#all this started because she didn’t understand why I was upset about her taking $1000 from my savings without my knowledge

[bleureiverswrites]

On the 3rd Day of Ficmas, I give thee: 3 thousand words! (plus 2k more)

A/N: This is a supplementary chapter that takes place after the conclusion of my college au, Come On, Collide. If you didn't read that in its entirety and do not wish to be spoiled on anything, please don't read this yet! This is also in celebration of 1000 followers on my twitter account, and as such this was picked by my twitter followers (though they didn't entirely know what they voted for).

ENJOY!

Zoro blew into his hands and rubbed them together, trying to keep them warm as he watched Sanji on the phone a few steps away. He couldn’t quite hear what was being said, but judging by the smile on his face it was all good news. After a moment he hung up and joined Zoro once more, not even flinching as he plunged his hands deep into Sanji’s pockets and buried his face in his boyfriend’s neck. 

“Fucking cold out here,” he grumbled. 

Sanji laughed. “I told you you didn’t have to come with me.” 

“I just don’t understand why those idiots would wanna live somewhere that gets so cold.”

“They like snow,” Sanji said, still chuckling. “That was Yonji, by the way, they got to the resort alright.” He looked around. “Where’s Tora?” Zoro nodded over Sanji’s shoulder and he turned as much as he could, easily spotting the black labrador against the snowy backdrop. Her nose was to the ground as she hastily searched something out, her ears perked up on high alert. “Tora! Come on, girl, time to go home!” 

The dog raised her head sharply at the sound of her name, cocked it to one side, and - finally recognizing Sanji - took off running toward the couple at full speed. 

“Here she comes,” Zoro said, deftly extracting his hands from Sanji’s pockets so he could drop to one knee and receive the brunt of her energy, which he did easily. Sanji watched as Zoro and Tora played around a bit, a small smile on his face. 

“Come on,” he said, nudging Zoro with his foot. “Let’s go home.”

“Alright girl, let’s go home.” Zoro clipped her leash on, handed it to Sanji, and once more crowded his space and shoved his hands in Sanji’s pockets. “Come on, come on, let’s go.” Sanji laughed again and obliged, letting Tora lead the way home. Once they were inside and Tora was freed from her leash, Zoro set about making a fire as Sanji dropped onto the couch. He watched Zoro a bit before his eyes began to roam the room, taking in the various pictures and decorations that were so very much Sabo and Yonji. He felt a slight tug on his heart as he remembered the previous night and how happy his baby brother looked to finally share a name with the love of his life. It was a bit bittersweet; since they’d graduated, gotten their own place, and opened their business, Sabo and Yonji made appearances at hangouts less and less, and no one could blame them. They were busy, everyone was. They were all getting older, starting their own lives but…it still sucked a bit. And now that they were married…Sanji knew that brothers went their separate ways eventually, it was just hard to let go of his, especially Yonji, because he’d missed out on so much of their childhood. 

A soft kiss was pressed to his cheek, pulling Sanji back to the present to see Zoro smiling at him, seated comfortably beside him on the couch. Sanji didn’t hesitate to curl into his side and get comfortable as well, sighing as he nestled into his boyfriend’s warmth. “I don’t know why you’re always cold,” he said quietly, “you’re like a personal heater.” 

“What are you upset about this time?” Zoro asked, ignoring the comment.

“I’m not upset.”

“Yes you are, you had that face when you were lost in thought. Talk to me.”

“I just miss my brother.” 

“Ah.” Zoro thought for a moment. “Maybe we should get a dog.”

Sanji sat up slightly. “What? Where did that come from?”

Zoro shrugged. “It might make you feel less lonely.”

“We can’t get a dog just because I’m feeling lonely.” 

“No,” Zoro smirked, “but it did get you to admit that you’re also feeling lonely.”

Sanji slumped against Zoro and hid his face. “I hate you.”

“I don’t know why you don’t just tell me things like this, I’m not gonna make fun of you.”

“It’s just…tedious. I’ve been gloomy about this for months, I’m sure it’s exhausting.”

Zoro pulled Sanji a little closer and pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “I will never tire of being the person you confide in. Ever.” He kissed him again, this time aiming for his temple. “And honestly, it makes sense. You had to give your brothers up when you were little and you finally got them back. Now it feels like you’re losing them again.” 

“Yeah. And I guess…I don’t know. I feel like I’m stalling out.”

“You’re not stalling out, we’re just in a weird place cuz we’re graduated and your job doesn’t start for a couple months. You’re probably stressed from the wedding and stressed about the move and stressed about your new job…it’s a lot. You’re allowed to feel overwhelmed and emotional. And it is my job as your most special and most important and most handsome person to support you when you feel that way. So let me do my job, ok?”

Sanji settle back into his embrace with a contented sigh. “Yeah…yeah. Ok.” They sat in silence then, entranced by the crackling of the fire and the sound of Tora chewing on one of her toys. He smiled at the dog absently, impressed - as he always was - by just how well behaved she was.

If he was being honest, Sanji was glad for the short break from everything going on in their life. Zoro was right, it was all overwhelming, and it had been a while since he felt like his head was above water. If it wasn’t for Zoro, constantly dragging him to bed and making sure he ate and yelling things like “hydrate!” and “posture check!” through the house randomly, Sanji was certain he’d be lying lifeless under a pile of paperwork and moving boxes by now. And even time with Zoro felt rare; the fact that he was shouldering 100% of the effort in their relationship was not missed by Sanji, and that fact only served to make him feel worse. So when Sabo and Yonji asked them to house & dog sit while they were on their honeymoon, Sanji jumped at then opportunity. They’d already be in town for the wedding, why not stay a few more days and just…unwind?

After nearly 3 weeks away from all the chaos, Sanji was already feeling like he didn’t want to go back home. Yonji constantly talked about how much he loved their little town, how it felt so cozy and welcoming, but Sanji didn’t understand it until a few days prior. He wondered if their new place would feel like that. Certainly it would be more warm, but would they feel welcome? Would they be able to describe it as cozy?

“Awful lotta sighing happening over there, love. Wanna talk to me?”

“Just thinking about the move.” 

“Hmm.”

Sanji sighed again. “What?”

“What about the move?”

“Just…all of it.”

“Sanji.”

“Zoro.”

“I’m fine with the move.”

Sanji snuggled closer, hiding his face slightly.

“I wouldn’t have told you I was ok with it if I wasn’t. I don’t mind the move.” 

“Weren’t you the one who said you wouldn’t know what you’d do if you couldn’t see your sister every day?”

Zoro laughed. “I didn’t mean I could never do anything if she wasn’t glued to me. I’ll be fine. I’m not just gonna send you off and hope all is well.” He caught Sanji under the chin and tilted his head up so he could speak directly to him. “I want to start this new chapter with you. Is that so hard to believe?”

Sanji frowned. “I’m asking you to leave everything behind for me.”

“Well…” Zoro smiled softly. “Not everything. I’ll still have you.”

“How can you be sure that’ll be enough?”

Zoro shrugged. “Always been enough in the past, it’s enough right now. No reason to think that won’t continue to be the case.”

“Sometimes…” Sanji dropped his gaze as he tried to choose his words carefully. “Sometimes I’m jealous of Sabo and Yonji, of this nice comfortable life they have. They just seem so content. No stress. No feelings of being overwhelmed. Just…this. A gorgeous house, a dog, each other…what if we move and we don’t feel welcomed? What if we hate it there?”

“Then we go somewhere else.”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that.”

“But—“

“Let me make this easier for you. This?” Zoro said, gesturing between the two of them. “This is it for me. There’s no version of my future where I’m not by your side. Making this move with you wasn’t even a question in my mind. It still isn’t. If you’ll have me, I’ll be there because that’s what I want. That’s my content.”

“I just worry you’ll be miserable and it’ll be all my fault.” 

“If I don’t like the new place you can just walk around in some of that lingerie, problem solved.”

Sanji barked out a laugh. “You’re an idiot.”

“It’s weird, I thought I hated it here but there are thighs warming my ears so that can’t be right.”

“Shut up!” Sanji yelled, playfully slapping Zoro’s chest as he laughed harder. 

“Just real hard to complain when you can’t breathe, that’s all I’m saying.”

Sanji buried his face in the crook of Zoro’s neck and held him close, his shoulders shaking as he continued to laugh. “I love you,” he said quietly, more as a reminder to himself than anything.

Zoro once more kissed the top of his head. “I love you, too.” Then, lowering his voice slightly, he added, “you know this.”

“I know, I know, I just…”

“Think too much.”

“Yeah.” Sanji scrunched up his nose. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to be sorry, I know you can’t exactly help it. But hey, we’ll have our version of,” he gestured to the surrounding house, “this, just give it time. We’ll start our new jobs, get settled in the new place, decorate it a bit, christen it a lot, and it’ll feel like home in no time.”

Sanji took a deep, calming breath and smiled at Zoro. “You’re right. I know you’re right. I’m just...” He gently but firmly patted his cheeks a couple times. “You know?”

“Surprisingly? Yes.” Zoro kissed him and Sanji wasted no time crawling fully into his lap, straddling him and burying his hands in Zoro’s hair. “Sanji!” Zoro gasped, feigning shock. “On your brother’s couch? In front of their dog?”

Sanji threw his head back and laughed, his earlier worries seeming so small and insignificant, he wondered why he let them loom so big at all. His laughter quickly gave way to a low, satisfied moan as Zoro took advantage of his exposed neck, sucking and biting and licking the flesh there until Sanji made the noises Zoro loved oh so much.

“Zoro hurry up, we’re going to be late!” Sanji pounded on the bathroom door, pausing just long enough to check the time on his phone. “The reservation is at seven!” 

“I know what time the reservation is at, I made the damn thing!” Zoro yelled. “Just…gimme a second, ok? I’m almost ready.”

“You’ve been almost ready for half an hour. What’s the hold up?”

“I’m just…just gimme a minute!” 

Sanji paused. He could hear the frustration in Zoro’s voice, but something told him it was directed at him. He leaned against the door, folding his arms across his chest. “What’s up?” He asked, his voice notably softer. “Anything I can help with?” 

There was a beat of silence, followed by a sigh. “Yeah, actually…can you tie my tie?”

Sanji nearly fell over in surprise. “Your what?”

The door swung open, revealing a very well put together, very embarrassed, Zoro. “My tie.” He held the strip of fabric out to Sanji. “I can’t tie the damn thing.” 

Sanji smiled softly. “Is that what you’ve been trying to do this whole time?” Zoro nodded and Sanji’s smile grew. He took the tie and closed the distance between them as his hands went to work. “Why didn’t you ask me sooner?”

“Wanted to surprise you,” Zoro mumbled.

“Well, I am surprised. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you wear a tie. Even at the wedding you just wore a really nice shirt.” Sanji narrowed his gaze playfully as he tightened the knot into place. “What’s the occasion?”

“Takin’ you to dinner.”

“You’ve done that plenty of times. Never with a tie.”

“Wanted to look good for you.”

“You always look good.”

“Yeah, but…” Zoro took a step back, straightened his jacket, and opened his arms a bit. “Have I ever looked this good?”

Sanji wanted to say something smart or sarcastic or biting, banter with Zoro a bit like they normally did but…he couldn’t. Anything he wanted to say disappeared from his mind as he really took Zoro in. His suit was a deep green, almost black, and was very clearly tailored. Zoro in a suit was trouble enough on its own, but the way this one hugged his body? Fuck, Sanji was in trouble. Zoro’d also gone as far as slicking his hair back, and for the first time in his life Sanji felt like he was under dressed. “Fuck,” he finally said, the word sounding more like a breath than a statement. “No, never. You…shit.”

Zoro caught Sanji by the hips and pulled him against him, smiling wickedly. “Put your tongue away, our reservation’s at seven.”

“I could not care less right now.”

Zoro laughed hard. “Well, as much as I’d love to throw you on the bed and fuck the life outta you–”

“With the suit on, I hope.”

“Yes, of course. As much as I’d love to do that, I’ve also been dying to take you to dinner for months, I’m not missing this.”

Sanji frowned. “That’s why you got so dressed up? Cuz we haven’t had a date in a while?”

“I got dressed up cuz I wanted to see your reaction. But it has been a while and I’d really like to spoil you tonight. That starts with a fancy dinner that you don’t have to cook.” Zoro took Sanji’s hand and pressed a kiss just below his knuckles. “But that you may judge to your heart’s content.” 

Sanji’s face turned bright red in a second. “I don’t judge the food when we’re on dates!”

“You do and it’s adorable. Now,” he tightened his grip on Sanji’s hand, “let’s get going before they give our table away.”

The drive to the restaurant was uneventful. The radio played quietly and the two talked about whatever popped into their minds and Zoro held tightly to Sanji’s hand, pressing kisses into his knuckles periodically. He let go only long enough to open Sanji’s car door, then they were once more hand in hand. Even once they were seated across from each other at their table, Zoro’s hand found Sanji’s, his thumb gliding gently over the blonde’s fingers as they talked. Maybe it was the romantic atmosphere, maybe it was because they hadn’t been on a date in a while, or maybe it was just the tailored suit…regardless, something about the evening was making Sanji’s insides feel like warm goo. Every time their eyes met, Sanji’s face would heat up and it would take everything inside of him to not look away. Zoro would just smile and kiss Sanji’s hand, never once breaking eye contact. 

Holy shit, Sanji was so in love it wasn’t funny.

Zoro surprised him further when, after dinner, he asked Sanji if he wanted to go for a walk. The night was still, but there was also fresh snow on the ground and Zoro wasn’t dressed nearly warm enough to walk around in it given how cold he normally got. But when asked, he said he was sure and simply held out his arm for Sanji to take. He did so happily. 

The walk led them to a small enclosed ice patch, atop which a few couples were skating. Fairy lights hung about the space, illuminating everything with a warm yellow glow. Sanji’s eyes lit up at the sight and squeezed Zoro’s arm, nuzzling his cheek against his bicep. “One of these days, I’m gonna get you all bundled up and make you go ice skating with me.” 

“Why not tonight?”

Sanji looked at him, surprised. “What?”

“Let’s go skating tonight.”

“We don’t…” Sanji trailed off as Zoro pointed at something across the ice. He looked closely and noticed a man, bundled against the cold, with a sign beside him that said simply, SKATES. 

“We can rent some. Come on.” 

Sanji stayed put. When Zoro realized he wasn’t budging, he gave his boyfriend a warm smile. 

“You don’t want to?” 

“What are you up to?” Sanji asked, suddenly feeling like he was being watched.

“You always talk about going ice skating, and Sabo told me about this spot in case I wanted to do something romantic while we were here. And I wanted to.”

“So you expect me to believe you got a tailored suit, made a reservation at an amazing restaurant, wore a tie, and now you want to go ice skating?”

“Yes.”

“But you’re not up to something?”

“Nope.”

“Sounds fake.” 

Zoro chuckled. “Is it so outlandish to think that I’ve missed you?” He gently cupped Sanji’s cheeks and kissed him softly. “I understand you’ve been busy, I understand it’s been necessary, and you know I’m not mad about any of it. But I’ve missed the fuck outta you. I’ve been planning this night for a while, weeks really. Maybe even months. I wanna sweep you off your feet, make you feel like you’re flying even after you’re back on the ground. Like I said, I wanna spoil you. So yes, I bought a suit just for tonight. Yes, I got us a reservation at a nice restaurant. Yes, I want to go ice skating. Yes, I wanna take you home and fuck you so, so good. I want to give you the best night of your life, is that so hard to believe?”

Grinning ear to ear, Sanji threw his arms around Zoro’s shoulders and hugged him tight. “I don’t fucking deserve you.”

“Well you’re stuck with me, so learn to deal with it.” 

Zoro insisted on putting Sanji’s skates on for him, taking great care to remove his shoes and even greater care to slip the skates on. Once he’d fastened his own, he took Sanji’s hand and shakily led the way to the ice, Sanji giggling the whole way. “You’ve never skated before, have you?”

“Nope.”

“Ok. Here.” Sanji stepped out onto the ice like it was as natural as walking. He spun to face Zoro and, smiling wide, offered both his hands. “Come with me, I won’t let you fall.”

Zoro gladly took the outstretched hands and gave Sanji his full weight as he slowly, little by little, made his way onto the ice. “This is so dangerous,” Zoro said, his eyes glued to his feet. “If you feel me start to fall just let me go, don’t let me take you down with me.”

“Have a little more faith in me,” Sanji said. “I’ll keep you up, I promise.” 

Zoro raised an eyebrow. 

“Shut up. You know what I mean.” Sanji tightened his grip on Zoro’s hands. “Ok…do you trust me?”

“With my life.”

“Then let’s go.” Sanji began to glide backwards slowly, pulling a wobbly Zoro with him. “Shift your weight between your feet, hold your balance with your core…good…good…you’re getting it…”

“Like hell I am!” Zoro said, laughing as he continued to wobble after his lover. “I look ridiculous!” 

“Because you’re too stiff! You have to move your feet!” 

They carried on like that a while longer, until Zoro was able to slowly and mostly smoothly skate beside Sanji, rather than behind him. He apologized a few times about how bad he was, but Sanji just laughed and told him he had nothing to apologize about. He was just glad Zoro had tried, and that they could do even this much together. They were skating back to the entrance when it happened; someone caught Sanji’s eye, someone who looked a lot like Yonji, and while he was distracted, Zoro lost his balance and took a spill. He let out a small yelp and Sanji turned just in time to see his knees hit the ice, and then he was beside him in a flash. 

“Oh, shit, I’m sorry!”

“Not your fault,” Zoro said, dusting off his hands. He lifted one knee up so he could brush some of the ice shavings off when Sanji offered his hand.

“Yeah, but I said I wouldn’t let you fall. I’m really sorry.”

“It’s really not a big deal, don’t be too upset about it.” 

“At least let me help you up. Are your knees alright?” 

“Knees are fine. And so, thankfully, is this.” Zoro pulled something out of his pocket and held it out to Sanji, and suddenly everything made sense. The suit. The tie. The dinner. The walk. The ice skating. The knee. Sanji took a step back, his hand reflexively moving to cover his mouth as his eyes filled with tears. 

“I knew it,” was all he could say. “I knew it, I knew it, I told you you were up to something!” 

“I know you’re nervous about asking your boyfriend to move across the world with you,” Zoro said, his voice soft and calming. “So…what about asking your fiance to do it?”

“That…you…idiot!” 

Zoro laughed. “I meant it when I said you were it for me, Sanji. I feel like I’ll pop if I love you anymore than I do, but I know that how much I love you today has nothing on how much I’m going to love you tomorrow, and the day after that, and so on and so forth until I stop waking up, and even then, who’s to say? Even with eternity stretched out before me I know my love for you will only grow with each setting of the sun. You are everything I could ever hope to want,  you are the only person I need by my side, and I would be so fucking happy if you’d do me the honor of letting me marry you.”

“Did you fall on purpose?”

Zoro blinked. “What?”

“You fell on purpose. Oh my god, I felt so bad for a second!”

“Sanji, love, focus.” 

“On?”

“What do you mean on? On the question!” 

“In what reality would my answer be no?” 

“You could still say it!”

“Say no?”

“SAY YES!” 

“Well if you’re gonna demand it…”

“Oh my god.”

Sanji dropped to his knees as well, tears streaking his cheeks. “Of course you can marry me, Zoro. Nothing would make me happier.” 

Zoro slipped the ring on his finger before pulling him into a searing kiss, paying absolutely no mind to the various onlookers who started applauding and cheering. 

One particular cheer caught Sanji’s attention and he turned toward the sound. It was one thing to think he’d seen Yonji, but hearing him, too? That’s when he saw them, not just Sabo and Yonji, but everyone: his brothers, Zoro’s sisters, both their parents and all their friends were gathered at one end of the little ice rink. 

To Sanji’s surprise, Zoro got to his feet easily and offered a hand to Sanji, once more hauling him into a kiss once he took it. “You fucking liar,” Sanji said with a playful glare, before turning on the small crowd. “You’re all fucking liars!”

They reconvened at the house, where everyone toasted the newly engaged couple with champagne and various desserts. Sanji stayed by Zoro’s side most of the night, the feeling of his arm around Sanji’s waist sending little shivers up his spine. Zoro’s fingers tapped against Sanji’s hip, each one seeming to echo the same word: mine mine mine mine mine. 

It took all Sanji had to keep his hands to himself. 

“So…no honey moon?”

Yonji turned, smiling when he saw his brother. “We leave tomorrow,” he said, turning back to the balcony railing as Sanji joined him. “We weren’t about to miss this. Can I see it?”

