#also gimp is a pain in the ass

[youredreamingofroo]

On Repeat

// Click for HQ

Whew,,, I finally finished these! Thank you @elderwisp / @elksun / @living-undead / @dejasenti99 AND @yukikocloud FOR THE TAGS!!!! Holy wow :0

Tagging :

@circusjuney / @butteredfrogs / @mmonetsims / @flovoid

@birdietrait / @venriliz / @retrotrait / @mattodore

plus anyone else who wants to do this! Also feel free to ignore esp if you've alr done this, idk who has and hasn't im sorry 😭😭

// Extras under the cut - below is very long, so open w/ caution if you don't wanna scroll a lot 😭

This has taken the piss outta me (albeit fun), so i'm kinda just gonna explain how I think the featured line in particular is akin to the OC/Ship and not the entire song... as much as I'd love to 😭 Also it's just SUPER hard (for me) to find songs that I relate to my OCs, lyrics as well so skdjhnsjk

Roo's Song Oil & Water by Origami Button "When did I become like the ones I never thought I'd welcome in my home"

The above line in particular is quite literally Roo in the current story/character arc- He's looking at himself from a third person view and going "Oh. I am what I hate." He's looking at his old self, in college, and how he treated Leo, to now, looking at his present self and seeing the way he creeps on Leo, how he clings to him despite being several states over. Roo looks at the progression of his stalker-ish behavior, his obsession, how it went from just general clinginess that Leo could bear, to something completely unbearable after 7 years of no contact, it saddens him. So taking it quite literally, if he was at his own door and he knew how awful he was, he would slam the door on himself. A painful self reflection for him :')

Leo's Song Truth or Dare by Ricky Montgomery "Hiding in the closet, trying not to vomit, didn't even want it"

The entire first verse for this song can be applicable to Leo. As a teenager (15-16), Leo went HEAVY on drugs as a form of escapism from his parents, of course they'd always find him and get on his ass HARD for doing that shit. After a while of being sober, Leo started going to house parties, great idea- Flash forward to his third house party, and he finally cut his year long sober streak for drugs. as many as he could fit in his body. He had terrible influences around him so they encouraged him to do this shit, it didn't take long for his body to feel the god awful effects of taking so many drugs, so he ended up in the bathroom for a while- He tried to hold back the vomit because he was,,, partially enjoying his high, but he couldn't hold it back for long and ended up passing out, but not before nearly gutting himself from vomiting so much. Cut forward in time, and people got worried, bashed open the bathroom door and found Leo's unconscious body slumped over the toilet 🙃 Obv he came out fine, but it's a major moment in his life, because looking back on it, he realizes that wasn't what he wanted, he just wanted attention, he wanted to be cool, he wanted to be rebellious, but he didn't want to (nearly) kill himself. The render isn't one-to-one with the situation, but the lyrics are accurate so :3

Onia's Song Bloodstream by Soccer Mommy Scene used in render "Now a river runs red from my knuckles into the sink and there's a pale girl staring through the mirror at me"

Overall, the song talks about how the artist (Soccer Mommy) has lost her childhood innocence and how she wants to go back to her childhood and putting Onia's Sheep in Wolf's clothing motif aside, Onia misses being a child, and misses not knowing the pain and burden of being the complete opposite of what her parents wanted, so she spirals over this a lot, and like the lyrics say, "a river runs red from my knuckles into the sink," She tends to lean towards harming herself, in this case, her hands, and her knuckles- I can't draw or simulate blood in either blender or GIMP, so the red light is supposed to simulate the blood-sodden sink that she's standing over, and of course, "pale girl," is Onia, she's staring at herself, but additionally I like to think she's staring past the mirror, or staring through it (wink wink), she's spacing out and thinking about who she should've been, or who she could've been.

Hero's Song Following Eyes by Soccer Mommy "An awful feeling started creeping over me and what I saw was like no horror I had seen"

I'm keeping this short and sweet. It's not easy to find a song (that I like) that's about being haunted or cursed so. I had to re-use her song from her intro post, which isn't bad, but I did hope to find a new song kdsjhnsjk Anyways. Hero's cursed, pretty much anywhere she goes, she is forced to perceive ~the horrors~, sometimes she's forced into a blank space, a void (SOMETIMES,,, not a lot,,, rarely moreso), where she'll be tormented for who even knows how long, this moment in particular, she was walking along this catwalk in the dark, she eventually felt something that felt similar to someone dragging their fingers up your spine, in a moment of fear, she turned around and just. saw. She looked onto this,,, being, what she saw was "like no horror I had seen,,," Although to be fair, the creature isn't all that horrifying (which in my defense.. I'm a blender novice so </333)

The Hiraeth Song Nomu by Good Kid "Four eyes entwined draw four separate lines and none of them point to you"

I think this song overall is a perfect example of Roo and Leo's relationship both after Leo's confession and after Roo tried to reconnect with Leo. After Leo confessed, he tried to keep their relationship going, but it didn't work out, so he gave up (Roo didn't realize Leo was pulling such a weight and he just let their friendship fall out) After Roo tried to reconnect (aka the CURRENT storyline), Roo has been trying to keep things together and has been trying to make things work, but Leo has long-since given up on their friendship as a whole. Now in terms of the lyric above; Post-Confession, every conversation they had together would not be the same, they couldn't look each other in the eyes, their eyes would connect momentarily and separate almost immediately; Nowadays, if they WERE to be living together or near each other, they just would NOT be able to talk to each other, because Leo would be fed up with Roo and trying to avoid as much eye contact and general verbal+physical contact as possible with him. Roo, on the other hand, is just terrible with eye contact so he would have a terrible time trying to engage in eye contact with Leo.

The Ithanel / It's All Wrong Song From Eden by Hozier "Babe there's something broken about this but I might be hoping about this oh what a sin"

Ithuriel and Nanel's entire relationship is inherently toxic, they are not toxic to each other, but the underlying (or moreso, the OVERWHELMING OVERLYING) dangers of this relationship makes it toxic, broken in a way. Nanel risks her life going to see Ithuriel outside of work-related interactions and Ithuriel risks her life by just. seeing, talking to and loving Nanel. Whether they know (they do) or care (they dont) about these dangers, they still want this relationship, they live on, literal, prayers that they are not caught and that they can continue to love each other in peace, but overall, their relationship, in the eyes of the heavenly council (ehhh W.I.P term for IAW lore stuff), is a sin, and nothing but a sin.

Ithuriel's Song What You Mean by Rome Hero Foxes "Cause every little god damn thing you do makes me wanna get close to you"

The lyrics speak for themselves... Ithuriel is very dedicated to Nanel, and literally every waking moment of seeing and knowing Nanel drives Ithuriel up the walls because she loves her so much.

Nanel's Song Future Me Hates Me by The Beths "It's getting dangerous, I could get hurt, I know, I've counted up the cons, they far outweight the pros."

This is semi-foreshadowing, but Nanel knows that her and Ithuriel's relationship is forbidden, wrong (not cuz its gay necessarily,, 😭), and the way Ithuriel's heavenly role works means that their relationship status and every interaction outside of a required interaction is a risky game of one or both of them being punished and sentenced to death. But ! Nanel loves Ithuriel wayyyy too much to let how insanely dangerous their relationship is to get in the way of them loving and being with e/o.

Nirvana's Song 1999 by Beabadoobee "And I'm not wasting time again, closure instead of s^x, and I'm not wasting time again" Idk if I need to censor s^x but i am justttt in case...

Oof, Nirvana... Nirvana has always been sxually active, she's always had one-night-stands with other men, she's tried to continue things after that ONS, but it never works, she's tried to have relationships with women, but they just use her for s^x. She's tired of wasting time with people who just want her for her body, she's tired of s^x, she just wants, well, closure, she wants someone who will love her for her, she wants a relationship without s^x, or at least isn't s^x-focused, she just wants to know someone will love her past her body. Although aforementioned is all just a habit so she will unfortunately end up right back where she started and continue this uncomfortable and sad spiral.

[socialoutsider1a]

Headcanon: House is a bisexual/gay submissive masochist as well as Wilson's bitch with House also a gimp- a sexual fetishist who loves not only being dominated but also wearing leather and rubber body suits with masks, zips and chains while Wilson is a bisexual/gay dominant sadist.

The two men are in a 24/7 all year round BDSM relationship, regularly dividing their time between Wilson's condo and House's apartment, both of which on the outside look unchanged but the two places along with the rooms in it are in fact completely soundproof which allows the two men to enjoy having a lot of sex without any interruptions from the neighbors.

As well as there being a bedroom, a bathroom and other rooms that store their BDSM gear including a variety of toys and equipment, they also have a dungeon in the two places which is also soundproofed, the two men even playing in both dungeons. House loves being tied up with ropes and chains. He also enjoys suspension bondage as Wilson walks around him, holding a whip with House's masochistic nature emerging when Wilson hits him in the ass with said whip.

In addition, Wilson is also skilled at dirty talk and is able to use his tongue, hands and even his cock (as he's well-hung in my opinion) to give House incredible orgasms although Wilson likes to prolong the torment by using cock rings or even a chastity device/cage to stop House from getting off too quickly. House is usually left exhausted but at the same time, is glad he has Wilson in his life, Wilson the only one who can teach House the joys of obedience, pleasure and pain.

Whenever they're not doing that, House and Wilson often roam around the respective kitchen areas, naked while also doing various chores. In the past, House was originally unwilling to do it at first but thanks to Wilson showing him the benefits, he later grew to enjoy it and now, the two men do it all the time.

In bed, the two men also sleep together in the nude, House usually the little spoon with Wilson behind him, Wilson's arms also wrapped around the lower part of House's chest, Wilson's right leg brushing against House's left leg while Wilson's left leg avoids the scar on House's right leg.

