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candidhoney · 6 years

Note

#4 because Blake and Sun grabbing a cup of tea just totally becomes a regular thing

I’ll be entirely honest, I thought of this too when I saw the prompt and already had some ideas running through my head. That being said, I think it wasn’t exact to the prompt, but I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it regardless xx

The way you said I love you [x] -

4. Over a cup of tea; blacksun

Word count: 1,154

“It seems like we’re making a habit of this, huh?”

The dark haired faunus smiled at his words, eyes kept steady on each porcelain cup before her as she gently tipped the kettle and filled them, one at a time. “I don’t know about you Sun, but I’ve always made a habit of drinking tea.”

Kali had always told her tea had been good for nervous stomachs, weary souls, tired limbs, and restless minds- all things that Blake had become all too acquainted with over the years. A cup of tea and a good book, and she would almost feel as though she were home again.

“It wasn’t my first choice when I was growing up in Vacuo, but I think it’s grown on me. And hey, the good company doesn’t hurt.” The cups were filled, kettle set neatly aside, and Sun gratefully took his serving when it was offered.

“Neither does the chance to rest.”

Though it was still fresh in their minds, time and distance had passed them by since the attack on Haven. And in that time, team RWBY had caught up and began to mend their weathered bonds. It seemed they’d all grown a lot since the tournament. And now, for the first time since the chaos, sitting in a familiar way with the company of the one who’d seen her at her worst, Blake felt content. It was like the first embrace of her mother when she’d gone home, but more subtle, more at ease. A home away from home.

The faunus girl took the steam into her lungs and brought the cup up to her lips. The tea went down smooth, leaving a coolness in its wake and a warmth in her core. The cup was held between both her hands, her gaze caught in the rippling reflection inside. “… I should thank you and Yang both for that.”

“For what?” Sun blinked. “We wouldn’t be here in Atlas if it weren’t for you either, you had as much a part in it as the rest of us.”

“No- uh, that’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?” Sun watched Blake with an amiably cocked brow, head tilted in a way that nearly let the messy golden strands fall into his eyes. His cup was held off to the side by his tail, idle, thoughtlessly. Blake had his attention.

And it was a funny thing, now with Blake getting that set expression like she was deep in thought amidst the plot of an engaging book, but there were no words in front of her; nothing but warm tea and the table space between them. She gathered her own, and spoke slowly again. “All of my teammates have shown me kindness that I couldn’t have ever imagined myself. But you and Yang have given me the kind I can’t repay.

“Yang talked me down when I was destroying myself trying to track down the White Fang. I couldn’t sleep, didn’t want to do anything but work towards stopping the violence.” Sun watched attentively as a small smile grew over Blake’s lips. “But she convinced me to take it easy, that it was okay to not always be preparing for a fight. If she hadn’t given me that talk, I never would have given the dance a chance.”

It seemed like so long ago- yet with the warmth of the tea radiating to her hands, Blake could almost feel Sun’s sturdy grip while they moved along Beacon’s hardwood floor, two parts moving as a whole. She could recall his smile, up to his eyes, when they got that dance. There really was something to tea and recollection, wasn’t there?

Sun remembered it as the surprise, the moment his entire night had turned around with those simple words- ‘I knew you’d look better with the tie.’ Dressing up wasn’t Sun’s favorite thing, but he’d do it a hundred times again if it meant one more night with Blake dancing with him. But they were here now, weren’t they? The silence of the pause that had encompassed them wasn’t uncomfortable. They both felt the nostalgia in the air.

It was such that when Blake spoke again, her voice came out quieter than before. “I ran away from everyone- twice since I started at beacon. I turned my back on my team, my school, and all my friends at beacon, out of fear. And both times, you were there for me, even when I didn’t want you to be.”

Maybe it was the tea, or the events of the months that had passed. Or maybe it was the reunion with the others from Beacon. But regardless, Blake seemed more open now, more vulnerable than Sun had seen her allow herself to be since their talk the day he came too after Ilia had wounded him. His cup was gently set aside with a gentle tap on the table without a thought.

“Sun… I didn’t think I could trust again the way I learned to trust you. And you’ve surprised me with your kindness each time- you’ve done more than I could ever thank you for, and I…” And now, after so many words had been spilled, Blake found herself at a loss for the right ones. Sun watched as her grip tightened around her cup and- gods, were her hands shaking?

I love you. The words were a lump in her throat that no amount of tea could wash down. She hadn’t realized she’d been so nervous until then, the warmth in her core turning to something dense, the subtle sweetness of peppermint turning dry on her pallet. “I’ve… never said it, but it’s meant a lot to me.” An unsteady breath. “You mean a lot to me.”

Sun could’ve swore that her nerves had been contagious with the blooming of butterflies in his stomach and flush in his cheeks, but he’d taken to it with a genuine smile. He bridged the distance between them with the soft but firm embrace of his hand over one of hers, steadying her as seemed to be his habit.

“You mean a lot to me too,” he reaffirmed, and when Blake lifted her gaze to meet his, she would be greeted again with a happiness that reached the blonde boy’s eyes. It was embarrassing and wonderful all at once, and the warmth shared between their hands was present in their cheeks. “I mean,” the blonde continued with a gentle laugh after a moment, “I did cross an ocean following you. I think that’s a pretty good sign that you’re important to me.”

“Not the first time you stowed away on a ship, Sun,” Blake reminded him with a more playful smile.

Sun conceded, shrugging his shoulders and lifting his cup again. His tone was light and airy, and his smile was comfortably warm. “Hey, but it turns out, your ship was much more exciting.”

First real contribution to the blacksun ship, huzzah!

Send me a ship and a number [x] and I’ll see what I can do!

#My writing #blacksun #wudonna #sunbella #sunxblake #blakexsun #any other combination that could translate to this ship wow #rwby #first time posting something of substance on here so hahahaha no im not nervous at allll #worth the nerves to contribute to this ship though i love it so much #and not that is matters but the tea is peppermint tea because peppermint tea is best tea #eclipse #my blurbs #my writing blurbs #my blacksun blurbs #mywritingblurbs #myblurbs #myblacksunblurbs

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mypoisonedvine · 3 years

Text

Love, Theoretically | Sebastian Stan x reader (chapter 10 - FINALE)

series masterlist

series summary: having lost your husband, sister, and best friend all to the same extramarital affair, you ran away to a secluded villa in the Hungarian countryside to write and get a little time away from the life you’d left behind. you were only looking for peace and perhaps some inspiration for your novel, but instead you found an unlikely connection with the immigrant repairman– even though the two of you don’t speak the same language.

word count: 6k

warnings: implied smut, angst, fluff, romcom tropes, lots of swearing, pregnancy mention/minor breeding kink

note: click the asterisk for a hyperlink to a translation when the time comes

Six months later...

“It’s good!” she beamed, setting down the last chunk of pages and taking off her reading glasses. “Oh man, that ending hurt, but it’s really, really good!”

You leaned back into the plush chair and sighed with relief. “You think so?”

“It’s best-seller material,” she assured. “With some editing, of course. God, I can’t believe you were sitting on this for so long.”

“What are the biggest changes you want to make?” you asked.

“Well, I’m thinking we’ll cut the romantic subplot,” she mentioned in passing, like it was no big deal. “It’s distracting.

“Distracing?” you repeated. “Nia, it’s the story. It’s a romance.”

“I thought it was a thriller,” she frowned.

“A romance disguised as a thriller,” you corrected.

“Listen, I get what you mean, but I didn’t get this—” she tapped the nameplate on her desk: ‘NIA BROWN, HEAD PUBLISHER’ in shiny letters— “for nothing. I know what I’m talking about, and I know what your readers want. Violence, gore, drama!”

“It has all that!” you defended. “But it’s all there to talk about the real love he finds in her!”

“What do you mean ‘real love’?” she pressed flatly.

“I mean…” you pondered. “I mean love where you feel like a version of yourself that you actually like. Love where you feel unjudged, no precedents or caveats or back-up plans. Love that fucking hurts because you never wanted to rely on anything or anybody. Love that lives in silence because you don’t even need words.”

She furrowed her brow. “That… sounds nice, I guess, but I don’t think anybody really has that. Everybody needs a back-up plan. Everybody needs words— a writer should know that.”

“Oh my god. Oh my god,” you groaned, your face falling into your hands. “I’m so fucking stupid. Jesus Christ, I’m a moron.”

“What? What’s going on?”

“I had that! I had that, and I let it go! I’m the dumbest bitch on the fucking face of the Earth.”

“Don’t say that,” she soothed, but you were already standing up.

“No, I need to find him,” you decided as you grabbed your coat and briefcase. “I need to go back and try to fix this. I love him, I’ve never— I didn’t know I could love like that, I didn’t know I could be loved like that… oh my god, I need to find him. It isn’t over.”

“It isn’t over?” she repeated incredulously. “You said Michael signed the papers!”

“It’s not Michael,” you rolled your eyes as you stormed out of the office. “It was never Michael.”

You ran into the first telephone box you could find, slamming the door shut as you searched your purse for the business card that probably wasn't even in there.

After a moment, you gasped with delight when you pulled it from a very bottom pocket and began punching in the number as fast as possible with shivering hands, long-distance charges be damned.

“Hello?” the confused voice on the other end answered.

“Mrs. Alberti, hi— does Sebastian still work for you?” you asked hastily.

“No, dear," she sighed, apparently recognizing you by just your voice (and likely your request), "he quit recently, and moved away.”

“Moved?" you repeated with a wrinkled brow. "Where?!”

“I assume back home, sweetheart; to Bucharest.”

“Shit,” you sighed. “Shit!”

“Are you having your ‘run through the airport’ moment, sweetheart?” she realized.

“Yes, I think so— do you have his address?”

“Well, no, but I’ll see what I can find.”

You waited rather impatiently as she shuffled through papers in the background, mumbling to herself as she apparently searched for information that could help you.

“All I’ve got is the address of a previous employer… a carpenter,” she finally explained, breaking the silence. “It was his only reference when he came to work here," she explained.

"Wow, you really did just hire him for his looks," you blurted out.

"He was desperate for work, that boy had nowhere else to go,” she defended.

“Right, well, I guess if that’s my only lead then I’ve gotta go for it,” you decided. “Thank you, Mrs. Alberti.”

“I told you to call me when that book was a hit. Did it happen yet?” she piped up.

“It’s not published yet,” you explained. “It needs some more work… but I think it’s almost ready.”

“I think so, too, dear.”

Learn Romanian in 10 Weeks! A practical language guide.

Week 1, Day 1: Greetings

Hello Salut

Goodbye La revedere

Thank you Mulțumesc

You’re welcome Cu plăcere

Good morning Bună dimineata

Good afternoon Bună ziua

Good evening Bună seara

Good night Noapte bună

You brushed your hair back out of your face with a sigh, turning the page as you mumbled the phrases to yourself. Broken Hungarian and your high school education in Latin were not getting you as far with this as you had been hoping.

How are you? Ce mai faci

I love you Te iubesc

“Te iubesc, te iubesc, te iubesc,” you repeated over and over in a whisper.

Each day you had a new routine: practice Romanian for an hour, check flight prices online (or call the airline), research what you knew about Sebastian and the address Mrs. Alberti had given you, and then get back to practicing Romanian again.

Oh, and occasionally you worked on the edits Nia wanted for your manuscript. You were focusing on the minor changes— grammar errors, rearranging sentences— and putting off her big request for the removal and replacement of the romantic aspects. More than ever, they seemed like the most important thing the book had to offer.

You had a small apartment, just a place to sleep and shower really; much too small to fit everything you’d already taken from Michael’s house (you know, the one that used to be your house) along with what he’d shipped to you that you forgot before. He included a letter in the package as well. You threw it out, unopened.

Truthfully, you never really fully unpacked. As much as you realized you probably should, in order to really feel like you had a real home, you couldn’t bring yourself to empty your suitcases when you knew you’d be packing them again any day now.

You also realized how outrageous this all was. Ignoring the unlikelihood of even finding him in the first place, Sebastian probably wouldn’t want anything to do with you after you broke his heart, left, and then randomly tracked him down after over half a year. But to be totally transparent, you weren’t really doing this to get him back, necessarily. You knew that was probably never going to happen. You were doing this because you needed to try. You needed to go there, and get hurt, and come back knowing you did everything you could: you’d never be able to live with yourself if you did anything less than that.

You couldn’t start your new life until you had put everything else to bed. And if that meant being 100%, painfully certain that you and Sebastian could never be together, then that was just how it needed to be.

After two weeks of looking, there still weren’t any reasonable flights to Bucharest, so you booked another trip by train, figuring you could use the three day trip to brush up on the key Romanian phrases you were going to need as well as prepare your speech.

Yes, your plan was a speech. You didn’t have a back-up plan. You didn’t even have a return ticket back to London yet.

A passage by Yeats came to mind; But I, being poor, have only my dreams. I have spread my dreams under your feet. Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams.

In all your life, you’d never understood before why someone would want to only have their dreams. But now, here you were… and yes, it felt terrifying and vulnerable and uncomfortably naked, but it felt pretty damn good, too.

With a sigh, you scribbled out the last sentence you’d written, tossing the trash paper aside. You looked up out the window at the scenery flying by in a blur, worried that if you didn’t look out from the train every once in a while you’d get motion sickness.

The sun was beginning to set already, the green of hills and trees tinted orange. You only indulged in it for a moment, though, before getting back to this god-forsaken speech you were deadset on finishing before you arrived in Bucharest tomorrow. At first, you’d figured the translating would be the most difficult part… but writing in English wasn’t exactly a piece of cake, either. You had so much to say, and suddenly so few words for any of it.

You’d probably done more editing on this than any of your novels combined; the crumpled up pages spilling out of your wastebasket were proof enough of that.

“And I’m a fucking writer!” you groaned aloud, to no one in particular. “How is anybody else supposed to be able to do this, if I can’t?”

Other people aren’t as emotionally constipated as you, the voice of your inner critic reminded you plainly, making you roll your eyes at yourself.

A rap at your door made you sit up straighter and turn around. A stewardess slid open the frosted glass slightly to give you a friendly smile. “Is everything alright, ma’am?”

Your brows furrowed at the sound of her accent. “Is that a Romanian accent?” you asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” she nodded.

“So you’re fluent in Romanian and English,” you concluded.

“And Portuguese, yes ma’am,” she agreed.

“Could you come in here for a moment and help me translate something?”

She seemed slightly confused at the request but stepped forward, sliding the door most of the way shut behind her. Leaning beside you on the desk, she picked up your handwritten letter and blinked her wide, brown eyes a few times. You felt slightly embarrassed knowing she was reading such intimate thoughts, but that was how it felt the first time someone read anything you wrote so you were pretty much used to it by now.

“I usually ask the passengers what brings them to Bucharest,” she mumbled after a moment. “This is the most interesting thing so far. Am I reading this correctly, that you intend to confess your love to someone you met—” she scanned the page quickly— “during a vacation in Hungary?”

“Yup,” you smiled awkwardly, popping the ‘p’ at the end of the word.

“And he doesn’t speak English?” she assumed; you nodded. “And… you don’t speak Romanian?”

You nodded again, and she breathed in and out quickly, sitting beside you as she stared at the letter.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” she explained.

“Sorry for sucking you into the entropic vortex that is my life,” you chuckled.

“I don’t mean to pry,” she sighed, setting the letter down, and you laughed a little internally at the idea that she was worried about prying when she just read the most personal piece of writing you’d ever put to the page, “but do you think this is… enough? I mean, to build a relationship on?”

You just gave her a shrug. “I have no idea. But, you know, I spent my whole life worrying about stuff like that. I dated my husband for seven years before we got married, because I wanted to be sure. I was initially interested in him because he was successful and ambitious, and it made me feel like this was a really secure relationship that I could rely on. I double majored in English and Computer Science because I wanted a more stable career to fall back on in case being a writer didn’t work out, and even though it did, I’ve spent most of my career publishing what I thought people wanted to read instead of what I wanted to write, so I’d have a better shot at a good paycheck. I grew up thinking the best thing I could ever have was security. And now I’m divorced, watching my royalties shrink every month, more insecure in every way than I’ve ever been, and I’m realizing that the choices I made didn’t give me what I wanted. I gave up so much in the name of safety, and I let the one good thing I’d ever found go, so I could go back to being the same person I always was. I’m ready to settle again, if this doesn’t work… I’m ready to accept that this is just the way life goes, and be thankful that I got a taste of the kind of stuff I thought only existed in the sort of books I’d read but never write.”

She swallowed as she looked at you, and you felt your eyes water as you stared out the window towards the dimming scenery one more time, smiling at the sight of a distant village, a church with a steeple, vineyards and farms. Someone’s whole life is in that little town, you imagined, and they’re just watching your train go by like they see every other day.

“Sebastian gave me more security than I’d ever had before, even though the whole thing was such a ridiculous little whirlwind, and nothing like I ever imagined my life could be. But he made me want to be honest and raw and write sappy letters like the one you just read. He doesn’t have any money, at least as far as I know, and I haven’t known him for seven years, and on paper it makes no sense… but you would understand if you knew him. If you felt that joy that he radiates, if you saw him live his simple little life like it’s the best thing in the world. You would understand if you knew how much I needed this. You would understand if you had been just as miserable being who I’ve been for so long, and finally had a chance to be somebody you think you were maybe meant to be the whole time. So, if I never see him again, I hope I just get to thank him.”

You waited for her to say something, but furrowed your brow at the long moment of silence, looking back from the window finally and finding her staring at you with a tear running down her cheek. When you met her gaze, she quickly wiped it away with a sniffle and looked down at your desk again. “Let’s get to translating, shall we?” she announced with a half-smile.

You noticed the way the other passengers looked at you as everyone was in line to deboard from the train car; you stuck out like a sore thumb, since everybody else was carrying heavy luggage and all you had was a backpack.

In your defense, you really had no idea how to pack for a trip where you knew neither the duration nor the true final destination. So, it was mainly filled with your essentials, a few clothes for any kind of weather, and enough leu to buy anything else you needed along the way.