Sanji held out his hand, showing off the simple blue metallic band. Yonji whistled. “Yeah,” Sanji said. “He did good. So all that shit about getting to the resort safe…?”

Yonji chuckled. “Zoro called us a few days before you guys got here, explained what he wanted to do and asked if we’d be willing to stay around another day.”

Sanji looked slightly uncomfortable. “So were you…home last night?”

“Why? You do something in our house you don’t want us to know about?”

“We…uh…well…”

Yonji laughed loudly and clapped his brother on the back. “Relax, I’m just fuckin’ with you. We’re not expecting you to be celebate, and no, we weren’t home last night. We got a hotel room.” Sanji opened his mouth to object, but Yonji held up a hand. “Which Zoro offered to pay for, but we were fine covering it ourselves. And it was nice to feel like we were stepping away while still being able to be here tonight.”

“Well, I’m glad you were. That was my one worry when I realized what he was doing; ah crap, my family’s not here.”

“He knows you too well to let that happen.”

“Yeah.”

Yonji studied his brother for a minute. “Something wrong?”

“Just…I’ve been freaking out about asking him to move with me. You don’t think he did this just because of that, do you? Like…I didn’t force him to propose, right?”

“Absolutely not.”

“But—“

“No, Sanji…Zoro started planning this a year ago. You hadn’t even gotten the job offer yet. You didn’t force anything.” Yonji clapped him on the back again, this time with a lot more force. “Hate to break it to ya, bro, but I think he’s just in love with you.”

“Are we talking about my stupid brother?” Nami sidled up beside Sanji leaned over the railing slightly. “If so, yeah, idiot’s so in love. Never thought he’d actually find a good one but here we are.” She smiled at him. “Did he surprise you?”

“Yup. Had an answer for everything.” 

“I’m surprised his brain cells cooperated long enough to pull this off, honestly. He’s never been a good liar.” Nami shrugged. “Guess you really do bring out the best in him.”

“I try.”

“Now everyone say thank you, Yonji.”

Nami made a face. “What? Why?”

“Yeah,” Sanji said, “why?”

Yonji looked unimpressed. “Uh, cuz if I hadn’t insisted Zoro join us that weekend, you two may not have made up? You’re welcome.”

“Made up?” Nami asked, her eyes darting between the two. “Did something happen?”

“Sa—“

“NO NOTHING!” Sanji said quickly, pinching his brother to help him read the room. “Nothing happened! We just had a slight misunderstanding, that’s all. Fixed it in no time.”

A darkness passed over Nami’s features that had both Sanji and Yonji taking a step back. “A misunderstanding, huh?” She cracked her knuckles one by one, first the right hand, then the left. “This misunderstanding, did it happen to hurt his feelings?”

“I think feelings got hurt on both sides,” Yonji said, scrambling to diffuse the tension.

“Nami, listen, it was just a stupid misunderstanding, he and I worked it out. I’ve made it up to him a thousand times over!” 

“You also made my baby brother cry.”

Sanji took another step back, yelping slightly when his back hit the wall. Panic rose in him quickly, until the wall…wrapped its arms around his waist? 

“Almost cry,” Zoro corrected, dropping his chin onto Sanji’s shoulder. He smiled at his fiance, pressing a quick kiss to his cheek. “I was wondering where you’d wandered off to.”

“Help,” was all Sanji could manage, his eyes still glued to a fuming Nami. 

“It’s fine, sis, ease up. Wouldn’ta proposed if any real damage had been done. Like Curly said, just a stupid misunderstanding. And he’s made it up to me so many times.” 

The suggestive tone Zoro used seemed to do the trick, because Nami instantly dropped the look of anger in favor of pretending to gag. “Spare me the messy details,” she said with an eye roll.

“Oh, they’re definitely messy,” Zoro said. He laughed when Nami punched his arm, deeming him disgusting and threatening to absolve their siblinghood. “Come on,” he said, directing his attention to Sanji. “Let’s go mingle some more.”

“You get him for the rest of your lives, let us have some time with him!” Nami protested.

“You were about to kill him,” Yonji said.

Nami smiled sweetly. “And my wedding gift is not doing the same to you.”

“It has been received with gratitude.” Yonji bowed slightly. “Thank you for your contribution.”

“Keep acting like that and I’m taking it back.”

“You two have fun by—e!” Zoro steered Sanji back toward the house, his hands squeezing his hips as they went, causing Sanji to shiver slightly. When they were still a ways away from everyone, Zoro nibbled on Sanji’s earlobe, before pressing his lips to his ear and lowering his voice. “Gonna fuck you so good tonight,” he whispered, laughing as Sanji attempted to hide his redened face. “I can’t wait, either.”

“Stop! Our parents are here!” Sanji hissed.

Zoro’s arms encircled Sanji’s waist, pulling him closer. “I’m aware.” 

Sanji laughed quietly, the sound shifting to a hum as Zoro kissed him properly. They remained like that for the rest of the party; Zoro, draping himself over Sanji, who was happy to lean back into the embrace. They laughed plenty and kissed too much, equally excited to be celebrating something that meant so much to both of them. And when they’d said their last goodbyes and retired for the evening, Zoro was certain to make good on his promise. 

All in all, it truly was the best night of Sanji’s life.

[forsworned]

could I pls request the hashiras w/ a sensitive s/o ( they get upset easily etc . ) and how they’d react to someone accidentally saying something that made them cry ??

gender neutral reader if possible

if you don’t wanna write for all the hashira , feel free to pick your favourites or something , I don’t really mind tbh

thank you in advance ! ! ! have a wonderful day / noon / night 💞

a/n: thank you for requesting again!! this was lowkey hella hard to do dude so i'm really sorry for how long this took. i managed to get all the hashira in and kept it pg obviously for muichiro since he is underage but i left him as is. i was legit brain dead writing this but here you go!

𝕣𝕖𝕟𝕘𝕦𝕜𝕠 𝕜𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕛𝕦𝕣𝕠𝕦 ʕ •ᴥ•ʔ

He doesn't take well to it, but he also understands that the fellow Demon Slayer was only trying to give you constructive criticism. Kyoujurou would scramble at first not knowing how to react since it was the first time he'd ever seen you so distraught. But then he'd finally recollect himself and dismiss the slayer and get back to you.

But just as he finally got himself together you'd throw yourself in his arms and blubber like a baby. Which again would have him flustered at first, but he'd soon chuckle and hold your face in his hands. A chaste kiss on your forehead that would cease your weeping.

"You know, my little flame, you're quite cute when you cry."

You looked up from his tear soaked uniform to his blazing eyes, gazing down at you lovingly. It sent your heart racing and you could no longer look at him. So you did what any other person would do if they were madly in love Kyo and couldn't look him in the eyes. You buried your face back into his chest while the heat rushed to your cheeks. The sound of laughter escaping his lips once more as you smiled against his damp uniform.

𝕘𝕚𝕪𝕦𝕦 𝕥𝕠𝕞𝕚𝕠𝕜𝕒 ₍ᐢ ̥ ͉ ̥ᐢ₎

He doesn't exactly think it through, just does. So in one swoop motion he'd carry you out of there and gave the fellow slayer any icy glare that had them shivering to their core. You'd be shocked at how quickly he'd get you out of that situation and he'd stop at an isolated area for you guys to be alone.

"U-um, Giyuu?" You'd stutter, as you rubbed your eyelids and looked at him with eyes are big as saucers.

"Are you alright?" His stunning cerculean blue gaze was piercing through your heart.

"Y-yeah. You can put me down now." His face automatically vermillion with agitation at the realization of you being in his arms. He firmly planted you on the ground and turned away to avoid looking at you. You laughed at how cute he looked when becomes embarrassed and slipped your arms around him from behind as you buried your face in his back.

"Thank you, my love."

𝕥𝕖𝕟𝕘𝕖𝕟 𝕦𝕫𝕦𝕚 ₍ᐢ ̥ ̮ ̥ᐢ₎ *:･。

"Eh?! Why are you crying [name]?"

It wasn't the first time he'd see you crying, but he was very perplexed by the sight in front of him. He didn't think much of it when the lower rank demon slayer was simply advising you to be more careful on the next mission. His ruby glare burred holes into the back of their heads.

"Why the hell did you make them cry for? It's not very flamboyant of you." He was menancing to say the least. It caused the demon slayer to stammer on his words until you spoke up rubbing at your eyes.

"It's not their fault, Tengen. I just get emotional. You know this." You sniffled as you tried your best to regain your composure. A soft 'tch' left his lips before he carried you on his shoulder which gave rise to a squeal from you.

"Put me down!"

He smacked your bottom and chuckled devilishly.

"Nah, I think we're gonna change that whiney mood of yours right up!"

𝕠𝕓𝕒𝕟𝕒𝕚 𝕚𝕘𝕦𝕣𝕠 U ´꓃ ` U

He doesn't waste anytime elbowing the person into the ground. Not only for just talking to you, but making you cry?! Oh, buddy. You're in for the beating of a lifetime.

"Obanai!" You exclaimed. Your tear stained face contorted into worry as you watched the now pummeled slayer knock out cold.

"That'll teach him. I'll make sure he never sees the light of day the next time he even looks in your direction." He sneered at them and then looked at you with gentle eyes. "Are you alright?"

You nodded as he dabbed away at your face and caressed you cheek.

"Alright, let's go then."

He stated before getting up and taking your hand in his as he dragged you away from the scene.

"Wait! Shouldn't we help him?" You were glad that Obanai cared that much about you, but he really shouldn't just go around attacking people like that and leaving them unconscious.

"No, Shinobu will take care of that eyesore."

𝕤𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕠𝕓𝕦 𝕜𝕠𝕔𝕙𝕠𝕦 Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

"You must have a death wish."

The tone in her voice was so venomous yet sickly sweet it almost could've been enough to kill you. The nerve in her temple popping out as the demon slayer who was unfortunate enough to accidentally make you cry shuddered in fear.

"Shinobuuu." You whined. "Please leave them alone. They didn't mean any harm!"

Her eyes went soft when she saw you in your distressed state and then back to her vicious glare when it was back on them. "Run along now."

Her voice still even, yet scary. The demon slayer bowed quickly before escaping leaving you two alone. Shinobu sighed as she caressed your cheek.

"You're so delicate, sometimes." Your shoulders slumped at her words. It wasn't for long because Shinobu decided to plant a kiss on your nose and giggled. "Ara, ara, [name]-chan. You're still my sweet butterfly."

Shinobu didn't show much PDA, but when she did it made your heart implode and she was absolutely, 1000% aware of this.

𝕞𝕚𝕥𝕤𝕦𝕣𝕚 𝕜𝕒𝕟𝕣𝕠𝕛𝕚 ʕ♡˙ᴥ˙♡ʔ

Her face would get all puffed up and red as she watched you cry from a few feet away, that is until you started to hug the person that was causing the "commotion".

"I hope you find peace." You said softly as you pulled away. The person thanked you and bowed with tears in their eyes before stepping away.

"[Name], are you okay?!" Mitsuri exclaimed as she hugged you with all her might. You had to tap out for her to let go. She noticed this and you gasped for air as she apologized endlessly.

"I'm okay, Mitsuri. Their family was attacked by demons and I managed to save one member and they just came to thank me in person." You vigorously swabbed at your eyes with your sleeves before smiling again at your lovely wife. Mitsuri didn't realize her strength and sometimes that would lead to her infamous death hugs.

"Oh, [name]! You are so heroic!" She squeaked with joy as she squeezed you again, this time with less agnozing pressure. You hugged her back as you laid your head on her shoulder and thanked God your partner was as lovely as she was.

𝕘𝕪𝕠𝕞𝕖𝕚 𝕙𝕚𝕞𝕖𝕛𝕚𝕞𝕒 ₍ᐢ｡ ˬ ｡ᐢ₎

His towering height alone was enough to have the culprit who made you cry shaking in their boots. Gyomei would simply ignore that he sent that person pissing themselves and would lift you in his arms as he dabbed away at your tears with his hankerchief.

"Dont cry, my flower. They're not worth your precious tears." He'd murmur against the apple of your cheek as he kissed it. This would instantly boost your mood and have you throwing your arms around him and squeezing him tight. You'd plant the biggest kiss on his cheek causing him to blush.

"Thank you, Gyo."

𝕤𝕒𝕟𝕖𝕞𝕚 𝕤𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕒𝕫𝕦𝕘𝕒𝕨𝕒 ʕ； •`ᴥ•´ʔ

Anger. Kind of a no brainer. He'd go off on the person who made you cry and in return would make them cry and run far, far away. He'd comfort you by giving you a nice, bear hug and kiss on the top of your forehead whilst asking if you were ok. You'd end up laughing with tears still in your eyes and obviously this would puzzle him.

"What are you laughing about?"

"You just scared the bejeezus out of that guy and sent him crying!"

He'd chuckle and bring you back in for another warm hug and your face would nuzzle the crook of his neck.

"I'll send anyone crying for you."

𝕞𝕦𝕚𝕔𝕙𝕚𝕣𝕠 𝕥𝕠𝕜𝕚𝕥𝕠 ₍ᐢ ̥ ̞ ̥ᐢ₎ ♥

Much like when he showed his distain towards Tanjiro when he interrupted Oyakata-sama. He would be watching from a distance, and fiercely flick pebbles at a scary fast velocity that was deadly enough to pierce a hole through the person who dared to talk down to you. But, of course, he held back since it was only a mere human but it was enough to send them to groveling on their knees.

You'd wipe your tears away and turn in the direction it came from to see Muichiro smiling at you while tossing a pebble up and down in hand. He was always watching over you.

[canary3d-obsessed]

Restless Rewatch: The Untamed Episode 18, second part

(Masterpost) (Other Canary Stuff) (Previous Post)

Warning: Spoilers for All 50 Episodes!

Hey OP where’s the funny header gif for this post? Sorry, it was murdered by an angst demon and the framing of these shots.

My Found Family Came to Find Me

Continuing our flashback from last time, we see Baby Wei Ying up a tree, refusing to come down because he's afraid there are dogs. Eventually he falls out of the tree, like a dumbass a child, and Yanli tries but fails to catch him. 

Unlike his grownup counterpart, Baby Wei Ying doesn't pretend he's unhurt when he is hurt. I'd like to put the change at Yu Ziyuan's door, but actually he admits to being hurt during his Gusu summer - he mimics Lan Zhan's stoicism when they're getting beaten, but it doesn't come naturally to him, and he whines a lot afterwards. 

By the time of the Animatronic Dog incident, however, he's laughing off obvious injuries that have secret trauma behind them. By the time he comes back, coreless, from the burial mounds, he won't confide in anyone about his hurts any more, except possibly Wen Qing.

Yanli carries Wei Ying, in a sequence that will be echoed much later in his life when Lan Zhan carries him (gifset here). While they head back, she tells him that Jiang Cheng has a bad temper and to ignore whatever mean things he says. This will also be echoed in the future, when Wei Wuxian says it to Lan Zhan after their argument with Jiang Cheng in the shrine.

Yanli also explains that Jiang Cheng loved his dogs and that he's been very sad since Jiang Fengmian sent them away, demonstrating once again that Jiang Fengmian is a terrible father. Yanli says that Jiang Cheng will be happy to have a friend with him, though. This kind of makes Wei Wuxian's role in Jiang Cheng's life "replacement dog."

Jiang Cheng, after getting over this particular snit, got worried about Wei Wuxian and woke up Yanli to find him, and then went wandering around in the dark like a dumbass a child, and is banged up and crying when the other two find him. Yanli encourages him to apologize to Wei Wuxian and he does, which will not happen again until the very end of the show.  

They all smile and laugh together, as Wei Ying looks to Yanli to guide him through the insanity that his life has suddenly become. 

(more behind the cut!)

They head back to Lotus Pier in a sweet montage of walking and smiling together, with Jiang Cheng carrying the world's most beautiful candle holder with the world's most wind-resistant candle in it, to light their way back. Back in the present day for a brief moment, Jiang Cheng pretends to sleep and listens to his sister insisting that the three of them should always stay together, while a single tear rolls down the side of his face.

Soup is Love, Chapter 1 of 1000

Then we head to the past again. In Jiang Cheng & Wei Ying's now-shared room, Wei Ying sits on the bed trying to figure out how to deal with his grumpy new roommate.

Wei Ying is unsure what to do when confronted with pajama game this strong. Tiny Jiang Cheng is already a fashion king. 

Then he tells Jiang Cheng he's not going to narc him out to the clan leader, since it was his own fault that he hurt his leg. This is all Jiang Cheng needs to hear to decide Wei Ying is all right, and he says that he will help Wei Ying chase away dogs in the future.  In fact, Wei Wuxian will protect Jiang Cheng from punishment basically forever, while Jiang Cheng will continue to threaten Wei Wuxian with dogs...forever.

They shake hands on their new understanding and then jump up and down laughing, Wei Ying's leg being all better now, apparently.  When Yanli arrives (carrying a tray of...can you guess? I'll let you guess), they stop jumping. Wei Ying dives in to give Jiang Cheng a little tickle/embrace in an adorable moment that would have me saying "oh, my ovaries!" if I hadn't surgically sent my ovaries to hell a few years ago.

Yanli introduces Wei Ying to the emotional and gustatorial miracle that is her lotus and ribs soup. He hesitates a long time before tucking in because he's so unused to being fed.

Consent? I Don’t Even Know Her

The flashback wraps up with Yanli conked out on the table from the drugs in the incense burner, while Wei Wuxian, who is somehow unaffected despite sitting almost as close to the smoke as she was, checks on her. Jiang Cheng and his Uggs period-appropriate sock thingies get out of bed to come stand with Wei Wuxian, and have feelings about sending Yanli away after she JUST said she doesn't want to be parted from them.

Wei Wuxian: If she didn't want us to do this, she shouldn't have signed that blanket consent-to-medical-treatment form.   Jiang Cheng: Wen Qing made me sign one of those plus a durable power of attorney, is that bad?

This episode is all about people overriding each others' agency and making massively important decisions without the consent of the people who will be affected. But in a feudal context, it's not a violation, no matter how it feels to the person being controlled. In feudal life, your body belongs to your lord -- your sect leader, in the world of CQL. Jiang Yanli and Jiang Cheng's choices are overridden by their clan leader's final command to Wei Wuxian.  Wei Wuxian's core is arguably Jiang Fengmian's property--Wei Wuxian certainly sees it that way, just as his hand was Yu Ziyuan's to take if she wished.  

The brothers tenderly tuck Yanli into bed in the rolly cart and hand her off to Song Lan. They talk about how important it is to get her to Lanling and that she's probably going to be mad, as they thank Song Lan for helping them. 

Yanli listens while she sleeps and, in what is becoming a trademark Jiang move, lets a single tear roll down the side of her face. Jiang Cheng points out that Yanli never gets mad at Wei Wuxian and Wei Wuxian is like, true dat.

How Can You Mend a Broken Heart?

Song Lan is always so emotional about every damn thing, I love him. Here he's like OH GOD NO DON'T FORMALLY THANK ME! STOP!!!

Then he starts to ask Wei Wuxian to pass a message to Song Xingchen for him, but then decides not to say anything, making it super obvious that they fought and aren't together. 

Wei Wuxian reacts to this with confusion and distress, probably because he doesn't want to imagine ever having a breakup with his own soulmate. Which he soon will be having.  But possibly he's just upset that his OTP broke up.

After Song Lan takes off, Jiang Cheng gives Wen Qing a rude & perfunctory thank-you bow, turning away before she can return it. Wei Wuxian tells her not to take it to heart - basically everyone who deals with Jiang Cheng gets a version of the "ignore what he says" speech. She says she understands and that in his place she would have behaved worse, which is so totally not true.  

Then she asks Wei Wuxian if he's sure about the core transfer (not in so many words, because the script is being kind of being vague about it, without actually hiding what's happening). His reply pretty much encapsulates the whole Wei Wuxian experience.

Then he and Jiang Cheng walk off, with Jiang Cheng giving us a rear view that had me googling Wang Zhuocheng's fashion shoots to determine if that wagon he's draggin’ is really as delightful as this belt makes it look. Alas, there is not a wealth of photographic evidence for this research, as compared to, for example, photos of Xiao Zhan's outstanding ass.

Wen Qing and Wen Ning see them off, with Wen Qing wishing they valued their lives more. Although, what she and Wen Ning are doing is massive treason, so their lives will be pretty much forfeit if they're caught, so...

The Sunshot Campaign of Like 60 Dudes

Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng walk up the mountain for the whole beginning of the Sunshot campaign, which...okay. Maybe it's like Dunkirk or The Witcher where they intercut stuff that is happening in different timeframes, which is one of my least favorite new film style thingies.

