#guy who definitely has a normal attachment pattern

[majimaisms]

why did he say that

[little-cereal-draws]

Details I noticed in Nimona pt 5

It was mentioned in this post on Instagram that Nimona was there in the crowd before the knighting ceremony. A person blocks her from view for a second and she emerges on the other side as a rat

In the video clip the news anchors play of baby Ballister hopping the fence, the Queen is there. She's sitting in a booth on the bottom right of the screen so she's slightly blocked by the crowd watching the news but she sits forward as Ballister runs in. The Director is in the upper right as she leads the class

During Ambrosius' introduction, there's a clip of him taking a selfie with a kid in the Glorodome. There are two men wearing red coats behind them who hug/lean into each other in a very couple-y pose. Are gay relationships ok here?

Ballister smiles when Ambrosius calls him "thinky face." At this point he hasn't even looked at him yet but Ambs can still make him smile

The knighting ceremony must have been done in alphabetical order by first name because that's the only way you would get Ambrosius and then Ballister right after each other

Ballister is definitely bleeding after the jumbotron falls. It looks like dirt in the shadows but he's got a huge scrape on his forehead that is red in the light

There's a reflective piece of glass or metal right by Ballister's work bench. You can see his reflection in it as he makes his arm and then Nimona's reflection as she sits in the chair, playing with the knife

The papers Nimona drew her "resume" on have the Institute logo on them. Somehow she got ahold of Institute letter paper lol

Everyone likes to talk about the symbolism of the eye highlights so here's something interesting. In the scene where Nimona declares herself his sidekick, Ballister's eye highlights are the same shape as hers. His highlights go back to squares in the next scene

A nice bit of character acting- Ballister holds his wounded shoulder as the knights shove him in the holding cell

I know people have already pointed out that you can see Nimona as a rat as the Director leaves his cell but there are also normal rats and you can hear them squeaking

Ballister's prosthetic has a ball at the top of it that mimics the ball and socket joint of the shoulder. That means that it would need something to attach to. He’s probably got a metal bit on his torso that the ball has to go into to be able to have the full mobility of a shoulder. Meaning… Ambrosius took off his arm and a chunk of his torso

As they’re walking past all the knights Nimona beat up during the jailbreak and she says “They were like this when I got here,” there’s a knight stuffed inside the vending machine and a sword sticking out of the filing cabinet

When Nimona’s cooking the mushrooms for the breakfast tacos, she breathes fire on them but her back is to the camera so that ability is still a surprise to the viewer later. You can tell it's her though because her fire is orange and the fire from the stove is blue

When Ballister takes the arrow out of Nimona's leg, she's sitting on an old car seat(?) and he's kneeling on the ground next to her with one leg up. He's got her injured leg resting across his knee. Idk maybe ppl already knew that but I always thought he was sitting on the seat next to her

The knight that Nimona points to when she says, "He just peed his armor, he peed his armor!" is the otter knight with the cast on his arm (rip that guy lol)

The Institute has a motto that's four words in Latin. It's on the Insitute's logo but is most visible when the Director does press conferences. It reads, "Trad?m?? Securitas ???????? ???????" (The bottom two words get cut off by the podium) I'm pretty sure it translates to "Keeping our way of life safe" which is the tagline on the picture of the Director Ballister has on his murder wall

After the Kingdom rebuilds, there's a shot of hover cars going in and out of the wall. On the wall, they've laid the stones to make a phoenix pattern

When Ballister hangs up Nimona's headphones when he's cleaning up the tower, her sunglasses are hung above them

pt one, pt two, pt three, pt four

[spotaus]

Hehe >:]

Yeag those tags ended up running WAY long lol!

Uhhh. Killer! I love this scenario bunches, because despite Night being entirely aware that Killer was alive and fine, he probably would've panicked! I imagine it being kinda like this:

Nightmare does his training with Killer, abd by this point Killer is taking it seriously. While Night is by no means trying to kill him, it hurts when a tendril manages to smack into his skull or trip him up, and while it's annoying, it can also be... kinda fun? He's caught Nightmare cracking a smile a few times at the very least. Looking pleased, with himself, sure, but Killer's pretty sure those smiles always showed up before an attack pattern changed. Like he saw Killer getting stronger.

Nightmare from the start had told Killer his objective was to get close, but Killer hadn't had the opportunity to break past his defenses just yet. *Until that day*. When Killer jolted forward, knife raised out of habit, and prepared to slam into the King to get past his stupid training. (If he touched Nightmare, he would get the next week off.) Of course, he did *not* expect the usually pretty mild attacks to sharpen and for one to wrap his arm, squeeze it tight, and chuck him away.

There was a snap, but he landed pretty decently for having been put off-guard. Now *that* had been fun. Exciting. Not the training wheel baby settings. He was ready to go charging back in, but he realized Nightmare had pulled back all of his magic, and his tendrils were doing that twitching thing again. 'Scared, afraid, bad,'. There was a weird look in his eyelight.

Nightnare had been short, a little 'You're hurt. Training is over, go to the healer.' And when Killer tried to laugh off the little fracture, Nightmare had ordered him to leave. Now. So he had.

But it was weird. Killer had *definitely* been hurt worse, and this was the same guy who was willing to watch him hang a month ago? He was pretty tame, sure, but that felt out of character. Unneededly careful. So he got the healing done (the crack really hadn't been that bad) and headed back to try and ask for answers. The training time wasn't even over yet, and Killer had done what the King was looking for?

But when he gets back to the training room, there aren't any guards (there usually are) and the door was slightly ajar. Just enough for him to get a glimpse inside and catch the lil dialogue you had above. Ccino comforting Nightmare, and Nightmare. Well.

Killer knew that grown men didn't usually just, curl up like that. Nightmare, curled up in Ccino's arms, like some sort of kid. Shaking, his tendrils more active, more ferally yelling 'BAD, HURT, NO' but not a single one smacking into Ccino.

Killer had no clue what was going on there, but he knew it was something he shouldn't have seen, and he makes the choice to silently pull the door closed that extra inch. He thinks about it a lot, a LOT, and comes to no solid conclusion. Ccino obviously meant a lot to the King, but the way they interacted was *not* that of secret lovers. Not at all. So he decided he'd be more observant. Because what he saw back there was a vulnerable, hurt, *traumatized*, person. Killer didn't think a normal person would get that freaked out about an attack during training, anyhow, unless they had reason for it.

Then, the next day, Nightmare canceled training, but asked to see him. Checked on his arm wound, and apologized for reacting so harshly. If he had been thinking, then Killer wouldn't have gotten so badly hurt. (And Killer has a very stark realization that, maybe that freak-out was partly the attack, but partly worry for hurting *him* which feels insane.) But he actually plays it off, saying he can take more than that, before admitting the quick reaction-timinh was good. That they should train like that more often. (Queue Killer getting attached to his weirdly emotional King, and deciding he'll play along until he gets bored or dies. He definitely does neither. It also stops being a game.)

Ough- and Ccino!!!

Night would feel so so horrible the moment he found those old documents. I think his blood would run cold and he'd be horrified. (One at the thought that his mother would do that, two at the thought that *Dream* would do that, and three at a much more childish horrible cringe level of imagining Dream being with Ccino in that way because a) his Twin is bad at romance + Ccino is not his type, and b) Ccino deserves better!) And all of these kinda just dog pile him at once until he's an anxious mess... he probably focuses really heavily on that for a while, the kinda episode like in the drabble (asking Ccino about his freedom) happens several more times until Nightmare finally accepts it. (Probably when the Mask is being made, he has a few more attacks in worry of Ccino lying for his sake, but Ccino stomps out those fears quickly.)

And broooo. I know my tags went on about it, but the idea that Ccino wonders whether him stepping in was the right move then? Because, yeah, he had so many pressures and dreads, but in the moment all he knew was that his two charges were at odds, stressed, and one of them (the more flightly and afraid) now had godlike powers. Honestly, he was half convinced he'd be skewered getting between the teens, but it was his job, and it was what he *wanted* to do.

Also the image of Ccino getting between them? All dressed up and meant to be a perfect offering for a newly adult, newly god-like, Dream, getting between them... and facing Dream. Back turned to Nightmare, the one who was the obvious threat in any sane-person's eyes, because he knew that *Dream* was the one who was angry, who had already acted in violence (and fear, but less) and Nightmare was there one who was afraid and preparing to retaliate. In his mind, this was just another case of the twins getting into their rare squabbles. This time, Dream was ultimately the one who didn't try to talk it out. He had to show Nightmare that it was *Dream* who set the bad example first. A lil bit of showing trust and preying to the gods it came across.

But yeah. Just. Wild...

(And as a person who *just* thought of this, I gotta say that if Ccino hadn't gotten in the way there, Night would've definitely given into the Apple's reflex and killed Dream. The unfamiliar magic between them confused the Apple enough for Nightmare to realize what was going on-)

OH I almost forgot Dream w/ his sudden realization- Idk exactly where u were thinking this would go in the timeline (I read the 'with Blue' to imply sometime after the two of them ran away together, but it could *also* be later when they're in the Dungeon or smth-) But a teen Dream, now as old as Ccino was during the ritual, probably sleeping curled up next to Blue (because Blue is warm and it's safer to sleep close, obviously- nothing more-) and he has a weird stress Dream that compiles into Ccino's face and he just sits up. All sweaty and face a huge blush of yellow because "Oh gods noooo." Because it just clicked for him that his mother did *not* mean Ccino would be his as in 'your servant/butler/etc.' And she totally meant mate. Betroathed. Lil side-piece.

And he is just HORRIFIED because he can't fathom it. Not that Ccino wasn't handsome, but that was his babysitter! He was the one who gave him and his twin baths up until they could do it themselves! He fed them as toddlers when mother was too busy! He followed them around when they wanted to get into trouble and told them no! NOT someone he'd ever have feelings for, nor would he even humor the idea of making heirs. (Now it made sense why mother seemed so disappointed when he expressed that he thought the guard members were pretty or handsome (Pan King me-thinks) though.)

And Blue wakes up, because Dream is literally shaking in embarrassment and red hot confusion/frustration, and blearily asks him what's wrong. And. Dream just can't explain it. Blue comforts him anyways, assuming it was a night terror.

And... the haunting idea that Ccino's role for him was given to Night? He can't imagine his twin would do something like that, but he *had* always been Ccino's favorite... and then he spends like 3 nights in a row trying to forget that he even figured that out in the first place. It kicks off the solidification of his twisted perspective on the whole thing.

Gifted Drabble - NewAgeAU - Understanding

Hey @spotaus !! As promised :3 I got a little something for you!

Your drabble got me thinking and made me consider something. (also i am so sorry if i got the ages wrong. I really tried)

As always. Feel free to use whatever you want from it or just ignore what doesn't fit <3 I am just having fun and it is meant as a gift for you <3 (also to motivate you to keep writing more about it!)

*------------------------*

Nightmare gets off his horse as he stares at the castle.

Well. His castle now.

He is still not quite used to that. Refering to it with his castle instead of his mother's.

Even after almost 12 months. He still doesn't expect to see himself in the mirror. or maybe the problem is that he expects his old self. The young teen.

The weakling. The failure.

No focus.

He isn't that anymore. He now has the magic. He is the new powerful leader of his land. And he will make this work. Even if he still has no idea what he is doing.

No. He needs to get back and make sure no one tried to rebel against him. That no one tried to hurt Ccino while he was gone.

Nightmare gets off the horse and someone rushes over to take the horse. Nightmare stares at this person and figures out quickly it is the stablehand who has been taking care of the horses.

Nightmare looks over his shoulder and motions the new people to follow him. The set of brothers, the dog monster. and Killer.

Nightmare walks into the castle as he speaks "Some of the other servants will take you to your chambers to rest and clean up. Tomorrow the three of you will join some of my other staff to see what is needed and where you fit. Killer. You will-"

"My liege."

Nightmare blinks and looks over.

Ccino has appeared out of one of the servant secret passages and walks straight towards him. Nightmare can see, and feel, when Ccino takes in the new people and just who they are.

