#but I can’t tell anyone because it’s so goddamn specific

[ratislatis]

just realized jesus christ probably canonically exists in one of my stories. live laugh love everybody

[mediumgayitalian]

“Oh, come on, there’s just —” Will blows an errant curl from out of his eyes, cheeks red with exertion, balancing nimbly on his feet to put both hands on his hips. “There’s no way, Nico.”

Nico, not blessed with such balance, has to hold all footholds with all limbs, staring warily at the lava wall’s snake holes.

“What? I’m just not as good as you.”

Will flops his right arm outwards, narrowly avoiding smacking it against the rock. “But you are!”

Nico shifts his wary gaze from the snake holes to Will’s rope harness. Is it tight enough? It better be tight enough. Will is putting a lot of faith in it, right now.

“You scaled those cliffs in — in the place —” he trips, still, over the pit, on the odd time he mentions it, and it always makes Nico wince — “like it was nothing! And whenever Percy visits and challenges you you’re suddenly the lava wall expert!” He turns stern blue eyes to face Nico’s head-on. “Not buying it, di Angelo!”

A gush of lava forces him to resume climbing, but there’s an aggression to his movements — a specific, stiff, curated aggression, that Nico has learned means anxiety in people known as William Andrew Solace. That, and coupled with the rapid muttering which, in between the roar of molten stone, Nico believes is a a repetition of “dumbass” “always tryna act a goddamn fool” and “I’m gonna kill him before he sends me into cardiac arrest again”, interspersed with random swears in English, Latin, Ancient Greek, and also — gods — Klingon.

“Will.”

Will ignores him, scampering the last few feet up the wall and slapping the top before relaying down. Nico sighs, following him (albeit significantly slower).

“Will.”

“You’re hiding something from me.” He practically rips the harness off his body — do not think about that do not think about that do not think about that — and shoves it on the hook so hard it damn near snaps off. The look he levels in Nico’s direction practically turns him to stone, it’s so frigid, and he has to resist a shiver. “I can tell.”

It takes a good amount of pushing to make Will all testy like this. Sure, his buttons are easy to push, but most of that is for show. He likes to be dramatic. (Especially because he knows Nico will indulge him, more than anyone else ever has. He relishes in it, Nico thinks; he likes that Nico will watch his productions. An Apollo kid through and through.) He’s not usually one to show his genuine frustration.

But, hoo, boy, when he is frustrated.

Nico has a bad, bad habit of making it worse.

(As if it’s his fault that Will’s hot when he’s mad.)

“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Nico says, forcibly lightly. He sticks his hand out defiantly. “Check me, why don’t you? Not hiding anything.”

He really isn’t. No injuries, no illness, hell, he’s not even tired. Had a full three meals and everything. Even his perpetually achey joints aren’t bad today.

All of this, obviously, is communicated when Will touches him, squinting suspiciously at their joined hands.

“You’re heart rate is high,” he mutters petulantly.

Nico looks at him patiently. “That’s ‘cause my smokeshow boyfriend is holding my hand.”

Grumpy as he’s trying to be, his ears redden. A smile twitches at the corner of his mouth.

“Shut up.”

Nico grins, pulling his hand up to his mouth and pressing a kiss to the knuckles.

“No.”

“Whatever,” Will says, snatching his hand back. His smile spreads widely across his face, now, and he looks away, as pleased as he is exasperated. “You’re still being a weirdo. I should not be so far ahead of you on the wall, Neeks.”

Success — back to nicknames. Crisis averted.

“Have you considered that you’re the camp-wide record holder for a reason, you spider monkey?”

“Still!”

“Yeah, yeah.” Nico gets up on his tiptoes, pressing a lingering kiss to the bridge of his freckled nose. “Stop worrying about me, Solace. I’m fine. Burn off some steam, I’ll watch.”

Will huffs. “Fine. But I’ll find out, y’hear me? Truth can’t hide from me for long.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

He watches as Will suits back up, helping him with his more complicated straps (because Nico was raised to be a gentleman, obviously, why else) and shooing him away when he opens his mouth for more interrogations. He switches to sticking out his tongue, and after a moment of hesitation, bounds back over to his first true love — being a big nerdy jock dork.

Nico settles on the grass several feet away from the wall, pretending to clean his sword. After a few minutes, he hears footsteps, and two people sit next to him on either side.

“So,” says Lou Ellen, ignoring Nico’s suspicious look as she tosses a glowing ball of something around, “how come you’re not climbing?”

Nico shrugs. “Only so many times you can climb before it gets boring.”

On his other side, Cecil makes a loud buzzer sound.

“Nope! Wrong answer. Try again.”

Nico is a dignified grownup who refuses to stoop down to Cecil’s level by responding. Instead, he reaches over and pokes him in his ridiculously sensitive ribs, hard, sending him sprawling with a screech.

“Shut up,” he says mildly, as his friend flails. “I’m trying to be a supportive boyfriend, and I can’t do that with all your whining.”

Will has, in the ten minutes since he started, made it halfway up the wall. He seems to have it programmed to the Super Extra Mega Evil Insane mode that the Athena and Ares kids invented just for him, since he smoked all the other levels. He dodges a shot of lava with a laugh, throwing himself to the side and hanging on with three fingers and one scuffed sneaker poised on the tiniest sliver of rock. His attention is broken when Lou Ellen sticks her face right in Nico’s field of vision, tracing Nico’s eyeline with narrowed eyes.

“Ah,” she nods knowingly. “You’re staring at his ass.”

Nico falters, damn near slicing his own fingers off. “No idea what you’re talking about,” he says blithely. He gestures without looking at his sword. “I’m busy, see?”

She scoffs. “Real busy. That’s why you almost just did emergency surgery on yourself.”

“Exactly.”

Will pushes up a foot, shifting his hips and launching himself upwards. He makes a little shout of victory, plastering himself to the wall to keep balance, every muscle tensed.

From his place on the floor, Cecil makes an appreciative noise. “He does have a nice ass. Can’t blame you for looking.”

Nico frowns. “Hey. Stop objectifying my boyfriend.” He reaches out and smacks a hand over Cecil’s eyes. “That’s my job.”

“You guys are ridiculous.”

Nico reaches over and puts a hand over her eyes, too, ‘cause there’s no missing where they’re pointed.

“Shut up or I’ll literally put shadows into your retinae and blind you forever,” Nico threatens. (Is this a thing he can do? No. Do his friends know this? Also no.)

“You’re a dictator!” Cecil protests.

“Depriving us of basic human rights!” Lou Ellen agrees.

Nico shrugs. He glances back up the the climbing wall, where he has a very perfect view — and a great reason to never even try to climb faster than Will does. He grins.

“Too bad for you guys.”

[makelemonade]

Both the parts for people finding out we're dating the characters are so good! Can I please request you to include Wriothesley in the next part if you're writing it?

how people find out you’re dating them

Wriothesley, Capitano

Wriothesley

ONCE AGAIN THESE GODDAMN MELUSINES

Most specifically SIGEWINNE.

she’s such a cutie patootie. you just wanna eat her up whenever you see her! Sigewinne, the adorableness she is, is not the smartest.

Whenever you come down so often to come visit Wriothesely, she comments on how you are such a good friend to always keep him company! and you just can’t bear to explain to her that is not the case!

This goes on for A MONTH. A GODDAMN MONTH and she has not figured it out.

Even when she bursts into his office to find you maybe massaging his back, arms, hugging him, holding him- she is completely OBLIVIOUS to the point Wriothesly wants to test out kissing you in front of her.

However, her obliviousness comes to a stop one day and for the stupidest yet funniest reason;

He’s not drinking his tea.

She’s shocked. Like jaw dropped, absolutely still shocked. She’s constantly trying to get him to drink or EAT anything other than tea so when she sees him with a MILKSHAKE?! A FUCKING MILKSHAKE.

She’s ready to lose her shit.
and then she sees YOU with the opposite flavour milkshake and she immediately knows and screams it out for the ENTIRE prison to hear.

A prisoner comes in injured; “Have you heard Wriothesly and Y/N are together?!”

On her next vacation, she’s running to Neuvillette, Furina, Clorinde- EVERYONE.

Well, it was a month of peace.

Capitano

It’s funny because he genuinely isn’t even trying to hide it from the Harbingers.

He doesn’t not tell them because he’s worried for your safety- he’s the fourth fucking harbinger he will GLADLY beat anyone’s ass for you even if it means it’s his own coworkers.

The man just doesn’t talk. That’s literally why no one knows. Like yeah, he’ll murmur a few words every now and then but like, he doesn’t see a reason in bringing something up if someone doesn’t mention anything related so he stays quiet.

He does talk a bit more though, and he’s willing to actually sit with the harbingers whenever they sometimes hang out.

It’s weirding them out.

The weirdest thing though,

WEIRDEST.

Is when he speaks to Childe.

Even Childe is absolutely shocked- like what do you mean the guy he’s been like practically simping over fight wise is actually soeaking to him?!?!!!

They have to ask Pierro if he’s sick, and even Pierro doesn’t know and Pierro is the ONLY one capitano talks.

They literally find out from YOU.

You walked into the castle once, being escorted by a guard who is quick to leave once he’s finally let you reach the insides of the castle.

