#everything i am finding out cements that knowledge and just makes me go 'no i do not want to see denji suffer like that im good'

[strangefellows]

in today’s episode of “manga i have read a small fragment of, but everything i learn about it tells me that i am not emotionally capable of catching up and reading the whole thing” we have a) chainsaw man and b) hoseki no kuni

like mmmmmmmmmmmboy they are high ass quality anime/manga to be fucking sure, they look SO good, but by golly i am not equipped to handle the slow emotional/mental destruction of Good Sweet Naive Protagonists, hoo boy

phos and denji u two deserve so much better and so many hugs, where are the shock blankets and hot cocoa, ppl in those fandoms please be nice to them for me i love them and want them to be okay even if i can’t stomach reading what happens to them

[faerlygraceful]

So I rewatched all of the “Begins” episodes last night and it only managed to cement my head canons about Tommy, which began forming after we saw him again.

Of course I don’t know if they thought this was going to be where the character ended up when they filled the firehouse back in season 2. I don’t know what Lou thought about his character. I don’t know what the intentions were. What I am doing (since this is my head canon), is taking new knowledge and using it to recategorize previous interactions. I’m queer, it’s what we all do.

So I’m going to share my analysis with all of y’all cause this is the internet, and I’m allowed.

Spoilers for… well everything.

Tommy is one of the three characters who shows up in all three Begins episodes, the other two being Athena and Sal DeLuca. His first appearance in the show is Hen Begins, but as we know Chimney Begins is chronologically first, so we’re starting there.

Chimney Begins

1) We first see Tommy when probie Howie walks in. He doesn’t seem to notice that Howie is a probie, asking who didn’t tip the takeout guy. Gerrard quickly takes the role of antagonist, and that’s when we move on.

2) At one point when they’re coming back from a call after Howie has been there a while, Tommy says, in a surprised tone, “You’re still here?” I think this is less of a, “You don’t belong here,” and more of a, “You’ve been here for weeks/months and haven’t been out once, I would have quit, why haven’t you?”

3) While man behind, Howie helps a guy who was having indigestion and a panic attack at the same time. When the rest get back, Howie tries to bond with them over the call, but is ignored. They are talking about takeout options and Gerrard asks Tommy, when his girlfriend is supposed to come in and cook. Tommy sounds extremely contained during this interaction, gives a a day, and when pressed he stammers and promises. The conversation fades off so we don’t hear what he promises, but he didn’t seem all that enthusiastic about his girlfriend coming in.

- Now this is where we really start getting into my hcs. Either Tommy is bi (which we’ll hopefully find out tomorrow) or he’s closeted. The tightness in his voice (which is all we have to go on because the camera is focused on the POV character), tells me that he’s extremely uncomfortable with the interaction. He’s been put on the spot, and he doesn’t like it. I think the girlfriend is either a) a friend he’s brought by the house once and everyone inferred or b) someone he manufactured in order to get out of team events ie, “Oh I can’t go out tonight, my girl is cooking.” He is uncomfortable with what his boss (a confirmed bigot) is asking for, and the man is pressuring him to produce his beard. If she was actually his girlfriend and Tommy is also bisexual, it could just be that’s he’s uncomfortable exposing her to the environment that the 118 is at that point.

4) Howie starts to try and broach the barriers between himself and the other firefighters, only to be rebuked. At one point he corners Tommy in the locker room, and starts naming off all these topics, stating, “Tell me what your thing is and I’ll make it mine.” Talking about his formidable people skills and asking if that means Tommy just didn’t like him that much.

Tommy tells him, “If I thought about you at all, I probably wouldn’t.” Which tells me that Tommy has already built his mask, his persona, and since the others don’t try to look beyond the surface he’s able to maintain it, but he can’t afford to let anyone in. He can’t think about the new guy on the squad, he’s too busy making sure Gerrard doesn’t find out about his closet. That would be just another person to have to hide from anyway.

This is when Howie gets pulled for the ambulance. Eli tells him that it’s not personal, because friends die and funerals are held. Which makes me also think that Howie stepped into the shoes of a firefighter who died. Maybe one who Tommy was particularly close to? Eli goes on to call Howie a puppy who doesn’t get a name until they know it’s gonna come through.

The next thing that happens is Kevin Lee’s death. Which is incredibly sad and is a big part of how Howie develops as a firefighter, but this meta is Tommy focused so moving on.

5) The garage collapse at the mall, and Tommy almost dies. More to it, Howie saved him. So Tommy decides to share some things with Howie. “Love Actually, monster trucks, and craft beer”. Maybe not a coming out story, but he did declare that one of his favorite movies is a rom com. It’s a start.

Hen Begins

1) Tommy is first seen when Hen walks into the house. He’s comes up to the railing after Gerrard calls for everyone and is positioned between the captain and DeLuca. Now it’s my personal opinion that DeLuca is an ass and that’s backed up by these episodes but even Hen defends him in Bobby Begins Again, and that started with this episode. But again, we’re not here to get into Sal DeLuca’s headspace, this is about Tommy. When Gerrard calls Hen an “diversity” hire, we see Tommy looking very uncomfortable, and Sal is the one to take up some of Captain’s dirty work for him (“For real?”). This is the episode where I truly see Tommy as “falling in line” with the captain. He’s opened up a little to Howie (no nickname yet), a little more inclined to joke, but still is holding these boundaries.

2) DeLuca talks about taking his girl to see some vampire movie and Tommy immediately knows it’s Twilight. DeLuca talks about how he likes Kristen Stewart (with Hen agreeing) before saying something about getting behind that, which makes Hen uncomfortable. (According to this, it would put it in 2008, which means she’s a paramedic for ten years prior to Buck joining which I hate. All those movies came out rather fast but could all be classified as “Twilight” so it was probably at least Eclipse in 2010 especially with the references made…. But then we start to go into how much I hate this timeline because nothing makes sense ever) Tommy talks about how he doesn’t understand the attraction to KS because she’s too… (Sal puts in hot here) broody, and Sal asks him if that means he’s Team Jacob (which is what makes me think it’s at least during Eclipse, I don’t see DeLuca being a Twi-Hard, and so his frame of reference would be movie based), and when Tommy acts confused (not sure if an act or not, he knew what Twilight was, but that doesn’t mean he knows about Team Edward vs Team Jacob), Chimney confirms that he’s implying that Tommy is gay. You. See. Him. Freeze. There is a few seconds where Tommy freezes in place like he’s processing before he makes a joke, blowing a kiss at Sal before laughing. Gerrard puts a stop to the conversation, and Hen takes a seat.

— Remember when Tommy has buried himself in the closet? What happened when someone rattles the door with a gay joke? One where it’s being implied that you are gay? When you’re bigot of a boss is sitting not five feet from you at the same table? You freeze to not immediately deny the accusation in a way that would make you look sus, and then you make a joke out of it. It hurts, so much.

———-Ah shit I’m going to timeline this———

From what we know, Tommy was in the army as a pilot. For Timeline purposes we’re going to assume that Eli leaving is the reason Hen went to the 118. During her med student arc it talks about how she was a paramedic for 10 years, so 2012 makes sense there. It doesn’t make sense with other thing’s because in Lonestar’s Hold the Line (2021 would make this make sense), Hen tells Owen that Denny is 10 and she and Karen and her were married for 8 years, (Same sex marriage has only been legal in CA since 2013). Bobby was their captain for a year in Worst Day Ever, they had a captain parade for two years (six captains) and before that they had a someone who was cleaning up after Gerrard. Also Hen and Karen were freshly back together when DADT was repealed. That makes Denny a baby on September 20th of 2011.

Enlistment periods are 8 years but that’s a mix of active and inactive duty. If Tommy signed up out of high school (18), was an active duty pilot for 6 years (24) and then moved to the reserves for the remaining two while he became a firefighter, it means he could have been a firefighter for two years longer than Hen or Chimney while being less than 10 years older than Buck.

Now none of this helps in placing where these episodes fall in the timeline, but I would say that Bobby’s first day falls about a year before the pilot, and Chimney Begins and Hen Begins butt right up together. Also I have no more information on Eli and how long he stayed after training Chim, and I probably never will because I cannot watch Boston.

More timeline BS. Hen and Karen had to have gotten together during the captain parade because Gerrard would not have let her on a call where she got hurt enough that Chim would make the call to Karen.

————��—— Timeline bs over ——————

3) Tommy asks about how “New York bitchiness” could be a compliment after Howie mentioning that she has an East coast vibe, and Hen thanks him for the compliment. And then Howie makes it seem like Tommy’s calling her bitchy, but I don’t see it that way. What’s more likely is that’s the only vibe he knows from the east coast, so when Howie suggests she has it, he’s like, wait you think that’s a compliment? Howie treats it like Tommy’s calling Hen a bitch, but it honestly didn’t come off that way, more like Tommy trying to clarify that Howie wasn’t calling Hen a bitch by saying she has an “East Coast Vibe”. Anyway this conversation quickly devolves in Gerrard being a misogynist, and Tommy and DeLuca quickly scamper off.

4) Not Tommy related, but we do have someone with insight into being an openly gay firefighter now. Casey with the 115. He says that they knew he was gay from the moment he walked in, and it didn’t matter that he was the strongest guy in the firehouse. Here we have proof that it doesn’t matter your qualifications, if you’re perceived as gay, you’re automatically singled out. He said it was so hard that he was told to quit and find a new dream by his partner. Now, there is a red flag about your SO tellingly you to give up your dreams, but can you imagine how bad it would have been for the boyfriend to get to that point? The person you care about coming home every night defeated and downtrodden over something that’s supposed to be his dream? The ease in which Casey shed the boyfriend makes me think that they weren’t together long enough to earn those privileges, but the job also gets a red flag for being so bad that you’d advise your short term boyfriend to quit.

5) Hen’s speech. During this we don’t see him often, because he’s off to the side. The camera is more focused on Gerrard, DeLuca and Howie for the most part. But he does seem very closed off, when you do see him, his arms crossed, not standing defensively or challengingly like DeLuca, but like he’s trying to shrink. Actually it kind of reminds me of another queer firefighter that we all know.

6) We don’t get to see much more of the reactions because we go immediately into a call where a party limo crashed into a flower truck. Which we only know about because Hen went looking for it, saving the life of a little boy. Tommy tells her good job, that they would have discovered the secondary wreck eventually but that it would have been too late. She also has now earned Sal’s respect.

7) When they get back the Chief is there. Now remember, she gave her speech, they went out, they come back out and Gerrard is being removed. Nothing that happened on that call or involving her speech has anything to do with this. She thinks she’s being fired, that Gerrard called while heading to or back from the scene to have her removed, but that’s not the case. Her speech wasn’t actually necessary because everyone was already complaining about how Gerrard treated her. They even talk about someone who compared Gerrard and his behavior to hemorrhoids. Which I’m not saying could be from the army pilot who was probably deployed and had to undergo long-term constipation or diarrhea, but it could be.

Now all in all, there nothing really bad about Tommy’s behavior that we’ve seen. He doesn’t approach Hen, but we’ve seen from her interactions with Howie that she barely accepts his overtures of friendship in the beginning, and Tommy is much more closed off, remembering how he only opened up to Howie after he saved his life. He also doesn’t stand up for Hen to the captain’s face, but as an Army guy, he follows the chain of command. Doesn’t mean he won’t file one or two or three complaints through the proper channels. He just can’t afford to put himself in Gerrard’s crosshairs, can’t afford to undergo his scrutiny.

Bobby Begins Again

1) Hen has started a betting pool on the newest captain. Over under is 6 weeks, making me think that that’s the least amount of time a Captain stayed (about a month and a half and if they had 6 captains in 2 years that’s an average of 4 months). Tommy gives Nash a month and has to run to the ATM. DeLuca is obviously the main antagonizer, it sounds like he wanted the 118 and was denied (Also ABC, maybe bring him back ala Billy Tyson? Might be fun.).

2) Tommy has never worked on a farm, or dealt with toddlers. Cause he was floundering and falling all over himself when trying to catch Maurice the rooster. All in all these calls don’t show much. Tommy follows Bobby’s instructions, even though part of time he’s just parroting what Sal says, no arguments. Adds further credibility to the fact that he follows chain of command. It doesn’t matter that this guys only going to last a month, he’s my captain now.

3) During the Guillermo’s fire, Sal breaks rank to save the kid (which considering who that kid grows up to be, it sucks that he was successful). But when Bobby takes him to task for endangering them all, Sal doubles down. I thought I was paying attention during this scene, but it’s hard with the yelling. At least two people try to get him to cool it, one of them being Chimney who calls DeLuca “Fredo”.

4) They’re all at the bar, talking about Sal getting fired when Bobby shows up and the vibes change. Now sometime over the past twoish years Tommy is single, and it seems chronically at least to the house. Maybe because Gerrard is gone he doesn’t have to maintain a beard anymore, but with the endless captain parade and DeLuca being a tool, he doesn’t feel comfortable coming out? I think he’s also classified the 118 as unsafe, so maybe this lended a reason for his later transfer. But as he says, “Single is easier. Having the scars impresses women, getting ‘em freaks ‘em out.” Which gives heavy implications that like Buck in season one, Tommy isn’t dating but hooking up. If he’s gay, then his partners would have to be okay with the fact that he’s still closeted. And mention of women aside, it’s implied that a longer term relationship ended because he got hurt on the job. (This is why I don’t ascribe to the Tommy dated Abby theory. She implied that her relationship ended because of Patricia, and Tommy implies his last was due to injury. Which could be. He got hurt on the job and she couldn’t handle care giver burden for both of them? But that’s also turning Abby into Shannon Diaz pt 1 and while I dislike both women, they don’t need to be same character different font.) Here’s what I think. He got hurt on the job, and his long term boyfriend couldn’t even go to the hospital to check on him because he wasn’t out to his crew, causing them to break up.

Also for all you Buck/Tommy writers, Tommy canonically has a scar on his right side from a piece of shrapnel that he caught. He says it’s from a factory explosion. I don’t have the ability to get screen shots atm, but it’s pretty.

5) Tommy quotes Fight Club with Chim. So maybe another victim of the Han School of Movie References?

6) Bobby starts with family dinners. Tommy decides to transfer. The cake says, “The 217’s lose is our gain,” and they push his head into it.

The very next scene is Buck walking into the 118.

So all in all, we see Tommy as a deeply guarded character. He doesn’t open up easily, he follows orders, he has a soft side. I don’t really know how to conclude this because I sprinkled my impressions throughout, but I hope that this helps anyone who’s looking for Tommy characterization, and we’ll see tomorrow if any of this is right.

[rueitae]

Season 2, Episode 4: the fashionista caper

Liveblog for @csweekly

I’d like to start off by saying how blown away I am that the writing team keeps each caper so unique and fresh in a formulaic series. It’s one of my favorite things. I never once find myself truly bored with this show even watching it so many times.

Player….making a My Big Fat Greek Wedding reference? Out of anything they could start the episode with. Not sure what to make of that one besides cultural osmosis. It’s a little before his time.

Love Dash Haber as a villain. Capers not boring and neither are the operatives.

Lol the Cleaners just stop. Don’t react. Move on. Not dramatic enough for their viewing pleasure.

Is this when we get to say “no capes”?

Ever since Paper Star clipped Carmen’s hat once, Carmen is able to save it every time.

Tug of war over the hat is so funny to me.

Carmen doesn’t win all the time. Keeps things interesting.

You know, since it’s coming from Carmen, I legitimately can’t decide if she’s being overtly satirical, or if Coach Brunt actually does knit as a hobby. …no. No way Brunt has the patience. Carmen’s just mad.

APOCALYPSE. One of my favorite Zack moments.

Ahh the home base conversation. Equal parts touching and even mORE guilt wrenching for Shadowsan to hear. “If only I knew more about my past..” If only we could see his face when she says that line.

“The only thread I could pull…” Player making puns literally in his sleep at this point.

Shadowsan filling in Fashion Fest and the team’s REACTION to it. And then just his “Countess Cleo always took an interest.”

Cleo backstory!!! At least a basic one. Just makes me yearn for more. I get the feeling we would have gotten a lot of criminal backstories if we’d had more seasons.

Cookie! I’m glad they had her back for a full caper. Really tho, Carmen totally got her entire look from her LOL. There’s not as much ode to 90s Carmen in this episode through her than the laying it on thick they did in the first. I can’t decide if I like that or I’m disappointed there’s not more. Because in this caper she’s her own thing.

Zack is ALREADY including Shadowsan as dad please I’m so emotional about those two and what it says between the lines of Zack and Ivy’s past. This boy LATCHED onto the first male adult he was allowed to and said “we are going to bond”.

Julia it should be illegal to be this adorable.

Yeah. Different capers like I talked about in the opening paragraph. Going after 16th century gowns. This is a homage to older CS. Always the caper is something historical and unique rather than simply money or jewelry. Keeps the vibe from older iterations.

Also. Again. This entire episode foreshadows the dark red arc, everything leads to it. Brainwashing Carmen was ALWAYS on the table.

Oops. Sorry Zari (Stockholm is totally revenge for this moment)

Ahh and the beginnings of trusting Julia. Carmen’s got her pegged completely. Knows her heart is in it for history, and that whatever act she’s putting on isn’t really her. All that she could glean from their first and only interaction in India. Carmen almost ALMOST knocks her out like Zari, but ever the quick thinker, Carmen takes a chance with the knowledge she’s been given. She’s done the math and needs one more person.

Although I absolutely would have roared if Shadowsan got up on that stage.

The runway scene. Fantastic. And really you get a feel that this is actually the beginning of Julia’s arc in gaining confidence in herself. She already sticks up for herself, but this scene is what cements that 1. Carmen is not the bad guy 2 if she can get on that runway, she can stick her neck out with confidence for what she believes in. She doesn’t waver after this.

Also color theory. Carmen gives her her hat. Julia’s red shirt is gone but Carmen gives her this lifeline of friendship. Literally by verbally putting her in charge she’s telling Julia that she trusts her and wants to let her in on what the team is doing.

Ivy and Zack PLEASE. I love you enough already. You don’t have to go so hard on the runway.

It’s kinda cool how the models still walk like models in between the fighting.

Shadowsan’s strength is literally terrifying

LOL her eyebrow of incredulity to “which modeling agency are you with”

“Hackers can wear white hats after Labor Day” my gosh I love their banter. Everything is building up to Player’s s4 zinger of all time.

This hq idea is SO clever. Literally hiding in plain sight. The most home that Carmen can get right now. It’s my favorite thing.

“Zack got to have gelato and pizza” I love this family.

Huh I wonder if some or most of those silhouettes are based off of older iterations of ViLE operatives.

Such a solid and fun episode.

[lifeinmedicine]

On Being an Attending (hey look Ma I made it!)

Somehow, after four years of college, four years of medical school, three years of residency, one year of chief residency, and three long years of fellowship, I have finally made it to this point—I am now an attending!

And I am freaking out.

What I previously thought of as the finish line, I now realize is just the starting line. Yeah, tell that to your 15 years of hard work. But as I sit here on my last day of freedom, ready to start my first real job tomorrow, I have so many conflicting thoughts and emotions.  

First off, I took a glorious two-month break between fellowship and starting my job. Everyone recommends taking some kind of break, given this is the first and likely only time you will have a vacation with no clinical or academic obligations. And though I don’t regret this time off, I also feel like I have forgotten every ounce of pediatric cardiology that was previously cemented in my brain over the last three years. I sometimes catch myself in the shower or while I’m brushing, just rehearsing, “Hi, I’m Dr. Misra, it’s so nice to meet you. What brings you guys in today?” as if I have completely forgotten how to talk to patients. I recently google image searched basic echo views to test myself on something I could do in my sleep, just two months ago.

I know I’m being irrational, and I probably felt this way after every small break I had in the different steps of my medical training, but now my medical knowledge counts more than it ever has, and this insecurity is definitely at the forefront. I hope everything is just muscle memory and I’m sure it will come back to me as I get thrown in different clinical situations. But I do worry that the small nuances I knew about subtle echo and EKG findings are now lost to the abyss of my scattered and nervous brain.

As a senior fellow, you feel like you are the top of the highest totem pole. Junior fellows come to you for advice and help, attendings give you independence and back it up with, “well, you’re going to be an attending in a few months so…” and you feel you have earned the right to speak openly with unbridled confidence about your management decisions and clinical reasoning. By this point, you have become an expert at being a trainee—it is, after all, what you have been doing for almost half your time on Earth.

And now, you are placed in an entirely new role with new responsibilities and all that glorious confidence has vanished. You go from feeling like you are at your prime, to all of a sudden feeling like a newborn babe in this field. Right at the cusp of starting, what feels like, the most important step in your career.

This rapid fall from grace brings me to my next anxiety—I don’t want to look or sound stupid. When I interviewed for this job as a third-year fellow, I was confident in what I knew, what I wanted from a career, and just overall felt confident in myself. I currently no longer feel that way, but I want to do myself and my skills justice as the person they hired, and the potential they saw in me. I know I will need to ask for help throughout my career, and am not afraid to do so, but what if I ask stupid questions that I should clearly know the answer to? The need to impress others is deeply ingrained in me from years of medical training, and the fear of looking or sounding dumb has always been a huge motivation to keep learning and getting better. That may be morally incorrect, and I sincerely hope that as I grow and mature my motivation takes on more genuine and pure reasons, but this is the sad reality of medical trainees. And right now, as I start my career as an attending, that external motivation has never been stronger.

And then there’s the weight of your clinical decision making, and the responsibility you have to your patients and team. The buck stops with you now. Yes, you will always have help and resources, but now your decisions matter, you have the final say in what happens with your patients, and that safety net is gone. What you diagnose, and what you miss, is all on you.

The imposter syndrome is real folks. All of a sudden, I’m supposed to teach and speak with confidence about clinical matters I’ve had limited experience with, and have full assurance in what I am doing even though inside I feel like I’m going to pee my pants. People will look to you, as the attending, for answers and next steps, even though you just graduated, and were looking to others just a few months ago. I know I’ve experienced this imposter syndrome when I become a resident, and again as a fellow, but this time it feels profound and with bigger implications.

I’m sure in the beginning I will over-order clinical tests, over diagnose, and be extremely conservative with my treatment plans, for fear of missing something or messing up. I want desperately to just assume that cool confidence I had in clinic as a senior fellow, seamlessly handling a full patient load independently, reading echos and finishing notes on time, feeling great in my own skin, and portraying that put-together doctor that everyone wants for their kid. I know I will get there eventually—it’s in me, it always has been, and I can do it again—but getting there will take time. There will be the clumsiness with the new EMR, the awkwardness with navigating a new team, and learning the flow of a new clinic and my place within it. Compound that with the mental gymnastics of balancing the weight of new responsibilities, and you have the perfect set up for an anxious but eager young attending who just wants to impress everyone and never make any mistakes. It’s like wearing a neon sign that says, “I promise I am a badass, no you didn’t hire the wrong person. Just give me a second, I’ll get there again.”

But wanting to be perfect is unrealistic and I know it. And no one is expecting perfection from me except me. And all of this is just another growing pain in my journey through medicine. And I’m sure all these anxieties are necessary to being a caring doctor who is always willing to do and be better for their patients. I’m sure everyone who has been in this position has felt this way, and all those in the future will feel it too.  

I’m nervous as hell, but I’m excited too. This is what I’ve always wanted, and there are so many opportunities and adventures that are in my future. I just have to keep reminding myself that this is the first step of many in my career, and to take time to appreciate everything that has led up to this point. I may never be ready for tomorrow, but whatever comes I will fake it till I make it, and keep pushing.

[fortes-fortuna-iogurtum]

Man, you're so cool. I adore the way you ramble about Dr Who and ACGS, it makes me smile :) I hope your college financial situation gets sorted out soon! I'm so excited for you to be in a good place for you.

ohhhhh Robin, this is just the sweetest ask!!! thank you so much!!! I smiled so big when I opened tumblr during my lunchbreak today and saw this message ^-^ ^-^ ^-^ I'm so glad you get a smile out of my rambling!! sometimes I worry that it's annoying to people who might not know about the media it's based on, or that I should be thinking and talking about more relevant or meaningful things than stuff like DW and ACGAS... so it's really really nice to hear that's not the case, at least for you :) <3 <3

and thank you!! I'm hoping for the same!!! (and, fun fact, but I should have actually hit the halfway point for my projected savings goal today!! but since my boss forgot to put the hours for my paid vacation last week into the system, I got much much less money on my paycheck than I should've :') but it's all going to be ok, I've already spoken to him about it and he's going to submit the proper forms and get everything cleared up and the money I'm missing will get to me somehow. and when it does, it'll go straight into my college fund.)

