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jollyreginaldrancher · 10 months

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Yellowjackets S2 e5

Why are they talking about the baby in the recap? Is Shauna gonna give birth soon? Or miscarry? Something is gonna happen with the baby for sure.

The vibes in Van's place are immaculate.

Excuse me, you mean to tell me there were other people in the room while they were having their moment? Like were they unaware that queer history was happening right in front of them, or?

TAI REALLY FELL FOR HER 😅

I could go on about how Van's place/shop indicate she is also stuck in time or regressing like the others but I feel like I've been ranting too long in these posts. It is weird she just threw her bills away though. Almost like she was not planning on staying there long enough for the consequences to reach her. Was she living a nomadic life or was she just about to pack up and move? Or were her problems so bad she was just giving up on them? I dont know. I could analyse that in a million different ways but ultimately I just need more info really.

Speaking of which, I hope the scene continues after the credits. If we have to wait all episode for an update again I don't know what I am gonna do.

Oh we're back to the friggin cabin.

I'm gonna set it in fire 😤

Van's not sleeping with Taissa anymore? 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

She woke up unattached to her. Is this her way of breaking things off? 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Please tell me she just got up to pee.

Oh thank god they're still together 😅

They're giving me life at the moment so I'm just happy to see them together.

Shauna's belly looks massive for someone who's stranded in the woods with nothing to eat. I feel like there's no way the baby and stomach would get that big.

Honestly let's take a moment to think about how much it would have sucked for Shauna being not only pregnant as a teen in that situation but also her best friend dying and losing any sort of comfort she had from that relationship on top of everything else. Like I can close my eyes and imagine Jackie helping her or snuggling up to her or giving her a massage or whatever cause she was that kind of friend. And now that's gone.

I completely understand why she would go into that shed to talk to her and Tai is fooling herself if she thinks she'd be any better if Van really did die when she got mauled to death.

"happy wife happy life" now you're getting it 😘

Honestly glad Trevor is at the cult therapy session. He needed some anger management and this is the closest thing to that in this scenario.

Did nobody tell Callie that her new friend is a cop or is this a scheme of some sort?

Would it be bad if I just skipped all these filler scenes and just watched the bits that I cared about? This is honestly starting to resemble pretty little liars in a bad way with all the random filler comphet relationships. Like I had to wait through so many Ezra and Aria scenes just to get to the good stuff (Paige and Emily) and it feels like this show is kind of turning into the same thing at this point.

Every interesting scene is intercut with random shit of straight people screwing or married couples fighting and crap like that. We get like one gay scene but we have to sit through 45 minutes of other crap to get to it and it's not fair.

I don't hate any of these characters, they're just spreading the runtime time too thin between too many characters. Cut Callie out completely. Take out a chunk of Shauna and Jeff's stuff, they haven't really been interesting since Adam's death. Even Misty is suffering due to her forced collaboration with that shitty stalker of hers. Nat and Lottie and Tai and Van is where the present day story is at but their scenes are moving along at a snail's pace because they just spend way too much time trying to showcase other characters. Especially when things are really picking up in these other stories. I'm getting whiplash with the way the focus is constantly changing between all these groups of characters.

And I know other shows do it too (Game of thrones, bold and the beautiful, etc) but it's still really frustrating that it's happening here.

At least we're learning a bit about the cards. Though we already heard about them, we never really saw how they used them to divide tasks.

Not Randy 😅 why is he always the go-to for these lies? 🤣

If he hadn't been to taco bell how would he know the beans upset his stomach? He's clearly lying there. Also I still think he is shifty as fuck.

Oh my god we're FINALLY gonna see Van and Taissa interact as adults 🥹

I just know Van is looking at that wedding tape and wishing that was her and Tai 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Van is sharp as a whistle. She immediately hit the nail on the head.

They were together at Shauna's wedding? 🥹 Or at least they were talking and interacting back then 🥹🥹

Please, for the love of God, tell me they got that pretzel 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Just know I'm hanging onto every word Van and Taissa say.

A bunch of other scenes and things happened and I didn't really care because Van and Taissa weren't there and I'm lazer-focused on them at the moment.

Like I love Melanie Lynskey but I didn't even want to look at her straight shenanigans. Just show us the lesbians please and thank you 😭

Crystal and Misty are bonding though and it's cute but it's making me worry that Crystal is going to get killed off soon. They tend to not focus on anybody but the mains and the characters that get killed off and since Crystal only really started cropping up recently I feel it would be naive to assume they were just showing more of the other yellowjackets out of the goodness of their hearts and not just to make us sad when they eventually killed them off.

One thing I did not anticipate is how much I would end up loving these characters...specifically the yellowjacket girls, and even more specifically the lesbians (Shauna, Nat, Van, Misty, and Taissa). I am just so glad all my babies are all alive 😌 and now Van and Taissa can get back together and live happily ever after 🥰

Nothing against Simone but she doesn't get Tai like Van does. And while divorcing would be hard I think it's safe to say their marriage is beyond saving at this point. Not only did they lose love and trust but when your partner actively fears you then you NEED to step away.

Anyway Crystal and Misty are cute -though some of those stories they're sharing feel like something they should be unpacking with a psychiatrist and not a friend- but I am really worried about Crystal...wait, Kristen, apparently.

Oh no. Misty no, please tell me she's not going to tell her about the black box.

Misty nooooo 😭😩 why would you tell her that? Read the room!

I'm honestly getting autism vibes from Misty if I'm being honest. Mostly from the deodorant thing.

Yeah, Crystal is definitely gonna die.

See I don't even want to write RIP because of the obvious joke (rest in poop).

I'm guessing eating Crystal is out of the question. Cannibalizing a corpse is bad enough but cannibalizing a corpse that fell into the poop pit is just beyond the realm of acceptable.

Nat must be on some mission here because up til now she was desperate to escape and I don't think two therapy sessions would have really had that effect on her unless there's a lot more to their relationship in the past that we have yet to watch. Maybe related to that cult stuff. Though with the info we have now it seems more like a rivalry and like Nat is trying to break her cult up from the inside rather than trying to join it. Although cults do have more of an effect on people who fit Nat's circumstances, who are isolated and don't have much of anything going on for them.

I'm lowkey hoping Misty Crystals that William guy that's with her because I don't trust him and I can't stand him and historically her friends don't dare well.

Anyway I'm clueing onto the fact that Misty has some deep seated issues with self loathing and only pursues friendships with people like Nat, who hate her or otherwise look down on her because she can't accept being treated with love and respect as she doesn't feel like she deserves it.

Basically Misty is a masochist and turning away someone who looks up to her (or at least appears to worship her) because she hates herself and doesn't feel worthy of love and this is the way she's stagnated (like all the other girls have) and gotten stuck at age 16.

Honestly the vibe I'm getting is they're all punishing themselves. Nat through drugs, Shauna through sticking it out with Jeff because she feels like she HAS to make it worth basically killing Jackie, Misty through living a life of Loveless was and anonymity where she just cares for other people who would never care about her and Tai and Van by giving up the one thing that kept them while and sane; each other.

Everybody's making a sacrifice.

Shauna/Randy is cracking me up. I forgot he had some useful info he could share with her. Their scene was funny though at least and a break from the usual torture her scenes with her family are.

Is Tai really joining team Lottie or just playing peacekeeper?

Tell me that drug isn't a sign of bad times for Van. Like, I am sure it's a bad omen but just like to me.

I'm guessing painkiller or something like that. Lowkey hoping Van just had some bad injury and needed it, and not that she's addicted to it or needing it to survive.

There's a lot of other similar looking bottles in that shelf though 😭

Like she was watching that wedding video and it looked like she was longing for something. I don't want to jinx it, I'll shut up now 😭😭😭😭😭

When she said the V is for Vicky I thought she married someone named Vicky 😅 but no that's her mom's name. It's horrible she got cancer and died. Isn't it generic though? Van might not be out of the woods 🥺

If she survived all that just to get cancer and die I will kill myself 🙃

Anyway Van is right and has every right to be upset probably. It looks like Taissa was the first one to walk away. I don't know if we'll get more details but that's the vibe that we're getting here. Like it seems like Taissa left her behind and Van has been waiting for her all this time 🥹

TAISSA LOVES VAN CONFIRMED!

THIS IS NOT A DRILL! GRAB YOUR U-HAULS AND YOUR SLEEPING BAGS BECAUSE VANTAI IS A GO!!!!!!!🥹🎉🎊

The gals are holding each other and crying, that's second base in lesbian.

The downside is we have to look at the other characters now. On the plus side I was right about Nat staying behind because she doesn't trust Lottie.

The wild thing is that Lottie did all that and Nat is the one looking insane in that scene. Like, read the room hon, this is a cult, they are self aware enough to know they're in a cult, they just don't care that it's a cult.

Honestly not surprised Shauna is terrified. Who wouldn't be in that scenario? But i feel like the subplot with Misty's friend dying should sort of take precedence over a simple fight. Unless it's not just a fight. I mean it's not like the baby's coming, they can wait a little

I just had to jinx it, didn't I?

Misty trying to save Crystal though was pretty heartbreaking. I thought she would run back to camp and play innocent. She really went all the way around to the bottom of the cliff just to try and save her immediately after threatening to kill her. Like I feel that shows she doesn't really mean to hurt people,

He really sniffed the splooge sponge?!

Misty: I lost Crystal in the storm

Van *is already out the door screaming Tai's name*

Is Shauna gonna give birth in the woods?

Are Van and Taissas's lesbian powers going to help the girlies get back to camp?

Speaking of Tai and Van we're back to the gals being pals. They fell asleep on the couch and Van covered Taissa with a blankie because she's in love with her 😌

There's no other explanation

And then Van painfully took her meds pretty much confirming she's the one that's sick.

You know what, I have decided to stop being a sceptic and lean into the cult stuff. If it cures whatever Vanessa has going on I'd be willing to convert 🥹

The girls are kissing 🥰🥰🥰

It was the other girl and Van but still.

I'm starting to think evil Tai has a widdle cwush on Van because that's twice now she took the chance to kiss her unprompted. 🫢

I want to believe in that "drunk words are sober thoughts" but instead of drunk words it's possessed smooching. I've decided that these two are getting back together and that they will get married and live happily ever after and buy a dog. Specifically a border Collie. They will have a yard and a VHS store and will live to be old. They will sip iced tea on the front porch and Van will be wearing jeans into her 80s. And when they do go it will be peacefully, in bed with each other, holding hands, in their sleep, together 🥹

That's canon now.

Anyway the show is trying to bait me into shipping Lottie with Nat but I've already decided that Nat is secretly in love with Misty so that's not gonna happen.

Maybe there's an AU where they all died. Maybe that universe is the good one.

Is it hunting at multiple universes? Or is the vision hinting at them being dead all along and being in limbo or hell? If Van dies we'll know it's hell.

Or maybe there really was something in the woods and they did bring it with them. Maybe that's why they refused to grow up and why they kept punishing themselves.

Then again maybe that something isn't an evil spirit but mental thing. That's what the sceptic in me would say if I hadn't drowned her when it became obvious that Van is dying.

The lesbian powers DID work! I knew they had some sort of telepathic connection. How else do you explain them constantly finding one another and so on.

Oh Shauna is giving birth to that baby like right now. Fuck the next episode is gonna be spectacular. I'm surprised they didn't hold out til the finale. They must have something bigger up their sleeve for that then. If they fucking kill Van I will be destroyed so hopefully not that though.

#yellowjackets #my babies #THESE ARE MY DAUGHTERS NOW #VanTai #i dont know what to tag them #thoughts #mine #speculation #but also canon i have decided on

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moomingitz · 2 years

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Because I know someone is going to ask for my opinion on the fan game Sonic Omens sooner or later:

Story wise, it feels like the people who made it had a clear beginning and end in mind, but they didn’t take near enough time to flesh things out and better plan how to get from Point A to B.

The whole twist involving the exiled Metarex dude and Chris was clearly planned from the start, as there were way too many hints and foreshadowing starting all the way back in the beginning cutscene for them to just be mere Sonic X easter eggs. It even the uses the leitmotif from the English dub of Sonic X in it’s soundtrack. The problem is that, in my opinion, it and everything else in the story felt like there was a massive crucial chunk of story missing in-between, especially since what apparently happened according to the info dumping dialog later on is something that’s kind-of hard for it suddenly come up as a “Oh, by the way-”

How did Chris manage to safely link his and Sonic’s worlds together, and how did the population and societies from both universes react to this and manage to integrate with each other? That’s a really major event for the story to, again, just go “Oh, by the way this happened-” Apparently traveling between two dimensions caused Chris to rapidly age, leaving him with only 15 years left to live, so he spent it wanting to make the world a better place to the point of joining G.U.N. with the goal of reforming it. Okay, makes sense in universe doing that sort of thing would eventually negatively affect Chris physically, and it seems to fit him post-season 3 to take Sonic’s philosophy to just keep going even when his time is running out. But, they should have done more showing than telling there before and after the reveal near the end. Maybe show a flashback or two, or include more hints to foreshadow it ahead of time.

Apparently Sonic wasn’t even aware that Chris had died until Russian Eggman’s info dump. You think one of his closest friends dying would of have been something Sonic would have learned about pretty quick(no pun intended). Or at least you’d think Chris would have let Sonic known about his 15 years-left-to-live clock ticking away as soon as possible. I don’t think Chris would have left Sonic and the rest of his friends in the dark about something that important. And no, there’s a photo of the two shown hanging out together in the beginning cutscene. So not only did Chris not pass away before the whole interdimensional connection thing happened, but him and Sonic had spent some time together before his time ran out. Again, another thing they really should have spent more time showing or at least hinting towards, instead of just going “Oh, by the way guys-”

I’ll give the devs credit for Chris’ death not being used as a shitty and cheap way to bash him, and in-universe it does make sense, and it was sweet of Sonic to defend him even in death. I just wish they had further elaborated on this whole very major plot point, instead of waiting near the end to just dump all of this onto the story. Would have been a lot more impactful if they further elaborated on it and not just have Chris die off-screen, or not have the big reveal of it told to us in an info dump. Hell, it could have served as a very meaningful way to end the character arc Chris went through in Sonic X. He spent a good chunk of his life wanting to avoid the reality that everything eventually has to come to an end and say goodbye, and now he has to face it himself and come to terms with it. You think facing his impending morality would be a really impactful way to cap off that kind of reoccurring internal conflict. But I guess the concept of your impending death is just an afterthought. I’m almost getting flashbacks to, Thor: Love & Thunder, concerning Shane Foster kind of just being there in the film’s story- despite going through something as major as having cancer and trying to prevent the inevitable(but at least in that movie, Thor was at least informed about it before she died).

I honestly think the exiled Metarex dude was a really interesting idea, and I do think he has an honest to God good character design. I don’t find it implausible at all of there being other seedrians beyond Earthia who also opposed and attempted to stop Dark Oak’s desire to genocide the entire universe. I do like that his motivation is simply because he became disgusted by G.U.N. shitting all over Chris’ hard work after he died(because the government gonna government), and basically just went, “Fuck this place! I’m going home!” But the way it was executed felt more like that one Aqua Teen Hunger Force episode where some dick named Mr. Wong went around ripping people’s dicks off, in order to make a giant dick ship to get back to his home planet, until Frylock tells him to just call someone to come and pick him up. Again, they really should have done more showing than telling with something that’s supposed to be so important to story.

And I’ve seen so many takes on the whole thing with Shadow and Maria, and the many other janky stuff in this fan game’s story. So I’m not going to talk about that because this is already long enough.

And I’m gonna kind of come to bat for the voice actors, here. It’s really obvious that for most of them, English is not their first language. That is especially evident when it comes to the dude who voiced Eggman- you can really hear the accent. I’m not gonna fault a bunch of non-professional voice actors working on a fan game for sounding off or weird especially when they’re doing it in a language that isn’t native to them. Simply knowing what to say in a language is different than knowing how to inflect and fully and properly enunciate in it. This comes down to the higher up devs on this fan game- which I’m going to assume English also wasn’t their first language- making the decision to have the voice acting done in English. I personally think they should have just had it dubbed in whatever their native language was, provide English subtitles, and then possibly have it dubbed in English later on by native English speakers and voice directors who are far more fluent in that language.

I think they should have just dropped the whole thing with them trying to tie the main game canon and Sonic X continuity together, and should have just made it into a fan game based purely off of Sonic X altogether. It feels like that’s what they really wanted to do, but they wanted to have their cake and it too. I think they just shouldn’t have made it into a fan game at all, but into an animated web series instead. They seemed to have focused much more on the cinematics than the game design itself(I didn’t play it but I’ve heard that it isn’t good when it comes to control and level design). It would have given them a lot more room to focus on fixing up and fleshing ouy the story, writing, and questionable characterizations.

Also, I personally find it harder to take more serious moment in the gameplay when you’re blasting the most pure and unfiltered Dubstep in the background.

But at the end of the day, I just see it as another harmless fan game. I do find it admirable when people who set out to make a fan project actually see it through, even if the end results aren’t the best. It’s much easier to start something than it is to actually finish it. Unfortunately it has that whole Patreon controversy attached to it(even though the fully finished game was released for free in the end anyway), combined with the growing “SEGA HIRE DIS MAN THEY CAN DO BETTER THAN YOU” attitude in the Sonic fandom when it comes to fan games and people getting increasingly annoyed by it, and fan game devs either hyping themselves up, or fan games getting hyped up by fans until their expectations make them forget that it’s(monetized or not) something not being done by a big professional team but usually by some people doing it on the side of their mundane ass lives, so if anything does come of it there’s no way it is going to meet those high expectations they’ve set for it.

It had a lot of really good potential, and the talent was there. But they were too damn ambitious, and they should have better managed their ambitions and expectations for what they wanted to do and set them accordingly. As an outsider looking in, Sonic Omens is “just another fan game” to me.

#opinions #rant

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shadows-of-a-memory · 2 months

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neal caffrey

back to white collar masterlist

romantic

one-shots

the high might be theirs (but all the bottles were mine)

(technically a two-shot) you’re in love. in love with danny brooks, your childhood best friend. when it turns out the affection is mutual, you two begin dating. then, danny finds out about his past: his real name is neal, and he was moved to witness protection when he was two due to his father being a dirty cop. you’re left alone, abandoned, unloved. a few years later, though, danny-neal shows back up, and you’re forced to figure put how to handle his reappearance. based off of “nothing else i could do” by ella jane

series

of small mines and subtle misdirections

(top gun!crossover) (bradshaw!reader) your life is pretty much perfect. oh, you have your bad days, your struggles, your fights, but you’re married to the love of your life, have the best kids you could hope for, and work with your best friends at a job you love kicking criminal ass. but when a case takes you out to san diego, familiar ghosts come back to haunt you and you find that sometimes running from your past only makes its shadow longer.

dawn ‘til dusk (and through the night)

(dc!crossover) (series of oneshots) you’ve been in love with pining a normal amount after neal caffrey for… far longer than you should. it’s part of why you’re the only person that figures out his real identities as both dick grayson and nightwing. this, as one might guess, causes a lot of conflict… both with suspicious superheroes and your paranoid coworkers. at least it can’t get any worse than this.

of refractions in reflections

(mcu!crossover) (stark!reader) when the universe was destroyed following the four infinity snaps, somehow instead of dying you find yourself having traveled back in time—just in time to fix things on the front end and sace the world, right? wrong. you’re exhausted. you’ve tried to save the world too many times to care now. so, instead, you create a new identity, separate from your family legacy. create a life, a niche, in an equally new and old world. unfortunately, things don’t always work out that well, especially not for a stark—no matter how hard you may try to run from the name.

pulling out the fray ‘til it comes undone

(national treasure!crossover) (no y/n used) Your mother was a crappy parent, the picture in the dictionary beside “negligent”. Your neighbors ended up raising you, taking you in but not adopting you after her death when your father decided against doing so. Not that you expected differently—he was absent. You had had time to resign yourself to your situation and his lack of involvement—but decades later, a chance encounter that may not be chance per se, means you might find out that all you lived was a lie.

platonic

one-shots

none yet

series

you're saying your goodbyes (before you've arrived)

So, why would you run, dear? When all that you'll find You had what you need, but you just couldn't see What was already there the whole time The problem with running your past is that somehow, someday, it always catches up. And following suicide mission after suicide mission, it certainly could have picked a better time to come knocking. Because when does anything go the way you want?

the life and times of y/n caffrey

multiple series’ following the adventures of neal's younger sister, in order: *nothing they say is enough (so they don't say anything) *walk away *to be added

everything money could buy

(mcu!crossover) (dc!crossover & dick grayson!neal caffrey) bruce wayne is… maybe not the greatest dad. so far, the number of you hiding from him in new york city has reached three, which is only 37.8%, but thats basically 40%, which is basically 50%, which is basically 100%. so yeah. you’re totally justified in living your life with definitely no thoughts at all to your father. you’ve moved on. except… when tragedy hits, you find that maybe you haven’t, after all.

when the sun clouds over (will you be by my side?)

