#also lets plot pls

[starry-bi-sky]

pouring one out for luo binghe in my disciple SQQ fic, poor guy has taken a backseat here. we're nearly 30k words deep and he hasn't even shown his face once. it'll be much longer before he even actually talks to Shen Qingqiu.

(i say im pouring one out but in reality im sitting in my director's chair chewing on a cigar and wearing a beret as he tearily and unsuccessfully pleads with me for more scenes with Shen Qingqiu)

[knotboy-dean]

No no no no no because Dean’s evolution of “it’s just me and Sam on this bitch of an earth” to “it’s just me and Sam (and Cas and Bobby and Jody and Claire and Donna and Mary and Jack and Crowley and-) on this bitch of an earth” is so important to me

[dailymydeidoodles]

Day 25: April Fool's Special

What ya doing when my gang pull up??? anyways i ADORED the april fools video and i rlly hope they do smth like this again next year. def helped lighten the mood of amphoreus after cas' trailer yesterday

reference photo ^^

[archdevilsupreme]

It is, by far, way too funny to me how I've been confused about Karlach's inventory for god knows how long before realising what's wrong. I was convinced it was the game being bugged since she can carry like 250kg.

Then I realised... she's been carrying around Cazador's corpse all this time. This shit is so funny to me because can you imagine a group of 4 people walking around Baldur's Gate, just casually dragging the corpse of a vampire lord along with them as a sign of dominance (and forgetfulness of said vampire corpse).

Update - beware! There will be fun and fire!

[mylovesstuffs]

ANNOUNCEMENT ! The Truth Behind Everything

recap: main announcement, individual asks, more qnas

Hey loves,

I’ve been thinking about how to go about this, and after seeing the way everyone reacted—some of you believing me, some questioning me, and some even being genuinely happy for me—I decided that I should be honest. You all deserve some background because, the truth is, what I initially announced was not an April Fools’ prank.

Everything I said in my announcement was real. I was actually reached out to—anonymously at first—through email after they found my and my friend's Instagram. After several discussions and a creative test, I was given an opportunity [about 4 months of back and forth]. But within 24 hours of announcing it, things happened, and I had to drop out of a major role. That’s when I thought about turning this entire thing into an April Fools’ joke to cover it up and not let it go to waste... :( though I couldve just be like, "hey, I didn't get the job" and move on but I'm choosing to give insights. I even wrote a post revealing it as a prank, but then I saw how many of you still weren’t sure what to believe, how some of you were genuinely happy for me, and how my own friends, despite their confusion, continued to support me. That’s when I realized I couldn’t go through with pretending it was a joke when it wasn’t one in the first place. My own conscience wouldn’t let me.

I won’t go too much into detail here in Tumblr, but just know that I made the best decision for myself. This experience made me realize just how different things are behind the scenes. If I had gone ahead and posted the April Fools’ ‘reveal,’ would you have ever believed that the opportunity actually happened and I was just covering it up? Probably not. And that’s exactly how things work in the idol industry too—if you don’t know the background, you don’t know the background. People can feed you anything.

I’m also adding a screenshot of the initial post I wrote as a ‘prank reveal’ to show you what I originally intended to say. But one thing that remains true in my prank reveal post is, what happened with svthub members lol, guys, I'm sorry for not seeing the pings on time and just poofing. They didn’t force me, some were skeptical but—they were happy, excited, curious, but most importantly, they stayed by my side even while I was silent. And for that, I am grateful.

Thank you for sticking with me through this. This has been a lot, and I’ll be back to posting soon [From tomorrow] [yes, I'll be! You'll see my notice soon again].

cover-up april fools' reveal post:

[annymaght]

Something I wish I had put on my Bingo card now is this new theory I have been cooking.

My theory is that The Handler is not in fact a genetic experiment where she's part raptor, but a behavioural experiment where she was raised alongside the raptors.

Experiments like this have occured in real life, though very ethically problematic. They demonstrate how much behaviour is influenced by one's environment and it would explain why The Handler acts the way she does.

In the 1930's an experiment called the Kellog's Experiment was practiced in which Kellog placed his son and a chimpanzee named Gua, both under the age of 1 year old, in the same environment and raised them alongside each other. During this period, Gua began to display human characteristics such as eating with a spoon, wearing shoes and even walking upright. However, the experiment was terminated as soon as Kellog's son started to display characteristics expected from a chimpanzee.

This shows how much learning takes place during this period of growth, and how much animals learn from one's they grow up alongside.

This could explain The Handlers seeming inability or desire not to speak, her demeener and her family-like bond with the raptors.

(It would also explain the deleted horse handler moment! Click here to learn more about that)

Of course this kind of experiment is very illegal today and it was probably carried out to see if raptors could pick up on human characteristics such as empathy and communication that we see being displayed with The Handler.

You could even argue that this phenomenon is displayed in Blue, having been raised by Owen Grady.

The only plot hole I have in this theory is that The Handler is likely in her 20s maybe late 20s, which would mean this experiment occurred over 20 years ago. That makes the raptors themselves 20+ years old as well, and puts this before the 2001 Isla Sorna incident, as well as before the initial opening of Jurassic World in 2005.

[sarastellasari]

New Years Kiss (Part Two)

part one, part three!

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Lyra couldn’t help but feel a bit anxious as she approached the Hawthorne house. What if she messed something up? She knew all of these people, yes, but she hadn’t really hung out with them. As she passed by the gates, she couldn’t help but gawk at the enormous grounds. They were beautiful but also slightly terrifying. She couldn’t help but wonder if Grayson or any of his brothers had ever gotten lost on them.

To Lyras surprise, when she knocked on the door, instead of a doorman or security guard answering as she expected, it was Avery, her face filled with excitement, looking beautiful in a tight green strappy dress. 

“Hi, Lyra!” Avery said, reaching to pull her inside. Lyra smiled at her. “I’m so happy you came! You’re right on time! Everyone else is here, let’s go find them!” 

Avery led Lyra to a courtyard in the back. Lyra gawkedt at the decorations. The entire yard was covered in streamers and fairy lights and there were balloons floating high in the air. There were different arcade games scattered around the courtyard, including a few that looked homemade. The scent of champagne lingered in the air.

“Dang.” Avery shrugged modestly.

“Usually we’d do more, but this is just our friends.” Lyra let out a sigh of relief. She had been dreading being photographed, being crowded, being surrounded by people who deserved to be here far more than her. Avery smiled at her relief.

“I agree. I’m so glad I got Alisa to give in.” Avery’s eyes suddenly widened as she saw Nash leisurely strolling towards them, dressed in a shiny black tuxedo and matching cowboy hat.

“Hey Nash,” Avery said. Lyra waved awkwardly. “What’s up?”

“My brothers are… still getting ready. Avery, there was a delay.” Lyra snorted.

“How? They live here.” Nash grinned at her.

“Good question.” Then he strolled back to Libby, dressed in a deep sapphire gown and hat matching Nash’s. 

“It’s ok. Grayson will be here soon.” Avery said, glancing at Lyras face with a smirk. Lyra sputtered.

“I- I don’t care about-“

“Mhm. Let’s go talk with the others! Have you met Thea?” 

And so Avery pulled Lyra away from the house, and over to Thea, who was standing with Rebecca. Both girls were in gold, nearly the same shade as the streamers around the yard.

“Hey girls. Lyra right?” Lyra nodded. Thea smirked.

“Where are your dates?” Thea asked.

“Grayson and Jameson are getting ready with Xander,” Avery said, scowling at Thea, who gave her a knowing look.

“Anyways,” Avery said, clearly changing the subject.

“Thea and Rebecca, are you excited to kiss at midnight?” Rebecca flushed all the way from her red hair to her equally red dress. Thea laughed.

“As much as I’m sure you are, Avery. What about you Lyra? Are you planning to kiss anyone?” Lyra cringed, feeling her cheeks turn red. 

“Uh-“ 

“You know,” Thea continued, “I’m sure Grayson would be up for it. He’s single, you know. Oh, look! It’s Max. Come on, Rebecca, let’s go say hi.” And Rebecca and Thea left. Leaving Lyra bewildered with Avery.

