#bc i mean! if you were to encounter her in a story she /would/ be a mystery to you

[tvrningout-a]

me: it's fine, i'll just do a lil bullet point bio to give all the important details straight-away

me, a minute later and summoning all the spooky vibes i can muster: i'm gonna write a chapter-style bio once again and hope people read it <3

[tomwaterbabies]

disneyland happenings

featuring varian and hugo. since thats what our costumes were

^(us trying to be very spooky) (there is a lot below btw lol)

someone asking if i (dressed as hugo) was from atlantis. surprisingly this only happened once

we went to kingdom hearts mickey first bc that was gonna be a popular one the rest of the night. the idea of varian in kingdom hearts is definitely really funny. i do not go here im just being honest

OH. new addition to the costume. i had olivia with me as a shoulder friend

met bruno from encanto who commented on her. we talked about our rodent friends he was very nice. he said he brought "all 200" of his rats with him and wanted to help feed them and knows mickey is a big mouse so maybe we could ask him. i said we could just steal some food. varian got mad

went over to see sid from toy story because he seemed like a mean little bitch. he was a mean little bitch. i may have said that his creations could use a little work but thats no reason for him to say "your mouse needs a little work" and "i hope you kept the receipt".... cunt

laughing about how mother gothel was no longer part of the characters to meet. "they killed her forever this time" etc etc

watching the parade and varian almost jumping out of his skin when mother gothel was in the parade. her ghost

we went to this thing called villain's grove which was a bunch of light and effects n stuff through their little forest area. it was mostly a cool immersive experience so most of the footage is on the Lights And Effects Themselves but here's a few of us that look cool lol. gay tunnel (maybe not) (that segment was themed after frollo)

met hans from frozen. we absolutely had no clue he was going to be there it was pretty funny. you may guess that my friend @kristoffs-lullaby (varian cosplayer) is a frozen enjoyer. so we hopped in line to see him

hans asked if varian's alchemy balls were some sort of magic or enchantment and you'll Never guess what varian responded with

though explaining its alchemy and science and all that didnt really make him feel better. he even asked if its something that would be in danger of bringing in an "eternal winter". varian did not like that :)

saw dr. doofenshmirtz (?) i didnt watch that show. he was pretty fun to meet though. i know some people dont like his creepy ass design, but i do, its fun and weird to me. he wanted to collaborate with me and varian since we're scientists. really funny to have him say "i'll have my people call your people". a possible strange message that rapunzel will get later /j

also encountered hades. though our friend @iammisswow was with us and so i had him focus on her since shes a big hercules fan. the visual was hugo getting this scary man's attention to be put on someone else by calling her out. it worked obviously. "oh SHE is a HUGE fan of hercules"

madam mim from sword in the stone didnt really have as big of a crowd so we actually talked with her a pretty good amount. shes SO fun. lots of discussion about magic vs science and how she thinks knowledge is stupid. you can imagine how we of all people felt when she said "KNOWLEDGE is not power, MAGIC is power". she also liked olivia (she thought she was a familiar)

meeting judge doom from roger rabbit was kind of scary LOL. very intimidating man. but his area had vats of chemicals and all that so you can imagine we had fun with that. WE can be trusted. obviously.

nervously just nodding our heads as judge doom tells us to come to him if we have any information regarding where "that rabbit is" (we are not doing that)

and also we saw ernesto de la cruz from coco. we were actually able to catch him right as he started performing which is rad but i dont actually have any interactions to tell u about here it was bad ass though

and, unbeknownst to Hugo (as in i also didnt know about this), varian had a surprise for him. he had a whole... horribly genuine and flustery spiel to say about messing around in his lab and all that and made something for hugo. which was a necklace with a piece of colored glass-like material (teal) in the shape of a heart. hugo handled that whole situation really well (lie)

ANYWAYS ! that's it. i've mentioned before but Disneyland Trips will be retired really soon since I'm not too fond of a lot of their wack shit right now, but wanted to share some of the last bit of enjoyable times to be had there before that happens

[soloroomies]

lifemate (Chapter 12/ Sakusa x f!reader)

summary: the aftermath of your argument with him word count. 3.4k cw. marriage pact au, smut, fluff a/n. hi guys! it's finally the end of the story! thank u for everyone who's been waiting and enjoying this first fic of mine bc I really enjoy writing this, too!<3 see u on my other fics! ♡⸜(˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝

Masterlist

As you slowly regain consciousness, the first sensation that hits you is the dull throbbing in your head. The room is dimly lit, and you squint against the soft light seeping through the curtains. Your mouth is dry, and there’s a sour taste lingering from too much alcohol. Your body feels heavy and sluggish, weighed down by the remnants of the night before. You blink a few times, trying to orient yourself. Fragments of last night’s events start to trickle back. Right. This is Tami’s hotel room.

You hear a sound from the bathroom, then Tami steps out. “Hey, you’re awake! Wait,” she says, grabbing a water bottle from the desk and fetching something from her bag. She hands you the water. “Here, drink this.”

She orders room service for breakfast, then sits next to you and places an ibuprofen on the desk beside you. “After you eat, if your head still hurts, you can take this, okay?” You nod while drinking from the water bottle she gave you. Your head is still throbbing. “Do you have a makeup remover?” you ask. The makeup on your face feels uncomfortable and greasy, and you can sense a breakout looming. Can’t wait to clean this all up.

“Yes. It’s all in the bathroom. There are also some toiletries from the hotel. You can use those,” Tami replies.

“Thank you.” You quickly get up from the bed and head to the bathroom. Removing your makeup, washing your face, and brushing your teeth, you feel a relief within you. Taking a shower would be refreshing, but you remember you didn’t bring any clothes and you don’t want to wear the same dress after showering. So, you decide against it.

When you step out of the bathroom, breakfast has arrived. You and Tami start to eat together. Thank goodness the throbbing in your head begins to subside. You sip on the coffee while zoning out, lost in thought. There’s too much to think about, and your mind feels cluttered with last night’s events and the lingering emotions.

Tami clears her throat and looks at you.

“You,” she begins. 

“What?” you stare at her dumbfounded.

“Do you want to tell me something?” she asks, her eyes searching your face for answers.

You press your lips together, considering whether to tell her or not. Well, she noticed that something’s wrong anyway. 

"I’m sorry for last night. I didn’t mean to be irresponsible like that,” you say, sighing and covering your face. “We were supposed to just have fun.”

Tami looks at you, concern written on her face. “Look. You can tell me anything. I’d be happy to help…” She holds your hand. “Kiyoomi contacted me last night. He’s worried about you.”

Shit. Kiyoomi. Taking a deep breath, you decide to tell her everything. Starting from the moment you got closer to him as a friend, to when you began sleeping together, meeting his family, your encounter with his past hook-up, and the arguments that followed.

Tami listens attentively, commenting occasionally, raging when she hears about what that woman said to you, and frowning when you confess your guilt about ‘potentially’ having romantic feelings towards him.

“Girl,” she sighs, “Don’t say ‘potentially’. You do have feelings for him.”

You groan. “That makes me feel worse, honestly.”

“And why do you have to feel worse?” she asks, confused.

“I just… That complicates everything. How am I supposed to be okay with him being with another girl?” Frustration oozes out of you. “I guess I was okay before with our rules. But now…” You rumple your hair with your hand.

Tami squeezes your shoulder. “Hey… He might return your feelings, y’know?”

“Tam. It’s just… I’ve never seen him like... have 'feelings' with anyone before. I don’t know what’s in me that might change his way.” Tears start to well up in your eyes.

“Don’t say that!” Tami hugs you. “There are tons of reasons,” she mumbles against you. 

Stepping back, she observes your face. “I’ll tell you this honestly. With everything you’ve done, he really might return your feelings.”

“I don’t know, Tam. I feel bad. I– I should’ve controlled my feelings better,” you say, looking away from her.

“No, really. Listen to me.” She looks you dead in the eye. “You can’t avoid him forever, right?”

You shook your head.

"It won't be easier too if you choose to completely let go of your feelings for him. So…" Tami continues. You take a deep breath, preparing yourself for whatever Tami is about to say. “Before you decide anything further like divorcing him,” you widen your eyes at that. That actually is an option. But, for whatever reason that just feels so wrong. “Just tell him how you feel.”

Instantly, you close your eyes and huff. 

“Hey! He knows that you feel weird about something. Maybe he has his own assumptions, too. If you tell him, there’s one possible outcome that you might like.”

“Yeah, but there are other outcomes too,” you counter.

“Even if he doesn’t return your feelings, what’s the worst that might happen? You really think he could be that mean to you?”

At that, you can’t say anything. She’s right.

“This is Kiyoomi you’ve known since high school,” she reminds you.

You remain silent, the weight of the moment pressing down on you. This is Sakusa Kiyoomi—someone many label as blunt and insensitive. But you know him better than that. He has never harbored ill intentions. If anything, the last six months of your marriage have further shown you just how understanding he is, how you can rely on him for so much. Every quiet gesture and every quiet word of reassurance.

“I’m not trying to force you or anything. Just… think about it.”

“No… you’re actually right, Tam,” you say. 

“Wait,” you froze as you remembered something. Something important. Suddenly, you’re on your feet.

“What?!” Tumi hurriedly followed you to get up.

“What time is it?” Urgently, you look for your phone, and find it on the desk beside the bed. It’s fucking dead. You pull your charger from your bag and charge it quickly.

Tami takes her phone, “It’s almost 1.”

“Fuck. His match.” You grab at your hair in frustration.

“Wait, I fucking forgot too! When is it?!”

“It’s at 1pm,” you say with resignation.

“We can still go there! Let’s–”

“Shit! I forgot.”

"What again?!" she looks at you incredulously.

“I’m fucking stupid. His match is at 11am today.” You unlock your phone, seeing his missed calls and texts, and drop to your feet. How in the hell could you forget this? For whatever reason everything seems to be getting worse. 

Tami crouches down beside you and puts her hand on your shoulder. “Hey, I'll take you home. At least you'll be there when he comes back,” she says, helping you up. Then, Tami starts to quickly pack up her things, checking out from the hotel, and you both get in her car.

On the way home, the weight of missing his match settles heavily on your chest. It just further validates that something is wrong. Doubt gnaws at your thoughts, whispering that perhaps you are blowing things out of proportion. 

When you finally reach home, you embrace Tami in a hug. She will return to her town as soon as she drops you.

“Thank you so much, Tam,” you say.

She nods and hugs you back. “I just hope everything turns out fine for you.”

You smile at her. “I’ll definitely keep you updated.”

As soon as you enter the apartment, you realize that Kiyoomi isn’t home yet. Quickly, you get in the shower, washing everything from the night before, trying to calm your mind. Afterward, you head to your room, put on some clothes, and start drying your hair with a towel while checking the news about the match on your phone.

It turns out that MSBY lost. 

However, the good thing about this V. League Division 1 match is that the team who lost will not be eliminated immediately. Every team will have the chance to compete with each other. The standings are ranked by total points, and so far, MSBY is expected to qualify for the playoffs. Their score is quite superior. But, you understand that a loss is a loss and Kiyoomi is very ambitious about this. You’ve even seen how he reacted the last time they lost. Coupled with the little quarrel between you both that you’ve caused, you really feel bad for him. You had decided to confess to him, but seeing the situation now… postponing it seems like a better choice.

You walk out of your room, intending on snacking from the fridge when you notice Kiyoomi’s gym bag in the living room. Shit. It wasn't there earlier. You look closer to confirm it. Why didn’t you hear anything? A sudden panic washes over you as you quickly turn to head back to your room, only to find Kiyoomi standing before you, his expression inscrutable. Is he angry? You wrestle with the dilemma of explaining your absence or consoling him about his match. Frozen in the moment, mouth slightly agape, you struggle to find anything to say to break the silence. Anything.

Suddenly, Kiyoomi runs to you and hugs you tight. Your eyes widen. Out of all the reactions you predicted from him, this is not one of them. Your hands are still in the air, frozen, trying to process his action. He steps back and looks at you in the eye, his hand caressing the side of your hair, eyes exuding warmth and concern. He grabs both of your hands and kisses them. “Please,” you hear him mumble between the skin of your hands. You’re about to ask what he means when he continues, “Please don’t leave me like that.”

You stare at him, feeling guilty about sneaking out and not coming home last night. “I…” you try to explain yourself, but still can’t find your words. He holds your face gently.

“I’m sorry about the other night. I didn’t mean to say anything to hurt you,” Kiyoomi says, gazing intently at you, eyes glistening.

The truth is, Kiyoomi can't seem to think straight about anything other than you. Despite just losing an important match, it feels like a mere afterthought in his mind. He wants to berate himself for his lack of focus during the game, but how can he when your absence is what truly feels like a glaring mistake? This one match may be important, but his urgency lies in returning home to see you. He aches to beg for your forgiveness and release the pent-up feelings he's kept hidden. And now, you're here. In your shared home, the place that used to be his sanctuary, now feels incomplete without you. It's not just a living space—it's a home because you're in it.

You bite your lip, the emotions you’ve been trying so hard to conceal start to spill. “No, Omi. I’m just…” you begin, breaking into tears.

Kiyoomi guides you to the couch, where you both sit face to face. Considering all your options, you decide to confess. Right. Now.

“I want to be honest with you,” you finally muster up the courage to confess, your voice trembling with emotion. “I was jealous. I was jealous of that woman the other night. And I’m sorry if I’m jealous when I’m supposed to allow you to be with anyone you want but…” Tears start to well up in your eyes, the weight of your emotions becoming too much to bear.

Before you can finish your sentence, Kiyoomi silences you with a tender kiss, leaving you bewildered.