(I'm putting the rest of this post under a break now, because I started typing and then accidentally vomited up a whole entire spiel about my complicated emotions towards college stuff, and no one wants that cluttering up their dash lolllll) (cw for emotional turmoil and general complaining/bellyaching/worrying/stressing about the future)

tbh, every time I talk about my college situation, I feel guilty. because when I step back and look at everything, I really am in such a sweet spot right now. I live at home with my family, which is (mostly) a fantastic situation--I get to eat my mom's cooking and hang out with my siblings all the time, which is great. I get to basically always bring my lunch to work (and it's usually leftovers of my mom's cooking) while my coworkers have to rush to buy something from a fast food place and swallow it down before our break is over. my family dynamic could be so much worse than it is. we attend a really sweet little church whose congregation has been so kind and welcoming to us (even if the style of the worship and teaching isn't quite what I'd like to find for myself someday). I have my own cosy little bedroom and all my books and my car and knitting and TV shows. I make seriously decent money for the kind of work I do, and most of it goes into savings for college while I have coworkers who can barely scrape by between rent and groceries and daycare bills and vehicle repairs. things aren't perfect, there are some pretty significant things I'd like to address (about myself and my brain and how it works, and some ideas about the world that I think got turned a little bit sideways at some point and need to be straightened out before they get too firmly cemented). I don't actually have any close friends who live near me (the nearest ones are at least 2 hours away and I rarely get to see them face-to-face). but honestly, I have it so good. I should be so content, I should be basking in the blessings I have right now.

yet I still complain about not being at college and talk about how badly I want to get there.

and as if all that wasn't enough, I'm petrified by the idea of things changing. I feel so weary and discouraged when I think about the idea of having to be brand-new in a brand-new place (again), not knowing anyone or how to do anything and constantly fearing that I'm messing it all up and I'm the only doofus who doesn't understand and there are all these secret common knowledge rules that everyone knows but me and if I admit to not knowing them I'll be labelled as an outcast but if I mess one of them up I'll be expelled from planet earth for having failed at humanity.

(and then also on some level, I'm terrified of moving on from the place I'm at right now, because things could be so much worse.)

I don't want to take what I have now for granted. I don't want to be unthankful for what I've been given. but I also can't be fully at peace here, because I just really really really am looking forward to the next thing. which of course makes me feel really guilty (and I tend to worry that when I do get to college, it'll all be terrible and I'll realize how wrong I was to want to hurry to that stage and my life will turn into one big Aesop's Fable and the Twilight Zone guy will appear to announce the moral of the story to everyone so they can use me as an object lesson to their Sunday school classes).

and of course, none of this makes sense and it's all one big jumbled ball of weird emotions and fears and dreams and I'm doing my best to ignore it and pray that God will just lead me where I need to go and not let me get distracted by silly things that will drag me off-course or waste my time along the way. which I guess is all I can do. but it sure doesn't come easily to me.

anyway, you didn't ask about any of that, but it just sorta... all fell out when I started typing :') I am excited to go to college, especially the college I plan to attend. it's my dream college, and I went from thinking I'd never be able to attend there to seriously planning to move into the dorms next fall. I think I'll learn so much there, and I'll meet other people--both mentors and peers--who will both affirm and influence me in meaningful ways. I can't wait to see how God uses all of this to write a grander story for me than any I could ever imagine!! but I do worry so much about pretty much everything, so even though I instinctively feel that this is the right thing to do, there are so many what-ifs and silly questions that plague me, simply because I cannot give a definite answer to them and unknown variables bother me.

[lauren-jay]

one is distinct from another: me from you, you from them. Out of seven billion people in this world, I am distinct from y'all! No one in this world exists without a purpose. We individuals have a purpose in life. We humans are the best creation of god, and each one is special.

Hi! My name is Lauren Jay Simeon, and I come from a middle-class family in Lubo Sto Ninio Cagayan. Nobody enters this world without the love and support of family and friends. Actually, everything you become is solely due to your family. My father is a well-known Farmer in our neighborhood. My mom is a housewife. My parents taught me the value of time, honesty, hard work, and dedication to a goal.

We are two siblings. My brother is in Manila right now, applying for military duty. Being the youngest is exhausting. Not because I'm the only one who does the housework, but I'm rarely blamed for anything. I am the most responsible of my brothers. Even though I was the youngest, I wanted to guide and care for my siblings.

I am currently studying at the best school in my city which is the St. Paul University Philippines(SPUP). I am presently in class 11th STEM. I feel happy to be a part of this great school with good friends, helpful and loving teachers and sound school administration. Were my learnings in SPUP are vital to where I am leading to? Yes, because thru SPUP, I am able to acquire knowledge that cements my intellectual capabilities and veers my direction into where I should go—to where I belong.

I chose STEM since it is relevant to my college subject and also because I know it is applicable to any type of college subject. We all know that this strand is much more difficult than others, but it also helps our minds progress and prepares us for college life. STEM was the best choice! Reconsidering studying AE or AERONAUTICAL ENGINEERING in college, STEM is the perfect fit as it focuses on the field of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. These four fields emphasize innovation, problem-solving, and critical thinking.

I have extraordinary skills in some subjects whereas I am very weak in a few. As for my favorite subject, well I would say math because it is challenging, and I can always find new ways to solve problems. I also like the feeling of satisfaction that comes from understanding a difficult concept, or getting a correct answer. I love math because it teaches me on how to think logically and solve problems. It is also a useful tool for communication. Some people find math’s difficult, but I think that it is just a matter of understanding the concepts. Once you understand how something works, it is usually not so difficult.

Every man has flaws, and I am no exception. I am a little lazy in several places that I dislike. I spend a lot of time playing, which is not a good habit, but I try my hardest to conquer my faults. Everyone has a goal in life. Aim or ambition is man's inner aspiration. Without a goal, no man can do anything. As a result, each of us should be very clear about our goals in life.

 I haven't lived much of my life, that’s why it's difficult to imagine my own unique future. There are numerous options available to me. I'm not sure where I'll be going tomorrow or if my mind will alter the next day or the day after. I can only hope that I make reasonable and prudent life decisions. Every decision I make has an impact on my future. I am convinced that I have a bright future and that I am on the right track.

I aspired to be an aeronautical engineer, something I had wanted to do since I was a child. Since high school, I've wanted to become an aerospace engineer. This is mostly because engineering is a tough career that will have a significant impact on the future of the entire human population. The implications of aerospace engineering inspire me to work on spacecraft that will advance humankind, develop increasingly effective propulsion systems, and develop aerospace engineering technology that will enhance life on Earth. But I recognize there are other more measures I must take in order to reach these so-called objectives. This involves finishing college, finding that special someone, and landing the ideal career.

I've realized that I've yet to begin my life; everything up until now has been practice as if I've been in a cage, and it's only now that I'm breaking free and doing things for myself. I need to work really hard to provide my kids a better future so they can concentrate more in school because without education, no one has a future.

Despite the fact that I have no idea what tomorrow will bring. I hope that every day is an experience and that my future is filled with adventure and love. All I can do now is concentrate on the present and plan for the future. Just remember what Matthew 6:34 said “So do not be worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own”. My future is determined by my decisions and life experiences, and I am excited to discover what the future has for me.

[dadsbongos]

gentle lover

(1)gentle lover (2)burn me to the ground Movie/Game/Show: Loki Dynamic: Loki Laufeyson/Reader Warnings: spoilers for infinity war/1st episode of loki ig, fem pronouns Summary: Loki almost wishes he could've experienced the life he's watching of you and him together. ~~~

There’s something about looking upon the gentle face of a lover and coming to the realization that you’d do anything for them. It isn’t as though you never knew - the knowledge was already there, it just took a few seconds for the thought to become cemented as truth. Loki sees this in himself as he stands before the TVA projection of his life.

He’s paused at a moment on an unnameable planet. He sees himself standing on a balcony in what he assumes to be a late-night, but instead of staring up at the stars, he’s looking upon a woman beside him. She’s looking at him as well. They share the glance with smiles - and that’s what alarms Loki most. The smile he sees is one he hasn’t felt in years. It’s small but it’s more genuine than the leather he was wearing moments ago. It’s a smile he hasn’t felt since before he knew about Laufey. Since before his mother…

He knows that woman. One of Thor’s Midgardian friends. The one assigned to watch and guard him in New York.

He doesn’t know why she’s there with him. He doesn’t know why she looks so content to be on another planet with him. He doesn’t know why he looks so at peace at her mere presence. He doesn’t know why it makes him miss a reality he’s never even known to exist.

He almost wants to be there, just to know what it is about that woman that brings him so much tranquility at that moment.

She’s just another bug, their difference in lifespans is proof enough of that. But Loki knows that look, as much as he hates to admit to his own conscience, he knows that feeling smeared across his own face. It’s caring. Tender. A softness he’s never felt for others is now on full display to a Midgardian.

Loki clenches his jaw and resumes the projection.

He watches the two slide their hands together on a railing, interlocking their fingers.

The Loki onscreen’s eyes flicker between hers and their joined hands. It isn’t even him that speaks first, it’s her.

“When this whole thing is over and Sakaar is ruined and Thor has the throne, where will you go?”

Silence is passed between them, Loki brushes his thumb over her knuckles, tilting his head to the side briefly in thought, “Where will you want me?”

She chuckles and shakes her head, “You wouldn’t want to go to Earth. Unless you’d like the Avengers up your ass.”

They giggle together, ignoring the very real reason why the Avengers would be so onto him in the first place. Loki blinks at the woman, scooting closer to her, “I wouldn’t be fond of that… but for you, my dear, I’d tear the universe apart.”

He kisses her knuckles and she merely jokes back, “That sounds like exactly why they wouldn’t want you. Sorry to say they’re not fond of universe-tearing.”

“I’m charming and romantic and this is how I’m repaid?”

“However,” she stresses with a broad grin, “I can’t say that’s not excellent bargaining to keep you on a leash.”

Loki’s brows furrow and he nearly pulls back, “Like a dog?”

“Well, now,” she bites her lip in thought and looks away at the dystopian city below, but Loki still looks at her.

He looks at her as though she’d sewn the very realms together. As though she’d hung all the moons and suns and stars and planted every sweet flower and harvested every fruit. He looks at her like she’s the beginning of his world - and he knows that it also means that, if she asked right then and there, he’d help her destroy the world too. He looks at her as though she’s the only true love he’s ever known. And for all this Loki, watching himself and this woman be entwined, knows - she probably is. He can feel it through the very projection he’s watching, and so he plays another scene with her in it.

“For a woman who could undoubtedly tear people apart, you master the role of a noblewoman, love.”

“Well, that’s a relief.”

Her response is dripping in lighthearted sarcasm and it manages a laugh from the Loki onscreen as he lays back in a shared bed.

“I am somewhat on the espionage scene, it’d be a little embarrassing if I couldn’t even pull off a little role like this.”

“Even so, I admire you for it.”

“At this point, it’d be rarer to find something you don’t admire me for,” she lightly huffs, a smile tipping at her lips as she finishes tying up her dress, “Not that I’m complaining. It's a huge ego boost.”

“There certainly is much to admire about you,” Loki shows his palms as if to display a sort of surrender.

Before more can be said, the projection is paused once again. Loki closes his eyes and lets his head down in the silence - almost expecting that voice to creep through his mind again. He can hear her now, in his head. He knows that out there, in those other variations of him on the sacred timeline that haven’t yet become Variants, they can probably hear her too. In a more realistic sense, of course. Because if they’re determined to fall in love, there must be one of her fated for every one of them. And he almost pities the fact.

He plays the projection in bits and pieces.

“My mother…”

“Loki, stop, you don’t have to.”

“I wish to, dear.”

“Loki…”

“My mother, I truly feel that she would’ve adored you.”

He takes in their love story as it comes and he struggles down what feels too intimate for even him to watch.

“Do you ever worry about the day when you wake up and I don’t?”

“Yes, of course, I do.”

“What will you do?”

“I prefer to not think on that.”

“You think about everything.”

“Some things… are better left unplanned for. At least for now, when that isn’t a valid worry in my mind.”

He almost wishes he hadn’t touched that tesseract. Just to live a life where he gets to see first-hand how this human woman manages to creep under the walls he so carefully spent years crafting.

“I love you.”

“Poor choice, really.”

“Loki. Seriously. I love you.”

“I love you, too, dear.”

It’s bizarre to see himself love. It’s bizarre to watch as he cares for a being he once would’ve had no qualms ruling over. It’s bizarre to know that this is what could’ve been the happiest times of his life if he hadn’t picked up the tesseract.

“Did you ever imagine yourself here?”

“On a spaceship with a bunch of Asgardians and the gladiators from Sakaar? No, never.”

“I meant with me.”

“I know, I was just messing with you. And… no. To be honest. I thought maybe I’d have to watch you as a guard or something. With the whole trying-to-take-over thing, but never that I’d be your girlfriend.”

“Eh.”

“‘Eh’? The hell does ‘eh’ mean? I am!”

“It sounds so… juvenile. Girlfriend - boyfriend.”

“What? Wife sounds better?”

“In honesty? Yes, it does. I’d much rather call you my wife than my girlfriend.”

“You can’t joke about that! I’ll get my hopes up.”

“Who said anything about joking, dear?”

And as he comes to the end, as he watches himself be lifted by the titan he’s come to fear more than anything, he hears her. Her mourning. Her screaming. Her pleading. Her gut-wrenching cries.

He watches her and Thor crawl to his body and sprawl themselves over it in heaps of hiccupped tears and choked sorrows.

“You were supposed to out-live me… Loki, please. You’ve come back before, Loki, please, come back again. Come back again… I can’t - I can’t live this life without you, Loki… please… please come back again…” she sounds as though her heart itself has been ripped from her chest and torn in two before her very eyes, “You were supposed to out-live me… Loki...”

He looks away from the screen. Decides that now is too much. He can’t watch her lose what she saw as the world. Loki barely knows her and yet he knows himself enough to know if he watches her grief then he’ll want to mend it.

Looking upon her and seeing how deeply and irrevocably she’d cared for him, knowing of his past and forgiving his ways and loving him anyway, he knows he’d want to end her cries. It’s that feeling of realization that makes him feel ridiculous for wanting to do so much for a Midgardian he hasn’t fallen in love with yet.

Yet?

Yet.

It’s a feeling of realization that he’d do anything for that lover of his, when he gets to love her. If he gets to love her.

And it’s that ‘if’ that makes him understand why Mobius was so interested in making him watch his own life. His own future. It makes him realize what he wants but can’t have. His brother, his love, his happiness - it gives him something to want. Lying just out of reach.

So long as he’s compliant with the TVA, he assumes. Otherwise, he’d have to tear the universe in half to even see that Midgardian woman once again.

[dutchdread]

In regard to what you said about how what Squall and Rinoa had wasn't necessarily true love because of them being teenagers, why is it that you even consider that Cloud and Tifa had true love when Cloud is technically a teenager too? Why do you say that you wouldn't like Aerith if she had survived and ended up with Cloud? You act as if Aerith ending up with Cloud is a bad thing. If Aerith survives things could've ended up happening differently for Cloud. He could've ended up happier with her.

To answer this question I think it's important to understand the difference between love and lust, I advise reading an earlier article I wrote about this:

"what is love, baby don't hurt me" There are a couple of things to address here. First, I am not sure I ever said that what Tifa and Cloud had at the end of FFVII was "true love". It's something that I think is up for debate, the fact that they haven't spent a lot of time together yet as actual adults makes me sympathetic to the idea that it's not really that far yet. Personally I find that they satisfy the conditions necessary for it to count as love, but you won't hear me pretend it's already at the same level as the love shared between my parents, who've been together for 40 years. Even in love there are degrees, love can always grow stronger, and I have no doubt that in case of Cloud and Tifa, it would. I am not pretending they start out as the ultimate pinnacle of perfect or true love. One of the most telling differences I think between people who support Cloti, and the people who support Clerith, is that the former are simply more in touch with reality. That having been said, like I mentioned earlier, I do think Tifa and Cloud satisfy the conditions of love that I describe in my article, I'll quickly go over why, but before I do, I think it's important to answer your first question first. "If being teenagers precludes Rinoa and Squall from having true love, why doesn't that same logic apply to Tifa and Cloud?" Well, the short answer is that being a teenager does NOT preclude you from loving someone, and I didn't say that it does. My argument is a bit more subtle than that. It's not that teenagers can't feel love, it's that it's very easy for teenagers to mistake infatuation with love. It's important here to distinguish between two different emotions, no one doubts of course that teenagers love, for instance, their parents, but we both understand that that's not exactly what is meant by love in the romantic sense. We also all know that we can be nervous around a boy or a girl that we barely know, and feel physically attracted to them. However, I think that everyone whose ever had more than one relationship in their life knows that that isn't love, it's merely attraction and a physiological response. It doesn't involve the same deep appreciation and closeness of a person that we associate with love. For me personally, the first girlfriend I ever had was someone I actually rather disliked before they suddenly confessed that they were attracted to me. When we were sitting on her couch a while later with her pressed against my arm my heart was beating out of my chest, I was more nervous than I ever had been before in my life and was borderline hyperventilating. But that had nothing to do with her, and all to do with me being a young boy who was about to make out with a cute girl. But that nervousness isn't love, I didn't love that girl, honestly, even while dating her I still didn't even like her that much as a person, and that "nervousness" quickly faded. My heart beating out of my chest...was not love, conversely, when I am with the person I actually do love, my heart is completely at peace. True romantic love I think lies at the intersection of those two emotions, where you long to be with someone physically, not because your heart is beating too fast, but because they're the physical representation of the complete and complex set of characteristics that make up that person. A state where you understand both yourself, and them, and understand that through everything you have become a part of each other. You would not be yourself if they're not there, because a part of you would be missing. The problem with teenagers in love isn't that they can't form the feelings of such a bond, but that they too often think that's what they're feeling when all it is is raging hormones. They think they can never live without each other but they'll have a new sweetheart 2 months later, because it's the nervousness, the beating chest, the excitement, and not the long deep appreciation of who the other person is and what they actually mean to you. They just feel new strong urges and emotions and ascribe meaning to them

when there barely is any. They lack the mutual understanding that sharing time together creates and which is necessary to understand who the other really is, and what that means. They lack the knowledge of the self needed to understand what is important in life and more importantly, what is, or should be, important to YOU and why. They lack the life experience needed to differentiate between love and infatuation, and they lack the wisdom needed make positive choices concerning which feelings to nurture, which often makes them subservient to their emotions rather than guiding them. Love takes time, it takes commitment, it takes understanding, it takes choices and the willingness to sacrifice, those are the things that bind two people together, through thick and thin, as they say. The good, and the bad. In a way, Cloud and Tifa perfectly represent that long slowly developing strength of mutual importance, while Aerith is more like a representation of the temporary hurricane of affection that we often ascribe with something new. This is the reason why Aerith was described by the developers as being like an exchange student who leaves midway through the schoolyear. This is the reason why Cloti is so often described as a "slow burn". The reason Cloud and Tifa are slightly exempt from the "teenagers in love" problem, although it does still factor in, is that their bond didn't start a week before the end of the game. Their bond started when they were kids. Tifa has been an integral part of Clouds life for his entire life, to the point where he decided to join SOLDIER, aka, the army, just in the hopes of getting Tifa to notice him. That is a decision, that is a commitment, that is Cloud tying Tifa into his sense of self ever since he was a boy, he didn't just sit around "wanting" her, he made a decision, to not just "desire her" or be "in love" with her, but an active decision to live his life with her as a central part of it. Those sorts of decisions and action form what you care about and value, what you deem as important, what you see as "you" and your life. Cloud had a type of love for Tifa long before he ever started developing any sexual urges. And Tifa doesn't just fit what he sees as important, he has made her important his entire life. In a way, he's molded himself over time so that the things he treasures, are the things she exhibits. More than that, the entire premise of Clouds character arc is rooted in him finding his true self. I mentioned earlier that a crucial part of love is knowing who you are, and what you treasure and why, and FFVII literally gives us a direct manifestation of Cloud finding himself in the lifestream.....and it's Tifa. There is no question here of whether Cloud knows who he is, what he treasures in a woman, and whether Tifa fits that mold, because Tifa made that mold. Concerning time, Cloud spent over a decade being in love with Tifa, she's not just a part of who he is, but she's such a part of who he is that when he lost her belief in him, he lost faith in himself and who he is. There is no question that these two characters lives are fundamentally emotionally intermingled. Cloud would not be Cloud without Tifa. And the same goes for Tifa, who has always held the image of Cloud close as a sort of representation of what is important. First like an unattainable star in the sky, then as a boy. Cloud is not just someone who has always been important to her, he's also her last link to her childhood, those things form bonds. Tifa is compassionate, and I've always been able to pinpoint the moment where in my opinion Tifa went from having a crush, to displaying true love, and its' the moment where she decides to spend that last days of her life caring for Cloud in a coma. That is not a small decision, and those decisions matter, they're not just telling the world something, they're telling YOURSELF something. When you make such a decision, you cement what is important to you. Through thick and thin. Tifa chose Cloud, she chose to believe in the memories they share together, not of the

memories of the last few weeks, but of the boy who asked her to the water tower all those years ago. Tifa, like Cloud, found herself during FFVII, Tifa knew what she cherished, it wasn't soldier Cloud, it was the Cloud she knew, the REAL Cloud, and her selflessness and conviction is rewarded.

I'd say that pretty much says it all, the groundwork is in place, the only thing needed after that is for a person to CHOOSE to go for it, to not give up, and that's what we get in the events before, during, and after ACC. That the two are willing to sacrifice and work on it, because they know that the other is worth it. And Tifa and Cloud have that as well. When Tifa is feeling down in case of Tifa, Cloud says he'll be there for her, when Cloud is having difficulties in ACC, Tifa never gives up on him. Ultimately Tifa is the glue of this relationship, because she has proven that she will never give up, and that's why her love is real, and why Cloud and Tifa ultimately will succeed as a couple. Cloud and Tifa have a difficult start to their relationship because of factors external to their feelings towards each other, but when you purely look at the basis of their relationship and feelings for each other, it's one of the strongest foundations in fiction. They have to weather a lot of storms together, but the reason the story can throw those storms at them, is that they have the foundation that allows them to handle it and grow stronger. "Why do you say that you wouldn't like Aerith if she had survived and ended up with Cloud?" I don't say that, I say that I don't like the Aerith version that exists in the minds of Clerith, and I don't. What I say specifically about Aerith surviving and ending up with Cloud is that I don't like that story, I think it would be a fundamentally bad story. I do say that I would not like Aerith if she knew the future, or anything really about the relationship between Tifa and Cloud, and still chose to try and get between that. Because setting aside all the shameless "Cloud/Tifa doesn't own Tifa/Cloud, they can do what they want" arguments, we all know that if your friend has someone they've cared about for a long time, and they're hitting in off, and you then try to get between that....you're scum, and I do not want you in my group of friends. I've known people like that, they're not kind. I also say that I wouldn't like that character, which is different from not liking Aerith as a person. A person can be sweet and likable and I can still not like their character if I think that the character is a hindrance to the story. "If Aerith survives things could've ended up happening differently for Cloud. He could've ended up happier with her." And if pigs had wings perhaps they could fly, or perhaps they couldn't. Perhaps had Aerith lived Cloud would have somehow married Scarlet, or perhaps if Aerith had lived Cloud would have been miserable and drank himself to death. I don't care about baseless speculation. Listen, I have no doubt that if Aerith had lived, Cloud would be happier, since it would be one less death on his consciousness, but he'd be happier WITH TIFA, Aerith living or dying has zero impact on who he ends up with and saying "maybe" is absolutely meaningless. Maybe if Aerith had lived, Tifa would have died, and the world would have ended because I don't need to be a fortune teller to predict that if Tifa died, Cloud wouldn't have come back from that. Honestly, saying "perhaps if Aerith had lived he'd be happier with her" is such a blatant attempt at trying to sneak shit past the radar that it honestly bugs me, you can take that implication back to the Clerith boards where dishonest takes live.

[mxvladdy]

Diavolo- True Form

Whoooooooo weeeee! ‘Pologies for the wait on these longer posts. I’ve been hit with a one two punch of house emergencies and sudden costly ass repairs, so my creative juices have been rightly squashed as of late.

Plus side I got my drawing tablet and drafting table back so I can neaten up my blog lay out now (yay!) 

Anyway this one was a challenge in the best possible ways. I really like Diavolo because of how little we know about him so it gave me some wiggle room. Or at least what I know of him- im only on like chapter 23 of the stories. Idk if I did him justice as this is angsty af but I sure had a blast writing it!

