#and he has a special place in my heart because he fucking ATE that role

[vwritesaus]

it's thinking about rob mills's fiyero again hours boys....

[thelargefrye]

MR. HOUSEDAD. yunho, ep. one

── summary. where yunho finally introduces you and taeyong to each other.

── roles. single dad!yunho + girlfriend!reader

── kids. taeyong (four)

── genre. single parent + slice of life + fluff

── run time. 1.2k words

to say you were nervous would be an understatement. because you were hella fucking nervous.

you don’t remember the last time you were this nervous. but why were you nervous? you nervous because this was the first time you will meeting yunho’s son, taeyong.

you and yunho have been dating for seven months now and he finally asked you if you wanted to meet his son, so of course you said yes.

taeyong was the most important thing in his life and the fact that yunho felt your relationship was serious enough for you to finally introduce you to his son almost made you cry.

“aw, baby, why are you tearing up?” yunho asked, cupping your face with his large hands as he wiped away the one tear that fell.

“it just... it just means a lot to me that you asked if i wanted to meet taeyong,” you confess, tears now falling from your eyes. “they’re tears of happiness.”

“baby,” he says wiping them away once more before bringing your face to his so he could kiss you. “i love you.”

“i love you too, yunho.”

and so now here you were standing outside of yunho’s apartment, palms sweating as you hesitate to ring the doorbell.

you screw your eyes shut before quickly hitting the doorbell letting yunho know you are here. it doesn’t take long before the door opens and your boyfriend greets you with a smile.

“come in,” he says allowing you space to enter before leaning down to greet you with a quick peck to the cheek.

“taeyong, i have someone i want you to meet,” yunho says as the two of you walk down the hallway and into the living room where you spot the four year old sitting in the floor playing with his toys.

taeyong looks up from his toys with curious eyes. first landing on his father before moving to you. gosh, he looked just like yunho, especially in the eyes and nose region.

“taeyong, this is y/n, my special friend i was telling you about,” yunho says, his hand coming to the small of your back as to move your forward a little bit.

“hi, taeyong, your dad has told me a lot about you,” you say with a nervous smile and you feel yourself getting flustered as the young boy just stares at you.

“do you like dinosaurs?” is the first thing he says to you catching you off guard.

“u-um, yes i do!” you say after you recover from the random question. well... he is four so what do you expect.

“yongie, why don’t you show y/n your dinosaurs while i go finish cooking dinner,” yunho suggest and that seems to the make taeyong excited as he is quick to stand up and take your hand to lead you to his room.

for the next twenty minutes, you and taeyong spend it going through his dinosaur collection while he tells you the name of each one. you try your best to say them all, but of course you struggle and stumble over the pronunciation here and there.

the sight honestly made yunho’s heart melt. he was glad taeyong seemed to be welcoming you well. taeyong was an extrovert just like yunho, so the older male wasn’t too surprised by how his son was acting towards you.

he honestly didn’t want to interrupt you two, but he knew you both needed to eat.

“hey you two, dinner’s ready,” yunho said as he stood in his son’s doorway.

“okay!” taeyong said before putting down the dinosaur that was in his hand and gently tugged at your hand to get you to come with him.

yunho followed after you both as the three of you sat down and began eating. dinner went smoothly, you all ate and talked and laughed. by now your nerves have gone down and you were glad.

after dinner, yunho had taeyong go play in the living room while you and him cleaned up the kitchen. while you were washing dishes yunho had come up behind you.

“still nervous?”

“not as much as when i arrived. i was really worried when i first got here, but taeyong is sweet. reminds me of someone else i know,” you tease, turning to look at your boyfriend who is smiling brightly at you.

“seeing you two talking about dinosaurs together honestly made my heart melt,” yunho confesses, arms wrapping around your waist before he leans over to kiss you.

“thank you for inviting me,” you mumble against his lips causing his smile to brighten even more, if it was even possible.

“thank you for coming,” he mumbles back before he steps away but not before giving you one last peck on the lips.

when you finish cleaning up the kitchen you go to the living room to see yunho and taeyong sitting on the couch waiting for you, movie on the tv paused.

“come watch a movie with us y/n!” taeyong says patting the seat next to him.

“what movie is this?”

“despicable me!”

“ah, nice choice.”

the rest of the night went with you all watching each despicable me movie, but about halfway through the third one was when taeyong fell asleep cuddled into his dad.

now it was your turn for your heart to melt. the father and son looked so cute together that you couldn’t help but take your phone out to get a picture.

you then watch as yunho carefully picks his son up and cares him to bed. he comes back a few minutes later, but instead of sitting down on the couch. he lays down sprawled out across the couch, his head resting on your lap.

your not surprised by his action as this is a usual occurrence between the two of you. your hand immediately goes to his hair, running through his black locks and you watch his eyes close.

you find yourself mindless combing through his hair as you go back to the movie. you think that by the time the movie is over he’s asleep, but when you remove your fingers his hair, he opens his eyes and a pout is on his lips.

“the movie’s over and it’s getting late. i should get back home,” you say and yunho whines just a little bit as he turns to shove his face into your stomach.

“stay the night, please?”

stay the night? this will be your first time either one of you will be spending the night at the others place. sure yunho comes over to your apartment, but he’s never stayed the night. always having to come back home to taeyong.

“a-are you sure? i don’t want to be any trou—

“i’m positive. stay the night, you can borrow some of my clothes.”

the look in his eyes assures you he’s serious and it makes your heart flutter a little bit.

“okay,” you answer making yunho smile up at you before he moves to stand up and takes you to his bedroom where he gives you clothes to change into.

yunho smiles at you, pressing a kiss to your forehead, nose, and then lips when the two of you climb into bed together.

“good night, y/n.”

“good night, yunho.”

[hargrove-mayfields]

Day two of the Horror on Cherry Lane Challenge! Today’s prompt is Rib Cage.

warnings for mentions of disordered eating.

It’s been a problem since he was young. Momma’s little projection of insecurity and status.

Steve doesn’t eat. Not when he can help it. And he’s good at hiding it too.

He wears concealer to cover the bags under his eyes. He goes and gets highlights in his hair to hide how dull and greasy it is. He brushes his teeth at least six times a day to hide the damage from the purging. And he buys his pants a size too big to pretend he’s not getting thinner.

But as good as he is at pretending, Billy’s even better at reading people.

Since November and getting put in his place by his step sister, Billy’s been an observer. The role of instigator went to Tommy while Billy sits atop his throne and just, takes it in. A dynamic not so different to what Steve once had with Tommy.

But it means he notices everything that goes down in his kingdom, and especially everything concerning Steve Harrington.

Steve doesn’t even notice at first that Billy has noticed him, not from the little remarks and the stares that last a little too long. It’s obvious, but he doesn’t get it. Doesn’t see what it is that draws his attention to him.

Not until Billy steps down from his royal court to confront him in the locker rooms.

Steve’s been avoiding the showers after practice for a long time. It’s bad enough being surrounded by that many other boys, all more fit than him in one way or another, but as if that isn’t enough, he has to show himself too. The second he takes his shirt off, everyone’ll know what he’s up to.

He’s proud of his body. He’s proud of having earned his beauty. But he’s humiliated by the questions. Be it the faux concern or the mockery he’s more than used to, he just wants nothing to do with it.

So he lingers, on the court talking to coach, pretending to be searching for something in his bag. Anything to keep him from having to face the nagging.

But Billy notices, because of course he does. And he sits on the bench between the lockers all smug like. Waiting for Steve to run out of excuses so he can corner him.

It works, after Steve digs through his locker for some imaginary object for the dozenth time, he sighs and turns to Billy, “You gonna keep starin’ at me, Hargrove? What’re you even still doing here?”

“Coach asked me to stay’n lock up. What’s your problem, man?” Billy hums casually, like he doesn’t even care how much he’s bothering Steve. It’s something he’s probably used to by now anyways.

If only he knew what that indifferent assailed routine did to Steve. He buries that for now though, to argue, “You seem to be the one with a problem.”

Billy snarks right back, “Ain’t wrong about that. But I was watchin’ you at practice. What’s wrong with your ribs?”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re crossin’ your arms over your chest. You’re breathin’ all shallow like. You won’t even take your shirt off and get in the damn shower. Someone kick your ass Harrington?”

“No, no. That’s.. not it.”

“Uh-huh. Say the word n’I’ll put a stop to it. S’it Hagan? I told him to get off your case, man” Billy tries to convince him into admitting something, not knowing exactly what it is, but Steve shuts him down again, trying not to think too much about the concern in the other boys tone and expression.

“Seriously, dude. It’s just.. it’s me.”

“Right. ‘Cause you knocked your own self around like that. Lemme see it, Harrington.” Billy motions vaguely to Steve’s ribs, where the imaginary injury is, making his chest seize, flinching back from the touch that doesn’t land.

“No. No fucking way.”

“C’mere.” Before Steve can tell him no again, Billy steps forward and touches his ribs. His face looks sort of defeated when he doesn’t make Steve flinch or wince, clearly wrong, as Steve already knew, about the presence of a bruise.

His fingers gently linger though, tracing over each bone as they protrude through pale skin. It sends a shiver through Steve’s spine, and a spike of anger into his heart. Before Billy even opens his mouth, he knows he’s seen through him.

Knows Billy noticed that, just a month shy of the year anniversary of the fight, his body has changed far too drastically for it to be natural, or otherwise normal. His face softens in a way that’s so distinctly not-Billy, it makes Steve want to never see him that way again, “Steve..”

“Fuck off.”

But it’s too late, “Why’re you doin’ it?”

“Leave me alone, Hargrove. For real.”

“Don’t be stubborn, man. Lemme help you.”

“You don’t even know me, douchebag. I’m fine so just stop it.” Steve insists, panic rising in his chest, making his breath come out short and his throat real tight.

Billy doesn’t relent though.

“Yeah? Well I do know you’re starving yourself.” Billy counters, his tone surprisingly animated. It’s almost make Steve feel special if Billy wasn’t being an ass, “Used to think the school lunches were just below you. Thought your ass was too expensive for cold pizza like the rest of us ate. But I get it now. S’why you don’t drink either isn’t it?”

“Okay, you’ve been stalking me?”

“Just been keepin’ an eye on my competition. N’I don’t much like it when my competition starts gettin’ too depressed to even put up a damn fight.” It’s obvious Billy’s using that as a cover for something deeper that Steve doesn’t get, wishing Billy would just come out and say it already.

“Well I’m not much of a threat. Never was.” He prompts, but what Billy responds with instead instead is, “Exactly, and whose fault is that?”

Steve raises his eyebrows, surprised by the venom behind Billy's words. He’s even more surprised when Billy tears into him again, “M’serious. You’re wasting yourself away. It’s no damn wonder you can’t keep up anymore.”

That stings. “I thought you were getting better, but you’re clearly still an asshole.”

“And I thought you were alright to begin with. But I guess we’re both wrong.”

“So what the hell do you want me to say? Thank you my savior for savin’ me from myself?”

“Would you let me?” It’s not the answer Steve is expecting, the way Billy’s been acting since he confronted him, and he makes sure he knows, asking, “What?”

“Would you let me help you? Save you from what you’re doing?” Billy tries again, and it’s even more blindsiding this time.

“Like you even could. You said it yourself, Hargrove. I’m kicking my own ass here. You can’t help me.”

“I bet I could. You need someone in your corner.” Steve opens his mouth to argue, but Billy cuts him off quickly, “That curlyheaded kid don’t count. You need someone to look out for you. I’d let you be King again if it stopped this from happening.”

“But why would you?”

“I got my reasons.”

“Then just fucking tell me. If it’s good, I might think about it.”

“Look, I like you Harrington. I ain’t gonna stand by and watch you do this to yourself. Why’d you think I was checkin’ up on you in the first place?”

“To rub it in my fucking face that I’m unstable or some shit. Try to get dirt on me so you can make my life even more miserable.”

“What do I gotta do to show ya I really care then?” Billy sighs, but Steve hardly has the mind to detect his frustration, because he’s suddenly hung up by this declaration, simple to Billy but astroninal to him, “Wait- care? You mean, you don’t just like me in the same way everyone likes King Steve?”

“No. I meant it in the other way, Steve. The way I’m not so good at saying with words. The way I’ve trying to show you since we made things right. But I guess I’m not really good at this crush shit either.” Billy’s so bashful, so genuine, Steve knows he’s being honest, but some part of him can’t process it still.

“Oh.” Steve shakes his head, can’t believe it long enough to even look Billy in the eyes and deny it, “No-No you don’t. You’re fucking with me.”

“I do and I’m not. And that’s exactly why I’m not gonna sit around and watch this- this slow death you’re putting yourself through.”

Suddenly, this whole conversation goes from frustrating and pissing him off, to embarrassing. Like Billy's perception of him somehow changed his own. It’s funny how he was willing to argue with an enemy, but the second that other motive came into play, Steve finds himself flustered and trying to cover his tracks with a declaration of, “It’s not even that bad.”

But Billy continues to be a sweet talker, and he begs, all gentle and considerate, “Then let me fix it before it is. Please, Steve?”

“Okay.. okay.” Steve nods, biting the corner of his nail as he thinks, regretting it and shoving his hands in his pocket instead. He starts, after a moment of trying to collect his thoughts, “Just- Billy?”

“Yeah?”

“I like you too. That’s the only reason I’m accepting this.”

“Fine by me. How ‘bout I follow you back to yours tonight? Keep an eye on you still. Keep my promise too.” Billy offers, tone somewhat hopeful.

In response, Steve smiles shakily, so nervous his heart pounds in his chest. His ribs feel weak against its rhythm, like his chest could cave in from the combination of nerves and admiration, at knowing someone actually cared for him. He’s never felt more fragile than he does for Billy.

“I would like that a lot, Billy.”

[nineteenninety-six]

Could I request some angst of the Shelby boys coming back from the war only to be told that their baby sister (Finns twin or maybe younger, whichever your prefer) is dying of the Spanish flu

I changed my mind about how this would end about midway through writing it lol

TAG LIST: @futuristicslimemongerbanana @dayna041101 @captivatedbycillianmurphy @sweetgoodangel @shadow-of-wonder

WC:2126

It’s Too Early To Say Goodbye

When Tommy and his brothers stepped off of the train at Small Heath station, they expected to see their aunt and younger siblings, ecstatic to see them after so long but they were only greeted by Ada and Finn, who looked happy to see them but were also weighed down by something. 

They instantly knew something was wrong and they felt out of place as their fellow soldiers reunited with their family, the tears of joy and screams of happiness of the people around them turned into muffled background noise as they approached their brother and sister.

Finn ran ahead and leapt in Arthur’s arms, the eldest Shelby brother easily holding the ten-year-olds weight and Ada ran into John’s arms when they got closer. There wasn’t a dry eye between them as they reunited with each other but eventually, the elephant in the room had to be talked about.

“Ada, where’s Polly and (Y/N)?” Tommy asked

Ada seemed to shudder before she looked around at the crowd around them, “Let’s get out of here first and then I’ll tell you.”

The eldest Shelby brothers looked at each other in confusion but followed as she left the station and to a quiet place around the corner. Finn was back in Arthur’s arms and had buried his head in Arthur’s neck, hands tightly clenching his shirt.

“(Y/N) has the Spanish flu…” Ada quickly began to cry as she talked about her younger sister, “Polly’s with her now, didn’t want to leave her alone.”

Tommy stared at his sister in shock before he suddenly brushed past his siblings and rushed home, not even bothering to wait for them, his mind focused on his little sister.

(Y/N) was closer to a daughter than a sister to Tommy. She and Finn were twins, (Y/N) younger by a few hours and when their mother suddenly died a few years after their birth, Tommy had taken the role of a parent for them. Arthur, with the occasional help from Polly, looked after John and Ada and he and Tommy had to find ways to support their family. Their father was a deadbeat, so it was left to two young men, barely out of their teens to support and provide for the family.

Tommy and (Y/N) had a special bond, and it was no secret they were each other’s favourite sibling but (Y/N) was six when Tommy left and now four years later, Tommy wondered if they were still going to be each other’s favourites since so much had happened and so much time had passed-if (Y/N) survives that is. 

As soon as he opened the door to the house on Watery Lane, Tommy threw his bag to the side, not caring where it landed and thundered up the stairs. Polly met him on the landing and while her eyes watered at the sight of him, she knew it wasn’t the time for a reunion. Tommy’s thoughts were only on (Y/N).

“Don’t get too close, Tommy.” His aunt warned him and Tommy gave her a weak nod in understanding before he slipped past her and into the room.

The sight Tommy was greeted with was the first thing to make him feel sick in over three years. Tommy thought France had desensitised him, he had gotten used to the sight and smell of death, he had walked past countless of dead and dying men, there were even times where he walked over them, in the tunnels in France he no longer feared death and had even expected it but the sight in front of him struck a new fear in him. 

(Y/N) was placed in the middle of the bed, a light blanket was thrown over her so that she didn’t overheat but Tommy could see how she was soaked in sweat. 

Tommy made his way over to her, his heart racing and his mouth dry, the sight of her looking so poorly and helpless made him want to cry and he felt himself tear up as he pulled her hand out from under the blanket and tightly gripped it in his.

(Y/N) stirred from the movement and blinked warily at him, “Aunt Pol…?”

“It’s me, princess. It’s Tommy.” 

(Y/N) merely blinked some more before she drifted back off to sleep.

Tommy could hear the loud stomps from his brothers as they climbed the stairs and moments later the door quietly opened and they shuffled in. He didn’t turn around to face them, only focused on (Y/N), though he heard Arthur’s muttered ‘Jesus Christ’ and John’s whispered ‘Fuck’.  They moved to the end of the bed and looked at their baby sister with sad eyes but they didn’t dare to get any closer.

“I know you this is not what you wanted to come home to and that you probably wanted to celebrate but this has to be brief, I can’t afford anyone else getting sick” Polly told them as she slipped inside with a bowl of water and some rags, “Especially not you John, you need to care for your kids.” 

Arthur and John nodded, giving their baby sister one last pity filled stare before leaving but Tommy remained.

“Tommy-“

“I’m not leaving Polly” Tommy interrupted whatever his aunt was going to say.

Polly sighed, “Then you can help me then. Pat her down and keep her cool with the wet cloth and I’ll make her some soup. Hopefully, she eats.”

Tommy harshly swallowed and nodded, taking the bowl from his aunt and soaking the cloth before ringing it out and dabbing it on (Y/N)’s forehead.

Polly lingered by the door, not yet leaving, “She dips in and out of sleep a lot, you should talk to her. She missed you a lot and I bet your voice will comfort her.”

Tommy nodded but didn’t speak until he heard her going downstairs.

“I missed you, princess” Tommy murmured after a few moments, “I missed you so much but your parts in the letters helped me a lot. I think I can recite all of them from memory now, considering the number of times I re-read them.”  

Tommy continued to cool her down with the rag, brushing it over her arms and chest, “Don’t tell anyone but I missed you the most.”

(Y/N) shifted slightly causing Tommy to freeze in his place but once it was obvious she was still asleep he continued.

“At one point, I was more afraid to come back and have you not recognise or remember me than I was to die.” He confessed, “You were so young when I left, still basically a little kid and I didn’t want to leave you, I hope you know that.”