Ccino's face turns a bit harder and Nightmare can feel the annoyance and frustration in the air "My liege!" Ccino smiles brightly as he speaks "Have you eben succesfull in finding a possible knight?"

Killer chuckles behind him and mutters "someone is in trouble~"

Nightmare knows Killer is being sarcastic. But if only Killer knew how right he was.

Nightmare however could never be worried or afraid off Ccino. For him? Maybe. But never because of him. He gives a tiny nod. The only amount of respect their places and ranks allow them when others are near "Ccino." He waves into the direction of the new arrivals "These people will join my workers." He looks at the four new arrivals "This. Is Ccino. He is head of the house." a title that will never pass away from him. Not as long as Nightmare is in charge.

Ccino nods "Pleasure." he looks back at Nightmare "My liege. If you have the time. There is a matter we need to discuss."

Oh yeah. Nightmare is very much in trouble.

Nightmare's voice is still calm as he speaks "Very well. I will meet you in my study after i made sure they go to their chambers."

Ccino feels unamused but he nods with a bow before he leaves the hall with a quick turn.

Nightmare turns back to his new... servants? He never quite liked that word but it works. He turns to his servants and feel his tentacles slowly rise from their position on the ground. They slowly start to idle again as he makes sure the new people learn where their rooms are and where to get food.

He brings Killer to a room more seperate from the others. Beyond the guard positions. Just because Nightmare wants to give him a chance and the fact he doesn't fear him is refreshing doesn't make Nightmare forget how dangerous Killer is.

Fuck this was a mistake.

What if Killer hurts people here?

What if he hurts Ccino?

Killer looks around his room before lounging on the bed "So what is the deal with the other skeleton?" he grins and wiggles his eye brows "Little secret going on there?"

Ngihtmare needs a moment as he wonders what Killer could mean. Then it sinks in and Nightmare feels his tentacles all spasm as he shudders "No." the answer is final and harsh. Killer actually looks surprised.

Nightmare holds his sight and speaks slowly "I will only repeat this once and remember this well. I don't like having to repeat myself." he holds Killer's gaze "Ccino is head of the house. He will remain head of the house. Nothing anyone can say or do will change this." he holds his gaze before straightening himself again as he moves towards the door "Tomorrow we will start training."

Kilelr sputters "We?!"

Nightmare stops and shoots him a look "Obviously. How am I to keep track of your skills and promise if i don't oversee the training myself?" and he leaves the room.

He hurries back through th castle towards his study. Sinking in and out of shadows as his mind, body and soul all know where he wishes to go.

He stops by his study and enters it.

Ccino is already in there. Studying the old masks in the special glass casing.

Nightmare closes the door and Ccino turns to him with a glare "What were you thinking?"

Nightmare gets taken back to a year or two prior. When he was still small. When he had cut himself to practise for the ritual. He hadn't been able to sleep and had been nervous about the apple ritual already. He had wanted to practise his part. to perform a blood oath to promise loyalty until death to his twin.

Ccino had caught him with a knife out.

Nightmare blinks back into the here and now as Ccino looks at him expecting with his arms crossed.

Nightmare blinks as he looks to the side for a moment. How is it that even wiht him being taller than Ccino he still feels small compared to him? "They were innocent."

Ccino looks unimpressed as he crosses his arms "Now with less lies."

Nightmare blinks and shoot his traitorous tendrils a look. No doubt they did something to give his little slight lie away. Ccino jsut raises a brow as he taps his foot.

Nightmare speaks again "Most of them were innocent. I didnt want them to get hang for something they did not do."

Ccino hums as he waits "And the murderer?"

Nightmare looks at Ccino "how did you know?"

Ccino sighs but has a small smile on his face. an old fond feeling as ccino looks at him and the tiny part of nightmare that had been stressed relaxes. Ccino just keeps looking slightly amused "There is a reason i told you to get out more. you only hear so many things from people in the castle nightmare. You need to go out to hear everything from everyone. I know who he is because i go to the market sometimes."

nightmare gives aslow nod as he looks away. So Ccino knows that nightmare brought a serial killer home. great.

Ccino sighs and sits on the couch for visitors and Nightmare joins him instead of sitting in his own chair.

Ccino looks at him "Just... tell me what happened. Why did you decide this?"

Ngihtmare looks at his hands. again slightly shocked to see the goop. It never stains anything yet it feels like a reminder. It is dirty. it isn't the holy light the powers promised. it is weird and looks diseased which is fitting for him. someone who betrayed everyone. who betrayed his twin. He may have gone it to protect dream. But even dream doesn't see this.

Where does that leave him?

Ccino's hand rubs his cheek and Nightmare shakes himself out of it. Ccino looks so worried as he rubs his skull "Hey... it is okay... i am not mad at you. I am worried about you. I am sorry if it seemed like i was mad."

Nightmare knows ccino isn't mad at him. Not like that at least. Nightmare can feel that. But he likes that ccino still tells him as much too.

Nightmare sighs as he leans into the gentle hold and touch. Ccino had always been one of the few to hold him. As his and Dream's babysitter it had been his job. But Ccino had always truly cared about them both. The moment that Nightmare could feel emotions he had been shocked by that.

That Ccino held no hatred for him. Not even a little bit. He enver blamed either Nightmare or Dream for his situation.

Nightmare speaks softly "The... kngihts you picked out. they were amazing. They showed much promise and would have made fine warriors."

Ccino hums as he keeps rubbing his skull "But?"

Nightmare sighs "They hated me. Even if with time they would eventually grow loyal and accept their place. They would forever hold resentment towards me for making them come."

Ccino hums and nods "I get it. It were only options Ngihtmare. there will be more people who fit the job."

Nightmare feels another part of him relax. knowing that Ccino still understands him "Killer wasn't afraid."

Ccino hums questioning.

Nightmare speaks slowly "He wasn't afraid. Not of me. Not of his situation. He stood up when near me. He didn't cower and he didn't hide." he sighs as he leans into the hug. He shouldn't need these anymore. He is an adult now and not that awkward young teen anymore. Nightmare shouldn't still count this much on the other "He saw me and didn't hate me. He knew who i was and didn't hate me. It was... new."

Ccino still feels unsure but he holds him still "And that gave you hope? That maybe if soemone didn't start with that hatred they could maybe become truly loyal?"

Ngihtmare shrugs. He isn't quite sure. he didn't think that far ahead. He just didn't want to lose another person who didn't hate him.

Ccino sighs as he keeps rubbing his skull and the back of his neck "I won't say i trust him. Because i don't. And I worry about you. I am scared he will end up hurting you."

Nightmare rolls his eyes as he answers "I have yet to even lose a fight and i had almost no training." all because of his tentacles and his newfoudn power.

Ccino just holds him tighter "There are more ways someone can hurt you Nightmare."

Nightmare feels the fear of before return. THe idea that somoene would kill Ccino. "If... if him being here makes you feel unsafe i will return him to the guards."

Ccino laughs and shakes his skull "Ngihtmare I am fine. I am not scared for me."

Nightmare keeps holding him as he feels himself start to shake. fears he had been trying to ignore and push away return to the front of his mind "Waht if they realise just how important you are? What if they try to hurt you to hurt me? What if they kill you to hurt me? Ccino maybe it is better if you hide." hide... hide away... out of sight out of mind.

Ccino just rubs his neck "It is okay Nightmare. It is okay. They don't know. and even if they have an idea your reputation adn the past of this country will just make them think I am someone who will be used as sacrifice last. That i will be punished last or least."

Nightmare shakes as he keeps holding the one person who remained "What if they hurt you because of me?"

Ccino is so calm and sure "then it would be on them. Not you. You don't want others to hurt me. It wouldn't be your fualt Nightmare and I will never see it as your fault. It is okay."

Ngihtmare still feels unsure. He made it obviously clear to Killer that Ccino is improtant. Killer is smart and Nightmare has no idea what he could be planning.

Another thought enters his mind. Somethign he had found early on in his ruling.

A very very damning piece of paper. a slave contract.

Nightmare speaks softly "I am sorry you are stuck here..."

Ccino shrugs as he keeps rubbing his back "Not your fault."

Nightmare shakes as he holds him "I.... I can undo it... I can give you back your freedom..."

Ccino had been taken from his home. Sold to the castle with a very clear purpose. First to be a babysitter. and later... well... Drema had been planning to be all powerful and go from young teen to adult in just one ritual. There is a reason Ccino's age had been only 6 years older than them.

Ccino had been suposed to be Dream's from the very start.

Ccino hums "A nice thought. Not that i thought about that contract in a long time. It hardly matters nowadays. Not like I can just leave."

Nightmare feels his grip tighten and his tendrils curl around them. He doesn't want to let go of the one person who cared. The one person he could count on to help him. To give a single shit about Nightmare. But... but how long will it take before Ccino starts hating him? If Nightmare keeps him here?

Nightmare holds him close "I... I can get you a horse... I can give you gold..." He will just use some of the treasury. Ccino deserves it. "I can send some guards with you on your way. You could go wherever you want. Back to your family."

Ccino locks both his arms around his skull and hums softly. an old lullaby and Nightmare stops. The amount of memories almost hurt. It was always Ccino who held him on bad nights. Or when he was sad. Or when everyone pushed him aside again.

Ccino speaks sfotly "Nightmare. When I say i can't leave i don't mean i physically can't leave. It means i don't want to. I decided a while ago i want to stay here Nightmare."

Nightmare shakes but refuses to let go "What... what about your family?" Ccino's fmaily have to love him. Ccino is so amazing. There is no way he isn't missed dearly after he was stolen from them.

Ccino sighs sadly "Nightmare... They have been killed a long time ago. The day i was taken the guards made sure i knew there was nothing to return to. even if i ran." Ngihtmare feels himself freeze. why... why had he thought?

Ccino rubs his skull "It hurt a lot but i accepted a long time ago Nightmare. I accepted that you two were my family now... and well... now it is just you. and it is okay. I am okay with that. I will always support you Nightmare." he grins "You may be older now but i like to think i am still the older brother."

Nightmare feels aprt of himself break as he just sinks fully into Ccino's hold "please don't also leave me." it is weak. it is pathetic. He should be stronger than this. He should have been prepared for this.

Ccino just covers his skull wiht his body and holds him "I am not going anywhere Nightmare. I will be by your side. I swear on my soul."

Nightmare relaxes and lets himself enjoy the comfort he should not need this badly. He enjoys it and can't help but let his eyes slide around the room. His sight finds the masks and remembers.

The masks are the highest honour. only shared with those most special.

He thinks something catlike will fit his older brother.

[starboyshoyo]

It’s Kind of Nice, Actually

Pairing: Chifuyu Matsuno x reader

Fandom: Tokyo Revengers

Genre: Fluff

A/N: Inspired by my own first date. It might read as a little juvenile, because I was 13 when it happened and it’s been years since then.

You and Chifuyu enjoy your first date together as a real couple.

11:40 AM.

Chifuyu’s never been this nervous before. Not when he ran from teachers after skipping class, not when his classmates almost saw his bento wrap with kitten patterns on it. He wasn’t even this nervous when he got in his first fight. But a simple date with you? That’s enough to make his palms sweat like there’s no tomorrow.

The small diner he had chosen as a location was on the outskirts of town. It wasn’t anything fancy; just a small 50s-themed restaurant with a checkered floor and red formica tabletops. Chifuyu is glad that he chose a booth in the corner- he’s a bit self conscious about the fact that he was overeager and got here almost twenty minutes early. The waitress has already come by twice already, and each time he had to turn her away with a polite but embarrassed explanation of “Thank you, but I’m still waiting for my date.”

Even though Chifuyu is the one who’s early, he can’t help but wonder if you’ll show up at all. After all, he’s only ever known you as a friend. Maybe he’s too awkward for your tastes.

He pulls the strings of his hoodie taught. Should he have worn something nicer? Was it too late to bike back home and grab a collared shirt and a tie?

11:45.

11:50. It’s almost time.

11:55.

