#and present himself entirely on his own terms

[wonder-worker]

Elizabeth Woodville and her daughters being harassed by “repeated intercessions and dire threats” to leave sanctuary and submit to Richard III should be talked about a lot more than it is, tbh.

[dcviline]

For all that I rag on Hizdahr for, I don't actually think he is the main conspirator behind the Harpies. I think it's Galazza, and Hizdahr and Reznak are just her main pawns. It's obvious what Hizdahr gets from it; he is named king of Meereen, and he's content with the prestige that brings to his name and how it elevates his family again in a world of uprisings that were ready to (metaphorically) cannibalize them and everyone else of that status. To him, he has played a part in saving his city and his family and stopped his entire culture and way of life from being completely uprooted. But ultimately, he is Galazza's puppet, and he knows that. I think becoming king emboldens him to question it more, to want to carry his own influence and break away from her control, but also, he knows that losing Galazza's favor means death.

I don't even think he is the main conspirator or perpetrator in trying to assassinate Daenerys; I think that was orchestrated in a way that very much makes him the fall man for it. Mind you, he was still aware of it and actively participated in it by trying to poison her, but I don't think that was *his* plan, I think it was something he was simply commanded to do with the promise of kingship hanging over his head and a threat of death on the other side. And as for Reznak, I think he is Galazza's true inside man and his purpose now is mostly to keep Hizdahr in line. That is why prophecies potentially warned Daenerys about Reznak (or Varys, or that one ship, but probably Reznak). Hizdahr and Reznak are both snakes in Dany's court, but Reznak is truly the snake with teeth.

[strawberrystepmom]

nsfw - mdni. cw pregnancy mention but only as a joke (calls reader a MILF), marriage discussion. f!reader (has breasts, is refers to with feminine terms), gojo and reader are in a “semi established” relationship aka idiots in love. self ship coded. wc 1.1k

“Do you really think right now is the time for this discussion, Satoru?”

Your knees are pulled to your chest to make room for your almost comically oversized boyfriend in your apartments’ barely big enough for one bathtub. He’s all limbs and broad shoulders and big arms and the sight, while delectable, makes you feel annoyed as you try to soak away what remains of your own post-mission injuries.

There’s a laceration on your right elbow, a blooming bruise on the opposite bicep, a slash on your thigh. The worst of it was handled back at the school thanks to Shoko but you refused further treatment, knowing a nice soak and rest would fix you up. Gojo showed up unexpectedly as soon as he heard you’d been roughed up today, holding your hand reassuringly the entire time.

You should have known better that his offer to take you home and immediately leave was not as listed on the label. He entered your apartment, kicked off his shoes, and followed you straight to the bathroom without a single word. It’s how you ended up here.

“No time like the present if you ask me. Every other time I’ve asked you’ve said "let's talk about it later” and now it’s later.”

Sighing, you listen to the gentle slosh of the warm water over the lip of the tub as he slides in behind you. Two long legs frame your body and you lean back against him, back pressed to his chest while he reaches around and cups each of your goosebump prickled breasts and squeezes them playfully.

“You’re asking me to marry you while squeezing my tits and making honking noises? Am I getting that right?”

“That’s exactly what I’m doing, yes.”

He chuckles and kisses your jaw, right beneath your ear. It’s his favorite spot, so unassuming yet so intimate. He knows you dab a little perfume there to give him something to look forward to and despite the stress and soil of the day, he sniffs hard and presses an additional kiss.

You reward him with a giggle and he leans over the top of your head, wrapping himself around you and gently running his fingers along the little reminders of how rough today was on you.

It motivates him to press his question even further.

“We don’t have to get married tomorrow, you know. We’ve been at this for long enough that we can wait but it’s time, babe.”

You want to understand his thinking but continually come up short, wondering why he wants something so permanent all of a sudden. Maybe it’s getting older, maybe it’s wanting to have someone to come home to that is more than his semi live-in girlfriend. So without thinking too deeply about it, you ask.

“This isn’t a no or anything so don’t immediately jump there,” you rush to clarify before speaking what’s on your mind lest he get the wrong idea. “But why? Why now?”

The answers are so clear to Satoru that he doesn’t have to think about them for a moment more, instead rubbing his thumb gently around the blue outline of the bruise on your arm.

“I could ask you the same. Why not? Why are you so convinced marrying me would be bad?”

Marriage used to be something he considered would be a burden. Love seemed like the least likely reason he’d marry, perhaps instead marrying reluctantly one day for the sake of his clan or to have kids or something. It never had romantic connotations until the day he realized he wanted to marry you.

Three years ago, a night not that dissimilar to the one the two of you are currently sharing, the realization hit him like a speeding train he couldn’t avoid. It was a culmination of nearly ten years worth of feelings, sure, but he knew as sure as he knew his own heart that you were it. The One, as they say.

Your injuries that night were worse than these ones and Shoko privately shared her concerns with him that your left arm would never fully recover from where it was snapped clean above the elbow. She did everything she could to heal it and you were confined to a sling for several weeks.

He was all too eager to come and take care of you, a little taste of what waking up and falling asleep next to you every day was enough to easily confirm you were it. You are it, still, years later and many long nights and early mornings since. Your grumpy mornings, your lazy afternoons, your evenings spent counting the stars twinkling lazily above your heads on the little adjoining balcony you spent most of your time on.

He was already in love with you, hanging on your every word and vying for every piece of attention you’d give him, but he knew that the rest of his life would be senseless if he couldn’t spend it by your side. Seeing you be so fallible, so painfully human and fragile, terrified him but it motivated him just as much.

Here he sits, still motivated to make you his forever, and he says he isn’t a romantic.

Scoffing, you turn your head to look up at him and gauge how he’s feeling. His face is impassive, brow raised, and suddenly you feel guilty for making him think the reason you’re apprehensive about marriage is him. It isn’t him, it never has been. It’s you.

“Marrying you would be the best thing to ever happen to me, Satoru but I don’t think it would be the best thing to ever happen to you.”

Now it’s his turn to scoff incredulously, pulling your head against his chest so he can rest his chin on top of it. The water sloshes even more and you shift, trying to avoid the friction from your half damp skin against his but there’s no use. He’ll take a little pain if it means he gets to have you this close.

“I know it would be the best thing to happen to me. Ever. In all my life.”

You laugh, shaking your head and wincing as you bend your elbow and the soreness catches up with you. He moves to cradle your arm gently in one of his palms, using the other to keep your cheek pressed to his chest.

“I’m afraid you’ve finally convinced me,” you whisper and he laughs. You wince again as he shifts and drags you with him, water splashing over the edge of the tub while he situates you in his lap facing him the best that he can. Your chest presses against his and you’re face to face, his eyes searching you for any trace of second thoughts.

“You mean it?”

You cup his cheeks in your palms and nod, a coy smile breaking into a grin to mirror his own as he pulls your left hand away from his face and pulls it to his mouth to kiss the back of your ring finger.

“Yes, I’ll marry you. I’d be honored to be your wife even if I think you’re setting yourself up for a lifetime of disappointment.”

Dropping your hand, he slides his arms around your torso and picks you up squealing and thrashing while water drips off of your bodies and back into the tub below. It’s a distraction tactic, of course, to keep you from delving any further into your own fears and doubts, but a man will do what a man must to make his fiancé smile.

“I think I’m setting myself up for a lifetime of laughing and great food and watching you turn into a MILF.”

Snorting, you swat his chest playfully with one hand and reach for the towels on the rack next to you with the other. You dry his hair first, giggling with each funny face he makes until you finish and wrap the towel around his shoulders.

“Are you threatening to turn me into a MILF, sir?”

The blood rushes from his head further downward as he pictures the insinuation you’re making and he smiles devilishly.

“If that’s what you want, consider it a promise.”

[myosotisa]

i'm starvin, darlin - e.m.

Eddie Munson x Reader

ǁ summary: Since coming back from the Upside Down, Eddie has slowly been changing. Each week seems to bring something different and he finds himself doing things he never thought he would.

ǁ tags: gender neutral reader, no pronouns, no y/n. nickname used (sweetheart). mentions of season 4 final episode and what occurred. canon divergent (every one lived). it's not smut, but smut adjacent. it's sexy

ǁ word count: 2k

ǁ notes: i sat down and wrote an entire one shot in one sitting again. and i am also not going to edit this one. and i do not feel bad for lowercase hozier title, so don't even try me like that. if y'all really like it, i can add a part 2 with smut, but this is it for now

-

There are still a lot of things Eddie is having to come to terms with since the night his heart stopped.

That night in the Upside Down, laying in Dustin’s arms, he had died. Without a doubt. Dustin had felt his pulse and there was nothing there. And though he didn’t know CPR, had no idea what he was doing, Dustin had laid him down on the ground and started to beat against his chest. Like maybe if he hit hard enough and in the right place, his friend would come back to life.

Somehow it worked. No one bothered to ask why.

But they all knew something was wrong two days later. Eddie, barely breathing and with a weak heartbeat, had been dragged back to the surface and hidden away in the RV they had stolen. Someone watched him round the clock as they debated what to do. If they should try to get him to a hospital, how they’d be able to explain it. But then something miraculous began to happen:

Eddie started healing. All on his own. Way faster than any person should have been able to.

His skin stitched itself back together faster than should be possible, leaving less scar tissue than it should have behind. His chest began to rise and fall in more steady breaths, his heart beat getting stronger, bones resetting themselves with slow and quiet creaks as he laid in that RV bed and slept. He’d been asleep since they brought him back.

The day he woke up, his body had almost entirely healed itself. From the brink of death, having even stepped over to the other side, and now he was almost back to before it ever happened. It had only been a week.

Everyone rejoiced, refusing to question anything weird that may have happened in the Upside Down and just thinking they finally won for once. Max had casts on both her arms but was otherwise unharmed, Steve had recovered from his own injuries at the rate of a normal human and now sported a scar around his throat that he sometimes felt self conscious about. Dustin was on crutches with his broken leg for another month at least. Eddie was alive and whole and back to himself. They’d made it, everyone had made it.

He began to notice more and more things that were different as the days went on.

The first thing he caught on to was that he had the capability to be strong. Way stronger than someone who had recently been bed ridden should be. It was like in the comic books with the Hulk – if he wasn’t paying attention or if he got too emotional, he could easily break anything. A walkman destroyed, a ceramic bowl reduced to shards, a metal pipe bent beyond fixing, the wooden handle of a hammer shattered in his grip. The boys were all present for the hammer incident and sighted it as one of the coolest things they had ever seen. They swarmed him, asking him how he did it, what else he could do, how strong he really was.

Only the other teens, Steve, Nancy, Robin, you, started to look a little bit closer.

When the next few changes became apparent, it was clear something unnatural had happened to Eddie that night in the Upside Down. He could feel other people's feelings. They brushed against his consciousness like ghosts whenever he looked at someone. Happiness like warm rays of sunshine, fear like a shuddering gust of wind, anger like hot coals pressed to his skin. It wasn’t a conscious effort – in fact, there were a lot of times he wished he could turn it off. Whenever he looked too hard at someone, it’s like his brain adjusted to a different frequency and their emotions reached out to him, no matter what they were. And he didn’t struggle to make sense of the sensations like he thought he might, his brain completed the dots easily at first, but then he began to recognize them consciously. It was certainly useful sometimes, especially when it came to you, but it still felt a bit invasive. When he’d explained it to a few people, he assured he tried to ignore it whenever he could, but sometimes he couldn’t help but react. The icey spike of terror he felt when you woke up next to him from a nightmare. The velvet comfort that enveloped you and him when he held you after.

The first time he spoke into someone’s mind it was an accident. Steve had whipped toward him, breath catching in his chest, eyes wide and mouth open in a gasp. Eddie felt it like ice down his spine. “Did you… You did that?” He’d asked breathlessly. It had been so shocking, Eddie wasn’t even sure what’d he said, or projected, or whatever it was.

“I - I don’t know.”

Steve stepped closer, suddenly looking determined. “Try to do it again.”

It was a slithering feeling when he dipped back into Steve’s mind. Like sliding his way in between cracks to a place he didn’t belong, seeping into the forefront of his thoughts to plant one of his own. It made him feel dirty, uncomfortable, and wrong. But it worked. Steve explained it as having a thought like his own but it came out in Eddie’s voice instead. An intrusive thought but not an uncomfortable one.

