#and I planned to write an exploration of it today

[little-sleepy-owl]

𝐀𝐥𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫 𝐱 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫,

who is a virgin and wants him to be their first. gender neutral, not so much explicit, but still smutty, as usual. Alastor is his own warning. kinda.

this one took me a while for several reasons. mostly because life is a bitch, but also because it was a really hard piece to write. I'm asexual myself and this is heavily self-indulgent. I wanted to maintain this treat of his, but still explore the sexual aspect of the relationship and the way asexual people might participate in it. so... yeah. proceed with understanding of this.

oh? so, you're just like him.

the only one who is not surprised whatsoever. isn't it supposed to be that way?

though there are a lot of vulgar people around. he might even praise you for keeping your chastity for so long.

but… becoming your first?

“Truly, my dear? That's quite the favor to ask a gentleman!”

it's less about being repulsed by the idea of intimacy (it doesn't sound bad if it's with you) and more about not wanting to step into a completely uncharted territory.

that's a first for him too, after all.

give him time. he needs to research some things before he's ready to try.

a week or two later he suddenly appears out of the shadows in your room with loud static noises, scaring the shit out of you, and announces that he would be very pleased to take the offer!!

hooray..? (please come out from under the bed, darling.)

now, just like Husk, he is an old-fashioned man. for him, this could only happen after a nice date.

he prefers a simple stroll around the city arm in arm, and having some coffee with you.

you can sense that he's a tad nervous, but also deeply thrilled. his posture is a little stiff while walking, ears, usually unmoving, twitch slightly here and there. it's cute.

you also notice he's more physically intimate with you today than usual. sitting a bit closer to you and leaning in subtly, so you can feel his warmth. gently covering your hand with his own. reaching to fix your hair, touch feather-like and making your heart pound in your chest.

none of it is sexual in any way, but the difference in his demeanor doesn't let you forget your plans for the night even for a moment.

judging by the sly curve of his smile and very attentive gaze, this is one hundred percent intentional.

inclined to take you into his own room after the date. if you're not against the living forest in the background.

(I suggest you accept the offer. fireflies would be a very romantic addition to your night.)

he needs to talk things out first.

“Let's discuss some rules of our… little arrangement.”

the rules are quite simple, although you might find them odd.

he will not take all his clothes off. especially not the lower part. pants stay on no matter what.

his hands, his mouth? all for your pleasure, darling. no limitations here.

and maybe, if you behave yourself and ask nicely… his shadows, too, can participate.

he merrily refuses to elaborate on what “behaving” means for him exactly. it's simply more fun that way, isn't it?

jacket tossed inside, sleeves rolled up. honestly speaking, it already feels too revealing. you don't think you ever saw so much of his arms or his neck before.

he is in a white shirt today, clean and pure, like the snow on the mountaintop. pristine even.

you never saw this, either.

he follows your gaze and his smile turns a little unsettling. you shiver, suddenly feeling like you are the one who's exposed here, even though you haven't taken off anything yet.

“No blood to stain it today, my dear,” he coos, adjusting the shirt slightly. oh, so usually he wears red for–

you don't want to continue this thought right now.

he's very insistent on undressing you by himself.

he uncovers you like you're his birthday cake in a cute present box. slowly removing every ribbon, carefully taking off the wrapping, anticipating what's underneath.

his hands are cold, but his eyes are heated, even somewhat hungry. and so, so intent.

he drinks on your every shiver, on the way your lips parts ever so slightly to let out a small gasp, on the goosebumps that run on your skin, when he leans in to nibble on your pretty neck, right beside the quicked throbbing of your pulse.

he hums an old tune, seemingly lost in exploration of your body and the way you respond to his touch.

he's eager to learn and very observant. he changes the pace the moment he notices you feeling uncomfortable. he discovers what makes you respond well and uses the knowledge without any shame.

but he also does very much love you telling him what you want him to do with that cute trembling voice of yours.

that's what eventually earns you the shadows taking part in the whole fun. if this is something you desire.

if you weren't satisfied before, you most certainly are now.

expect him to restrain you. he likes to see you squirming under his touch, unable to set the pace. he does everything deliberately slow, so you would beg him to give you more and do it faster.

he's very controlling in general, and although he takes into account what you want, he will also act on his own whim.

it honestly seems that he likes teasing and tormenting you to see your reactions much more than the physical aspect of it all.

humor him, and he will reward you accordingly.

but don't let him get too lost in it. he has a tendency to forget that you're not merely a toy to play with.

set some boundaries and you'll be alright.

once you both decide it's enough, he's a thoughtful gentleman again, bringing a glass of water for you, and helping you clean yourself up.

will let you rest your head on his lap, gentle light of fireflies surrounding you.

he sings a shooting melody, letting you peacefully drift off to sleep.

[llyfrenfys]

In which I try not to be That Guy TM when it comes to Irish ancestors: An exploration of ancestry, diaspora and culture

Because of The Horrors TM in my life atm I've been looking into my biological family tree. I'm adopted but estranged from my adoptive family and I never met my biological family since I was adopted just short of my 2nd birthday. I've been tracing my ancestry for about 3 years now and it's genuinely quite stress relieving to me. It's also fun and challenging from a research standpoint - putting together my own family tree gave me the skills to write articles like this one I wrote in 2022 about historical Welsh queer people, for example.

Lately, I've been finding out more about my Irish ancestors while an adoptee (and thus not knowing any of my biological family) - but also doing this as a Celticist and tired of people doing the 'my sister's friend's cousin's father's mother was Irish' thing. This has created an almost unbearable tension between curiosity at my own ancestry while trying not to be That Guy who finds out about one (1) Irish ancestor hundreds of years ago and is weird about it.

Especially since mine are quite distant ancestors - my great, great, great grandparents were born in Dublin and in a tiny village in County Down called Dunnaman (near Kilkeel). However, they were Irish Catholics and emigrated to Liverpool in the 1870s - all of their subsequent children and grandchildren were born in Liverpool and all of the above + great grandchildren were raised Catholic - including my grandmother (who died before I was born). So there was an obvious attempt to maintain that heritage. There's even evidence my great, great, great grandmother at least spoke Irish (which, as she was born in County Down, would have been Ulster Irish).

The problems with uncritically throwing oneself at an ancestor's nationality:

Now, not all North Americans of Irish (or Welsh, Scottish, Italian, Scandinavian, German etc.) descent do this - but there's a very vocal set of North Americans of Irish descent who find awe and interest in their ancestry - which is actually quite a positive thing! - however, due to either temporal or cultural disconnect, they may end up doing or saying things (and not necessarily with bad intentions) which can have a negative impact on the Irish and the Irish language (or [nationality] and [language(s) associated with that nationality].

I'm reminded of the time an American commented on a Welsh language rights post I made in support of Welsh speakers, but they accidentally ended up using a white nationalist slogan by mistake. It can be a minefield - and with regards to Ireland specifically, mistakes like that can be so much worse. To literally give my own (mild) example, today I decided to relearn Irish (since I haven't spoken any in years since being taught basics at undergrad) and picked up a blank notebook I bought at Tesco the other week, while completely forgetting the inside cover of the notebook was orange. I was planning on decorating the notebook anyway and painted it a different colour. While I know that nobody would really hold it against me if I didn't change the colour, I just know that walking around with an orange notebook filled with Irish I'm relearning because of interest in my Catholic ancestors could be a confusing set of messages, at the very least. If you don't understand why this is, look up the meanings of the colours on the flag of Ireland.

Which is to say, even those of us in Northern Europe who have significantly greater physical proximity to Ireland than North America (and therefore should know better) still can and do get things wrong. And not just benignly wrong like in my case.

