#even though i think a prequel would be Way Better because it could give us so many more answers

[too-antigonish]

My Strange but Unified Theory of Exeunt

Last week I talked about the poem Horatio in a post about Morse and fathers and @astridcontramundum asked what I thought it meant in the context of Exeunt. Hopefully she won't be sorry she asked because here's my (as usual) long answer:

Horatio is quoted from twice in Exeunt. The first time, Prof. Fortescue is lecturing to his students at a tutorial and gives us the most famous lines:  

Then out spake brave Horatius, The Captain of the Gate:  "To every man upon this earth death cometh soon or late. And how can man die better Than facing fearful odds For the ashes of his fathers And the temples of his gods?"

The second time occurs just before Thursday’s has his “turn” in the same spot where Morse will many years later experience his own collapse. He says: ”’How well Horatius kept the bridge in the brave days of old.’ We'd a padre big on that out in the desert. Drumhead service just before Alamein. ‘And how can man die better than facing fearful odds?’ Always stuck with me.”

I think they used those lines to plainly tease the idea that Thursday was going to die. Prior to Exeunt airing, almost everyone thought Thursday would have to die in order to explain Morse’s never mentioning him again in the future. When Fortescue says those lines in the beginning, I think we’re supposed to think that someone—probably Thursday—is going to die heroically. Then Thursday repeats some of the poem—connecting it to his WWII service—just before he has his “spell” and it seems like more foreshadowing. 

The thing about the poem though, that most people *don’t* know, is that the big surprise at the end is that Horatio *doesn’t* die. It just looks like he will: Even when his companions have abandoned the bridge because it is on the verge of collapse, Horatius remains. He stays until bridge finally does fail, and then plunges into the river below with the full weight of his armor. It is certain death and both sides stand stunned into silence by his final sacrifice.

But then, both sides find themselves even more surprised when they see the crest of his helmet beginning to rise from the water and he slowly emerges, striding towards the Roman bank. He not only survives, but arrives home to a hero’s welcome and a long life.

All of the usual narrative pieces are in place for us to expect Thursday to make the ultimate sacrifice—to die. For me, Thursday—like Horatio—does sacrifice everything, but the poem was actually foreshadowing his survival, not his death. And for Thursday, his survival is in many ways a far more difficult sacrifice than death would have been. It would have been easier for him in so many ways if he had died in defense of Sam or even fighting Lott. Instead he has to live with the ambiguous and messy aftermath.

Morse could also be Horatio in the sense that he goes to Blenheim Vale facing a high probability of death. What were the chances that the bikers would “come through” for him? That Morse went expecting to be double-crossed and killed by Lott seems much more likely to me. But I do think that Morse, like Horatio, would reason that, “If you’re going to go, then there’s no better way than defending the things that are most important to you,” and so he goes anyway.

He survives too—but unlike Horatio, his heroism will always remain a secret *and* with his realization about Thursday’s guilt and Lott’s revelation about Tomahawk’s identity, it brings perhaps more sorrow than it does victory. And, I would argue that his survival is only temporary or perhaps partial.

The gunshot scene has many possible interpretations, but at its core, my (forever unprovable) theory is that it balances out the survival foreshadowed by Horatio. Horatio was all about the audience assuming that Thursday had to die. But along with that went the assumption that of course Endeavour had to live. This is a prequel after all.

But the gunshot scene said a big, loud, “No. We can kill off Endeavour if we want to and we will.” You can go back and forth until the cows come home about whether or not the scene was simply him contemplating death, actually going through with it, or absolutely, purely symbolic and imaginative. However, I don’t think you can honestly argue that the scene doesn’t somehow connect the concepts of  “Endeavour Morse,” “gun,” and “death” to each other. Somehow those concepts have to be included in any interpretation.

So this leads to my weird theory about Exeunt, which is that Russ Lewis heard everyone saying, “Well I don’t know what’s going to happen in the end, but of course we all know that Morse is going to live—so no suspense there. And Thursday, well, he has to die. I mean it’s the only way to explain why we never hear about him later.” And to this, Russ Lewis thought, “Ha! I’m going to do exactly the opposite. Thursday lives and Morse dies!” 

Am I right? I will never know. Do I have more thoughts on Exeunt? You really, really don't want to know just how many.

[sprinklenoodles]

Okay!

This one is going to be shorter since I am trying not to stay up late! (Future me. I lied but I made it! It's not 12 this time! WOOOOO!!!) 'Tis 11pm rn instead of 12 or 1am. Decided to read And Then I Go And Spoil It All By Saying Something Stupid Like "I Love You" Did more art today so I didn't have a lot of time to read that much! Also, it's Jin and Kijo! The doomed gays!! I had too! Also, sliding this in. Hope you had good celebratory time!!! I'd say more but I forgot how to use more words. Yay for celebratory noises! As for my vaguely silly comments for the fic, it be good. Short, sweet, got the TUMI lore in there. So, pretty neat! Not crazy or anything since it's a little oneshot into the lives of Kijo and Jin in their youth, but still!! Makes me think more about these two. Mostly Jin because I never even cared about him much other than "HEADMASTER" and "KYOKO DAD". That kinda stuff. Never even took account like... his personality and what he likes, dislikes, or even how he was in his youth. Guess he kinda just existed in my mind before so it feels nice finally thinking critically about his character a bit more. With Kijo, I always had that intrest because he's so much of a mystery. In the game, there's only the allusion of his preseence cus "Duh! Byakuya came from somewhere. Not some money hole like some money mole" (heehee that rhymed) And like, the only stuff of Kijo IS his name. So I already was in that mindset to wonder about him. What kinda of guy would be responsible for the creating of Byakuya. Which, honestly, maybe I just need to one day go and just... look into the depths of Jin lore. A Jin Journey. Cus I know nothing and it is a crime. Realized this didn't have much fic talk in it and more just me blabbering about Jin and Kijo so I hope you don't mind! Also, since why not add some out-of-pocket thought, I must say this cus it's true and happened yesterday on my end and it's a wild realization. AHEM. I think Byakuya Togami made me realize I might be aroace or like, on the aroace spectrum. This sounds so dumb but it's true. Also think your headcanon for him helped me realize that. I thank you for good fics, interesting ideas, and self-actualization somehow. Like, no one could have guessed that to be on the bingo card. So, by the time of your reading this, it'll be like, 2 days since I had that realization which I'm still shocked about! I digress though. Thus, to end this off, take this MS paint doodle I made in like... less than a few minutes.

The way I drew Kijo is so freaking funny to me. He's so head empty. You bonk that head and he just doesn't react cus there's nothing in there. Also, would their ship name be Jijo or Kin? Kijogiri? Jingami? Also, I will give Kijo better hair some day. I promise!

That little one-shot is one of my favs. It's both recent and is just a nice little addition to the TUMI universe, which I always love to do.

It was also just time for Jin and Kijo to get something that focuses just on them, even if it was just a prequel... but who knows, that might become more...

But I really liked writing it and I'm glad u liked reading it :D

Loved the little doodle too! Poor Kijo's hair tho 😔 And I dunno what the ship name should be... Maybe something ✨creative✨

As for what you've realized, congrats! I'm glad my fics could help with that, though I'm not that surprised that they did. One thing I've noticed is that quite a lot of my readers are aromantic.

Also, I recommend watching this video by JaidenAnimations! It's her coming out as aroace and was quite eye opening for me back when I watched it the first time!

But congrats on figuring that out! If you ever have any questions or whatever, you know where to find me!

[starry-eyes-love]

Chapter 1: Frozen Desire

Pairing: Joel x F!Reader (18+ Explicit, Minors DNI)

Summary | Chapter 1 Frozen Desire:  It's been one month since Ellie caught both you and Joel grinding up into each other in a sleeping bag. Joel has hardly talked to you, and he has treated you like shit for the past month. When your sleeping bag zipper breaks one night and you are left to lay there alone, cold and freezing you think back to all the times Joel was nice to you and you finally break down. What you didn't realize was that Joel heard you and can’t take it anymore, so he comforts you in a way he swore to himself that he never would. 

Make sure to read the Prequel: Just This Once prior to reading this Chapter. This chapter gives a lot of backstory to help build the characters. 

Warnings | Smut, language, names used (honey, baby). Rough Joel & tender Joel, angst (a lot in the beginning), violence (shoving and attempted head butt by you to Joel), kissing, fingering, unprotected PiV, rough-ish play and sex, creampie, age gap (no actual age is stated but is implied).

Word Count: 4.4k

It had been several weeks since you and Joel had your little humping session in the sleeping bag.  Ellie, being a teenager, kept teasing Joel about it and he kept getting more and more angry with you because of it.  So much so that one night you two didn’t even share a sleeping bag together, and that was the night that you realized that Joel can sometimes be the world’s biggest asshole.

It was winter, and the wind was really cold.  Your sleeping bag had seen better days and you asked if you could conserve body heat by sharing a sleeping bag.  Without hesitation Joel replied “I’m not your fucking keeper,” and then zipped himself up, laid down, and faced away from you.  You tried to zip yourself up in your sleeping bag but you noticed that the zipper was broken, and you couldn’t get the sleeping bag tight around you.  You looked over at Joel and noticed that he had already fallen asleep. You quickly glanced over at Ellie too and noticed she was already asleep. So you tried to wrap yourself in your sleeping bag to stay warm by the fire, and then you tried to fall asleep.

In the middle of the night the wind had picked up significantly and you laid there awake, freezing, unable to feel your fingers or toes. You glanced over at both Ellie and Joel and noticed that they both were fast asleep, and you didn’t want to wake them. So you laid there shivering, trying to stay warm, but your mind kept wandering over all the events that have transpired over the last month. You felt a knot in the pit of your stomach form when you thought back to when Ellie had caught both you and Joel grinding into each other. Ever since then, nothing has been the same; not with Ellie, and certainly not with Joel.  

Ellie, being a teenager, loved to tease Joel about catching you two. She constantly called him an old man, and said that she was surprised that he could still get it up after all these years. Even though her teasing was harmless, it was something that you hated because it made Joel feel guilty especially since you were a lot younger than him. Joel had a habit that when he got really frustrated he'd take his frustration out on you by snapping at you, correcting you but not in a nice way, or ignoring you and refusing to talk to you. On one occasion Ellie's teasing got so bad that you snapped at her in front of Joel and told her to knock it off and to leave him alone. She laughed at you and said “I like to see him ruffled, it’s fun”, and then she walked away not understanding the complexity of what she had just done.  

As you laid there remembering all these moments you felt tears sting your eyes.  You remembered how Joel used to be, and you wanted that tender man back. Tender Joel was the person who talked to you, smiled at you, hugged you when you were worried or upset, and cuddled you when you were cold.  You missed his warmth and his love, if that is what you could call it.  He'd always roll his eyes at you and truly never gave you traditional affection, but he gave you Joel type affection. If you were hungry after having very little to eat, he'd give you his food. If you were cold, he'd share his sleeping bag with you to help you stay warm. If you had bad nightmares he’d hold you until your breathing returned back to normal comforting you until you fell back asleep. He also looked out for your safety. He’d kill raiders for you if you didn't see them coming. He also taught you how to survive, something you didn't know much about until you started traveling with him. 

Joel was always grumpy, always correcting you, but you saw his love for you a few months back when you killed a raider by shooting them dead center in the eyes when they tried to attack him. When Joel turned around to see who fired the shot, he was surprised to see that it was you who did it. As he got up off from the ground and walked back over to you he immediately grabbed you, hugged you, and whispered in your ear "that's my girl" and then turned and walked up the hill.

You also saw Joel's tenderness when you killed a deer, gutted it, and then dragged it back yourself. When you met up with him at the camp you noticed that he only had gotten 2 rabbits for supper. You couldn't help but tease him in that moment saying "mine's bigger" as you pointed to the deer. He stood there and for a moment you thought you saw a small smile touch his lips when he shook his head and said "apparently." Then once again he turned and walked away from you towards the fire. When he was a few feet away from you he yelled over his shoulder "go get Ellie to help me with supper. You can rest, you must be sore after having to deal with something that big." 

But ever since the sleeping bag incident, you didn't see any of that behavior anymore with him. Yesterday, both Ellie and Joel had gotten a rabbit for food. You, however, wound up empty handed and didn’t get anything. When you all returned to cook the prized possessions, Joel had asked you if you had gotten anything for food and you told him no.  He then said "well, you gotta kill it to eat it. And if ya don't get somethin', then ya don't eat. I’m sorry, I only have one." At first you told him you understood and that you weren’t really hungry, even though you actually were. You knew that survival was cruel, but you didn’t think Joel was worse until after speaking with Ellie. 

When you were scavenging for berries Ellie had approached you to help. You two were talking and then eventually she told you that Joel had the option of getting 2 other rabbits, but he chose not to. She told you that when she asked him why he said "you only kill what yer gonna eat." So that night you went to bed upset and hungry. As you faced away from everyone you silently cried because that was the first time in a year that Joel never got extra just in case you couldn't get anything. What you didn’t know then was that Joel heard you crying, and it killed him to know that he was the one that was causing you this extreme pain. 

As you laid there continuing to shiver you silently wished out loud that all of this would stop. You hated his hatred for you, yet you didn't do anything wrong. You hated his constant reminder of how stupid you were, even though you were just trying to live. You hated the way he scorned you for just giving in to your fantasy of wanting to be with the only man you've been with for the last year. You also hated the love that you felt for him as you realized that he didn't feel the same thing in return. It was then at that final admission that you felt your hardened exterior crack and a horrible sob escaped your mouth. 

Joel, unable to sleep, laid on the ground facing away from you and heard everything that you had said. After weeks of treating you like shit, it was then that he realized that he was being the world’s biggest asshole to you, and he hated himself for it. As he continued to lay there listening to you, he felt a sickening feeling rise up into his chest. He realized that he was embarrassed for the way he had been treating you. So when he heard your horrible sob escape your mouth he unzipped his sleeping bag, and took it over to you. When he got to you he grabbed your shitty sleeping bag and threw it off from you. He then said in a stern voice “come here.” When you didn’t budge, he rolled his eyes and then laid down next to you, grabbed your hips, pulled you tight to him, and then zipped the two of you up in his sleeping bag to get warm. He tried to turn you around to get you to face him where he could tuck you in closer, but you refused.  So he held you in the spooning position and soothed your cries by saying “shhh honey. It’s ok. I’m sorry. Stop crying now.”  

Fifteen minutes later your shivers finally stopped, but your tears did not. You had a lot of emotions boiling up to the surface and Joel didn't want to stifle them. So he just laid there with you and slowly rubbed soothing circles onto your skin to try to calm you down. But when he heard you let out another broken sob saying “Why do y-you hate m-me so much?", he paused as he didn't know what to do. 

After a moment of silence you took Joel’s lack of response as another sign that you did something wrong. You tried to move away from him, but you felt him grip your hips and say “Don’t" in your ear, but nothing else. Up until this point you would have gladly melted at his response if he would have elaborated more besides just saying don't. But his lack of response mixed with your emotionally exhausted state, you finally had hit your breaking point where you didn’t give a shit anymore. You were filled with so much hurt and anger towards him for not caring that you wanted to leave, and you wanted to lash out at him for his inability to care for you or even give a shit about you. So you started to shove him to get up. Joel, however, wasn’t in the mood for your theatrics. Every time you fought against him he just locked you tighter in a vice grip with his arms. You tried fighting harder to get away from him, even threatened to hit him if he didn’t let you go, but he never moved. The harder you fought, the tighter he gripped you. 

“If you hate me so God damn much then why won’t you just let me fucking leave?” you yelled trying to force Joel off from you.  When he didn’t move you attempted to headbutt him with the back of your head so he would let you up. When you did this Joel had finally hit his own limit with you and snapped. He firmly grabbed your shoulders, rolled you over, and then slammed your back hard onto the ground saying with a stern voice “Stop it and calm the fuck down. Right. Now.”

After Joel slammed your back onto the ground you laid there for several moments seething with anger but not moving. Joel had never been this rough with you before.  As if he could feel your tension he gently grabbed your head and tucked your head against his chest saying in a calm voice “I don't hate you, but you need to calm down baby, please.” He continued to place soothing strokes on the back of your head saying “I don’t hate you, never have. I just- I need you to calm down for me ok. Can you do that? If ya still want to leave after that, then I’ll let you leave.”

While being tucked into Joel’s chest, his scent of pine and cinnamon started to consume you and you closed your eyes to focus on your breathing. As you did this you had recalled a memory that the two of you had shared when you first started out traveling together.  One night you were fighting with him and you were overly emotional (like now) and he had then held you in the same tight embrace that he has you held in now, telling you to calm down and if you wanted to leave afterwards you could. The longer you focused on the memory, the calmer you were becoming. After a few moments Joel had noticed that you were slowly calming down so he turned both of you carefully onto one side. You heard him say "atta girl, you're doing so good honey" as he ran small soothing circles down your back. The longer he kept reassuring you, the more you kept melting into his embrace.  The more you relaxed mentally, the more your body responded to him physically. 

Joel could feel you slowly start to relax and calm down with you in his arms. He knew you could be very emotional, especially right before your period. But he also knew that being an asshole didn't help the situation either. As he laid there with you consuming your sweet smell of flowers and pine, he felt like he truly was in heaven. He was glad for a moment that you were acting all crazy, but he’d never tell you that. He was glad because it gave him the opportunity to hold you once again. It was something that he desperately wanted to do these last few weeks, but Ellie was making it very difficult for him. Ellie was always teasing him about being too old and that holding a woman close was ‘disgusting.’ It really didn’t matter to him what she said, as he knew she was just pushing his buttons, but each time it still hurt and made him question his want and need for you. 

As he laid there holding you, he started thinking on how he's been treating you these last several weeks. How mean he's been to you and how he just acted like the biggest asshole on this Earth. He knew that he shouldn’t be taking out all of his frustration on you, but god damn it, he wanted to be with you but he knows he shouldn’t.  He wanted to be inside you so bad more times than not, to the point where he couldn’t even think straight anymore. But after losing both Sarah and Tess, he knew he couldn’t take the chance yet again, not even with you. He knew that once he tasted you, even being inside of you, he would be hooked for life. He kept telling himself that he couldn’t risk it. But as he laid there trying to think of a way to get out of his feelings he realized something. If he didn’t start treating you better or showing you appreciation, he was gonna lose the one person that made his entire life better in this shitty world, and that one person was you.  

As his mind started to race he felt a tightening in his chest and he couldn't take it anymore. He couldn't take seeing you like this, someone who's always been so strong now reduced to an emotional mess, and it was all because of him and his stupid fears of getting close to someone again.  The truth was he adored you and wanted you not just to stay with him, but to be with him. Just him, as a man. When he saw the internal turmoil that you were having, of how you weren’t understanding what he was feeling (not that he shared it with you anyway), he did the only thing that he could think of at that moment. He reached down, grabbed your face, and then smashed his lips to yours in a rushed and heated kiss. As soon as his lips connected with yours, it was like someone unleashed the inferno in his body. He needed to have more of you and he didn’t care who the fuck was watching this time.

