#gonna post a set with bigger versions but that's gonna have to wait

[kazamajun]

Jun Kazama awakens.

[simpxxstan]

i’ve just finished reading your wonwoo!fics from the 550 followers event and i decided i need to request something myself because they were just TOO GOOD

given that, i thought about police officer!wonwoo (or mingyu, i wouldn’t mind—) who’s like super handsome and hot and all but also super nice and helpful and loves cats and—

and maybe he’s living in the same neighbourhood as y/n and they just feel drawn towards each other? idk, i’m not really good at making up scenarios 😭😭

it can go both ways, starting fluffy and then get smutty or angsty, everything’s gonna be fine <3

all i know is that i need to read something from you again 🫶🏼🫶🏼

THANK YOU FOR THE REQUEST! so firstly, I apologise if I disappoint you because instead of wonu, I did mingyu, because I had this wildest fantasy about him but I hope you like it still!! And I also added a few twists in the plot, because I wanted to spice it up a bit. I really pray you'll enjoy my version too!

this is part of my 550 followers celebration event! find the rest of the content of this event here!

also, thank you to everyone who's interacted with the event <333 your enthusiasm is so so much appreciated! the event is still on till the end of this month so you can still send in requests, my inbox is open hehe :) also to those who have sent in requests, T_T i am SOR SORRY for making you wait but honestly i am trying my best :((( i will answer your request as soon as i can, thank you for your patience <3

genre: strangers to lovers, police and criminal au, smut, fluff, neighbours au

word count: 5k words

warnings: 18+ NSFW MINORS DO NOT INTERACT police officer!mingyu, discussions of illegal racing, gangs, criminals, criminal activities, gambling (but nothing is explicit except the racing activities). smut warnings: unprotected sex (please please do not do this irl), almost public sex, oral (m. receiving), making out, usage of pet names, size kink, mingyu's a perv for reader

It's been six months since Mingyu has shifted to this town, and he's not regretted it a single day. it's a wonderful, quaint little town, on the edge of the city, that's close enough to the hustle but far enough to not be a site for trouble. The people are lovely and they've really accepted him with a full heart- the old ladies who bring him their delicious cooked food during his lunch breaks, the young boys who follow his gym routine meticulously, the mothers who either shamelessly flirt with him or try to set up their children with him, the fathers who pat his back proudly after a long day of work, the children who run around his clean police station with curious eyes.

After his busy five years in his posting at the city, this feels like heaven to him. He had joined the force in his craving for adrenaline and his innate nature of being helpful to everyone had driven him deeper into the profession. But he's twenty-seven now, and maturity has dampened the fire within his soul, although not his desire for social peace and justice- hence his choice to shift here.

It's not a town renowned for crime, and most of his days are peaceful with minor reports of petty theft or pickpocketing. But Mingyu has his fair share of excitement- being on the outskirts of the city, the edges of the town are less tame than the heart of it. It's a den for many gangs- all linked by the illegal racing grounds outside the town. Mingyu doesn't have any way to reach the gangs- they're being pursued by the force in the bigger cities with far more resources than sanctioned to his police station. But he tries to ensure the gangs and their dirty business doesn't get into his town. And Mingyu has his hands full with it.

But being busy keeps Mingyu happy. He's loved by the townsfolk and he's found a kind of peace here, different and yet beautiful. It's a slow town, and he's fallen into a routine that's good for his slowing-down body and his slowing-down mind.

So it's been a long, long day of work and at the end of the week, he's tired and ready to fall into his bed after eating anything that's in the fridge. But when he's walking up the stairs of his apartment building, his eyes meet a scene that's out of routine.

"Hello? Can I help you?" Mingyu walks up quickly as he sees you struggle to pull up two suitcases up the stairs, along with the clearly heavy rucksack on your back. "No! Thanks, no, I'm fine." "Please allow me, I live right here on this floor." And Mingyu casually picks up the suitcases, with a smile on his face. He doesn't miss the ways your body relaxes instantly and your eyes light up. "Umm, I'm here on this floor too. Just moved in into 309." "And I'm in 311. Right across your flat!" "I'm so happy to meet a neighbour already. I'm Y/N." "And I'm Mingyu."

And Mingyu feels the exhaustion of the day wear out when he sees your whole smile- not a tight-lipped smile, but the one that shows your teeth and your dimples. Well, dimple. There's only one big dimple on your left cheek, and it's a beautiful smile that stays on Mingyu's mind long through the night after you disappear into your flat and Mingyu goes into his own.

_

Mingyu doesn't know why he's suddenly choosing to skip his daily gym routine in favour of a run through the town at 5.30 am (nearly an hour before he's ever woken up in his entire life). Maybe one day he wakes up at 5.30 to use the washroom but spots you leave the building in your jogging shorts and earplugs. He joins the dots and his body joins them too- safe to say, he couldn't sleep again that morning. And neither the morning after that, because he's determined to join you on your run.

You don't talk much except brief interactions, and your speed is much faster than him, but he doesn't mind the exhaustion. The wink you throw him every time he lags behind and the bottle of water you offer him right after you drink from it too is enough motivation for him to keep running. Of course it helps that you compliment the way his muscles strain through his tank top and Mingyu's chest blows up even further with pride.

And it's so subtle, but Mingyu feels you slowly open up more to him.

It's in the won't you come in for coffee? I make a mean iced coffee.

It's in the I was shopping for groceries and brought you cooking oil, since you were asking for it yesterday. I thought you may not have had the time to go for shopping, since you're so busy at work.

It's in the see this magnet? my baby cousin made it.

And Mingyu goes to you like a moth drawn to a flame. He's drawn to you when he decides to take you out (for a friendly afternoon outing, he calls it officially, but internally he's treating it as a date). He's drawn to you when you show him around the veterinary where you work. He's drawn to you when he sees you eating ice cream on his couch after he's cooked dinner for the two of you. He's drawn to you when you barely touch his arm and tell him that you really like all your neighbours and the entire community in the town is great, but you're especially glad to have found Mingyu because he's one of the only people here who's near your age. And he's drawn to you when you smile for him, that rich, dimpled smile, after he tells you that you're exactly the friend he's been looking for since he's come here.

After that, Mingyu doesn't know what happens in what order. Do you kiss him first? Or does he kiss you first? Do you climb into his lap? Or does he pull you onto him? Do you bite his lip when his hands wander down to your ass that he's been eyeing for weeks now on every morning run? Or does he bite your lip when your hands weave through his hair? It's a blur, and when you pull back for a breath, your lips swollen, the first button of your shirt open, and a hickey already blooming near your collarbone, Mingyu knows only one thing. How he wants. Wants you. Wants more. Wants now-

"Mingyu, I- I don't know how to say this... it's not like I didn't like this. And I- I- umm. Maybe I should leave? Because if I stay I won't be able to hold back and I want to think about this a little bit?"

And oh, your eyes are so wide and so pretty, and the skin of your arms feel like butter under his touch, but he lets you go. He lets you walk away, a shy smile on your lips. He lets you kiss him on his cheek once before disappearing into your own flat, and Mingyu shuts the door and takes deep breaths as he leans on his door.

He's ready to give you all the time in the world to think, but he's sure that he's already yours. He just knows at the end of it, he needs to make you his too.

_

"Hello, darling."

The tone on the other end is unmistakable, and Mingyu sighs. "Don't try to seduce me, love. It's not gonna work." He's said this before, but the message clearly hasn't gotten through. The honey voice drawls on in a painfully slow pace, "You're late tonight. What's up?" "I was busy," he huffs, his heart still beating fast from making out with you a few minutes ago.

"Busy? Unbelievable." "A police officer can't be busy? Is it so unfathomable?" "No. What's unfathomable is that Kim Mingyu is off his routine. I wonder if there's something new... or someone new?"

The voice laughs, and Mingyu knows it's friendly prodding. His relationship with the person on the other side of the line might be anything but friendly but it's yet again become a part of his routine, and at least the friendly banter breaks the monotony.

"Are you jealous that I talk to women apart from you?" Mingyu smirks, knowing two can play this game.

"I'm jealous that she's taking up my time. You have to show her what's her place, really."

"Don't be rude love. You know I've got my ears on your voice only. Now, tell me if you have any news."

"Oh, getting straight to the point, I see..."

"Oh come on!"

The voice becomes serious instantly. Gone is the sexy drawl, and it's replaced by crisp words that are music to Mingyu's ears. "I've heard Taffy's gang making some noise in the borders. You might wanna come and look at it once for yourself."

"Do you have any more information?"

"Nothing much right now, officer. Look, I'm holding up my end of the bargain but you've got to be patient."

Mingyu groans. It's not good news, and it's certainly not enough news. But he'll take a look himself to make sure he understands the graveness of the situation correctly.

"Okay. When should I come? Tell me when Taffy's men are lurking around the area?"

The voice shifts again into a teasing, seductive tone, making Mingyu jerk at the sudden transition.

"Come tomorrow? Race night."

"Yeah no that's not happening. I'll-"

"Tomorrow, babe. Wanna see you race. A big boy like you likes his fast bikes, don't you?"

The thought of racing sends a spike of adrenaline rushing through his veins, but he knows this is illegal. It's one thing allowing the leader of the races to become his informant so that he can keep an eye on the circuit as well as get key pieces of information that remain hidden to the legal eye. But it's an entirely different thing getting into the centre of the mess himself and be involved in it.

And yet, a part of him wants to feel the thrill again. Tonight, after years, he felt that adrenaline rushing through him when you'd tugged at his collar and kissed him repeatedly. Fuck. It had felt good, hadn't it? One night won't matter, will it?

"I'll be there."

"Fantastic. Can't wait to see you, babe."

_

Mingyu doesn't see you the next morning. He waits outside your door at 5.30, but doesn't knock, hoping you'll come out eventually. But you don't. He doesn't spot you through the rest of the day either, and it makes him worry. But he's decided to give you your space and time, so he will be patient... at least for one more day.

It's a Sunday so Mingyu has a half-day at work. When he's back from work, his mind is still all over the place. Should he even go to the race tonight? He's raced a bit back in college days, but everything pretty legal. Nothing like the den of vice he knows he's going to walk into tonight. But he also knows that this is the best way for him to infiltrate through the layers of middlemen that stop information from reaching his ears.

By the time 8.30 comes around, there's no text from you. Instead, there's a text from his informant, saved under the codename of layla (he knows it's not her real name, but he doesn't care enough to ask about it).

I'll see you at the circuit tonight, darling. Don't be late.

Mingyu's heart speeds up. Is it wrong to feel excited right now? As a conscientious police officer, he should definitely not feel excited. But as nothing more than a man, he feels his blood become warm at the thought of meeting the woman behind that voice he's spoken to for almost three months now. He's almost 100% sure the voice isn't generated by a voice modifier or AI, but it's also impossible for that to be someone's real voice, so there must be some pitch changes or something along those lines. Nevertheless, their conversations has often made him wonder about the woman herself.

She's a shadow- no one really knows who she is. But about four months ago, when she'd called him up herself to supply information in order to buy protection for herself and her racing infrastructure, Mingyu had yielded instantly by weighing his priorities. And since then, he's tried endless times to put a face to the voice, but it's been a search in vain.

Not tonight.

Tonight, he's gonna see the face for himself and put all his wandering thoughts to rest. Thoughts late at night after a particularly long phone call with his informant, that made him wonder whether the flirting was real or all for show. Wonder whether the woman herself would be as sexy as the voice. And wonder what kind of woman she must be in order to be capable enough to singlehandedly run an entire illegal racing system.

Fuck it, Mingyu thinks, after seeing the clock strike 8.45 and still no contact from your end. He wears a black tank top along with a black leather jacket- intending to fit right into the crowd he expects to see there. He just hopes there's no one else there who'll recognise him. And he certainly hopes nothing will happen to make him regret this decision for life.

_

You're such a fool, Mingyu, he thinks to himself. You're such a fool for thinking you'd fit in.

Mingyu may be just twenty-seven but he doesn't feel young at all when he sees the crowd at the race. The people here must be of his age, but they all seem so different from him. Perhaps it's because his job has taken away his youth that he'll always feel perpetually distant from even people of his own age.

And so Mingyu stands there awkwardly, stiff amidst a crowd of half-drunk and half-high people, wearing colourful headbands and smearing eclectic neon colours on their skin. He feels out of place- and yet, a part of him wishes he could fit in. He wishes he could have enjoyed his youth like this- on the edge of the other side of the law. He wishes he could have lived like this for even moment of his life- beyond academics, beyond career, beyond mere survival.

"Hi beautiful, looking for someone?" A woman with a cigarette between her fingers strolls up to him. Her hair is flying in the wind, exposing the tattoos all over her skin.

Before Mingyu can say anything, the crowd around him suddenly erupts in loud cheers, and she quickly pulls his hand and drags him towards the centre of the entire crowd. He sees two bikers mount on their bikes- exquisitely reworked to glow in the dark. A woman hops up on a platform in the middle of the two bikers and lifts a gun towards the sky. And as the crowd counts down, she shoots the gun right after 1 and the two bikers zoom out into the blackness ahead, the crowd going wild with cheers for the biker they support.

The scene makes Mingyu's skin feel alive too- the sheer speed of the two bikes, the sound of the engines revving and the general merriness around him induces adrenaline to flow through his veins. When he turns to look at the woman next to him, he sees her looking at him with a curious smile on her face. "Umm, I'm... I'm not really here for the race."

"You're not? Layla told me you would be." The smile on her face deepens, and Mingyu gasps. "You know Layla?" "I do. But that's not important. Let's get you on a bike, hmm?" Mingyu's somehow missed to noticed how her hand's still on his arm, gently stroking his bicep over his jacket. "No, really I don't want to." She steps right up close to him, "But you can try once, pretty boy." Her eyelashes cast long shadows on her cheeks, but Mingyu doesn't care. "I don't want to try." "Let loose for one night." "I'm not here for fun. I'm here for work-" The woman in front of his laughs. "Yes Layla said that too. Don't worry, she's going to work. But only after you race against her."

Mingyu feels his heart speed up. Race against Layla? Fuck. Now, why does that sound so tempting? It makes him only more curious to meet his informant, because why must she make herself so mysterious?

"Are you her friend?" Mingyu knows that this woman is not Layla, because the voice doesn't match by miles. This woman here has a lisp in her voice, unlike Layla's clear diction, and no amount of pitch changing or machine alterations can change that (Mingyu knows that the hard way).

"I'm her sister. Well, kind of. Now, no more questions pretty boy. Next race starts in a few minutes. Let's get you on a bike!" And Mingyu finds himself in no position to protest as the woman drags him away without hearing him anymore.

_

In the blink of an eye, Mingyu finds himself on a beautiful beast of a motorbike, his entire body drunk on adrenaline. There's so many people he's never even met before, but they're hyping him up. The attention-whore in him goes crazy at the cheers. There's coloured smoke being released into the sky, and Mingyu wears his helmet to prevent it from clouding his eyes. And finally when the smoke fades away, he sees his opponent standing along side him.

Layla.

Fuck.

Still no face to the voice in his head, but it's still an enigmatic visual that draws Mingyu in and reels his mind. He watches the way her black latex pants hug her long legs as she swings her legs over her bike. And he watches the way her helmet covers her face but her hair's still flying in the air. There's something still mysterious about her, and yet so oddly familiar.

But before he can say or do anything, the crowd begins the countdown, and in a second, the gunshot goes off. And Mingyu zooms ahead, revving his engine from 0 to 100 in a moment, a smile spreading on his face as the excitement of the speed injects itself in his veins. Out of the corner of his eye, he notices Layla take a spin around the corner of the racetrack, her stable figure undeterred by the sharp turn. Mingyu may not be a professional, but it's not the first time he's racing. He's done this before and he can feel that familiar thrill returning, as he picks up speed and makes up his mind to defeat his worthy opponent.

It's a long and winding course, but to Mingyu it feels like a few minutes only. The cold night air hits his body and makes him feel like he's flying. Soon the ending flag is in sight, and he sees Layla speed up, hunching over her bike, determined to get there first.

But at the last minute, she steps back, her posture loosening as she sits back and watches Mingyu whizz off ahead of her.

Fuck, he mutters under his breath. Knowing she let him win easily hurts his ego, and he slows the bike down as they drive into the nothingness of the deserted roads ahead. When he finally comes to a stop, he gets off the bike and sees her stand a few metres away from him, her helmet still on her head stretching her legs.

"Hey! Layla! You let me win! I would've won anyway- fair and sq-"

Layla spins around and takes off her helmet, her hair whipping across her face, and Mingyu finally sees the face behind the voice.

_

"Y/N?" Mingyu's eyes are wide, his brain running as fast as his bike was a short while back, as he tries to connect the dots.

The voice is unmistakable, now slightly higher in pitch, and Mingyu wants to kick himself as he realises how big a fool he's been. "We finally meet, Kim Mingyu." There's a beautiful smile on your face, one he's not seen before. There are other things too- there's a nose pin on your button nose, making your features look sharper, and a necklace hanging off your neck, which is odd since he's never seen you wear jewellery before.

"Y/N? H- wh- how?!"

You don't answer him. You simply walk towards him, your hips swaying and Mingyu groans at the sight of your pretty legs in those tight pants. Fuck him for not recognising that ass sooner in spite of being obsessed with it for weeks.

"I thought I should come clean to you, officer, before you make any choices." You casually slot yourself between his legs, as Mingyu leans back against his motorbike. "What do you think?"

What does he think?

He thinks he's a fool for not finding out more about you before falling for you. He thinks he's a fool for maintaining a contact with someone as dangerous as La- you. And he thinks he's a fool for finding you even sexier after discovering this persona of yours.

And he thinks he would be a fool with regrets for all his life if he lets go of you now.

So Mingyu grabs onto your hips, and pulls you closer.

"You've got me by my balls, baby. Got me eating out of your hand. And you know I happen to like it. So it doesn't matter what I think, love. What matters is what you think." His fingers rub against the skin exposed as your crop top rises up as you dangle your hands around his shoulders. You laugh at his words, pressing even closer to him, the air between you two turning to electricity. "It doesn't matter what I think either- because I'd fallen for you ages ago when I first saw you around in town. The new, dashing police officer, Kim Mingyu, enquiring about gangsters and fending himself off prying old ladies at the same time. Since then I've just wanted to make you mine." Mingyu's heart hasn't stopped thumping loudly all night, and at your confession, his body tingles with a dangerous feeling.

"Glad we're on the same page, baby."