“Sorry to disturb,” You spoke nervously, somehow ending up in some sort of lounge room with the Harbingers. “I’ve brought lunch for my…boyfriend? Uh, Capitano? Do you know where I could find him?”

“Yeah, down the hall, first room on the left.” Arlecchino murmurs, reading through the latest Snezhnaya newspapers.

You smile at her, although she doesn’t see and everyone just returns back to normal.

Until they all realize WHO the hell are you and BOYFRIEND?!?

They all give each other a look before they are RUNNING to you, ready to ask questions and capitano is shocked when suddenly all the Harbingers are in his office and he knew he wouldn’t be able to stop them from questioning you on everything.

He likes the way you laugh at them all- it’s cute. He should bring you more often.

follow me on Twitter!; @II_makelemonade

[livwritesstuff]

i’ve been very quiet so srry - my week started with my annual performance review (which went well) and ended with an emergency surgery (also went well) so…a lot going on to say the least

this is a deleted scene from the first chapter of plant a seed

When Robin called, Steve and Eddie were in the phase of newborn parenthood where they froze every single time the phone rang (because said newborn was napping more often than not and when she was, there was a 50% chance minimum the phone would wake her up).

So when Robin called and the ringing of the phone broke the otherwise peaceful silence, Steve froze and he waited. When the baby didn't wake up, Steve exhaled a sigh of relief and answered the call.

"This is Steve."

"Hey Steve-o!"

Steve immediately recognized the voice as Robin's – of course he did, even if he hadn't heard it since she and Nancy left for a work trip in Japan a little over a month ago.

“Oh shit,” Steve said, because this means that Robin and Nancy are finally home, finally back in their Boston apartment fifteen minutes away from his and Eddie's in Cambridge instead of the opposite side of the entire world, “You’re home!”

“Yep,” Robin replied, popping the P, “That plane was a million degrees, I’m pretty sure. No more August flights if I have any say in it. Anyways – wanted to let you know we made it back unscathed. What’s new with you guys?”

“Uh…” Steve began, not totally sure where to start, because Robin didn't know about the baby he and Eddie had been placed with two weeks ago and she certainly didn't know that they're going to adopt her (because they'd landed on that decision that very day – about two hours ago, to be specific), “Well–”

“Hey, do you still have those placements?" Robin interrupted, "The kids who like to read the Goosebumps books?”

“Oh,” Steve blinked, “No. They went back with their mom a couple days after you left.”

“Damn. Been a while. Forgot this trip was longer than usual – wait, so are you between placements now, then? Hey, we should finally make that trip to P-Town!”

"Might need a raincheck on that," Steve said with a laugh, because at the moment a trip to the goddamn grocery store required at least a day's worth of planning, "We've got another placement right now – a newborn. We've had her for, uh, for just under two weeks, pretty sure."

“Shit, a newborn?" Robin repeated.

Steve faintly heard Nancy's voice, though he couldn't make out exactly what she was saying. He listened as Robin recounted to her what he'd just said, then started to laugh.

"Nancy just said that if she misses out on a chance to hold a new baby, she'll kill you," Robin told him, "Any idea when she might move on?”

Steve paused for a second. He and Eddie had decided earlier that they wouldn’t be telling anyone about the baby until the adoption was finalized, but…it’s Robin. 

He doesn’t think he’s ever kept a secret from Robin before, certainly not something this big and certainly not for very long.

He has to tell her.

“We’re, uh, we’re actually adopting her.”

Robin was silent.

Then –

“Holy shit – Steve.”

And then –

“I’m coming over right now. Immediately. Wait–” Robin stopped, “Damn, I can’t be a dick and come over unannounced anymore, can I? Because you guys have a baby. A baby. And she’s gonna be yours? What the fuck? Wait, let me start over.”

Robin paused long enough to take a deep breath.

“Steve Harrington – my best friend who’s finally fulfilling a lifelong dream of becoming a dad – when will you allow us to come and be formally introduced to our niece?”

Truth be told, Steve wouldn’t say no to a visit from Robin and Nancy that day (especially after the our niece comment), but their case worker had just started faxing over all the paperwork to get the ball rolling on the adoption process and Steve has a feeling that he might catch Eddie trying to fill that shit out as it came out of the machine so tonight they might be a little occupied.

"Tomorrow?" he suggested.

"Morning?" Robin added.

Steve laughed, "Sure. Tomorrow morning."

"Bright and early, dad. Holy fuck, I can't believe you're a dad."

"You can't?"

"No, I totally can."

[mockerycrow]

Undercover III (Soap x GN!Reader)

undercover series masterlist — previous | next

Summary: After your undercover op has been exposed, Soap has to record an interview of your account of everything, along with any sensitive information you’ve learned. You begin to sort through memories that drag you into a dark hole.

A/N: there is usage of scottish slang, such as bonnie. bonnie is a gender neutral term, i know it’s often used in fem! fics, but please note it’s not feminine specific. also, thank you so much for the love on this!! also i’m lowkey making this a slow burn on accident, my bad—

[WARNINGS: angst, flashbacks, panic attack, very vague unintentional self-harm, violence, vague descriptions of corpses - gore.]

“It is not the bruises on the body that hurt. It is the wounds of the heart and the scars on the mind.” -Aisha Mirza.

I keep my eyes on the pillow that’s across my torso and lap, feeling like if I move my eyes to anywhere else, my heart will fucking crawl out of my goddamn throat. I hear Soap shift in his seat ever so slightly, and I think he’s leaning forward because his breathing sounds ever so slightly closer than before. “We had six weeks to prepare our new lives, six weeks to adjust to our government assigned personalities, six weeks to move some personal belongings to different areas of Russia, six weeks to brush up on our Russian, as well as our Ukrainian.” My voice is quiet because I’m afraid if I talk any louder, it’ll tremble.

I have a hard time swallowing whatever spit has accumulated in my mouth, the entrance to my throat fluttering. “I.. I got on the next flight to Russia, said goodbye to my old unit. In the United States, I temporarily, well.. no longer existed. They had to make it look like I never existed in the first place.” I pause for a moment, remembering how much of a pain in the ass it will be to officially exist as a U.S. citizen again after living as a Russian one for a couple of years.

“I was no longer [Name] [Last Name], I was Zhenya Antonenko.” I take a deep breath and decide to risk it; I look over at Soap and he looks.. intrigued, troubled even. His finger twitches over the pause button before deciding against pressing it. “Was’it difficult to get into Makarov’s organization?” He asks, his left eyebrow eyebrow furrowing inwards like he’s hearing something he doesn’t want to—or maybe he feels bad. God. The last thing I want from anyone is pity. “A bit,” I glance at my fingernails to keep myself preoccupied. “He did, heh, ‘loyalty tests’.” My tone is a sneer, and my gut tightens at the memory of what I had to do to show my loyalty to the cause. There’s a heaviness to the air, the tension so thick you would need a meat cleaver and hack at it a couple of times to get through it. Soap is quiet and I reluctantly make eye contact with him, and we both know the unsaid question. ‘What did I do?’ I scan his face, his posture, his body language. Anything to tell me what he’s thinking.

Soap is certainly.. conflicted, like he knows he needs this information but he’s uncertain if it’s right to even ask. I close my eyes for a moment to regain my composure, but that was surely a big fuckin’ mistake because as soon as my eyelids closed, I see the blood of an innocent person spilled, dripping onto the floor, painting a horrifying picture behind my eyes of the different bodies—the different families I’ve torn apart and mangled. I jolt and my eyelids snap open as my heart skips a beat and settles into an unsteady rhythm underneath my rib cage, my heart monitor following along to the inconsistency. Fuck, fuck, why can I smell it?— that mortifying, dreadful smell of metal, licking at my nostrils. I phase out the beeping of the machines, fuck, my chest—it hurts, can’t breathe, I’m sorry, I had to, don’t you fucking understand?? I had to kill them, the world’s fate was on my fucking shoulders!!-

I grab at my chest as my lips part for air, my need for air following into an unsettling similar, inconsistent rhythm like my heart rate. Fuck. I have the sudden need to bolt, so I yank my handcuffed hand, and I barely feel the sharp pain of the metal digging into my palmaris longus muscle, the way it’s slicing through my skin, fucking unlock it, please, just—“Let me gO!”

Warm and callused hands on me—don’t touch me—I think I yell, but I can’t tell, numb, numbnumbnumbnumb—gunpowder, shit-

I form a fist with my free hand and I use all of the strength I can muster—I don’t punch, but I use that strength in my forearm to push them away, hopefully making them stagger. Just fucking leave me alone, please—!

“…amin’ bloody hell, bonnie, breathe!”

Soap’s voice manages to cut through the sheer panic that’s overflowing everywhere around me—his hands are on my face?? Why is he touching my face, don’t fUcking touch my—One of his hands leaves my face and returns with something fucking ICE COLD, sending a shock through my system. “wHa-“ I cough and try to push him away again but I hear a muffled, soft apology before the cold thing moves from my face to the back of my neck. The shock.. feels like my system got reset in a way. I blink rapidly as I pant, my vision flooding back to me, along with my hearing. I have this fucking ugly, heavy feeling deep in my stomach.