As with all of the other discoveries, a meeting was called. Dustin, Mike, Lucas, Max, Will, El, Robin, Jonathan, Nancy, Steve, and you. Steve did most of the talking while Eddie sat and looked at his hands. These meetings, while he acknowledged were important for everyone to keep track of his progression into… something, it still made him feel a bit like a zoo animal in a cage. A magician with a magic trick. All the boys immediately begged him to do it to them, they wanted to see what it felt like, wanted to see how easy it was for him to do it. 

Nancy and Jonathan had shooed them, catching on to how overwhelmed Eddie was, their excitement and curiosity battering against him like a whipping wind of too much. Once it was just the older people in the room, you crossed over to where he was, kneeled down in front of him, reached out to hold his hand.

Pity felt like someone was pissing in his pants.

“Are you okay?”

How could he say no? How could he admit that he was scared, confused, and feeling more and more like a monster with the passing days? “It’s just a lot. To deal with.”

Your smile was pained as you pushed yourself up onto your calves and wrapped your arms around his shoulders. His came around your waist on instinct, the breath feeling like a wheeze in his lungs as he held tight. Face pressed into your hair with his eyes squeezed shut, he inhaled deep in relief.

That was when the next thing changed.

It was a desire. A need. One he couldn’t place a name to. Like he was desperately missing something, desperately craving something and he didn’t know it was. It crawled under his skin like ants and sent him scratching for a feeling that couldn’t be satiated. No matter what he tried: eating, drinking, masturbating, exercising. The feeling wouldn’t go away. It got stronger day after day, his mind focusing more and more on the void it left behind until it was all he could think about.

Steve threw a little get together at his house once a month or so. Just time for everyone to get together, eat some food, listen to music, play board games, maybe watch a movie. This was the first get together since his hunger began.

He was sitting on the couch on his own, decompressing. While normally he was right in the middle of everything, today it was a lot to handle when he was hyperfocused on the crawling beneath his skin. He had his legs spread wide, hands resting on them, leaning deep into the cushions of the couch in Steve’s basement. While he had initially tried to close his eyes, hang his head back, maybe stare at the ceiling – he couldn’t stop his attention from drifting back to you.

You and Eddie had been friends for a long time. Understandably, you’d gotten much closer after the events in March. The two of you had helped each other through hard nights of nightmares, panic attacks in parking lots, flashbacks in public. You’d been a great comfort to him since he came back. But today your laugh sounded like music. The smell of your perfume hit him even across the room. Each emotion crashed over him in waves, pushing and receding like the tide as he tried to get off your frequency, unentangle himself from you before he did something he didn’t mean to do.

I’m starving.

Your back stiffened, the grip on your plastic cup getting just a bit tighter. A moment of fear quickly shifted to mellowed surprise, curiosity. He’d never spoken into your mind before, hadn’t meant to do so now. But you still shifted, your eyes slowly coasting across the room until you caught sight of him on the couch.

A shock of electricity shot down his spine as you made eye contact, his hands tightening over his thighs in reaction. Unsure exactly what to do, he settled for projecting again. Slithered his way into your ears and settled a respectful distance from the area he’d never been brave enough to venture. Sorry, he offered with a wince, didn’t mean to.

What he didn’t expect was the utter flood of feeling that hit him next. Like a drip of warm honey settling into the space between his hips, pooling there in a subtle swirl as the warmth from it started to diffuse outward. You realized you’d been staring and your eyes flit away, but the feeling didn’t cease. In fact, it only got stronger. Your lower lip caught on your teeth as you shifted between your feet. Things that would be completely normal to see, wouldn’t have anyone looking twice, but Eddie could. Your desire. The want that poured from you like water when your eyes first met his.

Was this the first time? Had something changed between you and him? Or had he just never caught on before?

The ants beneath his skin began to vibrate as he narrowed in on the feeling, on you. Like the part of him that had slithered into your thoughts was now bearing down, digging in for purchase, wanting to stay awhile and feed on this new feeling, what you were offering. It didn’t even occur to him what he was doing, how invasive it might be, how wrong he normally would have felt. All he knew is that it felt like licking at the thing he’d been craving for so long and he was helpless to chase after it.

Sweetheart. It came easy as breathing now, teeth sunk into your consciousness from where you stood across the room. You whirled on him again, another flood of warmth hitting him deep as you leaned your hip against the counter you were standing next to and focused on him. What’s got you so worked up?

He couldn’t even consider how bold he was suddenly being, the fear that he might ruin this friendship well out of his grasp. Especially when your embarrassment spiked along with the want, the pool of warmth now suddenly coming to life to have a heartbeat of its own. Your eyes widened, shifting on your feet again as you broke eye contact. It only took a few moments before you couldn’t help but look back at him again. The buzzing settled further, now like a purr beneath his skin. It was bearable as long as you kept your eyes on him.

You wanna do something about it?

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thanks for reading, please reblog and leave a comment if you liked it!

[contemplatingoutlander]

That the Editorial Board of the premier U.S. newspaper of record is finally warning about Donald Trump is significant. As such, this is a gift 🎁 link so that those who want to read the entire editorial can do so, even if they don't subscribe to The New York Times. Below are some excerpts:

As president, [Trump] wielded power carelessly and often cruelly and put his ego and his personal needs above the interests of his country. Now, as he campaigns again, his worst impulses remain as strong as ever — encouraging violence and lawlessness, exploiting fear and hate for political gain, undermining the rule of law and the Constitution, applauding dictators — and are escalating as he tries to regain power. He plots retribution, intent on eluding the institutional, legal and bureaucratic restraints that put limits on him in his first term. Our purpose at the start of the new year, therefore, is to sound a warning. Mr. Trump does not offer voters anything resembling a normal option of Republican or Democrat, conservative or liberal, big government or small. He confronts America with a far more fateful choice: between the continuance of the United States as a nation dedicated to “the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity” and a man who has proudly shown open disdain for the law and the protections and ideals of the Constitution. [...] It is instructive in the aftermath of that administration to listen to the judgments of some of these officials on the president they served. John Kelly, a chief of staff to Mr. Trump, called him the “most flawed person I’ve ever met,” someone who could not understand why Americans admired those who sacrificed their lives in combat. Bill Barr, who served as attorney general, and Mark Esper, a former defense secretary, both said Mr. Trump repeatedly put his own interests over those of the country. Even the most loyal and conservative of them all, Vice President Mike Pence, who made the stand that helped provoke Mr. Trump and his followers to insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, saw through the man: “On that day, President Trump also demanded that I choose between him and the Constitution,” he said.

[See more under the cut.]

There will not be people like these in the White House should Mr. Trump be re-elected. The former president has no interest in being restrained, and he has surrounded himself with people who want to institutionalize the MAGA doctrine. According to reporting by the Times reporters Maggie Haberman, Charlie Savage and Jonathan Swan, Mr. Trump and his ideological allies have been planning for a second Trump term for many months already. Under the name Project 2025, one coalition of right-wing organizations has produced a thick handbook and recruited thousands of potential appointees in preparation for an all-out assault on the structures of American government and the democratic institutions that acted as checks on Mr. Trump’s power. [...] Mr. Trump has made clear his conviction that only “losers” accept legal, institutional or even constitutional constraints. He has promised vengeance against his political opponents, whom he has called “vermin” and threatened with execution. This is particularly disturbing at a time of heightened concern about political violence, with threats increasing against elected officials of both parties. He has repeatedly demonstrated a deep disdain for the First Amendment and the basic principles of democracy, chief among them the right to freely express peaceful dissent from those in power without fear of retaliation, and he has made no secret of his readiness to expand the powers of the presidency, including the deployment of the military and the Justice Department, to have his way. [...] Re-electing Mr. Trump would present serious dangers to our Republic and to the world. This is a time not to sit out but instead to re-engage. We appeal to Americans to set aside their political differences, grievances and party affiliations and to contemplate — as families, as parishes, as councils and clubs and as individuals — the real magnitude of the choice they will make in November.

I encourage people to use the above gift link and read the entire article.

[edited]

[charliehoennam]

A/N: fulfilling @j23r23's request made here. Happy reminder that requests are open!!

Summary: Alfie comes homes late at night and finds his pregnant wife sleeping on the couch and confesses his fear to his unborn child

Pairing: Alfie Solomons x F!reader

Warning: sexual connotations towards the end, language, pregnancy themes

SHARING IS CARING, SO PLEASE REBLOG

Alfie was never one to be easily scared. He had a tough upbringing and, being the man of the house to his two older sisters, Rebecca and Debora, and their divorced mother, he had to grow up fast.

His father had left before Alfie was even born, leaving his son to become the only man of the house.

Sure, his mother was quite the mama bear herself. But there had always been resentment from Alfie towards his unacquainted father for leaving his mother to fend for her children on her own.

Alfie vowed that, if he ever became a father, he would support and help the mother of his child however he could, no matter how unconventional.

You felt like the luckiest woman in the world to be married to him. Alfie was nothing like most men. Most men would participate very little in these affairs, believing them to be limited only to women, but not Alfie. And if anyone dissed him for it, he'll tell those cowards to fuck right off because he wouldn't leave you alone in one of the most painful moments of your life.

It wasn't very common for you either. Part of you was so worried about just having him present for the birth. You worried he wouldn't want to go anywhere near you after it - obviously after you've healed - or have another child.

"Love, after the war I've seen, there is no amount of blood that can scare me away. Now, I won't pry if you don't want me to, of course. I'll respect whatever boundaries you have. But I would like to be there to hold your hand at the very least," he'd say.

He was hellbent on getting you all the best doctors and only the most experienced midwives to assist with pregnancy and the labor.

He didn't avoid making love to you because you were pregnant. It surprisingly turned him him on, made him certain about getting a baby back into you as soon as he could.

Every night, he came home to you with your favorite sweet and treated you to a warm bath together entitled to a foot rub and back rub just before bed.

Every afternoon, he'd meet you exactly at 3 when the weather wasn't too sunny or cold for a walk around the square or the block.

Every morning, once it became harder for you to bend over, he'd kneel down every time to get your heels on for you and compliment how beautiful you looked.

Regardless of the arguments you'd have, he was always consistent with his help. It didn't matter how he felt, he put his feelings aside as he reminded himself that they were nothing compared to the human growing in your body.

Your unborn child had reminded him of his sisters struggles during their terms. Crying over their husbands' affairs, neglected and alone, desperately wondering how they would raise the child. He was only a boy at the time, but he made sure to remember their names.

Once older and stronger, he tracked down all the men responsible for breaking his sisters' hearts and punished them with a beat-down they'd never forget. He considered offing them, but he figured the very least they could do is provide financial support. So, before they could even speak right or breathe through a healed nose, he put them into jobs his contacts proposed especially to him in order to keep a close on them.

That was simply Alfie's nature. Protective and vengeful.

Despite barely having to lift a finger for anything ever since Alfie hired an entire team to assist you, your body still felt exhausted and heavy from the weight of the growing baby in your belly.

You found yourself sat on the couch with Cyril snoring peacefully at your feet, warmed by the crackling fireplace before you.

You wanted to lie in your bed and rest your swollen feet in the comfortable warmth of your cotton linens, but Alfie still wasn't home. You worried when he got home late.

It took one look at the winding wooden stairs to convince you to swing your legs up on the couch, stretching them over the plush cushions.

Closing the heavy book in your hand, you tucked it snug between your side and the back of the couch for a quick shut-eye.

When Alfie arrived home, he tried to be as quiet as possible. He wasn't sure if you'd gone to bed, but he did know you had trouble sleeping without him. Your limited sleep positions were nothing as comfortable as snuggling up to his side.

Locking the door, he hung up his coat and hat. Just before he could make it to the first step of the stairs, he heard Cyril's snoring coming from the living room. That's when he noticed the light radiating from the fireplace, dancing against your skin as you slept soundly.

He stood in the door watching you for a moment, basking in the image of your sleeping frame. The warmth of the fireplace could not compete with of that which spread through his chest.

Alfie smiled to himself as he gazed upon you, his eyes admiring every crevice and hair on your face. The line of your nose, the eyelashes you'd bat at him, the shape of your lips and the faint curve of your smile lines. He loved knowing he'd been the main cause of those particularly.

But, as his gaze moved down to your protruding belly, he was reminded how close the day was. He wondered how the months flew by so fast.

He felt like he had so much time to prepare for fatherhood, but he felt just as hopeless as when you first told him about the baby.

Stepping into the living room, he walked over quietly to join Cyril on the floor in front of the couch.

He stared into the fireplace as cyril shifted to rest his head on Alfie's lap - his laziest greeting yet.