When your lips were first on Joel’s it was like the whole world had stopped or at least drastically slowed down for a moment.  All you felt was the moist, soft, tender lips; a scruffy face, and raw sexual energy. Your body felt like it was floating and your head was spinning. Prior to Joel kissing you it felt like you had a low fire burning in your belly 24/7 for this man. But now, it felt like you had a raging inferno. You wanted more, you were desperate for more, so when you felt his tongue skim along your lower lip requesting access into your mouth, you gladly gave him access. As soon as you parted your lips you felt his tongue gently enter your mouth cautiously, unsure if this was what you truly wanted. But as soon as his tongue connected with yours, it was like someone ignited a fire between the two of you. Very quickly the lazy slow kiss turned into a hot frenzy kiss where you both were wrestling your tongues together, trying to see who was the more dominant one. 

As you two continued to wrestle each other with your mouths, you felt a familiar throb between your legs return and you also felt yourself getting wet again. Without thinking, you raised your hips upwards towards his and as soon as you came in contact with them you ground yourself into him. When he felt you do this he also ground down hard onto you and moaned your name into your mouth to make it perfectly clear that you turned him on. And once again you felt his tight bulge against your heated core. You two both found your bodies begin that familiar dance rutting hard into one another, chasing that high once again. But this time it was different. This time his movements were more frantic and heated, like he was desperately trying to make you understand that he wanted this with you.

You wanted him to place his hands on you and to touch you in ways that you only could dream of. You wanted him to be inside of you and to help you calm that hard ache deep in your lower belly. You needed him to cradle you against his body and slowly rock into you filling a need that not even you could fill, no matter how many times you touched yourself in private. You wanted Joel Miller completely without restraint.  So when you pulled away from him, you looked up into his eyes with dark blown out pupils and tried to find the words to tell him how you felt. 

“Joel, please, I-” you started to say when all of a sudden he cut you off by saying “Shh honey, I know, I got you. I’m gonna give you a little relief. M’k.”  Then you felt him unzip your pants and shove his hand down between your legs.

“Fuuckk” he growled in your ear when he came into contact with your underwear and felt that you were completely drenched. “Is this all for me baby?” he said as he slowly slid his knuckles up the seam of your panties feeling how wet you were.  When he heard you slightly whimper you felt him move his hand to the inside your underwear.  As soon as he came in contact with your pussy you felt him tease your little hole to get some of your arousal on his big calloused fingers and then he slowly drew his fingers up your slit, circled your clit, and then slowly brought his fingers back down by your entrance. You heard yourself give out a long soft moan in his chest.

Joel then slowly slipped two fingers deep into your heat, and as he did you whined at the full feeling and the gentle stretch that was burning inside of you from his large fingers. “Fuck baby, you’re so god damn tight” he growled in your ear. “My poor baby has been neglected hasn’t she” he said while pulling his fingers out and gently tapping your entrance with his hand before entering you again. With each slow thrust of his fingers Joel slowly started to get your body to relax to allow him in deeper. Finally he bottomed out to the knuckle and curled his fingers to hit that spongy area deep inside of your core, the one that hasn’t been hit by someone in a very long time. After he stroked that sweet spot a few times you heard yourself groaning and frantically started to chase your high by humping his fingers feverishly trying to get a better angle but you couldn’t. Out of frustration you whined and started to beg for him to go deeper as you weren’t quite getting him where you needed him. He immediately hushed you and told you to be quiet and that he was going to help you. Out of desperation you reached out and tried to undo his belt on his pants and he bit the side of your neck and told you No while still fingering you at a fast pace.  When you asked him why, he said “I’m not gonna be able to stop if I- we can’t- it’s-” and then you knew the problem, the entire problem all along.  

Ellie was just a few feet away and you couldn’t risk her waking up with Joel’s cock buried deep within you, at least not laying on the ground outside. Ellie was the reason he was acting the way he was.  You didn’t hate her for it, as she was just a teenager and Joel was taking on the father figure with her.  She needed to be taught stability and appropriateness in a world that was not appropriate nor stable at all. But even in knowing the reasons you still felt your heart shatter again, like it hadn’t shattered enough times already tonight.  Once again the flood gates opened and you stopped moving and tears streamed down your cheeks. You were mentally exhausted and were sick and tired of feeling all of these emotions, but mostly you were frustrated and Joel knew it.  

Joel stilled at your reaction and then you heard him take in a ragged breath.  The next thing you knew he was yanking your pants down and shoving them at the bottom of the sleeping bag and undoing his belt and pants.  He didn’t give you any time to adjust as he plunged his cock deep inside of your scortching heat while putting a hand over your mouth to silence the moans that you gave him.  As soon as he was fully sheathed you felt him still for a moment to allow you to adjust to his large size and then he started to move, setting almost a brutal pace. 

Joel was bigger than any guy you have ever had.  At first it was uncomfortable, but then you started to love the full feeling while he moved in and out of you. You started to feel that coil build tight inside of your belly again so you started matching him thrust for thrust.  After a few moments you needed him to get a little deeper as he was barely scratching that itch inside of you, so you brought one leg up higher to allow him deeper access. As soon as you did that both of your your eyes rolled back into your head at the tight feeling and you heard Joel give out a loan moan followed by several incoherent sentences. 

The next thing you knew you both were grunting and moaning as you both rutted hard against each other. His cock kept hitting that sweet spot over and over again deep inside of you and you kept hearing and feeling his balls slapping hard against your pussy.  You were no longer concerned with who was nearby or what was happening, all you could feel or focus on was Joel. You heard him whisper in your ear “Fuck baby, you’re so god damn tight. God, I need this. You need this cock don’t you.”

You responded “Joel I- fuck it feels so good, please don’t stop.”

“I’m not stopping baby, I don’t fucking care who sees or hears us. I’m not gonna stop fucking this beautiful lil pussy until you come so hard on my cock. Then I’m gonna fill you up. Do ya want me to do that sugar, fill you up?”  

As soon as Joel said that you felt your walls begin to tense and flutter inside of you as the coil was being wound tighter and tighter in your belly. Joel could feel it too and growled in your ear “fuck baby, I feel ya squeezing me. Is my baby close, ya gonna come for me?”  A few more deep brutal thrusts was all that it took for you to feel that coil snap inside of you as your orgasm hit you like a ton of bricks and you exploded around him. His hand went to your mouth in an attempt to quiet your moans. But as you looked up at him you saw him look at you the same way he did when you killed those raiders, pure bliss and that he was so proud of you.  Joel continued to fuck you hard through your orgasm and he kept growling in your ear saying “that’s it baby, keep coming. Squeeze my cock, such a good girl." 

As your body started to come back down from your orgasm you felt his thrusts start to get sloppy and you begged him to come inside of you.  Finally after a few more deep thrusts he found his own release moaning your name into your ear as he spurt hot white ropes of his cum deep into your pussy.  Eventually you both came down from your high, reapplied your clothing, and then both fell asleep in each other’s arms.  

Come morning you were hoping that Joel was going to be in a better mood, and he was but only for a little bit.  After Ellie woke up his icy stance eventually came back up towards you. Later on you had approached him and wanted to discuss the subject of what had happened earlier when he said to you “we aren’t going to talk about it anymore, clear.” And just like that, tender Joel was gone and survival Joel was back. But this time it was different as when he turned back to yell at you to hurry up and keep up, you caught a smirk on his face as he looked you up and down with a heated glare in his eyes.  You didn’t know what was going to happen with your relationship or where you stood with everything.  But you knew one thing was for certain, sex with Joel wasn’t going to be a one time only thing. You two would fuck again. In fact, you were certain of it.

-End Chapter 1-

There will be more parts coming out in the future. If you want to be added to my taglist let me know in the comments.  Feel free to reblog and share it. Thanks for all of your support :) 

taglist: @punkshort

[laerien]

While I'm not necessarily ecstatic about The Acolyte being cancelled as far as the future of Star Wars television goes, rewatching the first season of Rings of Power solidified my thoughts about why I think the former needed a bit more work.

The premises are pretty similar: a story based in a time we haven't seen yet in a world that has extensive lore but lots of grey area. Rings of Power and The Acolyte both capitalized on this to take liberties and add several new aspects; whether to genuinely add to the story or to fit into a studio's motive is anyone's guess. Both had fantastical aspects, established orders who refused to believe evil was returning, love vs duty debates, and an exploration of morality.

As a Tolkien fan, I was left feeling indifferent about RoP when it first aired. There were several things I thought would be established in canon that were suddenly changed, yet there were new additions and stories that I could still trace to very evident Tolkien motifs. While not perfect, the new characters, relationships, and storylines all sat clearly on a timeline that would undoubtedly lead to the Middle-earth we knew from the existing media. The dark was gone, it's returning, and we're going to figure out who, how, and why.

As a Star Wars fan, I thought I was very open to The Acolyte coming in and creating some new stories on the timeline. I have to give them some credit, as the majority of the characters were new to avoid blatant fanservice. However, with so much room to work with, I suppose I expected a clearer establishment of the story. A lot of time was spent with so many new characters and world building, and for what? We know Star Wars for being a battle for a better galaxy, just like the LotR franchise is a battle for a better Middle-earth. Without the war, but with knowing the Sith didn't canonically reappear until the prequel era, what was the intention of the season? The Jedi Order exists, the Sith are hinting at a return, but we're not going to figure out anything by the end of the season besides small hints that the Jedi Order is already corrupt, both Mae and Osha would give up everything we learned about them in their backstories in a single moment for something they've been fighting against the whole season, and Darth Plageius is hiding in the shadows even though there's a rule of two and Qimir's motive of having an acolyte to fulfill the rule of two is supposed to still make sense? Everything else that happened in the season is inconsequential to a larger picture, and I think that's why I struggled to understand it, despite genuinely liking several aspects of it.

I recently rewatched Rings of Power, so it's fresh and, while not without flaws, it was an excellent juxtaposition to The Acolyte. By the end of the season, RoP gave us an immensely satisfying answer to the Sauron plot point given in the first episode. It began each storyline, played adequately in each one, and wrapped up each one, all while leaving plenty of mystery in a way I found exciting. The Acolyte had appeared to have all the characters revolving around one story: the Jedi stopping a mysterious dark force from murdering more Jedi. The audience was left out of the loop on so many important things, that, by the time they were revealed, we already had more questions lined up. For all the work they did in making characters with fleshed out backstories, none of it seemed to matter when they made a choice that seemed irrelevant to it all.

I think I'm mostly annoyed that the Acolyte was cancelled because I hoped they could redeem themselves in a second season. Although, I think that annoyance is about equal to watching the finale and realizing the few mysteries solved were either full of holes or just confusing. If anyone can clearly explain to me if I'm missing something huge about the Acolyte's plot and character choices, I am very open to it. It's always exciting to see something new in the fandom, and it's always discouraging to feel like you side more with the never-happy fan trolls.

In any case, let's hope the second season of Rings of Power survives these never-happy fan trolls. I'm catching a screening tonight, but would also love to hear if people think I'm missing something terrible with this show.

[rorywritesjunk]

I can’t tell where the journey will end But I know where to start

Prequel to my Kid Buggy fic, set about 11-ish years before that story.

Buggy meets you by chance when he needs his buttons sewn back onto his jacket. He’s young, up and coming, and he thinks everyone should cower before him wherever he goes, but all you do is smile at him.

Rating: PG-13ish just for some swearing. Warning: Buggy’s in his early 20s. I also gave him some anxiety and stuff because while he’s in love he doesn’t believe someone could love him back. He just has a lot of uncertainty with romance. A/N: Meet the Family plus one that isn't really nice. I finally caved and was kind to Buggy when it comes to romancing Sunny. End of the chapter mentions sexy times but nothing graphic at all. I just realized maybe I should take pity on the fool.

Title comes from “Wake Me Up” by Avicii.

TAGLIST: @lostfirefly @ane5e @kingofthemfingpirates @the-angriest-angel @tiredemomama @valen-yamyam16 @i-reblog-fics-i-like @plethora-of-fickleness @uhnanix

Chapter 1 + Chapter 2 + Chapter 3 + Chapter 4 + Chapter 5 + Chapter 6 + Chapter 7 + Chapter 8 + Chapter 9 + Chapter 10 + Chapter 11 + Chapter 12 + Chapter 13 + Chapter 14 + Chapter 15 + Chapter 16 + Chapter 17 + Chapter 18 + Epilogue

Chapter 16

Buggy couldn't fathom the amount of cousins you had.

They were broken into four age groups apparently. The 18 and older, the 12 year olds to 17 year olds, the 6 to 11, and the babies to 5 year olds.

The five and under thought Buggy was so cool and wanted to touch his face, hair, ask if he knew tricks since he looked like a clown, and when he resorted using his Devil Fruit to pick a grabby three year old up and hand the child to you, they thought he was even cooler.

The 6 and 11 age group felt they were too old for clowns and weren't really impressed that he was a pirate captain, but when he used his abilities to get their kites out of the branches of a tree and even some toys that ended up on the roof, they decided he was okay.

The older two groups mostly judged him because he was marrying their favorite cousin (you were somehow everyone's favorite in the family and Buggy fully supported that). Some of the male cousins tried to give Buggy the whole “you hurt her you die” talk but he wasn't actually intimidated by that at all for once. Found it to be more annoying than anything.

He would never hurt you in any way.

The female cousins thought you could do better, honestly, though they did ask what his hair care routine was when they saw how long and wavy it was (Buggy refused to tell).

All in all, meeting the cousins went better than expected.

He still had to meet your aunts and uncles. You told him it should be a little less stressful than the cousins, but when your dad mentioned the hot spring that all the uncles would be going to with some drinks, he insisted Buggy come along. You weren't there to help so he had no choice but to go with Blue.

It… it was weird. Buggy somehow was surrounded by all of them, each staring at him as they enjoyed their drinks. He didn't even try to drink yet, too nervous watching and waiting for one of them to ask something but they just stared at him.

“So, our little Sunny is engaged to a pirate captain.” One of them finally said (Buggy couldn't even begin to remember names right then). Buggy could only nod, unsure if this would lead to additional questions or what.

“How long have you been a captain?”

“How long have you been a pirate?”

“You better take care of our niece or else.”

Almost the entire hour spent in the hot spring went like that. Buggy barely spoke despite being in the spotlight. Blue actually did most of the talking even though he really didn't know Buggy well, but it sounded like he asked Sunny similar questions and got some answers and well, Buggy appreciated it. He had no problem being front and center when he was on his ship but off it, surrounded by this family, he was out of his element and hating every second of it.

A tiny part of him was starting to regret agreeing to coming here with you so early into the engagement since that had become a focus of a lot of conversation, but when he headed back to the main house and saw you with your cousins, holding the ring up that he gave you with a big smile on your face, he realized he could tough it out. It had only been a few days so far.

“Buggy, follow me.” Blue said as he put his hand on the young pirate's shoulder and steered him into the house. “I don't know if my daughter told you, but after Windy and I got married, we became jewelers.”

“Huh…” Buggy only nodded, not sure why that mattered. He was led into a tiny workshop where Blue turned the lights on, giving Buggy a view of everything.

Various tools, materials, stones, everything you would need for that kind of business filled the space of the small room. The worktop has dents, scratches, some scorch marks, showing years of love and hard work. There was a bright red cloth with two rings resting on it. Buggy picked one up to look at it, almost dropping it when he saw a tiny little engraving of his jolly roger on it.

“What is this?!” Buggy demanded, wondering if Blue was copying his jolly roger for some reason.

“Well, after you two showed up and told us the happy news, I started working on wedding rings for you both.” He chuckled, suddenly looking nervous and uncomfortable. “My wife sketched out the designs and I've been working on them the last few days as a surprise, but I realize now that that's silly because you probably have something better for the two of you.”

No, no he didn't. Was Buggy supposed to? He figured the engagement ring would be enough but was having a separate ring for marriage a thing? He was also thrown off by the fact that these rings were made in such a short amount of time. It was thoughtful, touching, but Buggy didn't know what to make of it. He set the ring back down and looked up at the older man.

“We… have to have a ring for marriage?” That was the question on his mind. He didn't have rings yet, he only had the (stolen) engagement ring so hearing that there was also supposed to be a wedding ring on top of it was a little much.

To his relief, Blue just chuckled, clapping him on the shoulder. “Only if you want! You're a pirate, I'm sure you have your own traditions anyway. I just wanted to give you a gift for taking such good care of Sunny this last year. I figure you're someone special by the way her eyes light up when she talks about you.”

Buggy scowled as his cheeks burned. That wasn't the case, you took care of him. He didn't do anything worthwhile to earn the love you have for him. Why would you tell your father something different? He didn't say anything, looking back down at the rings. They were a simple band, practical for working on a ship, but he wanted something a little more to it.

“If you already have something, I understand! I know this is a bit sudden.” Blue assured him. “And if you don't like them, I'm okay with that too!”

Buggy hesitated. It was thoughtful but it was missing something.

“No, they're… fine.” He told him, jaw clenched as he looked down at the rings. “Can you just add one thing?”

~

“Yea! We can have the wedding while the whole family is here!” 

Buggy spat out his drink while you choked on yours. Your mother's sister, the second oldest, heard that you wanted just your parents and someone to officiate and well, she didn't like that idea. She wanted to see her niece get married, why couldn't everyone enjoy it? 

“We'll find an officiant, we have the space to have your fiancee's crew join us so long as they behave and we can make the reception the big family dinner we always have!” Your aunt Stormy continued. Buggy was against the idea, was ready to say so, but you took his hand and gave it a squeeze.

“We just want to keep it small.” You told her, glancing over at Buggy. “The reception can be a party, but… we just want a small wedding.”

“Nonsense. You have a huge family, Sunny, and we want to see you get married.” Stormy said, shaking her head. “We won't take no for an answer.”

“‘We’?” You repeated.

“The rest of us aunts and uncles want to see you get married. It's not fair if we don't.” Stormy chuckled. “You're the first of the kids to get married, it's only right that the rest of us get to see it.” She glanced over at Buggy. “I imagine it will be quite a spectacle going by how your fiancee… is.”

“W-What-”

“I don't know what that's supposed to mean, Aunt Stormy, but the wedding will be small.” You told her, fixing your aunt with a look that told Buggy that the conversation was over. “Me, mom, dad, Buggy, and some of his crew. That's it.” You tightened your hold on Buggy's hand. “Please excuse us.”

You didn't wait and dragged Buggy away. He noticed you were tense after that, but you also jumped to his defense before your aunt could make any other jabs at him. Spectacle? What kind of spectacle was she expecting?

You dragged him into the house, relieved no one else was in there. Everyone was outside socializing. You took his glass and put it in the sink with yours, huffing in frustration. Buggy was both a little nervous but intrigued to see you frustrated, especially since it wasn't directed at him.

“Of course she would go against our wishes.” You muttered as you started washing the glasses. “Makes it all about herself. She just wants a reason to dress up and will end up making it about her. We are not having a big wedding. I don't want it.”

“Babe?” Buggy asked carefully. 

You looked up from what you were doing, frustration in your voice when you asked, “What?!”

“D’you want to… take a break and go to the ship?” He was hesitant to even suggest it, figuring you'd rather spend time with your family than with him, especially since you have spent so much time with him already. You stared at him in surprise and he started back pedaling immediately. “I mean, this is your family, and I know you want to spend time with them, so I shouldn't have even suggested that, babe. Forget it. We can stay. I don't need to go, y’know, I just wanted you to, uh, have…a break?”

“No, no, Buggy. That's a good idea.” You told him as you dried your hands. “We just have to sneak down to the water. Who knows what my aunt is saying about the wedding now.”

Oh, that was a good idea? He was pleased with himself, smirking at you as he leaned on the counter. “Yea? Maybe we come up with other good ideas while we have some alone time.”

You grinned and tossed the dish towel aside. “Oh, and what kind of good ideas do you want to come up with, Captain?”