11:57. He’s checking his watch a lot, isn’t he?

11:59. So close.

Finally, just as his digital watch turns to 12:00, the bell attached to the diner door handle rings and in you step. Chifuyu’s head whips around and he stands up hastily, waving to you from the other side of the small room.

“‘Fuyu! Hi!” you beam, and despite his nerves Chifuyu finds himself smiling back. The familiar nickname reminds him that this isn’t the first time he’s been here with you. It’s just the first time you’re here together in a different way- on a date instead of just hanging out.

“Did you get that text from Baji on the way in? When I told him I was meeting you here, he almost decided to come along- but luckily, Mitsuya convinced him not to!” You beam brightly as you talk. “I wouldn’t have wanted him to crash my alone time with my favorite guy.”

Chifuyu’s heart flips. Don’t blush, don’t blush-

“Well, I’m glad he didn’t come, then,” Chifuyu responds bashfully “I wouldn’t want him taking time away from my favorite person, either.”

You laugh. “You’re so cute, ‘Fuyu.”

Oh, that definitely made him blush.

+++

As pleasant as it is to be here, laughing and talking with you, Chifuyu can’t help but notice that the two of you have fallen into the same routine of your past visits here, when you were still unaware of the feelings you held toward one another. Do you remember that this is a date? He hopes you do. Because as much as Chifuyu loves the little romance and friendship he has with you, he still wants more.

His eyes drift downward to your hand, resting casually on the table next to your napkin. You’re still laughing about something Takemichi did last week. You don’t notice his hesitation, the roiling in his belly as he debates placing his palm on top of it.

Would you let him hold your hand? He won’t know unless he tries.

Quickly, not giving himself time to reconsider, he moves his hand to the tabletop as well, resting it on top of yours. His cheeks burn as he tries to keep a straight face, as if this is the most normal thing for him to do on a date-but-not-a-date.

He did it. He’s holding your hand! (Kind of.)

You seem a little surprised but you don’t pull away. Instead, you turn your hand over, palm now facing upwards so you can grasp his hand in yours. “I was wondering when you’d do that,” you chime with a smile, “Is this alright with you?”

(Oh my god he’s holding it for real now-)

Chifuyu swears his heart is going to burst. “Yeah! Yeah, this is alright,” he manages to say, fumbling over his words. “It’s… it’s kind of nice, actually.”

Comments and reblogs are greatly appreciated!

[vilevampire]

I was thinking about fandom shit and the way that whenever I hyperfixate on a new media and join a new fandom I always follow the exact same pattern . I start by having the main characters/relationships as my faves like a normal person, right ??? but then, inevitably, I eventually grow overly attached to barely relevant side characters and rarepairs. this happens every single time and I always found it annoying because that means my fave things never have any content ???? and it's hard to find people who appreciate them to the same extent that I do. it can be devastatingly lonely to put my blood, sweat and tears into producing something for a small fandom/side character/rarepair and get like, 5 notes bc nobody cares abt these guys except for me.

yet while I was pondering over this I suddenly realized a deep fundamental truth about myself, bc, see . this is definitely the way things must be in order to maintain a balance in the world . because, when I fall in love with a new irrelevant little guy, I become so intensely passionate, it's hard to describe it with words alone. my love turns into obsession, an explosive fervor that bubbles up and explodes and spreads like hellfire. that's why, I always end up making new content/creating new fans for my faves through sheer force of will. it's weird, something within me drives me to turn up my nose at things that are too popular. and just knowing my faves aren't popular makes me like them more. I find that feeling of "if I don't make the content for this obscure thing, then who will?" really motivating.

I feel like an addict that has to resort to increasingly powerful substances just to feel something . nothing fires me up more than getting attached to some random little guy only a handful of people in the world care about . I think this is definitely the reason I was put on this earth as nothing in the world could be more fulfilling and satisfying to me . this is how it's supposed to be .

[jiminrings]

Hey bb! First of all, let me just tell u how much I love your writing! You're fabulous, love. Don't ever doubt yourself. Secondly, I wanted to know if u could do a college professor! Jungkook and pretty student reader where Jk is absolutely enamoured by her.. (also, with a bit of the good ol smut🤭) It's a-okay if u can't tho! Just know that you're appreciated!❤️

the probability of us

pairing: jungkook x y/n

wordcount: 6k

glimpse: jungkook’s the son of the university’s president, y/n’s cardigan is everyone’s favorite, and adjacent walls mean shared victories. 

notes: there’s something so warm about this request that it made me write it as an actual fic and not a bullet one!!! i did alter it a little bit but i was genuinely so happy writing this so thank you sO much for this babe :D // gif from pinterest!

Jungkook, in his better and most definitely unbiased judgement, thinks he knows enough about you.

He knows you well enough to have noticed your patterns and habits with almost everything in between. They were predictable for the most part, and that was partly because he takes pride in being observational, but you manage to unintentionally throw him a curveball every now and then that makes him smile.

You always come into class when there’s atleast fifteen people in it and Jungkook wonders if you know it in the back of your head or if you just sneak a peek at the room every now and then. He’s not keen on being early to classes, and on the three straight occasions his dad left something in the classroom from the day before and got him to retrieve it for him, you were already there.

You’re fixated and practically attached to your knitted cardigan, seemingly having no problem wearing the same outfit for days straight — something so both adorable and visibly heart-racing when it’s almost always a tank top underneath that’s on the lower scoop, and a rotation of pants and sweats that sometimes feel so misplaced with your cardigan that it matches.

Jungkook’s found out that you probably wear atleast three rings on a daily basis, and that only took him two days to figure out because you’d exit the classroom with slight marks and indentations on your cheeks or on your jaw. Whether it’s to being sleepy, being bored, or being focused is something he has yet to discern — but yeah, he looks at you with his eyes silently when the class is dismissed, wondering if he’d see the same Pandora tiara ring mark on your cheek, or this time from a signet ring you sported more often.

He’s eight weeks in doing whatever this is. Whatever having the definition of him trailing behind his dad, a back and forth between his classes and his office, then them eating out for lunch break.

Sometimes, Jungkook forgets that his dad’s the president of this very university. 

He’s only really known him as dad and he’s grateful for that, and the only times he’d see his father as the educator he was with the fancy doctorate degree was whenever Jungkook’s been a little lacking in his studies as a child up until high school. His mom, a doctor, would be on duty for nights and at home for mornings so that’d be the window she’d teach him the alphabet and addition with the carrying, something that eight-year old him would tear up just at the mention of.

His dad would just sit beside him in a very calm manor, take out two notebooks for one of them each, and make reviewers. Jungkook writes down what he knows and what his dad tells him to, highlights the key terms, and for some totally odd reason, making his own reviewers saved him from failing altogether and become an honor student with little help from his parents and most especially his dad.

It humors him that people are so rigid and intimidated by his dad, and he knows that not everyone would believe that this is the same guy that taught him how to give someone a proper wet willy. Jungkook sees people left and right going out of their way to greet him and pay their courtesies, stifling in a giggle that his dad also fights the need to laugh.

He loves and looks up to his dad, feeling a lot more thankful that he has a healthy relationship with his parents as an only child. Jungkook feels he owes that much to his dad that he took education for his college course, despite his blatant lack of interest for it.

And here he is — a senior at another college his dad’s not the professor of, studying a degree that he’s not gonna practice, and shadowing his father for eight weeks while he goes and teach for the “experience” as his dad calls it.

This has got to be a little ethically questionable, but that’s okay. Jungkook takes some comfort knowing that his dad’s the boss and he could just sit in a chair, pretending to absorb his lessons. In fact, he doesn’t even know why his dad opts to teach still even if he’s well high up in that ladder, the only explanation being that his father just really really likes teaching and not just be moving between airconditioned offices and meeting rooms all the time. And if that was enough, his dad just had to teach two classes to which Jungkook needs to accompany him in both — Statistics and English Literature.

Jungkook has a memory of stone that’s probably of the same kind the Code of Hammurabi was inscribed in (because he just swears his memory started way earlier than the age of four), because he practically knows everyone in each of his dad’s classes.

Eight weeks in. He’s only known that long.

But Jungkook knows for a fact that you’re never late — that much he knows. He refuses to believe that you’re actually gonna be late to class. 

His dad comes in early and normally, he sits by his chair just when he’s a minute away from starting class. For some odd push today, he felt the need to enter the room with his dad and be early for once; but for the one time that he did this, you weren’t around for it.

You’re late, and you’re never late, and you’re throwing him a curveball, but something tells him in his gut that this just wasn’t something you pull out of your cardigan sleeve to confuse him.

You’re confusing.

You’re never usually confusing.

He visibly straightens in his seat when you enter the room with a sense of complacency and without the need to rush, the class only in the quieting down stages before the lesson begins when you walked in.

Mr. Jeon’s flickered to the entrance briefly, his tinkering with the HDMI cord continuing nonetheless. “Kook,” he just barely manages to get out because he’s already standing up from his seat, nimble fingers grabbing a slip from his desk that makes his dad perplexed.

Jungkook walks all the way to you at the back of the class, holding out the late slip to you a little too eagerly as it seems, and you can’t help but feel confused and irritated at the same time with how you started your morning.

For starters, coffee was spilled on your cardigan from the night before, and soaking it overnight in a mix of detergent, softener, and the tiniest bit of bleach wasn’t enough to completely rub the stain off — which meant you had to get up extra early to have it dry-cleaned (the staff looked at you a bit weirdly) and head off to where you needed to be, in a rush.

“But I’m not late though.”

You murmur as you peer up at him, refusing to even take the slip in between Jungkook’s fingers. He turns impatient, even more-so at your retort that honestly sounded genuine, that he settles on dropping it down your desk.

“You are, Y/N.” He says as convictedly as he can, only having to glance sideways briefly to your nosy seatmate to keep him out of a conversation he clearly isn’t a part of, and you make a note in your head to apologize to Jimin who gets scared easily, especially by the president’s son.

As if to prove his point, Jungkook rolls the sleeve of his bomber jacket in the slightest, enough for you to see a glimpse of his flashy gold Rolex in an attempt to tell you the time, one you couldn’t decipher because it was analog and your eyesight’s not that quick-witted nor clear.

“It’s three minutes before the start of the class,” you make it a point to outstretch your forearm, one that isn’t covered by your cardigan as he now realizes, your silver and digital Casio telling him that it’s 9:57, indeed three minutes away from the start of his dad’s class.

He barely even blinks before he adjusts himself to stand between your stretched legs so he could hold your arm and adjust your goddamn watch to be set four minutes later, his movements done so quickly that you straighten your back to the seat.

Jimin pretends he’s looking away, but deep down you already know that he’s gonna ambush you with questions as soon as Jungkook leaves.

“See that? You’re late,” he hums contentedly, pushing the late slip towards you and stands by himself with his hands across his chest, all-knowing that he wouldn’t leave not until you comply with his stupid request for a late slip.

His dad sees the interaction unfold from a distance, still confused but somehow amused, and a curious smile appears on his face as he now has something else to bring up on the dinner table later.

After all, he only called out to his son to tell him that they should go pick up a few groceries over lunch break — not to give you a late slip.

Jungkook collects the piece of paper from you wordlessly, letting his hand linger for the briefest moment but you pay him no mind, too occupied to looking at your left and gesturing for Jimin to scoot closer.

Something’s wrong.

His instincts are not exactly the most accurate but after all, it does account for something. He’s not the best at reading people when they’re indifferent, and normally you’re never indifferent to him. 

He decides to lay low at that, sitting back on his chair and only twirling the slip in between his fingers and not once setting it down on the desk, preventing himself to look at it.

It’s only when his dad calls him to do a summary and explain to the class about his lesson’s breakdown, and he turns stern when he crushes the paper within his palm for the sake of being indiscreet that he totally wasn’t fiddling with paper for an hour and a half.

Jungkook returns and that’s when his dad starts giving out final reminders for their next meeting, straightening it out as much as he could until he can see your messy handwriting more than he could see the creases.

Tutored Hwang Hyunjin; state quizbee next week.

