#duck egg interior walls

[redheaded-eskimo]

Hall Essex Example of a mid-sized minimalist porcelain tile, gray floor and brick wall entryway design with gray walls and a brown front door

[scrumpyfan43]

A weird trope I really like is Space Platforms

My working definition of a Space Platform is something that satisfies all of these criteria:

Artificial

Terrain (used primarily as a surface to stand and/or build on )

Suspended in space or high in the sky

Despite objective local gravity such that you could fall “down” off the side

Some things that are and aren’t Space Platforms

Stacraft’s Space Platform terrain, probably the purest example of it:

You walk on them, you build buildings on them, and there’s ice cream shops built into the walls (also they’re literally called space platforms):

Wube had planned on but eventually abandoned space platforms for Factorio that are very clearly inspired by Starcraft:

Gryphon Station in Tyrian has standing water and jungles exposed to the Space Air:

Motos I’m pretty sure explicitly refers to the environment as a series of space platforms; there’s no buildings (unless you count Nabicons) but the platforms are clearly artificial, they’re thin enough that the only thing you can do is stand (and jump) on them, and the objective of the game is to shove enemies off the platform and into the void:

Skyroads consists of driving and jumping a space car along treacherous space platforms:

Final Destination in Smash Bros.:

They seem to be a lot more common in games than in other media, but they’re out there. Most famously probably is The Jetsons:

The truck stop in Spaceballs is a fantastic space platform:

The Wander Over Yonder episode “The Box” has people milling about on space platforms (but contrast with “Duck Dodgers In The 24½th Century” later):

The ring city from Treasure Planet is a weird one because it’s the only one I’ve encountered that doesn’t have a uniform up and down, but unlike the rotating space stations it’s meant to evoke, you still experience objective gravity while standing on your ship next to it

And last, close to my heart is the floating platform “Cool Lightning” from the lost comic Monster Killers (which was heavily influenced by video games):

Now for some things that are not Space Platforms, even though they’re great in their own ways.

1) Floating Islands (they’re terrain, but not artificial terrain):

2) The RLS Legacy from Treasure Planet and other tall ships in space (vehicles, not terrain):

3) Buildings with lots of interior volume and no walkable surfaces, such as these buildings in The Jetsons:

and the Cloud City in Star Wars:

4) Artificial terrain that relies on centrifugal artificial gravity, such as Ringworld, the Halo Installations, O’Neill Cylinder, Stanford Torus, etc. These more or less obey real world physics and aren’t magically levitating, and while you could “fall off” one, you aren’t affected by gravity unless you’re standing on the surface:

And now for some borderline cases.

Neverhood. Hoborg constructed it, but does his divinity mean that it’s natural rather than artificial? Aesthetics are more “floating island” than “space platform” but the lore points the other way:

Death Egg and Doomsday Zones in Sonic & Knuckles. The interior seems to contain most of the important stuff, but Sonic spends most of the time running around on the exterior:

The walkways in Duck Dodgers In The 24½th Century. They’re very similar to the Wander Over Yonder platforms, but they’re not extensive enough that I’m happy calling them “terrain.” Space Balconies maybe.

[holethoa2010]

How to Build a Cheap Duck House with Bamboo | Homemade Duck Coop for Sma...

Building a duck house doesn't have to be expensive. Using bamboo, a versatile and cost-effective material, you can create a sturdy and comfortable home for your ducks. This guide will walk you through the steps to build a homemade duck coop that's perfect for a small duck farm.

Ghost

Bamboo Polish: 15-20 polish, dependi

**Limb

Wooden Planks: For the floor and roof (optional, but adds durability)

Hinges and Screws: To attach doors and secure parts

Nails or Bamboo Ties: For joining bamboo pieces

Tools: Saw (for cutting bamboo), hammer, drill, measuring tape, and wire cutters

Weatherproofing Materials: Paint or varnish to protect bamboo

Step-by-Step Instructions1. Plan Your Design

Size: Determine the size of the duck house based on the number of ducks. A good size is about 4x4 feet for a small flock.

Features: Include a nesting area, space for ducks to move around, and a door for easy access.

2. Prepare the Bamboo

Cut Bamboo: Cut

Treat Bamboo: To increase durability, treat bamboo with a mixture of water and borax or use a commercial bamboo preservative.

3. Build the Frame

Walls: Arrange the bamboo poles vertically and horizontally to form the walls. Use nails or bamboo ties to secure the joints. Ensure the walls are strong and upright.

Floor: Create a sturdy frame for the floor using bamboo poles. If desired, cover the frame with wooden planks for additional support.

Roof: Construct a slanted roof frame to allow rain runoff. Cover the roof with bamboo or wooden planks. Ensure there’s adequate overhang to protect the ducks from the elements.

4. Assemble the Coop

Join Walls and Floor: Attach the walls to the floor frame using screws or nails. Make sure the structure is stable.

Attach Roof: Secure the roof frame to the top of the walls. Ensure it’s well-supported and watertight.

Add Doors and Windows: Cut openings for doors and windows. Use hinges to attach the door and cover windows with chicken wire or mesh to keep predators out.

5. Weatherproof the Duck House

Seal Bamboo: Apply a weatherproofing paint or varnish to protect the bamboo from moisture and pests.

Insulate: Depending on your climate, you might need to add insulation to keep the ducks warm. Straw or hay can be used for bedding.

6. Prepare the Interior

Nesting Area: Create a small enclosed area with straw or hay where ducks can lay eggs.

Feeding and Watering Stations: Set up feeding and watering stations inside the coop.

7. Final Touches

Check Stability: Ensure all parts of the coop are secure and stable.

Clean Up: Remove any sharp edges or nails to prevent injury to your ducks.

Conclusion

Your bamboo duck house is now ready to welcome its new inhabitants! This eco-friendly and budget-friendly coop provides a comfortable and safe environment for your ducks, and with proper maintenance, it will serve your small farm well for years to come.

[homeimgs]

Sea Blue Living Room Ideas

Sea Blue Living Room Ideas are a great place to introduce this color. Many interior designers love blue, and this shade can be used as a neutral accent or to break up a monotone look. Here are a few sea blue living room ideas. Read on to see what these designers have to say about this color. Then, get inspired by these stunning coastal living rooms. Read on to see some of their favorite blues. We also share some of our favorite blue accent ideas.

Interior designers' favorite shades of blue

Dark shades of blue can make a small room feel drab. To avoid the risk of overpowering the space, limit the use of this color to one wall, preferably with wainscoting, and use neutral colors to break it up. On the other hand, brighter shades of blue create an eclectic yet cozy look. You can complete the look with colorful accents. Read on to learn more about some of the best ways to use blue in your living room.

One of the most popular shades of blue is deep, calming sea blue. This shade of blue evokes a feeling of serenity, but it doesn't require a seaside home to look good. Similarly, duck egg blue is the perfect choice for coastal living rooms, as it complements white and pale timber. While dark blues are perfect for coastal-inspired living rooms, light shades are best suited to a more urban setting.

Deep, rich blues are the perfect backdrop for antiques and vintage items, and can also anchor the rest of your space. Alternatively, these colors can be used to create a wall mural. These shades can also be used in other rooms, including the kitchen. De Nimes by Farrow & Ball is a deep blue with a distinctly earthy undertone. It works beautifully in a kitchen island or an airy drawing room. Another great choice for a living room is Indianola, a stunning design by Julia Miller.

Blue is a beautiful hue that can make a room feel both calming and dramatic. In nature, the color is found in many places, from the morning sky to the ocean. Whether you're decorating your living room in the traditional or modern style, blue can express your personality perfectly. Its dramatic effects can make it the perfect accent color for any style. But don't let the color scare you. As the most versatile color in the palette, blue is a great choice for both living rooms and bedrooms. Its rich, reflective undertones make it a versatile choice that goes well with just about any other hue. Choose a deep, rich blue for a living room that inspires you or a glossy aquamarine for an energetic atmosphere. You can also transform a modest bedroom into a chic retreat by painting it a soft, pastel shade of blue. And when it comes to bathrooms, ocean-inspired hues make for an elegant and relaxing experience.

Ways to incorporate this color in your living room

If you're considering a coastal-inspired living room, coastal blue is an excellent color choice. You can make the living room look serene and calm by incorporating driftwood decor, natural wood furniture, and neutral color schemes. This color also looks great with coastal-inspired wallpaper. For a dramatic effect, go for an entire wall covered in coastal blue. Or use a single blue tone to create an energetic room.

Once you've picked the color, the next step is to decide how to combine it with other colors in your living room. Depending on your style and preference, a soft periwinkle blue can serve as the base for bolder accent colors and graphic patterns. Don't be limited to blue paint on walls, either. Try mixing and matching blue furniture. Here are some examples of a sea blue sofa.

To add a splash of sea blue color to your living room, consider using the color as an accent wall. While it won't be your primary color, a feature wall will provide the perfect anchor for an otherwise simple space. When incorporating a sea blue accent wall into your living room, use accent colors of similar hues to make the room appear more cohesive. For example, a blue rug will help to balance a blue accent wall.

Mid-century modern decor is another great option for incorporating sea blue color in your living room. This style is perfect for playing with the sea blue color because it makes good use of throw pillows and throws blankets. You can also incorporate a blue accent wall in your living room with vases and a stack of books. The subtle hints of blue throughout the room will give the room a cohesive feel and a relaxing atmosphere.

The rich shade of blue living room makes an ideal accent wall for a dramatic sofa. Blue is a classic color, and when paired with white or another lighter tone, it becomes an eye-catching focal point. It also looks great with a neutral-toned sofa or accent chair. It can also give a room a beach-inspired look by including blue chairs in the dining room. Not only do these chairs add a touch of beach style, but they also lend a classy look to the space.

Ways to break up a monochromatic look with accents of blue

When it comes to breaking up the monotony of a monochromatic look, bold colors like blue are a great choice. For example, you can wear a navy trench coat over a silk cobalt blouse and culottes. This color combination provides an interesting balance between the drama and flair of unique textures. The houndstooth pattern gives the outfit a contemporary edge and balances the boldness of the blue.

The monochromatic look can be visually overwhelming if the color selection is too large. To avoid this, choose soft color living room like turquoise as a base and a darker shade for text. The main idea is to stick to two colors and use accents in those colors that tie into the overall theme of the room. If you want to keep the color scheme monochromatic, choose accessories that are close in shade.

Contrasting fixtures can also help offset a monochromatic look. The fixtures don't have to be in bright colors; they just need to stand out against the monochromatic palette. You can use copper or brass fixtures to add interest to your monochromatic space. Keep in mind that your furnishings and accessories are important pieces in your overall design, so it's best to start with one living room color and venture out a few shades from there.

If you already have a monochromatic palette, you can use existing accents as a starting point for your new design. A sectional couch or sectional sofa is a great place to start when it comes to creating a monochromatic look. You can also use accents of the blue living room on accessories such as purses, shoes, and hats. These accents will add visual interest and give your design a modern edge. Another way to break up a monochromatic look is to add pops of blue living room to your wardrobe. By adding a few accents of blue, you can highlight a statement piece, artwork, or statement furniture. A monochromatic design can be deceptively simple, but it can quickly become dull and flat. The key to breaking up a monochromatic look is to mix different hues.

Beautiful coastal living rooms with blue accents

For a modern take on coastal decor, try incorporating blue and white into your coastal living room. These coastal decor ideas incorporate neutral colors, bold color palettes, and a mix of textures. The result is a beach-themed living room that's both chic and casual. The perfect beach-inspired space for entertaining. If you have a small budget, you can even make your own nautical-themed coffee table to incorporate into your decor.

To make your room more inviting, consider using soft shades of blue and cream living room. These colors are often synonymous with the seaside, which is a relaxing, laid-back vibe. Use soft fabrics and try to steer away from bright hues. Instead, add contrasting textures with wood, woven textures, or chunky crocheted stools to your decor. If you're not a fan of bright colors, try mixing them with a neutral palette and accents made of natural materials.

To give your coastal living room a natural feel, use jute rugs or placemats. These are inexpensive and add an inviting touch. Jute rugs are also great for adding a touch of comfort and coziness to a room. You can also opt for a colorful throw pillow in your living room. Throw pillows can be a great way to bring nature inside. For a romantic atmosphere, try hanging a watercolor painting on one wall.

A seaside theme is an ideal way to incorporate blue accents into your living room. A coastal living room is usually decorated with a white background, natural wood furnishings, and seaside mementos. However, you can also incorporate blue accents into your coastal living room with different shades of color. Just make sure to choose the right color schemes! You'll be glad you did! There are several beautiful coastal living rooms with blue accents to inspire you!

For a nautical or seaside theme, you can try decorating a family room with cool blue accents. You can even incorporate seashells and dried coral into your room. Coastal living rooms are known for their breezy atmosphere and natural colors. The colors and textures will make you feel relaxed and rejuvenated. So, don't be afraid to incorporate blue accents into your coastal living room decor! You'll find plenty of inspiration in these coastal living rooms. Read the full article

[hometoursandotherstuff]

Kate’s a garden designer, and not only is the inside of her Georgian villa lovely, but her garden is stunning.  The duck-egg blue drawing room, at the front of the house, was added on in the Georgian period.

The handmade cupboards and exposed brick chimney breast in the kitchen create a country feel.

The brick paved passageway leads through the scullery to the garden.

Stripped pine and floral quilts in the spare bedroom continue the pretty country theme.

The military red walls in the hall provide the perfect backdrop for Kate’s collection of prints and mirrors.

Cream paneling and a roll-top bath in the bathroom.

The main bedroom has lilac walls and ivory curtains. The lithograph above the bed is French.

