#They're sort of false memories

[kakusu-shipping]

Fuck it, Virtue's Last Reward Self Insert Fic I thought of in the shower. Do whatever you want forever.

"If we are Termites, and our world is a beautifully constructed mound, what does that make you?"

The Anteater in the Lab

There's a man in my father's robotics lab.

He's short, with white hair and really really red eyes. I didn't know eyes could be red. I don't think they're supposed to.

He's been there my whole life. He's never changed.

He doesn't age, his heart doesn't beat, I've never seen him leave to eat or use the bathroom and he's cold to the touch.

At first I thought he was just another robot, one my father built to keep the Gaulem Bay running while he worked on more important matters

"Stay away from that thing!" My father snapped when I'd asked him about it the first time, "Don't trust it, don't go anywhere near it, you understand?"

At the time, I still thought my father had my best interest at heart, so I listened to him.

Mostly.

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

"Hello again, Kyle, Luna's not with you?"

Kyle, who'd put his babysitter Luna to a wild goose chase so he could make this confrontation alone, made sure the door was fully shut behind him before he dared to speak.

"What are you?"

The thing that looked like a man looked up from it's work on the Gaulem laying on the table, and placed it's tools down slowly. Kyle never hesitated with questions he had, in this lab curiosity was a virtue, and the one thing he'd always been rewarded for was seeking knowledge, so of course the anteater had always known this question would come, it was just a matter of when.

Kyle was only freshly 16, two years before he'd have someone to quell his loneliness, to project his need for a nuclear family onto. He'd long sense learned his father doesn't truly care for him, or long sense made such an assumption, and now that he'd reached such formative years he'd begun to act out, though only in the littlest ways behind his father's back.

This was one of those little ways.

The anteater smiled, "What a deep question. What are you, Kyle?"

"I'm human." Kyle answered, stepping heavily across the room until he was on the other end of the repair table, "Unlike you."

His words would come across as harsh to anyone else, but the thing that looked like a man had been watching over Kyle sense the Nonary Game yet to happen and all the way back to his creation. It knew him in ways no one else in this world ever would. It knew he was just being honest.

"Indeed you are. You're as human as Luna is Gaulem." The anteater hummed and reached for his tools to return to work.

Kyle, one slow to anger usually, slapped his armor covered hands on the table, "Don't avoid my question!"

The thing that looked like a man looked calmly across the table to Kyle, it gave a hum and tilted it's head.

"What do you think I am, Kyle?"

"I don't know-"

A finger placed over the part of Kyle's mask where his mouth would be, "Don't give me that. A good scientist always has a theory. Even if it's wrong, I want to hear your thoughts first."

Kyle's face flushed under his mask ever so slightly as he stepped back. He then placed his hand to his chin and thought, before answering, "When I was little... I thought you were a Gaulem, like Luna, put to work to make other Gaulems..."

The Anteater walked around the table and sat himself on Kyle's side, mimicing Kyle's pose, "A good thought. It'd explain my lack of aging and need for nutrients. But,"

"But," Kyle picked up, shifting his weight, "You're cold, whereas Luna is warm, and has a pulse. Plus, according to my father, he specifically made the Gaulems incapable of self repair, so it'd make sense that they couldn't build new Gaulems as well."

The thing gave a chuckle, ""He" made the Gaulems incapable of self repair, hm?"

Kyle blinked for a moment, then shared in the humor of his own statement. He'd learned a long time ago his father had virtually nothing to do with the creation of the Gaulems. Robotics and Bioengineering were entirely too far removed for one man to do both.

No, the real genius of the Gaulems, the AI that ran the facility, and even Kyle's suit was the Not Man sitting before him. His father just laid claim to these creations.

"What else might I be?" Asked the Not Man, crossing one leg over the other.

Kyle thought, his other Hypothesizes were far from perfect, "Well... We are on the moon. While never scientifically proven, space is near infinite, and I would not be surprised if you were some form of extraterrestrial."

"That would explain my advanced intelligence." The man confirmed, "Though I do look a bit too human, don't you think?"

"I would assume to blend in with other humans," Kyle suggested, tilting his head.

"But the only humans in this facility are your Father and you, and you both figured me out right away. Why would I not shed my disguise at that point? Or simply leave?"

Kyle hummed in thought, he could Maybe and What If this train of thought forever, but based on the resistance he was getting from the topic, he could only assume he was on the wrong track.

"Then... You're like my father, an esper who traveled through time to help him with his work."

The Not Man smiled and leaned back, "You're on the right track, but not quiet. If I was from your father's original time here to help him, wouldn't he be more accepting of me?"

Kyle thought back to the first time he'd asked about the man in the Gaulem Bay, and the sharp way his father had responded. He thought about the times he'd only been passing by and he'd heard his father yelling behind closed doors at this not man for interfering.

"Then you're here to... stop him?"

"Would he let me stay if I was?"

Kyle shook his head, he looked rather lost now.

"Not to mention, espers are still human. Your father may not act like it, but he is just as human as you. He needs to eat, and sleep, his heart beats and aches and flutters same as yours."

"Unlike you..." Kyle trailed off and placed his hand to his chin, thinking again.

When he was young he'd remembered reading about Zombies and Vampires, fictional undead creatures in horror stories that felt cold as the dead and who's hearts never beat. That seemed highly unlikely to be true, but it was about all he had left.

The not man stood up, he reached up and removed Kyle's helmet, as he'd done every time Kyle would visit him, and patted him on the head. His hand was cold. It was comforting. It was all Kyle had.

"What I am is something that cares very deeply for you, Kyle. Why I came here, why I help your father, it's because you are very very important to me." The cold hand moved to Kyle's cheek, "Is that enough of an answer?"

Kyle leaned into the touch of the one thing that cared about him most in the world, even if it wasn't human, it loved him. And he loved it.

"For now..."

[phoenixcatch7]

Luo binghe dies.

The system offers the widowed husband resurrection, the ability to continue the world even after the 'true' story has ended. Because the world cannot exist without its protagonist, it comes to a halt. No time will pass until he is revived.

Sqq gets dragged through stories and universes by the system, trying to wrack up the 10,000 points needed. It takes a long time. Far too long. He plays too many roles, spends too years unable to truly settle, goes through so much it all starts to blur together.

Seeing this, an unsatisfying, boring ending without closure getting ever more likely as Sqq continues to fail to remember why he's doing it, the system releases lqg, sqh and the ghost of lbh from the stasis of their world and sends them after him. As the only one with any real understanding of the situation, sqh takes the lead. After chasing his footprints through a handful of worlds (that sqh can sort of recognise, and he adapts rapidly) they are finally find him. But he can't recognise them. He's seen too much, been too much, hidden himself away in more and more layers, not wanting to think if anything outside of the immediate problems. He can only recall the reason he set out in the vaguest terms, deflecting and outright interrupting when pressed.

So lbh manages to pull them into sqq's psyche.

From there, it's like a really big, five dimensional onion. Each role Sqq has taken solidified into another barrier between him and the worlds he was forced to live in and lose in rapid succession. Nothing, individually compared to the world of pidw, but added up they're quite the defence. Inside each layer is a false Sqq hidden in the crowd wearing someone else's face, and an item or location important to that version of him that'll take them through to the next layer.

Each time, they find another thread to the peak lord they lost. Another habit, or memory, or trivia comes back to life. It gets easier and easier to identify him no matter the body he wears. They share stories about him during rests, or moments of travel, to help the others identify him too. They kinda sorta maybe bond.

Then, finally, after a world of zombies and inter sect wars, they find a mimicry of qjp, and Sqq at the table. He's confused but delighted to see them. Even sqh gets hugged. He's shaken at their story, but over the moon at finally reaching 10k points and more than ready to return to reality.

Congratulations! The system says, and offers them their return to the real qjp, with the points needed to save lbh and with it, the world.

Lbhs eager hand on the yes button is clamped in a vice grip.

Sqh is looking at Sqq. Sqq furrows his brows in confusion.

Every transmigrator can see the system. As such, every version of Sqq can see the system.

However.

To the outside world, there is no system. There cannot be a system. To play their role, a transmigrator pretends to not have a system. They do not see a system, they do not hear it, there is nothing there. They play as a native.

This shen qingqiu cannot see the system.

He too is a role.

Lbh presses decline.

They search the house. Fake Sqq, User 002, lets them with mild befuddlement.

In the bedroom, over the bed, they find the rip.

There is a glowing city of glass, a thousand people of every shape and size on the streets. Thousand more race past in cars and buses and trains. By the nature of the dreams, their appearance does not stand out, and they've learned quick how to adapt from the crowd.

They have no clue how to identify him, but for the hundreds of variations they've met. They know his tics, his stance, the way he words his sentences. The way he frowns when confused. By now, they would know him blind and deaf - and they're going to need to.

They split up. They meet back up when the sun starts to go down. Cultivators can work without rest, and they're all highly levelled. They keep searching, unwilling to give up, but they've been doing it for a while, not wanting to pause at the last stretch. They're tired, stressed and jittery from the flashing neon lights and constant roaring sounds and unmoving smog.

A man walks past at 2 in the morning with a luo binghe phone case. A luo binghe key chain. A luo binghe lock screen identifiable from ten paces.

Airplane feels it would be justifiable to punch him.

But he recognises them on sight. Probably. He seems (entirely bro platonically) entranced by his xianxia husband, so it's hard to say.

Congratulations, congratulations congratulations! The system says. Good things should be said three times!

The man startles.

Ten thousand points, lqg says, grabbing him by the wrist. Let's go.

The system doesn't break them out this time. Instead, they treck back to his apartment, where his bedroom computer is the only light.

FIN, it says, and underneath a blinking cursor in an empty comment box.

In the computer, shen yuan says, with the certainty of a dreaming mind.

In the computer?

In the computer, he confirms, shoving sqh forward. The computer is the rip. Aight, sqh says, and reverse girl-from-the-ring's himself back to reality.

He lay on a bed. Looking up: a white, gauzy canopy hung overhead, with finely crafted perfume pouches hanging from the four corners. Looking down: he wore a green robe of an ancient style. Next to the pillow lay a paper fan. Looking to his left: three handsome young men, also in that ancient style.

The one closest to him burst into tears and kissed him full on the lips.

[danlous]

"Armand is Alice and Daniel's wife/s and kids aren't real" has become a popular fan theory (even Luke Brandon Field said he liked it!) but i'd be surprised if it was right. I think it's definitely possible that Devil's Minion will be adapted in the show (though probably not exactly like in the books), but i personally think this whole imaginary family thing would be a poor way to handle the storyline for a variety of reasons. I think a twist like that would probably come across convoluted and (as Daniel might say) like something from a telenovela.

We see children's toys in Daniel's house and he's public figure who many people know with an autobiography and everything. Creating decades worth of false memories for Daniel and somehow also maintaining that imaginary life story for decades wouldn't be enough, Armand or whoever did it would also realistically have to have an absurd level of control over the physical world, public records and many other people's minds to sustain an illusion like that. I also frankly think it would be difficult to avoid having some sexist and biphobic undertones to the idea that Daniel's relationships with women were unreal and meaningless and only his relationship with a man matters.

However, the most important reason why i think Daniel's wives and children should be real is that they make him a richer, more nuanced character and are actually central to understanding him and his motives. He has lived a full and complex life that has been influenced and to some extent defined by his encounters with vampires, but those vampires still weren't his whole life. I think it's more interesting to see Daniel's human life and his relationship with Armand and Louis as something connected and overlapping that both affect each other. We actually learn quite a lot about Daniel from what he says about his partners and children.

This scene - as well as how Alice in general is discussed - reminded many people of how Daniel in the books talks about Armand, such as this famous passage:

Parallels between Daniel's relationships with Alice and Armand in the books are obvious but i think they're just that, parallels. Both the sweet little scene where Daniel is talking about Alice's eyebrows and the book scene where he's talking about loving Armand not despite but because he's a monster reflect in different ways who Daniel is as a person; he feels drawn to unconventional and strange and sees beauty where others might not. He ended up in this situation with vampires too because he wanted to interview people who're rejected by the society.

If Daniel already had some sort of relationship with Armand in the past it makes sense that it would be associated with Alice in his mind. There may be an overlap between the timelines of those relationships. A memory of Armand rises when Daniel is reminded of Alice rejecting his marriage proposal, in the books Armand rejected his wish to be turn him into a vampire, which would've been something akin to marriage. I think Alice being real is much more compelling for Armand's character too, with Armand expressing surprising understanding and sympathy toward Daniel's wife rather than just speaking about his own experience through an imaginary woman.

Completely putting aside Devil's Minion and is it a thing in the show or not, i think Daniel's family is particularly important to Louis' and Daniel's relationship. Something that hasn't technically been explicitly said but to me seems obvious is that Louis and Daniel strongly relate to each other as fathers. Many scenes where we see Louis and Daniel show vulnerability in front of each other have something to do with their partners and children. In 1.02 as one of the earliest examples of this Louis replicates the dessert Daniel had with Alice, trying to connect with him and his humanity through it, Daniel shares personal memory and they eat together in companionable silence.

I would argue that Claudia, her memory, and Louis' relationship with her is the heart of the story in these first two seasons. Claudia entering the story in 1.04 marks the shift in the interview and Daniel's approach; he becomes both more combative and more emotionally invested. He has a strong reaction to reading Claudia's diaries, and it's not difficult for any parent to guess that he's also imagining her own daughters in similar circumstances to Claudia.

I think this conversation at the end of the episode (alongside Louis' speech to Daniel in San Francisco and them remembering it in 2.05) is the most important scene between Louis and Daniel. They share the understanding what it feels like to have children and love them so much you don't even have words for it, but still fail them. It's not a coincidence that in the original interview in San Francisco what leads to Louis attacking Daniel is Louis telling the story of Claudia leaving alone and Louis going back to Lestat, and Daniel acting dismissively and clearly not understanding why this is so painful memory to Louis. Daniel was young, stupid and high - and he didn't have children yet. Daniel now wouldn't act like that when hearing this story, and he doesn't in 1.06 when hearing it again. And notably when Louis says that he would now agree to turn Daniel, Daniel says he doesn't want it anymore and specifically mentions his daughters as one of the reasons. Having to watch your children die before you is the most horrifying thing in the world. It's something Louis had to go through and Daniel wishes he never has to, even if vampirism still intrigues him.

Daniel realizes quickly that it all comes down to Louis' feelings of guilt and shame about failing Claudia and his inability to protect her, because he has similar feelings about his own daughters. Louis' story unravels in s1 finale because Daniel recognizes that Louis' more palatable narrative around what happened with Claudia isn't fully true. Daniel carefully read through Claudia's diaries and tried to learn to understand her, and he positions himself as someone who's trying to defend her integrity and reveal the injustice that was done to her. This is again about Daniel's own children as much as it's about Claudia. He knows that he's a bad father, his daughters don't talk to him anymore and it's implied that he neglected them when focusing on other things that interested him more. When Daniel defends Claudia he's on some level trying to rectify his own mistakes and when he calls Louis out he's also voicing his own self-loathing.

Eric Bogosian remarked that the scene in 2.01 where Louis cries and thanks for Daniel for helping him to remember that Claudia could dream is another shift in their dynamic. Daniel looks at Louis with genuine concern, and after that he tones down his usual sarcasm and jabs significantly. Daniel, again, can sympathize with how important this is for Louis. There's a new sincerity and empathy in their interactions. Sometimes the audience forgets that this story is ultimately about Claudia, but Daniel hasn't forgotten it since he first realized it. They're trying to understand together what happened to Louis' child and everything that led to it. I think if Daniel wasn't a father he would've acted differently, and Louis wouldn't have trusted him in the same way either and been able to share his and Claudia's story. I think this shared sorrow, love and guilt they feel as fathers is one of the most crucial parts of their connection.

[deafmangoes]

I'm not a shipper by nature, just putting that out there. But, uh, Dungeon Meshi does things to me.

Anyway, I've shared my Farcille thoughts, so now to blabber about a different popular ship: Labru. The Hot Mess. The Disaster Couple.

Firstly let's talk about the -bru part of the ship. Kabru is a neurotic little twink with PTSD and anxiety. I don't think that's in any sort of doubt. He exudes an entirely false confidence to hide his crippling self-hatred and survivor's guilt. For some reason, this makes him incredibly attractive to nearly everyone he encounters. Rin has the traditional tsundere crush, his whole party firmly believes in him (more than reflects his actual abilities), the ninjas blush when he smiles at them, even dead-hearted Mithrun warms up to him over time. The omakes take this even further: his landlord cleans his room for him, Dia's fiancé breaks down in tears when talking to him, and Holm's sister clearly wants to get it.

Kabru's not blind to any of this. He weaponises it, really. He's manipulative to an artform! Then he meets Laios. The Monsterfucker.