You know, for a guy Wei Wuxian constantly calls "peacock," Jin Ziyuan really doesn't wear a lot of adornment; just some subtle metalwork on his belt with no dangly bits at all, and a single reasonably-sized hair crown. Compared to the extremely fancy Lan Wangji he's almost plain. We already know that Wei Wuxian is a massive hypocrite when it comes to his idea of a perfect boy, however.

So, this is the Lanling Jin army, which consists of literally 60 guys, including the ones on the stairs and Jin Zixuan and Douchebag Dad. How are they going to fight a war with this tiny group? Why do they have such a big plaza? Hasn't anybody on this production learned CGI cloning?

That’s better.

Nie Mingjue and his best bitch Baxia make quick work of the 4 Wen guys who were assigned to hold the Unclean Realm. 

Hello, Daddy Da-Ge!

Squeeee, it's Lan Wangji! He's taking back Cloud Recesses! Ooooohhh we've missed you Lan Wangji.

Look guys he's here! Look how beautiful he is. He's looking at the gate of cloud recesses and thinking thoughts that Lan Xichen or Wei Wuxian could probably see in his bewitching eyes if they were here to see him, which they aren't. But at least he is here!

....and now he's gone again. *cries*

Hares On The Mountains

Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian continue roaming prettily around this pretty mountainside. The locations in this show are such eye candy. 

Young laddies they run like hares on the mountains Young laddies they run like hares on the mountains  Young laddies they run like hares on the mountains  If I was a young lass I’d soon go a hunting

Jiang Cheng starts to have doubts about the whole Baoshan Sanren thing. Wei Wuxian's reply pretty much encapsulates the whole Wei Wuxian experience.  

Then we have just the tenderest blindfolding scene, (more gifs here), which is fodder for your ChengXian dreams, if you have those.

Here's a good place for a sidebar about what is and isn't incest. Whee! In the CDrama context, relationships tend to be more clearly defined than in western media. The mechanism of confession & acceptance means that people either are or are not in a romantic relationship, with few grey areas. So a character can literally say "we grew up as brother and sister, but now we are dating" and when someone looks startled they just say "there's no blood relation" and everyone is like "cool cool" and that's the new definition of the relationship.

For a strong example of this, the extremely wonderful Go Ahead is about a contemporary family in which a girl and two boys, who are not blood relatives, are all raised together, and call each other brother and sister. When they become adults, they and everyone around them expect the girl (now a woman) to marry one of the two men who have been her brothers, while whichever one she doesn't choose will carry on as her sibling. It's treated as the most natural, logical thing in the world; the only question is whether she wants to make that transition, and with whom.

Looked at through this lens, Wei Wuxian's relationships with his adoptive siblings have just as much potential to turn into romances as his relationships with his friends do, and there's nothing creepy about it. As such you can expect my meta to always get into ChengXian moments without treating it as a wrong or forbidden love. Hopeless, of course, because Jiang Cheng is such a prick the power of WangXian is stronger, but that's a different matter.

What is wrong is wearing this fantastic hat & veil combination when the most fashionable person on the mountain is blindfolded and can't see it.

In the course of this blindfolded encounter with Wen Qing, Jiang Cheng gets to kneel before a powerful woman, be led along by a length of silk that's placed in his hand, and then knocked the fuck out and operated on. He'll wake up in a hotel room in a tub full of ice with "we took your kidney" written on the mirror in lipstick, and he'll love every minute of it.  

Soundtrack: 1. Still Fighting it, by Ben Folds 2. Hares on the Mountain, by Steeleye Span

Writing Prompt: The NEXT time somebody blindfolds Jiang Cheng

[acreepypastaloverposts]

Hi, I’m not sure if you’re doing asks or requests but if you are- How do you think the pastas would react to their S/O being asexual (not wanting/liking intercourse)?

Pastas X Asexual S/O:

BEN Drowned:

He's heard of it but hasn't really looked into it because he didn't think he'd need the information.

Immediately searches the internet looking at everything he could find about asexuality.

Will try and tone down the perverted jokes he makes if it makes you uncomfortable.

Honestly just wants to be your centre of attention and the person you love.

13/10

Bloody Painter:

He's more curious than anything else.

Would want to learn everything about asexual people and what it actually means to be asexual.

Will also ask how you found out that you were asexual and the experiences you went through.

Overall he's respectful and honestly just loves you for you.

10/10

Candy Pop:

Ehh I also think that they also prefer a sexual relationship with their s/o.

However if they truly loved their s/o, and I'm talking like soulmate kinda shit, then they'll learn to live without sex.

You'll have to set boundaries at the start and try to get them to understand why.

If that happens then they'll find out that they can still have a romantic and somewhat intimate relationship with their s/o.

8/10

Clockwork:

Knows basic knowledge of what being asexual is but that's about it.

Honestly doesn't really care what you are, in her mind as long as you two love each other that's all that matters.

Can and will kick anybody's ass if they disrespect or bully you in anyway. Seriously, like she isn't scared.

Will ask what you do and don't like so she doesn't accidentally cross a line and upset you.

15/10

Dr Smiley:

Again, he read the basics of what asexuality is in a book years ago but doesn't really know that much about it.

Honestly like he doesn't really care? Like he's not fussed on what you are or whether you like being intimate or not. He just... isn't really bothered.

Will broaden his victim pool to aphobic/acephobic people as a way to support you.

This relationships future will be hit and miss depending on how Smiley actually feels.

4/10

Eyeless Jack:

Absolutely no clue on anything to do with being asexual.

Once you fill him in he completely understands why you would be like that and 100% respects your decision.

Again he's another pasta that doesn't really care if their relationship doesn't have a sexual element.

He's in it fully because he loves you and wants to spend his life with you.

1000000/10

Homicidal Liu:

He actually knows all about it since had a friend in school who was asexual.

He'll find it difficult at first to find some kinds of relief but he'll find a way to make it work.

Sully is an asshole about it tbh. He'll probably degrade his s/o and make them feel guilty about it.

As time goes on Sully will get less abusive towards you but it's up to you whether you want to be in that kind of environment.

3/10

Hoodie:

It's pretty straight forward for him to understand so there's no need to have to speak with him about it unless you have slightly different requirements?

Honestly you didn't even need to tell him, he just knew. A gut feeling maybe.

Since he obviously knew what you were before you became a couple I imagine he wouldn't have an issue with his s/o being asexual.

Also another pasta to kick the shit out of anyone who mistreats you in anyway.

9/10

Jane The Killer:

She actually knows quite a lot due to a sexuality crisis she had a while back. (She still isn't completely sure what she is yet)

Due to her motherly-like nature she'll probably try to shelter you from a bad world so you can just focus on the love she gives you.

Doesn't mind what you are as long as you're not against cuddles. Jane loves her cuddles.

Will make anyone pay horribly for being mean to you, even if it wasn't about your sexuality, consider them dead.

100/10

Jason The Toymaker:

I feel like he's not going to like it at all.

Probably try to manipulate you into doing sexual stuff with him.

It's a very toxic relationship and if the manipulation doesn't work he'll probably either kill you.

Please don't get into a relationship with him. It's not worth it.

-500/10

Jeff The Killer:

He's a massive dick about it.

One of those guys that thinks that you will change your sexuality for him because he thinks he's "special"

Honestly I don't see a relationship with Jeff working out.

He's the type to brag about his sex life and if it gets to a point that other people have more than him he's either gonna end it or cheat.

0/10

Kate The Chaser:

She knows about it but will ask you for more information.

She honestly isn't really sexual either due to her trust issues so there's no worry with her.

Will accommodate for anything you like or don't.

Just wants to feel loved.

10/10

Laughing Jack:

He's asexual so he doesn't have a single worry.

Honestly just wants someone to help terrorise children with him.

He'll insist on visiting people who may have aphoic/acephobic towards you and watch as they slowly go insane.

All he wants really is a partner in crime to eat sweets with.

10/10

Laughing Jill:

She is also asexual.

She cares a lot for her s/o and would do anything for them.

Will kill anyone who comes near them with bad intent.

She just needs her s/o’s love, that's all she’s ever wanted.

1000/10

Masky:

He's aware of what it is and is a little shocked at first when his s/o tells him but gets over it.

Extremely considerate of your thoughts and feelings.

He always comes across like he doesn't give a damn but he's constantly eyeing the room you're both in to determine possible upsets.

Again will batter the shit out of anyone who crosses you or even tries to. No one messes with his s/o.

11/10

The Puppeteer:

I mean... he's a ghost so imma assuming that he doesn't have a problem with his s/o being asexual.

He'll take his time finding out what you do and don't like/want.

However he might use the information he has against you if he wants you to do something or act a certain way.

It's a toxic relationship that's almost impossible to see yet very dangerous.

2/10

Ticci Toby:

It's gonna be seriously hard for him to cope in a relationship without sex but it is possible.

He's going to need to have constant reassurance and praise and stuff like that.

Like Jane he needs cuddles in his life. He's so touch starved that he craves love and attention.

As long as you can give him that he's content.

10000000000/10

[rainbowvamp]

The Death of Lancelot du Lac (Part 1)

TW: Thoughts of unaliving oneself. Lancelot’s sacrifice. Angst.

It’s Merlin/Lancelot, about 1000 words, and there’s a part two coming. It’s gonna hurt. I can’t say the S word, so please just really process what “unaliving” means if you didn’t get it the first time. Be safe. 💗

--

It devastates him.

Merlin can't talk for days afterward, knowing it should've been him, knowing that Lancelot walked into the veil to save him. He can’t eat, sleep, move, except when Arthur makes him. Everyone else is mourning as well, but they knew that he and Lancelot had something special, heads bent together and secrets shared late at night.

They couldn’t have known about stolen kisses in dark corners, hands and bodies held close when no one could see. They couldn’t have known how they’d planned, when Camelot was safe, when destiny was completed, how they might escape to a countryside, alone and with only each other for company, for love. How plans had been crushed, dashed, destroyed in a single moment of selfishness, self-sacrifice, “I won’t live without you,” from Lancelot.

But what would Merlin do, now, without his Lancelot? How did Lancelot expect him to go on?

Destiny. He still had so much to do, a destiny to fulfill. 

It’s the only reason he doesn’t throw himself onto Lancelot’s honorary funeral pyre. It’s the only reason he doesn’t walk down to the Lake of Avalon and throw himself in, tied to weights. He doesn’t want to exist in a world without Lancelot, but he can’t leave. Not when Arthur still needs him, when Albion still needs him. 

He tries to be normal, after the funeral, but he cries in his room when no one can see. Cries giant, wracking sobs that break Gaius’ heart, even when he tries to muffle them with his pillow. Dreams terrible nightmares about how Lancelot might be suffering in the afterlife, without Merlin being able to offer him even the slightest comfort. He wakes up drenched in sweat and tears, fingers aching where he clawed his sheets. 

He becomes a shell of himself. Everyone can see it. The dark circles under his eyes where his sleep is no longer restful, the thinning of his face when he goes longer and longer between smaller and smaller meals. His loved one try to coax him to eat, to rest, to forget, but he cannot do any of those things. Not when every waking moment is tainted by how much he misses Lancelot. 

He thinks Guinevere understands the most, out of all of them, but even she cannot make him eat more than a few bites at a time. Even when she makes him lay his head in her lap and strokes his hair, he only sleeps for a few minutes, maybe a half hour, if she’s lucky, before she has to wake him from some nightmare. 

He can’t explain to them how much he lost with Lancelot. It was never for anyone else to know. He can only force himself to keep going, hope that destiny ends soon so he can finally be with the only man he thinks he’s capable of loving so deeply. 

He knows Lancelot would be upset with him, if he saw him, but Lancelot was dead and he didn’t get a say in how Merlin treated himself anymore. In those moments of anger he found himself lashing out at anyone, everyone, who happened to be in his way. Arthur gave it back as good as he got, and so did Gwaine, but the knights, and Gaius, and Guinevere started to avoid him if he looked like he had storm clouds in his eyes. 

He found himself alone more often than not, after that. He regretted his behavior, but couldn’t apologize. The words died on his tongue. Apologizing for his behavior would mean he’d also have to acknowledge what he did, why he did it. He couldn’t. He couldn’t talk about it. He never talked about it. Hadn’t spoken his loves name for months except to scream for him in his nightmares. 

“Lancelot would hate this.” Gwaine said, one day, while he clutched both Merlin’s wrists in his after Merlin took a swing at him. “He’d hate seeing you like this. Honor his legacy and pull yourself together.”

“You don’t know what he’d hate. You don’t know a damned thing about his legacy. He left me here, to suffer without him!”

“He saved the life of our king. I thought you of all people would be grateful.”

“No, He didn’t! If you thought I was going to let Arthur walk into that veil, you’re mad! He did it for me! He did it to stop me! I’d rather be dead than live without him, and none of you can see that!” He struggled against Gwaine’s grip but he found himself pulled tight to Gwaine’s chest, embraced, even as he slammed his fists into Gwaine’s back. 

He doesn’t realize how telling the revelation is. How much Gwaine takes it to heart. 

Suddenly, Merlin is not allowed to be alone. A knight always accompanies him to gather herbs, or Gwen follows him as he does his chores, chatting and making small talk. Arthur will order him to his side during council meetings and the like, and refuse every request to be dismissed. It takes him a while to make the connection.

At a small dinner, with just the knights and Gwen, he sits down where Lancelot once sat and makes them all uneasy.

“I’m not going to kill myself.”

“Your habits say otherwise, mate,” Gwaine cuts in, but Merlin holds up his hand.

“You can stop treating me like a child who can’t be left unsupervised. I don’t want to live, but I’m not going to kill myself. I have things to do, plans that were made long before Lancelot, that Lancelot believed in. They’re the only things that keep me going.” He leveled his gaze at each of them in turn. “And if anyone ever has the nerve to tell me Lancelot would hate what I was doing again, I’ll leave Camelot and never return. Lancelot left me here, and you don’t get to take his name and guilt me into doing what you want.”

“We’re not trying to-” Merlin glares at Arthur when he speaks.

“I will never come back.” This is an empty threat, but he puts weight into his words that his friends must believe, because they all nod.

He gets up, and doesn’t ask for permission to leave. 

No one follows him.

—

[kirstinmaldonado]

CHAPTER THIRTEEN 2.0

I remember watching Glee. The pilot episode came out the end of my junior year, and then resumed my senior year of high school when I’d already been chosen and named Show Choir Captain (which of course was the biggest triple threat honor and validation one could have as a senior in the arts, right?). ;)

I’ll remember how I felt after the pilot episode forever. A spark lit up inside of me. Of inspiration? Of drive? Of acceptance? 

All three!? It made this little choir nerd feel COOL! I remember being blown away because there was nothing quite like it at the time, representing teens unabashedly following their passions whether it seemed cool or not, right or wrong. To just be! The next morning at school we all chatted about how badass we felt and how we would bring that energy to show choir. How cool it was that such a show came out when we were seniors, in a very “Watch out world, this is OUR year” way!

Little baby Kirstie transferred to Martin High School, with its renowned and arguably top music and theatre program of high schools in that area, for freshman year; which felt simultaneously like a nice clean start and incredibly horrifying. I had a few friends from community theatre but not too many in my grade and not too many that I shared classes with.

I was one of two freshman to make show choir my first year, and while I was excited for such an honor it immediately ostracized me. No one knew who I was or where I had come from, and that made me few friends and a few enemies. Although I wasn’t popular in high school, I don’t think I was unpopular…I ran in the theatre and choir crowd and took all AP classes, even graduating in the top 30 of my almost 1000 person class. 

My amazing mother instilled a strong worth ethic in me, so I valued working hard in school. I loved the schedule, I loved taking notes because I liked looking at my handwriting and cursive, how neat it was. I liked to highlight and color code everything so it was easier and more enticing to look at. I loved immersing myself in studies and extracurriculars which I balanced well, the curriculum only made harder if I skipped studying to hang with friends, which then turned in to grueling all nighters. 

But…sometimes I’d go to first period exhausted (sliding in to my seat right on time or late, you know how I roll) and there would be a Starbucks coffee on my desk from my best friend Will. Or after school when I’d planned to walk home, my friend Jory would give me a ride, but only after we got snow-cones and belted “If Only” from The Little Mermaid musical in the car all the way home.

That’s just two tiny examples of how amazing my friends, how amazing their hearts were. I cherish my time at high school and the people I met there with all my heart!! I feel so fortunate to have spent the BEST times, the worst times, and all the times in between with them. We explored family hardships and disputes, our own sexualities, our fears, our dreams with each other.

My friends were diverse. They were FUN! They inspired me with their work ethic. We all weren’t even pursuing the same thing, and in a way that made all of our uniqueness that much more precious. 

I think that’s how Glee was. A bunch of unique people, all doing their own unique things, then finding each other by sharing a common love and becoming friends.

So senior year show choir, we all became a bunch of Rachel Berrys, Santana Lopezes, Finn Hudsons, you name it. Glee had given us, or at least me, this new sparkly confidence. It reminded me that music was exactly what I loved, and what I wanted to spend my life pursuing.

After I graduated and months flew by, I didn’t watch the show as religiously like I used to. I’d catch a few episodes here and there, ones where the characters development and newfound growth  intrigued me, but my life had taken a turn and I just didn’t have the time anymore.

July 13, 2013. I was at my ex’s brother’s wedding when I heard the news. 

Cory Monteith had died from an overdose.

I’m not sure if I’ve ever cried about a celebrity’s death before then. Although I hadn’t been close to the show anymore, a part of me felt immediately heartbroken. Heartbroken that he’d been alone, heartbroken that he was doing what he was doing in the first place, but had the ability to keep edging deeper and deeper into a point of no return. I had romanticized about a relationship like Rachel and Finn, I had admired his and all the characters hearts and purpose. I had rooted for him. They in a way, felt like my friends, because that’s how I viewed my friends in high school. He was an everlasting part of why and where I was now, because Scott, Mitch, and I formed our trio for a contest to meet the cast of Glee that first season. 

People made fun of me that day. You don’t even know him. Why are you so upset?

I watched The Quarterback and then I couldn’t watch Glee again. Occasionally it came on TV, but it didn’t feel the same to me.

To me, Glee was the first show of its kind, representing and making heroes and stars out of people who would have normally been called losers. I’d never seen representation on screen that made me feel special as a Latina or as someone pursing “not a real career.” As the season progressed it evolved past the cheeky humor and delved in to real-world topics and teenage struggles. 

Seven years later, with Naya Rivera being found the day of Cory’s passing, I couldn’t help but feel like he played a role in guiding her home.

I think Naya was incredibly underrated. The show obviously had its main frontrunners, but Naya’s character transcended the “normal” teen woes of wanting to be a star. Through her sarcasm and wit, she was more complex. She had more to hide. She had more to give.

I loved seeing a Latina woman on the screen, a REAL one, not just an actor with darker features. I loved seeing her delve in to her sexuality with her best friend, and her experiences made my own feel valid. I thought what courage it must take to sit down with your hispanic grandmother, who you love so dearly, and be able to share a part of them that they maybe wouldn’t understand. I was crying from the second that scene started, thinking I’d maybe never have the courage to be that open.

I’ve thought of Naya and her family a lot this week. I’ve seen how many people loved her. While I never met her, I know her and the rest of the cast left a special mark on my life journey, and I will forever be grateful for them, and her.

I will remember show choir practices, in our sparkly, itchy  outfits, preparing for contest.

I will remember sneaking up in to the auditorium catwalk to sneak kisses with my best friend.

I will remember making the silliest videos when we all went to All-State choir.

I will remember belting and dancing on our cars to “Don’t Stop Believing” at the local Starbucks parking lot.

I will remember holding my friends tight crying as we all wore our different college shirts in our final performance as a show choir, having no idea that I was about to go out and be a part of something greater.

Glee brought together a hodgepodge of people. And that’s what Pentatonix was too. And it brought us together.

So I guess at the end of the day, all I want to say is… thank you, to Glee. To Cory. To Naya.

For creating special characters, that lit that special spark.

Rest in peace.

[jediknightmcardle]

Suns of Tattooine

My first fic. I am marking this Explicit NSFW 18+ because of the smut in later chapters and the cussing. I want to Thank @nightsisterct7567​ for her help and encouragement, with out you this wouldn’t of happened. 

I would like to hear everyone’s thoughts on this. I hope you enjoy!

Suns of Tattooine, Chapter 1

Just like before, this time will be no different. When the drop ship comes in for a landing, you know that no one will be waiting for you. Your fellow soldiers and brothers all have wives, kids, parent’s, hell one even has his Aunt and Uncle coming to see him. For you though, nothing. Not that it upsets you, you are used to it. It’s been this way since you first left your home planet, when the call came out to help the Republic. You heard that call and was part of a non-clone unit assigned to fight the CIS.  

