#also turns out it has twice as much storage as i thought

[tittyinfinity]

I've had 16GB RAM in this computer the whole time?? I thought it was just 4gb. I was like how in the hell is my laptop surviving anything that I do to it

I'm realizing I got it mixed up with my tablet that has 4gb of ram lmao

[historia-vitae-magistras]

I think it might have been deleted with your old blog or buried somewhere but would you consider touching on Matthew having chronic anemia again? Idk I have chronic anemia and it's just weirdly comforting hearing your ideas for Matthew also suffering it

Oh man, yeah, I have thoughts. I just used this post to like brain dump 400 years of Matt meatsack headcanons so whoooo enjoy. Anemia was very common throughout history. Religious fasting, low meat consumption, famines, irregular food supply, blood loss, infection, cold exposure, lack of sunlight— you name it and it can cause anemia. I've got a friend who jokes that being anemic or vitamin deficient is just the Canadian default but to be fair its that isn't special or specifically Canadian. At least we get sun in summer. Sometimes. This got REALLY long like so long. I seriously did 400 years. asking me about the history of medicine basically makes me a word vomit machine. i am so sorry in advance.

I think about it as something that has often crept up on him throughout his life, like it will for most people at some point or another. It added a nice layer of misery too his existence. I don't think it was ever life threatening on its own but it did some damage over time or when combined with other things.

It's a reflection of carelessness if not neglect. I think he was often a healthy, happy child when someone gave a shit. Most of the people who did were his own, the few French Canadians. Occasionally Alfred, occasionally Alasdair, occasionally Francis, occasionally Arthur. These efforts were, however, mostly sporadic. Francois was desperate to squeeze out a profit, its often written that while France itself boomed, Quebec was a national embarrassment. When Matt and Quebec itself were failing, and they usually were, Francis left him to his own devices. Sometimes cared for sometimes not. This was the ancient regime, this era of intricate at and rococo and excess and high sophistication. Matt, a backwoods money sap was about as interesting as the smell of piss in Paris or Versailles. He didn't get hit, he got fed as well as anyone else, he tried to be useful. Here the anemia is seasonal. Shit food storage, lent eliminating what nutrition there was in the diet of the late winter, hard chores, cold weather. Late winter and early spring was always hard and I think it just hit him harder. It didn't matter though, being freezing tired and anxious because he's got one functioning blood-cell didn't matter if he had something to do.

It was really bad after the hand over. Years of hardship was crowned by the British and the French armies both burning Canadian crops and cutting off hunting fishing or any other method of obtaining food. Hauling canoes, marching. It wasn't uncommon for soldiers to just drop dead and I'm sure Matt did at some point.

The 15 years between the capitulation, the hand over and Alfred leaving were probably the best of Matt's life in some ways. He ate better under Arthur's hand. He didn't really get treated the same as Alfred but he ate as well and he was pitiful enough and Alasdair engaged enough he was only doing light, actually age appropriate chores, usually eating as much as he wanted and sleeping enough, usually snuggled up to Alfred's side. He started growing a little bit.

It didn't last. Enter another decade of war. An invasion of Quebec, being hauled up and down the American colonies as a paranoid Arthur loathed him for still holding affection for Alfred whiling counting on him to be disloyal and bail Alfred's ass out at least twice. No one pays attention to the quiet unassuming child always half out of sight so Matt got away with a lot. These years were hard when he was with Arthur. Shit food, not enough rest, abject emotional misery. He had it better than Alfred at least but thats not saying much. Shortly after the war turned south as the Americans slowly began to get the upper hand, Arthur dragged Matt with him. And the anemia contributed to the malaria and on a hot day he fainted, slid right out of the saddle and hit the ground. Arthur sent him north and didn't speak to him until Yorktown.

The years between Yorktown and New South Wales were pretty bad. The American revolution hadn't resolved the economic problems that Matt's acquisition had caused, there was no money to squeeze out of Canada, and the economy sucked. He was a part of the household. He did some chores, got fed two meals a day like everyone else, had somewhere to sleep. This is where I think a cycle kind of began. On the odd occassion someone was spending time with him, he got more or better food, affection, and with more energy he was bright and a bit less disappointing. Next to Alfred, everyone looks kind of dull but the cold, anxious lethargy of anemia made him look even worse. He's uninterested, doesn't initiate much, not very talkative, has to be forced out of bed. He seems lazy, stubborn, not particularly bright and that just adds to poor returns on any attention he ever does get. He feels like shit most of the time. The anemia doesn't help but he's just depressed in general. When Alasdair visits or someone acknowledges his existence and feeds him something with an actual vitamin in it, he has a little spirit in him again and got the cat for instance and Arthur gives him a whole 30 seconds of interest for the first time in probably a solid decade. He also fucked off back to Halifax without anyone noticing, working his way back on a ship and living pretty rough.

In a fit of frustration with how Matt only really seems to ever be happy when Alasdair is around, Arthur takes him to sea. Matt's a good sailor at first and Arthur is fairly pleased but long times at sea with shit food breaks down Matt's attention span, dropping those iron levels along with the vitamin c and everything else that plagued the average sailor. A vang line takes a chunk out of him and he gets knocked overboard in the process and Arthur dives in after him and kind of realizes, oh shit, thats the last kid he's got and even if he's pathetic he's better than nothing so Matt gets upgraded from a constantly damp hammock on the orlop deck to a fairly cosy cot in the captain's cabin. Matt receives a whole fuck given from Arthur, some decent food, heals up and its the perkiest Arthur's ever seen him. Instead of a dead-eyed pointless money suck, here's a bright, eager to please lad who hangs on Arthur's every word.

There are more wars with the French but Matt is loyal and by the very end of the century, the British royal family visits Canada and Queen Victoria's father actually took a French Canadian mistress iirc. Matt's growing a little, he's getting fed, he's getting attention. Arthur takes an interest, even lives with him sometimes, writes now and again. There are still some lean years, and he was really sick a few times in the late winter and early spring and once with cholera but its a lot better than it's ever been. He has another bad bout of it when Arthur throws him to Australia after the rebellion, shivering in the heat of the antipodean sun because he hasn't had a decent meal since he got on the ship six months ago. He was in bad shape if nothing next to Arthur when he earned his place back when he and Alfred bailed the imperial dipshit from the soup pot of HMS Terror. After that he's pretty good for a few years, living more like the son of an English country squire or whatever the fuck Arthur's pretending to be.

He doesn't have problems again until after he spends a few months with Alfred after Alfred got galloping consumption while burning the shit out of himself during Sherman's march to the sea. Alfred gets better, buts the lid on the whole Fenian thing and fucks off west. Matt's pretty healthy at this point, but spending a few months with a dying TB patient eventually leads to the inevitable and when the economy tanks just after confederation, its a whole ass free fall. He doesn't really mention it to anyone, but eventually he can't avoid Arthur's summons, dies on the old man's favourite sofa and they spend a lot of time at the sea side shoveling food at Matt until he doesn't look like a corpse. Things are good and stable for a decent period after that. He still has the odd small problem because he's slowly turning into a caffeine junky and eating with coffee and tea blocks iron consumption but mostly he's good. No major problems. He gets taller, things are going okay.

World War one he gets a nasty drop in iron every-time he's gassed, its fairly common and worsened existing issues. He does okay with the help of a lot of cocaine and coffee and tea until the kansas flu which can cause just all the anemia's just all of them. Not really unique to him but whoooo its a familiar feeling for Matt. It never really went completely away during the 20s or 30s. He was in pretty bad shape but he's kind of used to being in pretty bad shape by the great depression hits and the drop is bad but it isn't quite as catastrophic for him as it is Alfred.

World War Two has some rough moments, but in the grand scheme of things he's fine compared to the rest of the world. Post war goes pretty good. One short bout after Suez when he's pretty much exiled from the family and stops eating but Arthur gets a grip and he's good plus Jan's answer to most problems is calories so its pretty okay. Matt still doesn't know whats going on with that though.

It probably becomes the worst its ever been in the 70s and 80s as he and Jan drift, he has political issues at home, his foreign policy is increasingly isolated from the rest of the anglosphere, and he's doing a lot of drugs. Like a lot. Not eating in spurts. Not sleeping in spurts. He's careful enough it doesn't show but when things get so bumpy he starts going feral in the woods around this time it shows up in force and continues to be a problem when he's out there, when he's depressed, or just on some pretty intense green outs where he doesn't really pay attention to reality. Or he just doesn't give a shit. I feel like Zee only finally succeeded in getting him to do some blood work in the 2000s. Might have been when he had one of his depressive not really eating spurts, picked up something bad and was pretty helpless when the clock started to melt somewhere around 39 degrees. She took the opportunity to tap his veins like a maple to do a blood count lol the man is shocked when doing the bare minimum for his meatsack actually helps you know, keep him alive and healthy and not catastrophically depressed.

[blackswallowtailbutterfly]

I made lots of pretty flower arrangements for my aunt's friend. Most of the flowers were provided but I brought some from my own garden, including some weeds because obviously. Wasn't sure if I'd need them but they turned out to be nice little fillers. Anyway, I'm tired now. Who thought flower-arranging could be so physically taxing? I mean I've done a bouquet now and then, usually with help, but not six candle displays plus three bouquets by my lonesome. About 8 hours in total. I'm sure any professional flower arrangement people are going to laugh, knowing that they could do twice that much in half the time. I respect that! I don't work fast though. lol If I complete something quickly it's because it was a simple task that required no thought.

Anyway, I'm getting $200 out of it and also my aunt has some space in her basement so she's offered to take some things I've been keeping in storage, which means I can cancel the storage unit. Which makes up for my raised rent! I'll be able to breathe for a little while until something happens.

[cybernightart]

This is just word vomit with like little to no punctuation of a random ADHD FNAF fuled thought train I had last night at like 2:00 a.m. like this is so rambly I'm sorry in advance XD

There is an au concept at the end though!

So I went down a rabbit hole of glam Mike theory stuff yesterday, which then evolved into Cassie's dad could be the bonnie bully from FNAF 4, which then evolved into what if Cassie's dad was also one of the technicians that we see in sister location that "went missing" to put it politely and probably what the public knows, and then that turned into since apparently from what I've heard underneath the pizza Plex is the FNAF 7 location where Michael died in the fire and then under the pizza simulator place is the sister location basement storage facility where the technician died. Which then also turned into what if the reason (ignoring the safe mode thing) Freddy couldn't be infected with the Afton virus thing was because he's possessed by Michael in some aspect and what if the reason bonnie got decommissioned was because he is also possessed so the virus thing didn't work on him, and since it didn't work on bonnie then he made Monty kill him or something I don't know. Either way he got taken out the picture so he wouldn't alert anyone and prevent afton/vanny's plans from going through. And a lot of Cassie's voice lines make it sound like her dad is missing or isn't around so I mean it would be kind of funny in a sad way if Cassie's dad is glam rock bonnie and he basically got killed twice. And the reason bonnie is still semi active is because he's possessed and that's the only thing keeping his battery going until Cassie like turns him off.

Which then got me going down the thought path of what if all the glam rocks are possessed by one of the bullies who all ended up working for fazbear entertainment somehow and dying in one of the locations that are apparently in and around and under the pizza Plex. This was seeming kind of promising for a cool AU because I highly doubt that this random thread of loosely tied together things would be canon but who knows at this point fazgoo's a thing. That is until I realized there's four bullies and even though there's four band members including bonnie that would make five meaning that one of the glam rocks is missing a bully. And I mean it would have been interesting because the whole glammike thing is like him subconsciously wanting to help Gregory because either literally or metaphorically he is like a rebuilt reincarnation or is metaphor for the crying child, and he's wanting to make up for his pretty big mistake from so many years ago, and all the other animatronics are like hunting them down or something because the Afton AI thingy is basically making them torment who they think is like the crying child again I don't know. Also at least for Freddy, Monty and bonnie they have a bully counterpart with a similar color palette. Like the bonnie bully has the same color palette as Cassie, the Freddy bully is wearing like a Monty green colored shirt and I mean it would kind of be ironic because the whole Monty wanting to replace Freddy thing, and then Michael Afton and glam rock Freddy having a lot in common even down to their arsonistic tendencies and also the fact that the outfit worn by the player character which is believed to be Michael Afton in pizzeria simulator is basically the reverse of glamrock Freddy's outfit with the whole bluey and orangey thing.

Like the more I was thinking about it the more it was weirdly lining up in some ways and I could start to understand why people like the Michael Afton is glen rock Freddy theory because I had never looked into it before, and then I found there was game theory videos where that was the entire premise that I had never seen even down to the bonnie bully thing. And I mean he explained the very chaotic rough idea I had in a much better more convincing way.

And then I went to bed because it was like 2:00 a.m. and I'm tired XD

Additionally!!!! I just thought that with the whole Michael Afton is Freddy and the bonnie bully guy is Cassie's dad and glam rock bonnie, considering the romantic involvement that glamrock bonnie and glen rock Freddy seem to have, imagine the tragic love story that you could do with Michael Afton and bonnie bully guy being like best friends who both did love each other romantically but because of the time it felt like they could say that or actually do anything about it. So they have been trying to be together their entire lives and even in their afterlives, but it seriously just does not work out every time. And plus it would bring a new meaning to the always forever thing, because you could do like a whole thing with when they were kids saying that to each other all the way up to them meeting again as adults saying that again and then bonnie and Freddy saying that to each other.

Then you could make it a happier story by having a happy ending where Cassie and Gregory and Vanessa probably managed to fix the animatronics, and since the place isn't such ruin literally I don't think they'd be able to fix the pizza Plex themselves so they just take the animatronics away in the van.

This next part here is partially inspired by a comic I saw last night, with glam rock Freddy Vanessa and Gregory all leaving at the end of security breach and then end up living in the old Afton family home by pure chance pretty much.

Which if you were bringing all the other animatronics there and whatever parts they could salvage from the remains of the pizza plex and parts and service, and then the place they end up staying at because it's the cheapest house they could find, turns out to have a bunch of animatronic making supplies in it which would be ideal. And then one of them ends up finding like a family picture with a kid in it that looks suspiciously like Gregory down to the outfit and everything, and then even crazier if they find another picture having Michael Afton and the bonnie bully guy in it and Cassie recognizes that guy as her dad.

And even more freaky if when they go into Michael's room that's when they find that picture, and on the picture is written the same "always forever" message but this time instead of being from Freddy to bonnie it's from the bonnie bully to Michael causing a lot of them to go into an existential crisis.

I think that would be funny

[berniesrevolution]

CATALYST JOURNAL

Does capitalism in fact produce bullshit jobs? This essay examines David Graeber’s influential argument that it does and suggests it is flawed in important respects. Graeber correctly notes that many occupations today seem to comprise a great deal of wasteful activity — but this is more appropriately viewed as an aspect of tasks within the job rather than the jobs themselves. More to the point, Graeber’s framework weakens the link between economic analysis and political strategy. We offer an alternative framework that attends to both these weaknesses.

