#all capitals and then no capitals and whats a sentence who knows what a full stop is?? not me

[certifiedlovergirlsstuff]

Pretty Boy | s.r. x fem!reader

a/n: you know i had to do something for glasses reid i’d be crazy not to.

“oh, here comes your pretty boy. capital p and b.” derek’s smooth voice entered your shared office with jj. you didn’t bother asking who, even coyly, he would just say something along the line of “your other half, pretty girl.”

so you rolled your eyes while scanning over a case file, not bothering to direct attention to the man. “and why the need to visit my space?” a teasing reply, both knowing his visits to the double liaison office were once in a blue moon.

there was the sound of shuffling before derek responded, “cause i wanna see your reaction.” such a vague answer that it caused you to pick your head up with a quizzical look, “what are-“ and you stopped when spencer poked his head through the cracked doorway.

“hey y/n, i brought you…” you didn’t hear the rest of his sentence. eyes too focused on spencer’s face and the new wardrobe attire perched along his nose.

your heart beat fast in your ears and you could feel your body warm in temperature. it was like you were sent back in time to high school and spencer was the insanely smart, pretty student ripped right from your fantasies. you hoped you weren’t drooling at the sight.

“y/n? you alright?” spencer’s voice was much closer now and when you blinked he was directly in front of you with the back of his hand to your forehead and a frown on his face. derek’s chuckles filled the crowded space and you couldn’t even manage a side eye.

“you feel warm. you didn’t happen to catch anything from the last case, did you?” full concern with round puppy eyes shining behind black frames. your heart was the picture of a popsicle melting on a hot summer day.

you took a swallow, “not- not that i know of.” eyes honed onto a freckle placed to the left of spencer’s chin.

derek laughed again, “ease up on her, pretty boy.” he moved closer and stood behind spencer’s left shoulder, a smug expression painted on his chiseled face.

“i’m just checking if she’s physically well.” spencer’s voice got high from defending himself and his actions while glaring at derek.

derek then jerked his chin at your sheepish expression, “well it’s declining each second you’re in her space.” joking at the expense of your crush, but spencer took it the wrong way and pulled his arm back to his side. “sorry, right boundaries. should’ve asked first.”

you managed to bounce back when he started moving away, “no! no, it’s- derek’s just joking. i- i don’t mind you touching me.” and it took two, two seconds, for your mind to process your wording.

“oh this is a great morning.” derek howled then decided he’s seen enough, leaving both of you hot and pink cheeked.

squeezing your eyes shut you wished for the floor to swallow you hole and drag you away from this situation. “i’m- i’m sorry… about that. bit- bit scattered brained right now.” trying to play everything off.

“you- you sure you’re alright? i’m certain hotch will let you leave early.” spencer’s brows pinched in the middle turning his face into more of a pout. oh he has no idea the effect on you.

you smiled gentle at his worry, “i’m well, just been staring at potential cases too long, that’s all.” fingering at the edge of the manilla folder in your lap.

“also i like the new look,” circling a finger around your eyes to play charades with him than just mention the holy glasses. “they suit you nicely.” friendly but said with a hint of flirty.

spencer’s smiled widened and his cheeks turned from bubblegum pink to a rosie hue, oh how you wish to just cover him in thousands of kisses. “thanks. i ran out of contacts for the month so i’m stuck with these until then.” making it sound like an inconvenience, but oh how you were gonna suffering for a month of those handsome frames.

you turned your head away before you were caught staring for too long and saw a baby pink bag sitting beside your picture frames. you reached out to grab it then pulled it apart to see a sweet morning treat awaiting for your teeth to sink in. “did you bring this?” asking spencer since you then remember that he said something when arriving but you didn’t hear what.

spencer straightened up and happily beamed, “yeah! i was walking past that pastry shop you like and thought you’d enjoy something for all your hard work.” you both knew that was a straight lie since that pastry shop is an extra ten minutes out of either of yours work routes.

but you didn’t comment on it just looked spencer in the eye and said softly, “thank you, spence. you’re very sweet.” and with a sudden boldness you leaned forward to press a delicate kiss onto his right cheek.

pulling back you noticed spencer’s lips were slightly parted, he looked almost winded from the sudden action. you were gonna apologize if you over stepped but then jj entered her office with derek trailing behind.

“uh… hi.” she stopped two steps inside then saw the way you both fidgeted to appear normal. as if you were doing something you weren’t supposed… “hi, welcome.” “everything normal here.” you and spencer talked over each other.

“okay, not even gonna ask…” waving a folder about, “but i found a case and hotch approved so into the conference room for debriefing.” jj gave both of you a final stare then walked around derek to flee the scene.

“come on pretties, you can smooch later.” “derek!”

[allstrangeandwonderful]

So I'm reading for an art history class, and Baudrillard is talking about the trends in colour usage from generation to generation (mostly in interior design, but there's definite spillover into fashion, architecture, etc.), and how every new colour movement is a direct rebellion against the previous one, like how the bright colours of the 60s/70s were a direct response to the austerity and seriousness of the WWII/postwar era, and how a shift back to organized, moralistic neutrals were a direct rejection of 60s/70s gaudiness, etc., and that all makes sense, people find their parent's style tacky, sure

But he goes on to observe how we've now been stuck in a lull of pasty tones and naturalistic finishes for some time, and I'm thinking yes, he's so right, but that's weird, because its been hanging around for so long, like what is it rebelling against anymore? What is it answering to? Well all I had to do was be patient because lo and behold, Baudrillard provides the following sentence, which caused me to completely wig out:

"...except of course, for the spheres of advertising and commerce, where colour's power to corrupt enjoys full rein"

And I'm like ooohhhhHHHHHH, so this colourless minimalist wasteland of a design principle:

Is maybe hanging on so stubbornly because this corporate hellscape:

is assaulting all of our eyes, inside and outside of our homes, every waking second, and is tainting the very concept of colour into something we can't relax around in our living spaces.

EDIT: The reading was The System of Objects by Jean Baudrillard, 1996 Ed., Part A, Section II, Subheading "Atmospheric Values: Colour" (p. 30-36 in my copy). Even if this was a passionate spur-of-the-moment post, omitting this was pretty silly; my bad.

EDIT 2: I was trying to be chill and leave this one alone, cuz I know most people in the notes are talking to themselves and their followers and not actually me, but 11,000 notes in it's starting to get to me - yes, I am aware that decreased homeownerhship/increased renting/landlord specials/hyperfocus on resale values, are all very direct causes of this too. I totally agree. For me, those were the obvious answers; I think we all get why the owning class is serving this to us. My epiphany moment was about understanding the flip side, the psychology of the consumers who keep accepting it, and even seem to enjoy it. That's what I couldn't understand before, but now I suddenly do. (And for those of you saying such people don't exist, no one actually wants to live without colour - check the notes, bb, they're everywhere. Not everyone has the same brain as you. We all deal with the horrors of capitalism differently.)

[calisources]

𝐓𝐇𝐄   𝐁𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐀𝐃   𝐎𝐅   𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐆𝐁𝐈𝐑𝐃𝐒   𝐀𝐍𝐃   𝐒𝐍𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐒   𝐐𝐔𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐒.   all   sentences   have   been   taken   from   the   hunger   games:   the   ballad   of   songbirds   and   snakes   book   and   some   from   the   movie   trailers.   might   include   spoilers   for   the   movie   and   book.   change   pronouns   and   locations   and   names   as   you   see   fit.

“Nothing you can take from me was ever worth keeping.”

“Being from the Capitol doesn’t give you that right. Nothing does.”

“Well, as they said, it's not over until the mockingjay sings.”

“People aren’t so bad, really, It’s what the world does to them.”

“That is the thing with giving your heart. You never wait for someone to ask. You hold it out and hope they want it.”

“Snow lands on top.”

“I think there’s a natural goodness built into human beings. You know when you’ve stepped across the line into evil, and it’s your life’s challenge to try and stay on the right side of that line.”

“Before need, before love, came trust.”

“And try not to look down on people who had to choose between death and disgrace.”

“What are lies but attempts to conceal some sort of weakness?”

“The strain of being a full-fledged adult every day had grown tiresome.”

“You can blame it on the circumstances, the environment, but you made the choices you made, no one else.”

“Wars are won by heads not hearts.”

“There is a point to everything or nothing at all, depending on your worldview.”

“You're mine and I'm yours. It's written in the stars.”

“But better off sad than dead.”

“What young brains lack in experience they sometimes make up for in idealism. Nothing seems impossible to them.”

“I think it’s more important than love. I mean, I love all kinds of things I don’t trust.”

“I’m planning to build a whole new beautiful life here. One where, in my own small way, I can make the world a better place.”

“If the war’s impossible to end, then we have to control it indefinitely. Just as we do now.”

“What was there to aspire to once wealth, fame, and power had been eliminated? Was the goal of survival further survival and nothing more?”

“They were both after all, still children whose lives were dictated by powers above them.”

“Star-crossed lovers meeting their fate.”

“I’m bad news, all right.”

“The ability to control things. Yes, that was what he’d loved best of all.”

“What happened in the arena? That’s humanity undressed. The tributes. And you, too.”

How quickly civilization disappears. All your fine manners, education, family background, everything you pride yourself on, stripped away in the blink of an eye, revealing everything you actually are.”

“A boy with a club who beats another boy to death. That’s mankind in its natural state”

“Please, Coriolanus, I would never forget the favor.”

“Who are human beings? Because who we are determines the type of governing we need.”

“What sort of agreement is necessary if we’re to live in peace? What sort of social contract is required for survival?”

“It’s just the kind of story that catches fire.”

“And last but least, District Twelve girl . . . she belongs to Coriolanus Snow.”

“Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains.”

“If history teaches you anything, it’s how to make the unwilling comply.”

“You know what I won’t miss? People. Except for a handful. They’re mostly awful, if you think about it.”

“And to erase me, they must erase the Games.”

“Why did these people think that all they needed to start a rebellion was anger?”

“And if even the most innocent among us turn into killers in the Hunger Games, what does that say? That our essential nature is violent.”

“It's the things we love most, that destroy us.”

“We all did things we’re not proud of.”

“What are the Hunger Games for?”

"If you want to protect people, then it's essential to accept what human beings are and what it takes to control them."

“Hope is the only thing stronger than fear."

“If the cause wasn’t honorable, how could it be an honor to participate in it?”

“He’s a Capitol boy and clearly I got the cake with the cream, ’cause nobody else’s mentor even bothered to show up to welcome them.”

“To dine with her suggests that you consider her your equal. But she isn’t.”

“The endless dance with hunger had defined his life.”

"In nature, things that are prey, that are weak, are marked"

"The world is not kind to those who don't fit in"

"We all wear masquerades in this Capitol"

, "There's a price for everything, Lucy. Sometimes you pay it willingly, sometimes it's taken from you,"

"Freedom is not given, it is taken"

“I’m not convinced that we are all as inherently violent as you say, but it takes very little to bring the beast to the surface, at least under the cover of darkness.”

[twstfanblog]

Honestly, I just love to hear you rant!!! My request is any au you choose, with Crewel, Rook, and Vil, together or separate, your choice!!! I think your rants are super sweet and sound so much like my own to my friends!!! It kinda makes me think of when I spent 30 minutes trying to find out how much a pint of ale cost in 1843 England for one sentence in something I was writing! 😅 Too bad I'm already following you, because I would totally follow you again! Can't send the Tumblr gift thingies though, because screw American capitalism.

(That price of ale thing is literally how deep I get into world building if Im not careful XD Most days I just go, IT'S FINE YOU DON'T KNOW JUST KEEP WRITING)

Hmmmm... I've written about them all a lot in most of my AU's, honestly. I dont have anything really rant worthy left to say about...I literally had a whole hour to think about it, so instead, I'm just gonna drop another AU so I can get you something new about them. My Manhwa AU is pretty self-serving, but it's got plenty of Vil, Rook, and Crewel sprinkled in.

Basic idea of the AU is that 'Villainess' type story. Yuu was seen as a villain in the original timeline, only to die and come back in time to when she was a child with her full memories. She vows to change her ways and not die in such a way again.

Crewel and Crowley are Yuu's birth parents (Because my AU's are just the same universes in different settings-oop) Crewel married Crowley 100% for the money and power since Crowley was an arch duke. You couldn't call it a marriage of convenience hard enough. But of course, Crewel had to have a puppy to fufill his duty. Crewel will openingly treat Crowley like the bumbling man he pretends to be, but he is an adoring yet stern father to his precious puppy. So you can imagine when she wakes up one day and doesn't act like herself at all. He's so concerned about her...

Vil isn't nobility, but he and his father are both rich and popular enough to buy a title. Both actors, Vil leaves for the performance to the point he was called a succubus by one of his cast stars (teenagers acting so good one falls in love but the other is like 'dude we were acting, calm down'). Vil holds onto his issues with always being casted as a villain but he holds it in much better because hes just happy that he's well liked enough to always perform. As he gets older in this AU he starts to really show his support for the arts and all who create it. He's even started looking for investors to help him fund an acting school.

Rook is a noble man, lover of the odd and offbeat art, no one but his family really accepted his art. But he tried and he shared it with everyone he could. Vil saw it during an artshow and kinda tore it apart publicly by going on and on about how disturbed it made him feel. The current brownnoser tried to 'agree' saying it was bad art.

Vil:

Vil: There's no such thing as "bad art", you toad. I said it disturbed me, I find it grotesque is a very...eyecatching way. It's not bad because it made me feel something.

So Rook falls in love instantly and basically hunts this mean beauty.

They end up working well together because Vil has FINALLY found someone willing to write him in a hero role and PROPERLY CRITIQUE THINGS WITH. They discus art and what makes something 'moving' vs 'shock value'. They fall in love hard for each other to the point Vil accepted Rook's proposal and is already 60% planned through their wedding. Only to realize he never told anyone when his dad asked if he was open to seeing anyone because he's been told many a young man and lady would like to court him.

(SORRY THIS TOOK ME SO LONG TO DO!!!)

[user2772636]

Douzième Fille

12th girl

××《☆》××

××《☆》××

Years have gone by. It's now 1971. You've peaked in your career. You've become well known. But what happens when an all too familiar face returns, now more drawn to you?

===

Joseph Descamps x Reader

Warnings: steamy ASFF???, angst, swearing, alcohol consumption, shlut shaming (fuck that old man), implied smut in the end (i didn't write smut yall im nervous)

===

===

Chapter nine: You belong to me

===

You and Joseph called consistently. Phone bills got higher, but both of you could care less. Both of you sent letters, pictures, and postcards like you promised.

Joseph often sent you pictures of him and George. He sent you postcards from Italy, Germany, and some cities in France.

You often send pictures of yourself, Callum, and photoshoots. You sent him postcards from Milan, New York, Copenhagen, and more. Mostly fashion capitals in the world.

Every letter you'd send each other would contain your days, food you tried, people you met, places you've been. But in the end of each one, there'd be the same sentence.

"I love you. See you soon."

It always said that.

Years pass, the calls get less consistent, the letters talking about your days now talk about your weeks, then they start talking about your months.

You talk about college now, parties you've been invited to, alcohol you tried.

Less and less postcards. Only three to five would come in a year now, the only thing written in them is the place they've been to.

Seven years have passed. It's 1971 now. You're 23 years old. The phone ringings have stopped. The letter boxes are empty.

Joseph was now merely a memory. Something you've locked inside you. He's beginning to collect dust.

You write in your notebook about your day. You sit on your matress, only an underwear on and some sheer shirt. Your hair is up in a messy clip, bangs blown on your forehead.

Safe to say you're famous. You've been in countless magazines, influencing famous celebrities. For example, Jane Birkin with your full bangs. You actually have her number. It's in the room... somewhere.

Life in Paris has been... alright, you could say. Sure, it smells like piss, and sure, it's filled with rude people, but you grew up here, so might as well accept it.

Callum's been a big help. He's a famous photographer and car enthusiast now. He's done almost all of your photoshoots. There were some rumours that developed about you two being an item, but you quickly shut that down.

A knock is heard on your flat's front door. Callum walks in, a paper bag in hand, and a lit cigarette between his lips.

"Pretty girl," a nickname he never seemed to want to let go, "your wine is here."

You get up from your place, strutting down some steps and kissing Callum's cheek in greeting. You head to the bag placed on the kitchen counter.

"Fuck yes. Thank you, Callum. You're an angel." I place them in a gift bag, saving them for a future event.

In three days' time, a gala was to happen. It would be filled top to bottom with riches, designer clothes and items, jewels, and anything else that screams luxury. And what you're most excited about is the fact that it's a masquerade.

You, for one, were invited to this gala. The people who were invited are sort of a VIP. Only close friends of the host would be there, and knowing the host, they were luxurious as well.