As Tommy got carried away talking openly and patting her down, he missed how (Y/N) slowly blinked her eyes open and how she tiredly stared at him

“Tom?” She croaked, her throat dry.

Tommy whipped his head up when she said his name and even though he knew he shouldn’t, he climbed onto the bed and pulled the ten-year-old into his arms, pulling her tightly against him. (Y/N) didn’t seem to be bothered that she had been suddenly dragged into an awkward position as she weakly wrapped her arms around Tommy.

Tommy started to cry, too much was happening at once, he was still suffering from the war, he was finally back home and his baby sister is deathly sick and he couldn’t stop the tears. 

“Hello, princess” Tommy pulled back and gently laid her back down in the bed as she wasn’t in the clear yet. 

Tommy helped her sip the water that Polly had left out before he laid down next to her on the bed not wanting to move away even for a bit. He pulled her close to him, frowning at the heat that was radiating from her body before soaking the cloth back up and patting her face with it. 

“I’ve missed you.” (Y/N) murmured.

Tommy smiled at her, “I missed you too and when you get better, we’ll go horseriding, okay?”

(Y/N) smiled back at him, excitement lighting up her eyes before she slumped back down in the bed, still clearly exhausted, “‘m hungry.”

“Polly’s making you some soup, she shouldn’t be long.” Tommy combed his fingers through her hair, something that had always calmed and comforted (Y/N).

“You here for good? Not going back to France?” 

“I’m not going back to France princess, don’t worry” Tommy pressed a kiss to her forehead.

Polly found Tommy cuddled up to (Y/N) in her bed when she returned with her dinner and she sent Tommy a scathing glare, it had been hell trying to look after (Y/N) and she hated the idea of it spreading through the house.

Tommy shrugged apologetically at his aunt before he helped (Y/N) sit up so that she could eat. The room was silent as (Y/N) ate until she finished and complained to her aunt that she was hot and sticky, so when Polly left to get a bath ready for her, Tommy and (Y/N) were left alone again. 

“If I get better…can we go to the fair?” (Y/N) asked

“There’s no if, you are going to get better and when you do, I’ll take you to fair, okay?” Tommy told her.

Polly came in to get (Y/N) for her bath and after Tommy carried her to the bathroom, he let them do what they had to do while he went downstairs to his brothers. Arthur was playing with Finn, who immediately ran over to him as soon as he spotted him and Tommy felt guilty that he had forgotten his youngest brother in favour of their sister.

“Alright, Finn? Did you hold down the fort whilst we were away?” Tommy asked as he lifted his brother up.

Finn nodded, “I’m glad you’re back...too many girls”

Both Arthur and Tommy laughed at his words, Finn had been surrounded by women for the past four years but now his brothers were back.

Tommy spent some more time with Finn until Polly told him that (Y/N) was done with her bath and was asking for him. When he reached her room, he found her tucked up and waiting for him.

“Can you tell me a story?” She asked as soon as he stepped in.

Tommy settled into the seat next to her bed and began to recite a story that he knew off by heart. It was (Y/N)’s favourite story and before the war, she demanded that he read it to her every night and after so long, he no longer needed the book because he remembered every word.

(Y/N) fell asleep quickly, the illness draining so much of her energy and Tommy sat there watching her sleep, his eyes focused on the movements of her chest, making sure she was still breathing. He would forgo sleep every night until she was better if he had to.

He didn’t notice Polly slip in until she spoke up, “She’s a Shelby girl, she’ll beat this.”

“I spent four years in France, digging tunnels day in day out and fighting men so that you were safe over here. Then I come home and I find my baby sister on death’s door.” Tommy’s voice was quiet, “It’s not fucking fair”

“It’s not but she will pull through and I know you will do anything for the little girl. You’ll make sure so that she’s never wanting and you’ll protect her from everything you can.”

“She’s not going to die. I won’t let her.” Tommy declared.

Polly felt her lips pull into a smile in the first time in a while before she left them alone.

True to Tommy’s words, (Y/N) didn’t die. Thanks to her aunt’s determined efforts, (Y/N) pushed through the worst of the flu and over the following weeks (Y/N) returned back to full health, she regained the weight she lost and was quickly becoming bored of being confined to bed which had turned her to start trying to convince her brothers to ignore Polly’s instructions but none of them was willing to face a telling off by their aunt. But soon enough, (Y/N) was out of the bed and back to causing mischief with her twin.

Tommy and Polly watched as (Y/N) ran around with Finn, both of them giggling as they chased each other.

“I told you she’ll be fine” Polly told him

“I know.” Tommy gave her a smile before he rounded up his youngest siblings so they could go to the fair as he promised. 

[tloujm]

Part XX: Champ de Pâquerette

Author’s Notes: This takes place a day after the previous chapter. This part is dialogue heavy and at 3,365 words. Because there is discussion on Joel’s background, it strays from canon. Is it considered “straying from canon” when certain details were never presented officially in the first place?

Genre: Can I get a McFluffy?

Summary: Just another day during the honeymoon. The two of you flirt and talk more about each other’s background. 

Ship: Joel x Fem!Reader

You woke up the next morning to the sound of hammering. You tossed sluggishly around the bed with the expectation of bumping into Joel. Instead, you’re met with an empty bed. As you pushed away the last bits of sleep, it made sense that he was responsible for the sound that woke you up. You walked up to the window with no more than your hair to cover your breasts. You opened it to let in the fresh morning air. You looked out into the backyard and found your husband off to the right fixing the fence blown down by the storm. It was a beautiful view. The backyard was basically a meadow full of wild flowers, mostly daisies. There were less trees in the back than in the front, however, so it was blanketed by rays of sunlight. You smiled as you watched on and you contemplated greeting him. You imagined his reaction; him turning around at the sound of your voice, a smile breaking across that hard exterior at the sight of your disheveled nudity. 

You decided against it in favor of surprising him. He’s surprised you enough these past couple of days; you figured he deserved a little something. You took a quick bath and went down to the kitchen. The refrigerator was one of the things he stocked before he brought you to the place. It wasn’t running, as the cottage did not have electricity, so half of the space inside was full of ice. Just that detail alone, Joel lugging ice from Jackson to this little house so the two of you could eat something other than canned food on your honeymoon warmed your heart. You didn’t know if he had eaten breakfast yet, but knowing him he probably didn’t, so you decided to make some food and bring it to him. Wanting to enjoy the day and eat outside as well, you put together a little picnic. You packed up one of the empty suitcases that he used to bring things over with plates, cups, cutlery and the food that you packaged up so neatly. 

Joel grunted in frustration after the nail he hammered split a piece of wood. He used the back hook of the hammer to take it out and he placed it between his lips. With the hammer still in his hand, he flipped the wood over and positioned it against the other part of the fence. A drop of sweat fell down the side of his face. He only wiped it off with the collar of his shirt after he successfully got the nail through. He took the baseball cap off that he was wearing to fan himself.

“Working hard, cowboy?” You asked as you walked through the back door.

He squinted his eyes to block the light. “Just fixin’ your fence ma’am. Your husband insisted I get’er done ASAP so the place could look nice when you got up.” He raked his fingers through his short hair and placed the cap back on. 

“Oh did he? Well why don’t you take a break from all this hard work and have brunch with me while my husband is gone. I made enough food for two and I hate eating by myself.” You stopped in front of him and the fence; He was still on his knees. You handed him a glass of iced tea that you brewed. 

Joel stood up and took a sip. “You sure your husband wouldn’t mind, ma’am?”

“Let me ask him.” You replied coyly. He let out a breathy chuckle as he watched you turn away from him then turn back around. “Joel, I’m sorry it’s come to this but I’m leaving you and running away with the handyman, but first I’m having brunch with him and there’s nothing you can say or do to change my mind.”

“Ouch.” Joel playfully grabbed at his chest. “You’re a natural heartbreaker ain’t ya?”

You shrugged playfully. “You started it. I just went with it.”

“Well that’s not where I was going.” Joel responded with a chuckle. “ ‘Sides, it’s never too early to start role playing.” He reached up and gave you a sloppy kiss. 

“Meet me ‘round front. We’re having a picnic.” You said with a smile. 

“A picnic?” He repeated.

“Yeah! Just wait. I’ll bring everything out.” You ran back towards the door.

“You need help with anything, (Y/N)?” Joel shouted.

“Nope, just relax in the shade.”

Joel watched as you struggled to bring everything out in one trip. He got up and rushed over to you, but you insisted that he sit back down. He couldn’t just sit and do nothing, so he compromised and stayed on stand by just in case you dropped something. He watched as you laid a blanket down and opened the suitcase full of picnic things. The first thing you took out was the iced tea that you made in what used to be a bulk pickle jar. You refilled his glass before unpacking everything else. 

The two of you ate in relative silence. “What are you thinking about?” You asked him. 

Joel let out a satisfying sigh after another sip. “You.”

“Oh? What about me has you so enthralled.”

“Everything, but I will admit I’ve had a question on my mind since you came out with the drink in your hand.”

“And what’s that?” You asked innocently.

He sat the cup down and leaned in. “When you broke my heart back there with such ease,” He offered a half smile. “I was wondering if maybe it was because you had a little practice back in the day.”

“Is that your silly way of asking me about all the men I had before you?” You winked. 

“You don’t have to share with me anything you don’t want to, but I do feel like you know more about my life than I do yours.”

“Do I? How many women have you been with between me and Sarah’s mother?”

He made a face as to say ‘touche’. “No more than I can count on my left hand.” He exhaled. “The first woman I’d been with after Sarah’s mom was a blind date. Tommy convinced me that I needed to get back out there. At this point Sarah was in kindergarten---”

“Kindergarten? How young was she when she left?” You asked. 

“Her mom left us without any warning, only a note saying that she dropped her off with Tommy and my dad. She couldn’t have been any older than 2 years old.”

“So, she didn’t grow up with any memories of her mom?” You asked. 

He shook his head. “No, and I was fine with that. It was just me and Tommy in her life.” He cleared his throat. “So, yeah, he called himself helping me out by setting me up on a blind date after I refused to try online dating. She was pretty, I’ll admit that, but it didn’t take long for me to realize that me and her weren’t goin’ anywhere past the first date.” He glanced up at you for a moment. He noticed how you were eating his words up before looking back down at his plate. “Despite that, we went back to her place at the end of the date and we slept together.” He sighed disappointedly at himself. “I don’t know why I agreed to go over. It’d been a while since I had any...fun I guess. Taking care of a baby by yourself is lonely.”

“You don’t have to explain yourself.” You spoke up. He shook his head.

“After her, I told my brother no more blind dates. On nights that my aunts or cousins would spend with Sarah, I would go on down to the bar. I’d usually just flirt with the women there, buy them drinks if it was going somewhere. One night though, a woman took me into the bathroom and we had sex in a stall. It wasn’t,” He shrugged. “Nothin’ special. It felt good in the moment, but as soon as it was over and we went our separate ways, there was this feeling of...I don’t know how to describe it.” He took another swig. “You know, I used to work in construction. The guys I worked with, most of ‘em weren’t fathers. The ones who were, were much other than me. I lost most of my school friends after I got married. It was hard for me to make more because all of my time was either at work or at home with the baby. The guys at the site were cool but I was never gonna meet up with them after work for a beer. I had to pick Sarah up from daycare. Imagine how hard it was to meet someone to be more than friends with. My loneliness made me crave those few minutes I had in the bathroom stall again, so the next time I had a free night, I went back to the bar. I was more confident because I knew what I wanted. I ended up having sex with another woman in her car in the bar’s parking lot. Sarah ended up catching pneumonia sometime soon after that. Scared and watching over her in the hospital caused me to realign my priorities. I felt guilty for not being there for her. I was away drinking and fucking to make myself feel better. As tough as it was raising a little kid, Sarah was the only thing that truly made me feel joy. So that was the last time until…”

“You’re telling me, no woman has come on to you? A tall, fine, good with his hands, rough-around-the-edges-but-really-a-big-softie like yourself?” You giggled, he smirked.

“Every once in a while a lady has slipped me her number, but nothing ever came of any of them?” He smirked at the confession.

“Why not?”

He shrugged. “Mostly ‘cause I convinced myself not to. I would tell myself that giving it a chance was not worth it. I’d only been with one woman after the pandemic. Her name was Tess.” With that sentence alone, you already knew that she meant the most out of all of them based off the fact that he remembered her name. “We met at a quarantine zone years after I left the fireflies. I was by myself after Tommy decided to stay with ‘em. I found myself smuggling things in and out of the zone to earn extra ration cards. That’s how our paths crossed. She was a smuggler too. She was one of my contacts. After a while of building up trust, we decided to team up and work together for bigger payoffs. I suppose it was only a matter of time that we’d get together. We had this silent pact that she wouldn’t ask about my past and I wouldn’t ask about hers. It wasn’t a relationship though, I don’t think, not in the traditional sense. We never talked about what it was before she died.”

“How did---” You began to ask.

“She got bit. She didn’t tell me until we were surrounded by some really bad people. She convinced me to leave her behind when she showed me the bite on her ankle. She said that I still had a chance to get away, that she was gonna hold the other guys off while I ran. I almost died that day, but I kept getting back up because I didn’t want her death to be in vain. After a while of hiding, I snuck into another quarantine zone and began smuggling there. I’d only done one job  before my contact told me that my next job was to smuggle a person. I immediately rejected the offer until I heard it was for the Fireflies. I wanted nothing more to do with them after I left their settlement in Texas, but I couldn't help but think about my brother. That combined with the payoff is why I decided to escort you across the whole damn country to their base in Utah.”

It was silent for a moment before you began to share yourself. “My first time was when I spent a few weeks in Britain. It was my high school graduation gift to myself. I wanted to do something fun and adventurous over the summer before starting college. I had never been anywhere before so I saved up for the plane tickets, booked the accommodations; I did everything myself and I was so excited. I stayed at this hostel in Brighton, a seaside city south of London. A Spanish man named David was staying there as well. We’d become friends off the bat and everyday we’d flirt and spend time together.”

“What did he look like?”

“Why? You jealous?” You teased. “He was a little older than me. I was 18, I think he said he was 25. So I guess I got a type.” You playfully wiggled your eyebrows at Joel. “He was tall and very slender and had long, dark, curly hair. So the night before I checked out, I told him I was leaving. He kissed me for the first time and you know what my response was? I asked him if he wanted to fuck! I wanted to be bold and I did have a crush on him. That’s not how I imagined my first time being. I’d only known him for a week. I mean we got along very well, but I always imagined it being with someone I was in a relationship with first.”

“You’d never dated in high school?” He asked.

“No, I had dates to school dances, but never dated. So I went back up to his hostel room. He rented a private room while the room I stayed in had bunk beds, so I was sharing it with others. I told him I was a virgin before anything happened and he was ok with that. He was gentle and kind and everything I needed that night to trust him. I didn’t expect much for my first time, like I didn’t think there were going to be fireworks. I didn’t ask how experienced he was, but I assumed he wasn’t a virgin. The experience as a whole was good. The guy that I was crushing on my whole stay in Brighton respected my mind and my body. That was more than enough to make me swoon. Still I had to leave in the morning. He invited me to stay the night with him and so I did. I had to leave early, just before dawn, so I planned on slipping out and leaving a note, but he caught me before I left and we hugged and said goodbye and he whispered something in my ear in his native tongue. I didn’t know what he said and to this day, I can’t remember the words, so I guess I never will. I’m glad he woke up though. I’m glad he did that.” Joel didn’t know if you had more stories, but he could tell already that this was the one that stuck with you the most. You took in a deep breath before continuing. “So, spring semester of my freshman year I got into my first relationship. He came up to me in the library. I was just watching videos on my laptop, killing time between classes. What’s funny was that I didn’t want to be bothered that day, and there this man was coming up to me saying that he saw me as I walked into the study quad and thought I was pretty. So I close my laptop and sit with him at his table. We ended up talking until I had to leave for class. He asked for my number before I left and the rest was history with that one.” You shrugged.

“That’s it? What happened there?” Joel asked curiously.

“We grew apart.” You shrugged again, thinking back on it. “He was more into me than I was him and after a while, I didn’t see myself getting serious like I knew he wanted and don’t you dare call me a heartbreaker for that.” A tight lined grin broke onto your face. “I didn’t want to dump him, but stringing him along would have been worse. I know what it’s like to be convinced someone’s into you when they’re really not. He was sad, but I’m sure he got over it. I told him we could be friends, but that never happened. I got into another relationship my junior year of college with a classmate from my photography class. I’d known him since my very first semester. We were in the same financial aid program, which meant we had to take a lot of the same gen ed classes. We were always just acquaintances until he asked me out before class one day. I’m not gonna lie, I didn’t find him physically attractive at first, but after we went on several dates and I got to know him, he was all I could think about. I was infatuated and we fucked everywhere.” You blushed. “We fucked in the dark room more than once, in my car, his car. We got caught by the campus police when it was in his car. We did it in the library stairwell, under a small bridge at a park across the street from campus. Things ended when we graduated. He was from out of state, so he was gonna move back home and look for jobs there. I wanted to travel more before committing to a job. I really tried to convince him to travel with me, at least for the summer, and he really tried to convince me to go move with him to his hometown. Neither one of us compromised so that was that.”

“Did you love him?” He inquired.

“I don’t think so. If we loved each other, I feel like we would have tried harder to find a solution. In the very least try a long distance relationship. We were infatuated, horny young adults. I loved my time with him and I definitely cared for him, like I did for my first boyfriend, but I don’t think I ever loved them. Did you love Sarah’s mom?”

“Tyra?” There it was. Now you knew her name. He looked down as he wrung his hands. “I thought I could, but she never gave me a chance to. We liked each other and I grew to care for her and I think she cared for me back. I grew to respect her a hell of a lot more after I watched her give birth, but she didn’t make the idea of loving her easy. Towards the end, we argued a lot and then not at all. There was just nothing until she left.” You took his hands in yours. He accepted your comfort, but did not want to dwell on it. “So where did you end up going?”

“Hmm?” You hummed in question.

“After you broke up with the second guy because you wanted to travel.”

“I had brought a plane ticket to Italy. Trieste, Italy. That country is like an art student’s mecca so I had to go sooner or later. But it never happened. About a week before I was scheduled to go, the pandemic hit and the borders closed. I only chose that date because the layover time was shorter. It cost me though. Just think If I had purchased an earlier plane ticket, because I almost did since it was cheaper. What if I would have gotten stuck in a foreign country when all this went down. Wouldn’t know anybody, wouldn’t know if my family was ok, wouldn’t know how to get back home.”

“We wouldn’t have met.” Joel commented.

“No, I don’t think we would have.”

“Well, I’m glad you bought the more expensive ticket. I’m sorry you didn’t get to see Italy though.”

“I’m sorry too!” You laughed. “I can’t imagine that being the worst country to be stuck in. But I would trade Italy for you any day.”

The two of you laid on the blanket and enjoyed each other’s company until Joel decided it was time to get back to the fence. You asked him if he needed help, but he declined. You settled for sunbathing while you watched him work. After a while, he called it quits for the day and he got cleaned up while you made dinner. 