Alfie sat on one side, leaving his opposite leg bent to rest his arm over his knee. Your belly was just inches away.

Moving his gaze back your clothed bump, he sighed heavily.

"You know, I never met my father, right," he whispered to the unborn child. "I think it's wise you know that now, 'fore you come out. Didn't have one growing up, see? So I 'avent got the slightest idea of how to be one."

Lured from your nap by Alfie's voice, you slowly blinked your eyes open. Although Alfie's head of hair was all you saw, you realized he wasn't talking to you and he couldn't see you were awake.

Eavesdropping wasn't very polite, but you couldn't help yourself. You didn't want to stop him, but hearing him to the baby in you was quite heartwarming so you decided to let Alfie have a bonding moment of his own.

"Truth is you got me downright scared," he continued. "Even after months, I still am downright terrified and you ain't even 'ere yet... I know it's a lot to ask, yeah, especially since you're still in there, blissfully unaware of the horrors of the world. But I give you my word I'll try my best to be the best for you and your mum. I hope you can understand that even when you decide to hate me whenever I give you an earful. Though I doubt I can do it. Think your mum will have to sort you out," he mumbled with a playful smirk. "I'll try my best for you, yeah? I just hope it's enough."

Alife's smirk faded as she gazed at your belly. He felt pathetic, venting to an unborn child as if that would solve all his problems. Alfie hated admitted, and he would never admit it to anyone but you, but he was terrified of becoming a father.

You didn't blame him; you had your own fears as well, so you could understand why this precious and fragile life had him so frightened.

He still hadn't noticed you were awake or that you had heard his confession. Until you lifted a hand to stroke the hair on the back of his head.

" 'eard all that, did ya?"

He didn't exactly blush, but he did feel warmth racing around his face with embarrassment.

"You're going to be a great father, Alfie" you answered. "I know you're scared. I'm scared too. But as long as we're together and we have each other, we can get through anything."

"Yeah, I know, love," Alfie nodded and sighed. He hated talking about his emotions, even if it was to the only person he could trust blindly. "I just don't want to be a disappointment like my father, if you could even call 'im that much."

"You won't be, and I'll tell you why. You're nothing like him," you smiled, carding your fingers through his brown locks. "You're a good man, Alf. I know you do what you have to do out there, but what matters to me is the man you are in here. And in here, you're a good man. And I wouldn't want to be carrying anyone's child. I'm honored to be the mother of our babe."

"You really mean that?" he smiled trying to look over his shoulder at you, as far as his neck - and age - allowed.

"Every word. You're worried enough to ask your sisters and the midwives for help, Alf. Not many men care to even worry about that sorta thing."

"I'm not like most men," he smirked feeling a sense of pride. "How'd you know about that though?"

"Becca told me you been meeting her for tea every week for advice."

"I fucking knew it. I knew she'd blabber off to you," he chuckled shyly.

"It's nothing to ashamed of, love. I actually find your level of concern and willingness to help in whichever way extremely attractive," you smirked stroking the sensitive skin on his neck with your finger.

"Do you now?" He grinned mischievously knowing exactly where this was headed. One of the perks that came with your pregnancy, in the later stages of it, was the sharp peak of sexual desires.

There were no more worries about you getting pregnant - too late for that now - and seeing your belly swollen, with his child that he put inside you, only made him wish he could put more and more.

"I think I like where this is headed."

[shantechni]

I think an awful lot about Splinter believing in the start of the series that he'd lost his humanity.

For the sake of someone named Pete, I will go through the events in chronological order for once-

In Lone Rat and Cubs, Splinter tells the turtles about their time spent running from the Kraang before they found their forever home, and we learn that Splinter didn't easily slip into his new role. Sure, he cared for the turtles, kept them fed and sheltered them from the elements, but he still called them "creatures" and "turtles" before naming them. He didn't see this as an opportunistic situation where he miraculously became a father to a second batch of kids, but rather that he'd fallen into a pool of misfortune and would need to live with this new form while protecting himself and the turtles.

"What terrible deed did I do in a past life that such a curse has befallen me?"

As he considers the turtles' growth and the possibility of a future with them, he then begins to view himself as a potential father. He explains that he wondered if he had the discipline to be a proper father, especially after the loss of his first family, and he realizes it was something he wanted to be regardless of discipline or odd circumstances.

And so, he claims the turtles as his own, and accepts his role as their father.

Though he'd grown accustomed to being a mutant rat over the years, he still draws a line between "Hamato Yoshi" and "Splinter" without knowing it, albeit a blurry and ephemeral one drawn in ever changing sand.

We hear Splinter in the second episode of the series talking about the loss of his family, his home, and his own name. He more or less tells Leo that being mutated erased whatever connection he formally had to the name "Hamato," and the idea is further supported by a similar and more somber scene in I, Monster. Splinter fights off the Rat King's control as he again laments that his entire clan and family, even his humanity, is gone, and he has nothing but the turtles left for him in this new life. Fortunately, he retains his sense of self post mutation, and he's presented from the beginning of the series as one who's in control of himself, both to his sons and friends of theirs, as well as any enemy that comes their way.

However, that presentation of control gives us a bit of a look into his psyche and allows us to consider the idea of him still struggling to come to terms with not being human anymore.

With the introduction of the Rat King, he's taunted by a potential loss of that control for the first time and it shakes him to his core. It makes sense for him to be shaken up since all that'd be left without him is a mindless, humanoid rat who'd lost touch with the human it used to be. Which is why it's so compelling that his sons, particularly Leo, are so adamant about reinforcing the fact that his mutation doesn't erase who he is. It's incredibly noteworthy what Leo says to him when trying to break the Rat King's control over him, "Remember who you are!"

Not who he once was, or the human he used to be, but who he is.

They never viewed Splinter as a separate being from Hamato Yoshi.

The boys aren't strangers to Splinter's old life before them, and they're very much aware of everything he'd lost; the guy talks about certain things frequently enough for them to know his tragedies and recite them without skipping a letter. It's his recollections of the tribulations he suffered through that helped them understand that his life with them is undeniably disconnected from his life with Tang Shen, but not unrelated.

He's still Hamato Yoshi, and his place will always be with his family.

Having been defeated by Splinter, the Rat King runs to find another way of tormenting him, and his perfect target is fear.

Though we got a brief look into this during their first encounter with Falco's twisted appearance, it's not until Of Rats and Men that we get further insight into another layer of Splinter's concern with his rat half: the repercussions that could result from the loss of control.

Throughout all of his years of raising his sons, not once did he ever treat them with the intention to frighten them and make them wary of his every move. The Rat King can easily use that fear to his advantage and weaken Splinter's mental stability enough to figure out how to make mutants similar to him. And he truly makes use of that fear by turning Splinter into his personal puppet.

There's still a considerable amount of concern on the turtles' end that pierces through that fear though. After Splinter teleports across the room to distance himself, Leo looked ready to leap to his side, and the others, despite being threatened literal seconds earlier, remain where they are and are equally concerned.

Eventually, the Rat King strikes again and everyone begins to piece together what's going on when Splinter loses it. Mikey is absolutely terrified and staggered by what happened, and Raph and Donnie tread with caution while Leo and April are the first ones to approach Splinter.

The TV gives them extra confirmation that Falco is back, and to everyone's surprise, Splinter refuses to help them fight Falco, even when Casey is dragged down a manhole by one of the mutated rats in their first attempt to clear the streets. It's not an easy choice for Splinter to make because we see how guilty he feels for his refusal, but the gang doesn't fault him for refusing either. No matter how much they want for Splinter to join them, he's right to worry about what the Rat King, now stronger than before, could force him to do.

April speaks for everyone though when she tells him they all believe in him. They make it known that they aren't afraid of what may happen, and they especially aren't afraid of him.

Unsurprisingly, Splinter changes his mind at the last minute, and, with the help of a recently mutated cat, he chases Falco down to deal with him once and for all. Protecting his family takes priority over his doubts, and by the end of the episode, he overcomes his fear of the Rat King controlling him.

He has his humanity, and that's what makes him different from the rat Falco constantly made him out to be.

And for the first time in the series, in The Lonely Mutation of Baxter Stockman, he says out loud that he has his humanity and is thankful he's fortunate enough to still have it when others lose it post mutation.

I previously went a bit more in depth about it in this post but the boys have witnessed Splinter grappling with being a rat, particularly with the Rat King's meddling, and Donnie sincerely believed giving him retromutagen would be something he'd want. This was clearly an idea that's been weighing on Donnie's mind for a while considering that he seemingly kept quiet about his plan until he completed the retromutagen, and he's the most upset when he has to use the remaining dosage for Kirby.

But Splinter tells him and the other turtles he's content as he is and wouldn't do anything to change himself this far in. And the boys all seem content with his answer.

With the invasion of the Kraang and his defeat at the hands of the Shredder, Splinter again comes face to face with his mutated genes, and there's no Rat King stringing him along this time. He'd been swallowed by delirium with the lack of familial support to pull him out of it, and he became spiritually disconnected from his body as a result. The gang is initially caught off guard by Splinter's state, but they quickly get over it and work to subdue him.

While the boys are pulled away into battle, April uses her powers to sift through Splinter's memories and, after showing him the time he asked her to train with him, we see a memory with the turtles, Karai, and his only family portrait from before his mutation:

Seeing his family is what manages to bring him back to his senses.

We the audience, as well as Splinter, figured that was the end of his troubles with being a mutant rat, but Shredder decided to bathe in some super juice and sent Splinter careening a thousand feet into a dark cavern, the same one Splinter sent Falco down two seasons ago. Being thrown into near total darkness with a fairly debilitating injury and fever was the perfect recipe for him to begin hallucinating, and he believes the Rat King is attacking him when he's most vulnerable. But just when he feels himself slipping further away, his mind goes straight to the day his sons celebrated their 15th mutation day, and just beyond them is Tang Shen.

He regains his clarity, grasps that Falco's been dead the whole time, and is immensely relieved to see Donnie and Mikey after what he'd been through.

"Perhaps a teacher, but never my master."

Falco inadvertently taught Splinter that he's always had his humanity, and his family serves as a reminder of that fact by remaining a constant and significant pillar for him.

His family is his humanity.

[pecanwriter]

Big Boy Mode: Activated

Themes: rapid weight gain, humiliation kink, technology-induced weight gain (so like, magic weight gain but for sci fi nerds I guess)

Words: 2947

Part: 1/?

"Hello, sir, would you like to hear about our newest product, the most revolutionary nanotechnology to date?"

Elliott really wasn't one to ever let some marketing lackey torment him with semi-logical babble about something he didn't even want to buy. But he was a technology whore, and just the mere mention of nanotechnology had him nearly salivating at the mouth.

He smiled at the promoter, stepping closer and trying to look at all the flashing screens at once. 

"Introducing SimNano or Simulator Nano. This revolutionary technology is the newest hit in terms of body augmentation and we're making record sales all around the globe."

The promoter pulled something from his pad to one of the screens. 

"The way this works, we inject nanobots into your body and connect their signature to your personalised control panel as well as a wristband, the wristband sold separately." 

He watched as on the screen a scrawny shirtless man selected a holographic projection of his body and added 50% more muscle to the model. He clicked "Active Mode" at the bottom of the screen and for a moment his entire body rippled in an unfamiliar way until he stood there completely buffed out, Captain America style.

Elliott blinked. He looked from the freshly buffed-out man to the promoter.

"How does that work?"

"The nanobots we inject into the client's system are capable of replication and imitation of any human tissue. However, they are only capable of growing, not shrinking, it's not a diet pill as many would hope so." The promoter laughed at his own poor joke.

Elliot chuckled obligingly but the phrase "they are only capable of growing" was bouncing around in his head trying to make him hard. 

"Is there a limit to what they can imitate? For example, if someone was missing a leg…?" He chose his words carefully, hoping the man would fall for his set-up and tell him exactly what he wanted.

The man's gaze flickered down to Elliot's leg and although Elliot had no such thing, he let the man assume he had a prosthetic. It was an unassuming lie, didn't hurt anyone, it was just better than even a sliver of the truth.

"Oh, they're absolutely capable of replicating a leg. As I said, they can imitate any human tissue, muscles, nerves, fat, even bones…"

When he said the f-word Elliot's cock jerked awake and he had to cover his crotch with the shopping bag he was holding.

"And are the changes permanent…?"

"No, that's not how it works, It's imitating and replicating the tissue in Active Mode, but as soon as it's Deactivated everything goes back to normal."