The stewardess was waving goodbye to everyone as they shuffled out into the train station, occasionally stopping to shake a hand or give directions to nearby destinations. When you were just about to pass by, though, she pulled you into a tight hug.

“Good luck,” she whispered, holding you just a moment too long before pulling back and giving you an encouraging look. “If he doesn’t take you back, feel free to blame my translation… because if he knows what’s in your heart, I know he’ll say yes.”

“Yeah, that’s the hard part isn’t it?” you laughed weakly. “Thank you for your help. I guess if I come back alone for the return trip tonight, you’ll know how bad it went.”

“Then I hope I don’t see you again,” she winked.

It being a major train station and all, cabs were waiting around every corner so it was pretty easy to grab one and give them the address you already had written down for this exact purpose.

“This is pretty far,” the driver explained, “on the edge of town. Not a tourist spot.”

“Good, because I’m not a tourist,” you nodded, already only giving him half your attention as you pulled out the translated speech to practice.

“And you can afford this?” he pressed. You sighed and dug through your bag, pulling out a haphazard stack of bills and handing them through the plastic partition.

“Is this enough?” you asked, and he didn’t answer, just taking the money and starting the car as you smiled and leaned back in your seat.

As much as you had tried to convince yourself to not get your hopes up, the butterflies in your stomach felt more like whole birds at this point, demanding to break free as you practiced the words hand-written on the page over and over again, committing it all to memory.

“What are you reading?” the cab driver asked after several minutes.

“Oh, nothing,” you mumbled, “sorry if I’m bothering you, you can turn on the radio.”

“No, it’s not bothering me, but what you are saying… it’s very odd. It sounds like something from a play, or movie,” he explained.

“Um, it’s not,” you replied, a little embarrassed. “But does it sound like it’s from a good movie? Like, if you heard a character say this to another character, would you think they should get together?”

“I… don’t know,” he answered, sounding confused. “I mean, it depends on what happened, right? How they met, how well they get along…”

So, you told him the whole story, as succinctly as possible (which is not very succinct at all). By the end, he was actually giving commentary as you spoke.

“Why the hell did you leave?” he interjected, clearly irritated with you. “You loved him!”

“Yeah, well, sometimes love isn’t enough! I loved my husband too, and look how that turned out,” you defended.

“But that’s different. That was love for all the wrong reasons.”

“I promise, it felt very real at the time,” you shrugged.

“And now?” he countered. “You realize that this man— Sebastian, right?— is real.”

“I hope I’m right this time,” you offered. “But even if I am, he may not agree.”

The driver scoffed, taking a hand off the wheel to wave dismissively. “If he’s anything like you said, then he will still be completely in love with you. After all, you still feel the same way after all this time apart, don’t you?”

“If anything, I love him more every day,” you admitted, your heart beating quickly just to say it aloud.

“You know, when I met my wife, she was engaged to another man. He was rich, good-looking, and he wasn’t even a bad guy unlike this husband you describe. He was a good man, but he wasn’t right for her. They were… content together, but she wasn’t truly happy. Every night I would come to her window and beg her to marry me, because I knew that she knew we were meant for each other, but she was scared because her family wouldn’t approve and she would be a poor man’s wife.”

“How did you convince her to marry you instead?” you asked eagerly, sucked into the story already.

“I didn’t. On the day of the wedding, some people told me to go and break it up but I didn’t. I thought it would be wrong, to try to ruin her happiness and take it for myself by making a scene at the wedding. I realized she was her own woman and if she wanted to choose him, I had to let her. I had locked myself in my house, not wanting to see anyone that day, and she appeared at my door. I didn’t need to convince her because she knew the truth in her heart, and called off the wedding herself.”

“Wow,” you smiled.

“She was still in her dress!” he recalled with a hearty laugh. “She looked like an angel. We were married just a few days later. And next month will be thirty years,” he added as he lifted his left hand to show the golden band on his finger.

“Thirty years, that’s… a long time,” you sighed.

“It wasn’t always easy,” he admitted. “But it was always worth it.”

Just as you wondered what you could possibly say to that, you felt the car slow down to a stop.

“This is the address you gave me, this is it,” he explained, pointing out his passenger-side window. You leaned up against the glass and gasped in dawning fear as you saw the storefront dark and empty inside.

“No, nonono,” you whispered rapidly to yourself as you swung open the door and hopped out, pressing your face against the glass to try to get a look inside and finding what was undeniably a closed carpentry business. There was a note on the door, taped on the inside of the glass, and you knew enough Romanian to know it said something about a vacation and three months.

“Shit!” you yelped, holding your face in your hands, wondering if your journey had come to an end before it really began.

“Are you alright?” the driver asked, rolling down his window to speak to you.

“This was my only lead, I don’t have his real address,” you explained. “He used to work here, I thought maybe someone would know him…”

He sighed, giving you a sympathetic look. “Get back in, we can search nearby. You came too far to give in yet.”

But getting back in the car felt like giving in, too, which you realized as you looked back at the note taped to the carpenter's door. This was the closest you'd gotten, and it felt wasteful to leave with nothing.

Just as you were ready to hop in the passenger seat and start searching aimlessly through suburban Bucharest, or maybe look around for a Romanian yellow pages, you heard a noise from behind you, across the street; a laugh. His laugh. But it couldn’t be because it was too good to be true… and yet you found yourself whipping your head around and hoping beyond all reason that it was Sebastian.

Across the street was a restaurant, with a large patio where patrons were dining and chatting as they sat at wrought iron tables, and your eyes searched the crowd for any signs of him.

And then your gaze landed on a head of thick brunette hair, red and gold highlights so obvious now when the sunlight hit it this way. Broad shoulders wrapped in a white button-up shirt. He was facing away from you but he was looking to the side so you could see his face; he was smiling, laughing at something someone had said. And it was his smile that you recognized; it was like everything else faded away, and in that moment you thought maybe you could almost be happy with just this, just seeing him be happy even if it had nothing to do with you.

“Sebastian,” you called out to him, but he didn’t react. “Sebastian!”

His whole body turned, his eyes met yours, and you couldn't help but let the tears well in your eyes as you ran across the road to him.

He looked, understandably, stunned, and you realized he was actually waiting on a table at the moment; he said something to them, apparently excusing himself, and stepped closer to you.

But he stopped walking, not coming any closer, not exactly dragging you into his arms like you might've preferred, but with a breath to try to soothe your racing mind, you summoned your memories of the practiced letter and began. *

“Când am venit în Ungaria…” you started slowly, doing your best to remember the words and hoping your pronunciation wasn’t too awful, “nu căutam dragoste. Căutam spațiu, claritate și poate o idee de carte de un milion de dolari. În schimb, am găsit tot ce am căutat toată viața mea…”

You did your best to bite back tears, especially when his expression was nearly unreadable and you had no idea how well this was going.

“Ești tu, Sebastian, bineînțeles că ești tu,” you sighed, laughing slightly. “Ai fost acolo pentru mine când nici nu știam ce vreau de la nimeni. Ai fost prietenul meu fără să spui vreodată un cuvânt - cel puțin nu un cuvânt pe care l-am înțeles. M-ai iubit și nu știam ce să fac cu asta, pentru că uitasem cu mult timp în urmă cum se simțea să fii iubit. Și ce simțeai să iubești cu adevărat pe cineva. Dar te iubesc. Și am fost prost să te las să pleci, atât de neconceput de prost. Vreau să fim noi, Sebastian. Lasă-mă să te iubesc, mai dă-mi o șansă și îți promit că nu te voi mai lăsa să pleci niciodată.

The first thing he said was your name, and just the way he said it made you fall in love with him all over again.

“I… I dream that you would come back,” he shakily replied. “But now I cannot believe. You are my dream.”

Tears were openly flowing at this point and you wanted to run into his arms, but you tried to stay calm and hear him out. He stepped closer, almost hesitant, like you would run away if he got too close too fast.

“I love you, very much that I am sure I am insane person,” he explained with a grin, and you giggled. “We will live anywhere, do anything you would like— be my wife.”

You gasped as he pulled you into him, gripping your arms tightly as his desperation became apparent.

“Marry me?” he asked softly.

“Da,” you nodded, “yes, of course, anything—”

He kissed you suddenly, but gently, and it said more than any words in any language could.

It was a small wedding, in the Hungarian countryside by the lake. You could remember diving into that lake for lost pages of your manuscript; you could remember looking out over the water and dreaming of this moment you were living right now, thinking it was impossible.

He didn’t have much family, but they welcomed you with open arms.

Your family, well, they were too busy with planning another wedding, for your ex-husband and your ex-sister. A few of them sent cards but the rest were suspiciously quiet. You honestly didn’t even notice… you had a new family to attend to, anyhow. And it wasn’t like you didn’t have any guests, since you were able to track down and invite a stewardess named Maria, and a cab driver named Andrei and his wife, Paola.

Sebastian’s cousins weaved flowers into your hair and his grandmother tailored her dress to fit you like a glove. A picture of his parents was hung nearby in tribute; he told you they would’ve wanted to see him get married but that he felt, in some way, they were able to even if they had passed away quite some time ago.

You realized you’d never seen him in anything even mildly formal before; in fact, the suit he wore was rather casual, all things considered, but he looked so painfully cute in it. Sometimes you thought he actually looked a bit out of place wearing a shirt, though, especially one that was buttoned up all the way.

Luckily, the shirt was halfway unbuttoned about ten minutes into the reception.

Mrs. Alberti cooked a massive dinner for everyone, and even grew the flowers that you carried down the cobblestone aisle.

And wow, can Romanians drink. You had to be careful not to try to keep up with them, because if you had you would’ve been blacked out halfway into the night and the last thing you wanted was to forget even a moment of this.

As the night started to wind down to a close, you and your new husband retired to the lakehouse, running up the stairs and finding them as creaky as always.

He wrapped his arms around you in the hall and kissed you eagerly as you stumbled back into the bedroom, tripping over the doorway and falling onto the bed together.

It felt so right to have his weight on top of you, to feel his smile against your lips, to wrap your arms around his neck.

“This room,” he mumbled into the kiss. “Do you remember first time?”

“Yes,” you nodded, “da, I remember, how could I forget?”

He grinned and moved his lips down to your neck. "I thought of you every day… I love you,” he whispered.

“Te iubesc,” you whispered back.

It was almost like the first time in so many ways: passionate, yet oddly hesitant as you rediscovered each other. It was comfortable, though… you couldn’t think of any other person you felt so comfortable with, somebody who finally got you out of your own head and who made you want to experience everything life had to offer.

You were sure you’d never gone so long without worrying about something in all your life.

“My wife,” he whispered against your skin. “This is all I had wanted… from seeing you in very beginning.”

“You’re all I ever wanted,” you sighed in return, “ești tot ce mi-am dorit vreodată, Sebastian.”

Life with Sebastian was beautifully simple. You spent most of the day writing, usually, while he built furniture to sell and occasionally gardened with his spare time. You could always tell how busy you’d been with a new novel lately by how perfectly groomed the hydrangea bushes were.

You’d told him once that you’d come to Hungary looking for a million-dollar book idea. A Killer in Disguise performed alright, but not anywhere near that. The Language of Love, on the other hand, was definitely a million-dollar idea… about eleven times over. Sebastian didn’t seem to worry too much about how much money you made, though; he was just proud to say that he was the inspiration for your hit novel. You secretly suspected that he was more proud of your work reaching enough international notoriety to be translated into Romanian.

His English still needed some work, but you found it endearing. He was determined to get better and spent at least a half-hour each day practicing, but you hoped he wouldn’t get too perfect because you would miss the silly little mistakes he made. At least you could be sure he’d keep the accent forever… damn, that accent; and he knew exactly what it did to you, too.

In fact, you were crossing through the hall in your robe one evening when your husband’s voice stopped you.

“Darling wife,” you heard Sebastian call from the bedroom in a playful sing-song.

“What is it, Seba?” you asked with a smirk.

“Come in here, please…”

You opened the bedroom door to find most of the room covered in rose petals: most of all the bed, which was surrounded by candles, and topped with a shirtless (as per usual) Sebastian, laid on his side seductively with a long-stemmed rose (one you recognized from his very own garden) between his teeth.

“What are you doing?” you laughed. “Is this some sort of special occasion I’ve forgotten?”

You were already searching your mind for what it could be, but your two-year anniversary had passed a few months ago already and since it was spring it couldn’t be the anniversary of when you first met since that was late in the summer.

“Iss not quite a thpecial occathion yeth,” he answered before taking the rose from his mouth so he actually made sense. “I was considering it could be a special occasion, when we’re done…”

You smirked and climbed over the candles and into bed with him, taking the opportunity to run your hands over his chest. “And what occasion would that be?”

“A year from now, it could be the anniversary of when our child was conceived,” he answered.

Your breath caught in your throat, your voice reduced to a whisper of surprise. “Seba—”

“If you’re not ready, I will be understand,” he instantly added, stern yet soft. “Only if you want this, I just thought that maybe—”

You silenced him with a kiss, lacing your fingers into his hair and letting him roll you onto your back. He pulled back just enough to let you answer, but your noses were still bumping into each other and you smiled.

“I’m ready, Sebastian. More than ready,” you whispered.

He grinned and kissed you again, deeper and slower as he held your face with one hand and gripped your waist with the other. As his lips trailed down to your neck, you were interrupted with one pressing thought.

“Can I ask you something?”

He popped up and looked down at you with a smile. “Sure!”

“Why are you wearing ratty old jeans?” you laughed.

“Hey, these worked on you the first time,” he defended.

You gasped. “You don’t mean those are the jeans—”

“Yes,” he nodded, “the jeans that I had been wearing when I was working on Mrs. Alberti’s cottage. And, truly, when I was finding an excuse to work outside your window.”

“Wait,” you sat up, “did you actually work outside my window on purpose?”

He laughed, hanging his head quickly before looking back at you again with a sparkle in his eye. “You are very smart, my love, except for those times when you are— how do you say? Oblivious.”

You chuckled, unfortunately very aware that he was right.

“Didn’t you ever wonder why I was building a window frame, nearly a dozen metres away from the window it was for?”

You thought for a moment before dropping your face into your hands and laughing. “No, I didn’t notice that. I was too busy giving you a thorough eye-fuck,” you recalled.

“Yes, because I was not wearing a shirt and this distracted you,” he pondered, sounding suddenly like a scientist explaining a theorem or something. “See, that’s the beauty of wearing the jeans and no shirt. The body distracts you while the jeans seduce you.”

“How about you take the jeans off and put that body on me, capisce?” you pleaded; not that you didn’t love his humor or anything, but maybe his funny bone wasn’t exactly the bone you were interested in at the moment.

He grinned devilishly and suddenly pulled your legs apart, settling his body between them as he kissed your neck again, nipping at your jawline and ear. “You’re being impatient, dragă,” he purred. “You want to have my baby that badly?”

You whined involuntarily, arching your back as his hands roamed your body and finally began to untie your robe and push the silk out of the way. “Yes, Sebastian, please—”

“Let’s just say, theoretically, I wanted to have more than one? Would you have another of my children?” he asked softly as he reached up and palmed at your breasts, teasing your nipples which were already much too hard and sensitive for how little he’d touched you. The rough denim rubbing against the inside of your thighs was oddly arousing— maybe it was the sensation itself, or maybe it was just that this was almost like the first thing you imagined when you saw Sebastian all those years ago.

“Yes,” you moaned out your answer, “yes, you know I’d do anything for you.”

“What if I wanted a big family?” he pressed. “Really big? Like, Catholic big?”

“We can have our own fuckin’ Brady Bunch, Seb, I just need you right now,” you begged, grabbing the back of his neck and pulling him into a hot and desperate kiss.

He decided to wait until afterwards to ask what a ‘Brady Bunch’ was. You decided to wait until afterwards to ask when he’d learned how to use the word ‘theoretically’.

sfarsit; the end

#sebastian stan x reader

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starr-fall-knight-rise · 4 years

Text

HASO, “Dye and Diversity.”

Hope you guys enjoy the story today

Yeb stared.

She tilted her head this way and then that, and then continued to stare on the other side.

A soft sigh, “My eyes are up here.”

Yeb looked up to where the human was staring at her ascance his head slightly tilted.

“What?”

“Sorry dumb joke.”

He pulled to a stop, and the strange wheeled chair below him pulled to a halt.

She stared some more, “That is so strange! It looks so fun!”

Her interjection seemed to surprise him, and he glanced down at the chair, “Um, I suppose I’ve never thought about it. It’s kinda fun sometimes. I don’t use it much.”

Yeb waddled behind the chair and clambered up on two little pegs she saw jutting out from behind, “Why not?”

“Well usually I can walk, and it is generally frowned upon to use a wheelchair if you don’t need one.”

Yeb felt a rush of wind as he pushed the chair forward, and they began to roll slowly down the ramp, “Well why not?”

He laughed and shook his head, his earlier sour demeanor lost behind grim amusement. A few of the others came to join them as they rolled downward and off the platform. Yeb lifted her eyes wide-eyed in shock as she stared at her strange and unusual surroundings, and the massive interior docking bay of the space station…. To think! An entire city built in space! Looking around she could see ships of many sizes and designs, and other unfathomable and strange creatures hurrying this way and that.

A thought came to her, “Why aren’t you using the arm sticks?”

“Arm sticks…. Oh the crutches?”

“Yeah.”

“My arms are sore from using them, and plus the wheelchair seems safer on the station. I'll Be less likely to trip and get hurt.”

“Oh ok!.”

It still surprised her to no end that the human had even managed to survive without a leg. At first she thought he might have been born with that deformity. On her planet, while it was possible to survive with an issue like that it was not very common at all. She could think of only one Tricar she had seen live to adulthood in such a condition. There were always complications, plus, while Tricar were semi-social they tended to live only in mating groups and abandon their pups at a very young age.

If you couldn’t survive to adulthood in the cold metal mazes of her planet than that was a personal problem.

She climbed up higher onto the back of the human’s wheeled chair to get a better look. She wobbled dangerously in her excitement, her hands and feet not exactly built for climbing with her stubby fingers and large flat feet.

