#Sharing-and-Visibility-Designer Questions Answers

[13uswntimagines]

Weight of the Sky (Alessia X Leah X Reader)

Summary: No one knew why you left the United States and stopped accepting call-ups to the senior team. Only the important people were informed that it had to do with your treatment by the coaching staff. But some reporter got ahold of the story, and a report that was never supposed to see the light of day. How do you deal with everyone suddenly knowing your deepest, most shameful secrets?

Warning: This fic deals with how people process trauma. There’s implied abuse, but nothing explicitly described or explained. Again, systemic abuse (physical, mental, and verbal) is what is dealt with in this fic, specifically how someone might deal with it (in healthy and unhealthy ways).

It wasn’t something you talked about. 

It wasn’t something you liked to think about. 

The people who were important to you knew something had happened. They knew why you stopped accepting call-ups to the senior USWNT a year ago, why you had fled the NWSL, and why you were so adamant about never stepping foot on American soil again. 

You didn’t feel the need to explain it to anyone else. To open the dark box you had buried so deeply so long ago. To rip apart the fragile stitches you so carefully constructed over your wounds. 

But as you stared down at the headline, it looked like you wouldn’t have a choice. 

Scandal set to dismantle US soccer: reports of rampant emotional, physical and sexual abuse at both the youth and senior level 

You didn’t want to read it. 

You wanted to shove your phone back in your bag and join your team out on the pitch like nothing had ever happened. 

It had worked for you so far. 

But the way your phone was buzzing told you that it wouldn’t work for you this time. 

That arriving late to practice so you had the locker room to yourself wouldn’t be the out you prayed it would. 

It was one of the best and worst qualities of the team you had left behind. Their stubbornness, especially when someone’s well-being was on the line. 

They wouldn’t give up when you had been the baby of the USWNT for so long with your first call-up coming at 16. 

It didn’t matter that you barely answered them most of the time now. 

With both you and Foxy playing for Arsenal, you knew that Alex, or Kelley, or Alyssa, or Becky were not above calling Kim or Jen to sort you out. 

To force you to face the thing you had run to Europe to escape 3 years ago. 

The things you had never told them about. 

“Have you read it yet?” You blinked up at the voice of your fellow American, as Emily sat down beside you.

“Just the headline,” You sighed, tossing your phone into your cubby and grabbing your cleats. “I’m pretty sure I already know what it’s going to say,”

You could feel her eyes on the side of your face, trying to peel back the impenetrable mask you always used to cover your emotions. You had known Emily long enough for her to be able to see past it. To decipher the barely visible tells littered across your features. 

You could feel the pity in her gaze, and it made you want to puke. You didn’t want it. You didn’t need it. 

“I didn’t know the details,” Emily said, her voice a pained whisper. 

It wasn’t that Emily hadn’t known about the abuse. She was your longest friend, one of the people who you had shared nearly all of your soccer experience with. She knew that things had happened, but you always breezed over it. You didn’t give out specifics. You didn't need to be viewed as one broken toy. 

You made a low noise of agreement. “That was by design,” 

She caught your arm, and you finally looked at her. 

“Y/n,”

Concern accented her blue eyes, and desperation lingered behind her irises. It was an unspoken question. 

A why that rang clearly. 

“It was better for everyone,” You muttered, finishing the knot on your boot and pulling the 2nd one up, answering the question she hadn’t asked with words. 

You knew she would have fought for you. She would have stood up to the people you had been too afraid to. It was safer if she didn’t know the full extent of what you had endured. If the complaint you had lodged was the only record of it. 

You wouldn’t put anyone in the firing line. Especially not her. 

“Did Leah and Alessia know?” She asked, so quietly you barely heard it. 

Or maybe it was just the blood pounding in your ears. 

You blinked at the question, looking away from the defender. 

Of course, your girlfriends knew, but they didn’t know. You had never gone into depth about your experiences in the youth system. You never detailed how it had followed you like ghosts until you couldn’t take it anymore. 

Until you broke under the pressure. 

It wasn’t like you hadn’t tried to tell them. To let the words out during a million late-night chats over tea with Leah, or when you were so comfortable laid out in Alessia’s chest, her nails dragging up and down your back. 

They made you feel truly safe for the first time in your life. 

You didn’t want to give them a reason to not want you. To realize you were too… damaged to love. 

You cleared your throat, your cleats clicking in the concrete as it hit the floor. “You better get your boots on. We’re going to be late,” 

You didn’t wait for her response before you pushed yourself to a standing position, and headed out onto the field. 

You hadn’t spoken to your girlfriends since the article came out. You had spent a very rare night in your own apartment, ignoring their texts, and the calls that had followed. 

You were surprised they hadn’t staked out your apartment this morning, or been waiting for you when you arrived (admittedly late) to practice. 

You understood that you couldn’t ignore them forever. You didn’t want to. 

You just wanted enough time to gather your thoughts. Time to figure out how you were going to explain it all to them. You just wanted 3 hours of peace, before you would have to face reality.

Before you would have to finally deal with Pandora’s box. 

You snorted to yourself as you reached the locker room door. 

At least Pandora’s box had held hope with all of the bad things. Your box held nothing but pain and agony. Memories that had burned and sizzled the happiness you had finally regained. 

Experiences that were like bubbling acid, destroying everything they touched. 

You didn’t want them to destroy the word that you had rebuilt for yourself. 

You wanted to pretend for just a bit longer that you weren’t a poison that could only hurt the things you loved. 

Pretend like you weren’t about to lose everything. Like they hadn’t realized how… unworthy you were of them yet. 

*****

You felt eyes on you the second you stepped onto the pitch. Like tiny lasers, following your every step. Your every breath. Like they were waiting for you to break down. 

And for the most part, you ignored them. 

You painted your signature easy smirk across your lips and joined the midfield warmup line behind Kyra. It was also coincidentally the line furthest from your girlfriends. 

You focused on the drill, watching as Lia expertly weaved through the cones, the coaches passing her a ball every 3 cones to send into a mini-net. It was easy to let your mind sink into the familiarity of soccer. 

The field had always been your happy place, even when coaches were running you into the ground. It was a place where all that mattered was your skill. Your ability to ignore physical discomfort and pain to run circles around your teammates. 

It was why you lasted so long under Rory Dames, Paul Riley, and the rest of the USWNT coaches. They couldn’t break you on the pitch. Pain only fueled you. 

It’s what had driven them to… other methods. 

You pushed yourself through the line drills, forcing your legs to move faster, and your feet to take shorter touches, driving the pace of the midfield line higher and higher. 

“You know this is just warm up right?” Kyra panted as she made it through the final drill, both hands behind her head. “We still have an entire practice to go,” 

You shrugged, grabbing a water bottle and squirting a bit in your mouth as you waited for the other lines to finish. “Just feeling it today,” 

“Don’t feel it too hard though,” She said, side-eyeing you, trying to sound casual. “Pushing yourself won’t make it better,” 

You blinked at her, and the uncharacteristic seriousness in her voice. The young Australian was the last person you expected to read the article and then try to confront you about how you dealt with it all. 

“I’m fine,” You mumbled, squirting more water in your mouth. 

“Never said you weren’t,” Kyra said quickly, stealing the bottle from your hands, briefly glancing over your shoulder. “But you don’t have to be if you don’t want to be,”

You nodded stiffly. 

You knew that if you wanted to fall apart the team, and your girlfriends would be there for you. 

But you didn’t want to. 

It would make it real instead of just the bad dream you had convinced yourself it was. 

“I just want to play football,” You sighed, running a hand through your hair. “I’m over everything else,” 

Kyra hummed, her serious look shifting into an impish grin as she flipped the bottle towards you and squirted you with water. “Heads up,” 

“Must you always be such a pest?”  Leah’s voice appeared behind you before you could think about what Kyra meant, her arms wrapping around your middle and her chin resting on your shoulder. “Hello darling,”

Shivers ran down your spine when her lips pressed into the sensitive spot just below your ear, and your body tensed unsure if it wanted to sink back into her or flinch away. Your skin crawled in a way that it never had in her embrace before. 

You shoved the feeling down. 

It was ridiculous. 

Uncalled for. 

Not real. 

“Hey,” You said, painting a smile on your face and forcing yourself to relax back into her familiar hold.“The forwards aren’t finished yet?” 

“They were on their last drill when we finished,” She said, loosening her grip so you could turn to face her. “Less will be happy to see you. She missed you last night,” 

You noted the worry lines on her forehead and the crinkle between her eyes. 

You forced your lips to quirk upward into a teasing smirk despite how heavy it felt. “Just her?” 

“You know better my love,” Leah hummed, her blue eyes searching your face and her thumbs running over the skin under your training top just above your waistband. “We were worried about you,”

You could hear the honesty, the concern in her voice. The unspoken questions lingering in the air between you. 

“I’m ok,” You said, meeting her eyes. 

It was the truth. Right now, with the pitch under your feet, you felt alright. 

You felt almost normal. 

She nodded once. “Ok,” 

You appreciated that she didn’t press you. Didn’t point out the obvious cracks in your perfect mask. 

You knew you wouldn’t be able to escape their probing later, but at least now she let you be. 

“You’re still coming home with us tonight?” She asked, her voice still soft, and you swallowed hard. 

Jonas blew the whistle just as the forwards finished their last line drill, calling the group to circle up before you could answer. 

You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding, gently extracting yourself from your girlfriend. 

“We should go,” You said, ignoring her question and the deep frown etched across her features. 

It should have bothered you how the knot in your chest loosened as you stepped out of her grasp. How your skin didn’t feel like it was on fire. 

Her and Alessia had always made you feel safe and it should have bothered you that Leah’s hands had reminded you of his. 

But you didn’t have time to be bothered. 

You pushed the feelings down again, forcing the lid on them shut. 

You hoped Jonas’ remarks would be short. That you could have the ball at your feet soon. That you could sink into the familiar peace soccer always brought you before any more emotions tried to force their way to the surface. 

A stupid article would not derail your practice. 

*****

You stayed at the edge of the group as Jonas explained the 3 on 3 drill he wanted you to do, watching his little whiteboard as he drew out the formations. 

It was easy to ignore the poorly concealed glances from your teammates (and Leah’s blatant staring). It was easy to force yourself to focus on the coach. 

It was easy to pretend your other girlfriend hadn’t edged her way over to you, her perfume surrounding you with the sense of peace you had been missing since the stupid article came out. Surrounding you like it had done since the two of you were at UNC together, and she was your anchor to reality, even when she didn’t know it. 

Alessia didn’t try to touch you, even as she leaned closer. 

“Be my partner?” She asked in a whisper, the words tickling your ear. 

You made a low noise of agreement, your fingers fidgeting at your sides. 

It felt like when you were in college again. 

Like every time you would come back from a national team camp, and have to reintegrate back into the team. How she would always inch over to you while Coach Dorrance explained drills. 

The two of you had been dancing around your feelings back then, and you had been convinced your heart and soul were too damaged to deserve someone like her. 

You thought her and Leah had finally unconvinced you. That they had finally washed away the feelings of hands you didn’t want and cracks that you feared could never be healed. 

You were wrong. 

When the news broke, you stared at the headline for hours. You were thankful that you had decided to spend the night alone for once. That your girlfriends were having a date night (something the three of you tried to do every once in a while) because the rush of uncleanliness that rushed over you and settled deep beneath your skin, leaching into your bones was unstoppable. It didn’t matter how raw you scrubbed your skin in the shower.

“Ready?” 

The nudge pulled you out of your thoughts, and you blinked at the blonde forward. 

You hadn’t realized that Jonas was finished, or that most of your teammates had already dispersed. 

“Oh, yeah,” You muttered, unsure of where you were supposed to go, or what you were supposed to do. 

Maybe you hadn’t been paying as much attention as you thought. 

Alessia’s lips tilted upwards, and she sent you a knowing smile. The one you hadn’t seen often since you were both in America. The one that used to greet you after bad camps and hard nights. 

“Come on then,” She nudged your arm with her shoulder again.“Steph’s our third,” 

Your eyebrows furrowed. 

Why hadn’t she picked Leah as your third?

She always picked Leah. 

You were the one who liked to play against your defender girlfriend. She was always physical, and it never failed to get you worked up. 

Alessia liked to play with Leah. Their banter always wound her up. 

You turned, glancing at the Australian defender already collecting a ball. Frankly, you were just thankful it wasn’t Emily. 

That would remind you too much of your time at UNC. 

“Alright,” You nodded, swallowing hard. 

You had no reason to feel this… off balance. 

No reason to be thinking about the things you had escaped. 

Alessia’s head tilted to the side, watching you. “We need to make sure we kick Leah’s ass. She’s got Viv and Lea. It’s unfair,”

You hummed again. 

This you could do. 

You let your brain slip into the safe place where all that mattered were tactics and the ball. The safe place where all that existed was the pitch, and none of the other noise mattered. 

“We’re faster, and we can outmaneuver them,” You mumbled, letting her guide you towards Steph. “It’s the team of Beth, Kyra, and Katie I’m more worried about honestly,”

While Leah, Lia, and Viv were tactically savvy, you knew you could outpace them. They were defensive-minded, and you were far more used to being an attacking midfielder than Lia was. You would use their defensiveness against them. 

Beth’s team was much more balanced. Though Katie liked to attack, she was a damn good defender. Kyra could absolutely play as a box-to-box midfielder and Beth was a lethal striker. 

Alessia made a noise of agreement, her hand gently resting on the small of your back. 

The comfort didn’t send pinpricks up your spine like you thought it would, but maybe that was because you were talking about soccer. 

Whatever the reason, you leaned into it, accepting the familiar comfort. 

Yeah, you could do this.

****

“It’s scary to see her like this,” Leah breathed out, glancing towards the door to the showers. 

You had waited until the rest of the team finished before you disappeared through the doors, with a promise from Leah and Alessia that they would keep everyone out. 

Emily and Lotte both joined in their vigil, forming a little circle of sorts with their chairs just outside the washroom.

Alessia sighed, running her hand through your hair. “Reminds me of our junior year,” 

That year had been brutal. 

The two of you were growing closer, edging past the line of friendship into something more. At least you had been until you attended the USWNT World Cup Qualifying tournament. 

After that, everything changed. 

You pulled away completely and looked like a ghost. 

Your eyes dulled from clear to a murky y/e/c like your soul had been ripped out. You were basically nonverbal by the end of the spring semester. It was all Emily, Lotte, and her could do to make sure you ate and got to practice on time. 

She didn’t want to go back to that. Ever. And she didn’t like how similar this felt. 

How easily you had retreated back into yourself and put all of your shields back into place. 

“The year Paul was an assistant for the senior team,” Emily nodded, sharing a meaningful look with Lotte and Alessia. 

Leah frowned.

She was clearly missing something.

“She would come back from National team duty and look like a shell,” Alessia explained gently. “We knew something was going on, but not what it was,” 

“Or how deep it went,” Lotte added, her eyebrows pinched together as she looked back at the door. 

Emily put a gentle hand on her back, rubbing soothing circles. 

“He was her coach for the U17 team too,” Leah said, phrasing it as a statement instead of a question. 

She had read the article, and the full report, unable to stop herself even as the words sliced into her heart like razor blades. It was line after line branding the horrors you had faced from age 13 into her mind, as the reporter described the abuse you and your teammates had endured in excruciating detail. 