I.

For a few years during the mid-2010s, a friend of mine worked as an office temp. Her agency would send her to work short shifts for different companies around London, normally as temporary cover or during a particularly busy period. Except that it was never clear how much work really needed to be done. At a loss for how to spend her days, she would film herself engaged in a variety of office tasks: spinning on her desk chair, shredding blank pieces of paper by hand, neatening stacks of desks in the storage room, pretending to answer a phone that never rang, creating elaborate artwork out of the piles of mints at reception. After twelve months of this hard graft, her agency named her the official “Temp of the Year.”

There is a dark humor to be found in this pointless corporate existence, in stories of people desperately trying to look busy while struggling to find out what they’re meant to be busy doing; of people being paid to fill space, look smart, check boxes; of jobs being done deliberately badly so that someone else has to come in and clean up the mess.

These studies in time-wasting provide the basis for an enormously influential theory of contemporary capitalism and the pointless work it produces: that presented in David Graeber’s Bullshit Jobs.1 Graeber’s focus was on the spiritual and psychic damage caused by those jobs, but what made the book a sensation was the idea that “a large proportion of our workforce” — Graeber estimated somewhere between 20 and 50 percent — “find themselves labouring at tasks that they themselves consider pointless.”2

Graeber’s pessimism about the state of our working lives was turned into a theory with the help of two specific empirical claims: first, that the number of bullshit jobs is increasing rapidly; and second, that those jobs are particularly abundant in the neoliberal corporate sector. However, as I show below, neither of these claims seems to be true. Instead, statistical evidence from a range of advanced economies reveals that what Graeber calls “bullshit jobs” are actually concentrated in low-paid, insecure, manual employment, and that they seem to have become less common over the past few decades.

But rather than celebrate the fact that so many of us seem to love our jobs, I think we can salvage Graeber’s central insight that there is a profound disconnect between the jobs many of us do and the common good. Doing justice to that idea means abandoning Graeber’s subjective definition of “bullshit jobs.” Instead, I start with a properly materialist analysis of the way our jobs have been transformed by contemporary capitalism. Our working lives are full of bullshit. They are consumed by bureaucracy, by our bosses’ obsession with control, and directed to ends that no one would freely choose to pursue. Understanding how this came about means moving far beyond Graeber’s theory. But it also allows us to realize the full potential of his animating question: Why do we spend so much energy working jobs that do not contribute to the wider social good?

II.

Graeber’s claim that 20 to 50 percent of jobs are bullshit was based on YouGov polling that asked whether people thought their work “is making a meaningful contribution to the world.” Over the last seven years, YouGov has asked this question twice in the United States and once in the United Kingdom, and each time, the results were stark: between 20 and 40 percent of workers said their work was not making a meaningful contribution, while another 10 to 20 percent were uncertain.

It’s easy to see why some people would describe their jobs in those terms, and Graeber’s book is full of stories of pointless toil. Betsy spends her days interviewing nursing home residents and filling out forms that list their preferred recreational activities. The forms are then logged and “promptly forgotten about forever.”3 Ben has ten people who work for him, “but from what I can tell,” he says, “they can all do the work without my oversight. My only function is to hand them work, which I suppose the people that actually generate the work could do themselves.”4

But while no one denies that these jobs exist, many people have been skeptical about how widespread they are. And, over the last few years, a small cottage industry of social scientists has emerged, all trying to prove that Graeber’s “nonacademic thesis” (as they insist on calling it) doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.5

These critiques are based on two statistical sources. The first is the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), which has, since 1989, asked workers around the world how much they agree or disagree with the claim “My job is useful to society.” The most recent data we have is from 2015, and the findings are firmly at the low end of Graeber’s estimate: in the United Kingdom, only 30 percent disagreed or were unsure whether their job was useful to society. In the United States, that figure was even lower, at just over 20 percent.

More troublingly for Graeber, the second data set used by his critics — the European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) — gives even lower figures. There the number of European workers who say they sometimes or rarely “have the feeling of doing useful work” is less than 20 percent. If we focus on the original fifteen countries that made up the European Union, that number falls to just 14 percent.

It is always possible to quibble with the results of these kinds of surveys. In particular, it is worth noting that the EWCS says nothing about who the work is useful for, while the YouGov and ISSP questions make some reference to a wider social good. That is a higher bar, probably close to the spirit of Graeber’s critique, and might explain why the proportion of bullshit jobs is lower in that particular survey. But however you cut the data, it seems clear that the proportion of people who “find themselves laboring at tasks that they themselves consider pointless” is right at the bottom of Graeber’s estimate. That doesn’t mean that bullshit jobs are not a phenomenon worthy of study. But it does cast doubt on the claim that they capture something novel and essential about work under contemporary capitalism.

Yet Graeber’s theory doesn’t just rest on his estimate of the number of people who feel their own job to be pointless. One important element is his claim about the kinds of jobs people think are bullshit. Graeber gives many examples: lobbyists, political consultants, and PR specialists; doormen, receptionists, and bailiffs; sales, marketing, and advertising specialists; HR professionals and administrators; management consultants and corporate lawyers. He also singles out “information workers” — administrators, consultants, clerical and accounting staff, IT professionals, and the like — as being “precisely the zone where bullshit jobs proliferate.”6

These examples fit neatly within Graeber’s taxonomy of different flavors of bullshit, but, unfortunately, the statistical evidence is much messier. There is some suggestion from the ISSP that information workers find it slightly harder to justify the utility of their work than everyone else.7 But this obscures a much stronger pattern: the workers most likely to doubt whether their jobs are useful to society are overwhelmingly found in “unskilled,” routine, and manual occupations.

This correlation between what Graeber calls “shit jobs” and a feeling of pointlessness is even more pronounced in the data from the EWCS. There the people who are most likely to describe their jobs as bullshit are cleaners, farmers, laborers, machine operators, trash collectors, sales workers, and clerks. The EWCS also shows that, in countries like the United Kingdom, information workers are less likely to feel their job is pointless than the rest of us. Finally, more granular statistical analysis suggests that some of the best predictors of doubting the value of your job are poor management, toxic culture, lack of autonomy, and low pay.8

On one level, there should be nothing surprising about this. If your job pays you badly and treats you worse, then you’re more likely to complain about it to a stranger with a clipboard. But reading back through Graeber’s list of bullshit occupations with this evidence in mind, it starts to feel less like a well-developed theory and more like a list of jobs that Graeber doesn’t particularly care for.

Arguably, the most important element of Graeber’s theory is his claim that “the overall percentage of jobs considered bullshit by those who hold them has been increasing rapidly in recent years.”9 Graeber dedicates a whole chapter to explaining this historical trend, focusing in particular on neoliberalism. In his account, the move away from manufacturing and toward extractive and financialized industries has led to the growth of a whole series of bullshit corporate services (such as advertising, consultancy, and corporate law) and of pointless office jobs that consist mostly of moving piles of paper from one place to another. It has also defanged the organizations that might otherwise have redirected our economies toward more socially useful pursuits, crushing trade unions and left parties around the world.

Unfortunately, there is no statistical evidence to support this supposed historical trend. The ISSP data goes back to 1989 and suggests that, if anything, the proportion of people who think their own job is bullshit has fallen over the last twenty-five years. We get the same result from the EWCS, which shows the number of bullshit jobs falling between 2005 and 2015.

Graeber’s theory is premised on a long-run increase in the amount of bullshit in the economy, with a growing corporate sector awash with dejected workers. This has been a hugely influential characterization of contemporary capitalism — but on the basis of the evidence surveyed above, it stands in need of fundamental revision.

(Continue Reading)

[grandpiratecrew]

Tryst was below decks working on a small machine she was convinced would improve the magic gathering of the hull some. The door to her room opened and Flynt came bearing two wooden crates full of parts.

Tryst turned around and got up off of her stool with a grunt. “Whaddya got?” She asked a small machines skittered into the dark like insects. Some hovering, others with spider like legs and some like small people, two arms and two legs.

“Most of the stuff you asked for. Along with some extra silver, chromium, orichalcun and just a hair of adamantine.”

“You treat me so well.” She said lifting her leg in mock excitement. “Thank you. Ummm. Put it…. I’ll clear a space.” She said looking around. Her workshop was an absolute mess. As she walked to a wall and touched it the wall opened up to reveal a storage room. Eyeing the room her gaze held on a few items as she looked around. Various small mechanical life forms came out and began to round up the items. Flynt out the boxes down by his feet and waited patiently.

“Hey captain.” Tryst said as one pile of scrap dropped a silver ring which she picked up and put on. “Why are you captain?”

“Avast, this be a potential mutiny in the making?”

“No. Just a question. I know you first three picked among you, and you share responsibilities with Estin and Seravin. But why are you the captain, Seravin the first mate and Estin the navigator? Why isn’t Estin or Seravin captain.”

“Mind if I sit down to explain?” He asked.

Tryst shook her head as she went to a chair and moved a machine off of it. “It’s… a bit oily.” She looked around and found some old torn stockings, she sniffed them, grimaced and put them down as a little cover.

“Oh I’d be honored.”

“You’re lucky I know you know I’m gay.” She said frowning.

“Makes it sweeter.” He said with a chuckle.

“Fine in a gay disaster in the machinery world. So be it. Answer my question.”

Flynt nodded resting his hand on his leg. “So, I don’t have to answer why you or Lia aren’t captain right?”

“I can work the ship, even sail some. But don’t ask me to fight, or do more theft than my little companions can do. Mimi has me beat in theft, and is decent at fighting. Lia can fight us and you and Estin all at once and never lose. But she hates stealing anything that she isn’t hit with, and you can trust her to fish and that’s about it.”

“Alright. So it’s Seravin, Estin and Me? So. Estin.”

“I get him actually. He’s better with the ship.”

“Oh by far.”

“But in a fight he’s worse than you by a ton, can’t stop magic, and a terrible thief. Louder than me, can be bamboozled by most things. And you can pilot the ship. Can’t fire the guns at the same time, but still. Only me n’Seravin can do that safely.”

“Oh really?” Flynt asked.

“Well. Estin is training me. Sometimes at sea or in calmer winds he’ll find me and tell me to take the helm for a bit. I’ve never been in anything worse than a mild rain, and never without his support l, but we also haven’t hit anything yet.”

“Good for you. You’re better than me and Seravin there.”

“Thank you.” Tryst said with a curtsy.

“So you’re asking mainly.”

“Mostly why Seravin says when you’re here you’re the captain. She’s taken control a few times when you’re not around, twice while Estin and you were out. And she seemed willing to take over if she thought you were both dead. So why not her?”

“Well. A few reasons. I’m the only licensed captain.”

“And yet you’ve hit more than Estin has.”

“To be fair I did it for a almost ten years. Estin only started when he merged with the ship. But I could pilot it whenever he’s sick with ease. I taught Seravin, and if I’m honest, I’m better than her. I know how to better manage an emergency than her.”

“Fine. Maybe. But why not be the first mate and let her chose operations? I mean she does about a third of the time anyways.”

“Oh, cause I can get jobs done much easier than her.”

“How? You’re a blank, but plenty of treasures aren’t guarded by spells or magical wards.”

“Sure, but most of them are guarded by people.” He said. “And I can charm the pants off of almost anyone.”

Tryst got a bit red. He had laid the charm on her and gotten her excited. She had fucked Seravin but later she realized Flynt had been playing her wingman. “Alright you are a good wingman. But still if someone attacks with some guns and swords what do you do?”

“I shoot at them, and let Lia and Seravin hit them really hard. If they get below decks I can do much better, and Serana helps more. Though Lia will be so furious we’ll keep her above decks or in the main cargo storage.”

“But how does that make you captain.”

“Under stress? I can do that. I can keep people busy and guessing while not running away. I’m not so proud or battle hungry I’m not afraid to change my role and move around. I’m not captain cause I do one thing better than anyone.”

“Aside from being a blank.”

“Ok, I do one thing better than everyone. But I’m captain cause I can do everything everyone else can do. Even if it’s a bit worse. I used to maintain the ship. Who else could indentifu chromium.” He said picking up one of his small pieces. Even Estin can’t tell you what it is. I can. He’ll tell you how much to get but he can’t describe it.”

“I dunno.” Tryst said. “You do have one more skill you’re best at.”

“What is it?”

“I’d argue your charisma is best on the crew. After all, I signed up and never didn’t think of you as captain. Even if I called you a dumb-“

“Dumb pig headed brute who thinks with his hairy pencil dick.”

“Y-yeah that. I never told you- Seravin!”

“Oh. No, Mimi. Serana and Mimi are the blabs. Seravin likes Mimi a lot, and might let a bit slip in front of her. But an insult like that? She fling it at me as soon as she can remember half of it.”

“Ah. Fuck.”

[aemoglobin]

i'm back from my trip! it was very fun and i cried a lot at the airport on my way back lmfao i did NOT want to come back to wisconsin but i had to </3

i spent way too much fucking money on getting rides in/out of los angeles and then home from the airport (because none of the less expensive bus options were available to me due to landing after 5pm). i don't think i'll be doing that again. that was like a whole month's worth of rent in total that i spent on lyft and the worst part is that the drivers only got about 60% of the amount i spent. my mom gave me money for it so i am financially Fine but also i'm NOT fine because i didn't WANT to spend that much on rides lmfao i liked having a thicker-than-usual safety net...

also spent too much on kpop stuff BUT that was my gift to myself. that's what i worked hard for. and i had a lot of fun shopping with Nat in LA for the albums i wanted, so!!!!

there were three albums i Really wanted to get and i got two of them- cignature's My Little Aurora and Blackswan's That Karma. i did not find The Fifty at any of the 3 stores i visited (the 3 stores closest to each other in the area of LA that i was visiting), just copies of Cupid and while i do love Cupid a lot i didn't want to waste money on dupes.

that being said i did...waste money on dupes...because i bought a loossemble pc pack that i thought was going to be like, part of a set (ex '5 of 15' or '5 of 25', etc) but it turns out there's ONLY 5 pcs in the whole entire set. so i have dupes. because Mocha already bought me a pack of these pcs before...and since i opened it i can't return it lol

i'm thinking about selling some of the albums i don't really vibe with anymore. i know most fans don't want to buy Just the album or album/inclusions but like :thinking: i need to make room on my shelves and in my cd cases!!! aaah! and i'm not looking to make a profit on them or anything, i just want them gone lol. i don't think my local public library will take these since i'm not donating the plain cd, the WHOLE album....i also might just get a storage box and box up some of the albums that take up a lot of space- carat version boxes, all of the odd-sized twice/gidle albums....