With wide eyed excitement she looked all around them marveling at the diversity of lifeforms. There were so many of them!

She pointed to one, eyes wide, “What alien is that!”

The human turned his head to look then frowned “What do you mean?”

“That one right there!”

He frowned and looked again then laughed, “Oh well Yeb, that is a very tall human.”

“Oh, she frowned.” It sure didn’t look like any of the other humans she had seen, sure it was the same general shape, but it just looked so different that she couldn’t have been sure. But she supposed now she could see the resemblance. Like a stretched human.

“How about that one!”

The human continued to smile, “That is a human with a lot of fat, Yeb.”

“Oh…. what is that?”

“Er, like blubber but not really.”

That translated better and her ears flipped back over her head in mild understanding, “Oh, I get it, so those humans must be from cold climates, and that’s why they have insulation?”

“Not exactly.”

Her head turned and she pointed to another group, “Are all of those humans too!”

“Yes all of those are humans.”

“So pretty!” She exclaimed, they came in such interesting and new color combinations, ice white to stone ebony. Granted they all looked human, but the diversity in them was so astonishing that it was hard to believe they could all be the same species. As a biologist herself she might have assumed that maybe they were under the same classification, like fish, and how fish all sort of looked the same but that didn’t mean they were in the same biological category.

“Are they all the same subspecies?” she wondered.

“Yes.”

“Really? But they all look so different!” on her planet while they did tend to be diverse in height, their fur was generally always the same color, a grey white.

“There used to be other subspecies of humans a long time ago, but then they slowly started to die out. At the end it was only the Homo Sapiens and the Homo Neanderthalensis. Both of them coexisted for a while and even interbred but then the Neanderthal died out leaving only the Homo Sapiens with some Neanderthal DNA in certain cases,so we are all that's left, and our diverse lifestyles have given us different adaptational traits despite being the same species.”

She stared at him enthralled by this strange revelation about humans.

“For instance, in the middling areas towards the equator, things are a lot warmer and the light of the star hits the Earth directly, so humans kept their original dark skin color as protection against UV rays which can cause DNA mutations leading to cancer. A lot of times humans towards the equator tend to be taller and leaner which helps them to not overheat.”

“Your planet has a climate that diverse?”

“Yes, we can be as cold as your planet, or more than twice as hot.”

She stared wide eyed and shuddered at the thought.

“In fact, where I grew up we had seasonal changes in temperature. In the summer it was about thirty degrees hotter than the comfortable level I keep on the ship, and in the winter it could plunge to temperatures well around your home world.”

“How does anything survive in a climate so varied?”

“With air conditioning and heaters.” he said smiling, “Anyway, humans slowly began to move north, and as they did the rays of the sun couldn’t cut so easily through the atmosphere, as they were angled. That meant less UV light actually making it to earth. Problem is, humans need the sun to create certain vitamins used in the body. Darker skin helped to block the sun's rays when they become too much, but when there is less sun it isn’t so easy, and so humans developed lighter skin tones that were more vulnerable to sun damage but more easily allowed for the creation of those vitamins. In addition humans in higher climates tend to be shorter and stockier to conserve heat.”

“So…. you can tell where a human comes from?”

“You can tell where their ancestors come from.”

“So your family is from a cold climate?”

He smiled, bright white teeth showing the light above, “Yep, my ancestry stretches back to Russia, Norway, and other assorted parts of north eastern europe, but my family has lived far away from those places or the past few thousand years.” He smiled, “And yes, I can trace my lineage that far back. We’ve had pretty good record keeping for the past few thousand years considering we have internet databases stretching back about that far, and massive archives.”

“Wow/” She muttered quietly, “And I don’t even know who my mother was.”

The human raised an eyebrow at her, but by that time she had already transitioned to looking and pointing at something or someone else. She loved looking at the humans, they were so diverse and strange, and there was always something new to see. Sometimes it was their clothes sometimes it was their skin, sometimes it was their hair,

Sunny, the big blue Drev, placed a hand on the human’s shoulder in a quick gesture, “I am going to go look for the parts, I’ll get back to you in a minute ok?”

“Cool, bring me a working leg when you do.”

“She snorted but nodded and walked off,while he and the others continued onward.”

Yeb lifted her head in wide eyed wonder watching as they passed down a dark hallway from the docking bay, and then out, into an absolutely massive room. It was so large they might as well have been outside, a huge curving room in the shape of a doughnut that went around for miles and miles in either direction. Much of the ceiling above the mwas covered in some sort of see through glass structure giving her a view of space outside,and the rest of the expansive station highlighted by thousands of stars and hundreds more blinking lights.

Voices echoed and warbled all around them as hundreds and thousands of people filtered through the station like slow moving ice water. The room was so large that they had even built structures on the inside, which rose up many stories into the air glittering with colorful neon lights. She saw hundreds of aliens slipping in and out of these buildings and passing overhead on catwalks high in the air, talking, chatting and walking together.

It was all so alien and she was so excited.

She almost fell off the back of the chair as her unfit feet and hands slipped off a climbing surface. A hand steadied her from behind, “Don’t get too excited.”

She was pleased to find after that that the humans were very interested in bringing her around and showing her all of the new things. WIth her ability to eat a wide variety of food, she even got to try and taste some of their more strange concoctions, both excited and repulsed by some of them.

They walked past another shop whose brightly glowing lights attracted her like a moth to a flame and she backpedaled. Sounds pulsed and throbbed around inside her head and brightly colored pictures decorated the walls. On the inside, she watched in wide eyed fascination as one human sat patiently arm exposed, as another inked a pattern onto their skin with a whirring machine. The colors they used fluoresed under the strange blue light above.

A hand on her shoulder, “that is probably a human tradition you don’t want to experience.”

“What?”

“Tattoos, injecting ink directly into your dermal layer through use of tiny needles.”

She cringed a bit, “Why?”

“Because you can get cool pictures.”

There was a hum from beside her as one of the other humans walked up, “Maybe not the tattoo, but…” She trailed off and pointed to the other side of the room where humans were sitting in chairs leaning back as other humans painted strange chemicals on their fur. One of them stood up, and when she did, her hair was long and blue.

Yeb stared, “You change your fur color!”

“Yeah all the time.”

Adam rolled up behind them, “I don’t know if that's a good idea, we don’t know what kind of chemicals….”

“Well there is only one way to find out.”

They turned to look at her, “Want to dye some of your fur a cool color?”

She was so excited all she could manage was a squeak. The thought was so strange and exciting. There was only one fur color on her planet, to think that she could just go and change it!

Why hadn’t her people thought of this!

“YES!”

Her enthusiasm seemed to surprise them, but with smiles they were very encouraging and walked in with her as one of the humans came to greet them, “What can we do for you.”

Maverick patted Yeb on the shoulder, “Our alien friend here would like to go a different color.”

The human looked down and started with a frown, “Er…. what…. What are you. You don’t look like any Tesraki I’ve ever seen.”

“That's because she’s not. A new species, just coming into the galactic community. Anyway what do you say?”

The human paused then shrugged, “Long as you sign a waiver saying that we aren't responsible for any allergic reactions or damage to the hair of an unknown species, then sure.”

They glanced at Yeb, and she waved it off, “Let's do it!”

It was probably a horrible idea to have a team of humans not exactly known for their good life choices cheering on a naive Tricar as she chose bright neon green which was supposed to be at its brightest on the top of her hair and fade down slowly to the furn on her back.

The humans were excited all around, and she drew a small crowd as they began the process.

She probably should have been more concerned not sure what the chemicals would do to her, but nothing ventured nothing gained: that was a human expression she had learned just a few minutes ago, and she really liked it.

Warm water ran through her fur, and then a strange sticky paste was applied to it. Shehad to sit around and wait for a little bit as the color set, and then sit around some more as they washed the residual color out. When they were finally finished, she was turned to face the mirror, and her eyes went wide again.

Her grey white fur, against the bright neon green!. She turned back and forth watching the light glitter over the bright color.

“Wow.”

“Wat have we done.”

“I love it!” She exclaimed, leaping out of her seat to look at herself more readily in the mirror.

She watched as Adam leaned over in his seat and passed his arm over some sort of device.

Se assumed he was paying for it and was quite pleased walking out of the shop with her new fur enjoying the eyes on her as she passed.

It wasn’t long before some of their other companions returned. Sunny turning to look at Adam with a frown, “What did you do.”

He raised his hands, “Oh come on, its harmless, na look at how happy she is. Come on.”

Sunny rolled her eyes..

“Spirits give me strength.”

Yeb capered around the group, rubbing her paws through her newly colored fur. It didn’t feel any different, but she sure FELT different.

She was sure she was going to really enjoy all these strange human things.

Then again.

She had really only experienced the good things.

It would remain to be seen if she was going to be able to handle the darker side of humanity.

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goonlalagoon · 3 years

Text

A smile in your heart (no better place to start) || Second Star to the Left

Read on Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/33459862

(Spoilers through to end of ep 10 ahead)

It’s been weeks - months - and Bell’s thought about what they could say, when they’re finally on the ground and face to face with Gwen for the first time. Thank you, that’s a strong contender; they know themselves well enough to know they’re more likely to go with how did you do it? Maybe this time they’ll actually be able to say I love you, though Gwen seems adept at picking it up even when they can’t put the words to it. In their head, they planned for it to be - not dramatic, because they’re supposed to be a fugitive and they don’t want to draw attention, but meaningful. The kind of memory that’s something to think back on with misty eyes and fond words.

Capital-R-Romantic, as Gwen termed it so long ago, that first grudging conversation.

What they actually say is,

“Wow, you really do have a great jawline.”

It’s…admittedly not the worst thing they’ve ever said to someone they have a crush on, but that isn’t exactly the metric Bell wanted to measure this by. They’re standing just feet away from each other, drinking each other in. The silence starts to shade awkward before Gwen swallows, shrugs, gives a shaky smile. Bell remembers a letter, one of the first, remembers reading the clouds are all blurry and the twisting mix of regret and guilty relief, because they didn’t want Gwen to be upset but they couldn’t help but cling onto the fact that she was, that someone was upset on their behalf.

“Well, I never got to see your school graduating photos, so I had no expectations of your jawline, Bell, but hey! It’s a pretty good one too, so congratulations!”

Gods, they’ve missed that laugh.

Someone interrupts them then, of course, because the settler ship has just landed and scout Hartley is very much in demand by everyone, not just Bell. There’s a whole crew of people looking to start a new life, and all of them need their scout to tell them what to do, where to go, what to watch out for. They wave a forlorn goodbye, find a place to sit and idly look around, trying to match this new settlement (very new, scout Summers could probably gauge to the day when these buildings were set up by the wear and tear, even after all this time) to every overheard exploit they’d listened in on over the years.

Gwen had moved the settlement into the trees, combined the natural firebreak with dug trenches to add a layer of defence. There’s a clear track that Bell would bet leads straight to water by the quickest route, an escape path to the coast. They think that perhaps the two of them should put their heads together, figure out emergency bundles for evacuation protocols. Food and water, a spare repair kit for any prosthetics…by the time they find Gwen again, hours of running around helping the settlers - the other settlers - move in, Gigo has a whole list stored. Ideas and checks and suggestions that Bell got halfway through recording before realising that maybe Gwen already thought of all of this and they no longer needed to jot everything down to cram into their four hour window of contact.

They live on the same planet, now. There’s no limit on contact, except that the first several months after settlement are absolute chaos for the scout, and from what Bell recalled hadn’t seemed likely to slow down even before the apocalypse threw everything out the metaphorical window.

Maybe with two of them with scout training it’ll be less…just less. Gwen might be able to get if not the mandated six hours of sleep at least enough to average out more at four or five. They weren’t going to comment on it, but it was easy to tell she hadn’t been getting her full rest anyway - probably hadn’t for months, dark circles under her eyes like permanent bruises.

They’re standing awkward feet away from each other again, and Bell knows there’s going to have to be a conversation about that soon, because it hadn’t really occurred to them before that they know a lot of things about Gwen, years and years of stories and rambling conversations, but there’s things you don’t learn without being in person. Personal space, definitions and comfort thereof, the body language and facial expressions to interpret to know what’s welcomed and what isn’t.

“Hey, so, uh…I know there’s a protocol that I’m supposed to follow when my settlers arrive, and all, but there’s something else I want to do instead.” Bell huffs a laugh, steals a shy glance to see Gwen’s answering smirk.

“Another sworn class tradition to fulfil?”

“Nope! We never talked that far ahead except as jokes. We knew the stats, y’know? But - you told me, the first day, that I should watch the sunrise, that that was something I shouldn’t miss, my first morning. And I don’t…we don’t have that, but I’ve had a long time to find my own wonderfully inspiring views of nature here and I wanted - Bell, you haven’t been on a planet for years and you were with me through everything, but you’ve never seen any of it in real life and I want to show you all of it, and I know where to start.”

Bell thinks about muttering about protocol, for the form of it, for the joke that can be dragged out of it, familiar banter, but they decide not to. It’s no longer their job to care about protocol, and anyway the only reason they cared about the protocol was to keep their scouts safe. Gwen is standing right in front of them, leaning gently against Boots with a casually familiar stance - if they pointed it out, Bell knows she wouldn’t even have thought about it. This is just what Gwen does, when she’s standing about with nothing to do with her hands; rests an elbow companionably atop Boots, one foot hooked around a standing leg and balanced on the toe of her boot.

Gwen is standing right there, safe and alive and happy, so protocol can sort itself, thanks.

(Bell realises they have their own hands in their pockets, their own casual stance, and wonders if Gwen is noticing that too, drinking in all of the unconcious habits that it would never occur to either of them to verbalise. All the little tics and quirks that don’t translate over a FTL comms.)

It’s not a long walk, and it’s more silent than Bell would have guessed, but it’s comfortable. Novel, really, to not have to narrate things aloud because they can just look and see what Gwen is doing, can point at a bird with a dorsal fin and pause to watch it flutter around rather than try to describe it.

They can’t stop stealing glances sideways, catching Gwen more often than not doing the same, both of them collapsing into giggles about it each time. It’s just so surreal, to be walking side by side, after all this time. It feels like a dream, like one of the stories Gwen tells Boots at night - once upon a time, there were two explorers, setting out through the trees…

The light dances on the waves, well below their cliff edge destination. At some point Gwen must have rolled a fallen log over to act as a bench, because it’s too well placed to be natural and there’s a fire-pit dug and lined with careful stones. Close enough to be cosy, but far away from the treeline itself to be safe. The light is dancing on the waves and the grass is drifting in the breeze, a periwinkle blue that Bell is used to seeing in photos if they thought of it at all. Something that had seemed so wonderful and new, when scout Hartley made her first observations, but had drifted into commonplace. A detail that wasn’t worth mentioning any more.

“One day, I’m going to make a boat and go explore that.” Gwen waves grandly at the horizon; she’s leaning her head on Bell’s shoulder, and Bell has decided that they will happily never move again. The two of them can just stay there, forever, Gwen’s head on their shoulder and the soft whisper of waves below. “Once my settlers are…settled, and can be left without supervision for more than a few hours at a time.”

“Already missing the solitude? Mourning all that lovely peace and quiet?”

“What solitude? I had a very efficient scout minder in my ear, I’ll have you know! I didn’t have time to get used to the peace and quiet before beep, time for another check in. Hartley, have you followed the itinary, Hartley, did you maintain a reasonable sleep schedule, Hartley, have you eaten a balanced meal at your officially directed time selected for nutritional optimisation…”

“I’m honestly surprised that you went for reminding me of my remote presence first rather than protesting that Boots was with you the whole time. And I would also like to ask, in the spirit of enquiry, have you done any of those things without my input?” Gwen shakes with barely suppressed laughter and doesn’t bother answering; Bell tries not to join in, because Gwen’s head is still on their shoulder and they’re still determined not to dislodge it until they really have to. “And…hey, I also told you to go watch the sunrise, and you found this instead. I - when did you find this? You never mentioned a little ocean watching viewpoint.”

“I - uh, set it up a few months ago. I didn’t know if it had worked, or if it had all gone wrong, or - and I spent so long pacing around here and wondering what you’d think of the view…”

“Aw, and you say I’m a romantic.”

“With a capital R, yes, you so are. I’m your favourite person, you said so, it was very romantic.”

“That was possibly the least romantic declaration of love that has ever been given. I congratulated you on your jawline, Gwen, I write poetry in my spare time and that was the best I could come up with. I should have just stopped talking - writing, I don’t even have the excuse of not being able to edit it out, the first bit was fine but I kept rambling.”

“It was romantic and I loved it and I have saved all of your letters in three separate back ups to make sure I don’t lose any of them.”

Bell laughs, curls an arm around Gwen’s shoulders as easy as breathing, and lets themselves relax for what feels like the first time in months. A flock of birds takes off from the trees, darting past them over the cliff edge, setting out over the waves. The sun glints off their feathers, the raised fin, a riot of colour catching the light as they watch, leaning against each other, shoulder to shoulder. Gwen is beaming out at it all, and Bell can feel their cheeks creasing to match.

It isn’t a sunrise, but this - this is something close enough, a snapshot of a new world, a new horizon that they get to learn, the first day of a new life.

#My writing #second star to the left #sstl #This went very differently to how I planned it but oh well #Bell Summers/Gwen Hartley

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aforrestofstuff · 3 years

Note

BROOOOOO THAT NEW CHAPTER

RIGHT, lotta stuff happened. And I have a few guesses as to who that super-Jesus monster is buried next to Saitama and Flash, and yes they’re crack and make no sense but damnit this series is fucking whack anyway who cares. Wanna talk about DK and Genos.

As well all know DK and Genos combined into a megazord to pool their power into murdering Psykos, and while I do think that whole sequence was metal as fuck, it’s really leading up to the grand reveal of what kind of hero Drive Knight really is.

All of our suspicions will either be confirmed or denied following Drive Knight’s commitment to Genos’ wishes. Is he going to prioritize stopping Psykos or saving Genos? Are he and Metal Knight the same in their willingness to let go of others just to get the job done? Am I gonna get to suck him off? Find out next time on Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers.