On this return back, this was for a block leave for your unit. After spending months on the front backing up clone units on Christophsis. We didn’t have a luxury of special training or fancy armor that the clones had. Hell, we didn’t even have a Jedi to lead us. Our Commander was one of us, except he bought his commission and had little to no combat experience.  

After all that hard fighting, we finally get a few weeks off to blow off steam. First place you go is your tiny apartment in town. Dump your bag and hit the shower.  

“Kriff... how long has it been since you have felt warm water on your body”.  

After taking a shower long enough to use up the hot water in the place, it was time to get out to your favorite drinking hole. Not a flashy place by any means, actually more like a dump but the drinks are cheap and everyone leaves you alone.  

Last time you were home, no one bothered you about the war, last thing you want is to talk about it. They wouldn’t understand even if you told them. Most people only want to hear about the Jedi and Clones anyway, they have their own following too.  

You arrive at Screed’s; still looks like the dump you remember from the last time you were home. You enter the bar and try and find a place to sit, preferably alone. Motion to the bartender for a drink, Nik knows you from over the years and knows that you order the same thing every time. Just as you like it, no extra talking.  

Nik hands your drink off to the waitress, who proceeds to bring it over and place it in front of you. “Thanks”, as she puts it down. “Don’t mention it handsome, it’s not every day we have a war hero in here”. You sigh, “yeah big hero alright”. You think to yourself, “can’t she just not do this right now”.  

A couple hours and a few drinks later, you start to feel a little more “human”. Even have had a couple quick conversations with people in the bar, mostly about what is going on here. Moisture farming mostly. Ugh moisture farming, before the war that is what you did. Helped out on a couple farms just outside of town. You joined up to fight to get out of this place. Yet here you are, back home again.  

As you sit and dwell on your thoughts, the door opens and figure stands in the door. You look over to catch a glimpse, the person appears to be female but you can’t really tell because of the sun glare coming in the door.  

“In or out, but you need to get out of the door” yells over the bartender. Just then the figure makes its way into the establishment. As the door closes you get a better look, you almost drop your drink. It was indeed a woman, but not just any woman. Possibly one of the most beautiful women you have laid eyes on. Flowing red hair with the most striking eyes.  

“Have I been in combat too long?” you think to yourself as you continue to stare at her as she walks down to the bar. She glances over and notices you staring at her, but doesn’t pay it no mind. It’s not like you are the only one looking, at once everyone in the establishment stopped and collectively stared at her.  

As she approached the bartender, she reached into pouch on her belt and pulled out a holo disk.  

“Barkeep, have you seen this man” she asks as she lights up the holo disk. “No, no I haven’t. He hasn’t come in here. It’s all regulars in here.” She turns from the bar, with the holo disk still going. Looking around the bar, “1000 credits for anyone who can tell me where I can find him” she says out loud. The response is mostly grumbling and they go back to their drinks. She notices you looking over and checking her out. “Hey you, have you seen this guy?” she asks as she heads towards you. Quickly you focus back on your drink.  

“Kriff, why me? Why does she need to bother me.” You think to yourself.

“No, I haven’t seen that guy, I just want to be left alone.” you say out loud to her. She stops right at the edge of your table, and looks right at you. “Are you sure friend? You didn’t take much of a look.” she says to you. You continue staring at your drink, not daring to look up at her knowing full well that she is by far one of the most beautiful women you have seen and don’t want to embarrass yourself.  

“No, no, no, she can’t be that beautiful, it’s your mind playing tricks on you. Has to be. Maybe the sun has bleached your brain” Has to be that you think to yourself.  

SMACK, you get jolted out of your thoughts as she slams her hand down on the table. “Look buddy, I’m talking to you. There are a lot of credits if you could help me out.”.  

You sigh deeply, and start to look up at her, you notice she is wearing armor with some sort of jump suit under it. Almost Mandalorian ish but not really, and missing the helmet for sure. As your eyes keep moving up, you notice the curves in her hips first, then her chest. You don’t know how she keeps those breasts in that top but my gods. You finally look at her face and the first thing you notice is her eyes, her pale skin and flowing red hair.  

SMACK, again she smacks the table and you come back to reality. “Look buddy you’re not the first guy to check me out like that, but I’m not here to get laid. I want to get paid, so how about you help a girl out and tell me where he is?”  

You take a swig from your drink, wipe your mouth then motion to the bartender to send over another drink. “Look doll, I can give you some advice. I would keep yourself covered up here.” She looks back stunned, “Why? Do you think someone might try and man handle me?” she laughs out loud. “I have dealt with my share of men, meaner than anyone in this dust bowl.” she snorts back. “No doll, I mean because with the twin suns here, your pale skin will burn in about a minute out there. But if you want to walk around with your skin out, by all means go ahead.” you chuckle back at her.  

She steps back, with a bit of a shocked look on her face. Like she isn’t use to guys talking to her as a human being. “Well, um. Thanks. BTW where did you serve?” she says as she nods to the tattoo on your left arm. “Christophsis, we were brought in to support the 501st and the 212th clone battalions. I am just on leave and scheduled to go back to the front in a couple weeks.” you explain.  

The bartender interrupts the tention by bringing over a couple drinks and puts them down on the table. “Well looks like the man has brought you a drink, I guess you should pull up a seat and join me. You can tell me about where you are from and how you became a bounty hunter.” as you motion to the chair beside her.  

For the next couple hours, you both ended up chatting it up, trading war stories. Lots of laughing and comparing visible scars. You both lose track of the outside world while you drink and talk.  

“My gods she’s beautiful, why would she be still here talking to me, you think to yourself. I must be hallucinating” you think.  

“What makes you think your bounty is here?” you ask.  

She looks surprised as if she almost forgot she was on the job and not out for a good time. “We first my tracking fob brought me here, but he booked passage thru this system and I think he stayed. Trying to throw me off his trail.” She speaks. “Why did you come back here instead of going to another system like Scarif or Naboo?”  

“Well, those are the systems the clones go to, I don’t want to be around them. I have to fight with them but I want my time for me. Plus, have you seen how women go gaga over them? Makes me sick.” you reply with a disgusted look on your face.  

As you look at her, she giggles. “Yeah, I know all about it. They are kind of cute though.....” as she laughs. You look back down at your drink and say “This is why I came here, I figured if I want to be lonely, I should just go home instead of somewhere else in a crowd of people. At least here people will leave me alone because that’s what we do here, not drooling over some guys made in a test tube.”  

“Kriff stop feeling sorry for yourself” you think. “This is not what she would want to hear.”

“What were you planning to do after you were done here at the bar?” she asks.  

“I don’t know, haven’t really thought that far yet. Maybe go to the edge of town, slaughter some Jawa’s?” you say with a chuckle.  

She looks a little concerned at first, but then realizes the joke in your tone.  

“To be honest, I planned to come here, drink then go home and crash. Rinse and repeat daily” with a bit more of a serious tone this time. “My plans though are out the window as I never planned to meet a beautiful woman today”.  

You both stop and look at each other, “Kriff what did I just say, dumbass, why would you say that? Now she is going to think you are a weirdo.” you think to yourself.  

As you look up at her, you notice she starts to crack a bit of a smile. “Well show me this woman, I would love to meet her.” she says while smiling. You crack a bit of a smile after that comment. “Look let’s get out of here, I hear the setting of the twin suns is something to behold and I have never seen it before” she comments.  

You think to yourself,” ugh I have seen these hundreds of times, but I guess we should.”  

[sometimes-i-write-4-you]

will u do number 19 off the romantic prompts for jj from outer banks 🥺🥺

thank you - JJ x reader

a\n: idk about this one but i hope you’ll enjoy it. it ended up shorter then the first one, but the first one is the longest fanfic i ever wrote so i was’nt expecting this one to be that long anyways.

trigger warnings: cursing, undeage drinking

19: “there’s… there’s only one bed”

word count: 1678

"this sucks" JJ sighed. We were all sitting on the beach: JJ, Kiara, Pope and me. "John B would want us to enjoy the beach" Pope insisted, and so we are going through with this stupid picknick". Kiara looked at him, "yeah, Pope's right" she said and took out of the freezer 4 beers. Each one of us took one can, "to John B" JJ said. "and Sarah Kamron" I added, clinging cans with him.

"yeah, and her, whatever" Pope said, chugging his beer. The moonlight made the sea look like a hole of death. I never liked the way the beach looked at night, but this summer made me hate it even more. "hey guys" I said, "my parents have this house, not too far. We can go there on the weekend, they'll agree. We can drink, and smoke, and let out everything we feel". I stood up and kept talking as I cleaned the sand off my butt with my free hand. "plus, I think we have internet there, so…" I said, sipping on my beer. "yeah, sounds cool" Kie sighed. "it can be nice to have a weekend away" Pope agreed, but JJ had a different opinion. "guys, we can't go and have fun when our friend is dead!" he said, getting up. "and you'd rather stay here, where people ask you how are and the man who has John's blood on his hands pretends like he cares?" I asked, a bit upset to hear him resisting. "yeah, did you hear he declared on a prize to get the shipwrecks?" Kie asked. "he wants their bodies, promised to bury them together. 30K for the whole thing, 1000 for any clue if it leads to something, maybe even more" I contributed. "how come we didn't hear about this?" Pope asked. "it was on the Outer Banks Newspaper" I said, just as confused. "you mean, the one you get, and we don't?" JJ asks, bitter. "right, yeah" I say. Just like Kiara, I was technically a Kook, but I never got along with any of them. The only tolerable one was Sarah, and she's gone now. She's the only reason her brother's friends stayed away from me, but now they give me dirty looks every time we cross paths, and so me and Kiara stick together.

"so what do you think JJ, you in?" I ask, "we have a boat, we can look around, maybe we can get some money to pay your Compensation fees". He looks at me. "yeah, whatever" he gives up, and I knew a part of it was to be away from his dad.

The weekend is finally here. The Twinkie was now under JJ's possession, and he would often sleep in the house where John used to live. JJ was always a mess of a person – his moods, anger management issues, tendency to be irrational and irresponsible… always in the name of his friend and always with good intentions, but ever since John disappeared and presumed dead, it got worse. He became a bit colder, quieter. I missed the old JJ, but I knew his head was somewhere else.

We finally arrived at the beach house after a short drive. JJ would use any excuse to drive the twinkie, even though the beach house was close. My family is not Kamron rich, so it's a pretty simple place, half on the pogue side of the beach, which is why he wasn't that expensive.

"this place is nice" Pope said. "this place is crap" JJ corrected him. "hey, we're not the Kamron's, JJ" I said, a bit offended. "well, time for a tour" I say, ignoring JJ's comment. I know he's having a hard time, but come on, I am his… what am I to him?

"JJ, you're the best" I said, hugging him, "the fact you stole your dad's boat for John…" I laugh. I pull away from the hug, but our hands still hold one another. "well, yeah, he's my best friend" he says, smiling down at me. Pope and Kie are talking too. "Kie told me she's gonna go for it with Pope" I say. "really?" JJ asks. "yeah" I laugh, "I always thought she'd end up with you" I admit, my focus and my fingers travel to the collar of his shirt and fidgeting with the fabric. "I always thought we'd end up together" he confessed. "what?" I ask, and my eyes move from his shirt to his face. He leans down, but I didn't even realize the situation until his lips left mine. I looked at him, and I swear I've never seen him that red. I pull him back down and myself up with some help from his shirt, kissing him, and this time we get to feel the kiss. His lips moved against mine. "cool" he whispered, refusing to pull away until we have too. I peep behind his shoulder to see Kie and Pope kissing. "copycats" I whisper, pointing my chin at them.

Ever since the day John B left, JJ and I barley talked. Only when we were all together, but even then, he barley said anything, and when he did it was mean or rude.

"common" I say and start showing them around. "this is the kitchen, living room, and the rooms are down the hallway. My dad asked that we'll use the room that I sleep in and the room my brother sleeps in – their room is out of limit, it's on second floor" I said as I walked toward the rooms. "I figured Kei and I can sleep at my room, and you boys-"

"actually, I was hoping to share a room with Pope" Kei said, "if that's-". "no yeah, understandable" I smile at her, even though I really don't want to share a room with JJ. "My room had an extra bed for when I bring friends, so I can just share the room with JJ" I say, insisting it's fine and convincing myself while I'm at it. "well Pope, Kei, that's your room-" I said, pointing at the door, but before I finished my sentence they were already inside the room.

I walked into my regular room, but something was missing. "there's- there's only one bed" JJ pointed out. "yeah, no shit sherlock" I sigh. "I can just sleep on the couch" he says, "I left my bag in the living room anyway". "sure, yeah" I say. Normally I'd argue, but I'm not in the mood. He was being a dick for weeks now, so I don't mind. he can sleep on the couch. he left the room, avoiding being alone with me any longer. What a bitch. I should have invited Pope and Kiara and leave his ass back in John B's house.

I open the international paper on the computer in my room, hoping to hear something nice like, maybe somewhere in the world they found a cure for cancer or 2 specific teens alive. "Milkshakes with zero calories turns out as lie" I read the title. It's about this couple in Nassau that scammed people into buying their calories free milkshakes, but the reason they were so good were because they in fact included a lot of calories. "this is stupid" I think to myself, and just as I'm about to click of the report, the picture catcher my eye. "no way" I whisper to myself. Behind the couple there's a boy and girl. The boy has some familiar features, like long-ish brown hair, shorts paired with a button-down mostly open, jaw line. The girl looks like non-other than Sarah with her blond hair, short summer dress and the fact she was holding hands with a guy who looks so much like John B…

"guys!" I called, and they hurried to follow my voice. "look!" I point at the screen. "really? Wow, my family traveled from Georgia to taste that" Kie said. "no, I don't care about that, look!" I smile, zooming in on the mysteries couple. JJ's hand reaches for the desk, leaning over my shoulder. I'm trying not to blush. "no way" Pope says, looking at the picture. "(y\n), that's amazing" Kie says. "that's…" JJ starts, and the smile I missed so much appears on his face. I spin around in the chair to face them, and JJ grabs my hand to pull me up, right into his arms. I return the hug. "thank you, thank you so much" he whispers, and I swear I fell his warm tears against my skin. He kisses my forehead, and Kei pokes Pope and drags him away to leave us alone.

JJ's hands get comfortable around my waist as he pulled away. My hand stayed around his neck, and I looked at him, waiting to hear what he has to say. "I'm sorry I was a dick" he finally says. "it's okay" I whisper, but he doesn't let me talk, "you were nothing but nice to me since we met, and instead of letting you help me I pushed you away, and it wasn't very boyfriend of me".

"since when are you my boyfriend?" I ask, and he smiles awkwardly. "since this very moment, if you'll have me" he replies, removing my hands from his neck to take them in his. "are you asking me to be your girlfriend?" I ask him, laughing, "what are we, 12?". "shut up" he laughs.

"sure, yeah" I say. "sure, yeah what?" he asks, pretending to be naïve. "yes I will be your girlfriend" I say, "you happy?". "very happy, yeah. Actually, as your boyfriend, I'm gonna kiss you now" he says, and as he talked his hands cupped my cheeks, and the moment the last word left his mouth his lips crushed against mine, almost making me fall back into the chair. He spins me around to escort me to the bed and we break the kiss for a moment to sit down. The moment we're on the bed, his lips find mine again.

[youbloodymadgenius]

Unexpected (Modern!Ivar x reader x OC)

A/N: This is my contribution to @waiting4inspiration‘s Stay Safe, Stay Home Writing Challenge. Hope you’ll like it, hun 💖

Please, stay safe, it’s far from over. Last night, at 10:30pm, my eldest daughter's teacher called me. Two teachers positive. School (about 1000 kids) closed until further notice.

Prompt in bold.

@inforapound 💋

Let me know if you want to be tagged 😊

The gif (🤤) belongs to @therealcalicali 🌷

Summary: You're about to spend a quiet evening with your friend Vero when the doorbell rings. Ivar...

Warnings: Implied FxF sex ; implied threesome.

Words: 2229

You pull back from Veronica's embrace just as the doorbell rings and your friend gives you a questioning look. "Did you invite somebody?" 

 Shaking your head, you frown slightly, getting up off the couch. Handing her the remote, you sigh. "Might as well go see who it is."

 Squinting through the peephole, you let out a gasp of surprise before opening the door. "Ivar," you greet your unexpected visitor, "everything okay? What are you doing here?"

A sly smirk on his lips, Ivar shrugs. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just thought I'd come to see you. This isn't a bad time, is it?" Raising an eyebrow, he points behind him with his thumb. "I can leave if you want me to. It's no big deal." He then tilts his head to one side as his eyes wander over your body. "Though it would be a shame…" He says cockily, glancing down again to your tiny shorts. 

 "Ivar!" Suddenly hyper aware you are basically standing in the hallway of your apartment building, half-naked, you turn beet red, fumbling with the bottom of your shirt and pulling it down in a fruitless attempt to hide your upper thighs. "You know I'm not alone, right?"

 As he just nods, you furrow your brows, an idea popping into your mind. "Did you get my letter?"

 §§§

 Ivar (Dear Ivar, My dear Ivar, I don't really know how to begin… You know what? I'll stick to 'Ivar', everything else sounds too weird!),

 I bet you're wondering why I'm writing to you. And if I know you, you're probably thinking it's so twenty-century-ish. You are right but guess what? I don't care.

 §§§

 Looking down at you with a wry smile on his face, he shrugs and takes out of his jacket pocket a sheet of paper, on which you can clearly see your neat handwriting. "It would seem so, don't you think?" 

 His amused tone does nothing to calm your nerves and you wince, your heart speeding up until you feel it pounding in your throat. "And?" Biting your lower lip, you hold your breath, waiting for his answer.

 "Well..,” he chuckles, "I'd say it's so twenty-century-ish."

 Rolling your eyes, you heave an exasperated sigh. "You know that's not what I meant." Ivar keeps quiet as he locks his sparkling eyes on yours and you can't help but insist. "Please, Ivar, tell me what you think. Seriously!" You cringe at your begging tone, a dead giveaway that his opinion matters more than you'd like.

 "You're no fun, Y/N!” Ivar pouts for one second, then seems to realize how tense you are. "I don't understand why you didn't tell me earlier,"he frowns, "but I'm glad you eventually did."

 "You're not mad?" That's really a load off your mind and you're immediately breathing better. 

 §§§

 I have something to tell you. Actually, I tried several times, but to no avail. Hope it'll be easier in writing…

 You know about my friend Veronica, right? She was my roommate during my Erasmus semester in Spain, five years ago. I told you she was coming to visit me this week. That part is true, but I wasn't completely honest with you. There's more to it…

 §§§

 Ivar's face softens as his hand grazes yours, your fingers intertwining for just one moment. "Why would I be?" Giving you a sweet smile, he cocks his head questioningly.

 "I… I thought that…" Sputtering, you inhale deeply. "I didn't tell you the whole truth, did I? I… thought you'd be upset…" Running nervously a hand through your hair, you look down, shy and uncomfortable. 

 §§§

 I know we're not in an exclusive relationship, yet I know what we promised each other. That's why I feel awful about that… Because of course, the longer I wait, the harder it gets…

 §§§

 For two years, Ivar had been your lover's younger brother. Hvitserk and Ivar got along well, but even though they were family, they didn't run in the same circles. Different friends, different interests. Actually, during those two years, Ivar was always with his fiancée, a very blond, very pretty and very venal fucking bitch you couldn't stand. Freydis. Even her name rubs you up the wrong way. 

 Anyway… So, for two years, you had only occasionally met Ivar, mostly at family gatherings. And then, ten months ago, both of your love lives had been shattered, almost simultaneously. As you randomly found out Hvitserk had never stopped sleeping with Margrethe – Ivar's and Hvitserk's older brother's wife – Ivar caught Freydis fucking the gardener of the Lothbrok's estate. It had brought you closer together, as you spent nights drinking, cursing your former lovers and crying over your broken dreams, each of you drowning in each other's sorrow. You ended up finding comfort in each other's presence, and one thing led to another, you began sleeping together, rarely at first, more regularly for a month or two. 

 From the beginning, things had been clear between the two of you. No exclusivity, no commitment, as you were both emotionally scarred and totally not ready. However, an important rule had been established from the start: no lies, no secrets, no dirty tricks. A complete transparence at all times, in order to preserve your friendship – yes, you had become friends – at all costs. 