The tendency for some North Americans of Irish descent (Canada isn't exempt from this) to conflate Irish ancestry with a contemporary connection to the modern countries located on the island of Ireland as a whole can have results ranging from 'a bit weird' to 'jesus fucking christ'. As a Celticist, I've seen far, far too many Americans of Irish descent try to weigh in on modern Irish politics without any background knowledge or tact at all - and naturally they stake their claim on modern Irish politics entirely on the premise of having distant Irish ancestors. Or, even worse, things start to get all phrenological.

'Irish blood' and the nonexistence thereof:

'Irish blood' is continually evoked by some to validate their sense of 'Irishness' and the obsession with '[insert nationality] blood' is a distinctly North American phenomenon- likely related to or an offshoot of the concept of 'blood quantum', in which enrolment into some Native American nations and tribes is determined by how much 'Native blood' a person has. Notably, many people who would ostensibly have been described under this system as 'full blood' were registered by the US as 'half blood'. This is a method of genocide intended to wipe out tribes and nations by imposing strict measures of who does or does not qualify to enrol into a tribe or nation. This concept seems to have been extrapolated over time (in a North American context at least) into the idea of descent from other nationalities' being measured in a similar or adjacent way. This is how you end up with some North Americans declaring they are '1/8 Italian and 1/4 Irish' on their dad's side etc. While in Europe (where these nationalities hail from, crucially) this practice is seen as a really weird way to describe your ancestry. In general, it's simply 'my 4 times grandfather came from Spain' or 'my great great grandfather on my dad's side came from Finland' etc. if it comes up at all. For various political reasons, many Europeans with descent from multiple other European nationalities may choose to omit to mention descent from certain nationalities, especially if in recent history there has been conflict between their birth nation and an ancestor's nation. The most famous example of this is literally the British royal family changing their surname from the German Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the more 'British sounding' Windsor in 1917 due to the onset of the First World War.

Where it gets really weird (and also very offensive and rude) is when cultural stereotypes get invoked alongside the whole 'blood' thing in usually quite damaging and/or disparaging ways. I've seen way too many North Americans of Irish descent claim they're alcoholics because they have 'Irish blood' or even worse, claim it's normal to domestically abuse their spouses because of it!! (Genuine thing I have seen btw). Same goes for claiming to be a naturally good chef because of 'Italian blood' and so on. As a general rule, people from the place where your ancestors were from don't generally like to be inherently be considered drunks or prone to violence due to their nationality. Or have weird and inaccurate idealisms projected onto their language or cuisine.

Aren't there any positives?

It wouldn't be fair to make a post like this without mentioning some of the positives that can come from interest in an Irish ancestor. Like I mentioned at the start of this post, I myself felt inspired to relearn Irish because of my own Irish ancestors. I was taught the Connacht dialect at undergrad, however, since my ancestor was from County Down, I'm going to try and learn Ulster Irish instead. One doesn't need Irish ancestors to learn Irish of course - when I learned I wasn't aware I had any Irish ancestors. But being inspired to learn Irish because of an ancestor can't hurt and directly increases the number of Irish speakers in the world (provided you keep at it). This is a net positive for the language as a whole.

Similarly, people who have educated themselves on Irish politics because of their ancestry and genuinely learned something are also a positive thing to come out of discovering Irish ancestors. In my experience, these people are the kind of people I enjoy talking to about being a Celticist because they actively want to learn and respect the cultures being talked about. Which is huge to me!

Conclusion:

As a Welsh speaker whose national identity is more-or-less Jan Morris-esque, my Irish ancestry is an interesting facet of my ancestry I simply didn't know about before. And being an adopted person, I can sympathise with the general sentiment of a lot of white North Americans of feeling disconnected or alienated from any ancestral heritage. The conditions which create That Guy TM as described above rely on that sense of alienation to propagate a very ineffective, tactless and often very insensitive approach to Irish and other European cultures. But the important thing is that that approach can be challenged by people genuinely interested in their ancestry who are also conscientious of the living versions of the cultures their ancestors hailed from.

For me, that means learning Irish in a dialect my ancestors are likely to have spoken. I also visited the library today to check out some books on the Irish emigration to England and the sociopolitical reasons behind that emigration. I know the broad strokes, but the details are desirable to know to get a better idea of the why and how the country of my birth had a hand in creating the conditions which led my ancestors to emigrate in the first place. I think the world would be a better place if people took the time to understand the history and politics of ancestors which don't share their nationality.

As always, reblogs and thoughts are welcomed and encouraged!

Thank you for reading to the end - and if you'd like to support me, please see my pinned post. Diolch!

[becca-e-barnes]

Bucky pinning you down so you can’t squirm and he’s just sitting inside you while he tortures your clit feeling you clench around him. He makes you cum over and over until he finally cums.

Overstimulation + super soldier stamina = …

- 🍯

Dear God, I know I just don't have it in me to behave during cock-warming. When it comes down to it, I genuinely have no patience at all 😵‍💫

"You..." Bucky begins, pressing you down onto the bed before gripping your ankles and forcing you to flip over onto your front. "Have a problem with control."

With your face turned away from him, you can't help but smile to yourself. No one has ever said it out loud but you know he's right.

Being in control is where you're most comfortable. No hands are safer than your own. Except maybe his. You know he won't fuck this up.

"And you..." He continues, gathering your wrists behind your back, holding them tightly with one hand. "Need to learn how it feels to have control taken from you. Do you understand?"

As soon as you begin to nod your head, you feel him start to tape around your wrists, holding them together behind your back. Once he's content they're secure, he sits on the edge of the bed, facing the mirror before he pulls you onto his lap.

"Legs spread over the top of mine." He orders and you do as you're told, not because you have to but because you want to.

You notice the way your cunt is already glistening in the mirror and you're almost embarrassed because he hasn't even touched you yet.

"Fuck, you're made for this." He groans, lining his cock up to your slick entrance and you wonder if he's holding his breath too while he slides into you, as deep as your bodies will allow.

You're obsessed with the sight in front of you; your own naked body, with your legs spread so far apart you can see how your cunt is stuffed full of him.

Being shorter though, your feet can't touch the ground like this. There's no way you'll get enough leverage to fuck yourself on him but as soon as you start to tell him that, he silences you with two thick fingers between your lips.

"I'm not letting you fuck me." His free hand roams over your body, squeezing your breasts, pinching your nipples and then settling between your spread thighs.

"I'm going to play with you. I'm going to see how much you can take. I'm going to work out exactly how you like your clit stroked and I'm going to do that until your legs are shaking and your body won't let you cum any more. Maybe then I'll fuck you but sweetheart, that will be hours from now." His breath is hot against the side of your face, his fingers slipping from your mouth to your waist while he starts to flick gently against your clit.

"I'm going to start slowly. I'm going to do everything I can to drag this out as long as possible. I can feel every clench and flutter of this pretty little cunt and I'm going to enjoy it until you're dripping over my balls." At this rate, it won't be long until you're dripping onto the carpet, never mind over him. You dreamed he'd want to take control like this but you never imagined the way your body would respond.

"And then, when you've cum more times than you can handle, I'm going to tell you that I love you while I fuck you like I don't."

Update: Part 2

[violetsareblue-selfships]

good morning!! <3

[fortune-maiden]

I have done it! I have written ficlets for all 30 days of Sicktember! (only posted 7 of them but I wrote all 30! :D)

Over the course of the month, I've written:

25,343 words (8053 words in posted fic)

23 Complete ficlets

Ficlets in12 fandoms

Longest fic was Day 2's Four Hours at 1850 words

Shortest fic was at 508 words, tied between Days 12 & 27 (neither posted)

[llondonfog]

[dangaer]

ngl i definitely want the confidence to always be able to send people at least 2 memes from ask prompts in 2023.

[strangerays]

....thinking i might want to add Lonan’s perspective into my book for 1-3 chapters....