_

"This is my office," you whisper to him in between kisses as you drag him to a shady-looking room at the back of the building that's on the edge of the racing circuit, now deserted because everyone's busy at the races. "Office?" Mingyu giggles, because the term is ridiculous. The place is anything but an office- with the way dishevelled boxes are just stacked everywhere, and instead of desks there are more pool tables and boxes of alcohol. It's a small, dingy place, and the single tubelight at the end of the corridor flickers every other minute, but it's a vibe. Mingyu's not unfamiliar with seedy places in his line of work, but it's so novel to think this is where you truly work.

But fuck him if he doesn't think it just makes you hotter. Because there's something about you being the boss of a pack of hundred delinquents associated with even more hardened criminals that makes his dick chub up real quick.

Like it is right now, when your hands make quick work of removing his jacket and throwing it on the floor as you touch his bare muscle. Mingyu carelessly runs a hand through his hair as he sees you push him onto a chair on a desk that's in your office, the room lit only by the mercy of the distant tubelight and the moonlight streaming in through the window panes. "Fuck, you're so big Mingyu. Let me blow you? Please? Wanted to do this for so long." Your eyes are so pretty as you bend in front of him, fingers lazily rubbing into the tent in his pants, making him hiss. "Go on, baby. Whatever you like. Fuck, but kiss me once more."

And you do. You taste like berries, and Mingyu loves it. Mingyu knows he's got it bad, but he doesn't care. You're on your knees and you want to blow him, and if this isn't the mental image to which he's jerked off for days now, he'd be damned. So he pushes you down in between his knees after kissing you to his heart's content, and you quickly take off his pants. "God," you almost drool and Mingyu whimpers when you take off his boxers too. "You're so fucking big, Gyu. Never seen such a big, pretty cock," you say reverently, as you pump it and it twitches in your hands. Your eyes go wide when you lick it and fit your mouth barely against the tip, and Mingyu throws his head back and moans. He's not going to last long, if just this much has got him feeling like this.

Thankfully, you don't tease him much, eager to feel the heavy weight on your tongue too. So you take him as much as your throat allows, and Mingyu feels himself on the brink of heaven. When you bob your head a couple of times, Mingyu reaches down to tug your hair back and you moan around his cock. The vibrations send him over, and he cums into your mouth even as you continue to suck him. When you finally pull off with a pop, another squirt from his dick leaves a string of white cum on your lips and Mingyu feels himself getting hard again.

"That was so hot baby. You're so hot," he says, as he picks you up from the floor and on the desk. It's so easy for him to manhandle you like that, and you pull him close quickly. "You're hotter, Gyu. Can't tell you what fantasies I've had about you in these last few months." Mingyu smirks, his hands removing your beautiful pants, and spreading your thighs apart as he feels his way through your folds. "Umm? Really? Now don't be a bad girl, and tell me what you've thought about me."

You open your mouth to say something but then Mingyu pinches your clit, and any words fall away as you moan out loudly. Your hands steady themselves on his biceps as Mingyu begins to finger you painfully slowly- to the extent that he can hear the squelching sounds, and it drives him crazy.

"Tell me, Y/N."

When your breathing slows down as you feel Mingyu driving two fingers into you at a steady pace, his eyes fixed on yours, biting his lip in concentration, you tell him softly.

"Before I shifted into the flat... I wondered what you'd be like from up close. Because I'd only seen you from afar. And after hearing your v- aaah- voice, it just got worse." You feel Mingyu stretching you, hitting your g-spot repeatedly as he kissed your neck.

"And then when I did shift in... fuck. It was so hard to not give in to you. Whenever you looked at me with your puppy eyes and y- y- your smile- ah, fuck I'm g- gonna cum, Mingyu!" You scream as he fingers you through your orgasm, and he licks his fingers clean once you come down from your high.

"Then who asked you to not give in to me?"

"I wanted to make sure you'd like me in real life and not judge me simply as an informant." Your simple, vulnerable words take his breath away, and Mingyu pulls off your top in one go. "Fuck, you're so cute baby. I'd like you in every form, in every life. You drive me crazy, do you know that?" And Mingyu knows that now, as you hold on to his shoulders as he enters you in one go. "God, you're so tight, Y/N. Tighter than your pretty mouth, fuck." He's trying so hard not to cum right now, but as you grip his hair and moan filthily, a stream of curses falling off your pretty lips, Mingyu lets his adrenaline take over. And he thrusts into you without any hesitance, hips moving fast, his balls heavy as he slams against you again and again. The desk creaks, and you pant in his ears, begging him to go harder, and Mingyu can feel the way your pussy clenches him at every thrust.

"Gonna cum, Gyu. Please-" Your nails dig into his nape, and it drives him over the edge. When you come along with him, there's a sharp buzz spreading through his body and he feels like he's gone to heaven.

He holds you close like that for the next few minutes, unable and uninterested in letting you go. When you both finally feel the high subside, you look up at him, a hazy smile on your face. "I really like you, Gyu. I hope you can like me too beyond who I am in this racing circuit. Trust me, it's.... it's not my entire life. I am a person bey-"

He kisses you quiet. "Stop explaining yourself." You try to protest, but he kisses you again. "You know Y/N, I think I liked you from the first day I met you. And I get what you're saying but... trust me. Fuck. I don't know how to say this. But safe to say if I thought you were amazing as Y/N? I think you're absolutely the epitome of perfection as Y/N plus Layla. So hot, so gorgeous, and I love every bit of you."

And then there's that single-dimpled smile again.

"I also like the nose pin. Why'd you take it off?"

You giggle, "Didn't want it to be a deal-breaker once I had my mind set on you."

Mingyu kisses your nose at the pin itself and you shiver in his arms.

"Nothing about you can be a deal-breaker, baby."

[mayalaen]

Hi! I'm salty and here to complain about price gouging!

I recently needed some self-adherent wound wrap for my mom, and even though I have it at my shop, I checked how much it would be to have it delivered to my lazy ass.

Here's a screenshot from Walgreens:

This is brand name Band-Aid showing the price is $8.79 per roll. There was also a 2-pack of the Walgreens Brand for $7.99.

As many of you know, I own a tattoo supply shop, and I sell this very thing in my shop. It comes in various colors and I have both the 1 inch and 2 inch versions.

I pay $0.29 per roll for Sensi-Wrap (brand name) and other brands getting it by the case in bulk. If I buy it in super bulk, I can get it as low as $0.19 per roll.

Big companies get a bigger break on price than me, but even using $0.29 a roll as a starting point, that means they're selling at a 2,930.30% markup or a margin of 96.7%.

FYI the standard before the pandemic was a 40% margin, which gives you enough to cover your running costs plus allowing you to make a decent amount of money yourself to live on.

Companies took advantage of the pandemic and were doing 60% plus for a while, but post pandemic most settled at 50% margin.

A 96.7% margin is completely ridiculous, but a lot of big companies have started using 80% to 90% margins since the pandemic.

Buying from small businesses is a slower process because we can't get it to you within a few hours, but the savings are incredible!

We can't just charge whatever we want because not only do we have to complete with other small businesses, but we're not as greedy and corrupt as big business. We don't have CEOs making millions of dollars a year doing nothing in their big offices.

Big businesses have convinced you that it's too hard to go to stores or wait for things, so you think $8.79 isn't a big deal for a roll of stretch wrap. And then you see the Walgreens brand for $7.99 and think it's an awesome deal!

But walk into a brick and mortar or visit their online store, and you can get things like this from us for a reasonable price.

I sell this same product for $0.50 per roll. If you buy a case, I knock it down to $0.45 per roll. Same as all the other small businesses in the area.

Small businesses can't afford to advertise like the big guys, and we can't reach you on social media because of FB, Twitter, and Insta algorithms that favor big business, but we're here!

Support small businesses! We're not gouging our customers, but we're struggling because big business is too pervasive and influential. They're driving us out of business, and once that happens, they can set the prices with no competition.

I'm not posting this promote my own business. I'm not even gonna link to my business. I'm sharing this because I want everybody to support local small businesses 🥳

[tenpintsof-sundrop]

Nisha, did you know I would step on some legos barefooted for you? Anyways can’t wait to read for another fandom I have never stepped foot in and would probably never engage with the canon in just because you decided that’s what to make, and I’ve decided to read it anyways. Home cooked meal. -Rotten Anon

The opening line of this message made literal cartoon anime hearts appear above my head, just so you know <3

Also you have inspired me to post a rundown of my WIPs because I am really excited about what I have been working on. And for two of these fandoms, I know you have said you know nothing about the canon, but for the third, I am not sure, so we'll see.

My Current WIPs April/May 2024

Heaven's Gate (for The Walking Dead) - Daryl Dixon x GN!Reader. Strangers to Lovers/Soulmates/Lovers Reunited. Angst, Fluff, Hurt and Comfort. Set during Season 1 to Season 5. 17k in counting (will be a oneshot). You can find a preview here. In this fic, you and Daryl get separated when the Governor attacks the prison, and though you both believe the other person is dead (or long gone) you find each other at the most unlikely time, in the most unlikely place.

I am super excited about this fic, and the themes of hope that I have woven into it. Because yes, I unironically love writing about hope and how the human spirit can persevere - which is something that my favourite moments in The Walking Dead show. This is first draft complete and just needs to be edited.

The Jaws of Life (for DC Titans) - Jason Todd x GN!Reader. Sequel to Emergency Contact. Lovers Reunited. Extreme Angst, Smut, Hurt and (some) Comfort. Set during Season 3. 21k in counting (will probably be a oneshot - if it needs to be split up, it will be put in two parts, but I hope I can get away with a oneshot). (I highly recommend that everyone go read the original in the meantime, because it is one of my best fics ever.) In this fic, you and Jason struggle with the new meaning of your relationship after what happened with Deathstroke - only for this tentative change to be harshly disrupted by the Joker. And you're still heavily mourning when a red hooded stranger breaks into your apartment one night, seeking medical care because apparently - you owe him one.

Everyone give Jaycen @nctzenkane a big fucking round of applause for this one, because he was randomly talking to me about Jason Todd today (we were having the 'some characters are only fuckable in costume' discussion) - and I got talking about how this version of Jason from Titans makes me so passionate to write about the character. And it is solely because of him that I opened up this fic and took a good look at it - I have been thinking about this fic for months, wanting to finish it because I know I am gonna be proud of it, but I kept hesitating because I thought I had a way bigger mountain to conquer with it. But the conversation I had with Jaycen really inspired me and I wrote 5k on the fic just today, and I realized that with this momentum, I could have the first draft done by the end of this month. So I am promising myself that this is gonna be done soon.

Speaking of which - when The Jaws of Life is first draft done, I wanna host a poll so you guys can decide which of those two ^^ fics goes through the editing process to be posted first. Both will be posted (hopefully) by the end of May, but I do wanna know which one you guys wanna see posted first. Which leads me to:

Nasty (for Stranger Things) - Sub!Eddie Munson x Dom!Fem!Reader. Established Relationship. Smut/PWP. 3k (this is gonna be a shorter fic lmao). In this fic, you and Eddie have been dating for a while, but you don't like that all of his attempts to have sex with you have him taking on a (seemingly fake) dom persona. When you finally tell him that you prefer to be more dominant in bed, he isn't disgusted like you thought he might be - he loves it.

This is one I have been sitting on for a while, and right before it was ready to be posted - my brain lost interest in it like tiktok does micro trends. But I think this is gonna be really great to post while the poll for those other fics is cooking because it's short and sweet and for the past few days, whenever I have seen the cover for this in my drafts, I have gotten excited about it again. So I am excited to finish it and show it off to everyone!!

[iwsynttr-project]

WAAAHHH I just saw people have been posting about the project on Pinterest???

THANK YOU???

I am so pink oh my goodness aaa

I'll give some updates then so people know we're not just slackin', haha;;

This past week we've been hella busy with church, school, trying out programs, still figuring out the whole learning to drive thing, stuff with disability, etc... but especially with Valentine's Day & Moose's birthday.

CJ came up to visit which was really special & we got to eat out & get boba all together which was super nice as he doesn't live too close by ever since we moved a few years back.

I recently got most of my m3dz figured out so I might be able to start hrt within the next year, & it sounds like the date has been set for CJ & I to get married this April 29th!

On top of all this we recently found out that a couple other plans have been thrown into the mix:

Our folks are planning to head out for a week a few states away to spend time with family & celebrate our twin cousins' birthday & then they'll be goin to Medieval Times for Moose's birthday possibly with another friend or cousin.

My mom & I are gonna try & see a show with CJ & his mom if they're able to come for my 21st birthday (Which is March 13th!) & CJ's birthday is at the start of April.

Right before our wedding is my dad's birthday & we're gonna see another live performance in another state, & then right afterwards a few days later is gonna be the wedding.

We're just gonna make it small & Soukoku themed, but maybe years later from now when we're livin' alone & financially stable we might do a bigger more official wedding. We'll renew our vows, maybe have custom made suits, special stuff like that.

Somethin' we're hopin' to do is for the small one we might make custom Lego Minifigures to be in front of/above the cake & then if we save up... the four-six hundred bucks... we wanna get the Soukoku "wedding" figurines that came out a bit ago.

It's a dream.

Anyways, as for the actual project!

I'm still working on the script when I have time, I just got stumped since we don't have Golden Demon written yet- but I managed to come up with some content to fill in for during or after the scene plays out for now & continued from there.

Moose has decided to try & make two versions of Life's Better With A Little Party In It: one that's a trashy pop song, & one that's his own take on the song based on artists like YOASOBI. (Into the Night, Monster, Idol, etc...)

We're also thinking about making a Cover Album on the side to go with the soundtrack just for fun with covers of songs from bands & artists like ONE OK ROCK & Set It Off.

I'm still thinking I might go for making The I Was Screaming Your Name Through the Radio Project into an episodic animatic series, but with everything going on I might wait to record the actual script & songs until we've got most of the script & songs written out more at the least if not also until after I get a better microphone & possibly start injections. (Maybe I'll still do the first few chapters since they're just teens anyways but meh whatever; we'll see.)

I did do a drawing while I was free last night though & have been talking with my dad who's voice is basically his life & career about vocal training of sorts or if I should find classes online or something along those lines for it.

(Back to the drawing) I made a concept design for Moose's online/music persona AquaticSnow & a possible first EP/Album cover. I'm not sure I'll post it (yet?) since he might use it for stuff like his avatar, channel/s, music, etc but if I do it'll be on my personal main Tumblr, Instagram, & probably Deviantart & Twitter/X.

I'm also nervous about somebody tryin' to steal the art &/or concept.

Another reminder that I do have a personal server where I stream drawing, gaming, sometimes reading & writing, watch parties (movies, shows, etc...) & I post planning & updates for the project there!

.:Charli's Discord Server:.

( Don't forget to pick roles & read the rules! Otherwise you can't see the other chats;; )

Sorry 'bout the long post, haha;; we hope you all had a great Valentine's Day!

Charli

[pico-digital-studios]

Into, Across and Beyond! Scripting: The Help We Need

PREVIOUS POST

In More than One Universe, in the wake of OMT!Sally's death, OMT!Tails's five remaining allies were getting worried for him.

OMT!Mina: *sigh* I'm gonna set off the device.

OMT!Amy: Huh? But why are-?

OMT!Mina: I know he told us to wait, but... I'm starting to get worried.

OMT!Knuckles: Urgh. I just wish I could see him again!

Knuckles moved his arm up, which caused a portal to slightly flicker before vanishing.

OMT!Cream: Huh? Was that another portal?

Mini Sonic: Try that again.

OMT!Knuckles: Alright. I just wish I could see him!

He did it again, and the portal got slightly bigger before vanishing again.

OMT!Knuckles: Okay, I've got it. I want to see Tails!

The portal opened fully this time, showing Tails in a daytime variant of Green Hill.

OMT!Amy: Is that him?

OMT!Mina: Did it work…? I think that’s him… I-It has to be!

Two other hedgehogs were visible as well.

OMT!Knuckles: Tails! Over here!

OMT!Amy: Come on, Tails!

??!Tails: Huh? Guys, are you seeing this?

The other Tails jumped through the portal to greet those on the other side.

??!Tails: Are you all okay?

One of Dr. Robotnik’s robots nearby reacted hysterically.

Metal Sonic Clone: Oh no... Oh no! Multiversal trespasser is here! Run! Run! Run! Run!

??!Tails: Woah woah! Calm down! I don't mean any harm! *sigh* Okay. (calling through the portal) Guys! We're all good!

OMT!Mina: W-Wait…

??!Tails: Huh?

OMT!Mina: You’re… not from this world… Are you?

??!Tails: You're right. I'm the Tails from my world. Though yesterday, some strange portals popped up, and the source of them seemed to be… here.

OMT!Mina: Okay, so… there’s your Sonic there, and… who’s the yellow one?

??!Tails: Oh, his name is Nitro. A friend of ours. (through the portal) Right, we're ready, guys!

??!Sonic: On the way, buddy!

OMT!Knuckles: This must be because of that device.

OMT!Mina: It must be.

EV!Sonic and Nitro came through themselves.

OMT!Mina: So... even MORE worlds, huh?

Nitro: Yep.

EV!Sonic: To be fair with you, I feel we're here for a reason.

Mina: What is it?

EV!Tails: Whatever caused all the damage it did and wherever your Tails is at… I feel we need to help in some way.

OMT!Mina: C-Can you… help us find him?

Nitro: It's best if we do. Even after that, we're staying to help you fix whatever problem's hit this world.

EV!Tails: Maybe try what you did to get us here. It may help us reach him.

OMT!Amy: Knuckles, you’re the one with the ring.

OMT!Knuckles: Alright.

Knuckles used it again, creating another portal. It wasn't the exact area they were looking for, but another similar Sonic world. An older Sonic came through, alongside a younger blue hedgehog.

EV!Sonic: Ooh, boy. Another version of me.

??!Sonic: Hello? I hope it's okay. Me and Sonia just came through this...

The portal disappeared behind them.

??!Sonic: Oh. It just closed.

OMT!Mina: Another Sonic, huh?

??!Sonic: Yeah. I'm... Sonic the Hedgehog. I... I saw you guys…

EV!Sonic stepped forward.

??!Sonic: Wait, he's... he's not your friend.

Sonia, CU!Sonic's daughter, quietly stepped out of the way. The two Sonics exchanged glances for a moment, and then blows against one another.

EV!Sonic: Woah, I…

OMT!Amy: You're a hero, too. Why didn't you simply say that?

CU!Sonic: At the moment, I don't generally go around advertising my heroic roles.

OMT!Mina: That’s understandable.

As EV!Sonic got to cleaning up a small mess accidentally caused by the small clash, CU!Sonic spoke up.

CU!Sonic: Erm, this may sound kinda weird, but… I’ve been trying to find your Tails since I got here. I just have this feeling that… that he needs my help.

CU!Sonia: Our help.