Laios' sexuality is not immediately clear from the manga. He definitely has a little flame for Marcille - between his awkwardness over touching her, his succubus taking her form, his illusion memory of her focusing on her power and strength - it's not love, I don't think it's even a crush, it's just that "boy sits across the table and stares intently at you" sort of feeling.

He doesn't show any direct interest in men but dearly desires their companionship. He practically kidnaps Shuro and - even though he struggles with Kabru's name at first - takes a liking to him instantly.

So do they make a good ship? Hell no, they're fucking awful together, but it works. Kabru just natually slithers in as advisor, and Laios is more than happy to have someone take all that off his plate. If there's anything there, I think it's one-sided from Kabru, and whatever feelings he has for Laios are based in his total confusion over how Laios just... survives. He finds him fascinating. Intriguing. Possibly sexually. If everyone else is an open book, Laios is the eldritch tome he cannot decipher and will burn him if he touches it. You can see why this ship seems to naturally arise from the canon.

But from Laios' point of view, I think he's... sort of homoerotic asexual? His feelings towards Marcille are more like a fascination with the exotic and monstrous (because she's Not A Tall-Man, and he doesn't want to be one), but his interactions with male companions are much more open and affectionate, even if he's a bit oblivious about it. I think he'd openly appreciate Kabru but wouldn't realise they were in a relationship until literally at the altar.

As another user put it: Laios is a human fascinated with monsters and wants to be one. Kabru sees himself as a monster and is fascinated with humans. They definitely compelement eachother.

[delopsia]

every storm runs out of rain | Rhett Abbott x Reader

Word Count: 17,000 Cross Posted on AO3 Warnings & Notes: AFAB!Reader, Hanahaki disease, soulmates AU, childhood friends to lovers, alcohol, food mentions, vomiting, first kisses, thunderstorms, (temporarily) unrequited feelings, almost kiss, unprotected sex, eventual happy endings 🌹. Vaguely based on the Gary Allan song of the same name. Brief Summary: It's a cruelty you wouldn't wish upon your worst enemy. The perpetual ache of your heart, longing for a man who was never meant to be yours. Everything about him is as if he's made for you, and yet, your tattoos don't match. You're not made for each other.

It's hard to tell if the feelings started with the stuffiness in your lungs or if it's something that has always been there. 

An indescribable sort of longing that has flown beneath your radar for the better half of a decade. The kind of thing that has let you assume a false sense of comfort under the title of childhood friend. 

Best friend, if Rhett has a few drinks buzzing through his system. Two shining plaques with your name written across them in bold letters.

But neither of them are what you and your dumb heart crave. The pride of being called his significant other is a feeling you will never know, so long as your tattoos are around to remind you that they don't match. So, so close in nature, and yet, they're not the same. 

It's a cruelty you wouldn't wish upon your worst enemy. The perpetual ache of your heart, longing for a man who was never meant to be yours. Everything about him is as if he's made for you, so perfect he could fit into your life like a puzzle piece, and yet fate has destined him and you to fall in love with strangers. Not each other. 

Never each other. 

That tickling rises in the back of your throat. Snowballing larger and larger until you can no longer—

A horn blares. 

Your head jerks back toward the street just in time to see the passenger door of an old GMC squeal open. Rhett. Leaned all the way across his bench seat, hair in his face and all. 

"Y' comin' or not?" He chirps, already beginning to impatiently pat on the cloth seat, beckoning you in like he would a stray cat.

In this cold little town, your heart burns a little warmer.

How he got here so fast, you'll never know, but you've never been more thankful for it. Water splashes beneath your feet, darting toward his truck and away from the crowd of people raging on behind you. Up into your designated place in his passenger seat, slamming the door closed before you've even gotten settled, effectively shutting off the thumping music and flashing neon lights.

"How did you know where I was?" Because last you recall, you never told him about where you were headed tonight. 

Rhett just hums, the noise lost to the rumble of his truck engine. "Recognized the floor in the picture y' sent." 

Of course, that would be one of his many odd talents. 

"Being able to identify a bar just from the floor tile might mean you have a bit of a drinking problem, Cowboy," your eyes roll, shifting to rest against the door. 

"Listen," the streetlight catches in his eyes, lighting them up with a memory, "that checkered pattern is cute 'til your head stars spinnin'." 

He's...got a point. 

Ugh. 

The silence that falls into the truck is a comfortable one. It's the kind of quiet that lets you hear the impatient drum of his fingers, dancing to the soft drone of his radio set to an old country station. Backdropped by the sound of water spraying beneath his tires, washing away weeks upon weeks of built-up dirt from the ranch. 

His whole truck could use a good wash, but it won't see a bucket of soap and water until he scores another date with some no-name from the rodeo grounds. Or alternatively, you show up in the middle of the night and scrub it from top to bottom.

Your phone lights up with a text asking about where you went. Sent from some guy you cared so little about that you haven't even bothered to save his number in your contacts. But as you move to unlock the screen, it opens up to a different set of messages. 

You: Nothing quite like being stuck at a bar, waiting on your designated driver to decide she wants to leave. 10:47 PM

Rhett: What's wrong? 10:51 PM

You: I told a guy I didn't want to dance, and he 'accidentally' spilled his drink on me 🙄  10:51 PM

You: But my ride doesn't want to leave for another hour or two. 10:52 PM

You never noticed the message that was sent right after yours. 

Rhett: On my way 10:55 PM

Maybe not every man in this world has gone to shit. 

Rhett's hand bumps into your chest, some kind of gray fabric balled up in his hand, "here."

You've seen this old shirt before; it's the first thing he ever bought online, hadn't realized until it arrived that it was a few sizes too big for him. Not particularly ideal for a cowboy who can get caught on equipment, but perfect for your impromptu sleepovers.

"You still have this old thing?" You're already beginning to tug your damp T-shirt over your head. Potential onlookers be damned, you're ready to be free of the overwhelming whiskey bitterness reeking from it.

The back of his knuckles graze up your naked side, guided by the thin path of a decade-old scar. A branding from younger, brighter days; the ones when Cecelia would let you spend weekends on the ranch. Waking up at dawn to help Rhett with his ranch chores because the quicker things got done, the sooner you got to run down and play in the creekbed. 

"Still can't believe that piece of glass marred ya like that," Rhett mutters after a long moment. You can't see into his thick skull, but you've got a feeling that he's got a similar memory flickering through his mind. 

"To be fair, I did fall on it," slipping your arms through the clean shirt, you pull it over your head, and once again, that old scar is out of sight. 

That half-hearted chuckle sends a warmth rushing through your veins. The exact one that shouldn't be there. But he hasn't the slightest clue of the wildfire sitting next to him, back to tapping along on his steering wheel as he drives through the main stretch of town. Past feedstores, tourist shops, dinners, the grocery store, and every other little niche boutique hidden between. 

"Thank you." You hardly recognize that it's you speaking. Hadn't realized it was your voice until the sound of it met your ears.

It's a little too quiet in this truck.

But Rhett just reaches over to shake your shoulder. "Y' don't gotta thank me for shit like that," for a fleeting second, he's got just enough time to look away from the road and offer you a lazy smile. "'s what friends do, ain't it?"

Your chest feels like it's been stuffed with cotton. Meek, you nod, attention suddenly on the floorboard and nothing else—nothing else to say. 

Yeah. That's what friends do. 

He doesn't make mention of it, but you've got the feeling that your SOS text must have interrupted another one of his dates. A pile of rose petals rests at your feet, scattered as if they've been swept off the seat in a hurry to make space. Caked in mud and the rainwater that tracked in from your shoes. Storebought, that much you know for sure.

Roses don't grow in Wabang. 

The next time you see him, it's planned. 

You have, for some reason, allowed yourself to become roped into the craze of Wabang's beloved Sugarbeet festival. Right smack dab in the middle of some old ranching land that the county bought some years back. It would have been a pleasant idea if the festival was hosted in spring or autumn and not in the blistering heat of summer. Not an ounce of shade to be found, nothing but cheap tents to protect you from the beating sun. 

It's the kind of misery that makes the outdoors feel like a goddamn oven, and heading out to start your car is its own kind of devil. The air jammed in your AC blasts your face with the boiling winds of hell itself. So damn intense that if Rhett's truck weren't crawling down your driveway, you would have canceled and called it a day.

And you're so glad that you didn't, because good lord. 

The last thing you expected was for Rhett to hop out in that unbuttoned flannel, broad chest on display for all to see. The sleeve falls just far enough from his shoulder that you can see the scar hiding below his left collarbone. 

"Quite the festival outfit you've got," you chirp, dragging your eyes away from his bull tattoo and over to a nearby tree, feigning interest. The back of your throat is starting to tickle, lungs tight as you fend off the urge to cough. Not here, not here, not here.

He laughs, "What, y' don't think I look good like this?"

You do, but he doesn't need to know that. Not in the slightest. 

"Its...certainly a choice," faking a grimace, you turn your attention back to your car, slowly but surely growing cooler the longer it runs. A pleasure that Rhett and his broken air conditioning unit haven't known since last summer. 

You don't mind the idea of it staying broken if he keeps showing up at your house looking like this. Even if that does mean that you become his ride on the hotter days, fearing an onset of heat stroke. 

The passenger door is silent as he opens it. No longer squealing due to whatever he and Royal did to it last weekend. Being friends with a family of DIY ranchers has its perks. 

Thunk_

"Shit." 

You blink. Was that...?

Yeah. 

It was. 

As if last time wasn't enough of a lesson, Rhett's got his knees pinned up against your glovebox, the seat too far forward for him and his big body to fit. Though this time, he isn't hurriedly pawing at the seat levers like he'll die if he doesn't get any more space. Instead, he's resigned to a frown. More annoyed with himself than anything.

"You alright there?" 

Rhett's sigh is so heavy that his shoulders visibly deflate. "Yeah," reaching off to the side, pushing the seat back as far as it can go. "Humbled, but 'm alright."

It's toward the end of your drive that you notice the flower petals sitting on your dashboard. Roses, you think. It must be what you get for leaving your windows rolled down all morning, vulnerable to adventurous squirrels and other varmints that enjoy trespassing into property they don't own. 

They're certainly not from you, and you would have asked Rhett if your destination hadn't come up so quickly. Fighting for a parking space in the withered grass is a bigger task than folks let on. Even with folks on the ground, pointing you to the perfect spot, someone will always try to steal it out from under you. 

For a festival in such a small town, there is a hell of a lot going on inside of it. Food trucks, concession stands full of sweet treats, craft booths, and cheap knick-knacks bought offline to resell under the guise of being handmade locally. Apple bobbing, the duck pond, and ring toss. There's a precariously placed dragon roller coaster and a horse carousel that Rhett tries convincing you to get on. 

Worse. There are so many people. Faces you recognize and those you've never seen before. Waiting in lines and shoving themselves between you and Rhett because the small gap between your shoulders looked like a good opening to get somewhere quicker. 

"'s a lil crazy out here, don't ya think?" Rhett's asking through a laugh, once again stepping over to you. Two kids dart between you, their hands occupied with bags of fake goldfish. 

Only took a decade for them to learn not to hand out live fish. You can still remember the three you and Rhett got when you were small. One didn't survive the drive back to his house, and the other two managed to stick around long enough to see New Year's. 

Rest in peace, Goldie Junior and Patches.

"I think it's always been crazy," tilting your head to cough into your elbow, dislodging that goddamn tickling sensation—you look away before you can see what it is. 

There's a girl off to the side, staring in your direction. Or rather, Rhett's direction. Long, wavy hair and a delicate sundress, the kind of woman who looks like she's walked right off the beach cover of a magazine. Her warm gaze has long since settled on Rhett; it's a look you've seen a million and one times at the rodeo. The one that gets him a little weak in the knees.

You look away as quickly as they flickered over there. If you don't make eye contact, maybe she won't come over to introduce herself. 

"We weren't that bad, though," but then, pausing to look at you, concern lacing his narrowed gaze, "...right?" 

Rose-tinted memories flicker through your mind. Rhett falling and breaking his wrist after taking you out on a green horse. Trespassing onto the Tillerson property to play with Luke and Billy, only to get hauled home in the back of a police cruiser, 'cause their momma didn't care much for you two. Getting busted, sneaking out your bedroom window to go spend the night with Rhett. All those times, you had to run through back alleys together because you'd been caught out after Wabang's curfew. 

"I like to think we were relatively well-behaved," concluding after a moment. Though your families may have a vastly different opinion on that. 

Laughter rumbles from you at the same time it does from Rhett, shoulders bumping together. Sends a little shock of warmth rippling through your bones, twisting around your heart like briars.

Maybe the conversation would have lasted longer if you didn't get distracted. Rhett lays eyes on a truck dedicated to a locally crafted beer, and the small frame of a self-serve station from the local candy shop catches your attention. It only makes sense that you would step aside and regroup in a few minutes. You're in desperate need of a breather before that girl works up the nerve to approach him and turns you into a third wheel. 

There's more to this little station than what initially met the eye. It's shelves full of caramel apples, peanut brittle, fudges of every flavor you can imagine, covered pretzels, cookies, and hard candies galore. And here you thought that it would have been wiped clean by the folks who came early in the morning before the sun could reach mind-numbing temperatures. Even your favorite candy is here, the last box left on the shelf.

The price is a little steep, but the flavor of them on your tongue is enough to distract from the pained cries of your wallet. If Rhett knew these were here, then he absolutely would have skipped out on beer in favor of convincing you to split them together—the candy mooch. 

But you must have taken too long to make your decision because you don't see Rhett. Not by the crudely decorated truck, and he said he would be waiting next to the old wooden bench under the oak tree, but it's entirely empty. Not a cowboy in sight. That stuffiness arises in your throat again. 

Maybe he's...

"Hey!" A herd of kids are darting around you. Like a bunch of cats scrambling from the bang of a tractor. One slams into the side of your leg as she rushes past. It doesn't affect her in the slightest, but your feet stumble. Knocked off kilter. Your open container of candy threatens to spill onto the dirt. 

 But then another kid is bursting through the crowd, and this one... 

You recognize this one. 

"Amy?" 

She doesn't need to say a damn thing. Her wide eyes tell all you need to know. 

The crowd is too tall for her to see over it, but as she tugs you along behind her, you've got the feeling that she knows exactly where she's going. Navigating the festival based on terrain alone, over thinly spread gravel, and down a broad dirt path. Her hand clings to your wrist so tightly that her knuckles have gone white. 

You don't know who she's bringing you to or what could have happened. But it has to be something. Perry could have fallen into another one of his rages. Rhett very well may be doing something dumber than getting a DUI on the back of a horse. Or, or—

It's both of them. 

Perry's clawing at Trevor like a goddamn cat. His teeth bared like an animal. Crazed. Feral. Someone's got him by the collar. But it's not doing anything. He barks something incoherent. Jabbing a pointed finger at Trevor. Amy's shoulders jolt. Squeezing your wrist impossibly tighter. 

Plaid shirts scuffle behind them. Cowboy boots and Prada sneakers kick up plumes of dirt. Two brick walls slamming into one another. Caught in a spiral until someone makes the first pull backward. Luke's fist connects with Rhett's jaw. 

Flower petals burst into the air. 

All of a sudden, Luke is jumping backward, his palms raised to the sky. A rare white flag. One that you didn't even know was in the Tillerson arsenal. "I'm sorry, man," is all he can say. Pale as a damn ghost. 

Almost pale as the baby pink petals fluttering onto the dirt floor. 

"Is that..." Amy's the one to break the silence, looking your way as if you hold all the answers. In a sense, maybe you do. "I thought it was a myth?"

Air catches in your windpipe. Feels like you're about to choke. "I did, too." 

What the fight was over, you're not sure. It couldn't have been something serious; they've dropped the issue far too quickly for it to be something worth fighting over. There and gone within the blink of an eye. The Tillerson brothers are dispersing into the crowd without another foul word, Rhett's wordlessly pawing at the fresh red mark on his jaw, and Perry's barking something you don't care to hear. 

Amy's long nails are biting into your skin, threatening to tear through and draw blood, but you can't ask her to loosen up or let go. The sting is half the reason you haven't unraveled like a loose ball of yarn. It isn't enough to stop your lower belly from twisting and turning, a bitterness rising in the back of your raw throat.

"Sorry," Rhett's voice comes so suddenly that you jolt. 

"I leave you alone for five minutes." Your tone comes out blander than you intended, doesn't match the roll of your eyes, deliberately avoiding the sight of flowers lying in the dirt.

He must catch onto it because his frown deepens. But he doesn't say anything, and neither do you. Only offering a wave and a forced smile when Amy ultimately ventures off with Perry for another one of his ice cream apologies. Those seem to be happening more and more lately. 

Hypothetically, someone should say something. Explain what the fight was about, how he got across the festival so damn fast. Was the beer any good? Want to share this candy before your jaw starts to ache like a bitch? The words are flickering through your head a million miles a minute, but not a syllable makes it to your tongue. 