Hope ya like! Next up: Beelzebub 

Trigger warning: Mention of blood, and swearing. 

Diavolo-

He'll never show you, so don't ask. His true form is god-like in its own right and such knowledge, such truly raw demonic power in its natural form is not for your mortal eyes.

No matter what your lineage, it would break you. And despite his roles and being the literal devil, he doesn’t want you suffering.

Sometimes when he thinks you wouldn't notice he relaxes his hold on reality, just a fraction. He wants to relieve some of the tension that is always building just below the surface. Like closing your eyes when you have a tension headache. The mental energy he has to exert to keep face is enormous. Regular glamour doesn’t work nearly as well as his own, or Barbato’s magic.

But you see hints during your downtime spent in his company. A ripple in his reflection on the window pane. Unexplainable shadows dancing across his exposed skin. Too many teeth in his mouth when he laughs. Sometimes when you stare into his eyes you see something indescribable staring back behind them. His usually warm and inviting gaze darkening. A barest flicker, a hulking bestial thing kept locked behind in his golden gaze. It's enough to freeze the blood in your veins.

On certain nights when you can slip away from the brothers you stay in his room. Lying  awake, you watch his magic wane and shift as he slumbers. Sometimes you see runes, or at times letters. You are tempted to write them down and ask Solomon. But something stops you each time.

The worst images are the faces. Unknown souls trapped beneath his flesh clawing to be freed. Silent screams fading back into his body as he dreams. Your fragile fingers trace the patterns they leave as you wait for the next day wrapped in his embrace.

Only once have you seen more of his form then he would ever wish. The depths of his strength and mental fortitude were unknown to you so the slip up took you both by surprise. He masks the error well, but the sudden shift in energy in the room couldn’t be suppressed .

You are suddenly so aware of the oppressive weight of gravity on your frame. Your bones grinding together under the force of his aura. You panic, desperate by the need to breathe, but are unable to draw even the smallest bit of oxygen as it is robbed from the room. Time and reality wrapped too, distorting in ways only you thought only Barbatos could do. You knew in that moment the sudden dread of death, how mortally was but a rusty shackle tethering you down.

He collects himself, dispelling the energy and locking his glamour down tight to protect you. But that split second of fury felt like an eternity to you as you sink to the floor. You hiccup a shaky sob and shiver. Your fragile human mind bowing under the strain of what it cannot comprehend. Scolding hot tears fall from your cheeks, before splashing crimson the stone below you.

You didn't approach him again for over a month. No matter how strong you are, some things were better off unseen.

Mini Fic

He didn’t know. For once in his ancient pitiful existence, he had been unaware of his surroundings. It had been for just a moment, one tiny crack in his veneer. The foolishness of Mammon and Belphegor’s actions finally poked the right nerve. He wouldn’t hurt them, for Lucifer’s sake. That prideful demon would never forgive him if he did. But he could scare them. A quick look at his true self; a flash of the deepest bowels of hell. Enough to give them a reminder of their positions and standing in his court. He had expected their whimpers of fear, could taste the acidic tinge of it exuding from their pores. What he didn’t expect though was your blood curdling screams alongside.

Ironically, he would have to thank the second eldest later. His fast thinking is the only thing that saved you from complete damnation. His body shielded yours, taking the brunt of the stronger daemons hellish might for you. What little magic Mammon still had left used to protect you. Though, while your vision was blocked, you could still feel his oppressive presence. It racked your mortal flesh. Diavolo knew what affects his power had on humans. He spent years breaking and consuming damned souls with zeal after all.

The brothers had run from him after that, screaming for Simone. Barbatos following close behind, a look of consternation on his usually impassive face. You had been so limp in Mammon's arms. Diavolo could do nothing, shocked by his own weak will and realization that he might have ruined everything. You had been whisked away so quickly by his faithful servant and the brothers that he hadn’t had a chance to look you over himself. But the brief moment he saw will haunt him for years to come. Your eyes red from the sudden haemolacria, the blood staining your clothes and face. Your fingers digging away at your soft skin, black and purple blotches staining what he could see. Mouth opened wide on a silent scream. He knew what you must have seen. The souls of the damned trapped under his glamour breaking free to latch on to your unmarred soul trying to drag you back with them.

Against his butler's advice he stands at your door now days later trying to see you. He couldn’t sit around and just hear updates second hand. The brothers had been keeping guard most days in a valiant attempt to keep him away. But he could only be waylaid for so long before he used his rank against them.

He had arranged a full council meeting. Every one of the brothers knowing full well it was to get them out of his way. Yet, the order was absolute. This time none of the brothers could reject it. Barbatos would keep them in that room for eternity if he so wished for it. He hated using his age and power against them, but he saw no other way to get to you.

It was foolish now, standing as he was in front of your door. A part of him hoping you would turn the knob and let him in. Let him comfort you for once, instead of the asinine distractions the brothers offered. He could help too. Hells, he wanted to. He wanted to be closer to you. Power discrepancy be damned. The other part of him knowing it was for the best that you didn’t. Your guardian and tormentor all in one. He listens to your muffled sobs for a moment fighting with his feet to stay cemented to the floor instead of heading back in defeat.  

"When my father was still around he took me down to the deepest depths of the kingdom. Where the worst of the traitors and sinners are imprisoned." His deep baritone rumbles through your door during a break in your crying. "It’s a place few seldom go; even now I have yet to return. Back then he told me ‘there will never be a human soul that is undeserving of punishment. Even the ones destined for the celestial realm are tethered to sin.’ At that time I believed him. The things I saw in your realm... " The prince chuckles wearily.

He remembers the ever present scowl on the old King's face. His dark eyes looking out at the sea of damned souls he controlled. Even as a young daemon, fresh into his wings and still sharpening his horns to impress others he could tell how much his father detested his position. How it had warped him, turning him bitter and cold, even to his mate and only child.

Diavolo never wanted to be like that. Not to the ones he supposedly cared for at the very least. "I think that is why he hated the other realms so much.” He continued. “Humans, for their ability to choose which realm they would eventually end up in after they pass. That even the worst sinners could find redemption enough at the last moment to get to the pearly gates. While daemons, no matter how well they served, or the duties they did for the good of their own would never be seen as equals to our celestial counterparts or yours. That this existence is all we'll ever be destined to have. Nightmares and monsters, stories to tell little human children to keep them in line.” He pauses, collecting himself. “I believed wholeheartedly that every human deserved the punishments only my kind could dowel out. But, in this past year I have spent with you, I find myself changing. You are so undeserving of such torment. Somehow you are understanding and forgiving beyond measure to us. You handle our ill tempers with such grace. For daemons such as us, it is staggering, and humbling. I regret that I have hurt you so deeply and have broken your trust. I swear it as the head of this realm I would never intentionally do so." He looks at the door handle willing it to open. " I am so sorry."

Your crying picks up again. Huge heaving sobs that rattle your chest. Great Father, he just keeps making it worse. Clearing his head Diavolo turns.

Rejection of this nature was new to him. No one had ever dared to ignore him, especially such as this. The royal in him- his father's blood- seethed that he would even stoop so low as to grovel to a short lived thing like yourself. Even deeper yet, it demanded another taste of your essences. You little soul kept safe behind your rib cage. He wanted it added to his collection, kept tucked away deep within his maws.

It was sick; it was wrong. He chokes on the idea. The intrusive thought burrowing deep. How deplorable was he? Perhaps the angels were right to keep him out of heaven.

You didn't show to class the following day, or the days after. Unsurprising to him and the seven of the inner council. He figured the other day wouldn’t change anything. But it was utter agony to him. These days trapped in his office only getting short and curt updates on your health from Lucifer. It had been a special kind of torment.

Today he sat once again at his desk staring at some godforsaken bitching of a royal cousin. He knew this whelp. Some backwater thrice removed eons ago. Yet he was demanding an audience? The gall. The ink of their eligible handwriting makes him cross eyed. Would this day ever cease? He looks to his hourglass, the sands within seemingly frozen in time.

"My Lord, perhaps you should take a moment to stretch your legs?" Barbatos moved from his corner. Gloved hand coming to rest on top of the same three lines he had been reading for the past two hours. "This work could wait another evening I’m certain ."

"Did I do the right thing my friend?" Diavolo doesn't even bother answering the question his servant posed. They both knew he wouldn't. "This program. Our human exchange students. Solomon is one thing, but-"

"Your will and path is absolute." Barbatos states. "There are no mistakes within you, merely stumblings onto different paths."

With a gentle push Barbatos moves the hulking demon out of his way to collect and organize the scrolls and letters scattered about the large desk. "You made the right choice bringing them here. Look at what they have done. They are entertainment to you are they not?"

The prince rose knocking his desk aside and descended on his butler. His true form out in all its unholy glory now. His highly condensed magic distorting the study as if he was a black hole. The axis of the room shifts. His priceless collection of books and toys disintegrating from the cold radiation he emits.

It was all for show really. There was nothing he could do to an ancient being such as Barbatos. So he lashed out, throwing a tantrum in the security of his office. The hopeless agitation he felt fueling the flames of his rage. His butler had only added holy water to his already festering wounds.

Barbatos had been by his side for time in memoriam. The crafty bastard had helped raise him. Had shaped him into the ruler he was today. If anyone could break and remold him it would be his oldest companion.

The dark haired daemon waited for the waves of agitation to dry up. Moving only when the prince was in his more presentable demonic form. Large barrel chest heaving as he reined himself in. “Are you back to your senses?” He asks coolly, already categorizing the items to replace and furniture to be mended.

"I had not meant for it to go like this."  Diavolo croaks into his hands collapsing back on what remained of his desk. Building a bridge between realms, yes. That noble idea was the greater purpose of this program, but the rest of it. The classes, and dances. The parties where he threw his newest toys about to see how they would react to things other mortals worshiped? That had been for his own curiosity and amusement. Lesser beings navigating a foreign world blind to the dangers that were right under their very nose. Bring a mortal with no magic into his realm? Deep down he knew this was an inevitability. Especially with the freedoms he granted them. He just didn’t think he would get so attached.

“No one believes that you would hurt them on purpose.” His butler cuts off his downward spiral. “It would ruin the program. That is what you are so stressed about, right?” Barbatos eyes him skeptically. Diavolo, himself, and Lucifer had spent many sleepless weeks constructing and negotiating this program. If the Arch Angels heard a mortal was hurt down here it could very well end this little escapade. But the look in the prince’s eyes told a different story.

A warm glow emanated from his cheeks and he was unable to meet the old daemon’s gaze. Ah. "Or perhaps things have changed?" Barbatos smiles coyly up from beneath his bangs. "You are your mother's son after all. Neither of you were ever able to stem your bleeding hearts for long." Diavolo squawked indignantly but didn’t argue. Instead he merely turns a darker shade of red and curses under his breath.

He skipped out on court that evening. Not that he cared much. The other nobles would no doubt use the time to gossip about his whereabouts and uncouth behavior of late. Truth be told, he was avoiding the brothers more than anything else. They had made it expressly clear (some more then others) how they felt about him currently. He wouldn't doubt that Belphegor had a few more brothers on his side now.

Instead he stood at your door once more with a tea tray in hand. He had bumped into Simone on the way. The angel had come to bring you dinner and to check up on the last of your wounds. Celestial magic worked miracles on those who have been touched by the darker arts. Diavolo was grateful for his talents. And, by some miracle, Simone had made it abundantly clear he was not going to bring this to the higher ups on his end either.

Upon seeing the prince slinking up the house's stairwell the other man had simply smiled and offered him the tray. “I suddenly got a message from Luke. Could you perhaps drop this by our friend’s door?” Diavolo had accepted without preamble, large hands dwarfing the platter of little tea cakes and sandwiches. The young cherubs work no doubt. His cooking was a fine treat, and a great incentive to at least open the door.

“Hello again.” He knocks twice. “I just wanted to check in on you. I know I am the last person you wish to see but I was hoping to talk?” Silence greets him. Were you awake? He breathes deeply and focuses on picking up your vitals. You were up, your heart thumping steady somewhere in the room. That was good. “I also have dinner for you. Simone had an urgent matter to attend to so he- for better or worse- entrusted this to me.”

Diavolo searches hopelessly for something else to say. He couldn’t just leave the food and go. He needed to see you. “I don’t plan on staying long today. I understand when I am not wanted, but I cannot help myself but be worried for you. Perhaps this is just me contritioning, because I know I caused this. The amount of times I have been called a ‘ass’ by Solomon over this have been staggering.” He rambles. After another bout of silence from your end he coincides. “I see- I will leave the food by the door and let you rest.” Defeated he puts the food down and turns to leave.

The door clicks open slowly. One bloodshot eye peeking through the crack. “Oh mio piccolo mortale.” He loses his grip on your shared tongue at a loss. You looked- you must have been in the hall longer then he or the brothers had known. Such damage couldn’t be done in a few moments. Your skin was healing as nicely as Lucifer had said, but the deep purple scarring still remained on the surface. The burn pattern of it all was random. Twisting wounds that reflected an oily sheen from the light of the hallway. “I-.”

“I know-” You cut him off with a raised hand. “and I feel as though I owe you an apology too.” Your voice was so weak and shaky. A mockery of your normally strong and jovial tone. Hearing you laugh at school had brightened the dreary halls. He hadn’t realized it until you weren't there.

“You owe me nothing.” Diavolo says in earnest. He watches you contemplate your next words before throwing whatever you were going to say away.

“Would you like to come in?” Your eyes drop to the tray. “Luke always makes more than I can eat.”

“I don’t think that would be wise.” He backs out. All his plans crashing and burning around his feet. His actions had been irreparable.

“Perhaps not,” You open the door wider taking the tray and heading to your side table, leaving him no room to argue. “But then again, being a lamb among such wolves as yourself and the brothers isn’t smart either.” You meant it as a joke but he couldn’t even muster a chuckle. It was true. Gods. “Dia-” You approach him again but falter at the last second.

As much as you wanted to be close to him again the memories were still so fresh in your mind. The cold hell fire of his magic ensnaring you, searing your skin. The whispered words of sinners long since past still echoing in your head, all in languages you’ve never heard before. The worst though had to be the screaming. Lost souls begging for help. Some sounded so familiar…You shutter involuntarily.

You wanted to hate him for this. Curse him for putting you through this pain. But how much could you blame him? Or any of them? They were daemons. Whether he meant to hurt you or not, it truly had only been a matter of time before it happened. It would be hypocritical of you to fear or hate him forever over this. Six of the seven brothers have threatened your life before, and you have forgiven them. Hell, one of them actually killed you. What’s more was that Diavolo’s wrath hadn’t even been directed at you.

Wrong place at the right time; seemed to be your forte. “Please, come in.” You repeat again firmer than before mustering up either courage or sheer human stupidity to order him in. You couldn’t tell the difference anymore. “We need to talk.”  

He enters, following at your heel like a lost puppy. All air of princedom gone as you clicked the door shut. Diavolo fiddles with his hands, old habits from childhood coming with his nerves. He didn’t know what to expect anymore. Yelling? Some kind of beratement? A plea to go home and never look back?  He would let you.

You pass by him, giving him a large berth of space to get to your seat. “Tea?”  

Diavolo jerks his head to you. He had forgotten momentarily the plate of food he had used to get access to you. You smile sheepishly pushing it and a plate of sweets towards him with your unbandaged knuckles. He doesn’t move till your hand retracts back to your lap. You jerk your head to the open seat waiting for him. You weren’t going to take no for an answer.

“I- thank you.” The daemon sits making himself as small as possible in the straight back chair. He takes the porcelain and drinks mindlessly. The scalding hot tea doing little to help the tightness of his throat, but it did thaw some of the ice in his mind.

“Are-how…” He fumbles so unsure of what to do next. “I see you’ve been keeping up with your school work.” Diavolo closes his eyes, wincing internally at his words. That’s what he comes up with? Idiotic.

You smile anyway, eyeing the massive pile of books and paperwork spewn about your bed. “Yeah. I’ve taken to doing my school work with Levi in his room. Mammon and Beel are nice enough to drop it off to the teachers when they are due.” He nods. He knew this of course. But it was nice to hear it from you. But yet, you don’t meet his eyes. Far too afraid to see what hid behind them.

The thought of being dragged back into those dark depths again makes your pulse quicken. You instead stare at your nail beds, finding them more interesting. They were purple now. The nails stained black by the contact with his magic. “Will- will that go away?” He asks. Demonic curses or taints were nigh impossible to remove fully. Disgustingly, he hoped they didn’t. Then your nails would match his. The darker depths of his soul coo at the idea, happy that in a small way every daemon would know your his. Not as good as a pact, but as close as he could get to being a part of your little mortal life.

“I’m not sure.” You reply honestly bringing your hands up to place them on the table. “Simone and Solomon have done what they could. But, it is as good as it’s going to get for now. They say it could fade with time.” You look up at him, eyes gazing to the left of his face. “Luke thinks I should see a stronger angel.” Diavolo winces, the thought stung, and terrified him. “I told him no.”

That surprised him. This was your chance. The celestial realm had been skeptical from the beginning. If they knew, it would be a perfect caveat for them to step in. “Why?” Finally you look at him. The fear was still there. Hesitation evident in your eyes. Yet you forced yourself to look at him, fighting through your trepidation.

“Did you mean what you said earlier? About your father and what you think of me?”

“Of course.” He replies without hesitation reaching for your cold hands. You flinch but don’t move away. It felt-nice. His warmth chasing away the perpetual chill that covered your fingertips. Idly you stroke his strong hands with your thumbs.

“Then, I think we can work on this privately.” Slowly but surely you felt like you could fix this. Not for the program, but for yourself.  

[heliads]

Making the Team

Based on this request: “The reader is the daughter of natasha and steve, and she is nervous about for her first mission. Her mom and dad tell her that everything is gonna be great, and the mission is complete, but the reader is badly injured and her parents and Bruce takes care of her.”

masterlist

You’re awake when the first light of dawn tentatively begins to shine through your window. You’ve been awake for a while, actually, too excited to sleep a wink. This is the day of a very important mission. It’s probably going to be the most important mission of your life, in fact. If you do well on this assignment, you’ll be made an Avenger. If you don’t, you’ll have to get sent back to training and know that your entire future might have just slipped between your fingers.

Most teenagers your age would never have gotten this opportunity. If they were lucky, they might be accepted to the S.H.I.E.L.D. academy or embark on an internship with Tony Stark. You, however, happen to have two Avengers as your parents. Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanoff, the classic Avengers couple. After much wheedling and careful manipulation on your end, they’ve allowed you to begin training as a potential Avengers recruit. Now, all you have to do to cement your place on the team is to prove yourself in this mission.

It’s not like you’re getting into this team solely based on nepotism, though. Your father was a super soldier and your mother was trained in the Red Room. Ever since you were old enough to walk, it was evident that you would be destined for the same path as they so famously trod. You ran faster, knew more, threw punches harder than anyone else your age. Even without your parentage, S.H.I.E.L.D. would have tapped you long ago. You just get to bypass the protocols and go straight to a potential slot on the team.

Eventually, you can lie in bed no longer, your adrenaline already pumping through your veins at the mere thought of the upcoming mission. You sling your legs over the side of the bed, jumping down onto the floor and rushing over to don your awaiting clothes. Your real suit is waiting in a quinjet at Avengers Tower, so all you have to do is pull on some casual clothes and rush your parents out the door.

They’re already up, as it turns out. Your mother is nursing a cup of coffee, and your father is standing over the stove, brow furrowed as he considers a pan of scrambled eggs. Natasha smiles when she sees you. “Look at you! Ready for the big day?” You nod excitedly, starting to grab the beginnings of a breakfast. “Couldn’t sleep a wink.” Steve chuckles. “I’m starting to think you’re excited about running headlong into danger.” You stare at him pointedly. “I wonder who I learned that from.” Natasha laughs at Steve’s expression. “She’s got you there.”

By the time you’re pulling up to the Avengers Tower, however, the excitement bubbling into your chest is deepening into nervous worry. What if something goes wrong? You’ve never been allowed on a mission as large as this one before, where civilians and the other Avengers alike are counting on you. What if you mess this up? The stakes are higher than you’ve cared to realize- not just a spot on the Avengers, but the lives of those you care about. You head over to the quinjet, but your fears only grow when the plane takes off.

You force yourself to calm down, heading over to the racks of weapons and gear in the hopes of distracting yourself. There at last is your suit- a flexible, bulletproof black jumpsuit with armored paneling overtop. You glance at your reflection in the mirror, but instead of seeing the usual confident version of yourself, you only see a nervous teenager. Why have you been allowed on this mission in the first place? What if this really isn’t what you were meant to do?

You hear footsteps behind you and turn hurriedly, doing your best to wash away your worries and plaster on an expression of relaxed calm. Your mother, however, has been reading people her entire life, and nothing can get past her. Especially not the worries of her daughter. She frowns at you, pausing at the doorway and heading inside. “Hey, you alright?” You sigh, staring at your palms. “What if you guys were wrong about me? What if I’m not supposed to be an Avenger after all?”

Natasha shakes her head. “We’re not wrong about you. That’s a promise. Y/N, I’ve seen you since you were little. You can do things that most soldiers couldn’t even dream of. If Steve or I thought that you couldn’t do this, we wouldn’t have suggested you take the mission.” You look at her anxiously. “But Steve is a super soldier. You’re a Black Widow. I am none of those.” There’s another voice from the door now, and you turn to see your father leaning against the doorframe.

“You don’t have to have that experience to be special. What about Maria Hill? You’ve seen her before. Even Thor’s afraid to take her on, and she doesn’t have any special abilities.” Steve walks into the room, smiling comfortingly. “No, Y/N, you are more than capable, even without training or a strengthening concoction. Honestly, if I was out in the field and I came toe to toe with you, I’d be worried.” A laugh rises unbidden to your lips. “You just have to say that because you guys are my parents.”

Natasha shakes her head, a small grin crossing her face. “Actually, us being your parents means that we wouldn’t usually say that at all. We made sure that you were given the best training and preparation, and that you had equal treatment with the other recruits. You didn’t make it this far because of us, you made it this far because of you. And, if that isn’t enough to convince you, check out your file. We didn’t write that, your instructors did, and your instructors gave you the highest marks we’ve seen in years.”

You smile grudgingly. “You’re sure I can do this?” Steve nods, reaching out to pull you close in a hug. “I know you can do this. You’re an excellent fighter, Y/N, and after today, you’ll be an Avenger. Just like that.” You laugh, returning the hug. “Just like that.”

This, however, is easier said than done. S.H.I.E.L.D. and Avenger training have done a lot for you- teaching you how to fight, readying you for battle. Nevertheless, no amount of simulations can prepare you for the mission at hand. There are hostages inside a building, dozens of guards and soldiers waiting outside. The hostages aren’t the only things to contend with, though- there are civilians, goons, and the knowledge that S.H.I.E.L.D. plans are hidden in the coat pocket of one of the hostages. At any moment, the guards could find out, and then the mission would be over before it even started. You have to rescue the hostages before the data is uncovered.

Your group fans out, looking for entrances. You spot one quickly, rushing to it. There’s an opening on the roof, and you jump from window to window, quickly scaling the building. There, you’re able to take out a couple of snipers and a few roof guards before heading inside the building through a service entrance at the top. The fighting gives you a rush, and you find yourself smiling as you take down yet another soldier. Maybe you were meant for this after all.

At last, you find the room with the hostages. You draw back, waiting around the corner out of enemy view. You tap on your earpiece, speaking hurriedly. “I’ve found the hostages. Second floor, far east side, about a dozen or so guards.” Steve’s voice crackles across the radio. “We hear you. Do not engage, wait for us.” You nod. “Affirmative. Waiting for you.”

Steve and Natasha, however, take their time getting to you. The soldiers must realize that someone’s found a way in, as they’re doubling up around the entrances. You stare at the room with the hostages, watching with bated breath as the leader of the goons circles the captive men and women. The man frowns, pausing by a woman in blue. She has a gold circle pinned to her chest, designating her as the leader. The man stares at the pin, then at her. You can almost see the pieces clicking into place in his head.

You curse softly as you realize what he’s about to do, and switch your radio back on. “The leader has figured out that someone has the plans. I think I have to go in.” Natasha’s voice is sharp over the comms. “Negative! Y/N, do not engage.” As you watch, the man draws closer, flipping open the woman’s jacket with the tip of his rifle. Even from here, you can see the hidden pocket, and even from here, you can see the man’s eyes light up as he spots the rectangular package tucked away inside.