“We’ll just have to see, won't we?” He looked quite proud of himself for being flirty without something happening to him for once. “I'm sure we'll come up with something, babe.”

~

Something was you and Buggy in bed, naked and tired, both of you not sure how long you were in there for, both too distracted by each other to really care about time anyway. You had initiated it after Buggy made some joke about getting naked and you didn't hesitate in stripping down in front of him, grinning at the blush on his face and how wide his eyes got up on seeing you naked for the first time.

Now he was a little hesitant. You had said you weren't disgusted by his body upon knowing of his Devil Fruit powers, how limbs and parts separated when he needed them to, but he suddenly felt a little self conscious, so you walked over to him and kissed him, pulling at his clothes to encourage him. He never did this before, you had said the same, but like everything with you, he wanted it to be perfect.

He knew what to do from stories he heard growing up from the Roger Pirates and you knew what you wanted from romance novels you used to read to pass the time at the shop. And while Buggy took charge, he listened when you gave him directions on where to touch, kiss, everything. Hearing how you moaned and whined, panting his name between little gasps spurned him to make sure you screamed his name in the end.

And he was impressed he managed to keep it together when he was finally inside you, holding back to keep from finishing too quickly. There would be other times, sure, but this was the first time for both of you, and you were letting him touch you, pleasure you, and he needed it to be perfect for you. He was so in love with you.

And after all that, he was in your arms, head on your chest as your fingertips stroked down his spine while he made himself comfortable. 

“We should probably make an appearance before they come looking for us.” You sighed, making no effort to move. “I just don't want to.”

“We can stay here. The crew won't let anyone onboard.” Buggy mumbled back, eyes closed as he sank into your arms.

“I would like that since the second my aunt sees me she'll want to talk about the wedding, which is the last thing I want to do with her.” You kissed the top of his head and closed your eyes. “It's kind of late, we can make an appearance tomorrow morning. I just want to spend time with you right now.”

“Yea?” He lifted his head up, eyes wide in surprise. “You’d rather spend more time with me?”

You opened your eyes and looked at him with a frown. “Of course I would. I love you, Buggy.” Touching his cheek, you gave him a kiss as he wrapped his arms around you. “I love spending time with you.”

“Your family-”

“Yea, I'll see them tomorrow. I want to spend time with you right now.” You assured him. “Get some rest, honey.”

He nodded, settling back down with his head tucked under your chin, closing his eyes as you pulled the covers up over the two of you. He was more than happy to be in bed with you for the rest of the day, just spending time with you, not having to be surrounded by everyone else and their questions about himself and the wedding. 

Maybe Buggy could convince you to stay on the ship for the rest of the reunion.

[the-ultimate-bookworm]

Just listened to “Can’t Catch Me Now” by Olivia Rodrigo (I’m OBSESSED with her), and as it is the only song (as far as I know) in the soundtrack released from the movie “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” (which comes out November 17th, I can’t wait!), which is an adaptation based off of the prequel of “The Hunger Games”, if you didn’t know.

Spoiler under the cut, cause this song is literally just *chef’s kiss*

If you haven’t read the series yet, you should.

First of all

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

There’s the song.

Second,

Can we take a moment to appreciate this song?

Like, it describes the book, like perfectly.

I’m literally going to a deep examination of this song and point out every single reference to the book. Peeps who’ve read the book can add stuff.

“Shadows of us are still dancing

In every room and every hall”

Olay, I don’t think Snow and Lucy Gray ever danced in the book, but this feels like a direct reference to the fact Lucy Gray was a performer, and SHADOWS OF US.

Their broken relationship, obviously.

“There’s snow falling over the city

You thought it would wash away”

Now, a normal person wouldn’t think anything of that, but I, am not a normal person.

Direct reference to “Snow fall on top” !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And then, in the trailer and the book, Dean Highbottom is like “Do you hear that? It’s the sound of snow falling” or something like that.

“The bitter taste of my fury,

And all the messes you’ve made”

Do I really need to explain this one?

Snow’s just messed up.

“Yeah, you think you got away

But I’m in trees, I’m in the breeze

My footsteps on the ground

You’ll see my face in every place”

LUCY GRAY AND HER MOCKINGJAYS

LUCY GRAY AND HER MOCKINGJAYS

Also “Wordsworth’s Lucy Gray”

“But you can’t catch me now,”

I don’t know if this is a reference to “She could fly around District 12 all she liked, but she and her mockingjays could never harm him again” which is Snow not being harmed by Lucy Gray.

Or, if it’s Lucy Gray not being able to get under Snow’s words and lies anymore, and he can’t hurt her anymore either.

“Through wading grass, the months will pass

You’ll feel it all around

I’m here, I’m there, I’m everywhere”

Wading grass gives me “Deep in the Meadow” vibes, and the months will pass is like, even though it’s been months, years even, Snow’s guilt will be there. He might not show it, but it’s there.

Lucy Gray’s haunting him.

“Bet you thought I’d never do it,

Thought it’d go over my head”

Okay, so here, it’s like, where Lucy Gray is hiding from Snow. She could’ve ignored the signs pretend that she didn’t know, but she chose to show that she knew, because that is Lucy Gray Baird.

“I bet you figured I’d pass with the winter

Be something easy to forget

Oh, you think I’m gone cause I left”

Lucy Gray lives on in District 12, through her songs. Not her name, but her songs.

“You can’t, you can’t catch me now

I’m coming like storm into your town”

This is more in the beginning of the book, where Lucy Gray comes to the Capitol. She made a giant impact, in my opinion, especially with her reptile show.

“You can’t, you can’t catch me now

I’m higher than the hopes you brought down”

Obviously, Lucy Gray’s just better, and Snow is… certainly something

“There’s blood on the side of the mountain,

It’s turning a new shade of red”

Lucy Gray disappearing after we presume Snow shit her, which might’ve caused her death.

“Yeah, sometimes the fire you founded

Don’t burn the way you expected”

This definitely feels like a reference to the OG series, you know “catching fire”, “fire you founded”.

It definitely feels like Snow had something to do with sparking the rebellion, and it got out of hand. The Hunger Games, especially the 75th one, was to prove the Capitol controlled the districts, but the rebellion was sparked because of the and tore it down completely.

“Yeah, you thought that this was the end.”

It wasn’t. You know, Katniss and the rebellion. The mockingjays really could hurt Snow again.

[ooops-i-arted]

I am so tired of Ahsoka!

She wasn't needed and now she is literally everywhere. I go on on any social media and serach for Prequel Trilogy stuff and I can't go 1 minute without seeing something about her, when she wasn't even in the films. I honestly am so mad that I wasn't part of the fandom before Ahsoka was created because she kinda becomes "the most important person for Anakin (fuck you Obi-Wan and Padme)".

It's a bit sad since she could have been a cool character. Just make her master someone else and don't make her the most special and powerful Jedi. And if they wanted to make her a padawan of a "special" master than maybe introduce a new Jedi who idk maybe left the Jedi Order long ago and now they return because of the Clone Wars. This would mean that: a) Ahsoka still has a "special" master b) because she is trained by a master who only recently returned to the order she has training different than any other padawan c)due to her master she has controversial opinions on some Jedi customs. This could be a good point of conflict for her character (do I listen to my master or the Order) and also doesn't make unnecessary changes in the story of film characters (Anakin, Padme, Obi-Wan and others).

Honestly, I think that when you do a serial for a beloved film you should ensure that the characters you fit with what the films tell us. The Jedi Council didn't want to make Anakin a master, so why would they give him a padawan. As ignorant as they could sometimes be, I think that connecting "Anakin is not mature enough to be master" with "Anakin is not mature enough to have a padawan". It's really something I think they would notice.

I 👏 HAVE 👏 BEEN 👏 SAYING 👏 THIS 👏 FOR 👏 YEARS 👏

She is COMPLETELY unnecessary to Anakin's story and always was. Every story beat she supposedly fulfills is already fulfilled by another character. I kinda wonder if it was an attempt at whitewashing Anakin's character (Lucas was involved in TCW and apparently wanting Anakin to be more appealing from what I heard, and this was back when the prequels and Hayden were NOT as loved as they were now because my generation wasn't as huge a fandom voice as the old OT-loving guard) and making him more appealing but no. Anakin is a human garbage can and that's what makes him such a compelling and interesting character!!!

I honestly would probably be a huge Ahsoka stan if TCW was envisioned as its own thing and focused on her as a character on her own instead of making her Anakin's Most Specialest Beloved Padawan Who Is Best At Everything (She Can Even Fight Grievous omg!!!). Back then we were so starved for female characters, we had Leia and some Padme mainstream but that was it (you only knew about Mara Jade in Legends and she wasn't in the mainstream merch or anything from what I recall), and much as I love a good dies-of-sadness joke, Padme is often simplified to that and shoved aside even though she's a really cool and complicated character in her own right. I will give Ahsoka credit for blazing the way for female characters to be more included in Star Wars, but it falls flat when she's just propped up as Coolest Wisest Bestest Jedi-but-not-a-Jedi-actually-she's-better-than-the-Order Girlboss. Now we're back to Only One Female Character Above All Others. (Rey and Rose were ruined with bad writing, Hera and Sabine are wonderful but definitely not mainstream (and probably being butchered in the show), Gina Carano ruined our chances of any more Cara content, Peli was just a cameo last season, and Bo-Karen also got the Always Right Beloved TCW Girlboss Treatment.)

Imo the Council was pretty much always on the money with Anakin (at least with what they knew of him - they didn't know of the Tusken murder spree for example) and there's no way Anakin was ever ready for a Padawan or that anyone in their right mind would give him one. In MY episode III fanfiction when Favored Main Character Got A Padawan, Obi-Wan got the Padawan because he had more experience teaching, even at 12 I knew Anakin had no business teaching anyone. Also, it was NEVER previously canon that Padawans were assigned. Masters chose them as in the Jedi Apprentice series. I will NEVER let that go. Ahsoka being assigned to Anakin was so contrived.

[antianakin]

I feel like the best way to "fix" Padme in the Prequels isn't to have Anakin brainwashing her, but to just have her be morally corrupt from at least the start of AOTC. In TPM, she's a scared young Queen, she's trying so hard to be peaceful and diplomatic and it DOESN'T WORK and she has to turn to violence and war to save her own people. She's not who she used to be anymore.

So when you start up AOTC, Anakin makes his interest known sort-of accidentally and Padme is immediately intrigued. There's none of that "Oh Ani, you'll always be that little boy I knew from Tatooine" stuff, let her follow up on the "Wow you've grown" comment just a tad more, comment on how impressive he looks now, nearly a Knight himself! And in the packing scene, instead of calmly explaining that sometimes mentors see our flaws better than we'd like, have her agree that Obi-Wan's treatment sounds frustrating perhaps, she can relate it to her own struggles in the Senate with other politicians who just won't LISTEN TO HER. In response, Anakin says that at least this new mission means he'll be away from Obi-Wan and spending time with Padme alone which sounds so much more enjoyable. Padme asks him how much more enjoyable and, well, things can devolve from there. Fade to black or just a kiss and a promise to follow up on Naboo or something, doesn't matter.

And you can let Anakin question why she's doing it or something if you want, bring up that it should be forbidden for them to be together and that Padme is risking a lot by doing this with him. Give Padme a nice simple answer here. Something like "I learned when my planet was attacked that life can be so short and sometimes the best way forward is to act decisively. I know what I want, and I'm willing to take the risk, because this feels worth it to me, it feels right." Nothing too deep and it brings up a little sympathy from the last film.

At the lake scene in the rainbow dress, bring back the comment Padme made in that deleted scene from their arrival on Naboo where she mentions she had expected to have a family by now, but with everything going on in the Senate she isn't sure that'll ever happen. Instead of "I hate sand" (yes yes I know) let Anakin RELATE to Padme's musings on her desire for a family, mention how he'd always kind-of wanted a child of his own, how important family is to him and while the Jedi ARE a family, it's not the kind of family he knew and grew up with and sometimes he misses it.

Come back to her frustrations with the Senate during the meadow scene on Naboo, let her admit that sometimes she DOES wish she could just force them all to listen to her even though she knows that that would lead to more problems than it would fix, so when she brushes off Anakin's dictatorship comment as a joke, it makes a LOT more sense that she would think that way.

And then for a more modern fix-it, have Anakin NOT murder all of the Tuskens, just the warriors, but he admits that he nearly did kill them all, that he wanted to, and a part of him still wants to return to the village and finish what he started even if it's not the Jedi way. It's still violent, and still a horrifying red flag, but this allows Padme to decides that Anakin's feelings are more important than the lives he took (and almost took). It's less out of character because she's been stupid for him from literally the start, they've been probably fucking since they got to Naboo, she's already compromising on her own morals for him, why not do it again?

Is this my ideal Padme? No. My ideal Padme is much more complex than this, but that Padme cannot exist in the story they were telling in the Prequels, so the best way to have Padme exist more easily in the Prequels without completely changing the story for her is to just simplify her down a lot.

[elvisabutler]

could i possibly request more gun kink pls? 🙏🙏🙏

red brass

summary: elvis loves you or at least likes you. elvis learns things on the road. elvis likes to have the girl he likes try the new things he thinks he'll like with him. you allow it. fandom: elvis presley | elvis 2022 pairing: elvis presley x female reader rating: m word count: 3408 just i don't know what happens. i don't know why i write 3k gun kink fics. warnings: gun kink. use of a gun in penetrative ways. guns. implied masturbation ( m ). implied future oral ( f ). technically defined as masturbation or maybe fucking ( f ). dubious, and i mean very dubious consent. 50s era elvis being a little shit. infidelity ( elvis to the reader ). southern accents being mildly butchered. faintly erring toward a sub elvis, while also somehow being a dom elvis, it's nebulous honestly. me implying that texans love their guns a lil' too much. use of nicknames ( honey, darlin', baby. ) and 'vis. no use of y/n. i think that might be everything? author's note: hi anon, i know who you are and i love you. i hope you enjoy this fic that essentially is a prequel-ish, a spiritual prequel to gunmetal. and me basically going, i guess i'm gonna write 50s elvis with a gun kink. generally speaking i don't even know what has come over me with this, i'm just gonna take y'all along for a ride. watch me inevitably write army e or hollywood e with gun kink.

You know you can find a better guy, or at least you think you can, because there's something that makes men- little boys want to prove themselves after they find out you're with Elvis Presley. You're fairly certain that you could at least find a guy who would be there more often than Elvis is, you could find a guy who could take you out on regular dates and could eat dinner with your parents and- maybe even get married to you sooner rather than later. The problem is, you're never quite sure you want to find that guy, never quite certain if that sort of guy would be better than Elvis. For all Elvis is a selfish young man— the kind who will take take take from his girlfriends as much as he gives gives gives- he's also a good man. He's a better man than half the boys who sniff around you, the little hound dogs as you and Elvis like to call them. So it's always a whispered "honey, ya ain't gonna leave me are ya? gonna be comin' home soon and we'll have some fun. gonna show those dogs who they'd be fightin' wit' for ya."

Your friends think you're being silly, waiting on Elvis, thinking he's remaining faithful to you while on the road. Your mama thinks the same thing and god help you even Miss Gladys agrees. She loves her son, she does, but she knows- oh she knows how he's been calling her less and less and knows that can't mean a single good thing. Can't mean anything good for anyone involved. But when her little boy calls you or calls her he's always reassuring you both that the girls don't mean nothin'. He's jus' lonely and he can't take he can't take the love of his life or his mama wit' him so sometimes- sometimes there's a girl in the hotel. June says you shouldn't forgive him when he admits it the first time but you've never been like June, never been as strong as June is and maybe— maybe that's why Elvis liked you so much. You're not June but you're just close enough that he can still have her with the parts that don't fit his life removed. Selfish, but he's never claimed to be a saint, hell no one's ever claimed he's a saint.

The thing is- you've gotten used to him talking to you over the phone about things that don't always happen. Sometimes it's just about his dreams, about his plans for what he's gonna do the second he sees you. Sometimes it's plans for how he's gonna take you out on the next tour, he doesn't care how it looks, he misses ya widdle pussy and everyone already knows he's got a girl, it won't matter seeing ya on the tour. You're expecting tonight to be just the same, another night of promises he can't keep even though he'll be home tomorrow night for at least a week or two. Tonight, though, tonight, he surprises you.

"Baby? Ya- Whatcha got planned for tomorrow? Nothin' fancy right?" He murmurs into the phone, his breath hitching in a way you know doesn't mean anything good.

You hum softly, shifting in your bed a little. "Planned on jus' lettin' ya go home to ya parents, honey, why?"

"Wanna- Ya gonna think I'm crazy but wanna try somethin' wit' ya tomorrow night. Think you'll like it." He sounds excitable in a way that means you're gonna regret telling him no if you do. He'll every bit of the young man he is, the yittle boy who wants so much and now that he's got a taste of people saying yes, yes, yes, he doesn't necessarily want to hear no on something he truly wants. "Ya gonna say yes, ain't ya?"

A sigh leaves your lips as you debate with yourself, debate if you can chance saying no before settling on the a yes that's filled with such trepidation you worry he'll still want to argue with you. "'Course I am, darlin'. Tell me, 'Vis, whatcha plannin' on doin' wit' me. Gonna take me somewhere and have us play there? We gonna have fun in the car?"

The tone you manage is light and playful— or at least as close to it as you can manage before you hear Elvis's laugh. It's a laugh you've never heard from him and one that worries you. It sounds a little demonic if you were being perfectly honest, but you trust Elvis for the most part. He loves you and wouldn't purposefully hurt you and maybe it's just a mean idea. One he shouldn't be asking you but he's going to because he knows you're better than all those girls on the road.

"Ya ever played wit' ya daddy's guns, darlin'? Ever felt the metal on ya? It's cold on ya skin, ya know." He muses, like he's put it on his skin and a rush of jealousy rears its ugly head at the idea that maybe just maybe some other girl has gotten to see this. Or maybe he's done this to another girl. You almost miss his next words. "Bet it'd make your chest- make those pretty nipples of your stand right up. Be beggin' for me to suck on 'em."

Your pussy clenches at his words and you can't help how your breath catches. "You'd- I've never— What are ya sayin', Elvis Presley?"

Almost his full name because you're so taken aback by what he's saying. You're imagining this or he's playing a joke on you, trying to get some sort of rise with you. He wouldn't dream of saying this and honestly meaning it. Let alone telling you over the phone like this, it's almost as if he's warnin' you about this but— why? Why would he want to warn you about something like this.

"Honey, I— down here in Texas they— their girls are wild, ya know? Thought it was jus' the women but no it's girls your age too, ya know? Somethin' 'bout this air that makes 'em do things I ain't ever seen another girl do. And I was talkin' to someone 'bout the gun he had on his holster, prettiest thing I ever did see other than you, darlin'. Told me 'bout how his girlfriend— or maybe it was his fiancée played wit' it." Elvis's voice sounds simultaneously like he's nervous to bring this up to you while also taking on this certain element of delight. Certain pleasure in telling you about this person. "Inside of her."

"Inside of— Now I know you aren't— You mean inside her—" You cough, because you are not some wilting little girl. You are Elvis Presley's girlfriend and you can be a big girl about this. "You mean she put it inside of her vagina?" The last word is whispered almost as if you're scared your parents are going to hear or if it'll make it more real to say it out loud.

Elvis chuckles softly, more of a huff of a laugh than anything else before he responds back with any words. "She did. He said he watched her and said she— She liked it. Told 'im it was even better than when he fucked her."