"It's over someone at the bar," Rhett's admission comes in the tune of a guilty child confessing to breaking a vase. Meek. Like he'll fall apart if pushed any harder. "If that's what y' were wanderin'." 

Falling back into the character of annoying best friend is easy. All you've got to do is throw your weight into his side, not strong enough to deliver a playful shove. "So there really is another person stuck with that god awful tattoo," letting your mouth rise into a smile, almost thrilled to be pulling this off so well.

"Hey!" He's pushing you back, laughing, though he's careful not to knock you off your feet this time."'Least mine ain't a shoe."

Defiant, you raise your left arm, the tattoo on your wrist just as dark and bold as it was the day you were born. "It's a lucky horseshoe, thank you very much." 

And just for a little bit, you can deceive yourself into thinking you can still breathe.

You never do put the passenger seat back into its place. It's so far back that you catch yourself thinking it's not there at all; more than once, you clamber into the vehicle and think someone has robbed you of it. A part of you wishes it would happen. That some ridiculous bandit would break in and take that seat. 

It would be doing your dignity a favor; you're acting as if he's dead. 

You passed his truck on the way over here, parked outside the Handsome Gambler. If you weren't worried about wrecking, you would have tried to get a glimpse through the open door to spot him with his shiny new soulmate. 

A good friend would stop in and say hello; if she makes Rhett happy, then you should be happy. It should be on the forefront of your mind; you're three stores down from the bar, but your feeble heart jerks in your chest with a familiar sourness. Hand trembling, struggling to hang onto this little bag of chips. 

A good friend would be happy for him. 

But you're not a good friend. 

And if this cashier doesn't hurry up, you might also become a horrible customer. Your stomach is twisting like you're about to puke, something bitter rising in the back of your throat. Damn near dropping the receipt when she hands it to you, shoving it into the bag, and darting out the open door. 

You hardly make it to the edge of the sidewalk. Keeling over with a wretched noise. 

But the only thing that comes up is the shit that's been lodged in your chest all afternoon, stubbornly sitting in your chest with the weight of a damn elephant. Refusing to move, restricting your airway until you crack, and confess your feelings to a man who was never meant for you. 

"Hey!" 

Bleary, your eyes peel open. Really hope they're not talking to you. 

"I have your sidekick!" Sherrif Joy's voice cuts across the night air like a knife. Swift and straight to the point.

Turning your head might be the thing that puts you on the ground, vision spinning like your eyes have gone loose in your skull. Funny. You can almost deceive yourself into thinking that's Rhett she's towing along.

Maybe because it is him. Boots dragging against the sidewalk, shoulders so loose that they sway in the wind, eyes hardly open, simply led along by the hand Joy has on his bicep. You've got just enough time to paw at your mouth with your sleeve before she's close enough to notice that something may be off.

"I know he's not your responsibility," the glint in her eye suggests she's getting more amusement out of this than she should be. Probably because this wouldn't be the first, second, or third time that she's sought you out. "But he wouldn't shut his mouth when he saw you."

Rhett's grin is too bright for his flushed face. "Hi." 

You don't need to look at your phone to know that it's too damn early for this, and yet, you can't seem to muster up the slightest bit of irritation as you ask. "How are you already drunk at eleven at night?" 

"I—" Hiccup. "Been here all evenin'." Shreds of red rose petals cling to his lips, flaking off with the movement of his mouth and fluttering to the ground like rain.

Oh, Rhett. 

"If you don't want him, I can bring him to the station," Joy always says this, the same damn line over and over, as if she doesn't know what you will ultimately say, "it's no big deal for me." 

Looping your hand through the handle of your grocery bag, you reach out to take Rhett by the wrist. He comes to you easily, long arms reaching out to wrap around you, clinging like an oversized piece of velcro. 

"I'll take him," feigning annoyance is impossible when he's smiling at you like that. Drunk but completely and utterly happy to be with you. 

If only he looked at you this way when he's sober.

Getting him to the car might be the hardest part of this excursion; it takes you and Joy to get him into your passenger seat without banging his head on the roof like last time. But this isn't your first Drunk Rhett Rodeo; Lord knows it ain't Joy's either. It might even break your previous record of five and a half minutes. Not that you were counting.

"Where we goin'?" He chirps the moment you've clambered into the driver's seat. 

"Home." It's the only response you've got. Not entirely sure if he's got the capacity to follow long sentences. 

But his head cocks to the side like a goddamn puppy. "My home, or...home home?" 

Ice forms in your wrist. Suddenly caught before you can turn the key in the ignition. Is he...? It's gotta be. What else would he be referring to? 

"Home home?" More of a question than anything, but he's not sober enough to notice the difference. That grin simply grows a little bigger. His boots kicking against your floorboard, happy as a clam in high water. 

It doesn't fade, either. Even as you get the car going, and he fusses about leaving his truck behind, he doesn't lose the excitement that bloomed the moment he laid eyes on you. Content to sit here and let you drive, looking out the window and commenting on whatever he sees. The crazy lady on Second Street has added more flamingos to her lawn hoard, and someone's mailbox has been knocked over. What does that sign say over there? 

"So what's your soulmate like?" You ask, reaching to turn down the radio. "You haven't said anything about her." 

Rhett's shoulders rise and fall with a shrug so subtle that you nearly miss it. "They're alright," pause. Then, a weary laugh. "I jus' wish they'd like me back."

Yeah. You understand the feeling. 

He doesn't seem to notice the petals clinging to the lower strands of his hair and into his flannel, hanging off the edge of his pocket and accumulating in his lap. They're identical to the ones sitting on your dash, dry and shriveled from the sun, bouncing as your front tire hits a pothole. 

Now that you give it some thought, you suppose that's why he's drunk. 

"My throat hurts," he grumbles out of the blue, rattling you from the sanctuary of your thoughts. 

You hum, not entirely there. "Getting sick?" 

Quiet, he reaches into his flannel pocket, producing a small assortment of something green. Rose stems, their thorns stained with crimson. There's no way that he's...

Your tire smacks the edge of a curb. The steering wheel yanking out of your hands.

Shit. 

Right. The road. 

"You've been coughing those up?" Voice strained by your heart, sitting high in your esophagus. You're so damn lucky that was a concrete curb and not another car. 

And yet, you dare to peer at him through your peripheral. Those stems still resting in his big palm, as if he doesn't have the strength to put them away again. You reckon he's not sober enough to have noticed your mistake. He would have commented on it by now, making fun of it as if he's any better of a driver. 

"Fuckin' hurts," it comes out softly, a confession that his own ears are afraid of. 

And it's the kind of statement that echoes throughout your car for the rest of the drive. Rattling between the pauses between songs and bubbling to the surface at every lull of the music. Clouded over by too many wonderings of how long he's been quietly dealing with the roses growing in his lungs. A condition so extreme that the stems are beginning to come up, too. 

You would ask why he's never told you about this, but...

Rhett's head cracks against the window with a heavy thunk as you pull into the driveway. So sharp and sudden that you fear he's broken the glass. But the only wound to come out of it is the red spot on his forehead, the color already rising to the surface by the time you put the car in park.

"Did that hurt?" It's impossible to ward off the lightness in your tone; a smidgen amused. 

"Nuh-uh," but he's rubbing at it like it does. 

You shouldn't have believed him, either, because by the time you get him through the door, it's already begun to swell. Miniscule at first, but if you give it some time, it'll grow into a proper bump. One that he'll grimace at in the morning but will lie through his teeth when you ask if it's hurting him. 

If he were sober, he would be nipping at your palm for daring to venture near his face; you can hear it now, the prematurely yelped "'m alright!" before you've even opened your mouth. But he's not sober. Has to put his hand on your waist to stabilize himself, not entirely aware of how you're curling your hands around his cheeks, holding him still. 

You don't think this one will rise too horribly, but you've been wrong before. Like how you insisted the cut on your side was just a scratch and wound up needing more stitches than you knew how to count. 

"Will you let me put ice on it?" You find yourself asking, your fingers drifting up to smooth over the bump. 

Defiant, his head shakes. 

"What if I order a pizza? Will you let me then?" Trying again. But even at the prospect of his favorite drunk snack, he's not interested. 

"Ice cream?" No.

"A movie?" Wrong again.

"Two movies?" Nope.

"A promise to never speak of this again?" Nada.

Huffing, you let go of his face, throwing your hands in the air instead. "Is there anything I can bribe you with?"

His brows furrow. A thought flickers behind his eyes.

Slowly, he nods. 

You've got a bad feeling about whatever this could be, but God, it's too late for you to care. "What is it?"

Even if he would have let you go on for the next century, you would have never guessed that he wanted this. 

Here in the soft sanctuary of your cozy little unmade bed, nestled beneath the myriad of sheets and blankets that you swore you'd throw into the washer three mornings ago. There might be a few crumbs left over from your snack last night, too distracted by the video on your phone to notice the mess until it was too late. 

The state of it all would bother you under normal circumstances, but you reckon you're getting contact drunk. Head spinning at the sight of this cowboy, snug as a bug in your bed, his cheek squished against the spare pillow. His arm has wound up draped over your side, over the sheets, and you can't remember when your hand drifted to his face, thumb swiping back and forth over his scruffy, unshaven jaw.

For once in your life, you can breathe.

You've started to forget what that was like.

He's so unnervingly close that you reckon he can hear the hammer of your heart rattling against your chest like a caged animal. Furious. Determined to burst through and spill its contents for him to see. The devil on your shoulder suggests that you should let it happen; chances are, he won't remember any of this come morning. But the soft, whiney voice of the angel reminds you. 

Rhett's got a soulmate. And it isn't you. 

"What made you ask for this, anyhow?" The sound of your voice comes as a surprise; one of those thoughts that have journeyed to your mouth, rather than staying up in your head. 

Those sleepy blues peel open; maybe the slightest bit cross-eyed perfectly matches that crooked little grin. "'s like a sleepover."

There's a word you haven't thought of for a while. Probably hasn't surfaced in your vocabulary since your early teenage years, arising in arguments about how unfair it was that hitting puberty meant no more sleepovers. It was okay before, so why did it become a problem when your ages started ending in 'teen'? 

Hesitant, your attention drifts to the tattoo on your wrist—that not-so-lucky horseshoe. A symbol that only became a problem in your second year of high school when your heart decided that it wanted your best friend over a soul mate. "Like the ones we're banned from?"

"Uhuh," his foot juts out to kick your ankle, "'cause we're too damn old." 

You're kicking him back before you can think twice about it. Old habits be damned; you're not letting him get a shot in without getting one yourself. But he's already fighting back, socket feet smacking against yours. Tangling. Fighting to get one punch in over the other. His leg bangs against your knee. Your hands lightly shove against his chest. 

All of a sudden, Rhett's lurching forward.

The room spins.

And you're lying on your back. Caged beneath the broad frame of a man proven to handle animals over a thousand pounds heavier than you. His hands planted on either side of your head, knees straddling your hips. Long hair strays into his face, slipping out from behind his ears, but it's not enough to block your eyes from locking.

You're itching to reach up and tuck it back into place. To drift your palms across the roughness of his cheeks and trail a thumb over those thin lips. They're bitten to all hell, but try as you might, you can't imagine they're anything other than soft. 

Time itself might have stopped. 

God. You can't breathe. Don't know if it's from the infestation building in your lungs or the overwhelming scent of alcohol on his tongue. 

Or maybe...maybe it's because he's gradually growing closer. Minimizing the gap between your bodies, inch by debilitating inch. An image plucked right out of your own imagination, replayed a hundred and one times. 

But this version of Rhett doesn't belong to you. 

The one in your head didn't reek of whiskey and beer. 

"Rhett..." You're whispering as if anything louder will shatter you like glass. But he's still...he's still leaning in, and, and— "Rhett. You're drunk."

He freezes. Stiff as a board. Eyes so wide that his irises look tiny. 

"Shit," jerking away as if he's been burned, "sorry." 

This time, when his back hits the bed, your belly doesn't fill with butterflies. It fills with something much, much worse. 

It's the silence that eats at you the most. He's right next to you, and yet, not a word can leave your mouth. What if you hadn't stopped him? Did he confuse you for the pretty thing at the bar, wandering around with the same marking as him? Your heart lurches in your chest, tummy twisting sourly. God, why are you even entertaining this sort of thing? 

He's your friend. Friends don't think of each other like this, especially when one of them has a soulmate waiting on them. 

A funny feeling swells in the back of your throat, stomach gurgling so loudly that it's got Rhett tilting his head to look at you. 

"Are y—"

You're getting up before he can finish talking. Darting for the bathroom for the umpteenth time today. 

You wake to an empty bed. 

Sunlight trickles through the cracks in the blinds, illuminating the freshly made sheets that Rhett once occupied, tucked in the best he could get it. He's been gone long enough for them to feel cool to the touch, but you can't hear him moseying around your house, either.

Your bare feet drift across the chilly, wooden floor, still frozen with midnight's temperature drop. Where Rhett would typically bump the thermostat up a couple of degrees, today, it sits the same as you left it. 

"Rhett?" Voice a smidgen too fragile for the hammering of your heart. 

All you receive is an echo, variants of your own tune. His boots are missing from where they once sat by the front door, and when you creep far enough to peer through the kitchen window into the backyard, you don't find him there, either. The ice pack has been resting in the freezer long enough to begin hardening again. 

And your phone left sitting on the counter overnight, contains a notification from everything and everyone, except for one man. Still the same text messages from three days ago, no matter how many times you refresh the page. But the magnetic whiteboard on the side of your refrigerator has a new smiley face on it. 

...and the marker is once again missing.

With a sigh, you reach for the phone, fingers tapping away at the keyboard.

You: Hey, cowboy, you've got something of mine. 09:47 PM

It's not until after you've got a morning drink in hand that you recognize the tire tracks in your front yard. The grass flattened in the corner of your driveway in a fashion that only Perry Abbott can pull off. No matter how many times he's driven here, he's always overshot the turn and ventured into the lawn.

Your phone is still quiet when you cruise through town a little after nine. Rhett's truck is missing from its place in front of the bar, the space now occupied by a vehicle that the Abbotts can't afford. 

 On its own, your heart lurches in your chest. The tail end of a blue pickup is poking out from a streetside parking spot just down the main drag, and that's got to be him. You know this town like the back of your hand. There aren't many trucks that look like Rhett's. If you catch him now, maybe you can smooth things over regarding last night. Before the dust begins to settle and erode away at your psyche—

But Rhett's truck doesn't have stickers. 

This time, you don't make it to the bathroom before that damned sickness overtakes you. Spewing onto the side of the road at the only red light in town, right in front of the old cafe with its outdoor seating. 

A hangover would be more dignifying. At least then, a little old lady wouldn't be tilting her head at you, her kind, wrinkled eyes soft as she offers you a smile. You understand that look more than you'd like to admit. 

It's the same expression you carried when those petals burst from Rhett's mouth. 

You: Hey, cowboy, you've got something of mine. Yesterday.

Odd. Usually he responds fairly quickly, at least when it comes to him hijacking one of your belongings, but maybe he's busy. Summer has never been kind to the Abbotts, between blistering heat and cattle who love to take down the southern fences to get at the neighbor's grasses. Judging by the forecaster rambling on the news, things aren't about to get easier, either. 

You: Hey, cowboy, you've got something of mine. Two days ago.

You: I'll give you a hint. It writes in purple ink. 07:33 PM

No dice. 

How are you meant to leave reminders in the kitchen when a rogue cowboy has pocketed your only marker? It's barely been three days, and you've already started to forget things. Today was laundry day, but now you're standing here, swaddled in Rhett's oversized shirt because it's the only clean thing you have left. Maybe there is a benefit to not returning his clothes. You were meant to go get a spice for this new recipe but didn't remember until you were halfway into working on it. Come to find out, that recipe really, really relied on it. 

You can try to blame your lack of an appetite on your cold, unseasoned dinner all you want, but it only goes so far. Heart lurching in your chest, as the screen lights up with a text.

Autumn: Still coming with us Friday night? 👀 07:51 PM

 You: Hey, cowboy, you've got something of mine. One week ago.

You: I'll give you a hint. It writes in purple ink. Five days ago.

You: I'm going to call a bounty hunter if you continue this hostage situation. Three days ago. 

You're getting sick of feeling your heart twist every time you look at this damn screen. But that stupid son of a bitch still hasn't—

"Excuse me," a lady whispers, squeezing past you, "I'm sorry." 

The entrance of Odessa's probably isn't the best place for you to be checking your phone, now that you think about it. 

That's alright; you're already sliding the device into your back pocket, reaching to catch the door before it can close behind her. You've wasted enough time for your friends to have already secured a spot at the Handsome Gambler. It's a wonder nobody hasn't given you a ring to make sure you weren't nabbed off the street. 