“What did she mean?” She asked, turning to Avery, who cringed.

“Oh, you know. Just Thea being Thea.” Lyra rolled her eyes. This was going to be a long night. She should’ve just gone back home to her parents and brother.

Just then, Avery’s phone dinged. Her eyes lit up.

“Oh look! Jameson is inside. He needs help with something. Come with me?” Lyra raises an eyebrow. She was sure that Jameson needing “help” with something was probably code for… something she didn’t want to witness, but she didn’t want to leave the one person she knew, so she nodded in agreement. Avery cheerfully led her into the mansion. Lyra gawked at each room they passed, at every painting probably worth millions. No matter how many times she had been inside, it never got old. And she was pretty sure she had never been in this wing before.

“Avery, where are we going?” She asked, slightly worried that they were lost. Avery grinned. 

“A room.” 

“Thanks,” Lyra said sarcastically. Avery laughed. Lyra frowned. She felt a bit uneasy like she was being tricked into something.  The feeling escalated when Avery opened an elaborately designed door. Lyras eyes widened. Jameson was standing in the room. And next to him… 

Grayson was tied up in a chair. Lyra felt herself turning, asking what was going on. Suddenly, Avery pushed her into the room exactly as Jameson sprinted out. The door slammed behind them.

“Lovely.” Grayson sighed.

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Grayson silently cursed his brothers, Avery, and everyone else who had gotten him into this situation. He knew his brothers were planning something when he saw their smirks, but he never thought it would be this… extreme. He silently watched as Lyra hurried to the other side of the room and grabbed a pair of scissors clearly left on a table. At least they didn’t intend for him to stay trapped then.

“Thank you.” He said stiffly after Lyra cut him out of his bonds.

“Where are we?” She asked scowling, before hurrying over to the door and trying to turn the knob.  It was locked, of course.

“One of the libraries. The smallest one.” Grayson sighed.

“One of the- nevermind. How do we get out?” Grayson shrugged. “Knowing my brothers, probably a game or puzzle of some sort.” 

“Correct!” Came Xander's voice from a walkie-talkie subtly hidden on the bookshelf. Grayson cursed, jumping. Lyra burst into laughter.

“Figure out what we want you to do and do it, and you will be let out!”

“Xander I swear on all that is holy if you do not-“  Grayson trailed off. He knew what his brothers wanted them to do. 

“Oh my god. Xander, that is not happening. Xander? Xander!” But there was no response. Grayson swore under his breath, dragging a hand down his face. He probably looked like a mess- his blonde hair frizzy from fighting with Jameson on the rug, and his grey suit jacket rumpled from being tied up.

Of course, Lyra looked perfect though, in her red strapless dress and matching earrings, hair, and makeup perfect as usual. 

“Could we break a window?” Lyra suggested.  Grayson shook his head. 

“Probably not. We could try though. He grabbed a book and threw it at the window, shaking his head when it didn’t work.

“Ok, that didn’t work. Now what?” He shrieked as without warning,  Lyra smacked the window, full force, with her high heel. The window shattered. She tried again. It broke completely.

“I really hope that window wasn’t expensive.” She panted. Grayson simply climbed through, offering her a hand as she did as well. Somehow she still looked flawless.

“Let’s go back to the party. Grayson suggested. Lyra nodded.

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part one, part three!

[kalofi]

zl fic idea

hii everyone i wrote something yesterday about an au idea i had for zolu and. i thought i'd share it here since its a bit too messy and disjointed in places to post on like. ao3 or something.

4.7k words, warning for temporary major character death but do not worry all will be fixed in due time. i'll put the rest under the cut

ok i have an idea for an au thats like kind of reincarnation but like reality displacement but like. okay just listen.

so we start at laughtale. its a couple years into the future from where we are in canon the strawhats are achieving their dreams luffy is about to find the one piece theres a big battle happening between them and the blackbeard pirates and whoever the fuck else is there idc. the rest of the strawhats are fighting the bb crew while luffy and zoro head off to find the one piece and also end up fighting black beard himself. luffy and zoro atp r like basically a thing but they never talk about it cuz theyre luffy and zoro and they kind of just exist with each other but like. theyre basically in love and everyone knows it. anyway they go off together luffy has the one piece almost in his grasp blackbeard attacks they fight its a big battle blood is shed bones are broken uumm in my mind luffy and zoro are like teaming up against bb bc his devil fruit is lowk broken and op and like ok theres gear5 too but i didnt rly consider that so lets just assume bb’s devil fruit can negate gear5 somehow or luffy exhausts it before bb is fully defeated. 

finally theyre able to knock bb down and hes out and theyre both tired and worn but they DID IT and the one piece is luffys and theyre facing each other grinning ear to ear and zoros saying “you ready, king of the pirates?” and luffy laughs and goes “not just yet zoro, i still gotta-“ and then theres a spear piercing right through his chest. and in the next moment its gone. 

theres a gaping hole through his captain and theres blood, theres so much blood and luffy’s still smiling like he hasnt realized it yet, like it hasnt even registered. zoros ears are ringing and he doesnt know what to make of whats hes seeing because its just not real, it CANT be. 

he looks over luffy’s shoulder and blackbeard is on the ground with his hand outstretched , black energy coiling back into his form and he’s laughing and laughing with bloodstained teeth. hes fucking laughing. one moment zoro is still standing parallel to luffy and the next hes in front of blackbeard and the mans head is rolling through the dirt and gravel, wado dripping crimson, a terrible gap toothed grin still stretching the man’s cheeks. 

zoro is breathing heavy, hes trembling and hes almost mesmerized by the blood pooling around a lacerated neck— then he’s remembering luffy and turning around and calling his name and he can see right through him theres a HOLE right through him and he chokes and stumbles and rushes to his side right as luffy starts to crumple to the floor . catches him and lowers him gently and doesnt know what to say. 

hes still shaking but cant move his mouth and everything is muffled, the sounds from the battle outside are distant and they dont matter but what does he do. what does he do. 

he snaps out of it when luffy gently calls his name. a strong “zoro,” like hes not fazed at all. like there isnt blood soaking into zoros clothes. 

his brain kickstarts and he’s speaking. saying things like “youre ok you’ll be ok” and “choppers right outside i’ll just call him and he’ll fix you right up” and “you always bounce back, right captain?” and hes thinking “dont die please dont fucking die. not now, not when we’re this close please dont fucking die” and hes silently praying to all the gods he doesnt believe in but luffy calls his name again and his mouth clicks shut. luffys saying it’ll be fine, that he had fun. that hes proud to have made it this far with all of them. and those sound a lot like parting words so zoro’s shaking his head no but luffy is still smiling. hes saying that hes glad he had zoro, that he made him happy. hes saying to tell everyone he’s glad they met, that hes glad they all had each other, that he knows theyll be just fine . 

zoro wants to say that luffy should tell that to them himself, when hes wrapped up and recovering and alive but his mouth is glued shut again and he feels that interrupting luffy now would be cursing him to death, like his words are the only thing keeping him tethered here, he just needs to get him to keep talking to stay awake. 

he tries to smile but it comes out ugly and wrong and he feels his lip wobble so he drops it. he settles on rubbing his thumb on luffys shoulder. something to keep him here. 

so he rubs and luffy talks little things until he cant anymore. until his eyes grow dull and his skin loses its warmth and still zoro rubs and he rubs.

—

thats how law finds them. zoro hunched over a body that should never be as still as it is. and its really no surprise hes there, hes been gunning for the one piece since the time he could captain a ship (or a submarine) but it all feels so wrong. 

zoro either doesnt notice him or doesnt care, but either way the man doesnt acknowledge law until he’s right behind him. its not like law can say anything to announce himself either, not after seeing the state of the body that zoros currently holding. the body that used to be luffy’s. hes still processing it all when the other man(the one whos alive) finally speaks. 

zoro asks if hes got a devil fruit. less of a question and more of a statement, but he should know anyway since theyve spent considerable time together and hes literally seen him use it. law cant unstick his jaw so he hums in affirmation. “and you can switch stuffs’ places?” another hum. “what about time.” 

that makes law pause. “what?” his voice comes out stronger than he feels. 