 Ivar giggles. He fucking giggles. "Love, that's a tiny white lie, an omission, you know? I can live with that. What I don't get is, why were you so afraid of telling me?" No mischief in his eyes. Ivar seems genuinely curious, prepared to hear your answer, whatever it is. 

 Relieved yet a bit embarrassed, you bow your head, feeling suddenly childish. Why didn't you tell him? It's nothing to be ashamed of. Plus you didn't do – and are not doing – anything wrong. So yeah, why? "I'm… I'm not sure, Ivar. I suppose… I thought… Maybe…" Chewing on your cheek, you suck in a ragged breath while collecting your thoughts.  "I didn't know how you'd react. We never talked about… this kind of things, you know…"

 §§§

 Okay, here goes. When I met Veronica, I was single and so was she. We were young and carefree, always up for anything. Vero was bubbly, self-confident, straightforward and quite fascinating. And so, so beautiful. 

 I don't remember how it happened the first time.What I do remember, however, is the softness of her skin and the smooth roudness of her breasts. (How wonderful a woman’s breast is! Right, guess you know that.)

 After that first time, there were others. Many others. In the end, my Erasmus semester had been peppered with a lot of kissing, touching, caressing… And so much tenderness… That was fantastic. 

 From then on, whenever we see each other again, and as long as we're both single, we don't resist. Not a chance. Why should we?

 Well, here we are! Now you know my "big secret.” I didn't have the guts to say it in person, that's why I chose to write. Because even though you and I aren't really in a relationship – or not in that kind of relationship, and you know what I mean – we promised to be fully honest with each other, and I didn’t feel like I had been. 

 Because I never told you about Vero, or the fact that I'm bisexual. It's obviously what I am. Quite frankly, I don't know. Maybe. Possibly. Truthfully, I don't care. Labels shouldn't matter, don't you agree? To me at least, they don't.

 Anyway, now you know. Please, try to be understanding and non-judgemental. And forgive me for not saying anything earlier. I'll be glad to still be your friend, you know?

 Talk soon,

Y/N.

  §§§

 "We never talked about this kind of thing?” Ivar mumbles, repeating your words. "It would have been pointless. There was just nothing to talk about!" His nostrils flare and he clearly struggles to restrain a growing anger. "Fuck Y/N! I can't believe you think so little of me. It is well known that Sigurd fucks more men than women, isn't it? And I'm pretty sure my father was once in love with a man. A fucking Christian priest! You really thought I was that closed-minded that you playing stink fingers with a girl would shock me?"

 Quirking your brows, you shrug, wincing slightly. "I… Sorry Ivar… I thought… I don't know what… I… huh… I was… scared… or maybe… I… Shit!" Stopping your rambling, you pull yourself together, inhaling deeply while rubbing your sweaty palms up and down your bare thighs. "Guess I don't know you so well. After all, we sleep together and sling mud at our unfaithful exes, but that's it. There are a lot of things we've never talked about and yes, I was scared. Yet, I should have known better, you're probably right. I've been silly, haven't I?" 

 A half-smile tugs at his lips, and he nods. "Yes, you might say that." 

 You can see his face is still tense, but his tone, much to your relief, is playful, which gives you the courage to ask another question. "Still friends, then?"

 "Of course. I wouldn't be here otherwise." Reaching out, his right hand cups your face, his thumb stroking lightly your cheek. Ivar is sometimes so soft, it's disarming. 

 "I'm glad." You're not lying. Ivar is important to you, has a special place in your life. You would have been disappointed if he was less accepting. 

 Wrapping your fingers around his, you stand on your tippy toes, giving him a quick peck right under his cheekbone. "Thank you. And now…,” you clap your hands, your face breaking into a wide grin, "are you finally going to tell me what you're doing here?"

 "I will," Ivar begins before shifting his weight from one foot to the other still leaning heavily on his crutch, "but won't you let me in?" Gesturing to his legs, he groans, tilting his head. "Or are you going to leave the poor cripple on your doorstep? How rude!"

 You burst out laughing, rolling your eyes. "You know using your disability that way is a shame?" Still, you can't help but feel guilty when you see him stifling a wince, trying not to show his pain. "Okay Ivar, come in." Stepping aside to let him in, you scratch your head, confused. You still don't know what he's doing here. 

 ***

 The awkward small talk is unsettling. Frowning, you take your seat on the couch next to Veronica after getting Ivar a beer, who is now comfortably seated in an armchair. 

 "So, what is it you really want, Ivar?" You ask growing annoyed at this point. As much as you like him, you'd rather spend your night in Vero's arms than chitchatting with her and your current "bedfellow.”

 Ivar doesn't open his mouth for a long time, an impish smile lingers on his lips. Tilting his chin up, he finally clears his throat. "Kiss her." His hoarse, bossy voice – his sex voice – catches you off guard, sending shivers through your spine. "Excuse me?" You murmur, your hand gripping Vero's. 

 "That's what I want. That's why I came. Kiss her." As he suggestively licks his lips, your eyes widen, a familiar warmth spreading in your lower belly. Knowing that Vero is anything but bashful, you give her a meaningful look, pleased as you can see desire in her dark, dilated eyes. Immediately leaning forward, you brush your lips against hers, your tongue parting them almost instantaneously, invading and claiming her mouth. Soft moans escape your lips as Vero deepens the kiss and you close your eyes, allowing yourself to get lost in the moment.

 "We can do better than that," Vero mutters, her teeth nibbling on your earlobe, "if he wants a show, we'll give him a show. It would be rude to deny him, don't you think?" Without waiting for your answer, she slips a hand under your shirt, gently pushing it up, running her fingertips over your breasts as you wrap your arm around her waist, bringing her closer. 

 Catching your attention, Ivar lets out a low, appreciative growl, his expression unreadable. He's aroused, the bulge in his pants is obvious, but does he want more? Remembering that time when you sent Vero a pic of him, and how she was screaming over the phone about how hot he was, you know she wouldn't mind. She wouldn't mind at all. 

 "Care to join us?" You blink at him, making sure he can see your fingers sliding under her panties. When he doesn't answer and looks unsure, a faint frown creasing his forehead, you slowly get off the couch, kissing Vero one last time and then cross the room. Kneeling down in front of him, you reach out, putting your hand on his groin and squeezing his hard cock. You can hear Vero stand up, "Yes Ivar, join us please.” You make sure you whisper so that only he can hear you. "I promise, you won't have to take your pants off if you don't want to."

 His nod brings a beaming smile to your face and you grab his hand as Veronica joins the two of you. Brimming with excitement, you lead them up to your bedroom, wordlessly, your heart hammering in your chest.

 This is unexpected and definitely not how you planned to spend the night. But you won't complain. It's a thousand times better.

 🛡⚔️🛡

@honestsycrets @lisinfleur @waiting4inspiration @saldelys @gearhead66 @readsalot73 @a-mess-of-fandoms @hecohansen31 @lonewolf471 @milkkygirls @ivarthebloodyking @fuckindiva @tgrrose @shannygoatgruff @zuxiezendler @didiintheblog @xbellaxcarolinax​

[fioletowa-krowa]

So I’ve had to deal with the absolute worst customer in my entire working career ever this past week. (It’s Rose at the Notre Dame university bookstore in case anyone was wondering) apologies in advance, it’s going to be long

So for this school we have two “titles” that are basically just boxes of lab equipment. There’s a lock, goggles, a lab coat, a notebook, and an access card for the online book. These are shipped as individual boxes since there’s a good amount of materials. This is different from what we usually send to stores, which would be boxes of multiple notebooks. I mention this bc the store manager, Rose made such a damned big deal about it.

So the whole ordeal started at the beginning of the month when my boss CC-ed me on an email conversation with Rose letting her know that she was going to be out of town so to contact me with any questions or requests for her order of the two bundles we had for the school. She ended the email with “hopefully things go smoothly this year” so already I have a bad feeling that this is going to be difficult.

Rose emails me to let me know that this is a time when they receive a lot of deliveries at their store (she specifically mentioned receiving football equipment in addition to books and school supplies) so she wanted to make sure that their order of nearly 1000 bundles could be split into smaller orders with only one order arriving per day to make sure that they weren’t overwhelmed at the store. A bit of an annoying request, but not impossible for us to attempt to accommodate. The only thing being that once an order leaves our warehouse we have zero control over how long it takes to deliver or when it gets delivered so I told Rose that I was putting notes on her orders so that they would hopefully ship on different days and then be delivered on different days. And she again reminded me that they needed the orders to arrive just as she specified. Okay, fine, I’m doing what I can.

Now, unfortunately, we’ve been having delays it’s getting materials and books in stock on time this season bc our printers are all short staffed and they can only print and ship so much at a time. So the bundles are already going to be a little later than expected. We had a team of people putting the boxes together at our satellite warehouse last last week so we could get them shipped out last week.

So we finally get things together and get the first order shipped out Tuesday. This first order was for 85 boxes of one title (11181) and 150 copies of the other (11171) and the manager at the satellite warehouse gets it shipped out Tuesday last week. On Wednesday I send Rose an email with the tracking information (I had to wait for our regular warehouse manager to get me the info bc the satellite manager was out all of last week after Tuesday) and at 4:56 Wednesday evening I get the following email from Rose:

“Beth, do you realize we already got three skids today? You sent a skid of 11181 when we only wanted 85 and two skids of 11171. Please do not send any more of 11181 and I will write up everything tomorrow and you can arrange a call tag to pick up the others. This is a hot mess and the paperwork the driver had was wrong and we have damaged cases as well. Way to go..........................”

So I was about to lose my mind at this. Not only was it at the end of the day, but she was incredibly rude over something that was genuinely a mistake and moreso, not my fault! The editor in charge of the projects wanted to respond to her that evening, but I told her that, quite frankly, I was off for the day and Rose didn’t deserve any of my unpaid time. Plus i wanted to hear back from the warehouse to see their end in case something happened so they sent out more than they were supposed to or if Rose was just stupid and we did what we said we would and it just wasn’t exactly what she was expecting. So the editor sent Rose a message saying that I’d get back to her in the morning with more information and I went to dinner w my parents and papa so that I wouldn’t punch a hold thru a wall in anger

So Thursday morning I get in to an email from our main warehouse manager (since the satellite manager was out the rest of the week) letting me know that we had sent three skids for the order. Because each skid holds 96 boxes. So, since the order was for 235 boxes, it physically had to ship as three skids. I was fucking giddy as I typed my response to Rose, spelling out why she received three skids and letting her know that I would be holding her remaining four orders for 150 of 11171 each until I got the go-ahead from her that she was okay with the fact that the orders would be one and a half skids each.

Well, Rose emails back that we actually sent three full skids instead of one full and two partials. She included the phrase “believe it or not, I can count” and then after reiterating how she wanted her orders sent said, “My next suggestion would be to fulfill my orders as requested going forward.” And asked if they’d be getting another order that day. So I typed up a very off-color response to her informing her how obnoxious and cunty I thought she was being and how her attitude was helping exactly zero people and quite honestly making me feel less inclined to be helpful at all. And then I typed up a nicer response and asked my boss for read it over to make sure that it was professional and appropriate. In my email i let her know that we only had the paperwork to go off of as the warehouse manager who put the shipment out was out of the office, so we legitimately did not know that she received more than what was on her order and that, no I had held her other orders to make sure that she was okay with how they were going to be shipped, but I could put them in and hopefully get the next one shipped out that day or Friday.

At that point, she got the other manager at their store involved who emailed Friday morning to ask me to confirm they’d be getting the rest of their order that day as they had students arriving on campus who would need them. I informed her that no, we hadn’t shipped anything else yet and said that it was bc our satellite warehouse was short staffed (which is essentially true. There’s one person who works in that warehouse— the manager— and he’d been out all week) so Rose jumped back in to say “Just to make certain I understand correctly, there hasn't been another order shipped since the first delivery? We need to get on the ball with this order short staffed or not folks!!”

At that point i was beyond pissed. They were asking for something above and beyond what we do normally, and we were doing everything we could to keep them placated, including shipping the rest of their orders for free, but there’s literally only so much we can do with the staff that we have. So, after venting into an empty word doc, I responded with “That is correct. We wanted to make sure that we wouldn't overwhelm you with multiple orders in a day, like you asked, and since the first shipment went out incorrectly, we wanted to be sure that it didn't happen again. Unfortunately that means that we aren't able to schedule a pickup from the shipper until Monday as it took some time to confirm that the rest of the shipments were okay to go forward per your instructions. The remaining shipments will be going out all of next week, but if you need us to send more than one order at a time, please let me know and I can coordinate with our warehouse team to make sure that happens.” (Also I’m now realizing that rose never actually confirmed that we could/should ship the rest of the orders so that’s a fun thing) as this was going on, I was trying to coordinate with our warehouse manager to see if we could get the next order out and (as my dad who works in that warehouse told me) they were basically running around asking every shipper who came by that day if they could take the order bc the store’s preferred shipper wasn’t available to pick it up. But we finally managed to get it picked up and shipped around 1 Friday afternoon

So, Rose, in all of her Karen-ness responds “In what world would it be, as the buyer, my fault for making and having confirmation of shipping directions the reason why your company has failed??” Funnily enough, that email sent me passed pissed off to just calm and I’d started typing a response when a message from my boss (who had been CC-ed on the entire conversation) popped up saying “take a minute, step away from your computer, then respond” so I laughed to myself and explained to Rose that I wasn’t trying to blame her (yes I was) but that I was only trying to explain why I was being so cautious and why there would be a gap in their shipments. Of course, then I get an email from the other store manager saying that she wished we had communicated the delay in shipments ahead of time and that if that had happened they would have been able to tell us that it mattered more that they received the boxes on time, not that they were received separately as originally requested, ending with “I would have thought this would be a logical conclusion on your part, so the mistake was mine in thinking that.”

And that’s when I realized that this manager (Becky) hadn’t been informed of everything that actually had happened and most likely just got the bitching from Rose that we’d messed up and it was all our fault that they wouldn’t be getting the boxes on time. So I got to inform her that I had told Rose immediately that we were going to be holding the remainder of her orders until we got the ok from her to ship since she’d been so upset with how the first shipment had arrived.

So once I’d gotten that all explained and smoothed out, I got an email from the freaking Macmillan rep for the area who’s been “filled in” on the situation and wanted to make sure that we were going to be able to get the store what they needed and when 🙄 and she followed up this morning to make sure that we’d done what we said. So we got the order delivered today, another one that’s either been delivered since or is being delivered tomorrow, a third that’s either tomorrow or Wednesday, and the last order that’s shipping tomorrow being delivered Wednesday or Thursday depending on shipping times.

Behind the scenes, I wasn’t aware, but my boss’s boss and his (new) boss had also been filled in about the situation and my boss had explained our half of the story, so I got a message from my boss’s boss thanking me for handling the situation and that he thought it had handled the situation well and professionally and that it was “100% the fault of an extremely difficult customer”

I’m just so Done with this and I hope to God I don’t ever have to deal with this store in the future

[duhragonball]

Cult Classic

I had a really exhausting week, so I’m going to try to chill out by writing this thing about cults that’s been bouncing around in my head since... oh, like January 6th?   For some reason?     But it’s also about my insanely long OC fanfic slash vanity project slash concept album.  Join me, won’t you?

Okay, so back in... geez 2018?   Has it been that long?   Around October 2018 I started working out the details for the big climax of the “1000 years ago” section of my fanfic.  From the start I had this idea that the Legendary Super Saiyan would be locked into a death struggle with pretty much the entire Saiyan population, led by a Saiyan King who just can’t handle being upstaged.   But I had to figure out a lot of details to make that actually work.   What I finally ended up with was the Jindan Cult. 

Why a cult?  Because I wanted my King character to be the main villain, but also be physically weaker, but also he needed to be powerful enough to challenge the heroine. I came up with all these different ways to beef up his power level without making him a Super Saiyan himself, but ultimately I wanted him to have an army of Siayans at his back.   That led me to consider some sort of magic elixir that would make them all stronger, but especially the king, since he’s ultimately in this for himself.  At first, I considered having him mind-control all of his goons, but I spent the mind control nickel in earlier arcs, and I’ll have to use it again later, because Towa and Demigra use it.   Then I thought of drug addiction, which is sort of like mind control but not literal brainwashing or anything like that.  And that led me to the cult concept.  

One major inspiration for me was the real-life cult called “NXIVM”, which made the news back in 2018 when their leaders started getting arrested, including “Smallville” star Allison Mack.   Every time I read about it, it felt like something from a movie, but it was real.   I guess the celebrity angle made it more bizarre to me, because it’s sort of like “Hey, this isn’t just some group of randos; someone you’ve heard of is in this thing.”   Not that I ever paid much attention to “Smallville”, but you get the idea.  She didn’t just join NXIVM, she eventually became one of the top recruiters.   Some of the character arcs in my fic were my own attempt to understand how a person goes from Point A to Point B. 

The big plot hole, though, in my mind, was that I came up with this whole master plan for the bad guys, but it involved sending wave after wave of Saiyan cultists to die in pointless, unwinnable battles against Luffa.    I couldn’t have them win much, because if they beat her, they’d just kill her, and the story would be over.    It struck me as fishy that these Saiyans would sign up for a war where the casualty rate is 100%, but I tried to lampshade it as best I could.   “Yeah, all those other chumps couldn’t beat Luffa, but I’ll pull it off because I’m special!”   It still seemed a bit unlikely.  

But then 2020 happened, and I guess the main thing I learned from that year was that people will accept almost anything in order to believe a comfortable lie.  The joke I’ve seen on the internet is that we need to retire the expression “avoid it like the plague”, because it turns out a lot of people don’t actually avoid plagues very well at all.   The horrifying thing about COVID-19 is how easily people will accept the climbing death tolls.   “Oh, well this person was already in bad health, so they would have died eventually anyway.”   I don’t want to get too political here, but I’m pretty sure a lot of the anti-mask, coronavirus-is-a-hoax crowd are the same people who made up tall tales about “death panels” in Obamacare.    “They’re gonna euthanize your grandma!” they would say, but now they say your grandma is acceptable losses if it means reopening bars and restaurants.

Actually, I do mean to get political, because holy fuck, Qanon stormed the Capitol Building.    Look, if you don’t believe Joe Biden won the election, I don’t know what to tell you, except please get far away from me, right now.  If you’re not familiar with Qanon, a few years ago some guy on an image board posted a bunch of cryptic messages and claimed to be an important government figure who would know about important things.    People started “deciphering” his “clues” and when he stopped posting new ones they started inventing their own “clues” and interpreting them any way that suited them.    This led to an overarching narrative that Donald Trump was actually part of this massive sting operation to arrest hundreds, maybe thousands of left-wing politicians, celebrities, and whoever else.    Any day now, he was supposed to have Hilary Clinton arrested, and also JFK Junior would somehow show up and help him, even though he’s been dead for 22 years.  Every day, these Qanon guys would add on more bizarre lore to their “theories”, and every day none of their predictions would come true.  Then Trump lost the election, which put them in a bind, because their whole mythology is based on the idea of him saving the world as POTUS, and now he wasn’t even going to be POTUS for much longer.  

I’m pretty sure this had a lot to do with the lies about election fraud.    Trump himself refused to accept defeat, and his supporters didn’t want to accept it either, so they all told each other that it wasn’t real, and they believed each other so much that they dug in their heels.   But then they’d take this stuff to court and the judge would be like “Uh, what evidence do you have of mass voter fraud?” and they would just be like “lol nvm!”  I mean, if there was proof for any of this, why would they not want a judge to see it?   But for Qanon, it was more than just being sore losers.    They needed all their whackamaroo predictions to come true, and Trump losing re-election would upset the applecart.  

So then they started telling themselves that they could win this thing through the boring certification process.   I think it was like, December 14 when all the states had to certify their results.   So they held out hope that nothing was over until then.    Then they pinned their hopes on the Electoral College, and that there would be enough faithless electors to hand Trump the victory, in spite of the voters.   I found this one amusing, since I used to see tumblr suggesting the same thing back in 2016, when they were still trying to come up with ways for Bernie Sanders to win.  

Then they decided Mike Pence could fix everything, because on Jan 6, Congress would officially count the Electoral Votes and formally declare the winner, and Mike Pence would step in and overrule the whole thing, because the Vice-President oversees that process.    Except he just oversees it, he can’t legally change the outcome, especially on a whim.    And then the riot at the Capitol happened, and I’m pretty sure all these Qanon types thought it would mark the beginning of a nationwide uprising, with all seventy-odd million Trump voters going apeshit, but it... didn’t work out that way.  