Lonan is living in the city while he’s away at college, and as Ray’s problems ensue at home in Point Blink, he faces plenty of his own challenges to become accustomed to city life. These include facing up to the past and meeting his new roommate:

Growing up, my father always fell asleep with the television on. Beer bottles and crumpled chip bags lay attacked on the coffee table and even the floor as bad comedians said their final lines and wildebeests were killed in nature documentaries. Mom never cleaned the house or made breakfast – she was careful not to make noise when she got dressed for her job – so Dad didn’t feel rushed to wake up for anything. His eyes were red when he peered at me in the morning, just standing at the edge of the fold-out couch.

Vick was completely the opposite of this: he rose before his alarm and went shopping so I could cook, washed all our laundry together, and left his bedroom door open even though I always kept mine shut.

“What’ve you got to hide in there?” he’d asked me at the end of our first week living together.

Nose buried in my sketchbook, I merely shrugged and scratched his tabby named Bagel around her ears. “You’ve lived here for a year all alone. Do you really want to show a stranger all your stuff?”

“Ouch. You’re not really a stranger anymore since we’re living together now. And by the way, I have nothing to hide.”

“Why do you need to know what’s in my room?”

Vick made a face. “I don’t need to know. I thought it might be cool to hang out together sometime. If you want.”

The cat made a low grumble, and jumped off the couch.  I rose both my eyebrows at Vick. “When?”

Vick patted his stomach and laughed. The tattoos – oranges and yellows and blues – on his forearm flexed. “Do you need a formal invitation to hang out with your roommate?”

I shrugged.

“Well, Lonan Herrings, you are formally invited to my bedroom.”

....maybe this will be a good idea or a bad idea - who knows! I think it’s relevant to the story and actually helps explain some plot whilst taking a break from the same old stuff. anyways, I’m having lots of fun with it :)

I really just love Lonan, okay ‘-’

[aria0fgold]

Freed from hsr trailblaze quest finally and just whooooaaaa... Can Shaoji keep writing for other worlds too please? He's so good with it.

[blacktabbygames]

Slay the Princess Concept Art

We shared a bunch of concept art on Twitter today. Sharing it here, too, where you can find it all in one post. Post contains spoilers, so proceed with caution (or just play the game already if you haven't 😉)

Going to start with the first piece of concept art Abby drew for the game.

In the earliest stages of development, we toyed around with the concept of there being multiple "end game" forms of the Princess.

The initial outline, rather than being tied together by an overarching metanarrative, structured a full playthrough as a 5-6 chapter long, self-contained journey down a single route, determined by your decisions in chapter 1. Here's an alternative late-game form:

The idea of deviating end-game forms didn't lost for very long, though. As we explored the game's themes more deeply, it made the most sense for there to be a singular "true" form.

If your reality is shaped by subjectivity and perception, then the "truth" has to be what's left when that subjectivity is swept away. the Shifting Mound's final design feels like that initial truth for the Princess, though there's also another truth if you push back against her and press on into the final cabin.

We really liked this "void" design, and I played around with the idea of it being an intermediary to the final form. The "void" Princess would be what you saw upon encountering the final Princess without understanding your own truth, but once you had that understanding, you would see her as the Shifting Mound, as depicted in the game.

That gave way to the intermediary design of the SM being a sea of disembodied limbs, and we also took parts of both designs and incorporated them into the protagonist (particularly the wings.) You can see the eyes and feathers for this void form in the ending card of the original trailer below:

You can see extremely early concept art for the spectre (top), nightmare (top-right), stranger (left), beast (bottom) and ??? (right) as well!

The eyes became a motif in the Nightmare route (Paranoid's manifestation of the fear of being watched), but I also like to think of them as a part of The Long Quiet's truth. You are space and emptiness, but you're also that which observes those things, and it's your perceptions that give the Shifting Mound shape.

Anyways, on the note of the original original concepts for the game, the Princess was initially going to remain human for several loops before taking on more monstrous forms. Some concepts of that are below. Had to get Abby to tone down some of the more horrifically cartoonish designs because they creeped me out and I didn't want to romance them in a video game.

We had to hold our cards close to our chest in the non-metanarrative early drafts, which is part of why, even in the first demo, the cabin doesn't really change much in chapter 2. More room to subtly play with the concept of transformation over time.

There were a lot of reasons we moved in a different direction for the full release. The branching was unmanageably large to write, and the game felt like a slog to write.

Using an overarching narrative as a framing mechanism in the final version gave us a lot more freedom to explore wildly divergent ideas within routes while still driving the player towards the originally planned finale.

Anyways, now we've got some concept art for individual princesses. There's a lot more than this lying around somewhere, but it's all in sketchbooks, and we'll probably wait until we make an art book to show it off.

First is the tower, who really didn't change much at all. (She got a little thicker, I guess. All of the Princesses did)

Not a lot to say about her, other than the fact that we knew we wanted a set piece where she gets so big that the trees and cabin orbit around her.

The stranger went through many many redesigns over the course of development. Here, she was a "princess skin" filled with a hive of sentient bugs. The script wasn't working for me, though, so instead she became a peak behind the curtains without the necessary context to know her.

A lot of people ask how these earlier drafts of the Stranger route would have played out, and the answer is I can't tell you, because I couldn't figure out something worth writing.

The writing process for individual routes didn't really start with outlines or plot beats. Rather, the routes started from a theme and a relationship dynamic, and I organically found their outcomes by exploring actions within those themes, and then seeing if those passed Abby's editor brain.

Neither of us found actions we wanted to explore with those versions of the Stranger, at least actions that weren't a beat-by-beat retelling of chapter 1, which contained way too much variation to put on a single chapter 2 route.

If each princess examines a relationship formed by perception and first impressions, the Stranger examines one that's fundamentally unknowable. One where you've seen too much, too quickly.

An insect hive-mind pretending to be a person seemed like a good starting point, but it was too difficult to write any interactions that didn't immediately feel knowable, if still strange. So the final version of the Stranger was designed in such a way where her unknowability makes interacting with her on a human level fundamentally impossible, and you don't get to have a real conversation with her unless you satisfy extremely specific criteria.

Anyways next up is the razor's final form. We decided she needed more swords.

Hearts became an accidental motif very quickly in the development process, too. (The fact that it is only strikes to the heart that fell her in the demo was accidental, but it felt poetic so we extended it to the rest of the game.)

So on top of adding more swords, we made her heart visible. This is something we did with the fury as well, as a way of showing their emotional (and physical) vulnerability.

Here's an early version of the Adversary and what would eventually become the Eye of the Needle, back when she was still called the Fury. Originally her hair was going to be fire (as seen on the right), but it didn't feel right in its execution.

She's hit the gym since this concept art. Good for her :)

And we're going to end with the Beast, who at this point was called the Adversary. I think this was before the Witch was added? The Beast was originally designed to be a Questing Beast who lurked in the shadows, where you'd only see glimpses of her, and where each glimpse would make her appear to be a different animal. This was too difficult to execute, though we gave her a more chimera-like appearance in the final game.

This design was from when we still has the Voice of the Obsessed, and the route was going to be a more feral mirror of what eventually became the Adversary, but it felt too thematically similar while being less interesting, so we moved in the direction of making the Beast about consumption as a form of love.

Anyways, that's all we've got for you right now. Hope this was fun!

[2soulscollide]

free resources to write a novel in 2024

hello hello! it's me, rach!

as the new year approaches, many of us set goals and resolutions - myself included. one of my goals for 2024 is to write a novel (I've been procrastinating on this for quite a long time now). i assume that some of you might have the same goal, that's why I'm writing this post today.

over 2023 i've been releasing some freebies for authors just like me, so I thought I could compile my favorites in this post. hope you find this useful :)

1) the writer's workbook

this workbook has over 60 exercises to help you develop characters, scenarios, etc. if you're ever stuck, I'm pretty sure this workbook will be your best friend.