Loyalty is probably the most important thing for you. With how many times you’ve been betrayed, knowing that the people by your side will stay there no matter what, is one of the most sacred things to you. It’s a belief held that only increases when you join SHIELD and enter the game. When your brother, the person who you trusted above everyone else to stick by you, betrays that trust, will you be able to learn how to trust the others around you once again? And when he comes back, needing a favor, will you be able to put aside the knife in your back and assist him, or is that too much to ask on his part?

#navigation

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harleyquinnagenda · 2 months

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A PLAN TO SAVE THE ENVIRONMENT

MOST PEACEFUL, MOST IMMEDIATE OPTION, CODE-NAME: A

FOR CIVILIANS / NON-GOVERNMENTAL ACTION

PLAN OPTION [A]: "Boycott: Now" (time frame: up to three years)

problem: target: solution

CO2: Jet-Fuel Air-Flights: If you have to take flights for work, then you do those. All other flights you cancel. No flights for fun, for vacation, for the holidays, to see your family, whatever, any of it. No flights. If you don't have to take them you don't take them. Tell your family they could've chose to live near you. They can talk over Zoom. Try to get your employer to let you do Zoom conferences instead of taking business trip flights. If they don't okay keep taking those flights. All other flights you cancel. Everyone else cancels all flights, for the time being. No more flights.

CO2: Gasoline/Diesel Transportation: No. If you have to drive to work (and that means there's no city electric train/subway), and you only have a gas or diesel car, and you can't walk, or bike, to work; if you have to drive your gas or diesel car to work, and you can't arrange a car pool with someone, and there isn't even a natural-gas powered city bus, or anything (did you try? Did you really try? Are you sure there aren't any options? Think think think. Would you be willing to try to switch jobs just to solve the problem? Okay if not that's fine) if you just have to gas/diesel to work oh my god do it for now, but, everything/everyone else, no gas/diesel trips anywhere, except: okay groceries- are you sure there isn't a walking distance, even if a longish walk, grocery store at all that you could do an exercise-walk to on weekends, with a couple canvas bags or even your own small luggage cart, mini shopping cart, or even full-size shopping cart? you could remove the wheels and put thicker ones on for going up down curbs? ha anyway for the gung ho do these, otherwise if you cannot do that, gas/diesel to pick up groceries okay. other chores- are you sure there isn't a place within walking distance to you that does the same thing? investigate your neighborhood, try to figure out how many places you can walk to that take care of your needs. No: using the car for socializing. make friends who live near you, go to local bars you can walk to, stay home more and amuse yourself there, make friends with neighbors, take EV ubers, do you know anyone with an EV yet? make them pick everyone up, pay them a little maybe or volunteer to be the sober driver and drive their car all night, etc work it out, or use electric transportation for going out if you have it- electric rail/etc. Just stop using your gas/diesel car either completely, if you are physically able, or, "just for work", or "just for work and groceries", or, "just for work, groceries, and chores". pick one, pick the best you can do. Obviously if you or someone are writhing around on the ground dying and the world only has gas-powered ambulances call a gas powered ambulance. Total boycott around that though / otherwise. No.

Methane: Stove/Oven:- No on the stove- buy a hot plate (if you can afford one) they're like 30 bucks maybe. Single hot plate plug-in. Switch to using that. If there's nothing you can do about the oven okay.

Methane: Beef Industry:- I know it's tough everyone loves beef but the beef industry is actually the other huge part of the puzzle; they just haven't figured out how to run those places at profit without doing anything about the enormous amounts of methane (if you want a better explanation of this, comment and I'll address it in the comments). Meanwhile the other red meats or more creative ones like wild game are all fine. Beef is an especial problem and the demand for it is huge, huge, everyone got into having beef as much as possible basically cause it tastes so good. Well, it's a problem. Be brave. Beef boycott as well. There's plenty of other red meats. Yup beef boycott. No beef. Here I'll introduce a note that I'll expand in the comments too- I'll do a note on the idea of rations and of rations versus upfront-total-boycott).

(as a note this above covers a reasonable amount of the Greenhouse Gas Problem (Co2 and Methane), at least on the civilian side of things, while possibly causing a follow-through across the board, which i'll explain, keep reading)

but also, before we move on:

to add the other greatest "environment problem" onto this list:

Non-Recyclable Plastic Trash: In your homes, personal use, stores, products: Total boycott as much as possible for you on non-recyclable plastic trash, even if it's just some stuff. Starting with: in your kitchen: you don't use plastic plates/utensils ever while you're at home, do you? Boy that's lazy. Stop doing it. First of all only washable dishes in the kitchen. Next: are you sure you need fricking plastic wrap and ziplock bags all the time? Invest in tupperware or use it if you have it or cheap option: start saving plastic boxes from takeout or togo food and just save them, wash them in the dish washer or by hand, save up a bunch and use as tupperware. Start, if you can, refusing to buy things that come in lots of non-recyclable wrapping, or start trying to figure out any way around it. Like, is there an actual butcher shop near you where you buy meat and have them hand it to you over the counter or in paper wrapping, and you could put it in a tupperware or in a tupperware and then into a refrigerator-bag/insulated bag/cooler with some ice in it, plastic or styrofoam for lightweight and re-used. If you have to use plastic wrap / ziplock, can you order ones online made out of recyclable materials? Etc. Think, do what you can, do everything you can. You aren't throwing away anything recyclable into the regular trash already, are you?? please start doing this immediately too, just look for the little triangle symbol.

CO2/METHANE/PLASTIC TRASH = ATMOSPHERE SAVED AND OCEANS/LANDFILLS SAVED, THIS EFFECTIVELY "SAVES THE ENVIRONMENT", DONE

WHO WANTS TO SAVE THE ENVIRONMENT

IT DOESN'T HURT THAT MUCH

COWARD IF NOT

*as for the beef you could also say, well i'll ration it, once a week, once a month, etc pick something. same with flights, once a year, or something. up front though a total boycott would cause more effect because not everyone's gonna do it at first, so you could also say total boycott for a year up front to make a huge point, then like rations of some kind after that maybe. just some ideas for how to do it and make it appealing enough to the mainstream.

**did you know an airplane burns a gallon of gas per second? on an average trip youre burning like 260 gallons of gas personally, multiplied by each passenger. should you personally have to light 260 gallons of gasoline on fire just to go somewhere? if all your friends were inside a building having a party without you, and the cost of getting in was you had to first stand outside and light a stack of 260 gasoline gallon cans on fire all at once, are you so lonely that you'd do it? make a stand about it. we have legs, we shouldnt have to burn fossil fuels to go anywhere if we dont want to, its time to change up society fundamentally- total strike/boycott until the industries come crashing down and neither business nor government nor military can do anything about any of it- total citizens' worldwide strike/rebellion-boycott.

if the summer gets bad and hot again maybe well have a chance to motivate others as well.

#environment

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suck-itaand-see · 3 months

Text

march '24

If she can't be by my side, i can't let anyone be beside me.

If she doesn't want to be there, i don't want anyone else to be there.

If she is too busy to be there, I will be alone.

If she can't be here for me in a darkest times, I will walk alone through dark.

If she can't be right now by my side, I really don't need anyone else who is not her.

If other people want to be there, I don't care.

If other people tell me you don't need to do it alone i will go with you, for me it's no difference if you are with me or not.

I learned to survive alone until she'll say I'm not actually alone.

I don't care if you are here for me physically because i've never felt your presence. If you know what i mean.

I'm not sorry to say no to you because you think you never said no to me when it was too obvious that all i wanted to hear is yes.

I'm not sorry i'm not accepting your help, i learned to cry silently to not wake you up.

I'm not sorry that i don't want you now here, when it's hard because you watched me suffer for so many years, just watched me...

You not caring about me, teached me to care about myself.

You made me develop my illness, so you won't help me cure it now.

I'm sorry that i learned to live without you.

I'm sorry i need other people who are not my family more than you.

I'm sorry that you hurt now but I can't let you.

I'm sorry it hurts you, i'm sorry but i can't speak to you.

I'm sorry but mostly sorry about myself.

No, you can't be there for me now.

No matter how ill i am or will be, i will rather take care of myself or pay to medical stuff to take care of me.

I'm sorry you're worried when i don't pick up, but i called you when i thought i was dying just for you to say 'stop being dramatic.'

I'm sorry you are so worried when i don't pick up, but when i would you would always say everything is impossible for me, there's no help for me, i'm the problem.

I'm sorry you neeed to show up at my door just for me not to welcome you, or even open them.

I'm not sorry that we're becoming strangers, but you never really knew me anyway.

We're both hurt...But now, you will deal with your pain alone, like i did since i was a child.

I begged and begged and begged for help many times, everyone criticised me. I wish i can say I'm exaggerating.

I showed every sign that i need you, you only saw me being ,,insane.''

If you are mad now, i don't care...I forgave you everything. You need to learn to forgive me too because you are the one who never should've cause me any pain or madness.

Once people realize their option always was to do it alone, they become strong in weird ways and picky when it comes to other's company.

People become cold, especially for other people,

especially when they once loved with whole body and soul,

especially when the one they loved, never loved them back.

#march 2024

0 notes

ophelia-jones · 1 year

Text

Thorns pt 4

Lacey's feet were healed, none of her wounds had taken long to heal in this environment, and she was grateful to be strong enough to start working in the community. She provided whatever answers they wanted, but was not made privy to any plans they had to attack the Saviors compound. Not that she would even want to know.

Today, however, she had spent in the infirmary with Denise. She had already known her body was changing, and she was not young enough or naive enough to not already know what was causing it. She was 37 years old, an age which would have been considered high risk for a pregnancy even when there were hospitals available in every town.

Tonight she was wandering around the streets aimlessly, trying to know what to do. It was too far in really, to stop it safely. She had considered it when she had first realized what had happened, when the morning sickness started. But to be honest, she wasn't sure she could. Even though she was scared, both for herself and the child, she already felt protective of it. So she was making her peace with the fact that this could well be the thing that ended her life. She wiped away tears as she thought bitterly that Negan had possibly found a way to kill her after all.

There was a commotion at the gate, and she hurried to see what was happening. Daryl had been out on a scavenging trip and had arrived home with a deer and two bags of canned goods and other non perishables. It was like manna from heaven at a time when the community had been cutting back to preserve its food stores.

Daryl smiled at Lacey when he saw her, moving quickly to greet her.

"Got you something." He said, reaching in to his pocket and producing a pack of MnM's. "They were under a counter out the sun and everything. Should still be decent." He tried to act like it was no big deal, but at that moment it meant more to Lacey than just about anything else anyone had ever done for her. She surprised Daryl, and herself when she stood on her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around his neck. She had been with them for 7 weeks now and each day she became more grateful for the people here - and more afraid of losing them. Especially Daryl.

"Alright, alright." He replied awkwardly, patting Lacey on the back at first; when she didn't let go however, he wrapped his arms around her as well. He completely enveloped her and she lingered there in his arms for every second she could get out of him.

"You ok?" He finally asked, pulling back to examine her face and seeing that her eyes were puffy. "Whats wrong?" He looked as if he hoped the problem was someone whose ass he could kick.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just a little emotional tonight." She said. Other than when she first came here, exhausted and hunted by a madman, he hadn't seen an emotional side to Lacey. She had a good head on her shoulders and she could work more than most of the men around here. He had discovered that her brothers had taught her a great deal about hunting and fishing and she knew how to identify useful plants and mushrooms in the are surrounding Alexandria. They had spent many afternoons together gathering ingredients for medicinal teas and wild asparagus, leeks and best of all morel mushrooms; a share of these she had fried and served to him proudly. They were something she had been foraging and eating every spring since she was young - and they were worth the effort. They were a rare decadence in this modern world.

She was tough and resourceful, and in their wanderings had shown herself to be capable of taking walkers down without any help from him at all. He had certainly not seen the sensitive side of her. So if she didn't mind hard work or fear walkers (or saviors on the lookout still), what on earth would make her cry?

"Walk with me?" She suggested, and Daryl nodded his agreement, falling into step with her. "If you knew you were dying, what would you want to do before that? I mean, is there something that you would regret not having done, when the time came?" She asked, her hand brushing Daryl's as the walked.

"Did something happen with the saviors while I was gone?" Daryl asked gruffly.

"No. Answer my question." She urged.

"I don't know. Maybe." He seemed to be considering it. "What's the point?"

"I have something I would regret not having done." Lacey told him, and this time when his knuckles brushed her hand, she slipped her fingers into the calloused palm of his hand and held it gently. He stiffened briefly, but then his fingers relaxed around her hand and held it.

He didn't know what to say, so he didn't say anything at all. When they reached Carol's house, they stopped in front of it, but he didn't let go of her hand. She smiled down at their interlocked hands and then back up at Daryl, who was shifting awkwardly, not knowing where he should be looking or what to do next.

Lacey leaned her face up close, and then closer still but didn't quite touch his lips. He was perfectly still for several agonizing moments, but with each breath of his, she could tell he was breathing faster, deeper; finally he worked up the courage to close the gap and let his lips meet hers.

It was not a deep, sensual kiss - he barely opened his lips - but that made it no less passionate. It was, perhaps because it was so simple, so slow, that its heat was so intense. It was intimate, lingering.

When he drew back slightly, Lacey made a small noise of disappointment, her eyes fluttering open. Daryl was looking at their feet shyly.

"I have to tell you something." Lacey said, her voice catching in her throat. "And I'm scared to tell you, but I have to."

He scowled down at her in concern but remained silent as ever.

"I should have told you this before, and I'm not going to be able to hide it much longer. And the truth is, it terrifies me… Daryl, I'm pregnant. I knew before Simon threw me to the wolves." Daryl blinked in shock, unaccustomed to feeling so many emotions at once. "And I know how dangerous it is, that I may die when the time comes. I needed to… to tell you how I felt about you. I just wanted you to know how I feel, that I adore you. I feel at home when we are together."

More silence.

"I don't blame you, if you don't want anything to do with me I understand."

"Shut up." He told her, leaning down, one of his big hands slipping up into her hair as he kissed her again. And then again. She melted against him. If she hadn't put her arms around his neck, she might've fallen down. Her chest was pressed to his and one of his hands slid around behind her to slide under her ass and lift her up with one arm until her feet were off the ground and he didn't have to lean over.

"About time." They heard Carol say as she breezed past them to go home.

Daryl pulled back and lowered Lacey back down to her feet.

"I should go. I uh, just…" He was back to being shy, most distant. But he smiled at Lacey, stayed close even when they weren't quite touching anymore. "You're not going to die, it's going to be ok."

"You can't promise that. All I want is more of you in the meantime." She told him, one hand against his chest. He breathed out heavily, and she knew he felt it all too, the need and the desire, and the tender feelings, which Lacey did not dare put a name to. He rested his forehead against hers.

"Yeah." He said simply. But it was all he needed to say.

#original female character #negan smith #the walking dead fanfiction

0 notes

kiridarling · 3 years

Text

𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐒.

katsuki bakugou | birthday gone wrong (aha), f!reader, baker!reader, pro hero!katsuki, blizzards, angst and smut, exhibitionism, cockwarming, begging, confessions. minors dni!

— 4.7k words

Wanna blow off some steam?

“Surprise!”

Katsuki jumps ten feet high, and the plastic grocery bags precariously balanced on each finger tear without a second thought. Apples hit the ground with a thud and the egg carton with a depressing slap; one that signifies the crack of at least half a dozen. Katsuki looks at the crowd, red-faced and livid, and Eijirou Kirishima intercepts the awkward silence with:

“Happy Birthday Bakubro! I know y—“

“Said that I didn’t want a fuckin’ party?” Katsuki growls, groceries forgotten on the forgotten. Eijirou looks guilty and chuckles, scratching the back of his head.

“W-Well, yeah, but—“

“Everybody out.”

People sigh, and you think you hear Denki whisper told you he’d kick us out. You hate to say that you foresaw a similar outcome. Katsuki’s never been one for people.

Especially you.

“Awe come on, Kacchan,” Izuku says with hands on his hips. “We came all this way! Just let us stay for a little bit.”

“Yeah!” Eijirou seems to cheer up once given a sliver of hope. “Plus, we got cake and stuff. And Just Dance.”

Katsuki narrows his eyes, but you know better—he’s always had a soft spot for the redhead. You all wait with baited breath, wondering if this entire evening was a bust, as Katsuki weighs his options in a pool of fallen groceries.

“One hour.”

Eijirou gasps so hard he chokes, and Katsuki’s generosity earns him applause from the audience. (Plus whoops and hollers from Denki and Mina.)

“And I mean it—y’all have sixty fuckin’ minutes before you’re gone without a goddamn trace. Kapeesh?”

“Kapeesh!”

Katsuki sighs, rubbing at his temples as he steps over the mess at the front door. You assume he’ll make Eijirou clean it up. “Whatever. Where’s the fuckin’ cake?”

Ah.

“In the kitchen, my good sir!” Denki says as he ushers the ash-blond into the said kitchen, the rest of the party hot on their heels. Eijirou grabs the cake from the fridge and you’re tense until the plate hits the marble of their island.

“Flavor?” Katsuki asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Uh, I dunno, [Y/N] made it,” Eijirou throws you under the bus, just like that, and you want to scoff at the way Katsuki freezes—if only for a moment. Eijirou’s oblivious as ever, “[Y/N]?”

“It’s red velvet,” you say, trying not to burn under Katsuki’s carmine eyes. You don’t know why he doesn’t look away.

“Frosting?”

“Buttercream.”

As if you’d give him anything else.

Eijirou tries his best to cram 26 candles into the cake before being forced to opt for 23 lest he ruin your decorations. Denki presses him to make a wish and Katsuki rolls his eyes as he blows out the candles. Eijirou wipes an invisible tear because ‘his boy is getting so old.’ Mina and Jiro cut the cake and people seem to enjoy it, and you think that maybe, reuniting with your high school friends after so long isn’t as bad as you thought it’d be.

Even if he said he never wanted to see you again.

“—due to the incoming blizzard, we highly suggest all those who reside in the red and orange zones stay inside until it passes; which should be around ten am tomorrow morning.”

You spoke too soon.

Katsuki turns to the crowd, and you know what he’s going to say before his lip curls.

“Out.”

“Kacchan, don’t be unreasonable!” Izuku says from his comfortable position on the couch. “We’d get caught in the storm if we leave now.”

“Not if you’re fuckin’ fast enough,” Katsuki growls, pulling the greenette’s to his feet by his hair. “Get out, I’m not bunking with you fuckers overnight.”