At the end of the garden is Kate’s pride and joy: a garden office which she designed and had hand built. Inside, her drawing board has sketches and planting lists for gardens that she is currently working on.

A brick path leads from the house to the garden.

Lovely patio with a pergola.

A terraced area outside Kate’s office is a perfect place to sit and enjoy the garden.

https://priceless-magazines.com/interiors/up-the-garden-path/

[yeojaa]

stay gold.

pairing.  jjk x f!reader.  rating.  explicit.  tags.  blond!jk being a good boy?  idk.  that’s literally it.  wc. 3k.  beta reader.  @hobi-gif​, ofc.  author note.  this was meant to be pwp but i cannot shut up so here is this mess that is neither pwp nor something with a legit plotline. 🤠 blame blondie.

Having a content creator boyfriend is fun.  Usually.

You get to go on cool trips, he gives you all of the random shit his sponsors send him, and you get to preen like a cat that ate the canary when his DMs blow up with hundreds of messages.  

Sure, there are the downsides.  All his stupid pranks - the ones that piss you off when you’re trying to do your makeup, the ones that have him dunking ice cubes on you while you’re in the middle of a shower - and his perpetual recording, camera glued to his hand and if not that, then his phone.  There are the rude comments - the oh, that’s his girlfriend? He could do better was a common one - and the long hours he spends editing, holed away in his office;  the beyond inappropriate packages he gets in the mail, thongs and other things that he immediately tosses away with a reassuring tilt of his pretty head.

You don’t mind it though.  He enjoys it, thrives on it, and you’re there to support him.

But you’d never expected this.

This Adonis standing in the doorway, freshly styled strands pushed back from his forehead, glimmering gold falling across his eyes.  He looks, for lack of a better word, unreal.

(You’re not often speechless.  Can’t be, when you’re dating someone like Jeon Jungkook and everything he does either makes you laugh or infuriates you.  Boring isn’t a part of his vocabulary and you’ve learnt to keep up with his antics over the years.)

(Still, this comes close, stealing all the air from your lungs.)

“Hey, baby.”  It’s his usual greeting, offered without hesitation as he crosses the threshold and tosses his keys into the catch-all by the door.  Kicks off his chunky sneakers and peels his sweater over his head, effectively tousling the tawny threads.

He’s so handsome it’s outright disgusting, leaving you gaping up at him from your post on the couch.  Gives you very little to work with as he shimmies down the hall, grabs an apple off the kitchen island, and then not-so-gracefully plops himself down beside you.  

You still haven’t found your words by the time he takes two gigantic bites, flesh crunching between his teeth, big doe eyes sparkling like he’s stepped right out of a Disney film.

“D’you like it?”  

Did you?  Well, obviously.

You’ve never imagined Jungkook blond.  He’d gone through a phase in college, colours of the rainbow rotating through the ends of his hair.  Brown, red, orange, blue.  You’d loved each hue but this was something else entirely.  (Different even from the two months he’d spent as full-on ginger, committing far too hard to his Haikyuu!! Halloween costume.)

This version of him is steeped in some twisted fantasy, a dream crafted by years of bedtime stories and happily ever afters.  It screams Prince Charming and has you reaching for him before you know what you’re doing, threading fingers through the surprisingly soft silk that curls over his ears and looks so lovely next to the silver of his piercings.  

You mean to be gentle, to comb delicately through flax but fuck.  He looks so good you want to devour him.  (You can only imagine your face - a lovesick puppy brought home from the pound.)

There’s still apple in his mouth, juice tracking down his chin because you’re really making it quite hard for him to chew when you’ve got him like this, two hands on either side of his face, holding him in place.  Inspecting him like a piece of meat as he peers at you, deceptively innocent and amused.  “That’s a yes?”  

An answer comes in the form of a kiss, of limbs rearranging and settling directly into his lap.  Knees wide, chest to chest, you can’t even be bothered by the sickly sticky feel of his skin, the way his hands are too cold to be creeping up beneath the hem of your - his - shirt.

(Where had he put the apple?  You know it’s not finished, two bites in and left to roll all over the rug.  You’ll give him shit for that later, when you’re not so distracted.)

“You look like Barbie,”  you mumble against his lips, into the warmth of his mouth.  You ignore the way he laughs, swallowing it down with a pass of your tongue and too much spit swapped, a string of saliva caught between you when you come up for air. 

Somehow, you’re still lightheaded, all your thoughts framed into the familiar silhouette of the boy beneath you.  Cherry red lips - your fault, from all your biting and teasing and the balm you’d applied earlier - and blond hair.  Who would’ve known that was your weakness?

(Deep down, you know Jungkook as a whole is the issue.  That it’s your stupid handsome boyfriend with his lopsided smile and bunny teeth, dimples and that scar on his cheek.  This is just a new layer to be explored, another reason you love him added to the Jungkook Best Boy jar that sits front and centre in your mind’s eye.)

“Don’t say that,”  he groans, equal parts reproach and affection, palms resting where they belong, nestled over your spine.  Long fingers toy with the soft cotton of your thong, brushing over the seamless material with small repetitive motions. 

You realise then his hands aren’t the only things heating up.

The two of you have an understanding, an abiding awareness of the boundaries of your relationship and the roles you take on.  Best friend, occasional sucker for the sake of a TikTok, lover.

He knows how much you hate your dirty laundry being aired - does his very best to never post anything that might be misconstrued, ensures he only ever portrays you in a good light because the internet could be cruel.  (Even if he argued with you in the quiet of your home, he’d keep you safe outside of the four walls.)  

You know how he needs his quiet time but that sometimes, a night out was unavoidable, a part of his life he - and by extension you - couldn’t always say no to.  (Even if you were achy and tired by midnight, glaring down at your phone as he made his rounds, exchanged contact details and rambled about shit that meant nothing.)

He’s learnt to make your eggs the way you love them:  soft in the centre, covered with too much pepper.  He never washes your clothes in hot water (not after The Great Sweater debacle) and he always makes sure not to use your special memory foam pillow.  

You kiss him goodnight without fail and play with his hair until he falls asleep;  you bury your face against his chest when he’s had a long day, signing your love with the felt-tip of your lips.  You bring him fresh cut fruit when he’s been working for more than three hours and wash his hair when he’s stressed. 

Knowing each other was easy;  loving each other was like breathing.

This, though, is different.  New.  Special.  

He’s never been like this before, glazed over in the eyes, patience wearing thin.  Sat so well, picture perfect beneath you and cornsilk crown lighting his entire expression up like a halo, he’s ethereal. 

“Baby,”  he whines, grits through his teeth as you roll your hips that much slower, the glide impossibly smooth thanks to the lychee watermelon lube he’d received to his PO box.  (One of the items you hadn’t thrown away from that package, together with a handful of other toys that’d come in handy over the months.)

You’re shameless, soothing a hand across his cheek, thumb slipping past his lips.  (You ignore the noise of indignation, meet it with a twinkling laugh of your own.)  It sweeps over his tongue, pressing down in tandem with the second sound - one that echoes out of his chest, a growl that pitches into a whine and makes your ears buzz.  “Hi, baby.”

“Stop teasing.”  It’s practically begging - or as close to it as Jungkook will get.  It draws a smile and another pass of your thumb, gliding across his gums to slot against the interior of his cheek.  You’ve got him fishhooked, immobile, even as he glares up at you.

(He’s so, so handsome.  Looks utterly out of it even as he tries to harden his gaze, coerce you into doing what he wants with that stare that makes your heart lurch pathetically in your chest.)

“You don’t like this?”

You know he does - that he loves being pampered.  That he’ll rarely ask, instead pouting at you from wherever he sits until you turn to putty under his gaze and smother him in all the love you have to offer.

“I do.  I just—”  The rest of his words don’t come, stolen by a gasp when you grind against him, swollen head of his cock bumping against your clit.  He’s making a mess of you both, back arching, hips rising, hands fisted into the sheets even as he chases friction like a dog does its tail.  The warmth between your legs is so close he looks as if he’ll lose his mind, rutting against your cunt like just the right angle might get him what he wants.  “Fuck, baby.”

“I’m trying,”  you retort, mouthful of teasing that only earns you another glare, some poor semblance of one as he bites into the webbing of your hand, bucks up impatiently.

“Please.”  He tries again, a different tactic this time, all sugar-spun sweetness.  Strawberry shortcake rather than sour cherry pie, so eager to get what he wants that he’s not above pulling out all the stops.  A hand risen from the sheets, digits decorated in ink swimming over your skin, sinking into the meat of your thigh.

(He doesn’t push though.  Knows you’ll pull the moment he does.)

“Please?”  An echo chamber, endlessly teasing, and a ducked head, lips finding the sweat-slick column of his throat.  Just one drag of your tongue has him crumbling further, careful composure slipping with each swivel of your hips, the edge of your teeth.  There’s nothing but desperation radiating off him, demand choked back when you drift lower, tracing over his chest, teasing him in the ways you know best.  

It’s all so unnecessary, drawing out what he wants until he’s a goner, three seconds from combusting beneath you.  You’d give him anything he ever asked for - offer it all up on a silver plate, a meal fit for a king.  This is just fun, different and exciting. 

You relent with a minor adjustment, settling yourself against him, face dropped into the crook of his neck.  “Slowly.”

He repeats after you, uncertain and hopeful;  his hand falls further, warmth descending to pull you close, hold you still.   As much as he needs this - needs you - he loves the slow burn just as much.  The stutter of his pulse gives him away, erratic beneath your touch.  He’s a thousand miles above the clouds, floating on cloud nine;  every second passed is another tingle of his toes, a tightening of the coil in his stomach.

When he aligns himself against your core, pre-cum pearling over his tip, he does exactly as you’ve asked.  Sinks into you at such a leisurely pace you wonder if you might be the one who splinters apart, shatters into a million tiny pieces at the way he splits you open.  

“Good?”  Jungkook asks so nicely it’s impossible for you to say no, to deny him this tiny bit of reassurance.  

(Maybe it’s the way he looks, crowned in glittering gold, painted by Fra Angelico.  Or maybe it’s how his smile spills like sunshine, a peachy pink horizon dragging over the apples of his cheeks, burnt red like their namesake.)

(Whatever it is, it’s everything you want, packed perfectly and pouting.)

“Good boy,”  you purr, breath hitching once he’s sheathed to the hilt, seated so deeply within that you swear you can feel him in your throat.

You’ve never felt so full before - close to overflow, taunted and taxed by ridges and veins, each flex of his hips that drives him somehow further within your fluttering walls.  So full you might burst, that you can’t possibly hold yourself together when he begins to move, fucking you tenderly, as if he can feel the weight of the moment.  

There’s something happening.  A shift in the air, in the axis of your planet that revolves around him.  It falls on its side, spins wildly out of control, and you’re emotional.  It’s not just his hair - that gilded crown he wears, heavy heavy heavy like aureate coin - or the impossible dark of his eyes - blown out, an entire galaxy devoured by the supermassive black hole that is his pupils.  It’s the things you can’t see, the pieces beneath skin, soft and jammy, the tongue-tart sweetness.

(The thing with Jungkook is that he doesn’t let go, refuses to fully submit, always so careful to regulate his voice when things get to be too much.  He’ll blink back his tears, stifle a sob, even as his breath disappears from nothing but a delicate brush of his chest.)

You take his vulnerability as a treasure, hold it close and craft a chest for its home, promise to keep it safe even while you're the one who poses the most danger.  When it’s your teeth and tongue that eviscerates the soft of his flesh, makes him keen and gasp, heart pounding like hooves, beat imprinted against, under, into your palms.

When he begs you to move - manages the request in a broken articulation that makes you giggle - you give, swivel your hips in a figure eight, an infinity of motion that never ends.  

You take all he has to offer and sing your praise into the wet of his mouth.  Lick over teeth and gums and trade spit for love;  know there’s only more where that came from, that the fountain begs to overflow as he finally - finally - breaks that much more, gripping your hips gentle as can be.  Hands soothe up and down, an unspoken plea in how he thumbs your hip bones, taps hopefully over the small of your lower back.

He doesn’t need to speak for you to hear him. 

It’s more than a kiss forming against your skin.  It’s a confession of adoration, sealed by the frame of his mouth, cemented by the sting of his teeth.  It’s I love you without saying it, plastering the pecks along your spine, placing them safely in all the spaces you’ve created for him.

It’s also an apology, because he’s just torn your castle to pieces, shattered your entire fantasy into smithereens.

He hadn’t expected you to react the way you had, rolling off him as if he hadn’t just been chasing the sweet bliss of release, splitting your walls and making you wail above him.  It has him pouting, utilising the one thing that melts you down like candle wax.  

“Baby,”  he whines, reaching for you, needy and horny and so hard he imagines all the blood has rushed from his head straight to his cock.  Everything spins when he moves with you, scrambles across the California king to paw at your hip.  

He’d been so good for you - wasn’t that enough?

“Don’t,”  you grumble, searing his insides with just one look.  (It shouldn’t be as hot as it is.)

“But—”  A plea punctuated by groping hands, eager as always, smoothing over the swell of your ass, flesh squeezing between knuckles.  He’d normally let this go - fuck into his closed fist in the shower after he’s done something to cut playtime short - but he can’t help it now.  He’s been on the edge for so long, lit up in neon that demands to be seen, heard, felt.

“Don’t dye it again.”  

Oh?

That has him reeling, laughing, such a stupid grin across his face.  It devours everything else, spearing dimples into place as he pulls you against him.  You can feel his smile forming against your skin, the wet drag of his tongue as he sucks a welt into the sensitive spot of your shoulder.