[munchbell45]

yahiko and yamato for the character ask game :D !!

I'm not good at the song association thing, so I will skip that one. Sorry. IDK, I tend to listen to instrumental stuff, and I don't always think "OMG, this is so Skleeby from Splungo's Adventure" when I listen to music.

I will say that i sometimes picture (in my mind) angsty AMVs or animations of Nagato and Konan (post-Yahiko's death) set to Anemoia by Oliver Buckland. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0guReRtGWI&pp=ygUHYW5lbW9pYQ%3D%3D

Though that may be because the song was used in a really cool video game trailer.

Yahiko

Favourite thing about them?

I love his sincere desire to change the world for the better, as well as his love of others and hope for a better future. Of course, it's not just hope but also a DRIVE to make the world better. He just seems like such a sweet, hardworking dude, and if he was real I would love to know him.

Least favourite thing about them?

The fact that we don't get to see more of him. TBF, he died well before the start of Naruto, so we only see him through memories (and that one weird Infinite Tsukuyomi filler story, but I digress.) I want to see how he'd interact with MORE canon characters, I want to see MORE of the original Akatsuki, and I want to know MORE about the Hidden Rain Village.

I'd love a spin-off miniseries about the Hidden Rain Village.

Favourite line?

I'm not always the best at memorizing lines, but I'll go with this one, where he sets out to go on a mission to scout out an area.

"This land is crying, as usual. It continues to endure much pain. In the past, I hated this land that was crying all the time. But now... I want to save it... I truly feel that way. It's too much like the crybaby I used to be for me to leave it alone."

brOTP?

Obviously he is besties with Konan and Yahiko, they have a truly inseparable bond. I also imagine that he was close with each and every member of the original Akatsuki.

Sadly, there are only a few characters we see him interact with in canon, and many of them are minor.

In a happier timeline where nothing bad happened and the Hidden Leaf was magically not corrupt at all, I could see him being friends with Naruto.

OTP?

Nagato/Yahiko/Konan. They have a deep bond, forged through their collective efforts to endure many hardships. To me, it's as if they are destined to be together and to always develop a deep, intimate care and affection for each other. Even if they were to reincarnate, they'd find each other once more.

nOTP?

Yahiko/Obito, Jiraiya/Yahiko (IDK if anyone ships that, LOL,) Zetsu/Yahiko, Madara/Yahiko (Is that a thing?)

Random headcanon?

He learned how to do a lot of basic repairs, so that if the shack got beaten up, he could fix it. I could also see him loving children.

Unpopular opinion?

My man's underrated. I feel like most people tend to either forget about him or just think of him as the guy that became the Deva Path. I mean... I get why, but I wish he was more popular. How can you not love him?

Favourite picture of them?

Two options. I hope these load in.

A: This panel (I am typing this on my computer and GIMP is being a bitch, so no crop.)

B: (My PFP as of 2/5/2024)

Yamato

I am very neutral on him, so my apologies for some lame-ass answers. Also, i felt like I spent a lot of time writing my opinions on Yahiko.

Favourite thing about them?

His abilities were neat, as one of the few who could use Wood Style. i also respect how he tried his best to keep Team 7 in check and (later on) help rebuild the Hidden Leaf after Pain destroyed it.

Least favourite thing about them?

The fact that he was sidelined for most of the War Arc, serving little use outside of buffing up Zetsus. IDK, that was kind of disappointing.

Oh, I also feel weird about the fact that he's supposed to watch Orochimaru in Boruto. Like, if we treat the anime backstory as canon, dude should be traumatized by Orochimaru.

Favourite line?

That one where he threatens to use "draconic measures" on Team 7 when they keep arguing and fighting each other, I guess.

brOTP?

Kakashi once they are both adults. Sai after he is free from Dan's control, since they could relate to each other a lot (especially if you treat his anime backstory as canon.)

I could see maybe see him befriending Anko as well.

OTP?

KakaYama?

Maybe Yamato/Shizune. Yamato/Anko would either be cool or would suck.

nOTP?

Yamato/Orochimaru, Yamato/Kabuto

Random headcanon?

After the War Arc, he hangs out with Asuka, Kurenai, Guy, and Kakashi. They all reminisce about being teachers and vent to each other about weird crap that happens on the job.

Unpopular opinion?

Um... I thought the ANBU Kakashi filler arc (and Yamato's role in it) was overrated.

Dude needs more development, but that's probably the opposite of an unpopular opinion.

Favourite picture of them?

I hope this one loads in. I've been taking way too long writing this.

[bakersfield-row]

Am a Windows user, have never used anything but windows, am comfortable with windows.

Convince me to linux. Explain

I’m going to keep this short because I could make this infinitely long.

In a world where you really cannot trust big companies, windows has gotten very self conscious that they could track and sell every piece of data from their customer and add unnecessary features and no one would notice it, even though it actually makes the user experience worse. If you don’t have a key, you probably also have to over a hundred dollars just for some basic amenities, like changing a wallpaper.

Linux, in the other hand, is free and open source software (FOSS), which, in its simplest form, means that all the code is there for you to change and revise. Because of this openness, most Linux distros usually never have features to sell your data, and if they do, someone’s bound to make a patch to have that not happen. This means that Linux is much more safe and secure than windows by a long shot, and you really don’t have to worry about your information being sold to dubious companies.

Linux, with all its FOSS-ness, also allows anyone to make theirs distro look anyway you want. For instance, I personally prefer the look of MacOS to Windows (I know, probs controversial opinion). On windows, it’s be a pain in the ass to get it that way, especially without a key, while in Linux you can easily do that with relative ease, as long as you have a guide. Linux is just more freedom, something probably over said but still very true.

There’s other reasons why people would want to switch to Linux to. I didn’t really note that it’s less “bloated” than windows, which means that it has a lot less unnecessary features and thus will run way faster on any computer, especially old ones. Bloat has been kinda a controversial word in the community, since people like to argue that some distros are worse because they have more features. However, no matter what you choose, it’ll probably be better than windows.

The biggest drawback to Linux, in my opinion, is obviously app compatibility. I’ve mentioned gaming before, but that’s something that’s seedy vastly improved over the years. However, some popular apps are just incomparable with Linux, most notably the entire adobe suite and (unsurprisingly) Microsoft office. There’s a couple other things you can do to circumnavigate this.

You can try to find alternatives. GIMP works as a nice alternative to photoshop, Davinci Resolve has native Linux versions, and libreoffice is probably capable enough to replace word or PowerPoint.

You can try to install wine and pray to god it’ll work (though it probably won’t).

You can run a virtual machine and run windows with that, thought that’s not GPU accelerated and thus might be laggy.

OR, and this is the best option in my opinion, you can dual boot windows along side linux, so if you really need to use it, it’s there as an option. If you’re going to do this option, make sure to install windows first before Linux (because of some stupid thing where it erases it in grub or smtn) and that the two operating systems are on separate drives. Also try to debloat windows though guides on YouTube, but know that it won’t be as private as Linux.

Honestly, that’s as much as I have to say about the subject matter. Others are free to add on, since I probably missed a few things. You might not like it at first, but I do encourage you to at least try it. Hell, you might even like it so much that using windows is now alien to you (like me, lmfao).

Hope this helped, and remember, never type “sudo rm -rf /” in the terminal. (Aw fuck, I forgot to explain the terminal. Oh well, I hope someone can explain it to you, and if you get stuck on it there’s always guides online)

[virtuangel]

my millie for the ask game i want to ask 24 14 and 37 thank you i love you

my ina whom i LOVE

24. what is something that you're wanting to learn right now?

i still rlly wanna learn gifmaking like so bad i keep being like THIS wld be SO much better if i cld make gifs . but i refuse to try on gimp (mainly bc i remember how graphic w gifs turned out when i tried them when i was like 14 but also just like . gimp is Not . made for gifs it's just . not) and to this day all my cracked ps refuse to import videos so .

14. colour(s) you like?

on graphics (and just in general ig) i like to use beiges and pastels to get started out if i don't have a clear colour scheme in mind !! also purple is a pain in the ass to work with sometimes but as u might or might not have noticed it does inspire me a lot i guess ?? or like. i see a lot of songs in a purple light and since songs r often my main inspo . .

37. what do you feel is a must in every graphic?

i feel incomplete when i dont add at least ONE soft light layer like no matter how little it does to the end result i just . have to have it there ?? also well . obviously u need the #heart,

[jazzyblusnowflake]

Which brushes do you use for CSP 😳??

oh i always dreaded this question lmao-

ill be honest and clear cut with yall~

✨I have no idea✨

//wHEEze-

ok lemme explain, [tho if you dont wanna read all this just skip to the images in the end that i posted of my dumb self made and modified brushes] i have always used different mediums in my art~ ive used SAI, Gimp 2, CSP and occasionally Photoshop for the effects, filters and some brushes~ and i almost never remember where i downloaded them from because, first off, they were free anyway and i also almost always change them to fit my style beyond recognition to how they originally looked by default XDDD

MOST of my work is usually with SAI with almost the only brush i use in general for everything [ Inking, Coloring the edges, Shading, Lighting, and most other hand drawn shapes and hatching and etc ] is used with these settings. i never change it because i had years of experimenting to finally be comfortable with these and i will die a painful death if anything happens to my laptop before i could save these settings so i keep it in my art files just in case lmao~ [i do NOT like change and trying new stuff is2g i need therapy-]

HOWEVER when it comes to CSP i have had..... very depressing progress yay :D ... SAI in my experience has been a bit sucky in being able to handle large sizes and layers or anything else and having the possibility of crashing but the way it makes some things easy has been a MIRACLE for my lazy ass, i might have given up art before i ever even started if SAI didn't exist, but as how all EASY things usually are they start lacking in variety after a while, and i realized since one of my friends had bought me a CSP a long time ago, heck i might as well use it and oh my GOD the anxiety it induced ended me up with an IV and several trips to the hospital for injections to calm me down [and potentially temporarily blinding me] im not even joking. i mean yeah i was going through stuff back then that did NOT help my situation in general but the fact that CSP doubled my anxiety cuz i just couldn't draw with it made me have several existential breakdowns where i thought i will never be able to improve my art as a self proclaimed artist anymore because i had gotten so used to only working with what i found PERFECTLY comfortable to my own tastes that im just useless at getting used to anything else... so what happened was that i went on the most violent weekly spree of downloading any brush i could that even resembled REMOTELY to what i wanted- i also searched for brushes on tumblr or google or anywhere else- i watched so many CSP transition videos on youtube my brain was spinning and i was on a rout of self destructive agony to make this WORK. so now i have a bajillion downloaded brushes and all of them have spawned 20 other copies that i have aggressively modified beyond any sort of resemblance to what they used to be- it doesn't help that the file names and the brush names are different so i cant search for them either 😑

but if the brush names could help you in finding them uhhh, heres like.... 1/10th of the brushes i downloaded and modified that i actually did NOT go back and delete because they are fun to have around XD

have fun, //goes to cry in a corner-

[spookyspaghettisundae]

Where Nobody Else Will Go

Jericho sat in a daze, staring at the crimson splatters on the wall.