"I don't want anyone else but you," he interrupts, his eyes filled with sincerity. He takes your hand, placing it gently against his cheek as he continues, "There's nothing between me and her. It's always been you that I want. Just you."

As his words sink in, you're left speechless, your mind reeling with disbelief.

"I thought I wasn't enough for you. That’s why I initiated the rules," Kiyoomi admits, his vulnerability breaking down the walls between you. You’ve never heard him like this before—he always seemed so sure of himself in everything. “You kept trying to date other people not too long before New Year,” he continues, pain evident in his eyes. “I didn’t want you to feel trapped with me.”

The realization hits you like a ton of bricks. You both had been struggling with the same insecurities, trapped in a web of misunderstandings and doubts. Tears fall from your eyes as you wipe them away. 

"Omi, that's how I feel about you," you finally admit, voicing the unspoken thoughts that have plagued your mind. “I just don’t want to burden you with me as your option.”

“What?” he mumbles in disbelief.

You nod, a soft giggle escaping your lips as you lean in to kiss him.

As you both kiss, what started as a slow, tender embrace gradually intensifies into a passionate exchange. His lips move from yours to your neck, sending shivers of pleasure down your spine. Gasping for breath, you grip his side, silently communicating your desire. Catching the unspoken message in your eyes, he lifts you effortlessly into his arms, carrying you bridal style to his room.

You both continue to kiss with you sitting on his lap, your hands trembling slightly as you undress him. He reciprocates, removing your clothes with a fervor that sends shivers down your spine. His hands find your breasts, kneading them hungrily before his mouth latches onto your sensitive skin. You whimper, your fingers tangling in his hair. "Omi..."

He hums in response, his voice a low, comforting vibration against you. He gently lays you on your back, eyes never leaving yours as he slides your pants and panties down. His fingers slip inside you, each movement deliberate and electrifying. He peppers kisses along your neck. “How do I deserve you?” he mumbles as he earns another moan from you, your back arching off the bed.

“Omi. I want you. Please. Now.”

His gaze is intense as he replies, "Anything you want," before kissing you deeply, his hands swiftly removing his own pants. Kiyoomi is about to grab a condom from his drawer when you stop him.

“No condom,” you whisper, smiling softly at him, not knowing the effect you have on him.

Ensuring you're ready, he slides his fingers into you again, making you gasp. He then begins to stroke himself, positioning at your entrance. "Please, Omi," you babble, barely coherent. As he finally enters you, a harmonious moan escapes both your lips. It always feels so good—you're no stranger to it. His stamina, coupled with his blessed size… he can always make you feel heavenly. But there's something about feeling him with nothing between you, being able to feel him fully, that sends waves of raw emotion crashing over you. You grab his face, pulling him closer until your noses touch.

“Omi, you feel so good.”

“You too, baby. Always so tight and warm,” he murmurs, his voice husky with desire. His eyes lock onto yours, as he increases his rhythm. Each thrust pushes you closer to the edge.

"I'm close, Omi," you say, breathless, your body trembling beneath him.

He sucks his thumb briefly before rubbing your clit with it, your moans escalating. "Ah! Omi!"

"Good, baby," he mumbles, his words punctuated by tender kisses. Your body tightens, and with a final cry, you come hard around him. 

You hold his face while he continues to thrust. This is the first time he feels you raw, and the moment he enters you, he’s afraid he’ll combust right away. Thankfully, he doesn’t. But you just feel so good and look so beautiful beneath him. He can’t believe his luck at being able to love you this way. Love. He feels it prickling on his skin. He’s never been one to cry during sex, but he feels like crying now. 

You caress his hair, your lips finding his neck, and it’s enough to send him over the edge. He pulls out just in time, his release spilling onto your stomach. The two of you lay there, panting and spent, the room filled with the quiet aftermath of your shared intensity.

Kiyoomi lifts you gently, carrying you to the bathroom with him. He cleans your body thoroughly, keeping his touches innocent while kissing you occasionally. You’re still drying your body with a towel as he steps out of the bathroom. 

When you return to his room, you notice he’s changing the bed sheets. He pulls you back onto his bed as he finishes, keeping your body flush against his. It’s funny how he used to maintain such a distance, but now, he can’t keep his hand off of you. 

Kiyoomi looks at you adoringly. “Hey.” His voice is soft, pulling you from your thoughts.

"Hey." You shift your whole body to face him, tangling your legs with his.

He looks at you with a mix of adoration and regret. "I’m sorry for not being clear with my feelings all this time."

“Me too," you admit, your fingers tracing patterns on his chest.

"I guess sometimes I do feel afraid at how fast my feelings escalate with you," he confesses, his voice tinged with vulnerability. "I… I think I love you, ___."

Your eyes widen, the unexpected declaration taking your breath away. He quickly adds, "You don’t have to say it back. I just want to put that out there." He caresses your hair as he gazes at you like you hold the moon.

A tender smile spreads across your face. "I think I love you too, Omi." Realizing how new this is for both of you. He has never felt anything remotely close to this, and neither have you. 

The joy in his eyes are unmistakable. Kiyoomi pulls you closer by the waist and kisses your shoulder. “I’m sorry too for making you upset with what I did with Hiyori,” he mumbles against your skin.

You sigh, the memory doesn’t sting as much now. "I guess it’s alright. I didn’t know better either, choosing to avoid you when I should’ve been honest."

“Are you jealous of the fact that she used to be with me?” he asks, genuinely curious.

“Um. Not exactly. I mean, everyone has their past, right? It’s more about the way she leaned close to you and touched you? It’s just… I know for a fact that you’re really particular about your personal space except with those you’re very close with.”

“Oh. I didn’t realize that,” he says, frowning in disappointment with himself.

"It’s okay, Omi. You used to be close with her before, so you might not have noticed. I was just insecure because I didn’t know how you felt about me." You look away, feeling embarrassed.

He gently holds your chin, turns your face back to his, and kisses you tenderly. "I’m sorry. I’ll be better," he promises, wrapping you in his arms.

Then, out of nowhere, he says, "We should have a honeymoon."

Surprised, you giggle. “Really?”

He hums in agreement. “And restart our wedding night too.”

You look at him incredulously. “How?”

"Maybe you can try on that white lingerie gift first," he suggests, his eyes twinkling.

You gape at him and swat his arm playfully. “What the hell?! You remember that?”

He chuckles, kissing your cheek. “Matter of fact, I really want to see you in it.”

You laugh, shaking your head. “Okay, baby. Tonight,” you agree, kissing his lips.

The next morning, you receive texts from Tami.

Tami: hey   Tami: are u feeling better??   Tami: is everything good?

As you read the messages, Kiyoomi pulls you close, kissing your shoulder from behind.

You: so much better   You: everything’s good   You: thank u sm, Tam. I owe you tons   You: also   You: it’s late but   You: thank u for the wedding gift. he loves it.

Not even a minute later, you receive her replies.

Tami: OMGGGG   Tami: TOLD U!

You giggle at her response. Kiyoomi peeks over your shoulder, smiling at the texts. You put your phone down and turn to him, marveling at how right everything feels. Seeing him in the morning like this is something you’ll never get used to. If you told your high school self about today, she would laugh. There’s no way you could have predicted this outcome. Making a marriage pact with your high school friend and actually doing it, only to find a love you thought you’d never experience. It’s one of the best decisions of your life, no matter how crazy it sounds.

Kiyoomi kisses your neck and looks you in the eye. “So?”

"Hm?" you murmur, still lost in your thoughts.

“Does Maldives sound good for our honeymoon?” he asks.

You lean in, kissing him softly on the lips. "It’s perfect, Omi."

Taglist: @wolffmaiden , @fiannee , @nightlydream , @choizzn , @peachyaeger @crxm-dollx , @marisabel14 , @yunskook, @reimiiko, @megumuro

[chaosandmarigolds]

imma request more bc that adoption one actually sent me to the heavens and back..

so i have a similar idea that i wanna throw out there but have it be Dad!simon riley and foster/adopted!reader. Have like, their interactions when reader has to first meet simon, and simon is able to bond with reader bc hes traumatized too

it can be like a headcannon style or a one shot, whatever idea striked you.

like actually can i be you? like you write SO GOOD so QUICKLY my writers block could NEVER

(I'm actually a Tomato right now I'm blushing so much in my school library what- thank you so much!! your words will live rent-free in my head for the next seven to eight weeks ngl

Ahem ahem I have a new thingy- Adoptive dad Simon! lil blurb (700-1000 words i think) & foster!care reader (i don't think I used gendered pronouns but if I did please remind me)

For the record, you never thought yourself to be a problematic child, sure you were a little unruly and you lived by your own rules but to be honest any person in your situation would be the same. A child whose childhood was ripped from you the second your father grabbed a beer bottle and the rest you preferred to keep locked away under a lock with a key you kept away. So you sat in your social workers office for what you thought was the billionth time in the month, hands mindlessly fiddling with your hoodie string and eyes staring out the window.

Birds. You always wondered what it would be like to be a bird, it must be nice, to be free like one at least- no matter how cliche the thought you enjoyed it.

Only for it to be ripped from you as you hear your named hissed from the workers, Margi's, mouth. With a grumble you turn to look at her from across the oak table, trinkets from her perfect life adorning it, and her perfect little family in a golden frame, staring at you- made you sick.

"Seventh school, seventh! Are you trying to have to move counties again?" She snipped at you, her voice dull as she typed something into her computer.

"Maybe I am."

Margi gives you a look, a frown written across her face, "What does that mean?"

"The Wilsons, Adams, Johnsons, Kievs, they all suck and they were mean."

"They were mean?" She mocked your voice and then scooted her chair to face you fully, "I'm trying here, kid, I'm trying. But you-" she shuttered a laugh as if she just found your mere presence unbearable, "You make it so hard, you're goin to Douglas county."

A look is etched across your face as you take in the news, Douglas was forty miles away, so the news was a bit shocking. "Wha-"

"There is a single man-"

"No."

"Yes. You'll sleep here and he's picking you up in the morning."

--

It was stupid, Price had told him he needed to find purpose in his life and that fostering might fulfill that- well...he didn't realize his captain meant dogs and cats and somehow he had passed to be a foster parent. For reasons that are beyond him. So there he was, four foster kids deep- all adopted within two or so months and then going to their new homes. He wouldn't lie, he didn't like any of them but he was sure to be as kind as possible, as...open as he could (which is close to none) but according to the children he did a great job.

Somehow.

There was a new one, problematic from the file, a story reading a bit too close to his own that he almost didn't want to take it up for the sake of his own mental clarity. However, it was urgent, and there was a need and the solider in him urged him to go on and fulfill it. So that is why he was now standing in the police station at six in the morning an hour away from his home.

A brief conversation with the social worker and a few police officers that had encounters with you, all warning him with the banter of your antics and that if he had any common sense he'd 'slap some sense into you' All of that he just responded with a glare and changing the topic.

Then they brought you out your lively hood packed into a small and tattered black and blue duffle bag and clothes a bit worse for wear, looking exhausted upon all of that. Simon made eye contact with you for a moment, it almost seemed like a stare-down- until the social worker cut in-between you both.

She motions to you as she introduces you to him and she then motions to him, trying to take your bag to hand to him but you had an iron grip, "Mister Riley-"

"Simon." He interjected, giving the worker a look, "Call me Simon."

You bite back a smile at how flustered Margi became by his correction and after a few more warnings of how you like to run away and skip school and everything you had a tendency to do you sit on the bench in the building. A good forty or so minutes passed and you wouldn't lie you were hungry so as soon as 'Simon' came over you chirpped up, following as he had motioned for you to do.

"Could we get some food?"

Simon stayed quiet until you reached the truck, letting you put your duffle bag into the back and then stopping you from getting in the front, checking your height against his chest and then with a breif motion of the hand told you to sit in the back.

Alright. You thought, not a big talker.

"Diner okay?"

"There's a good one down the street-"

Simon hums and grabs his phone from his pocket as he buckles up, holding it back for you to take, "Put it in the gps, yeah?"

A faltering silence as you stared at the phone, which was new, normally your foster parents wouldn't let you touch anything of theirs- much less a piece of technology. An unlocked piece of technology.

--

"Can I get juice?" You ask quietly as you look over the menu, subconsciously looking for the cheapest option.

"Mmhm, what else?"

To that you look up, "An...and pancakes?"

"An' eggs."

"What?"

"An' eggs," he said again, looking up from his menu, "Growin, need protein."

"I don't...like eggs." You see his blonde eyebrows furrow to your words and you mumble on, "Not alone, I like potatoes and eggs but eggs alone make me gag."

"Then get potatoes an' eggs."

Darn, there goes pancakes. So when the waitress comes back over she gets Simon's order and then yours, and you ask for the potatoes and eggs, only for when she left Simon to be staring you down.

"Have you ever been told you're scary?"

"All th' time. Though' you wan' pancakes."

A moment and you blink, "You said to get eggs and potatoes."

"Get al' three."

"But that's expensive."

"Ah, yea- 20 dollar's for a meal tha' gonna make you full an' happy is expensive," He dully replied, and then your expression he did his best to soften his expression, "Kid, is okay, yeah? Don' feel bad."

You sniffle as you see the waitress come over with your juice and his very boring black coffee, "Can I actually pancakes?"

"I'd be offended if you didn't."

(anywaaay that's it! hope you liked it! <33 ps. i love feedback and comments it truly makes my day!