My eyes remain unfocused as I look at the man next to me and his proximity makes me jolt; Soap is right up next to my bed but on the other side this time, one hand holding my handcuffed arm and the other holding.. I think an ice cold hand towel? His face comes in and out of focus, and I catch glimpses of worry and concern. “Back wit’me now?” Soap’s voice is a low, raspy murmur as he speaks, like I’ll bolt any second. I nod and shakily take a deep breath to control my breathing completely, and he nods in response. “Good, there ya are.. Take another one, yeah?” I follow his instructions and repeat my last deep breath, the oxygen flooding my lungs, flooding my veins.. Now that my chest no longer aches, or at least ache in the way it does when you have a panic attack there’s this.. stinging pain lining my wrist. I wince with a hiss and look down and the metal ring of the cuff around my wrist is lined with blood, dripping down onto the blanket. “Goddamnit.” I whisper, my voice hoarse. I go to turn my wrist to see if I’m able to view how much I fucked up my skin and joint, but Soap’s hold on my arm tightens and he makes a quick tsk sound. “Don’t’cha move that, maybe it’s a better idea t’let the nurse take a look.” I mumble “maybe” and I try to rest my wrist, but I can’t. No matter what I do, it fucking hurts. Soap stands up which makes me look at him and he reaches over to a button pad near my pillows and presses the big red button, a soft alarm going off down the hall. He situates himself back in his seat.

I make eye contact with him and his gaze is so.. intense. So many questions, his eyes searching mine for.. something. I don’t know what that ‘something’ is though, and it’s bothering me. “We can continue the report tomorrow,” Soap’s hand gently lets go of my arm—which I completely forgot he was holding—but he keeps his other hand holding the small hand towel to the back of my neck to keep me calm and grounded. “I honestly dinnae ken ta’reason why they’ve decided to do this shite so early.” I blink as I try to make out what he’s saying because his accent is thick, but luckily I’ve spent some time around some Scots in my lifetime to give me a head start. “Early?” I repeat back to him in a question. Too early to.. get the report?? Of course they’re going to want the information as soon as possible, it’s fucking Makarov! “Early.” Soap confirms back to me. “You’ve barely been awake enough to properly process this.” My eyebrows furrow together; why is this random guy concerned about that? His only job is to literally make sure I don’t try to do some stupid shit before my evaluation. Like kill myself or someone else, something like that. Before I’m able to retaliate what I’m able to sense in his voice, a middle aged man wearing this green scrub outfit. He gives me a wide and fake, polite smile. I fucking hate this. “Hi, I’m Mr. Sutton, one of your nurses for the day. What is going on?” His tone is laced with faux-politeness, and I can see the corners of his smile are tight, like there’s strings pulling his lips into something that isn’t a snarl. I feel my muscles tense and suddenly I feel lighter—but my heart rate monitor picks up a skipped heartbeat and I can’t feel my fingertips again.

Oh.

Sutton immediately eyes my monitor and furrows his eyebrows, looking back at me. “Are you feeling alright?”

I don’t answer, I can’t.

It’s like I’m fucking stuck in that godforsaken chair again, waiting for Makarov to come up with a new attempt to beat the fucking shit out of me, to wring out my plans.

The adrenaline.

Soap calls me by my name but I don’t look at him. I keep my eyes trained on Sutton.

Fuck, I can barely think.

Why am I suddenly like this? Why is it this particular nurse?

“Maybe it’s best if a different nurse treats ‘em.” Soap suggests to Sutton, his tone laced with a warning.

Yeah, thanks for stating the obvious, captain.

My eyelids flutter open and I stare at the ceiling as I wake up—my wrist was disinfected bandaged, and handcuffed one again. There’s no noise besides the faint beeping of my machines. I was given medicine so I could sleep, I really wish they hadn’t given me that stuff because now I’m laying here with the image of a mutilated body burned into my memory. Her name was Anya Kozlova. She didn’t do anything, yet Makarov had me slaughter her and leave her remains out like I was a poacher. My fingers twitch as I feel discomfort around my abdomen, which is where some of my surgery stitches are, so my pain medicine is probably wearing off. I stare at the fluorescent lights of my room until I can feel the dull pain of looking at a bright light source for too long settling in my eyes. I blink harshly to “reset” my eyes, my free hand coming up to rub my eyes gently, then going up to my eyebrow muscles and apply pressure, rubbing in slow, firm circles to relax the muscle. I freeze for a moment because this is a habit that developed after I successfully got into the organization—a clear sign of stress.

My thought process is interrupted by a loud snore, making my skeleton nearly fucking jump out of my skin. I quickly look to my right side and.. It’s Soap?? He’s still here??

He’s leaned back into the chair in a position that cannot be comfortable—these are the chairs that have squishy padding as a seat until you sit in it for ten minutes and then your ass goes numb. His legs are spread out in front of him in a manspreading kind of way, one of his hands on his chest and other on his lap which is holding a.. book of some kind? Maybe a sketchbook? Looks like it. His head is limp and is resting against his left shoulder, his lips parted with a line of drool, soaking into his shirt. The corner of my mouth twitches. I notice a pencil behind his ear, which he must’ve been using for his notebook, er sketchbook… Maybe. I feel my muscles slowly untense and honestly, I barely noticed how tense I was a few moments ago, how paranoid I felt when I thought I was alone. I glance at the door and then back at Soap’s his snore dying down into a soft rhythm as he adjusts his head’s position in his sleep. I wonder about the story surrounding that chin scar? The scar runs deep into the skin there, so it must’ve been something nasty. My eyes trace the way his nose is shaped, how the beginning of his eyebrows are furrowed inwards. His long eyelashes flutter ever so slightly which I take as my cue to look away, dragging my eyes across the room to scan for anything new, which of course there isn’t.

This is the reason why I hate being stuck in one room for a long time. Of course, the familiarity is somewhat comforting, you don’t have to stare frantically search for something that may be different, a weapon, a bomb, something, but at the same time? It gets me antsy. I’d much rather be able to get up and leave this room, but one, I don’t think anyone would let me—even if I managed to get myself out of these cuffs—and two, I’m not sure if I can stand. Fuck. My chest tightens at that thought; I’m not sure if I can stand. I can’t help but think back to Makarov and what he did to me, how he found out I was not born Russian. A part of me wants to resent Soap and whoever the fuck was in that room, and trust me, a little part of me does because they did a piss poor job at basically slapping a couple of bandaids on my wounds and then decided to try to waterboard information out of me?? If I didn’t say anything to Makarov, what did these fucks think they’d get out of me? I take a deep breath, feeling my chest expand as my lungs fight to make room for the oxygen. I hold it for a couple of seconds and slowly exhale through my lips. I need to calm down.

The door swings open to my room, making my heart rate spike again, my fingers instinctively grabbing the pillow on my front. Dr. Erikson and Mutton-Chops enter the room, and I don’t feel any better. Their eyes land on me and I can see the surprise stretched across their faces, at the fact that I’m awake, but I have a hard stare and I keep it. My shoulders ache as my muscles lock up once again. The door opening jolted Soap awake, my eyes flickering to him once I hear his sharp inhale from being startled. His head is turned and his eyes are also on whoever entered the room—scanned the room like a soldier. I hold back a quiet chuckle because of fucking course he woke up from that, he is a soldier. “You’re awake, [Name].” Dr. Erikson points out as he walks over, holding a clipboard. I don’t respond; my throat feels tight. He pauses at the fact that I don’t respond and he glances at Soap, then Mutton-Chops, then back at me. Dr. Erikson’s hand gestures to Mutton-Chops. “This is Captain John Price. We know you are having some trouble.. recounting what happened on your end, so Hudson thought it might be helpful for Price for catch you up to speed on his, considering you both have similar goals.”

Soap’s groggy yet loud voice cuts in. “What?” His tone is incredulous as he properly sits up in his chair, closing the notebook sketchbook thing in his lap. Mutton-Chops—the man who now has a proper name, Price—shoots Soap a look, like it holds so many words unsaid. Whatever his look said is enough to get Soap to quiet down. My fingers grip the pillowcase again because the silent, unspoken communication causes this weird fucking anxiety to flare up in my stomach. I don’t like it. I don’t respond again. Dr. Erikson approaches the IV machine—an infusion pump I think it’s called?—and presses a few buttons. I panic and I grab his wrist and yank it away because what if he’s sent by Makarov to finish me off, what if—“He’s just adjustin’ yer meds, bonnie.” Soap’s voice is low but close and I don’t bother to look at him, but I slowly let go of the doctor’s wrist. Dr. Erikson’s face has a troubled expression before he writes something down and takes his leave through the swinging door he came through in. That leads me to look at Price, as I’m left alone with him and Soap. He comes over to the other side, opposite of where Soap is sitting. I keep eye contact with the man and I must be unintentionally glaring at him because he’s looking back down at me with a challenging gaze. Gaze that screams ‘you have a couple of loose screws, don’t you?’

I can’t tell if I’m imagining it or not anymore, especially when he finally speaks. Price’s voice is rough, like gravel, yet incredibly soft. Which I hate because I feel like he’s treating me like a ‘civ.

“We need to get your head on straight.”