Elliot's cock was throbbing as he fought to maintain perfectly normal eye contact with the promoter.

"And while it's active, does it feel real or is it like a hologram or a model or…"

"Oh no, It feels absolutely real, that's why we are the leading company in…"

He prattled on but Elliot didn't listen, all he could think of was the phrase "it's only capable of growing" as his cock throbbed.

"How much is it?"

It was bloody expensive, as it turned out. Elliott put a sizable dent in the savings he was putting away to get a mortgage on a single-bedroom flat. But somehow, all he felt was excitement, there was no shame or regret to be found anywhere.

After he made his purchases he had to go to their branch store and get injected with nanobots. The syringe wasn't that big and he wondered if it would be enough firepower for what he had in mind. They scanned his body thoroughly to put the model into his pad and wristband and connect the nanobots to it. As a trial, the shopping clerk showed him how to give himself impressive biceps and everyone present at the shop oohed and awed at the result. 

The promoter was right, it felt absolutely real. The rippling Sensation Elliott saw in the video felt only like a slight cold tingling under his skin and then within seconds the impressive biceps appeared.

He deactivated his SimNano, thanked the clerk and left, struggling to walk straight with his dick pressing hard against his trousers.

When he came home he almost immediately tore off his shirt. He brought out the control panel on the band with shaking hands and clicked on the scrawny little model of himself. He moved his finger around, highlighting his midriff and ass. He clicked "expand" and then in the tissue subcategory he clicked "fat" instead of the pre-selected "muscle". You could put the desired amounts in body percentages or in units of measurement. He clicked on lbs, the most precise one, and tapped in 20(9kg). Then after a moment's hesitation, he erased it and clicked 40lb(18kg) instead.

With shaking fingers he clicked "Active Mode" and his skin began to tingle with the cold sensation. Seconds later Elliott was staring down at a round, fat gut and he could feel his boxers strain mercilessly against his expanded ass. 

He put the pad away gently and grabbed the ball of flab at his front. He was never this fat in his life, but it felt real enough, from what he could guess. He lifted the stomach and let it drop, watching it jiggle and wobble. A moan escaped him. He couldn't believe this was happening. 

Before even getting a look in the mirror Elliott fell to the couch, frantically gnawing his flesh with one hand and stroking his cock with the other. He never came this hard in his entire life. 

He finally managed to pull himself up into standing, revelling in how his gut was suddenly in the way and looked in the mirror. 

He laughed, the effect was ridiculous. Although his belly and ass looked fantastic and absolutely realistic, it looked ludicrous on his scrawny body which remained unchanged.

Elliott deactivated the band and reset the model. After a moment’s hesitation, he selected his entire body “Increase by 100% body mass” and selected “fat” in the tissue category. He considered carefully and finally decided to increase his ass and gut separately on top of increasing the fat equally around his entire body. 

Elliott’s finger hovered over the band, but before clicking the Activate button he checked the measurement box again and changed 100% to 200lb. Again, before clicking it, he wavered and finally ended up changing it to 300lb(136kg) with sweaty fingers. Adding 300lb to his meagre 132lb(60kg) would put him at a glorious 432lb(195kg), a fulfilment of a fantasy Elliott had since before he was even consciously aware of it. 

Eliott pressed the Activate button.

He was still standing in front of the mirror and he let out a gasp as the nanobots went to work, making his entire body shiver with the unfamiliar coldness, the feeling much more overwhelming with tasking them to simulate 300lb instead of a measly 40 he attempted at first. 

Elliott watched with intense, nearly blinding fascination as his body rippled slightly and moments later exploded into folds and bulges and rolls, becoming an unrecognisable mountain of flesh. He stared at the enormous gut, too heavy to be completely round as it hung in front of him almost like a massive, engorged flesh apron. His face was unrecognisable, swallowed by an enormous double chin and chubby cheeks, melting into the fat around his neck seamlessly. The man in the mirror couldn’t be him, could he? It was too good to be real… The fat man lifted his arm as Elliott lifted his, only his arm never had an enormous wing of fat hanging off it and jiggling as he moved. When Elliott moved his normal arm it didn’t send his entire massive body into wobbles, but the man in the mirror sure wobbled like an impressive jello dessert. 

Elliott grabbed his gut, an enormous, almost all-encompassing mound of flesh hanging in front of him. He grabbed it, lifted it as much as he could and dropped it. The way the flesh shook and jiggled forced a moan out of him. Already half-hard again, he inched closer to the mirror. Elliott could barely move under the unknown sensation of this immense bulk and he almost stumbled into his mirror, nearly crushing it. Just the half step made his heart race with excursion and his lungs begged for air. 

This SimNano thing was worth every penny, in fact, Elliott thought they were losing money. It was too good to be real. 

He turned off Active Mode, in a few seconds staring back at this familiar skinny self with an impressive hard-on. 

Staring intently, eager to catch every little detail, he pressed Activate again. 

Watching his body explode with fat, filling out with blubber in mere seconds and leaving him unrecognisable was so impossibly erotic that he climaxed just from turning the SimNano off and on again, watching himself gain hundreds of pounds in seconds. 

After he managed to somehow climax three times within the span of an hour he decided it was enough for one day, he was starting to feel light-headed. 

He tapped Deactivate. 

Nothing happened. 

He tapped it again. Still, nothing.

He stared at the band, but it appeared to be frozen. Frantically, he started waddling unsteadily to his backpack where the main SimNano pad was. Walking across the room to his bag while suddenly 300lb heavier was incredibly difficult and equally, if not more, arousing. His giant thighs were rubbing against each other, he could feel he was hitting his enormous apron of a gut with each clumsy step… The enormous behind he’d given himself jiggled with every step and so did his soft, blubbery tits. 

When he finally made it to his back and retrieved his pad Elliott was nearly ready to collapse with how out of breath he was. 

The pad was as frozen as the band was. 

“Fuck.” He whispered, looking into the mirror across the room. He was enormous, there was no way he could leave the house like this and he had a night shift at the bar today. 

It was 5 p.m., and he had work at 8, so technically, he still had time. He could just… Indulge for a while while waiting for the SimNano to unfreeze. 

Elliott laboriously waddled to the bedroom. He had a few pieces of massive clothing he sometimes wore while stuffing it with pillows and pretending he was huge. He pulled on a pair of tracksuit trousers. They could barely encompass his enormous ass. Even the biggest of his secret fetish shirts was snug on him now and his monstrous gut was happily hanging out at the bottom. 

The flat needed tidying up and he also had to cook to have something to eat after his shift when he would undoubtedly be too tired to do anything. 

He began busying himself around the house, every little chore making him hornier than the last one. Everything was a thrill, trying to wipe dust off the higher shelves and feeling how his enormous gut was hanging further and further out of his shirt, trying to wash dishes and finding that he could barely reach into the sink with the enormous mound of blubber in the front of him. When he went to clean the plastic shower door, something that he meant to do all week, he nearly got stuck in the narrow space and instead of trying to find the best angle to free himself he rubbed against the shower wall, making himself cum just with the friction against his fat body. He would’ve jerked himself off if the was any hope of reaching his penis under all that flesh, which there absolutely wasn’t.

With all the chores completed and with food prepped for later, Elliott went to check on the pad. It was still frozen. It was 7.20 pm.

He called in sick and trying not to freak out about it just yet he repositioned the mirror closer to the couch where he planted his enormous ass and began rubbing his flesh. 

There was no need to freak out, he was sure the NanoSim would reset overnight. 

*

Elliott woke up still on the couch and still as enormous as when he drifted off, exhausted by the almost constant sexual tension of the previous day. 

He tapped the band. Frozen. The pad proved to be in a similar state. 

Elliott tried calling the NanoSim Technical Support but they told him that there was nothing they could do remotely because there were health hazards involved, so he would have to come to one of their stores to get it reset. 

Which meant… Going outside as a 432lb man. 

Elliott ate his modest breakfast of a skinny man and wondered how it would look to an outsider, a guy who was nearly half-tone of blubber eating a modest portion of oatmeal. 

Before leaving the house he pulled on a beanie and didn’t shave his unimpressive stubble. There was no way anyone would recognise him, but he still didn’t want to risk it. 

His heart was pounding so hard that it was all he could hear as Elliott stepped out into the hallway. 

Usually, Elliott just took the stairs from the second floor he lived on, but there was no way he was going to take the stairs today, he could barely move with all that unfamiliar weight on him, his waddle almost a caricature of itself. 

There was a lady in the lift and when the doors opened she frantically looked between Elliott and the lift control panel informing all the passengers that the weight limit was 500lb. She was slim, but there was no way she was less than 100lb. 

“You go on” Elliott smiled at her and she pressed the button to close the door almost frantically. 

He wasn’t sure if he actually WAS 432lb or if the nanobots just made it appear so to him, but he wasn’t going to risk it. 

There was an Uber waiting for him, but Elliott had to cancel the ride when it turned out that he couldn’t fit in the car. 

With his dick painfully hard and trapped between mounds of flesh he selected a different ride, making sure it was big enough to accommodate for a massive hog like him. He barely fit and his gut filled his lap completely. The driver was visibly disgusted and Elliott’s already painfully hard dick throbbed under his apron belly. 

Waddling and puffing his way through the shopping centre to the SimNano store was the most humiliating and gratifying experience of his life. Everyone, without exception, stared at the giant man barely waddling his way through the halls, his too-small shirt riding up his enormous gut and his face flushed with the effort of putting all that blubber into motion. 

When he finally made it to the store he was heaving, his breath rasping and his entire body sticky with sweat. 

The only person in the store was the clerk, a teak-skinned man with a mop of black curls and bright, quick eyes. He was very much Elliott’s type and the fact that he had to talk to a handsome guy while his enormous gut hung out of his shirt and he was so out of breath was arousing beyond all reason. 

“Hello, I’m Omar, how can I help you?” 

“Hi, I… uff.. Sorry… I have a problem with my SimNano, the program froze last night and it’s still frozen.” He handed the man his pad, still trying to catch his breath. 

“Let’s see here…” Omar took his pad from him and when he saw the program the SimNano was frozen on he slowly looked back up at Elliott, his lips stretching into a mischievous grin. Elliott felt like his entire face was on fire. Somehow it didn’t dawn on him that the clerk would see the program he was running. If he could, he’d bolt it out of the store in embarrassment, but he couldn’t, not when he was this massive. 

“Let me just do some troubleshooting here.” Omar said, his smirk still on his face as he plugged the device into a PC and started clicking. 

“Alright,” he said a few minutes later. “It looks like I got it, but let me just check…” 

“What…”

Elliott watched with growing terror as Omar proceeded to add another 50lb(22kg) to his program and activating it. Elliott staggered back, feeling his gut hanging marginally lower, the waistband of his tracksuit digging just that much deeper into his blubber. 

“Just to double check, better to be sure.” Omar said, adding another 50 on top of that. 

Elliott had to grab onto the counter as the enormous weight started to threaten to topple him to the ground. He was heaving just from the sheer effort of standing up.

Omar’s cheeky grin was turning downright mischievous. 

“I think it’s working now.” the clerk said, bringing the program down to its original +300lb setting. 

“T-thank you…” Elliott panted, taking his pad back and thanking all the Gods that his gut hid his erection. 

As he was waddling back to the entrance Omar’s voice stopped him in his tracks.

“Ey, fat boy.” 

That nickname alone nearly made Elliott give an ungainly moan, right there in the middle of the shopping centre.

“Y-yes?” “Give me your number, I write NanoSim codes in my spare time and big improvement to the overall experience. I mean…. Huge improvements.” 

Omar’s grin was pure evil and Elliott was sure his own was no better as he gave the handsome man his number.

This was going to be fun. 

PART 2

[heartfullofleeches]

Hybrid Cafe Yans

A list of the hybrid yans since it's been a minute-. The first name is their real name and the second is the nicknames reader has given them. The only exclusions are Saber and Wistera who haven't been nicknamed yet, and Doc and Trick who have never been official named

Saber [he/him] - Model/Influencer Catboy who got saved from the ran by Cafe reader on their first shift. Very snobby and feels entitled to most if not all of reader's time being their first customer

Clyde/Spot [he/him] - A lonely delivery rabbit. Shy and Sweet. Bounced around in the foster care system as a child and has severe abandonment issues steaming from it which later on resulted in him dying his fur white to be more appealing to others. His nickname comes from Reader finding a spot on his ear since it had been a while since his last dye job

Shanna/Bo [She/Her] - Reader's sheep girl coworker. Extremely clumsy and timid, but also plays up the act to lean on reader's shoulder. The daughter of a local club owner who is still coming to terms with her recent coming out.