2) author's corner (notion template)

this is the most downloaded freebie in my shop! it is a notion dashboard with everything you need to organize your writing and has some templates included (like scrivener)!!

3) another notion template

this one has two themes you can choose from: cottage-core and dark academia. they're very similar to the previous template, but this one is more recent and I added some new features. feel free to explore both and pick the one you like the most.

4) the author's journal

this is a cute printable with 20 pages that will help you stay on track and manage your social media accounts as a writer who shares their work online. you can also register what you're currently writing and your personal research and resources.

5) plan your book printable

this is a 6-page printable for you to fill out and plan your book easily and effectively.

6) excel sheet to organize tasks & word-count

this is a simple excel sheet, but it is very effective for keeping track of your tasks & word-count of your novels. also, it is 100% customizable to your liking!

that's all for now! feel free to explore my gumroad shop where I have plenty of freebies to grab! also, don't forget to subscribe so that you never miss any opportunity to get a goodie for free :)

hope this post was useful!

have a nice day,

rach

[rhiannswork]

hii i was wondering if u could write something about a pool party that morgan throws, so ofc bau!reader and the rest of the team goes. spencer gets in the pool and everybody is speechless when they notice the scratches on his back. unbeknown to your involvement.

the water’s fine.

spencer ᕁ bau!reader

warnings: allusions to sex, suggestive if you squint with a monocle, smart reid (i did some research for that btw lolol), private relationships, hmm i think that’s it!

"hey, yln made it after all!" morgan exclaimed while relaxing by the pool, drink in hand. "sorry, guys. i had a bit of trouble finding a good bathing suit," you explained, not entirely truthful about the reason for your tardiness. in reality, you and spencer got sidetracked once you found the perfect suit, causing both of you to arrive late. yet somehow, spencer managed to beat you to morgan’s location.

as morgan gestured towards spencer, he reassured, "don’t worry, pretty boy just arrived." emily found it amusing, asking "who reads at a pool party?" while opening her soda can. "spencer reid does," jj responded as she sat beside the pool with her feet dangling in the water, earning a laugh from penelope who was sunbathing on a unicorn float.

"hey derek, do you have any more of those floats? i think i’m going to get in the pool." you placed your bag by the patio table and started to apply some sunblock. "sure thing, i’ll go inflate it." "thank you!" you shouted as he walked away from the group.

as you applied the rest of your sunblock, you couldn't help but notice the chatter of your colleagues. you walked over to spencer, who was deep into reading his book. "hey handsome," you whispered, making sure only he could hear you. spencer raised his head, squinting as he blocked the sun with his hand. "hi baby," he replied with the same volume. "are you planning to get in the pool, or will you stay here and read?" you giggled. "i’m going to finish this book," he said with a shrug. "suit yourself!" you walked off.

soon after, morgan returned holding a heart-shaped floatie which he handed to you before returning to his chair. you threw the floatie into the pool and gradually got in after it. descending the pool steps, you winced as the cold water rushed over your body. "why is it always freezing when you first get in the pool?" you complained as you reached for the heart-shaped floatie.

“the cold going into the pool is actually a result of conduction of heat. see, water is a much better conductor of heat rather than air. energy can flow from your body quicker than it would if you were surrounded by air at the same temperature. even if the water is much warmer than the air, you would still feel cool getting in.” spencer answered your rhetorical question.

"let’s not ask reid any science questions today," penelope giggled as she took a sip of her soda can. "my apologies," he chuckled, refocusing on the final chapter of his book. you shook your head and repositioned yourself in the float, finally finding a comfortable spot.

"spencer, come join us in the pool, the water is great!" jj exclaimed, eyeing the artificial waterfall nearby. "but I'm not finished with my book," spencer whined. "if he doesn't want to swim, that's okay," you shrugged as you started to float around in the pool.

he’s knows you, he’s caught on to what he calls the ‘yn trend’. when you say “that’s okay, it’s fine” he knows what you really mean. he huffed and placed his book down and walked over to the pool.

"i knew you would," you teased as you made your way to the edge of the pool. spencer removed his shirt and you couldn't help but keep your eyes on his body. "wow, spence! you’ve got the body and the brains," penelope commented, lifting her sunglasses for a better look.

"i’ll only be here for a few minutes," he muttered before diving into the pool. the sudden rush of coldness left him shivering, but he quickly adjusted and began to swim around. as he explored the refreshing waters, he found himself falling in love with the pool.

"spence what’s going on with your back?" jj tilted her head. spencer turned to face jj and emily, who had come over. emily commented, "it’s so red." spencer lifted up slightly and morgan asked, "pretty boy, are you allergic to chlorine? you should've told me earlier." "i’m not allergic! i don't know what you guys are talking about." he raised his voice, combing his wet hair back.

you hadn’t been paying much attention to the conversation that had erupted about spencer’s back. you looked over to see penelope inspecting him. “it looks like scratches… reid are you seeing someone?”

you could tell that spencer was caught off guard by penelope’s question. he stuttered a bit before responding, "uh, no, i’m not seeing anyone." penelope didn't seem convinced. “okay i know i’m not a profiler like you guys but this doesn’t just happen.” she traced the scratches with the pad of her finger.

you watched spencer becoming slightly uncomfortable with the questions of his dating status. “spencer, let’s go see if it really is scratches from fingernails.” you slipped off the plastic float and went to grab a towel to wrap around your body. spencer followed you into morgan’s home and slid the patio door to limit the cool air from coming in.

“jesus, did i really do that?” you spun spencer around to look at his back. “you did.” he chuckled throwing his head down. “‘m sorry…” you felt a little guilty, you didn’t mean for him to become a target of interrogation.

“don’t worry about it… i like it when i make you feel good.” he smiled with his hand on your face, his thumb slightly grazing your face. “yeah?” you slightly smiled. “mhm.” you reached for his lips until you heard the door open.

“and now we know who the culprit is.” morgan laughed with a empty glass of piña colada of his hand.

[iwanthermidnightz]

When I was 24 I sat in a backstage dressing room in London, buzzing with anticipation. My backup singers and bandmates gathered around me in a scattered circle.Scissors emerged and I watched in the mirror as my locks of long curly hair fell in piles on the floor. There I was in my plaid button down shirt, grinning sheepishly as my tour mates and friends cheered on my haircut. This simple thing that everyone does. But I had a secret. For me. It was more than a change of hairstyle. When I was 24. I decided to completely reinvent myself.

How does a person reinvent herself, you ask? In any way I could think of. Musically, geographically, aesthetically, behaviorally, motivationally. And I did so joyfully. The curiosity I had felt the first murmurs of while making red had amplified into a pulsing heartbeat of restlessness in my bars. The risks I took when I toyed with pop sounds and sensibilities on red? I wanted to push it further. The sense of freedom I felt when traveling to big bustling cities? I wanted to live in one. The voices that had begun to shame me in new ways for dating like a normal young woman? I wanted to silence them.

You see, in the years preceding this, I had become the target of slut shaming, the intensity and relentlessness of which would be criticized and called out if it happened today. The jokes about my amount of boyfriends. The trivialization of my songwriting as if it were a predatory act of a boy crazy psychopath. The media co-signing of this narrative. I had to make it stop because it was starting to really hurt.

It became clear to me that for me there was no such thing as casual dating, or even having a male friend who you platonically hang out with. If I was seen with him, it was assumed I was sleeping with him. And so I swore off hanging out with guys, dating, flirting, or anything that could be weaponized against me by a culture that claimed to believe in liberating women but consistently treated me with the harsh moral codes of the Victorian era.