🏷️; @glitterypirateduck @darling006 @elowynnlane @hardnutpost @boycigs @wolfyland07

[suzukiblu]

WIP excerpt for miri_tiazan; obligatory sugar baby Kon. ( + non-chrono link for mobile users )

“You–are?” An odd expression flickers across Suzie's face, and he's not sure what it means, but then she smiles brightly. “Oh, um–congratulations! That's–great, yeah! Is she . . . nice?” 

“Not even slightly,” Tim says wryly. 

“. . . is she a supervillain?” Suzie asks, looking a little worried.

Tim doesn't even want to know where she got that idea. Maybe he's giving off the fifteen-year-plan vibes a little too early again, though. 

He's really gotta work on that. 

“No,” he says, shaking his head. “She's just a stubborn, arrogant brat with a bad temper and enough attitude to power half of Gotham. And kind of an attention whore, too.” 

“And you’re dating . . . someone who’s not nice?” Suzie says, frowning in confusion. Admittedly, Tim could’ve made that sound better. And Suzie’s still a little confused about . . . literally everything, sometimes, so it’s not like he can blame her for being confused about him kind of insulting someone he’s dating. He doesn’t mean any of it insultingly, just as statements of fact, but . . . well . . . 

“Yeah,” he says, pretending to check a few more connections. “She's really cool, actually. I mean–people are complicated, obviously. She's all that other stuff, but she's also brave and determined and she wants to help people. Like, you know–just with her life, I mean.” 

“Oh, like, um–us?” Suzie says, biting her lip again. “Is she a vigilante too?” 

“No,” Tim says, because technically a superhero is a different thing from a vigilante. Barely, but still. He’ll ride that technicality all the way to the bank, if he’s gotta. “I can’t really tell you anything specific about her, sorry, just–”

“Secret identity thing, yeah,” Suzie says, looking a little sad for a moment. Tim feels bad about it, a little. Suzie doesn’t even have an identity, secret or not. Like–“Suzie” isn’t really her name, it’s just a hand-me-down from Cissie, and she got it even more recently than Kon got “Kon”. Not much more recently–which, considering how long Kon’s been in the community and how long Suzie’s been in the community is a goddamn crime, in Tim’s opinion, especially since Kon’s been a public figure from day one and Suzie is literally a secret–but still more recently. 

“Yeah,” Tim says, and gives her an apologetic smile. “Sorry.” 

“It’s okay,” Suzie says. “I understand. If, um, I had a family to protect, or anything like that . . .” 

She trails off, then looks embarrassed. Tim feels increasingly like an asshole. 

“Robin is my responsibility,” he says. “Not anyone else’s. It’s not fair to drag other people into my secrets.” 

His dad . . . he doesn’t even know how his dad would react to this, really. He’s Robin because it’s necessary, and one day he’ll be a supervillain because it’s necessary, but he doesn’t have any intention of ever actually telling his dad about either of those things, even once Bruce is dead. It just seems . . . unwise, maybe. 

Or really, really stupid, maybe. 

Also, really awkward as a conversation to start. “Hey, Dad, three guesses how bad you were at parental supervision when I was growing up, and the answers are definitely all illegal . . . ?” 

Definitely awkward, yeah.

[cookinguptales]

okay one more meta post at four am and then I’m done for the night

I canNOT stop thinking about Nandor’s “fatal flaw”, so to speak, and how the Djinn is punishing him for it. It’s so simple and so complex and so frustrating, and the Djinn is clearly 1000% done with it.

Simply put, Nandor is never satisfied. He’s absolutely one of those guys that’s always thinking the grass is going to be greener somewhere else, but he never bothers to water his own goddamn lawn. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, but Nandor romanticizes things. He romanticizes people. He romanticizes ideas. And that allows him to avoid emotionally engaging with reality -- because he’s always focused on a fantasy instead.

The first time you see what a problem it’s going to be is in the citizenship episode in s1, I think. That’s when we see Guillermo really, genuinely lose his temper with him for the first time. As Guillermo says, who cares if he’s not an American citizen? He’s a vampire and he should be happy and proud and grateful.

But he’s not. Nandor can’t be satisfied with anything. Part of it is perfectionism, part of it is an inability to understand the emptiness that he feels inside him at all times, but part of it is greed. That’s what the Djinn has zeroed in on, I think. At a certain point, the inability to be satisfied with what one already has is greed. The Djinn even specifically said he punished greed.

And Nandor is greedy.

He has a good home. He has a chosen family. But those weren’t enough for him. He had power. That wasn’t enough for him. He has a person who loves him, desperately. That wasn’t enough, either.

He has this chronic emptiness and ennui and it’s partially because he cannot appreciate all the good that he has in his life. He keeps thinking that there must be something better out there, something that can fix him, but there isn’t, is there? When Nandor finally feels better, that will have to come from inside him, not from any outside force. Nandor’s problem isn’t that he needs more. It’s that he needs to stand still for five goddamn minutes and notice what he already has.

There’s a sort of frenetic desperation to Nandor’s quest for meaning, and I sympathize with that. But I also sympathize with the Djinn’s irritation. Nandor hurts those around him when he doesn’t appreciate them for what they are. He can’t form real relationships because he won’t give people a chance and engage with them emotionally on more than a surface level. This is most clearly seen with Guillermo, but Nandor treated his wives abominably, too. He found such trifling faults with them despite claiming to have loved 35 of them, and he threw them away like yesterday’s trash instead of trying to form a real relationship with them. He keeps altering Marwa instead of getting to know her. 

He keeps looking for a wife when the person who loves him more than anyone on earth is right next to him.

And the Djinn has really had a front-row seat to all this. He sees how picky Nandor is, how quickly he discards things that aren’t “perfect”. He sees how Nandor is never satisfied. Not with his life, not with Guillermo, not with his wives, not with Marwa, not with himself. Which is the real root of the problem, I think...

The Djinn’s been run ragged trying to follow all of Nandor’s fickle changes, and he knows better than anyone (save maybe Guillermo) what Nandor’s real problem is. Nandor wants an easy fix for a difficult problem, and when potential solutions don’t immediately fulfill his needs, he abandons them. 

(And yes, this is absolutely why he joined a cult.)

I think this was exactly what the Djinn was getting at when he told Nandor that he’d only had a small increase in dick size and he was surprised that he’d wasted a wish on it. (Just like the Djinn keeps telling him that he’s wasting wishes on other shallow things, too.) He was telling him that he was wasting his life trying to fix what’s not broken. And in trying to fix his dick, which was already huge, Nandor ended up losing his ability to have sex with Marwa altogether.

So that’s why the Djinn chose the punishment he did, I think. He’s not just forcing Nandor to think about Guillermo every time he uses his dick. He’s forcing him to think about all Guillermo does for him. He’s forcing Nandor to confront the good things he’s been ignoring in his life, and he’s forcing him to realize how precious Guillermo is... after Guillermo has finally gotten a boyfriend. He wants Nandor to pine for something he used to have.

That’s the ultimate punishment for throwing away good things because you’re greedy for a fantasy that doesn’t exist. It’s realizing just how fucking good those things were once they’re no longer yours.

And I do think that Guillermo isn’t going to be off-limits forever, but he is right now and I think the Djinn senses that. That’s why he looked so fucking smug when Guillermo ran off. He knows that this is going to be a punishment for both of them, and he’s ready to watch the sparks fly.

...ah, Nandor... The Guide’s not the only one here who needs therapy! Use one of your wishes on that, if you haven’t already squandered them all LIKE YOU DO EVERYTHING. ;;

[siriuslysatorusimping]

Above Or Below? (Another Level Extra)

Okay, so, it's not a lot of the beatdown, but it's what I got for you guys lol

It's below the cut!

You can read Another Level on AO3 💕

2018

He felt his smirk grow to a sneer as he practically slammed the door open, meeting Naobito’s wary gaze.

“Heard you were waiting for me to pay you a little visit,” he said simply, raising his eyebrows when the man stayed silent. “Something you might wanna talk to me about? No?”

Naobito’s eyes narrowed at him as he shrugged his shoulders.

“You gonna tell me what the fuck you did to her? Or am I gonna need to start-”

“I saved her fucking life,” Naobito snapped. “She was the one stupid enough to come barging in, screaming at anyone she could find. And I tried to get her to a goddamn doctor, but she left before-”

“Doctor wouldn’t have fucking helped her and you know it,” Gojo cut him off. “She would have died if she’d stayed for your doctor, and that was why you were fucking panicking.”

Stepping closer, he felt his sneer grow.

“Who started the fight?”

Naobito clenched his jaw before he shrugged.

“I wasn’t here, so I don’t-”

He pulled his shades off as he glared at the old man, watching fear flash in his eyes for a moment.

“Don’t bullshit me, old shit,” Gojo ordered, watching Naobito tense further. “You talk to each other. And ya had to for this shit, yeah? To get your goddamn stories straight for when I showed up. But you’re gonna tell me the fucking truth and then you’re gonna tell me where the fuck Jinichi is.”

When Naobito didn’t answer, he narrowed his eyes.

“Who started the goddamn fight?”

“Jinichi started the fight,” Naobito admitted. “Hit her on her way out.”

Gojo grinned as he placed his shades back onto his face.

