#and then not only allow but encourage me turning it down to analyze the song

[mbakuetshurisprincess]

From My Headphones: Mountains

AN: Hello my loves! I really just wanted to write something today so we went back to old faithful and pulled something from my song inspo playlist. This thing really is like a quick writing palate cleanser for me in full honesty, hence why it’s so short lol. I really didn’t even wanna put a tag list on this one cause it was so short lmfao. 

Summary: Who else would Shuri turn to in her time of need?

Pairing: Shuri x Fem!Reader

Warnings: Cussing, mentions of injury that’s it I think.

Word count: 1,068

Part 1.  Masterlist.  Taglist.

Suggested listening: Mountains - Charlotte Day Wilson

“Up on the mountain (up on the mountain) Searched through the valley (searched through the valley) You hear me calling (you you hear me calling) Won't you come find me? (Won't you come and find me?) Please don't forsake me (please don't forsake me)”

It had to be easily two or three AM when the familiar sound of a certain someone knocking at your door came. Groggily throwing a large fur over your shoulder and slipping your feet into your slippers you opened the door, greeted by an injured Shuri. She stood sheepishly there, staring down at your feet waiting for you to say something.

“This is the third time this month Shuri.”

“Does that mean you’re going to leave me out here? I mean, I trekked all the way up here in the snow.” The young Queen rocked on the balls of her feet, pulling her bottom lip into her teeth.

You stared at her for a moment, contemplating if denying her to teach her a lesson would be best in this case. But as much as you wanted to, your heart said no. Here Shuri was, feeling comfortable enough with you to come to seek your aid when she was at her most vulnerable.

No, you could never turn her away when she was like this.

Stepping aside to let the poor girl in, Shuri breathed out a thank you. Appreciative that your thin patience hadn’t run out just yet.

At this point you two had turned this whole ordeal into a dance, knowing the ins and outs and working with each other to make sure you had all the materials you needed. While you pick out an incense stick to set the room, Shuri grabs the matches from the cabinet above you. Making sure to breathe ever so slightly down your neck when she, leaving goosebumps in her path.

As you clear your small kitchen table of its wood decorations, Shuri strips out of the thick over-layers that she wore on the climb up here. Leaving her just in her sports bra and leggings. You try not to oggle at the sight, this was about healing Shuri, not praising the God’s for giving her a perfect body. Shuri however was amused at the way you pulled your eyes from her quickly as if you’d seen something you weren't allowed to.

This dance you two did ended with Shuri laying on her back on the table and you standing over her, a bowl filled with various herbs in your hand. There was only one injury Shuri came to you for, the one thing she didn’t trust anyone to try and heal; her injury from the fight with Namor.

Looking down over her as you gathered some of the mixture in your hand you analyzed the wound. Clearly, she’d reopened it doing God’s know-what and tried to get it to reseal by itself with no success. “What did you do to it this time?” You distracted her with a question as you applied the first layer.

She groaned slightly when your fingers made contact with her skin. No matter how gentle you seemed to be, that area was always extra sensitive. “I was helping with the rebuilding efforts in the River Tribe, moving things, stuff like that.”

“Mhm,” You encouraged her to continue on as you applied the second layer thicker this time.

Shuri’s eyes studied all of your movements. How focused you were on the task at hand, how every movement seemed filled with intention and you allowed not even a drop to go to waste. “I was playing with some of the children, showing off my strength.”

This pulled your eyes away from her stomach and up to her own. Giving her a look that let her know you were not pleased.

“What!” She cried out in mock defense. “They’re small children, what was I supposed to do? Not pick them up?”

You rolled your eyes. “Uh huh yeah whatever. So you pick them up and then what?”

Shuri lets out a sigh, moving her hands from her side to rest interlaced behind her head. This put her toned upper body right in your face and it took everything in you not to feast on what she was so clearly dangling in front of you. “Well of course when I feel my stitches rip, I can take a good guess that picking up all twenty of them was not the best idea. So when I got back to my lab, I whipped something up quickly to deal with it and went about my day.”

You shook your head as you wiped the last bits of the mixture onto her skin, encasing the previous two layers with this one. “That’s your problem.” You declared as you cleaned up your workspace, Shuri sitting up from the table and looking down at your work.

“What’s my problem?” She asked as she hopped off the table and followed you around the kitchen. Not giving you a lick of space to yourself. This was on purpose and you knew it, Shuri didn’t get a lot of time to spend with you. With your house being situated deep enough into the Jabari Land mountains your own brother M’baku had famously declared he would never make the trip. And Shuri’s newfound responsibilities being Queen and Black Panther, time just wasn’t on you two’s side.

But that didn’t stop Shuri from coming to you anytime she was injured, using it as an excuse to turn up at your doorstep at odd hours without invitation. Knowing you’d never turn her away.

“Your problem,” You turned around to answer Shuri but found that she was right behind you. “Is that you keep expecting a machine to heal something that only you can.”

Shuri sighed at your words having heard a variation of this speech before a million times. “I’m serious ihunanya (love).” You reached out and ghosted your fingers over where the paste had now completely dried to her skin. “You can’t use technology to heal this, nor can you expect me to with my herbs. Your body will heal once your mind has.”

You looked up at her hoping that maybe this time your message had gotten through to her, but you couldn’t tell.

“Can I stay here tonight?” Shuri’s request came quiet, it wasn’t unusual, but it did come as a shock to you that she asked. Typically you would just go to bed normally and she would join you, no questions asked just a mutual understanding. But tonight you had a feeling this was about more than just sleep, Shuri was searching for connection.

“Of course.”

Taglist:  @shuriszn @sokkasbae25 @verachii @cuddl3s4shur1 @takeyaki @jinnie10101 @letitias-fav-deactivated2023040 @sweetalittleselfish-honey @beautybyfire @6-noir @mocha-aya @yvxmpire @mysticalmarss @ziayamikaelson @youralphawolf72 @n7cje @inmyheadimobsessed @shurisjournal @shurisbigtoe @saintwrld @pinkwright @chatitajens @playhousedistee @motheroffae @injeolmiee @tchhairbandhere @._mrqs @msudaku @lppriceisright @bratydoll @blackqueengold @iheartsolo @cafehyunji @abenomeiiii @naomis-daydream @ilroachsworld @locoforshuri @nrc-06

[ohgaylor]

i have many thoughts on the lavender haze discourse that i won’t get into here. i simply want to analyze some thoughts about her quote. but i first want to emphasize that it’s worth recognizing we haven’t heard the song yet so we don’t entirely know how she’ll explore the topic. and as such, i think it’s too early to be frustrated with the situation or to point fingers at anyone (on any side of the debate) because we simply haven’t heard the song yet, so we can’t be sure what it will be about, particularly given her quote about it. and i’ll get into why.

first of all, as is often the case with Taylor, she may likely be saying one thing publicly (referencing her 6yr relationship, rumors, etc) only to have the lyrics point in an entirely different direction. (as was sort of the reverse case with Betty, where many people instantly interpreted the song through a queer lens before she suggested it was written from a male-James’ perspective.) i’d argue that Taylor often allows for this ambiguity and even encourages it surrounding her art (is pronouns, tropes, etc) it’s something she has long done throughout her career.

so with that said, before i address her quote about the song, it’s important to note two key definitions that have to do specifically with lavender and relationships:

lavender haze — a slang term coined during the '50s, referring to being in love.

lavender marriage — a male–female mixed-orientation marriage, undertaken as a marriage of convenience to conceal the socially stigmatised sexual orientation of one or both partners.

note the first definition, which Taylor has explicitly referenced, is purely positive in its description of the status of said relationship. it’s a time of joy and optimism. Taylor alludes to as much in this first half of her quote…

Lavender Haze is track one on Midnights, and I happened upon the phrase “Lavender Haze” when I was watching Mad Men and I looked it up because I thought it sounded cool, and it turns out that it’s a common phrase used in the 50s where they would just describe being in love, like if you were in a lavender haze then that mean that you were in that all encompassing love glow and I thought that was really beautiful.

again, a very positive description of said love. not a care in the world. just pure love.

well, then things shift in her quote. she takes a deliberately different direction by suggesting that the lavender haze is state of one’s relationship that is fragile and is worth protecting. she says that if this love is found out, that people will weigh in on it and ultimately bring it down. so she must do what she can to protect the real stuff.

that’s not only extremely queer coded if you ask me, but also this shift instantly caught my attention because it doesn’t necessarily have to do with lavender haze whatsoever. but more so with the definition lavender marriage, as you’ll recall from above. here is exactly what Taylor said in this second half of her quote…

And I guess theoretically when you’re in the lavender haze, you’ll do anything to stay there, and not let people bring you down off of that cloud and I think a lot of people have to deal with this now, not just like quote unquote “public figures” because we live in the era of social media and if the world finds out that you’re in love with somebody they’re gonna weigh in on it, like my relationship for 6 years we’ve had to dodge weird rumors, tabloid stuff and we just ignore it and so this song is sort of about the act of ignoring that stuff to protect the real stuff.

quite a specific perspective wouldn’t you say? again, it has nothing to do with the simple definition of lavender haze, of blissfully being in love.

but rather, i interpret this as her articulating a much more nuanced closeted relationship, where dodging rumors is a reality (skeletons in both our closets plotted hard to f*** this up), where this relationship is worth protecting in every possible way because if people we to discover it, they would bring it down (something happens when everybody finds out, see the vultures circling, dark clouds, love's a fragile little flame, it could burn out, whispers turned to talking and talking turned to screams, our secret moments in a crowded room, cynical clones, hunters with cellphones)

i simply think it’s fascinating this secret love motif is ever present in her work.

we know Taylor loves to take a common phrase and give it a new meaning, or simply to twist its meaning with a sense of literary license she proudly holds as a songwriter. perhaps this is a case of that, where she is aligning herself with lavender-esq relationship terminology deliberately, by using a decoy of lavender haze for a lavender love that is far more secret.

because afterall, every bait and switch was a work of art.

for reference: all my analyses; mad men dialogue / scene / overall context

ps. i think it’s worth navigating these spaces with delicacy. we can’t assume what exactly it is she meant by “weird rumors”. because seconds later she mentions “tabloid stuff”. we simply don’t know much yet. i think it would be beneficial for everyone involved on any side of the debate to refrain from going at others and instead wait until we hear the song before we judge the situation.

pps. i’m not suggesting that concealing one’s relationship is an exclusively queer experience. certainly many celebrities encounter that. however, it absolutely is a reality within the queer many face. and given her track record and the continuous themes of her music, it speaks for itself. i am simply pointing out themes i see and addressing them through my lens.

[theberywnloopers]

Manifesto. Resilience

Andie Olson

Professor Alfarone 

HUM2020

6 August 2023

Manifesto: Resilience 

Below is an artistic synopsis depicting how I feel about humanities. I have put much thought and effort into what humans have done and are capable of. Every piece on my blog is something derived from humans. Everything from the details to the blog posts was created from thought and turned into reality. The theme of my blog is resilience. Each post demonstrates strength. We are resilient. We work hard. We keep fighting. And we do not back down. The works of art, stories, songs, photos, and videos help make understanding resilience easy. 

The individual in Bill Viola’s Ascension demonstrates resilience. Time moves slowly for such a short clip. This man seems to be sinking. But he is not drowning. Perhaps he is having thoughts of suicide or just needs some time underwater to breathe. This individual is showing a struggle which is then resolved by resilience. This man is not dying or struggling physically. This is more about mental resilience. Mental resilience is a skill imperative to survival. I can relate to this man. Sometimes I feel like diving into the water. No preparation, diving without hesitation. I want to fall into the dark blue and listen to my thoughts without distractions. My resilience is what will pull me back up to the surface.

The musical theme post is another perfect depiction of resilience. All of the songs  are about war. Some songs are about trauma and hardship, some make it something to smile about, and another song has no words at all. Each song represents resilience because war itself is not for the weak. And if not resilience, then what else must you have during and after the war? Every individual involved in war has some degree of resilience. They must be tough and push through traumatic experiences. It is only those who have mastered resilience that can overcome internal struggles. 

My ‘Plotting’ post represents resilience humorously and admirably. I filled my gas tank with diesel gas and shut down on the highway in the middle of nowhere. I could have shut down, but my resilience enabled me to keep my head high. I toughened up and did what I had to do. This lesson was expensive, and I did not let it disappoint me. I showed resilience as I kept on with my journey to Ginnie Springs. 

My representative work demonstrates resilience by me and the characters involved in the artwork. I showed resilience by persevering through the long hours of cutting and gluing every pair of eyes I saw. This took countless hours. There were times I wanted to quit. And gave up, but I pushed through. The eyes in the picture also represent resilience. Each pair of eyes tells a different story. Not everyone looks like they are going through a tough time, but for those that are, you can see that they are resilient. 

The Public Art I decided to analyze perfectly depicts resilience. This is a sculpture of a woman opening her chest, exposing what should have been her heart. This woman is standing tall and graceful. You can tell she is vulnerable. She shows resilience by standing firm and allowing roots to grow through her body. The plants growing in and out of this sculpture represent resilience, also. These plants are primarily weeds, which have a bad name. No one likes them. And everyone tries to get rid of them. But they do not let that stop them from growing. This sculpture represents how I sometimes feel, but I stay risen and keep my head up. 

I hope some of these analyses have encouraged you to stay resilient. I am being resilient in this moment by pushing through this last assignment. Humanities are a great way to cultivate differences in the arts. Many of my other posts demonstrate resilience, but I touched on my favorites. Risielnce is the commonality in humanities. It is a beautiful thing that most of us share. And I am so happy to have shared this process with you. 

[elentiyawhitethorn]

Exile

Rowaelin Month, Day 29

A Work Based on a Song @rowaelinscourt

CW: language, minor NSFW

AN: Based on the Taylor Swift song

Rowaelin Month Masterlist//Main Masterlist//5747 words

Second, third, and hundredth chances

Balancing on breaking branches

I think I've seen this film before

And I didn't like the ending

There she was. Arm-in-arm with that man and standing tall and smiling.

She didn’t have any right to smile like that.

Not when it wasn’t because of him. Not when he wasn’t the one holding her, wasn’t the one telling her cheesy jokes and pressing heated kisses to her neck.

And that man had no right to lay his hands on her. She didn’t belong to him.

Rowan clenched his fingers so tightly he heard something snap. He glanced down to see the plastic lid of his coffee cup with a crack in it. He loosened his grip, then looked back up.

He shouldn’t be watching her. She had given up on him. She was the reason he was struggling, and she was the cause of his pain. Aelin didn’t deserve any attention from him.

But he just couldn’t tear his gaze away.

—

“Stop it,” Aelin complained halfheartedly, a laugh creeping into her voice. “You can’t pay for everything.”

Sam winked. “Who says?”

Aelin rolled her eyes and shoved him lightly, a smile twitching at her lips all the while. “I hate you.”

“And I love you.”

A grin broke over Aelin’s face. Sam had said that for the first time last night, after a lovely dinner. There had been roses and candles and a gourmet (at least to Aelin’s uncultured taste buds) meal. Sam had really gone all out.

And he had been more than understanding about the fact that she wasn’t ready to reciprocate those three words. He’d insisted that she didn’t actually, knowing everything there was to know about the relationship she’d just gotten out of and having complete and utter respect and supportiveness for her.

But she would say it back soon. She was free, and she was with Sam, and for the first time in a long time, she was happy. Aelin may not love him yet, and she never was sure of when that extreme adoration crossed the line, but it had to be soon. It had to be because Sam was good to her. And if she could love people who weren’t good to her, Aelin must certainly be able to love the ones who were.

That’s how it worked, right?

Aelin smiled even as her thoughts raced back in time, to a different point in her life, when things had been much different. These things did not need to be analyzed. Aelin had done enough overthinking to last a lifetime, and she had promised herself to stop. To just stop thinking about him at all.

Aelin leaned in and pressed a chaste kiss to Sam’s cheek. “C’mon, our coffee’s getting cold.”

Sam grinned and waggled his eyebrows. “I bet I could find a way to warm things up.”

Aelin choked on a laugh. “Don’t you dare. That was the least sexy thing I have ever heard come out of your mouth.”

Sam pulled her closer. “I have plenty more up my sleeve. Did it hurt when you fell from heaven?”

Aelin whacked him on the arm playfully. “You are the worst boyfriend ever,” she teased. “Let’s go, maybe I will let you warm things up.” She grinned, knowing that encouraging him only increased the number of ridiculous jokes and pick-up lines being sent her way and not caring one bit.

With one last smirk, Sam tugged Aelin toward the door of the coffee shop, arm loosely around her waist. She leaned into him as they walked to the door, only slowing down as she reached over to adjust her purse strap over her shoulder… and something caught Aelin’s eye when she looked back.

Someone.

Aelin came to a complete standstill, eyes widening in shock.

It shouldn’t be such a surprise. After all, this was a small town. But Aelin having to see him again, having to see him staring at her unashamedly, maintaining eye contact…

It was unnerving.

His eyes bore holes into Aelin, and she shivered. He hadn’t always looked at her like that. It had been happy, once. Once there had been love in gaze. Not possession. Not loathing. Not fury. Just pure, unadulterated love.

So much had changed. No, Aelin corrected herself. Nothing had changed other than her ability to notice what was really going on. This was how it had always been. Aelin had just been too blind to see it.

Distantly, Aelin realized Sam was asking her what was wrong. He was following her gaze. He was putting the pieces together.

And now he was asking her if that was him, but they both knew. They both knew it was.

Aelin spun around suddenly, a complete 180 degree turn, eradicating Rowan from her line of sight.

“Let’s go,” Aelin said. “Let’s just go.”

—

“See you tomorrow,” Aelin said, kissing Sam on the lips.

He deepened the kiss slightly before pulling away and saying, “See you, babe. Love you.”

Aelin smiled.

Sam smiled back, but the expression dimmed before he could leave, hesitating on the doorstep. “Are you sure…”

Aelin took a deep breath. “Sam, I love that you care about me, but there is nothing to be done. Rowan lives nearby; I’ll have to get used to seeing him every once in a while.”

Sam shook his head. “That’s not fair. He doesn’t get to do what he did to you and then walk around untouched, flaunting it.”

Aelin flashed a watery smile. “That’s the thing, Sam. He can do whatever he likes, and it won’t matter. It doesn’t matter because I am with you and I am happy and anything he does is entirely inconsequential.”

Sam held Aelin’s gaze, then his eyes softened. He kissed her again and pulled back. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he repeated in a whisper.

Aelin smiled, watching him leave.

She leaned against the doorway of her apartment, watching Sam walk away with a gentle expression on her face. He glanced back only once to toss a saucy grin her way as he took the turn and headed down the stairs, out of sight. But she didn’t go back inside quite yet, instead gazing in the direction he’d last been visible at, thinking. Thinking happy things.

And then thinking some not so happy things.

It wasn’t fair that Rowan could consume her thoughts so wholly. Yes, consume was the right word. He consumed her mind now, and before he had consumed every inch of her body, every aspect of her life. And it was a word with so many different connotations that for a long time, Aelin hadn’t thought that was so bad.

She knew better now.

Aelin normally would have willed a smile back to her face to reassure those around her, but she was alone now. No more pretending. Aelin frowned fully as she turned to renter the apartment.

And nearly ran smack into Rowan, who was standing on the opposite side of the doorway. Only a couple feet away, staring at her, breathing her air, and she hadn’t noticed.

Aelin regarded him silently, trying to decide if Rowan was real or not. This wouldn’t have been the first time she’d imagined him beside her.

“What exactly did I do to you, Aelin?” He was real then.

“You have no right.” Aelin’s voice was raspy and beyond furious.

“You can’t stop thinking about me, can you?”

Aelin shook her head, her entire body shaking. “You have no right,” she repeated.

Rowan crossed his arms. The door was wide open, and Aelin stood on the side with the hinges. Which meant she had the disadvantage, unable to get in without Rowan stopping her.

“What do you want from me?”

Rowan shook his head, eyes simmering with something deceptively similar to hurt. “I want to understand.”

“What is there to understand?” Aelin hissed.

“Why did you leave me?” Rowan’s voice was hard.

Aelin breathed hard through her nostrils, not bothering to put a leash on her temper. “Because you didn’t treat me right, Rowan. You ignored me. You used me.”

“I loved you!” Rowan shouted.

Aelin shook her head. “That wasn’t love. That was something else.”

“What was it, Aelin?”

She bit her lip, and Rowan’s eyes snapped down to her mouth. He stepped forward. “What was it?” he demanded, voice far too gravelly for this conversation.

“I don’t know!” she snapped. “Something bad. Something wrong.”

With that she kicked out her foot and caught Rowan on the inside of his leg. Thought likely uninjured, he was surprised enough by Aelin’s spite that he stepped back an inch. Just enough space for Aelin to shove past him and slam the door.

Angry tears streaming down her face in hateful torrents, Aelin flipped the lock, then slid the chain into place.

Then she released a muffled cry of anguish and leaned back against the door, swaying. She started crying in earnest, trying to keep her sobs relatively quiet in case Rowan was still at the door. He probably was.

Aelin slid down the door limply, falling into a pile on the floor. She reached around and placed a palm flat on the wooden surface. He was out there.

She knew he was.

Confirmation came in the form of a shadow, flitting across the crack under the door, and finally blocking the space considerably, accompanied by the a soft thump.

Rowan was sitting next to her. Without the door, he’d be touching her. Holding her.

Aelin pressed her face against the door, getting as close to him as she could while still being able to deny it. She’d slammed the door on him. No one could take that away from her.

But no one could take this away from her either, this moment.

—

Aelin was crying. He’d known she would be, but it still hurt to hear.

Rowan traced his fingers across the door delicately, imagining her own touch on the other side. They were almost holding hands.

Time passed. They kept sitting there, and Rowan knew Aelin well enough to know she’d be screaming at herself inside her head, trying to make herself get up, to no avail.

Rowan felt a twisted sense of satisfaction to know that she couldn’t leave him just yet.

It was two in the morning when Rowan finally heard Aelin stand. Faintly he heard her, still sniffling, shuffle off to somewhere else in their apartment.

For it was their apartment. Rowan’s just as much as Aelin’s. More even. He just wasn’t allowed inside anymore.

Rowan stood and walked away.

—

Aelin giggled. “You did not.”

Chaol flashed a smile. “I swear on all that is holy I did.”

Aelin shook her head, eyes dancing with mirth. “How does one even manage to do that without being—”

“May I cut in?”

Aelin turned, smile frozen in place, to find her boyfriend reaching over to place an arm around her side, fingers digging in a bit too much for her liking. “Of course. We were just talking about you, actually.”

Rowan smiled, but there was something in the expression that didn’t appeal to her. “Oh?”

Chaol joined in. “I told her about the day I met you, how I got so upset with you that I put your phone number in all the bathrooms and you got a bunch of calls asking for a hookup.”

Chaol laughed, clearly under the impression this was long since water under the bridge. Rowan’s returning smile was a bit tighter, and Aelin wondered if he still held a grudge. Or if he was upset about something else.

“As much as I would love to reminisce,” Rowan said, voice dripping with manners and camaraderie, “My girlfriend and I need to go. I’ll see you on Monday, Westfall.”

Chaol smiled and waved. Aelin just took another sip of her champagne.

Rowan plucked the champagne flute from her hand and set it somewhere off to the side, then pulled Aelin toward the exit, his hand still firmly around her waist.

Aelin didn’t say anything as they left the work party. Nor as Rowan opened the passenger door of his car and helped her inside, like he thought she’d bolt at the first opportunity.

The ride home was silent. As was the walk up the stairs leading to their apartment. Rowan unlocked the door with his keys and held it open, letting Aelin go first. Once again, she got the feeling it wasn’t a gesture of kindness.

Aelin dropped her purse on the counter then spun around, anger finally spilling over the top. “What the hell was that?”

Rowan crossed his arms. “I could ask you the same thing.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

Rowan didn’t waver. “You were flirting with my coworker.”

Aelin gaped at him. “I was doing no such thing!”

Rowan just snorted.

“You asked me to make an effort with your friends,” Aelin said icily. “That’s all I was doing.”

Rowan scoffed. “Don’t take me for a fool, Aelin.”

“Excuse me? I was not flirting with anybody, Rowan. We were talking about you for fuck’s sake.”

“Chaol always has ulterior motives. I don’t trust him.”

“And what about me? Do you trust me?” Aelin barely managed to keep her voice from cracking.

Rowan’s face instantly softened. “Of course I trust you, baby.”

Aelin didn’t reply.

Rowan stepped forward and brought his hands to her face, gently cupping her cheeks. “Look at me.”

Aelin hesitated, then brought her gaze to meet his own.

“I’m sorry, love. I shouldn’t have been so suspicious. Forgive me.”

Aelin’s lower lip wavered. She still said nothing.

“I love you,” Rowan continued, softly tracing a line over her cheek. “Forgive me.”

“I love you too,” Aelin rasped. And it was true. She loved him more than anything in the world.

Rowan leaned in and pressed his lips against her forehead. “I’m sorry.”

Aelin squeezed her eyes shut. She was tense as Rowan started to move his mouth down her neck, loving and demanding at the same time.

Rowan’s hand found its way to her shoulder, sliding the thin strap of her dress off. Aelin stayed still, breathing through her nose while Rowan started following the top of her dress down with his mouth, kissing her bare chest, Aelin’s breasts covered only barely.

“Rowan,” Aelin gasped as he finally freed a breast from the fabric and closed his mouth around it. She wasn’t sure if she was spurring him on or protesting.

Rowan pushed her back a step. Then another. Aelin felt the wall at her back. She let her head fall back against it.

“I’m sorry,” Rowan repeated in a dark murmur, breath caressing her ear. His hand fell to her thigh and pushed up the dress, then he reached for his own buckle.

Aelin could only try to convince herself she wanted this as Rowan pulled her underwear to the side and—

Aelin jolted up in bed with a gasp.

Sweat soaked the sheets and dripped down Aelin’s face as she panted into the darkness. Aelin bent over and buried her face in the sheets, face already wet with tears.

—

Routine had long since become mechanical for Rowan. Get out of bed. Take a shower. Eat breakfast. Brush teeth. Dress and get out the door.

It helped keep his thoughts from straying.

It wasn’t just getting ready that Rowan approached with machine-like indifference. The rest of the day passed in a blur, and soon enough Rowan was in a bar, sipping his first whiskey of the night.

It sure as hell wouldn’t be the last.

He slipped his phone out of his pocket and placed it on the bar in front of him. Turning it on revealed Aelin’s smiling face, framed by her vibrant golden hair. A white sundress highlighted her curves subtly. The sun was high behind her, and the cloudless sky was the blue of her eyes. The whole picture was so Aelin.

Rowan entered his passcode and took in the home screen, another picture of Aelin, this one with him as well. Aelin’s cousin Aedion had taken the picture. They were sprawled across the grass, Aelin haphazardly lounging on top of Rowan, her mouth open in a laugh that he could almost hear, even now. And that beautiful hair, strewn across his chest.

She looked the happiest Rowan had ever seen her. There was no way someone could look that happy and just be pretending. It was utterly impossible.

Rowan searched for indications that he was treating her wrong, that his grip on her arm was too tight or his eyes were angry or mean.

They weren’t. He was gazing at her with adoration, just as he’d always done. He had loved her, and he still did, and Rowan had never hesitated to tell Aelin. So why had she left?