Stepping outside does nothing to ward off the drone of multiple shop televisions. All of them moan about how another wicked storm is due to ravage Wabang and every town around it. Same channel. Same woman talking. Same obnoxious blue background. It's a tale you've heard so many times that you can nearly quote it word for word. 

There's a serious storm rolling in tonight. Tornadoes and hail are possible. Here's what to do in a tornado. Do not do these five things in a tornado. Download the news app to stay connected. Tune back in soon to find out if the forecast has miraculously gotten better or worse! 

Looking overhead, you can already see the dark accumulation in the distance, a humid breeze tickling your neck as it drifts past. It feels just like the night you and Rhett rode out into the west pasture to watch the storm roll in. 

Sitting in the grass, watching those dark gray clouds roll closer and closer whilst the horses relaxed behind you, their attentions focused solely on the greenery below. You can still hear the tune blaring from the speaker of his phone. He'd really thought he was clever, playing that Gary Allen song about how every storm runs out of rain. It wasn't so cute when the south pasture flooded. 

A laugh cuts across the evening air. Sharp and pitchy enough to have your head tilting in the direction of it. Right behind you, on the corner of the block. 

Maria Olivares. That's a face you haven't seen in a long while. Wasn't she off to medical school, a couple hours away from here? Who in the world could she possibly be...

You know that cowboy. 

Puzzle pieces click into place. The darkened mark gracing her inner wrist. Too small for you to make out. How she giggles and batts her eyes up at Rhett, as he talks about something in that wonderfully deep voice of his. 

Of course, Rhett's soulmate would be Maria. How could it not be? No wonder why he was so crazy about her in high school; they've got the same damn marking on their bodies. 

As if to spite you, a muscle spasms in the juncture of your wrist. Sourness bubbles in the back of your mouth, but for once, you're able to swallow it down. Not here. Not when either of them can turn their heads and realize that you're standing in the middle of the sidewalk, staring like some kind of creep. Even coming from a childhood best friend, that would be weird. 

"Are you in line?" 

You jerk backward. Wide eyes landing on the wirey frame of some middle-aged man standing in front of you. He motions, with the brim of his hat, toward the door. The Handsome Gambler. Your destination.

"Distracted," you blurt, scurrying to grab the handle before he can, "sorry."

"There you are!" A glass of beer rises from the opposite end of the bar. Autumn. "I was fixin' to come looking for you!"

You have to wait until you're within earshot before you can respond to her, squeezing past the group of cowboys crowded at the corner, watching a PBR ride on someone's cellphone. "I was eavesdropping," You supply, can't keep a damn thing to yourself these days, "Maria Olivares must be Rhett's shiny new soulmate."

Autumn's jaw slackens, eyes so big they might comically burst out of her skull, "are you kidding?" 

One of her friends, you forget her name, gives you a gentle nudge with her arm. You suppose Autumn has already filled her in about your situation. "How did you find out?" Her tone is gentle, nearly washed over by the music blaring from the stereo. 

"Saw them laughing together in the street." There's more to that statement, context, and a reason behind why you've come to that conclusion, but Autumn is taking a brightly colored drink from the bartender, passing it your way.

The Handsome Gambler and mixed drinks do not go hand in hand; there's always too much or too little of something. But out of the corner of your eye, you can see the door opening, two familiar frames entering the bar, the happy new couples themselves. 

Tonight, you don't give a damn what these things taste like. So long as it makes you forget the sour twist in your chest, lungs tightening as if all the air has been sucked from them. Without second thought, you bring the glass to your lips.

It doesn't leave until it's halfway empty, and that's only because the need for oxygen has grown superior. 

The lady behind the bar lifts a freshly cleaned shot glass. You've got a feeling that she's overheard your ramblings. "Need something stronger?"

She doesn't need to say another word. "Absolutely." 

One shot. 

Fuck this town.

A second. 

And fuck Rhett Abbott. 

You're feeling delusional enough to ask for a third, but Autumn's nudging you a glass of water instead. It doesn't have the same bite, but it's equally unpleasant against the back of your throat, still raw and sore. 

Next to you, Autumn and her two friends are already delving into a new conversation. Something about the oddities going on around town and how some old man says he walked into a cave and saw a mastodon. You suppose there must be some inside group dedicated to continuing the claim because it's a rumor you've heard every year. 

A smile fights its way onto your face. You and Rhett used to gear up and go mastodon hunting up on the old trails behind the Abbott property. Royal loved to ask what y'all planned to do with it once you caught it, but you and Rhett never thought that far ahead. 

Your gaze follows the bartender, ready to ask for something sweet, but she's on the other end, gathering a dozen beers for a party that just walked in. Someone leans onto the bar. His head blocking part of your view. But then he looks over, and—

Rhett's eyes widen at the sight of you. By the feel of it on your face, the expression is mutual.

At least, it is for a second. That sourness jumps into your throat. Lower gut churning with a fervor unlike ever before. 

"I'm heading out back," you blurt, hand rising to cover your mouth, "you don't wanna follow." 

The girls frown, but they're certainly not making the risk to stop you. Autumn's already reaching for your drink, accepting your nod as a sign that she can finish off what you've got left. A voice jumps across the blare of the music. Almost sounds like the call of your name. But you don't have the luxury of stopping and looking. 

Your feet are barely falling into line. Rushing to push through the men gathered by the back exit. Past the blasting jukebox. There's that tightness in your lungs again. A thick sensation rising higher. Higher. Higher in your throat. There's the door. There's the door. Your hands are reaching out. Grappling at the handle. 

Hinges squeal open. Shoes scuffing on the concrete. 

Vivid purple petals burst past your lips like goddamn confetti. Stems and all. Ripping past your already battered windpipe and sticking to your tongue, little bits of purple carrying in the wind. 

Those three-petalled flowers were pretty until they started growing in your lungs. You can't stand the sight of them, but you've got no choice but to cough more of them up. As if any amount of effort will make them disappear. 

 A bundle of them have caught in the back of your mouth, stubbornly thwarting your ability to breathe. Light as a feather, your head spins, feet stumbling as you scurry to one of the chairs, sitting against the wall. The plastic groans under your weight, so brittle that it ought to give away at any moment.

Lightning flickers as another wave of flowers rain to the floor, and it's a wonder you can get these out at all. 

The back door opens with a screech. Music pours through the gap, an incoherent tune so loud that you can hardly hear the thunder rolling through town. Someone in boots stumbles out, keeling over.

A bloodstained rose tumbles to the ground, pink and red petals dancing behind it, landing amongst your mess of purple. 

When you lift your head, you know what you're going to see. But that doesn't make the look in Rhett's eyes any easier to bear. Some kind of hellish cross between horror and bewilderment that manages to look akin to a wounded puppy. 

Not a word leaves his mouth. Doesn't get the opportunity to, for that matter, another plume of petals forcing their way past his lips before he can do anything about it. Just the sight of them has that tickle building in the back of your throat, but for the time being, your tank is empty. 

Thunder booms as Rhett falls into the chair opposite you. His hand dips into his flannel pocket, producing...

your marker. 

"'m sorry," he mutters, sentence broken by a cough, "Didn't realize I stuck it behind my ear 'til you texted me."

"Which time?" You can't help the bitterness seeping into your tone, plucking the little writing utensil from his outstretched hand. 

His eyes dart away. 

The tension in the silence doesn't come from the storm. Wind howling around the corner of the building, rustling through the trees. Lightning flickers, illuminating the world around you for the briefest of moments, and just like that, rain begins to fall. Coming down in a thick sheet, so strong that even under the awning, it manages to reach you, mist tickling your skin and dampening your clothes.

Idle, your fingers twist the marker back and forth; it's still warm from where it rested in his pocket, snug against his chest. A part of you wonders if he always runs this hot or if your hands are just cold from the Wyoming air.

"So you and Maria, huh?" Even with the roar of the storm, your voice is too loud; a megaphone in the library would be more tolerable. 

"Nah, I just ran into her 'bout a half hour ago." Rhett's head shakes, eyes on the floor. "We were both goin' to the same place, 'n that was about it."

"Damn, and here I thought she was your soulmate." You hate that a selfish part of you floods with relief. So overcome with it that you can feel the way your shoulders drop. "It would have made for the perfect story."

You could have been the perfect story, too.

"I don't know why I liked her in high school," he's continuing, running a hand through his hair, fingers visibly catching on a tangle, "'s like talkin' to a fuckin' wall."

Of all the things you've imagined him saying, that wasn't even close to making it on the list. Though, you can't say he's entirely wrong; ever since that time you got paired with Maria for a history presentation, you haven't been able to see what's so interesting about her, either. Nothing but one-word answers and giggling with her friends while you worked on the assignment by your lonesome. 

It may be petty, but you're still bitter. 

"I'm sorry, I..." Rhett's talking again, caving to the silence that you've unintentionally put between you two. His hands fall into his lap, clasping together. Then, break apart just as quickly, one of them reaching up to rub at his forehead. "I shouldn't have tried to kiss you the other night."

"It's alright—" your tongue pauses before the rest of your sentence can follow. I wanted you to. But you're looking down at your tattoo, and it's still the same horseshoe. It doesn't match Rhett's. 

It will never match Rhett's. 

Finding your voice is damn near impossible, but you do it anyway. "You've done stranger things while under the influence." 

"Like gettin' a DUI on the back of a horse?" He says it so bluntly that you can't help but sputter. 

It's easy. Dissolving into laughter. Peering at each other through smiling eyes. Yeah, getting a DUI on horseback is much, much worse than trying to steal a kiss. You've still got the voicemail from when Joy called you in the dead of night, asking you to come get Rhett and his horse. 

White flashes. Lighting up the world for the briefest moment. An ear-splitting crackle erupts from above. So loud that the town lights flicker in unison like a bunch of candles nearly blown out by the squealing wind. 

"'s gettin' pretty bad out here." The sound of Rhett's voice is nearly lost to the ringing in your ear. 

"Tell me about it," you lean forward, peering over at the miniature river that runs down into the alleyway, carrying with it a parade of purple, pink, and red flower petals. "The road'll be flooded by the time Autumn decides she's ready to leave."

Rhett's head tilts to the side. "You didn't drive?" 

"Couldn't." Shocker, you know. "I had a hot date with a shot of whisky."

"Two from what I saw," so he was watching you do that, huh?

You wink. "I would have made it three if I knew you were watching."

Something crackles in the distance. Maybe a tree struck by lightning, bits of bark falling like rain. A little too close for comfort, whatever it was.

That tickling rises in the back of your throat once more. Forces another cough out of you. The purple petals catch in the wind before they can hit the ground, soaring off like tiny planes. Rhett's eyes follow them until they're out of sight. 

All of a sudden, he rises to his feet, spurs chiming with the motion. Must have forgotten to take those off again. "Need a ride?" Offering his hand. 

You take it before you even realize what he's asking. 

A part of you is beginning to suspect that Autumn can see into the future because she's hardly phased when she turns her head to see you meander back into the bar, hand in hand with Rhett. Her white teeth flash you with a smile, perhaps a little too interested in whatever Billy Tillerson is babbling into her other ear. With their hands intertwined, you can hardly tell that they've got timers imprinted on their wrists, bearing identical numbers.

Autumn doesn't need to ask when you hand her the twenty from your pocket; in the time you've known each other, you've proven to be a creature of habit. Instead, she offers you a wink, not a word said. 

Rhett's already by the door, working his beat-up wallet back into his jeans before he can set it down and forget that it's there. "Y' ready to get wet?" He chirps once you're within earshot. 

You're not, but there's no stopping the rain now that it's coming down. "Ready as I'll ever be." 

The door creeks open. A gust of wind rushes in through the gap. Slams you with the force of a freight train. Damn near strong enough to knock you on your ass. But Rhett's grabbing hold of your wrist and him hauling you forward is the only thing keeping your feet from being swept out from under you. 

Freezing rain splatters against your skin like a million tiny bullets. So sharp you think they might pierce through and come out the other side. A sheet of white blinds you. Forced to lower your head and prey Rhett's hauling you the right direction. The sidewalk is already flooded. Splashing up to lick your ankles. Soaking through your shoes. 

You're moving. You know you're moving. But you might as well be on some hellish treadmill because it doesn't feel like you're going anywhere.

All of a sudden, Rhett's pulling you to the right. Toward the curb. Reaching for the handle. Yanking so hard you can hear it over the rain. 

It opens. You're inside within the very same second. Clambering into the cloth passenger seat, pulling your legs in, just as Rhett slams the door shut. Through the blurry dash, he's only identifiable as a big blue splotch, travelling around the front of his truck. His door rips open just as quickly, the vehicle rocking as he all but throws himself inside.

"'s fuckin' cold!" He sputters, blindly jabbing the key at the ignition. Miss. Miss again. Another miss. He tilts his head. It slides home. 

It's been a minute since the last time you heard this old truck roar to life. Even longer since you've last felt your skin go this numb. Shivering like a leaf, nerves so ruthlessly beaten by the elements that they're shot. There's a texture to this seat. You know there is, but you can't feel it. 

A weary hand darts out. Wavering back and forth. Narrowly misses the little heat dial.

"Ain't got heat, remember?" Rhett almost sounds guilty, though you can't say for sure. It's hard to get a read of his face when he's focused on putting the truck into gear, looking straight ahead as he pulls onto the road. Though you're not entirely sure why, he's still got that old—

...no. His spare shirt is still sitting in your clothes hamper, next in line for a wash. Even if you had miraculously known to carry it with you tonight, there's no way it would have done you any good. Not with how soaked your clothes are, dripping like you've just gone for an impromptu swim in the coldest river you could find. 

Your arms rise to wrap around yourself, clinging to what little body heat you've got left. A jacket. Why didn't you think to carry a jacket? Lightning flickers. Crackling so loudly that you can feel it travel through the ground; almost sounds as if it's laughing at you. 

Even in the safe confines of this truck, the win threatens to wriggle in and get ahold of you. Screaming around the truck. Whipping past light posts. Rattling them so hard that they sway back and forth. Something is telling you that a power outage is in your near-to-distant future. With how you can look out the back window and see it ravaging the main part of town, there's no way it's not going to take out a power line. One little mess up is all it takes to plunge this little town into darkness. 

There's already a tree down. Its long branches obstructing part of the road, forcing Rhett onto the other side to squeeze past. 

"'m I over far enough?" He sounds like he's got a handle on it, head tilting back and forth, drawing the truck closer and closer to the edge of the road. 

Your eyes squint. Struggling to see through the window. "I think so."

It's an obstacle easily overcome, but as you begin to pick up speed once more, a new problem arises. Those poor little windshield wipers can hardly keep up with the rain. Coming down in sheet after sheet, splattering against the glass quicker than it can be swept off. Driving in the ocean would have better visibility.

"Can't fuckin..." Rhett's talking to himself. You hope he's talking to himself because you can't hear him over the chatter of your teeth. Trembling like some kind of exaggerated cartoon character.

The truck gently veers to the right, off into some kind of gravel space on the side of the road, grinding to a halt.

"The— the wipers can't go any faster?" Tongue limp in your mouth. Impossible to move.

Rhett's head shakes. "No, they don't..." 

His eyes lock onto yours. Even that might be enough to eat away some of the ice forming in your bones. His jaw softens. Eyelashes fluttering with an incoming thought.

Slow, his arm rises from his side, extending your direction. "C'mere."

Your breath catches. Is that...no, you....you shouldn't—

"Promise I won't kiss ya," his fingers tap your shoulder, "'m jus' gonna warm ya up."

Another bolt of lightning flashes. 

You're scooting across the bench seat before thunder even has the chance to arise. Slipping beneath his outstretched arm, helpless to do anything but fall into his big chest, equally soaked as you are, but he's warm. A big furnace, wrapping around and squeezing you into him. 

He shifts the slightest bit, leaning against the door, opening himself up for you to properly squirm into his side. With such little space in this truck, it's a squeeze, but you fit nonetheless, cheek resting atop that old bucking bull tattoo, the scruff of his jaw tickling your forehead. 

Another rumble rolls through, wind slamming into the side of the vehicle, rocking it back and forth like some kind of giant cradle. Rhett's legs shift, properly rising up onto the seat, knees knocking into yours as they settle. There's no way that you can feel his body, not with those thick jeans in the way, but a part of you swears that you can. So certain of it that you think the ice in your bones is beginning to thaw.

A big, warm hand runs up and down the expanse of your arm as if to create a little friction there. "Can y' still feel your hands?" He murmurs, voice rumbling against the top of your head, and you think that's the tip of his nose bumping into you.

You're wiggling your fingers, can see them moving in the darkness, but hardly any sensation comes of it. Feels as if you're operating a separate object and not a part of your own body. "I don't know." 