“Dude,” Denki points to the window, and if you hadn’t known any better, you would’ve thought the blizzard had already started. “If we leave now, we’ll literally die.”

“Die, then.”

Eijirou sighs, clapping his roommate on the back. “C’mon, man. You know we ca—“

There’s a whirr then a click, and the lights and tv die at once. You can’t see a thing but you definitely hear Katsuki shout:

“Motherfucker!”

Eijirou turns his phone flashlight on first; Katsuki’s busy angrily flicking at the light to no avail. You sigh, turning to the ash-blond (and ignoring those ugly fucking butterflies in your stomach.)

“It’s a blackout Katsuki. The lights aren’t going to work.”

“Don’t you think I fuckin’ know that, dumbass?” And your chest tightens because even though he’s not eighteen anymore, he sounds the same—but you aren’t sure why you expected him to sound so different either.

You lift an eyebrow (not that he can see it), “It doesn’t look like you do.”

Denki snorts at that, hollering about how you just owned the ash-blond as Katsuki yells at him to shut the fuck up. It’s...familiar and comfortable, like you’re all in high school again, before you had to worry about your friends dying in their line of work because you couldn’t be there with them.

Before you got injured.

“Well I mean, we have a few blankets,” Eijirou offers, and as your eyes slowly adjust to the dark, you’re convinced you see his figure cross the living room. “And like, sweatshirts if it gets too cold.”

“It’s already getting too cold,” Mina says, and you can’t help but agree. The quickly cooling room has the goosebumps raising on your shoulders, and you’re starting to regret forgetting your jacket at home.

“Okay! I don’t have that many, but,” Eijirou hollers from somewhere, before returning with a handful of cloth. He drops it onto the coffee table. “Plus Hanta and Denks left their hoodies here last time.”

“Oh shit, we did?” Hanta says, and you assume it’s his figure who starts digging through the clothes. “Totally thought I lost this, lol.”

“Did you just saw lol out loud?”

“I did.”

“Ooh Ei, do you still have that old Red Riot hoodie?” Mina asks, and all of a sudden, she’s all over the pile. She finds it before the redhead can answer and snatches it away with a gasp.

You watch the pile dissolve in the darkness, one by one, and by the time you reach for something, your palm hits the cool wood of the coffee table. Fuck.

“Oh [Y/N]! Do you need some of my blanket?” Mina offers, but the blanket is small, and wrapping it around both of your shoulders just renders it utterly useless. You shake your head after she tries for a while.

“It’s fine Mina, I’m not that cold,” you laugh, but she shakes her head vehemently.

“No! Girl c’mon, you look like you’re freezing!”

And, well. Freezing is a stretch. Sure, you’re a little cold, but you’ll live.

“Do you need my sweatshirt?” Eijirou asks, already pulling at the hem. You roll your eyes.

“I’m serious guys, it’s not that bad,” you say, waving your arms for emphasis. They all grumble but they give up, and you feel like you can finally relax.

Something soft and army green drops into your lap. You pick it up in confusion, before looking up to see who dropped it.

Katsuki looks down at you, face glowing white from the phone flashlights. His eyes pierce your soul nevertheless.

“I don’t ne—“

“Take it.”

Katsuki takes a seat next to you on the couch in his own hoodie. You don’t realize until you put it on that he gave you a sweatshirt themed after his own hero costume.

You can’t sleep.

You can’t sleep, and you’re sure it’s due to the temperature. The wind howls and it sounds like you’re in the eye of a tornado, loose branches knocking against the rattling glass, and upon looking through the window, you see nothing but stark white. You sigh, checking the time on your phone for the fiftieth time this hour. Yep. Still four am.

“Stop fuckin’ movin’, dumbass.”

You all decided to bunk in the living room for warmth. You’re surprised Katsuki stayed, though; you figured he would just head to his room and let you all fend for yourselves while he slept in a comfortable bed. But here he is, sleeping next to you on the cold fucking floor.

“Sorry,” you say, but it’s hard when your shivering and your jaw aches from stunting your chattering teeth. Katsuki and Eijirou only had a limited amount of sleeping bags, meaning you’ve got to share a blanket with the hulking ash-blond.

“You cold?” He grunts. You don’t know why he’s asking.

“No.”

Katsuki sighs, and you hear him adjust, the blanket sliding from your neck to your shoulder. “You’re a shit liar.”

You prop yourself up on your elbows to glare his way, and you look to notice Katsuki’s laying the same way.

“What’s your point?”

Katsuki doesn’t answer for a moment, but it doesn’t seem like he’s looking for an answer, either—his neon red eyes glow through the dark and straight into your soul, and the next time you shiver, it isn’t because of the temperature.

“You’re stubborn.”

You roll your eyes, scoffing, “Thought you figured that out senior year.”

Katsuki’s face flashes with an emotion you can’t quite pinpoint before it’s gone again. “Yeah. You’d think almost dying would fuckin’ fix that.”

You sigh. Looks like you’re having this conversation now, then.

“I didn’t almost die—“

“Yes, you fuckin’ did,” Katsuki snarls, and Denki almost stirs at his raised tone. “You took that bullet and you didn’t get up for months—“

“And then I woke up and everything was fine! Seriously Katsuki, what’s your problem? I lived.”

“My problem is that you shouldn’t have been there in the goddamn first place!” Katsuki says through grit teeth. You watch his temple roll underneath his hairline. “That was my fuckin’ fight. I don’t need some chick jumping in front of a bullet for me just ‘cause she thinks I can’t take it!”

You scoff, looking around to see if any of your other sleeping friends are listening because get a load of this guy. Naturally, they don’t respond.

“That’s what this is about? Oh, well I’m sorry I bruised your dignity because I didn’t want to see you get fucking shot!”

Katsuki chest inflates with disbelief before it deflates again, and he’s rolling his eyes before he says, “That’s not—you fuckin’ know that’s not what I meant.”

“Oh really?” You laugh, and goddammit Katsuki, you just had to bring it up, didn’t you? “Because waking up after two months to your best friend telling you to give up doesn’t preserve your dignity at all, huh?”

“I didn’t tell you to fu—“

“You said those exact words, Katsuki. You said give up, and you left the hospital.”

The ash-blond has nothing to say to that, because he knows that you know you’re right, and trying to jedi mind trick you into believing he isn’t an asshole won’t work.

“Well you fuckin’ listened,” he grumbles, more to himself than you, but enough emotion flares in your core to make you want to scream.

“I didn’t have a choice,” you say, huffing, before turning your back to him, deeming this conversation over. “Good night, Katsuki.”

There’s a lull and it has you convinced you’ve won, finally relaxing (as much as you can) onto the cold floor. At least arguing heated your blood up a bit.

“The fuck do you mean?”

You roll your eyes even though they’re closed before you hop back onto your forearms to give the ash-blond a nasty look. “What?”

“You...said you didn’t have a choice,” Katsuki says, and it’s the first time you think you’ve heard him sound weary. Unsure. “The fuck does that mean?”

“It means I had to give up on being a hero either way.”

Which sucked. Because you had spent the past four years of your life working your ass off to save others, and you wind up out of commission before you even got started. You...suppose you didn’t tell Katsuki the whole story. Well, you hadn’t had a chance to—today’s the first time speaking with him since you woke up in the hospital.

Katsuki eyes you out of his peripheral, but only for a second. “And that means...?”

“It means that if I land on my spine the wrong way, there’s a high chance I’ll be paralyzed from the waist down.” You growl, frustrated that it was easier to coax the truth out of you than you thought.

The bullet buried close to your spinal column. You had to do PT for months, relearning how to walk as you slowly regain your motor functions. That’s when you started to bake.

“Oh.”

The howling of the wind turns from somewhat soothing to aggravating as Katsuki’s unimpressive “oh” hangs heavy in the air, and you find yourself sighing, the puzzle pieces finally clicking in your head. “Stop it.”

“Stop what?” Katsuki asks—he’s still not looking at you.

“Blaming yourself,” you gesture to his figure, which is lax with depression, lacking its sturdiness and usual fire. “You didn’t shoot the gun.”

Katsuki snorts at that, running a hand through his hair, “I might as well.”

“Stop.”

“You got shot because of me,” Katsuki says as if it were a fact. “They were trying to kill me. Not you.”

“And they didn’t kill me. I’m here and you’re here. If I hadn’t been there, you’d be six feet under right now,” you reason. Katsuki shrugs because he’s just as stubborn as you are, and you figure he’s been carrying around this baggage for too many years.

“Does your back hurt often?”

“No,” you shake your head. “I mean sure, I get flare-ups sometimes, but it’s not too bad. Doesn’t really get in the way of baking as long as the table is high enough.”

Katsuki thinks for a moment, teeth worrying his bottom lip. “Is the table high enough? At your café.”

You shrug, failing to see where he’s going with this. “I have a platform thingy, so. It’s mostly for decorating cakes and things—“

“I’ll buy you a new one.”

“What?”

“I’ll buy you a new table,” Katsuki says, nodding to himself as if he was confirming the idea. “A higher one.”

It takes a second for his offer to process, but once it does, you’re fighting a smile. Still the same kid. “Kats, I don’t nee—“

“An—And if you need a new chair. I’ll pay for that shit too.”

You shake your head—mainly in disbelief, “I don’t need a chair, Katsuki.”

“Then what?” He asks, and it almost sounds desperate with the speed he rushed the sentence, “Y’need a car? That hunk of junk you drive could use some work.”

You ignore the jab, because your car works perfectly fine thank you very much, and snort at the suggestion of such an outrageous purchase.

“What? You tryna be my sugar daddy or something?” You joke. Katsuki gives you a look, and it's dead serious.

“D’ya need one?”

“I—no!” You laugh, and have to remind yourself to reel it in before you actually wake Denki up. “I’m fine financially I just—what’s gotten into you?”

“Nothin’.” Katsuki quickly grumbles, facing forwards again. “I just...”

You raise an eyebrow, “You just..?”

“I dunno. I dunno,” Katsuki shakes his head. You let him gather his thoughts in silence before he tries again. He doesn’t.

“Then fuck me.”

In your defense, your mouth moved before you thought it through.

Katsuki has an unreadable look on his face, but his voice is anything but steady when he says, “What?”

Fuck. Fuck.

“U-Uh, I mean,” you recoil. Stupid big mouth. “I—you—don’t worry about it.”

“You said you wanted to fuck me,” Katsuki deadpans. You choke.

“I—no, that’s not—“

“That’s exactly what you said.”

“No, I meant as in I’m pent up. Obviously,” you defend with a huff, crossing your arms on the pillow as you glare daggers his way. Katsuki matches your stare.

“Not as pent up as a Pro Hero,” he scoffs, lifting an eyebrow. You take it as a challenge.

You click your tongue in faux pity, “Awe, the number two hero Dynamight doesn’t get laid?”

“No fuckin’ time,” he grunts, though you don’t find much remorse in his voice.

“Well, you have time now,” you say, completely unsure of where this confidence is coming from. Either way, you’ll take it and run.

“I do,” Katsuki confirms, leaning in closer. He’s close enough that you can smell what’s leftover of his cologne, and see the hint of a grin that makes his upper cheek shine silver in the moonlight. You find yourself leaning in just as much as he does.

“Wanna blow off some steam?” You dare to question. Katsuki’s grin only grows wider.

“Thought you’d never ask.”

Katsuki’s kisses are surprisingly soft, you think, and so are his lips. But you don’t have much time to think about it as he pulls you in by the waist, quietly groaning into your mouth while he lays you down on your back.

“Always thought you were the prettiest fuckin’ thing,” he growls, trailing butterfly kisses down your neck. “‘M gonna make it up to you, yeah? Make you feel so fuckin’ good.”

A hand hikes his sweatshirt above your chest before Katsuki’s latching onto the skin under your collarbone and sucking, teeth digging into your skin hard enough to bruise.

“Y-Yeah, that’s fine,” you whimper, intoxicated by the way Katsuki’s lips flush pink as he pulls away, eyes locked on the fresh hickey on your chest. They flicker up to you; he grins.

“Good?”

“Mhm.”

Katsuki hums at that, licking his lips before diving back in. You hiss when he bites too hard, prompting him to bite harder, but he always soothes it over with his tongue, topping each bruise with a kiss. You flinch when his lips wrap around your nipple and he chuckles at your meek whimper; a hand removes its grip on the sweatshirt in favor of sliding it up your thigh.

“Fuckin’ perfect,” Katsuki says once he pulls away, enjoying the sight of you writhing in anticipation. “And it’s all for me, ain’t it?”

“Yeah, ‘m all yours just—“ you kick a leg in frustration at the thumb playing with the hem of your panties, “—do something already.”

Katsuki raises an eyebrow, “Do what?”

You frown, huffing, “You know what.”

Katsuki shrugs, adjusting so he’s caging you to the floor. Ghosting a thumb over your panties, he says, “‘Course I do. You gotta ask nicely first.”

You tighten your hands into fists. He would.

“I’m no—“

“Beg, Princess,” Katsuki growls, his stare unwavering. He presses an inquisitive finger to your clit through your panties either as a promise or a threat—which, you’re not quite sure.

You crumble.

“I—fine, just—finger me.”

Katsuki doesn’t move. Asshole.

“Please.”

The ash-blond grins, finally pushing your panties to the side.

“Good girl.”

When Katsuki slides his first finger in, it’s much too easy, and you blame it on the foreplay. You shudder, hands moving to brace themselves on his big shoulders, and the ash-blond muffles a moan as your nails dig into his shoulders.

“Another,” you moan, bucking your hips into his palm. Katsuki’s heated gaze flickers from your body to your face.

“Already?” He chuckles, the rasp in his throat giving his arousal away. You nod—he clicks his tongue.

“Fuckin’ dirty.”

Two fingers feel like so much more than just one, and they have your eyebrows folding in a poor attempt to muffle a whimper. Katsuki’s fingers still move tentatively but they’re getting comfortable, curling and searching for that place that’ll make you tremble. And then he finds it.

“F-Fuck,” your body jolts, and Katsuki’s shushing you against the pillows.

“Keep your mouth shut, Princess,” he purrs, head dipping down to nip at your neck. It adjusts the angle ever so slightly, but enough to make you hiss, and he chuckles. “Unless you wanna get caught.”

“Oh yeah, because that sounds fun right now,” you snort towards the ceiling. Katsuki pulls away with an unimpressed look as his thumb comes down over your clit.

“Can’t wait to fuck the brat outta ya. Maybe then you’ll actually shut up for once, huh?” Katsuki inserts a third finger without you asking him to, and you gasp, clawing at his back.

“Shh, shh, shh,” he laughs against your mouth lowly, as if the light kisses will do anything but make more noise, “Good God sweetheart, you’re really pent up, aren’t ya?”

“Shit—I doubt you’re much better,” you try, scoffing at what you can see of his painfully hard cock in his sweatpants. Katsuki looks down before sending a huff your way, with a cute little blush dusted on his cheeks.

“Shut the fuck up,” he grunts, pulling out his fingers. You whine at the loss. “How d’ya want me to fuck you?”

You need to take a step back from how crude the question is. Right, sex.

“Right um,” you look around, trying to find the least obvious position—and one that doesn’t make a shit ton of noise. Laying on your side, you tuck an arm under the pillow, before turning around to Katsuki to suggest, “Cuddle-fucking?”

“Cuddle-fucking.”

“Yep,” you say with finality, popping the p. Making big grabby hands his way, you say, “C’mere, big guy.”

Katsuki rolls his eyes but moves behind you anyways, warm arms easily finding themselves around your waist under the blanket. After a few adjustments and ensuring you're both fully covered, Katsuki’s hard cock presses against your entrance as he hooks his head over your chin with a huff.

“This is so not on fuckin’ brand.”

“I don’t think fucking in a living room with sleeping friends is on-brand for a pro hero or a baker,” you say casually. Katsuki breaks out into a snort, pressing his face deeper into your neck.

“God, I fuckin’ missed you, ya know that?” He chortles. Your chest blooms with something it hasn’t in years, and for the first time, you find that you don’t mind.

“Don’t be such a dick and maybe I’ll stick around this time,” you quip with a smile he can’t see. Though you feel his against the base of your neck.

“Noted.”

Katsuki’s last words hang in the air, unusually heavy, and your eyes catch the snow beating against the window with a less than angry howl. Katsuki’s chest shudders against your back but he doesn’t move, hands frozen at your waist.

“Hey, I thought you were gon—“

“I’m getting to it,” Katsuki snaps, and you gasp as he starts to push inside. “So fuckin’ impatient, goddamn.”

He pulls you down until he fills you completely, and you suppress the urge to shout at the speed he did it with. Katsuki moves a hand to slap over your mouth.

“Shut the fuck up.”

You reach around to pinch him in the side with a huff, he calls you a bitch. It’s a little hard to hear you behind his hand as you say, “Then don’t catch me off guard like that, asshole.”

Katsuki snaps his hips and does exactly what you tell him not to do—prompting another surprised whine out of you and a dark chuckle from the ash-blond. His cheek presses into your jaw as he finds leverage in hiking your lower half up until your puffy cunt is level with his cock, and fucking you until you drool all over the pillow.

“What a pretty fuckin’ thing,” Katsuki grunts, and you can tell he struggles to keep quiet in the way his chest sporadically shudders. You have to grip the pillow for some semblance of purchase and Katsuki chuckles at watching you struggle, before he’s hiking your leg up to fuck you that much deeper.

“I always—always knew you’d sound so good,” he pants, the grip around your mouth bordering on clammy. You want to tell him that if he keeps making so much noise he’ll wake up everyone in this fucking room, but there isn’t much time between moans to get more than a word in. “Fuck baby, keep tightening around me like that, and I might fuckin’ cum.”

You find it amusing how close he is so quickly, until two fingers land on your clit and start rubbing in slow, small circles. Your walls flutter around him and Katsuki digs his teeth into your neck with a curse, his grip around your raised thigh contracting as he tries to hold on for as long as he can.

And that’s when Denki starts to move.

First, he rolls to the left. Which would’ve been fine, seeing as it’s in the opposite direction until he bops Eijirou straight on the nose and promptly rouses the redhead from his slumber. Katsuki’s hips still.

“O-Ow, dick,” Eijirou curses under his breath, quickly scrambling to his forearms. It’s hard to tell through the darkness, mostly because you’re squinting your eyes to feign sleep, but it seems like Eijirou rubs under his nose, only to blink back at a bloody hand.

“...Shit.”

Katsuki’s hips shift, ever so slightly, but enough to nestle his cock deeper and force you to bite back a whine. And another. And then another.

You try your hardest to be discreet when you reach to pinch Katsuki in the side, and he breathes a laugh down your neck.

“What?” He whispers, though it's more than a rasp than anything else. Good to know you’re not the only one struggling to not cum, here.

“You know 'what,'” you quickly hiss. But Katsuki’s hips don’t stop as Eijirou weighs his options to cure his bloody nose in the dark. The fingers on your clit return their usual pressure and you inhale sharply, nails digging into Katsuki’s forearm as your orgasm begins creeping up on you.

Eijirou sniffles and gets up, stumbling through the darkness to turn down the hall that leads to the bedrooms. Katsuki sees that as fucking freedom and his hips really start to pick up so much speed that you struggle to breathe through it all.

“‘M gonna cum,” Katsuki whimpers into your neck, burying his face deeper in a poor attempt to stunt any sound. “Fuck, fuck ‘m gonna cum, you close baby?”

“Y-Yeah jus’ a little more,” you whimper, eyes rolling as Katsuki finds some inhumane energy in him to fuck faster. He nods at that and bites into your shoulder with a growl, “C’mon, fuckin’ cream all over my cock—atta girl, fuck, fuck—“

Katsuki fills you up the moment you clench around his cock with a sigh, the weight of your orgasm knocking you forehead-first into your pillow as you bite the urge to squeal. Katsuki doesn't growl as much as you expect, moans breathy and light as his hips finally stutter to a stop—but you suppose some things have to change over the years.

