#and i know that i sometimes shift that direction. i know thats a part of my identity

[sanguinaryrot]

gender can be so confusing :/

[honkytonk-hangman]

Line of Sight [4]

JAKE ‘HANGMAN’ SERESIN X READER

Summary: In which everyone's worst nightmare is realised, and Jake's girlfriend isn't actually the reasonable one at all. She's actually just as bad. There's a reason she's with him, after all. or Penny bollocks you over your petty antics with Jake during a volleyball game, but you're too busy enjoying being the only thing on Jake Seresin's radar (on the ground, anyway).

Warnings: fluff, mentions of jakes clealry very healthy mental health that is in no way compromised or flawed and he defintiely wont be needing therapy. thats mostly a joke, this chapter is all fluff :P

Notes: Its done!!! thanks so much for readin this little series and sticking with it <3 I hope this is a nice little happy ever after for these two <3

MASTERLIST

“It's impolite to stare.” Jake scolds, not even bothering to look away from where he prepares to land his third bullseye in as many minutes. For your part, you don’t bother to stop staring as he at last throws his dart, earning a mix of impressed cheers and annoyed groans. You’re still watching him when he turns to you, ignoring the others as they clap him on the back or try to goad him into another game. Instead he steps in toward you, collecting his beer and taking a swig, now just as focused on you as you are on him.

“Say, you’re pretty good at this darts thing,” you ignore his prior commentary and instead shift your weight to pop your hip out. Jake takes another swig, raising an eyebrow, but shrugging all the same. “Maybe you could teach me a thing or two.” You bat your eyelashes innocently, earning an amused look from the blond.

“Who am I to refuse helping a lady out?”

Before you can even really respond, Jake has stepped around you, one hand trailing down your side and to your hip, the other curling around your elbow as he guides you the few steps over to the dart board. Just as ever when you do this routine, Jake is pressed right up behind you, and just as ever, he pays no real attention to teaching you a thing at all, instead simply using you as a vessel to show off once again. He knows you love it, and you do, your body growing warmer with every bullseye he lands, his hand at your waist gripping tighter when you snuggle further back into him. He squeezes you a little in warning when you wiggle your hips again, but when you glance up to shoot him your best innocent look, you find him grinning down at you with only trace amounts of smugness present.

“Gee, you really are good at this,” you tease, speaking softer now so only he can hear. Playfulness seems to leave his smile entirely then, and he leans in, hand tracing up from your arm to your chin, where he directs you to a much better angle for kissing. It’s only a quick kiss, but you can’t help but laugh a little at the way your little show melts Hangman right down to the Jake at his core. You bounce up to peck the corner of his mouth as he begins to pull back, aware of the crowded bar around you, and neither of you wanting to be that couple (although, you definitely were that couple, Phoenix has reliably informed you), but you weren’t willing to let him go so quick.

Jake chuckles at your display of clear affection, and even all these months later, you know it’s still something he’s getting used to. It saddens you sometimes, how he was so easy to give affection, but in many ways never seemed to expect it back. It makes you think of the year and then some that he practically ignored you, for what he thought was your own good, working off of the assumption that should you talk, you simply wouldn’t like him.

He was dead wrong of course, you had grown to like him without him ever saying a word to you, and once he did, your interactions only served to confirm the feelings you had. Jake’s soft little surprise anytime you plainly and clearly expressed your interest in him or what he believed to be his various character flaws quickly grew to be one of your favourite things about him, and you loved taking the time to complement or fawn over him at any given opportunity, to big him up in a way that you can.

You place one last kiss to the underside of his jaw as he straightens fully again, and you both become aware of the discussion of a pool competition. Still with his hands firm on your hips, he turns his head long enough to invite himself to the game.

“Duh.” Javy replies with a smile and a half-hearted roll of his eyes. Phoenix’s eye roll isn’t nearly as subtle, but her smile is.

“I’ll get you another drink,” you say softly, reluctantly extracting yourself from him. Jake seems to hesitate for a moment, eyes flickering between you and Dagger before you reach out and give his chest a light shove. “Go on, win for me, Hangman.” You have to suppress a giggle when his chest seems to puff out. A wide smirk pulls across his face, and he gives you a little nod. You loved how seriously he took these sorts of things.

“Careful what you wish for, baby, don’t want to get too competitive about a friendly pool game just to make you happy,”

“That is like the most romantic threat anyone’s ever given me!” you exclaim with a mostly genuine dreaminess. You yelp as you turn around, as the moment you have your back to him, Jake delivers a light swat to your backside. You fix him with faux-disapproval and flick your hair hastily in a way you know he finds extremely sexy.

“Careful there, Hangman,” you call in a sing-song manner, all the while he continues to smirk at you in a way that some may consider ‘infuriating’ (Review courtesy of Phoenix) or ‘annoying as fuck, man! Blink!’ (Feedback provided by Coyote). “Penny’ll have you thrown out for that sort of thing…'' you say with sickening amounts of fake innocence, batting your eyelashes at him, as he non-verbally calls your bluff, his smirk widening and his chin lifting as if to say ‘go on, then, do it.’.

You don't bother pretending you can win that sort of battle with him, especially not while you’re still clothed, so you flick your hair even more aggressively this time, and begin making your way toward the bar, swaying your hips dramatically for the sole benefit of the seaglass-green eyes that you know will follow you until you reach your destination.

You manage to find your way to the front of the drinks queues fairly quickly, and push yourself up and into the empty seat at the end of the bar. You’re in kind of a blind spot here, you’re more than familiar with the Hard Deck by now to know if you were anyone else, part of any other group, you’d be seriously worried about you chances of actually ordering, but all things considered, you aren’t anybody else, and you just so happen to be a part of the owner’s husband’s little band of merry men.

Penny spies you almost impossibly, and despite the heavy crowds at every other section of the bar, you see her pick up an already cleaned glass, and pretend to wipe it down as she makes her way to where you are, placing the glassware away and hitting you with a blindingly warm smile.

“If it isn’t one of my favourite love birds… what can I get for you hon?” Just as Penny finishes her eyes flicker to the place behind you before she frowns and looks back at you in slight confusion. “Where’s your shadow?” She follows up. You give her a little laugh and roll your eyes, gesturing the general direction of the pool table.

“He’s about to win some pool for me, although he did debate whether or not to come with me instead for at least seven seconds, so you know, we’re improving on the shadow front.”

Penny laughs loud and joyfully, giving a shake of her head at nothing in particular.

“If it weren’t so sickeningly sweet, I’d say good for him, but to be honest, at least I know he’s not going to get into that much trouble when he’s with you,” she says with the sort of wry knowingness one is only allowed to use when married to Pete ‘Maverick’ Mitchell. You raise an eyebrow and cock your head.

“Why does everyone always assume I’m keeping him out of trouble?” you wonder aimlessly, knowing Penny wasn’t one of those people, and in this rare context, she was also correct about keeping Jake from trouble.

Penny shrugs.

“You and Jake are just about the most perfectly matched duo I’ve seen in a while, but I think you hide your assholery better than he does,” Penny tells you with a laugh. You pout at her.

“You think I have assholery?!” you ask, faux-offended. Penny reaches across the bar to give you a light smack, rolling her eyes at you as she does.

“I saw you at the beach party last weekend, egging that man of yours on to humiliate your poor new friends,”

The memory brings an immediate smile to your face and you let out an involuntary bark of laughter.

“Oh my god, but that guy was such a douche! God, he had no idea what he was in for, challenging us to volleyball! Idiot,” you snicker only a little evilly thinking about how thoroughly you’d wiped the floor with the small group of beach goers who had wound up joining your party, only for you all to realise too late that they were kind of really annoying.

“Do you know what most mature adults do, what the other mature adults did?” Penny questions like you’re a preschooler. You roll your eyes, again. “They ignore school yard bait and try to make peace.” Penny tells you, which you don’t think sounds like the right answer. She looks at you expectantly, as if she’s waiting for you to concede her point. You make a face.

“Penny, those guys sucked, and they were talking such a big game about their volleyball skills. They didn’t even bring a volleyball with them! It was a netball!” you justify. Penny you can tell is only half telling you off, being a not-so-reformed troublemaker herself these days. “Jake and I play v-ball literally every sunday, we didn’t do anything or humiliate anyone on purpose, all we did was accept the invitation of a game.” you don’t believe a word of what you say, but it does sound almost convincing. If Jake were here he’d give you a supportive nod.

Penny lets out a laugh and shakes her head at you.

“Only you and Hangman can take something adorable and sweet and romantic that you do together, and turn it into an opportunity to dunk on some tipsy losers who’d mildly annoyed you,” Penny says, still like she’s scolding you, but the sparkle in her eyes says she would have done the exact same thing had she and Maverick been thirty years old again, and if the mere suggestion of beach volleyball wasn’t cause for a physio visit.

“Besides, I’m glad y'all got to watch us play at last. Since we made the mixed regional team last week we’ve wanted to get you all down to a game sometime,” you say, dodging any accusation of pettiness. Penny nods enthusiastically.

“You know Mav, Amelia and I will be at every one of those games. We’ve got to make sure you guys actually win and don't just tell us you win, to get the free drinks I promised.”

You can't help but smile warmly. It was nice to have a family in San Diego, to be able to rely on people.

“Really, Penny, thank you so much for sponsoring the team, you totally didn’t have to do that, but it means a lot to us, to both of us,” you say gently, reaching out to rest your hand over her. Penny returns your soft smile.

“See, this is the sort of thing Jake would never say, not without a heavy helping of sarcasm, irony or whatever else he thinks makes him less vulnerable.”

You laugh at that and bow your head in agreement.

“Hey, I’m working on it with him. I mean, Pen, he still gets surprised when I just tell him that I like a particular facet of his personality… Anyway, in the meantime, I’m happy to be the emotional go-between.”

Penny gives you a knowing, sympathetic hum.

“That man is everything he says he is and more, but he just can’t seem to bring himself to believe it. I’m glad he has you to show him it’s not just bluster.”

Your eyes momentarily prickle at Penny’s frankness, the words painful to hear from somebody else. Although she’s completely correct, it really does upset you to think of the way Jake must consider himself sometimes, and why you were so determined to adjust the way he clearly thought about certain things, mostly, himself.

“Very little of him is just bluster, and I can’t understand sometimes how he doesn’t actually see that, considering it’s a narrative he made for himself… he’s complicated, but I’m pulling at those threads as they come,” you nibble your lip with a small frown, before dropping your gaze to the bar top. “I just wish he’d see him the way I see him, and the way other people see him…” you pause, and Penny lifts a sardonic, incredulous eyebrow at you. You immediately relent, waving your white flag on that point in the form of holding up your hands. You’d had to come to terms a while ago now with the fact that you’re an exceptionally unreliable source when it comes to how you think others see your boyfriend, Dagger squad notwithstanding. “Okay, maybe not the way other people see him. Pretty sure that's the one thing he’s not mistaken about.”

You both share a soft laugh before Penny straightens, and throws a cursory glance over her shoulder at the seemingly ever growing crowd around the bar, though she still remains clearly unbothered as she turns away from the rush, and shifts her weight to her hip as she looks back at you.

“Anyway, I believe you came for drinks, and I believe I should go get them. The usual?”

You nod, thanking her as she steps away to fetch one bottle that supposedly contained beer, before she fetches your much nicer, far superior sarsaparilla, and waves you off when you attempt to pay.

“My shout, for the two of you making the regional team, and celebrating by destroying some amateurs, because you were bored.” She tells you with a playful wink. You grin widely, cheekily, before shooting her a faux-scolding look.

“Rewarding us for our supposed asshole shenanigans? That’s only gonna reinforce our poor behaviour, Penny! This is exactly why we’ll never learn!” you call out raising the drinks as your excuse for choosing to ignore any self-growth.

You manage to narrowly dodge a ‘rogue’ ice cube that finds itself mysteriously launched at your head, and poke your tongue out at the now distracted bartender, who somehow sees your childishness despite her mixing some brightly coloured cocktail, and spares a moment to throw you the bird, then a blown kiss. You laugh to yourself, as you push away from the bar, feeling quite pleased with yourself, and adjusting your focus to immediately inform your boyfriend of Penny’s definitely very real disapproval of your actions, and not at all conflicting response to the two of you grown adults humiliating some random pricks that in complete honesty, you certainly would have expended far less energy by just ignoring for the rest of the night.

You pause briefly, realising that that is the exact sort of petty assholery that Penny had suggested you hid, and briefly consider that you’re just as bad as Hangman, not Jake. You quickly come to the conclusion that you don’t find that to be a terrible thing, and so shrug to yourself, and continue on, unbothered by such little things like being a peaceful, non confrontational and relaxed person. In your eyes, being chaotic, always down to clown (on others) and quite likely an incredibly petty asshole at times sounded like way more fun, and involved far less unwanted self-introspection, you suspect.

The closer you get to the pool tables, the less you have to work to get through the crowds. All the Navy guys tended to congregate most thickly in this part of the bar, a sea of flight suits and unfamiliar patches greeting you, a fun quirk of which you’d discovered fairly soon after you’d visited Jake on base for the first time a month ago. Although you had no clue who any of these sailors were, or if they knew Dagger in any way, they definitely had become aware of you, and more importantly to this topic, who you were dating.

It's probably the petty-asshole in you again, but you get a sweet kick of satisfaction when you approach anywhere near the Navy guys, and for the first time in any bar ever, you don’t have to make yourself known to anyone for them to get out of your way. It’s almost as though a definitely unknown person may or may not have subtly mentioned (see: threatened to the best of his not-inconsiderable abilities) to any Hard Deck regulars on base, that should you be making yourway over to your regular spot, they are to clear the path and make sure you’re able to walk without going unnoticed by rowdy sailors who can't hear or see you.

You’d be annoyed that someone, surely not anyone you’d know, went to such efforts after just one incident in which you were trying to get past some sailors for much too long, only for one of them to step and into you, making you drop the round of drinks you’d been carrying, but honestly, as a remarkably unintimidating woman who wasn't known for her great assertiveness when not backed up by her six foot actually intimidating Navy Officer boyfriend, you kind of loved that someone, who you really had no clue as to the identity of, had gone out of their way to make sure you’d not have any more issues during what should be an uneventful commute from the bar to the pool table.

You have no idea who could be willing to use their mean side to your benefit, the result of which is the most unbothered walk anyone has ever done in a crowded bar, and a bunch of random sailors you don’t know occasionally giving you polite, stern little nods as you pass, as though their instinct was to salute you, before they remembered that you are not in fact any form of authority to them, but they couldn’t not do something as a sign of respect. You really do wish you could find out who it was that had put the fear of god into these men, if only to give him some really, really good head later.

You finally arrive back at the pool table, the red sea closing back up behind you to form a seemingly dense wall of uniforms, that Payback looks at in clear confusion, then to you, as if you had an explanation you were willing to give. He lifts his brows and you shrug, putting on your best smile.

“Guess they just all thought I was cute or something’!” you say brightly, wishfully. From the direction of the pool table, a familiar voice responds to you.

“Yeah, I guess they did, how polite of them.” Jake says meaningfully, though you don't know what he’s on about, but you suspect is in fact a veiled suggestion-not-threat to the sailors within hearing range.

You wander over to Jake, making sure he's not about to take a shot before you step right into his personal space, and hand him his what apparently passes for beer these days. Jake takes a sip, and thanks you, dropping a brief kiss to your temple. You see him briefly take a look at what you’d ordered, only to receive a scoff.

“And you have the nerve to call my choice in drinks ‘nasty’. Hate to break it to you, sweetheart, but you’re drinking’ cough medicine.” This is the one facet of Jake’s personality you can’t stand, and have made clear to him you dislike.

“‘Oh look at me, I’m a grown man from Texas who hates Sarsaparilla, how unique and quirky!’” you mimic his voice in a fairly insulting way, it sounds not a thing like him, but that's part of the jab. Jake narrows his eyes and pokes you in the side.

“You ain’t witty, plenty of people hate that shit,” he tells you, frowning. You ignore him.

“Oooh, I claim to be accepting and appreciative of the few differences i have with my girlfriend, but always happens to forget her favourite drink when he goes out for snacks!’” you mock him further.

Jake huffs and is about to open his mouth, no doubt in his defence, but you cut him off, narrowing your eyes.

“You ain’t slick, Seresin.” you say darkly.

Somewhere around you, wherever your friends are, you don’t know, you hear Rooster whistle lowly.

“Hey guys, first fight!” he says mirthfully, but with no real conviction. You snap your head in his direction.

“This is not our first fight,” you correct him with an eye roll, no longer concerned with your petty argument, both you and Jake forming up into a single entity once more to face the rest of the world. Jake’s arm slings casually around your waist and he leans on his hip, into your side.

“Get a load of this, Rooster thinks that's what a couples fight really sounds like,” Jake adds, as if speaking to you conspiratorial, toxic levels of faux-sympathy for his squad mate.

“If that's what he thinks a fight is, I’d hate to see what he thinks a declaration of love sounds like,” you say, mostly for the benefit of Jake and yours little game you’ve started, and not for Rooster, who was already ignoring you both and rolling his eyes as he moves to take his shot.

You glance up at your boyfriend, who is smiling Cheshire-like, but he shoots you a wink when he returns your gaze. He turns toward you then, using both hands, both of which also hold a beer and a pool stick respectively, to grasp your hips and duck his face into your eye line.