[georgeclarkewifey]

Inconvenience | g. clarke

Chapter 5 - The Bach and Arthur Podcast

Summary: Noa spills all in an eventful episode of her favourite podcast

Word Count: 1.3k

Warnings: swearing (I think that’s all of them? lmk if you think there should be more xxx)

noamurphy

liked by arthurtv, italianbach and 18,938 others

noamurphy Issac wouldn’t smile for the photo :(

but hey, catch me on the Bach and Arthur podcast where I talk about literally anything and everything (sorry Chris)

Comments open

italianbach i look so cool

chrismd10 what do you mean sorry Chris??

⮑ noamurphy guess you’ll have to watch and find out ;)

⮑ chrismd10 Noa…

⮑ noamurphy Christopher…

arthurtv best episode yet id say

⮑ noamurphy yeah bc I was there

⮑ maxbalegde useless hotline when??

⮑ noamurphy 👀

⮑ fan NOA WHAT DOES THIS MEAN????

fan1 the silence from George is LOUD

⮑ fan2 yes!!! Bc why is the entire uk yt scene following her except for him???

⮑ fan3 speculation 👏 means 👏 nothing 👏

⮑ noamurphy fan3 speaking facts

gkbarry_ everyone prepared to get jealous bc I’m meeting her tomorrow

⮑ noamurphy giggling and kicking my feet like a child

⮑ arthurhill can confirm this

⮑ taliamar can I come 🥺👉👈

⮑ gkbarry_ noamurphy odds on making it a London girlies meet up?

⮑ noamurphy let’s do it x

⮑ gkbarry_ freyanightingale consider yourself invited

⮑fan4 this meet up is going to be legendary

“Welcome back to the Bach and Arthur Podcast, where we have a very special guest, please welcome the very cool Noa Murphy!” Arthur introduced, grinning as Noa moved onto the set.

She sat opposite Arthur and Issac, relaxing into the plush sofa. “Hello hello, thanks for having me.”

“You’re very welcome, to be honest I’ve wanted you to come on ever since you moved.” Arthur said.

“What can I say, I’ve got some great stories to tell of our childhood in Jersey.”

“Please tell me you have embarrassing child Arthur stories.” Isaac begged, adjusting the microphone in front of him.

“Oh of course I do.” She replied, grinning mischievously at Arthur, who closed his eyes.

“How am I regretting having you on already?” Arthur asked.

“Maybe you should give yourself a small introduction, so those who are watching who may not know who you are?” Isaac suggested.

Noa nodded, and waved at the camera. “Hi! I’m Noa, I grew up in Jersey with Arthur, and the even more famous Chrismd, and I’m currently working as an architect.”

“God you’re instantly cooler than all of us.” Isaac replied, glancing at Arthur and shaking his head.

“I mean I’ve got a law degree-“

“But you’re not an actual lawyer.”

“But I trained-“

“But you quit two months in.”

Arthur sighed. “Fine.”

“So, growing up in Jersey? What was it like?”

Noa smiled fondly, leaning back in the chair. “Even though it was small, I did really enjoy my childhood ya know? There’s been times where I’ve thought I was a bit hard done by, like missing out on being near London, and all the cool stuff there, but at the same time, as a kid who was fond of the outdoors, being able to run around in fields for hours on end was really good for me.”

“All fine until you encounter a bull.” Arthur added, grinning like a Cheshire Cat.

“I’m sensing a story…” Isaac said, leaning closer to the mic with a smile.

Noa rolled her eyes playfully and looked at Arthur. “Shall I tell the story or do you want to?”

“You’re the guest, all yours.”

Swiping a few stray hairs away from her eyes, Noa smiled fondly and set about telling the story. “So, next to the roads where Arthur, Chris and I lived, there were loads of farmers fields - some had crops in, but the majority of them were grazing pastures for cows.”

“Jersey cows, one of the main things we’re known for.”

“Exactly. And so as kids, we’d run around these fields whenever they were empty, which would be a couple of weeks to a month on rotation. The farmer knew we did this, he didn’t really care so long as we weren’t in with the cows.” Noa said, exchanging knowing smiles with Arthur.

“So one summer, I think I was about 12? So Arthur and Chris were 15,16 maybe, and we’re running around these as we do, with the other kids in the neighbourhood. And it’s getting late, so before we go home, what we would do is we’d go up to the fence within the field, to try and feed the cows, Arthur even had a favourite.”

“He what?”

“Oh my god, Moovis! How could I forget about her!”

“You named a cow, Moovis?” Isaac asked, slowly turning to look at Arthur.

He shrugged. “She was cute, and she liked me, so I thought why not?”

“So we went up to this fence as usual, but for some reason the herd wasn’t in the adjacent field, which we all thought was weird, so we decided to investigate.”

“Hindsight shows that we should never have done that.”

“So we all climb over into this field, and start exploring. I think we got about halfway across when we realised why there weren’t any cows in that field.”

“I’m really scared about what’s going to happen next.”

“There were bulls. No cows because there were about five bulls in the field.”

“Honestly, it was one of the most terrifying moments of my life.” Arthur insisted, nodding furiously. “The fear that went through me was insane. I think I’m still apprehensive to go in fields with cows now after this.”

“So we then have to get out, but we’re trying to creep backwards in the hope that they haven’t seen us, and that we can escape without dying.”

“I’m guessing that something went wrong?” Isaac asked.

“So as we’re backing it towards the fence, this fucking massive bull spots Chris, who’s wearing his bright red Arsenal shirt, and does the normal thing and starts charging. Which prompts the rest of them to start charging us. So, we are all scared to death, sprinting for our lives - I’m pretty sure Kelly, Chris’ sister and Chris were both holding my hands and dragging me along, because eleven year old me could hardly keep up.”

“That sounds deeply traumatic.”

“Trust me, it was.” Arthur said, looking a little pale.

“Then as we get to the fence, I reckon they were about ten metres behind, so we throw ourselves over, and as we tumble over, poor Chris landed headfirst into a cowpat.”

Isaac’s jaw dropped, and slowly formed into a grin as he looked between Noa and Arthur. “You’re kidding.”

“She isn’t.” Arthur confirmed, biting his lip in an attempt to grin too much. “He then started screaming about how he had cow shit in his hair and all over his face.”

“So we did the sympathetic thing and laughed at him, because we were all so high on adrenaline and were just happy to be alive.”

“That might just be the best story that’s been told on the podcast yet.”

“I think I have to agree, poor little ChrisMD.”

“He complained the entire way back, and then to make it even better, we had to hose him down, because his mum didn’t want him coming inside with shit covered hair.” Noa added, grinning. “He stank for a couple of days though, he had to play Sunday league smelling like a cow’s arse.”

————————————•————————————

“So, Noa - the question everyone wants us to ask, are you ever going to do content creation?” Isaac asked, glancing over to Noa, who was happily curled up in the chair, cupping a fresh mug of hot chocolate.

She sighed. “It’s a complicated thing - I’ve obviously got my regular job, to which I am very happy in - my project is going well, which is always a plus.”

“For those who don’t know Noa is a really cool architect.”

“Arthur is exaggerating, I’ve just started at my dream firm and this is my first proper project.”

“But you’ve got a Masters degree, yeah?”

Noa nodded, rolling her eyes at Arthur. “Yes. Distinction in Modern Architecture with a Special Specialisation in Greco-Roman Architecture, is the full title I believe.”

“And it’s from Cambridge.”

“And that.”

“So, vlogging, TikTok? Are we going to see you there in the future?” Isaac questioned, trying to steer the conversation back onto the right track.”

“Right, yeah. I have considered it definitely, seeing as nearly everyone I know is a creator. But I’ve really considered the pros and cons, the biggest factor being that I don’t know how to edit, and I don’t really have it in my budget right now to pay an editor.”

“But if you found something that you were good at would you?” Arthur pressed, exchanging a glance with Isaac. “Because we must admit, we both think you’d make really good kinda micro-vlogs, or just really minimalistic ones.”

“Yeah, like they’re only like, ten, fifteen minutes long and it’s just your entire week, and it’s just you doing your normal routine.”

Noa raised her eyebrows. “You guys genuinely think that people would watch that?”

“Hell yeah! Even if there’s hardly any voice over, and you kinda just have some gentle music over your soft footage almost?” Arthur suggested.

“I mean, I’ll consider it. If people would genuinely watch it then yeah, I would probably start doing something like that.”

“You’d want it to be manageable.”

“Oh for sure, because it’s got to come after my job, and I’d also feel a bit weird if I become that one coworker that does YouTube or TikTok.”

“I mean, that was me. And I was working at a law firm.” Arthur added, trying to convince Noa more.

“Well on that subject, how did you get into architecture? Was it something you were always into?”

Arthur gave Isaac a slightly panicked look - this wasn’t something they had planned to talk about. He glanced at Noa, who didn’t seem too phased about the question.

“I mean, kind of? It was my special interest as a kid, aside from other things, and it was always fostered whenever we’d go on family trips to literally anywhere, because I’d just be walking round a city staring at all the buildings. That’s also how I was nearly run over by a bike as a child.”

“Stepped into the road without looking?”

“Indeed I did. Always look where you’re going kids.” Noa said, pointing down the camera lens that was focused on her. “So yeah, when I was applying for uni I knew that it was what I wanted to do.”

“That’s pretty cool. Would you ever design a house for one of us? You know, if we paid you enough?” Isaac questioned jokingly, raising an eyebrow at her.

Noa huffed, taking a sip of her hot chocolate. “Maybe? It would have to fit the style of what I enjoy designing, but maybe.”

“You hear that Sidemen? You want a new house, get Noa to design it.”

author speaks: hello! I’m back! Sorry for the break in updates, moving out of uni took a lot of my time, therefore hardly any time to write :(

but I’m back now, so we vibin 😎

[sugarcloudsky]

thanks for explaining what is considered short character thoughts!! I really appreciate it :)) sooo uhmmm.. remember when one of affogato cookies disciples mentioned something about a Licorce gods/spirits or something? I don't remember which one it was- but how would the dark cacaoian cookies react to reader being that licorice sea god/spirit? And they, like, turn into stone when sun comes up? Or when they use over the maximum of their powers? Btw by dark cacaoian cookies I mean like the main ones like dark cacao, affogato..yk, right? And maybe sea fairy cookies reaction to readers relationship with them bc I feel like reader and her would be related if they were like a licorice sea god/spirit.. this isnt as short as I thought it would be- preferably seperatly, I hope this counts as a short character thought though because I'm obsessed with this concept.. Anyway, make sure to eat, sleep, and don't overwork yourself! Take care of yourself and take your time!! If this doesn't count as a short character thought then I'm sorry and I can also wait until requests are open again! Or maybe I'm just overthinking this-

nah ur fine dw!!! sorry for taking a bit to get to this!!! ^_^

didnt get to go too crazy with these bc i didnt want them to get too long, but i honestly think this concept is super interesting! if you want a full fic of this concept feel free to send a request when they open up again!

the rest are under the cut bc it got pretty long anyways, lol

———————

dark cacao cookie would be wary of you at first. he already shows no mercy for any of the licorice monsters who dared climb the kingdom’s wall, but now seeing a licorice monster that resembles a cookie was definitely something else. not only that, but he’s once again confused when you see you’re very weak, nor even aggressive. he tends to see you wander around the kingdom carefree at dark, only retreating back to the licorice sea when the sun begins to come back up. for now, he’ll leave you be, but just know he’ll always keep an eye on you.

affogato cookie is as always, intrigued. he would immediately try to think of ways to find out more about you, find out how he could use your powers to his own advantage. he sees you strolling the kingdom at night by your lonesome, and he ends up approaching you. he immediately begins buttering you up as much as you can, complimenting and manipulating you in order to gain your power. once he has you, he acts as if he cares for you; giving you a room with covered windows so the sunlight wouldn’t bother you. but in the end, he truly has only selfish motivations.

your first time meeting caramel arrow cookie wasn’t really what you would want when you’re first introduced to someone. unless you like someone pointing their bow at your throat, then yeah. she keeps you still, the string of the bow pulled back ready to shoot you. she’s completely focused on you, waiting for you to make any kind of movement that could be threatening. but you don’t make any other movements, other than raising your hands up in surrender. she huffs, lowering her bow but keeping her guard up. she decides that the king would know what to do with you.

crunchy chip cookie first encountered you when you were wandering around the snowy forests after dark. he was first alerted when he saw his cream wolves run off barking at movement somewhere deep in the forest, only to find you hiding in a tree while the cream wolves kept barking and scratching at the bark to get to you. he immediately prepares to fight, brandishing his claw hand to show that he’s armed. you swear you mean no harm, that you were just frightened from the barking, but he doesn’t buy your story on bit. better start talking, intruder!

sea fairy cookie is the one kindest to you out of everyone. she treats you as her own family, spending time with you as much as she can. she hides you from the sun, knowing it could injure you and turn your entire body into stone within a matter of seconds whenever you’re exposed to even a little bit of sunlight. because you’re only active during the night time, you’ve come to know and love moonlight cookie as well. these two are like family to you, and even if you come from a darker part of the sea, they still love you equally.

[stackslip]

your post about fma03 are good and i'm stuck thinking about scar for hours at a time again. stories talking about 'revenge' can read really bad to me because a lot use 'this oppressed minority trying to fight state violence is bad' plotline. fma03 was honestly pretty unique in that scar was this tragic hero instead. it's sad, it's clearly difficult for him and he see him struggle, but everything he does was also necessary to prevent further genocide.