The image of Elvis pumping his gun in and out of you like he would his cock has you dropping the phone for a second in pure shock. The way you can feel your arousal starting to pool between your legs has you biting your lips and shifting in your bed, your thighs gliding together as your breathing changes just slightly. You know Elvis can tell from how he growls into the phone. He may be a dumb yittle boy sometimes but he knows you just as well as you know him now. "You don't really want me to do that when you get home, do you 'Vis?"

"I think ya wanna do it for me, honey. Think if I was there I'd see ya looking like a damn cricket, sliding your legs together. Just one time, baby? One time and if we don't like it, I ain't ever gonna bring it up again. For me? For us?" He sounds so small when he asks, but you know better, it's him trying to charm you, trying to seem all innocent when you both know he hasn't been innocent since the first time he went on tour or the first time a girl batted her eyelashes and said hello.

Your only response is a simple okay before you move onto better topics. Less arousing topics.

Your parents are used to Elvis whisking you away for any number of things so when he comes home the next night, they don't bat an eyelash at him taking you with him to Graceland with promises about how you'll be in another room and his mama won't let him do anything untoward to you. Nevermind that when Miss Gladys sees you it's for the briefest of moments as her son whisks you up the stairs and has you pinned against the door, hands roaming every inch of your skin threatening to set it on fire as he kisses your lips and your neck. He's needy tonight and you don't know if it's because of what you promised him or if he missed you just that much. You feel a hard mass near his leg and you can't help but wonder if it's his cock or the gun because you haven't seen a holster or anything that shows off a gun. Despite your better judgment when he pulls away and you are nuzzling at his nose you give him a nervous grin and whisper a joke.

"That your gun, 'Vis? Or are ya jus' happy to see lil ole me?" A laugh escapes his lips at the same time one escapes yours before he moves to try and pull down your skirts.

"Lil' of both, honey," he practically coos at you when your skirt comes down and you're standing there in your half unbuttoned shirt and your underwear. "Wanna see ya naked for this. Get the full effect."

You bite your lip, your nervousness finally fully peeking through. It's not as if you've never been naked with Elvis, it's not as if he's never seen you completely laid bare underneath him or above him but this is different. Something about this makes you feel raw and exposed like a live wire. A shiver escapes you as Elvis tilts his head just a little bit. 

“Don’t— Ain’t nothin’ we haven’t shown each other, baby. I ain’t gonna hurt ya. Gonna make ya feel good. Gonna have ya feeling the hot and cold’s what they said,” his hands ghost over your waist before he slides his hands under your shirt to pull it off of you, kissing along the skin he’s exposing bit by bit. “Ya wanna take off my clothes, honey? That gonna make ya feel better? Give ya somethin’ to settle the shakes ya got like ya had the first time we did it in the Cadillac?”

Your hand clenches into a fist before you nod, moving to undo his belt with a speed that embarrasses you a little bit until you hear him laughing softly above you. He finds it endearing, your eagerness or your nervousness and somehow that settles something in you, makes this seem less terrifying. Elvis may have asked you something that’s a mighty strange request but he’s still your Elvis. He wouldn’t hurt you, not intentionally. It doesn’t take too long before you manage to get him out of all his clothes, watching as his muscles twitch under your touch and how the moment you step out of your undergarments his cock twitches so violently in the confines of his underwear he hisses when he gets to pull them off, cursing at his foreskin. The gun is sitting on the bed and you stare at it as Elvis moves behind you cupping your breasts and kissing along your neck slowly, trying to settle you like a scared animal. 

“It ain’t loaded, honey, just— this one time, ‘member? We jus’ gonna try it, see if those Texans know somethin’ we don’t.” His voice is low enough to be crooning at you and you feel your body lean up against him, relax up against him. “You get to do it, baby. Just, do what ya want with the gun.”

It takes you a minute or maybe five of just relaxing against him to get up the nerve to crawl on his bed and prop yourself on his pillows.The gun feels heavy in your hand but you’re pretty sure you’re just imagining it as you let the metal touch your neck— your overheated neck— and whimper at the coolness of it. Elvis settles himself at the end of the bed, eyes watching how your nipples are already pebbling before the gun even touches them. You let your legs fall open to give him a better view and you hear a grunt that has you looking up at your boyfriend’s lower lip between his teeth.

“Already gettin’ shiny down there. Glowin’ in the moonlight, darlin’. Wanna- Gonna taste all that later, if ya don’t leave it all over the bed.”

You clench around nothing at the words and Elvis reaches out to touch you before you shake your head, “no, wanna— you wanna see me play wit’ this. Wanna see me play wit’ this like they did. No- You don’t get to touch.” 

The funny thing is, you don’t think you’ve ever seen Elvis react as quick as he does in that moment. You don’t think you’ve ever seen your boyfriend respond to something you’ve told him to do as quick as he does in that exact moment. His hand goes directly to his own lap as he nods, whining just a little as he does and you have to bite back the soft giggle that threatens to escape you. The gun though, the sharp coolness of the metal helps you, helps distract you from giggling even if as the gun glides across your nipple you cry out almost in agony. Elvis had been right, they were practically begging to be sucked, to be warmed by his tongue and his mouth. Anything would be better than the bite of the metal, the brush of the barrel against them. Elvis doesn’t make a move though, you had told him not to touch and he was being good even as his hand strayed to his cock, playing with it, his thumb brushing over the tip as he pulled his foreskin back. 

Focusing on him made things worse and somehow better, made you wish you had told him he could touch, made you wish he would was moving the gun himself but he told you this was your call, you were in control of what happened with the gun. Small whimpers leave your lips as you try and keep your legs open, practically trying to grind on the air as you slide the gun down down down your torso. You stop just shy of your vagina, your hand shaking a little before you hear Elvis’s voice.

“Ya— Ya good, darlin’?” His question is asked a little shakily but it makes you realize you aren’t the only nervous one here, or maybe he’s just so turned on he can’t speak straight. It doesn’t matter, you don’t think, not with how it calms you just so. “Ya want my help? Want me to hold it for ya?”

“Please?” Your answer comes out rushed and so quiet that you feel the rush and heat of embarrassment as you shiver from it. You want to do this, but it’s not something you’ve ever done and it’s new. For both of you, you hope. Elvis moves closer to you, deciding that sitting next to you might be the best position for this so he can watch and still help you. You move to take your hand off the gun, thinking he wants complete control before he links your fingers together and places both your hands on the gun. You’re still in control with just a little help from him. 

You take your hand that’s not on the gun and use it you spread yourself open, making sure there’s enough of a glide from your arousal- a forgone conclusion you think- to help with the gun brushing against your cunt— your vagina— your whatever the two of you want to call it. As your fingers start to play with your clit you feel the brush of the metal finally sliding down and against your clit. A groan leaves your lips as you grind down automatically, craving something to finally give you some proper friction. It’s cold but it doesn’t have the same bite as it did against your nipples, no it’s almost as if the burning heat that keeps growing between your legs offsets it, allows the gun to be heated quicker than it ever would be outside of you. Elvis’s lips brush against the shell of your ear. “Ya ready baby? Ready to take it inside?”

A hum is all you can manage, too anxious and excited all at once to trust anything other than a whimper to leave your mouth if you open it. Elvis knows you though, knows you like the back of his hand or like his guitar and he pushes the gun inside you, slowly but surely, watching the barrel disappear in between your legs as you practically keen at the sensation. It’s the metal contrasting with your skin, with your arousal with everything. It feels like it shouldn’t be up there while feeling less filling than Elvis ever has been. You rock a little against it as part of it brushes against your clit or maybe that’s just yours and Elvis’s hands. At some point you shut your eyes, not because you didn’t want to watch, but because the sensation feels better when you don’t see it, it keeps you grounded in a way having your eyes open doesn’t. Elvis’s voice seems so far away even as you rock against the gun. Had this been what the women were talking about? Did they feel like this too? Powerful and yet stripped bare knowing what was between their legs sliding in and out of their most private parts? 

“Christ they weren’t lyin’ ya look fuckin’. Gonna hafta help me wit’ what’s ‘tween my legs, honey. Wanna taste ya after this- wanna have ya all night. Missed ya and now ya doin’ this? Fuckin’ perfect for me. Best girl I coulda asked for. Ya gonna— Ya hear how ya sound?” His words are slurred against your ear and you do hear yourself, hear how the gun squelches and squishes between your folds and you whine, your head turning trying to bury your head into Elvis’s shoulder even if it should be impossible. Your brain and your heart and your ears register him shushing you, telling you he’s gotcha, telling you how he wants to see you come like this and that does it. You clench around the barrel and a soundless scream leaves your mouth as your orgasm rips through you and leaves you shaking and twitching against Elvis. There’s a warmth next to your leg and you open your eyes to see Elvis’s own release against your leg as he flushes under your gaze. 

Almost as if he wants to distract you he starts to pull the gun out and you shut your eyes at the sensation before opening them back up again when you hear the pop of it being pulled completely out of you. It takes you and Elvis a few minutes after he tosses the gun to the side before you speak. 

“Can’t do that again tonight.” But perhaps another night, your mind thinks as you move to play with Elvis’s cock.

His hand moves to swat your hand away as he slinks down the bed and puts himself at eye level with your vagina. “Don’t want ya to,” he pauses, licking his lips as you allow your legs to fall open just a hair. “Gonna taste ya though. See if ya taste any different.”

You don't.

[cicaklah]

fic author q&a

thank you @the-lady-general for tagging me, I love to procrastinate by doing stuff like this.

1. Why do you write fanfic?

because my brain is a relentless what-if machine and it can't be stopped or tamed. If I wasn't writing it down I'd be losing time just thinking about it, trust me, its far better this way.

and because I love writing, love the fic community, and just love creativity. I've been reading fic literally every single day since I was 11 or 12 and I'm now 38. I'm passionate about the fic writing world and my experience in the 'conventional' writing space has been nothing but anxiety, inferiority and bitterness.

2. Which of your posted stories do you think about the most, even though the story is “finished”?

I don't tend to feel like that about my stories, because I am always up to write sequels or prequels to things, or add stuff onto various universes. I still think often about weibermacht, which is the name of the sex club in my Hitman stories, and one day I will write a proper weibermacht story, but the reason I still think about stories is because they aren't properly finished. I also think a lot about the watch me series because I feel guilty that I never finished it. I have at least another 3 stories in various stages of writing.

I'm planning on doing a WIP amnesty next year (once One Man is finished), and I'm hoping that it will get me to finish some of these things I want to return to, but haven't since.

3. If you could give yourself fic advice from when you first started writing fic, what would that advice be?

Use the momentum of being really into something to make more art. Write as much fic as you can, and don't let guilt catch up with you. It doesn't matter if it sucks; you have to love it, and if you love it in the moment, you are going in the right direction.

4. What’s your relationship to fic stats?

As a professional sort-of statistician I adore them, I wish there were more of them, specifically available over time, and also the number of subscriptions to series would help me as someone who writes in that way. BUT: comparison is the thief of joy. My big fic-related breakdown was over constantly comparing myself to the people I thought were my peers. Stats don't tell you why you aren't doing better than someone, and I know from my profession that you can't just assume things from numbers.

5. Is there a pairing or scenario or friendship you miss writing? If so, why? If not, why not?

I miss Stormpilot (Finn/Poe) circa 2017. What a beautiful time. It will never come again, even if we got something to make the ship sail again, the world has changed.

6. What motivates you to write?

Much like the lady general, I am motivated by wanting to tell jokes, or by specific ideas that enter my brain and won't let go. I am motivated to keep going on one man because there are specific stories I need to share with the rest of the class, but I must tell the rest of the story in order to get there. The journey is the point, but so is the punchline.

7. Why do you write for the fandom(s) that you write for?

Star Trek, specifically SNW, is my current blorbo, so I write for myself and my id on that one. Hitman is for the thirsty thirteen and because its OTP. Oxventure is...complicated. I am so very burned out on that fandom. Super Secret RPF pairing is because of my co-conspirators <3. I've also written way, way too many things because Phoenix and I have talked about them and I've then be POSSESSED.

8. If you’re stuck writing a WIP, what do you do?

As long as I'm still interested in the project, I do my best to push through. I have the philosophy that a story doesn't really exist until it is published anyway. I do have an abandoned WIP folder, and within that is a folder called 'look I'm never writing these ones'. There are 12 stories in that folder. Meanwhile there are 134 I have yet to give up on, not including the 4 that are currently in progress (not including one man.)

Basically I need another WIP amnesty.

9. What do you wish people knew about comments?

They really are the fuel on the fire. I have finished stories because of comments. I have written entire worlds because of comments. I do my best to answer every single comment, and I try to also leave comments as much as I can. At the same time, I have to, for my own sanity, try not to put too much stock in them, because we have to be self-fuelling machines, we have to be self-raising lazaruses. You have to write for yourself, because if you base everything on other people's opinions, you will die nobody.

10. Maybe there’s a question you wish had been on here. What’s that question (and answer)?

I think the question I'd like to ask is what is your personal greatest fic achievement? Not your most popular story, what was the story that you still look at and go: I will never not be proud of that achievement. Mine is the fact I have published 750,000 words and 130 stories and I still feel like I'm only just getting started. That the perseverance over the last 14 years proves that I can do whatever I set my mind to, that I am valuable in a way that matters, and all the doubters of my youth can go fuck themselves forever.

I'm tagging @postalninja, @stickthisbig, @android-and-ale and @alienfuckeronmain and anyone else who wants to do it. lets navel gaze, lads.

[shzmluvrs]

Hi! I'm the same anon that requested the "Batson and The Bat's son" imagine. I'm so glad you had fun writing it ❤️ and honestly- I can't stop rereading it 😭 words can't describe how it makes me feel (in the best way ofc!). I'm hoping it isn't too soon to be asking for a (kinda) sequel 💀 or prequel- depends on you!

Basically Billy talks about the reader to his family but he's kinda vague, since he doesn't wanna reveal too much and he knows Freddy would bombard him and her with questions if he says too much. They also haven't met the reader yet so they start joking that she's imaginary. One day the team gets themselves into a situation they can't get out of. So the reader comes in and saves them and in the heat of the moment Billy says smth like "SEE- SHE'S REAL". After he says that he has to inevitably introduce the reader to them. Idk what else I want to happen 😭 tho I trust your creative mind 🛐 pls take your time and have a good day ✨💖

Omg haii😼!! I'm so happy you enjoyed it, like, I wasn't sure how well it was going to turn out, but I think I did right by you, which is always the goal for any requester🫶🏽. Anyhow, yes, I am happy to continue your "Wonder-Daughter dates Billy" lore, I'm super into this, and I really hope you like it😙💕.

~ Star✨️

Themyscirian Girlfriend

Prompt: The duties of being an "average" teenage boy are proving to be quite difficult for Billy. School, chores, being a superhero, keeping your family safe from supervillains, magic, and monsters... And, oh yeah, making sure you don't get beat up by your superhero girlfriend's best friends. OH, and make sure you don't reveal her secret identity to anyone...

That last bit is extra difficult when you have a nosy, superhero obsessed, younger-by-a-month little brother, though.

Timeline: Post S!:FOTG

TW/Content: Freddy teasing TF outta Billy⚡️Bizzaro cameo😱?!⚡️Swearing, cuz teenagers do that⚡️You (reader) being so awesome-powerful-cool⚡️Billy loving you so, so, so much🥺⚡️So many references, be like Ash and Ketchum all

Reader: Fem! She/Her/Hers Pronouns! Wonder Woman's Daughter!

Requested By: Anon

Back to Master List

The golden light casted above the two of you dowsed your body in gold, creating an aura around your figure that Billy wished was nothing short of permanent. Not that he didn't already believe you to be a gift he had no clue how he earned. He just thought the added halo effect seemed fitting, even if it was just a result of a house/porch light that needed thorough cleaning.

"Thank you for joining me today." You spoke once he disconnected his earbuds from the jack of his phone. "I had a great time with you, as always."

"Of course! I'd never miss a chance to go out with you." He admitted, a lot quieter than his voice had previously been on the walk back to his home. But swiftly, the confidence returned as he clicked his phone off and smiled.

"Next time, I'll introduce you to some Steve Lacy."

You tilted your head while he went on in better clarification.

"He's another musician. You'll like him."

Your lips formed an 'Oh' shape as you nodded in understanding before placing a gentle kiss on his cheek and then his forehead.

"I'll see you next week, okay, Billy?"

He nodded, ignoring the heat rising through his body at your simple acts of affection. Maybe he had gotten a little used to giving it, but receiving it back was always such a hassle for his mind. Though you couldn't help but find it endearing when he'd trip and stumble over his words or be genuinely left in surprise whenever you'd reciprocate whatever love he had to offer.

But not this time, because he had focused himself on a heavier subject matter, his words catching you before you could walk away.

"Do you really have to go?"

"Hm?" You hummed in confusion, your head turning to look back at him. It was once you saw the look of forlorn glossed in his eyes that you gave him your full attention again, making your way back in front of him as he explained.

"For the week, I mean. Do you really have to go all the way back to Them... There-is... Themu...uh..."

"Themyscira?" You finished, Billy nodding at the correct pronunciation of your birthplace while you giggled.

"You can just call it Paradise Island. But, thank you for trying."

Billy nodded respectfully, almost laughing while he talked.

"Yeah, I bet it is paradise if there's more girls like you over there..."

"Huh?" You quirked a brow at his statement, Billy immediately sensing his slip-up and grasping at loose straws to fix it.

"I... I just mean, because like, I really like you and since you're from there, there's other women like you, or...your mom."

"What?!" You gasped, Billy letting out a curt sigh at his own, horrible explanation. So, he just gave up instead. It was probably for the best. Or, more accurately, in his best interest.

"I just-! I'd...! I love you, and I'd never breathe in another person's direction because nobody can compare to you...?"

"...Much better." You praised his statement that came out as more of a question waiting for your approval, giving him a playful narrow of the eyes while he gave a breath of relief.

"But, yes, I do have to return to Themyscira. I am due to compete in this year's Amazonian Olympic Games. They will determine whether or not I am worthy of my title and abilities. You, of all people, should understand this given you have a magical wizard looking out for you and your family, yes?"

"Well, yeah, but-"

"-Plus, I just..." You sighed, looking off for a moment in melancholy. "I just really want to make my mother proud. She was much younger than me when she first competed, and though she didn't win, I still have a lot to live up to since I haven't returned in nearly eight years."

Billy nodded, showing his understanding for the matter while your gaze remained glued to the porch floor beneath you.

"Are you nervous?" He asked, and almost instantly, you nodded. Hell, just thinking about the whole ordeal made the jitters appear in your stomach and hands.

"Immensely."

With a warm smile, Billy gently took both of your hands into his, cupping them so they'd stop shaking while making sure he was able to hold eye contact with you.

"Well, I just want you to remember that you'll do amazing. No matter what happens, you're still worthy to me, and you'll always have a place here. Just, y'know...be careful. And good luck; don't let them get in your head."

"Oh, Billy..." You sighed in fondess but didn't get to express any further gratitude for his kind words as he went on.

"And also, call me if something happens."

You gave him a look, one that was a clear expression of, "Do you really think we have those silly little phone-thingies on the island...?" He caught it, nodding side to side a little before re-wording.

"Send me a bird letter if anything happens. And like, seriously, be careful because I know it's probably a long trip there and back. Which reminds me, please come back soon. And-!"

"-Billy...!"