Pauline/Belle [She/Her] - The ex head chef at the cafe. A hot headed cow woman with a soft spot for reader who's what keeps her crawling back to the city from her cozy new life on her farm

Robbie/Honey [They/Them] - A bumble bee who as their name implies is sweet as can be..... on the surface. Robbie is one of if not the most willing to beat others into submission for Reader. Their mother is the head of a massive company who gifted them the entire apartment complex they live in. Later moves Reader into one of them who pays next to nothing for rent

Trick [They/Them] - A tired Crow enjoying early retirement/hiatus from their work. Greatly enjoys relaxing with a cup of tea and gifting reader presents from the various regions they've traveled to over the years. Works as a teacher as a secondary occupation which slowly drains them as it reminds them of the empty nest they have at home

Asher/Prince [he/him] - Hyperactive Hyena boy ready and willing to throw hands for reader. Their kindness helped him get over his fear of humans after years of bullying for having a human father and a shorter stature because of it, and being wrongfully arrested when attacked by bullies and choosing to fight back

Wisteria [She/Her] - Plant woman of unknown origin. Owns a flower shop not too far from the cafe and supplies it with bouquets for their displays which she uses to eavesdrop on reader. Soft spoken and formal

Doc [They/Them] - Leech Hybrid med student. Extremely giggly and carefree. Always tries to give Reader check ups which certainly aren't ploys to obtain vials of their sweet, sweet blood. Has difficults walking on land and wears leg braces for the weak muscles in their legs

Scout/Bear [he/him] - Wolf hybrid. Doesn't like to talk much about himself, but lived with his grandmothers and dogs in the wilderness before they all passed away. Stoic and grouchy, but weak to soft praise and touches

The manager - A deer hybrid mentioned briefly in the Christmas special. Not much to them now, but I'd really like to use them eventually

[levithestripper]

Misc. Peeta Mellark Headcanons

warnings: fluff, gender-neutral reader.

length: 1k || read on ao3 || join my taglist

notes: just a lil something to help me get back into the swing of things after not writing for a while! hope you enjoy ’em, even though it’s a bit short.

Never hesitates to give you his jacket or sweater if he sees you’re cold. He pretends not to notice that the clothes he gives you never return to his closet.

When he kisses you, he always cups your face in his hands, thumbs stroking your cheekbones.

You had no idea just how much one person could bake before you met him. It seems like you get a new baked good every other day. Cupcakes, themed cakes, loaves of sourdough bread, muffins, pasta, you name it, and it’s probably on his list to bake for you.

Peeta loves teaching you how to draw/paint!! He’ll sit outside with you on a nice day and walk you through how to draw a frog or something else simple. By sunset, both papers are filled edge to edge with stick frogs, flowers, hearts, and sad-looking deer. Peeta dates both sheets and leaves cute little notes next to some of your drawings for you to find later.

Most of his own paintings are of you. Some are posed, and some are candid. The candid ones are Peeta’s favorite. You get his favorite portrait framed as a birthday present, and he nearly cries when he opens it. Before you could ask if he liked it, he kissed you, then kissed all over your face, where you both erupted with giggles.

This boy is so stupidly adorable it has to be some form of disease. You’ll catch him sitting across from you with a lovesick smile, his blond hair illuminated by the setting sun he loves so much. You tease him about it, making him blush, which only makes him all the cuter.

At the start of your relationship, Peeta had little self-worth/confidence in himself. He didn’t have much to offer you in terms of money or pretty clothes, but he soon realized you didn’t care about any of that. You like him for him, not for what you could gain from him.

If he’s forced to pick just one thing, Peeta’s favorite part about your body is your hands. Why’re they his favorite? Because that’s one of the main ways you show your love for him. Holding his hands, cupping his face, cooking meals, smoothing them across his chest, that kinda stuff.

He would hug you all day, every day, if he could. This man is a hugger to beat all huggers.

Peeta wants to start a family with you, whatever that family ends up looking like. Just you, him, and a few pets? A-okay with him. A child or two? Count him in! As long as Peeta gets to spend the rest of his life with you, he’s happy, no matter what it looks like.

Definitely uses pet names like “honey,” “sweetheart,” and “my love.”

This man never not has a smile on his face. You’ll catch him staring at you from his seat in the living room with the stupidest, lovesick grin spread across his features as he watches you do whatever it is you’re doing.

When Peeta plans on proposing, he organizes an entire day of fun activities for both of you. He knows exactly how he wants to propose: in a gazebo, hidden by the blanket of night, illuminated only by the mood lighting he set up the day before. But it never ends up happening. The two of you were dancing in the living room to your record player, nose to nose, pressed so close to one another he couldn’t tell where he ended and where you began. As he swayed, Peeta whispered, “will you marry me?” It wasn’t what he had planned, but the outcome was exactly what he had hoped.

He’s not the biggest partaker of PDA, but he’s not averse to it. He’ll hold your hand, kiss your cheek, that kinda stuff, but he won’t make it obvious or rub it in other people’s faces.

Peeta’s very hard to anger, so he’s great to vent to. He’ll always be up for listening to your problems and helping you fix them if that’s what you want. If you just need someone to listen and not try to resolve whatever you’re upset about, he’s perfect for that too.

Peeta starts a garden full of your favorite flowers. Once they grow tall and bloom, he picks them to make a bouquet for you.

At night, he has to be touching you in some way or form to be able to fall asleep. Holding hands, you sleeping on his chest, spooning, you name it. He needs to know you’re still there so he can allow himself to relax enough.

Peeta gets up before you, so he loves to wake you up with kisses. Rapid fire against your cheeks, forehead, nose, the palm of your hand, up your arm, basically anywhere he can reach.

When it comes to Valentine’s Day (objectively his favorite day, minus your anniversary), he surprises you with breakfast in bed and fresh homemade muffins. There are fresh-cut roses in a new vase on the dining room table, and the entire house is deep-cleaned from top to bottom. Lunch is a picnic under an old weeping willow tree, followed by cloud gazing. He cooked you your favorite meal, making enough for leftovers. Later, he gifts you a portrait he painted of you in secret. It showed you, facing away from the viewer, sitting on the porch swing, watching the sun set below the rolling hills of District 12. When it’s time for dinner, Peeta cooks a classic romantic meal: spaghetti with meatballs by candlelight. The day was the definition of perfect; everything he surprised you with made you fall in love with him all over again.

Throughout Valentine’s Day, Peeta kisses you almost every chance he can get. You look too damn beautiful not to kiss. You don’t look any different than yesterday, and you won’t look any different in the days to come, but none of that matters to him. Your beauty never fails to floor him, and today was no exception.

[beevean]

Continuing my quest on finding good Charlastor content and I keep having Thoughts :)

because most of said content was, understandably, made between the pilot and the beginning of the actual show. And it's not only noticeable by the insistence of having Charlie and Alastor bond through dancing (since in the pilot that's the scene where the two seem to be having genuinely fun with each other), but also because the "creepiest" works (for lack of a better term) do indeed paint Alastor as Charlie's puppeteer, as the one who will push her to the dark side and unlock her demonic potential.

Part of this is still canon. There's all the heavy handed manipulations in ep. 5 where he presents himself as a better father figure than Lucifer and as the only one Charlie should love and trust; and also... well, the everything in the scene in ep. 7 where he finally manages to strike a deal with her lmao.

(you sure are unusually touchy with her :^) )

And this damning line:

Yes, Alastor desperately wants to have a hold on Charlie's mind if not heart. Even after he admitted in the pilot that he doesn't believe in her cause, he wants her to see him as a trusty mentor. And while the pilot is outdated in certain aspects, I can almost see traces of this... possessiveness? in the way he kept pushing Vaggie away: he clearly doesn't like anyone threatening his authority, and in that moment, Vaggie and her mistrust were an obstacle in his objective to ingratiate himself with the Princess of Hell.

I also noticed that Alastor is willing to make deals that don't require owning a soul: he cares about being the one in control even if he doesn't gain anything material. He struck a little "deal" with Vaggie just to do things his way, and he struck a more serious (but still not soul-binding) deal with Charlie so that she could owe him one favor. Alastor very much cares about having the upper hand in any situation, even the smallest one.

But then ep. 8 came along. And we get the confirmation that Alastor is bound by a deal. He hates it. It "clips his wings". He clearly blames this deal for limiting his freedom and causing him to nearly die for the sake of his "friends".

Alastor may be more of a puppet than Charlie is, at the moment.

And if the theory that this deal is what is forcing Alastor to protect the hotel... Charlie may be the one holding the strings, without even knowing it. While Charlie is not the one who directly owns Alastor's soul, she might have power over him.

It doesn't help that Alastor, as much of a self-serving liar he is, really seems to like Charlie...

(He doesn't need to offer her his precious mic that seems to be the source of most of his power. She already owes him a favor, and was shown comfortable enough to talk to him about her personal issues. This is Alastor showing his trust in Charlie.)

(again, he doesn't need to say this to Rosie, who clearly thinks the world of him)

(yes, this is about the entire hotel. But my point still stands that it's more earnest than anything we usually see from him)

So now we have a puppet in the hands of an unknowing, kind puppeteer that he actually be mildly fond of... and he wants out of every constraint possible because he wants to pull the strings, damn it all! And he will do anything to gain mental leverage on the one he's been forced to serve!

And I think this is what makes the dynamic even more interesting than a straightforward "manipulator/victim" :)

[stealingyourbones]

Hello

I just finished reading the chemistry teacher Danny phantom post and saw you and your twin mention a really chaotic chemistry teacher you had

It's fine if not, but I was wondering if you had any more stories about that teacher?

They sounded really fun and I am now curious what other antics they got up to.

Sorry if I'm asking too much.

Oh no absolutely I can! That man was my chemistry teacher for two years and was my favorite teacher of all time.

Ok sO.

- The Fume Hood Incident (twin shall explain @bonebrokebuddy)

- making an absolute SHIT ton of thermite when we couldn’t inhale boron gas as our last chemistry club experiment. We initially wanted to melt a hole in a junk car with it but the dude who offered his car backed out :(

- did the “exploding gummy bear” experiment that made a lot of very toxic gas for shits and giggles. We had to stay in another teachers classroom for the next class period because the room had ventilate for a while.

- once burned some extra magnesium for fun DIRECTLY UNDER THE FIRE DETECTOR and made the entire school leave because the fire alarm got set off in the dead of winter. Things akin to this happened two more times.

- since the first incident, he found out how to TURN OFF the fire detectors in his room whenever he’s doing experiments involving fire. Evidently he failed twice in this exercise.

- self medicated ADHD with coffee and drank at least 3 pots of the stuff during school hours. He had his own coffee machine in the classroom. Once did a presentation on potency stuff and brought in espresso for the class to drink. That man drank a whole pot of it before the end of the school day.

- during said coffee drinking experiments, he broke his one mug he used and used a new beaker for 2 weeks until he bothered to get a new one. Rinse and repeat this exact scenario from the beginning of his teaching until he left.

- would buy pure chemical or whatever un watered down esque chemicals are and would lower the molar count himself because “he didn’t want to pay for water” and did it IN THE CLASS ROOM BY HIMSELF WITH NO FUME HOOD. (Chemistry terms are bad I haven’t had a chem class in 5 years)

- this man is now a college professor I think. Where he rightfully should be because there is no way the experiments we did with him were given a green light through the wavers we signed.

- he bought the school a blast shield with the rest of the chemistry club funds to encourage the next chem teacher to do more dangerous experiments. (They never did :( )

These are just annecdotes. If @bonebrokebuddy wants to add onto it they’re free to do so :)

[incorrectbatfam]

How do the Batfamily celebrate their birthday?

Dick: decorates the house with pictures of himself

Jason: comes up with new ways to piss Bruce off

Tim: plans his own surprise party

Damian: gives everyone a puppy as a party favor and then offers to be a long-term petsitter

Duke: hires a hype man to follow him around

Cullen: Supernatural marathon from start to finish

Stephanie: dedicates every karaoke song to herself

Cassandra: reenacts her birth

Barbara: hosts a Babs-themed trivia night

Harper: motor oil slip 'n slide

Carrie: makes everyone watch her eat an entire cake

Kate: pranks her old drill sergeant

Alfred: subtracts a year from his age

Selina: robs the house for her own presents

Bruce: gets a Batmobile cake (minus the wheels)

[em-writes-stuff-sometimes]

gevivys (beauty) │ Chapter 3: Delight

terms of endearment ‘verse: see my Masterlist for the correct series order!