Were they ketchup? Or blood?

He sniffled and removed the sunglasses from his nose—a pair of aviators that certainly never belonged to him. The whole room around him resembled the aftermath of a hurricane. Chairs had been overturned, the mattress of a king-sized bed had been stood up against the floor-to-ceiling windows to a huge balcony, and the color of the carpeted floor could barely be identified with all the trash littering it.

Plastic wrappers crinkled under his ass as he shifted in his uncomfortable seat on the floor, a sharp pain coming from his butt cheeks that had fallen asleep.

How in the hell had he even gotten there? This wasn’t the shabby motel room where he had gone to sleep, awakened by that woman and her thugs—

The power of a thousand hangovers converged on his skull and started hammering it like a heavy metal drum set. His whole head throbbed. Jericho groaned and tossed the sunglasses aside, then rubbed his face.

Barely able to stand straight once he rose to his feet, the tip of his bare toes caused empty bottles to clink and empty cans to clatter. Junk, wherever he gazed.

“Man, what the hell?” he muttered.

Surfing on the waves of a powerful headache, first memories crashed upon his aimlessly floating shreds of consciousness.

He had not just sampled booze from that magic skull. That woman had mixed some liquid drugs into the bourbon.

Aria. That was her name. Aria Chambers.

Jericho had never gone to college or enjoyed any higher education. Yet last night, he had chugged toxic brew from the hollowed-out skull of a dead president, as if he had to make up for lost time by mimicking the wildest frat parties of his wasted youth.

He groaned again, sitting against an elegant white dresser, now stained by what had to be a mixture of vomit and more of the red stuff.

He scratched the red stuff and sniffed. Retched.

Definitely ketchup.

That smell brought back memories. Those gorilla-shaped men in the three-piece suits kept bringing them whatever they asked for. Aria’s drunken giggles tickled his mind. He recalled how one of those cheap plastic ketchup packets from the golden arches had exploded in a spray of red splatters.

She had kept serving him up more to drink from the skull, and he downed every drop like his life had depended on it. They had scattered dozens of bottles throughout the hotel room to show for it.

Truly, though, he had never felt so free as he had last night. He almost permitted himself to think he enjoyed partying with Aria.

He waded through the sea of trash, looking for anything that remotely resembled his clothing. A wide mirror above the bed revealed he was currently garbed in a black leather gimp suit, with his buttocks exposed. Red streaks marked his cheeks. Soon after groping them and riddling over the painful origin of the reddened marks, he spotted their source—a small riding crop, haphazardly discarded upon the empty bed frame.

Jericho groaned a third time. He only drew a blank when he tried to recall if they had slept together. Though, judging by the chaos of this mysterious hotel room, he wouldn’t have called it sleeping together.

He would have called it fucking.

Either way, his memories failed him, leaving him unable to fill the gaps with any coherent recollection.

They had also been talking at some point. He had climbed out of the skylight of a white stretch limousine, howling in joy, and drunk out of his mind, just before the two thugs pulled him back down, only for Aria to hand him another skull full of whiskey and liquid LSD, which he greedily drank up.

A robotic giggle interrupted the disjointed reverie when he stepped on a busted Baby So Happy doll. It was missing an arm and a leg, and someone had drawn a mustache and devil horns onto its face with a magic marker.

“The fuck?” he muttered.

Finally, he rediscovered his black jeans. Someone had crudely clipped the legs with scissors, turning them into jorts, provoking a whole string of profanities from Jericho. He swore some more when he remembered that he might have done it himself. He angrily dug around in their pockets until he found a lighter, then tossed the ruined pants aside.

After several more minutes of rooting around in this disaster zone, he gave up on looking for his leather jacket and instead retrieved a half-smoked blunt from an ashtray, which he lit up and took a long drag from.

He let himself slide into sitting in a shallow puddle of cold liquid in the bathtub of what had once been a luxurious bathroom. Two empty champagne glasses sat on the ledge, with dozens of party streamers crisscrossing the floor in a riot of garish colors. Lewd scrawls drawn in bright red lipstick marked the mirror.

More memories returned as he sat and smoked in silence.

Aria had kept asking about the Way King. In turn, Jericho kept stopping her from saying that name out loud. He loathed the horrors that followed every time anybody uttered the Way King’s name.

Some asshole must have told her about the boss. That thought bounced around in the cavernous hollow of his throbbing skull.

His “master”, as she had put it. Jericho had remained uncooperative.

After another long drag from the blunt, he downed some remaining drops of champagne from an empty bottle. They tasted more like warm spit.

This is going to be a problem. She is going to be a problem. Fuck, Jericho thought. I kind of like her.

Aria Chambers seemed to be the same kind of fucked up on the inside as Jericho, just packaged with a different flavor. Sweet like strawberry-flavored bubblegum and cotton candy, with all skeletons neatly stacked away in her closets, and dressed like a rockstar. She clearly knew about magick and the dukes. Hell, for all he knew, she probably was one of the dukes herself. And she was leagues apart from being as uptight and psychotic as the others he had had the misfortune of getting to know.

She must have footed the bill for this hotel suite—even through all the destruction they had wrought, the place must have cost something on the high end of triple digits per night, Jericho wagered. Just pondering what might be charged for damages here, his head hurt even more.

Still smoking the blunt in his daze, he stumbled around the suite until a sharp pain in the back of his head reminded him of more pressing matters. The thing she had distracted him from.

His job.

He had something to do here.

Bright light accompanied a blurry glimpse of the skyline of Chicago outside the hotel balcony windows, providing another stark reminder of his dirty work. Dirty, stained hands, destined for dirty, magick work.

He still had work to do. For the fucking Way King. It was, after all, the only way he knew to escape this life. A paradox of its own. Going deeper down the spiral to escape. Building momentum to fly off the rails and crash through the walls of the cosmic drainpipe. Just one more job, he kept telling himself. Just one more job, and I can punch my final card.

But he had now paraded himself right into another problem. It could take him hours to recover his wallet—if he hadn’t lost it before getting to this hotel already. Hours to acquire clothes—something other than a gimp suit and a pair of jorts, something that wouldn’t get him arrested the moment he took a stroll through the city. And maybe a few minutes to hijack a ride, once he had the first two objectives covered. A gun also wouldn’t have hurt, but that was low on his list of priorities.

Aria had effectively left him stranded.

Jericho grunted, wondering if that had been on purpose. If she worked for some other faction, trying to stop him from getting his work done.

Maybe. But that was not adding up. Though he refused to believe in coincidences, Jericho knew the power of synchronicity. The way their kind were unconsciously drawn to each other. Trouble finding the troublemakers.

He snuffed out the blunt in the overflowing ashtray and lumbered his way around in search of the room’s air conditioning controls. The place was hot and stuffy. More than a pricey room like this should have been.

Courtesy of his own meddling, of course.

Trash crunched and clattered with each shambling step. It took him half a minute of swiveling and stumbling around like a zombie till Jericho remembered where to look. Finally, he found the panel, kicking some junk out of the way so he could stand and lean against the wall.

He flipped open the control panel and tapped the top of the plastic device three times. Three times three. Then he adjusted the dial to a freezing temperature and muttered the magic words out loud.

“Gesserred agamemnis.”

He tapped the device again, three times three.

“Come on, you piece of shit,” Jericho muttered. “Open sesame, motherfucker. Roger, over, magick S.O.S., open your fucking ears. Come in.”

The device whined. Whispers erupted from the nearest air conditioning vent on the wall.

“Jericho,” whispered the voice in the air. “Time is running out. What are you doing? The Way K—”

“Shut up,” Jericho said. “Don’t say his fucking name and just—just let me speak, okay? I’m aware of the time. Just shut the fuck up and help me out here. I need clothes, cash, and a car. And a gun. Can you do that?”

Wind whistled from the vent. An eerie silence accompanied it.

“Yes. FBI agent Parker will arrive in Chicago soon, and you need to intercept her.”

“I remember my fucking job, you mystic jack-off. Stop wasting time and send me—”

“A new group emerged from the shadows,” hissed the whispers. “The Threshold was disrupted. Threads are rapidly unraveling around Parker. I cannot see what they want, but you must hurry. Get to her first. You must act decisively. You must be willing to go where nobody else—”

Jericho used his middle finger to flick the air conditioning controls off.

It rendered the whispering wind silent.