“what about time? can you switch things in time?” by this point law has awakened his devil fruit or some shit dont sweat the logistics but hes never tried anything of that sort so he kind of stumbles “im not- maybe? ive never attempted-“ zoro interrupts “send me back” 

“what?” 

“send me back so i can fix this. you can do that, right.” it clicks. law would pity zoro if he didnt know any better, instead he just feels mounting despair and resignation. 

he may not be crew, but he knew luffy too, he was allied with the man for fucks sake, and this just feels- wrong. he sighs, a tired, heavy thing. 

“what about your crew?” its useless. zoros as stubborn as his captain, with arguably a handful more screws loose. “it wont matter. they’ll never know because i’ll make sure this doesnt happen.” he still hasnt turned around. law doesnt know what expression hes making and hes sure he never wants to find out. 

hes ready to deny it, cut his losses and head for the one piece himself (hes not heartless, but if he stands here any longer and has to look at. well. he think he might never be able to move again) but then he really thinks about it. could he? would it even be possible? surely this isnt the way things were supposed to go, surely this isnt right. luffys never been one who was supposed to die just like that, like this, law knows that much. he thinks hes going to regret this, but he counts it as one last thank you for everything luffy did for him. 

youre gonna owe me big time strawhat-ya. if i even remember this, that is. 

he puffs a breath “i can try. i cant- promise anything but. i think we both know this,” he makes a vague, weak gesture, “isnt right.” 

zoro doesnt say anything, law didnt expect him to. he just bows his head slightly and law takes that as the acknowledgment it is. 

he brings his hand up, “dont do anything stupid, zoro-ya. or, at least, make it stupid enough to bring him back.” 

he positions his fingers in way so familiar, but the weight of it now is nearly unbearable.

room.

shambles

—

zoro’s world shatters, differently than before, and then theres nothing.

—

he wakes up in bed, bleary eyed and a pounding headache assaulting his senses. his alarm clock is going off which only adds to the drumbeat against his eyes. he grumbles and whacks around aimlessly to shut it off. the silence lasts a moment before his eyes fly open and he jolts up, sheets pooling around his waist. luffy. where was he? where was zoro? did the crew find him and take him back to the ship? did law fail? but this didnt look like chopper’s office.

he looks around to find hes in a room hes never seen before in his life, yet he instinctively knows is his. it all feels so wrong, like he doesnt belong in his own skin. he scratches lightly at his arm. he needs to go to work. 

work?

what the fuck is happening. 

its like his mind is at war with itself, one truth trying to dominate over the other. he trained at sensei’s dojo. he aged out of foster care. he was a swordsman, he was the first mate of the strawhat pirates. he didnt go to college, hes working construction. he made a promise, and kuina died. kuina…died. huh. his captain, his luffy, someone he knew so intimately and who knew him in turn. hes never met someone with that name his entire life. he needs to go to work, he needs to find his crew. 

he doesn’t understand what the fuck is happening. 

without his permission his legs stand him right up and he moves confusedly, surely, to the bathroom he didnt know he had. his reflection stares back at him in the mirror and its him, of course it is, he doesnt know why he expected someone else, but hes also…different. he has both function of his eyes, first of all. a scar in the same place as before but its light and healed over and doesnt seem to have blinded him like it once did. his hair is green, sure, but black roots peek out from underneath the familiar shade. hes grown stubble, he should shave. he needs to go to work. 

hes so confused, but his body moves like its been doing this its whole life. as far as zoro knows, it has. 

he continues getting ready, mind still at odds, and makes himself a cup of coffee (in his own kitchen. his own kitchen? the state of it leaves less to be desired. sanji would surely skin him alive) before tucking into his shoes, grabbing his wallet and keys and heading out the door. he seems to live in a single room apartment, and a crummy one at that. his legs move him faster, he has to go to work, he cant be late again (again?).

his car is parked outside the building, he has no fucking clue what it is but he unlocks it all the same and settles in. he feels like he shouldnt be operating this sort of machinery. franky would know better than him how it must work. he starts it up and backs out. trusting his gut to get him where he needs to be. he should be more concerned, he should be frantic and inconsolable, his captain was dead in his arms and now hes? what? going to lay some bricks or some shit? but he finds that part of him dulled in favor of following whatever mundanity this body is pushing him towards. 

uumm whatever whatever he arrives at work eventually i dont know how construction jobs work are there offices or something. idc thats not the point. johnny and yosaku are there and zoro is surprised to see them since, as far as he knows, the last time they were with each other was at arlong park which was years ago for him. but the two greet him like this is a daily occurence, like theyve been working together for years. and zoro thinks, knows, they must have. but this is good, this is great fucking news actually because until now theres been no confirmation if zoro was here alone (wherever “here” is) but now his proof is right in front of him because if johnny and yosaku are here, and they exist the same as from before, then that must mean everyone else is here too right? he clings onto this hope with both hands trembling. 

nami, usopp, the cook and chopper and robin and franky, brook, jinbe and fuck. fuck, luffy. theyve got to be here somewhere, zoro just has to find them. hes not sure if they remember things like he does but hes got to try because they are his as much as he has always been theirs and they should all exist together as it has always been. 

so then yeah he finishes his shift because its what hes ‘supposed’ to do but he doesnt go home. he drives around aimlessly before pulling into a random lot and pulling out his phone (theres no snail attached to it. weird.) he doesnt even know where to begin. hes not usually the one coming up with plans, he just goes where theres blood need to be shed. but no one seems to be in any danger here except for maybe himself, and its not like he has his swords anyway- shit. fuck did he still have wado? he must have right? he knows there was a kuina that existed here too, he knows because he remembers. and she, well she wasnt around anymore so he must have wado. he must. with shaking fingers he pushes that aside for now, though barely. he needs to find luffy, but he wouldnt even know where to start. luffy could probably find the rest of their crew by simply wandering around and happening upon them, thats how he did it before. but zoro has no idea where he’d be, he doesnt even know where he is. nami or robin would be a good bet to at least form a plan, but he wouldnt know how to find them either. 

is there even a coco village here? would robin still be part of baroque works? he needs someone who has a defined location that he could google or something (what the hell is google?). usopp would be at syrup village right? shit. is there even a drum island? these are all too broad, he needs something specific. specific…..a place with an identifiable name, somewhere smaller that would be easier to stake out…

a lightbulb goes off. 

fucking shit he thinks. of course. of fucking course it would come down to the cook. 

he types in “baratie” to his maps and a location pops up, just 27 minutes from where he is now. he hasnt eaten yet either, so he figures thats killing two birds with one stone. he taps the address, backs out of the lot and drives. 

(if it takes him nearly an hour to get there thats nobodys business but his own)

he pulls up to the building about a quarter after 7. it seems packed enough already, but if memory serves him right then that was just par for the course for baratie. he parks, gets out and locks his car, then shoves his hands in his pocket and resigns himself to another oncoming migraine hes sure to get upon interacting with the man hes certain is waiting somewhere inside. 

the tables are full, the host tells him, he slips a 20 from his wallet and suddenly (of course) theyre more than willing to serve him. 

he gets settled in a far and somewhat isolated booth and a waiter comes up to him, but he cuts the man off as hes introducing himself and says “you got a blonde working here? stupid ass side part with a weird eyebrow? goes by sanji” the waiter looks shocked and put off by his rudeness but quickly collects himself and says “we might. depends on whos asking” zoro snorts “just tell him hes got someone who wants to talk to him,” he cringes at this next part, tries to smile but knows it comes off as a sneer. hes not sure if he still has conquerors haki wherever he happens to be now, but he tries to channel that energy the same way he would if he were in battle and says “tell him im a fan.” the waiters eyes widen, in fear or surprise zoros not sure (most likely a mix of both) before he nods and scurries across the floor, weaving in between patrons and coworkers alike until he disappears behind the double doors to the kitchen. 

zoro sits with his arms crossed and skims through the menu out of boredom and impatience. its a couple minutes before he sees a familiar head of blonde hair emerge from across the way. a smile climbs onto his face despite himself. sure, the guy annoyed him to hell and back and their…friendship (if you could really call it that) was a tumultuous one, but it was good to see someone familiar nonetheless. he schools his expression before the blonde can spot him. a few moments pass before hes standing right in front of zoro, his stupid suit primped and pressed as always, and a cautious look on his face. 