The worst was the photo that he had included in the report. 

Three words were handwritten in font that was left on colorful sticky notes around your apartments, telling her and Alessia how much you loved them. Font that was on every card, every poem you wrote for them. 

Font that spelled out Help me, please. 

A plea that hadn’t been heard for years, until an anonymous source had sold the story to the New York Times. 

“Yes,” Emily agreed. “He used to push her so hard during practice and the things that would come out of his mouth were vulgar, but I didn’t know about the other stuff. She only told me they were extra film sessions to help with her game,” 

Leah snorted. “She told us they were tactics meetings, and that he would make her play games she couldn’t win. She never told us what the punishments were,”

“It was by design,” Emily said, using the same careful tone you had used earlier, shaking her head. “I don’t think she’s ever actually processed what happened. She was too busy trying to protect everyone else,”

“She was a child,” Alessia hissed. 

The article said you were 13. Just a kid. You shouldn’t have to protect anyone. They should have protected you. 

The system shouldn’t have failed. They shouldn’t have to deal with the catastrophic fallout. 

“So was I. So was Mal.” Emily bit back. “She didn’t want what was happening to her to happen to us, so she didn’t fucking tell us. We could have stopped it,”

Lotte held up her hands, telling both of them to calm down. “She buried her feelings so she didn’t have to face them,”

They weren’t angry at each other, she knew. They were both fixers and they couldn’t fix this. Just like they hadn’t been able to fix this while the four of you were in college. 

She was just surprised Leah hadn’t snapped yet either. She was the most protective over you, probably because it had taken you longer to fall for her than it had taken for you to fall for Less. 

“And now she doesn’t have a choice,” Leah said with an eerie sense of finality. Like the matter of fact bang of a gavel after a judge made a ruling. 

The stupid Times writer made it impossible for you to continue to ignore it. He made it impossible for you to outrun it. 

“She’s going to try to pretend it’s fine,” Emily sighed, meeting Leah’s eyes. There was something… haunted hiding in their depths that sent a shiver down Leah’s spine. 

“And then completely implode when she can't,” Lotte added, mirroring the haunted look behind Emily’s orbs. 

They had both seen you at your worst, and they feared they were about to get the sequel. 

Leah dragged her eyes from Emily to meet Alessia’s. 

They knew the struggle you had with your emotions, even the happy ones. The cycles you spent oscillating between locking everything inside and shaking in the shower because you couldn’t stop them from pouring out of you and you were afraid of what you would do. 

They all knew about it. 

They had all dealt with it at some point. 

“We’ll keep an eye on her,” Leah promised quietly, again meeting Alessia’s eyes. “She’s coming home with us, or we’re going home with her,”

“She will not be alone tonight,” Alessia agreed. “Or ever again,”

The three other women hummed, before a comfortable silence enveloped them, broken only by the sound of the shower. 

They didn’t have to wait long before the water stopped, and then it was only a few minutes before you came shuffling into the changing room, dressed in one of Alessia’s oversized hoodies and a pair of Leah’s sweatpants despite the warm temperatures outside. 

You looked small. Fragile.

Leah pushed herself to her feet the moment she saw you, only refraining from pulling you into her chest when Alessia placed a gentle hand on her arm. 

She learned in college that physical contact wasn’t always something you enjoyed when you felt this vulnerable. 

“Ready to go Darling?”

Your head bobbed, and you held your hand out for Alessia. 

Leah tried not to let it bother her that you had bypassed her. She knew it was just because you were familiar with how Alessia handled you when you were like this. You knew what to expect from her, while Leah’s reactions were more of a mystery. 

You didn’t want any surprises.

Not now. 

Not when you were feeling so vulnerable. 

Alessia took your hand and pulled herself to her feet, while Leah grabbed all 3 of your bags. 

“Lead the way then,” Leah sent you a very soft smile, gesturing with her free hand. 

Your head bobbed again, and you headed for the door, not even acknowledging Lotte or Emily. 

You didn’t have the mental capacity to address them anymore. Practice had taken all that you had, and you just hoped you could make it through the night with your girlfriends. 

You honestly just wanted to curl up in your bed and pretend the rest of the world didn’t exist. 

Maybe they would let you for one more night. 

*****

Dinner had been… quiet. 

Frankly, most of their night had been quiet. 

An eerie silence seemed to settle over any space you were in, suffocating and heavy, unable to be broken even by a soft soccer game playing in the background. 

You seemed to be… sleepwalking in a way. 

Your eyes were open, but you were light years away, lost in exactly what thoughts they weren’t sure. 

This was much worse than when you were at UNC. 

But Alessia and Leah both resolved not to push you. 

They let you pull away from them both while you watched a random men’s game, cuddled into the far end of the couch. They didn’t press as you stared blankly at the screen, only chiming in when they directly asked you a question. 

With the way the night had gone, they weren’t entirely sure you would join them in bed, afraid you would choose to sleep in the guest room instead. Alessia knew if you did, they would be keeping watch outside the door in shifts. 

But you didn’t. 

You had crawled in between them, still dressed in sweats despite the high temperatures in the house. 

Things were again quiet while Alessia scrolled through her phone and Leah read her nightly chapter. You steered clear of touching either of them at first, glaring at the ceiling like it had personally offended you. 

Then you shifted. 

You rolled over slowly, pressing your face into Leah’s stomach. 

She lifted her book to give you space, carefully winding her fingers through your hair with her free hand. Her nails dragged along your scalp, and you were relieved at the familiar warmth and comfort that spread through your chest. 

You never wanted to associate her or Alessia with the feeling of him on your skin. 

It was easier with Alessia. 

She had been there to pick up the pieces after each camp. She had been on ground zero for the fallout. 

Leah hadn’t. 

You only knew Leah from the time you played against her. 

This was also different. 

It was like an army of souls you thought you defeated marching their way back through your mind, reigning old wounds, and ones you had so long pretended didn’t exist. They ripped apart the careful stitches you had used to pull yourself back together and pried open the covers you had placed on the things you could not face. 

This wasn’t a new wound. 

It was stupid that an article. Words. Had reopened the festering relics you thought you escaped. 

Leah turned the page above you, seemingly oblivious to the anguish pulsing through you with every heartbeat. 

But you knew she wasn’t oblivious. 

Her and Alessia had been watching you all day, trying to support you in their own ways. You knew they wanted to help. All you would have to do is ask. 

You made the decision before you could overthink it, rolling away from Leah and staring pointedly at the ceiling. 

“It wasn’t that I didn’t want to tell you both about what happened,” You said, your voice far more shaky than you thought it would be, and you felt the women on either side of you pause. “I just didn’t know how. I’ve never really known how,”

You didn’t look at them. 

You knew that if you did, you wouldn’t be able to talk about it. The words would get caught in your throat, and just like all of the other times you tried, you would be rendered speechless. 

“We know,” Leah said, her book closing with a low thump. “We’re not upset with you,” 

“We just want to understand,” Alessia added, setting her phone down on the side table. “The things in that article. It went on for so long,” 

Her voice cracked, and part of you longed to turn over and pull her into your arms. To tell her that it wasn’t that bad. To pretend, just like you always had. 

You swallowed hard. You couldn’t do that. 

They knew the truth now, and there was no escaping it. 

“I didn’t know what to do. There’s not exactly a recourse for stuff like this in America,” You explained. You needed them to understand that it wasn’t that you hadn’t tried to stop it. 

It wasn’t that you liked it. 

You were just powerless. One of many cogs in an outdated machine. 

Leah shifted, sitting up and turning to face you, sitting crisscross on the bed, a deep frown etched across her features. “Even on the youth teams?”

You shook your head. 

There hadn’t been anything you could do until you got to the senior team. Until a certain forward recognized the signs and had been so… stubborn and unrelenting in her support. 

“Alex helped,” You sighed., picking at the edge of your sweatshirt sleeve. “She got me to do the report and had Coach Riley removed. Apparently, I wasn’t the first, nor the last,”

You owed a lot to Alex Morgan. More than you would ever be able to repay. She had been the only one to know the true extent of the damage the coach had done, and she fought for you when you couldn’t fight for yourself. 

It’s why you felt so guilty when you left the team. When you left her. 

“It’s why she visited so much in North Carolina,” She said, rather than asking as realization brushed across her features. “Not because she wanted you to play for Orlando,” 

“She was worried, and my Captain at the time,” You mumbled, unable to help the way your lips turned upwards slightly at the mention of the old fight between you and Alessia. The fights about Alex taking a 2-hour flight to visit every weekend. The fight you knew now was centered around jealousy and fear that Alex was trying to get you to leave her.

Leah’s eyebrows pulled more tightly together. “If Riley was gone, why did you stop accepting call-ups?” 

“Vlatko was a lot like Paul. And Roary,” Your nose scrunched at the mention of their names. They left a terrible taste in your mouth. “He doesn’t understand player health and wellbeing. He told me to play on torn tendons in my ankle or risk my spot,”

Leah’s frown deepened as she tried to understand the full extent of what you had endured. “So you gave your spot up,” 

You nodded once. 

Your greatest regret in this whole thing was that you had given up playing for your country. Given up the thing you dreamed about for your entire childhood. 

“I was too tired to fight him too. Especially when I found places and people where I didn't have to fight at all. People who treated me like an actual human, instead of a playing card to be toyed with,”

You finally met your girlfriend's eyes, the weight of your words. The weight of the choice you had made was not lost on either of them. 

“And you carried the weight of it all on your own,” Alessia said, shifting and laying a gentle hand on top of yours, effectively stopping you from unraveling the hem of your sweatshirt sleeve. 

You shrugged. Sometimes you felt like Atlas, forced to hold up the sky, but it was better than being forced to watch the people you loved hold it. 

“You don’t have to do this alone. We’re here to help, but we can’t if you hide things from us,” Leah said, joining Alessia's hand on top of yours. “So no more secrets, alright?”

You bit your lip, finally nodding. 

Old habits would die hard, but you had to try. 

For them. 

Alessia squeezed your hand, and you turned, rolling over so your face rested in its favorite hiding place against her chest, and Leah shifted to spoon you from behind. 

The smothering sadness around you disappeared, driven out by comfortable silence your girlfriend's breathing, and the feeling of them pressed against you. 

There was something else nagging at the back of your mind. 

Something else you hadn’t been ready to face yet. 

No more secrets, you reminded yourself. 

“Emma called me last night,” You admitted softly against Alessia's chest. “she wants to talk at the game against Chelsea,”

The coach had been very polite in her voicemail, leaving an apology you knew she didn’t owe you, and suggesting that the two of you have a chat. 

Leah hummed behind you, lips brushing your ear. “Do you want to talk to her?” 

“She’s probably going to try to convince me to play for the US again,” You said, ignoring the question she asked you. 

“And do you want that?” Alessia prompted again. 

Your shoulders lifted and fell helplessly.“If anyone could convince me, it would be her,” 

“That didn’t answer the question sweet one,” Leah said again, pinching your side. 

You made a low noise, finally pulling your face out of its favorite hiding place. 

You knew what your answer was, and you knew that Alessia and Leah would support you. 

They would help you hold up the weight of the sky, and it would all be ok because you would do it together. 

Article and all. 

[jayssparemerch]

Spare Merch for Gaza + Sudan

Hello everyone! I'm running a donation drive - merch and prints in exchange for donations to Palestinan and Sudanese fundraisers. I've got a lot on offer here - too much to put in one post due to the image limit so I've split it up by the minimum donation I'm asking in exchange for each item.

There's official and fanmade merch in here, leftovers of my own limited run designs. buttons, stickers, enamel pins, standees, zines, charms, prints, figures, etc!

$5 items

$10 items

$15 items

Take a look and see if there's anything you want! This is all first come first serve so don't hesitate to donate. More information about how exactly this will work under the cut.

Donation minimums are just that - minimums. Please donate as much as you can spare.

Please donate directly to people in need and grassroots orgs. Gaza Funds will spotlight a random campaign if you have trouble choosing. E-sims for Gaza and Khartoum Kitchen are both great choices. Hopefully your dashboard has people sharing fundraisers on it, so it shouldn't be too hard to find somewhere good to send your money to!

You'll be expected to pay for shipping on your own items. I will ship both domestically within the US and internationally outside of it.

Letter-size mail [aka paper goods 5x7 or smaller] can ship for free both domestically and internationally, but they will be untracked. If you would like tracked shipping on letter-size items, please let me know and I'm happy to do so instead.

Once you've decided on an item you want, send an ask to this blog with the following information:

- The item you want - An email address where you can be contacted for followup in the event that you're the first person to claim an item - Your zipcode, or country and postal code if outside of the united states so I can estimate shipping

After I receive this information, if yours is the first claim, I will contact you at the provided email with a quote for shipping and ask you to provide a confirmation/receipt for a new donation made after the creation of this post. A screenshot is fine as long as the date is visible

Feel free to donate in whatever currency is most convenient/required for the fundraiser you're donating to, as long as it's equivalent to the required donation amount in USD

Items will be slow to ship. Sorry about that, but I work full time and I won't be able to get to the post office more than once a week or so.

REGARDING ACRYLIC CHARMS/STANDEES: These may appear cloudy in the photographs. This is because they all still have their protective film on them! They are all completely untouched and will be crystal clear once the film is removed.

Feel free to ask any questions you have that weren't answered here, and I'll reply to you/update this post as necessary

[kindasleepywriter]

An Unexpected Visit (Cal Kestis x Mechanic!Reader)

Summary: You find a little metal friend in your lonely workshop on Koboh and you have no idea where he came from. The answer to that question brings you more hope than you thought it would.

Warnings: Small blood mention.

Words: 3.8k

Note: Thought I'd post a little something while I work on the next few chapter of BoP! Pretty sure this is gender neutral, but if im wrong don't hesitate to point it out!!

Koboh was a hot planet to live on even on its coldest days. There was no such thing as frost here, and snow was out of the question. The native population of the planet was used to it, buildings designed to keep out the sweltering air and clothes made of the thinnest materials.

You, however, hated it.

You’d been warned the planet was warm, but no one had quite mentioned how high the temperature really was. You regretted trusting the Ihi Tib that had brought you here more than anything, but you’d used up all your credits on that trip and there was no way in hell to make that money again to leave, not while working here.

You longed for Habo, the little planet you’d decided against in favor of this one. No raiders, no empire soldiers, just nature and its shy inhabitants. No droids either, but there wasn’t any here either, so you didn’t care. Sometimes, you dreamt of reaching its lush forests and mountains and feeling cold drops of rain on your skin.

The metal roofing of your shop did you no good either, heat waves often visible above it. Its only room felt like a furnace even at the best of times, and you weren’t a stranger to the feeling of sweat-soaked clothes sticking to you uncomfortably anymore.

You tinkered with a metal detector that some prospector had brought to you, taking the opportunity of the night’s barely detectable coolness to work on a project. Apparently, it had stopped functioning properly after it’d been dropped into a chasm. By the looks of it, you were surprised it even was in one piece. Well, mostly in one piece. Maybe the revenue you’d make from this might be able to pay for new boot soles, yours having almost completely disintegrated because of the burning sand that covered the entire region.

The only sound in your workshop was the harsh grating of your screwdriver against the detector’s metal, as you tried to pry open its chassis. The thing just wouldn’t budge, and you considered whether the boots were even worth it.