“Asshole,” Jericho muttered.

He flipped the vent both birds, even if the Oracle on the other end couldn’t see it.

It was, after all, the thought that mattered.

Now, all he had to figure out was how to get through the hotel to an exit without getting himself arrested. Jericho continued rooting through the mountains of trash and overturned furniture. He recoiled when the broken television set suddenly emitted a flurry of sparks.

Another series of profanities escaped him when he slipped on a half-eaten burger in its wrapper, leaving his bare foot slimy with patty and ketchup and pickles.

He finally recovered one of his boots from underneath the bed and held it up high in triumph. With a bit of luck, some other clothing remained in this chaos.

His triumph was cut short. A chill ran down his spine. He sensed a presence before—

The door to the suite opened. Aria waltzed inside, with the two thugs flanking her.

She looked Jericho up and down through a pair of yellow contrast spectacles, and Aria had clearly cleaned up better than Jericho in the meanwhile. Not a sign of any hangover or lasting effects from their wild party last night. That, or she was good at concealing it with makeup and narcotics. And the eccentric white designer dress did more than enough to grab all his attention.

The two thugs looked like two different guys, though Jericho had paid little mind to their features.

“You look like shit,” she said, puffing a cigarette.

“Hey, Hollywood. You should have called. I was just about to freshen up,” Jericho muttered. “Where the fuck is my shit?”

“Do I look like the Oracle of New York?” She clicked her tongue. “I don’t know, but I’m sure you know why I’m back. You know what I want to ask, right?”

Jericho sighed.

“Yeah, listen. I’d really love to tell you, but I’d rather eat literal shit than fuck my boss. That crazy German fuck can do things that are far worse than murder.”

Aria rolled her jaw and set it.

“He’s German, huh?”

“Ah, fuck. That’s it. That’s all I’m saying. That’s it.”

Jericho focused. He channeled his innermost power. The darkness lurking in the deepest recesses of his heart.

He needed to get out of here.

Now.

He focused on the little that remained of his life. The memories that arrived effortlessly. His only friends from Evergreen. Unimportant little things they treasured so dearly, like Tom’s crappy old Apple laptop, or Joel’s ring from his trip through Nepal.

Breaking the awkward silence, Aria’s speech trailed off, like his memories, dissolving into the ether. She said, “Listen, darling…”

The headache vanished. The throbbing in his skull ceased.

Purity followed. Clarity. The purification of a raging fire.

Destruction.

The belt buckles exploded from the pants of the two thugs, causing their pants to drop. Their dress jackets exploded into clouds of worthless fabric scraps, revealing shredded white shirts, and they yelled in pain as their earpieces turned into molten plastic slag in a flash, forcing them to yank them out.

Jericho squinted. Aria had remained completely unaffected by the explosion of unloved objects.

“How in the fuck?” he asked. “How?”

One of the hired thugs scrambled to draw a melting pistol from a sagging, broken concealed-carry holster, but Aria slapped his hand away.

She glared at Jericho. Reminded her of the high school teacher he used to have a crush on as a kid. He peed a little in his gimp suit.

He had never seen anybody unaffected by his breed of magick.

With a wave of her other hand, holding the cigarette, the two gangsters in the suits froze. Nodded. Cheeks rosy with fury and shame, they both pulled their pants back up, stepped outside, and closed the door behind themselves, leaving Aria alone with Jericho in the hotel suite.

“Jericho, darling,” she repeated through gritted teeth. “You are very, very, stupid. Comically stupid, even.”

“Uhuh,” Jericho said, failing to keep his composure and looking for a way to escape.

The only other way out was a drop of a dozen stories off the balcony. He bit the inside of his cheek, trying to come up with plan B.

Aria added, “I could have hurt you if I wanted to. But here’s the kicker—I don’t. Even after that little stunt of yours.”

He paused, meeting her gaze through the yellow spectacles. She calmly smoked.

Not an ounce of fury about her.

She asked, “Do you even have any more juice to sling?”

“Of course! I could burn this shithole to the ground,” he lied.

She dropped the cigarette from its holder. Underneath an expensive red heel matching the rest of her fancy runway attire, she stomped out the butt on the hotel room floor.

“What little of your life remains for you to destroy?” she asked, twisting her heel to punctuate the question.

He chewed on the inside of his cheek. Maybe she was going to give him an easy way out, after all.

“You sure you don’t want to tell me about the Way K—”

“Ah!” he shouted to interrupt it. “Zip it. Please, for both our sakes, don’t say that asshole’s name out loud. And how the fuck do you know about that? My cheat codes?”

She tilted her head and sighed. An air of amusement washed over her mien.

“You were very talkative last night, even if you dodged every question about your… employer. I almost thought we had something here.”

“Sure. So, can I go now? Are we gonna have to do this the hard way?”

“He’s got something on you, doesn’t he? This isn’t loyalty, this is—”

“Look, I just need to go, or I will be in a world of hurt. And you might enter that world with me, just by proxy.”

“He’s got something I want, darling. If you’re a sweetheart and promise to help me get it, I’ll be out of your hair for now. You can go off to dance to the piper’s tune, get back to me, and we can talk shop afterwards. I have an aged bottle of bourbon we could share to sweeten the deal; catch up on old times. How about that?”

Jericho sighed.

“Sure, fine. Okay. I mean, for what it’s worth, I’d rather work for you than him. I just need to know I won’t be finding out what fates are worse than death, alright?”

Anything to placate her for now. Maybe he would even think about what she wanted. Maybe.

The yellow shades clicked as she slid them down the ridge of her nose, gazing at him over silvered edges.

Eyes fierce. Crystal blue. Seductive.

Jericho caved immediately. The maybe turned into definitely.

“Okay,” she breathed. She pushed the shades back up her nose. “Your other shoe’s over there.”

She whipped her hair around and left the hotel suite.

Left him alone to scramble, peeling out of the gimp suit with effort, getting dressed in what remained of his attire. Save for the sorry state of his jeans, he found all the articles.

By the time he snuck out of the trashed hotel room, Aria and the two thugs had disappeared. Jericho slinked through spacious white halls to the nearest elevator. It dinged melodically, serenading him with finest music on the ride down. Its doors slid open without incident, and he strode outside at a fast pace, avoiding eye contact with a well-dressed concierge behind the front desk. The majestically and comically gigantic entrance lobby made Jericho uncomfortable in how long it took him to march himself outside.

His body was taut as a wire, expecting to stop himself from punching anybody in the face if he encountered anybody stupid enough to stop him. Could not afford to cause trouble.

Wearing a pair of jorts with his leather jacket and black boots embarrassed him the most. The rest of his disheveled appearance was standard fare, nothing he normally felt ashamed about. Several people in the lobby stared. His face burned; he kept his eyes level with the exit. Acting as if he belonged where he clearly did not.

Finally, he had made it outside. He furrowed his brow upon reading the logo above the entrance.

Hilton Chicago.

More than ready to leave, Jericho looked around and exhaled a sigh of relief. Several limos and taxis waited at the curb. One of them had to have been sent by Michael, he reckoned.

While he scanned them, two unfamiliar faces approached. Shadows in the corner of his eye. An Asian man and an African American woman. Dressed like government agents. They gave him a rotten feeling, worse than his breath currently smelled.

Jericho turned, pretending to have overlooked them. He wandered down the sidewalk, away from the hotel entrance—away from them. Shooting a glance into a window and glimpsing their silhouettes in the reflection, he confirmed his suspicion.

They were tailing him. Beelining right through the crowd to follow his path. He bit his tongue before he could swear anymore, picking up his pace and marching down the sidewalk, weaving past passersby.

He didn’t know Chicago well and had zero clue regarding his current whereabouts.

Should have asked Aria, he thought. Stupid.

Another glance over his shoulder. The two suits had matched his pace. He had no idea where to go. Crossed the next road despite the red light. Tires screeched, a horn honked in anger, and he waved at the driver with a shit-eating green, flipping each other the bird. It helped mask his nervousness.

He did not want to wait at the crossing for those two suits to catch up.

They kept following him while he continued down a narrow driveway. A bridge crossed over the road, and one of the L-trains rumbled and squeaked and shrieked as it rode above him. Jericho ducked into the alleyway above which the train tracks trailed, sticking to the shadows. His eyes darted about, looking for a place to hide.

Nothing.

Only a parking lot with a high fence, and an endless stretch of brick walls covered in breathtakingly beautiful graffiti.

“Fuckfuckfuckfuck—”

Maybe a dumpster, he wondered. Just hop in a dumpster and wait them out.

Nope. Too late. Another furtive glance, and he knew the two suits had already caught up, rounding the corner into the same alley. Definitely on his ass.

And with nowhere to hide.

At the very least, there was nobody else nearby. No immediate witnesses if things turned ugly. Just the two suits and him.

They probably had guns, but he had one last trick up his sleeve. Aria had guessed right: he was running out of juice. In their wild night of partying, he must have told her something about how he worked mojo. This was, indeed, going to be his last shot for now.

A long shot.

“Yo,” said the Asian man behind him. He sounded almost friendly, but his casual tone could not fool Jericho into missing the hidden malevolent intent. “Hey, hold up, dude.”

Jericho gritted his teeth and stopped in his tracks. He slowly turned, finally getting a chance to get a good look at the two.

Without fail: two concealed-carry holsters in their jackets. Good shoes, both of them, suitable for running. And they both looked athletic enough to give Jericho a run for his money.

Correction, he thought. Reality kicked him in the teeth again. I feel as shitty as I look, and I can’t get up a fucking flight of stairs without feeling winded.

“Okay—the hell is your problem, you fucks?” he asked them, spittle spraying from his mouth.

They stopped a solid dozen steps away.

The Asian man smirked. Said nothing.

