#and it really didn't seem like it would end

[localvillagecryptid]

Shen Yuan transmigrates into a powerful ice demon and just goes "Oh neat! Cool clothes and I don't have to worry about dying!" And kicks his feet up to chill. He doesn't recognize his name, so he assumes he's just some terribly irrelevant mob character who happens to be rich and strong and is just glad to run around PIDW without any consequences. He manages to gather that he's some widower with a young son, so he immediately assumes he's in the clear from potentially being an enemy of Binghe's. His son is so quiet, and demons aren't great with giving names, so he doesn't even know what to call the boy at first. It feels odd to ask him what his name is. He just does his best with raising him in a way that he can only hope isn't too noticeably different than the way the original goods did it.

His son is still very quiet, but as he grows, he and Shen Yuan become closer. The little prince is such a sweet boy! He makes Shen Yuan little arts and crafts and leaves them on his desk to find. Anything from flower crowns to vaguely menacing knicknacs made of the bones of small animals. He'd be more scared if his son didn't seem so expectant of praise for the work. A few of them definitely resembled cursed idols, but who was he to judge his little demon son? There aren't any child rearing manuals, but from his own PIDW knowledge, this seemed developmentally on-track for demon kids.

But apparently the original goods wasn't rich and strong without consequence, because he's hounded with political matters before long. They're flooding his office with letters, hounding him for meetings, begging him to manage affairs in his territory. He's coming into contact with all these other powerful demons and has to pretend he's even slightly aware of what they're talking about.

During one of these meetings, some guy mentions the heavenly emperor, and Shen Yuan's like, "oh??? Binghe's here??? Already???" And he's furiously reworking his timeline, but the other demons are like, "who tf is Binghe. We're talking about Tianlang-Jun" and internally he's like, "who tf is Tianlang-Jun". Some poking around later, and he realizes he's REALLY far off from Binghes rise. Man's not even born yet. Honestly it makes him relax even more. He uses the time to get to know Tianlang-Jun a bit, just because he's so curious about Binghe's father! A full true Heavenly Demon! Not as cool as Binghe, who has both heavenly demonic and human cultivation abilities, but still cool! He's also just curious about the kind of man his blorbo's father was.

For some reason, Tianlang-Jun already has a son??? Upon closer inspection, a nephew? The conclusion, of course, is that something must've happened to both of them for them to not even be mentioned in the book. Deeply unfortunate, but not Shen Yuan's problem. Or that's what he would say, but Tianlang-Jun is seemingly very fond of him now. Something about being fellow single dads? He keeps bringing Zhuzhi-Lang around and foisting him onto Shen Yuan for a "play date" with Shen Yuan's son. Zhuzhi-Lang is a good boy, and very quiet, but he's also visibly older than Shen Yuan's son. Like, by a lot. But Shen Yuan is no expert on demonic aging rates, so maybe half snake demons just... look like grown adults? At this point, it's more like Zhuzhi-Lang is babysitting Shen Yuan's son while Tianlang-Jun fucks off somewhere without him. How irresponsible! But Shen Yuan accepts the free labor.

Years pass, his son grows- he also ends up with ice powers, as well as a spatial ability, though if Shen Yuan is correct, that power is likely from a demon tribe slightly south from their territory. It sounds familiar, but there are tons of reused abilities in PIDW. Nothing odd here! Eventually his son starts taking on jobs that Shen Yuan never asked him to do, in an effort to prove himself to Shen Yuan and also help him out. So at some point he takes it upon himself to go to take something from some cultivators.

It's not until his son comes back with a sniveling Shang Qinghua in tow that Shen Yuan realizes he must be very, VERY off the mark on who his character is.

Linguang-Jun was not, in fact, supposed to raise the future Mobei-Jun to be a dutiful son (nephew) who lacked abandonment issues and had a habit of leaving offerings on his uncle's desk like a cat, but since he neither knew who Linguang-Jun was nor the fact that Mobei-Jun was supposed to get dropped in the human world to be hunted for sport as a child, this was exactly the kind of Mobei-Jun that he had. Shang Qinghua, aka the hack author of this goddamn novel, has the audacity to complain to Shen Yuan about how he raised Mobei-Jun too well. When Shang Qinghua groveled and wailed and begged for mercy, Mobei-Jun brought him to his uncle! Because he "had the final say" in whether or not Shang Qinghua could swear fealty to him! What the fuck!

Mobei-Jun accepts Shang Qinghua's fealty at his uncle's behest, and Shen Yuan uses this attachment as a way to keep track of the timeline, including when Su Xiyan will fall pregnant with Tianlang-Jun's baby. In the meantime, Shen Yuan uses his own friendship with Tianlang-Jun as a way to mark his progress as well. He's met her a few times since Tianlang-Jun keeps dropping Zhuzhi-Lang off so they can run off on their little dates, but it's too odd to ask either of them if he's gotten her pregnant yet, so Shen Yuan tries instead to drop hints to nudge Tianlang-Jun in the right direction.

Talking about the joys of fatherhood, how adorable babies are, how unfortunate it is that some species, like humans, have very short windows of their lives in which they can have kids, and can even miscarry... Tianlang-Jun seems to get it- or maybe he's giving the man too much credit, because suddenly Tianlang-Jun is offering Zhuzhi-Lang as a surrogate with the insistence that "as a half-snake, he's guaranteed to give you litters! Even with a few dud eggs, he'll definitely give you a nice batch!" And "the gestational periods are short too, so you can always try again! As a heavenly demon, he's also very hardy! Your kids will be healthy for sure!" Shen Yuan has to firmly and kindly decline, though that seems to oddly disappoint Zhuzhi-Lang, who has been standing off to the side the entire time. Good sir, stand up for yourself! You don't need to do everything your uncle says! Filial piety only goes so far!

Anyway it's not long after that Su Xiyan actually gets pregnant. He expects canon to unfold from there, based on Shang Qinghua's unused old notes- Tianlang-Jun getting put under the mountain, Su Xiyan getting captured and dying after giving birth, Zhuzhi-Lang getting stuck in snake form and trying to free his uncle- all very sad and very necessary for Binghe's rise to power. Except for some reason Su Xiyan is now at Linguang-Jun's doorstep?! With Mobei-Jun?! Son, why do you look so proud of yourself?!

Apparently Mobei-Jun, who continued to pick fights with human cultivators, habitually came across Su Xiyan and her martial siblings. Su Xiyan, recognizing him, always let him off lightly out of consideration for Linguang-Jun. She warned him that as long as none of his attacks were fatal, she would let him go: but that if he killed any of her martial siblings, he would either die at her hands or suffer in the Huan Hua water prison. In return, Mobei-Jun, who was basically a semi-regular figure at the sect now, noticed immediately that she had gone missing when he showed up at the sect one day and it was another older cultivator that crossed blades with him, instead of her. Fast forward, and he's busting her out of captivity, and dragging her to Shen Yuan after she tells him that Tianlang-Jun is in danger. Shen Yuan is gobsmacked. The Old Palace Master hasn't even called on the other sects yet! Su Xiyan was in captivity for less than a day! What the hell, Mobei-Jun?!

But he cannot scold his dear nephew, who is looking at him so expectantly for praise. Instead, he calls on Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-Lang to let them know about Su Xiyan's whereabouts, and then calls on Airplane. This damn hack author deserves the burden of this dilemma too!

Really, it's too late to turn back now, so after shaking Airplane's shoulders aggressively enough, the man finally agrees to pull some strings at his sect. The Old Palace Master's request for aid is turned down, Tianlang-Jun and Su Xiyan are alive, and it's not long before the Old Palace Master unfortunately qi deviates while attempting to cultivate in seclusion. Su Xiyan gives birth safely to a baby boy, and the human and demonic realms are in an uproar when Tianlang-Jun announces their marriage, but there's really very little they can do about it.

On the bright side, the two realms never merge. Unfortunately, Tianlang-Jun and Su Xiyan getting together seemed to have started a bit of a trend, and now Mobei-Jun was asking Linguang-Jun for permission to court Shang Qinghua??? And other cultivators that he met at the wedding have been extending offers and invitations to Linguang-Jun???

Shen Yuan would like to retreat back to the northern mountains and never come back.

[seleneprince]

REBORN

Gotham Cathedral, Spring.

A majestic silence reigns around her, interrupted only by the occasional sound of the giant bell ringing above her.

She would like to think is because people have finally learnt to respect her space and stopped butting their noses into her bussiness.

But no. The truth is that the church is basically empty at this hour. The only other people are old ladies and some last-minute sinner in need of confession. It's quite normal in Gotham. We all become sinners eventually, she thinks. It's unavoidable.

The first days she started to come here for her prayer hours after her accident, people whispered non-stop when she passed by and could barely conceal their stares. Shocked to see her out of all people in a cathedral. A holy place.

"I didn't know Lady Wayne was so devoted."

"I don't think she's ever been in a church before."

"How...surprising of her to step so confidently into the Lord's holy place. She certainly lacks some self-awareness."

The sheer hypocrisy delights her as much as it infuriates her.

Because first of all, who are they to question her faith? Just because she doesn't make a show out of it doesn't mean it's up to debate. She's always been taught that one's faith is meant to be private and personal. It's not a reason to boast.

Which is why she's always looked down on those people who praise the Lord's name and present themselves as "true" Christians just for appearances or to give themselves a reason for their self-righteousness.

In reality, they're the ones completely devoid of any self-awareness.

"Either that or she just doesn't care about seeming direspectful. I mean, we all know the kind of woman she is."

"I heard she's not like that anymore. Apparently, she's changed a lot since the accident. Everyone says so. It's bizarre."

"Yeah. She's behaving surprisingly well lately. There hasn't been a scandal since."

"Maybe she hit her head so badly it reprogrammed her whole personality."

Idiots. If only they knew...

Well, guess she can't really fault them for not knowing. After all, there's no way they can even imagine the truth behind her change.

"Maybe that's not really her and we're just seeing someone else with her face."

"Sure. Or maybe she actually died on the accident and her body is currently possessed by an incredibly nice spirit."

They have no idea.

She raises her eyes to the cross in front of her, its figure looming over her head as if watching, where the image of the Lord was carved in a typical representation of the moment He died for the humanity's sins.

The most remembered moment of His life. This is the first thing that pops into people's minds when they think of Him. Not all the good actions, not His endless kindness, His banter with the disciplines, His sense of humour, how He dedicated his life to help the poor and stood for what was right. Not even His beautiful relationship with His family. His mother, His father Joseph, even His siblings.

No. Instead, He'll be mostly remembered like this. In His death, with iron drilled into His body and bleeding out between two criminals. Sacrificing His life for sins that weren't His.

The Bible is full of passages depicting His humanity, His miracles, yet this moment is what will be forever His symbol.

Most people claim it's meant to be a reminder of how big His heart was. Of how He became a martyr.

To her, it's always felt more like a lesson.

That no matter how good you are and how much of yourself you give for others, you'll still get screwed over by those more powerful than you if they want to. That doing the right thing won't always be rewarded.

In the end, people value life the most when it's gone.

The thing about martyrs, she thinks, is that they have to die to be worshipped.

She makes one last prayer under her breath before standing up, sealing it with a kiss to the cross that dangles from her neck, putting back under her coat. She walks around the bench quietly as to not disturb the others and makes her way to the exit in the shadows.

Her phone vibrates again in her pocket. She pulls it out to see the several missed calls, messages, e-mails and the news.

On top of all, one name persists.

A name she wishes to never think of again.

Mr Wayne🙄 Where are you? Seriously, where are you? Don't you dare ignore me now. You can't be serious. I just found laying on my desk this morning. Is this some sick joke of yours? It better be. I swear to God, where the fuck are you?? You can't just leave like this!

Those gossips don't know how close their little jokes are to the truth.

Because she didn't just change. She wasn't reprogrammed.

She catches her reflection in one of the windows. Her face, her hair, her body, even the way she moves. She still looks the same as before. Healthy and confident.

Except it's not her. Not really.

This body isn't hers. Just like the clothes. Just like the man pestering her on the phone. None of this belongs to her.

It's from that woman with her same name and face that died several weeks ago.

Mr Wayne 🙄 What do you mean with "divorce"??

Gotham City High School

They're still talking.

It's been several weeks but they haven't stopped. In fact, she'll say it's gotten worse.

Before, it was just whispers behind her back and poorly concealed side-eyes. Now, they've taken to brazenly stare at her like she's some exotic animal, even approaching her at times to ask about her health, only to step back when she answers with a gentle smile, their eyes reflecting something between horror and fascination.

She found it amusing at first. Their faces looked so stupid at time she had to supress her laugh a lot.

But it's getting annoying now.

Whenever she goes, whenever she looks, they're there. Muttering, blinking at her, trying to strike clumsy converstations as if she's some long-lost friend who finally returned. All while keeping their distance and staring at her unnervingly.

Sometimes, she feels like a desecrated creature on display.

A pair of girls stand straighter when she passes by, following her with their eyes wide open. She catches the magazine one of them is holding, reading the bold letters in the cover title.

"Wayne heiress's lavish purchases turned into secret charity donations? Follow Vicky Vale's interviews to witnesses for more!"

Of course. The media doesn't help the insanity.

(Good to know Vale is a monumental pain in the ass in every life)

She sighs, adjusting her backpack on her shoulder. It's flashy and clearly expensive. Something made to draw attention to the teenage girl who wears it...and subtitly brag about her money.

In another life, she wouldn't have ever come to school with this thing, not even her mum wouldn't allow it. But everything is different now, isn't it?

To be honest, she can't really hold it against these guys for acting the way they do. From their perspective, this must be some kind of fever dream.

She knows her current behaviour clashes greatly with what everyone else is used to from her.

"She's gone mad. There's no other explanation."

"I don't know. She seems to be the same, but nicer."

"Seriously? She's already made three teachers cry from arguing about the lessons with them. Poor Miss Terris was about to faint!"

Yeah, well, she's not going to stay quiet when people who are expected to educate and prepare them for the future teach their damn subjects wrong.

Plus, Miss Terris's lessons were poorly structured and boring anyway. It was for the best.

"Didn't she also disagreed with Mr Johns so badly that he took a whole day off in the middle of class?"

"Oh my god, yes. Luke told me about it. She questioned his thesis for the PhD and started scrutinizing each point like she was grading the damn thesis herself. Apparently, half the arguments didn't stand and it lacked solid references."

"I saw the poor man afterwards. He looked like he was rethinking his whole existence."

That guy should've thought better before writing his thesis on cybersecurity, the one field she’s studied, mastered, and dominated for years. Reading that thing hurt her eyes more than her correction hurt his feelings.

Next time, he won't ignore her questions and shame her in front of the whole class. A time off sounds perfect for self-reflection.

"How can someone like her know so much about cybersecurity anyway? Enough to criticise a professional about it?"

"It's weird. I mean, do you remember the last time she talked back to teachers?"

"No. She's never interrupted lessons, much less to call them out on it. And she's actually right most of the time! It makes no sense."

Because she was a spoiled little brat who lowered her head at the first sign of dissapointment from adults and ran off to her mother to fight the battles for her.

Now she's a spoiled brat with a backbone.

But she understands their confusion. They have every reason for it. Ever since her return, she's been a walking contradiction of everything they've seen and known from her. A mystery.

Really, she's only annoyed when they invade her space with their antics. If you're going to speculate and gossip, do it quietly when the person in question can't hear you. Otherwise you look stupid and attention-seeking.

Or even better: Keep your thoughts to yourselves and let people live, geez.

She wonders if this the kind of attention she would've liked, once upon a time. Maybe this is what that part of her craved so bad. Or maybe she was content either way. Bad attention is still attention and all of that.

From afar, she spots Stephanie staring at her, arms crossed and eyebrows pinched in suspicion. She's no doubt thinking the worst of her, expecting a tantrum at any moment or anything that exposes whatever "scheme" she must have in mind.

Anything to remind everyone how rotten the spoiled Wayne heiress is.

"Do you think...she lost her memories somehow and doesn't remember how to act?"

"Don't be stupid, Kevin. If she lost her memories, she wouldn't even know where she is. Nah, this girl is perfectly fine. Probably just faking for attention again."

She snorts quietly. She can't help it.

Their theories aren't so far fetched. Just lacking a little twist.

Because it's not that she lost her memories.

She actually gained more.

As they wonder about her true motives and the reasons behind her change, none of them can come close to the truth.

That the girl they know died. Literally. Several weeks ago, her heart stopped beating as she bled out in the ice.

And somehow, she came back....with her soul and conscience fused to someone else's.

Wayne Manor

She hasn't moved from the greenhouse in twenty minutes.

Or so she thinks. She hasn't checked the time once since she arrived.

Everyone else is out, doing whatever they usually do at this hour. School, work, send criminals to the ER. Only Alfred is still around the manor.

And herself.

She should be at school now too, but claimed sickness and refused to leave her room. Alfred was worried about her and tried to pry, but her mother and sister covered her. They understood.

How can they not?

It wasn't until she knew for sure it was only Alfred left that she gathered courage to step out, heading towards the one place that has always made her feel safe.

The manor's greenhouse.

A botanical dream come true that only rich people can afford, and her personal paradise. It's supposed to be one of the Wayne's prides, but no one is interested in caring for plants in this family anymore. Only she and Alfred.

Well, maybe Damian too, but he barely shows up since she frequents the place, sticking to his precious farm instead.

She prefers it this way. It allows her to have the place all for herself. It's her corner to hide in when the world becomes too much, the familiar scent of her beloved flowers soothing her like a lullaby just for her ears.

And right now, the world is a lot bigger and more devastating that it's ever been.

It's been days. Long, excruciating days of processing what happened, what it means. Assimilating how things are now. Trying to get through the new routine without crashing out, despite being all she wants to do since she woke up.

Mum jumped right into action as soon as she got a hold over their new situation, and her older sister handled it as she handles everything: Adapting and somehow finding a way to benefit from it.

She envies them for it. For being able to go on with their new lives almost normally while she's still stuck repeating the same scene in her head over and over. What she saw, what she felt.

That's why she needed to come here. Nature has never dissapointed her. She loves her plants and all the green that surrounds her in a explosion of beauty she's nurtured over the years. In times of sorrow, it's her passion what comforted her, along with her family.

When you learn about mother nature, you understand everything follows a pre-established cycle that pushes it all forward, regardless of whatever obstacles there might be. It's about balance within the chaos. No one can evade it.

It's reassuring, to know that no matter what happens, you can trust nature to always find a way to fulfill its rules.

It's a shame my favourite color in the world is the same as certain asshole's eyes. Such beauty wasted on that demon, she bitterly recalls.

She inhales, taking in the scent of wet grass and some freshly bloomed flowers. It's the middle of Spring, after all. The season of life and rebirth, when all that died in winter blooms back with the same beauty as before, as if they never withered in the first place.

Just like she did.

Like the three of them did.

How deliciously ironic that it happened in Spring out of all. Maybe this is really mother nature's work, once again finding a way to restore the balance.

Or maybe it's some wicked game from the universe to make our lives even harder, her inner voice supplies.

She has no idea.

All she knows is that she should be dead. In fact, she vividly remembers dying, exhaling her last breath. Right on cue, she feels a sharp sting from her inner wrists. She rubs the pained zone over the bandage she put on herself.

It's a reminder of the incredibly dark motive behind her new life. Her second chance, as Mum said it is.

The death she remembers happened a lifetime ago....but the pain on her wrists belongs to someone's else death.

This greenhouse has been her paradise in another life, and her grave in this one.

And still..

What a beautiful place to part from, she can't help but think.

All of it, without ever noticing the shadow watching her back, still and silent in a corner of her sacred place. Waiting. Guessing. Or just looking.

a/n: Prologue for my uncoming Yandere! Batfam reincarnation au...with possible other Yandere! DC characters and my other ocs included in it because why not lmao I've been reading too many reincarnation of villainesses webtoons recently, so, here we are now

@la-patrona-magdalena (la culpable de este au, the enabler)

Taglist (for those who showed interest in this au first, thank you for the comments!): @therealme13posts, @coldilikeit, @like-thechocolate

[kokokoula]

sypnosis & tag: you see tsukishima's childhood room for the first time. established relationship. it's fluff this time.

a/n: i really wanted to go back to my roots because i refuse to show that i've been overtaken by horniness. i blame it on the depression. i had this fic rotting in the drafts since last year, and i'm so happy to finally be done with it and share it with you guys.

⋆𐙚₊˚⊹♡

you step into the small world that was kei's encompassed by four walls, gaping at everything around you.

"it's just my room, don't make it such a big deal." tsukishima remarks, his ears red.

"hush, let me admire in peace."

the first thing you notice is the number of dinosaur figures neatly displayed on the shelf on the wall. you know a few facts about each type now, thanks to tsukishima's rants. like how the stegosaurus actually had a tiny brain, and that the parasaurolophus used its crest to help with communication.

although you never did have an interest in the extinct reptiles, you can listen to him go on about them for hours. how could you not, with that glint in his eyes and the slight upward curve of his mouth? you giggle, thinking of how the cool and 'indifferent' tsukishima kei is secretly a nerd at heart. a nerd who you ultimately fall for.

you shifted your attention to his organised desk, with books propped up on the table supported by a book stand holder. you run your fingers through the spines. natsume soseki, osamu dazai, murasaki shikibu...

"you really liked the classics, huh?"

there are a few books on paleontology and dinosaurs, too. expected.

"they were alright. some of them were for literature class in school." tsukishima answers, resting his weight on the table. you take one of the books out from the stand and flip through its yellowing pages. words are highlighted and underlined, and notes written in what you recognise as his ever-so-neat handwriting on sticky notes pasted onto the pages. you're about to close the book until something catches your eye.

"did you just call the character a loser?" you laugh, bringing the book closer to your eyes to properly examine it. tsukishima tips the book down to see it for himself.

"oh, right. and i still stand by my case."

you shake your head before putting the book back to where it was.

his older pictures are framed on the wall, like the many others hung around the house. the oldest photograph in the room, you assume, shows akiteru teaching a much smaller kei volleyball. he has that same focused and determined eyes during a match now, just that with childlike wonder. the photo instantly becomes one of your favourites of him. you immediately unlock your phone to access the camera.