He reaches down, both hands wrapping around yours, and immediately, it's as if you've been set ablaze. Fire burning in your frozen joints, sensitive to even the slightest change in temperature. Rhett's thumb swipes against yours, a rough glide, his skin weathered by a lifetime of labor on the ranch. 

They're so much bigger, too, dwarfing yours in comparison, long and thick with muscle and built-up callouses. He must be noticing it as well because he's sliding his index finger down next to yours, and even in the dark, you can tell that he's at least twice the size. So big that you can hold just the four of his fingers, and not even need the rest of his hand.

You don't know why you're doing this or why he's letting you. 

Careful, your gaze crawls upward, roaming over the wet fabric of his flannel, up his damp neck, and the dripping curls resting at his nape. And he's...

he's already looking at you. Half-lidded eyes fixated on your face, the corner of his lip twitching upward for the briefest moment. A tickle rises in the back of your throat. Nothing comes of it. Lightning lights up the world like a light switch flicked, but you don't hear the thunder that follows. 

His nose bumps into yours. Breath fanning out against your skin. 

This...you shouldn't...but...

Those blue eyes drop down to your lips. Then back up to you. His eyelashes flutter. You think yours might, too. He's so close. Can feel the stubble on his chin brush against you, a fleeting thing that you can somehow still feel, even after the contact breaks. A breath trickles out of your chest. The slightest little movement that brushes your bottom lip against his. And he's not moving away, he's—

An ear-splitting boom tears past the truck. Rattling it back and forth. Sends you and Rhett jumping. Your head bangs against the seat cushion. His elbow hits the horn. 

"The hell..." he grumbles, with a shake of his head. "Was that s'pposed to be thunder?" 

"Is that what it was?" Parroting him, looking toward the window as if that could possibly give you an answer. 

The rain has slowed into a slow trickle that is easily swept away by the windshield wipers, unveiling the world around you once more. You recognize where you're at now, just two or three miles down from your house.  So damn close, and yet...

"Let's get you home," Rhett's sitting up, and you've got no choice but to do so as well. The scoot to the passenger side is almost shameful, the cold, soaked seat squishing beneath you like a sponge. 

A thick collection of petals swell in the back of your throat as Rhett's foot finds the gas pedal once more. Were you about to kiss him? What the hell were you thinking? That isn't how this works. You're not soulmates.

Somehow, the air has grown even colder without him wrapped around you, his very presence haunting you like a ghost. Lingering in the back of your mind so strongly that you can almost deceive yourself into believing that you're still snuggled into his side. But no matter how hard you focus, you can't force it to manifest into reality. 

Cruel is what it is.

Even as the rain picks up once more, it's not enough to pull you over again, swept away from the windshield as quickly as it lands. There's another tree down, but it has barely made its way into the road, such a simple obstacle that only takes a second or two to get past. And just like that, your porch light is emerging in the distance. A golden glow that grows larger by the second, like a tiny sun rising to greet you.

The gravel driveway crackles beneath the tires; it's usually a pleasant sound, but today, all it does is cause your stomach to sink. Such a sour feeling that it rises, flower petals tickling the back of your throat until you cough. Little bits of purple scatter across your lap. Rhett's foot jumps to the brake pedal, a soft squeal emitting from beneath the vehicle as it comes to a stop. 

You've never been so disappointed to see your front door. 

"Thank you," barely a whisper as it leaves your mouth. Anything louder might break you.

He nods, eyes darting from your lap and up to your face. "Yeah." 

The only sound in the truck is that of the frozen rain pitter-pattering on the metal roof. Nothing more. Nothing less. With a forced, tight-lipped smile, you reach for the door handle. It opens with a groan, creating just enough space for you to slip out, the oversaturated ground squelching beneath you. He doesn't say anything as you shut the door, so neither do you. 

Resigned to silence, you trudge through the rain. Wind rips past, determined to lift you up off the ground and whisk you into the sky. But you don't lift off the ground. You don't even slip. Your feet find the front steps of your porch, hand fishing into your pocket and producing a set of drenched keys.

The confines of your home are so much warmer than it was outside, and yet, as you toe off your muddy shoes, you can't help but compare it to Rhett. Your heater may be strong, but it doesn't wrap around you the way his arms did. Big. Secure. The kind of thing you thought only existed in your daydreams. 

Strange, you don't hear his truck pulling out of the driveway. You know he hasn't; that old GMC runs far too loudly for it to slip by unnoticed. Curious, you hook your finger into the blinds, pulling them down.

No, he hasn't moved at all.

...what's he doing out there? Even from here, you can tell that the storm is picking back up again, rustling through the trees, swaying them back and forth. 

Nothing has fallen or otherwise obstructed the driveway, and something couldn't have gone wrong. Not that quickly. Unless he's suddenly developed the ability to hear your heart hammering against your chest, wordlessly begging him not to leave your driveway, there's no reason for him to still be parked. 

The cab light flicks on. Then off again. All of a sudden, he's rounding the back of his truck. You're opening the door, socked feet stepping out onto the cold, wet porch. His spurs chime, boots thumping up one stair. Two. Three. Four. No, no, something must have happened. His eyes are wide, and his jaw is slack, looks half scared to death. 

But he's not stopping. 

"Rhett—"

"I forgot somethin'." One more step, and he's leaning down, and, and...

It's the simplest of things, merely pressing against each other for a long moment, but heaven itself cannot compare to the feeling of Rhett's lips against yours. His nose crushed uncomfortably against your cheek, big hands cradling your cheeks like you'll break if he doesn't. 

Just as quickly, he draws away, soft blue eyes meeting with yours. Lightning flashes, but even the following slam of thunder cannot stop you from grabbing a fistful of his flannel and yanking him in once more. Lips crashing together, feet stumbling with the force of it. One of his arms is wrapping around your waist and your hands are sliding up into his hair. Bold. As if this is familiar, something you've done every day of your lives. 

The press of his mouth and the stubble of his chin are so much more than your imagination ever could have crafted. Warm and scratching against you so deliciously that your head goes quiet. Soul mate markings be damned. This is where you're meant to be. Right here. Twisting your fingers through his unruly curls, gasping against him. Drowning as he kisses you again, and again, and again. 

Your head is spinning. Stumbling blindly as he leans into you, forcing you backward. Your heel catches on the doorway. "Rhett—" But you don't fall. You can't. Not with that strong arm around you. "Cowboy!" 

"You're the only one that's ever called me that." He breaks away, kicking at the door with his foot. There's no doubt a mud stain on the white frame now, but you've hardly got it in you to care. 

"What?" Your nose bumps into his cheek. A little too close.

"Cowboy." He mutters, lips brushing against yours. So, so close. 

A breath hitches in your throat. "Should I stop?"

"Never." And he's kissing you again. 

Muffled thunder rumbles outside, and you're pretty sure the power has gone out, but you can't open your eyes to check. Helpless to do anything but tug on his hair, drinking in his deep grumble like you're starved. You should be embarrassed. Shouldn't be this desperate over a first kiss. 

But Rhett's got it just as bad. Pushing you backward until you're bumping into the wall. His big, calloused hand is venturing beneath your soaked shirt. God, and you're letting him. Back arching as his fingertips trail up your spine, chest pressing into his. Gasping against his lips like you're trying to put on a show. 

More. You want more. Reaching down to toy with the buttons on his shirt, undoing them one at a time, shaking fingers struggling to push them through the holes. Too eager to feel the expense of his chest beneath your palms. 

"You're gonna have t' stop me," Rhett's speaking against your lips, batting your hands away. Makes no effort to finish your handiwork as he yanks the flannel off his shoulders, the final three buttons snapping off and scattering across the hardwood floor.

Before you can stop it, your hand drops to his belt, pulling him closer. Earns you an affectionate chuckle that echoes throughout the house. Those hips of his press forward, obnoxiously large buckle digging into your belly, not an inch of space left between your bodies. 

"Why would I stop you?" It's too early for you to be reaching down to grab at the hem of your shirt, but you don't care. You want this damn thing off. The soaked fabric stubbornly clings to your frame, heavy as you drag it over your head. It hits the floor with a wet thunk, a mess for the future version of you to handle. 

Those deep blue eyes might eat you alive. "Good point." 

It's hard to tell who makes the next move. All you know is that you're leaning in to kiss him, noses crashing together, and his hands are appearing on your ass, squeezing until you get the hint to jump. It all happens so fast. The thunk of your back against the wall. His hips slotting between your thighs. 

"Y' feel what you're doin' to me?" He grunts, and he doesn't need to specify for you to know what he's talking about—heavy bulge straining against his jeans, pressing perfectly against your core, igniting a familiar heat there. 

"Uhuh," is all you're capable of. Greedy hands sliding across his chest and up his shoulders, feeling over all the little freckles and marks that have haunted your imagination. Fuck, and he just lets you. Too busy leaning in to steal a kiss off you. One. Two. Three. Before he shifts to the juncture of your jaw, stubble tickling as he kisses down your neck.  

Your hips buck forward. 

"Fuck," Rhett's voice tickles your ear, "shoulda let me kiss you earlier, sweetheart."

A shiver ripples down your spine. That's new. 

Your mouth opens, but nothing comes out. Finding your words is a task in of itself. Hard to do much of anything when his lips find the soft spot beneath your ear, sucking lightly. 

"You were drunk," voice strained, wound too tight in your throat. 

"Felt pretty sober in the moment," He hums, tongue poking out to wet your skin. Fuck, you wonder what that would feel like in other places, thighs squeezing impossibly tighter around his hips, works a groan right out of him. 

Thunder booms outside, but it's not enough to stop your lips from crashing once more. Teeth clattering, hopelessly grinding down into him, and even these layers of clothing can't stop you from feeling the way he twitches. 

It's all a blur. 

One moment, you're up against the wall. The next, you're on the ground again, socks sliding against the floor as you stumble down the hall. Hands tangled in his hair. Gasping against his lips. Moving blindly, too focused on each other to spare even a second. You don't know you're in the bedroom until the backs of your knees hit the edge of the mattress, falling backward with a yelp. 

Fuck, you shouldn't be doing this. There's no reason for you to be letting Rhett Abbott climb into bed with you and slot his big, warm body between your legs. He's your friend. You've known him since you could walk. And these tattoos. They don't match. You're not soulmates. 

Rhett's hand rises, pinning yours to the mattress, fingers slotting together. Must know what you're thinking about. "Who gives a fuck 'bout soulmates," he whispers, leaning forward to bump his nose against yours, rubbing them back and forth. "A damn stranger ain't gonna make me as happy as you do."

And you don't...you don't know what to say. 

Maybe you don't need to say anything because he kisses you like he's heard everything your heart has to tell him. Stealing your breath away, plucking every little flower from your lungs, so dizzying that your legs have to curl around him to keep from floating away. As if you could possibly escape the big, warm arms that have settled on either side of your head. 

Slow, his weight settles on top of you. Bellies snug together. So close that you can hardly grind up into him, reduced to a needy squirm, whining high in your throat. 

"Shh," he coos. A big hand curling around your cheek, thumb stroking the thin skin there. "I'll take care of you."

He's already making good on his promise, pulling away to kiss down your neck once more. Hot tongue poking past his lips, running over a vein, leaves behind a glistening trail as he makes his way to your collar. One of his hands dips behind your back, pinching the clasp of your bra, opens it so easily that it almost surprises you.

The last thing you expect is for him to gasp when he pulls it away. Awestruck by the sight of you, bare, for his eyes only. "So fuckin' pretty," whispering, as he kisses down your chest. Too eager to run his tongue down the swell of your breast, so content that his closed eyes seem to smile. 

Oh, that's...

"Rhett..." Heat swells in your lower belly. The feeling of his tongue swirling around your nipple is...truly something... 

Just as quickly, he's darting to the other one, all too excited to feel the little bud harden beneath his touch. Sensitive. Only takes the slightest bit of suction to make you jolt. But he must have noticed something even more enticing because he's pulling away from that one as well, a big hand rising to toy with it as his head dips down lower. 

A delicate kiss presses to the scar on your left side. 

Then another. And another. And another. Loving on the old wound, as if he can possibly reverse the damage if he gives it enough attention. Maybe just one more kiss will do it. If not, then surely the next one can make it happen.

"It was nobody's fault," you say softly, reaching to run your fingers through his hair once more. Truly, it wasn't. Nobody could have anticipated that shard of glass. 

"I know," the rumble of his voice tickles, pausing to run his tongue up the expanse of the mark, "jus' wish it didn't hurt ya like it did."

Gradually, he draws himself away from your side. Kissing his way down your belly until he meets the thin, delicate band of your underwear. His eyes peer up at you with a silent question. Your answer comes in the form of lifted hips, allowing him to pull the material down your legs. Then, he reaches for his belt, pinching it open with mesmerizing ease.

One boot thunks against the floor. Then the other. You really hope he didn't track mud all over your hardwood.

"You and that obnoxious buckle," the comment slips off your tongue before you can stop it. Too busy watching him undress. It's unfair how well the fabric clings to his thighs, fitting him like a damn glove. 

He laughs, kicking his jeans off his feet. "What, don't think it looks good on me?" 

"If I answer that, your ego will go through the roof." Your eyes roll; the last thing you need to do is tell him that, yes, you do like it. Lord only knows he'll run himself through four more rodeo seasons, trying to score an even bigger buckle. 

"Already has," he winks, hooking a thumb into the waistband of his boxers.

You don't know what he's got to be so confident about until...

"Jesus, Rhett."

"What?" He grins. Absolutely fucking obnoxious. But you can't formulate a single word. "What?"

Your thighs cinch together, hiding yourself from view. There is absolutely no reason why that should be springing up from its confines, so heavy that it smacks against his hip, unable to stand up against his belly. So wet that even in the dark you can see him glistening.

"Naw, y' don't gotta be shy," Rhett's hand travels up your knee, slipping between your closed legs, callouses dragging deliciously against your sensitive skin, "'s just me." 

A little too easily, you fall apart once more, feeling a little too exposed as his hungry eyes rake down your body. Every imperfection and curve is on full display. An exhibit of the life you've lived. And Rhett just might be your biggest admirer, his warm frame slipping between your legs, big hands gliding up your sides, pressing lazy kisses as he settles on top of you. 

"Rhett..." you don't know why you're saying his name, thighs curling around his sharp hips. His cock head bumps into the meet of your thigh, sends you jumping before you can realize what's happened.

"Ain't gonna hurt ya," uttering beneath his breath, a sentiment meant for your ears only. "I promise." He reaches between your bodies, gently guiding himself to—

Your head tilts back with a gasp. That's new. The delicate drag of Rhett's cock, gliding between your folds, the underside of him nudging at your clit. Hadn't realized you'd gotten this worked up until now, so wet that you can almost convince yourself that you don't need any lube at all. Not a hint of dryness to be found, sliding so, so easily against you.

But then you're gathering the courage to peer down between your legs, and even the darkness can't hide how big he is. Thicker than your daydreams have ever depicted, just a hair longer than any of the toys hiding beneath the bed.

"Bedside table," you blurt, heart fluttering in your chest. Walking is a privilege you'd like to keep. 

An unforeseen positive to letting your best friend between your legs is the fact that he knows exactly what you're trying to say. No need for questions as Rhett reaches off to the side, hand disappearing into the drawer. Comes back with the bottle, then delves back in, producing some tiny, round hunks of plastic.

You don't recognize them until he flicks one on—the tiny, fake candles from a few Halloweens ago.

"How romantic," there's a strangeness to this that you didn't expect; oddly casual, even with this newfound situation. 

"What?" He asks, innocent as can be, like you have a choice in the matter, already putting one flickering candle off to the side. Another, next to your hip, and he's still got four or five of them left to turn on. "Ain't in the mood for some mood lightin'?"

Lying to yourself is fruitless. The soft golden glow is a welcomed addition to this dark little bedroom. Highlights the room just enough for you to catch the way he drizzles the lube into his palm, reaching down to spread it over himself. That big hand almost tricks you into believing his cock is smaller than it really is, the flushed tip nudging at your cunt with every upward glide. 

They say monsters hide in the dark, and you know you caught sight of one between his legs. 

Two fingers press into you. No warning to be found, the thick digits easing in like they've done it a million and one times, crooking upward, dragging against your walls. There's the slightest hint of a stretch, a soft ache that—

You suck in a breath, a soft noise escaping past your lips. 

Rhett's cock twitches against you. "'s that it?" 

Weak, you nod. Don't trust yourself to speak. Not with him gradually beginning to move, shallowly pumping those long digits into you, never pulling out far enough to make you feel empty. But it's so hard to stay quiet when he continuously rubs up into those little nerves, nudging them on every pass over. 

"Rhett..." hips writhing against the bed, not sure if you want to lean into it or squirm away. 

That must be all that he's planning to give you because all of a sudden, he's drawing away. Wet fingers glisten in the candlelight as he reaches for his cock once more, guiding it back between your folds. Not entirely the same as what you had before, but the drag of his cock head against your clit is so, so worth the exchange. 