Also we got confirmation that the shit in Genos’ chest is, in fact, a nuclear reactor as shown in this panel that was so kindly translated by GoFancyNinjaWorld in this post.

Says some shit like “Nuclear reactor at it’s limit” idk I was too lazy to copy and paste. While that makes a lot of sense because he obviously isn’t battery-powered, it’s a wonder how he hasn’t blown up yet seeing as how often he gets his shit kicked in. I mean, you’d think that’d pose some major safety violations and give any physicist brain hemorrhages but hey, it is what it is.

There’s a superhero I always found very stark similarities in when it comes to Genos, and that’s Firestorm from DC Comics. You know, teenager undergoes some fucked up shit, comes out a warrior for justice, has an old scientist best friend, that kinda thing.

Well, Firestorm is also powered by a nuclear reactor in his chest. And it’s how he dies in multiple storylines. Not saying that’s how Genos is going to go too, but things have lined up just a bit too well. They’re both too reckless, reliant on their raw power, but the difference is Genos’ fate is in someone else’s hands, albeit a very morally dubious robot/cyborg. Again, Genos is probably not going to die because he’s just a bit too important to the story and has a lot of unresolved shit going on, but if he does, it’s going to be because of the ticking time bomb in his chest and not by getting his face broken one too many times.

Now, as for the theories as to what this thing is:

My first thought was it’s monsterized Blast. I understand that this is bogus and probably 100% wrong but hear me out here, who else could it be and why would they have Blast’s cube buried so close to them? All this buildup with Tatsumaki’s backstory and the bitching from DK, and we get this reveal. It has to be him, or at least someone somewhat related to him. It would explain where he’s been all this time, and why he hasn’t been responding to the world-ending threats that have been happening every five minutes since the series started. However, what isn’t lining up for me is how the FUCK Blast could become this. Psykos said she had many experiments before Orochi, but none as great as Orochi himself. Could this be what she was talking about?

Second thought was that it’s God but I think God is like, a sphere or whatever now so that doesn’t really line up. I’m getting a headache Murata please just fucking tweet something I can’t wait another month to see who the dormant goblin underneath the Monster Association HQ is.

Anyways, yeah. That’s my thoughts. I’m now shipping Genos and Drive Knight until further notice. I mean, how could you watch two dudes Voltron each other and not go “wow they’d look really cute holding hands”, because if you didn’t then you’re lying. Thanks for the ask, anon! ❤️❤️

#one punch man #opm #blast #Saitama #flashy flash #Genos #meta #asks #drive Knight #firestorm #dc comics

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panevanbuckley · 3 years

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@on-maars ooh tysm for the tag! I haven't seen this tag game before 💜

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 252

2. What's your total AO3 word count? at the moment, it's 487,043

3. How many fandoms have you written for and what are they? man idk...too many. maybe, like, 15? I'm not gonna list them all 😂

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

baby come home - 2052 (when i tell you i cried...)

come home to my heart - 1697

fake boyfriends (with real kisses) - 1623

don't tell my husband (he'll kill me) - 1615

it's always been you - 1597

5. What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending? oh, I have no clue. I very rarely write angst so it'd be an old fic anyways

6. What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending? umm...all of them?! literally, I pretty much exclusively write fluff so all my fics are happy endings

7. Do you write crossovers? If so, what is the craziest one you've written? rarely. I'll sometimes do a fic of 9-1-1/lone star or combine the hbo war shows. the craziest one I did was (wow almost exactly a year ago!) 'don't count your chickens before they hatch', a world war z/justified soulmate fic that I actually really like 😂

8. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? not often, and usually it's from a prompt or request because I suck at smut

9. Do you respond to comments, why or why not? of course! every single comment I receive makes my day!! the fact that people read my work, let alone take the time to leave comments, is so insane to me

10. Have you ever received hate on a fic? not that I know of?

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? again, not that I know of

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? I think I have? a while back...it might've been a reed900 fic? idk off the top of my head though

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? not an entire fic but I've bounced plot ideas with friends before whilst writing, that's always super fun

14. What's your all time favourite ship? to write for? probably buddie at the moment. honestly, it's impossible to choose an 'all time favourite' anything with me though 😂

15. What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will? I have an old reed900 strip club!au that will probably never be finished at this point, as well as a 17k hogwarts au for the pacific that I haven't touched in a year 😭 tbf it's safe to say that any WIPs I've got posted atm probably won't be finished

16. What are your writing strengths? nothing? 😂 idk, I guess I can turn small interactions into meaningful gestures? that's what people tell me anyways

17. What are your writing weaknesses? obviously multi-chapter fics. or just longfics in general. my inspiration has commitment issues and doesn't often stay around long enough for me to write much more than 5k of one idea. which sucks because I'm great at coming up with ideas that could fill 100k 😂

18. What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic? I have done it often, there's a few bilingual characters I write for. I also love reading fics that have other languages, it always feels more authentic? I don't mind having to use the translator

19. What was the first fandom you wrote for? there'll be no surprise that it was the maze runner - newtmas to be more specific. I'd never considered writing fic before, until lil' fetus me was struck with an idea that I just had to write down

20. What's your favourite fic you've written? oh, I don't know. I tend to love my fics as I'm writing them but once they're finished I hate them? take my jegulus WIP atm, I adore it right now but when it's over I'll probably look back and realise how much it sucks 😂

tagging: @ace-diaz @alienoresimagines @fuzziezss @fix-the-skies @buckbuckley ✨

#tag game #ao3

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kobayashi-aika · 4 years

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Before “a new departure”—Kobayashi Aika, Takatsuki Kanako, Furihata Ai’s five years with Aqours (Translated Interview)

For simplicity’s sake, each seiyuu’s line indicators will be denoted as either F(urihata), K(obayashi), or T(akatsuki).

TL: arb TLC: xIceArcher QC: Mega, Yujacha

All nine of us are a little different, but put us together and we become Aqours

—It’s the 5th anniversary of Love Live Sunshine’s school idol group Aqours. The “Aqours 5th Anniversary Jimo Ai! Take Me Higher Project” is now underway, including the series’ first dome tour. But first, please tell us your impressions about the Dome Tour’s theme song, “Fantastic Departure!”.

T: (joyfully) It feels like “the sea”! (laughs)

F: A whale?

T: A dolphin?

All 3: (all having fun) Yeah, yeah, yeah! (laughs)

K: That’s the part that leaves an impression on you, right?

T: It’s easy to think of what it would look like at the concert, right? Like, you...

K: Like getting beckoned by a dolphin to ride a whale? (laughs)

F: The new songs totally have a sea motif, which is something we’ve surprisingly never had before.

K: “Fantastic Departure!” has lots of back-and-forth lyrics, so the image of everyone [in the audience] singing comes to mind. It’s making me excited for the concerts.

F: It’ll definitely be a really nice song live.

T: It feels like every year, our new songs keep getting more difficult.

K: Right, right.

F: [This song has] quite a lot of low parts, right?

T: The A melody is low, but the chorus is high.

K: I think it’s also because we’ve become an Aqours that can take on these kinds of challenges. Our cooler sides can start showing.

T: Recently, our songs have stopped sounding anime song-ish, but in a good way. We’ve had a lot of songs that are somewhere in between anime songs and J-pop — a very “Aqours-like” place.

K: The genre is “Aqours”!

T: A stylish feel...?

K: Stylish sound!

T, F: Ahaha!

F: The lyrics are packed with an Aqours-like feeling, and the song has a stylish sound!

—What were some of your favorite lines during the recording?

K: I like Hanamaru’s “Where is it? Where is it?”

T: Hey! (laughs) Recently, my habit’s been getting worse every time we record...

K: You noticed? (laughs)

F: (while looking at K and T) Those two often record first. I listen to their voices while I record.

K: When I listen to Hanamaru-chan singing, I can find lots of parts that I really like.

T: I want to listen to all of the individual versions once. When we’re recording, we don’t know who will get which part, so there are phrases we approach differently. Everyone has their own unique ideas, so it’s exciting to hear them and think “Ah, so that’s how they’re singing it!”

K: They’re releasing the solo albums (Aqours First Solo Concert Album), right?

T, F: Right! That’s great.

F: I want everyone to hear how much we’ve all grown. The nine of us are all different, but the moment you put us together and we become Aqours is amazing.

K: And speaking of the “Fantastic Departure!” lyrics, the “A fantastic departure” phrase had a pretty difficult rhythm.

T: I know~. The rhythm was really tight.

K: Right. I could really get used to that.

F: It’s a little nerve-wracking thinking we’ll have to perform that live, huh?

Hata Aki-san’s lyrics really represent Aqours’ feelings

—In the B-side “Aqours Pirates Desire”, you have the “Dan-Da-Dan//We’ll steal it!” part. It’s a really addicting song.

All 3: (joyfully) Dan-Da-Dan!

K: You like that part, right, Kanako?

T: Right, I love the world view. I also love the “Dan-Da-Dan” and the “Da-Dan Da-Dan” parts.

—How was the recording?

All 3: (smiling) It was really fun!

F: There were a lot of “Dan-Da-Dan”s, so it was really fun.

K: But it feels like I’ll mess it up at some point, so I’m a little worried about the concerts. (laughs)

F: You might end up repeating the wrong one.

T: I’m excited for the choreography and the costumes! I want to have some accessories on it.

F: Some pirate accessories?

K: Oh, right! I thought we would have taiko drums! (laughs)

T: Just call them regular drums! (laughs)

F: There’s that line, “Beat the signal drum“. (laughs)

K: Everyone doing it together!

T: We might just have a performance like that (laughs).

F: I like the (singing) “The red flag of freedom//will part the wind for you to run“ part.

T, K: I know, right?

T: Then there’s “(A black skull and crossbones//The wild seas)//We’ll overcome it～～♪ “, and it gets really low after.

K: Is that the lowest Aqours has ever gone?

F: Maybe! Both songs are really cool. They’ve got a lot of really powerful lyrics like “Plunder” or “We’ll steal it! “.

T: “Fantastic Departure!” and “Aqours Pirates Desire” make for a strong combination. Both give the feeling of strength on the seas. I think they’ll be popular songs at the concerts.

K: They seem really exciting. [The fans] will probably like them.

—In what ways do you feel the charm of Hata Aki-san’s lyrics?

K: The lyrics often represent our feelings. In these two songs, there’s “A fantastic departure”, “A huge world//A vast world is waiting for us “, and “Search for it“. All of which really symbolize the current Aqours.

T: Recently, it feels like we’re walking down a path Hata-sensei created. It feels like she’s guiding us towards the future.

F: Even if we haven’t fully grasped the lyrics by the time we record, as time passes, we come to realize that “this is what Hata-sensei was talking about.” We sing a lot of songs about how we’ll feel in the future. Like, “Hata-sensei was already thinking this far into the future with her lyrics”. And as time passes, the appeal of those lyrics start to sink in.

K: Very deep.

T: Yup, very deep.

“It’s thanks to Aqours that we’re back” μ's words were really moving

—Going back in time a bit, Love Live! Fes was held in January 2020. You overcame the “walls” of the franchise to perform together with μ's and the Nijigasaki High School Idol Club. In particular, you were all able to make the dream of standing on the same stage as μ's come true. Looking back, how was that?

F: It was really... I’m glad we did it. (She seems deeply emotional)

T: (lost for words) Wow... It truly was...

K: (while deeply nodding) Yeah...

F: The thing we’ve always been wishing for these five years finally came true.

K: We've been wishing for it for so long... while it was a goal, we also ended up thinking it would be a dream that would never come true. So it made us really, really happy.

T: The Love Live! series’ 9th anniversary project gave us a lot of chances to interact with μ's and the Nijigasaki High School Idol Club, so we had a lot of chances to speak with them. μ's gave us some very kind words.

“It’s because Aqours has been doing these concerts and other activities that we, too, could come back here.” When they said that... it was so touching. They really were watching us. It made me so happy.

K, F: (nodding)

—If I might ask, were there any other happenings with μ's?

K: We had a sort of photoshoot after Fes, right?

F: Was it after Day 1?

K: We came on stage to take a group photo, and afterwards it turned into one.

T: And then it turned into free time?

K: Right. Photo time started. It was sort of like at a theme park, when...

—Sort of like when you meet the mascot characters?

K: That’s right. (laughs) Everyone was lining up, and going “Please take a photo with me”. Well, except for Aqours.

—Except for Aqours?

K: Everyone in Aqours was a little gun-shy. μ's are pretty much goddesses... they’re like something out of a dream, so we all thought “Is it really okay for us to be this happy?”, and started acting really shifty. (laughs)

—To have them right in front of you...

K: We stiffened up. (laughs)

F: Even when they said it was okay, we still didn’t go. We turned into regular old otakus. (laughs). But I think Komiya (Arisa)-san took the initiative and went over to the other groups.

—When μ's came on stage, were you in awe?

T: We felt the mood in the arena change in an instant. It was the moment that so many people who came were waiting for; it felt just like a holy atmosphere.

K: I couldn’t stop my goosebumps. The arena started shaking. It really was.

T: It felt like it’d be alright if they just stood there doing nothing. At the end of Day 2, Aqours went after μ's, and after the audience was engulfed in orange light for “Snow halation”, we came out on our ship. We felt just like pirates.

K: When I saw that orange light reflecting off the ceiling, I thought “Ah...” And when we came out, it changed into a sea of blue, and I went “Ah...” again. It was really moving.

Eating natto rice... it’s freedom before the live starts!

—Aqours also debuted their new song “Mitaiken HORIZON” at Love Live! Fes. The trio units of CYaRon!, AZALEA, and Guilty Kiss also performed, right?.

T: Debuting a song, and especially as the first song at Fes, was pretty nerve-wracking. The “Mitaiken HORIZON” costumes are cute, and it’s really in sync with the PV, so we really wanted to kick things off with a “This is Aqours!” kind of performance. It really was an honor to be able to debut it there at Fes.

F: CYaRon! was the first subunit, and because there were a lot of groups performing at Fes, some people might not know CYaRon!. So we were really enthusiastic about giving it our all.

But when we got on stage, the entire arena was really warm and welcoming. So while we were dancing, we were thinking that “Love Live! is really amazing.” That warmth is one of the good points about the fans.

K: Some of Guilty Kiss’ songs make you want to do the “Guilty Kiss!” call, even if you don’t know us. (laughs) Even the first timers do the “Guilty Kiss!” with everyone. So I feel like everyone will remember us. Or at least their mouths will remember us from the calls. (laughs)

T, F: Just their mouths? (laughs)

K: Mouths that blow Guilty Kisses. (laughs) On the grand stage of Love Live! Fes, we were able to show the greatness of the Love Live! series as both the Aqours that worked so hard to get here and as our subunits..

—How do you spend your time backstage? Is there anything you always do before every live?

K: It’s just the huddle up, right?

T: We’re quite free, huh? And then there are people who eat a lot of natto. (laughs)

K: Natto and egg rice is the fad. Pretty much everyone is eating it, right?

T, F: Yeah, yeah.

K: On live days, you have to do that. My mouth will remember the taste.

T, F: (laughs)

T: Having the chocolate fondue from catering was so nice!

K: I was so happy! It was white chocolate, right?

T: I was like, “Do you think I can drink this chocolate?”, and Komiya Arisa-chan went, “I said the exact same thing earlier.” (laughs)

K: We’re all just talking about food. (laughs) Some things never change. But when showtime comes, we flip a switch, right?

F: That’s right. Our liveliness has an on/off switch. Speaking of which, (Osaka) Shizuku-chan (Maeda Kaori) gave us all chocolate. It was the kind with a message on the back, and she wrote messages like “Ganbaruby!” for everyone. It was really cute.

K: We wouldn’t normally do something like that, huh? (laughs)

F: Right. So it was really cool.

T: The only thing we think about is eating. (laughs)

The first years’ strong point is being able to feel “at home”. We can be ourselves around each other

—There have been a lot of subunit activities recently, but this interview is with your year group. How would you sum up the first years’ strong point in a phrase?

K: (happily:) We get along!

T: (smiling:) Yup.

F: Like a place to come home.

—A place to come home?

F: We’re all in different units, but when we’re together as first years, I really feel at home and at ease. That’s the atmosphere when I’m with everyone.

K: It’s like you’re “at home”.

F: “At home”! Yeah, that’s it.

T: It’s simple, but fun. Enjoy!

K: We can just be ourselves.

F: We can mess around and have fun. The first years have lots of very energetic songs, and the three of us all play around with each other and enjoy, so concerts are always really fun too.

T: We’re like a box of toys.

F: And I think that’s great. The second years are very serious, and the third years give off this mature and calm vibe, and we have an energetic and casual style. But of course, I really respect the other year groups.

K: And we have that underclassman vibe.

T: We’re the moodmakers, too!

—I definitely can see that. While talking to the three of you, I’ve felt strangely relaxed and at ease.

All 3: (together) That’s great! (laughs) At home.

—Tell me about some times when you’ve felt the bond between you three.

All 3: Our bond, huh?

K: We’ve never had those kinds of emotional moments. (laughs)

T, F: Yeah. (laughs)

F: But when we debuted “Mitaiken Horizon”, I somehow felt... glad that we were the first years. (doing the choreography) Like in the “Let’s give today everything we’ve got”, where the three of us form a triangle and dance with our arms out, and we look into each other's' eyes as we sing. That part is really touching. It made me think, “Ah, we’ve really grown.”

K, T: Yeah, yeah. That’s true.

K: It’s nice that the first years are always in the center for “Mitaiken Horizon”!

T: I’m glad that the three of us are always together.

F: Our singing parts are also all together, and it feels really powerful.

T: Even so, in the chorus, we’re the ones who have to bring the energy. (laughs)

F: Right, the “More!” “More!” “Yeah!” parts. (laughs)

K: Usually, the first years (when dividing the lines in songs) are in charge of the extra lines. Like the “Fu!”s. Those energetic parts are very “first year”.

—Between the three of you, who’s the mature one, or the one who can help you when you’re in a pinch?