Your dress was ready. Your gift was ready. Everything was ready. Even your plus one, who is very obviously Callum, was ready. Everything would be perfect.

But you were nervous. Something deep inside your gut was telling you something would happen, and you couldn't tell whether it was a bad sign or a good one. You were hoping for the latter.

It crawled through your skin. You weren't one to get nervous, especially after all the exposure to the media in the past couple of years. So this wasn't exactly normal.

Your heart was exhilarated. Your mind was all over the place. What if you didn't look your best? This was a question you haven't asked yourself in a long while. You've been so self-assured, but what changed it now? That gut feeling sucked.

You take your mind off it. You'd rather talk about your plans for that evening.

The dress you, Callum, and your stylist picked was an archive of Audrey Hepburn's 1956 film Funny Face. It was fluffy around the bottom, the end cutting off in the middle of your calf. It was off shoulder, drop waist, coloured white with accents of pink and blue for the flowers imprinted.

Some things to add on were long white silk gloves, your mask that covered anything but your eyes, along with a pair of white kitten heels, pearl earrings, and hair pieces. It reminded you of when you were young. You, in high school with your puffy skirts, pearl jewellery, and kitten heels.

There was something bugging you. Something you're missing. It was a nostalgic memory. It's something you were trying to figure out, but before you could, Callum's arm wraps around your shoulders.

"You alright, pretty girl?" He asked, worry etched in his tone.

You simply smile at him. "Yup. All good."

××《☆》××

You were riding around Paris in your vespa, the wind blowing through your hair and messing it up. It was an hour before midnight, the air colder, and the streets lit up with lights.

You wanted some air. Something about what happened earlier made your mind jumble over what it could've been. You needed to stop it from running around. It would've kept you up all night.

Your coat was on, keeping you warm. You had borrowed it from Callum, using the excuse of the fact that it was bigger, meaning it would keep you from the cold. Which was true.

He barely even used it anyway. It didn't even smell like him. Callum smelt like new cars, cigarettes, and hair gel. This coat wasn't too far, but it wasn't that close. It smelt like cigarettes, yes, but also expensive cologne. Callum doesn't wear that type of cologne.

It got your mind running again. You roll your eyes to yourself. You thought this would help. You speed your Vespa up, making it around l'Arc de Triomphe, turning to a road and going straight ahead.

The wind blew harsher, your nose getting irritated from the cold. You guess Callum's coat wasn't enough. You make some turns again till you get to Pont d'léna, now making you ride face to face with the sparkling Eiffel Tower. You got here in time for it.

Your awe for the tower never really faded even after seeing it almost every day for the past several years. Many people wish to see it for the first time again, but you, it will always feel like the first time.

You turn your head back to the road when you go right, on your way back to your flat. Your neck hurts a bit from craning it to the tower, but most of the time, it's worth it.

Again, you feel nostalgic. There's a tall figure standing on the side of the road looking up at the tower. His hair was messy, so as yours, and he was smoking a cigarette. He had something wrapped around his head. You couldn't quite focus on what he looked like exactly from the speed you were going.

You turn your head to the road again. What was that? It was probably a man you've seen around the streets, or somebody you worked with. You shrug it off and continue your ride home.

××《☆》××

It was the morning of the gala. It would start somewhere around six in the evening for dinner. You woke up early for the day.

You're outside a café with Callum, sipping on piping hot coffee and eating your pastries. Every once in a while, a flash is seen in the corner of your eye. Fans or paparazzi, you pay it no mind.

"Is there anything else we need to do or get before we prep for the gala?" You say, putting your cup down gently onto its plate.

"Nope. You seem a lot more nervous than usual. Is there something you wanna change up?" Callum asks, taking a puff out of his cigarette. You shake your head.

"Yeah, I don't know. I've been feeling it since yesterday. There's just... I think something's gonna happen. Something big." You shrug, crossing your arms and leaning on the table. Callum nods, leaning forward too, mirroring you.

"Ah, well, is it good or bad?" He questions, butting of his cigarette. You think for a while, reminiscing on the feeling.

"Actually, it might be good. That's why I'm nervous, you know? I don't want anything to get messed up. Because if something bad were to happen, well..." I shrug, hissing. Callum chuckles.

"Well, alright. We'll double-check everything so it goes smoothly for you, pretty girl." He pats your arm, reassuring you. You grab a hold of his hand, squeezing it and saying "Thank you."

It was afternoon now. You began to prepare for the gala. Your team came in a few minutes ago, and they begin working on you. You're sitting in your chair with your makeup artist fixing you up when the phone rings.

"Callum, can you get that, please?" I shout towards him. He comes out of the kitchen and into the living room we were in. He picks the phone up. You had a clear vision of everything. He leans against the wall, greeting the caller.

Then, his face shifts. It morphs into something you can't read, but Callum seems to hold in a smile. When he notices you looking at him, he turns his back towards you. Instead of speaking in a normal volume, he began to whisper.

What the fuck was that? Who could the caller be? It's probably one of his hookups, for sure. You let it slide. You'll ask about it after.

When Callum hangs up, you immediately call after him.

"Callum, who was it?" Callum turns around, hands in his back pockets and lips pursed. He does this when he's trying to hide something. You raise your brows.

"Just... someone special." He flashes a quick smile and then runs out of the room. Oh. You were right.

"Someone special" was a code name for one of the boys he fell in love with during your time here in Paris. You both were still in college. He was from the architecture department. Things happened, and things fell apart.

But then, you weren't so sure. Every time someone special called our place after their relationship, Callum was always sad after. Maybe something new happened?

When the clock hit five, everyone was on their way down stairs. You were fully prepped now, in your makeup, and dress with your jewellery and heels. Your mask was on, and you put on a large white fur coat.

Upon exiting your apartment complex, bunches of paparazzi blocked by barricades took pictures of you with their bright flashes. Callum and your team huddled around you, trying to get you safely in the car.

You get in your vehicle, and Callum had made an arrangement that he was to drive it. Nostalgia has filled your senses these past few days. You wonder what would come next.

When you arrived at the venue, wlaking through high ceiling halls and large oak doors, the room was filled with masked people, all dressed in various colours. They stood, laughed, and talked, all while drinking their preferred drinks.

It was a bit chilly in here, and you started to regret leaving your coat in your car. You didn't want to ask Callum to go with you to get it, seeing him already in conversation with the guests. You decide to go to the bar area instead.

You get your drink, fiddling with your hands as you wait. The ballroom was elegant, so much more brilliant than you thought it could be. Though, it felt rather lonely. You shake off the feeling once you receive your poison of the night.

Then, an announcement was heard. Everyone was to grab a partner to accompany them to dance. You promised Callum to enjoy the night, and you guess a dance could fulfil that.

You opted to a man who was sitting in the same bar you were in. He brought you a sense of familiarity for some unknown reason. He was slouched in his seat, ash brown hair a bit messy. He was turning his glass in circles.

"Hello." You greeted. When he turned to you, your eyes widened in wonder. He only had one eye hole, the rest of his face covered like yours. He blinks, and you could slightly hear him breathing.

"Hi." He says simply. You scan him, and there's a feeling in you that you definitely knew who this was, you just couldn't pinpoint it.

"I know I'm not in the position as a woman in this economy," you roll your eyes, "but, would you like to dance with me?"

His back straightens, and you think you've made him uncomfortable.

"Oh. I'm so sorry for even think-"

"Yes." He cuts in. He offers you a gloved hand as he stands from his barstool. You're surprised. He's taller than you imagined.

You take a hold of his hand. It's warm. Familiarly warm. He leads you into the middle of the ballroom, other guests already forming into formation. He gently takes your risks into his hold, moving up to his chest. Again, it's so familiar.

He drifts his hands to your sides and clutches it a bit. You feel as though you knew these hands. Like you've memorised the lines on the palm, the way the fingertips swirl, or how the muscles twitch and the joints move.

The orchestra starts to play, and you start to move. There's a flow you follow, and it feels so easy. You hadn't even known there was choreography, but the man you were with did. And he showed you through it.

You couldn't stop looking. Even if your neck started to hurt from looking up, even if you twirled, even if your eyes started to dry. You couldn't stop. And you didn't want to.

His eyes stayed on you all throughout the dance. The way he held you, the way he felt. He was so warm even if his body was covered in multiple layers of fabric. You could feel it. Like you've sunk into his skin.

When the dance ended, and he asked you to go with him, you agreed. You didn't know what he looked like. You only feel like you knew him, but you weren't sure. But even with that running through your head, you agreed.

The outside was cold but warmer than inside. You still shivered as you did before. Just then, a coat is wrapped around your shaking shoulders. You look up at the masked man. He took his coat off, now only dressed with a white button-up and a vest matching his pants. His already messy hair messes up even more now. It's in perfect condition to run your hands through.

You both make your way to the large railing of the balcony, taking a seat on it. It viewed the beautiful Eiffel Tower, its lights sparkling in the night. The wind blows once again. It's peaceful.

You turn your head to the man, and you almost fell over the rail. Sitting in front of you, his face finally unmasked, was Joseph Descamps. Out of all people, you didn't expect your first love to be sat in front of you. Seven years have passed, and he's still beautiful.

Your eyes began to sting as you lifted your hands to your face, discarding your own mask. He smiles, his pretty pink lips curving upward. He looks down, fiddling with the inseams of his pants. Again, it's familiar.

"Hi, Y/N." He whispers gently, taking a hold of your shaking hand. He takes your gloves off, putting them aside. He connects the tips of his fingers to yours, then encapsulates it in his warmth.

You can't speak. You can't breathe. You can't stop your heart from beating the way it was now.

"Seven years, and I finally see you again." He shows his teeth in his smile, and again, you can't stop looking.

"Still not talking?" He asks with a teasing tone, tilting his head.

"Did you know?" You asked, your voice so low you were surprised he even heard. Of course he did. He payed the closest attention to you.

"Know what?" He raises his eyebrows, anticipating your next words.

"That it was me?" He chuckles and shakes his head.

"Of course I did. I mean, I recognised you with one eye. I think I'd recognise you blind." He moves closer, bringing your hand up and placing a kiss on your knuckles.

You laugh. You lift your free hand up and cup his cheek. He leans into it, head laying heavy on your palm. He looks up at you, his eyelids heavy. Fuck.

He closes his eyes, taking his other hand to clasp at your wrist. He kisses your palm, leaving some wet patches from his open mouth. He trails his kisses up to your pulse, and you can't help but grab on his hair.

"Y/N, I've been looking-" Callum says as he runs towards the entrance of the balcony, stopping in his place at the sight of you.

"Oh, you finally met." Finally? You furrow your eyebrows, trying to figure out what he meant. Joseph pulls away from your hands, keeping his eyes on Callum. You turn my head back to the man in front of me, raising an eyebrow.

"What does he mean finally?" You ask Joseph. Callum walks towards us slowly, hands clasped behind his back.

"Uh..." Joseph looks to Callum. Callum raises his hands up. Joseph looks back to you, licking his lips before answering. "I planned it... sorry?"

"Planned it? Sorry? Joseph, why are you saying sorry? This is the best thing ever." You exclaim, and the two men just look at eachother.

"Not to ruin whatever the fuck you guys were doing just then, but the host wants some pictures, so..." He gestures to the door. You purse your lips in disappointment but nod. You get up and straighten your skirt, wiping off any wrinkles.

"I better go." You take your gloves and mask from where you were seated. "Can I see you after the gala?"

Joseph nods. "I was already planning on it." After prepping fully, you just stand there. You then lift your hand. "Bye."

Why was that so awkward? You'll save your self-beating bit later. Before you could even walk a step, Joseph takes your wrist again. You turn around to be met with a kiss on the corner of your lips.

"You look as gorgeous as the day you left." He whispers and presses another kiss on your cheek. They're beet red, you can feel it. He walks away, waving a bye to Callum, too. Callum slowly turns his head to you, then ushers you to go with him.

"What was that?" There's a cheeky smile on his face, and you try to hide your growing one.

"I don't even know."

××《☆》××

He was... clingy. The host, you meant. He was tall and built, but he was honestly so annoying. He kept bragging about his riches and talking about himself. The only time he shut up was when he took a sip of his whiskey.

You look around subtly, trying to keep yourself from rolling your eyes in front of the man, even though he could barely see them from your mask. Speaking of, he didn't wear one. This might've just been a party to make him somewhat the centre of attention for standing out.

"Dance with me, darling." You grimace. You're very glad for these masks. That nickname will be the death of you. And in a bad way.

"I don't feel like dancing. My feet are starting to hurt." I shrug, pointing to my ankles. You thought you were so smart, but he was just so insistent.

"Well, why don't we go upstairs? My office is free, and, you know," He comes disgustingly closer. You can smell his bad breath from his rotting yellow teeth. "I can help you with the aching."

Before you could retort, an arm wraps around your waist, keeping you still. You would've pushed away if you hadn't recognised his touch or his scent.

"Excuse me, sir. I must bring Ms. Pardine home immediately. She is busy tomorrow. And most definitely busy tonight." He turns his head towards you. He felt so tense. Like he was keeping something within him. A feeling so strong.

The man huffs like a child. "And who are you supposed to be?" He crosses his arms. He looks so immature, even with that saggy and wrinkley face.

"A close... friend." Joseph's hand slid down to my hips, clutching it slightly. He tugs you in closer, making you lose balance and place a hand on his chest. You refuse to look his way, or even anyones.

The other man scowls, disgust now visible in his face. "What a slut." He mumbles, finally leaving you alone. Joseph's grip on your hips tightens, and it starts to hurt you a bit.

"Joseph." You say, trying to gently push his hand away. He immediately lets go, turning to you worriedly.

"Shit. Sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you." He rubs your hip to relax it, but you don't relax one bit. Your heart hammers in your chest, and there's a feeling deep in your stomach.

"It's alright. Just take me home." I caress his neck before grabbing his hand, moving through the crowds of people. You try to look for Callum, but when you find him, he's talking, or quite literally eye fucking some guy he was conversating with. He can get home, you guess.

Joseph takes you home in his car. This felt weird. Not badly, just that you've never been driven by him. It felt comforting. You could get used to this.

You tell him the directions to your place, and when you make it, you pause.

"Come in?" You turn your head. Your masks were already long gone, and all you could see was his beautiful face again.

"Are you sure?" He asks, voice shaking. You can't believe he's still nervous with you, especially with that stunt he pulled with your wrist on a public balcony. You'll tease him about it soon.

"With you? Always." So then you went up to your room, and as soon as you did, his hands were on you again. He backs you up until your back hits the wall behind you. You're both breathing so heavy it's the only thing you could hear in the entire flat.

"I missed you. And I need you. So fucking much." He whispers, one hand cupping your face and the other roaming your waist. Your legs go wobbly, so you take your heels off, making you shorter than you already were standing in front of him.

"Fuck." You mumble. "Kiss me already."

He smashes his lips against yours feverishly, and you could taste everything he had that night. Wine, whiskey, cigarettes, and even strawberries. His tongue swipes your lips as he lets out a groan.

He pulls you closer, kneeling a bit to grab your thighs, then carrying you with ease, all while he loses his breath from kissing you. He lets go of your face to let his hands roam the area, not wanting to accidentally hit your wall.

"Bedroom?" He asks, parting for only a millisecond before placing his pretty pink lips on yours again. You have to fight the urge not to drown in him.

"To the left." He nods, continuing to kiss you as he reverts his way to the left side of your flats. You bump a few things on the way, like some side tables and magazines.

You finally make it to the bedroom, and he lies down gently onto your bed. He slows his lips, savouring the way you tasted. It makes you squirm in anticipation, and you feel a smirk on his lips as he continues. He parts away, a small string of saliva accentuating it. He pants before he speaks.

"I wasn't lying. I really fucking need you. Please. Please, tonight." He whimpers, arms wobbling from where he placed it to hover over you. You just can't say no.

One nod sealed the deal for him, and his lips were on you again. This time, it's on your forehead, your nose, your cheeks, your eyes.

He pecks down to your neck. Everything inside you feels so fuzzy, especially when he kissed and sucked on those sensitive parts. He lowers down to your shoulders, and you can feel the bruises forming. You love the way it feels. You love the way he feels. You love him.

××《☆》××

End - Chapter nine: You Belong To Me

Next - Chapter Ten: I love you

××《☆》××

WHAT'S UP GUYS??? So, like this is nice (i need him so bad OMFGGGGG) totally can still breathe after that last scene (i can't i want him pls omg) so like hope you enjoyed THAT cliffhanger. It's better than my old cliffhangers, right? But overall, i hope you enjoyed THE WHOLE chapter bcs its real nice, and it's all me. ONE CHAPTER LEFT!!!