A whistling sound startled you, the old screwdriver slipping and taking a chunk out of your palm. You swore and tugged a rare oil-free cloth from the toolbox beside you, hitting your head on your work lamp in the process and swearing again. You pressed the cloth against the wound to stop the bleeding and looked towards the open room to determine where the whistling had come from. The door to the shop was locked, you’d triple-checked it while closing. Was this one of the raider lackeys trying to draw you outside again? You’d fallen for it exactly once and promptly learned not to investigate strange noises you might hear outside, but this sounded like a mechanical whistle, not a breathing being.

The strange whistling sounded again, this time from behind you. You spun on your heels, tied the cloth around your hand, and reached for the rusty rebar you kept by your workstation. Nothing seemed amiss at first glance. Had you imagined the sound? Maybe the heat was getting to you, you hadn’t refilled your water canister since this morning. Dehydration hallucinations were rare for you, but you’d still had your fair share, especially when you’d just arrived to Koboh. Getting used to this planet had been a challenge.

Suddenly a flash of red and white crossed the room, hiding behind a wooden bin you used to store your own unfinished projects. The whistle came again, followed by a few beeps. A droid, you realized. He’d been speaking binary! You’d hardly recognized it, not having heard it since your arrival. Lots of droids, the Ihi Tib had assured you, the bastard.

“Hey little buddy, can I help you?” you called, slightly lowering the rebar but still holding it tightly with your free hand. A series of beeps followed in response. It was mostly unintelligible, but you could make out the meaning of some of it.

“Yeah, I’m the mechanic here, do you need something fixed?”

A scared whistle. You crouched, putting down the rebar at reaching distance from your hands.

“I’ve let go of the iron, I won’t hurt you as long as you don’t hurt me, deal?”

You received no response, but the droid tentatively stepped out from its hideout. It was a cute one, you thought, a little flat head and cubical body supported by its two lanky legs. You could see his eyes focusing and zooming on you, no doubt examining you for any sign of aggression. You raised your hands as a peace gesture, and he stepped closer. He emitted a green light from his position. You laughed at the sudden scan but didn’t move.

From up close, you could see the damage he carried. The side of his left leg was blackened as if burnt, and its small body had a gaping hole that revealed his inner components. No wonder he’d been scared, one more hit and he’d be fried. He looked mostly intact on the inside, but you’d need him in your hands to determine if that was the case. You went to speak but got cut off by the loud noise of your door slamming shut behind you.

“Beedee, I told you to wait while I left to find a spare-”

You squealed at the man’s voice, grabbing the piece of rebar again, wincing as it rubbed against your clothed palm, and jumped to your feet.

A man stood at the entrance of your shop, only a few feet from you. You shakily held up the rebar between the two of you as a threat, the droid incoherently beeping behind you and hitting you with his little leg. You ignored him, and the intruder raised his hands, showing you that they were empty. You could see a metal baton at his side and a pistol strapped to his thigh, but he wasn’t reaching for them despite the threat of your rebar.

“Whoa, easy,” he exclaimed rapidly, “I’m not here to attack you!”

“What do you want?” you called, “Shop’s closed at this hour.” It was fairly late in the night, and not many people were still up at this time apart from you. No one with good intentions, at least.

He took a less defensive stance, increasingly unimpressed at your choice of weapon, or your unsteady hold of it. “My name’s Cal, I’m just here for beedee.” He gestured to the droid. “Come on buddy, we’ve got to get back to Greez.”

The cantina’s owner?

“How do you know Greez?” you asked with narrowed eyes. You’d never seen this man, and he’d never been around here. News spread fast in a village this small, you would’ve heard about it in less than a day. The cantina sometimes welcomed suspicious or dangerous individuals, and you wondered if this new guy was one of them.

“It’s a… long story. I’m just visiting. Beedee, let’s go.”

You examined the man closer, as he was clearly only interested in the droid. Now that the adrenaline had mostly run its course, your mind pointed out how attractive the man was. Sure, his armor-looking leather garments looked like they had seen better days, but it was hard to ignore his soft-swept hair, scatter of freckles and sharp jawline that his stubble didn’t quite manage to hide, not to mention his lean yet muscled build.

The droid, beedee, didn’t make a move to leave. Instead, he pushed into your leg again and emitted a series of noises you couldn’t understand.

“Is he always this unclear or is my binary just rusty?” you asked the man hesitantly, keeping the rebar in hand and taking a few steps back to put space in between the two of you.

“He got shot in the middle of a fight, his vocabulator got damaged,” he said. Your grip on the metal tightened. A fight? “I was going to fly to a relay point to find him a new one, but this guy,” he shot a reproachful look at the droid, “Won’t stay put long enough for me to go.”

The droid continued his monologue. The only word you could make out was ‘Mechanic’.

“I’m a mechanic, beedee, is that why you came to see me?”

He near-violently nodded his head.

“I’m sorry he disturbed you, like I said, we need the new component to fix it.” Cal said, shrugging.

You crouched and took a closer look. You could view the injured piece now, its main area intact but its outer edge clearly burnt out. You shook your head. “You don’t need a new one, actually.”

Cal looked at you like you’d grown a third head. “Have you seen the chip? That thing is as good as dead.”

“Not if you reroute the circuit towards his internal commlink instead.”

He blinked. “You’ve worked on droids before?” he asked cautiously.

You nodded. “It’s what I trained for as a teen on my home planet, but I had the great luck of finding a dishonest pilot who promised me there were a lot of droids here.” You gestured to your near empty workshop, embarrassed. “As you can see, not quite the reality of the area. The only ones here are those the raiders keep, and I’ve made it quite clear to them on multiple occasions that they could shove it. Being on their bad side isn’t the greatest, but at least I’m not helping them loot and kill people. Used to work on ships too and loved that, but those are also lacking here.”

He looked at you as if evaluating your body language. You weren’t exactly hard to read; you wore your emotions quite visibly. “Why haven’t you left?” he asked.

“A droid mechanic on a droid-less planet doesn’t exactly have the revenue to jump on a hyperspace voyage. Maybe in a couple years, but at this rate the raiders will have found any stash of money I could keep. Anyways! what I’m trying to say is I can fix beedee if you want.” The droid beeped approvingly from where he stood, jumping up and down in triumph.

Cal seemed to weigh the risks. You didn’t blame him, some unknown mechanic on a near empty outer rim planet didn’t exactly inspire confidence, but you knew you could make the repairs easily.

“Alright,” he said defeatedly, “but if a single electrical filament is damaged, I’ll know, and you won’t get a cent.”

You shrugged, his threat not scaring you. The droid already had enough injuries as is, you weren’t planning on adding to them.

Beedee jumped up to the worktable you’d been working at earlier and you pushed aside the metal detector with a wince. The movement pulled on your palm painfully. The droid didn’t miss your reaction and pushed on your injured hand with a foot.

“Just a cut, little guy, nothing to worry about.” You said, perhaps unconvincingly. The screwdriver you’d used was a bit rusty, and you knew you should get a bacta patch to keep an infection from spreading, but you couldn’t afford one. You’d wash it out with water later and hope for the best.

The droid didn’t miss a beat at words and a little vial was suddenly flung up in the air. You didn’t manage to catch it, not having the reaction time you might have with more rest and water in you, but a calloused hand caught it before it could hit the ground. Cal stood next to you, offering the tube in an open hand

“A stim?” you exclaimed, picking it up and examining it, “I haven’t seen one of those in years, they cost a fortune.” You glanced towards Cal.  “I’m not sure the cut warrants using one.” you added.

The man just folded his arms and leaned against the table. “If beedee says you need one, I wouldn’t argue, or else you’ll be arguing with him all night.” he said.

You mumbled a soft thank you as you injected the stim, your hands already feeling much better after only a few seconds. You took off the cloth and despite the dark red that coated your hand, the cut had all but disappeared, leaving only a thin pink line behind. You scrubbed the dry blood off as best you could and turned towards the droid again.

He sat in front of you, presenting his exposed wiring. You picked up your smallest welder and started working, self-conscious of your beat-up tools. You could feel Cal leaning in with each detailed movement you made, unquestionably watching the process to learn how to do it himself. You worked as diligently as you could despite your focus trailing occasionally to the man that held close to your side. The slight reprieve the night air provided seemed gone, his warmth seeping into your skin.

It wasn’t a complicated job, you just needed to reroute the processor to the commlink to translate the droid’s processes into clear binary code to then bypass the burnt translator located on the edge of the vocabulator. It was a trick that was specific to this type of vocabulator though, so it wasn’t a well-known process.

You finished with the rerouting, satisfied by the clear binary beedee could now emit as he properly introduced himself to you. And idea shot through you and you slipped out from Cal’s side to reach for your spare parts bin. You rummaged through it for a moment, the droid sending you a questioning whistle.

“Wait a minute! I know I’ve got it somewhere here…” you grumbled. “Ah-ah! Here it is.”

You held out a grey piece of thin durasteel as you sauntered back to the waiting duo, grabbing your heat gun along the way. “I think I can give you a temporary fix for your casing, let me just… There! It doesn’t match your colors, but it should do the trick.” You slid a newly shaped metal plate over the spot where the casing had melted away, grinning at its sturdiness. “This won’t fix it forever; I’d need a little more time to make an entirely new one and to make it the right color, but this should keep your components safe for a while!”

BD-1, as you now knew him, spun around in circles as he tried to check out his new part. You took out a small mirror from a drawer and held it up to him so he could see. He let out a string of excited beeps and whistles, repeatedly asking Cal to look at his ‘cool looking patch’. You glanced to the man on your side and discovered him watching you intently with a small smile. You felt your cheeks heating under his stare and scuttled back a few steps.

“Uhm, I hope this all works out until you’re able to find new parts, you guys! I could get started on a new custom permanent case too, so beedee doesn’t lose his usual flair.” BD-1 whistled in approval. “Shouldn’t take me more than a few days, maybe 5 at most, if you’re interested.”

Cal nodded, his intense gaze not faltering. “I think that’d be perfect. How much for today’s work?”

“Oh no, consider it as a repayment for that stim and for the opportunity to work on a droid again. Honestly, I had forgotten how much more interesting it is than working on the prospectors’ tools. As for the pickup, if I’m not here when you come back to get it, that means I’ve gone out to trade for parts. I’ll leave the finished casing in this drawer here,” you pointed to the right one, “and you seem to know how to get past the locks. Just close it back up when you leave!”

He laughed at the remark and thanked you for your work on BD-1. The droid gave you a sharp farewell whistle despite its clear disappointment at having to leave already. He climbed onto Cal’s back as the man moved toward your shop’s door.

“Hey,” you called, “if you come around this corner of the galaxy again after picking up beedee’s casing, don’t hesitate to swing by! It’s always nice seeing someone new.”

He turned on his feet, walking backwards for a few steps. “I have a feeling we’ll see each other again, don’t worry.” He winked at you, leaving you at a loss for words, and turned back to walk through the door.

After you calmed your elevated heartbeat, you locked up after him, deciding the two unexpected guests were enough for one night. You leaned back against the door and sighed. Maybe you should’ve accepted the money. Cal seemed like a nice guy, but Koboh was getting harder every day. Habo was still on your mind, but you’d settle for anything other than this damn planet. Kriff, you’d even be willing to join a crew of wandering space pirates if that meant you actually got to do something other than retrieve and fix the same old tools over and over again. Maybe one day luck would favor you, you thought, or maybe it just wasn’t meant to be.

-- 9 days later ---

The walk back from trading was always exhausting. The prospectors that held the best materials were currently residing on a high cliff that hid a cave’s opening. Getting up there was arduous, but if you left early enough it was manageable despite the climbing you had to do. By the time you made the trek back, however, there was no escaping the sun’s rays, and the only thing keeping your hands from the burning rocks as you scaled down the cliff was an almost ruined pair of leather gloves. They wouldn’t last another climb, you thought, and neither would your boots.

You’d have to find something to barter with the one villager who made most of the prospectors’ equipment. You didn’t even have money for food this week, but you’d make do, like you always did. Maybe you’d go back to the cantina tonight to offer maintenance on Greez’s bartender droid. His cantina was apparently bringing in more customers this week, so maybe you could find some other work there too.

You were also looking forward to hearing more of the village gossip. You’d heard rumors of a Jedi taking down raiders all over the region when you’d gone for a drink the night before but given that the source of that information was Turgle, you were far from convinced. A Jedi would be hunted down in a minute by the Empire, especially if they used their famed weapon and left witnesses. The fisherman you sometimes saw hanging around the streams, Skoova, had however confirmed that there was indeed a newcomer hunting down raiders for sport.

He hadn’t been very talkative, only describing him as a short-haired man of average height that fought in a poncho. You didn’t know how you felt about someone wearing a poncho on a desert planet, though you did find humor at the idea of the raiders getting their ass kicked by some new guy in a raincoat. Either way, if there was a chance that this not-a-Jedi-even-though-Turgle-says-he-is guy had arrived here by ship, you wanted to find out more no matter his unusual taste in clothing.

You entered your workshop after the long walk back from the prospectors, bracing for the intolerable heat of your metal cage. You stored what little you’d brought back in its rightful place and dragged your feet to your worktable, ready to start working on another tool a prospector had given you to fix. You remembered distantly that Cal still hadn’t swung by to pick up BD-1’s new case.

You peeked inside the drawer and found it empty of the custom case. There were a few credits in there, thankfully enough to cover the material you’d used for the case, plus a couple more. Despite the much-needed money, you couldn’t help but feel disappointed. Of course, the one day you left your workshop had to be the one when he decided to come here. You sighed and pushed the drawer away, rubbing your eyes with your palms, hoping (and doubting) that he would visit again. You didn’t even know what region of Koboh he was from, you didn’t recognize his accent at all.

A glimpse of white caught your eye before the drawer shut completely. You reached towards the unknown object and found a folded note that you were sure hadn’t been in therebefore you left. You opened it and didn’t immediately recognize the handwriting.

-

Thank you for the case, BD-1 is practically begging for a couple more designs (to match my ‘rizz’ - I have no idea what that means. He convinced me to wear an old grey poncho I had just so we matched and I fear giving in to the different colored cases will be the start of a slippery slope, but how could I say no to the little guy?)

I’ve gone off-track – What I mean to tell you is that if you still want to leave Koboh, there will be a ship (it’s mine) at the landing pad until 1500 tomorrow. Bring what you need, but I have all the essentials on board. Food and water I mean, and maybe I have a spare toothbrush somewhere too?

Anyway. We’ll figure it out.

I can drop you off somewhere if you want, but I wouldn’t mind a mechanic on board if you’re interested. Can’t guarantee regular hours or absolute safety but hey, still more interesting than metal detectors, right?

This might be my last visit to Koboh in a while.

P.S.: BD-1 wants you to know you’re the only one allowed to fix his leg, and that he ‘requires you on board’. His words, not mine. He shot an electric dart at the last person who tried to repair it (me).

Cal

-

You couldn’t help but let out a loud celebratory shout as you read. He had a ship, and you were finally getting out of here! No more prospectors whining at the time it took to fix their tools, no bedlam raiders trying to kick through your door in the middle of the night, no need to refill your water supply from the well that stood well over a mile away.