All 3: (together) Eh... none of us are really the mature one?

F: We really feel like we’re in the same year. That’s pretty much how we are with each other. But I’m the one who gets teased, and (looking at T) she’s the teasing type.

K: (while pointing at herself) I tease and get teased. Even when the other years are ignoring us, we feel like we’re always energetic. The first years are always just going off and doing whatever. (laughs) We pretend to be clueless, but we’re always watching our surroundings while we play around... I think.

T: And the helper... do we even have times when we’re in a pinch?

K: We probably just laugh our problems away. (laughs)

T: If I had to say, we’re the type to have fun even when we’re in a pinch. They (pointing at K and F) probably feel the same way, and it puts me at ease.

—What are your tics?

F: Recently, it’s been “Right, right?”. It changes a lot, but before that it was “Yup, yup.”

T: She says it twice. (laughs)

K: All three of us do this, but I always say funny things a second time. (laughs)

T: It’s immediately after, too. We do it unconsciously.

F: What was your tic, Kanako?

T: “Water”, maybe? I really like water. (laughs) I drink about two liters a day, so I’m always looking for water. What’s your tic, Kyan (Kobayashi)?

K: Maybe when I always say “Oh no~”. I say it no matter what happens. (laughs)

I’m glad that we can be one with Yohane, Hanamaru, and Ruby

—Now, looking back on Aqours’ activities, can I ask how you feel now that five years have passed?

F: When Aqours first formed, the other eight members... I still really look up to and respect everyone... but when I compared myself to everyone, it was really clear that I had no experience. I couldn’t dance, I couldn’t sing well, and I couldn’t act.

But now, we’ve spent five years together, so I’ve come to realize my own place in Aqours, and I’m really glad that Aqours is the nine of us. If it wasn’t these eight members with me, I probably wouldn’t have felt like this.

—Five years is quite a long time.

F: Getting this close with a person for this long, as I have with Kurosawa Ruby, is the kind of thing that doesn’t happen often. But on both the outside and the inside, getting closer to her in my own way is something I’ve thought of as very important. It’s made me aware of a lot of different sides to myself, and I feel like my love for both the franchise and Ruby is stronger than anyone else’s. Of course, the other eight members probably feel the same way.

—What about you, Takatsuki-san?

T: For me, my natural voice isn’t very high, and I’m taller than Hanamaru-chan, so I don’t have much in common with her. So when we started our activities, on top of being Aqours, I was also worried about if everyone would accept me. During concerts and performances, I was focused on whether people were looking at me.... I had a period where I didn’t have much confidence in myself.

But now, no matter what I do, even if I’m just talking normally, people often say to me, “Oh, it’s Hanamaru-chan~”, so I’m really glad that I could become one with Hanamaru.

—When did that start to change?

T: Around 2nd Live. (2017′s Love Live! Sunshine!! Aqours 2nd LoveLive! HAPPY PARTY TRAIN TOUR) Up until then, I was afraid of people looking at me on stage, but since 2nd Live, it’s become just like a festival, and I’ve been able to do more and more things.

I wasn’t very good at dancing to start, but I felt myself slowly getting better, and I started to really feel the joy of Love Live! inside me.

—What about you, Kobayashi-san?

K: Aqours had a few people who were new to voice acting, and I was one of them. Acting with your voice, and living Yohane’s life alongside her was a first for me. But by asking myself, “How can I get closer to her?”, I’ve been able to grow all the way until today.

Over these five years, I’ve learned to do a lot of new things, like learning how to use a low voice, how to sing in a voice completely different from my natural voice, and lots of other things.

By facing Yohane (Yoshiko) head-on, so many new possibilities have opened up; it feels like “a me that isn’t me”. Every day, I get the chance to grow alongside her. I’m so happy that this mysterious feeling can continue. It’d be great if Yohane and I, as part of Aqours, can do more and more and more fun things together.

—Takatsuki-san was talking about how she changed around 2nd. Live. So, Furihata-san and Kobayashi-san, when did your outlook change, and you started becoming more confident?

F: For me, it was slightly after 3rd Live (2018′s Love Live! Sunshine!! Aqours 3rd LoveLive! Tour ~WONDERFUL STORIES~).

At 3rd Live, we debuted “Awaken the power”, which had 11 people. (Saint Aqours Snow’s collaboration song with 9 of Aqours and 2 of Saint Snow) I felt a lot of pressure for that song. I was desperately giving it my all, and there are a lot of painful memories... But when everyone who went to 3rd Live was cheering, “I’m glad that Kurosawa Ruby is Furihata Ai”, it was a really big moment for me.

—The voices of your fans became your strength...

F: That’s right. Up until then, I didn’t have any self-confidence. And so for 4th Live (2018′s Love Live! Sunshine!! Aqours 4th LoveLive!~Sailing to the Sunshine~), I went in with the positive mindset of “Aqours made it to Tokyo Dome!”.

—What about you, Kobayashi-san?

K: I think it was at 2nd Live. 1st Live (2017′s Love Live! Sunshine!! Aqours First LoveLive! ~Step! ZERO to ONE~) was at Yokohama Arena, a place where I never thought I would be, even in my wildest dreams . And then 2nd Live was a tour. In my mind, I was thinking “Is this really going to be alright?”.

You have to really take care of your health, and because it’s a tour, you have to treat every venue with care and importance, while also making sure every performance is better than the last. And because we all overcame that together, and made each and every performance of the HAPPY PARTY TRAIN TOUR a unique one, I realized that my outlook had started to change.

—Thank you all for your stories. Now, the focal point of your 5th Anniversary Project is the series’ first Dome Tour, isn’t it?

F: It’s our first nine-person concert since Love Live!’s 9th anniversary’s first full-member Fes in January. Just like how the lyrics of “Fantastic Departure!” and “Aqours Pirates Desire” are, I want to bring out an even stronger Aqours.

I’ve always felt a sort of desperation, but for this tour, I feel a sort of calm from being more in sync with Kurosawa Ruby. I hope this can be a concert where we can show off what’s in store for Aqours.

T: The Dome Tour will probably have a lot of songs that we’ve never performed before. I’m excited to see the setlist, and I want to find all my favorite points in the staging, choreography, and costumes. I’m really looking forward to it!

K: When I look back, when we made it to Tokyo Dome for 4th Live, we sort of “burnt out” in a way... While we felt the relief of having reached our goal, it was also a day where we decided that we would keep on giving it our all. So this dome tour performance really feels like a dream.

Up until now, for our tours, we always just made small changes to the setlist, but this time, I’ve been thinking, “What if every performance had a different setlist?” I feel like the current Aqours could pull something like that off, so I hope everyone can have fun with both our new songs and some of the songs that are important to us, in true Aqours fashion.

What are the charm points of each of the first years?

Kobayashi Aika -> Takatsuki Kanako

It’s amazing how she can brighten up everything around her so naturally. Her smile is contagious. Her charm point is her sleeping face; it’s really cute! It’s my favorite part about her. (laughs) The two of them (Takatsuki-san and Furihata-san) have this in common, but she pays close attention to her surroundings and says the right things. Her actions give off this air of maturity, and I love how she’ll always mess around together with me. (laughs)

Kobayashi Aika -> Furihata Ai

The fact that she’s created her very own genre. Her existence itself is a charm point. (laughs) The small things she says are amusing, and she has a lot of parts that are so cute that you just want to imitate her. The three of us are really close, and we have a lot of matching things. We have matching sweatshirts, and sometimes we wear things that we find together at a sale, but pick in different colors.

Takatsuki Kanako -> Kobayashi Aika

I love that Aikyan (Kobayashi-san) is so amusing, and she brightens up the dressing room. When I first met her, she seemed really mature and stylish, and her long black hair was really beautiful; she seemed like the picture perfect city girl. But we’re the same age, and as I spent more time with her, she opened up. Recently, it feels like we’re partners-in-crime. It’s amazing how she’s more devout than anyone for Yohane, too.

Takatsuki Kanako -> Furihata Ai

Furi-san (Furihata-san) is an airhead, but in a good way. (laughs) The things she says are funny, and I like how she’s always the butt of the joke. My first impression of her was that she really had things together, and since she's the eldest of three siblings, I thought she would be like a big sister. But she unexpectedly has some weird sides to her. (laughs) But she’s also my partner-in-crime.

Furihata Ai -> Kobayashi Aika

Kobayashi Aika-chan is our trendy fashion leader, and she’s really knowledgeable. I’m a tech boomer, so she’s the first person I turn to for help with games and social media. Also, she takes really good care of her image. She’s really good at singing and dancing, and it’s amazing just how multi-faceted she is.

Furihata Ai -> Takatsuki Kanako

Takatsuki Kanako-chan’s unique personality and vocabulary are really charming. She latches onto things that most people will let slide, so you can’t just deal with her like your average person. She works really hard at being a good singer, but she never shows that. I think she taught me how to be serious with my work.

Kobayashi Aika’s Q&A!

Q1: Tell us what you really love about Tsushima Yoshiko-chan!

(sounding troubled) I love everything about Yohane...

I love how she’s honest about the things she loves. After meeting Aqours, she’s been able to be more open about the things she loves. She’s grown to be able to share that love with so many different people. I’m glad that she met Aqours.

Q2: What’s something you want to have or want to do?

I’ve always wanted to go to England, which is Yohane’s “World Image Girl” country. They have a “Magic Museum”, where they have a lot of pots and things that real witches used on display, so I want to go see that. I think Yohane would like it, too.

Q3: Have you read any interesting books or played any interesting games recently?

Animal Crossing: New Horizons. I even play in my dreams, and in one of my dreams I built a bridge. (laughs)

Q4: As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

A singer and a nursery school teacher. I’ve loved singing and dancing since I was a kid. And I love taking care of little children, so I’ve always admired nursery school teachers. I went to school and got my nursery school teacher’s license. Hopefully, my second dream will come true some day.

Q5: What do you do on your days off?

Usually I stay at home. I’m either sleeping or playing games. I play so much that it’s the only thing I think about. Like, “When I go home today, I need to do X in ACNH.” (laughs)

Takatsuki Kanako’s Q&A!

Q1: Tell us what you really love about Kunikida Hanamaru-chan!

How cute she is! (laughs) I fell in love with her from the moment I met her. She’s a shy bookworm, but she’s also super curious. And as the story progresses, she begins to feel more real. In season 2, she started becoming a gag character, but I love watching Hanamaru eat, so I was happy to see so much of it.

Q2: What’s something you want to have or want to do?

I’m not actually a very materialistic person. So for now, I just want some inner peace. I hope the whole world can be enveloped in happiness soon.

Q3: Have you read any interesting books or played any interesting games recently?

It’s actually a movie. I recently bought a projector, and I’m enjoying using it to watch movies or dramas. Ninagawa Mika’s “Followers” is really interesting.

Q4: As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

A singer. I started wanting to become one around 4th grade, when we sang for our class recital. I didn’t have a particular genre I wanted to sing, so I just vaguely wanted to become a star.

Q5: What do you do on your days off?

I’m an indoor-type, so I just play games or watch TV. Also, I like going on trips, so it’s a little tough right now, but I want to go to Hawaii one day.

Furihata Ai’s Q&A!

Q1: Tell us what you really love about Kurosawa Ruby-chan!

She seemed like a little sister-type from the moment I saw her, so on the flipside, how she’s very strong-willed. She might seem a little timid, but mentally, I think she’s just like her big sister (Kurosawa Dia). I love how much she loves her big sister, too. And like with school idols, I think it’s wonderful how dedicated she is to the things that she loves.

Q2: What’s something you want to have or want to do?

To spend time with all the people who support me. When I take questions on Instagram, I get a lot of messages from overseas fans, too. And of course, there are plenty of fans from Japan, too. I just want to see them soon.

Q3: Have you read any interesting books or played any interesting games recently?

Grand Maison Tokyo. I got hooked on the drama, so I read the novel, too. The scenes and food appear vividly in my mind, so it was an easy read.

Q4: As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I loved drawing, so I wanted to be a mangaka, artist, or something to do with art. But I thought that doing something I like for work might make it tough, so I started wanting to become an anime seiyuu.

Q5: What do you do on your days off?

My little sister, little brother, and I all live together, but usually I’m with my sister. I’m also the kind of person who likes to go out in the rain, so I go out and end up buying something I don’t really need, and my sister usually gets mad at me. (laughs) I collect vinyl records as a hobby, so I end up buying jackets for them.

#kobayashi aika #aikyan #takatsuki kanako #kinchan #king #furihata ai #furirin #aiai #aqours #aqours 1st years #interview #livedoor

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youllallriseintheink · 3 years

Note

Can we have fusions of your five favourite ships?

Sure! Not doing two full paragraphs for each of them, though, because that would be a lot of writing! (maximum three fusions per ask for that- but feel free to ask for any of these if you want their physical descriptions or something).

Jack x Sammy

Basically a much more cheerful, sociable Sammy. Combining Sammy’s musical genius with Jack’s ability to work a crowd would make them a great stage performer.

Abby x Lacie

Oh wow. Congratulations, you have made the ultimate butch lesbian. She’d be clever, brave and biting and take no shit. More worldly and charming than Lacie but also care less about people than Abby. Would get along very well with Bertrum.

Grant x Shawn

Best case scenario, they’d really balance each other out in terms of a lot of different traits, recklessness and nervousness being the obvious one. Worst case scenario, you’d get a version of Grant that is willing to talk back to Joey and would be quickly sacrificed.

Norman x Susie

Very motherly, for lack of better words. More social than Norman but not dependent like Susie is. Could actually translate those psychoanalysis abilities into social skills.

Allison x Thomas

Again, either they’d balance each other out beautifully (optimism and pessimism, irresponsibility vs. passive guilt, etc.), or it would be a disaster of a person who doesn’t have Thomas’ sense of responsibility but is twice as able to cause chaos.

#bendy and the ink machine #joey drew crew #thanks for the ask #fusions

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delaneytveit · 3 years

Text

Satellites Part 15

Wow so I ended up getting some really good reviews on the last one! Thanks for the comments guys! Its great to see that ya'll are enjoying this story as much as I am

Which reminds me, read a really good fic, or just any fic? I have a challenge for you, go back and write a comment about something you liked in the fic, it can be anything, the title, the pace, the language, ANYTHING! Writers thrive off of comments, and your kind words just might make someone's day (it definetly made mine!)

Spread positivity and genuine enjoyment! because at the end of the day, we're all people with crazy lives who just want to be able to come back to our stories and lose ourself in worlds galaxies awayAlright, now i'm reigning in the preacher moment and am simply here to say, follow me on twitter!

Twitter - sfw -> @/spacemom_laney | nsfw -> @/15_agentwash

ko-fi - ko-fi.com/delaneym_15

(Part 14) (Masterpost) (Part 16)

“Maybe a cake, Lance likes red velvet cake. Though it's basically just chocolate with food colouring. Or those pseudo-chocolate chip cookies, he can wolf down an entire batch of them. Or maybe…” Hunk had momentarily turned around to face Pidge, the dish he was currently scrubbing still in hand. “Pidge?”

“Hmm, what?” Pidge looked up from her computer, completely oblivious.

After the meeting on the bridge, tensions had been high in the castle. Knowing as much as they knew about Project Leo had put them all on edge. It had been a week since then and the unease still hadn’t settled. So of course, Hunk in all his anxiety had decided he would cook something to cheer up the team, or at least Lance. He had it the worst, clearly the information wasn’t as shocking to him, but the confirmation of it somehow made it all real for him.

He had been closely monitored by Coran. Though it was a larger question of it was helping at all. He never really admitted it, they’d have to be blind to not notice the far off stares, the decrease in appetite, and the heavy bags under his eyes.

Lance wasn’t doing too well, and though Hunk knew there wasn’t much he could do for his best friend, he could at least cheer him up even if it was for just an instant.

Hence the sweets. Hunk had been in the kitchen attempting to decide what to make, and considering he always thought better without still hands, had taken to cleaning the entire kitchen from top to bottom. Pidge had walked in about an hour into his cleaning frenzy, perched upon the island counter and opened her computer.

Having another person in the room, Hunk had begun talking out loud, wondering what he could make out of the space ingredients he had.

Of course, she wasn’t paying attention at all.

“You know, you could at least pretend to be listening.”

“Look, I don’t see you looking through hundreds of data files!” she retorted.

Hunk turned back to the sink and continued scrubbing the plate. He shook his head. “You know, Shiro said to stop. We already know enough.”

“Do you always do what dad says?” Pidge joked.

“Pidge, seriously. What good is it going to do?” Hunk hand turned around fully, crossing his arms over his chest.

“What do you mean, what good? Hunk, I’m on the verge of something!”

“What about Lance? Does he know you’re doing this?”

“I’m doing it for him! The more we know about the experiments, the better. We can help him!”

“Help who?” the man in question asked as he walked into the kitchen. Both Pidge and Hunk jumped at the sudden sound.

“O-oh, hey Lance!” the Yellow paladin greeted, as Lance made his way to the fridge. They watched him closely as he opened it, grabbing a juice pouch from a shelf.

He closed the fridge and leaned against it, sticking his straw into the pouch.

“So, what are you guys arguing about this time?” he asked, taking a sip of his juice pouch.

Hunk and Pidge looked at each other in question, a silent argument unveiling before the Blue paladin, until finally Pidge sighed in defeat.

“Hunk is mad because I think I found something while going through the data files again.”

They didn’t miss the uneasiness that washed over Lance’s body. Though he was still leaning against the fridge, the tenseness in his now more distinct muscles was apparent.

“Didn’t Shiro tell you to stop?” Pidge lowered her head at that.

“He did. But when does Pidge ever listen?” Hunk admitted.

A small smile played on Lance’s face, though it was gone in a moment. “So, find anything useful?”

Pidge perked up at the question. Grabbing her discarded laptop, she opened it up and pulled up the file she was looking at previously.

“Of course I did!”

“Wait, so there’s another experiment?” Keith was pissed. Besides the fact that one of his teammates go directly against orders, but apparently whatever was happening to Lance wasn’t over.