YEAH, it's a trope i absolutely loathe and scar in the og manga is its poster boy and everyone and their mom loves to pretend it's super progressive or something lol. there are aspects to scar's manga character i wish i could have enjoyed more were he not constantly scolded by half the cast for being an Evil Murderer when the war criminals' redemption arcs are assumed to be done by now and they're good people we should all root for. bc like. i genuinely LIKE the idea of scar's brother's other arm being about reconstruction. i LIKE the concept of scar holding destruction and rebuilding at once, and being able to one day move on and participate in the rebuilding of ishbal! but it comes with the idea that he is wrong for wanting to destroy amestris's military and the people who've murdered his people in the first place, it comes with him calling himself scum for being a Bad Murderer, it comes with the only other major talking ishbalan character BEING A MEMBER OF AMESTRIS'S MILITARY, UNDER THE COMMAND OF A WOMAN WHO CURSES HER BROTHER OUT FOR NOT HAVING JOINED IN THE GENOCIDE, basically scolding scar in turn for daring to want revenge. lol. i likewise would like the thing between him and mei a lot better if it didn't feel like it didn't play in tropes of "this big brown scary man is actually sweet bc this cute pale skinned girl makes him Soft" which.... i'm not fond of. i like mei and his relationship to her a lot, I Do Not Like The Framing. i do not like what arakawa does with scar in the manga, and this will always, ALWAYS be my biggest contention with fma, my line in the sand that i refuse to back down. so many things i can chalk up to taste, but i'm never not going to argue that scar's treatment in the og manga is absolutely abysmal.

in comparison, the way 03 reframes scar from his very first appearance as someone a lot more vulnerable/human and understandable, how his violence is put into context for what amestris has done to him and how al and him have this direct connection and mutual understanding, down to al flat out saying "if someone killed my brother i'd probably want to burn down the world too".... it's just. really good all around. scar's arc does not revolve around the elrics' plot, but when he does encounter them it's not so ed can scold him for being a murderer--because scar can and does bite back ed for participating in the military in the first place. his encounter with lust, the dynamic between him, his brother and his brother's love and how all three of them have been denied even their very names and identity in the aftermath of the genocide..... unbelievably bleak. how lust and scar likewise are trying to reclaim an identity as specifically Ishbalan in different ways too! lust by remembering what she was made from, going against dante and realizing what has been taken away from her, dying while proclaiming I WAS A WOMAN FROM ISHBAL. and then you have scar, who refuses his past name because he died with his brother and he died with the old ishbal. amestris murdered him along his people. there's no coming back from this. and like.... it's tragic, because it means scar is doomed from the start. he sees himself as a ghost and he is unable to not be one. but he also *chooses* to do something of it. to not simply pursue revenge but to actively stop amestris's military from repeating the genocide in liore! he is STILL enacting violence, he is using ishbal's own old alchemy and usurping amestris's claims so he can turn their own weapon back on them. ishbal was murdered for amestris's principles, and likewise scar is going to destroy as much of the amestrian military as he can in the name of not only avenging ishbal but stopping it from ever happening again! and his plan works. it works, and it's tragic, but also triumphant. it's tragic because scar was a good man.

that's the difference between the treatment of scar in og fma and 03. in the former, scar is the one character who has to Grow Into A Good Person, because it is assumed that no good person should use violence even to defend their people and avenge genocide. because violence is the prerogative of the protagonists, and because it is easy to remove the "bad people" from the premise--you can just excise them as a tumour, and then amestris is no longer a fascist and genocidal hell state. never mind that a sympathetic character (one often touted as a feminist icon ffs) is actively defending her choice to participate in the genocide to the end and derides another for NOT participating in it, but apparently she's fine! but scar has to Learn To Forgive and becoming a good person means settling down and things will magically improve. and scar has to learn this from the elrics, even as they talk down to him and see him in a very negative light, because apparently the two blonde protagonists understand violence better than a survivor of genocide does.

in 03, scar is a good person. or at the very least, he's entirely justified. and he might not be right 100% of the time, but he is from the beginning considered to understand a lot more of the world than the elrics are! he is a tragic hero because he died long ago, and there was no other path for him. and he isn't.... wrong. it's been shown in 03 that ishbalan survivors literally get hunted and displaced wherever they go. they can't rebuild, as long as amestris is as it is! you can't just spout platitudes about how violence is bad, because even if you give up violence it will show up at your door and burn your refugee camp and the only way to counter is meeting it with violence yourself. where ed sacrifices himself at the end for his brother in another tragic hero ending, scar sacrifices himself for not only the memory of his brother but for all of ishbal AND liore to be able to live. and he's right! he's destabilized the military enough that when roy makes his choice and kills bradley, the military has been crippled and is forced to take a step back, and amestris is suddenly on the defensive and no longer able to take on offensive wars. ishbalans and liorites are shown rebuilding in peace, as amestrian soldiers are no longer able to attack them. scar's sacrifice worked. he took on the identity of old ishbal's avenging ghost, and he pushed it to the end. he finally accepted his brother's love and sacrifice, and sacrificed himself in turn--like the elrics do! his last words are words of love. they're tender. in the moment that he kills hundreds of amestrian soldiers, music swells. yes, it's tragic. fma 03 isn't saying that justified violence is all glory and roses, it's still painful--the soldiers' death isn't a fun happy time, but.... they were coming in to murder thousands of liorites, possibly rape some of them like they did rose. their lives, 03 says again and again, are *not* more important than the lives of marginalized people. they've made their choice. violence here was the right call, it was an act of love, and it is framed as such. scar's final act is mirrored by the final act of the protagonists, there too an act of love. scar in 03 is so much more humanized and respected a character than he is in the manga, and regardless of 03's other failings or differences in taste, i will argue that his story in 03 is more relevant and real as ever today as it was during the political context of 2003-04

[horizon-verizon]

If Rhaena gets Sheepstealer then, as far as the book go, that confirms it for me that Nettles really was Daemon’s biological daughter. But in HOTD, instead of bonding with his bastard daughter, Daemon will bond with Rhaena, his trueborn daughter. Laena asking Daemon about their daughters made me realize. Daemon is going to take Rhaena with him, train her in dragonriding arts, and they’ll become closer. She’ll want to step up for her father before they face Aemond and Vhagar, but he sends her away to protect her. Doesn’t make me like the idea more or accept Nettles being cut (because wow, way to just remove one of the only canon black characters IN the original story, and combining two Black women’s stories without understanding how each of them are completely different but both entirely necessary to the story) but as far as just wanting to make a show and not faithfully adapt the book ? Eh. It gets the job done.

rhaenin-time writes in this post's comments about the writers likely making Rhaenyra's later "madeness" into a more shocking spectacle by making her turn against Rhaena & having Rhaenyra turning against Rhaena nonsensical even for the show.

a) IF you are the first adapting a story, the aim should be to tell the original story as it is as best you can without undermining the themes, the plot-time-event sequence, and characterizations...since those make the story. ARE the story. Later adaptations can come in with their alternative storylines, etc. if they wish, but the point of wanting to see the story that you encounter made live....is to see that story made live.

Sometimes you need to make some changes because time constraints, production costs, or you find that you can cut some stuff/add others and the point of an original event from the original has both similar enough WEIGHT and the similar enough MEANING that the audience mostly understands the point of. However, HotD doesn't do these. So I do not see why "as far as just wanting to make a show and not faithfully adapt the book" was supposed to endear or pacify me to such changes? All it looks here is that they think Rhaena and Nettles are interchangeable & the story remains the same....which it does not and it is very obvious why when you read the book.

b) It never made sense for Daemon to treat his daughter, Rhaena, the way he did. That was forced drama. So for him to now have to finally bond with his own daughter from his Black wife only after she has a dragon presents a Daemon who has his come-to-Jesus moment way too late into his arc...he's supposed to come to himself and what he wants in his marriage to Laena.

And no I don't really care abt them having to follow their own bad choices bc of all the costs. Those choices were their own when they had options, therefore we still have the room and right to continue criticizing their later decisions that come from earlier ones. They also decided to be the ones directing this adaptation.

.............................................................................

below is just a reiteration of why I would never approve of a Rhaena-Nettles merge in any adaptation:

c) Rhaena has trouble hatching her egg; after Rhaenyra & Aegon die and Aegon III ascends, Rhaena's egg finally hatches thus representing some sort of hope and new beginnings but she cannot use said dragon to protect her brother as a war machine and thus still relies on her diplomacy and plotting w/Baela and Alyn Velaryon to do so. It also ensures that their house, for longer, out of the direction of other greedy houses like the Hightowers and the Peakes. However, she at least had the privilege to have access to a eggs to one day bond with.

Nettles is a lowborn teen girl with Valyrian ancestry who's enlisted to fight in the actual war, has likely been discriminated against her entire life whether due to skin or class intersected with her gender, & that matters bc she bonds with a dragon the sort of "twist" or surprise in a young girl having a dragon is precisely that they didn't expect a girl who looks like her to be able to...bc yes you do need Valyrian blood for a dragon to want to bond with you. Dragons "choose" their riders, you can't "tame" them. Nettles also coaxed Sheepstealer to bond with her, unlike nearly every other then wannabe-rider during the "Sowing", does it by continuously and patiently offering Sheepstealer sheep and thus establishing herself to the dragon as one interested in caring for them. A promise is made before the bond. [You can read more on Nettles' connection to Dany, dragonriidng, and her fire-goddess cult HERE on danylanzhou/brideoffires' Twitter thread]

Unlike Rhaena, who was put in the Vale for her protection and to disperse their scions to ensure the family/dynasty's survival, Nettles was in the very midst of fighting, was fighting and in the action of the war. But bc of classism and classism triggered by Ulf & Hugh's Betrayals at Tumbleton, she's also subjected to suspicion from Rhaenyra's council and nearly killed, thus propelling her to have to leave and later inspiring a huge fire goddess cult where people in the particular ethnic group must prove their bravery. Nettles and "Sheep"stealer, as I recently learned, also mimic how the first contact b/t Valyrians and dragons might have went--the first Valyrians were sheep herders in Essos.

Rhaena does not have this parallel, which emphasizes Nettles' ancestry, even as both--for all these reasons concerning dragons and bonding--contextualize and stem from Daenerys Stormborn's own dragon/magical arc.

Aside from all of this, Rhaena was raised alongside Rhaenyra's kids and became one of her own children whereas Nettles, though loyal, was never a "daughter" to Rhaenyra and possibly was one (I think she was, biologically) of Daemon's. It makes much more sense for Rhaenyra to want to execute a person who is "stranger" to her than her own stepdaughter she raised from young. Note, if Nettles WAS Daemon's daughter, she wouldn't have known that and bc he dies and Nettles flies off she would never know as much as she never knew that her youngest son, Viserys, was actually alive. So either Rhaenyra sought to kill her husband's daughter who she may have, once, been more amenable to have around (Nettles was 17, while they had been married for much shorter, so he hadn't cheated on her) if she had known but also bc this ties Nettles much closer to the Targs similarly to how Brynden Rivers was politically. I say Brynden Rivers bc he, like Nettles, was actually very loyal.

So the Rhaena-Nettles merging has little logical basis other than them not reading and understanding their stories thematic wise and/or misogynoir. It also has little moral basis.

How else can you explain to me that we have Hugh Hammer as our smallfolk look-in AND sympathized when he and Ulf are responsible for Tumbleton's Sack bc they wanted to be "kings" or high lords & raping at least one woman during war? And not Nettles, the teen girl from the lowest drudges of society, who had to fend for herself for seemingly a very long time and thus observe others to survive (Hugh was at least a blacksmith with a more reliable profession), who raises herself up from her deprived beginnings through a dragon and her own wits/charm?

[ameliora-j]

Aaron Hotchner finally took a page outta Rossi's book and got with a black woman and his life was forever changed. He always felt like there was something missing, something he couldn't quite put his finger on. He talked to Rossi about it one day and he told him that he'd been in his shoes before meeting his second wife. Hotch took it with a grain of salt before a chance encounter had him revisiting the conversation. Everything was different for him from the first conversation and she made everything better for him. Vibes? Leveled up. Music taste? Leveled up. Casual styles? Leveled up. He already had BDE before her, but she took him to a whole new level and he worships the ground she walks on. He dotes on her and is super soft with her, but when it's time to do it (😏) he's rough, but gentle. He's slutted her out a few times though, she didn't know how big of a freak he was until they finally got super comfortable in their sexual relationship. Long story short, he's a whore, but only for his princess 🥰 (sorry that was so long lol)

DO NOT EVER BE SORRY I’VE BEEN FUCKING WAITING FOR THIS ONE

content: spicy (no smut but suggestive), mainly fluff though!!

he’s so so respectful and he honestly didn’t think much would come of it when rossi set him up with you. the both of you went into this blind date thinking that maybe you’d have a new friend or perhaps a hookup but not much else. but the second that aaron hotchner laid eyes on you, he was a goner. you were the most beautiful woman he’d ever set his eyes upon.

he couldn’t help but stare at your lips as you spoke, and he was completely enamored with every single one of your features. he makes sure to tell you that every chance he gets, too. he loves to learn new things about your culture and what all the slang means. you giggle everytime you use an aave term and he gives you a clueless little “what’s that mean?”

he pays for your hair!! sugar daddy!hotch is my favorite hotch! all he asks is that you send him 3 options to choose from and he sends you the money for it. and then when you come home, he greets you with a gentle “can i touch it…?”

teaching him your wash day routine and eventually he becomes so well versed in it that you let him do it when you’re too tired or to lazy too. eventually he starts memorizing how long you go in between wash days and asking if he can do it for you and it quickly becomes his favorite time to spend with you.

helps you take down all of your protective styles and is just so so gentle with it. when you’re cuddling and you’re head is on his chest, you constantly worry that your hair is in his way (when it’s out natural). always self consciously saying “i’m sorry, i know my hair gets in the way and trying to smooth it down.”

he just shushes you and gently grabs your wrist muttering “stop that, it’s beautiful” as he kisses your hair.