You’d happily make BD-1 a thousand little metal outfits to match Cal’s ponchos if he wanted-

Your mind screeched to a stop. Hadn't that been the outfit Skoova mentioned?

You remembered what Turgle said about the second newcomer, the one he had called a Jedi. You didn’t remember ever reading about that order using guns, but… Cal had been carrying another weapon. The metal handle, you now realized, that was hanging at his side.

Oh kriff.

Had the idea while building the BD-1 Lego set. I meant for this to be just a little 1k meet-cute oneshot, Of course, me being me, i wrote 5k. Edited it a little, and it's as short as I can tolerate lmao

My first time posting for Star Wars! Still not over Survivor despite having played it more than 100 hour in the first two weeks i got it, and having done reruns since. The double-bladed stance has me in a chokehold.

Tell me what you think, and check out my masterlist!

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Excuse me, do you have any posts on writing well written female characters/protagonists?

Writing Notes: Female Characters

Conducting research through observation – including self-observation – is the very first step in creating memorable women characters.

We observe the women in our lives. We watch and learn, noticing how they engage relationally with family, friends, colleagues, and strangers.

Creating memorable women characters is much like developing memorable relationships. The only way to have meaningful relationships is to be real:

Be willing to share.

Be honest.

Listen with an open heart.

Love without judgment.

This is all very easy to say and much harder to do.

But it’s what’s necessary if we want to have rewarding and lasting friendships and partnerships. And the same is true if we want our female characters to connect with audiences.

Let your female characters speak to other female characters about something that matters. In doing so, you will make women and girls visible.

Here are a few questions you should ask yourself before writing from a woman’s perspective:

Why are you assigning a female gender to this character?

Are you just doing it to show how cool and hip and progressive you are?

Are you writing a biting, sardonic social commentary?

Do you want to create a realistic portrait of a woman?

Is there an added level of symbolism to your gender choice?

Let the answers to these questions dictate how you assign gender to all of your characters, not just the female ones.

Using men and women to foil each other can create an delightful dynamic in your story, as long as you avoid stereotypes. Here’s a list of stereotypes:

The delicate flower. She barely talks above a whisper, she’s sad, so terribly sad, suffering from the pain of a mysterious past.

The femme fatale. She’s a sexpot, only wears skin-tight clothes, and has a gun with your name on it.

The crazy girlfriend. She’s also got a gun.

The stay at home wife. She’s wholesome, virtuous, and dependant. Her only will for living is to be a wife and a mom.

The career driven. She’s cold-hearted and she wears designer shoes.

The most beautiful girl in the world. She’s so beautiful that she doesn’t even know it, but every other woman around her hates her.

Stereotypes make a character fall flat.

They deflate what could be an interesting character.

Refer to the Bechdel Test. By no means is this “the end all and be all,” however the test is useful in determining whether you story supports two active female characters who aren’t solely wrapped up in a guy and/or his journey. A story passes the Bechdel Test if it has:

two named female characters

who talk to each other

about something other than a man.

The tool is a great reminder that females, even in a love story, can discuss other matters that don’t include a man or romance.

There is no formula for creating complex female characters.

For that matter, there’s no such thing as a step-by-step approach to crafting compelling stories with complicated characters of any gender.

But we can begin to intentionally reflect on how we think about gender representation in film, television, literature, and other media.

We can think about the people we love and consider how the screen stories they see will impact their lives, today and in the years to come. We all want our loved ones to feel confident and empowered and inspired.

We’ve recommended films, television shows, and books to our family and friends not only because we think they’ll enjoy them, but also because we think the stories will in some way be helpful to them. Our stories can help.

They can make viewers/readers laugh when they feel down. They can help them process their feelings and experiences, escape into a fantasy, or visualize possibilities for their future. The benefits of screen storytelling are limitless.

And if we populate our stories with characters that represent all of humanity, in all its complexity … who knows? Maybe someday this conversation will be outdated and unnecessary.

STRONG CHARACTERS. Come in all shapes, sizes, and genders. Every creator has a different idea of how strength is expressed, but there are a few ways to ensure your audience understands the type of character you’ve created when your focus is on writing a strong female character.

Writing Tips: Strong Female Characters

Creating strong female characters is the same process as creating strong characters in general—they need backstory, motivation, and depth in order to cultivate a three-dimensional profile that makes them feel like believable, real people. Here are some ways to write strong female characters:

Give her complex emotions. Vulnerability and emotional depth are important characteristics for good characters of any gender. A strong woman shouldn’t be written as a one-dimensional trope—she can be a stoic warrior who cries when her best friend dies, or a sweet kindergarten teacher who boxes to deal with her rage. People are complicated and often unpredictable, so giving your female character the same complex range of emotions you yourself experience as a human being is a good way to start writing stronger characters.

Give her multiple kinds of strength. Physical strength isn’t everything—even the most hulking adversary can be taken down by smart, tactical fighting—and a female lead doesn’t have to be a bodybuilder or professional athlete in order to be strong. There are different types of strength that female characters exert. They can have confidence, wit, and mental fortitude. They can be brilliant scientists who stand up for themselves when no one else will listen. They can be stay-at-home mothers who won’t tolerate their spouse leaving a mess. Female characters have their own strong opinions and morality and aren’t just generalized for being women.

Give her female allies. Sometimes writers try to make a female character appear stronger by turning her into a “tomboy” who only has male friends. However, your female protagonist can just as easily draw strength from the women who surround her. Giving your female lead character female friends can help her feel more like a real-life person.

Give her more than her looks. Describe the way your female protagonist looks in a way that informs who she is. Does she have a defining physical feature that is integral to the storyline? Does her body language denote a particular personality trait? Brainstorm ways to avoid or subvert clichés (“she was pretty but didn’t know it”), which can weaken an audience’s first impression of your character.

Characteristics of Strong Female Characters

Strong female characters can encompass many different types of women, with varying opinions on what is considered “strong.” In order to write strong female characters, old tropes and stereotypes (like the damsel in distress or the nagging wife) should be avoided, as they can be detrimental to how your female character is viewed as a whole. If you’re looking to write a strong female character, check out some common characteristics below:

She has her own opinions. A strong female lead will listen to her own instincts and make her own decisions based on her own value system (even villains have their reasons for their choices). She’ll make mistakes, but she’ll always try to learn from them. A strong character isn’t immune to influence, but they have their own thoughts and feelings about their world and the things that happen within it.

She is her own person. Strong female characters don’t all have to be single, independent women. They can be in relationships and care about their partners without being weak or codependent. However, a strong female character has her own identity and trajectory that she follows, as well as her own ambitions and goals outside of her relationship with another person.

She has flaws. Strong female characters have struggles and flaws just like everyone else, but what makes them strong is how they deal with their shortcomings. Even the strongest characters have weaknesses, but that’s what humanizes them and makes them relatable to audiences.

She’s tough in her own right. What makes a female “tough?” The term is subjective. Is toughness just a character’s ability to physically bring down foes? Or can it be her ability to think fast under pressure or negotiate with powerful figures? A stay-at-home mother can be just as tough as a soldier—a woman’s role does not necessarily dictate who she is as a person.

Give her conflicting personality traits. Conflicting personality traits make a character interesting. Balance traditionally feminine and masculine character traits, as well as give your characters several flaws and strengths. Conflicting character traits not only make your female character three-dimensional but also provide for interesting internal or interpersonal conflicts in your story. You can imagine characteristics—positive, negative, or neutral—in pairs of opposites, such as:

Bookish & arrogant

Gossipy & trustworthy

Pensive & uninhibited

Kind & tactless

Empathetic & selfish

Examples of Strong Female Characters

Strong female characters are not flawless and unemotional—they’re complicated, just like everyone else. Authors, along with screenwriters for TV shows and film, have portrayed a great number of strong female protagonists in a variety of roles. Here are a few that are especially memorable:

Buffy Summers: Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a powerful heroine with awesome fighting skills who can be both tough—even when chasing a love interest—and empathetic—even towards those who have wronged her. She is a three-dimensional character, and she always tries to do the right thing.

Ellen Ripley: Sigourney Weaver plays alien-fighting heroine Ellen Ripley in the film Alien. Ellen Ripley is straightforward, physically strong, and a smart main character—but she also has strong maternal instincts that sometimes drive her decisions. All of those traits coexist with one another without lessening the strength of her character.

Katniss Everdeen: In Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games, Katniss is a young woman living in a dystopian world, who volunteers her own life in order to protect her younger sister. While sometimes impulsive and susceptible to the manipulations of others, Katniss grows throughout her story arc, becoming a skilled warrior who makes sacrifices to keep the ones she loves from harm. Although she has love interests, most of her decisions are based on survival and not romance—because as long as she’s alive, she can keep her family safe.

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 ⚜ More: References ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

Here are some notes and tips I compiled from various sources. It's interesting to see where the authors' advice overlap. Choose which ones work best for your specific story. Hope this helps with your writing!

[multiplicity-positivity]

Internal Meetings

This post also started out as an ask response, but it kept getting longer so we’re making it a post on it’s own! Our own system has internal meetings once every month or so. We’ll share a bit about what that entails along with answering some specific questions which were sent by the anon asker. In a Q&A format so we can be sure to answer everything!

What is an internal meeting?

An internal or in-system meeting is a gathering, conference, or conversation held by multiple members within a system. An internal meeting can have as few as two members or as many as countless, depending on the system and their own capabilities. In our collective of around 20 members, usually 8-12 show up to our meetings. It can get to be a bit crowded!

During our system meetings, we update others on how our life is going internally and externally. We ask each other how they are doing, and have others provide status reports for members who are unable or unwilling to attend. We create an updated roll call for our parts to keep track of our members. We keep each other in the loop about important events happening in and outside the system. And we try to in general just socialize with each other a little bit to help us stay connected and in tune with one another.

How can we go about establishing internal meetings?

Our meetings started off with just three members, and they grew gradually over time and as our communication skills improved. It’s okay for your system meetings to start out small! To start up a meeting, first establish when and where the meeting will be held. Pick a time that works for your system when you don’t have prior obligations and can be fairly uninterrupted. Our own system holds our meetings in the living room of our headspace, with our body physically in our bedroom in the evening when we are calm, safe, and available.

Whoever wants to hold the meeting should tell every headmate they have access to, and those headmates can in turn tell others. If you’ve established a time and place, you can do things like set a reminder on your phone, save the date on your calendar, or leave a note somewhere that’s visible which other headmates can access.

How do we get into a routine of holding internal meetings?

Our system started off haphazardly trying to hold a meeting whenever we felt we needed one… but it got hard to keep up with. We are autistic and incredibly routine-oriented, so incorporating internal meetings into our routine helped a great deal to ensure we could actually have a meeting successfully.

Our meetings now take place on the second Wednesday of every month (or every other month if we feel like we don’t need/aren’t ready to meet) at 7:00 PM. This is a time where we are usually not busy, and are able to set aside an hour or so where we will not be rushed, bothered, or distracted. We have the meeting time set in our calendar, and there are a couple members in our system who have taken the job of keeping us reminded about our meeting and gathering those who want to join when it’s time for the conference to take place.

To those hoping to start up a routine, our best advice is to pick a time that works best for everyone and start making attempts regularly. Whether it’s once a year, bimonthly, once a month, once a week, or once a day, make a habit of attempting to meet whenever your established meeting time comes around. The more often you make genuine attempts to meet, the easier it will be to hold a successful meeting in the future!

What if some headmates can’t/don’t show up?

This is likely bound to happen, especially if your system is large or has high dissociative barriers. And that’s okay! Our own system has a designated minutes taker (or record keeper) who takes notes during the meeting in our physical journal. That way, any part who was unable to attend can check out a record of what happened during the meeting as they are able.

We also have some parts who don’t front often, some of whom also struggle with things like reading and staying grounded. For these parts, our caretaker pays attention in the meeting in order to share what we’ve discussed with them at a later time. If your system has headmates who don’t front often or who may struggle to understand a notes recap, having a designated headmate who can effectively relay the meeting’s events to these system members may be incredibly helpful!

What if some headmates refuse to show up?

It is a very real possibility that some headmates may refuse to attend your system’s internal meeting. They may have certain issues which prevent them from comfortably attending. They may not get along with the rest of your system. They may be sullen or traumatized or obstinate. And while it is important to try and include these headmates in system life as much as possible, we don’t recommend forcing them to show up or scolding, punishing, or shunning them for not attending.

Rather, we’d recommend treating them as you’d treat those who genuinely can’t make it to the meeting. Keep the meeting’s minutes in a central, visible place where they can see when they next front. If someone who has been to the meeting interacts with them in the future, maybe they can share some key points or takeaways. If they are unwilling to listen, be frank with them and insist on telling them only the things which are necessary for the system to know for their own safety. In all this, remind them that they are welcome to attend any future meetings, but will never be shamed for not showing up.

How can we keep internal meetings diplomatic?

Our system has a part whose role is mediator. They act as a calming presence and help to keep the peace when things get heated. If your system has a member who has or is willing to take on this role, maybe let them try to act as a diplomat for a meeting and see how it goes.

Some things to keep in mind for the whole system during meetings:

Things may get intense. There is a difference between heated discussion and useless, spiteful arguing. The former should be welcome in system meetings while the latter should be banned.

Internal meetings are for everyone. If one headmate is facilitating the meeting, that’s fine. But if one member is monopolizing the meeting and taking up all of the time talking about what they want while ignoring the wants and needs of their headmates, that is not fine.

Fights may happen. When they do, ask the members involved to breathe and calm down before expressing themselves. Words exchanged in the heat of an angry moment often sting more than those said after a chance to reflect. Maybe invite overwhelmed or emotional headmates to use REST (<- hyperlink to our post) before speaking in order to engage more effectively.

Do not shame, judge, or make fun of any headmate for concerns or ideas that they bring to the meeting. Do your best to treat each other as dignified equals, even if what someone else says sounds goofy or ridiculous. Take each other’s thoughts seriously and treat each other with as much patience and kindness as you can.

How can we ensure every voice is heard equally?

Our system usually has a roster of members pulled up (like Simply Plural or our own list) during meetings. We take note of who is there, then try to make sure that we’ve heard from everyone who has something to say. Sometimes headmates may want to just observe, and that’s fine! No one should be forced to share if they don’t want to.

Having a designated facilitator can immensely help with making sure every headmate’s voice can be heard equally. The facilitator can chime in with “Greg, we haven’t heard from you in a while, is there anything you’d like to add?” or “Daisy, you’ve been talking the most today, why don’t we let someone else share their ideas?” It’s possible to facilitate in a calm and non-confrontational way that allows all members to be heard while simultaneously not forcing other members to feel like they’re leaving the meeting without fully expressing themselves.

Conclusion

Another long post from us… our apologies! We do hope that this post may have some useful tips for anyone out there who is hoping to start internal meetings in their own system. Please keep in mind that resulte may vary, and it may take a few tries before you’re actually able to hold a successful meeting. That’s okay though - don’t give up and keep trying regularly!

We’d love to hear from y’all! How do internal meetings work in your system? Do you employ any strategies that we haven’t listed here? If you’ve made it this far, thanks so much for reading! Have a great day, everyone!