OMT!Mina: He… He does.

Mini Sonic: We don’t know where he is.

OMT!Amy: And, in all honesty... we're the only people he has left by his side.

Nitro: Well… is there some place he might go… which has meaning to him? Like a place where he’d go to just…

CU!Sonic: …get away from everything? From what I remember… It was at the top of one of Central City’s skyscrapers, close to the office tower.

OMT!Mina: Y-Yeah. I… I think I know exactly where that would be.

After OMT!Tails had gotten back from the Mobiverse, he sat on that rooftop on his own, holding Sally’s jacket as the only remaining memoir of her. OMT!Mina and Mini Sonic, as the first to get up there, hugged him.

OMT!Tails: T-Thanks, guys…

OMT!Mina: There’s someone who wants to see you.

Tails noticed the others, not only his friends, but those from other worlds.

OMT!Tails: Woah, w-what?

And it happened that EV!Sonic and Nitro brought extra company with them from other worlds in their universe.

Nitro: Tails… we're sorry about what happened.

CU!Sonic: He's right. I know you have some understanding you want us to-

OMT!Tails: N-No… Please don't tell me you know what I'm going through…

EV!Sonic: Y-Yeah, we do.

OMT!Tails: S-Sally's gone… and it's all my fault. I didn't save her in time. I'm… not even fit to be a hero. I'm gonna do what I should've done from the start.

Nitro: Tails, no. It's not right.

OMT!Tails: None of you apart from my friends here actually belong here. I'm gonna send you back home. You're still heroes of your own worlds, aren't you? So just stay out of this. This isn't even your fight, or mine anymore. I'm sorry you all got dragged into this… Goodbye…

OMT!Tails tried to start up another device to send them home, but was stopped as Nitro put his hand on his shoulder.

Nitro: Long ago... I lost most of my family and assumed they were all dead. Back then, I wanted the guy behind it all to suffer in pain for what he did, and it took me five months to understand he had suffered too. I don’t want you to fall down the same path, Tails.

Tails lowered his head in response as CU!Sonic also approached.

CU!Sonic: I can relate to what he just said. I lost Amy a while back when we had Sonia as a daughter. She was my Mina… It took me a while to move on from then and cope as a single father. Ever since, I kept trying to be the carefree hero she saw me as, but it became tough as time went on. Sonia was all I had left to call family. You shouldn’t experience that same darkness.

He sighed for a moment, venting out his anger towards Richard.

Tails: I just wanna kill him... tear him apart… make him suffer and beg for what he did to Sally! I... I can still hear it all in my mind… *sobbing* Even in her last breath, S-Sally didn't want me to give up… She said to…

Tails and Asriel (in unison, unknowingly): …to “enjoy the future for her”.

Tails: Huh?

Asriel: Yeah. A certain skeleton told me that before… something happened.

Chara: ...Maybe her death wasn't for nothing, Tails. Maybe she gave what she had so that you could fight on.

Asriel: Our arrival was clearly for a reason, and we’re ready to help you with everything we’ve got.

OMT!Tails: You… You're really sure you can help put this all right?

OMT!Mina: We’ll have your back through it all, Tails… I promise.

OMT!Tails: T-Thank you… all of you.

The Errorverse counterpart of Sally stepped forward, gently hugging Tails.

EV!Sally: For the time that I and the others are here, I’ll help look after you as much as I can, okay?

OMT!Tails: O-Okay.

He hugged her back, feeling a little bit better since he still had a Sally to be around for now.

Grace: So, considering what's happening, is there any place we can use as a base to help put things right?

OMT!Tails: Y-Yeah. Another counterpart of myself and a friend I made before already went ahead there. I'll show you the way if you'd like.

He got back up, putting Sally's jacket on as a memoir.

EV!Sonic: So should we get moving?

Frisk: Yeah, good call.

OMT!Tails: Alright. Follow me!

They headed out, though Nitro, Lilac, Frisk and Benjamin hanged back for a moment, taking note of the changes to the evening sky.

Frisk: You think there's going to be more people coming here than we'd once expect?

Lilac: I imagine so. Hopefully a lot of them are on the good side of things.

Benjamin: Yeah. And NOT too many of those that were confined to endless torture.

Nitro: Yeah... God, I hate those alternate timelines.

Lilac: We should get moving.

Frisk: Right!

Benjamin: Right!

They headed off.

Comic covers for the Errorverse AND ChaosIIUniverse/Next Dimension came down onto the growing pile to introduce our next two Blur Gang stars.

"Well, you probably know the drill by this point, so let's do it one last time. Or... is it the SECOND last time? Eh, never mind."

A shot of Nitro trying his shoes on for the first time is shown.

"My name is Christopher Smith, and for a couple of years, I've been the one and only... Nitro the Hedgehog. I doubt you know the rest, so I'll sum it up; I fled from my old home into Mobius, helped in the war against Eggman, and even saved the multiverse from possible destruction at the hands of Toxinfect."

As part of the summary, Chris as his human self is shown fleeing into a portal, not daring to look back, then of him as Nitro using the Burst Wispon against Eggman's robots, and then finally him utilising the power of the Sacred Ring to fight Toxinfect.

"That said, with all the times I've been knocked down, I haven't always been able to keep on moving. In an older timeline I came from, I suffered from long-term depression that I hid from everyone. At least, until a mini "Smol" version of myself revealed it, by which point I got some much-needed therapy."

As he said that, a shot is shown of his "Smol" counterpart, Smol Nitro, discovering a hidden note under Chris's bed, showing he was secretly suicidal at the time.

"But of course, there have been positives. I saved a newer friend from the clutches of a corrupt corporate boss, met amazing friends across the multiverse, and even got girlfriends out of my Amy and Mina."

Shots are shown of him offering Wade (Evo's boyfriend in the present day) his hand, him alongside the Mario, Lilac, Mega Man and Frisk of his multiverse, and him sharing a first kiss with Amy and his reunion with his Mina.

"Just today, of course, something weird happened. A portal opened under my feet, and I had to go to the hospital for a bit after some creatures gnawed at my legs. We waited a little bit, and then we saw that portal open into OMT!Tails's house. Wanna see what comes next now? Same! But before we do..."

The focus then shifts over to the Next Dimension comic cover.

CU!Sonic: ...It's time for us to do this-

CU!Sonia: -one last time!

CU!Sonic: Heh, knew you'd get the drill, mini-blue!

Shots are shown of CU!Sonia and CU!Sonic respectively preparing for battle.

CU!Sonic: So anyway, I'm Sonic, and this is my little daughter, Sonia. For a while, I've been the hero of my world. Pretty sure you know the rest! I got together with Amy, we had Sonia, and I've continued saving the world countless times. We did get into some tough love at times, but we always sorted it out!

CU!Sonia: Ah, erm... You gonna mention what happened with... mom?

CU!Sonic: Oh, er... I'm... not really sure if I can muster up the courage myself...

CU!Sonia: Come to think of it, I don't really remember what happened, but... she's no longer with us. Ever since, dad's been raising me on his own.

A shot of the two paying their tributes over their Amy's grave is shown, with CU!Sonic looking somber about it.

CU!Sonic: Right. Sonia's really the only family I have left, so while looking after her (and a mix of her keeping me right, of course), I've also been helping keep my home safe from criminal organisations trying to take advantage of things.

A shot of Sonia pilfering CU!Sonic's chilli dog out of possible jealousy that he was planning on dating someone else is shown.

CU!Sonic: Hey! My chilli dog!

CU!Sonia: If you're planning to swap out your poor daughter with another woman, you aren't worthy of this chilli dog.

CU!Sonic (annoyed): Darn it, Sonia! You're just like your mom, always trying to control everything!

CU!Sonic: One day, however, something weird happened.

CU!Sonia: We saw a portal just open up in front of us during our walk, and we met other friends on the other side!

A shot of them discovering the opened portal from their perspective is shown.

CU!Sonic: Sure you wanna know what happens next as much as me, so let's cut it here.

[branmuffins22]

Moots said they wanna hear about WIPs and I feel like I gotta get this brainrot out anyways so HERE I GO

I've only got three projects I'm actively working on right now, all of which are Owl House fanfics, although I've got ideas here and there for other things (video games I might've made if I weren't so burnt out, ttrpg characters that might need their own goddamn settings and stories to themselves, a Code Lyoko fanfic, music (mostly loads of disconnected song lyrics), 3D avatars, etc).

The Owl House fanfics in question are three(-ish?) fold:

Theseus Who?, a mostly-canon-compliant 5+1 post-titanification headcanon compilation that DOESN'T just let Luz keep her titan form (mostly it's just a bunch of changes along the lines of when Hunter's eyes changed color after Flapjack saved him). - It's actually sort of a tie-in to another, bigger fic I'm writing that's gonna be point 2, so you can assume anything mentioned in this one will happen throughout the timeline of the next one as well. - I've currently already got the 5 written, so now I just need to buckle down and finish the +1, unless I decide to do another sweep of edits (I think the excessive parentheticals might be too excessive). - - I only started it like a week ago, and I've been waiting for motivation to strike again to let me finish it for like half that time.

Masha and the Very Normal Nocedas, a mostly-canon-compliant sorta-multimedia veesha longfic based on the dramatic irony of Masha slowly driving themself nuts trying to piece together what the Deal is with Luz, Vee, and the rest of the Nocedas. - by "sorta-multimedia" i mean its got plaintext segments describing the story, journal segments of Masha recounting events as they remember them and trying to organize their thoughts, chat segments when the characters interact over text, and possibly more if I feel the Need. - I've only outlined the three prologue chapters and the following intermission, only have snippets and vague ideas for scenes for the main bulk of the fic itself, and have only actually written two of the prologue chapters and the intermission. - - won't start posting it until I at least get the third prologue chapter done, so I've got a usable buffer. Hopefully that'll be sooner rather than later.

The Overthinker AU (or "The Artificer AU"? name is also very much a work in progress), a canon rewrite that I think I'll actually split into a bunch of shorter "episodes", so I can appropriately tag each one, rather than tagging one monolithic fic with Everything Under The Sun. The basic premise is "what if The Owl House, but there's more time", both in the meta sense of "not bound by the 20-minute TV episode format" and the diegetic sense of "the broad-strokes plot of the show will happen over a longer in-universe period of time" (though I'm a bit stuck on just how much more time I want to give em). - for the most part, I wanted to put more emphasis on Luz's magical development, and extrapolate a somewhat wider magic system out of what we see in the show, but I also want to go into more detail on how her actions affect those around her, even outside of all the friends she makes (stuff along the lines of the little things the crowd mentioned while protesting Eda's petrification at the end of season 1). - I'm almost (reluctantly) thinking of pulling a Grapes of Wrath with it, structure-wise, by having main plot/character development chapters alternate with shorter intermissions focused on magical exploration, worldbuilding, and so on. - this project is currently just the scribblings of a madwoman in my private discord server and three wildly unfinished fics in my google docs folder - - one of these fics is Something Like a Bible, which is essentially a condensed version of the entire broader project, boiled down to bare plot and occasional commentary. Like a series outline and a plot synopsis rolled into one, though perhaps not quite the series bible it claims to be. - - - honestly I REALLY aughtta work on this one some more, just so I can get most of the Big Ideas out of my head and share them with people. - - the other two fics are currently untitled snippets of scenes from the project, one a sentimental/instructional note from Eda to Luz, and the other sort of a ragefic twist on the ending of Thanks to Them. - this project is gonna include tons of ideas from and allusions to other fics which inspired it/me, such as The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled by IdeaHunter, All that's at Stake by The_Lampman, and Decorative by TheTokenAro, to name a few. - I could make a whole post about this project on its own (and in fact, I have before), talking about all the little changes I'd make, the developments I'd include, the more sweeping changes, the additional themes I'd toss in, and so on, but there are some I REALLY don't think fit well into the "rambling tumblr post" format (and/or just don't want to spoil yet), so I shall Abstain (for now :P).

[emmy-everafter]

will you post anything from the crow coven au?

I'm not sure if you're asking if I'm going to be posting a new fic sometime soon or asking me to post a snippet now. (I'm also not sure how old this ask is, so sorry if this is late getting back to you!)

I do have maybe like... 1200 words or so? Towards a fluffy Wesper first kiss one-shot that takes place a few weeks after the events of We're Gonna Need a Bigger Pentagram. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to write a lot lately due to personal life events (defending my dissertation, graduating, getting a last-minute job offer, moving to a different state, etc. etc.). Even though it's mostly good things happening (for once! Thank you universe!), it's been the craziest few weeks of my entire life, and some of the hardest few months before that. So the long-term answer is yes, absolutely, but the short-term answer is that it will have to wait.

I can, however, share a snippet of the Wesper one-shot, although I haven't really edited it as much as I normally would, so there will probably been some revisions before it gets to the final version. (I'm very picky about how my sentences sound, so I usually do several passes of edits before I'm satisfied.)

So, here is a moment from the fic, which takes place in the greenhouse behind Crow House where Wylan has taken Jes up on his offer to use an empty flower bed for his midterm chemistry project.

He wasn’t sure if things had changed because he knew the truth or because the coven bond between them made him more attuned to his housemates’ powers, but either way, Jesper could feel the magic in Wylan’s voice now, like an ocean current pulling everything in the greenhouse towards the source of the lovely music.

Everything… including the cells of the seeds that Wylan was burying in each planter under his various fertilizers. Jesper could feel how the internal makeup of the seeds shifted in response to the faint humming, changing, beginning to germinate faster than their natural growth pattern.

He paused, setting aside the watering can. “Uh, Wylan?”

“Hmm?” Wylan glanced up, halfway through pouring the next bag of fertilizer into a fresh planter.

“Your project is an experiment, right?”

Wylan nodded and gestured to his growing pile of empty plastic bags. “I’m testing out variations on a popular fertilizer compound to see which one works best.”

“Yeah, about that…” Jesper clicked his tongue. “I think your humming there is messing with your scientific method.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that if you keep humming like that, you’re going to have to include a step in your lab report about letting a siren sing to the plants to help them grow.”

Anyway, fingers crossed that once I get settled into my new place and my new job this fall, I'll have the time and energy to finish this, but in the meantime, hope you like the preview!!

[beardedhandstoadshark]

Thanks to brainrot and remembering this post of mine, I got some more things that could happen regarding the battle subway in a potential Gen 5 remake

1) Apparently in the postgame of Gen 5.2 you can fight N whenever you feel like it for rematches. This but make it Emmet in front of a closed subway entrance. He has two possible teams to fight you with.

1.5. aka a variation of point 1 that doesn’t necessarily fit but seems fun) There are no double battles. But if there are, his team is always made up of three Pokémon from each single team, and when defeated he‘ll say this was the first one he fought in quite a while. Chandelure will always be part of the team.

1.5.2): He doesn’t even vaguely reference his brother. Nothing at all. If you didn’t play either the originals or PLA, you wouldn’t have ever known he was once one half of a now broken set, the only trace left being that his pose sometimes just feels incomplete.

2) The subway was not replaced by another facility like the battle tower was replaced by the maison, but instead renovated to be even bigger and better! And now it’s finally open just in time for post-game for the first time since the people in charge changed!

2.5) everything is the same but 1) does not simultaneously happen here.

3) The Subway is closed for renovations during main-game, but in post-game there’s a new NPC you can talk to who‘s investigating something but lacks any leads. Through another NPC, you find out that it‘s not being renovated, but actually closed for investigation regarding weird occurrences that were first seen in Alola but have now since spread. Now if you go back to the first one, he joins you to discover more. At the beginning, all lines are closed, maybe due to a power outage, but the further you get in this little sidequest, fixing the different issues with the subway system, the more lines become available once again. Each time you advance, you find out some more about your partner. As it turns out, he‘s not actually interested in the happenings themselves, but is instead searching for someone he was separated from and can’t find again, a man who looks exactly like him yet couldn’t be more different.

3.5) Depending on the version of the game, the NPC‘s coat and hat color is a different one, mirroring the color of the other edition.

He never said it was the other person that vanished first.

Bonus 3.5.2) the happy but maybe slightly crack ending idk this is Pokémon what even counts as crack here:

at the end of the quest a portal/ ultra wormhole (depending on if Ultra Beasts are ever gonna be a thing again) opens on the tracks and we go all aboard a train to go through it full speed ahead, like in Gen ultra 7 but instead of riding a legendary Pokémon by titling the console it’s subway surfers. (Which I didn’t notice was a horrible pun until I wrote it).

There we come across Arceus/Giratina/a new Ultra Beast/any other legendary Pokémon, as well as the missing bro in question just being there for some reason, and we get to defeat and/or catch it (maybe while the finally reunited bros make it happen Gamefreak please hold off some random team grunts or someone else who decided to crash the party by double battling. After the battle the twins are officially reunited, Ingo finally remembers Emmet’s name, and we find out the brother in question was in this place because Ingo was waiting for his back to the future-train to arrive/Emmet decided he wants to fight god.

(If it’s the version with Emmet being in this dimension, Ingo already got back the same way the PLA player did. Or maybe he just fell though another random portal. Or one of the games is a different reality with Warden Emmet instead of Ingo. All the games are separated into multiple timelines/realities for each game of a Gen anyways, who says this can’t be the case for PLA just because we only got one. Listen I just really like the thought of this wth moment that would happen if we saw that Ingo just randomly chills in Unova when he‘s the one that vanished?? And Emmet should be here? But he‘s not??? What’s going on?? And also parallels to the colors of the games! You can’t just have two separated twins that are mirrors of each other in the colors of the games with their main Pokémon’s types matching the Legendaries with the same theme, and have one pair switch but not the other.)

Anyways they ask for a double match with the player, we defeat them, everyone goes home and after this the Battle Subway fully opens and functions like it always had, yay for everyone because if Gamefreak doesn’t give them a happy ending I will.

[cocochannel00]

Story time: How Fan Pages Directly Impact Columbia Records Decisions and Harry Styles Image

Ok I was waiting to see if I would need to sign an NDA after the session way back in June but I haven’t so here’s what I’m going to spill for all the people that don’t think record labels keep up with fan pages:

I was at a zoom event with the Vp of Digital Marketing for Columbia Records (he label Harry is signed too) and the guy on the call (John Vincent Salcedo) talked a lot about the Eroda campaign.

The campaign wasn’t initially supposed to be that big (and was supposed to be a secret much longer) but it was the fans that figured out all of these crazy connections because of their errors. The fans found the connections in accounts and all of these “Easter eggs” that weren’t even Easter eggs but they gained so much attention online that Columbia rolled with it decided to blow it up.

That entire campaign was literally driven by Instagram accounts and Twitter and tumble finding bizarre connections to Harry from the code of the website to the post cards share through Google drive (big stupid mistake there).