THE BDE AND THE STYLE CHANGE ABSOLUTELY. aaron is already a dilf there’s no question. but once you start dating him? he ditches the t-shirts and polos, you get him a nice silver chain that he constantly has on and help him up his shoe game. you have millions and millions of matching pairs of sneakers (paid for by his credit card ofc bc he’ll be damned if he lets you spend a single cent on absolutely anything).

you are first and foremost a strong independent black woman who doesn’t need a man, and aaron absolutely respects that,, but when you’re with him? you’re a spoiled princess and he won’t hear anything else. he’s literally the only one that can both tolerate and fix your attitude.

say you’re used to toxic relationships and arguments, so immediately in a disagreement you start with the push back and the yelling and the attitude. aaron let’s you rant and vent and scream at him and then j looks at you with a raised brow and asks “are you done? cus i’m prepared to have a conversation and work this out when you are sweetheart.”

or or or or smth petty like you’re j annoyed with the whole day and you snap at him? within seconds he squeezing your jaw and glaring down at you asking “who the fuck do you think you’re talking to like that?” you lose the confidence quick as you squeak put a quick apology.

rossi starts to notice the changes in aaron. in his attitude, his style, the way he carries himself. rossi just leans over to him and chuckles out an ‘i told you so.’

aaron makes a mental note to thank david as the two of you are laid in bed, he’s putting your hair up into your bonnet and dragging you to his chest to watch a movie—jack snuggling up between you guys when he finishes up getting ready for bedtime.

aaron hotchner belongs to the black women if you think otherwise smd

[courtingchaos]

random idea that i would like to share with the class (or just you, you lovely human being 💕):

river monster!eddie but reader hasn’t come to see him in a while. she wants to, but she’s hardly had any time to go exploring thanks to her new job (or some other thing that would pull her away for a while… maybe family drama??) frankly, she’s hardly had time to even breathe with all the shit that’s been going on. but eddie doesn’t know that… no, for all he knows she’s been hurt… or killed… or, worst of all, mated by another. what would our favorite river monster do to get his girl back? does he leave the river in search of her, even though that’s horribly dangerous for him to do (maybe he can’t breathe for long out of water?? or maybe just having people see him is dangerous… ya know, cause he’s a monster. fuck it, maybe it’s both)? if so, how does he plan on finding her? does he have a plan or is he just being horribly rash and winging it bc nobody takes my mate away from me or fuck, she could be hurt, she needs me?? does he find her?? or does he stay put? sulking in his lonesome river, all alone without his one source of happiness: his precious sunshine, his sweet landling. does he worry about her? or does he think that she’s abandoned him? if so, is he sad or is he angry? what if she comes back? does he rush to her? embrace her? mate her so that she can never leave him again? or does refuse to see her, to hear her out? does he scare her off as a way to protect his own cold-blooded heart?

I’ve been thinking about this ask since last week when I got it. I started a little drabble response but then it turned into a lot of key story telling aaaaaaaaaaaand…

Yeah. I’m keeping some things close to my chest for this. But let me paint you a couple little pictures instead?

So starting at the top. What would he do to get her back?

Well, he’s used to her being gone for varying periods. I mean she just showed up one day out of the woods and she keeps doing it randomly so he tends to wait her out. At least in the beginning. He swims and he sleeps and he hunts and if he’s lucky he finds an unwitting human he can lure and eat and uh…other things.

This Eddie can speak English, he understands it he’s been around too long to not. Plus he has Wayne. No I won’t be explaining this yet, it’s a plot point. So Wayne assures him multiple times that she’s a human. She has a job. She has a community. She can’t just break away from it and sometimes she can’t be there at the exact same time every day.

Once they’ve been together though it’s almost like he can sense where and how far she is. She’s staying close to the river but he knows when she leaves his perimeter. He knows when she’s on solid, dry land. The first couple of times he fights with himself to not leave because he knows he wouldn’t survive. Wayne’s explained how the world works and Eddie has been on the receiving end of pain from humans before he kills them. He’s aware he’s othered so as much as he would like to run ashore and find her, he’d be dead and unable to protect her.

He’s definitely sulking in his den. He’s collected a lot of things over the years. There’s pieces of trash he’s found in the river that interest him. A radio that she’d gotten working, something someone had with them and lost while they were tubing one summer. He’s found gold teeth in mouths before that he hangs on to because they’re shiny. Rocks and bones and the occasional fossil or geode. He’s got a lock of her hair she’d given him, tied up in a thin piece of grass. There’s little things she’s left that he keeps safe with the radio and he’ll sulk with that.

Sometimes she comes back smelling like so many things. Strange scents he’s never encountered and numerous people and it sets his teeth on edge. He wants to remind her that she should only ever smell like her and him. He knows she’ll be back, she’s already promised it and let him mark her so she knows, she has to, that when she comes back smelling like all the others he’s going to fix that. Maybe he plays a little hiding game when she shows back up. Lays low in the tall grass along the edge to watch her search around. He’ll run a claw over her toes when she gets to close to make her jump. He does like scaring her sometimes, likes the way her heart rate spikes because he can almost taste the sharp scent she gives off.

Getting down to your last few questions I will say at the beginning when they’re becoming acquainted and Wayne is explaining things Eddie is very wary. She smells like a mate but she’s human so what the fuck? She’s never once terrified of him, just wary. She holds her hands out to him like he couldn’t pull her right in and kill her. So he’s standoffish. Doesn’t come fully out of the water for a while. He doesn’t understand who she is and why she smells the way she does and why she makes him care, but that changes very quickly when she willingly gets in his water with him.

I know this went a different way a bit, but again, you asked some real deep questions for me and I don’t want to give a lot away yet. But yeah. Eddie loves her and once he’s claimed her he won’t turn her away for anything.

💚

[avalonauggie]

Re: last reblog bc I don’t want to put my outright criticism on a post full of Bridgerton fans BUT—

there’s accepted norms of a romance novel series that straight up make for bad television, and just because it’s escapist fluff doesn’t mean it should be immune from all analysis.

F’ex: the structure of the seasons is repetitive in a way that makes sense for a book series. Each installment covers a different couple meeting, encountering obstacles and overcoming them to get their HEA. That is what people come to the romance genre FOR.

It’s absolute dogshit for a tv show, though! We have all joked about tv shows being allergic to change, shows where a major development at the end of one season will be returned to the status quo by the end of next season’s premiere, because to resolve the larger story means the show is out of gas.

Romance series run on variations on a theme. Tv series run on keeping the larger story spinning out, and in a lot of romance series there ISNT a larger overarching plot. For the pure fluff escapism value authors/publishers/readers want something they can pick up any installment of and not have trouble following it. These types of books I feel like…just can’t be adapted for tv in the same way bigger grander fantasy epics are.

Netflix made a passable effort and clearly it has a dedicated audience, but the fact is that by season 3 the plot feels repetitive and boring in a way that if wouldn’t, if I were reading a book.

The OTHER problem is, yeah, the efforts at diversity. And I feel like it’s only gotten more glaring as the show has progressed.

I honestly feel like Netflix and Shondaland could have just gone ahead with the colorblind casting in season 1 and not made any mention of it, or leaned on the “it’s escapist fantasy!” angle and who gives a fuck about the pedants on Twitter who’d rage at the altar of Historical Accuracy. I feel like that would have been the braver choice tbh.

But they didn’t do that! They supplied a Watsonian justification for Black nobility in regency England, and making that kind of choice about your worldbuilding raises a shitton of questions that I don’t think they were prepared to answer.

Alix, you may say, it’s not meant to be questioned like that! It’s a sugary cupcake! well I’m sorry but it’s a different experience watching a show vs reading a book, where everything between the covers exists in that little bubble. A show expands the world of the story, there’s colors and fabrics and the narration isn’t just following the MC, there’s a camera capturing the MC, and her friends and family, and the servants in the background, and I can’t NOT think about the things implied by what the camera shows.

So here’s the thing: Bridgerton rests on an ahistorical conspiracy theory that Queen Charlotte had African ancestry, which is problematic on its own, but it takes this assumption and extrapolates it to “hey the king was so in love with his wife that he ENDED RACISM (for some people)(in this specific place)” in order to justify the casting choices of the showrunners.

So yeah I don’t think it’s unreasonable to wonder what Black Queen Charlotte feels about the slaves in the new world who are making her wealth possible so she can have clockwork ballet dancers in her giant wig. Or what Lady Danbury feels, or what Simon Basset feels, or MY GOD what Will Mondrich feels. (The mondrich’s arc in season 3 is honestly the most disappointing because it was legitimately interesting to see the contrast between free Black britons and how their lives touched the bejeweled elites in precarious ways, but no! Their son is a duke or an earl now so hey, they get to wear the fancy clothes and go listen to Vitamin String Quartet with the rest of the characters!)

But none of the Black characters (the ones who are given personalities and are more than tokenized room meat, anyway) seem to have any response to this world other than “we’re very lucky to be here.” And that’s disappointing but hey it’s a romance novel the audience doesn’t want to be bummed out.

But now I have to wonder, what’s the East India company doing in this world? what’s happening that caused the Sharma sisters to come into the story in season 2? Was there a similar anti-racist royal triumph for the Desi nobles at all the balls? For the East Asian nobles? where did they COME from? And what’s it like for their cultures OUTSIDE of England? But bridgerton isn’t interested in exploring any of that, and we just need to forget about it and enjoy the fluff. Right?

Season 3 seems to be leaning into the “hey look, this world is so wonderful that ANYONE can wear fancy dress and find love! Look how diverse it is!” even harder than the previous two installments, which is honestly…worse? I feel like it’s worse.

I can believe the nobleman in the wheelchair, especially since he’s introduced as a sort of lowball training wheels flirt target for Poor Awkward Penelope, and ok he does come back in the balloon ep so it’s not like they put a disabled man in the show for one scene to prove how progressive they are 😑 he’s in TWO scenes, guys! Totally different! But honestly this is the regency, there SHOULD be some fucking…napoleonic war vets around somewhere. It’s not completely unbelievable.

I have GOT to wonder what the fuck is going on with the one Deaf debutante signing her dismay to her mom in BSL that the Queen wasn’t impressed with her curtsy, though! In what world was this girl not left to waste away at the family estate???? How did George and Charlotte’s love conquer racism AND uhhhh longstanding historical attitudes towards disability??? It strains belief. Also she’s only in that one scene so she is ABSOLUTELY just a token. Thanks lady so and so! Hope you find a husband, I fucking guess!

And speaking of finding a husband, here’s the thing that really pisses me off personally about Bridgerton. the more diversity the show puts into each scene and season, the more glaring (and, frankly, insulting) it is that queerness is still demonized in this beautiful fluffy sugary escapist fantasy.

Benedict had one (1) artist friend in season 1 who turned out to be a Secret Homosexual living in Bohemian Debauchery, and two of the prostitutes Colin sleeps with in season 3 share a really tepid nude embrace with off-camera kissing noises when he’s too troubled by the realization of his feelings for Pen to like. Enjoy his threesome he paid for. Hooray.

It’s fucking rotten, really, to be presented with this world that says “everyone is welcome here!” In big glittery begowned spring colors, and then offhand says “not YOU though.” It’s disgusting, and cowardly, and really exemplifies how the people making this show want to have their cake and eat it too, be diverse but not too divisive, and toe the line of mainstream audience acceptability. Yes there’s a lot of steamy sex scenes and female pleasure but in the end, it literally is all in the service of a world where everyone, EVERYONE who’s allowed to be a character, is focused nonstop on finding love in a marriage.

I didn’t know a lot about the Bridgerton books when I started watching season one, and I was pleasantly surprised by the very clearly baby gay sibling Eloise, who chafes at the feminine expectations her family and society puts on her. But then…in the books, she marries a widower and eventually falls in love with him I gueee, and in the show….all of her individual potential is sidelined in favor of her now-rocky friendship with Penelope. And I need to give the show credit, the writing of these storylines about growing pains and female friendship and social ostracism fucking HIT. It’s deeply affecting and done well.

So it’s clear that the show isn’t afraid to shy away from SOME heavy emotional content! Just not the queer kind! Or the kind that questions where the money is coming from. Or the kind that questions whether Francesca needs to find romantic love at all, mom, since she’s clearly happy without it!

I don’t know if I’ll watch the second half of season 3 when it drops. Honestly, the ball scenes, the gossip, all that was done SO well that it left a bad taste in my mouth, just like real middle/high school dances did. I am left feeling like in this beautiful glittering amatonormative world, someone like me would still be too much of a freak to find any happiness, despite how welcoming it purports to be. And that just sucks.

Another quibble I have with season 3 is how vastly it’s expanded the characters it gives plot lines to. Like. Ok. Sure. I have to question why it was ok to do this and divide the screen time away from the main character in the installment when the MC is a fat girl. As opposed to the previous seasons. And I don’t think this was even a conscious decision, likely. BUT it’s a little odd to have the steamy escapist sex romp elements be given less screen time in favor of redeeming Caustic Bully Mean Girl Cressida, you know? Why does Penelope have to share tv real estate when Kate and Daphne didn’t? Kate HAS MORE SEX SCENES IN THIS SEASON THAN PENELOPE????

Last point and this is mostly a joke but HEY at least the overwhelming amount of synthetic fabrics means that England isn’t obsessively focused on destroying India and the Americas in its insatiable hunger for cotton, right?

Right?

Ok anyway Bridgerton is afraid of the questions it raises by the choices it makes, it is a cowardly show attempting to hide all criticism under the veneer of escapist fantasy, and it’s increasingly straining to work as television as the charm of the novels grows stale and repetitive.