He hushed.

"...I will, don't worry yourself. I'll be careful, I'll send you bird letters, and most importantly..."

Just as you had before, but directly on his right dimple this time, you placed down a gentle kiss. A reminder and a promise.

"I love you. And I will be back as soon as I can be."

You watched in amusement at the boy in front of you beginning to grow even more bashful than before, unable to look you in the eyes for fear he'd just crumble beneath you. And honestly, neither you nor him would have it any other way. But, just to be on the safe side and make sure he didn't actually do so, you were quick to capture him in a real kiss. Billy eager to return it with a passion that was predictable yet always appreciated and matched.

"You know I have super-hearing, right...??"

The voice went echoed into the air, the same place your skirt and hair went flying at the sudden gust of wind that almost knocked the two of you over.

"The hell...?" Billy commented as he held you to keep the two of you from falling over, looking around in confusion while you merely rolled your eyes.

"Jon..." You all but murmured, and in reference to his super-hearing, he responded with another burst of speed and more echoed words.

"I'm just saying, like, are you two done now? I don't wanna hear you guys swap spit."

"Obnoxious with the use of your powers, I fear you may hardly deserve them...!! Bring yourself here so you don't have to keep listening in!" You shouted in a scolding tone before letting out a breath and shaking your head.

"Sorry. He's my ride." You both explained and apologized to Billy, the boy nodding in understanding with a slight chuckle before the two of you smiled at Jon's very fast appearance. Stopping right in between you with a quickly dispersing cloud of air behind him, he was quick to give you a joking snarl as you shot him a deadpanned glare.

"Can we go, now? I have a cerfew, too, y'know."

"Yeah, well, some of us can't fly, nor have super-speed. Consider yourself lucky."

The raven-haired boy simply shrugged, sticking his hand out towards Billy to initiate a greeting that the brunette returned with a smile.

"'Sup, Jon?"

"Nothin' much, just, y'know... saving the world. No biggie."

Billy nodded in understanding as they dapped each other up, a smug smile gracing both of their lips.

"Same, same."

"Idiots..." You sighed, unable to contain your smile at the friendship that had blossomed between the two. Damian, on the other hand... was still a work in progress, hence is absence.

It wasn't long after their brief moment of catching up that the two of you took your leave, Jon carrying you as you waved down to your boyfriend for the final time this evening, him waving back until Jon was swiftly out of sight. A loud, crashing boom of him breaking the sound barrier to follow up after that caused the front door to swing open.

"I thought I said no Shazaming in the house...?"

Billy whipped around to face Victor, thinking quickly to come up with a viable excuse.

"It wasn't me!"

Nice one, Billy.

"It was my girlfriend, she just left, like... two seconds ago."

Victor raised a brow at his son's explanation, watching as he scratched the back of his neck while continuing to ramble on.

"Well, technically, it wasn't her. She was getting a ride from someone else and he- It- Whatever, nevermind, it doesn't matter."

The man chuckled while his son slipped past him and into the house, letting out a teasing, "Girlfriend, huh? I guess that explains the..." and circling around his own face to imply something. Billy, who didn't even spare a look back, hadn't caught on upon making his way to the dining room.

──────────── •⚡️• ────────────

All five of his siblings, his parents, and welcomed guest Anthea, watched as Billy shoveled spaghetti into his mouth at an ungodly rate. Which one would think would be impossible for a literal demi-god, but here they were. Alas, it's not like anyone could really blame him. It was his favorite meal, it was Rosa's cooking, and he was sick of the vegetarian meals Darla had been making for the past four days.

Although, it wasn't the main reason he was being gawked at in the moment, Freddy and Eugene the ones to be stifling laughter while the rest wanted nothing more than to tell him. It was clear he didn't realize, it was just a matter of how to approach the subject...

"Um... Billy?" Mary began gently, the teen not even looking up from his plate as he continued to eat, unknowing of his entire family's attention on him.

"You have... a little something, like, all over... your face right now." She made the same circling motion around her face as Victor had prior, not that he saw that one either. Just missing it, actually, finally looking up to notice all of the odd stares towards his seat at the table.

"Oh." Was his only reaction, setting down his fork to wipe his cheek. It gained more unseen giggles for some reason, but his only goal was to get back to eating, so natrually, he brushed then off with a curt, "Thank you, Mary." and continued is stuffing.

"No, you still..." Anne spoke aloud this time, her words trailing off when she realized she hadn't caught him in time once he started eating again.

"You just made it worse, dude." Mary giggled, having to lean her head down on the back of her hand to hide it.

"Oh." Billy spoke again, brows furrowed in the slightest while Rosa had set down her own fork. She motioned for her son to come closer, picking up a napkin and slightly dipping it into her water.

"C'mere honey, let me just wipe them for you..."

"Mom- No, stop it, I got it." He reassured, slightly embarrassed by her offer while going for his own napkin. "I'm not five."

And with one quick motion of his napkin up and down his face, it was clear to everyone but him he had simply made the situation much worse.

"There."

It drew in more laughter, this time from everyone, as he stared around the table in confusion that slowly turned into annoyance. It was like being on the outside of an inside joke, and if there was one thing he was tired of feeling in his life, it was being left out.

"What...?" He questioned, Darla the first and very eager to ask simply out of her own and pure curiosity.

"How come you got kissies all over your face?"

. . .

"...Huh...?"

Everyone burst into laughter, Billy's questioning gaze soon shifting into one of realization as he thought back. Back to moments that felt forever ago, where you had placed kisses across his face. Kisses with your lips coated in dark red lipstick...

"Oh... my god, (Y/N), why... just, why...?" He cursed your name lightly, now taking up Rosa on that offer to clean his face. Not that it mattered, his face still as dark red as the kisses that had now been wiped clean out of sheer embarrassment.

"So that's her name?" Victor pointed out, his voice and chest swelling with pride for his son's unadmitted achievement in life. Getting himself a girlfriend. "(Y/N)..."

He moved his hand across in the air as though your name were the title to an upcoming movie or a fresh take. A new and interesting topic, something this family thrived in, especially during dinnertime. And Billy, natrually, was not at all prepared and internally scolded himself for not being careful enough with his words.

It only grew more chaotic from there, Mary, Rosa, Darla, and Anthea letting out squeals loud enough to rival the TV playing in the living room as background noise.

"Billy, you never told me you had a girlfriend! Since, uh, when...?"

"Why would I ever tell you...?" Billy countered Mary's words, Darla already voicing her fantasies on merging her into the already big family.

"Her name is so pretty! Is she pretty, too? I bet she's gorgeous, like a princess! D'you think she'll play mermaid princesses with me?!"

"She must be...!" Rosa agreed swiftly with a laugh, motioning towards Billy fondly with her hand. "You saw all of the little besos she gave him. She probably thinks the same of you, Billy... My sweet boy with his own girlfriend, aww...!"

She just couldn't take it, placing a hand over her heart out of pure happiness for her son who had seemed to have finally found his love. His first one, at that. Which yes, he did, but-

"Mom, stop it, it's not that big of a deal, please..."

Not what he was thinking when you first asked him out, but whatever.

"Oh my gosh," Anne gushed, already jumping in with her own opinion to give. "With a name like that, she's bound to be amazing."

"I-" She kept going, Billy hardly even able to inhale as his siblings gushed on.

"Does she go to Fawcett, too? How come we've never seen her around?"

Freddy's scoff of a laugh caused the attention to leave Billy for a split second and move onto him, the curly-haired boy casually taking a bite from his own plate while he spoke.

"Pro'lly 'cause she ain't real..."

He jumped slightly when Anne quickly landed a slap to his arm, his mouth full and chewing as he laughed and went, "What?" Before it was his mother's turn to scold him verbally.

"Be nice, Freddy, this is probably a big deal for your brother."

Billy rolled his eyes. Not at Freddy (even though he debated kicking him under the table for his implication). But at the sudden attention he was receiving on the topic of his accidentally mentioned girlfriend. He hadn't even known whether or not if he was ready to tell them about you, let alone introducing you to them. Plus, he didn't trust himself enough not to slip up about the fact that you were Valkyrie. Or Wonder Woman's daughter. Or... both facts.

But on the other hand, he wouldn't tolerate any slander of your name, nor would he allow either of you two to become the target of any teasing from the family, so...

"Well, first of all, yes... she is real, Freddy..." Billy glared in his direction, the room going quiet at his words while he continued to clear the case of your existence up.

"And second, Darla, she is... beyond gorgeous. Like, angel levels of pretty, it's unbelievable."

"Wow!!" Darla squealed in excitement as Freddy gave a small tilt of his head to the side.

"Unbelievable, wow, you don't say?"

But nobody heard, too focused on the description of your person and enthralled with just the way he did it. Full of passion and care they hadn't even realized the boy possessed for anyone outside of the family, let alone a girl. A love that couldn't be replicated or replaced, something that'd make you glow red if you had been in the room to hear it.

"She's got this amazing hair that frames her face perfectly, and she wears glasses, but when she takes them off, you can see how, like... just wow her eyes are. They remind me of a type of jewel or something because they literally sparkle when she's happy or are firey with determination when she's- uh... doing something that requires a lot of focus.

Her entire face is just something I can't stop looking at, and gosh, that girl is... her body is-..." He coughed. "She's a little bit taller than me, so... yeah..."

"And you just... never thought to maybe bring her over? Y'know, just 'cause..." Freddy shrugged, holding back his complacent tone as Eugene bobbed his head in agreement.

"And, let me guess, she texts you all the time, and you go on walks around the park together every Saturday."

At their back-to-back quips and hushed laughter, Billy shot them a scowl as Rosa began to nod in oblivious agreement.

"Yeah, sweetie, why don't you invite her over for dinner tomorrow night? It's a Friday, after all. You can tell her we'd love to meet her."

With a chorus of agreements settling consternation into his chest, he blurted out a slew of excuses as he waved his hand up and down as if to brush the idea of you coming over away.

"Nah, no, that's... she- We already have a lot of people here, she might get... overwhelmed! Yeah. And, y'know, it's just not a good idea."

"And whyyy not?" Freddy pushed, leaning against the open palm of his hand while feigning an affable smile and forcing his brows to jump up and down in silent suggestion.

"She's busy." Was his simple statement, Eugene following up on his claim in an instant.

"Busy doinggg...?"

"...Work." He filled in the blank awkwardly, practically squirming in his seat at the expecting silence. He conjured up some of your favorite hobbies in his mind, anything as far away from superhero work as possible, so he could word it as some type of job that you "have".

"She works as a (Favorite/Hobby), and she's probably gonna' be, like, swamped with stuff to do, so... tomorrow wouldn't work."

"Oh, how wonderful!" Rosa praised, impressed by your skills and interests. "We'll certainly have to make time for her over the weekend or next week then!"

"She can't. She'll be busy all week, too."

"Natrually..." Freddy poked with a theatrical eye roll and a closed-mouth grin. "She must be on the 'twenty-four-seven, forever' shift, which I'd expect from a girl with an imaginary sense of work-life balance."

"Harhar, you're hilarious." Billy mocked, now going through with his actions to send his brother a kick to the shin under the table.

"She's actually going to-...on...uh..." He had to stop himself. What would've been a smug brag about you visiting Paradise Island, becoming a realization that would just throw you under the bus. Plus, it's a lot more unbelievable than everything he had said so far. As much joy as it would bring Billy to rub a trip to Themyscria in his face, he'd just have to make Freddy jealous another time. Besides, he didn't necessarily have to lie. He could just not tell them the full story.

It wasn't a lie if he never told them otherwise to begin with.

"She's going on vacation. With her mother. So, she's gonna' be gone for the rest of the week."

"Oh, really?" Mary piped up out of genuine curiosity, having always wanted to travel herself. "Where's she going?"

. . .

"Out of the country."

"Oh."

"How convenient!" Eugene chirped while he slid his phone towards Billy, as if he were telling him to go ahead and prove it. "Why not just FaceTime her, then? You know, just check in like any good boyfriend should? Maybe even shoot her a little text."

"I can't do that!" Billy exclaimed. "I wouldn't wanna bother her or be rude or anything. She's- it's a... mother-daughter bonding thing, it's different. Hard to explain."

In a sense, that could also be construed as truth, considering you'd be competing in an Olympic event, racing and fighting against others and the elements to both claim and prove your status. Something that would ideally make your mother very proud. Billy himself didn't even one-hundred percent understand the whole event, so it was right for one to assume that he probably would have trouble explaining it to his family. Should he ever have to, of course.

Good thing he won't.

A silence loomed over the family as Billy loosely twirled his spaghetti around his fork. He'd almost be grateful for it if it weren't so uncomfortable. He was sick of being pressed about you, not that he wouldn't take any chance to show you off otherwise. And if it wasn't that, he was annoyed at the way Freddy and Eugene didn't seem to even believe you were real, Mary and Anne able to sense this as they gave each other an unsure look.

"Uhm, well..." The goddess coughed, playing with the hem of her (Freddy's) sweater. "How'd you two meet?"

Finally! Something Billy knew the proper answer to!

"Oh, we were-"

Ohp-. Wait, nevermind. No he didn't.

You two were saving the world when you first met, battling a beast that wasn't even real because it turned out to be a test? He didn't know the details of that dilemma very well, either. All he could remember fondly was the way you looked at him when he accidentally revealed himself. Warm and promising, full of care and will-power that he'd been drawn to ever since.

The same look you gave him when you asked him out on that very first date, where he-

Oh, great idea...!

"At an ice cream shop. I was at an ice cream shop, and that's where I met her. She had never had any before, and so I suggested she start off with something simple, like vanilla. I bought some for her and we spent the rest of the afternoon together. We've been going out ever since."

"Awww~!" Rosa and Anne chorused, Freddy already calling nonsense at the story with a few chuckles hidden behind his hand.

"Wait, so... lemme' get this straight..."

"Frederick..." Anne warned with his full name. He ignored (and he'd be apologizing for it later, no doubt).

"You mean to tell me, this girl has never had ice cream before? Like, in her seventeen-to-eighteen years of life, she had never had one singular scoop of frozen milk and sugar?"

"Dude-"

"-Nevermind the fact that you just, outta' nowhere, decided to rizz up some random girl you didn't even know inside of an ice cream parlor."

"Yeah, Freddy, I did." Billy snapped, waving his hand around in the air for a moment as if he were magically conjuring up the false memory. "And apparently, it all worked out because we've been dating for months, now. Thank you very much."

Jaws dropped at this, having not expected such a bond. It was one thing for Billy to have started a fresh relationship. Maybe for him to even be a little secretive about it until things had proven to be smooth sailing for a long time. But months? Either he forgot to brag about it, or she most definitely didn't exist.

Freddy and Anne almost immediately turned to give each other a knowing look, as if they were reading each other's minds before speaking in unison.

"Is this like a Canadian girlfriend thing...?"

Billy huffed through his nose, knowing better than to let insults fly at the dinnertable with his parents present. But regardless of that fact, Mary was the first to tell he had grown fed up, nudging Victor on the arm while she murmured.

"Here we go again..."

"She's real, okay? (Y/N) is very much real, and you two are just jealous because it took an entire dragon rising from the depths of hell for you two to get together."

And off he went, storming away, leaving Freddy and Anthea's mouths agape in shock while Pedro and Eugene practically sobbed from their loud chortles.

"Do you think he'll come back this time if I call him?" Victor cheesed, Mary shaking her hide from side to side at his reference from the last time Freddy had pissed Billy off at the table. Speaking of which...

"Alright, yeah, whatever...!" He called as if the older boy was still listening. "At least we can all actually see my girlfriend...!"

──────────── •⚡️• ────────────

"Is it her?"

Though Freddy's index finger was very obviously directed towards a young girl in the hallway, his brown eyes remained glued to Billy's green ones, waiting for them to change in recognition. They didn't, remaining as stoic as they had when Freddy first began this little game of "Point Out The Person That Looks Closest To Billy's Imaginary Girlfriend."

"No."

"Okay, then it's her." Freddy suggested next, his arm practically flying across Anthea's person just to point his finger at the girl they waltzed past. Billy swore that if the poor thing wasn't in between them, he'd tackle Freddy to he ground, in the middle of the hallway and all. So, maybe it was a good thing Anthea was there.

Billy's eyes drifted to the next victim, a short girl with scene hair and huge platform demonias that stared them down in confusion. He quickly shook his head.

"No, it's not her. (Y/N) is way taller than her. Genetically, without platforms."

"Fine, what about her?" Freddy waved lazily in the direction of someone ahead. "She looks like your type."

Billy huffed.

"That's literally just a guy with long hair."

Freddy's face twisted in disbelief, shaking his head as though he knew better.

"No it isn-"

"It is." Anthea cut in before her boyfriend could finish, turning him towards the person who had finally spun away from his friend and proving to Freddy that he was, in fact, just some dude with a gorgeous head of hair.

"Oh. Mm-."

"Can you just-?" Billy started a desperate plea that went ignored as Freddy smiled in satisfactory, spotting the next girl. Who, yes, was actually a girl this time.

"What about her? Look, she's even how you described, glasses, tall, (Your/Feature), the whole shaza-...shebang..."

Billy hardly wanted to entertain this any longer, but upon looking her direction, noticed swiftly how oddly her features did line up to yours. And yet...

"No, that's not her. I told you already last night, (Y/N) doesn't go here. She's... homeschooled." He excused, quite proud of how fast he had come up with it. Plus, it was kind of true, Diana the one who had taught you most of your studies. And when not her, a private tutor Bruce had graciously spent his money on for you to have.

Yes, the Bruce Wayne.

"Oh, of course. What an awesome coincidence."

"Freddy, stop it." Anthea nudged him, not allowing the teasing to continue any further upon seeing the scowl from last night returning onto Billy's face.

"I'm sure he's probably telling the truth, I mean, what reason would he have to lie? Besides, she's probably just...shy. Maybe she's shy."

And though the girl was satisfied with her answer, Billy could only laugh giddily to himself while remembering the time you had allowed him to watch a very special training session you had in the past.

"Yeah, if you call accidentally bodyslamming Superman "shy," then sure. Most timid girl I know..."

"What was that?"

"Nothing...!" He brushed his remark away when he had almost been caught, quick to change the subject before he could be questioned any further.

"Guys, look, just drop it, alright? I know you don't believe me, and you know what? I don't care anymore. I'm happy, outside of the fact that you're really working my nerves, and that's all that matters. I'll see you two later..."

"Billy, hang on...!" Anthea called, having not meant to cause a fuss on the matter. She couldn't help it. She was entirely too good-natured. But, there was Freddy, always there to ease her own tensions and make her laugh in the process.

"Agh, don't worry about him. He'll get over it. You know, the imaginary girlfriend thing is a common phase, cited by phenomenons all across the globe of people with the exact same conditions and symptoms. Lois Lane even wrote an article on it way-back-when she was first starting out."

"Oh, yeah?" Anthea entertained smugly, Freddy nodding fastly as he droned on.

"Totally. It was a very interesting article, but it made total sense. I mean, even I went through a phase just like it, and I turned out fine."

"Oh?"

And then it clicked, Freddy's face growing a deep shade of red under his freckles.

"Yea- Only when I was like, super tiny-young, I mean. Like, it was- I..."

His rambles stopped when he noticed Anthea's raised brow, almost laughing to himself while they paused in front of her classroom door.

"Just...forget I told you that. I love you my very much, my real and amazing girlfriend. I swear, my pillo- I mean, Jennifer was just a quick fling and nothing compared to the goddess that stands in front of me...?"