Chapter 1 │Chapter 2 │Chapter 3 │Chapter 4 │Chapter 5 │Chapter 6 │Chapter 7 │Chapter 8 │Chapter 9 │Chapter 10 (COMPLETE!)

Synopsis: Daemon returns to King's Landing after ten years in exile, intent on rekindling his affair with Rhaenyra. He wasn't expecting you - the revelation changes everything.

Welcome to the third chapter of my rework - this one is completely new! Never-seen-before content! Smut galore! YAYYYYY! I do hope you’ll enjoy. Daemon-centric thought POVs are always fun as hell to write, and it’s super interesting going back to this stage of the story. Thank you to @ewanmitchellcrumbs, my slap daddy Ange, for reading through this chapter for me and making sure I’m not uploading total shite!

TRIGGERS: objectification of women, derogatory discussion of poverty, derogatory views of sex work. (Daemon is a yuck man!)

“Three cheers for the Prince!”

“Hear, hear!”

“Cheers!”

“And let his return bring coppers and silvers aplenty to the streets of Flea Bottom!”

“Aye!”

Daemon smirks obligingly at the congregated carousers as they lift their tankards in honour of him, ale-soused faces grinning haplessly throughout the dilapidated tavern. The Maiden’s Teats had once been a favourite of his in his youth, ramshackle and poorly lit and smelling always of piss as it did. And still does, he thinks distastefully. Looking around, he finds it peculiar that he’d had such an affinity for the place. There’s no accounting for the tastes of a young man. But no longer could he abide remaining in such close quarters with the source of his turmoil. What—or who—that is, he cannot say.

“Let us begin right now!” he yells over the din, standing on the wooden frame affixing the stool’s legs together. It bows ominously under his weight, but he supposes the fall would be a trifling matter if it should break. “Ale for every man here! A gift from your Prince to mark the occasion.”

Loud shouts and praises ring through the space as he passes a pouch of coin across to the alewife. He notes from the corner of his eye that she tugs her tunic down to expose her tits just a little more—any further and they’ll pop free of the neckline entirely—though he has no interest in fucking the innkeeper’s wife. Too much trouble.

A hand claps against his back, jolting him into the present. “My Prince! Welcome back!”

Daemon laughs. “Arric Dargood! Still infesting this city with your filth, are you?”

“You know me!” Dargood says, dragging him to a quieter corner as he speaks. “When there’s cheap ale and cheaper whores, you can’t get rid of me!”

Ah, good old Dargood. The third son of an already insignificant House, the man hadn’t much by way of prospects. In some ways, Daemon could commiserate—they had both turned to the sword to distinguish themselves from the rabble, becoming formidable in combat irrespective of their noble names. What luck it was to have been appointed to the City Watch at the same time! As one of the captains under his control, Dargood had rather quickly become one of his most esteemed companions. A rare sight it was to see Daemon Targaryen roaming the slums of King’s Landing without Dargood in his circle of cronies. And yet, while he might profess himself to have matured somewhat over the years, it seems the same cannot be said of Dargood.

Settling down upon the seat to which he is ushered, he partakes in the gaiety of his fellow libertines, an assemblage of persons known and unknown. Some faces are familiar, like the gold cloaks still in uniform that he recalls from his own days as their Commander; and some are fresh, from youths newly raised to notoriety to older men with a certain savagery to their disposition no doubt its own invitation to the table. Conversation flows as easily as the drink does, the men gathered sharing tales of just how little has changed in his absence.

“We even use the same route on patrols!” Steffon Hollard giggles madly. It is clear the ale has overtaken his faculties more than most present. “Ten bloody years, an’ nuffin’s changed thereabouts!”

“Why tamper with excellence?” Daemon smiles smugly as the words set off a new round of boisterous approval.

In truth, he is disheartened. For so little to be different, he’d expect to feel as though he’d never left. And yet, nothing is the same. How can that be? he wonders. He thinks of you. You least of all have remained untampered by time—he’d be hard-pressed to connect his recollections of his tiny little doll-girl with the temptress you’ve become.

“Uncle Daemon,” you say, hands twisting and eyes welling as you realise what he’s doing, that he’s about to leave—

“Uncle Daemon?” you ask, lips parted and just begging to be pried further apart by a thumb or something more, something larger—

He swallows, the motion almost painful. When he tries to focus back on the discussion at hand, he finds that talk has turned to his exploits across the Narrow Sea.

“I heard he flew to the ruins of Old Valyria!” one insists.

“Don’t be stupid!” another derides. “I heard he fucked the Prince of Pentos’s daughter!”

Lessella is a fucking shrew of a woman, Daemon thinks to himself drolly. Gods save the man she takes to her bed. He does not voice this, though—instead, he merely smiles enigmatically, allowing all to make their own assumptions.

“Either way,” Dargood says with a leer, “our Prince was surely knee-deep in Eastern cunt. Oh, what a fortune! Tell me”—at this, he turns to Daemon—“why the fuck would you come back to this shithole if you had all that at your disposal?”

Daemon grunts. “Perhaps I missed the comforts of home.” He takes a healthy swig of his ale. He grimaces; he’d forgotten how disgusting it was.

Hollard sniggers. “It’s obvious, innit? ’E’s hopin’ for another run at the Realm’s Delight!”

He tries to hide his scowl as his company share sly looks, sniggering amongst themselves at the mention of his woeful attempt to swipe Rhaenyra from his brother’s hands. Fucking idiot, he rails at himself, for not bothering to craft a version of events that would make me seem less pitiful. The gossipmongers must have had their choice in tall tales to tell of that evening—never mind the scope ten summers might bring them.

“Cheers”—Oswald Kettleblack, another lowly son from a lowly House, raises his tankard—“to the Realm’s Delight!”

The men thump the table, hooting and cackling.

“Cheers!”

“Aye, cheers!”

Dargood guffaws. “And what a delight she is,” he says, once again slapping Daemon between the shoulder blades, “to just about every man with a highborn cock. Ol’ Rodrik here says she even let him have a go!”

The man to whom his long-time ally gestures to waggles his brows with lecherous intent. It triggers a fresh wave of mocking hilarity around the group, the sound unpleasant in the ear.

“Careful now.” Daemon’s teeth show in a grin that is far less friendly than it is threatening. “That is my niece and your future Queen you’re slandering. I’m duty-bound to defend her honour, even from you lot.”

This sobers the congregation; the mirth dies down to an awkward chuckle, each of them shifting uncomfortably at the censure. Fucking children, all of them.

He may have had his fair share of paroxysms over his brother’s decision to name Rhaenyra as heir over him, but it was never lack of love that drove such a response. To hear this small collection of folk disparage his niece so casually is unsettling; nay, insulting. If such a crowd is arrogant enough to voice these slurs in front of him—the woman’s own uncle—what the fuck might they be saying about her behind closed doors? It is concerning, and for more reasons than mere personal distaste.

“Is that your plan, then?” Dargood asks, curiosity plain to see in his countenance. “To ‘defend her honour’?”

The end of the query is spoken suggestively, leaving no confusion as to the intent behind it.

Needs must. “Ah, lads,” Daemon says, “not at all. How to put it? That ship has… sailed, if you will. It’s as you said; it seems she’s been a delight to many in my absence.”

It is a thoroughly tasteless remark to make, and one that leaves bitterness flooding over his tongue. Truthfully, even when he’d still thought there was a chance of reclaiming Rhaenyra, he’d not cared overmuch for the hearsay that had filtered across the sea—he’d fucked who he liked as a lad, and as far as he was concerned, she was free to do the same. All that had mattered was that, in the end, she remembered she belonged to him. Now, there is nothing tying him to the matter at all beyond the faint pangs of resentment and an indifferent sort of intrigue as to whether or not he might have a second (third) opportunity to bed her.

But still—better to conform than oppose when in amongst the scum of the city.

Hollard frowns. “Then why? Why come back at all?”

He shrugs noncommittally. “Viserys got bored without me, I suppose. And I got bored of seeding all those foreign cunts. Such a shame for it to go to waste.”

He doesn’t quite realise the significance of his remark until he hears the response.

Dargood raises a sceptical brow. “A wife, then? Why not just take your pick over East?”

Fuck. But also—‘tis true. He’d had the option; Viserys would enquire as to his efforts in securing a new bride every few moons, each raven bringing with it the same indelicate attempt at subtlety. His reply would be the same. No, brother. I’ve not found anyone sufficient to breed more Targaryens into.

What is the point in asking over and over again? he’d wonder. There’s little to be found in Essos beyond the lineage of slaves or savages.

“And sully my line with spicemonger’s ilk? Hardly,” Daemon rebuffs with a derisive snort. “No—I’ll be wanting someone worthy of my name.”

“Sounds like you’ve already an idea of whom.” It is an invitation to continue, and an obvious one at that. Still, Daemon indulges Kettleblack’s provocation.

“Perhaps,” he says, punctuating the declaration with a long draught of ale. “I’m waiting to see if it’s worth pursuing.”

He is not being serious, but they don’t need to know that. After all, who is the Rogue Prince if a scheme’s not afoot? A delinquent to hunt down, a highborn lady to seduce, a whore (or several) to fuck… His pleasures are simple—predictable, even. Time has not changed him so greatly that his old pastimes lack a charm of their own.

“Well?” Dargood motions impatiently, nostrils flaring with lascivious glee. He always did enjoy the more lurid of Daemon’s many exploits. “Don’t leave it at that! Go on!”

Daemon shrugs evasively. “What can I say? Good breeding, well-mannered… a pretty thing, too. Excellent assets. Certainly wouldn’t be any trouble to bed her.”

As the men surrounding him crow and jeer, awash with lusty praise for their Prince’s conquest-to-be, Daemon cannot help but be reminded of you. At some point during his oration, the words had ceased being a collection of personal partialities and instead become an inventory of your own characteristics—polite in the innocent, trusting way a maiden is like to view him, a delicate beauty reminiscent of the finest illustrated manuscripts, an impeccable figure below all that ridiculous finery. The Targaryen name, too. The fact that you are his little niece might just be a credit to your appeal rather than a hindrance.

Pure Valyrian ancestry, of marriageable age, likely fertile and able to give me robust sons and daughters… And her memories of her Uncle Daemon, her kepa, would have her bending quite easily to my will.

“Well, what’s stopping you?” Dargood asks. “You’re a fucking Prince! No one’s saying ‘no’ to you!”

Except his conscience, perhaps. He still has one. True, there are lords even older than he is marrying noblewomen (girls, really) your age—but eighteen summers is indeed a great disparity. When you are his age, he’d be in his dotage, surely! It would be a hard fate to subject you to, never mind the battle he’d face at Viserys’s hands. His prospects had been rather spoiled by his decision to take Rhaenyra to a fucking brothel. Idiot. He should have known the threat of her ruination would incite the man to find her a husband that was not him. Never would the King have given him the satisfaction of winning.

Daemon puts these musings aside. Better to heed my instincts. No good can come of stirring Viserys’s wrath a second (third? fourth? thousandth?) time. Besides, it is no more than titillation. He doesn’t truly wish to take you, let alone make you his wife.

“I don’t answer to you, Dargood.”  Slapping the table, Daemon rises, suddenly restless. “I’ve had enough of tedious conversation. You heard me! I’ve spent too long in distant shores—”

More hooting. “Bet they were wet, eh!”

“—and what better way relearn Westerosi customs than to fuck some Westerosi cunt? I’ll need the practise if I’m to have myself a bride from these parts!”

It is between rowdy titters from his companions that Daemon departs the tavern, spilling out through the open doors and into the muck of Pisswater Bend, an aptly named street in among the foulest locales in King’s Landing. Staggering under the weight of Hollard—a pathetic drunkard if ever he saw one—he ambles along narrow roads that stink of shit, rank and roiling, his mind set on partaking in the finest of Sirille’s current offerings.

That is, he reflects, whichever doesn’t also possess the look of disease.

It is very nearly an unreasonable feat to procure a whore from any brothel in Flea Bottom that lacks the ability to shrivel a man’s cock from whatever putrid humours have long festered in her cunt. But the whores of Flea Bottom possess a very particular advantage. They cater to a larger range of tastes than most, discretion being vital to their work in a way the higher-scale establishments do not offer, and one of the reasons Daemon had come to frequent the slums of the city in the first place.