“The corner store we go to for snacks doesn’t have sarsaparilla, but it’s kinda a bust most times anyway, let's find a new snack stop, alright?” Jake says, definitely earning him some extra, extra good head later.

“I didn’t think you really were leaving it out on purpose, it's so hit and miss in Cali what stores stock it.” you tell him, grumbling that you couldn't just go to any store and get you some cough syrup.

Jake hums, and steps around you, your convection on pause briefly as he steps up to take his shot, sinking all the balls he's supposed to and not the ones he isn't (you refuse to learn more about pool than absolutely necessary), before he turns back to you as if he’d never stepped away at all, and sweeps you up again.

“I know a place back home where you can get a year's supply, I’ll see if one of my sisters can figure something out,” Jake says softly, as if a little worried the others might hear him being so gentle and tender. The others, while certainly all pretending not to eavesdrop, only wear various expressions reminiscent of the sort generally worn after being shown a baby animal video compilation.

“And how are either of your sisters supposed to get a year's supply of sarsaparilla up to North Island from Austin?” you question, not wanting to bat away his clear intent to apologise for any wrong you may have thought he’d done. Jake’s eyes swing toward the ceiling like you’ve just said something stupid and he won't actually believe it.

“You forget I’m a pilot.” he says as if it's obvious and also a good point. You frown.

“Pretty sure your jet can barely fit you, let alone a bunch of sarsaparilla.” you say, feeling distinctly like you might be about to walk into a verbal trap he’s laid.

Jake huffs, and still keeping his eyes off of you, he all but stomps his foot at your logic and reasoning.

“Whatever, I’ll drive it back if I have to,” he says, even more quiet and even more worried of the others hearing him. You refrain from ‘aww’ing dramatically, and instead cup his cheek.

“You can just apologise or like, use your words you know. You don't have to communicate with me via intense acts of devotion and service.” you give him a little smile to let him know you were being serious, despite your light tone. Jake’s eyes fall on you at last and he purses his lips.

“It doesn’t feel like enough.”

“But driving around forty hours round trip to Texas and back again all for some cough syrup does?”

“Yes.”

You consider him for a few moments, but relent, and release him of his obligation to make eye contact during vulnerability, patting his cheek lovingly.

“Alright, well, if that's what you’d like to do, Jake,” you say, not fully understanding why words aren’t his thing in this one aspect of his life, when in every other area he excels in anything verbal, damn-near silver-tongued. But you also don't have to understand it, you just had to know it, and then see his displays of love and affection no matter how odd or unconventional or totally over the top and ridiculous, for what they were.

Jake takes a few moments to process the amicable end of that discussion, seemingly expecting a fight or more pushback, but you only nudge him, to draw him from his distraction.

“Hey Hangman, aren’t you supposed to be winning this for me?” you ask playfully. Making the blond frown at you as he looks between the table and your face.

“I said I would, didn’t I?” he asks back, making you pause. You glance back at the table with an earnest frown and after you seemingly take much to long to decipher the secrets of the little round balls, Jake chuckles, stepping up beside you and wrapping you up in one arm, pulling you in as he continues to laugh at you (you retract one extra off of the ‘extra extra good head’ you were planning on giving him later) and kisses your temple, his chuckle nothing sweet and instead completely, totally, and all-consumingly infuriatingly smug (Review by His Girlfriend).

“You have no idea what you’re looking at, do you?” he asks, quieter than you’re expecting, so only you hear. You glare, and answer him with an exasperated sigh.

“Don’t you worry your pretty little head about it, darlin’.”

You now glare directly up at him as he watches you with a mix of genuine assholery and softer playfulness that lets you know he’s fully aware of the former trait making a rare  appearance in reaction to you.

Sometimes, you almost wish he’d go back to ignoring you. It had to be better than suffering this. You didn't deserve it, you were an occasionally good person, right?

Jake draws you back from your silent pleading for a time machine, and he leans down toward you, smolderingly self-satisfied with how his little display has gotten under your skin, and his expression combined with his much more intimate proximity suddenly brings to mind that night several months ago now at the club, the night that Jake had paid attention to you for the very first time, and you’d understood clearly what it must feel like to go up against Hangman in a dogfight, what it felt like to be in his direct line of sight. 

Jake plasters on an identical smile to the one he has in your memory, but unlike that night, he gains an evil glint to his eyes, which you find out the reason for mere seconds later, when he gently boops your nose in a manner that tells you he definitely knows has lost him all extra good head privileges for the night.

Apparently, he deems it worth it, and sadly, you can't help but be swept up by him, rolling your eyes in mock frustration, but unable to keep from grinning up at him like a lovesick fool, waiting for him to finish his line.

Jake’s smile turns momentarily sweet, but he quickly covers back up with his bluster and fake mega-douche routine you actually definitely loved.

“Let ol’ Hangman take care of it for ya’.”

[gallierhouse]

asking for opinions about armand on a friday night is crazy because ive been terrorizing the people in my life about him for a month and now?? im being asked to talk about him?? anyway so i couldnt get thru s1 back in 2022 bc it felt like a kind of rehash of hannibal (character dynamics wise) in a different setting and kind of bored me. i really liked louis in the pilot and honestly would just watch a historical drama about a black pimp and his gens de couleur family in 1930s nola and that was cruelly ripped away from me and ill never forgive lestat. BUT THEN s2 arrived and i gave it another go and armand just rose out of this show as a character ive truly never seen before?? his identity-lessness, his role as a bad stage director, that eager black hole growing around 500 years of life, its so fascinating. the Moment for me with him is obviously the donor painting seeing the whitewashed beautiful pleading garish (when compared with the real man) painting just shifted something in my soul. and THEN getting hit with the arun/maitre stuff and them the entirity of ep5 directly after? ive literally memorized the loumand argument from listening to it so many times Television of All Time fr. i love failmarriages that rot and decay and are inescapable and loumands whole thing felt so good and fresh and so so tasty. those bitches do not like each other. they dont even like each other and yet theyve stayed together for 77 yrs in a relationship built on abuse, spite, and 24/7 power exchange bdsm and thats CRAZY ! plus ive never seen toxic yaoi executed so well with two nonwhite, darkskinned characters and as a south asian that lowkey made me happy lol. anyway i love armand so much he sucks so bad but i do feel deeply seen and deeply compelled by his little gremlin ass

I miss Louis’ New Orleans era too. I get why Lestat fell in love with him, though, if I saw this beautiful creature pull a knife on his own brother in the middle of the street I’d stop at nothing to pursue him. It’s alluring. I think that’s the part of Louis Lestat has always loved and loathed most, his fierce independence and survivor’s instinct and capacity for violence. I say loathed because Lestat’s always torn between wanting Louis like that and wanting Louis to be his little housewife. He’s stupid like that.

I thought his stage direction was nice. Were his plays “good”? No. But were his notes well thought out? Yes. His notes for the trial were good. So it’s the playwright’s fault the scripts were bad, actually.

Re: his identity, I really think he’s doing fine. Not everyone needs a laundry list of hobbies and characteristics to “have an identity.” It’s true that Armand molds himself into whatever shape that’s required of him and sometimes he makes erroneous assumptions about it, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have an identity. I think Armand doesn’t perceive himself as having an identity, and it’s obvious that he structures his life around whatever role he’s occupying, and that it’s all very fragmented and difficult for him to see the continuity in it, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have an identity. His priorities and thought process are fairly obvious to the viewer, so that’s his identity. You can see the structure of his mind. That’s him. Right there. We don’t have to wait for the “real” Armand, he’s already here.

I don’t remember when I started loving him, but it was before the painting. Maybe the hunt, or when he starts participating in the interview. The painting did change something for me, though, and so did the bench scene. But I liked him from the start of season two, really, from the moment I found out he’d essentially been stalking Louis the whole time in Paris. I like him most when he’s got a little bit of edge, but then again, I love him when he lies. I actually have a shirt with their argument printed on it. It’s so fucking funny.

Well, I think there was love, at least before Armand strangled it to death. I don’t know if Louis ever loved Armand again, not after the trial, but I think Armand loved Louis, although not in a way that would really be comprehensible as love to anyone else. Maybe only the way you love something you own. But I think he at least enjoyed the performance of it. Besides, all the best relationships are 24/7 BDSM built on abuse and spite. You don’t agree? I think it’s very romantic.

Yeah, it’s the first time I’ve seen something like that too. And it was the greatest thing ever and I’m really glad we got a South Asian lead, even if I’m unsatisfied with AMC’s promotional strategy. One million seasons of Armand and one million posters of his face splashed across all major cities around the world, please. He’s perfect! More people should see him. More people should be subjected to him.

[mcmookiemeal]

Can I request a Donkey Kong x Socially anxious human(just reader who came with Mario and Luigi……your choice) Female! Reader? When I say “socially anxious”, I mean as in doesn’t talk alot and often gets nervous around others yet is still pretty stand-offish and seems intimidating despite the small size(but is actually not……just anxiety) but also has difficulty opening up. I also thought it would be a love at first sight thing(like Mario and Peach in the movie) as well as DK being all protective and maybe he gets jealous at one point…..

It can be a whole imagine, headcanon, multi-part story……..imma leave that up to you.😉

Donkey Kong x Socially anxious reader

I’m gonna make you Mario and Luigis younger sister I hope thats okay!!

You and Dk had kind of a rocky start when you first met.

He was just so…out there.

And you were not.

So there were definitely a lot of walls to break before you guys even developed a friendship.

You met at the arena when mario was going to fight in order to win an alliance with the Kong army.

You were sitting up on the balcony with Cranky Kong and peach.

Dk hadn’t even noticed you at first.

He was too busy trying to gain his dad’s attention while showing off his muscle.

Then his eyes shifted in your direction.

And when he saw you he was just struck by your beauty.

“Hey…Hey whats your name?”

You looked around to see who he could be talking to before it hit you like a ton of bricks that he was talking to you.

“I’m (Y/n.)” You responded quietly.

He smiled at you and winked before turning his attention back to his brother.

He was here to fight after all.

After that event it kind of felt like Dk followed you everywhere.

And you didn’t mind, you were just wondering why he had chosen you.

“I’m sorry but is there a reason you’re following me?” You questioned while standing on the porch of the hut

“You’re just really pretty.” He said without hesitation

Did he even know what he was saying?!

Had he by any chance mistaken you for someone else? Never has anyone outside of your family called you pretty before.

In fact, most people considered you intimidating.

You just chose not to respond to his complement because you honestly didn’t know what to say, but that didn’t seem to stop him from keeping his mouth closed.

You didn’t even talk to him much, he did all the talking and you sat back to listen to him.

I mean everyone needed a friend who could listen to them right?

During the events of helping Peach take down Bowser, Dk stayed right by your side.

Seriously he never left once, he was always there.

It was almost like he was a lost puppy.

Mario picked up on what this “smash monkey” was trying to do and he really wasn’t a fan of it.

And the fact you seemed perfectly fine with it bothered him even more.

So whenever Mario would try to separate the two of you and keep you close to him, Dk just wouldn’t have it.

He would snatch you back from your brother and keep you next to him, where you belonged.

You really didn’t like it when they fought over you, but you understood Dk was probably just happy to have a human friend so you didn’t mind.

It was a completely different story from his perspective.

He just had a really really big crush on you.

He just didn’t understand how could a girl as beautiful as you be related to someone as annoying as Mario.

Even though you didn’t talk much, he still loved being around you.

But sometimes it did worry him a bit.

Did you secretly hate him? Were you in love with someone else? All these thoughts ran through his head so finally he decided to ask you about it.

So when you and Dk got swallowed by the giant eel after the big battle at rainbow road, he figured this would be the time to ask.

“Do you hate me?” He asked, breaking the silence.

You looked up at him and raised a brow.

“No.” You responded before looking back down at your feet.

Then why do you never talk to me? Did I do something to upset you?”

You sighed and shook your head.

“No you didn’t…It’s an issue on my part.”

His face contorted from one of worry to one of confusion, He didn’t understand what you mean’t.

“I’m just not good with other people. It’s not that I don’t like you, i’m just nervous around everyone.”

He didn’t understand how you felt, but he didn’t need to understand to help you.

He grabbed your hands in his very large ones and squeezed them reassuringly.

“You never have to be nervous around me.”

You blushed as he stared at you with those big eyes you just couldn’t bring yourself to turn away from.

You know…since we might die in here, I’ve got something I wanna tell you.”

You look at him with a curious expression, wondering what he’s going to say.

“I really like you.” He confesses.

“Huh-?”

You really were not expecting that.

You didn’t know what to expect from him but it definitely was not a love confession.

“I just think you’re really pretty and nice and cool and I just really like you.” He continued

Your blush only grew darker and darker as he continued with his confession to you.

“It’s okay if you don’t feel the same way, I get it.”

You sat in your own thoughts for a second, contemplating on what you should say next.

You liked him too but you have never been a romantic person so you really didn’t know what to say right now.

He anxiously looked at you, obviously waiting on your response

You couldn’t keep him waiting forever so it was now or never.

“I like you too but I- I’m kind of scared of getting in a relationship.”

“Scared?”

“Yes I’m scared. It’s a lot of commitment, trust, and it just sounds so scary to be in love with someone.”

He wasn’t sure on how to comfort you, this was obviously a personal issue that he stumbled into by accident.

“Whatever you decide I hope you know I’ll always protect you.”

You look up at him with glossy eyes and nod, wiping away any tears that had stained your cheeks.

“Thank you, but how about we continue this conversation when we get out of here.” You said remembering that you were in an eels stomach.

After escaping the eels stomach on a barrel from Dk’s kart, you two made your way to go crash Bowsers wedding.

Fighting your way through the koopas like badass couples do(you’re not a couple yet but you act like one)

You and Dk came in as the fight was still at its peak, so you helped out by fighting some koopa troopers who just so happened to be in the way.

The fight at the Mushroom kingdom looked like it was about over, You and Mario found Luigi and had your moment as you were reunited, the same went for Dk and his dad.

Everything was fine until Bowser released that giant bullet onto Peaches castle.

Mario stepped in and led it away into one of the pipes which seemed like a smart plan at first, but it ended sucking all of you in with it.

You all landed in Brooklyn and Dk made sure to keep you in the backlines.

The two of you had been through so much together, he didn’t wanna risk loosing you now.

But when Dk has his little brawl with Bowser it wasn’t looking too good for him.

Bowser had him up in a chokehold and was getting ready to punch the life out of him.

You needed to help but you didn’t have anything on you so you grabbed a brick from one of the buildings that had been destroyed and threw it at bowsers head.

He dropped Dk and slowly turned his head towards you.

He huffed and angrily ran in your direction but before he could get to you Dk pushed him out of the way.

“(Y/n) go get the star!” Dk yelled and nodded over to the star.

You understood and ran as fast as you could over towards the star but sadly Dk wasn’t able to hold Bowser off forever and Bowser came after you once again.

He caught up to you and grabbed you by the collar, throwing you back with intense strength.

Dk caught you in his strong arms and didn’t let you go.

He wouldn’t let you go. He couldn’t let that crazy turtle freak hurt you again.

“You’re okay I got you.” He comforted as he stroked your hair with his finger.

You clung onto his big fuzzy arm, shaking violently as a few tears escaped your eyes from the fear you just felt.

The rest of the fight you and Dk sat back to let Mario handle it since you had done all you could do by that point.

The conclusion to the battle was sweet, Bowser was defeated and everyone was happy.

You decided that you didn’t want to stay in Brooklyn anymore, Instead you wanted to go back to the Jungle Kingdom with Dk.

Your brothers chose to stay in the Mushroom Kingdom meaning they were always close, which you were happy about.

Dk and you got together(obviously) and ended up having a pretty successful relationship.

Sure it took a lot of effort to get to where you are now, but you’re so happy you put forth that effort.

Dk is pretty happy you got together because he was really wondering if that crush would ever go away.

A/n: Hope you enjoy!!❤️❤️

[reverie-verse]

Love Triangle Or Not (Four)- Pt 4 ..haha

Here are the other parts

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Anon Request Prompt: Y/N is a trainer (very well known for her badassness) She just came back from a mission; she gets a little jelly that Tris and Four had gotten closer. There’s some feelings but on who’s end? Four asks Y/N to help Tris. Being the amazing person she is, she agrees to help, but in the process she gets hurt. After the mission ends she returns home only to have an argument with Four. Leads to late night confessions  

I’m also making Y/N a Divergent but in secret. 

A couple things, this is ridiculously long, I put it in parts and I am releasing them all at the same time because it makes sense okay. Cooooooollll I hope you enjoy. 

Established something between Tris and Four. 

Yooo I am so sorry I know it says late night confeession but thats not what happend. Im sorry the story writes itself sometimes hahha.

My requests are OPEN

————————————————-

Four ran from the room he and Tris were in, Jeanin laid unconscious on the floor. His mind reeled back to you. His panic set in, the two of them ran together, Caleb, Marcus and Will were not too far behind them. “ We need to get to the train!” Tris says, she shifts her gaze to Four.

Four growls in irritation, you should’ve been back by now and you're not. Four comes to a halt and so does the rest of the group. 

“ What are you doing? We need to go now!” Tris yells.