Without even as much as twitching, Jericho reached deep inside himself.

He rooted around in the few pleasant memories he retained from his early life. His dog, Finch, cuddling up to him before that sweet little dachshund died of old age. One of his only friends as a kid. It wasn’t like he wanted to sacrifice a memory like that, but what choice did he have?

Murderous intent sparkled in the woman’s eyes. The smirk on the Asian guy projected malice.

They weren’t going to play nice if he didn’t do exactly as they said. And neither was Jericho.

The clarity returned. The memory purged. A past going up in smoke, dissolving with the memory of tossing Finch’s leash into a bonfire. Jericho’s cheeks and ears burned with inner flames, all blood rushing to his head.

All the woman managed to exclaim was the clipped phrase, “What the—”

Their jackets ripped open, fabric torn asunder, and their pistols went flying towards Jericho in a straight line.

He snatched both firearms out of the air and pointed the weapons at the two. Jericho’s face twisted and froze somewhere between a grimace and a wicked, toothy grin.

“I haven’t even had breakfast, but I’ll pass on whatever bullshit you’re selling,” he told them, keeping one pistol trained on each of them.

“Okay,” said the Asian guy. “My bad. I take back what I said about this shmuck.” Way too confident for having witnessed Jericho work real magick.

“Hey—asshole,” Jericho shouted at him. “Do you not have eyeballs in your fucking head? I’m holding the guns here. Your guns.”

“Easy,” said the woman. The sparkle of murderous intent had given way to a dull sheen of surprise. “We can talk about this. We wanted to talk, anyway, but we can do it on your terms.”

“Oh, spare me that bullshit,” Jericho groaned. “I’ve got things to see and people to do. How about we start with who the fuck you are?”

The Asian man thumbed at himself. “Tommy Wu.”

“Jolena Ford,” said the woman.

“Cool. Who do you work for?”

They exchanged a glance before meeting Jericho’s gaze again.

“The House,” said Tommy.

“What house?” Jericho asked.

Then it hit him. He knew exactly which house they meant. That House. The House of Change.

All the fire died. The blood drained from his face, and a clammy cold made his palms holding the pistols turn sweaty.

They said nothing else. Either they knew that he knew, or they refused to speak of its nature out loud.

Jericho refused to return there. He had escaped it once and dreaded the thought of never escaping it again.

“What the fuck do you—what the fuck does the House want from me?” he asked them. “I’m not going back!”

He would rather have the Way King turn him into a doormat for the rest of eternity.

Jolena said, “Mister Wu here had the bright idea that it would be easier to get to you than it would be to…”

She stopped mid-sentence. Clenched her jaw.

“Spit it out,” Jericho said, cocking the hammers on both pistols for emphasis. “Or I’m gonna put you both in wheelchairs.”

Tommy tilted his head and sighed.

“No point in beating around the bush. We were going to get you instead of intercepting the FBI agent. Parker.”

“Why? What do you want from me? Or her? Why the fuck is everybody looking for this FBI lady all of a sudden?”

“I don’t know,” Tommy said.

“Are you fucking kidding me? Do not tempt me, motherfuckers,” Jericho spat.

“We truly don’t know. You’d have to ask him. Your… boss,” said Jolena. “The Way K—”

Jericho pulled the triggers. He blazed away with both pistols. Unfortunately, he was a terrible shot, and handguns truly weren’t meant to be wielded the way he was misusing them. Most bullets missed, though one of them winged Tommy in the leg, provoking a crude expletive from the Asian man.

The rest of the bullets just sprayed sparks from the asphalt, and the dumpster, and the steel pillar upholding the bridge while the two agents of the House scrambled to find cover.

Jericho wasn’t sticking around to find out or make sure how badly he had hurt them.

He ran.

His lungs burnt with growing intensity as he charged down the alleyway, tumbling over the nearest fence, stumbling over a pile of cardboard boxes, and crashing through a door. Someone yelped in terror as he pushed a stranger out of the way, carrying stacks of something or the other, now flying wildly in every direction. Someone else shouted in the distance, and yet another person yelled bloody murder.

Too frantic to distinguish if they were chasing him closely, Jericho fled like a coward. It usually worked out for him this way. His most reliable method of survival. He ran like a madman. Guided only by instinct, blindly taking turns, and zigzagging through back alleys and narrow spaces in his mad dash.

He ran past a crowd of surprised faces working at a loading dock, charged right around a corner, and down a ramp of the next building’s underground parking garage.

His whole body was on fire, covered in a sheen of sweat, and the air rattled through a tortured throat into lungs abused by smoking since his thirteenth year of age. He hid behind a van and held his breath.

Plenty of ruckus outside. Emergency sirens blared in the distance. Traffic in the streets. The L-train rumbled down the elevated bridges. Honking horns. Shouts. Chatter.

The blood rushed in his ears; his lungs screamed at him to breathe.

Breathe.

He had shaken them. For now. He hoped. He had to hope.

Definitely clipped the Asian guy, Tommy. The splatter of crimson from his leg had stained asphalt, one of the last clear glimpses he had caught of the two people from the House.

The House of Change.

Jericho shuddered as he crept between parked vehicles, testing them to see if any set off any alarms. He eventually climbed into a shiny black sedan.

He tried to banish the thoughts of that place. The House. It haunted his nightmares and waking hours. If he could have sacrificed those memories for magick, he would have done so a long time ago. Unfortunately, it never worked that way.

No free lunches.

No keys under the mat, for that matter, either. Nor behind the sun visor, nor in the glove compartment. No keys in the car whatsoever.

Never such luck.

Luckily, he knew how to hotwire a car. It would serve him well enough to get to the suburbs, where he could finally catch this damned FBI agent, deliver her to the boss, and call it a day.

Nobody entered the garage while he worked. His heartbeat still raced, his lungs still burned, and stale sweat caked his body, but he started feeling somewhat safer. The sound of police sirens passed by outside, en route to some other crime scene—perhaps unrelated to him, he hoped.

He desperately matched the two wires he had gutted from the car’s ignition. Tiny sparks flew on each attempt. It took several attempts till the engine chugged to life.

With the car started, he finally permitted himself to sigh in relief.

Now, perhaps, he could finally get his work back on track. Get the Way King off his back. He had to hope.

He took control of the steering wheel and further controlled his shuddering breaths, calming himself. Get the Way King off my back—that’s the dream. Just one more job.

The radio lit up, springing to life without invitation. It whined and emitted eerie shrieks, like a cacophony of demons howling from beyond the void. Freezing air shot from the vents of the expensive car’s air conditioning.

Whispers hissed at him through the slits of its vents. A familiar voice. “What happened? Where did you go?”

“Two fuck-heads from the House of Change tried to jump me. Don’t worry about it.”

Something inside the air vents rattled, like bottle caps caught within.

“Don’t worry about it?” Static crackled from the radio with a high-pitched whine, causing Jericho to cringe; becoming so painful he almost let go of the steering wheel to cover his ears.

“DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT?”

“Alright! Alright! I got it handled, okay?”

Another whine from the radio, more rattling in the vents.

“Do not let them stop you. Do not fail. I sent help.”

“Help? I already have a car and not one, but two guns, no thanks to you, asshole. Your help better be a cabbage roll of cash, a medium steak, and a free blowjob, or I'll—”

The cold muzzle of a gun pressed against the back of Jericho’s neck. He had a hunch about who it was, and he hated this. He hated how she could just show up like this.

“You will bring Agent Parker to the Ranch,” Michael whispered through the vents.

Jericho groaned through gritted teeth. A creepy woman’s smile greeted him through the reflection in the rearview mirror.

He knew that smug smile. A pair of piercing blue eyes, long raven-black hair, and a symmetrical face framed full lips, a face too attractive to fit the psychopath she was.

Jericho hated her. Karma was a bitch.

“Just so you appreciate how important this is, I sent Karma to ensure you wouldn’t fuck this up,” Michael whispered.

The most sadistic bitch Jericho knew.

[wrenhavenriver]

For the gif ask-box game: 13, 19, 34!

thank you i’m love you <3

Where or from whom did you learn how to gif? I started out making the most busted ass gifs you’d ever seen in your life through wildly inefficient trial and error (shit like pausing a video clip at uneven intervals to manually take screenshots of frames, then compiling them all into a folder and opening it in GIMP to add subtitles and other adjustments frame by frame - reeeeally terrible). I probably only had the patience for this since this was back in 2010ish when the gif file size limit was like 0.5 MB, so you really couldn’t squeeze in many frames without some serious sorcery (and/or making everything greyscale and cutting out huge swathes of the background). At some point though I went “there has to be a better way than this” and started looking up tutorials by other infinitely more competent gifmakers (something something standing on the shoulders of giants) and eventually migrated over to photoshop, and the rest is just a decade+ of very slow tweaks (and hopefully improvements, my god, some of my old gifs have me Marge Simpson Hiding Face Meme dot png).

What is your gif’ing process like? Gif’ing little bits of dialogue is generally the simplest - I gather my footage, write out the transcript of what is being said in my Notes app, block out how the text will be divided/how many gifs the set will be, then import the frames to photoshop and figure out what kind of coloring I’m dealing with. Some games are a lot simpler and only need some basic Brightness/Contrast adjustments, but others (Dishonored, Control, etc) need more Curves/Color Balance/Selective Color/etc layers to try and neutralize any particularly strong filters/effects to dig out more natural or visually interesting colors underneath. From there it’s a matter of adding subtitles, checking the timing, making sure the loop isn’t too jarring, cutting down the file size if needed, then exporting and checking how it actually looks on tumblr and making any final adjustments based on that (usually adding some extra brightness layers or tweaking the frame rate).