Rowan entered his photo app and started scrolling through them, though dozens upon dozens of photos of her smiling in the sun and laughing in the rain and eating on the couch.

He was a masochist to do this to himself, but he couldn’t stop.

He kept searching for any signs that something was wrong, that he wasn’t loving her right.

He couldn’t find any.

—

The echoing noises of the thumps on the bag were the only sounds in the room. Aelin struck with deadly capability, slamming her fist into the punching bag again and again.

She’d gotten into self-defense not long after the breakup with Rowan. Punching things, more specifically. And Aelin had gotten good, too.

She used to work out in the gym, but the closest gym was annoying to get to, all the way across town. So Aelin had invested some money into some basic equipment and set everything up in the only empty room in the apartment.

Well, it was only empty after Aelin had dumped all of Rowan’s things out on the curb. This was his former office. There was a picture of him on the wall where there used to be one of her. It was filled with holes from the various weapons Aelin had thrown at it, among them knives, darts, and a single fork.

Maybe Aelin needed to talk to a therapist.

Aelin twisted her body and pivoted her foot, landing a deadly roundhouse kick on the bag. Why the fuck hadn’t anyone told her about this miracle cure sooner?

Aelin was so busy taking out every ounce of fury within her body—which totaled up to a frighteningly large quantity—that she almost didn’t notice her phone ringing. She finally noticed the screen lit up out of the corner of her eye, and Aelin pulled out her earbuds and strode over to her phone.

It was from Sam. Aelin reached for her phone, then paused, breathing deeply. From the exercise, she told herself. Solely from the exercise.

The ringing stopped. Aelin was too late. She reached once more, intent on calling Sam back, but stopped again.

She’d been thinking a lot over the past few days. Trying. Trying so hard to love him. And every time she was with him and she opened her mouth to get it over with, she couldn’t. Because Aelin couldn’t do that to Sam. He deserved better.

And because she was thinking about somebody else.

Aelin spun around and executed a perfect boxing maneuver on the bag. Jab, dodge, duck, right hook to the body, left hook to the body, left hook to the head, slide back with a defensive jab. She repeated it, then moved onto a different maneuver.

Then Aelin stripped off her gloves and bolted for the door, off to do something she would most certainly regret.

—

Panting, Aelin knocked on the door before she could loose her resolve. Then she waited, hands on her hips and shoulders back.

Not even a minute passed before the lock clicked and the door was pulled inward.

Aelin took in Rowan’s tired eyes and haggard expression and knew she was the reason for that. And probably for the smell of alcohol on his breath.

He didn’t ask how she knew where he lived—Aelin had a depressing amount of free time; or why she looked like she’d run all the way here—she had; or why she was here—that one she didn’t know. He just opened the door wider.

“Come here.”

Aelin did. She wondered if her fate had been sealed from the moment she first laid eyes on him. Rowan Whitethorn was like a sinkhole, drawing you in farther and father no matter what you did, only tightening his grip when you struggled.

That gruesome description wasn’t enough to make Aelin turn back quite yet.

She stepped inside and pressed her lips against Rowan’s, hands twining in his hair instantly. His own hands came to her hips, pushing her tank top up slightly and tracing familiar patterns on her bare skin.

Aelin shoved Rowan backward in his apartment one step, then one more. She spun around so Rowan was against the wall. Aelin could feel his lips curve upward against hers, but she didn’t care what amusement he was deriving from her dominance. He wanted to take everything from her? Well, she would take right back.

Aelin parted Rowan’s lips with her tongue and the small groan that left the back of his throat had Aelin pulling his hair none-too-gently, melting into his giant frame even farther.

Nothing mattered anymore. It all evaporated into some space that Aelin couldn’t and didn’t want to access. Her brain was blissfully empty as she hooked a leg around his ankle, and as she nipped at his lip.

Rowan growled and started moving his hands upwards toward her breasts, thumbs brushing the undersides just enough that Aelin could feel it and lean into the sensation, ignoring his gleeful smirk against her mouth. Rowan finally broke the kiss and trailed his mouth along Aelin’s jawline, until his lips reached her ear.

“I love you,” Rowan whispered, voice dark and hoarse.

Aelin exhaled, her grip on him loosening. “I hate you.”

Rowan pulled back and frowned. “No, you don’t.”

Aelin chuckled humorlessly. “You’re right.” She stepped closer to the door. “But I hate that I love you.”

“Bullshit.”

“I shouldn’t have come here.”

Rowan shook his head. “Bullshit,” he repeated.

“Goodbye, Rowan.”

Aelin started for the still-open door, only a couple feet away.

Rowan’s hand immediately took hold of her wrist. “You can’t leave again. Not like this.”

“How, then?” Aelin asked, shaking her wrist free of his grasp. “Was last time any better?”

“Don’t leave me at all.”

The desperation in Rowan’s voice would have provoked some sort of sympathy in Aelin any other time, but she only felt cold as she stared him down.

“Goodbye, Rowan,” she repeated. Then Aelin spun around and slipped out the door before he could stop her.

—

“Stop it.”

“I will not.”

“Yes you will.”

“No I won’t.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“What’re you gonna do if I don’t?”

“I’ll beat you up, that’s what.”

Aelin and Sam only managed maintain eye contact for a minute more before dissolving into laughter.

“I’m being serious,” Aelin said between laughs.

Sam shook his head. “I don’t even understand what the issue is,” he replied, features filled with delight.

“The issue,” Aelin enunciated, “is that you can’t just be stupid like that. It’s not a good look on you.”

Sam scoffed in pretend hurt. “Excuse me, it’s not stupid to tickle my girlfriend.”

“It is,” Aelin insisted. “You’re an asshole for it.” She pouted.

Sam made an over-dramatic frown. “I’m so sorry I hurt your feelings, babe.” He spread his arms wide and leaned over from the car seat.

Aelin could only involuntarily cackle as Sam moved his evil fingers over her again, his false hug turning into an ambush. “Stop it,” she cried between giggles. “This is mean. And foul. A foulable offense.”

“Is foulable even a word?”

“It is now,” Aelin hissed, elbowing him.

Sam grinned. “It’s not my fault. What else is a guy to do when he finds out his girlfriend’s ticklish?”

“You’re supposed to not bully them!”

Sam laughed into Aelin’s shoulder. “I love you so much.”

Aelin hugged him, for the sole purpose of making sure he couldn’t see her face at the words. Before she had been so happy to hear Sam say it, and now the only thought she could conjure upon hearing it was Rowan’s face.

Everything she’d ever had, everything she’d ever worked for, Rowan soured. It was a talent of his.

Aelin hadn’t told Sam about the kiss. Almost a week had passed already, and she hadn’t told him. Acknowledging it validated it, and Aelin didn’t want that. She just wanted to forget. Though it was hard to forget the one thing haunting her through all hours of the day and night.

“Let’s go inside,” Aelin said abruptly, pulling away. “I’m already forgetting what I wanted to get.”

Sam smiled, oblivious to Aelin’s internal struggles. “Sure.”

—

How dare she come to him, kiss him, make him think she was ready to invite him home? How dare she use him the way she claimed he used her?

The nerve of Aelin’s visit left Rowan seething. All he wanted was Aelin. And he’d be damned if he didn’t get her.

The bell dinged to signal a customer’s arrival and Rowan’s eyes snapped up. He relaxed once more as he saw it was only an elderly man, then tensed up all over again as he spotted a familiar car parked outside the shop.

Aelin came here every Tuesday without fail to buy a new book. It was one of the few luxuries she allowed herself, and it was the only part of her routine she hadn’t changed after dumping him, and he’d been waiting in the mystery aisle for over an hour now.

And his waiting had paid off. Except, rather than leaving the car, Aelin and that man were talking and laughing and touching. He was tickling her, like a fucking loser.

Another five minutes passed and Rowan was debating going out there and knocking on the car window when the doors finally opened.

They walked hand-in-hand into the bookstore, and Aelin pressed a kiss against the man’s cheek as they neared a shelf.

His smile made Rowan smile. This poor, innocent man had no idea what had happened last week. He had no idea how unfaithful Aelin truly was.

Aelin murmured something to the man—Rowan refused to even think his name—and headed off to the romance section. Rowan followed her, creeping around shelves and not giving a fuck how bad it looked.

Aelin was reaching for some book or other when she noticed Rowan coming up behind her. Her face flushed, much to his delight, and her eyes widened.

“Go away,” was the first thing to come out of her mouth.

Rowan shook his head. “Not a chance, princess.”

Aelin’s face tightened visibly. “I’m not interested in doing this again, Rowan. We’re over.”

“Really? You haven’t seemed too sure about that lately.”

Aelin huffed. “Last week was a mistake. I know that now. I knew it when I did it. But that’s it. We’re done now. Get over yourself, Rowan.”

“I love you.”

“And I used to believe that,” Aelin snapped.

Rowan ground his jaw in frustration. “What do I have to do to prove that I care about you?”

“That’s just the thing,” Aelin hissed, voice quiet but angry. “There is nothing to prove. You could started acting like the perfect boyfriend, the man I thought I loved, and it still wouldn’t matter. We’re not good together, Rowan. We’re broken. We. Are. Fucking. Broken.”

Rowan took a step forward, every molecule in his body freezing as Aelin flinched. “Are you scared of me, Aelin?”

She shook her head, but she’d always been a bad liar. Rowan could see right thought it.

“I have never laid a hand on you in my life,” Rowan stated, voice devoid of human emotion. “Never.”

Fire swirled behind Aelin’s eyes. “I know that. But you didn’t have to.”

Rowan shook his head vehemently. “What the hell does that mean?”

Aelin’s chest was heaving. “Think about it, Rowan. Think about us. Remember how you were with me.”

He did. Because he was a fair person who cared enough to listen to Aelin, he did.

—

“Maybe you should stop hanging out with Dorian,” Rowan commented.

It was a joke. It had just been a joke.

“What?” Aelin asked. She looked confused.

“I mean, whenever you two are together you’re smiling more than you smile with me. It’s a little difficult to watch.”

Rowan shrugged as his lips twitched. She was supposed to laugh now, amused at the joke.

Aelin didn’t laugh.

—

“You should really learn how to cook something,” Rowan said, watching in amusement as Aelin reached for the Chinese takeout menu, and not for the first time this week.

“Gods, Rowan, if you’re so sick of eating takeout then make something yourself.”

Aelin stormed off. And Rowan had clearly been the right one in that conversation, because after Aelin didn’t like his suggestion and decided to make a fuss about it and be a bitch, Rowan let her leave and didn’t bring it up again. Because he cared about her.

—

And finally, the day everything went up in flames:

Aelin tipped her head back and laughed. Rowan watched this little spectacle from afar. Until she got so loud that his boss’ boss looked over and that’s when Rowan had had it.

“Aelin, come with me,” Rowan said as he grabbed her hand. Gently. He had grabbed her hand gently.

Aelin frowned, but didn’t protest. She would have protested if she wasn’t okay with this. Rowan knew her.

They made it outside the building and both of them stopped. They weren’t waiting to go all the way back to the apartment this time.

“Maybe I need to stop bringing you to these things,” Rowan said, running his hand through his hair.

Aelin frowned. “Why? Am I embarrassing you?”

“No, Aelin, of course you aren’t. But you are bothering my coworkers, and I don’t want them to look down on me because of my girlfriend.”

She snorted. “That’s the literal definition of embarrassment,” she slurred.

“No, there’s a difference between being embarrassed by someone and logically not wanting to have someone with you for strategic purposes.”

Aelin laughed incredulously, and Rowan wondered if she still didn’t understand. But the next thing that came out of her mouth made him the one who couldn’t comprehend what was happening.

“We’re done.”

“What?”

Aelin smiled, but it wasn’t a happy thing, it was twisted and sad and so many other emotions, some of which Rowan couldn’t even name. “I’m breaking up with you.”

A moment of shaky silence passed as Rowan held eye contact with Aelin. Finally, he said, “We’re going home now.”

Aelin scoffed. “Don’t you hear me?”

“You’re drunk, Aelin.”

A tear slid down Aelin’s cheek and Rowan stepped forward to console her, for that’s what he’d always done when she was upset.

But Aelin stepped backward. “Go home. Get your things. Get out.”

Rowan sighed. “Aelin, seriously—”

“No!” she yelled, and Rowan glanced back at the party he’d just emerged from, worried someone might have heard her. “You don’t get to ignore me! Get the fuck out of my apartment. Now!”

“No,” Rowan snapped.

Aelin seethed. “Well, I guess I’ll just have to get your things out on my own.”

She snatched the keys from his hand and took off toward the car, but Rowan’s head was swimming enough that he could only stand there, frozen, for a solid thirty seconds as she climbed in the driver’s seat.

Then he started moving. “Aelin, stop this. Calm down. You’re overreacting and I need you to get out of the car.”

Aelin held the wheel tightly as she hastily locked the car. She didn’t bother buckling in before the car jerked backward. Rowan raced to the other side of it and blocked it from leaving the parking space.

Aelin must have had more to drink than Rowan originally noticed, for instead of stopping like the sensible woman he’d thought her to be, she slammed on the gas and went over the grass, swerving and turning back onto the pavement farther down. Aelin narrowly avoided a lamppost as she got onto the road and started speeding down the street.

Rowan could only watch, mouth agape and heart stopping altogether.

—

“I can’t think of a single thing I did to provoke something like that from you, Aelin.” Rowan’s hands were clenched into fists. “You just started acting out for no reason at all. I wasn’t the one behaving poorly.”

“There were signs,” Aelin breathed, voice riding the edge between stability and insanity. “There were so many warning signs.”

Rowan opened his mouth to protest, but before any sound could come out, Aelin’s so-called boyfriend walked up to her. She was at the corner of a shelf, and the men were on either side of it, meaning Sam hadn’t yet noticed him. Rowan wanted to step forward and beat some sense into the man, show him who Aelin really belonged to, but Aelin spoke before he could step forward.

“Hey, babe. I found my book. Ready to leave?”

The man grinned. It was a snarky little look, and Rowan knew he’d look better with a fist in his face.

“I am.”

Aelin stepped closer to him and farther from Rowan, then paused. Her tactic had originally seemed to be getting Sam away from Rowan as quickly as possible, but now she stance took on a different posture.

Rowan had never wished he could see inside her head more than he was now.

Aelin didn’t even look his way. “I love you, Sam.”

Rowan froze. He didn’t need to know anything about their relationship to know that was the first time Aelin had told Sam that. Not just from the delight on his face, but from the way Aelin spoke. Rowan could feel it in his bones.

She was spiting him. This could easily be discussed anywhere else, at any other time, but Aelin chose to say it now, with Rowan hovering in the background. It was a message to him, to stay away. It was hateful. It was cruel.

Something splintered in Rowan’s chest.

Sam was saying something, presumably a reciprocation of those three words, but Rowan didn’t hear it. His ears were buzzing.

Aelin took ahold of Sam’s arm and started for the checkout desk.

She didn’t look back.

———

Tag List:

@aelin-bitch-queen

@evolving-dreamer

@feysand-loml

@flora-shadowshine

@gracie-rosee

@infernoqueen19

@julemmaes

@lemonade-coolattas

@live-the-fangirl-life

@midsizewitch

@morganofthewildfire

@nehemikkele

@realbookloverproblems

@rhysandswingspan

@rowaelinismyotp

@rowanaelinn

@sexy-dumpster-fire

@sleeping-and-books

@story-scribbler

@swankii-art-teacher

@thenerdandfandoms

@yesdreamblog

[marsbutterfly]

Mirrors

Note: I have been working on this for months. Every time I listen to this song, I think about slow dancing with Hanji. Please I’m begging, let me know if y’all like it <3

Summary: Stars shine brightly in the sky outside but inside the crowded ballroom, the only star you are interested in is Hanji.

WARNING: Slightly NSFW! 

Wattpad Version! | AO3 Version!

|◁ II ▷|

“Aren't you something to admire

'cause your shine is something like a mirror

And I can't help but notice, you reflect in this heart of mine”

The music that echoes from the main hall is now muffled by the closed doors. You take a few steps forward, propping your body on the balcony as you watch the leaves on the trees dancing with the wind.

Strands of hair fall from their assigned position in an elegant bun. As you shiver, you wrap your arms around your torso in an attempt to keep yourself warm. 

Sliding your hand up and down the sides of your arm, you silently take your free index and middle fingers towards your mouth, a red lipstick mark staining your skin.

A smirk curls up on the right corner of your lips as you think about the tall, brunette awaiting for you inside the ballroom. Her black suit perfectly matches her eye patch as the waves of her hair fall over her shoulder, still the usual messy ponytail.

You take a deep breath allowing the cold air to fill your lungs. The wind hits your face and your nose turns bright red in response. Your eyes analyze the land ahead of you while you pay close attention to the armed soldiers protecting the building.

“Y/N.” A voice pulls you away from your thoughts. Immediately, you turn around and bow to her, paying close attention to her cheeks as they turn red under the pale moonlight.

“Your Highness.” 

“I still can’t get used to that.” Historia says. The long, red cape she wears sweeps the floor as she walks closer to you, and in her eyes you can see how desperate she is for a break from the overwhelming attention she’s been receiving. You flash her a compassionate smile before extending your hand, helping as she struggles with the flowy white dress she wears. She mouths the words “Thank you” in return..

“Would you like a cigarette?” You ask, opening the container as the smell of tobacco quickly hits against your nose. She shrugs, quickly shaking her head while putting her hand up, trying to gently push it away. All you can do is laugh in response.

“God, no.” She says, a laugh of her own escaping her small body, “Just the smell makes me want to cough and plus, it wouldn’t look good if anyone saw the Queen smoking.”

“I don’t smoke them either.” You place the container back into the small pocket hiding in the fabric of your red dress, arms quickly wrapping around yourself once again in an attempt to shield yourself from the cold. “But I learned that it’s always a good idea to have a pack with you when dealing with the higher-ups.”

After taking a few more steps forward, Historia places her hand on your upper left-arm. Neither of you say anything for a few seconds, simply enjoying the rare seconds of silence surrounding you. It doesn’t last more than a couple of minutes.

“If you ever feel alone and the glare makes me hard to find

Just know that I'm always parallel on the other side”

Rushed footsteps come from behind you. The blonde girl by your side lets out an audible sigh before turning around to face whoever was making their way through the massive door and you notice a hint of sadness hidden in her ocean blue eyes.

“Your Highness, your presence is being required.” A tall soldier says, short of breath after running towards you. Historia hangs her head low, shaking it slowly. 

“Go.” You try and encourage her, “Those military idiots in there won’t be of any help once the alcohol gets to their head.”

She grimaces before nodding, the soldier takes her hand and guides her to the massive brown doors of the ballroom. But before going in, he turns to you quickly. “Section Commander Y/N, Commander Hanji would like to see you.”

A smile on your face, you practically run back inside the building, your heels clicking against the floor as you pass the queen. She giggles and shoots you a quick glance. 

“They really are an amazing couple, aren’t they?” She quietly asks the guard standing next to the door, not expecting an answer from her other than a smile and a nod.

The sound of loud voices and wine bottles gently hitting the edge of glasses fills your ears. In one of the corners, the band plays an upbeat melody while couples dance around the room. Ball gowns coat the floor with glitter as they spin around like dandelions flying with the wind.

On the way in, you rush past the crowd, bumping against a few and quickly apologizing until you lay your eyes on her. She holds a champagne glass in her right hand as her left rests in the pocket of her high-waisted pants. Even though Hanji is a few inches shorter than most of the men surrounding her, she still makes a point to hold  her chin up and look down at all of them.

But as soon as her eyes meet yours, her face noticeably lights up. Once you are close enough, she excuses herself before quickly running towards you, careful not to spill the drink in her hand. Your arms wrap around her waist, face resting on the crook of her neck while she pushes your head as close to her as possible. 

“You were looking for me?” You ask, propping your chin up on her collarbone. She smiles widdly at you and nods, strands of her hair tickling your face.

“Yes, I needed you to save me from…. Them.” She tilts her head, a barely noticeable gesture but enough for you to look over her shoulder. A group of four men stare at you, one of them you quickly recognize as Commander Pixis, who simply raises his nearly full wine glass at you before taking a long sip. Once he places it down, there is nothing in it anymore and you let out a giggle against Hanji’s skin.

“I’m sorry, I needed some fresh air.” You say and smile at her.

“Cause with your hand in my hand and a pocket full of soul

I can tell you there's no place we couldn't go

Just put your hand on the glass

I'm here trying to pull you through

You just gotta be strong”

The upbeat song quickly disappears and in its place a comforting silence appears. The woman in front of you takes a step back before extending her hand forward. No words are needed for you to understand what she’s trying to say.

You nod and take her hand, allowing her to guide you towards the dance floor. A red blush spreads across your face though you are not quite certain why. Perhaps it’s a result of Hanji’s warm fingers touching your skin or maybe the alcohol is finally hitting you.

Once both of your bodies come to a full stop, she places one hand on your back as the other remains holding yours. She pulls you closer and your focus now belongs to her intoxicating and intense, whiskey brown eyes.

Hand resting on her shoulder, you take a deep breath, preparing yourself as the band starts to play a slow melody. Couples all around you begin to move and you can feel your heart beating in your throat, a mixture of excitement and nervousness.

Hanji’s grip on you tightens for a second and you feel a wave of calmness washing over you. Her feet begin to move, gently guiding you around in perfect sync with each other. The smile on her lips as she escorts you from one side to the other is nearly enough to outshine the moon, your heels clicking against the marble floor. 

For a second, it seems as if the world around you has disappeared and only the two of you remained. Curious eyes from the crowd now rest upon you, paying close attention to your movements. You can feel your heart racing in your ears, nearly blocking out the music.

Guiding both your hand and hers above your head, she spins you gently and you allow a quiet giggle to come out. As your body comes to a full stop, Hanji pulls you in, your palms resting against her chest while your eyes focus on the waves of her hair. 

Every last particle of air is sucked out of your lungs before your lips meet hers. The taste of the alcohol in her breath mixed with the faint smell of your lipstick brings out a feeling you are all too familiar with, comfort.

The softness of her mouth against yours erases every other thought you might have in that moment and the only one left is Hanji. The way her fingers feel against your skin or how you are able to feel the beating of her heart, rhythmically matching yours.

All eyes now rest upon the two of you, carefully waiting for your next move. In this moment, underneath the bright lights of the ballroom and the gaze of every superior in the Military, you realize you belong to Hanji, body and soul.

“Cause I don't wanna lose you now

I'm lookin' right at the other half of me

The vacancy that sat in my heart

Is a space that now you hold”

Lips finally separating, she smiles brightly at you before spinning you one final time and carefully supporting your body weight as you fall into her arms. When she brings you back up, your faces are merely an inch apart. 

Your chest rises and falls rapidly, trying to catch your breath while she touches her forehead to yours. After what it feels like an eternity, you are able to break out of the trance her intoxicating eyes had you in and you finally notice the two of you are the center of attention.

A burning sensation takes over your cheeks and you shift your focus towards Hanji’s expensive shoes but before too long, you feel her index finger brushing against your skin and resting underneath your chin while she places her thumb parallelly on top.

She gently forces your head up and welcomes your eyes with a bright smile. You can’t help but allow the corners of your lips to rise in return. 

Before you have time to fall into yet another trance, you hear someone clear their throat behind you. Quickly, you turn around, consequently freeing yourself from Hanji’s embrace. The bald man with rosy cheeks gets closer to her, making sure she can hear him over the deafening beat of the band’s new song.

She simply nods and you watch him walk away. You flash Hanji a curious look and, in response, she brings her lips dangerously close to yours only to make a detour and place them by your ear. 

“Let’s go outside.” She says, “I want to introduce you to a few more of my colleagues.”

You nod. Her warm breath hitting your skin now turns into the feeling of her lips biting your earlobe. A shiver goes down your spine and a part of you melts right then and there. She lets out a giggle before pulling away and grabbing your hand, gently guiding you towards the exit.

“Show me how to fight for now

And I'll tell you, baby, it was easy

Coming back into you once I figured it out

You were right here all along

It's like you're my mirror”

The cold wind hits your face as soon as you step outside but this time you are welcomed by loud laughs and the smoke from several lit cigarettes instead of the calming silence. 

Hanji closes her eyes, taking a quick breath before making her way down the stairs, your hand now resting on her upper left arm.

From a small group emerges a man you have never seen before. The insignia on his chest indicates he’s a part of the Garrison but nothing more sticks out to you. He reaches for Hanji’s hand and she quickly obliges.

“This is my Y/N.” She says. You simply nod and smile at him.

As they strike a conversation, you wave your hand at one of the servers and grab one of the many glasses of wine they hold above a tray. 

The liquid slides down your throat with ease as you try and focus on the words flowing around you. Hanji shoots you a concerned look, to which you simply squeeze her arm gently, wordlessly letting her know that you’re still there, and that you’re bored.

You wordlessly transmit what is going through your head by squeezing her arm repeatedly, “I. Want. To. Go. Home.” You pause for a few seconds, and then squeeze her one final time as if to say “please.” 

In response, Hanji laughs into her cup, acting like she’s paying attention to whatever the man in front of you is saying.

Suddenly, you feel her hand sliding across your hips. It doesn’t rest there for long before quietly making its way down. A gasp escapes you once you feel the pressure of her grasping the flesh of your ass.

You shiver gently, trying to play it off as if you’re cold but the devious smirk on her lips is nearly enough to destroy your cover.

With each look she shoots you, you feel the world around you spin for a second. You’re not able to tell if you're drunk from the wine or from those intoxicating brown eyes.

“Well gentlemen, it has been a pleasure.” Hanji says, and nods at them gently, “But we have an early start tomorrow and I would hate to deal with the initiation ceremony while suffering from an awful hangover.”

The men burst into laughter all at once, so synchronized it reminds you of instruments in a symphony. You simply smile and wave them goodbye before rushly following behind Hanji. 

As you wait for your ride, you pull her closer to you in order whisper to her, sweetly and desperately, “I need your fingers inside of me.”

Hanji looks at you out of the corner of her eye. 

“Then my fingers inside of you is what you shall get, my lady.” She replies, lust filling her eyes. Her hand rests on your lower back, pulling you closer and destroying every inch of space between you two.

“My mirror staring back at me

I couldn't get any bigger

With anyone else beside of me

And now it's clear as this promise

That we're making two reflections into one”

Outside, all you can hear is the clopping of hooves against the pavement. Yet inside the carriage, the sounds of your moans fill the air. 

You straddle Hanji on the carriage seat as your hands desperately unbutton her white shirt. Her blazer already lies forgotten on the empty seat across from you. The warmth of her fingers travels from your back to your ass, feeling the pressure of her squeeze as it drags a delighted sound out of you.

A smile takes over her lips before they shift to plant wet kisses on your jawbone. You groan quietly, your hands shaking as you push her now-unbuttoned shirt off, and you watch as the cloth slides down her arms.

Lifting your head, you wordlessly invite her to kiss your neck. She immediately obliges, her lips brushing against the area gently. She travels from your jaw to your collarbone and you melt against her touch much like snow in the sun.

Hanji giggles quietly, fully appreciating the savory image before her. You decide to use the break to your advantage and reach for her hand. You guide it towards your already soaked underwear and press her fingers into you.

Her fingertips brush lightly against the thin fabric of your lace underwear, dragging a prolonged moan out of you. Once she applies a bit more pressure right above your clit, you know you are done for.