[spaceskam]

92 or 98 for malex? 💗💗💗

92. “I want you to be happy.” & 98. “Take a deep breath.”

ao3

For a king who had been hailed as a genius, Alex found that Michael was a goddamn idiot.

“What is wrong with you?” Alex breathed, tears already covering his face as he stared at the man he loved more than anything. It was late and the rest of the castle was asleep aside from a few guards, leaving them stuck with speaking quietly over candlelight.

Alex Manes had been found as a toddler, abandoned and hungry with an infection on his leg. The queen at the time had taken pity on him and brought him home, letting a doctor do what he needed so he could learn to walk again. With a specially crafted leg funded by the royal family, Queen Nora gave him to her staff as sort of a side project. He grew up inside the castle as the son of 20 different women who doted on him like their own and 20 different men who thought it was their duty to teach him to be a man. It made him skilled in a vast number of trades as the king and queen watched. 

By the time he was 10, they realized how intelligent and capable he was and began letting other, higher staff members teach him things like how to read and write. He was 15 when he was granted tutoring sessions alongside Prince Michael where they became close friends, but things didn’t start becoming complicated until they were 16.

King Heinar died, leaving the throne to Michael who was panicked and sad, but he took on the duty. Alex took it upon himself to help him to the best of his ability, but they soon found that their attraction ran deeper than simply friendship. They talked through royal plans while naked in bed most nights, sharing thoughts and ideas and it never bothered Alex when Michael passed them off as his own.

At 17, Queen Nora suggested that, for appearances' sake, it would be best if Alex officially became a Gentleman of the Bedchamber. It would explain why they were so close without stirring the wrong kind of gossip. There had already been publications of drawings with Michael as a giant baby with Alex spoon-feeding him political ideologies. People were already assuming, so he agreed.

Alex’s duties for the last five years as Gentleman of the Bedchamber was to be Michael’s closest companion, to help him dress, to wait on him when he ate, to guard his chambers when he was most vulnerable. He quite typically did none of that. His sword and prosthetic leg usually laid beside them on the bed for easy access, but no guarding or servent-esque duties took place. Alone, they were equals. That was their rule.

Which worked quite fine until Michael had to begin courting a young princess. He needed heirs after all and that was something Alex couldn’t provide. It made it harder to steal time alone with him, harder to show affection, harder to stop his heart from aching in a way he couldn’t heal. Because as of tomorrow, Michael would be married and he would need to begin working to provide heirs. Loyalty was no longer an option.

“What is wrong with you?” Alex repeated, feeling disgusted not for the first time as he stared at Michael. He looked sad and lost like he did most days lately. “How dare you ask that of me? I know you are a king, but I am not your plaything. I never have been and I refuse to let you treat me as if I am.”

“That’s not what I meant!” Michael insisted, struggling to keep his voice down, “I just need you there, beside me, to give me strength.”

“Do you hear yourself?” Alex scoffed, “What we have is ending tomorrow morning for good and you want me to stand beside you as it happens? You want me to stand in front of everyone as you rip my heart out of my chest?”

Michael stared at him, bottom lip quivering as he let his tears flow freely. Alex assumed he didn’t have any control over them. He gasped a desperate little breath and wiped at his face, but Alex didn’t back down from staring. He knew he had no right to be angry, he knew what he was getting into when he first laid with a king, but, God, he was.

“It’s normal for kings to have mistresses,” Michael said weakly, the same argument he brought up every single time they’d spoke about this since it came apparent that he would need to get married, “It’s normal. We can still be together. I don’t love her, it’s pure politics. I’m sure she’ll have her fair share of men as well.” 

“You don’t understand,” Alex said, shaking his head, “You simply don’t understand. Mistresses are normal because you have power. This is all power. The fact that I am forced to have a title simply to be close to you is all power. And I don’t want a love that has any sort of fucked up imbalance in it any more than I’ve already accepted. I refuse to be some sort of mistress. You either have only me or you don’t have me at all. That’s how it’s been for years and that’s the only way I’ll take you.”

“Alex,” Michael begged, coming closer. Alex took a step back. “Alex, this isn’t an option for me. I have to produce heirs.”

“I know,” Alex said, sniffling as he wiped his eyes, “Which is why I can’t stand beside you at your wedding. I’ll attend, I have to, and I’ll take up duties as the Gentleman of the Bedchamber, but I no longer can be anything more. I can’t take it.”

“Fine!” Michael said, falling to his knees and taking Alex’s hand to place over his heart, “Fine! I won’t touch her! I’ll marry her for appearances and I’ll only touch you. Fuck heirs, fuck it all, nothing matters without you.”

“And what if people find out that your marriage hasn’t been consumated? What happens when she asks you won’t touch her? And what happens when she is publically and ritualistically shamed by your people for not producing heirs? She doesn’t deserve that either,” Alex said, “The only way is to stop. You marry her, you learn to love her, you have children with her.”

“I don’t want that! I want you!”

“Michael,” Alex said, resting his hand on his wet cheek. His face was a wreck from crying and Alex assumed he couldn’t look much different. Still, he looked in his eyes and told him the truth. “I want you to be happy. For that to happen, you need to let go.”

“No,” Michael said, shaking his head, “I can’t be happy without you.”

He dropped his head forward, resting on Alex’s stomach as he wrapped his arms around him. He didn’t seem to have many intentions to let go. It was times like these that Alex realized that, although they’d grown up at the same time under the same roof, they were taught many different things. For example, Alex was taught that all good things come to an end eventually. Like when Sir Aubrey, the only other man he’d met with an artificial leg, died the night he told Alex he had a surprise trick to teach him at his next sword lesson. Years later, Alex still wondered what it was.

And, years from now, he’d wonder what it would be like to have had Michael to himself for eternity.

“I’m going to sabotage my own wedding,” Michael said into his stomach. Alex huffed a humorless laugh, losing a bit of inhibition as he dropped his crutch and combed through Michael’s hair for the last time. Michael held him upright easily. “I-I’ll insult the priest. I’ll forget what I’m meant to say. I’ll trip and need a doctor.”

“Your new wife doesn’t deserve that. Give her a nice day,” Alex insisted. Michael squeezed him.

“Stop it, you’re too kind. If you must push me away like this, you’ll have to make me hate you,” Michael stated firmly. Alex laughed softly, closing his eyes as he slowly started to get to his knees. Michael helped him, eyes still full of sadness as they found themselves face to face. Alex wanted to kiss him, to grab him and run away, to go somewhere that they could be together without consequence.

But Michael was a good leader, the best they’d had in years, and Alex played a crucial role in making that happen. Neither of them could leave for the sake of their country.

“I’ll make you hate me,” Alex promised, taking his face in his hands, “Just you wait.”

“Good luck,” Michael said, chin raised and jaw set in determination despite his wet eyes, “Nothing you could do would make me hate you. I lo-”

“Shh,” Alex said, shaking his head as he put his thumb to those lips that he’d kissed daily since he was 16 years old, “Take a few deep breaths. You need to calm down before you go back to your room.”

Michael shook his head. 

“I’m not leaving until I figure out a way around this,” Michael stated, “We think best together, we always have. If anyone could come up with a way to make this work for everyone, it’s us.”

Alex’s shoulders dropped as well as his hands, scared to touch Michael when he was speaking that way. It was too easy to fall into habits he hadn’t had the chance to break quite yet when he did. He still wanted to touch him, still wanted to find a solution, and it made it harder to stand his ground when Michael wanted to do the same.

“Michael, we’ve already tried. We’ve been trying,” Alex said weakly. Michael looked at him for what felt like an eternity and Alex stared back. It was easy to get lost in his face again and just think about what could’ve been.

But then Michael’s eyes widened.

“We haven’t tried one thing,” Michael said. Alex, refusing to get his hopes up, eyed him suspiciously. “We haven’t tried talking to her.”

“What do you mean?” Alex asked hesitantly.

“I mean,” Michael said, already moving to get to his feet. He grabbed Alex’s crutch on the way before holding out his hand to pull Alex up as well. “We need to talk to my soon-to-be wife. Maybe she has someone I don’t know about that she had to give up for me. Or maybe we can have her fake a pregnancy and adopt. There are other options, but if she’s going to be my wife, she’ll need to be included. And I want to keep you, so we need to ask her. Come on.”

“Come on? Michael, it’s the middle of the night,” Alex said, though his heart was beating in his chest. He knew telling this woman would be a very risky thing and she could easily confirm the suspicions of people, but she was their only option. 

“Yes, and our wedding is in the morning. We’re low on time,” Michael said, pulling him just a little bit closer, “I refuse to lose you, Alexander. You are a gift from God himself and I don’t intend to give you back.”

Michael kissed him to seal his promise and Alex was couldn’t say no. This was their last chance to have a future and if that meant doing something reckless, well, it wouldn’t be the first time.

Maybe it wouldn’t hurt as much to stand beside him as he married someone else if he knew he was still all his.

[wyrmmaster]

I started granblue recently on large part because of your posting about it. What happed with Yuel thata got you so upset?

Okay, I’m tempted to point you to some of my other posts but I’m not gonna do that and instead I’ll use this ask as a place to lay everything out, both for my sake and everyone else’s - sorry, this might get long.

Right, so. In the beginning you have Yuel. Unusually for an Erune, she has a massive tail on top of larger than average ears.

Yuel’s a bumpkin, a hyperactive goofball, and generally just all around a nice person. Yuel, bless her heart, is on a quest to discover artifacts that belong to the ancient royal family she serves to return it to glory but is a bit scatterbrained and can’t focus on one thing for too long so really she’s just On an Adventure™. You learn that beneath that ADD is an incredibly perceptive woman that can deduce the exact emotional state of everyone around her and cleverly cheer them up or offer them support without ever seeming to actually go out of her way to do it. She gets people to loosen up and enjoy themselves, even if they’’re miserable.

Later, you have Societte. Like, Yuel, she has a massive tail and larger than average ears.

Her introduction to you is freezing solid a small army of monsters that had you cornered. Societte is grace given physical form but, bless her heart, is shy to the point where even after that display of power she can’t actually talk to you. You guys just patiently interpret her mumbles and slight gestures until you get the gist. Turns out Societte’s the princess of that ancient royal family, and Yuel’s nominal master. You learn that the earlier freezing wasn’t a fluke: beneath that shyness is solid steel. Societte is powerful, brave, and fiercely protective even to her own detriment.

Through Societte, you learn that this ancient family ruled an empire lost to time under a benevolent nine-tailed fox goddess that gave them her power.

They meet in your crew, on your ship.

Yuel discovers that Societte is The Princess™ - this shocks her. She knew that Societte was Important, the local village ojou, but not the level of quasi-religious importance that she actually has. Yuel gets angry that she wasn’t told. They’re old friends, you see. More than that. Even this early on it doesn’t take much reading between the lines to assume they’re actually a romantic item. 

Societte starts sobbing because she wanted to tell Yuel everything, she wanted to go with her when she left the village. But the knowledge that she’s the princess is dangerous. There are a lot of murderous people that are after her, to try and get rich. Some of them murdered her parents while she watched.

Turns out the tails and bigger ears are signs of the lineage, and massive red targets. This has given Societte a complex about her ears and tail, and in some of her homescreen lines she outright asks if they bother you and says she’s doesn’t want them.

So, to protect Yuel, she doesn’t say anything and lets her go far away. Then she leaves the village, to try and find out why all this is happening and to protect them from any more roaming bandits that come after her.

The two reconnect and Yuel gets Societte to calm down and look at her journey through a different lens: Societte’s not guilty of anything, she’s not on her miserable quest out of penance or obligation, the cruel world that’s taken so much from her and made her so scared isn’t all bad. They’re together now, and they’re gonna get to the bottom of this - together, as it should’ve been.

Now, enter Yuel’s 5-star fates.

This story obviously focuses on Yuel, and how she feels about Societte and her own role in the grand scheme of this situation. Yuel loves Societte more than anything, but she’s a bit jealous. Societte as mentioned is grace given physical form. Societte is gorgeous, extremely powerful, and a flawless dancer with natural talent that Yuel will never compare to. 

However, we learn that Yuel is also a princess - and heavily implied to be the real heir over Societte. Remember: the ears and tail are signs of the heritage.

So, Yuel’s found some ancestral weapons of her own. They’re hers, and they give her memories of a dance, and she does it flawlessly - once. This unlocks her true power and massively boosts her magic.

But she can’t do that dance again. Just can’t. Societte tries to teach her, but again, Yuel does’t have her talent. She fails over and over again and gets angry.

That nine-tailed fox goddess doesn’t approve. Thinks Yuel’s a failure, and useless. Unworthy. So she turns that increased power back on Yuel and starts cooking her alive with her own fire.

This is alleviated when Yuel stops trying to follow an ancient dance and just does whatever comes to mind. Channel herself into the dance, yeah? And she ends up with something more special and beautiful than the traditional dance. Ninetails approves, and stops trying to kill her.

Moral: Yuel is special and talented in her own way; not lesser than Societte, if not exactly equal. They set out anew on the journey with the knowledge that both of them have much bigger roles in this than they assumed.

Then you have Societte’s fire version.

This story focuses on Societte’s trauma. She goes back to where her parents were murdered in an attempt to remember the dance they were doing there and do it herself to finish whatever they were trying to accomplish.

We learn that there’s more to this whole thing than there appeared to be - a fragment of Ninetails’ power is sealed in a stone, and it’s pumping out extremely dangerous poison gas. And it’s spreading more each day. This is not the only stone. And the gas will spread from all of them until the world dies.

Turns out Lady Ninetails ain’t so nice. They’re given visions their ancestors - Societte’s foremost among them - using the ritual dances in front of Ninetails, and channeling her power.

Here, Societte finds her true motivation and overcomes her grief. She will do what she must for the people she loves. She’s got to do what she needs to do, to save everyone. The journey continues on a very solemn but no less hopeful note.

Interlude: Summer Yuel.

We see how close the two are. Yuel follows a Societte who’s grown mostly out of her shyness and can apparently go out and meet people, sparking conversation herself. The change in behavior is so marked Yuel’s flabbergasted, and assumes she started dating someone.

 But no, Societte was just doing that to find out where the best vacation spots in the area are and to commission swimwear for the two of them. They enjoy a fun evening with each other and the crew.

The fate episode ends with what amounts to a love confession.

Now, where it could’ve been great but starts to fall apart.

Their first event, Forgiveness and Gratitude.

Enter Kou.

Through him, we learn there were nine royal families, ranked from first to ninth.

We learn that Societte is the scion of the First, and Yuel of the Third.

Turns out that the empire was built around these families sealing an evil Ninetails away and stealing her power to bring about a golden age.

Kou for his part is of the Ninth. This family was mistreated, and basically used as nigh worthless servants by the other eight. In a bid for power, the Ninth betrayed the other eight and sided with Ninetails. The legends about her being a benevolent goddess and the royal families having a shitload of treasure were fabricated by them in order to set bandits after the heirs of the other families as the empire eventually fell apart, so the Ninth would be the only ones left.

Kou was supposed to Ninetails’s vessel so she could return to the world and conquer it. 

But…. Now there’s two better candidates. One of them is super gullible and kind. 

He tricks Societte into throwing herself on the chopping block instead. 

This is important: Ninetails is ecstatic over this. Using Kou was like finding a broken, rusted sword. Getting Societte? The Scion of the First? Finding a fucking chaingun with fifty belts of rounds. She is by far the superior vessel, because again, Societte is just that talented and powerful.

This is solved by Yuel being Yuel, and using her bond with Societte to save her from the possession. Yuel, the freed Societte, and an apologetic Kou work together to defeat the apparition of Ninetails’s power.

That? That’s good. Don’t like how quickly Kou was forgiven, but it’s serviceable.

The bad part? The event is stuffed with onee-chan /ss/ jokes. And people ate it up.

So, we get the event that never should’ve happened.

We get Kou and The Hollow Existence. An event with a character’s name in the damn title.

This event, as you’d guess, focuses on Kou. Turns out the little dude’s actually the FInal Boss for Ninetails. He knows everything, and is inexplicably the most talented and powerful now. He’s the hero. Remember: he’s supposed to be the failure. The spare. The “I’ll take what I can get” for Ninetails. Not so anymore. With zero setup or explanation.

Then we get You. You is a cheap knockoff of Kou, but a Girl This Time, both in and out of story. It’s an actual plot point. You’s being tricked by Ninetails, who’s using her resentment to fuel a revenge streak. Ninetails is gonna use You as a vessel when she’s strong enough. Kou saves her from Ninetails and helps her out of her funk. By himself.

Yuel and Societte’s impact on this event is nonexistent. The major players and main characters don’t do shit but get jobbed and have extremely skeevy shotacon bait moments with Kou. There’s an entire scene dedicated to Yuel intentionally making him uncomfortable by trying to get him in a bath with the two of them.

Yuel goes from emotionally perceptive and kind to a near molester. Societte’s character development is scrapped entirely and it’s like she’s who she was in her first fate episode.

This event quite literally invalidated everything that came before it. Everything was scrapped to make Kou the hero and pander to shotacon fans.

That’s the end of their story.

It’s bullshit.

[cutie1365]

A Kid from Queens Part 11

Pairing: Peter Parker x Stark!Reader

Info: CA: Civil War Era. Tony Stark enlists his daughter to find the web slinging spider in Queens.

Word count: 2.8k

Warnings: language, lmk if I should add anything

A/N: I’ve removed a lot of people from my taglists for being inactive, to be on it and stay on it you must like my posts, and comment or reblog. There’s a google form in my bio to request to be added.

Masterlist linked in my bio. Taglist in the reblog.

                  - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

A bright stage light blinded you as you shifted back behind the curtain. A production assistant was clipping a microphone onto your dress that was so tight they’d actually made you wear spanx. Fucking spanx. You were a healthy 18 year old girl, wearing Spanx. You felt like you couldn’t breathe.

Your gaze shifted to the other side of the stage where you saw your publicist-turned-manager, Linda, give you a thumbs up and a cheery smile. You flashed her a toothy smile right back to reassure her. She had been preparing you for this all week, and you were ready. You were used to meetings with important people, investors, and shareholders; Pepper taught you well, you knew what you were doing.

“Ok people! Live in five... four...” A jaunty producer bellowed from behind the cameras.

You took a deep breath in, closing your eyes and reminding yourself why you were here. When you opened them, you put on your mask: a bright smile, wide eyes, and shoulders back. You were no longer the girl who just last week was crying in a conference room over a boy. No, for the next hour you were Y/N Stark: a girl who definitely had her shit together, sporting a nearly $5,000 Oscar de la Renta dress with some Jimmy Choos to match.

The audience roared as the large red “Applause” sign above the stage lit up.

“Thank you! Thank you for joining us and welcome to all of you at home tuning into our live broadcast of The Tonight Show!” The spirited host greeted the audience, he spoke again once their cheers died down.

“Tonight we have a very special guest. She’s a partner of Stark Industries. She’s the daughter of Iron Man! Give it up for Y/N Stark!” His voice grew more and more excited with each description.

Was that really all you boiled down to? ‘The daughter of Iron Man’? Would you ever be able to be your own person? All your accomplishments, and still, the most interesting thing about you was your paternity.

                  - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

Unbeknownst to you, thirty minutes away in Queens, May Parker was flipping channels as her nephew ate dinner. Landing on channel 6, she recognized a familiar face.