Katsuki collapses next to you in pure exhaustion and you’re sure that’s his cum leaking down your thigh, but for some reason, you don’t really mind.

“Hey you,” he speaks first, eyes blazing red in the darkness. You snort.

“Hey, you.”

Katsuki chuckles with a stupidly giddy smile on his face, "Y'know, you still fuck really well."

You drop your head on his chest to snort, and his hands find their rightful place around your waist.

"Better than high school?"

"Yeah..." Katsuki grumbles, before his eyes narrow. "Wait—hey, yo—"

"I haven't fucked anyone since," you snuff the fire before it even starts, and Katsuki relaxes, though his eyes stay slim. He pulls you closer and you sigh—it's comfortable.

"Good," he grunts. And then after a pregnant silence: "I haven't either."

That's...strangely reassuring.

Your arms wriggle until they fold over his shoulders to play with the small hairs on the back of his neck, and he hums, eyes fluttering shut with a final peck on the lips. As Katsuki's breathing evens and the white of the snow dyes the highest points of his face white, you smile. He looks older.

You think he's asleep until he nudges your waist.

"Be my girlfriend."

You don't even hesitate.

"Okay."

By the time Eijirou comes stumbling down the hall, both you and Katsuki are passed out—with his body encompassing yours in the most intimate way, face tucked into your hickey-ridden neck as your arms and legs lock around his being. The redhead gives you both a soft smile as he passes, snorting to himself.

“Took them long enough.”

HAPPY BIRTHDAY THOTSUKI

#— 𝐊𝐀𝐓𝐒𝐔𝐊𝐈 #bnha smut #bakugou smut #mha smut

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reiedits1 · 4 years

Text

The Last Of Us Part II

I played and finished The Last Of Us Part II last week and it has been on my mind ever since. I obviously understand that a lot of people have problems with this game, and that’s okay. I’m not here to change anyone’s views on the game or anything, I just want to kind of write down my opinions and takeaways as, again, it’s been on my mind since finishing it lol. Nobody may see this and this will mean nothing, that’s fine.

Anyway, this post will contain SPOILERS

My Overall Thoughts

I’m not entirely sure how to structure this so I guess I’ll just start with a broad statement lol; I loved The Last Of Us Part II. In my opinion, it’s a beautiful and well-crafted story about loss, grief and consequences, with how each of these things affect different people.

Discussion

From what I’ve seen, I see a lot of people hating on this game for its handling of Joel and the decision to have the player play as Joel’s murderer, Abby. I’ve also seen a lot of people say that the message is as simple and plain as “viOleNcE iS bAd”, but I personally think it’s so much more than that.

The Last Of Us Part II doesn’t just tell you that violence is bad, but it shows you the ramifications of it by dealing with the emotional toll as well as the consequences on not just the main person involved, but their loved ones too.

As we all know, at the start of the game, Joel is brutally killed by Abby and we go with Ellie on a mission to avenge him by killing everybody involved. We see it all from Ellie’s point of view, hardheartedly seeing Abby as the villain as she just killed the character that we know and love as we have an emotional connection to him after the first game. His death is supposed to make you feel angered. It’s not like you’re supposed to be joyed by it. His death scene left me feeling empty and sick, wanting revenge alongside Ellie.

However, as the game goes on, we start to see the story from Abby’s point of view. We learn that the doctor that you, the player, had to murder at the end of The Last of Us is actually the father of Abby. This is brilliant. Now we see one of the main themes of the story, consequences, and I was immediately on board. Joel is not a good person, at all. He murdered hundreds of Fireflies and took away the possible cure for humanity for his own personal reasons. This is incredibly selfish, even going to the lengths of lying to Ellie about the events as he knows that it isn’t what she would want. Technically, Joel is the villain.

Joel had been through so much, so you may think it’s justified. But the point is, Joel isn’t the only person in the world of The Last of Us. Everybody he murders aren’t just mindless NPCs, they are people. People with their own problems who have gone through their own share of pain and loss, people with their own loved ones. Such as the doctor, who had Abby, whom he loved very much and Abby the same. So, understandably, she would feel incredibly angry and feel the need for revenge, just the same as Ellie and the player after Joel’s death.

There is now a cycle of revenge. Ellie goes on to kill Abby’s friends, and so Abby tries to kill Ellie and her friends. It’s not until Lev talks Abby out of it that the cycle seems to have been “broken”. Abby and Lev put it behind them, however, Ellie cannot and nor can Tommy, which means that the cycle is not broken. Ellie continues her hunt for revenge, thinking it’s still what she needs. Just as she’s about to murder Abby, she sees it’s completely useless.

Here I’m going to talk about another core theme of the story: loss. As Ellie is about to kill Abby, she realises that Joel is gone. Completely gone, and killing Abby is not going to change that. She now has Lev, and if Ellie was to kill Abby, Lev would only lose Abby, leaving him in the same situation Ellie was in at the start of the game, which in turn means Ellie is becoming what she set out to kill. It’s no use. Revenge only causes more pain and loss. This cycle is so vicious and nobody wins, and Abby realised this once she found Lev, and found that revenge is a futile thing that does not achieve anything, especially not bringing back her dead friends. She managed to break the cycle herself, and in turn, she found a life worth living, a live with Lev. However, Ellie could not manage this, choosing to still seek revenge.

Because of this, she faces the consequences. She loses all of her loved ones. She loses Dina, she loses Jesse and she loses her baby son, JJ. Tommy is the same too. Tommy couldn’t break the cycle, and he loses his wife, Maria. And guess what, Joel is still gone. All of that loss, yet Joel is still dead. It’s all been for nothing. Ellie is now completely alone, which is what she said she was scared of in the first game, all because of revenge. The way forward is not anger, rage or revenge, but acceptance and love. That’s my takeaway.

You may think this treatment of Joel and Ellie is “disrespectful”, but I disagree. In the first game, you do a lot of bad things as these characters. Yeah, you go through a lot of pain, but so has everybody else, yet they still face the unfavorable consequences. It only makes sense that Joel and Ellie would too. In my opinion, this only helps to build the world of The Last of Us and show that just because Joel and Ellie are the main characters, they aren’t invincible, and the world doesn’t revolve around them. They just happen to be two people who live in the world amongst so many others, which for me, makes it so much more realistic. This is emphasised in the incredible detail in the gameplay of each enemy having names, with other enemies interacting with eachother as you stalk them. It makes them feel so much more real and only increased my enjoyability.

From a story like this, which is so dark and gritty, I don’t expect a happy ending. You’re not supposed to like Ellie by the end of this story, as she serves as the example of why the cycle of revenge is horrible. You’re not supposed to feel satisfied by it, you’re supposed to feel empty, hurt and sad. That is literally the point.

You have to realise that The Last Of Us is a piece of artistic storytelling told and made by artists. It would have been so easy for Neil Druckmann to write a boring and two-dimensional story to appease players and make bank. But he didn’t. He chose to craft an intricate, heavy and creative direction for his material, and I hugely respect that. At the end of the day, he doesn’t owe you anything. This is his story, and these are his characters, he can do what he wants with them. If you don’t like his creative vision, then great! You don’t have to. If you don’t like something, just don’t play/watch/read it. If you loved the first game but hated the second, then just pretend it doesn’t exist and come up with your own fanfiction for these characters, it probably wouldn’t have been as good as this.

A lot of people blame “bad writing” when they don’t like something. There’s a difference between feeling bad about something than it being bad writing, you know. Just because it wasn’t what you wanted, doesn’t mean the writing is bad. By you feeling angry about Joel dying, Neil Druckmann’s writing has accomplished its objective. And I’m not trying to say that everybody who doesn’t like this game didn’t like it because their fanfiction didn’t come true. You cannot like this game solely because you don’t like the direction it took, and that’s fine. Because again, this story is a piece of artistic storytelling, and art is subjective.

This entire post is just my opinion. I personally loved this story and these characters, and it was exactly what I wanted to get out of this game. Everything about the game I just adored. I loved the plot, the writing, the characters, the gameplay, the music, the visuals, the performances - everything. And if you didn’t, then great. That’s your opinion. It just hurts me to see so many people dismissing the incredible things achieved in this game solely because of one plot point. I don’t know. As I said, I’m not trying to change your opinion or anything, I just thought I’d share mine.

I only scratched the surface of my thoughts and opinions on this game. I could talk about it for hours, which only goes to show the extent of its achievements and how incredible it really is. I doubt anybody is reading this and that’s fine, apologies if none of what I said made any sense at all lol, I’m awful at articulating my opinions aha.

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in-tua-deep · 3 years

Note

idk if you still do au ideas but what if delores was a real person in the apocalypse? how it woul dbe done i have no idea but i love all your aus and thought it would be cool

okay okay I don't tend to go for real!Dolores aus admittedly because I find her much more compelling as what she is: a reflection of five himself and a symptom of his crushing loneliness

but i started thinking about it and you know what?? i think five deserves a little socialization, as a treat

so say like, 0.5% of the population is resistant to abilities. Allison would really struggle to rumor them, Five wouldn't be able to jump with them, and, most importantly, whatever the fuck Vanya's ability does has like, reduced damage or something

and the og apocalypse isn't the moon apocalypse, so let's say that it was pure waves of Vanya's powers that fucked over the earth

so 0.5% of the population survives the apocalypse. though, let's be honestly, the real number is a lot smaller than that. People who might have survived Vanya's initial power wave (miraculously) did not survive buildings crushing them or survive the car/plane/bus/train/other transportation crashes or survive being left alone when they are too young to reliably look after themselves, or the variety of other problems that come with 99.5% of the population dying at once

So, Five arrives in the apocalypse and is met with ruin and fire and a whole lot of dead people. He finds his siblings, but it doesn't matter. They're dead. He doesn't even recognize them at first, these strange grown-ups who he identifies not by their faces but by the umbrellas on their wrists that match his own

As he realizes the full impact of his situation, he hears a voice that says, very succinctly, "holy shit!"

It's a girl a few years older than Five himself, maybe 15 or 16, and she is very excited to see another survivor.

And here's where I u-turn this au around bc i'm not all that interested in real!Dolores, but I would be down to talk about Five meeting survivors in the apocalypse, because if Dolores is real I don't buy no one else survived.

So Dolores shows up and see a Literal Child crying over the corpses of his family and assumes that Five is a fellow survivor, and she immediately grabs him up. Five is incoherent with grief at this point anyway, so he doesn't even protest when she basically hauls him away from the bodies. She's babbling at him, but he doesn't really hear anything she's saying

And then she takes him to her dad

(Why not, let's have the 1% potentially be a heritable thing)

and her dad, let's call him just some dad name. like Rick. it has been a fucking WEEK for him, okay. he had his daughter with him, his ex-wife is on the other coast for her work, and by some miracle he survived the apocalypse and so did his child, and he's been wracking his brains trying to figure out what the fuck to do next

and then his daughter shows up with a traumatized thirteen-year-old in tow

now rick is a good dude. he's a dad. they get out of five that his name is five ("what the fuck" dolores mouths to him over five's shoulder and rick can't help but agree) and the bodies he found were his siblings ("Dad and Ben and Vanya weren't there though," this child cries desperately and rick feels his own heart clench in response, "They might still be alive!")

"We can look for them." Rick assures his new adopted child, because he is an adult in a fresh apocalypse and this kid has presumably lost everything he's ever known (more than rick even knows at the time)

and they do. They each get wagons and they go out and find supplies and look for other survivors. Five is... surprisingly helpful and also surprisingly docile as he is able to rely on Someone Else to give orders while he attempts to (dissociate) process what the fuck has happened

and here's the thing: Five prides himself on being independent, sort of. He's independent for a child soldier, but he's used to taking orders from a male authority figure and Rick happens to be just that

The first time that Five does something dangerous and Rick yells is a revelation

(Rick isn't sure if he hopes that Five's dad is alive or not, because if they find that man alive then Rick might just kill the jackass himself. Also like, Five is bizarrely knowledgeable out survival skills, like way too knowledgeable about it, which is helpful for them but also very concerning)

they find a newspaper and Five finds the article that mentions his father's recent death ("Huh. Heart attack." Five says, and there is no emotion in his voice)

(Years later, years later, Five and Rick talk. "I don't think I wanted to find him, either." Five admits, softly because Dolores is asleep, "I think I was more scared of finding him alive than I was of finding his body. He would've been so mad at me, I think.")

this newspaper is how Rick and Dolores find out about Five being Number Five, Umbrella Academy Missing Person

"Dude, what the fuck." Dolores says, wide eyes, "You're like, thirty?"

"I'm thirteen." Five says, and then checks the date on the newspaper again, "Also I think I would technically be 29 if I lived through all of it, 'cause it's April and my birthday is in October."

"You... time travelled?" Rick asks, which is honestly the more relevant question, "Can you go back?"

And Five just,,, crumples on himself. Because he tried, he tried really hard. It didn't work. "I'm gonna figure it out. I'm gonna go back, I'm going to save them."

That, Rick thinks, is a lot of weight to put on one person's shoulders, but especially the shoulders of a child.

"Alright." Rick says, because what else can he say after finding out his new child has superpowers and is from like, 2004? "What do you need?"

("Oh my god I have so many memes to teach you." Dolores says later, reverently. Five blinks in confusion and Rick mentally prepares himself for the recitation of so many vines)

And it's easier, somehow. Five sometimes feels like it's a betrayal, but he settles into apocalypse life with an ease that surprises him.

He lets Rick fuss over him and help tie his scarf securely around his head every morning before he sets off on supply runs with Dolores. And they're kids! Five has never had a friend before, and Dolores is funny and smart and she's struggling just as much as he is.

"I don't know if my mom's alive." She says to him, in solidarity when he checks the face of every corpse to see if they're Vanya.

Five is practical in the way only a child soldier can be. He's economical with the room in their wagons, carefully examining what might and what might not be useful.

Dolores, on the other hand, constantly takes up space with what Five sees as useless shit.

"Excuse you," Dolores says, shoving a game of monopoly, the entire discworld series, and a pack of glitter gel pens into her wagon, "These are absolutely vital apocalypse supplies."

She challenges him, plays with him in a way no one ever has. "I bet you I can find more batteries today than you can," She grins at him, "Winner gets to pick dinner first?"

"You're on." Five says, directly before Dolores pulls two packs of 24 AA batteries from behind her back, like a cheat.

Dolores makes him take a ten minute break when they find a playground that has been mostly not-destroyed. They rummage around kids backpacks and mother's handbags for some good loot, too numb to corpses to even be bothered all that badly about the corpses they belong to.

"I'm getting on the swings." Dolores says when Five starts making noises about moving on, "I haven't been on a swingset in ages."

"What's the point?" Five grumps.

"Don't be sour because you can't swing as high as I can!" Dolores laughs, getting higher and higher as the swings creak ominously.

Five grumpily gets into the other swing and grudgingly kicks himself back and forth until Dolores takes pity on him and teaches him how to properly move his legs and body to get higher and higher.

Dolores jumps from the swing seat and lands with a flourish and smile. Five jumps out of his seat and then jumps, warping right in front of Dolores and making her yell and hit at him in outrage. Five smiles the widest he has all week.

This is how Five grows up in the apocalypse, with Dolores teasing him into taking breaks and leaning over his shoulder to look at his math and scandalizing him by stating that she'd only just started on matrices in her own high school math class.

Every night they huddle around Rick while he picks up whatever book Dolores picked out that day because it is a travesty that Five has never read hunger games or whatever, and then they read together because it would be a genuine blood bath if they all took turns. The first time Five accidentally mentioned a spoiler and Dolores genuinely considered murder was the birthday of this tradition

Some days the air is too smoky or there are dust storms or it's just plain too dangerous to go out, and they all stay in. Dolores regales Five with stories about public school, and Five tells them about his siblings.

Then they all cry

"I shouldn't be crying." Five sobs.

"Shut the fuck up," Dolores sobs back, "You literally watched me lose my shit over remembering my shitty eighth grade dance and listened to me sob-sing toxic for like four hours."

"In fairness I also wished you would shut up then."

"Let me hug you or I will start singing songs that I only remember the chorus for again you absolute fucker."

"I could always sing some -"

"No, Rick/Dad."

And Five grows up. Rick shows him how to shave very carefully in front of cracked mirrors. Dolores teases him every time his voice cracks. Rick tells Five in no uncertain terms that he loves and cares for him, and that Reginald was a little bitch. There are a lot of heartfelt conversations around that, honestly. Rick telling Five that he and the siblings deserved better, that they were children and deserved to have a childhood.

And that he has faith in Five. Rick and Dolores both do, they bring him back paper and pens and pencils and chalk and anything Five can use to write equations. They poke around any libraries for books on theoretical mathematics and quantum physics. Rick and Dolores go out scouting for food while Five stays home and can work longer.

They also make him take breaks, make sure that he's looking after himself.

They're a little better off than OG!Five when it comes to food, because some animals survive. Enough that Rick figures out how to hunt. Five is the first one to each bugs, and even though Dolores makes faces they all start eating bugs as well.

"Pretty sure there's loads of cultures that eat bugs." Rick says grudgingly, wondering if he should try stirfry the cockroaches and if that would improve the taste. "There's even, uh, cricket flour or whatever, right?"

"Plus you eat like, five spiders a year when you're asleep." Dolores says cheerfully, just to watch her dad's face scrunch up in displeasure.

"That doesn't sound true, but I don't know enough about spiders to dispute it." Five mutters, and Dolores gives him such a proud look that it makes him roll his eyes.

They're in their thirties when Rick dies. He's out foraging and hunting, and the rubble he's standing on gives way and he ends up with a gash in his leg. He manages to stop the bleeding, but the world is filthy and they don't have any antibiotics.

He gets an infection.

"It's okay." He tells both of his kids, "It's okay. I'm just so glad that you guys have each other, y'hear? I'm so glad."

"It's not okay." Five says, voice thick and choked, "It's not."

"Yeah, well, you're going to figure out how to go back, right? Go back in time and save everyone. Then I'll have never died, right?" Rick smiles, "And even if you don't, I'll be waiting for you on the other side and we'll see each other again anyway."

"I'm going to fix it."

"I know. I have faith in you, Five." Ricks says honestly, and that's more than Reginald ever said.

They sit quietly together while Dolores is out scavenging. They've been taking turns sitting with Rick.

"I won't remember you, in the past, will I?" Rick says rhetorically, but Five answers anyway.

"I don't think so."

Rick hums, "Well, doesn't matter. If you need help in the past, you come to me, y'hear?"

"You won't remember me."

"Doesn't matter. You come find me, and you tell me your crazy story until I believe you, and then I'll help you." Rick says firmly, "You're family. You're my son. Timelines? Don't matter. If you need help, with anything, even if it's just with - with filling out a bowling team or something -"

"I have never been bowling in my life and you know it." Five interrupts, but it makes him laugh just a little bit which was clearly Rick's intention.

"Well who knows what you'll get up to in the past! You'll be able to go bowling, you know. Get to wear those uncomfortable shoes. Hey, you go far enough back maybe you can go to Dolores's tenth birthday party and put me out of my misery."

"Was she bad at bowling?"

"Oh, she was wiping the floor with me. No contest."

"Honestly, that sounds absolutely accurate."

"Shut up, bowling just wasn't my sport. Regardless, the point was that I'm giving you a free pass to come and get me. Because I know you, I know how you think." Rick brings up his hand to tap his finger against Five's forehead, "You get it into your head that you need to go it alone, take it all on your shoulders. I'm telling you that if you do that I'll somehow manifest my memories and come smack you over the head for being stupid, you hear?"

"I'm not dragging you into anything." Five says firmly, "I'll have my siblings."