And why, exactly?

As far as he knows, Hyunjin’s the faculty’s favorite because he was such an intelligent student. He might be the favorite of his dad but he’s not entirely sure because his dad says he doesn’t like playing favorites, but he seems to think so nonetheless. If the guy who’s in the line-up for summa cum laude is asking help for a mere quizbee, what exactly is it for?

You’re an honor student, sure. In the dean’s list and in the running for cum laude, but you’ve said it yourself that you’re no Hyunjin and in verbatim, anyone who takes education as seriously as he does needs a hug and an emotional support system. Do you see yourself doing all the extra credits when you already have the highest average on all of them?

Did you hug him?

Jungkook scoffs to where his mind is running, a little dejected as he ponders on it even more as he stands next to his dad’s desk, nodding curtly at the students who bid him goodbye.

He’s extra quick to stepping up when it’s you who passes him, hands on his pocket as he asks under his breath.

“We cool?”

He tries to search for a hint of distaste in your face and he’s almost disappointed to find none, a genuine small smile on as you reply and come out the door without so much of a look back at him.

“‘Course we are, Mr. Jeon.”

... \ ( ♡ ) / ...

“What’s up with you?”

Jungkook utters the moment the door of your apartment swings open. It was straight to the point, really. No buttering up to you and no unnecessary bullshit before he drops the question that’s been plaguing his mind the whole day.

You had only been brushing your teeth when you hear a series of crisp and heavy knocks that led you to think that your neighbor Hoseok next-door has finally screwed up the pooch completely, and accidentally set his kitchen on fire with the cookie batter he’s been doing a series of trial and error with for a dozen times already.

Oh.

It’s only Jungkook, then.

He doesn’t look the slightest bit concerned being out in the hallway that gave everyone an opportunity to see him. Frankly, everyone who’s set foot to the president’s office, which is everyone, could tell who he is simply by looking at the few hundred picture frames Mr. Jeon has on his desk. 

He’s not concerned and he doesn’t have the gall to be concerned either, because as much as he knows that although underneath his dad’s section, the housing section of the college wasn’t under his close supervision. Besides that, he finds that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with this.

Jungkook only looks up to you for a few seconds, wide-eyed with your toothbrush in your mouth, and decides to let himself in.

This being yours and Jungkook’s interactions for the past eight weeks. There’s not a label to it, but it goes along the lines of the occasional fuck, and then the ranting about each other’s days, and binge-watching that either ends up as hook-up, or trying to pick up new hobbies the other’s just suggested, or whatever’s playing is actually playing and the two of you just watch, your head laid on his lap and his hand brushing your hair.

Yeah, that one. Whatever that’s called — that’s what you and Jungkook are.

It’s been painfully obvious to your tight knit of friends, namely only being Jimin and Hoseok, that those things practically yielded to the commitment of him being something that starts with boy and ends with a friend, no spaces in between and all in one word.

You blink away your internal monologue, remembering that you need to spit before replying to his question that he’s asked you point-blank two seconds ago.

“You saw me in class today.”

That one couldn’t be anymore obvious and he huffs at that, once again going on a grumpy fit of frustration while he lies on your bed upright, arms across his chest. “Off,” you swat his leg immediately, making him haphazardly throw away his shoes if he want to keep being frustrated with you.

That’s the exact bit though. Regardless if you forced him to take off his shoes while he’s on your bed, he’d be frustrated at you regardless. He doesn’t know why he’s frustrated with you in the first place and that just makes him stressed even more.

The realization hits him that Jungkook doesn’t really know why he’s so pressed about you, his tone considerably softening because now he feels a little smaller under your curious gaze.

“Yeah, yeah. I clearly know that. I, uh, I meant outside of class.”

Normally, he’d find your avoidance of things actually endearing because you seemed to worm your way out of any situation you just deem to be unrelated to you — but for the first time, he doesn’t know if you’re avoiding his question. If this was still your passive-aggressiveness or genuineness showing its head right now.

“You’re starting to sound like a professor, y’know,” you note with intrigue, relishing to how Jungkook lying on your bed and looking at you under such intensity seems normal to you at this point and at this moment. “A professor hanging out with his student outside of class, in her dorm, and on a weekday.”

The comment you add was supposed to be humorous but you find it rather odd now having said it out loud, the realization dawning on you that whatever this is, is just too ambiguous and vague that you’d never wanted something so specific in your lifetime.

“Just trying to appease dad. Do I look like I have the patience to teach a class, better yet show up?”

That’d be the actual bane of him.

Don’t get him wrong, professors must be so cool and patient with their workload and stuff, but holy fucking shit does he hate it for himself. He means no disrespect to his dad but he honestly can’t see himself doing what he does, even for a fraction of his life willingly.

You sort of envy him for the upbringing he has and the wholesome and healthy relationship he has with his family that you wouldn’t mind telling people all about. Not everyone expects Jungkook to be as family-oriented as he looks, and the little nugget of information he made you privy too puts a gentle smile of your face.

“You do have the patience to ask me if I’m okay though.”

It’s a question between reeling yourself in and putting yourself out there more, plopping to sit on the edge of your bed as you try to put lotion on your legs all the way down to your heel.

Jungkook finds it normal to see you putting lotion on and zit cream on your face, and he doesn’t question it for one second.

That doesn’t automatically mean that he’s gonna address it though.

“Well, baby, are y’okay?” he crawls the short distance from you, putting half of his body weight as he slings himself on your shoulders from behind, lips brushing against your ear as he pulls you tighter.

“Mhmmm.”

He finds it that as much as he pulls you tighter, you grow a bit more distant. You’re there with him but your mind isn’t, perhaps lost on the lotion that only adds into your scent that seems engraved in his mind nowadays.

Jungkook does as much as to tug a sleeve of your shirt to expose the slightest bit of your shoulder blades, pressing wet gentle kisses that leaves you, surprisingly, unfazed.

You make no move nor action, just continuing on rubbing your arms with your hands and him taking the momentary act of silence to look around your room, seeing your textbooks piled neatly on your desk with your lamp on.

“Long night?” 

He asks and not a second later do you hum in confirmation, making him roll his eyes and his stomach churn, but it probably just has something to do with a heartburn that’s beginning to form because the ache’s spreading to his chest.

It’s got to be heartburn, right?

“Alright. Didn’t have to answer me too quick just so you can kick me out.”

He mutters underneath his breath a little hurt, taking your responses as his cue to leave. His flair for what you think is the dramatics makes you roll your eyes and slap his thigh, following him out on the way to the door.

Jungkook’s fazed because he doesn’t exactly know the essential purpose plus his expected outcome of this five-minute visit. He doesn’t have a clue, but dropping to your apartment unannounced and seeing you for just even five minutes, even if he doesn’t know why, doesn’t seem wrong.

What is wrong, is that you’d normally kiss him goodbye.

This time, you don’t.

... \ ( ♡ ) / ...

Jungkook’s gut tells him to come early to class, even telling his dad that he’d come down there by himself so he could scope out his class like the great son that he is, and he does exactly that.

Some of the early-birds are pleasantly surprised to see him there, early and alone without Dr. Jeon, sitting on his usual chair.

This setting’s odd for him and as much as he wants to leave, he doesn’t feel the need to. He doesn’t really care if he’s intimidating the students because after all, that’s not the reason why he’s here. In fact, he’s aware that he seems to be quite the talk of the campus, the verdict being half and half if he was as fun, easygoing, yet stern like his father — or if he’s something else entirely. Either way, none of them could catch on to the fact besides you that he’s not here out of passion, but rather obligation.

There’s less than thirty students in the room but Jungkook could just feel it at the back of his spine that you’re gonna walk through the door soon enough. You’ve got to be, right? Jungkook stands by himself near the door, practically barricading the door with how he’s built.

This familiar guy he can’t put a name to is walking through the door carelessly, eyes completely fixed on his phone that his shoulder’s barreling into Jungkook’s.

“Oh hey dude, what’s up?”

The guy in question barely even looks up for a second, a meek smile on his face before turning to his phone again and just staying there by the door, a character paused to block it all for a fucking text as what it seems.

Jungkook barely needs a second to look at him eye to eye; tall, pale, long blonde hair, and smooth pronounced features.

Hwang Hyunjin.

He’s only seen him in passing but never on this scale, his first instinct being straightening his back. They’re roughly the same height, Jungkook shoving his observation to the back of his head that Hyunjin’s only a millimeter higher than him.

He’s probably the only one applying pressure to this scenario, thick brows furrowing as he almost grimaces looking at the younger guy in front of him.

“Are you in this class?”

What?

Hyunjin’s confused to say the least, not only because this random dude he bumped into is suddenly making conversation with him, but because someone’s actually questioning about his presence here.

He lowers his phone, putting a pause to his heated exchange of which installment of this series they’re watching this, all in the favor for staring at this guy who’s cowling at him.

“... Yes?”

His answer even sounds unsure, Jungkook’s questioning raise of his brows prompting him to explain.

Hyunjin doesn’t even know why he feels compelled to explain but he does it nonetheless. “They say I could sit in this class. Some topics would show up in the quizbee next week.”

That’s just grand.

Before Jungkook can simmer in his irritation even more, his dad slips through the door by holding his shoulders in place, looking between the two of them briefly before walking to his desk.

“Kook? Thought you’d open up the lesson without me.”

Blondie tilts his gaze, eyes narrowing as he tries to scan a Kook in his brain’s directory and why it sounds so fond coming from Dr. Jeon.

“Mmmm, sorry dad.”

Jungkook emphasizes a little more than needed, turning to him and sending him a half-hearted grin while unbeknownst to him, Hyunjin pales and is having a breakdown and a half.

Did he really just accidentally bump into the college president’s son? Is he gonna be expelled now?

Jungkook’s oblivious to the inner turmoil that’s unfolding in the guy in front of him, crossing his arms before looking at his dad once more.

“Is he allowed here?” 

He questions sharply like a toddler who’s just seen an inconspicuous man by the swing, his cheeks rounding with his lips pursed.

His dad’s really confused because this is the most intrigue he’s seen Jungkook inhibit for the whole eight weeks.

Of course his dad knows; he’s more than aware that his son has literally no interest in being a professor, and honestly speaking, he’s not even mad at that. He’a outsmarted him on this one and just went along with the lengths of hi son trying to impress him, falling into this eight-week routine of them bonding together with little practice teaching, yet Jungkook still wonders where he got his wit from.

He looks back and forth between Jungkook and Hyunjin, perplexed because he’s pretty sure that the two of them don’t know each other and that doesn’t explain the tension lingering.

“Hyunjin? Yeah. President’s lister, right?”

Hyunjin grins and chuckles at that, bowing slightly as he just passes Jungkook that appalls the latter.

“You put me there, sir.”

Jungkook mocks him under his breath, not going unnoticed by his dad who just chuckles all the same. “What’s up with you?”

“Nothing,” he lies right out of his teeth, sitting on his chair and spreading his legs until his dad nudges him to be atleast decent because he wants the students to focus on his presentation and not his son’s crotch.

He feels cursed having such clear vision because even when the lights are dim, Jungkook still finds his gaze looking for you out of habit. Cursed for seeing Hyunjin sit on the other side of you and suddenly he wishes that this would be the time that Jimin interferes.

He’s unsure if you’re making him confused or he’s confusing himself, but the way his head feels like splitting just by thinking about you and what he could’ve done wrong tells him that he should be definite.

“Would you mind wrapping up the lesson, Mr. Jeon?” his dad asks outloud and for any other context, they’d share identical smiles on how they should be professional towards each other (as suggested by his dad) during class.

“Not at all, Dr. Jeon.”

God, he’s so oblivious to see how he has everyone gravitating towards him that it’s actually endearing. You sitting all the way up gives you a front-row seat to see how everyone sits up a little straighter and how heads follow his every move.

Jungkook has everyone wrapped around his finger and he doesn’t even know — you’re everyone; he can’t know.