“Peter, isn’t that your little friend?” She asked excitedly, pointing to the TV. He lazily draws his attention to the screen before he did a double take. Oh God, she looked amazing. He thought.

“We’re not really friends May, she’s just my boss’ daughter.” Peter spoke, hoping she’d change the subject, or the channel.

“Wow, look at that dress! She looks like a million bucks!” May smiled, in awe.

“Try a billion.” Peter muttered, thankful that May didn’t have super-hearing like him. Normally at this time, he’d be getting ready to go out for patrols, but he was curious. Why were you on live TV? You didn’t do interviews. So tonight, he decided to take his place next to May and watch, because honestly - he missed you. If this was his chance so see your smile and hear your laugh, then patrols could wait an hour.

                  - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

“Thank you for having me.” You nodded politely as you adjusted in your chair.

“Well it’s not everyday I have superhero DNA seated across from me.” The host joked, and you laughed politely, mentally regretting this already.

“What can I say? It’s in my blood.” You shrugged, the audience roared as the neon sign flashed. Your interviewer joining in, though you could tell it was fake.

“Yikes that was bad wasn’t it, guess I’ll leave the jokes to you.” You declared with a smile.

“I guess out of all those PhDs you have, none of them translate to being able to come up with a decent punchline.” He retorted, playfully.

“Oh certainly not, probably the opposite considering they’re in Electrical Engineering and Ethical Philosophy.” You laughed.

“Which is incredible by the way! You’re 18 and you have two PhDs. How’d you do it?” What an original question. You thought and mentally rolled your eyes.

“A lot of hard work and dedication. And, sure, I’m not oblivious to the tremendous amount of privilege that I have. Sometimes it’s about the right opportunities, and those aren’t always fair. I’m hoping one day to change that.” You spoke honestly, gaining a round of applause from the audience.

“And how do you plan on doing that?” He asked, baiting you. He knew why you were here and what he was supposed to steer the conversation towards.

“Well, systematic change doesn’t happen overnight. But as a start, we want to be able to give young people interested in science, technology and engineering a foot in the door. We’re opening up a Stark Internship program, for kids across the country to come work with us and learn from us. Anyone is welcome to apply. There are more details on our website.” You looked directly into Camera One. You felt as if you were reading from a script, you’ve practiced this so much.

                  - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

“Peter, isn’t that what you do?” May asked, turning to her nephew.

“Kinda, Mr. Stark said they were expanding nationwide, wanna help out more people ya know.” He lied, in reality he had no clue what you were doing. A heads up would have been nice, but it was helpful that his alibi was now legitimized.

“I like her.” May said with a soft smile, focusing back on the screen.

“What?” Peter asked, taken aback.

“I like her,” May repeated, “She recognizes her privilege and she’s giving back. Plus her shoes are to die for.”

                    - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

“That’s amazing. Does that include scholarship opportunities?” Your host inquired, just as planned.

“Of course! We already offer a few scholarships, there’s even one named after Dad and I at MIT, but we will be expanding greatly. One hundred of the applicants will receive a $50,000 scholarship, so there’s certainly no reason not to apply.” You laughed.

“You’re going to be a busy girl, doing all those interviews.” He remarked. You hated the way he called you girl. You faked a laugh before responding.

“Oh, I know, but I think it’s important for me to really have an intimate role in the selection, you want to build those personal connections. Ya know?” You nodded.

“Those are important, sure. Now, Y/N, it’s no secret that you’ve also been running Stark Industries’ Philanthropy, so what’s next on the agenda for you personally?” He asked, turning the conversation... this wasn’t planned.

“Um, sure we have a lot of fingers in a lot of pies here at Stark Industries, so we’re constantly making pretty large donations to a number of deserving causes. If you’re referring to large scale philanthropic galas then the NYC Hope Gala is coming up, which targets childhood cancer research and awareness. And of course, The Met Gala is coming up next month.” You nodded. What was he playing at here?

“And can we expect you to attend?” Something about his demeanor was changing, and you cursed yourself for agreeing to do this on live TV.

“Haven’t missed it in four years so there’s a good chance.” You assured him with a smile.

“Are you nervous to attend a public event considering what that took place at the last one?” You felt like you had just been punched in the gut, and you hoped that didn’t translate onto your face. He really was going there, and you had a feeling you knew where this was heading.

“I believe that when you live in fear, the people that orchestrated these terrible things win. So I’m not going to let that happen.” Your mind was reeling trying to figure out his next move, and what your response would be. Should you keep talking to fill the time until commercial break, in an attempt to limit whatever might be coming next? You looked at the monitor, 5 minutes until commercial, shit. A lot can happen in 5 minutes.

“When footage of the attack came out, I think it’s fair to say that the world was shocked.” There were random voices of agreement coming from the audience.

“About?” You asked, surely he wasn’t bringing this up. Your heart began to beat faster.

“I don’t think anyone expected you to stand up and fight the way you did, what prompted you to do that.” Ok this is your chance, stall. You thought.

“I- I suppose it was a spur of the moment, fight or flight sort of thing. In times of panic everyone reacts differently. I have basic self defense and martial arts training and some Stark tech, that’s about it. No crazy powers or anything. Someone once told me that if you have the ability to stop the bad things from happening, and you don’t, then they happen because of you. I knew that I could do something, so I did.” You spoke slowly, hoping to come off as sincere and thoughtful, though you were really just killing time.

“And paid the price.”

“I didn’t say it was easy. But some broken ribs are a small price to pay for saving some lives.” You tried to convince him.

“And how has it affected your relationship with the Mayor’s son, the reason you were at the gala that night?” Shit.

“I think it’s normal that trauma and stress can put a strain on a relationship, but if you’re both willing to communicate and work through it then there’s no reason it should have a negative affect.” You were immediately reminded of your interaction with Thomas last week.

                  - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

“Let's be honest, you were using me the entire time.” You said calmly, shouldn’t you be angry?

“Well not the entire time.” He answered with a smirk, dropping it when he noticed you were not amused.

“Thomas.” You spoke seriously, with a brow raised.

“Ok fine, like 95% of the time,” He admitted, dropping his playful tone once more, “Why are you here Y/N?”

“Because it's my turn to use you.” You stated simply, mimicking his smirk.

“What?” His eyes grew wide.

“The public needs to keep thinking were the perfect happy couple.” You explained.

“Why?” He asked, shaking his head.

“I have my reasons and you have yours.” You answered cryptically.

You weren’t surprised when he agreed, his father’s poll numbers had been dropping significantly. He wanted to get back in his father’s good graces. You were going to use this opportunity to look into the family, and the possible weapons dealings Danny Rand had warned you about. Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer, they say.

Plus, it gave you a good alibi to move the attention off of Peter, well, Spider-Man.

                  - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

“So you’re still together, despite the rumors that you’ve split?” Your interviewer pried.

“We are still together, and doing quite well, though I appreciate your concern.” Your reply was confident, and just cocky enough to get a laugh from the audience.

“How did he react to the rumors about a midnight tryst between you and Spider-Man?” He was enjoying this, and to top it all off, blasted that damn photograph on the screen, just in case the world had forgotten.

                  - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

Peter choked on his water, causing May to worryingly ask him if he’s alright. He attempts to reassure her, and silence her to hear your response.

You laughed before answering.

“Well I’d hardly consider it a midnight tryst, considering this picture was taken at 7:30. Plus Thomas was over at the time so it would be pretty hard for him to believe there was any ‘trysting’ going on.” You lied. Peter listened more intently as the interview was slowly devolving into an interrogation.

“So are you denying that you know Spider-Man?” The interviewer pressed, his tone near threatening.

“I’ve met the guy once,” Peter saw you shrug, “He saved my life, I thanked him. I’d hardly consider that knowing someone.”

It was in that moment Peter realized why you were doing all of this. You were trying to protect him, to shift the story. You wanted to get the attention off of him, and by doing that, shifted it all onto you. You were taking the fall, and once this blows over you can’t turn back. You were going to have to keep this up, this media persona. That meant more TV appearances, more interviews, more parties and galas. Becoming the exact person you didn’t want to be. Putting aside your work and research, for him.

                - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

“When we come back Y/N Stark is going to answer your questions you sent in on Twitter!” He pointed his note cards to the camera with a smile.

The curtain closed as you cut to commercial break. Your smile dropped and your mask melted away.

Your publicist Linda ran on stage yelling at the host.

“What the hell was that? We told you the attack was off limits!” She scolded him, you almost thought she’d threaten to sue. You’d never seen her this worked up before.

“It’s what people care about, it’s what they want to know! No one cares about how much money you donate to some kids.” He argued, you shook your head at how heartless he was.

You stormed over to the side of the stage, you could hear Linda’s heels behind you.

“Y/N-“ She spoke once she caught up to you, you whipped around to face her.

“This is why I didn’t want to do this bullshit! I’m out here getting interrogated! What’s he gonna ask about next, huh? The incident? The fucking Accords? Jesus!” You ranted, flailing your arms about.

”Back in 10.” A stagehand informed the two of you.

“Listen, I didn’t know he was going to do that ok. But now, you’re going to get your butt back in the chair and answer their silly questions from Twitter and you’re done, ok?” She pushed you back onto the stage, you quickly took your seat as the curtain separating you and the audience was pulled open and you were back live.

              - - - - - 🕷 - - - - -

After a painful 15 minutes of mind numbing questions like “Who’s your favorite Avenger?” and “F Marry Kill- Thor, Captain America, and Iron Man” (which you had declined to answer, that was your dad for Christ sake), you were finally making your way back to the car. Linda was giving you instructions in preparations for your day tomorrow.

“Ok, we’ve got the Vogue interview tomorrow morning, then Elle in the afternoon so I’ll send hair and makeup over around 5:45AM, you’ll have to be up and ready. Oh, but don’t eat anything you’ll want to look nice in your dress tomorrow.” You gave Linda a side eye and eye roll when her last words came out of her mouth. You were certainly not starving yourself. If you wanted to eat, you were going to eat, and God have mercy on anyone who got in your way.

Once you returned to the quiet emptiness of your apartment, you immediately slipped out of your dress and into yoga pants and a sports bra.

You began wrapping your knuckles, and attacking the punching bag - a little coping mechanism Cap had taught you. You were furious about how the interview went.

You had doubts that people would ever stop asking about Peter, and if any of this was worth it.

Little did you know, the friendly neighborhood Spiderling was sitting on your roof, after peering in through the window and seeing your assault on the bag.

He was curious about how you were doing. You had looked so happy and put together- but was that just a brave face and a dress? He realized now it was just a mask.

When he glanced once more, he found you in the kitchen, unwrapping your bleeding knuckles and downing a shot... and then another. You looked miserable, and exhausted.

He wanted to talk to you, but he didn’t want to make things worse. He was about to leave when he noticed you pulled out your phone and open the call app.

Your finger hovered over his name and he raised an eyebrow. You had an internal struggle over whether or not to call him, instead you set the phone down and groaned, sliding it across the counter.

“F.R.I. can you set an alarm for 5AM?” You asked, though you wished you didn’t have to.

“Sure can boss.” F.R.I.D.A.Y. replied.

You slipped a robe over your athletic wear and headed onto your balcony. You leaned on the edge, and looked out onto the moonlit park with a sigh. Dropping your head to your hands once more, and gently rubbing your temples.

Leaning back up onto your elbows, you took in a deep breath.

“I know you’re there Peter.” You spoke softly, turning your head slightly but keeping your body facing out over the ledge.

And your next action surprised both of you: you invited him in.

- - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - --

Taglist in the reblog.

Requirements for my taglist- like this post, and comment or reblog to stay on. 

Google form in my bio to request to be on it.

[haiyuta]

Fallen for you (m) || Wonho

request: I want to ask a really naughty smut, where Wonho is a male prostitute or a stripper, and he falls in love with one of his client. (the client is a girl).

Word count: 2.3k || Genre: smut, fingering, angst ish, kissing, Host kinda escort wonho, love, lap grinding, marking, 

a/n: no comment I love wonho hardest part picking a gif cause there is to many good ones lol. ending kinda rushed lol

Sitting across from him you shyly stared at him as he walked across the kitchen smoothly as he cooked the food. "Wow you're quite the chef," you giggled watching as he finished up the plating of the food.

Flashing you a small grin he slides the plate to you "Mmh I love cooking for people," he replied eyeing you. "Especially for a beauty like you," he flirtatiously said gazing at you. His dark eyes held that seductive yet loving look.

Loving. He was an escort he didn't 'love' you and probably wasn't interested in you he was playing a role you paid him for.

"Do you do this with most of your clients," you asked genuinely curiously taking bites of the food. Shocked at how good it was noting how he could cook better than you.

Wonho sat across from you and gave another look. "No I've never done this before with one of my clients," he replied smoothly. Your stomach twisted with the information feeling special that he did this for you.

"Oh wow I feel special," you gave a nervous laugh.

Wonho gave you a look a smile lifted on his face "that's because you are special," he replied with that dazzling smile. The smile you fell for the first time you met him at his host club the smile that made you pay him hundreds of dollars just to talk to him. Shin Hoeseok aka Wonho he had the charm he was smooth and flirtatious without coming off fake. He was handsome with his gentle swept hair and his strong chin and body. He had the money from being an escort.

Sitting in his apartment it showed he enjoyed the better things in life. Like nice furniture, a large kitchen and always had the more expensive clothing on.

You chatted lightly as you both ate. Talking about school, work and just life in general. He was always so comfortable talking to him and honestly, you did fall for his charms. He was attentive, kind and charming. He was the whole package. In the back of your mind, you knew this was what he did he charmed girls for money. You grimaced a little in jealously thinking of him with other girls charming them like he was charming you.

"Thank you it was great," you smiled.

"Maybe one day you could cook for me," he grinned leaning over gazing at you with so much love. Your mind went to jelly at that look.

"I would love to but don't blame me if you get food positioning," you joked.

Wonho sighed "Maybe I could teach you," he said. Your mind raced to imagine cooking next to him as you both would laugh and cook together. Like a couple.

Smiling you grinned "I would love that,". Looking at the time you realized it was almost '10'. "I should get going," you said getting up.

Wonho let out a whine coming across the bar area to put his hand on your back "You don't have to," he said.

Rolling your eyes "I'm sorry I just can't afford," you paused looking down feeling your face heat up. "I really want to though," you mumbled in defeat.

Wonho gave a look of confusion and then snapped his fingers "you mean money to pay me," he guessed.

"Yeah that," you trailed off.

"I don't want your money for my services," he said grabbing your hand and entwining his fingers into yours.

"Wonho," you mumbled shocked at the fact he didn't reject you.

In a quick movement, you felt Wonho wrap his one arm around your waist as your lips connected for a kiss. In a smooth motion kisses you. It was familiar and needy as you both opened your mouths letting one another invade the kiss.

You felt your body get pushed back to the couch as you kept the kiss your hands moved across his body feeling his muscles his soft parts and you enjoyed the kiss.

Parting the kiss you felt your lips red and aching for more from the kiss. Pushing you to the couch he laid above you as his lips attached to your neck. "I hope I'm not squishing you," he commented.

You grinned "You're not," you giggled as he moved his body across you.

With moans of want, you felt Wonho teeth on your neck and he bites and nibbled on it. You moaned feeling your stomach tighten knowing he was marking you up. "Wonho," you moaned.

Lifting his head up he gazed at you with those dark eyes he had. "Got to mark up my baby girl," he commented leaning up capturing your lips for a moment. The hurried kiss took your breath away for a moment.

Your fingers found their way to his toned torso as you felt his muscles up. They were practically perfect as you felt yourself feel every curve and hardness. Your fingers lightly found his joggers as you slightly palmed his erection.

"Hm baby," he moaned out to you. His fingers found their way to your pants as he unbuttoned them swiftly. He has done this so many times he should be good at this.

His fingers lightly played with your flesh "You feel so soft," he commented grinning.  

You blushed looking away from him his gaze was too intense and his comments so warm. The comments made your mind world with love.

His fingers found their way past your jeans are your panties as he teased you. Letting out a small gasp from the pleasure. Your legs opened slightly more for him to tease you better. Closing your eyes you let your body just enjoy the feeling of his fingers.

"Look at the cute face twisted with pleasure," he teased. Opening your eyes to see Wonho with that lust gaze. You turned away twisting your hips up to feel him more. "Look at me," he said grabbing your face turning it toward him.

Those talented fingers stroking you slowly as he played with you. "Wonho please more," you whined.

"Don't come yet," he teased out his tongue peeking out licking his lips. Those beautiful bow lips. Lifting your hips you panted as he thrust his fingers harder against you.

"Please," you whined with want. Slowly you felt him withdraw his fingers.

"Hm come here," he said as he shifted you from under him as he slowly but angled yourself on his lap. In that hurry, you pulled off your jeans.

You sighed in content putting your arms around his neck feeling up his large shoulders. "I love that body of yours," you complimented him.

Wonho pursed up his lips "is that all you love about me," he complimented.

You frowned "No I love your smile," you paused tilting your head "I love the way you cook and how kind and caring you are," you said.

Wonho gazed at you with a look. "I love this," he said taking your waist in one hand and threading his fingers through yours. The contact made you warm with love and affection. 

With that, you felt Wonho pull his joggers down a bit as he took his already red aching cock out. His hands leading your body like a dance as he lifted your body up placing you on his lap. Without words, you slowly slide on him. He hummed with pleasure you sat on his lap.

You slowly ground your hips onto his letting the pleasure flow through you as he gently met your hips. "Ah," you gave a whiny moan as you held his hand keeping your mind and body still grounded. 

Lifting your hips you slowly fucked him ever so gently. Wonho threw his head back moaning as you moved your hips up and down. He moaned "you look so pretty on my lap," he said.

The pleasure was overtaking you. The tension felt so real and your body felt so warm. The heat licking your skin like fire from the pleasure. "Please Wonho," you moaned wanting to just feel that moment chasing it with the one you love.

You felt Wonho grip your body tightly in a protective manner as his hips thrust in a sloppy manner telling he was chasing his own high. With an equal thrust, you felt the pleasure build so good. You panted with want as the feeling of pleasure feel you. 

"Fuck Y/n I love you," he moaned placing his hips deep into you as he came.

Your eyes widen from the confession but without notice, you felt your legs tremble with want as waves of pleasure crashed across your body. Letting out strings of moans you slowly grinded yourself on him until you came down from your high.

It was silent for a moment making you shiver from the cold air and the tension. Smiling you looked at Wonho shyly "thanks," you mumbled lifting yourself off of him. Embarrassed at how exposed you were. The tension from those little words  'I love you,'

Without words, you got dressed ready to just leave the house. "Y/n I," he stopped reaching for you but you pulled away.

"I'm sorry I have to go," you said looking for your stuff wanting to just get out. Of course, you felt the same you've had sex with him multiple time spent so much time together you just couldn't.

He was an escort a host this was his job and you wanted to be selfish and have him for yourself.

"Y/n what I said was true I," he paused watching as you hurried to get your shoes back on. "I've fallen for you," he finished his voice soft.

You paused tears threatening to fall. "I'm sorry Wonho," you said looking up at him. "I just can't right now," you said going for the door.