They are literally watching everything to see what’s trending, what do fans want, what are they able to give us (what are they able to get Harry onboard with). So while sure Harry might have been given the credit about wanting to make the Eroda island, almost everything else done by th digital marketing team at Columbia was driven by fans. (Keep in mind there’s only so much they can watch so it’s usually just keeping an eye on hashtags and look at the bigger fan accounts and what’s going on in their comments section etc)

They also talked about how each artist on the label handle their social media differently. Some artists choose to be completely in control of what gets posted, what they post, what they like, and comment on (think Miley cyrus). While others have their digital team take control of their accounts when it comes to posting, liking, following etc and then there’s some that do a combination of both (they and the digital team have control together). Regardless of what they choose all artists have it in their contract that their required to promote their tours and music (think of why all of Harry’s posts since going solo have only really been about promoting himself).

If you don’t think the publicity team keeps with fans you’d also be wrong. Mike Navarra who is the VP of Publicity at Columbia follows 4 different Harry update accounts on Instagram (who the heck needs four of the same content as a VP).

His PR team is always watching what’s online and fans reactions so don’t think that they don’t have ways of getting things taken down and covered up.

Every aspect of Harry and celebrities that we see is because their publicist and publicity teams want you to see it. Every “candid” photo, every pap walk, it’s all perfectly staged and set to create and perfect their image. It’s not all necessary fake, but structured. Sure some fan photos are inevitably going to leak here and there but the media training he’s gone through since One Direction makes it so you’ll never see him lash out at anyone like other celebrities because he knows how to hide his anger (and if he did lash out at a pap or someone his team would quickly shut it down and you would never know).

Everyone has their own version of Harry in their head and that’s ok! But some times it’s good to remember that Harry Styles that “we know” or think we know is ultimately Harry Style the brand, not the person. The Harry that gets portrayed to us is only shown through tailored videos and interviews where questions have been banned/excluded or through rare social media postings used to promote merchandise and tour or an album. No one knows who he is so we shouldn’t act like we do (but that doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be held accountable for his actions from time to time). Harry most likely is a pretty decent and genuine guy but what we see as fans and what happens when no ones around is a different story (just like everyone). Just because he uses good marketing strategies and promotion tactics to sell his music, doesn’t make him a bad person.

Ultimately what I’m getting at is that Harry Styles is a business and a business needs to do well so him and his team will do whatever they need to do to get him to the Beyoncé level of success that he wants where he could drop an album with no warning and have it go double platinum in less then an hour. His entire Fine Line album was held together by his dedicated fans pushing it to the general public. Without them, there’s no way he would have been Grammy nominated (aside from in Azoff connection which we can get into another time) and he would have had a decent release much like his first solo album (nothing to this scale). I’m not saying this to discredit his hard work on the album but the pop genre is very vast and for a song like watermelon sugar to become so big (don’t hate me for dising the song I’m just soooo over it) you need to acknowledge all of the other factors everyone happily choose to ignore so they can put an artist on a pedestal.

*disclaimer this has nothing to do with larrie (I know some weirdo is gonna be that guy) and if you’re a larrie please leave as I can’t help you*

*ok second disclaimer cause some people are getting aggressive: I’m not saying everything an artist does is based on what their fans want. I’m saying that the music industry as a whole is based on trends. It’s the reason tik tok and tik tok songs have been able to reach such popularity sometimes from nothing. There’s a lot of factors involved in marketing and promoting an artist/their brand and keeping fans engaged (especially large fan bases) is important for artists long term success (I’m mean look at Olivia Rodrigo now, her team looked at what people like from drivers license aka teenage angst and made sure to market that as part of her look for her album). This is how all record labels work, they try and show the best version of the artist/talent. And yes for those out there, there are some celebrities that are nice a genuine but they’re also human so take them off the pedestal and treat them like what they are, human.

Here’s the proof of the event since people be annoying :

[blueeyedgeorgie]

Cancelled-Dream Was Taken

A/N: Surprise bitch. Weren’t we expecting for me to release mcyt fanfics soon? If I didn’t tag my usual @‘s it’s because idk if you’d like to be tagged for mcyt content.

Pronouns: she/her

Word Count: 2.3k+

_________________

"You're so harsh on him!" Her hands sat on the keyboard, staring at the green human that stood on Y/n's computer screen.

She needed to be careful. While this was a heated moment, she couldn't let herself get too loud for multiple reasons. If she got too loud, Dream's stream viewers would be able to tell she was in the next room or they would just receive noise complaints from their neighbors.

"No Y/n! You're too soft on him! He needs to learn that he can't get away with everything. You're setting him up for failure." As the h/c girl listened to her roommate speak, she had to remind herself over and over again; 'This wasn't real.' Dream was mad, not Clay.

This had all been arranged as roleplay. Y/n would be leaving in a few days to go visit some of her family for a reunion, so Wilbur had been the one to think up the brilliant idea of what was playing out now; an argument between Y/n and Dream. The plan was to have Y/n get so upset she didn't log onto the SMP for the next few days, only to come back with a master plan to backstab Dream.

At first, Clay wasn't really on board with the thought of him getting angry at Y/n. They had been together for a little over a year, there wasn't a single moment they had gotten upset with one another. But surprisingly, Y/n had been the one to convince Clay it was a good idea.

The fans knew Dream and Y/n had a close friendship, Dream had always been so protective of her. But when this was going down, they didn't know how to act.

Every time Y/n would glance at her chat, she'd see thousands of comments rising up as new ones appeared. Comment after comment, it looked like the fans were shocked by the way this stream was turning out.

"I'm not setting him up for anything! He's a kid, Dream!" Y/n glanced from the chat,  back at the screen showing her PC game. Standing on her screen was Dream and Tommyinnit, she had accompanied Dream to visit Tommy.

"You're just babying him! 'He's a kid!' Well, he needs to learn to grow up eventually," his voice had been filled with such spite. It felt weird to hear Clay speaking to her like this in such a tone.

For a moment, she stared at the green man before a short scoff escaped her lips. "I can't believe you." With that, Y/n had pressed a few keys, turning her character towards the nether portal a couple of yards away. Before Dream had gotten the chance to speak again, Y/n began to move away.

"Y/n! Come back here!"

She flicked a few buttons, taking a moment to look behind her character to see Dream following. Good, everything was going according to plan. Within the next few minutes, she'd be able to log off and she'd be on vacation for the next few days.

The h/c girl ignored the green man as she stepped through the portal, taking her to Minecraft's version of hell. Almost done, she just needed to find a good spot to stop as she listened to Dream continue to speak.

"You can't keep ignoring me! You know I'm right in this. You know you can't keep defending Tommy. You know Tommy is driving a wedge between us-"

Perfect. Y/n had stopped just on the edge of a bridge, molten lava sat feet below them. If she fell, she'd surely die. "No."

"No?" Dream was a bit surprised to hear Y/n cut him off, but he stayed silent as he was prepared to listen to what she had to say.

"No. No more. I don't wanna hear you blame Tommy for us breaking apart. I want you to listen to me. You've been acting like much more of a dick than usual and I hate it. I despise it. You've changed for the worst because you think you can step on everyone. At this point, everyone fears to tell you the truth-except me. I'll be a hundred percent honest with you, you've been so egotistical, it's really pissed me off. This is your fault, Dream. Not Tommy's. You exiled a child for pulling a prank on a vacation house! Not even George's real house!"

"But-"

"Shut the fuck up. I'm done, but I don't wanna hear you bullshit me. So shut the fuck up."

A moment of silence passed between them as Y/n stared at her screen. Just a few more steps.

And within seconds, Dream had pulled out his netherite sword. With one hit, she was falling back into lava. Y/n glanced at her chat, a look of shock on her face as she read over what a few comments said. A moment of silent tension had passed before Y/n had finally spoken up, removing her from the voice chat she was in.

"Alright guys, I guess that's enough for the day. I'll see you all... later." With that, she had clicked a few buttons, raiding Dream's live-stream as she ended hers.

For the next 20 to 30 minutes, Y/n knew Clay would be busy streaming. So she had decided to take a bit of time to wind down and think to herself.

Get a glass of water.

'Are the fans harassing him in his twitch chat?'

Sit down on the living room couch.

'The SMP fans were always so protective of me.'

Pet Patches.

'Was I too much when I snapped at him?'

It didn't seem like 30 minutes had passed when Clay had walked out of his streaming room, only to find Y/n on the couch with Patches in her lap. "Hey, N/n." "Oh, your stream is already over?" Y/n smiled, pulling herself out of her thoughts as she scoot over, giving Clay room to take a seat right by her.

"Yeah, did you lose track of time or something?"

"I must've. How did the chat react after I 'died'?" She smiled up at her boyfriend as he wrapped an arm over her shoulders, pulling her closer into his embrace.

"Everyone was filled with joy that you died."-Y/n playfully swatted at him. "Okay, okay! I got a few chat messages of people bashing me for it, but it's fine."

"Well, it's a good thing the chat wasn't completely littered with hate. How was it after my raid?"

"Honestly, not that bad as you expect. Like I said, just a few comments. Nothing bad, I just ignored it." Clay placed a hand on Patches's head, gently scratching her, followed by the animal beginning to purr.

"Good to hear, anyways... I'm not ready to pack. Do you think we can procrastinate?" The h/c girl let out a huff leaning against her boyfriend. "How?"

"I was thinking a bit of movie binging, cuddling, and ordering dinner?" A cheeky smile spread on her face as she spoke.

"It's like you read my mind."

The couple had made it through three movies, by now it was later at night. The sun had set and they had already door dashed some food. By now they were in the middle of watching 'The Empire Strikes Back.'

'I love you.' 'I know.'

The iconic moment between Hans and Leia had been interrupted by the sound of Clay's phone buzzing. "Why is George calling?"

"What?" Y/n was a bit curious herself. Considering the timezones, George should be asleep right now. Pausing the TV, she turned her attention to her boyfriend's phone.

"Hey Clay."

"What's up, George? Isn't it like early in the morning for you?" Clay raised a brow, moving his phone so Y/n would be able to see George as well.

"Yeah, I had to stay up to fix a YouTube video I need to get out today. I was about to go to bed and I checked Twitter-"

"Oh no." Clay made a short joke, only to be cut off by his friend.

"I don't know if it's trending for you in America, but you might as well look."

"What's going on?" He swiped up, taking him to his home screen so he could click on the little blue bird app. Y/n had grabbed her phone from the coffee table, opening up the app as well. "#Cancel Dream... #Y/n... #Dream SMP"

"Is... is Clay getting canceled for killing me in Minecraft?" Y/n scrolled through the tweets involving the hashtag 'Y/n.' She could see plenty of people defending her, but making it much bigger of a problem than it actually was.

"Oh, hey Y/n. But yeah, he is." George chuckled awkwardly, scrolling through his Twitter app as well.

"This is so fucking stupid."

"It really is. So we might as well get this cleared up with the fans as soon as possible. Do you want me to tweet something, or do you want to?" Y/n looked up at her boyfriend, it looked like he was thinking.

"Yeah, I'll tweet it. Don't worry about this, Y/n."

"Alright, whatever you say," she replied, pulling a blanket over her as she waited for Clay to finish typing his response.

"Here's what I'm gonna say: 'I can't believe you guys actually think me and @(y/n) are in an actual fight in real life. We have been good friends since forever, the fight was only roleplay. I love that you guys are so protective of Y/n, but no one's actually upset.' How's that sound?"

"I think that's good," George hummed softly.

"Yeah, I doubt you'll stay 'canceled' once you've explained to them it was all part of the SMP lore." The h/c girl smiled up at her boyfriend with a small nod.

"Alright, I'm gonna post it. George, I think you should go to bed because you're half asleep already."

Y/n turned, looking at her boyfriend's iPhone. "Go to sleep, Gogy!"

"Alright, alright... I'll talk to you guys later." The call had ended with Clay and Y/n saying goodbye to their friend while George simply yawned to them as a response.

As soon as the call was over, Clay looked at the response to his tweet. It didn't seem to be going too well. There had been a few fans who understood what was going on and responded with a paragraph as an apology for the misunderstanding. But most replies had been telling Clay he was bullshitting the fans or that he wasn't being honest.

"I'm sorry, Clay," his girlfriend had huffed as she read through the responses to his tweet.

"Honestly I'm just a bit pissed off. Literally, any time someone tries to 'cancel' me, it's over something stupid. I'm not a bad guy, it just feels like some people just don't want to see me succeed." Clay had excused himself to grab a glass of water from the kitchen.

It hurt Y/n to hear how upset her boyfriend was. He never got too upset over things, but seemed to take a small toll on him. "Hold on. Let me say something." The h/c girl couldn't be asked to post multiple tweets of her response to hate sent towards Clay over the internet. So what was better than a short video that could be posted to the blue bird app?

"Um, hey guys. I'd just like to make this quick. Stop sending hate towards Dream. The fight was roleplay and nothing more. I'm gonna be busy for the next couple of days so Wilbur thought of a good idea to help build SMP lore with me and Dream and we both agreed to the argument. Now stop sending the green man hate, or I'll commit war crimes or something-"

Y/n had been interrupted by the sound of Clay letting out a small giggle. "What? What did I say?"

"Nothing, just keep going with your video."

"Whatever, I'm cool. No matter what Dream says. Anyways, I'll speak to you all later." Y/n had hit the red button again, ending her video. Within seconds, the video had been uploaded to her Twitter account.

Placing her phone back down on the table, Y/n approached her boyfriend, wrapping her arms around his torso. "I'm really sorry about the hate, Clay. I love you."

"Don't apologize for something you can't control. I love you more." The brunette held his partner close, accepting her hug. Y/n always loved his hugs, she always felt so safe in his embrace.

The rest of the night had been spent with more cuddling and more Star Wars movies. Hours had passed before Y/n had even thought about the Twitter situation again. But for some reason, she had decided to look at the app again tonight.

It was 2 in the morning by now, Clay was half asleep. His head laid in the h/c girl's lap as she brushed a hand through his hair, her free hand opening up her Twitter app once again.

It had been a bit of a surprise to see a couple of trending hashtags had changed so quickly. What was trending now was #Dream, #Y/n,#(ship name), and #Dream's Laugh. This had to be about Y/n's short clip she posted. And by the looks of it, people had stopped acting so harsh towards Clay. But instead, they had decided to focus on the fact Dream and Y/n were hanging out together. Not to mention the fact Dream and let out a stupid little giggle because of Y/n. People had been apologizing to him through Twitter for being so hard on him.

"Babe."

"Hm?" Clay mumbled, not bothering to open his eyes.

"Pretty much everyone is apologizing to you over Twitter for being hardasses."

"Hm, that's good to hear."

"You're really tired, huh?" Y/n paused her scrolling to look down at her boyfriend.

"Yeah," He continued to mumble, followed by a short yawn.

"Alright, time for bed, babe." Y/n smiled to herself, beginning to carefully move away from Clay. "I can pack tomorrow and we can laugh over the stupid bird app tomorrow after you've gotten a good amount of sleep."

"I still can't believe Twitter tried canceling me over roleplay."

"I can't believe you got uncancelled by shippers."

Taglist: @notphilosopherstudentblog

[deniigi]

Please take this section from a piece about Baby Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon bonding post Bandomeer.

I’m sure that this isn’t how their master-apprentice relationship was formed but I refuse to read so this is it for me 🙃🙂

Title: platelets

Summary: After the smoke clears on Bandomeer, the Agricorps gathers 12yo Obi-Wan into their ranks and prepares to train him to become one of their own. Qui-Gon thinks they should wait a damn minute here. He’s had a change of heart.

---

Obi-Wan was no longer in the med bay. It took Qui-Gon two hours to find him and two years off his life trying to look casual under the irritated gaze of so many suspicious Agricorps members.

The foreman (forewoman) was the first to crack under Qui-Gon’s very charming smile—and she didn’t so much as crack as tell him that his attempts to be subtle disgusted her to the core.

Obi-Wan had been given over to a young lab manager. A friendly man in need of his first supervisee. He was soft at heart and, according to the foreman, very good with kids.

Qui-Gon understood implicitly and rapidly that this was his new competitor.

He asked the foreman what the knights had done to incur the corps’ ire and she told him to search his fucking feelings.

She closed the door behind him, effectively locking him into one of the Agricorps terrarium-lab bubbles.

 --

Qui didn’t like to snoop. He loved to snoop.

Nothing was more satisfying then having a poke through the lines upon lines of glasses and test pockets that covered the tables. He had a sniff around the experimental cuttings taking root in their glasses and then took cover when he heard a voice break out into a laugh.

He peered over the edge of the counter and spotted the familiar green smock-tunic of the corps. Its owner had tan skin and narrow eyes and his back stooped into an arc. Qui-Gon craned his neck and found that the arc came over the tuft-y red hair of his future apprentice (because there was no real question here, regardless of the corps’ agitation; the knights would always get first choice over the initiates).

The lab manager, however, gave no sign of trepidation. He held in front of Obi-Wan a handful of seeds that sprouted and curled under his smile. Obi-Wan watched them with wide eyes. The manager turned his gentle face down towards Obi-Wan and nudged his hands until Obi-Wan was holding the mass as it grew.

“Look, you’re a natural,” the man said.

Obi-Wan sucked in a lip and focused hard. One of the plants’ first adult leaves began to unfurl.

“Well done. Fantastic,” the manager said. “Look at you already. Great job and for that, a reward.”

“A reward?” Obi-Wan asked, handing the tangle of roots off as the manager held out his hands for them.

“A reward,” the manager agreed, plucking one of the fat stems from the bunch and holding it out to Obi-Wan, “A snack.”

Damn. This guy was good.

 --

 The foreman was smug as a dungbeetle in shit when Qui-Gon skulked out of the lab. She asked him how his proposal had gone. He scowled at her and made off back to his quarters.

Normally, he would call someone to lament the traitorous actions of these supposed-allies, but no one was going to be sympathetic right now—not even Tahl. She was going to say what everyone else was going to say which was “Man, you had how many chances to get this right?”

He smashed his face into the pillow of his bunk, then flung it off and flattened his cheek against the mattress.

There had to be some way to turn these tides back in his favor. He wasn’t losing to the Agricorps. Master Dooku would have a heart attack. Qui’s failure in this—more than Xanatos—would kill him and then he’d have to live with that guilt for the rest of his life.

UGH.

Alright, Jinn. Think.

 --

 He had a brilliant plan. It involved a lightsaber. Obi-Wan loved lightsabers. Qui-Gon had witnessed him loving them many a time.