[the-crooked-library]

Permit me a Nosferatu (2024) comment in April of 2025? Haha, but seriously, I rewatched the film this week because I missed Ellenorlok, and I still can’t get over their kiss it is so impressive just how many emotions Lily-Rose and Bill were able to convey. For them, a single reciprocal kiss is enough to both embody and further characterize that fervor they share - a vehemence which lacks from those between Ellen and Thomas throughout the movie imo (sorry buddy). The way Orlok appears to be smiling when they part, and the affection in his eyes?? Something we hadn’t yet seen from him before? It really was about Orlok giving as much of himself to Ellen as she does for him.

haha don't even worry about it, any film that has ever impressed me lives rent-free in my head forever and idc if it came out last year or in 1922, you can absolutely talk to me about it whenever

that said, YES! the way they move together in that kiss, the sheer intimacy of it, the chemistry rocketing off the charts!.. i am obsessed with it. my favourite element of that entire scene is how genuine it is - and that is in great part because, in my opinion, one of the most powerful aspects behind Orlok's appeal as a character is what, in anyone else, we would recognize as humanity. it is unpracticed. it comes as a surprise even to him; he hasn't actually been human in centuries, he was shunned and feared even when he was alive, and his visuals are designed to further support that framing. unlike many modern vampires, from ruthven to carmilla to lestat, he is visibly corpse-like - monstrous; and in this visual context, the little expressions of genuine emotion, fixation etc hit that much harder. it forces the viewer to confront a question: why would a monster care about the smell of lilacs?.. why would he want her companionship? why would his hands tremble when he touches her face, why would he be tender with her, why would he stay with her into the sunrise when he knows it will kill him?..

the answer, of course, is that he's in love - as much as he believes himself to be incapable of it. the kiss shatters any illusions he may have had in regards to that, so the scene is absolutely enthralling.

[the-kr8tor]

Hi! I love your TTN series so much.

I was wondering if you could write a bit more about them, like, reader meets Gwen or Miles (because Hobie already knows them) and maybe reader helps them with their suits or helps them by making something for them. It's okay if you decline this, I didn't know if this counted as a normal request or fluffy friday request, sorry. I really admire your writing, you're really talented.

Take care, you're amazing 🤍

Thank you, lovely! You're too kind 💛 hope u like this one!

Pairing: Hobie Brown x fem! Reader/ Spider-Punk x fem! Reader

Tags: use of Y/N sparingly, no specific physical description of the reader, cw food mention. TTN! Hobie, TTN! Reader. FLUFF

Thread the Needle Masterlist

TTN oneshots Masterlist

ʕ⁠·⁠ᴥ⁠·⁠ʔ

“Oh those are so based, dude!” Gwen exclaims from the floor, her sentence a bit muffled by the chips she's currently munching.

You look up from Miles’ suit that you're currently mending, the spandex slippery to touch. Sitting on the settee with Hobie sitting in-between your legs, you lock eyes with him who's equally confused as you. His head on your lap, eyebrow cocked up in question.

The four of them are sitting in a circle, snacks and sugary sweet drinks in hand. Miles lounges on the foot of the sofa, wearing an outfit you've designed once upon a time in college. You wouldn't let him wear Hobie's clothes, because, well, he looked like he was being eaten by just his shirt, his pants pooling on the floor. After almost tripping and landing smack on his face, you insisted on giving him a Y/N exclusive outfit. A one of one design.

You mentally take note to design clothes for the three of them that perfectly encapsulates their tastes.

Pavitr— who definitely didn't express how jealous he was of Miles’ new outfit, is sitting beside Hobie who is currently taping an ice pack to Pav's head with duct tape (that will definitely have consequences). He got annoyed that the ice pack kept slipping from his friend’s head, landing on his crisps, smooshing its contents.

“Ah, Gwen? What does ‘based’ even mean?” you ask, closing up the last seam.

All three teenagers look at you, then the other two stares at Gwen, waiting and snickering. Hobie leans against you, hand absentmindedly curled around your ankle.

“I keep forgetting you're from the 90s” Gwen cleans her hands with a napkin. “It means, uh, to carry yourself with swagger, yeah! I think…”

Miles and Pavitr guffaw loudly, Miles' soda spilling over the can. The houseboat shakes a bit on the water. You murmur out a ‘swagger?’ still scratching your head for an answer to your previous question.

“Oi! You're spilling everywhere!” Hobie throws a chip at Miles. It hits him on the forehead, leaving sour cream dust on his skin.

“Ack!” Miles mumbles while wiping his forehead. “You used to be cool, man”

“It's our house. I'd like to see you be cool when somebody spills sticky crap on your hardwood floors”

Our house. Even after all these years, Hobie still finds a way to make your heart sing.

You lean forward, placing a chaste kiss on his temple. Fingers kneading the muscles on his shoulder. “It's alright, Hobs. Miles didn't mean it, right Miles?” Hobie visibly relaxes, body melding close to yours.

The spider kids share a knowing look, triple smirks on their lips. Hobie doesn't notice, too busy getting lost in your eyes. You look at him like he's the stars in the sky.

Pavitr sighs, hand on his chin, mumbling about missing someone.

“Yeah, Hobs, I didn't mean it” Miles chuckles throughout the sentence, almost unintelligible with his laughter. Gwen scrunches her nose at her friend.

Meanwhile, you and Hobie are inside your own little bubble. The bubble bursts when the door to the houseboat bursts open with Ned heaving, clutching a stack of papers.

“Hobie! I figured it out—” he stops in his tracks, everyone looks at him, you stop with your barrage of massages. Pavitr pauses mid bite. Ned stares at the room, eyes swimming with questions.

“Who are these children?”

[thefaiao]

Do you remember what hooked you on the LISA series? It's a decently impactful set of games so I'm curious as to why you've created so many drawings from it

A great question. I don't think I can answer this with absolute precision, but I'll try. I'll begin explaining how exactly I first got into drawing LISA, and we'll work from there to the reason I believe I am still compelled to draw more of it.

I first played and finished LISA at the end of 2016. I was decently active at that point, but hadn't garnered much attention to my drawings. I had made a Hotline Miami post that had gotten decently popular, and a few Yogscast(1)(2)(3) drawings that also did decently well, but overall nothing super noteworthy. Most Yog fans at the time weren't into what I liked mainly, which was Shadow of Israphel.

I was immature at the time, so had a hard time connecting with people in fandoms. Not to mention, I was a Brasilian in a sea of Americans and Europeans. You'd be surprised how hard it was to relate with people in that setting, but I tried here and there.

I felt pretty strongly about the HM post though, since it felt like a great personal achievement. I felt a drawing I had a clear vision for had achieved what I set out to do with it. Seeing how much people liked it, it was pretty magical when you've never had a post "do well".

Anyway, people were hopping out of tumblr and onto twitter, and I did as well. Twitter, despite everything, sort of puts you way closer to other people. Your reply to someone important is very visible and hard to ignore. It was a type of equalizer. There I had gotten to get my drawings actually seen and shared by Austin, the guy who made the LISA games.

Having had my drawings shared and recognized that way had a strong impact on me, and I even got to talk with an artist I really looked up to at the time, Maren, who had also gotten into LISA. She had done art for SBFP and TF2, so it felt surreal to me to be acknowledged by someone like that. Up to that point I really felt like more of a passive observer to everything.

In 2014 I finished high-school, and 2015 I spent the whole year learning how to draw better. I tried so hard that I ended up dissociating, a very scary emotion, that I didn't even know was a thing at the time. It felt like all that time and effort was starting to pay off, and that there was a way forward here.

First I posted sketches, and the passion I had for the game and motivation from the recognition led me to put a lot more effort than usual into my drawings. I ended up making these, which got really popular, it was very validating.

So because of all that I kept drawing. I'll be honest, a lot of the time I just wanted to get even more of the attention of these weird new cool popular friends that were paying attention to me for some reason. I was very lonely at the time. I think I stayed lonely for a long time after too.

But eventually people move on, as is normal with fandoms. I didn't really feel my passion for drawing and LISA die out though. I had started a massive LISA art project at the time, that took me 5 long years, and also was more focused in college, where I did Game Design.

Drawing wise, eventually I branched out to other RPGmaker games, but LISA was very easy to draw. It was sort of a home-base for me. Something I could come back to when I was uncertain.

I think Urasawa put it quite well, with Billy Bat:

Drawing the same characters over and over is extremely rewarding, and a great way to reflect on your progress so far. I suppose it's meditative, but that's not quite the right word. It's very fun and constructive, and people can also keep track of your progress through that. I did the same with OFF characters, a game I had drawn way before all this.

Of course, I had a lot of issues because of how things developed. I related a lot of my self-worth with the validation I received from people online, and I still do, to an extent...

When I started taking the game I'm making, Meanderer, more seriously, and started living alone, posting anything felt awful. I didn't have the energy for bombastic posts, or the time spent developing the way I draw the characters like I did for LISA, that is, with ease and style. It felt very humiliating, but I understand it was a warped view of things.

It was a long and depressing time in my life, but it taught me a few important lessons, and made me sort of re-evaluate how I engage with "online" overall. But I still liked drawing LISA throughout all of this, I almost felt ashamed of it to a certain point.

All of this isn't to say I didn't love the game itself. It wasn't all just context. I really, really love LISA. It drove me to sobbing tears, which I don't think another game has gotten out of me. It's a fantastic game, that really showed what fresh things you could do with the medium. When I played it I'm not sure I fully understood how much I loved games.

I just grew up with the characters of LISA. Maybe not in my adolescence, but definitely in my adulthood, and with my art. These characters help me orient myself, understand my limits. And it's damn fun to get better at drawing them. Even just a character on an empty blank canvas, with only black and white lines. It's the most fun in the whole world.

To finish it off, I have a general philosophy of not republishing drawings. So whenever I want to do a LISA post I have to draw a LISA post. Just keep drawing and drawing. Don't get hung up on one drawing or idolize one thing you did. Keep making things. It doesn't have to make sense. Just keep drawing.

(There was a power outage while writing this and I had to retype this whole damn post by the way. Appreciate it!)

[uzlolzu]

Hi uzlolzu! Your art is so unique and captivating you've been my favourite artist since I was a teenager! I've recently graduated uni now and have done some freelance jobs here and there and I'm wondering how someone goes about building a stable freelance career as an illustrator. Can you share how you started?

Hello and thank you! That’s flattering and I’m very happy to hear it.

I can! Or I will try. It’s a pretty tricky question to answer, because my path into this has been organic and, in a way, one of least resistance.

In short: I was born into it.

Not in an “I’m the chosen one” way, of course, but in that my parents are artists and designers. Both currently work as graphic designers and have worked with illustration in the past. My mum is also a tailor and my dad is a wood carver (my sister does wonderful ceramics and has an education in tailoring too). Art and design, and working in those fields, is a core pillar of my family life.

All of this was pretty convenient for me regarding pursuing a career in illustration; I’ve always had access to all digital and traditional materials I’ve ever needed to draw or paint or do any craft (my first tablet was a 1999 Wacom Intuos 1), I grew up in an environment that was encouraging even when nothing was said, AND I had my parents’ extensive professional network available to me as soon as I was old enough to work. That last part has probably been more important than my level of skill ever was. I was lucky. I hit the ground running. So I can’t really remember a time where design or art of some sort wasn’t already my “career” (in my mind, I had an art career when I was four). It took quite a few years before I understood that I could technically have other jobs.

That said, my first paid jobs were photo editing ones that I got through my parents, not illustration. They were touch-ups, extending, cropping, resizing, masking… Those things that Photoshop often can do on its own now (or at least streamline) but couldn’t when I started almost 20 years ago (though PS and I have been friends for almost 30). Eventually, I got to do small illustrations for the same publications I had edited photos for, as well as some others. These kinds of illustrations still constitute a large part of my work hours, though in greater numbers and larger batches. They aren’t the flashiest, but they pay well. I also still work with my parents often. We’re all self-employed, but it’s really a family business setup at the core.

Moving outside of my inherited network…: I got my table top RPG-jobs by becoming part of the Swedish indie and semi-indie TTRPG scenes, which aren’t very big. It was straightforward to be visible enough and many people had their own (often tiny) projects that needed illustrations. Some of them contacted me. I think a not insignificant portion of the Swedish TTRPG game designers know who I am now, but I started small. Role-playing is one of my biggest hobbies, so networking came naturally. In my experience, these are flashier pictures to make, but rarely pay well (with some glorious exceptions). Anyway: If you have a specific field you want to work in, get involved in that field. There’ll probably be more people who want illustrations than people who illustrate in it.

Then there’s the concept art. I worked as a concept artists for Ubisoft Massive for a few years, and got this job partly through the game developer school (The Game Assembly) that I went to and partly because of my skills, I guess. But TGA and its proximity to Massive was instrumental. Game art is the only profession I have a formal education in.

So, when I started “officially”, I was already in a pretty good situation for it. Another important factor in my case, I think, is that I’m comfortable with many illustrator-adjacent disciplines as well, since the “packaging” or context of an illustration has always interested me. I use Adobe Illustrator and InDesign every week. Sometimes I do design work (layouts, logotypes, powerpoint presentations, annual reports, diagrams…), and I often do the in-betweens (infographics. Icons, patterns, other kinds of logotypes…). I prefer illustration and the in-betweens, but being open to branching out has given me more clients and, as a result, the ability to choose more freely which jobs I accept.

Either way. It’s really helped me to know a little something about all parts of a project, planning phase to phinished product. It makes it easier to talk to everyone involved, whatever their position and profession – programmer or printer. I know how to make a book from start to finish. It’s neat.

And, as you can see, there’s a lot of luck involved here and even if I know when I started getting paid, I can’t really say when I started developing the skills and the network I needed. That’s been a life-long process. And, of the two, I think the network has been more important for landing jobs than the depth of any particular skill of mine (though the variety of them might have helped). The more people who know you, the easier it’ll be, and that number of people will grow with the number of jobs you do. And I might as well add that physical meetings have worked better for me than just online contact. It’s easier to remember someone you’ve met, even if it was just for a few seconds.

And to finish off, I’ll add a few work samples that differ from what I generally post on Tumblr, since the ability to work in many styles has also benefitted me:

(Don’t let the text in the yellow box fool you. It’s Swedish lorem ipsum.)

[drvirgus]

Behind bars

Non Idol! Minji X Convicted! Reader

Description: Coming out of Jail is never easy. Y/n even would say its harder then even getting into Jail. What happens when she lives with a Person that absolutely hates Criminals? What even got her into Jail? and what happens if she starts to like the person that hates her?

Chapter: you have friends?

Masterlist

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Amazed by the vast selection, I looked at each one. Minji and Hanni were right across from me, with Hyein sitting beside. Danielle and Haerin were in their own little world, which I found quite adorable.

"So, where should I start exactly?" I asked with a light laugh, my cheeks visibly blushing. Hyein smirked, and Hanni was the first to respond, while I could feel Minji's eyes on me.

"It doesn't matter. Begin with what you like," Hanni answered with a smile, gesturing for me to start, probably because I was the oldest at the table. So, I simply grabbed one of the pancakes.

"And? Did you throw up?" Danielle asked curiously, with Hyein immediately complaining that we were eating and this wasn't a suitable table conversation.

I chuckled softly and just nodded at Danielle. This made Dani smile, but she turned her attention back to her girlfriend, as Haerin seemed to want something passed to her.