“you asked for me?” his tone is the one he only reserves for men who he deems not worth his time. zoro grits his teeth but says “yeah, theres something ive gotta discuss with you.” 

hes never been one for tact, forever blunt unlike his swords. 

sanji quirks a brow “i dont plan on talking about anything with anyone unless theyre a paying customer” zoro feels his eyebrow twitch but grabs his menu nonetheless and points to a random item without looking “i’ll have this then, and whatever booze you got.” sanji leans in to see what hes pointing to before his one visible eye widens and a grin slowly overtakes his previously unaffected face. 

he speaks condescendingly. “wonderful choice sir, coming right up.” before zoro can get another word in he grabs the menu out of his hand, spins on his heel, and marches back to the kitchen. 

zoro clenches his fists and does his best not to grind his teeth into a fine dust. no matter where they are or what displacement in time the fucking curly brow never fails to be absolutely insufferable. at least this way though, zoro knows its him for real. 

its another 20 minutes before the shit cook reemerges from the back with a platter and a mug in his hand. he steps up to zoros table and places the plate and cup down in front of him with a smug look. zoro has no idea what the fuck hes looking at on his plate. he doesnt have time to question it before sanji plops down in the booth seat across from him, disregarding all previous faux-professionale and asking “so what do you want” zoro tears his eyes away from his plate and looks into sanji’s, trying to convey as much emotion, as much urgency as he possibly can. 

“luffy needs us. and we have to find him” whatever the cook was expecting him to say, it definitely wasnt that. the other man regards him more warily now, looking him up and down with a tense frown before replying “i dont know what the hell youre talking about. and i dont appreciate being mocked or having my time wasted” he goes to stand up but zoro grabs his wrist, yanking him back down unceremoniously. 

he blinks before rounding back on zoro, flaring his nostrils in a way zoro knows means hes about to get himself in deep shit “oi, what the fuck do you think youre-“ he doesnt let him finish “im not mocking you. this isnt some stupid prank or whatever youre thinking. and despite how much i would enjoy punching your teeth in right now im not looking for a fight either.” 

the cook still looks affronted but seems to actually be listening. zoro continues “look, i dont know what the fuck is going on. i was at laughtale with you and the others, with luffy, and then i woke up and now im here and i dont know how but this is all wrong. its all wrong but i need to find luffy and fuck, i cant do it alone. i need your help to find him. find everyone.” the blondes eye is wide, but he blinks and its gone. he looks more tired than zoro has ever seen him 

“im not paid enough for this shit. i dont know why i even-“ he looks like hes getting ready to leave again but zoro is desperate at this point so he blurts out whatever he thinks will convince the other man hes not bullshitting.

“we met you here, at the baratie. me and nami and usopp and luffy. luffy busted through one of your walls so your old man punished him by making him wash dishes. i dont, i dont know what luffy said to you, or how he convinced you to join us, but he changed your life like he did mine. we sailed together, and we had each others backs no matter how much we got on each others nerves. you were our cook. i was our swordsman. luffy was our captain and youd do anything to help him, i know you would, same as me. youre a pervert and an asshole and a damn annoyance, but youre strong. i could still kick your ass though” if the cook’s eyebrow could go any higher hes sure itd be clear off his forehead by now. 

“and you- your dream. you wanted to find the all blue.” he stalls there, engine sputtering. zoro doesnt know what else to say, so he snaps his mouth shut. 

the blonde is still gaping at him like a fish, but he mouths the phrase “all blue” like hes been searching for it his whole life, like he always knew but just never had the words. 

he blinks. 

then he blinks again, rapidly. there are tears pooling in his eyes. his mouth flaps for a moment before he seems to finally be able to push out words. 

“you- zoro?” he sounds small. he sounds hopeful. zoro grins. 

“yeah, yeah its me.” sanji stares at him a moment, then looks around, as if hes seeing everything with clear eyes for the very first time. zoro figures he might as well be. 

“holy shit. holy shit.” 

zoro laughs, a rough thing. theres a ball in his throat that he cant seem to dislodge. “nice to have you back, curly brow” sanji’s gaze snaps back to him before he scowls and tries wiping away the tears that are now streaking down his cheeks. its useless though, it seems they cant stop. zoro laughs again at the sorry state of the asshole in front of him, this time more full and genuine. he feels so relieved he doesnt know what to do with himself. 

“yeah yeah, whatever dick head.” sanji grumbles. zoro quiets down, glances away, lets him have his moment. “fuck, mosshead, im still on the clock and you unload all this on me? how the hell am i supposed to finish the rest of my shift?” his words are sharp but he doesnt sound angry at all. in fact, when zoro turns back to look, hes smiling. 

“you remember now though, dont you?” he has to be sure. 

“what does it look like, dumbass? think im tearin’ up cuz of pollen or some shit?” the cook rolls his eye. theyre both silent for a moment, trapped in their own heads, before he speaks up again. “so, what now?” zoro doesnt even have to think before he answers “we find everyone else, obviously.” “well no shit, but how?” zoro glances to the side. “i was hoping youd figure that out” sanji stares before bursting out laughing. zoro scowls and hunches into his shoulders. 

“of course!” sanji cackles “of course your dumbass wouldnt know what to do! you probably just typed in the most recognizable place you could remember and hoped one of us would be there!” zoro doesn’t answer, because yes thats what he fucking did, but it worked didnt it? he doesnt see whats so funny. 

“fuck you.” 

he wants nothing more than to bash that smarmy mouth in, but the familiar egging settles something in his soul. sanji gasps a few breaths before calming down, now wiping tears from his eyes for a completely different reason. 

“alright alright, well lets figure this out then, yeah? we figure out how we got here then we can figure out how to get back right? simple enough” 

zoro nods, “law was-“ he stops. remembers dull eyes and clammy skin and wrong wrong wrong. he shakes his head, “no, no we cant” sanji looks at him confused. 

“we cant go back,” zoro presses, “not until i fix things. i promised i would” the other man seems to pick up on his panic and his mood dampens, becomes more serious. “promised what?” 

zoros never been one to sugarcoat, but now he wishes he could find a way to soften the blow hes about to deal. he inhales, pushes the breath out. says, “luffy died, sanji.” the fact the hes actually using the other mans name seems to fly right over his head in favor of the first part. “what?” zoro huffs, is he really gonna make him say it again? “luffy di-“ sanji interrupts, angry now, fists clenched and whitened from the pressure “i heard what you said. but what do you mean.” 

he doesnt want to have to tell sanji what happened, doesnt want to talk about it at all, wants to slice it up into small enough pieces that it very well may have never existed.

he told law the others wouldn't have to know, that he would make sure of it, but he's realizing now just how unrealistic that is. as much faith as zoro places in his own abilities, he's aware he's only one man.

and, he figures, if there's anyone i can trust enough to share a burden heavy as this with, might as well be the one who's strength i'd count on just as much as my own.

sanji cant help if he doesnt know what went down once they got separated at laughtale, so zoro sets his shoulders, clenches his fists, prepares himself like hes riding into a battle he knows he has no chance of winning—hes the first mate for fucks sake—and resigns himself to filling the other man in on every horrible detail

by the end, the cook looks much the same as zoro feels, pale-faced and shaky. he runs a trembling hand through his hair and clenches his eye shut. “fuck mosshead, thats…” he doesnt bother finishing, and zoro stays silent—already knowing just how much of a shitty situation it is that theyve found themselves in.