“ It’s Y/N. I can’t leave. Just go to the train and get on, I’ll be right behind you guys”  Four runs in the opposite direction back into the building hunting for you. He’ll be damned if he were to ever leave you behind. He’ll be damned if you're hurt, and if you were he only had himself to blame. He asked you to do this mission, it was a rushed process he knew that. Yet his heart still sank, he needed to make sure you were safe. He had so many things to say to you things he wished he had said earlier. So many emotions filtered through his mind and he only could think about you. 

As if on cue, you stumbled out of the room that you and Eric were fighting in. Grabbing both hands he socked you in the side of the ribs repeatedly. You curved in on yourself in an attempt to block the punches. Eric managed to corner you between the wall and himself. Four panicked yelling at the top of his lungs from the other end of the hall “ GET OFF HER!” Four took off into a full sprint. Eric snapped his head towards four realizing that he was in fact awake and not affected by the serum. You took advantage of his distraction. You’ll definitely need to thank Four for that later. You pushed the hand away that held your wrist. Reach up and over Eric’s head you forced it down, locking it in place with your other hand. You jumped up so that you could wrap your legs around his waist. You planned on putting his ass to sleep. You squeezed your arms tight, cutting off his air supply. 

Four slowed down as he neared you, Eric groaned in pain as he tried to push you off of him. He resorted to punching you in the side causing you to lose your grip. You groan in pain as your grip slips from your fingers. You dropped to the floor while Eric attempted to grab you again. Four took off in a sprint tackling Eric to the ground. You took this as a second to recover looking for anything to take him down. By now all the little Knick knack of weapons that you had on you were gone due to the fight with Eric. Four battled it out with Eric, you stumbled up searching for anything to stop Eric. Your eyes landed on a piece of round metal, you ran towards it reaching for it. You stopped in your tracks holding it in your hand, it was a smoke grenade. Your eyes snapped in the direction of Four and Eric. As they wrestled amongst each other, you waited for an opportunity for them to separate. You started off in a jog before fully running you shouted Fours name as you pulled the clip from its slot and tossed it. Both Eric and Four stopped to look at you. Eric, not having time to react, Four punched him in the face taking off in the opposite direction. You threw the grenade forcing him to collapse and cover his face while you and Four barely made it out of the room-heading for the trains.

The train had led the group to Amity, a safe haven for now though it wasn’t ideal but it was necessary. The group had jumped off the train landing in the grass near the open field. Everyone graciously landed on the grass except you. The pain you now felt in your side was immense, the adrenaline in your body slowing down allowing all the damage your body took, catching up to you all at once. You were tired, your body wanted to give out, sweat rolled down your face, you pushed yourself up, you couldn’t breathe, it seemed to become more difficult as you tried to catch your breath. You swayed for a second or two. The thing was you didn’t land incorrectly, you landed how you were taught. So why can’t you breathe? The group had walked a good distance before Four noticed your absence. He turned around and saw you standing in place, you looked so defeated, but you also looked like you were about to drop.

 Four ran over to you as he yelled your name “ Y/N?!”, your body swayed again. You knew you couldn’t stand for much longer. In that very same second your body gave out your eyes  fluttering shut. The last image was Four’s concerned face as he caught you in his arms..” Hey, Hey, keep your eyes open. You can’t sleep, Stay awake” Four checked everywhere he could possibly as he searched for wounds. You had a few cuts and bruises here and there. What captured his attention was the broken rib that perturbed out so far that it pressed into the suit you wore, the back of your head carried an injury that caused it to bleed. Damnit! It was you, he did this to you, out of all people. He cursed himself, as he lifted you up and carried you bridal style. This was the last thing he wanted and yet he was the one who asked you to do this mission to start this war. You willingly followed him, even though you told him it was a bad idea. You were always right but somehow you kept it to yourself and you never told him so, he would always find out the hard way. This time it was different, he let someone else talk him into it and you tried to stop him, to make him wait. If only he had listened. You were his best friend but in this moment you meant more to him than anything else. 

You laid in the hospital bed bandaged up asleep. Four held your hand in his as he rested his elbows on the bed, his lips resting against your hand. It had been about two days, you hadn’t woken up yet, you just continued to sleep, Four paid attention to your breathing every now and then to make sure you were in fact breathing. Four caught in a trance he hadn’t noticed Marcus walk into the room, “ I think you should eat and get some rest-” Marcus walks over to him, placing the food on the bedside of the table. Marcus placed his hand on Four’s shoulder to bring comfort to him in hopes he might take a break. “ -Tobias” Four flinches, it brings him to reality.. His name sounded wrong in his mouth, his touch burned, it wasn’t the touch he yearned for or the way his name was said by only you. Yet here you were laying in this bed, because of him. He never looked away from your face, watching you sleep, you looked so peaceful, in a way it made his heart twist. A piece of hair rested against your face in the way, one of his hands let go of yours, he reached over and pushed it out of the way. He caressed your face gently. Marcus sighed leaving the room quietly giving him the space and privacy with you. 

A memory of you filled his mind as your smile appeared, you and Four had decided it would be a good time to prank Eric by replacing his mattress with farting cushions, so that every time he rolled over it would fart. Those damn farting sounds woke up the entire unit. Your laughter filled his ears. His heart swooned again, oh how he wished he could hear it right now. He closed his eyes just long enough so that he could hear your laugh and see your smile. Though when he opened his eyes he realized that you may just be in this state for a while. A bad memory filled his mind as it flashed back to you fighting Eric in the Warehouse, you fought with purpose, and he wished he would have taken it back-

“ Well you look like shit. Stop scrunching your face like that, you’re gonna get wrinkles” Your voice hoarse as you spoke. Four opened his eyes as he looked at you. You were a sight for sore eyes, his heart swelled at the sound of your voice. He wasn’t sure if this was a dream or if it was real. You smiled at him.

Four chuckled “Oh is that so?” He questioned still lost in you.

“ Yeah” You continued to smile as you spoke softly 

“ Mmh I wonder who told you that.” He replied carrying the same volume

“ You” You watched Four hold your hand as he looked away from your face, guilt filled his chest. You had seen his mood shift and just as you were about to ask him what was wrong Tris had walked in with a tray of food. She stops in her tracts realizing that you were awake. Four straightens up in his chair. By the looks of it not only did she care to feed him but she cut her hair too, her smile not quite reaching you but directed at Four. Of course it was. Your eyes drifted between the two. Tris cleared her throat “ Um I brought you food, I know you haven’t eaten all day. Oh uh Y/n you’re up, I am so glad you are finally awake” 

You gave her a simple “mhm” as you turned slightly on your good side, kind of showing your back to her and the door. You faced the window and Four. You watched Four watch her, he was hesitant “Uh thank you Tris, you can leave it right there on the counter” He nodded towards it giving her a smile. She yet again returns it before leaving, giving him one last look. You rolled your eyes groaning in pain as you sat up slowly pushing Four out of the way. No way in hell were you planning on staying here to watch this shit happen. Four shook his head “ No you need to lay down” 

You shoved his hands away. “ Fuck it I am leaving”

“ You can’t leave Y/n” Four argued back as he tried to get you to stay on the bed. 

“ Watch me” You winced as you shoved him out of the way standing barely on your own two feet

“ Y/n come on. Don’t do this, just lay back down and get some rest”

“ No, I’m leaving, I can't stay here.”

“We need to lay low. Which is something you already know.”

“ We, please more like you and Tris with your little group you call family. I am not needed and that much is clear. What a great way to wake up”

“Is that what this is about? Tris?” He asks, watching your reaction closely, you however couldn’t find a way to answer that question without being rude. You also were tired of hiding your feelings for him. 

“ You know what so what if it is” You questioned as you tried to walk past him but it was a struggle. Four grabbed your arm holding you in place. “ Four don’t make me kick your ass”

“ What has she done to you that you hate her so much? If you hated her so much then why did you help take down Erudite-”

“ I didn't do it for her! I did it for you!” You challenged as two stared at each other. It was time to let him know even if this doesn’t go the way you’d like. 

“ What?” Four let go of your arm. 

“ I. did. it . for. You. Because I care for you more than I should. I am in love with you and I have been since I met you. You are the one person that I can’t live without. I put my feelings aside because it was the right thing to do. It was never just for her” You told him, as a tear slipped out of your cheek. You had held that in for so long that when it came out it was more powerful than it should've been. “ But what does that matter? She’s the one you want, you two can save the factions together. You don’t need me” You stated as you took a step away from Four. 

“ She’s not the one I want” Four says as he stares into you from behind. He wasn’t about to let you walk away after he almost lost you. Tris was not the person he wanted in his life as much as he wanted you in his life. You didn’t turn around, instead you chose to stay in your place. You waited. What if he was only saying that just to say. You were a sucker for him, one word, one phrase or sentence was enough to keep you here, but could you really do that to yourself? Four walked over to you turning you around to face him, He cupped your face in his hands. 

“ You are the one I want, Y/n. How can I save factions if the one person who knows me the best isn’t my partner. You have been by my side supporting me every step of the way. It wasn’t until the moment I thought I lost you that, it was you.” Four rested his forehead against yours.

 He shook his head, “ She was never you, she couldn’t be but I did have to help her. I knew what she was and that was life that needed to be saved. That doesn’t make things better but I had to help. It’s what you would’ve done”

You sighed “ Tobias-” Four couldn’t take it much longer pulling you into a kiss capturing your lips with his, the way you folded into each other was like a perfect mold. Four’s hands moved from your face sliding down your sides wrapping his arms around you. Yours wrapped around his neck, your fingers carting through his hair. You both must've been holding back from each other, as you both took the breath from each other's lungs. You both held so much passion and love that it felt as if no time had passed, the only indicator was the need for air and the pain in your ribs. You both pull away, while you wince slightly.  

“You okay?”

“ Yeah, just keep in mind the next time you do that, let me know so my ribs don’t hurt” You tell him.

“ I will be sure to warn you, but can I just say Jealous is a good look on you”

[juni-ravenhall]

If you take over SSE, what would be your first changes that you make? Like immediate things you want to do?

And what’d be your long term goal, how would you achieve it?

- ro-sso

this is the best ask ever thank u but u might not be prepared for this essay........ sorry :3

first off id need to find out exactly who are the current ppl for game director, art director, etc direction positions, and who of them are making the crazy decisions. is it directors and managers, is it the CEO, etc. ofc there might be many parts in this chain from an uncaring CEO down to a confused director down to a struggling game designer down to a coder/writer/artist that doesnt get enough time and resources, like, i understand its a complex chain but that doesnt change the fact that someone (or several) have been fucking shit up for all of sse's history. so i would do a lot of talking to staff respectfully and finding out whats really been going on in the chain, and who is not working in the best interest of the game's quality and the company's stability. map out where in the company theres the most and least problems.

(this to me is easy, im analytical and resistant to lies and manipulation as a person. i see through shit very easily and i have a long history of self-studying and analysing stuff related to running companies and making games, since thats my life goal... so to some ppl it might sound like "thats harder than you think" bc theyre just not me. some ppl arent passionate about running good healthy ethical game companies - i am!)

sse clearly has basically never had good directors with good direction, or if they did, those werent given enough power and resources. they shouldnt have been changing artstyle several times, they shouldnt have been abandoning storylines and areas, they shouldnt have been ignoring bugs in general, they shouldnt have been ignoring bugs and cheats in racing and champs, etc. so, its very important to get a good game director, art director, and so on, in place, whether its an existing staff member who just needs more power and resources, or its someone new who is a good fit.

then ofc take a look at all staff hired and see what everyone is there for. after the layoffs im not sure if they have many passive workers left but id get an overview and do some interviews w staff to find out how the efficiency situation is and if more/less ppl are needed in diff areas to actually pay ppl to work on the game itself. (as an example mb u need one less social media person and one more programmer, one less team manager consultant or other middleclass word salad jobs... etc.)

then overview of salary differences. this is a huge point to me. was the CEO that im assumably taking the job from, earning a lot more than everyone else a month? then thats not happening anymore. all salaries within the company would become more balanced, setting in place a system where the minimum salary and max salary at the company are tied together in a ratio so that to raise the top u must also raise the bottom. this will instantly lower much of the top and assumably raise some at the bottom (how much, i dont know from the outside). this ratio system would be clearly outlined and from now on a pillar of the company's structure. also, check that skilled senior staff has appropriate pay for their experience, etc, make sure salaries seem fair.

along with this ofc a good overview of costs, loans, earnings, the current office and all of this to know the situation. i think thats obvious but ill say it anyway to be clear. have a complete grasp of the economic situation, talk to the economics staff.

with staff interviews and salary checkups it would also be relevant to see if theres any gold star workers who should shift up in positions, for example a very good animator could become lead animator, stuff like this. sse has already done things like this fairly often (sometimes maybe not with the right people) so im not too worried about it but i would do another check. also just general talk w staff to find out who has hidden potential that might not be getting used. (i want to know my workers and be able to help them shine, this is good both for the workers, the work environment, and the company results.)

at this point, we should have balanced out some of the leaking money at the top (and hopefully made a few leeches jump ship while at it), boosted the happiness within the company (balanced salaries etc), and have a great overview of whats going on from the more economic and hierarchy standpoint. we should have gotten rid of some potential leeching staff that didnt actually help create a good product and run a healthy, ethical company, and we might have gotten new people in positions where we needed more skills (direction, programming, whatnot). compared to sse's 10+ years of being a chaotic mess, the company structure should look pretty good now, even if not perfect.

i would have a lot of talk with the directors and team leaders and senior staff to make sure everyone is on the same page from now on: we are making a good quality game, we are being consistent, we are not adding new random shit just bc ooh shiny or cashgrabs, we are going to impress the players and make them feel "oh god, finally sso is consistent and living up to its potential". everyone at the company needs to understand this goal and why the loyal players are disappointed with the game. there will still be new horses and item recolors etc ofc, we do need a certain degree of "ooh shiny" from the player side of things (hopefully good gameplay and good stories would also be ooh shiny though), but there needs to be a new focus on the Actual core and Actual pillars of the game, which sse failed to do bc they have bad direction.

most likely, we would change the weekly update into bi-weekly or monthly, maybe starting with bi-weekly to test the waters. in order to deliver a good quality main storyline and also good quality stories and updates to tie up loose ends, there needs to be enough time to do that. there would be very solid goals on the cadence at which major updates are released and no long stretches of time without main story, and no long stretches without other significant updates.

an important part of that is also the seasonal events - i think the 4 seasons of events is a good thing, but they need to be properly bug fixed and have some design and writing improvements, one new fun (more challenging) race for each of them, etc. so hopefully we can afford enough staff that we have a few ppl working on updating and finalising the 4 seasonal events to their more or less final form.

each seasonal event needs to have a cool and challenging race (similar to cloud kingdom rainbow race or some other recent races) that HAS A HIGHSCORE BOARD. this is a key thing to me. all event races should have highscore boards (and some crappy event races may be removed, or combined into a better version of all of them together). *everyone* playing would be able to just better their own score for a generic gold/silver/bronze score, which gives specific rewards for reaching the medal score on the event race(s), and those who are at the top of the leaderboard among everyone, would get a non-exclusive prize, like 1000js. its not a huge win - not to encourage cheating to get to the top - and mostly based in the existing "daily best" system. it would still encourage players to actually try their best at the event races and feel like there's some stakes in it. (active human moderation of suspicious race results is also necessary - we should be able to afford that now.) i also think, if someone has won the daily best, they should then not be able to get the daily best for at least another week, leaving place for other people... but this becomes a problem with alt accounts, so it needs more consideration, i dont have the full answer to that yet.

also, all the tack and clothes need a stats overhaul. the random top stats we currently have are stupid and they seem like they just didnt think about this at all. this is partially a dress up game, so you need to be able to dress up cute and still have top stats and be able to win champs. if possible, i would set staff to work on letting you upgrade any piece of equipment to max stats (which would be something like 5-10 in each stat i guess). this system might require starcoins to upgrade - a way for the company to earn money from cosmetic changes, that seems fair enough to me. (maybe there would be a way to pay with shillings and collectables, but just an easier way to pay with sc, it would be considered.)

we'd also need to sit down and take a good look at what all horses stats are, which horses seem to be boosted or nerfed in races for no reason, and make sure all horses at least function fairly and as intended. after that, to consider whether you should be able to train all horses to have the same max stats, or if we want to keep breeds unique and different, then those differences should also be well thought out and actually matter. right now, and for a long time, some horses are just better at races than others (pintabian, etc), and some (ardennes) seem to be shit for no real reason (other draft horses dont necessarily have the same problem). so it needs to be properly looked at and fixed so all horses at least have good reasons to be different, if they are different at all, and no bugs or unintended boosts and nerfs. horse stats should make sense for gameplay.

all the champs need to get their updated forms, so i also hope we could afford enough staff to have a few ppl working on updating the champs consistently until thats done. i do think a lot of sso's races also should be overhauled, because racing is the main gameplay we actually have (collecting light in hollow woods is not challenging and not really gameplay) and it should be satisfying, fun, and challenging, like playing a mariokart race (that doesnt mean it should play *like* a mariokart race, just that it needs to be fun). the highscore boards and the gold/silver/bronze medal systems are really, really neglected assets of sso's player motivation. if getting a gold medal score on a race was consistently actually difficult and required practice, and getting that gold medal also gave you a good reward (shillings, items) that motivated you to aim for it, then players might actually have fun challenging themselves for higher scores! the same goes for daily best / etc scores that should be looked into, what rewards they give, etc.