BUT YEAH my trip was fun, my music collection has expanded, and i am going to play financial catch-up for the next 2 months lmfao

[corazondebeskar-reads]

stuck in a lonely loop

soft!Din Djarin x f!reader

originally for Febuwhump 2024 Day 7 - suffering in silence | Febuwhump masterlist

words: 2.1k

summary: Din can't let go of the feeling that something's wrong, even if you deny it.

warnings: pre-relationship/catching feelings stage, depression, depressive episode, tiny injury and mention of blood, vague mention of self-harm thoughts, hurt/comfort, this is just 2k of din djarin being worried about you, reader can be lifted by din but also i think he can lift literally anyone so take that as you will

dividers by @saradika-graphics

He notices.

Of course he does. He notices everything. You’re not sure why you thought you wouldn’t count.

Well. That’s not true. You thought you wouldn’t count because why would you? Why would he notice you? The Mandalorian was a busy man…dalorian with his life and his ship and his bounties to worry after.

Not you. Not some girl from the scrap yard who he bought parts from once in a while.

Oh, but he does. And he’s the only one who does.

The first time, he brushes the thought aside. Everyone has off days. You’re quieter; the world around you made a little duller. Your blouse is wrinkled, but your hair is neatly tucked into a scarf. You smile, still, even if it falls short of your eyes.

The second time, he knows something is wrong. You aren’t tinkering behind the counter. It’s not necessarily unusual, as you have a whole back storage room and scrap yard to disappear into, but you don’t holler out when he rings the bell. 

Instead, he hears you call “coming” from the back room, voice dragging like a quarry across the market square, followed by silence before the screech of your stool against the stone floor. 

You’re moving slow, like you’re floating through bacta to get there. You don’t mean to make him wait, it’s just that every movement lately takes so much effort. Your body is drawn to the molten core of the planet, aching to lay against the dirt and let it draw you down. 

The Mandalorian is looking for a valve and coolant coil, of which you have plenty, but for his old ship? You’ll have to dig through four bins of valves to find one with a big enough seal. 

You sigh quietly and lean against the counter for a moment, palms splayed on the dusty top. “I’ll go out back for a coil. Valves are in there,” you jerk your thumb to the back room.

You never let anyone go in there. It’s organized the way you like and full of small, easily stealable parts. But you just… don’t give a kriff. You could not care fucking less. So what if he pockets extra bolts? You’d rather he just take all the valves rather than cope with the effort. 

There’s a spark, barely a flicker, that urges you to care. But it’s snuffed in the same ice that runs through the rest of you. It hurt, at first, but now you’re just numb. A cavern where a person once was. Everything passes through you now. People, thoughts, wants, needs, troubles. Everything steps into the void and steps out on the other side unnoticed.

It doesn’t take you long to find the coil. You had actually started a pile for parts compatible with the ST-70. He came in every few months, after all. She was a beautiful ship, but so very old, and his mechanic’s suppliers were unreliable. 

It wasn’t something you regularly did for customers, but it wasn’t unheard of, either, so you tried not to think about it too much. The excitement you felt when you found a part was purely enthusiasm for your job. 

You’re not feeling it much today, only grateful that by having a dedicated pile near the shop, you were spared from walking out to the back of the yard where the coils lived. 

You’re quiet as he settles up, a neat stack of credits on the counter. You nod when he thanks you, but as he turns to leave, he pauses. 

“Are you okay?” he says.

You blink at him once, twice, heavy and slow, brows furrowed. “Yeah?” 

“It’s just—okay,” he says, and you don’t see him again until he needs a new capacitor and a handful of replacement switches. 

But the shop is closed. He stands dumbfounded for a moment at the door. There’s not a sign or any notice posted. It’s early afternoon on a busy shopping day.

Maybe you’re on vacation, he thinks. You deserve one. It's doubtful, though.

He stands there, looking up at the dark windows of your apartment above the building, long enough to apparently draw attention to himself. 

“She ain’t open,” says your neighbor, who runs a salon from their main floor. Your buildings are conjoined, not quite butted up to each other but with roof panels that stretch across the small gap. She’s smoking in the tiny alley between them.

“Okay,” he says, but finds himself standing in place still. “Do you know when she’ll be open?”

“Nah. Haven’t seen her around much. Been keepin’ to herself up there.” She jerks her head up. 

But when he looks at her, about to ask a question he shouldn’t, she’s watching him through narrowed eyes.

“Is there another scrapyard around?” He doesn’t remember there being more than one in the city.

“Other side of the flats,” she says with a shrug. “Is it an emergency?”

Yes. No. He doesn’t know. The capacitor is important but not emergent. It’s his unwillingness to walk away that feels urgent. 

He thinks about how smudged you were last time, how you seemed to pull on the air around you like a blanket. Like you wanted to be smaller, to be invisible.

But he saw you. 

“Yes,” he says. 

Your neighbor appraises him. He’s not sure what she sees, but she jerks her head down the alley, and he follows.

There’s a set of stairs carved into the back of the building, outside the gates of the scrap yard and right up to your apartment. She climbs them two at a time and raps her knuckles against the door.

“Honey, you got a customer with an emergency. Think he’s one of your regulars,” she calls. 

There’s nothing for a moment. She shrugs and heads back down the stairs. 

He doesn’t follow, and she doesn’t ask him to.

When the door slides open, you’re still wrangling your matted hair. An oversized tunic droops from your shoulder, just the hint of soft sleep shorts peeking from the dip on the side. You look as if you’ve just woken from the first taste of sleep in months, unrest lurking in the shadows of your slouching frame. 

“Hana, if it’s an emergency, just send them—oh,” you say. “Mando. I’m sorry; I hope I didn’t hold you up.” 

“You didn’t,” he reassures. “I was going to go, but she—”

“She what? Did she say something about me?” you’re stiff, suddenly, face drawn tight.

“No, just asked if it was an emergency. I thought maybe you had asked her to let you know if someone came by. I don’t mean to disturb you.” 

You sigh. “It’s fine. Samshi isn’t going to have what you need, anyway.” You hesitate a moment. “C’mon through this way, I don’t want to go ‘round the front.”

As soon as the door shuts behind him, you grimace. “It’s uh. It’s a mess, sorry.” 

It’s an understatement. The flat is dark, dust mites glimmering where the light dares to touch. There’s a nest of blankets on the sofa and detritus scattered in an arc around it. Empty cups, plates too full to have been more than picked at, rolled-up socks kicked off one arm, and a discarded bra teetering precariously on the edge of a takeout box. 

The scanners in his visor don’t detect a fever or any distressed vitals, but it’s clear that something is very wrong. For a scrap yard, you run a neat operation. It’s not meticulous, but it’s never dirty in the shop, and he’s only seen you less than tidy yourself the once. 

You try not to look around and see what he sees as you cross the room and open the door that leads down to the shop. You also won’t look him in the eye while you ask what he’s looking for.

He follows you out back, even though he usually stays put. Doesn’t encroach on your space. He’s seen the way you tense up when others do, so he’s always left you be.

But that undeniable feeling of wrong doesn’t go away, so he follows. 

You rifle around in the pile outside before he realizes what it is. 

“Are those all parts for the Crest?”

You would have been embarrassed, you think, but the thought slips away. You just don’t fucking care. You shrug. “Yeah.” 

You hand him the parts, switches and all, and head back inside. You’re a few steps ahead when he notices.

“You’re bleeding,” he says abruptly, a hand on your shoulder.

You stare at it for a moment. He’s never touched you. 

“Are you okay?” he says. 

You can tell he must be repeating it, that you hadn’t heard the first or second time. 

“Yeah,” you shrug, displacing his hand on accident. “It’s probably nothing. I stepped on something out there.”

You’re on the counter before either of you really realize what he’s done, his broad hands around your waist before they’re grasping at your leg to examine your bare foot. 

“Where’s your medpac?” he says.

“It’s fine,” you wave a hand at him. “Barely felt it.” 

If you thought that would reassure him, you’re wrong. There’s a screw, albeit a small one, in your heel. 

He cups your jaw gently in one hand, urging you to look up at him. “What’s going on? Are you sick?” 

You look at him for only a moment before your eyes flick away. You bring your leg up between you, folded over the other so you can peer at your foot. Your nails pick at the screw idly until they get a grip and pull. 

You gasp, and he swears. 

“Where is your medpac?” 

“Under the counter,” you say. What had been a few drops of blood is now a steady trickle down your foot and you can’t deny it needs attention, now. Well. You could, and you’d like to; you’d like to crawl back up to your pathetic blanket pile and sleep. 

You don’t think he’ll let you without an argument, and it seems like a lot of effort and a lot of scrutiny that you can’t be fucked to endure. 

“I can take care of it,” you try when he comes back around, splaying the pac open to rifle through. 

He somehow, despite being featureless, fixes you with such a withering, doubtful glare, that you resign yourself to his ministrations. 

The antiseptic spray stings, and you hiss, drawing a murmured apology from the Mandalorian. You grimace and blow him off, but the truth is, you found you liked it. It was maybe the first time you’ve felt anything in months other than the sharp bite of jet juice. 

It’s a more dangerous line of thought than you should indulge in, and it’s a relief to recognize that you’re cognizant enough to see the signs. It doesn’t make it any less true, though.

You’ve zoned out enough that you haven’t noticed, but Mando’s finished bandaging your foot and is watching you with palpable concern.

“Do you have someone who can look after you, help you out?”

“It’s a tiny puncture, I’ll live,” you say.

“That’s not what I was talking about.”

“Then I don’t know what you‘re talking about.”

“Whatever it is that’s wrong, whatever it is that’s drained the light from you,” he says softly. He’s leaning on his fists, settled on either side of you on the counter, bringing him closer than he’s ever been before. 

“I’m—”

“Don’t,” he warns. “You don’t have to tell me; it doesn’t have to be me you talk to. But don’t lie to me.” 

You try to look away, but he’s in all your peripherals and blind spots now, too. You’re surrounded by his broad body, surprised by the heat he throws despite the beskar, and somehow, the smell of oil and iron and nutmeg and musk embraces you. 

“It is nothing,” you say. “It’s just a thing that happens. Sometimes, I’m just… empty like this.” You’re not sure why you’re telling him. You think it should scare you.

He shifts his weight and brings his gloved hand back up to your face, the motion slow and exaggerated. You don’t run from it, though.

“You don’t have to be alone. It doesn’t matter if you’re used to it.”

For the first time in months, you cry. You expect him to flinch away when the tears spring up, something rotten and bloated from dragging yourself through the mire has burst at his simple kindness, but he gathers up the raw edges of you and holds you together against the cold cuirass of his armor. It’s soothing against your overheated cheek.

He holds your head there steadily, not letting you breathe a word of an apology. “It’s okay,” he murmurs. “We’ll get you through this.” 

And you believe him. 

*title from "So Much (for) Stardust" by Fall Out Boy

[retphienix]

Since I spent a Long Time sorting my items I felt like giving a minor visual tour (lacking actual commentary) of my current world's base, so here's some notes~

To start: My meager array of vehicles, all start, about half are clunkers due to overuse and no time dedicated to maintenance.

Pete and Barrett's graves, right next to each other and one body per. I'm glad I took the time to haul Pete's body here from the elementary.

I've finally got an outdoor storage solution for spare car parts- obviously I lack said parts, but it's nice to have especially since I plan on opening up the base a bit so the vehicles can come in.

The garage has become my general crafting store; 6 crates dedicated to general crafting mats (nails etc), 3 empty spares, and 3 crates dedicated to each type of craft (atm, I know I'll need more x.x) Also a shelf for "Item / Misc" stuff since some of that is actually for crafting (dumb naming conventions not being recognized by better sorting mods) and it's a place to toss my pokemon cards which I only just started collecting. Admittedly, that latter point is a bit out of place here.

I've gone a bit overboard and have grabbed 5 generators so far, 1 is at a local gas station and the other 4 sit here in case I decide to expand elsewhere. Obviously only 1 running.

I have a boat. I do not appreciate the boat as much as I thought I would, mostly because a different boat bugged out heavily and it annoyed me so much I now hate my boat. Don't have much use for it due to that.

The meager defenses are due to world settings. I WANT zombies to destroy my buildings and fuck me up, but I find the default stats behind this interaction to be lacking (1 zombie can just slap a wall twice and it falls, yes you can explain that as shoddy craftsmanship and what not but it FEELS terrible). Basically, I'd feel best if it took more than 2 seconds to destroy for one zombie, or if it could only be destroyed when under distress from multiple zombies. As the game doesn't play like that, I've decided to try a world with zombie destruction off- and to be honest, kinda hate it. I know there are attempted solutions through some mods (mostly by increasing barricade health) but nothing stood out to me.

I kinda just plan on turning destruction back on (I have a mod that allows world settings to be changed mid-game) but it's an ongoing internal discussion. I want my stuff to break, I don't think it feels right for a shambling corpse to home in on my buildings with no LOS on me and break them in the time it takes me to sprint up behind him. Feels bad.

At 1min is where my work today shows, and boy is it ugly and less impressive than it was in my head. I wanted to break down the top floor and make it an open room for easier organizing, but it turns out that pre-fab buildings like this have awkward T shaped corners that you can't break down without opening the entire building up and needing to make replacement walls.

I didn't wanna. So here's the result of my labor.

Going counter clockwise from my entrance through the west window-

Library corner with plenty of material. It used to be more impressive due to running the Occupations Expertises mod which includes new books for all the melee stats- but I removed that mod and the books went with it (obviously).

Non-perish stores

Water stores (I have an infinite source of tainted and fire to untaint it, but convenience)

Med corner.

Weapon room- organized between weapon type- parts- ammo. All guns stripped bare and empty.

Spare boxes.

Tool shelves.

Clothing room, similarly split up like the weapon room.

Spare boxes

Cleaning supplies

Electronics closet (Should probably move this downstairs)

Bedroom with sentimental keepsakes from previous characters (and skill journals)

Cooking station and freezer

Arcade stuff.

Not shown due to being on first floor.

Fireplace storage

Survival (Fishing / Farming / Camping etc) storage near fireplace.

Furniture and other storage (also near fireplace)

All in all, it's a work in progress, but it's a nice home near Louisville proper.

[moemoemammon]

. Have you ever seen those tiktoks titled "Ask your boyfriend to go do things he loves." Can I ask for the MC to to that with the demon brothers?

"Hey, Can We Do that Thing You Like?"

(Feat. GN!MC and the Demon Bros!)

✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦

Lucifer

What did you do

Or what did HE do? Are you trying to butter him up? Did you do something wrong? What did you break where's Mammon-

The fact that you're genuinely interested in a FACTORY TOUR is... well, Lucifer always knew you were the type to understand his refined tastes. ✨

And what's there not to be excited for? He's sure you'll both have a great time, with him as your guide. Don't tell anyone, but Lucifer's so excited he got his coat stuck in the door twice-

"I'll clear my schedule for the day, then. I have to admit, MC, I never thought you'd have an interest in something like this. I wonder if we have more in common than I originally thought?"