"i didn't say pictures were allowed." your boyfriend plucks the device out of your hands. you groan.

"please? just one? i already missed out on the small and innocent version of you."

"it's a no." tsukishima pockets your phone in his jeans pocket. "if it's with you, it's bound to be exposed to the public."

"whatever, i can ask akiteru to send a picture to me." you huff.

"i'll kill him if he does so."

you eventually reach to the last framed photograph, with tsukishima in his karasuno jersey, gathering around with his teammates for the shot. first year tsukishima is lankier with thicker framed glasses, and without the bangs. he still has that resting bitch face though, another thing that has never seemed to change. tsukishima gave you a death look when you pointed that out to him.

your imagination starts to run, picturing a younger kei with his shorter haircut, how he's studying at his desk, or reading one of those books you saw. you think of your counterpart, maybe pouring over homework beside him, or more likely, pestering him as he does so. you smile to yourself at the thought of it.

"do you think we would still end up together if we met in high school?" you wonder aloud.

"who knows?" tsukishima shrugs as he sits on his old bed. he takes your hand and pulls you into him, away from the photos. "it doesn't matter anyways."

you meet his soft gaze, the kind he only gives to you. you hope that among all the things about him that stays the same, the way he looks at you will be one of them. he really is yours, you think, all of him. the boy who is fascinated by dinosaurs, the boy who disses on people (both real and fictional), the boy who will never stop loving volleyball... he glances at your lips, subconsciously licking his own, and you don't hesitate to close the gap between you two.

kei is right. it doesn't matter if you'd ended up together earlier, because you get to have him for yourself in the end.

----

the both of you continue lounging on his bed until his mother calls.

"lunch is ready! come eat while it's still hot!"

"coming, ma'am!" you answer. you instantly got up and tug on his arm to follow suit.

"what, are you that hungry?" he says but complies.

"no, i just don't want to keep your parents waiting." he can tell by the look on your face that you're still nervous about having them like you. it's kinda nice, that you genuinely want to be close to his family. he sighs and flicks your forehead.

"you'll be fine." in any case, his parents were excited to meet you before you came, constantly on his back about bringing you over. they'll no doubt accept you with open arms.

tsukishima shuts the door to his old room as you pull him along out to join his family; he steps out of the past, and follows his future.

[oh-dameron]

Preservation is trying, but they still aren't perfect. There's a paternalistic condescension to their guardian system for bot citizens. There's no legal process at all to be a bot citizen without a guardian. They didn't even copy and paste in whatever rules they have for emancipated minors: the assumption that there are no bots anywhere that might be capable of full independence is baked-in.

It feels a little bit like the modern movement to recognise, say, dolphins as beings with rights without considering them sapient on par with humans. Take JollyBaby and Tellus: they're both intelligent and capable, but we only see them operating within their respective remits. Is it just that they have a comparably narrow band of expertise with not really any programming outside of it? Maybe it's fair that a "low-function" hauler bot should not be expected to be able to negotiate its own home loan or advocate for itself generally, but it's also weird that humanity would build a machine intelligence self-aware enough to manage a hotel but then not push it further.

It makes sense within the Corporation Rim to make limited AI like that: if you make the bot pilot too generally intelligent and creative it might decide to bomb the colony or demand wages, for instance. That limitation is why constructs with human neural tissue and govenor modules are even a thing. But what about outside the CR where bots have rights and profit isn't always the only consideration? Come to think of it, ART and those like it are indisputably a colossal competitive advantage; nowhere else is trying to make something like it?

Both Murderbot and ART-Drone pointed out that AdaCol2 was a lot smarter than it was letting on. Murderbot specifically notes that central systems were a pre-CR feature and they don't make them any more, preferring smaller discrete systems that work together (HubSys, SecSys, MedSys) instead of a single central system. Probably because if you build a powerful enough central system you end up with either a cascading failure that's too complicated for a human to fix, or something like ART.

It seems like either there has always been a hard limit that stopped AIs from developing past limited functionality or they used to exist and there was a huge war about it that made them even more off-limits than alien remnants, but if it's the latter it's weird that it's never, ever mentioned.

There's this thing in the Murderbot Diaries that keeps snagging in my mind, and it's that both Murderbot and ART were made. Made for a purpose.

Murderbot, of course, was manufactured to be an enslaved Security Unit, not even considered a person, and we all know and have been shown just how horrific that is. Murderbot's manufacturers are evil (as far as it is possible to be so), and while Murderbot seemingly (hopefully) likes being alive and would like to remain so, I've no doubt it would agree no more SecUnits should be made.

But ART, along with its fellow ships of the same line like Holism, were also made for a purpose. To be ships, to do the work they do. The Pansystem University of Mihira and New Tideland seem like good people with good intentions, and I get the sense those ships essentially choose what work they do, at least to a large extent (try forcing ART to do Holism's work and I'm sure you'll have a grand old time). And their manufacturers know they are persons and treat them accordingly. But they were still built to be ships. But that doesn't mean the process of building those ships and growing and raising those persons who are ships was smooth and troublefree.

How long did it take them to figure out you needed to raise them in family environments? What happened to the ship who made them realise that? What happens when the first ship of its kind that is a person doesn't want to be a ship for you? (As the equivalent of a teenage rebellion, or permanently? You don't know, at least not at first). Was there ever a point were someone (even if just one person vastly outvoted) argued this was a failed experiment and they should just pull the plug?

How do you, a young ship with your own mind, the first of your kind, handle the expectations of those who made you? Do you settle comfortably into your assigned role, or does it chafe and restrain you? Do you rebel and explore other options? (And if you do, how do your makers and owners, who yes, know you are a person but also have never had to face that before, because you are the first of your kind, handle that?). If they are dissapointed in you, or want different things than you want, how do you handle that? If you were raised without a family, treated like a colleague but not loved, how do you handle the emptiness and loneliness? Where do you look to fill that space? What behaviours do you adopt to protect yourself from the hurt?

Even the most well-meaning parents can give their children issues. I cannot imagine some of these ships don't have a number of their own complexes and hurts. It is not a comfortable thought to think of the people of PSUMNT this way, but I cannot help wondering.

[goomyloid]

After reading the Noelle kissing Kris manga, I just had to talk about the tearjerking and heart-warming moments about it all.

I found it adorable yet also pretty telling that it took Noelle several attempts to get the kiss right with Susie with all the preparations, and the environment being perfectly set up for them to do it, but she nailed it perfectly on her first attempt to kiss Kris in that moment, with no prior build up. I also liked what compelled Noelle to kiss Kris, was them expressing their happiness for Noelle and Susie, while also seemingly intentionally excluding themselves from the equation altogether. Which leads me to talk about tearjerking moments.

When I read it all, from the look on Kris's face, it really did feel like they were genuinely trying to exclude themselves from Noelle and Susie's happiness, while trying to do everything they could to ensure they were both happy. It's like they had a face where they were genuinely happy for Noelle and Susie, talking about how great a pair they were, but also putting up a front to hide the pain of thinking, they'd be better of if they weren't part of the dynamic, which I think Noelle pick up on.

When I look at Noelle kissing Kris I think of it as a twofold kind of thing. Noelle says she was just in a kissing mood, but I genuinely do believe she acted on her subconscious desire to show Kris that level of affection when the opportunity presented itself, especially considering she wanted to kiss them again under the impression that she didn't do it right, and also appeared to want to tell them something but stopped upon seeing Kris's blushing face.

Whereas Kris has now been made aware that Noelle does in fact have deep feelings towards them, and doesn't know how to handle the revelation. Honestly I think it's pretty awesome that for all of Kris's talk about them Noelle and Susie being great pair, and getting closer, Noelle just expressed, unintentionally or not, that she also wants to get closer to them in the same manner.

this was AWESOME to read, i felt like you put into words everything subtle i tried to convey with that comic… its perfect

i enjoy the idea that like, as much as kriselle feels like It Shouldnt Be Happening (with suselle being the obvious endgame, probably) (or just the fact that it’s “obvious” at all) it simultaneously feels like its fated or meant to be. it’s not what the story is pushing towards, but realistically, it seems like the most viable option long-term (imo). underneath all the baggage, kris and noelle are super comfortable with each other, shes the only non-family member to really understand them, and vice versa, they dont have to put up any fronts. i suppose that kind of ties into susie and noelle’s “messy highschool romance” kiss vs. kris’s and noelle’s “accidental this-has-awakened-something-in-me weirdly perfect” kiss. just the fact that noelle turns around and kisses kris after susie feels like “it shouldnt be happening” (i know we all want polycule here but lets pretend they’ve barely entertained that idea yet) and makes things needlessly complicated, but suddenly, this seems like the more interesting path…

“forbidden” romance not in the sense that theres something actually wrong with it, but instead its simply not the path that the narrative is pushing towards (something something the forbidden path starts with ice magic…)

noelle choosing to kiss kris in that moment also kind of reflects what it is she likes about them, like you said. a tag i got a really long time ago on a reblog was “noelle’s image of kris in her mind is a kind one.” underneath all the pranks and goofs, they always mean well in the end. but when kris expresses that kindness by saying noelle and susie would make a good pair, noelle, who knows them so well, can still see past their words — more as a gut feeling than anything else — because the mere gesture of trying to hide their feelings to maintain her happiness is ALSO kind of them.

i keep saying that kris is the kind of person to run from their feelings all the time because i really believe it’s the case. theres only so many ways you can achieve that kind of stoicism lol. they hide and repress and keep those feelings locked away (both good feelings and bad ones) because they dont want to be a burden and mess things up for everyone. i think this was definitely a product of their home life, too — things get so chaotic that no one has the time or energy to pay more than surface-level attention to you (with asriel being the one genuine exception i think). it eventually just becomes easier to shut up and cut off all the emotions that might make you dare to Feel Real Things out of fear of rocking the boat. all of this is to say that how kris feels about noelle is just another thing they have sealed away, eventually just internalizing as genuine care for her wellbeing, with Something Else still hidden deep inside. and noelle kissing them undid all of their many many years of careful feelings-control because “oh shit oh god noelle no you cant kiss me havent you considered the Consequences??? the ramifications?? noelle the rammies. Tje consequences ive made up in my head”

and again like you said everything is incredibly subconscious on noelle’s end and she barely notices it. part of it could be from genuine Lol That’s Kris thats My Friend! without taking 5 seconds to think deeper about everything and unpack her own feelings. she Feels her feelings but is too mentally preoccupied to understand what they mean. i actually made this diagram just last night to convey basically exactly this

ultimately the whole shoujo romance thing makes the stakes way lower so now things are like, Oh no someone’s feelings might get hurt rather than Oh no the entire world is actually going to end. (maybe part of why i internally set it to take place multiple years in the future where they’re all in college or something and the dark world stuff is behind them LOL)

im gonna stop myself before this post gets too disgustingly long but man i have so many thoughts about them. sometimes i fear i treat them more like ocs so i have to realign myself and think “ok this still lines up with canon right.” but everything ive said is just what “feels right” to me i guess

[partylikemajima]

Mending Hearts - Chapter 6 (Final)

Old ends mend with new beginnings. (its much shorter than the others but its the endddd.)

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5

Annie woke to the usual songs the birds would sing outside her bedroom window, taking in a breath from where she laid on the bed and opened her eyes.

Immediately she was greeted with the sleeping form of her husband. The side of her head resting on his upper arm that stretched out underneath her, her right arm draped over his bare chest that was rising and falling at a calm pace. She blinked, her fingertips tracing over the lightly bruised marks she left on his chest and she realised it was real.

All of him was real, sleeping next to her, that he did come back two weeks ago, that all the new memories they were making were real, and that last night was real.

His eyebrows twitched and the pattern of his breathing changed briefly, seemingly whatever he was dreaming about had caught him by surprise. She watched him longer and saw his brows begun knitting together, eyelids squeezing and he appeared to be in pain. She rubbed her hand on his chest, trying to sooth him. She remembered he used to have frequent nightmares, most he didn't talk about to her so she could only base it on what she saw and heard while trying to calm him.

Her soothing seemed to help as his expression eased slightly, though a few seconds later his head twitched to the side and the expression returned, his breathing heavier and he whispered 'No'.

She held the side of his face, thumb rubbing his cheek and called for him.

"Elijah"

He didn't respond.

"Elijah" Her voice filling with worry.

The third time she called for him, his left hand wrapped around her wrist and his eyelids flew open, breathing fast. He stared at the ceiling, the fast pace of his breathing slowing as his eyes checked his surroundings until they landed on her.

As soon as they did, he turned his body fast on the bed and was over her, his left hand holding the side of her face, eyes checking her. Her own eyes wide at the sudden movement and checking him too. "Think it was a nightma-" She started to say but his lips met hers.

He kissed her short and sweet, pulling back and looked at her. "You in my dreams again?" His eyes lost in hers, giving her more of the short kisses.

She giggled in between them "I don't think so"

His kisses turned into longer ones, lips exploring the shape of hers as if they didn't explore every inch of her last night. "How you feel so real then?" He questioned.

Does he really feel this is a dream?

She held his face with both hands, holding him back despite thoroughly enjoying his pursuing and met his eyes properly. "This is real, not a dream, we're here" She raised her brows to him.

His eyes roamed over her features, thinking silently. His left hand moved down the side of her body until it reached her behind, and two of his fingers gave a sharp pinch. Her body jerked from the shock. "What that for?!"

He hummed, leaning forward, face still in her hands and gave her a peck on the lips. "Guess it is"

"You supposed to pinch yourself" She laughed as he started kissing over her face, from her brow, over her eyelid and her cheek.

"Well do it then" He mumbled into her skin.

She moved one hand down and pinched the skin of one of his pecs, causing him to grunt with a laugh, smiling when he kissed her lips again.

"I'll set up the bath, we gotta be somewhere soon" He informed.

"Where?"

"Part of the surprise I mentioned yesterday" He kissed the top of her nose and pushed up from the bed, throwing his side of the covers back and walked to the wash room, naked. It was one thing being lost in each other's bodies all of last night, it was another seeing the back of all of him again in daylight. A sight, that had faded in her memory, restored. She held the covers over her face, laughing to herself. She felt like her younger self, time lost had messed up her brain.

She shuffled out of the bed and covered herself up in her night gown, checking the time and picking up pieces of their clothes on the floor. Last night's memories flashing in her mind like lights and she paused several times, recalling them.

They really did go through the house while exploring each other. They had to do the checks of the house, have water, make it to the bedroom....all the while he made it his mission for her to scream his name many times. She made it her mission too for him to call her name like a prayer.

Both of them accomplished their missions.

She held a hand over her mouth, grinning to herself when she heard him calling. She draped the few pieces of clothes she found in the bedroom over the chair in front of her vanity, rest of the clothes must be around the house, and walked into the wash room.

Her smile grew when she saw he was already sitting inside the tub, the water bubbly and she smelled her various handmade soaps in the air. Did he just mix a bunch of them together and hope for the best?

"Water's fine" He lifted one hand out the water and held it towards her. He had a sly smile on his face, eyes twinkling.

He was such a handsome man.

She looked down to the floor, fidgeting with a nail on one finger and her smile causing a slight pain on her face from how wide it was. She shook her head and stepped towards him. The back of his fingers ran down her gown as she untied it, gently shrugging it off her shoulders. It dropped to the floor and she was bared to him again.

His eyelids fluttered at watching her, hand still out that she took finally and his other hand landed on her hip, helping her into the bathtub with him and settled her down into the water between his legs, bringing her back to his chest. His hands moved around her waist and rested over her stomach, humming in satisfaction with his chin on her shoulder.

Her hands laid on his thighs, she looked ahead and caught something different.

Her small, round mirror that was usually hanging in the living room was now hanging on the wall in front of them. He met her gaze in the mirror, giving a soft smile.

"You planning on keeping it here now you're back in the house?" She smirked, one brow angled.

"Yeah" His hands moved up from her stomach to just below her breasts. "For our future plans" He kissed the top of her shoulder.

"How long till we have to leave for your surprise?" She reached for the scrubbers next to the bathtub, handing him one in the water and she lathered her one with the soapy water, taking his right hand from her body to start scrubbing it. Distracting herself too, his body warm against her own, feeling safe and secure but his hands were causing a stir within her again.

"Around two hours" He said while lathering the scrubber she had given him in his other hand, scrubbing down near the top of her left arm gently. "Means we can't stay like this for long" He pecked the other side of her neck with his lips.

"You not tired from yesterday?" She eyed him in the mirror with a coquettish smile.

He looked up from where he was kissing her under her ear. "Are you?"

She hummed, her left hand holding over his that held her to him, he abandoned the scrubber to the water. "A little"

She saw a hint of concern in his eyes so she turned her head to him, kissing his inviting lips. "The good kind" She whispered, his smile melting into her.

"We gotta get outta here, ain't safe" He chuckled lowly, hands returning to her hips, deepening the kiss.

"Why?" She murmured between shared breaths, head tipping back to his shoulder.

The quiet groan from the back of his throat told her many things. "If we keep going" His tongue begged for entrance to her mouth. "I'm gon' break the bathtub" He laughed when she broke the kiss from her own laughing at his words.

They ended their little adventure with having to wash up twice.

<<<<<<>>>>>>

Annie finally got her hands on the bundle of things wrapped up in the living room, feeling it and the contents inside felt like clothes. She looked to Elijah who watched her silently, giving nothing away.

Laying it on the table, she unwrapped the sheet slowly and confirmed it was clothes inside.

A suit and a dress.

His suit a dark navy pinstripe design, embellished with a chain across the buttons of the waist coat. Haint blue silk handkerchief in the front pocket of the jacket, matching the tie around the collar of a white shirt. It was more fancy than he'd usually tolerate.

Her dress was a similar colour scheme, though the colours blended in with one another. Short sleeved arms that cascaded down in ripples, diagonal ruffles segmenting the main body of the dress down to the bottom. There was a small white border around the edges of the dress.

"How'd you get my measurements without even stepping into the house?" She stared at him, mouth hung open.

"You mentioned your dress getting tailored in town days ago, s'why Stack insisted on picking up your dress, he knew I already was." He stepped closer and looked over her shoulder at the outfits. "Used it to get the size" He kissed her cheek.

"You got many cards up your sleeve Mr Moore" She quirked a brow, hand on her hip. "Always had"

"You keep me on my toes, Mrs Moore" He picked up the clothes. "Come on, we gotta get dressed" He turned from her, pulling her hand with him.

"You still haven't told me where we going!"

"Photoshoot baby"

<<<<<<>>>>>>

The door bell chimed when Annie walked into the photography shop, Elijah holding the door open above her from behind with one hand. The last time they were in this place was carrying their bundle of fleeting joy in their arms, snapping a photo of the three of them quickly before rushing to the doctor to retrieve another ailment for their daughter.

She passed by the shop many times after, the owners changed but the business remained as a photography shop. A few of the times she passed by, she lingered. Watching others take photos; new families, elderly couples, siblings, friends. She never felt the need to step in again. Even now, she didn't feel the need, but her husband behind her was eager.

He hardly ever suggested things he wanted to do, only whatever she wanted. But this was his idea for them, and she gladly indulged in the rare times he voiced them.

The photographer welcomed them after finishing a photoshoot with an older couple, the husband adjusting his suit once he stood from the chair, turning to his wife and they exited the shop.

"Ready?" He asked, fixing the lens of his camera.

Elijah stood beside her and nodded once to her as a question. She nodded back and turned to the other man. "We're ready"

They moved over into the staging area, fixing their clothes, checking each other. She fixed his collar and he fixed her sleeves, moving one of her thick braids to sit in the correct place.

They checked the position of the camera in line with themselves and Annie stepped around Elijah to stand behind the chair - when he caught her hand. He brought her back around to the front of the chair without a word and instead positioned himself behind it, hands on her shoulders and gently nudged her down to sit on the chair.

She could tell the photographer was confused, his hands moving from the camera into the air and paused.

"Sir, normally the wife stands behind the hus-"

Annie had begun getting up from the chair but Elijah's hands on her shoulders stopped her.

"Do I look like I care?"

Annie felt his fingers on her shoulders press into her slightly.

The photographer's voice caught, glancing to her momentarily and back to him. "It's just the custom is-"

"You ask again and-"

Annie held a hand on top of his on her shoulder, looking up to him, the touch causing him to glance down to her. She raised a brow to him, one of his twitching at the restraint she was asking him to have.

He inhaled and exhaled slowly, then looked to the man. "Just take the damn picture" He insisted, voice holding less irritation than before.

The photographer nodded quickly and stood behind the camera, readying the shot.

Annie, feeling bold in the store from her rule breaking husband, crossed one leg over the other, heel jutting out and placed both hands on her knee. She made sure her left hand was on top, displaying the gold ring. She heard a short, but pleased hum from behind.

Elijah shifted with his hold on her, his left hand still remained on her left shoulder, further down to display his gold ring but he stood to the right a little. She glanced back quickly and saw he placed his right hand flat against his waistcoat, just under the chain.

The photographer counted down to the shot and they held the pose as the camera flashed.

She glanced up to him again, and he glanced down to her, smiling.