Pidge nodded, “Yeah, well not an experiment exactly. It's called Phase Two.”

“Phase Two?” Keith repeated.

“Lance was the first of four successful tests. I guess that was enough for them to move on to Phase Two. Which is basically to see if they would be able to recreate the serum without the manufacturing part.”

“I’m confused, what do you mean without the manufacturing part?” Lance asked. He had never heard of Phase two, though then again he hadn’t really stuck around to see it. All of this was absolutely new territory for him.

“That, I couldn’t get. It was difficult to translate, and the parts that I could read were vague. What I did get is that the point of Phase Two was to see if the serum would stay in your body for a long period of time.”

“Well we know that worked.” Keith stated quietly.

“Yes, but why would they need to discover a way to recreate the serum without actively formulating it?” Allura was beyond confused. Why would someone go to such lengths to create something, only to search for alternatives?

None of it made any sense.

“Pidge, were you able to find the ingredients of the serum?” Lance asked.

Pidge shook her head. She had been searching for days and couldn’t find a thing. Not only that but every blood test Coran had taken had yielded little to no results. They had no idea what the serum was, nor any of its long term effects.

“The lengths that they’ve gone to hide that, it's possible that they only were able to make a few of them. That or the ingredients are too costly to keep making them from scratch.” Lance reasoned.

“So what would they use then?” Keith asked, voicing everyone’s question.

In all honesty, Lance didn’t know either. What could they use? He knew they needed him, more importantly they needed him alive. So what could they use?

It was almost like a lightbulb had flashed above his head at the realization.

“Stem cells!”

Lance’s mention of the testing facility had sparked a realization in Allura. If there were more ships, then the likelihood of there being more subjects was incredibly high. There could be others, stolen persons just like Lance, being experimented on, tortured.

How many had families?

How many were taken from their homes?

How many were like Lance?

The longer she thought about it, the more she came to the conclusion that they had to do something. They were Voltron after all. The defenders of the universe. If for even a second they suspected that someone may be in danger of the Galra, it was their duty to protect them. They may not have been able to rescue Lance, but maybe they would be able to save those still being held in the facility.

So away she went, to the other side of the castle where the Paladin’s chambers were. She walked past the doors until she came to the one she needed.

She stopped in front of it, and knocked softly. It was only a few seconds before the door opened, and she was greeted by the one person who she knew would help her.

“Allura?”

Bright blue eyes met hers. Eyes that even heavy with sleep, held a look of determination, a desire to protect.

“I have a proposition for you.” her voice was soft so as not to wake the others, though she knew he could hear her as he now seemed more awake. “May I come in?”

Lance nodded, turning on the light and moving aside so that she could enter the room.

Allura had never been inside one of the Paladin’s rooms previously. Though she did have to admit that it was a lot cleaner than she thought it would be. Lance had somehow managed to combine clutter with organization. There were books and pens on his desk, his bed piled high with pillows and blankets. Pictures adorned the walls and a set of blue lights on a string were taped to the shelf above his bed.

It looked...homey. Comfortable.

“So, what was it you wanted to talk about?” Lance asked, taking a seat on his bed. He gestured for Allura to take a seat at the chair in front of his desk. She did so, crossing her legs and bringing her posture up to a more poised position.

“I’ve been speaking with Coran, and though it seems you still have quite a ways to go in terms of mental stability, I believe that keeping you from missions would do more harm than good in the long run.”

“So, you woke me up at…” Lance looked over to the clock next to his bed, “3 in the morning to reinstate my mission privileges?”

“Well, yes and no. I’m only doing this for one mission.”

“One?”

“Yes, one I’m sure you’d be very adamant about going on, even if I were to refuse you.” Allura leaned forward. “A rescue mission, at the testing facility you were held at.”

“Wait, you found it?”

Allura nodded. She had been searching for it since the issue was brought up.

“Okay, rescue mission. When do we leave?”

“I’ll make the announcement tomorrow. After I talk it over with Shiro, we can come up with a sound plan of attack. Lance, are you sure you will be okay?”

Lance took a second to think about it. He knew what she was doing, giving him an out. He was thankful for it, but this was something he had to do.

He was one of the lucky ones, he had got out. But there were so many of them that didn’t. He owed it to them to do everything in his power to free them.

“I’ll be fine, Allura. I promise. Now, let's go save these guys.”

#vld lance #lance serrano #lance mcclain #langst #i love two blue bois and lance is one of them

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secretsfromwholecloth · 4 years

Text

Deadfire, day 7.

Oof, those nāgas. And when it’s not those nāgas, it’s those traps. I had to reload a couple of times, most notably after Serafen died. Properly, four-injuries-in-one-fight died. Ciphers are squishy, I’ve learned that quite well, but damn.

Wow, the rathun sure are friendly to a fire godlike Watcher.

After all this time, I still can’t not laugh when Tekēhu makes his “What a glorious hole” crack.

Talking Jadaferlas down is one of my unbreakable habits. I’m not even sure why, considering that across my various playthroughs I’ve killed both scarier dragons and ones with better arguments for letting them live. I guess because talking her down is so easy and has no negative consequences whatsoever, so I’ve never had to fight her, which would’ve reinforced that the option was there?

This is the first time I’ve brought Pallegina to Ashen Maw, as far as I can remember, and her habit of roasting unspeakably powerful entities that could squash her like a bug is as delightful as ever.

The conversation with Eothas about why the Watcher has accomplished great things, whether because they’re just inherently more capable or because of the situations their life has put them in...gnrf. The latter would be the obvious answer if a. the “strong soul” thing weren’t canonically true and b. there weren’t the whole extra meta-level of the Watcher being the protagonist and having a player behind them, and then I get to thinking about all of it, and, well, gnrf.

Xoti got an approval bump from Pallegina. That’ll be a red-letter day in everyone’s diary.

Why yes, I do have a whole bunch of feelings about Eothas telling Edér to take care of the Watcher, thank you for noticing.

I think Aeldys’ speculation about the afterlife merits another “gnrf”. Just one of those things.

Woedica, your “I <3 eugenics” speech isn’t exactly endearing you to me right now. No, that it’s magical eugenics doesn’t help.

I’ve gotten the second teleportation quest, and my regulars are all level 20, so I think it’s time to take some of the more neglected babies on a jaunt around the Neketaka hinterlands. Right now that means Rekke (level 16, I hope to all the gods I can give him some attention in the DLCs), Fassina (level 15, I’ll be needing her for you know what), and Xoti (already level 20, but I need a specialized healer with this lot, and Pallegina’s tankiness is unnecessary with Rekke to hide behind).

Yes, I’ve left it extremely late this time. I usually don’t eliminate quite so much of the mapping and bounty hunting before Ashen Maw, and sometimes I’ll make the rounds on foot when I get the bounty for Nomu rather than wait for Flaune to send me out there.

Ooh, hello there, Animancer’s Energy Blade. Yes, Anlaf would love a lightsaber to wield alongside Marux Amanth.

I normally make sure I have Pallegina along for Castol’s performance review, but you know what, I’m curious, I think I’ll dive in with the party I have.

Wait, which archmage is meant to be in attendance? Duc Remasi cuts Nirro off before he can say the name, and while there’s a person in a robe standing off to the left, I can’t pick out anything except their hair color (brown, I think).

Well, that’s done, Castol is safe. Unless he tries to come for me on the way to Ukaizo. We’ll see.

“I hear the Huana hate few things more than a food stealer.” Heh, yes, I’ve been to Tikawara.

Oh, hey, I got the box of, er, “beans”. Still no visits from any archmages on dragonback, though.

So Clelia actually saw Furrante hanged, but she didn’t go back to Fort Deadlight to finish the quest, because she wasn’t about to throw in with the Príncipi no matter who was leading them, and she got the epilogue slides for Furrante still being alive and in charge. We’ll see if I can get his death to register this time.

Looking at the Darcozzi oath, I see we have another Vailian name for a god—”Dicenas fiaces” in the Vailian text has got to correspond to “Magran’s flames” in the translation. Elsewhere we see that -s seems to be the possessive suffix, among other functions, so that’s Dicena for the Vailian name of Magran.

And I think this is the part where I turn down the difficulty and start doing the real fun stuff. First up, Splintered Reef, since I’m over here buying a certain ship upgrade anyway.

The additional challenge of Easy/Relaxed difficulty can be fun, but sometimes you just want stuff to die already. And that’s what Story mode is for. :D

Eh, the fuck happened here? Fassina, is there something you’d like to tell your casità?

...nope, I did not mean to disembark in Port Maje with Maia in the party. Nope. Maia, get back on the ship.

The reason I was in Port Maje in the first place was to buy that beautiful, beautiful bow. But who’s going to use it? No one who uses a ranged weapon and doesn’t already have their good one is going to be spending much time in the party. Maybe I can give it to Xoti. It won’t kill either of us to have her switch away from her sickle and lantern. I don’t think. And depending on who else is in the party, she could move from the melee squad to the ranged one. It’d be a way to give Rekke more attention, for one, if the fifth spot goes to someone like Aloth, Fassina, or Tekēhu who mostly does crowd control.

What’s that? My playstyle and taste in companions is tailored to Watchers with good support capabilities, playing a rogue was always going to be a trial, and I must be positively itching to rerun one of my favorites by now? You don’t say.

And now, we go after Concelhaut, because I very nearly forgot about him.

Bweeheehee, Concelhaut is so angry. :D Go on, Edér, needle him some more.

Yeah, his VO is so much funnier here. Something about all those trilled /r/s combined with the sheer indignation in his voice. And the hamminess. There’s hardly a piece of virtual scenery without bite marks in it by the end of the conversation with him.

The sheer speed with which Concelhaut was defeated only adds to the hilarity. I may be somewhat overleveled for this quest.

Oh, and the killing blow? Came from Ishiza this time. Never mind the farmhand, Concelhaut, this time you got taken down by an animal.

Hello, Tayn, and hello again, Llengrath. We’ll talk more later.

And I think Nemnok is up next, because I’m pretty sure I’m down to just that, DLCs, megabosses, and the endgame. And I’d like to get that last blackwood log to finally give my ship its good hull. But I’ll have to actually go after him in the morning, because it’s late.

#pillars of eternity #deadfire #watcher Anlaf

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goodbye-i-need-space · 4 years

Text

Matchup for ♥️ Anon (I messaged you, so you know who you are ~) - - - Here is what I got for you:

Out of all the OM! characters I feel like Satan is the most interested in foreign languages so if you need someone to help you with a new language, don't be afraid to ask for his assistance. He owns a lot of books that he'd love to translate into another language. Of course he could ask one of his brothers to help him out with those (since unlike him they've all been born as angels and it's most likely that they're able to speak any language naturally) but there's something very calming about teaching you and working on your own translated book together.

Mammon will test your patience permantly, but since you get along well with kids you may be able to get along with him as well. He can be a handful ngl but at the end of the day he just wants some genuine attention! It's similar with Asmodeus tbh, but that's no new news considering he's the avatar of lust and a very attention demanding individual.

Beelzebub doesn't share a lot of similarities with you, which doesn't stop you from hanging out with him of course. He's generally very accepting and easy to get along with.

Levi probably has a small crush on you, which doesn't come as a big surprise. Due to his tendency to stay inside his room all day long he rarely meets new people, let alone people that share his hobbies. He likes to show off a lot at first, expect lots of bragging about anime and him beating you at his favorite videogames. Someone teach him how to get a girlfriend/boyfriend pls. He realizes that losing every game against him doesn’t have the best impact on your mood/patience as soon as the first controller went flying out of your hands in a fit of rage. There’ll be a bit of an awkward silence between you two for a moment. He’s not mad or anything but then again wtf did you just do? Both of you probably just laugh it off after a moment but it kinda left a hint for him to start getting a bit more considerate about how he spends his time with you.

Also regularly provides yo with fresh memes so !!! 10/10 good boi pls be his frend

Belphegor is definitely surprised by how easily you can lose your temper over small things and usually finds it quite amusing when you get angry. Mostly because it's nothing compared to what his own anger can do, if he were to let it run free that is. Prob will laugh at you should you ever get angry at him. I'd gently sock him for that but that's up to you!

At first the person I wanted to ship you with was Lucifer, but the more I thought about it the more I felt like his pride would get in the way of a healthy relationship between you two. I don't think he'd treat his s/o too softly, at least not in front of other people. Once he gets close to someone in a romantic way he can get quite possessive which, combined with his general need to be in control, wouldn't help with any insecurities or negative experiences you had so far at all.

Since I mentioned almost every other character already, you probably already guessed by now that I am shipping you with

Simeon !

When I was reading through your matchup request I already thought "Wow, this girl really needs someone to appreciate her!" Someone who adores your clumsyness, enjoys the things you talk about and makes you feel good about your happyness. I mean, who'd be better than this than a literal angel?? Although it might take him a while to realize the severity of his feelings towards you, once he does he's not afraid to hold back his affections and let you know how important you are to him. He's very attentive and definitely notices even small things about you that others would look past . There's a good chance Luke also grows fond of you, since the smaller angel follows Simeon everywhere like a puppy. Don't treat him like child though, he'll get all pouty at and complain to Simeon who just sweatdrops at the whole scene. At the end of the day Luke does have a fond opinion about you though no matter how much you tease him.

Barbatos would definitely catch interest in this human/angel affair as well and given his power he might even play a bigger part in how well all of it turns out. It'd be wise to get on his good side.

Back to Simeon though. He’s a very balanced person. You wanna talk for hours about something? His attention is all yours. Don’t feel like talking today? No problem he’s got you covered with years & years of knowledge. Archeology/History? Simeon is your personal guide through ancient times, there’s so many stories he could tell you and he sure isn’t above using his powers to let you witness a piece of history. (Srsly why is no one talking about the angles/demons & what kinda powers they could/should have? Just imagine! Memory reliving/memory projection! That'd be such a intense way to bond with each other)

I feel like angels of the Obey Me! Universe don’t have a very close connection to the human world since the Great Celestial War happened (maybe they’re even forbidden to go there without strict orders) so Simeon is also genuinely interested in (and a bit clueless about) current human cultures/technology

(Usually I include a small scenario at this point, and while I already have a rough concept of how I want to write it I'm kinda stuggling on how to put it together!

(> _ <)

My brain might just need a bit of time, so I decided to upload the first part already and add the rest later. (I'll definitely add the finished scenario as well though so keep your eyes open for a message from me once I'm done with it !)

#obey me #obey me!#obey me simeon #simeon #matchup #angel

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illegiblewords · 4 years

Note

hm-- i'm going to be the obvious one and suggest lahabrea (or hades, whichever someone hasn't already sent!)

YOU’RE IN LUCK, NEITHER HAS BEEN SENT!

LAHABREA

First impression: Wow what a boring villain, very 2-D with shitty dialogue and bland motives wearing the all black spooky-like. And we are supposed to be very impressed and intimidated just like Hydaelyn. When is Heavensward?

Impression now: My friends I have 180′d and now love this poor sad loser to pieces. Emet-Selch revealing that no, Lahabrea really has been being a lameass this entire time and why the hell did we take him seriously when he had such horrendous decision-making throughout was the beginning. Seriously, I basically yelled laughing when the “crowning moment of idiocy” line happened. Because until that point the models for Ascian behavior were Mr. I-laugh-at-explosions-and-yell-about-Zodiark Lahabrea, Sir I-don’t-talk-much-but-when-I-do-it’s-about-Zodiark-and-balance Elidibus, a certain I-hate-all-these-people-because-Zodiark-likes-them-better-WAITAHOTCHICK Nabriales, Ms. I-fucked-up-and-will-never-live-it-down-so-no-longer-show-my-emotions Igeyorhm, and a couple of oneliners. None of whom have seemed overly self-aware. The second that line came out of Hades’ mouth, it became clear that YES we can judge them all and NO this is not some kind of standard Ascian behavior we should just accept. None of them have to act that way. They’re just weirdos.

Then Shadowbringers happened and there was a period of “wait how did Amaurot’s top orator turn into the Lahabrea we know” and learning that Lahabrea was weak because he kept body hopping despite knowing it was damaging him.

Aaaaand at Gamescom, bless Oda and Yoshida, they gave the single smoothest fix and I am eternally grateful. Workaholic Lahabrea is a gift. He probably doesn’t even know what he’s saying most of the time and is just trying to give the impression he knows what he’s about before dropping a monster and running off.

But then combining all the info and playing detective with past scenes he’s actually really sad. Still lame and stupid funny at times but also sad as hell when dots get connected. At this point I figure he’s motivated by guilt complexes, denial-flavored-tempering, and fear of both falling asleep because nightmares and how much blood will rest directly on him if he fails. Because I think I remember seeing that Zodiark was his idea. And literally everyone except for him, Hades, and Elidibus died in connection with that.

I think he’s a Stepford smiler in the sense that internally he is deeply, deeply fucked but he distracts himself in how ridiculous a lot of the FFXIV situations are and laughing at the resulting blow-ups. Space-dragon-ghost-explodes-out-of-the-moon-to-wreak-havoc is a hell of a thing for the history books. I also think he probably knows or assumes people don’t like him and that he deserves it. I also think that while the other two Unsundered get frustrated with him, he’s probably also been hiding the level of fucked up he still is from them in a lot of ways and they assume to varying degrees that he’s being irrational, hot-headed, arrogant, and stubborn with it. I think in actuality he’s somewhat aware but is semi-deliberately hurting himself and alternately doesn’t think he has a right to stop or is horrified by how much less capable he is after spending thousands of years essentially hurting himself through body hopping and overwork. Reprimanding him probably doesn’t work because he already has a lot of reason to detest himself. I also think he probably tries really hard not to think about himself on a personal level because once he falls into that pit he’s not getting out easily, so there’s a solid amount of repression going on too.

I could go on. He is a sad clown to me who tries to cover up how tired he is by vomiting five syllable words.

Favorite moment

See, there’s funniest moment and there’s most interesting moment. His intro at the Thousand Maws of Toto-Rak makes me giggle a lot now. Most interesting to me is possibly his exchange with Elidibus after Nabriales’ death or when he shows up late to a meeting and discreetly tries to explain why he should be allowed to work again.