—

(btw the reason sanji was so smug about what zoro randomly chose on the menu is bc its one of their most expensive dishes. even upon regaining his memories he still makes zoro pay it cuz hes an asshole like that. business is business 😁)

uuummm i dont feel like detailing the rest basically my idea is that they work together to try and track down all the members as well as law, since hes also a part of this. i dont know how or when or in what order but i do know finding luffy would come last. so yes its zolu but for a majority of it more in spirit than anything. maybe i can throw in some luffy pov of him living with ace and sabo . he knows something is off but cant place his finger on what. he knows something is missing but hes got his brothers with him so what else could he possibly need? etc etc. you get the idea

[vendemiaireftn]

is there like a top secret hidden tag i don’t know about

[okalanissolis]

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭ ꜱᴇᴇ ɪꜰ ɪ ꜱᴛɪʟʟ ᴇxɪꜱᴛ

ᴀ ᴄᴇʟᴇꜱᴛɪᴀʟ ᴍᴀꜰɪᴀ ᴀ.ᴜ.

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭ ᴏɴʟʏ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ᴋɪɴɢ ᴀɢᴀɪɴ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖

ʙᴇꜰᴏʀᴇ ᴛʜɪꜱ ᴘᴀꜱᴛ ɪꜱ ᴄᴏɴꜱɪᴅᴇʀᴇᴅ ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴏᴜꜱ . . .

pt. ii | | series masterlist

focus on: muni sarang (diane meunier), choi san, & song deokhee word count: ~4.6k warnings: language, intermittent Lore Dumping™, mentions of violence, occasional graphic imagery, mentions of semi-main character death, Even More Gods Are Introduced and i think that is lovely

ᴛᴄᴅᴜ (ᴛᴏᴏ ᴄᴏɴᴠᴏʟᴜᴛᴇᴅ, ᴅɪᴅɴ'ᴛ ᴜɴᴅᴇʀꜱᴛᴀɴᴅ) ɪꜱ ɪɴᴄʟᴜᴅᴇᴅ ᴀᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ᴇɴᴅ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ !

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭

lilo's mic: still knee deep in history but with more character introductions! i think at some point i might do a character recap page where i can offer some quick stats about the character's strengths and role, but idk if it would be helpful or just another way that i Procrastinate™ — let me know your thoughts !

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭

⌜ my girl pinched my hips to see if i still exist / i think not ⌟

ꜱᴇᴇ ɪꜰ ɪ ꜱᴛɪʟʟ ᴇxɪꜱᴛ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖

— ʜᴀᴇᴍᴏ ᴘᴏʀᴛ was the main harbour of hoku city. home to the oldest and most robust working port on the island, the leeward side of the city was often referred to as haemopu side — an amalgamation of the names ʜᴀᴇᴍᴏꜱᴜ, the god of light and namesake of haemo port; and ᴋᴀᴘᴜ: sacred, taboo, forbidden. it was an unspoken rule that the shadows that danced on haemopu side were all puppets of that power known as serpens, and if you saw their strings or witnessed their plays, you would keep quiet, or your days were numbered — your gift from samgong through.

— still, haemo port was vast and wide, and business had to keep. it wasn't particularly bad luck to be a shop stationed near haemo port: there was so much foot traffic there, so many lives crossing back and forth, still hungry to survive; the best of money could be found for those who dared haemopu and kept their sight where it belonged — out of their eyes and in the open hands of hoku — or so the urban prayer went.

to the untrained eye, haemo port and ʜᴀᴇꜱᴜ ꜱᴛʀᴇᴇᴛ (the road that led to the devouring mouth of it) were the same as any other harbour on the island: only slightly more complicated than the sum of their intricately stacked, labyrinthine parts; bathed in light by enormous streetlamps so that when the sun went down, the majesty of ʀᴀᴋᴇᴛᴜ, night, couldn't be the refuge with which spirits attempted to thwart demons. but the fangs of some serpents still found their venomous purchase, and the storefronts along haesu street were often just that — fronts. legitimate stores, but facades for things still sinister, sliding their way through the waters, encircling your world, whole.

— on the furthest place inland haesu street ever went, there was an old business complex that had stood so long the original signage was lost and along with it, the precedent name. haemo complex, haesu park, haemo plaza, haemopu ether — old things have many names, and in legend, the many named becomes gods. inside the six story building, shops and establishments checked in and out like aimless souls in a graveyard: some lingered, some faded, some lasted the test of time.

on the first floor of haesu complex stood a taekwondo studio.

next to it, an indoor shooting range.

— we start this story with the taekwondo studio — the dojang, where mountains go to be edified and pupils to be fortified. eventually, we will open the door to see what is made with bullets and loose gunpowder, but for now, we take an abrupt turn right, through the third set of doors on the ground floor.

ᴄʜᴏɪ ᴊᴇᴏɴɢᴄʜᴇᴏʟ, father of one, was the owner of the modest studio: a stern man with a compassionate underbelly, a fourth dan black belt and the first sabeom — teacher — to enter the business complex. in the early days, when he was newly teaching and the world was more cruel and wanton than it ought, he orchestrated and ran illegal fights in the backmost part of his dojang. necessity begged it; life forced his unwavering hand. he'd never been proud, but he stood in his choices steadfast, and if you only saw the whole of him from an angle upturned and below, it seemed the might of him was his honor, unmarred.

dealing in entertainment and prestige, jeongcheol made ends meet in the evening to bring necessities and opportunity to his wife and newborn son at dawn, and by noon, instill dreams in the children that called him sabeom, center of their budding confidence.

when the serpens found out about his midnight habits, they paid a prompt price for front row tickets. by the end of the evening, jeongcheol's rental payments were moved to an account more reliable, and his small family moved out of the back office space and into one of the apartments that sat on the fifth and sixth floors. in exchange, the fights would persist on a grander scale at a more regular schedule ad infinitum, and the serpens would get their due cut.

jeongcheol always knew that this favor would amount to more debt, in the future, but for the security he was promised, in this blood oath? for the advantage and chance he could bestow upon his son? if it were shortsighted and misguided — this business deal with the serpent of the sky — then forgive him, but omniscience was simply the name of his city, not the power in his mind.

— and as san, his darling boy, grew from jeja to seonbae and in the course of time, sabeom all his own — a 3rd dan black belt and the pride of jeongcheol's world — the price of a demon's mercy became ever clearer, crystalizing into the certainty of future: law.

— it was in that very dojang, after all, that jeongcheol added to his myriad of students two young girls: diane and soyeon, dawn and dusk. jeja diane, a student named wisdom, took early to sparring with san, never minding that the younger always won, ever scheming to learn from a protégé's skill.

when san was chosen to be the demon heir's protector, it wasn't a matter of surprise or honor, simply that of providence.

and san was dignified by it, at any rate.

— only ever envisioning an inherited taekwondo studio for himself, a modest future but fulfilling dream, san's world expanded at the hands of diane — and his dojang, while still being the center of all his tethered existence, was a future now shared. ʏᴇᴏꜱᴀɴɢ, a pupil and friend, would aid him in handling the fights in the backmost part all of his father's hope and shame, an eternal rite, the sisyphean promise the choi family would never complete.

— jeongcheol had slowly backed away from the uglier side of his business as he aged into complacency and fatigue, and san had taken up the mantle in his place. now, sin would beget sin and shackled to the serpens would be yet another soul.

yeo was clear that he didn't mind.

already one foot into corruption, what was one more leg?

— he'd been cleaning up bruises from betting fights and broken limbs from shadow duels for years. he'd sewn flesh together the way others might knit tenderness and virtue, goodness and love.

every dojang needed it's medic. and every medic needed his charge.

— this was merit enough, for the both of them. respect for san in being trusted with something on which the whole of the underworld revolved; prestige for yeosang in the power inherent of a ruling head of a domain long standing, and in it's ancience, revered.

and watching them both, once the hand that led them deep into the mouth of something ravenous, still, stood choi jeongcheol, left wondering when security was no longer security — a promise no longer words of honor.

ꜱᴇᴇ ɪꜰ ɪ ꜱᴛɪʟʟ ᴇxɪꜱᴛ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖ ᴄᴏɴᴛ.

— diane had asked him to disappear, again.