[wetcatspellcaster]

The way I GASPED when I saw the notification of a new chapter ❤️❤️❤️

They are so sweet, so awkward, I love them 😭

I loved the subtle smut, that focused more on emotions, making sure everyone is safe, and just oh. It felt so intimate, so gentle, it made me tear up, I was so happy their first sex scene was like that. Hot, but tender. You did such a great job balancing everything. In a work like this, I find sudden burst in very detailed smut a big dissonance, but here it looked perfect. The push and pull, the humor, the fears, all that persisted throughout the whole fic, is still there.

It had been years for them, and a decade of different kind of torture, and they are still... Them. It warmed my heart.

I had never expected a chapter with sex, because you mentioned you were not comfortable writing it, but when I read it. When I read it, let me tell you, it was pure perfection.

I can imagine how nervous it must have been posting this chapter. And it was gorgeous. It was so good. You opened the characters further (he he), you made it feel so domestic after that initial awkwardness between them, and oof.

Also, Rose. I'm ten years younger than her, but oh how I feel her 😂 thank you for showcasing those fears and self-consciousness and those PAINS. I love her so much. I'm so sad that there is only one chapter left, but I'm so glad I got to read this story at all.

Thank you again. I'll go cry over how beautiful those two disasters are.

thank you, beloved anon, I'm glad that you enjoyed it 💖

I said in a previous ask that I don't want to claim the chapter as smut, but I'm pleased it read that way! I didn't expect to write a chapter with sex either, but it just felt like the right call for the story, for the reasons I talk about here. I guess that might be why there's no dissonance, it was just a thing I figured would be in-character and then I wrote it as in-character as I could.

And yeah, I know it's kinda cringe to have to cast mobility spells or change things when they feel weird and not immediately have the best fucking orgasm of your life in this moment that you've built up into this massive deal in your head bc you're nervous and feeling a lot of emotions but... the more I thought about it, the more I realised that the mindblowing sex is like, three rounds in. The first time there's too much pressure.

Anyway, it's less smut and more a scene where we get to see what Rose would be like in a safe space. When the Ascendent tried to label her praise kink, or called her old, she brushed it off bc she didn't allow herself any vulnerability around him. When she nearly fucked him on a throne, she wasn't in her real body with its real weaknesses. All of the things she rejects in the chapter are reminiscent of non-consensual encounters, but that means there's an admission of the parts she enjoyed as well.

I'm was nervous bc it felt more like a character study and um... that's not what I'm reading smut for, I'll be candid. But unfortunately for me my first foray into none fade-to-black happened in the saddest fucking fic I've ever fucking written, so this is what we get lads. There's much hotter porn elsewhere but this is the ending to this particular story.

I'm glad that you enjoyed it, and felt like it fit the tone of the work! I felt like it fit as well. I wouldn't have posted it if I didn't, and I wouldn't have written it just to put some sex in there bc honestly? There are people that can do that job 10,000 x better than me lmfao.

Thank you for messaging ! x

[astralleywright]

how about the rest of the hells? i think laudna, fearne, orym and letters, right? not braius though he's only been here for 6 episodes unless you think that's enough

Chetney sweetie i'm so sorry. here's Chetney

First impression

just ;like. laughter for an hour. that first hour or so after Chet's introduction just one of the funniest moments in the campaign

Impression now

that's peepaw!!! what a wonderfully insane old man. i love him. i'm not sure if Travis even realizes that he made an actually good character

Favorite moment

honestly its probably still him giving the moon box to Orym. one of the first most thoughtful things he did. but also his confrontation with the other toymaker in the Heartmoor

Idea for a story

WE ARE GOING TO POPCON.

Unpopular opinion

HE IS NEVER GOING TO DIE. CHETNEY WILL LIVE FOREVER AND WE WILL GO TO POPCON

Favorite relationship

wood genuinely i tried to answer this and then my answer was like. all of the Hells and also Deanna and FRIDA. the heart of the group fr. the Laudna and Chet bestiesisms specifically have been hitting like crazy recently though

Favorite headcanon

he's not Orym's dad. Orym's dad is an actual guy whose last name is Tarrintel. Chetney is Scanlan's dad

i guess i'll do the rest of em too, while you're here:

ranked in order from least to most controversial

FCG!

First impression

the most adorable, silliest little robit i had ever seen. Sam Reigel you have done it again

Impression now

the most adorable, silliest little robit i had ever seen. Sam Reigel you have done it again -said while crying now

also like. damn. kind of one of the best CR PCs to ever do it

Favorite moment

i'm not original, it's his sacrifice scene. and by that i mean when he and Fearne encounter Otohan in Razora and over their link he tells the others to run, assuming they'll die and Fearne will only be captured. AND THEN THE BANISHMENT. but also his death scene yeah

Idea for a story

I will be haunted by them experiencing Aeor again and Downfall forever

Unpopular opinion

Their following of the Changebringer was in fact them trying to stake their entire identity in another person and have someone to tell them what to do bc they feared their own autonomy! This only really started to change near the end, with his insight check on her and expressing his doubts during the Honesty Trial. but ppl were really committed to defending it as Strictly Good bc they were so desperate for a PC with a simplisticly positive relationship to a god

Favorite relationship

LOVELETTERS... also him and Ashton!! and Deanna and Imogen!!

Favorite headcanon

takes your hand. if FCG had seen Downfall he would have gotten to the speakeasy scene and immediately decided to start playing an instrument. they would have approached Dorian for advice about it and everything. it would have been his new thing, like baking or smoking or having a flesh tongue. i miss them so bad

Fearnie!

First impression

i'm going to be honest with the last name Calloway and only having seen her headshot and not actually watched yet she came across as like. an Old Money girl to me SDFDSFVC

Impression now

well. not that! she's actually god's favorite princess and the interesting girl in the world! i love her and want to study her like a bug and listen to her talk about anything

Favorite moment

Everything post shardgate was so good, and her reviving Orym, but I will be honest with you. It's when she gets high as balls on shrooms in the Gloomed Jungle and talks to a beetle she believes is the Changebringer.

Idea for a story

PLEASE LET HER DO UNSEELIE COURT STUFF AND TAKE GLOAMGUT AND THAT FUCKASS SWORD. praying that this diversion they're about to take is more than just 2 combat encounters and back to Vasselheim

Unpopular opinion

please let her be poly and stop obsessing over putting her in traditional monogamous relationships and tropes

Favorite relationship

it might be her relationship with Nana Morri! but also with Orym and Chet

Favorite headcanon

Every time someone makes her fat in their art an angel gets its wings

Waudna

First impression

Impression now

Favorite moment

I have said multiple times that it is impossible to choose and it has never actually been as impossible to choose as this. Do you have a favorite moment of a sunset. Of a breeze on a warm day. It's when she gives Ashton the doll

Idea for a story

an excerpt of the first few pages of What Doesn't Break is out and it is fucking amazing

Unpopular opinion

swordgate was Laudna's anger and grief over the sword AND her desire for power being taken advantage of by Delilah. both played a role, and that desire for power helped spur her to action, but in the literal order of events that grief and anger came first. jokes aside it was Wrong of Laudna to do that, obviously, i don't think anyone actually disagrees, but to pretend it was solely or originally about power is like. ignoring the literal chronology of events lmao.

Favorite relationship

IMODNA obviously but her relationship with Ashton is a very very close second

Favorite headcanon

she's nonbiney :)

Orym haha

First impression

was extremely disconcerted abt hearing Liam speaking in an American accent as my previous CR watch time was almost exclusively C2. where was my littol german boy.

Impression now

i liked Orym well enough but did not find him a particularly engaging character, especially in comparison to his fellow hells, up until their first trip to Issylra. but by the end of that visit I found him intensely interesting! he was spiraling! he was behaving in clearly flawed ways! Liam was saying things both in and out of game that gave the impression he had ideas and a trajectory for Orym besides just kind of like. being stressed and staying the course! I loved the version of Orym we got in Issylra, I found him fascinating, I was so excited to see where he went from there, and then he just kind of disappeared 😭. and Liam started backtracking or specifically nixing many of the most compelling interpretations of Orym's actions then. and it's like okay. 👍. idk what Liam's got cooking for Orym and it's not over until it's over but rn he is kind of back on that original shelf for me

Favorite moment

"That sounds like a threat Orym" "that's what it was" you will ALWAYS be famous

Idea for a story

I would like to know abt his 6 years of traveling after Will died! where did he go. what did he see

Unpopular opinion

i'm pretty sure every opinion i've ever had about Orym is an unpopular opinion LMAO

Favorite relationship

Oh him and Fearne! And Ashton. And i honestly love his and Chet's dynamic

Favorite headcanon

Alma called him a "stoic" child during the Hells visit to Zephrah and ever since I have loved the idea of Orym having been exactly as serious back then. Serious little baby man.

[ganondoodle]

I only just found your fancomic and art now and I’m really curious as to where Farore, Nayru and Din fit in with your AU, and where Courage fits in with it all too; is the first Link/hero that Hylia chose supposed to be the reincarnation of Courage?

Well, you see, i kinda took the zelda lore and remixed it until it tasted good to me uwu

actual answer is i rewrote the lore .. or put it in a different context so it might be confusing at first and i dont know just how much into detail you want me to explain bc .. theres alot .. like ALOT

to sum it up rly shortly:

in my AU/comic the gods (here a rough sketch i did last time i redesigned them, tho this is only nayru, actually all three are one entity but also not, like three bodies melted together at the hips down)

-each created a world, and once life started to thrive there they chose a mortal to call them to come to them, the gods then killed them and used the mortals spirit to create a deity, not mortal, but no god either, as their servant

"Courage" (not actually their name, just a word to call them since their language is long lost) is the first one to be created, but fails the purpose the gods had intended for them rather quickly; so they abandon them and flood the world until nothing but Courage survives, out of madness/desperation Courage then destroys the ancient statue of the gods and promptly discovers a path to another world through it

and that is the second world, in which "Demise" (also not his actual name) resides, he is the deity of that world and has so far succeeded, although not quite like the gods intended; he was told essentially the same prophecy we hear in the intro of skyward sword (invasion of a monster etc.) this monster is in this case Courage, who attacks Demise, who in turn seals Courage away quite easily, which isnt how the prophecy went, he was supposed to die, which makes him doubt the whole plan and starts intentionally delaying working further on it, so long in fact that Courage, now mishapen (similar to the imprisoned) and mindless, breaks free of the seal Demise then kills them, but loses one of his blade spirits in the fight (he used to have two here in my AU), now that the gods plan is not doable anymore (since Courage is dead) they abandon him and his world alot of stuff happens here, inclusing mortals turning to war, then against him, and him destroying his version of the triforce as he saw it as the source of the conflicts; but in the end his world dies a slow death by drought, just like Courage he destroys the ancient statue of the gods in his world and woop theres a path there

which is Hylias world, so, Demise is taken by wrath and grief as this world was allowed to thrive while his own died seeks to reach the the gods in revenge by all means necessarry but is quickly stopped by Hylia, who instead of sealing him like she was ordered to, spares his life, bc who she encountered was not what she was told, and wishes to know why that is, why the gods would lie to her

this is where the comic itself starts, the first encounter of her and demise is the first chapter :3

it is a theme that courage is very similar to link and demise to ganondorf (tho my hylia not that much to zelda hmmmm) but here it has no ACTUAL connection, and the triforce trio as we know in canon has no actual great lineage, no reincarnation, just mortals manipulated by the gods to make them do their bidding after all three deities revolted against being used as the gods puppets

as you can see, im very bad a summing anything up, i hope this didnt sound too lame or something, there is alot of thought and heart put into this story (i even have the background stories of each deity from before they were deities, even tho it doesnt come up in the comic) and i hope i will keep my motivation and passion for this giant project alive enough to get at least more than one chapter done (i have a bad track record of failed comics, im horribly afraid of abandoning this one too bc i put so much more work and love into it already, i guess it depends on the support from you guys how far i will be able to go qwq)

feel free to ask me anything about it, cant promise to respond right away but i cherish nice asks to a point that i dont want to post answers bc then its gone from my inbox lmao

anyway, its 3 am, goodnight and perhaps ... hopefully this gave you a rough idea of what im going for >o<

[arcann]

43 47 diokos

Thank uuuu 💚❤💚❤

47. crave is here (2.7k words)

I made this one a sequel for the last one I wrote bc I got into the story. It was neat 43. undone (5.3k words)

The language of the Sith was a complicated and ever-changing part of their culture which had, for some mysterious reason, become very simple in the later years. Millennia might have passed and so much of it had become unrecognizable, or so Diokos had heard his entire life.

That mysterious reason had a name and was, in fact, a present player in its mutilation.  Vitiate had tried to suppress any inconveniences, and the way the Sith language was preserved had become one. It should serve the will of only one man, not the people he had subdued. He had proved his omnipotence, so his words were commands and only through his voice would those magnanimous orders be heard.

And what they heard from him was silence.

What could they do with that response?

The powerful hoarded what they could find and kept the rest in the shadows, the ideology of the Sith overshadowing any sense of community they had ever shared, if there was any. 

There should have been one, in a time no one wanted to remember.

There should have been songs that could soothe wounds or alleviate grief, his mother insisted as she cared, or struggled to care for him. Decades ago, crying after a conversation with his grandfather or when she was forced to return to the battlefield on some distant planet she didn’t want to talk about. Diokos couldn’t imagine he was good at giving her any solace, being young enough to still struggle with Basic.

She was as ignorant as he was, back then when he was a toddler and now, when he had been granted the knowledge of his own family, the one she must have known when they lived together in Ziost. That broken and half known system he could never fix on his own.