Mammon

*comedic spittake*

Legit?? So excited?? You actually want to go gambling?? He didn't think it’d be your sort of scene!

Wait what did he do to deserve this- Nah, it's probably that you've finally recognized how great THE Great Mammon really is!!

Already clearing his schedule just for you- There's no way he’d miss a chance like this for the world! He's even canceling that modeling gig he's got later!

"Wait, seriously?? Y-ya wanna go gamblin' with me? Then.... let's do it! Let's make a night of it! I know all the best spots for a beginner like you, so just stick with me, alright? The Great Mammon's gonna make sure we're rakin' in a FORTUNE tonight!"

Levi

SERIOUSLY?? Like, you're not joking?!

You want him to tell you about EVERY PIECE of Ruri-chan merch he owns?! You promise you won't get bored? No no, of course you can't get board when you're in the presence of the ever-radiant Ruri-chan!!

He'll even show you the stuff he's got in storage! See, he has so much that it can't all be displayed, so he rotates them out every week, and-

But you really wanna see?? There's no backing out now! And try not to let your head spin. It's okay to be jealous of his amazing collection! 😤

"Isn't she cute? The craftsmanship for this figure is the reason I HAD to have her. Aside from it being Ruri-chan, of course. They really caught the details in such an accurate way that it makes it seem like she's in the room with me! Do you want to listen to the albums too? I've even got vinyl! Oh right, I've got a ton of stuff recorded! Let's watch those! Here, this is one of my most prized possessions! See? I got this from the time I went to my very first expo, and-"

Satan

REALLY?!

Wait that was super loud ehem-

So you don't mind helping him turn the garden into a cat paradise..? It'll give you both the perfect view of the strays that might be attracted!

He's already got a ton of ideas. He wants to install a little perch near the window, put up some steps that wind up the tree, clear out a space for a napping spot...

"I've already worked out a design plan for the entire thing. I planned on doing it in secret, but knowing you want to help me makes this even more exciting. Should we also plant some catnip in the garden? I'd like to watch them play in it. Ah, and maybe I'll make a large community feeding bowl? Hm..."

Asmo

Wait.. really? Are you sure you wouldn't rather just bask in his beauty instead??

You actually want to help him organize his closet?? You know how big it is, right? Maybe it's because you want to take in all his lovely vibes, but he's still touched! It's not like people normally want to help with something so boring.

But he's been meaning to update his entire wardrobe, and not even Satan wanted to help with that! The fact that you're offering with no strings attached.... 🥺💕

Everyone knows how fashion forward Asmo can be, and he's got SO many clothes, it takes ages to get it all organized! It could take days, or even WEEKS! But it's sure to pass in a breeze with your help!

"You're a DOLL, MC~! I love you! Now then, I've been thinking that I should add a couple of pieces that are better suited for cold weather. You know how I HATE the cold, so I don't usually add many winter outfits. But wouldn't it be cruel to deny the world my beauty just because it's cold outside?? Here, should I go with this, or this?"

Beel

ARE YOU SURE?! You really wanna go on that food tour of the devildom he signed up for?!?!!?!

Beel immediately gets out of his chair, wide eyed like a little kid who was told they'd be going to Disney World.

Scrambles around to find his phone because he's gonna get your ticket RIGHT NOW

A day of trying every food in the devildom, AND he gets to spend it with you?? Pinch him, he had to be dreaming. Was this heaven?

"Okay. I'll call so I can add you into the tour with me. There's this black apple pie I really want to try with you. Oh, and I heard the blood orange meringue pie is good, too! There's also the black boar platter where they flambé the meat in demonus, and the fat becomes caramelized...."

Belphie

You don't mind..? You know it's cold out, right? And the hike is gonna take forever??

You actually WANT to go stargazing with him?? Belphie's gotta admit that there's nothing like seeing the stars in person so he can understand why you'd wanna go, but it really IS a long way...

Still, he's not gonna let you take back your offer. AND you're offering to let him use your lap as a pillow?!?!? He'd be suspicious if he weren't so happy right now. Not that he'll let you see it-

Trying his damndest not to be all giddy, but you've never seen him move so fast to get ready in your life.

"Don't tell the others we're going, okay? I want this to be our secret. And maybe... we could do it more often? We could even invite Beel next time to carry me up on his back, unless you're up for that too. Eheh, I'm joking."

[tetralea]

To play a game

Pairing: dom!Tom Holland x reader

Word Count: 1.8K+

Warning: dom-sub dynamics, dirty talking, cum in panties, exhibitionism, semi-public play, vaginal sex

Summary:  You are attending at an event with Tom and the both of you likes to play dirty, so you ditch your panties for the night.

A/N: So,it was inspired by a conversation veeery long ago with @we--are---not--afraid​ also it kind of clashes with this ask: (P.S please at least say hi, next time because I’m not writing on demand)

The event was loud and as overwhelming as ever no matter how many times you did it. The red carpet walks, the interviews, the photos, it got easier over time but never less draining. The only thing what kept you on the edge was one specific man and the hurried promise he made before you got out of the car.  

‘I bet you are not bold enough do this event without your panties.’ Tom purred into your ear, his eyes and words challenging you.  

This is how it happened, your hands sliding under the dress which reached around your knees to find your panties and push it into Tom’s pocket. ‘And I bet you can’t walk around with my panties in your pocket without someone noticing.’ Your little head tilt and innocent eyes earned a groan and a dangerous glint in those brown eyes, but he didn’t say a thing.  

It has been an hour now at least and you felt yourself growing wet as the cool air brushed against your pussy. You knew your dress was long enough to cover you by any means, but it didn’t help your feeling of being exposed and absolutely aroused by doing all this small talk and posing while not wearing your underwear, let alone having them in Tom’s pocket. It was a dirty little secret for the two of you, which riled you up more and more by every minute.  

The first time you could finally talk to him again was before the dinner when he stepped to you, his fingers lightly touching your shoulder.  

‘Do you have a minute for me, darling?’  

With an apologetic smile you excused yourself from the group and started to follow him through the crowded room to an empty, dark hallway, curtains hanging from each side, giving you just enough cover for now. His fingers were interlocking with yours during the walk, only letting them go when he pushed you to the wall, getting tangled in a curtain a little.  

‘How are you doing lovie?’ His words were hushed, lips finding yours before you could have answered in a hungry kiss.  

‘Better than you, I'd say.’ The devilish smile on your lips and the way he gave himself away so easily earned you another groan before he was back kissing you silly. It was hot and heavy with need, need building from the moment you got out of the car a few hours ago. His hard on was painfully obvious as he stepped a bit closer, his full body pressed to yours now. Sure, it explains why at least one of his hands were in his pocket. Those tight, slim pants didn’t hide his erection very well.  

Between the heated sloppy kisses, Tom’s long fingers slipped under your dress. ‘Do you know how it felt watching you flirting with everyone and knowing you little pussy is bare under your pretty dress?’  

It was a rhetorical question, but he didn't give you time to answer anyway, his lips were on yours, kissing you in a way it made your head spin, your small whimpers lost in his mouth. ‘Lovie, you soaked even your thighs.’ Tom cooed, when his fingers run up on your skin, to find you completely roused and wet. The sound you made then his touch, even if it was light as a feather hit your exposed pussy lips was almost feral. ‘You know, originally I wanted to finger you here and go back to fuck you later, but I don’t think I can wait for so long.’ His mumbles along with his ministrations were too much to let you form any more coherent thoughts. ‘I think there is a storage room across the hall, what do you think?’ His question was sweet as honey in sync with the way he was petting your pussy, coating his fingers in your slick, pressing into you a digit only when he touched your gaping entrance.  

‘Yes.’ As embarrassing as it was this was the first and only word which come to your mind, to Tom’s amusement. He loved it, loved to make you so flustered and worked up you practically forgot how to form words and there were nothing left but those sweet noises only for him.  

It felt like it wasn’t even a minute later when the door of the small room clicked behind you. Tom was immediately all over you, his hands trying to feel as much skin as you could, being desperate to finally have you. ‘Turn around, lovie.’  

You did with a bit of a help, hands pressed to the hard, steel shelves, but you didn’t care. There was a bit of a pause while Tom undid his pants, a bit of a shuffling until he pushed them down till his knees, to pull himself free from his boxers. Lifting your dress with one hand and aligning his hot cock head with your entrance with the other shouldn’t have been this hot in this situation, but you couldn’t help it.  

‘Tom?’ Your voice was weak and impatient, when you didn’t feel the immediate fullness, you were expecting but only the delicious stretch at your entrance. He stopped.  

‘Ask for it, darling. You made me walk around with a hard cock all night, this is the least you could do to make it fair.’ 

The frustrated moan didn’t help, nor the almost inaudible please. ‘You know you can act like a little brat, and I could always just jerk off like this and leave you frustrated, so you better think about your next words carefully.’ With his words a sharp slap cut through the silence of the small space followed with your whimper when he slapped your ass a bit roughly.  

‘Tom, please.’ You tried, but already knew it won’t cut it. He tsked with his tongue, which didn’t mean any good for you, mostly when you felt his hand slowly moving starting to gently stroke his own cock.  

‘Last chance, baby girl.’ He warned and gave you another slap, his hand not speeding up yet.  

The last nick name seemed to wash away all of your remaining resistance, getting the obedient little sub out of you.  

‘Please, fuck me.’ Your words were so fast it was a miracle he heard them correctly.  

‘What is it?’ Tom teased, leaning closer to your seemingly to hear better, pushing his thick cock half-way in during the process.  

‘Please fuck me, please I need your cock!’ The words fumbled over your lips like prayer now, a shudder running down on your spine making you twitch around his cock.  

‘Look at you. You must be so desperate.’ Along with the soft, slow purr he finally pushed into you fully inch by inch. The mewl you made was primal, finally feeling the fullness and weight of his cock inside of you. 

‘Open up!’ It threw you off for a minute, but there was no time to think about it when he tapped on your lip, and something lace like touched them too. Tom stuffed your panties into your mouth without hesitation. 

Your eyes rolled back, any of your previous resistance thrown out of the window, melting into Tom’s touch, as he fucked into you. He didn’t start slow, knowing your body enough by now, to be sure you could take it. He did slow down tho after a few minutes, to pull you closer, to pepper sweet kisses onto your neck, to whisper sweet nothings into your ear. ‘Such a good girl for me.’ Tom cooed and bit your earlobe, before letting you go and starting to thrust hard and fast again.  

With your sounds muffled by your panties, lips and jaw stretching around them, eyes shut as you got lost in your pleasure, until you felt your high approaching. Your fingers left the selves which were warm under your palms now, to tap in his wrist twice.  

‘Oh, baby girl, look how good you can be. Are you there? Are you asking for my permission?’ His words were surprisingly coherent compared to the state he was. You felt his thrust becoming sloppy, his grip on your body tightening, his pants and moans becoming more breathy, he was also close.  

The answer for his question was a frantic nodding and a desperate cry trying to hold it.  

‘Good girl. You can come on my command when I hit zero.’  With that Tom started to count down from ten, making it almost the longest ten seconds of your life because he didn’t slow down, he was taking you with the same strength and speed as before, making it especially hard for you to hold back your orgasm. Now you were grateful for the small ruined piece of fabric in your mouth to hold back your desperate cries, moans and whimpers, because you were on the edge, your whole body shaking during those ten seconds.  

‘One, almost there.’ Tom’s voice was equally breathless and wretched. ‘Zero. Come baby girl, come on my cock. Come on.’  

To the permission and encouragement, you started coming immediately without even fully registering it. It took a few seconds to really reach your peak. Your mouth opened to a silent O while your body shook and convulsed under the force of your orgasm. The small, wet hole tightening around Tom and the unmistakable signs of your orgasm pushed him over too, his cock twitching and oozing his thick, warm cum into you.  

When it was over, he pulled out carefully, being aware of just how sensitive he made you. The small kisses on your shoulders sending shudders down on your arms, your eyes still closed, enjoying his closeness. He took your panties out of your mouth reaching down to use them to clean your thighs a little.  

‘Did you enjoy it?’ He asked, his lips finally finding yours for a soft, loving kiss. ‘This is what you had in mind?’ 

‘Yeah, yeah thank you.’  

‘Good, because otherwise you would be so punished at home for sticking this into my pocket. I was so fucking hard all night, darling.’ Tom softly schooled you while he turned you around trying to re arrange the both of you to a presentable state.  

‘I know and it got me so wet.’ Your tired giggle was an obvious sign of your satisfied state.  

‘Yeah?’ Tom looked at you with amusement. ‘Good, because you will wear a fresh pair now, right? And I know I’ll get hard again eventually, because you are running around with my cum in your pussy eventually dripping out of you and leaving a visible wet patch on your panties with all these very important people around us.’ As he talked you pulled out that fresh pair from your purse, he helped you to put it on, his fingers pressing the material to your entrance firmly. ‘Let’s go and enjoy the party while my hands are out of my pocket.’ 

Tag list: @terrifictomholland @itstaskeen @thegirlintheswivelchair @duskholland @sinisterspidey @tomsrebeleyebrow @annathesillyfriend @hazofmyheart @greenorangevioletgrass @worldoftom @augustholland @m-multifandom-multishipper

If you want to be or not to be tagged please let me know!

[neonacity]

HYACINTHE | Chapter 1: Jaemin x Reader

Summary:

Na Jaemin is far from being your typical 20 year old. Instead of slaving through college, he wastes away his hours cracking safes. Weekends that should be spent partying with friends consist of illegal races on good days and small scale bombings on bad ones.

Na Jaemin is far from being average, unless you consider being a member of Seoul's top organized crime family normal.

There is no such thing as a sense of normality and peace in his trainwreck of a life, so when he met a barista who was brave enough to call out his dangerous taste in coffee, he was like a moth to the flame. Everything about her is normal, which means she is forbidden to him, in all sense of the word.

So why, then, does he always find himself in the front steps of her shop, breaking all his personal rules even if he wishes he could stay away?

A/N + Disclaimer: this is a side story to Black Daisies, my main mafia fic feat. 0T23. While the plot is based on the main story, this can also be read as a standalone fic. As usual, this is purely a work of fiction and in no way am I implying any member of NCT to behave the way I write them here. tw: crimes, heists, potential death, mentions of drugs and other illegal activities.

PAIRING: Jaemin x Reader

BLACK DAISIES MASTERLIST

___________________________________________________________

I've known him for almost a year and a half when it happened. 

The small bell of the cafe's back door dinged so hard, I thought it would get ripped off from the wall. I looked up, eyes wide with panic and hands still wrapped around the cold corners of a metal tray when a head of jet black hair appeared on the entrance. It took me half a second to register what I was seeing before I found myself flying to his side in a heartbeat. 

"Jaemin! Oh my god, what the hell is going on!"