Right now, he’d prefer tongues did not speak of the urges he must satiate to cool his cravings to a more manageable simmer.

To think—barely a sennight ago, he had believed himself uninterested in pursuing his basest impulses! How quickly things change. He is not so dull-witted as to lack awareness of what has incited the shift. Even as his mind wrests with the contrition of thinking of you so licentiously, his body—his cock, specifically—welcomes the flash of your skin that sweeps upon the insides of his eyelids like a phantasm, the shape of your body and the contours of your pretty, pretty face, the sound of your voice caught between girlish charm and womanly rhythm, the hallmarks of the only bloodline he’d ever sought to pursue in a bride.

 No. But you are his niece. Moreover, you are his little niece. It is different with you, not like it had been with Rhaenyra. He won’t. He can’t.

Incense is strong upon the air in the brothel, stinging his nostrils and making his eyes water. Truthfully, it is a site not quite built for the purpose it conducts, being more of a ramshackle dwelling than a business front, but it serves well enough. Besides, the curtains do an ample job of concealing those customers who wish for relative anonymity, even if the sounds cannot be escaped.

In the middle of the room sit those who wish only for the sight of whores free of their meagre attire, tits and cunts and arses all on display, or for the thrill of watching love-play between prospective clients and the girls in their laps, or perhaps for the hedonistic delight of fucking out in the open, privacy be damned. Daemon notes the sunken pallor of customers and whores alike, the lines of poverty and starvation etched in plain faces. They’d looked better back when he was a regular. Likely all the coin I spent, he muses.

“Milord!”

A voice sounds from behind him, rasping with the grit of Flea Bottom’s lowliest brogue. He turns to spot the madam herself, her jowl wobbling as she limps toward him, grinning. One by one, his companions sidle past her, approaching their intended conquests with an easy familiarity that belies a long-standing routine. 

“I ‘eard you were back! Welcome! ‘Tis an honour to have the Prince in my place before the rest get ya!”

He smiles. She’d procured all manner of needy little maidens from the bowels of the city in past romps through the establishment, skinny shy things quivering and fearful, wide-eyed and reluctant. Not to his most exact tastes, no, but their timidity and frailty had been oh-so-precious—and even more fun had it been to break them of their reticence as thoroughly as he’d break them of their maidenhoods. Peasant cunt is truly a delicacy.

“Sirille.” He dips his head, inciting a round of abashed giggling. It carries not the girlish enchantment she must think it does, but she’d served him longer and more loyally than some of his own men in the City Watch. He takes no issue in humouring her. “A pleasure.”

“Oh, you! I don’ suppose you’re ‘ere to see—”

It is convenient enough for him then that one of the plainer girls approaches her employer with haste, an artless squawk of complaint filtering thready to his ears and yet, mercifully, stealing Sirille’s attention from him. He is able to move away from the entry and further into the brothel. Daemon settles on the chaise beneath the window, slouching lazily across the threadbare surface and surveying what little there is to see.

Hollard and Kettleblack have their girls stripped to the waist now, tits freed and lurching with the short, frantic motion of hips colliding. Dramatic yelps fill the room with each crude slap, the whores panting and wiggling atop their patrons with efficiency, their rhythmic release creating an almost-song in tandem with the men’s grunting and groaning. Dargood has his own on the ground in front of him, gagging enthusiastically on his prick with little swallowing moans punctuating each drag of her head forward and back. Her skirt is pulled up to bare her arsecheeks and the bruise-red flex of her cunt, wet and glistening with more than just the oil that prepares her. The other men are in similar states of disarray, open-mouthed and starry-eyed and lust-drunk in their various positions around the room.

Several of the waiting whores eye him, fluttering their lashes and flashing their tits and cunts at him. He casts a critical look over them. Too thin, too shapely, too pale, too dark, too pockmarked, too young, too old, too—too—

None of them are interesting. At least, not interesting enough to bother sticking his cock in. Shame. The itch that had driven him to fuck any whore worthy of the name in his youth has died down to a faint pulse, still frustratingly there but difficult to satiate, choosier, more selective. No longer can he spend himself in just any cunt. Rhaenyra had ruined desire for him—well, he’d thought it was Rhaenyra who had done so. He’s not so sure now. Nevertheless, there is a very particular breed of whore that fulfils his needs, one he presumes will require visiting a higher-end establishment to—

Wait. There.

A smallish, white-haired waif of a girl saunters in, adorned most curiously in a thin gown of lavender—not a cut nor colour usually available to the lower echelons, he thinks—done up to the neck, not a sliver of flesh to be seen beyond the pale of her hands and the arch of her throat and the softness of her face. He’d nearly mistaken her for a higher class of commoner, one who’d regrettably stumbled into the wrong place in the wrong district, but the ease with which she holds herself disproves the notion. She is among the less attractive in the brothel, but her features—Valyrian silver locks, Valyrian purple eyes, no doubt the baseborn daughter of a Targaryen bastard some generations back—are unmistakeable.

Are unmistakeably, exactly what he is after.

He lets his eyes linger on her, waiting; she’ll come to him, of that he is certain. None in this line of work are unfamiliar with the predilections of a man of his stature—and from the cautious, near-bashful manner in which she picks her way across the room, careful to avert her gaze from the filthier displays present, she knows precisely what he enjoys. To find a rarity like her in such a downtrodden environment is unusual. She must be quite the unlucky one, he presumes. No doubt a victim of downtrodden parents desperate to make a quick coin or several. It's not uncommon for the poorest of the city to sell their daughters to the brothels in the hope of lasting through the winter season.

Then, the whispers from the other patrons reach his ears—not abnormal, no, but it is the name they speak as the whore passes that sends a jolt through him.

“The People’s Delight,” they call her, their voices dripping with mockery even as their eyes gleam with longing, absorbing the way the fire in the hearth plays upon her silver-spun tresses so like his own. “Look at ‘er—the People’s Delight!”

The realisation strikes him like a bolt of lightning. Curse his abominable fortune! For how can ‘the People’s Delight’ be anything but a crude play on his nieces’ epithets, yet another reminder plaguing him with the thoughts he cannot escape? Rhaenyra, ‘the Realm’s Delight’, bold and brash and beautiful from infancy, his dragonrider girl since the age of seven; and you, ‘the People’s Princess’, always with a polite word and a shy smile to give the commoners from your seat in Aemma’s lap on alms days in girlhood. This cobbled-together moniker is very clearly an allusion to these titles.

“My Prince.”

The girl stands before him, bobbing in a clumsy curtsey, peering down at him through pale lashes. Her hands clasp together in a show of modesty, her spine held straight and proud in a manner so rarely to be seen on this side of Flea Bottom. Pride is indeed in short supply in so destitute a locality.

Daemon is torn. He could—he should—castigate her thoroughly for daring to disrespect the blood of the dragon. He ought to make an example of her in front of all present, to drag her into the streets and through the city by her hair so that everyone may see what happens when you ridicule the Princesses of the Realm, when you besmirch their honour by adopting their royal styles and honours for cheap whore’s tricks…

But he wants very badly to discover how deep the similarities run.

“A bold choice—‘the People’s Delight’.” Daemon does his best to maintain relative impassivity. “One might say treasonous, even.”

Rather than quail, the little slut laughs. “If you were going to ‘ave me thrown in the Black Cells”—she moves to sit beside him, not too close and not too far, calculated and infuriating—“you would’ve already.”

“Brave thing, aren’t you?”

Up close, her gown is rather less demure than he’d assumed—the fabric is diaphanous, gauzy, revealing blush-tipped tits that have yet to slacken from age or famine. Perfect.

She grins teasingly when she spies him watching, obligingly arching her back to raise her chest to his view.

“Clever, too,” she adds, slowly bringing a knee up and out so that he may catch a glimpse of what lay between her thighs. The hair matches her head. Good. “At least, cleverer than you’d think, bein’ from these parts and all.”

“Hm.” He’s not really listening, truth be told—if he wanted conversation, there are at least a hundred people he’d choose to engage with before he ever bothered with a whore.

Emboldened by boredom, he reaches out, allows his hand to fall to the hollow spaces between her ribs just beneath her upraised arm, to cup the meagre weight of one of those tits with a thumb and drag up, up, up to feel the nipple stiffen under his touch. She sighs, pushing into him barely, a tacit encouragement that doesn’t overstate her eagerness but invites more. A consummate professional.

“B’sides,” she says, breathier now, lower in tone, “the rich people’ve got plenty of Realm’s Delights and People’s Princesses over in them pretty whorehouses on Silk Street. What about Flea Bottom, eh? Lotsa poor folk want to fuck a royal just as bad. Can make a lot’ve coin that way, too.”

“I imagine you can,” he replies dryly.

‘Tis no surprise that men want to pretend their cocks are buried in Rhaenyra for but a moment—he’s long been one of them, after all—though the idea that you are in the minds of such scum when release pools fast and heavy in their stones sends frissons of vexation throbbing through his bloodstream. That anger, so quick to mingle with desire, fuels his cock to full mast.

“Well, pet”—he delivers the address with a sharp twist to the teat he’d been fondling—“care to earn a few coin more?”

“Thought you’d never ask, Your ‘Ighness.”

With a saucy wink, she pushes herself off the chaise, holding a hand out to him. He accepts the implicit offer, allowing her to lead him through the open area and onward.

At first, he presumes they are headed toward one of the cordoned-off spaces—but then, she continues, pulling him gently but unerringly to the narrow staircase. A boon indeed, to be a Prince. It seems he’ll be receiving the royal treatment, after all.

The chambers in question are not at all pleasant—with creaking floorboards, the pervasive scent of mildew and a faint squeaking that indicates a rather significant rodent problem, it is a far cry from the luxurious standards he is accustomed to in higher-end establishments. But the bedframe seems solid; the mattress unsoiled; the pillows serviceable enough. He does not intend to linger.

He seats himself in the chair by the hearth, angled toward the bed, and readies himself for a show.

The whore stops before him. “You’ve a liking for the elder one, don’t you, my Prince? I don’t act for the littlest yet, but the middle one’s getting quite popu—”

Daemon interrupts, trying not to shift uncomfortably at the mention of Rhaenyra—of you. “That’s fine.”

With a wave of the hand, he commands her to do away with her attire. She makes speedy work of the buttons affixing the front closed, beginning to shrug off the sheer fabric so that her thin shoulders reveal themselves more and more. The smug half-smile and the cock of her hip lends the performance a breadth of flirtation, furthered by her impish little shimmy as the cloth catches on the twin swells upon her chest.

He stops her with a sigh.

“No,” he corrects, gut heating at the crestfallen look that overtakes her visage. “Again, but more…” He casts about for the right descriptor.

“Nervous?” she offers, immediately adopting a pose of diffidence, arms curling inward to tuck her gown back over her exposed skin.

“Hm.” He nods once.

Nervous. A shy, soft little mouse-girl, ready to be snatched up by a predator…

The whore hunches slightly, eyes shifting flightily about the room, never once settling on him as she slowly, slowly tugs down the dress, hands folding over her tits to conceal them from view. Shades of lavender puddle around her hips, sliding effortlessly over protruding bone and onto the ground with a whisper, exposing a neat thatch of silver curls below her belly. Her knees clench tight, twisting urgently to prevent his gaze from reaching the prize that lays between them.

“There we are. Very pretty.”

A muted, bashful curve of the lips. “You—you think so?”

“Turn around.” She spins on her heel, hair spilling molten down her back to kiss the roundness where her torso meets her legs. Lovely. For a chit as lean as she is, she most certainly has a nice arse. “On your hands and knees.” The girl pads over to the bed, making brief play at tentativeness before crawling into his desired posture. “Bend—ah, that’s it,” he says, ogling greedily as she bows her spine to raise her cunt up higher, fluttering in greeting as the cooler air hits. “Look at you.”

She moans softly when his hands fall to her arsecheeks, thumbs sliding down to spread and lift where she is most protected. The petals shielding her hungry little core peel apart slowly, hastened by his thumbs digging into the meat of her. Mm. Valyrian cunt, that is. Regardless of bastardy, Daemon knows what the blood of old looks like, feels like.

He is dizzy with it—the sight of it, the smell of it, heady and ripe for the taking. “Call me ‘Uncle’, won’t you, pet?”

“Mm.” She whines, hitching back before she remembers the game afoot, aborts her impatient little overture. But that cunt—flexing, wet, spitshine little doll cunt, peasant whore or no—doesn’t lie. “Yes, Uncle!”