And it gnawed at him, that he had to live knowing what she really wanted, adopting those urges. He couldn’t forget these longings his mother shared with him, not as he remembers being pressed against her chest, her sobs all around him, wishing for a place where they weren’t stuck, where they wouldn’t be fated to push each other away and wither alone. He recalled wondering how she could say that, when he was using his pudgy arms to make his little body wide enough to hug her, with as much strength as he could muster. Much later, he understood what would have happened had she stayed, but back then he just wished she would calm down and smile at him.

Because stars, it felt good to make her smile again.

—

“I saw your little encounter. You didn’t even try to hide it this time.” Cipher Nine said with amusement as he let his chair twirl under his weight. One of his legs was over the armrest and he was playing with something that looks like a broken antenna. He dropped it on his desk when he heard the heavy doors of his office shut behind the Sith lord. 

“Are you here to admit your guilt?” He reached over to lean on the table and smiled at him, watching expectantly.

“If you saw what happened then I don’t need to tell you that.” Diokos snapped and said nothing else.

“Oh, well…” Rex sighed as he moved back, resting his elbow in the chair. “You know how erratic security cameras are when someone uses the force inside the same room they’re in. The image glitches and there are noises coming from all over as the packaging slowly gives up under your power.” 

His hand tightened into a fist, motioning what to a Sith can only mean one thing. 

Crush. 

“Might have been Arcann though. I can’t say for certain. Maybe he’s the one who owes me a camera.” Rex raises his brows, waiting for Diokos to answer.

“Are you going to make me pay for it?”

“I won’t, if you stop being shy and tell me what our latest recruit told you.”

Diokos sighed as he ordered his ideas one last time.

“He wants to go back to the place where he was imprisoned along with his sister. He told me he could get information from his captors, but I don’t believe it. I think he wants revenge, plain and simple.”

“There’s rarely anything plain about revenge when it comes to you Sith.” Cipher Nine can’t stop himself from commenting, “Last I heard, you formed an entire cult around it.”

Diokos ignored him and continued.

“I assume this isn’t news to you. He couldn’t hide his indignation over not being able to sway you and the others into letting him go.”

“What? Vaylin was the one who came up with that plan.” Rex crooked his head as his crimson eyes shined more than usual. “Fascinating to see so much initiative from someone who fell from grace thanks to our efforts.”

Diokos would never tell him, but he would become unnerving every time he talked like that.  In his eyes there was a chain no one but he could see, and it was always searching for the next link to ensnare someone with it.

Then again, Cipher Nine probably knew how he felt.

“She did? Really?” He felt clumsy just by uttering those words. What a terrible day.

“Really! And I, for one, am quite interested in finding out what her brother will do when he finds himself alone in the place where he was… broken. And humiliated. I can tell you it was much more miserable than what you did to him.” He described this with the tone of someone who just saw his least favorite swoop racer blow up. 

“He also said he wants to go with me.”

“You and him?” Rex replied with levity. “Another wonderful idea, not only does he want to be alone, he wants to be with you.”

“What are you saying? You’ve told me dozens of times not to start fights!” “And you always insist on making me repeat myself.” 

Diokos’ eye twitched.

“Didn’t you just imply that I should attack him?”

“Is that what you thought first? Well then, let me be clear.” His leg left the armrest, and he rearranged himself so he’s sitting correctly in his chair, as any professional would. 

“He can have his, let’s be polite, his mission. And you, as his only support, as he wishes it to be. You can take your ship and your droids.” His tone shifted, finally giving this conversation the seriousness Diokos thought it deserved, and then turning it into the direction he didn’t want it to go. 

“But I will follow, to see you two react as a team. You’ve become a problem worth attending in an operation that cannot be paused.” 

Diokos thought back to how he was told he would be getting an official mission, only to find himself with two weeks of free time at the last minute.

“We’ll see who is the issue, you and your paranoia getting out of control, or him and his delusions of indomitability. And then whoever is wrong will correct himself.”

Diokos felt an “or” incoming, and he waited for it. Instead, Cipher Nine continued.

“Don’t worry, neither of you will notice I’m close. You can treat him as you think he deserves.”

His conclusion was more disheartening than Diokos thought it would be.

“Just like that? You’re giving him free leave?” The wound in his torso ached madly, as if it was reveling in the memories that haunted him.

“No, I’m telling you I have an interest in you working together as an actual team and not two, what, old rivals with a grudge? Whatever you’d call it.” he waved carelessly, annoyed at giving their relationship a second thought, “And I’m implying that I wasn’t the one who told them no.”

“He took five years of my life from me.” Diokos grinded his teeth, trying to stop himself and yet the words kept pouring out. “When I woke up everything I had built was unrecognizable, in shambles. My efforts had all evaporated, as if I hadn’t even tried. And my body– my body–” 

Rex shivered at that comment, almost imperceptibly, and Diokos was surprised to feel his mood darken as his hand uncontrollably reached one of the many scars that adorned his face. He caught himself before he got there and exhaled loudly.

“Finally, I am asking you to think of the big picture, for once in your life. I promise it can become a nice view. Let me worry about the details instead.”

“I don’t want to take care of him.” He replied firmly, despite the knot on his throat.

“But I want to take care of you. And I will achieve that goal through you, as fast as it is possible. So cooperate with me. You’ll see results.”

Diokos swallowed his rage as if it were a burning and sticky liquid. It was somehow easier while seeing Nemore’xiel saddened, to focus on someone else's pain and distract him of his own. He could feel stronger than his brother in battle and calm himself, or at least appear calm.

He didn’t hear the footsteps approaching the office until they rang the bell at the door, asking to be let in.

“Now cooperate with me, after I have been so direct with you.”

One, ten, thirty seconds pass and the doors open, Theron Shan appearing behind them running his hands through a datapad while looking preoccupied. He’s followed by Risha Drayen, who pierced both of them with a look. 

“Huh. I’m not gonna like this, am I?”

Theron’s eyes shot out to his direction, alarmed. Rex ignored her comment.

“I want to propose that we reopen our investigation of the Black Sun Syndicate’s new foothold on Nar Shaddaa. The Lord Wrath has given me a very good plan to start with.” He glanced at Diokos and looked at him expectantly, his crimson eyes shining once more.

“Yes. My plan has several purposes, and it helps that Arcann approached me himself, seeing as he has experience with them. But what I want is to resolve the one problem in my team that I’ve been ignoring for far too long.” He didn’t miss a beat, so he supposed Rex was satisfied.

“Long enough for Team Red to be dismissed in assignments I told you beforehand I was interested in leaving in their hands.” Cipher Nine added with reproach, but not exactly towards him.

 Theron groaned and rubbed his head, not hiding his exhaustion.

“So you took it as an insult and responded immediately. With your favorite sith. How very… you.” 

He and Risha shared a look that Diokos couldn't understand.  

“Well then, let’s hear it.” 

—

He didn’t say much on their way to Nar Shaddaa. Just enough to give Arcann the news that his proposal had been accepted, and to mollify him for their travels. He was evidently surprised, paying attention to his every word but Diokos didn’t stay to take in his final reaction, excusing himself by saying he needed to clarify the final bureaucratic processes, and they would be good to go.

There weren’t any, as the conclusion was that the assignment would be kept under the table. If there were documents to fill in the future, Rex would probably take them off his hands. And if the main problem was truly his paranoia, then he should learn not to worry to an obsessive degree. To not observe Arcann like another predator in his territory.

The Wrath wondered if his travel companion saw the signs. They left along many other ships, as inconspicuously as possible to the space regulators and, once outside Odessen’s atmosphere, took a completely different direction. He detected Blessaire’s ship and thought about reaching her through the force, then rejected the idea entirely. Why? To let her know of his anxiety then fade away in the complete opposite direction? What else could he communicate? Nothing of value to her.

Once they had arrived there was no better choice than to let Arcann lead. Some force users found it overwhelming to manage their powers in places crowded by millions like Nar Shaddaa but almost immediately the fallen emperor found a foothold and his hunt began. Diokos knew he was observant and pragmatic to impressive heights but what he saw continued to awe him.

And he really was trying to stay like that, keeping a positive outlook on what Arcann could do and not following his old impulse of thinking how their skills would compare if the situation turned violent. He thought of giving him praise but quickly decided against it. They weren’t there yet. Coming from him it would sound fake or worse, condescending.

Arcann and Vaylin had been taken to a prison on the edge of the moon’s more urban areas. The destruction caused by the Alliance (or more specifically, the Voidhound’s crew and her mandalorian allies) had allowed many more prisoners to escape, leaving the place mostly abandoned: The Hutts didn’t like little operations outside their notice and the Black Suns had enough insight to know when they had to cut their losses and hide their trail.

So that’s where they started, and worked their way from there. Diokos always had difficulty with machines but Arcann was a perfectly decent slicer. In the dark, he worked with half broken monitors and neglected droids. It even felt a bit too easy for them, which made the Wrath wonder if Cipher Nine or his agents were roaming around somewhere outside their notice, dealing with security protocols to take off the brunt of their job.

Would that also count as underestimating Arcann’s abilities? It did not matter. Soon enough they had a location and the name of the person in charge of that failed operation. 

A Falleen noble that thought he could reap benefits by aiding the incipient syndicate leave the Core Worlds and granting them a stronghold in the center of the galactic underworld. He hadn’t taken his loss well and was hiding on his own pleasure barge, lamenting himself. How could he not? By mere chance he had obtained a trophy invaluable beyond anyone’s belief, the Zakuulan emperor that had tormented the galaxy for five years and his heir as prisoners. Hutts would have paid an unimaginable amount of credits to have those two in their walls. And now his luck had utterly rotten, for he had lost them and was left with an illicit burning base to cut all ties with. And that wouldn’t be the end of it.

From the smoldering fury Diokos could sense more and more clearly under Arcann’s somber facade, it was obvious the nobleman's fate was going to take a turn for the worse. He remembered how Arcann’s prosthetic had been mangled, made to hurt him instead of aiding him, how all the wounds the Wrath had caused in their fight looked much more grim when they met again. And yet he looked at him with so much fury and excitement, like he was about to convince him to restart their fight where they had left it, only to faint moments later.

That same look had been magnified now and oddly enough, Diokos found himself genuinely interested. He hadn’t seen Arcann get his hands dirty like that. His impression was that he didn’t like it, but maybe he was wrong. They hadn’t been in many fights during their own reconnaissance missions, and none of them had personal stakes. He was intrigued to see if he would give in on the violence, when he had such lofty promises of intel a few days ago.

—

There were plenty of assassin droids in that immense luxurious barge, as if the Black Suns had expected a stealth assault, not an open one. The Falleen must have thought the Hutts’ bounty hunters were his most likely enemies and he chose that type of protector specifically for them. They hid in dark corners and roofs where the wealthy guests would not pay them any mind and continue gambling and partying in peace.

There was no reason to disturb them. That’s what Arcann had decided.

The man was practically sealed in his private chambers and even if they covered the fancies of a noble with an overinflated ego, they were also prepared to stop an army, or dissuade most slicers and spies. 

They didn’t need any of that.

With one look and a word, Diokos ordered the guards away after unlocking the durasteel doors. They formed a beeline, ready to spend the night away in other places on the barge. 

Arcann didn’t waste a second and ran, much faster than the Wrath expected him too. Diokos chased after him, only to see the reason for his rush.

The Falleen approached the entrance, alarmed by the noise the door made. He didn’t have time to scream or fight. In a blink he was kneeling in the expensive carpet, clawing at his throat and letting out half formed howls of pain as Arcann extended his metallic arm towards him, force choking him. It didn’t take long before the noises that came from his throat weakened more and more until they completely stopped. Arcann relaxed, and moved his hand away and the man’s torso felt limp over the floor, no longer alive.

He had not given any announcement of who he was, no monologue before attacking, no grandstanding over his victimizer turned victim. No “delusions of indomitability”. Not a single word.

They both had passed. Diokos trusted him throughout the mission and in turn, Arcann hadn’t made a mess looking for revenge, even if he was looking for revenge. The only thing missing was the intel, but he knew Cipher Nine would deal with it even if they found nothing here. The barge was still theirs, or it would be, soon enough. And yet Diokos held his breath as Arcann turned, his eye shining golden, brighter than any of the ornaments in that room now that he was watching him.

“Tell me, what did you see in his mind as he died?” Arcann nodded in the direction of the corpse but didn’t stop looking at the Wrath.

“I didn’t pay attention.” Diokos answers shortly. He was completely concentrated on Arcann. “Let’s be done with this and search for his data.”

Arcann laughed without humor.

“Well, you should have. He was thinking of all the codes we needed to break into computers.”

And to think, he still hoped this would be easy. He covered his mouth with exasperation.

“What do you want, Arcann?”

“Nothing I can ever earn.” The fallen emperor replies as he moves away, his spite finally coming out after months of forced mildness. He steps over the Falleen’s corpse and approaches the closest piece of decor. A glittering disk, ostentatiously decorated, probably Onderonian. The base it was placed over lifted it right in front of Arcann’s face, distorting his mask in the reflection it gave.

“Do you know what they made us swear, after we arrived? And I could finally rise from bed, obviously.”

“I wasn’t there.”

They thought I would kill you if I saw you back then. And they were right. I would have done it.

He suddenly senses a force attack intruding inside his thoughts. 

Arcann was attempting to prod into his mind, trying to peer inside him, as if he was just another one of his victims and not the one who had ruined him. He was ferocious in his attempt, focusing more of his power as he felt the Wrath’s pushback, extending his metallic arm once more.

“Stop.” Diokos orders in the ancient Sith tongue. Immediately Arcann’s prosthetic arm goes limp, the lights of its mechanisms flickering along with the ones in his mask, fighting to stay on. For a second he is about to fall but he catches himself, exhaling loudly and giving him a puzzled look. 