“Wasn’t so hard, was it?” he asked, his grin widening until he was baring his teeth. “Now, where is he?”

“I won’t have you killing a member of the Zenin clan over that-”

“Call her a mistake, old man,” Gojo said quietly, letting his shades slip back down. “Or a half-breed. Go on, you piece of shit.”

Part of him wanted the old man to do it. To give Gojo the excuse to kill him for being part of why she fucking saw herself that way. Called herself a goddamn half-breed when that shit never even fucking mattered.

When Naobito clenched his jaw again, Gojo sighed and ran his hand through his hair as he gave him a bored look.

“I’ll make you a deal,” he reasoned, stuffing his left hand into his pocket. “Unfortunately for me, I can’t beat him as bad as he beat her. Ya know why, old man?”

Naobito stayed silent and Gojo pushed his shades up as he gave him a cold grin.

“Because Jinichi would die before we got even halfway to how bad he beat Kurisaki. On top of that, I promised her I’d beat him within an inch of his life if she gave me the okay.”

Naobito’s eyes narrowed at the last statement, and Gojo smirked, shrugging carelessly.

“Which means I gotta avoid that margin, too,” he continued. “But I’m sure you know all about these little specifics, huh? So here’s our deal: You tell me where Jinichi is, and I’ll let you decide if we go above or below that. Two inches from death or half an inch. Your choice.”

“He’s with the rest of the Hei,” Naobito relented, his eyes narrowing when Gojo’s grin widened into a sadistic one. “They won’t stand by while you-”

“They will,” Gojo cut him off, clapping his hands together once. “You’ll tell them to. Because if they don’t, our little deal is void. And I won’t give anyone else the same courtesy he gets this time.”

Leaning closer, he let his shades slip again as he stared into Noabito’s eyes.

“Now, you didn’t say which: above or below?”

-

Gojo pulled the piece of paper from his pocket and held it up after he unfolded it.

“Had Shoko make a chart just in case you need visuals,” he said gleefully, watching Jinichi roll his eyes. “List of all Kurisaki’s injuries. Had ‘em listed in order of how severe they were. Y’see this line here? That is the line where shit starts becoming fatal. Now, you see all of this?”

He pointed to the graphic slowly and grinned when he saw the fear flicker through Jinichi’s eyes.

It had made Gojo feel sick when Shoko first handed it over.

Cracked skull, ripped lungs, broken sternum, four broken ribs, three cracked vertebrae, broken cheek bone, bruised larynx, broken left hand, misc. internal bleeding, ruptured spleen, broken nose…

Oh, this piece of shit had done a number on Rinko, alright.

Gojo was even more surprised she was still alive after seeing the full list.

He’d make her cum for each injury after the fatal line once he was done here.

If she didn’t pass out first, he thought as he looked at the list. Might be too many for one sitting. She usually started crying around four-

“According to science, she should have died here.” Gojo pointed to the little mark. “So, here’s what we’re gonna do- hang on, lemme just-”

He retrieved the measuring strip from his pocket, causing Jinichi to roll his eyes again. Holding it up to the chart, Gojo located the injury listed exactly two inches from the fatal mark.

“That is where I’ll stop.”

Stuffing the paper and measuring strip back into his pockets, he pressed his hands together happily.

“Two inches from death. Just as agreed.”

Warping behind Jinichi, Gojo rammed his fist into the back of his head, throwing him out of the room and into the courtyard.

“Heard that was the first hit, hm?” he called, holding his hand up beside to mouth to make sure he was heard. “Back of her head? Weren’t even brave enough to face her in a fair fight?”

Warping again, he raised his leg and kicked Jinichi in the back. Squinting slightly, he made sure he aimed correctly. Shoko had said the fifth vertebrae.

“Don’t worry,” he stated calmly, grabbing Jinichi by the throat and slamming him back into the ground. “I didn’t put enough behind that kick to snap your spine quite as bad as you did hers. Shouldn’t paralyze you, yeah?”

Sadly.

“Now, while I don’t have seven fists,” Gojo mused, grinning as he went over the list in his head. “I think I can move fast enough to simulate that damage.”

[nanograms]

do u take requests?

If yes, could u do floyd x gn!reader crush headcanons?