Your hand rises to your earpiece once more. “Sorry, but I have to do this.” You flick your radio off, drowning out the frantic voices of your parents. You race over to the room, kicking down the door with your boot. The guards turn to you when the door crashes open, but you fire your weapons methodically, taking down the guards one by one as you race around the room to the woman. The leader is standing back up, shouting orders at his troops, but you’re not paying attention.

Then his rifle is raised again, pointing towards the woman with the plans. You feel your feet moving without a second’s hesitation, pounding towards the pair. You manage to shove the woman aside just before the man’s finger tightens on the trigger, and you can feel her slip you the plans even as the bullet impacts on your side. For a second, you don’t feel anything at all, and manage to turn your weapons towards the leader, knocking him to the ground. Then your hand comes up from your side, stained red as blood begins to pour onto the ground, and the pain truly hits.

It’s the worst pain you’ve ever felt in your life. You’ve seen Thor wield his thunder before, seen him raise his hammer and watched as a boom of thunder cracked the sky. Lightning arced down to the ground before him, burning the ground and decimating his opponents. You’ve wondered what that would feel like, and now you have a fairly good idea. Maybe you’re not being electrocuted, but you feel like you’ve just been hit by the blow of a god.

There is shouting above you, more shouts ringing out. You stand up unsteadily, hand clamped to your side, and realize that Steve and Natasha have finally found you. They take down the guards with an almost frightening certainty, and then they see you. Just like that, their calm and cool exteriors break away and they run to your side. Steve visibly pales when he sees the blood pooling out from your side. “Y/N!” He shouts, and you weakly hold up the plans. “It’s alright, I got them. They’re safe.”

Steve shakes his head, and he’s saying something else but you can’t quite make it out. You think you hear your name, then Natasha’s, but for some reason you can’t focus on his words. Then the room tilts dizzyingly, and then you can feel nothing at all except for the overwhelming pain in your side and a sickening worry that your parents will never be able to forgive themselves if you die on this mission.

When your eyes open at last, you’re in a bleached white room. A smiling face swims before you; after a second you recognize it as Dr. Banner. His smile widens when he sees you sit up. “Hey, easy there. You took a pretty big hit.” You groan, feeling pain starting to blossom again from your side. It’s not as bad as it was in the room with the hostages, but it isn’t a picnic either. You rub your face with your hand, still disoriented. “What happened?”

Bruce chuckles. “You took a bullet for Ruth Hanaway.” At your confused expression, he clarifies. “The woman with the plans. You know, with the rest of the hostages. She’s fairly important, too. Apparently a higher-up among the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, and she’s very impressed with what you did. She said you didn’t hesitate at all, just dove to save her. Now, that’s Avenger material.” You frown up at him, remembering the stakes of the mission. “So that means-”

You’re cut off by Natasha, who’s just burst through the doors. “Yes, you’re on the team.” She rushes to embrace you, and you smile at the show of affection. “But I got shot- I disobeyed orders-” Steve, who’d been closely following Natasha, shakes his head. “You saved the mission. If you hadn’t acted, the plans would have been lost. As much as I hate to say it, you did what you had to do.”

He fixes you with a sudden glare, although you can see right through it. “That being said, that was incredibly dangerous. You could have died or suffered serious injury. Even as it is, you’ll be spending at least a week in the hospital wing. We thought you were going to die, Y/N. No amount of missions will make up for your life.” You smile up at him, undaunted. “I’m not planning on repeating this anytime soon. I’ve had my life-and-death risk quota used up for the time being.”

Natasha chuckles, mussing up your hair. “That’s what I wanted to hear. Barely awake five minutes, and you’re already cracking jokes. I didn’t expect anything less.” You fix her with a triumphant grin. “Hey, I’m an Avenger now. I’m supposed to be used to this whole lifesaving thing.” Bruce chuckles, standing up to check a few readouts on the surrounding monitors. “I have no doubt about that. You might have to contend with Parker for the title of youngest Avenger, but I think that will be the least of your worries. Welcome to the Avengers, Y/N. We’re happy to have you.”

requested by @maximeevansblog​

marvel tag list: @mycosmicparadise​

[instasiswetrust]

July Prompts, Day 5 - Camera

"You still kept this one?"

When Jonathan turns to look at him, Steve's holding a broken camera in his hands. It's the one he had broken after seeing the pictures Jonathan took of Nancy, cracked and missing a part of the casing.

"I figured I could get it fixed but then you guys got me a new one. Kind of forgot to get rid of it afterwards." He shrugs, going back to rifling through his cassette collection, trying to find the Motley Cure one.

"You mind if I take it?"

This time, when Jonathan turns to look at him he appears to be confused, maybe even curious. Steve just shrugs, trying for nonchalance. He's not sure how to explain why he wants to keep the camera, just knows that he feels like he needs to.

So he's relieved when, after a moment, Jonathan nods. He gives him instructions on where he can get it fixed, a few tips about taking pictures, and that's that.

Guess Steve owns a camera now. Fun times.

-*-

Bitterness.

That's what the first picture he takes makes him feel.

He had stared in the mirror, brown eyes taking in the aftermath of Billy Hargrove's anger, of two nights of restless sleep and nightmares that left the phantom taste of rot and ash on his tongue. Had stared, looking at the canvas of bruises, black and blue and purple.

Nebulae on ashen skin at 3 AM.

His fingers had been shaking, a hint of desperation in his movements, when he reached for the camera. The flash had reflected on the cracked bathroom mirror, the outcome of a previous panic attack, blinding him for a moment. The end effect had made his stomach churn when he saw it.

With his eyes scrunched closed and the bruises lit up by the light of the flash, he had looked so fragile. Vulnerable and in pain. The bags under his eyes so dark that they blended in with the bruises already there.

He hated the picture.

It was still tucked safely in between the yellowed pages of an old empty journal.

-*-

The second picture taken comes courtesy of Dustin.

He had spent a whole week locked up in his room, bitter and scared, too afraid to be alone but too tired to face the whispers that would undoubtedly follow him. Each time he closed his eyes he could see Billy's face. Twisted in anger, golden curls flying with the force of his punches, but there had been something in the depth of those blue eyes. Something like fear, like regret.

Something Steve had wanted to forget if only because he didn't think he could stand it if there was something more to Billy Hargrove than just all the fury.

On Saturday the doorbell had rung. Insistent and unrelenting, the shrill sound hadn't stopped until he had wrenched open the door, scathing words dying in his throat at the sight that greeted him.

"Mom made extra chicken pot pie because she knows it's your favorite." Dustin had said as soon as the door had opened, shouldering his way past Steve on his way to the kitchen. "And everyone's been worried about you so I figured it was about time to force you out of your self-enforced pity party."

"It's not a pity party..." He remembers himself murmuring, lips pursing into a pout as he followed the boy into the kitchen.

By the look Dustin threw him, it was obvious he saw right through his bullshit.

It had been later, stomach full for the first time in days, that the younger boy had spotted the camera he must've left on the coffee table at some point. Steve had been lazying on the couch, eyes closed and mind blessedly empty when the sudden flash of a camera had gone off, startling him.

"What the hell dingus?"

When he had opened his eyes, Dustin had been grinning wide, all boyish smugness. He had only given Steve a moment before the shutter had gone off again. And again. And again.

He had taken pictures until the camera had run out of film avoiding all attempts Steve had made to wrench the camera out of his hands. Despite the annoyance he had felt though, a smile had curled Steve's lips for the first time since they had made it out of the tunnels.

Looking back on the stack of Polaroids, most of them had ended up blurry and unfocused from the chase. Only that very first one he had kept. He had looked content faded bruises, and eyebags the only hints that not everything was okay but that maybe it was getting better.

Bitterness and Hope. Maybe he should start a collection.

-*-

The third picture doesn't even come from his camera at all.

"Wha-?"

Once the brightness of the flash cleared, Steve was turning to look at Nancy perched on the hood of Jonathan's car, his camera in her hands. She was smiling at him the same way she used to back when they had started dating, all dimpled cheeks and crinkled eyes. She was even more beautiful now but she no longer his.

His chest ached with the knowledge. A quick jolt of pain.

It still didn't explain why she had just taken a picture of him.

"You should talk to them. If you miss them, that is." He didn't understand what she meant until the photo finished developing and she handed it to him.

She'd captured his right side in the frame, his gaze seemingly lost in a random point in the distance. At least, that's what he thought at first before he spotted the outline of a couple on the opposite edge of the frame. They looked a little blurry because of the distance but it was clear Steve's gaze was fixed on them. Longing was etched deep and clear on his features.

Maybe he should have stopped assuming that nobody was paying attention to him these days.

"Why would I talk to Tommy and Carol? They are assholes." It had come out a little too quickly, a little too guarded. An obvious lie.

"So were you but you changed." She gave him a soft but knowing look. Like she could see right through him. Maybe she could, he wouldn't put it past her. "Plus, you guys were friends since childhood weren't you? Those types of bonds aren't that easy to forget."

And he knew there was truth in her words but he felt scared.

Because although Steve was fine these days with no longer being considered King Steve, it was one thing to just passively lose popularity and another one to have Tommy and Carol spouting his secrets for everybody to hear.

Thing was, they hadn't done that yet. Even with Billy in the picture, they still hadn't.

"Maybe." And for a while that had been that.

Later that week he had dropped by Tommy's house. Tommy had begrudgingly accepted to talk after Carol needled him a little. They had talked and apologized, although it would take some time and effort before things between them resembled that of old.

Bitterness. Hope. Longing. Wonder what would join his collection next.

-*-

By the time the fourth polaroid joined the others in the old journal, his room was filled with dozens of pictures of his friends --his family-- hanging on strings over his head.

"I didn't peg you for a photographer, princess."

Billy had been standing in the middle of the room, looking at the motley array of pictures that littered the room. He had one in his hand, tugging surprisingly gently on the string so he could get a better look at it.

"Well I didn't peg you for an idiot but somehow you're in my room instead of the bathroom." But the heat that normally would accompany his words hadn't been there, the corner of his lips curling into a replica of a smile.

He remembers walking further into the room until he had stood next to the blonde, not quite touching but close enough to feel the heat of his body. At the time he hadn't thought much of the heat on his cheeks, attributing it to his embarrassment when he spotted the picture in Billy's hand.

It depicted Steve and Jonathan, both of them either high or drunk. He had been draped over Jonathan's side, pressing a lipstick-covered kiss to his cheek. Dark red lipstick and black eyeshadow to match, to be exact. Probably high, that's the only way he would've allowed Nancy to put any of her makeup on him.

"Black really doesn't fit you, pretty boy." Billy had teased him, all wide smirks and tongue between his teeth.

"Oh shut the fuck up, Billy." He had scoffed, punching his arm. "I looked damn fine."

And the way Billy had laughed, loud and honest and surprisingly bright. Steve couldn't help himself. He wasn't sure why he had found it so important at the moment but it had been, so he had grabbed his camera and snapped a photo.

Billy had stopped laughing at once, but at least he hadn't tried to take the photo.

It would be two weeks later when Steve realized what it was that he had seen at that moment. Another week before he had scrawled Love at the bottom of the polaroid and tucked it safely with the others in the journal.

-*-

The fifth photo just cements Steve's resolve to never show anybody the polaroids tucked inside the old journal.

"B...B-Billy fuck... baby please. I can't- I can't. Please."

Steve bit down on his bottom lip so hard that he had tasted blood. It had been impossible to quieten his sounds and focus on rolling his hips at the same time, especially when Billy seemed intent on covering his neck with as many lovebites as he could.

"Gonna come for me, baby? Come on my cock all pretty?"

And, oh god, Steve had whined.

High, and breathy, and so fucking lewd. Billy hadn't even touched him and he had been so close already, desperately chasing an orgasm that had been denied twice already. His eyes had been closed, head thrown back as pleasure mounted, dragging him even closer.

If he had opened them, maybe he would've seen what Billy was doing.

"Come for me, baby."

He vaguely registered the flash of a camera going off at the same time tremors overtook his body, thighs shaking with the force of his orgasm.

Later, when they were curled up on the couch going through the remains of a pizza, Billy had handed him the polaroid. Lust had been scrawled at the bottom of the photo.

"For your collection." Was what he had said.

-*-

If somebody were to ask what his favorite polaroid was, Steve thinks he would have to choose number 6.

He had caught Billy looking at his chest in the mirror, where the pale white scars twisted across the expanse of his chest. After the Mind Flayer, he had taken to wearing his shirts buttoned all the way. Even in bed with Steve, it was rare that he ever took off his shirt.

The look on his boyfriend's face then had been so miserable. All the iron defenses stripped away until only the fragile vulnerability underneath remained. It had pushed him to step into the room, wrapping his arms loosely around Billy's waist.

For a second Billy had tensed up, muscles going taut, eyes widening a fraction before he relaxed into Steve's arms with a sigh. The fragility had still been there but his roughened edges had softened some.

"What's on your mind, baby?" He had whispered, pressing a kiss to a bare shoulder.

He hadn't gotten an outright answer at the time but each kiss Billy pressed against his lips had been stained with a restless kind of desperation. Like he had wanted to etch each kiss on his skin and remember them forever, just in case he were to lose it all again.

And yeah, Steve knew exactly how that felt.

"Billy, I'm not going anywhere, okay?" The words had been muttered between slow kisses, reassuring and gentle. Silently begging Billy to believe in his words. "This? Us? I want this to be forever. Even if it's hard, or we have bumps along the way, I want to stay by your side."

Steve had gotten an idea then. With a quick *I'll be back* he slipped back to his room and grabbed his camera, giving it to Billy once he was back. His boyfriend had been understandably confused.

"Um, so I know this probably sounds lame and you can say no but just- Hear me out okay." He had taken a deep breath to try and battle the blush coloring his cheeks. "I was thinking that, as a... promise or something, we could take a photo each year. Just as a reminder. Of us. If you want, I mean, it's kind of a dumb id-"

Warm lips pressed against his, effectively shutting him up.

"You're a dork, Stevie." But Billy had still pointed the camera at the cracked mirror and taken the photo before dragging Steve back to bed.

[readyplayerhobi]

Flower | 39

; Hoseok x Reader

; Genre: Fluff

; Word Count: 4.6k

; Warnings: Drinking, mentions of pain

; Synopsis: You finally decide to take a dip into the world of online dating and find the Flower dating app. One of the top matches for you proves to be a guy who looks to be your complete opposite; tattooed, pierced, a metalhead and oh…incredibly handsome. What happens when you throw caution to the wind and reach out to him?

; A/N: Much faster this time, huh? For only the second time in the story...enjoy Hoseok’s POV! I hope you enjoy it and please reblog if you do so others can read <3 let me know your thoughts in a comment or ask! :D

; Flower Masterpost

-

“Everyone, take a shot,” Jimin says loudly, thrusting the tray holding a dozen or so filled shot glasses around the table. “Good, good. Now, let’s drink to Hoseok defying all our expectations and getting married!”

The younger man is already half-drunk, never being one to go slow or take it easy when there’s plenty of alcohol around. Hoseok isn’t particularly surprised, not when the group had already visited three bars by this point. It was his bachelor party tonight, only two weeks before his wedding and his friends were determined to give him a good time.

He’d been adamant that he wanted absolutely nothing to do with any strippers or anything that could be accidentally misconstrued. The last thing he needed was you thinking he’d cheated only weeks before the big day. Plus, he just wasn’t into that anymore.

Instead, he’d asked Jungkook to try and plan something that would avoid stuff like that. Hoseok just wanted to have a good time with his friends, not potentially cause a scandal. Thankfully, his best man had agreed happily and had instead planned the night to be a series of bar hops around the city. The day had involved everyone driving an hour to a place that let them drive quad bikes, do archery, have some paintball matches and loads more.

He was hurting from the paintballs, particularly the awful gauntlet they’d made him run at the end in which everyone had formed a tunnel for him to run through while shooting the shit out of his ass, but he’d enjoyed every minute of it. Now, he was just comfortably buzzed while some of his friends were well on their way to drunk. 

Namjoon, who was currently suffering from his toddler’s inability to let him sleep past 5 am lately, looked half asleep across the table from him. His eyes were glazed and unfocused, jaw slightly dropped as he tried to focus on the glass in front of him. Jungkook had placed it there about ten minutes ago, full of water. 

All of the guys were here today, having made sure to block out the time to celebrate with him and he felt a little shy at all the attention surprisingly. You didn’t have any other male friends, which meant his friends were all he had in his groom’s party. Six groomsmen for him and five bridesmaids for you.

You’d had to diplomatically pick between Chungha and Soyeon for your maid-of-honour, ending up with Chungha being chosen. Hoseok was forever amazed at how strong the friendship was between you all. Decades of media had taught Hoseok was women saw each other as rivals in everything and he’d been beyond worried about the fact you had to pick between your two best friends.

Reality had been a good slap in the face though, and he’d learnt over the four years of being with you that he should firmly ignore everything the media said. Your best friends had been gracious with each other, both trying to encourage the other to take on the role before Soyeon had given Chungha her full support. It amazed him but also made him happy that you had such a good friendship with them both.

The final space in your bridesmaid lineup wasn’t filled, and Yoongi was going to be walking alone at the end. You’d kept the space free to symbolise his sister, letting her be a part of the ceremony even if she couldn’t be there physically.

That had gotten him a little choked up when you’d told him your plans, but it had made his parents cry when he’d, in turn, told them. Any lingering concern that his parents might not actually like you had vanished then. Your sweet insistence of making sure she was a part of the day and not forgotten cementing your place in his family.

He’s brought back into the moment by Jungkook slapping his back hard, causing him to wince and almost spill the entire shot out of the glass. Glaring at him, Hoseok pushes him back before swallowing what was left of the shot. It makes him cringe, the taste of the straight vodka, not his favourite.

“Man,” Jimin sighs, flopping back into his seat before running his fingers through his hair. “Can you believe it? Jung Hoseok. Getting married. If you’d have said that in college, I would’ve laughed hysterically at the thought. The only thing I thought you’d marry was your dick into any available pussy.”

His words make Hoseok’s nose wrinkle, even if he couldn’t deny what he’d said. It was still amazing even to him that he’d finally found someone that he genuinely loved and who he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. For his friends, it was probably even more fascinating. Yet here he was.

Loving every moment of it.

“You know, I’d have thought after four years that you all would have come to terms with this. It’s not exactly a surprise anymore.” Hoseok was pleased that he hadn’t drunk enough to have his words be slurred. The last time he’d been truly wasted had been when he’d decided to introduce you to the lovely male concept of a dickcopter. Not his best moment.

Perhaps one of his funniest though.

“We have come to terms with it. Still a surprise though.” This comes from Namjoon, causing Hoseok to give him a betrayed expression. Of all his friends, he’d have thought that Namjoon would’ve been the one who understood how his life had changed upon meeting you. While Jimin had married Eden since Hoseok had met you, everyone had known that Jimin was one of those guys who wanted to have a loving, monogamous relationship.

He was the one in their group that had fantasised about marriage even in college. Meeting Eden had been the icing on his cake, even if neither of them was too sure whether they wanted kids or not.

But Namjoon had been much like Hoseok during the first years of college. Something which had certainly surprised you when you’d found out. Despite how diligent he’d been at his studies, Namjoon had discovered that he was attractive to women. Combined with the help of his friends to make sure he presented himself to highlight all his best points, such as his tall and broad physique which only looked better with a few workouts or how glasses seemed to make the girls swoon, he’d been in his element.

And then he’d met Amelia in his final year, falling hard and defying everyone’s expectations. There had been many heartbroken women, and men, around campus upon finding out that Kim Namjoon had finally succumbed to love.

They’d consoled themselves in Hoseok’s bed instead, for years afterwards as well.

Images of all the girls he’d entertained throughout his life ran through his mind like lightning. Girls of all skin colours, heights and backgrounds had graced his bed, or him theirs. All of them beautiful and worthy of a fun night, or at least ten minutes of his time.

He’d used to be one of those guys who was proud of his sexual prowess, safe in the knowledge that he could probably get any woman he wanted with some effort. It made him cringe now. Hoseok had never been one of those asshole guys who’d bragged and boasted about his body count, but he’d not exactly been subtle either. 

Throughout those years, he’d been adamant that he didn’t want a proper relationship. Hoseok had been more than fine with one-night-stands and short-term relationships that were probably better as being categorised as friends-with-benefits. He hadn’t thought he could monogamy. The thought of reducing himself to one woman and denying all the delights that life had to give him was dissatisfying.

The Hoseok from back then was a fucking idiot, he thought now. A self-centred, dick-centric idiot. The very idea of what he’d been was embarrassing to him now, making him more than thankful that you’d never met him back then. You’d deserved way better than whatever he’d had to offer.

Hoseok knew that he couldn’t go back in time to change things. But he also knew that if he was given the chance, he probably wouldn’t either. Because as humiliating as his old self had been, he knew that it had formed the person he was today. And if he’d been open to a serious relationship for all those years, then he probably wouldn’t have met you.

So, yeah, he wasn’t proud of his past. But he wouldn’t change it. Not when he knew that he’d finally grown up in time to find you. You’d shown him that relationships weren’t something to roll his eyes at or be afraid of, that love was something he was deserving of and was also capable of giving.

And here he was now, frowning at the glass in front of him on the table and being a sappy idiot. The way he kept drifting away from conversations made him wonder if he was a little more than buzzed, but he found that he didn’t care. He was enjoying himself, even if he kept having these more serious thoughts.

It was a good job none of the guys could hear his thoughts now. They already gave him enough grief for going googly-eyed over you, as they called it.

Shifting back into the conversation, he realises that everyone is now talking about who they think will be next to get engaged. Hoseok is a little surprised at how quickly the topic had moved on, but given his friends, he’s also wondering how long it’ll take until it changes once more to how many farts a human can hold or something dumb.

Still, it’s his bachelor party and he feels the need to get involved. So he throws an arm over Jungkook and gives him a smirk, raising his brows in expectation.

“I bet our little Jungkookie here is going to be next. Got any plans on popping the question to Soyeon?” He grins broadly, taking in Jungkook’s expression with pure amusement. The younger man looks remarkably like a deer caught in headlights with his expressive eyes wide and sparkling with their usual youthful exuberance alongside more than a little alcohol.

“I-er,” He stutters, his cheeks turning a rosy pink even in the lowlight of the bar that makes everyone snort with laughter. “I haven’t really thought about it.”

“Bullshit!” Jimin’s small fist slams down on the table hard, causing the multitude of glasses to shudder and some of them to clink together. It also causes most of the guys around to almost clawing the ceiling with how hard they all jump. Eyes squinting at Jungkook, Jimin points one finger at him in an accusatory manner that seems a little out of proportion for the question.

“You’ve been together...a while now,” Hoseok’s shoulders jerk as he tries to hold in the snort at Jimin’s lack of numeracy skills suddenly. “There’s no way you haven’t thought of it. Women think we don’t think about that kinda shit but we do! And you’re the biggest fucking romantic on the table, Jeon Jungkook!”

His words are more than a little forceful and Hoseok has to bite his lip to stop from laughing, particularly when he glances at Jungkook’s shellshocked face. Alongside those impossibly large and wide eyes, his jaw has now dropped open and he’s staring at his friend in disbelief. Taehyung has an equally surprised look but Yoongi is nodding along in agreement, nursing his glass of whiskey that he’s had for at least half-an-hour now.

“He’s right, you are. I mean...you cried at Hercules when Meg died, remember?” Everyone goes quiet as they try to recall the incident from long ago. Even Hoseok is trying to remember it, his head tilted before giving up. There have been so many incidents of Jungkook crying at films that the Hercules one doesn’t even leave a mark.

“Sorry I have emotions, unlike you lot.” Jungkook is pouting now, crossing his arms over his chest. On another man, it’d probably look a little intimidating given the way his biceps bulged in the black dress shirt he’d put on or the way the buttons strained a little from his shoulders and chest. But Jungkook’s face negates that with his lower lip pushed out almost comically and his cheeks full.

Hoseok can’t help but reach over and cup them, squishing them until everyone laughs at the sight and making cooing noises to him. It’s with resignation that Jungkook lets him, his deep sigh brushing past Hoseok’s fingers while his shoulders slump. 

Almost immediately, Hoseok is reminded of how you call Jungkook the baby of his friendship group. It’s with a grin that he realises it’s true. He’s their baby, despite the fact he’s bigger than most of them all and can probably kill them just by squeezing their head between his arms.

“Girls dig that. Soyeon likes it, right?” Taehyung comments, brow rising from where he was sitting. His arm was resting on the back of the seat, body looking long and lean with his legs spread. He hadn’t been lucky enough to be in the booth itself and had had to grab a chair from another table.