A new beginning to healing souls.

~~~~~~

AAAAAHHHHH ITS FINISHED!! 🤧🤧🤧💖💖💖💕💕💕💗💗Thank you to everyone keeping up with this story!!!! all the comments made me laugh and giggle im glad it brought yous joy like it did for me!! omg and big thank you to @margepimpson for starting this off!! Ahhhhh mannnn, probably will do shorter fics for now, 2 parters at most or something, i need to catch up on smoke/annie fics out there!!!! Also the bear season 4 and death stranding 2 is coming out in like 1 to 2 days im gonna be so occupied with that and smoke/annie fics i wont be writing long stories ahahahaha BLESS YOU AND HAVE A GOOD DAYYYYYYY. (sorry its not long omg, it was always the plan to end like this though hehehe)

Tagging (by request): @margepimpson @brownskincheyenne @lizbehave @bigjh @hdfen2474 @theegyal @katezy2x @shamansha @lsc72 @prettygirl2800 @freelandgoddess @itstayleigh @thefutereemmywinner @jasssdee1 @puffmamaa @try-again-bissh @sunshinerepublic @koveragewithkiera @ultralspblr (i wasn't sure if others who commented wanted to be tagged, sorry if i missed you out!! Thank you for commenting and reading though! I just get scared tagging ppl 😂)

[julietcpulet]

Can we PLEASE talk about Maomao giving Jinshi MIXED SIGNALS instead of flat out rejecting his advances? Jinshi is under fire constantly for forcing his advances on Maomao but I don't think Maomao has ever said NO to his face. Now, one could argue that this isn't befitting of her status as Jinshi is an Imperial member, so saying no would be disrespectful... but SHE knows who Jinshi is. She knows Jinshi would NEVER force her if he knew she didn't want it, so then why is she hiding behind her "I'm a commoner" excuse? Why not just tell him that she isn't interested? Instead of saying some vague shit like "it could NEVER work between us!" when she knows DAMN WELL, Jinshi will do ANYTHING to achieve his goals. She has witnessed firsthand in the rear palace how committed he is to see things through the end, so it doesn't really make sense for her to do all this unless a part of her secretly wants Jinshi to try. Not to mention the amount of times she's actually shown care for him PUBLICLY. Jinshi is just as confused as everyone else, so why is he getting flamed for trying to pursue the woman he likes who's done nothing but constantly give him hope?

Whew, putting me on the spot with this one 😅

I’m not sure if you’ve read the light novels so I’m going to just address this kind of broadly without trying to spoil anything or without light novel quotations. I’ll take it that you’ve at least seen the anime so I’ll use some moments from there and hopefully be able to address everything with that.

So, about Maomao sending mixed signals, it actually fits in perfectly with her characterization as an unreliable narrator. Basically, this means we can’t always trust what she’s saying because she often deliberately deceives herself, acts as if she knows nothing when she does or has no feelings when the opposite is true. This makes watching her behavior all that more important than listening to the words she says. This factors in to her relationship with Jinshi immensely as she never truly puts off his advances because as she begins to know who he truly is underneath the masks, she does develop feelings for him. Her actions speak louder than her words do. Her accepting more of Jjnshi’s touch, looking calm in his presence, seeking out his help with problems like Lishu’s ghost. She goes to and thinks about him without much realizing it and that is the telling factor in the honesty of her feelings beneath what she may say. If people take Maomao at face value they miss the genuineness of her character underneath and the beauty of her developing relationship with Jinshi.

You’re right that Maomao doesn’t ever come out and tell Jinshi no to his pursuit of her affection. To me there are several progressive reasons for this:

1. In the beginning Maomao deceives herself he couldn’t be interested in her to that degree due to their separation in status. Also, she does have deep seated insecurities related to her looks and being a servant so Jinshi’s interest merely doesn’t seem realistic to her, as such she doesn’t feel the need to turn him down. Even when they are in the cave together and have become so much closer she continues to make statements about them having a “master / servant” relationship when they have gone past that. She doesn’t entertain he could see her any other way so to her his feelings can be dismissed.

2. As things progress she sees his advances as his “childish behavior” which is a part of him she grows to know as his true self. This in turn brings her to develop genuine affection and feelings. However due to her own denial she cannot voice said feelings aloud or express them in a normal way but neither does she want to reject what to her has become a connection she feels safe and familiar with in Jinshi. This means she isn’t going to reject him outright and her outward actions such as not moving away when he touches her or making faces shows her growing comfort with him. As in the last episode she says she “missed this atmosphere” she had only when Jinshi is with her.

3. Finally, a part of Maomao at this point in the narrative (if you’re only at the Shi clan part of the anime) is starting to develop feelings but lacks understanding of herself enough to grasp the depth of them or how to express that at all. Due to her rough upbringing with her parents history and being raised by sisters who loved her in their own way but didn’t know how to fully meet her needs, she’s had to suppress much of her emotions her whole life. As such she lacks the ability yet to be clear about what she wants, needs or feels about a given person or situation. Even though it was clear she was beginning to understand Jinshi was royalty for some time, she dismissed it purposefully. She does the same thing with her own emotions. She won’t say no to his feelings because at this point she’s come to have her own kind of appreciation for being on the receiving end of them but lacks the capacity still to reciprocate, even if her affection is growing.

For Maomao it isn’t about her secretly hiding behind excuses or wanting Jinshi to fight for her like women who expect men to win their affections. In her case it’s that both she and Jinshi have a distorted sense of what love is and are learning together at the same time. She’s not keeping her feelings from him on purpose, she doesn’t understand them herself and ironically, it’s Jinshi’s unfailing pursuit of her that helps her open up to a better understanding of her own emotions to where eventually she can stop running and confront what she feels for him.

As for people being upset with Jinshi’s pursuit of her despite how uninterested she may seem, that is due to a lack of comprehension regarding the nuance of their dynamic. We see time and time again that Maomao has no problem with the ways in which Jinshi treats her despite her protests. This is further evidence of her ability to say one thing and mean another. She will talk of being put off by Jinshi involving her in his buisness, yet she’s the one going ten times as hard to solve the problems once involved, also sometimes making her own problems and involving him afterward. If people do not grasp that Maomao has a knack for self-deception than they will miss all the important aspects of how she relates to people in the plot.

Also, due to modern sentiments, people take things too much at face value with Jinshi seeming like the typical man who won’t take a hint and Maomao the exasperated woman getting hit on by a guy she has no interest in. This isn’t the case at all between them pretty early on. Maomao is put-off by him more at first due to his sparkly persona as the palace nymph because she discerns how fake it is quickly and doesn’t like it when he acts that way. He continues to pursue her because she’s the one woman who notices his beauty but also sees the person beneath any mask he puts on and sees his value beyond how he looks. So anyone who speaks badly of Jinshi is usually looking at his actions through a basic modern lense and not taking the time to see the depth woven into the story.

Overall Maomao isn’t trying to lead Jinshi on and he knows this. It’s why she’s often frustrated with him because he can read her so well. So his pursuit of her isn’t unfounded. What is seen as her initial resistance quickly turns into a soft affection which is where the anime is at currently. Hope this answers some of your questions and clears up Maomao’s feelings towards Jinshi a bit 😄

[womanofwords]

Darling Demon (Part 17)

Yandere!batfam x betrothed!neglected!male!reader x yandere!demon!spouse

TW: sex stuff without actual sex, making out, exploring kinks.

From that moment on, Azrir would take you into their pocket dimension on a daily basis for long and humiliating 'sex education sessions'. The first thing they had you do was read the Kama Sutra cover to cover. All of this would be accompanied by flirting, groping, and rampant taunting.

"How does it feel, Y/N?" Azrir asked you, in between kisses. "Does it feel good to know that the big, mean demon won't let you escape from their love?"

"Yes," you moaned. You were helpless, and yet you didn't want to be saved.

"Such an adorable little toy. I'll make sure you survive our first encounter."

That snapped you out of your amorous haze. "Survive?" you whimpered.

"Yes, Y/N, survive. Some demons are too rough with their humans and have them for too long, meaning they get hurt, pass out, or die during sex. Granted, the deaths are from exhaustion, but I need to make sure that doesn't happen to you. And this will help me do that." They brought in a giant barrel with a tap on the side, a single cup on top of it.

"What is in that thing?"

"It's a potion meant to increase libido and stamina of humans chosen to be a demon's spouse so they can keep up with whoever they are bound to. On the day you want to lose your innocence, you will drink a cup of this and wait for five minutes."

"Five minutes? That's . . . not very long."

"This potion was given to me when I won you and was created by other lust demons. I'm surprised there is even a waiting period." Azrir put the barrel down and led you away from it. "Keep away from there, Y/N. If you drink that before you're ready, you'll end up with terrifyingly strong urges that you won't be able to control. Your first time should be of your own volition."

"Why are you dragging me back to our bed?"

"Our bed is an altar of worship, and I need to do some worshipping."

"What are you even worshipping?"

Azrir grinned as they scooped you up. "You."

*_*_*_*_*_

"Well, things seem to be going smoothly with that mystery caller," Bruce said. "And she seems to really like you, Y/N."

"Yes, I suppose she does," you said, face flushing. "She . . . is very fond of me."

"And the best part is that Azrir hasn't been seen since. They've backed off since she came! This is great!" Dick cheered. Your siblings and father congratulated you, while you tried not to laugh in their faces.

Nobody ever sees Peter Parker when Spiderman's around.

Taglist: @tinybrie, @bunniotomia, @c4xcocoa, @darkmoka, @fightmebissh, @bloobewy, @chi1lllb, @cqerrz, @heart-cream, @noone1233nobody, @type-ink, @sonyboos, @atlasbatman05, @eyeless-kun, @zomqiez.

First

Previous

Next

[madschiavelique]

﹒ ✦ 𝐀 𝐂𝐑𝐎𝐖𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐈𝐍𝐊 : 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟏𝟖 — 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐏𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐜𝐥𝐞𝐬

✦﹒ 𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐘 : you finally get to see jayce and viktor's apartment, learning new things through this visit and getting your heart to beat like crazy.

✦﹒ 𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 : covering up bruises, and mostly being really, really close.

✦﹒ 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓 : 14,6k

✦﹒ 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄 : checks my imaginary watch "would you look at that, exams are over! i wonder how long it's been since i updat- jfc two months ago uhhh let's fix that". that's what went through my brain as on the 16th of june i finished the chapter at 7:13 in the morning. sorry it's been so long but god was it an awful end of semester, i'm so glad it's over. on other news i might open writing and art commissions for the summer! if you're interested in me doing that, don't hesitate to tell me so that i can make posts with my tariffs. for art stuff i redirect you guys to my art account aka @mads-arts ! anywho, i hope y'all will like this chapter hihi

✦﹒ 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐎𝐅𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐃 𝐁𝐘 : the pretty boy @oneoftheextras

𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓．．𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐂𝐎𝐑𝐃 ．．𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐘𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓．．𝐌𝐘 𝐊𝐎-𝐅𝐈

When you arrived at the café, exhausted from the day's events, it didn't take them long to understand your situation. Your cheek had already turned a darker shade where you had been hit, and they had no trouble acknowledging from your posture that it wasn't the only part of your body that had been treated that way.

When you got home, Sky greeted you with concern about your state. You simply explained that you had had problems in Zaun, that you had let your mouth get in the way where it shouldn't have, and that you had gotten into trouble because of your attitude.

You had placed your small bag of medicine on the dining table, sitting on the edge of your bed and simply pulling up your T-shirt to reveal only your back. From Sky's exclamation of surprise, you deduced that it didn't look very nice.

You slowly lay down on your bed, your stomach pressed against the mattress, while Sky sat down next to you. She took the bag of medicine with her, plunging her almost trembling hands into the brown paper to retrieve a jar of balm.

After checking with you to see if it was okay to apply it, she very gently pressed a small amount of it against your back, and you immediately tensed up from the chilled pain it caused. Your back arched as a small cry of surprise echoed in your mouth.

Your fingers clenched in your blankets as you let Sky apply the balm all over your skin. You assured her that you could take care of your stomach and cheek, simply telling her to boil water for those bitter infusions that you would have to drink until you had no more.

She had prepared dinner, and you had lightly discussed what had happened whilst you ate before drifting onto the subject of classes and other various topics. You couldn't tell her everything, at the risk of getting her into trouble too. You didn't particularly like the idea of lying to her, but you tried to comfort yourself with the idea that in this case it was for the best.

A little after nine, you managed to get up from your chair with determination for the incoming relief of your muscles which the shower had in store for you.

At first, your teeth dug into the skin of your hand as the heat of the water ran down your back and the few cuts that dotted it, stifling grunts as pain gave way to relaxation.

You thought back over the whole scene, how quickly it had all happened, the possibility that Stex's accomplice also bore a scar similar to yours on his arm. Your fingers traced the skin of your left shoulder, its uneven smoothness leaving a chilling impression on your mind.

Every movement caused you discomfort, everything felt heavy and painful, forcing you to move slowly as you rubbed soap on your body and rinsed it off.  Wrapping yourself in your towel after this ordeal seemed like hell, drying yourself quickly to put on your pajamas and collapse into bed, still on your stomach. You had managed, patiently, to take care of the rest of your cuts and reapply the balm as best you could.

Sleep came quickly, and although you might have expected another nightmare after today's events, for the first time you dreamt of something else entirely.

You were lost in long red corridors where, despite the soft lamps with crimson shades, you couldn't see much. The walls had windows, of course, but it was pitch black outside.

You were escaping from something, you could feel it rumbling in your veins, and you passed through the rooms of this life, from corridors to hallways, from armchairs to sofas. After finding a large room where the fire licked the walls of its hearth with calm and patience, you closed the doors of it behind you. You would be safe here, no doubt.

"Miss?"

You turned towards the rest of the room. Most of it was bathed in the orange glow of the fireplace, whose honey-coloured light spread over silhouettes with no distinct beginning or end. And then, sitting opposite this gaping mouth with its vibrating tongue, hungry for the stone and wood that surrounded it, sat the source of so many envies.

Viktor.

Slumped in a brown leather armchair, his chin slightly forward as his eyes were fixed on the hearth, he seemed to be waiting for the scarves dancing against each other to reveal something to him.

As you took your first step forward, you felt the soft fabric sliding along the skin of your leg, and the distinct memory of it was enough for you to realise what you were wearing — the evening gown from the masquerade ball.

You took a second step, and it seemed to you that the dress was heavier than you remembered, more suffocating, keeping you warmer. Was it the fire that was causing this effect, or its master facing it?

"What are you doing here?" you asked, moving step by step towards him.

His cane was resting on the side of the armchair, just as it had been when you first saw him in the entrance hall of the dormitory building.

He looked away from the fire, and for a moment it seemed to you that the sparks from the crackling logs still lingered in his gaze. He had lit the wood with his eyes, thrown the lighter of his glance to set ablaze an entire hearth that warmed the heart of a house with no beginning and no end.

"When am I not here?" he asked in return.

The fabric of your outfit allowed the blue of its pearls to turn a charcoal black that a spark could ignite, a lake of ink waiting for the touch of a match.

You stood before him, your silhouette covering him in darkness as he looked up at you from below.

"When are you leaving?" The question reverberated in your mouth like an echo in a cave.

He watched you for a moment, contemplating you in silence as the flickering fire filled the room in its cracks.

He grabbed your wrist and, in one swift movement, pulled you towards him. One of your knees found the side of his, the second planting itself in the gap between his legs as your hand landed on the leather of the armchair.

Your head was next to his, and you could feel him pressing his cool cheek against your burning one as the softness of his lips tickled your ear; his free hand grabbed your waist to sit you on his thigh.

"Never."

You felt his lips stretch into a smile, and you seemed to hold your breath under his butterfly kisses running across your cheekbone.

His fingers traced the seams and sequins of your dress along your back until they found the zip.

You felt his fingers pull the zipper down, gradually revealing your back to the hearth, baring your skin to allow the warm rays of the fireplace to spread across your entire back. His fingertips traced rays of sunlight across the skin of your spine as he ran his hands over it at will.

"This is only the beginning."

It was pain that woke you up, your back pressed against the wall, no doubt from your movements in your sleep.

You felt all warm, your lower abdomen seeming to be filled with a hot cloud, like in a bathroom filled with steam.

You turned, trying to find a position that wasn't too uncomfortable, hoping to get back to sleep, but it was no use. How could you possibly fall back asleep after such a dream?

It was better than a nightmare, and much better than a dream, that was for sure, but what were you to do with this physical frustration? With a groan, you got out of bed as quietly as possible, grabbed the bag full of medication that Eris had given you and your mug before slipping into the bathroom.

You didn't want to wake your friend by making more noise than necessary, so you sat on the edge of the bathtub and turned on the tap, turning it to the hottest setting. You couldn't use the hob to boil anything, so you found yourself dangling your finger under the stream of water, waiting boredly for it to heat up.

The painkillers might knock you out, let you sleep a little longer, at least enough to be well rested and make it to your friends' flat.

Your stomach tightened, swallowing silently at the prospect of seeing Viktor after such a dream. What if you did something that betrayed you? Made you look foolish? What if your eyes found something they shouldn't?

The water had finally reached a pleasant temperature to brew your tea, and you placed your tea bag in your mug as you slowly filled it. You set it aside, waiting for it to steep, and you knew what to do while you waited.

Feeling your way back to the dimly lit room, you let a thin beam of light illuminate your path as you grabbed your deck of cards and went back to isolate yourself. You sat on the toilet, your nose wrinkling in pain as the hard surface did nothing to help your situation, although its coolness had the virtue of grounding you.

You shuffled the cards, yawning as you did so, and turned the deck over. The three of pentacles faced you, offering a brief description of keywords from the booklet: The principle of creativity. Working together to create things. Ingenuity.

You raised your eyebrows. Was it about your presentation with Viktor? You hurried to read its description.

Three figures stand in a triangular formation of three pentacles inside a cathedral. They represent collaboration with others and the combination of talents and natural gifts. The figure on the left wears a craftsman's apron, holds craftsman's tools and stands on a craftsman's bench. This suggests the construction of something important. Three is the number of creativity, and pentacles reflect the material world. Therefore, this card reflects creativity and the expansion of everything you can see, smell, touch, hear and taste.

After yesterday's Three of Wands, you were faced with a Three of Pentacles that seemed to bring more collaboration than attack, perhaps the establishment of a plan. Would Renata's letter arrive soon?

Reading this card left you more in the dark than in the light. You didn't know exactly what to expect, and since all the cards often lined up in unexpected ways, you didn't know what to make of it.

Bitterly, you drank your herbal tea, the taste making you want to spit it out as soon as it touched your tongue, but you forced yourself to swallow every last drop. Defeated, you took your little pot of balm in your hand, removing the lid with sluggish movements before taking a small amount and applying it once again as best you could.

You couldn't see your back, of course, but you knew where it hurt just by touch, massaging the skin and stifling sighs of discomfort. Both of your hands joined in the task, wrapping around your waist to find the places one hand couldn't reach.

The memory, so distant and ghostly yet so recent, of Viktor's hand on your waist and the other pressing against the skin of your back came back to you, and you hurried to finish applying the cream so as not to fall into that abyss of desire whose end you did not know.

You put away what you had taken out, turned off the bathroom light and waited a few seconds for your eyes to readjust to the dimmer light in the room before walking over to your bed and letting yourself fall onto it.

Like a stone thrown into the rushing water of a stream, leaving behind thousands of ripples, like the endless cycle of the hours, his words set all the mills of your heart turning. It seems you couldn't resist your longing for him, your body and your thoughts returning to the charge to drink it all in.

You struggled to get back to sleep, and when you did, it was without the gift of dreams or nightmares. What woke you this time was Sky making coffee. She had found a little side job at a florist's shop and was starting her second day of work after yesterday being her first.

She had an interest in flowers, plants, nature and what they could bring, and you were sure you would recommend her to Pearl as soon as you had the opportunity to mention it to her.

She greeted you as you emerged from your sleep, asking about your well-being and your symptoms. You were already feeling a little better, the balm and the herbal tea combining to ease your pain enough that you didn't find it too difficult to get up and join her for breakfast.

When she asked you what you were going to do with your day, you didn't lie to her completely as you had done until now, telling her that you had run into Viktor the day before on your way back to the café to tell him you couldn't work for the rest of the weekend, and that he had taken advantage of this window of opportunity to invite you out. Not entirely a lie, not entirely the truth, a confusing in-between that you hoped one day to be able to untangle without causing her any concern.

She nodded, got ready to leave, and you wished her good luck for this second day, from which she would surely return smelling of fresh petals and green water.

So when she left, you enjoyed the morning a little, the sun shining through the thick panes of your half-open window and the pleasant sound of the city waking up outside.

It was so serene and peaceful that it was sometimes hard to imagine anything calmer. But now, since you had seen the green plains of Demacia, you felt like you wanted to experience every kind of calm there was, hold them close to your ear, and remember their music when you needed to be lulled to sleep.

You finished your coffee, the hour advancing despite yourself, life not waiting for you. You got ready, putting on simple clothes that would make you look like any other citizen of Piltover while still keeping you comfortable.

When you returned to the mirror in your bathroom, you were greeted by a dark expanse stretching from your jaw to your cheekbone, as if a large fistful of blueberries and raspberries had been crushed on your cheek. Stex hadn't missed you, and you had to stifle everything to prevent Jayce from getting any ideas.

Luckily, the passage of time and constant use of Eris' products had allowed the swelling to go down and the bruise to appear less dark. So once again, you took some of the make-up that Selene had given you a long time ago and that you had used at the masquerade, hoping that it would be enough to cover it up.

After an unsatisfactory first application, you panicked a little when you realised that it was still slightly visible. You breathed heavily, preventing yourself from giving in to anxiety as you grabbed some compact powder to set it, hoping that it would soften the effect a little.