Being a consummate optimist, I assumed I could fix this if I simply changed my behavior. I swore off dating and decided to focus only on myself, my music, my growth. And my female friendships. If I only hung out with my female friends, people couldn't sensationalize or sexualize that, right? I would learn later on that people could and people would.

But none of that mattered then because I had a plan and I had a demeanor as trusting as a basket of golden retriever puppies. I had the keys to my own apartment in New York and I had new melodies bursting from my imagination. I had Max Martin and Shellback who were happy to help me explore this new sonic landscape I was enamored with. I had a new friend named Jack Antonoff who had made some cool tracks in his apartment. I had the idea that the album would be called 1989. And we would reference big 80's synths and write sky high choruses. I had sublime, inexplicable faith and I ran right toward it, in high heels and a crop top.

There was so much that I didn't know then, and looking back I see what a good thing that was. This time of my life was marked by right kind of naïveté, a hunger for adventure. And a sense of freedom I hadn't tasted before. It turns out that the cocktail of naïveté, hunger for adventure and freedom can lead to some nasty hangovers, metaphorically speaking. Of course everyone had something to say. But they always will. I learned lessons, paid prices, and tried to… don't say it don't say it. I'm sorry, I have to say it. Shake it off.

I’ll always be so incredibly grateful for how you loved and embraced this album. You, who followed my zig zag creative choices and cheered on my risks and experiments. You, who heard the wink and humor in "blank space" and maybe even empathized with the pain behind the satire. You, who saw the seeds of allyship and advocating for equality in "Welcome to New York". You, who knew that maybe a girl who surrounds herself with female friends in adulthood is making up for a lack of them in childhood (not starting a tyrannical hot girl cult). You, who saw that I reinvent myself for a million reasons, and that one of them is to try my very best to entertain you. You, who have had the grace to allow me the freedom to change.

I was born in 1989. Reinvented for the first time in 2014, and a part of me was reclaimed in 2023 with the re-release of this album I love so dearly.

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine the magic you would sprinkle on my life for so long. This moment is a reflection of the woods we've wandered through and all this love between us still glowing in the darkest dark.

I present to you, with gratitude and wild wonder, my version of 1989.

It’s been waiting for you.

[violetsareblue-selfships]

good morning!! <3

[hotgirlssupportlando]

one day x lando norris

pairing: lando norris x fem!reader summary of series: a series following one day of every summer from 2016 onwards in y/n’s and landos lives, exploring their friendship and love for one another. of course some angst and fights along the way in this rollercoaster of emotions. a friends to lovers, growing up together kind of thing. summary of this part: the start of y/n and landos friendship/crush. y/n is bored at the eurocup where a stranger (lando) is suggesting a betting game to make her interested in the sport (and him). wc: 1,2k notes: im too obsessed with one day atm so just had to write a story inspired by it!! it’s very modified tho, and i haven’t decided yet if it will have the same ending, don’t know if i can handle that haha! also pls ignore the charles pic, couldn't find a better atm. hmu if you have any requests for any of the years x part two here

summer of 2016

Red Bull Ring, Austria

”please y/n, you’re 16 years old, can’t you go elsewhere and entertain yourself, you’re getting a bit annoying now” y/n’s dad told her whilst he was trying to fix the broken car.

”ugh, sure i’ll go for a walk then” y/n sighed and went to go for a walk around the paddock hoping to see something more interesting than broken cars. her friends were jealous that y/n could tag along her father around europe all summer watching the eurocup formula renault 2.0, but she wasn’t very impressed. despite having a father working as a mechanic and utterly interested in motorsport she hadn’t inherited any interested in the sport what so ever. but at least she could escape england and the rain for some time so it felt like a win although she sometimes felt like dying from boredom. 

y/n walked around the paddock and decided to facetime her friend y/f/n.

”please come and save me, austria is so fucking boring and where the hell are all the cute guys i was waiting for??” y/n proclaimed. 

”omg y/n stop it, you’re always nagging about everything, you should be happy!! nothing happens here either so might as well be in another country doing the same” y/f/n said as y/n entered a tent where they served drinks and snacks. while she was ordering she noticed a curly haired boy shaking his head whilst smiling her way but she just continued her conversation with y/f/n. after enough discussion about the lack of interest y/n had for the sport and talking about y/f/n new crush y/n ended the call, sat down and opened her pepsi in front of her. it took about five milliseconds before the curly haired boy reappeared, this time in the seat in front of her. 

”hi” the boy squealed. 

”…hi?” y/n said questioning what he wanted, she weren’t exactly in the bestest of moods so to say. 

”i heard you hated the eurocup and that you think every guy is ugly here, so here i am to prove you otherwise” he said grinning. y/n chuckled at the way the boy seemed to have no time to waste in proving her wrong. 

”and how are you supposed to do that? do you have a masterplan?” y/n asked looking amused.

”glad you asked! well first of all here i am so now you’ve at least seen one cute boy around the paddock so there’s one problem solved an-” the boy was interrupted with y/n’s laugh. she couldn’t help herself from laughing but tried to gesticulate with her hand that he could continue. 

with a smile he proceeded to tell the girl about a betting game that could make her interested in watching the races. y/n was immediately down for the idea because honestly she could’ve done anything at this moment to have some fun. they had to come up with one condition each for the bet and agreed on saying them at the same time so no-one could back out. the curly haired boy betted that he would stand on the podium on today’s race and y/n betted that he wouldn’t, easy as that. now to the conditions. the boy apparently had his condition already planned out so y/n panicked trying to come up with one quickly too. she looked around her and went with the first random idea she got. 

”okay so we’ll say them on three?” y/n asked getting a nod for an answer.

”one.. two.. three” 

”you’ll buy me-” y/n started before getting interrupted.

”you’ll give me a kiss” the boy said with a cheeky smile. 

”…a pepsi. WHOA! you’re wasting no time mister” y/n laughed out after finding out the big differences in the conditions given. she was followed by a laughter from the boy too who was unsurprisingly very pleased with the bet. y/n wasn’t disappointed either, the boy was indeed quite cute for being a driver but she couldn’t let him know that. imagine the hubris he would get then, in comparison what he already had. 

the pair shook hands and locked in the bet. they decided to meet up after the race either at the podium or at his team, depending on how the race went. y/n was excited and almost felt a little butterfly in her stomach getting loose. 

”see you later then…” the boy hesitated realizing he hadn’t asked her name.

”y/n l/n, and yours was?” she asked.

”lando norris, but there’s no need to remember that, you will see the name on the top of the podium later” he chuckled walking away to his team. 

y/n could only smile and shake her head while walking away too. 

—

”and lando norris takes his fourth victory in this seasons eurocup!!” the presenter shouts excitingly. 

y/n was smiling so big her dad had to check up on her, how she immediately had watched a whole race after watching exactly zero of them up until now this summer. y/n had no time to explain to him what was going on and started to run along the paddock until she reached the podium. she was so excited and nervous that she was about to burst, it was hard to believe that she was developing some kind of a crush to this random driver. 

because she had little to none sense of direction the celebration at the podium was already done and dusted when she reached it. a bit disappointed and confused she looked around to see if she could see lando somewhere. there was surprisingly many people running around here.

”looking for someone?” a familiar voice said and y/n turned around. there he was, a happy lando holding a trophy in one hand and a bouquet of flowers in the other. she smiled and congratulated him partly for the victory and partly because he somehow got her interest in the sport for once. 

”i know it’s not nearly as good as a pepsi but you can have my flowers as a consolation prize” he said handing them to her. she took the flowers and admired them with a smile feeling her butterflies about to let loose. she collected some courage and looked up at his eyes before quickly looking at his lips and crashing onto them. the kiss took lando a bit with surprise but he was quick to answer it. with the hand not holding the trophy lando gently grabbed the back of y/n’s head, slowly deepening the kiss. the butterflies were officially out and about in y/n’s stomach. she tried so hard to hide the excitement but at the end she couldn’t resist smiling and therefore accidentally ending the kiss. slowly they pulled away from each other, leaving them both with blushing smiles on their lips. they looked at each other in silence for a moment before abruptly getting interrupted.