There’d been more than a few hungry looks given to him from other patrons in the bar but Taehyung had remained oblivious, his long black hair ruffled from the day's activities and tiredness on his face. Although part of his obliviousness may also be because he was both asexual and aromantic, so it may be more than he’s purposefully not paying attention to it.

“Let’s not generalise women,” Seokjin interrupted, reaching out to gesture wildly with his bottle of Asahi beer. “It’s rude and they get angry when people do that.”

Everyone pauses to look at him with eyebrows raised, wondering where that came from. But no one questioned it, instead shrugging or nodding in acknowledgement to avoid him going on a rant. Not that there was anyone who didn’t agree, but the last thing Hoseok wanted was to listen to a bunch of drunk guys debate that.

“Anyway, I think she finds it more amusing. Like...sweet but...mostly funny. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Soyeon cry at a film yet. Maybe I just haven’t found the right film or genre yet.” Jungkook has a thoughtful look on his face, his gaze distant and Hoseok realises that he’s probably too tipsy for this kind of conversation.

From personal experience with Jungkook, Hoseok did not doubt that he would spend far too long having internal conversations, arguments and debates without even realising other people were talking to him. If anyone thought Jungkook was introverted normally then they hadn’t seen anything until he was drunk.

“Keep looking,” Hoseok says cheerfully, taking another shot and trying to clean his tongue with his teeth to remove the flavour. “You’ll find it eventually. I discovered that Meeps doesn’t cry at most things but she will cry at videos of cats that have been nursed back after being hurt.”

“Well...duh.” That comes from Taehyung, who’s giving Hoseok a serious ‘wtf’ look right now. It makes him feel a little self-conscious and so he grabs one of the random beers on the tables before taking a swig.

“Yeah, who wouldn’t cry at that? What the hell.” Placing a hand on the table, Yoongi looks at them all with a serious expression that could almost sober a person. It causes him to start ranting on about animal rights for the next five minutes, no one feeling brave enough to interrupt him. When Yoongi got going, everyone had long since realised that it was better to just let him get on with it.

By the time he finally stops, sitting back with a triumphant expression on his face before swallowing the last of his whiskey, everyone else has already finished another bottle of beer. Almost like they were trying to get themselves drunk as fast as possible to cope with Yoongi’s insistence that people who hurt animals should receive the same injuries back to them.

While Hoseok agreed, he didn’t quite like hearing about some of the incidents that Yoongi was talking passionately about. It made him think of Kasumi and Ciri, which made his chest hurt. 

He was a bit of a baby when it came to his furbabies.

Suddenly though, he’s overwhelmed with the intense desire to go home. To see his dog and stroke his cat and cuddle with you. Blinking slowly, he stares at the bottle before reaching into his pocket and pulling out his phone. The bright light as he unlocks it causes him to squint, trying to avoid being blinded before he realises with a shock that it’s after one in the morning.

His day had started at 10 am when he’d met up with all the guys at Jungkook’s place. They’d then made their way to the place for the day’s activities, having spent until 4 pm there before heading back to Jungkook’s to change into some clean clothes for their drinking time. Soyeon had been amused as she’d watched them all emerge almost like a new man, clean from the quick showers they’d taken and ready to get wasted.

But now he was tired. And holy fuck, he hurt. Hoseok had avoided trying to get up whenever possible. Which meant he fucking needed to piss right now, but moving hurt. His joints ached like fuck from all the activities while his body hurt so bad from the paintballing.

Licking his lips, he finished the last of his beer before sighing deeply. It caught the attention of the others, despite the music and noise. Upon seeing everyone’s gaze on him, he smiles at them.

“Okay guys, this has been a pretty great day. Thank you Jungkook for organising it and thank you to everyone for coming. It means a lot to me. Now, before I get too sappy...I’m going to head home.” He’s already organising for an Uber on his phone, ignoring the outraged noises that start from everyone.

It’s Jimin that’s loudest though, his voice rising in pitch and yet simultaneously getting deeper as his accent gets a little stronger.

“What? It’s not even late! We’ve still got plenty of drinking to do.” Now he’s the one pouting and Hoseok notes in amusement that Seokjin and Namjoon are nodding in agreement. Taehyung doesn’t seem to give two fucks, either way, giving him a lazy shrug before taking a drink of what Hoseok realises is a glass of water while Jungkook remains quiet.

“Guys, it’s one in the morning. I know that I’m flaking out early, but you guys can keep drinking. I’m okay with it, honestly. I just...I’m really tired. A little drunk too, probably not as much as you’d all like but enough for me. Also, I have a bruise on my ass that’s probably the size of Ireland from all the fucking paintballs you fired at me. I hurt.” He whines out the word, wanting to wiggle almost like a child but the pain that shoots up from his asscheek causes him to inhale quickly and still.

“Shit, does it hurt?” The question comes from Jungkook, who’s scanning Hoseok up and down as best he can. It’s not a good attempt given he’s had a little too many drinks and he doesn’t seem to be able to lift his head properly once it’s gone down too far, causing Hoseok to snort.

It doesn’t stop him from giving the younger man a droll stare, which he can only see when Hoseok forcefully lifts his chin back up. “Yes, it fucking does. Why do you think I’ve barely moved all evening?”

“Sorry.” Jungkook’s face is scrunched up and Hoseok knows why he looks so awkward. He’s pretty sure he may as well have Jungkook’s name imprinted on his back in bruises from how many times he’d been hit by him. The guy was far too fucking good at paintball, something Hoseok had regretted agreeing to within five minutes of being in the arena.

“It’s okay. But I’m done for the night. I’m going to go home and sleep so fucking hard. Meeps might think I’ve died in the morning or something.”

“Morbid.” Yoongi chuckles, tipping his new glass of whiskey towards him before grinning.

“Yep. Really glad that I asked for this to be done two weeks before the wedding. I’d have been like an old man if I’d agreed to do it the day before.” The very thought of having to hobble up the aisle made him cringe.

A notification on his phone distracted him though, the Uber app telling him that his ride is here. He feels a surprising amount of relief at being able to go home, the thought of his bed almost like a siren call that was too tantalising to resist.

“And with that, my Uber is here. Thank you for today, really,” Hoseok lets out a yelp of pain as he stands, gingerly holding his ass and causing everyone to simultaneously laugh and look concerned. “I appreciate it. It was fun and I enjoyed it all.”

It takes him another few minutes to finally get out of the bar; hugs being given out repeatedly to the guys while he accepts all their praise and well wishes. The Uber was idling by the side of the road and he wished that he could slump inside but instead, he had to gingerly get in and position himself with the least amount of pain. 

To make it even worse, he had to explain to the very sober driver that he wasn’t shitfaced but was actually in pain from the earlier paintballing. That had led to a whole conversation that Hoseok hadn’t anticipated, lasting the whole trip as he’d discussed where they’d gone and the activities they’d done. The guy seemed to be very interested in it and had given him many congratulations when he’d found out that Hoseok was at his bachelor’s party.

It never failed to amuse Hoseok how easily people wish congratulations upon finding out as if they felt obliged. What he didn’t quite appreciate was the guy's remarks about marriage, which were more than a little derogatory. Hoseok didn’t know why anyone would think it was a good idea to disparage marriage to someone who was only weeks away from marriage.

As he was leaving the car, he put on a polite smile and thanked the driver for the trip. Once he was out though, he resolved to not leave a good review. Maybe he sounded a little harsh, but having to listen to how he should ringfence all his finances to avoid them being leeched by his soon-to-be wife for whenever she inevitably cheated or left him had been more than he could handle.

If Hoseok hadn’t been tired before, he sure was now. 

Opening the front door, he kicks off his shoes with a heavy sigh before heading into the living room in darkness. Ciri is in her cage, fast asleep until Hoseok unlatches the door and calls her out. She’s slow to react, her little body tired until he opens up the backdoor and lets her out. He figures that you can both have a nice lie in if he lets Ciri out now. 

Closing the door once she’s out, he heads into the bathroom and brushes his teeth while peeing before washing his wash. He gets to see how badly bruised he is in the mirror for the first time and winces at the sight of the already black and blue flesh, knowing he’s going to be in even more pain tomorrow.

Sighing, he towel dries his face before heading out and letting Ciri back in. He’d love to have a little cuddle with her but he’s too tired, so he just puts a treat into her cage to coax her back in before giving her an attentive stroke and locking it. She’s too busy eating her chew eagerly to notice him. 

Heading to the bedroom, he pulls off his clothes in the dark before fumbling around to find his pyjamas. He’d go to bed in just his boxers but he wants to try and give a little bit of coverage to his poor body for tonight. Which is why he doesn’t even know if he’s put them on the right way around or not. Hoseok doesn’t even care, he already feels asleep.

There’s a little light when he gets over to the bed from your clock, the numbers glowing brightly in the night and highlighting your face as you sleep. Kasumi is curled up against your stomach on top of the covers, her eyes blinking slowly at Hoseok as he leans over to give her a stroke as well. She gives a quiet chirp of appreciation and he smiles softly at how her body vibrates as she purrs, her paws flexing and closing as she pads at your covered thigh.

And through it all, you don’t even stir. Your breathing is slow and steady while your body is completely relaxed, unaware he’s even arrived home. Hoseok doesn’t even realise he’s smiling until he lets out a soft laugh, knowing that you probably won’t wake up at all. Once you’ve fallen asleep then you’re truly out like a light until the early hours of the morning so he has no fear of waking you up.

Carefully, he climbs into bed and throws the cover over himself with a quiet groan as his limbs feel so heavy. He can’t even remember the last time he hurt this badly. It takes way more effort than he’d like to admit to not wake you up and have you coddle him. Mainly because you’re grumpy when you’ve been woken up.

What he does do though, is shift onto his side that doesn’t have the most bruises before carefully shuffling closer to you. A soft mewl of pain leaves him as he does so but he doubts he could get in any position without some level of discomfort right now. So he’ll be damned if he denies himself some comfort in cuddling your sleeping form.

Wrapping an arm around your waist, he moulds himself to your back as gently as he can before letting out the deepest sigh he’s done in a while. His whole body relaxes, causing him to almost whimper as the pain he hadn’t realised he had is exacerbated by his now lax muscles. Fuck, that’s the last time he paintballs with Jungkook.

Pressing his nose to your back, he inhales deeply. You haven’t even moved, despite all the jostling he’s done behind you and there’s no change to your breathing. Taking in the comforting scent of you, he recalls his earlier thought process about his past. Feeling you solid and warm in his arms provides him with a sense of peace that he’s never found with anyone else, causing him to feel content despite his discomfort.

Yeah, he wouldn’t change a thing if it meant he ended up with you. And he doesn’t care how cheesy it sounds. In only two weeks, he’d be marrying you. He was allowed to be as sappy as he wanted, whether it was internally or externally.

You deserved to be praised and shouted about and goddammit, Jung Hoseok was going to worship you.

[sassooda]

Worlds Away JJK AU / Chapter 22 - Familial Ties 🔞

w/c - 5,892

           Choso is on his way to Itadori. He could create a portal but found that he wouldn’t mind using the time it took completing the distance on foot so he could arrange his thoughts. He’s planning on bringing Itadori into the understanding, giving him all the knowledge he’s idly kept to himself over the years. He’s not even sure where to begin but only hopes that he’ll be able to properly explain everything to him.  It seems that even with a slowed pace and shortened steps, Choso ends up in front of the door before he knew it. He takes a moment to collect himself, breathing in deeply. ‘Maybe I should start off with the good news about Elska…’. He knocks on the door lightly and announces that it’s him.

           “Ummm…come in?” Itadori sounds confused that he’d be treated with the courtesy of the warning before entry.

           Choso opens the door with a nervous demeanor, eyes primarily looking at the shabby floor as he turns to shut the door behind him. He’s so anxious that he forgets all of his words completely and upon raising his eyes, sees an agitated Itadori. He wishes maybe he would’ve taken after Naoya in preparation of his room, it being dingy and plain in comparison to Elska’s.

           “You’re Choso, right?” Itadori’s arms are folded into his shaman uniform while he sits in the cushion of the yellow couch that was placed in the room. “I thought you were on our side, you helped us rescue Gojo didn’t you?”

           “I did, yes.” Choso is struggling to find his confidence as he sits in a chair across the couch from Itadori, his black suit feeling uncomfortable. “I know you have a lot of questions…and I plan to answer them all.” He’s now relaxing into his seat as he studies Itadori’s face to judge where to go next. “For starters, Elska is going to be alright. Naoya’s with her now.”

“Naoya? I was told he’s one she needs protection from!” His body language is slightly tensed to this but finds relief in knowing that she’s alright after he was told that Getou attacked her. “She wouldn’t have been put in that situation if you’d left us alone.” He’s not sure what to make of this situation yet, nor of Choso but something is telling him to listen.

           “He’s not a bad man at all, he’s actually one of the greatest I’ve ever met.” He sees Itadori frown to this as he’s not convinced. “I’ll show you in a little bit but first we have to talk…I’ve been waiting for this moment for a very long time.”

           Itadori remembers Toji once saying that he would want to converse with Choso and this causes him to become more interested. There was something they knew that he definitely didn’t and feels even less alarmed about the visit now. He’s not sure how Choso would show him what he means about Naoya but he decides to let that go and so he can continue. “Ok, I’m listening then…”

           “Itadori… have you ever found your inhumane strength odd?” He asks rhetorically before proceeding, “It’s because you’re not exactly human.” He waits a moment to take in Itadori’s reaction but is kind of relieved when he sees he’s not dismissing him yet.

           “I’m still listening, I really have wondered about this…” Itadori leans in to where his elbows are now placed on his knees and face resting on fists as he lets Choso speak.

           “To put it simply, you’re half cursed spirit in origin, like myself.” He holds his breath for a moment, “To put it even more directly…I’m actually your older brother.” He chooses this instant to hold courage in his expression as he informs Itadori of their familial ties. “I’m gathering you haven’t any memory of this though…”

           “This doesn’t make any sense. How? I had a family…a human one.” Itadori is clearly puzzled and having a hard time understanding how this could be. He looks down to his hands after removing them from under his chin and asks himself, ‘There’s no way, right?’. He’s searching his brain for some kind of excuse but finds it difficult to deny Choso’s words, ‘There is something super familiar about him now that I think about it…’

           “We have more brothers, others like us born of the same Kamo blood.” He sits back up in his seat as the ease of Itadori’s reactions settle him into a more composed way.

           Itadori’s eyes widen to the mention of the Kamo clan, the third of the three major ones. “I still don’t really understand but that’s alright.”

           “Some of our brothers are scattered around the globe, a few still sealed as I was for so long. You were too until the family that raised you in this life found you.” He smiles sadly and softens his eyes, “They seemed like good people, I’m sorry that they’re not with us anymore…” He see’s Itadori’s confusion after that statement, probably unsure of how he was able to know that. “Due to you being Sukuna’s vessel, I was tasked with keeping an eye out on you and so I have for a  while now, even before you were forced into being so.”

           Itadori’s brow furrows as he thinks of his past. “I did actually feel like I was always being watched.” He lightens his tone, “Not in a creepy way but it’s more like I never felt alone!” He smiles now as his mind is trying to churn all of this information at once. “Why am I here though? Is it because I’m your brother?”

           “No, I would probably just approach you normally if circumstances were different.” Choso almost chuckles at the end of the statement, laughing to himself as if he knew what normal really was. He looks around the room further, ashamed that Itadori’s quarters were so plain and barren. “Getou needs Sukuna to help him defeat Gojo. He needs Elska more or less for the same thing, except she’s also been promised to Naoya by the elders.” He leans forward, closer to Itadori and lowers his voice, “But neither Naoya or myself trust Getou. I specifically aim to destroy everything he is.”

           “I really don’t get it…why are you here working for him then?” Itadori is calmer than he thought he would be given the situation of his abduction. He finds this uncanny urge to trust Choso. His gut hasn’t failed him yet, more like the other way around so he internalizes these thoughts as he listens further to what he has to say. ‘…my brother?’

           “Getou murdered two of our siblings.” Choso stops for a second and brings his hands together slowly as he inhales deeply. The sadness he experiences to this day is clear as the humanity within him longs for salvation of his younger brothers. “I don’t even know why but before I could intervene, Kechizu, the youngest, was killed. Shortly afterwards Eso, the middle one, perished while trying to avenge him.” His hands start to shake as he recalls how close they all were, how Choso was supposed to protect them like he swore he always would. “I’m here to ruin Getou from the inside out. He has hurt so many people and will continue to do so if he remains unchecked.” He thinks about the black-haired woman now and how he failed to save her too. He clenches his fists on his knees while looking down to the cement floors.

           Itadori can’t explain why but an uncontrollable sadness washes over him as he hears Choso’s words of their family. It’s almost as if he found a part of himself that was lost for so long, only to lose it again instantly. ‘Could this really be true?’  Instead of communicating this he asks instead, “Why wait to take him out? Are you hoping he’ll fight Gojo too?”

           “I actually do not care one way or another about Satoru Gojo. The only time he will concern me is if he gets in Naoya’s way with Elska. That’s also why I haven’t harmed Getou yet though, I want to help Naoya be successful in his venture.” Choso’s words trail as he remembers the golden light that cascaded over Naoya before, the sheer power that was emitted from him at that time. “There’s something strange occurring in our cursed energy world Itadori.” He looks to him with complete seriousness, “I have a feeling Gojo isn’t the only complete member of his clan.” He sees Itadori’s raised eyebrow. “I can’t say for sure how much but I can tell you Naoya has unbelievable strength that he’s yet to show anyone. I can’t figure out why he would be so intent on hiding it though. Getou claims to be an orphan with no particularly profound background but he’s so incredibly strong himself that I can’t help but wonder if that’s completely true. That power comes from somewhere at least.”

           “What do you mean by a complete member?” Itadori is still struggling to keep up with everything but is trying his best to wrap his mind around it. His mind takes to different instances where he’s seen Gojo in action and is unsure about how he feels knowing there’s a possibility that Naoya or even others could posses the same realm of strength.

           “Gojo is revered and feared for being the first six eyes user with all other inherited techniques in 300 years…but I have a feeling there may be other clans with the same awakening…like the Zenin’s. Naoya has unwavering power but refuses to let anyone know and I’m beginning to wonder if his desire for confidentiality is due to him possessing the Zenin’s ancient techniques as well.” He leans back further and crosses his own arms as he thinks out loud. “Getou’s strength in itself would hold as a full fledge member but I don’t know which clan his techniques stem from…I’ve never seen or heard of gravity manipulation branching form a lineage.” Choso’s eyes widen in a moment of clarity. “Sukuna might recognize it though, he’s around 1,000 years old!” His eyes shift back to Itadori, “I don’t want you to worry about that right now though, keep your body for yourself.”

“So you’re saying there are others that could potentially be as strong as Gojo sensei?” Itadori’s mouth drops as he thinks of that and fears what that could mean. “Even so, you want to help Naoya but what if I told you that Gojo will stop at nothing to get her back?”

           “That’s partially why the elders have concocted this atrocious plan…they’re hoping for him to attack and initiate the proper means for the elders to vanquish him. If killing him is out of the question I’m sure they won’t hesitate to have him sealed once more.” He sighs as he relives the scene of Naoya holding the dying Elska. His heart shivers at the echoes of his cries that rang through him. “Naoya truly cares about her and I believe him when he says he would never cause her harm. When she was hurt, he fell apart…I’ve never seen him so emotional before…”

           “Sukuna isn’t the most cooperative you know and I also would never give him control to fight Gojo sensei. Not ever.” It’s not often that Itadori speaks so coldly but he can’t help but frown internally about some of the information received. “You would have to fight me and I doubt Elska would ever be convinced to go against him either.” He knows Elska and Gojo love each other and although he oddly trusts Choso, he can’t help but disagree about her being better off with Naoya.

           “I don’t want you giving control to Sukuna either. I detest the thought of you being used like that to hurt the ones you love, regardless of how I feel about them.” He sees Itadori’s eyes light up to this and gives a shy smile to emphasize he was being truthful. “Is there no way that Sukuna would work with us temporarily?” He asks Itadori know more than well enough it was unlikely. The curse is not exactly known for being reasonable.

           “I can try and ask him but I don’t think so…there would have to be something in it for him, probably something terrible.” He throws his arms up in the air to stretch while still sitting, “Plus, Gojo sensei had to suppress Sukuna yesterday so I don’t think he’ll be out for a while.”

           “What do you mean ‘suppressed’ him?” Choso looks distressed and wide eyed.

           “He came out when we saw… something strange and he tried to attack Toji, Gojo and Elska. I think he was trying to take Elska, wanting to…umm…breed I guess with her…” His expression is of embarrassment as he considers he would’ve had to sit front row for that show. “I remember enough but when I woke back up, I didn’t even feel the usual strain from keeping him at bay all of the time like I usually do. It made sense when Gojo told me he locked him down.” Itadori places his hands in his lap as he goes to rest back against the cushion, feeling very casual with Choso and finding himself to respect the honesty he’s receiving.

           “That doesn’t make sense…you can’t just suppress Sukuna…” Choso has brought his hands together, palms flush against each other while the tips of his fingers nudge into his chin.

           “What do you mean?” Itadori is perplexed at this statement as he’s living the proof that he definitely could be subdued. He has to do it all of the time.

           “It just doesn’t work that way with an outsider…he would have had to made a deal with the curse.” He’s now staring at Itadori with concern, not understanding fully what took place. “…and you’ve not felt any issue with him since the occurrence took place?”

           “I mean I still hear him in my head but he’s not trying to overthrow my consciousness.” He’s now finding it odd too, although not wanting to doubt his sensei. “I trust Gojo did what he had to…” Itadori speaks with conviction but now is seriously starting to wonder what it could have been if there was indeed a pact involved. He said it himself just moments ago, in order for Sukuna to cooperate there would have to be some kind of reward or benefit…something awful more than likely. He thinks of everyone back at the academy and wishes he had everyone’s brain power to help him sift through all he’s learned. His expression lights up as he raises to his to face Choso again. “I need to let the others know we’re ok!” He’s now overcome with haste to prompt the others as to what’s going on.

           “Toji has been calling me nonstop but I’m afraid to bring anyone else into the fold. Getou is extremely lethal and he needs to be handled prudently.” With regret in his eyes he asks, “We can make contact with them soon, just not yet. Please, try to understand…”

           Itadori still thinks it’s best to let the others know that they’re ok but also isn’t in the best position to make demands. “I don’t like that part but I’ll wait just a little while.” He’s still looking at Choso, “As soon as it’s ok though, please tell them…I know they’ll worry about us.” He hopes Megumi is doing alright and that Gojo sensei hasn’t lost his mind at them disappearing. “Everyone is against her becoming a Zenin though too, you should know that.”

           He feels terrible for having to ask Itadori to wait to inform his friends but knows it’s absolutely for the best. He’ll probably have a lot of explaining to do when this is all over in order to keep it amicable with Itadori’s party. “I’m grateful that you’ve been so understanding about all of this, I appreciate your willingness to learn about the situation before acting.” He smiles to Itadori again, “As far as her and Naoya go, like I said before, it’s better if I just show you.” Itadori nods to him slowly and can tell he was waiting for that to be explained. “This is how I was able to watch over you for so long.”

           Choso moves to the couch next to Itadori who gladly scoots over to see what he meant. He draws the oval into the air and maps the path to Elska’s quarters. He opens his eyes abruptly when he hears her and Naoya moaning loudly into each other.

“Ahhh!!! WAIT… This isn’t what I meant!” His eyes widen and he becomes red in tint as he embarrassingly moves to look to Itadori for assurance that he doesn’t think he’s a freak. Itadori’s eyes blare open as blushes immediately. He rips his gaze away from the window and stares into the floor awkwardly. It seems like Elska and Naoya were at the end of their sexual floundering but he was still nervous about what Itadori would feel about that and goes to wipe the technique until he hears Getou’s voice.

“No…not again…” Choso is fluster free as he waits to see exactly what Getou is up to by being in there. He’s ready to move if he strikes against Naoya or her. “…Getou.”

           “That’s Getou? What is he doing?” Itadori is watching Getou sit on the bed as Naoya and Elska sit bare into each other. The angle doesn’t show their nudity, aside from Naoya’s ass so he’s not terribly bothered by it but feels uncomfortable for Elska as the supposed dangerous man creeps closer to them. ‘Is she with Naoya too?’ His confusion increases.

           “I don’t know but if he attacks them then the plans change.” He feels his body tensing up as he quickly tries to come up with alternatives that would suffice if shit hits the fan. “What he did to her was unacceptable…I know it’s taking everything in Naoya to let him live.”