Grunting, he fumbles one-handed with his laces, near to bursting already. Yes, Uncle, high-pitched, breathy-sweet, precious and fearful and wanting and—and he must remember what he is here for. What she is here for. She cries out when he delivers a speedy strike to her rump that flushes the flesh a pleasing pink, the colour of dewy cheeks and new-bloomed blossoms and childlike innocence.

“Did that hurt?” he taunts, landing another blow to the same spot and delighting in the garbled whimper it forces from the girl.

“No”—she squeals at the next slap, corrective this time—“I mean, yes, Uncle. It hurts.”

Though she cannot see his face, he bares his teeth, a smile that is more menacing than enticing. “This cunt tells me a different story. You’ve soaked the sheets—look at this mess.”

She’s barely wet her thighs, but the exaggeration heats his blood almost to boiling. “I’m sorry.”

“Not as sorry as you will be.” He is forced to unbutton his surcoat and discard it on the floor to dispel the mist of perspiration clinging to his skin and undershirt, suddenly ravenous. He’s toyed with her long enough. “I could just slide right in, couldn’t I?”

He tests the statement with little ceremony, prodding one then two fingers straight to the knuckle. Save for the quiet yelp she emits, the entry is smooth, unresisting, nearly proving to undo the illusion he has stirred up. Soft, warm, drenched cunt—too easy, but it’s better than nothing at all. He curls the digits, hooking firmly down toward her navel and drawing forth a louder noise, startled, less controlled. It spurs her to speak.

“Yes, a slut”—she nods her head vociferously before catching herself at the warning dig of nails into her sensitised flesh, abruptly changing course—“I mean, no! I’m not a slut!”

So many errors from this one. For a commoner, it’d do.

“No.” He lets the blunder be. Removing himself from her passage, he allows his hand to fall carelessly upon her rear again, the moisture clinging to his skin harshening the arc into a blow. “You’re a good little maiden, aren’t you?”

“Yes!” she pants, raising her hips higher.

Her arse is a shade of bright now, the subtle glow of pomegranates, of red little tongues, of dusky hot innards spilled forth by the blade under the searing sun. His handprints mark all over the flesh, a symbol of proprietorship that will last longer than this night.

“Dripping more than a used whore.” He scoffs, spurred by the sight of her, shuffling up on his knees to seat himself behind her. The slight lands perfectly; she flinches at his words, and it is oh­­-so-easy to pretend it is the hasty advancement of his cock notching at her entry that incites such reaction. “If there’s one thing Uncle’s very good at, it’s turning maidens into whores. Would you like to find out how?”

He is already rocking his way inside in increments, taking just one moment to savour the feel of her grasping cunt-lips mouthing along the heft of him, greedy, eager to start work and perform the duty they’ve been tasked to. Hissing, he clutches roughly at her hips, pulling her backward.

She pants, breath stuttering. “Oh, I—”

“Sh, just take it, take it.”

He presses down between her shoulders, leaning his weight into it and pinning her to the bed as he comes flush with her form, lodged deep within pulsing walls. The groan he lets out is involuntary, an exhalation of utmost relief at finding himself once more in the depths of familiar territory.

“Easier than I thought,” he croons, holding her firm despite her attempts to wiggle up, out, away from his hold. “Perhaps you’ve been dishonest. Only sluts have such loose cunts.”

A shaky gasp. “I’m a maiden, I promise!”

And the sound of it is enough to make him forget where he is, when, who he is with and why.

Yes, a maiden, a perfect little maiden whore just for me, made for me—

He chokes on the rising wave of pleasure, lowering himself onto your back and covering you in him, shielding you with his body, protecting you with himself as he takes and takes and takes what he wants from your body, willing and wanton and his. Your hair ripples like moonlight over water with his every thrust, harsh and frantic, desperate to reach his end.

“And now you’re mine.” Daemon’s muscles strain and he can barely hear himself above the pitch of his heart galloping faster and faster. He tucks his chin to your shoulder, ear against lips that cannot stop mewling shrill and besieged, using your juddering frame as traction to force himself deeper, further, more. “Say it!”

“I’m yours, Uncle!” you bleat, lost kitten dewy-eyed and damp-cheeked, fingers grappling with the covers above your head. “I’m—Uncle—”

For some strange, unknown reason, it rings hollow, the fantasy blurring at the edges and allowing the cold touch of reality to slowly trickle in. Not quite right.

“No.” He redirects her in coarse tones, unwilling to forsake the illusion. “Call me ‘kepus’, call me—”

“Kepus,” you—she—you cry, cunt suctioning tight around him. It’s hot within you, unbearably slick, your walls knotting vigorously to the contours of his shaft with each hard snap forward and rough glide back. The scent of it, raw and heady and humid, fills his nose and lungs and clouds his mind. “You’re going too deep—ah!”

“That’s just your tiny baby cunt making room,” he thinks he coos, but really, he’s snarling through clenched teeth down at you, precious girl, sweetest niece, cock cleaving straight through the hollow spaces inside you and gut tightening with a rising, rising—“pretty little cunt just for Kepa’s cock, all for me—”

His release is swift, sudden, arriving too soon and ending too abruptly, prying your name from his lips when the ecstasy reaches its fleeting summit. Still, he lets his mass collapse upon you, hips pistoning to the beat of his climax as he groans his relief. And then, it’s over. The ember fizzles, and he is left with sticky, cooling skin and the feeling of a sweating form below him. Without thought, he sighs into the crook of your neck, nostrils searching for the rose oil that lingers on your skin even now—

Only to find naught but the trace of cheap lye soap. Only to remember that the girl quivering beneath him is not you, but some nameless whore. Only to realise that he’d been fantasising of you this entire time, of fucking you fast and forceful until you knew nothing but the sensation of him on you, in you, your kepa taking you and claiming you and keeping you.

—‘polite in the innocent, trusting way a maiden is like to view him, a delicate beauty reminiscent of the finest illustrated manuscripts, an impeccable figure below all that ridiculous finery’—

Fuck. Fuck. He had called out your name.

—‘you are his little niece. It is different with you, he won’t, he can’t’—

More than that. He had all but declared you for himself. In a fucking brothel. He’d never dare allow his true inclinations to be known in the past. Not even with Mysaria, with Rhaenyra had he shown such base need. Such weakness. But you…

—‘no more than titillation. He doesn’t truly wish to take you, let alone make you his wife’—

How lack-witted he is. Barely an hour ago, he had disavowed attributing any sort of significance to his lusts, denoting them as little more than the reflexive whims of a man accustomed to sampling anything or anyone he wishes. Already he has proven himself incorrect!

No. This is far, far more than mere titillation. The precise degree to which his desires afflict him—well, this he doesn’t know. He can only hope the girl will uphold the custom of her line of work and keep quiet, hope that rumours will not abound of the Rogue Prince’s latest fascination.

Hope that word will not make way to you. Such tales reaching your ears is the very last thing he wants.

Questions he cannot answer churn through his mind as he extracts himself from the whore, deposits coin on the mattress, ignores her overtures and stumbles out of the room, wondering what the fuck has just happened.

Read the story on AO3:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/42100623/chapters/120367177

Taglist (😭 thank you!):

Now in the comments!

[lakesbian]

i really like how worm commits to making superpowered characters weird. i think in most superhero media, superpowered characters are largely distinct, normal individuals with powers tacked on like tools they can use. but in worm, having a power kind of inherently puts you to the left of being entirely human. in worm, the lines between the power and the person are blurred, both literally in terms of how shards work & in terms of how powers present themselves. you can’t have a power without it altering your relationship to your mind and body.

and the “relationship to your body” bit applies to almost all capes, not just the ones who have been physically altered by their powers! whenever the experience of having a (not physically altering) power is described, it‘s phrased as being some sort of additional sense or sensation in a way that is still inextricably connected to the cape’s physical self. imp’s power isn’t just “okay, i’m invisible now,” it’s “i can physically feel my power rolling over my skin and jabbing out into the air to push memories of me away.” 

the other examples i specifically have in mind here are skitter and regent. skitter’s power isn’t just “move the bugs and make them bite people,” they’re effectively a part of her. like additional limbs. she keeps functioning in fights when her human body is knocked the fuck out on the ground because the rest of her body--a million other little bodies--is still there to work with. the fact that she has millions of extra eyeballs at any given moment means it’s not actually so bad when the two of them that happen to be physically connected to her human body are blinded, which results in my favorite Worm Out Of Context ever:

and regent has one of my favorite subtle, uncanny examples of a power that seems like it shouldn’t alter the power-haver’s connection to their own body, but does anyway. in alec’s interlude, while he’s puppeting sophia, there’s a point where the undersiders get far away enough from her that it makes it more difficult for him to control her. he starts struggling to coordinate her movements.

the uncanny part is that he starts struggling to control his own body’s movements, as well. he puts his alec-self’s earbuds in so that he doesn’t have to talk to anyone, because he knows that if he did speak, he’d start stuttering and slurring his words from loss of physical control. sure, his alec-self is the body he’ll end up in when he’s done using his power, and his sophia-self was taken by force, so there’s obviously a distinction between the two, but that doesn’t make his alec-self easier to control. his power implicitly calls the separation between himself and the people he’s puppeting into question. he doesn’t get to have a “main” body he can control without effort, he has to divide his attention between each body and put concentration into moving each of them. in that way, his own body is placed in the same category as the bodies he’s hijacked. it’s Weird!

[aimbutmiss]

I feel like Roger loved both Buggy and Shanks equally, it’s just that he REALLY saw himself in Shanks and less so in Buggy, which made Buggy feel like the less loved child, just because he didn’t quite have the same “Oh wow we are just immediately on the same wavelength” like these two

If you asked Roger though he would have spoken about both of them with equal pride. He may see himself in Shanks but Buggy is … Buggy is just his own entire thing and sometimes Roger is kind of stupefied at this young pirate just putting so much into showmanship and being FLASHY and by god this is a greedy little shit but that just means he is just always going after something.And once he gets it he’s gonna show it off in the flashiest way possible that’s just so infectiously joyful to witness. Also- bombs?! Who taught him that?! Rayleigh did you teach him that? He didn’t teach him that! How’d that boy get so crafty! Hey guys check it out Buggy made a BOMB! Haha, hey may never know quite what’s going on with this brat but what a lad! His little firecracker…

Buggy wasn’t unloved but he was a massive causality of Shanks “chosen one” status (another one of these is Shanks himself imo but that’s getting into theory corner), because in his eyes that didn’t leave him to be anything else.

Yessss I do agree that Roger didn't really have a favourite, just different approaches to the kids. If there was any favouritism it would be unintentional, like I've said before. Because I really don't think Roger was that type of man. He loved those kids, they were basically like his sons.

I also agree that he saw himself in Shanks. And he saw something completely different in Buggy. Not just in the way that he was different from himself and Shanks, but he was different from everyone. Roger has never met someone like Buggy before and that fascinated him. This little kid was so... flashy, as he put in his own terms. And he was a go-getter. Roger was convinced that kid had the potential to flip the world upside down if it would get him what he wanted. And there's something so refreshing about that kind of unending determination. The only thing that stood in the way of that was his inferiority complex. And oh did Roger try to make it better. He tried his best to treat him and Shanks equally. Always told them both they could do anything they put their mind to, and that he loved and cared for them deeply. But it just didn't seem to penetrate through Buggy's thick skull. Him giving his hat to Shanks did NOT help. I think that small action was truly the catalyst for the "chosen one" complex you talked about. I mean the effects of it are still very much present, with Luffy and all...

I don't think Buggy was really a casualty in Shanks and his "chosen one" status (at least not as big of a casualty as Shanks himself) because he didn't let himself get stuck because of it, like Shanks did. He knew he couldn't reach his full potential in his friend's shadow, so he left. He started a new life because he refused to be stagnant. And he had a goal, a dream, that did not match what Shanks wanted. So of course he left, because Buggy always goes after what he wants. He chose to go forward, but Shanks stayed there. He could not move forward. He was destined to be forever that little boy on Oro Jackson, the pirate king's chosen one, and that teen Buggy left in Loguetown. (Taylor Swift - Right where you left me, literally)

On a lighter note... those damn bombs!!! Who taught him???? Literally no one. I'm convinced he just threw shit together. And honestly, Buggy is very smart. He figured how things work very quickly at a young age, and he was always good with his hands. It's another thing Roger always felt proud about him. "His little firecracker..." Anon shut up right now I will cry 😭😭 that's so cute

Thank you for this!! Sorry for replying late, I knew I was gonna write something long so I wanted to do it when I had the time