“You wanna play with Barbie, baby?”  It’s such a stupid line - utterly sophomoric and riddled with teasing and yet the delivery has you shivering in his arms, equally childish huff splitting your lips.

Jungkook doesn’t listen to you often - not about silly things like this - but he figures he can, just this once.

“I won’t,”  he chirps, sneaking another kiss, stamping another smooch.  It’s working exactly as he wants, stilling your protesting limbs as he cages you to him, slips his hand back where he most wants to be.  The glide is perfect, a mixture of arousal and fruity lubricant;  he slips a finger in without resistance, grinding his palm against your clit. 

“R-really?”  Of course you don’t believe him.  He messes with you too often, plays too many pranks.  (He deserves that.) 

His promise comes too easy, driven by how nice you feel, how pretty you sound when he presses another digit in along the first.  The scissor of his fingers is languid, exploring for the spots that make you breathless as he hums a noise of affirmation against your neck;  he fucks you open as if he has to, as if you aren’t already dripping, eagerly sucking him in.  “Really.”  

“Put it in then, Ken doll.”

He laughs - and then he does.  In bed, with your knee hooked over his, pace slow and sure and sinful.  In the shower, bent over with his hands bruising your hips.  In the kitchen for a late night snack, another apple in his mouth and your hands in his hair.

Maybe blonds did have more fun. 

tag list.  @neverthefirstchoice​ @youwannabelostandnotbefound​ @codeinebelle​

[delimeful]

to taste your beating heart (4)

warnings: nightmares, flashbacks, mind control/thrall mention, mental breakdown, blood mention, impalement/staking, upsetting thoughts, panic, ptsd responses

-

A plastic-sounding click, like someone pressing a button.

Anx took a breath, staring intently at the person bustling around across from him.

Patton was making tea like someone vying for a professional butler position: setting saucers and cups in front of each of them, managing the teapot with a steady hand, motions smooth and automatic.

“Sorry, I’m just so used to setting up refreshments for guests,” he chuckled nervously. “My sister always insists on tea when she comes by, so—“

Logan shifted next to him, impatient and more than a little irritated after every one of his inquiries had been deflected or outright ignored. Patton had invited them in, though, and he was currently their best lead on one of the most vicious cases they’d ever dealt with.

Even if he seemed utterly incapable of answering any of their actual questions.

That wasn't saying he wasn't willing to talk at all. Roman was chattering with him, their most sociable member easily drawn into discussion and more than willing to natter on in the hopes that Patton would let some vital information slip.

Anx wasn’t the only one who noted the way their host set an extra saucer and cup out, but when he met Logan’s gaze, the hunter only rolled his eyes, more than content to dismiss it as another element of the stranger’s apparent airheaded personality.

Patton was still speaking, discussing the many alleged merits of ignoring allergies for the sake of fulfilling experiences. Roman, who was lactose intolerant, was nodding along wholeheartedly. Logan, who was the one to deal with Roman’s post-dairy consumption whining, looked a lot less agreeable.

His own attention remained pinned on Patton’s movements rather than his words. There was a pattern there, a careful turn of the cup so the handle was facing the right side, lift the teapot from the warmer, and pour. One by one, he went around the table.

Anx was the only one watching when the man finally fumbled. After pouring each of their cups with surprising grace, he reached that final, fifth teacup. He twisted the handle so it was right-aligned, lifted the teapot, poured— and then reached for what looked like a cream pitcher.

A beat late, Patton’s hands suddenly swerved to the side, and he pulled them back as though he’d been burned. His voice didn’t even falter.

Anx reached across the table lightning-quick and seized the pitcher, knocking a few of the porcelain jars over and effectively cutting through the conversion as he did. Roman was asking something, but Patton only stared at him, something both fearful and grateful in his gaze.

Anx pulled the lid off, and the thick smell of blood hit him, like iron and rust.

“Your sister, you said?” Logan asked, and Patton bit his lip hard enough to bleed.

Click.

He was in a different room of the same tiny apartment, though it took him a moment to recognize the interior.

Put bluntly, it looked as though a miniature hurricane had torn through it.

The wallpaper was shredded and splattered. The cute decorative furniture had been thrown askew at best, smashed to bits at worst. Everything was in disarray, the valuable and mundane targeted indiscriminately. An entire life torn to pieces.

In the eye of the storm, Patton stood, hands fisted in his hair and eyes bloodshot.

They’d known the backlash of the bond breaking would be hard on Patton, but they hadn’t been prepared for this. It was entirely possible that they had never run into a thrall this strong, one maintained for so long, in their entire hunting career.

Most aggressive thralls would attack relentlessly to defend their master from harm. Seeing as they’d been the ones to kill his “sister”, if Patton was going to vent his ire on anyone, it would be them. Roman stepped forwards carefully regardless, knowing that they owed it to him to at least try to help him recover. “Patton?”

“I should have helped her,” he replied tonelessly, voice half-ruined from screaming. He picked up a broken chunk of a table leg, and they all went tense, but all he did was slam it against the wall.

“I should have saved her!” he cried, punctuating every word with a swing. “Where is she, where is she, what did I do to her?”

“A better question would be: what did she do to you?” Logan asked, ignoring the sharp look Anx sent his way. They’d all been unsettled at the way the vamp had talked about Patton, like someone possessive over a favored plaything, but that didn’t mean they should be bringing it up now.

They’d finally gotten Patton’s full attention, as he turned to them with angry tears in his eyes. “She did everything for me! And I— I gave her away, I betrayed her…”

“She was hurting people,” Anx cut in, voice firm but not unkind. For all that he’d been through, Patton didn’t deserve unkind.

“I could have fixed it, I thought I was— I was getting through to her,” he pleaded, his voice unsteady and unconvincing even to himself. He dropped the wood, pressing bleeding knuckles against his face to stem the tears.

“It’s not your fault, Patton, okay?” Roman tried, stepping closer until he could reach out and set his hand on a trembling shoulder. Patton only seemed to bow further with the weight of his grief.

“Giving her up was supposed to kill me,” he said softly, the frenzy gone from him. “How am I supposed to live without her?”

“The same way everyone else does,” Roman pulled him in for a hug, his own eyes wetter than they’d been before. “One day at a time.”

Click.

The living room of the house— their house.

Perhaps more importantly, the smell of something burning.

Anx had always been twitchy about things like this-- a thousand potential disasters in mind for every little inconvenience-- so he bolted off the arm of the couch the moment the scent registered.

When he got to the kitchen, he heard the rattle of an active microwave, saw Patton standing and staring blankly at the display as the inside of the microwave clouded up with smoke.

Cringing at the thought of the smoke alarm going off, he turned on the overhead fan and pulled the window up before finally yanking the microwave door open.

A plastic takeout container was halfway to a melted puddle, mixing with whatever leftovers had formerly resided there. He slid on a pair of duck-themed oven mitts and grabbed the most solid-looking parts, quickly lifting and carrying the mess to the balcony where it could cool down without making their house smell like burnt plastic.

When he returned, Patton was still in that same spot, frowning slightly as though just realizing that something might be a little off. Like someone had pressed pause while the world fast-forwarded around him, Patton had described it once.

Anx flitted about for a moment, putting the mitts back and cleaning the leftover residue, and then finally faced his friend with a wry half-smile. Patton’s eyes snapped to him, as though just realizing he was there.

“Hey, Pat.” He reached out and set his hand against Patton’s back, watching as the touch helped ground him slightly. “Can you go sit at the table? I’ll bring us both something to eat.”

Without a word, Patton turned and walked to their little dining table.

Cooking was admittedly harder when he ducked away to check on the other room every few moments, but he managed alright, only singeing the eggs slightly where Roman would have incinerated them.

He set the table for them both, and sat across from Patton, who was motionless and quiet in his chair.

“Can we eat together?” Anx asked, offering Patton a fork so there was a physical prompt as well as a verbal one.

It took a moment, but Patton gripped the fork easily and started to work through the motions of eating, mirroring Anx. Whenever he faltered or seemed to forget what he was in the middle of, Anx would nudge his attention back on track.

Once they were finished, he gathered up his dishes and asked Patton to grab his, carrying them back to the kitchen together.

Patton paused for a moment at the sink, mouth twitching into a frown as he stared at his glass and the lingering layer of orange juice at the bottom.

“Does anyone want tea?” he asked suddenly, a well-practiced line in a cheery tone. “I’m very good at tea service, you know.”

Anx swallowed the lump in his throat. “I’m good, Pat,” he declined instead of pointing out that they didn’t have any tea in the house.

Patton seemed to get a little hazier, his face going sad and then quickly lax again. Anx took the glass from him and offered him a hand to hold instead, squeezing his palm comfortingly when he accepted.

“I need help out in the garden today. Do you think you could lend a hand or two?”

He dipped his head in a nod, and as they made their way to the back door, Anx shot a text off to the group chat.

> nightmare on edge street: out in the garden with pat. bad day protocol, stat

When they came back in hours later, dirt under their nail beds and probably a little sunburned, Roman and Logan had already combined their talents to set up an elaborately decorated but still structurally sound blanket fort spanning the entirety of the living room.

Patton’s face twitched into a tremulous little smile as the others waved them over, and Anx felt him squeeze their joined hands gratefully.

Click.

The sequence rewound, restarted. Ran him through it over and over, the same scenes-- the same memories. Patton pouring tea with a determined, terrified glint to his eye. Patton’s mind struggling under the stress of the snapped bond. Patton working through a difficult day with the help of friends.

The scenery grew brighter and brighter with every repetition, like saturation turned all the way up on a screen, until they were as painful as sunlight on his bare skin. He tried to close his eyes, to move away, to change something, anything, but his body wasn’t his own.

Look at him, it seemed to demand, keeping him frozen in a sensory hell. Pay attention. Look what you did. Understand how you hurt him.

Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.

Clunk.

Silence. The memories vanished, leaving him floating in an impossible, endless black space. Between one blink and the next, he was eye-to-eye with a mirror image, something about it just slightly off.

He didn’t notice the stake in its hand until it was too late.

---

Anx jerked upright, hands jumping to his chest as the phantom sensation of wood between his ribs faded. His breath stuttered painfully, as though he expected to feel ichor welling up in his mouth any minute.

Staking a vampire was an archaic hunter method. It was difficult to manage, it was messy, and it was the slowest and most painful way possible to kill a vampire. He knew this, though he wasn’t sure which life was providing the facts.

Regardless of memories, he couldn’t know how it felt to actually be staked. He’d been injured before, with a coven as temperamental as his, but nothing like that. Nothing even close to that. It was just a bad dream, an imagined pain.

There was a subtle shifting nearby, and his head snapped up, eyes bright and teeth bared. If those assholes thought he was in the mood to have his space invaded--

“Easy, Count Chocula.” Across the room, the sword-wielder-- Roman, that was his name-- settled back into the armchair by the door, watching him with narrowed eyes. “I was simply noticing your… abrupt awakening?”

Right. Because he wasn’t settled into one of the tiny, dark rooms reserved for the newly-turned and those who couldn’t shake off the urge to sleep. He was captured by weird hunters, who trapped him in their weird house, and asked weird invasive leading questions about his weird night terrors.

He was also tucked into a bed, for some reason.

The comforter had already slipped down halfway due to his sudden jolt into wakefulness, and he wasted no time in kicking free of the sheets. The room was surprisingly dark in both theme and lighting, with deep purple walls and heavy spiderweb-patterned curtains blocking out any potential sunlight.

There was also a warding circle of ash carefully smudged in a perimeter around the bed, the burning containment runes strong enough to make him want to sneeze even from this distance. The diameter of the circle was wide enough that he could theoretically keep away from any stabbings if he pissed Roman off enough, but add even one more hunter to the mix and it would take virtually no effort to pincer him.

Nothing he could do about the new cage for now, with the hunter staring at him expectantly from his sentry position. He sent a poisonous glare back and hissed, still crouched on the bed like an exceptionally angry gargoyle.

Roman pressed an offended hand to his chest, but was cut off by an inordinately cheerful knock at the door. His expression flickered to a sort of bitter resignation, and he shot Anx a much more serious warning look before unlocking and cracking the door open.

“Hey, Pat! I thought you were taking a nap?” he asked with impressively feigned lightness to his voice.

“I was, I just— Is he awake?” Another too-familiar voice replied, sounded distracted. “I felt…”

“Yeah, Padre,” Roman admitted after a strained pause. “He’s up. You remember your key?”

“Of course!” Patton said, and neither of them elaborated on what the hell that was supposed to mean. Roman stepped aside, and Patton beelined to the bed like a compass needle to true north.

He stopped just short of the circle, like a determined enough— or cornered enough— vamp couldn’t reach out and drag him in. “Anx! I’ve been so worried about you! You took quite a tumble, are you feeling alright?”

Anx stared at him. The words were bright, but there was a thread of something fervent and barely-controlled in them, something frenetic in the way he shifted from foot to foot. It sent a pervasive feeling of wrongness down his spine, like looking at an old photograph and realizing that something you remembered from it was entirely absent.

Anx didn’t— couldn’t know enough about Patton to recognize when he was acting off, but every piece slotted neatly into place anyways, dragging him to a conclusion he didn’t intend to realize; Patton was pretending, ignoring the parts of him that felt bad to reassure the rest of them. After everything he'd already gone through, he was bearing the stress of being thralled without a word.

He could feel the thrall tether pulled taut between them, already mentally frayed from both the time passed since feeding and the pain that had ricocheted through him at his last order. Looking at Patton like this, it was bizarrely easy to loosen his grip and let that last thread connecting them fall apart.