Sets with any sort of typography effects take a lot longer because i am Very Bad at them, and sets compiling lots of different scenes usually end up with me having to load up/replay various parts of the game a bunch of times to get more footage when i inevitably realize it would look more balanced with shots X, Y, and Z viewed from another inch to the left or whatever.

A set that took you a long time/was really hard but you’re really proud of how it came out. The Dishonored 10th anniversary set for sure, it was the double whammy described above of being very bad at typography and also needing to retake a bunch of footage or just find alternate scenes that the text would fit in/around better. I started that one like a week in advance specifically because I knew it would be a pain in the ass, and it was, but also Anything For You, Dishonored 2012 Dev. Arkane Studios, My Beloved

[verminfang]

for the pokemon asks:

Volt Switch / Aerial Ace / Shadow Ball / Cherish Ball / Ultra Ball

Loooooong response becauuse lotta asks!

Volt Switch: Favorite Electric types(s)

Listed roughly in order from most to I guess 6th most, I found grubbin very charming and I do love vikavolt but if I'm picking one from the line I just gotta love chargabug being both a battery, a bus and a compact little guy.

Rotom rules because electric poltergeists are fun and I love the variety of forms, flaffy is some movie nostalgia, enjoying the static electricity wool idea and some nostalgia for having one (eventually ampharos) in soul silver. Toxtricity gets points for being electric guitar pokemon and the closest I'm gonna get to metal rep (even if they are more punk rock) and the other two are riding the train of just being based on irl animals I like.

Aerial Ace: Favorite Flying types(s)

(honorable mentions to Archeops, Vesiquen and Gliscor)

This one is in less particular order than the first in terms of faves because I kept remembering things and changing my mind.

Love gyrados, a childhood fave and sure the little guy into cool big scary guy is a common trope but they're the og! and also a threatening wind sock. Gyrados rocks. Love Honchkrow, maybe my top 1 favourite flying? The mafia don theme is fun and its just got such great personality.

Yanmega is a prehistoric bug that kicks ass and does a great job conveying that irl dragonflies are apex predators. Vullaby is fucking adorable and I love its fucking, human skull nappy. Perfect goth baby. Drifloon is a hillariously ghoulish little It balloon. Mega pinsir is a great glow up for one of the favorite original bugs and is such an outright demonic looking bug pokemon but despite how it looks its one of the only megas that doesn't have an entry about being in pain, fucked up or more aggressive, its just fucking zoomies

Shadow Ball: Favorite Ghost types(s)

Ok now we are at the Hardest of all questions, also theres no team builder that has all these regions together so from scratch time:

Shoutout honorable mention to pretty much every single ghost type especially Shedninja and gengar and Dhelmise and litwick and-

Mimikyu is favourite number one, its adorable, its ability is fun, is a great meta commentary on pikaclone mascot attempts, my perfect aesthetic of creepy cute love it. Houndstone aesthetically is so good and I wish there was actual art of it I could grab. Phantump is cool, cute and a wonderfully dark pokedex entry, love to have Evan on my team.

Phantump is finally a jackolanturn pokemon and I love the route of not just making the face the carving but doing a fun little black cat/bat thing with it! Halloween! Huge fan of OG bannete the scuzzy little haunted puppet and its fucked up gimp mouth and mega bannette just expands on that more and more, it kicks ass and looks like you let 12 year old me design it (complementary). Duskull is really fun, the one eye pendulum swinging in the skull, its cool little mask, very cute/creepy. Huge fan of dusclops as well but for different reasons and then unfortuantly dusknoir gets too busy for me. Does mean I can eviolite dusclops tho!

Cherish Ball: Favorite Gen IV Pokémon

Activates my secret autism power of having already compiled in a doc my favourites of each gen, ask only asks for one though so gotta give it to my man toxicroak

delightfully slimy little smile, pleasing colour scheme, love a toxic toad and his fucked up little claws.

Ultra Ball: Favorite Pseudo-legendary(ies)

Apparently Volcarona doesn't technically count as one but fuck bulbapedia its the only bug one and it has the stats, high level to hang. Moth light obsession/khepri sun god bug theming is sick. It rules and it counts. Tyranitar and Dragonite are both here from childhood nostalgia for the show and leaf green respectively, I love that Tyranitar is godzilla and mean and I love that one of the strongest of the first pokemon and only dragon type was just a chubby guy. Garchomp is a cool land shark, star on it feels unnecessary, Hydreigon is a cool fucked up and evil hydra dragon with head hands and tatered wings, really love the ghost dinosaur concept of dragapult so it gets to be number 6 I'm just not actually that into the stealth bomber aesthetic.

[socialoutsider1a]

My own official headcanon: House is a bisexual/gay submissive masochist as well as Wilson's bitch with House also a gimp- a sexual fetishist who loves not only being dominated but also wearing leather and rubber body suits with masks, zips and chains while Wilson is a bisexual/gay dominant sadist.

The two men are in a 24/7 all year round BDSM relationship, regularly dividing their time between Wilson's condo and House's apartment, both of which on the outside look unchanged but the two places along with the rooms in it are in fact completely soundproof which allows the two men to enjoy having a lot of sex without any interruptions from the neighbors.

As well as there being a bedroom, a bathroom and other rooms that store their BDSM gear including a variety of toys and equipment, they also have a dungeon in the two places which is also soundproofed, the two men even playing in both dungeons. House loves being tied up with ropes and chains. He also enjoys suspension bondage as Wilson walks around him, holding a whip with House's masochistic nature emerging when Wilson hits him in the ass with said whip.

In addition, Wilson is also skilled at dirty talk and is able to use his tongue, hands and even his cock (as he's well-hung in my opinion) to give House incredible orgasms although Wilson likes to prolong the torment by using cock rings or even a chastity device/cage to stop House from getting off too quickly. House is usually left exhausted but at the same time, is glad he has Wilson in his life, Wilson the only one who can teach House the joys of obedience, pleasure and pain.

Whenever they're not doing that, House and Wilson often roam around the respective kitchen areas, naked while also doing various chores. In the past, House was originally unwilling to do it at first but thanks to Wilson showing him the benefits, he later grew to enjoy it and now, the two men do it all the time. In bed, the two men also sleep together in the nude, House usually the little spoon with Wilson behind him, Wilson's arms also wrapped around the lower part of House's chest.

[pumpkincentaur]

WIP Introduction: How to Break a Deadly Curse

In a world where humans and magic live together in faulty harmony, Katsurou Kuroda has been dealt the worst hand possible. He’s an Elemata, doomed to be devoured from the inside out by the magic he was born with. His doctor’s best estimate sees Katsurou dying by the time he’s thirty. Nihilist would be Katsurou’s middle name, if he had one--hence his extensive criminal record and the eight schools around Vancouver that have kicked him out the door.

But this time, things went a little too far. People got hurt, and Katsurou had to get out fast. Now he’s on the other side of the country, in a city he’s a stranger to--Maybridge, the walled magical metropolis on Canada’s East Coast. 

Katsurou being Katsurou, things went a little too far yet again. After trying to steal from a witch and failing miserably, Katsurou has been cursed. He now has eighty days to live instead of twelve-ish years, and it looks like those eighty days are going to be rough. However, thanks to a gang of misfits headed by a woman with a curse of her own, Katsurou has a place to stay until the end--and, perhaps, a way to break his curse. Not the one he was born with, but the one he managed to get put on himself by being an idiot.

A strange group hiding within Maybridge’s many shadows is up to something odd, but they may have the key to making Katsurou’s imminent death a little less imminent. Not that he cares, of course. He was dying anyway.

Genre: ya/na urban fantasy

Themes: found family, delinquent kids, lgbtq+ relationships, neon cyberpunk dystopias

Status: second draft in progress

Current Word Count: 18,000

Tags: #htdbc, #maybridge

if you’d like to be added to the tag list for How to Break a Deadly Curse, either send me an ask or comment on or reblog this post and I’ll promptly add you and tag you in all future content.

[wasleichtesart]

Talking to God’s spokesman Companion piece to this Crowley.

[pyjamaenzel]

you know you shot me down/it's a lethal connection your heart is a weapon

[greed-the-dorkalicious]

Presenting my thesis: The fandom’s perception of Jotaro and Kakyoin is slightly skewed because for some reason in the part 3 anime DavidPro drew everyone with angry eyes and also completely forgot how to draw any facial expressions whatsoever, thus subtly causing Jotaro and Kakyoin in particular to come off as more emotionless/cold/boring than they’re actually supposed to be

Thanks for coming to my TED talk. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more game theory

[carbonateddelusion]

1, 4, 8!

1. What's an art program you have but don't use?

iirc... gimp, mspaint, and I think I also have an Adobe product on my computer

2. What's your favorite subject to draw that is very difficult TO draw?

I am grabbing gore by the scruff of its neck. This bitch is SUCH A FUCKIN' PAIN IN THE ASS FOR ME. You'd think someone with as much awful stuff in their stories as I do would be very good at drawing gore, but I keep it to only blood and the cartoony bones for a reason.

4. What's an old project that you're lost interest in?

Mm.. probably Admins. Haven't touched that in a long while. It used to be a collaborative effort between me, Ben, and an ex-friend, but our portion of it kinda disintegrated once we lost contact with said ex-friend. IRL (Eris) and Red (Pen) are still alive and kicking, but I still really like the multiverse idea of Admins and it isn't currently being used.

[keichanz]

Neighbors | ch. 4

AO3

i know i said i'd use the tag list for only my major stories, but it's honestly too much a pain in the ass to keep up with so...sorry. no tag lists anymore.

When her bladder woke her up a little after six am, Kagome wasn’t really surprised to find herself in her bed. She blinked slowly and with half of her face smashed into the pillow, her vision was slightly obscured as she sought to clear it. Her room was still dark, a testament to the early hour, and it was also strangely cold.