Through her giggles, she nodded, pressing a kiss to his cheek and taking her leave.

"That's what I like to hear~. Now, don't go off 'saying the word' while I'm gone, 'kay?"

Freddy nodded at her parting heed, knowing it was a reference to the way he'd ditch class to go off and do hero work without warning.

"I won't, I won't...!"

──────────── •⚡️• ───────────��

"SHAZAM!"

"Alright, what's the plan?!" Freddy shouted as they all gawked up towards the threat, Billy shrugging casually while he shook his head as though he were literally wracking his brain for a proposal.

"Uhh...Ahhh... No idea! I think we should just wing it, to be honest...!"

"That's a terrible plan!!" Mary and Anthea shouted in unison, the shorter girl using magic to cloak over herself and change into her armored attire.

"Superman's weakness is Kryptonite, right?!" Mary swiftly informed the group, Freddy nodding in confirmation. "Good! If Bizzaro is anything like him, it should be the same! If we can distract him long enough for one of us to catch him from behind, we'll have a chance at detaining him! Then, we can send him back to his world...!"

"Yes, awesome, Wisdom of Salamander...!" Billy praised, leaving all of his siblings to groan.

"Solomon...!"

"Whatever...!!"

And with that, they put her plan into action, Freddy and Pedro flying up high until they were facing the Kryptonian clone with complacent, challening grins.

"Hey, Bizarro-Man...!!" Freddy called, nudging Pedro. "Since you're a copy of Superman, is it really true you have super strength like him?! Betcha' we could take you in a fight...!"

The villain merely scoweld, sending a sudden breath of flame towards them. Freddy dodged, Pedro just missing his chance to do the same before being his with the blast and being sent flying into the nearest billboard.

"...Fire breathing?! You can breathe fire?!" Freddy yelled in a panic, unable to add on how that was very much unlike Superman's notable ability of freeze breath before realizing Bizarro was barreling straight for him. Freddy took off, both of their super speed rivaling each other as he crated a path for his siblings to follow.

"Where are we gonna' get Kryptonite?" Darla gasped, all of their heads turning as the two flew by. Mary pondered the situation deeply, having never even seen the green emerald herself, let alone come into contact with it. She figured it was a lost artifact, a gem only the most powerful would have. Except for Superman, all things considered. So maybe more like magical powerful people.

People like...

"The Wizard!" She shouted. "He's the most powerful person we know, having kept all of his powerful objects in his lair, right?"

"Yeah," Billy agreed. "But what does he have to do with anything? He's not the-"

"I know, but the lair is ours, now!" She explained further. "Which means so are all of the things in it!"

"But-!"

"Anthea, Darla...! Go help Freddy and make sure to keep Bizarro busy! Eugene, go help Pedro, make sure he's alright!"

"On it!" Anthea gave Mary a nod, Darla having already dashed away as Eugene made his way towards his brother.

"Billy, you come with me, hurry...!" Mary instructed, grabbing his wrist and practically dragging him along as he followed in confusion.

"Mary, where are we going?! This is really not a good time to ditch them, we-!"

"We're not ditching them." She insisted, opening a random shop door with the intention for it to open a portal to the Rock of Eternity. And luckily, it did just that as she went on with a rapid explanation for her actions.

"You know how Eugene has been mapping the place out? Well, I've been helping him. Mainly making sure he doesn't get lost, but also because I've been studying it all. Making sure we know that everything that's in there is actually safe."

They wandered past the main part of the lair, the area where everything had been decorated freely and most obviously lived in, to the more labrynth-like parts that always confused Billy and Darla whenever they tried their own hands at exploring. But this time, Mary was there to lead him, having a clear sense of direction seeking out whatever it was she was searching for.

"We came across this space or...cave or something. Like a mine, y'know? And at first, I wasn't sure what was in it. Neither of us were, I mean, I couldn't find any of them in any books or articles. It's like... all the gems that are in that cave aren't from here or something. From another world."

"Mary, this really is some interesting stuff, but I don't get wh- woah..."

Billy's rambles were cut short, the two siblings having stopped in front of the very cavern Mary described. The entrance was glowing due to all of the luminous crystals buried off inside of it. Hell, the cave itself seemed neverending, branching off into different routes, holes, and other tunnel systems that were surely easy to get lost in.

Luckily, they didn't need to go too far in, Mary stopping Billy from doing so with the tug of his arm back closer to her person. She was slightly bent over, hovering above a large chunk of what he assumed to be an emerald. Practically matching the color of his eyes, they both sparkled at one another while Mary began to confess her opinions.

"I can't believe I hadn't thought of it before, but if my assumption is correct...if these are otherworldly artifacts...then I don't know what else this could be, other than-"

"Kryptonite..." Billy finished, turning towards his sister with an ecstatic grin. "Mary, you genius, you! Here, c'mon, help me get this stuff out of the wall...!"

──────────── •⚡️• ────────────

"Where the hell is Mary with that Kryptonite...?!" Freddy whined in an almost sing-song tone, blasting a continuous bolt of lightning directly at Bizzaro. It had no effect, merely slowing him down by a second until Darla, Pedro, and Eugene all joined in. And though it didn't hurt him, he was stuck in his tracks, trying his hardest to deflect it.

"She said she had an idea...!" Darla grunted. "But I dunno' what! She just took Billy back to the lair and- AAH!!"

Bizzaro had used all of his strength to blast the lightning back, sending the group soaring backward at the impact. As he began to stalk closer towards Darla, Eugene was quick to jump in the way with a protective, "No!" leaving his lips.

A bolt of lighting shot from his hands, Bizzaro quick to blast it with-

"Freeze...eyes...?"

The beam of icy blue turned Eugene's lighting into a solid rod of frozen air, the large block dropping to the ground and shattering beneath their feet. Freddy had... never seen a power like that before. It confused him, all of them, long enough to be a stall as Bizzaro quickly let off another beam towards them.

"Watch out...!!" Anthea warned, quickly hopping in the way with her hands out. Her palms glowed, swirling with golden power until the buildings and structures around them began to move and shift rapidly. Power of Axis, always a helpful tool in changing perspective, but not in changing the course of a blow to its intended target. Given the girl had learned this fact the hard way in the past, she was quick to turn to them in haste.

"We have to move, hurry! If we don't, we'll still get hit!"

Almost as if on cue, they watched the blast of ice cold vision barrelled towards them through a park, just barely missing all of the different play structures as the group swiftly managed to fly off in different directions. Freddy was sure to take Anthea in his arms, watching as the beam instead left a jungle gym frozen solid into a dome.

"Guys...!!"

Looking towards the voice, they were happy to spot Mary and Billy flying back towards them with a glowing, green gem in hand.

"No way-No way-No way!!" Freddy gushed as they approached, showing it off with pride. "You two actually found Kryptonite?! Do you know how rare this is?! Like, it's literally thought to be a myth, like, it's more believable than your imaginary girlfriend...!"

"Oh my god..." Billy groaned as the rest giggled. "C'mon, man, it's been like a week!"

"I'm being totally serious!" Freddy held his hands up as though he were giving surrender while Billy shook his head in dismay.

Mary sighed, floating in between the two boys with the gem in hand.

"Not the time, guys. Look, if we can keep Bizzaro distracted for just a little longer, this should definitely do the trick. We got this."

She held out her fist towards Billy, sending him a sure smile.

"You ready?"

"Yeah," he nodded, giving a smirk of his own before scanning the land beneath for their foe. He bumped her fist back. "Let's kick this dude's ass."

──────────── •⚡️• ────────────

"Dude, we're getting our asses kicked...!!" Eugene grunted, struggling to pick himself up from the ground as he clutched his side.

"It's like he's more powerful than before!" Anthea alluded, wiping the blood from her lip as she helped Mary from the ground and onto her shoulder.

"I don't... understand..." She coughed, grateful for the support as she looked up to her two brothers, trying their best to subdue Bizzaro hand-to-hand.

"The Kryptonite should be working. It should...be making him weaker."

"Maybe it isn't what you thought it was..." Darla whimpered, sending her sister a look of vanquish.

Billy watched as Bizzaro landed a blow onto Freddy's chest, the man in blue being sent flying back into the earth with a loud yelp and a crash. He wanted to call for him but reminded himself to focus on the battle at hand if there would be any chance of defeat. Even if he was scared, as much as he didn't want to admit it.

You'd be scared, too, if some weird copy of Superman was hurdling towards you, Kryptonite wedged into his bleeding shoulder (blue blood, which was quite jarring when they first stabbed him) with some obtuse goal to destroy the world he deemed "lesser" than his own.

Because of this, he'd frozen up, unsure of how to counter his speed let alone his attack. Instead, he took it like a champ, as he had many punches even before he was a superhero, and went hurdling towards the ground just as Freddy had.

"Oh. Hey, man..." Freddy groaned when his brother appeared next to him.

"Having fun, yet?" Billy haphazardly joked, referring to Freddy's "love" and "enjoyment" for his "superhero duties."

"Oh, yeah, loads." He nodded unconvincingly, wiping the blood from his nose with his arm. "I love the smell of iron in the morning. And, y'know- the sounds of terror and destruction really just...pull it all together."

They helped each other up, checking themselves for any fatal injuries. And, when they found none, regrouped with the rest of their family in doldrums as they watched Bizzaro inflict his reign of dismantling on the city.

"What're we gonna do?" Darla asked, looking to her brother in worry.

"Your realm is not capable of destroying power such as this. How are we to do the same?"

Anthea's words had been directed towards Freddy but left Billy's mind swirling instead. Was she right? She had to be...

If the Champions of Magic and an entire goddess couldn't decide the fate of their opponents on the battlefield, who could?

. . .

Their heads whipped up at the sound of a furious battle cry, a shimmer of gold and the quick blur of your (H/C) locks barreling towards the enemy. Your sword drawn and in position to leave its target slain as you attacked from above, a ferocious look on your face for none other than the mockery of hope and justice below you.

When your weapon made contact, you knew better than to think it'd actually cut through Bizarro. But, it did send him hurdling towards the dirt as he had Freddy and Billy moments earlier. You had cut a large chunk of the green Kryptonite from his shoulder, dimming him back to his normal level of powerful abilities. And yet, you knew this wasn't the end, much more work to be done as you announced your threat.

"My mother and her colleagues have defeated you once, and you dare to return to this world and cause its people pain and anguish once again?!" Your booming scolds might've reminded someone that of a parent, pointing your sword below you at Bizzaro's stunned figure.

"How dare you have such audacity?! Let it be known I will not allow you to do so, and you will now fall by my hand, even if it kills me!"

"Valkyrie?!" - "(Y/N)?!"

Both of your aliases spoken into the air at the same time, yet it was Billy who wanted to slap himself after being the only one to have said your real name rather than your well-known, hero one. He even tried to ignore the looks his siblings (and Anthea) gave him, pure shock just oozing from their figures.

"That's (Y/N)?!" Mary shouted in bafflement.

"She's real?!" Freddy's tone of incredulity made Billy's eyes roll for a split second.

Not alloted any time for anyone to question or answer further, your head whipped back, you're firey (E/C) eyes glaring deeply into Billy's.

"You...!" You bellowed menacingly, and suddenly, he was a lot less excited to see you.

"Wha-?! Are you-? Oh...my gosh, are you mad at me right now?..."

From a bystander's point of view, it definitely looked a little silly, your shorter and younger appearing figure stomping towards this grown adult man, who was fearfully stumbling back away from you as you approached with anger. His face was dowsed in fear, and yours?

Where to begin...

"I leave you on your lonesome to protect your people for a week! A week! And this is what I'm fated to return to?! Do you even know what it is you've done allowing him to remain in such close proximity to green Kryptonite?!"

"I- Uh...Well, technically, it wasn't even really my idea, 'cause-"

"William."

You seethed his full name, cutting off his excuses, which consisted of throwing his older sister under the bus. She thanked whatever God above for that one, not even having been in your presence for a mere two minutes, and was terrified of your wrath.

The groan of Bizzaro rising from the dirt stopped the rest of your reprimands, leaving you the sigh in simple vexation before pointing a finger at your incautious lover.

"I will deal with you later."

A silence passed over as you leaped into action, everyone still left a bit shaken at everything you had to offer so far. Including Billy, even though all he could muster up was a quiet, "I told you she was real..."

"That's your girlfriend?!" Freddy nearly exploded. "Valkyrie is your girlfriend?! Dude, I-...! You-! You do know she's Wonder Woman's whole ass daughter, right?! How the fu-?!"

"-Clearly...!" Mary interrupted loudly before he could heavily cuss around Darla. "He's got a type!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever!" Billy exclaimed, already beginning to hover above the ground in hopes to aid his girlfriend. "It doesn't matter right now. We have to help her, c'mon!"

It was once Anthea and the Champions joined the fight, Bizzaro was left with a slim chance of winning. Especially without the enhancement of that same green jewel that always seemed to leave Superman weakened and withered. Mary was still lost on such fact, and Freddy was searching his mind for any possibility of how that could be so.

"I don't get it!" He finally wailed, exhausted from the fight and from using his brain overtime. "He's just like Superman, almost...! If he's such a copy, then how come none of our plans are working?!"

"That is because he is not a copy." You stated plainly, no evidence of normalcy left in your voice. What was left was that of a warrior. A warrior thick in the ways of battle and strategy, knowing your enemy much more than your allies seemed to.

"He is a mirror. Bizzaro, El-Kal, is from a twisted world he created. Everything there, including himself, is some backwards nuisance of what we're so used to here on our planet."

"Hold...Hold'up..." Eugene paused, unable to believe the information being told to him. "This guy's is from another planet just like ours?"

"Yes and no. His world resembles ours, but it is not. It is cubed shaped and docile, with a blue sun that amplifies El-Kal's strength. Much like how this earth's yellow sun aids Superman's. Kal-El."

"Ohh, ha, that's funny, I get it." Freddy chuckled. "It's all backwards over there, so Kal-El is...yeah, that's...that's bad..."

"Well," you smirked, the first and only hint of positivity you had exuded from your person since you had arrived. "Not all bad."

From the latchel which normally held your Lasso of Truth (well, a more miniature one, technically, because your mother wouldn't dare give up her own), was a medium-sized vile of blue liquid clipped in its place. You unhooked it carefully, showing it off to the group as your smirk stretched into a satisfied grin.

"What are the great and powerful without their weaknesses? Blue Kryptonite, liquefied. When I first arrived home this morning, I had seen the news. Trouble here in the heart of Philidelphia, and I immediately recognized that... that..."

"That dumbass question mark on his chest?" Billy spoke up for you. In much more vulgar terms, sure, but you couldn't help but agree with an admitting nod.

"Yes, precisely. I knew what he was capable of, and I knew that you all more than likely didn't have the proper contingencies to stop him. So, I asked Damian for a favor..."

Freddy leaned in towards Billy, putting a hand up as if it'd conceal his bad whispers.

"Who's Damian?"

"Don't worry about it." Billy ignored, slapping him away lightly as you finished.

"...With this, we will surely defeat Bizarro. I can detain him, and I will convince him to leave this world in peace once again."

You opened the vile, neon blue smoke immediately pouring from it like dry-freeze until you began to dump some of the contents onto the blade of your sword.

"All I need for you all to do, is keep him busy. Until then, hold out your hands..."

They all did as told, watching as the rest of the liquid went dumped into their palms while you explained such actions.

"Should any of you come into physical combat with him, your touch will now weaken him, leaving him vulnerable. Easier to take down."

"And what about you?" Billy asked, his tone laced with worry for your well-being. Your gaze softened as you moved closer, hardly used to having to look up at him. But, you could admit, you found it a nice change of pace as you reached up to hold his face in your palm.

"I will do what I have to. Don't worry about me, okay?"

"That's literally impossible, but okay."

You chuckled.

"Fair. Your only job is to make sure all goes well. And... don't make anymore 'dumbass' decisions. You keep that green Kryptonite away from Bizzaro."

Billy nodded, laughing at your use of his improper language before floating upwards to complete his task.

"Alright, guys...!" He called down, his siblings following in suite while you motioned Anthea to remain with you at ground levels.

"Let's kick this guy's ass. For real this time, though."

──────────── •⚡️• ────────────

"Who is that?!" Rosa shouted as she stared at her TV in horror, scared for her superhero children tackling the evil Superman imposter with some random girl who had just shown up, as any mother would be.

Almost as soon as Victor moved to grab the keys for his van, the front door opened and in waltzed their children. Like ducks in a row, Mary, Pedro, Eugene, Darla, Freddy, Anthea, Billy, and-... ??

"Hi, mom!"

"Hey, Ma!"

"Hi, Mommy!"

"'Sup, Dad?"

The choruses of their greetings eased their nerves and tensions, but the sight of a new girl with glasses and her hair in a fancy, braided updo took them by surprise. She remained close to Billy, seemingly glued to his arm as he quietly attempted to convince her of the kind nature of his parents.

"Are you sure? I don't want to impose if it's trouble..."

"(Y/N), don't worry. They've been wanting to meet you for forever, you have nothing to worry about. They'll love you."

You looked towards him in surprise, already growing more anxious by the second.

"You told them about me?"

"Only the important stuff." He winked jokingly.

"Ah! My babies...!" Rosa shouted her greeting, more grateful than ever that they had returned safely, running over and planting a kiss on each one of their foreheads and pulling Darla and Anthea into bone crushing hugs.

So...! Uh," Victor started, already interested in your figure remaining quiet by the door. "Who's the new girl?"

Billy smiled this time, neither embarrassed nor annoyed by the inquiry of you while he proudly pulled your body into his by the waist.

"She's-"

"She's the coolest, ever!" Freddy announced, Darla practically jumping up and down as she agreed.

"Uh huh! And she's so pretty, just like I knew she'd be!"

"She literally sent that supervillain back to where he came from...! Like, without even breaking a sweat!" Eugene praised, leaving your cheeks to grow red with bashfulness.

"I have to admit, I think she'd be a good influence on Billy. She's super smart."

"And a good fighter."

Mary and Anthea were happy to admit such facts, Pedro the last to give a reserved shrug and a polite smile.

"I like her. She's dope."

Rosa and Victor were left to stand awkwardly, unsure of what to make of all the high-end words being spewed about like lightning while you struggled to fight back your grin.

"As I was saying...!" Billy exclaimed, giving his siblings the "Shut Up So I Can Talk" look. "This is (Y/N). My girlfriend."

Victor was the first to happily greet you, explaining how he'd heard so much about you, all good things (as you could clearly see), and that he was happy to have finally met you. Rosa, on the other hand, was leaned back with her eyes glued to the news on the TV. They would flicker back to you every now and again, making your heart beat faster in nerves until...

"Crazy question, I know... but...that doesn't happen to be you on the news... yeah?"

Immediately, you looked towards Billy, who could only shrug and scratch the back of his neck.

"The important stuff, huh?"

"Sorry...I tried..."

You sighed, pinching the bridge of your nose before giving a polite nod and announcing your introduction one final time...

"Yes, that... would be me. My name is (Y/N), otherwise known as Valkyrie. Daughter of Wonder Woman, Granddaughter of Zeus, and last born... of Themyscria."

Don't make me steal this idea and write a full-fledged book, Anon, I'll do it🤨 (I probably won't cuz writer's block likes to eat me alive). But seriously, I really hope you like this because again, I adore this, and I defo want more of your ideas/scenarios🥰🫶🏽.