He scrounged up some tools and squeaked past the Agricorps security for a quick bounce off to acquire a crystal. A blue one. Obi-Wan looked like a blue saber sort of kid. It took a while to find one because everyone, everywhere, was conspiring against Qui-Gon on this. Even the Force seemed to be telling him that he was too late.

But for once, he didn’t care. There were only so many times you could fuck up before you started fucking up at least in the right direction.

He got the crystal. He brought it back to the corps headquarters and went on the hunt yet again for his (his damnit) future apprentice.

  This time, Obi-Wan was in the dormitories. Qui-Gon almost gasped in horror to find him outfitted in an over-large green smock-tunic. He flapped the too-long sleeves with a goofy smile while his lab manager reached around him and tightened the belt at his waist as far as it would go.

“You’re so scrawny,” the lab manager told him. “We’ll fix that.”

Obi-Wan beamed up at him and held up his sleeve-covered hands.

“I like green,” he said.

A small piece of Qui-Gon screamed internally.

“I think you’re more of a blue, actually,” the lab manager said. “But this is what we’ve got for now. When you get bigger, we can see if there’s a blue that fits you.”

“There are so many colors,” Obi-Wan said as the manager trapped his arm and started rolling up one of the sleeves. He tried to do the same with the other on his own, which just made the manager’s job harder.

“There are,” the manager said.

“Do you get to pick?”

“You sure do.”

“How do you pick?”

The manager patted Obi-Wan’s head and turned around to hunt down something else from the spare clothing supply.

“It comes to you,” he said, muffled.

There was a long silence. Qui-Gon had just decided to step out of hiding, when Obi-Wan, looking at the rolled edges of his sleeves said,

“I think I want to leave.”

Qui-Gon’s heart stopped. The manager’s rummaging did, too. He pulled himself carefully out of the cupboard.

“Leave?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Obi-Wan said to his sleeves. “I think I want to leave.”

No.

“You’re a little young to leave, aren’t you?” the manager said awkwardly.

“Maybe,” Obi-Wan said. “But I’ll figure it out. If I can survive those people in the mines, then I can figure it out, can’t I? And then I can pick my colors out there. You get to pick, right? Maybe I’ll do blue after all.”

Fuck. No. Qui-Gon was gonna—

“Hey, why don’t we do this?” the manager said, setting aside a set of gaiters to kneel down in front of Obi-Wan. “Let’s give us a trial run, huh? Two months, max. I know we didn’t make the best first impression, but give us two months—eight weeks—and after that, if you don’t like it, we’ll make sure you’ve got somewhere to go when you’re ready to leave. Does that sound okay?”

Qui-Gon held his breath. Obi-Wan studied the knuckles of the hands holding his. He rubbed his split lips together.

“Eight weeks?” he asked.

“That’s all, no more and if you really, really can’t stand it, then even less,” the manager said.

“And you’ll help me? Even if I say I don’t want to stay?”

“Even if you don’t want to stay.”

Maybe Qui was operating on another, less child-friendly level here, but why in kark’s name you’d even give the boy the illusion of choice was beyond him. The answer was, truly, that the second Obi-Wan set foot away from the jedi, he’d be signing his own death sentence.

Xanatos wouldn’t care if he wasn’t Qui-Gon’s true apprentice. He wouldn’t ask those kinds of questions. He’d just seize the opportunity the moment Obi-Wan no longer had someone standing behind him, and when he was through, he’d bring the body to the Temple and lay it out cold and open-eyed on the front steps.

There were no other options for the child now. Qui-Gon was being kind with this process of trust-building. In reality, if he really needed to, he could contact Yoda and acquiesce to his previous wisdom and arguments for Qui-Gon to take the kid on. Yoda would then change the boy’s assignment and orders; he would return to the temple and thereafter again go through the selection process. But this time, Qui-Gon would select him without hesitation.

That wasn’t how Qui-Gon wanted to do this, but if the boy thought that he was going to leave, to step out into the cold of space, then to spare him a cruel, meaningless death, Qui-Gon would.

“Thank you,” Obi-Wan said quietly to the manager.

“Anytime, hon,” the manager said. “Who knows, anyways. You might even like it here.”

 --

  The trouble with the damn Agricorps was that they were phenomenal talkers. They talked to people about their problems and all these insecurities and they gave them food and drinks and told jokes and laughed and hefted their littlest supervisees up onto their shoulders and all that served to make their members loyal to each other to a fault.

In short, Obi-Wan’s lab manager was winning this battle more every day.

This was not helped at all by the fact that Qui-Gon had discovered through a surprise meeting that Obi-Wan was afraid of him.

They’d bumped into each other in the hallway as Obi-Wan came from the mess hall and Qui-Gon went to drop off some documents, and the kid scrambled away from him and flattened himself against the corridor’s wall.

Some serious meditation (and agitating Mace, great tower of sleep-deprived wisdom) had brought Qui-Gon to the conclusion that yeah, a month in forced labor, being banished to a mine, food deprivation, physical assault, and so on really did a number on a twelve-year-old’s trust in people and their associates.

Further, Mace pointed out that Qui-Gon was approximately ‘half a mile tall and covered in overgrowth.’

He did not appear to be a soothing presence to children. Mace said that if he’d deigned to join him and the other masters in chatting and cuddling the younglings in the crèche, this wouldn’t have been a problem, but alas, Qui, you stuck-up nerfherder. You reap what you sow.

Mace’s hind and foresight was, as per usual, invaluable.

Qui-Gon decided that he was going to be the nice version of himself. He was going to smile at Obi-Wan. That would do it.

 --

 It didn’t do it.

The foreman came to Qui-Gon’s quarters to gleefully tell him not to approach the corps’ young supervisees unprompted. He was giving the children hives.

He explained to her outright that he intended to take Obi-Wan on as his apprentice.

She told him good luck. Obi-Wan, she claimed, was already settling in with the others. He was making friends. And Qui-Gon wasn’t so cruel as to separate such a traumatized boy from such comfort, now was he?

But there, she was mistaken.

He definitely was that cruel.

The foreman told him to die miserable and slammed his door.

 --

 It took another two tries, but eventually, he managed to find Obi-Wan tucked away on one of his breaks from his training in the lab. He appeared to be at a loss for what to do with himself. He’d settled against a window and had splayed both hands on it as he stared out into the cracked soil of Bandomeer.

Qui-Gon watched him for a little while and then cleared his throat.

Obi-Wan jumped. His eyes came up for the briefest second and then his head went down.

“Master,” he greeted.

“Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon replied. “You seem bored.”

Guilt colored the boy’s cheeks in a flush.

“I’m not bored, Master,” he said, fidgeting with his rolled sleeves.

“May I sit?” Qui-Gon asked, gesturing next to where Obi-Wan knelt. He nodded and arranged himself in a more dignified posture. Qui-Gon let him; he sat down next to him, grumbling and creaking and popping.

His bones weren’t what they used to be.

Once he was finally more or less comfortable, he turned to notice Obi-Wan staring at him with eyes like a cat’s.

“What? You never seen an old man sit?” he asked.

“What happened to your hair?” Obi-Wan asked.

Oh.

“It’s in a bun,” Qui-Gon explained, reaching up to release the mane. It tumbled down over his shoulders and cheered for fresh air.

Obi-Wan’s gaze became even more cat-like. Qui-Gon fought off a smirk.

“You want to touch it?” he asked.

The kid looked away abruptly.

“It’s okay. You can touch it,” Qui told him. “It looks better than it feels, I must say. Needs a trim—look at these ends, little one. I ought to be arrested for crimes against decency.”

Aha. Gotcha. Look at that wobble in those lips. Trying not to smile. They’d see how long that worked, now wouldn’t they?

He badgered Obi-Wan until he finally broke and reached up to brush his fingers against the hair Qui-Gon put within his reach. His attention snapped into place.

“It’s soft,” he said, amazed.

His fingers started combing without permission. Qui-Gon let it happen.

“Very useful for cold climates—have you ever felt a snow-yak, Obi-Wan?” he asked.

The boy shook his head. Of course, he hadn’t.

“Do you know what they look like?”

Another shake.

“Well, perhaps one day, you will see them,” Qui-Gon said indulgently. “When I was a boy, my master told me not to try to pet them—he told me at every step of the way, he knew me well. But you know what I did?”

There was that smile now.

“You pet them?” Obi-Wan asked.

“I sure did,” Qui-Gon told him. “And you know that they did?”

“Kicked you?”

“Me? No. I was too small a target. They charged my master—Master Dooku; you may have heard of him.”

Obi-Wan shoved his giggles into his palms.

“I want to pet one,” he said.

“Yes, you do look like the type,” Qui-Gon said. “Tell me, Obi-Wan, what are your feelings on pathetic lifeforms?”

“What’s that?”

“You tell me. What’s a pathetic lifeform to you?”

Obi-Wan settled in and thought about it as he gazed out the window’s thick glass.

“Me,” he decided.

Bless him.

“You?” Qui-Gon said incredulously. “No, no. You saved a jedi master. I said ‘pathetic.’”

“Me,” Obi-Wan insisted again.

Qui-Gon held a finger out between them.

“If you are a pathetic life form, then I am in grave danger,” he said.

The giggle this time wasn’t hidden. It make Qui-Gon’s own grin grow.

“I was thinking a lothcat,” he admitted. “Or a dragon—love a dragon. Of course, the yak—perhaps not pathetic to my master, but to others yes. They’re not smart, Obi-Wan, poor things.”

“You like animals,” Obi-Wan said.

Qui-Gon weighed this statement with his head.

“’Animals’ isn’t quite broad enough, but yes, they fall into the category,” he said. “I’m also a big fan of rescuing the plants that no one can keep alive.”

Obi-Wan brought up his knees and wrapped his arms around them. He settled a soft cheek onto the top of the right one.

“That’s what I’ll be doing here,” he said.

“Indeed,” Qui-Gon said.

There was a long pause. The boy sniffed softly.

“You will be happy here,” Qui-Gon told him gently. “They will take care of you.”

Another sniff. An eye scrubbed with a too-long sleeve.

“I’m sorry I’m not good enough,” Obi-Wan whispered.

Well, this was a conversation Qui-Gon hadn’t wanted to walk into. There were, from his vantage point, a few ways out of it, but at the end of each of those paths was a set of brown eyes framed by intense, wispy green brows.

“You are good enough,” Qui-Gon said. “I am just a foolish master. You deserve someone better than me, Obi-Wan.”

“There is no one else,” Obi-Wan said.

“There will be,” Qui-Gon said.

“No, there won’t. I’m out of time. All that’s left for me is...this,” Obi-Wan said, gesturing to the landscape beyond the window.

Qui-Gon studied it; the cracks in the soil, the piles of broken stones.

“It is a little bleak,” he admitted.

“What is it like for non-jedi people?” Obi-Wan asked. “Do they go to school? How do they find somewhere to sleep?”

“You will not be a non-jedi person,” Qui-Gon said.

There was a long pause.

“What?”

Qui-Gon sucked in a breath and let his shoulders fall.

“Unless you really want to be one,” he added. “Apologies, I spoke without thinking.”

Those blue eyes were the same color as the crystal in Qui-Gon’s pocket. He put his hand inside of it and pulled the carefully wrapped parcel out so that Obi-Wan could see it. He rolled it slowly until only the crystal sat in his palm.

“There is greatness in you, Obi-Wan,” he said. “And I am not a good enough Master, but you are more than a deserving padawan.”

The eyes flicked from the crystal to Qui-Gon’s face once, then twice.

“Do you mean it?” Obi-Wan asked.

“Are you okay with having a silly master?” Qui-Gon asked. “I will not sugar-coat it—one of my students has already fallen. I am the type of person who Master Windu has been dreaming of the unfortunate demise for since we were children.”

“Why?” Obi-Wan asked with eyes only for the crystal.

“Excellent question. I am told that my brain is fundamentally ill-suited for human interaction,” Qui-Gon said with a smile.

Obi-Wan huffed.

“Does Master Windu really dislike you so much?” he asked.

“He speaks to me in such ways only out of love. My other friends say that I am dedicated intensely to the flight of fancy.”

“I don’t know what that means,” Obi-Wan said.

“You know, funny thing,” Qui-Gon told him, reaching over to take his hand and press the crystal into it, “Neither do I.”

[deancasheadcanons]

Slightly Gayer

[ao3]

7.3k words post-15x18 domestic Dean/Cas (loosely) inspired by this artwork by skepticalfrog

Dean is sitting at the kitchen table drinking his coffee and halfheartedly scrolling through the news. He can’t focus because his eyes keep drifting over to the other side of the kitchen, where Cas is cooking breakfast and talking on the phone with Claire.

Cas looks different, is the thing. He’s wearing a pair of bright green boxer briefs and one of Dean’s old gray t-shirts, neither of which fit him right. Since becoming human, Cas exercises constantly, stacking his arms and legs with thickly corded muscle.

But he eats, too, and loves eating as much as Dean does, so his stomach juts out big and round from his muscular chest, several inches of tan underbelly visible out of the bottom of Dean’s shirt. The fabric is caught in the crease between his chest and belly, taut around the outline of his nipple rings. The sleeves are also too tight around his biceps, revealing the Enochian tattoos that extend from shoulder to elbow of each arm.

Dean knows what Cas looks like, of course he knows. He knows every inch of his perfect body. But the way Cas moves, Dean is still getting used to. Still studying.

Cas has the phone tucked between his shoulder and ear, his hands occupied with making pancakes and eggs. He has his weight shifted to one hip, his butt sticking out even more than it already does, and he keeps waving the spatula around animatedly as he talks. He takes a drink of coffee, then scratches his belly, then gestures with his hand, flipping his wrist rather...limply.

He turns around to the kitchen island to plate the pancakes and catches Dean staring at him. He smiles and winks in his direction while continuing his conversation with Claire.

Dean tries to look back down at his phone. He makes it about five seconds before his eyes find their way over to Cas again. He takes a long drink of coffee and sets his mug down as he stands up. He strides over to Cas and comes at him from behind, wrapping his arms around his middle and burying his face in his soft neck. He kisses the tattoo that’s on the juncture of Cas’ collarbone and neck—Dean’s name in Enochian.

“I’ve gotta go, Claire,” Cas says, his voice as deep and gravelly as ever. “Tell Kaia I said hello. Yes. OK, bye.”

Dean squeezes Cas’ belly and presses long, slow kisses to his neck.

Cas turns the stove off and moves the eggs over to a different burner. His hands, now free, fold over top of Dean’s. He laces their fingers together.

“Claire said they’re thinking of coming by to visit in a few days,” Cas says, leaning his weight back against Dean.

“Mm. Good.” Dean continues his kisses.

Cas huffs a laugh and rubs his hand up and down Dean’s forearm. “Feeling affectionate this morning?”

“Always. C’mere.” He tugs at Cas to get him to turn around in his arms, then he fits his hands to his hips and presses his flat torso against Cas’ gut before leaning over and kissing him on the lips.

Cas puts a hand to the side of Dean’s face and the other on the counter behind him, supporting his weight against it. He moans into the kiss, pushing his tongue hungrily into Dean’s mouth and rolling his hips in an intoxicating rhythm.

They stop after a few minutes. Cas keeps his hand on Dean’s face, rubbing the pad of his thumb back and forth across his cheek as he smiles softly up at him.

“What?” Dean asks self-consciously. He circles his own thumbs into Cas’ love handles.

“Nothing,” Cas replies, his smile widening. “You’re just very beautiful.”

Dean ducks back in for another quick kiss. Then, “You move differently than you used to.”

Cas tilts his head to the side, furrows his brow. “What do you mean?”

“You’re, uh, I don’t know. Your mannerisms...you’re more feminine. Gayer.”

Cas laughs and drops his head forward. His hand falls away from Dean’s face, and he flips it out palm up. “Well, Dean, I am gay.”

Now Dean is laughing. He pulls Cas closer to him and once again pushes his face against his neck. “You were just so stiff before.” He pulls back again and looks Cas in the eye. “I don’t like thinking that you were, I don’t know, holding yourself back. Repressed.”

Cas barks out a laugh. “Yes, please, tell me more about how I was repressed.”

“Yeah, yeah, shut up.” He squeezes a soft hip. “I’m starving, let’s eat.”

They sit perpendicular to each other at the kitchen table. Cas rubs one socked foot up and down Dean’s calf while they eat.

“Do I move different?” Dean asks with a mouthful of eggs.

Cas frowns at him, mug of coffee in his hand. “Is that a trick question?”

“Oh god, I do, don’t I?”

“Well, first of all, Dean, your voice is an octave higher than it used to be.”

Dean blushes and shoves more food in his mouth, avoiding eye contact.

Cas leans his elbows on the table, closer to Dean. “And you carry yourself differently. You’ve always been confident in your body, but you don’t posture anymore. You carry yourself in a more relaxed way—like when we’re walking, and you keep one hand in your pocket and the other holding mine. You don’t puff your chest out so much, and it makes you look more natural.”

“Gayer?”

Cas laughs again. “Yes, Dean, I think when you, uh, rub my lower back and kiss my temple while we wait in line at the grocery store or something, you definitely look gayer than you did before.”

Dean reaches over and tangles their hands together, swinging them back and forth playfully on top of the table. “Can’t help it,” he says gently. “If you’re near me, I gotta touch.”

They smile shyly at each other. Cas eventually moves Dean’s hand up to his mouth and kisses his knuckles. “I’m not too gay for you, am I? My mannerisms don’t bother you?”

Dean rolls his eyes. “You’re fishing for a compliment.”

“So give me one.”

He scoots his chair closer to Cas’ and moves his hand under the table, spreading his fingers over one of Cas’ thick thighs and squeezing the soft muscle. “I’m fucking thrilled that you’re comfortable in your own skin, sweetheart. I love the new ways you move, and I love how you’ve made your body your own. I get distracted staring at you so much that I can’t even read one crap news article without looking at you.”

Cas takes a deep breath. A tear slips down his cheek, and he wipes it away delicately. “I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to hearing you say stuff like that to me. Not even in my most self-indulgent fantasies did I imagine...”

Dean laughs and tugs on Cas’ shirtsleeve, coaxing him over to him, patting his legs so Cas straddles his lap. Once they’re settled, Dean rubs soothing circles into Cas’ back fat and looks up at him reverently.

“I’ll always think you deserve better than me, but, uh,” Dean starts. “I guess if you want me instead of somebody better, then I gotta be the best version of myself. I’m sorry I wasn’t this me sooner.”

Cas presses their foreheads together. “You mean this gayer version?”

Dean laughs into a kiss. “Only took you confessing your love and dying for me to get my head out of my ass.”

Cas puts a finger to the tip of Dean’s nose. “No, actually, it took more than that. Seven months after I came back, Dean. It took you seven months.”