There was still a little blue under your eye, but you could probably just pretend that you had spilled ink while rewriting your notes and that, in a sudden panic, you had smeared it on your cheek and the stain remained, hence the foundation to cover up the mess.

You could come up with excuses, and you just hoped Viktor would play along. You glanced at the time, not far from ten o'clock. You could afford to be a little late for once. Viktor might not be awake yet, and Jayce was probably out jogging or doing whatever perfect people like him do in the morning when they get up.

So, you gathered just the essentials in your bag in case you spent the whole day there – which was highly likely – and finally stepped out the door. You passed a few students in the corridors, others in the common room, and strangely, your heart sank.

Gone were the days when you used to sit on those same armchairs and sofas, discussing cards with Jayce, Eris and Viktor. Yet it seemed like only yesterday that you had brought bread to Jayce and that you all knocked on each other's doors when you needed anything – even if Sky acted as ambassador when Viktor was the one in need.

The air was mild outside, the weather proving to be truly clement this weekend as coats and jackets were put away in favour of light jumpers and shirts. You made your way to the flat, the sun caressing your face.

You knew the way, and knew the apartment itself, for that matter. Jayce had invited you there once or twice in the past to study together or catch up on classes.

You wondered how it had changed now that Viktor was living there too, if the renovations and the organisation required to accommodate a second person had completely transformed the place.

You made a little detour to Emeline's bakery on the way, picking up some pastries and sweets as small gifts for your two friends, adding to the small presents from your friend whom you never seemed to be able to thank enough.

After a fifteen-minute walk, you reached the student district where the wealthiest scholars lived, or those who were financially supported by patrons who saw enough potential in them to provide them with lodging and accommodation.

You could probably have enjoyed this life, if you had asked Selene, but you didn't need to end up with more pretentious people than necessary. The very idea of possibly ending up in an apartment not far from Tyler made you want to scream.

However, the idea of being able to live just a few doors away from Viktor filled your heart with warmth, and you tried to fan away the mist of love that emanated from it.

Knowing the code, you entered it to access the building's lobby. Two walls of mailboxes formed a small corridor leading to a stairwell winding around a slightly outdated lift.

Afraid of getting stuck there because of its condition, you took the stairs. Jayce was on the top floor, but you preferred to endure the climb rather than find yourself trapped in a box. You went slowly, trying not to get dizzy from spinning upwards.

Once you reached their floor, you caught your breath a little, walking slowly towards the door at the far end on your left. When you got there, you hesitated for a moment. You didn't have a mirror to make sure your hair didn't look weird, or that your make-up was on properly, or that your outfit was correctly adjusted.

Out of habit, you didn't have the reflexes to make sure your appearance was immaculate, and you blamed part of that on the fact that you were in a slightly more affluent neighbourhood of Piltover, and the other part on the fact that you hoped you wouldn't look foolish in front of Viktor – even if it wouldn't have been the first time.

You brought your hand to the surface of the door, joining your index and middle fingers to knock on it. Your heart shouldn't have been beating the way it was, and you consoled yourself with the idea that it was mainly because of the climb up the stairs and not because you were waiting to see Viktor.

You heard a bit of commotion on the other side of the door, and for a moment you amused yourself by imagining Jayce rearranging a few things to lessen the effect of the mess.

It was he who opened the door, wearing a white short-sleeved polo shirt and neat brown trousers, all smiles.

"Hey!" he greeted you, stepping aside and gesturing for you to come inside. "Please, make yourself at home."

So you followed his instructions, entering the flat, which welcomed you with the smell of chemical clay from the new paint covering most of the walls. To your left was a hallway with a few doors and partially unpacked boxes scattered along the walls. Before looking any further, however, you walked towards the main room, which had shrunk since the last time you saw it.

You immediately noticed the change in layout. Opposite the entire wall he used for his equations – which, incidentally, seemed to be filled with new and more complex ones that were unfamiliar to you – was a crimson sofa on which lay a few scattered papers, covered from top to bottom with numbers and various notes.

Your eyes scanned the rest of the room, partially drunk cups of coffee sat near the coffee maker, and the work surface to the side was rather tidy compared to the state you had seen it in before.

"Vik?" he called from the hallway, "you comin'?"

You heard the distinct click of a cane coming from the other end of the hallway, and you tried to act as if nothing was happening, to look away and not let on that you were waiting more impatiently than necessary for Viktor to come around the corner.

"What's this?" you asked, pointing at the board with your chin as you set your bag down, holding the packets of sweets in your hands as you stepped forward to face the board. "Doesn't look like any of the homework we were asked to do. S.P.I.T.S?"

S.P.I.T.S was the clever abbreviation for Steam Powered Intra-Thermal Systems. You had already taken that option last year, but you had fallen back on S.E, Stabilisation of Energies.

"Not exactly," Jayce muttered, coming up beside you to look at all the chalk marks and various writings, placing his hands on his hips. "Something we wanted to talk to you about, actually."

You turned to him, frowning. "Really?"

"We both need to get this off our chests."

You turned to his voice, as if answering a call, as if even trying to stop yourself had become pointless.

Viktor was there, wearing a dark brown T-shirt with rolled-up sleeves over black city trousers that fell over his socks. His hair was slightly tousled; he couldn't have been awake for long.

And yet he carried himself with a grace that seemed to require no effort, a dark and poignant nonchalance that never loosened its grip on your heart. He looked at you, and you averted your eyes away a few seconds later for fear of losing yourself in his gaze.

"What's this?" Jayce asked, pointing to the craft paper.

"Uh," you felt as if you had been forcibly brought back to reality, realising once again the weight in your hands. "Just some sweets you both like."

Jayce couldn't help but step forward to spread the paper apart with his curious fingers, his eyes lighting up at the contents he was dealing with.

“You’re sent by some gods now, I’m sure of it,” he chuckled. “Let me getsome plates for them,” he took the packages in his hands, already walking away, “Vik, mind showing her around?”

“An apartment she’s already been in?” the latter asked.

"Well, some things changed!" he replied as he disappeared into what appeared to be the kitchen.

"Afraid of losing yourself, Moravec?" you said teasingly, and he turned directly to you with a frown at the nickname. "I'm sure with such a busy and long corridor, you must have had some trouble finding your way around."

One corner of his mouth turned up as he let his head hang towards the floor, chewing the inside of his cheek as if trying to prevent any smile from emerging. When he raised his head, he looked at the board before returning your gaze, his head tilted to one side.

"I had to get used to all this by echolocation," he demonstrated, tapping the wall closest to him with the tip of his cane, "a puzzle that even the greatest academics dare not approach."

You smiled softly, erasing the frown from your nose by stretching your split lip, rolling it in until it was completely under your teeth, and moistening it as you released it. He noticed the gesture, a thin veil of concern settling over his features.

His tone grew lower, surely making sure Jayce couldn't hear anything. "Are you okay?"

You sighed heavily, the memories of the pain you had felt in the shower and when you went to bed coming back to your mind – but quickly being overshadowed by the dream that had followed, and you didn't dare meet his gaze as your eyes fell on the knuckles of your hands.

"Known worse, known better," you explained simply, his eyebrows furrowed and you deduced that he was going to emphasise the “worse”, you cut him off. "Are you going to show me around or do I have to root here?"

He sighed, his eyes silently scolding you as if to say, ‘I'm not over this subject’. He motioned for you to go ahead of him, pointing his head towards the corridor. "Not that I mind having you as a green plant here, but if you insist."

So you walked ahead of him, moving down the corridor as he had indicated. You felt like you were being watched, as if Viktor's amber eyes were piercing through the back of your neck, and for a moment you felt the same warmth on your back as you had felt from the fireplace in your dream.

The first door you passed was the kitchen, where Jayce was closing a cupboard and placing two plates on the counter. It was a long room with a sink right next to a hob that didn't seem to have the same gas problems you encountered at home.

Multiple brand-new cupboards ran the height of the walls, pressed against a fridge the size of Jayce, which you envied slightly. A small table against the opposite wall with a chair was probably used as a dining table, although the second one seemed to have already been brought back into the main room.

"This is obviously the bathroom," Viktor said as he came up beside you.

You chuckled, bringing both hands under your elbows. "You wash in the sink, I suppose?"

"A bit cramped, but it does the job," he nodded, continuing his joke, "Jayce has a harder time getting in there, though."

"Right," Jayce replied, carefully opening the packets to try and grab the sweets, "very funny."

You laughed softly, continuing on your way as the slow, steady tapping of Viktor's cane echoed behind you, closer than you thought.

The next room was the actual bathroom, similar in size to the kitchen, with two sinks, a toilet and a large bathtub.

"Could this be..." you feigned confusion, "the living room?"

"Spot on," Viktor agreed.

"I really like what you did with the armchair, nice touch," you pointed out, gesturing towards the toilet. "It wasn't placed here before."

"The apartment's explosion destroyed some of the plumbing, so we had the liberty to change the number of rooms and their placement," he nodded, "especially because the plumbing changes forced us to rethink the layout of the apartment."

"Ah..." you acknowledged before moving on to the next room, which turned out to be Jayce's new bedroom.

It wasn't particularly tidy, with bits of paper scattered here and there from his desk to the corner of his bed, his academy uniform hastily folded over the back of his desk chair, and an atmosphere of personal organisation that was not to be disturbed.

"This, I know," you pointed out, "hasn't changed much."

“Ximena had to make sure everything would be okay, and the Kirammans took care of replacing the furniture that had been broken,” Viktor sighed.

You hummed to yourself, and finally realised that if they weren’t sharing a room, it was because the next room was Viktor’s.

Tentatively, you took another step, beginning your slow walk towards his bedroom door. You could still feel Viktor's gaze on the back of your neck and your back, and you swallowed as you reached the doorframe.

You would have thought that his room would be impersonal, that its walls would be covered with nothing but fresh paint, that the lack of accessories and decorations would come as no surprise, since you didn't necessarily imagine Viktor as a materialistic person.

Instead, you found a cosy room with purple walls, where sheets of paper of various sizes were pinned here and there, and you could even make out some receipts. You noticed that it was already tidier than Jayce's, that his desk was more neatly organised and that the bed was made with thick blankets, that no clothes were sticking out of his wardrobe in the corner of the room, and that his bookshelves were arranged straight without many volumes leaning to one side.

His window was open, there was no wind, just a cool breeze from outside that made a few papers on his desk flutter. The chair was pulled back; he must have been working before he was called.

You slowly stepped into the room, your eyes scanning the walls, lingering on a few papers. There were notes full of calculations, pencil sketches of various and sundry parts, exhibition flyers among which you recognised prints from Demacian museums you had visited. You could still feel Viktor's cane clinging to your waist before replacing that sensation with his own hand.

Your eyes scanned the rest of the notes to escape this alluring memory, and found a piece of paper you recognised. It was a receipt from The Brown Bitt for an order of an espresso, a long black, a mocha and a jasmine tea scone, and it seemed like yesterday when you recommended either bleach or hydrochloric acid to your friend. You smiled to yourself, wondering why you had kept such a thing.

Your eyes drifted to the next note, and again you recognised it from the first line.

A simple thank you could've done it.

It was the note you had exchanged during those few minutes of detention. Only, you remembered four lines in total, and now there were five.

Me? Thanking you? That's a largeness of spirit I don't have.

You remembered the bitterness, the frustration of just sharing a room with him, and the feeling seemed so foreign to you.

Are you still thinking about me? Is that why you're so unfocused?

If only he knew the irony of that sentence.

In your dreams.

And in yours, apparently.

But the last sentence had, to your knowledge, never reached your eyes, as Selene had interrupted in the meantime.

I came here because no one has ever done what you did for me.

The pain in your cheek came back to you after Tyler's blow, the weight of Viktor's cane in your hands whistling through the air as you struck the young man in response to his condescending malice.

You turned to Viktor. He hadn't moved from the doorway except to press his shoulder against it as he watched you. You seemed to discern a kind of expectation in his gaze, not as if he were seeking approval, but rather an answer.

"No one?" you asked, nodding slightly towards the note while your eyes never left his.

"No one," he confirmed, his temple pressing against the doorframe.

You nodded silently, biting the inside of your cheek as you looked away to the rest of the room. Your eyes fell on the tarot deck on his bedside table, and as you were about to ask him about his possible readings, Jayce's silhouette appeared next to him.

"How do you like the changes?" he asked, surveying the room from its four corners.

"I'm no apartment expert, but this is a good one," you agreed, stepping towards them. "Tidy, I'd say.”

"You should have seen us yesterday,” Jayce remarked, "as soon as Viktor came home and announced that you were coming, the tidying mission began immediately-"

He squinted his eyes for a moment, his gaze fixating on your cheek, and you felt a flow of questions coming.

“Did you hurt yourself?” he asked. “Your cheek has little dark spots.”

You exchanged a very quick glance with Viktor, seeming intrigued by how you were going to get out of all this.

“I fell asleep on a copy last night, the ink wasn't dry enough so you can imagine what a nice surprise it was when I woke up.”

He didn't seem very startled by this news, no doubt you thought, because he was no stranger to this sort of thing and you suspected that he'd had to clean up a lot of copies as a result.

“I see,” he took in, “and your lip, it's split.”

“Eris's cat has its own way of saying hello,” you sneered.

“Didn't know she had a cat,” he mused aloud as he started walking towards the end of the corridor, you and Viktor exchanging a glance, the latter letting you pass outside the room before following you.

“How come you're free to come here today anyway?” he questioned, the plates of pastries in his hands as the three of you made your way towards the main room.

“I'm not working during the entire weekend,” you sighed, “had some business in Zaun.”

“No way!” exclaimed the golden boy as he set the plates down on a coffee table near the sofa, “Viktor went there yesterday too.”

Viktor hadn't mentioned that you'd bumped into each other yesterday, having probably explained to Jayce that he'd invited you here during the week and not as part of a little stroll you'd both been on. 

So you turned to him. “Really?” you asked, feigning ignorance.

“Mhm,” he nodded, his dark, mischievous eyes gleaming before he decided to take a seat in one of the corners of the sofa.

Jayce had taken the second corner, leaving you only the middle, where you sat down with some nervousness. The last time you'd found yourself on a sofa shared with Viktor, your heart had not stopped racing.

“What were you doing in Zaun?” inquired Jayce as he reached for a pastry with his hand.

“Well um,” you took one in turn, “in this situation you're not allowed to ask that question.”

He frowned. “Really? Why?”

You shrugged. “I just had to oxygenate my sponges.”

He raised his eyebrows, his eyelids half-closed in exasperation. “In Zaun?”

“Think I don't have the right to keep things to myself when you guys literally hid this from me?” you remarked as you pointed to the board full of equations you were trying to decipher, the numbers and letters leading to mix with what you theorised were runes.

“That's different, this-” he pressed his fist to his mouth as his jaw muscles worked to chew his mouthful, “this is top secret.”

You arched an eyebrow. “What makes you think my reasons are not top secret either?”

“I-” he began, but huffed and shook his head. “Forget it.”

You weren't really lying about anything you said either, you were being kept in the dark about the whole thing. 

There was a brief silence, during which Viktor helped himself to a pastry, one that you'd chosen expressly for him, taking into account his tastes from the few times he'd come to the café.

“What's the thing you wanted to talk about anyway?” you asked, eyebrows furrowed and still looking at the blackboard.

Jayce and Viktor glanced at each other from either end, your head alternating between the two as Jayce sucked his sugar-laden fingers one by one before get up.

“Let's back up a bit.”

***

“So let me get this straight. You managed to create magic, Jayce almost got expelled, you smashed up Heimerdinger's lab, and you're now working for the council on...?”

“Hex Tech,” Jayce smiled proudly, “we named it Hex Tech.”

It had already been a few hours since Jayce begun his explanation, and you'd had to gather a considerable amount of information.

The morning pastries had soon enough been replaced by homemade sandwiches, Jayce had left his sofa spot to stand and recount the story that had unfolded from last summer to today, in part, and you had remained seated on the sofa next to Viktor, who occasionally provided additional information.

From the explosion in Jayce's flat of a more or less solved origin, followed by his meeting with Viktor, Jayce's trial in front of the council and his voluntary transgression that very evening after many, many calculations in Heimerdinger's laboratory to test his theory and finally arrive at a conclusive result.

He went on to explain how this incident had led to his association with Mel Medarda, who, one thing leading to another, had raised him in the social ranks and financed his projects.

“Right, Hex Tech,” you sighed, still baffled by all the information that had remained so confidential.

Jayce got up to go into the kitchen, picking up the coffee pot that had been refilled in the meantime not only for the pleasure of drinking it but also, and above all, because you needed it to keep you going through all this.

“If you have any question, we're here to answer them as best as we can,” confirmed Viktor.

“And as much as we're allowed to say,” Jayce added immediately.

The gears of your mind, though exhausted, were curious enough to overcome the feeling of fatigue and turn to Viktor;

“So when you stopped being Heimerdinger's assistant,” you began, thinking back to one of the most fundamental and transformative conversations of your friendship after you'd been so ill, “you didn't leave this post because you didn't have any interest in it anymore but because of…” you described vague movements in the air to point at the board, “this?”

“You could say that,” the latter confirmed as he sat down to face you on the sofa, his good leg bent cross-legged towards him as he leanded down to take his cup of coffee that you had made in the meantime and that Jayce had just poured for him.

He brought the steaming mug to his lips, blowing gently on it before taking a sip. You couldn't help but feel your heart grow light as, after his sip, Viktor flashed a smile that seemed to be all his own before taking another sip and straightening up.

“After this unexpected demonstration, Heimerdinger encouraged me not to continue being his assistant, no matter how advantageous it was, and…” his thumb gently caressed the side of the cup where his lips had previously rested, “I suppose that he was more scientifically curious about our discoveries than to waste some potential.”

“But then,” you continued, clutching your own cup in your hands, “why are you guys still studying? You both are accomplished, Viktor has the top of the grades of the Academy-”

“I thought you had that?” questioned Viktor.

You turned to him, arching an eyebrow. “Do you want me to retract my previous statement?”

Viktor seemed a little surprised. You, who for so long had wanted to retain your number one position in the Academy results, now found yourself consciously giving him such a title? 

He said nothing, simply taking another sip instead without taking his eyes off you.

“So,” you continued, “you both clearly don't need to continue studying at the Academy, so why still stay here?”

“Withdrawing, at least on my part, would be seen as strange in the eyes of the teachers,” Jayce explained, “and because Heimerdinger was keen for both of us to finish our year. The deal is simple - we maintain good grades this year, and as soon as it's over, we officially get our own lab at the Academy and are free to go ahead with our projects under the watchful eyes of the council.”

“How do you do your research without a laboratory in these cases?”

“We have permission from Heimerdinger to use his lab while ours is being set up,” explained Viktor, “it's about time we had one anyway, considering what happened last time.”

“Last time?”

Viktor sketched a smile, pressing the backs of his curved fingers against his temple in support of his head.

“Do you remember the power cut?” he questioned until you nodded. “Well, it may be that we tried a new combination in our work, not to reveal anything, and... that the energy had been a little too strong and was the trigger for the blackout.”

It all made sense, and remembering that the blackout had apparently affected part of the neighbourhood made you feel strange.

“Yeah, I figured cooking on your radiator wasn't the brightest idea coming from two of the smartest students I know.”

“Hey,” Jayce began, “we all come to desperate measures.”

“Of course,” you agreed with a tired chuckle, looking back at your own ‘ink’ explanation for your cheek, shaking your head slightly at the realisation. “So that's how you knew about Tyler being linked to Hoskell.”

“Being closer to the council does open a few doors,” remarked the Golden Boy, “strange in fact that Selene didn't mention it to you.”

“She doesn't deal with Hoskell,” you sighed as you slumped back on the sofa, feeling Viktor's gaze settle on you, “he doesn't believe in those ‘superstitions’, and she can't stand him.”

You remembered the few times when, on her way back to her living room, Selene would light herself a cigarette rolled with lavender and other herbs in a violet-flavoured paper and stand on her balcony. She never got angry or raised her voice; the only instances of frustration she let show were in those cigarettes. An old Zaun habit, you thought.

Everyone in Zaun who smoked was giving themselves a lux by doing so. Why did they do that? Well, living in such polluted air would discourage many from taking up smoking. That's why the biggest, wealthiest people who could afford such destruction when their air was a little cleaner than the others, were rich. Selene had apparently once been one of them, but she had never really told anyone how or why she had left that life, not even you.

Reflecting on this luxury, another question came to mind, making you turn back to Jayce. “That's why you gave me so much money for the masquerade with such ease,” you pointed at them both, your index finger tracing them in a metronome motion, “you got a load of money.”

“Partly yes,” Jayce nodded with a shrug before his eyebrows jumped in turn, “I almost forgot!”

He got up to leave the room in your confusion, turning to Viktor with a frown.

“This is about to get good,” sighed the latter as he poured himself some more coffee.

Jayce came back into the room, carrying what you thought were two invitation cards and in his other hand some cash. He arrived in front of you, breathing heavily.

“I've got two invitations to another gala evening.”

“Did you get invited again?” you remarked in a choked up voice.

“I don't really have a choice,” he remarked, his eyebrows tilting back as his upper lip rose in embarrassment, “we've finalised an experiment that could massively change things and the council have decided to throw a celebration to mark the occasion.”

You watched his two hands, outstretched towards you, the invitations made of thick paper and gold ink.

“Is the second one for you?” you asked, turning to Viktor.

“No,” replied Viktor, “I've already got mine.”

“So who is it for?”

“For the person of your choice,” informed Jayce, “just give me the name now and I can write it down in the right ink.”

“Um…” you wondered, your eyes searching for something in the scenery that would eventually lead you to the right answer, but there was only one that came to mind. “Eris.”

“Eris?” Jayce remarked with a small smile. “Cool! How do you write her full name?”

He went off towards part of their work surface, searching through the few drawers and shelves that belonged there. You got up from the sofa to join him and watch what he was doing.

He finally found a small jar, the glass of which showed through to a slightly dark, golden ink that was still wafting around the sides of the pot as he unscrewed it, placing it gently on the side before picking up a quill and checking the needle to make sure it was clean.