if no, then ignore this

Floyd x Gn!Reader Crush Headcanons

I’m finally doing this omg this has been in my inbox for so long goddamn

Cracks knuckles Floyd by beloved

~~~

Floyd is a little shit(lovingly) and at this point we all know it.

He truly find you interesting. Imagine a person from another world being isekaied fighting overblot dorm leaders + a vise dorm leader with a magical fire breathing cat

He truly gets to know you during book 3

The fact that you would go out of your way (more like forced lmao) to bargain with Azul to free your friends and that cat? Absolutely hilarious he can’t wait to see the downfall of that

It was only after Azul’s overblot that he started to notice things about you

To Jade, it’s always “shrimpy this” and “shrimpy that.” Who would’ve known you’ve attract the attention of his brother so much?

In real life, shrimp and eels have a symbolic relationship in the wild. The shrimp gets to clean the eel of parasites, dead skin and algae while the eel protects it.

But instead of cleaning, you give the eel all your attention and he protects you from the ‘less’ favorable students of NRC

It’s only when he sees you hanging around crabby and mackerel that he starts to feel funny

“Eeeeh..? Why do you wanna hang out with them? C’mon lil’ shrimpy! I’m way more fun than those little guppies! If they keep approaching you, I’ll have to squeeze them till they pop! I want you aaaall to myself!”

I head canon Floyd as a hopeless romantic as well as an obsessive type

He shows that he likes you in a really obvious way. Hell, he’ll even outright say it

His possessiveness comes from the thought of people taking you away from him, so his solution to this problem is to squeeze anyone who dares to approach you (romantically) is to squeeze them till they get sent to the ER.

He will drape his body over you like a massive blanket. It doesn’t matter where you are, what you are doing, he lay himself on your back

He respects your boundaries. If you specifically tell him to stop he will

If you don’t expect a lot of cuddling from Floyd and him following you around like a lost little puppy

“SHRIMPY~ I finally found you~ c’mon, I don’t feel like playing basketball today.. so I’m gonna hang out with you~”

Ace is on his knees begging you to come to every basketball game and meeting because whenever Floyd sees you he plays a lot better

He won’t hesitate to run up towards you in the stands if he sees you in the crowd. Doesn’t matter if he’s in the middle of a game either

Azul noticed how his mood seemed to shift a little whenever he sees you, so now he has you on speed dial whenever Floyd is in one of his moods

Either way you have a very affectionate eel on your tail. Only question is if you’ll return that affection

[unlikely-course]

Does anyone else ever think about how like the specter of Allison’s bisexuality haunts the show just as much and in the same sort of way as big, painful things that are shaping the narrative but are never directly seen, like say her and Patty’s childhoods or Chuck’s violence?

It’s most apparent to me in her talking about high school—like her only friends were devoted church girls! Swimming was very important to her but those girls “didn’t really like her” because she was “too competitive,” there’s something about that (ostracization, perceived aggression, actual aggression as a deferral of some other emotion). She liked Sam, and she also liked feeling like she was beating his girlfriend (but also anxiously assured herself that it wasn’t so awful because they weren’t friends). Like, it's not not a thing a straight girl would ever think, and certainly can’t be divorced from Allison’s insecurities, but still…when Sam tells Allison that he told Jenn, the first thing she says, the first thing we hear in that scene, is her saying “does she hate me?” Once again, it’s something that’s very Allison to say generally, but also…!

Then there’s everything about Kelly (another woman Allison talks to while she’s on a porch smoking), clearly admiring of her (among other, murkier things), bringing swimming back up again, bringing up paths not taken, precipitating Allison’s vicious self-recrimination in City Hall. Kevin punishing her for daring to pay Allison attention.

Do you ever think about the thing Patty says to Tammy in the “let it be hard” conversation, where she says “I have cable, okay? I know we’re all fine with everything now”? The way that communicates to me having lived a past that was so intensely hostile to Patty being queer that she had to reject it immediately and totally and not even so much as think about it…and then living through the world around her changing as though that pain had never happened to her, as though she’s the weird one for hanging on to what protected her. It's like double for Patty, too, Miss “Good Catholic repression takes time,” who fucking hates having her emotions seen or talking about them—MHI’s delivery of “it’s embarrassing” tears my heart out of my chest every goddamn time. And then how this scene is the first of a specific sequence—we go right from there into the sitcom scene with the band, how she can’t be in the band because she can’t be “one of the guys” (bonus rejection of even the suggestion of gayness in “you can’t have a girl in a band named Jenny McCarthy Tank Top”) but she can’t be seen fully as a woman either (calling her a “half-chick”). It’s important that this scene comes between the scene with Tammy and the tub scene, because when she realizes at the end that’s she falling in love with Allison, it’s not just about the terror of the new feelings, possibly jeopardizing their relationship, or her belief that Allison won’t return the feelings. It’s that being this way and feeling these things are impossible in this house, in this world that she’s lived in, and she has to go to this new world with Tammy to even feel this way at all.

Do you ever think about how Allison also lived in and stayed in that same old world? When Kevin starts the fire in the trashcan it’s his symbolic attempt to destroy her, but it’s also a little tour of things he’s already taken from her. He puts in three things that we see specifically. He puts in Allison’s purse (the money he stole from her) and we see at the end he burns her passport (identity, freedom of movement, dreams he specifically sabotaged and mocked her for, like going to Paris). But what’s the first thing he put in there? A coat! Warmth and comfort and safety. But it’s not just any coat: it’s her fucking. bisexual-colored. coat.

It’s immediately apparent in the show that Allison is so fucking hungry for any minute of consideration Patty will give her, any conversation, any touch or glance or laugh. She works so hard to make Patty like her. Part of this is because she’s been almost totally alone for like ten years and desperately needs any kind of human contact or support that actually sees her. Part of it is because she needs Patty to do things for her, to help her with her plan.

But also.

Also, Allison just fucking loves to talk to her. She thinks she’s funny, and cool, and confident—and as we will learn later, she’s still at that bar wishing this cool, confident girl would sit down and talk to her. What she wanted fifteen years ago she still wants now; it doesn’t go away no matter how many times she’s been rejected or she’s packed it up. It’s still there. She just wants more and more time with Patty because things come easier and feel better with her than with anyone else.  Whatever nebulous, insurmountable thing lurked between her and other women her whole life, even before Kevin, just isn’t there, despite the fact that Patty invokes it specifically (“You’ve never had girlfriends, have you?” “I have you”). And the thing between Allison and other women is the thing that’s between her and everybody but also it’s not, it’s something else enormous and painful and awkward until she’s with Patty and it goes away, or maybe it changes, or maybe it just finally finds a space that it fits. Maybe it’s a starving thing that’s finally being fed.

At the end of 2x08 when Patty stands up on the step, I see her standing on the step in 1x07 in front of Tammy, with Tammy telling her it isn’t a big deal, Tammy telling her that if she was the right person, Patty would kiss her without thinking or worrying who could see. And I know now what the tub scene told me, that Allison is the right person, and I know that Patty would kiss her right now without thinking or caring what anyone thought. But I also remember how painful that was for her in 1x07.

When Patty goes down the stairs and takes that step towards Allison, I see her take that step towards Allison in 1x08 during the argument, when Allison could not finish that crucial sentence and Patty moved forward hopefully, and asked “What?” But Allison couldn’t answer then. She tried, as hard as she knew how, but she couldn’t get her head around it. She didn’t have the language to talk about what she was barely even aware of, much less understood. So in 2x08 Patty takes that step and that good long look at Allison and knows that she’s still not there yet, that she hasn’t really even begun to unpack that yet even though she’s been through so much and grown so much in other ways. And Patty’s not gonna press it, and she’s not going to tell Allison something Allison needs to figure out on her own. She’s not going to make Allison talk about this before she’s ready any more than Allison is going to make Patty stop eating burgers or move out of her house. When Allison says “I miss you,” and Patty says “I know,” well, she knows a lot of things now about how Allison feels because Allison has demonstrated that to her, and she’s decided she can handle waiting for Allison to be ready, because they have time. After all, they’re dying alone together.

[prozac-shaped-urn]

I’m goddamn serious when I say I socked that Leocadia audio away and used it for hot tub on the mesa because lemme tell you what just happened.

Breathy grunts n shit allow me to hypothesize sex positions, which then allows me to hypothesize sex scene dialogue, which then allows me to hypothesize specific motives for both characters, which then allows me to apply motive to other places in the story, which then gives me a better insight into what these characters want and need.

I just unlocked Stella’s place in this puzzle. She’s Beth’s daughter, 25, a recovering addict and a fashion photographer. She’s the undercurrent of logic in this story and it’s ironic that it’s her who’s the “brains” so to speak. Beth comes to her when she’s getting really self-conscious about her body, and Stella’s the one who reminds her “it’s called self-worth for a reason. Only you can determine your self-worth because it comes from you and you alone.” Which is like……. SO wise.

But also!!! There’s a thing I do where I find something that’s mine and nobody else’s on my body. Like my stretch marks. They’re mine. They’re a tattoo in my skin and cannot be replicated on anyone else. They’re my calligraphy fingerprints and no one else has them. My only child ass LOVES doing this. So that’ll be going in the script.

A third thing!!!! I’ve been playing around with the whole idea of sexuality in women 50+ and how it would no doubt be difficult for a woman of that age to go full steam ahead and throw caution to the wind and whatnot, on film and IRL. So hearing a 30-something Donna be… idk I guess open is the right word here… in delivering a performance with a sexual aspect in it gives me something to point to and go “OKAY! So obviously she was younger then but that woman is still alive inside her right now. Is there something I can gain from this? Can I translate this into a language which would play well on film? Can I headcanon my way into a 3D character with all the qualities needed for a full backstory, arc, motive, lesson to learn, etc? And if I can’t, then at least I tried.”

And ya know what? It helped. It helped so much. Because now I’m looking at Felicity going “…honey child, you’re about to carry all of my insecurities about my stomach and you’ll carry them better than I ever will.” And that’s a beautiful discovery.

(No I didn’t mix the names up. Liss has the body insecurities and Beth is self-conscious about literally everything thanks to social media. Body image issues are only a small % of Beth’s insecurities. Liss p much worked thru her shit except for her belly. Which like,,, same sis.)

[crystallizedkingdoms]

all the posts youve tagged as igsi have created SUCH an interesting portrait!!! if you ever want to talk about him, please take this as an invitation!!

sending this ask is like hand-feeding me crack cocaine. I WILL utilize this invitation i will tell you this man’s fucking life now. under the cut because this gets extremely long but tl;dr for anyone else: Igsi is my angry dog coded character who hates authority and will NOT respect gods (even though he ends up dating one)