also, there should be a ban on adding any new npcs to the game if theyre not extremely necessary. sse has been adding new npcs left and right all the time, and it just clogs the game with random irrelevant characters that dont add anything to the game, it takes time and resources to make their model, give them a name, write their dialogue, and so on. instead, focus all that energy on actual relevant npcs and ones that players want to talk to and find out more about, hear their storylines, etc, and let races be handled with either existing npcs or with new and improved highscore board objects (make it obvious you click them to start the race).

of course, the art style of sso should never again change. art direction from now on is consistent and solid with an art director who understands their job, lead artists and lead animators who 100% understand what the goals are. directors who make sure that the quality of art, design, animation are up to the standards of the style we are using, that things fit together in the game. new models should not actually be "better" than the old ones - you end up in a destructive cycle where the art keeps changing. the style should be consistent with only relatively minor refinements over time. so, the art directors and leads need to make sure the style continues to be consistent, and update things that need to be. (im not sure how many areas of sso should really get the complete overhauls like silverglade village anymore - at some point you're also wasting resources on something less important than the gameplay and story, but some areas also look really outdated, so careful consideration needs to go into which areas to update and *how* to update them. maybe jarlaheim doesnt need a complete overhaul but a partial one. etc.)

the gen 4 horse needs to have very solid planning before release, which seems to have been the case so far from the little ive heard about it. if players can finally get a more custom horse with custom markings, mane and tail styles (preferrably available across breeds), and ability to pick coat, mane and tail colours separately, i think this would be great. it also relates to the whole thing with horse stats and just making sure that horses function properly and have reasons to actually have different stats and such, if theyre going to have that.

there also needs to be a decision made about sso's future - specifically, should we keep developing this game on this crappy messy engine for another decade, or should we eventually say, "this is sso 1, and we're finished with it (the story is finished, game isnt buggy, etc)" - and then go on to create a new game (while still keeping sso 1 running!) on a new, modern engine, where there is good direction and good planning from the very beginning? i dont know how far they got with project curie before cancelling it, whether theres much work to salvage, but i think that creating a new horse mmo set in jorvik (curie was supposedly not a horse game) as a more or less "sso 2" is a fair idea. the potential of customisable gen 4 horses might not really be that relevant for sso 1, or customisable player character faces and bodies like the sims. maybe this is stuff that should be in sso 2 from the very beginning, rather than patches trying to fix the mess that is the current sso? i think a lot of players wouldve been happier to see the old avatars and stuff remain in sso 1 and see the new, current artstyle we have be a separate game as sso 2 instead. (runescape classic etc.)

so, i would want to very carefully consider what really should be in sso 1 versus if we should be making sso 2. its possible to decide, actually we do want to just keep updating sso 1 and make it the best it can be, to basically keep adding expansions to it. but even if we decide that, the thing is, its hard to save the original story at this point due to the careless updates that have already been made for years. my question is, is it possible to give the loyal, old players a satisfying ending to this story and these characters' stories and this world's lore, within the current state of sso? or is it just too far gone off the track? so this needs to be carefully considered. maybe sso 2 could be a sort of remake of the story, starting with elements based on SSL, rather than the haphazard "uh these girls saved the world a while ago and now youre here i guess" that sso did start with. maybe its not too late to give the loyal long term players a satisfying end to the story. but its a complex issue that needs a lot of thought. (which should never have happened! the story shouldnt have changed the way it did, things shouldnt have been abandoned randomly, added randomly, changed randomly, all of this is just bad shitty direction and management without respect to the players, which is especially frustrating bc it goes right into "girl gamers dont matter, girl games dont matter,".)

there are more things, like a weather system, that i would have loved to see in sso but ultimately might be better to save for sso 2. or maybe sso keeps going with major updates and major expansions and then it would be relevant to consider for sso. the same thing for customising our home stable, getting a player home to customise, there are lots of fun ideas like this that i could talk about but that ultimately im not sure how much time and resources should be sunk into when sse have chosen to fuck themselves over for this long and caused this many problems with the game that need immediate attention to make it playable and enjoyable. so in this... essay... i focused mostly on solving problems and making the game a solid and fun experience, and what to prioritise to keep it that way, while these bonus new content like weather or customisable horses or customisable player faces/bodies and all that, would be great updates (or sso 2) but have to come as a bonus when everything else is under control.

so yeah thats covering both a lot of immediate stuff and long term considerations. this is like, a fraction of the stuff i've thought about. i have a lot more to say about a lot of things to fix in sso and other things that have to do with running companies too. and ofc theres a lot of things i just cant know from the outside, and so on, im not a perfect person who knows everything and never pretend to be (i have to say this bc ppl like projecting things on me just for being confident in my skills). getting to take over sse would still be a learning curve with finding out exactly where the problems are and how to solve them. i view this realistically. there are always unknown variables and things i'll have to figure out when i get to it, but you can do that if you have a strong core and strong direction that wont be swayed by capitalism or ooh shiny. i just know a lot about prioritising and directing and about ways to run healthier, better companies, and ways to be ethical and create good products instead of cash grabs - and i also value the skills and knowledge of others, which matters in finding the right people to work in the right positions. these are specific interests i have and spend a lot of time thinking about, analysing, studying, practising, etc.

if you or anyone else actually read all of this (im shocked) and want to discuss more about it or have questions about it, im all ears :D

[ninja-knox-ur-sox-off]

"….Y’know it really feels like they’re just trying to force discord between monkey king and macaque with no reason and with like… no actual emotional argument buildup??" In season 3 they fought over noodles (it wasnt really about noodles of course, but thats what started the bickering). Season 4 when they worked together macaque kept sniping him and even gave an unnecessary comment about his smell. I think I get what you're saying but lmk doesn't need to force discord when there's already discord. I don't know don't know, I'm just obsessed with their dynamic and it felt IC to me.

Oh bro! I'm glad you're enjoying the dynamic!!! Honestly in my reaction posts its usually just my kneejerk reaction and my takes on stuff may change later so don't take my rambles too seriously there, it's definitely not an analysis post lol

to be clear, when i said like, "forced discord," its more about the dialogue and how the arguments were written rather than me saying they shouldn't be fighting or snappy with each other. The arguments themselves just seemed kinda off. The noodles one made sense with Macaque coming over to purposefully poke at Wukong like he's been doing since his first appearance. (Though honestly my kneejerk reaction was that Wukong reacting and bristling was weird too because he'd never really reacted to Macaque before unless it endangered Mk but like obviously that was just the dynamic development and the direction it went i just wasn't used to it inghklsdfj My kneejerk is just wrong sometimes.) But it was still a similar thing with the smell comment in s4; Macaque insults/pokes, Wukong reacts, but he's not like actually offended and moves on pretty quickly and its more of a superficial insult that doesn't mean anything. It's just kinda them trying to make a connection with each other if anything and not really knowing how.

S5's arguments (at least to me in the two--oNLY TWO so be patient with me guys i don't have all the context yet like you do--episodes I've seen) seem to be more just... Macaque criticizing every move Wukong makes and Wukong getting snappy about it. Even if the criticisms themselves don't necessarily make any sense. Like episode 1 where Wukong is doing his best to talk to Mk about the whole Monkey thing and Mk shuts him down and literally runs away and Wukong isn't about to tie him down and make him talk even if he could and he wouldn't want to, Mk sounds like he's two questions away from a breakdown. And then despite watching all that happen and seeing how much Wukong cares about Mk and wants to do his best for him, Macaque just shows up and calls Wukong a bad mentor and lectures him for not talking to Mk, and claims its Wukong dodging the conversation RIGHT AFTER seeing him trying to do exactly the opposite of all of that; be a good mentor and talk to Mk. That to me just is... I dunno it felt forced. It felt irrelevant even, and not even like a valid criticism. Just a weird sort of comment for the sake of an argument.

Honestly part of it might just be that I'm missing a lot or not invested enough to really like get it, to get the dynamic shift, cause to be fair!! I've fallen a bit out of liking their dynamic for one reason or another. or maybe it was rushed, or maybe I'm distracted and not reading things properly, (honestly the dialogue is still really hard for me to hear and understand for some reason) I ain't about to say my opinions infallible or anything, i could be out to lunch (and totally wrong) on a lot of this stuff. And hey, the more I think about it the more my opinion will change and I'll notice new stuff. Like hey! Just while writing this I started thinking about the scene under the mountain where Wukong lashed out at Macaque because he was upset, thought about the circlet scene and how Wukong gets snippy with Macaque and noticed hey! That's interesting! Seems like there might be some falling into old habits! I can make connections to make it work in my brain it just takes a hot sec when i'm also processing the visual change XD

[alexanderlightweight]

Hey! could you do something with autistic alec? cus i saw one of your fics with that tag and i love autistic Alec :) cus i feel seen and it makes me really happy ❤️❤️

so first things first anon, i have wonderful news! all of my alec's are autistic because i headcanon him as autistic and thats the only way i write him really <3

i'm autistic and thats just how I ended up writing him and i have for years, but i stopped tagging it because i got tired of dealing with people (this is not directed at you btw, i was so excited to see this prompt and that you liked them and felt seen by it!!! because thats what i originally wanted) who didn't feel i made alec 'autistic enough' which just annoyed and triggered me so i stopped tagging it. also some gross stereotypes and at one point someone told me to 'prove i was autistic'... but that was several years ago.

now i live with my bf who is more than happy to deal with ignorant people for me, so i'm happy to start tagging it again if it makes people feel seen? since that's the most important part. so this is autistic alec but it's more domestic than focusing on autistic? since like i mentioned, all my alecs are?

so i hope you enjoy that knowledge and this fic.

also, in pretty much all of my fics Magnus is Alec's main Special Interest. it's why he kind of just is happy doing things Magnus likes, because that's who he likes enjoying himself and that makes his day. Especially when he contributes to it in some way or just gets to bask in it.

lumine

-

Alec stares at the group of ichor-dripping shadowhunters in front of him and looks blankly at the sheepish faces of his hunters and the unrepentant, mulish expressions of Jace and Clary.

Already he knows exactly how this is about to go and he wants no part of it. In fact, he is activating his newest protocol.

“Mirai!” He yells out and in a flash of runic speed, his second is there and staring at the group with her own scowl. “These two teams seem to think that whatever mess they got into, that it required the Head of the Institute, do you agree?”

Mirai scoffs and gives the group a dark look, “Commander, the only thing they need is to be tossed into decontamination and put on ichor duty for a few shifts. Especially since one of them left a body shaped dent in an alley wall and mundane chatter picked it up.”

Jace winces suspiciously and Alec sends him a scolding look, because he really should know better.

“You didn’t punch the wall or something after? Make it less suspicious?” Alec asks, because they have protocols, and nothing tonight should have required such sloppy work.

“Clary saw something and—” Jace trails off and shrugs, as if realizing he’s only about to get himself and his little menace in more trouble.

“I’m leaving.” Alec finally says and he turns, walking out of the Institute itself instead of just going to his office.

—

“What’s wrong?” Magnus asks and Alexander melts into him, ignoring Magnus’ book and his cup and his greedy boy practically shoves them out of the way so he can collapse onto Magnus’ lap.

“People are wrong.” Alexander tells him and he makes a grumble against Magnus’ belly, “no more talking now.” Alexander tells him, which means that his boy is very close to overstimulation or is already there.

“Alright darling, I have you.” Magnus promises and the lights dim, and he hesitates before he touches Alexander, relieved when Alexander nuzzles into the touch.

Alexander mumbles an agreement but doesn’t say anything else and Magnus lets time pass as he gently plays with Alexander’s hair until his boy finally, slowly takes a deep breath and sits up. He’s avoiding Magnus’ gaze but in a relaxed way, so Magnus waits patiently. There are lips pressed to his cheek and Alexander leans against him, snuggling into his side and claiming Magnus’ hand to wrap around himself so he can kiss the knuckles.

“Shall I portal us away?” Magnus offers, because sometimes the rare occasion of being taken somewhere safe and protected by Magnus’ magic is appealing. Other times, like now, Alexander just shakes his head with a sigh and leans more firmly into him.

“No, I need to stay here and be on standby. Mirai is going to cover for me while I take a break though. It wouldn’t have been such a big deal, if they hadn’t brought in enough ichor to give every shadowhunter a headache. Sensory overload when I wasn’t expecting it and I was already pretty raw from my meeting with the clave.”

“You can relax here.” Magnus promises him, reminding Alexander that the loft is safe and will always be safe for him.

Anywhere Magnus is will always be a space that is safe for his boy.

[kijosakka]

i have so many hypotheticals for dramaturgy u dont even KNOW (i am going to sit here and go through them though)

so this is all coming up because i was considering a tiny detail about the initial cast relations on island (then turning into this whole. mess.) and wanted to do a little thing where i explore hypotheticals to this au that aren't necessarily 'canon' to it,,

CAST RELATIONS: in my rehash post of island and covering the casts' reactions to noah acting Like That, i say the feeling of uncanny detachedness was immediate. but it could also? not be?

maybe he just comes off as shy at first, or especially standoffish -- perhaps the sense of detachedness is a mounting realization that 'oh this guy is kindof Weird As Hell' instead of an immediate bad sense,, this effectively would not change the cast relations or dynamics at this point, but it would provide more exposition opportunities for cast members to try striking up anything at all with him and getting shut down immediately as opposed to (unintentional) ostracization from the beginning.

^ and also, conflict exploration. not during island, but during his shift in WT, there could be the issue of noah knowing these people already tried and he shut them down each and every time, so what reason do they have to give him yet another chance? (is it worth the emotional risks and potential hurt and no gains, etc etc)

PHOBIA FACTOR: as it is, 'canon' to the AU noah gets eliminated during dodgebrawl (which is necessary for his general character), but phobia factor is a lovely little 'consequences of forgetting about the cameras' if on a much smaller scale.

now,, im ngl this sounded a lot more fun than it is actually going to be. because the simple answer is just that noah lies. put in this position -- if his onscreen character is forced to have depth, then it will be fake for his own peace of mind.

^ the only thing that would potentially happen is that it would, in a way, isolate him from his castmates further, simply because his reaction,,, Isn't. the fear among the cast as they face their greatest fears is shared -- except for noah. because its not genuine. his reaction comes off as flat (and even then the response that he is showing is further, repeated theme, uncanny valley. to have never seen this guy fearful performing some facsimile of it? Weird.)

SIERRA / WT PAN-OUT: ok,, sierras role here is very closely connected to the other idea mentioned here -- a wt hypothetical season play-out,, thing. while not 'canon' to the au for the simple fact that noah has Little to No development in this and thats the point, im spilling all my 'what-ifs' and might as well include this one.

theres actually,, a shocking number of moving parts to this. to summarize: tyler is eliminated in noahs place in london (mostly to keep numbers even), and thus takes his place witnessing the Kiss.

^ im not sure why tyler would be eliminated honestly. havent thought that through. however i do have something mapped out (kinda) for the trajectory of the love triangle,, being that noah doesnt do Anything. it boils over eventually, obviously, since duncan and gwen both know that he knows, im thinking around picnic at hanging dork? (elimination-wise, between london and picnic [*greece & area 51] cody is eliminated, sierra is Struggling but i do need her here for future plot purposes)

[*greece; noah volunteers before duncan in the scavenger hunt and along the way kiiinda talks with gwen?? just a little, just kinda nudging her in a direction away from any Dramatic, Exploitable behaviors]

^ so noah says nothing, right? he doesnt want to get involved in this Plotline, but he can get duncan to spill. so he does that -- talks to others, sometimes points over at him, and through the two challenges and the time between ends up freaking duncan out enough that he confronts noah post-picnic (theyre just outside the plane getting uhhh idk drinks. its Hot.) while the cameras arent rolling. the cast is around though.

duncan spills it all by himself, noah has a little moment of 'i didnt tell anyone, but you just did' -- courtney is pissed, but duncan is downright furious and gets all in noahs face, to which he responds much like he did at the very beginning of island: he doesnt.

he says something to the effect of 'if youre looking for a reaction, im the wrong person to look for it in' (or he doesnt say anything -- this is a work in progress) and Leaves. i also do like the mental image of noah spilling whatever drink he has down duncans shirt to force him away in a manner that doesnt make noah reveal any (perceived sense of) vulnerability via stepping back himself.

not much else on that -- just that post-challenge i also like the idea of noah being physically close to owen after. idk to what ends,, owen just wants to Comfort (< see also, noah can have a little breakdown in the showers or smth. a tiny one. its been far too long having to keep this all up and being close and not even properly involved in some of the drama of the show is making him crack whether he shows it or not)

^ and (im ngl i do imagine gwen being eliminated here? again, semantics r lost on me in favor of the Numbers) now,, sweden comes: duncan definitely believes anything with noah is nuked, so sucks up to owen and alejandro both in similar ways. basically like how canon went, etc etc noah is back to fading into the background.

however post-sweden offers up duncan&noah interactions. say duncan has had time to cool off and now wants to know why noah didnt say anything; noah deflects, bc of course he does, but does talk duncan into a kindof realization of just how much the show itself impacted his relationship with courtney -- not at the moment, but later it would serve to duncan to characterize noah a little better (and by a little i mean a lot); being, he's keenly aware of the cameras and the audience.

niagra brawls,, everything most goes, save the pairing are changed a bit: heather and alejandro, owen and blaineley, duncan and sierra, and courtney and noah. < courtney and noah win immunity (note: courtney definitely carries him across). post-challenge, noah point-blank tells courtney that hes sorry and that he shouldve come to her immediately.