He steps up to the plate and the natural dominance and hold he has on everyone broke through, a lesson about statistics never being this intense and a large majority of the people would really stay for another hour and a half if it’s Jungkook who’s teaching.

He’s so absorbed into summarizing as a way of destressing that he ended up giving perhaps one of the best makeshift lectures ever, his dad positively awed and ending up even more confused.

Jungkook’s coming down from his lecture high, nervously fiddling with his fingers as his dad gives the final reminders. What doesn’t help is also you coming out of the classroom with Hyunjin in tow, wearing your cardigan, and that’s what considerably sets him off.

Suddenly, he now decides that your cardigan is the ugliest and most disgusting piece of clothing he’s ever seen in his life. It’s the furthest thing from adorable, and the nearest thing into being set on fire.

You still smell sweet and homey when you’re nearing him, and the realization that your cardigan’s tainted by the smell of you and soon enough, Hyunjin will — it hits Jungkook too hard that he mutters under his breath, his jaw lax from being clenched.

“If you have a problem with me, just tell me about it.” 

He can’t find the will in himself to care whether or not Hyunjin’s gone on without you and is waiting for you by the corridor, or that his dad’s arranging his shelf and could be possibly listening.

“I don’t,” your face reflects the same thing as your answer, devoid of any uncertainty that you have a problem with him.

“You don’t?” he prods further even if he knows that asking the second time wouldn’t even help.

“I don’t. Do you?” 

There’s no malice in your tone. It’s the same gentleness laced with mischief underneath, head tilting in question.

That’s when he narrows his eyes at you, always knowing how to play your cards right without him knowing.

“With you or with myself?”

You shrug carelessly, an automatic giggle tumbling out of your lips that it bothers you too because you shouldn’t be okay with pulling yourself away from Jungkook, and the fact that it could be because you made peace long enough that the two of you will never be more is something to blame.

“You tell me, Mr. Jeon.” 

He’s never hated his family name more and the formality preceding it than now. In reality, he’s just a year older than most of you in this class and the last time he’s checked, no one calls their senior, despite being from another university, like that.

Everyone assumed that he should be called with respect because after all, they’re probably looking at the future of this institution anyways. 

Stable breaths aren’t enough and Jungkook seems to despise the way your slightest change towards him affects him the most, and his pride over not reaching out to your first has long been gone since.

He figures that this is just your way of detaching from him because his eight weeks are almost up, and that he should be totally fine with it because after all it’s only been eight weeks.

He can’t see another eight weeks of you pulling out from him, and even worse, eight weeks without you.

“We’re not cool.”

Jungkook says as soon as you open your door, not waiting for you to gesture him to come in. In any other situation, he’d find you adorable having traded your contacts for glasses, and absolutely sexy if his blood’s rushing elsewhere besides his cheeks. There’s no introduction of asking about your day nor catching you off-guard with a kiss either. 

It’s him going straight to your bed and lying upright, looking at you somberly that you feel sorry you’ve been establishing this change in the first place.

“Tell me what’s wrong.”

His question is a complete 180 from his voice that’s been gravelly since morning, sincerity underneath the rough edges.

You shake your head no, a signal that there’s absolutely nothing wrong and you don’t have anything to tell him about.

“Are you sure?”

He looks at you with wide reassuring eyes just begging for anything, atleast something, the only time that he wishes there’s something wrong going on so he could chalk it up to that instead of facing this shift with you blindly and aimlessly. 

You’re wordlessly climbing up on bed too, making him automatically scoot over to his side of your bed when he stays overnight, instant warmth welcoming you just by having your shoulders touch with him. It’s a head nod of yes, I’m sure that there’s nothing wrong with your eyes closed. 

Being beside him is the equivalent of all the comfortable nights you’ve slept. Jungkook’s the ultimate compilation and the most expensive goodie box of warm hugs and warm tea that tasted familiar instead of incredibly earthy. He’s white noise and eight-hour loops of rainfall against your windows and humidifier-goodness of sleep that you take indulgence and warmth in.

Jungkook’s in another realm of thought when he almost snaps at you because your roles have been reversed and it’s him who’s doting over you.

“Are you usually this non-committal?”

You’re always warm with a cherry on top when you talk to Jungkook, and just only two days of you giving him timid replies has him asking you if you’re the opposite of the adjective that people most commonly attached to you.

“I think we both know best that I’m loyal.”

You are. 

It’s a word that’s almost always attached to your name. You’ve never really sustained a large group of close friends, and it wasn’t needed, but Jungkook finds it funny that you’re oblivious to how people look at you.

He’s well-acquainted with what goes around, and the only things that go around about you was that you’ve touched them in one way or another. You’re the most loyal friend Jimin has because you’ve stuck with him even if he’s spilled his guts on your bathroom floor, missing the mark of your toilet bowl. You gave up your bed for him and tucked him in even if he was still at risk of throwing up because he just couldn’t stop, and made him breakfast the next morning. You’ve only known each other for three days.

Hoseok considers you his most loyal neighbor slash friend ever, because you let him have a go at your pantry even if you knew at the back of your head that he’d screw up something in his recipe one way or another. Even started buying extra ingredients whenever he needs them, and him purposefully forgetting that he has brown sugar at the back of his cabinet.

You are loyal, and that’s what he sometimes hates about you too because it makes you more vulnerable. A little too easy to trample on. A little too easy to have you cheering for someone from the bleachers when they’re still on the bench.

Jungkook wonders if you’re loyal to him too, and if you were (which he’s sure of, and there’s no denying it), would you still be even if he feels like the two of you are growing apart?

“Then why do I feel that-“

He sighs in exasperation, head turning to face you and he’s greeted with your finger outstretched, digging in to where his dimple would appear.

He could look at you properly this time because he’s not in a rush asking if you’re okay. Eyes glazed looking up at him underneath your glasses, scrunched nose with the cutest smile and all that he wants this to never stop.

“Hey.”

You whisper in a rush all of a sudden, a toothy grin fading steadily when your thumb comes to rest on his cheek, whole hand soon pressed to it whole that Jungkook finds himself leaning.

“I’m in love with you.”

It comes out of you fluidly; no baited breath and no hesitation at all. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go, actually. Not once did you think that you’d ever tell Jungkook you love him in this way, or ever for that matter, but it’s something that materialized out of thin air.

It’s as quick as a passing thought and as stable as a core memory, reiterating what is only a truth instead of a confession.

There’s no sadness in your gaze and no distrust either, but the smile that stretches on your cheeks doesn’t look as giddy.

He’s a little cross-eyed with how close you are, but Jungkook audibly whimpers when you pull away suddenly and out of the bed altogether, picking up your laptop from your table.

You don’t know what you’re doing either, but you could only hope that it looks as natural as it seemed, wanting him to know that your sudden realization that you need to make a twenty-page essay in size 12 font has nothing to do with your profession of love.

“But I know I shouldn’t, and besides, it’s a conflict of interest. Anyway, let’s just end this here now and-...”

“Are you insane?”

Jungkook exclaims in punctuation marks and of deep urgency, looking at you as if you suggested the most ridiculous thing ever after what you’ve just said, which you exactly did.

“Just continue loving me!”

He says it as the most obvious thing ever, his chest feeling an odd sense of relief after having blown up with emotion. He’s a sponge at this point in whatever relationship the two of you have. He’ll take what you can give, but this was something Jungkook would run to hell and back for to not take from you.

“You didn’t even ask if I loved you back! And that’s my honest answer, not something that would appease you when you return the question.”

He looks a little softer around the edges at the moment — arms flailing around and hair bouncing as he keeps moving his head. 

His cheeks are puffed out when he’s angry and his lips are red from trying to get his point across strongly, stammering with what more he could think of in his head.

“It’s not a conflict of interest either! I only shadowed my dad to please him, but we both know that I don’t want to become a professor like him. You just think that it is because you’re up on the seats and I’m down on the podium!” he’s heated and his cheeks are warm and there’s no way it has something to do with your airconditioning.

“It’s a stint. It was a literal eight-week stint for free, because he’s the president for god’s sake — that’s it! I go back to my university in like what, a week? And they don’t even need me passing requirements, because they already know, again, that I’m the son of a university president! Honestly, it’d be stupid of them to.” 

Jungkook feels like he’s gonna pass out with how overwhelmed he is. Too overwhelmed to the point that he doesn’t see you smiling out of the corner of his eye, hand rubbing down the length of his nape to his back.

It’s only then that you realize that he’s rambling and his voice is wavering, concern dripping down from you instead of amused laughter.

“Y/N, please, it’s convenient — more than convenient. I graduate this year, and you next year. The last thing I’d do in my life is grade papers. You know what I want to be? I wanna be-...”

Jungkook’s cut off with a tender kiss on the corner of his mouth that’s grounded him, blinking twice to look at you.

He should really kiss you right now.

“You could’ve condensed that into a single simple sentence,” you snort when you pull away from Jungkook’s hold, sending him a look of faux disappointment to which he whines. “It’s called I love you too, Jungkook.”

He squints at your teasing but reasons just as quick, sneaking in his head underneath your shirt to escape from your teasing and importantly, press a gentle kiss to your chest, then your boobs, and settling to lie down on your stomach as he’s content.

“I was panicked!”

Jungkook’s certain that he loves you, laughing to himself when he heard heavy knocks against your bedroom wall that just conveniently happens to be adjacent to Hoseok’s.

“Fucking finally! I was about to flirt with either of you just so you could cut to the chase and admit it to each other!”

Your laugh is the sweetest thing he’s ever heard, coming out from hiding underneath your shirt and just laying on top of your clothed tummy, hand looking for yours to hold on to.

You’ve been sleepy the entire time, he’s figured. You having switched to your glasses meant you’ve already had your night shower, and only had three hours maximum before succumbing to your bed. You’ve had a long day clearly, and it’s when you’re starting to succumb into sleep right exactly where you are that Jungkook suddenly remembers.

“You know what I want to be? I wanna be-…”

“With you.”

“Mhmm?” you all but mumble, feeling him adjust your head on the pillow while he lays on his, literal weight being lifted off from you.

Jungkook feels even more endeared if that’s any more possible, the tiniest boop to your nose and the softest kiss on your forehead.

“I wanna be with you.”

[startanewdream]

Written for @efkgirldetective's Summer of Jily Prompt #7 (Ice cream + "I don't want anybody else touching you like I do).

Tumblr exclusive at the moment because I don't have a title and the 'happy ending' part of the 'angst with a happy ending' was lost somewhere.

Rated M.

I will love to hear your thoughts about this!

_______________

I.

She is at the end of her round, going towards his cabin—her friends’ cabin, though Lily knows exactly who she is hoping to meet there—when she hears it.

‘—and Potter, what a waste. He won’t ever join him.’

‘We should just wipe him away. Blood traitor, muggle lover—’

‘You mean mudblood lover, Severus?’ Avery’s voice is tinted with malice and there are snickers around. ‘Potter and Evans seem pretty close nowadays. Do you think she gives him everything she denied you?’

‘I would never filth myself,’ comes Snape’s cold reply. ‘If he is tainting his blood, all the worse for him.’

Taint his blood. Is this what Lily’s presence does to James? Is she putting him in a danger he didn’t need to be just by being closer to him?

It’s Snape’s words and she shouldn’t listen to him—the days where she would hear him, would admire him, are long gone—but when she finally reaches the cabin (when James grins at the sight of her, bright and warm, and her heart skips a beat and Lily has to smile back), she sits away from James.

‘Anything wrong?’ he asks, familiar enough to read the tension on her face.

‘No, all normal,’ Lily says, and it’s the first lie.

______

II.

It’s summer and everyone is out of age now and apparating makes things so easy that Lily finds herself less and less at home during that break.

She tells herself it’s because she is avoiding the presence of her sister’s annoying fiance; she blames the fact that Dorcas has a beach house and it’s so much better spending days swimming and tanning; she even goes introspective to blame the pressure of the war looming over them in a way that means she needs to enjoy the last summer break before real life gets them.

But she knows the reason is James.