My first thought was that he was injured. He was doubled over and I quickly hunched to his level so that I could peer at his face. He looked paler than usual, beads of sweat stuck on his forehead, eyes glazed with a slight look of panic as he tried to keep himself from falling over. I threw out my hands to hold him by the shoulders and that's when my gaze caught it; the small black package that he quickly tried to hide inside his bomber jacket before I could even fully see what it is. I didn't give it much attention back then—I was far too focused in trying to see if he was hurt anywhere to worry about anything else. When his gaze finally focused on me, I thought I saw guilt there.  

"I need your help. Sorry, I don't know where else to go."

My brows furrowed together. 

"What the hell is going on—"

He reached out for one of my hands helping him up and squeezed it tight. 

"Please don't ask me questions. Just—can you trust me?" 

"I don't understand—" my voice started to rise. Is he hurt? Bleeding? In pain? 

"Please."

My lips parted then pursed again. 

"Okay."

Jaemin tugged me closer to him and threw a panicked look outside. He then pulled me farther into the now closed cafe, back into the storage room, the location of which he shouldn't even know in the first place. 

"Let me hide here for a bit. Just a bit."

That encounter was my second mistake since meeting Na Jaemin. 

I should have asked questions. 

Lots of them. 

___________________________________________________________

The first mistake happened about a year and half ago. 

"Welcome to Brick and Beans, what would you like to have today?"

I plastered on my practiced smile and looked at the stranger in front of me without actually looking at him. Working in the service industry sure does things to your head once you get used to it. Despite having to deal with people all the time, you also get to develop a kind of numbness and detachment to human interaction. A face just becomes a face, a customer simply becomes just another passing responsibility. I tried to blink a few times to make myself seem more interested on the boy standing in front of my counter, patiently waiting for him to give me his order so we can go ahead and get on with both our business. 

"Uh… I'll have an iced americano. No water. Eight shots of espresso."

My lips parted and curled on the sides to give him my service smile. My hand automatically reached out for the plastic cups stacked on my side while my other whipped out the marker clipped on the pocket of my apron to scribble his order. 

"That's one iced americano, no water, eight—"

I stopped and blinked once. Twice. My gaze shot up at the customer in front of me again and really looked at him for the first time.

"I'm sorry, that's eight shots of espresso?"

He nodded, seemingly unbothered by my question. 

"No water?"

A slight shake of the head. 

"...eight shots. Of espresso."

"Eight shots, yes." 

For a moment we both just stared at each other. He was looking at me patiently, probably only slightly weirded out by my question while I gave him a look that's a mix of worry and disbelief. Working as a barista has exposed me to my own fair share of weird coffee requests, but this is by far the one that takes the cake. 

I softly cleared my throat and turned my attention back to the words I was scribbling on the cup. As strange as it is, I really am not in the position to judge a customer. 

"That'll be 4.50 dollars. Is that for here?"

"Make it to go." 

"Got it. I'll get you your order soon…"

"Jaem." 

I smiled and scribbled his name on the cup. 

Foot traffic was pretty slow on the cafe so I was able to quickly finish the order on autopilot. As I worked on mixing, I found myself humming softly to myself, my tune shifting into short whistles every time I would dunk an espresso shot down into that cup. I didn't even realize that the customer didn't bother taking a seat on one of the empty tables, opting to lean on the wall by the side instead, hands shoved in the pockets of his jogs as his eyes followed me. 

"One iced americano for Jaem," I called out and pushed the packed drink into his hand. He handed me his card and I quickly worked on swiping it. 

"You sure like your coffee explosive, huh?" I shot him a question for the sake of making small talk as I punched some buttons on my terminal. 

"It's the eight shots, isn't it?"

I answered by giving him a shrug and a smile.

"It's the first time I ever did one like it. I can only imagine how it tastes like."

His lips slightly quirked into a smile. A...really cute smile if I might add.  

"Is there anything wrong?"

"It's really good." 

"Sure, Jaem. I'm not here to judge," I gave him a wink before handing back his card and receipt. "Well, thank you for dropping by. We hope to see you here again." He took both wordlessly and slipped them on his wallet. 

I was waiting for him to walk off with his drink with the practiced polite smile plastered on my face again. He turned, coffee in hand, took about five steps, before turning to me again. I blinked in mild confusion as he placed his cup back on my counter. 

"Actually… I'll have it here." 

___________________________________________________________

"I'm not going to try your death coffee, Jaemin." 

I didn't look up from the page I was reading but I could feel it, that deadly pout and puppy eyes combo drilling onto the side of my head. I flipped a page of my textbook over and I heard a sigh come from the boy beside me. 

"I bought it for you. You said you need to finish a paper tonight."

"I do. That doesn't require me to be awake for the next week and a half," I answered back with a quirk of my lips as I finally looked up to meet his gaze. We were seated at one of the far tables of the cafe for my 15 minute break, away from the handful of customers scattered on the smattering of tables and high chairs. This has become quite a routine already… but how it started, I can't really explain.

Ever since that first order, Jaemin had made it his routine to drop by almost regularly. At first the banter started similar to how a regular customer and his favorite barista would have, but since he would always come and visit during slow hours, we would always have more time for longer conversations. Casual talk turned into light-hearted jokes, and finally into a kind of banter that comes with familiarity with each other. Slowly, I came to know the complexities of Na Jaemin, and boy, is he an enigma and a paradox rolled in one. 

You never really know what to expect with him. There are days when he would be a bursting ball of energy—most of the time when he would order his drink from hell—but there are also moments when he would be quiet and reserved. I found it odd at first, but slowly accepted it since it didn't really hurt me in the first place. In fact, if I am going to be completely honest, I find this kind of personality set working for me. Imagine gaining two friends, except they're only in one body. 

But that's not the only odd thing in our dynamic, too. If someone would ask me now to describe the kind of friendship I have with him, I wouldn't really know how to explain it. We joke together, laugh together, sometimes even tease the crap out of each other like we've known each other for years. We work well together, but at the same time… I know almost next to nothing about him. I don't know his address, who his other friends are, if he's going to school or not… hell, I don't even know what his number is. Outside of this cafe and his regular visits, I don't have anything to prove that he actually exists. He didn't share, and I also didn't ask. 

Until today.

"Fine. I'm just going to drink this then."

I gasped before shooting him a squinted glare. 

"You are going to burn a hole in your stomach, I swear to god—"

He simply shrugged and made a huge show of sipping the previously untouched tears of Lucifer. 

I reached out to tug at the hood of his jacket in an attempt to call him out when I noticed it. His hair was initially masking it at first but now I could see it in full view: a purple bruise just on the side of his eye, almost to his temple.

"Oh my god, Jaemin. What happened?" I asked in a hurry as I tried to take a closer look at it. His expression changed in a heartbeat as he realized what I saw and he quickly leaned back and pulled the hoodie again over his head. 

"That's—it's nothing." 

"It looks so bad. How did you get that?"

He didn't answer. His eyes avoided my own and his hand gripped the plastic cup between us a little bit tighter. 

"Did you get into a fight?" I pushed, gently this time. 

His gaze moved to meet mine again for a few seconds. It's obvious he was contemplating what and how to answer. 

"Yeah… I got into a bit of a tumble with some friends."

I frowned and crossed my arms over my chest as I leaned back on my seat. He threw me a look that silently asked what else I want from him.

"Look. You don't tell me shit but at least I know enough to be sure you are lying."

Jaemin looked away and started tapping his finger against the table. 

"Why are you… why do you even want to know?"

I looked at him incredulously for a few seconds before leaning over. 

"Because you're my friend and I want to make sure you are okay."

"I am okay."

"Your black eye says otherwise."

"Come on, don't push this. Can't we be friends without," he waved his hand between us. "This?"

"Jaemin, I don't even know who you are."

That made him stop. He stared at me for what felt like a full half minute and that's when I saw it for the first time. The dilemma in his eyes. 

"It was because of work…" 

The look of confusion I made must have been so intense that he quickly tried to jump over it.

"Work—why, what do you—"

"I'm sorry, but that's really all that I can tell you." 

The sound of desperation in his tone wasn't lost on me. He looked so torn that I felt almost guilty for pressing.

"Fine… I won't ask again… As long as you are sure you're fine."

He peered at me once more as if assessing if he was finally off the hook. 

"So...we're still friends?"

"Huh?"

"You and me… we're still friends?"

"Uh, yes…" 

The look of relief on his face made me smile despite myself. He caught it and he made it a point to answer it with his best eye roll. 

"Don't laugh at me. I don't know how to do friends."

"You're so cute~"

"Shut up."

And that was the exact day I decided—I'm never going to let Na Jaemin feel alone again. 

Chapter 2

[keijifairy]

big little things 〃

♡ kageyama, nishinoya, oikawa, iwaizumi, bokuto, akaashi, atsumu, osamu, suna do that show how in love they are with you.

genre. fluff fluff fluff

warning. kinda spoiler for timeskip! bokuto

author’s note. hi,, im so sorry for promising to write but not writing :// i hope this disgustingly fluffy thing will make up for it as a late thank you for 400+ followers!!! aaaaa what 💗💗💗!!!!! 

+ writing this was super fun but also kinda upsetting bc sum of these are inspired by real life love stories wow </3

༘ kageyama frozen by your door with a painfully awkward smile and an assortment of wildflowers in his grasp is truly a sight to behold. before he picks you up for a date, he plucks flowers from the park near his house and shoves them into your hands with an incoherent compliment he exclaims (along the lines of “your face looks pretty”, you realize when he mumbles it the next minute and looking at anywhere but your face). you accept them with a giggle and return the sentiment with your lips brushing his cheek which blossoms into a deeper shade of red. hinata doesn’t believe that the rigid boy with a volleyball for a brain could be a sappy romantic like how you describe him to be.

༘ nishinoya is well aware of your sweet tooth, which is especially fond of chocolates. packs upon packs of the tiny chocolate kisses you secretly pop in your mouth during classes are stashed in his fridge, backpack, and even in the pockets of his uniform as a result. “it’s for emergencies,” he assures you with a proud grin whenever you find yet another family bag of hershey’s somewhere near him. you didn’t guess that not getting a particularly good mark on a test or homework piling up as the days pass were the so-called emergencies he proclaims: when your shoulders sag and your feet shuffle on the ground without a thought, the taste of chocolate lingering in your lips come as a surprise. his favorite laughter finally reaches his ears and nishinoya can’t help but gift you with another of his own chocolate kiss.

༘ oikawa is stubborn, incredibly so, but he’s only doing his best — even tries to push himself past his limit. it’s no surprise to enter the gymnasium to the thud of the ball as it hits the ground and you observe how strands of his hair stick to his forehead while his heavy breaths fill the room. you offer to help, to wait for him until he’s had enough—for too many to count—but he only flashes you a grin and lightly urges you out to the door every single time. oikawa couldn’t bring himself to focus if he watches you jolting awake every now and then instead of resting after bearing the weight of school — though he worries either way. with his phone leaning against his bag, he initiates a video call that gives you the perfect view of the boy jumping in the court through your screen as you make your way home. 

༘ iwaizumi has never gotten used to the ridiculous amount of nail polish you have collected ever since the both of you settled into your own home. he looks back and forth between your face and the small bottle of polish in your hand with his lips pressed together. “do you really need six bottles of blue?” you scoff and correct him for the nth time about the exact name of each color and end it off with a “none of your business, haji.”, causing him to narrow his eyes at you in concern with an exasperated sigh. quite ironic of him, acting so bothered and all, when you catch him watching a “how to build a nail polish shelf” video the next day.

༘ bokuto still calls one of his teammates every wednesday morning to inform them that he would have to miss practice, and atsumu still snickers on the other end of the line with an, “again? are ya sure yer not just slacking off?” wednesdays are scheduled for your doctor’s appointments, after all, so bokuto always makes sure to make it up to the other guys by doing extra drills or staying another hour the next day because he doesn’t intend on missing a single meeting. hospitals and clinics aren’t places you enjoy and you don’t feel comfortable talking with the doctor on your own, but you don’t worry too much — especially with bokuto seated beside you, listening intently to their words with his thumb rubbing circles on the top of your hand. his presence alone is enough to ease your anxieties. (his teammates don’t have it in them to be mad, only thinking about how whipped bokuto is for you).

༘ akaashi knows the moment you open the door with your eyes trained on your shoes that the day hasn’t been the kindest to you. he approaches you in quiet steps, taking your bag from your hands and placing it on the couch. you think the way his hand holds yours so delicately is enough to make you cry as he guides you to the bubble bath he had prepared at the right time, as if his sixth sense had told him of what you were feeling. the scent of lavender oil lingers in the air, and the flickering candles cast a soft glow throughout the room; it’s a comforting silence, save the occasional sniffles that tone down as akaashi gently scrapes through your scalp with shampoo. when the suds of soap are rinsed off of your body and he caresses your cheeks with the pads of his thumbs in the comfort of your bed, sleep crawls into your eyes as a “thank you, keiji.” falls from your lips. he only kisses your forehead in response.

༘ atsumu takes tentative sips on the cold can of cherry cola you offer to him every day. it’s the only drink you purchase at the vending machine during lunch period and what you grab when you two stop at the convenience store for movie night snacks. he doesn’t bother to buy himself one, as you immediately nudge the can on his cheek as soon as you open it. its taste is something he could never get used to, but he swallows it nonetheless, only to convince you afterward that he couldn’t finish it on his own — and of course, he teases you, just like in every opportunity he grabs when you’re simply minding your own business and completely unaware of the trick up his sleeve — and always, you’re left stumbling over your words as you stare at him in shock? embarrassment? offense? perhaps a bit of all of them? but he does know that “that was an indirect kiss just now.” of his and your adorable reaction make cherry cola worth it.

༘ osamu comes home in your arms with drooping eyes and a worn smile. his words are almost incoherent when he mumbles them on your shirt, eventually turning into snores when you tell him to at least wash his face. owning quite a famous shop with the best onigiris in town (your words and his) can be hectic; with the day spent molding countless onigiris and tending to every customer, that ends with his arm limp on top of your waist. with your own work to deal with that occupies almost the rest of your days, there would be no room to breathe with just the both of you — but with osamu, it’s not like that at all. the soft sizzling from the kitchen wakes you up to an empty space beside you and your stomach’s quick to grumble in anticipation. the shop opens early, but osamu doesn’t leave until the both of you start the day eating at the dinner table and talking about the events of yesterday. it’s no doubt he’s still exhausted, so the small gesture of waking up early in the morning to cook your favorite breakfast and the gentle hum that greets you when you wrap your arms around him is enough to make you full. 