”lando! we’re taking pictures! come here now!” a member of his team shouted.

”well i guess i have to go then.. hope i’ll see you around” lando shyly told the girl.

”i hope so too” y/n stated not knowing the rollercoaster of joys and troubles they’d share in the future as friends and lovers. 

—

notes: feel free to give feedback and requests for future parts! x

[cloudcountry]

1.5K FOLLOWER CELEBRATION

SUMMARY: The Octatrio takes you to the ocean, where you explore a shipwreck with them!!

WARNINGS: Jade & Floyd being slightly threatening? They imply that they'll drown you lol sillies.

COMMENTS: i had this in the works for like a week and i really like how it turned out!! (i'm especially fond of the floyd parts hehe) THERES ALSO SOME DEUCE CONTENT BC I COULDNT HELP MYSELF but thats only in the beginning wahhwawah ANYWAYS i hope ygys like this one!!!!!!!! im excited to hear what you all think!!!!!!!!

You slowly unfasten your arms from around Deuce’s waist as the blastcycle skids to a stop. Vehicles in Twisted Wonderland are still incredibly hard to get used to, even though you’ve been here for longer than you want to think about.

“Thanks for the ride.” you lean back, swinging your legs over the side with a smile, “I appreciate it.”

“Ah…no problem.” Deuce replies, eyes darting from the seemingly empty shoreline to you, “Just…if anything happens, call me. Okay?”

You sigh, touched by his concern. Lifting your hand, you extend your pinkie to him. He wraps his pinkie around yours, and when you whisper that you promise, he nods and lets you go.

“Thank you,” Deuce whispers.

It’s nice having people who want to protect you.

He drives off and you wave, even though his back is turned to you and it wouldn’t be safe for him to wave back. Once the roaring engine has faded completely, you turn your attention to the beach. There’s a set of wooden stairs leading down to the bay, and you take them down. The sand feels warm and inviting, and you kick your shoes off without a second thought. It’s odd, your three companions should be here by now, but you don’t question it too much. Those three do what they want when they want to, and there’s no telling what they decided to do today.

You spend a few minutes swiping at the sand, collecting a small pile of pretty shells. It’s a modest collection, nothing to write home about, but the childish act alone fills you with a glee you haven’t felt in quite a long time.

Perhaps Azul was right. A trip to the sea really might be all you need.

“Hello, angelfish.” a familiar voice croons from behind you.

You turn and barely manage to contain your surprise when you see Azul in casual shorts and a shirt. Although it’s plenty warm outside, the mental image you have of him always wears a suit. It’s a nice change.

“Hello, Azul.” you smile, and take the hand he extends to you.

A kiss that burns hotter than the sun is pressed to the back of your hand. Your arms fall back to your side far too soon.

“I do hope you’ll enjoy this little trip I’ve planned.” he muses, turning his attention to the water, “There’s a shipwreck a little ways from here that Floyd and Jade wanted to explore, you see. Bad things happen when I don’t indulge those two.”

Something tells you that you are also part of that indulgence.

“Where are they?” you ask, scanning the wide expanse of golden sand, “I didn’t see them when I arrived.”

“Ah…” Azul winces and shakes his head, pointing a single finger toward the water.

You turn just in time to see two pairs of glowing eyes peeking up from the water. They’re gone in an instant, and if it wasn’t for Azul’s uneasiness you would have thought you imagined it.

“They’re very sneaky, aren’t they?” you murmur.

Azul nods.

You shake your head, mimicking Azul’s earlier actions. Except you decide to take the route the three of them probably wouldn’t expect.

And so you start walking towards the water.

Azul sucks in air through his teeth and grabs your arm as if warning you not to go.

“It’ll be fine.” you turn back to him and pat his hand, offering him the most reassuring smile you can manage, “If Floyd gets a little too rambunctious and forgets that I can’t breathe underwater, I’ll have you to stop them.”

Azul hesitates but lets you go. He does follow you though, which is rather endearing.

It’s nice having people who want to protect you.

Once you reach the water, you start to sink into the sand. You keep walking until it’s reached your knees. There isn’t any sign of them, but you’re sure Floyd will ambush you sooner or later. You start moving again, eventually wading into the deeper part of the shoreline. Azul watches you apprehensively.

Something brushes your foot.

You can’t help but jerk, but the ticklish sensation makes you laugh.

Someone pinches your thigh, and you swat at them.

There’s a swarm of bubbles that surrounds you, and for a second you swear you can see a tail flick out of the water before a giant merman jumps out of the water and body slams you into the waves.

“Shrimpy!” Floyd cheers, squashing your faces together and splashing salt water everywhere.

“Hi, Floyd.” you giggle as he digs his webbed fingers into your sides.

“My my. No greeting for me?” Jade pouts, resting his chin on your other shoulder, “You’re so heartless, Pearl.”

“You didn’t even give me a chance!” you laugh, running your fingers through their hair, “Hello, Jade. I’m very happy to see the two of you.”

“Will you two be more gentle with them!?” Azul hollers, a sour look on his face, “They haven’t taken the potion yet, so you should be cautious!”

Floyd sinks into the water and blows annoyed bubbles. Jade just smiles serenely, making no move to leave your side. Azul groans loudly, exasperated.

“Azul, it’s okay.” you call, slowly making your way towards the shoreline with two mermen in tow, “If I didn’t want them here, I wouldn’t have come into the water.”

“Well, there you have it.” Jade smiles triumphantly, wrapping his tail around your leg, “The Little Pearl doesn’t mind one bit, do they Floyd?”

“Yeah, Jade. They don’t mind at all.” Floyd grins menacingly, wrapping his tail around your other leg.

“Guys, I need those.” you remind them gently, and they begrudgingly let you go.

It’s funny how they listen to you and not the man they call boss (who is still fuming on the shoreline.)

You clamber out of the water with the grace of a crab as Jade and Floyd continue to pinch at your legs. You’re only safe when Azul catches you in his arms, lips pursed and hair tousled from the wind.

“What’s this potion I’m supposed to take?” you ask, paying no mind to the splash of water that hits you in the shins.

“Ah. It’s a water breathing potion.” Azul hums, clearly proud of himself, “I brewed it myself, so rest assured, it will work. The potion allows you to breathe and see underwater with minimal difficulty. Your payment for the potion will be assisting us in collecting artifacts and such from the shipwreck I mentioned previously.”

You have a feeling that all that meant was your payment is spending time with us.

You suppose they are rather lonely, with their reputations and all. Azul especially, with that sensitive heart of his.

“Okay,” you say softly, following him as he leads you to a neat row of duffel bags. He leans down and unzips the one with a cute little octopus charm and produces a purple glass bottle. The cork is shaped like a clam shell, and you marvel at how pretty of a bottle it is for only a few seconds before you look at Azul.

The sea is dangerous, you remind yourself. But these three will protect you.

“Now, I will not be joining you.” Azul declares, taking out a book from the same duffel bag, “So you may go with Jade and Floyd.”

He plops down in the sand, opens the book, and ends the conversation.

What?

You must have stood there for far too long because Azul looks up at you over the rim of his glasses as if you’re the one doing something weird.

“Come on Azul!” Floyd yells from the sea, “Shrimpy doesn’t care!”

“Indeed. And you were so excited about this trip, too. I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t want to come.” Jade sighs, shaking his head in disappointment, “There’s nothing to be done about it, I suppose. It looks like we’ll be getting the pretty little pearl all to ourselves, won’t we, Floyd?”