           Itadori is watching the way Naoya stands in between Getou and Elska, seeing the fire in his expression. He doesn’t seem as possessive as Gojo even while claiming her at the top of his lungs to Getou’s face. Only the worst of rumors have met his ears about the Zenin clan but everything Naoya is displaying with Elska actually goes against it all. They didn’t value women for anything aside from bearing children, he knew that much. Naoya seems to really care for her well-being though, at least in this interaction. He tenses up too as he sees Getou side step to see Elska.

           “He’s a really bad man Itadori, we can’t let him have his way.” Choso’s brow is furrowed until he see’s Getou leaving the room. “His plan is become an elder, this job is from the elders. If he can ascend to such heights then we will be in a world of hurt.” He then looks to Itadori who is watching Naoya protectively console Elska while watching the door to make sure Getou left. “I am so thankful that didn’t escalate…but I wonder why he went back? Surely he knew Naoya would be with her after what happened…”

           “I don’t know but I’m glad too.” Itadori’s eyes are still still curiously trained onto Naoya and Elska, wondering if something happened between her and Gojo to make her be so seemingly ok with being with Naoya. ‘Everything seemed fine before we left…’ but then he remembers how strange it was that Toji was there naked in their room with them. ‘I completely forgot about that!’ He thinks for a moment but then hollers out, “Toji!! Toji is like her but I’m pretty sure he needs Elska to feed from! He’s my best friend’s dad…” His heart sinks as he thinks of the stress the others must be under with them both missing. It’s more than just being upset at their vanishing, Elska was actually imperative for Toji as far as he knows.

           “Naoya and I are already working on how to handle that. We both care for Toji too and will not see him undone by this.” Choso relays a warm smile as he assures Itadori that no harm will come to anyone if they can help it.

           “That’s…incredible…thank you.” Itadori feels his trust was not misplaced in Choso and is still finding himself surprised by how kind the powerful being is.

           “I will try to arrange it so you and Elska can visit with one another. I know that would probably be nice for both of you.” Choso goes to stand, feeling lighter than ever as his fears fall away about Itadori’s judgment of him. “For now though, I’m going to figure out how we can take care of Toji too.” He starts walking to the door but is stopped as Itadori calls out to him.

           “I still need to let everything soak in but Choso…” Itadori is leaning forward in the yellow cushion, “If you’re really my brother…then I’m happy for that, you seem like a good person.” He smiles to Choso meaning every inch of his visible affection.

           “That brings me the upmost joy.” Choso feels like his heart may have mended slightly from the loss of his other brothers. He was never going to let harm befall Itadori. He was going to be the greatest big brother that has ever lived.

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           Getou found himself extremely irritated with the pressure in his groin. ‘Why do I suddenly want to impale that bitch?’ He’s made it back to his new quarters, although he can’t ignore his disappointment that his lovely black-haired beauty was gone. He never meant for her to die, she actually refrained from breathing even after he released his grasp from around her neck…she genuinely was never going to submit. “Now I have nothing to fuck.”

           He sits back in his brown modern wingback chair as he sighs his frustrations into the air. His eyes are strapped to the ceiling while he storms his brain for an explanation. “Something is definitely up with that fucking girl…” He brings his gaze back down to his lap and knows he’s going to just have to take care of it. Not even the walk minimized the blood flow, he was still throbbingly hard. “Ugh…fuck…”

           He unzips his suit pants and lifts his hips so he can push them down to his knees. His bulge is prominent through his light grey briefs. As he slides those down as well, he grabs himself and begins to stroke. He tries to picture his black-haired goddess, the one he wanted for so long but the disappointment of her resistance causes his hands to stop the jerking motions. Not even his fondest memories of debauchery of with her were doing it for him. “Fucking women… almost completely useless creatures.” He closes his eyes and begins to pump himself again but this time his mind takes to Elska.

           He’s imagining how entitling it would feel to pummel her throat with his length. “Maybe then she wouldn’t have anything distasteful to say.” He’s actually finding himself very turned on by the idea as he pictures how pitiful her face would be as her tears flow down her face to his stretching. “Mmmmmm” He’s liking the idea more and more as he visualizes her lips meeting the base of his member, him jutting his hips into her to further abuse the situation. He can almost hear her gagging as he continuously spreads her throat. Her trying to push him away while he absolutely controls the situation sends a twinge to his testicles. “Fuck…yes…”

           He’d wrap his hand into her brown hair and yank her off so he could see her disheveled expression as her saliva connects them both. He would then degrade her verbally, call her a slut and make her say that she liked it before slamming himself back into her mouth. He might even spit on her and smear it with his glistening tip. His hand finds an increased rhythm as he pictures fucking her face so horribly that her eyes can’t even remain open… but that’s when he’d command her to look at him. When she fails to do so he’d remove himself from her mouth hastily and slap her a few times…the last one being hard enough for her to fall to her side.

           He figures she would try to scurry away but he’d grab the chains wrapped around her and pull her back towards him while she screams out in horror. Her stomach would have contact with the floor but he’d use her metal restraints to bound her arms behind her back as he straddles her flattened body from over top. He allows his imagination to run wild as he forces himself into her completely while she lies on the floor in displeasure. “Take it like the nasty little whore you are.” He mumbles to himself as he continues to yank himself off. He’s so hard by this point he’s unsure of how long he’ll last like this but is salivating as the imagined scenario plays further.

           She would likely still fight him, so he’d have to use his body weight to keep her pinned as he violently thrusts into her. It wouldn’t be fun to use his technique. He even pictures her crying his name out in distress and finds it so exhilarating that he almost felt himself get close to releasing. “God…I would fucking dominate her…” His brow furrows as his eyes remained closed, fist still engulfing his extension rapidly. He then wonders what it would be like to do so in front of Naoya. He bites his lip and he entices himself further to the depravity of breaking him while simultaneously breaking her in. It would be better if Gojo were there too though.

           Naoya would be trapped by gravity no doubt but would be purposefully positioned in such a way that the only thing he could see would be Getou splitting her. He’d probably yell to no end, announcing threat after threat as he helplessly watches her body bounce off the floor from his crude impacts. He’d then grab her by the neck and bend her backwards so she’d have to look up to Naoya.

           “He’s not such a great prince now, is he?” While her tears roll down her face, he’d snap his hips a few times for additional effect as she’s made to take it all. He imagines she’d somehow be sopping wet from this as he grips his length a few times to simulate her spasms around him. “Fuuuck…” his light moans now erupt as he continues. He can see himself laughing in her ear, mocking her whines before pulling out from her and lining up for a different type of punishment. He’d broadcast boisterously to Naoya that he was going to ruin every useable orifice of hers, reveling in the fear that would stem from them both. He bets that as he nudges into her rear she would wince and attempt to scoot, attempt to run away from him. He of course wouldn’t allow that.

           As he pictures himself ramming relentlessly, he can’t help but let the thoughts of him wrecking her all over bring him to his release. The images in his mind are so fucking wonderful that he just keeps replaying that specific switch of holes over and over until he’s finally filling his hand with his contents.

           Upon opening his eyes, he certainly felt relieved but also is disgusted in himself for thinking of her to get there. “What a fucking mess.” He looks to his hand that’s seeping DNA and stands to halfway pull his pants up to go wash his hands, trying not to do drip on the suit along the way. He’s confused as to why he had felt so compelled do that, why he wasn’t able to stave off masturbating. “I have to figure out what it is about her that causes these…issues.” He’s lost in thought as he washes his hands extensively, not meaning to for as long as he was. He turns the water off at the porcelain sink and dries his hands on a rough green towel hanging on the grey papered wall near it. He would rather not use his clan technique to spy on her but feels it might be necessary to get to the bottom of things. It’s that or he jeopardizes the entire operation by going back to her room and fucking her senseless. He’d be forced to kill Naoya then too. “There’s too much on the line.”

           He then thinks to grab his phone, he has a lot of updates to report.

           He dials the number, it being saved into his memory versus the phone. As it rings, he holds the phone between shoulder and chin as he fastens his pants again. He’s trying to pretend that he didn’t just fuck his hand to the thought of her. ‘Unacceptable’. The phone line picks up after the third ring and he’s met with a voice on the other end.

           “I would just like to inform you that we have them both.” A smirk now forms across his lips as he’s happy to finally be able to say that. “We still don’t have Gojo but with the girl and the vessel here, we can corrupt them and force them to join us.”

           “We can certainly try with the vessel but there are major risks that pose a threat with repeating the same manipulations on the girl’s mind.” The tone of the male voice on the other end is calm but also domineering. “If her mind breaks, we can’t hope to predict what that will mean.”

           “Why is everyone so concerned about this? We can just fucking kill her if it doesn’t work. She’s not as necessary as you all seem to think.” Getou is irritated by that response, he would really rather the bitch be out of the equation totally…he truly does not want to be adhered to her.

           “You still have much to learn Getou, do not act rashly.” The other person clears their throat. “If she loses control, we don’t know how powerful she will be. We cannot guarantee that we’ll be able to contain it.”

           “Well she certainly isn’t going to accept her fate with me either, I can almost assure that.” Getou’s frustration is obvious as he unknowingly taps his fingers along the surface of the table in front of him.

           “She doesn’t have to be willing, she just needs to remain unharmed. I know you detest the idea but you have to keep her safe, she’s just part of the bigger the picture.”

           “Tch. You’re right, I definitely don’t care for that.” Getou is now twirling the ends of his hair that have escaped his bun. He was smarter than to let them know of his recent theft of her wing, he knew that wasn’t allowed. “When can we get this ball rolling again?”

           “You should have a meeting coming up in the next couple of days with the elders. Just keep your focus and mind yourself for a short while longer. Everything is going rather smoothly now.”

           “I have a feeling that Zenin may try to undermine me, he’s hiding something important, I can tell.” He thinks of Naoya’s drastic change in personality within the last few months, ashamed in his former accomplice’s weakness for the girl. “What do I do if he tries to take her?”

           “You don’t allow that to happen.” The voice is now dreadful with seriousness, “You’re the next head of the clan so you will have to behave as such and be able to navigate these kinds of situations. We’ve waited 900 years for someone like you to be born again, you cannot mess this up.”

           Getou slams his fist down on table. “Just let me kill the fucker and it’ll be dealt with! What’s the point of having all of this power if I can’t use it to wipe out our enemies?”

           “You will get your chance to but you first have to face Satoru…or have you given up on that timeless revenge?”

           “Of course not, I am eager to hurt that fucking cunt…we’re just so close and I’m losing my patience.” Getou realizes this revelation as he speaks it out loud. He’s usually so good about waiting, he has for all these years anyways so what’s a few more weeks or even a month? Getou thinks of his mentor and all of the admiration he had for him, how Gojo himself snuffed the one light in his life.

When Getou was a child of age 5, he had a typical temper tantrum for not receiving his way, most kids do. The difference here was in this same moment, all of his abilities came to fruition from the astronomical magnitude of emotions he experienced. Being so young, he was not able to control the feelings nor was he aware of it being a problem, he simply just felt them. Without meaning to, Getou unleashed his gravity technique and slowly crushed his parents to death, horridly watching the life fade from them as their cries silenced to trade for growing amounts of surrounding blood. He hadn’t a way of understanding that was even him that caused it, he was just plastered in place, immobilized by fear. This was a moment of evolution in his life being that he was then recognized as the long-awaited youth that reclaimed the clan’s ancient techniques. His growth came at the price of his heart for the memory is so fucking horrifically shattering, he can still recall it clearly to this day. Often times it takes place of his dreams causing him to constantly feel tired and unrested.

He was secretly celebrated amongst his clan’s elders and people after this, them all putting the faith and responsibility of absolute greatness on the young boy’s shoulder. He may have developed differently had he more support but the same members also feared his capabilities and much like Gojo in a sense, suffered the duality of his existence. There was only one man that had the strength in his heart to raise Getou, to provide him with the backbone he so desperately needed. Genghis Temujin.

Gojo’s killed so many in their clan and each death weighs on Getou but he can never move beyond the fact that his mentor suffered extremely at Gojo’s hands. ‘Experiments…’ It’s been years since the silver shaman abused his clan but for years before that, they agonized immensely under his tyrannous involvement. His clan was pertinent to Gojo’s goals then…and it would help them advance their own ideas along with the elders as well so they remained compliant.

           “Alright then. I need to you gather yourself, there’s much to do in the small time remaining.” The voice pauses but then proceeds, “Indulge Zenin for a while longer, you may need him even with the help we expect from the vessel against Gojo. If he’s so enthralled with the girl then surely, he’ll fight to keep her there.”

           Getou sighs in annoyance some more, trying to center his brain around the true task at hand. “I understand and I will make sure everything is ready over here.” He hears them say “Perfect” before the phone clicks and gives tone of a dead line. Getou slowly lowers the phone from his ear as he relishes in the excitement that they’re that much closer from eliminating every single one of their obstacles.

           “Master Genghis…” his eyes become dead in sight as he imagines the amount of agony his mentor suffered. His purpose is embedded back into his thoughts as he allows his own darkness to soothe his physical body.

“I will avenge everyone.”

Next Chapter (23) >>

Chapter List

[lnterjection]

Sleepy Bois Inc and DSMP Fanfic Recs

Uhhh I realized I have a ton of stuff in my bookmarks list and might as well compile a list of favorites because I’m always looking for good fanfics, and this might help some people. Most of these are SBI, though a few focus on things other than their dynamic with each other. Nothing explicit here. Feel free to suggest more recs. 

Fics set in DSMP universe/about DSMP (One-shots first, then longer fics):

One-shots and series of one-shots-

therein lies the madness by sapphicist - 2095 words. Currently says it’s one chapter out of three complete, but can be read as a standalone one-shot. Nice introspective fic on Tommy’s exile and his parallels with Theseus. In 2nd person, but it’s actually done nicely. Mostly angsty, can have hopeful interpretation depending on how you look at it. 

crazy how life goes on without me (2090 words, one-shot) by itisjosh - What if Ghostbur did remember everything, and just pretended to be clueless and vapid? Made me cry. It’s so good. Tortured my heart. 

the inner mechanism of a black box (13521 words, one-shot) by Bee_4 - only work of a series called “system theory”. “Technoblade lets himself get imprisoned for Philza’s sake. He doesn’t plan on being there long. Unfortunately, he’s underestimated Pandora’s Vault. There are things that will make even the Blade fall apart in due time, as it turns out.” Yeah so Techno’s mental health goes out the window in this one and its written brilliantly. There’s comfort at the end, if it helps? 

A State For One Man Is No State At All (5247 words, two-shot) by angstfortheangstgod - “A different version of the festival, in which Dream shows up unarmed, the Community House is left intact, a traitor is executed, and Tommy doesn't betray Technoblade.” Ranboo centric. Angst and comfort. 

All the Kings Men series by MollyPollyKinz - “After Ghostbur's suggestion to do Lads on Tour, Tommy finds himself reunited with his family. However, escaping from Dream is going to be harder than anyone previously thought.” A connected series of one-shots and short fics about Tommy, his exile, his family, and escaping Dream. Well written, good characterization, great studies into the characters themselves.

ad astra per aspera series by cacowhistle - Collection of one-shots that start with Tommy’s exile and expand to be about SBI and their dynamic with each other, including a resurrected Wilbur. Really, really well written and probably my favorite of the “Tommy exile fic groups”. 

the fall of a hero series by cracklesnaple - “After being threatened with being exiled yet again, Tommy takes the decision into his own hands. If those around him can't see that he's given up everything to make this nation what it is, then he's not sure he can stay in L'Manburg any longer.” Series about SBI and mainly Tommy, eventually crossing over into Mianite territory in a way some might enjoy and some might now. Writing’s good, though, which is what I care about.

Longer fics-

Rewind (101002 words, 25 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 17 2021) by Anonymous - Best time travel fix-it fic I’ve ever read period. Tubbo and Tommy travel 10 years back from a very messed up future to the first L’Manberg election. Concept may seen a bit weird at first but trust me, holy fuck this is amazing. 

second chances (hurt the most) (8841 words, 4 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 17 2021) by Anonymous - “Wilbur wakes up alone in a bloody room, and has to come to terms with living again. (How can he go on, knowing who's blood is on his hands?)”. Amazing fic where resurrection requires someone else’s life as sacrifice. Phil is dead. Wilbur struggles to come to terms with his father’s decision, and his second chance. 

all scotch, no soda (47466 words, 43 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 14 2021) by fishstixx - “Vulnerability meant trust, though, and trust was a thing not so easily given. Post-exile and canon divergent, follows the consequences of Tommy’s isolation. Expect chases, heists, bloodshed, and the mending of a family.” Features raccon hybrid Tommy being badass, and I live for it. I really, really love this one. 

DON’T FORGET THAT ICARUS FLEW. (16426 words, 6/10 chapters, last updated Jan 1. 2021) by orpheusaki - “The day before and the days that follow Tommy's exile; told through the eyes of The Blood God.” Techno (and Dream) is a god, and gods often forget how the intricacies of the minds of mortals. He’s trying to get better, however. 

what do you fall for? (16374 words, complete) by tablrcloth - Ranboo centric fic with Techno, Phil and Tommy. Ranboo realizes that playing L’Manberg’s politics is less than ideal for him. What can I say, it’s just really good. 

Breathing’s Just a Rhythm (12631 words, 6 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 17 2021) by MollyPollyKinz - “Tommy, Tubbo, Jschlatt, and Dream all end up in the past. (Oh, and the Chat comes too).” Great time travel fic. 

What World Have We Inherited? (73635 words, 12 chapters, unfinished and last updated on Dec 22 2020) by Anonymous (this one has a series with all their works, and they’re all AMAZING). Holy fuck this one is probably one of my favorite fics in the fandom so far. “Wilbur blows everything to hell on the day of the Manburg festival, just like he wanted. When the ashes settle, it's just Tommy and Technoblade. It's not good, but it's better than nothing. It's just them, healing up in a world that never wanted them.” Amazing characterization, worldbuilding, everyone’s internal thoughts are portrayed and written so well. Even if it never updates again I would keep coming back to it. I rec this Anon’s works so much. 

In June, I Changed My Tune (29489 words, 6 chapters, unfinished and last updated on Jan 6 2021) by KryOnBlock - Eret runs away and eventually becomes friends with Techno. Nice cottagecore aesthetic. I have mixed feelings about this one - the writing’s good, descriptions and characterizations are really good. Just that there’s consistent punctuation mistakes and it takes me out of the world a bit. Everything else is good enough for me to continue reading, however. 

stay with him (24353 words, 12 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 9 2021) by junipersand - I especially rec the first chapter, which can be read (and originally was) a standalone fic with the summary “Every ghost had a purpose to fulfill. So what was Tommy’s?” Utterly heartwrenching, probably the most emotionally gut-punching bit of writing I’ve ever read in this fandom. It continues with other lore stuff afterwards that eventually branch off from just SBI and Tommy, but man. I don’t think I can ever forget that first chapter. 

I’m not angry at you, well, sometimes I am (52801 words, 16 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 14 2021) by sircantus - After Tommy is exiled, he runs away to Techno’s house instead of going off with Dream. SBI decide some revenge and “world domination” is in order. 

Fics set in AUs outside DSMP happenings:

One-shots and series of one-shots-

Empty Crowns AU by UnderUrsa - the SBI + Tubbo are gods, and a family. Series of one-shots. Nicely written, what can I say? Some angst, some fluff.

Secure, Contain, Protect AU by blue000jay - Amazingly written SCP AU. Knowledge of the SCP universe would help with understanding some more meta things, but is not needed to understand most of it. Some angst, disturbing themes around memories but nothing terribly gory.

CLASSIFIEDS. (13804 words, finished). SCP pages on SBI, short stories and audio transcriptions as well as files, lots of good lorebuilding here. Features an escape, + Tubbo!

CONFIDENTIALS. (13232 words, finished). Centers on Dream Team.

ARCHIVES. (1270 words, one-shot). What happened after SBI and Tubbo’s escape from the SCP foundation.

old gods (new gods) AU by WriterWinged - the relatively well known SBI gods AU. Amazingly written, great character interpretations. 

the gods are cruel (none crueler then you) (1394 words, one-shot) - As much the grammatical mistake in the title hurts me it’s no doubt one of the best pieces of work in the fandom. 

and yet they find kindness (and so do you) (2/4 chapters posted) - continuation of “the gods are cruel”. 

there’s a risk to the world (but the kindest are strongest) (2/3 chapters posted) - continuation of “the gods are cruel”. 

SBI Antarctic Princes AU by ScripWriter -  One of several Antarctic Empire AUs, this one just has these two preliminary one-shots but they’re nice bits of fun and neatly written. All fluff and mild hurt with lots of comfort so far. 

Younger Holding On Another (1781 words, one-shot). Techno is a good brother and reassures and newly adopted Tommy. 

But Oh, Don’t You Know How It Goes (2511 words. one-shot). Tommy, Techno, and Wilbur have some “fun” at a boring gala. Phil is very exasperated. 

Antarctic Princes ‘verse AU by BirchWrites - AU where Techno, Tommy, and Wilbur are princes of the Antarctic Empire (well, Techno’s technically the emperor now), but this time the events of DSMP still happen (at least up to the 1st season).

Homeward bound for the arctic ground (10562 words, one-shot). Wilbur and Tommy travel to the Antarctic Empire in person to ask Techno for help in fighting Schlatt. Good worldbuilding and acknowledges Wilbur’s beginnings of insanity while still being rather light.

Surprise Hugs (2542 words, one-shot). Dream doesn’t realize Tommy is Techno’s brother and thinks he’s going to get killed for tackling the infamous Blood God.

Family Reunions (1396 words, one-shot). Fundy never realized he’s loyalty and Techno informs him unexpectedly.

Longer fics-

leave me your starlight (14620 words, 4 chapters, unfinished and last updated Jan 11 2021) by findingkairos - “Once upon a time, Philza Minecraft is the only person who does not shy away from the bloody teen that regularly turns the tide of war. This cements a friendship that will last wars, empires, worlds, and lifetimes.“ Amazing backstory fic on Phil and Techno’s relationships, one of my absolute personal favorites. Very well written and really digs into the intricacies of Techno’s character (or an interpretation of it, but hey, that’s what all fanfiction is).

I was a kid in a village, doing alright, then I became a prince overnight (21736 words, 5 chapters, last updated Jan 13 2021) by sircantus - another Antarctic princes AU, this time centering on 16 year old Tommy catching the attention of Phil, Techno, and Wilbur after thwarting an assassination attempt. Really well written. Actually, I rec all of sircantus’ SBI stuff because they do amazing work.

antarctic adage (26591 words, 4/7 chapters posted, last updated Jan 13 2021) by blue000jay - Another very well written Antarctic princes AU with Emperor/ruler Phil. Are we seeing a pattern yet? blue000jay is another writer I’d rec, with really great SBI stuff.

a renewal of faith, and of family (56684 words, 31 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 13 2021) by SolivangantStories - One of the only fics here that doesn’t feature SBI, this one is Tubbo and Dream centered. Basically, the DSMP!Tubbo is executed by Schlatt and wakes up in a world where Manhunt!Dream is trying not to die and is also actually a nice person, to Tubbo’s surprise and confusion. Not SBI and technically not even DSMP, but it’s really good so I’ve decided to rec it anyway.

[electronicdelusionstarlight]

Anyway, the Crimson Cult

Legends of Runeterra is a card game based on League of Legends Lore. It’s pretty cool, and has some interesting characters adapted as cards.

The most interesting ones are probably the 4 members of the Crimson Cult.

The Crimson Cult is the private cult of big old vampire Vladimir, an actual LOL Champion.

Anyway, Vladimir is this, like... eminence in shadow figure, waits in his big old mansion in Noxus for centuries till something big is about to happen so he can show up and go “my job here is done” while everyone else wonders what exactly did he do at all, only to then get back in his mansion and become a shut in for another couple centuries or so.

That said, when Vladimir gets back into society and stops being a gross Hikikomori obsessed with bloodplay and having creepy portraits of himself commissioned like he’s the world most self centered furry, he becomes kind of a party animal and starts setting up some sort of cult of personality over him, based around the spooky forbidden knowledge he can offer over blood magic or some shit.

Most members of the cult just smile and nod along as they use this as a chance to get high.

Anyway, LoR introduced 4 Crimson Cult Characters, and much like cards like Tyari or Cytria, they all tell a story, so to speak.

They are also particularly interesting since their 4 collective lore blurbs are all interconnected conversations they have with each other over the course of their meetings.

Anyway, we have:

The Disciple.