~ Star✨️

Back to Master List

[finalgirlkateausten]

📚📚📚 (that’s right, three rounds s’il vous plait ;)

haha thank you for the triple ask! I'll give you the other two in separate posts. this is sort of a prequel to a s4 canon divergence fic I'm working on, and... I did not intend for it to get this long 😅 (this is for the pinterest ask game 👀)

PUT ME BACK TOGETHER AGAIN

Succession s4 canon divergence ~ kenrava ~ 1,213 words ~ rated M

He calls her once, twice, three times, after the funeral. Way after the funeral. It's late, so late that she could be asleep, could be legitimately missing his calls, but he doubts she would answer if she was awake.

And maybe this isn't the most logical next step, after that polite but implicit denial, but earlier that day he'd threatened to lay down in front of her car so he's not feeling fucking logical on the day of his dad's funeral and Roman is AWOL and Shiv is-- fucking pregnant? Maybe staying with Tom? Not a shoulder to lean on, at any rate, so Kendall dodges business partners and politicians and everyone else who wants to probe him about the GoJo deal or tell him how deeply fucking sorry they are and finally collapses into the backseat of his car.

He checks his watch.

Half past two in the morning.

He calls his driver anyway, Fikret is used to keeping up with his weirdass schedule, and asks him to take him upstate. In the time it takes him to arrive, he double checks with the security team he still has following Rava and the kids. Which, okay, he can see how that maybe could've been a little intimidating. But it tells him to head up the coast to Connecticut, and he feels a painful weight in his chest when he gives Fikret the address to the beach house he and Rava had picked out together sometime between their engagement and honeymoon. He really... he can't remember the last time he was there.

The drive takes less than two hours, and when Kendall looks at his watch and sees that it reads 4:30, he winces a little. Rava probably won't be thrilled that he's waking her up at this hour.

He has Fikret pull into the garage, because the code is the date they got engaged and it's the same for really every password they'd both needed to know. Never their wedding anniversary, interestingly enough. Rava had said, way back when, that that was too easy to find and guess. But it feels a little metaphorical now.

Kendall is leaning against the hood of the car, frowning at the door leading into the house and wondering if he can open the deadbolt with his mind, when it opens on its own. He only wonders if he's suddenly become a Jedi for about half a second before Rava appears, wearing an old R.E.M concert tee with just her underwear, her go-to pajamas for as long as he'd known her.

"Ken!?" Her voice is hoarse with sleep and he's making damn sure that his eyes are glued to hers and she runs a hand through her bedhead as she descends the stairs, stopping a good six feet away from him. "Why the fuck are you here?"

He swallows hard, unable to think of an all-encompassing answer. "...to apologize," he offers quietly. "I... Rav, I've been saying some fucked-up shit. And I don't know-- I barely know what's going on in my head half the time, let alone coming out my mouth. But I don't want to lose you."

She raises both eyebrows, hands on her hips. "It's a little late for that."

"No, I mean..." he really doesn't need a reminder that he's divorced. He's well aware of that on any given day. "What I was saying about making a play for custody. That-- that was stupid. You're a good mother, Rava, way fucking better than I am as a dad. I just needed to say that. I need you to know that I'm sorry, and that I-- I love you." He winces at the surprise and wariness that flash over her face. "In a-- you know. Divorced co-parents kind of way." He stares at her, swallowing hard, trying not to blink. He's never gotten over her, ever, doesn't she fucking know that?

"Even though I'm hysterical?" She smiles, a little viciously, and he can tell the more she wakes up the angrier he's getting, but he takes a step forward anyway, trying to get invited in instead of kicked out.

"I didn't want you to be freaking out," he tries. "I-- I wanted the kids at their grandfather's funeral, but in hindsight, I understand why you didn't, and it was probably good that they weren't there. You were right."

She lifts her chin, regarding him icily. "About...?"

Kendall bites back a huff. "I don't know, fucking-- everything? You were right that I needed to clean up my act for the kids and you were right that I didn't have the willpower to do it and you were right that one time you yelled at me that my dad didn't love me enough to fulfill any of his promises, because he didn't and now my whole life is a gaping hole and I'm fighting the Swedes for my birthright, and you were right to resist me trying to be for the kids what he was for me because he was a good business leader and a fucking shitty dad, but I was a shitty dad anyway, you were right about that too, and you were right when you said that if I drove you away I would regret it eventually." He nods jerkily. "I do. I do regret it. You're my fuckin' lighthouse, Rava. You always have been. I think I need you now worse than I ever have before."

She folds her arms over her chest. "That's too fucking bad."

He winces. "Yeah. I deserve that."

The silence stretches out before them, and everything feels fragile and breakable, and he tries to reach out without actually reaching for her, like that will lessen the sting of rejection. "Rava. What can I do to make it up to you?"

She sighs slowly. "Drive back to New York?"

He swallows hard. "Look, say the word and I will, but I really think we should talk."

"That's the problem, Kendall," Rava says through gritted teeth, stepping closer to him. "I don't-- I am sick and tired of listening to you talk. You're all bark and no bite, and you change your mind with the weather. I stopped believing most of what comes out of your mouth a year ago."

He reaches out, since she's getting closer, gently resting his hand on her arm. He doesn't want her to think he's trying to restrain her. "Then I could... crash in the guest room? Spend time with the kids tomorrow? Give you space, but still try to fix what I've fucked up this week?"

Rava closes her eyes, leans into him. "I-- I don't know, Kendall."

Gently, carefully, he reaches out to cup her cheek, his fingers brushing through her hair. "Please," he whispers. "Let me try."

She looks up at him. "Sophie's going to be worse than I am."

"I'm prepared for that," he murmurs. "What do you need, right now? While the kids are asleep?"

She steps back from him, looks him up and down. He thinks he recognizes the look in her eye, but surely--

And then Rava is kissing him, her hands around his neck, her body warm against his. She's shaking. Or he is.

Kendall closes his eyes and kisses her back.

[jedibongrip]

title: be the dreadful need (in the devotee) Relationship: anakin/obiwan Rating: M tags: AU, Gods & Old Gods, set in the GFFA, no jedi Summary: Obi-Wan travels to Tatooine to fulfill his late father's life's work. He finds something else to dedicate his life to, in the ruins of a forgotten wasteland.

for the @deaddoveobikin blasphemy week day 3 prompt: gods, prophets, false prophets! a (wip) chaptered fic. read under the cut or on ao3 for all the tags/notes

If Mace Windu were a less kind friend and employer, he would deny Obi-Wan’s request for a sabbatical, coming so soon as his bereavement leave. Instead, he raises an eyebrow as Obi-Wan silently slides his forms across his desk, unwilling to make eye contact.

“You know you don’t have to continue his work,” Mace reminds him, though he signs the forms anyway.

Obi-Wan shakes his head. “I know.” A moment passes. “But I do.”

(Perhaps it’s a show of how much Mace respects him, giving him the space and money to go on this search that he clearly thinks is foolish. Perhaps Obi-Wan would be better off if Mace respected him a little less.)

Permission granted, substitutes found, and some measly funding acquired, the only thing Obi-Wan has to do is gather supplies and pack his things before he heads off. His apartment is stuffed to the bring with boxes, datapads and notebooks, maps and totems, scrawlings of all different kinds, all overflowing and toppling over each other. The more delicate items - glass compasses that never pointed north, beautiful daggers and knives too old and dubious to be used as anything but decoration, but too unsettling to even be used as that, carefully wrapped bone and pottery remnants - were littered over every table and counter space that he has. Obi-Wan does his best to move through the turbulent sea of debris, making his way to his bedroom, the only room which he has managed to keep free of all this junk.

He shakes his head. It isn’t junk, he shouldn’t call it that. All these dusty artifacts, these unorganized folders and notes, this is all Qui-Gon’s work. It’s all that’s left of him. And all of it has been left to Obi-Wan.

He collapses onto his bed, fatigue overtaking him and weighing him down. His eyes burn from the dust and the ashes of incense that have overtaken his apartment, ever since he hauled in what was left in Qui-Gon’s office and house. Like a true academic, Qui-Gon had very little in the way of savings or property left behind, and what he did have was quickly snatched up by his remaining, distant blood relations. There was nothing of comfort or monetary value left to Obi-Wan, the quasi-son that Qui-Gon half-raised but could never stomach the thought of adopting. Between his moments of grief, Obi-Wan can feel himself grow bitter about it. It’s an old hurt, one he healed from and accepted, but Qui-Gon’s passing seems to have bruised the scar tissue of it. But hurt and bitter as he could grow to be, Obi-Wan loved Qui-Gon. Loved and cared about him, cared for him as he grew old and his body and mind began to fail. Loved him enough to promise to finish his research. And despite what everyone tells him, about how he doesn’t need to keep a promise he made to calm an old and dying man, Obi-Wan knows himself to be too loyal to break such a vow.

Even if he knows he’s being sent on a fool’s search. Because even before Qui-Gon’s health declined, everyone knew that his theories and research were odd. Everyone thought he was mad for what he was proposing. Everyone insisted that Qui-Gon Jinn, Doctor of Intergalactic Archeology of Sentient Species, study and research something that was actually in his field. But no. Qui-Gon, ever the rebel, even as he lectured in one of the most prestigious and expensive universities in the Inner Core, insisted that he was right, that he could prove his theory, that he just needed a bit more time.

Well, Obi-Wan thought, time’s up. He sits up and sighs, keeping his eyes closed for a moment longer. When he opens them, he sees his own degrees hanging on his walls. Obi-Wan Kenobi. Bachelor of Intergalactic History. Master of Socio-Political Sentient Organization. Doctor of Intergalactic Anthropology. Oh, how he felt like a rebel when he didn’t follow exactly in Qui-Gon’s footsteps when he turned away from the mysteries of the dead to focus on the mysteries of the living. He ended up playing right into his hand.

Obi-Wan sighs again and pushes himself off his bed. He has a lot of packing to do if he wants to leave by noon tomorrow. He can’t bring himself to be thankful that Qui-Gon did leave him his ship, as helpful as it will be to cut down costs on his journey. It’s a rustbucket, one that Obi-Wan has always hated flying in. Very well, he thinks, reaching under his bed for his suitcase.

Qui-Gon used to love dragging him on cross-quadrant trips. This will be like a trip down memory lane, a homecoming, of sorts, and a final goodbye all wrapped in one. If he’s lucky (and he rarely is) the ship might hold together long enough for him to get there and back, before he can sell it for scrap.

—

It’s late afternoon when Obi-Wan finally leaves orbit, parking garage fees paid, his bags and crates safely stored on board, and coordinates for the source of Qui-Gon’s obsession plugged in and waiting until Obi-Wan weaves his way through traffic to get to a hyperspace route.

The jolt into hyperspace is momentarily unpleasant, a rush of unease and queasiness rushing through Obi-Wan’s body, as if all his cells know that they are not meant to be moving so far, so fast, and so they protest. Then the jerking and creaking of the ship ceases, and planets and stars are nothing but smudges in the pitch of space, and his body and mind calm enough for him to set the ship on autopilot and step out of the cockpit.

The ship used to feel so much bigger when he was a boy. Even after all his growth spurts and moments of teenage rebellion - like the time he stole this very ship to go on his own adventure - it felt spacious and freeing, even as he had to stoop to walk through doorways or squeeze into his childhood bunk. Without the sheen of adventure and the comfort of Qui-Gon's constant presence - physical or not - Obi-Wan saw the ship with the eyes of an adult; old and aging, cramped, the amalgamation of cheaply pawned and traded parts that once felt magical and eclectic, and now felt vaguely unsafe and slapdash. Every corner had a memory so Obi-Wan keeps his head down as he walks through the corridors. When he was loading the ship, he automatically began storing his things in the tiny cabin that he used to stay in, until he realized what a waste it was. Qui-Gon’s berth was larger and, of course, wasn’t being used. Obi-Wan moved his things there, but now that he walks through the doorway, he feels awkward and out of place.

He intended to look over his data in the comfort of the bed, but he cowardly grabs the bags he thinks have the maps and pads that he needs and brings them to the common area. He carefully unrolls the star maps onto the table. Some of them are copies, some are original from years ago - Qui-Gon always dodged any questions about exactly how old they were, or how they came into his possession. But despite years separating some of the data, all of them focus on the same system, the same accursed planet staying in focus in the centre.

Tatooine.

An abandoned desert planet, a wasteland, a graveyard, a planet that hasn’t held any sentient life for thousands of years, since before the republic was even an utterance on anyone’s lips.

The place that had captured Qui-Gon’s interest, his soul, his mind, since Obi-Wan was a boy.

Many intergalactic archeologists had a passing interest in Tatooine, Obi-Wan knew. Despite its dry and desolate state, Tatooine once held oceans, possibly had fresh water too. Some academics and conspiracy theorists believe that Tatooine may have once held sentient life - though what happened to it, if it ever existed, was where many debates emerged. Some thought that, if intelligence was once found on Tatooine, it would have died out when four of the planet’s moons escaped orbit, leaving it with only three remaining to protect it from the blaze of the twin suns. Others thought that the original population could have been some of the first to discover interplanetary flight, and left their dying planet in the hopes of finding a new home.

The nature of the shifting tides of sand means that any remains, any evidence, had long since been buried or eroded by time. What few attempts have been made to mine what few valuable materials exist on Tatooine have been too small to make a dent on the surface, and have never been profitable enough to inspire greater efforts to explore or excavate the planet. Tatooine, it seemed, was fated to remain a forgotten mystery, one that most people didn't care enough about to try to solve.

And despite all of this, Qui-Gon became insistent that Tatooine is where ‘it all’ began. A lifetime of digging up burial grounds, worship grounds, ancient temples, of learning about how different systems thought of life and death and the divine, and yet he thought that all of that flowed from Tatooine. Every myth, every god, every ceremony he ever uncovered, it all pointed him to a planet that, by all accounts, seemed to be as dead as the bones he used to study.

And Obi-Wan is heading straight for it. He fights off another sigh as he scans Qui-Gon’s notes, full of half-baked theories of settlements and rituals, rambles in a code that Obi-Wan is only half fluent in. He isn’t sure why this is something he needs to do. Will it make him feel better, when he arrives in a wasteland and finds nothing? Will it honour the man who cared for him for so many years? Will it make up for all the arguments and fights and months of silence that weighed them down as time went on? Hardly anyone entertained Qui-Gon’s hypotheses, Obi-Wan certainly didn’t when he was alive. What does he prove by going there, except that his father wasted his time, his life when he could have been finding fulfillment somewhere else?

And still, the ship races on, through star systems and empty space, heading to the middle of nowhere and the centre of a universe that Obi-Wan never really understood.

Obi-Wan tries to translate Qui-Gon’s thoughts into ones that he can understand. It's unforgiving work. There will be plenty of time to give himself a headache trying to do that later. Instead, he goes and checks the batteries on some of the supplies he’ll be using, goes to make sure he has all the solar panels he’ll need while he is grounded. After all, it’s not like Tatooine has a shortage of sun. All he'll have on that planet is sun, time, and the unwanted fragments of Qui-Gon's career.

—

The relief Obi-Wan feels when he finally lands on Tatooine is short-lived. After days of travelling through the endless night of space, he’s developed a perpetual nausea, a dull headache behind his eyes, and an unpleasantly greasiness to his skin. It’s almost instinctual, opening up the ramp to stumble out to the solid ground beneath his ship, to relish in the marvellous feeling of being still.

He feels the heat on his skin before he registers it. The ship shades him from the glare of the twin suns yet he swears he already feels his skin searing. The air is dry, sucking the moisture from his lips, leaving his mouth feeling gummy. He only wanted to stand on solid earth for a few minutes, but dizziness from the heat forces him to the ground, sprawled on the unforgiving rock shelf that he landed on, already feeling grains of sand working their way into his shoes.

This is the forgotten hell that Qui-Gon dreamed of for years. Obi-Wan already has half a mind to leave and venture to one of the many seedy resort planets that are scattered around the middle and outer rims.

He takes a few deep, scorching breaths and hauls himself upright, using the ramp of the ship as support. The metal is already almost too hot to touch. Shaking off lightheadedness, he staggers back into the ship, hastily closing the door behind him, trying to keep the blasted heat out for as long as possible. His ship is still pleasantly cool and feels all the colder now that he’s drenched in sweat. He takes a moment to centre himself, a task that has become all the more arduous since Qui-Gon’s death.

He must gather and check his supplies once more, preferably before his ship gets too hot. He should double-check his maps and scan his surroundings, make sure that he’s stopped in a safe location, somewhat close to one of the possible sites that Qui-Gon wrote about. Obi-Wan had no false illusions about the heat of the planet, but knowing it and feeling it are two different things. He needs to check his radiation block and ensure that he has enough bacta and ointment to soothe any burns that he is sure to get. Make sure that none of his water tanks broke or tipped over during his difficult descent and landing.

There’s so much to do and Obi-Wan is already so tired of it all. He sighs and goes to the ship's computer. He ought to coordinate his clocks with the planet, now that he’s arrived. He checks when the suns set.

Tatoo I sets in eighteen hours. Tatoo II, twenty.

Obi-Wan sighs again. Well, he thinks, I better get moving.

He stays seated for many more minutes.

—

Loaded up with gear, it feels even hotter outside. The suns are at Obi-Wan’s back, their light narrowing as they descend under the horizon, feeling like a glare from an old, angry god. He can feel his skin burning through the protective layers of clothing and UV block that he’s put on. He almost isn’t sure if it's real or just the phantom pain of burns that he’s gotten and healed over the five days that he’s been on Tatooine.

Five days on Tatooine. The thought makes his body ache. Five long, miserable days and nothing to show for it. He has less than nothing. He expected his search to come up empty, but he didn’t expect it to take so long. He only managed to find and search two of the sites that Qui-Gon wrote about, half-crazed scribbles talking about star alignment, dates and coordinates that seemed to repeat themselves everywhere he looked. On each page he searched through, he half expected Qui-Gon to start rambling about fractal and Fibonacci sequences. To make matters worse as he was flicking through one of Qui-Gon’s notebooks the night before, eyes burning, movements lethargic and clumsy, he found that a few of the pages had gotten stuck together by time and who knows what. Peeling them apart revealed more locations, more sites of interest. More work for Obi-Wan to do.

It leaves a bitter taste in his mouth. He takes a swig from one of his canteens, drains the last of the water it in, and reattaches it to his pack. It clinks against all the other empty bottles that he’s finished during his trek today, a cacophonous symphony to score his movements. He’s hiked up rock formations, crawled across cracking limestone bridges, and crossed a seemingly endless sea of sand. He should turn around and head back to the ship. He wants to turn around and head back to the ship.

But the thought of that terrible sun shining in his face, blinding him as he stumbles back to his bed almost sickens him. He huffs and puffs as he hauls himself up the jagged side of another rocky peak. It seems much taller than all the others he’s scaled but it could be exhaustion and irritation fooling him. He’s long stopped heading towards the spot that Qui-Gon marked on a map. Instead, he’s in search of something much more valuable: shade.

Yes, Obi-Wan thinks, as he continues to hike up the flattening incline. If he can find some shade, he can rest, maybe even take a short nap. He’ll wait until a sun has set and start making his way back to his ship. While he’s been scaling this large formation for a few hours, the mountain range rising out of and dipping below the sand like a wave, everything before was flat. He’ll be able to see the ship once he’s down, he can even send one of the small droids he stuck in his pocket to it in advance to light his way. He hasn’t seen any sign of life since he landed. The isolation, the feeling like he’s the only thing to exist in the whole galaxy, is as terrifying as it is exhilarating.