"I guess I never asked... what do you all do?" I inquired as I looked around. Mainly, I focused on the three whose professions I didn't know.

Danielle smiled at me, pouring orange juice for herself and Haerin. "I'm a model. My mom is a designer, and I model for her clothes," she replied, and I nodded in understanding.

"I'm a writer," Haerin revealed, and my eyes widened. Intrigued, I leaned forward, "Really? Have you published anything?" I asked, and Haerin nodded proudly, sharing details about the four books she had written.

My attention turned to Hanni, who grinned immediately. She set her utensils aside, saying, "I'm a producer," and my eyebrows raised. "I mainly produce music, but I'm also involved in the film industry," she added, leaving my mouth slightly agape.

"Wow... seems like I'm in the company of some high achievers here," I quipped, though I could feel my self-esteem shrinking.

"What about you, Hyein? What are your plans for the future?" I asked, looking at the younger one. "I'm going to be an idol! I got scouted a few years ago, and soon I'll debut. But apparently, only after I graduate," Hyein shared with a big grin. I smiled immediately.

Yes, Hyein was destined to be an idol. She was always singing and dancing, showing interest in Korean idols. While I wasn't particularly interested, I did listen to a few songs from Twice back then.

I turned to Minji, asking, "And you want to be a lawyer?" Minji looked at me, finished chewing, and swallowed her food before answering.

"No. I want to be the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court," Minji replied ambitiously. Her eyes sparkled with determination, leaving me momentarily breathless. I smiled and nodded in understanding.

Everyone had such ambitious goals or challenging professions...

And me?

I'd probably have to work forever in a 7/11 store... maybe even at a gas station.

Nobody would hire someone with a criminal record...

"How about Mimosas?" Hanni asked with a slight smile, glancing around. Danielle declined immediately, with Haerin agreeing. However, I looked at Hanni inquisitively.

"It's Champagne with orange juice. There are different flavors too," Hyein explained as she noticed my questioning gaze. I nodded in understanding.

"Not for me, thanks," I replied with a smirk, but Hanni almost immediately complained. Haerin also voiced her discontent. Dani and Minji remained mostly quiet.

"Okay. But just one glass," I said, laughing lightly.

————————————————————————————

"Here you go," I heard a voice I recognized quite well, and immediately looked up from my meal. My eyes landed on the waitress, and my mouth opened automatically.

The taller woman also glanced at me as she placed the Mimosas on the table. Her eyes widened. I swallowed visibly nervous. "Thank you," I heard Danielle say to the waitress.

The familiar person forced a smile and gave a brief bow. She looked at me once more before disappearing from our table. My eyes followed the waitress.

"What's up? Do you like her?" Hyein asked with a grin, nudging me with her elbow. I blinked, perplexed, and looked at the woman beside me.

"What?" I asked, but I had to clear my throat immediately as my voice broke. Haerin looked at me questioningly. I noticed Hanni and Minji also glancing at the waitress.

"Um, I need to use the restroom real quick," I said, laughing lightly, and stood up from my seat. Everyone looked at me with questioning expressions, making me sigh slightly.

"I won't take long. Feel free to start drinking. Don't wait for me," I said with a smile on my face. I glanced briefly at the familiar waitress before making my way to the bathroom.

The others' eyes were all on my back.

Nervously, I bit my lip as I stood in front of the restroom door. I immediately looked around. Fortunately, a wall obscured the view from our table to the bathrooms.

"What are you doing here?" I heard the familiar voice of the waitress say as she hurried towards me. A smile on her lips as she tightly hugged me. She sighed in relief as she let go.

"Wonyoung," I said, smiling, looking at the taller woman. I appraised the slightly younger one. "The uniform suits you," I quipped, but I almost immediately received a light smack from the taller one as she started giggling.

"Since when have you been out?" I asked, a bit more serious now, leaning against the wall. The waitress mirrored my stance. "Want to smoke while we're at it?" she asked with a light laugh, and I just nodded.

I followed her through the kitchen and out the back door, where most of the staff seemed to be smoking. She grabbed a pack and offered me a cigarette.

"I've been out for about a week," the younger one replied as she exhaled the smoke from her lungs. I nodded, looking around. We were in an alley, next to the business's trash bins.

The street was as lively as ever, with honking cars, people talking, and even the barking of a dog.

"Are you doing okay?" I asked, and Wonyoung chuckled humorlessly. "Well, aside from serving and pleasing these damn rich people," she began as she took another drag, "I'm doing pretty well. I'm out of all that crap," she added, visibly relieving me.

"And you?" she asked after a brief silence. I exhaled the smoke. "I got my diploma... now I'm job hunting," I replied, glancing briefly at my cigarette. "But it'll be tough... Nobody wants to hire someone with a prison record," I sighed, running my left hand over my face in frustration.

"Hey, you're brunching on a Thursday. Can't be all that bad, especially in a place like this, not exactly cheap," Wonyoung remarked, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, I got lucky," I replied with a slight smile, finally looking at the taller one. "My mom's best friend. She took in Hyein and me," I explained, prompting a nod from Wonyoung.

"Hey. Do you have a phone? Let's exchange numbers," Wonyoung suggested, placing the cigarette between her lips as she took out her phone.

I did the same, and we proceeded to exchange numbers. Smirking, I put my phone back in my pocket.

"Wony," I said, speaking a bit softer, causing her to hum. She noticed my expression and stamped out her cigarette on the ground.

"Yeah. She'll be released soon," she murmured, speaking a bit quieter, making me tense. "But that doesn't mean anything! You have a completely new life. No one would expect to find you in places like that," she quickly added, sounding more panicked than before.

"Don't worry. She won't find you," she reassured, placing her hand on my shoulder.

I smiled a bit through her attempt to cheer me up. "Thanks," I said as I headed toward the staff door. "Oh, definitely download Twitter. It's pretty fun," I added, laughing lightly as I disappeared through the door.

With quick steps, I returned to the table where the others were sitting. "Sorry, I'm back," I said, sighing as I took my seat.

Minji furrowed her brow as she scrutinized me. "Did you smoke, Unnie?" Hyein asked, waving her hand to disperse the air around her. "Oh. Do I stink?" I asked, smelling myself a bit, but I couldn't detect any odor.

I chuckled, probably in an attempt to ease my tension, which unfortunately didn't work as well as I hoped.

"So, what did you talk about?"

[tk-duveraun]

3/? Luo Binghe is SO NORMAL about Shen Yuan

1, 2, 3 (here), 4

Read up through even numbered parts on Ao3

Thanks to his System quest countdown, Luo Binghe knew to follow Shen Yuan to the Lingxi caves to retrieve Shen Jiu. In IRS, the blood relationship between the two was left ambiguous. Their Shizun had claimed that as twins they could co-rule Qing Jing Peak as Shen Qingchun and Shen Qingqiu, but the swapping POV meant Luo Binghe knew both men were certain their resemblance and shared family name were coincidences.

Their POVs never offered evidence for those claims, finding the idea preposterous and the 'truth' self-evident in yet another lazy diversion from either writing or explaining things. Luo Binghe honestly wasn't sure the author, Snowballing, had even made a concrete decision about it.

The justification their shizun made to the then-sect leader had been that since Xiu Ya had split itself between the two of them, they clearly had a connection worthy of being dual peak lords. Of course, the shippers called them soulmates for that.

It was uncomfortable to keep his expression politely curious as Luo Binghe followed after the elegant line of Shen Yuan. Ning Yingying chattered away at his side and received a head pat — a head pat! — for her enthusiasm. For his part, Ming Fan was desperately trying to get Shen Yuan to answer questions about the budget. Likely, he wanted everything done before Shen Jiu could ax everything he deemed unnecessary.

Luo Binghe tuned out the reunion between the peak lords. Shen Jiu was a little bitch, snarly and overprotective, but otherwise harmless. Despite being in the most chapters after the protagonist, Shen Jiu didn't get so much as an accidental kiss or nipslip for his trouble. Snowball really wanted to play at Schrodinger's incest. Shen Jiu was definitely interested, but didn't get any sugar to ensure those who'd be turned off kept tuning in and paying.

Actually, the last bit was a little up in the air. Luo Binghe's weird cousin was corporate espionage stroke an actual criminal and he hadn't been able to find Snowball's real identity or address. Look, Luo Binghe just wanted to ask him some questions, okay? But his cousin had come to the conclusion that Snowball was either also quite rich or lived in a series of actual gutters.

Luo Binghe followed dutifully as screams attracted Shen Yuan's attention, but didn't stop thinking.

Wealth would explain why even offers of generous payments to modify the story never hit, but Snowball was notorious for neither responding to nor even reading messages. The story was locked by the platform multiple times due to some failure to respond to their admin on his part.

It wasn't as if artists could afford to have actual integrity in the capitalist economy. A monthly payment of less than he spent on boba kept several artists from lewding Shen Yuan with any of his worthless suitors. They could still lewd him, of course, but he had to be alone, with Xiu Ya or with the sword Luo Binghe had designed for himself. It was a beautiful thing called Zheng Yang whose sun imagery went great with the 'spring' of Shen Yuan's courtesy name.

Honestly, it was pretty ridiculous that no one he commissioned realized the sword was his. Instead, there were fights over which love interest Luo Binghe supposedly supported since apparently none of the girls believed him shameless enough to ship Shen Yuan with himself. Which was the height of folly. He said in the comments, explicitly, that Shen Yuan was his and his alone.

"We know Shen Qingchun is held in high esteem by both cultivators and demons," Sha Hualing spouted, interrupting Luo Binghe's thoughts.

Truly, any mention of his beloved would immediately snatch his attention.

She continued, "So this Hualing suggests that he judge the fairness of the matches."

Shen Yuan snapped open his fan and visibly considered the idea. From IRS, Luo Binghe knew that he was quickly counting the demons and evaluating their strength. His final estimation was that he and Shen Jiu would be able to send the demons packing, but that the casualties among the disciples would be too high with only two of them.

"Very well," Shen Yuan said. He stepped away from Shen Jiu and toward the demons. He held his fan at arm's length and everyone, human and demon both, took several steps back. He spun in an elegant circle, his robes swirling around him even as an array appeared underneath his feet.

Shen Yuan smiled, not even looking at his work before he moved to stand on the edge of the arena he'd created. With a snap of his fan, he addressed the crowd. "Matches will be to forfeit or when I signal the defeat is complete. As we are exchanging pointers, there's no need for anyone to lose their life." His eyes flashed in challenge; Sha Hualing made him mediate so he wouldn't compete so she would have to deal with his rules.

Luo Binghe had never been so hard in his entire life. He felt light-headed. All of the cultivation studies he'd crammed in anticipation of this day fled his mind in an instant. He was literally panting.

Luo Binghe allowed himself the duration of Shen Qingqiu's match to drool. When his nominal master won, he clenched all of the muscles in both thighs to redirect blood flow to areas that might actually let him win his match. If Sha Hualing wasn't sent running Luo Binghe was in for a bad time.

Liu Mingyan fought the Saintess personally. Her intent was to show her Shen-shibo that he would be marrying into a strong family that could protect him and his interests, but like her brother, she failed miserably at proving anything. Though, Luo Binghe supposed, she was gracious in defeat, which wasn't worthless. It would be a good trait for when Luo Binghe finally had his wife and dashed all hope of her becoming a sister-in-law to his beloved.

When Shen Jiu announced Luo Baixiao would fight Elder Sky Hammer, everyone not from Qing Jing yelled in surprised protest. However, it was an open secret that Shen Jiu despised their youngest disciple. Why? Ask Snowball, but don't hold your breath. He needed the young demon to have a grudge, fuck you, that's why.

In IRS, the fight was a painful beatdown. Luo Baixiao hadn't been particularly filial, so the crowd didn't understand why he wouldn't concede. But the chapter was a rare Shen Yuan POV, so he knew his beloved was frozen with indecision, hidden behind his benign solemnity, which explained why he didn't call the match early.

After the reveal of Luo Baixiao's demonic heritage there had been speculation that he won his match due to channeling some of his demonic energy. Well, if the original goods did, it wasn't an option for Luo Binghe, whose demonic abilities were currently locked behind a system wall. In his corner, however, Luo Binghe had anime.

Though he took a beating memorizing Elder Sky Hammer's attack patterns, Luo Binghe finally had a long enough window to launch a direct qi attack somewhere between a rasengan and kamehameha. Elder Sky Hammer fell with a crash, the poison on his armor completely unused.

Luo Binghe shot his largest, purest smile at Shen Yuan in victory.

[OOC! 7 S-pointed deducted! Only 14 S-points remain.]

"Are you kidding me? I won! I completed the mission!"

[Tutorial quest "I'll Be Your Saint Sebastian" incomplete. Objective: Cause Sha Hualing to flee from Cang Qiong Mountain.]

"Fuck you!"

Luo Binghe had been too busy arguing with the System and almost missed one of the best moments in the universe. Elder Sky Hammer had flung himself across the arena to kill the opponent that bested him, only for Shen Yuan to dash forward and swat him back into the flagstones like a particularly annoying fly.

"My disciple isn't for you to bully."

Shen Yuan's delicate, elegant, pale hand hefted the demon's hammer as if it weighed nothing. Then, Luo Binghe's dearest heart casually tossed the massive weapon to crash at the feet of the assembled demons.

Again, Luo Binghe was instantly hard, but he couldn't allow it to distract him. This was one of the most pivotal moments in all of IRS. Elder Sky Hammer would attack a second time and inflict Shen Yuan with Without-a-Cure, a poison that would cripple his cultivation and inevitably force several instances of dual cultivation to remove the stagnation in his spiritual veins. Luo Binghe couldn't allow it.

Adrenaline replaced blood in his veins as Luo Binghe scanned his immediate surroundings. With his demon heritage, he wouldn't die to Without-a-Cure and shouldn't even suffer permanent cultivation damage, but surviving meant nothing if he couldn't kill Elder Sky Hammer before Shen Yuan was poisoned.

An An Ding disciple to his right had a sharp spade in his hand and grout all over his robes. Good enough. Luo Binghe lunged and snatched the spade before pivoting. Everything seemed to go in slow motion. Elder Sky Hammer had lifted himself onto his hands and knees and was bracing to pounce. Luo Binghe couldn't afford to wait or hesitate and moved before the giant demon did.

As a result of his preemption, Luo Binghe reached Elder Sky Hammer in the moment he left the ground. With a bare-toothed snarl, Luo Binghe struck the spade up through the demon's neck, the poison spikes on his opponent's gorget scratching his forearm through his sleeve.

Together, Luo Binghe and Elder Sky Hammer crashed onto the flagstones. The poison made quick work slithering through his bloodstream. Luo Binghe's vision turned blurry and rainbow-tinted.

"Disciple Luo!" yelled his precious, unharmed beloved.

He passed out.

[naomis-daydream]

seven deadly sins // shuri udaku

summary: self explanatory tbh

warnings: descriptions of sex, mentions of accidentally skipping meals

a/n: ik some of these aren’t the real meanings behind the seven deadly sins, just a fun take on it. something quick & cute until i get other stuff out. also, i finally learned how to add the ‘keep reading’ tab🤭 enjoy!