She blinked again as her mind slowly came back online, the last vestiges of sleep gradually fading away to reveal what had woken her up in the first place. Kagome grunted, yawned, and reluctantly pushed herself upright when her stupid bladder very rudely reminded her of its current state. Grumbling, Kagome reluctantly tossed the covers off her – why was it so damn cold in here? – and carefully swung her legs over the edge of the bed before blindly groping for the crutches propped against the nightstand.

Shaking her head to clear the rest of the cobwebs, Kagome heaved herself up and groggily hobbled her way out of her room and toward the bathroom. She really shouldn’t have drunk all that soda last night…

Bladder relieved and her hand now throbbing slightly from the weight she’d put on it from using the stupid crutches, Kagome sat on the closed toilet lid and stared longing out into the dark hallway. She was more or less awake now, and with how damned cold it was, she doubted she’d be able to get back to sleep no matter how much she wanted to. And since the chill wasn’t confined to just her bedroom, Kagome suspected her furnace had quit sometime in the middle of the night. She made a mental note to look at it later.

For now, though… Kagome eyed the shower and decided the thought of hot water was entirely too appealing to deny. She couldn’t stand and she’d have t be careful not to get her stitches wet, but she’d make do. Nodding to herself, Kagome hopped the scant distance over to the tub and turned on the water to warm up while she undressed.

She was careful as she unwrapped the bandage around her ankle, wincing slightly as the tension was released. It was still bruised and slightly swollen and Kagome sucked her teeth as she made a face. Her mother had always said she’d had dainty ankles and Souta’s teasing about how easily she bruised suddenly had a lot more merit.

Rolling her eyes, Kagome sighed and went about cleaning herself of two days’ worth of sweat and general grossness. She essentially gave herself a sponge bath while sitting on the lip of the tub, being extra caution to not get her injured hand wet. The most difficult part was washing her hair using only one hand, and with the aid of the detachable shower head, she succeeded in that feat for the most part.

She was feeling much better and much cleaner by the time she was finished. She wrapped her hair up in a towel and then her body before hobbling back into her bedroom to dress into some comfy lounge clothes, instantly shivering when her wet skin met the cold air of her apartment. Hastily she found one of her oversized but warm sweaters and some sweatpants, not even bothering to put on underwear or a bra since she wasn’t going anywhere that day.

Deciding to let her hair air dry, Kagome crutched her way into the living room to confront the furnace, or radiator heater or whatever it was called that was situated in the far corner. It was one of those old cast iron ones and the paint was peeling. Kagome wrinkled her nose as she studied it, shrugged, and gave it a good kick with her good foot. She honestly hadn’t expected that to do anything, so imagine her surprise when she heard a low grinding noise and then the familiar sound of the heat kicking on.

Immensely pleased with herself, Kagome happily gimped to the kitchen to make herself a congratulatory cup of coffee. With her first cup of coffee brewing a short few minutes later, Kagome was just about to bite into a yummy cream cheese bagel when there was a series of knocks on her door. She frowned and leaned backward to stare out the kitchen doorway toward the apartment door as if that would allow her to magically see through walls to see who was on the other side.

The knocks came again, a little more insistent this time. With a huff Kagome stuffed her bagel into her mouth and crutched her way to her apartment, heedless of her breakfast hanging from her mouth, her unbrushed wet hair, and her less than flattering attire for the day. It was like 6:30 in the freakin’ morning, who the hell could possibly—

Swinging the door open after unlocking it, Kagome’s irritated glare swiftly disappeared to be replaced by an expression of soft confusion. “Imnu—”

Remembering her breakfast still in her mouth, Kagome reached up to remove it and swallowed her bite before trying again. “Inuyasha? What are you doing here?”

Hands in his leather jacket pockets, backward ballcap sitting on his head, and silver hair hanging down his back in a thick braid, said half-demon took in the sight before him with amused amber eyes. Apparently, she hadn’t bothered to brush her wet hair after her shower and that large sweatshirt positively dwarfed her small frame. The corner of his lips twitched at how adorable she looked and out of fucking nowhere he wondered what she would look like in one of his shirts.

Just as quickly he banished the thought and flashed his gaze back to hers. Jesus Christ— “Heard you walking around,” he supplied. “Thought I’d see how you’re doing before I left for work.”

Kagome blinked and then her expression cleared, delight swiftly replacing confusion. She smiled and his stomach did that stupid swooping thing again. He was strangely getting used to it.

“Oh,” she said and a pleased blush colored her cheeks a soft pink. “Well, I…um, that’s…that’s so sweet of you.”

Good lord, where was her brain this morning?

Flush darkening, Kagome cleared her throat and stepped to the side. “Would you, ah, like to come in for a bit? I have coffee brewing.”

Though he wanted to – like, really wanted to – Inuyasha knew he shouldn’t. The look on his face must have conveyed his indecision because Kagome’s smile turned a little sly.

“I have to-go cups…” Her voice was edged with an engaging lilt, selfishly wanting him to stay a little longer.

Beneath his hat, an ear flicked and that time he couldn’t stop the grin from curving his lips upward. “You do, huh.”

Sensing her victory, Kagome giggled and put her bagel back into her mouth before turning around to hobble back into the kitchen. She heard the door close and heavy footsteps following after her. With her back toward him, she allowed the pleased smile to blossom across her face as those damned butterflies took flight in her belly again.

“Why’s it so damn cold in here?” he asked, more to himself than her, but Kagome answered anyway.

“Radiator stopped working sometime in the middle of the night. I gave it a good kick, though, and it seemed to fix the problem so it should be warming up here pretty soon.”

She heard a grunt so she assumed he accepted that answer. Kagome dropped her half-eaten breakfast onto a paper towel, abandoned the crutches against the counter, and hopped on her good foot across the kitchen toward the as yet unpacked boxes stacked next to the fridge. If she recalled correctly, the to-go cups were on the top one, ready to be put away to have available for work meetings when she didn’t have time to stop at Starbies. As suspected, they were right there on top so they wouldn’t get crushed or bent.

Turning around with a grin of triumph, Kagome held the cups aloft, but then promptly faltered at the disapproving look her half-demon neighbor was giving her. “What?” she asked innocently. “I’m staying off it and I can’t carry anything using those stupid things. And they hurt my hand, anyway. Quit glaring at me.”

Inuyasha scowled but didn’t comment because she was staying off it, at least. And he had to admit, adding any kind of pressure onto her stitched hand probably wasn’t pleasant as she’d said, either. Didn’t mean he had to like it, though, and his low scoff said as much.

Rolling her eyes, Kagome decided to ignore his surliness and hopped back to her coffee maker to brew up another cup for her attractive but paranoid neighbor. Jeez, it wasn’t like this was her first time living alone or something. She was perfectly capable taking care of herself, even if that meant finding handy little shortcuts to make things easier.

I’m not an invalid, Kagome mentally grumbled, brow knit into a peeved frown as she replaced the used k-cup with a fresh one. Sure, I’m a little clumsy, but that doesn’t give him the right to—

“Where’s your bandage?” Inuyasha asked, interrupting her thoughts.

Kagome glanced at him then down to her bare ankle. “Bathroom. I took it off before my shower and haven’t put it back on yet. I figured I would—”

Inuyasha grunted and stalked off before she could finish, presumably to retrieve said ace bandage. Kagome frowned after him. Did her hopping around really bother him that much? Sure, it wasn’t the most effective way of getting around, but it was quicker than the damned crutches that hurt her pits and hand and she was only going from one side of the kitchen to the other…

He stormed back in seconds later and headed straight for her. Kagome had just capped his coffee with a plastic lid when he snagged her around the waist without any warning and easily lifted her onto the counter.

“Lift,” he ordered while gesturing to her foot.

Kagome pursed her lips and glared at him, put off by his attitude. “I can do it myself.”

He shot her a warning look, brows dipping low over his eyes. “Just gimme your damn ankle, wench. I ain’t got all day.”

“No.” She crossed her arms and lifted her chin.

Inuyasha growled that time, a scowl twisting his features. “Stop being so stubborn and just let me—”

“I didn’t ask for your help, Inuyasha,” Kagome snapped, leveling a glare at him. Really, why was he being so—

He actually looked surprised at that, eyebrows shooting up into his bangs as he leaned back a little. He blinked at her, mouth parted, but then just as quickly the surprised vanished to be replaced with cold indifference. Kagome eyed him warily and bit down on her lip.

“Didn’t ask for my help?” he echoed, his voice light. “Fine. Here.” He shoved the rolled ace bandaged into her crossed arms and instinctively Kagome grabbed it. “Do it yourself then. I’ve got other shit to do other than waste my time helping somebody who obviously doesn’t even need it.”

Then with that, and before Kagome could say a word, Inuyasha spun around and stomped out of her kitchen, across the living room and to her apartment door. He slammed it closed and Kagome felt cold as the realization that she had just fucked up struck her like a fist to her stomach. She paled and muttering a quiet curse, Kagome hurriedly hopped down from the counter, hardly caring about the pain in her ankle as she limped as fast as she could to the door.

“Inuyasha,” Kagome called, yanking open the door and stepping onto the platform. “Inuyasha, wait! I’m sor—”

The front door slammed closed with a finality that made Kagome flinch. She was too late. Kagome slumped against the railing, cursing herself for her own stupidity, then cast one last longing look at the door before hobbling back inside her apartment. The coffee she’d made him sat on the counter, untouched, and looking at it pathetically made her want to cry so she grabbed her crutches, the bandage she’d dropped, and crutched into the living room.