— it was never an explicit demand, not since the first time, when she'd been following the tail of a banker and realized it would be so much easier to approach him if she were just a woman and not a daughter, held.

the nameless banker had decided he no longer wished to be a pigeon fed from an opened hand but a raven shot out of the sky, the shiny things he stole slipping from his traitor beak and landing back into the hand of the power that wielded the shotgun evermore.

— "you're intimidating, san." and it hadn't been her words or the command in her eye so much as it was a shift in her being — sarang to diane, veracity to something mutable and ever brewing. "i need to ensnare him..."

and he'd slipped away, taken her half-cue and was already gone.

— if the demon of hoku knew how often diane asked him to slip away, san was sure the mythic ernest would be none too pleased. it takes half a second for malignance to seize you in hoku city, and only a fraction of that if you're particularly inclined. of course, san was never far, and sarang more competent than what the wills of well meaning fathers offered her, but it would be more than just san's immortal soul on the line if something befell her and he were at all still breathing.

but it was always sarang's eyes that sought for the mercy of him, in the hairbreadth turn of her infinitesimal micro-expression, the graceful warp into something so unseen it were all but hidden to eyes that were any less devoted than his. and it was never a question because she would never need to ask; he'd learned to read the depths of her during sparring sessions in a dojang made of his youth and all his tomorrow. once, he'd crafted alongside her the armor that was so much a second skin, there were barely any joints or seams that one could rub the pad of their thumb along.

he'd seen her, then, and so he always knew.

— and that's how he found himself here, again. vanished from a spot he said he'd always defend: dematerialized, because bang chan had come to call.

— or so diane let the boy think. she'd found chan first, weeks before this encounter he'd name 'chance' or 'fate'. it had been simple to learn his routine and easier to insert herself in it. a coffee shop he always walked past. her new favorite window seat. a position so comfortable it looked as though it had always been.

and so they talked; this woman neither diane nor sarang, crafting a life by degrees of admission, chan warming to the gentle flame of her lies so that eventually, perhaps, knowledge of him would melt, secrets in him slip between them, in this place behind glass, warm between cups of untouched coffee.

not even san would hear the things chan would reveal in his adventurous, half-flirtatious speech. the thought often made the black belt's heart skid — his resolve stutter — but the bulk of him never wavered. he was a mountain and summits never crumbled; their might certainly never moved.

and that simple conflict of interest was something his friends never failed to entertain, and in mocking, enjoy.

— ᴅᴇᴏᴋʜᴇᴇ, twin sister of ᴡᴏᴏʏᴏᴜɴɢ and the one-minute younger half of their expert gunman team, was the one to first discover san's internal battle, having joked about his affection for diane from his sabeom days at the dojang. first, a true baseless joke, then overtime, a comfortable uncomfortability for san as it grew in truth and size.

san and his diane; no one loved their work the way san did; if san could marry duty he would.

— if he wasn't always looking at deokhee down the barrel of her sniper rifle, he just might knock some humility into her near prophetic teasing and her twin's identical shit eating grin.

but what was he to do when she was, in part, always right?

— sarang laughed at something chan said, and diane reached out to touch his shoulder with the soft of her hand. san turned his gaze, somehow half guilty, and that's when he saw the ephemera of a shadow he should not have.

what was kim hongjoong doing all the way here?

— first order of business would be to pull sarang from the place at which she stood. second would be to see just who the informant whisperer was that hongjoong strove to meet. third would be to evaluate just where that placed this puppet-master of secrets in the ever turbulent waters of organization and fealty — obeisance and axis.

— san was standing in front of her in the coffee shop before the shadow had ever truly dissipated — before any of the prior thoughts had fully formed in his mind.

sarang was good at smoothing her own confusion and concern, and playing the part of the innocent and sheltered. she huffed a convincing sigh and muttered something about a father that, overprotective, cut her time with this young officer short, and san caught the thrown word of 'cousin' like a fire-hot, thousand pound and ever-burning coal.

so that's how she'd explained his presence to chan.

— when she knew she'd almost been caught in the act by hongjoong, sarang swore.

— ʜᴏɴɢᴊᴏᴏɴɢ was a member of the serpens syndicate, and had, since the death of byeonghwa, been the watchful eye that extended past the confines of hoku city. loyal to the demon — a horkos made potent in the poignance of a blood debt — hongjoong was trusted... so far as anyone could be reliable, in this city that ate you whole, in these times that twisted the sinew of your very heart. at any rate, he was an informant of ernest, and while not one nearly as volatile as soyeon, still convoluted in intent.

he would be interested — perhaps even moreso curious than san, who daily burned all of his inquisition and steadfast resolve near through — as to what the demon heir was doing out here, in the pristine half of hoku city, talking with an officer that would just as soon as imprison her, if he knew even a fraction of the atrocities and moral impurities she ordered and aided, abetted and carried out.

— of course, even if hongjoong were to ask, sarang would never tell.

— not even with san, himself, did sarang reveal her true intentions in this business involving newly minted officer bang chan, a rookie at some few years post-graduation, an acquaintance turned friend from their first windfall encounter. not even with san, who knew the verity of sarang and had cherished her humanity from it's first appearance, did she let any information slip, a single hint pass.

he'd look into her eyes and unexpectedly, a wall was there — a guardedness of which he'd never known. she was no longer forthright about all possibilities with him. her thoughts were not so easily read, her want not so readily known.

— but that was not the worry that had the jaw with which to gnaw at san. not yet, anyway. not when hongjoong was surreptitiously on the same path as them, in a place where neither was colloquially seen (his informant hadn't been anyone of note, and so the consequence of his gained knowledge that day couldn't have been much, but one could never be complacent, if they wished to thrive).

— not when soyeon was unhappy, and sarang was the fool to not believe it.

— not when ernest, kingpin of terror, chessmaster of the underworld and ruler of hoku city, was mired in that slow changing-of-hands and place of gentle retreat where all of his speech was about the hand of iku, that terrify in the weight of dying.

the death of a demon was always a wounded threat that demanded first redress.

— it had started, in part, with the death of byeong-hwa. what was a king, after all, when his sworn shield had fallen? what menace was left in a monster, when his right hand was rotting, 6 feet below? the monsoon season would come, and a sickness would plague ernest along with the rain. jangma was the will of bada — the monsoon season the cursing volition of the sea. it was divine law, in some ways, that bada would claim her vengeance on hoku by taking it's epicenter and sweeping it's fortune and prosperity into her tumultuous seas, but it was still too soon, and thus, a secret well hidden.

no one in the serpens outside of the few remaining elders that sat at the demon's table, byeong-hwa's only daughter, his heir, and his warded nephew knew of the state of ernest's true mind.

the tides were swelling, the ground was saturating; bada was clambering toward the city, and at the time least affordable, the cracks between sarang and soyeon's friendship and intertwined lives deepened to a schism, with roots on either side, blooms torn apart, thorns tearing stem like gnashing teeth devouring flesh.

— when it rains, it pours, and in jangma, the storms were violent and unending; when bada raged, all the gods hovered close to witness her torrential price.

— "i'll tell ʏᴜɴʜᴏ." when they were haemopu side, diane turned to san, the silence between them broken, the confidence that always held in it's place perhaps worse for wear, if either of them had the resolve to mention it. "he'll have some clever way to spin hongjoong off our track - if he even saw anything in the first place."

— san nodded: just once, a jerky motion that left this world still buzzing, a dull, low whine.

yunho, sarang's cousin, was a close confidant of theirs. he moved into the serpens complex when he was 17. some commonplace tragedy left him with a want in the pit of his belly, and ever since the breaking down of all that tied sarang to soyeon and night to the dawining day, he had played the role of strategist and pragmatic advisor to his cousin — a safer, less volatile option for diane to pick, considering soyeon had always been her council, former.

— diplomats need their advisors; conmen require their marks. diane had a necessity for yunho and a plan for bang chan, and of course, they would be dealt with first. san was just a bodyguard, and in this way, he'd always known his place. but favor had a way of lead to want, and if he tended to that fire, it could always lick its way past his defenses and consume him whole.

— sarang blinked, and the change pulled san from his thoughts the way it always would. born to serve, her movements were what he'd been shaped to read. "i guess i'll tell hermes that you stood him up for yunho again, when it's time for your 13:00 date and you don't show."