“Oooh, yeah!” Floyd beams, tongue flicking out between his sharp teeth, “All to ourselves, Jade.”

You see Azul’s eyebrow twitch.

Floyd groans, seemingly annoyed at Azul’s lack of reaction, and shifts his targeted jeers to you.

“Shrimpy! I can tell you why Azul doesn’t want to go!” Floyd yells, flailing his arms around, “He doesn’t want you to see his merform! He’s super squishy and slow!”

“Now, now. That’s rude, Floyd.” Jade chastises his brother, but his smile lets you know that he’s getting a kick out of this too.

“Well, that’s a good thing, right?” you turn back to look at Azul and kneel next to him, “I won’t be a fast swimmer either, Azul. Not as fast as Jade or Floyd. It’d be nice to hang back with someone.”

Azul says nothing.

You block out Floyd’s jeering and focus on him.

“Hey.” you whisper, “If you want to come along, you can. Don’t let me stop you. I promise I won’t judge how you look, hell I won’t even look at you if you don’t want me to. But I’d really like it if you came—”

“That is out of the question.” Azul says curtly, pushing his glasses up his nose.

You hesitate, debating if leaving him here would make him more comfortable.

Except you know Azul. And you know if he doesn’t join you three on this trip, he’ll regret it.

“Listen, Azul.” you murmur, keeping your tone gentle and firm, “I want to go with you. It won’t be the same without you. So if you want to come, you should. I don’t want to leave without you.”

Azul hesitates, and you know you’re getting through to him.

“So come on!” you place a hand on his shoulder and smile reassuringly, “It wouldn’t be fun without you. Who else is going to teach me about all the different coins you can find?”

“Gahh, fine!” Azul snaps his book shut and tucks it back into his duffel bag, hands shaking, “You run a hard bargain, my dear.”

You laugh, and your heart feels light. You lead Azul to the water and turn away as he prepares to transform. You hear a soft splash and you pop the cork off the pretty glass bottle. Tipping it back, the contents spill past your lips and down your throat. Not wanting to be messy, You place the cork back on and put the bottle on a nearby rock. A slimy hand reaches for you, and you turn to see Jade smiling up at you. Floyd is a little ways away, bouncing around in the water like he can’t wait for you to enter. 

Azul is nowhere to be seen, but that’s okay. You can only hope he’ll feel more comfortable as the trip goes on.

”Come on, Shrimpy!” Floyd yells, and that's all the encouragement you need to take Jade's hands and let him drag you into the water.

And he coaxes you into the smooth waves, just like a siren. His eyes certainly glow like he’s hypnotizing you, but you’re certain his beauty is enough to have the same effect.

Once your head is submerged, you open your eyes. Instead of the sharp pain you expect to feel from opening your eyes in the salty water, you’re able to see clearly. Jade’s still holding your hand as he drags you deeper, tail swishing as he darts around coral. You try your best to follow him as you cut through the water, and you know if it wasn’t for the care he puts into making sure you’re not getting scraped on the rough outcrops of coral, you surely would have been injured already.

Floyd swims down from up above and snatches you from his brother in the blink of an eye. You’re pressed into a slick, pale chest as Floyd bears his teeth playfully, swimming farther up.

“No fair, hogging Shrimpy all to yourself.” Floyd grumbles, clutching you against him like a prized catch.

“Now, now. No need to get aggressive.” Jade hums, swimming up to meet Floyd, “They were very much enjoying themselves with me, weren’t you?”

You’re saved from the growing conflict between the brothers by Azul, who pokes his head out from a small cavern in the coral.

“Our goal is to get to the shipwreck, not mess around.” Azul chastises him, and you marvel at the parts of him you can see (which just so happens to be his face and the upper part of his chest.)

He really is beautiful.

“Yes, boss.” Floyd smiles lazily, flicking his tail at him before swimming off with you in tow.

Jade smiles but says nothing as he follows after his brother, who decides to take a small detour. He spins you around a coral spire as if he’s dancing, holding your hands as you spin. His grin is toothy and wide, and his laughter rings clear even in the water, eyes shimmering as if reflecting the sun. He twirls you around like a dancer, and the water fans around you like a costume. It makes you feel like a performer, gorgeous and renowned, and you find yourself grateful for Floyd’s adventurous spirit.

“You see that, Shrimpy?” Floyd giggles, halting mid-dance to swim closer to the coral reef, “It’s you!”

You swim a bit closer, using Floyd’s hand as an anchor to keep yourself close to him. There’s a small shrimpy fluttering through the crevices, skittering across the coral-like an underwater insect.

“Do I really look like that to you?” you tease, shooting Floyd a doubtful look.

“Sure ya do! You’re tiny and you scitter around and you’d probably taste really yummy.” he teases.

He bites just beside your ear and you swat at him. Floyd laughs and swims circles around you, jabbing you with his hands and poking you with his tail. He’s more touchy than usual, you think, and it makes you want to hold him too.

The next time he circles you, you latch onto his tail. Floyd shrieks and flings his you through the water, shooting you towards the coral reef with his pure strength.

“Only shrimps this tall get to ride for free!” He holds his hand up just a few centimeters taller than you and sticks his tongue out.

“Only eels this tall get to receive hugs from shrimpies.” you say, holding your hand just a bit higher than him.

Floyd swims upward and bonks into your hand, looking very proud of himself. You hug him as he takes you the rest of the way to the shipwreck.

It’s a towering thing, made almost entirely of wood. There’s a gaping hole in one of the sides, and you assume that’s how it sank. Floyd giggles and you realize your mouth is gaping in shock. You slam it shut, embarrassed.

Jade and Azul are already examining items they found in the sand, Jade swishing around in the open water while Azul hides most of his body in another crevice. There’s a small treasure chest by Jade’s tail, full of coins and what looks like paper—?

You’ll have to ask them about that.

“It certainly took you long enough.” Jade chuckles.

Azul acknowledges you two with a curt nod as he sorts through coins that look older than Trein. He’s far too deep in his element to engage in pleasantries, you think.

“Floyd, I found some well preserved musical records.” Azul says mildly, handing Floyd a book that seems completely dry without sparing him a glance.

Floyd positively lights up and tears the book out of Azul’s hands, flipping through the pages that are indeed dry.

“Old merfolk spells.” Jade explains, smiling at your surprised expression, “We find paper books fascinating, you see. If the pages are protected by leather and metals they last underwater for quite a bit of time. We had to preserve them somehow.”

“That is fascinating.” you breathe, and Jade chuckles.

He grabs your hand and you turn to him questioningly. He gestures towards the large ship, towering over your little group. You gape at the structure again, and Jade laughs at your facial expression. The hole in the side of the ship looks just big enough for someone to enter it, and you find yourself wondering how it got there again.

Now that you think about it, the hole could have been made after the ship sank.

“Shall we?’ Jade murmurs, pressing a guiding hand to your lower back.

You let him lead you into the shipwreck, but he doesn’t allow you to enter until he’s checked the floor you’re on thoroughly.

“It’s all clear, my pearl.” he offers you his hand again, and you take it.

The second you’re inside, you break free from Jade’s grasp and swim around the room. There’s a collection of silverware in a rickety old cabinet. There’s an old chest that’s cracked open, and you can see scraps of paper peeking out from their age-old prison, suspended in the water. There’s an armchair with an intricately woven cushion, one of its armrests broken off.

Jade watches as you dart around the room, silently following you as you glance from item to item. You know he must think it’s amusing that you can be so enraptured by your own kind. He can’t blame you, though. Humans have always fascinated him, and you’re well aware he’s aware of you indulging him on many occasions.

Many people would be frightened if Jade Leech examined them so closely. You are not one of those people.