Her middle and ring fingers move in small circles and a shiver travels down your spine. Instantly, you begin moving your hips against her, your arms wrapping around her neck as you try to balance yourself.

Once both of you quicken your paces, you begin to gasp desperately. Hanji’s face is buried in the crook of your neck, her warm tongue tracing along the dips of your skin. 

The carriage comes to an abrupt stop. Hanji’s hands move towards your hips, securing you in place. As your eyes meet, she giggles, and it’s so heartwarming that it fills the air and brings the corners of your lips up into a smile. Seeing her like this awakens the hundreds of butterflies in your stomach.

You move your leg, allowing her to get up and open the carriage door. Your hands carefully examine the seat, looking for her blazer. Yet all you find is the imprint left by her ass. Once you feel the expensive fabric in your fingers, you grab it before making your way outside the door.

As you stand outside, Hanji’s left arm rests on your back while her right scoops your legs out from underneath you. She lifts your body up, and laughs loudly as she carries you towards the building. She backs into the heavy, brown doors while holding you in her arms, and stumbles inside of your house. 

Standing in front of your room’s door, she shoots a look at you to silently ask you to turn the knob. 

After turning on the lights, Hanji makes her way past the small wooden table in the middle of the room and carries you towards the bed. You pull her in by the neck, sealing your lips together in a kiss. 

Your body is gently placed on the bed, kissing all the while. Her tongue gently explores your mouth and you crave for more of her touch, to feel her breath against your skin despite the smell of alcohol that lingers on her tongue.

Hanji laces her fingers with yours, and you notice how well they fit together like the pieces of a puzzle. You finally realize you need air and you mentally curse your lungs for their need to breathe, forcing your lips apart. 

With a smirk, she pulls away, gently grabbing your wrist and placing your hand right above her heart. As you feel the beats, you could’ve sworn they were saying your name.

She plants a quick kiss on your lips before getting up, quickly unbuttoning her own shirt while making her way towards the door once again. A whimper leaves your body and your bottom lip quivers. 

Hanji doesn’t say anything but simply locks the door before walking back to you, hands behind her back as she starts to remove her bra. A smile on your lips, you begin touching the fabric of your own dress before pulling it up your body.

The last thing you pay attention to before focusing solely on Hanji is the flicking light of the candle standing on the bedside table. 

As she lays in bed with you, her hands quickly find their way towards your boobs, gently pinching your nipple in between her fingers while resting her face on your shoulder, wet lips leaving small, purplish marks on your skin.

All you’ve ever wanted was for Hanji to feel like you belong to her and tonight you will show her that you do, body and soul.

“Cause it's like you're my mirror

My mirror staring back at me, staring back at me”

[blueprint-han]

pickup lines ↠ hhj ♡

             ↳ inspired from the song i love you by treasure. (no relation to the song idk why i was inspired)

genre: fluff type: drabble word count: 1.9 K ⇥ warnings: none except one (1) teeny tiny kiss (just a peck nothing too suggestive), lot’s of fluff and pickup lines and that’s a warning. 🥺 IF THIS DOESN’T SHOW UP IN THE TAGS THIS TIME I WILL FUCKING FUME. network tag: @stayverse​

↯ note: uhfuyewhf please forgive this random outburst that overcame me, fluffy boyfriend hyunjin is just !!!!. Also my first fic woo hoo !! no particular premise of this blurb idk what this is for but i’m still gonna write it. ⇥ dawn.☀️

A long, deep sigh.

A cheek pressed against his palm, resting his head against his elbow as he stared off into space. The library was relatively quiet around him, no other sound other than the timely flipping of the page by the two other people sitting in the almost empty, spacious room.

And of course, the sound of you humming the tune that poured through the earphones you were sporting. Hyunjin could almost swear that he would fall asleep from the tune, if it weren’t for the hard wood underneath him.

Hyunjin pouted when he noticed you completely immersed in your sociology 101 textbook. Studying to be a data analyst was hard, and while it was both yours and Hyunjin’s dream job, (instead of focusing on the plethora of books lying on the table) Hyunjin found staring at the love of his life much more interesting than analyzing any sort of data.

Sunlight poured in through the open window. It was still fairly early in the morning, and while Hyunjin hated waking up early, he was more than ready to do so the moment you called him the previous night, begging him to tag along on the pretext that “it would be boring to go alone.”

And the moment you entered the library, you picked out your books and quickly drowned yourself in them, and in less than five minutes, Hyunjin found himself the one who was “bored.”

You felt a poke at the side of your arm, startling you out of your concentration.

“Hey.”

Pulling your earphones off, you smiled at Hyunjin. “Yeah?”

“You said you’d be the one bored but now I’m the one bored.” Hyunjin humphed, folding his arms across his chest. “Remind me why I accompanied you?”

You laughed, gently pinching his cheek. “Because you’re a good boyfriend.”

Being the dramatic llama that he was, Hyunjin rolled his eyes, though the subtle smile on his lips told you otherwise. “Fine finish it soon now.” He pointed before poking your arm again. “Or I’m gonna leave you and get subway for myself.”

You gasped in fake betrayal, clutching your heart as your eyes widened. It was a known fact that Hyunjin was too smitten for you, far too caring and considerate to leave you alone in the library without breakfast. And you loved to tease him about it.

Anyways, the act faltered in two seconds the moment you giggled at him.

“You’re adorable, have I ever told you that?” You mimicked his position as you faced him, admiring how he looked at the moment. Heavily lidded eyes, messy black hair, and the sunlight from behind him almost made him look like he was glowing.

At your words, Hyunjin felt the tiniest blush creep up his cheeks as he shyly admitted. “You tell me every day!”

“Well I’m going to keep telling you that, so…” you shrugged, turning your attention back to your books as hyunjin internally groaned. The library didn’t allow use of phones either, so he couldn’t just start playing around with it to kill time.

Brushing his hair off his forehead, his eyes sparkled when a thought popped into his head, a smug look on his face. Quickly grabbing his cellphone from the back of his pocket., his fingers moved against the screen — not quick enough for the librarian to notice — but at this point, it hardly mattered. The librarian was almost asleep on his table — he must’ve not adjusted to the early hours of his job very well.

When your phone dinged — signifying the arrival of a message — Hyunjin watched intently as you picked up your phone and tapped the screen a couple of times. When you grinned widely, Hyunjin knew his message had the desired affect. In all honesty, that was Hyunjin — always looking for subtle ways to tell you he loved you, and ways to keep you smiling and happy.

You reached over to push your reading classes up your nose before turning to look at Hyunjin’s direction, raising your eyebrow playfully.

Hyunjin:  Guess what I’m wearing?

He had a similar grin on his lips as he silently coaxed you to reply, and so you did just that.

You: What? Your uniform? 🤭

Knowing Hyunjin, you knew that the answer would not be so simple, but nevertheless you curiously waited for the answer.

When the reply came in, the smile on your face turned into a wide, ear-to-ear smile, cheeks almost hurting with how widely you were grinning. You tried desperately trying not to alert anyone of what you were doing, but it was getting harder with how adorable Hyunjin was being.

Hyunjin: No, the smile you gave me. You: usdyuegwydedh 🥺🥺🥺 You: you cheesehead! 😘😤 Hyunjin: But I’m your cheesehead - ;D

Hyunjin, still staring at you was in a similar state. He admitted that watching you laugh and smile was something he could never grow tired of. He treasured that moment, and it always seemed like you lightened up the whole room with just your smile.

“Hey!” you looked at him, books totally forgotten as you stared into his eyes.

“They say the eyes are the mirror to the soul.” Hyunjin said, straightening up his posture as you eyed him confusedly. “You must have one beautiful soul.”

Your jaw dropped open at the sudden explosion of pickup lines coming from your boyfriend, rolling your eyes to the back of your head as you felt yourself grow coy at his compliment.

“Oh gosh, what’s gotten into you.” You whispered, slapping his arm slightly. Hyunjin smiled devilishly when he noticed your beaming face, feeling oddly relaxed — but then again, he was always relaxed when he looked at you.

“ On a scale from 1 to 10 you’re a 9 and I’m the 1 you need. “

You gasped, squealing as you slapped his arm yet again.

“Oh lord, your cheeseball stop being so cute my heart can’t handle this.” You pouted, and Hyunjin bit back the overwhelming desire to squish your cheeks.

He always did everything in his power to make you happy, and it never changed, even after a year of dating. The love between you was pure in every way, and you couldn’t help but feel lucky to have such a caring and lovely angel for a boyfriend.

“Come on, I need to focus now, just half an hour more?” You managed to convince him (only after giving him your traditional puppy eyes which you knew he would never be able to resist), before turning your attention back tot he book.

Twenty minutes passed. Hyunjin had found himself a book to read in the mean time, but he wasn’t the type to be patient. It wasn’t ling before he reached for his phone yet again.

When your phone dinged again, you quickly snapped your attention from where it was fixed on Hyunjin, hiding it under the table as you stealthily read the message.

Hyunjin: Can we go eat now?

You laughed to yourself, brushing hair off your forehead before replying.

You: There’s still 10 minutes left 🤭 Hyunjin: Please I’m hungry 🥺 Hyunjin: pls pls pls pls pls pls pls 🥺

You quickly looked at the watch before sighing, smiling at Hyunjin before shutting your book and stretching your arms out. You’d been there for about two hours, since your college library opened fairly early. As expected, Hyunjin let out a silent squeal of victory, quickly helping you pack up before getting out of his seat, all to eager to get out of the cramped space.

“Remind me to never tag along with you again.” He chided playfully, and like you said before, you knew Hyunjin was too soft to be able to ignore your pleas — and even if he did, you had your secret weapon: puppy eyes. You only giggled and nodded. “yeah, whatever.” Allowing him to intertwine your fingers together as he pulled you out of the building.

Once you were out of the building and walking towards the nearest subway, you decided to go the park (which was incidentally opposite to the subway shop). As you walked in the almost empty park, you munched on your sandwich slowly, whilst Hyunjin had already devoured it all. You figured he didn’t drink his coffee before coming to the library, and you didn’t bother to ask either.

Hyunjin had still not et go of your hand, and every once in a while — out of pure habit — he would squeeze it gently, just as a form of reassurance. It never failed to warm your heart.

The both of you found a clean bench under the cool shade of a tree, enjoying the breeze as you finished your sandwich; while Hyunjin simply looked around the rows of trees and plants that were planted along the edge of the ground.

When Hyunjin caught your gaze on him once again, another thought popped into his head as he smiled yet again. Personally, he had no idea how he was acting so cheesy today, but seeing your reaction did not encourage him to stop.

“Do you have a map?” You boyfriend asked all of a sudden, and you frowned confusedly. Of course, you’d let your guard down from the previous explosion of cheesiness, which only fueled it more.

“Why do you ask?” You murmured.

“Because I keep getting lost i your eyes.”

“Aghhhh,” you groaned, covering your face with your palms as you looked at Hyunjin. “Where do you even get these from?” You pouted at him.

“I don’t know, maybe you bring it out of me?” Hyunjin shrugged.

“Hmph,” You pinched his soft cheek lightly, smiling as you did so.

Next, he grinned, tilting his head to the side as he gazed into your orbs. You sensed another attack coming ahead, but did nothing to stop it, because deep down, you were enjoying this way too much.

“You know at this angle, as the light hits your eyes.” A dizzy smile on his face as he gently fixed his hair, tucking some of the strands behind his ear. “I can see myself and I look great.”

That caused you to close your eyes, erupting into a fit of giggles as your eyes morphed into the softest of crescents.

Hyunjin opened his mouth yet again, but this time, you were quick to stop him.

“Ah, no young man. No more, or I’m gonna combust.” You tucked your own hair behind your ear.

“Nooooo,” He whined, pouting as he gave you the softest look that he could muster. “One more, please? Just one. Please please please please please-”

“okay fine! One more, and then no more, deal?” You looked at him smugly, and he nodded.

“Okay so, kiss me if I’m wrong, but dinosaurs still exist, right?”

Hyunjin had chosen that line for a joke, expecting to get yet another slap on his arm, or a shy turn of your head. What he didn’t expect was for you to blush profusely before you leaned in, pressing a soft peck to his lips.

When you pulled away, Hyunjin’s eyes were widened as you stared at each other silently for two seconds, before you snapped your fingers in front of him, pulling him out of his daze.

“You were wrong.” You stated as nonchalantly as possible, shrugging at him as you got up, grabbing your bag as you began walking towards the exit.

“H-hey, wait for me!” Hyunjin cried, not being able to suppress his smile as he ran towards you, immediately entwining your fingers once again. And the rest of the walk was spent just like that, in peaceful silence as you enjoyed each other’s presence in the cool, moist air.

“You’re such a goofball,” You mumbled at him, gaining his attention as you rubbed your thumb against the back of his hand. And before he could even reply with his loving, playful gaze, you completed the statement yourself, eyes twinkling in content.

“But you’re my goofball.”

↯ note: i pray to every god out there please just show up in the tags for fuck sake i worked hard on this ; - ; ⇥ dawn.☀️

[hearthandhomemagick]

Cottage Witch Journal Entry - Self Love, Sex and Other Things That Just Feel....Naughty

It wraps around your senses like silk. That fire in your tummy that you simmer down so often with bland love making and insecurity. 

It flickers and licks at your edges, hoping to rub your skin raw with the passion you know you want to let out.

It’s in the music. RnB slowed down, on reverb, echoing through the rooms walls. The bass is pulsing through you as your fingertips seem to just caress your limbs. 

No one has ever touched you more intimately than you could in this moment. No one knows the dips of your curves, or the scars across your skin. No one can love all of you as deeply as you could right. now. 

Don’t swallow that flame. 

Let it rise out from your pelvic, allowing it to crawl through the depths of your soul and out from between those rose petal lips. Let your body move like a serpent, weaving through the smoke filled air and inhaling the thick, hot atmosphere. 

You are sexy, my love.

You are the sultry song whispering in their ear. You are the wine that drips from their collarbone, a drunken need, unsatisfied with anything less than every part of you. 

Baby, I feel it to.

I am a Queen in my body. A God born into the world, no one can resist the confident aroma that wafts from my neck and wrists. I am the drug that brings ecstasy, the dessert that fills your plate, and the water the flows through your veins. 

I have lived my entire life hoping and praying a man could one day love me in my entirety.

How could I have been such a fool. To blatantly ignore the one person I’m stuck with the rest of my life.

Me.

A man cannot complete the parts of me taken by others. For a man did not create me. I did. 

Read that again, if you must, before we move on. Make it your mantra and own your Queen energy before continuing forward. Now, this is my journey to self acceptance through sexual passion and searching for the confidence and courage to enjoy it all again. To enjoy myself. 

If you resonate, feel free to openly communicate your thoughts, or even offer encouragement to yourself, to others and so on. Self-Love is a process and we don’t have to go through it alone.

I will start this with less-than-sexy, ugly and raw truth I’m sure everyone can relate to.

I have struggled with body and mental insecurities all my life. 

Last week alone I had an episode where comparing myself to someone else lead my body to emptying it’s contents on command. 

I get in these ruts where I simply hate myself, as if my own worst enemy was the brain I had to live with every day. I have days where I see myself and am purely disgusted with the weight that hangs from my bones. Over time, days turn into weeks, weeks to months...and this causes build up of dishes, laundry and trash. A nasty, and depressed home.

To hate yourself is one of the hardest things a person can go through in life. To abhor the very skin you live in. To say something, only to immediately regret it and overthink it for hours to come. To feel like the intrusive thoughts are constantly winning, and you are failing. I feel that, and I fucking hate it, man.

Even now, I feel weak. I feel extremely...wrong. And every action I try to take simply overloads my brain even further.

An analogy so I may describe the way my personal turmoil feels. 

Imagine swimming naked in a river. The cool flow of water against your skin seems to add a youthful energy to your blood. You did this often, just swimming in the clear river around you. 

Overtime, you decide to rest somewhere near the bank, choosing on standing in ankle-deep water. The water is beautiful, clear and has a lot of fish in it. And the current just feels good against your toes while the Sun licks the water from your skin.

You decide to stay here for a moment, it’s muddy but lovely. You don’t even fully notice that the water is rising. You brush it off as nothing because of how slow it is rising, and how beautiful the surface of the water looks. But, soon enough it hits your knees. This doesn’t bother you so much, but it has made you a bit perturbed, so you try to move. You then have the horrifying realization that your ankles are now trapped in the mud from standing there so long. The water starts rising, gaining momentum and soon enough it has reached your lower spine and your knees are now sinking deep beneath the mud. 

That’s when you realize the water hasn’t just been rising, you have also been sinking. You have slowly started becoming consumed by the dark, now murky water. Heart racing, you try to wiggle your feet out, but every time you lift one foot, the other drifts further down under your weight.

The water hits your neck and you stop. You know if you move then you’ll go further down. So you stay still. You stay and you wait quietly. The pressure of mud colluding your body is overbearing, and yet you try to stay positive because at least your head is above water, right?

But, you’re suffocating. And no one is checking on you, because you have never needed to be checked on before. You’ve never had to ask for help before, either. But you. are. suffocating. And you can’t stop the slow progression of water and mud. You’re cold, but it’s hard to feel anything at this point. You want to cry, but moving sinks you further so you hold it in. 

You’re stuck. And alone to boot.

Suffocating under things that could have been noticed prior to the damage. Suffocating under the weight and burden that seems to snake around your limbs. I’m tired, cold and too scared to ask for help.

In this moment, I hurt. In this moment, I’m not myself and can’t seem to get out of this nasty place with myself.

But, Carly, my love. You are putting in the effort. You are trying and you are more than enough. Take a deep breath and take in this silent moment. Cry, if you must. Loosen your muscles and let yourself be vulnerable. 

This next part is for me. Feel free to skip out or not, quite frankly I don’t care. I need this for me more than anything. If you want to skip, move past the italicized love letter to myself. We will get right back to the raunchy here in a minute.

Carly, it’s time to heal.

You are wonderful. I know you feel gross right now, and that’s understandable. But you have to keep eating. You can’t stop yourself from eating, it will create side affects before it creates the body you are so badly attached to wanting. Your brain is full of thoughts and ideas and intrusive images. 

You feel as though you’ve lost yourself in some way or another. You feel like you’re being left behind, forgotten or disregarded.

When is the last time you did something for you? Not to please others, but simply to make your heart happy? When is the last time you meditated? When is the last time you expressed your feelings healthily? When is the last time you simply took a moment to fucking breathe, dude?

That’s right. You can’t remember. So stop the negative shit right this second. Stop manifesting the things you don’t want to happen and start manifesting what YOU WANT TO HAPPEN. 

I feel a deep rooted connection with the river right now, and I want to bathe naked there. I want to get lost in the woods somewhere and sit with my thoughts so I can organize them without people putting their thoughts and ideas into my life. I want to be away from everyone and simply...be.

You are enough. You work out almost every day now, and if you don’t work out you definitely try to be active to some degree. Be excited for where you are going, along with appreciating where you are and have been. And you also are hyper aware of your eating habits. Maybe, just maybe, you should give yourself some space to grow and heal, the same way you tell everyone else to.

Carly, I love your curves. Every inch of your skin has a story to be read and I can’t wait to analyze it with my fingertips. Your eyes sparkle with delight and a fiery passion, when you speak you have something to say. You are graceful, you accept everyone as they are and love so deeply and thoroughly. You want so badly to let everyone know they are appreciated, that you care, and that you are strong enough to carry both of you. But you need to reassure yourself that you can carry you. 

It’s hard, I know. But those negative thoughts are temporary. Keep your head above water, and choose to float to the surface rather than drown. Surrender to the current pulling you out of the mud, appreciate where you are and trust that you will accomplish whatever you need to when the time comes.

The art of not trying so hard. 

Lao Tzu wrote literature of many, discussing flow and the art of not trying. It’s a mental game that, if overthought, can and will lead to the opposite of your efforts. Just let it go and stop fighting everything, if you need help then say it only to the people you want help from. Don’t cut yourself short, everything in your life is 100% done for you not against you. So stop trying, and just live.

Now, that suffocating feeling. 

Fuck. That. Shit.

If you don’t choke me, I’ll devour your breath. I will make sure you feel every single centimeter of my passion and fire. 

To feel goosebumps under my lips, and know I’m leaving marks every time my nails rake the entirety of your back. I want him to smell sex seeped into the sheets, to wallow in the energy that is my pussy. 

As I go down on him, I want his head between my thighs. His mouth consuming my soul. 

I want to walk, and his hand to meet my ass with a sudden greeting. I want his hands to go up my thighs in public places. I want him to take me somewhere hidden and take advantage of my body. I want him to crave me as much as I crave his attention. 

I want to not think so low of myself, because I deserve better. I deserve more and should want more for myself.

I’ve been trying too hard.

I look back at my past self and wish only to ask, “Who hurt you this bad?”

Maturity. 

Maturity comes with a knowing of ones self and having a sense of self control while recognizing you cannot control others. It is confidence in standing alone. Maturity is what you should aim for. 

You need to know who you are, and be absolutely positive of it. Stand confidently in your skin. Stop letting that shy shit get to you, it only holds you back from greatness.

Find your balance in maturity. You deserve that peace of mind. Appreciate where you are going, where you are, and where you have been. You’ve done so much already.

[aspenflower17]

Finding You (Part Nine of ??)

Happy Thanksgiving everyone (even if you don’t live in the US)! Here is the update for this week :) This chapter was a little self indulgent. I do talk a tiny bit about music theory and Jane Austen in this chapter. If you have questions about either, just ask and I can try to explain/direct you to some good sources on what I’m talking about 😅 

Edit: Totally forgot to mention! The whole Pride and Prejudice HC about Lucifer is not originally mine. I believe I read it on one of the Beel blogs. I think it was @taco-beel :)

For anyone new, here is the link for Part One. I hope you enjoy 😁 

Tags for the Lovelies:  @simpingforsatan @naimena @hachimochi @wrathandgreed @magi-minminxiii @rensphilia @a-dream-at-night @chloelikesobeyme @getbehindme-satan (If you’d like to be added to the tags list, just message me or comment below!)

Satan/ F!Mc

Trigger Warnings: possibly for depression?

Word Count: 2,322

After Mc shut the door, she slid down the door to the floor, head in her hands. Well, that couldn’t have gone worse. I would’ve rather had him ignore me or not remember me at all. I could’ve figured out how to interact with him in those situations. But what was with him being sweet in the beginning, and then just seizing up? Then he grabbed my wrist and seemed super worried about me leaving and then didn’t even say anything the whole walk?! That goodbye too! What was that?! 

The more Mc thought about the whole thing, the more upset she got. She leaned her head back against the door, her brain replaying the beginning of the conversation trying to figure out what had gone wrong. Remembering the look in his eyes as he had fervently declared he remembered her. The warmth of his voice.

Then the progressive unease as she had continued talking until the abrupt emotional cutoff. He had obviously been uninterested in talking with her any longer, though she really couldn’t figure out why. He had been so dismissive. But when I tried to leave… She looked down to the wrist he had grabbed. He sounded so… desperate. Like he truly didn’t want to let me leave. So, why didn’t he talk to me?

“Mc? Are you alright?” Michael asked, stepping into the entrance hall with Diavolo.

“I’m… I’m fine. Diavolo, do you have a music room?” Mc asked, standing up as nonchalantly as she could.

“Yes, of course.”

“Do you have a piano, or similar instrument?”

“Yes…”

“May I use it for the rest of the day? I need to compose.”

“I… Sure. I’ll have Lil’ D No. 2 show you the way,” and as he said that, a small demon appeared and beckoned her forward, and she promptly followed.

“Oh dear,” Michael sighed, eyes following Mc.

“What’s wrong,” Diavolo asked, thoroughly confused by the whole encounter.

“She is definitely not alright. She can only compose when she’s really emotional about something.”

“I… Wait, is she going to let us hear it when she’s done?” Diavolo asked, eyes lighting up.

Mc sat down at the piano. It was an almost pure black grand, and the key colors were reversed, which was messing with her brain visually. The piano bench lid was made from a beautiful dark red wood, the rest the same black as the rest of the piano. The piano did not look worn, but it was obviously old. 

Mc started playing her normal warm up scales, but quickly stopped when she realized they didn’t sound right. She tried again with the same result. It’s in minor…

Trying out all the keys, she realized the whole piano was in minor. You could play major chords, but it was like making minor chords on a normal piano. Interesting.

Mc continued playing and getting warmed up, wanting to explore the amazing opportunity that had presented itself. She started playing some of her own creations, marveling at how different her songs sounded. As she was playing, she remembered a song she had abandoned a long time ago. Though it should have sounded correct, she had never been able to make it sound correct. I wonder…

She started playing the song, and was amazed to find just how perfect it sounded. It was the same song, but it now sounded perfect. Encouraged, Mc tried to continue composing, but she couldn’t get past where she had already composed, no matter how much she worked on it. Discouraged and a little frustrated, Mc look at her DDD and was surprised to see it was almost time for dinner.

Standing up, she promised herself she’d come back later, and work on it more.

“I’ve decided to throw a ball in Mc’s honor!”

Michael and Mc looked up from their dinner at the proclamation from Diavolo. Luke seemed unphased by the announcement.

“A ball? In my honor?”

“Yes! You’re my honored guest after all.”

“He also loves throwing balls,” Luke added.

“Also that,” Diavolo admitted.

“Well, I’d be honored. Thank you.”

“Perfect! It’ll be held a week from today. Barbados! Make sure invitations are sent and food is ready.”

“Yes sir,” Mc jumped, not realizing Barbados was in the room, turning around to see him exit. She was starting to notice the butler seemed to be everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

“Is a week too fast?” Mc asked worriedly.

“Nonsense! This is a lot more notice than I usually give if I’m going to be honest,” Diavolo laughed.

“For a whole ball to be planned?”

“Yes! Barbados is one hell of a butler,” Diavolo grinned over his teacup, before taking a sip.

Mc sat in her room and mused over the events of the day. Now that she had calmed down enough to think rationally, she started analyzing Satan’s behavior, and found she really couldn’t make sense of it. Unless he thought I was someone else… Wait. That makes a lot of sense actually. Like not a ton of sense, because he should have realized I wasn’t them before I started talking about meeting him before, but more than anything else I can think of. He may have also been a little… unhinged. He did look like he hadn’t slept in three days…

Satisfied enough that her brain could rest, she snuggled down into her blankets. Every time she closed her eyes however, all she saw was Satan’s face as he had grabbed her wrist. She brought her other hand up to her wrist and grabbed it. Now smiling, she drifted off to sleep.

Mc snorted, shifting a bit as she read. The bed was comfortable, the scent of its owner making her feel safe and comforted. Classes had been long and when the demon that sat behind her had gotten up, they had accidentally hit her in the head with their bag pretty hard, which had made Mammon nearly kill them. She had narrowly saved their life by assuring him it had been an accident and somehow calming her guardian demon down. This then had resulted in her being called into talk with Lucifer about what had happened, and so she had missed her Devildom History course.

She had come to Satan’s room to grab the notes he had thoughtfully taken for her, but when he saw how worn out she was, he had offered a quiet evening of reading and tea. She hadn’t been able to refuse, seeing as how she relished anytime she could get with him. The scent of old books and their caretaker was a surefire way to help her unwind from the day, the stacks of books throughout the room making her feel like they were in their own little world. The outside world glittered in the perpetual darkness through Satan’s large windows.

“What’s so amusing?” Satan asked from the armchair he had moved over by his bed once their reading sessions became a normal occurrence.