✧

LUST - a strong passion or longing, especially for sexual desires

a soft moan escapes shuri’s lips as she tugs lightly on your hair. she’d been gone on a mission for three days, yet it felt like a lifetime since she felt you against her. you were buried between her thighs, her legs swung over your shoulders as you gripped her supple flesh under your fingertips.

your lips were wrapped around her clit, her walls were around your fingers which were pushing slowly in and out of her. the sound of her clenching around you filling the room as she whimpered.

“miss me that much, sithandwa sam?” you mutter, lips still against her, the vibrations making her squirm slightly.

she nods quickly, head thrown back against the pillows.

“how about you show me, then?”

GREED - the excessive pursuit of material goods

no matter how many times you attempted to tell her otherwise, shuri continuously showered you in gifts. whether it was high-end or hand-me-downs, your girlfriend spared no expense to show her everlasting love for you.

like the time you mentioned a garment you liked, but said it was too expensive to buy. later that week, a package was left on your side of your shared bedroom with a note on the top saying “open me :)”. you knew better than to dissuade her, because when you looked at the label in the corner, you found pen scribbled over the return address.

GLUTTONY - an excessive and ongoing eating of food or drink (or in this case, when shuri works so hard she forgets to eat)

it wasn’t unusual for shuri to miss a meal every now and then because of her duties. she was the head of the design group, queen, and black panther. it was perfectly understandable if she skipped lunch or fell asleep before having dinner, because when you’re the world’s smartest woman, ruler of the most powerful nation on the surface, who wouldn’t?

though, that didn’t mean you would simply let her.

like tonight, when shuri had refused to leave the lab, which she’d been in for over fourteen hours, until she finished her newest contraption. she was gone when you woke up and still missing when you were ready to sleep, so you hauled down to her lab at nearly midnight to persuade her to take a much needed break.

“shuri?” you called, looking around the empty room. “baby, you in here?”

the sound of mechanical wiring answered your question, leading you to look over to a large machine which hid your girlfriend.

“you need to eat.” you called, raising your voice over the noise.

her response was low and vague. “i’m busy.”

“i made your favorite,” you say, attempting to get her out of her lab and food into her stomach.

she peaks her head up from behind the large machine. “fufu?” she asks quietly.

“mmhm,” you hum.

“with nkatenkwen?” she says, the top of her face still being the only visible part of her.

“yep.”

“and your homemade peach drink?”

“all waiting for you upstairs, my love,” you say, walking up to the machine. you go around to the back, tugging her hands so her focus would be on you. “your work will always be here when you’re done, shuri, but you won’t if you don’t eat. let me take care of you. can you let me do that, sana (baby)?”

SLOTH - excessive laziness or failure to act & utilize one’s talents

hardly anything, or anyone, for that matter, could pull shuri away from her lab. that was until she met you. now, you had to practically pry her off of you in order to attend to her duties.

you groaned quietly as you glanced at the clock in your nightstand. “shuri, you must get ready for work. you are supposed to be at the lab in less than twenty minutes.”

to which she’d hush you while pulling you closer to her frame. “shh, intombi entle (pretty girl), just a few more minutes,” she mutters, pushing her chin further into the soft skin of your neck.

“you said that yesterday. we never left the bed.”

“and i heard not one complaint!”

though your back was to her front, she could feel you playfully rolling your eyes, prompting her to whisper against your lips, “who’s queen?”

“you are, my love,” you’d say into a soft kiss.

WRATH - a strong anger or hate towards another person

hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, or in this case, a woman whose girlfriend had been. when it was announced shuri would be courting you, people were ecstatic that the lone udaku had found someone she was going to spend the rest of her life with. though, there were unpleasant whispers about a non-wakandan sitting on the throne.

one afternoon, the two of you were making rounds to all the tribes to formerly make acquaintance of their soon queen, when a member of the border tribe had a few words to say about the matter.

“an american ruling over us? wakandans?” he smacked his teeth. “i’d rather turn my blade onto myself than serve under someone who comes from such barbaric land.” he chuckles as two men beside him laugh shortly.

you overhear the conversation, frowning a little, but determined to not let them get to you. you look over to shuri, whose eyes are cutting daggers into the three men a few feet over.

before she could do anything, you stop her. “my love, it’s okay. i promise. it takes more than a few assholes mouthing off to get to me, okay?” you assure her. she looks down at you, momentarily glancing back over to the men before nodding. though as you walk with the Doras and make your way to the exit, shuri slips from your eyeline and in the faces of the three mouthy men.

“utter another word about my fiancé, who is soon to be your queen, might i remind you, and you will find yourself wishing that you had turned your blade onto yourself once i am done with you. kuqondwa (understood)?”

ENVY - the intense desire to have an item someone else possesses

before you two got together, you were in a relationship…with a man, and that bothered shuri to no end. you would talk about how he would flake on dates and forgot special occasions like your birthday and anniversary, and she couldn’t stand it. she could treat you so much better.

“you don’t deserve that, uthando (love). you should be with someone who cherishes you, appreciates you, worships you endlessly.” she’d say, rubbing the back of your hands which where held by hers.

you’d sigh, warmed by her words but conflicted between your head and your heart. the lines between platonic and romantic often blurred with you two, and the feelings you had for shuri overpowered the mere comfort of familiarity that kept you in your relationship. your head was tilted down, mostly so you didn’t have to meet her eyes. “i don’t know. he’s a good guy-”

“and you need a great woman,” she interrupted, “i can be that for you.”

your heart rate picks up as she hooks a finger under your chin.“let me show you how you deserve to be treated, hm?”

PRIDE - an excessive view of one’s self without regard for others (or in this case, how shuri cannot go a day without the admiration she has for you spilling from her lips)

the warm feeling in her chest whenever she was with you, the burn in her cheeks that came from smiling so hard, and the tranquility that overtook her only when you were by her side. to everyone else, the two of you were almost an annoyingly adorable couple. whenever in your presence, shuri could not draw herself away from you. her eyes followed you wherever you went in the room, and if you were within arms reach, hers were wrapped around you. and when shuri was away from you, there’d be rarely a day she went without mentioning her to wife to be.

“ngangamsha (your majesty), what is this…music?” okoye asks hesitantly, face lingering with slight distaste for the current song choice in the training room.

“she calls herself megan thee stallion with two ‘e’s,” shuri responds, effectively blocking okoye’s spear with her forearm.

“her lyrics seem a little provocative, no?”

“yes, but, the beat is nice, eh?”

shuri relaxes her defensive stance to dance to the lyrics of ‘cash shit’ for all of three seconds before okoye sweeps her leg, hitting shuri’s ankle and bringing her back to the mat.

“unfair! i was showing you the dougie!”

“since when do you listen to american rap?”

“y/n plays it while she gets ready.” shuri says simply, rising from the ground.

okoye shakes her head, “whipped.”

✧

[alistairs-raven]

Lunar Eyes

The story of why my Alistair and Hattie designs have mirrored dead eyes.

Story also available on AO3

No triggers. PG

I truly hope you all enjoy it!

---

It was his first day at Gracey Manor, or rather it was the first for everyone. Hundreds of spirits had been summoned to the house and they had quickly made themselves at home. Some of them sat together and talked, while others danced and sang. There were shy ghosts as well, who found quieter places in the house. He was one of these spirits, and he had found the attic most to his liking.

The Hatbox Ghost was his name or simply Hattie by his friends. He was a short man, made even shorter as he braced himself against his cane. Upon his balding head was a tall top hat that made him more noticeable, but his most unique trait was the hatbox that gave him his name. Hatbox’s mortal life had ended when he was murdered by an axe to the neck, and now his head had a nasty habit of falling off. To the delight of his visitors, it would land in his hatbox before returning to his shoulders. 

In stark contrast, there was another spirit who shared his space in the attic. To some she would appear a fearsome presence. She stood tall in the wedding dress she had lost her life in, and her visibly beating heart glowed in her chest. It was for this trait that she came to be known as the Beating Heart Bride. But to Hatbox, she was Emily, his closest and dearest friend.

As the day’s guests left and the house became truly theirs, the happy haunts were free to simply enjoy each other's company. The sounds of the other ghosts moving about and laughing was distant, which suited the pair in the attic just fine. Emily smiled happily as she heard the sound of his cane on the hard wooden floor as he approached. Ever a gentleman, the man set his hatbox down and tipped his hat to her. As he did, his head fell into the hatbox, causing Emily to giggle as she returned the greeting, taking her long gown in her hand before bending into a curtsy. 

“I wasn’t sure at first but I think I’m going to like this place.” Hatbox answered the question before Emily could ask it.

He saw the visible relief upon her face as she replied. “I like it here as well. We have a home now.” For so long they had been wandering spirits. Always together and forever in close sync, tragedy had bound them together. 

Gently setting the candle and bouquet of flowers she held onto a nearby table, Emily turned to gaze out the window. Outside the full moon shone bright against a clear night. Hatbox came to her side and took her hand. She looked at him, pleased to see his head had returned to his shoulders. Some may have liked when his head peaked out from his hatbox, but she knew he preferred that it stay attached. She squeezed his boney hand, enjoying the peaceful moment. They were quieter ghosts. Not much needs to be said when one knows another soul so well. 

“They’re dancing downstairs.” Hatbox broke the silence. “They’ve been dancing all day down in the ballroom.” “Do you think we should go down and join them?” Emily asked. After such an eventful day she would be surprised if he did.

Hatbox laughed. “No, I want to stay up here. But I do think dancing sounds very nice.” He set the cane against the wall and took Emily’s other hand in his. 

The pair danced together as the light of the moon cast their shadows across the room. They could have danced together until the end of time and Hatbox would have been happy.

But like mortal life, everything has an end, and the night they danced was the last time Hatbox ever saw Emily. 

Decades passed, generations of mortals came and went, and the happy haunts continued their joyous fun. No one seemed to notice that Hatbox left the mansion and never returned. No one except Emily. She waited for him, the glowing heart in her chest dimming. One day it went dark and the Beating Heart Bride faded away. 

—

When Hatbox returned to Gracey Manor few remembered him, but those who did were overjoyed. He quickly found himself overwhelmed by ghosts and mortals alike wishing to see him. Wishing for some quiet, he returned to his preferred spot in the attic only to find it inhabited by a stranger. 

Constance was her name. At first sight she could have been mistaken for Emily, but Hatbox knew immediately this wasn’t his soul mate. She was a cold, cruel woman who in life had killed multiple husbands. In her hand she carried the axe used for the crimes. The sight of it made Hatbox’s neck hurt, and he kept as much distance as he could from her. 

“I can’t find Emily, have you seen her?” Hatbox found himself wandering the hallways that night, asking everyone he could find if they’d seen her.

“Yes, I’ve seen her. She was looking for you.” The Host Ghost was the first to provide some much needed answers. He had been one of the few to recognize Hatbox when he returned, and he inwardly kicked himself for not realizing earlier that this was the man to ask about anything in the mansion. 

“Oh wonderful! Where is she now?” Hatbox asked, his grin wide. It slowly faded as Host rubbed his chin, seemingly having trouble remembering. 

“To be honest, I’m not sure. It’s been awhile.” “How long is awhile?” Hatbox’s voice mirrored his growing irritation.

“Years I believe. I’d have to check the records for the exact time.” Host’s voice was emotionless as he merely spouted facts. 

“YEARS?!?” Hatbox felt his temper flare.

Host raised an eyebrow, an impressive feat for a man who had a skull for a face. “Yes, that’s what I said. She was like you, just left without a word. I assumed she’d stopped waiting and finally went off to find you.”

Hatbox was shaking. Should he leave again and go after her? Or should he stay and wait for her to return? His soul felt hollow and the shaking caused his head to fall into the hatbox he carried at his side. Host patted the headless man on the shoulder.

“You returned after all these years. Perhaps she will as well?” He tried. Unfortunately offering comfort was not his forte. 

Hatbox didn’t know how to respond so he simply settled for “I’m going to return to the attic.” “Be careful up there.” Host warned. “The woman up there is a scary one. We keep her up there because she’s a bit of a buzz kill.”

“Thanks…” Hatbox’s cane thudded against the floor as he solemnly made his way up the stairs. His head had just returned to him when he entered the attic to find Constance gone. Perhaps she had decided to wander the mansion as well. She seemed the type to be where the people were-

Constance jumped out from where she’d been hiding and swung at Hatbox with her axe. The motion did nothing to a ghost, but unfortunately it startled him enough that he leapt back and his head fell off once more. The woman laughed darkly. “Oh, you’re going to be fun.” She shoved past him and he watched as she made her way down the stairs and disappeared, leaving him alone. If only he could lock her out for good. 

Hatbox made his way to the window, his head returning as he set the hatbox down. He reached out with his hand and gently touched the cold glass. That night felt like it had just happened. How could it have been years? Outside the moon emerged from behind the clouds. It was a full moon, just like that night, and the irony made Hatbox’s dead heart hurt even more.

The sounds of the other ghosts became background noise as he got lost in his thoughts. He was only brought out when the grandfather clock rang midnight, and the chime echoed powerfully throughout the manor. As he listened he noticed the lights above him sway. With the last chime of the clock they went from yellow to bright purple. 

Hatbox didn’t have much time to ponder before he felt strange. It was like he was being pulled away from the manor once more and he panicked. No! He couldn’t leave. He needed to stay in case Emily returned. He resisted the pull but it quickly became too strong. In his ear he heard a cruel laugh that sent a chill through him. 

“Don’t fight it. You’re already suffering, it will only hurt you more.”

“Who are you?” Hatbox tried to sound strong against the dark, echoing voice.

The laugh got more boisterous. “Why, I’m you. Or rather, I am a better you. A you that is without grief.”

Hatbox felt himself fading. He no longer felt in control of himself. “What have you done?!” He shouted, the words failing to come out of his mouth. The dark entity must have heard it anyway because he responded. 

“You can leave the mansion. It’s what I desire, so I’m taking control.”

“No!” How was this even possible? “No, no, no!” Hatbox cried out again and again as he became merely an observer. 

—

Alistair Crump smiled out the window at the full moon. In the glass he could see his reflection and his smirk disappeared. The face was his but more skeletal, with no lips or eyelids. His eyes were now colorless and his hair was longer. He hoped he wouldn’t have to spend the rest of eternity looking like this. 

Stepping away from the window, the man picked up the hatbox and made his way out and down the stairs. He had just reached the bottom when Constance jumped out at him, swinging her axe with glee. Alistair didn’t even blink and instead he looked up at her with squinted eyes. “A bit more respect would serve you well. I don’t tolerate such foolishness.”

Constance blinked at the reaction, or rather the lack thereof. She opened her mouth to speak but seemed to change her mind and instead moved past him to return to her place upstairs. Alistair rolled his eyes and continued making his way through the manor. 

Alistair knew the Gracey manor well. He had spent well over a century ruling over it after all. The exit wasn’t far, but he couldn’t help wanting to have a little fun. He had a natural desire to be noticed and instead made his way to the ballroom. 

As always it was packed full of ghosts. The organ was playing, there was dancing, and of course there was an endless feast. Normally it would have been cleared out as he arrived, but now the party simply continued as he was welcomed as one of them. 

“Well if it isn’t the Hatbox Ghost, finally out of the attic.” Alistair recognized that voice and turned to look at the hitchhiking ghosts. He disliked these three because no matter what he did they never seemed bothered. But they had been quite useful to him. At least, in another afterlife.