Dean winces. “Worth the wait?”

Cas sighs and kisses Dean’s cheek before climbing laboriously off his lap, grunting as his gut shifts. He pulls at the hem of his boxer briefs to get them down over his huge thighs; Dean pinches his butt as he walks away.

In the time it takes Cas to refill their coffee mugs, Dean’s phone rings.

“Hey, Sammy,” Dean answers.

“Hey, what are you doing?” Sam asks.

As Cas comes back and hands Dean a mug, sliding his arm gently across his shoulders before making his way to his seat, Dean says, “Having breakfast with the love of my life. What do you need?”

“Eileen and I are going on a hunt, gonna take a few days. Can we drop Jack by later today?”

“What? The kid can’t stay by himself in the bunker?”

Cas flattens his lips and raises his eyebrows, silently chastising Dean. Dean throws his hand up and shrugs.

“He’s 4, Dean,” Sam says.

“He’s as powerful as God, Sam.”

Jack’s voice comes through the phone, sounding far away. “I don’t like staying here by myself. It’s lonely.”

“Of course you can stay here, kid,” Dean says loudly enough for Jack to hear. To Sam, he says, “But make sure you stop by the store on your way and pick up some food for him, because Cas and I are on a diet.”

“Seriously?” Sam asks.

“No,” Dean scoffs. “C’mon, dude. I’m sure the kid’ll be thrilled to get some real food instead of whatever rabbit food crap you and Eileen feed him.”

Cas snorts a laugh and tucks back into his stack of pancakes, pouring more syrup over them before taking a bite. Dean watches him, obsessed with the dainty way he holds his fork.

“You know, it’s gonna catch up to you one day,” Sam says. “You’ll wake up and suddenly realize you look like Cas.”

“Mm,” Dean hums, eyes still glued to Cas. “You mean I’ll be hot as shit?”

Cas winks at him.

“Yeah, I walked right into that one,” Sam mutters. “See you this afternoon.”

“Bye, Sam.” He hangs up.

“I don’t know why you goad him into judging our eating habits,” Cas says. “He asks about my weight every time I lift with him.”

“What? I’ll kill him.”

“No, it’s—���

“Where’s my gun? I’m gonna kill him.”

“Dean,” Cas says, exasperated. “He only asks because he doesn’t see me every day. You’d notice I was getting bigger, too, if you only saw me every week or so.”

Dean pouts at him, offended. “I touch you and stare at you constantly every day, of course I fucking notice. You’re big, Cas. And you take good care of yourself. Sam can mind his own fucking business.”

“I don’t need you to defend my honor to your brother, you insane man.” Cas stands and picks up their plates to take them to the sink. “And you need to limit the number of ‘fucks’ you say when Jack gets here.”

“Jesus, when did you become such a nagging wife?”

Cas turns away from the sink, sets a hand on the shelf of his belly, and says in a deadpan, “When I became pregnant with our third child.”

It’s a joke he stole from Dean, but Dean still lets out an embarrassing laugh like it’s the first time he’s heard it. He then joins Cas in the kitchen, hugging him from behind again and sneaking a hand up under his shirt so he can cup one of his pecs, teasing his thumb over his piercing. He kisses the shell of his ear as he mumbles, “I’ll clean up in here. I know you wanna go work out.”

Cas shuffles around in his arms and kisses him languidly. Even though they’ve been together for months and have shared at least a thousand kisses, a thrilling warmth washes over Dean’s body every time Cas initiates.

“What?” Cas asks gently when they break apart.

Dean kisses him again, squeezes his sides. “I just love you so much.”

Cas fights his smile and fails. He runs a hand up through Dean’s hair, which Dean is growing out, because Cas likes to touch it. “I love you so much, too.”

“C’mere.” Dean pulls him into a hug, wrapping his arms around his back and holding him tight, nuzzling his face in his neck while Cas fists his hands in the back of Dean’s t-shirt. “Loved you for so long. Should’ve told you sooner.”

“Yeah, you should’ve.” Cas squeezes him. “I should’ve, too.”

Dean clears his throat as they break apart. “We’ve turned into the biggest fucking saps. Go, go lift your silly weights.” He shoos Cas out of the kitchen and smacks his butt as he goes. “And hey! Don’t forget to walk your sweaty body through here on your way to the shower.”

Over his shoulder, Cas says, “Of course. I would never deprive you of that, Dean.”

When Dean finishes cleaning the kitchen, he heads to the living room where they’ve set up a workspace to help hunters out. Sure, it would be easier to do the job from the bunker, but Dean and Cas wanted their own space, a homier environment for hunters to stop by and rest. They have a room for Jack, a room for Claire and Kaia, and two extra bedrooms for anybody else who shows up—although, one of the rooms is half-full of Cas’ exercise equipment.

Dean has his eye on a rundown bar down the road, too, but not enough time has passed since they committed crimes to get a loan for their house, so he has to wait before they can buy it.

While Dean is doing research for a case that Garth is working on, Jody calls.

“Yeah, go ahead,” Dean answers, putting her on speaker.

“I’m three hours from your place,” she says, sounding tired. “Can you guys take the kid again for just, like, one week? Please.”

“Yeah. Yeah, of course, Jody,” Dean replies, his posture straightening with excitement. “But you already knew that, because you’re already driving her over here.”

Jody laughs. “Yeah. Thanks, Dean. See you soon.”

Dean shoots a text to Sam: Raven’s gonna be here, too. ETA?

Sam texts back right away: Whenever we feel like it o’clock.

Bitch, Dean types.

Whore, Sam replies.

When Dean and Cas got together, they didn’t get the chance to tell Sam. They were on a hunt, and Sam was at the motel doing research while Dean and Cas ate dinner at a bar nearby. Cas was talking about the case and reached over and stole a fry off of Dean’s plate, and something about the gesture broke something inside of Dean. He blurted out, “I love you, too,” like a fucking idiot, causing Cas to nearly choke on the fry.

The truth was that Dean was in shock when Cas came back from the Empty, and he could not believe that this ancient unknowable being actually loved him. But then Cas was human, and ordinary, and he grew more comfortable around Dean as his body filled out. Easy warmth and affection radiated from him, like loving Dean was as natural to him as breathing.

And Dean knew that his own feelings couldn’t be buried anymore. They were clawing their way to the surface with each day that passed, until finally they burst free with an I love you, too over a stolen goddamn French fry.

They finished their meal quickly and quietly, then they walked out to the Impala together and Dean couldn’t wait a second longer than the nearly 13 years he’d already waited, so he pushed Cas up against the driver’s side door and kissed him.

“Oh,” Cas breathed between their mouths.

“What?” Dean mumbled.

“I didn’t—realize—when—”

Dean moved to kissing Cas’ softening jaw and neck so that his mouth was free to talk.

“I wasn’t sure you meant you loved me like this,” Cas explained.

Dean abruptly pulled away. “Oh. Uh, did you not—we don’t have to if you don’t want—”

Cas cut him off with a bruising kiss. “No, no, I definitely want.”

“Thank god.”

It had taken all of their willpower to get in the car and drive back to the motel, and Dean had barely put her in park before dragging Cas to the backseat and messily stripping clothes off. There wasn’t nearly enough space, so they ended up rutting against each other while making out like horny teenagers, and that’s when Sam knocked on the window.

Dean cracked it the smallest amount, his body still tangled with Cas. “We’re a little busy here, Sammy.”

“Yeah, uh, I’m gonna get another room so you guys don’t have to do...this...out here.”

“Sammy, you’re the best brother in the world,” Dean said stupidly as he and Cas struggled out of the backseat, holding their clothes half-on, shirts and overshirts and jackets in hand and jeans unbuttoned. Dean dragged Cas by the hand up to their room.

And so Sam (homophobically, in Dean’s opinion) started calling Dean “whore” instead of “jerk.”

Dean is typing on his laptop when Cas clears his throat from the hall. Dean looks up immediately, raking his eyes up and down Cas’ glistening, swollen body as he walks shirtless toward their bedroom.

“Hey, hey, hey, no, come back here,” Dean says, scrambling to get up, tripping over his own feet, then finally making it to Cas so he can squeeze his biceps and press kisses to his sweaty shoulder.

Dean moves his mouth down Cas’ collarbone and chest, hunching his body so he can get a better angle as he works his tongue around a nipple ring.

Cas cards a hand through Dean's hair. “Do you want to shower with me?” he asks patiently.

Dean reluctantly lets go of his nipple and straightens up. “Does a bear shit in the woods?”

Their shower is just big enough for both of them, but it’s too difficult to do much more than wash each other’s bodies. They talk loudly to each other over the spray, which is why neither of them hear the front door open and Sam and Eileen announce their arrival.

Dean walks out to the kitchen wearing a towel around his waist and one around his hair. Sam and Eileen are making sandwiches while Jack sits on a barstool at the island reading a book.

“Oh, hey, guys,” Dean says. He grabs a La Croix out of the fridge and takes a long drink. “Didn’t hear you come in.”

Cas comes in next, wearing just boxer briefs, his wet hair dripping water onto his body. He greets everyone then puts a hand on the small of Dean’s back and kisses his cheek. He takes the La Croix right out of his hand and drinks it before giving it back.

“Cas, are your nipples pierced?” Eileen asks, shocked.

“Oh, yeah,” Cas says flippantly. He pats the tattoo of Dean’s name on his shoulder. “Dean talked me into it when I got this.”

Dean mutters, “Not like you needed much convincing.”

“So are you guys gonna bother putting clothes on, or…?” Sam asks bitchily.

“Oh, I’m so sorry for existing in my own house,” Dean teases. He settles against Cas’ side; Cas wraps his arm around his hip. “Maybe if somebody had told us when they would be here, we could’ve been ready.”

“Yeah, well, we were anxious to get here,” Sam says, looking pointedly at Eileen. “We have some news.”

“Uh-oh, this sounds like something I should be wearing clothes for,” Dean says.

“I’m pregnant,” Eileen says and signs. She makes a face like she’s sorry about it.

Cas sucks in a sharp breath. Dean’s eyes widen.

“Yeah, uh.” Sam sighs and throws a hand up. “We’re not totally sure how we feel about it, you know, never really planned on…”

“We don’t want to stop hunting,” Eileen finishes for him. “But if there’s a good reason to stop, this is it.”

“We can help,” Dean says quickly. He nervously sets his water down on the counter so he can sign and talk. “You know we’re always willing to take care of a kid. Especially a baby.” He looks over at Jack. “No offense, Jack.”

“I told them I would help, too,” Jack says cheerfully. “I would love a little brother or sister. And I can heal most injuries other than death, so if they keep hunting while Eileen is pregnant, it’ll be OK.”

“We’ll be here every step of the way,” Cas adds. “Whatever you need.”

“Yeah,” Sam says solemnly. “We know it’ll be OK, we’re just...I don’t know, I’m just not naturally maternal like you, Dean.”

“Come here, Sammy,” Dean says, walking away from Cas and putting his hand up on Sam’s shoulder to bring him down for a hug. “You’re already a great dad. You’re not gonna fuck the kid up, I promise.”

Sam laughs and squeezes Dean once before letting go. He frowns down at Dean’s bare torso and says, “OK, go get some clothes on, please.” Under his breath, he mutters, “I don’t understand how you and Cas even fit in a shower together.”

“Hey.” Dean points a menacing finger at him. “If you don’t lay off my boyfriend, he’s gonna use his massively buff arms to kick your ass.”

“No, I’m not,” Cas says in a monotone, flipping his wrist to blow Dean off. He kisses Eileen on the cheek as he leaves the kitchen.

“What? I’m not—I don’t care what Cas looks like,” Sam says. He opens the fridge and gestures dramatically to it. “I just think it would be good every now and then if you guys ate, like, one vegetable.” He looks Dean up and down. “Also the fact that Cas works out and you don’t, you look like a skinny little beanpole next to him. He makes you look ridiculous.”

Dean crosses his arms and pouts. “He likes how I look. Says it makes him feel big and strong when he picks me up.”

Sam and Eileen both laugh. Eileen asks, “He picks you up? What, like during sex?”

Dean blushes. He halfheartedly says and signs, “No, I mean, like, when I fall asleep on the couch and he carries me to our bed.”

Sam and Eileen laugh harder.

“I think it’s sweet,” Jack interjects. “I would never laugh at your relationship with Cas, Dean. You two love each other very much.”

Eileen rolls her eyes. “Yeah, perfect little angel over here has never said a mean word about anybody in his life. We get it, Jack, you’re better than us.”

Jack straightens his back and smiles, proud of himself. Dean passes by him on his way out of the kitchen and squeezes his shoulder in thanks.

“A baby, huh?” Dean asks excitedly as he rummages through his and Cas’ closet for some clothes. “We should plan on staying in the bunker with them for the first few months, you know, help them out and stuff.”

Cas scoffs from the master bath. “You just want to hold a newborn.”

“Yeah, so what?” Dean joins him in the bathroom, taking his towels off his head and waist and hanging them back up on the racks. He takes a piss while Cas stands at the sink messing with his hair.

Cas is wearing a pair of black joggers and a faded pink tank top, a denim overshirt sitting on the counter. A long chain rests against his chest between his big pecs, three rings hanging from them. Two of the rings are Dean’s old ones, and the third is a new one Dean picked out for him when they moved into their house together.

Dean checks his hip against Cas’, nudging him out of the way so he can wash his hands at the sink.

“Does it bother you that we can’t just accidentally have children?” Cas asks, turning toward Dean seriously, unaffected by his naked body.

“What? No,” Dean answers. “Why, does it bother you?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.”

Dean grabs deodorant and pushes Cas’ arm up so he can apply it for him. “We got plenty of kids, honey.” He does the other arm. “And we’re old. I don’t need us to be the sole provider of a child for the next 18 years.” He picks up the denim shirt and helps Cas put it on.

Cas places a gentle hand on Dean’s bare hip and rubs his thumb in circles against his skin. “I just think...I think about how perfect Jack is, and how if I was still an angel and could’ve borrowed a female vessel for a while, then maybe we could’ve…”

“Jesus Christ, Cas.” He pats the slope of his belly. “OK, no more jokes about you being pregnant. It’s fucking with your head.”

“Mm, yeah.” He leans forward and presses a kiss to Dean’s mouth. “Now be honest with me, does this shirt make me look fat?”

Dean laughs as Cas expands his big stomach out and pulls at the fabric of the tank top to make it tight.

“You look perfect, sweetheart.” Dean jiggles his belly. “Fat and very gay.”

“Thank you.”

Dean puts on his usual jeans and flannel over a plain black t-shirt. He also has a necklace with a ring Cas gave him, but he wears it under his clothes and out of sight. He likes feeling it against his skin.

They eat a quick lunch with everybody before Sam and Eileen head out for their hunt. Cas and Jack go in the backyard to tend to Cas’ garden, which is full of beautiful flowers and absolutely no vegetables.

Jody shows up right when she said she would, and she passes Raven off to Dean before she’s even stepped in the door.

“I’m gonna spend the night here if you don’t mind,” Jody announces as she kicks her boots off.

Dean is cooing at the baby and tickling her belly with one finger. Right now she has dark olive skin and a head full of black hair and big gray eyes, but that could change any minute. Jody got her just a few months ago when she was trying to help her mom, a teenage shapeshifter, but the girl had a lot of complications and died during childbirth. She asked Jody to name the baby Raven after Mystique from X-Men.

Jody, claiming that she’s too old to raise a baby on her own, brings Raven over to Dean and Cas’ for at least one week per month.

“Dean?” Jody presses.

“Hmm?”

“I said I’m gonna stay here tonight.”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s fine.” He kisses the baby’s head. “Cas and Jack are outside. Make yourself at home.”

Under her breath, Jody says, “Give a baby to Dean Winchester if you want him not to pay attention to you at all.” She walks to the kitchen and puts on a teapot.

Cas barges in the back door and makes a beeline for Dean, his hands outstretched. “Baby,” he commands.

Dean frowns but hands Cas the baby anyway. He knows if he tries to hog her, he and Cas will have a petty fight about it later.

“Yeah, good to see you, too, Cas,” Jody says, still talking in a dejected tone, grabbing mugs out of the cabinet. “You look good, you been working out? Of course you have, look at you. Yeah, I know, I look good, too. New haircut. Thanks.”

“Hello, Jody,” Cas greets, turning toward her but keeping his eyes on the baby cradled in his arms. She looks impossibly small in his hold. “Your hair looks very nice.”

“Well, thank you, Cas,” Jody says smugly. “Would you like some tea?”

“Are you offering us tea in our own house?” Dean asks.

“You told me to make myself at home.”

Cas moves Raven up to his shoulder, spreading his long, thin fingers over her back to keep her in place with just one hand. With his other hand, he pulls out a barstool at the island and takes a seat. His tank top gets stuck between his underbelly and his lap, and Dean watches, transfixed, as Cas demurely lifts his butt off the chair and flicks his free hand against his shirt to unstick it.

“Dean? You OK?” Jody asks, amused.

“Hmm?” Dean whips his head toward her. “Yeah, sorry.”

“You looked a little lost there for a second, buddy.”

“Oh, yeah,” Dean says. “I don’t know if you know this, but I’m very obsessed with Cas.”

Jody laughs. “It’s impossible to even make fun of you anymore. Like, if you’re going to be blissfully happy, at least act a little embarrassed about it.”

Dean walks over to Cas and puts his arm across his middle, presses his cheek firmly against the side of Cas’ chubby face and looks at Jody as he says, “No.”

“Jody, I would love a cup of tea,” Cas says, ignoring Dean. “Thank you.”

Raven fusses and nuzzles against Cas’ shoulder, so Dean reaches his arms out for her and says, “Too much muscle in your shoulder, she can’t get comfy.”

As Cas hands the baby over, he says, “Yes, because your bony body is so much better.”

“Do you guys even like each other?” Jody interrupts.

“No,” Dean and Cas answer in unison. They then look at each other and smile.

Cas asks Jody about the girls, which gets her on a long-winded rant, so Dean kisses Cas’ hair and heads out the back door with Raven. He walks across the porch and takes a seat on the porch swing and watches as Jack stands in front of a flower, says something to it, then moves onto the next flower and says something else.

“Are you talking to every flower, kid?” Dean calls.

Jack turns and tilts his head with a gentle smile. “I didn’t hear you come out here, Dean. Yes, I’m giving each of them longer lifespans.”

“Oh. Well, thanks.”

It’s mesmerizing, swinging back and forth and watching Jack tend to the flowers. Raven falls asleep quickly, tucked up facedown against Dean’s chest with her head turned to the side.

“See, I’m plenty easy enough to fall asleep on,” he mutters to her.