“‘We all know him to be a proud, unpleasant sort of man; but this would be nothing if you really liked him’” Mc quoted.

“Ah! ‘You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.’” Satan said, a cheeky grin on his face.

Mc’s brain stopped functioning for a second, “Wai… Wha…?”

“Pride and Prejudice right?”

“Oh, hehe, right,” Mc laughed, trying to hide behind her book as best she could as all the blood rushed to her face, “It’s a good quote.”

“You know, when it came out, there was a rumor going around that Mr. Darcy was based off of Lucifer.”

“Wait… You’re joking.”

“No. He had been spending a lot of time in the human realm. Sometimes we wouldn’t see him for weeks at a time. Then, he just stopped going up as much. About a year later, Pride and Prejudice was released. After the rumor started, Lucifer would not allow it in the house for the longest time. He even went so far as to ask Diavolo not to allow it in the Devildom at all.”

Satan had Mc’s full attention at this point, “What was his excuse?”

“Something about a stupid romance novel ruining his reputation, and how we needed to be the voice of reason for the lower demons if they were going to allow themselves to be so easily swayed to believe the nonsense.”

“You had a copy though, right?”

“Oh, of course I did. I still do actually. First edition. I even went up to the human realm to get it.”

“Wow… That explains so much though. Lucifer is like the epitome of Mr. Darcy.”

Satan shifted in his chair, and looked down at his book, “You think so?”

“Yeah. Tall, dark, handsome,” Mc watched as Satan sunk a bit lower in his chair at each word, seeming to get fairly upset, “Standoffish. Rude. Conceitful. Overbearing.”

“Ah, so you’re not a fan of Mr. Darcy?”

“Hmmm… I wouldn’t say that. He is her most popular leading man for a reason. But…”

“But?” Satan was looking at her now, his eyes probably larger and more insistent than he meant them to be. 

“He’s far too prideful in the beginning for me. We probably wouldn’t have gotten anywhere,” Mc watched Satan relax visibly before continuing, “While I enjoy Pride and Prejudice, I’d rather read Sense and Sensibility or Northanger Abbey. I would rather have a Mr. Tilney or possibly even a Colonel Brandon. Someone who I could sit and make jokes with. Someone who would read to me. Someone I could go on adventures with and who could tell me all about this or that because they’re so well read,” Mc was looking down at the cover of the book now, and she could tell her face was heating up, “I’d much rather have someone like that.”

There was silence after Mc stopped talking, and she dared not look up. She’d basically just confessed to Satan, and she hadn’t even meant to. She kinda hoped her words went over his head, but also hoped they didn’t. The silence stretched longer than Mc would’ve liked before the bed shifted.

There was another few moments of silence before Satan spoke, a bit haltingly, “Mc, will you look at me? Please?”

Mc lifted her eyes shyly looking a little sheepish. She only had a moment of Satan’s shocked look before there was a flash of gold and his lips were on hers. She was so shocked she couldn’t respond for a second, but then she returned the kiss, melting as her body was on fire. Completely focused on the moment while soaring through the clouds. Perfect. It was perfect.

Mc came back to consciousness, her alarm playing soft piano music. She reached out her arms grasping. Searching. Coming up empty, she cracked an eye open, disappointment flooding her body when all she saw was her own arms. Her vision blurred as a strong wave of loneliness washed over her. She blinked a couple times to clear away her tears, feeling them slide down her face. She had had mornings like this in the Celestial Realm, though this was the first time she had remembered the dream that preceded it. She hadn’t really felt lonely since coming to the Devildom, and hadn’t registered it. Now though, it felt debilitating. She sent a text to Luke explaining she probably wouldn’t be down for breakfast and asking him to apologize to everyone for her. She then turned on some soft music, and dropped her DDD on the bed.

She lay quietly, the tears falling openly. This is what she had to do those terrible mornings in the Celestial Realm when she felt like she couldn’t face the day. Eventually her tears gave out, and she was left with an apathetic empty feeling. She continued laying in bed, not remembering a bout this bad in any recent history. After a while, she drifted off to sleep again.

“Hey. You awake?”

Mc groaned, sore from not moving in awhile, “Is that you Luke?”

“Yeah. I got a bit worried when you also missed lunch. You okay?”

“I think I’m okay now. I just got a bit too upset this morning.”

“Are you sure? I can tell Michael you’re caught up in an artistic frenzy or something.”

“Nah. Thanks though,” Mc smiled, still sleepy.

“Okay. As long as you're okay,” Luke was looking at her worriedly, but leaning down and kissing her forehead anyways, “I’ll make sure some lunch gets saved for you.”

“Thanks Luke,” Mc sighed, sitting up.

“Anything for my little sister.”

Over the next week, Mc continued trying to work on her song, though she didn’t get any further, along with her other art. She also read all about the Devildom’s history and visited some historically significant locations to put a name to a place. The whole time, her mind worked on the enigma that was her dream. She supposed it was a product of her brain trying to work through the disappointment of how her first meeting with Satan went, along with how active she had been since coming down to the Devildom. She tried to convince herself of this anyways. The truth was, it felt exactly like she was reliving a memory. It felt real, and nothing about it had been weird, all details clear, nothing out of place. It even felt familiar, she’d even go so far as to say worn, like some of her favorite memories did.

She blushed even thinking about the dream, clearly recalling the warmth and softness of his lips. The feeling of his hand on the back of her neck....

“Mc, are you almost ready,” Luke called from the other side of the door.

“Give me a couple more minutes. I’ll be down soon.”

“Okay. The guests are starting to arrive.”

“Sounds good. Thanks for letting me know,” Mc took one last look at herself in the mirror before nodding and getting up, “Let’s do this.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thanks for reading! Like, comments and reblogs are appreciated! I love discussing Obey Me so feel free to chat with me 😁

Part Ten

[onyourzeus]

in ruins | kyh

title: in ruins pairing: kang younghyun (youngk of day6) & you genre: heavy angst, not a happy ending i’m warning you, small caps words: 4.0k

author’s note: i love hurting myself this way. 

any requests? check my pinned post if i’m accepting any at the moment, thanks!

you thought upon knocking on the door, you’d be greeted by the one person you have been looking forward to seeing all week. instead, an unexpecting friend of his unlocks it ajar, eyes peering over to your figure before realizing who you were. 

“wonpil, hey,” you greet him amidst the confused expression on his face. it brings him back to his senses, shaking his head slightly before fully letting the door open. he gulps slightly yet you catch it, but don’t question why he looks.. so nervous.

“is this a bad time?” you hesitate, taking one small step forward as you crane your neck to look around the apartment. wonpil immediately shakes his head again, sidestepping and gesturing his hand over. “no, no! please, come in. make yourself at home.” 

“okay, thanks…” you trail off, a small smile on your lips but a certain emotion tugging at your heart. with a better sight of the inside, you notice dowoon lying down on the couch with his phone on hand, seemingly focused on a game that requires both of his hands to control. wonpil closes the door behind you, and excuses himself to the kitchen before asking, “did you want anything to drink? water, tea?”

“i’m okay, wonpil. thank you, though,” you tell him, nodding your head to let him be. as he makes his way to get a glass of water for himself, you walk into the place further, taking in the minimal decorations and a few picture frames hanging on the walls. it’s been a while since you’ve set foot in the dorm, and taking in its unique scent and interior gives you some comfort from the anxiety building up from your stomach. 

you tell yourself that’s just how wonpil acts around you when younghyun isn’t around: a little shy, polite, and a smidgen bit careful not to say anything weird. you wish, at this point, he can get used to your presence. then again, you only get to see most of them whenever the bassist invites you over.

“hey, dowoon, what’cha playing?” you attempt to start a conversation, standing next to the edge of the couch where dowoon’s head rested. his sight is obstructed by the screen of his phone, so you bend down to check what has gotten most of his attention: genshin impact. 

“ah, jae had told me you rolled a keqing yesterday, that’s pretty cool,” you comment, and dowoon jumps from the sound of your voice so close to his ear. you get up, stepping back while apologizing. “sorry, sorry! didn’t mean to be nosy.” 

“no, you’re good—” he starts to say, sitting up from his comfortable position while pausing his game, haphazardly placing his phone on the side. a scratch on the back of his neck, he glances over to you. similarly to wonpil, he looks surprised to see you here. “oh! how’s it going?”

“it’s going,” you reply quickly, realizing more and more it doesn’t seem like you were expected to come. weird, you wander in the back of your mind, younghyun usually gives them a heads up when you’re coming over to hang out or just pick him up to leave. 

“did younghyun not say anything today?” an air of silence is felt, and now you’re more concerned when turning to look at his bedroom door— he’s not in there. 

“he probably forgot,” wonpil chimes in, approaching the living room as he sets down his glass. “hyung has been really busy lately, so it might have slipped his mind.”

“yeah, yeah. it’s no big deal. you’re always welcome here,” dowoon adds, an encouraging smile appearing on his lips. you reciprocate, albeit a little forced, feeling less sure of the fact that the plans you and younghyun had made and promised to pursue are starting to crumble beneath your feet. 

sighing deeply, you grip onto your purse and interrogate further: “he’s not in his room, is he?” 

the drummer and pianist steal a glance at each other for a split second, but every detail of their silent conversation is not lost on you. that’s a look of panic, worrying what you’d feel if they told the truth, rapidly forming excuses in their heads they can use to white lie their way out of the situation. 

“he’s…” wonpil begins, and dowoon’s ears have warmed up to the tense air looming all over you three. a door to the left creaks open, and for a moment you’re relieved. maybe you were overreacting, already affected by the many times something similar has happened to you, but there was no reason not to forgive younghyun.

 however, this time, it’s different. if that’s not him coming out of the door right now…

“hey, i’m gonna go on a run—” sungjin informs his roommates, locking the door in his wake. he finally looks towards the three of you in the living room, and given his certain sense of maturity— and analyzing what’s going on by the awkward expressions painted on your faces, he gives you a wave of his hand. 

“hi. you’re looking for younghyun?” 

“sungjin, i… yeah. where is he?” you let your breaths stabilize, not wanting to break down in the middle of what once was a familiar space, and is now becoming more and more foreign to you. as wonpil and dowoon remain quiet, pretending to busy themselves with his almost empty glass of water and overheating phone respectively, you keep your eyes on sungjin. begging him to tell the truth. 

he delivers, but his stare is hard, almost as if he’s hiding something behind the glassiness of his eyes. “he’s been out for the whole day. he said to not wait up on him since he still has another work schedule tonight.” 

as you stand there, knuckles turning pale with the way it holds onto your purse for dear life, you scoff sarcastically. leaving sungjin’s gaze, the anxiety had reached the base of your throat, restricting words of profanities to come out of you like a broken dam. 

“you can wait for him in his room. did you text him?” sungjin continues to console you, walking closer but allowing personal space between you. “i can call him while i run, he’s going to get annoyed eventually and pick up.” 

“yeah, i’ll do the same as hyung. we’ll blow up his phone so he can come back home,” dowoon joins with a perk to his voice, seemingly anticipating their master plan to succeed. wonpil nods along, but doesn’t meet your gaze, only swirling the remaining liquid in his glass. 

“you don’t have to do that,” you let them know as much as your voice can muster before breaking. “i’ll take you up on your offer of waiting for him, if you don’t mind. i’ll call him myself.” 

sungjin brings his fingers in between the bridge of his nose, contemplating on accepting the compromise. to hurry things up, you bring a hand to his shoulder and squeeze it gently. he seems to understand as he nods firmly, patting your hand before you let it go. 

“okay. let me know if he doesn’t come back in an hour, yeah?” 

“yes, sir.” 

“do you want some snacks? leftovers? are you hungry?” wonpil goes off with his questions, and it’s an endearing sight to watch him treat you so politely in his humble abode. honestly, at this point you’d rather leave and forget this day even existed— but you needed answers, and you know you’re not getting it from them. 

you don’t want to, anyway, because they shouldn’t be involved in this. they don’t need to be. this is between you and younghyun, and if you were to wait for him again, for the longest time— and maybe the last time, then so be it.

you’re not going to leave until you get what you wanted. 

“don’t worry about me, wonpil. i’m sorry for intruding on your night,” you apologize, bowing down before him as you make your way to younghyun’s bedroom. thankfully, he left it unlocked, and you swung the door open and close in an instant. with your back on the door, your labored breathing comes back— it took a lot from you to stay calm, collected, and unbothered by what’s going on. you didn’t want to make it a big deal, they’ve seen this before, and it usually gets resolved.

like you said, forgiveness was not an uncommon concept with you and younghyun. you believe it’s essential with how… complicated your relationship is with each other. you’ve fucked up a couple of times, said things that weren’t within your best intentions to, and younghyun didn’t hold grudges because of them. 

he would be upset, justifiably so, but after a day or two, you were both back to normal. he reassures you there wasn’t any bad blood, and he understand the frustration himself. 

from then on, you tried— really hard not to fuck things up anymore because it’s scary. it’s terrifying to think about the consequences of unwanted words, uncalled for actions with a person whose schedule is jam packed everyday, and his thoughts never ending. 

younghyun is always on the run, whether that be hopping from studio to studio or collecting ideas for a new song and another. 

it’s not like you aren’t busy yourself, but the degree to which he pushes himself further into his career is miles ahead from yours. and it’s not your place to complain about, it’s your choice to be supportive, though. which you promised. from day one, and he kissed you like it was the one answer he needed to hear.

you miss it. you miss him, his lips, his touch; everything that screamed younghyun, it’s right here. in his room. the only thing missing is the person himself, him. 

you walk over to his bed, kept clean and sheets folded. always organized, rarely leaving miscellaneous crap in random places. sometimes it’s intimidating, to visualize the kind of person who inhabits this room, but knowing who he is, you feel safer than insecure here. 

walking over to his desk, a black notebook sits atop with a pen to the side. ah, you notice the cap is missing, and you look for the miniscule thing all over the place. you find it on top of his dresser, and quickly put it back in its place. 

you guess, there are some things that younghyun forgets, that he misses, but never the big picture. 

you’re tempted to turn the pages over, but respect his privacy nonetheless. it might be lyrics he’s not ready to show anyone yet, and you of all people know what it’s like to write something new, a genre you haven’t dipped your pen in yet. it’s quite the daunting experience to bring it into the world, for other inquisitive eyes to read. 

most of the time, younghyun’s words are never amiss. in fact, they always fall in the category of perfect, for you. you don’t like to admit that because he will never believe you, so it’s best to keep it a secret for yourself. 

you enjoy his new releases better that way, making you feel more special in a sense that you’ve heard his melodies first. you’ve heard the stories behind these metaphors face to face. 

you wish you could see him face to face right now. 

before you forget, you pull out your phone and pull up younghyun’s messages with you. your text was sent three hours ago, and it was read which made you think okay, he’s seen it and acknowledged the fact that you’re coming over, maybe he’ll reply once he gets a break soon. 

he never did. 

you scroll up to the previous messages, a lot of back and forth short phrased responses that don’t mean as much as the way you guys would constantly bombard each other with long conversations. 

have you eaten? yeah, a lot. you? yup, out with a friend rn. ight, stay safe. u too. 

r u asleep? no, in the studio. oh, it’s super late. yeah, working on stuff. alright, text me when u’re home? i’ll try. 

he never did. 

feeling a tear fall down to your cheek, you wipe it away roughly and begin to type another text. 

i’m at the dorm. the boys didn’t know i’d be here. do you remember our promise? please respond.

your hand hovers on the send button for longer than you thought, and you bite your lip in anticipation for a decision so foggy in your brain. should you? should you be this upfront and accusatory? it’s not that bad, right, because he did promise. and now you’re here, the only one taking care of that promise— what’s his excuse?

i’m at the dorm. the boys didn’t know i’d be here. are you coming back soon? is what you sent instead, feeling the lump on your throat getting bigger and your eyes welling up hot, salty tears. you try to compose yourself. sitting on the edge of his bed, hands going over his white sheets as a way to ground yourself. 

you can’t cry, the walls are too thin and dowoon or wonpil will know. and wonpil will be too polite to leave you alone, and dowoon wouldn’t know how to confront the situation and just run to his room leaving wonpil by himself. 

it felt like forever that you wake up uncomfortable lying down on younghyun’s bed. you blink a few times before sitting up straight, your side hurting from the way you fell asleep on the mattress. you straighten out the right half of your hair that had been messed up having plopped down on the pillow, and look for your phone in your purse. 

it has been an hour since you got here, and no new notifications on your phone. 

you have had a fair share of getting stood up on blind dates before meeting younghyun, and at one point you stopped caring. boys don’t deserve your tears, you’ve never even met them and if they thought you were fooled by their persona online, then they were dead wrong.

but this is younghyun, the guy who proved himself different. the guy who came to your first date spot prim and proper, an hour earlier than the designated time. to think you were actually going to cancel this one because it was too tiring, too predictable at this point. 

but seeing his selfie that day, a table already reserved for the two of you and you haven’t even gotten ready yet, you felt guilty for assuming so wrongly of him. 

two years later, you’re thinking you should have listened to your gut all this time. 

as you are about to leave and practice what you have to say to the boys in the living room, the door opens and in comes a disheveled looking younghyun. his coat hangs on his arm, his hair a little haggard but his smile soon disappears upon seeing you invading his space. 

“oh, you’re here.”

oh? you’re here?

you stand up from the bed, eyes directly staring at him just five feet away from you even though he feels like a galaxy away with that kind of answer. 

“did you look at the texts i sent you?” you deadpan, trying your hardest not to seem fragile. 

younghyun shakes his head, plops the coat on his dresser and shrugs. “i’ve been busy, did you need something?” 

“you don’t remember?” 

he stands rigidly, his own fox like eyes avoiding your burning stare. they focus on the wall, with his lips in a tight line. 

he looks different to you. 

there’s something about the younghyun in front of you that makes you question your presence in his room. and how unwanted he’s making you feel. 

“younghyun, what’s going on?” 

“what do you mean by that?”

“don’t play dumb with me. you promised, hell, we promised we would see each other tonight,” you remind him, your voice rising a pitch higher and it strains your throat. you drop your purse on his bed, and cross your arms defensively. 

anything to make you feel safer in the cold that has entered the room once he got in. 

“something came up, i’m sorry. you know how work has been,” younghyun explains nonchalantly, still refusing to see you. refusing to tell you the truth with his eyes. 

it’s not enough anymore. 

“you could have texted? you could have let wonpil or dowoon or even sungjin tell me that , you’re busy, you can’t even do that?” 

“i don’t want to bother them.”

“well, younghyun, guess what? you’re bothering me!” your sudden outburst causes him to turn towards you, eyes wide and brows furrowed. 

they definitely heard that, and they’re definitely listening from the outside. but any worries about your image towards his friends had gone out the window by now, only to be left with an ounce of desperation for an explanation. an answer. an apology, even. 

he doesn’t say anything for a few seconds, and you’re scared to break off the eye contact at this point. you’re determined to tell him you’re not really mad, just frustrated. you’re not holding a grudge, you just want to hear it from him that he didn’t mean to do this to you. that he didn’t mean to hurt you this way.

your vision gets blurry, but you force the tears to pool over your eyes and not fall down. not right now, not when his gaze is steel and intimidating. 

“i’m leaving, stay as much as you’d like but i’m not going to be back until midnight,” he dismisses  you, grabbing his coat to bring it with him. 

a scorn burns on your mouth, words tasting like lead when you say: “leave, that’s all you know how to do.”

this stops him from his tracks. a pin can drop in the middle of the room, and you still can’t hear it. your thoughts are screaming, a headache forming on your temples not understanding how it’s come to this so suddenly. 

you didn’t mean that, but now your tears are saying sorry for you. you sob standing up, arms on either side and hands shaking from the pent up frustration popping out of your veins. 

you’re tired, so tired of being the one to adjust. of being the one to stay when he leaves, and foolishly wait for him to come back. only that he doesn’t, and this time he probably never will anymore.

“pull yourself together,” younghyun tells you, tone hinting pity which aggravates you further. he doesn’t look as mad anymore, but his shoulders are tense and his eyes fierce. “we can talk later. i have dinner with heejin and i still need to record kiss the radio later—”

“dinner? with who?” you snap, tears momentarily stopping with the mention of a name you’re unfamiliar of. “when did you schedule this? could it not have waited after tonight when i have been asking you for some time together for this very day?” 

younghyun rakes his fingers through already unkempt hair forcefully, distaste in his mouth as he shoots back at you, “i told you i’ve been busy, heejin and i have a song together and it’s supposed to come out in two days so we’re meeting up as much as we can—”

“yeah, okay. over dinner, at a fancy restaurant away from a recording studio, am i right?”

“you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“younghyun, it’s my fucking birthday,” you talk over him, your voice speaking over the loud beating of your heart. sweat drips down your temple, the headache hammering itself on your skull as the tears escape down the surface of warm cheeks. suddenly, you hear yourself laughing. monotonous, without emotion, as you see younghyun’s scowl snap into a look of confusion, then of realization. 

“i know what the fuck i’m talking about, brian. and from the looks of it, you don’t. you never did.” 

“you should have told me—”

“and i need to remind you of that? after knowing each other for years?” you snap back. the walls vibrate with the volume of your cries, and you hear a knock on the door and a person asking if everything is alright. 

younghyun looks back, but doesn’t respond and turns to you with pained eyes, a fine line between guilt and feeling bitter. he knows he should have remembered. besides, your first date with him was on your birthday too. 

“enjoy your fucking evening, brian. i’ll see myself out,” you mutter under hot breath, breathing hard and eyes red. grabbing your purse, you walk past the man you thought you knew. and now he just feels cold. 

it stings when he grabs you, and he loosens his grip when you exclaim loudly. “brian, stop.”

“i’m sorry. i’m sorry i fucked up.”

“it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“yes, yes it does,” he pleads, pulling you closer to his body. you shiver, not liking the way he presses into you with a desperate attempt to forgive him. maybe if it wasn’t today, you’d drown yourself in his needy touches, inhale the scent you miss having all over your skin, kiss younghyun on the lips and understand he’s human too. 

not anymore, not when all the chances you have given him were taken for granted, and there’s nothing left inside of you to give him another one. you’re all out, exhausted from the waiting, the forgiving, the crying. exhausted from it all. 

“younghyun, let me go. please. i’m tired.” 

he hesitates, but once you pull yourself off him he releases his stone cold grip. your eyes hover downward, face sticky from the tears you have shed. 

no more. 

coming out of his room, wonpil and dowoon are nowhere to be found anymore. it was only sungjin, sitting by the island counter, scrolling on his phone absent-mindedly. he notices your presence, looks up and offers you that warm smile of his even if his eyes sympathize with your heartbroken gaze.

“i’m so sorry,” he whispers. 

you close your eyes, shake your head and offer a grateful smile. for him. “not your fault. i’m sorry you had to hear that. please let the others know i’m deeply sorry.” 

“text me when you get home, okay?” sungjin hops off the barstool and places his hand on your shoulder this time, transferring the kind of warmth you have been needing all day, all week. 

you know he’s just being kind, roped into the tail end of your disastrous break up with younghyun so you nod once. he doesn’t take it and adds, “i’m serious. if i don’t hear from you, i will text you. multiple times. you’ve seen me do it.” 

with no escape from his compromise, you emit a small laugh and firmly nod this time. “okay, sungjin. thank you.”

“happy birthday, by the way,” he consoles you, and you do your best to keep another wave of pain locked up. you thank him, accepting the side hug he offers you, and make your way out the door. 

as the breeze outside doesn’t do well in vanishing the evident sadness on your expression. you walk the streets of the city holding in a breath, careful not to attract too much attention to your lonely self.

you get home barely alive, shoes left on the doorstep and your clothes slithered off on the hallway. you text sungjin what he wanted to hear, and once you’ve landed on your bed, you let it all out again. 

birthdays were never really a favorite “holiday” of yours before you met younghyun on this very same day two years ago. 

it was as if being alive on this earth for another year was a favor given to you by fate, having to know younghyun even more as the days go by past it. as much as he created meaning to your birthday for the past two years, this time, younghyun had destroyed everything you built together. 

the pieces are too small, much too fragile to make your heart whole again.

[a-pretty-nerd]

Rebellion

Tomura Shigaraki x AllMight!Daughter!Reader

Chapter 2

Premise:

When The League of Villians discovers that AllMight has a daughter, they are quick to snatch you up and hold you hostage. Shigaraki had a careful and thought out plan, but that was before you got there. Now you're in the mood for some not-so-healthy rebellion.

Word Count: 1,567

Warnings: Kidnapping, mommy/daddy issues? Fictional politics? Future chapters will include NSFW content and violence!

A/N:

I cannot describe how much fun I'm having writing this. Like I'm genuinley having a blast with this concept. The more I learn about Shigaraki for, "reseach purposes", the more I fall in love with him as a character. He's so complex, that character development, GOD! That charactet design, FUCK! The exploration of the complexities of mental illness from trauma and grooming, DAMN IT! He's becoming an anti-hero and I 👏 AM 👏 HERE 👏 FOR 👏 IT👏 Anyways, Don't forget to check out my Patreon! ❤

Chapter 1 Chapter 3 

You passed out again. Dehydration. 

You woke up in a sleeping bag. Your wrists and ankles bruised slightly from the restraints, but free. You laid there on the floor, looking over you noticed a few bottles of water and a granola bar. You took down one bottle in a matter of seconds before discarding it and starting the next. A horrible aching pain in your head raged on as you took in your surroundings. Light trickled in between the cracked of the barred-up window.

Your heart began to race as you began to sort through your options. Could you manage to escape through the window? Or were you on a second or third floor? Maybe if you asked to use the restroom, maybe there was a window there where you could get a better look.

Poor All Might, he must be so worried. Did even know you were missing? Of course, he knew, it wasn't like you to be out all night and gone in the morning. He'd probably called Mom by now, she's probably on a plane already. She's going to be furious.

After you finished a second bottle and the snack, you stood. You felt better. Not good, but better. You made your way to the door and knocked.

"Hello! Is anyone there?" You called.

"The doors open!" A new voice answered. The door let out a harsh creak as you opened it. It let out into the living space you had been in before. There, the majority of the villains surrounding you earlier sat around. You looked up to the figure that stood, leaning against the wall closest to the door.

"You're new." You mumbled.

"My apologies, Miss. I believed I was absent when you first arrived. I'm Mr. Compress." His sing-song voice reached out from behind a mask.

"A pleasure." You groaned back. "Why is the door unlocked, aren't you afraid I'll break free?" You asked the room. They all turned to look at you.

"I doubt you could fight all of us at once." The red-eyed man had the hand again.

"Bathroom?" You asked. Mr. Compress pointed you in the right direction and you walked off. The only window in there was way too small and too high up to help you. You finished your business and washed your hands before looking at yourself in the mirror. You looked tired and worn out.

You shuffled back into the living room and found the group lounging around. A Tv played the news non-stop. A few of them were passing the time by playing games on devices.

"I'm sorry...Who exactly are you?" You spoke to the room.

"Wow! You really are clueless!" The girl mused.

"Don't you follow hero news?" Patchwork asked. You shrugged.

"I never really paid attention to what was happening over here. All I know is what Dad has told me. He's mentioned 'The League of Villians' a couple of times, but I guess I wasn't listening. Hero news back home is, different."

"You know of All For One, don't you?" The red-eyed man asked without taking his gaze off the Tv.