Her name is Clara. Social Status Uncertain but probably of lower birth (If such a thing ever mattered in Trifariax Noxus). She’s an hedonist and has a good relationship with all other members. She claims, and I quote, that “(She)'ll try anyone once” but most importantly will go from  awkwardly flirt with Ophelia when they are paired together (”I like your stile” “I like your face...”) to outright “dating” her in the flavor text (Kinda). A balancing act between being constantly Horny and being constantly High. She also seems to have a long standing friendship with Edvin and knew him from before the cult.

Given how her effects has her take damage to activate it, and some of her most suggestive lines, she’s definitely a bottom and a sub. The collar is also a big tell.

Vladimir will refer to her as “Supper” when meeting her, but will also reprimand her for her carefree way to handle blood magic.

Bad Bi Rep? Maybe, but she’s an evil bisexual hedonist in a freaky blood cult in the most sexually permissive country on the planet, what did you expect?

Her Flavor Text is, like everyone’s else, a mess to navigate through, so I’ll try to present it in order via numbers and makes with the other 3 Flavor Texts.

1) "Edvin! There you are, handsome. I was just thinking of you!" (Responding to Edvin’s 1, responded by Edvin 2)

2) "Each of us can go, now…" (Responding to Edvin’s 3, Responded by Edvin’s 4)

3) "Escort me. I'll make it fun." (Responding to Ophelia’s 2, Responded by Ophelia’s 3)

4) "Or nothing at all?" (Responding to Ophelia’s 3, Responded by Edvin’s 5)

The Aristocrat.

The other female member of the gang. Her name has been revealed to be Ophelia but is never mentioned as such in the game. As the artwork suggests she’s WLW (hence the artwork being censored in the Chinese release by removing the lesbian subtext in the art and coloring the blood purple), but also has a fairly friendly relationship with Edvin, referring to him as “finally, someone with style”). She’s a member of the aristocracy, as her title suggests, and it seems her parents are also kind of homophobic and disproving of her lifestyle, which is kind of weird in Noxus but then again they are Aristocrats so they are probably still following the Pre-Trifariax Mindset. While she isn’t exactly unbothered by it, she also doesn’t want to be disowned out of their fortune. She is incredibly arrogant and will be catty toward everyone but Edvin and Clara, with Kye being a sort of middle ground (Her: “You’re Late.” Him. “Mhm, Knew you’d wait”).

Her effect deals damage to someone to empower it, making her a Top and, potentially, a Domme.

She has no interactions with Vladimir.

As for her Flavor Text:

1) "Ah, you too? To the Reveler's B--" (Responding to Edvin’s 2, Responded by Edvin’s 3)

2) "How am I to tolerate mine?" (Responding to Edvin’s 4, Responded by Clara’s 3)

3) "Respectfully, my dear, my father would disown me. ...perhaps we should wear matching dresses." (Responding to Clara’s 3, Responded by Clara’s 4).

The Curator.

Edvin. He is the richest member of the gang, and their unofficial weed dealer. His blood potions bring all the boys to the yard, so to speak, but he seems to have acquired all his wealth by himself. He seems to not have an affluent family such as Ophelia, and in fact seems to value the gang, his new family (His Bloodkin, as he calls them) more, making this an ACTUAL, FOUND FAMILY SCENARIO. He has great relationships with the other three members of the Gang, and will in fact lament more losing his friends than actually dying when his card, well, dies (”But... My Friends...).

Shaped like a friend, and his ability, while triggered by taking damage, actually allows him to call forth the gang by drawing them in hand.

Vladimir will comment on the richness of his blood.

Has the longest Flavour Text:

1)  "Beloved companions!" (Starting Line in the exchange, Responded by Clara’s 1)

2) "Were you? Well I received an invitation." (Responding to Clara’s 1, Responded by Ophelia’s 2)

3) "--Reveler's Ball! Yes!" (Responding to Ophelia’s 2, Responded by Clara’s 2)

4) "Then we must! I shall present my family." (Responding to Clara’s 2, Responded by Ophelia’s 3)

5) "Starters before dessert, my dear. And you, Kye? Will you attend?" (Responding to Clara’s 4, Responded by Kye’s 1).

The Awakener.

Kye. He’s the eldest of the gang, and the one with the most experience with the cult. She is your classical aloof loner in anime who pretends not to care about his so called friends when in fact he cares way too much. He will appear constantly bored and disillusioned with everything, even when meeting Vladimir, but will still have positive interactions with his friends (Teasing Ophelia, having some best bros talk with Edvin, and reminiscing about their lessons together with Clara). Probably the most stoner coded of the gang.

His ability has him deal damage to all friendly creatures in play as a additional cost to be played, thus triggering Edvin’s and Clara’s abilities, both of whom he spent expensive time teaching Blood Magic, and just annoying the top Ophelia, as he does.

Vladimir reminds him about the importance of manners, and is implied he was taught blood magic by him, just like he in turn has taught it to his friends.

That would make the Crimson Cult Runeterra first Weed Smoking Polycule based Pyramid Scheme.

He has only one interaction in the whole flavor text conversation with his friends, cementing the fact he prefers to hang in the sidelines of the gang despite his supposed role as leader.

1)  "Even if I said 'no', you'd drag me along. So... sure." (Responding to Edvin’s 5, concluding the conversation).

With this we can reconstruct the full conversation as:

Edvin: "Beloved companions!"

Clara: "Edvin! There you are, handsome. I was just thinking of you!"

Edvin:  "Were you? Well I received an invitation."

Ophelia: "Ah, you too? To the Reveler's B--"

Edvin: "--Reveler's Ball! Yes!"

Clara: "Each of us can go, now…"

Edvin: "Then we must! I shall present my family."

Ophelia: "How am I to tolerate mine?"

Clara: "Escort me. I'll make it fun."

Ophelia: "Respectfully, my dear, my father would disown me. ...perhaps we should wear matching dresses."

Clara: "Or nothing at all?"

Edvin: "Starters before dessert, my dear. And you, Kye? Will you attend?"

Kye: "Even if I said 'no', you'd drag me along. So... sure."

There is then a secret, last Flavor Text, coming from Vladimir’s upgraded art, about him probably overhearing some of his guests at the Reveler’s Ball from his creepy dark corner somewhere in his creepy dark vampire mansion and going, probably as a direct response to either Kye’s lack of enthusiasm or Ophelia’s arrogance:

Vladimir: “Do you find my little fête banal, darling? Then let me give you a real show!”

Anyway, this was the Crimson Cult. A found family story hidden in a card game depicting a gang of hedonist stoners who also happen to be fairly LGBT friendly.

[jasperwhitcock]

equinox | chapter 07 –– “a cruel god, a wrathful goddess”

here is chapter six of my bella as a vampire and edward as a human fanfic inspired by an au that @bellasredchevy​​ posted. you can read the new chapter on AO3 or here. i post updates on AO3 or on tumblr using the #equinoxjw tag. but it seems 10/10 times my tag does not work, so that is a fun mystery for me to solve.

oof... sometimes u get distracted and then ur sister gets married and then u get unmotivated & d*pressed and forget to update ur fanfic for over three months... my bad y'all... sorry for the wait hehe. i hope it is worth it. again, i'm so thankful for the comments & i read them all. i get too shy to respond, but i WILL. i just need to talk myself up first. i love u. thank u. hehe. ♡♡♡ merry christmas/happy holidays if i fail u again before the 25th. i WANT to update more frequently. my catchphrase these days is "i'm trying my best," so... i'm trying my best.

this is for the sweet anons who slide into my ask box & ask me questions abt my fanfic. and for taryn, who consistently reminds me that there are people wanting to read this seeing as she is one of those people, kim, who i am so desperate to impress that i began working on a new chapter once she started to read my fanfic, and kae, because without her, this fanfic would never have existed in the first place. i love how i'm writing this as though it's the intro to an actual book when it's literally just chapter seven. ok, i will shut up now so u can read. love u. again.

07 A CRUEL GOD, A WRATHFUL GODDESS

In great contrast to the noisy ambience of the other students in the hallway, we were silent on our walk to our shared biology class. I wondered how conscious Edward was of the stares and whispers focused on our proximity to one another, but my guess was that he was very much conscious of it. I intentionally ignored glancing in any direction that I sensed one of my siblings’ presence, although I figured it was mostly paranoia driving me to feel as though we were about to cross paths. Holding my breath to more easily walk beside Edward left my senses impaired to the ability to pinpoint their location. 

I was lucky that for the majority of my immortal life, I’d managed to escape unwanted attention. But now, it seemed that precious luck had finally run out. Maybe embarrassment had been creeping up on me, maliciously building itself up all these years, waiting until just the right moment to rear its ugly head and exact revenge that immorality had stolen its favorite object of humiliation to torment. But here it was, ensuring that I was finally catching up on feeling awkward and out of step, a feeling I experienced for what seemed like the entirety of my human life. I thought once I’d been changed, I’d never feel this way again, but becoming misaligned with my family made me feel bashful to parade my defiance in their faces. I had operated better under no scrutiny as a mortal and was surprised to realize that that still held true as an immortal as well. Because though there was now never a struggle of staying upright or a risk of tripping over my own feet, that didn’t prevent me from feeling self-conscious as I walked beside Edward. Although for different reasons –– it was too mortifying to consider what my family might make of what my actions suggested about my feelings towards Edward.

And yet still, I would put up with the ridicule and disapproval of my siblings if it meant I could listen to Edward speak his silly philosophical theology, his questioning of god and existence, for just a few more hours. If I were going to be teased over Alice’s visions regardless, I might as well find out what I can about this pretentious boy before I leave him alone forever. If only to understand why his moving to this small town threatened to warp my own future so much. In losing night and in losing death, there were so very little anomalies in the endless amount of time I’d been given. So what would it hurt to allow myself to fixate on this minuscule difference in my life for just awhile?

It could hurt Edward, a more selfless part of myself reminded me. If indulging myself was playing with fire, I was being justly punished with the way flames were efflorescing the inside of my dry, burning throat.

If a god did exist, why would it make sense for such a being to craft someone like Edward with his perceptivity, and send him off to this small town, home to a secret such as ours? If a god did exist, why it would be fair for such a being to craft someone like Edward, someone who tempted me both in bloodlust and in curiosity, and send him off to this small town, home to the very vampire who desperately wished to kill him most? If a god did exist, if our kind had fallen short of heaven, I could understand why sending Edward into our path –– and more specifically, my path –– could be some kind of punishment. But what I couldn’t understand is why a god would allow someone as innocent as Edward to be endangered for the sake of bringing a sinful, undead creature to justice. It seemed the only reasonable explanation would be that a god probably did not exist. 

And how could there be? I was on the precipice of falling into temptation with every step further in the hallway and every question he asked and answered. I could never not be very much aware of the fact –– especially now with his body merely inches from my side and his sweet fragrance blooming both deliciously and relentlessly in the air. And even as I impossibly withstood the lure of his blood, how was I meant to ignore the irresistibility of his mind and how inexplicably concerned I was to understand it? It seemed like a very cruel experiment of free will and knowledge –– far too cruel to allow much room for the kind of god Edward hoped for.

I frowned as I realized that this experiment wasn’t that of a cruel god’s but that of a cruel vampire, and I felt very much like a vampire as the sound of his heartbeat was so appealing that it made my mouth water.

“Do the stares bother you?” Edward spoke quietly to me as we weaved throughout the hallway. Easily distracted, his question was able to pull the more civilized parts of myself together, though this was probably also in thanks to my choosing not to utilize my sense of smell. I found it funny that at least one of his thoughts had been in a similar vicinity. But of course, the rest of his thoughts were probably free of all consuming agony and struggle. For all his curiosity about morality, to inflict this existence upon him would probably devour him in misery. At least as a human, despite whatever conclusions he may come to, there was still some hope to be had for an afterlife. This thought should have been dark and depressing, but because it made Alice’s vision seem like a complete hoax, I almost found it funny. How would Edward ever end up like me?

“Oh, no,” I swallowed the venom in my mouth. “I live for attention.” I watched from the corner of my eyes as his gaze flickered over to me, the ever present half smile appearing on his face at my joke. My answer came out so comfortably as though I was used to this, when in reality, the student body for the most part had grown accustomed to ignoring me. And, of course, there was nothing comfortable about the demanding, aching dryness in my mouth or the burning in my nostrils. “How about you?”

“Likewise,” he joked, laughing. “This is interesting –– their fascination. I understood their interest on my first day because I’d guess a new addition to the student body in a town this small is something of a rarity, but today, walking by your side is garnering even more attention. Is it a once in a lifetime opportunity to have Bella Cullen walk you to class?”

“You’re just so observant, aren’t you?” I rolled my eyes, though the corners of my mouths pulled up despite myself. “And I’m not walking you to class. I’m walking to a class I just so happen to share with you, so don’t get the wrong idea. I think they’re just surprised because they’re probably under the impression that I don’t play nice with others.”

“And do you?”

“You tell me,” I replied, pausing to face him beside a wall of lockers next to the entrance of our biology classroom. As he stopped beside me, a gust of air from a passing student walking hastily down the hallway sent his scent reeling into me at an unfortunate moment where I’d chosen to breathe in. My muscles tensed to spring, and I desperately anchored myself to the floor as my mind fell into disarray.

“Nicely enough,” Edward winked naturally as though we’d been the best of friends since his first day. The demanding thirst was intruding on my awareness, and the desperation for something wet and hot and delicious in my desiccated throat was so dizzying that his voice sounded as though it were underwater. With an effort as though I were swimming through drying cement, I resurfaced, just barely proving my dominion over the desire. I focused on his voice so that it’d become clearer, forcing myself to take another excruciating breath in and exhale the fire out. “I will say I am honored to be the exception –– to be plucked from the masses by the renowned, reclusive Bella Cullen.”

With torturous effort, I snorted as though I wasn’t fighting everything within me to keep him alive. I breathed in again heavily, allowing my body to become a pyre so that I could speak. “Alright, that’s enough. Stop saying my name like that. And you’ve lost the privilege. I am never walking you to class again,” I rolled my eyes even though my joke could very much be the truth. The bunching of my muscles, the twitching of my hands, and the fierce pain in my throat reminded me of the fact. Before he could point out the contradiction of what I’d previously clarified, I sighed. “Let’s take this quiz.”

His pretty green eyes were alive with mischief and enlightened with what must be more answers to questions he hadn’t outright asked me as he turned to enter the classroom. I followed behind him towards our shared table.

Air from the vent rushed out, thrusting the scent of his blood wafting into my face again. I paused for an indistinguishable moment as I battled agony, murderousness, monstrosity. Holy fuck. What was I trying to prove! Was it really worth this? Swallowing hard, I sat beside him as though nothing happened. My suffering was so great that Emmett could have brutally ripped my arm off, he could have beat me with it, and I wouldn’t have noticed nor felt a thing. I could have been set on fire, and it’d feel like sinking into a cool pool of water on an even cooler day. I was already burning alive, my body acting as a furnace, and I was imprisoned inside it.

Without intending to, I sighed aloud, exhaling as though it would smother the flames. It was a stupid, attention seeking thing to do. Humans sighed to expel air or express some sadness or relief or exhaustion, so when my family emitted an audible breath, we did so as a means of blending in. But to breath out in a way to clue Edward into the fact something was plaguing me… it was a stupid invitation for more questions. And these were questions I had no intention of sharing the answers to. I felt his eyes on me, but before he could say anything, Mr. Molina began passing out quizzes face down on our lab tables as students continued to pile in from lunch.

“Alright, class. Today we have a pop quiz–– oh, come on, guys, don’t groan. You will have the opportunity to make corrections after these have been graded. This is just an assessment of what you’ve retained from this unit so far. You will have the entire period to complete–– thanks for joining us, Mr. Patterson, glad you could fit my class into your busy schedule. Why don’t you take your seat? –– You will have the entire period to complete your quiz. If you finish early, feel free to get a head start on this weekend’s homework! I’ve written the reading down on the board. Aw, I’m sure you’re all moaning because you’re disappointed at how light of an assignment it is because I just know how very excited you all are to continue your passionate pursuit of studying biology. Alright, now that everyone’s settled–– wait a minute––”  Mr. Molina paused, raising his pointer finger in the air, his eyes squinted in anticipation. Three seconds later, the bell signaled the beginning of class. “Begin!”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Edward reluctantly turn away from me. In an elegant script, he wrote his name at the top of the paper and began his quiz. I turned away from him to look at my own paper, preparing myself to uncomfortably hold my breath for the next hour. The difference this made in my thirst was almost insignificant, but enough so that it gave me a tiny more leverage in my control. I smoothed out the pucker on my forehead with the eraser from my pencil, accidentally snapping the rubber off against my face. 

Absentmindedly, I began to breeze through the assessment, circling the correct answers, but my mind was more absorbed in the warmth of sitting beside Edward. Aside from the affliction of doing so, it was too pleasurable to have sat beside him so often and for so long today. I enjoyed the toastiness like a lizard basking in the sun. It made me recall the muddy human memory of laying out on a blanket in my backyard beneath my beloved blue Arizona sky, hiding beneath the small shade of a book. Not the blistering heat of a summertime Phoenix sun, but the warmth of the first day of spring. But the heat of Edward’s body alone was enough to fill my mouth with venom, so I tried to refocus my attention onto my quiz.

When I turned to the last page of questions, a motion beside me diverted my concentration once again. I peeked over, turning my head slightly in Edward’s direction to see what it was. As he thought over one of the questions, his right hand was moving peculiarly as he lifted and dropped down his long fingers almost as though he were impatiently tapping each digit one by one along the tabletop. Except the movement was more exact and calculatingly random. Engrossed, I watched as his his soft, fragile skin rippled over the muscle, the tendons appearing and disappearing with every bizarre movement. It took me a moment to make the connection between the large grand piano in his home and the motion of his hands. I realized he was miming piano movements while he thought through his answers. There was something both weird, funny, and endearing about this. I smiled to myself, not having the required oxygen to quietly laugh.

I felt his curious eyes flicker over to me and watched peripherally as he raised his eyebrows. I shook my head, biting down on my lip to unsuccessfully fight the smile, and returned to completing my quiz.

I finished a moment later and impatiently waited another ten minutes or so before I could turn in my work. I tried to ignore Edward for this small period of time at least, mentally reading myself the opening chapter to Wuthering Heights. Even though the words were committed to my memory, it was still never as good as actually reading from the book itself.

Once I’d decided an appropriate enough time had passed, I stood up to walk my quiz to the completed basket on Mr. Molina’s desk. Even having waited, I was still the first to finish the examination.

“Thank you,” the teacher whispered without breaking his focus away from the crossword puzzle he peered through his glasses at. I breathed in now that I’d placed some distance between myself and Edward, gladly facing the cool, fresh air from the vent.

“Neophyte,” I whispered back now that I’d replenished my oxygen supply.

“Excuse me?” He glanced up, his slightly aged face confused.

“Neophyte,” I repeated. “Eight across, two down.”

I took in one last clean breath and walked back to my seat as he tapped his pen across the squares of the space, mouthing his count of the letters to check if the word fit.

As soon as I took my place in my seat again, Edward stood up to walk his own quiz to the basket.

I wanted to watch him, but instead I forced myself to unzip my backpack and retrieve the biology textbook.

Busying myself with the assigned chapters, deciding to actually read them so as to not feed into my invasive Edward obsession, I couldn’t help but listen as Edward too placed his own textbook on the countertop.

I heard the scribble of pen on paper as he began to write what I imagined were notes until his large hand slid the paper over to me beneath the wall of my hair spilling over the desk. Well, I wouldn’t ignore him if he was the one deciding to bother me.

You know I’m pretty certain that cheating is a violation of the student handbook, but I’ll let you get away with it just this once.

I turned to glance at his face to see if he were serious. His eyes were warm and inviting, his mouth in the same crooked smile.

I took the piece of paper and looked around for my writing utensil that had gone missing somehow. My eyes zeroed in on a suspicious, tiny pile of wood dust on my side of the desk. When had I brutalized my pencil? He held his hand out to offer his own pen, and I accepted it, carefully plucking it from his fingers without making contact.

I wasn’t cheating. You were doing something funny. And what do you know about the student handbook? You’re new.

I slid the paper and pen back to him and watched as he combed a hand through his bronze hair, reading my response. The smile grew wider as he construed the biting tone of my note. 

Can I be let in on the joke? Edward wrote, turning to look at me once he was done. Again I was prisoner, though this time not to my own body. I was momentarily held hostage by the beauty and warmth of his light green eyes. I was understanding more and more the attraction the other students had for him. If I had a soul, it was as though he were staring straight into it.

I recovered, placing my hand atop the desk and then wiggling my fingers as though I were weaving my way through a very complicated piano piece.

Oh, Edward mouthed, immediately understanding. He silently laughed and placed his left hand to his forehead briefly as if to hide his face in mock embarrassment. The ink from the pen spilled onto the paper as he began to write again.

In my defense, there’s research that supports classical music puts students in a heightened emotional state, making them more receptive to information and helping them focus.

That’s very nerdy of you. I scribbled back, the corners of my lips pulled upwards.

I know. As I read the words on the notebook paper, we both laughed a little too loudly for the quietness of the room.

“Please remain silent for your classmates still working,” Mr. Molina stage-whispered from his desk, his eyes still fixated on the crossword puzzle.

It’s a bad habit. Edward tacked on to his message. I beamed. I knew a thing or two about bad habits today. I was appreciative of this silent conversation on paper; it made it easier to be beside him without needing to breathe to speak aloud.

What were you playing? I scrawled.

Clair de Lune. Edward wrote back. His thick eyebrows raised as my eyes lit up, and he continued writing. You know Debussy?

My mother used to play a lot of classical music around the house. It was one of my favorites.

It’s one of my favorites, too. Edward’s eyes were a little sad and lost in thought, and he smiled softly.

I was shocked by the change in expression and weirdly desperate to return the brightness back to his eyes. The burn in my throat was almost forgettable in the face of my concern. Almost, but not quite. He turned his head down to write on the paper again.

You said Rosalie played piano. You never learned? He turned to look at me, his expression curious. I shook my head and shrugged, reaching for the pen.

I didn’t think I had the coordination for it. While this was true for the time I was human, it wasn’t true now. Still, even though my days stretched into endless nights, I hadn’t yet devoted time to any instrument as an immortal.

Edward read the paper, his long pointer finger tracing the line beneath the words as he did so. He held his large hand out, and I dropped the pen into it.

I’ll show you sometime. Edward half smiled at me, his eyes sweet and earnest.

Knowing I shouldn’t be allowing him to think making a plans with me was an option, I reached for the pen to tell him that it was alright, but I froze as he suddenly moved to drop the pen and take my hand. Though he should have been the one hesitant and cautious as though approaching a dangerous, wounded animal, I held perfectly still as though he were the danger, and I needed to play dead for protection. You can’t play dead if you are dead, I thought to myself. 

My body tensed as my hand was enveloped in the heat of his much larger palm, uncertain as to what he was doing. My muscles screamed at me as I clenched my free hand into a tight fist, terrified of myself.

A shiver rippled through him as he felt the chill of my frozen fingers, and I twitched the hand in his possession, wanting to yank it away to protect him from the iciness but not wanting to alert him with the swiftness of the motion.

He smiled mysteriously at the spasm as though he somehow expected it. I wanted to ask him what he was thinking but didn’t want to risk breathing. My control could too easily be lost. Besides, I was scared that if I were to open my mouth, I’d end up screaming.

I felt him push slightly and realized he wished for me to curl my fingers, so with great concentration and the acute awareness of his fragility, I moved my stony hand into the shape he directed, my fingers curved slightly beneath his like a relaxed talon. I didn’t like the shape; it was odd and inhuman and made me think of the violence I could cause.

But it wasn’t a claw. Because once my hand was positioned the way he wanted, he began to slowly place pressure on my fingers, and I dipped and rose them accordingly to carefully move with his. I watched as the two of our hands together played what I imagined must be the opening chords to Clair de Lune.

The disconcerting emptiness in my chest soared at the bizarre pleasure of this touch, and a weird sensation tickled my scalp, moving swiftly down my spine to my entire body. 

My muscles tightened violently and then relaxed, sending a shiver to ripple through me. It was too much pleasure and too much pain as my throat ached and I leaned into the warmth.

Embarrassed and not wanting to push my luck, I cautiously pulled my hand slowly away. He lifted his hand to allow me to escape as though I couldn’t just break his hand to do so, a half-smile pulling on his lips. I pretended not to notice the goosebumps on his arms.

See? he mouthed before deciding to whisper. “You could do it.”

I forced myself to smile and then turned away for the rest of the hour, trying to keep from doing anything stupid like looking at him or killing him. I’d completely forgotten where we were.

When the bell finally rung, I collected my things atop the desk hastily. Edward reached for my backpack and held it up for me.