"Who were also children." Rick points out. "And dragging? Dragging is such a strong word for a volunteer."

"A volunteer who won't remember volunteering." Five shoots back.

Rick just shrugs, and then winces when the movement jolts his bad leg. "Five, I'm going to be honest with you here. And sappy. Can you handle a bit of sappiness for a minute?"

"No."

"Well too bad. Can't leave a dying man, you'd feel too bad. So you're stuck with me. But you listen good, okay? Because you aren't dragging me into anything. Whatever life you have, I want to have a part of that. Because you're my son. Wherever you are, whatever you do, I want to help because you're family. What you'd be doing by leaving me out of it is depriving me of someone I love, depriving me of knowing one of the best kids I've ever known."

"Shut up." Five says, choked.

"Nope, it's sappy time." Rick states, "Maybe asking you to come find me is selfish, but I don't care. No matter what version of me exists, I want to be in your life."

"My life is a walking joke, why would you want any part of that?"

"It has been my privilege to watch you grow up. To help you. To be here for you. Of course I'd want to be there to watch you grow up the rest of the way."

"But -"

"Shut up, just let me tell you that I am so proud of you. You never give up, and your heart is so big. You love so much and so loudly, and it's been the highest honor of my life to be included in your family."

Five pauses for a moment to collect himself before simply saying - "You're the best dad I've ever had."

Rick snorts, "Considering my competition, I'd sure hope so. That bar was so low old Reggie was practically limbo dancing with the devil. Now get over here and give an old man a hug."

They don't bury Rick, when he dies. They don't have time and the ground is too hard and they don't have the heart to move him. Instead the pack everything up and seal him in the shelter they'd lived in.

Dolores pulls out a bottle of ancient nail polish and painstakingly writes Rick's name on the wall with his birth year and an approximate current year. They aren't 100% sure though, since time blends together out in the apocalypse, but it's something.

They continue by themselves. They get older.

Dolores jokingly calls him her husband because the way his face scrunches up makes her cackle. They see other people very occasionally, usually passing through. Usually groups. Dolores and Five get to flex their hosting skills, though more than one group declines their cockroach stirfry.

("It's a family recipe." Five says with amusement in his eyes that usually manages to drown out old grief.)

"Jeeze, that kid couldn't have been older'n twenty-three." Dolores complains, "Makes me feels positively ancient."

"They wouldn't have known any world 'cept for the apocalypse." Five muses, pouring some boiled water into wine glasses because they might be living in the apocalypse but they can be fancy.

"Do you ever think about that?" Dolores asks, turning to him with no judgement, just curiosity. "When you go back, you'll be like, erasing them from existence."

Five shrugs, "Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe this place will just split off into an alternate timeline."

"Maybe none of this is real." Dolores says, amusement coloring her voice. "Maybe you aren't talking to a real person at all. Maybe this is just a symbol of your insanity and cracked mind."

"Dolores, I literally have a scar where you stabbed me. Did I somehow manage to stab myself in the back?"

"Scraped you, I scraped you. By accident."

"So you maintain." Five says haughtily, swirling his water in his wine glass like a pretentious prick.

"I could totally be fake. You don't know my life."

"I know way too much about you, Dolores. Like, way way too much." Five scoffs, because Dolores and him have literally no secrets from one another at this point. Five even knows the truth behind what happened at Janet Scranton's thirteenth birthday party. Like, he said, way too much.

"Maybe you made it up. Maybe that's why you know so much."

"Dolores, I'm going to be honest with you right now." Five presses the tips of his fingers to his chin, "If you were a figment of my imagination, you would be so much better at math."

"Hey!" Dolores squawks indignantly, "I didn't even get to finish high school you pretentious prick!"

"Neither did I!"

"You didn't even go to high school, you brat."

"I'm fifty-two I think I've outgrown 'brat.'"

"Tell that to your attitude." Dolores says haughtily, "You're still younger than me."

"Won't be when I go back in time." Five says cheerfully, completely ignoring Dolores's venomous look.

"That's cheating."

"Sucks to suck." Five says loftily, taking another sip of his water.

Sometimes they talk about The Plan, with capital letters. What Five is going to do when he goes back in time, depending on when he pops out. Is he going to adopt his siblings? What about Reginald?

"You don't think I could kill Reginald?" Five says, holding a hand to his chest in mock offense.

"I think you should let me do it. I'll even give you control of tonight's music if you do."

"What are you doing to do? Bite his ankles? What if you're like, seven or something?"

"All the better to get away with it since I'll be too young to convict or whatever."

"Pretty sure that's not how the law works."

"How would you know? Just for that I'm playing Istanbul on repeat again."

"I don't know why you think that's a threat. That song slaps."

It takes a few more years before Five is close enough that the Commission comes to interfere. Because that's what I think happened - Five was getting too close and they stepped in because they might as well distract the man as much as they can with missions, right?

So the Handler shows up. And she offers Five a job, telling him that they have the ability to travel through time. And Five - hesitates.

"Give me some time?" Five asks, and the Handler graciously gives him 24 hours.

And he and Dolores talk it over, because now that his goal is more in sight than it has ever been and Five is scared.

"What are you waiting for? You have the chance to see your siblings again." Dolores says patiently.

"Yeah," Five says, and what he doesn't say is clear. But I won't see you.

"Five." Dolores says, and she cradles his face between her palms like he is something precious, "I have had so much time with you already. More than I would have ever. We have been so lucky, to have this time. How can I demand more than what we have already been given?"

"When have you ever not demanded the world, Dolores?" Five asks, his own hand coming up to cover Dolores's own.

"We've had decades together, Five. We're getting old. I was always going to lose you, one way or another. Nothing lasts forever."

"I don't want to lose you."

"I know. But if I had to choose a way, if I could decide where our story ends, this would be it. Letting you go, because this way you get to live. You get to see your family again. You get to save the world. I could ask for nothing more than for you to get your happy ending."

Five removes Dolores's hand from his cheek so that he can cradle it between them, "I'm happy here with you. I've never been happier. Isn't that silly? That I was happier in the apocalypse?"

"I bet killing Reggie would make you happy." Dolores laughs rustily.

"One day you're going to see the mysterious disappearance of a famous billionaire in the paper and feel a twinge of satisfaction and now have a clue why." Five laughs as well, shaking his head.

Dolores pats Five's hands, "Five, look at me. We've had our time. And you're going to give me even more of it. More time with my father. More time with my mother. I'll never know it, but you'll have saved me."

"What if this is - what if this is an alternate reality? What if I leave you here alone?"

"Then you'll be saving a 15-year-old girl from the same fate as me. Because as much as I love you, as much as I have loved this time we have had together, this is still an apocalypse. This should never have happened, and if you have a chance to go back and prevent it, then I want you to take that chance with both hands."

"Even if it means leaving you alone?"

Dolores smiles at him, "I'm not going to be alone. Far too many creepy crawlies in the apocalypse for that."

"Shut up, I'm being serious."

"Hmm." Dolores hums consideringly, "Maybe I'll head North, to that new settlement that last group said they'd heard word of. Sure they'd find some use for an old woman who's survived this long in the wilderness."

"You can have my half of the record collection." Five says, pulling her against him into a hug that she easily returns.

"As if I wouldn't have stolen them as soon as you left." She scoffs, but it's a little wet, and Five pretends his own eyes aren't leaking tears.

When The Handler comes back, Dolores gives him another hug. She also slips something into his pocket - some photos. They'd taken it a year into the apocalypse, when Dolores had found an ancient looking polaroid camera and towed it home despite Five's protests about practicality. The photos are worn and faded at the edges, but the smiles on Five's little apocalypse family's faces are undeniable.

"You'll have to see if they magically fade when you change the timeline." Dolores whispers to him with a grin, "Like in the movies."

"Okay." Five whispers back.

"You have the list of movies to watch, right?" Dolores says. Five rolls his eyes and nods because he wrote the list last night into his Vanya-book while Dolores hovered over his shoulder and critiqued his handwriting.

"And you promise to try a proper non-expired twinkie at some point?"

"That I do not promise. I think even looking at one would make me lose my lunch. I have twinkie-trauma."

"Shut up and get going." Dolores says, because the Handler is starting to tap her foot impatiently.

And off Five goes to become an assassin. Though - he's much more gentle this time. He's careful, he doesn't kill children and he usually takes jobs that don't require killing at all. He distracts and manipulates events as much as he can without killing.

He's actually much more well socialized, thanks to Rick and Dolores. Less feral child and more determined man on a mission.

Which is why he's so frustrated when he finally, finally manages to get the equations to work and falls through and falls - directly back into his stupid thirteen-year-old body.

"Shit." Five says, loudly, and revels in the surprised look on his siblings faces.

He strides into the kitchen, and they all follow him like ducklings. They look exactly the way they did when they died.

"Wow this is actually way harder than I thought it would be." Five muses, looking at their dead faces. But as Dolores would say, life is hard but you have to keep on trucking sometimes. "Whatever, what's the date?"

"Five, where have you been?" Diego demands, looking irritated. It makes Five snort in amusement.

"The future. The past. If you want like, an exact list of dates you'll have to hold your horses. I spent like, two weeks in Peru once. No souvenirs though, unfortunately."

They look taken aback, like they didn't expect Five to have quite this much sass. Oops. That is definitely Dolores's influence. Or maybe he was always a little asshole. In fairness, what teenagers aren't tiny assholes? He has an excuse.

"What the fuck does that mean?" Diego's eyebrows are furrowed in anger. It kind of takes Five aback for a second, because he remembers a Diego who stutters when he argued.

"When did you learn the fuck-word?" Five asks, raising an eyebrow before her can help it, "Grace ought to wash your mouth out with soap."

Diego immediately goes red, "Shut up!"

"Wow you're so easy to rile up. Aren't you like, twenty-something? Actually, I could figure out for myself how old you are if you gave me the date."

"I'm twenty-nine." Diego growls, like that was the point.

"Haunting!" Five says cheerfully, because that means there is way less time than he would like, narrowing his time down to a six month window.

It's extremely funny how his cheer makes all of them make faces.

It's Klaus who leans forward, "Why do you need to know?"

Klaus's face is open and curious and - (looks exactly like he did when Five found him all those years ago) - and Five can't help but answer him. "The world end on April 1st, 2019. No it isn't an April Fools joke, yes I have heard that joke like a million different times. I just want to know how close I landed so I can, you know, start working on how to fix that."

"Woah woah woah, roll it back." Allison says, holding a hand up, "What?"

"The apocalypse occurs on April 1st, 2019." Five says, slowly. "I have traveled from afar to prevent this from happening, because like, everyone dies."

"Everyone?" Vanya says weakly from the side.

She's clearly expecting to be ignored, so Five turns his head to address her directly by wiggling his hand back and forth a little. "Sort of. Like, not too many people survive at all. A handful of the human population, you know."

"But you survived?" Diego recovers admirably, if bitingly.

"Well, no." Five says rolling his eyes, "Wouldn't you just know it, Klaus here has managed to figure out a new ability!"

Everyone turns to look at Klaus, who immediately holds up his hands like he's being arrested or something, "I did not!"

"Wonderful! Now that we've established that I'm alive -"

"Why should we trust a word you say?" Luther says for the first time, looking pensive.

Five blinks, genuinely taken aback. "Because... I'm your brother? Because I can clearly and obviously time travel? Like, yeah, it would have been more convenient if I'd arrived in like, my old-body for proof-purposes, but like. I mean. Thirteen is still a pretty convincing age to be to prove time travel considering if I hadn't, I would be like, almost thirty."

"Roll it back again." Allison says firmly, "What do you mean by 'old body'?"

"Great question!" Five says pointing at Allison and smiling. Everyone looks at him weird again, and Five takes a moment to wonder if they've ever experienced positive reinforcement. Knowing Reginald, probably not. "Wait! Is Reggie alive? Wait, no, answer that in a second. Uh. When I time traveled I fucked up my body I guess, I was like, old. White hair and wrinkles-type old from spending decades in the apocalypse. But I fucked up the calculations and got booted back to my thirteen-year-old body, I guess. How, I have no idea."

"What?" Vanya says, still equally weakly.

"You have no idea how fucked up time travel is." Five whispers conspiratorially to Vanya, loud enough for the whole table to hear, "There are so many ways to die. Or permanently tear a hold in space time. But like, with life as we know if ending soon-ish, I figured I couldn't possibly fuck it up worse than it already was, y'know? Speaking of, anyone have the date again?"

"Wait, what was that about dad?" Luther asks, very focused.

"Oh, you still call him dad? Big oof." Five says automatically, because apparently his verbal filter is shot to hell after living with Dolores. It does make Klaus bark out a too-loud laugh.

"What does that mean?" Luther asks aggressively.

"It means Reginald sucks and doesn't deserve the title of 'dad,' what did you think I meant?" Five asks, and now both Diego and Vanya and both cracking smiles, though Vanya is covering hers with a hand.

"Have some respect for the dead." Luther growls, standing up and looking very large and threatening.

Five sways back, craning his head up, "Woah there big buy, sit down before I injure my poor growing spine looking up at you. Jeeze, did Reggie force feed you steroids or something? I wouldn't put it past him but like, I just want to know he at least went over the side effects of the drug with you. Also like, thanks for narrowing it down. Also terrifying! Seriously though, exact date please because if I have less than 24 hours I am going to break down crying and that is a threat."

"I love this Five." Klaus says reverently.

"March 21st." Vanya offers, finally.

"Wow! Terrifying!" Five says, clapping his hands together, "Hate that. Ten days, huh? Well, who wants to get on board the save-the-world express?"

Klaus immediately flings his hand in the air, Five points at his brother appreciatively. "Yes, excellent! I'll take the volunteer in the lovely skirt as my first team member. Any other volunteers?"

"Danke!" Klaus simpers, grinning widely like this is the vest entertainment he's had in weeks.

"I'm not just going to stand here and listen to you badmouth dad and boss us around." Luther slams his hands on the table.

"Well not with that attitude." Five snarks.

Diego raises his hand, "I would like to join team fuck dad as well."

"We can certainly debate team names later." Five says, nodding wisely as Luther gives some sort of scandalized gasp.

"Honestly, I just want to see where this is going." Klaus confesses.

Five shrugs, because he doesn't really care about the reason. "Don't you want to prove me wrong them? Prove what a well-adjusted young man Reginald Hargreeves raised?"

"Shut up." Luther grinds out, looking a moment away from throwing a punch.

"If this is all true, I have to get home." Allison cuts in, looking concerned, "I have - I have a daughter."

"I mean, if you want to give Claire a world to live in then I'd stick around, but that's just me." Five shrugs.

"You know her name?" Allison asks, obviously taken aback.

Five is almost offended, "Uh, yeah. I have her photo as well. Y'all get on like, a bizarre number of gossip magazine covers did you know that?"

Allison manages to outdo herself in terms of being taken aback once more.

There's a beat of silence, and then Five turns, "Vanya? You in?"

"Me?" Vanya blinks, looking shocked. "What can I do?"

"Yeah, what can she do?" Diego asks, crossing his arms and suddenly looking grumpy.

It baffles Five, who scrunches his nose, "Uh, like, a lot? I assume? I mean. I'm going to be honest here, just looking at y'all right now is a lot. In more ways than one! Hashtag trauma and all that, but like, name a single one of you that wouldn't be the most obvious person in the room as soon as you walked into it. Except Vanya, who somehow manages to look like a well adjusted adult, by some miracle."

"Did you just verbally say the word hashtag?" Allison asks, looking so deeply confused.

"More concerned about the trauma he tacked onto there, but y'know, to each their own." Klaus immediately cuts in.

"You think I'm well-adjusted?" Vanya asks, looking oddly touched.

"I would like to direct your attention to Diego's leather pants-scowl combo and Luther's general aura of daddy-issues." Five says pointedly, "I can practically smell the tragic comic book backstory in this room. If I'd jumped back a decade earlier this would have been Batman's wet dream of orphan selection."

"Alright! Game plan!" Five says, waving Diego's knife in his hand.

Diego's hands immediately go to his weird harness looking thing, "Hey!"

"Give me just one moment to get the tracker out." Five rolls his eyes, "Then I'll give it back, I promise. Also if someone could ask Grace for like, some antibiotics that would be good."

"What?" Allison asks, directly before Five stabs himself and there is suddenly panic at the table.

"Relax!" Five says, allowing Diego to remove the knife from his hands. He doesn't need it anyway and his hand immediately drops down to root in the wound.

"Five what the fuck!" Diego yells, but Five just pulls up bloody fingers and waves the tracker into Diego's stupefied face.

"What the fuck is that, Five?" Allison demands, looking very shaken.

"I literally just said it was a tracker." Five points out, "Now, I think our first team activity should be voting on whether we destroy it or take it out to bumfuck nowhere and ditch it to confuse the Commission."

"What the fuck is the Commission?" Diego barks.

"Man. Maybe I should just hit up Rick." Five muses, "This is going to take so much explaining."

"Who is Rick."

"So much explaining."

#survivors au #well adjusted five au #five actually has some social skills!#and an idea of what an actual parent looks like as well #klaus absolutely adores this version of five #who quotes vines and uses gen z slang with the best of them #five has been reliably informed that public education is worse than the apocalypse #but he's also pretty sure working with his family is worse as well #five: i have so much trauma lol #klaus: oh big same #vanya: mood #five is somehow the most well adjusted hargreeves #and the most responsible #he doesn't legally exist and he doesn't pay taxes but somehow he has his shit together #five showing up at rick's house: you don't know me but i know you in the future #rick: what the fuck #five: don't make me bring up bethany midler from highschool because you gave me so many embarrassing stories to convince yourself with #rick: okay okay i believe you and you are???#five: your son from the future lol what's up dad want to help save the world #five arriving back at the manor like: WHAT'S UP LOSERS RICK IS NOW YOUR DAD TOO BC GOD KNOWS Y'ALL NEED AN ACTUAL FATHER FIGURE #klaus calls rick a dilf and five kidney punches him hard enough that klaus can't even properly introduce himself #it's better for everyone that way #delores: 15 and ready to fuck someone up #delores: i'm not staying with this weirdo (diego) while you go off with my dad #five threateningly: don't make me bring up what really happened to dad's good suit in 2012 #delores: i will stay right here #rick: wait WHAT happened to my good suit #five: unimportant don't you want to save the world #long post #far tua long

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mizunetzu · 3 years

Text

Tags~: @scifiji @shiny-bun @luv-hqs @gummiebearsmp4 @aquariusmurderer @inarizza @roadkillarr (finally I made the part two AHAHAH)

——————

Kita x reader - warm, warm professions (God I love you so much) (cold cold obvs. Part 2)

Warnings - ahaha angst, crying Kita

Pronouns - male, he/him

you can find part one here!

——————

“Shicchan, your hands are so cold...”

(Y/n) cupped both of Kita’s numb hands in his own. Kita tensed, looking down at both of their hands. He felt his own hands being attacked with (Y/n’s) warm ones, his cold, cold hands already thawing just at the one touch.

“Isn’t it hard to toss the ball when you’re hands are numb? That’s bad!” (Y/n) brought Kita’s hands to cup his face, his hands stinging from how warm his cheeks were.

(Y/n) nuzzled his face into Kita’s left hand. He practically murmured into his palm. “How’d they get so cold in the first place?”

Kita wouldn’t show it, in fact he didn’t think he could if he tried, but the warmth that spread across his chest made him suddenly want to run laps. He settled for slightly gripping and rubbing (Y/n’s) cheeks with his thumbs. “I don’t know.” Was all Kita could muster. He was too lost in (Y/n’s) captivating eyes.

God, he loved him so much.

——

Numb.

Numb was the way Kita would describe the feeling in his mouth.

He sat quietly on a foldable chair in the gym, twirling his fingers together instead of watching the practice match going on. He didn’t think he could pay attention if he tried, when he used to be able to have his eyes glued onto the ball even though he was on the sidelines. His fingers felt kind of numb.