“Jade.” you whisper, swimming over to him with curiosity in your eyes, “Is this an old terrarium?”

Oh, you can tell that piques his interest. You point to a dark corner of the ship to a small table and a tiny, house-like structure. It’s made of some type of fibrous material, and two glass panes extend diagonally from the rectangular base. Jade swims over, gently taking the structure in his hands and peeking inside. His sharpened teeth glint in the slivers of sunlight as he beams, cradling the discovery as though it was worth more than all the gold Azul was sorting outside.

“Yes, it is.” he murmurs, voice soft as he coaxes you forward, “Humans didn’t care so much about how pretty terrariums were as long as they were functional. I’ve heard many merpeople talk about how boring these terrariums in particular are as a result of their lack of stained glass, but I can’t help but find this style charming.”

“Sometimes being functional is better.” you agree.

Jade gazes upon you with a softness he does not normally display. It makes your heart take a little tumble in your chest.

Jade opts to take the terrarium with him, and the two of you bounce ideas of what to put in the container back and forth. At one point you bring up taking some coral and sea floor rocks for decor, and Jade perks up like you’ve just reinvented the world of terrariums.

“I’ve been so fascinated by your world that I forgot about the beauties of mine.” he murmurs, lifting a silver knife to examine it, “Say, what do you think about using this knife as a plant marker?”

“You could carve the name of the plant in the handle.” you muse, and Jade nods with a wide smile.

“You have a fascinating mind.” he places a hand on your head, scratching gently at your scalp, “It makes me want to explore you, too.”

You feel your face grow warm in the chilly water.

With your suggestion in mind, Jade begins collecting the various plates and silverware he can find, debating how he can use each bit of his treasures. You watch him for a while as he darts around, storing the items you used every day in his terrarium as though it was a precious treasure chest.

“Isn’t there a story about how the mermaid princess believed that a fork was a comb?” you ask as he picks up a golden fork, “I think Floyd told me that one.”

“So he does pay attention.” Jade chuckles, turning his gaze to you, “Yes, indeed. She was so excited upon seeing one at the prince’s dinner table that she snatched it right up and began vigorously brushing her hair. As you can imagine, the prince was very confused.”

“That would have hurt her scalp pretty bad.” you murmur, furrowing your brow, “But she had the right idea, I suppose.”

Jade laughs, and you feel proud that you were the cause.

“Jaaaade!” Floyd pokes his head in and beams when he sees you, “Have you gone down to the bottom floor yet? Azul says there's a lot of fun stuff down there.”

“I haven’t.” Jade says mildly, “We’ve been having a grand time up here, you see. I daresay I got a bit distracted.”

Floyd sticks his tongue out and blows a raspberry, but with the unparalleled length of his tongue, it looks incredibly odd. You barely manage to stifle a laugh, and Floyd beams as though he’s just won a prize.

“C’mon, Shrimpy!” Floyd cackles, darting forward and snatching you up into his arms, “Let’s go explore!”

You’re surprised when Jade follows the two of you down to the deeper levels of the shipwreck. You expected him to continue perusing the selection of silverware, but instead he clutches his terrarium in his arms and swims after you and his brothers. Floyd’s chattering away about how you aren’t going to believe what’s on the lower deck and how it’d shock your poor shrimpy heart to death if you were alone. He giggles and wraps himself around you, covering your eyes as he leads you into an open space.

“Look, Shrimpy.” Floyd murmurs right next to your ear, peeling his hands away from your face, “Look at all those weapons.”

Floyd’s not wrong, this would be a rather creepy sight if you were alone. There are two long rows of cannons, each one covered in seaweed and coated in a strange green film. The seaweed reaches out for you in the water, almost as if they’re composed of dead souls that yearn for vengeance. Jade swims out into the room and swats away the seaweed as it clings to his tail. Floyd leads you after his brother and giggles when you shy away from the plant, hating the way it feels against your skin.

“Shying away from a little seaweed, Shrimpy?” Floyd hisses, playfully swatting at the tendrils that reach out to you, “Don’t worry about it. You’ll be fine.”

You’re relieved when you reach the end of the hallway.

Jade carefully examines a wad of mud that bulges from the opening of a nearby cannon, sediments peeking out from the sludge. Floyd busies himself with darting up and down the aisle, laughing and flipping around in the water. You let him drag him with you, and slowly get used to the texture of the rough seaweed clinging to your legs. Floyd twirls you dramatically and dips you, proclaiming loudly that dancers always do this in those silly little human movies, taking the opportunity to snap at your ear again.

He seems amused when you still don’t flinch.

“Floyd, don’t tease them.” Jade calls, a devious grin on his face, “We wouldn’t want them getting cold feet now.”

“I dunno, Jade. I think their feet are already pretty cold.” Floyd giggles, poking the bottom of your foot with the edge of his tail, “Cold as ice.”

Your toes flex at the ticklish sensations. They certainly do like finding all your weak spots, don’t they?

“We should warm them up, don’t you think?” Jade quips, tilting his head innocently.

“Maybe we shouuuuuld.” Floyd hisses, running his claws down the length of your arm.

They must see how your face twitches because they laugh and close in on you. What teases they are, whispering things to you like that. Just when it seems like they’re going to give you one of their famous squeezes, they stop.

“C’mon, Shrimpy. Let’s get you back up to the surface.” Floyd snatches up your wrist and yanks you so hard you’re certain he almost popped your arm from its socket.

Jade grabs your other hand, much more gently, and curls his fingers through the gaps in yours. You let them pull you upwards, powerful tails cutting through the water and they propel you up and out of the structure. Azul is nowhere to be found, and you must look confused at his absence because Jade squeezes your hand. You turn to him and he offers you a calm smile.

“Don’t worry, Azul is back on land. He’s had his fill of being seen for today.”

He doesn’t want you to see him in that form more than you already have.

“That’s okay.” you murmur, “He’s done more than enough already. I’m proud of him.”

“I’m certain he’ll appreciate the understanding.” Jade smiles his closed-eyed smile and nods.

The trip back is full of the same coral reefs, the same tails twining between your legs and curling around your waist, the same laughter from Floyd and quips from Jade. There’s a bittersweet feeling that wells up in your chest as you reach the shoreline again, knowing you likely won’t be back here for quite a while. Despite the rumors that the students of NRC spun about the Leech brothers, they weren’t nearly as dastardly as they usually were. You wonder if it has something to do with the joy of exploring a ship, of being in their element, of being able to talk about things they like.

“If you two want to talk about the things you like, I’d be happy to listen.” you say.

The Leech brothers share a look, one that seems as though they’re communicating without words. They turn back to you and smile, Jade’s grin is far less toothy than Floyd’s but just as happy.

“Keep talking like that and we’ll have to drag you down into the depths and keep you to ourselves.” Jade murmurs, eyes flashing, “Won’t we, Floyd?”

“Ohhh, yeah.” Floyd giggles, “Jade’s right. Who knows what’ll happen, hmm?”

Nevermind.

You laugh and shake your head, to which Jade chuckles.

Your head bursts from the water and you stumble onto the warm sand, where you see Azul sitting in front of three treasure chests. His brow is furrowed as he hunches over the coins, sorting them by year. You decide to sit beside him as the Leech brothers continue to swim. At some point, you hear Floyd slam his entire body into the water, and shriek as Jade slams into the water and pushes an even bigger wave back at him.

“Did you have fun today?” you whisper to Azul.

“I did, yes. I haven’t gotten the chance to explore a shipwreck since enrolling in NRC.” he pushes his glasses up his nose, and they make a soft clicking noise, “I found many more coins for my collection. I’m pleased.”

“I’m glad.” you say, and you don’t say anything else because there’s no need.

You do, however, find yourself splashing back into the water when Floyd calls your name a little while later.

You’re glad you came.