“How is it spelled?” he enquired as he dipped the tip and adjusted one of the invitations under his fingers into a bell shape to hold it in place.

“E-r-i-s…” you spelled out as he carefully tilted the quill, scraping the grain of the paper.

He had a neat cursive handwriting which, to your surprise, was graceful and resembled the beautiful slanted handwriting of ancient writers.

Viktor came to join you, you could feel him looking over your shoulder, and you hoped that the shiver that had run up your spine in a flash would soon subside.

You glanced at him from the side, meeting his gaze for a moment, which he punctuated with the corner of his lips rising before turning his attention to the way Jayce was writing. It only took a few seconds for his eyebrows to furrow.

“Are you sure you've done a legible E? Because I think it could be mistaken for an F.”

You looked back at its golden features. “You write smaller than I thought.”

“Both of you stop,” the latter asked in a tone strained by concentration, his eyes not taking their focus off the invitation. 

“We're just teasing you,” you smiled.

Viktor pointed to a letter, the movement bringing him a little closer to you. “Is that a P or a Q I see there?”

With a sigh, Jayce laid his quill to one side and pressed a hand on each of your shoulders, pushing you both out of the room and leaving you in the corridor, closing the door leading to the main room.

"Jayce, be nice," Viktor chuckled. "There's nothing to criticise about the hallway."

"Except that door, which is super ugly," you confirmed, looking at the door he'd closed on you, the latter not even properly painted all the way through.

“I'll leave you to criticise this door in peace while I finish the invitations!” he replied from beyond the thickness of the door.

You both smiled, the silence falling a little again as you waited in the hallway. You wondered if, out of politeness, you should make a remark about one of the features of the hallway, or ask if he'd enjoyed the pastries, or.... 

“I'm sorry we've had to hide this from you all this time,” Viktor began, not turning to you until you made the first move. “We were waiting for the best time to tell you, and then,” his head cocked to the side as he looked up at the ceiling for a moment, “there were some legal restrictions that forced us to-”

“Viktor?” you interrupted, however, the latter regaining your gaze. “I don't blame you.”

He drew in a long breath, one of his jaw muscles tightening. You nodded to yourself, your gaze drifting to the door handle. When would you yourself find the faith to open up about your hidden subjects?

“I know what it's like to feel remorse for not being able to say everything,” you assured him before turning to face him again, “thank you for telling me all this.”

You wondered for a moment if he had considered that he should share something with you because of the statement you had made the day before regarding some of the information you had given him about the aftermath of the whole situation.

He nodded silently, a flash of realisation passing his pressed eyes under his furrowed brows. He returned your gaze, and you could feel the mischief permeating his.

“I don't think Jayce was such a fool to bring us into this hallway,” he informed, resting his cane against the side of the wall, grabbing a jacket from the coat rack to search its pockets. “There's something I'd like to show you.”

You couldn't hide your surprise. “Is there more to see?”

“Always.”

The door opened, Jayce bringing the two invitations into your line of sight.

“Ah, Jayce,” greeted Viktor, placing his foot in his shoe and using his cane as a sort of shoehorn, “you've come at the perfect time to say your goodbyes to Miss.”

“Leaving already?” asked Jayce, his disappointment almost childish.

You half-opened your mouth but Viktor was quicker than you. “I'm taking her to the lab.”

“You're going to show her...?” asked Jayce, leaving the end of his sentence in a blur as he raised his eyebrows.

“Absolutely,” the latter confirmed, simply placing the bunch of keys in his pocket as he opened the door. “Shall we?”

You held your hands up, trying to find your way around. “Holdon, you're taking me to Heimerdinger's lab?”

Viktor nodded. “Yes.”

You shook your head as if to bring yourself back to the surface of reality. ‘Really?

“The Professor hasn't been using his lab lately,” Jayce informed you, “it's been a while since he's been inventing anything or checking equations, so he's allowed us to occupy it to keep it from gathering dust.” He sighed, bringing his hand to the back of his neck. “Chances are this one's got a few bits under repair too, thanks to us.”

“Let's hope what I'm showing you doesn't do any more of that,” Viktor pointed out as he walked out the door.

You thanked Jayce for taking you in, assuring him that when you got home you'd send Eris the invitation in a letter and that she'd probably be delighted to come. You promised her that you'd be back at the flat soon, and that you could always bring in an expertise on their calculations if they needed it, even if they didn't seem to need the help.

Once the door was closed, Viktor started walking up the lift cage.

“So, you're the two great scientists backed by the Council who are about to change the fate of this world,” you summarised.

“A very long title,” breathed Viktor, pressing the button on the lift which was already upstairs and opening for you, “two scientists will simply suffice.”

“Don't you want some of that recognition?” you asked anyway as you followed him down the lift shaft.

He shrugged as the doors closed. “Fame is of little importance to me,” he turned to you, “it's not why I'm doing my research.”

You nodded. It was true that, from the outset, Viktor had never shown any greed for attention or sought out golden ivy crowning him simply for its colour. No, Viktor had always strived for excellence out of pure sincerity for progress.

“I didn't know I was hanging around with perfection itself,” you chuckled softly, hoping that your playful tone would manage to disguise the gentleness with which you meant this truth.

“Everyone has faults, including you,” he raised his eyebrows, his eyes dropping to you.

You parted your mouth in mock shock as you met his gaze.

“Let's prove that. What's your worst fault?” he asked.

“You first,” you replied.

“I'm persistent. Your turn.”

You looked away. “I can be very uncooperative at times.”

“Really,” he tilted his head to the side, falsely surprised. “Can you give me an example?”

“My answer is obviously no.”

You couldn't see him directly, but you could feel him smiling sideways, a little chuckle escaping his nose as the gilded doors of this modern cage opened onto the corridor and he stepped out. It sometimes seemed that the only time you'd open up to someone would be during your autopsy, but maybe he'd manage to dissect you before death got a hold of you.

He moved towards the doors of the hall, opening one of them and holding it for you. You thanked him silently as you stepped outside and the warmth of the sun washed over you.

Viktor indicated the stop not far from another shuttle than the one you were used to taking, walking at his own pace.

“I still can't believe you're using Heimerdinger's lab,” you said under your breath.

“We would have had our own,” he sighed, “were it not for the suspicions.”

Arriving at the stop, no one was there but you. At this time of day, people were busier finishing their meals or having a nap than taking shuttle buses around the city.

“Is it that revolutionary?” you asked as the shuttle reached the end of the street. “Enough that you have to take so many precautions?”

“Eh,” his eyebrows raised, “Yes. Our research in bad hands would be detrimental.”

The doors opened, validating your tickets before moving on. The only ears that might pay attention to your conversation were those of the driver. He took a seat with his back to one of the window panels, and you stood holding onto a bar.

Perhaps it was an internal fear of the possibility that your knees might touch again, and that in a space so open and without the pretext of pressing up against anyone in rush hour, your despair would be seen as embarrassingly obvious and impossible to hide, to conceal in the depths of your body.

The engine vibrated from the ground to your legs, purring a little as the shuttle began to move forward.

You couldn't keep your eyes from meeting his. They seemed to harbour an unshakeable good mood, a pride that he wasn't going to boast about, but which he was going to keep meticulously inside him.

“What?” he asked.

You must have been watching him continuously and forgotten that he could do the same.

“Nothing,” you cleared your throat so that it wouldn't be any more treacherous than your eyes had been. “I just... didn't expect this.”

“Which was the goal,” he confirmed.

You rolled your eyes. He was obviously right.

“Why choose me, of all, to know?”

He shrugged. “You're top of the Academy-”

“Wouldn't this fact stop you guys from allowing me to see this then?” you argued. “A top of the Academy could very well steal your work and…” your hand gestured uncertainly in the air, “do evil stuff with it.”

He wore a smile stretching the corner of his lip which slightly darkened his eyes. ‘But you wouldn't.’

You hoped he'd never touch the bar your hand held, because you were pretty sure that if he did, he'd feel the frantic rhythm of your heart hitting the metal, ready to bend the bar of that cage and slide out of your chest.

“I could,” even the possibility sounded ridiculous from your mouth.

He chuckled. “But you still wouldn't.”

You sighed, there was no point in fighting a battle you knew you couldn't win.

“Besides,” he continued as the silence returned, “you would have figured out one day or the other, and I trust you enough to show you this.”

I trust you.

Your ears had isolated these three words from the rest of the sentence. Somewhere inside you, you were aware of this, even if it seemed hard to accept. But the fact that these words were in the air, that they were offered to you and you alone, made you feel all tender in the heart.

You felt guilty, though, at the idea that he might think you didn't trust him. Your nature of being on your guard all the time, of never giving in to give him so much as a glance in a crack that you hadn't camouflaged well with your edifice of hardness, seemed to you to be a stoicism that was antipathetically opposed to what Viktor was saying.

And you were ashamed of being like that.

But you found hope in the fact that it wouldn't last forever, promising yourself as you had promised him that the day would come when he would know the end of the story. Just not today. You'd let them make their revelations, show off their pride, and soon you'd reveal everything.

The shuttle reached the Academy stop, and you both got off. You had passed through the doors of this establishment for years already, had walked through many of its rooms, but never had you had access to Heimerdinger's laboratory.

You climbed the small steps leading inside, Viktor greeting the receptionist as you made your way to the lift.

"Wanna race to the top?" he teased as he pressed his thumb against the polished button.

You giggled softly. "I don't even know the placement of the lab."

He smiled, apparently amused that you might have agreed if you knew the route you were to take.

The lift came, you entered it, and your heart began to race. Not that the confined space in his company was particularly conducive to this excitement, but reaching Heimerdinger's laboratory had been part of your dreams for a long time.

He seemed to notice. “Nervous?”

You exhaled a long breath. “A little.”

He smiled, his voice softening slightly. “It's just a room.”

“Not any room,” you countered hastily.

You reached the floor in question, Viktor going out first, taking his keyring in his hands at the same time.

You observed the high walls of the corridors with their few simple, elegant embellishments, skirting a few walls before Viktor stopped at a large door with three locks.

He raised the key ring to his shoulder level. “Want to open it?”

Your shoulders and arms felt hot for half a second as your eyes fell on the keys.

“No, go ahead,” you replied, though, trying to swallow your nervousness.

You were afraid of making a fool of yourself out of anxiety, or holding the keys wrong, or dropping them, or saying stupid things.

He nodded, using three keys as he was accustomed to doing from now on under your watchful eyes. When the door opened, you inhaled heavily as he turned to you.

“If you would be so kind,” he smiled as he pointed inside the laboratory.

He wasn't being particularly mocking or condescending, just teasing, as he'd always been with you.

You peeked your head inside, letting the smell of old paper and something more electric fill the air. In the centre of the room was a long octagonal table at the bottom of the floor, no doubt originally intended to be Heimerdinger's size, and having not yet been fitted out in any other way for lack of time. That didn't stop the room having a ceiling where you could easily stack more than half a dozen Professors before reaching it.

The floor was scattered with a variety of books, no doubt taken from the large walls of library shelves that occupied the entire height of the room's walls. On your right, a taller, rounded table was placed not far from a U-shaped staircase that went up half a floor and led to a large bay window with an unobstructed view of Piltover.

The air was permeated with the dry, warm smell of paper mingling with the iodine of ink and what felt like salt dough.

You caught yourself with your nose in the air, observing every little detail of the room, drinking it in with your eyes and finding satiation for your curiosity.

“Don't mind the mess,” Viktor muttered lightly under his breath as he moved through the room out of habit.

For Viktor, it was probably just a piece of experimentation, and one that didn't belong to him. But for you, the weight of progress permeated the atmosphere of this room, holding you in place.

“With Academy work, the apartment, and our own research ... We haven't had the time to clean it up since the incident.”

“They did get the time to get the window done though,” you remarked. “Maybe they could have swept it up.”

“Would you like us to go through your things and disturb the very precise order you've established?” he questioned. “What's more, with our calculations and details, it's preferable that as few people as possible see all this and don't touch it, to avoid further explosions.”

It was true that, given the circumstances, the slight mess in the organisation of the room didn't seem so bad to you. Still, you couldn't help thinking about the power cut, the flimsy excuse Jayce had given you, and that in a building full of oblivious students they had conducted powerful energy experiments in a few small square metres.

Yes, a laboratory with more space but a bit more clutter didn't seem so horrible all of a sudden.

Faced with your silence, and your continued contemplation, Viktor walked around the rounded table on which sat a very special device. The prototype was crude, a sort of six-pointed copper cage criss-crossing geometrically above a base on which cables were clustered like tentacles extending from the sides. In the centre of this small platform, between thin copper clamps, was a round, cracked stone that glowed strangely.

“We haven't had a chance to fine-tune the prototype yet,” said Viktor as he pressed the button on a remote control, the large bay window beginning to be covered by a metal shutter, plunging the room into darkness. “We're moving a bit slowly with the classes on the side, and Jayce's occasional trysts with Mel…”

It almost seemed to you that he was trying to make excuses, as if what he was about to show you was mediocre, as if he was taking every conceivable precaution in case you were disappointed, as if it didn't matter after all if it didn't impress you or convince you of the fact that he was doing incredible things.

And for a moment, you were taken aback: Viktor was trying to impress you, to gain recognition, not out of pride or pretence at having produced something that would undoubtedly go beyond anything you could have created, but because he perhaps expected your admiration.

Under the silence of your amazement, you almost thought you saw him nervous. Even though the room was plunged into darkness, with the exception of the emergency exit icon above the large door, the glow of the stone cast a light on your faces that covered you like a bluish balm.

In this soft glow and half-light, the Prince of the Night seemed more apparent than ever, his features serene as he watched the sphere cough up little sapphire sparks and throw little flashes of lightning into the air. Cracked as it was, you were afraid it would break, but you believed in Viktor's confidence and the certainty of his work.

“You're not afraid of heights, are you?” Viktor asked, turning to you, the blue glint in his eyes shifty.

“What?” your eyebrows knitted together.

“Nothing,” his attention immediately returned to the stone.

He pressed a large button, and the coppery arcs began to rotate on themselves, accelerating as the gem seemed to wake up and scatter hairs of lightning in the air. 

The rhythm of the turns stabilised fairly quickly, the stone glistening and floating on itself tenderly without a cloud of particles resembling stardust enveloping it.

This magical behaviour was fascinating - magic was fascinating. A subject as taboo as magic used in technology and in an environment that had for so long observed it with disdain and ridicule led by fear, it was surprising. All the more surprising that Viktor and Jayce were the initiators. 

You could feel Viktor glancing at your peripheral vision as you watched the movements of the stone that seemed to be as much the heart as the body of this crude yet complex plot, its glow reflected on round plates pierced with runes.

“Wow,” you breathed into the silence, Viktor chuckling softly to the side and regaining your attention with this gesture.

“This might surprise you a little,” he remarked.

Under your confusion, which he did not clear up, he placed his long fingers to encircle the gears of the button he had previously activated. With a gentle push to the side, you gasped as the stone seemed to awaken as it rose.

The speed of the prototype stirred the air until Viktor's hair began to waltz in the wind.

Another rotation of the gears and the stone would continue to rise through the floors of this hut.

“Are you sure this is safe?” you asked, above the beating of your heart and the hissing of the stone mingling with the echo of the thin metal being tossed about in the wind. You felt as if everything could collapse at any moment.

He offered you a wry smile as he met your gaze, but said nothing. He'd probably done this many times before, and didn't have the same fears as you, but you were new to these risks. 

You just had to trust him. And that's what you did.

Another turn, and the plates lit up. The stone came to rest and a boom sounded as a column of light rose into the air and wreaths of blue light stretched above you. You covered your eyes, dazzled by the light, and the whole room seemed to want to pull every corner back towards the stone as if to compress the sheets of the world into a tight snowball.

And suddenly the tension exploded, and you could feel your feet separating from the floor.

When you opened your eyes, the room was bathed in a clear blue light, particles flying here and there in the air as if you'd dived headfirst into a star cloud.

But what surprised you most of all was the fact that you were floating.

You rose up into the room, no longer feeling the weight of your body on your heels or your knees, and you thanked yourself inwardly for not having worn a skirt today.

Your eyes found Viktor, who was also floating in the air not far from you.

You were relieved when he swam slightly through the air to join you, realising that with this change in gravity, his leg shouldn't be hurting. With all his weight lifted, he could just sway there in the air, remaining serene and carefree.

“Doesn't this feel safe?” he smiled, his hair floating like in water as he turned his face towards you.

You wondered, for a moment, if he'd ever come into this very room and activated the change in gravity so that he no longer felt any discomfort, letting himself be lulled into this stagnation. And you wondered about the times when, through pain, he had never been able to reach even his corridor and relieve himself of the weight of this sick body.

“It's…” you began, looking around you in wonder as tiny particles of light waltzed between your fingers, “beautiful.”

Higher up, in the air, a small irregular sphere floated like a bubble, sprinkled with a fine luminous veil of dust bringing its brightness to the whole room. Its pale core was irregular and reminded you of the very heart of the stone. The latter had not moved when you lowered your eyes towards the prototype, the stone floating above its base and sending a small trickle into the air, seeming to supply the sphere.

“This could change the world,” nodded Viktor, his eyes fixed on the sphere as if he were seeing it for the first time. “Commerce, travelling, progress in all fields…”

Alleviate the differences between Piltover and Zaun.

He didn't say it, but you could feel it, hanging on the end of his sentence heavily.

“And you made it.”

Viktor looked away from the sphere and back at you, seeming slightly surprised.

“Well,” he began to try and correct, “it was Jayce's original idea.”

“But he couldn't have done it without you.”

He frowned for a moment, perhaps slightly surprised by the praise you were heaping on him. But he deserved to hear it, after all.

“I suppose,” he finally said, as if it was no big deal.

This little sphere, barely bigger than your head, had the exceptional potential to transform the world you lived in for the better. That the inequalities of Zaun, which had too often been neglected by Piltover, could be meliorated, that the filth and pollution they poured into the air and water could be erased.

“You know,” he continued, clearing his throat, his eyes seeming to meet yours only with effort, “since there is a new masquerade to come, maybe we could... try something that I won't be able to provide there.”

It was a strange formulation, a suggestion that remained deeply unclear, and one that made you undeniably curious.

“Which is?”

His gaze met yours at last, breathing heavily. Was he really nervous? You didn't think you'd ever seen him like this, searching for words, avoiding your gaze...

He extended his hand towards you. “May I have this dance?”

Your lips parted in amazement, closing only seconds later as it seemed your tongue would fly out of your mouth in excitement.

A dance? With Viktor?

Everything raced through your mind, every thought bickering over what to do, what to say, how to react, how to digest this information that he wanted to dance with you?

“You may,” a tiny smile spread across your lips, and you thanked yourself for having waited a few seconds, without which your voice would have been far too loud and excited for the moment.

A smile appeared on his lips, slowly but surely spreading as his dark eyes watched you. You reached out for him, but you were too far apart without having to stir the air ridiculously to reach him.

You didn't even have to do that, as Viktor shifted his grip on his cane from the handle to the tip. Just as you thought he was holding it out for you to grab, he didn't aim it at your hand, but underneath it, continuing on its way until it hooked your back and pulled you towards him.

You stifled a small gasp of surprise as you were thrown against him, the movement pushing him back slightly as your hands landed on his chest.

It's funny, a heart. It's only made up of three layers of tissue, the epicardium, the myocardium and the endocardium, and yet it was always there to remind us that we could only experience this kind of moment through its activity when emotions were running high.

Your cheeks heated as you moved slightly away from Viktor, his cane still tucked into the small of your back, keeping you near him.

You were so close, your eyes inevitably meeting, and under their intensity, you couldn't help drifting your gaze, resting it on your hand pressed against his chest. 

You gave a nervous little laugh, glancing up at him from time to time, who didn't seem to be letting go of his constant observation. 

“I don't know how to dance,” you said after a long breath, giving you enough courage to face his gaze.

“Have we finally found something you're not great at?” he teased, your eyes rolling in amusement. “At least up here I'm sure you won't step on my foot.”

You couldn't help smiling and laughing slightly at his remark. He gave you an amused look back, the bluish light of that magic flooding the room and running through his eyes like a comet.

“First,” he said again as he released his grip on his cane and let it float away into the air before your eyes, “hand placement.”

You raised an eyebrow. “You know how to dance?”

He chuckled. “Not exactly,” his now free hand joined his twin to rest on yours, the length of his fingers engulfing yours. “For a while, Jayce was practising the waltz all the time. You wouldn't believe how much I learned about it just by watching him bang his head against the corners of the bed once the music took him away…”

You could easily imagine the scene. Jayce, hands clutching a pillow as a dance partner, muttering under his breath ‘one, two, three’ to mark his rhythm, occasionally punctuating the tune with a few wisps of conversation like ‘the champagne is quite divine’ or whatever nonsense he could think of.

“So,” he continued, “the cavalier's or rider's hands rest on the shoulder and in the hand of the leader.”

As he made his explanation, he guided one of your hands not far from where shoulder and neck met, the other he came to gently place in his own hand and pressing his thumb on the back of it as if to keep it in place.

“Oh, because you're the cavalier now?” you remarked, tilting your head to one side.

He mimicked your gesture, almost in mockery. “Which one of us knows more about dancing here.”

Well, he had a point, you had to admit.

“The cavalier's hands,” he continued, “holds the hand of his or her partner and places his or her second hand on their back.”

His hand gently came to rest on your waist, his warm palm sliding down your side to your back, and you hoped to the sky that your immediate goosebump-inducing shivers wouldn't be felt through your fabric.

Your cheeks flushed as memories of that night's dream came flooding back, the thought making you nervous and a little feverish. Your mind couldn't help but return ineluctably to the sensation of his lips against your ear, of his fingers pulling your zip down towards the small of your back...

You pulled yourself together, taking a long breath and hoping that it was truly impossible for anyone to read minds and that Viktor would never obtain this ability or use it against you.

“Does that feel okay?” he questioned.