His warm chest settles against yours once more, lips finding your cheek, scratchy jaw tickling the skin there. Sounds like he murmurs your name as he travels to the corner of your mouth, pressing another kiss there. Finally. Finally, he meets you for a proper kiss, almost immediately broken by the swivel of his hips, reformed just as quickly.

Your hands are on the move. One in his hair, the other on his naked shoulder, feeling the way his muscles flex and ripple beneath your fingertips. Strong from a decade of bull riding and all that time spent on the ranch, chiseled and perfect in every way you can imagine. Fuck, it's like he was built just for you and this. Rutting between your legs like he's in heat, dragging against your needy clit until your hips twitch off the mattress, pressing into him. 

Swallowing down his groan is enough to put you up on cloud nine. 

A pressure appears at your entrance—the soft nudge of his tip. Your antics must have caused him to wander a little too far down. But you're pushing down onto him like it was your intent all along, and by God, he's not trying to stop you. 

Rhett stiffens. "You want me to...?" Muttering against your lips, unable to draw himself away any further. 

"Yeah," it's the easiest thing you've said all night.

It's all the encouragement he needs, mouth meeting yours once more. Slow, that pressure between your legs begins to grow, his blunt tip spreading you wide. There's a part of you already beginning to wonder if you should have asked for more lube, but his incessant lips are so damn distracting. Tangling with yours, drawing you into a captivating dance, spinning your head round and round, drawing your mind away from the burn. 

His head slips into you with a soft 'pop,' such an odd little feeling that has you gasping into his kiss, fingertips digging into his shoulder blades. Now you can really feel him. The delicate drag of his length gradually filling you, centimeter by debilitating centimeter. You'll be waddling come morning. You can already feel it.

There's no way you won't be. Not with how your pussy aches with the overwhelming stretch of him.

"Y' want me to stop?" Rhett's low voice rumbles against your bottom lip; when did the kiss break? 

Thunder rumbles outside, your only reminder of the storm that looms just past the thin walls of your home. Even the memory of running with him in the rain feels like it was forever ago. There were flowers filling your lungs just a few hours prior, but as you draw in a breath, you can't feel a shred of evidence that they were ever there.

"Yeah," nodding, your nose bumping into his, "you're just...a lot." 

God, you shouldn't have said that. 

But it's too late. There's already a wild grin emerging onto his scruffy face, so pleased with your words that his eyes seem to sparkle. As if the sight of you struggling to take his cock wasn't enough of a boost to his ego. 

"'s that it?" Speaking through his smile, still has the audacity to sink even further into you. "Ya never had anything big as me?" 

Your eyes roll so hard that they might get stuck.

All at once, his hips are flush with yours, not an inch of space left, your legs tightening around him as if there's a risk of him pulling back out. But that's not happening. Not with the way he's blindly nuzzling his nose into you, so lost in the feeling of you wrapped around him that he can't hold his eyes open.

"Y' alright?" His eyelashes tickle your cheek as they flutter open.

"Uhuh" is the best that you've got at this given moment. It's so hard to speak when you're so full. Couldn't take another millimeter of him, even if he begged you to. "You can..." pausing for a breath, "you can move."

In perfect synchrony, your attentions flicker down to where your bodies meet. A sight lit by the golden glow of the artificial candles, illuminating the slow withdrawal of Rhett's cock, where you're stretched so wide that you don't think your smaller toys will ever satisfy you again. 

"Shit, look at that," there's no reason why Rhett, of all people, should be so mesmerized by this, but he is, and it makes you fucking dizzy. "'s fuckin' hot."

And then he's sinking back in and—

"Fuck," it's too early for you to be whimpering so high in your throat, but his blunt tip is dragging right against the sensitive nerves hidden within you, and it's so, so much. 

This close, it's hard to miss the way Rhett's breath hitches, "'s that the spot, baby?"

All you can do is nod. Nails biting into his shoulders as he draws back once more, rubbing past that little spot once more. Toys don't normally get this sort of reaction out of you, but there's just something about it being Rhett that's getting to you. Your childhood best friend. The man that your weary heart has yearned for since high school. Eye candy at every rodeo he's ever set foot in. 

His lips find yours, tangling lazily, humming all the while. A part of you wonders if he always demands this many kisses. If he makes a habit of smiling into them. The rest of you knows that he doesn't because otherwise, he'd know that the heavy thrust of his hips would send your teeth clattering together.

"Ow," he's jerking back as if he's not the main culprit behind it. 

His cock head drives right up into those nerves. Sends your back arching up off the bed, pussy spasming around him, and you don't know which of you cry out louder. 

"There, there, there," you're babbling like a fool, but he's already missing it again. Such a minuscule thing that every correction is an overshot. 

Rhett's brows furrow, focusing so damn hard, and yet, "I can't...shit, that ain't it either." 

But you've got an idea.

Without a word, you begin to lean up, foreheads bumping together as Rhett tries to follow along, his big blue eyes so wide that they glisten in the light. Slipping out of you entirely as he falls onto his haunches, looks like a big puppy when he's confused like this.

"On your back," your command is soft. It could easily be bent if he really wanted to, but he's already following through on it, twisting and falling back onto the bed without a fuss. 

Settling into his lap is a feeling you've imagined a million and one times, and yet, somehow, it's unlike anything your mind has ever come up with. Warmth radiating off him like he's a damn heater, broad chest making your hand look impossibly tiny, as you lean on him for balance. He's already one step ahead of you, carefully guiding his cock back to your dripping cunt; all you've got to do is sink down and—

A pair of gasps tear through the room. Louder than the storm raging outside.

"Y' look so fuckin' beautiful on top of me, baby," Rhett sputters, peering up at you as if you've hung the moon and the stars in the sky. 

Already, you're beginning to move. Knees digging into the mattress, palms firm against his chest as you lift yourself up. The curve of his length alone is enough to make your thighs shudder.

"You're not so bad yourself," you're breathless already, hips swiveling, searching for that deceptive little angle. Maybe if you...lean a little further forward...

There it is. 

A tingle ripples up your spine, clamping down around Rhett's cock, and he must feel it because his head rolls to the side, lips parting with a groan that ought to make your head spin. Those big hands settle onto your thighs, gripping like he'll fall off the bed if he doesn't.

"Is that—oh fuck,"  his hips jerk up off the bed, leaking tip kissing those little nerves head on, "is that it?"

You can't answer. Palms shivering against his chest, already fighting to keep yourself upright. An ache blooming in your thighs with every rise and fall, head tilting back, a familiar heat beginning to bloom in your lower belly.

Rhett must be feeling it, too. There's no way he isn't. Head rolling from side to side, back arching off the bed, unable to keep himself still beneath you, a whiny mewl escaping his parted lips. And all it's doing is jostling his length inside of you, sporadically tapping against all those sensitive spots.

A calloused thumb appears on your clit. Not sure when he started reaching down, but it's damn near got you collapsing onto his chest, a tremble setting into your exhausted bones. 

"Fuck, Rhett!" You're squealing, poorly built rhythm already beginning to fall apart. 

Again, his hips snap upward, heavy balls smacking against your ass. "'m sorry, I'm not trying to buck my hips. I just..." he doesn't get to finish that because you're falling forward into his chest, face burying into his shoulder. It's too much. It's too much. 

Big hands settle on your hips. Gripping tight as his knees bend, feet digging into the mattress to pump into you properly. Lewd smacks of skin on skin echoing through the room, artificial candles bouncing with his every motion. 

"Anyone else ever fill your sweet pussy like this?" He rasps in some rumbling, guttural tone you've never heard before. "Hm?"

Your head shakes, but it takes a moment to realize that he can't see what you're doing. Not with you nuzzled up under his jaw. "N-no," whimpering right into his ear. 

Those hands are moving again, gliding up your back, big arms securing themselves around you like a hug, the only damn thing that keeps you from bouncing further up the bed. Your forearms settle on either side of his head, shivering as you try to lift yourself up, but you can only go so far, barely able to meet his eyes.

Lips clash, so loose that it hardly even counts as a kiss. Drinking down Rhett's feeble whine. Makes your head spin so much more than the alcohol ever did. Heat pools between your legs, pussy tightening like a vice around his pistoning cock, thick tip rubbing into those nerves over and over and over. 

You're close. 

"I love you," it slips out of him so quietly that you nearly believe it's a figment of your imagination. "I love you, I love you, I love you." 

One of your hands delves into his hair, noses colliding. Think you might be whispering it back, but you can't hear what's coming out of your mouth. Overridden by the blood rushing to your head and the slap of his skin against yours, and, and, and...

Spots appear in your vision. Body going taut as you cum around him without the slightest warning. Crying out high in your throat, forehead knocking against Rhett's, an invisible flame racing across your skin. Every thrust pushes your head higher into the clouds, could damn near float up to the ceiling if his arms weren't tightening around you, his hips stalling. A melody of whimpers bubbles out of his throat, orgasm washing over him like a tidal wave. 

You think you can feel it. The spasm of his cock and the warmth of his cum painting you white, flooding your pussy so full that you think it's already beginning to pour out of you. His hips jerk up into you, punctuated by a sickening squelch and his own broken moan. 

And yet, somehow, you've got the strength to meet his swollen lips, lazy tongues poking out to twist together like a greeting. Wet and messy as can be, saliva running down your chin, drooling like dogs in the summer sun. Rhett twists beneath you, and you're vaguely aware that the world around you is spinning, falling into the mattress beside him. 

A tickle rises in the back of your throat, forcing a cough out of you. Two purple flowers dance out onto the bed, obnoxiously vibrant and dainty. They've always been small, nothing compared to the roses Rhett's been choking up, but they look even tinier in his sweaty palm.

"Spiderwort," he murmurs after a moment, running a fingertip over their petals. Bleary blues peer flicker up to you, half-lidded and turned upward by his dumb smile.

They've always been his favorite. 

"So there was no girl at the bar?" You ask, hand wandering onto his cheek, curling around it like he's the most delicate thing on this planet. 

His head shakes. "Never." 

There's still a storm lurking outside, rattling the house, lightning and thunder striking the ground with an unmatched fury, but you hardly notice it. Too distracted by the warmth of a cowboy, his legs tangling with yours, uncaring of the mess you've made together. Kissing just for the hell of it, wandering across cheeks and peppering over old scars, musing about the memories attached. 

When you fall asleep, you're not sure, but you wake snuggled into his naked chest, his big arm looped around you like a blanket. Sunshine peeks through the gap in the curtains, the shrill tune of a bird singing her song, and for once, it's dreamy rather than irritating. 

On its own accord, your fingers drift across his sleeping face, warm and maybe the slightest bit flushed. Wandering over the scruff clinging to his jaw, finally at that length where it's grown soft to the touch. Drifting around the minuscule scar above his brow, the only remnant of the night you snuck out together and wrecked the four-wheeler. 

As far as you're aware, Royal never did find out why it started making that funny noise.

...or maybe Rhett was never asleep to begin with because when you look back down, his eyes are open. 

"Keep doin' that," he grumbles, voice deeper than the rumble of last night's thunder, leaning in to press his lips against your forehead. You don't need any further encouragement, trailing your fingertips across his face just for the hell of it.

There are things you should be saying. Discussions to be had about where this puts you and what you are to each other, but the upturn of his lips tells you a million and one words. Seriousness can wait. For now, all you want to think about is this next kiss he's planting on you.

And then another between your eyes, and another on your left cheek, one more on the tip of your nose. Slowly but surely sprawling across your face, peppering you with them so quickly that it feels like the wings of butterflies fluttering against your skin.

"Rhett!" You squeal, pushing at his jaw, but it's no use. He's rolling on top of you, and you're helpless to do anything but squirm and cry out, forced to endure all these kisses. 

As quickly as they start, they stop. 

You're half anticipating them to begin the moment your eyes peel open, but he's not even looking at you. Too focused on something next to his face, just past your wrist.

Or maybe...

"What?" You're not following. 

He leans back, brows furrowed as he looks down at his arm. 

You don't get it. What, was he expecting the tattoos to change overnight? It still looks the damn same to you—

...oh. 

That's not the same marking that has marred your skin from birth. And Rhett's turning his arm to let you see, and it's—

It's the same. Rhett's old bucking bronc, your shoe flying behind its upturned feet. It was never meant to be identical; they were meant to complete each other's picture. 

"Are you serious?" You're sputtering through the smile emerging onto your face, so wide that it shapes your eyes with it. 

And Rhett's not doing much better. Red-cheeked. Grinning from ear to ear. "We just been wrong 'bout it the whole fuckin' time."

This time, when he leans down to kiss you, there isn't a single flower to be found in your lungs. No roses. No spiderwort. Just you and him collapsing into these messy sheets, tangled together as one, matching tattoos at all. 

Separation is only temporary. Breaking apart just long enough to venture into the shower together, uncaring of the tight fit, so long as Rhett's hands are gliding along your body. Tangling together in the kitchen, waiting on the microwave to beep, feet knocking into each other beneath the table like you're five years old, and sharing breakfast at the Abbott house again.

He kisses you in the hallway while mopping up the mud he tracked in. Peppers them along the side of your neck when you stumble out onto the porch to find that a tree has fallen, blocking your driveway completely. Perry says he'll come by with a chainsaw tomorrow afternoon; he could be here within the hour, but you've got the feeling that he's already caught on to what's happened. 

In the middle of summer, you begin to suspect that some familiar flowers are beginning to grow around your home. Vibrant little buds sprout from amidst the dewy grass, nestled against the foundation of your home and roaming out into the lawn, running rampant now that the storm has run out of rain.

Roses don't grow in Wabang. Unless, of course, they're accompanied by spiderwort. 

A few kisses from a cowboy are all they've ever needed. 

[eggsandramem]

thinking about the notes i currently have for nameless (siffrins nickname in the 1k loops au that ive kinda stuck onto him in a rp server)

i dont??? know if ive even shared them here??? erm

YAP SESSION TIME‼️ (below the cut)

[CW FOR MENTIONS OF IMPLIED SH, AND SUI]

[additionally, spoiler warning for pretty much the entire game :0c(?)]

yay! yay! yay!

`TIMELINE`

꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦

`. • Timeless days of Lost Reflections • .`

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

[ The AU itself takes place during the canon events of ISAT, but with the sort of effect of Siffrin losing more and more of his memories as he passes through loop after loop, forgetting more and more with each loop.

Its mentioned, and even *shown* ingame that Siffrin forgets entire loops, and the game will sometimes hop from, lets say for example; 320 to 326 [as i have personally seen happen to myself multiple times as i went through my own save file consisting of exactly 1000 loops (why i did this? i saw the post Adrienne(isertdisc5) made, with a video showing a false cutscene when you reach 1k loops, with loop responding with "Stardust. What the fuck". I thought it was silly) and thought it would be a fun bit to pull off), but happening more and more with each loop. The more loops that go by, the more his memory starts to decline; forgetting where traps, keys, items are... but as the loops happen more and more consistently, he starts to lose more *important* memories, those being that of what he did with his family before the loops, small little things that have made important memories with them, and even over time, he's grown to forgetting his family members as a whole. Forgetting all of this is bad enough, but there's a point where he forgets himself; the things he likes, the things he's supposed to do, the hobbies and food he likes and dislikes...

Loop is still apart of all of this, except they've kept every memory in this journey so far. originally, they thought it was rather funny at first, due to being "happy they weren't the only idiot who got themself trapped in time". Overtime, however, Loop just grows... exhausted. it was funny at first, but with Siffrins memory and motivation rapidly decreasing, they're just stuck with the memories that the universe has had them keep, rather than forget, and they start to think, even more so, the fact of what the point of their original wish was, if it was to turn out this way? It hits them hard, to say the least, having them think of if this happened to them in their own universe as well, what it would be like...

Siffrins forgotten loop multiple times as well, surprisingly. Loop would call to check in on Siffrin during loops, only for him to be startled, asking where the voice came from, who it was... They forget their physical appearance often as well, whenever this happens, they just look.... confused, seeing Loop under the favor tree when he goes to visit

Siffrin is..... extremely tired, fatigued, overall *exhausted* from all of these loops, and often stays within the meadow in Dormont. ]

[ This AU actually takes place in act 5, and sort of reverses itself as it goes on. Safe to say, Odile wasn't able to stop Siffrin from looping back during the fight, and it started all over again, from going in the house on his own multiple times, back to going with his party after not noticing many changes due to the Bigfrin fight not happening a second time, Siffrin being able to defeat the King on his own, only to end up with the same thing from the Head Housemaiden over, and over, and over again. Just. Like. Usual. After not being able to find any changes with going on his own, he starts going with his party again. Being with his party in the house again, he starts to try new things, only to forget things he's done beforehand, and repeating them when he forgets, but thinks of it again.