༘ suna must be obsessed with you! might be the first thing someone would think when they get their hands on the boy’s phone. his gallery is a gold mine: full of images and videos he takes of you in unknowing times that he has definitely used for blackmail at least twice a week. nibbling on your pen with your eyebrows scrunched when you attempt to start homework, cheek squishing on your pillow as a line of drool slides down the side of your mouth, clutching your stomach and throwing your head back because you’re wheezing too much over something he said, and plenty more embarrassing moments you don’t like looking back on are what fill his storage space. he refuses to delete even a single one, despite how blurry they come out or how you complain about how ridiculous you think you look. suna is obsessed with you — you would know if only you notice how he stops after he snaps a photo, with a small adoring smile that disappears as soon as it comes before he teases you to no end. 

[peachy-panic]

“Look at me.”

Hi there. I’m new here, but also very much not, which is to say you’ve probably seen me pop up a few dozen (hundred) times in your notifications with likes and comments and the occasional ask when I’m feeling brave, sliding under the radar from the safety of my obscure fandom-turned-main account.

POINT IS, I’m no stranger to the wonderful works of this community, and CERTAINLY no stranger to whump appreciation, even if I haven’t always had a word for it. And because I’ve been so inspired by all the talented writers here, I’ve decided to finally cut loose and throw my own work into the ring, and the whole @whumpmasinjuly thing seemed like an opportune time to pop up.

I’ve aggressively lurked on so many of your pages in the last year so I’m sure I’m leaving someone out, but I did want to tag a few of the writers who have really motivated me to start this page just by reading their writing:

@ashintheairlikesnow @orchidscript @deluxewhump @whump-tr0pes @evermetnotforgotten @card-games-and-pain

And if you’ve made it this far into the post, we’ve arrived at the actual content. This snippet is from a project I started writing before I knew about the existence of the BBU, but I’ve slowly started molding it into something that fits more-or-less within the bounds of that collective universe. Some things may take slightly different turns to the rules established there, but it’s the same general concept.

Without further ado.

PROMPT: “Look at me.”

WARNINGS: General BBU-esque warnings, human trafficking, slavery, non-con (fade-to-black ish but the lead up is… Not Great). Let me know if I missed anything!

He knows something is off right away when Mr. Torley calls to him from the end of the long hallway on the other side of the house. 

When the children are home, Jaime is confined to the main common areas: the living room that spills into the large open-concept kitchen, the guest bathroom, the laundry room (where he has already spent most of his time working), the boys’ toy room (where he has only gone to clean up after them), and of course, the small room he has been given to sleep in, which he is sure once served as some sort of storage area. 

At the mouth of the living room is a corridor that leads to Mr. Torley’s study, and across from that, his bedroom. So he is told. Jaime was given instructions never to go into that wing of the house unless explicitly invited. He has been in his new home assignment for three days now and has never once been asked to cross those bounds. 

Until now. 

Carefully, Jaime places the mug he had been diligently scrubbing in the basin of the sink and shuts off the tap. He looks around for the hand towel and, remembering he had thrown it in with the last load of laundry, dries his hands on his t-shirt instead.

There’s a shift in the air, something thick and weighty and terrible as he steps into the opening of the hallway, but he doesn’t allow himself a moment to hesitate. He pads near-silently forward, toward the only open door, all the way at the end. 

In the threshold between the hall and the master bedroom, Jaime’s toes brush against where pristine hardwood meets soft carpet. It feels good against his bare feet after days of standing on an unforgiving surface without the allowance of shoes or socks, but not nearly good enough to settle the uneasiness building in the pit of his stomach. Mr. Torley sits on the edge of the bed, a long, deep-colored robe covering most of his body, save for the deep strip of exposed skin down his chest where a few patches of thick, dark hair peek through. Jaime forces his eyes up to his.

“You called for me, Sir?” His voice low and steady, even as his eyes draw unwittingly to the lamp on the bedside table, which has been dimmed to an orange glow that makes the room feel small and suffocatingly warm. 

“Come here,” his Keeper beckons, and Jaime’s muscles operate by the hand of some unseen force, pushing him forward. He only makes it half a step in before Mr. Torley raises a hand, gesturing to where the light of the hallway spills in around his silhouette. “Close the door behind you.”

Jaime’s limbs feel very heavy all of a sudden, but he moves anyway, a phantom sting buzzing beneath his skin at even the briefest thought of hesitation. Never make your Keeper wait. Never let your Keeper ask twice. 

The hallway is plain and sterile, much like the rest of the Torley house, but Jaime stares longingly out at it as he pulls the door shut, wishing he were out there instead.

When the door clicks shut, he can feel a pair of eyes rake down his back like cold fingertips. It raises the hair on the back of his neck, his skin breaking out in an unpleasant chill, but he forces perfect neutrality into his expression before he turns around. He zeroes in on the sensation of soft carpet under his soles instead of the prickling dread under his skin as he makes his way toward the bed, coming to a stop a couple feet away.

Mr. Torley chuckles under his breath, a low, amused sound that Jaime is already getting used to hearing. He seems to reserve it for Jaime alone and it always serves to make him feel like there is some sort of private joke he’s not been let in on. Or, more accurately, that he is the joke, and he can’t quite stifle the lingering sense of shame that comes with that. 

“I said, come here.” It’s a direct order, but paired with a hint of amusement and something darker swimming behind his eyes. He rubs a hand invitingly, pointedly, over the comforter next to him and Jaime swallows back a lump in his throat that feels a lot like bile.

He isn’t stupid. Despite everything that’s been told to him, he’s not. But in that moment he wishes maybe he was, and then ignorance could be bliss for just a few more seconds. He knows where this is headed, and he knows that it’s wrong. It is against the policies, against the rules, he knows it is, but he isn’t surprised, either. It hadn’t taken long at the training facility to discover that the system on paper looks a whole lot different than the system in practice. 

“‘We uphold a zero-tolerance policy for the sexual exploitation and abuse of Domestic workers,’” a cruel, mocking voice recites in his head, alongside the memory of a leather-gloved thumb sliding between his lips, his wide, tearful eyes glued to the tiny, black remote in his handler’s fist. 

The skin beneath his collar burns at the memory, and he raises his fingers absently to touch there, half expecting to feel the heavy weight of the electric clip attached. He doesn’t, of course, and the only electricity he feels now is of a different nature, coming off his Keeper in waves as he waits, a bit more impatiently with every second, for Jaime to sit. 

So he does. 

Mr. Torley crowds his space immediately, and his instinctive response to pull away is smothered by a heavy arm draping over his shoulders and a droning voice inside his head. You must make yourself available at all times. You may not refuse any order or request that does not directly interfere with the wellbeing of another person. Jaime allows himself to wonder, for the briefest moment, if his wellbeing counts for anything. He knows it doesn’t. They had just spent the past three months teaching him, in every way imaginable, that he was not, in fact, a person at all.

All the offhand remarks from the trainers, the lewd sneers, the heavy-lidded glances and roaming hands… they had all painted him a picture of what to expect. He had just tricked himself into thinking that maybe, hopefully, if there ever really was a god in this universe that loved him like he was sure he once believed, that he was wrong. In the three days since he had stepped foot into his newest post, Jaime had managed to convince himself that maybe, possibly, he had gotten one of the good ones. 

Mr. Torley is all too happy to shatter the illusion as his finger and thumb find Jaime’s earlobe, rubbing it between them and then ghosting down the side of his neck. 

“Take off your shirt,” he whispers.

Jaime’s blood runs cold. 

You may not refuse any order or request. He can’t conceal the trembling in his fingers as they curl around the hem of his standard-issue grey t-shirt. You may not refuse any order or request. The warm ambience of the room feels startlingly cold against his naked torso as he pulls the fabric over his head, letting it fall in a soft whisper onto the carpet. You may not refuse any order or request. His arm is back around his shoulders instantly, hot and cold assaulting his skin all at once and he feels so exposed and he doesn’t want to be here he doesn’t want to do this. 

Mr. Torley places a heavy palm against his chest, running it slowly downward, and Jaime can picture what it looks like without even looking; calloused pads scraping over soft skin, all thick fingers and subtly unkempt nails, the beginnings of age spots and wrinkles and small dustings of black hair across the knuckles. He thinks his keeper must be able to feel the way his heart is pounding through his ribs, and he feels a surge of embarrassment that he was sure the training should have beaten out of him.

It’s because you weren’t trained for this, the panicked voice in the back of his head screams as the hand trails lower, grazing the thin patch of hair below his navel. This isn’t supposed to happen. This is against policy. You weren’t made for this. His skin feels static in every place Mr. Torley’s fingers brush, and he wishes he could dissolve under them.

“You’re shaking, baby.” Jaime winces at the unexpected term of endearment. So far, it has only been boy, curt and abrasive when thrown in his direction, usually followed by a direct order. “Have you never had a man touch you like this?”

His mind supplies a horror show of memories, flashes of images behind closed eyelids -  leather-gloved hands and concrete rooms of the training facility - and he realizes he doesn’t know how to answer that. He wants to cry. Can’t cry. Isn’t allowed to cry. Then there are fingers on his chin, on his jaw, softer than any of his touches have ever been; soft like the word baby on his lips, soft like the half-lidded eyes that he is forced to meet. 

“I asked you a question.”

“I haven’t. Sir.” His voice shakes, barely a whisper. 

It is mostly true, probably in the way Mr. Torley really meant it, and unfortunately seems to be exactly the answer he was looking for. Dread splits Jaime in two. One part, the part of him that’s hazy and pliant and good tells him he has done a good job, that he has pleased his Keeper, he has said the right thing. His keeper’s needs are his needs, if his Keeper is happy, he is happy. 

The other part just keeps screaming. And screaming. And screaming.

He doesn’t want this.

It doesn’t matter what he wants, he’s not supposed to have wants.

But this isn’t allowed.

His Keeper is happy.

Please, please stop touching me.

He can’t say no, no is forbidden to him.

Please don’t make me do this.

His keeper is smiling.

“You’re very lucky,” Mr. Torley says, dragging the thumb that was holding his jaw over he’s lower lip. “They could have given you to any one of your bidders, and trust me… there are some messed up people out there who invest in the services of Domestic Companions. But I can be good to you.”

Somehow, he doesn’t feel very lucky at all.

“Yes, sir,” he says, a bit breathless as fingers trace up and down his spine. His own fingers curl into the bedsheets on the opposite side of his thigh where Mr. Torley can’t see the outward signals of his distress, though from the naked delight in his eyes as he watches him, he doesn’t think he minds. 

There are lips on his before he can even process what is happening, and he feels his whole body go rigid in his Keeper’s hold. He’s never been kissed before and the cold wetness against his mouth is nothing like the movies make it out to be. It’s hard to wrap his head around the overwhelming sensation, but the one thing he knows for sure, immediately, is that he hates it. 

He hates his first kiss unlike anything he’s hated before. Terror and humiliation seize him in equal stride as he realizes he doesn’t really know what to do. He is frozen, for a moment, his own pulse beating wildly in his ears as slimy lips move against his own. When Mr. Torley cups a hand around the back of his neck, pulling him closer to lean into the kiss, his mouth opens instinctively, submitting to the insistence of the movement, and this seems to be exactly what he was looking for. A low, throaty hum vibrates against his mouth and Jaime clamps his eyes shut tight. He feels like he might die. For a moment, he kind of wishes he would.

He doesn’t register the pressure of the hand against his chest until his back is already pressed into the duvet. Mr. Torley sits up then, breaking the kiss, then stands. Jaime doesn’t look at him - he can’t bring himself to - but he can feel his eyes on him anyway. Thick fingers hook into the elastic of the thin, gray pants he had been given three days prior, and his breathing goes flat. Please don’t please don’t please don’t, his brain lights up with panic, every nerve ending in his body on high alert. But he doesn’t move, other than to close his trembling fingers around the material on either side of him, curling the soft fibers of the duvet into his fists. He wants to close his eyes, but he can feel them burning, then swimming with moisture, and he knows if he clamps his eyelids shut, the tears will spill over and he doesn’t want to cry in front of Mr. Torley.

Instead, he stares up at the ceiling fan, focusing on the long, thin blades of wood instead of the feeling of cool air against his lower half as the material is pulled away from him. He hears the rustle of cloth as his pants join the discarded shirt on the carpet at his feet, and then another sound of the same, this time heavier, but he doesn’t dare look away from the grey clump of dust dangling from one of the fan blades above him.

Worse than the chill of the exposure is the heat that follows in the form of skin on skin, an immovable weight settling over his body. His throat jerks in another attempt at a sob, a plea that can’t let free. He swallows it down and tells himself that if he just keeps staring at that one spot of dust, he isn’t really here, that his keeper is not on top of him, that this isn’t about to happen to him. 

But he is. It is. There’s no stopping it now. There never was.

“Look at me.” 

For the first time, he allows his eyes to slip shut in a quiet moment of defeat - just a singular moment of hesitation before he follows the command. He feels the moisture slipping out at the corners but he can’t do anything to stop them even if his hands weren’t being slowly pressed above his head and into the mattress. When he opens his eyes, he looks up into the cold expression hovering over him, fully eclipsing the spot of his previous focus. It’s just him now. It’s all him, every one of his senses besieged by the one person whose life he is supposed to center himself around now. In that context, perhaps this should feel exactly right. 

Somehow, it doesn’t. Not at all.

[eyndr-stories]

The Stranger The Better (FNAF SB fanfic) C14 - Gotta Tase Em All

Read the intro to Chapter 1 (Enter A Sleepy Bitchard) for more details! I'd start reading there anyways else things won't make a whole lot of sense lol

In Summary: Reader is a forever exhausted young adult who has social difficulties doing their best to pay the bills, so when they get hired at the well-paying, almost entirely automated Freddy Fazbear's Mega Pizza-Plex, they don't really hesitate to think things through before stumbling headfirst into a horror mystery surrounding this company and its crew of quirky (and surprisingly kind) animatronics.

Things To Know (lmk if I should add anything):

There are some horror elements in several chapters! This chapter is Very Spooky! Feelings of fear, being hunted, being grabbed, being attacked, attempted murder, feelings of stress, a taser is used. (as the title suggests lol)

Eventual romance, minorly important to the plot.

Reader has paranoia.

There is much swearing.

Reader is also addicted to energy drinks, though at this point in the story they are doing well with battling said addiction.

Reader is nonbinary (and also trans masc) though it's not vital to the plot and only comes up once or twice.

Reader is from the south, is protective of their friends, and if you threaten their friends then I'm afraid you've yee'd your last haw and yes that is important to the plot

Previous Chapter | Chapter 14 | Next Chapter

C14 - Gotta Tase Em All

     Needless to say, you were extremely upset. However, you knew you were not safe, and Greggory was not safe. So you told the bear bot to go to the only place you could think of that no one could access but you.

     The hidden room in the warehouse, where Moon's body once sat in storage, the room that you still had the key to.

     The three of you made it there without issue. You shut and locked the door behind you as the bear turned on the light and set Greggory down. Then, finally, you started to cry.

     You sank to the floor and put your face in your hands. You didn't want to think about what had happened to Sun, or what might be happening to Moon right now.