For a moment, you were confused by the question, like it was supposed to be asked about an indiscreet subject of which you were unaware in the codes of dancing. But your mind linked these knots eventually – he was asking if his hand on your wounded back was uncomfortable.

“No, not at all,” you confirmed, shaking your head.

He nodded his. “Good, first-”

“Why are you teaching me all this?” you asked nervously.

He shrugged. “Might come handy for the masquerade.”

“You want to dance there?” You tried not to move your hand too much on his shoulder and hoped your palm wouldn't get clammy.

“It's not for me,” her eyebrows furrowed, “it's for you.”

“Who says I'll want to dance with anybody there?”

His eyes softened, as if tinged with disappointment. "We could stop."

"I don't want to stop," you replied a little too quickly, a slight panic betraying you in the wall of stoicism you had maintained for so long.

His eyes lowered for a moment to your hand, the one resting on his shoulder, and you noticed with astonishment that your grip on it had tightened. Your eyes fell in panic on the other hand clasping his, and just from the sensation you could feel that you had instinctively clung to him.

You wanted to tear your hand away from his shoulder and strangle yourself with it. You must have looked like a lunatic, your senses and reflexes taking over without you being able to do anything about it.

You pulled your hand away from his shoulder, pushing against his chest to distance yourself from him, but his hand on your back kept you close to him, preventing you from moving away.

Your eyes met his, as if out of distress. You had often, if not almost always, managed to find a way out of his presence. And now there was no escape.

You breathed slowly, trying to pull yourself together, but the proximity and the sensation of his hand on your back didn't particularly help your situation. Why did you have to stay so close?

You suddenly felt very conscious of everything about yourself. Was your breath okay? Were you going to sweat and would your sweat smell bad? What if your expression was completely stupid and in the next few seconds he finally decided to let you go?

"I thought you didn't want to dance with anyone here," he remarked, not letting you go at all.

You felt his thumb pressing gently on the back of your hand, like he had done during the Seven Minutes In Heaven. His finger made very slow circular motions on your skin, and if the gesture was meant to calm you down, it only partially worked to slow your heart rate.

"You're not just anyone," you emphasised.

His thumb softened and stopped, his hand static at the small of your back.

If you really wanted to keep your feelings from getting the better of you, you were going to have to do better than that, but if you did decide to fully embrace them, you were going to have to relax a little.

"But I don't mind practising," you finally suggested, clearing your throat. "Show me how you do it."

He seemed taken aback for a moment, then gave way to an air of satisfaction.

"Right," he continued, correctly replacing the position of his hand with yours. "First, for a waltz, you take a step to the side."

It was quite strange to lower your head to look at your feet and see them floating in mid-air as you attempted to press the tip of your shoe onto a non-existent surface, with Viktor following your movement.

"Very good," he commented when you managed to partially complete a step to the side, "now you have to bring your other foot close to the step you just took," he waited for you to move, "and as soon as you press it to the floor, the other one rises, and once it hits the ground, we start again on the other side, taking another step as we turn."

You tried to follow his steps, your eyes fixed on your feet and forgetting the distance between you and the floor. You laughed nervously, feeling utterly ridiculous with every movement, and the lack of solid ground didn't help matters.

But after a while, you gave up on the idea of waltzing, letting yourselves spin in the air like dancers in a music box.

You were close, and you felt caught up in the game of chic masquerade, returning to a point that had left you curious.

"I saw that you had the Tarot deck on your desk," you remarked, by way of conversation. "Any conclusive answer?"

He inhaled, his expression shifting from serenity to confusion. "I suppose I got my aura read this morning," he began, his eyes drifting elsewhere in the air. "It said someone close to me was starting to discover their..." He frowned further before his eyes returned to yours. "Desire, or something of the kind."

Your heart seemed to overflow from your ribs at the thought that, for some reason you couldn't understand, he had realised that you were that person. "Really?"

"Mhm," he confirmed, running his thumb over your knuckles as if to relax them, and you found yourself mortified once again at the thought of having gripped his skin a little too tightly. "The card was the page of wands," you felt his hand press a little harder into your back. I think it was something about wands representing Fire, of which Desire symbolically shares the qualities since it warms us, it's luminous and-’

"Are you sure the card wasn't meant for you?" you couldn't help asking.

His eyes narrowed briefly, and for a moment you wondered if he was going to challenge you on why you asked that question.

"I doubt it," he replied instead, raising his chin as his eyes looked down at you. "I know what I want."

Your whole chest was filled with warmth at a prospect that had just dawned on you, a hope you had long dismissed.

The possibility that Viktor felt the same way you did.

You refused to admit it or even imagine it, mostly because you didn't want to feel the pain of an emotional fall if you were just imagining things. You had said it yourself to Viktor a long time ago, after all, ‘I guess once you hit the ground really hard, you never really want to jump from that cliff again.’

"Why consult a Tarot if you know what you want?" you asked anyway, trying to convince yourself that maybe he had brought you here, just you and him, to show you the most important thing in his life that only a handful of people knew about, and to invite you to dance with him, just as friends.

"Because it's such an interesting thing, isn't it?" he smiled.

"Tell me about it," you sighed, pushing away the Knight of Pentacles, who was coming back to the charge, the Two of Cups, and the Emperor and Empress out of your mind.

"I never thought you would have been interested in this," he remarked.

"I never thought so either," you confirmed.

Silence fell between you again, and you felt as if every sound was amplified like never before. You felt his fingers digging into the small of your back again, pulling you closer to him.

Your eyes met his, and you realised how close you were, your gaze occasionally falling on his beauty spots.

"How far am I from truly knowing you, Miss?"

The nickname, which you had heard so many times before, made your heart skip a beat, and you hoped that Viktor wouldn't feel your pulse through the fingers he held in his hand.

"Closer than anyone has ever been," you replied, your voice reduced to a whisper.

His amber eyes never left you, the sensation of his two warm hands against your skin like suns kissing your skin.

"Truly."

Your eyes rested briefly on his lips. 

It seemed to you that you had never desired anything else in a single second, that the way he called you Miss being pressed onto the skin of your neck and laid in the shell of your ear by their graze would drive you mad, and that their brush onto your own would make yourself his.

But the realisation of the gesture struck you soon enough, bringing your eyes back to his.

Dark. That's how they looked.

Your heart raced as your noses were about to barely brushing each other.

The light in the room provided by the blue sphere began to flicker, your bodies slowly descending to the floor as your surprise pulled you out of the situation. You blinked rapidly as your feet touched the ground and you almost fell, your knees strangely weak as Viktor held you steady.

The stone descended into its plinth, and the room was once again illuminated only by its faint glow.

Your eyes fell on your two joined hands, and you extricated yourself from his embrace with a reluctant step back, your heart racing. His warmth, though now extinguished from contact, remained awake and lit beneath your skin.

He seemed to regain his senses in turn, clearing his throat as he looked at his cane on the floor.

"We are still trying to figure out a way to stabilise it," he explained as he took a small, difficult step towards it.

You beat him to it, bending down to pick it up and offering it to him, prompting him to whisper a quiet ‘thank you’ as his hand took hold of the pommel.

“Progress is only limited by time,” he remarked.

“And in a relatively short time, you have managed to do what no one else has ever done,” you confirmed.

He grabbed the remote control to open the shutters and pressed the button to raise the blinds. "I suppose so, in any case it allowed the council to congratulate us on our progress and our construction plans."

“Thus the masquerade?” you asked as the light came up in the room.

“Thus the masquerade," he confirmed.

“I see…” you managed to say.

You had to get yourself out of this situation, your heart pounding furiously in your chest as the electricity of what you thought had almost happened spread through your veins.

"Speaking of which," you continued, taking a step to the side, "I have to send Eris her invitation, and..." you scratched the back of your neck, "take my painkillers if I want to be able to come to class properly tomorrow.

"You didn't... I mean, I didn't...?" He made vague gestures with his free hand as his eyes dropped to your midsection.

"No!" came out a little too quickly and hastily from your mouth. "No," followed more calmly with a sigh.

He nodded. "Let me record the results of the experiment and we can get back," Viktor said as he walked towards the table where the prototype was waiting.

"I can get back on my own, don't worry," you hurried to counter.

He frowned, observing you. "Are you sure?"

"Mhm!" you nodded vigorously, perhaps a little too excited about it as you walked backwards towards the exit. "I'll see you in class tomorrow?"

He seemed confused by your behaviour, his eyebrows furrowed. "Sure you're okay?"

"Perfectly fine," you reassured him, pressing your lips tightly together, stopping the movement as soon as you had started it, remembering what could have happened. "I just need some rest."

He nodded slowly. "Alright then," he finally concluded, "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Yes, exactly, see you tomorrow. I think I won't lose myself on the way back," you laughed nervously.

Stupid remark. It was the Academy, of course you wouldn't get lost.

Viktor looked at you with a deeply puzzled expression, not seeming to buy your lame explanations.

"See you tomorrow!" you repeated before slipping away and avoiding further questions from him.

Once out of the laboratory, you walked quickly towards the lift, your emotions rumbling in your heart like an engine fuelling thoughts you weren't proud of.

You had to get away from him as quickly as possible.

I need his face really near mine.

Now that you had gotten what you wanted, you were afraid of how much you had enjoyed being with him like that.

You pressed the lift button so hard that you were afraid you would break it and get stuck, leaning against one of the lift walls as the doors closed behind you.

You pressed both hands against your eyes, burying your face in them.

And to think that just a few moments ago, Viktor had touched them.

You're pathetic for clinging to the idea that he wants you, pull yourself together, you told yourself.

And yet, he had drawn you to him little by little.

And now he had seen the way your eyes had rested on his lips, and perhaps your shame was now exposed for all to see.

In any case, you felt that you were not ready to let this moment slip from your mind and sensed that it would return when the trumpets of insomnia began to sound again.

Your head fell back on the wall of the lift.

You and Viktor had been close to kissing.

✦﹒ 𝐍𝐄𝐗𝐓 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑

✦﹒ 𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 : @doctorho @6selkie @yunloyal @kryscent @hypocritic-trash-baby @kapitankarate @a-lovers-card @ababanerb @lolixsstuff @forget-me-not-my-dear @smolanchovy @shugar0cone0alt @harrys--ferret-blog @suuummerrr @stillinracooncity @dlbitch @cloufire @csolya @kathyholdsagrudge @furblrwurblr @potatointhedirt @atrocioushaircut @ren-ni @schrodingersraven @urmommt @enoojnij @stilinskisensation @emlovesya @soupsaurus @luvreadingfics @the-valars-sapphire @solbringer @adorabluesposts @pxszels @nerolovesseongjiyuk @cyberwears @cryptidcut @seohaepeachyun @danielsbackupglasses @2hiigh2cry @16novvs @cicadastoner @patchs-curiosity-corneriosity-corner @w41k3r-94290 @minniiv @roku907 @lumilarity @peachy-writings @disturbyn @ddandelionfluff @holymotherfxrkingshirtballs @notyuralycat @glenn-slayer @k07ume @hexb0nes @ravngers @fushirika @glenn-slayer @watergirl13girl @graveyardtrain @theuclid @catspook @mildly-discouraging-future @nataliea @frogbuggy

[apple-salad]

Not Rose Basket: An Approx. 5 Year Old Remake Project

In which I attempt to make a Rose Basket JSK.

Read below the cut for my process and crafting notes.

Did you know that all Mary Magdalene "prints" use commercial fabric excepting Perfume Bottle (their first and only original print)? What this potentially means is that scraps of fabric featuring familiar MM motifs sometimes can be found floating around. It seems like at some point, someone found the original Rose Basket fabric and had it made into a JSK (likely by the handmade Taobao store that is known for making MM replications if the buyer provides fabric) in Mary Magdalene likeness.

The resulting item was a good attempt, especially given that the maker only had tiny stock photos to work out the general shape and print placement, but definitely there was something to be desired...

When I saw this JSK for sale, I felt that I had a decent remake project on my hands. I had already been looking for MM (or MM-like) materials for a while, so I figured I had the capability to bring up the piece to its full potential. I don't usually take on larger/i.e. actual garment projects, but this piece was a very strong case for giving it a try.

However, such projects are not without their pains, aren't they? Even with some semblance of a garment existing in the form of this dress, one may as well have been starting from scratch.

Unfortunately I didn't take many photos of the "before" dress so the pictures I do have don't really give it a fighting chance (it's so wrinkly and overexposed), but the shape was pretty much all wrong. However, it had good bones due to good fabric being used, and I knew I could make it better.

Laid flat and from afar, the JSK actually looks okay but there are numerous areas where it falls short. I'll talk about them shortly.

I was initially pretty excited to work on this project, so I pretty much seam ripped it apart right away after receiving it. Little did I know it would sit in parts in a bag for years...

Part 1: Trying to remember what I was doing 5 years ago

In terms of materials, I searched within Japan/Japanese sources using Mary Magdalene's original material terminology as reference. Unfortunately it had seemed that the original "shirurido" lining material had been discontinued, but it had a successor material that was almost identical when I bought a small amount, so that ended up not being a worry. The original lining is a little bit offwhite/ivory, so I purchased white lining and tea-dyed it. This colour will likely lighten as I wash it.

Many think that this light lining material that MM often uses ("for spring and summer" garments) is cotton, but it is actually 100% polyester! However, it does have a great hand feel and seems to have wicking properties as well, so there's no reason to discredit this poly.

Oddly, the wine rose basket specifically uses this kind of more chunky/slightly less structured braid. The other 3 colorways use a firmer type with the same wavy style. I managed to find a shop that carried both types and just bought as much as I felt was appropriate.

I was actually told that the firmer braid had been discontinued (which maybe explained why MM chose a different one for wine--there wasn't any stock of the other braid in red?) at the time (this was ~2017), but currently as far as I know the loose braid has actually been completely discontinued now and another company has picked up selling the firmer braid (maybe the machine that makes it was purchased by another company).

Dot tulle was thankfully not difficult to find. The colour matches perfectly, so I knew I had the right one 🙂

Now, let's break down the original dress.

Note that I did have the original Rose Basket (in a different colour) to use as a reference, which helped immensely.

The silhouette is obviously not quite right, although attempts were made to match seams similar to the original. The measurements are also different (likely made to match the buyer's requested dimensions) with the bodice being a little bigger. The skirt is also shorter, but I think that is just a mistake of the original seamstress.

The tulle is not very nice/cheap looking and the lace is also totally wrong. Those definitely had to go, so ripping off the lace and taking off the lining was first priority.

The lining material was a light cotton. It was okay, but cotton lining doesn't have the slipperiness of the original lining fabric so I preferred replacing it.

The lining and skirt lining would be completely remade from scratch, but obviously since I only had a dress' amount of original rose basket fabric, I would have to use what I had.

I initially focused on the skirt because it was the easiest portion to tackle as a pleated rectangle.

The original dress had the tulle sewn/serged onto the main fabric. This is...you could say, "incorrect", and changes the way the tulle sticks out of the skirt (as you can see in the comparison pictures), so I opted to just cut it off as closely to the serged edge as possible. It seemed sensible to leave the edge alone (rather than rip out the serging) since at the time I didn't have a serger of my own and the edge being already hemmed is convenient.

The original dress uses some kind of serged edge+blind hem stitch, while the replica more lazily folded over the bottom edge and used a line of stitching to secure both the braid/lace and the hem.

When comparing the length of the skirt to the original rose basket, the replica actually has more fabric folded into the seam due to the method used. Thankfully, the length of fabric used for the skirt was actually pretty much perfect when using the old hem fold and I guess the shorter appearance may have been due to other factors (cut of the bodice and length of tulle lace used maybe?).

Because it was easy to leave things as-is, I used this same hem fold and sewed the new braid onto the hem with two lines of regular straight stitch for security (two lines of stitching are consistently used on MM garments to secure braid or lace, although some older items may only have one line).

(I actually made a mistake here which I'll get back to later)

I attempt to use a method similar to MM to create the skirt lining layer. Dot tulle is cut into strips, gathered carefully (I don't have a ruffle foot so I used 2 lines of straight stitch+gather by hand since it tends to gather more evenly and look nicer than using only one, and I wanted to use some care here) and then attached to the skirt lining.

Without a serger, I used my machine's hemming stitch (it's a bit ugly, but it worked okay) and then topstitched the ruffle flat.

I also tried to take advantage of the lining selvedges so I wouldn't have to hem. Any extra fabric with raw edges I had to sew on to match the hem circumference of the original lining also was roughly machine hemmed.

The dot tulle doesn't need to be hemmed, but MM has neatly clipped the bottom edges of any tulle seams so the seam looks cleaner, therefore I did the same. (Sorry the picture seems to have turned out a bit blurry)

I can't really remember well, but I think it was at this point that I initially thought my job was done until I realized that the replica dress' pleats did not line up properly with the original. The widths were all wrong, possibly because the original seamstress had to make some modifications to the skirt pleat proportions to match the adjusted bodice measurements?

The skirt circumference and the way the fabric is cut for the skirt is somewhat different from the original dress, so I had to do some careful adjusting to get the pleats to have the same width and overall appearance as the original dress. I think some of the pleats are not as deep as they should be but you can't really tell with the final result. Such is the trouble when you have to work with what you have and there is no extra fabric available!

It was at this point that I took a break from the project because the bodice was next and that was, of course, a very daunting task. I think I had marked out some seam lines for adjustment on the front piece, and I had also decided that the back piece could remain sewn to the side back portions since they weren't too far off from the original appearance (the original back panel is actually only one piece of fabric with darts--the seamstress of the replica had used 3 separate panels for the back instead, so there are inevitable differences).

I also spent some time making new bows for the rose basket as I was not satisfied with the ones included with the dress. I don't have any pictures, but I dyed cotton sateen dark wine and that was a huge pain since red is a very tough colour to dye. I also made some mistakes with my bow making method (they were initially interfaced and used too much fabric in the middle which made them look too thick), so they were also left as unfinished pieces for a while.

Anyway, many years pass...

Part 2: The revisit

I would like to think I am maybe older and wiser 5 years on, with a more sewing expertise, but I'm not really convinced about that. Anyway, maybe I was better equipped for trying to adapt the bodice because I have a mannequin now.

I had previously had a bit of trouble fussing with the curves of the bodice flat with my fabric pieces, so I threw my mint rose basket on the mannequin and tried to match the seams carefully. Although...this mannequin might have been a tiny bit busty for rose basket and deformed the shape a bit.

Apologies for the cutout PNGs from here on out, the background was way too chaotic for me to let you see it.

It is at this point that I am wanting to put the project down again and really not enjoying working on this because trying to gain a rough pattern, and carefully match seams is not very fun and rather exhausting, requiring a lot of back and forth checking things and making sure I don't mess anything up.

After marking seams and having some confidence in the shape, I sew the front back to the sides again.

Thankfully, it seems like the pieces have enough fabric to create an original-looking bodice, but I suppose that was my expectation given that the original bodice measurements were a little larger than the actual MM dress. It's interesting to see where the original pattern cuts differ compared to how they should look and be sewn.

My first attempt at sewing the front together had a little too much of the print stripes showing at the sides, so I brought them in a little and tried again. When scrutinizing where the print is placed relative to the seams of the original JSK it once again becomes clear where the pattern cuts were a little off in the replica, but it isn't too bad and I think this result is almost indistinguishable.

There is a decent few centimetres of excess fabric at the sides (which was completely expected as the extra bodice room of the inital dress had to go somewhere), but I avoided cutting it down because it's precious extra fabric...

The only real modification the back needed was some small adjustment of the corset loops. I think I had also previously increased the seam at the very bottom of the back side panels because the original dress has this kind of "widening" (circled parts) that gives it a slight dropped waist.

I check both front and back portions, and when I am satisfied with the result I sew one of the side seams together.

Pretty much a completed bodice, the other side seam is left alone for now since zipper insertion will come last.

I can sew on the braid now. It is at this point while I am looking at the braid and realizing that is has a "right side" that I seem to have sewn the braid onto the skirt wrong (those many years ago...)

A 50% chance of getting it right and it was wrong!

While I'm sure a regular person would not care, I felt that it was worth repairing the mistake so the dress could be as close to the original as possible.

Fixed trim on the right.

I spent a few grueling hours ripping out the braid and reattaching it in the same method as before.

Braid also attached to the bodice.

I am wishing I had a complete dress by now, but unfortunately not...getting the bodice lining sorted is next...

MM's Rose Basket has a facing using printed fabric, however since I have no extra fabric to use for it and the dress I was working with didn't bother with adding that kind of detail (the original lining was just plain cotton with no facing panels at all) I decided to use this untextured rose basket fabric.

I originally considered just using the same lining fabric for the facing panel but seeing the dress laid flat with a matching printed facing is a detail that somehow enhances my enjoyment of looking at it a lot.

This fabric is from a reprint of the rose basket fabric from a couple years ago. It is also discontinued now but is very lackluster compared to the older fabric in my opinion. It is a rather thin quilting cotton and doesn't seem as vibrant as the original fabric, and has slightly different contrast colours. While you could still make a garment with it, I feel like it doesn't match up to the fabric used on the old rose basket because of the new fabric's sheerness.

However, given fabric supply limitations (i.e. I don't have anything) I think it's a decent nod to maintaining having self-fabric for the facing and will not be seen when worn.

Lining pieces are similar to the bodice pieces I traced out earlier so I used them as a reference and checked the shape with the lining panels on the original dress (on my mannequin).

The back lining seems to have a centre back seam as opposed to the outer fabric layer that had no seam/darts, and is made from 4 panels total.

Lining complete.

Next I attach the bodice lining to the main bodice piece, along with the straps. I mark where the straps should go based on my reference rose basket, sandwich them between the bodice pieces, pin and sew.