"Yeah. You're his associates, or something aren't you? Like his henchmen?" A few chuckled.

"You can call me Toga!"

"Twice!"

"Spinner."

"Dabi."

"'Henchmen'...hehe. No, I wouldn't say that." Red-eye stood and began making his way closer and closer, holding a bottle of water in his hand. Careful to hold a finger away from it. "There is nothing I hate more than heroes. This wretched society that rewards such self-serving narcissists." Closer. "We seek to destroy it." Closer. You're backed against a wall now. You watched him place his last digit down on the bottle. It began to crumble before shattering to dust in his grasp. "My name is Shigaraki Tomura. You can consider me, All For One's heir. The future King of Villians." He came so close the wrist of the hand on his face rested dangerously close to your chin. His red eye stared down at you. Your heart raced.

"Oh yes. I've heard of you." You whispered.

"Good." He hummed before turning back and taking his seat again.

"How could you let this happen!?"

"I didn't know this would happen! She's strong, she's an adult now! I thought she could handle herself!"

"She's just a kid! She could be dead by now or worse!" Your mother cried. Her fists firmly slammed on the table where your father sat. Policemen and detectives scattered about the apartment. When you hadn't returned after a few hours, All Might went down to the gym. He found your bag, but no sign of you. First thing he did was call the police and then your mother. She arrived less than 24hrs after receiving the call. 

“Please Ms. L/N, we’re doing everything we can. We’ve got the best team in Musutafu looking for her.” Detective Tsukauchi was the second person he called. He felt better knowing his friend was on the case, he had faith that if anyone could find you, it was Tsukauchi. 

“Everyone knows if a victim of kidnapping hasn’t been found in the first 24hrs its hopeless! How could you be so sure about this?” 

“I understand your frustrations ma’am, but we already have reason to believe we know who took her, and motive. At this rate, we’re just trying to track down their location.” 

“Its the League isn’t it? They’re using her to get to me aren’t they?” Your father sulked in his chair. His eyes fixated on his hands which sat in his lap. He shook with fear, rage, disappointment, all targetted at himself.  He took sole responsibility for your kidnapping. Your mother fumed across the table from him, arms crossed, and nails digging into her arms. 

“Don’t beat yourself up, we’re going to find her,” Tsukauchi assured him. Your mother sat there, gritting her teeth as she gripped her phone. 

“I have to go.” She spat as she got up. 

“Huh!? You’re not going after her yourself are you?” 

“No. I sent for Xavier, Y/N’s boyfriend as soon as I arrived. I’m going to meet him at the airport.

“Boyfriend? Y/N never said anything about a boyfriend.” Your father watched your mother walk towards the front door as she threw her jacket over her shoulders.

“Yes, well, there’s a lot about her you don’t know, Toshinori. I’ll be back.” 

“What’s it like in America?” 

Toga asked with a wide smile as you sat with them. It was odd, they seemed entirely unbothered by you walking around doing your own thing. The front door was right there, you could have made a run for it. You knew that was a bad idea. They knew, that you knew, that was a bad idea. 

“Oh, it’s alright, I guess.” You sat on the floor against the wall beside her. 

“I heard heroes work for the military there,” Dabi noted. 

“Yeah, they are. Back home, heroes are organized into ‘Military aids’, or ‘police aids’. Meaning, if you want to be a hero, you have to choose between working for the military, or independent police forces. A lot of heroes go into police work because it allows heroes to be community-focused. But Military, that’s where the money is. If you want to be a hero celebrity, that’s where you work.” 

“Yeesh, there aren’t any independent agencies?” Toga asked, pulling her legs to her chest. 

“I guess the police offices work like hero agencies do here. It’s just a group of people who are authorized to use their quirks to ‘keep the peace’.” You used your fingers to create air-quotes. 

“You don’t sound too keen on the idea.” She pointed out with a sly smile. You sighed. 

“I know things seem bad here with heroes, but in America, it’s worse. The system was built so that people wish flashy quirks get the best out of life. It’s created a highly militarized country that only cares for those who have something to offer it. If you can’t serve your country, you’re considered trash.” 

“I’ve seen the anti-hero marches online. Things seem really out of hand over there. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a league over there too.” 

“It’s not anti-hero, it’s anti-military. If we could take away the idea that we’re supposed to serve the system, then heroes could be held accountable for their actions as individuals, not part of a flawed system. When you give these people so much power, they ultimately abuse it and leave the rest to rot.” 

“You sound like a villain,” Dabi smirked. You sighed, having realized how loud you got. You were passionate on the subject. You spent your college years working to analyze and fight against the system. The system your mother so willingly played into and encouraged you to do the same. The system that killed your friend. 

“Maybe here things are a little more simple. But back home not everything isn’t so black and white.” 

“It isn’t here, either.” Shigaraki groaned from his place on the couch, facing away from you.

Taglist

@craftybean13 @babayaga67 @imjustverable

[rpmemesbyarat]

RP meme from Tori Amos quotes

- Healing takes courage, and we all have courage, even if we have to dig a little to find it.

- I think that people who can't believe in fairies aren't worth knowing.

- I know I'm an acquired taste - I'm anchovies. And not everybody wants those hairy little things.

- Some of the most wonderful people are the ones who don't fit into boxes.

- I have so many different personalities in me and I still feel lonely.

- The violence between women is unbelievable.

- I'm too wacky for most weirdos. Who am I to judge?

- If they keep crashing stuff into the moon, the moon's gonna get pissed off, and the tides'll change, and all the women'll start PMS-ing together. Then you guys are going to fucking regret it.

- If you really want a challenge, just deal with yourself.

- I don't see myself as weird, I just see myself as honest.

- I see the dream and I see the nightmare, and I believe you can't have the dream without the nightmare.

- Some people are afraid of what they might find if they try to analyze themselves too much.

- Once the bleeding starts, the cleansing can begin.

- On some of my darkest days, Lucifer's the one who comes and gives me an ice cream.

- Most people would rather be sheep than stand on their own with antlers on.

- The sense of loss is such a tricky one, because we always feel like our worth is tied up into stuff that we have, not that our worth can grow with things we are willing to lose.

- When you've got the virgin and the whore sitting next to each other, they're likely to judge each other harshly.

- I think you have to know who you are.

- Get to know the monster that lives in your soul.

- Dive deep into your soul and explore it.

- I don’t want to renounce my dark side.

- The truth has always held an enormous interest for me.

- Healing for me is being able to sit next to the butcher and say 'Yes, I’m sitting next to the butcher now,' instead of saying 'there is no butcher'.

- This is very simple in the world of chicks; some are hoochies, some are not, and some should never try to be.

- We don't often see our own stories. Good artists are the ones that whisper our own stories back to us.

- Music is about all of your senses, not just hearing.

- Again, we go back to the power of words and how they can make you feel. They bring liberation or stagnation, they're chains.

- You don't have to apologize for growing and learning and changing your mind.

- Music has an alchemical quality.

- Certain relationships can just wear you down.

- Containment of your opinion is a must if you are going to nurture an artist's development.

- It's a good thing I'm curious, because sometimes I just research how a soccer player kicks a ball and the impact it has on his foot. I haven't used this yet, but I might.

- But over the years you can cultivate hate for the art you love.

- I don’t believe anyone’s story is boring. Every story has value because it belongs only to you.

- Sometimes I fantasize backstage about how people do their laundry. Woolite? Mixed-color loads? Do they fold? Do they press? Do they Shout it out? And the thing that kills me—do their whites come out dingy?

- Our generation has an incredible amount of realism, yet at the same time it loves to complain and not really change.

- We like our pain. And we’re packaging it, and we’re selling it.

- Festivals or radio shows can be the heavyweight championships of arrogantly detached clusterfucks.

- People who are addicted to power can live on the same street or attend the same school as us or even play on the world stage.

- None of us are this light and dark fantasy. What's dark to you may be light to me and vice versa.

- I don't think that many performers necessarily want to see their audience empowered. I think a lot of performers, no different from priests, need the hierarchy.

- Modern, celebrity-driven entertainment turns the stage into an altar, and so many celebrities refuse to be removed from those altars once they manage to ascend.

- All storytellers, all troubadours worth their salt knew their myths.

- The Sídh's historical myth is the source of the bastardized concept of a fairy—as if anyone gives a rat's ass.

- The problem with Christianity is, they think everything is about outside forces, good and evil. There's not a lot of inner work encouraged.

- Over the last few hours I've allowed myself to feel defeated, and just like she said if you allow yourself to feel the way you really feel, maybe you won't be afraid of that feeling anymore.

- I'm the queen of the nerds.

- Don't give up. Don't listen to these foolish critics that are so small minded they don't get it tonight.

- Sometimes listening to music can motivate you.

- I think even in a good marriage, especially if you stay together long enough, there are going to be events that happen.

- An ounce of breast milk is even more potent than the finest tequila.

- Music is always a reflection of what's going on in the hearts and minds of the culture.

- Many people lock a part of themselves away. It's a bit sacred.

- I've always seen the songs as having a consciousness.

- Our world is a huge mess right now, and not big enough for masses of intolerant people.

- We are all fairies living underneath a leaf of a lily pad.

- That is some funky-fresh, pop lockin' shit.

- If I saw someone destroy a piano I'd fuckin' kill 'em. Wouldn't think twice.

- I experiment with things that are usually an internal experience, because that's just what excites me. And yes, it does sometimes give me visions.

- Some of those trips were eighteen hours long and I'll never forget, once I ended up sitting by the bush trying to ask the flowers why they didn't like me. It's like, Why can't I be your friend?

- You might not like my story because I'm not gonna tell you how it ends yet, and you need to travel it with me.

- I just imagined a huge juicy vagina coming out of the sky, raining blood over all those racist, misogynist fuckers.

- You can't control your popularity

- If you can't create physical life, you find a life force. If that's in music, that's in music.

- I started to find this deep, primitive rhythm, and I started to move to it.

-I held hands with sorrow, and I danced with her, and we giggled a bit

- I usually get myself into situations that cause sparks.

- I love feeling alive, I love walking out in the cold in my bare feet and feeling the ice on my toes.

- For the most part, pianos are female to me.

- Anger is natural. It's part of the force. You just have to learn to hang out with it.

- In our minds, love and lust are really separated.

- I think all the boys that write the screaming stuff would write the best love songs

- When you stop putting yourself on the line, and you don't touch your own heart, how do you expect to touch other people?

- Guys would sleep with a bicycle if it had the right color lip gloss on. They have no shame. They're like bull elks in a field.

- Your worst enemies are made when you ignore people.

- It's as if the horses have come to take us back, to descend, to find the dark side. By dark I mean what's hidden, not necessarily satanic.

- There's room for everybody on the planet to be creative and conscious if you are your own person. If you're trying to be like somebody else, then there is isn't.

- Sometimes you have to do what you don't like to get to where you want to be.

- You know that saying, bad things don't happen to good people? That's a lie.

- I'm not a habit, I'm a lifestyle.

- There are a lot of hidden nerds.

- People who become the front runners often used to be outcasts or loners.

- Um, don't get me wrong because I love boys, it's just that sometimes we don't need you.

- There are only ten ideas under the sun. What makes the difference is how you spice them.

- So I'm in Virginia, and I had crabs--I keep saying that! I had crab sickness, I had eaten bad crabs in Maryland!

- I'm a winter girl; I like coming out when things are desolate and everybody's ready to slit their wrists.

- You can only be you. A lot of times it's never enough for people.

- I've never played the guitar, except throwing it against the wall cause it was pissed off I couldn't play it.

- Truly, I was a sweetheart when I was little, like the Honeysuckle Faery. Sweet-pea. But sweet-peas are not popular after second grade. Sweet-peas become nerds really fast.

- I really enjoy having a giggle with a friend, but then someone crosses my line, then I don't really take it lightly.

- I sometimes forget I'm not 7'2" and a Viking.

- A boundary was crossed. And maybe I drew a boundary, consciously.

- It was a bit violent, a bit sexual.

- When nothing makes sense, music seems to come and bring me a margarita and sit down with me.

- You don't have to justify everything. Being pissed off is just absolutely okay.

- There is a level of the vampire in me, which is OK.

- It hurts me when a woman doesn't come through for me, more than a man.

- I'm a grown woman. I've earned my experiences, my scars.

- What is an angel but a ghost in drag?

- I'm beginning to accept and love the parts of me, of women that I was trained to hate all my life.

- People can be so vicious toward the imaginary world and it saddens me. You kill a lot of little people's dreams that way.

- Even if you don't read history or you aren't interested in anything that happened before the '60s, there are reasons why we think the way we do.

- That's how the story goes but I don't believe the story.

- I would find myself either the lovey-doveyest-woviest sweet pea, or a mad-woman.

- I believe in eating.

- You can't change what happened. And nobody's asking you to forgive.

- Why be afraid of these cuddly, soft, adorable things?

- I have good days. Like if I get really good coffee ice cream with just the right amount of chocolate syrup.

- A lot of people see themselves as victims, even when you have to stand in line for ice cream.

- It's so difficult to be critical of children because they need to discover themselves. We're always telling them, "No, the tree has green leaves!"

- I'm tired of being a rebel. Now I just want to be me.

- When things get really empty for me, empty in my outer life, in my inner life, the music world, the songs come across galaxies to find me.

- Do you know what it's like to be a girl and have blood running down your legs and think that you're dying, just because no one's told you that's what happens? It's horrible.

- An angel's face is tricky to wear constantly.

- Mess with me and you will not survive.

- I think that happiness is when you can let yourself feel every emotion you want at any time instead of being a lying little fuck.

- I'm not into this dieting thing.

- The cross has been used as a weapon, as it has been used against all women throughout the ages. And that's the greatest evil of all.

- I think you've got to find a giggle somewhere in stuff that would scare the poop outta ya.

- A cornflake girl is Wonderbread whereas a raisin girl is whole wheat bread.

- I would like to think I'm a raisin girl, because in my mind they're more open minded. Cornflake girls are totally self centered, don't care about anything or anybody.

- I like butter and the people who like butter."

- I'm known as that girl who has tea with the Devil.

- I'm not afraid of sadness.

- Everybody has creativity and each person has it in a different way. Some people aren't musical, some musicians can't even think about painting or gardening. There's so many different ways to be creative.

- I wanna be burned, definitely burned, like the witches.

- Give the kids tools, so they can go build their own houses; not the blueprint of what the houses should be.

- Look at me now. I'm breast feeding pigs.

- I wish I had more of a sense of humor.

- I can be so hard on people.

- If somebody's being a jerk, I would like to go wee on their head. And then I do that, mentally.

- The people on the internet know more about what I am doing than I do. Like, they will say that I am going to be in this mall on this day, and sure enough, I am there!

- I'm like a lioness who kills her own prey and no one else has to kill for her. But if some other lioness comes to me and says "I just got a good prey, do you want a piece?" I can say "of course" - and the other way around.

- There are things that I would disagree with Jesus about, and I feel really good about that.

- History has recorded some pretty nasty things that have happened to people. I think we remember. I think it's in our cells and I think it can still hurt sometimes."

- I don't believe in the saying that it all happens for the best, it's just not appropriate.

- Of course I believe in past lives, I mean, three quarters of the human race believes this, it's not like a great new thought here.

- I use innocence in my demeanor like a Venus flytrap.

- I do like to talk about things no one wants to hear at the dinner table.

- I'm not interested in being a really nice person; I want to be a creative, responsible person that's balanced.

- Boys are cute but food is cuter

- Do any of you dream about crocodiles?

-I know I dream about crocodiles. I'm obsessed with them.

- If people can't see things from the other side that's not my problem, it's theirs.

- I think I give equal time in my hatred, right?

- Sometimes I'm mad at some guy, sometimes I'm mad at some girl, and sometimes I'm totally loving some guy, so and sometimes I'm loving some girl.

_ Well, Pele is the volcano goddess and I thought of like, um, sacrificing some of the boys in my life to her but then I decided that that wasn't really a very good idea.

- Anger originates from envy and outrage, not being seen, not being heard.

- We don't know where souls go when they die. We don't know a lot of things. We didn't create the planets. We didn't do this all by ourselves. So, therefore, why wouldn't there be a creative force if it can create humans and planets?

- I've been hanging out with some of the Hell's Angels in England. They're some of the sweetest people I've ever met.

- Real friends have to be understanding of each other, and their faults.

- I think I'm really hard to get to know on a personal level.

- Thailand is calling me.

- People I see laughing all the time, check for razor blades in their anal-force underwear, because it's just a little lie.

- I'm not interested in taking drugs. I do hallucinogens once in a while for journey experiences.

- I hear the wine. It's like a structure. I see it as a piece. I hear it before I taste it. It's calling me. And then I start to hear it when I'm tasting it.

- Not that I use crystal suppositories, I'm not New Age.

- A peach tree says, 'Some of me will be juicy and some of me will be dry I'm not growing for you; I grow because that's what I do.' You always hear some person complain about how dry their peach is and the peach says, 'It's not our fault you have no understanding on the proper use for dry peaches.'

- My theory is that women were the Mona Lisas for a long time and now men are Mona Lisas with little goatees. They are our muses.

- If you're gonna tell a story, you have to grow into the head of the rapist as well as the raped.

- He was a lite sneeze, and not the flu. Most boys would like to think they're the flu, wouldn't they? But they're really just a achoo.

- If you call me an airy-fairy new age hippy waif, I will cut your penis off.

- It's a double-edged sword and if you pretend you don't want it you're a liar and that is going to rip your soul to pieces.

- I'm always dreaming that these bulls are chasing me. Half the time I don't get away - I almost get over the fence, and then they gore me.

- I believe in energy, everything is energy. And therefore sometimes magic can be created if somebody is open to letting energy do what it does, instead of being so cynical, that you miss magic happening.

- I feel like a work really has many sides to it when people have such extreme reactions. When a work is greeted with just, 'Oh, you know, it's nice', then it's not affecting people. So love it or hate it, that's okay.

- I am a real believer in looking at pain and taking it out shopping.

- The music is the magic carpet that other things take naps on.

- I just try to strip myself, peel myself like an onion. At different layers I discover stuff.

- Why is the world where it is? It's so deep-rooted, if we really start looking, and we might not like what we find. But I think we have to, we have to ask the questions.

- I'm beyond the fury of youth.

- I love young women who are angry. They're wild mustangs.

- I didn't want her looking and hearing me and thinking, "Oh my God, that's a scary lady!"

- They felt that it was detrimental material for their children and that it was blasphemous.

- They've decided they kinda' have you figured out.

- My nightmares are so bad, that I mostly reject it when my friends want to take me to a cinema to watch a horror movie. Then I say, "No, thank you. I will dream in a few hours."

- I don't know of anybody who's gonna be fulfilled if they get hit by a bus. You have to surrender to that eternal need to be fulfilled.

- How do you know I'm not having a margarita with Jesus tonight at 10 o'clock?

- Let's be honest, religion has not supported women and men exploring all sorts of their sides, their unconscious. It has not been supportive of, you know, go into the places without shame, without blame, without judgment, and just let yourself really see what's cooking in there.

- I think human beings are so much more capable of what they told us we're capable of.

- Anyone can attend yoga, kabbalah classes, church, lectures by the 'Dalai Lama', yada, yada, yada - but can you be present for your life, and live with the way you treat other people?

- Only a few people should have a "greatest hits". I'm not one of those people.

- I feel like our leaders have hijacked America's personality, and taken her to personality plastic surgery school. And they decided this is who she is.

- The playground is the biggest war-zone in the world.

- You have to read visionaries to have visions.

- They squash the baby bird because their bird got squashed.

- I love reading. I'll read the first sentence and if it makes sense to me I pick it up.

- It's ridiculous saying there's only one true faith, it's like saying there's only one map to get you up the mountain. I want to see those other maps, man.

- I kinda have all the aspects of my personality round one table for spaghetti.

- If it's too loud, turn it up.

- I was doing drugs with a South American shaman, and I really did visit the devil and, well, I had a journey.

- There is no passion without broken crockery.

- You have to ask, how could a nation nearly vote in somebody who isn't qualified for the job?

- We're living in a frightening time and I wish people would wake up and realise they're surrendering their civil liberties.

- Who wouldn't want to shag a queen?

[iplaymatchmaker]

@nishtharya​ Thank you so much for requesting🥰🥰! I’m sorry for taking so long! I feel like I  have to also apologize after all that angst in the prompt. I didn’t really mean to make it this sad but I couldn’t help myself 😅, especially considering I have written a beauty and the beast au fic in the past that was also very angsty. All the feels came rushing back. I hope you still enjoy it!❤❤ 

I match you with:

Arthur!

I had a few other guys in mind but I think Arthur would be the only one who could really give back so much while keeping things interesting.

The man has met women who graciously return his advances, but no one managed to play him like you. The look of surprise on his face when you beat him to his own games is extremely entertaining. It quickly becomes a competition of smoothness between the two of you.

After you grow more comfortable around him, both of you realize you have more in common than you think. Your conversations on the dinner table are quite the sight, since you both won’t stop talking until the subject has been completely drained.

When the two of you get into a relationship, it’s very hard for you to keep your hands off each other. He always finds himself reaching for you, whether that’s when he’s writing or when you’re out in town. Your presence around him becomes so natural he finds it hard to focus without you around for long stretches of time. He definitely tells you that a lot, especially when you’re apart for too long.

When he finds out you write and sing your own music he absolutely loves hearing your work. It provides a lot of inspiration for him and he feels very productive when listening to you, even if you’re simply talking. He often asks about your opinions on his latest Sherlock stories, especially after he reads some of your writing.

When you sleep together for the first time he notice how hard it was for you to fall asleep, so he takes it upon himself to help distract you. He’s found quite a few things that often work , although his favorite is definitely cuddling, and other things, but this a family friendly show.

 Prompt 5: Fairytale AU:

“Arthur, open the door!” no matter how many times you yelled and knocked on the door of the large mansion, no answer came.

“I’m not leaving until you talk to me.” You sat yourself on the steps, trying to appear calmer than you were. It was hard not to picture Arthur, alone and afraid, waiting for the inevitable.

“Where did we go wrong?” memories flashed through your mind as you traced your steps, trying to find any signs that this is where it would all lead.

  You had been with Arthur for years and had known him for even longer. You tried to deny it, pointing at your own tendency to over analyze, but his deteriorating health became more and more apparent by the day. He tried his best to brush it off, usually teasing you about how much you worried about him, until one day he collapsed and remained unconscious for the next two days. No doctor could explain the cause of this. He had been perfectly healthy. No problematic past, no underlying health problems. But now he was dying and there was nothing anyone could do.  

You looked back on happier days.  You vividly remembered all the nights the two of you had spent sitting next to each other, working on your stories, often turning to the other for inspiration or a simple word of encouragement when your insecurities got the better of you. He always had a way with words, a way to make you feel special.

The images provided some comfort and you slowly drifted off, still waiting for your love to open up to you, like he did before.

  When your eyes opened you were in a room you didn’t recognize. You were covered in a mountain of blankets and a hot piece of cloth lay on your forehead. When you sat up, you noticed Arthur, writing a few feet away.

“Arthur?” when he noticed you had woken up, he shot up, before tripping, landing back on the chair.

“Watch it.” You moved to get yourself out of bed but he stopped you, slowly lifting himself up, a pained expression on his face. Your heart ached for him as you watched him struggle trying to walk toward you. When he sat down next to you, some of the discomfort seemed to disappear. When he reached for your hand, a shiver run through you after the sudden contact with his ice cold skin.

“My love, you shouldn’t have come here. And you definitely shouldn’t have fallen asleep outside on the brick of winter.” You could see the concern painted on his face as he looked at you. The moment brought you back to the times before all this.

“At least I got you to open the door.” You smiled, sitting up to reach toward him. He pulled away before you could get too close.

“You should’ve left like I told you… There’s nothing for you here anymore.” You glanced at the rose, sitting on the small table by the windowsill. Very few petals were left.

“There’s you.” This time he didn’t move when you reached for him, cupping his cheek.

“I won’t be here much longer.” You didn’t want to think about what life would be like without him by your side.

“There has to be a way to stop it! We still have some time, maybe we can undo this!” he placed a kiss on your forehead, a kiss that felt too much like a goodbye kiss.

“It’s over, love. My time’s up. It’s time I join Rick again. I wonder if he’ll forgive me for not saving him.” You remembered Rick. He was a small boy, barely ten years old when his brother came to Arthur, asking him to treat Rick, who was suffering from a raging fever. He had been the first patient Arthur hadn’t managed to save, one of the many lives he still carried with him, the guilt eventually becoming too much.

“It wasn’t your fault. You can’t save everyone, you shouldn’t expect that of yourself.” you had worried about the weight being a doctor would put on him, but you had never expected it would be the thing that ended him.

“If I can’t save my patients… what kind of doctor am I?” no matter how hard you tried your words weren’t getting through to him and his time was running out.

“Love, please! Your guilt is what birthed this curse. It’s killing you! It’s in your hands to break it!” he had been cursed by his own mind for so long, growing weaker and weaker, until it manifested in the form of a rose, counting down his days. Tears slid rapidly down your eyes. He wiped them away, trying to take your pain along with them.

“I’ve always considered myself intuitive, but the mystery of my mind is one I’ll never be able to solve. But If I may, I want to ask a favor of you.”

“Anything.” You squeezed his hands, bringing him closer.

“It’s selfish of me. I’m the one who told you not to come here and yet here I am wishing you would stay by my side, until the end.” You nodded, tears blurring your eyes.

“I will, always.”

The next few hours felt like an eternity and like no time at all at the same time. There was so much you wanted to say but as you at next to him in front of the fire nothing came out. You could only watch as his life slowly faded away.

“Will you sing for me?” his eyes turned to you, a faint glint to them. You could tell he was struggling to focus, fighting to stay conscious, to spend his last moments with you.

Your voice filled the room, singing one of the songs you had written especially for him a few years ago. You tried to keep your voice steady, despite the situation.

As the minutes passed and the last petal begun to make its descend, his strength completely abandoned him.

“Ugh..”  he collapsed, falling limp on the floor.

“Arthur!” you run to his side, holding him in your arms trying to keep him from slipping away.

“Please, sing…” his words were barely more than a whisper, a sign of his end fast approaching. In spite of it all, he was smiling.

You tried your best to keep your voice from melting into weeping. You wanted to see him off the way he wanted to.

When the last petal touched the ground, he stilled. And so you allowed yourself to cry, unable to stop, to move away, to leave him.

Suddenly, a bright light surrounded you, lighting up the room, bringing warmth back to the empty space. When the light faded, Arthur’s eyes opened.

“Arthur!” you pulled him closer, so close, making sure you weren’t dreaming. He was alive, breathing and warm as ever.

“You’re alive! But how?” he laughed pulling you closer.

“Not happy to see me again?” it was such a relief to see him smiling again.

“Shut up.” You pressed you lips on his, feeling him next to you, just like before.

“I thought I was going to die. My life flashed before my eyes, but when I felt myself slip away, I heard your voice…” tears begun to form in your eyes again, the amount of information making it hard to focus.

“I… I followed your voice… I followed you and It felt like home.” Tears streamed down his face, his body still shaking from the adrenaline. “I guess I’m too much of a coward to die. Not even a self inflicted curse could keep me away from you.” You laughed, unable to contain your happiness. He followed suit, your happiness filling the once gloomy room, bringing you closer than ever before.

“It seems that I’m not going anywhere any time soon.

“You better not! I am still waiting to see the end of your latest story!”