He wrapped his fingers up in his shirt to no avail. All it did was make his stomach cold from his fingers bitter touch. It wasn’t even that cold outside. It was a rather nice day in terms of weather. But it didn’t feel like that at all.

“-ita. Kita!”

Kita raised his head. Atsumu loomed above him with his arms crossed.

“...Did you need something, Atsumu-san?”

“Yeah. Why’re ya actin’ all depressed? You’re makin’ everyone feel depressed too, y’know.”

“Atsumu! Shut the fuck up!” Kita heard someone whisper-yell, as well as a grunt of pain from Atsumu. Kita blinked.

“Nothing...much.”

“Nothin’ much?! How bout’ when you started cryin’ yer ass off during practice a week ago? Didn’t seem like nothin’ to me!”

Osamu slapped Atsumu upside the head. Aran sighed.

“I gotta agree with Atsumu-san on this. You don’t look too good these days. Especially since (L/n)-san stopped showin’ up to practice.”

There was hums and nods of agreement. Kita pursed his lips.

“Did...did something happen between y’all?”

Kita couldn’t look Aran in the eyes. He, also, used to have no problem speaking his mind (in fact sometimes it came out automatically) but right now his mouth was glued shut. Now, and probably forever. He didn’t wanna say it. He didn’t wanna think it. He didn’t wanna hear it-

“Kita and (L/n) broke up a week ago.”

Suna pitched in monotonously. Kita flinched subtly. The gym was silent. All eyes were on Kita. His throbbing, cold hands didn’t help, as he tried warming them up discreetly by stuffing them under the backside of his shirt.

“Oh...uh, sorry.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t mind.”

The awkward, sympathetic pats on the back didn’t really help either, but he replied with a curt “s’fine.” nonetheless.

——

(Y/n) kissed the back of Kita’s hand.

“Looks like your hands warmin’ up...” He drew it away from his lips and examined it with half lidded eyes and a reserved smile. Kita watched as tiny specs of sun fluttered around (Y/n’s) warm face, painting his face and hair with light that made him look like an angel sent from heaven.

Kita mindlessly brought his free hand up to the side of (Y/n’s) face, touching and stroking his cheek with the grace of a feather. (Y/n) looked up from his hand, up at Kita’s face.

(Y/n) leaned into his touch. He used his other hand to cup the hand resting peacefully on his cheek, nuzzling his nose further into Kita’s palm.

“Something wrong?”

“No...”

Kita felt a throbbing, hazy feeling in his chest. Like something inside his ribcage was trying to break free, and explode into a million pieces.

“Then, do you just like holding my face?” (Y/n) smiled that smile that made him go weak in the knees. “That’s good...I like it when you hold my face too.”

God, he loved him so much.

——

Kita slumped down, doubled over himself panting and heaving on the sidewalk where Inarizaki was collectively jogging. Ginjima stopped in front of Kita, jogging in place.

“You’re usually in the very front of the pack when we all run.” He said in between huffs.

Kita said nothing, only panting and crouching down to catch his breath.

“You run in the very back of the group now.”

He was met with no response again. Ginjima stopped running in place, and stared down pitifully at Kita’s hunched over body.

“S’everything alright back there?!” Aran called out from a distance. Ginjima yelled out a “Everything’s fine!” While waving his arms around in the air until Aran waved back. Ginjima looked back at Kitas scrunched up form.

“Y’know-maybe you should just...go home for the day. Take a break.”

Kita looked up at him with dry, tired eyes. His throat refused to put out any other sounds than exhales the occasional cough.

“Go freshen up and go home. You won’t die missing a day of practice.” Ginjima crouched down to Kita’s face, his voice noticeably softer and careful. “It’s not like you to push yourself when you know you’re not doing well.”

“I’m not sick, it’s not the same thing-“

“But you’re heartbroken.”

Heartbroken. Kita supposed that was the word to describe his situation right now. Heartbroken, yet it didn’t feel like the correct word to describe how he felt. He felt like he was dying. Drowning. Freezing.

“I’ll walk you back, ‘kay?” Ginjima pushed off his feet, extending a hand over to Kita. He pulled him up, and Kita swayed in the air like a bobblehead. “Go change and go home. We’ll see you tomorrow, don’t worry. I’ll tell the others you went home.”

Ginjima and Kita walked in the opposite direction they were running. Kita downcast his face.

“M’kay.”

——

“Do you love me?”

Kita remembered the way (Y/n’s) face didn’t radiate the warm glow it usually did when he was around him. His eyes looked strained, infuriated even, and he looked like he wanted to say something more. But it was a simple question, ‘do you love me?’. And of course he did. So that’s what he said.

“...Of course I-“

“”of course I do.” That’s what you always say..! Say something else, dammit! Say you love me!”

(Y/n) abruptly rose from his seat, stepping over the bench and grabbing Kita by the collar. He pulled him closer to his face, shaking him by the shirt with knuckles that almost turned white.

“M-Make me believe that you love me!”

He really wish he didn’t remember how much tears flowed freely from (Y/n’s) eyes, and how he was biting and gnawing at his lip to keep from screaming, or the way he shook with despair in general. It played over and over again, the same sorrow-riddled expression that made Kita’s stomach drop.

He really wish he didn’t remember. But he wished he’d said something, anything, even more.

(Y/n’s) face went from angry and sad, to numb and cold in a matter of seconds. He’d much rather prefer the heated look of (Y/n’s) angry face, than the stone cold lifeless look (Y/n) held when he let go of his shirt. Because even with his angry sobs and screams, there was still a hint of warmth. Even if it was angry passion, it was still better than the cold, dead stare he held that Kita couldn’t meet.

“...I think we should break up.”

Kita’s world went silent. He was struck with an immediate shock of dread, panic, stress, and everything in between. He had so many questions. Why? Didn’t he know that he loved him? He loved him so, so much, so why was he saying that he didn’t? Was his love not enough? Didn’t he know how much he needed him?

He had so many questions, yet his face made of cold stone could only say one thing.

“Why?”

(Y/n’s) iron clad grip on Kita’s shirt loosened, he stepped back, face feeling raw after crying. “I don’t want to be with someone who can’t tell me they love me. Once you can tell me you love me, and mean it, I’m all ears.”

Kita watched as (Y/n) turned his back on him for the first and last time. More thoughts raced in his head. He could change. He could do better. He’d love him a thousand times more, fix every little imperfection, hell, do it a thousand times over again if it meant that (Y/n) would turn around with that warm smile again. He wanted see that smile again. That smile that made him feel so warm. Please. One more time. Kita’s arm gravitated outwards, reaching for (Y/n’s) cold back as he turned away. One more time, please smile for me.

But he didn’t. He was met with nothing more than a cold shoulder.

He was left with the sudden drop in temperature, the world once filled with so much warmth being winded away into a cold wasteland. Kita looked down, his eyes numb and wide.

“Please come back...” he remembered saying, though he didn’t think it ever came out audibly.

“I love you, (Y/n)...”

‘God...dear God...’

He loved him so much.

‘Why did you take him away from me?’

‘The gods were always listening, is what my Baa-san would always say. Were the gods not listening to my undying love for you, (L/n)(Y/n)? Was my feelings for you not enough to make you smile for me one last time? God, I loved you so much.’

‘So did I not love you enough?’

——

Kita found himself sitting on the same bench (Y/n) professed his love for him to. Granted, it was the same bench they had broken up on, but Kita didn’t want to think about that.

He twirled a wilted cherry blossom petal in between his fingers. The rigid, dark pink petal cracked and crumbled, turning into dust in Kita’s hand.

As much as he hated this place, this stupid stone bench with a cherry blossom tree, it was a beautiful sight that not much students knew about. It was quiet, but it caused (Y/n’s) cold, cold eyes to bore into his mind all the more he stayed. It was a double edged sword.

He sometimes wondered what (Y/n) was doing with his free time outside of the club. What did he do? Did he take a nap after classes? His sleeping face looked very cute, though he only saw it once when he dozed off studying at his house. Did he spend time with his parents? He always found people respectable to their parents very attractive. Did he find a new club to stay with?

Kita clenched his fists. The thought of (Y/n) playing a different sport, doing something else after school, didn’t sit right with him. Was that what he was doing? Did he realize how cold and uncomfortable he made volleyball for him, and decided to leave? Would he never see him smiling up at him again after school?

Would he never see (L/n) (Y/n’s) warm, warm smile directed at him ever again?

He heard footsteps echo on the grass behind him. The footsteps halted awkwardly, and Kita turned around.

(Y/n) locked eyes with Kita. He should’ve been paying attention to where he was going, huh? Maybe if he was looking where he was walking, he could’ve noticed Kita Shinsuke sitting there, and could’ve found a different spot to sit at after school.

(Y/n) wasted no time spinning on his heel and leaving. He didn’t wanna face Kita after everything that went down.

Kita feet sprang him up and off the bench. He didn’t know what he was doing, but the next thing he knew was that his arms wrapped around (Y/n’s) body, holding him while he was facing away. Kita’s mind raced with thoughts and went absolutely blank at the same time.

(Y/n) pursed his lips. “What do you want?” He said. It came out harsher than he intended, but Kita paid no mind. He wordlessly buried his face into the crook of (Y/n’s) neck, nuzzling it and relishing in the warmth that was not intended for him.

“H-hey! What gives!” (Y/n) half-heartedly tried pushing Kita away. He knew if he gave in now, he’d come crawling back into Kita’s cold, loveless arms, craving that touch and pretending it was indeed, love. “Don’t...don’t touch me, Kita-“

“Shinsuke.”

The arm that was trying to push Kita away went limp. (Y/n’s) hardened exterior cracked as his resolve faltered. Kita buried himself deeper into (Y/n’s) shoulder, firmly wrapping his arms around (Y/n) tightly. He was practically murmuring into (Y/n’s) school uniform.

“Call...call me Shinsuke...it’s what you used to call me...when we first started dating...”

“Well,” (Y/n) downcast his face, his eyes hardened and cold while he balled up his fists. “We aren’t dating. So why does it-“

All of (Y/n’s) resolve, all the time he spent putting up the barrier to his emotions, shattered once he heard the first sniffle from Kita.

After that, Kita fell apart like dominoes.

His grip on (Y/n’s) waist tightened as he shook violently, sobs crescendoed and ripping through his body explosively, unlike the silent tears that he shed that day he left. His whimpers and choked cries were muffled from the cloth of (Y/n’s) uniform. He loved him so much. Why couldn’t he see how much he loved him?

Kita cried and cried on (Y/n’s) shoulder. He couldn’t see the type of face (Y/n) was making, and that made him all the more nervous. He wanted to feel the warmth of (Y/n) at least one last time. After that, he swore he would move on. He swore. He swore, so one last time. Please.

(Y/n) sighed. “Kita...”

Kita didn’t respond. He continued to cry pathetically onto (Y/n’s) shoulder.

“Kita-kun.”

This time, Kita shakily shook his head. (Y/n) sighed, this time more stably, and untangled Kita’s vice grip from his body.

“Shinsuke-kun...”

Kita, confused and sad, finally caught a glimpse of (Y/n’s) face when he turned around. He had a look of empathy, his warm hands brought up to his cheeks, melting his ice cold skin awake. Kita rumbled with another choked sob, closing his eyes and sobbing into (Y/n’s) hands. It was so warm. After the cold winter storm he’d suffered through, the first ray of sunshine that shone through always felt the best.

“Shinsuke-kun,” (Y/n) repeated. Kita hiccuped, trying to stop his tears from falling.

“P-lease come back...” Kita’s voice was hoarse, cracking with every word. “I-I don’t like this...”

(Y/n) said nothing. Kita broke free from (Y/n’s) soft grip on his face, and brought him into a hug. He was never much for physical affection, but right now (Y/n) felt so, so warm.

“You’ve...you’ve treated me so kind...I-I’m sorry...i’ve been so cold...” Kita rambled on, sobbing into (Y/n’s) hair quietly. (Y/n) still didn’t say anything.

“I-I...didn’t mean to...I swear...! I’ll be a better boyfriend...please...I’ll love you correctly...”

(Y/n’s) silence was defecating. Kita felt his ears go numb with the silent treatment he was being put through. Was this his punishment?

“I...say something...! Please...” Kita whispered, tears gathering at his eyes once more. “Please...”

Then, (Y/n) finally wrapped his warm arms around Kita. He mumbled pathetically, “Y’know I don’t like it when people cry, Shinsuke...”

It was Kita’s turn to go quiet. (Y/n) pulled away, much to Kita’s protest. However, the warm smile (Y/n) gave him made his heart throb and his throat close up.

(Y/n) caressed Kita’s face with his thumb. “Stop crying...”

“I love you...” Kita whispered, his voice cracking at the seams. (Y/n’s) face adorned a look of astonishment, a slight blush lighting up his already perfect sunny face.

(Y/n) smiled again. That same smile Kita had been craving for forever.

“T-Tell me that again...please.”

Kita collapsed into (Y/n’s) warm arms. Choked sobs of “I-I love you-!” And “I-I love you so much...” echoed through the air. The emotionless barrier, holding all of Kita’s emotions captive to the world, cracked and shattered, his crying face bearing the weight of a man who loved (L/n) (Y/n) with his entire being.

(Y/n) stroked the back of Kita’s head softly.

“Of course you do...”

God, he loved him so much.

——————

#kita angst #kita shinsuke x reader #kita x you #kita x y/n #kita x male reader #shinsuke kita x reader #kita shinsuke #kita x reader #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu boys #haikyuu angst #haikyuu x male reader #hq x y/n #hq x male reader

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kaisa-ryo · 3 years

Text

Attention deficit (pt. 1)

jujutsu kaisen

Characters: Itadori Yuji, Satoru Gojo, Megumi Fushiguro, Inumaki Toge, Sukuna Ryōmen, Nanami Kento, Suguru Geto

Warning: English isn't my native language!

☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*

Itadori Yuji

Itadori in this situation acts, oddly enough, completely primitive. The less attention he sees from you, the more he tries to get him back. In other circumstances, this might even seem exaggerated, but here and now this is the most critical moment. What does he do? Yes, everything in a row: drops the book, turns its pages, rummages in the bag, humming softly to himself, and so on ... And all this continues until it comes to stroking the hips and lightly squeezing one palm, while the other rewrites the abstract ...

- I miss the old y/n. - he gives out with sadness in his eyes.

At this moment, the game of interest begins: you feel how simultaneously there is a feeling of spontaneous and purposeful manipulation, how you are gently and imperceptibly pushed towards the long-awaited goal.

In such a situation, one could easily succumb, but you, resisting this, answer:

- Yuji, I'm very busy right now.

It would seem that a strong guy fights curses, trains with the strongest shamans, but with ordinary words it is so easy to break.

It's hard for you to realize that right now he is depressed because of you. It's unusual to see a sad Yuji almost always smiling and making others do the same. Especially you.

And so you compromise, intertwining your fingers, frowning slightly and pretending to listen to something inside yourself ... After that, Yuji remains in this position for a long time, as if afraid to frighten you off, because now such closeness between you is too valuable to miss out.

Satoru Gojo

It turns out that sometimes even acting like a fool doesn't help you pay attention to Gojo. First, the way you constantly focus on the same thing, so that the words in your speech get confused, takes on a comic character, and he comes to the idea that, for no reason, for no reason, you decided that work is more important to you than himself. Then you stop paying attention to him altogether. You no longer look at him from under your brows, do not frown at the idiotic jokes with which he is trying to distract you, as it was yesterday. Satoru notices that you are much smaller. He is puzzled and even confused. Finally, it occurs to him that you just have nothing to do, and comes up with the craziest idea to entertain you.

- What are you doing? - a voice of a man sounded nearby, who had been watching you with interest for some time.

There was no answer. However, it is not surprising.

- Okay, okay, you don't have to answer... - He looked away.

This was his usual technique. After asking several meaningless questions, he suddenly fell silent, as if giving you the opportunity to think over the answer properly, and he himself imperceptibly removed, leaving you in complete confusion. But this time, due to the circumstances, the technique had to be slightly changed.

In the next moment, he was already pressing you to him and, taking advantage of this, with his other hand began to explore the curves of your body. The reaction was as if you were doused with boiling water or doused with cold water.

- What are you doing? - You asked in a trembling voice.

- Checking to see if you got fat after we lost sex. - still clinging to you, he answered. You were taken aback and began to push him away from you.

- I have not grown fat, let me go! You barked, feeling his arms tighten. - Let go! Fool! Let go!

Hands rested on your back, and he began to rock you slowly, stretching the moment when you finally stop resisting.

- It's okay, y/n. You just need to calm down. - he whispered, not hearing your words.

There is a mess in my head, the goal of your resistance has fled somewhere, and you start desperately hugging the man while he grins at the fact that he managed to do what he wanted.

Megumi Fushiguro

Megumi is not one of those who will behave like a child, attracting attention to herself when you do not even know the reason for her loss. He will speak to you as soon as he notices it.

- Do you want to talk about it?

You rub your eyes with fatigue, but you shouldn't ignore Fushiguro's question, because it concerns the two of you. No matter how serious his intentions are, he will always be there to remind you that you can talk to him about what worries you.

- I... will hardly give any good advice, but I will try to make it easier for you after the conversation. Megumi continues after a minute of your silence.

Even such a seemingly small detail as being able to talk to someone else significantly reduces stress and other not-so-good emotions. And the guy knows it.

- You can always count on my help. - already with a drop of confidence he says, and it's like the touch of a soft, pleasant hand on your shoulder. Of course, he does this primarily because he is worried, but this is only a secret cover for the fact that he is upset that you turned away from him, without noticing the real reason.

"Fushiguro, if I do this, I don't know... I... will feel like this..." The words elude you. It’s hard to even think about what you’ll say next.

The guy spreads his arms to give you room to hug and apologize, but you just put your head on his shoulder. You don't want to talk about anything else. The chest against which your head is pressed turns into a pillow. And then a quiet voice is heard:

- I'm not mad at you. You can stay here as long as you like.

But here you won't need anything as long as Fushiguro is around.

Inumaki Toge

Not surprisingly, the first thought that comes to him is "it's all because of the damned speech."

Does he talk to you too little? Maybe he is too quiet and invisible for you? Perhaps you are afraid that someday he will take control of you? From such questions echoing in my head, my jaws come together and a lump appears in my throat. But the worst thing is that Toge begins to doubt his right to meet with you, because he cannot even talk to you with dignity, as a person to a person. Even your sweet persistence, which sometimes breaks through the boundaries of ordinary attempts to turn the conversation back on track, does not help. As a result, when it comes to your attention deficit, he begins to think that all this time you did not notice him, as if he was one of those whom you forgot on the first day.

- Okaka? - the young man has been trying to attract your attention with his eyes for a long time, but it seems that even words cannot help.

- Sorry, Toge. I'm not in the mood today...

The guy was actually a perfectionist and would rather have your smile shine every day. I wish he could turn back time right now, scroll to the moment when something went wrong and fix it at any cost.

Inumaki tucked a lock of your hair behind his ear to see your face behind it. He knew you had flawless skin and plump, sensual lips. He would admire your face for hours.

The next second, the blond rested his head on your lap, looking into your eyes. You liked such cute things from him. They weren't vulgar or inappropriate. They were what she needed.

You smile faintly and stroke the hair on the back of his head, touching his cheek with your fingertips.

Sukuna Ryōmen

This is the case when Sukuna uses passive aggression. Slightly wrong, some small sign of ignorance - his speech turns into direct pressure on your relationship with him. He can really hurt you a lot if you don't appreciate his efforts to make you even a little happier. Most often they are small and insignificant, the kind that anyone would do, but for the King of Curses, this is really something grandiose. And since he has many ways to destroy your relationship, if you think he made a mistake, remember how it hurts him.