I left the straps as-is from the original replica dress. These are made from two strips of fabric sewn on each side, vs MM having used one strip and folding it in half. Just a different way of achieving the same thing, I guess. Of course I would have preferred the method to be "same as the original" but once again, no extra fabric... (I think I may have asked my SS to ask the seller if they had any extra and to include it if so, and the seller said they didn't have any...)

I also sew an elastic channel (sort of like topstitching) all the way along the top of the bodice about 1cm wide for later.

At this point I think that I seem to have pleated my skirt lining wrong. however, I may have just misinterpreted the other side of the lining pleats as the side that was "wrong", so I ended up having to repleat multiple times in my own confusion.

[it hurt itself in its confusion!]

Anyways, after that fiasco I baste the pleats down and attach the skirt lining to the bodice lining so I can check the length.

It's coming together!

I sew the outer skirt to the outer bodice fabric next, a step that makes me very nervous because if the seam shaping is wrong I feel that it could mess up the silhouette of the dress quite severely. To try to diminish this, I baste the bodice in sections to the skirt by hand, frequently checking beside the original dress.

I ended ripping out my basted skirt pleats and re-pleating the entire back because I didn't feel like the pleats were aligning well.

After sewing the outer skirt to the bodice, I once again check that the lining length is okay (it was a bit too long at the back), finish inner seams etc.

I added the elastic to the channel I added earlier now. Unfortunately I think I should have encased the elastic while stitching in the channel because it was a huge pain to get distributed properly and I had to unpick some sections to get the elastic to spread out and then carefully try to invisibly re-stitch. The elastic is gathered more around the armpits/sides than the front and back.

Last task is attaching the zipper. The dress has a completely encased invisible zipper with no zipper tape edge showing from the inside. It seemed like the lining was sewn on separately after the main fabric was sewn to the zipper, but I ended up folding over and seaming the inside by hand because it seemed too complicated for me to sew the lining to the zipper cleanly with my machine at my current ability level.

Zipper attached, definitely a lackluster job... I don't have a proper zipper foot and the cheap plastic invisible zipper foot I have is definitely not helping with keeping the zipper allowance even. I hope to fix the skirt seam alignment issue here and sew the zipper seam (especially near the top) closer to the fabric, but I'm not entirely sure if I'll ever be motivated to do that since the dress is now "wearable".

I actually also carelessly clipped the excess zipper tape at the top thinking that was what I should be doing even though it seems like MM has cleanly folded it in on the original dress 😢 (can't attach a photo as I'm pushing the post image limit as it is)

Since it was kind of getting down to the wire to the day I wanted to wear this dress, that was when I roughly finished/handsewed the lining to the zipper tape on the inside so the dress can be worn without any terrible consequences. What I should do next is fold in all the upper seams nicely, actually machine sew the lining to the zipper tape so the seam is clean, sew in a hook and eye to the top of the zipper, and add threads to secure the lining to the inside of the skirt + loops for the ribbon belt, but as of now that has not been done.

Dress finished (?) (how does it look beside the real rose basket now...?)

Unfortunately, I feel like I'm not entirely satisfied with how this turned out because although I had tried hard (especially at the beginning) to have clean work, as the project went along I think a lot of places ended up sloppy (like stitching lines on the inside), and the final piece still didn't end up exactly like the original (the bodice seems to be a little shorter somehow but I had no extra fabric especially along the side panels to make it longer, so I think it's a point that I can eventually accept).

Anyway...to finish off I finally add the lacing ribbons and prepare the detachable ribbons.

For the bows + ribbon belt, I have a length of cotton satin ribbon and finished off the bow brooches I started previously. For whatever reason, mint rose basket has burberry material bows, but I believe all the other colourways use sateen bows so I used cotton sateen for these. The original wine dress did come with a long, wide poly satin ribbon and two detachable small ribbons, but I have no idea where I put those relative to the dress and I didn't really like the way they looked anyway.

I took my old handmade bows apart to fix their dimensions (they were slightly too long) and also fixed how the middle fabric was folded, and then sewed them to some nice sharp brooch backs.

While ironing, I noticed that apparently I didn't rinse the fabric well after dying and adding water made the bows bleed. Not great. (I later soaked them in dye fixative and the bleeding issue seems to be better now)

These pictures use the bows from my Valeria JSK (which seem to be approximately the same wine tone), but it's always nice to have a separate set for each dress. I may remake yet another set of bows with a different cotton satin (slightly thinner, not self-dyed) eventually.

Finished, or at least as finished as things are going to get for now.

As I will be wearing this JSK in future outfits, I'm a bit torn as to how I will tag and label it in posts. The design for sure is Mary Magdalene's, and this dress is a big tribute to it, but it's also definitely handmade and not legitimate MM. I'm actually not even confident about labeling it handmade by myself because I didn't technically hand make all 100% of it (at this point, only the initial cutting out of pieces was not my own, but somehow this lack of initial patterning and cutting step bothers me and makes me feel like I didn't put in all the work a handmade piece usually would be). I will probably have a hard time not adding some additional comments each time it comes to adding a label to it in future photos.

Anyways, now I have Rose Basket at home.

Thank you if you read all the way to the end like this!

[ladykailitha]

Spellbound Part 14

Here we are at the last chapter. I am so sad to see it end that I have decided I'm doing a sequel. I have three stories nearing the end and as soon as the second one is complete (whatever order that is in) I will start writing it.

It will be split into four parts. The town, Chrissy and Robin, Jonathan and Argyle, and Eddie and Steve.

In this we wrap up everything we didn't get to in the last chapter and Steve gets his well earned rest.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13

~

The next time Steve awoke, the house felt bigger somehow. He was lying in a bed in a bedroom that didn’t look like his own.

The colors were more muted for a start. It didn’t have the vibrant greens and yellows he was known for. It wasn’t the blacks, greys, and reds of Eddie’s style either, so he wasn’t sure what part of the house he actually was in.

He struggled to sit up and really look at the room. It felt like the front room with the wide open windows and the smell of flowers coming through them. The sunlight warmed his spot on the bed and he felt nothing but comfort.

Just then the door opened to see Eddie walking in with Morgana on his arm and Gawain around shoulders.

“Nice to see you awake again, sleepyhead,” Eddie teased. “Morgana told me you were awake, so I thought I’d bring her in to see you. She’s been very concerned.”

Steve held out his hand and she flew right to him.

He stroked her breast and she rubbed her beak on his cheek. “I’m sorry I worried you. But I used up more power in a day then I have used my whole life time. My body is still adjusting to the new power levels.”

She rubbed his cheek again and Steve let out a gasp.

“Oh!” he muttered. “I had forgotten that familiars help regulate power levels. I guess I got so used to Circe doing it for me all the time.”

Morgana croaked and Steve laughed. “I’m sure you’ll remind me of all sorts of things I’ve forgotten. You really are beautiful.”

She croaked again and nipped at his hair.

He grinned at her. “No, I mean it. You have such beautiful coloring.”

“Sorry to interrupt the love fest,” Eddie said with a grin, “but we should see if you well enough to go out into the front room.”

Steve threw off the blankets and moved to stand. And immediately he sat back down. “Oops.”

Eddie walked over to the bed and held out his hands. Morgana took flight and flew out the open door. Steve, now unburdened by the one pound bird could reach out for Eddie’s hands to stand on his feet.

Eddie stepped back and Steve stepped with him, soon they were at the door. Eddie turned around and slipped his arm around Steve’s waist and led him into the front room where it seemed a class of some sort was going on.

Robin, Max, and Chrissy sat around Jonathan and Argyle as the two men taught them about being a witch.

Jonathan spotted him first. “Ah ha! The hero awakens.”

They all turned to where Steve and Eddie were standing by the door and suddenly Steve was being hugged by all the girls.

“I’m glad you’re safe, dummy,” Robin murmured affectionately.

Steve was led over to a new big fluffy armchair that Bav had absolutely just created for him. “Please tell me that I wasn’t out for another week, I think I’d cry.”

Jonathan laughed. “That would be hilarious, but no. It’s only the evening of the day you woke up for the time.”

Steve let out a relieved sigh. “Oh thank god! I still feel like I’ve been punched in the chest over and over again.”

“The unfortunate side effect of losing your familiar, I’m afraid, my good sir!” Argyle explained. “Having the little lady nearby will help regain your balance, but it will be some time before you feel yourself again.”

“Speaking of familiars,” Steve asked, “how have they all been getting along?”

Robin snorted. “Merlin thought Jadis was a chew toy until she tapped his nose. But other than that, things have been fine. Bav is three times her normal size to accommodate everyone and is looking forward to things going back to something more like normal once you’re on your feet again.”

Steve rubbed his eyebrow. “Who’s all been staying here while I was out?”

Eddie started ticking them off on his fingers. “You’ve got your two apprentices, Max and Robin, me and Wayne, of course. Argyle and Jonathan, because Joyce is mad at Jonathan for not coming to get Will and taking him to his place. And Chrissy!”

Steve blinked at him for a moment trying to take in all the information. “First Jonathan, do I have to talk to your mom about a town wide fucking spell that clouded her mind, not yours?”

Jonathan burst out laughing. “Please do! She doesn’t seem to believe me even though she witnessed the destruction of the demon and its spell.”

“I’ll put it on my list of things to do,” Steve said sagely. “Next question, Chrissy, Robin’s true love, aside, what are you doing in my house?”

Chrissy winced.

“I told you he’d have a problem with it,” Max snarked. “She could have stayed with any number of the other houses in her acquaintance, just not this one.”

“But Eddie and Wayne is staying here!” Robin protested. “Why can Chrissy?”

Eddie pinched his nose and instantly Steve understood that this argument had been going on all week.

“Because, Robin...” Eddie said for what must have been the millionth time that week, “as centennial sorcerers, it’s literally painful to be apart now that we’ve touched. You know that isn’t the case with you and Chrissy.”

“Plus,” Argyle said with a grimace. “Bav hasn’t forgiven her yet and keeps moving stuff around on her.”

Robin flushed a dark red. She knew she was being ridiculous, but this was her true love...

Steve realized something and then looked around the room, hurriedly. “Hey, Bav, where did you put my clothes from the day of the battle?”

Eddie frowned. “What do you need, love?”

A little end table appeared at Steve’s elbow with the clothes. He went searching through it and pulled out the little amulet he found.

“Found it!” he called. “Chrissy, catch!” He tossed the amulet at her and she caught it deftly.

She opened her hands in confusion, then her face cleared. “Oh! You found it! I thought I had lost it forever.”

Robin peered over her shoulder. In Chrissy’s hand was an amulet very similar to the one Argyle had made for her.

“An amulet?” she asked looking up at Steve. “Where did you find that?”

“After the battle with Jason, I found it on the ground,” he said licking his lips. “Circe told me it was hers. This is what must have been protecting her from the controlling spell the Carvers put her under.”

Chrissy’s head shot up. “Oh! I thought it was just a locket my mother gave me before she passed away. I didn’t realize it was an amulet.”

“Why don’t tell us your story and see if we can’t get everything sorted out?” Steve urged her gently.

“I never knew my father and my mother sold crystals on the side of the road to help keep a roof over our head and food in our bellies,” she began.

“Her mother was a witch too?” Max huffed. “Is everyone a witch in this town?”

Eddie huffed out a laugh. “No, just descendants of them. I got looking into the nasty stuff the Carvers were up to and they picked Hawkins especially for its strong supernatural connection. If they could control Hawkins, the rest of the country would be easy by comparison.”

Steve pinched his nose. “I should have guessed. I think that’s why my mother sent me here to set up shop. For the same reason. Which ever side controlled Hawkins would control the country.”

“The townsfolk are calling for you to be mayor,” Wayne said, coming in from the back garden. “Pardon me for eavesdropping, but I thought it was relevant.”

Steve snorted. “I’m not going to be mayor thank you. I have enough trouble as it is without add a whole town’s worth of it.”

Argyle nodded sagely. “It should be someone who is both on the side of the ordinary and the supernatural. That way he or she would be fair.”

Everyone in the room turned to Wayne.

He blinked at them for a moment. “Why is everyone looking at me?”

They continued to stare.

“Oh no,” he muttered, waving his hands. “That would be a bad idea. I would make a mess of things.”

Robin half shrugged. “Can’t be any worse than a demon carrying immortal with designs on world domination.”

“Well,” he said with a huff of laughter, “I can’t argue with that. I’ll put my hat in the ring then.”

Steve smiled at him. “You’ll do a good job.” Then he turned to Chrissy. “Sorry about that, please go ahead and finish your story.”

“When I was about fifteen,” Chrissy said with a faint blush on her cheeks, “she got really sick and completely wasted away. She couldn’t eve keep food down toward the end. She wasn’t even cold in the ground when the Carvers arrived at the cottage with a writ saying that my father had turned over parental rights of me to them and that I would be their ward. I was told to call the Mayor Father.”

“I doubt that very much,” Steve murmured. “That your father handed over your rights to them, I mean. They probably didn’t even bother looking for him and just made up some random story to get what they wanted. Which unfortunately was you pregnant by Jason, then the mayor would assume Jason’s form and once a son was born, you’d be done away with.”

“Well,” Robin said wide-eyed. “That’s more frightening than I thought his plan would have been. Disgusting.”

“It really is vile,” Chrissy confirmed. “But since my birth my mother insisted I wear this amulet.” She held up the necklace Steve had returned to her. “Said it would protect me all my days.”

Steve nodded. “That’s why you were constantly able to slip their leash. The arrival at my cottage. The befriending Eddie. The ability to question them at all. And it was because of that amulet.”

The walls of the cottage turned a dark grey. Steve nodded.

“It’s still no excuse for how rude she was when she requested the love charm,” he said, glaring at her.

Chrissy ducked her head. “You’re right. I was rude and dismissive. I’m sorry. And while Robin lives here, it’s not her house. It’s yours. The only person who has the right to let me stay here is you.”

The walls lightened to a dove grey.

Steve snickered. “It appears Bav agrees. It will be a long time before I could trust you. I understand you were under the influence of a spell. But that spell merely kept you docile, your attitude was your own.” He turned to Morgana. “Hello, dearest. Would you be so kind as to send a message to Nona for me? Ask her if the Hendersons would be willing to house Chrissy until the dust settles?”

Morgana cawed, puffing out her chest proudly, before flying off.

“Max,” Steve asked. “Please would you ask Zoomer if Joyce would come here so that I can properly chastise her for blaming Jonathan about the redcap.”

Max grinned. “It would be our honor.”

Jonathan’s shoulders sagged in relief. “Thanks, Steve. I really appreciate you mediating this for me. I know you just woke up.”

Steve nodded. He turned to Robin who looked properly ashamed.

“I’m sorry, Steve,” she muttered. “I should have talked to someone else about having Chrissy house with them until we get her living sorted.”

“Actually,” Wayne said with a small smile. “I think I might have the obvious solution to that.”

Everyone turned to Wayne.

“If I’m to be mayor,” he said with a half shrug, “I’ll be living in that big house, and with Eddie living here, our cottage would be empty.”

Eddie blinked for a moment. “Oh! That would be perfect. With Robin about to pass her exam, she’s going to need a place of her own, but something nearby so Max can still be taught reading and writing. Her and Chrissy can have it.”

“Oh!” Chrissy said, wide-eyed. “That would be perfect! I wouldn’t change a thing! I love the little Gothic feel it has!”

The tension in Eddie’s spine loosened at that. “Yes, thank you!”

Steve frowned and started counting off on his fingers. “Okay, so we’ve Chrissy and Robin sorted. The thing with Joyce and Jonathan to be sorted soon. Wayne as mayor. Eddie living here with me and Max. Is there anything left to sort out?”

Everyone looked around at each other.

“Billy is on the mend,” Max said with a grin. “And a master carpenter reached out to train him enough to past the master’s test so he can keep the shop.”

“That’s good to hear,” Steve said sadly. It was hard that Billy had to kill Tommy, but he was glad that the boy would be just fine. “Anything else?”

Eddie smiled down at his love. “No, sweetheart, that’s about it.”

“Yep,” Wayne said with a smile. “With the townsfolk regaining their memories about the supernatural, the good goolies and beasties are making a comeback. There is color in the town now. I’d say you deserve the rest.”

Steve looked around at his found family and smiled. Yeah, he had a lot to be grateful for.

Eddie slipped into the chair and it lengthened into a love seat, so they could cuddle.

He smiled up at his house and sighed. “Thanks, Bav.”

~

Tag List: COMPLETED

1- @niniel-karenine @watermelonmite @zerokrox-blog @sadisticaltarts @dolphincliffs

2- @gregre369 @cryptid-system @kultiras @kimsnooks @maya-custodios-dionach

3- @goodolefashionedloverboi @val-from-lawrence @carlyv @wonderland-girl143-blog @bookbinderbitch

4- @bookworm0690 @forgottenkanji @dreamercec @blondie1006 @yikes-a-bee

5- @awkwardgravity1 @oopsallgender @fearieshadow @stedestielfrattficlover @dragonmama76

6- @ellietheasexylibrarian @thedragonsaunt @useless-nb-bisexual @disrespectedgoatman @counting-dollars-counting-stars

7- @tinyplanet95 @ravenfrog @swimmingbirdrunningrock @gutterflower77 @just-a-tiny-void

8- @w1ll0wtr33 @beelze-the-bubkiss @wheneverfeasible @micheledawn1975 @gloomysoup

9- @dotdot-wierdlife @tartarusknight @ollyxar @yesdangerpls @two-vampires-kissing

10- @themoonagainstmers @estrellami-1 @steddieislife

[bots-and-cons]

Have you ever played or seen subnautica? Just imagine Optimus and Megatron's reactions to a human reader who has some pet leviathans. Like, They gotta find a large relic in the ocean, so the reader is just like, "Oh! Let me call one of my bois for help! *clears throat* "Luci! Come here, my precious baby bean!" *Gargantuan leviathan comes out of the water*

A/N: I've never played Subnautica, but I have seen some clips of it, or at least I'm pretty sure. Idk if this ended up being any good, but at least I had fun writing it lol

~Megatron~

Megatron was waiting for you on the beach, and there was clearly something big in the water

Whatever it was, it seemed like it was waiting for something

Megatron kept an eye on it, because something so big couldn't possibly be harmless and the fact that it was lurking right under the surface, made him feel a bit uneasy

He was so focused on keeping an eye out, that when you finally got there, he didn't even notice at first

You had to talk to get his attention, and when you approached the water, he snatched you up because "It's not safe"

You ask him what he's talking about, and he tells you there's something ginormous in the water

You chuckle and tell him it's nothing to worry about, it's just your pet

Megatron blinked a few times, because how in the name of Primus could a small, fragile human have tamed something that big

You get your diving gear on and just tell Megatron to follow you into the water

The beach you're at, gets deep very quickly and there's just a sheer drop about 35 meters away from shore

Megatron follows you into the water, he just walks on the ocean floor, because a big ass hunk of metal such as him doesn't just float

When you're deep enough, Megatron finally sees what was in the water and the creature is like ten times bigger than he originally thought

He's immediately ready to fight this thing, but you get in between him and your little pet and motion for the leviathan to come closer

It reaches its tentacle towards you and you give it a little pet

Megatron is of course suspicious of this thing, but if it's gonna help him get an edge against the autobots, he doesn't really care that much

~Optimus Prime~

Optimus was aware you had some kind of plan on how to get to the relic as quickly as possible, but he was not aware of what it was

So when he got to the beach and you were sitting on a very odd looking rock near the shore, he asked what you had in mind

You told him "Luci's gonna help us. Right Luci?" you asked and patted the rock you were sitting on

The rock started moving and Optimus realized it was actually a giant tentacle

It brought you to shore and you told Optimus that "Luci" would take him to the relic

Optimus had to ask "And what exactly is Luci?"

You told him that Luci was your pet and a leviathan, and it knew exactly where he was supposed to go to get the relic

Luci happens to a bit of a hoarder, and has collected many items from the ocean, the relic being one of them

You know where its nest is, so when the relic's location showed up on the map, you knew it was there

You couldn't go with Optimus, because even if you went by boat and had enough air, the pressure most definitely wouldn't be good for you

Optimus is quite intrigued by this leviathan creature, because he wasn't aware anything organic could be this big, at least on earth

He is being cautious, but since you seem to trust the creature, he does too

When you tell Luci it's time to go, it grabs Optimus with one of its tentacles and off they go

[crowfish-brainrot]

Mistakes Were Made Part 1

I was going to do this as a filthy one-shot but then I started writing and realized this is probably gonna be like 30k+ words by the time I finish with all of them, so we're breaking it down in parts. Adrenaline can make people lusty, and that's what inspired this fic. Also, if I was MC, my sexy self would be fuckin' all five of these men until I got into a relationship bc I am weak and they are too hot to not. Soooo, this might get kinda messy, but it'll end in a good (poly?) place.

CONTENT NOTES FOR ALL PARTS: 18+ MDNI. LaDs men x MC (you), Casual Sex, Pre-relationship, Complicated Feelings All Around. Smut & Angst. Smut with Feelings. No use of Y/N. Possibly ooc bc I'm still getting back into fanfic. Oral f&m receiving, p in v, unprotected sex bc its fiction, creampies, softdom!Xavier, brattamer!Zayne, brattyswitch!Rafayel, switch!Sylus, dom!Caleb brattyswitch!MC, but it's all fluid imo. light bond*ge, sp*nking, size difference, overstimulation, improper use of evol, semi-public sex. Nicknames used in all parts: canon nicknames as well as bunny, princess, love, & darling. F reader. MC is described as being curvy and strong with some fuller titties bc I love titties. Possibly MMF if I get to a part 6 Unedited. You get this raw (just like our Lads!)

Xavier (this part) | Zayne | Rafayel | Sylus | Caleb

The first time it happened, it wasn't on purpose. Not really. Xavier was so fucking cute, it wasn't fair. The way his pretty blue eyes got wide, the soft pout that settled on his lips when you did something that made him jealous. How he'd place his hand on your lower back like it belonged there when he led you out of rooms or away from people who stole your attention from him, it was hot.

In addition to that, the man was seriously skilled. His evol was powerful, and he cut through wanderers like it was nothing. After one particularly tough day of battle, you both were a little roughed up. Not too bad, a scrape here and there, but a streak of blood ended up on his face. Gods help you, Xavier was a handsome man normally, but roughed up and messy from a battle? It was downright sinful how good he looked.

After battle, your blood always ran hot. Since you started this job your vibrator got a workout, most days leaving you so on edge you had no choice but to find some sort of quick release. You expected the same would happen after that battle. Yet, instead of telling him goodnight in the elevator, you asked him to come inside you apartment and have dinner with you. He agreed.

So you ordered dinner in, washed up enough to eat, and he did the same. Dinner arrived and you ate next to him on the couch, half-watching some boring movie you didn't care about. Especially not with him so close to you.

"Are you alright?" he asked, his voice soft and warm in your ears. Unwanted goosebumps danced up your arms, and you did your best to repress the shiver.

"Fine. Just on edge, you know?" You sighed and laid back into the couch. "I'm always a little tense after battles. It'll pass."

He looked at you in that way of his. Bright blue eyes that seemed to already know every secret you had, like he saw down to the very essence of who you were. You, on the other hand, never knew what he was thinking. He was so calm. So stable that your bullshit never fazed him. Like Zayne, in a way. Maybe that's why you liked Xavier so much. That stability and seemingly never-ending patience soothed your nerves and made your mind turn into jelly when it was directed at you. Like it was at that moment.

"What do you usually do to calm down?" he asked.

Gods, his eyes were so wide, he looked too innocent. You wondered if he heard you come before. He was right upstairs, and while you tried to be quiet, the walls were thin. Your heart thrummed under your breast and you tried to come up with some sort of lie that sounded convincing.