Jody comes outside a few minutes later, tea in hand. Dean scoots over so she has room to sit next to him on the swing. She doesn’t say anything, just takes a seat and drops her head to his shoulder.

“You know we can keep the kid longer if you need us to,” he says. “Cas has baby fever, so I’m sure he’d be thrilled.”

“Hm. I might,” Jody considers. “Alex is really attached to her though. I am, too, but. I don’t know. It’s different for me.”

“You never thought about having a baby again in your life, did you?”

“No.”

“Hmm.”

Cas walks out next and stops right outside the door, staring straight ahead at Jack. Cas has both his wrists bent against his hips, hands palm out, straight-back posture making his gut look more pronounced than it already is.

“Hey, Jody,” Dean starts, his eyes on Cas.

“Hmm?”

“Do you think Cas is different? I mean, different than how he was as an angel.”

Jody snorts. “Um. That Cas looks like he would eat angel Cas for breakfast.”

“No, I don’t mean—” Now Dean is laughing, too. “Obviously he looks different. I mean, like, the way he’s standing right now. Don’t you think it looks a little…you know…”

“Gay?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, yeah, but only slightly gayer than he used to act.”

Dean balks at that. “What? Really?”

“Honey, I knew Cas was gay the second time I met him. Sure, he’s definitely more comfortable and open and maybe a little more, uh, effeminate now, but he’s always been pretty clearly gay. No offense, you just weren’t paying attention.”

“Hm. Well, I’m paying attention now. Very close attention.” He surreptitiously licks his lips.

After a pause, Jody asks, “How did you live so many years of your life unaware of how horny you are for him?”

Dean puffs out a breath. “Shit, I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. Like, I have a sleeping baby on me right now—one of my favorite things in the world—and yet it’s taking all of my willpower to keep sitting here with you instead of going to put my stupid hands all over him.”

Cas turns toward them then, offering a close-mouthed smile and a delicate wave of his hand, totally oblivious. “Jack is talking to the flowers,” he says loudly.

“Yeah, I know,” Dean says back, less loudly so as not to wake the baby. “Powerful as God, and he’s here talking to our fucking plants.”

Cas furrows his brow. “What did I say about cursing?”

Dean rolls his eyes.

They all hang out outside until Raven wakes up and cries for food, so Dean takes her inside and paces around the kitchen while he gives her a bottle. Cas walks through on his way to the bathroom, and Dean stops him with a, “Hey. C’mere.”

“What?” Cas asks, smiling as he closes the distance between them.

Dean leans to the side, keeping the baby steady as he kisses Cas on the lips.

Cas shakes his head when they pull apart. “You have zero impulse control.”

“See Cas, touch Cas. That’s how my brain works.”

His smile widens. “You’re lucky I’m patient.”

Later, Dean is in charge of getting Raven down for the night, Jody is taking a nap upstairs, and Jack and Cas are out picking up takeout for dinner.

The four of them eat at the kitchen table, and Dean inhales his food quickly so he can relax and sling an arm over the back of Cas’ chair while everyone else finishes. He rubs and scratches at Cas’ back while they all talk, occasionally looking over to watch Cas eat. With how muscular he is, Cas would have to have a high-calorie diet even if he didn’t also just love food, but still he eats slowly and properly as he demolishes at least twice as much as everybody else.

Dean, itching to move and sick of being in the same spot for too long, eventually leans over and nips and kisses at Cas’ neck and face, forcing him to eat even slower. Every so often, Cas turns and pecks Dean on the lips in acknowledgment of his ministrations.

“Dean, you look smaller every time I come over here,” Jody says.

“No, optical illusion. It's 'cause Cas is getting bigger,” Dean responds. He pats a loving hand against Cas’ full belly. “He can’t help that he looks extremely cute like this.”

Mouth full of food, Cas turns his head and kisses Dean’s temple in thanks.

“No, I definitely think you’ve lost weight,” Jody continues.

“Yeah, I think you have,” Cas says. “Not that you weren’t skinny before, but you’ve lost weight since you stopped drinking.”

“Mm. Yeah, I guess.” Dean puts a hand on his own stomach, noting how flat it is. He ignores the heat rising to his cheeks at the basic knowledge that Cas notices things about him.

After dinner, Jack asks if they can watch a movie together in the living room, which they of course oblige. Dean can count on zero hands the amount of times he and Cas have told Jack “no” when he’s at their house.

Cas privately asks Jody if she wants a glass of wine, which she turns down. Dean sees the conversation take place as he’s turning the TV on due to his inability to take his eyes off Cas for even one minute.

Jack, god help him, picks some tragic foreign language film and sits cross-legged on the couch with Jody. Cas and Dean settle in sideways on the loveseat, Cas’ back up against the armrest and one leg hanging off the side so Dean can sit between his thighs and rest back against his chest. Dean rubs his fingertips against Cas’ knee and listens to him unwrap candy after candy, occasionally offering one to Dean.

After about 15 minutes, Dean turns his head and cocks an eyebrow at Cas.

Cas looks back at him, confused, as he puts another candy in his mouth. “What?” he whispers.

“You’ve had, like, 20 of those.”

Cas’ face changes into gay bitchiness as he unwraps another one. “Now who’s the nagging wife?”

“Can you two can it?” Jody asks at a regular volume. “I’m trying to hear what these sad French people are saying.”

Dean ignores her and whispers to Cas, “I don’t give a shit about you stuffing your face, babe, I just wish your hands were more Dean-focused.”

“Oh. Of course, Dean.” Cas tosses a wrapper aside and puts his arms around Dean’s torso, squeezing him firmly back against him.

“Mm, that’s better.” Dean snuggles down and bends his arm up to feel Cas’ bicep.

Jody shushes them again.

Cas presses a chocolatey kiss to the bolt of Dean’s jaw and moves one hand across his waist, teasing with the waistband of his jeans. Dean grabs his hand, stopping him.

“Not in front of the kid, dude,” Dean says through gritted teeth.

“I’m not doing anything,” Cas says innocently, his lips still on Dean’s skin.

Jack pauses the movie and looks over at them with a smile. In a sweet, polite tone, he asks, “I don’t mean to be rude, but can you guys please shut the fuck up?”

Cas nudges his head against Dean’s in fake annoyance. “What did I tell you? What did I fucking tell you, Dean?”

Dean can’t stop laughing. “Yes, Jack, we’ll shut the fuck up.”

With nobody to talk to and with Cas carding his perfect fingers through his hair, Dean falls asleep within 10 minutes. He half-wakes up a little while later and finds himself curled up on his side with his legs pulled up to his chest, using his big boyfriend as a bed, his big arms a blanket, big pecs a pillow. Cas’ chest vibrates beneath his ear as he whispers something to Jody, but Dean doesn’t hear it. He balls his hand into a fist and nuzzles his face against Cas’ shirt like a baby and falls back asleep.

When he wakes up again, it’s because Cas is trying to carefully lift him up and take him to bed. He wraps both arms around Cas’ neck and his legs around his waist and hangs on tight as Cas stands, only one of his muscular arms wrapped around Dean’s butt to hold him in place.

“Wow, he really has you whipped,” Jody whispers to Cas.

Cas responds completely seriously, “Why else would I exercise so much if not for this?”

“G’night, Jody,” Dean mutters against Cas’ neck.

“Night, little baby Dean.”

Dean smiles, his eyes still closed. “I like that.”

Jody sighs. “Seriously. Impossible to make fun of him.”

Cas starts walking toward their room as he says, “Dean is an all or nothing person. So many years with so much shame, now he has absolutely none.”

“Hmm. Yeah,” Jody replies. “Night, Cas.”

Dean is fully awake by the time Cas lays him gently down on the bed. He gets up immediately, changes into pajamas and goes to the master bath to brush his teeth. Cas joins him at the sink, wearing just boxer briefs and one of Dean’s shirts. It barely covers his belly button.

“You can’t possibly be comfortable in that,” Dean mumbles with a mouth full of foamy toothpaste. “I don’t get why you’re still wearing my shirts to bed. I told you, you stretch them out and then I can’t wear them.”

Cas spits his own toothpaste into the sink and looks up at Dean through the mirror as he wipes his mouth. “Until the sleeves cut off circulation in my arms, I will keep wearing your shirts to bed.”

Dean pulls at the hem of one of the sleeves, pointing out where Cas snipped it with scissors. “Cheater.”

Once they’re in bed, Dean presses up against Cas’ side, throws one leg over him, buries his face in the crook of his neck, squeezes his butt.

“Finally,” Dean says against his skin. “I’ve been dying to touch you all day.”

Cas smiles and wraps an arm around Dean’s back, shoving his hand down his pants to grab his ass. “Yes, and you showed remarkable restraint by not touching me at all today.”

“C’mon, you know what I mean.”

Cas hums, thinking. “You don’t like having your attention divided. If you can’t focus fully on me, it feels like you’re being deprived of something.”

“Yeah.” Dean rolls completely on top of Cas and kisses the pocket of fat under his chin. “Don’t let it go to your head, though. It’s not like I’m, like, completely obsessed with you or something crazy like that.”

Cas smiles into a kiss, putting his hand to the side of Dean’s face to pull him down to his lips. Dean groans in the back of his throat and rolls his hips.

“Do you want to have sex?” Cas asks between their mouths, like he almost always does, because he has a take-it-or-leave-it attitude about sex and is perfectly content with any amount of physical contact with Dean, no matter how little. So he leaves it up to Dean: a person who needs to touch Cas so badly all the time that he feels like he’ll die if he doesn’t.

“No, not with us on baby duty,” Dean says. “Let’s just make out until I fall asleep.”

“Mm, that’s exactly what I fell from grace for.”

Dean laughs and pinches his shoulder, kisses the corner of his mouth. “Hey, you knew me when you fell. You knew what you were getting yourself into.”

Cas’ face softens. He rubs the pad of his thumb slowly across Dean’s cheek. “I did. I was willing to give up everything without ever even knowing what your lips feel like against mine. So, excuse me for thinking every second with you now is just icing on the cake.”

Dean blinks. “You’re getting better at food metaphors now that you eat so much.”

Cas allows him to trivialize the moment. He just simply smiles up at him as he wipes a tear from Dean’s face.

So Dean closes his eyes and kisses him, slowly, until he falls asleep.

-----

Dean wakes up to the sound of Raven crying over the baby monitor. She only cried once during the night, when she shapeshifted into a fat pale baby with brown eyes and thin hair and needed a bottle and a change before going back to sleep. Now it’s morning, and Dean blinks awake to the sunlight streaming onto his face. He’s on his stomach, arms wrapped around a pillow under his head, his skin unreasonably warm.

He shifts and feels Cas’ heavy arm draped across his back, his chubby hip squished against his side. Dean shuffles and turns, picking Cas’ arm up and kissing his hand before setting it on the bed and standing up.

Cas is also facedown on the bed, but instead of getting up, he burrows deeper and mumbles sleepily, “Start the coffee, please.”

Dean pinches a sliver of his love handle and leans down to kiss his cheek. “I’ll bring you a cup. Go back to sleep, sweetheart.”

Cas snores softly in response.

It’s early. The house is dimly lit and quiet, and Dean takes his time changing and feeding Raven. When she’s done with her bottle, he puts her on his hip and carries her out to the back porch to listen to the birds. His phone rings.

“Yeah?” Dean answers.

“Hey,” Sam says. “So, uh.”

“Spit it out, Sam.”

“You know our new rule?”

“Not monsters until they act monstrous,” Dean says, his heart racing. “What happened?”

“Nothing too bad. It’s just that, uh, we think this pack of werewolves may have abandoned their, uh, young.”

“How old? How many?” Dean asks quickly.

“Twins. They’re small, Dean. Six months at most.”

Dean looks at Raven then at the garden in front of him. He thinks about Cas, about how wonderful of a father he is, about what he said yesterday. Then he says, “Well. Bring ‘em here if there’s no other option. We got the space.”

[natromanxoff]

Queen live at Elland Road in Leeds, UK - May 29, 1982 (Part-1)

The original intention was to play this show at Old Trafford, the home of Manchester United Football Club. Despite it having been cleared by the council and police (and not to mention, tickets had already been printed),

it was the local residents who somehow got the last vote, insisting that the volume of the sound would be disturbing. Residents of Leeds voiced similar complaints after it was announced that the show would be played at Elland Road, but it would go on regardless. There were reports that Queen had paid for residents to move out of their homes for the day, and perhaps this was part of the negotiations with the local authorities. This was unfamiliar territory for the people of Leeds - at the time this is the biggest show ever staged there. The band negotiated a later curfew with the police to ensure they could perform their full show (and with a full light show).

A fan who attended the show vividly recalls the opening bands' sets, saying how The Teardrops Explodes got [lemonade] bottled by the crowd (frontman Julian Cope appeared very nervous throughout his band's set to begin with). Another fan says, "Cope picked one of the bottles up and started hitting himself with it and stretching his arms out saying he was an Argentinian bomber or something. It was during the Falklands war, remember." Some have come to interpret this reaction of Queen fans towards the post-punk opening act as a manifestation of their distaste for Queen's general departure from rock on the Hot Space album. Heart and Joan Jett And The Blackhearts, both hard rock acts, went down well.

Right from the beginning, the band could feel like it was going to be top notch show due to the audience's involvement and enthusiasm. "Too much!" Freddie says to their singing in the fast version of We Will Rock You. After the song, he greets them. "Good evening, Leeds! Hey, it's really nice to be here. You're a wonderful-looking crowd, I'll tell you. You're a fucking amazing crowd, and you don't know what that means to a performer." Action This Day gets a lukewarm response like at most shows, but both the audience and band are truly on fire for the remainder of the evening, perhaps even more so than on the officially-released show from a week later with the title "Queen On Fire: Live At The Bowl." At one point Freddie was almost pulled into the crowd.

As Roger plays the beginning Staying Power, Freddie says, "C'mon, get your funky hats on now, huh?" Tonight the first chorus is "You and me we got... fucking power." This show is a fine example of Freddie's stellar vocal control, especially in Staying Power and Somebody To Love. After the former, he said it was a "fucking motherfucker to sing, I tell you."

Brian, before Love Of My Life: "I wanna tell you, it means a lot to us to come back up here after eight years. We won't wait this long before we come back to Leeds, okay?" But they never would.

Before Save Me, Freddie does a brief improv of Keep Yourself Alive with the audience. Brian then noodles on the piano as he usually does, and you can hear the disappointment of a few audience members as it sinks in that the band aren't going to perform the debut album classic. Freddie would initiate a similar improv in Nagoya a few months later.

A superb version of Back Chat is played tonight, after being absent at the past few shows. Brian gives his absolute all towards the end, bringing it such energy almost to the point of it becoming a completely different song.

Freddie has a slight moment of honesty before Fat Bottomed Girls: "This next song reminds me of all the dirty things I've done in my life, you know. I'm not gonna explain all the things, but you know what I mean. The bigger the tit, the better it is, I kind of think."

At the end of the show, he tells the audience how they were "Absolutely fabulous. We shall not forget you!"

Queen waited until 10pm to go on, as they wanted their lighting show to be at its most effective, but this resulted in a fine from the authorities. They wouldn't be so lucky in Milton Keynes a week later, as seen on the video footage. Despite the various rumours told over the years, the Leeds show was not filmed. Years later Brian May recalled this to be one of his favourite shows, and said he wished they had recorded and filmed this show instead of Milton Keynes.

The first pic was submitted by Fabio Minero.

Here are a few pro pics from this show:

More pictures from this show can be found at http://www.repfoto.com. You have to register as a user.

Various bootleg 45s (such as this one)

were released in the early 90s containing interviews with Brian and Roger done on the afternoon before the Leeds show.

Queen reportedly rehearsed the Hot Space ballad "Las Palabras de Amor" before this show, but it was never performed live.

Part-2

(x)

[mimisempai]

I will always find you

Summary:

End, continuation and fixing of the episode 6, Loki is facing Mobius who does not know who he is and Mobius does not know where to look for Loki. Will they manage to find each other?

Notes:

I had to fix it, it's done. End of The story of Loki and Mobius - Season 1 series on AO3 I'll begin soon a whole rewriting of the season 1. Follow my other series for more Lokius oneshot post-canon.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/32584870

3008 words - rating G

He was back at the TVA.

Mobius!

He was about to rush to find him when he stopped abruptly.

Sylvie... the kiss...

Now that the adrenaline from the fight had worn off, thinking about the kiss gave him such a weird feeling.

He didn't know what had made her kiss him, if it was a desperate attempt to change his mind or if it had been to betray him.

He had not even answered the kiss, too shocked to react, and she had taken advantage of it to send him here, at the TVA through a Timedoor.

Mobius, he had to find Mobius. That was his only thought.

He ran through the hallways in a desperate manner. Everywhere there was turmoil.

He came to the archives, between the familiar shelves, and there he saw him, next to Hunter B-15, finally.

It was like coming home, the sight of the familiar face and stance giving him an unimaginable feeling of comfort, the impression that everything was going to be alright, that anything was possible despite the disaster.

Mobius seemed flustered and as Loki went on, he heard their conversation.

"That's, what, 63 new branches in this unit alone?"

"Does he want us to just let them all branch?"

"At this point, how are we gonna stop it?"

Loki shouted, "We can't!"

Mobius looked at him surprised, "What? What'd you say?"

Loki shouted back, "It's done, Mobius. We made a terrible mistake."

Loki wondered why Mobius didn't react, why he seemed so distant, as he asked him, "What's done?"

Loki answered hastily, "We freed the Timeline. We found him beyond the storm. A Citadel at the End of Time. He's terrifying. He planned everything. He's seen everything. He knows everything. It's complicated. Okay?"

Mobius replied, bewilderment on his face, "Right."

Loki continued, "But someone is coming. Countless different versions of a very dangerous person. And they're all set on war. We need to prepare."

Mobius tried to soothe him, but something wasn't right, "Take it easy. You're an analyst, right? What division are you from?"

"What? What are you talking about?"

It was Loki's turn not to understand as Mobius asked him, pressing, "Who are you?What's your name?" and that Hunter B-15 was calling for reinforcements, "Boots on the ground now. Archives."

To Loki's dismay, Mobius asked again, "Who are you?"

Loki felt the same pain break his heart as when Mobius had been disintegrated before his eyes. Panting, he slowly turned around and his eyes fell on the spot where the three timekeeper statues normally stood. Instead, there was a statue of the man, the demon, he didn't know what to call it, the one who was in the Void.

Loki understood.

It was not his TVA, it was not his Mobius. It wasn't him!

As the guards came towards him, he felt hope returning and the wheels of his brain turning at full speed, he had to find a way to get back to the TVA from the main timeline.