She finds herself gravitating towards him, unable to resist that attraction even as she knows how dangerous it is for him. Once or twice Lily thinks of telling him about it, of warning how he is stupidly raising his stakes by being near her, but she gives up only for the fact that this (might drive him away and she doesn't want it, not really) would probably just make him want to be even closer to her.

And they are already alarmingly close.

Once Lily would have been repulsed by that idea, but one year later everything has changed—James has changed—and everything about him appeals to her. The way he cares for everyone around him. The way he smiles patiently whenever he is explaining something. The way he grins as if to invite the world to share a great funny joke with him. How he runs his hand through his hair when he’s nervous. How he is so expansive that he seems to occupy any room he is in. How he loves flying, even more than Quidditch, and how relaxed he seems when he is on a broom. How he talks to her, taking it seriously when she needs to and making a joke when things get too serious. How he opens up about his own life and doubts and listens to her.

That would make them friends, really good friends, but then Lily’s heart would not stop racing when he’d touched her hand, or when their knees would bump while sitting closely in the library and then she was forced to note all the physical aspects—the muscles of his arms, the shape of full lips, the line of his jaw, the hazel kaleidoscope of his eyes and how fit he was—and give up any belief her feelings were limited to a friendship.

She fancies him, okay.

Except it’s not okay, because it’s dangerous and by now Lily is positive that James knows it too. Everyone knows it.

They end up together, just the two of them, a lot during that summer. It takes Lily a few days to realize it’s not a coincidence that her interests never align with those of her friends—if she wants to swim, somehow it’s only her and James in the sea; at night, even though it’s still so warm, they are the only ones who venture into the pool for a midnight swim, while the others stay stubbornly indoors.

When Lily suggests going to town to grab an ice cream, somehow James is the only one who is in the mood for it, despite the heat.

It’s not on purpose from his part—at least that’s how Lily sees it—but he isn’t refusing her company either and neither is she refusing his, so James’ boldness flourishes that summer. It’s not cocky as it once would be, it’s just a quiet acceptance that something is finally happening between them as if he never stopped believing it would be possible. Lily feels it when he throws his arm around her shoulders when they are sitting close, almost absently, almost not noticing when Lily lays her head over his shoulder; it’s there when he openly gawks the first time he sees her in a swimming suit, only to be nudged in the ribs by Sirius and then complimenting her ('good thing you wear robes at school, Evans, or there wouldn’t be much schoolwork done'). It’s definitely there when he intertwines their hands, pulling her to the sea with him.

And it’s there when they are sitting closer than they would need for a bench so wide, watching seagulls flying over the sea, each one holding an ice cream.

‘Chocolate chips with chocolate cover and chocolate sprinkles,’ James teases. ‘I think you have an addiction, Lily.’

‘Guilty,’ she replies, not ashamed at all, proving her ice cream and very aware of how James is staring at her. ‘It’s better than asking for vanilla ice cream.’

‘Hey!’ He would look deeply offended if not for the grin on his lips. ‘I’ll let you know vanilla is the best flavour.’

‘Never took you for a vanilla guy, James.’

‘What would take me for? The adventurous gorgeous type?’

Lily laughs, but she doesn’t answer. She doesn’t want to lie to him and deny it.

‘Attractive mysterious type, then?’ he insists. ‘Handsome scoundrel?’

‘I notice your beauty is enhanced a lot.’

‘My beauty? So you admit that I’m beautiful, Evans?’

‘Do I need to? You seem to already know it.’

‘I enjoy hearing you saying all the same,’ he says, and though James shrugs easily she can sense the shift in his eyes, the nervous glint there. ‘That means we would make a beautiful couple.’

‘We would,’ she whispers, still not wanting to lie.

She turns back her attention to the ice cream, already melting under the scorching sun. It makes a mess, and James laughs as she tries to lick the ice cream out of her hands, but then his laugh dies and she watches him swallow slowly, reacting. He always reacts to her.

She licks her lips now, and he also watches this movement, the grin on his face replaced by concentration—no, determination, a fierce look and Lily knows what James will do even before he raises his hand to slide his thumb at the corner of her mouth.

‘You missed here,’ he says, and though he must have wiped off the ice cream already, his caress remains.

His eyes are dark now, even under the sunlight, and he registers how Lily hasn’t stepped back, how she raises her head just the slightest to get closer to him. His gaze strays to her lips, Lily blinks, and then James looks back at her.

‘Lily,’ he says, and it’s a question.

‘James,’ she says, and it’s the only answer she can give him.

His lips find hers and in the bright darkness that surrounds Lily when she closes her eyes, she can see everything in colour. The white of his taste of vanilla. The green of his perfume that reminds her of early mourning in the woods. The brown of his skin as he pulls her closer, one hand holding the back of her neck and the other hand finding hers, locking their fingers together. The red of her blood pumping furiously through her veins, so loud and unstoppable.

And she sees him, messy dark hair, hazel bright eyes, her own sun.

But when they break apart, when she watches him keeping his eyes closed a second longer—savouring it, remembering it—, all that comes to her mind it’s the warning.

Taint his blood.

Her smile falters.

‘James,’ she whispers, all warmth of the day gone, hating everything but herself so much more when he opens his eyes and they are filled with hope. ‘This doesn’t mean anything.’

And this is the second lie she tells him.

___________

III.

Summer is over as far as Lily is concerned, but they still have two weeks in which she forces a smile up to her lips that doesn’t fool anyone.

Everyone knows something happened, though no one knows exactly what, and Lily feels too tired to pretend everything is normal. James barely acknowledges her when they are in the same room, and in the few occasions their eyes meet, there is nothing of that familiarity that he once thrived to share with her. He looks confused and hurt.

Lily could deal with the confusion but she is powerless against the hurt. She is the one who damaged him after all.

Their friends are mostly adamant in letting them deal with the situation, one notable exception being Sirius Black, but Lily didn’t expect anything less from him. He watches her rather resentfully in the first days, and Lily starts looking for excuses to avoid attending the events she had carefully arranged with them (with James, sitting by the edge of the lake, holding a scroll against his back as they wrote everything they would do, laughing and planning and hoping).

The summer days are hot, unbearably hot, and the breeze that comes through the window of her room isn’t enough. She could cast a Cooling Charm, but her wand is far away and the fact that she can cast spells outside school has lost its appeal now. She doesn't even celebrate when her school letter comes with a badge attached to it.

Most of the time Lily just stares at the ceiling of her room, finding patterns in the painting that aren’t really there, too strained and too tired to avoid being even more strained—her mind keeps replaying the moment James leaned closer, the brief moment his breath tingled her skin and the softness of his lips over hers, and Lily has no strength to avoid it. She is addicted to it, to the one thing she had a taste of and cannot have again.

Five days into hiding (she is hiding, Lily won’t deny it), her sister knocks on her door to tell her unceremoniously that one of her freak friends has come to visit her.

‘Hurry, I don’t want Vernon finding him when he arrives,’ Petunia tells her, and Lily ignores her completely.

Him, she said. Him, Lily thinks, and her mind conjures James sitting on the couch of her parents’ living room, a grin on his lips as he charms his way with her parents (he charmed her, Lily doesn’t see what challenge her parents would present), accepting a cup of tea and looking around trying to understand all the muggle contraptions in that muggle house—

Muggle lover. All the worse for him.

She rushes downstairs, her heart pounding on her head, her mouth dry with the excuses she will have to present (go away, just go away) but it’s not James after all.

Sirius looks even more out of place than the James she imagined inside her head, standing with his arms crossed in that pastel living room, and with an unhappy grimace on his lips. He turns at the sound of her, his grey eyes burning disapprovingly—and then, as he stares at her, his expression shifts.

‘You are a mess, Evans.’

Self-consciousness washes over her, and Lily runs her hand through her hair—or tries to, because it gets stuck in the knots of her messy braid. She knows she hasn’t changed clothes ever since she woke up, though it’s nearly midday, so she does the only thing she can: she presses her lips, crosses her arms and tries to look unfazed.

‘I wasn’t expecting a visit,’ she says. It’s summer break, she can do nothing all day.

‘I didn’t even mean your appearance. It was more your… aura.’

‘Aura,’ she repeats, a tiny part of her finding this amusing, but Lily can’t muster strength enough to break a smile. ‘Very mystical, Sirius.’

‘That’s me, master of occult arts. But in this case, I just needed to look at you. You—you look miserable.’

‘Thanks. If that’s all you wanted to say—’

‘Oh, no, I came here to give you a piece of my mind about how you broke my best friend’s heart, but you look somehow worse than him. What’s going on?’

Lily shrugs. ‘Nothing.’

‘So you just decided to play with his feelings and ditch him the moment he corresponded?’

His words are a poison that crawls through her skin, entering it slowly but certain; Lily feels it reaching her bloodstream, spreading through every part of her body, until the poison finds her heart. She thought she was oblivious to pain after the last days, but she was wrong.

‘I wasn’t playing with his feelings,’ she whispers, her voice hoarse, so close to breaking.

‘Then what? I thought—everyone thought—you fancied him too. Merlin, Evans, that boy was in love with you.’

The worst part is that Lily knows it. It was not a play to James, it never was. She saw it in the way his face lighted up at the sight of her, how eager he was to become friends once Lily first extended her peace flag. She saw how his eyes always looked first for her in any room he entered, how he’d find any reason to stay closer.

And she saw everything because she was paying attention.

Of course she was. One does not fall in love also if not paying attention.

‘I don’t know what to say, Sirius,’ Lily says truthfully. ‘I am sorry for all the confusion I’ve caused.’

‘Sorry is not enough.’

‘I know.’

Sirius watches her with something that borders on disappointment now. ‘You better find a way of fixing this, Evans.’

‘I—I don’t know how. I’m trying to keep my distance—’

‘And how is that helping you two?’

It’s not, Lily knows, and that’s the point. She can’t explain to James what is the problem and she is afraid that if she sees him again, if her determination falters her for one second—

‘We are going to have a party tomorrow night,’ Sirius says, his voice leaving no room for argument. ‘Dorcas’ house. It’s a goodbye party, we even invited the muggle neighbours. You’ll come, you’ll find James and you’ll talk. Fix this.’

‘I can’t.’

‘You better find a way, Evans, because that thing of keeping your distance? Well, Hogwarts letter came yesterday. Let me guess, you are Head Girl.’

Lily nods, not understanding where Sirius is heading with this.

‘Guess who’s Head Boy this year?’

____________

Lily hears the music as soon as she disapparates near Dorcas’ house. People, young people around her age, are walking towards the house and she joins the flow letting herself get lost in that stream of people, hoping it’s enough to not draw attention to her presence.

It’s useless. As soon as she crosses the doorway, Dorcas cries for her, her voice louder than the music, and then people look at her curiously.

‘Merlin, Lily!’ Dorcas cries, ignoring everyone in the room to whom that sentence makes no sense. ‘I thought I would need to invade the Prefect’s Cabin to see you again.’

‘Sorry, sorry,’ Lily says, accepting Dorcas’ hug, and using it as an excuse to avoid looking around. ‘I had stuff to do.’

It’s vague, it’s almost a lie, and Dorcas is on the edge of discussing it when Lily says she is going to get a drink, leaving the room.

When she reaches the kitchen, Lily considers that having herself questioned by Dorcas was preferable, because of course she runs into James at the first opportunity.

And of course he already has a company.

He is with his back to her, holding a bottle of beer in his hand while he talks with a pretty dark-haired girl. In another time Lily would find amusing how James obviously has no idea what he’s talking about—muggle rock bands, a subject that Sirius would fare better—, but she can’t break a smile right now, because she sees that James is trying.

That’s what he is doing with that unknown girl. He is making a real effort to keep a conversation, trying to understand what she is saying; he is trying to look interesting, to gather her attention.

Ten days, she thinks selfishly. We kissed ten days ago and I can’t stop thinking about it and you are flirting with another girl.

He must sense her staring; he turns around, and his eyes find her for a brief second before Lily bolts through the door (she is running, and she won’t deny it), grabbing the first bottle she sees on her way out.