[puckpocketed]

i just hate when players do this and people call them “warriors” i know you wanna play in the playoffs to help your team but YOUR FINGERS ARE LITERALLY BROKEN MY GUY THEY COULD NEVER GROW BACK TOGETHER THE RIGHT WAY im crying

my poor cringefail wifes i love them all so much i hope they all take the rest they need

GOD I hope they get rest too :((

breaking soooo much character right now to give my fullest take, and it’s that we can hold multiple ideas in our minds and i don’t think they conflict

playing through injuries is terrible.

They are whole adult human beings and professional athletes who have resources to keep them informed about long term consequences, and they still get to make those choices even if we hate the choices they make. Even if those choices drastically reduce the length of their career. Even if those choices end with long term heath complications.

i might lose some people on this one but i don’t care!! it’s what I believe: being disabled or chronically ill/injured/in pain is not a death sentence. it is not the worst thing in the world. people live full and happy lives whilst also being disabled. can it suck for the person living through it? yes. absolutely. but to me, people are not and never will be defined by how able-bodied they are!!!

All of this is true (to me) and also we can still condemn the circumstances that cause them to make these choices. (culture of not wanting to be seen as soft, the normalisation/valorisation of playing through injury, all the other [gestures wildly] forces at play that set athletes up to make these decisions) Like i’m sorry to get political but choices do not exist in vacuums. sports does not exist separated from hegemonic models of masculinity or capitalism. there are so so so many reasons a player might choose to harm themselves by playing through injury and not all of them are noble or valid, some of them are stupid and informed by bullshit!!! and we should be mad at that bullshit!! because it’s awful!!!!

these are their jobs, and i’m talking in the sense that they are performing labour and i think labour laws and workplace health and safety must apply here too. I think we have to start talking about these things in terms of workers rights, in amongst all of the compassion we have for them as players. there’s the pressure to perform due to contract status and salary bonus milestones; there’s team doctors having direct conflicts of interest, a monetary and cultural incentive to look the other way when clearing people to play; there’s the plain fact of the best possible safety equipment (cages/bowls, neck guards, cut resistant protective gear) not being mandatory; the blatant denial of CTE coming from the league itself. there’s a lot. and it’s a workers rights issue, not just a moral one. someone will play through xyz because of the culture, because of the pressure, and they will die from it.

EVEN STILL. there is beauty and narrative resonance and something compelling about it all, and I don’t want to deny that. as someone looking from the outside in, sports captures people’s hearts because of these narratives. sacrifice and teamwork and triumph — we have an appetite for these things. I am never going to sit here and deny that I feel compelled by it (which is simultaneous to the anger, the fear, the deep deep well of “i’m sorry you have feel you have to do this”) This appetite I/we as a society have for pain — unpacking it and addressing it is a whole other conversation and I am not qualified to have it. I’m just going to acknowledge it exists because I think pretending it doesn’t would be dishonest of me.

we are allowed to feel fucked up about all of this. call it parasocial, call it entitled, call it inappropriate, i don’t know!! we are people and knowing other people are in pain tends to fuck us up — and as much as I try to keep a healthy distance from these celebrities, as much as I remind myself they’re strangers, I care when they’re hurt because I’m human.

anyway. YES OUR POOR CRINGEFAIL WIVES 😭🤲

[holy-puckslibrary]

━ 𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐕𝐄

˗ˏˋ main masterlist ˎˊ˗

pairing(s) — (soft)dark!QUINN HUGHES x gray!reader word count — 4k

note — i am so sorry for this (not really)

recommended viewing — sorority row (2009)

bingo squares and additional content warnings under the cut.

bingo squares —orgasm control, non-consensual voyeurism (+ pictures taken) and implied past mutual masturbation (dubcon — you’ll see) additional content warnings — dom!reader + subby-as-hell!quinn (ngl he’s kind of a pathetic loser here, but that’s why we love him), m!receiving oral (perhaps too much idk you tell me) + cum play x2, quinn rendered dumb and speechless by his raging humiliation kink and his need for degradation (and an itty bitty bit of praise — quinn: new kink unlocked), i have been plagued w ball play as of late so im subjecting yall to it, mention of edging and orgasm denial, oh and just some pheromone kink bits and a cute lil oral fixation moment or two, nothing to see here!

QUINN HUGHES WAS ENAMORED the moment he saw you.

Three rows from the front. Laptop cracked, but more for show than anything. All your glittery, coveted attention fixed on the cellphone resting in your palm while you tapped away, your lips loosely draped over the pen you were gnawing on. 

You were positively mesmerizing.

He briefly contemplated sliding into one of the open seats beside yours, but a gaggle of your insipid "sisters" beat him to the punch.

As if he would’ve been able to capitalize on the golden opportunity anyway; it took half the semester for him to form a full, coherent sentence in your vicinity.

Ironically, Quinn was far more comfortable when you weren’t looking.

Or, rather, Quinn was more comfortable when you didn’t know he was looking.

He didn’t interact much with anyone outside of his coding cohort and the club team—athletic prowess only garners state-school clout when your sport is top dog, and this was a football school, through and through. As such, and at the hands of his tragic awkwardness, he rarely spoke to women, if ever.

And he never got face time with any as effortlessly beautiful and interesting as you.

Discovering that your large bedroom window faced the secluded side street he took to get home from practice each night felt like a sign. He’d struck gold, and it would be a shame not to put the knowledge to good use.

In his own shadowy domain, he could be whatever and whoever he wanted; he could be the guy who got the girl.

It was exhilarating, really. 

Quinn supposed some of that rush should be attributed to the feeling of unbridled control his daily routine sorely and consistently lacked. He hardly, if ever, felt like an active participant in his own life.

But in the privacy of his own head—and the safety of the very curb he’s stood on now—there were no alpha douche-canoes to eat up your finite attention or loud airheads to crave your tutelage. 

Between sundown and sun-up, you were his and his alone.

— Even if you were none the wiser.

As benevolent as you may appear, he knew you would never give a guy like him the time of day. Quinn was a lot of things, but stupid's never been one of them.

You wouldn’t even acknowledge his existence if it weren’t for your shared smaller sessions on Thursday mornings. Just you and him… and ten other students, with the occasional appearance of your slacker TA—how romantic.

And if he couldn’t even get a moment alone with you, he definitely wouldn’t get a night inside of you, either. 

So, he settles.

Quinn puts up with the bugs and tolerates the bushes, swallowing his pride (and his mortification), and takes what he can get.

He's accustomed to maneuvering in the dark—this stretch of pavement in particular—but he stumbles through the dimly lit street like he’s got two left feet that only grew in yesterday. 

If you were privy to his impromptu audition for Bambi, you don’t mention it.

And if you clocked the obnoxious bulge tenting his jeans, you don’t acknowledge that, either.

Quinn isn’t entirely sure this is happening in his real, waking life; it’s far too good to be true. 

This is not at all where he thought the night would go when your name flashed across the screen.

When he hesitantly clicked ‘accept’ and brought the phone to his ear, all while still palming himself to the memory of your head tossed back in ecstasy—the way it was before the lights went out abruptly —Quinn assumed he’d soon be gripping steel bars.

“H-How’d you get this number?” he asked after hearing his name.

You whispered it so ardently he could almost feel your breath on his cheek. It made him shiver and, momentarily, forget he’d likely been caught red-handed—literally.

“You made the group chat for our section, silly.”

Instinct compelled Quinn to chastise himself, but knowing you remembered that minute detail—a nothing of a fact, really—was enough to override the urge entirely.

And the complete lack of ire in your voice lured him into a false sense of security yet to be disproven.

He gulped and willed his hand to stop moving. “Oh, right. Uh, is there something you need? Did the outline for next week not go through? Because if not, I can just re-send it ri—”

“Meet me at the same door as last time,” you sliced through his rambling with a tone that was neither foreboding nor comforting.

Then, the line went dead.

For once, Quinn was grateful to be so eager to please. If not for that zeal, he couldn't have walked up to the service door of Delta Nu.

Risking the wrath of your underlings was never a goal of his, but considering how quickly they turned up their plastic noses at him when he came by to drop off notes from the class you missed, Quinn couldn’t imagine worse circumstances for Round Two. 

When the backdoor swung in, you spoiled him in all your glory and the assurance of an empty house.

Out of pure exhaustion—and in his excitement to resume his ritual after a long week away—it slipped his mind; tonight is the best and biggest Kappa Tau rager.

Hence the ghost town

“Do you stand out there all night, stalker?”

Quinn’s head bobbed despite the apt insult. Then, he remembered you couldn’t see his reply, given that you were leading him up a staircase.

“M-Most nights, yeah.”

At that, you spun on your heel. Quinn shook like a leaf as you stepped forward. Gripping the railing, a hand on either side of his shrunken form, you invaded his personal space for the sole purpose of degrading him further.

The sneer hadn’t reached your eyes, but it speared him just the same. “God, you’re fucking pathetic.”

Quinn launched into an attempt at groveling, but his own verbal clumsiness rendered the effort futile.

However, his sputtered half-thoughts and litany of sentences that went nowhere were brought to a screeching halt by a single, manicured finger. Unable to process the touch and the wicked grin on your otherwise cherubic face concurrently, he froze.

His predicament worsened when you gently breached the tight seam of his lips to rest your interruption against his tongue.

You stepped closer; he saw stars. “I like that.”

It was at that moment Quinn realized you came straight down to the side-yard...because he could taste you. As you massaged his tongue with the pad of your finger, effectively rubbing your essence into his body, it took every ounce of strength to keep himself from busting right there in your foyer.

Still, he managed the mortification he sought to avoid.

“Are you… Are you humping me?” you barked with an incredulous snort.

Humiliation blurred his vision as you backed away from him; it wasn’t his fault your perfume elicited a Pavlovian bodily reaction. 

You kept your finger in his mouth as you bit back genuine laughter, but that just made him harder.

“Y’know,” you hummed, contemplative. You paused to watch your pointer finger slowly thrust in and out of his needy mouth. Your smirk was noticeably wider when you spoke again. “My last boyfriend couldn’t even text me back—or remember that he was in a monogamous relationship.”

Quinn blinked. “Your last boyfriend?”

The question was garbled by your finger—and his own sucking. It didn’t matter, though. His reply wasn’t necessary.

At least, not yet.

“Mhmm, my last one.”

You repeated yourself as if you were speaking to a child and not to the grown man whose boner was digging into your skin. 

It made him whimper. Your condescension was his kryptonite, apparently.

“But...I know my next one will be different; you’re too devoted to hurt me.”

He wasn’t given time to respond because as soon as you got your desired reaction—mewling akin to a bleating lamb and the whites of his eyes—you were dragging him up the remaining stairs and into the president’s suite.

Quinn’s spent countless hours wondering what your bedroom looked like, and even more fantasizing about what might happen if he ever saw it firsthand. His mouth splits after working up the nerve to compare the reality of your space to his mental notes, but before he can shove out any words, you’re backing him across the room with a devious glint in your eyes.

“W-What are you doing?” he asks when his back hits glass.

Right now, he’s pressed against his standing window into your most private moments. It feels wrong to be on this side of the wall.

Quinn gets none of the bubbly warmth he assumed he would if he ever found himself here. Instead, he feels unbelievably small as he drowns in a sea of poor choices.

“I think a little exhibitionism would be good for you, Hughes.”

"I-I don’t understand…”

You smile. His stupid heart flutters.

God, love’s fucking embarrassing.

Again, you crowd his space. This time, though, until there’s barely enough room between the window pane and your body for his wilted one. You press a single, fleeting kiss to his pulse point, your breath fanning over his clammy skin. His hitches in his throat.

“I want you to see things from my point of view.”

The words seep into his neck. Your intentions slam into him like a semi-truck going full speed. Anyone walking on the path—his path— would need only to venture a peek at your window to know exactly what was happening.

It would be too easy to watch him the way he’s watched you for weeks. 

A taste of his own medicine.

The candy-coated threat shouldn’t have the effect that it does. Given how emotionally charged the air’s become—for him, at least—it makes sense for his body to get some wires crossed; the same sticky emotion causing him to wither in fear should not be making him harder than ever.

He isn’t expecting you to kiss him, so it takes Quinn’s mind a beat to catch up. Still, he melts into the affection like it's the only thing keeping him alive. Though, as soon as Quinn regains enough composure to actually participate, you kill the kiss as swiftly as you brought it to fruition.

He chases after your mouth, much to your amusement.

“What, sad there was no tongue?” you tease as if you weren't the one to ruined the moment. 

Quinn doesn’t find you very funny right now.

“We’re going to play a little game.” 

Your lips brush his as your hushed words march out, but he remains still. He knows better now than to ask questions prematurely. You hum in acknowledgment, satisfied. 

Quinn beams. He's always been a quick study.

You take him by the wrist and guide him into the space you just vacated.

Physically, he knows he’s stronger. It wouldn’t take much to overpower you, but that means nothing in the face of your mental sway. Quinn can’t move because you don’t want him to—because you haven’t told him he can.

And any hope of gaining the upper hand crashes out onto the concrete the moment your bare knees hit the carpet.

Quinn knows he’s a dead man when your hands coast up his thighs.

“Put your hands on the window sill.” He does without hesitation. “Keep them there. You move, I stop. Understand?”

“Yes, I-I understand.”

“Good boy,” you say.

It’s more of a taunt than true praise, but his bulge twitches all the same before your eyes. The slight betrayal announces the internal chaos in the wake of the unexpected praise.

Quinn knew he liked that, but he didn’t want you to know it, too. What little control he managed to horde dissipates.

The delight on your face confirms the worst; you plan to do with that information what he hoped you wouldn’t. “God, I am going to have so much fun with you.”

It's an uphill battle, trying to keep his eyes open and his hands where they are supposed to be.

Quinn tastes nirvana when you finally flick the tip of your tongue over his cherry-red tip, the skin having adopted a luminous intensity courtesy of the few street lamps nearby. Glowing, after too much teasing.

Normally, he veered toward edging and denial JOI content, especially if the voice actor sounded anything like you. Tonight, he’s never hated a concept more. Still, he's making sure he behaves because he knows you’ll reward him handsomely.

You can be sweet when you want to be.

Like right now, for instance. You’re snuggling your face into his body, generously nuzzling his painfully stiff length with your cheeks. Whenever the friction mounts to anything substantial, you pull back to decorate his hips and inner thighs with little pecks.

They're reminiscent of the chaste parting kisses you’ve given his cheek in the past just to make him squirm.

You lap up what you can of the escaping arousal, hungrily drinking down all he has to offer. You do your best, you really do, but there’s just too much. The successor to each puddle arrives faster than you expect, and quicker than you can keep up with.

So, you stop trying.

You’re both so desperate, anyway.

Quinn bites back a scream when your dominant hand loops around the base of his cock; the cruel, beautiful beast only settling once the middle finger finally reaches the accompanying thumb. The pressure is light, but encompassing enough to make him dizzy.

So dizzy, in fact, that he actually appreciates your one rule.

However, nothing could have prepared him for what torture you enact next.

Blinking up at him, you rub the leaking tip over and between your lips. With one hand braced against his bare thigh and the other unchanged, you gently tug downward as you suckle the bulbous head.

The sensation is unlike anything Quinn has felt in his limited experience, which he wears like a scarlet letter. The little huffs that make him feel like a dog panting in mid-July remind him that while he's gotten a blowjob or two before, they were nothing like this one. They weren't from you. It might be unfair to lump those instances in with the magic of your mouth.

You can’t compete where you don’t compare.

So, Quinn showers you in soft, airy whispers. Even when you pull back until only the ridge preceding the tip rests past your spit-stained lips, he goes on and on about how good your mouth feels and how much he adores you. 

And, if he were slightly more coherent, maybe he would’ve caught the obvious squeeze of your thighs at his flushed cheeks and the reciprocal effect your lazy teasing.

His hips go rogue when you try to swallow him a little deeper, jerking forward and sending the firm tip to the back of your throat. Naturally, you lose your grip and gag around him, your eyes watering more and more with each subsequent unintended impact.

Quinn is bashfully apologetic, but you’re quick to remove him from your mouth.

“Shouldn’t you already know I like to choke on it?” your raspy voice goads.

You shoot him a wink before hollowing your cheeks to accommodate his wide girth, your tongue flattened and pressed tautly to the underside.

The shallow movement triggers images he shouldn’t have, bright and flashing through his head: of you, on your knees like this for that jerk-off ex-boyfriend of yours—of you, from a distance and fuzzy, forever immortalized in a single film unit pinned to the back wall of his closet.