“Thanks,” I murmured as I dumped my books into the bag. Before I could take it from him, he slid it onto his back and nodded his head once for me to go forward.

Feeling awkward, I turned and allowed him to follow me to the door. I was lucky to walk in front of him, taking the opportunity to breath again as the vent blew out in front of my face.

Exiting the classroom, I paused for a second when I saw Emmett waiting for me across the hallway rather than his typical spot beside the wall of lockers next to our shared Spanish classroom. Even though I was well aware of the fact I’d been dangling my irresponsibility in their faces all day, I still felt as though I was being caught in the act.

Emmett’s eyebrows raised as his golden eyes watched Edward follow behind me, carrying my backpack. I crossed the hallway reluctantly towards my big brother.

“Hello,” I greeted him, avoiding his eyes. I felt smaller than ever beside him with my head down, and yet not small enough as I wished to disappear.

“Hey, little sis,” Emmett began uncertainly, though I glanced up to see his full lips were beginning to stretch into a smile that I didn’t like. “Who’s that with you?”

“Uh…”

“I’m Edward Masen,” the lanky human boy introduced himself confidently as he stopped beside me. “And you must be––”

“Emmett,” my brother interrupted, grinning as though he always so comfortably interacted with humans. This was all too weird, but he looked to be enjoying it far too much. His desire to mess with me and his confidence in Alice’s visions seemed to override the abnormality of speaking to a student so amicably. I watched as he breathed in and shot me a meaningful look. I grimaced.

I opened my mouth to put an end to this torturously awkward interaction, but Emmett interrupted again.

“It’s nice to see you made a friend,” he began, an evil glint in his eyes as he watched my face. I was confused as to where he was going with this because our entire family would come across as misanthropic to the rest of the school, so why should it matter to him. He turned his attention to look at Edward who was closer in height to him. “You know, we worry about her––”

“Okay, let’s go to Spanish,” I cut him off quickly. “Edward, can I have my bag, please?”

Without looking at him, I reached for my backpack as he offered it and threw it over my shoulder, heading down the hallway. It was a massive relief to put some distance between myself and Edward. My thoughts were clearer, and I could breathe freely.

Emmett burst into laughter, his guffaws booming in the hallway. Several students paused in fear making me concerned about Edward’s reaction to my giant of a sibling, but I relaxed when I heard Edward chuckling along with him.

“Um, see you,” Emmett said to Edward before his steady, near silent footfall followed after me.

Even moving at a lethargic human pace, he caught up to me quickly.

“That wasn’t funny,” I grumbled.

“What the hell are you doing?” Emmett chuckled, ignoring my question.

“What the hell are you doing? What was that back there?”

“I don’t know. That was weird, but not as weird as you playing with your food.”

I hissed quietly.

“Damn, I’m kidding, Bells. But seriously, what are you doing? What happened to your high and noble speech about doing the right thing and staying away from the kid? I thought Esme was about to produce real tears. It even softened Rose.”

“Ugh, don’t talk to me about Rosalie right now. She’s been giving me dirty looks all day. It makes me feel awful. I already feel bad!”

“Well, I don’t really care what you do either way so––” I looked at him questionably. “I mean, sure, I want you to do the right thing, whatever that means. I don’t want you to feel miserable. But on one end, I didn’t really mind so much what happened to me.”

“Rosalie did,” I countered.

“Yeah, Rose did,” he acquiesced quietly.

“Anyways, I’m not having that conversation. I wasn’t talking to him today to test whether or not he’s worth it. That’s… unethical.”

“So what were you doing?”

“I don’t know,” I groaned in answer.

Emmett laughed.

“You’re weird these days, Bella.”

“You’re weird everyday,” I quipped back before sighing. “I don’t know. He’s weird, too. I guess… I’m not making any decisions, at all, but if Alice told you what she told me… wouldn’t you be curious?”

Emmett thought it over. “Yeah, I think so. But I also don’t think I’d have even made it to this point,” he admitted. I winced.

“It’s kind of unfair for me to care more about satiating my curiosity and dance with the devil this way, right?”

“Well…he may not know it, but isn’t it more so that Edward’s the one dancing with the devil?”

“Yeah,” I agreed, frowning as we walked into our Spanish class. “I guess it is.”

I made the decision to avoid thinking of Edward for the remaining hour of school. I paid very little attention in Spanish, returning to the familiar mind-numbing boredom that classes had been prior to the last few days. Now that it was in stark contrast to the sudden life breathed into my time at Forks High School by my fixation with Edward, the tedium was no longer something dealt with indifferently and sluggishly. Now, it left me feeling restless, and it almost pained me how laborious it was to sit through a life I wasn’t an active participant in. It was nowhere near the pain of dealing with the excruciating thirst I had around my bronze-haired lab partner, but it almost tampered with my thoughts more knowing I’d feel less miserable if I spent this time analyzing every word Edward shared with me, every fluctuation of his tone, every glint in his perceptive eyes, every expression on his pretty face… But I was becoming too obsessive. The same hunger for adventure that made me fall in love with reading must be what was leading me to so treacherously, so impetuously dive into exploring this insignificant and yet cataclysmic difference in my life.

As though it had a personal vendetta against me, time moved even more lethargically than it ever had before, but finally, the bell signaling the end of school rang. Emmett’s eyes shot a concerned look at me as I rose from my seat too quickly, and I immediately felt embarrassed again. The cautious reminder in his expression made me feel childish as Emmett was never one to care much about bending the rules. 

“See you at home, I guess,” he shook his head, giving me one last look that seemed to suggest I’d lost it.

“See you,” I mumbled, slinging my bag over my shoulder. Leaving Emmett behind to wait for Rosalie, I weaved through the crowded hallway and out to the parking lot. Students were bundling together and squealing at the chilling air as tiny, fluffy snowflakes fluttered down from the overcast sky. The floor of the parking lot was almost as glassy as yesterday as the rain from this afternoon had melted into a thin layer of icy mush. Though there was hardly enough snow for a decent snowball fight, some of the rowdier students were bundling up a pitiful pile of snow to form pathetic snowballs in their fists.

I nearly skipped to the pearly white vehicle parked beside Rosalie’s overly conspicuous crimson car which was forming a small crowd of admirers. Leaning against the trunk of the car, I watched the front doors of the school to look for Edward.

The tangle of reddish-brown hair was easy to spot because of its strange metallic tint as he strolled out of the building with Naomi, the student who’d provided him with the information about my family on his first day. He had his coat folded over his arm, revealing how form fitting his light tan turtleneck was. He truly was a very attractive boy. It was odd that I hadn’t really paid much attention initially. With his dazzling face and tall, lean frame, Edward was pretty enough that for the vampires who searched for exquisitely beautiful humans to create into even more stunning immortals, he could probably be a contender for someone to collect.

Thinking of how Emmett questioned my motives today, I quickly banished the idea of Edward as an immortal from my mind, even if it was only a hypothetical inspired by my observation.

Edward paused, asking Naomi if she could hold on to his backpack for a moment. When she grabbed it, he pulled on his long black coat, and fiddled with the collar. Recollecting his backpack, he slid it onto one shoulder, then rubbed his hands together, blowing the warm air from his mouth to heat them up. Thinking of the sweetness of the smell of his breath made me remember to take in swallows of fresh air before he made his way over to me.

As he was distracted momentarily, I watched as a stray snowball flew towards Edward’s head. I was overcome with the urge to intercept it in the event it may hit him too harshly and knock him to the pavement, but flying across the parking lot inhumanly fast twice in one week was probably not the way to go about correcting my mistakes.

The soggy snowball crashed into Edward’s hair, exploding into shards of ice and water that slid down his prominent cheekbone. I laughed aloud at his shocked expression as the curtain bangs framing his face were immediately drenched, darkening his hair into a brown color. Once he’d realized what happened, his face broke into a good-humored smile.

“Holy shit! Sorry, Edward!” The classmate who had thrown the snowball with poor aim called out.

“No worries!” Edward called back. He shook his head, chuckling as he wiped the water from his face. As he laughed, his eyes found the space where I waited and brightened seeing that I, too, was enjoying the moment.

“Hey, I’ll see you tomorrow,” he told Naomi, who was too beside herself in tears of laughter to reply.

Edward sauntered over towards me, and I inhaled deeply as a fortuitous whisper of wind blew from the tree line. I held onto the notes of crisp eucalyptus, fresh snow, and cedar wood, trying to distract my mind from the offensively mouthwatering scents approaching me.

Edward was a coordinated human, but even he lost his footing on the icy pavement. His body slid forward for a moment, but I stepped towards him to close the space between us and caught him by the elbow.

He looked up from his boots against the frozen parking lot into my eyes, startled momentarily at the swiftness in which I had appeared. Then, his full lips lifted into a crooked smile that creased his astonishing green eyes into half moons. I let go immediately and took a big step back to ensure a safer distance between myself and the warmth of his fragile body. It had been a risky movement, but somehow in comparison to yesterday, it didn’t seem to matter as much. I figured our classmates were too involved in their gawking at the details of my sister’s car or their feeble, slushy snowball fight to notice, and oddly, I didn’t care that Edward had seen. It was beginning to feel too late to keep up certain pretenses.

Although, it wasn’t too late, and it shouldn’t feel that way. I reminded myself I still had every intention of leaving Edward alone once I’d figured out what was so compelling about our paths crossing that had Alice’s visions spiraling in a confusing jumble. I took another step back slowly.

“Thank you,” Edward said, his eyes humored with another secret he didn’t seem willing to share. “You keep saving me.”

“Well, let’s not make this damsel in distress thing habitual,” I snorted, turning so that he couldn’t see the smile forming on my face. I felt shy about showcasing any comfort or happiness in his presence now that I was reminded of how fleeting this experimental friendship was, but I wondered if subconsciously I wanted him to catch me in my misery and ask me to explain, though I wasn’t certain why I wanted to sabotage myself like that. I opened my door and turned to look at him again. “You coming?”

Before he could answer, I dipped into the driver’s seat, and breathed in one last time. Well, once this was all over, I could finally stop inhaling dramatically as though they were truly my last, dying breaths. The air was mostly clean of his scent, but I knew that regardless, the heat of his body would be enough to disrupt my comfort and control. As the thought crossed my mind, I painfully swallowed back the venom pooling beneath my tongue.

Edward swerved through the crowd obsessing over Rosalie’s car and opened the passenger door, sliding into his seat. As he placed his backpack on the floor and fiddled with his seatbelt, I made sure to adjust the air conditioning so that the heat could warm Edward from the frigid Forks air. Though for me, just being in his presence made the intimate interior of the car feel as though I were again sitting by his fireplace.

“That’s a beautiful car,” he murmured. “Is it an M8?”

“Uh, it’s a BMW?” I asked uncertainly as though he’d spoken another language.

Edward grinned as though he wanted to laugh but didn’t want to make me angry. Rosalie would have loved to answer all his questions if he too had an interest in cars. Would have loved to, if she wasn’t deeply offended by my actions or if I had any intention of Edward meeting any more of my family members.

“Ready?” I bit my lip as I forced out any inconsiderate plots of murder that threatened to distract me from being a defensive driver.

“Mhm,” Edward answered.

I reversed out of the parking slot slowly, but as I looked in the rearview once I’d straightened out, I saw the fleeting image of Rosalie’s exquisitely beautiful and exceptionally angry face. I quickly readjusted the mirror to remove my sister’s reflection and sped out of the parking lot in a way that could have taken out a few unlucky students if I didn’t have above average years of driving experience.

Peripherally, I watched as Edward’s thick eyebrows raised, but he decided not to question me. Once we’d reached the main road, I slowed my speed so as not to rush through this time, even though I knew for his safety and my sanity, I should. As I drove, his right hand moved in odd shapes again against the arm rest of the passenger side door as though he were playing piano once more.

I decided to bite and use up some of my limited air supply.

“What are you playing?”

“Clair de Lune again,” he replied. Then, he began to hum the melody aloud for me as he moved his hand.

I thought to offer to play the song for him through the speakers, but I decided against it as I listened to Edward’s soft, velvety voice hum beautifully through the song, breaking the silence.

The ugly, slush-like falling of snow transformed into a falling of rainwater, and Edward’s voice was orchestrated by a lovely symphony of raindrops.

Before his voice could weave into the more involved moments of the piece, Edward stopped.

I looked over at him, curious for the reason as to why. His face was turned away from me so that all I could see was his untidy bronze hair as he gazed out the window. I pulled in front of his driveway and parked against the curb.

Miraculously, I’d made it again. Carefully, I inhaled through my nose to experiment with my control. The sweet bouquet of the boy’s blood was potent and even more mouthwatering than usual from the snow turned rain that’d wet his hair. I hadn’t considered the possibility that he could smell better than before, and I kept myself from groaning aloud as I dug my nails into my own palms. The tingling sensation in my nose was as though I’d sniffed some powerful chemical, the burning sensation in my throat as though I’d taken a long drag of a cigarette. But more painful. More demanding. Desire, need flew from my core out towards my extremities, and the beating of his heart pumping the blood through his body drummed loudly in my ears. It seemed to move through me, my frigid body almost twitching with every pulse, ready to lunge forward and crush his neck to my lips.

“What was your mother like?” He asked me suddenly, his voice soft. Edward turned from the window to face me, and I was bewildered by the intensity of his expression. His eyes were light and beautiful against the gloomy grey of the sky, and they squinted slightly as though studying my face like this information was absolutely essential. But this was not what stunned me, as I’d already seen the severity of this expression before in our ephemeral time together. It was the unexpected vulnerability of his stunning face. The more time I spent looking at him, the more I realized how beautiful this human boy really was. And it seemed a great tragedy for this beautiful boy to harbor such devastation in his eyes.

Whereas previously in his presence, my thoughts had become incoherent due to a lapse in control, now my thoughts were incoherent in distress and desperation to understand what had gone wrong and how I could fix it. I was momentarily dumbfounded, but I pulled myself together after the soft sound of a few droplets of rain against the roof reminded me that he was waiting for an answer.

“Well, she looked a lot like me, but prettier,” I began stupidly. He raised his eyebrows. “Or at least, she used to look a lot like me, and I used to look a lot like her. I don’t so much anymore.” It’d been so long since I’d really spoken about my mom, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to laugh or cry. I knew I should have made some comment about whether or not she looked like Esme or Emmett since our story made us siblings, but I didn’t want to taint the rarity of sharing who she was with a lie.

“She was more outgoing than I am,” I continued, thinking through the foggy memories I held onto from my human life.

“That’s difficult to believe,” Edward teased quietly, his lips curving into a half smile.

I laughed, listening to the melodic sound of it, thinking of how it symbolized how very much different I was now from the human girl my mother knew.

“I was always very shy,” I smiled, before speaking up again, caught in the echoes of my past. “She was brave and irresponsible and slightly eccentric. And she was a very unpredictable cook!”

I laughed aloud again thinking of some minor explosions in our tiny kitchen and some questionable dishes. Edward laughed too, but when our laughter faded into the falling of the rain, my smile faded.

“She wasn’t perfect,” I admitted. “I think I recognize now that she was very fallible. I worshipped her when I was younger, but when I think back, I do see how in some of the ways she raised me, I was done a disservice… I grew up too fast. When she died––“ I sighed, feeling insincere and guilty about perpetuating this lie when I really should have said when I died, “––Esme became more of a mother to me, and even Rosalie’s been more traditionally nurturing than my mom ever was… But still, she was my best friend.”

“You miss her,” he murmured simply. I met his gentle eyes.

“Yes,” I bit my lip.

“How old are you, Bella?” Edward asked. “And not the formulaic, theorized version where you were born in your thirties. How old are you really?”

I tensed, wondering if he was asking this again because he’d taken note of how I didn’t directly answer this question the last time he asked.

“Seventeen,” I answered automatically.

“You don’t seem seventeen,” he responded, reproachful.

The tension left my body at the tone of his voice. I smiled again easily.

“Sorry?” I asked, biting my lip to hide the smile, unsure of how to respond.

Edward chuckled and the subtle crinkles by his eyes lit up his face. “Well, I wish you’d been given a happier, normal childhood.”

“I’m fine,” I shrugged, brushing it off. “I hardly remember most of it, and what I do remember reminds me that I probably didn’t have much chance at a normal childhood to begin with. I was terribly shy, remember.

“I did do girl scouts, though….Oh, and ballet briefly,” I admitted, unsure as to why I was volunteering so much information about myself. Wasn’t the purpose of me sitting here to uncover information about him?

“Why does that make you… embarrassed?” Edward’s eyebrows pulled up.

For an odd moment, I felt betrayed by the flush of my cheeks before I realized there was no blood rushing to my face. I blinked, bewildered by the peculiarity of this long buried instinct to become frustrated with my easy blushes when I hadn’t blushed for years. I felt self conscious as I wondered what Edward saw reading my expression to so perfectly decipher my feelings.

“I was very uncoordinated,” I dismissed his question as I fought the urge for my hand to flutter to touch my cool cheek.

“Now that truly is difficult to believe,” Edward half-smiled. “I can’t imagine I’ve seen anyone as graceful as you.”

I laughed aloud at his compliment, though I didn’t doubt his sincerity. I knew this was true of myself. It was true of all of our kind to appear fluid and effortless, but still, no one had ever applied the word to me. My vampiric poise was irrelevant and unimpressive to my family, and the very few humans brave enough to overcome their nerves to compliment me typically found their words to fail them.

“You’re very odd,” I beamed.

“What do you mean?” The bronze-haired boy asked, again wanting to be let in on the secret. While I had an insatiable thirst, it seemed he had an insatiable curiosity.

“How old are you really? Your word choice is bizarre for someone your age, you know.”

“Oh,” he laughed easily. “Well, I’m actually not seventeen. I’m eighteen. But I’ll try to strictly adhere to a more teenage vernacular, so I can compliment you in a more acceptable way from now on.”

I looked out at the dim light of the brewing storm, my smile fading as I decided that I should probably allow him to escape me before I did something I’d regret. But I knew I wasn’t resolved enough to completely leave him alone. He made me monopolize too much of the conversation, and I wasn’t satisfied with what I knew about him yet.

I sighed aloud, and Edward, too, looked out at the rain darkened sky.

“Will I see you tomorrow?” he asked hopefully, making the assumption that our conversation was coming to an end.

“Yes,” I promised reluctantly. My eyes flickered back over to his pretty face, studying the lines of his strong jaw, his chiseled cheekbones, his full lips, committing this inconsequential face to memory as I silently resolved that this should be –– and would be –– one of the last times I’d allow myself to be this close to him. Tomorrow may well be the very last.

Likewise, as though his thoughts were in the same vein, his beautiful green eyes studied my face as well, though he did so in that mysterious way of his where he looked at me as though hoping to read my mind.

He sighed, then collected his backpack. Edward opened the door, stepping out into the bitterly cold weather. A shiver ran through his lanky body, making my body tense with perverse excitement. I cringed away from the deadly instinct and swallowed against the dryness of my yearning throat.

Edward’s tall, lean frame leaned down to peek into the car.

“Goodnight, Bella,” he spoke softly.

“Goodnight, Edward,” I almost whispered, gazing into the beauty of his dazzling green eyes.

Edward smiled his half smile, and closed the door, escaping into the building torrent of rain.

I gasped in relief at his absence, then stiffened realizing how the cab of the car was still heavily perfumed with his scent. I took in another deep breath, forcing myself to confront the burning thirst again, willing myself to manage it. I sighed as I hit the gas, making Edward disappear behind me.

  Both my control and the rain pour strengthened significantly as I turned onto the long drive leading to my house. I grimaced as I wondered how I’d face my family and explain the complete reversal of what I’d promised to do. I didn’t have time to consider for much longer as suddenly, a figure appeared instantaneously in the drive. I slammed my foot on the brake immediately in shock at its appearance, not wanting to total yet another car against one of my siblings.

I peered through the windshield, unable to see through the complete downpour that submerged my vehicle as though it were underwater. It was annoying for my perfect sight to be obstructed by anything, rainwater or even the transparent windshield because of my eyes’ desire to focus on the microscopic scratches.

The car violently screeched against the muddy pavement, and it looked as though we would have to bid this car goodbye until the figure hidden by the storm placed their hands out on the car roughly and forced it to a stop. The tires screamed in protest, and the metal groaned as it warped into the shape of the palms. I listened as it unnaturally bent again in a piercing moan as the figure fixed the indentions they’d created.

My windshield wipers swatted away a flood of water. Finally, I could make out my sister Rosalie, her hair dripping wet down her back like a supermodel who’d just emerged from a pool on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Her exquisite face was absolutely furious.

I gulped, feeling like a child who’d just been discovered sneaking home past curfew.

I felt uncertain as to what to do and why she’d chosen to stop me here. Surely she could wait for us to be under the cover of the garage before she chastised me. Not wanting to be drenched by the rain, I revved the engine to ask her to move aside, but the car didn’t inch forward against her strength. Beginning to feel annoyed, I revved the engine again loudly and for longer, but still, she didn’t move.

“Rose,” I hissed as I hit the brake again so that the car could roar viciously in the storm, only to be cut off by the voice of my adopted mother.

“Girls!” I couldn’t see Esme through the obscured glass behind the downpour, but even with the barrage of the rain, I could hear her lithe steps run furiously to the front porch. “Please!”

Rose’s head snapped up to look in Esme’s direction before turning to glance unhappily back at me. She stepped aside, and I sped into the garage, parking the car hastily.

I exited immediately and went to expect the damage to the front of the hood. It was only a minuscule bend from having been pushed and prodded back and forth, and I was positive Rosalie could make it look like new, though why it had been necessary to punish the car was beyond me. It wasn’t even mine.

I wheeled around once I’d heard the near-silent steps of her run, a wave of anger making me forget my guilt.

“Are you insane?!” I demanded.

“I could ask the same of you, Bella!” Now free from the obscurity of the rain, I could see in perfect detail the stunning fury of her glorious face. Her golden hair had been darkened by the rain, and it was slicked back effortlessly, like a glittering waterfall down to the middle of her back. She looked like a wrathful god, but I couldn’t find it in my stubbornness to care about how valid her anger may be.

“Okay, but did you have to take it out on the car? What did it ever do to you! You couldn’t have waited another twenty seconds to confront me? Well, you have my attention now, Rosalie, so say whatever it is you want to say!”

“You’re just unbelievable, Bella!”

“He’s not going to say anything, Rose! We already talked about this yesterday. You heard Alice! He’s not a threat to you and Emmett, so I don’t understand why you’re taking this so personally.”

“Exactly, Bella. I heard Alice. Which is precisely why I fail to understand as to why you wouldn’t understand why I’d take it so personally. After all these years of sisterhood, how can you not understand how I feel about this?”

I frowned, my forehead puckering, but still, I retained my anger. She huffed, continuing.

“If it was an inevitability, I’d understand. However, it hurts me deeply that you recognize the choice that you have. The choice that Edward has. And still, you’re willing to play with his mortality as though it were a game, when I never had that choice.”

I froze, the realization dawning on me that she was right. No matter the ways in which I tried to justify my actions or spin my intentions, she was right. Another part of my mind acknowledged that while I was aware of right and wrong, I wasn’t certain that what was right would be enough to keep me away anymore.

We stared each other down much like we had yesterday. Only today, rather than anger, her face was contorted in hurt, and mine was contorted in hopelessness.

“But… you found Emmett when he was still human…” I weakly protested, selfishly trying to highlight the irony, though I knew it was pointless as I wasn’t advocating for Edward to be changed either. That was too complicated a thought to wrap my mind around. But whatever may happen –– and I was still very much aware of the worst of possibilities –– I didn’t want my sister to hate me for it.

“He was dying, Bella,” Rosalie whispered. The anger on her face had completely faded, and in its place, pain marked her eyebrows, her full lips, her golden, sad eyes. In her sadness, she looked like a work of art, like one of those paintings of a weeping saint. “It’s not the same.”

I didn’t have a response to that, and I felt as though I was at an impasse, both with myself and with Rosalie. Because I knew the promises I’d made and broken, but I knew the promise I’d made to Edward today, and I had no willpower, no desire, and no intention to break that promise.

“You may not feel anything for him now,” Rosalie began, her eyes intently fierce as they bore into mine to warn me. Only this warning felt significantly more horrible than I’d imagined it may be, because it wasn’t made in anger, but in desperation and love. “But if Alice is right, you will. And it seems to me a horrible way to repay someone you love to steal their life, their future, their soul from them. You should leave him alone now while you still can, because once you love him… it’ll only hurt more one way or another. And you’ll have to live with that for the rest of your existence. I know I have.”

And with that, Rose turned, her face cold and sad, and she left the garage.