Feeling sorry for herself, even though it was her own damn stubbornness that had her feeling so low, Kagome sank down onto the couch with a sigh. She stared despondently at the rolled-up bandage sitting on the coffee table. Now that she was alone with her thoughts, Kagome could admit she’d acted childishly. Inuyasha had only been trying to help and she’d pushed him away and for what? Because she’d wanted to prove a point? That she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself?

She wrinkled her nose and slumped back into the couch cushions. Sure, she could take care of herself, but everyone needed a little help now and then, right? She was beginning to understand now that her neighbor spoke through his actions, and not so much through words. His gruffness was a façade, she surmised, to hide his concern and she felt like a giant butthead now that it was clear he’d just been worried.

“Congratulations, dummy,” she muttered to herself, tipping her head back to glare up at the ceiling. “You just successfully managed to push away the only person you’ve met since you moved here, the only person you thought could be your friend or maybe even more, and all because you wanted to prove a stupid point. Well done.”

Silence was her only response to her self-deprecating monologue and it only made her feel worse. Pouting slightly, and refusing to give into the ridiculous urge to cry, Kagome sat up and went about wrapping her up ankle herself. It took her several attempts, many curses, and one count of hurling the bandage across the room in a fit of frustration – she’d sheepishly hopped across the room to retrieve it, glad no one else had witnessed her lapse in maturity – but she finally managed to keep it secured. It wasn’t as tight as she’d like, and it was crooked, but it was the best she could do so she resolved to let it be.

Needing something to distract herself from thinking about a certain handsome grease dog, Kagome settled herself amongst the boxes in the living room. She could at least unpack her DVDs and organize them on the empty rack. Lord knows she still had a crap ton of other unpacking to do, but with her bum ankle, her choices were limited. Hopefully she’d be able to at least get the majority done before she started work again next week.

Heaving a sigh, Kagome dragged the first box over to her and used a box cutter to cut through the tape. It was going to be a long day.

She’d only gotten about half-way through the medium sized box when her apartment door opened. Inuyasha found her sitting on the living room floor, surrounded by DVDs, and looking up at him with a look that he could only describe as a cross between surprised and cautiously hopeful. She gazed up at him, regret clear as day in those caramel depths, and Inuyasha’s chest constricted. She looked on the verge of tears and it tore at him.

Ears pinned beneath his hat, Inuyasha sighed and set the Starbucks Diabetus Cuppus on the bar counter before crossing over to her. Kagome bit her lip as he approached and offered a small, sheepish smile when he knelt before her. He tipped a small grin back and scooped her up into his arms. He brought her over to the couch, carefully set her down, and sat before her on the coffee table before gingerly bringing her ankle up to rest on his knee. Kagome remained silent and allowed him to rewrap her ankle, incredibly glad he’d come back when he had every reason not to. She’d acted like an ungrateful brat when he’d just wanted to help. Why would he?

Inuyasha had just secured the third clasp to keep it in place when Kagome broke the silence, her curiosity too great to ignore.

“Why did you come back?” she asked softly. “Don’t you have work?”

He sighed and kept his eyes on his handiwork as he replied. “Shop doesn’t open ‘til eight.” A glance at the analog clock above the TV told her it was a quarter past seven. “Just wanted to get there early to get some shit done before opening. And also…”

Inuyasha grimaced and finally lifted his gaze to hers, the amber gold of his eyes holding a wealth of guilt that took Kagome aback. “I heard you call out to me as I was leaving. But I was still mad, so I…didn’t stop.”

Setting her foot down with a gentleness that belied his tough exterior, Inuyasha stood and went to retrieve his gift of apology. “I didn’t even make it halfway down the street before the guilt slammed into me, so…”

Instead of finishing, he wordlessly held it out and Kagome noted it was the same sugar laden, caramel drizzled drink he’d gotten her yesterday. Feeling the familiar prickling sensation behind her eyes, Kagome gave him a trembling but genuine smile and happily took it off his hands.

“I’m sorry,” Inuyasha mumbled as he sat beside her on the couch, eyes trained on the water stained and scratched coffee table before them. “I shouldn’t have left. I shoulda—”

“Please, stop,” Kagome said and her hand settling on his arm stalled him more than her words did. He stared at her hand then lifted his gaze to her face, caramel depths locking with twin pools of honey.

“You don’t need to apologize, Inuyasha,” she began with a sigh. “I’m the one who’s sorry. I acted like an ungrateful child when you were only trying to help me. I guess I just…I…”

She struggled to find the words, to explain the best she can, but thankfully she didn’t have to. A clawed hand landed on her head and ruffled her hair, the cool strands sliding between his fingers like ebony silk. Kagome looked up at him through her bangs and found him grinning down at her.

“S’okay,” he rumbled, expression soft. “I get it. Next time I’ll ask before assuming.”

Kagome blushed and ducked her head but not before he saw the smile bloom across her face. “You don’t have to ask,” she mumbled and hid her red face behind her tasty diabetes in a cup.

Inuyasha grinned. “No? Well if you insist.”

Before Kagome could object, a clawed hand covered both of hers that were currently wrapped around her drink and moved it toward him so he could steal a long sip from the straw.

Kagome blinked. “Hey!” she protested, but she was smiling.

Pulling back, Inuyasha smacked his lips—and Kagome watched in abject amusement as his face screwed up from the overly sweet concoction, laughing at his exaggerated shudder of revulsion.

“Christ, how the hell can you drink that?” he groused, releasing his grip on her drink and her hands.

“It’s good,” Kagome defended, dark eyes glinting impishly as she took a sip of her own. “You just lack a taste for the finer things in life, Mr. Grease Dog.”

He snorted his opinion of that. “Obviously your taste has been completely destroyed if you can tolerate that sugary hell. I feel like I need to down a six pack just to maintain my manliness.”

She snorted as he got to his feet. “Where’s your phone?” he asked, scanning the room for the elusive device.

Kagome blinked and thought for a moment. “Bedroom,” she supplied. “I plugged it in yesterday to charge and forgot about it.”

Nodding, Inuyasha wandered off to presumably collect her phone and Kagome happily sipped away at her sugary hell. Sure, it was fattening and sweet and had way too many calories, but it was yummy and Kagome would never give up her Starbies addiction so long as her silver-haired neighbor kept supplying it. Kagome giggled, secretly hoping it wouldn’t be the last time he showed up with deliciousness in a cup.

Inuyasha returned, her cell phone in his hand, and he handed it over with a pointed look. Kagome smiled and nodded, wordlessly agreeing that she’d contact him if anything happened or she needed him for whatever reason. She liked that he gave her that option, that he cared enough to let her know he was always available. Her cheeks colored and she looked away, focusing her attention on her phone. She blinked in surprise; she had several unread text messages and a voicemail. She wondered if they were from yesterday while her phone had been charging, or before that when it had sat on her counter completely dead.

Satisfied, Inuyasha sighed and knelt down before her. Kagome turned her gaze to him and offered a sheepish smile, her cheeks colored a becoming shade of pink. He frowned and Kagome rolled her eyes, giving a soft chuckle as she playfully shoved his shoulder.

“I’ll be fine,” she assured. “I’m just gonna finish unpacking my movies and maybe start on my bookshelf if I feel like it. I promise to stay off my ankle and call you if anything happens. Okay?”

Inuyasha still didn’t look appeased but heaved a sigh, giving a single nod. “Take your meds,” he reminded and ruffled her hair again. Kagome pouted and stuck her tongue out at him. He grinned and pushed to his feet.

“Yes, Mom,” she said mockingly but the grin spreading across her face belied her snide tone.

“Brat.”

“Jerk.”

“Wench.”

“Insufferable prick.”

“Stubborn weakling.”

“Cocky, uh, limp-dick?”

“What?”

“I don’t know!” Kagome dissolved into giggles as Inuyasha shook his head.

“Don’t do anything stupid.” He gave a final warning as he headed toward the door, then on an impulse detoured into the kitchen.

“Who? Me?” Kagome asked innocently.

Inuyasha remerged with a familiar to-go coffee cup in his hand. Kagome blinked in surprise and ducked her head to hide her pleased smile.

“I’ll be home around five,” he said by way of goodbye and opened the door. “We’ll change the bandage on your hand then.”

“Have a good day, Inuyasha,” Kagome called and just as he was about to close the door, she added, “And thank you.”

Inuyasha paused, looked directly into her eyes, and took a long sip of the now lukewarm coffee in his hand. Kagome’s smile widened. Satisfied, Inuyasha tipped her a smirk and finally closed the door behind him.

Feeling much better now than when he’d left the first time, Kagome sighed and directed her attention to her phone, idly sipping at her drink. However, upon discovering who the texts were from, she rolled her eyes and promptly deleted them all before going to do the same to the voicemail because she already knew who it was from. But before she thumbed the button to delete it forever, she hesitated, a small inkling of curiosity making her want to hear what the jerk had to say.

So, with a long-suffering sigh, Kagome rolled her eyes and gave in, putting it on speaking before pushing play.

“Hey,” he said, his voice rough like he’d just woken up or he’d gone through an entire pack of cigarettes which wouldn’t be surprising. “It’s me. I wanna talk. Stop shutting off your phone, I know you’re only doing it to piss me off”—Kagome scoffed because, yeah that’s exactly what happened—"and it’s fucking childish. If you don’t call me back, I’ll have no choice but to track you down so we can have a mature fucking conversation like adults and sort this out. And I will find you, Kagome.” A pause, and he exhaled roughly. “Don’t be stupid. Call me.”

He hung up and Kagome stared down at her phone, her fingers tightening on it until her knuckles turned white. It was an empty threat. He couldn’t find her. She knew he couldn’t find her, he knew he couldn’t find her, so there was no reason to worry.

So why, then, as Kagome deleted the voicemail off her phone, did she suddenly feel so cold when only moments before she’d felt so warm thanks to amber eyes and a fanged smirk?

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