Quinn does know you like to choke on it. He knows you like to be choked, too.Quinn knows a lot of things about you—likes, dislikes, sleep patterns, study habits… sexual preferences.

Your bizarre reaction to his Peeping Tom antics makes him wonder what you might know about him…

He’s given no time to fall down that rabbit hole on account of your nose brushing his public bone once more. Quinn cannot fathom how his length disappeared down your throat so smoothly, and it's useless to try, given how thoroughly muddied his head’s become with your tongue gently petting the delicate skin of his sack.

With your lips stretched around the base—and your thumb tucked into your palm to subdue innate reflex—you begin massaging what you can. Until you realize quinn has absolutely zero volume control. As crazy as his loud and breathy moans make you, you’ve come too far only to get this far.

Viscous, glasslike threads hang between your withheld mouth and his anguished cock in the lower fringe of your vision. Above you, Quinn is struggling, whimpering like a lost puppy caught in a storm. 

Lips parted ever-so-slightly, his forehead rests against the frame, limp. He's white-knuckling the historic, but recently refurbished wood, trembling in your barely-there hold because he’s that aroused. Mindlessly teetering on the border of “too much” and “not enough," all the while mumbling unintelligibly between choppy breaths.

You could get drunk on those pretty sounds; you’re sure of it. 

Maybe next time, you will.

“I know I said everyone was out, but I don’t think you want Ms. Patty busting through the door before you have a chance to.”

The thought of your sixty-year-old, strict-as-fuck house mother catching him with his pants around his ankles is just horrific enough to coax him a bit closer to the ground.

Quinn bites his lip in a show of good faith.

“Good boy,” you hum your approval while stroking him. “Now, tell me what you want. Tell me what you need to cum in my mouth, Quinn.”

“I need—f-fuck!” he grumbles, at war with himself. Ultimately, primal need overpowers the fickle social invention that is a shame: “I need you to play with… with my b-balls again—please.”

Delaying his wish, you wrap your mouth around him one last time. You need to elicit that one-of-one sudden, uneven intake of air—the giveaway gasp, the tremor of truth. Insatiable, you fill your throat to the brink. The distinct, thick scent of the day’s natural musk swirling with the sheen of hard work on the ice keeps you there until your vision blurs and drool pools under your tongue.

Motivated by a sticky, overdue reward and a whine bursting from deep in Quinn’s throat—the sweet sound of total surrender—you succumb to your own desire to make him feel the best he’s ever felt.

You lick at them gingerly at first, and with a doughy, flattened tongue. You meant to test the waters, to take things slow and drag out his orgasm, but a string of colorful language tumbles from his pretty, pink mouth to derail your plans.

With the dam crumbling, you have to suck one into your hot, wet mouth.

His reaction does not disappoint.

Your spit-soaked hands rise to his recently abandoned length as you devote equal attention to the pair with your mouth. Quinn swells and heavies on your tongue and everything is throbbing.

Including the tight heat between your knees, pulsing around the mere thought of him fucking you there instead.

“S’close, ‘m gonna c-cum soon—Shit!”

Amidst the drawn-out expletive, you detach in order to aim his release on his behalf (though very reluctantly), knowing full-well Quinn is far too gone to be capable of anything.

His eyelids flutter seconds before snapping open, intent to watch you watch him fall apart.

Oh, and fall apart he does…

Crude and ear-piercing, and over faster than either of you would’ve preferred, you’d be lying if you said you weren’t a little flattered by it. You enjoy how easy he is—how pliable.

His hips jerk too easily and his hands wander aimlessly, and you can’t bring yourself to chastise him, entirely consumed by the show unfolding at your hand. It's like he can’t help himself; can’t help but twitch and drip, can’t help but whimper and beg for anything and everything.

He won’t even let you pull away to catch your breath without whining. At one point, whether by accident or designed to keep you from retreating, Quinn’s knees squeezed together, effectively caging you in from both sides.

A messy concoction of cum, spit, and tears paints the lower half of your face. Quinn’s chest heaves as he watches it collect and drip down your neck and into the valley of your chest, soiling your delicate pajamas beyond repair.

Unfazed, you leave the emotionality to him while you lick your fingers clean. Once you’ve finished, you mop up the dissenter spray on your cheeks, chin, and décolletage, and greedily swallow it down, too. It's when you delve between your tits to scoop out the remainder of his spill that Quinn just about keels over.

He falls back against the window, and you shift back into your heels.

He rights his pants, and you wipe your mouth with the corner of your bathrobe. 

For a while, you observe one another, having not been this close—or alone—together before.

That’s not to say you didn’t notice him, though.

You actually struggled not to, and it drove your now-ex insane. His enmity toward Quinn came to a head this afternoon. Unable to deny your raging, juvenile crush, you finally pulled the trigger on something that was a long time coming—and for reasons beyond that not-so-unfounded jealousy.

“C-Can I have a head-start before you call the c-cops?” Quinn asks.

He’s so timid, you can’t help but laugh. He blinks down, and you can practically see the gears turning in his head as he rifles through yours, searching for malicious intent or knotted strings—fury behind an unspoken threat.

You let him look; this is a conclusion he needs to reach without you holding his hand.

When the investigation runs its course having turned up nothing dubious, he slides down to the floor beside you. He’s reverted to avoiding eye contact, unfortunately. Quinn watches the tremor in his fingers instead.

“I am sorry, y'know, about… Well, uh, you know.”

You find the way he dances around committing a felony (repeatedly) weirdly endearing.

While you very well could put him out of his palpable misery—you can actually smell it on him—there's no fun to be found in that. As such, you force Quinn to wrestle with his words a bit longer.

Eventually, you offer him a shrug that isn’t the least bit pacifying.

“You’re going to make it up to me, don’t worry.”

His eyes snap to yours just as you knew they would. His throat quivers in the wake of a sharp gulp.

The nervous tick cracks your nonchalant demeanor. You roll your eyes. “If you’re going to keep watching, you might as well make yourself useful.”

Quinn’s eyes narrow, perplexed. You grin in anticipation.

“My vibrator’s dead, and I can’t find the right charger. Time to get your ass off the bench, Hughes.”

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[ofliterarynature]

TBR TAKEDOWN: Week 12 (Aug 18)

TLDR: I have too many unread books, and I’m asking tumblr to help me downsize. Pick one or none, and comment if you can - a convincing sentence is worth a dozen votes! You’re also welcome to just choose the one that sounds the worst :D Book descriptions below the cut, see my pinned post for more info.

The Rector and the Rogue by W. A. Swanberg

It began quietly enough one morning in February 1880, with a mutton-chopped Acme Safe Company salesman knocking on the door of Reverend Morgan Dix, the starchiest clergyman in Manhattan's most respectable church. The salesman was surely misdirected, Reverend Dix explained--he had no need for a safe, and he had not made an appointment. But soon after, used clothes dealers arrived, followed by heavy machinery salesmen, and soon the street filled riotously with wave after wave of solicitor-tormentors--hundreds of funeral directors, horse traders, wigmakers, fellow clergymen, doctors--all insisting they'd been summoned by the bewildered Reverend Dix. And for weeks, it continued in this manner. Reporters from every newspaper in New York camped out to watch the fun, and as the story gained national attention, police and postal officers raced to capture the gleeful prankster-cum-performance artist who was making a mockery of the esteemed Trinity Church.

A fascinating tale of detection and revenge, The Rector and the Rogue uncovers for the first time the trail of celebrated Victorian trickster "Gentleman Joe"--the mysterious con-man whose innumerable identities, wild fabrications, baffling motives, and international trail of chaos would lead to one of the most bizarre criminal cases of the 19th century.

The Incredible Adventures of Cinnamon Girl by Melissa Kiel

Alba wants to stop time so she can stay in her small town forever - but the end of the world might just force her to confront her future.

Alba loves her life just as it is. She loves living behind the bakery and waking up in a cloud of sugar and cinnamon. She loves drawing comics and watching bad TV with her friends. The only problem is she's overlooked a few teeny details. Like, the guy she thought long gone has unexpectedly reappeared. And the boy who has been her best friend since forever has suddenly gone off the rails. Even her latest comic book creation is misbehaving. On top of all that, the world might be ending - which is proving to be awkward.

As doomsday enthusiasts flock to idyllic Eden Valley, Alba's life is thrown into chaos. Whatever happens next, it's the end of the world as she knows it. But when it comes to figuring out her heart, Armageddon might turn out to be the least of her problems.

Full of Keil's trademark quirky characters and witty dialogue, readers will be hooked by Alba's romantic dilemma and the hilarious plot that links the end of high school with the end of the world.

Moth and Spark by Anne Leonard

A prince with a quest. A commoner with mysterious powers. And dragons that demand to be freed—at any cost.

Prince Corin has been chosen to free the dragons from their bondage to the Empire, but dragons aren’t big on directions. They have given him some of their power, but none of their knowledge. No one, not the dragons nor their riders, is even sure what keeps the dragons in the Empire’s control.

Tam, sensible daughter of a well-respected doctor, had no idea before she arrived in the capital that she is a Seer, gifted with visions. When the two run into each other (quite literally) in the library, sparks fly and Corin impulsively asks Tam to dinner. But it’s not all happily ever after. Never mind that the prince isn’t allowed to marry a commoner: war is coming to Caithen.

Torn between Corin’s quest to free the dragons and his duty to his country, the lovers must both figure out how to master their powers in order to save Caithen. With a little help from a village of secret wizards and a rogue dragonrider, they just might pull it off.

[cellarspider]

26/30 PIE to the face

(Previous) | (Index) | (Next)

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We return to a movie that is going to linguistically hurt me again, Prometheus. You get to read a ramble about PIE. You’re welcome.

Content warning for MORE OF ME. I cannot be stopped.

So. Imagine you have found a sleeping alien. You believe that they were on a mission to destroy humanity as a disappointment. What do you do? Not waking them up is certainly an option. But what if you do? You’re going to want to not disappoint them.

One could, for example, study the records still maintained within the alien ship. Learn about their culture. Get more than one guy to learn their language, particularly since this translator you’ve got seems to be a little gung-ho on things like “seeing [his] parents dead.” That’s a bit of a warning sign.

And hey, something horrible happened on this ship, probably right before or right after this alien was put into hibernation. There’s a lot of dead bodies on the ship. Having a trauma counselor or three there would be a good call. People trained in de-escalation, definitely. Give you a chance to talk the alien down, and help them process stuff in what’s hopefully a culturally appropriate manner, given your xenological research before waking them up.

You’ll probably want to make sure to take the “kill humanity” button away from them too, that would be a good idea. And, preferably, not have exploded the head of one of their colleagues.

Am I describing a process that would take years? Yes. It should. This is the most important thing humanity’s ever done.

It’s been two days since the Prometheus landed.

As stated before, my faith in fictional humanity was not high in this scene.

David wakes the Engineer up. Rather than any of the measures I described above, the Engineer is met with David, Weyland, some security guys, Doctor Franenstein the head-exploder, and Shaw.

It took most of the humans a good hour or so to stop looking like death after waking up after a two year nap, and this Engineer’s been under for a thousand times longer. The poor bugger is visibly hung over and feeling sick, almost falling over on Weyland.

Shaw starts demanding David ask where they’re from, what’s in the ship’s cargo, why was it made for humans, all in English as Weyland tries to talk over her. They are speaking a language that only took its modern form 1600 years after the last events on this ship took place. The Engineer has zero clue what anyone’s saying.

The Engineer remains silent, and visibly disturbed by how Wayland orders his security guy to hit Shaw, which just makes the still unintelligible questions louder and less coherent.

And then David starts speaking to them.

There was a short dialog between them filmed, but in the final cut, the Engineer doesn’t speak at all.

The final cut also removes Weyland’s pitch for why he should have immortality–he created life in David. David is something more perfect than human. Therefore Weyland is a god, and gods never die.

This is, as you can imagine, not convincing. It would’ve made Weyland slightly more explicable as a character, but the movie hasn’t even done that for its lead, so of course it doesn’t for Old Man Capitalism.

In the full release, David only says a few sentences. To quote Anil Biltoo, who wrote the translation:

The line that David speaks to the Engineer (which is from a longer sequence that didn’t make the final edit) is as follows: /ida hmanəm aɪ kja namṛtuh zdɛ:taha/…/ghʷɪvah-pjorn-ɪttham sas da:tṛ kredah/ A serviceable translation into English is: ‘This man is here because he does not want to die. He believes you can give him more life’.

This is–okay. In the theater, I did not know precisely what this language was. But I was making a fair imitation of the Engineer's expression in response to this, because I was pretty sure it was PIE.

Proto-Indo-European, that is. A massive swath of world languages are all traceable back to one source, though we have no records of it. Linguistic reconstruction of how they evolved from earlier roots allows us to infer a language that must have existed, and we call that the Proto-Indo-European language. PIE for short. And this is a big ol’ slice of PIE right here. 

And I had a whole thing in early drafts of this post. I’d convinced myself over the years that my inexperience with PIE had led me astray in the theater. I’d convinced myself this was a PIE conlang. Meaning, I thought this was a language created for this movie that sounds like a cousin to PIE. That’s still howlingly weird, for reasons I’ll get into. But then I saw this featurette:

[Video description: A behind the scenes featurette for Prometheus entitled “Language Of The Gods”. It interviews Anil Biltoo on his work for the movie, in which he explains the concept of a proto-language, of PIE in specific, and what he did for the movie.]

It’s PIE. It’s a different reconstruction of PIE than the current standard, but it’s PIE.

And I feel vindicated, because that’s what I heard in the theater. David opened his mouth and out came PIE. 

I can actually read a few words in the excerpt. I could hear them in the theater. The word /hmanəm/ is clearly meant to be a root word of “man”, which standard reconstructions indicate is the descendent of PIE *ǵʰmṓ. /Namṛtuh/ is very clearly from PIE *ne-mért, “not-die”, because anything that looks like “mort” in an indo-european language probably has something to do with death. And “/kredah/” is close to PIE *ḱréddʰh₁eti, hence Latin “crēdit”, hence modern italian “créde”, “he believes”. 

PIE is just like that, sometimes. Some roots are unrecognizable, others are instantly identifiable. I’ll include my attempt at a gloss (a brief technical explanation of the meaning and grammar) at the end of the post.

The implication is that the Engineers taught their language to humans. That was Proto-Indo-European, which then spread from there. I almost started laughing in the theater at this. 

In the real world, we know a few things about where PIE came from. PIE was probably spoken by people north of the Black Sea, at least five thousand years ago. This guy who’s just woken up with a hibernation hangover went to sleep three thousand years after that. 

But, y’know what? Fine. Let’s say it’s a liturgical language. David’s done the equivalent of walking up to somebody and speaking to them in church Latin. Weird, but not impossible that it could be understood. Or maybe they’re just so damn long-lived and linguistically conservative that it’s more like talking to somebody in an old-timey news broadcaster voice. Still weird! But comprehensible.

But you know what we can’t possibly link back to PIE? Egyptian, Sumerian, Akkadian, Hawaiian, or the Mayan languages, most of the other ancient cultures the movie says the Engineers definitely contacted. Did all those come from the same ur-language? We don’t know. We can’t know, because our reconstruction methods are ineffective past a certain point. But if they did, then their root language had to have existed before the Bering Strait closed off the Americas from Asia, making any common ancestor at least twice as old as PIE. The movie’s implication is that it was PIE. The language of the gods is PIE. PIEngineer.

Apparently everybody who the Engineers talked to just forgot the language of the gods, save for the linguistic descendants of some nomads on the Black Sea Steppe.

And that’s before we get into the worse implications. We can’t tie East Asian languages back to PIE. Austronesian languages. American languages. African languages. Were these people just not contacted by the Engineers? Did they forget? Did they refuse to listen?

None of these are good answers! None! They’re all bad!

In Anil Biltoo’s defense, he’s an academic linguist, and, to my knowledge, not one who’s a conlanger. Ridley Scott specifically wanted to work in the oldest possible human language, and Biltoo delivered on that, based on modern scholarship. He did not make an alien language that evolved into a human language. If Scott had wanted that, David and Jesse Peterson would probably go feral for the project, but they weren’t asked. What would be the most naturalistic thing to do, if you wanted to get across the idea that humans inherited language from the Engineers?

You make a Proto-Human language. People have tried before, and others have argued their attempts are bullshit. This is one of those times that Wikipedia has a “the neutrality of this article is disputed” flag at the top of the page, because there are nerd fights everywhere on this. We don’t even know if a Proto-Human language ever existed–there could have been multiple independent origins of language–but if you’re writing fiction, sure, Proto-Human exists.

Come up with a vocabulary and grammar that could work for Proto-Human, have David speak it to the Engineer, it sounds alien to everybody, nobody gets to be the special children of the gods, and no linguistics dork in the audience will laugh at you.