Patton’s shoulders eased, all of him sagging slightly like a puppet with strings cut. And wasn’t that just an uncomfortably accurate metaphor.

In the next moment, the hunter was stepping neatly over the line of ash and into the circle, arms lifted. Roman shouted something, but his alarmed words were meaningless noise against the roar of anticipatory fear that overcame Anx.

Get away, his instincts screamed, but his body remained stuck, stalled by a resentful whisper in the back of his mind: Doesn’t he deserve to get a few hits in though? Look at what you did to him.

A sudden touch made him curl in on himself, but the arms that folded around him were careful, even gentle. His head jerked up, and sure enough, Patton was hugging him. He froze, struck dumb.

Over Patton’s shoulder, Roman was stopped a few feet away, hand outstretched as though he’d planned to yank Patton back out of the danger zone. Anx met his stare, eyes round as quarters.

“I did not tell him to do this,” he blurted, and Patton’s chest vibrated with a little sniffly chuckle. The human was so warm.

At the door, Logan appeared, glasses slightly askew. “Patton? I heard—“

He paused, taking in the room. His expression grew more and more unimpressed. “... I see. Exactly what happened while I was away?”

[fandom-monium]

Alive Together - Day 1

Summary: Welcome to the Monsterpocalypse. You’re a lone wanderer trying to survive. Until you meet Joel Dawson and Boy.

WC: 4k

Tag/Warnings: light themes of death and grief?? Cursing but minimal. Slow burn. Enemies to friends to lovers?

AN: MEET CUTE? NO. MEET UGLY.

(Entry 2#3#)

Hungry. I have nothing else to report today except that I, (Your Name), am starving. Grilled spiders and roasted centipedes are starting to get old.

I've mentioned it before and I'll do it again, but I miss home cooked meals. Even Dad's shoddy attempts at recreating Mom's recipes. The last time I think was… nevermind.

It hurts; I barely remember the last time I had dinner with Dad, much less Mom, flashes of the memories I have left blurring. Probably from the tears. I used to cry at the slightest thought of Mom and then Dad. Now my heart clenches whenever I try because I shouldn't have to try to remember my own family. Believe it or not, it’s progress.

Maybe it's my fault. I hadn't bothered to snag any mementos that reminded me of them before fleeing the bunker, like an album or something. There weren't many personal items that they'd given me, now that I think about it. Too much clutter, the Captain said.

Or maybe it's the lack of consistent stimulus to my brain. I can't read as much as I'd like to, mainly because it's too dangerous to be distracted (constant vigilance is an important virtue in this world, if you hadn’t noticed). Most books that I've stumbled across (literally, I tripped over a hill of hardcovers. Not fun. Very painful) were either tattered or worn beyond comprehension, destroyed by rain or monster attacks.

Speaking of, my stomach grumbled. I need to start hunting before it gets dark... and before I attract another monster to myself. Again.

-(Your Name) (Your Last Name)

Day 1 - First Impressions

You shut the journal as an ominous roar thunders in the distance. Heart in your throat, you’re already on your feet, shoving the book into your pack and gathering the rest of your things. Once you’re certain there’s no trace left of you on the roof, you gaze at the neighborhood below, shielding your eyes as you scan for signs of alerted monsters.

Greenery and ruins go on for miles, unperturbed.

It’s high noon, rays of sunlight seeping through the clouds and warming your exposed skin. A gust of wind brushes your face and hair, and you suppress a smile. It’s not everyday the weather is this nice, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d relish in it.

Good thing you do know better.

You trace your path to the hills. The town is a maze of torn down buildings and overgrowth, winding roads littered with abandoned houses and wrecked vehicles, and, of course, hidden monsters. There’s only a couple hours before nightfall, and you’re far from your destination.

Better start walking. You’ve wasted enough time.

You climb down the side of the dilapidated house, dropping to the ground with a thump. If there’s one thing you’ve learned since the start of the apocalypse, it’s that residential areas harbored the most monsters, aside from the cities. Too many alcoves perfect for nesting. It’s safer away from the old world.

Safer, not safe.

You keep to the shadows, avoiding the open whenever you can despite the barren streets, darting between urban remnants. Your heart eventually settles as you scan your surroundings like anything and everything will pounce on you the second you let your guard down. By the time you cross the residential area and asphalt roads bleed into dry fields (from years of neglect, you somberly note), the sun has crept out from behind the clouds and the sky is clear blue.

You find a barn after hours of trudging through shrubs and your sore feet. It looms at the top of the hill leading to a dense forest, tall enough that as you step into its shadow it blocks out the sun. Walking closer, you tense as you scrutinize the place, eyes combing over the immediate vicinity.

Nothing. Nothing moves or breathes. You don’t see or hear a peep. Not from the barn or the woods beyond. It’s completely isolated from the nearby town, a perfect fort.

Or a nest.

You huff; shit like this has happened one too many times and you’d be a fool if you haven’t learnt your lesson by now. You pull out your javelin and approach with caution, leaves and grass crunching under your boots as you take in the chipped paint and boarded up windows, steadily making your way around the decrepit building. You frown at the clear deterioration, unable to spot any visible breaches.

Reaching the front of the barn, you gaze warily at the lone entrance. Tall doors ajar, old boards are still nailed across the slim gap or hanging precariously. As if someone or something pried them off, busted through.

In or out, you can’t tell.

For a moment, you weigh your options. You doubt the place had anything to offer, pillaged long before you stumbled upon it. Hell, there’s probably a monster nesting somewhere inside, or a bunch of monster eggs.

But you need food, supplies, rest. Are you willing to risk your life on the small chance this rickety barn can provide those things?

You stare down the the opening and it stares back, deceptively innocent. But it’s mocking you, you can hear it. Just daring you to walk away. 

You shuffle on aching feet, making your clothes rub against your sweaty skin.

As if on cue, your stomach growls.

Groaning, you adjust your grip on the spear before ducking inside.

You let your eyes adjust to the dark interior. Light seeps through the rotted ceiling and cracks from the boarded windows, enough that you don’t need a flashlight to see the place is deserted. You glance around the huge room, javelin ready as you wait with bated breath, ears straining to hear over your pounding heartbeat.

Nothing. You don’t hear anything, except the trees rustling outside. Nothing shifts or darts out of sight. No signs of life, not even eggs (that you can see).

It doesn’t mean you're clear, but it’s a start.

Biting your lip, you take a careful step, and another and another, your eyes sweeping the room as you tread over straw and debris. You pause mid-step when you catch a pulley system attached to the ceiling. It’s dark, but you recognize its outline. Frowning, you trace its small, thin woven ropes as they split in different directions against the ceiling and walls, hitting and crossing the floor until they disappear under a thick layer of hay.

You raise your foot, gently kicking away the straw. You step back.

A net. A decent sized one by the width of the patch of hay.

You sigh, shoulders dropping in relief. If you hadn’t been cautious you’d never have noticed it.

You make your rounds quickly as you check for resources. At this point, it’s muscle memory for you as you move through the room with silent purpose, efficient and controlled. You dig through every storage unit, every container, pulling open cabinets and drawers, tearing through the floor with precision as you toss aside rusted tools and empty cans, a pit burning in your stomach. You snarl, throwing down another torn rag. It hits the floor with a thud.

You knew this would happen. You know the chances, but after all this time you still feel the crushing disappointment? You let out a shaky breath, nostrils flaring as you attempt to quell your frustration.

You can practically hear your mother snap at you. Don’t let your emotions get the better of you, (Your Nickname), unless you want to die, her stern voice echoes. You unclench your teeth with a sigh.

It doesn’t take long, your anger simmering down with each exhale, and when you’re sure you’re calm enough, you resume your initial task: scavenging the barn. Is it a waste of time and energy? Yes. Will you find anything useful? Unlikely. Are you going to try anyway?

You head for the stairs to the hayloft. Even if there seems to be nothing left, you need to make sure.

A few minutes later, you're sifting through another trunk when a yelp cuts across the dusty air, followed by the shrill sound of grinding metal. You startle, hissing as you bang your head against the trunk lid. Pushing down the throbbing pain, you snatch your spear and clamber down the stairs, stumbling forward as your eyes darting around the dust drifting in the air. Something barks over you and you look up.

Huh. Did not expect that.

You were prepared for a snarling, limb crushing insect. Or maybe a triple jawed mammal. Even a mega-pig. You’ve seen enough of those and managed.

But a dog? More specifically, a dog caught in the net you barely avoided. It’s tangled in the ropes suspended just above your head, gently swaying. It seems it does not care for the swinging because it starts barking again, louder and more urgent than before.

“Ah, poor doggy,” you croon, lowering your weapon. To your surprise, the dog stops and jerks to face you, its dark eyes gleaming in the shadows. You eye the seemingly calm animal. “Now, how did you get here? Were you following me?”

The dog whines, squirming in a sad attempt to escape. Your lips quirk up. Aside from the occasional bird, you haven’t seen a normal animal in what feels like forever, much less a dog. Most regular animals were consumed by monsters or by people for food.

Food. You haven’t eaten.

You study the dog; its dark brown fur, sleek and short, its body small⎼almost medium sized, with pointed ears and a long snout. And by the way it looks at you, it has some intelligence.

Your stomach grumbles, and the creature cocks its head at you, ears forward.

Shit.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that,” you grimace at the dog, adjusting your hold before aiming the tip at it. “It’s nothing personal, okay? I’m hungry, and you’re the first thing I’ve seen that hasn’t tried to kill me in a while.”

Which isn’t a lie. Hunting is crazy difficult these days. But you swallow as your eyes meet, its stare unwavering like you aren’t pointing a weapon at his little body. Just one motion and you could end its life painlessly (lucky bastard), but your knuckles go white and you grip falters. Why are you hesitating now?

The dog, as if sensing your battle, barks again, this time more composed than panicked, as if trying to communicate with you. You’re grateful you can’t speak Dog. It’s probably saying something like ‘No, you’re better than this’ or ‘Please don’t do this’ or⎼

“Put him down!”

Or that.

Dear Aimee,

Guess what?

I got a dog! And he’s the coolest, his name is Boy.

He saved my life from a giant frog in a pool who tried to eat me with his tongue, and then we hung out in his bus! Man, do we make a great team. We found out that we have a ton in common too. I feel like we can talk about anything.  

You gotta see us out here; we’re like this iconic duo. I don’t know, feels like when we’re together, we’re unstoppable.

“Right, Boy? Boy?” Joel glances at his side, doing a double take. The dog’s gone. His shoulders slump, “Of course, the first friend I’ve made outside and he leaves me. Sounds about right.”

He didn’t think he could gain and lose a friend within the span of two days. This has to be some kind of record.

He jerks when he hears Boy’s faint barking, guiding him as he drags himself back to the old barn they just passed. For good reasons. The decaying barn looks like it’s in need of a new contractor and a paint job… or three. And an exterminator.

God, the surface is terrifying.

Gulping down his dread, Joel crouches to peer through the gaping hole in the wall. This must be where Boy came through. “Whatcha got there?”

The barking ceases, and so does Joel’s heart.

You stand in the dark like an apparition, back turned to him so he can’t make out your features. Your attention is fixed on the shadowed lump hanging over you, and while it’s dark and he doesn’t have a good vantage point, Joel’s mouth goes dry as he seeks out Boy.

Boy woofs again, and Joel’s heart drops. You step closer to the lump.

For a split second, he sees a flash of his mother’s face, her tears streaming down her cheeks.

He doesn’t think; no thoughts, head empty. Blood roars in his ears. His hands tremble. But he doesn’t hesitate, ripping the makeshift crossbow from his back as he scrambles under the opening.

“Put him down!”

He’s not entirely sure what he expects. He’s read enough comic books to understand the situation; the hero drops in to save damsel in distress then proceeds to demolish the bad guys. Technically, he has the upper-hand here. Right?

But realization slams into him. It knocks the air out of him, and he forgets to breathe.

He shouldn’t have barged in like an idiot. He isn’t a hero. He’s nothing like the superheroes in comics and movies and graphic novels. He doesn’t have super strength or speed or highly advanced tech and he sure as hell is not a genius. 

What he does have: a freezing problem.

He’s already lost feeling in his hands, and he almost drops the weapon as you look over your shoulder at him.

On the other hand, you have a pretty clear idea before you face your captor (seeing him now, can you even consider him that?). With the apocalypse, governments crumbled with ease along with laws and morals, so it’d make sense for people to disregard them. You’ve met quite a few… characters, and you’ve chalked it up to these main categories; garbage thieves, sleazy scavengers, and shitty thugs.

In short, humans are selfish creatures. Prepare for the worst.

You’ve thrown down, fought dirty, bartered with them all and still managed to come out on top, the scars across your body a constant reminder. Nothing surprises you at this point.

A fumbling boy though? You mask your amusement, raising an eyebrow as you take him in. The guy, tall and disheveled, blocks the only exit out of this godforsaken place, his red jacket rumpled and dusty like he’s fallen one too many times. However, what nearly sends you is, as he steps further into the light, you bite your lip, his eyes round and small lips pressed together as the crossbow quakes in his hands.

Who let this puppy out of their sight?

“Listen, buddy,” You finally speak, making Joel flinch. Your eyes narrow as his fingers jerk on the trigger. That’s not good. “If you’re gonna point that thing at me, you better know how to use it.”

He sucks in air, clearing his throat as his eyes dart between Boy and you. He cringes when his voice comes out octaves higher than he expected, “Let Boy go.”

“’Boy’?” You glance up, your weapon still raised at the squirming little fellow. “Oh, you mean Dinner?”

“You were gonna eat him?”

You shrug. “Maybe. Depends how this goes.”