Then they convinced themselves that everything was building to January 20, because the innauguration was actually a clever trap, and once Joe Biden took the oath of office, he could then be arrested for treason, so you see, they had to make it look like Trump lost the election, because it was the only way to fool Joe Biden into incriminating himself... or... something.   But Jan 20 came and went, so the latest fallback position I heard was that there’s a double-secret REAL inauguration day, and it’s in March, and the January 20 one isn’t legitimate, even though Trump was inaugurated on January 20, 2016, but whatever.    That, or the guy we see in the White House now is actually Trump disguised as Joe Biden, or a Joe Biden android or something.   

I think I sort of understood that Qanon is a cult, but I didn’t really put the pieces together until the events of January unfolded.    Pre-November, it just seemed like a conspiracy theory, without any real timetables or prophecies, like Flat Earth.    But once the end of the Trump Administration was in sight, it really started to look like all the doomsday cults I’ve heard about over the years.  The predicted events wind up failing to come true, and they invent new predictions to explain away the old ones.   It’s not about the veracity of the claims as much as the claims themselves.    People want to believe there’s this whole elaborate explanation for everything.    They wanted to believe that Trump was this hypercompetent superheroic messiah, because the alternative is to face the uncertain reality: that he had no idea what he was doing, and real people were going to suffer for it.  

I think I sort of worked that idea into my fictional cult, but I backed into it.   NXIVM was a sex cult, not a doomsday cult, or an elaborate conspiracy theory, so I was mostly fixated on all the depraved things the cult could do to its members.   But they all share the same lure: a belief system that promises to make everything fit. I’m not sure what the hook was for NXIVM, but Allison Mack didn’t go in thinking about how much fun sex trafficking would be.   That came later, after she was convinced that NXIVM had all the answers, and one of those answers involved sex crimes, apparently.   In the same vein, Qanon attempted to explain mass arrests and executions by claiming that Hilary Clinton eats babies or something.   “Well, I don’t want babies to get eaten, so I guess breaking into the Capitol building seems like a reasonable course of action.”  

Weighed against real life, a bunch of Saiyans accepting a 100% casualty rate doesn’t seem so outrageous.   It also helps that sometimes the leaders of these groups can buy into their own hype, and think they’re infallible when they’re really not.    This week, I started reading the Darth Plagueis novel again, and I’ve seen the Sith from Star Wars referred to as a cult, but I never gave it a lot of thought until I noticed that Plagueis buys into the whole Dark Side of the Force thing a little too hard.   At times, he’ll wax philosophical about how the Jedi are the real bad guys when you think about it, and he’s not just saying that to be manipulative.   He honestly believes that the Sith can save the galaxy from decline, which is stupid and hypocritical, because they’re the ones causing all the decline.    I always got the impression that Darth Sidious understood that it was all about accumulating power as an end unto itself, and any high-minded talk of necessary evil was just to keep the rubes in line.    Rise of Skywalker plays into that idea nicely.   He somehow survived Episode VI, but he let the Empire collapse, because if he can’t rule it, he doesn’t want it to exist at all.   But he’s still playing himself, because he thinks he can win by following the same failed ideology that got all the previous Sith Lords killed.   

That’s pretty much all I have to say about it right now.    I need to move on to other topics, because Towa’s not doing a cult thing, so my fic is moving in a different direction.   But I feel better for getting this out of my head.

[jasasvimmojimmanama]

A cry for help...I need some advice, please

Hi. So, I am really in a difficult situation, that is I don’t know what is going on with my boyfriend and I’m afraid we’re going to break up. I know it may seem silly, it something that happens all the time, but I feel so exhausted and I need to tell somebody my story, and maybe to have a second opinion. 

I’ve had a difficult life, full of illnesses and losses. I have depression and some anxiety attacks, but I stopped seeing the therapist years ago because my family thought it was stupid. Now I am afraid to start again (plus I felt awkward) and I could not afford it. Anyway, I tried to manage it. I had ups and downs, but in the last two years I kind of started seeing some results. That is mainly because of my boyfriend. 

On the one hand, I felt as if it was finally my time to be happy. I felt as if it was time for me to have a family, because my real family...is not a family. I have no contact with my family except for my dad and granny but I do not have a good relationship with them, especially not with my dad who is the main source of my mental illness. My bf gave me hope: he seemed to be in love with me, he talked about family, having kids, even kind of proposed, living together....and his family loved me. 

On the other hand, he is quite focused on his life and his life only. He loves his family very much and he never seemed to include me fully in his life, not like he does with his family. He put me (it seems to be) in the last place. family, fake friends and work were more important. he preferred being with his friend the day of our anniversay than with me, he wanted to stay with his fam and not me on Chirstmas and his bday, when we started living together he went back home every weekend. he decided everything on his own or with his family.... 

I gave up my dreams and twisted my life for him because he didn’t want to move away from his city and he wasn’t ready to change his plans to see me. I did it because I believed in us, in his words and promises.

I kind of suffered a lot for his behavoir but never truly spoke to him. Well, I told him something, maybe how i felt but not everytime and not everything, but the things that made me upset were always the same and i was worried that if i would insist and repeat myself, he would leave me and i would be once again alone. 

i always hoped that after he would move in with me, things would change and get real. they didn’t. i spoke to him, openly and honestly, not to reproach him, but to make him understand that i was suffering and that i couldn’t carry the whole relationship on my own and that i felt as if all the promises were just words. he sais he finally understood, he thanked me and said he couldn’t live without me. 

then, he started to act weirdly. he didn’t talk to me much, he stopped asking me how my day was or to tell me his day, he texted me differently, he didn’t want to make love with me. then he told me a girl tagged him on FB. i overreacted, but because i connected his strange behavior to that girl + it wasn’t a friend of his and he sweared thet have NEVER spoken etc.  so i didn’t understand how come she tagged him. then months later (It may seem weird, but sometimes i have like premonitory dreams) i dreamt of him texting this girl. in the morning i looked through his phone and found a conversation with her, nothing special but still, he lied to me and hid the convo. I am ashamed of what i did, i thought i would never do something like that, but i wasn’t thinking. when he came from work he packed his stuff. eventually he stayed and the morning after he said he agreed to be still together. he said he did it to protect me, but he never apologised nor said he was sorry hor hiding the chat, he said he didn’t know whether he would ever again be honest and that he was kind of relieved i discovered him. 

he went back home because of a job. 3 weeks he said. in 2 and a half weeks he didn’t do anything. i was upset and said it wasn’t right. he said he doesn’t know how he feels about us, that he feels as if i don’t support him (i can give u 1000 examples it’s not true). He said to cancel the papers. 2 weeks before that i told him that maybe i was pregnant. during that call he said (in response to what i told him) that yes, he won’t come home to see me, but he would if i’d have an abortion. then i didn’t hear from him even though he said we would. he texted me for easter and after a week i decided to call him. he hasn’t asked me about the pregnancy, nor how i feel. he didn’t answer me (if we are on a break or if it’s a break up) but he said he was confused, that he doesn’t know what his feelings are etc and that he thinks that i’ll suffer with him and he won’t change and that he won’t be able to keep the promises but that he believed in them when he promised me those things. i told him to forget those promises but he said it wasn’t possible because if we do it, the first time he won’t do something i, i would think also about the past promises etc. 

i still do not know wheter we’re together or not. i am crying all day and night. i cannot sleep properly, if i fall asleep i dream about him and i wake up, i cannot focus on work. i feel destroyed. i do not know what to think. i don’t know how to deal with it. how can it be that he went from “i can’t live without you” to a “idk how i feel, i don’t see a future” in less than 2 months? 

i haven’t said a lot of things, it would take too much time. but i though of suicide, he knows it, he saw that i was looking something about it on the net. he knows i am not fine, that i am willing to continue our story, that i love him a lot. why does he not love me back? has he ever loved me? how can i deal with it? how can i start a life after him? for the first time i thought  i could be happy and now i feel as if i’ll never be happy because i don’t deserve it. sorry for the mistakes  but english is not my first language and i am really too tired.

[trashynyland]

Alright, someone asked about this and I'm here to give.

There's not much to the HermitFamilyAU. I'll try and go in order in a way from oldest to recent characters that have been created so far.

Grian, mute avian hybrid. 23 but acts like an excited 10 year old. He communicates in bird, sign language, writing and charades. Only Mumbo, Iskall and Xisuma can understand Grian's bird talk (he'll chirp, squeak screech and squawk). He's a bundle of joy, really energetic, he loves to cuddle and he's usually always happy. He'll tend to stick by Mumbo's side a lot. He has the habit of sitting on people's shoulders, it helps him with his height dysphoria, makes him feel taller which makes him happy. He loves to build with his legos since he isn't allowed out of the house unless he's with Xisuma. He was abused by his parents who cut out his vocal cords with a knife at age 9. He's lived in the hermit household for 5 years. He has a feather shedding habit which Doc despises (that's what earned Grian the name "Feathers"). Grian and Doc have a love hate relationship but mostly, Grian loves being a little shit to Doc and annoy him. Grian can easily get sent into a panic attack if someone touches his neck without permission. He has trust issues and won't let anyone he doesn't know near him.

Mumbo, human but has the power to generate Redstone dust from his hair (like King Sparklez but he can generate the dust with his hands). He's 24 and a nervous wreck. Mumbo always needs an explanation to things he doesn't understand, if he doesn't get it then he'll try and figure it out himself. He's very shy around others he doesn't know and has a horrible stuttering habit when he has to talk to people he doesn't know. He loves hanging out with Grian (his comfort buddy boyfriend) and loves to help the little avian. His legs got shattered and ripped from a piston malfunction that he was trying to fix, they had to amputate his legs from the knee down. He's got Redstone prosthetics that are powered with Redstone (made by King Diamond). He has no recollection of his past, all he knows was that he showed up on the Redstone King's doorstep at age 7 and was adopted by the king. Mumbo's father is King Redstone (or CaptainSparklez) but Mumbo lives with Xisuma since Mumbo himself isn't found of the Royal lifestyle. But he works for his father and helps around the castle from time to time. Started living with Xisuma at age 19.

Iskall, slime hybrid. He's 27 and a comedian. He acts like a crazy uncle, loves to make inappropriate jokes but also acts like the 2nd father of the house. He loves to jokes around and pull pranks. He's very kind until you hurt his family in any way. Again, acts like the second dad of the house because things can get too crazy sometimes. When he was 16, he was shit in the eye by a blast spell which caused his eye to never grow back. Instead of getting an eye patch or a regular eye prosthetic he asked Mumbo and Doc to make him some kinda cool looking eye instead. He was abandoned by his mother at age 13, was taken in by Xisuma at age 15. He has abandonment issues.

Xisuma, Archangel hybrid (four wings, halo and 6 eyes. 4 of the eyes and the halo only appear when X uses his powers. Two of the wings get hidden beneath the top two wings.). He's over 1000 years old (but 38 in human age). He absolutely loves adopting and it's his horrible bad habit. He's been banned a few times from adoption centers because the guy can't control himself. Because of this, he's been named the "Caretaker" and "Dimensional Adopter". He's a Warrior (meaning he goes out to different dimensions to help out others in corrupted dimensions) but he's also a coder and hacker. He loves his family and would do anything to protect them. He was banished to the world Palace Concy at age 17(human age) and has lived there happily ever since. In his old world, he use to live in the heavens which had thin air. Since the air is much thicker on the ground and too much for him he wears a ventilator to help him breath better. He also can't die, he can respawn which he finds unsettling. When he dies he respawns in his bed. He's a bottom, he's gotta admit that and his husband is Doc (someone he first saved when he became a Warrior). Most of his scars on his body (including his "X" scar on his face) we're given to him by Doc himself on accident. He's a dad of the hermit household.

Doc, creeper human cyborg. He's 40 years old and a cranky guy. He tends to put up a touch guy act but in reality he's just a soft teddy bear. He'll only show his true softness when alone with Xisuma or playing with the kids. He's caring but will act like he doesn't give a shit. Parents call him Soccer Mom because of how prepared he is and how much he helps his kids but also because he tends to pick fights with the entitled parents who thinks their kid(s) are better than everyone, "News flash Christian! They aren't special!". His prosthetic arm, half head and neck, part of his chest and half is heart were all designed by King Diamond and Doctor Joe Atlantic(they also got some help from Prince Stampy). In Doc's old dimension he use to be a creeper that couldn't explode (which hunters found amusing so they'd pick on Doc and give him scars, basically abuse him). One day he fell in love with his world's Cub who later ended up turning him him an and forcing him to become his science experiment. Once he was deemed useless, Cub put him up for auction which Xisuma ended up buying him and taking him home. Doc has major trust issues with everyone and still doesn't trust Xisuma's 3rd new adoption, Cub Issatic who's always on edge and thinks someone is after his blood (character Cub is still a wip so this may change later on). Doc is surprisingly actually a cuddly type of hybrid. He loves to cuddle alone with X when they get the chance. Doc's husband is Xisuma. Doc is the mom of the hermit household.

Tango, very energetic guy, he's a Telikiantors (a mythical creature created by me the artist, there's a post I made about them but to be short, they're forest creatures that are like SirenHeads but don't eat humans unless provoked by them). Tango is a hybrid version of a Teli. He's 6 years old and still waiting for his future surgery to get on his mouth tail so he can start eating from it again (in his old home it was damaged). He loves to pull all sorts of pranks and is the house's little chaotic demon. Even with no arms, he can't be stopped. He use to be owned by an old woodworker who used Tango as his personal slave. Since Tango was young at the time and didn't know any better and was a child he'd always fool around and didn't listen. This angered his old owner who cut off Tango's arms off and cut his tail mouth so he couldn't eat. Xisuma stumbled upon him one night when the Archangel got lost on a hike in the woods. X saved him and adopted him at age 3. Even though Tango went through that torture he's still bubbly and doesn't have much trama. He's more unsure about things and will asked about them.

Impulse, he's a God actually who was the son of a lightning goddess and ocean god. He's currently 5 years old. When he was born his eyes were completely gold and blue but after his mother and father forced him to use his magic he went blind. Since he was only 3 at the time his eyes were still sensitive and not use to powerful magic or anything bright. His mother was frustrated with him that he couldn't summon up lighting or water so she summoned up some lightning and struck it right in front of Impulse which caused him to go blind and his eyes to lighten up a bit. When the parents left to argue after the situation, that's when Xisuma jumped into the dimension to save Impulse and take him away. Originally his eyesight was supposed to be fixed and he was supposed to be sent back to his home world but he refused the care and refused to leave X's side. He's very scared of powers and when people raise their voices. He's shy and fragile and can easily get overwhelmed by things. He has some sensitivity issues, where when he's so overwhelmed by something he can easily fall into a panic attack. Doc, as a Christmas gift, gave him two shovels that have turned into his comfort item. They help conceal his magic so it doesn't get too out of hand when he gets overwhelmed, upset or angry. He usually sticks by his brothers Tango and Zedaph's sides but when he's not with them then he'll be hanging around his dad, mom or one of his siblings while on a child leash (he doesn't mind the leash and actually loves it since it gives him comfort. He's still not use to being blind and all).

Zedaph, he's a witch, that what everyone knows so far. He's 5 years old and has a teddy bear attitude, his personality is very fluffy and caring. He loves the world and the world loves him. In his old dimension, he was a rich witch's slave and was forced to do dirty work. His owner once had enough of him one day when he accidentally dropped her food and his owner blasted his arm off. Because of the traumatic experience, Zed prefers to keep his eyes shut in fear of having to go through something terrible and scary again. His old owner sold him off to Xisuma who took him in and adopted him. Zedaph's powers are unknown because they haven't yet activated. He's been labelled as a witch for now because of the place he came from and his low power levels. His favorite person in the world his his Uncle Stizoom because of his fluffy hair and tail. He loves to curl up in anything soft and fluffy because of how comfortable and safe it makes him feel. It's the reason why he owns a large Wooloo plushy.

Cleo, a very rare zombie eel siren. She's 31 years old and doesn't like speaking. She likes to stay mute unless talking to Xisuma or False. Nothing seemed to be wrong with her old dimension same with her except that she was always bored. Pirates and fishermen always tried to catch her and at first Cleo loved to prank them but as she got more and more bored she started letting them capture her and sell her at black markets, auctions, sold to royals. She always knew how to escape and she found it fun at first but soon grew bored of it all again. It was always the same routine. Xisuma found her while he was wondering her dimension in a black market. He asked her if she wanted to join him but of course she said nothing. Xisuma ended up buying her and bring her home with him. Cleo has never tried to leave or escape since (except to False's bedroom to sleep with her).

Ren, dog hybrid who has DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder). Since he has many different identities all have different personalities (check out his character sheet for more details on all the identities). But mostly Ren is in charge and upfront to control the body, he is the main host after all. Ren is the definition of the one crazy uncle. He's comedic, crazy and loves to put a smile on others faces, he's also very playful. He can get flustered easily if someone dominates him (either in bed or at his own games like flirting). Ren and the body are about 21. In his old world he was abused a lot, mostly chained to a wall in a basement his entire life. He was abused a lot by his owner alpha and many other bad things. It's where a lot of his trama comes from. He one day ended up escaping but fell through a dimensional portal and ended up in Palace Concy. He was found in the woods passed out by Slime n Bone podcast who were taking a vacation with the Woodworks family in the Kosikians Sky (mt. DeathLoxes) mountains. He's was taken to Xisuma after the podcast group couldn't figure out how to help him since Ren wouldn't say anything and just shake in fear in the corner. He was taken in by X which Ren is very greatful for. Ren is scared of everyone since he's an omega and comes from an omegaverse, he thinks an alpha will come and hurt him again. Ren has a huge crush on Iskall and even though he knows the man likes him back he's too scared to ask him out. Ren loves to hang out with Grian, Doc and sometimes Iskall when he isn't blushing nervous. Very cool dude.

Bdubs, human but is immune to explosives but can still get stabbed. He's 19 actually and has a big habit of getting into trouble with Impulse and Tango. He works at an explosives store in town, helps out the construction crews when they need a certain area exploded and loves to volunteer at the firework stands that pop up during July 1st "Redstone Founders Day" (Bdubs favorite holiday). He's enthusiastic and doesn't mind teaching kids about explosives and safety in his spare time. He loves causing trouble when he can but he also loves helping out others with decorating. He's got a side job he's made "Bdubs Interior Design" and usually many people hire him for help. He use to live in a HermitCraft world when he decided to leave one year and stubbled upon an Earth dimension which he was then used as a bomber during the everlasting wars that were going on. He was one day capture and take to Palace Concy by Lunch Army and was then later adopted by X. During his time on the Earth War he gained black smudge on his face that X has found won't come off so it's become part of Bdubs skin basically. Some have called him blackface and think that he's being racist but he's not. He's just got some black smudge on his face that is unremovable. He's bubble and loves to make others smile when having a bad day. He doesn't really have any trama except for being weary of portals. He's got a crush on Keralis but won't admit it.

Keralis, human. He's 18 (looks 16) and a punk. He's mean and bitchy to everyone and doesn't let a single soul through his walls (he doesn't let others see his emotions and what he's really feeling). He love to break the law and pick fights. He works with "Brtakis Construction Company" which causes him to travel from home a lot. He's very strong and can pack a punch. He's a warrior so that's why he's got his own special weapon, he's not allowed on any dimensional missions but he's allowed to kill Alumas (soul takers) when they show up. In his old dimension he was a homeless immigrant who lived on the streets of New York (where he earned his punk attitude). He was saved by Xisuma one night when he was about to get killed by a gang group, almost got shot in the head. X had offered him a home but Keralis denied his offer. It took 5 years of constant saves and denied offers until one year he almost committed suicide he finally opened up to X and accepted his offer with a wailing sob. He still keeps his punk attitude because he grew up with it but also because he finds it cool. He also kept it because of Doc, Keralis wants to be just like the guy. All smug and strong. Doc is the person he looks up to, his idol in a way. His trama? He gets scared and panicked when left alone and he can't go near any big cities that are similar to New York.