^ courtney,, appreciates the genuine apology. she asks him why he didnt -- noah is, for once, honest, saying it was mostly a selfish reason and he didnt want the fallout. (smth smth he can truly hold sympathy abt the situation, knowing just how badly the presence of cameras can Fuck Things Up)

now. i swear ill circle around to sierra eventually but i need to talk about blaineley really quickly. so dramaturgy right?? noah is In The Business. i had it in the very original post of this (rb, covering cast dynamics) that noah did not like blainely. i renege. bffs. absolute shit-talkers together.

^ the point of that is that noah talks her out of the alliance with chef. im not actually sure what that does bc i still intend for blaineley to be eliminated post-china (aswell as courtney probably idk?? could be switched with duncan) but maybe she also has smth to say about how detached noah acts?? (see also the little scene concept thing of chris pointing out just how unnerving it was seeing noah act so lifeless)

also: noah wins. the china challenge. master of keeping a Flat Face. (note: he definitely does vomit immediately after. sick for Hours)

the semantics kinda fizzle out from here, but in essence noah floats his way to the final three à la cody style (does not want to be there also) and on the way kinda bonds with sierra? < that brings up another little correction ill rb onto another post at some point; sierra, while initially holding the intrigue as opposed to dislike of noahs detachedness, does in fact grow to find it unnerving. seeing him through a screen? really fun! being around him? ...not so much.

^ sierra, through noahs Magical Advice Powers That He Has In This Pan-Out For Some Reason, does earn herself advice from him about her obsessiveness or whatever. havent thought about it too much and actually propped sierra up as me having way more to say about her than i actually do,, but they do bond. they get a little bonding.

also: plane explosion. theres a little scene here that lives in my head wherein heather, frazzled from the explosion and having voted against alejandro, kinda blows up at noah? lashing out at him etc etc,, noah, par for the course, doesnt react -- mostly. he does just get up and leave, and both heather and alejandro get to hear one tiny little intake of breath that sounds vaguely like he might be crying. but he is Gone. (he breaks down around the interns instead, and fully resolves to himself that this is the final three and he was definitely making third place)

anyway beyond that i think it would be funny if the tiebreaker was actually heather and alejandro and noah some how finagles his way out of being tied up to be the first person to hit the water. thus taking himself out of the game and promising a 'dramatic finale between rivals' like hes very aware chris was gunning for.

^ this is,, tbh idk how 'canon' any of this will be?? if ill keep this as a loose outline and just change noahs character and dynamics,, idk idk. its getting late i cant really think and my god this is so so so much longer than i intended.

[alyjojo]

Gemini Yearly Career & Finance Reading 🪖2024

Preshuffle: You’re being shown at crossroads, genuinely stuck between the old and the new. It’s like you’re leaning towards the new, you’ve been hurt by whatever exists currently, you have many reasons to just let it go and move on with your life…but at the same time you have valid reasons to defend yourself should you choose to stay, logical ones. The Moon at the bottom show a lot being unknown to you and fear dominating your mind because of it.

Meditation: Very short meditation, mostly just a song, “Carousel” by Melanie Martinez. Love her 😍 And it was her *in that era* (that’s important) going around and around on a carousel, singing the song. She’s since changed a lot though, and so have you. Are you still playing out an old persona of yours? It feels like a shedding of skin is necessary, snakes 🐍 could mean something for you. Or lizards. This line in particular was highlighted: “But you already bought a ticket and there's no turning back now”

The whole song is about love, a difficult relationship could be part of this, I try not to focus on that in a career reading, but sometimes they’re intertwined financially, it is what it is.

Main Energy: 8 Pentacles

Pause & Delay are the first oracles to come out, followed by Happy Accident & Direction together. Work exists, you currently have something that pays the bills, and I don’t see any cards out initially of wanting for anything financially. It’s like work is work, and you show up every single day, giving them 100% every time. But it’s not your main priority, or you may think of changing things for this reason or that, ultimately you’re a logical person that puts a lot of effort into what you do. It could even be a specific or specialist type of job, it’s not something where there are dozens of opportunities. Once in a blue moon there might be a listing for an Ecologist with the kind of salary thats *better than* what you have, possibly having been somewhere for many years it’s only gotten higher. But still, it’s 1,000 miles away. There are reasons, I keep hearing that, and they’re valid. There’s a lot of waiting energy, with this crossroads, it’s like you don’t know which part of you or even life is a phase. If you do end up moving on, will you miss the old? Or are you legitimately shedding your skin & a different person now, needing new things? Does it have to be work? Pause & Delay shows time will tell, and until this “Happy Accident”, keep giving everything you do the same effort you always have, 8 Pentacles is a very detailed & perfectionist energy, you’re likely the best at whatever you do, or that’s your aim. Some of you may be students on the way to this, and any setbacks would probably be more school related than work, for my youngins, I have some young Page energy showing up. You could be paying for kids’ education. I won’t stick with that story, just apply it to school 🍎

January: 2 Swords & Strength

Oracles: Excitement

Zodiac Signs: Pisces, Gemini Mercury

A good place to start, matches the preshuffle. It’s not shown as a crossroads here though, it’s more like “should I refrain from the new”, again showing it’s something new that’s calling you. Something that fills your heart, makes you happy, you’ve received some sort of clarity or news (maybe a job posting) that makes you feel like THIS could be the thing, your 10 Cups possibly. If it’s a relationship, it could be, it would be one where leaving a job might have to be considered. Yours or theirs, either, you could live at a distance. Or you’ve just realized maybe evening shift is the worst thing on the planet, you never see anyone, you’re feeling disconnected and now realize you need different hours. It could just be that, shifting hours, leaving *something*. A position for another. If you’ve gotten into a relationship very quickly, that’s where the “you’ve already bought a ticket” line is coming in. I don’t see that being a bad thing, you may hold back from this person at work, or you have to, you’re a surgeon and you’re busy. You’d like to have a new lease on life, a rekindling of a relationship, whatever the thing is something that’s being desired with your heart, emotionally, to make you happier than you’ve ever been, or for your family, 10 Cups. Maybe building a family. Whether you actually act on it or not…I don’t think is the point, at least not yet. It makes you FEEL something really good, in your heart, redirects you back towards what’s important, or shows you a whole new way of being that you deeply admire & want. Could be a new hobby you’re obsessed with.

February: 6 Pentacles rev & 5 Swords

Oracles: Protection

Zodiac Signs: Taurus, Aquarius, Aries Moon

There’s someone around you, an authority figure or boss, that you see as an asshole, and you’re generally just not that friendly to. You’re not unfriendly, you could get paid from this person, but you’re not friendly either. 5 Swords shows up here and on the bottom of the deck, this is someone that likes to prove a point, knock people down a peg, flex their intellectual superiority on some level…or that can be you by means of “I ain’t doing anything for them”, purposely coming up with clever quips or “humbling” snark, because you can’t stand them. Or that’s why you can’t stand them. There’s a lack of mutual reciprocity between you that’s the problem, one person may do a lot more than the other one, but the other one gets paid more. It may have nothing to do with their personality at all and is just bitterness like “how’d they get where they are!” And you’re where you are. Either way, you’re internally conflicted about being nice to this person, or you’re obligated to even though you’d rather not. This could be someone outside of work, that is offered something at their own job, and you’re kinda jealous and bitter about it, whether they did anything wrong or not. I don’t see you as not well off though, and whoever has this issue, it’s one sided. Authority at the bottom of the oracles show a boss for most, maybe someone becoming your boss and it’s Chad the Jackass, your eyes want to roll back into your head. You may want to give less to this situation because of something like this. Could be a parent/family member that is demeaning with money, acts better than everyone, talks to you like a moron. Of course they get more money/opportunities, they totally need it 🙄 It’s snide, petty, arrogant. Especially if they hold it over your head. For someone, this could be a romantic partner, and this comparison dynamic is unhealthy, or someone making a lot more than the other possibly, breeds resentment.

March: Judgement rev & Page of Swords

Oracles: Detachment

Zodiac Signs: Leo, Scorpio, Heavy Aquarius Sun/Venus

Power on the bottom of the oracles, fixed signs/energy could be your issue. Stubborn know it alls that do things in a particular way and aren’t very flexible or accepting of outside perspectives, “my way or the highway” mentality. Or this lack of flexibility could be your own issue and Detachment is your advice, if you’re stuck to your view on things and stubbornly critical or petty towards others’ views. Either/both. Someone is succeeding, possibly being promoted, someone you don’t like, but you’re holding back your harsh feelings of Judgement and just observing from a distance. If there’s been actual conflict between you and this person, you’re just done talking to them, interacting with them, focused on yourself and your own happiness, success, long term career growth. You may not see it immediately, but this situation may be a catalyst for you to move in your own direction, succeed in your own way, no pettiness required. Judgement rev is like a lesson you’re failing to learn, it seems to center around bitterness. So someone is doing well, cool, you do well too! Or find your own lane that you can do that in, whatever that is. For some, more education may be needed with Page of Swords, or you could *be* more educated than this person and still they rise. It’s a dick measuring contest fr, you need to detach from this specific thing and address what it is in you that feels “less than”, the root cause, seems to be a lack of attention, praise, perks, accolades, money, titles, etc. How can you get the same thing? Let it inspire you 💡

April: 4 Swords & Queen of Pentacles

Oracles: Concentration

Zodiac Signs: Gemini Saturn

You need a break, a vacation, or will, for some that’s already planned and for others could be forced by illness. Mentally detach, same as last month, you can’t put out a fire inside the house? Is that how it goes? That’s what I heard. Queen of Pentacles shows you on top of your shit, you work all day long, take care of the bills, grocery shop, fix things, build things, side hustle, always doing something. Gemini Saturn is like…you’re not even honoring your own energy, it’s a burden or something that “needs discipline”. You’re holding back your feelings, from friends, loved ones, coworkers, maybe even the people at work that could actually do something about it, you’re not one to speak up and be like “hey, over here, I work hard every day, promote me”. Sometimes that works. Or they’d be aware for next time anyway that it’s your intention to rise or you might consider other options, boss bitch energy. Not that you won’t, just not this month, it seems like you’re trying to get a reign on your perspective - perception vs truth - so that you may handle an issue in a mature and appropriate way. King & Knight of Swords at the bottom, you’re not presenting a bunch of fluff, what you say needs to make sense, so you’re working through your emotions and formulating that in your head before just acting/speaking.

For someone, you could be ill or someone around you is, if so there’s another person around that loves you (or you for them) and is nurturing them back to health - that could be the focus this month and the rest is handled privately in your quiet moments. Going along to get along with others, for the time being. If you’re going on vacation, it could be a romantic getaway that others aren’t really privy to, and work just isn’t the priority. If you’re not resting at all, you need to 💯 Or you’re not getting enough sleep, doing too much, you’re conflicted and distracted and need a break to recharge, focus, and strategically formulate a plan of conversation/truth it looks like. What to do about it?

May: King of Pentacles & 5 Wands

Oracles: Revenge

Zodiac Signs: Heavy Leo & Scorpio Mars

Oooh, the pride wafting off of these cards is just…palpable. Whew. Someone is arrogant, kinda selfish, taking immediate or spontaneous action that may or may not actually work out for themselves, because they obsessively plot revenge…but is the revenge worthwhile? Does it have anything to do with what’s actually happened to offend whoever is offended? Or does it seem mean in the way that it’s done? Bullying even, Mars Scorpio can be ruthless. The story of Perseus and Medusa is shown by this Mars Scorpio card and I have to mention it. Perseus thought he was a hero, and was glorified as such, but if you read Medusa’s story…he was just a pawn sent by a jealous biatch. An unconscious villain, an accomplice. You or someone else, King of Pentacles shows up again as the adversary, could be a boss, maybe a partner for someone (not everyone) just because of matching Pentacles, a friend, a parent, authority. 5 Wands shows competition, again you two must keep measures in your drawers to check how long your dicks are (metaphorically for women ofc) because that’s all this is. Constant comparison, tit for tat, you get hurt and lash out at someone else for winning, being successful, it’s projection, immaturity, and jealousy. Or someone is this way towards you, it’s a problem no matter who it is. Power trips being shown at the bottom of the oracles, more Scorpio energy. You could be dealing with a Taurus, King of Pentacles, specifically one with Algol on or within 5 degrees of a personal placement. For most in these recent generations, Algol is around 25’ Taurus, it’s not widely used but Taureans themselves often seem to resonate. If it’s 3’ it’s not them, the closer it is the higher the trigger. Or you could have this, that’s a rabbit hole for you to explore if you do, there is a lot written about it & I’ll never get off of here. Algol is Medusa, you and another person could be playing off a battle or relationship dynamic similar to this story. I’m also picking up on Lilith with this Power card on the bottom, that may play a direct role as well. You could be either person. It’s shadow work 💯

June: Knight of Cups & Page of Cups

Oracles: Indecision

Zodiac Signs: Heavy Pisces, Leo, Libra Venus

The tables turn, thank goodness. Not only is it many of your birthdays this month, but Jupiter is moving into your sign, which is likely to help bring more blessings your way over the next however long it’s here. At least a year, and at least some positive attention, recognition, perks should be coming your way. People are being really nice to you, loving even - especially a partner. If this is a contentious partner, it could feel kinda lovebombing, going by next month…keep your eyes open for false affection. Idk how you would, that’s only for someone with repeated issues, the partner is a problem & it’s known. If you’re on a “carousel”, then there’s a pattern of high highs and low lows. Could be you too. Indecision may be true, the cards don’t really support that other than “is kindness from others genuine or not?” The imagery on the card is light vs. dark, shadow work, it also shows an Angel in your corner in your time of need, and this shift in energy seems to be coming at just the right time. Not only that, Jupiter is said to be like having an Angel on your side, and that’s being literally shown. Venus is in her element in Libra, things will be loving, kind, and peaceful, even your own inner conflicts are liable to take a hike for a month so you can just enjoy yourself. The Chariot could show travel, you could be swept off your feet and taken somewhere amazing, or you have plans for a getaway with someone romantic. If not, you’re getting really good news on the career front, it’s followed by success, promotion, attention, a bonus, something is coming your way that makes you feel like it’s not all for nothing. Could be a new job opportunity for someone, maybe through a friend, this crossroads energy shows up at the bottom, and this may have to do with a “happy accident”.‘ That card is connected to Direction, The Chariot is direction, ambition, overcoming all obstacles towards success. You could find a better opportunity 1000 miles away, like I said before, and you’re definitely tempted. Some may even act immediately, YES 🙌 This could be love too, someone flirty or into you shifts your perspective greatly, boosts your ego, you realize you don’t actually have to put up with the bs you have been - if a partner has been the issue.

July: 9 Wands & The Emperor rev

Oracles: Isolation

Zodiac Signs: Sagittarius, Virgo Saturn

Virgo Saturn…some of you are working yourselves to death. Some of you may be injured or getting sick around this time. Or you’re over-worked with no concern for your health, not eating properly, over caffeinated and dehydrated, not taking care of yourself, of course it’s affecting you negatively. You have a lot of stress on your shoulders this month, crushing pressure, and you’d rather withdraw for awhile than be open and discuss it with others. A boss could be cracking the whip, forced over-time for someone, or there is an issue that would require long hours, even weekends, to fix. The Sun & The Lovers at the bottom, mirroring last month. Love is great, but work is killing you. If there’s been a lover/3rd party thing, that’s either come out already and has caused hurt in the relationship, or all of this stress is considering how to be honest about this situation. Do you even want someone new? It could’ve been a passing moment just to boost your ego, it happens sometimes. A flirty person at the gas station, or a coach at your kid’s school that gives you the eyes, whatever. It doesn’t have to become anything, it can just make you feel good, for some this is the crossroads. Do you stay or go? If not love, then it’s work. Whatever happened last month is still on your mind, you’re deeply burdened, pressured, you’ve done something a long time. Is new for you? Can you bring that happiness & success into what already exists - seems to be your main focus for most. Some of you may be overly critical of what already exists - Virgo Saturn, and are being led by excitement, impulse, spontaneity, humor, lust…the good stuff, Sag energy. That doesn’t last though, and this Isolation is necessary. If you’re overworked, the positive side is it gives you time to think, it’s shown that you don’t want to hurt anyone and don’t want to let other people down. Some of you could be hurting, literally, and need more rest/healing time. If you’re sick, hurt, injured, you’re irritated and critical af about it, you just want to have some FUN 🤩 It’s possible someone is being an arrogant, controlling, dictator asshole to you and it causes you to withdraw completely. Your person? Someone could mess around and get another person pregnant, that’s here too, and you’re deeply burdened or hurt by the Judgement of others. Or fear that. Or this isn’t your first child, and you’re burdened you’re doing this again. Probably with a different person for Judgement to be a thing. Could be a shitty or overly critical reaction from the other person that has you Isolated and hurt, but *you’re* happy.