“I would never leave my love hanging like that.” Everything in that moment felt right, preparing you for many more happy memories in your future, with him by your side.

[missinghan]

「 what am I // stray kids 」

❖ genre : sci-fi; superpower au; platonic relationship au

❖ word count : 3,9k (bullet points only)

❖ warning : explicit language, most likely ain’t scientifically true at all

❖ summary : superpowers manifest in certain individuals once they hit puberty and naturally, those odd abilities will vanish as soon as adulthood occurs; but how will those teenagers protect themselves from the curiosity of science?

❖ a/n : this isn’t a proper fic since I don’t think I’ll actually write smth decent out of this but I don’t want the idea to rot inside my dungeon either- so yea, bear with me through this character intro post(?)

— bang chan ↠ locating ability-wielders & teleportation

· sometimes when he’s running errands for his parents, chan can feel a distinct ‘zing’ ins his bones if someone else with unusual abilities is nearby and can describe their power perfectly to the t; he ignores it at first but learns to make do with it eventually; can teleport another person with him and also needs to calculate carefully before teleporting because he once ends up in the middle of a freeway instead of school resulting from lack of sleep.

· looks intimidating but is the first to talk to a new kid in class and show them around as he’s president of the school’s student council; smiles and laughs a lot once you get to know him, and is also very caring, reliable.

· he wishes to apply for a music production company after his college graduation but his family turned the idea down almost immediately and sent him to a boarding school in Europe.

· chan starts taking notice in strange things at his new school after the first few weeks; for example: how they unreasonably force students to have a daily health checkup, how their food taste like medicine most of the times, teachers don’t really seem to care about what they’re teaching and some of his classmates mysteriously ‘move away’ whenever security shows up at their dorm in the middle of the night.

· after finding out where they actually are via photos of students being locked up inside cells, arms and legs chained up like domestic animals, injected with odd substances on a daily basis which were taken by an anonymous individual, chan secretly packs his stuff and decides to ditch this so-called boarding school for good.

· he works hard to hide his identity ensuing flying back to his hometown for a solid three weeks and the fact that there are more people cursed with supernatural abilities begins dawning onto him; cutting off contact with his family completely, moving from one crusty apartment to another every month, chan tackles this crazy idea of assembling a group consisted of extraordinary people to give him a hand with creating a safe environment for the ‘gifted’ youths.

— lee minho ↠ collapse

· law major, quite the loner, raised by a single mother; didn’t have much since little but his mother’s love and affection make up for everything.

· looks intimidating, is actually intimidating; the only person he talks to in college is his dance coach, doesn’t like school nor has many friends; his slightest glare is as cold as a wife trying to win custody of her children in court.

· minho can make his surroundings crumble and fall apart with his mind, which shouldn’t be confused with telekinesis since he can’t physically move objects to his will; this deadly power is triggered whenever he’s experiencing extremely negative emotions like fear or anguish and he’s not (still isn’t) very good at getting a hold of it.

· a group of suspicious men shows up at his house one day as he returns home from dance practice; they claim to be an agency looking for up and coming talents but by the way that his mother is staring at the ground nervously with her legs trembling, his institution tells him that something’s off.

· he firmly declines their offer with a stiff “I’m uncertain that I’m the talent you gentlemen are looking for, but you should know that when the cops are here to fill out their reports, I’m gonna be very helpful, as helpful as possible.”

· “what other random merry of fucking misdemeanors are going to pop up once they go through your records? domestic violence? illegal substances and weapons possession? human trafficking?”

· with a gun to her head, his mom scrambles to her knees and begs him to go with them, admitting that she’s already signed the contract; if he follows their orders and agrees to become an experimental subject, she won’t have to worry about any financial problems for the rest of her life.

· in the heat of the moment, they ultimately force him to activate his power for the very first time; as a result, his house collapses, the death of his only family and the group of men following suit.

· “I’m too late.”

· chan manages to find minho under the aftermath, severely injured and is hanging by a string of life so fragile that can only be saved after undergoing a twelve-hour operation at the hospital.

— seo changbin ↠ sound waves manipulation

· a good student, reputable within his social sphere at school, and comes from a pretty well-off family.

· changbin is able to bend and control sound waves to his advantage; whether it’s simply for his musical instruments or moving objects around, he can also use something as minor as his own heartbeat when he’s emotionally unstable; using the ability continuously for too long can give him severe migraines and potentially damage his brain to a degree if he’s not mindful of it.

· he stays up late at night to write and produce his own songs, keeping it a secret from his parents; posts his own songs on a SoundCloud account, or performs even live at a random underground club under the alias SpearB if he has the chance to.

· an organization full of outlaw scientists comes across a video of his performance on the web, analyzing how he can enhance the beat, his vocal cords without the help of any form of technology, and just like that, he easily tops the list of their targets.

· having no choice but to do what they want when those men hold his parents hostage inside his family’s mansion, changbin gets sent to the same boarding school as chan but they’re being observed in different buildings for his power is on the more useful and dangerous side; hence, his classes consist of a smaller amount of students and they are put through checkups more constantly.

· he doesn’t really pay attention to the skepticisms that reek off all over the place as he’s too busy being homesick and studying because he fully believes that the harder he works, the more obediently he acts, the sooner they’ll let him go; all hell breaks loose when those photos are scattered everywhere, from the hallways to the bathrooms; changbin takes advantage in the riot to get himself out of there as quickly as he can possibly run to the airport.

· changbin swears to never trust anyone again until chan and minho find him sleeping inside an abandoned grocery store with a pistol inside his sleeping bag, two daggers concealed in his sleeves at all times.

· “are we seriously going to contain some headass who was this close to blowing my brain out of my head?”

· “huh, funny, last time I checked, you almost smothered me to death under a gigantic block of cement when I was trying to save your life.”

· “who are you guys and how the hell did you get in here? I don’t recall not locking the door.”

— hwang hyunjin ↠ permeation & memory manipulation

· a true theater kid, meaning he knows almost everyone but every single student at school knows him; naturally, becomes the Prince after playing one too many male lead roles because of his godly features; rather well-mannered and diligent though he doesn’t look like it.

· mistaken to be a player by every new batch of freshmen that only ever gets to watch him practicing his lines from afar, swooning tremendously whenever he ties up his hair; always carries a camera around, doesn’t like to have too many friends but if you get close enough, he’s probably the most fun to be around, won’t ever judge your questionable life choices.

· hyunjin’s ability allows him to walk right through walls as well as any other solid matters but it will drain his stamina painstakingly, causing him to run short on breaths after using his power to change his costumes faster between scenes; the thicker the wall is, the more strength it takes for him to pass through completely.

· he can also erase a certain chunk of memory from someone’s mind but he needs to physically touch them; has only used this ability one time to wipe his existence out of a childhood best friend’s mind before moving away from his hometown. 

· his interest in photography sparks the moment his uncle comes back from a business trip and gives him a toy camera, it’s nowhere near the real ones but the ten-year-old hwang hyunjin sure takes it very, very seriously; after a decade or so, he has replaced it with cameras that actually work and developed quite the talent for taking photos of sceneries and people (jisung is his number one victim but he can’t care less as long as he looks decent and that hyunjin won’t save any crack ones to blackmail him).

· suddenly gets a sketchy summer scholarship to a boarding school in London (the same so-called school that Chan and Changbin went to), his mom encourages him to go after looking it up on the internet without knowing the chances of her own son being exploited for twisted science is shockingly high.

· and the culprit who takes those photos during a wandering around school after curfew is none other than hyunjin himself; he knows damn well posting those photos means getting himself into trouble but heck, his conscience forbids him to leave this hell-on-earth place without alerting these innocent people.

· so the night before those photos are spread everywhere, in every corner, every edge of the building, hyunjin smashes his camera completely with a baseball bat and burns the broken bits in the school backyard; he tries getting through those sleep-deprived men in their fifties who aren’t likely paid enough with his ability and flees.

· surprisingly, he comes rushing into his best friend’s house right after his horrendous flights only to find him being surrounded by three mysterious men.

— han jisung ↠ plunder

· the jokester of the class, takes great joy in stressing the living daylights out of his professors with irrational questions that aren’t necessarily relevant to the lesson, procrastinates, and sleeps through lessons like there’s no tomorrow but still keeps that shiny ‘A’ on his report card nonetheless.

· being friends with hyunjin results in occasional admirers here and there for him but he does kinda have his own fandom base after being pulled upstage out of the blue in the middle of last year’s spring music festival, musing him an opportunity to show off his rapping skills; because of that event, he takes writing music more seriously with the stage name J.One.

· if jisung is being honest, he hardly uses his power since it’s basically taking over anyone’s body and mind for a maximum of five seconds meanwhile his own body is immobile; and if any physical effects occur (for example, a basketball hits him on the head spontaneously), he’s obligated to endure that pain for that person until they become conscious of their own body again.

· he’s not a creep, he swears.

· and who knows? what if his body gets kidnapped within those five seconds?

· hyunjin and jisung know about each other’s ability but don’t really discuss nor talk about them because they don’t find walking through walls or temporarily possessing someone’s body cool.

· well, that’s that until chan, minho and changbin show up at his house the same day when hyunjin returns from his summer exchange program with a cut lip and bruised knuckles. 

· “han jisung, you’re going to have to come with us unless you want to live inside a cage for the rest of your life.”

· “I’m sorry, are you threatening me?”

· “we’re trying to protect you, smartass, you’re far too dangerous to be roaming the streets so freely.”

· “....me? I’m dangerous?”

· jisung not knowing the slightest bit about his own ability downright baffles chan—he’s only scratched the surface of it at this point; his true potential is if he’s taking over another ability-wielder’s body, he will then take their power for himself; and jisung can’t remember the last time he properly uses it either.

— lee felix ↠ imperfect invisibility

· initially lives in Australia but after finding out about his ability, he moves to Seoul with his parents to live a quieter, more covered-up life without being surrounded by too many relatives.

· an absolute sweetheart, smart, kind, honest, a little slow to read in between the lines at times; can concentrate relatively well on an empty stomach, but gets drowsy quickly after eating, especially big meals. 

· lix is also homeschooled up until high school in order to avoid any unwanted situation; later on, applies for a course that can be taken online for the most parts at an average-ish university to not draw so much attention. 

· since he stays at home most of the time, he spends lots of time playing different video games, experiences random cooking recipes without burning the house down, and teaches himself how to dance through online tutorials, getting awfully good at it fast partially thanks to his natural flexibility.

· he can disappear from a single person’s field of vision for as long as he wants to but it’s still limited and considered flawed since felix can only disappear from the sight one person of his choice at a time; although it can come in quite handy whenever he gets shoved into a dark alleyway by random people varying from cheap pickpockets with a box-cutting knife to muscular men dressed in black.

· learns boxing during middle school so he can still kick asses to preserve his own life.

· felix once punches jisung in the gut and slaps hyunjin in the face with a cabbage after seeing them follow each and every one of his movements the moment he steps out of the supermarket—he’s got used to listening to people’s footsteps over time. 

· “okay, first of all, ow, and second of all, why did I get the punch and he got the cabbage?!”

· “oh, don’t be such a baby.”

· “you two don’t look like those balding dudes in money-dripping black suits...what are you on? crack? what do you want from me? money? food?”

· “of course we’re not balding men in their forties! I take personal offense to that! and please, who do you take me as? a total creep who only ever knows how to follow people with his stupid sidekick tagging along for background noises?”

· “HEY! I NEVER AGREED TO BE YOUR SIDEKICK!”

· “well, it’s time you fucking did then, han.”

· “you know, I suppose this is the part where you two put me to sleep with some kind of drug and bring me back to your excuse of a headquarter.”

· “oh, did you bring the anesthetic pills?”

· “I thought Changbin gave it to you, no?”

— kim seungmin ↠ time-leap

· born in a middle-class family, very studious but also enjoys playing baseball during retreats, takes time to open up to people so he has more acquaintances than close friends but he doesn’t mind, that way he has more time for himself. 

· definitely and never will be the kid who lets his classmates take advantage of his wit, he does do a good chunk of every group project but makes sure everyone has at least one decent thing to do (low-key loves bossing people around); can be pretty distant at first, but he just weirds people out after getting closer and doesn’t hold grudges.

· seungmin is capable of bringing himself back to a specific past event to alter the future outcome though it won’t work most of the time unless he really, really has to for safety purposes or the situation gets out of hands; time-leaping won’t activate if he wants to retake a test but works like a charm when he tries to save a kid on the street from a car accident.

· actually does deep, proper research into other ability-wielders and often stays in school during nighttime to read the news, articles or anything that he can find on the web to learn about how that one cryptic boarding school in Europe that’s accused of abusing their students got shut down all of a sudden, the students never return and family members never bother to look for them. 

· hence, he adapts to hiding his ability and himself fairly well—never takes the late-night buses, doesn’t try to become close and bond with other people, asks his parents to change the door lock every month, burns bills each time he purchases something but he tries not to go out as much as possible. 

· seungmin has seen hyunjin use his power once by accident but decided to say nothing about it; eventually finds chan’s headquarter (which is just his crusty apartment) by following jisung and hyunjin after their practice hour, baffles them all a little but joins in no time. 

· after asking hyunjin to erase his parents’ memory about himself, seungmin gives everyone a hand for their plan of building a school and campus, completely safe and under the radar for other ability welders until their adolescence is over; he time-leaps back to back in order to collect as much information about lottery tickets as he can.

· another flaw occurs when he travels to the past for the third time: his eyesight gets weaker and weaker every time he time-leaps so he starts wearing glasses as a temporary resolution but chan stops him when he tries to do it for the fifth time, saying that they would rather work hard for a little longer than have seungmin lose his vision forever. 

· after over a year or so, they successfully repurchase an education organization and officially establish an exclusive academy for ability-wielders, reaching out to those individuals before scientists can get a hold of them. 

— yang jeongin ↠ superhuman speed

· the quiet kid who most likely won’t talk unless the teacher asks him to answer a question or someone tells him to let them copy his homework; has his earbuds in most of the time to pretend he can’t hear what people are saying so he won’t have to interact with them. 

· joins after you when chan finds him hitting a wall head-on at an abnormal speed while trying to save a kitten in the middle of the streets. 

· jeongin has extremely enhanced agility and reflexes but he still lacks accuracy for he is naturally a clumsy person; therefore, changbin tells him to wear a protective layer under his uniform so even in the worst-case scenario, he can jump off a building and make it out with minor scratches. 

· reluctantly buys lunch for every member of the student council (aka 00 liners + you) on a daily basis although he can’t really see which kind of sandwiches he’s grabbing at and they end up being mushy most of the time. 

· and for those people who say his resting face is scary, he’s mainly just frustrated because of his friends. 

· also usually is the one who returns with the most injuries because of his own ability—he always flees like his life depends on it to save jisung’s ass from being hit by a truck and hyunjin’s camera from being crushed (the sole purpose of the student council will be explained more thoroughly later).

· has single-handedly saved everyone inside a bookstore when a sudden fire breaks out. 

· minho scolds him and felix a lot for spending too much time at the arcade after school instead of doing their required tasks. 

· acts all tough and mature since he’s the youngest of the squad, loves to make fun of jisung for his height but still is and probably will always be a complete child who hates eating vegetables with a passion; gets yelled at a lot whenever there’s a BBQ party since he only ever eats meat. 

· “corn? why are we raiding the Asian market for corn at one AM?”

· “an outdoor, wholesome BBQ isn’t complete without corn, duh.”

· “do you want to get us caught?!”

· “oh please, they’re going to show up either way.”

· “YOU’RE NOT MAKING ANY SENSE!”

— y/n (reader) ↠ telepathic manipulation

· president of the student council, stubborn, slightly less bossy than seungmin, appears to be apathetic and cranky mainly because you can’t sleep that well; with that being said, you don’t feel too tired during ungodly hours when people are tossing around in the comfort of their bed but snap at irritating people a lot in the morning if they’re making too much noise. 

· your ability allows you to control people to your will, from something as meaningless as slamming their head through a wall to life-threatening actions like forcing them to point a knife at their own throat; it’s somewhat similar to jisung’s power though you don’t have to physically feel what your target is going through and you don’t need to worry about taking over their body.

· the only downside to it is that you easily fall asleep the moment you set your target free.

· minho is the one who gets you out of the laboratory where your parents were working on a huge, secret project about individuals with supernatural abilities for an unknown organization; you’re unfortunate enough to become their first-ever experimental subject which only nourishes resentment slowly, gnawing at your sanity while you’re dreading each day behind those cold metal bars. 

· perhaps joining the student council is what makes your life less depressing, perhaps; you’re far too busy facepalming at the beautiful monstrosity of their friendship and feeding them ensuing returning to the dorm after school since those boys only know how to eat, cooking is too much for them to comprehend (albeit felix).

· when your family was still… normal, your parents sent you to martial art classes every weekend so like felix, you don’t actually need your power to save yourself from some random mobsters on the streets.

· you’re also the only person who eats vegetables properly and even tries to incorporate more fiber into their diets but as always, they never listen, especially hyunjin when it comes to green onions.

· don’t have the best reputation in the academy because the idea of letting the new girl with a seemingly useless ability become president of the student council isn’t very appealing to many people, and it doesn’t help when every member of the council is exclusively allowed to drop out in the middle of a class to ‘collect’ any ability-wielders that chan manages to locate that day since he’s always worn out with changbin and minho from boring paperwork as well as other businessy stuff.

· even when your ability is considered almost perfect, you’ve only used it once when you thought minho was going to sell you off to another place and almost made him put a bullet through his own brain; you’ve refrained yourself from using it since that day.

[lokiarsene]

though i'm really eh about sumi having a crush on ren bc it makes me uncomfy for a personal reason, i think their friendship changes his relationship with akechi in a way that i find pretty interesting. i don’t see them as the royal “trio”, personally (the same way there’s no “trio” in the ST of star wars), but sumi is pretty significant because her arc is all about understanding herself and relying on herself to do that. it’s just easier for her to do this when she has someone who supports her standing by while she figures it out--something which neither akechi nor ren can do alone. they need support, yes, but they also need each other.

anyway! onto the rambles:

sumi is kind and hardworking, very polite and friendly (which is akechi's public personality, though he’s also hardworking in all aspects of his life); she struggles with expectations and feels unbearable pressure from school because of her reputation in gymnastics (like akechi as a detective prince idol [and shido’s demands of him]); the defining tragedy of her life altered her perception of reality and herself so much that she can't even see herself clearly (akechi thinks he's an unwanted, cursed child who shouldn't have been born, and he thought he had no choice but to ally himself with shido to get revenge). sumi realizes who she truly is and embraces herself fully at the same time akechi no longer hides himself from ren (who fully embraces akechi’s 180 personality shift, and even has to tell sumi that this is how akechi truly is).

as if all this weren’t obvious enough, maruki tells akechi and ren that sumi is searching for a place to belong and how they're the exact same as her--and akechi reflects on this and looks at ren.

sumi's arc is about her own growth independent from needing anything from ren (or akechi). it’s exactly as she says about the PT: helping people is fine, but you shouldn’t rely entirely on others to change things for you. you should do that on your own. so it's really interesting to me how both boys actually need her character growth to have a crucial one of their own.

addendum: i don’t think i highlighted enough of how the boys grow because of sumi, so! let me get started.

the PT starts because ren and his friends wants to take the initiative and change things, shake up the system, help those who are hurt by it. their whole MO is taking charge and challenging authority, both when asked to (by the phan-site), or when they deem a target worthy.

ren steps in to help sumi repeatedly throughout the first part of her confidant arc, and then when she sits down with him and akechi over the summer to talk about the PT, there’s a pretty significant shift in their dynamic. instead of ren doing things to help her, he instead stands back, watches her, supports her, and witnesses as she makes decisions.

they start small–picking out the proper glasses for her dad, encouraging her to dance in the crowd at school–and then culminate in the promise at the rooftop. a promise for ren to look after himself (to come back alive from a mission). sumi wants to help on the mission even though she hasn’t fully awakened, so she settles on the next best thing: having ren give his word that he will stay safe. if you’re powerless to help someone/change their circumstances, a promise is the next best thing. that promise gives them something else to fight for.

guess who ren makes a promise with, a promise that defies impossible odds, all doubts, all fears? a promise that is made when they are powerless to change circumstances? a promise that is very likely the reason why this particular character survived a situation? akechi.

and he makes this promise multiple times throughout the final act of the game: telling akechi he would abandon the PT and join him (or saying that he prefers to keep akechi as a rival, thus promising to keep their relationship in tact). a promise for a rematch, a reminder of that promise in the engine room; reminding himself once again of his promise to akechi, a decision so significant that the game specifically highlights it; a promise that is the foundation of their third semester dynamic; a promise that ren clings to in the form of akechi’s glove, which he keeps! in his pocket! a promise that is represented in the final theme song (and for y’all who accuse me of mistranslating the ending theme to make it about shuake: learn japanese yourself and how to analyze text before you run your shitkid mouth lmao).

sumi’s inspiration to akechi is quicker than it is with ren. he doesn’t have that deep of a relationship with her–or indeed a relationship at all–yet it’s maruki’s reminder about sumi’s pain that shakes akechi to his core. he understands her in that moment, because he has a similar wound in his heart.

this adds to akechi’s conflicted emotions about ren and their bond, and is probably the reason he reasserts that going back to “their reality” on 2/2 is like going home. not only that, akechi has made it repeatedly clear that leblanc–and ren himself–are comforting places for him. ren’s home is akechi’s safe haven–ren himself is akechi’s safe haven. akechi has his third tier awakening in leblanc, when every other character has theirs in the place they feel most at home/strengthened by. akechi shows ren his “favorite/special place”–the jazz club–and remarks that he has never taken anyone else there before. all these things happened in the real world with ren, and it’s that world akechi wants to return to. the true world where he and ren met and made their promise. it’s that ren–the real ren, the true world’s ren, the ren not strongarmed into accepting a false reality–that akechi wants.

sumi’s inclusion in royal impacts the plot of royal, which is about ren, akechi, and confronting a villain so hurt by the world he wants to allow everyone to retreat from the very pain the PT are fighting against. sumi’s arc is about turning around to face the pain she confronted and not allowing it to consume her anymore. ren and akechi’s arcs are about finding other things to dedicate your life to besides revenge/justice. and while i joked that she’s just straight bait, she also is a really important character that i doubt fanboys will ever understand in full. she’s one of the few female characters whose arc is contained within herself and inspires the growth of male characters without requiring her to die.

[artificialqueens]

Blue Neighborhood Series: BLUE (Methydoll) - Mac

AN: All my thanks to Alex for betaing this bitch. Sorry it took so long to get this chapter out!! Hope you enjoy!

Summary: Nicky offers to help Crystal with her art school applications by acting as a model and getting her portrait done.

Crystal had only just sat down at her desk, bags still thrown haphazardly about her room, when she heard a loud thwack on her window that nearly caused her to fall out of her chair in shock.

She whipped her head in the direction of the sound. Through the early afternoon sunlight she could make out Nicky’s flushed red face, and three words written boldly on a piece of paper pressed to the French girl’s window.

YOU’RE A BITCH

Crystal bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing outright, sealing her expression in mock annoyance as she threw open her window.

“I was only gone two days.”

Nicky gave an over exaggerated sigh, throwing her head back and clutching at her chest as if in pain. “I was stuck with Heidi and Brita who kept talking about how hot MEN are.” Nicky gave a pathetic sniffle.

When her antics didn’t produce the reaction desired, Nicky crossed her arms over her chest, puffing it out in frustration and refusing to look Crystal in the eye. “You should be thankful I am even talking to you after you LEFT ME!”

Crystal just raised one judgemental eyebrow, fighting back the urge to blush. “You’re such a drama queen,” she chuckled, shaking her head.

The side of Nicky’s mouth quirked up in a half smirk. “And Heidi’s a bad liar.”

Crystal’s eyes widened for a fraction of a second. Dammit. “She told you?”

“She didn’t have to!” Nicky exclaimed. “As soon as she mentioned it, I knew. She never invites me over to her house, so of course you had to be behind it.”

Crystal sighed. “Did you at least go?”

Nicky scoffed. “Of course I went. I’m a good friend.”

“And-”

“Why do you say it like that? Like I did something bad?”

Crystal raised one skeptical eyebrow.

Nicky eventually raised her gaze, allowing herself to meet Crystal’s eyes for the first time that conversation, and sighed. “Heidi’s mom is pissed because I strongly encouraged Heidi to buy this gorgeous Coach bag.”

“How much was it?”

Nicky pursed her lips. “I’d rather not say.”

“Two hundred?”

“Yeah…” Nicky trailed off, “plus another two hundred,” she mumbled.

Crystal’s jaw dropped. “You got her to buy a FOUR HUNDRED DOLLAR PURSE?”

The older girl held her hands up in surrender. “In my defense, retail therapy is good for heartbreak!”

Crystal, still in shock, just nodded dumbly to herself, mumbling, “Oh my god, you’re actually the worst person on the planet. I can’t believe I’m friends with the actual worst human being to exist ever.”

“You love me.” Nicky winked, causing Crystal’s heart to do that silly little flippy thing making her palms sweat and her ears burn.

There was a beat of silence before Crystal gave a long-suffering sigh. “I’ll talk to Heidi’s mom.”

She had been trying, rather foolishly, but she had been trying to get Nicky to open up to the rest of their friend group. Nicky had been living in the U.S. for nearly four months now and yet hardly seemed concerned by the lack of bonding she had accomplished with the girls in the neighborhood.

Maybe it was a selfish part of Crystal too that needed someone else to understand how she felt under Nicky’s spell.

Because surely it couldn’t just be her.

Nicky had that effect on everyone.

“Did you at least like the college?” Nicky asked, drawing Crystal out of her spiraling thoughts and back into reality.

The artist cast her eyes down to where her fingers were fiddling with the peeling window trim, and couldn’t help a smile from breaking out.

“It was wonderful,” she said lightly.

Nicky’s gaze softened, brilliant smile taking over her features. “Stop being so fucking cute. I can’t be mad at you when you smile like that.”

Crystal couldn’t fight the blush this time and allowed her cheeks to flush crimson. If worst came to worst she could blame it on the cooling temperature and the change of season.

Her mind trailed back to the college visit, a sigh leaving her lips against her will.

“But-” Nicky prompted her.

Crystal shook her head. “But- the admissions lady took a look at my portfolio and said it could use some work.”

“So she is an idiot.”

“No- I mean, maybe.” Crystal sighed. “I know my art style isn’t… traditional, and I know that to move in the art world I have to play by their rules, at least a little.”

Nicky nodded gently. “So what are you going to do?”

Crystal sighed, leaning forward to rest her head on her hands. “I need more ‘realistic’ pieces. Portrait work is probably my best bet, but I’m not entirely sure who I would do, and I got a C in freshman bio so-”

“You should paint me.”

Crystal’s head shot up. “W-what?”

Nicky smiled, rolling her eyes playfully. “Paint me like one of your French girls.” she snickered, posing dramatically. “C’mon, don’t act like you don’t want an excuse to stare at me.”

Crystal couldn’t help a laugh from bubbling out, lighting her up from the inside out. “Can’t argue with that,” she threw back, just as teasingly.

Nicky’s eyebrows shot up in surprise, as if she hadn’t expected Crystal to match her energy, when her usual reaction was to blush and gloss over the flirtatious tone.