Wels, avian hybrid mixed with an angel hybrid. He owns a halo that's cracked and shattered but only appears when he's angry. He's got beautiful golden wings that goes along with his ruby red hair. He's 15 but a secret Drag Queen at night. He loves to entertain people and put on a show, show off what he can do. He loves the stage and to him it's his home and life. (Idk how to explain it but he's just like the YouTube Wels but gay). He owns two Drag Personas, Cherry Rider who's his usual sona he dresses as who can be a wild ride. Cherry is an encouraging fool that will try and help anyone build up their confidence to do anything that their heart desires to do. His other persona is HelsKnight, Hels is a naughty bad fool who, for Wels is his way of getting his anger out in style and in a safe way. He'll preform and have a happy attitude when Cherry but have a dark and naughty~ attitude when being Hels. Because of X's worry, Wels has paired up with Doc on the weekends to do drag but pairs up with Skeppy during the weekdays for drag. Since he's young he still needs parental vision. Not much about his past except for being an orphan all his life and getting bullied at school and at his orphanage for being gay and loving to cross dress. When Xisuma adopted him, Wels hid his love for drag which ended up causing problems because when Cherry Rider first appeared on TV Xisuma fell in love for her and was horrified when he found out the drag person character was his son. After a bit of awkward talking and drag performances from Doc for X, Xisuma got over his silly love crush for Cherry and told Wels that he accepts who he is and will always love him as family. Xisuma told him that it would just be a bit awkward for awhile because X still had to get over the fact that his favorite drag queen he had a crush on was actually his adopted son. Doc helped both X and Wels after the reveal. Wels grew more confident and stopped hiding his drag cross dressing side (while his father Xisuma got over his crush and dropped it entirely but he ended up crushing on Wels' drag performance partner Skeppy). Wels still has a small fear of being himself in front of others but has overcome most of that fear because he knows his family has got his back (especially his over protective Dadsuma who would kill anyone who hurts his family and his Docmom who will murder any parents that talk his son down, "I'm lookin at you Rebecca! Your daughter is a lesbian and will never be straight you blind fu-"). Wels has a small crush on Biffa (an orphan friend of his that lives on the other side of the world (Biffa is still being developed) who Xisuma is thinking about adopting.

Jevin, rare blue slime hybrid. He's 1 year old and there's not much to him. He's a happy a baby who has a weird love obsession life with the Jello food. Iskall loves to take that and tease his baby brother with it (like stabbing his lil brother's jello in front of him and watching him cry about it, Iskall just finds Jevins whole Jello obsession hilarious). Xisuma actually found Jevin in a basket by his tracker right before he was about to work on his farm fields. Jevin will usually be hanging out with Iskall since he's also a slime and the hybrid connection helps them work better with each other. But also since Xisuma and Doc have no idea how to take care of a slime hybrid since they're hard to come by in Concy and there's not many books about them, so the two husbands let nature take it's course with Iskall since it looks like he knows what he's doing.

NPC Grian or Rustie, he's a demon but apparently can change into a robot? He's an interesting type. He's 25 and a cheerful man. He works in architecture, both with planning out the building and how it will look along with the construction. He also works at a bookstore named "BookRook". He's sweet and kind but will snap your neck in you make him angry, a smile with a dark atmosphere like aph Russia. He loves his kids but if he finds Grain making anY MORE ROBOTS THEN HE'S GOING TO-. He love to volunteer for events and he loves his husband Zoom. He was found by Zoom in his old dimension where Rustie was still locked and hibernating in his closet. He would have taken his robot brother with him but Robot Grian was in horrible condition and... dead so there was no use of him. Rustie owns a nice little rustic cabin in the woods beside a like with a great view. He and Zoom built the house and nother are proud of their work and family.

Evil Xisuma or Stizoom(Zoom), a Strider hybrid but fluffier. He's 27 and has a very gentle heart. He loves nature with a passion and Rustie tends to find him curdle up in his flower beds quite often. He likes to bird watch and plant flowers. He's a five star chief for "Blossburgi Restaurant" and a karate teacher for "Hightri's Karate". He hates the cold and loves to cuddle up with Rustie during the cold seasons and Rustie finds it adorable. Luckily, the two own a nearby hot springs so when things get to cold, Zoom will go hang out in the hot springs for awhile. He loves animals, all kinds. In his old dimension he was always forced to be near creatures and he always hated the small to so little space he always got. Xisuma found him and took him in for all awhile until Zoom found and fell in love with Rustie. His husband is Rustie and they both love each other very much. Very cute :3.

HermitPets, they're more used and made for a different AU of mine but in HermitFamily they're more background characters for sorts. Not much.

HermitFamily house, huge house I mean huge. It's a mansion that's up in the Stonety Mts. It sits in a large valley surrounded by mountains. The valley is actually a farm the the hermit house owns. They grow crops and sell it the small nearby town they live by named "Vellenture". Their house, in the back has a large poor (more of a lake and it's for Cleo) but it attaches to a nearby forest. The house itself, on the outside is a creamy white and on the inside, many colors. (I'll have to draw it out for a better explanation but basically the house looks like Grian's mansion but a creamy white and rustic grey.

[staruplatinum]

so, here it is. 4.5K words of pure smut and filth - MY GIFT TO MY FOLLOWERS!! Thank you so so much for 1000 followers (◞ꈍ∇ꈍ)◞⋆**✚⃞♡

 this was a little hard to write since there are 10 point of views - I wrote every La Squadra member in this; including Sorbet and Gelato. I hope it isn't confusing to read, and that you understand what is happening in the background.

warnings: extremely nsfw, this story includes graphic depictions of a gangbang, multiple creampies, cum eating, rough sex, degrading.

thank you as always for your support!♡

tagging some people who might be interested @lasquadrahoe @beedingtears @e-lectroma @bjnurse 

             Being the only female member in all of La Squadra was rough. You had to deal with all 9 men staring at you; constantly checking you out. Sometimes it was unwanted - like when you were just trying to do the dishes and melone would sneak up and grab your ass - but other times, you couldn’t help but blush at the feeling. It felt nice to be sought after. On top of the ogling issue; you had to deal with cleaning up most of their messes. While Risotto, Prosciutto,Gelato, Pesci and Sorbet were pretty good with cleaning up after themselves, the rest always left a mess in one way or another. Formaggio’s room was a disaster - filled with cum rags, playboy magazines, empty food boxes and clothes. Melone and illuso always left their hair and skin products on the bathroom sink, while Ghiaccio’s room was always freezing and filled with crumpled paper and books all over the place.

Despite it all, you really couldn’t complain. While you were an assassin yourself - you were also La Squadra’s personal maid. You were hired to clean for them and occasionally cook - though Risotto preferred to cook for his team instead of making you do it. If needed, they’d often ask you to come join them on missions considering your skills were quite impressive. 

The job description didn’t include that you’d be subjected to please each of the members whenever they wanted. But, again. You didn’t complain. What could be better than fucking 9 very attractive men? They always took their turns with you; and each were assigned a night to have you. Sorbet and Gelato usually took you at the same time, while the others preferred to be separate. Some days, you had sex with at least 5 different members. It made you feel dirty, but this was your life now.

When you came home one night, you noticed all the boys playing poker - drunk. The living room reeked of alcohol and cigarette smoke (courtesy of Prosciutto!) and you already dreaded having to clean this mess. Peroni bottles littered the area - some were even broken. 

“Ciao! Y/N! You’re back already?” Formaggio practically yelled, before laughing right after with Melone. 

What was so funny? You couldn’t tell. You knew it was just the fact that they were drunk. You sighed heavily, putting your purse down on the counter. You walked over to where they all were seated- the clink of your heels making noise as you crossed the hardwood floor. 

“Why don’t you come and join us Bella?” Melone asked - there was a mischievous tone in his voice. 

“I’d love to, but I have to clean this entire mess that you boys so graciously made for me” you spit back. You weren’t upset; but today had been a long day. On top of that, you hadn’t had a chance to have sex with any of them for about a week, since their last mission took rather long. Tonight they were celebrating their win. You couldn’t help but feel needy, all you really wanted to do was brush your teeth, wash your face, go masturbate in bed and then sleep. 

“Come on y/n! Join us. This mess can wait.” Melone insisted. He was always SO persistent when he wanted something, and instantly the hairs rose up on your neck. You hesitated for a moment, before thinking that maybe, just maybe, Melone wanted to fuck you. If he did, you know you’d feel satisfied tonight.  Sighing, you mumbled a faint “fine” before sitting down next to the spare spot on the couch with Melone. 

As soon as your bum reached the leather of the couch, melone wrapped his arm around you while passing you a Peroni. You stared at him for a moment raising an eyebrow before saying “fuck it” and downing the bottle in front of his eyes. 

They all stared at you in shock. 

“What? Did you think I was innocent or something?” You asked them rhetorically as faint laughter echoed through the base from them all. You didn’t want them to answer that question, since they had seen just about everything you could do in the bedroom...

An hour passed, and now you were confident with how much alcohol you had drank, along with the others. As more bottles littered the coffee table and the floor, you could hear faint conversations from all around the room. Your vision was slightly blurred, everything was hilarious to you, and you never felt more confident than you did in this moment. 

“So who’s going to fuck me tonight?” You asked. “I’m sooo needy…” you added, admitting just how desperate you were. “... and it’s been too long!!” 

There was a soft whine to your voice as you grabbed your breast through your bra sensually. 

Immediately, all men lost their train of thought as they looked at you. Formaggio stood up, offering to take you. You nodded, but before you two could get to the bedroom Ghiaccio scoffed and threw a bottle at the wall directly behind you. 

 “Tchhh! As if you can even fuck her as good as I can! I want her tonight!!” He yelled. 

You held your hand to your ear as you tried to block out his tone. Maybe it was the alcohol making you sensitive - but hearing Ghiaccio tell really pierced your ears. 

“Back off man, I got up first” Formaggio spat. You held onto his arm for protection since you really didn’t want an argument to go down right now, and because standing up was starting to make you rather dizzy.

Melone cleared his throat before suggesting something that caused an awkward silence. 

“What about if we gangbang her?” 

The awkward silence ensued for a good minute before you noticed every man in the room with a smirk - except Pesci, who was visibly sweating. You knew that he wanted this just as bad, though. 

“I think that’s a great idea.  Finally, stronzo. Your freak brain comes up with something good.” Prosciutto added as he stood up and patted melone on the shoulder. He looked over to you, and suddenly you felt 9 pairs of eyes on you - a red blush forming on your face.

Formaggio suddenly let go of you as he pushed you back over to the couch, causing you to fall on your hands and knees. You bit your lip in anticipation. 

“Who’s first?” Illuso asked, smirking down at your small form.  

“Why don’t we ask her? Who do you want y/n?” Prosciutto asked, while patting down on your head.

Your face stayed a bright red as you surveyed the room. There were so many options! If only you could have all 9 of them inside you at once - sadly that would be impossible, especially considering the size of their cocks. 

“Melone.” You said, winking at him. Sure, he could be creepy at times, but you really wanted him to take the lead - after all, he was kinkier than the rest.  

“Good choice Bella,” melone added as he lay back on the couch, pulling you up with him. The two of you began to make out, hands grazing each other’s exposed skin. Melone moaned into your mouth as you started to grind your hips into him; feeling his cock get increasingly harder with every movement. Thank god you were wearing a skirt, Melone thought to himself. He pushed your lace panties to the side, and slowly began to drag his index and middle finger along your slit. Pulling away from the kiss, he jokingly mocked you. “You really are wet, bella. How long have you been wanting this, hm?” You shook your head and closed your eyes, barely able to form words, you just wanted to be fucked. Melone chuckled and lifted up your skirt. 

“You should all come here and see this for yourself.” 

Immediately, the rest of the men in the room leaned closer as melone lifted up your skirt; exposing your pussy to the hazy room and showing how shiny it was from your wetness. 

As if on queue, they all started to palm themselves through their pants as they patiently awaited their turns.

“Melone, hurry up. We don’t have all night.” Illuso added, his cock was the most visible in his pants since he was also close to you, but who was really paying attention? All you knew was that every man in this room was going to be inside you soon enough, in one way or another. 

Fed up with their insistent bickering for him to hurry, and the grinding of your hips, he finally pulled his long cock out. As slutty as it sounds, you knew how every man in La Squadra looked “down there” and Melone wasn’t lacking in any sense - his dick was always so smoothe. Lifting your hips slowly, you lined up his head with your entrance and slowly sunk down on him, eventually bottoming out. 

“Merda!” he hissed as he felt your tight walls clench around him. He instantly began to fuck up into you fast, the sound of skin-slapping echoing in the now-silent room. 

“Pull her skirt up so we can watch man!” Formaggio yelled. Melone didn’t really care, but he obliged anyways, for a brief moment at least, until Illuso interrupted him. 

Illuso pulled your face up by squeezing your cheeks, and you stared up at him with a lustful grin. You bit your lip as you ground your hips along melone. 

“Think you can take us both bellissima?” 

Before you could even answer him, Sorbet laughs under his breath. 

“Of course she can. She takes Gelato and I all the time.” 

The other members didn’t know this, so it was quite a shock to them. But really, no one gave a shit. You nodded up at Illuso, batting your lashes as you waited for him to make a move. Suddenly, he managed to push both you and Melone downwards into the couch, and soon you were laying on top of him. You pulled your skirt back up angling the view to Illuso as you anticipated for him to join in. Illuso and the other members watched - mesmerised - as they saw Melone fuck you. But the atmosphere was starting to change, and you knew these men were getting restless.

Illuso pulled his hard cock out, giving it a few pumps before kneeling between your and Melone’s legs. He spread apart your ass cheeks, getting a close-eye view of your beautiful cunt being stretched and fucked. He smirked, spitting on Melone’s cock to add some extra lube. He didn’t even need to ask permission - You and Melone were more than okay with this. 

Surprisingly, Illuso slipped in with ease. You really were that wet. 

The two men started to fuck you, grunting as they used your tight hole to their advantage. Illuso grabbed your hips, attempting to pull you more into a “doggy style” position, while Melone tried to pull you closer to him. You felt like a ragdoll between the two.

Meanwhile, Prosciutto, Pesci and Formaggio came up to you - standing in front of your face. “You forget about us, Dolcezza?” Prosciutto asked, blowing a puff of smoke from his cigarette.

You shook your head. How could you forget about the others? This was only the beginning!

Dazed and confused for a moment, you wanted to tell them to wait their turn, until Formaggio and Prosciutto brought out their hard cocks. Prosciutto dropped his cigarette and put it out with his shiny leather shoes. His hand began to pump his hard cock, pulling his foreskin back - while his other hand grabbed your hair; bringing your face closer to him. 

“Get to work, bella. And maybe when these fools are finished, ill fuck you good.” 

You hated when Prosciutto pulled your hair, but you knew tonight wasn’t going to be easy. Not only were they drunk - they were pent up and restless too. There was bound to be some roughness involved.

You opened up your mouth, making an ‘o’ shape as your left and right hand gently began stroking Formaggio and Pesci’s shafts. Prosciutto then took matters into his own hands and gripped the side of your cheeks - beginning to fuck your face.

It had only been minutes, but it felt like an hour already. There was so much movement going on from every angle, you didn’t even know what to think. Praactically every part of your body was being used!

Ghiaccio got closer to you and started to rub his hand against the soft mound of your ass, as Illuso and Melone continued to thrust into you. You, however, couldn’t even tell who was touching you anymore. From your peripheral vision, you could see other figures looming around you and jerking themselves off - just waiting for a turn.

Ghiaccio spit on his fingers before slowly rubbing your asshole - the sensation caused you to gasp - though it was muffled from Prosciutto’s cock being lodged in your throat. You could tell it was Ghiaccio by what he was doing- he knew what buttons of yours to press. You weren't going to complain though.

“Fuck. Bella - Im close.” Illuso spoke. “Wh-where should I finish?” he was starting to lose his composure.

Prosciutto was then courteous enough to pull out from your mouth, allowing you a moment to catch your breath before you spoke up.

“Inside. I want, I want you all inside!” 

Your words alone, and everyone’s grunts and swearing was enough to make Illuso finish. He shot his seed deep inside you, and the sudden warmth and wetness caused you to clench down on both Illuso and Melones’ dicks. Melone didn’t want to end so early but the pressure was just too much. Seconds later, he finished as well, his cum mixing with Illuso’s as both men came to a stand-still. 

Slowly, Illuso pulled out first as he gave his shaft one last pump to get rid of any excess cum. Melone followed after. Both men lifted you off of them, careful not to let any cum spill out. Immediately, you lifted your ass up and remained in doggy style position.

As the two men backed up and sat back down to “cool down” from fucking you, Prosciutto then pushed Ghiaccio away and grabbed your hips tightly. He surveyed you for a moment as your hands continued to jerk off Pesci and Formaggio. 

“Pesci, you’re next - don’t cum all over her hands, you're going to fill her up too” Prosciutto snapped.

You looked up at pesci - clear worry and anxiety on his face.��

“B-but!! I'm going to cum soon…. Her hands are so soft… it feels so nice” Pesci retorded back. Prosciutto paid him no attention as he noticed a small dribble of cum slowly drip down your folds. He smirked at this, and used the head of his cock to slide both the cum and his cock into you. 

Prosciutto began to fuck you at a a rough pace, barely giving you time to adjust. Not like you needed it though, with all the cum lubricating your walls. He leaned down to pull your hair back and whisper in your ear. 

“My my.. I always knew you were a whore. Taking 3 mens cocks in one night? And letting them cum inside of you? Disgusting.” he hissed, landing a hard slap on your ass. 

You hated to admit it but everytime you and prosciutto fucked, he was always so vulgar and degrading. You loved it though. The deep tone of his voice and the smell of cigarettes that lingered in the air as he fucked you - it felt like heaven. Not being able to say much, you simply let out a whorish moan att his filthy comment.

“It's funny though, Dolcezza. Even though you’ve already taken 3 cocks, you’re still so -ngh- tight!”

You moaned again as your hands began to work Pesci andFormaggio’s cocks quicker. 

In the background, you could hear the faint laughter and conversations between the 8 men, going on about how good you are and how much of a slut you are being, but there was one voice you couldn’t hear - Risotto.

You quickly surveyed the room as best as you can, trying to find him. Meanwhile, you were letting out cute moans and grunts here and there, particularly, whenever Prosciutto hit your cervix. Finally your eyes settled on him. There he was, sitting in his black leather chair, stoic as ever - watching this all go down. Your eyes trailed to the massive girth underneath his pants which was more than noticeable. You bit your lip in anticipation just thinking of how good it would feel inside of you. It happened many times before, but taking the size of his cock was always the hardest. When prosciutto pulled your hair back, you let out an audible scream of pain and pleasure.

“You fucking Puttana.. Don't look at him! I'm the one fucking you right now!” he cursed, as he slapped your ass hard. You nodded your head as best as you can while risotto just smirked. 

Pesci pulled away from your grasp, panting

“I-if you don’t stop - ill cum all over your pretty face”Pesci whined. 

“it wouldn’t be the first time”, you thought.

While the other men laughed at him, you gave him a reassuring smile. He was always so kind to you. Prosciutto gestured for Pesci to join him, and after a few more seconds, Prosciutto came - spilling his seed inside of you and coating your walls white. He wasted no time in pulling out and pushing pesci into you, urging him to just hurry up and cum inside of you as well.

Prosciutto made his way back to your mouth, telling you to clean him up. And you did. You sucked him off clean before he tucked his flaccid dick back into his pants and walked away to sit somewhere. Pesci was so close to cumming, yet he still remained ever so gentle with you. It was a nice contrast compared to the others who were always so rough.

As you continued to jerk off formaggio, you urged pesci to cum! “You feel so Good, Pesci- you're such a good boy!” you said, hoping that would make him finish. After all, there were still 5 very needy men who wanted their turns. Seconds later, he came inside you as well, moaning louding. You already felt so full of cum - like you’d overflow at any given minute. But, there was still Formaggio, Ghiaccio, Sorbet, Gelato and of course, your Capo.

Prosciutto called Pesci over, slapping his neck enthusiastically as he congratulated him. 

Formaggio left your soft grasp and smirked, making his way behind you. “Finally, my turn!” he practically shouted. Just then, Gelato and sorbet, accompanied by Ghiaccio - came up to your face with their cocks out. You knew what that meant. 

As Formaggio began to thrust into you at a fast pace, you repeated what you were doing earlier in the night. Your hands grabbed onto whichever dick you could get between the three, while your mouth was shoved open by ghiaccio’s length.

The other men who had already finished were slowly beginning to get hard again as they watched you take 4 cocks at once. It was quite a lovely scene, and none of them could deny the fact that they missed how tight and wet your cunt felt around them.

A slap across your face from Ghiaccio seemed to knock you back to reality, and you altered your mouth movements so you could accommodate him better. It was intimidating, feeling all these eyes around you. Thank god for the alcohol, or you would have been a blushing-embarrassed mess by now.

Time seemed to be going by quicker every time, you almost didn’t even feel Formaggio cum inside you until he pulled out. You felt a small trail of it ooze out of you and immediately he used his sensitive cock head to push the dripping cum back into you.  

You were so close to overflowing. You knew you’d for sure be pregnant by the end of this. 

Ghiaccio pulled away from your mouth and pushed Formaggio aside, taking his spot. His thrusts were fast- and enough to pull you back and away from Sorbet & Gelato’s cocks. They shot Ghiaccio a look of disapproval but proceeded to wait it out.  Formaggio plopped down on the couch ; sinking into it as he shut his eyes. He always found sex to be so tiring. 