- Will you ignore me again? - Sukun asked with imperious anger, the last pieces of despair were dying in his soul. - And where is your mercy? If I have become disgusting to you, why do you continue to need me?

There was nothing to answer. It was not pride that tormented him at all, but an ever-deeper regret that with your equanimity you just caused another outbreak of rage in him. Most of all, the thought that you, perhaps, does not even notice it, and your eyes clouded with pain glide over something that is very dear to him, terrified him.

The dead silence continued, and my chest ached more and more. Then there was a soft groan:

- Y/n, I love you.

Tears ran down your cheeks, but did not brush them away with my hand. You knew it wasn't going to help. Bitter emotions generated by the word "love" are not able to be burned out on the face, like the sun on clay. You can't stop feeling. And all the same, looking at you was as painful as seeing your motionless glazed gaze.

He hugged you from the back as soon as he felt that you were repenting. Like the time you forgave him for calling you your own. He had strong hands - you can be sure. He was very gentle. You felt less pain. Maybe in the future it will be difficult for him to remember this, but now he tightly squeezed you in his arms and was so affectionate that you wanted him to never let you go.

Nanami Kento

He begins to suspect that something is wrong very early. First, morning kisses disappeared somewhere before leaving for work, then sincere conversations at the table, and then completely short meetings with glances. Moreover, the last remnants of intimacy are gone. Nanami began to think that something had happened to you. He always tried to protect you from any problems. And so you found yourself right in front of him, so closed and detached, he could not so easily take away the comfort and peace that he had been creating for so long and skillfully. And first of all, of course, he will lend you a helping hand to make it easier for you as quickly as possible.

A perplexed look will appear from under dark eyelashes after a man touches your forehead with his palm. It seems that the whole thing is not about health.

- You don't have a fever. He began.

- I know, thanks.

But Kento was clearly hinting at something.

- So what's up? - then you know what Nanami means. But she said nothing.

- Y/n, I do not want to impose anything on you, I just need to know what is happening to you so that our relationship with you does not suddenly go downhill.

The man took your hand and brought it to his lips. Nanami felt that if he said something now, he would commit tactlessness. And so he was silent, waiting for your answer.

- Sorry... - Tears began to burn my eyes. - I am very, very ashamed. I... it's just hard for me now, but it will pass by itself. I'm sure.

You pressed as tightly as possible to the man, hugged him and buried your face in the chest. He put his hand on your head encouragingly. I already didn't care about the problem as a whole. Now for you there was only what you felt - his soft stroking, the smell of a strong male body, warmth and care, and there was nothing but that.

Suguru Geto

He will take it calmly, without intention. But she won't ignore it. Often he will offer tea or something else, just to get at least one word out of you, in an attempt to bring you into conversation. He will not touch you without asking, because he knows about the value of personal space. And yet, for a while, it can fiddle with spontaneous statements in order to simply take away the soul and break a long silence.

- I see your day is going well... - Geto smiles with restraint. - Lots of news for me?

Guessing that he is once again trying to create a dialogue between you was almost nothing. But you are, of course, silent.

- I see. - Suguru sits down next to you, as close to your side as possible, not giving a damn if you don't like it.

- Maybe I offended you in some way? - he continues. - Or are you just not too open in your thoughts?

- Nothing. It's okay. - you throw.

- But it seems to me that no. - he takes your hand in his, as if trying to make you smile. “I think you have something to tell me, don’t you? He raises his eyebrows, expecting your reaction. Instead of answering, you grimace with a shrug. Suguru repeats the question:

- So what happened? Why don't you want to share your thoughts with me?

- What would you like? You ask. - Would you be happy to know that there is a perfect girl with great manners, beautiful and intelligent, whom you deserve?

To be honest, Suguru did not expect such an answer. You can see that he is a little dumbfounded, but quickly comes to his senses. And then he starts laughing - so sweet and sincere that you start to feel embarrassed and blush with shame.

- And I was already expecting something more terrible. He laughs. - Okay, be it your way. I'm not a particularly sentimental person. I do not know what to say.

- Tell me you feel terribly in love. - grabbing his wrist, you say.

The brunette makes a startled face again. But you do not retreat - you hold him for a few more seconds, forcing him to surrender. - Only from the bottom of my heart ...

- Y/n, I feel terribly in love with you and will never fall in love again next time. So? He asked, grinning.

Wiping away the tears of happiness, you hugged him without words, while he, hugging you with one hand, exhaled with relief.

☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*

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liquidstar · 3 years

Text

I feel as if many people, myself included, have been having problems with the way “critical thinking” is conducted in fandom circles more and more. Which I’d say is a good thing, because it means we’re thinking critically. But still the issues with the faux-critical mentality and with the way we consume media through that fandom group mentality are incredibly widespread at this point, despite being very flawed, and there are still plenty of people who follow it blindly, ironically.

I sort of felt like I had to examine my personal feelings on it and I ended up writing a whole novel, which I’ll put under the cut, and I do welcome other people’s voices in the matter, because while I’m being as nuanced as I can here I obviously am still writing from personal experience and may overlook some things from my limited perspective. But by and large I think I’ve dissected the phenomena as best I can from what I’ve been seeing going on in fandom circles from a safe but observable distance.

Right off the bat I want to say, I think it's incredibly good and necessary to be critical of media and understand when you should stop consuming it, but that line can be a bit circumstantial sometimes for different people. There are a lot of anime that I used to watch as a teenager that I can’t enjoy anymore, because I got more and more uncomfortable overtime with the sexualization of young characters, partly because as I was getting older I was really starting to realize how big of an issue it was, and I certainly think more critically now than I did when I was 14. Of course I don’t assume everyone who still watches certain series is a pedophile, and I do think there are plenty of fans that understand this. However I still stay away from those circles and that’s a personal choice.

I don’t think a person is morally superior based on where they draw the line and their own boundaries with this type of stuff, what’s more important is your understanding of the problem and response to it. There are series I watch that have a lot of the same issues around sexualization of the young characters in the cast, but they’re relatively toned down and I can still enjoy the aspects of the series I actually like without it feeling as uncomfortable and extreme. Others will not be able to, and their issues with it are legitimate and ones that I still ultimately agree with, but they’re still free to dislike the series for it, after all our stance on the issue itself is the same so why would I resent them for it?

Different people are bound to have different lines they draw for how far certain things can go in media before they’re uncomfortable watching it and it doesn’t make it a moral failing of the person who can put up with more if they’re still capable of understanding why it’s bad to begin with and able to not let it effect them. But I don’t think that sentiment necessarily contradicts the idea that some things really are too far gone for this to apply, the above examples aren’t the same thing as a series centered solely around lolicon ecchi and it doesn’t take a lot of deep analysis to understand why. It’s not about a personal line anymore when it comes to things that are outright propaganda or predatory with harmful ideals woven into the message of the story itself. Critical thinking means knowing the difference between these, and no one can hold your hand through it. And simply slapping “I’m critical of my interests” on your bio isn’t a get out of jail free card, it’s always evident when someone isn’t truly thinking about the impact of the media they consume through the way they consume it.

I think the issue is that when people apply “Critical thinking” they don’t actually analyze the story and its intent, messages, themes, morals, and all that. Instead they approach it completely diegetically, it’s basically the thermian argument, the issue stems from thinking about the story and characters as if they’re real people and judging their actions through that perspective, rather than something from a writer trying to deliver a narrative by using the story and characters as tools. Like how people get upset about characters behaving “problematically” without realizing that it’s an intentional aspect of the story, that the character needs to cause problems for there to be conflict. What they should be looking at instead is what their behavior represents in the real world.

You do not need to apply real-world morals to fictional characters, you need to apply them to the narrative. The story exists in the real world, the characters and events within it do not. Fictional murderers themselves do not hurt anyone, no one is actually dying at their hands, but their actions hold weight in the narrative which itself can harm real people. If the character only murders gay people then it reflects on whatever the themes and messages of the story are, and it’s a major issue if it's framed as if they’re morally justified, or as if this is a noble action. And it’s a huge red flag if people stan this character, even if the story itself actually presents their actions as reprehensible. Or cases where the murderers themselves are some kind of awful stereotype, like Buffalo Bill who presents a violent and dangerous stereotype of trans women, making the character a transmisogynistic caricature (Intentional or otherwise) that has caused a lot of harm to the perception of trans women. When people say “Fiction affects reality” this is what they mean. They do not mean “People will see a pretend bad guy and become bad” they mean “Ideals represented in fiction will be pulled from the real world and reflected back onto it.”

However, stories shouldn’t have to spoon-feed you the lesson as if you’re watching a children’s cartoon, stories often have nuances and you have to actively analyze the themes of it all to understand it’s core messages. Oftentimes it can be intentionally murky and hard to parse especially if the subject matter itself is complicated. But you can’t simply read things on the surface and think you understand everything about them, without understanding the symbolism or subtext you can leave a series like Revolutionary Girl Utena thinking the titular Utena is heterosexual and was only ever in love with her prince. Things won’t always be face-value or clear-cut and you will be forced to come to your own conclusions sometimes too.

That’s why the whole fandom-based groupthink mentality about “critical thinking” doesn’t work, because it’s not critical. It’s simply looking into the crowd, seeing people say a show is problematic, and then dropping it without truly understanding why. It’s performative, consuming the best media isn’t activism and it doesn’t make you a better person. Listening to the voices of people whom the issues directly concerns will help you form an opinion, and to understand the issues from a more knowledgeable perspective beyond your own. All that means nothing if you just sweep it under the rug because you want to look infallible in your morality. That’s not being critical, it’s just being scared to analyze yourself, as well as what you engage with. You just don’t want to think about those things and you’re afraid of being less than perfect so you pretend it never happened.

And though I’m making this post, it’s not mine or anyone else’s job to hold your hand through all this and tell you “Oh this show is okay, but this show isn't, and this book is bad etc etc etc”. Because you actually have to think for yourself, you know, critically. Examples I’ve listed aren’t rules of thumb, they’re just examples and things will vary depending on the story and circumstance. You have to look at shit on a case-by-case basis instead of relying on spotting tropes without thinking about how they’re implemented and what they mean. That’s why it’s analysis, you have to use it to understand what the narrative is communicating to its audience, explicitly or implicitly, intentionally or incidentally, and understand how this reflects the real world and what kind of impact it can have on it.

A big problem with fandom is it has made interests synonymous with personality traits, as if every series we consume is a core part of our being, and everything we see in it reflects our viewpoints as well. So when people are told that a show they watched is problematic, they react very extremely, because they see it as basically the same thing as saying they themselves are problematic (It’s not). Everyone sees themselves as good people, they don’t want to be bad people, so this scares them and they either start hiding any evidence that they ever liked it, or they double down and start defending it despite all its flaws, often providing those aforementioned thermian arguments (“She dresses that way because of her powers!”).

That’s how you get people who call children’s cartoons “irredeemable media” and people who plaster “fiction=/= reality!” all over their blogs, both are basically trying to save face either by denying that they could ever consume anything problematic or denying that the problematic aspects exist all together. And absolutely no one is actually addressing the core issues anymore, save for those affected by them who pointed them out to begin with, only for their original point to become muffled in the discourse. No one is thinking critically because they’re more concerned with us-vs-them group mentality, both sides try to out-perform the other while the actual issue gets ignored or is used as nothing more than a gacha with no true understanding or sympathy behind it.

One of the other issues that comes from this is the fact that pretty much everyone thinks they’re the only person capable of being critical of their interests. That’s how you get those interactions where one person goes “OK [Media] fan” and another person replies “Bro you literally like [Other Media]”, because both parties think they’re the only ones capable of consuming a problematic piece of media and not becoming problematic themselves, anyone else who enjoys it is clearly incapable of being as big brained as them. It’s understandable because we know ourselves and trust ourselves more than strangers, and I’m not saying there can’t be certain fandoms who’s fans you don’t wanna interact with, but when we presume that we know better than everyone else we stop listening to other people all together. It’s good to trust your own judgement, it’s bad to assume no one else has the capacity to think for themselves either though.

The insistence that all media that you personally like is without moral failing and completely pure comes with the belief that all media that you personally dislike has to be morally bad in some way. As if you can’t just dislike a series because you find it annoying or it just doesn’t appeal to you, it has to be problematic, and you have to justify your dislike of it through that perspective. You have to believe that your view on whatever media it is is the objectively correct one, so you’ll likely pick apart all it’s flaws to prove you’re on the right side, but there’s no analysis of context or intent. Keep in mind this doesn’t necessarily mean those critiques are unfounded or invalid, but in cases like this they’re often skewed in one direction based on personal opinion. It’s just as flawed as ignoring all the faults in the stuff you like, it’s biased and subjective analysis that misses a lot of context in both cases, it’s not a good mindset to have about consuming media. It’s just another result of tying media consumption with identity and personal morals. The faux-critical mentality is an attempt to separate the two in a way that implies they’re a packaged deal to begin with, making it sort of impossible to truly do so in any meaningful way.

As far as I know this whole phenomena started with “Steven Universe Critical” in, like, 2016, and that’s where this mentality around “critical thinking” originated. It started out with just a few people correctly pointing out very legitimate issues with the series, but over time it grew into just a trend where people would make cutesy kin blogs with urls like critical-[character] or [character]crit to go with the fad as it divulged into Nostalgia Critic level critique. Of course there was backlash to this and criticism of the criticism, but no actual conversation to be had. Just people trying to out-do each other by acting as the most virtuous one in the room, and soon enough the fad became a huge echo-chamber that encouraged more and more outrageous takes for every little thing. The series itself was a children’s cartoon so it stands to reason that a lot of the fans were young teens, so this behavior isn’t too surprising and I do believe a lot of them did think they were doing the right thing, especially since it was encouraged. But that doesn’t erase the fact that there were actual real issues and concerns brought up about the series that got treated with very little sympathy and were instead drowning out people’s voices. Though those from a few years back may have grown up since and know better (Hopefully), the mentality stuck around and influenced the norm for how fandoms and fandom people conduct any sort of critique on media.

That’s a shame to me, because the pedestal people place fandom onto has completely disrupted our perception on how to engage with media in a normal way. Not everything should be consumed with fandom in mind, not everything is a coffee-shop au with no conflict, not everything is a children’s cartoon with the morals spoon-fed to you. Fandom has grown past the years of uncritical praise of a series, it’s much more mainstream now with a lot more voices in it beyond your small community on some forum, and people are allowed to use those voices. Just because it may not be as pleasant for you now because you don’t get to just turn your brain off and ignore all the flaws doesn’t mean you can put on your rose-tinted nostalgia goggles and pretend that fandom is actually all that is good in the world, to the point where you place it above the comfort and safety of others (Oftentimes children). Being uncritical of fandom itself is just as bad as being uncritical of what you consume to begin with.

At the end of the day it all just boils down to the ability to truly think for yourself but with sympathy and compassion for other people in mind, while also understanding that not everyone will come to the same conclusion as you and people are allowed to resent your interests. That doesn’t necessarily mean they hate you personally, you should be acknowledging the same issues after all. You can’t ignore aspects of it that aren’t convenient to your conclusion, you have to actually be critical and understand the issues to be able to form it.

I think that all we need is to not rely on fandom to tell us what to do, but still listen to the voices of others, take them into account to form our opinion too, boost their voices instead of drowning them out in the minutiae of internet discourse about which character is too much of an asshole to like. Think about what the characters and story represent non-diegetically instead of treating them like real people and events, rather a story with an intent and message to share through its story and characters, and whatever those reflect from the real world. That’s how fiction affects reality, because it exists in reality and reflects reality through its own lens. The story itself is real, with a real impact on you and many others, so think about the impact and why it all matters. Just… Think. Listen to others but think for yourself, that’s all.

#see i told you guys id find that essay and post it for real. i wasnt kidding.#good luck inbox of mine :praying:

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onlymexsarah · 3 years

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Promise pt. 5 || Kaz Brekker

Summary: When the life of Kaz is threated by her presence, she had to make a crucial decision that will bring misunderstanding among the two of them. Now that he has his Fire Girl, will he be able to keep her, or Dirtyhand will mess everything up?

Pairing: Kaz Brekker x grisha!Reader

Warning: angst, Kaz being Dirtyhands for ten minutes straigh, spoiler of Six of Crows, my english.

A/N: Thank all of you for the comments, the likes and the shares. I didn't expected that this little idea would have captured your attention, really you made my writing more enjoyable and easy. I'm so sorry if I'm late but I've been sick these days and I couldn't finish the chapter :( there are a lot of things that I want to tell you, see you at the end of the chapter ;)

PT. 1 - PT. 2 - PT. 3 - PT. 4

MAIN MASTERLIST

Few days passed with the girl lying on her bed recovering from the wound that the fight gave her.

When she opened her eyes after have fainted in Kaz's arms, fear had been the first to come to visit her. Fear of being already tied at some bed on a ship, sold at the Shu that would have been more than happy to make experiment on her. She was scared that the temptation must have been too much for Kaz Brekker to have such a value grisha in his hands, but then she noticed she was in her room at the Slat and a rush of tiredness hit her making her sleep again.

The other times she opened her eyes someone among Jesper, Inej and Wylan was always at her side, changing the bandage and bringing her food.

Inej told her that her father, Jan Van Eck, was now aware that she was part of the Dregs, and she was under Kaz Brekker's protection. Everyone was aware she was a grisha, but neither Jesper and Inej seemed to mind her lie, maybe because they had secrets too, she though.

A morning a letter came for Kaz, a letter from her father.

Mister Brekker

we never had the occasion to meet, and you'll agree with me when I say that I wish to keep things like this. Voice is spread that you have my beloved daughter with you. I hope you understand that she is a danger for this city. I've sent her away many years ago with the only interest of protecting Kerch from her, but I see that I could have done things in a better way.

It is as a father that I ask you to bring her to me so that I can repair my mistakes. She is a danger for all of us if not under control, Mister Brekker, and I am sure you saw it yourself last night. She has to face a trial for her crimes and be sent where she can't be a danger for anyone anymore. If she doesn't come back in seven days, I should consider you and your Dregs as her accomplices, planning to attack Ketterdam and all Kerch using her power.

Surely a smart men as yourself doesn't want those kind of problems.

Hope to see my city safe again,

Jan Van Eck.

Inej had brough the letter at her in the afternoon, and in the evening the grisha girl was already planning her escaping from Ketterdam for the third time in her life.

She didn't want to leave Wylan, hell she had promised him they wouldn't split up ever again, but if her plan worked then he would have been able to follow her after few months. If the Van Eck siblings moved together they would have caught too much attention, and they had to do everything in secrets.

Wylan tried to convince her to stay. He was sure that Kaz would have helped her, Wylan was sure that Kaz Brekker would have sealed all Ketterdam to keep her save, and even if as her brother he didn't like her closeness with the Bastard of the Barrel, he couldn't deny that it was useful.

"I'm putting all of you in danger just staying here. If I go away father will have nothing to threat you with." she said putting her clothes in her bags. Seven days, she couldn't give her father the time to close all the harbours in Kerch. If she wanted to go she had to do it as soon as possible.

"Talk to Kaz! Let see what he says, please." begged Wylan grabbing her hands in his to stop her.

She looked in his beautiful blue eyes and saw hope. "You really think Kaz has the power to keep me here?"

Her brother smirked. "I think Kaz would tear apart this city to keep you save. Talk to him, keep your options open."

Dirtyhands would never fight a battle where he couldn't win money, but Y/n was willing to try. That night after dinner she decided she would speak with Kaz and see if he was willing to keep her.

"Let see what the great Kaz Brekker think about it." she sighed putting her arm around Wylan's shoulder and walking downstair where their dinner waited them.