They will definitely laugh at what happens next, though.

But the post is not done! Bonus linguistic nerdery below, including a sample of my constructed language and its script.

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Citations for alt-text rambles:

https://moomin.fandom.com/wiki/Stinky 

https://www.deviantart.com/pretty--kittie/art/Prometheus-Engineer-407327934 

https://www.uni-wuerzburg.de/en/news-and-events/news/detail/news/new-indo-european-language-discovered/

Edit: additional citations!

Movies in 15 Minutes review of Prometheus by @cleolinda, as retrieved from the Internet Archive. Hat tip to @kantama for identifying it!: https://web.archive.org/web/20120726203957/http://m15m.livejournal.com/23209.html

PIEngineer gloss

Alright, for the language nerds in the audience, I’ve put together a potential gloss, entirely based off of PIE roots available on Wiktionary and a shaky understanding of PIE verb construction:

/ida hmanəm aɪ kja namṛtuh zdɛ:taha/…/ghʷɪvah-pjorn-ɪttham sas da:tṛ kredah/ this.[singular neuter??] man.NOM [anaphoric demonstrative].1.NOM.MASC here not-die EMPHATIC/towards.3MASC.PRES(?)…life-many-[resultative or inchoative verb suffix? adjective of possession, accusative singular?] [genitive singular reflexive?] give.[middle 3S] believe.[stative(?) 3S] A more literal translation would therefore be “This man here does not (want to) approach death…he believes he (can be) given more life-having to himself.”

I am not good at figuring out suffix affixation for PIE verbs, so I probably missed or misinterpreted a few in there. I’m not sure how to break down /zdɛ:taha/ in particular, and /sas/ is a bit mysterious to me. Biltoo definitely created his own PIE reconstruction for this. Vowels are all shifted (ex *éy -> /aɪ/), there’s more palatal consonants (*ḱi-Ø -> /kja/, *polh₁-r̥-m -> pjorn), and other sound shifts I’m too scatterbrained to categorize right now.

PIEngineer to Tade Taadži translation

Alright. I previously mentioned that I have a conlang. I have yet to mention that it is distantly related to Prometheus, powered by the spiteful creative energy this movie engendered in me.

So it’s only fair I translate this passage into my language, write it in my script, and give a thorough gloss.

Jàà odormàà, hu sàà id aannãgu … midadjã kii jur kaas ʻus mogeso. /jɐː odoɾmɐː hu sɐː id aːnːãgu/ / … /midadjã kiː juɾ̥ kaːs ʔus mogeso/ This.VOC not-native-person.ALL, death.INST not go.ATTR want.PRES. Forever.NOM give this.ALL 2S.VOC ACC 3S.NEAR.ponder.PRES.3P.FAR.ACC

Translation notes:

I am assuming David is speaking formally, clearly, and respectfully in this translation, even if one of the people he’s being respectful about is Weyland. Both Weyland and the Engineer are thus addressed using the Vocative case when first directly mentioned.

Due to the formality of the speech, formal style glyphs are also used: these require significant planning ahead of time, to identify ligatures, aesthetic considerations, and, ideally, to select a total number of words that works out to a multiple of six, as this is culturally the ideal number for a line of text.

Formal ligatures can cross glyph boundaries, and are read every time you encounter part of them in the left-to-right, top-to-bottom reading order. The most common ligatures are between grammatical markers, as in this text, but can extend to whole glyphs or even individual components of them. If one is feeling particularly artistic, aesthetic ligatures may also be joined between thematically similar glyphs.

Gendered pronouns are not used in this context. Politeness dictates that any third person pronouns be replaced with the equivalent of “this” or “that”, unless given express permission to use more informal terms of address. This is especially true when referring to non-native speakers, as they do not have an equivalent social role to the five (yes, five) genders of Taadži culture.

The word for “non-native person” used to indicate Weyland literally means “thing that has a spirit”.

Following my shaky PIEngineer gloss, I tweaked the verb in the first sentence: “to die” would normally be “hur hybà” (lit. “to stand at death”), but this has been changed to “hu iddà”, “go to death”, indicating that Weyland fears even getting near the idea.

The word for “forever”, “midadjã”, is derived from the word for 6^6, or 46,656. Tade Taadži uses a base six number system, because I felt like taking Jan Misali up on his heximal advocacy.

The normal word order for the language is SVO, but in dependent clauses it becomes OVS, just to make things harder for everyone, including me, who muttered “ah fuck” when I had to check my notes to remember where to put an allative and vocative in there. It’s after the verb, apparently.

The language has verbal person marking in some contexts, and I deliberately bent the second sentence into a more poetic mode so that I could show it off while retaining formal speech, referring to Weyland’s belief as if it’s a person. The glyphs ligate the person marker to the tense marker, Both to save space and for aesthetic purposes.

I had no word for “believe” when I started writing this sentence, so I grabbed a verb already associated with thinking during unmoving meditation to stand in for it, to get across the idea that “this is something he has thought about a lot”.

It’s a shame David’s being polite, because while I didn’t have a word for “believe”, I do have a word for “to believe despite evidence to the contrary”.

Bonus citations:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daemon_(computing)

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[sly-s-n0nfusion]

Hello octopathers I woke up in the mood to share opinions online so today it's the time to talk about

💫 Erhardt's War Crimes 💫

as well as explaining why I don't, never did, and will never like him as a character

/!\ Disclaimer: I'm not here to judge anyone who likes Erhardt, truly. I'm 100% okay with liking morally gray characters in fiction (and I do myself, as a fan of characters such as Ogen, Oshka, Kaldena and Ceraphina, which are pretty bad/terrible people as well, some of them are much worse than erhardt lol) so if he's your favorite character and your little sopping wet meow meow, that's great (you're also part of like 98% of the octopath fandom so if someone has to be the weird one here that'd be me lol) so this post is completely judgement-free 🙏 /gen

I just felt the need to address the full extent of his actions in game as some sort of reminder because I feel like the actual consequences of those are often overlooked or straight up not acknowledged, also because we see a lot of that in CoTC and many people who played OT1 did not play that one, and because I have seen quite the number of fans out there being like "Erhardt did nothing wrong" or "I'm an Erhardt apologist" or "regicide ain't that bad" when I think what he did was actually pretty bad and here's why!

TW children death, spoilers for Olberic’s story and CoTC Bestower of All

Okay so we can all agree with the fact that what happened to him was horrible. Man had to watch his hometown (and family, too) perish in a fire while Hornburg did nothing to help and he's been indoctrinated since he was just a child by Werner, who we know as being great at manipulating and inducing fear in people. Like no wonder he wanted revenge.

In Ot1 we only see him killing King Alfred and thus causing the fall of the whole kingdom of Hornburg as stated by Olberic at the beginning of his story, and then his "redemption" speech during Olberic's chapters 3 and 4, and that's pretty much it. We aren't exactly told what happened to the people of Hornburg after that.

Well, Champions of The Continent tells us as the fourth chapter of the Bestower of All storyline is set in Hell, where Hornburg and its ghosts still stand. And I say ghosts because those are all that's left of its population, with the exception of a few other NPCs we encounter in game who were lucky enough to flee in time.

Now the part of map we can walk on is quite big but it’s still a small fraction of the Hornburg capital (as we can see from the huge amount of buildings around the castle) and there are approximately 30+ npcs’ souls wandering around the streets, inside the castle and outside the capital (again, they’re just the ones we’re allowed to see)

(Don’t let this image fool you, he’s dead. All of them are dead, he didn’t make it out alive)

The most tragic part of all of this are obviously the souls of two children that can be found in a house, discussing which one of the Twin Blades is stronger. And honestly this piece of dialogue broke my heart

I’m afraid to inform this poor kid’s soul that Erhardt actually played a major role in the events that caused them to get killed.

And this brings me to the conclusion of this saying that no matter how strong Erhardt’s desire for vengeance was, and how manipulated he was, it still doesn’t excuse what he did. “Regicide ain’t that big of a deal” well no it isn’t, but the consequences of it are. I refuse to believe Erhardt didn’t foresee what would happen to all the inhabitants of Hornburg, children included, after he’d killed king Alfred and gave complete access to Werner’s army. Of course the ones who couldn’t flee in time would get killed. Of course he knew, but that wasn’t enough to make him think about stopping his rage.

He’s not a war criminal because he killed a guy with a crown, he’s a war criminal because he sentenced to death the whole population of a capital city and if we had doubt at first, cotc gives us undeniable proof.

Yes he lives hating himself. Yes he does regret all of it. But he had a choice. And yes, being afraid of Werner hunting him down is a solvable problem when you’re at the apex of one of the biggest kingdoms’ military force, he could’ve asked for help if only he spoke. Causing the death of so many innocent people isn’t going to bring his family and hometown back and he knew it.

That’s why I think what he did was, in no way, excusable.

“Erhardt isn’t a villain” doesn’t stick with my view of things.

Now, on to the personal reasons why I don’t like him in particular as a morally gray character lol

And that can be summed up as “Olberic’s first two chapters made a pretty damn good job at making me hate him”

But no for real it has to do with me valuing trust more than anything else in life and having the habit of self-projecting a lot on every character I play. I tend to ask myself “what would I do in this situation, how would I feel” etc, so it came natural to me to wanting to punt Erhardt into the sun instantly as soon as I saw Olberic (the guy that was my main character in his ch1) literally start his story having nightmares and being depressed because of this guy.

Of course it was instant, deep hatred from me I swear I’ve rarely wanted to kill some guy in a jrpg as much as I wanted to make him pay for what he did (even if I knew well that Olberic’s main goal was just to seek answers).

Now imagine my utter disappointment when the game didn’t let me kill him lol (just kidding, of course after his backstory traumadump I ended up sympathizing a bit with him).

Also no, Olberic never forgave him for what he did, as precisely stated by him in his chapter 3, but he does give him another chance to redeem himself because Olberic is a much better person than I am.

I… have been wanting to write this long post for a while now. I hope I didn’t upset anyone with it as that was not my intention. I get why erhardt has so many fans, with the whole emotional trauma he has and his pretty face and fabulous hair, I really do and I don’t think you’re weird for liking him. I just like to ramble about fictional characters from time to time lol

Peace ✌️

[nucleo-bang-tan]

The Uisa's Daughter | Chapter 11: Her Unfriendly Friend.

Pairing/s: Kim Taehyung X Reader, Future!Jeon Jungkook X Reader, Slight!Min Yoongi X Reader

Genre: Medieval Korea AU, Mystery, Strangers to Lovers, Angst, Smut

Rating/s: 18+ Mature Themes

Warning/s: blood, violence against a child, Yoongi following reader everywhere (I mean everywhere), sneaking out, exhibitionism (kind of), squirting, choking, sex on the grass (fertilizer oop), piggyback ride, pet names, a shock at the end ╥﹏╥

Summary: In the 1700s, the Jeon Dynasty spread all across the Korean peninsula.  Happiness quadrupled with the founder Emperor's presence, or so it seemed. Secrets scattered over the palace in the capital city, Hanseong were known to none except a few.

Chapter Summary: Turns out your new bodyguard isn't that bad. Your lover still wants to prove himself but he's not your lover for long.

A/n: This is just a filler i guess. And if you can't guess what the italicized sentences are... well, can't help you.

Masterlist

Series Masterlist

Prologue Teaser Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

"Good morning, child. Who might you be?" The older lady inquired lovingly.

Your 5-year-old self was lingering around the palace courtyard after your father had asked you not to bother him while he conversed with the Emperor.

You had caught sight of a small pup and followed it all the way to where you were now.

The aforementioned lady wore her pitch-black hair in an updo, which you were sure couldn't be replicated on your short hair. Her smile reminded you of a bunny. Everything down to her hanbok was beautiful, it was decorated with embroidered pink flowers.

You looked at the canine skipping towards the said lady. "Father told me to not talk to strangers. I am sorry, I must take my leave."

The woman watched you, amused as you tried to navigate back to the King's private study.

Reluctantly, you asked, "I am not talking to you but could you lead me to the King's study?"

"Oh, but you are talking to me, aren't you?"

"This does not count. I am asking you directions." You pouted.

"See, you talked to me now!" The lady laughed.

You grew frustrated and began to burst into tears.

The woman panicked, "No, I am no stranger, honey."

"W-Who are you?" Your naive self asked the person who claimed to know you.

"I am the King's wife. I have known you since you were a tiny infant." She smiled and bent down to lift you up.

You gasped, "The Queen?"

Her melodious laughter once again filled the courtyard, "Don't be afraid, dear. I am here to introduce you to someone."

She pointed to a pillar. What you didn't fail to notice was a kid, likely 5 years older than you, peeking his head full of obsidian black hair and glancing at you with his doe-like brown eyes.

"He has been meaning to speak with you but he is quite timid." She said, gesturing for the older kid to come out from his not-so-obscure place, "This is my son."

Her son walked slowly, eyes catching everything but your own, and came to a halt where the two of you stood.

She set you on your feet and placed a caring hand on both of your heads, "I'll leave you both to it then. Ask Eunuch Kang if you need anything."

You turned to him. Surprisingly, he didn't carry himself as a prince. You assumed he had a lot of pride inherited from his father but he looked simple and humble much like his mother.

"Do you want to play with Bam?" He asked being unsure of himself.

"That's Bam?" You asked pointing your finger at the pup who decided to run in circles around the little prince.

"Yes, mother brought him for me. She says it's good to grow up with pets, although, father says the opposite."

The prince picked the dog up and carried it close to his chest. You playfully tickled Bam.

The royal chuckled, "How are you so tiny?"

"Uh, because Bam is a puppy. I think you should know that." You stated snappily.

"No silly, I am talking about you. I suppose the same logic applies to you?" He teased as you frowned.

The two of you played around a lot that fine day. Annoying the chefs by sneakily taking a few sweets, earning a sigh from the gardener as the prince picked out a few flowers for you to wear, and testing the durability of the guards' armors.

He showed you around the palace, which he was sure you'd forget. Unbeknownst to him, you were relatively smarter and mapped your way back to the study where your father and the King were chatting.

You looked out the window, the sun had already set, which meant your father and you would return home.

"I see you have met the little prince." The King laughed. It echoed around the high ceilings of the room. It was not anything like the Queen's beautiful laugh, rather, it was quite scary.

He patted his lap, which meant that he demanded you to sit on it. You had no choice but to do what delighted him. Of course, your father would prefer to stay silent, if he cared, that is.

The prince, in contrast to his father's expression, held an angered one. He held your wrist to stop you, "Stop, don't feed into his disgusting thoughts."

"What did you say you insolent boy?" The Emperor rose from his chair, the force tumbling it over.

Before you could process anything, you heard a loud thud followed by blood being strewed on your face followed by another thud.

The King had punched the poor prince so forcefully that his ring pierced through his soft skin and left his cheek bleeding. The young lad was rendered unconscious by this blow.

"I should not find you with that boy, under any circumstances, is that clear?" Your father cut your line of sight.

"Leave me alone with my son, I need to teach him a lesson." The King fumed from his wrath.

"No, no-" You finally came to your senses and when you did, you were bawling your eyes out.

"What did you do? Wake up....." You realized you didn't even know his name.

It was you who woke up instead. Panting, covered in a sheen of sweat. It was that dream again.

You weren't sure if it was a dream or a memory being played back to you. But you had had this dream a couple of times, and every time you did, you remembered every single detail.

You groan remembering last night. You fought with your father for not trusting you. You were sure he wouldn't hit you for your insolence because he had a reputation to uphold in front of Min Yoongi.

Speaking of Min Yoongi, he was supposed to follow your every step and protect you. Oh, but how could you forget the most important thing, report things back to your father and the King.

You chuckled bitterly, this was going to be very difficult. You had gotten so used to Taehyung being around, that it would be practically unbearable for you to be without him. A few days, sure, but we were talking about an indefinite amount of time.

A firm knock pulled you out of your thoughts. You didn't recognise this knock.

"I suppose you're up by now?" A voice asked from behind the metal-wood door.

"You can come in, I have no solitude in this household." You replied.

Min Yoongi entered the room with a bright face somehow; even when his cat-like eyes still gave a dark expression.

"Good morning, kitten." He chimed.

You gave a clear sham smile, "Good morning, indeed, now that you are here."

"That attitude will take you places, I am positive."

"Please, do not bother me."

"Its afternoon, Hoseok told me to invite you to the dining room for lunch." He was on first name basis with your chef already?

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

You sat under your favourite tree in the garden reading a medicine journal that your father gave you to memorise. Usually you would love something like this, but today was not usual.