It was almost comical how long it took Nicky to process the statement, and Crystal found herself, for the first time, in a position of power over the other girl.

She pushed her luck. “Tomorrow after school? Art room?”

It was refreshing to see the impeccably put-together girl out of her element, and Crystal’s smile only grew as Nicky caught her breath before nodding.

“Yeah, sounds good.”

…

The rapidly cooling air that signified the coming winter seeped through the shoddy insulation in the art room. Old walls did little to prevent the howling wind from seeping into the well-worn cracks in the brick. And yet, Crystal had never felt more at home.

As the sun was already beginning to make its descent from the sky, she allowed herself to glance around, marveling at the expanse of half-finished art pieces that littered the shelves, and her large blank canvas that took up the middle of the grouped tables.

The door to the room creaked on its hinges and Crystal looked up suddenly, heart pounding in her ears at the prospect that she was about to spend the next however long having to stare at Nicky’s beauty up close and personal.

But her elation quickly faded as the figure that burst through the art room doors was not at all who she expected.

“Sorry, I was just… looking for Jacks…” Gigi trailed off, breaking eye contact before nodding to the floor. “I’ll just-” she motioned to the door.

“So it’s true?” Crystal heard herself say. “You and Jackie?”

Gigi met her eyes warily, holding her gaze just long enough for Crystal to see that she was genuinely afraid.

The cheerleader nodded once. “Yeah.”

Crystal hadn’t seen Jackie in a couple days, the older girl having given the excuse that she needed to practice the changes in their cheer routine. But she had mentioned in passing that she and Gigi were seeing each other.

Crystal hadn’t believed it at first, but now, looking at Gigi’s worried expression, the first vulnerability she had seen from her ex in a long time, she had her answer.

It was… different, Crystal decided.

Not bad, but not nearly comfortable.

Her ex and one of her best friends.

Crystal could be more mad. She probably should be.

But just by looking at her Crystal could tell that this Gigi, this nervous, timid thing, was a far cry from the Gigi that had caused all that pain freshman year. She had three years to grow and change, and if the way she was guiltily staring at the floor was anything to go by, she had changed quite a bit.

Gone was the cavalier, above-it-all attitude she used to exude. The smarmy chuckles and flirtatious winks she gave out like candy.

She had no doubt been humbled by her fling with Jaida being outed, however, it was more than that.

But Crystal didn’t allow herself to analyze further. They were different people now.

The heavy silence was clearly eating at Gigi because she went to explain herself, “If you want to talk about-”

Crystal stopped her with a shake of her head.

Gigi withered.

“Just don’t hurt her.” Crystal said firmly, putting every ounce of strength she had in those four words.

Gigi met her eyes finally, determination clear in them. “I won’t.”

Crystal believed her.

“Okay,” she said.

We’re good. She meant.

…

They got five minutes into painting before Crystal sighed, dropping the brush exasperatedly.

“What’s wrong?” Nicky teased. “Can’t capture my beauty?”

Crystal rolled her eyes. “Nothing could ever capture your beauty,” she deadpanned.

Nicky tried to hide the flush of her cheeks by turning her head, but Crystal caught her, smiling inwardly at the reaction.

“You need to relax. Put on some music.”

“I don’t know about-”

Nicky’s eyes lit up. “Here, I have a playlist for this!”

Crystal raised an eyebrow skeptically. “You have a playlist for getting your portrait done by your friend who’s never going to get into art school and might as well drop out now and live in a cardboard box under a bridge?”

Nicky rolled her eyes, hopping off the stool and grabbing a random half-finished pottery project off the art room shelf. “No, that’s too long for a title.”

Crystal stuck her tongue out.

Nicky just smiled knowingly. “I called it ‘songs to play when Crystal gets frustrated that give me an excuse to initiate physical contact.’”

“Wait what-”

But before Crystal could get a word in edgewise, Nicky was blasting her old-timey music.

The notes rose and fell against the unfinished clay pot, adding a strange echo to the song. Nicky didn’t seem to mind though, turning on her heel and holding a hand out to Crystal.

She looked editorial, pristine white blouse and matching pants hugged her slim figure like they were tailored to her frame.

“Come dance with me,” she spoke softly, pushing herself off one of the tables to inch closer to Crystal.

The artist had the distinct feeling of being hunted as Nicky’s eyes zoned in on her face, tracing the curve of her lips. “I-I have to-”

“S'il te plait, mon amour.” Nicky practically whispered coming closer, breathing in her air. “Danse avec moi.”

And Crystal had no clue what she said, but she couldn’t very well refuse Nicky when she spoke like that. All soft eyes and gentle French words.

She took Nicky’s outstretched hand and found herself in the leading position.

It was only when Nicky pulled her closer that Crystal noted her own drab appearance, overalls smeared with paints and bits of charcoal that most definitely would ruin Nicky’s all-white outfit.

“Wait, the paint isn’t dry!” She tried to warn, but Nicky ignored her, pulling the artist closer, the blues and oranges and lilacs pressed against the expensive fabric.

The French beauty just shook her head and laughed at Crystal’s shocked expression.

They fell into a rhythm before long, Crystal swaying them this way and that. She was surely doing something wrong, but Nicky didn’t seem to mind, peaceful smile pulling at the corners of her mouth and eyes.

She looked ethereal up close.

Her pores varied in size and the lines beside her mouth were deeper than Crystal had assumed at first glance.

She was perfect.

She was just like everyone else.

Almost without realizing it, Crystal slowed their rocking to a stop.

Nicky blinked her eyes open. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Nothing.” Crystal shook her head to clear it.

“Why’d you stop?”

Crystal smiled gently. “I wanted to see your eyes. I missed them.”

Nicky threw her delicate neck back in a laugh that rang in both their ears. “Awww, Crystal,” she cooed. “You’re such a sap.”

“You love it.”

Nicky just hummed noncommittally, poorly hiding a smile, and went back to swaying.

…

It went on that way for nearly a week.

With Crystal trying to paint her neighbor, and said neighbor distracting her by doing something ridiculously romantic that made her head spin on her shoulders.

They got good at it.

Danced around each other like professionals.

Like they had since the day they met.

When the painting was finally done, Crystal didn’t tell Nicky at first. She soaked up their time together like she couldn’t just throw open her window anytime she felt like it and see the older girl.

She drank in the moments right before she unveiled her masterpiece.

Nicky didn’t say anything for a long while.

And then finally, “It’s beautiful.”

Crystal scoffed. “It’s you, you fucking arrogant ass-”

Nicky shook her head, turning to meet Crystal’s gaze, eyes brimming with something so… real it nearly stole Crystal’s breath.

“It’s beautiful because you did it. Because I can see the brush strokes here,” she pointed to the tip of portrait-Nicky’s nose, “and how you changed the shade of white under my chin. And that you got the two different tones of my eyes.”

Nicky’s hand was sweeping over the expanse of the canvas, tracing the patterns and divots and blemishes that made up her being. Crystal would have scolded her for running her fingers over the painting, but Nicky was breathing in her air again, and Crystal’s head felt woozy with the rush of emotion.

Because Nicky noticed.

She noticed each color change, each shadow placement, each brushstroke.

And Crystal suddenly felt very stupid because of course Nicky noticed.

She always noticed.

“It’s beautiful because you love me.”

Crystal’s heart lurched forward.

“You don’t have to say it. I know.” Nicky turned back to look at the painting. “This is how you love me.”

“Nicky-” Crystal started, unsure of what she was going to say.

Nicky turned to her, that ever-present mysterious emotion front and center, and only then could Crystal place it.

“I love you too.”

Love.

Of course.

Love.

And before either of them could dance away, Crystal pulled Nicky in by the hips, digging her fingers into the dip in her waist and pressing their lips together.

It felt like rainfall.

Or like a promise.

But mostly it felt like love. Like a long-time-coming love.

Like the kind of love that had time to mature. That had time to grow.

Nicky’s hands cupped Crystal’s face like she was a delicate work of art, and Crystal’s nails dug into Nicky’s skin like she wanted to shatter it.

And the kiss was messy and wet because someone started crying but they were both smiling and clutching onto each other like a lifeline.

And Crystal couldn’t ever remember being happier.

[itsuki-minamy]

“K - SIX IDOLS”

CHAPTER 1: “SPRINT DREAM” (Complete)

Translation: Naru-kun Raws: Ridia

"Good morning ladies and gentlemen."

"Good Morning!"

A pure voice echoes through the Kendo hall of "Promotion Scepter 4".

Many remains of that remain, in the office that was created with the remodeling of the old Army facilities. The Kendo hall is one of them, and the idols belonging to "Scepter 4" sometimes take lessons there and other times hold their swords in their hands.

And at the beginning of the week, there was always an instruction from the president, the "Idol Blue King", Reisi Munakata.

Munakata makes a soft voice in front of the idols lined up in a "rest" position.

"By the way, this week is the biggest event of the year for my production, "Sprint". The "Dream Live Tour" will take place. I hope to have the encouragement of each member so that no preparation or lesson is neglected."

"Yes!"

The responses of the idols are not disturbed. More than an entertainment bureau, the closer rigor to the police or the military was due to the nature of representative Reisi Munakata, and it was also a feature of "Promotion Scepter 4".

The group's glasses glowed brightly, staring at an idol.

"But recently, I have received some concerns, Andy Domyoji-kun. Go ahead."

"Yes!"

Domyoji, who was called by name, screamed to death. From his normally cheerful face, blood is drawn in the blink of an eye.

Domyoji took a heavy step and stepped out in front of the superior.

There is no anger in Munakata's expression. A slight smile floats on the sleek face like a statue. That doesn't mean that Domyoji and the other idols were relieved that they didn't understand the superior.

It was a man named Reisi Munakata, who sentenced to death with a smile.

"Domyoji-kun. The other day, there was a report that you were 5 minutes and 27 seconds late for the entire "Gyumetai" lesson. Is this true?"

"Actually, that's…"

"What is an idol in "Promotion Scepter 4"?"

"Ah, idols aim to be the ideal humans who should become the norm for people..."

"Do you have your own excuse for being late, knowing that?"

"No, I'm sorry..."

Domyoji is drooling. It was like a prosecution and a defendant, but in this case it was a military trial rather than an ordinary court. The sentence is already decided from the beginning, and this exchange is only a ritual.

Munakata acts like he's convinced of something,

"Ok. Let's ask Domyoji-kun to do one of the highlights of the "Sprint Dream Live Tour", "Extreme solo part, Idol from above 6500~”."

"What?"

With a strange voice, Domyoji's expression was frozen in despair. Munakata smiles and touches his shoulder intimately.

"As you know, "Extreme Solo Part" is one of the most popular projects on "Countdown Dissolution, Shoumutai". This time it's a solo part while skydiving from an altitude of 2,000 meters, so his brave figure will be a great copy on the big screen."

"President, please! That's! Just forgive me!"

"What do you say? This is your chance to get more fans. And if you're at the mercy of your life, you won't be late for lessons."

Munakata treats Domyoji, who clings to his eyes, with a smiling smile. The idols are silently staring at the horrible sight.

"Kindness is called haste. Let's start the special training today. Akiyama-kun, Benzai-kun, please take him to the office to complete the procedure."

"Yes!"

The same members of the "Shoumutai", Himori Akiyama and Yujiro Benzai, grabbed Domyoji crying from both sides. Domyoji screams while ruffling his hair.

"Not! I don't like the "Extreme solo part"! Akiyama, Benzai, I am a posterity, so don't miss out!"

"Hold on, Domyoji."

"Oh. Get angry and train. Hopefully you won't die."

Domyoji was dragged out of the Kendo room.

When the door closed, Munakata saw the idols lined up. All the idols looked at Munakata with a better attitude than before.

Munakata says, looking at him with satisfaction.

"Don't be late either. As members of society and as idols who should be a human norm, please respect that."

"Yes!"

The voice of the idols who responded contained a desperate sound.

++++++++++

"Sorry, President! I can't make it on time!"

The driver's scream also contains a desperate sound.

As he listened to him in the backseat, Munakata gracefully reassembled his legs, put his hand to his jaw, and muttered, "Hmm."

"Sprint Dream Live Tour", first day, 4:52 pm.

Munakata's transport vehicle got caught in heavy traffic filling the road and got stuck at all.

Until the day before, Munakata was planning a large-scale live concert in London as part of the overseas expansion of "Promotion Scepter 4". The big picture and charisma of Reisi Munakata, the "Idol King", managed to shake up the stubborn management of the French entertainment world. A few hours ago he won a partnership and a contract in the EU and returned triumphantly to Narita airport.

From the transport vehicle, Munakata continued to instruct the "Sprint Dream Live Tour". Back home. Although he has a difficult schedule of immediate events, he does not have fatigue or mistakes. There was a figure like: the perfect idol king.

It was in the time after Sakura's exchange that the news of the accident and jamming arrived.

Fortunately, no one died, but traffic was completely paralyzed. A line of cars continues towards the horizon, and it takes 30 minutes to finally reach 100 meters. Literally, he was forced into a state of immobility.

If nothing is done, the big event that is approaching a few hours later, will expose the mistake that the "Idol King" will be late.

In such a critical situation, however, there was no impatience in Reisi Munakata's expression.

"Ok."

Munakata says cheerfully to the driver reflected in the rearview mirror.

"I understand the situation. Please, I'll get off at the next intersection."

"But it will take 30 minutes to get there and, according to traffic information, the situation is similar on the lower road."

"It doesn't matter. In the meantime, let's get ready."

Munakata took his PDA out of his pocket and made a call. Munakata's trusted deputy director responded with two calls. It's Awashima Seri.

"Where is he now, President?"

"Currently, we are targeting a four-way interchange. It will take about 30 minutes to get there. I am planning to get out of here."

"That is…"

Awashima groaned. Even if he can get off the four road interchange, it will take more than an hour from there to the location, regardless of the mode of transportation. Since the show started at 6:30 pm, arrival on time is desperate.

After a few seconds of silence, Awashima's voice regained its composure.

"I would like to review the song list. The current program is to start with the president's number at the same time the performance begins, but we will correct this to start from "Shoumutai" and put the president's turn as far back as possible."

"Rejected."

Munakata categorically blocked her.

“Changing the song list will cut the rhythm of the fans. As idols, we shouldn't give fans any kind of anxiety."

"However! If this continues…!"

"I will be on time."

"......"

Awashima lost the words.

He was not surprised by Munakata's recklessness. She knows more than anyone what kind of person Munakata is and what kind of idol he is. He's never the type to talk about the impossible and break the plan.

If Reisi Munakata says that he can do it, he certainly can do it even if all other humans can't.

The next time Awashima opened her mouth, there was a determined intention.

"So, President. Please give us instructions."

A satisfied smile reached Munakata's mouth.

And 30 minutes later.

As soon as all contacts were completed, the transport vehicle passed the toll booth.

The lower street was still full of cars. Since Munakata hated traffic, he analyzed the situation. Progress is not much different from high speed.

However, that is no longer relevant to Munakata.

Because this is the end of the transport vehicle.

When he got out of the vehicle, the driver's seat window was opened. The driver looks from there and says...

"President, I wish you good luck."

Munakata smiled calmly at the young driver.

"Yes. Please drive carefully and come back."

That said, the next moment, Munakata was on the run.

With a forward leaning sprint style, Munakata is steadily increasing in speed. He reached a row of cars that couldn't move like a tombstone, and finally couldn't see his back.

Even after that, the conductor continued to pour his longing eyes beyond the horizon where Munakata disappeared. Holding on his chest the driver's cap that he took off as a sign of respect.

++++++++++

That day, Kazumasa Hatanaka (19) was driving his favorite Hara Chari.

He is in an unprecedented mood because he was able to finish his work early. The construction company he works for has been working hard these days, but yesterday they calmed down and was able to pay him. Hatanaka, who worked especially hard, was allowed to return home as the president had a special plan that day.

Akemi Hatanaka (18), a heavy wife, waits at home. Just thinking about it will loosen the origin of Hatanaka. When he wondered if he could serve his beloved wife and a child he had yet to see, his tired body mysteriously strengthened.

(Oh, that's right. Should I contact her to get back to Akemi soon?)

Suddenly, Hatanaka took out his mobile phone while driving the Hara Chari. He tries to send a message to his wife using one hand to handle and one hand to write.

Was when…

"You…"

"Oh?"

Hatanaka was about to fall due to the noise surrounding his ears. The body, which was about to slalom, was held by an outstretched hand and returned to its original trajectory.

While running to Hatanaka's side, the bespectacled man yells in a soft voice.

"It is a violation of the Road Traffic Law to use a mobile phone while driving."

"Uh, oh, sorry."

“In addition, it has already exceeded the legal speed of motorized bicycles. Wear your helmet correctly. It is meant to protect your life."

"Ah, hey, uh, yeah, sorry."

Hatanaka, who was once feared for being a "Chitaka mad dog", simply admitted his guilt not because he understood the accuracy of the words of the man with the glasses. This is because he was upset and scared by Hara Chari's run and the appearance of a man running side by side on only his own feet.

The man with the glasses smiled at Hatanaka's stunned face.

"Okay. If you follow the law and try to drive safely, you won't make driving mistakes like you do now."

(No, no, I'm going to be mad now because you called me. Do you want them to tell you that driving safely is something like running at that speed?)

The word never left Hatanaka's mouth at last. The man with the glasses raised his hand slightly and said, "Excuse me, bye." and then sped up and disappeared from Hatanaka's sight.

Hatanaka was stunned as he slowed the Hara Chari to 30 km / h.

(Is that so? I wonder if the god of the road advised me...)

There is a yellow light ahead. It stopped at the stop line correctly where it would normally cut, and the director took control.

(From now on, I will drive safely.)

++++++++++

That day, Nami Sakai (6) looked at the giant tree with tears in her eyes.

A blue balloon is stuck in a tree branch. It was in the hands of Nami just a few minutes ago, and in the hands of her beloved grandmother ten minutes ago.

Nami felt like a treasure when she received the blue balloon from her grandmother's wrinkled hand. She would take it home, about 10 minutes on foot, and she rushed to show it to her mother, but she accidentally fell off.

The balloon, which was detached from Nami's hand, floated in the sky and was blown away by the wind. She got trapped in a giant tree.

The giant tree has a height of about 10 meters. The blue balloon got caught near the top. Even if she asked the adults who passed by to take it, they just laughed and shook their heads.

Can't she get it again?

Every time she thought about it, she was filled with regret, sadness and guilt, and it turned into tears and appeared in Nami's eyes.

When the tears were about to break, Nami suddenly noticed something approaching from a distant road.

(Eh?)

In her childhood thoughts, Nami makes such a judgment.

In fact, in the distance it was like a colored wind. If she thinks it were there, it is way ahead. Nami stared at the blue breeze, which flowed without shaking her side, for a while, forgetting her sadness.

Suddenly…

With that wind, the eyes met.

The moment she thought that, he was already in front of her. When he stopped, the wind was not the wind, but a grown man with glasses. The skin is white like a woman and the facial features are beautifully groomed.

For some embarrassed reason, Nami looked down at her toes. The voice of a kind man spills over her.

"Do you have any problem?"

Nami looks at the man.

When she looked into the eyes behind the glasses, she felt like she was being sucked into the deep sky.

Nami opens her mouth to be fascinated.

"I cannot do it."

The man looks at the balloon at the point. Nami looked away and turned down. She was sure this person couldn't do it, and like everyone else, he would laugh and say "Give up", she felt such disappointment in her small chest.

But the man said in a nonsensical tone.

"Please wait a bit."

The man was already kicking the ground when she turned her face away.

He clings to the trunk of the huge tree and climbs up when he's ready. He deftly found the dents and bumps that could be called a steps, and in the blink of an eye he reached the top and took the blue balloon in his hand.

Nami was looking at the man who came down the same way, her mouth hanging open.

"Here it is."

Although he offered her the balloon, she was unable to receive it for a time. Then, finally picking it up, she asked with all her courage.

"Oni-chan... what?"

If you translate those boring words into something that makes more sense, it would mean something like "That move was out of the ordinary, who are you?"

The man accurately grasped the meaning of the question, smiled a little,

"I am an idol."

He responded like this.

Nami didn't really understand what an "idol" was. She blinks and look at the man. With a smile on his face, the man reached into his pocket and handed Nami a card.

"If you grow a little, come see us live."

The words "Promotion Scepter 4, President Reisi Munakata" were written there.

Of course, Nami can't read the card. She doesn’t even know about the existence of a business card. However, she thought the blue-tinted card was beautiful. Blue was Nami's favorite color.

Nami finally remembered what she should say to the man who gave her something nice and got back what she wanted back.

"Thank you."

"You are welcome. Well, I'm going."

The man bowed, turned blue again, and ran down the road.

Nami won't forget him forever.

++++++++++

An hour after the start of "Sprint Dream Live", the heat in the Tsubakimon Dome was visibly increasing. At the same time as the entrance began, a group of fans flowed into the audience seats like a flood, and they began to furnish the place with posters, posters and items with each of the recommended men drawn. At the same time, fans are excited about the upcoming festival and are looking at the stage with shining eyes.

To meet that expectation, a scene similar to a battlefield was unfolding in the backyard of the stage.

"The president has arrived at Shikaido Station! We will move on to Sequence B!"

"The target has been set at point B! We will wait until the president picks it up!"

In the temporary monitor room with the sign "Headquarters for the execution of the president's return plan", a part of the backyard, reports were constantly being raised.

The purpose of this headquarters is to fully support the return of Munakata. The staff involved are elite to make the "return plan" successful, from organizing and contacting various locations, managing the schedule, passing on traffic information and understanding Munakata's current position.

In one of the compounds in the panel, his current position is always displayed by the Munakata PDA tracking system. Awashima asks the staff while looking at them with a tight gaze.

"What is the progress of the plan?"

"It is 2 minutes and 15 seconds late, but it is within expectations. Currently, the Sequence C execution unit is moving. We will get to Point C on time."

"So…"

Awashima occupies a small area and looks at the monitor.

The plan is going well. At this rate, he can be in time for the opening ceremony, even if it's at the last minute. Unless something unexpected happens.

"Deputy Director Awashima."

Awashima looks around in a loose voice, rolling her shoulders.

Fushimi Saruhiko was as if he was leaning against the monitor room door.

He is the star idol of "Promotion Scepter 4", which is the center of the popular "Shoumutai" unit. Many fans were fascinated by the lonely atmosphere, and about 30% of the customers who packed the dome today are looking for him.

Awashima opens her mouth as she calmly looks at Fushimi.

"Fushimi. You should be in the final stages of doing a "Dream Corps."

"If the president is late, there won't be any 'Shoumutai', right?"

Awashima's beautiful eyebrows drew a dangerous angle.

“The plan is on the right track. You do not have to worry about that."

Fushimi laughs. It was an annoying laugh.

"Isn't there a countermeasure in case we run out of the star? Do you really think he can pull it off?"

"What do you mean?"

Fushimi casually pulled his hand out of his pocket and tossed what he was holding to Awashima. Awashima takes it deftly.

It is a recording medium in the form of a micro card.

"If you don't, I will. I made a new list of songs. If the president is late, I will."

Awashima's expression becomes more and more pronounced in a throwing tone. She squeezes the recording medium and she says quietly.

"Do you think I will receive this?"

"If you don't need it, you can throw it away. I can't bear to expose ourselves to that person's mistakes."

Awashima quickly waved her arm and threw the recording medium back.

"President…"

Fushimi deftly accepts that which came back like a bullet. Awashima, looking at the stagnant eyes behind the glasses as if shooting.

"I will not make any mistakes."

"Sorry."

Fushimi shrugged slightly and went back to his place. Looking back at Awashima over his neck.

"Well, tell me if you need it."

With that alone, Fushimi left the monitor room.

Awashima stared at the monitor room door for a while, staring into his eyes. It's like doing it is a protest against Fushimi.

It's not that she doesn’t understand what Fushimi is saying.

Believing is different from believing blindly. Fushimi's view that he assumes the worst and take countermeasures is entirely correct.

However, Awashima did not receive that song list. She refused to even see it and turned around.

She felt that receiving it would be a distrust of Munakata, who had confirmed that he would be on time.

"The president has reached point C! Collection complete!"

"We have started to move! The plan is going well!"

Awashima muttered unknowingly, listening to the reports that came in one after another.

"President, be careful."

Those words were like a prayer.

++++++++++

That day, Yuri Yamazaki (26) was vaguely in front of Shikaido station.

She works in a product store managed directly by "Promotion Scepter 4". It was supposed to be closed today due to the shift, but she got an urgent call from her boss about 5 minutes ago. She had no particular plan, and she was quick to get to this point because she was drawn to a pretty good vacation assignment.

Anyway, Yuri thinks.

It was a strange call. Being with the bicycle in front of the station instead of the store.

Apparently, they told her to lend the bike to someone, but they did not tell him who to lend it to and only told her the time of the meeting. It would be profitable to get a vacation allowance on this alone, but Yuri checks her cell phone while deeply thinking that she would complain if she was forced to do something else.

Seeing the displayed time, she sighed.

The "Sprint Dream Live Tour" will begin soon. Like most idol shop clerks, she is a fan of “Promotion Scepter 4.” She decided to work at an idol shop because she loved idols.

However, just because she is an employee doesn't mean there are benefits. Controls in that area are tight, and the clerk who secretly secured her own live ticket was sometimes ill. She must take the ticket herself, and if the lottery is lost, the schedule may disappear from the vacation she got, just like the current situation.

Two minutes have passed since the specified time.

"I wonder... if he's late, can I contact him?"

She doesn’t know, the murmur leaks out. After 5 minutes, she will contact the store manager. Thinking of that, she suddenly looked up.

And she doubts her eyes.

Someone was running from the street in front of the station, at tremendous speed. He easily overtook the next bike and came closer. Yuri instinctively tried to back away.

However, when she saw the man's face, she doubted her sanity.

"Ah, President?"

What she unwittingly said was the nickname of Reisi Munakata, the representative of "Promotion Scepter 4" and "Idol King". Naturally, it spread from the case where the idols under his command called him "President."

Faced with the stiff lily, Munakata strode over to a halt. He exhales a little and smiles at Yuri.

"Excuse me, are you a store clerk?"

"Eh, yes!"

Her voice shook. Feel the blood of her entire body concentrate on her face. The reason is that Yuri Yamazaki's favorite idol is Reisi Munakata.

Half in panic, she yells out the questions that come to mind.

"But why are you here?! What happened to the 'Sprint Dream Live Tour'?"

"I'm having a little problem and I've taken a different route than normal. Don't worry, I'll be in time for the opening."

She felt as if the blood that had risen through her head was coming down this time.

In other words, it is an emergency. Yuri was a fan and she knew how confusing it would be to be late for the opening ceremony. Perplexity, pain, disappointment. Just imagining being there, the pain felt like its own.

Yuri rushes up and says.

"Is there anything I can do?!"

“Lend me the bicycle. It's enough."

Yuri blushed again. If she thinks about it again, it was probably all part of the plan coming here. It is not a feat for the Munakata representative to give instructions to the directly administered office.

"Please..."

"Thank you."

Munakata straddled the bike without showing any pretense of noticing Yuri's tension. Somehow, it was an unattainable sight. The King of Idols, who can only be seen on TV or on stage, sits astride her bike.

"Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going."

"Oh, yeah!"

Yuri instinctively stopped Munakata who was trying to get out.

Munakata looks at Yuri with his foot on the pedal. She held her breath with a mysterious look.