Sirius must have lied to her (you broke my best friend’s heart), because James looks normal. Not hurt anymore, just… normal. Not like he used to like her in those first glorious days of the summer—bright and hopeful and awaiting—but as if she is just anyone else. Ordinary.

It’s fair, all things considered. She couldn’t expect him to remain in love with the girl who kissed him then rejected him. But she sees it, clearly as day, what the future holds: James will move on whatever he feels for her (that boy was in love with you) and then he will do with someone else everything he used to do with her—that inviting grins, the glint in his eyes, throwing his arm around her shoulder, pulling her closer, so… intimate. Familiar. Hers.

He will share with others what used to be hers.

She leaves the house, in search of a quiet place at the beach to sit on, and looks at the bottle in her hands. Wine. Not good. She will take forever to get drunk on wine and afterwards the headache won’t even be worth it.

But it’s all she has and James is somewhere in that house flirting with a girl (that’s not her) that didn’t reject him and he has every right to do it. Even if it’s a muggle girl. Even if the reason Lily is not with him is that she is muggleborn.

It’s ironic and it’s sad, but it’s not the same. This is a one-night thing. It’s the end of the summer, he’s probably just looking for the last bit of carefree summer adventure as the single guy he is. They will just dance with each other, close together, enjoying their freedom, finding a secluded room, and he will touch the corner of her lips, asking, and she will say yes because that’s the only answer she can give him.

It won’t mean anything, but this time it will be true and this time James won’t get hurt by it.

Maybe Lily should do the same. Not to get even, but to start her own way forward. She can’t be harbouring her feelings for him—wasn’t that the point of not advancing things? Wasn’t that why she lied to him? (That kiss had meant everything)

She takes a sip of the wine, then another and one more for good measure, and she rises, almost colliding with him. Of course.

‘Hey,’ he says awkwardly, arms extended to steady her. It lasts less than a second, but his hands over her arms burn all the same, stronger than the heat any day of that summer.

‘Hi.’

He is looking at a point over her head, unable to meet her eyes, his hand lifting the hair at the back of his head and Lily remembers running her fingers through the strands of his hair while they were kissing, enjoying the fact that for once she was the one messing it.

‘Look, I’m just gonna say it, okay?’ James says in a rush, not as when he is excitedly talking about something he finds interesting. ‘I’m sorry for—for everything.’

Everything. What does it mean?

‘I am too,’ she answers carefully. He takes a deep breath.

‘I heard we are going to be Heads this year—I don’t know what Dumbledore was thinking, really—and I don’t want things to be weird between us.’

Weird. Things were never weird between them before. They weren’t friends, then Lily barely stood him, then they were acquaintances, then they were friends, then they were flirting with each other and then they were so close to something.

But never weird.

Somehow this notion helps to clear the fog in her head.

‘I don’t want it either,’ Lily says, and there is no doubt in her voice. James seems to breathe again with her words.

‘Good.’ There is a moment of silence. ‘Can we forget everything and go back to being just friends?’

Lily steels herself. She takes a look at James’ face—his eyes are on her forehead now, almost meeting her eyes but not yet ready—, one last look to admire him in the darkness of the beach and she is not lying when she says: ‘We can.’

By the end of the night it will be a lie, though, and that’s number three.

___________

They are trying and because no one tries better than James Potter, they are almost achieving it.

They go back to the house, keeping a safe distance between them so no one could misinterpret it, but whatever their friends see in their faces seems to relax everyone. Lily and James are fine, they believe, they are over that weird thing between them, and Lily starts believing it too.

She can do it.

A bottle of gin finds its way towards her group and the music is exciting. It’s a party, she is on a party, and it’s easy to join Dorcas in the middle of a dance, and it’s even easier when Dorcas is replaced by a cute muggle boy who doesn’t look anything like James (that’s why it’s easier—it takes only one second for her to look for any similarity and find none and it’s so easy).

She wonders if that’s why James was talking to that dark-haired girl. If he was avoiding finding Lily in someone else too.

But that’s a bad thought, it’s not a thought of someone who’s trying (and Lily is, she swears), so she accepts his arms, let who-knows-his-name twirl her around the room, but when he leans in to kiss her, she laughs and diverts—she is trying, but it takes small steps, so she says something about getting another drink and goes to the next room.

That’s a mistake.

A big, big mistake.

She finds them sitting close together on a couch that should only fit one, joining some silly drinking game. His arm is around her shoulders, holding a glass that’s nearly finished; they are laughing and as Lily watches it, the girl leans closer to speak something in his ear, her hand playing with the curls of his hair as she speaks. It takes a full second, but he grins, turning to her and winking.

It could be nothing, it could be just some joke, but it’s not harmless, Lily knows it. It’s a flirt, and James has every right to do it; he is free and Lily has just told him they can be friends. Friends don’t get jealous. Friends don’t get their hearts ripped out with the sight of the other smiling happily at someone else.

Lily can’t do it at all.

So she turns away and runs once more (she’s getting quite good at it by now), sprinting upstairs in search of an empty room, somewhere where she can rest until she can breathe again, until she can rearrange her expression into something normal enough for her to come back to the party, find that blond guy who is not James and enjoy her summer break as he is doing right now.

Until she can pretend everything is normal.

‘Lily?’

His voice breaks the silence of that room—though Lily knows she would have heard it anyway—and it sends a wave of panic through her body. She is not ready. She can’t look at him and still keep her promise.

James doesn’t know about her troubles—he is trying after all, and he is so much better at this than Lily will ever be—so he walks towards her, takes a look at her face and kneels in front of her.

‘Are you okay?’

‘No,’ she says, unable to lie. He would see through her anyway.

‘I saw you leaving—what happened?’

‘I need more time. I can’t...’

‘Can’t what?’ She doesn’t answer. James sighs. ‘Are you drunk? Come on, rest a little, I will bring you some water—’

‘I’m not drunk,’ Lily says. Another truth. ‘I just need—I want—’

‘What?’

In answer, she raises her hand and lets her fingers comb his hair. He shivers, his breath catching, his eyes widening and he holds her arm to stop the movement. Nervous. Insecure. She can’t fault him. They’ve been there before, at the edge of something, and she accepted only to turn him away a second later.

‘What are you doing?’

It’s a demand more than a question, and Lily attends it. ‘I don’t want anybody else touching you like I do. It’s mine.’

Her voice is ferocious and unfair and Lily waits for his cold reply, the one she deserves—she has no right to claim any part of him—, but it never comes. Instead, James blinks.

‘Then take it,’ he challenges. Lily does.

Her lips crash over his, and this time is not soft or patient. It’s desperate and when she tastes the whiskey in his mouth, she understands the difference and gladly accepts it. His hands are everywhere—holding her waist, climbing under her skirt, running through her hair to pull her closer—but what somehow stays with her it’s the moment he closes the door and then they are alone and the darkness is their friend.

The darkness makes it easy, embarrassingly easy, for her to break the kiss enough to lift his shirt and for him to slide her dress down and for them to find their way to the bed. He holds her, his lips incessantly, and a part of Lily wonders if he doesn’t want to break apart for fear of what happened the last time he did it.

But the majority of her is too wrapped in the feelings he is bringing to worry about anything. She accepts him, accepts every caress he distributes openly, and returns it eagerly. She tastes the saltiness of his skin, feels every muscle of his chest—the ones she has memorized after so many days at the beach though she had only imagined how they would feel under her fingers—, presses herself closer to him. His hands are exploring her—he saw her at the beach too—and then his mouth replaces his hands and the moan that escapes her lips is true.

She pulls him up, tasting her own sweat on his lips—it was a warm day and it’s a warmer night—and her hands work on the button of his jeans. There is a moment of hesitation—he breaks away, his eyes boring into hers even as the darkness barely allows them to see each other—and then it’s gone. He pulls her last piece of cloth then stands up long enough to take out his last one and then there is only them.

Only Lily and James, except they don’t feel like two anymore. They are one and in the darkness, Lily sees those colours that are so James once more, fireworks whose sounds are moans and short breaths and names whispered so low that the other could pretend they didn’t hear.

But Lily hears it and it’s hers. He is hers for that moment and she is his.

She lied before (and now she knows it). She can’t forget him. She can’t be just friends. James is bright sunny days, cosy cold nights and she longs to share it all with him (she couldn’t, but her mind can’t recall why right now). She locks her hand with his, her nails burying into his skin, and Lily doesn’t want to let go.

He holds her hand, pressing it so hard that she can’t feel circulation there anymore, and then he cries her name, this time impossible to deny it. He called her.

It’s not the last time he will do it tonight. He presses another kiss to her lips—it’s feverish and urgent and somehow even more desperate than the first one—, rests his forehead against her catching his breath and Lily enjoys the moment, enjoys that pleasure and soreness that runs through her body, enjoys how her chest brushes against his as she breathes, slower each time, recovering.

Recover. As if she could.

James breaks apart, rolling to the side and for a moment there is silence, the music distant, the world distant until it’s not anymore, until the world seems too close and the air too heavy, not one breeze to refresh it. Lily thinks of opening the window—it’s already opened, the wind bringing the smell of the sea to the room—when she realizes it’s not the air that feels wrong.

It’s them. No, it’s him.

‘James,’ she calls, panic and fear trembling her voice, coldness spreading through her skin in a way that it should not be possible, not on this summer day.

She can hear him rising from the bed, grabbing his clothes.

‘Lily,’ he answers shortly, opening briefly the door and she can’t see his face. ‘I know, it doesn’t mean anything.’

And that’s James Potter's first lie.

[descendantsramblings]

Style Headcanons

So basically, I’m a big hater to the way the costume team worked on them. The whole “All Isle kids wear Leather” and “Auradon Kids always look like they’re on their first kid and on the way to the country club” thing drives me crazy. It sorta feels like they made costumes before giving them personalities (The leather on Carlos  and Evie feels like it clashes with their personalities. Lonnie’s dresses in the first movie doesn’t fit the personality we see, even though she didn’t have much of a personality until movie two. Audrey dressed like a thirty-four year old mother who just picked up her kid before going to the country club. Ben’s only good outfit was his swim trunks.) So here are some personal headcanons and pictures of what I imagine for them. (I started making them at 1am last night lol)

Villain Kids 

Evie

As someone raised to want to be a princess, she wants to dress like how she imagines a princess would.

She loves pastels and is no stranger to pairing pastel blue with a neutral red or bright white. 

The only pants she really wears are either athletic shorts or those little flowy elastic shorts, otherwise she’s all skirts.

She’s sorta a prep but not in the same way a character like Audrey would be. 

Evie has respect for most aesthetics, even though she doesn’t fully fit just one. However, she hates crocs and those little pastel shorts that white boys wear, she will announce it often.

Wouldn’t be caught dead in neon colors. 

owns a blue fur coat (it’s fake fur, obviously)

Carlos

Baby boy is a total softie

You know that one gay little sweater in movie one, that’s where they went right, more of that.

He’s into the soft boy aesthetic and only strays from it for formal wear

loves layering sweaters over button ups

Cuffed jeans, always because ya know, bisexual 

Owns a floral button up from Jay, normally he hates patterned button ups but it’s his favorite shirt. 

Loves striped sweaters, he owns about 6 variations of them in different colors (all include red, white, or black of course)

Jay 

In theory, Jay doesn’t really have one aesthetic, he’s willing to try on just about anything

Most of his clothing was bought by Evie or Carlos, especially his formal wear

The only clothes that Jay will buy for himself is athletic wear

He doesn’t really see the point of buy clothing that he can’t go straight to practice in. 

Still has the beanie,  but he owns one in just about every color to match it to his outfit.

Listen, we know Jay’s main color is yellow/gold, but why did we always see him with more red/blue in the movie? What type of snow white aesthetic were they trying to give him?

Jay owns a button up that he write on, he refuses to wear it actually buttoned though

Mal

She loves the grunge/alternative aesthetic, she thinks it makes her look more like she belongs to the Isle

She wouldn’t wear skirts until after she and Evie became friends, Evie bought her her first skirt (a purple plaid one) and she fell in love with it

Mal has a whole jewelry box of just chains, both necklaces and ones that attach to clothing 

Owns a pair of Demonia Swing-815 boots (black patent) and a pair of Demonia Camel-203 boots (holographic purple) 

100% owns one of those studded hot topic belts. 