Ghiaccios thrusts were rough, and he pulled your hair back as he fucked into you like a jackhammer. Luckily for all this “lube” or you were positive that your pussy would be burning right now from his rough pace. He kept calling you a “puttana” over and over as he came inside of you. You bit down on your lip as you breathed in heavily, smiling to yourself as your pussy gratefully took in his cum, adding once again to the others. 

When he was finished, he made sure to let it be known how much of a whore you were, and how disgusted he felt with himself. However, none of the other men really paid him attention. It was Ghiaccio after all. What didn’t piss him off? 

Sorbet and Gelato took this into their own hands as soon as he was out of sight. They decided to double team you, like they always did. Sorbet slid underneath you - careful not to let you “tip” over and “spill” any cum. Meanwhile, Gelato lined himself up behind you. As if on queue - both men pushed inside of you at once, causing you to let out a gasp and a moan of pleasure. 

Whenever it was your night with them, they always loved to use you like this, though sometimes sorbet would fuck your ass while Gelato fucked your Pussy, and vice-versa. 

Both men gripped onto you tight as their thrusts increased.  When sorbet pulled out, Gelato pushed in. The contrast felt so nice as you felt the others sperm inside you make you extremely wet and slippery. 

As the two lovers came inside of you, their dicks were coated with a clear layer of cum- both from themselves and everything else.

You made sure to keep your ass in the air once again, as they exited your vicinity. 

Only one person left…

Risotto. 

Risotto was different from the others. He was quiet, and he rarely liked to engage in big group chatter. But with his team, it was different. 

He pushed you onto your back and put your legs over his shoulders - keeping you in the mating press position. It would be easier to take his full length this way anyways. As he leaned down to your face, he whispered:

“You’re such a cute little whore, Tesoro. Are you sure you’ve been stretched enough to take me? You know the others don’t compare-“ 

You held onto his cheeks and kissed him passionately. 

“You know your cock is the only one that can make me cum ~” 

You smiled at him as he pushed his length in as far as it could go. It was true what you said, risotto was the only one who could make you cum - and you felt extra attached to him for it. The way his thick cock felt inside of you was like heaven as you rubbed yourself to orgasm. 

Risotto started to thrust into you slowly. Even though he had waited all this time, and was practically straining against himself - he was still always so kind and gentle, only being rough when you begged for it. 

You could feel all the cum inside of you swishing around and mixing together. There. Was. So. Much ! 

Luckily risotto was so big, his cock acted like a plug of some sorts - keeping it all inside of you. That was, until, your orgasm approached. 

Using your slender fingers, you began to rub your clit, moaning as loud as you could to get the other men’s attention. You wanted them to know WHO was making you feel like this. Risotto just smirked as he continued to fuck you. It was a nice confidence boost, knowing he could make you moan from pleasure. 

Moments later, you screamed out your Capo’s name as you came all over his cock. The clenching of your walls sent him over the edge, and finally, he spilled his seed inside of you as well.  Some of it was even leaking out of the sides of your cunt.  As you both took a moment to catch your breath, risotto planted a chaste kiss on your forehead before holding your legs up and pulling out slowly. 

The other men got up from where they were and immediately turned their attention to you. Once again, the intense gaze of their eyes felt embarrassing, but you  couldn’t help but embrace how slutty you felt. 

The 9 men in the room looked at your cunt. Red, used, and gaping, as a small white ooze could be seen making its way out. 

You used your index and middle finger to gently rub the over-sensitive bundle of nerves, and sure enough, a gush of their cum came squirting out of you. 

All the men stared in awe as you chuckled and bit your lip. Thanks to Risotto holding your legs up and apart, it was easier to see just how much cum was inside of your small hole. 

“You’ve got to be pregnant after this Bella!” Melone shouted enthusiastically, though that was the last thing you wanted to think of right now. 

Melone walked up to you and scooped up some of the cum with his fingers, bringing it to your mouth and forcing you to suck his fingers clean.  

“Mmmm. Di molto ~” he hummed.

It took a few minutes, but as soon as you felt like most of their cum was out, Risotto let your legs go and you sat down, catching your breath.  The couch was now a mess, filled with sweat, cum and god knows what else. You were not going to have fun cleaning this tomorrow. 

Slowly as the night tapered off and the alcohol wore of, each man headed back to their rooms to get ready for bed. 

When all was said and done, you quickly showered, brushed your teeth, and plopped down in your bed - naked. Tonight was definitely satisfying. 

“I hope they all fuck me again…” you mumbled, before drifting off to sleep. Risotto, Prosciutto and all the other La Squadra members had heard this, as they stood outside of your door, watching your sleeping form. 

Maybe your wish would come true. 

[hellzyeahwebwielingessays]

Did MJ try to make Spidey retire?

Short answer: Never when she was in character and never unjustifiably!

The number of times I’ve heard people claim this is unbelievable. I’m going to settle this shit once and for all. Feel free to share this with anyone making these claims.

The simplest way to do this would be to run through things chronologically.

Unless anybody can bring up other examples, off the top of my head I can recall only three times before ‘One More Day’ where MJ floated the idea of Peter retiring.

The first time was in ASM #283. However the important context of this is that Peter himself  has already resolved to quit as soon as he is done with his latest case involving his friend Flash Thompson.

However further important context is that Peter has resolved to retire even earlier in ASM #275 and in that issue it was MJ (after learning his origin story) who encouraged him to NOT quit.

An issue later she was back to being against his work as Spider-Man.

However, many issues around this era (which was before  they got married!) depict MJ flip-flopping on her feelings and the reasons why boil down to her being concerned for Peter’s safety.

At which point why is MJ being out of order in desiring him to  retire? She loves this man and doesn’t want him to be hurt but also understands why he does what he does and it’s that fundamental heroism that is a major reason for why she loves him. This is again summed up in Web of Spider-Man #6.

Next up we have an example of when MJ didn’t  ask Peter to quit. But people always treat it as though she did so we’re going to address it anyway.

It stems from the clusterfuck that was ‘Maximum Carnage’.

Let’s give you that all-important context.

In Spider-Man Unlimited #1 Pete and MJ are attending Harry Osborn’s funeral. Harry died in chronologically the story right before ‘Maximum Carnage’ so this is a very fresh wound; he died merely days earlier.

Prior to his death, Harry had been waging months of psychological warfare on the Parkers and even tried to kill Peter. His attempt actually almost killed MJ and his own son Normie. During this whole time Harry’s wife (now widow) Liz Allan had been pushed to her wits end too.

As a result Mary Jane is reluctant to talk to Liz.

Also, for months now (starting with Carnage’s debut actually) MJ had taken up smoking to cope with the stress of their lives, chiefly her concern for Peter’s well-being. This topic and her behaviour at the funeral gets raised when they return home.

The talk zeroes in on the risks to Peter’s life and how he and MJ got lucky with Harry. MJ asks Peter to take a break for a week or two.

Not retire permanently.

Not take an indefinite hiatus.

Not even take a break for a month or definitely two weeks.

She literally asks for 7-14 Spider-Man free days so they can de-stress and catch their breaths in the wake of a serious crisis and loss.

Peter promises he will.

Unfortunately Carnage has just broken free of the authorities and formed a gang.

For the sake of argument let’s say MJ doesn’t know much about Carnage’s cronies. She just knows he has back up.

However, she absolutely knows about Carnage.

As his name implies, is an incredibly lethal foe. You know Venom, that guy who’s famous for being a bigger badder version of Spider-Man? Yeah Carnage is an even more powerful version of that  guy. Spider-Man one-on-one is physically incapable to defeating him and had to team up with Venom to do it. Even then they actually weren’t strong enough to beat him physically because Carnage is stronger than the pair of them combined!

Making matters worse Carnage’s whole body is extremely durable to injury, with blunt force not being the most effective way of fighting him. His forte is being able to quickly generate a large arsenal of sharp edged weapons from his body; think the T-1000.

This skillset is appropriate given how Carnage prior to obtaining any of these super powers was already a highly violent and sadistic serial killer who killed purely for the pleasure of it. How violent and sadistic? 11 life sentences merely for hi known  crimes. That’s how violent and sadistic. And again, this was when he was just a normal guy.

Oh, and on top of all that he doesn’t trigger Peter’s Spider Sense, making him immeasurably more vulnerable to an already overwhelming powerful foe.

He is possibly the single most physically dangerous Spider-Man villain of all!

This isn’t idle little trivia about the character by the way. It is key to his whole concept and was laid out explicitly in his original appearance. In fact, in that first appearance he was so powerful that Peter was helpless and forced to team up with Venom, who lived to kill him!

Even when backed up by Cloak and Dagger, Spider-Man’s ribs take a pounding from Carnage, Shriek and Doppelganger. It is in this injured state he returns home to a concerned and naturally  upset Mary Jane.

She then begins an argument with Peter when he tells her he plans on going back out there.

Let’s sum up so far.

MJ has been stressed for months prior to this to the point where she’s started smoking.

Peter and her nearly died mere days ago because their friend went psycho.

Said friend died in front of them.

Their other friend, his wife (who MJ was naturally going to relate more to since they were both the wives of costumes folks) is now a grieving widow.

MJ’s husband promised her he’d take a break for a little while so they can recover a bit.

Her husband then almost immediately went back on that promise.

His risking his life again against a bad guy who’s all but guaranteed to kill him if he fights him alone.

Last time MJ’s husband beat this guy he did it with the help of a powerful nasty piece of work who wanted to kill him. Even then they only just won. That’s how dangerous Carnage is.

This time Peter is fighting him alone, whilst injured, and Carnage has two  people backing him up.

So if it wasn’t a guarantee that Peter was dead meat before, now she might as well get ahead by planning the funeral.

THAT is the context behind MJ’s rage and desire for Peter to not be Spider-Man temporarily  in this story.

However, noticeably by the end of the story she’s changed her mind!

We then jump forward to the ‘Clone Saga’, specifically a mini-series called Spider-Man: the Final Adventure.

The context behind this story was that Peter, upon believing he was a clone and that Ben Reilly was in truth the original Peter Parker, had decided to retire and support a pregnant Mary Jane.

To this end they had both left New York but due to a lab experiment involving Peter’s blood a serial killer had mutated into a spiderlike monster. With no other heroes around Peter suits up again as Spider-Man to the dismay of the heavily pregnant Mary Jane who wants him to NOT do that.

Is this MJ being not as understanding as she could be, maybe even selfish to some degree?

Sure.

Is it also Peter being in the wrong too?

Also yes, the story brilliantly points that out.

But more significantly prior to this story the Parkers had been through Hell.

In less than a year (in-universe):

Peter’s robot parents had turned up pretending to be the genuine articles

They’d betrayed Peter, breaking his heart

Their close friend Harry Osborn had gone mad

Harry and used his knowledge of Peter’s identity to torment the Parkers

Aunt May had gone into a coma

Peter had suffered a mental breakdown

Ben Reilly and other clones had shown up (including clones of Pter’s murdered lover Gwen Stacy)

Aunt May has passed away

Peter was framed for murder

MJ had been targeted for abduction more than once

They’d discovered MJ was pregnant and that the baby might have serious health issues due to Peter’s mutated DNA

Peter was revealed as a clone and had a second mental breakdown

During his mental distress Peter had accidentally smacked MJ across the room

The Jackal had nearly killed everyone on the planet

The Jackal mind controlled Peter into trying to murder MJ

MJ had nearly died due to complications with the pregnancy

That isn’t even everything but all that stuff had been happening across the previous three years of publication alone. And as I said in-universe it was less than a year.

So MJ and Peter had been through a LOT of horrible and stressful things that had put them both on the edge and sometimes over it. Most of that stuff was connected to Peter’s life as Spider-Man that MJ always had mixed feelings about at best. And now after Peter FINALLY retired and their lives were blissfully normal, allowing them to catch their breaths and do some much needed healing, Peter is coming out of retirement…When it isn’t 100% necessary for him to do so.

And all this is happening during MJ’s second or third trimester when she is very obviously heavily pregnant. This often can be a stressful time for pregnant people generally and of course sometimes mood swings occur due to hormones firing all over the place. And MJ is dealing with super powered spider hormones on top of all this. With a baby that is a total lottery because nobody on Earth has ever been pregnant with a half human/half spider powered baby before.

Given that she is dealing with ALL that is it really unreasonable for her to desire for Peter to simply continue to be retired.

She isn’t demanding he give up being a hero.

She is angry and demanding that Peter CONTINUE the choice he already made about giving up.

Which is not the same thing and she was okay with him going back into the hero game after he pregnancy concluded.

Finally we come to the Howard Macke/John Byrne run on Spider-Man where MJ again desired Peter’s retirement.

Here is the thing, MJ once again was desiring Peter STAY retired as opposed to demanding he outright quit.

Moreover the Mackie/Byrne era was a period where MJ, Peter and other characters were often written incredibly out of character practically systemically. For example Flash Thompson behind Peter’s back literally made fun of the fact that his girlfriend Gwen Stacy and his wife Mary Jane were dead (at the time MJ’s death was faked by a stalker).

Peter and MJ were actually written in this reductive way back during this run as part of an editorial policy to break up the marriage.

The thinking at the time was to make their relationship unlikable in order to make people glad for when they got rid of it via killing off Mary Jane and leaving Peter single.

So essentially not only was MJ and Peter out of character back during this era but they were literally being sabotaged so readers would hate them.

Between that and how OOC (out of character) the characterizations were back then this by rights should simply not count in any analysis of the characters.

Now, there have been instanced post-OMD of MJ clearly wanting, asking, demanding, etc. for Peter to quit.

But as with the Mackie/Byrne era (or Black Cat from 2009-2018) these are out of character and should not truly count.

So when written in character and when there are not extenuating circumstances (like pregnancies) involved, Mary Jane would actually not ask Peter to quit and never truly has.

[ishkah]

Early Beginnings...

My 22 year old self spinning 15 year old diary entries into something or other…

One of my earliest memories is sitting by a river bend after school just sitting and thinking, being, remembering family togetherness building dams on the river, playing poo sticks. I wanted that deeply, I was aware I couldn’t be seen directly, playing with the other kids, but I also liked the idea that the adults would have to take time and think to know where I was.

With this came an identity, I heard a pride in my mum’s voice when she told the other mums where she found me, a deep nature boy that one.

I knew she would because whenever there was bedlam at home I would always take myself off outside. I knew how important it was that I didn’t see her cry because I saw it once, or get upset or argue but more than anything, she didn’t want me involved in the drama; to become something I didn’t understand.

My brother was a resistance fighter, in the trenches telling both parents what they were doing wrong, living the trauma, with two sunburn creased lines between his eyebrows to prove it.

I was a dreamer I liked this new state of being, I distrusted and held onto my words because I saw them used by other people like daggers or simply to pull on heartstrings. I must have thought a lot about how words are only used to hurt each other and get one over each other because by the time I was in secondary school I’d been given another personality story to hold onto.

I was like my great granddad I told people, he was a quite honorable man, would say hardly a word, but he always knew when something was at odds, so when he did speak his words had a profound impact on people. I became the listener and solver.

I thought about how small I was in this incomprehensible beautiful universe that I read in stories, I didn’t try much to understand it just admire it. I wanted to mimic its uniqueness, I wanted to be compassionate. I probably started labelling a lot of things, good and bad, normal and extraordinary. I went vegan with this people gave me the identity pacifist.

It wasn’t till the army came to school that I had a chance to practice what I’d learnt. Reading back over my diary at the time I felt a huge responsibility to my friends that they wouldn’t go off and get killed for no good reason. I’ve tried to stay as real to the 15 year old kid who’s newly forming ideas were shaped through the experience of what follows.

I spread my ideas militantly, if they were going to advertise the killing of innocents in my school, me and my young cronies were going to disrupt it. I wrote up a petition, confronted every kid in school with this reality. I made a ruckus because I was doing something radical that had never been tried before in the school’s history.

I must have got three quarters of the whole school to sign my little clipboard chart, not least because of the rumours that were spread, some of the kids straight out of primary learning about conscription in history class cued up to sign it, expressing a tangible fear.

My betrayal came suddenly, the teacher who invited the army to school flipped out at me, saying I was trying to limit other student’s access to knowledge about the army. I walked away furious, even more committed to stopping them, I schemed with friends how we could lock doors and sit on stage. I thought how an institution committed to educating, expanding minds could let someone go off and kill others halfway across the world.

I stubbornly asked all the head of staff each day when the army would be coming to school, all of them told me it hadn’t been scheduled but they’d tell me when they knew, not for a while…

When I walked into the school the next day to find everyone at assembly with teachers keeping a close eye on their forms in rows, I was pissed. I walked in from one side of the hall and surveyed the scene with contemptuous hilarity, down the hall, past the class sitting quietly transfixed on me, ignoring my form teacher’s calls to come sit down, and out the other end.

I sat outside with 4 girls fuming, a teacher came round to ask us back in, I glared back but 3 of us slinked back in. So this was the great resistance effort the 2 of us crumpled down to the floor.

We started talking about how depressing it all was, how powerless the teachers had made everyone feel, people had been scratching their name off the petition for fear of getting punished. We hated everything that was in that room and we threw in a few choice words of our conversation into the hall.

BULLSHIT!

The teachers guarding the doors peered through the curtains at us, they were afraid of us! Aha so they should be! Our beings and ideas were powerful!

The talk ended, the army officer came out and I felt an anger welling up in me, but I had nothing to say to him, the head of department came next, I had a maths lesson with him next but he’d lied to me only yesterday, I had no interest in hearing what he had to teach me. He encouraged me to move, saying it’s finished now, I laughed a laugh that came from the pit of my being, it was just the opposite of how I was feeling, a dramatic change in my being, nothing had come and gone, only feelings inside of me had grown a 1000 fold.

He threatened me with truancy, I learned the best way to get on an adult’s nerves was never to rise to them, never give them any ammunition. I just looked at him. None of the politics needed words, we weren’t going to get one over on each other, we were simply diametrically opposed and I wished the opposite of wanting to be understood by him by engaging him in conversation. I just watched him walk away.

The rest of the day I sat exactly where I was and made paper cranes for peace and talked to anyone and everyone. I was committed to public resistance. Resistance is emotional, beautiful even and I’d crossed a treasonous line with characteristic style. Action would from now and forever be how I wrote my story.

The next few weeks I was in and out of full-time detention where I wasn’t even allowed to go to class, I had to be watched carefully to curb my disruptive ways.

I raged against the teachers that had lied to me, but when I was in detention I got my first whiff of privilege, the kids I was in with admired my rage but with a sense of novelty.

I thought they’d understand more than anyone why I was fighting them, but they didn’t, they believed in the system more than anyone, they just got angry sometimes and needed to lash out and so were seen as unpredictable.

For most of them a care worker or teacher were the only people that would believe in them, show them the rails. I knew where the rails were but I wanted to derail them and set a new course.

But I began to hate the idea that I could afford to step off and be an example only to later intelligently articulate a political reason to excuse myself.

Even more entitled than that I had a co-conspirator mother who used her knowledge of childcare regulations to stop me from being expelled and afford me an easier sentence than my new friends who earned their detention by setting off alarms by setting fire to bits of paper and smoking in toilets

I came out of school feeling a strong sense of purpose, that words weren’t necessary in finding my-self, which validated my search for a spiritual interconnectedness based on compassion. Also the people telling you what you should or shouldn’t do can be the worst amoral shits on the planet.

I grew up as an outsider, the scouser transplanted into a tiny village in a valley in Wales. This moment was the activation of an identity I only knew through the biker friends of my mum and the stories they would tell together that I looked up to. An identity known only to myself that no one could take away from me, and I felt my internal world growing stronger, I felt a sense of purpose, the more active I felt fighting oppression, the more alive I felt. Now I have the privilege of being able to jump into so many struggles without getting burnt out or losing face.

My only limits are when I am being asked to conform to a situation I don’t agree with, in this way I need to stay spontaneous, my inner strength comes from the efficiency by which I can throw myself into a struggle and make gains, I am learning now to transform that into a circular routine of building my bases.

My outer self is a culmination of novelty stories of struggling through hardship and pushing through in pursuit of truth and finding pockets of hope. I need people around me to be open, allow me to tell my story slowly and not restrict my image to something that suits them.

When I’m on the road I’m still that little kid who disassociates, but the game of living with strangers allows me to feel creative. I feel like I need to make connections more strongly; because mutual aid is so important, the entire journey is dependent on other people. When I look at my life I see the journey, my life is about the means by which we make change not the end.