August: 10 Cups & 10 Pentacles

Oracles: Enterprise

Zodiac Signs: Pisces, Leo, Aries Jupiter

Beautiful energy 🎊 Clarified by 10 Cups again. So you have an off month last month, someone could be full of worry and anxiety, someone may act like a jackass, illness could be a thing, it’s going to turn out for the best. You’ve been “warned”, just withdraw a bit and give things time, it’s needed. If you’re the one acting out, maybe don’t do that 🤷🏻‍♀️ This month, Aries Jupiter rushes in with no fear and takes control of a situation, aiming for enthusiasm, positivity, and success, which is exactly what’s happening. Celebration! You’re surrounded by supportive family, friends, coworkers, everyone around you is coming together to celebrate you and your happiness in some way, you’re not staying down for long. Even a partner, 10 Cups is romance, if they’ve been a way, I’m hearing “that’s how they are”, is that okay probably no, but they’re coming around. Altogether you have a very happy family and at least for this month, nothing could be better than what it is right now. If the good news in June was regarding work, it could go into effect this month, making your dreams come true - a promotion is definitely coming for someone. The same thing you were jealous of someone else for, or upset you didn’t have, is yours now, and with Jupiter Aries here, you can take credit for it too. You knew what you wanted and made it happen 💯 Spirit helped of course, but it’s a good month to pat yourself on the back and enjoy your wins!

September: 2 Cups & King of Swords

Oracles: Birth

Zodiac Signs: Aquarius, Cancer Sun/Venus

Someone is definitely pregnant. If so, financial concerns are the reason someone acted like a jackass. Is that okay, no, but you’re making up with this person that you’ve been disconnected with (off and on) even if you’ve never actually separated. King of Swords shows up twice, here and on the bottom, this is a logical and detached conversation about the wounds within the connection, what’s been said or done to cause pain, this person is stressed and really worried about you/them leaving - that’s not what they want. Whoever is hurt has considered leaving, but instead is going to persevere. If no baby, then it’s just a birth of a new chapter in your relationship, maybe new love altogether for some. There are anxieties, abandonment issues, past hurt and pain, walls to navigate and trust issues - 9 Wands, is it easy no. But they’re not giving up, or you’re not, the love is genuine. If single and no love, this can be platonic love with a best friend, an ex even, some sort of conversation happening where old hurt gets addressed so a new beginning can occur. It’s positive ❤️

October: The Hanged Man & The Sun

Oracles: Inspiration

Zodiac Signs: Capricorn, Heavy Pisces Sun/Mercury

Another beautiful month of everyone getting along well, cooperating, working together and appreciating each other for what they bring to the table. You may hold back a little bit, feeling kind of skeptical. It’s what you want, and things are going swell 😊 but are you being too optimistic? Queen of Pentacles at the bottom shows you still on top of things, taking care of everything around the home, at work, you’re very responsible and financially stable. Waiting for something, which is obvious for pregnancy, but the newness of something is still settling in and you’re just biding your time while the changes continue to come - Wheel of Fortune with this Queen. Lucky energy 🍀 Your new beginning is something very stable & worthwhile, even if you don’t trust it yet due to whatever has happened before. If nothing else, you’re allowing yourself to just be happy for awhile, and letting the pieces fall wherever they may, knowing changes are inevitable. It’s not an action taking month, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t active, you keep busy.

November: 7 Pentacles & 8 Swords

Oracles: Principle

Zodiac Signs: Sagittarius Sun/Jupiter

You are on a high horse this month, there’s a defensive energy about you where you feel like you need to stand up for up yourself and speak out against opposition in regards to personal morals, belief systems, what you want. For those pregnant, you and your person could have different views on circumcision, for example, but it becomes a whole thing because YOU have firm beliefs and will absolutely die on this hill! That’s fair, everyone has those things they stand by & believe in. Some of you are the opposite, you feel this way but you aren’t speaking up, or didnt when it mattered, so emotions are turning into paranoia, projection, assuming the worst, festered anger, and other things that aren’t very helpful. You could get mad about something and people around you legitimately have no idea where this came from or what your problem is. Moody, with The Moon at the bottom, and 8 Swords, keeping things to yourself is self-sabotage, but when/if they do come out, it’s super defensive and head-biting. You have a point to prove and a cause to fight for, minds to change and convince of something or other, or someone could be doing that to you, a very pushy individual, and you just stay quiet and *don’t* stand up for yourself - when you should. Either story. 5 Cups shows this will be something you regret, if you don’t, or you already do, it could also be defensive energy that’s simply sadness with a different face, or someone making you sad. If you’re ready to lash out, make sure you’ve got the facts and aren’t just flipping out over things you assume to be true, someone’s body language or a snotty expression, “obviously she meant abc when she actually said xyz” sort of energy. If you’re staying quiet, you should probably speak up now 🗣️

December: The Devil & 9 Swords

Oracles: Health

Zodiac Signs: Capricorn & Virgo

If there’s a pregnancy, someone may be high risk, be put on bed rest, Risk at the bottom of the oracles with health. At the bottom of the deck is more necessary rest, Queen of Pentacles (I assume you) is doing too much, thinking too much, working too much, honestly. Sit down. Put your feet up. There are legitimate warnings here if you don’t, you don’t want complications. The Hanged Man clarifies as a need to shift your perspective, see things from another angle, more towards the positive, for all of you. The Devil is in your anxiety, worries, stress, how much you’re taking on, seeing the glass as half empty (completely empty) and you’re the only one who can fill it. I don’t think you are though. You need time to allow things to change how they’re going to change, you don’t have control over this thing (but may be trying reaaaally hard to control it). Forced medical leave is here for someone, or even needing to switch around hours or positions temporarily to do less. Maybe you climb a lot of ladders and the doctor says no more ladders, so your job has you answering phones for however long it takes. Or you haven’t actually said anything (still) because you’re afraid of being let go. If you have a health issue that keeps coming back, it’s stressing you out because it’s interfering with work and you’re afraid you’re going to lose your job or people will not be willing to work with you like they have been. Some of you may simply be at risk for something genetic, and you have a lot of tests & blood work done that you have to wait for…which is taking forever, while you stress tf out in the meantime. You seem to worry about *the worst* possible outcome to any problem no matter what it is, and this may be part of the cycle (Carousel, The Devil) that needs to end. Keeping yourself trapped in stress and anxiety, what’s it doing for you? Some of you may be kept extra long at work on days when you 👏 have 👏 shit 👏 to 👏 do! Holiday stuff, busy busy, no I do NOT want to stay a few hours longer or work weekends. Will you say that no, you’ll just stress out about it.

*Does Gemini have anything to worry about with this health issue? - 9 Cups. If it’s addictive, a drug, or indulgent somehow, yes. This could show sweets, gestational diabetes for the pregnant women perhaps, some kind of slight allergy you just dismiss (you freakin love crab and do not even care, swell on), that would be a bigger issue/risk at this time. Otherwise this shows a dream come true, you could be worrying for nothing but need to get tested for things, be patient, and assume everything will be all right. If it’s not, you’ll know what to do when the time comes and not a moment sooner. The Devil can be about control, and a need to release that.

[eohpmdsteams]

Fight For Life

(part 3 of mission 5!)

Blood

Thats all Bluey could smell wafting around her as massive black claws wrapped around her tiny body and ripped her from the ground and flew off with her. But it wasn’t her blood that she smelled, it wasn’t even fresh blood or just one persons, but very very old yet several very familiar scents.

While the claws that held her were covered in fresh blood by some unsuspecting victim she couldn’t make out if she knew or not the raggedy faded shawl brown from dried blood that dangled in her face held smells she knew. She could smell her mother, her father, her grandparents…and so many more who stained that shawl. When Bluey looked up all she saw was the frenzied face of a Yamask with its eyes laser focused ahead of it as it raced away from Bastion and Jenga who were hot on this ghosts tail. As Bluey looked down towards the others, she managed to get a look at the golden mask attached to the tail of the Yamask.

While it was impossible to not know who a Yamask was in the past due to their golden mask that was a resemblance of their once living face, it was almost impossible to make out the face on this mask as it had been clawed at and scratched away. The scattered direction and depth of the gouges in the gold made it clear it was done out of sheer anger and hatred. Did She do this to herself? What made her hate her own face? It was questions Bluey was certain she knew the answer to, some part of this Yamask had to have hated what it did.

“Let her go, Scarlet!” Jenga barked as he flung a stone that ricocheted off the mask with a loud clang. In response to the sudden pain the Yamask let out a gargled scream and dropped Bluey as her focused shifted from stealing the Pawniard, to mauling whoever dare strike her.

Bluey let off a shriek as she fell towards the ground, clenching her eyes shut she braced for impact but instead was only slightly winded as she felt herself impact against Bastion’s chest after the massive Bisharp leapt to catch her before she hit the floor.

“N-Nice save again, Bash!” Bluey said shakily feeling a bit week in her legs having fallen several feet, “That was a close one…heh…heh.”

While Bluey steadied herself Bastion caught sight of the Yamask slamming into his grandfather, sending the old Sableye clattering to the ground, breaking off one of the gem shards on his back with a swift rake of her massive claws. Bastion hissed at the sight and charged into the Yamask sending her through a tree with a swift backhand. Sending shards of the dead burnt trunks scattering around the clearing from the impact.

“I forgot she followed me here from Sands.” Jenga winced as he sat up looking at the ruined remains of one of his gems with disdain like someone kicked his favorite dog, “She’s been nothing but a menace since reawakening. Sometimes I think she still has fragments of memory, but she always reminds me she’s just a beast now.”

“Wait so that Yamask is my mother? She came back and she’s still like this?!” Bluey exclaimed.

“Death and Undeath doesn’t seem to be a cure for it either I am afraid. I made the mistake thinking she may have been snapped out of it when I saw her climb out of her grave, especially when she was so keen of slowly following me, I thought she might of remembered me but every time I let her get too close, she never hesitated to attack me.”

The trio watched Yamask fling herself from the splintered trunk towards bastion and was once again sent careening through another tree sending more shards of wood splintering into the clearing.

“Physical attacks like that aren’t gonna do anything to her Bastion! You are only pissing her off!” Jenga said as Scarlet picked herself up again. Bastion shook his head at Jenga in a way of showing him that injuring her wasn’t his intent.

“Bastion if you gotta knock her out just do it cause she’s only gonna keep coming at us!” Bluey barked, “I know you may not wanna, cause she’s what’s left of my mom, but she not my mom anymore, she’s just like any other feral!”

Bastion looked at her hesitantly but nodded and the third time she lunged at them a thin dark sheen came over Bastion’s arm before he hit her hard with ‘Metal Claw’ which combined with Bluey using ‘Assurance’ sent Scarlet careening across the clearing and into the door of the library with a loud thud, leaving the Yamask crumpled to the ground from the super effective move.

“What brute’s making a mess of my library” A strange voice echoed from around them, “You’ve overstayed your welcome.”

“Wh-what was that?” Bluey said as she and Bastion looked around but saw no sign of where the voice came from.

“One of the guardians…It’s Azelf.” Jenga whispered and tried to make himself look smaller, “We’ve made too much of a ruckus.”

“Some guardian! A coward hiding in the woods, if you wanna fight just come out and do it! Or are you chicken?!” Bluey yelled into the forest only for a giggle to ring back.

“Why would I dirty my hands on a lower lifeform like you when I have a far more perfect specimen to do it for me? I’ll see to it that you destroy each other!”

A ripple of a white mystic fire rang through the forest like a tidal wave, it made Bluey shutter as the energy rippled over her, but the pained scream that came from bastion as he clung to his head and dropped to his knees, whipped Bluey’s attention from the voice to her partner.

“Bash, yo Bash are you okay?!” She called and ran over to him, “Whats wrong, bud are y-”

CLANG

Before Bluey could even finish her sentence she was sent clattering to the ground as she was smacked away with all the force Bastion could muster. She winced and pulled herself off the ground, “What the hell, Bastion?! What’s wrong with-”

But instead of Bluey’s red eyes meeting Bastion’s blue eyes, they were met with eyes that had a dull pink glow as this strange white and blue alien-esque creature slithered its long tendril like tails around his neck. For a moment Bastion seemed to react and looked at his hand in horror before looking back at Bluey and before he could say anything or respond in anyway the tails tightened and all expression except for sheer hatred was drained from Bastion’s face. He glared down at Bluey and for the first time in her life she was actually a bit frightened of him.

“What did you do to Bastion?!”

“I’m just borrowing him. I’ve watched how defensive you are of each other, so I’ll see to it you rip each other apart. If you wish to get into my Library you’ll have to get past me. But I’ll be honest the only way you will leave this forest is in a body bag.” Azelf sneered before with a flick of its tails the shine in Bastion’s eyes got brighter and he charged her.

Bluey had little time to react as she was slammed with a hard swipe of Bastion’s metal claw his size and strength having no issue sending the tiny Pawniard flying several feet and clattering with the loud scrap and groan of her metal against the rocks in front of the Library.

“Bluey?! Are you ok?” Percy shouted as he spotted her impact with the stone and her roll to a halt, “What did that?”

“Bastion” Bluey groaned as Bramble helped her up. Both brothers looked at her with shock

“Bastion did this? Why would Bastion ever hit you?”

“He’s…uhg…he-he’s been…bewitched by whatever took over…Drauzen! B-but I don’t know if anyone else has been bewitched.” She whined and shook the dirt and rubble from her dented metal, “As if this day couldn’t get worse.”

“Wait bewitched? Like what happened in Sandstone and Onyx city?”

“Yeah, exactly like that.”

What can we do to help?”

“I can handle Bastion; He might hit like a rockslide, but he won’t kill me. Just catch me if he throws me a third time.”

“Third time! He hit you twice and your still stand-” But before Percy could finish his sentence Bastion exploded from the tree line and made a B-line for them.

Bramble didn’t hesitate to launch ‘Pin Needles’ at Bastion which made the large Bisharp wince but he didn’t steer away from his target as he lowered himself and barreled full force with iron head into Bluey, as he mowed over her Azelf had grown board of just watching and placing itself in the middle of the group, cackled and let off a blast of horrible light from what must have been the use of ‘Signal Beam’.

Bramble and Percy winced from the sting of bright light, and Bluey barely managed to stand back up. Every part of her stung with a dull throbbing pain as she looked at Bastion who for a moment shook Azelf’s will off and he looked at Bluey with both confusion and seeing just how bruised and dented she was, horror as she charged at him, he didn’t even notice at first that her eyes were pink and not red.

The sharp pain of Bluey’s ‘Fury Swipes’ made Bastion grit his teeth as he tried to back away from her shaking his head in disbelief that she was attacking him. Why? Why was she attacking him? And why was she so injured?

And after she slashed at him several times she stopped and shook her head as if snapping out of a trance, “B-Bastion? Wait you snapped out of it thank the great mother!” She exclaimed before looking at his bleeding cuts, “Wait did…did I hit you? I-I’m sorry I’d never!”

“Uhg, that little one is so boring!” Azelf yawned, “She’s a durable little thing but does such little damage. The big one is far more fun.”

Bastion reached his hand out to gesture that he was fine but before he could respond again, he grabbed at his head and slashed at Bluey throwing her through a tree nearby.

“Bastion stop!” Percy shouted at him to get his attention off of Bluey, “What’s wrong with you?”

But Bastion didn’t respond and merely stood glaring at the other Bisharp and with the way he stood reminding the other how much bigger he truly was. With a flick of Azelf’s tail Bastion charged at Percy and the two Bisharp locked blades with a violent flash of light that must have been from the sparks of colliding metal.

“W-Woah! Easy Bastion, look I don’t wanna fight you. But you are really not giving me much of a choice man!” Percy grunted as he did his best to keep Bastion locked in place, damn he was heavy.

Azelf laughed, “You lot are so easy to move like pawns of a chess board! This is too eas- AH!” it yelped as Bramble filled its back with needles.

“That hurt you little brat!” Azelf shrieked as it let loose another Signal Beam that for a moment blinded the three ‘mon around it long enough for Bastion to break away from Percy, “Deal with that brat!”

Bastion lunged for Bramble but before his blades made contact with Bramble’s throat there was a flash of light followed by the loud shriek of metal on metal as Bastions blades were locked with another’s.

“Thats Enough!” Bluey shouted into his face, Making the Bisharp halt for a moment.

“I was hoping that last hit had killed you.”Azelf frowned before sneering, “Well second times the charm.”

Bluey buckled a bit under the new force of weight coming from Bastion pressing his blades full force into her own, running out of options given her already weakened state she groaned, “I’m sorry buddy please understand this is for your own good!”

With that she focused all the energy she could into what she was about to do, positioning herself just right, she slammed her leg will all the force she could muster between the Bisharps legs. The pain that radiated through Bastion made him give a high-pitched gasp of a whine while through the shared link with Azelf even the mythical nearly collapsed from the pain as the Bisharp collapsed at Bluey’s legs curled in a fetal position with his hands between his legs while Bramble and Percy both winced having witnessed it.

“Bastion would never turn his blades on his family or his friends! And I’ll die before I ever let a bastard like you make him take the life of anyone he cares about! And for your sheer audacity of forcing him to live through that you’re gonna be the one leaving this forest in a hearse!” Bluey screamed as she charged the Azelf who was still reeling from the pain it experienced through Bastion.