“If I had known you three were going to be here I’d have stayed up there.” Alistair growled through his lipless teeth. 

“Uhhh” Phineas seemed too dumbfounded to say real words, but Ezra did it for him.

“Are you feeling okay, Hattie?” “Yea, I know you’ve been having a hard time looking for Emily.” Gus chimed in.

“Who’s Emily?” Alistair asked. The dumb faces he got in response made him sigh. Choosing to move on he made his way past them to the table. The lack of pillows on his favorite seat caused his hackles to raise for a moment before he remembered this wasn’t ‘his’ Gracey Manor. The ghosts here were a leaderless, chaotic lot. The thought made him sick.

“Leave and go back where you came from, then.”  Hatbox’s voice was faint in his mind but Alistair still heard him.

“I told you, we will be leaving.” His thoughts became words that Hatbox could hear. Alistair turned to leave the ballroom, suddenly no longer feeling the need to be here. He still needed to keep up appearances, and if he couldn’t rule over and torment the other ghosts what was even the point.

As he made his way to more quieter halls, Hatbox spoke to him once more. “Your name is Alistair.” 

“How do you know that?!” Alistair stopped in his tracks, his attention going completely to internal conversation. 

“We’re sharing a mind. I can see everything.” Hatbox explained. “Alistair Crump. You own a manor on the other side of the country.”

“Two can play this game, I see your memories as well.” Alistair didn’t like anyone knowing personal information about him. This seemed to be an unfortunate side effect of his spell. “I see you were a weak man with very little. But a woman foolishly fell for you anyway. Her name was… Emily.” Outside their minds an evil smirk crossed the man’s face. “She agreed to marry you but then someone murdered you both.”

Hatbox had long since come to peace with their deaths. It was nothing he could change, and as ghosts they still had eachother. At least, they did. Alistair chuckled as he saw the thoughts flash through his mind.

“She gave up on you. You left the manor and abandoned her.”

“That’s not true!” 

“Then why did you leave?” It was a genuine question disguised as a cruel one. Alistair couldn’t find anywhere in his memories why Hatbox had left, only that he had. 

“I don’t know! One moment I was happy, and the next almost 50 years had passed.” His voice shook as he added. “I would never have abandoned Emily.”

Alistair’s laugh echoed through their minds as he enjoyed the pain Hatbox felt. “For love he lost his head now this man spends his days cold and dead.”

Hatbox didn’t need to ask to know what he was talking about. He’d seen the graves. In fact, he’d seen all this man’s crimes. It filled him with disgust to know that in another time he could be like this. “You deserved to be banished.”

“I deserve revenge. I deserve respect and admiration from those too weak to seek it for themselves. My ritual failed, but once we get out of here that won’t matter.”

Alistair continued down the halls, his cane echoing as he slammed it down harder than needed to. He was almost out of here. He was finally going to be free from this wretched manor. 

He just needed to get past the seance room.

The man quieted his steps as he entered, hoping that this late at night Madame Leota would be more dormant, having spent the entire day reciting spells. He seemed to be in luck, because she didn’t seem to notice him until he was almost to the other side of the room and out the door when she spoke. “Where are you going, Hatbox?”

Alistair tried to sound friendlier. Tricking her would be far harder than the three idiots from earlier. “I’ve been looking for Emily. I wonder if she’s outside looking for me.” 

“Emily never left.” 

Inside of their shared mind, Hatbox suddenly came to attention. “Never left..?”

“I see…” Alistair responded aloud. “Well, regardless I need to step outside.”

“Do you think that’s wise?” Leota asked. “I remember when you left before.”

“You do?” Hatbox asked silently and Alistair asked aloud.

“Oh Hatbox, I should have told you before. When I summoned you here, your soul arrived different then the others. It wasn’t… complete. Part of your soul was here, and another was somewhere else. As a result, you couldn’t stay. You were cast out of the manor. But Emily is a bound soul. Without you, she faded away.” 

Hatbox tried to process as he was overcome with grief. He cried out in anguish, the sound so loud that Alistair had a hard time forming his own response. “His- My soul isn’t complete?! And you call yourself the world’s greatest medium.” 

Madame Leota recognized that voice. “Crump?!?” 

It seemed the game was up. “I decided banishment to my manor wasn’t for me. And so I’m here now, but don’t worry. I was just seeing myself out.”

“I will send you back. And keep a better watch on you this time!”

“Not without punishing an innocent soul.” Alistair laughed darkly as he felt once again he had the upper hand on the medium. 

“We shall see.” Leota began chanting, much to Alistair’s surprise. He hadn’t expected her to so willingly endanger another soul, which meant she thought this spell would work. 

“You told me his soul doesn’t belong to the manor. It won’t stay!” Alistair tried to manipulate the medium with her own words.

“Hatbox… Hattie, you have to choose.” Madame Leota’s words reached the grieving man trapped in his own mind. “Is this your home?”

The Hatbox Ghost thought back to that first night at the Gracey Manor. How Emily had called it their home now. If that’s what she had wanted, then that’s what he wanted as well. He missed her so much. He felt so hollow with the missing part of him. “Emily, this is our home.” 

“Quiet. All of you, quiet!” Alistair demanded, for once fear evident in his voice. He cried out and suddenly Hatbox was back in control of his body.

Hatbox almost fell and lost his head immediately but quickly found his legs. He looked around, recognizing the seance room. There was Madame Leota, floating in her crystal ball. But her attention wasn’t on him. He followed her gaze and he felt his dead heart jump.

There was Alistair Crump being held aloft by Emily. He writhed in her grip, trying to tear her hands away from his neck but she held him firm. 

“EMILY!” Hatbox was too elated to care about anything else. “EMILY HOW.?” “You chose to be here.” Leota spoke calmly behind them. “Your soul belongs here now and therefore, so does your soul mate.”

“You all make me sick!” Alistair snarled, still trying to get free. 

“Bring him over here, let me have a good look at him.” Leota couldn’t help the amusement in her voice as Emily brought him over and pinned him down on the table. He looked different than she remembered. His lips and eyelids were gone. His right eye was an intense yellow, but the left one was dead. Pale, like the full moon that gave him his powers. Behind him, she could see that Hatbox hadn’t been left unmarked. In an inverse, his right eye was dead and ghostly. “I’m sorry this had to happen, but I promise he will not escape this time.” 

“Don’t lie to them. This will not be the last time we see eachother.” Alistair promised as he was chained to the table by purple light. He continued to glare at Hatbox, the ghost who shared part of his soul, until he vanished. Banished back home to Crump Manor, this time they all hoped for good.

Emily turned to Hatbox, tears in both of their eyes. They embraced, her heart beating loudly against him. Decades had passed, and most had forgotten their bond. But it still burned as strong as ever. Hatbox never wanted to let her go but finally she loosened her embrace and said “Let’s go upstairs where we belong”. 

Hatbox nodded, tears wetting his eyes and face. “Thank you, Madame.” He tipped his hat to the medium.

—

Nighttime continued in the Gracey Manor. Most were oblivious to the night's happenings. As far as everyone was concerned, everything was normal. Except for Constance, who tried to tell everyone who would listen that “they” kicked her out of the attic. “We’ll just find somewhere else for you later, don’t worry.” The Host Ghost told her dismissively.

In the attic, two ghosts held hands. Emily touched Hatbox’s face, which was now changed by the pale eye. She didn’t care and told him not to worry either as she kissed him on the forehead.

In a strange way, the dark man had reunited them. Hatbox wanted to forget him as he danced with his beating heart bride once more. But as they slowly swayed together, he felt his dead right eye water. He tried to rub out whatever was in his eye when he realized they were tears. Far away, in another manor, Alistair was sad. It seemed they were bound together as well. Perhaps he was correct when he’d said they’d see eachother again some day. But for now he let those concerns fade away into the night. 

-----

Written with my friend Draco in mind. I enjoy our conversations.

[ssenvs3000w25]

My Role as an Environmental Interpreter

After reading Who Offers Interpretation? from our textbook, I have come to realize that my ideal role would be as an environmental interpreter in an aquarium. The role of an interpreter, especially in the context of nature and aquatic environments, is to deliver information in ways that captivate and educate visitors. The goal is to enhance their experience while promoting a deeper appreciation for the wonders of the natural world.

My role as an interpreter could entail leading guided tours where guests can experience animal exhibits more intimately and educationally. I would also create and arrange hands-on educational programs for children and adults, ensuring every visitor leaves with a better understanding of aquatic ecosystems. In addition to in-person interactions, I could help design interpretive signs that combine real-life and cartoon visuals with fun memorable facts, as well as include the signages into mobile apps with a fun twist of interactive stories and quizzes to enhance accessibility and engagement when in the aquarium, or at home! In addition, I would be responsible for sharing knowledge about various aquatic habitats, from coral reefs and mangroves to the various types of aquatic organisms in the facility. This role would involve much more than simply reciting facts, it would mean bringing the underwater world to life through enthusiastic storytelling, interactive discussions, and engaging activities. Answering visitor questions would be an integral part of this role, as it would help create meaningful connections to the aquatic life they’re learning about and seeing in the vicinity.

To be successful as an aquatic life interpreter, I would have to develop a range of skills, such as communication and creativity. Strong communication and public speaking abilities would be essential, as I would need to recite information from several exhibits in an engaging and manageable way to maintain the crowd's attention. (There is nothing worse than a guide who is visibly not passionate about their tour). Creativity and adaptability would also be crucial for creating unique programs and responding to diverse visitor needs, as we all learn differently. Additionally, a sense of humour and the ability to connect with people of all ages would make my interpretation more enjoyable and memorable for visitors. Last but not least, a deep passion for aquatic life and the environment would be vital, as enthusiasm can inspire others to care more deeply about the topics being presented. (Luckily for me, I have always loved the ocean and marine life. I have attached some photos of my Dad and me scuba diving.)

References

Beck, L., Cable, T. T., & Knudson, D. M. (2018). Interpreting cultural and natural heritage: For A Better World. SAGAMORE Publishing, Sagamore Venture. 

[adobe-outdesign]

looking at the woodland color in neopets, I can safely say that my most favorite neopet in that color would be the techo. Which other neopet do you think fits that color if you don't mind me asking?

Woodland was released post-customization, but it shares one thing in common with some pre-conversion colours like Maraquan or mutant: the brush has a specific concept, but not any specific or consistent visuals. The amount of variation this brush has is truly insane; some pets are root vegetables, some are shrubs, some are wood carvings, some are tree-based, and some are oddly specific plants you've never even heard of before. Even color palettes, while mostly brown and green, can vary quite a lot.

Because the colour can vary so much, how good or how bad a pet looks in it is almost completely random and depends on both concept and execution. That said, as a whole I do like it as a colour a lot; it feels like it fills a specific niche and a large majority of the designs are pretty good. For example:

Favorite Species:

Techo: Not technically based on a plant at all (other than dried leaves), but instead several gecko species that disguise themselves as foliage, such as the satanic leaf-tailed gecko (yes, that is its real name):

Visually, the palette is monotone, but it does do a good job of using high contrast to break up the design. The leaves themselves are well integrated and feel natural to the design, and the tail's especially fun. Good stuff.

Grundo: This design is honestly incredibly simple compared to other woodland pets, but it works really well. Those ear stalks are just amazing and work perfectly with the Grundo's design, and the rest of the body is just a pleasent green and brown gradient with some leaf veins and a few extra leaves for support. Very nice.

Uni: This one goes in a very different direction than the browns and greens of most woodland pets, instead opting for a lovely off-white and pink palette. The cherry blossom mane and tail are somewhat detailed but not so much to feel overwhelming, and the little colorful accents around the hooves are a very nice touch. My only nitpick is that the extra blossoms at the tip of the horn are a bit too much.

BONUS: I covered this one in my Scorchio review so I'll keep this brief, but the woodland Scorchio is super nice. It's based on the very weird rainbow eucalyptus and shares a palette with that plant, using a black base with some pretty orange and green splotches. The on drawback is the out-of-place twig coming off the head.

Least favorite species:

Moehog: The only drawback to having so much individuality in a colour is that there's inevitably a few Neopets who get the short end of the stick. The Lutari and Poogle were also strong contenders for this spot, but ultimately I had to give the honor to the woodland Moehog for... just being really weird. The leaf mane and tail are perfect as are the wooden nose and ears, but as for the rest of the body, I'm... not even sure what's going on with. Is that supposed to be grass? If so, why it so flat, and why is it textured so strangely? Why does it have real tusks and eyes? Why does it keep the stripes on the back if they're barely visible? These questions and more will not be answered.

[inuvampirechan]

A sneak peak of a WIP side story of my RadioApple story “Let’s make a deal” on AO3! Focused on Michael and Leviathan!

   “Do you regret your choices?” 

   God’s voice echoed loudly in his head, reverberating through his very chest and reaching Michael’s ears. The Archangel had his back turned to his father, his gaze focused on a spot on the white stone walls across from him, the intricate ornate golden lines that traveled through the stone being easy to track. They trailed up the perfectly spotless wall, twisted around in swirling designs, forming the perfect representation of the shape of wings. The distraction did not take awake from his ability to focus on the other being in the room though. 

   Nor did it stop him from pondering the question. Not that he needed long for the answer to come to mind. “No.” Far too easy, far too simple, the answer held no hesitation and not a single inch of remorse was visible in his body. Yet, in the face of God himself, a bit of doubt did start to wedge itself in his heart at the answer. 

   Michael’s lips thinned together tightly, his hands clenching at his side and he finally turned to look at God. Seated in his gold and white throne, a large book in his lap, he wore a suit that matched the colors of the very chair he was always present in. On top of his head, perfectly straight and balanced, was a long top-hat that hid the blonde hair beneath it. His large singular eye was focused on the book he was holding but Michael knew he could see him. With this in mind he voiced his question. 

   “Is that wrong?” He asked, demanded almost, the tips of his nails pressing into his palms. “Are you going to tell me Lucifer was right in this? That not all sins are equal, that not everyone deserves eternal damnation? That they can be forgiven and let up here? That the victims who reside in Heaven should have to share space with the people who harmed them?” There’s a hitch in his words, his voice lowering as that doubt grew more. “That we shouldn’t obliterate their souls and just be rid of them altogether?” 

   There’s the sound of a page turning, loud in his ears and heavy in his chest. His father didn’t look at him, but he had clearly heard every single word. This was the first time he’s turned a page in ten minutes and it doesn’t take God that long to read. “Is there a right or wrong answer to your question? Is there a right and wrong way to view this? Is the Heavenly Order black and white or shades of gray, as Samael worded it. Are all crimes equal and therefore should Purgatory even exist?” The book is shifted in his lap and God finally picks his head up to look at Michael. 

   “I can read your questions as easily as I can read you, Michael. Just as I read them in Samael before he gave Eve the Apple of Knowledge.” That had him tensing up, the thought he was starting to question things like Lucifer. It was a common saying up here; that if you questioned too much like the devil you would fall as he did. None of them want to end up like that, thrown from Heaven for doubting the Heavenly Order. For making the same mistakes as the devil himself. 

   God either didn’t notice his discomfort or didn’t care. “Perhaps you’ve taken on too much lately. You always try to shoulder the weight of Heaven on your own. Why don’t you go and search for your answers rather than asking me. Come back when you can answer my original question without more questions forming in yourself.”