“Okay,” Joel swallows, a futile attempt to keep his tone even as nausea sprouts in him. You plan to eat Boy? How can someone eat something so cute? “Let him go, and we’ll leave you alone. How ‘bout that?”

Beads of sweat drip down his temple as his breaths come out shuddered. He’s not used to this; he’s gone from being the chef of his colony to making demands, negotiating with a possible psycho.  He never trained for this! Well, he’d never been trained, period.

What if he says the wrong thing and sets you off, hurting Boy in the process? He might faint⎼no⎼he will faint. He doesn’t think his heart can handle losing more people… or animals. How is he supposed to save Boy? His fingers twitch against the trigger.

You don’t miss it.

“I don't know about that,” You reply, studying him. His hands tremble as they clutch the weapon. He may not be a scavenger or a thief, but that just makes him all the more unpredictable. Goons, you’d expect them to shoot first, ask questions later, but the fact this guy is making an effort to talk? You want to know his angle, his intentions.

Whether it’s good or bad.

“I’m hungry. It’s going to be dark soon, and Boy here,” You jerk your head at the canine, “was unlucky enough to fall into this ol’ trap.”

You watch, withholding a sneer as emotions and thoughts flit across Joel’s face like an open book. It seems a lightbulb goes off because he looks back at you, eyes wide and hopeful. “You want food? I have some in my backpack. If I give it to you, you let him go?”

He tries not to squirm, the little courage he has waning as your eyes bore into him.

“…Put the crossbow and the bag down. Slowly.”

“You too.” You tilt your head curiously as Joel stutters, “Your spear⎼I mean, if you could stop pointing it at my dog. Please.”

Your brows shoot up. Since the moment he entered⎼wait⎼floundered in here, he could not have made it more obvious that he has no idea what he’s doing. If it wasn’t the way he carried that exposed him, it was definitely his facial expressions, and if not his face, you can hear it trickle through the cracks in his voice. Yet despite how unfair the situation is for him, he’s trying to cover his terror. Failing miserably but trying. All for this cute, little doggy.

And he said please. You ignore the way it warmed you, his tone so…. genuine.

Manners, sincere or not, in the face of danger? You have to respect that.

“It’s a javelin, actually, but I agree to your terms.” Your grip slackens. He might be a wimp, but you have to give it to him. He’s got balls.

A flicker of relief crosses his face, and you both comply with your instructions. In spite of his obvious fear, you roll your eyes as he unzips his bag unnecessarily slower than you meant him to, throwing you a look.

On second thought, he’s either really brave or really stupid. It’s fifty-fifty at this point.

Joel pulls out an aluminum can. It glints in the light as he holds it up and tosses it to you. You catch it easily, inspecting it in your hands.

“Now will you let my dog go⎼Boy!” His scream tears through the barn.

You’re already composed. Uncoiling like a snake, you seize your spear and swing, all in one motion. He lunges for you, but you’re too far. He hits the ground.

Groaning in pain, he berates himself. He should have known; they had no reason to trust each other, so of course this stranger, this psycho, would betray him. He tries to brush it off, the false sense of security dissipating, the relief replaced with crushing betrayal and horror. 

This is what the surface is like? His chest clenches. He can’t breath, but this isn’t like when he freezes up on a monster. At least, not those monsters. This is worse. So much worse.

The net rips, then a pained grunt. Joel shields his eyes, burying his face in his hands as tears trail down his dirt-smudged cheeks. His heart thunders in his ears as he prepares for the inescapable sound of Boy’s pained yelps, the squelch of metal piercing flesh. He chokes down a sob.

He only knew Boy for less than two days, but within that timespan he bared his soul to the animal. He probably knew him better than his own colony. In the short time they had together, he became his best friend⎼

Okay, ew. What is licking him?

“Boy?” Joel groans, flinching away as the dog bombards him with wet kisses. “Wait, you’re not dead?”

You step into the light, javelin in hand as you snort, “Of course not. Did you think I was gonna kill him?”

Yes. Joel sits up and cradles Boy to his chest, gawking at you.

You glare at him, almost offended. “I’m not a monster.”

No. No you are not.

Decked in a faded blue jacket, you stand relaxed, spear perched over your shoulder (or a jav⎼java-something). Your eyes glint in the sunlight like steel, hard and piercing, with dark circles under them. You watch him with a slight frown. And like him, there’s smudges of dirt on your face and clothes, but you manage to make it look cool and purposeful.

You don’t look like a monster, but you kind of acted like one. Joel is conflicted.

He opens his mouth to respond, but he's not sure what to say in this situation, overwhelmed by a cocktail of emotions that he’s still coming down from. Before he conjures an appropriate response (is there even one?), you're shouldering your backpack and slipping through the gap. Joel rushes to his feet. “Hey, wait!”

You continue up the hill, not bothering to turn to him as you purse your lips. “Oh. You’re still here.”

“Yeah, I’m ‘still here’! You held my dog hostage; kind of hard to get over,” he grumbles, panting as he trudges after you with Boy at his heels. You’re faster than you look. “So⎼uh⎼where you heading?”

“Away.”

He nods almost sage-like, wringing his hands together. “Cool, cool. So mysterious,” He pauses, inhaling deeply. His voice, now deeper and a bit more relaxed, comes in a rush as he asks, “Is there any chance we could go with you?”

You freeze, and Joel almost crashes into your back. You whirl around and suddenly you’re faced to face, but you’re too astonished by his question to care that he’s in your personal bubble.

His breathes come in heaves. His eyes are big and round, brown and bright with… hope?

It occurs to you that this guy, who hasn’t even given you his name, is a loser. A hopeful, naive loser.

And it’s for that reason you come to a decision⎼you’ll entertain him. 

“Where are you going?”

“West,” Joel’s shoulders hunch, his voice self-assured as he adds, “to the coast.”

Yeah... fuck that. 

You turn to walk away. “No.”

“Wait!”

You glower at him, stopping him in his tracks. “Dude, we got what we wanted. I got food, you got your dog. End of transaction.”

Joel stares at you for a moment, like he’s debating how far he can test you. He seems to think better of it as his shoulders sag and he caves, “Fine, I’ll head west without you. I can do it.” The last part he says more to himself before turning on his heel, starting in the direction opposite of you.

You nod. This is good, for the both of you. And safer, you tell yourself as you turn to begin your trek again. You’re two strangers in the apocalypse; you don’t know who he is, where he’s been, and, from your experience, it’s best to travel alone. It’s inconspicuous, efficient and⎼

Where the hell is he going?

You halt, squinting as you watch him hike away from the west coast. “Hey!”

He looks at you over his shoulder, his face surprised but expectant. Hopeful. He reminds you of a puppy being called over by their owner.

He thinks you’re caving into him.

Well, jokes on you, loser. You raise an eyebrow, “You know that’s not West, right?”

“Oh,” Joel’s eyes widen, clearing his throat. Boy woofs and he shoots him a withered look, altering his trajectory. “I knew that.”

“That’s not West either.”

He switches directions again.

You shake your head. “No.“

And again.

“Nope.”

Joel’s face reddens, unable to meet your eyes as he stops trying so he doesn’t further humiliate himself.

You make your way over to him, rolling your eyes. He seems to make you do that a lot. “Okay, how much food you got on you?”

“Enough to last me a week? Why⎼”

That’s all you needed to hear.

“Then it’s settled,” You decide, clapping him on the shoulder. He winces. “You share your rations with me, and I’ll help you get to the West coast.”

He blinks, clearly taken aback as you begin your trek once again, gesturing him to follow you. You feel his eyes on your back. “Really?”

“Really. You are a food source. Also I’m pretty sure you’d die before getting halfway.” You add, unabashed.

He frowns, unsure whether to be grateful or not. He decides on the latter. “Oh…thanks anyway?”

“You're really not from around here, are you?” You pause, looking back at him.

He scratches the back of his neck. “No. Is it that obvious?”

“Painfully. So free advice,” You, with a hand on your hip and tone clipped, gesture up and down at his⎼well⎼everything. “Try not to let anyone know you’re a newb. Might keep you alive.” With that, you start heading West, not bothering to see if he’s comprehended the note you bestowed on him.

Joel glances down at himself before trailing after you. “Good to know.”

AN: I want to make it clear: I would never eat a dog, you would never eat a dog, no one would ever eat. A. Dog. That was a joke for this part 1. I even wrote emphasis on your character’s hesitation. It’s just that this is the apocalypse, so it’s safe to assume that survivors are driven into corners, desperate and have to make some hard choices.

The end dialogue is reference to @teenwolffanclub-me ​TW rewrite bc i love it and them so if you like Dylan O’ Brien and Stiles pls read their shit. <333

This part is a slow starter, but I don’t want to rush this, your intro and your development. But, now that you’ve finally met, hopefully the rest won’t seem any slower than the beginning.

I’ve never wrote for a lone survivor kind of character before. I hope you enjoyed the intro nonetheless!

I think I’ll forgo the 7 parts idea, but that’s a goal.

Part 2 in progress.

Also, how to get a beta reader??

[southeastasianists]

On the western shore of the Chao Phraya river, south of the Wat Arun temple, lies Bangkok’s small Siamese-Portuguese enclave, Kudeejeen. Within its maze of narrow alleyways that weave past aging teakwood houses lies a 250-year-history of cultural commingling. In that time, the neighborhood has been home to Siamese-Portuguese, Thai, and Chinese residents of different religions. This diversity can be seen in the local architecture, with the Catholic Santa Cruz Church, the Buddhist Wat Kalayanamit, and the Kudi Khao Mosque a few minutes’ walk from one another. The combination of cultures is also deliciously evident in the enclave’s sweet specialty: khanom farang Kudeejeen, or the Kudeejeen “foreigner cake.”

Behind a bright teal door down an alleyway is Kanoom Farung Lan Mea Pao. The dark interior of the family-run bakery features big mixers in the corner, several blazing charcoal braziers in the middle of the room, and the sweet aroma of freshly baked khanom farang Kudeejeen. Along with Kanoom Farung Pa Lek and Thanusingha Bakery House, it is one of the only three bakeries that makes the cupcake. The small, golden discs resemble sweet muffins, their flat tops adorned with pieces of dried fruit—usually raisin, persimmon, and winter melon—and caramelized sugar. Crispy and crunchy on the outside and fluffy on the inside, the cupcakes are not made with raising agents. In fact, for such a rare treat, the cake itself has a shockingly plain ingredients list: eggs, wheat flour, white sugar, and the dried fruit.

Although it sounds simple, spinning these basic ingredients into khanom farang Kudeejeen is an art that dates back at least 252 years, to the time when Kudeejeen was established. Navinee Pongthai, a Kudeejeen native and the owner of the Baan Kudichin Museum, which chronicles the history of the enclave and the Siamese-Portuguese people, believes the cake’s origins might go back even further, to when the first Portuguese traders settled in the capital of Ayutthaya in the 16th century.

According to Pongthai, the cake is the result of Portuguese settlers and their descendents struggling to recreate European-style sweets. “At first, they tried to make cakes with rice flour, since wheat flour was hard to come by. But the cakes were too hard,” she says. While many classics of Portuguese confectionery revolve around sugar and egg yolks, the lack of available flour and milk forced Kudeejeen bakers to adapt. “Traditional Thai desserts are made from sugar, coconut milk, and duck egg yolks, which are very different than what they were used to. So the Siamese-Portuguese tried to make a replica of European cake without milk and butter.” The result is a cake that is less moist and more flat, as it doesn’t rise up like regular cupcakes, but is still fluffy and tasty.

Khanom farang Kudeejeen is not the first fusion dessert nor the most famous among Thais. Many of the most popular Thai sweets can be traced to Maria Guyomar de Pinha, an Ayutthaya-born woman of Japanese-Portuguese-Bengali descent who was married to a high-ranking Greek official in the 17th-century Ayutthaya court. One of her most iconic creations is foi thong, a nest of egg yolk–based golden threads boiled in sugar syrup. Anyone familiar with Portuguese confectionery will notice the treat’s striking similarities to Portugal’s fios de ovos. Another classic attributed to Guyomar de Pinha is sangkhaya, a coconut jam that may have been inspired by Portuguese custard. However, her recipes did not include cakes, making khanom farang Kudeejeen a dessert unique to the enclave.

Though the cake’s roots lie in the 16th-century intermingling of Portuguese and local traditions in Ayutthaya, it is forever associated with its home in Kudeejeen. After Burmese invaders sacked and destroyed Ayutthaya in 1767, many Siamese-Portuguese, along with other residents of the former capital, migrated to the kingdom’s new seat of power in the town of Thonburi. Here, the king gifted the Siamese-Portuguese community with the land that would become their enclave in 1769. The plot was a reward for aiding in the fight to successfully drive out the Burmese invaders.

Also spelled “Kudi Chin,” Kudeejeen's name is a nod to a nearby Chinese temple and the local Chinese community. Diners can see the influence of these Chinese neighbors in khanom farang Kudeejeen’s toppings. Considered symbolic of health and fortune, the dried fruit was originally added to the cakes just for Lunar New Year celebrations. But the decorative, auspicious additions proved so popular that bakeries have since incorporated them into the cupcake year-round.

Thonburi’s time as a major hub was short-lived: The capital moved across the Chao Phraya river to what would become Bangkok in 1782. But the Siamese-Portuguese community of Kudeejeen stayed put. Still very close to the capital, Thonburi is now a district within greater Bangkok. Despite the staggering size of Thailand’s largest city—it has an estimated 10.7 million residents as of this year—just the three, hole-in-the-wall bakeries continue to make khanom farang Kudeejeen from their small, diverse enclave. For the Kudeejeen locals, they are a special occasion treat and a New Year staple or gift. For visitors, they are a great souvenir and a must-buy when visiting the area.