"Let us talk about this," he pleaded walking toward you. He was still disheveled from the sex which was such a sexy look on him. Your heart raced looking at him not wanting to go through this emotional rollercoaster right now.

Shaking your head "I just can't I'm sorry," you said. Right now you felt all kinds of feeling dirty, conflicted and confused were the main ones.

"Why Y/n just tell me why," he asked. "Why are you walking away from me," he asked his face twisted with confusion.

You paused reaching for the door stopping "Wonho you're an escort and this," you went between you two. "Can't work," you stopped reaching for the door handle. 

"I love you so much Wonho and I feel selfish for saying this but," you kept going "I just want you all to myself," you finished.

Turning the handle you just wanted to escape this tension and get home "I just shouldn't have fallen for you for your charm," you finished the rant tears escaping now. "We just couldn't be," you said "I'm so sorry," you whispered out again leaving the apartment and leaving him.

It's been two weeks since you've spoken to Wonho. It was hard not getting morning texts or flirting with him. He didn't call you and you didn't call him like an equal understanding that this couldn't happen.

Honestly, you felt like an ass declaring that to him. It wasn't that you disliked he was an escort you just couldn't date him even if he was hosting/escorting. A job like that with a girl like you it would just cause jealousy and insecurity dating him as he gets paid from women for his attention.

You were helping him in a way you kept telling yourself. He would lose business if he dated and the girls found out. It would hurt them knowing you get love free and were dating. So to keep him from that fate he had to stay single.

A small beep made you lift your head from your bed.  

My Wonho: Could you please meet me at the usual spot?

You stared at the screen for about 2 mins until you blinked.

You: Sure I'll be there

You replied quickly as waiting for a response. 

My Wonho: Thanks see ya soon:)

You sighed getting ready to face him again your stomach turned as you put on an outfit. In your mind, you did try to look for an extra cute one for him.

Sighing you got to the place. It was an isolated place near the river you both would have lunch together before.

Seeing Wonho you gulp a nervous feeling butterflying in your stomach. You felt your legs walk on there own toward him. You noted he looked very attractive his skin clear, his clothing a black shirt and a denim jacket with matching tight pants.

"Hi," you mumbled leaning on the rail eyeing him.

Looking at you he replied "Hey," he reached over to hand you something "I got you a coffee," he said handing you one of the iced coffees from the bag.

Smiling you thanked him as you both stood there awkwardly. You took a sip cringing at the taste "oh where did you get this from," you said finding it rather distasteful.

"I made it," he commented "did you not like it," he said with a worried tone. "It was my first training day," he said putting his hand on his neck rubbing it in embarrassment.

Raising an eyebrow "you made this," you said shocked.

Wonho gave you a grin taking your hand "well I got a coffee job now," he said smiling. Your eyes widen at the news. "I have fallen for you," he confessed. "I was going to tell you I quit the club already but you didn't let me finish," he laughed.

"You quit," you started shocked.

"I did it the moment I realized you were the only person for me," Wonho said.  "I just want us to be together and I can't be with you if I spend hours a day trying to woo other people," he stopped his hand squeezing yours. "I want us to be a couple and take you on dates, and meet your parents and make dorky vlogs," he said. "I want us to be real no money no other clients just you and me," he finished.

"Wonho I," you stopped still startled. "I'm so happy," you finished wrapping your arms around his neck hugging him. He was yours finally no more sharing no more paying he was all yours. You felt your body buzz with happiness.

"I'm glad baby girl," he commented hugging you back.

"Now let's talk I haven't talked to you in two weeks and it killed me not to talk to you," he said. You grinned taking his hand feeling safe and content.

[benofie]

Another Nick x June tag game.

Okay friends! Let’s do this. Spread some love for our fave dystopian couple. 

1. What’s your favorite Nick x June scene? 

2. At what point while watching the show did you realize you were invested in their relationship? 

3. If you hadn’t already read the book and knew they would be a thing. When did you say “Oh yeah, something is going to happen with these two?” Or were you kinda caught of guard? 

4. What do you think their relationship means to them? For June and Nick as individuals? 

5. What was your reaction when it was revealed June was pregnant with Nick’s baby? 

6. What do you think their relationship brings to the show overall? And what are some of the things you love most about their relationship?

7. The nursery scene. Discuss. 

8. Favorite June moment on the show. 

9. Favorite Nick moment on the show. 

10. What scene of theirs do you feel is a bit underrated? 

Bonus:

Technically speaking, June’s relationship with Nick can be classified as an affair because she’s married to another man. Do you see their relationship as June cheating given the unique situation they are in? Or do you feel because of the circumstance they are in, it’s a grey area and as such it’s unfair to classify it as straightforward as June is cheating? 

~~~~~~~~~~~

Thanks for the tag @skyshipper!! I deliberately have not read any answers to these questions yet because I wanted to be sure my answers were authentically "me," although I will not be surprised if some of our answers are the same 😉

So... for those who aren't aware, I was tagged to do this WEEKS ago and had jumped right on it. I had been super inspired too and poured my heart out answering these questions and then..... Tumblr ate my post. 😡 This hurt SO BAD! I had really loved some of my answers and was so proud of it and then *POOF* gone! 😖😩

Frankly, this stung so bad I've had a hard time even OPENING Tumblr since then. But at the same time, I really wanted to go back and finish this. It was like a mental block for me... I could not be alright with Tumblr again until I finished it.

So this is my attempt to mentally recover all of the brilliant things I had said before 😑 It is at least as close as I can recall to what I lost. Hopefully after all this, that it's worth the trauma 😉

1. What’s your favorite Nick x June scene? 

It really is so hard to choose just one, isn't it? But the very first scene that I still remember having a huge impact on me from first watch was their first real sex scene in 1x05. I had never seen anything like it and I doubt I will ever see another one like it again. What makes it unique is 1) June's circumstance, taking back her agency and control over her own body; 2) Nick's instincts to hold back and allow her this agency and taking control of that moment. Beyond that, the level of passion and desire is off the charts and watching how they nonverbally communicate with each other through the whole thing is mesmerizing.

Another thing I thought of is the additional significance of June stripping Nick and herself of their clothes... in addition to June taking control of that situation, she is also stripping them of their Gilead "roles." So that Nick and June are no longer Guardian and Handmaid but simply a man and a woman standing before each other.

2. At what point while watching the show did you realize you were invested in their relationship? 

I think I had been "lightly" shipping them all along. But the moment when this ship took full possession of my brain and nearly every second of my life afterward was the end of 2x09. I was and still am so moved by Nick's honesty and selflessness. I am so used to seeing lying or withholding the truth used to create drama on TV shows. It's a bit sad to me that it was actually shocking to me that Nick was completely honest with her when he stood to gain nothing and risked losing the woman he loved by doing so.

I had already loved their story and looked forward to their scenes and even was already rewatching their scenes before that point. But the day after I saw 2x09, I was completely useless at work, could not get them out of my head, started looking up Nick/June fanvids on YouTube and seeking out Nick/June discussions online. I was a goner after that and still have yet to recover 😍

3. If you hadn’t already read the book and knew they would be a thing. When did you say “Oh yeah, something is going to happen with these two?” Or were you kinda caught of guard? 

Lol were there people caught off guard by this?

I'll be honest, I binged all of S1 over a single weekend and attribute my fast consumption of that season to why I don't remember too many of my first impressions of things. I don't remember what I thought about Nick in S1, for example. Apparently many didn't trust him at first... I can't remember if I even thought about it.

My point is, I don't have a clear memory of any particular moment when I realized they were going to be a thing, it's also worth noting that I have never read the book, so I didn't have that context to go on either. But I kinda think it seemed pretty obvious from the beginning that something was going to happen with them.

4. What do you think their relationship means to them? For June and Nick as individuals? 

For Nick, I think June is the love of his life. I have always had the impression that he was just very drawn and attracted to her in a very natural "boy meets girl, boy likes girl" way from very early on. Only in this case, it's dangerous for both of them if he acts on his feelings. I also don't think his desire for June had anything to do with their circumstance or proximity. I think he would have been drawn to her outside Gilead too, if he'd seen her at a bar or coffee house.

For June it's so much more complicated! But put very simply, I think Nick is her sunshine in this very dark place and period of her life. Many have pointed out how often June is bathed in light when Nick is with her and I think it's the same for her with him. Nick is what prevented June from becoming batshit crazy like Janine and Emily. He's her savior, her comfort, her balance, her release... he gives her whatever she needs at any given moment.

5. What was your reaction when it was revealed June was pregnant with Nick’s baby? 

This is one of those moments I do not remember my specific reaction to. But I can't imagine I was terribly surprised by it.

6. What do you think their relationship brings to the show overall? And what are some of the things you love most about their relationship?

Kinda like what I said about what Nick is for June, their relationship is like rays of sunshine cutting through all the pain and darkness of this show. It's like the heart that keeps pumping life into this story. This show would not survive without it. Period. It would be far too bleak without the reprieve of their love and the hope it brings. We root for them to survive and have the life they dream of after Gilead.

What do I love most? I think what sets this ship apart from all others to me is how high the stakes are for them. They are both risking their lives to be together. That is such a moving example to me of what a powerful force love can be.

7. The nursery scene. Discuss. 

OMG!! SO GOOD!!!

My only complaints about this scene are that it is too short and that I wish the set pic of Nick kissing her forehead was in it. Other than that, it's perfect!! I love every detail... June sweetly leading Nick into the nursery by the hand; how nervous Nick looks just entering the room; Rita quietly taking her cue to leave the couple alone with their baby; June's face as she's holding their baby and looking lovingly at Nick; Nick looking terrified to even touch the baby, like he's afraid he's going to break her (so adorable and relatable!); the overwhelming flood of love as Holly makes Nick smile bigger than we've ever seen, June is moved to kiss his cheek and TELL HIM SHE LOVES HIM!; Nick, breathless and overwhelmed, looking at June; June's tender smile and tears confirming her words of love to him are true; the look of resolve that Nick gets on his face that he will do anything to protect his girls, his family.

I think describing it in detail took way longer than the scene actually is, but it's just so good, so perfect 😍

8. Favorite June moment on the show. 

I think the moment right before the nursery scene when June comforts Nick. Nick has always been a source of comfort, support, and understanding for June and this was June's turn to comfort him and he lets her. Touching his face, telling him it's ok.... He's hurting and can't be for her what he usually is, and she's letting him know it's ok and she understands. So beautiful.

9. Favorite Nick moment on the show. 

The head nod in 2x13 letting June know in a single gesture that he knows what's going on and it's ok. I loved that head nod so much. I still get a shiver of relief and recognition when I see it. It says a million things in a single gesture... trust me, I got you... I love you... goodbye. Fuck me up. It's such a small moment that says so much and that is such a perfectly "Nick" thing.

Gah... I think I'm gonna cheat and say Nick's honesty at the end of 2x09 too... I've already talked about why I love it and why it's so important to me. I can't choose a favorite between these two, sorry. Don't make me!

10. What scene of theirs do you feel is a bit underrated? 

Same scene as #8 above. This moment was so special and moving to me and literally NO ONE mentioned it in reviews or podcast discussions. People glossed over it like it had no significance at all. What the actual fuck?!

Bonus:

Technically speaking, June’s relationship with Nick can be classified as an affair because she’s married to another man. Do you see their relationship as June cheating given the unique situation they are in? Or do you feel because of the circumstance they are in, it’s a grey area and as such it’s unfair to classify it as straightforward as June is cheating? 

June usually tends to get a pass for this because of her circumstances. She's endured torture, rape, beatings, isolation, and separation from her family and at least in the beginning, her affair with Nick seemed to come out of desperation to reclaim some control of her own body and seek sexual pleasure and release. And I think this relationship has saved her sanity. For this reason most people don't fault her for becoming physically and eventually emotionally involved with Nick. And I don't either.

I would also add that it happens all the time where people develop feelings for others outside of their marriage. And sometimes this leads to relationships that end marriages. I don't necessarily endorse cheating as a rule and I don't think being unfaithful is ok. My feeling is that if this happens, people should be as honest as they can be with their partners. If it's a sign of problems in the marriage and those problems can't be fixed, maybe that relationship has run its course. What I dislike about affairs is the lying and deception. I think the lies hurt more than learning the truth sometimes.

In June's situation, she is simply unable to communicate any of this with Luke. So typical conventional rules of cheating don't seem to apply in her case. Further, had she remained faithful to Luke and NOT engaged in this relationship with Nick, she may have become so broken she may not have survived at all.

Ok! It's finally done!! Yippee!!

Source credit: @pegsccarter

I think everyone has already done this but I will tag you guys so you will at least see this...

@dcgal814 @aperture @loth-cat-loth-cat @splitscreen @teamnick @smoulderingocean @crollah @supermessgirl

[bellarkefanfiction]

We Play Our Parts So Well

written by: Josefine / @selflessbellamy

prompt: bellamy and clarke are actors on a tv show. theyre love interests but are also dating irl and they have to shoot their first sex scene together. they get it on either during (unknowingly to others) or after the shoot for anonymous

word count: 2847

There are countless things wrong with having your co-stars head between your thighs. Especially if it’s done off-camera, in the casual setting of his apartment, with the spicy taste of Italian red wine lingering like a promise at the tip of her tongue. Bellamy, of course, ate her out vigorously until she grasped at the sheets like a lifeline, and now his character, Julian Amerada, has to do the same to hers. And Clarke has to pretend, for the sake of self-preservation, that she doesn’t know what it feels like.

In the hit NBC TV-series Embers, Clarke plays the role of Cassandra Tallion, a princess whose life is forever altered when she discovers what it’s like to be a warrior. And since the premiere of the show — the first scene she shared with Bellamy, more precisely — fans on Twitter (and virtually every other social media platform in existence) — have been screaming in all caps for them to just ‘SUCK FACES ALREADY ASDFGBSKCKXS’

Now, they’re finally going to get what they want. It’s been five seasons and the showrunner, Thelonius Jaha, has decided that it’s finally time to make Jassandra a thing — a canon thing.

Jasper Jordan, one of the special effect technicians, puts sugar in his coffee (enough to kill a small animal), quirks up an eyebrow and looks from Bellamy to Clarke before stating the obvious, “The internet is gonna fucking explode when you guys finally get it on.”

For a moment, Clarke’s eyes flicker nervously to Bellamy’s. Oh god, she’s supposed to be an actress, but she can’t even keep her cool in this situation. Meanwhile, her very handsome and very forbidden boyfriend takes a sip of his Earl Grey tea (Miller loves to call him a ‘sophisticated bastard’ for that preference), looking at Jasper nonchalantly.

“Did I hear someone say ‘getting it on’?” Raven chimes in, walking towards their table to throw her arms around Clarke’s shoulders. “That’s my domain.”

At that, Clarke only chuckles. So does Bellamy. “Raven, the last time I checked, you were happily married to an ex-pilot by the name of Shaw.”

Flippantly, Reyes takes her best friend’s coffee mug to steal a sip, then winces at the taste when she realizes that it isn’t black. “Yeah, and we get it on all the time. But of course, you wouldn’t know about that now, would you, Griffin?” It’s a fair burn, but little does Raven know that it no longer rings true. Since Clarke started seeing Bellamy off set four months ago, she’s had more orgasms than she had during all of last year.

“Have you read the script?” Harper McIntyre joins them. She plays Amelia, Cassandra’s stepsister, who is trying to overthrow her own father’s regime. “It’s cunnilingus, right?”

Jordan chuckles, “Oh please, Harper. You read all of it just like the rest of us,” and when Clarke looks at him, her brow furrowed in confusion, he continues, “Every single one of us is on team Jassandra. It’s no secret.”

As Clarke looks around the table, everyone — including Miller — nods, and Murphy even confesses to buying merch from Ebay, which leaves the rest of them shook. Still, his only explanation is, “What can I say? Some of this fanart is pretty fucking cool.”

Well, you can’t argue with that. Every time Clarke logs on to Twitter, her mentions are full of beautiful art pieces and gifs that people have made of the show (someone even wrote a song for Jassandra once). It warms her heart and makes her smile each day knowing that there are so many talented, passionate fans out there.

Episode 5x07 of Embers is called ‘The Land We March For’, and they’re shooting some of it tomorrow morning, including the already notorious love scene in Cassandra’s bedchamber in Marble Castle. Feeling a bit nervous about the whole ordeal, Clarke decides to abandon the table and take a look at the set, which has been prepared for the shoot tomorrow.

There are candles everywhere, ready to be lit and the bed has been covered in furs. It looks beautiful, but Clarke still has to swallow the lump in her throat.

“You alright?”

Smiling, Bellamy puts a hand to her shoulder. He must’ve followed her here, and she instantly appreciates it. For some reason, she always feels more at ease when she’s around him, and even though having to do her first love scene on screen is still incredibly daunting, she’s so glad that he will be there with her.

“Yeah… Just a bit nervous,” she confesses after a minute.

In comfort, he places his hand on her shoulder, caressing it with his thumb. “Trust me, I get that.”

Unlike her, Bellamy has done a love scene on Embers before, although it was a short flashback one between Julian and his deceased lover, Karolina. “Whatever,” she says, exhaling. “We’ll just have to kill this scene, you know? The viewers deserve something great. Our characters deserve it. We just need to do it justice.”

In fact, it was partly with the viewers and their characters in mind that Bellamy and Clarke asked for some of the script for the scene to be altered. Originally, Cassandra was supposed to beg Julian to ‘ravish her’, but that seemed non-consensual and out of character, so they made sure that the line was changed to ‘make love to me’.

“I can’t wait to see the fan reaction.”

“Jasper’s right. People are gonna lose their shit.”

(Certainly, they are not wrong…)

***

Just before they start filming the scene the next morning, Clarke tweets a row of cryptic emojis along with the hashtags #EmbersTV and #BigDay. Smirking, she joins Bellamy on the set of Cassandra’s bedchamber, and even though they both look very much in character, they have one last ritual as Bellamy and Clarke before they start shooting.

They hug. For a long time…

It’s nice, not only because of the obvious reasons, but it also seems to strengthen their connection, so that the chemistry continues to be — as according to @TheTheloniusJaha on Twitter — on fire. When this ritual started two years ago, the showrunner found it so special that he posted a picture of it to the Internet, and to say the fandom went nuts would be an understatement. Most notable retweets go to:

@Jassandraisrealbitches: NOW WE HAVE SOME CONTENT FOR MODERN AU’S FOLKS ASDFJGGJFSO

@JulianAmeradaah: Oh would you look at these cuties??!!!?? No wonder why their connection is da bomb.com

@QueenCassandra: This might not be the canon story, but my Jassandra heart has been fed a whole ass meal thank u @ jesus

“Are you okay?” Bellamy murmurs once they pull away from each other, his eyes as soft as the rain-soaked Earth, and she just barely resists the desire to kiss him. Instead, she nods, determined. Then they go to their assigned marks just before Thelonius Jaha roars, “ACTION!”

Cassandra’s hair is still wet from a bath, so she’s wringing it out when Julian emerges from the shadows, his ripped shirt exposing the blossoming bruises on his chest. She gasps, stepping forward to reach for him, but he takes a step back. His midnight sky eyes have lost their stars as they flash with an emotion she can’t identify. “I’m a monster, Princess,” he proclaims.

She ignores it. “I told you not to call me that.”

Without looking at her, he bursts into laughter, almost hysterical. The horror of battle has started to feast on his soul, on his heart and it threatens to tear her apart, seeing him like this. “Julian, please…” She can tell that he wants to look at her, because he clenches his jaw.

“I thought I was angry when I heard about Bhoran asking for your hand in marriage, Your Highness, but how can I be? I will never be good enough for you. I could never give you the life you want.”

Once he’s said that, the blood boils in her veins and fire sparks within her ocean eyes. This time when she strides forward, she doesn’t let him back away. Instead, she crashes her mouth onto his, her lips violent and desperate…

Unbeknownst to their co-stars, Bellamy and Clarke have already kissed countless times, so even though their makeout sessions are a lot more relaxed than this, kissing is easy. But staying in character, however, that’s difficult. She can tell that Bellamy wants to soften the kiss, which he isn’t supposed to. He also buries his hand in her hair, going off script, but it likely won’t be a big deal.

Definitely not to the fans anyway… They will gush about this for months.

Julian breaks away to discover that her rage hasn’t evaporated completely. “Since when do you know what I want?” She hisses, even if her lower lip quivers with emotion. In front of her is the man who taught her to fight, to defy her father, to value her own ambition instead of being obedient. “I want you. All of you,” she states, tearing at his ruined shirt until the material falls off.

“Cassandra…” Finally, he says her real name, causing her eyes to shut briefly as desire strikes her harder. Still, his voice is barely audible, hidden by a veil of uncertainty, but she holds his gaze with the utmost determination as she maps his chest with her hands, the bruises too.

(Clarke takes the liberty of licking her lips a little, so that means Cassandra does as well)

“Make love to me.”

He stares for half a minute. “I can’t… You’re a—“

“Don’t say it!” When she turns her back to him, Julian can’t resist the temptation of undoing the buttons on her dress. In fact, he wants nothing more than to free her of that horrible corset. Leaning into his touch, she sighs. “Until morning, I am Cassandra, no more, no less… And I love you.”

One thing that the TV Scoop journalist Riley Peterson remarked in his first of many reviews on Embers was that the love scenes were graphic, just like in Game of Thrones, which had a bunch of horny white men flocking to the show only to be disappointed when they discovered that Embers is unapologetically feminist. Jaha even had this in mind when he chose the type of sex that Julian and Cassandra (his two leads) would be having.

(“Yeah, Cassandra’s father may be all about preserving medieval values, but Julian isn’t.”

When Jaha said that, Bellamy had winked at her discreetly, whispering, “Julian knows how to please a woman. We have so much in common.” For that comment, Clarke kicked teasingly at his shin under the table)

There’s a cut between Cassandra’s dress falling to the floor and the next scene where they’re in her bed, having sex, so they take a quick break to have some water. “We got this, right?”

Looking around to make sure nobody’s watching them, Bellamy presses a reassuring kiss to her temple, and she smiles in gratitude. Still, she’s unsure about something, so she decides to ask Bellamy for his two cents because he’s probably the person — right next to Jaha and herself — that knows the most about Cassandra as a character.

“How loud do you’d think she’d be?”  When he raises his eyebrows, grinning, she swats at his arm. “It’s a genuine question, Bellamy.”

“I know. Sorry… I’m gonna say that she’s a woman, a virgin, who’s having oral sex with the man that she loves the most in the world, so… she’s probably loud. At the very least shook.”

Well, that part won’t be hard to play at all. The first time Bellamy went down on her, she was left speechless, feeling as if she were flying high above land with the stars surrounding her. Yes, it’d been that great, and luckily he’d felt the same way.

They’re smiling at each other when Jaha appears. “Sorry if I’m ruining a moment, but we gotta roll again.”

Showtime…  

To get it right, Clarke tries to remember the stars that formed behind her eyelids when Bellamy licked into her for the first time, and it works. She cries out, clutching at his hair with one hand and at the sheets with the other. As her lips part, Bellamy presses an unscripted kiss to her inner thigh, which has her gasping. It’s a natural reaction, for her as well as Cassandra, so it really doesn’t matter, but she still feels self-conscious.

“You good?” Bellamy adlibs, and she nods frantically, managing a fake moan when he pretends to pick up the pace.  

To be fair, the script doesn’t mention anything about Cassandra having an orgasm, but in the matter of two seconds, Clarke decides that yes, her character would definitely have one, so she does her job as an actress and fakes it. This is something that she’s never done with Bellamy before, which means that the production team will have to decide whether it’s convincing enough to keep in the final take.

“Beautiful,” once again, Bellamy adlibs, but he’s good at that, mostly because he has such a strong sense of Julian. Then he moves up her body to kiss her deeply, and when Jaha yells ‘CUT!’ it clearly takes all of his willpower to stop. Pulling back, he mimics ‘Later’ like a promise; his dark eyes alight with sparks.

***

Later in her dressing room, Clarke is alone and has just pulled out a Hershey’s cookies and cream bar as a reward for her sweet tooth when Bellamy walks in, hands buried in his pockets. A smile is blooming on her lips when she turns around to face him.

He starts, “You should improvise more. I know that’s usually my thing, but you’re really good at it.”

Feeling heat rush to her face at the compliment, Clarke admits, “Well, I’m not actually used to faking orgasms… I’ve only ever done it once.”

His brow furrows, and it’s most likely because of their five-year-long friendship that she understands why without having to ask. Therefore, she clears her throat, blushing harder. She feels like a teenager. “Not with you. I have an ex-boyfriend that I only slept with once before we broke up, and he really failed at getting me off.”

“Do you want me to get you off?”

“You just did,” she replies, her sassiness colliding with his bluntness in a way that makes him laugh. It’s her favorite sound, even better than jazz on a Sunday morning or a rainstorm pounding against her window…

“No. Julian got Cassandra off. We should celebrate. Jassandra’s canon, after all. ”

There are countless things wrong with having your co-stars head between your legs; especially it’s in an unlocked dressing room… Whatever. It’s too late to be sensible now, and if being sensible means that she can no longer date or have sex with Bellamy, she is choosing to be foolish.

“Oh, the things we do for fun,” she thinks out loud, the words emerging at the edge of a moan. Bellamy’s tongue is always able to give her earthquake-like orgasms that cause tremors to run through her body, the best of aftershocks. Laughing, she pulls him up to kiss the bronze stars on his forehead.

“Do you think we should tell the others about us?”

Her heart swells. This is getting really serious for him, too. “Yeah. When the time is right.”

***

As it turns out, the time is right on the night where the episode airs on national television, and Clarke has decided to invite the entire gang over to celebrate and watch live. Just when the love scene is about to start, Jasper mumbles around his slice of pizza, “This is my favorite part,” and everyone chuckles, but he is too fixated on the screen to notice.

Smiling a little shyly, Clarke walks to Bellamy while their friends are watching the scene unfold and sits down on his lap. Only when the scene is over, everyone turns to them (mostly because their phones are blowing up with Twitter notifications). Apparently the least shocked, Raven is the first person to make a comment, “Fucking finally. I knew all of that chemistry wasn’t there for nothing.”

“Reyes, you sound like a Twitter fangirl,” Miller notes, which earns him a pillow in the face.  

But yeah, in Miller’s defense, she actually does:

@Jassandraisreal: ASDFHDISNVJ BITCH I AM ON THE F L O O R. WHAT THE FUQ? #Jassandra #EmbersTV #507

@AmeradasJulian: SHE CAME… SHE CAME!!!111!!! WHEN WILL YOUR OTP EVER? I HAVE ASCENDED #Jassandra #EmbersTV #i am deceased

@Embersfan125: How is it possible to be so alive and so fucking dead at the same time?? I blame @EmbersTV @TheTheloniusJaha @ClarkeyG & @BellamyBlake #EmbersTV

However, this is nothing compared to the amount of keysmashes and exclamation points in the tweets following Bellamy’s announcement 18 months later:

BELLAMY BLAKE: ‘YES, IT’S TRUE. CLARKE AND I ARE ENGAGED.’

Fans all over the world have lost it. As @Jassandraendgaame on Twitter so eloquently puts it: “WE NEVER FUCKING LOSE BITCHES!”

[thehonestreader]

The Wicked + The Divine, Volume Six: Imperial Phase Part 2 by Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie, Matthew Wilson, Clayton Cowles

Rating: C-

Every ninety years the gods of the Pantheon return. They’re loved, they’re hated, and in two years, they’re dead. Those two years are almost up. Half the Pantheon is already dead, and the remaining members can feel time slipping from them. And while some, like the Norns, are determined to work out what Ananke was up to, others just want to let themselves burn out brightly. Because once you’re at the peak of your power, there’s only one way left to go.

--