Idea for a story

:[ I don’t know if I can do it because I am still very happily committed to my Hades/WoL sequel, but following the story Stalemate I did I could see a situation with that specific WoL checking the Eye post-Shinryu and freeing Lahabrea. Very scenario-specific and all but I have some ideas about that.

Unpopular opinion

Idk if unpopular so much as different?

I’ve seen a lot of Lahabrea variants that I think are really cool and interesting! Some are very serious and dignified. Some are intimidatingly hot-tempered. But for me, part of what I find intriguing are the ways he doesn’t quite add up with the persona he’s trying to portray. I also really like small, cute human elements in characters that let you fall in love with them a little. This goes even for characters I find reprehensible because IMO it’s important to take both the endearing and the appalling together when forming opinions. It’s still fiction and I don’t think it translates to “if you like a character who committed murder then you like murder” or anything. I do think though that if the audience steps back and has to say point blank whether they think the character is a good person, a bad person, or somewhere in-between (regardless of liking them) that kind of thing becomes important.

I can understand why people would write off the iffy early writing to just spin Lahabrea as a highly respectable, unflappable, untouchable dude. I definitely still enjoy stories where he’s written that way. It’s just not so much how I read him haha. I think he tries to be that but there’s a lot of comedy and tragedy going on with him internally that hits hard when embraced. And I think being assumed as immune to any kind of vulnerability or real connection would probably fuck with him a lot too. Before the Ascian we know, he was considered one of the most exemplary citizens of Amaurot. It would be weird imo if he was completely isolated even then, and seeing how he got from Point A to Point B has a ton of pathos potential.

I also like him a lot despite thinking Thancred is absolutely justified in hating his guts, but it doesn’t come up as much with me so I could see there being some ???

Favorite relationship

XD I just did a WoL/Lahabrea shipfic personal challenge so naturally that influences me a bit so far as shipping goes. That said I am a multishipper. I could see him with either of the Unsundered being interesting. I’ve seen some cute stuff with Igeyorhm too but have less strong of an opinion there currently. Non-shipping I think he’s probably closest to Elidibus, has a sort of testy relationship with Hades but they ultimately do care about each other, and possibly has some level of closeness with Igeyorhm too. I also think that Nabriales dislikes Lahabrea more than Lahabrea dislikes him and that can cause some interesting problems.

Probably in-general I’m just very here for dysfunctional Unsundered trio.

Favorite headcanon

The workaholic thing and the self-destructive thing are technically both canon. His being lame specifically because of being tired all the time I think is probably it because the rest just follows for me haha.

As a smaller, more mundane headcanon I think Lahabrea is a super ugly sleeper most of the time. Probably drools.

Will do a post for Hades too and tag it but need to do other stuff for a bit! BUT THANK YOU!

#lahabrea #ascians #final fantasy xiv #final fantasy 14

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starr-fall-knight-rise · 6 years

Text

Humans are Weird “Rhythem”

What if humans were the only ones who could FEEL a beat like in music?

The Journal of Mechanics and Biology

Take a moment to consider a level one death world, take a moment to wonder what it would take to survive and adapt on a planet where literally everything is out to kill you. Imagine doing all of that without carapace, infrared, or particularly impressive short distance running speed. Yet the humans did it. They did it and then took their survival to an extreme. How is it that, relative to other predators, such a weak, slow, and helpless species survived on such a death world. * I take a moment here to point out that this is only a comparison of humans to their own planetary species well aware that they are considered a level A-1 predictor in the rest of the galaxy.

To answer this question, I draw your attention to he human brain. It is a fascinating organ of feedback loops complexities and redundant systems. Not to mention the human brain loves patterns. Not to say that there are other species who aren’t just as adept at noticing patters, however the difference remains that humans brain’s delight in predicting patterns within their environment. While a Glarian may be able to see a pattern faster than a human, the prediction power of the human brain on short notice is absolutely astonishing.

Anyone who has ever attempted to fight a human knows this. Humans are almost impossible to hit as they analyze and predict on the fly in a way that other species cannot. As it turns out this may have been the key to their survival.

The ability to predict future behavior from past and present stimuli is common among higher sentient species, however a human is a fast predictor on the fly. A human and another species may come to the same conclusion though it may take their counterpart seconds or minutes to do what a human can do almost unconsciously and immediately.

The human brain loves patterns and predictions so much, that certain patterns can even elicit a dopamine response in the human brain giving rise to feelings of pleasure. Clearly an evolutionary advantage to enjoy patterns and predicting them.

Krill had only been aboard the human ship for about a week when he first heard the noise. It was distant and throbbed on the air with a certain alarming regularity. First, he thought it might be an alarm of some sort, but the rise and fall of the pulses made him think twice. The noise wasn’t a radio frequency which he could pick up, but the universal translator he wore continuously interpreted the sounds on the air allowing him to hear just like the humans did, or at least similarly to how they did. He found this ability to be critical on a ship where atmospheric vibration was a large part of human culture.

He stood up from where he sat and wandered his way down the hall listening to the sound and it’s throbbing pulse. As it turned out the human auditory system processed sound in similar ways to how he processed radio transmission, in fact, humans often used the radio to send messages with transduction equipment to interpret the signals. In a similar way, that is what his translator did for him, turning sounds into appropriate frequency radio signals.

These signals were getting stronger as he made his way upwards and onto the bridge. The noise was close now, and he had to brace himself as he opened the door walking in to find the group of humans lounging around at their stations in various states of relaxation.

But it wasn’t the humans that caught his attention, but the pulsing beat that swelled up around him throbbing in his chest and throughout all six limbs. The experience was so exquisitely intoxicating that he staggered to the side with a wave of sudden overwhelming emotion.

The beat pulsed inside him with impossible regularity and complexity. So complex was the pattern that he could hardly keep up and his cortical systems struggled to keep all of him functioning as he listened.

Somewhere, someone must have noticed him, and the music was abruptly discontinued.

He became vaguely aware of bodies around him as he finally gained control of his senses.

Captain Vir was the first person he saw standing above him with a concerned look on his face.

“Uh, KRill? You alright.”

He couldn’t answer for a long moment before shaking his head one last time to clear his mind, “I... wow.... why did you stop. That was the most.... amazing thing I have ever heard.”

The captain sat back on his heels and the humans looked on in perplexity, “Have you.... Never heard music before?” The captain wondered

Krill shook his head, “No, I have but.... never.... like that.... so many patterns.... how do you keep up.”

The captain scratched the back of his head in confusion, “I uh.... well it’s not really all that big of a deal....”

Krill’s eyes widened in shock and he shook his head, “Not a big deal..... Human.... it takes years an an advanced mathematical degree to make sounds like that. The ability to create a beat with that regularity requires computerized algorithms or the ability to do mathematics in microseconds. I would have to count every beat and then some if I wished to come close to what you just did.” He shook his head in amazement, “And adding EXTRA sounds on top of that which match the beats is.... well its nigh on impossible without a computer do do it, and to make it sound good when all is said and done....” He trailed off in confusion.

Of course there was music on his planet, but it was very difficult to make, and even harder to make sound good. Generally speaking only two sounds were used in any really good piece of music, and they generally had to follow the same beat line, but the humans.... well what they did was astonishing.

As far as he understood from that once piece, it had a general background beat with very deep frequencies which would be low and deep, it then there was higher frequencies on top of that and at a faster beat, which was at almost exactly twice the speed of first.

The captain gave a grin as a look of understanding spread over his face, “You mean you can’t feel that?”

“Feel what?” Krill asked in confusion

“The beat?” He asked

Krill shook his head, “You don’t feel a beat.”

That comet created an immediate uproar in the humans who disagreed with his analysis vehemently.

The captain shook his head in amazement. Yes you can, its like... a pulsing, and you just.... well you just KNOW something needs to be there. Makes you want to tap your foot, bounce your knee, or start dancing.”

Krill stared at the human who must have gone completely daft, “You FEEL sound.”

The captain frowned, “No... not exactly, its just a feeling. It builds up in your body, and its hard to keep yourself still.”

Krill had his head another shake, “It’s impossible.”

The human gave a frown of annoyance and stood up, “You know what then.... bet you I can make a beat right now, and I bet everyone else in this room can follow with me.”

Krill disagreed, “To coordinate over twenty crew members is impossible.”

“Yeah, you bet, bet I can do that and get a background beat to go with it too. Bet we could make up a song right now if we really tried.”

“I would very much like to see you do that, human.”

The man gave a grin, “You know what, I’d turn this into a bet, but winning will be to easy.”

Krill very much doubted the human’s statement, but he let the man think what he would and watched him as he returned to the center of the room. All the humans had taken to their feet interested in what was about to happen.

The captain stood thinking for a moment, and Krill watched sure that he would give up any second, but then

The captain stomped his foot on the metal deck.

Thud...Thud-Clap (his hands struck each other with a loud sudden pulse. That sure didn’t sound like a beat to him.

But then

Thud...thud-clap.... thud....thud-clap-clap... thud... thud-clap....

Krill blinked in shock, as slowly, one by one all the other humans joined mimicking the beat the captain had created out of thin air. But it wasn’t just a simple beat, it was a cycle of slow to fast, and as far as krill could tell it was almost the same every time.

Behind him someone started knocking their hand against a control panel every so often in a completely different beat that both contrasted and matched the first.

With a hand, the captain motioned to the first lieutenant who then placed his hands over his mouth and began to weave another cycle of beats through the first two.. He wasn’t using any language that Krill could identify. Krill had never heard a human voice box used in that way before.

“Alright, someone wanna give me some lyrics.” The captain called somehow still maintaining the complex under-beat as he spoke to the crew. Krill couldn’t understand it. He could hardly follow the beat as it was much less talk to anyone while doing it.

Somewhere in the back a noise rose up to weave through the three beats around. HIs translator caught a few words, but the sound was so different... so unexpected that he couldn’t have comprehended it if he tried. The human was.... doing something. Something that opened her throat and allowed the air to rush through in controlled bursts between breaths. It was like speaking but drawn out to send vibrations through the air. A few of the humans whooped their approval joining to add their voices to the first.

Halfway through another crew member added his voice. Krill could hear it this time, but the human was speaking almost to quickly for the translator to comprehend, and he was pacing it WITH the beat. He was speaking with a rhythm.

Impossibly all twenty humans on the bridge crew had joined in. Some used their voices some their hands some their feet, and more than one mixed them in combination.

He had never seen anything like it.

He would later learn about the human brain’s enjoyment of predictable patterns. Their brain enjoyed patterns and predictions so much that a musical beat was almost second nature to a human. This enjoyment was so profound that the humans received an almost intoxicated reaction to the complex auditory patterns.

Not only that, but the humans could increase their factual memory tenfold by creating a song that incorporated the information. Ask a human and they find it easier to recall the lyrics to their favorite song than it is to recall mathematical equations. That is until you add a rhythm to a mathematical equation and then the human might end up with the equation stuck in their head on repeat as their brain replays the beat over and over.

Want a human to remember something.... make a song about it.

If human musicians had been popular on their home world, it was multiplied tenfold once their music reached the galaxy/ They were actually beginning to have a problem with humans retiring and buying the odd moon here and there.

#humans are weird #humans are space orcs #earth is space australia

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dahniwitchoflight · 5 years

Text

Candy 18-21

oh, oh no

I’ve heard things about Jane x Gamzee

now I get to experience them, oh boy...

Gamzee gets, strangely serious about stuff for once, huh, who would have thunk it

yeah, It’s clear Jane’s political stuff seem to stem from some kind of fear that one day humanity won’t exist on Earth C for whatever reason

that over time, the population of trolls versus humans will eventually skew so much that there won’t be any adam and eve left to match up with each other

in her mind she really doesn’t hate trolls, cuz its not really about the trolls, not at all, but obviously her actions are equivalent to someone who does hate them and she just doesn’t get that

and like, yeah if you just left them to their own devices, maybe that would happen, but then (and I can’t believe I’m saying this) Gamzee has an extremely good point that they already did that when they plopped all the ectokids down and called it a day for a 1000 years, like, they managed to figure it out on their own just fine

and also

ectobiology will literally never stop being a thing so like, as long as some of the god kids stick around, eventually you can just make more humans it’s no big deal to restart the human gene pool since it will be identical to the first time they started it

there’s no reason to make sure this system runs smoothly the “natural way” it won’t, this situation is unnatural for both species

Jane’s just gotta realize that if she wants humans to keep sticking around, she just has to keep supporting the human population, that’s it, whatever trolls do or don’t do doesn’t matter for that goal

course it doesn’t help to compare trolls to animals when talking about their breeding rate and how it naturally evolved over time unlike the apparently non animal humans Janey

Also Alternian society is def not how troll society naturally is but like how could she know that? And how could any troll near her really explain that?

aaaand I got so up in taking this seriously I forget who was talking

Jane’s into troll blackrom though that’s interesting and unexpected

oh wow, Jake was there the whole time

Did they really name Jake and Jane’s baby Tavros??? oh jeesus

Yeah Kinda figured the Jane x Jake thing wasn’t gonna actually be happy

I’m really surprised Jane’s version of happiness apparently involves boinking a weird funny man I mean, she canonically likes clowns and jokes, so at the same time I’m not surprised, I mean, she WAS raised by the condesce, it’s just weird how that influence comes out in her sometimes versus how it doesn’t come out in her

literal Jake nightmare scenario though I think lol

really hammering home how the passions of youth don’t really translate well to happy adult relationships

Oh, so there’s the part where Jade reveals she has Bec biology, considering the fandom reaction you’d think we were gonna get some kind of gross M rated sex scene where she pegs Karkat or something

but all she does is talk about how she’d love a normal family and home life and lament that her circumstances ended up not really allowing that and giving enough hints that we can figure out why that would be

it’s not handled grossly at all, even if the subject matter is odd and it doesn’t come off as some sort of character sabotage

this whole time what we’ve known all Jade was that she was lonely and just wanted a family, not that hard to figure out why, girl’s got the same complex as Joey Claire about her family situation, but she’s more reserved about her feelings since she didn’t get to have a comparison of role models like Joey did with her babysitter and also Jade’s food and shelter needs were somewhat taken care by a planet guardian so the affect was somewhat lessened on the outside, she just didnt get the same chances as Joey to be able to articulate her emotional turmoil about it

aww Jade’s not happy either, well, that’s how it goes when you make relationship decisions based on flimsy passions that are more about fulfilling the needs of the self than about actually wanting good things for a partner

More like Jade’s sort of realized that Karkat and Dave don’t have a genuine romantic interest in her and she’s the only one keeping this ship afloat

oh shit, a dead younger jade, oh damn wait she’s the one from Meat that was trapped in the house juju and then immediately died from space razors

Yeah’s she’s a bloody symbol of meat that’s for sure, theyre making that pretty clear

“Her eyes go wide and she feels the breath go out of her for a moment. She looks directly upward. Where did this body come from?”

Again, if we take that symbolism circle of Breath = Sugar = Drugged up High = Breath

This little dash of meat falling into wonderland would break the breathy haze for a bit wouldn’t it?

So if this kind of thing can happen to others besides John, there’s hope yet for something of value to come from Candy

“ There’s a peaked skylight at the top of the foyer that splits the morning sun like a prism, spilling multicolored dots across every surface below. Amongst those dots are drips of teen-Jade’s blood. It’s so dark on the spotless tile that it looks nearly black. “

I wish I could draw things, I’d love to draw this exact scene here, it’s pretty and morbid

Yeah, the relationship theme of Candy seems to be that everyone’s jumping into Kismesis plus Matesprite threesomes, that seem to be neither of what anyone actually wants in totality

There’s some realization that their Candy filled atmosphere is actually more a drug or a poison, teen jade can’t be revived, and it’s not because of what happened to her, but more because of the environment she is in now

Ah Roxy, ever the social chameleon people pleaser, not working this time though

Jade’s is easily explained already as she has the social graces of an elephant

It is kinda sad tho to see most of the human characters actually aren’t that good at being cool about troll stuff

“CALLIOPE: pUrple roses traditionally represent love at first sight, however these roses are actUally red roses that we prepared Using a blUe dye.CALLIOPE: the blUe rose is the most elUsive and mysterioUs of all flowers.CALLIOPE: the combination of red and blUe in this context is meant to evoke the dUal natUre of death, in that there is nothing more mysterioUs and impossible to comprehend than the vast void of the afterlife, bUt also there is nothing that makes Us appreciate the life and and love that we already have than the mystery of death.CALLIOPE: while death is terrifying, there is always joy to be foUnd among the sorrow. each time we witness death, we fall in love with the important people in oUr lives all over again.“

Why do I get the feeling Calliope is talking about actual rose here somehow?

Is it because she started off with “here’s the symbolism of Purple Roses”?

a Red Rose dyed Blue

Now if Cascade taught us anything Blue and Red certainly represent a mutual destruction of opposites coming together to create a third new thing in the blaze of the aftermath, but that thing was a Green Sun, not something purple, so why bring Rose into mind for all of this?

We have been seeing the effects of what happens when people in candyland awaken from their drug haze with a smattering of blood, but in that case why not make the symbolism more clear by saying a Blue Candied Rose dyed Red as if with Bloodied Meat?

is it more to mean that the correct path lies NOT in Candy being dyed Red, but in Meat being dyed Raspberry Blue?

I Mean, Candy!Rose certainly seems shaken here, having gotten jolted out of her drugged haze at some point, but unable to See, and she’s actually starting to be concerned about that and Meat!Rose is kind of out of commission at this point, So I guess to get things back on track, Candy!Rose would have to go back to the Meat somehow, or might be the influence needed to snap Meat Rose out of her daze

Though I don’t like how this is taking place in the context of a funeral, specifically bringing to mind how Dirk did the same thing using the vessel of Death, I hope Candy Rose doesn’t try to just, off herself

with Dirk taking control of Rose’s ultimate self in Meat, Candy!Rose might be the only true Rose left to take heroic action

Aww, Callie is still head over heels for Roxy, I’m really surprised with this theme of threesomes that nothing ever came of a John x Roxy x Callie, but then again all the threesomes so far have been painted Black and Red, and unless John or Roxy was to form a Kismesis with Callie, I don’t see it happening at all

OH SHIT SPEAKING OF RED AND BLUE

Damn, Sollux and Aradia are here

“KARKAT: MAYBE FUCKING NEPETA IS ABOUT TO POUNCE FROM BEHIND THAT GROTESQUE STATUE OF THE HUMAN SUFFERER T-POSING OVER THERE.”