While not all of us have our own charcoal brazier, it’s still possible to make a version of khanom farang Kudeejeen at home with the recipe below.

Homemade Khanom Farang Kudeejeen

Yield: 10–12, depending on the size of your cupcake liners and muffin pan Special equipment: An electric mixer with beaters Cupcake liners Muffin pan For the cupcakes: 6 eggs (the small eggs used in this recipe were around 45 grams each) 1/3 cups of flour 1/2 cups of fine white sugar A splash of vanilla extract (optional) For the toppings: 2 tablespoons of assorted raisins and dried fruit 1 tablespoon of white sugar 1. Preheat your oven to 360° F and place the cupcake liners in the muffin pan. 2. Measure out all the ingredients and set them aside. As there is no raising agent, the fluffiness of the cupcakes relies entirely on the aerated eggs, so it’s important to move quickly. In a mixing bowl, add the eggs, sugar, and—if desired—a splash of vanilla extract, then beat the ingredients using an electric mixer until the mixture is foamy and very pale. This should take at least a minute; the mixture should double in size and be a little stiff. 3. Gradually sieve and stir in the flour (do not pour it in all at once). If you end up with lumps, whisk the mixture again with the electric mixer. Make sure to do it swiftly so that it doesn’t deflate. Don’t worry about it being too runny. If the cupcakes are thick with too much flour, they will become too dense. 4. Fill up each cupcake liner to 3/4 full and place the tray in the oven. 5. Let the cupcakes bake for two minutes before adding the dried fruit on top. Add as many as you like then sprinkle the cakes with some sugar before putting them back in the oven. 6. Let the cupcakes bake for 12–15 more minutes before pulling them out (check about halfway through and rotate the tray if they’re baking too much on one side). Do the toothpick test to check if they are ready. They might deflate and wrinkle a little afterward, but that is normal.

[awful-roffle-archive]

Starbound // Welcome Aboard!

so uh. basically i got my first crewmate on this character and wanted to write something with it 🤷 cringe culture is dead

"Oh uh- mind your head, everything's falling apart in here." Phzi spoke as he patted himself down to make sure everything was still in one piece. Sure their teleporter may have been fixed, but they still weren't sure it wasn't going to turn them into a pile of scrambled eggs.

"Ah! It's okay. Where did you even find this thing? It looks like it was sitting at the bottom of an ocean planet for years." Nona ducked under a low hanging pipe as she looked around, running her hand down the rusty paneling.

"It was stolen. From-" A robotic sounding voice popped in before Phzi interrupted.

"Ah ah- Not stolen, borrowed."

"Typically 'borrowing' means you have the intention of returning it." SAIL argued.

"I do! I'm borrowing it for an indefinite period of time."

"..Right." Nona snickered at the pair's conversation as she stepped over stray machines spread out across the floor. "Thanks again for saving me, by the way. If you hadn't have come I.. Well, I don't know what I'd've done. Also thanks for inviting me aboard, seeing as Lethia probably isn't hiring anymore I guess I-"

"Nah, don't mention it. To tell the truth it was getting kind of lonely up here. And besides, now I can use you as my meat shield!" The Khidos grinned as Nona widened her eyes with fear.

"Wait, what? That wasn't part of the deal!"

"Kidding! Kidding. You look out for me, I'll look out for you." Phzi gave her a reassuring shoulder pat before hopping down a narrow hole in the floor. "Hey, down here!" He shouted over the rather loud whirring of the ship's engine. Yanking the door's latch open, he motioned in the air with a grin. "Well, welcome to your room!"

The room was rather small, with a metal bed hanging from one wall and some lockers pushed against the other. Although the white paneled walls were a nice change from the rusted interior of the rest of the ship, there wasn't much decoration other than a small string of yellow fairy lights hanging from the ceiling.

"It's um… Cozy." Nona gave them a somewhat forced smile, nervously clasping her hands together. "Thank you, I love it."

"Look I..Know it isn't ideal, but once I fi.. I mean, once I can afford some more hull for the ship I can make us both better rooms, yeah?" Phzi sighed as she gave them a reassuring nod. "If you need anything, my room's right next door. Bathroom's up the hatch on the top floor, but there isn't a door yet so uh.. I'll try and avoid it while you're in there."

"Oh!" Nona cleared her throat as her gaze turned to the floor. "Y-yeah I'll..same here."

He chuckled before continuing. "Other than that.. You saw the teleporter room, right past that is the meeting room. Keep going is Navigation. I don't really have any ideas on what to add with renovations yet so.. If you want something, let me know!"

"Well.. A bathroom door would be good, for starters."

"Yeah yeah, I'm working on it." Phzi gave her a playful shove before clasping his hands together. "Well! I gotta work on some things in Nav, so uh.. If you need me you know where to find me."

"Yep!" Nona smiled at him as he left, then turned back to her room. This place was going to need some serious help.

[glorious-spoon]

For the prompts: Holiday shopping with any combination of Jack, Peggy, and Daniel. h/c or casefic hijinks welcome; your choice of pairing(s) or gen.

So.... this is both very late and a very loose interpretation of your prompt, but I hope you like it!

Also on AO3: Christmas Errands

*

“You know,” Jack said, yanking the knife free with a grunt of effort, “when you asked for help picking out a Christmas present for Sousa, this isn’t what I thought you had in mind.”

“Oh, such a fuss.” Peggy barely sounded out of breath, which was aggravating. The air seemed hot and close, although that was probably just his imagination, and possibly the stuffiness of two people breathing hard in a tight space. There was plenty of air in here, even with the slowly moving plants blocking the door. Probably.

The vines were the real concern. They didn’t exactly seem sentient, but they were way more mobile than any natural vines, and he’d nearly broken the blade off of his pocket knife hacking away at the one that had coiled around his wrist while Peggy was trying to break into the safe. He’d already lost his one good winter coat to the damned things. Their most recent target seemed to be taking his mad science to a level that even Howard goddamn Stark would have envied. The entire interior of his swanky mansion was filled with this unnatural greenery. Jack had seen a pair of Venus flytraps in the front hallway that could have swallowed a small dog whole. Maybe that was why the owner hadn’t interrupted them. Poor idiot bastard had probably already been turned into plant food. “I’m just saying, if I’d realized this was gonna be a jungle expedition, I’d have brought a machete. Or a gun.”

“Yes, well, I didn’t exactly expect—” Peggy broke off. “What was that?”

Jack paused. At first, he wasn’t sure what she meant, but then he heard it: footsteps clattering up the stairs, the sound of voices. The two men seemed to be talking normally, at least, evidently unaware of the two intruders, but if they decided to come into what had probably, at one point, been a cozy smoking room—

He took a shallow breath, shifting his grip on the knife as Peggy eased toward the door with catlike silence. Hopefully, she at least was carrying a gun.

This really wasn’t how he’d been planning on spending his night, although he probably should have guessed, when Peggy dragged him out of the office at 7:30 on a Saturday evening for a last-minute Christmas shopping expedition, that it would end in chaos.

The man-eating plants were an unexpected complication. The breaking and entering, not so much. Knowing Peggy, this all fell under the heading of routine household chores. Pick up milk and eggs at the grocery, drop off the dry-cleaning, burglarize the townhouse of a man suspected of a clandestine liaison with a covert Russian operative: just a day in the life of Agent Margaret Elizabeth Carter.

At least they’d managed to get the safe open. Or Peggy had, anyway. He hadn’t asked what had become of the files, but he suspected that the bodice of her dress had gotten an extra bit of padding while he was distracted with the vines.

The footsteps continued on down the hallway without pause, and Jack let out a slow breath across his teeth, then kicked out as a vine attempted to stealthily wrap itself around his shoe. “Think the coast is clear?”

“I certainly hope so,” Peggy murmured back, fighting her way over to lend him some assistance. The vines themselves were slippery, but there were sharp ridges of thorns that caught and tore at his skin and his pants and what had been a very nice pair of Italian leather shoes, and he didn’t really want to find out if the sap had any dangerous properties other than being sticky and unpleasant as hell to touch.

Between the two of them, though, they managed to shove the door open, tearing vines. Peggy stuck her nose out into the dim hallway, peering around, then pushed the door the rest of the way open and tugged Jack out behind her as another, thicker vine attempted to coil itself around his ankle. He stumbled, getting loose, and nearly slammed into the far wall before she caught him.

“Careful,” she hissed.

“I’m trying,” Jack retorted, also in a whisper. The air was cooler out here; it made him aware of how overheated he was. There were more of the plants out here, but at least they mostly seemed to be confined to pots, although most of them were rustling in a distinctly unnatural manner. Not to mention the two guys who’d disappeared into the room at the far end of the hall; fortunately, that door was shut.

He glanced at Peggy, who was disheveled and smeared with green sap and grinning widely, because of course she was. The curtains in the window by her head were open and a soft snow was coming down. Looked like it would be a white Christmas, assuming they managed to make it out of here without getting eaten. “I hope to hell you got everything you need.”

“Well,” she said. “Nearly.”

Jack groaned--quietly--and fell into step beside her as she started down the stairs. Vines twined up the railings, and he hoped that it was just his imagination making him think that the whole structure was groaning under their weight. He didn’t think he breathed properly again until they were on the moss-stained marble floor at the bottom. “Nearly?”

“Well, yes. I think we can definitively say that Doctor Simonsen’s botanical experiments are entirely out of control—”

“You think?” Jack yelped, ducking a massive hanging plant that swayed toward him, its pinkish head of spongy petals closing like teeth around there his head had been a moment later.

“--and the files you’ve just so graciously helped me recover should prove that he’s attempting to make a deal with the Russians. Do look out.”

Jack dodged another one of the hanging plants and palmed his knife, glancing anxiously behind them as Peggy pushed the front door open in a rush of snow. He’d lost his coat up there, but that was still a relief. “Aces. Good for us, always a pleasure to spend my Christmas Eve almost getting eaten by rogue science experiments. Let me guess, we’ll be rounding off the evening with a gun fight, or maybe a nice diving expedition in the East River—”

“Don’t be absurd, Jack,” she said cheerfully. The humor dancing in her eyes warmed him unexpectedly, even as the chilly wind cut through his jacket. “As I told you back at the office, I still need to pick up Daniel’s Christmas gift. And I suspect that our spare room will be a better place to spend Christmas Eve than your hotel room. Or your office couch, for that matter.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Jack grumbled, but he followed her down the front steps without further protest. “Alright, fine. You’re paying for the cab, though. And a new coat. I liked that one.”

“Naturally,” she said. “It’ll be my Christmas present to you.”

[maximoffvizh]

fic: every witch needs a familiar

post-endgame fic born out of a conversation on twitter, sam and wanda friendship ft. a kitten

The apartment echoes with emptiness. Not her apartment, not yet. Just a collection of rooms with only the most basic furniture, only blinds over the windows instead of curtains. A world of blank walls and empty shelves, and her hollowed out self at the centre of it all, quiet and alone. She may have signed the papers and paid the first few months’ rent, but this isn’t her home. She can’t imagine how it ever will be.

A knock at the door forces her up from the couch, her socked feet padding over the floors, and she steps back in amazement at Sam outside the door, surrounded by bags and boxes. “What are you doing here?” she asks, and he just grins.

“Thought I’d help christen the new place,” he says. “So I bought dinner, wine, and a variety of snacks. But first we’re going to personalise the place. I went to IKEA for you.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” she says, watching him just move past her. Unpacking more than just dinner and snacks onto the counter, plastic cartons of fruit and cartons of eggs and bottles of milk and bags of pasta and packages of ready-to-cook vegetables and boxes of tea bags. “Sam?”

“There are many things you don’t know about me, Wanda Maximoff,” he says with an enigmatic smile. “Before I got caught up in superhero shenanigans, I wanted to go back to school and become an interior designer. So I went to IKEA, and I used a red theme to pick things out. I tried to stay neutral other than that, so the red pops.”

Somehow, his grin drags her along into helping to make her apartment more of a home. He hangs the grey curtains at her windows, plumps cushions on the couch and her bed, and she almost bursts into tears when he sets a guitar in her living room. “I took the liberty of hunting down a similar one,” he says, and she puts a hand to her mouth to hide her trembling lip. “See. You can make this place a home.”

“But he’s not here,” she says softly. Sadly. And Sam slips an arm around her waist and kisses her temple, squeezing her tightly.

“I know,” he says, and opens the flap of one last box. “I also, ah, took the liberty of hunting down some memories for you. This was the best I could do since the compound was destroyed.”

She does tear up when she pulls out the first frame, the official photograph of the New Avengers team taken in 2015. Natasha’s frozen, touchingly proud face makes the first tear fall, and she ghosts a fingertip gently over Vision’s awkward smile, her chest aching with the need to have his arms around her again. Every frame is perfect, photographs of her with Clint’s children, with Steve and Natasha and Sam, with Vision. The memories of the life she’s left behind. “Thank you,” she breathes through tears, and Sam just smiles.

“You’re always welcome, Maximoff,” he says, and breaks away as she stares into a picture Vision took of the two of them on a beach somewhere in Europe, his hair falling over his sunglasses and freckles breaking out on her cheeks, her lips pressed to his cheek. “I bought mac and cheese. Even remembered to add some spice for you.”

They settle down on the couch with dinner and wine, and she finds herself relaxing into it, just a little. Even if when Sam leaves the shadows creep up again and she can’t sleep for the nightmares and she sits in the bathroom in the middle of the night shaking and crying, when he’s there she can relax. She can know he’ll take care of her.