Before the Azelf could react to what was happening it felt the horrible burning sting of Bluey’s blades against its chest as she left a deep X shape gash. The pain from the super effective move was anguishing and as Azelf glared at Bluey, it shrieked again this time as Percy slammed it int he back with his own ‘Assurance’ and Bramble wasted no time peppering it with ‘Pin Needle’ after ‘Pin Needle’.

Seeing as it was vastly outnumbered as losing control over the situation and several other ‘mon it had taken control of Azelf hissed at the group and attempted to stand its ground, but little did it know it had done the most foolish thing possible. It had struck the metaphorical hornet’s nest and as it tried to gain a better vantage point it was snatched from the air by the rake of Bluey’s ‘Night Slash.’

As Azelf hit the ground it tried to let out another Signal Beam but had failed, why had it failed? Then it realized the anguish it was feeling it should have gone away already, but it handn’t, it wasn’t just from the link to the Bisharp. Azelf whirled and looked over at Bastion who was shakily standing up.

“YOU! You used Torment on me?!” Azelf screamed as it was slashed this time by Percy.

“Serves you right!” Bluey barked.

Azelf let off a blast of psychic energy but watched to its own horror as the energy reflected off Bluey’s metal hide.

“Those tricks won’t work on any of us.” Bluey growled as she moved closer to the Azelf with her focus steel set on ripping it apart with her own claws.

Azelf was bristling from the rage it felt and having focused too hard on this small group it had quickly lost all control over the situation as it couldn’t keep its influence spread far enough if it continued to focus solely on them. Its injuries were also severe enough it would be foolish to attempt to take on this group now that they’d figured out a way to break its hold. Finally, having concluded its best strategy for the situation it waited until the four charged it again and with a snarl followed by a flash of light vanished as Bluey’s claws sliced the ground where it once stood.

She reeled back with a growl seeing that it got away. Taking a moment to scan the area for it and seeing it was long gone she sighed, “C’mon we have to help the others.”

-----------

Word Count: 2,610 Items used: -one move tm ticket (Bluey Learned X-SCIZZOR!) -one evolution ticket (Bluey evolved into Bisharp! Bluey learned Metal Claw!) Bluey's new move set: X-Scizzor, Metal Claw, Night Slash, Assurance

[staravya]

ep 30 eye iof the dragon. these are starting to just be liveblogging the episode and u know what thats fine too

intro reminds me that the whole “control that dragon and you control the world” line rly is in the context of beau yelling “YO CHILL” into a stampede lmao obviously he cant control dragons (though he intimidates most)

hes so worried for decepshun... aww. okay so did she just absorb the vysox’s energy or her memories too? bc it seemed like memories too bc there was a personality shift + added knowledge.

tbh i think part of the reason artha has such a chronic problem with overtaxing beau too early in the race is bc beau LIKES fuckin sprinting and nyooming at max speed, did you see his grin? he loves it.

also kit deserves better

“like she has a mind of her own” most dragons do, okay.

so they know what a bonemark nub is. so does beau have one? from the furox? i imagine this was exposited to them at an earlier time

wonder if the staves have a piece of some gold bonemark in them that lets the priests mag without a dragon?

i think decepshun’s eyes glow red when accessing the vysox’s memories/powers but i do wish it didn’t look so much like the vysox was possessing her sdgfksfd

FINALLY dragon loser is so much better than dragon blunder. ive been thinking it this whole time. the rhyme works much better than the alliteration

mag claw fighting and stuff has probably like. incredibly intricate and also really interesting? the dragon keeps their rider in the air which means they can probably counter things like momentum from getting thrown

okay the advice of “fight together” really doesnt translate well into “just pour a bunch of power into artha and fight separately”. maybe rework that theming and solution.

like they never actually did “use” the own-mindedness of a psi-class against them. a better example for this would be... hm. poor communication, i think. like beau is clearly willful but also willing to try and communicate it with artha; decepshun and others like her might just not have that patience, and that’s where they get the reputation for being hard to control.

so maybe the shadow booster does get inside the temple. but while they’re slowly picking their way through the traps, beau and artha work together (with their friends?) to make decepshun and moordryd scrape each other’s scales a bit. maybe flash a light somewhere in moordryd’s line of sight but flare mag energy in a different direction, so dragon and rider get confused and leave an opening

plus you can have moordryd address his beloved dragon’s change in attitude this way! they can resolve it by, like, even if they’re driven off, moordryd gets confirmation that it’s his dragon in control, and the vysox was indeed simply absorbed. (this has been the case for every bonemark that’s been shown but like. you know. when its your dragon, you worry.)

also this works at the “dragons and humans should work together” thing bc you can have artha comment on how that felt icky to turn the dragon on her rider, and then discussions on how sometimes the dragon and human just don’t have the patience to try to communicate

[shotorozu]

encountering a ‘pick me’ girl

character(s) : kirishima eijirou, todoroki shouto, bakugou katsuki (bnha)

warning : PICK ME GIRL, misogyny (?) pick me girl makes an off handed comment about your body but it’s not detailed at all

PART TWO — PART THREE

legend : [Y/N = your name] afab! reader, but they/them pronouns used, quirk not mentioned

headcanon type : fluff, angst if you squint

note(s) : i made 2 versions of this post so,, if you’re reading this— then i probably decided that i liked this one more than the other one i made,, anyways, i used real life examples 💀

»»————-　♡　————-««

kirishima eijirou

i’d imagine that eijirou would have an idea of what a pick me girl is— i mean, there were probably 2 of those girls in middle school

but has he experienced it first hand? nahh.

though, eijirou didn’t think he’d encounter one when he was already in a healthy and committed relationship!

eijirou is practically friends with everyone— and yeah, even the most unexpected. so, he’s bound to accidentally befriend a pick me girl

him, being the nicest one out of all of the characters in this list, will still be nice to said pick me girl, despite wanting to snob them to the core

because really— you can’t really fight fire with fire in some cases

but, he can be everything but lenient when the pick me girl starts insulting you for doing certain things, and for absurd reasons too

like,, how you laugh, and how you take care of yourself (for example— if you wear makeup, or how you style your hair)

which is odd! everything about you is everything but the things the pick me girl has stated so.. he cannot stand by.

SCENARIO

the girl giggles to herself after that snide comment leaves her lip gloss coated lips. eijirou shifts uncomfortably— honestly taken aback by the anything but subtle insult that was thrown at you

“like.. seriously! it’s honestly quite superficial if you look at it like that. who the hell would put that much effort infront of your boyfriend? i’d assume they’d see everything AND everything but.. i guess not.”

you blink. superficial? now that’s a new one. the girl infront of you has been babbling insults sugarcoated in boasts the entire time, and you’re just wondering if it’s about time you guys leave but—

“well that’s unfair,” your boyfriend laughs, “i put the same amount of effort as this cutie right here,” eijirou pokes at your cheek, earning a quick laugh from you— which he can only thank the heavens for that

“but that’s different. it actually looks put together when you’re doing it, eiji.” the certain glint in her smile makes you want to wipe it right off with a dirty mop, “it’s impossible to look put together with expensive clothes, but being built like a—”

the sound of the sliding of a chair is quicker than your actions, and it easily cuts her off.

“i’m sorry, but we gotta go, it’s totally not cool of you to say those things about Y/N!”

“what? but i mean.. it’s true, right? i’m looking out for them! they’re literally out here l—”

“bye!” eijirou waves her goodbye with your hand, dismissing the sour expression on her face— as he dashes off with you

you’d question how he’s just so nice to people like that, but when he turns around, you could see the distaste in his eyes

“so that’s what a pick me girl’s like,” shaking his head, his expression lights up with such a quick manner “i’ll never make friends that are like that again!”

safe to say, eijirou’s friend list has been a a person shorter ever since that incident

bakugou katsuki

oh, so that girl’s bold bold.

if she thinks she could get away with being a not so subtle pick me girl infront of bakugou katsuki, then she couldn’t be more wrong.

it’s absolutely revolting— i mean, he hasn’t displayed any romantic feelings towards ANYONE that isn’t you.

also, they’re quite gutsy if you ask me. so congrats for having guts??

i don’t think he’d be friends with a pick me girl. he’s very selective of who he’s befriending, so it’s probably your friend that’s the pick me girl in this case

he wouldn’t know what a pick me girl would be, but he’d probably know the description of one.

over some time, he’d grow some resistance to insults directed at him, but when someone insults his s/o

oh boy. that’s not good. remember when i said that katsuki was almost like your scary and intimidating dog

this is what i mean

knows he can’t make a scene, so his first option is to be dismissive asf— but if said pick me girl literally can’t get it, he won’t be afraid of shoving some explosions into her face

because his hands are rated e for everyone

SCENARIO

“so you wanna be picked or something, is that it?” he hates how you literally have the resistance of a rock— which is something he always liked, but in this case hated. if it weren’t for you— he would’ve blasted explosions into her sorry excuse of a face until it’s beyond recognition (that wouldn’t be hero like, is what you’ve said in the past, but he disagrees.)

but seriously? ugh. he just wants to leave this horrid place, and make some dinner with you in the comfort of his home. why are you even friends with her anyway? she’s not even trying to be slick at this point.

“p-picked? i’m not understanding, katsu.”

“it’s bakugou.”

“right,” her laughter is like nails on chalkboard, “i’m just watching out for Y/N, y’know? there’s no point in wearing all of that.. on their face.” and she’s obviously referring to your obviously very well done makeup

“it’ll make your skin terrible in the long run! and really— i couldn’t really understand on why someone would wear that much, when you could survive with i dunno.. lip gloss at most?”

you would’ve actually said something as a rebuttal, but your boyfriend is quicker, and a lot more direct than anyone else in the area.

“just say you can’t do makeup and fucking scram,” katsuki’s ice cold glare finally breaks out of the act he’s been trying to hold together for you

“their makeup is fucking bomb as hell, compared to your ridiculous spider lashes, lady. come back when you’ve watched james charles’ entire fucking channel.” he harshly states in similar bakugou fashion, despite the lack of screaming.

and if you squinted hard enough, you could see tears welling up in her eyes. but katsuki tugs your hand before anything else could be said

“let’s fucking go, you need better friends.”

he makes you cut ties with all of them, and he practically scolds your terrible choice of friends— but he goes quiet when you tell him that you’ve been friends with her since middle school

“good fucking riddance. next time, i’ll punch them as soon as they say something outta line, got that?” and next time (hopefully, there won’t be a next time) you’ll actually lash out— or maybe,, you’ll let him loose for once.

todoroki shouto

now shouto might be,, socially unaware sometimes. but he can tell whenever someone’s trying to insult his s/o

like,, right away.

now— you both run into this person after a pleasant date, and she eagerly presented herself as your friend

so, her attitude catches him off guard because who’d have anything rude to say about you and towards shouto’s face? especially when it’s about something normal.

like,, wasn’t she your friend?? why is she even like this?

his hostility is very well known, so they should be scared.

he gets detached from the conversation, and he’ll immediately go cold— and shouto would probably go as far as walking away with your hand in his

doesn’t matter if he properly says goodbye or not— if a girl’s being rude to his s/o, they obviously don’t deserve his usually polite attitude. nope, that’s a luxury.

oh— and what more when they’re seeking for his validation. newsflash! said pick me girl won’t be get any from him.

SCENARIO

shouto couldn’t stop the bitterness bleeding into his mouth, when the girl in front of him continued to babble and take up the valuable time he had left with his s/o

initially, she presented herself as your friend from middle school— but as of now? she seems to be more interested in him more than you, despite knowing you first.

she’d ask him a string of obvious questions with very obvious answers, like ‘is she treating you well?’ ‘is she acting correctly?’ and questions of the sort

“oh, sorry! i’d hate to cut this conversation short, but—” you finally decide that it was about time to leave, while shouto looks pretty,, deadpanned right now, you could tell that he was gradually starting to get irritated by your friend’s words.

“wait. thats.. kind of controlling, don’t you think? do you ever let shou make decisions?”

“uh.. controlling? since when??” you question at the accusation. this girl knows nothing about your relationship dynamic, and she’s already jumping the gun and making conclusions.

your gaze snaps back to shouto, who looks just as surprised as he could possibly be.

“yeah! it clearly looks like he still wants to talk” which is an obvious lie, shouto just wants it out of here “i wonder how you managed to snag such a guy like him,” she comments with a smile that looked anything above suspicion (yet, it makes your stomach churn)

you could see the way her hand gets gradually closer to him— and frankly, you’re not sure about what she was planning to do next, “you wouldn’t need to dress all expensive and fancy, if you’re with a girl with an already classy appear—”

“i think this conversation is over,” shouto grip is firm on the wrist that was attempting to grab his shoulder, shouto makes no attempt to even look at the girl infront of him “i don’t know what you’re trying to do, but it’s not humorous. at all.”

“what?” she stammers, drawing her hand back “i-it’s obvious they don’t know how to take a joke! this is why there are barely any good w—”

shouto’s next actions knocks her speechless, his hand rests at the small of your back, before gently guiding you forward— “love, what movie are we watching later?” he says, making an effort to press a quick, yet intense kiss on your lips

“oh,” you breathe out, surprised by this action. “don’t be so tense, love.” shouto comments on how tense your shoulders have looked, ever since she started running her mouth, “now.. what movie do you want to watch tonight? comedy? thriller?”

“you pick,” you laugh at the quick shift of topic. and when you look behind you, you could see shame and defeat welling up on her face. shouto finally feels like he could smile again, the bitterness dissipating from his mouth

after shouto questions you if that was what a pick me girl was, he makes sure that you guys won’t ever encounter such thing again

“you.. don’t have more friends like that, right? if you do— we could always do another friend list cleansing.” this statement makes you laugh but shouto is anything but joking

but being reminded of his reaction to that ‘pick me’ girl does puts a smile on your face.

»»————-　♡　————-««

likes and reblogs are appreciated, thanks for reading!

i do not own bnha/mha and it’s characters. boku no hero academia/my hero academia belongs to horikoshi kohei, i only own the writing and i do not profit off of my hobby

do not plagiarize, reupload, translate, or use my works for audio readings without permission

[nemeseos-noctua]

Hey darlings! Can I request Xiao, Albedo and Diluc separately carrying reader around for a day because of a bet they lost? Love yall! <3

𝐅𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆: diluc, albedo, xiao (separate) x gn!reader

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒: not proofread

𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐒: THIS TOOK SO LONG I’M SO SORRY ANON (i was busy and didnt feel like writing anything for like a month ☹ but im back and ill try and write more, esp since my school year ends in like a month and a half)

oh you could see so much 

Diluc was so tall.... it was great 

“is this what height feels like?”

despite you enjoying every second of it, the pyro typhoon was slowly suffering

HIS REPUTATION !! WHAT HAPPENS TO HIS REPUTATION ???

the answer is nothing (except that Donna is jealous and pissed)

“How much longer are we going to have to do this for?”

“The whole day, obviously! That was the bet!” you cheered, clearly enjoying where you were currently. His suffering for your enjoyment.

The red-haired man sighed and continued walking around, eventually drifting over to the giant tree in the middle of Windrise. 

He stops next to the base of the oak tree, slightly lowering himself down. You weren’t exactly surprised that he could carry your weight, since he wields a giant claymore as a weapon, but you couldn’t feel not just the tiniest bit bad for him.

you guys were playing a guessing game as Diluc took a shift at Angel’s Share last night

“how much is venti gonna drink tonight”

you won, obviously

that damn bard drank at least 50,000 mora’s worth in dandelion wine

HE DOESNT EVEN PAY FOR IT IN MORA 

and thats how you lose money in a business, children

You lowered yourself off of the man’s back, assuming that’s what he wanted. 

“Hey, sorry about the bet...” you trail off, taking a seat on the grass and letting the wind graze your face.

“It’s fine. A bet is a bet.”

“Yeah but--” you stopped. There was absolutely no way that you would win this debate. 

The pyro user looked at you after a few seconds of silence. You usually talked a lot more than this and strongly believed in sharing your thoughts, so what was stopping you now?

“You know what? Let’s just go to the winery and take a walk there together.” You begrudgingly got up from your spot from the cool grass and started to walk in the direction of the winery.

There were a few hurried steps coming from behind you, assumingly from Diluc, but you paid no mind to him. He probably just didn’t wanna leave you behind--

“Woah-- hey! Diluc, wh--”

“A bet is a bet.”

you found yourself on his shoulders this time

dude really ran up and lifted you onto his shoulders

like dipped under you

mans said “woOOP” 

you would kill him but hes too hot for that 😉

You sighed.

A bet is a bet. 

you were taller than the alchemist

not by much, but it was enough that it was wacky as hell

(i hc that Albedo isn’t super strong so he’s struggling even tho he’s a sword user-- tbh i thought that he was a catalyst at first lmao)

it’s so funny because Albedo is literally holding you like a baby being burped while doing some sort of experiment

“Stop kicking before I spill something on the both of us, (Y/N).”

“No.”

The blond sighed and continued to work on some kind of potion. 

It was comforting to be in someone’s embrace again. How long’s it been? Years, maybe...

And soon enough, you fell asleep while the scholar cradled you in his arms. 

i can assure you that he was FREAKING OUT

he was scared that he would wake you up if he put you down on the bed that the he occasionally would sleep on (he survives on caffeine)

but he needed to do this experiment 

like... NEEDED to 

“../N)..? (Y/N), wake up.” You whined in response, not really processing anything that was coming out of Albedo’s mouth. “You won’t be able to sleep later tonight if you continue with your nap.”