OKAY so to start off. Igsivalitaq “Igsi” Anderson is a guy from my original story Ittuatuq and I’ve written a few things for it but I never actually wrote anything with him, though I should Really Change That. he’s one of the main antagonists in the second book/season (I section off Ittuatuq into books/seasons cuz im insane), but over time he becomes part of the main protagonist cast instead.

so, backstory: Igsi grew up in Iqaluit, Nunavut. He lives with his mother and father, but also an anthropologist named Roland Lawrence who’s lived there most of Igsi’s life(not important now but later), and as he grew up he started getting into trouble with authority, even at a young age. at first it started with petty domestic stuff, like acting out for attention at home or teasing classmates, but over time it started really escalating into getting into trouble with the law with crimes like theft, trespassing, underage drinking cuz of good ol undiagnosed mental illness. he specifically starts running into trouble with one RCMP officer in particular, Officer Nakasuk.

so, Igsi obviously starts to form a grudge against him, and he starts to repeatedly antagonize the Officer specifically. in turn, the Officer and Igsi’s parents set him up with the Officer’s mother, who we just call Mentor. the Mentor starts Igsi on a very spiritual path towards healing and also lowkey teaching him about being a whole ass angakkuq in the hopes that this makes him stop being such a troubled kid. and while Igsi does actually get very, very interested in traditional spirituality and does end up liking the mentor and wanting to be a full-fledged angakkuq, his troubles with the law still get worse.

this all REALLY comes to a head just after he turns 18. the night Igsi gets released after a gruelling inpatient treatment that really left him frustrated, he and the Officer really come to a head. theyre alone and it’s a dark winter so they’re really saying like the shittiest things possible. one thing leads to another, Officer Nakasuk threatens Igsi with a stun gun, Igsi’s frustrations of being treated like shit for his entire life for things he never got Actual help for while being consistently incarcerated by the people who have authority over him finally overflows, and… oops! Igsi utilizes his angakkuq power andddd the Officer is dead.

THIS is where the dog coding really kicks in because it’s like. oh my god, he killed a person. he has fought and injured people, yes, but he has never actually killed someone. and he’s an adult, there is no juvie waiting for him, its Real Prison, and while he has hated the Officer for breaking his community apart, he’s still law enforcement. this shit is going to ruin him. so… he runs! he runs away with practically zero preparation, into the very dangerous tundra wilderness in the dead of winter. and he essentially just becomes a stray dog, living on scraps while a part of him desperately wishes he could return home and curl up in the lap of his parents, but he KNOWS he can’t do that.

but at the same time he refuses to believe that what he did was wrong. that he’s done what should have been done long ago, that he DESERVED to bite the way he did, because goddamn it, he was horribly oppressed by a system that was created to subjugate people like him, and he will never be the boy he was again, and isnt that enough to prove it was worth it? its during this exile that he really feels dejected by the entire world, from controlling human society and uncaring spiritual society, that he’s like Fuck it, whatever happens to me, i dont care, i will never follow anyone’s orders ever again.

anyway. hes about to die in the tundra due to hypothermia (lmao) when he encounters a spirit made of flame. this spirit is a tuurngaq, an auxiliary spirit that angakkuit can bond their souls to and gain extraordinary power, named Paliq. Paliq is a whole other can of worms lol but essentially, the two of them have very similar ideals in regards to authority and being controlled, so they make a deal: they can bond, Paliq will keep Igsi warm and protect him from then on, but in return Igsi cannot treat Paliq like a regular tuurngaq and they must act like a team, not with no orders or subordinates. which Igsi is like okay yeah perfect.

this however does Not solve the fact that Igsi is wanted and also starving OOPS. so one way or another, Igsi ends up returning to Iqaluit, and obviously he’s fucking arrested. and while Igsi and Paliq are planning to find a way to escape and leave the country (its a terrible plan), guess what. it’s that fucking anthropologist in the beginning didn’t expect THAT. and he’s like Listen Igsi. youre a good man if a bit misguided. I can get you out of this situation to the best of my ability, but in return you have to tell me about what your mentor has taught you, and also tell me about your new friend. because turns out, while this anthropologist joined Igsi’s family to study poverty and culture in Inuit families, he ended up getting really obsessed with the “lost” art of traditional angakkuit so now he wants access to it.

Igsi agrees, the court proceedings go surprisingly well bc Lawrence has the money to provide Igsi with a good lawyer, and Igsi gets off with manslaughter. so he still does time but like, better than second degree. and while Igsi has obviously lost the trust from his Mentor for killing her son, he still has a lot of angakkuit knowledge that he starts to provide for Lawrence, and while Lawrence is very careful to make the whole transaction seem very equal bc they’ve known each other for so long and he knows Igsi’s deal with authority, he basically has Igsi on a leash and is using him as a working dog isnt that FUCKED. I love it.

this goes on until “present day” in the story (which actually takes place in 2030 cuz im insane), where Igsi is finally off of prison. and Lawrence is like hey I’ve got word from two reputable angakkuuk (the protagonist’s, Piqati’s, parents) that theres actually a super small hamlet in the middle of buttfuck nowhere where a living god resides and is basically a bastion for power and spirits. come with me and we can go there and you can basically do whatever the fuck you want there forever and i get to pursue my studies (unlimited power but Igsi doesn’t know that). and Igsi is like Fuck Yeah let’s go.

SO. NOW HES LOOSE. he enters Ittuatuq and immediately starts antagonizing the fuck out of everyone in there, but especially Piqati and his friends. WHICH IS INSANE. BC THEYRE 18 YEARS OLDS WHO ARE STILL IN SCHOOL and at this point Igsi is 24 it’s like. he’s beefing with high schoolers and he’s very pathetic about that. But what i reallyyyy wanna focus on is his interaction with a certain character: Airaq, the VERY beloved bear deity of Ittuatuq.

HIS DYNAMIC WITH AIRAQ IS SOOO. RRAUURAGH if you love dog coding and religious doubt then this is it this is the place. at first Igsi starts pursuing Airaq because he’s kind of very into the whole challenge of getting with a deity and the fact that Airaq seems so pure and beloved on the outside. so it starts out with very casual flings and hook ups, but over time as the plot moves on Igsi starts getting really attached to Airaq and it’s like. oh shit. now all of a sudden he feels himself getting wrapped around a god’s finger, instinctively doing what Airaq says (the whole fucking “call your dog off” dynamic), and oh god, is this going against his ideals? what does it mean that he’s falling in love with a god?

so yeah. dog metaphors, religious metaphors, and crazy insane power dynamics all about. also stupid crazy faggot sex but thats not what you asked for and i wont embarrass myself elaborating here LMAO.

OKAY THIS GOT VERY LONG. and i could honestly do this for hours but this is, believe it or not, just a brief overview of him and i barely even got into the main plot. if you or anyone who is reading this wants anything more specific then please feel free to ask and ill go even deeper. god i really need to actually start writing him cuz im obsessed with him genuinely.

thank you for asking this if you read all of this my dear mutual sworcerie im kissing you square on the lips (or just high fiving you if that’s cooler)

(btw heres him all drawn by my gf)

[gojuo]

tbh the whole aegon storyline is giving “writers don’t get the severity of actions they’re writing” bc the way the whole scene in his chambers proceeded… him telling his mother that he could never be enough all teary-eyed as if she’s mad that he’s doing something silly like drinking around, and not raping servants. also how come alicent is already over hers “you’re no son of mine”, she smiled as if how could he even think she didn’t love him… don’t get me wrong that’s not me hating her, i also don’t think it’s impossible of her to still love him despite his actions, but the structure of it all just feels as if the show itself doesn’t take any of his crimes seriously. and bet they’re never getting mentioned again. also i’m pretty sure someone was referring to aegon as a “jerk” when what they’ve written is way beyond that.

Yeah because the writers don’t. The r4pe plotline isn’t about Dyana the victim, it is about Aegon the r4pist. And even then it isn’t about Aegon the r4pist, what it is is a cheap manipulation tactic so that the audience will for sure never side with the opponent of their favorite gwirlboss uwu morally superior and always right paragon of virtue never did anything wrong in her life ever even though she put a literal bounty on her 2-year-old nephew’s head and then laughed when his dismembered body was delivered to her and also fully sanctioned Blood and Cheese Qween. It’s such pathetic fucking writing and anyone with two brain cells can see right through this awful choice. They just had to make Aegon one of the worst things ever, didn’t they? But a bigger issue with this writing choice is that his on-screen character is inconsistent with his apparent off-screen character. Off-screen he’s a cartoon villain who r4pes women and watches children fight to the death, but the way he is on-screen, the way he talks about himself, the way he cries about the parental neglect he went through, the worthlessness he feels, the way he cries so easily about all of this and then the vulnerability he shows his mother when opening up about his insecurities, like… these are just not the actions of the cruel person the writers have made him be off-screen and as a result it is so damn hard to reconcile these two Aegons with each other. And that’s why it is so obvious why introducing Aegon’s as a r4pist before even introducing Aegon himself is nothing but the writers trying to manipulate the audience into favoring their own favored side.

And if this cheap shot at forcing the audience into one side wasn’t enough, they also just had to make Aegon a child fighting pits enthusiast too. As if Aegon’s entire fucking reason for even accepting that stupid crown wasn’t because his people convinced him his family and children would be in mortal danger with Rhaenyra “I enjoy executing and murdering people who might as well look at me wrong” Targaryen as Queen. As if it wasn’t the tragedy of Blood and Cheese which led him to taking this war and the threat of Rhaenyra seriously. Like I fucking cannot take these writing choices seriously in any way, I’m sorry but I just can’t. They made him a r4pist and a child fighting pit enjoyer not to explore that part of his character arc, but only for fans to go "Oh so you stan a r4pist?!?!!!" all the damn time in my goddamn inbox.

I’m never going to take these writing choices seriously because I see them for what they are: Not actual writing choices which matter in the grand narrative for this specific character, but the writers manipulating the audience into never rooting for said character. So yes these writers do not take what they did with Aegon seriously, they just needed you to be Team Black and feel morally superior for it.

[britcision]

Listen. Could Dead and Loving It be a fraction of the length and maybe finished by now if I only focused on Danny and Jason?

Possibly

Would it be a better story?

Probably, from several perspectives

But it absolutely would not be the same story, and nor would it be the story I want to tell

Because I am hopelessly addicted to ensemble casts, and I don’t want the boys to exist in a vacuum. I want Jason to run off with his siblings and with Danny’s friends, and I want Danny to fuck with the bats

I want them to touch all the parts of each others lives that existed before they met, and will still continue to exist after even if things change forever between them

I want all the background characters to interact with each other, have their own inner worlds and their own motivations, and yeah, this absolutely means this is not an efficient telling of a slow burn romance