— sarang laughed at that, warm and clear, almost chasing away the mist that had gathered all through the day, at choice intervals and expected alleyways, thickening to the obscurity of fog. hermes was sarang's greyhound — the puppy she'd once found when younger but crowned wise. she never had taken him to the serpens complex, where he could be socialized with the dobermans she'd cared for most her life. instead, san took him in — an act of kindness she never stopped praising him for, never quite forthright about her reasoning but offering just enough to where he was satisfied.

"tell the twins when you see them i need to have a word."

ꜱᴇᴇ ɪꜰ ɪ ꜱᴛɪʟʟ ᴇxɪꜱᴛ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖ ᴄᴏɴᴛ.

— the shop never had a name: just a wordless sign in the shape of a generic gun scope: the focus for an eye you'd never look into as you took your final, heaving breath.

the shooting range, the eye, akita's place, the final shop on the ground floor of haemo plaza.

— every child who'd ever touched a gun — any soul who had enough of some small mercy they had the fire to protect it in this heaving city — had, at some point, entered the shooting range that sat haemopu side. established longer than jeongcheol's dojang, but having changed hands at around the same time, the shooting range was owned by a woman named ᴀᴋɪᴛᴀ — ex-military but dishonorably discharged, a mother of twins, and simultaneously warm yet cold: distant, but always manning her station.

it was only natural that, sharpshooter of her squad, akita had taught her children to shoot from the moment their hands had the strength to thumb a trigger.

eyes bred to look at you through the barrel of a firearm, hearts trained to see the liberation at the end of a mission and none of the causalities between. akita took her twins, cradle of her future, and gave them all the skills she broke skin and bruised knuckle to hone. they would never have to struggle, because they would be born with skilled gift. they would have the freedom of honor, because no training would mar their resolve.

— at first, the shooting range was only that which sat within the four walls in the ground floor of that complex. but slowly it expanded: the back property, accessed through the side entrance, narrow but deep, for single sessions with moving targets; the abandoned lot near the docks that akita had come into possession of by chance and was appraising for sale until her daughter showed an aptitude for long range and a spark to pursue it.

before long, what was modest expanded, and with an open mouth, devoured until engorged. the shooting range was well known. beloved. conspicuous. exactly the sort of place one would expect to find a doorway into the depths of a now illegal, though still legitimate syndicate, and therefore, a place where they could never be found. in reverence and renown, akita secured a safe haven for her children, a place where they could rest without the fear of being poached.

two doors down, the serpens paid a lease, but here, in the four walls she maintained, they could never sink in their teeth.

but fate was the domain of samgong, and mischief the trait of hoku, and here, in a city where the presence of gods were only so strong because they were so ceaselessly revered, the two powers often conspired to thwart the dreams of those who dared trying, and those whose complacency masqueraded as crown.

— wooyoung, the older of the twins, was the impulsive to deokhee's passion. touched by caprice, drowning in compulsion — akita whispered into his ear as he grew up, tickling the soft skin hidden there, that he was born the same star sprite as hoku: before he became the omniscient eye, back when he was nameless, and his fervency was tried by the test of his father's tedium. in constant motion, neverending activity: "make no deals with iku, listen not to the obligation of horkos. you are a star, you belong to nothing but your own burn."

— deokhee, of course, was the fire burning her older brother brighter, still, the combustion in his path that kept him from apathy, that saw all his visions through. ᴇɴᴊɪ, her mother would call her, the fire god born into flesh. the ardor, the devotion, the commitment deepening to obsession, the dedication to wooyoung's whims, the conviction in her twin brother's mania. akita adored her daughter's fervency, fanned the flames of her exuberance never quenched. "shackle yourself to no one, my enji, you are not meant to be contained. never turn in on yourself; find a direction to incinerate: you are meant to set this world ablaze."

— avoiding flirtation with the fetters of the serpens was an unspoken request from akita, a desire never plainly raised. if she had been wiser (if she saw all too clearly the way serpents rise to challenge and adaptable, warp their venom to something honey-sweet) perhaps akita would have been more explicit in her demands, exact in all she envisioned and prayed to conspire. but it seemed an evident requirement, a moral anchored deep and in it's inevitability, made potent and strange.

"you are made for more," she had always told them.

but what can be done when your only framework of 'more' and 'greater' is the gunpowder residue of a superior weapon?

— once, akita built her children into crook of a firearm. ever after, they would know mostly it's bitter taste.

— none of this is to say, however, that the twins were a tragedy and their penchant something acrid, lead.

— deokhee was bottled excitement and effervescent joy in every task, and wooyoung the kind of gregarious that surrounded him with enthusiastic friendship and kindred brotherhood in every space he ventured to grace.

— and ᴛʜᴇ ʟᴜᴍɪɴᴀʀʏ was one of those third spaces that wooyoung and deokhee frequented most.

a serpens owned establishment: an electricity plant on the edge of town, with hidden rooms that opened into dark things that could only hide in the shadow of a generator as massive as that which fueled a never-blinking city. the luminary was one of the largest holes in the wall that the serpens ran. there, you could order any sin you could pay the ferryman to usher you to.

(so long as you were in the right room, of course. the serpens liked to keep their messes orderly.)

— the twins mostly frequented the rooms with standard bar fare. alcohol, dance, betting and games of chance, fisticuffs when more than just spirits hit you square in the jaw after one freedom too many. a common enough vice with a burgeoning sea of acquaintances and a militia of contacts and friends. it was here, in the pale of haemosu's light — all the glare they could harness but never reach — that the twin's sociability spun a web that was never meant to entrap them, but still made them the perfect players for a serpent game.

after all, it was in the luminary that the twins aligned themselves with the ꜱᴘɪɴᴇ ʙʀᴇᴀᴋᴇʀ ʙɪᴋᴇʀꜱ.

a group of criminals and delinquents that rode through ꜱᴋɪᴛ — the next door neighbor of hoku city, and the border at which the serpens let their needles halt. the serpens owned hoku, and every gang and group of would-be hopefuls that they'd long run out had taken up station in skit and brawled it out, there. a neighboring city was of no consequence to the serpens as long as they spilled blood on their rightful side of the fault line, and the spine breakers were a fairly established group that worked their own city and only occasionally crossed the borders of hoku — careful to always show their deference and pay their dues. they were a infrequent though to some familiar face in the luminary on nights when the moon hung low, mostly to work deals with the mercenaries for hire in the back, and always to chase a drink alongside the twins.

ᴊᴜɴɢᴋᴏᴏᴋ was their closest companion of the lot, and if his drink of choice was an expected usual, and his uninspired flirtation with deokhee an affectionate and comfortable aside, then the night would be warm and the luminary waitstaff would make better money in tips than they had all month.

— and it was precisely that friendship with jungkook (and perhaps their closeness with san, though why make complicated something already written by fate?), that brought the twins to the serpens those aging years ago.

it had been hongjoong, newly syndicate minted, that noticed these two sparrows who somehow seemed to know everyone he had been keeping his thousand eyes on, and dared to ask himself what use could come with knowing their names.

it had been simple, after, for seonghwa to convince him that wooyoung was the easier approach, and for soyeon to cast the die on his fate.

(but that had been years ago: before the breaking down of factions, before suspicion and envy cast shadows that demons new not how to play, before ties were cut like marionette strings, and seonghwa and soyeon became a duo, and hongjoong, far enough from the barrel to not yet choose how to align, had to keep his ideas in his breast pocket and his lies tucked beneath his tie.)

— in the end, the twins were brought into the serpens because their connections would open doors that had no keys. it was through wooyoung and deokhee that the serpens greedy left hand reached into the heart of skit and, with an emboldened and wanting jungkook, staged a coup and installed this friend as the spine breaker's acting head.

ever after, the bikers would be in debt of the might of hoku, and in perpetuity, there would be scouts and reinforcements should there be need of aid from a distance.