“..what time is it..?” you let out a large yawn and covered your mouth. Since you had just woken up, your brain had refused to function properly. And with that, it took you a while to realize that you were laying on a bed. 

Albedo was still working on something (you weren’t sure what) but stopped to wake you up.

he’s cute

but he almost blew up

impressive how you didn’t wake up

“Only around sunset. Come, I’ll make dinner.”

the least i could say is that Xiao was not pleased.

HE WANTED TO COMPLAIN SO MUCH

but he didn’t wanna hurt your feelings 🥺

karmic debt was nothing compared to you feeling sad /j 

karmic debt is horrible :( poor xiao

also being in crowded places was not fun for him

LANTERN RITE !!  he did think that the xiao lanterns were cute 

“Ooh, ooh, look! It’s a food stand,” you excited pointed out from on the yaksha’s back, “wanna get something? There might be almond tofu!”

“Only if there’s--”

“--almond tofu. Yeah, yeah, I know. It’s the only thing you can stomach. Mr. Dream Eater...”

That must’ve struck a chord in him. The “young” man kissed his teeth, showing a hostile attitude that he had never done to you. 

“Just because I agreed to let you win doesn’t mean that I won’t go back on it.” 

secretly he didn’t 

he really enjoyed your company and hates everyone else 

funny because he desires company and love but WHATEVER !

xiao loves you in some type of way 

he adores you and all of your stupidity

and sometimes you mess up and it’s fine

it’s just a “mortal thing” 

(he also makes mistakes but shh)

You remained silent until the two of you reached the food stand, filled with savoury smells and delicious aromatics. Though there was no almond tofu.

“You wanna try somewhere else? I don’t mind going to find a different spot.”

Xiao grumbled. Not like you were the one walking and exerting energy to get from one place to another. 

“Fine.”

“Look... I promise this is gonna be the last place. If we don’t find any, we can go back to Wangshu Inn and ask Verr Goldet for some,” you reasoned. 

The adeptus remained silent, but didn’t show any signs of displeasure. You took it as a yes.

“Wanmin restaurant has some, I think! It’s the best of the best in Liyue too.”

“This better be worth it.”

“Don’t worry, it will! I’ll even pay for it and everything!” He sighed, making his way toward the restaurant. Honestly, you didn’t wanna even get anything to eat. For the most part, it was just spoiling Xiao for once since he never went anywhere and only ate the almond tofu Verr Goldet made at the Inn.

I hope that you can be happy, at least for today.

[vannybarber]

The Prenup

Summary: After four years of being together and finally being engaged, Chris wants you to sign a prenup.

Chris Evans x Reader

Warnings: angst, swearing, chris getting his ass handed to him, a lot of pain.

Part Two Part Three Part Four Final Chapter

Scrounging through the little desk in the corner of Chris and you's bedroom, you hear him let out a boisterous laugh.

He was watching some movie and there was a certain part that he found so hilarious. After 4 years of watching it with him constantly, you still don't get what's so funny. But it makes him happy so that's what matters.

You were searching for the wine opener so Scott could get his middle-aged-4-kids-divorcee vibe on. You cleaned the other day and stuck it in there after a nightly dose of freakydeaky from Chris, which consisted of wine, whipped cream, and a many different forms of chocolate.

After what seemed like forever, you find the corkscrew and grin at your accomplishment. You take one more look in the drawer out of habit and you spot a big orange envelope with Chris' name on it. Being the nosy curious person you are, you take the envelope out and get a good look at it. You see the words Prenuptial Agreement in bold and your heart drops.

Chris had proposed to you 9 months ago and you were happy beyond words. After being together for 4 years, he finally put away his commitment troubles and made you his fianceé. And now you find out he's going to get you to sign a prenup. A fucking prenup.

You look around the room at loss for words. You were angry, hurt and confused. After 4 years of being together, he doesn't have faith in his own judgment that you guys would be together forever? You both have been through literally everything. There isn't one thing you don't know about each other. Your relationship was rare and it was special.

After moments of contemplation, you decide you would confront him on it. There's no way you could carry on the night and sleep after this. Not until you get your answers. Closing the drawer, you take a sharp breath and exhale before walking out the room. You get back to the dining table where Lisa and his siblings surrounded.

"Here you go Scott" you say slamming the corkscrew on the table in front of him. He looks up at you, puzzled. You glance at him then at Chris and he's looking at you just the same. Evidently your tone matched your movements because everyone went silent. You draw back and put both hands behind your back and huff.

"Babe, are you alright?" It was Christopher talking to you now. Your attention goes to him and your lips are in a thin line. Refraining from blowing up at him, you force smile on your face and change your tone of voice.

"What do you mean, honey? I'm fine." You should leave the acting to Chris honestly. That's definitely not your field of expertise. Shifting on your right foot, you stare at him. He shuffles and tilts his head with a knowing look.

"Spill it Y/N. What's up?"

"The flames when I burn this damn house down." So much for not blowing up. You snatch the envelope in front of you and chuck it on the table. Everyone watches the exchange and the envelope fly to the table. All their faces change from confusion to shock and even more confusion.

Chris didn't even need to look down to know it was the prenup. His eyes went from you to the wall. Guilt written all over it, you almost wish you gave a shit. You wonder how long he was going to keep this hidden from you. No need to wonder now.

"You want to explain to me why you have a prenup?" You place your hand on your hip and roll your neck at him.

"I got that for us."

You swear to everything you wanted to lunge at him right then and there. 'I got that for us'. Why do people always use that excuse for everything? They weren't thinking about you, just themselves and expected you to go along with it.

"You got it for us? I know you didn't do this on your own. Who put you up to it?" You look around the room. Scott has his hands up shaking his head. Carly and Shanna both let out a quiet "not me". You look at Lisa who had this look of hurt.

"Chris, you tell me everything. How did I not know about this? Why didn't you tell me?" Well now you know she didn't suggest it. You feel slightly guilty for letting it cross your mind, but you had your reasons.

"Ma, I had my reasons. I kept it hidden because I didn't know how I felt about it myself" he says rubbing his face and fixing his hair under his cap. Still didn't answer your question.

"Christopher, who put you up to this? Tell me now!" You're getting fired up by the minute. You have an idea who it could be too.

"Megan. She thought that it would be smart to consider. Just to protect me."

"Megan." Your voice is laced with absolute venom. "You know Chris, she does a good job keeping you out of trouble and bullshit so you're not all over the tabloids, but sometimes, her ass is too much!"

Chris is never in the news for anything negative. He's always minding his business and moving quietly. Megan is a great publicist, but she can be pretty overbearing about his personal life. She gave you side eye for like the entire first year of you guys' relationship.

"Baby, she was just looking out for me. You know how it is, women getting with you for your money. Guys loose half of everything they have when getting divorces."

You can't even believe it.

"I am not 'women'. I'm your fianceé. We've been together 4 years, Chris! After all this time your material things come before me?" Tears are puddled at your eyes now and your voice is cracking. This catches his attention.

"I told you from the start Chris, that I never cared about your money! Never have and never will. I am used to not having much. I'm not money hungry or concerned for having top tier everything. I've learned to settle."

"Y/N, I didn't mea-" you slam your hand on the table, making everyone jump. Chris shuts his mouth.

"I'm. Not. Finished. I am not marrying your bank account. I'm not marrying your cars. I'm not marrying your house. I don't give a damn about any of that shit. And you literally are still concerned about all of that?" Your face is wet and your nose is runny. You wipe your nose and cross your arms.

"It's not even like that!" Now he's getting upset. For literally nothing. This is his fault. "It's just in case it doesn't work out, we don't need to deal with all the extra mess."

That completely shattered you. In case it doesn't work out. He actually has thoughts that your marriage couldn't work. What would even cause that? You guys don't even argue. You don't even remember the last time you did. You've learned to understand what each other needs and mastered that. What is he on about?

"You know what the sad part is? Us not working out crossed my mind in, like, the first year of our relationship. And I decided that if we did get married, and God forbid we divorced, I wouldn't take anything from you."

He looked at you like he just found out he wasn't the father of your baby.

"Yeah, Chris. That's your money. You made it, not me, so why would I ask for any of it from you? You gave me an amazing relationship and thats enough for me."

"Oh my goodness." Everyone directs their attention to Scott. "So you wouldn't want anything from the divorce?"

"Of course not! I came in this relationship for him. Plus a make my own money. I don't need anyone else's."

You had your own business. Many employees at different buildings in Boston. You didn't have much growing up and you were proud of yourself for not having to worry about financial issues. Chris liked that you had your own thing going and didn't have to adapt to his life and depend on him financially. And he still got a prenup.

Feeling like you were gonna cry again, you rub your temples and take deep breaths to prevent it. But you failed and started crying more. Chris got up and moved to stand in front of you.

"Baby, I'm sorry I upset you. I thought you would be okay with this. Like you said, you don't care about my money so what's wrong with the prenup?" His hands were on your sides, but not for long as you shook them off of you.

"What's wrong with it? What this is telling me is three things. You have doubt that our marriage won't work out, you think I might change my mind and ask for alimony, and that your money comes before me."

"I..." he struggles to form words. You take this chance to get out of there.

"I really don't want to be here right now." Chris looks up and grabs your arm.

"Babe, you don't need to go. Where the hell are you gonna go?" You turn and grab the envelope from the table. You open it and pull the papers out, shoving it in his face.

"I'll go to a hotel or something, but I'm not staying here if this is the shit you're trying to pull with me." You turn the paper to you and look in disgust. You scan over it and your eyes fall on the dotted line where you need to sign. Beside it is where he needed to sign his.

Well not anymore.

You read over his signature on the line. Chris Evans.

He signed the prenup already. Now he was just waiting for your signature. He really was leaving you zero choice.

"You signed it already??" Everyone at the table head snapped up. Shanna gasped and covered her mouth. Lisa mumbles an "oh no" under her breath.

"So you were just going to bring it to me and expect me to sign it with no fight, huh?"

Chris says nothing, but his face is red. You don't wait for a response and walk to your shoes and your bag. Already having everything in there, you slip your shoes on and walk back to Chris.

"Just a heads up, you brought this on yourself."

You whip around and walk to the fireplace. You chuck the papers and envelope in the blaze and turn back to him.

"You can forget about that damn prenup, cause I'm not signing it. As a matter a fact, you don't even have to worry about that because there won't be a chance of us divorcing." You force a smile and clasp your hands together. Lisa and Scott rise from the table panicking.

"Babe, no-"

"Forget the wedding, this engagement and all of it. You can take this fucking ring too." You pry the ring off your fingers and throw it at him. It hits his chest and falls at his feet.

"I'm not marrying you."

You turn on your heel, grab your purse and jacket, walking out the door, leaving the Evans' speechless.

Was this too dramatic? I have my own opinions on a prenup, but maybe it's not as big as it seems? Idk🥴.

masterlist

[caleiiiii]

mcytbers as subway workers because i work at subway and i said so

i wrote this all at like 1 am im sorry

subway terminology (at least where i work)

waste out -means an item cant, or isnt, being sold, like overbaked cookies or expired milk. gets written down on a list for tax returns or smth

freezer pulls -pulling items from the freezer to the walk in fridge so they can thaw for the upcoming days

POS system -the software used for ringing up food, has a bunch of options per type of sandwich

generally 2 shift rotations , each one has a shift lead which is ur main opener or closer

characters

dream 

makes sandwiches so fast. 

how ??? 

he wraps the sandwiches immaculately as well

definitely a main closer

george 

just. disappears during a rush 

only to be found two hours later STILL doing dishes

dream and sapnap are not pleased.

sapnap 

convinces dream to waste out bread for him so he can eat it

gives ppl he likes free cookies 

terrible at wrapping sandwiches

tommy 

always works with wilbur and tubbo. always. 

he HATES freezer pulls but if he has to he can be seen SPRINTING between the freezer and the fridge

also bad at wrapping sandwiches

does all the online orders for tubbo because he cant read them well

tubbo 

loves to bake the bread and cookies

got a complaint once because he read an online order wrong so tommy always does them

hates ringing people up but loves to make the sandwhiches

technoblade

only works like 1 shift a week but its the most goddamn productive shift of anyone.

always makes sure they are selling potato soup when hes working

another main closer

wilbur

always controls the radio in the store

always works with tubbo and tommy, drives them to work

bribes others so he doesnt have to do the dishes

main opener

philza

the manager

super chill about scheduling

turns a blind eye to people “accidently” dropping cookies and wasting them out

niki

a goddess at baking the bread and cookies

never burns anything ever

everybody wants to work with her shes so nice

fundy

is really good at ringing those ppl up with 28372 coupons

horrible at making sandwiches tho

the only one that knows how to fix the soda machine when it breaks

quackity

always gets asked to translate the writing on the boxes since its in spanish 95% of the time

loves stocking the milk cooler so he can take home the expired sodas n shit

always forgets to remind customers when stuff costs extra

schlatt

that one transfer from another store that does everything

slightly wrong.

its been long enough now that he should know better but nobody wants to correct him.

eret

has tons of pins on his hat, 10/10

really good at making the wraps

always says hello when customers enter

karl

the new hire

immediately taken under sapnaps wing, much to the chagrin of dream

much more bread is now wasted out.

bbh and skeppy

regulars that are just. always there

they know all the employee gossip and get discounts on food

phil is .5 seconds away from asking them if they want a job

normal shift schedules

wilbur, tommy, tubbo (day shift)

dream, george, sapnap (night shift)

eret, niki, fundy (day shift)

technoblade, quackity, schlatt (night shift)

karl mainly works with the dteam, but jumps around

random things

the cookie incident

once tubbo accidently overbaked like 2 dozen cookies

so he and tommy ate all of them during their shift

they did not come into work the next day.

dream and techno rivalry

dream and technoblade have a rivaly about who can close and leave the store the quickest

eventually they decide to time themselves and race eachother on their respective shifts

techno wins with a time of 3 minutes before theyre officially allowed to close.

they both get yelled at by phil

technoblade’s only mistake

the only mistake technoblade has made ever was accidently leaving the bread cabinet open overnight

wilbur, tubbo, and tommy find it in the morning and have to throw all the bread out

tommy and tubbo split the bread and each leave with a garbage bag full of subway bread

wilbur still wont let techno live it down.

hacker things

once fundy hacked the POS system to give him a 100% discount

used it for about a month before someone (quackity) accidently pressed the option and snitched to phil

luckily, he just sighed and reset the system

cookie dough

wilbur comes up with the idea to pop raw cookie dough in the microwave and eat it half baked

phil comes in one day only to make -direct eye contact- with tommy as he and tubbo lick cookie dough off of some deli paper

allows it to happen as long as they pay for the dough

subway garlic bread

on a really slow day niki and eret are goofing off and create

~subway garlic bread~

it instantly becomes a secret menu favourite among employees and regulars

the bet

once skeppy bet quackity and schlatt that they wouldnt start a fake argument during rush hour

skeppy recorded the whole thing

technoblade can be seen in the backround silently making sandwiches as quackity and schlatt scream at eachother about if quackity has a “flatty patty”

phil tries to be mad but sees all the tips they made and lets is slide

sacrifices

george is the one always sacrificed to deal with the crabby middle aged moms

its his punishment for not helping during the rush.

torture

sometimes for fun wilbur takes his meal break right before the dinner rush

tommy stares at him in fury the whole time.

betting pool

none of the employees can tell if bbh and skeppy are dating

its to the point that they keep a betting chart on a white board next to the “top failure of the week” spot

subway ghost

after a few freak instances wilbur is positive that the subway is haunted and convinces phil to let him do a séance after hours

he manages to convince half the staff that the store is haunted

(the ghost is drista or smth idk aksjdhajk)

top failure of the week

a tally on the white board in the back room of who dropped/wasted out thw most items

sapnap has the record top failure of the week, dropping a total of 42 loaves of bread in a week

schlatt got put on the board once. never again.

enamel pins

tubbo finds a enamel pin of a bee that he puts on his visor

its not technically allowed but phil lets him do it anyway :)

bandanas

tommy and tubbo take subway bandanas from the back room and initial them before trading with eachother

nobody comments that theyre not technically allowed to have a hat and a bandana

the war

at some point a rivalry breaks out between the day staff

wilbur, tommy, tubbo, niki, eret, and fundy

and the night staff

dream, sapnap, george (techno, karl, schlatt, and quackity stay out of it)

what starts out tame eventually leads to workers purposely messing up stuff for the next shift to deal with, like not stocking the fridge or mopping the floor 

at some point eret switches to the night shift

the day shift does not take it well.

 after about 2 weeks phil is forced to step in as the store quality starts to go downhill

he closes the store for a day and makes everyone clean it u

 techno watches from outside the windows with a bag of popcorn

pogway

tommy starts placing the stickers they use to wrap sandwiches everywhere with the words “pogway” on them

everyone can tell its his handwriting but no one can catch him placing the stickers

phil even checked the cameras, still no trace of him

subway gun

sometimes tommy goes around spraying others with a spray bottle full of water used on the bread

he calls it the “subway gun”

wilbur gets fed up hides it in the freezer overnight

thats all for now! if i come up with anything else i might add it lol

EDIT PART 2 IS NOW OUT