Min Yoongi stood in the sun 'guarding you', probably getting a sun stroke, or probably not, just because he was so fit. He probably had a lot of days where he trained in the sun.

"You do know, I am perfectly safe in my own home, Mr Min."

"Wouldn't want you to die, that would be a sad story to tell." He replied snarkily.

"Like I said..." You continued being ever-so-slightly annoyed, "I am safe in my house, you can have a chat with Mr Jung or some other thing."

"No, I'd rather watch you." He smiled lopsidedly.

You huffed in pure annoyance. You weren't going to bear any of this. You strutted through the hallways with him following close behind you. Finally reaching the kitchen, you called out for your best friend.

"Mr Jung? May I speak with you?"

Hoseok wasn't shocked, he knew this was inevitable. He sighed, "I am not going to keep Yoongi busy for you."

This was going to be very difficult.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

You looked at the sun's position, it was almost time for you to meet Taehyung near the river. You weren't going to tolerate your new bodyguard stopping you or even catching you whilst you went to meet your lover.

"Mr Min?" You asked closing your journal and catching the attention of the man blankly staring at the sky.

"What is it, kitten?"

"I wish to take a bath." You said dusting your hanbok.

"I don't believe I will be the one to bath you." He raised his eyebrows.

You sighed, "Well, you could atleast go and ask the maids to prepare a bath for me?"

Yoongi was perpetually tired of standing in the sun and figured it would be best if he went under some shade, even if it was for a while. So he agreed and went to go look for your maids inside the house.

This was the ideal time to sneak out. One last glance at your bodyguard and you were already inching slowly towards the gates of the establishment you were supposed to call 'home'.

Yoongi was stumped, he didn't know where to find the maids. So he decided to ask his only friend about it.

Entering the kitchen he asked, "Hey, Hoseok-ssi, Y/N wishes to take a bath. Where are th-"

"You left her by herself?" Hoseok asked in distress.

"Don't worry. She's in the garden."

"No, no, no. You can't leave her alone at this hour!"

"What do you mean?" Yoongi was now alarmed.

"She may slip out of the house!" Yoongi wasted no time in hastening back to the garden.

Surely enough, you were no where to be seen. He immediately rushed out of the house to see you steadily close the gates.

"Y/N!"

Alright, now seemed like a perfect time to panic and run. And that's what you did. You didn't dare to look back at him and assumed he was chasing you.

You were very wrong to think you could outrun an exceptionally healthy man in his late 20s. It was quite effortless for him to grab your arm and turn you around.

"Well, caught you, kitten."

You squirmed and tried your very best to get out of his grip much to no avail.

"Where were you leaving to, huh?" The man who caught you, asked.

"I don't suppose you have any business knowing of it." You spat.

"Oh, I do. Your father will be informed of this." He said tugging you back inside the property.

"No, fuck no. I beg you, anything but that." You tried to free your wrist from his grasp.

"Careful with your language, kitten. And your father will know of it."

"I'll tell you!" This made Yoongi stop in his tracks and look at you, "I'll tell you where I was headed to, if you don't tell my father."

He scoffed.

"Please, I'll do anything. Don't let him know."

"Anything?" He smirked. You gulped knowing well that he could have ulterior motives. But you still nodded.

"Take me there. Take me where you were headed."

"What?" Was all you could say. You didn't want him to discover Taehyung. The fear of what Yoongi might possibly tell the King almost had you shivering.

"I won't even mention of this to anyone as promised. Not your father, not the stupid King."

"How could talk of the Emperor like that?" You whispered checking around you if there were any ears.

"I have heard the stories; of what he makes you do. Don't act so loyal, I know you hate him too."

"You work for him!"

"I don't work for anyone, I work for the money." He said, nonchalant. "So take me there."

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

You were at the rendezvous point, the lake-side forest where Taehyung had always asked you to meet him. But today, unfolded a quite peculiar scene.

You could see the annoyance seething from Taehyung. Who was this unnamed man and why was he brought to the secret meet-up point?

You stood between your lover and your bodyguard who at once decided to enter into a staring contest with each other.

You tried clearing your throat to grab their attention and possibly break the staring spree much to no avail.

"Taehyung, this is Min Yoongi, my bodyguard." You tried to break the silence.

Taehyung smirked, "Nice to meet you, Yoongi."

The other man scoffed, "And you are?"

"I'm Taehyung, her lo-"

You cut him off, "My friend! This is Taehyung, my friend."

Taehyung held your hand reassuringly, "Y/n's lover." He stated.

You groaned with disbelief. You knew well that this would be directly reported to the King in some way even when Yoongi said he wouldn't.

"Fine by me." Yoongi shrugged, "I'm just here to protect her."

Taehyung speaks with a certain weight on his words, "I don't think, I'm the one you need to worry about, Min Yoongi."

Yoongi doesn't press or question anything because he somehow knew he was alluding to King Jeon and your own father.

"Why did you bring him here, again? Taehyung questions you.

"I just told her, I would inform her father of her failed attempt to sneak out." Yoongi speaks.

Taehyung narrowed his eyes and let out a chuckle. He walked behind you and wrapped his arms protectively around your waist making you blush profusely at the display of affection in front of someone else.

Placing his chin on your shoulder he looked at Yoongi and said, "I can never let anyone, and I mean anyone interfere between us." Taehyung says as if stating a law.

"Never said I wished to interfere." Yoongi backed away and decided to stand guard a few meters away with his back facing the both of you.

As soon as Yoongi turned his back towards you, Taehyung placed a kiss on your neck, while rocking you side to side slightly.

"Taehyung!" You whispered, blushing more at your lover's affection.

Taehyung hummed in response as he buried his face further in the crook of your neck.

"We can't do this right now, Mr. Min is right there!"

"Do you remember what I told you about men? None of them have a pure mind, Yoongi is no exception. I can see that he fancies you."

"Taehyung, I don't adore him like that at all."

"I know you don't, but I want to let him know you belong to me."

"What are you suggesting?" You asked, still whispering.

He turned you around and without wasting a second, kissed you.

His kisses were always, tender yet passionate but today? They were possesive, as if he was trying to prove himself worthy of you. You couldn't help but moan slightly into the kiss.

" That's right, Y/n. Let him know." Taehyung pulled away, "I want you to moan as loud as you can." He requested.

He laid you down onto the grass, soft beneath you as Taehyung's hands explored your quiet, yet submissive body.

His lips found yours, and you responded with a shy gasp, heart racing under his tender touch as he gently parted your thighs.

Taehyung's hands roamed over your comparitively petite frame, teasing your sensitive spots through the thick fabric of your hanbok.

He knew how dumb you got for his cock. He knew you would let him do this. But he wasn't all shameless, he just pulled his pants and undergarments down slightly, just enough to pull his length out.

"Come on, Y/n. I know you want it. Ask for it."

"I- please, Taehyung." You whispered.

His hands found their way to your neck, applying a slight yet firm pressure; something you figured Taehyung enjoyed a lot. You weren't complaining because your neck fit so snug in his grip. The power dynamic made you gush.

"It's not me that needs to hear it, it's him. So louder. Let him know how much you crave me being inside you."

You tilted your head just enough to peek at Yoongi. He wasn't looking and didn't seem like he had any intentions to. But you could see him shifting his weight from leg to leg, which he never did before.

Yoongi seemed impatient.

"Say it, Y/n." Taehyung urged.

You took a breath and said in a voice that was just enough to let Yoongi hear without an issue, "Please... Taehyung. I want you."

You could see Yoongi's breath hitching as he got more impatient.

With one swift motion, Taehyung pulled the skirt of your hanbok down just enough to reveal your glistening pussy for him. Both of your footwear long gone.

He smirked, "Does this make you wet? Your bodyguard being a few meters away from us while I fuck you?"

You nod, a gesture that seemed way too cute to Taehyung.

He leaned down and kissed you after muttering a quick, "God, I love you so much." His kiss was still possesive.

You jutted your hips upwards and whined, "Taehyung, please. I want you inside of me."

He chuckled, "Yeah? I shall give what my queen needs."

With those words, he pushed his length inside of you entirely. The intrusion made you roll your eyes as Taehyung had to hold himself up. The pleasure, heck, the feeling of being so close was too much for the both of you.

Over the time, you had realized that Taehyung was much more than an ordinary farmer's boy who just happened to be handsome.

Your lover had secrets, he somehow knew every happening and every dark event that the aristocrats hid.

The rebellious son of the Cha family? Taehyung knew that he didn't just disappear, it was his father who had sent him off, disowned him.

The daughter of Hwang household? She got pregnant before her marriage resulting in her 'untimely death.'

You knew Taehyung had to be involved with these high class people somehow.

A particularly harsh pull on your bottom lip by the aforementioned man got you back to the present.

"Are you alright, princess?" He asked. No matter how rough he got, he always asked if you were alright.

"Please move..."

He slowly pulled his length halfway out only to thrust it back in. "How are you so tight? I assumed that I had fucked you enough."

Taehyung's brown eyes were filled with determination, an urge to prove himself where he didn't need to.

He fondled your breasts through the thick fabric of your top. His hips snapped into yours, slowly yet powerfully.

"T-Tae.."

"Yes, princess? Do you want more?"

"Please faster." You shut your eyes, the pleasure almost bringing you over the edge.

His hips picked up pace and the sound of your skin slapping was too obvious to not be heard by Yoongi.

But this wasn't close enough for Taehyung, he wished to be deeper inside of you. He lifted your legs and put them over his shoulders. You knew Taehyung loved to try new things and you loved them just as well.

You could feel the tip of Taehyung's dick brushed against your cervix at this angle. Your moans became more and more erratic.

When you did open your eyes, you saw a man, you saw someone you loved so much that it hurt being away from him. His tan skin reflecting the setting sun perfectly and his fully set on yours.

His hair was stuck to his forehead due to the sweat and you couldn't help but reach out and touch his cheek.

At that very moment, a gush of fluid. The pleasure was so intense you blacked out for a quick second.

You had never read about this, probably because the female body wasn't explored or documented much.

Taehyung looked down, you had just squirted on his cock. "Shit, that was so, so beautiful. Princess, I love you."

Taehyung had experienced this before, but never with you.

You were tired and Taehyung could sense that. He wasn't too far behind on coming deep into your womb.

"You did so well, my love." He placed his forehead against yours, nose rubbing against yours.

"I love you, Taehyung." You muttered, being way too tired.

"I love you more than you think." He pecked your lips before helping you pull up your skirt. "You can rest now." He caressed your hair.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

Taehyung carried you on his back to the edge of the forest. You were asleep.

Yoongi walked besides him. The two men had clear distaste towards each other but decided to keep quiet about it.

"I know you love her, but how long do you plan on continuing this exactly?" Yoongi asked.

"Till my last breath. Even then, I would not go to the afterlife. I'll stay on this Earth as a spirit." Taehyung said, stopping before just before the exit of the forest. He couldn't carry you further in the open.

"The King, do you know how much he wants her?" The older man asked.

"I do, but I would never let him get her."

Yoongi scoffed, "That useless man would stop at nothing to have her."

Taehyung's ears perked at the disrespect towards the ruler. He smirked knowing Yoongi was possibly on his side.

"I heard you were the King's son, the prince's half brother. Is that true?" Taehyung inquired.

"Yeah, I may or may not be."

"Listen to me, Min Yoongi. The King needs to be killed, tortured even. He has never treated Y/n kindly." Taehyung stated.

"You don't know his power."

Taehyung and Yoongi started yet another battle of staring.

"I don't care." Taehyung replied snarkily.

"Let me just tell you this, Kim Taehyung. King Jeon is going to marry her and it's going to be soon." Yoongi sighs.

"What do you mean by that?" Taehyung knew this was more than just a hollow warning to him.

He tensed up and his grip on your thighs tightened, making you stir.

"Taehyung?"

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

You and Yoongi had walked towards the Kim household and you got home before your father did, as always.

After dinner you asked Yoongi to follow you to your room. And he did as you said, sitting on the floor of your room in a seiza stance.

You sat in front of him, "You don't have to sit so formally, you know."

"I know I don't need to, but I want to."

"I am sorry." You bowed to him, head on the floor.

Yoongi tried to stay nonchalant when he asked you the reason.

"Taehyung can be a bit too much at times." You say raising your head. "I know you heard us and it may not have been pleasant. But know, that I meant no disrespect."

He chuckled, "I know you didn't, kitten. But he sure did."

You smile at the light heartedness.

But you could hear footsteps from the other side of the door.

It was a habit you had picked up since your parents never gave you any kind of privacy. They never knocked or asked before entering. The way your father walked, the soft creaks of the wooden floor, everything was etched into your memory.

Their footsteps were the only indicator that they were entering your room.

And you proved yourself right when your father opened the door without any second thought.

He frowned looking at the both of you. "I see, you have told her."

"Not yet, Mr. Kim." Yoongi replied.

"Ah, not yet? Well, do tell her. She needs to leave tomorrow morning."

"Tell me what, father?" You asked.

He looked extremely worried, "Yoongi, please do tell her. I'll leave you two to it." Saying this he closed the door and left. The soft creaks slowly fading.

"Well?" You asked.

Yoongi couldn't bring enough courage to look into your eyes, "I don't have a choice, do I?"

Yoongi sighed, "The King found out that your father is a spy for the enemy."

You would have laughed if Yoongi wasn't so serious. Your father and King Jeon were extremely close.

So close that at times, your father forgot that you were his daughter and let the King hold you in front of him.

"What are you talking about?" You tilt your head in confusion.

"Mr. Kim has been working undercover for the past 25 years."

"He had married my mother more than 20 years ago. And he had me as well. Do you even know what you are suggesting?"

Yoongi clenched his jaw, "Marrying your mother and having you was just a part of his plan. King Jeon doesn't take kindly to treason."

Your face felt numb and you seemed that you couldn't breath at the information.

Maybe you were just dreaming and your mind was playing weird tricks on you. But the pain in your chest signified that it was real.

"What do you- what do you mean?" You asked.

"The King gave Mr. Kim two choices."

He paused for a while.

"Let the King marry you, or he publicly executes both of your parents for treason."

You held your head in your hands trying to process it all. This was real, this was happening and you were in the present.

"I am going to let you guess what your father chose."

[lewisyellowhelmet]

feel so close

summary: lewis hamilton x reader

You meet Lewis at the club after the Las Vegas launch.

content: 18+!!!! general m/f sex acts. established relationship. let me know if u want anything else flagged!

word count: 1k+

You’re late, flights and traffic and the heady crush of Vegas. By the time you’re pushing through the club, your phone is a mess of texts and calls from Lewis, each more garbled by the last. He’s started just sending you your own name in capitals and a strange string of emojis, heavily featuring hearts and dancing figures. You give your name to the burly man guarding the VIP section, and then there’s an assistant leading you through the maze of dancers and sponsors and various people from the launch until you’re bursting out between a group to Lewis, a pink drink in his hand matching the flush on his cheeks.

 You see his mouth form your name, can’t hear him over the music, laugh as he crushes you into his chest. He’s lost his jacket, smells like sweat and vodka and cologne, the drink dangerously close to tipping down your back as he nuzzles into the side of your face.

 “Here you are!” Lewis is saying, and you know you’re missing parts of sentences as he stumbles back from you and then close again, a dopey grin on his face and eyes glazed. He looks so happy. It makes your chest fill up, all full and content, pleased that he’s pleased.

 “Here I am,” you tell him, gratefully take the drink he’s offering a try of. It’s sweet and strong, fizzing on your tongue. People move around you in one big pull and push, dancing and talking and laughing. You’re aware of people calling him, trying to tug him away, get his attention, but Lewis is centred on you, urging you to finish his drink, torn between trying to kiss you again and find you your own cocktail.

 By the bar, you have to turn away from him, let his face find your jaw, neck.

   “Stop,” you say, pushing his face away, but he just licks over your palm, laughing, and there’s no bite to your scolding. It’s dangerous to be like this, so many people around, anyone could see. You want to keep this to yourself, just for a bit longer, this special, private thing with him. But then you’re taking a tequila shot, licking the salt off Lewis’ wrist and sucking on a lime, leaning into the hot press of his body, and nothing really matters anymore.

 The night takes on the heady blur of intoxication and the joy of being surrounded by people having a good time, the pound of music, Lewis’s arm slung around you as he introduces you to his friends. Everyone knows who you are already, tease him and hug you, and you feel yourself falling into the group, enveloped within them, already a part of it. You love Lewis like this, drunk and lazy and happy, stupid dance moves and this big, lovely grin on his face, shining eyes. Up on the stage with him, jumping and laughing and letting your body do whatever it wants to do, carried by the familiar thump of club hits. Every so often, you catch people holding phones up, pointing, filming, but the liquor has kicked in, and Lewis is so happy, it’s easy to look away, let him drag you in, let him grind into you and lick into your mouth. He shoves his cap on your head, insists on taking what must be an incredibly badly lit photo of you on his phone. The black material of his t-shirt clings to him, skin shining with sweat and joy and your touch. The night runs on and you lose yourself to it, the music, the laughter, the friends, and Lewis, grinning at you, never not beside you.