I called it. I. Called. It. The minute David Blake showed up last volume I knew that he was going to play a bigger role in all of this, and that’s finally revealed here. I didn’t see Jon coming, so I didn’t see the bigger picture, but Blake coming back into the picture was a bit obvious.

This volume definitely ends with a huge cliffhanger. But at this point it’s like, “Do I even care anymore?” And I gotta admit the answer is verging more and more on no. I don’t feel for the characters anymore. Mostly because I don’t even feel like I know them at this point. These are a bunch of strangers, clawing at each other and fighting at every turn. Or fucking. Whatever, right? Same thing to these assholes. And there hasn’t been any in-depth character building for ages so everyone is flat as hell. Like, maybe I would have found Sakhmet’s arc here interesting if she’d had any semblance of a personality. Or a backstory. Or something. Literally anything would have been better that the bland beige character she is. But over 30-some-odd volumes I know two things about her: the only emotion she feels is anger, and she ate her dad. Based off that, Gillen is asking a lot of me to care about her and Persephone. A lot.

Cassandra is my favorite character. At least she has a personality. Dionysus would probably be my second favorite at this point, but like Sakhmet, we don’t know all that much about him. I just feel for the guy in this one since Woden fucks him over pretty badly. And then...well...yeah. The whole premise of this series is the gods are going to die. Three guesses what happens to my ace homeboy. My third liked is Morrigan, but only because I love her overall vibe and looks. Otherwise...meh.

I think I keep coming back to this series because it’s familiar. This may have been the first graphic novel I read seriously. This or Saga; I can’t remember. So no matter what, these hold a special place in my heart, even if I don’t think they deserve it. Because Jesus fucking Christ, the story is so confusing at this point that I barely understand what’s happening anymore. This is a series that lost me pretty frequently from the very beginning, and I know Kieron Gillen is out there somewhere thinking I’m just too much of an idiot to understand his work. I think it was in the back of the Year One collection where he mentioned something along the lines of, “My work is so intricate you may need to read it several times to understand it.” (I can’t direct quote because I don’t actually own that collection and this is going back years at this point.) And pretty much since then I’ve also had this, I don’t know...resentment?...when I read these now. Because that’s pretentious. That’s so pretentious. I shouldn’t have to reread this start to finish every time before every new volume because the writing is so convoluted that I can’t follow it. I also almost always avoid all the little “extras” in the backs now too because I’m afraid I’ll come across another such comment.

The art is always gorgeous, consistently. It’s the biggest reason I keep coming back. The story will almost always disappoint me in some way, big or small. But the art? The art never lets me down.

At this point I’ll just keep chugging along; this series is almost over anyway. I have no idea where all this is going. But can we all just admit that wherever this story does end up, it’s not going to live up to expectations?

-Review by C.M.

[gffa]

THIS IS GOING TO BE A JOURNEY and it may not be what you were looking for, but I hope that it can explain how I came around on TLJ and why I’m sitting where I am, why I’ve made peace with it and even come to like aspects of it.  It’s going to seem pretty negative at first and it’s not going to work for everyone (spoiler alert: I think the supplementary canon is pretty invaluable for turning someone around), but I’ll lay out how I got to a pretty good place with TLJ! Because, looking back on it, I think what I really needed to do wasn’t to sweep aside my negative feelings, but instead to work through them.  This isn’t a post for people who loved TLJ and want a celebratory post about it!  It’s also not a post for people who hated it and want to read criticisms of it (though, both those things are in here!).  It’s a post for those who are struggling with how to figure out how to feel about it and want to like it a little more.  (Or anyone who just wants to rubberneck at this rather long navel-gazing post!  XD) LET ME START WITH THIS:  I fully recognize that my method and my views and my way of coming around on TLJ aren’t going to be for everyone and that’s okay. We all have our different views of the movie and we all have our preferences/lines in the sand drawn at our own personal points.  If you read what I have to say and don’t come out any more convinced than you were before, that’s okay, too! LET ME FOLLOW IT UP WITH THIS:  My feelings for TLJ are complicated, in that there are aspects of it that I really enjoy, but I came around to them in a very roundabout way and that may not work for everyone.  While there are things I really love about the movie now, there are also things that I think are never going to work for me.  In a nutshell:  The Luke & Rey storyline is largely the only one that really works for me.  The Kylo stuff actually hangs together reasonably coherently for me, I’m just not sure what to do with it until IX comes out.

The Finn & Rose stuff has a lot of potential that I like, but it fails to follow through on that potential.  As @thewillowbends has noted many times (and she’s very right about this, imo) HOW do you have a storyline about what war does to people by the rich and powerful to the oppressed, HOW do you have a storyline that contains child slaves in it, AND NOT CONNECT IT TO FINN’S STORY AS A CHILD SOLDIER IN THE FIRST ORDER? The Poe & Holdo stuff has potential and hangs together well on a thematic level, as the three stories are about cementing characters into their roles and making sure they are committed to being on these paths, as well as the movie has the theme running through it of defying expectations (yet this still locks them into giving those expectations just as much importance, because that’s the framework you’re still working it) and that it’s about men being called out by women, that this is how the Poe and Holdo thing defies what we expect.  Yes, I can agree with all of that!  I can agree that Holdo doesn’t owe him an explanation, women don’t owe men shit, in that sense!  It works on a thematic level, but then I look at it from a character level and it just absolutely falls apart for me.  W H Y did Holdo not sense the mutiny brewing under her nose, W H Y not just tell us a good reason for not saying anything about their plan?  There’s no in universe answer that has satisfied me on that yet. AND THEN THE ONE THING THE MOVIE MAY NEVER BE ABLE TO FIX:  Rian Johnson makes no bones about how this was a movie about defying expectations, that Rey’s story in the cave was about the hardest thing for her to hear, it was a movie about Luke Skywalker not being what we thought we wanted from the story.  And I can eventually come around on the Luke part of that story, because rewatching the OT has actually helped me a lot to see where much of his characterization has been stemming from!  But we’ll get to that later.  Right now, what this movie can probably never fix is that, yeah, okay, you’re defying expectations, that’s the story you wanted to tell and maybe there’s something to that whole thing.  But it also means that I’m never going to get Mark Hamill as a badass Jedi Master in all his glory, not for more than about two minutes. Instead, I’m going to be left with the feeling of how bitterness ate at him for at least those six years, how he died for this, and it’s never going to reach the epic heights of what the old Legends EU set up for him.  Whether it’s a better story or not, that depends on what each of us gets out of it, but my heart wanted Luke Skywalker being badass the whole way through a movie and getting to see him in a lightsaber fight that actually put his incredible skills to use, to see that strength in the Force on display in movies that could do the special effects justice.  I’m never going to get that with Mark Hamill and I’m never going to be satisfied on some level for it.  All the good (if you think they’re good) reasons in the world are never going to be able to fill that in for me. AND THE BIGGER PROBLEM WITH THE OVERALL SEQUELS:  I had to come home and Google what the fuck the First Order even was after TFA.  I have no idea what the state of the galaxy is like during TLJ and boy did the movie work to make sure it didn’t feel connected to anything that came before on a worldbuilding level.  Sure, you have Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa and the Millennium Falcon and lightsabers!  But that’s about it.  There were no recognizable alien races.  There are almost no recognizable planets.  There is a very, very obvious lack of knowing the backstory and I don’t know if IX can stick the landing of what is very obviously a WIP.  George Lucas managed it, that the prequels evolved as he wrote them/worked on them, but I think one of his strengths is that he’s really good at building a bigger world like that.  Can a George Lucas-less film trilogy stick the landing without him?  I’m willing to work with them, but I’m not sure JJ Abrams (a guy known for the Alias ending and that LOST was his baby as well, even if he wasn’t as involved as later, and the Star Trek movies) is the guy who can achieve that. WHERE THIS ENDS US UP AT:  Okay, so those are my big criticisms with the movie.  For me, it helps to understand where my dissatisfaction is coming from, that pinning it down and laying it out in clearly expressed words so that I completely and totally grok my problems with the movie, that lets me move on to, well, okay, what do I like, what potential good stuff is here. This is a pretty high up view of my problems with TLJ, of course, I’m skimming over a lot of the more detail-oriented problems (like how Holdo’s kamikaze hyperspace attack basically breaks Star Wars, because WHY HAS NO ONE DONE THAT BEFORE?, THERE IS NO REASON THAT ANYONE HAS COME UP WITH THAT SATISFIES THAT QUESTION FOR ME, but that’s not really a TLJ problem, that’s a “this was always there, just that no one really thought about it and assumed it wasn’t possible” problem), as I want to keep this post under 3k words, but that lays out the framework.  Okay, so where did I go from here? SOME WAYS I STARTED TO COME AROUND A BIT: → I started getting into the supplementary material.  I watched the Battlefront II game like a movie and, oh, hey, they’re doing the work of connecting the Empire to the First Order!  And, whoa, that was the single best Luke Skywalker story post-ROTJ that we’ve gotten yet!  I read Legends of Luke Skywalker and that gave me a lot of Luke feelings, which eased up my feeling stung about how the majority of the screentime he got was him mired in depression and blaming the Jedi for the problems. → I started reading interviews with Rian Johnson.  Now, this is a mixed bag at times, but there are some things that he explicitly explains that really worked for me, such as:  “[Luke]’s taken the weight of the world on his shoulders, taken himself out of the equation, so that the Jedi can die out, so that light can rise from a worthier source. So, in his own way, similar to Kylo, he’s trying to disconnect, he’s trying to throw away the past, he’s saying 'Let’s kill religion.  It’s the thing that’s messing us up, thing thing right here, let’s kill it.’ And the truth is, it’s a personal failure.  It’s not religion[’s fault], it’s his own human nature that’s betrayed him.” This puts A LOT into context       → It highlights that Luke was in a really bad place mentally and I’m here for characters who are speaking out of being in bad mental/emotional places!       → It highlights that Luke’s words about how it was time for the Jedi to end, how they were responsible for the creation of Vader and the rise of the Empire, how they were fucked up, how they weren’t needed in the galaxy, were all explicitly set up to be knocked down!  He literally goes out to face down the entire First Order with his laser sword!  Rian Johnson explicitly states what happened was a personal failing, not the religion/Jedi’s failing!       → It took me a long time and a lot of going back over Luke’s scenes from the OT to really connect them to how they were being continued on with TLJ and focusing on him as coming from a bad mental health place made me ready to hear that. → I read the novelizations, which are largely pretty standard retellings, but they do contain a lot of the characters’ thoughts and confirmation of some details that bugged me.  Like, it’s confirmed that Rey’s abilities with the lightsaber are based on the Force bond that Snoke gave her to Kylo, that she’s using his memories as a way to fight. This also allowed me to take a better look at Rose Tico’s character and give better context to Finn.  There’s a scene in one of them (I can’t remember if it’s the adult or jr novelization?) where it’s pretty clear that Finn wasn’t a failure at being a Stormtrooper, but that he was mopping decks because they couldn’t squash the compassion and goodness out of him, to do the jobs they were tasking him with.  He had really high scores in the rankings, but he just couldn’t follow through on the bad shit, so he was being punished.  That kind of thought being given to Finn, even if only for a moment, really helped me! Rose also gets more exploration and her reactions as coming from a place of grief are much easier for me to see.  Her anger at Finn’s desertion attempt because Paige gave her life for it, her latching onto him because she has this empty place in her because of Paige’s death, her readiness to FIGHT EVERYTHING IN HER WAY, were all really charming to me! → During this, I’m also reading the supplementary material to get me more emotionally invested in the characters.  Both the Phasma and Cobalt Squadron books really charmed the hell out of me and they helped fill in the world for me! WHERE I STAND AT THAT POINT: Well, I still have issues with TLJ, but it’s starting to make more sense to me.  I still think some things are bullshit about it or just leave me feeling entirely cold, I think a lot of the backlash against the criticism for the movie ignores that there are a lot of people with really good points, instead of it being just assholes who are angry that women and people of color are getting all up in their Star Wars.  (Don’t get me wrong, that’s a very real problem with Star Wars fans, but it’s not all of the TLJ criticism.) But I guess I’m warming up to it. And I realized that I needed to drop a certain mindset from the movie:  It is not revolutionary or breaking new ground or a big, shocking thing. The movie does kind of pride itself on defying expectations, but that still means it’s just as married to using those expectations as a framework for the story.  For example:  Rian Johnson talked about how the cave scene was about telling Rey the hardest thing she could hear, rather than what would be the satisfying answer or whatever.  Okay, but that still uses the question of, “What would the audience find satisfying?” as the foundation of how that scene was written, rather than something that would feel organic to the character’s actual development and the world around her.  (In fairness, the whole “defies expectations” thing is more about reviewers and defenders on YouTube than it’s something directly from RJ himself, so I’m not putting this on him as much as I am on the fandom-in-general.) So I dropped the whole idea that TLJ was revolutionary or different or breaking new ground. “Let the past die.  Kill it if you have to.” KYLO REN IS NOT RIGHT ABOUT THIS.  And Rian Johnson explicitly says so.  He says that you shouldn’t be stuck in the past, but that you build on it and move forward.  And, when I looked at TLJ in that light, I suddenly liked it a lot more. FOR EXAMPLE:  That cave scene.  You know why it works for me?  I explain more fully here, but basically it really works (even RJ’s comment about what would be the hardest thing for her to hear works with this) as the time honored Jedi tradition of going into a cave full of the Force and facing your greatest fears that linger inside yourself. Luke did it on Dagobah.  The Jedi younglings all did it on Ilum.  Ezra did it in the Jedi Temple on Lothal.  And now Rey does it on Ahch-To. If that scene wasn’t about revealing some external truth, but instead some internal truth about what she was carrying around with her?  HELL YEAH I’M HERE FOR THAT, THAT’S WHAT A JEDI NEEDS TO DO TO BECOME A JEDI. And if I could turn around on that aspect, maybe there were other things I could turn around on, too? WHICH BRINGS US TO THE LUKE SKYWALKER QUESTION:  A big crux of a lot of people’s dislike of TLJ is OMG LUKE SKYWALKER WOULD NEVER.  And that was absolutely how I felt for a long time! But now I’m kind of wondering:  Am I sure about that? Because I’ve been doing some meta about Luke Skywalker and I’ve been finding it to fit with the things the character has always struggled with.  As much as we want Luke Skywalker to be a pure cinnamon roll who is nothing but sweetness and light, that’s not actually who he is.  (And let me be clear that this is not a criticism leveled at Luke or even a “oh, you can only like him if he’s ~flawed~, otherwise you’re not seeing the ~truth~”, but instead aimed at showing why Luke Skywalker is incredible as a person and as a character, as I see him!) It’s easy to remember that Luke threw away his lightsaber and refused to fight, that he said, “I am a Jedi.  Like my father before me.”  But you know what came right before that?  Sidious taunting him with how he feels the hate and anger flowing through Luke, as he threatens his friends down on Endor.  We see it, too:

He is SO ANGRY here, even at this late in the game.  He’s spent years working on himself and controlling those feelings and he STILL struggles with it, even knowing that there’s good in his father. Sidious’ taunt wouldn’t rile Luke up if there was nothing in him that was there to rile up. And it’s present all along the way, Luke’s struggle with fear and anger.  He’s angry after ANH when all the slaves on Cymoon 1 are killed, blaming himself for Vader killing them.  He has fear and doubt swirling around in him, because the cave on Dagobah isn’t showing us an external threat, but an internal one.  All that he faces there is what he brought with him.  He runs off from Dagobah before he’s ready to face Vader, who says he can feel the fear Luke is at least learning to control--but it’s clearly still there.  And when Luke cannot deny the connection to Vader, when he has to yield some part of himself to the truth that Darth Vader is is father, he wants to die.  Mark Hamill talks about how Luke let go from Cloud City, “like committing suicide”. Luke is an incredible, phenomenal person, but a big part of that is because of the struggles he faces to overcome his anger and fear, that he does it--not that he never felt them in the first place. And the Jedi very much make the point that this is a lifelong journey to keep facing all the dark side stuff inside you.  They make this point in the prequels, they make this point in Rebels, they make this point in TLJ even. So, the idea that he would ignite his saber in a moment of weakness (because, let’s be honest, Ben Solo is not innocent at that point--if someone is willing to MURDER ALL THE OTHER STUDENTS because his uncle realized the darkness in him--and that is how it’s phrased in the novelization--then THAT PERSON IS A DANGER and Luke’s reacting to something that’s there) and then regret it so deeply that he withdraws from everyone for the next six years?  That he would be borderline suicidal while on Ahch-To because the dark things inside him were eating him alive? Yeah, for me that’s a continuation of everything that’s been established about Luke in previous stories. We remember Luke’s insistence that Vader had still had good in him, that he didn’t want to fight him, that he didn’t want to leave him behind on the Death Star.  But it’s easy to forget that Luke also did have moments of anger and violence against Vader, after he taunts Luke and threatens Leia, reading Luke’s thoughts about her.  (God, there was a twitter thread that I’m sure I reblogged that talked about this issue specifically, Luke’s aggression towards Vader in ROTJ, but I cannot find it again.) He believed there was good in his father, but it was still a struggle to put down his weapon. That’s exactly what happened with Ben as well--he knew there was still good in him, but he felt that darkness roiling in Ben so strongly that it was still a struggle to put down his weapon. (Also, this was six years pre-TLJ, so Ben was in his early-to-mid-twenties or so, not a teenager!) And then Luke, who struggles not to take on responsibility for others’ actions, retreats because he goes to a bad mental place, as the dark things that have always been in him (that are in all of us) get the better of him. AFTER ALL OF THAT: All of this may just solidify that you (or anyone else reading this!) are never going to like TLJ and that’s okay!  It’s not going to work for everyone, it’s not going to jive with everyone, some people are going to read those scenes differently.  Also okay!  There’s no hard feelings on my part if someone reads all of this and goes, “That’s not how I saw it.” And I’ll give the caveat that this process took me months, honestly I’m still sorting through my feelings.  I don’t think this is going to suddenly make anyone go OH SHIT YOU’RE RIGHT.  But maybe it might help nudge a few people towards recontextualizing everything in their head--which is the process that I went through and the only way I could go from “WTF WAS THAT?” to “Yeah, okay, that makes sense to me.” Plus, you know, hey, not everyone is going to want to read a bunch of supplementary material to feel better about the movie and there’s a very valid point about how you shouldn’t have to.  I ENTIRELY AGREE ABOUT THIS, btw!  But, at the same time, those supplementary materials exist and I’ve been consuming them and they’ve started drawing connections in ways that really help me. The novelizations and the comics have given extra bits of insight that made it clear they are thinking about the worldbuilding in the wider franchise.  The books and comics set in Canto Bight’s casino have specifically made an effort to include established aliens.  The Star Wars: Battlefront II game’s story has gone to worlds that are familiar (LEIA ON NABOO, bestill my heart, the arcade mode in the Naboo palace where you can have Vader or Leia or Luke wander by the stained glass windows with Padme’s image on them!  MY HEARTTTTTT) and great characterization.  The Propaganda and Aftermath books are doing a lot to start bridging the gap of what happened between VI and VII, helping me see that, yes, they are building this world up and the First Order being the Empire 2.0 actually WORKS for me. I put more things into context of how, for example, it’s only been six years (give or take) since Luke retreated--he spend the other ~25 years doing WHO KNOWS WHAT.  At least some of that time was spent traveling the galaxy in Legends of Luke Skywalker.  Mark Hamill got to voice Luke in a Forces of Destiny short that made me feel better about his connection to the role!  Rewatching the OT and listening to Mark talk about Luke helped me see TLJ as an extension of what was already there. OKAY, HERE’S SOME STUFF I STRAIGHT UP JUST LOVED: A lot of fandom really hates that it wasn’t Anakin showing up to talk to Luke, but it made perfect sense to me that it was Yoda.  In universe, Yoda is the one that Luke spent the most time with, they spent months together on Dagobah and developed a very strong bond.  As much as we love Luke and Anakin’s story, Yoda was actually incredible important to Luke in-story.  AND BOY DID I HAVE FEELINGS about Yoda showing up and smacking Luke in the face literally and metaphorically, that he was like GET BACK IN THE GAME, TRASH FIRE, and “Ahhh, Skywalker, I have missed you.” LUKE SKYPEWALKER.  Oh, my god, Luke Force Skyped himself to death, that is an Extra As Fuck way to go out as ANYTHING, I hope the Force Ghost gang are all proud of him. That fight on Crait was pretty fucking gorgeous.  I wish we’d gotten a longer fight but oh MAN everything we did get was incredible.  Luke sliding under Kylo’s blade in slo-mo was F A N T A S T I C. Also crystal foxes!  I LOVE THEM.  The porgs were really cute but GIMME THOSE CRYSTAL FOXES.  Crait as a planet in general was beautiful. Leia, practically in a coma, so all her thoughts were shoved out of her head and she was acting on instinct, using the Force like that?  HELL YEAH I 100% BELIEVE ANAKIN SKYWALKER’S BIO-DAUGHTER WAS CAPABLE OF BEING THAT EXTRA. Luke blowing up the hut when he exploded in on Rey and Kylo’s Force Skype call, that is an underrated moment of FORCE USING BADASSERY. Luke on Ahch-To, staring out at the binary suns, so far away from where he started and yet all things circle back around in their own way.  His body disappearing, his robe fluttering to the stone floor.  HI THANKS I’M CRYING especially when the novelization hinted that there was a voice waiting to welcome him to the other side. I legit got misty-eyed at Luke and Leia’s reunion.  I wish I could have had an entire movie of them working together, I wanted to see more of Mark and Carrie’s chemistry, but I am going to cling to the hope that, just like Obi-Wan and Anakin, they’ll be together in the Force one day. IN THE END: This is how I came to like at least big parts of this movie.  But I needed to work through those feelings, rather than sweep them aside, so that’s what this post was aimed at, showing how I did that (if in a very generalized, bird’s eye view kind of way). So much of it ultimately revolves around my growing understanding of Luke Skywalker’s character, why I disagree that he’s a pure cinnamon roll too good for this world, but instead that his incredible strength of character and inherent goodness are about overcoming the dark side, not about never being tempted in the first place or making mistakes.  And I see that Luke in the man who found peace and purpose in the end of TLJ, who took a long, hard look at himself and dragged himself back up again, because that’s what good people do. I’ll always wish we could have gotten Mark Hamill to play Luke during the high points of his life, to see that in a Saga movie on the big screen.  But if this is Luke Skywalker’s end, then I understand how he got there and that the ultimate lesson of his life was: The dark side is a part of all of us, it’s in the fear inside of our hearts and minds that we must constantly face.  It can knock us down sometimes, it can make us doubt ourselves and retreat because we think the world will be better without us. But we get up again, we take a look at ourselves, and we re-choose the light all over again.  The world works better when you’re on the side of good and you have a choice about that.  And sometimes it’s going to be a struggle to choose it, but Luke Skywalker showed me that, even when I fall down into a dark hole in my own mind, I can still get up and find peace and purpose in my path going forward.

[freezingwintah]

Hot - headed capitulation

Something was way off. This bed was too soft to be his, Sans thought, half sleepy. And his bed wasn't so big either. Sans sat up and had a look around.

This wasn't his bedroom. The walls were dark blue and bed was so comfy, he never wanted to get up, but he should. Who's bed he was in and why or how did he end in it?

Then the events from yesterday came back to him and he blushed deep red, burying head in hands. He really pulled it off. By Asgore's beard, Grillby...