— it was simply providence that the twins would have use beyond their sociability and want. it was the work of that ever mischievous hoku that in a chance encounter and a single ploy, diane was gifted with the two best marksman the city could afford.

danger, of course, in the single-minded passion of deokhee and the brilliant, aimless apathy of wooyoung, but when combined together (and wooyoung under the threat of the only one he swore obeisance to: san), they were a power more than their arsenal, a weapon greater than their might and distant reach.

— when san found the two of them sitting on his couch, deokhee knuckle deep in affectionate rubs for hermes, wooyoung eating noodles out of the pot, on his pinky swinging the apartment's spare key ("for emergencies," san had said, and pointedly handed it to deokhee), there was less a reaction of disappointment or surprise, and more an acceptance that at least this way, the message would be easily delivered, in brevity, made sweet.

"diane's calling."

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭ ᴏɴʟʏ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ᴋɪɴɢ ᴀɢᴀɪɴ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖ pt. ii | | series masterlist

ᴛᴄᴅᴜ (ᴛᴏᴏ ᴄᴏɴᴠᴏʟᴜᴛᴇᴅ, ᴅɪᴅɴ'ᴛ ᴜɴᴅᴇʀꜱᴛᴀɴᴅ) :

1 - jeongcheol, san's father, used to run a taekwondo studio. because times were hard, he ran illegal fights in the back of his dojang, and when the serpen's found out, they co-opted his business and expanded it. as he got older, he passed down his dojang to san, who now works as the bodyguard of diane. because of his busy schedule, he co-manages the dojang with yeosang, the medic of the taekwondo studio.

2 - the taekwondo studio is situated on haesu street in an unnamed work-live complex often referred to as haemo plaza. on the same floor as the dojang there is an unnamed shooting range, owned by akita, the mother of twin gunman for the serpens deokhee and wooyoung. akita does not know of her children's affiliation with the syndicate and would disapprove if she knew.

3 - san, deokhee, and wooyoung are all friends are are closely allied with diane. diane is also close allies with yunho, her cousin and strategist council after her falling out with soyeon has deepened in the past few years (there has been a vague multi-year time skip from pt. i to pt. ii).

4 - ernest, kingpin of the serpens, is currently dying. it is a well kept secret - but not from soyeon, who diane fears will use this knowledge opportunistically. recently, diane has been keeping many secrets from even her closest confidant, san, especially regarding her consistently visiting officer bang chan, trying to weasel from him secrets... but about what?

5 - hongjoong is a member of the serpens with many secrets and many informants. diane is unsure if, in the power vacuum created after ernest's death, if he will show loyalty towards her or soyeon, and so she is wary of what he knows, when he was in the area as she was meeting up with bang chan.

6 - hongjoong was the one to originally recruit twins deokhee and wooyoung, because they have many contacts in hoku and neighboring cities - notably jungkook, now leader of a biker gang in the neighboring city named skit.

7 - diane has a mission for deokhee and wooyoung heretofore lacking details or rhyme.

now onto pt. iii . . .

[napping-sapphic]

Love is so freaky and messed up to the point that sometimes i do wish and hope SO badly that no one ever has to suffer being in love with me specifically because it honestly sounds absolutely unbearable

[akkivee]

Penny for your thoughts, but I'm wondering if the upcoming Kuko angst is going to be related to him getting true mic'd. Like one of the first things he establishes way at the beginning the importance of making your own choices, and how he wonders if coming back to Nagoya when he did was right or not, but is the choice he made. But he didn't. And like immediately finding out he complains of being shrouded in doubt during "when six colors combine" drama track.

i like where your head’s at!!!!!! love it actually lmao!!!!!!

idk how to try and support your ideas without breaking down each and every verse lol, but i’ll try to keep it short. i think in this song preview, we listened to kuukou question everything he believes in, but as the song further and further progresses, we see him reassert his beliefs and give them focus, quite literally saying to never waver again. what set that off is the big question and i do think it’s linked to that very verse

the only time he’s ever mentioned such a sentiment is towards ichiro actually; ichiro always wavered in his heart and it’s the one thing kuukou could not stand about ichiro, so there’s potential it could be about ichiro

but this is a bat track lol and besides, ichiro and kuukou are very similar people. what he hates in ichiro could be actually reflective of something he hates in himself for a past choice we aren’t privy to, or even that very ‘choice’ to have left ikebukuro

as for it being bc of true hypnosis mic thought, i don’t see why it couldn’t be!!!! esp since kuukou himself didn’t sound very happy with the way he was called strong for breaking free out of the true hypnosis mic in the six colours track. if he needs maybe we’ll get some insight as to how kuukou broke out of the true hypnosis mic???

something that caught my eye while looking over the lyrics was that both he and hitoya have a similar verse about ‘illusions,’ hitoya plans to unravel its lies and kuukou’s is about how those illusions became reality. idk lol!!!!! that kinda sounds like a nod to the true hypnosis mic to me!!!! plus!!!! we had hitoya accompany ichiro, jakurai and gentaro’s block party mission to find out about the hypnosis mics, so that gives bat another connection to the hypnosis mic lore, as small as it is rn lol

on kuukou’s end, he true hypnosis mic had the power to strip away the value of choice. kuukou’s talked about how the hypnosis mic can change your fate in glory or dust and fate for kuukou is directly linked to choice. choice affects karma and depending on the karma you accumulated in life would affect how kuukou faces the buddha at the end of his life. so where does a choice like his actions the true hypnosis mic made him do fall under??? what’s that karma???? maybe it’s why kuukou’s thinking at some point in this song that his heart’s conviction isn’t enough, as evidenced by that verse ‘even when closed, with unwavering resolve in our hearts / this belief itself extinguishes like a flame,’ if his will had been strong enough in the first place, maybe he wouldn’t have succumbed to it is his thought process and that’s very harsh for kuukou to put onto himself lol

and lastly lol, about hirono-san uncharacteristically tweeting about kuukou it was def a hint lol 🤭 our first hint was hayama-san’s post and pic with bimi in may, the second was hirono-san’s kuukou bday tweet and the third was the fact kuukou’s sukajan was falling off the exact same way hirono-san liked to strip tease and then, hirono-san posting that very pic himself after the drop lol

[freezegirl]

Jesse Watts - Coldfront, used to partake in group therapy at the now defunct Isis Foundation. Used to live in Smallville. Now lives in Central City. Music lover. Speedskater. Cryokinesis. T.anner B.uchanan.

Randy Klein - Shadow Killer, used to partake in group therapy at the now defunct Isis Foundation. Used to live in Smallville. Now lives in Central City. Pretended to be a serial killer for attention. Shadowform transformation. Ty T.ennant.

Mary Pierson - Lamprey, deceased, used to partake in group therapy at the now defunct Isis Foundation. Was killed by the Smallville Serial Killer. Electricity Manipulation. M.ary M.ouser.

Kids like those three are easy to miss. It's easy for them to slip through the cracks.

One of them, dead. Two of them, forever changed in more ways than one. Jesse Watts spends his time at the Nora Fries Ice Complex which is a little larger than the Central City Ice Arena where Kie skates. His best friend Randy Klein can often be found there as well, though he's a lot less enthused about it.

When shadows start vanishing and bodies and temperatures start dropping in Central City, Barry ( @flashpointed ) and Khione investigate together with Cisco and Caitlin ( @crimsonfive ) and their investigation leads them right to the kids that Smallville forgot about.

Smallville might've forgotten about them, though, but Central City definitely won't! Iris ( @yearnstarved ) will make sure of it!

Little does everyone know, though, that this is but the beginning, for the Parliaments of Flames, Waves, Stones and Vapors have a stake in all of this, too.

[elvenbeard]

Me: I'm gonna write the angst now!!

V and Kerry: But what about some kinky sex first?

Me: ............... okay fine, but you have to go through the angst afterwards!

V and Kerry: Deal.

[im-still-watching-anime]

i have to read every new chapter of bsd twice because without fail i spend the first read through too distracted hoping for akutagawa to process any of it

[www-jungwon]

oops i lied one more post before i return to death

SONG KANG. MY DEMON. PLS TELL ME YOUSFV ESEEN IT BC OH MY GDUSO I CANTW HES TEWWWWWWWWWW FINE LIKE HELLO ???