     It was all you could think about.

     The bear bot crouched next to you and gently pat your back.

     "Shit… I'm sorry." You sniffed. "This is no time for a breakdown."

     "It is alright to cry, Y/N," the bear assured.

     "I've cried twice tonight!" Greggory chimed in.

     You took a deep breath and wiped your face. "I just… I don't know what's going on. Almost everyone has this weird virus, they're all dangerous, like Moon was a while ago… I don't know if they're okay. What if they're not okay??"

     "They will be. We will make sure of it," the bear said. "We're still going to figure this out."

     "We need to get Greggory out of here first. It's not safe for him here," you said.

     "As a security precaution, none of the animatronics can open level ten security doors. All exits are level ten doors," the bear said.

     You thought for a moment. "So we need to find a level ten security card. One of the security desks somewhere should have a level ten card, right?"

     "What if I don't wanna leave??" Greggory said.

     Both you and the bear stared at the kid.

     "I wanna help! You guys helped me, so…" Greggory folded his arms. "I'm not scared."

     "It really is not safe for you here, Greggory," the bear said.

     Greggory frowned. "It's not safe for me out there either!"

     You shared a look with the bear.

     "Look, I'm really good at puzzle games. I've already found a bunch of clues!" Greggory reached into one of his cargo pockets and pulled out a few crumpled balls of paper.

     You gasped. "You found more pages from Monty's diary??"

     "Monty's diary?" The bear looked at you quizzically. "Is that what I have been carrying around for you??" He opened his chest cavity and pulled out the green book.

     "Yes, I think he left it and the pages as clues. I found a page balled up and placed on top of an ATM machine. Greggory, can we see those pages?" you asked.

     "Only if I'm allowed to stay." Greggory held the papers close to his chest.

     You bit your lip and looked at the bear bot.

     "…Alright, you may stay. We will keep you safe," the bear said.

     Greggory grinned and sat with you and the bear on the floor and spread out the notes he'd found. There were three pages, though the entries were short.

     'Yet another episode. This time I woke up in the warehouse, and I was all grimy, like I'd been handling some grease or something. The episodes are getting more frequent. I'm starting to get worried. I dunno what to do. My systems are about to shut down, I can hardly even enter rest mode anymore. I've been trying to play it cool, but it's getting hard. I don't kn

     Ok. So I actually shut down in the middle of writing. My systems just couldn't take it anymore. I rebooted in safe mode, and suddenly I feel fine?? Not sure what the hell happened.'

     'Okay. Two things.

     One. Being in safe mode is definitely what made me feel better. I completed a full rest cycle for the first time in… fuck, years.

     I even had a weird dream. I can't really recall it. Something about rabbits. I dunno, it was stupid.

     Two. Chica's been acting weird recently. She's twitchy, like I was, and she doesn't talk as much anymore. And she LOVES talking. When she walked past me to her room after the show, she was warm enough that I could feel it a foot away. That's freaky, right?? Like whatever I had jumped from me to her. I dunno.'

     'This is bad.

     After my rest cycle, when I woke up I was no longer in safe mode. The lock on the recharge station was broken, and I know it was fine when I got in.

     I'm worried. I don't know who to talk to. The others are warm and twitchy… I'm starting to get twitchy again myself.

     I've been thinking. If being off the system made me better, there must be some kind of virus or something in the network?? I don't know how. It's supposed to be super secure. You can't even access it outside the plex, besides management HQ I guess.

     I feel… bad. Something is going on, and I don't think I have the time to figure it out.

     If you're reading this… shit went bad, so I hid my notes around the plex. I don't know what's going on, but I'm gonna try to figure it out.'

     "So being in safe mode is what makes you safe," Greggory said.

     "It does seem that way." The bear hummed thoughtfully. "Perhaps we could shut the others down and reboot them in safe mode? Then we can figure out what's behind this virus."

     "You don't think… someone at management did this, do you?" you wondered. "The system can only be accessed there, and inside the plex. And I seriously doubt any of yall did this."

     "What reason would management have to sabotage their own animatronics?" the bear asked.

     You frowned. "I dunno… It doesn't make sense. Maybe Monty found something out and left another clue somewhere."

     "How do we get the others in safe mode?" Greggory asked.

     "When we experience a total system shutdown, we reboot in safe mode as a default safety feature," the bear explained.

     "Right," you said. "So how do we shut everyone down?"

     "May I see your taser, Y/N?" the bear asked.

     You looked at him quizzically, but handed it over.

     The bear studied the taser closely. He lifted a hand, and the tip of his pinky finger flipped open, revealing a small screwdriver inside. "If I can adjust the voltage to the same level as the electricity that runs our systems, an overload of the electricity will likely cause a system shutdown, as a safety feature to prevent fires and damage."

     "Oh, great!" You watched as the bear got to work, taking your little taser apart and fiddling with it.

     "Can I use it??" Greggory asked.

     "No," you and the bear said simultaneously.

     Greggory pouted and folded his arms.

     "That should do it! Here you are, superstar." The bear handed the re-assembled taser back to you.

     "Thanks dad." You re-attached the taser to the little wrist strap and snapped the key back in. When you looked back up, both the bear and Greggory were smiling at you. "…What??"

     "You called him 'dad'," Greggory said.

     "What?? No I didn't. Hush." You awkwardly averted your gaze and got to your feet. "We can't just sit around here all night. We have until the plex opens and people start coming in to fix this mess."

     "Good point, kiddo. Let us get a move on," the bear said.

     Your face felt hot. You awkwardly fiddled with the key to the door as the bear stored Monty's diary and all the pages in his chest cavity and got Greggory situated once more on his shoulders.

     "Alright. Okay." You took a deep breath and let it out. You looked at the bear, who nodded at you. You looked up at Greggory, who looked a little apprehensive. "Ready, Freddy?"

     "I'm ready, superstar!" The bear replied with a smile.

     "I was talking to-" you paused. "Wait." You stared at the bear. "Freddy???"

     The bear looked at you curiously. "That's my name, don't wear it out."

     Holy shit. Finally. His name!! You stifled your excitement and cleared your throat, then quickly turned your attention back to the matter at hand. "Greggory, are you good to go? Any second thoughts about leaving?"

     Greggory straightened up. "No way! I'm not scared. Let's go!"

     "Okay." You turned to the door and unlocked it, then lead the way back out into the access tunnels.