 Time isn’t anything. Nothing is real. The lights flash blue and purple and green and you’re anonymous and Lewis is no one. Just you and him. Moving to the beat, pressed in close, skin sliding. Everything is electrically perfect. A sliding, dizzy moment that goes impossibly on and on. You feel intrinsically connected to everyone in the room. Lewis takes a shot and licks the chaser out of your mouth. You surrender to it, to him, to everything.

Saying goodbye, hugging everyone you can see, trying not to blush under the knowledge that you’re going back with Lewis, that everyone knows, that he’s chosen you, he wants you. You can feel people watching, knowing, seeing, but it feels good, like this, pride. His big arm around around your shoulders, his hat on your head, the way he rubs his face on yours. You want to devour him. Lick the salt off his skin, the alcohol out of his mouth, hold him down and watch him come apart. He keeps looking at you with this heavy, dazed look, like he’s already there in his head.

 The hotel is just down the Strip, the fresh air cool on your cheeks as you hurry down the street, bumping into each other, tripping on nothing and laughing too loud. At somewhere past the half way point, Lewis guides you into an alley, the shadow of a building, gets you between his body and the wall, kisses you until you can’t think, can’t speak. He makes lovely, soft sounds into your mouth, has his big hand around your throat, the other spanning your waist, holding you to him so you can feel where he’s hard against your belly.

 “You make me,” Lewis is panting, pausing between words to kiss you again, like he can’t put a thought together without it, “I don’t fucking know what it is. Crazy. Make me crazy.”

 “You’re drunk,” you tell him, even as the words feel big and lazy in your mouth from your own intoxication.

 “Doesn’t matter,” he says, kisses you again, licking behind your teeth, laughs when he steps away and you sway forward, grasping for him.

 “Come on,” Lewis says, tugging you back out into the street, “We gotta get back before I lose it and just fuck you on the street.”

You barely notice the hotel room, it’s dark shapes and the floor to ceiling windows. You feel innocent in a strangely lovely way, wiped clean, stood by the bed with him, undressing, giggling, stumbling out of socks. Lewis is hard and flushed, standing off his body, a silhouetted figure in the city lights, the wide span of his shoulders, angles of his hips, muscles of his legs.

 “Fuck,” you say, just looking at him, laugh at your own delight, let him wrestle you onto the bed, clumsy and warm and pretending to get away and not wanting to at all.

 Lewis is drunk, and endearingly so. Clumsy in a way he isn’t, usually, and so ready to laugh and tease and kiss. Rubs his hands down your body, spreads your legs for him so he can lick hot and wet, spit into the centre of you. Your fingers twist into his hair, his eyes half lidded looking up your body. Folds his arms over your hips so you can’t move, steady movement of his tongue over you and into you. The alcohol numbs sound, thoughts, embarrassments, so you don’t care when you groan, writhe up into his arms, pull at his hair. Everything is so overwhelming in the best way, feeling him drool over you, bite at the inside of your thighs and tell you how good you taste, how he can’t wait to get in you.

 Giggling as he crawls up your body, kneeling on you accidentally, his hasty apology, brow furrowed with concern until you smooth it out. His cock is throbbing against your belly, leaking wet on your skin.

 “It’s okay,” you tell him, for the third time, taking him into your hand so he keens and curls over into your neck, laving his tongue over the tendon in your throat. You thumb over the head, just to hear the sweet, wounded sound he makes, vibrating into your skin. Notching him where you’re open and wet from his mouth, the blunt tip of him pushing through, spreading you.

 “Oh, God, oh, God, Lewis, fuck,” you say, head tossed back into the pillows, Lewis’ forehead pressed to yours so you can swallow his breath as he sinks home, groans into you. It feels like he’s touching every part of you, everywhere, his body laid out over yours, his cock so deep, taking you, having you. You want to cry, dragging him into a kiss, biting at him.

 It’s messy and fast and feverish, one leg over his shoulder as he fucks into you, harsh snaps of his hips that you feel all over, no need to be quiet, no need to slow it down. His rhythm is sloppy, but it only makes it more addictive, more overwhelming, knowing he wants it so bad, that he wants you so bad.

 “Baby, you feel so good, fucking. Amazing,” Lewis says, his body slick with sweat, his breathing shallow and raspy, and he’s grinning, laughing, eyes all crinkled up and teeth white and sharp. You tangle your hand in his hair, wrap yourself up in him, come with a shout, delirious and drunk and vibrating with the joy of it all.

 He fucks you through it, trying to hold himself steady, his chain dragging over your collarbones, but his hand is a fist in the sheets beside your head, his chest heaving.

 “I’m,” he says, but he’s coming already, rutting into you, jaw slack and eyes screwed shut, moaning all ragged and breathless.

 “Fuck,” he pants into your mouth, hips jerking through the aftershocks, “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

He’s heavy and solid above you, still kissing you, smoothing your hair off your damp face. You blink up at him, smiling so big your face hurts.

Things are spinning but Lewis is at the centre, sprawled out on the bed with you, a tangle of white sheets and limbs. His big hand anchored on your belly, insisting on lying all pressed up against you despite the heat of your bodies. He keeps laughing at nothing, and when you ask why he smiles this soft, secret way and says, “I’m just happy.”

[kybercrystals94]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

1. How many works do you have on Ao3? 75

2. What's your total Ao3 word count? 92,568

3. What fandoms do you write for? Currently, Star Wars (mostly Bad Batch); however, I've written for a lot of TV shows over the years. (I prefer TV shows over movies simply because I can get to know the characters better and have a better feel for them when writing)

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

1. Unconventionally Easy (Star Wars: The Bad Batch) - a pre-Order 66 story about a mission gone awry for the Batch. 2. I Miss You (Star Wars: The Bad Batch) - Echo finds an unexpected message from a brother. 3. Regroup (Star Wars: The Bad Batch) - Tech and Omega have to leave Hunter and Wrecker behind when a job for Cid goes sideways. 4. Just Sit With Me (Star Wars: The Bad Batch) - A Cadet Batch fic featuring young Crosshair and Tech. 5. Resilient (Star Wars: The Bad Batch) - Echo struggles with his PTSD.

5. Do you respond to comments? Yes! It's one of my favorite parts of writing fan fiction!

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? This one is really hard since I did Whumptober and Febuwhump and Angstpril 😅 I'd have to say maybe Haunting Failures or Sick Day (although my readers would probably choose different ones).

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? Probably the Stardust Conspiracy or Detail Work.

8. Do you get hate on fics? In other fandoms, I have...I have yet to experience hate in this fandom.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? I don't read or write or watch it...not my thing.

10. Do you ever write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written? I haven't really written any...but I did kinda play with the idea of writing a Psych and Bones crossover 😂 I was gonna call it The Psychic in the Capital.

11. ?? (there was no question for #11...so I'll just say....nothing, I guess)

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? Not that I am aware of, but that would be so cool!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Kind of! I wrote Where Fears Are Born & When Fears Are Faced as companion pieces of @just-here-with-my-thoughts' fic Phobia. And then @just-here-with-my-thoughts wrote a couple cute companion pieces for The Stardust Conspiracy! (Find the Stardust collection here!)

14. What's your all time favorite ship? Kanan and Hera 🥰😭

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? Mmmmm...I don't know. Any WIPs I have chapters posted for I have plans to finish...the ones slowly dying in my folder, however...😅

There's a Fives Survives AU I've been writing where he's actually the one who finds and rescues Omega from Kamino that I would really like to see through.

16. What are your writing strengths? I love character studies, so I feel like that really helps my writing!

17. What are your writing weaknesses? I hate writing action scenes...and I tend to lean heavily on dialogue.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in a fic? The only time I've used "another language" in a fic is when I have clones use Mando'a words...but they don't usually use full sentences.

19. First fandom you wrote for? When I was an early teen I wrote for the Disney show Pair of Kings. 😂 However, I think I deleted the story after a couple of days...the first fandom I stuck to for a bit of time and still have stories floating around out there was Bonanza.

20. Favorite fic you've written? Basically any story I've written with the boys as cadets. They All Fall Down is probably one of my favorites, just because it reminds me so much of growing up with siblings. I also loved writing the Stardust Conspiracy.

Thank you for tagging me, @the-little-moment! This was so fun!!

Is it possible to tag all my moots?? Because I wanna see all your answers...(**cough**cough**if you've read this far, consider yourself TAGGED)

[slibraries]

Right Where You Left Me

Anyway, here's some angst

Contains: Carmy being angsty, al-anon meetings, male m*stburbation, The Box, mentions of s*icide

Carmy’s back in Chicago for less than forty-eight hours before Sugar brings you up. “You should go see her, Carmy.” He bites back what he wants to say, (“fuck off, Sugar.”) and takes a deep breath so he doesn’t feel like he’s drowning. 

(He still feels like he’s drowning.) 

“I know.” 

He doesn’t go see you, and you don’t come see him, and life goes on. He hires Sydney, because she’s fucking incredible, and he works on the menu, and he doesn’t miss you. 

(Except when he does miss you, which is all fucking the time. It’s worst early in the morning when it feels like there’s a knife shoved under his ribs.) 

((And if that ache settles under the finch tattoo on his rib cage, that’s nobody’s business.)) 

He goes to meetings and learns how to talk about Mikey and what happened and how to let people in. He’s at a meeting when he sees you for the first time since that Christmas he called you a bitch and then moved halfway across the world. You’re speaking, because the universe hates him, about your ex-husband’s suicide and him leaving the restaurant to his little brother. 

“I didn’t divorce Mikey because I stopped loving him, I love him more than words. I divorced him because I couldn’t do this.” You gesture at the people sitting in front of you. The light catches the diamond ring around a chain on your neck and Carmy stops being able to breathe. He’s out of the room before you can finish your share. 

He shoves you into a tiny box in his mind, labeled DO NOT OPEN in big, bold, red letters, and tries to forget. 

(When he inevitably wakes up at night, his hand is resting on his rib cage, covering the finch tattoo he’d gotten on your eighteenth birthday because he would’ve done anything you’d asked, and he doesn’t fall back asleep.) 

It’s Sydney who opens The Box, completely by accident. “Chef, somebody ordered a Finch special and Tina won’t tell me what it is,” (fuck, T’s still giving her trouble), “and I…it’s not on the menu so I’m just—“ 

“It’s an Italian beef sandwich with pickles, Lays crumbled on it,  a Diet Coke, and a cookie.” Your order is etched onto his mind. Carmy can’t name the capital of Montana or give directions or diagram a sentence (whatever the fuck that means) but he knows your order. Sydney gives him a strange look. 

“Is that all, Chef?” 

“Yes, Chef. Thank you, Chef.” 

He spends the rest of the shift trying to close The Box. 

He goes home and dreams about being bracketed by silky smooth thighs. He dreams about hands in his hair and gasps of pleasure. The piercing cries of the fire alarm pull him back into the world of the living. 

It takes him all of five minutes after CFD gives them the all clear to go back upstairs before he’s frustratedly shoving a hand into his boxers to palm himself. He’s still half hard from the dream and the memory of being wrapped inside you. His hand doesn’t compare but it sends sparks through his body nonetheless. Carmy doesn’t touch himself very often, too exhausted after work and too Catholic. 

He always thinks of you when he does. His first everything. Your smile, your eyes, the twinkle in your eye when you give him shit about something, the way you move when you’re dancing around the kitchen. His strokes speed up as he imagines your face full of pleasure. 

(The few times you’d had sex before he broke your heart and left were incredible for him. He’s certain you didn’t cum.) 

Carmy spills into his hand and onto his chest. He lets the cum dry there, evidence of his shame. 

It’s a Thursday when Carmy speaks to you for the first time since he came back to Chicago. 

(Because fuck Thursdays)

He isn’t even supposed to work front of house. Richie’s out because Ava’s sick, Fak’s in the back trying to fix the AC, Tina had to go pick up Luis from school, and Sydney needs everyone else so he’s up front. It’s been a shit day from the start. It’s hot as fuck outside, so his apartment is sweltering. He’d been covered in sweat before he’d even stepped out into the summer heat. The Beef isn’t any cooler

”Carmen?” 

And there you are, his worst nightmare and his most cherished dream, standing in front of him. 

You smile and it’s as beautiful (maybe more?) as he remembers. He can tell right away that the grief has taken a toll on you. Your hair is a little duller than in the wedding photo he’d found in the office, your smile not as radiant, your eyes tired. You’re still absolutely, without a doubt, the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen. He’s been to parties with the top models in the world (at which he’d sat alone in the corner) and you still take the cake. 

“Uh, hey Finch. Hey.” 

You look around him at the grungy Beef. “Haven’t changed anything, have you? Good, as co-owner, I get a say on any major changes.” You’re grinning at him but he’s brain stuck on that word, co-owner. You’d owned it with Mikey, of course you had, you’d been his wife. You laughed. “‘M kidding, Carmen. I let Mikey have it in the divorce. You can do what you want with the Beef.” He really shouldn’t feel such relief that you wouldn’t be here, and he shouldn’t hate you calling him Carmen as much as he did. 

“Finch, ya don’t hafta…you don’t have to call me Carmen.” 

Your grin, that grin her loved so much, faltered. “I know. But you never…we haven’t…what are…” it wasn’t like you to have trouble finding your words, and he hated that he was the cause of it. “Carmen is safe.” That shouldn’t hurt as much as it did. “You know you’re always safe with me, Finch.” Your look wasn’t quite withering, but it made him feel impossibly small. “Am I, Carmen?” Before he could say yes, you are, or I still love you, Fak appeared at his shoulder and started talking your ear off. 

You’re gone before he can take your order.

[thorongil82]

Till Death Leads Us Away

When he returns to Katolis, he makes sure Sarai's okay. That when Sol Regem burnt to cinders, she remained untouched. And when he begs for forgiveness, he weeps. A waiver every sentence. A sniffle every break. A break every second. And his family hold him close. Chase his blame to ash and flame.

And when she watches she aches. To reach and comfort the one younger than him. The one who has needed to defend his throne. To aid he who has brought their worlds together.

And when she kneels before Sarai, she promises to keep him safe. And in return, if she may ask, please let her mothers know her fate.

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

When the war is over, she finds herself before her mothers. She tells them it's all over. That they can truly rest. That no one else should ever have to sacrifice themselves as they did. She tells them how her brother grows. How strong he is. How he's kept her safe and sane. And she quickly brings herself to touch on how well Ezran has kept her on task, to bringing the conflict with Aaravos to an end.

When he arrives to celebrate, he first visits the queens. He pays respects, he thanks their aid, he hopes things could be better. And then, when he could talk of peace, he makes sure to praise their daughter. Her aid to ally, her call to arms, her sass, her wit, her charm.

He knows she's helped him more than he could ask for, and he says he'll help her till forevermore.

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

When he comes of age, he already knows the burden of his rule. That his partner had best be prepared to rule. That love must take a back seat. And yet, he confesses to his mother, that welcoming smile across his face. He nearly begs to be able to do as they did, wed for love instead of strength.

And though no name passes his lips, the bow may well have shot.

Opelli's invitations have been sent, and no Queen would dare beset, that the closest of their allies would come of age without their presence. Immediately Aanya declares to go, forgoing her council's stares. She knows just where she needs to be. Katolis is her goal.

And when she arrives, she pays respects, Sarai's graceful smile aimed down. As she vows, knowing full well how, greedy nobles seek to strike.

So though she knows this party's thrown to maybe bring about a partner fair, Aanya'll forgo her ache to truly make sure her close friend's heart is treasured.

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

When word reaches him of Neolandia's betrayal, he rises to his feet. Sends word out to Amaya before rushing off to meet his stead. Not caring for the setup rush, he'll march with what he can. To Berylgarten he needs to ride, he aid his friend, his heart is soul.

Katolis cuts through the Mad King's force, breaking through the chain linked frail. Immediately the king seeks her bow, her crown, her ring, her veil. In pushing through, he looks beyond the throne to the lonesome lake. Mayhaps he seeks her mothers' may have seen her living wake.

And when he spies her caked in blood upon the slate, he holds her close, sweeps blood and tears from her face, and wishes he could kiss her till he knows she's lived her fate.

There's too much blood, too little light, the dead tower oh-so high. The seige was swift, vicious and bereft of mercy for their plight. Aanya had prepared, feared every day for vengeance for Kasef's death. Yet peaceful times leave lacking signs of defences wholly held.