Because the story isn’t the slow burn romance

The story is these two people, and the world they live in, the story is the way Duke and Cass both see Jason differently than Dick and Tim ever could and that matters, and that none of them are wrong

The story is Danny finally telling people who will listen about the Anti-Ecto Acts, and all the fucked up things the GIW do, and being able to ask for help and have that be okay

The story is messy and complicated and will have so many rises and falls, so many pivotal moments that are drama and combat and so many that are just two people talking to each other and finally seeing eye to eye

The story is the way that Jason’s relationships with his family can finally mend, now that he has someone who can get him the help he’s needed

The story is the way that Danny can come to terms with the responsibilities of being a king, the constant question of agency and power and what he’s worth if he’s only Danny and not the Ghost King

The story is Clockwork fucking with the pair of them because he specifically thinks it’s funny (he’s right)

And yeah, there’s a slow burn romance in there. There’s also a coming of age tale, and a story about healing and reconciling and moving forward knowing you cannot change the past, but you can do better

Unless fucking Clockwork decides you can change the past because yeah then it’s fine to just go do that I guess

I was kinda considering breaking the story out into multiple chunks because holy fuck is 100k an intimidating chunk of words, but I’m not gonna

It’s all one story, and you will be my hapless victims as we get to fucking 300k or wherever this beast ends because we are not here for efficient story telling and motion of the plot

We’re here for the connections, the characters, the meaningless bullshit that would absolutely be cut in anything anyone ever wanted to sell, cuz I am not selling this

Imma write every fucking scene I wish I got from books, TV, movies, podcasts, actual plays, every fucking time I scream at the characters to just fucking talk to each other because messy is good too

Messy is okay

Stories don’t need to be marketable to be worth telling, and this one’s gonna be too long and intimidating for some people and that’s okay

But I fuckin’ rolled in from Critical Role which averages around 500 hours of content per campaign and a cast of 7 plus Matt’s NPCs

And I STILL want more goddamn character moments from all of them so I haven’t found a size yet that I can’t manage

I love reading focused stories that I can get through fast, and fuck, look at the rest of my AO3; I will fucking never diss a one shot, or a short story, or a piece that really focuses in on one or two characters

Delicious, I love them, my bread and butter

It’s just not what this mess is gonna be, and that’s okay too

Gods be fucking willing we will not have another six chapters that take place over the course of three hours, but we’ll just have to see how that shakes out cuz I’m being possessed by a seemingly infinite number of plot bunnies and my own tendency for “hey it’d be funny if”

And oh boy has it been funny every time

[thesakuragarnet]

We Were Just Kids

Summary: After the events of the Paranormal Liberation War, Dabi gets a call.

Tags: Post-Breakup, Post- Paranornmal Liberation War Arc, angst, DabiHawks angst, swearing, Hurt/No Comfort, blood (see GIF)

Word Count: 823 words

AO3 link

Toya blinks when he sees the familiar number on his phone screen. He feels so fucking numb at this point; he barely even  knows how he should feel anymore. So much had happened in the past forty-eight hours. Everyone else has gone to bed or is busy in the medical ward; Dabi, however, can’t sleep at all. He’s lying back on the couch, staring at the ceiling, examining his extended scars. 

“Well. Let’s see if you got anything interesting to say, Birdie,” He sighs before clicking the button. 

“Before you even try, this call can’t be traced,” Dabi snaps into the phone. His answer is silence…followed by faint, strained sniffs. Dabi sits up, eyebrows furrowing. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Keigo Takami’s voice comes soft and shattered through the speaker. The villain blinks. 

“Tell you what? What the fuck do I owe you? You fucking backstabbing murderer,” Dabi growls through gritted teeth. To Hell with how much he once loved Hawks, he’d murdered Twice in cold blood. Twice was his friend. Twice also thought Hawks was his friend. Dabi is answered with more silence and sniffs, as if Hawks is trying to compose himself on the other end of the line. 

“Why didn’t you tell anyone ?” Hawks shudders through the phone, and Dabi balls his hands up into fists. 

“You know, you’re gonna have to be a bit more specific. I said a lot during my little speech,” He snaps. 

“Toya…”

Dabi’s heart clenches at the mention of his real name. At Keigo ’s voice calling him by his real name. Growing up, Keigo was his only friend. He was the only kid who gave him the time of day at school. Hawks didn’t recognize him years later when they reconnected as villain and hero…before becoming something more…that is…until war broke out. 

“Why didn’t you tell me what he did to you? You let me talk about how he was my hero. My idol . And you just. You just let me keep believing,” Hawks mutters. 

“Would you have even believed me if I’d told you?!” Toya growls, pissed that Hawks is making him feel guilty for simply being an abused kid who was too scared to say anything. 

“It’s ME! I thought you knew me better than that!” Keigo exclaims, frustrated. 

“I WAS A CHILD , KEIGO! I WAS A GODDAMN CHILD! SO WERE YOU! WITH YOUR DUMB CHILDISH FANTASIES ABOUT HERO SOCIETY THAT WERE ALL BULLSHIT! NONE OF IT IS WHAT WE WANTED! AND YET YOU STILL PLAY THEIR FUCKING GAME!” Dabi shouts furiously, smoke curling out of his new scars. 

“AT LEAST I DON’T KIL-”

“DON’T YOU FUCKING DARE SAY WHAT I THINK YOU’RE GONNA SAY, KEIGO TAKAMI!” Dabi cuts him off, practically foaming at the mouth. He hears a sharp intake of breath through the speaker. 

“I…did…what I had to do. I had no choice,” Hawks says slowly, almost as if there’s a hint of regret in his voice. 

“There’s always a choice,” Dabi retorts coldly. He brings his hand to his temple, anger bubbling up in his chest. 

“Was any of it real? Any of it at all? Any of us ?” Dabi blurts, waiting desperately for a response. He hears Hawks sigh. 

“Don’t you fucking lie to me,” The villain seethes, feeling a painful warm sting beneath his eyes; he’s going to start bleeding soon if he gets any more worked up. 

“Toya, I-”

“Is it so fucking hard for you to believe that I loved you? That a villain could actually love someone? Because I loved you long before I started going by Dabi. Bet you didn’t fucking know that, hero ,” Toya says through gritted teeth. 

“Toya…I want …I want to love you. I really, really do. But I can’t . I just can’t,” Hawks stammers, choking on tears. 

“How many times do I have to tell you,” Dabi whispers with venom in his voice as blood trickles from beneath his eye scars, “ There’s always a choice .” 

“You know this call is recorded,” Keigo mutters, “You know I can’t say everything I want to say.”

“You know where to find me, Takami. Come fucking say it, then,” Dabi hisses before being met with more tense silence. He slowly reclines back on the couch, wiping the blood off of his face with his thumb. 

“Y’know, maybe I should’ve asked you to come to Sekoto with me instead of Dad. Perhaps you’d be one of us instead of the Commission's perfect soldier boy,” Dabi spits, cursing his burned tear ducts. 

“Goodbye, Dabi.”

Click. 

The phone turns to ashes in Toya’s hand, and he sticks his hand up under the couch cushion before pulling out a red feather. He knows Hawks can still hear him through it. 

“It’s your fault that it has to be this way. You better hope I never see you again,” He whispers directly into the vane before incinerating the red plume.

[tepkunset]

Top Surgery Journey Part 2

So, it’s been two days since my top surgery. How am I feeling? Very tired… In some pain, but not unbearably so… Itchy… But far above all, I am absolutely euphoric about how my new flat chest looks and feels. I can’t stop admiring my own reflection in the mirror, which is something I have never felt in my entire life before now. There’s still quite a lot of swelling, so it’s hard to get an idea of how exactly it’ll look when completely healed, but judging by what it’s like now, I am so unbelievably happy and impressed with my surgeon’s work.

But let’s back up a little, because I want to journal the experience itself for anyone else out there considering this procedure, and interested in going to the Centre Métropolitain de Chirurgie (CMC) in Montréal, Québec.

The flight in was fine – the weather was merciful right up until we arrived safely at the hotel, thank goodness. My mother was a very nervous flyer, and I’m really proud of her for conquering her fear in order to be my support person. (The CMC has strict rules about needing someone to accompany you after discharge, because trust me, you will be in no position to travel alone after.)

The CMC took care of everything; they booked the hotel, all the transport, meals, etc. so really the only thing I had to worry about was following their instructions/schedule.

I was paranoid that my weight would be over their cut-off limit and they would deny me even after travelling all that way, but I needn’t have, as my weight was acceptable. (The CMC will only operate on people who have a BMI less than 39.)

When we arrived at the centre, I was given basically a book’s worth of paperwork to fill out. Thankfully they have copies of all their papers in both English and French, as my French is poor. Then I met with a nurse who gave me some pre-op meds, and strapped an identity bracelet to me. I was pleased that the bracelet had my pronouns on it, and thought to myself, “holy shit, why isn’t this the norm at every health facility?” Then I got dressed in nothing but a hospital gown and a housecoat, and was shown where my bed was. My mother sat down to wait for me, and I was immediately taken to consult with the surgeon and anesthesiologist. The surgeon drew all over my chest with a marker and said she was confident she could work with my body shape, which really brightened my outlook again.

It’s a good thing they went over exactly what surgery I was getting though, because they almost did nipple grafts on me, despite me specifically requesting no nipples. (I just didn’t care about them enough to make the effort of grafting them back on and extending the healing process, especially when I always felt like my nipples were quite ugly.)

With the error corrected, I was taken into the operating room and strapped down to a T-shaped table like Jesus on a goddamn cross. I was starting to panic despite telling myself over and over in my head how it would be worth it. I felt the prick of the anesthesia needle, and then the last thing I remember was one of the nurse’s rubbing my temples and telling me they would take good care of me, before suddenly I was lying on a bed with a flat chest! Apparently the first thing I said to my mother when waking up and wheeled into the recovery room was “Mom, I’m so happy.” I don’t actually remember this though, and I went back to sleep almost immediately. But the next time I woke up, I stayed awake until I was discharged.

I was sent back to the hotel that afternoon with a scheduled follow-up appointment the next morning. That night was definitely the worst night, as the pain was at its highest and I was very, very nauseous from the anesthesia. I just kept throwing up and throwing up, regretting attempting to eat anything. Thankfully it passed come morning though, when I also got better control of my pain again after the appointment squared away my prescription. They were also pleased that my drains were working well. I have to keep recording how much fluid is draining three times a day, until they’re ready to be taken out by my nurse practitioner on Tuesday.

I haven’t had any more nausea, and my pain has maintained an acceptable level when at rest – I’d rate it a 2 out of 10 at most. Though, I do have a very high pain tolerance. But holy fucking shit, the Montréal airport this morning nearly killed me. There was so much walking and standing around and I was dead on my feet ready to fall over; my mother quite literally had to catch me from doing so a couple times. I really wish I would’ve had a wheelchair, because the extensive walking both flared the pain up and made me incredibly fatigued, very fast. Then to make matters worse, our flight was delayed by an hour. But the important thing is the flight back to Nova Scotia was safe and the drive home was safe.