He had caught him by surprise, but he doubted it would work again. 

Diokos swallowed his anger as fast as he could. They were so close. If Arcann wanted to vent, he would hear it. He knew how he paced himself and picked his moves. He had obsessively watched him, waiting for this moment. And now that it was here he would finally, finally get the poison out of the wound breaking his team.

“Tell me what they told you.” 

Wrinkles form around Arcann’s right eye, as if he was snarling behind his mask.

“You will not strive for more in this life. You will be given what you need. You must follow our orders and be at peace with them. It's not an offer, you must accept. Or else.” He throws those memorized words as if they had personally insulted him, then he takes it further.

He beckoned him into his mind, as only two force users could. Diokos had never done that, not with permission. The scene that unveils itself is clearer than what he is used to, not marred by pain or fighting to be hidden again. 

In it, he saw Arcann and Vaylin, surrounded by a dozen Jedi and Sith in a place he could not recognize but clearly inside Odessen’s dark wilderness. He could identify the Barsen’thor and Darth Occlus, alongside their own apprentices. Everyone had their lightsabers on and were watching attentively. The only one who couldn’t wield the force there was Cipher Nine, who guided a recording droid and held a holotransceiver, its image changing from one member of Command to another. Many words were exchanged and by the end the Barsen’thor turned off her lightsaber, her students following in perfect synchrony. She addressed Rex directly, her pose confrontative, but Rex ignored her and said those words Arcann resented him so much for. It was the only thing Arcann allowed him to actually hear. 

Soon it was over, and he was staring once more at Arcann and his fractured reflection in the disk.

“That is…” better than what you deserve. “A very restrictive deal.”

“It is.” Arcann whispers as his eye returns to the disk.

“Yet justified.”

The disk cracks. With a flash, his lightsaber is turned on.

“They have us running around doing chores. We fight pirates who do not matter and gather samples on planets that are further and further away from the Core Worlds and Imperial Space.” He began to stalk the hall, measuring him as if he was planning an attack. “Do you know why?” 

Diokos’ hand twitches, anxious to grab his own weapon, but he doesn’t want to respond like that.

“Do you wish to wage war again?”

“I do not. That was… his…” He doesn’t say the name of the man whose mere thought makes him act like he's in pain, twirling his lightsaber as if he was ready to defend himself against him. “Idea from the beginning. I lost much while I followed him, but I lost even more when I answered your rampages with war.”

“Then you should understand that alliances of convenience can be stretched for a long amount of time, as long as it gets results. What matters is that you become more powerful and rich when you part ways.”

Arcann frowns at that. “And what have you gained in this venture?”

Would he believe that most of his friends in this half empty galaxy were there? That there was nothing left for him to return? That he will loathe the day this is all over? Of course not. He doesn’t want him trying to get inside his brain again.

“I got my revenge for your betrayal.” Diokos says, with the most neutral tone he can muster. “That was enough for me.”

“My betrayal?” Arcann crooks his head, bewildered. ��Tell me, when did I betray you?”

“We were going to strike him down. Not B–, not the Battlemaster or me, us. You weren’t supposed to stab us in the back when you thought we had dealt with your problem.” The anger that tainted his words was directed at himself for being foolish enough to trust. “I imagine if you hadn’t done that, you would still be ruling Zakuul with a fleet powerful enough to make the Empire and the Republic think twice.”

That wasn’t diplomatic at all, but it sends a message that appears to captivate Arcann. He stops glaring at him, his right eye widening.

“I… hadn’t thought about that day in a long time. I didn’t want to.” For just a second, the amber color of his eye abates, turning into something closer to green. “You’re right, I should have joined you instead. I’m glad you see it that way.”

Glad?

“Then put your lightsaber down. We don’t have to fight. Not anymore.”

The scarring in Diokos’ torso itched again, his memories working as a catalyst to dig up his pain as he let himself be observed the only way Arcann had watched him in what seemed like a lifetime ago. Like a threat.

Don’t do it. Don’t.

“But I want to fight you again.”

Arcann is tremendously fast, but Diokos can extract what he’s going to do by sensing his dejection and how it will guide him to choose his next moves. He picks the Makashi form, assuming Diokos will turn on his lightsaber and doesn’t expect him to rush at him unarmed, seizing his wrist and twisting it while punching him in the side of his face that is protected with the mask. Not hard enough to break it, but enough to stun him, and make it hurt.

The fallen emperor starts groaning as Diokos keeps bending his arm so he cannot point the lightsaber in his direction. He feels the thrashing of his telekinetic powers against his, trying to escape, but the Wrath meets his efforts with the same momentum, making every piece of paraphernalia break around them as they clash, neither letting the other overpower him.

“Let. It. Go.” Diokos snarls through his clenched teeth. 

“Why? You’ll never forgive me.”

His lightsaber drops from his hand and he grips the Sith’s arm like a vice, keeping him in place. They’re stuck like this, neither of them being able to move even an inch without ceding the other something. The adrenaline rushes through Diokos’ entire body at the fierce proximity of danger. Arcann is much worse. His pupil is blown, more orange than yellow, just as he looked in his falling flagship, when he thought he could still win.

“You haven’t asked for my forgiveness yet.”

That miniscule effort is an opportunity for Arcann to break out, his metallic arm shooting for his face, not to hit him but to grab his jaw and pull him so they end up eye to eye.

“Can you forgive? I cannot imagine your temper leaving any survivors. None but me.”

Still, he wonders if there are any others. Diokos can see it in his face, his thoughts bare enough to be visible through the force. And it’s also an opening for the Wrath to clasp the metal protecting his neck and pulling him even closer, until the jewels on his lips crash against his mask.

“I have. Long ago, I did.” The vapor of his breath leaves an imprint over the polished metal that disappears when he pauses. 

Arcann doesn’t pull back, his prosthetic arm still holding him close, making small circles with his thumb against his cheek. It’s too warm for a human, becoming sticky with his sweat, and yet he doesn’t move to bruise or hurt him in some other way. His telekinetic assault slowly wanes, letting Diokos guide the pace. Little by little, both of them let their power fade.

“Now, stop being so craven and find out if I can do so again.”

Diokos removes his hand from his neck but Arcann holds him still.

His right arm relaxes itself, leaving it hanging unnervingly close to the wound he left on Diokos’ body, as if he wanted to touch it, despite the armor between them.

“Ask.” Diokos demands, using the Sith language once more. Its effects don’t work on Arcann this time, just as he had assumed. He still presses against his face, brushing himself as if he was an adoring pet. The metal pulls on his skin, uncomfortably so. He looks at Arcann directly in his right eye only to find it closed, as if he was enjoying himself.

Reticently, his hand leaves the Sith’s face, and he slowly moves away, opening his eye and bringing his hand to where his mouth should be behind the mask. Diokos is mortified to notice that he spat there while they were pressed together, but Arcann wipes it off nonchalantly. 

And then, to the Sith’s added chagrin, he kneels, clearing his throat while staring downwards.

“Lord Wra–” Arcann hums and corrects himself. “Diokos Erkserai, I have wronged you, I have taken much from you, I have gravely injured you.” He speaks with a severe tone, the mockery gone from his voice.

“I acknowledge everything. What I have taken from you is irreplaceable. So from now on I will work to help you in your endeavors, protect you as you reach them and revel in your success. No matter how odd or unlikely it is, what you wish to accomplish will be done.” 

Diokos doesn’t remember the last time someone had apologized to him so effusively. Something inside him becomes undone at the novelty of this. 

Maybe it never had happened.

“This is so that one day, if you feel my efforts have been enough, you can forgive me, as it has been my desire for a long time.” He exhales and his body tenses.  “And if that is not possible, then to appease your suffering and make your pains easier to bear moving forward.”

Diokos looks at him in awe, long enough for Arcann to turn his face sideways and peer at him, expecting an answer.

“Stand, please. I don’t want you to kneel.” Arcann laughs at that.

“Oh, I know. But I really wanted to do that too.”

“You just want to… disobey me.” He laughs again as he rises from the floor but does not answer him.

“Was I clear with my intentions? Or do you wish something else from me?”

“No, no. It’s a start, a good start.” He blurts out, trying to keep his astonishment in control. “Thank you.”

The fallen emperor can’t hide his contentment even with his face mostly covered, his right eye softening, finally returning to the pale yellow that was usual of him. And oddly, Diokos feels something similar. He becomes more aware of his body as he calms down. His scars protest with all the tension in his body but no more than usual. He was content with what he had achieved. Maybe thinking back to his past wouldn’t hurt the next time it happened.

Arcann’s words meant something, like a balm for his rancor.

He also notices the mess they left as they fought, most of the decoration turned to pieces and in the middle of the room the corpse of the kingpin still laid on the floor not too far from where they stood, an uncomfortable reminder of why they had gone there.

As if he had sensed Diokos’ mild disgust, Arcann frowned and waved his hand to push the body away with the force, until it was hidden among some fallen curtains, less visible and much farther away from them.

“You promised he had intel worth recovering.” Diokos asked, looking for a new voice to speak with, now that they were back to working. More casual and less stiff. “Was that true?” 

“It is. I will bring it right away.” He rushed deeper into the chambers and Diokos took his time to smile and enjoy the relief that his answer gave him before slowly walking in the same direction.

He didn’t lie.

[marshmallowprotection]

Hii, could you please clarify the timeline for the whole v and rika twin meeting and such? Like their age differences.. and specifics of how it all came together bc if there’s anything that confuses me more than certain dramatizations for this games story, it’s definitely the details of the timeline😭. Like at first Rikas official age was 23.. then it was changed to like I think 28 was calculated in the wiki..? Uhmmm… plus V’s age gap with Saeyoung isn’t even THAT big.. it’s like 5 years, no?? When did these people meet… Ive been a player since 2016, so a lot of dlc’s or secret endings I played have left my memories super fuzzy as I replay this game but omg. It’s so confusing to me ab Rika and V’s ages when they met, how long they’d been together as they ‘rescued’ or attempted to bring salvation to the twins by becoming their guardians without a legal procedure (which was understandable for their case bc of prime minister��� i guess?). They’re made out to be these parent figures to saeyoung and saeran but idk kinda hard when they aren’t that much older.. or maybe it’s more than that and I just can’t really come to terms w how they’re portrayed cuz it’s such an icky feeling knowing how it plays out in the end for them when they entrust these people with their safety and full trust only to later have it crushed 💔💔 UGHH. sorry I kinda made this too long. I read a lot of rants before writing this, haha…. The twins story makes my heart ache a lot.

Rika's age is all the place. Do not try to gauge Rika's age or you will cry yourself to sleep. Her official age in the RFA Package was listed down as twenty-three at the time of her death.

However, there are many factors that lead people to believe she's older and it has everything to do with Rika Behind Story and as most people don't bother to read it, they're not aware of why things appear to make her seem older than what she was officially stated to be at debut.

tldr; CHERITZ RETCONS A LOT.

Rika fights her church and family over Sally when she is sixteen years old. Two years pass and she sees V's debut photography on display in a gallery. He is about seventeen at the time as mentioned. Another year passes and she meets Saeyoung Choi, which means she meets him when she's about nineteen years old and he is twelve years old.

Saeyoung comes to the church at an irregular rate, but she spends her time talking to him and helping him learn about math and other such subjects during this time. We can assume that since Saeyoung left his brother at around the age of fourteen or fifteen, that he had a few years with Rika before she encountered Jihyun Kim in the flesh. She also met with Yoosung for the first time during those years.

Her adoptive mother mentions during this time period that she will throw Rika and Sally out in two years since she won't be obligated to do so after that. The legal age in the Republic of Korea is nineteen, so I'm not quite sure why they would let Rika stay with them behind that since she would've already been an adult here, but hey, as far as I am aware of, she had a kick-out date of twenty-one.

She took Saeyoung to an exhibition that held multiple different works, he ran off to a science showing and Rika ran into Jihyun. That's the start of their partnership since it begins as an artist and model before it becomes romantic.

He takes her in as a model at first, but then their relationship builds into something more than that. She was kicked out after two months of doing work for V, so I can only assume she's turned twenty-one at this point.

He comes to her church to find her after her adoptive mother told him that she'd run off. Rika reveals a lot to him after that, talking to him about her demons, her fears, and more. They grow closer, and during that time, while the details we already know about the two of them dating, they were also trying to help Saeyoung and his brother.

So, if Rika was nineteen when she met Saeyoung and he was twelve, that means there is a seven year age-gap between those two. If V is meant to be seventeen when Rika is eighteen, that means he's about one year younger than she is. Which means, when Rika and V come together to help the twins, she's about twenty-one years old, give or take, and Jihyun is twenty, give or take. Which means that Saeyoung is fourteen.

He goes into the Agency at around the age of fourteen or fifteen. We know that he does some jobs on the side before he's pulled into that damn agency, so I work with the assumption that he's fifteen by the time they yank him overseas to study computer science.

Jihyun mentions in a phone call during Saeran's After Ending that he met someone who worked for the agency who convinced him that it would be safe for Saeyoung in the agency... and he believed it. That's tough to think about, you know? As someone who started this game back in 2016 when I was younger than Yoosung by a year, I just can't imagine being in Rika or V's position.

Yes, you're an adult at twenty and twenty-one but my God, there are so many experiences you've got ahead of you in your early twenties that by the time you get to the other end, you see that time as being a tall child. The me at those ages would not know how to help those twins, much less myself.

If Saeyoung is 21 in Casual and Deep Story, that means Rika would've been 28.

Where this can get perplexing is the fact that Jihyun is supposed to 26, which is two years younger than Rika, while some of this math is implied to state that there should only be a year between the two of them.