Kaz Brekker sat in his office, in his gloved hands the red handkerchief and Jan Van Eck's letter. Before that morning the death of Van Eck had been one of the many he wanted to deal with for what he had done to his Fire Girl, but now his death had taken a shape, colours and many details that Kaz's was adding one by one.

Brick by brick, Kaz would take all his enemies down, and Y/n was more than welcome to take her revenger with him.

He went downstair at the second floor walking toward Y/n's room. He wanted to check how she was, and speak with her about how she wanted to deal with her father. He didn't know if she wanted his actual death, but he was just fine with torture.

When he reached the door and looked inside his blood froze. All her things were packed in three bags, all her clothes were gone from her wardrobe and none of her objects were around the room. Neither the little portrait of she and baby Wylan that she kept on her bedside table before falling asleep.

She is leaving you.

These words felt like a stab in his chest, like someone had taken the oxigen from his lungs. Would she, leave him? Yes. Y/n would find a better life everywhere out Kerch, it was reasonable that she was already packing. When she wanted to leave? Where she wanted to go?

He knew nothing about it and Kaz Brekker always knew everything. Especially of what happened in his Slat. But this time the girl was leaving him, again, and she hadn't had talked with him about it. She hadn't advised him. Did you really think she was going to live this life just for you? For a man who can't even hold her hands without hyperventilate? A man who can't give her the love she deserve?

The fear he saw in her eyes when she saved his life with her power wasn't because she was feared of his rejection; she feared that he would have send her out of the Dregs, without protection and away from her brother.

He stormed back in his office, anger filled his boody and what else? Disappointment? Sadness? He was angry with himself because he had been a fool again. He had let someone playing with him again, that's what Y/n had been doing. She had been toying with him. She had made sure to have a safe place where live, a job and her brother beside her. Every little nice things she did for him was just to keep him close, to keep Dirtyhands at bay.

Like a fury he threw everything that was on his desk on the floor with his arms. Documents, the handkerchief, the letters, were all on the floor but he couldn't care less. She wanted to leave? Fine. Dirtyhands didn't care.

A known shiver crossed his spine before he heard a knock at his door.

"What?" he didn't look up when the girl entered, too focus on something in the drawers of his desk.

"Wow, and I though to be the one who had a bad day." she joked looking the mess at his feet.

He didn't smile, or smirked. He kept his eyes on something she coudn't see. "What bussiness?"

What bussiness. Those words were the greeting in Ketterdam when two bussiness men met, but the grisha girl though that she and Kaz had passed that step. He must had really a bad day, and it could have been because of the letter...she though sadly.

Who knew what other problems her father had caused around Ketterdam to earn the attention of Kaz, to push him to hand her in his hands.

"My father...I don't want any of you to be in danger because of me." she said carefully walking closer to his desk. A glimp of red captured her eyes but the pain at her waist made her close her eyes for a second.

"I'd say it's too late for it, isn't it?" he asked coldly. She took a step behind, taken back by his coldness toward her. "You seemed to enoy keeping secrets, didn't you? Do you know how easier it would have been knowing about your being grisha months ago?"

That wasn't the boy who had brough her in his arms out from the gala. He wasn't the boy who fought beside her, spied beside her and saved her a couple of time.

"I am sorry, I truly am Kaz. But I know what is the price of being a grisha here...it wouldn't have been easy for me walking with a target on my back. I have done it my whole life."

He refused to look her in the eyes, and it was driving her crazy. Was he really that mad at her that he couldn't bare even the sight of her?

"You decided for yourself, a thing you tend to do often I see." she was sure he had never spoken to her like that, neither in his bad days, and Kaz Brekker had a lot of bad days. "You swore loyalty to the Dregs, to the Crows. If you can't trust us then you shouldn't stay here."

He had said the crucial words, and there was no going back. She wanted to leave, then he would make sure to let her believe that he didn't care. That he didn't care about not finding his hot coffee on his desk again, or that from that day on he wouldn't feel the shivers in his spine anymore. He pretended to not care about not seeing her anymore. She had left him once, he could survive it a second time.

"That's it? That's what you want?" she felt her voice dying in her throat. Was her mistake that big? You knew that once Kaz knew what you were he would have pushed you away like everyone else. 'No one will understand you as the other of your kind', Baghra once told her, but when she met Kaz she believed that her old teacher was wrong. Kaz Brekker had been her safe harbour when no one else would care about her, was she so easily replaceable for him?

"You would have leave anyway at some point, you said it yourself the first time we met at the Club. Today, tomorrow, in five years...I don't see the difference." he shrugged like he didn't care.

He doesn't, her mind reminded her.

"Alright then...I don't want to be of any trouble to you anymore..." she whispered with her hands behind her back. She hated how little she felt, but he was sendind her away. Kaz Brekker, the boy she'd die for. The boy who had let her felt hope again after years, the boy who made her laugh even when he surely didn't mean it. The boy in who she was willing to put the most important years of her long life, that boy was sending her away without looking back.

"Then go." he said fixing his eyes in hers. She could feel the sharpness of his eyes cutting her chest.

"Fine, then I'll just-" she stopped talking when her eyes landed on the red thing she had seen before. A red handkerchief. Her feet moved on their own will. Before she could register what was happening she had the red handkerchief in her hands, her eyes fixed on the three letters on it. W. V. E.

"Y/n don't-" Kaz stood up trying to stop her but it was too late.

"Why do you have my brother's hand-" she was confused, but then her eyes raised to the boy in front of her. His brown eyes, his dark hair and pale skin, and in a second her mind brough her a memory.

The little boy smiled standing before her. He was at the same height of her belly, but his eyes seemed older.

"I have still things to do, and people I need to find. " the last words said with rage.

"Take care of yourself, boy. Don't let the bad days winning your good ones, there is always light at the end of a tunnel; you only have to walk a little more."

And then another.

"What is you name little boy?"

"K-..." he stopped for a long moment thinking about it. He looked the girl beside him and even if he wanted to trust her he just couldn't after what happened. "Jordie..."

"J-Jordie?" she asked, her voice trembling. "I-...You are not him, aren't you?" he stayed silent, looking her like a statue. "You would have told me if you were him...Kaz you are not the little boy I met eight years ago, right?!"

Her voice raised squeezing the handkerchief in her right fit.

She saw him gulped before answering slowly. "Yes, I am."

She took two huge steps back breathing eavily. He had known me all along. "Why you've never said anything? That day when you approached me, you knew who I was and you offered me a...job..."

"Can you keep a secret?" she asked touching his shoulder with her own. The boy, whose name wasn't obviously Jordie, nodded looking her curiously. She smirked bringin her left hand on her right one and rotating them slowly. A flame came out from her right palm, little but still powerful; red and orange like the handkerchief she had given him before.

The boy's eyes shone marveled looking the flame on her palm. "You are a grisha!"

The truth hit her hard. She raised her eyes in his letting him see the betrayal. "You had always knew what I was. That's why you gave me the job...you didn't care that I was new, you didn't care that I was the girl you met when you was a child. You wanted an Inferni to work for you!"

Every words, every attention, every talk they shared were all lies. Nothing of what he said was true, Kaz Brekker didn't need a reason, he didn't need a reason to give a job to a girl new in town, but it was clear that Kaz Brekker always had a reason. She had been only too foolish to not understand everything before.

She thought she was good to keep a secret, but something like her power couldn't pass unnoticed to Kaz Brekker. She had been a fool to believe he didn't know about her power. It was the only reason he kept her in the Dregs since the beginning.

"An inferni would have been very useful, but you have proved to know how to do your job perfectly without your power. Now, if you want to go you are free to do so. Nothing bind you here." he said, his voice cold as death.

You bound me here, she wanted to shout. But it had been Kaz's plan all along. Making her believe she was different, making her believe he saw her.

"Nothing." she repeated before walking away from his office, leaving the boy alone with the loudly silent that filled the room, staring at the handkerchief that she let fall on the ground, the only thing that had always bound them.

***

The next morning Kaz woke up and knew immediately that something was wrong. He took his cane and walked downstairs to the kitchen where he heard people talking out loud.

"I swear Jesper, when I see him I-" Wylan stop talking in the exact moment Kaz stepped in the room. The red haired boy fixed his eyes on him and before he could understand what was happening Wylan was yelling at him with all the rage he felt. "How dare you coming here like nothing happened!?"

Jesper had to put his arms around Wylan's torso to keep him from throwing himself on Kaz. "Last time I checked this was my Slat."

"And you find amusing sending people away, don't you?" Wylan spoke spitting venom from his mouth. "She needed help and you turned your back at her!"

Now Kaz needed few minutes to make his brain, still sleepy, working to connect the dots. It was clear that Wylan was talking about his sister, who seemed to have played the victim with her own brother.

"If you want to know, merchling, she decided her will herself. She came to me to let me know she was leaving." Kaz shrugged walking toward coffee machine. He didn't have the strengh to face an angry boy if he wasn't properly awake.

"As hell she did. She came to ask you what to do and you sent her away." Kaz let his words running in his head for a while, studying them one by one.

He didn't..."When she came in my office she had already decided." he refused to tell them he had seen her bags ready in her room, he refused to let someone know he cared.

"No Kaz, she didn't." This time Inej spoke, he hadn't even noticed she was there. "She wanted to leave to protect you from her father, but Wylan convinced her to slow down and come to you to ask what to do."

No, no, it was not possible. "When she came in your office she hadn't decided yet. You gave her the answer, Kaz." Jesper spoke keeping his hands on Wylan's shoulders, who now was sat on a chair with his face in his hands.

I would have noticed if she was asking me what to do. She had her bags ready...she came to me to tell me...his thoughs were running wild inside his head.

"That's it? That's what you want?"

Kaz tried to put his thoughs together. He tried to find a logic of what had happened the night before.

"You had always knew what I was. That's why you gave me the job...you didn't care that I was new, you didn't care that I was the girl you met when you was a child. You wanted an Inferni to work for you!"

No, no, no. Everything was so wrong again. He though she was going to leave him and he had let her believe that he had used her all this time. He though she was leaving him...that was the only thing he had needed to loose his mind.

"You didn't know..." whispered Inej surprised.

Kaz couldn't trust his voice enough to not break in front of everyone so he just shoke his head slowly looking the Suli girl in the eyes.

"What have you done..."murmured Jesper rubbing his eyes with his hand. "Alright, if you hurry you should arrive before the schooner leaves."

"Fifth harbour?" Kaz asked with raspy voice.

"Yes! Go!" said the Zemeni boy excited. "I love a dramatic romance."

He didn't let him repeated twice, ready to run if he had to he walked toward the door when Wylan's voice stopped him.

"Brekker, bring her back." Please, was the word the boy let unspoken.

He nodded before running toward the harbour. He took just his cloat at the door, leaving his hat behind. He couldn't let her leave again. He had to arrive in time, and if he didn't he would have swim until he'd found himself on the schooner and ask sorry to her for his infinity dullness.

"Alright then...I don't want to be of any trouble to you anymore..."

She wasn't a trouble, he wanted to shout in the air. She had never been a trouble, he was the wrong one. He was the twisted, crooked, problematic who couldn't stop himself from hurt her everytime.

"My father...I don't want any of you to be in danger because of me."

Even when she was the one in danger, she would think about him first. He didn't see it last night, too focused on accusing her of betrayal. Betrayal of what? She hadn't broken any vows she made. She wasn't bind to him, she own him nothing and surely Ketterdam did nothing to earn her protection.

Since the first day she had stayed on her own will, she had stayed beside him even when he pushed everyone away. That's what got under his skin, her perseverence. She kept fighting for him, she kept seeing good in him and the only thing he had been capable of was making her feel used and unwanted.

He saw the harbour and he barely noticed that he hadn't used his cane. It would have just slowed me, he thought already searching his girl with the eyes.

He owed her an explanation, he owed her a lot of apologies, and then she would decide if she wanted to stay. Kaz swore to everyone who was listening that if Y/n chose to stay in Ketterdam with him, he would have made sure to be worth her choice. He would fight everyday to go trought his boundaries for her, with her. He would be the man she deserved.

"The schooner for Os Kervo." Kaz asked urgently to a man. He knew Y/n, she would find a safe home in Ravka at the Little Palace where the grisha were safe and strong.

"The first one left this morning at four bells, the next it's at the berth twenty-four, leaves in half bell." the man answered.

Kaz didn't think twice and ran toward the schooner with his heart in his throat. Please, saints if you exist make sure she hadn't already left.

He felt pathetic. Never in his life he had ever prayed, but he though that if it gave him a chance to see her again that it was worth a try.

He arrived at the schooner, but looking around he didn't see her. She must be already on board, he though and without difficulty he went on the ship.

There wasn't many people, but from what Kaz knew the grisha girl could have been already in her room and there was no way to find her before that schooner left.

He felt a shiver in his spine, telling him that she was close, but he didn't know where to look. Right, left, he looked everywhere. People around him looked him worried.

She can't be gone, he kept reapeting in his head like a mantra.

"Came here to bring me back to my father?" a voice said from above him. "How much did he offer to you? Must be a lot to affront a grisha alone."

His heart missed a beat and when he looked over his head he though he might start to believe in saints.

She was there, perched on one of the boom. Her hood was up hiding her face like she always did when she was out of their zone. She was a wanted grisha now, and he felt a grip on his heart at the though that she was used to that life of a runner.

You are not alone anymore, Fire Girl, he though vividly.

"I thought you had decided to leave..." he said. It didn't sound like an apologize at all...Damn Saints, there were a bilions things he wanted to say her, and yet his throat felt dry when he could talk.

"I did." her voice was sharped as a blade and cold as ice.

He gulped, I deserve this. "I know..." He had a flashback of their first conversation at the Crows Club, and cold shivers ran in his blood. I will not make the same mistake twice. "I should have told you who I was since the beginning."

"Maybe if I knew I didn't have to hide my power you could have had your personal inferni sooner." it was his fault. He had let her believe that he wanted her just for her power, but it wasn't true. Kaz Brekker kept her with the Dregs because he couldn't bare the though of her being hurt or threated.

"Could you get off from that boom? Please..." the last word burned in Kaz's throat like fire. It wasn't easy for him to say out loud his feelings, but he knew it would have been the only thing to make her stay. He owed her the truth.

She scoffed and jumped, landing in front of him with the lightness of a feather. Crossing her arms over her chest she studyed him from under her hood, waiting for him to speak first.

You want me sto stay, you have to say it, her posture told him.

"I saw your bags in your room, I though you wanted to leave me, the Dregs. I would understand if it what you wish, but you have to know that I was angry. Angry because I though you didn't trust me. You had just packed all your things without talking to me first, I though...I though you..." said those words Kaz brekker, a voice said in his mind. "I though you used me as a protection, nothing else. And when you showed up in my office I though you were going to say me you were leaving. No question, no mouners."

She stayed silent for a bit, surely surprised by his words. He couldn't see her whole face from his height, and he needed to use all his self control to not take it and push it down.

"The only reason I decided to leave was because my father knew about you. I knew he would have used you against me if I stayed, and I couldn't put you in danger just because I wanted to be selfish." her voice had softened a bit, but it was still sharp as she was ready for any attack from him. "Wylan convinced me that you would have helped me, that you would have been willing to fight for me. But when I come to you, I find Dirtyhands planning my departure. And what I find out? That you kept me under your roof just because you knew I was a grisha."

"It's not true." he stopped her firmly. "I knew you were a grisha, but never in my head I though about using you for your power."

"Then what other reason to keep the truth about our first meeting from me?"

Now it's the moment. Don't let your shame eat you alive, put yourself together and take your Fire Girl back.

"Because I was ashamed of the man I became. Because if you knew who I was you would have seen that the little boy you met eight years ago doesn't exist anymore. You would have seen that I failed you..." saying finally those words after a year left him lighter.

She gasped softly. It's not true, I can still see that little boy right in front me... "No, I failed you. You were a child Kaz, you had no faults. I should've stayed with you."

She could see the surprise on Kaz's face when she spoke those words. She had time to think that morning, at the little boy she left alone in the streets of Ketterdam. The boy who had kept her secrets all those years and never blackmailed her.

"I don't think something would have changed. I chose my path." he said with his raspy voice. How many nights he had dreamt about that moment? When he would finally speak with her, when the little boy and the Fire Girl would meet again.

"Becasue no one was there for you. Beccause you were alone. But if someone would have taken care of you, if someone would have showed you another way, maybe everything would have been different." maybe you would have been different.

She wasn't disappointed in what Kaz had became, she knew that everything he did it was to survive at the Barrel. She was proud that he had found the strengh to fight and live; Y/n would change nothing of the man she had in front of her.

The captain of the schooner announced that they were ready to leave and Y/n took a deep breath. "You should go..."

"Come with me." his mind, his rational part stopped working. There were nothing to brake his tongue. "Eight years ago you asked me if I wanted you to stay with me, and I said no. Today I'm asking you to stay in Ketterdam, with me, with the Crows. We cant-...I can't loose you. Not again."

Her heart started to beat faster like a roller coaster. Was Kaz Brekker the one who was talking in front of her? The Bastard of the Barrel was asking her to stay with him. You are going to put him in danger, a voice in her mind reminded her.

She looked Ketterdam behind him, as she could see her father's house.

Kaz saw the shift in her face's direction, and immediately understood what was thinking that mind of her. He rose a gloved hand in front of him taking her by surprise.

"If you wish to go to Ravka I will not stop you, but if you give me a chance I'll try everyday to be the man worth to stay by your side. And I promise you..." he took a step forward making her gasp. "I promise you we will take down everyone who threat us and we'll make them know the real meaning of the word suffer."

That's the Dirtyhands I fell for, she though smiling brightly. She took his hand firmly feeling his fingers closing around hers. "Just one condition." He raised an eyebrow to say 'continue please'. "Jan Van Eck is mine, and he's not going to die until I say so."

She knew that Kaz wasn't the only one who had changed in those years, and there were no reasons to hide it. The grisha girl who lived in the shadows and the little boy who was scared would never meet again, both had died when the world had turned its back to them. Both had raised like phoenix and became stronger.

"The deal is the deal, Fire Girl." he smirked walking with her toward the berth. The schooner was already leaving and there was a little void between the berth and the schooner, so Kaz squeezed her hand and they both jumped. When their feet touched the berth he didn't notice he was laughing with her. Her hood was over her forehead and he couldn't hold it anymore, he stood in front of her with the steady hands of a magician and gently lowered it, feeling the hurge to see her smile again. "No secrets anymore."

"No secrets anymore." she replied keeping her eyes in his.

It was their promise to start from the beginning. Their past was a beautiful story to remember, but they would fight for their future side by side, and little did she know that for all the time she hadn't spoken with Kaz Brekker, Bastard of the Barrel. But the boy in front of her, with the light of hope in his dark eyes was the normal, simple Kaz Rietveld.

A/N:OH MY GOODNESS WE ARE HERE! This is the end of the story of our lovely, brave Fire Girl and our little, cute Kaz. I think I can cry... This is the chapter that most I love of the series and I think you can see why! Writing it was so emotional and still so easy, I knew from the first moment how I wanted their story to end and how I wanted to write it. I have many ideas for a future book with those two idiots, but in the mean time...would you like a bonus chapter where we are gonna see how they're managing they're "relationship"? Maybe where he tells her his real name...👀 but now tell me, what was the part that you most liked? Would have you made the same decisions as them? MY CHAT AND REQUESTS ARE OPEN SOO I'm gonna wait you there ;)

p.s. : who recognize the scene from an old tv series for young I took ispiration for the fight and the departure? 👀

#kaz brekker imagine #kaz brekker x reader #kaz brekker x grisha #kaz brekker #the crows #jesper fahey #inej ghafa #wylan van eck #matthias helvar #nina zenik #grishaverse #shadow and bone imagine #shadow and bone #six of crows imagine #six of crows #soc #crooked kingdom #imagine

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