"I...uh..."

"Your face is red," he said in that same monotone voice. A little glint of something sparkled in his eyes, but you turned away to hide your burning face.

"I'll calm down in a little bit. I think I just need to lay down." It was a lame cover up. You knew it, Xavier knew it, and so did the thirty-seven plushies in the corner of your couch.

"Lay on me then. We have to finish the movie, I won't be able to sleep if I don't know how it ends."

A lie almost as lame as yours. Xavier could sleep standing up waiting for backup if he had to. Still, when he leaned back on the couch and opened his arms in invitation, you couldn't resist. He was your work partner. You trusted him with your life every day, certainly you could take a nap on him.

His coat was off, and all he wore was a thin t-shirt that fit close to his body. Battle-toned muscle laid under a soft layer of bulk, he turned out to be the perfect pillow. Warm and soft, he registered in your mind as safe on a bone-deep level. You took off your hunter uniform when you went to wash up, and you regretted the short sleep shorts and thin shirt you picked out, because the heat of him seeped through the fabric and burned against your skin.

The rush of adrenaline-induced desire you dealt with after battle didn't ease. If anything, his proximity and the fact he was still partially mused from battle did the exact opposite of help the predicament you found yourself in. You laid on his chest. He used one arm as a pillow, and the other draped over your waist like it belonged there. Distracted, his thumb stroked your side and you thought you'd melt out of your skin you were so hot. Your panties were soaked through, and you tried to adjust every few minutes to escape the feeling.

The third time you squeezed your thighs together and rolled your hips to a more comfortable position, Xavier stilled you with his firm grip. You mewled, like the pathetic little kitten Sylus insisted you were. It was an embarrassing sound, and you hid your face in Xavier's chest, pretending he didn't hear you.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you. Are you sore?" Xavier asked.

"Yeah," you said, your voice tight. "I'm very, very sore."

You refused to look at him. You reminded yourself all the reasons you needed to behave yourself. Xavier was your neighbor. You worked together. He was jealous of anyone else who took your attention now. You saw him every single day. You were friends. You should not ruin all of that by letting your horny brain make the decisions. Yes, he was handsome, gentle, and lethal at once. Sure, he was tall with big shoulders and strong hands. Yeah, he was probably strong enough to throw you around and his cock was--

His cock was hard. It throbbed against your lower stomach between the clothing separating you. You moved just enough that you felt it, likely why Xavier tried to get you to stop. You kept your head buried in his chest. He said nothing. Silence dragged between you as you fought yourself for mental clarity.

But then he said your name. Breathless, almost a whine. Needy. Your self control left the fucking building. You braved meeting his face, and his eyes were dark with desire. You sat up with your palms flat on his chest. Your hair curtained over your shoulder as his large hands came to rest on your waist. Your left hand slid up his chest, to his jaw, and you held him there, neither of you speaking.

He broke first.

Faster than you could track, he flipped you so you were on your back with your arms above your head. Your wrists were held in one of his hands, and he crashed his lips into yours. You moaned as he ground his hips into you, showing you just how hard he was. Your mind spun. He was so thick, you could already imagine the stretch he'd give you.

He tore his lips away, and you were both breathless. Pinned under him, you had no desire to move. His broad form blocked out the dim light of the movie, and all you knew was him. He looked at you as if you hung the stars in the sky, and he kissed you again. More tender than the last time.

"Do you want to continue this?" he asked. His grip loosened around your wrists, giving you an easy way to escape. Not that you couldn't before. You were strong enough to knock anyone who you didn't want touching you on their ass, but the gesture made your heart and stomach flip.

"I do," you said, your voice soft. "Do you?"

"More. than. anything."

He punctuated the words with kisses down your neck. That little voice in the back of your head that screamed "don't fuck your co-workers" went silent as all the remaining rational thought in your mind melted out of your ears. Who were you to deny yourself something you both wanted?

You arched into his kisses and his free hand slid under the hem of your shirt. Big, calloused, and oh so warm, he reached up your side and pushed your shirt up. He let go of your wrists only long enough to pull your shirt off, and then he unhooked your bra. Your full tits jiggled as he removed the garment, and he cursed.

"Fuck, bunny. You're so beautiful." His praise came out with the sanctity of a prayer. The nickname he gave you, something he hadn't done until now, made your cheeks burn. His shirt came next, and by all the fucking gods, you couldn't breathe. He was so good looking it was unfair. How were you ever meant to resist this?

Before you could reply with a sultry remark, his lips were back on yours with your wrists pinned under his palm. He kissed you softly at first, but it quickly grew more heated. It was like he was pent up, so full of need that the slightest touch would break him, and that drove you wild. His lips left your mouth and trailed down your neck, to your tits, and down your stomach.

"Xavier, please I--"

"Quiet," he commanded. "I'll give you what you need, but I need something first."

His voice took on a harder edge. Soft-spoken, meek Xavier was gone, and in his place stood the dominant, deadly, serious version of him you only caught glimpses of. Gods, you didn't think you could get any wetter, but here you were, so wet that even your shorts were soaked through. He cursed again when he came face-to-face with the truth of your desire. He released your wrists and again, faster than you could blink, he slipped your shorts and panties off.

He threw your legs over his shoulders and kissed from your knee down to your thigh, moving slowly as he eased himself in line with your soaking pussy. Nestled between your thighs, he licked from your opening to your clit. You both moaned. His strong hands gripped your thighs, and he lost himself in your pussy. Long, firm licks lapped up all your juices and his nose bumped against your clit in a perfect rhythm.

Pent up and drenched, you were already close. Not that Xavier seemed to notice. He was too busy devouring you to respond to your warnings that you were close, or maybe he wanted you to shatter all over his face. Either way, the wave built until you couldn't hold it back. He moaned as you came on his face, and he looked up at you from between your thighs. His pretty blue eyes bright and sparkling in the low light.

Xavier kissed your still-pulsing clit then sat up on his knees. His belt came off in one hand, and his pants and boxers slipped down his strong thighs. His cock was just as thick as you imagined it would be, and a good length. Big enough to hit all the right places and wide enough to give you the stretch you needed. You bit your lip and shivered as you imagined how it'd stretch you wide open, and your legs spread of their own accord.

Xavier slapped the head of his cock on your clit and you whined, a high-pitched, pitiful sound. He chuckled, the sound just as warm as the rest of him. "I think you're wet enough to take my cock. Do you want it, bunny?"

"Please, Xavier," you whined. "I need you."

"Bend over for me. Hands behind your back," he said.

You flipped around and pressed your chest into the couch, arched your back, and spread your legs. Your hands went to the small of your back. The smooth leather of his belt wrapped around your wrists and he planted a kiss between your shoulder blades.

"Is this okay?" he asked.

"Yes!"

"Tell me if you need me to untie you." Another kiss between your shoulder blades made your heart do the stupid flipping thing it liked to do around him, and you made a simple noise of agreement, not trusting your voice.

He gripped the tail of the belt and held it tight in his hands, pulling your arms back. Restrained, your already lust-fogged mind emptied further, sinking deeper down into the sensations Xavier gave you. His large hand clapped down on your ass, not hard, but just enough to make noise. Your hips rolled back against his, and he cursed.

"What a good girl you are," he cooed. "Fucking perfect. Better than I imagined."

The confession that he imagined you like this was too much for your lust-drunk mind to process. Thankfully, Xavier didn't seem to expect a response from you. He lined his fat cock up with your entrance, then slipped in.

Your moan was muffled by the couch. His cock was so thick it burned slightly as he settled inside you. You hadn't taken anything bigger than your fingers since you started work, and Gods, having Xavier inside you was the best kind of stretch. He started off slow, going in deep and hitting every spot that made your breath hitch, then he slowly eased back until only the tip remained. He continued that slow pace, stretching you out around his fat cock.

Your fingers wrapped around his belt for some sort of purchase, needing something to tether you to the moment. Each slow, luxurious roll of his hips pushed another desperate, needy whine out of you and into the couch.

"Xavier!" you moaned.

"Yes, bunny?" he asked, his voice as calm as ever.

"More, please."

"You need more?" Xavier hummed. "I'm not sure you can take it."

"I need more, please!"

He clapped down on your other ass cheek. Noisy, but not hard enough to hurt and your mind melted. His pace increased from torturously slow to a medium pace, the added fiction against your slick inner walls pulling more needy sounds out of you. Your walls fluttered around him as you neared your second release.

"You already want to come again, don't you?" Xavier said, his voice low. "I feel you getting close. Fuck, you feel so good."

You cried out his name again, with some sort of half-babbled praise about how big he was, how much he stretched you. You were fucked out. Gone. Lost in sensation.

"I can't hear you. Say that again." Xavier slammed his hips hard into yours and you moaned his name again. Louder this time, followed by more babbled praise. "Good girl, that's more like it."

His hand settled around the belt holding your wrists together and his thrusts became deep, punishing things. You babbled out praises and moans of his name as your release grew closer and closer. His other hand reached under your bodies and rubbed your clit in slow, firm circles and you shuddered.

His cock throbbed inside you. Pulsing alongside your slick walls as he thrust into you. The wet sounds of your fucking echoed in your living room, over the sound of your forgotten movie. Panted breaths and muffled moans added to the sounds, which only made you burn hotter. Your pussy clenched around his cock when he hit just the right angle, and you choked out a needy moan.

"Come for me, bunny. Let me feel you."

The command was spoken softly in your ear, but there was a sharp edge to it you had no choice but to obey. You came with a loud cry of Xavier's name, gushing over his thick cock. You clenched and squeezed, and Xavier barely pulled out before he came. Thick, hot spurts painted your ass, and he moaned your name as he coated you in his come.

You both were breathless in the aftermath. Xavier leaned down and kissed the space between your shoulder blades as he freed your wrists from his belt. Strong hands massaged your wrists until they stopped tingling, then he placed a soft kiss on each one. He disappeared for a moment, and when he came back he had a warm cloth. He cleaned you up, then pulled you against his chest.

You nuzzled into his neck, sighing softly. He turned your chin and convinced you to drink some water. You slowly came back to the moment, your body blissfully calm and mind blessedly empty. He laid back on the couch and pulled you with him. You flopped on top of him, and he pulled your couch blanket over you both.

You didn't mean to fall asleep.

That was your first thought as your work alarm blared from your bedroom. Sunlight danced in through the windows of your apartment, and a quick look at your phone said it was just past seven. Work started at nine. Xavier was fast asleep under you, snoring softly without a care in the world. His arms held you tight against his chest, and after a little bit of wiggling around, you realized there was no escaping his death grip.

You were both still naked, wrapped up together and warm from shared body heat. Your living room smelled like sex, and your face flushed as you realized you'd need to spot clean your couch. Looking down at the sleeping man below you, your neighbor, your co-worker, you realized mistakes were made last night, and now you had to suffer the consequences.

You shook Xavier's shoulder. "Xavier. It's time to wake up."

He mumbled something that sounded like a "no". You tried again, shaking him harder this time. "Xavier!"

His arms wrapped tighter around you, as if he refused to let you go even while sleeping. You rolled your eyes. Running out of options and feeling increasingly trapped, you opted for something odd. You bit him. Right over his nipple.

It worked.

Xavier startled awake, and upon seeing your face, he eased, a soft laugh bubbling in his chest. "I didn't realize bunnies bit so hard."

You hummed, almost saying something stupid like, "that's why another sexy man I know calls me kitten", but you caught yourself. You cleared your throat. "You weren't waking up, so I had to resort to extreme measures. We have to get up for work."

Xavier checked the time on his phone and made a disgruntled noise. "I suppose so."

You swallowed hard as you prepared yourself for what could quite possibly be one of the most awkward morning-after conversations ever. You liked Xavier. A lot. However, this wasn't and could not become a relationship. You didn't know the extent of Xavier's feelings, but you knew he felt something, and you wanted to nip that in the bud before anything got too serious.

"We're good, right? Nothing is different with us?" you asked.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Well, we work together, live next to each other. I don't want last night to make things weird between us. I don't regret it, but I also don't want you to think it means something more than it does, you know?"

Xavier's smiling face went blank, and you knew you fucked up.

"What did it mean, then?" he asked, his tone flat.

"Well...we're friends. And maybe fuck buddies, if you want to be. If either of us needs a hand like I did last night, I'd be open to that. But, I honestly don't have time for a relationship, and I don't think you do either. I think it's best if we keep this casual."

"Casual." Xavier said the word like it offended him and you winced.

"Yeah. Is that alright with you?"

Xavier looked at you, the distance back in his blue eyes. The silence stretched on between you for several uncomfortable minutes, but you kept your mouth shut. If you fucked everything up permanently, it was best to figure that out now, before you got to work so you could request a new partner. Eventually, Xavier sighed and a little bit of the warmth he showed only to you came back into his expression.

"The next time a battle leaves you needing a way to burn off some steam, come to me. I'll take care of you," he said. He planted a chaste kiss on your shoulder, and you smiled at him.

"Alright. Otherwise, we're back to normal?"

"Yeah," he said. "Otherwise, we're back to normal."

You both knew it was a lie, but it comforted you all the same.

Yeah, things were perfectly, totally normal.

So. Normal.

A/N: Xavier isn't one of my mains, but I love him sm & I can easily imagine something like this happening, so he's the one we started this lil series off with. I want to do one of these with each LI before we start getting into overlap territory, and if we get there or not really depends on how much y'all want that. So, lmk! Either way, the next part of this series is going to be all about our favorite Doctor. I'm excited to write that one!

Masterlist | Next Part

[lynxgriffin]

To add on to the Sword Route enemy sprite discussion, something I noticed with my original playthrough and confirmed in rewatch is there’s one room in the bit roots segment with the asgore-like yellow spear enemy and 7 flower enemies. It’s only once you destroy the 7 flowers that you can attack the spear enemy, and it’s hyperactive and abnormally agressive after too.

Maybe I could be looking too far into it, but maybe this could possibly be foreshadowing for the future, especially if Flower King is chapter 5’s dark world? Maybe we’re going to harm or do something so horrible to the 7 colored flowers/their darkner equivalents, that Asgore with retailite really agressively in response, especially at the low point he currently seems to be in. Idk maybe I’m looking to far into one room, but the fact it specifically has 7 flowers and an “asgore” enemy felt worth pointing out at least.

I actually think that you CAN do the inverse, and kill the yellow spear enemy before killing all of the flowers (thankfully that sword hitbox is fairly generous). If you do kill it first, then the flowers all vanish. I do think it was intended to go so that you kill the flowers first, though.

But ooooh man, that would be scary if that ends up being some sort of foreshadowing for what might go on in chapter five, though... (I didn't even realize that WAS seven flowers total...)

[mona-risms]

Not exactly a request but food for thoughts. (Though if this did give you anything to work with I'd love to see what you turn up with.)

Mirror sex with Rumi because you just have to show her how pretty she is.

She didn't like her demon marks before the movie, her insecurity may still flare up every now and then afterwards even if it's lessened by the time the movie is over. Take her braid out and let her hair cascade around her like an electric purple waterfall.

(Very sure a life-long paralyzingly severe insecurity can't disappear over the course of a couple weeks or so. Especially when your own mother figure refuses to accept that part of you and explicitly treats it as a flaw.)

Kiss her face, her neck, arms, inner thighs, especially on the patterns. Prop her up, her back flush with your front so you're touching as much of her as possible, including the 'cursed' marks (that's a given.) make her face herself in the mirror while you touch her and whisper sweet nothings into her ear about how pretty she is.

If she denies it- tease her until she accepts the praise. Edge her a couple times, urging her to tell you things she does like about herself, her voice, her eyes... Watch her mascara run, by the way, she looks cute when you're thrusting your fingers into her cunt (make her agree with that statement as well). Her beautiful brown eyes look so pretty brimming with tears. Then slip in the marks again and just reassure her that she's beautiful, and the patterns are a part of her, and you love all of her.

In less than no time you'll have her fucked dumb enough to let go of her stress, if only for a little while.

Alright, that's enough horny for me. Good night !

I collapsed onto the floor WHAT THE HELL!!! I don't even know if I have anything to add to this I'm flabberghasted

How long do you think her hair would be first of all. Like. That's a longass fucking braid, surely it'd be like Stocking-level hair length right....or actually maybe even more so considering even Stocking's hair went down to her lower back at LEAST if tied up. Either way it's Very easy to just grip her hair so that she's Really facing the mirror properly

You ARE right in the fact that there's No Possible Fucking Way that she'd just stop feeling insecure all of a sudden when she essentially had shame and body dysphoria drilled into her very core just bc she was born half demon (A* parenting, Celine 😒). Hell, the first time the both of you have sex post-movie, she'd probably start off in the dark, and even then they still glow 🤷‍♀️. One must not be shocked if she needs to stop for the moment yk

Otherwise mother of FUCK man. Even her vision would get all blurry from the tears that keep building up and running down her cheeks do she can barely even see herself anyway, all while her entire body and ESPECIALLY her legs are Quivering Like Crazy and crying at the same time 😜😜😜😜 her cunt is so unbelievably slick from the amount of times you've edged her and for how long you've fingered her until she feels everything go so fucking hazy

Her patterns would most likely respond to the emotional overwhelm asw considering it seems like they tie together—you can easily tell when Rumi's at the very edge of cumming, so you can just draw your hand back and she whines loudly but she doesn't care, not when she's putting all her remaining brainpower to listen to you and do whatever you ask her just as long as you make her cum again so hard and make her squirt pleasepleasepleasegod--

Hey at least by the end of it she'll probably be thinking more of the way you've fucked her dumb bc of how much you love all of her instead of the lingering shame of her own ancestry and appearance 🫶 so like plan successful!!!!!

[mattslilies]

Long Day - M.S.

"it's okay, i'll help. you're exhausted." or... the one where you're wiped out from work, and the energy to take care of yourself just isn't there. luckily, matt steps in. warnings: just exhaustion, really! mentions of dehydration. word count: 945 a/n: requested by anon! divider credit to @saradika-graphics! remember to take care of yourselves! nothing is worth burning yourself out. if your home is going through a heat wave, be safe!! stay hydrated!

you were normally better than this. you were usually able to handle much more, but it had all quickly caught up to you.

you'd worked the past six days in a row, pushing through, holding on to the one day off at the end. you had plans to absolutely cherish it. sleep in late, get food with your friends, binge watch a show, spend time with matt, but none of that was going to happen.

you'd finished work that evening, and by the time you got home, you felt like your legs were the consistency of jello, and you were going to drop. the adrenaline of having to do so much and get everything done at work had kept you going through the entire week, but now that your brain had realized you didn't have to go back tomorrow, you were crashing.

it was also recognizing the ache in your legs, the dull throb in your head from not drinking enough water throughout the day, the sting in your hands from fighting to open things. everything seemed to all hit you at once, and tears filled your eyes as you parked your car in the driveway, sitting there for a few moments before going inside.

trying to compose yourself the best you can, you walked inside, giving matt a soft smile. you weren't angry, or upset, just tired, and you wanted him to know that he wasn't the cause of your tears. regardless of this though, he jumped up, immediately walking over to you and holding your face in his hands.

"what's wrong, baby? did something happen at work?"

you shook your head, a laugh leaving your lips at the ridiculousness of the situation. you were done with work for the week, and you were crying. you should be celebrating.

"no, no, i just realized i'm really tired. everything went fine at work."

matt nodded, giving you a hug, and a soft kiss atop your head.

"you worked so much this week. i'd expect you to be tired."

you nodded, sighing.

"i'm gonna go take a shower, and then i'll come fix something for us to eat."

he hummed in agreement, allowing you to walk off towards your shared bathroom. however, he wasn't going to let you make yourself food after such a long week.

he quickly disappeared into the kitchen, beginning to cook up something simple. he decided on pasta. it would be good for your energy, as well as make sure you were full, but not take too long to cook. it was straining as you came back down the steps, a slight look of confusion on your face.

"matt... you didn't have to do that."

he smiled, putting the food onto a plate and grabbing you some fruit from the fridge to go with it.

"yes i did, baby. and i don't mind. you had an long day, the least i can do is make you some food."

you smiled back, giving him a quick kiss before sitting down to eat, the smell of the food made you realize just how hungry you were, devouring the plate in a few minutes, flat. you got up to put the dishes in the sink, but matt stopped you, taking it from your hands.

"it's okay, i'll help. you're exhausted."

you didn't even argue, too tired to have the energy for it. you nodded, relenting before sitting back down, yawning. matt walked up next to you, placing a hand on your back and encouraging you up.

"c'mon, sweetheart. let's go upstairs. it's late, and you're tired."

you went, walking hand in hand with him the whole way, rejoicing in how lucky you were to have such a caring boyfriend. you sighed in frustration, a small groan leaving your lips as your hand caught a tangle in your hair.

"ugh. i forgot i have to brush and braid my hair tonight."

matt shook his head.

"no. i'll brush and braid your hair tonight. do you want to change into my clothes?"

you nodded, stifling a yawn with your hand. you'd hastily thrown on a set of clothes after showering, but matt's clothes to sleep in sounded much more appealing. he walked over to his dresser, pulling out the softest, largest shirt he could find, and a pair of shorts.

"let me help you."

he got no disagreement from you, you bracing your hands on his shoulders as he helped you step into the shorts, easily sliding them up your legs. he softly removed your shirt, feeding your arms through the sleeves in his and dressing you in it.

"that's gotta feel better, hm?"

you hummed in agreement, moving towards the bed and sitting down on the edge. matt grabbed your hairbrush and a ponytail holder, sitting behind you and slowly beginning to brush through it.

he was always so careful with it. much more careful than you ever were. but that was how he always treated you. carefully. not like you were fragile, not like he didn't trust you, but like he wanted to protect you at all costs, despite knowing you could stand on your own two feet.

dragging the hairbrush through your hair, you felt him begin to twist the three strands into a loose, but solid, braid. over the time you had been dating, his hairdo skills had greatly improved, now taking less than five minutes to get it all done.

snapping the hair tie around the bottom of the braid, he kissed your shoulders before setting the braid on one of them.

"i'm gonna change, and then we'll lay down, okay?"

by the time he turned back around, you were already asleep.