     It was time for the hunted to become the hunters.

~~~

     Over the next two hours, the three of you carefully made your way through the pizza-plex, gathering security cards just in case something bad happened and Greggory needed to get out of the building. The bear bot, Freddy, (oh my god, his name is Freddy) pointed out that he wouldn't last much longer without needing to stop and let his systems cool off. Without him there to automatically opening security doors, it'd be harder to get through the plex.

     You gave the one badge you had to Greggory, and let him keep any others you found. You figured he'd need them most. The little sneak already had a few, including the level three card from the daycare, which he admitted to taking while he was behind the security desk. Soon enough, the three of you had collected security cards level one through eight.

     You desperately wanted to go back to the daycare, but Freddy insisted it was too dangerous. Not only were the lights out, but there was likely broken glass on the floors and there was no way to know if Moon had managed to restrain Sun. You didn't need to be seeking out danger. You tried to argue, but Freddy told you firmly that he would not allow it, and only he could open the door. It needed a special daycare pass, not just a security card. You had no way to get a pass, so you relented.

     The DJ was easy to reboot, but only because he was asleep when you entered the arcade, Little Music Man asleep as well atop DJMM's head. You felt horrible tasing the big guy, but his paint was cracked and he was hot to the touch. It only took them a minute to reboot, and they both seemed very confused when they did. The taser trick worked though, they were in safe mode. After you and Freddy explained the situation, Mister Music and Mini Man both decided the situation seemed complicated and dangerous, and they felt better resting for the rest of the night, just to be safe. You signed 'good night' to them both, and Mister Music happily returned the gesture.

     The three of you left the arcade. It wasn't long until you ran into the others. Unfortunately, you ran into both Chica and Roxy at the same time.

     The two were in the cafeteria, stalking around the tables and chairs, checking behind booths. You hid with Freddy and Greggory behind an arrangement of giant potted plants and benches.

     "Okay… you two stay back and I'll go up and try to tase them both quickly. I don't think they'll attack me, since I work here," you said.

     Greggory gave you a thumbs up.

     "Be safe," Freddy said.

     You took a deep breath. Your nerves were jumping, but your resolve was steady. You had to protect this kid. You had to help your friends.

     You walked towards Roxy, who was a few paces closer than Chica. She had her back to you. Chica, however, did not, and noticed you approaching.

     Without hesitation Chica charged at you, eyes blazing and hands outstretched to grab you. Apparently, she must have remembered you tasing her earlier. Either that or the virus had her feeling particularly murderous at the moment.

     You swore and dove to the side on instinct, narrowly dodging her. Chica stumbled past you and exclaimed in frustration.

     Roxy was also aware of you now. You gripped your taser tightly and eyed the both of them warily.

     "Stay still," Chica demanded, then tried to grab you again.

     You dropped down, missing her hands by an inch, and whipped your taser forwards, hitting Chica's legs. She screamed, and you winced.

     Roxy grabbed you, yanking you up by your arm hard enough that your shoulder instantly started to throb. Luckily, she'd grabbed your free hand, so you jabbed your taser at her shoulder just as she opened her jaws, likely to bite your head off.

     Roxy dropped you as she yelped and convulsed, collapsing to the floor with Chica.

     "Sorryyy," you said, getting back to your feet. Your heart was pounding, you could feel it in your fingertips. You took a few shaky breaths, then checked your shoulder as Freddy hurried over with Greggory. It hurt, but you could still move it around well enough. It felt a little swollen.

     "Are you harmed??" Freddy asked.

     "I'm fine. Just pulled a muscle or something," you said.

     "You should put some ice on it. Also rest, keep it elevated, and use something to compress it," Freddy said, looking concerned.

     "There's no time for all that!" You frowned. Freddy looked upset, so you huffed and pushed up your hoodie sleeves, the fabric bunching up around your arms. "There, compression. That'll do for now."

     "We will take care of it properly as soon as we are all out of danger," Freddy said.

     Chica got up first. "Woah… where am I?? Why do I feel so awful?" She looked around, spotting you and Freddy and Greggory, who hid behind Freddy's legs. "Hey guys! Who's your friend?"

     Roxy sat up next. She frowned and slowly took in the scene. "…Why don't I remember how I got here?"

     "Hey, I can't remember how I got here either!" Chica said.

     You helped them both up and explained the virus and having to tase them to get them in safe mode. You told them about Monty's notes and everything you'd learned so far.

     "Are we the first two you've tased?" Roxy asked, frowning at your taser.

     "This thing has seen a lot of action tonight," you said sheepishly. "DJMM and Little Music Man are in safe mode, they're currently resting. Freddy is fine, Moon…" you pressed your lips together.

     Freddy stepped in. "There was an incident in the daycare. Moon was in safe mode, but Sun was not. Moon ended up holding Sun off while the three of us escaped."

     "Oh gosh! I hope they're okay." Chica looked worried.

     "Me too," you said softly.

     "Aw, hun. I'm sure everything will turn out alright," Chica said, offering your arm a soft pat.

     "You don't know what's causing this virus?" Roxy asked.

     "Not really. We have not located any more clues from Monty yet," Freddy said.

     "What's up with the kid??" Roxy asked next.

     Greggory, who'd poked his head out, dodged back behind Freddy's legs.

     "He's Greggory. He's stuck in the plex, since no one can open any exits. We're keeping him safe," you said.

     "Oh dear. I don't remember… we didn't cause you too much trouble, did we??" Chica asked, kneeling down and giving Greggory an apologetic look.

     "You couldn’t catch me," Greggory said proudly. "Plus, Freddy knows a pretty great hiding spot." He smiled and pat Freddy's leg, then winced and shook his hand. "Ow! You're hot!"

     "Oh no, are you alright??" Freddy carefully studied Greggory's hand, being careful not to touch him.

     "I'm fine." Greggory stuffed his hands in his pockets.

     "I do not believe that I am fine. I am overheating," Freddy said. "I need to rest for a while."

     You got an idea. If Freddy was resting, maybe you could convince Chica or Roxy to open the daycare doors for you.

     Freddy, however, seemed to know exactly what you were thinking. "Chica, Roxanne. Why don't you two head to the daycare and figure out how Sun and Moon are doing? Y/N, you need to keep Greggory safe. Monty is still around here somewhere, and the last thing we heard about him is that he is not in safe mode. Keep looking for security cards, and I will catch up with you once my systems have cooled down enough."

     "But- I…" You stopped and scowled. You knew it was safer this way. You were desperate to know if Moon and Sun were alright, but Freddy was right. You had to keep an eye on Greggory, and the daycare was not safe. "…Alright. Fine."

     Chica shared a look with Roxy.

     "Good luck, everyone. I will see you soon," Freddy said, then made his way to the nearest recharge station.

     "We'll come find you as soon as we know how Sun and Moon are doing," Chica said.

     "Thank you." You smiled gratefully.

     Chica winked at you, then walked off with Roxy in tow.

     "Alright kid, it's you and me. Let's try to find some more cards," you said.

     "Right." Greggory straightened up and put on a brave face. "Where's the next security desk?"

     "The next closest security desk is I believe the big one behind the stage. This way." You pointed to a nearby hall.

     Greggory trailed along beside you. He kept looking all around with his observant eyes and would occasionally glance behind the two of you.

     You would have loved to buy Greggory a snack from a vending machine, but none of them seemed to be working. The screens were all glitchy and purple, just like all the ATMs and other machines around the plex.

     It occurred to you as you walked that you hadn't seen Vanessa since she'd run into you in Monty's room. If all the animatronics were hostile… you did not like Vanessa, but that didn't mean you wanted to find her body anywhere by any means.

     "You're a security guard… right?" Greggory asked, pulling you out of your thoughts.

     "That's right." You tapped your hat, which had the word 'SECURITY' embroidered on it. It also had two lovely little pins pinned to it. You tried not to think about that right now.

     "When this is all over… are you gonna call the cops on me?" Greggory asked hesitantly.

     "Absolutely not. I don't trust the cops." You scowled.

     Greggory seemed to relax. "Okay, good."

     "Do you wanna talk about… um. Why you're here in the plex tonight?" you asked.

     Greggory frowned. "No."

     "Okay. That's alright." You didn't want to pry. You'd figure out a permanent and safe solution for Greggory's predicament once this was all over. "You wanna hear a riddle?"

     "Yeah!" Greggory's expression lifted.

     You tried to think of an easy one. "What has hands, but doesn't clap?"

     "A clock," Greggory said, almost instantly.

     "Woah, okay. Hm. What has many keys but can't open any doors?"

     Greggory thought about that one, but only for a moment. "Keys… a piano!"

     "Wow, you're good at these. Alright, here's a tougher one. I am weightless but can be seen. Put me in a bucket and I'll make it lighter. What am I?"

     Greggory pondered that one until you made it to the security room. "Is it… sunlight?"

     You paused. "That wasn't the answer but actually, that does work! I'll give ya that one."

     "What was the answer?"

     "A hole. Put a hole in a bucket, the bucket gets lighter," you said.

     "Ohhh." Greggory nodded. "Hey, look!"

     Sitting squarely in the middle of the desk was a crumpled up piece of paper.

     Greggory took the security card (level nine) while you unfolded the paper and held it up so you both could read. The entry was very short, and looked to have been written in a hurry.

     'Remembered something else from that dream. Numbers. I dunno if they're important. 4765182'

     "Weird…" You folded the paper and put it in your pocket for safe keeping.

     "Maybe the code opens a secret safe?" Greggory wondered.

     "Maybe." You shrugged. "We've got one desk left. Number ten has to be there. You ready?"

     Greggory nodded. "Lets go."

     The last desk was in the security room, down in the access tunnels. It was clear Greggory was uncomfortable down here. The tunnels were dark and spooky.

     "Here, why don't you light the way?" you suggested, handing over your flashlight.

     "Okay." Greggory gripped the flashlight and swept it back and forth. He seemed a little calmer, now that he had a task to do.

     You had to admit, you were a little freaked out as well. Not just by the tunnels, though they weren't helping. This whole night was upsetting, and you just couldn't shake that 'nightmare' feeling. Something dangerous was close by, you were not safe, the people you cared about were not safe. You didn't know what was going on. You didn't know how you were going to fix this. You didn't even know if Moon and Sun were alright. God, you were so worried about them. Besides all that, it was just you now between Monty and Greggory. You were worried you'd hesitate to hurt Monty, or that Monty would easily overpower you. What if you died protecting Greggory? You thought there were worse ways to go, at least.

     You and Greggory reached the security office. Greggory used the level 9 card to unlock the door, and it popped open.

     Things looked pretty much the same here as they had when you'd first been in here months ago, when Chica had showed you the way here. Dusty, coffee stains on the desk, heavy filing cabinets against the wall. The monitors were all glitchy. No chance of checking the daycare's camera.

     Greggory took the final card, level 10.

     You took a deep breath, and knelt in front of the kid. "Listen, Greggory… if something happens to me, you need to take that card and get to an exit." You took out the folded piece of paper in your pocket and grabbed a pen from the desk. You wrote your address on the bottom of the page and tore it off, then handed it to Greggory, as well as the key to your house. "You can go to my place. It's not much, but it's safe, and the utilities will be on for a while. I'm good about paying my bills."

     Greggory looked at the key, then at you. His eyes watered. "Thank you."

     "I'm sure I'll be fine though. Just… worse case scenario, ya know? I expect to get that key back once this is all over." You stood back up and cleared your throat. "I think we should probably stay put for now, wait for Freddy to find us. He'll probably check around the security desks for us once he wakes up."

     "Right. Good idea." Greggory pocketed the paper and the key, then climbed up into the office chair.

     "I… I'm gonna keep watch outside. Just open the door if you need anything, I'll be right outside," you said.

     "What if you need to come back in?" Greggory asked.

     "I'll just knock on the door and you can let me in."

     "But how will I know its you??"

     "Oh, uh…" You thought for a moment. "I'll do a special knock. Like this." You rapped your knuckles on the desk four times, to the beat of 'happy birthday'.

     "Okay." Greggory nodded.

     You gave him a thumbs up and stepped outside.

     You took a long, deep breath. You leaned back against the wall and rubbed your face. You lightly poked your shoulder, which still hurt. The fear was getting to you. If you did die, you didn't want the animatronics to be discontinued because of it.

     You pulled out your phone and opened your writing app, then hit record.

     "Uh. So this is Y/N. Just gonna leave a little message, just… just in case. Preparing for the worst case scenario to help ease my anxieties. So, let me explain…" you recounted the night so far, talked about Moon's bug, and Monty's worsening memory issues, and everything he'd said in the notes he left. "I'm not sure what happened to Vanessa. I hope she isn't… I hope she's okay." You paused. "Uh. I think that's everything. So yeah, there's some freaky virus, the animatronics are not at fault here, they are not acting of their own will. If… Sun and Moon, if you two hear this… well, I'll be damned if I kick the bucket without coming clean. There's something I've been meaning to tell you." You took a deep breath. "I-"

     "Hey, Y/N!!" Greggory stuck his head out from behind the door.

     "Oh- Greggory, what's up, are you okay?" You quickly stuffed your phone in your pocket.

     "I'm fine, I found something!! Come look at this!" Greggory said.

     You followed Greggory back into the office. You noticed that one of the filing cabinet's drawers were open. Greggory went to the cabinet and pointed inside the drawer.

     "Look in the back," Greggory said.

     You approached the cabinet. "Wasn't this filing cabinet locked?"

     Greggory smiled. "Nope."

     You squinted suspiciously. You looked inside the cabinet.

     There, at the back of the cabinet, was a chunky panel with a keypad.

     "Oh, what? A keypad?" You paused. "You don’t think…"

     "Try those numbers!" Greggory said excitedly.

     "Okay, okay." You quickly got out your folded piece of paper and tapped in the numbers Monty had written down. 4765182. You hit enter.

     Suddenly, the filing cabinet to the right of the one with the keypad slid to the right, scraping along the linoleum floor. In the wall behind where the cabinet had been was a neatly cut out doorway, beyond which there was only darkness.

     "Woah," Greggory said.

     "What in the…" You frowned at the doorway. A cold draft crept through the space, chilling your legs. You shared a look with Greggory.

     "We have to check it out," Greggory said.

     "I'll admit, I am extremely curious about this secret hidden passage," you mumbled.

     "You first," Greggory said, handing you the flashlight.

     "Right." You took a deep breath to steel your nerves. Taser in one had and flashlight in the other, you stepped through the doorway, leading the way into the darkness.

[bokutosworld]

i won’t say (i’m in love) | kageyama t. 

pairing: kageyama tobio x gn!reader

wc: 1,935 words. fluff, high school crushes. hinata being a wingman lol. 

summary: an encounter at kageyama’s favorite spot in school leads him to meet someone that makes him feel all sorts of confusing feelings. 

a/n: so if it’s not yet obvious by the title, this was inspired by the song from hercules, i won’t say i’m in love :D this idea has been on my drafts for quite some time and i finally had the chance to work on it yaaay 

The first time Kageyama saw you, you were in front of the vending machine he frequented.

It was lunch break, and with ten minutes left before the next period, he figured he could get his favorite banana milk. He was walking towards the area that hid the machine away from prying and hungry eyes. Kageyama was confident that no one was familiar with its spot, especially since the machine always seemed to never go out of stock of his go-to drinks. But boy was he wrong.

The instant that he rounded the corner, he heard the recognizable thud of the drink box falling and someone getting it from its confines. He took a peek and saw a glimpse of a student cheerfully sticking the straw to the pack, humming as they take a sip of the milk. With a contented smile, the student walks off and passes him, giving a side glance and showing off a smirk to Kageyama.

How odd, the setter thought. Though he didn't dwell on it for any much longer, opting to get his own share of the milk. However, when he stood in front of the machine, his heart lurched upon seeing the red light that indicated not available. Kageyama's eyes shoot wide open and he whipped his head towards the direction you went, sending a glare to your retreating back as he realized you took the last milk. Oh, he was furious and poor Hinata was on the receiving end of that sour mood for the rest of the day.

Since that unfateful encounter, Kageyama has been noticing your presence everywhere. And it was an understatement to say that he didn't find you annoying. He remembers how you went under his nose to grab that last box of milk and it still infuriates him.

Whenever you walk by in the hallways, he can't help but follow you with a pointed look on his face. To any outsider, Kageyama looked as if he was sending curses towards your way, at least that was what Hinata thought. But actually, the setter was trying to figure out who you were and why he hadn't seen you in the campus before that day. One day, his curiosity finally got the best of him and he asked Hinata about his concern.

"Huh? What do you mean you don't know Y/N," the orange-haired boy replied. Hinata gave his friend a puzzled look, and as if the cogs in his mind stopped turning, a teasing grin made it way to his face. "Ah, so that's why you've been looking at them like a madman recently. You're so dumb, Kageyama! How could you not recognize them, they're literally our class president."

Hinata was right. That time, Kageyama was dumbfounded when they returned to the classroom and saw you chatting with your friends in the corner. He was entranced by you and the way you were laughing at one of the jokes that he hit his hip in the sharp edge of the desk. He shrieked, causing you to turn your head towards him with worry cast over your face.

It didn't hurt that bad. He was massaging that spot on his hip when you silently stalked towards him. You stood by his side, placing a hand on his back and asking if he was okay. It took all of Kageyama's willpower not to lose his composure in front of you, but Hinata caught on his actions. In that moment, an idea popped up in Shoyo's mind.

"Hey, Pres," he put an arm around Kageyama's shoulders, wiggling his eyebrows at him. "Can I ask you a favor? Can you bring my friend here to the clinic and get his injury checked out? I'm sure it's only minor but we can't be too sure." Kageyama angrily nudged Hinata, a string of stupid, you idiot falling on his lips.

"Yeah, no problem. Come on, Kageyama, let's get you to the nurse."

He was immediately flustered. Kageyama swears his face has never felt that hot when you took his shoulders and wrapped them on your own, acting as his crutch as the two of you walked to the clinic.

Kageyama cleared his throat, his eyes looking at anywhere but you. "H-hey, I'm not completely paralyzed. I can walk on my own."

You laughed, "It's fine. You can rely on me sometimes, you know. Besides, I don't want our star player sitting out of the games." A moment of silence clouds over the two of you on the rest of the way, but just before entering the clinic, you say, "I know you love volleyball. You should enjoy it without any injury."

Kageyama thinks that maybe you were much more than a milk thief after all.

Hinata doesn't know what happened after he sent you and Kageyama to the clinic. But he has a slight idea about what changed when he sees that his teammate has been talking more to you at every chance that he gets, walking by your desk and starting up conversations when he can.

In mornings, he notices that Kageyama always has two packs of milk in hand. And when you enter the room, he sees how he lights up, a shy smile forming on his face as you wave a hand and walk to his desk. He couldn't believe his own eyes when he watches Kageyama give you the other milk and he comes to a conclusion that he bought it just for you.

In gym class, Hinata observes the way Kageyama is extra pumped up to be against you in the 100m dash activity. He sees the playful taunts he sends your way and how you gladly react to them and indulge Kageyama in his competitiveness. He honestly thinks Kageyama won't let you off the hook but he's shocked, when just a few centimeters away from the finish line, he fakes a trip and falls down on the ground. You pass him in high spirits, jumping up and down as you exclaim that you won against the King of the Court. And Hinata knows that the normal Kageyama would be pouting and pissed off at his loss.

But this wasn't a normal Kageyama. He figures that this was a Kageyama in love. 

The pair was assigned to set up the net and prepare the gym before practice started. They were in the storage room getting the equipment when Hinata started teasing Kageyama about his little crush.

"I don't know what you are talking about." The taller boy strongly denied all the accusations that Hinata was throwing at him. "Just shut up and help me here."

Hinata chuckled like an evil villain and continued to spew obvious facts. "You give them milk every morning. You unconsciously make them laugh with your not so funny jokes. You look out for them during gym class more than their friends does. You make time before practice to say goodbye before they go home."

"So, what is your point?"

His friend smirked, "Kageyama Tobio, you have a crush."

Kageyama stood frozen, his hands went limp by his sides at the sudden realization. He was aware that in his recent interactions with you, he'd sometimes feel sick, like he'd get nervous around you, his breathing becomes unstable and his palms get sweaty.  He has noticed it himself how the surroundings would turn brighter whenever you walked in the hallways or how his own heart would beat twice as fast whenever you were approaching him in his desk.

He didn't know what that feeling was called. He didn't want to give it a name. But Hinata just had to point it out. Frustrated that his friend called him out on his adoration for you, Kageyama stayed silent and started playfully punching Hinata. The poor boy was only saved when they heard footsteps come in, and Kageyama was quick to push Hinata away and avoid your gaze when you walked in.

Hinata was grumbling as he walked out of the scene, leaving you two some time to figure out your mutual feelings.

Kageyama immediately crouched down and hid his face on his hands, making you laugh at his awkwardness. He inquired in a muffled voice, "How much of that did you hear?"

You answered him truthfully, narrating the moment when you stopped to hide behind the doors was when you heard Hinata starting to tease him about his little crush. "I'm honestly flattered, Kageyama. Though I am also surprised that Hinata was watching us closely. Or should I be creeped out?"

He glanced up at you, standing from his position and going off on a tangent about how he also thought that Hinata was looking into things too much. He complained that instead of thinking about his love life, Hinata could've used that time to practice his spikes and jumps.

At this point, Kageyama was rambling and though you thought it was endearing, you needed him to pause and breathe. "Can you stop talking for literally ten seconds?" This seemed to work as he shut up and straightened his back, his eyes gazing straight into yours.

Kageyama realized, "Why are you here anyway?"

You smiled and brought out something from your pocket. "I wanted to give this to you." It was the banana milk that he loves. "I saw that it was the last one in the vending machine. I figured you'd want to have it. Have a drink before or after practice."

You thought it wasn't humanly possible to see eyes literally sparkling, but Kageyama was giving you proof of that as he excitedly took the drink from your hands. The corners of his mouth turned upward in a soft smile, and you thought that was the prettiest that he has ever been. He remembers the moment he first saw you and laughs, "You didn't have any problems before taking the last available milk for yourself."

It was your turn to get shocked, hiding a blush behind your palms. You also recall that incident, "Stop, I didn't do that on purpose. Was it my fault that they haven't restocked on that day?”

Kageyama scoffed, "Yeah, right." You pouted, crossing your ams on your chest as you looked away from him. "Thank you."

He has put the straw in the opening of the pack, taking a sip of the milk when you asked him for the second time. "So, you like me, huh?" Kageyama almost choked on his drink, and you laughed before patting his back to help him calm down. Some liquid were spilling from his lips and you were quick to wipe it with your hand. The action was enough to render Kageyama speechless, so he put some distance between the two of you.

You were taking some tissue from your bag to give to Kageyama when you also shared a confession of your own. "If it makes you feel any better, I like you too."

"I'm free this weekend. If you want to take me out a date, you know my number." He looked at you expectantly, the words yes, I'd love to go out with you resting on the tips of his tongue but he wasn't able to let it out. Because in a few seconds, you boldly took a step closer and pressed your lips to his cheek. His face felt warm and his heart was beating like crazy.

"I'll be expecting your call, Tobio."

In that moment, the feelings that he kept on a tightly closed lid were overflowing and it was the affirmation that he needed to know that he was already in too deep for you.