Karkat don’t tease me about Nepeta but also again WHY is actual Jesus here.

Is Roxy a christian in this timeline? Was she legit just praying to actual Human Jesus? That’s so, weird, especially for Roxy to do, what the fuck in Roxy’s upbringing on an apocalypse earth would make her want to worship Jesus?

Oh wait, that’s obviously what she thinks that every other human sincerely does, since she only had human media to go off of, and like, technically no human has ever said they DONT worship christian gods to her.

“GAMZEE: wHeN tHe DoOr Of ThAt FrIdGe pOpPeD oPeN iT wAs LikE i Be AlL sEeIn ThE lIgHt AnD sHiT.

SOLLUX: well yeah

SOLLUX: that’s what happens when s0me0ne 0pens a d00r t0 a t0tally dark encl0sure.“

Gamzee has had a weirdly meta understanding of what’s going on so far, for some reason, I can’t fathom what could be the Lighty influence that he’s gotten

unless...

Dirk really IS starting to subsume Ultimate Rose, and that’s bleeding over to every Ultimate self connected to Dirk

the more Gamzee knows meta shit and says oddly correct things, the more we know Dirk is “winning” over Rose

Oh, that’s why Gamzee is really here isn’t he? I mean, storywise? He’s a Dirk thermometer/gauge/thing, he’s our way of measuring how far Dirk’s influences are going in Meat

“ARADIA: its so nice that you believe all that gamzee

ARADIA: i think i can honestly say

ARADIA: im reasonably happy for you?“

lol

“blue smoke”

You don’t really tend to describe Smoke as being Blue right? At least, I don’t think that’s usual

But if we’re straight up associating Candy with Blue to complement Meat with Red now, it’s just making the whole Sugar = Breath thing that much stronger

*EDIT* DUH OF COURSE OF CANDY’S COLOR IS BLUE

BLUE GUSHERS. OBVIOUSLY. *end edit*

and I mean, what is Breath but a weird bluey smoke?

Roxy just wants to be happy with all her friends, that’s all

It is a good shake at trying to explain the nature of infinite possibility, that in reality, there isn’t really more weight put into one possibility over others, that’s how it works in real life anyway

unfortunately a storyline of canon is going to favor some version of events over others, and people make choices because they have preferences for that choice over other choices, something that seems kind of lost on Candy!Roxy who seems to just be okay with going along with anything because everything has an equal chance for having happytimes in this place

Roxy may be starting to lose her sense of self as well, and with her knowledge on things and how’s she’s been described as immutable so far, I wouldn’t be surprised at her having easily and subtly slipped into Ultimate Self hood herself and just being really okay with the idea that there is no one true Roxy, that she is just one piece of many, and not like, needing to delve into that further, not needing to connect with all her alternate selves, happy just being singular but at the same time completely malleable

Oh! Baby time.

Oh fuck, Al!Calliope in Jade time.

Why is Callie so afraid of Alt!Callie? That didn’t come across in their meetings in Homestuck as much, so why is that different here?

Is it because of Jade’s earlier comment of “there can only be one instance of a person here” and Callie doesn’t think she can win against Alltie?

Also, all these instances of Alltie appearing in Jade’s body is making me worried Alltie is doing something to both of their Ultimate Selves, like she’s subsuming Jade somehow like Dirk is subsuming Rose

I mean, they are fighting one another, so if Dirk’s doing something she has to keep pace right? In her mind, it’s probably totally justified

this is getting long enough for this post though, off we go again but I’m still reading

#Homestuck #Meat or Candy

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spectraspecs-writes · 4 years

Text

Tatooine - Chapter 58

Link to the masterpost. Chapter 57. Chapter 59.

@marie39554 @averruncusho thank you for reading you get a tag

Today. Out into the dunes. Bastila and I should… No. Not Bastila. In her current state? She’s still in a tizzy about her mom. Not in a fighting state, and there will be fighting. But I still need another melee. “Juhani!” I say suddenly - she’s in the room. She looks at me. “Fancy a trip into the Dune Sea?”

“I would love to,” she says.

“Great! We’ll head out in a bit.” Also bringing HK, for translation. I know he’s got combat protocols, but I’m not so sure about them. I want my best shot. I need my best shot. And that means… but I’m not done thinking. Not all the way. Most of the way.

If I want him to trust me, I have to trust him.

I do trust him.

I knock on the door of the port side quarters, to be polite. “Yeah?” Canderous says on the other side.

“Is Carth in there?”

“Yeah, come on in.”

I open the door. Wow, Bunny Man in just a shirt and his pants - he was cute with the jacket, but he’s even cuter without it. Good God. Easy there, Rena. “What’s up?” he says, looking expectantly at me. I can’t have been just standing here for more than a few seconds.

I refocus myself. “I’m going out into the Dune Sea, want to come?”

He smiles. “Finished thinking, then, have you?” he says. Happy.

I smile back. “Yeah, you’re out of the kath house, for now.”

Canderous gives a little nod at me. Hey, if this only stops him being the weird friendship counselor he has been, then this is the right move. “Get some armor,” I tell Carth, “The jacket is great, but I doubt the Sand People have the same appreciation for fashion that you and I do.”

“The who?”

“I’ll fill you in,” Canderous tells him.

Now to find HK. He’s not in the loading bay where he shut down last night. Or the main hold. I go into the comms room to check the cameras - it’s not like he would have left the ship, so he’s got to be here somewhere. Engine room - weird, wonder what he’s doing there. I’ll have to ask.

Why is the door closed? And locked - I have to pull my spanner out to unlock it. When it opens, an ion shot narrowly misses my knees. “THAT WAS A WARNING SHOT YOU RUST--” What the hell, HK? “Correction: Meatb- I mean, master. I was expecting the utility droid. My apologies, master.”

Oh, damn, the droids are fighting, I was afraid of this. “Why were you going to shoot T3?”

“Answer: The utility droid has been monitoring me since I boarded this vessel, and has made a show of displaying his security implements. Speculation: It is as though he wishes to dismantle me and use me for spare parts. A droid has to protect himself, after all.”

“Hence the ion rifle.”

“Correct, master.”

Good God. “Okay, I’ll talk to him,” I say with a sigh, “Meantime, I’m taking you out into the desert. Facing organics, not droids. Pick the right rifle for that, then meet me in the loading bay.”

“Excitement: Affirmative, master. Thank you, master.”

I steal my sunglasses back from Mission, and when Juhani and Carth join me and HK in the loading bay, we leave. It’s not exactly difficult to find the way to the Dune Sea - forget the fact that we were near there yesterday, it’s a massive door in the middle of Anchorhead. Not that hard to find.

I tell you what I’m seeing a lot more of today than yesterday is Jawas. At least I assume they’re Jawas. They’re short and hide their faces beneath brown Bantha wool robes, and they mumble-speak a lot faster than I can listen. One of them, near the gate to the Dune Sea, stops me, tugging at my robe. HK points his rifle at the Jawa, but I stop him. Worst case scenario a swift kick would solve any problems I could possibly have here. “Can I help you?” I ask the Jawa.

“Yes, help. There are troubles from the ghosts among the sands.” At least I think that’s what the Jawa says.

“Could you speak a little more clearly?” I ask, trying to be polite.

HK chimes in. “Statement: It is doubtful he can be clearer. Their language is difficult even for droids. He is using a trade language to try and help.”

“The trouble is yours, not of Jawa,” the little guy says, “We must use a language of trade because you listen complicated to what we say simply.”

Okay. Whatever that means. “You said you wanted my help?”

“Iziz, I am,” the Jawa says, “Leader of the tribe that is mine. You are the same in kind, a leader that stands before your tribe?”

“Leader of our tribe?” Carth scoffs, “That's a new one.”

I turn to him and grin playfully. “Do not mock your tribal leader!” He snort-laughs shortly - I can tell he missed this - and I turn back to the Jawa.

“There are troubles that we have,” Iziz says, “The giants made of sand, they are horned ghosts that take us away.”

“Sounds like Sand People to me,” I say.

“That is how you know them,” Iziz says, “Giants are different for us, we being smaller.” Well that’s true. “People of Sand are who I mean.”

“Okay, so what do you want me to do?”

“There has been no help given by asking the great group that digs with machines.” I’m not surprised, damn Czerka Corps. “Now Iziz asks you. I ask that you find us, and then bring away from the People of Sand. Then we will offer a trade with you. Long have we scavenged, among you and those that came before. We have things you will like for this service.”

“Who knows how long the Jawas have been here?” Carth says, “Maybe he knows something about the Star Map.”

“These are things I know!” Iziz says eagerly, “Yes! From those that came before, the guide to lights far and away. I can tell you! Please, first help the tribe of Iziz among the People of the Sand, and we will trade what we each need.”

Seems honest enough, I don’t sense any deceit - I sure do love these Jedi senses. “I’ll take a look.”

“Iziz hopes you have the luck you need.”

Finally the Czerka guy who’s supposed to be at the gate shows up. “Hey!” he says to get my attention, “No one leaves Anchorhead without proper authorization.”

“I have proper authorization,” I say, “I’ve just been waiting for you.”

“Well, let’s see it, then.” I hand him the hunting license Czerka gave me. “All right,” he says, scanning it into his datapad, “I'll just scan that and you're off. I'll keep it on file, too. Good luck out there. You'll need it.”

“Thanks, man.” A smaller gate opens for us - the big one must be for rontos, dewbacks, sandcrawlers, big stuff.

The sand on the dunes is marked by a stretch of marker posts. Like Czerka has established safe areas. Well, safer than the desert past them, I’m sure. I put on my sunglasses. The suns are a bit blinding but once I’ve got them on I can see a massive sandcrawler, smoking like it’s been damaged. I seem to recall the Czerka officer saying to follow one of the sandcrawlers if I wanted to run into Sand People, so that seems like the way to go. “This way,” I say, indicating the sandcrawler.

“The sooner we’re done here, the better,” Carth says, shaking his head, “I feel like all this sweat will make my armor slide off.”

“Statement: This is not a problem that droids face. As I explained yesterday, you meatbags truly are filled with water.”

I laugh, probably too loudly. “Yeah, yeah,” Carth says, “I don’t want to hear it.” I just love the whole “meatbag” thing, I think it’s hilarious.

I hear some noises in the distance. I’m not… scared precisely, but I want to get to the cover of the sandcrawler as quickly as possible. I don’t want to be snuck up on. “Rena?” Juhani asks, “Are you all right?”

“Probably just paranoid,” I say, “You and Carth get on to the sandcrawler, I’m right behind you.” They go, leaving me with HK. “How are your optical sensors?” I ask him.

“Answer: Fully equipped to observe a variety of wavelengths of light, master, with clarity of vision well over 100 meters.”

“Great, scan the horizon for me, would you? Tell me what you see.”

After a few moments, he outlines for me what he sees: “Master, there is a group of meatbags assembled beyond the ridge armed with combination melee weapons and blasters. Their heat signature is low. I suspect they have a hostile intent. Would you like me to terminate them for you?”

“No, not on your own. Are they moving?”

“Indeed, master,” HK says, “While they have not seen us yet, they are approaching. Suggest we engage immediately.”

“You’ll be able to satisfy your bloodlust soon enough, HK. Let’s get to the sandcrawler.”

“Objection: Master, I am a droid. I am incapable of bloodlust.”

“You could have fooled me.”

“Explanation: You cannot blame a droid for a desire to be efficient, master.”

“I guess.”

When we get close to the sandcrawler, Carth comes up to me. “Something out there?”

“Yeah,” I say, “Something.”

“There’s a Czerka team here,” Juhani says, “The mining captain says the last attack by the Sand People took out most of the team.”

“They came out of nowhere!” a man says, presumably the mining captain, “Can you handle a blaster? They may attack again at any second.”

“They are, HK saw them over the ridge,” I tell him, “Are you guys fit to fight?”

“I doubt we could hold out on our own against another wave of them.”

“You won’t have to,” I say. Carth pulls out his blasters and checks them, the power packs. “You’ve got two Jedi Guardians, a Republic soldier, and a combat-ready protocol droid here to help.”

The noise comes again, louder, closer. In the shade of the sandcrawler, I can see better. People - at least people-shaped - wearing sand-colored robes, complete with a mask covering the face. About what I’d expect from a race of beings living in the desert. They start out walking, but when they see us, one raises his stick in the air and hoots, and four of them run toward us. Another eight guard the perimeter.

Carth and HK join the miners, firing shots at the Sand People from a distance, while Juhani and I go head to head. She jumps right to one, activates her lightsaber, sparks coming off when it crashes into the gaffi stick. But I want to try something. I want to try talking. I don't want to strike first. Maybe that could make an impression? Cause him to pause?

Nope, that didn't happen. He raises his gaffi stick against me and I activate my lightsaber to meet it. Clash! “Nice to meet you, too,” I say sarcastically. The Sand Person pushes hard against my lightsaber. His form is sloppy, and his footwork unstable. I'm more than willing to grant that the Sand People have a different fighting style than any I've seen before, but that being said there are certain fundamentals to melee combat and this guy doesn't have it. For God’s sake, is this a kid? Is this guy still training, or is he just nervous? “Look,” I say, parrying a blow, “I don't want to kill you, can we just talk about this?” He roars and moves to strike again. A big gesture - I move aside and he stumbles into the sand. “Not up to talking, I see.” He quickly recovers and fires a shot at me from close range. Singes my arm.

Behind me. Duck! Another Sand Person, trying a sneak attack. Fun - two against one. God, I miss my other sword. And stable footing. I hate sand!

HK shoots the first Sand Person in the back. The other Sand Person swings his gaffi and I jump and flip, and I cut off one hand. He screams and stops fighting me. “I'm sorry!” I shout, “I just want to talk!” HK shoots this one, too. While Carth and the miners are focusing on the perimeter and doing a damn fine job, HK seems to be going exclusively for the Sand People on the offensive. Which on the one hand is nice because it takes the pressure off me, but on the other hand, the whole perimeter force would be gone if he would focus. Out of the original eight, only the two on the fringes are left. Which makes sense - Carth is a crack shot but blaster pistols have a limited range, thirty meters at best, these two are further than that.

And coming closer - Juhani is fighting two at once, and the two on the fringes are coming for her. From their stride I can tell these are better warriors than the two HK just gunned down. They don't disturb the sand as much with their steps. And she doesn't even see them coming. I took a lightsaber off those Dark Jedi yesterday - I take a brief moment to find it in my pack and pull it out. And then I jump to the approaching Sand People, striking with the two blades and slicing an arm off one. His partner clashes with the new blade, shining violet light across his mask. “I don't suppose you want to talk, do you?” Can't hurt to ask, can it?

I'm starting to think they don't understand Basic.

The one missing an arm is still swinging, despite the immense pain he must be feeling, but missing a limb throws him off his balance and it doesn't take very long for HK to shoot him. With a single slash, Juhani takes out two she was facing. I take the handle of one lightsaber and crash it over the head of the remaining Sand Person.

His mask comes off.

And in that moment, it's like he forgets all about me. I didn't even get a glimpse at his face. The mask must be more than just protection from the wind and sand - if it wasn't, he wouldn't be putting himself in such a vulnerable position. I take a step back and let him replace the mask. To win now would be cheap and cowardly, and strip him of his dignity. To win now would be… well, no better than a Sith.

Not that he respects me not striking while he's down. In fact, the minute he gets his mask back on the swipes at my legs with his gaffi stick and knocks me down. And as he's standing over me, pointing the firing end of the gaffi at me, I feel like I should regret my decision not to strike when I had the chance, but I don't. Not for a second.

And then a blaster bolt hits him. “Rena!” Carth calls, closer now than he had been, “Are you all right?” He helps me stand up. He smiles at me. “You’ve got sand in your hair, beautiful.”

I shake my head, and the sand flies out. “I'm okay,” I say.

“Query: Master, there was a moment in the combat when you could have struck your opponent,” HK says, “Yet you simply stood there. Was there a reason for your pause?”

“Yeah, I didn't want to win that way. Let's get back to the shade. The sun is killing me.”

“What do you mean?” Juhani asks.

“I've seen enough cultures to know when something is super important to a particular culture,” I say, “If that mask was just to keep sand out of his face, he wouldn't have stopped fighting to grab it.” I shrug. “Maybe it’s religion, maybe it's a family thing, maybe it's an honor thing. I don't know. But I want to talk to these people. Czerka wants me to kill them. I would rather make peace. And disrespecting a part of their culture is the wrong way to do it.”

“Sounds like a noble idea,” Carth says, “but there's one problem with that. If we want to get into their enclave to talk to them, we’re going to have to dress like them, right? Wouldn't taking off their robes disrespect their culture? I mean, do we really have a choice here?”

That's a good point. I didn't think about that. I know, I don't know enough about their culture to make assumptions, but I just don't think the Sand People would take too well to a bunch of outsiders killing their people and then leaving them naked in the desert. Or having outsiders look at them.

Well, here's a thought. “HK,” I say, “You can selectively delete portions of your memory, right?”

“Hesitation: What are you proposing, Master?”

“Nothing too severe,” I reassure him, “If you remove the robes from the Sand People and bring them to us, and then delete the memory of what they looked like under their robes…”

“That sounds like a lot of extra work,” Carth points out.

“Better than starting off on the wrong foot.” I've already apparently pissed these people off by being here, I'd hate to make it worse.

#knights of the old republic #star wars #star wars knights of the old republic #autistic artist #kotor #specs writes stuff #kotor fic #rena visz #oc #fem!revan #ls!revan #carth onasi #juhani #hk-47 #tatooine #fuck czerka

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