This continues to happen, until Siffrin sort of... grows tired, and his sense of time in the House, as well as his memory fail him. He starts to just remain in the meadow, laying in the field with the birds often coming to sit with him ]

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

`NOTES`

꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦

`✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦`

☆*:・ﾟ - Siffrin keeps number of how many loops he's gone through by using a small paper card to cut a tally into his skin. This being said, he has 1000 tallies total spread out along both of his arms. For some reason, his body has sort of just. goes on autopilot, and Siffrin usually doesn't even notice that it happened, especially later in the loops since he doesn't know where they keep coming from (despite being the one causing them). Why these remain is strange, especially since he loops to before it happens, but... weird thing in the universe, i guess

*: ･ﾟ ’★ - As a continuation to the tally mark scars; Overtime, the amount of deaths from certain things start to leave a mark on Siffrin, literally. Scars start to remain the more he dies to them, only healing them to be non-lethal, and just as scars in general. This includes; a scar on his head in reference to slipping on a banana and hitting a rock, a large slash-like scar going from the top to bottom of his torso (front AND back), partially frozen 'markings' from his hands and up his arms from frozen tear deaths, other random scars from fighting sadnesses here and there, and a scar on his neck from.... you know. `(visuals for scars can be found HERE. heavy cw for the sh-like tally marks!!!)`

☆*:・ﾟ - Similarly to the scarring, Siffrins hair length doesn't stay the same the more loops he goes through. Over time, his hair has grown to be able to reach where his tailbone is, and is still growing with each loop. Said hair is very messy; matted, unbrushed... He's thankful that he has the ability to shower and clean his clothing in dormont when he has the chance, atleast. You don't want to be walking around with overly greasy hair, and gross/smelly clothing, after all. Siffrins cloaks have also started to look more and more worn out along with his hair, and permanently has some missing fabric here and there, as well as parts he's had to sew back together.

*: ･ﾟ ’★ - `[cw sui ment.]`Siffrins dagger starts to have blood stained, or dried on the blade further in the loops, the more he ||uses it on himself.|| The more its used, the more present it is on the blade.

☆*:・ﾟ - One of the memories that can be equipped, is the "Memory of Memories". in the game, its description is [You can remember this, at least.], so i think that it would be interesting if it acts as a permanent Memory now that it's been made aware of. That being said, Siffrin can read the language of his home country, and even over time speak it, the more he needs to use it in the house. Below is the proper description for the Memory;

---- • Memory of Ḿ̶̨e̵͛ͅm̶͘̕o̶̥͠ŕ̷͂i̴̔̉è̴s?

[ you cannot forget this even if you tried ]

( allows the user to understand and use the north islands language) ----

*: ･ﾟ ’★ - On the topic of Memories; Siffrin forgets the "Memory of Emptiness" as soon as he stops going through the house on his own, and goes back to loops including his family. The only Memories he keeps are "Memory of Ḿ̶̨e̵͛ͅm̶͘̕o̶̥͠ŕ̷͂i̴̔̉è̴s?", and "Memory of Spiraling" after this. "Memory of Spiraling" is the other Memory that Siffrin keeps after the previously mentioned one. Instead of not having a Memory for remembering the script dialogue in the actual game, 1k loops Siffrin is *forgetful as hell*, so having a memory they cant forget helps with it. The memory is as follows;

---- • Memory of Spiraling (Passive Memory)

[ Turning back the clock- watch it spiraling, spiraling ]

( allows the user to ALWAYS remember their lines in the script. cannot be unequipped ) ----

☆*:・ﾟ - Siffrin experiences Craft Sickness due to very obvious reasons during all of his loops. Siffrins been brought down to his entire body being weakened, collapsing when he deals with it for too long with no breaks. However, Siffrin has grown to push through them with sheer stubbornness, before it gets too bad and it happens again. This happens over and over again, a loop within a loop in a way, if you think about it.

*: ･ﾟ ’★ - Siffrin avoided Loop for a good amount of loops after he looped back from the Bigfrin fight due to their previous convo, but went back after a while

☆*:・ﾟ - Siffrin, over time, has found himself collapsing from exhaustion within the house when with his party, and it causes him to loop due to the stress of something new happening. Additionally, a very common death Siffrin experiences is when he's exhausted himself to point of dying in his sleep when his party offers it

*: ･ﾟ ’★ - Siffrin, the more loops he goes through and the more he forgets about his Family Members and their Names, the less he can even hear their names, and his own. Names he previously knows of sound fuzzy and static-y within their hearing distance!

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

MORE TO COME! BUT YAY! YAY! YAY! YAY! YAY!

[kaidatheghostdragon]

Deaged Danny escapes the GIW and goes to Gotham. He has some sort of connection to the Waynes, but it doesn't really matter the exact details. Possible options:

Demon twins (Danny is deaged to whatever age Damian thought he died as)

Lost child/sibling (Danny was adopted, Tucker tracked down living bio-relatives to one of the Waynes. Dealer's choice on which Wayne and how they're related, and how they react to Danny being the wrong age.)

Danny is a clone (in which the Fentons are crazy and cloned one of the Waynes, OR Danny was born in a lab for an unrelated plot and one of the scientists grew a conscience and put the baby in the system for adoption. Again, Tuck is the real mvp here.)

Etc

Danny gets settled into the Wayne family, who immediately start researching and tearing down the GIW on behalf of their newest member.

Suddenly, the boomerang appears out of nowhere and launches at Danny. He's terrified the Fentons (either a bad reveal or at least the ASSUMPTION of a bad reveal) or the GIW sent it, but hopeful that it might be his friends looking for him.

Instead, it's an age-correct version of Danny, who is absolutely losing his shit because he finally found the baby clone, thank the ancients he's safe, are you injured, how long have you been with the Waynes, how much do they know?

In other words, Danny was cloned by the GIW but didn't know, when his friends (and parents if the bad reveal turned out to be false) came to rescue him and destroy the facility, the clone with all of his memories also escaped (believing themselves to be the original), none of them the wiser. The clone sought out their connection to the Waynes, believing that returning home wouldn't be safe. Team Phantom (and/or Fentons) only discovered the clone's existence a few days later while combing through the data they stole from the GIW facility and then immediately set out to find the lost clone.

Tucker (and/or Fenton parents) created a bracelet to mask Danny's ecto-signature to prevent the GIW from finding him again, and had the brilliant idea to use the boomerang to find the clone since it couldn't track Danny now. (Or they tested the effectiveness of the bracelet with the boomerang, which took a hard left and disappeared off to the east. After discovering the existence of the clone, they had a collective ‘oh shit’ moment and quickly accessed the boomerang’s gps data to track it down.)

[scribefindegil]

Some thoughts on unreliable narrators as I procrastinate on writing several tricky scenes with unreliable narrators:

Every narrator is unreliable. Just like there's no such thing as 'objectivity' in journalism or academia, there's no such thing as a truly reliable narrator. The narrator's viewpoint is limited, they're shaped by their culture and personality and experiences, they overlook things and make assumptions. It's all a matter of degree. But usually we talk about "unreliable narrators" when the gap between what the narrator says and what the reader/author believes to be true is prominent enough to be narratively significant.

Where is the gap?

Unreliable narrators are not all duplicitous. In fact, many are telling the truth as they understand it. But some are not! This is by no way a comprehensive taxonomy of narrators, and even within a single story there are likely to be shifts and overlaps, but here are some Types I find helpful to consider:

Oblivious The reader doesn't get crucial information because the narrator simply was not paying attention. Maybe they were missing context. Maybe they were bored. Maybe they were distracted by a hot girl (Gideon I love you). Alternatively, the reader gets clearly false information (especially about how other characters are thinking or feeling) that the narrator wholeheartedly believes to be true (Breq I love you).

Repressed You the reader can tell that what the narrator's telling you they think/feel and what they actually think/feel are not the same, but the narrator themself has no idea. For narrators that lack self-awareness and don't understand why they do the things they do or for narrators that are really good at not looking at things that make them uncomfortable.

Liar (internal) The "Sure, you keep telling yourself that, buddy" version, where the narrator is on some level aware that they're lying to themself but doubles down on it anyway. Tends to involve a lot of rationalizing or misdirection. It's very common for a character to have a realization about something important partway through a story (that The System is corrupt, that they're in love with their best friend, that their actions are actually more self-serving than altruistic, etc) that makes them switch between Repressed (passive internal conflict) and Liar (active internal conflict). Or, you know, they might have a realization and not immediately start lying to themself about it, but where's the fun in that?

Liar (external) Usually shows up in first-person stories or in-universe writing, since it requires the narrator to be aware that they have an audience and be attempting to intentionally mislead them. In this case, there is a deliberate disconnect between what the narrator's understanding of events and the account of it they're giving for the purpose of spin or deception.

Coerced This is where the gap comes from an external factor, usually magic or sci-fi nonsense that messes with a character's mind and changes their perception of themself and/or reality, (eg they can't talk/think about a certain subject, they've had their memories altered, etc). It's a different flavor than the other sorts of unreliability and can overlap with any of the others depending of how aware the character is of what's been done to them.

How Obvious Is The Gap?

Another thing to consider is at what point, and to what extent, a reader becomes aware that a narrator is unreliable. Is it clear from the beginning? Is it played as a reveal? Is is a slow dawning realization? Is it something that you could overlook on a first readthrough that only becomes obvious once you put the pieces together? All of these can be effective, but it's good to know going in. If you want the narrator's unreliable nature to be a reveal (that is, there's a point where the reader realizes that they're lying and that recontextualizes the whole story), you're going to approach it differently than if you want your readers to be screaming about the dramatic irony from the beginning. If your point is that the reader shouldn't actually know how much of what the narrator's telling them is true, that's going to look very different than a story about a narrator who has an on-page realization about one of the big things they've been lying to themself about and has to navigate the consequences.

[noomyguts]

Since the show has already shaken the books timeline and events up so much I'd love if they could walk Armand back from the multi million dollar tech bro he's sort of starting as, no more private jets, no more private islands please

I know he becomes a millionaire in queen of the damned to buy himself and Daniel luxury things/experiences/the island, but I feel like we are already starting the story here when we get introduced to him in the show, except it's a sort of mock version of the life he has with Daniel in Queen of the Damned.

The show presents an alternate history from the book that has Louis and Armand stay together after Paris, Armand and Daniels first meeting be at Daniel and Louis interview in 1973, Armand erases Daniels memories of him, Armand doesn't turn Daniel in the 80s, and Daniel ages 50 more years.

Instead of being in a relationship with Daniel, Armand has remained in his relationship with Louis in a very twisted parallel.

Instead of building a house on an island filled with cherished memories with Daniel, he built a concrete box in Dubai filled with loaded memorabilia to match his life with louis. They're surrounded by wealth and luxury, but it comes across cold and hollow.

Assume without Devi's Minion plotline from the 70s-80s happening (as far as we know), Armand would have had to adapt to the modern world, without Daniel, alongside Louis instead.

His hobbies he loved sharing with Daniel (from the book) are either absent altogether in season 1-2 or get reflected in a empty way with louis in Dubai. His interest in art, fashion, Interior decorating, technology are all very muted from the eccentric, eclectic, hyperfixations we know Armand from the books to have had.

SO in the next seasons I hope we see Armand post divorce, depression era 2, hoping around from hoarder apartment to hoarder apartment, I want filthy kitchens, wild outfits, books and movies scattered everywhere, tanks on every surface, cables wires and computers, every game system ever??

except instead of his interest being a source of happiness for him like in the book, they should make it a little self destructive.

I want him to spiral into his interest, I want him so out of his mind with self bought distractions he can't keep up with hiring staff anymore, he's unstable, he's on his own, he's on the city bus like everyone else, and trying not to think about how he's tanked his life.

I think that'd be interesting. A way to take his character from the book and twist it a little to match his current situation in the show.

Like Daniel is already a vampire now, he doesn't need to be sugar baby spoiled/swept off his feet by Armand in order to like him, Armand needs to be humbled even further, and once the false persona Armand built with Louis fades, Daniel will like him all the more for it, and possibly be the one to help him out of that low place.

[fandomfluffandfuck]

I'm thinking about the progression of Bucky's memory journals (and so you all are going to have to suffer with me through these thoughts, too, because Pain)

I imagine the very first few journals Bucky gets his hands on--compelled to write by the desperate urge to cling to any of the memories, false or true, that crash into his head and shatter moments, leaving him chasing the fragments slipping through his hands like gains of sand--are incoherent. A word or two strung together. No sentences. Short. Choppy.

In these first journals, these single words are sometimes written so tiny, it's near impossible to discern what the word is. It may just be a charged scribble, not a word. Then, other times, the words are scrawled so large, across an entire page, even two pages, that despite the messy print caused by his shaking hands, it's clear what it reads. Ink may pool on the page, making the letters thick and pressed deep into the page, tearing through. Or the words may be light, as if he was afraid to write the word and give it existence. What would it make him if it's true? What will it do to him, though, if it remains in his head? Words come in English and Russian and words from languages he doesn't recognize.

As he sorts through and regains more memories, his entries stretch longer. He keeps tearing through journals. He has stacks of them. Entries become less single words, disjointed and incomplete, and more sentences. A few chucked together. Still clunky and confusing, but more.

Then, further, they stretch into paragraphs.

Paragraphs into pages.

Pages into hours and hours of nonstop writing until the serum can't even mend the ache in his shaking fingers. He can't see the page anymore, at that point. The memories are so vividly smeared across his vision, chopped together like reels of different films cut and taped together.

Suddenly, when he reads his entries back, the longer memories string together awkwardly but underscored by a relatively constant tone. He's scrambling his voice back together. Written, but still his voice.

The longer Bucky has his journals--stacks of them, they're hidden everywhere, always with at least one blank one on his person--and the longer he goes unpunished for admitting his remembrance, the more he spills. His honesty with himself grows, spreading until he's able to reach back and tug and pull and unravel memories that would've repulsed him in the beginning. He wouldn't've been able to admit it to himself, not even in the privacy of his journals, but now he can. He's learning about himself again. He's learning to be comfortable with himself again.

[astromaxi]

do you write stsgxreader?

if so imagine geto brings you home from the bar just KNOWING gojo would fawn over you.. like some sort of gift to his lover .. a little plaything.. gojos allll over it the moment youre through the door

I do! I’m non stop thinking about these two…

ANYWAYS-

Warnings: not explicit sex, still 18+ : Geto being a tease and a meanie, very bad writing, bad dirty talk, fem reader, reader is referred as “pretty thing” swearing, pussy eating, slight chocking(?)

If I miss anything lmk

Also also: not entirely proof read, like usual some grammar and spelling mistakes; Grammarly can only do so much

😞👊

“She so pretty, isn’t she..?” Geto purred out as he tied his long black hair up into a bun. “So, fucking pretty” Gojo groans out, as he runs his hands up and down the soft skin. “Look at her, she is twitching so much,, isn’t she just soo needy mm?” Geto says in such a mocking voice. You don’t even know if he is trying to be nice. This is all so mean, they both are heartless. They're both talking at you like some kind of toy, a doll; the sheer audacity- “…A’h!” You whined out as the snow hair boy placed a soft kiss on top of your clit. “Mmm, look at the sugu she really liked that huh?”

The Gojo boy laughed as he laid himself on his stomach, shifting so your legs were on his shoulders. He just stares at the naked cunt in front of him, you tried to clamp your things, shifting away, fucking anything to stop the intense embarrassment flowing through your veins. Geto, the man who brought you here held down your hips, placing himself at your side. “Come on baby.. don’t try to run away now..” he gives you a false pout “You were so.. eager earlier”

Geto teases you, as memories of the heavy makeout and dry humping flow into your head making you whine. “Just be a good girl for Toru’ yeah? You can do that, right pretty thing?” Geto's voice drips in a liquid, making you heat up and ache. Geto's soft lips found yours as one of his slender hands found home on your neck. Just as he deepens the kiss, more whines, and moans are pushed out of you.

You arched up into Geto’s chest as you break away from the kiss and look down at Gojo, who is eating your pussy like he is starved. The sounds and his moans are boarding on pornographic, the sheer amount of greed that radiates from Gojo, as if you are nothing more than something to satisfy his hunger. “Mm.! Ah- Toru— it’s too much please..” you moan out laying back down as you cover your mouth trying to contain the whiny and high-pitched moans that escape you.

Your body twitched and jolts up every time his nose brushed against your clit. Geto hums at you as his hand takes yours, removing it off your mouth, he takes ahold of your other hands, raising them both above your head as he kisses up your neck. Reaching your ear he hums out “Aww pretty thing… we can’t have that not can we?” He sucks into your neck, making your on sought on moans grow, “we need to hear you pretty thing, how else are we supposed to know you are enjoying yourself..?”