Somehow, it turns into a weekly ritual. No matter what Sam is doing, what he’s dealing with out in the real world now the mantle of Captain America has passed to him, every Friday night he turns up at her door. Usually with a new knick knack for her apartment in one hand, and dinner in the other. Fairy lights to wrap around the curtain pole in her room, a pasta machine, a new houseplant, a record player including a few of his favourite records from before she was born. He chooses something mindless and uplifting on Netflix, and they sit on the couch and eat quietly.

She makes the mistake of telling him how much she’s struggling to sleep, and he appears at the door with a stack of lavender products, telling her they’re supposed to help her sleep. She confesses that she doesn’t want to go back to dark hair, and he helps her re-dye hers, even cleaning up the murder scene her bathroom becomes under the red dye. He shows her how to make bread, and she pretends not to notice that he never leaves her with any leftover wine for fear that she’ll use it to cope. He gently asks if she thinks she should see a therapist, and she shakes her head and they leave it at that.

Over the months, she thought it would get easier. But it’s been six months, and it never has. She still wakes up every morning in a cold bed, missing Vision, wishing she could just reach for him like she used to be able to. When Sam doesn’t come to see her, she eats leftovers, or nothing. She spends sleepless nights listening to love songs, the words of them eating her up inside, beautiful words she never said to Vision. She wasn’t brave enough.

Tucked into a heavy jumper, reading one of the books that Laura sent her after she cleared out the shelves at the farmhouse, she doesn’t bother to move when the doorbell rings. It’s Friday night, six thirty, and Sam has a key, and she can hear him opening the door, moving around behind her. Then she starts violently when he pulls the book out of her hands and replaces it with a tiny ball of brown fluff that lets out a squeak of a sneeze and blinks blue eyes at her.

“Sam?” she asks, twisting to look at him, hands instinctively cradling the kitten. “Why is there a kitten in my apartment?”

“Well, here’s the thing,” Sam says, turning the dial to pre-heat her oven and dusting his hands off to pull a food bowl and a litter tray and a bag of litter and an assortment of toys out of a bag. “I was at the shelter this week, because Barnes is thinking about getting a dog and he’s got it in his head that he wants a rescue and I grew up with dogs so I’ve obviously offered to lend my expertise in helping him choose the right one. And I was chatting to the girl there, being my usual charming self, and she recognised me and said I must know a lot of people in need of some animal companionship. So I said I did, but not all of them have the space for a big running dog like Barnes wants. So she showed me the kittens, and that little guy just caught my eye.”

The kitten presses his paws into Wanda’s chest, leaving pale hairs on the red wool of her sweater, and she cradles him a little closer, feeling his tiny thin body shivering beneath her hands. “What happened to him?” she asks, a rush of protectiveness rising in her at this tiny powerless little thing that needs someone to help.

“His mom got hit by a car,” Sam says. “Tragic accident. And they were a litter of five, and most of them got adopted quickly. He was the runt, and he never pushed to the front and purred. She thinks he needs a special someone to look after him. Someone who’s been hurt too.”

“I see where you’re going with this,” she says, and Sam smiles. And the kitten mews quietly, so high-pitched, kneading his paws into her shoulder, and she looks down into his huge eyes and feels herself melting. “I don’t know the first thing about looking after a cat.”

“Feed him, water him, make sure he’s scratching the post Uncle Sam got him and not the furniture, love him,” Sam says. “I even did some light Googling to check none of your plants are poisonous for cats. They’re not.”

“Sam, I...I can’t accept him,” she says, and the kitten mews when she moves him away from her, paws pulling at the air like he wants to get back to being cradled against her chest.

“I even bought him a collar with a bell on!” Sam says, shaking the length of red to jingle the tiny bell. “See, it’s to match you.” He moves towards her, the hum of the oven filling the silence, and carefully pushes her hands back to her chest, the kitten curling up against her with a contented sigh. “I know you’ve been going through it, Wanda. Don’t be too hard on yourself. You need a companion apart from me. Every witch needs a familiar.”

“Does he have a name?” she asks, and Sam shakes his head. She rubs two fingers carefully over the space between the kitten’s ears, his fur so soft, and asks, “What do you think about Hex?”

“I think that’s an adorable name for a witch’s familiar,” Sam says, and she smiles, suddenly teary-eyed. She moves Hex closer, and he chirps quietly, curling into her. “He’s going to look after you when I’m not here.”

“Sam,” she breathes, overwhelmed and trying not to cry. And Sam leans down to brush a kiss against the top of her head, and she ducks her head to hide the falling tears in Hex’s fur.

They eat dinner on the couch, Hex in her lap and staring at her with huge pleading eyes until she gives him a tiny piece of the salmon Sam made for them. When Sam leaves, taking the bottle of wine they only drank a little of with him, she means to start as she wants to go on, with Hex in a bed in the front room and not on her pillow. But he cries until she relents, and his tiny body curls into her in the bed, warming her the way it used to warm her to sleep plastered against Vision’s back.

When she wakes up in the middle of the night, breath coming in rapid-fire jerks after another nightmare, Hex is there. She cradles him carefully in her hands, and he purrs and butts his head against her face, his chest rising and falling beneath her hand. The motion of it soothing her slowly back to sleep.

[hometoursandotherstuff]

Sam, and her husband Richard’s home in 1960s home in England, is not decorated in run-of-mill Mid Century style. It’s vibrant and uniquely filled with fascinating finds, 

The couple found vintage shelving – which now displays collections of records, globes and old mobile phones – in North Wales.

The drawing room looks out into the garden which surrounds it, complete with a flock of vibrant pink plastic flamingos

“I never buy anything that I don’t personally like and so inevitably I just can’t bring myself to let the odd thing go,” says Sam.

The hallway is full of mirrors and pictures which Sam has collected.

In the kitchen there’s an eclectic mix of items including a collection of plates featuring bugs, bees and birds that Sam found in Anthropologie.

Sam’s company specializes in preloved gifts and vintage homeware and pieces  she bought to resell somehow never made their way onto the site...

The walls surrounding the staircase are filled with vibrant artworks in an array of yellows, greens, blues and reds.

Halfway up the stairs hangs a vast canvas of silver birch trees.

The family bathroom has been brought into the 21st century with modern fixtures and fittings.

The master bedroom was once virtually all pine, three walls and soaring pitched ceiling. Sam covered one wall in a print, leaving the ceiling bare.

Daughter Esther’s room sports the same dramatic pitched pine ceiling as her parents.’

Daughter Iris’ room has been papered in duck egg blue flamingo wallpaper.

A family of flamingos reside in the spare room.

This wallpaper made an appearance in the loos of the Queen Vic in an episode of Eastenders.

https://priceless-magazines.com/interiors/retrospective/

[just-jily]

October 31, 1981

Here’s a one-shot for a request I got from @nolamc147 for a “If Jily Lived AU”. I’m not sure if this is anything like what you wanted, but the idea just stuck with me so hopefully you like it. 

Also, @petals-to-fish there is a little TS easter egg (idk if you can really call it that because its pretty obvious) thrown in here at the end :)

November 1, 1981

The small cottage that sat at the end of the cul-de-sac in the sleepy little village called Godric’s Hollow was nothing much to the eye of the odd passerby. Not even the neighbors in the village took much notice of the small cottage, and the first of November in 1981 was no different—or at least it wouldn’t appear to be, in the minds of these neighbors. These unaware muggles, however, had no way of knowing the standing of that small little cottage and its inhabitants, or the great importance of the events that had taken place just the previous night.

October 31, 1981

Sirius Black was a normally suspicious person. Between the beliefs of his blood family and the things he had witnessed in the walls of his own home for the first fifteen years of his life, he had grown weary of the goodness of people rather early on. There were precious few people in his life that he trusted, and it made Sirius sick to his stomach that one of those few was now the cause of a sense of unease that ran deep into his bones.

It was because of that feeling—the unnerving sense that there was something wrong—that Sirius found himself trailing silently behind one of his best mates, hidden under a borrowed invisibility cloak, despite the fact that he was meant to be checking on him in his hiding place in a mere three days. The fact that he had left and was obviously in a hurry only deepened the sense of wrongness Sirius felt in his gut.  

Peter Pettigrew walked briskly through the narrow streets of the city, his head down and his cloak pulled tightly around his face. Sirius was grateful that he had not decided to travel in his Animagus form, as it would make Sirius’s surveillance more difficult.

He paused as Peter slowed, looking around the quiet streets quickly before ducking into a nondescript building tucked between two shops that were closed for the night. Sirius followed, slipping into the building just before the door clicked shut. He moved down the hall silently, wary of the dark wood floors stained with dust and age. He knew there would be nothing good to come if he were to be caught.

Peter slipped into a brightly lit room at the end of the hall and Sirius risked moving closer so that he could see just who was so important to meet with in the middle of the night. Leaning forward, Sirius felt his gut clench with dread and disgust, but not surprise, when he saw the figure standing near the fireplace in front of Peter.

“My Lord,” he heard Peter saying in his shaky voice. “Master, the Potters, they have made me their secret keeper. I can tell you where they are.”

Sirius bit down on his tongue, fighting the urge to burst into the room and kill the traitor he had once called a friend. Before he could turn away, the whispering voice of Voldemort reached his ears.

“Very good, Pettigrew. I knew you could prove useful.”

“Thank you Master. Shall I call the others?”

“No, there’s no need. I’ll handle this myself, tonight.”

Sirius clenched his jaw and turned, hurrying to the door as silently as he could. There was no time to wait around and listen, he had to warn James and Lily.

 November 1, 1981

The cottage at the end of the cul-de-sac stood quietly, giving away nothing of the destruction of the interior of the small family home. Inside, however, was a war zone. The battle of the night before had left the house in ruins. The walls of the living room were splintered and charred, the furniture strewn about the room brokenly. The banister of the staircase was broken and hanging haphazardly down the wall. Pictures from the walls were knocked to the floor, the glass broken out of the frames and scattered across the wood floor. There were streaks of blood smeared on the walls, on the overturned couch and leaving a trail to the kitchen.

Amid the mess stood a young man with a mess of dark hair and tattered clothes. His face was cut in several places and his grey t-shirt was dark with blood. There was dust and plaster in his hair, and his specs were sitting crookedly on the bridge of his nose, one lens missing from the frames. His arms were around a woman—the same age as him—who was holding a small bundle in her arms. The woman had long auburn hair tucked messily into a knot on the top of her head. She had her face buried in the young man’s shoulder as her body was racked with sobs.

Across the room, another dark haired young man stood talking seriously to a much older man with a long white beard. His arms were crossed in front of him over the torn leather of a biking jacket and he too, had several cuts on his handsome face. The older man stood looking around the room wearily, though he had a gleam of something that could have been described as relief in his eyes.

“Death would’ve been better than betrayal!” The silence was interrupted by a furious shout from the young man in the leather jacket. He threw his hands into the air in frustration, and the older man looked at him patiently.

“Mr. Black, it is understandable that you are angry.” Albus Dumbledore responded. “Mr. Pettigrew’s acts are unforgivable, and justice will be served to him. However, you need not dwell on those unpleasant thoughts. Instead, be thankful that you acted in time. James and Lily are safe, and Voldemort is dead.”

“Padfoot, he’s right.” James Potter said, pulling away from his wife-though he kept one arm around her shoulders—to look at his best mate. “Peter will be punished. But you, you saved us.”

The young redhead smiled up at both men and she wiped her tears away and shifted the bundle she was holding in her arms. “James is right, Sirius. You saved us. You saved Harry.”

The three of them looked down at the small bundle tucked away in her arms. Baby Harry was sleeping soundly in his mum’s arms, unaware of the destruction surrounding them on his behalf. Lily smoothed the hair away from her son’s smooth forehead, kissing him lightly before turning back to the three men standing before her.

Sirius looked at them, two of his best mates and his godson, and despite the anger that still burned deep in his eyes he smiled. If he never did anything significant for the rest of his life, that would be alright, as long as these three were there to be a part of it.

Lily sighed as she looked around the destruction of the house. “Everything is destroyed.”

Dumbledore crossed the room and rested a hand on James’s shoulder. As he looked at the young couple standing before him, holding their son, his eyes twinkled.

“Only in the shattering can the rebuilding occur, and you Mr. and Mrs. Potter, have plenty of time to rebuild.” With those last words, he nodded at the three young people in the room and with a crack of his wand, Apparated away.

James stepped away from Lily to pull the most intact chair amongst the debris into an upright position so that his wife could sit down. She sank into the chair, the adrenaline in her veins from the stress and terror of the night slowly leave her body and leaving her feeling exhausted.

“I shouldn’t have brought Harry,” Lily said, looking down at the sleeping baby. “I just couldn’t leave him though. Not with knowing how close we came to…”

She trailed off, unable to speak the words. They had been so close to death. Had it not been for Sirius acting on a feeling, they wouldn’t be sitting here talking now.

James nodded, grasping her free hand between his own. Sirius moved closer to them, sinking down to sit on the floor near Lily’s feet. He leaned his head back, resting it on her leg as he closed his eyes.

They sat in silence for several minutes, taking the time to reflect on the events of the night and let it sink it that it was finally, finally, over.

Sirius was the first to break out of the silence, raising his head and looking at three of the four people in the entire world that he loved.

“So where do we go from here?” he asked.

Lily rose from the chair, holding Harry in one arm. James slipped his arm around her waist and rested one hand lightly on Harry’s sleeping form. Lily extended her hand to Sirius, who took her hand gratefully.

“We rebuild.” She said, leaning her head on James’s shoulder and squeezing Sirius’s hand. “We step into the daylight and let it go.”