("Please sign.")

She had to desperately suppress that desire that came to her mind. Hasn’t she just found out it's an emergency? There is no second chance. And yet, unable to say such a silly request, that embarrassment forced Yuri's awkward smile and false words.

"Please do your best. I support you!"

Munakata, however, was looking at Yuri's face with calm eyes that looked through all her smile and strength. Munakata laughed lightly at Yuri, who suddenly became flustered and reached into her pocket.

"What should I write?"

"Eh?"

"I have a pen, but I don't really have colored paper. It's not in good taste with a notepad."

Yuri blinked many times. The feeling of regret, even the time she was wandering and wondering why him could see through her desires made her stiff.

Yuri handed him the PDA she was holding in her outstretched hand to Munakata. With her voice asking "Is it okay here?", she was fascinated by the magically moving pen. She picked up the PDA again, looking at the Munakata signature written there, and it was like a soliloquy.

"Why...?"

"I am an idol."

Munakata's response, as well as their relationship, was open and frozen.

"Idols live up to the expectations of their fans. My job is to capture your expectations."

"......"

"Good luck then. Thank you for your continued support."

With a courteous greeting, Munakata pedaled off the road in no time.

Yuri holds her PDA to her chest while watching him back. She murmured in an emotional voice, promising to turn it into a relic, and she was about to buy a new one.

"President, I will follow you for the rest of my life!"

++++++++++

That day, Yojiro Sato (51) was driving his own high-speed boat and racing in Tokyo Bay.

His main business was fisherman, but he also works as a fishing boat captain as a side job. In any case, the main job is to chase the school of fish, current high-speed boats are used for that purpose.

But today's work was different than usual.

The client was a fishing cooperative and the content of the request was mysterious: "Anyway, I want you to go to Chiba city using a high speed boat." He goes through it several times, but it seems the reason he couldn't get the point was because the fishing cooperative was asked to go further.

Sato accepted it simply because the reward was great. Otherwise, it would not accept suspicious requests.

However, when he passed by the Tokyo Bay Aqualine, he began to regret it.

He doesn't think it's a dangerous story.

It goes without saying that Tokyo is one of the largest cities in the world and Tokyo Bay is a large adjacent port. Many are trying to carry out illegal transactions by sea. Unfortunately, he has heard stories of people involved in such problems at the level of rumors.

He's been through the fishing cooperative, so he doesn't think it's something to worry about.

Even so, a bit of anxiety washed over Sato's mind.

At that moment the radio sounded. When he reached out his hand and responded by reflex, he heard an unfamiliar voice on the back of the radio.

"Hello. Is this Mr. Yojiro Sato?"

It was a feminine and intelligent voice. Sato responds while confused.

"Oh, yeah. That's right."

"Nice to meet you, my name is Seri Awashima. I was the one who made the request."

"Oh, I see."

The confusion disappeared, but Sato pressed his face into place. Listen to Awashima's words, eager to decline the request in the event of an emergency.

"First of all, I apologize for reporting uncertain content to you in the application. I was in a hurry, so I thought about explaining after taking the first step."

"Okay, but what kind of job is this after all? It doesn't appear to be a fishing request."

"Yes. I want you to pick up a certain person."

When suspicion and vigilance increase, he raises his eyebrow. Sato asked in a low voice.

"Who is that? He is not a criminal, right?"

"What, criminal?"

From the other side of the meeting, he could feel the sign that Awashima was completely disappointed. The voice that echoed next seemed to lack a bit of calm, unlike before.

"Incorrect! The president is not involved in such things!"

"Oh, yeah."

At the angry response, Awashima coughed a little.

"No, sorry. It may be inevitable that it looks like this. I would like you to pick up Reisi Munakata, the representative idol of "Promotion Scepter 4"."

While driving, Sato is confused.

"Why do idols want to get on our ship?"

“As I said before, it is an urgent matter. He didn't seem to be in time for a regular water taxi, so I contacted you."

"Hmm... Well, it's okay."

Sato is not familiar with idols. He is simply not interested. From time to time he sees them on television, but to him they all have similar faces and clothes, so he cannot tell them apart.

That sect image is probably one of those idols. No wonder that is used instead of a taxi, but, work is work.

"So where should I pick him up?"

"Please wait a moment. I'll link the information on the president's location to that PDA."

"Eh?"

A second after the stupid voice leaked out, a spot of light lit up on the GPS map attached to the ship. Sato opens his mouth and looks at it moving at high speed on the map.

“Did you get the location? The point that lights up in blue is the current position of the president."

"Yes, I got it."

"Good. Get closer to the point of light. It also shows the next meeting points."

The GPS map reacts again and projects an orange spot of light. It shows a jetty near the beach park, that made Sato panic even more.

"Wait a minute! How did you do that? This is my PDA, right? Why can you operate it on that side?"

"There is no time to lose! I took emergency measures! Rest assured that we have formal permission to use the system!"

"What is that system?"

To Sato's confusion, Awashima doesn't reply. "More than that!" When he started yelling, the blue point of light on the map continued to flash.

“He is approaching the meeting point. Thanks for your cooperation. Awashima, over and out."

And the radio was unilaterally cut off, leaving only Sato who was confused.

The ship curves and begins to move parallel to the shore. Sato alternately compared the map and the coast. If this location is correct, Munakata will soon be in sight.

"Ah."

With that said, he opened his mouth. Someone was there. That's probably definitely Munakata.

From a distance, he can only tell that he is a man. It would have been indistinguishable on its own, but the appearance of a human who could ride a bicycle at a speed comparable to that of a high-speed boat fits this unusual situation perfectly.

"What should I do?"

Sato is a man of the sea. He is confident that he can handle most things that happen at sea. However, he had never imagined such a situation. Sato looked towards the beach while maintaining his speed.

At that moment, Munakata pointed forward.

Sato looks ahead so he can catch it. A jetty leading off the shore blocked the ship's path as it gently curved.

Reflecting a sailor, Sato curves the speedboat along the jetty.

Munakata's bike has picked up speed.

"Hey, it can't be!"

Unknowingly, Sato was screaming. Because he understood the man's thoughts. Because he understood the meaning of "meeting point" that Awashima said on the radio.

The bicycle races down the jetty at a speed that exceeds that of high-speed boats. Sato made the boat's engine run at full speed. It was not because he understood their speculations, but because he thought that, as a man of the sea, he would not be able to stand upright if he was driving a boat and losing to a bicycle.

The bicycle and the speed boat run next to each other for a very short distance.

For the first time, Sato saw Munakata's face.

Munakata was smiling with a clean face in front of him. It was not the expression of a human reaching such high speed on a bicycle. He was horrified. Perhaps this is a monster that seemed to drag him to the bottom of the sea. Even such an imagination took over his head.

Munakata's bicycle leaned over. At the end of the jetty, Sato's high-speed boat drew closer and Munakata jumped with the bicycle with only the spring from his body.

Sato opened his eyes and looked at the figure of Munakata leaping against the sun.

After a short break, Munakata's bicycle landed on the back of the high-speed boat, made a sharp turn, and came to a stop.

"Fu..."

With a sigh, Munakata wiped the sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief.

"......"

Sato was just looking at Munakata, who was behaving like a human, with his mouth open.

When he got out and parked at the bicycle rack, Munakata looked at Sato and said with a smile.

"Nice to meet you. Sato Yojiro-san. My name is Reisi Munakata. Thank you for your transportation to the planned location."

Swallowing hard, Sato asks suspiciously.

"You are a human?"

After opening his eyes somewhat surprisingly, he replied with a bitter smile.

"I'm just an idol."

++++++++++

At the Suzugaya sorting yard, Domyoji Andy (19) turned his pale face down and swallowed nausea.

He, who is scheduled to appear on "Sprint Dream Live Tour", is at that location because the Suzugaya courtyard is a helicopter landing site owned by "Scepter 4."

The event titled "Extreme Solo Part, Idol from Above 6500~", is Domyoji's assigned role this time. The event of strumming a guitar solo while skydiving from 2000 meters above the sky is sure to be a great thrill if it succeeds, but it can only be said that it is insane.

For today, Domyoji was repeating a special training every day. In total, it would have fallen enough to reach the surface from the stratosphere. Domyoji said that if he ran for Guinness, he would not pass, and gave a tired smile.

At that moment the door to the waiting room was opened and the staff entered.

"Domyoji-san, please prepare for take-off!"

"Eh?"

His eyes are round. Domyoji looks at the watch as it is. There is still some time left before the live begins. The turn of "Shoumutai", including Domyoji, was supposed to be in the second half of the opening ceremony.

"Is it still early? Was there an accident?"

Anyway, when he got up and left the room with the staff, Domyoji was so quiet. He doesn’t know what kind of problems are waiting in the live presentation. Not only staff but also idols need to take this into account and respond flexibly.

"There is no change to Domyoji-san's appearance time! We are going to pick up the president from now on!"

Domyoji opened his mouth. The staff didn't look back and pushed the door in front of them while walking quickly.

At the landing site, the helicopter was already preparing for takeoff. The high-speed rotating main rotor disperses a roar like a gunshot. Defeating the sound, Domyoji yelled at the back of the staff.

"What happened to the president? That person is surely the interpreter for the opening ceremony!"

“Currently, the president is crossing Tokyo Bay! We'll pick him up at sea and head straight to the Tsubakimon Dome!"

Domyoji is confused. He is crossing Tokyo Bay? He has no idea what the hell is going on. What he knows is that he is about to fly high again.

After sitting on the seat and fixing his body with a harness, Domyoji finally noticed.

"Hey! Don't I need it if I pick up the president?!"

"It's the president's judgment that it's a waste of time to go back every time! After leaving the president in the dome, Domyoji-san will wait in the sky until the time of the "Extreme solo part, Idol from above 6500~”!"

That was brilliant. Wait a minute, he try to tell if he would be flying all the time, but then his body was fixed. Jumping out the rear hatch, the staff gave Domyoji a big thumb up.

"Thank you good luck!"

The hatch closes as he continues. The sound of the rotor increases the pitch. Domyoji's stunned face disappeared into the darkness of the plane.

++++++++++

"The President has arrived at meeting point E! The pickup helicopter that was already waiting has started to approach!"

"Let go of the rope, the helicopter must be very careful!"

"Got it! Let go of the rope! Try to drive safely!"

Brilliant laughter erupted in the monitor room as the pilot made a joke. Private language during the operation should be strictly prohibited, but Awashima felt a slight smile on her lips. This would indicate their high morale. She doesn’t have to worry.

"President, I secured a rope! Start climbing."

"Domyoji, can't you point the CCD camera at the president?"

"Oh, yeah, I'll try."

Domyoji hastily responded to Awashima's voice. After a while, a rough image appears on one of the monitors.

Munakata was about to board the helicopter. Standing in the open hatch, he turns and pays him homage. A high speed boat floating ahead, probably Yojiro Sato, a man who appeared to be the captain took off his hat and waved it.

The expression of the image has been softened.

"President. Thank you for being safe."

On the CCD camera, he sees Munakata smiling.

“Thank you for your hard work, Awashima-kun. Did you worry?"

Awashima shakes her head slowly.

"I wasn't worried."

It was a lie. During these 30 minutes, Awashima has looked at the clock no less than 50 times. It's not because she doesn’t trust Munakata. It is probably due to the weakness of Awashima's heart.

Munakata's deep eyes can even see Awashima's inner heart. Still, she looked directly at her boss and reported on the situation.

"We are on time. If you move at full speed from the current location of the president, it will be enough to reach the inauguration. The president's suit has been brought to the room of the occupant of the helicopter."

"Okay. Let's finish all the preparations on the fly. Has the final landing point I submitted changed?"

"No, there are no changes. The helipad is already in control."

At that moment, one of the monitors lit up red and emitted a warning sound.

"What?"

"I will confirm it!"

Staff operate the console quickly. Awashima holds her breath and stares at the movement.

Finally, the staff raised a strained voice.

“There was a fire at the Tsubakimon Dome Hotel! Looks like an evacuation notice has been issued at the hotel!"

"No!"

“No recommendations have been issued for this place! Deputy Chief, what do we do?"

Impatience melts in her hand. Various thoughts come to mind instantly. How big is the fire? How to accept evacuees? Should the concert be canceled, even if no recommendations have been made? The enthusiasm of the people involved and the fans for this live show is extraordinary. But if something happens to the fans, it is irreparable.

An intelligent voice broke those thoughts.

"Awashima-kun. Confirm the evacuation of the hotel guests."

Raise her face. Beyond the CCD camera, Munakata's rough expression was as calm as if he were sitting at his usual office desk.

Awashima looks at the staff. The personnel turned to the front and quickly returned to operating the console.

Finally, he told the staff in a shocked voice.

"We share the confirmation of the status of the place, but the evacuation of the three guests has not been completed! It seems that we are reconfirming the people who have been in the air and have been evacuated!"

"Three people. That means they are…"

The CCD camera points in the other direction. Seeing that, Awashima took a breath.

Near the window on the smokeless floor. A man and a woman are crouched in a narrow space. The woman appeared to be holding a child.

"The number of people matches. Apparently, the evacuation was delayed."

Awashima looks at the image from the CCD camera. Imagine a tragic future for a family left behind at the scene of the fire and blood gushes from their faces.

And Munakata said of course.

"I am heading to the rescue."

Awashima knew that Munakata would say so. Knowing that, she still screams...

"President! Don't do it!"

Domyoji's camera captures Munakata's face. Munakata wasn't looking there. He murmured, looking serious at the scene of the fire, perhaps putting together another thought.

"Awashima-kun. About us?"

"Ah..."

The answer to that was fixed. Awashima squeezed her hand so tightly that her nails dug into her palm.

"We are... idols...!"

"What kind of person is an idol in "Promotion Scepter 4"?"

"Our goal is to be the ideal human who should be a role model for people."

Munakata looked at Awashima with a teacher's gaze, watching over the poor students who gave the correct answer.

"So that's it."

"Huh!"

Munakata goes to the scene of the fire. Although he is an idol, he is only a human. There is no guarantee that he will be able to return safely, so the worst consequences may await him in the future.

And, while looking at the worst, taking steps to prevent it from happening is also a condition of being an ideal human.

Awashima said that decisively when she took a little breath, exhaled and was ready to do it.

“We will contact the various parties involved in the handling of this incident and request assistance in rescue activities. I pray for your safety, President."

Behind the camera, Munakata nodded slightly.

Fushimi Saruhiko clicked his tongue as he leaned his back against the wall.

If Munakata's decision was stupid, Awashima, who followed him, could only be seen as a fool. He are an ideal person and he are trying to ruin his job by getting caught up in an additional idea. Fushimi's frank opinion is that, it is the role of rescuers to help the victims, and that is why they have to get rid of that work.

But he will never reveal it. At least not yet.

It only deals with possible situations.

Makes a call from his PDA. The other party came out with a ringing sound. Before they say something to him there, speak up.

“Akiyama, I got a job. Call the members of the 'Shoumutai'."

While saying that, Fushimi turned away from the wall and quickly headed to the end of the hall.

++++++++++

That day, Maki Arakawa (29) was visiting the Tsubakimon Dome hotel with her husband Takashi Arakawa (32) and their son Daichi Arakawa (0).

That day was Maki and Takashi's third wedding anniversary. The Dome Hotel was the place where Takashi proposed to Maki, and it was customary for the couple to visit this place on their anniversary every year.

With a new family member who is less than a year old, Maki and Takashi huddled together and wanted a night view from the living room. Takashi leans into the champagne and Maki leans into the non-alcoholic sparkling wine, looking at each other with a smile. In Maki's arms, Daichi, who had just fallen asleep, was giving a silent sigh.

A little compliment to a family that usually leads a modest life. Still, Maki was happy enough until the explosion happened.

The moment the explosion caught her, Maki was thrown to the ground with her husband.

When she woke up, her head was covered in black smoke.

"Daichi?"

The first thing that came to mind was the safety of her son. Looking down into her arms with a pale feeling, Daichi was still asleep. It was just a moment of relief, and he was soon filled with smoke-colored anxiety.

"What the hell?"

There was no way to answer that question. Her husband has wandered off a bit. He appears passed out, bleeding from his head. When she saw him, she was terrified that his heart would stop, but at least he seemed to be breathing.

Maki crawls closer to her husband, feeling pain glowing throughout her body. There seems to be a fire somewhere between the black smoke that comes in and the heat that burns the skin. That fact irritated Maki and made her reach out her hand.

"Get up."

The husband does not respond. Maki raised her face slightly and looked around her.

There is no one but them.

Is it after everyone has evacuated? Have they been left behind? Even if she gets lost, she does not know where to go and cannot leave her husband. It was decided that she cannot take him or her son on her own.

Fear and anxiety clench Maki's throat.

She takes the PDA out of her pocket and touches the emergency number. However, Maki herself wasn't sure how much it meant. The fear that surrounds her is getting stronger. Even if the rescue team is dispatched from now on, will they arrive in time?

"Yes, what happened?"

Communication has been opened. Maki squeezes the words out of her throat that moisten her body.

“Please help, please help. Please, please."

Unless this child is saved.

The moment he muttered a sentence-like word in a weak voice, a roar deafened Maki's ear.

A helicopter appeared outside the living room, behind a glass window.

A high-speed rotating rotor disperses a bombardment sound and the strong wind moves in the opposite direction. The helicopter tilted slightly and a sliding door pointed into the living room. Maki saw with wide eyes that a man with glasses was standing in the place that had already been opened.

It was not a rescue team. She knew it at a glance. After all, clothes are different. She had never heard of a rescue team dressed in such white, flowing clothing. It has beautiful bright colors and is like the clothes that idols wear.

The man with the glasses laughs smartly when he sees Maki. Then jump out the sliding door with a run.

"......"

Maki loses her words and watches over the elaborate suicide scene. From the PDA that fell to the ground, a Fire Service official said, "What happened? Please respond!" She heard a scream, but couldn't react. That was not the case.

The man crossed his arms, jumped high and rough, through the window, rolled across the living room floor, and landed brilliantly.

He balanced on his right foot, left knee, and right palm, and lifts his face to look at Maki.

Then he said with a smile.

"Hello."

"Ah, hello."

Barely responding, the man approached slowly, keeping low.

Behind him, there was a figure that jumped in the same way. He rolls on a glass covered floor, jumps and screams.

"Gak! The glass stabs me!"

“Domyoji-kun, continue with the preparations immediately. Be careful not to inhale smoke."

"Yes! President Munakata!"

When the man named Munakata approached Maki, he lifted his body, turned it forward, and began to wrap something.

"Oh, that...?"

“We will get away from this. Please hold your son firmly."

The soft voice in her ear soothed Maki's fear. She hugged her son tightly and, through her armpits, Munakata fixed a harness on Maki's body.

Munakata looks back and calls out to Domyoji, who is also wrapping the husband in a harness.

"Are you ready?"

"Well, somehow!"

Domyoji nods wrapping her weakly passed out husband around his body with a harness. When Munakata turned around, he turned his smart eyes towards Maki.

"Don't worry, I'll get you to safety immediately."

Somehow, however, she had an unpleasant sensation.

Maki looks out the window with her harness wrapped up. She sees the back of a helicopter that was going very far away. Maki asks, swallowing hard.

"Isn't that the one you ride?"

"Unfortunately, the emergency exit leading to the helipad is blocked by fire. Landing is difficult and jumping from here to the helicopter would not be possible with you in tow."

The question of what to do then did not need to be asked.

Munakata walks over to the broken window while tying Maki and Daichi to himself. The trampled piece of glass rings. A strong wind from the high sky blew and caressed Maki's cheeks forcefully.

The Tsubakimon Dome can be seen below. She wonders if he was doing some kind of live performance, and she could see the crowded seats even from such a high place.

Munakata looks at her calmly and has a soft voice.

"And we have less than five minutes to get started. This is the only way to get there on time."

She is not sure what you are talking about, but she understands what "this method" means. Maki looks towards Munakata with tears in her eyes.

"I'll ask you just in case, you've done it before, right?"

Munakata responds with a smile on his face.

"I read the manual."

Maki tried to resist, but her hands were empty and only scratched the air. Maki, who was shaking, saw that she could no longer understand the language, Munakata placed the sole of the shoe on the window frame.

Smooth to the end, Munakata says the last sentence.

"Ok, let's go."

"Hm..."

She can't say wait a minute.

Munakata was a man who executed words. A second after he said that, he had already jumped from a height of 100 meters above the ground with Maki and Daichi.

++++++++++

Basically the longer it takes to fall, the faster it will fall.

Its formula, commonly known as gravitational acceleration, is 9.8 m / s, and a rough calculation consumes a height of about 100 meters in less than 5 seconds. Knowing that, it's probably a bit more serious. She would have resisted.

Fortunately, the fear fainted her and it did not interfere with Munakata's work.

At the time of take-off, Munakata quickly opened the parachute. Munakata experienced a free fall for a time until the acceleration died due to air resistance.

At the sound of the wind, Munakata heard laughter.

Suddenly the baby was laughing in his arms. He wondered if he was enjoying the fall, and while hearing a laughing little voice, Munakata was laughing too.

"It's fun? It may be common for you."

The parent's "up and down" game and the current situation may not change much for this child. With that in mind, Munakata precisely operates the parachute.

Air resistance travels through the harness and squeezes Munakata's body. Munakata looked at the Tsubakimon Dome below, while reducing the burden on mother and child as much as possible. Already in his direction, the dome has been opened to reveal the stage.

"President, please respond. Let us know the current situation!"

Awashima's voice echoes from the device close to the ear. Munakata responds to that.

"This is Munakata. We are currently gliding about 70 meters from the earth's surface. We will proceed to land on stage."

In the center of the stage is a circle of bureaucracy, the end of today's sprint. There are 2 minutes and 47 seconds until the start. The image of landing, taking off the parachute, and entering the performance has already been created in Munakata's mind.

"No problem. Everything is fine. Awashima-kun, let's meet up on stage sleeve!"

At the image of Munakata, a sudden gust of wind disappeared.

"Yes!"

Before thinking of anything, Munakata had to devote all his energy to controlling his posture. The parachute, which was about to rotate like a cone, was operated with one hand like a hot kneading jumper, and in the worst case it prevented a free fall due to the disappearance of air resistance.

"President? What did you do?"

Awashima screamed at the anomaly.

"Well, it's not a big deal. I was exposed to the wind from the building and my posture was altered for a moment. The check was completed, but there is a problem."

"What kind of problem is it?"

“The current gust of wind has blown me off the field a lot. If nothing is done, we will land in the audience seats."

Awashima took a deep breath.

Due to the gust of wind, the chances of landing on stage were nil. A similar gust of wind might bring the whole picture back to the landing course, but it's like waiting for a miracle. It was the role of the believer, not the role of the idol, to hold onto heaven with prayer.

Munakata ponders as he spins in the air.

He cannot get off in the audience seats. No action can be taken that could compromise the safety of the public. Not only Munakata himself, but even the metal parachute hardware cannot be dropped on the heads of fans.

So there is only one way left.

"We will take a landing course outside of the dome. We won't be in time for the performance, but we can't help it."

Awashima squeezed out a rough voice.

"Come here."

Until now, Munakata has been racing to get to the performance on time and not disappoint the expectations of the fans. It is not unfortunate that the effort turns into a bubble.

However…

Munakata stroked the baby's hair, giggling happily at his mother's breast, with his fingertips.

"Don't be sorry. We are idols. Those who seek the best. But if that doesn't come true, we can choose the next best option."

"President..."

Awashima's voice has a bitter resignation.

But she was also an idol. Awashima starts working after dispelling it in an instant.

"I get it. Immediately, personnel will be sent to the outside of the cupola, and the president, the mother and the child will be immediately collected. Even if the delay is unavoidable, it should be as short as possible."

"Yes. Thank you."

A sudden voice interrupted Munakata who was about to approve the decision.

"It's not like that."

Munakata slightly opened his eyes.

He can't be wrong, it was the voice of Fushimi Saruhiko, the center of "Shoumutai".

"What are you doing?"

"Please be quiet, Assistant Principal. President, there is no need to change course. 2 minutes to start. If so, it is time to do so."

"What?"

"Akiyama, do it."

With Fushimi's command as the trigger, a sight of pure white spread under his eyes.

It was a huge cloth that completely covered the audience seats at the Tsubakimon Dome. The pure white fabric that glows under the light has a blue dyed stamp in the center. That's the emblem of “Promotion Scepter 4”, the flag of the idol that they should be proud of.

"Now you don't have to worry about landing in the audience. Please come down quickly. The stage is set!"

Watch the scene and listen to the words.

A powerful smile appeared on Munakata's mouth.

"I get it."

Then she slowly descends towards the emblem of his proud "Promotion Scepter 4".

++++++++++

"Huh... someone..."

In a park located outside the Tsubakimon Dome, Domyoji Andy was trapped in a tree and called for help with a weak voice.

The rescued person, tied in front, fainted slightly. After all, he never woke up during the drop or after the landing. He doesn't think there is any difference in life, but he wants to be rescued as soon as possible and taken to the hospital. It's about time Domyoji's shoulders scream from their weight.

"Oh, Domyoji-san! You were in a place like this!"

At that moment, a light illuminated Domyoji's face with a voice of salvation.

They were the staff of "Scepter 4." It looks like he was holding a ladder and looking around the dome. Domyoji mutters through tears when he sees them preparing for rescue.

"Hail me..."

Domyoji, who was saved several tens of seconds later, asked the staff with a deep sigh.

“No, what happened to the president? Did he do it on time?"

"Yes! It seems that with Fushimi-san's ingenuity, he was able to make it in time for the performance! It seems that he is performing well as of now!"

The staff deftly pulled out the PDA which projected a live image.

6:23 pm. The stage lights go out and the noise from the audience seats quickly subsides. For example, fans' expectations, enthusiasm and excitement increase.

The silence of passion, as if you could see it.

A suddenly glowing spotlight pierced the darkness.

In the center of the stage was a man crouched with one knee raised. He is dressed in a beautifully decorated suit and holds a microphone in his slim hands. There is not a single mistake or a single wrinkle in his clothes. The ideal idol is that person, the Idol King who was there.

Those in the audience, behind the television who are watching him, probably don't know how he got to that stage. Munakata must say that it is also the idol's responsibility not to report it.

As soon as the song started, Munakata looked up. A confident smile. An act that can be said to be solemn. Take a fixed turn and start singing.

Domyoji laughed impressively as he watched the fans' enthusiasm explode.

"I'm glad. He is on time."

"Yeah, I'm glad."

The staff laughs too. Only they know how many difficulties Munakata had to go through to be in that place. These difficulties have finally been overcome and the goal has come true.

"Well then, I'm ready too."

Domyoji says that, shaking his head. He also has a major role in the "Extreme solo part, Idol from Above 6500~". For that, he has to go back to heaven.

The staff stopped Domyoji's back.

"Domyoji-san, it's very difficult to tell... but Domyoji-san's part is gone."

"Eh?"

The staff scratched their heads at Domyoji, where their eyes became a point.

“It seems that it is impossible to take off on time because the helicopter has run out of fuel on the previous flight. Therefore, we will reproduce the PV of the album released next week as a replacement for the emergency. That was decided."

Domyoji froze and said...

"What is that? Has all my special training so far been for naught?"

Look at the facial expressions of the staff, quietly but surely.

"What is that? Aaaaaaaaaah!"

Domyoji's scream echoed around the outer edge of the dome.