Obi-Wan keeps walking up the mountain, the curve gentle and the stone beneath his feet flat. It curves upwards and around. With each step, Obi-Wan is hopeful that shade will appear. It seems almost endless, a Tantalus torture just for him. His eyes droop as he walks and his neck becomes limp under the weight of his head.

Almost imperceptibly Obi-Wan feels a coolness against his legs. He pries his eyes open and sees a large stone jutting out of the ground to his right. It stands to his shoulders but is angled in such a way that its shadow is cast long and low against the ground. He almost collapses with his haste to crawl to it, pressing his back against it and twisting his body to fit within the comforting embrace of its darkness. Relative to everything else on the planet, its surface and the ground beneath him feel damp. He sheds his pack and lets it wobble and tremble, seeking an equilibrium on the gentle slope.

Exhaustion pulls his eyes shut again as he pants. He claws at the scarves and layers he piled on to protect against the suns, shedding them until he’s left with only his loose, long-sleeved shirt and the breathable trousers he bought just for this trip. His heartbeat pounds in his ears and his chest heaves. The heat is still intense, the rock still hard and unforgiving, but the relief of being out of the sun and no longer moving feels heavenly compared to just moments before. Obi-Wan sags under his own weight, allowing himself these brief moments of rest before he forces himself onwards. Though, now that he’s still, now that his eyes are closed, it’s questionable if he’ll ever convince his muscles to pull him up.

He doesn’t know how long he rests, his body boycotting each movement that he dictates. He’s soothed by the tempo of his breathing, the thrum of his own heart, the sound of-

Obi-Wan peels his eyes open and squints. He turns his head, looking further up the mountain. Straining, he shuts his eyes again and tries to zero in on the sound. He couldn’t possibly have heard it right, it must be some kind of auditory mirage, or perhaps-

His ears prick up as he hears it again. Faintly, further away, but clear once he hears it. Water. Running water. Water splashing against stone, pooling, echoing against itself. Now that he’s heard it, it sounds clear as day, impossible to miss or ignore.

Tatooine has been devoid of water for at least twelve thousand years, long before the birth of the Republic, long before sentients tried to explore the outer edges of the galaxy, looking for freedom and wealth and friendship.

And, yet, Obi-Wan can hear it. It calls to him, beckoning him closer, to explore and discover. Obi-Wan has never thought too highly of himself, never believed that he innately knew better or knew more than anyone else. And as much as he may doubt himself, he’s never doubted his capabilities. He trusts what he experiences, what he knows, and what he hears.

It feels like the planet’s gravity has doubled but Obi-Wan pushes and pulls until he’s standing, legs wobbly like a newborn’s. He throws the protective poncho he was wearing over himself, leaving the rest of his layers in a dusty pile. He just barely remembers to grab his pack but is too exhausted and confused to bother putting it on properly. He drags it behind him, like a petulant schoolchild, listening as the frantic scrapes along the sandy stone as he ascends.

The sound of trickling water is faint, but slowly grows in volume as Obi-Wan makes each labourous step up the mountain. He puts a hand on the rock face to stabilize himself, gasping when it feels cool to the touch, even as it sits in the sun. The path he treads starts to grow twisted, angling up and down, the rock under his hand growing more jagged and cracked.

The sky is a vibrant purple when Obi-Wan remembers to look at more than just the rocks around him. A sign that one sun has long been set and the other is following its lead. The wind picks up, blowing grit into Obi-Wan’s eyes, and he feels the first semblance of coolness in hours. In a few hours, the desert will be frigid. He should turn back, and hurry down the mountain to the safety of the ship. Continue this fool's journey tomorrow or not at all.

But the musicality of dripping water sounds so sweet. How could Obi-Wan abandon the discovery of the millennium? How could he abandon the chance of vindicating Qui-Gon? How could he reject this sweet, mysterious oasis gift in the middle of the desert?

Obi-Wan pants as he climbs. Was this mountain always so tall? At the base of it, it looked so much smaller, a quick hike up and over. He cranes his neck to look back, searching for the way he came, and finds that he doesn’t recognize the path. The sound of water is so close, almost thunderous in his ears. Trepidation weakens his legs and stomach. He edges closer to the cliff face and looks steadfastly at his dusty boots as he continues.

It sounds like he’s right next to a waterfall, white rapids crashing right next to him, and then silence. Obi-Wan looks up, confusion and fear mixing like alcohol in his stomach, leaving him just as disoriented.

He stands before a cave. The entrance is narrow, a gap between large boulders, precariously wedged against each other. It’s dark, inside. A cool breeze blows from within, smelling sweet and gentle. That’s what surprises Obi-Wan most, after spending the last few days surrounded by the musty scent of sand and the sharp tang of his own sweat. But no, it smells like a forest, like a garden after a light rainfall. It smells of a peaceful life. It smells heavenly.

Obi-Wan barely casts a glance behind him before he dips his head and squeezes into the gap in the rocks. He has to shed his backpack when the fabric of it starts to catch and snag against the walls. It’s fine, he reasons. He won’t go too far. He’ll turn around in just a moment, collect his bag, and be off again.

When he presses his hands against the rock, the surface is hard but not harsh, not jagged or sharp. Like a river stone that needs a few hundred years more before it’s ready for skipping. It feels gentle, like a salve, on his sunburnt hands. He blocks on the measly rays of sun that managed to sneak into the cave, casting a shadow where he means to walk. In a brief moment of clarity, he berates himself for not fishing the torch out of his bag before entering. Stupid!

He pauses. The shadow on the ground in front of him, long and monstrous, has grown fainter. A glance behind shows that a second shadow has emerged, trailing behind him. There’s a glow in front of him, faint, hidden behind the gentle curve of the cave wall, but there. Obi-Wan swallows and feels the hair on his neck stand on end. There seemed to be meters upon meters of solid rock above the cave when he was outside. Inside, everything feels just as solid, just as isolating. There’s no way that there could be a gap in the rocks, large enough to let so much light in that it can illuminate this cave without weakening it to the point of collapse.

It’s with a jolt of surprise that Obi-Wan realizes he’s still walking deeper, that even with the sudden mystery of the light, the sound, the smell, even as his mind grapples with it all, his body still moves against his conscious wishes. His breath stills in his lungs as he rounds a gentle curve and the soft light that only tickled him before grows into a bright beam.

Finally, Obi-Wan stills.

A vast room unfolds before him. Impossibly large and spacious compared to the cramped entryway leading to it. A small pool of water, fed by a waterfall emerging from cracks in a wall, sits next to the entrance, but its sounds are light and playful, nothing like the deafening stream Obi-Wan heard from outside. Plush moss and beautiful plants and flowers stretch across the rock floor and climb up the walls and ceiling. The brightness seems to just exist, not originating from any specific source. Glinting in the light, Obi-Wan spies golden trinkets, jewels thrown carelessly across the room, and piles of silks left in heaps.

A young man lounges on a round, gilded bed, woven sheets artfully draped around his naked body. A gilded head resting on a gilded hand. Golden eyes stare at Obi-Wan’s shocked and frozen form, pink lips twitching up into a sly, mirthful smile.

“What pretty little thing wandered into my grasp now?” The man laughs. He pushes himself up, revealing a swarth of golden skin. Obi-Wan swallows.

“Sorry,” he stutters out. “I was just- I heard- I think I’m a little lost.”

He tries to step back. The man on the bed scowls, his expression going from playful to dark faster than Obi-Wan could blink. His back hits a wall, cold stone pressing against him. He turns his head and finds that the entrance, the cave he was walking through, has disappeared. When he looks forward, the young man is inches from him. The warmth from his body feels almost scalding and his gaze is piercing, almost painful when Obi-Wan makes eye contact with him.

The man tilts his head. His hair, beautiful bronze curls, fall across his snarling face. He reaches out with his hand of shining gold and cups Obi-Wan’s chin. The metal is hard and warm, bruising against his skin. He sees the man’s lips twitch as he tilts and moves Obi-Wan’s face, eyeing him like a predator eyes cornered prey.

Obi-Wan has been in bar fights and drunken brawls. He’s no ignoramus when it comes to martial arts, having taken many classes over his life. He may not be an expert, but he’s won more fights than he’s lost. He knows the moves he should throw to get away from this strange creature and knows he should look for some way out of this strange room. But this man… he’s captivating, enthralling. Obi-Wan can’t find the strength to escape his grasp or his gaze. He stands still and pliant as he’s maneuvered, as gold and flesh hands trail across his clavicle and neck. He feels like he’s being appraised or studied, and he can’t help but blush from the attention.

“Who are you?” The man asks. His voice is raspy like he hasn’t used it for a while, but it washes over Obi-Wan like a wave. He swallows.

“My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi,” he answers. The man in front of him raises his eyebrows. “I’m a professor from Coruscant.”

“A professor?”

“A teacher,” Obi-Wan clarifies. He clears his throat. His jaw aches from the strong grip on it. “I teach anthropology. Cultures from around the galaxy.”

The man hums. “Why did you come here?”

Obi-Wan opens his mouth but can’t find the words to say for a few seconds. “I don’t know. My, well, I guess, he was my father died and he… he was obsessed with Tatooine.”

The man breaks out into a grin. It’s sharp and beautiful, a broken glass sculpture. He releases Obi-Wan, and he feels quick pulses of pain jolting from where fingers once gripped him. The man takes a step back. Obi-Wan has to fight himself to not let his eyes drift beyond his chest.

“Obsessed?” The man asked. “Devoted?”

“What? I… I guess.”

“To what? To whom?”

“He was-” Obi-Wan pauses. What was Qui-Gon obsessed with? “I could never figure it out, exactly. He… he had these ideas about Tatooine having the first people. The first… Gods.”

The smile on the man’s face seems almost splitting, manic in its excitement. It makes him look like he’s glowing. “To whom was he devoted to?”

The question seems ridiculous, insane even. Qui-Gon had only ever been devoted to himself, really, though he showed that devotion in many ways. Like taking on an adopted son. Like paying for his son’s schooling, even if he didn't fully support what he wanted to study. Ensuring a legacy that Obi-Wan could never really understand. But this stranger doesn’t need to know that and wouldn't understand even if Obi-Wan told him. Yet, Obi-Wan’s mind races, he sees flashes of Qui-Gon hunched over a desk, of maps and printouts pinned to walls, chalkboards and projectors covered in his scribbles. He sees all the scrolls and tablets and books that clutter the ship that is sitting, hot and dusty and empty, probably miles away. He sees one thing, one name, repeated throughout it all, sometimes half translated, sometimes underlined, sometimes just penned in the margins.

“An… Anakin?” Obi-Wan stutters out. The name is strange and unfamiliar on his tongue as it crawls out of his throat.

"Again," the man breathes out. "Say it again. Say my name."

"Anakin," Obi-Wan whispers, like the name is a secret like it's precious and special. Like it's a prayer he's trying to remember.

Anakin smiles and it feels like the burn of the twin suns.

[ltleflrt]

I’m disappointed they didn’t even mention Cas. 

Now here’s the thing. I didn’t think spnwin was Going Destiel. I haven’t thought so at all from the very beginning.  I’m not surprised there’s no Cas, I’m not surprised there’s no mention of Cas, and I 110% agree with the positive fandom takes floating around that it wouldn’t have given us a fleshed out reunion scene, which is what we Hellers really want.  Tho, I wouldn’t have minded seeing them together, and then getting the reunion in another season or spinoff.  There’s room for things to happen out of order.  We’ve got time and universe travel, so linear storytelling is kinda boring when you’re playing with those tools.

But the thing is, I didn’t want The Winchesters.  I hated John, I didn’t care about Mary, and I didn’t see how this prequel could heal the still open wound that 15x20 left me with.  But I gave it a chance, and I really love it!  I have learned to like John and care about Mary, or at least this version of them, and there’s so many more characters outside of them that I have fallen in love with.  I even really like how season 1 wrapped up!  It was well done, and not just because of Dean’s presence.  This whole season has been a romp, and the finale was no different.  And I really really really want more seasons!  Just for more stories about the Winchester Gang.

But it didn’t do anything to make me feel better about 15x20.  In fact it made me feel even more upset about it.  And unlike many lucky people in fandom, I can’t pretend the finale didn’t happen.  Which means that I can’t rewatch SPN anymore.  For the better part of a decade, I watched the show on repeat.  It was the background noise of my life.  I cross stitched with it playing in the background, I cooked and cleaned with it playing in the background, I wrote fanfiction with it playing in the background.  I can’t do that anymore.  I tried to rewatch it in 2021, and I just kept getting angry.  I was losing sleep over it because I was so angry all the time.  And the only way I could stop being angry was to never watch it again.

I miss it so fucking much.

But even watching one episode a few months back caused me 4 days of depression and lost sleep, even though it was one of my favorites.  I cannot watch SPN again while 15x20 affects me like this.

And I was hoping The Winchesters would give me something to help.  It didn’t. And I don’t resent that, because I understand that the season was short, Misha was busy, Jensen’s really hoping to do more someday.  But the thing is...he may not get to.  There may not be a S2.  There may not be a reboot mini series.  This may be all we get.  And so I’m sad, because if there’s no more, then I may never be able to rewatch SPN again.

I’m depressed as fuck about it today, and I can feel the underlying rage coming back, and I already popped awake at 3am and lost sleep over how easy it could have been to include Cas in 15x20 or to mention him in 01x13. 

I’m going to bury myself in Dragon Age for a while.

See y’all next week for GK.

[yourssinfullyquiche]

Have you read the hunger games prequel, the ballad of songbirds and snakes?

What's your opinion about it?

What's the most shocking revelation from the novel related to the original trilogy?

What's your favorite character from it?

Do you plan to see the tbosas movie in theaters?

Thank you

@curiousnonny

Hello curious anon, thank you for sending me this ask even though I take a dismal amount of time to respond~ 1. Yes, I've read tbosas. I actually inhaled the book the moment I had the chance. Finished it in 2 days, I think. Which is fast for me because I can be quite the slow reader.

2. I LOVED IT. Suzanne Collins is a masterful writer and it astounds me how her mind works. THG books were my doors to the world, it laid the ground and outlined my views be it social or political, etc. It helped me understand the world, and I know it sounds morbid but I find comfort in those books, the characters, especially in Katniss. Katniss inspires me so much and when I read her thoughts I'm comforted by her kindness and maternal instincts. It touches my soul. Her courage, sarcasm, defiance burns my soul. I think you can get the idea how special these books are to me. So when tbosas came out, I immediately loved that we were going to explore Snow. I love exploring how villains/antagonistic characters think, how their mind works. We had the privilege of listening to Katniss's voice and now we have the opportunity to understand why Snow is the way he is. Suzanne did not disappoint! At every turn, you can see the parallels between Katniss and Snow, at every turn where Katniss would've responded with selflessness, it is selfishness with Snow. You can see how two people who were from somewhat similar hardships could turn out to be polar opposites. We had a glimpse of that in THG with Katniss and Gale. I think that's fascinating, when you can empathise with a villain yet see where one or more wrong decisions could permanently alter the course of their life. Suzanne makes us understand him yet does not ever gives us the means to justify his actions. That's also what makes Snow or other well written villains terrifying because anyone could turn out that way.

3. I think it would probably be the fact that Snow knew the location of the shack well and was in the shack (I keep saying shack, think that's what it's called) in the woods. All this time I thought he knew of that secret place because he's the president and would have probably installed some cameras there. So I assumed he just turned a blind eye to the hunting that was occurring because he sees D12 as a worthless district, they hunt but yet his own peacekeepers are benefitting, so why shake the system that feeds his pawns well. But to know that he trekked the same route that Katniss did, to know he spent some time in that area, around the lake that Katniss did. And don't forget that's the first time we also hear Lucy Gray singing 'Deep in the Meadow,' around that place (iirc). It's so spooky to know that the shack that Katniss associates good memories with, was visited by someone who she doesn't have any good memories with. 4. I don't think there's a character that I really love, I appreciate all of them for what they add to the story. I guess...I like Sejanus but only after I've read the book because while reading, he annoyed me a few times. Now though, I appreciate his sweet personality, his courage and his defiance, admire it even. I remember feeling so shocked and afraid for him when he stood up to Dr. Gaul during the class discussions because had it been the era Katniss was in, we all know she would've either been executed or turned into an Avox for that. Words can't describe how sad I was when (...) happened. He was too good like Prim, he deserved better. He only wanted to leave and live a life that he would've been proud of. And it boils my blood whenever I think of what Snow did to his legacy. Side note: I've said this before, when I read the books, I pictured Sejanus to be a lanky, dark skinned Indian boy. 5. I think I would...idk, I'm just not that excited with some of the main casting choices. I'm not having any expectations at all so it would save me from any negative feelings. But I do hope the movie does well. This was really fun, thanks for asking me!

[mousieta]

Review: The Novelist Series

The Novelist (2018) Mood Indigo (2019) Pornographer: Spring Life (2021) Pornographer: Playbook (2021) Pornographer: Continued Spring Life (2021) Country: Japan Platform: Various I truly think this series broke something in me, in the good way. I’ve had post-show depression since binging the whole thing and since I did binge it all in one go, I’m going to review the entire series as one. 

There are two orders to watch this show in, by air date or by in-story chronology. To do that latter, you’d start with Mood Indigo then watch the rest in air-date order. While story wise it may make sense to do so, I would argue that it is better to watch them in air-date order, even though that takes you back and then forward in in-story time. I watched Mood Indigo first, but I actually think the series is better watched in order of air-date.

The Novelist (Pornographer) is an erotic melodrama that tells the story of Kijima Rio, a published author of erotic fiction who gets his arm broken when college student  Kuzumi Haruhiko crashes into him with his bike. As Kuzumi cannot financially compensate Kijima and has apparently taken out his means of making a living, he agrees to transcribe for Kijima.

Mood Indigo is a flash-back/prequel to The Novelist exploring Kijima’s path to becoming a ‘pornographer’ and his relationship with Shiro, his editor. The subsequent series then pick up after The Novelist and see the conclusion of all three men’s stories.

The show is intensely erotic, the character’s often viewed through the lens of their sexuality. What the show does incredibly well is showing sex as multi-fasceted and capable of carrying so much more than lust. Sex is as complex and complicated as any other human endeavor, engaged in for a multitude of reasons and imbued with layers of motivations, manipulations and desires. This is, honestly, a thing in dramas that I didn’t even know I was missing so deeply.

Sometimes the de-sexualization of characters in dramas starts to grate a little. There is nothing wrong with romance and exploring it but the coyness and aversion to explicitly showing that our leads sometimes just want to rail the fuck out of one another, or are using sex as a subterfuge, or are confused but over-wrought by desire, feels like a part of the human experience is being missed. Thus, I appreciate Thai drama’s depictions of sex but don’t want it to just be the horny kind, or the romantic kind, because humans are more than just horny and romantic. And this show gives us that with some truly wrenching angst.

The series is truly good on every level, the acting gripping and compelling. Takezai Terunosuke as Rio traces such a believable character arc through his whole chronology. The writing is moving in its compassion for its characters and subject matters, allowing things to be messy and not completely resolved. I have more meta I want to write about it specifically, in particular about the character dynamics between Rio and Shiro because there is so much meat to chew on there, which I love.

I’m glad I finally got around to watching this, am sad I binged it too fast and it is now over and which one of my frens would watch it soon so I could obsess over it.

2022 Drama Reviews Masterlist