[timeagainreviews]

The Edge of Acceptable

Hello friends! Previously I said I would try and post an article between then and my "Doctor Who: The Edge of Time," review. This was mostly due to my not knowing how long it would take me to finish playing the game. Well, intrepid reader, it appears I overestimated the game's length, as I have beaten it and I have many things to say. Before we begin, however, I would like to state that this review will be full of spoilers, so if you plan on playing "The Edge of Time," for yourself, you may want to hold off reading this. There, you've been warned. Let the spoilers commence!

The game begins in a laundrette somewhere in a dark corner of London. After some strange anomalies, a television kicks on, and the Doctor, played by Jodie Whittaker can be seen on screen. Speaking directly to you, she tells you that you're the only person that can help her. Suddenly a shift in the lights (and possibly time) occurs and the laundrette is filled with a black sludge reminiscent of the purple gunk from "The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild." Peering from the individual dryers along the wall are black sludge monsters with murky red eyes that stick to you. If you get close to them, they lunge and crack the glass.

After explaining to you that the universe is like a hard drive and that people and moments are like individual files, the Doctor informs you that someone has installed a sort of computer virus. Lost on the edge of time, she is unable to help you, but using a bit of her Doctory magic, she's going to help you help her, and by extension- save the universe. It's no small order, but you're raring to go!

It's during this point, however, that I did find myself slightly frustrated with the game design. As the Doctor begins speaking to you, she's oftentimes drowned out by the music, making it hard to hear what she's saying. When I went to the options menu, I was surprised to see that no option to lower the music volume was available. There was however a subtitles option, which I opted out of due to my feeling that seeing subtitles somewhat sullied the immersion. The next bit of frustration came from the following scene in the back office of the laundrette.

Another big source of frustration was the controls. While in the office, you're made to find the code to a safe, and then enter the code into its keypad. As excited as I was to be playing a new Doctor Who game, I almost rage quit due to the sheer difficulty of entering a simple four-digit code. Now, it's worth mentioning that at this point, I was still using my Playstation controller. After switching to the Playstation Move controllers, my experience improved exponentially. However, even with these Move controllers, performing minute actions felt a lot like trying to unwrap a lemon sherbet while wearing a pair of woolly mittens.

You learn a little bit about the late owner of the laundrette. He used to be a janitor at Coal Hill School, and he's now a pile of ash on a chair. The books strewn about the office show he was a man interested in strange phenomena dealing with time and space. The Doctor, using a bit of Time Lord magic, has stashed her sonic screwdriver away in the safe. After fishing it out, I took great glee pointing it at literally anything I could. Sadly, the sonic has very little actual interactivity with the surrounding world other than pre-scripted actions like opening doors that carry the story to the next stage.

Once outside, you get your first glimpse at a Dalek saucer, floating above the sky like something from the Dalek Invasion of Earth. It's a great little callback, and the alley conjures images of Totter's Lane. After building a signal booster with junk from the alley, you call the TARDIS to your location, where it materialises like the beautiful Ghost Monument we all love. Now, I'm not too proud to admit it, but as I walked into the TARDIS for the first time, I got a little misty-eyed. It really does feel like you're walking aboard the greatest ship in the universe. The people at Maze Theory did a fantastic job rendering the Thirteenth Doctor's TARDIS interior. And yes, the console does dispense custard creams. Trying to make my boyfriend laugh, I held the biscuit to my mouth and was pleasantly surprised when my virtual character actually ate it!

This joy was short-lived, however, because I was once again at the mercy of needing to perform exacting tasks with rather sloppy controls. What should have been a joy (piloting the TARDIS), was instead another rage quit moment. Really though, this is more of a problem native to virtual reality. You're only ever as good as your tools, and Move Controllers aren't hands. Controls are one of the game's biggest flaws, really. For instance- there is no duck or crouch function. Meaning that despite all of the wonderful little Easter eggs peppered throughout the game, the second you drop one on the floor, it's gone forever.

After being recruited by the Doctor, you're treated to a title sequence in full 3-D glory. Let me tell you, the time vortex has never looked cooler. I was like David Bowman entering the Star Gate. Moments like these are when the VR really shines. Afterwards, the first place you land is sort of a head-scratcher. You arrive on what looks like a planet, where you're being stalked by a creepy race of aliens known as Hydrorks. I was slightly sad that you never have to actually worry about them. They're mainly there to scurry about in the shadows. Despite the warnings of a woman you're speaking to over a holo-pad, they don't ever actually attack you. You can stop right in front of them and shine your torch at them and walk away unscathed.

If you recall from my Doctor Who and Video Games article, I complained that one of the biggest issues Doctor Who games have is puzzles. This chapter of the game has the most egregious of the puzzles and had me worried that it was about to devolve once more into a series of irritating puzzles, but they lessen as the game progresses, much to its benefit. I would like to mention though, that the game does take accessibility into consideration. Puzzles involving colours also incorporate shapes for those that are colour blind. You can also switch between hands with your sonic screwdriver, a fact that I, as a left-handed person, wish I would have discovered far earlier in the game.

After getting to the lift, you discover the planet you're on is a sort of space ship. The effect of leaving what seems like the outdoors only to find a giant window overlooking alien planets was like something David Lynch would do. I was reminded of episode three from "Twin Peaks the Return," when Dale Cooper exits a room in a building surrounded by a vast purple sea, only to find himself climbing out of a boxy spaceship surrounded by a network of stars. This kind of otherworldly experience is yet again another strength of VR. After a series of puzzles involving lasers, you meet Emer, the ship's computer that forgot it was a computer. Remember how I mentioned David Bowman earlier? Well, the "2001: A Space Odyssey," vibes don't stop there, as Emer's interface looks a lot like HAL 9000. It's a great little homage.

Before leaving the ship, you save Emer onto the sonic screwdriver and find yourself a time crystal. The time crystals are artefacts the Doctor needs you to collect to save the universe. It's a little vague in that "It's a video game, so just go get the thing," kind of manner. But it's a video game, so I'm not even bothered by it. After arriving back on the TARDIS, the Doctor uploads Emer into your brain. Emer's job is to help you along with little hints here and there. I was a little disappointed because the only reason I can imagine they did this is because they only had Jodie Whittaker for six hours on the day she recorded her dialogue. Having the Doctor speak to you like her closest friend is a rapturous bit of nerd joy, so replacing her for a bit is regrettable. But Emer is a likeable character so you don't really mind. The only time Emer really gets under your skin is when she's dropping hints repetitively. You may know exactly how to solve a puzzle, but the mechanics aren't as spelled out. Having her tell you what you already know, over and over again begins to grate on you.

The next place you visit is a very shabby looking Victorian London. You know right away that you've entered Weeping Angel territory. However, the classic Who fans will love the fact that part of this portion of the story incorporates Magnus Greel's time cabinet from "The Talons of Weng-Chiang!" I could tell the people at Maze Theory threw this in for the nerds out there. The Weeping Angels portion of this chapter is easily the creepiest moment in the game. There's a jump scare that had me jumping out of my skin. For full immersion, headphones are a requirement as the sound design is full of little creaks, groans, and stabs as the Angels make their way toward you. The incorporation of the cherubs (which you never see) and a baby pram only adds to the nightmare fuel.

This isn't to say that this sequence is without criticism. One of my chief complaints is that it's a very repetitive sequence. Once you do the first portion, you know exactly how to do the next portion. It then becomes a waiting game which is more tedious than tense. If they'd had varied up the gameplay in this section, I would have said it was the best part of the game. Instead, the Angels only play a minor part, and once you know how to beat them, their terror factor plummets. After a while, the worst part of getting caught by an Angel isn't the dying, it's the waiting for the level to reload. Even with my PS4 Pro, the loading times are egregious. Expect to spend a lot of time staring at the floating orange embers that are the loading screen. At least you can fiddle with the sonic screwdriver while you wait.

After receiving the next time crystal from Magnus Greel's time cabinet, it's time to move on to the next phase. The Doctor begins to tell you a little more about who is tearing apart reality- an entity known simply as The First... or the One. I honestly can't remember which, and the internet isn't much help. It's not a very memorable name, much like the title of the game itself. This "First One," is the very first form of consciousness in the universe that has awoken to find her creation of other forms of life is a disappointment to her. Our penchant for death and destruction has lead her to believe that the only course of action is to reboot the universe, hence the reality virus.

Our next stop is Metebelis...Four? I would be lying if I said I wasn't massively relieved to discover they weren't sending us to Metebelis III. That would have been cruel and unusual. When arriving at Metebelis IV, you're greeted with a gigantic temple structure. In VR, its size and design are really grand in scope. I was reminded of my visit to Durham Cathedral with its impressively high vaulted ceilings. After a quick time jump, you find yourself in a point in history where the Daleks have taken over the planet. I really enjoyed the music cues in this part, because you knew right away you were about to encounter Daleks. You can almost hear a digitised version of their voices in the score that really sets the tone.

This portion of the game was probably my favourite. A lot of it is sneaky stealth missions, which gradually increase in difficulty. The only problem with the stealth portion is you really need to bait the Daleks into following you at points. It goes against usual stealth mechanics which at this point are generally universal. When you accompany this with long load screens, and Emer repeatedly telling you what you already know, it gets to be a bit much. But getting to drive around as a Dalek later on in the level makes up for this in spades.

Much like the Weeping Angels portion of the game, the key to beating this section is patience. You can systematically work your way through the level by budgeting your time. If you take out drones and Daleks in the right order, it's a piece of cake. It becomes a memory game at that point. That being said, I still had a lot of fun. Dalek vision was especially cool. After tearing ass through various temples, you find yourself sort of outside of time. The reality virus has almost torn the universe apart but using memories of the places you've been, you're able to hold things together long enough to stop the First One. The Doctor congratulates you and tells you what a star you are. Emer is given human form for her efforts. The TARDIS drops you off back at the laundrette, seemingly to do it all over again, which leads to my biggest question about the game. Am I supposed to play it again, or was that just a meta-joke from the designers encouraging you to replay at your own leisure? Furthermore, is the Doctor not also now stuck in a time loop along with the player?

I've not done a second playthrough, so I can't rightly say if it adds more content to the game. I'm going to bet the answer is probably no. This is a shame because for a game that has been marketed for as long as it was, and had its release date pushed back almost two months, it's surprisingly sparse. At the very beginning in the Laundrette, the Doctor mentions both the Stenza and the Zygons, which made me expect to see at least one of them throughout the game. What turned the laundrette owner into a pile of soot? Hell, you don't even see the sludge monsters from the laundrette again. I expected them to be a far bigger problem than they were. The game is surprisingly devoid of other characters. Perhaps this is a symptom of VR, but disembodied voices, static Angels, skittering background aliens, and rail driving Daleks are the most interactivity you'll have with other characters.

Throughout its runtime, I couldn't shake the feeling that "The Edge of Time," was originally supposed to be a much bigger game. While I'm aware that most VR games are generally shorter in length, this feels truncated. Perhaps it was from budget issues or internal problems, I can't say. But is it twenty quid's worth of video game? I would say that maybe with DLC it would be, but as is, it feels incomplete. The ability to select chapters does increase replay value. I could see myself pulling up the Weeping Angels level for a group of friends. However, due to the lack of variety in said level, I don't see the novelty lasting long. If they were to release a couple extra levels that were more like survival horror where you were in a creepy mansion avoiding Angels, or maybe something with Cybermen or Zygons I could see the value increasing. I wouldn't want to pay more for these levels, mind.

Compare the price of this game to going to a movie with friends. These days £20 will buy you maybe two tickets to see a film. The game is basically a feature-length episode of Doctor Who. So if my boyfriend plays the game, and my wife and friends, then sure, it's paid for itself. But for people who might play this game alone, they may want to wait until the price drops a bit. I had a good time playing the game, myself, but I have to temper that response with the fact that I am a massive Whovian. Will it have the same appeal for casual fans of Doctor Who? That's really the big question, isn't it?

When the game was announced, my first reaction was to shake my head at the BBC's inability to make a proper Doctor Who game. As you may recall from my article on Doctor Who games, this stems from the fact that going with VR was pre-emptively cutting off a large portion of gamers. While there is a very real demand for Doctor Who video games, VR is still a niche market. Not everyone is going to buy VR just to play one game as I did. And even if they are, VR systems aren't cheap. I had to purchase mine on credit. The cost of admission is now much higher than the asking price of twenty pounds. That being said, the game manages to prove that Doctor Who video games can still try new things. The formula and gameplay are very close to what a lot of people have wanted for years. While I still don't feel like we've seen a truly great Doctor Who game, I had a lot of fun with this one.

[acindra]

Still playing Stardew. I’m right at the end of winter and my farm has upgraded quite a bit (in no small part due to being able to see the whole map for planning purposes). I have a plot of land for all of the crops except for 4, so I cycle two of the plots between the 6 flowers. I’m hoping the game will keep my interest into the other two seasons so I can do progress screenshots but I’m not holding my breath.

I found a nice barn and coop interior recolour and then got another of each so I could separate the animals a little better. I was going to do purple walls because they were very pretty but my whole farmhouse is purple and I needed to get some teal in somewhere. I have 6 of each animal (3 white cows 3 brown) except dinosaurs of which I have 4 to make room for two of each white, brown, blue, and void chickens (one void egg is still incubating). Also I fixed the duck skins to what they’re supposed to be because I hadn’t noticed they didn’t change earlier.

I’m growing large amounts of starfruit for dat cash money and I just recently go access to slimes and luckily, with automate, I don’t usually have to go into their pen or deal with them.