———————

Meanwhile, Mobius and Hunter B-15 watched the main timeline split into hundreds of timelines.

Mobius, more than a little worried, said aloud, "No turning back now."

Hunter B-15 replied, "Who said anything about turning back?"

"For all time."

"Always."

One sentence remained while the uncertainty was complete.

"Mobius! Mobius!"

Mobius turned at the call of his name. Casey was beckoning him over. He quickly rushed toward him.

"What?"

"You told me to tell you as soon as I had access to data about Loki! I found it! Because of the multiplication of timelines, we now have access to the Void's timeline. We can see what's going on there! Look at it! There he is! Loki is here!"

Mobius pulled up a chair and sat down next to Casey, his eyes focused on the screen, deaf to everything going on around him.

Sylvie and Loki seemed to be in a castle or building and across from them stood an unknown man who spoke, "Better hurry. Timeline's already branching."

Sylvie seemed to look surprisingly aggressive as she addressed him, "So, what are you suggesting? That we think about it. And what precisely is there to think about?"

Loki turned to her, looking almost imploring, "Weren't you listening to what he was saying? That's the gambit. Remove the dictator and what fills the void?"

The way the screen reflected the image, he couldn't see Sylvie's face, but he heard the animosity in her voice when she said, "Ah. You want the throne?"

Oh no...After all that Loki had done to become better, how could she say something like that?

Loki replied in an urging tone, "No, that's not it. No."

"I don't believe you." Sylvie's tone was unmistakable. Mobius, who knew Loki perfectly could read all the distress on his face as he tried to convince Sylvie.

"Sylvie, the universe is in the balance, everything we know to be true. Everything. I know the TVA has hurt us both. But what if by taking him out, we risk unleashing something even worse? All I'm suggesting is we just take a minute to think about it. I promise you from my heart this isn't about a throne."

Of course not! I always knew it. Only you didn't know it Loki, you thought that's all you could be, that that was your glorious purpose. I always knew you were capable of much greater things.

Sylvie insisted, " What was I thinking trusting you? Has this whole thing been a con?"

Mobius' heart broke for Loki who answered her, his voice clearly strained, "Really? That's what you think of me... after all this time? Sure. Why not? Evil Loki's master plan comes together. Well, you never trusted me, did you? What was the point? Can't you see? This is bigger than our experience."

Sylvie, completely unmoved by Loki's argument, answered him, "Why aren't we seeing this the same way?"

Loki replied, looking defeated, "Because you can't trust... and I can't be trusted."

Oh yes Loki. You can be trusted. I trust you with my life, without hesitation, without even thinking for a second. Don't you see that you are not the same as you were?

"Then I guess we're in a pickle."

After these words, Sylvie attacked him. On the screen it was impossible to follow the whole fight, but it was clear that Loki was only defending himself and refused to go on the offensive, until he magically placed himself between Sylvie and his target. Mobius saw with horror Sylvie's blade on Loki's throat. a.

"Stop. "I've been where you are. I've felt what you feel. Don't ask me how I know. All I know... is I don't wanna hurt you. I don't want a throne. I just…" Loki sighed deeply before continuing, "I just want you to be okay."

Sylvie lowered her arms and suddenly kissed him. Mobius' heart sank as the kiss dragged on and suddenly Sylvie stepped aside and said, softly, "But I'm not you." before pushing Loki through a Timedoor.

"Where is he? Casey, where is Loki now?"

Casey didn't have time to answer, as the screen blurred and Loki was back on the screen. This time the surroundings were much more familiar.

"It's the Time Theater!" shouted Hunter B-15.

Mobius started to run, arriving at the door, he opened it and called, "Loki!"

Nothing. The room was empty.

"Mobius! Mobius!" Hunter B-15 was coming running in, "You need to come back and see this! Right now!"

"What?!"

"Hurry up! Come on!"

He rushed up behind her and they reached Casey's office area again. Hunter B-15 showed him the screen.

Loki was walking the hallways of what appeared to be the TVA, the ones past the time theater, but Mobius knew that couldn't be the case, they had just passed through.

"Casey, are you sure this is happening now?"

"Yes, we're in real time!"

Loki was now in the archives, and seemed to be looking for someone, maybe him, Mobius, between the shelves.

"Mobius!"

Mobius gasped, in front of Loki a few shelves over were himself and Hunter B-15.

"What? How?!"

"Wait, wait, wait!"

On the screen, Loki continued to advance toward their duplicates, and they heard Mobius say, "That's, what, 63 new branches in this unit alone?"

Hunter B-15 answered, "Does he want us to just let them all branch?"

"At this point, how are we gonna stop it?"

Loki intervened, shouting, "We can't!"

Their two doubles looked at him in surprise.

As he watched Loki try to explain what was going on to the two stunned doubles, Mobius' brain began to race, trying to pick up clues from what he was hearing.

63 branches in this unit alone. 63 branches in this unit alone.

This unit alone. That means there are several. Think Mobius. Think!

He began to speak aloud, "The main timeline branched, that means there are a lot of timelines now, what if each timeline has now a TVA? Could it be that..."

On the screen he looked at Loki and asked, "Who are you?"

Loki, looking shocked, slowly turned around and began to breathe heavily before releasing a gasp, which Mobius and those around him in front of the screen repeated in echo.

Where the statues of the three timekeepers should be, there was a single statue, that of the man Loki and Sylvie were with before.

"Casey! keep looking, cross-reference the data, try to figure out what date it is, I need my Tempad!" Mobius ran to his office.

_____

Loki looked back at the one who was not his Mobius and did not answer, quickly assessing the danger, he had to find a way to find the TVA he knew, but first he had to escape since Hunter B-15 seemed to have called a squad to stop him. He concentrated, closed his eyes, and saw the room he wanted to teleport to, the one he had arrived in. He felt the suction, then reopened his eyes, he was there, the relief short lived, because it would not take them long to find him. Still, he summoned a spear to put across the door, to at least delay their arrival in the room.

Think about it Loki, you're not supposed to be here, but now that the timeline is branching, how can they find you? Everything is chaos...

Spinning around in the room, he sighed, wondering how the situation could have slipped away from them like that. In fact, he knew, they had never been in control of the situation, their enemy was ahead of them.

Sylvie... who had not hesitated to betray him while he for the first time had found a "glorious purpose" that was greater than him, in fact it had nothing more glorious, because he no longer needed glory, he had discovered that it was much more rewarding to fight for a cause greater than himself. But now...

Mobius... His Mobius, where was he? How to find him? Did he get through it? Had he been able to warn all the other agents? He missed him so much, his reassuring presence that had the power to calm him down. How he had developed such a strong bond in such a short time was something that still amazed Loki. In Mobius, he had found someone who had believed in him when he had only seen the worst Loki was capable of, who had seen beyond what Loki was showing the world.

He had told Sylvie that love was not real, but in the end...love had a name.

Mobius…

"Mobius...", lost in thought, he didn't realize he was saying his name out loud.

When suddenly the now familiar sound of a Timedoor opening made him turn around. Summoning his sword, he braced himself ready to attack.

The Timedoor was just forming, when he heard the door to the room trying to be forced open, as voices shouted at him to open it from the other side.

Suddenly a figure he knew well stepped through the time door, "Loki! It's me Mobius!"

Loki, suspicious, did not dare to let his guard down. What if it wasn't his Mobius? How could he be sure?

The man in front of him looked uncertain and did not move forward. He lowered his hands in surrender as the banging on the door grew louder and louder.

"Loki, it's me, Mobius, the real one."

"How can I be sure?"

"Ask me a question. Something only the two of us would know."

Loki began to think quickly, what question to ask? Then suddenly he knew.

Cheeks slightly flushed, he asked, "Where did our first kiss take place?"

Mobius shook his head and smiled fondly, "The elevator."

Refusing to give in to the relief that washed over him, Loki asked another question to be sure, "Why?"

Mobius sneered, "To shut you up."

"It is really you, my Mobius!" shouted Loki before rushing into his arms. Mobius closed them on him. In an instant they reconnected with the emotions and sensations of their last embrace. Once again Loki felt like he was home.

"Yes, it's me." The door rattled, interrupting them. Mobius let go of him, took his hand and pulling him behind him, he led him to the Timedoor saying, "Quick, let's get out of here first, the explanations will come later."

They rushed through the Time Door, which closed on them as the door to the room gave way to the guards.

It was odd because they ended up in the same room, but in the TVA that Loki knew, there was the table and chairs from the last interrogation before Mobius went to join Loki in the Timecell. It seemed like only yesterday that Mobius had refused to believe him, blinded by jealousy as he himself had said."

"You-"

" How-"

"You first," Loki told him.

"Come on, let's go sit down," Mobius told him. They did, but instead of being face to face, separated by the table as they had been every time they were in this room, Mobius slid his chair next to him.

After an awkward silence, Mobius began to speak, "So, you and Sylvie..." then he stopped, aware of what he had just said.

Loki raised his head, shocked. "You... you saw?" he didn't even give him time to answer, "Mobius! I swear I didn't mean to kiss her, I didn't even respond to the kiss, I don't even know why she kissed me, I've never felt that way about her, never, you know that, Mobius, it's you I love, I know we haven't really had time to talk about our relationship and I'm not the kind of person who can be trusted and I've lied in the past, but please, you have to believe me, I would never- Hmph"

Mobius had not let him finish and had crashed his lips against those of Loki. He kissed him in the same way as their first kiss in the elevator, the difference was that it was no longer their first kiss, it was a kiss of reunion, of familiar sensations, of shared intimacy.

When they separated to catch their breath, Mobius murmured, his lips against his, "This is really the best way to shut you up..." and laughed softly.

"Hey!" Loki pushed him gently. Then he got serious again, because he wanted to make sure Mobius believed him, "Mobius, I'm serious."

Mobius took his hand and replied, "I'm not going to lie to you and tell you that I didn't feel jealousy, I'm human after all, and seeing the man I love kiss another woman was pretty hard to watch. But I also chose to trust you, that means all the time and not just when it suits me. So if you tell me that kiss meant nothing to you, then I believe you."

This time it was Loki who barely let Mobius finish his sentence and who put his lips on his, settling astride Mobius' knees and putting his arms around his neck. This time, they took their time, the kiss was soft and slow, then they caught their breaths, their foreheads pressed one against the other, neither of them wanting to be separated more than by a few centimeters.

Suddenly Loki kissed Mobius again, this time forcefully, he was shaking, his hands clutching Mobius' back, holding him tightly. Mobius, feeling a wetness on his cheek, pushed him gently.

"Hey, hey easy Loki, it's okay, it's okay now."

Loki " I-I, I really thought I had lost you, when your double asked me who I was, I thought you had completely forgotten about me."

Mobius wiped away the tears with his thumbs, letting his hands linger on Loki's cheeks before kissing him gently. Then he cradled Loki's head on his chest, resting his chin on his head as he hugged him tightly, Loki's arms wrapping around him again.

"Never, you hear me, never will I forget you. And even if I did forget you, I'm sure you'd find a way to get my memory back."

They stayed like that for a few more moments, tasting the relief of having found each other again and of having once again overcome an obstacle. Together.

Then Loki came down from Mobius's lap and held out his hand to help him stand up.

"I guess there's a lot to do now that the timeline is branching out."

"Thanks for the reality check... but yes you're right, as nice as this interlude has been." replied Mobius, keeping Loki's hand in his.  Then he continued, walking towards the door, "Come on, it's time to introduce you as a member of the team."

At those words, Loki had a strange feeling, something like belonging, and asked with a smile, "What's the TVA's motto again, For all time...?"

"For all time. Always." answered Mobius.

Loki squeezed Mobius' hand as he continued to walk forward. When Mobius opened the door, he repeated softly, "For all time. Always. Together."

They didn't know what was going to happen, but one thing was certain now, they would face it. Together.

_____

Whole series : The story of Loki and Mobius

As always, bear with me as it is not beta'd I hope you enjoyed it 🥰

[igotathingforvampires]

Marcus x F!Human Reader | A Tug of Fate | Wildest Dreams Taylor Swift Inspo Babble

TRIGGER WARNING: CANONICAL TALK OF WANTING TO UNALIVE DUE TO LOSS

CANON DIVERGENT: DIDYME IS NOT MURDERED BY ARO BUT KILLED IN RAID

It was a rather bleak day, granted every day was bleak if it was Marcus' opinion. He didn't need sleep, hadn't for the last six thousand years, though the last thousand had made him want to close his eyes and not wake up.

If he had his way-- which he wouldn't thank to his blasted-- loving-- albeit pushy brothers and sisters.

Marcus was of the mind that after living as long as he did, once you lost your anchor there was no point in one even being here. And ever since she was gone. Lost to him and the world in an array of violence and diamond dust ash. He hadn't had the ability to even fathom a world without her.

And so, he had trudged, along and quiet, alone and miserable, weighted by the thousands of years of killing, betrayal, ruling, and chaos. But the one thing that had been a constant was the sweetest voice in the world calling his name.

As he stared out at Volterra from his rooms, he exhaled an unneeded breath, it was utterly bleak-- truly so. How was he supposed to keep going, for what another thousand, maybe more if humans didn't obliterate them all with their nuclear nonsense.

Marcus leaned over and placed his head in his hands staring at his feet. There it was again that incessant tug that had been happening for the last three days, pulling out his window into the city.

A chain had formed and he had no concept as to where it would lead, this phantom taunting from his own gift. Ghosts of the past, perhaps he was finally losing it.

But then as he turned his head, a flash of a sound.

A bell like laugh followed by words of humor. "Come on, you can't even look in there? Awe! It's so beautiful! Hm...seems kinda familiar..."

The voice trails off-- and the jerk of the chain is painful.

The voice had sounded so disappointed.

Marcus glared at the silence outside his windows past the gardens he and his love had built to the wall where the voice taunted him. Beckoned him, called him like a sailor to the sea to drown his misery in waters of oblivion.

With more determination than he had in a millennia he strode into his closet and got ready in a flash.

---

---

Your hand traces the walls of the gigantic palace like structure, the stone feels-- hm, it's hard to place, in fact this entire place feels just-- familiar.

You had booked a trip out of sheer randomness, flinging a dart at the board and it had landed in Italy, bringing a bigger map you had flung another dart and here you were-- Volterra.

What were the odds that this place had been in your dreams?

No one knew, none of your tour group, none of the people who jostled you along because it was time to check out the plaza and shops.

"I wonder what was in there..." you mutter softly unaware of the eyes watching you carefully till you turn and see a shadow partially covered by a walkway, sunlight carefully filtering through the greenery and terracotta roofing. "Hello?" You call smiling at the tall figure. "Hi! uh sorry I don't speak Italian but are you needing anything?"

The shadow moves back a few steps. You frown, and shrug, "well okay! Bye-bye!" you wave and prance back to your group.

---

---

Marcus had paused, you were not what he was expecting. Watching you in a sun dress with the setting twilight of Volterra glittering off your bangles and sun kissed skin.

He knew you.

But did you know him?

He followed carefully, watching as your group circled the plaza and fountain. Your head turned and caught sight of him, and you froze. Blinking quickly as if to clear your head. "Hi there!" A beaming smile crossed your face, honey eyes gleaming. Oh he knew those eyes. It was impossible to miss the specks of brown and tawny spindles of circles that would glitter with happiness.

Not your red eyes...oh no...not yet...

But did you remember.... you were not who you were...you were a new person... not weighted down by the sorrows of the past, a second chance to a clean slate of happiness....was that the Gods designs?

Had you come back?

Marcus sees you step forward, "excuse me. Do you live here?"

I thought heaven can't help me now Nothing lasts forever....

But this is gonna take me down

----

----

Your stunned. He's utterly beautiful. A tragic beauty you think, Romanesque features, tall build and so utterly still like a Sentinal posted at the gates of eternity waiting-- what was he waiting for...

The man nods, "yes, I am." His voice is pitched deep enough to rattle in your ear drums, and strike something deep in your soul. You're confused for a moment.

"Oh! how lovely, it's a beautiful city! I was about to go to a tour of the--" you pointed at a lovely lady gathering people but he is suddenly right in front of you.

"That is not a good idea, I hear the tour is quite dull."

"Awe...but it's for the Palazzo..." you pout a bit, "is it really that dull?"

He's watching you, as if trying to figure something out, "that is actually where I work, would you like a private tour?"

You smirk, "You're not a serial killer are you?"

He bows, half at the waist, a elegant-- out of time-- movement as he offers you a hand, one that engulfs your hand entirely as it closes on your fingers. "You shall be in the best care cara mia."

You realize he's freezing, and something clicks, another thought that this feels all too familiar. Those onyx eyes, the soft smile on his lips, the light lingering in his gaze as he looks straight into your soul.

----

----

I can see the end as it begins My one condition is...

Marcus has given you a tour of the entire Palazzo, hanging to keep the guard and you separated, and you away from the throne room away from the screams.

But as he comes to the garden he pauses. You're chattering away asking so many questions and tugging on his sleeve. He smiles at the happiness you have-- the bond is there, the same....the bond he had missed, but it's stronger, it's pure and it isn't weighted by the tainting of sorrow or the ever present torture of wanting to leave immortality.

He couldn't make you happy....you had been so bereft with immortality.

How were any of them to know?

But now? Marcus watched as you perused the gardens smiling at all the flowers. The setting sun sparking off auburn and black in your hair.

You glanced over your shoulder at him and smiled.

Say you'll remember me standing in a nice dress Staring at the sunset, babe Red lips and rosy cheeks Say you'll see me again Even if it's just in your wildest dreams

----

---

"Can I ask you something?" you pause and glance at him.

"As I've said you may ask me anything and I shall answer it for you."

"You're going to think I'm crazy." You watch him pause, this mysterious guardian you've acquired. "D-do...do I know you?"

He raises a brow, but you can see it, the twitch of an emotion that is barely held in check.

"I... I feel like I do...and it's odd. I've never been here, I've never met you before but I--" you swallow feeling a deep welling of pain in your heart. "I missed you...." you don't understand and you feel tears clog your throat as you instinctively reach for him.

But he's caught your hand, a desperate, ecstatic look on his face. "I don't even know your name this time...." He whispers as he presses a cold kiss to your palm.

And his voice is a familiar sound Nothing lasts forever....

but this is getting good now

"it's y/n..." you whisper.

A wide smile. "....little one....Do you remember my name?"

You pause, and the answer floats up to your lips like bubbling champagne from a uncorked bottle.

Sweet, drunken, loving, everything, nothing, the world, and the universe wrapped up in heart strings of red.

"Marcus...."

Suddenly you're embraced, a cold kiss to your lips and the empty ache that had presided your whole life in your heart--

Was suddenly gone.