… This is Grillby's room...

I am at his house.

Flabbergasted didn't do justice the feeling he was experiencing. But... where was Grillby? The blankets were done on other side of bed. Sans gulped down. Oh my god. We slept in the same bed. Now I remember. The door creaked and Grillby was standing before me, in his usual black suit and red tie, holding two plates of... hot dogs with mustard. Grillbz knows me the best, Sans thought to himself as he gazed at the purple elemental who approached the bed and sat down close. "I was about to wake you up. I'll be heading to work soon and I wanted to eat with you something."

Grillby gave him the plate with the hot dog and Sans took it, unsure how to act. They weren't on a customer – bartender basis no longer. They have upgraded their relationship to lovers.

Lovers.

It was still hard to believe that a simple blue flower played a huge role in their get – together. In Underground, strong looked for a suitable partner with high LOVE , because it was just like that for years. Sans was sure their relationship will not be approved by the community in Snowdin. And Pap - Boss, he'll blow a fuse, or several as he knew him. Such ghastly matters should be left for later. Now...

He should enjoy the morning with Grillby.

The skeleton dug into the hot dog, munching and avoiding the intense silent stare - down of his lover who also ate, but was way too focused on Sans. Said skeleton was nervous under the warm gaze. He wasn't used to someone looking at him so tenderly. He was more used to the annoyed and pissed off looks whenever someone saw the small skeleton. This was tingling all his bones and his hearts fluttered. These mushy feelings, they are back. Honestly, this was all new for him. Grillby touched his cheekbone with a gloved hand, tracing down and Sans stayed still. Wh- what is it?

The elemental gathered something from his face and licked. "Mustard." He stated and Sans got even more flustered. Grillby held his hands and the 'dogs were forgotten. "grillb-"

He was silenced by a pair of fiery lips seizing him. Sans enthusiastically opened his mouth to grant him better access. He vividly heard the fire elemental giggle at that.

– DING DONG –

Grillby ignored the door bell ringing and Sans's head was spinning from mushy and fluffy overload. Sans tried to speak between kisses. "grillbz... ah, fuck... the... bell... so hot..." The elemental smirked and deepened the kiss, silencing his skeleton.

He happily gave in to the sweet attack on his senses, holding Grillby who was whispering some very kinky words to the skeleton while he kissed down the collarbone.

"fuck it, grillbz! There...!"

- BAANG!

"Flaming bastard, what have you done to my pathetic brother?! He didn't come home yesterday!"

The mood was killed. Grillby growled annoyed. "Tch. I've had it with Papyrus. I'll give him a piece of my mind. I've bitten into my tongue for a long time."

Sans watched as Grillby scooted up the plates with half finished 'dogs and put them on a table, turning to face his skeleton. The banging didn't stop. It got worse and he snapped, pulling the small skeleton up. "Come. We'll confront your dickhead brother together."

"what?! grillby, that is a horrible idea!"

He squeezed the bony fingers and Sans looked up at him. "I won't let him handle you like that. I am willing to fight him even."

He would? Grillby would fight the terrible Papyrus for...me?

No one was so good to me. He's too good for a weakling and useless bonehead like me, Sans thought while Grillby led them to the front door.

Sans put on slippers that were thrice his size and realized they were Grillby's. And Boss was yelling from the other side of the door, threatening to tear it down if Grillby won't open up.

The fire elemental held onto Sans' hand while he opened the door and they were confronted by the raging younger brother. "Ahaaa! I knew he was here! But, why is he here in the first place!"

Then he noticed the joined hands and went quiet for a moment, contemplating probably if he wasn't dreaming. Then he decided it was reality. "Brother. Why are you holding hands?"

Grillby inserted himself into the conversation. "As of yesterday, Sans is my boyfriend, my partner and I intend to form a soul bond with him one day. Did that satisfy your curiosity?"

Boss' jaw dropped momentarily, skipping from the elemental to his older, blushing brother. He didn't understand, couldn't process this information. And the fire elemental was far from done. He caught Sans' gaze and smiled sweetly before letting go. He jerked Papyrus inside his house and closed the door from spectators on the morning streets.

The tall skeleton wouldn't let be manhandled and Sans knew he was going to attack regardless of place or circumstances and he stepped in before it got haywire, blocking both from attacking.

"Sans, get out of the way. I will teach your brother a lesson." Grillby said calmly and Papyrus growled. "Ha! You two are so pathetic! Standing up for each other. It's disgusting!"

"So what if I love your brother. We chose what we wanted secretly all along." Sans flared up when love was mentioned. They never quite got to the confessing yesterday. He remembered only falling asleep in the elemental's embrace. Wow, this was way too much for Sans to handle in two days in row. The smaller of skeleton brothers glanced back, holding back the tears from joy. "y- you love me, grillby?"

"I have loved since you first walked into my bar."

Sans was stunned and Papyrus snorted, turning on heels. "You two make me wanna barf. I am leaving. I expect you to be at your station on time, Sans."

He left, shutting the door like it offended him. Grillby sighed. "I didn't need help, Sans. I would have beaten him. And don't think I have forgotten all the times you came to my bar because of your brother's really bad brotherly instincts, if he has any. I'll have a chat with him soon and next time, I won't have any disturbances. He may be the Head of the Royal Guard, but you are his brother, only family he has left and he shouldn't handle you like you're a stranger or some random monster."

Sans didn't know what to say. He was resented by everyone – thanks to Boss, his head of royal guard position and Sans simply went with it. Grillby cracked a smile, once more gently holding his bony hand. "Sans, I am here for you. From today onward, I share with you pain, sadness, but also hope and love. I'll be by your side." He kissed the skeleton's hand and Sans gasped at the romantic gesture.

He found himself tearing up, unable to hold back the mushy feelings, finally letting them loose. "grillby!" Sans was much shorter than the fire elemental, so he grabbed on the signature red tie and yanked him downwards. A bit startled, Grillby let the skeleton kiss him tenderly. When they parted, Grillby smirked, wiping away the tears. "As much as I like where this is going, we have places to be at. When we're both done, come here. I have a spare key. It's yours."

Sans took the offered silvery key and put it on his key chain and shoved it back into shorts pockets. "I'll treasure it. It's the first thing you gave me."

"And there will be more with more time we spend together. But enough for now. I believe we had hot dogs before your brother rudely interrupted our breakfast. Go to the kitchen and I'll bring the hot dogs and I'll make some eggs and bacon. We are grown monsters and one hot dog won't suffice till lunch break."

Sans nodded and went to the stylish kitchen, stopping at the dining table and taking seat on one of the two kitchen stools. True to his word, he was promptly back with the unfinished plates of 'dogs and set them on table. "I'll prepare the eggs 'n bacon. You just sit back and relax." The elemental said while he put on an apron so he didn't get his suit dirty.

Sans propped elbows on the table and dreamily sighed looking at Grillby in that apron. "did i tell you how hot i find you? and not just because you're fire."

Grillby snickered, cracking the eggs into the frying pan and soon the slices of bacon followed. "I can't tell if you're flirting or making usual fire puns, Sans."

"hmm...maybe both."

Grillby had to be careful not to burn their breakfast, so his attention turned to the frying pan and Sans simply watched his incredibly hot lover who rocked not only suits but also aprons by doing his daily routine for them.

Soon he was done and presented the skeleton with scrambled eggs and crusty bacon that smelled awfully good. Grillby joined him by table and the fire elemental resumed with eating his 'dog. "grillbz, bone appetite."

The elemental chuckled and 'dog got stuck in his throat. Sans quickly handed him a cup of whisky and he drank up. "By Asgore, Sans... hahaha. I'll have to get used to your witty puns."

Sans grinned widely as he finished his last bits of hot dog and dug into the Grillby special. "grillbz? can i ask you a question? tt concerns what you told b – papyrus."

"Did I say something I shouldn't have?"

The skeleton swallowed the mixture in his mouth, the flavor reminded him of childhood and the rare memories of peaceful domestic existence. Ah, good 'ol days...

"Did you mean the soul bonding?"

Grillby positively eyed him. "I meant it. Do you not want to?"

"no, no! i mean, i do. i want that. you're the best that has happened to me, grillby."

"Then? What's the problem?"

Sans put down the fork and avoided to look at the fire elemental. "i am the problem. i seem weak next to you. there will be a scandal and your bar will be in jeopardy... because of me."

He said what was tormenting him all those years when he decided time and time again to not tell the elemental how he felt about him.

Grillby also put down the fork, stood up and went along the table and knelt down to the sobbing skeleton. "Shhh. It's okay. Our relationship won't hinder me in the slightest. When someone gives us grief, I'll simply grill them to dust."

"it's not that simple, grillbz."

"It can be. Come here." He let his skeleton hug him and he was calming down in the warm and loving embrace of the flame that loved him indisputably.

"oh my god. you made a pun." Sans stated after good one minute.

"I am only getting flared up." Now it was Sans' turn to giggle and they disentangled getting back to eating the cold breakfast.

After finishing up their plates, they both checked if they had everything and Grillby brought his skeleton before the front door. Sans wanted to leave alone, but Grillby wouldn't hear nothing about it. "I bet your brother's tongue has already wagged about us in town. Come, I'll escort you to your station. I have half hour before the bar is opening."

Sans grinned. "no need, grillbz. i can be a capable fighter if needed. also, i have a shortcut. can you come closer?"

Grillby leaned down slightly and Sans inserted a chaste kiss on the elemental's cheek, blushing. " see you later. i love you, grillby." The small skeleton winked, snapped fingers and he vanished before Grillby's eyes.

The elemental held the place where the kiss was planted, feeling it burn up. He smiled. "I've known that all along, Sans."

Grillby then left for his bar, counting the minutes before he meets with his adorable skeleton.

[sage-nebula]

5 & 8?

Sorry I’m late on this! I fell asleep after I ate dinner last night, orz.

5.) Favourite and least favourite boss fight? 

Favorite: If mini bosses count, then this easily goes to Dark Link in Ocarina of Time. His room is the only good thing about the Water Temple. I love the entire look of that room, I love the concept of Dark Link himself, and I love how if you swing your sword horizontally the bastard jumps on top of the blade and uses it as a springboard to stab you in the face. Love it!

But if mini bosses don’t count, then hmm … probably all three rounds against Majora in Majora’s Mask. Majora is one of the most interesting characters / villains in the series to me, and I love how each stage of the fight against Majora represents a different part of its psyche. Even though the fight itself is ridiculously easy if you have the Fierce Deity’s Mask, the atmosphere, the music, and the lore behind it still makes it all really interesting. 

Least Favorite: Off the top of my head, probably either Morpha or Gyorg. Both of those were a massive pain. Thunderblight Ganon was also really bad until doing battle with lynels taught me how to properly utilize flurry attacks.

8.) 8. Top 3 villains?

HMM . . .

Majora --- I love Majora, on every conceivable level. Like, to count the ways:a.) I love that Majora has a personality that is intricate, but also hard to figure out. What I mean by that is, Majora reveals itself to be rather sadistic and . . . not refined, per se, but collected and in charge when spoken to as a mask in Termina. Majora doesn’t appreciate that Link doesn’t have a sense of humor, and can taunt in a sort of childish way sometimes, but the way that Majora curses Link, the way that it has Skullkid lounge as it speaks to him, the way it smacks Tael when Tael tries to give the hint, the way it says “this puppet’s role has ended . . .” and discards Skullkid . . . all of that speaks to a more mature villain.And yet, when you get to the Moon itself, it’s clear that Majora also has a very childlike personality. Majora invites Link to play with it, to play Good Guys vs. Bad Guys, and sees Link as the Bad Guy. And in the battle itself, Majora’s Incarnation in particular prances around like a child. It isn’t until Majora’s Wrath that the serious personality comes back. The fact that Majora successfully portrays both a more calculating villain, as well as a more childish villain, is something that I really love about it.b.) I love that Majora is so petty and creative with its curses . . . most of the time. Majora curses Kafei into the body of a child because Kafei is enjoying adulthood. Majora curses a man into a gibdos because he’s studying them. But Majora also shatters the Great Fairies, and outright murders the Deku Butler’s Son purely so that it can curse Link. This plays into the dichotomy mentioned above, but it’s worth its own bullet point because Majora isn’t like most Big Bads in the series, I feel. Majora has its one over-arcing evil plan, yes (to drop the moon and destroy the world), but it also ruins people’s lives on a personal level. Majora is a very personal Big Bad, and I really like that.c.) I love everything about the final area, which is all Majora’s creation. I love the Moon World. I love the bizarre Moon Children and the armor piercing questions they ask. Majora’s final fight, particularly if the Fierce Deity’s Mask isn’t used, is challenging and creative in each of its phrases, each of which says a lot about Majora. The final area and final fight are just great, and Majora is why it’s great.d.) Its theme music is the creepiest fucking villain music we’ve had in the series yet, jesus christ.

Ghirahim --- While it was disappointing that Ghirahim was ultimately usurped by Demise, I still really loved Ghirahim for the role he played as the primary antagonist of Skyward Sword, particularly because I really love the way he talks. Like, he keeps up an affably evil front, but his dialogue is just incredibly raw at times (such as how he at one point says that he’ll defean Link with the sound of his own screams). He was a delight every time he appeared, and I hope that if Fi ever makes a reappearance, Ghirahim does as well.

Vaati --- I have a special place in my heart for Vaati given how I fleshed him out (and, uh, made him more of an anti-villain by the end of it >_>) in a role play I did years back, haha. But I nonetheless really like the potential that Vaati has there, as someone who was sensitive to the darkness in people’s hearts, and who was perhaps corrupted as a result of that. Plus, I mean, his human form has a damn nice character design, I’ve gotta say. That doesn’t hurt his likability, haha.

Runner-up would have to be Veran, because everyone loves a good sorceress who can possess other people and heck up the entire time stream.

[pldubrahs]

anyway, this has been a While coming and now im back in new orleans so LOTS OF GUSHING ABOUT THE LIGHTNING THIEF MUSICAL, UNDER THE CUT

the ambiance of the theater, dim and filled with soft storm sounds

this show does really beautiful things with overlapping singing and w harmonys and its So low budget but still so good and the cast is small but amazing and literally everyone but chris is cast into several roles and its just amazing

if u dont wanna read this whole thing, just scroll down to the end for a Special Surprise

ACT 1

the Bitter, Angry, Sad music, ltm is truly the Emo Rock Musical we deserve

i seriously almost fell out of my chair when chris mccarrell came out. he honest to god was SUCH a good percy, so fidgety and all his expressions were ON POINT

“CHROOONOOOOOOOS”

ms dodds in General she was hilarious for the literal 3 minutes she was onstage

the pen to sword transformation is literally just: chris hides the pen and grabs the sword from somewhere else onstage. during my show, in the ms dodds fight scene, the sword was on the back of chirons wheelchair and it got stuck so he had to trip after the chair as chiron wheeled off and TUG it off to fight

DID I MENTION HOW MUCH I LOVED CHRIS MCCARRELL AND HOW AMAZING HIS VOICE WAS? BECAUSE I DO AND IT W A S

sally is a BLACK WOMAN 

just in general, this show was Amazing at raceblind casting

sally sprayed febreeze after smelly gabe, like he leaned to look in the fridge and she stood behind him spraying febreeze directly at him for like 30 seconds

“he was handsome and strong and before too long- you came!” percy was roasting marshmallows and looking out towards the audience and sally was rubbing up and down the sides of her body during this before “you came!” and it was v funny

Strong in general was Great bc WOW IM LOVE THE “NORMALCY IS A SOCIALLY CONSTRUCTED MYTH” MESSAGE

grover and percy meeting outside camp

“oh look a goat” “percy!”

“he met a furie” “youre all furry! what happened to your legs”

the v cute friendship bickering, overlapping voices thing that percy and grover v often did. this was the grover and percy friendship that we always needed

during the weird dream when he sees annabeth and hes like “gee whiz shes the most beautiful girl ive ever seen”

and then when he officially meets her after hes not out of it, he says “youre my dream girl!” and then backpedals and its great

ANOTHER TERRIBLE DAY. DEFFS ONE OF THE TOP FIVE SONGS. MR D IN GENERAL WAS JUST AMAZING, GEORGE SALAZAR ROCKED IT

he kicked the chair over so much and then there was a part after his camp halfblood intern thing left so his chair didnt get reset behind him and so he kicked into the air, got frustrated, and put the chair up himself

“of course, who am i to give relationship advice, im literally the god of alcohol”

“you can hate it here, but i HATED IT FIRST”

so so so many Soft sex jokes and bc im a Child i loved them 

chiron is just a guy galloping with a horse tail its the cutest thing and everyone laughed bc like imagine a kid galloping w their legs high and w/e, but on an adult and slow motion

“you’ll get used to mr d. he can be a bit... well, he hates children”

luke was Very attractive and ALSO he had a lot of chemistry w percy and w annabeth and i, who remembered shipping percy and luke back in my Youth, was Living

annabeth deffs had a crush on luke dont @ me

also luke was Softly bitter. like he sounded like a modern kid, bitter and upset but saying it in a joking way; totally makes sense that no one suspects that he’d do anything w chronos bc all the kids are upset and he doesnt get dark until the very end of the show

“are you ever going to wear pants again?” “Nope!”

luke: “havent you ever played capture the flag?” percy, excitedly: “not with swords!” *makes swooshy lightsaber noises* annabeth, suffering, full of regret: “It’s not a lightsaber.”

“sexist much?” “no, i love girls” [muffled luke and grover cackling in the background]

CLARISSE, LOVE OF MY LIFE! her song was so so good

im sure everyone has mentioned this but the LEAF BLOWERS BLOWING TOILET PAPER TO REPRESENT WATER LITERALLY CHANGED MY LIFE

the campfire song

percys Soft concern for annabeths story about running away “wait is that true”

grover starting to cry during his part

“my father is chronos.... remember my lecture, he ate his children””....... chiron wins”

APHRODITE'S DAUGHTER’S STORY “godess of love, my moms aphrodite... i bring home a boy and shes there in her nightie! oh nooooo” “she steals my mascara and all of my dates!” wonderful

percy sings nicely about his mother and everyones like “hes doing it wrong”

“we dont care where our parents may be, as long as you are here with me!” FRIENDSHIP MAKES ME EMO

“havent you noticed that there arent any other little sea godlings running around? any sons of hades or daughters of zeus? the big three gods arent supposed to have kids!” i loved this tiny easter egg i love my big three kids

“look at the boy, hes clearly not a thief!” “oh, yeah no yeah yeah yeah no no yeah yeah no yeah no, youre right! you cant fake being that stupid unless youre a brilliant actor, but im also the god of drama, so i can tell you HES NOT”

“his lightning?” “yeah, we're not talking some crummy tin foil zig zag from some off broadway play!”

GOOD KID IS EVEN BETTER LIVE THAN IT WAS ON THE RECORDING IT RUINED MY LIFE

Killer Quest! is an amazing end of act song and v upbeat and cute

“so where is the underworld actually” “look for doa records” “its a record company? actually, im not surprised”

ACT 2

WE’RE LOST IN THE WOODS SOMEWHERE IN NEW JERSEY AND WE’RE NEVER GONNA MAKE IT TO LA

“half bloods to monsters smell like mickey ds, like tacos or take out vietnamese”

“dude are you talking to the squirrel?” “satyr powers, be nice. this squirrel knows every corner of the woods, maybe he can help us” “really? because i think that seems kind of nuts” [silence] “you hurt his feelings. tell the squirrel youre sorry.”

medusa in general, what a Good scene

ensemble members shaking maracas to make snake noises for her

medusa cant say “nemesis”

“ive done everything to prove to the gods that im the best and you- i mean, you dont even know how to hold a sword” “yes i do!, yes... i do...” “no, hands here *adjusts percys grip*” “i didnt ask for any of this: gods, monsters, quests- oh, wow, that is a lot easier”

my grand plan is the most annabeth chase song ever and i love it its such a good look into her character and i love her so much

“when boys mess up they always get another chance”

“cause most girl never win if theyre polite”

THE COMMENTARY ON HOW WOMEN HAVE TO BE IN TODAYS SOCIETY IN ORDER TO BE TAKE SERIOUSLY HELL YEAH

“the gods will think we’re impertinent” “we are impertinent”

the squirrel gave them three amtrak tickets

DRIVE IS A COUNTRY SONG AND I FUCKING LOVE IT IM HONESTLY SHOOK

i hate country except for this One Song

ITS ONE FOOT FORWARD AT A TIME; DUST OFF ALL THAT GRIT AND GRIME; WE STILL GOT A LOT LEFT TO DOOOO, CAUSE PEOPLE ARE COUNTIN ON US AND IM COUNTIN ON YOU! DRIIIIIIIIVE JUST DRIIIIiiiiiiiiIIIIIIVE STAY AHEAD STAY AHEAD STAY ALIIIIIIIVE

“is that chihuahua?” “its a chimera!”

“maybe if you hadnt brought all those dam snacks” “uh it was the hoover dam and i was hungry!”

ares drives them to las vegas and when they get there he says “this is where i... get off” and its HILARIOUS i love lowkey sex jokes

gentle easter egg to bianca and nico re: may 1st 1939

“the oracle can can it ill save my mom and savE THE PLANET!” im love percy so much

tREE ON THE HILL IS ABOUT THALIA AND IT MADE ME CRY GOD WHAT A GOOD SONG and grover feels like a failure and annabeth is like “no u saved my life ur a good friend and a good guardian <3 friendship”

THE FERRYMAN TO THE UNDERWORLD FLIRTS WITH GROVER

“you wanna hear my demo?” “uh-” [loud music plays] “im sorry i couldnt hear you over this SWEET ASS RIFF”

YOURE IN THE D.O.A. AND YOURE HERE TO STAY YEAH YOURE STUCK FOREVER NEVER GET AWAY NO HOPE FOR SURVIVAL YOURE DEAD ON ARRIVAL

“oh! do you have any josh groban?” “we will.” I CACKLED

DJ CEBERUS W A COOL 3-HEADED DEADMAU5 ESQUE MASK

the ferryman also attacks them all like “youre not gonna save the planet, you wont protect your friends, you wont be remembered”

everyone says this but “i think this pit is tartarus” “LIKE THE FISH SAUCE?”

“why would chronus want my shoes?” “they were really cool shoes”

bitter, sad hades who just wants people to stop thinking that hes the bad guy and for his brothers to come visit him

“one does not simply walk out of the underworld”

W H A T  B E L O N G S  T O  T H E  S E A  C A N  A L W A Y S  R E T U R N

small reprise of good kid as he considers hades offer and then the melody cHANGES and percy realizes that the seashell, a gift from a god, can SAVE THEM and its beautiful because SON OF POSEIDON IS A GOOD SONG

“maybe my dad was a screwup too, his best laid plans always falling through... maybe he never knew how to care but hey, thats life, and life aint fair... but i think my dad mayve thrown me a line, and better late than never, ill finally get a sign!”

its a good song kids

the kids get to the oceans and they FIGHT ARES and ares and percy are both singing, percy singing The Son Of Poseidon chorus and ares singing Put You In Your Place and its b e a u t i f u l

THE TOILET PAPER THROW- basically they bring in like 6 leafblowers w toilet paper rolls attached and the first five rows get covered in toilet paper. as someone who was in the fifth row, it was amazing

poseidon comes in, they have a Heart To Heart, he brings sally back to life, he flirts with sally, its hilarious and awkward

“the gods are unfair but we’re not total dicks”

percys like “you dont have to stay w gabe anymore” and sallys like “smh boy u cant solve all my problems. you saved my life, now i have to figure out how to live it”

he gives her medusas head

“what is this” “its a... do it yourself scupture kit” “oh! *begins to open it*” “no no no its, um, medusas head”

“well, as my official protector, you can officially escort us back to camp” “and youre conscience this time!”

chiron is also cast as poseidon so like he runs into the camp scene after a quick change and says “i hoofed it here as quick as i could!” 

last day of summer happens and w/e its cute but whAT REALLY MATTERS IS LUKES BETRAYAL: okay so the music slows and goes into the minor key and percys like “we still dont know whos working w chronos :/” lukes like “yeah it sucks” and he starts singing about how he doesnt trust the gods and how the gods hate them and how they need to take over the world and put the gods in their place--he and percy do their handshake fist-to-the-chest thing and luke is serious and percy does it but hes v confused and it Hurts. this is the first time in the show that luke sounds just Bitter and Angry instead of jokingly deprecating and its quite the effect

THE DARK GOOD KID REPRISE 

“ill do anything, i dont care if i hurt anyone, it doesnt pay to be a good kid, a good kid, a good son" GOD IT HURTS luke has so much pain and i feel so bad for him like yeah hes evil but,,, hes had a hard life

annabeth comes in and DISARMS LUKE but PSYCH luke has a small switchblade and STABS PERCY IN THE BACK (bc they cant use scorpions onstage)

percybeth moment interrupted by clarisse’s loud coughing and grover

percys like “we cant just sit here and wait for our parents to fix things.”

“the gods will say we’re impertinent” “we are impertinent” goddamn that symmetry

“are we ever gonna once have it easy?” my poor poor kids

percy- “feeling ready” annabeth- “feeling stoked” grover- “feeling queasy”

THE SEA DOESNT LIKE TO BE RESTRAINED

bring on the monsters is just a Good song

also hey if you got to the end of this, congrats! i have a ltm audio and either in a message or in an off-anon ask and ill hook u up