Neolandia attacked as swift as they could in strength beyond their means. A swift attack, one strike alight, aimed straight to kill the Queen. They carved their way to the castle gates, the capital besieged. A call sent out, more hope than faith, that aid may come their way.

When Katolis' horn blew out so loud, she could barely hear their call. To busy defending her people's home, she'd been lost to death and war. And only seeing Ezran's crown, coupled with Aihling's fall, could Aanya finally rest, her battle-weary form collapsing into her king's soft grasp.

Beneath her mother's visage, he gently cleaned away the muck, crimson ichor stained her face. She could finally rest within his arms, longing for one last request.

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

A final peace brokered between men and elves was born at last by all. Berylgarten's attack the final nail to bring all together as one. Neolandia's collapse, their monitered rule brought peace to human lands, and with the end of this final war elven-kind followed in peaceful bands. As part of this, the border of Duren and Katolis shared a new town, by insistence of the King and Queen new statues would be set aground. The Queens of Duren, the Queen Sarai, measurement of their sacrifice, and by her side, King Harrow's kindly smile completes their hopeful mound.

Despite the incomplete nature of the courtyard, Ezran brings Aanya to this spot. He smiles and laughs as she jokes and scoffs, no rule between them at all. And though Opelli may well kill him for his lack of contemplation, it's in this new home - before their parents, he proposes marriage to her.

She cups his face, kisses him so soft, she whispers yes evermore. And when the town is finished do they wed, beneath their parents' caring looks, a bond forged in sacrifice and love.

[sebastienlelivre]

i found peace in your violence | lestat/louis | 3.1k words

There's bad dreams and long distance phone calls and Louis tries to protect what's most important while Lestat does the same. Each in their own way, each to varying degrees of success.

It's three forty-six in the afternoon when Louis is torn out of a dead sleep, the taste of blood (human) and ashes (inhuman) in his mouth. He still keeps to the same day-night schedule, even in the skyscraper, even though the modified coffin means he doesn't really need to, but the dreams...the dreams have been haunting him, tearing him out of a deeper sleep faster than even his own nightmares of Claudia's face in bright sunlight. He has just turned, putting his feet flat on the floor as he rubs his hands over his face when Louis' cell phone lights up with a text message.

It's from an unknown number, but the area code is from New Orleans, and Louis knows without even really thinking about it who it is. It's not just one message, but four of them in quick succession, like the mind typing them is moving too fast for his fingers.

the album is out

have you listened yet

only on digital

i can get a vinyl for you special edition

The lack of capitalization and punctuation and basic grammar make Louis smile, a bead of warmth flowing through him and chasing away the last bit of cold from the dream, but he turns his attention from the phone to listen, reaching out to eavesdrop on the other vampires again. He keeps them blocked out most of the time, knowing that their threats are empty, knowing that Daniel is listening and keeping track in case someone does get brave and stupid, and there's only been one who has even accepted Louis' challenge and shown up on his balcony (beautiful, blonde, tall, familiar blue eyes, but the woman hadn't said a word, only hummed, then disappeared as fast as she had arrived), but as he listens now, their attention isn't turned to him.

It's not even on Lestat's brand new musical career.

They're talking about...about... …burst into flames right there... ...full view of everyone, it was a protest... The voices are a cacophony, loud and jumbled, talking over each other in their panic, confused and scared, a mix of sentences that it takes Louis far too long to catch enough to piece the story together. They're not even talking about the dream, not really, but something has kept the vampires awake even when they shouldn't be.

Instead, their fear is about something else.

Something immediate and worse.

A vampire catching fire on the streets of Jakarta, the press were framing it as a act of self-immolation, a suicide to draw attention to some conflict somewhere, but Louis knows vampires.

And vampires are not so socially conscious.

His phone chimes, and the fifth text makes him laugh out loud.

this is lestat

It knocks Louis from the worry of other vampires, of dreams and fire, and right back into his own drama. He doesn't type back a response, though, clicking the number instead and calling. He says the second the connection clicks, "You type like you speak, Lestat." Louis hates how fond he sounds when he adds, "I don't recall giving you this number." There's other things that he should say, like asking how Lestat even got a phone or a record deal or why it sounds like he is in the middle of a party in the middle of the day.

"Yes, well, the vampire Sam is good for some things," and Lestat pauses before he raises his voice to be heard above the crowd even though it isn't like Sam, even if he isn't actually in the room, needs the added volume, "...beyond being obnoxious about song lyrics!" Louis opens his mouth to ask about that, but there's the sound of a scuffle like the phone is being wrestled out of Lestat's hand which is clearly just a performance and nothing more because Sam's answer comes in Louis' mind and likely Lestat's too.

Tell him all of his songs cannot be about you or.... Sam trails off, like he's second guessing what he's about to say, and Louis can see in his mind that he's probably making eye contact with Lestat before he adds, ...or the mademoiselle, not anymore, the audience has no appetite for tragedy, not now, not after a fucking pandemic!

"Do not be ridiculous, Samuel, I have listened to modern music, it is all tragedy and heartbreak, it sells, you of al-..." and the laborious sigh that Louis can hear both in his head and over the phone makes him laugh and that stops Lestat's voice in mid-sentence, "Do not laugh at me, cher.”

"Then stop being funny, Lestat," and Louis can hear all the bluster leave Lestat as he hears the furniture creak as if he is slouching in an overly stuffed armchair. "Do you...are you really writing songs about her?" Decades and years and months after her death and the revelations about it, and Louis still can't say her name. Lestat doesn't respond, but Louis can hear him stand and walk across the room, and he's practically holding his own breath until he hears a heavy door close.

"She deserves songs, no?" Lestat finally replies, the noise of the party a dim murmur now.

"She'd think modern music is too loud, too nonsensical, you know she would, no one tells stories in their songs anymore," Louis says, walking out of is bedroom and into the meditation room, sitting down on the bench and looking up at Paul's picture for a moment as he presses his feet into the peebles to ground himself.

"I am a storyteller, though, she would like my songs," Lestat replies, but his voice is hushed, barely a whisper, and Louis smiles.

"She would hate your songs in particular, on purpose, on principle," he says, but his voice isn't unkind, even when Lestat makes a hurt sound, and Louis can imagine the dramatic way he's clutching his chest.

"You wound me, my love," Lestat says, and there's a moment that Louis can pretend he can see the smile, soft and loving, that Lestat is giving the phone, but it's not an expression that Louis actually remembers on Lestat's face, not really. "Why did you call? You didn't have to."

"It's late, maybe I shouldn't have."

"It's early actually. Summer in New York, and the sun has been up for hours." His voice is soft when he continues, "It's the city that never sleeps, you know, even for us." And there is a drag to Lestat's voice, an exhaustion that tells Louis Lestat is hiding something, and he thinks (knows) maybe the dreams are haunting Lestat as much as him. "Why aren't you sleeping, cher, your sunset is hours away." Louis waves the question away, and he knows Lestat can't see it, but he still seems to react to it when he says, "Do not avoid my question."

"Dreams," he says, just one word, simple, and not inviting exploration. If Lestat is, if the dreams are hitting more than just Louis, he doesn't need to explain. Lestat makes a sound on the other end of the line, but before he can argue, Louis asks, "You're in New York now?" as he forces a smile as he finds the thought of Lestat in Times Square or on Broadway particularly amusing.

There is silence for a long moment, and he almost thinks Lestat won't answer, won't appreciate the change in subject. Eventually, though, Louis gets a quiet, "Oui," in response. "The tour starts in a week. We have rehearsals, Sam is very strict about that." Lestat huffs out something that could have been a laugh. "You remember."

"Hmm," Louis hums, "He's reporting on you to the Talamasca, you know."

"I'm a fascinating subject, Louis, my life is a rollercoaster of adventure."

"Have you ever even been on a rollercoaster?"

Lestat doesn't answer that question as he replies, "I may even contact your Mister Molloy. Perhaps he'd like to interview me." Louis can hear the grin in his voice, and he even imagines it with a flash of fang. "We could make another bestseller."

"You will leave him be, Lestat," Louis says, his voice clear that it is an order.

"I would make a good story."

"Lestat." Lestat laughs again, but he doesn't argue. "Tell me about this tour." He's changing the subject again, he knows it and Lestat knows it, but as he remains silent, not answering at first, Louis wonders if he pushed too much, ignored the topic that Lestat wants to talk about too many times, and Louis almost can't handle it, not right then. He can practically feel Lestat's manic energy and annoyance over the phone. "You playin' or just singin'?" Louis asks, playing up the accent slightly. It's comforting and comfortable, and he can almost hear Lestat relax a little more at the sound of it.

Lestat huffs again though, an annoyed sound. "Vampire Sam only wants me to sing, he says my playing is desecrating his masterpieces. Which is ridiculous, no? It's my music, I wrote it, I should get to play it before the world," and his monologue is interrupted by a sputtering in both their minds that Louis can only assume is Sam preparing his own monologue.

"You might wanna stop broadcastin' your annoyance before Sam starts airin' grievances of his own," Louis says, the laughter plain in his voice.

"Let him," Lestat replies, and Louis can hear the smile in his voice. It feels sharp and pointed at Sam, but it warms Louis, little bubbles of happiness, and it makes him slightly giddy. The silence settles and stretches, comfortable and warm. "Why aren't you sleeping, cher?" Well. That's a mood killer.

"I told you. Bad dreams."

"You didn't say bad." There is a flash then, the taste of blood and ash heavy in his mouth again, enough to make him gag, but something else too...red, and he's not sure if it's hair or more blood, but it's only half remembered, and it only makes the nausea worse.

"Didn't I?" Louis coughs, the words thick in his mouth, and he knows the answer, and judging from the sound Lestat makes, he knows too. They fall into silence again, but this time it is a loaded silence, all of the unspoken things just at the back of their throats. He coughs again, waiting for Lestat to say something, to continue his interrogation, but his only answer is Lestat's breathing.

Clam and patient, this is the vampire who spent decades in a ruined hovel in New Orleans waiting for Louis to remember. Louis exhales finally, and says, "Just a U.S. tour? Or are you taking it world-wide?" This is not what either one of them was expecting, and Lestat laughs, the sharp bark of sound makes Louis flinch.

"Oh," but before Lestat can finish his answer, the other vampires, distant and indistinct, the cacophony, stirs again. Another one.... ...flames in Padang... ....it will be noticed now.... "Oh."

"Lestat."

"They're moving." Lestat sounds awed.

And terrified.

"Lestat." Cold settles in Louis' belly then, a kind of dread he couldn't really place. For a second he is back in the dream, blood and ash heavy on his tongue, choking him. Vampires burning is nothing new, but the fear of the other voices, the ones who had been so certain of how they would tear Louis limb from limb, that is cold and certain and it makes Louis' hands tremble.

"After New Orleans, after....after the first time," after Louis and Claudia had tried to kill him, Louis remembers and he nods for Lestat to continue even though he can't see him, "Rats were not enough, but I could move, when I could move, I stumbled my way to them, I played for them, for her, and she....her blood brought me back."

"Lestat."

"She bit me, then of course, I bit her, what else was I supposed to do, and...a-and...." Lestat trails off, and Louis can hear him breathing, the soft, unnecessary huffs of air coming quicker than they should. "The first of us, I found them, I played my music for her, p-...played Nicky's own violin, and she woke up, her head turning and her eyes finding mine, and it shouldn't have worked, I shouldn't have been able to, I am nothing, but she gave me life again." Lous could hear Lestat trembling, the little taps of his body as it moved involuntarily. "It shouldn't have worked." He is trying to convince someone of this truth, but Louis wonders if it's him.

Or her.

"Lestat."

"I don't know if it's the music or the book or whatever it is you said to them, the others, but they are....she is moving." Lestat is distracted, and Louis doesn't know who exactly he is speaking to.

"Lestat." Louis can hear him breathing, slow and shallow, and Louis pushes, "She?"

"Akasha."

And Louis remembers now, the name said in Magnus's lair years ago, he remembers tasting the confusion on Armand's lips. He hadn't recognized the name, neither had Louis, of course not.

"She's the first of us, Louis."

Louis's breath is shaking as he exhales. "You need to come to Dubai." He doesn't know what inspires him to say that, to offer sanctuary, but Lestat is afraid, and Louis has never known the man, in over a hundred years, to be afraid. Not really.

Lestat laughs, but Louis knows him well enough to know it's not a genuine sound. "Don't be ridiculous. The tour starts next week, we'll be visiting cities all over the world, it would be impossible for me to take time off to travel to you." Meaning it will be impossible for an ancient vampire to find him, and Louis can hear the lie in those words.

"Come to Dubai."

"Come to Paris."

"Lestat." Louis blinks. Paris catches him off-guard, but there is no malice in the words. "You will be safe here."

"Safe?" The word is a scoff, and Louis knows it comes with an eye roll.

"Apparently half the vampires in the South China Sea are being set on fire with no obvious source."

"So the two of us can burn together and take down a skyscraper at the same time?" There is panic in his voice, just an undercurrent, but it's there and it makes Louis stand up. "If I am with you, my love, and she finds us, she will kill you too, and I cannot....I have limits of what I am willing to watch."

"I don't know. I'm a charming guy, maybe she'll like me better than you," Louis says as he walks from his meditation room, across the sitting room, and over to the balcony doors. He pulls the door open and lets the wind hit him for a moment before he steps out. "What's your plan, Lestat? Lead the oldest vampire alive on a merry chase around the world?"

"I am captivating, my love, my music has already distracted the others from their quest to destroy you."

"Think that was the vampires burnin', but sure," Louis replies, a smile that is half a smirk playing across his lips.

"Wounded, Louis, wounded." Lestat exhales then, and Louis hears a creak of furniture like he's flopped back into a chair again. "When have you ever known me to have a plan, cher? I am just...." Lestat trails off and Louis holds his breath as he waits for him to continue.

When he doesn't, Louis finishes, "You are simply savin' lives?"

Lestat laughs at that, loudly and joyously, and it almost sounds real. Louis's lips quirk just a little. "Yours, perhaps, the others...." Louis imagines the elegant little shrug Lestat perfected centuries ago. "Does that sound like me?"

Louis sighs. "No." He leans on the railing, shaking his head. "Are you sure it's your girl doing this?"

"She is not 'my girl'," Lestat replies, and Louis imagines he is shaking his head. He hears the chair creak again, and now Louis imagines him standing and pacing the room as he speaks even though Louis can't hear the movement. "People are burning. Unless humanity has suddenly grown wise to our existence, unless your Mister Molloy's book is not being excused as plain fiction anymore, what else do you think is going on, my love?"

"Big leap to ancient vampire gods, that's all," Louis says, and Lestat makes a sound like he agrees, but he says nothing else, not at first.

"Perhaps I am just reacting to the fear of the others," Lestat finally says, and it would be easy to simply agree and let everything lay there, never to be picked up again.

Instead, Louis says, "When is your show in Paris?"

"A month, at least, I'll send you the dates. We start in New York, then Ireland, then London, then....then, finally Paris," Lestat doesn't sound scared anymore, but the undercurrent is still there, a faint trembling of his words that no one but Louis would be able to pick up.

"I will meet you there, and I will drag you back to Dubai." Lestat makes a noise like he is about to argue, and Louis holds up a hand to quell the argument. "If vampires keep burning, I will drag you back to Dubai. If this was just...two vampires throwing themselves into the fire, then we'll...we'll meet in Paris, share the night, and go our separate ways. That's all."

But the terror in the other voices has stuck with Louis, and he is not sure this is all coincidence, and Louis's first concern is to save what matters most.

Lestat.

Maybe Daniel too, distantly, but still family. Maybe Armand too in some weird fucked up way. Maybe...maybe some of the others too.

Finally Lestat exhales.

"We will meet in Paris." Before Louis can respond, Sam cuts in again, telling Lestat in both their minds about lighting tests and sound checks. "The stage calls, cher."

"Hmm, it always does," and he can hear Lestat making his way to the door, pulling it open, and Louis says, orders really, "Lestat. If it gets worse, you will come to me."

"And you will protect me, Louis?"

"Strength in numbers is all."

Lestat hums in agreement. "One month, Louis. Paris."

Louis nods. "Paris." They both hang up without saying goodbye, and it's not even a minute later before another text comes through.

are you having the dreams

Is that why you are not sleeping

Louis doesn't respond, and after several minutes the dots to indicate Lestat is typing pop back up. Then the Paris dates. And then....

listen to the album louis

Louis laughs before clicking over to buy the album, letting it download as he prepares to return to his bed.

He'll listen just as soon as he finishes Daniel's book.