His voice is nothing but a husk whisper in your ear as you clamp your thighs around Gojo’s head. At this point, you don’t think you can last any longer, Gojo’s fingers have made way into your pussy as they reach’s parts you didn’t know was possible, and his fingers are so fucking long. Gojo’s mouth attacks your clit not letting up as your hips raise and fall, your legs clenching and un clenching. It was all to much, the overwhelming sensation paired with both of the attractive men giving you their sole attention it’s so much, all to overwhelming.

Maybe you will have to give them your phone number, for next time. Yeah, definitely for next time.

———————————

A/n: this just proves I’m bad at writing nsfw stuff, it’s okay tho hehehe

[bellygunnr]

Broken Out of Time

A commission piece for @bloodgulchblog -- a Pilot/Chief fluff piece. This was really fun to write.

----

"Joy."

John sinks down into a crouch, hunkering further down behind the worn boulders they'd been using for cover. The elements of his HUD jitter as Joyeuse shifts attention, which he also feels in the connection between his NI and armor, which some part of him translates into fingers trying to tickle his neck. It's uncomfortable.

"Joyeuse," he says, firm. "Where'd Esparza go?"

She makes a humming sound. John takes stock of their surroundings while she plays nice with components of his armor, cycling through the various scanning functions to locate their wayward civilian.

"I thought you were watching him," she replies-- with enough grace to sound slightly abashed and guilty.

He grunts and detaches his pistol from the magclamps on his thigh.

"And I thought we were watching the birds," he returns evenly.

They were watching the birds, to be fair. Zeta Halo differed from his previous experiences on Forerunner structures in that it had a functioning… ecosystem… of sorts. With the remaining UNSC forces securing a tight foothold, he'd felt he could start relaxing his stranglehold on procedure and start-- something. Appreciating things. As it turns out, false suns feel just as warm as real ones.

"It's a little disconcerting to see birds use brass shells for mating displays," Joyeuse says. "Fernando doesn't have any proper IFF markers. I don't know…"

And he'd-- what? Relaxed enough to let a civilian sneak off into unknown territory and get himself lost? He twists around, staring intensely at his surroundings, waiting for details to seep out of the long grass and compacted dirt, like remnants of Esparza would suddenly make themselves known.

And they did-- eventually. Boot prints. Impressions of knees in the dirt. Headed further away. John carefully follows the tracks and picks his way down the rocks, closer to the thin bubbling creek that coalesces into a river in the distance. Joyeuse casts out another round of scans.

Ah.

John forgoes scaling the remainder of the terrain in favor of dropping down right behind his charge. Or, he would have, if Joyeuse didn't throw out the mental equivalent of an arm across his chest.

He freezes in place. Esparza lays prone in the grass. She highlights a handful of silhouettes. Ah.

Esparza must have snuck off to obtain a closer look at a different set of wildlife. Zeta Halo also possessed a number of rodent-like creatures (that the marines and personnel made quick work of eating). He sees them now, dipping their naked heads into the water for a drink.

Briefly, he wonders if the rings are capable of seasons. Then he shunts that thought aside and hunkers down beside Esparza.

"Hello," John intones.

Esparza jumps in his skin and bites his tongue on a yell. John stifles a surge of mixed emotions -- guilt and pride, mostly, with a tinge of amusement.

"Wear a bell," Esparza says, shaking his head.

"You snuck off first."

He blinks at John, expression scrunching up, radiating surprise.

"Guess I did."

John shifts his position in tiny increments. He doesn't want to disturb Esparza, nor does he want to disturb the animals they're watching. But this particular area has even fewer sightlines than the outcropping and it's-- rankling him, might be the word. Yeah, the sergeant uses that word a lot. Now it's in his vocabulary.

Joyeuse's good humor at the phenomena is a burst of sunlight down his spine.

"My house was on a prairie," Esparza says suddenly. "Country home. You know. So we got a lot of critters like that in the evening."

One of the rodents stands upright.

John casts back for a memory, maybe something to relate to Esparza (as he can learn to converse, Cortana would be--), and makes a listening grunt.

"My kid learned pretty quick about the circle of life though," he finishes. "Or…"

He trails off, stymied by the ground shaking seconds before the vibrations sink into the Mjolnir. Two of the rodents bolt off into the grass. The third lunges into the water and paddles determinedly to the other bank. This puts it within throwing distance of them for all of a second before it vanishes into the ground.

Joyeuse had been correct about the burrows, then.

Esparza opens his mouth and snaps it shut as the air around them rapidly shifts. A crimson Banshee roars overhead, followed by an UNSC aircraft.

"Let's move," John says.

He instinctively reaches over to Esparza, but his charge is already on his feet and retreating. More guilt and pride assaults him but he stuffs it down in favor of hurrying back to the Warthog on which they came. Joyeuse automatically switches over to friendly radio chatter and yeah-- that's contact.

Banished making a move on the local FOB.

"Can never catch a break, can we, big guy?" Esparza laughs.

John waits excruciating seconds for Esparza to buckle in before flooring it.

No, they can't. But the lulls are nice while they last. He thinks Esparza understands when their hands overlap on the shifter.

[thgfanfictionlibrary]

hello! can you please suggest any post-war everlark fics where their friendship is explored and is the core of the narrative? fics where their friendship gradually turn into something much deeper? sort of the same vibe of cf everlark when peeta was taking care of katniss and they were working on the plant book and katniss was inner-monologue-ing about peeta's lashes and they're friends but katniss was slowly falling deep in love and peeta was there at the bottom of the pit, ready to catch her. you know. something like that. multi-chaps are preferred, but i'll take any one-shots as well! tysm, your blog is a blessing!

Hello Anon!

I know I have a ton more than just these ones but I'll add this to future masterlist topics but for now I think these would be a good start! Happy Reading!

A Girl, A Boy, and Everything Else-CassandraO (ao3) Summary: It's been a year since the war ended. Peeta and Katniss are in the process of growing together. Peeta is learning about setting boundaries and taking better care of himself and Katniss is drowning in depression. How they grow together as friends and eventually, something else, all the while facing new challenges. A Painter, a Baker, and a Boy who Never Took Sugar in his Tea-katiac (ao3) Summary: Peeta’s months in the Capitol under Dr. Aurelius’ care as he struggles to sort real memories from false, come to terms with the horrors inflicted on him and those he loved during the war, and understand the true nature of his connection with Katniss Everdeen. Good Again-titania522 (ao3) Summary: "The sun was rising, fingers of glorious orange, red and yellow crawling across the sky. The window appeared as a frame around a picture, dawn’s ascent bursting from the folds of a delicate skirt the color of burnt copper. I sighed and turned back to Peeta, holding his hand against my cheek." After all they have experienced, Katniss and Peeta realize that things can be good again. The Missing Book - The Early Years-Hey_You (ao3) Summary: Katniss and Peeta grow back together after Peeta's return to District 12. After Katniss realizes her true feelings for Peeta, she is faced with the very real possibility that he no longer cares for her in the way she had hoped. Post "Mockingjay" but pre-Epilogue. Canon compliant. Us Among the Living-aspiringpandabear (ao3) Summary: When the air smells of spring and Peeta returns to District 12, Katniss finds a reason to live again. Classic Everlark growing together fic heavily focused on Peeta and Katniss' journeys processing their grief and trauma in the months following the rebellion. And, of course, the story of how they fall back in love while helping each other pick up the broken pieces of their lives.

I’ll be adding this to future masterlist topics! If anyone knows of any, please let me know!

As always, if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, please feel free to shoot me an ask!

[mla0]

it's so weird having been a slenderverse fan for so long, because i feel like i remember things from a long time ago yet when i look for it anywhere i can't find a single trace proving its existence. AUs, RP blogs, different famous artists and writers from back in the day.... they're just, like, gone!

one of the examples is i SWEAR back in like 2015 or 2016 there was some askblog or comic or something about a multitude of slenderverse characters being stuck in a mental hospital or asylum of some sort, and like, habit was stuck in evan's body and couldn't leave, milo was trans and changed her name to "mia", i think mary asher was there, patrick was there and i think patbit was a key plotpoint... and i think there were these detailed maps and stuff and characters were dropping like flies and i swear to god it was at least a LITTLE popular. but every time i look it up, no trace of it, or its art, can be found anywhere, even on wayback machine. do i have false memories, or what?

oh, also there were tons of RP blogs with the wildest of ideas. OCs, crackships, fully drawn art and askblog esque stuff.... you'd go into the tag and see people writing bits of roleplay in the askbox back and forth, but i never see that anymore.... can't figure out if it's specifically the community that changed, or just tumblr as a whole...

[y-rhywbeth2]

Been thinking on the afterlives of the party:

I mean Shadowheart is faithful, so Gates of the Moon or Palace of Night (unless Shar is feeling stupid and short-sighted again and wants to lessen her own power by abandoning a powerful faithful soul).

Halsin is faithful and an elf, most likely to go to Arvandor but could get claimed by Silvanus.

Mystra is willing to claim Gale, if he's still mortal, so it's up to him.

Karlach's been praying to gods such as Lathander and Selune as she approaches death, and the gods do take deathbed conversions from compatible mortals, so she could potentially end up with Shadowheart. Cleric characters can also pray with her, so she could go with a Tav.

Wyll's so incredibly lapsed/areligious that you wouldn't call him faithful, but he acts in accordance with the teachings of the Triad, so I'm pretty sure that gives them a potential 'in' if he takes it.

Lae'zel is faithless (Vlaakith is not a god). She can easily dodge that by just not dying on Toril though.

Minthara: false false false false

Astarion is not only faithless but pointedly so. As an elf he theoretically has a foot in the door to Arvandor, but considering his relationship with the Seldarine is probably terrible...

Durge is either Bhaal's faithful or false, and as a Bhaalspawn should go to Gehenna regardless, though Jergal apparently has called dibs and they could seek another faith if we ignore that second bit. There are lots of gods you can pray to in this game. Most of them evil! Shar, Loviatar, Bane... most of them are Bhaal's co-workers, so you can sort of end up in the afterlife where your estranged and pissy dad usually lives and works.

Anyone who undergoes ceremorphosis might have 'property of Ilsensine' stamped on them...?

The Wall of the Faithless has been struck from SCAG errata, apparently, so I guess anybody who doesn't have a place in the afterlife (statistically; Minthara, likely Astarion, maybe Durge and Wyll) is going to be getting a job in one of the most boring cities on the planes, False or Faithless. At least there are occasional invasions from the Abyss, weird politicking with devils, and Jergal sometimes secretly sends souls out into the planes as undead on missions, so it could get interesting sometimes...

(All of this assuming that Jergal doesn't flat out claim any or all of them and fudge the reports the way he casually omits usage of undead from them when he hands them in to Kelemvor. Still comes out to the same result though.)

(There is the question of whether the personality is going to stay intact once they're dead, and what position you get; Myrkul's petitioners sometimes got to be 'princes' of sections of the City, while others were just faceless, identity-less wraiths wandering aimlessly. Cyric turned his into weird monsters who also didn't really remember who they were... The gods get to decide whether you keep your personality or not.)

Speaking of; Myrkul's domain is presumably still within the City of Judgement, so Ketheric is probably there! Dunno about your Tavs or Durge but mine is going to have a beautiful reunion if the idiot ever dies and ends up on the Fugue and Ketheric still has his memories and personality. Eternal punishment: spending eternity continuing the hell that was having this brat/this annoying old fuck as a co-worker.

More fun: maybe Myrkul still has an avatar there! That's not going to be awkward At All. Repeatable boss battles!

[nanomooselet]

My Brother's Keeper (I)

So, uh, I have seen the complaints that Stampede is "poorly-written". Often enough, really, to get... somewhat overly bent out of shape about it. Stampede was my entry into the story and I may have mentioned once or twice that I like it. You know. Just a little. This is not to say it's without its flaws, but it's technically very skilful, at least to my eyes. It's just… skilful in roughly twenty-two minute chunks, so it crams a whole lot into those chunks.

Vash tells Wolfwood he can "see [kindness] in his eyes" half an hour tops after hitting him with a truck. It's assumed that they're relying on previous characterisation of the two to carry this beat.

They're not.

See, animated shows or films (and definitely in the case of Stampede) aren't only written. They're story-boarded, rendered, scored etc. and all the parts interlock with the other parts. It has to be taken as a whole: spoken, written, visual, musical, situational, compositional. These are twelve instalments of a single story where everything in it develops, comments on, or reflects what lies at the work's thematic heart, but you have to figure out how. It's not going to explain it to you. If the relationship between two characters appears strange, that's because there's more to it. And whenever you see something in it that visually echoes something else in it, get out your pasteboard and stick in two thumbtacks connected with string because the show's letting you know it's important.

Now, because I viewed Stampede first, my reaction to this part was very much like Wolfwood's ("???") but the more of the show I watched, the more sense it started to make, and the more I appreciated what it did for Vash's characterisation. Having since read the manga, in my opinion the boys aren't at all interacting like they're accessing past-life memories. Vash is too busy silently reeling over Jeneora Rock and dreading his confrontation with Knives to keep up the whacky act that the older WW pierced. Wolfwood is too young and trapped by his own hurt to empathise by seeing through Vash's false smiles.

There's something else going on with these two, and if you think carefully, it's clear what it is. There were two loved ones that Vash lost tragically early in life, and we can assume it's not Rem he's thinking of.* The heart of this series is "the song of the brothers."

Whose side are you on?

I have to choose.

Lo and behold, through that lens the character interaction made a whole lot more sense. And I want to talk about how.

So, according to the show's language, right from his very first appearance Wolfwood has a connection with Knives.

In the ensuing scenes/episodes, it was then clear to me that Wolfwood isn't just connected to Vash's brother. He's a representative, serving as a sort of understudy while Vash journeys to confront the real thing. Anything and everything Wolfwood does or says is with that role in mind, because he's either playing along or fighting against it. It dictates his development as the show unfolds. He's got a job and he'll do it, but which of the twins' agendas is he ultimately serving as he does? Even he can't yet be sure.

This is a significant change. It has a huge effect on Wolfwood's characterisation; it's why he comes across as less confident, more surly - he's rebellious, but conflicted and immature. In the manga, the first time we meet Nick he's (mostly) his own man and he (mostly) makes his own decisions. While he isn't honest about his agenda, he is trying to temper Vash's idealism for honest and well-meaning reasons, albeit in a bitchy way. When he reveals himself, throwing down the coin halves, you feel the man is protesting too much so it'll make what's coming easier on Vash. Despite how deeply the two came to love each other they couldn't communicate their forgiveness, but Wolfwood is at his core a good man first who lost his way, then finds it again in Vash. **

Again by contrast in Stampede, Nick's identity isn't his own to shape (yet). He standing in for Knives, and he doesn't much like it. He does know more about the actual shape of things than the reporters - for instance, he doesn't bat an eyelash when Brad mentioned how long they've known Vash. So he can readily talk with Vash and test his convictions. They basically both know each other's biggest secrets already, so they don't have to make a whole production of getting to know each other.

But standing in for Knives is also why the introductory aw-look-he's-nice-really scene is so quickly revealed to be staged. Knives is the primary antagonist, not a neutral agent - he's the most dangerous and personal opponent the protagonists face. He's also cruel, controlling and manipulative. His "help" is anything but. Any gift he seems to freely give, like a protector, will either extract an awful cost down the line or have some hidden purpose (if he isn't "solving" a problem he himself created). Approach with caution.

(You know how Nick did something no one asked him to do then hit Vash, Meryl and Roberto with a massive bill for it like a dick? You know how he then violently rescued them from a situation he himself engineered so they'd have gratitude? Those are Knives's most basic manipulation tactics, when he isn't just hurling verbal abuse: I help you/I love you so I'm entitled to take this from/do this to you. Wolfwood is causing problems on purpose by acting out because it's funny, and knows he won't get whatever he's demanding. Knives thinks he's helping, and rarely hears when he's told "no".

Also, both the English and the Japanese have Roberto calling Wolfwood someone who kills with a smile on his face. He doesn't, really, but we have met someone else who does.)

That means like every other character, Wolfwood isn't quite himself. Not yet.

And that's actually awesome. Because it speaks to who the other characters are - specifically, about Vash.

(Part II)

(Part III)

(Part IV)

(Part V)

(Part VI)

(Part VII)

* OR COULD IT BE, as inevitably assumed on tumblr when two men are in proximity, unspoken romantic desire????

I'm not saying it can't be a factor, but it doesn't explain why they start having discussions over their principles like they've known each other for years. Or at least, to me it doesn't. As I've said I don't ship them. If you disagree, it's totally fine! Hear me out and decide for yourself. There's no reason to believe both can't be true.

** By what's coming, I mean the same development that eventually comes to every iteration of Wolfwood. You know the one. And by "they loved each other" I don't mean necessarily mean romantically. My personal belief is that there were mutual feelings along those lines, but they're both too emotionally reticent to acknowledge them and might not have regardless. But that's just me!