Has a headband with little horns that symbolize her mother’s horns 

Instead of the leather half gloves from the movie, she has those little fishnet gloves and covers her hands in rings.

Uma

Her style is similar to Mal’s because if Mal is going to do something, Uma will do it better.

Uma only wore outfits that were super Fem and had skirts until Mal started doing it

Then it was Uma always wearing pants, because of her love for plaid skirts she owns a whole collection of plaid pants

the only jeans she owns are black or dark wash. 

Her first ever large purchase was a pair of Doc Marten 1460 Zip Tartan Lace up boots (they’re green, black, and blue plaid) 

She and Harry bought matching Doc Marten Jadon platforms (his are more shiny though)

Isn’t as into chains as Mal, more into chockers. 

Harry 

When the E-boy aesthetic came out, Harry was all over it 

Harry definitely has one of those chains with a little lock on it. 

I’d like to imagine he has baby gauges

the before mentioned platform doc martens, he definitely treats them like his baby

Even though Harry dresses like an e-boy,  he always has his pirate hat on

Definitely wears cloth masks as a fashion piece he actually would wear his in the pandemic though, unlike some people who wore them before but not for safety 

Harry is actually really good at graphic liner, he owns a gold, red, and white eyeliner to add color to the outfit if it’s mainly black

gold>silver 

Bought plaid pants because Uma did, he want’s to match with his captain

Gil 

As we know (maybe you don’t) it’s in the canon that Gil’s mother taught him to sew and he enjoys it. 

So Gil doesn't dress in one aesthetic or even close to being in one, he wants to try out everything, both making and wearing them.

He does stick to a monochrome color scheme though, mainly shades of brown with white or black thrown in. Sometimes he adds a little red or yellow though to “honor” Gaston

Most of his clothing is more comfortable than anything

Only owns three pairs of jeans, the rest are different types of pants (he loves corduroys) 

Owns a pants chain that harry bought him but he only really wears it when Harry and Uma are wearing one so he won’t feel left out on it. 

Dizzy 

Baby girl has seen the Isle steal the childhood innocence from people, she dresses in kidcore as a way to keep hers

Her outfits always has at least 4 different colors in it.

No stranger to neon colors, she has a pair of overalls that are neon rainbow and covered in gummy candy and she only wears them with a neon green tee, Evie and Carlos hate this outfits, Jay loves it because of the disappointment it brings to the two fashion fans 

Dizzy’s outfits in the movie were colorful obviously but they should have been just more over the top

She loves patterns and has no fear of pattern mixing

definitely owns some funky earrings, clay rings, and  statement necklaces

puts beads on her shoe laces, especially on her converse (they were white ones, she drew all over them) 

Auradon Kids 

Ben

Okay so Ben’s animated and movie outfits were bad, you can’t convince me of anything else

Why was Ben not dressed in the soft boy aesthetic? You’re trying to tell me that Belle’s son wouldn’t be a soft boy?

He has a jean jacket with his father’s beast symbol painted on the back

Absolutely loves graphic crewnecks, often layers them over collared shirts

He and Carlos go shopping together often in their free time

Lover of funky crew socks,  ones with paintings, patterns, logos, whatever. But his socks always match

After he and Mal started Dating, he bought a white jean jacket and let her paint it, he wears it all the time even though it didn’t match his original clothing, he bought more clothes in her color scheme to match it

He owns like 6 pairs of high top converse (light blue, yellow, white, navy, black, and Purple after getting the jacket back from Mal)

Chad

Listen, out of everyone he was the closest to how I imagined he should be, that being said, he had a little soft boy thing going on in some movies that I don’t think fit his personality

Polos and button ups are basically all he owns, but he does have some of those pastel simply southern esc graphic tees (Southern people probably know what I’m on about, all the guys who act like Chad at my school have like 5 of them each)

Owns 6 pairs of those horrid little southern boy pastel shorts in different shades of blue (plus 1 white pair)

Will not wear jeans, ever, the only pants he owns are khakis

All over the shirts that have logos embroidered into the shirt over the chest. 

Definitely gets asked if he’s on the way to golf/ the country club, the joke is that he is, he has to meet his father there after school

prep.jpg

Audrey 

Listen, I’m not an Audrey stan, but they did her so dirty in the first movie

She should have been the stereotypical mean girl outfit wise, I mean, mini skirts, all pastels

Owns a pink teddy coat, and a white one, she actually cares about if they get dirty though, takes good care of them

definitely has a collection of tennis skirts, pairs them with sweaters/crewnecks or blouses that have a slight puff to the sleeve

The type of girl to wear rufflely rompers on her birthday every year, pink, white, or baby blue obviously

loves those tiny shoulder bags

preppy and looks good in it. 

cropped polos and tube tops

Jane

This account is a Jane should have been cottage core/ fairy core fan page, her outfits were almost there, just not there, she’s literally a fairy but can’t use magic nor did they let her dress like one, I hate it here

Baby girl loves gingham and floral patterns, some of her dresses are a little more to her mother’s taste than hers (her mother bought them) but as long as it’s a pattern she likes she will wear it. 

Cardigans are her best friend, she owns one in multiple shades of pink and blue, plus a white one (all of her clothing fits a pastel pink/blue/white color scheme)

Babydoll dresses her a her favorite style of them (the one I put in the top right corner is what I imagine her birthday dress as) 

People try to mockingly ask if she’s on her way to a tea party/picnic (like they do with Chad and the country club) if the answer isn’t actually yes one of her friends still say yes, no one can be rude to her about it 

She owns a corset (Evie bought it for her, it made her nervous at first but she loves it) 

Owns kitten heels and flats mainly also two pairs of mary janes (in white and blue) 

has one of those little pearl purses that aren’t really useful but they’re cute 

Lonnie

Last but not least, our funky little lesbian (she is, Jay is just her emotional support queer man) Lonnie, she sticks to the teal, blue, and pink color scheme they gave her in movie one

She mainly wears sweats (or athletic clothing) otherwise it’s graphic tees tucked in (many of them are from the men’s section) 

Only wears sneakers, she has places to be but also collects them (also owns 1 pair of pink crocs, Evie tried to burn them)

Carlos and Ben talked her into wearing a collar shirt under a graphic tee once (they bought her a sleeveless button up which she hated at first) and now she does it anytime she wants to look like she put effort into her outfit. 

Wears a lot of necklaces and rings (she loves to layer necklaces, she thinks it makes her sweats look less boring) 

Uses a mini backpack instead of a purse, easier to carry more things.

Has two pairs of custom painted air forces. 

Hates wearing bracelets but always has to have a hair tie on her wrist so they don’t feel empty .

[beoneofus]

THE LOST BOYS : DAVID, DWAYNE, PAUL, MARKO

- With stores they'd shop at in our generation

𝗛𝗼𝘁 𝗧𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗰

I feel like Hot Topic would be a thing for all the boys. There's no way in hell Marko would walk past that store and think ‘ this place sucks ’, because let's face it, Hot Topic is a battle ground full of the utmost artistic sets of jewelry wear and grunge related clothing around. It's expensive, but who's to say these boys are broke?

Dwayne would definitely go for the chain wallets. He just radiates a ‘ I wear chains ’ vibe, ya know? Probably would get one of those chains you hook to your belt loops, too.

Paul would definitely be browsing the different pants and looking at the body jewelry. In my mind, I see him as someone who'd rock a lip or eyebrow piercing - I can also see his curiosity peaking of how he'd look with one.

We all know David would be eyeing the cool jackets. Although he wears one related to a tuxedo type-a jacket, I can feel he has a great sense of fashion that he hides under that cold exterior. And, believe it or not, he'd be curious about the supernatural merch.

𝗦𝗽𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲𝗿𝘀

This place would be more of Marko and Paul's type of store. Although I can see David finding amusement in some of the wall decor, I don't think he'd be too into it. It DEFINITELY wouldn't be Dwayne's thing.

Marko would most likely go for the strobe lights. Although he hates normal lighting, the colorful lights don't really get to him. I can see him buying multiple ones just to have a whole ass rave with Paul and his pet pigeons.

Paul would be attracted to the mugs with vulgar sayings and the latex horse masks. I can see him picking up a black mug with the word ‘ hobknocker ’ on it, snorting at it, and then asking Dwayne what it actually means. Once he explains it, Paul would slowly set it down and never speak of that experience again.

As for the later horse masks - he's just a weird, marijuana junky that's into out of this world shit. He'd see it, think of scaring the shit out of some surfer Nazi's with it, and immediately buy it.

𝗝𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘆'𝘀

This store has more of a mellow, skater type of vibe to it. It'd definitely be in Dwayne's setting, even though it has more bright colors than dark.

I can see him checking out the various book bags and designs they hold. Maybe bob his head in approval at one, and then go right onto the next.

Marko, I don't see him being too into VERY bright colors, but if there's a pattern with the right alignment of shades, I can see him taking interest in something like a pair of sneakers with different colored swirls on them.

By the end of the night, I can see Dwayne buying a shirt from the store with a saying only skater kinda people would get. The boys would be confused, but Dwayne would just ignore them.

𝗦𝗵𝗲𝗶𝗻

This store is online, and more for females, but they DO have a men's section.

I feel like Marko would be flipping around online one day, surfing the internet, when he stumbled across it. The guys would be brought to the attention of the store and they'd instantly start flipping through the categories.

David, I think, would take immediately to the sight. Despite criticizing some of the patterns on shirts, I think he'd actually enjoy the style of their pants - maybe take to some cool looking jeans.

Marko would probably like their hoodies out of everything else. They have some cool designs, wordings and even some mysterious shit that screams ‘ wow ’.

Paul would definitely like that hats and accessories. I feel like he'd get a beanie with graffiti themes on it, or just a plain weed leaf.

Dwayne would probably only take interest in the smaller items, like the earrings and necklaces, maybe some of the cross body bags. The jewelry on the side is pretty rad, I can definitely see him wearing an earring with a small skeleton attached at the end of it.

[redgalaxyarts]

Cat Fucker - Shinso/Reader

Synopsis: You get hit with a mutation quirk while chasing a villain and while you're waiting to transform back to normal, Shinso finds you. (MxF reader)

Warnings: Language, violence, fluff, smut, masturbation, quirk use, choking, gagging, spanking, pet play, pet names, deg/praise, breeding kink, very slight dubcon if you squint

The reader has a fireball quirk, your hero name is Cherrybomb.

(Y/H/C = your hair color)

The chill of the cold night air hits your sweaty face and palms creating a slight tinge of pain from the contrast between the temperature of the night and your body. You have been running away from the robbery in progress after the police arrived to chase after the villain who caused it. Your calves burn and your feet feel like glass from how long you've been running and chasing after him. You dip, dodge, and jump over all the obstacles in your way and as he threw something behind him, you just barely ducked enough for it to only graze your palms as you tossed it out of the way, a little scrape left in the wake.

"Will you fucking stop already?!" You scream out to the villain dressed in an all-black outfit with a purple short cape swirled with various patterns that seem reminiscent of various animal footprints on it.

"You seem too slow hero, might need some help with that!" The guy yells back before slapping a random shape on the back of his cape and using his fist to throw an orb of light at you but you quickly sidestep out of the way just in time.

Taking the chance after he stumbled from throwing it at you, you open your palm wide and fire three balls of fire at the villain in front of you. They all land perfectly into his side and he doubles over and falls over his own two feet while running. He skids along the pavement and takes out a lamppost in the process but he ultimately comes to a stop and lays still while breathing shallow breaths.

"Hah, I, hah I got you, villain." You say panting and out of breath. "Damn I need to work on my stamina." You say mostly to yourself.

You bend down and flip the villain over onto his back before grabbing a tight pair of handcuffs from your utility belt and quickly clasping his wrists with them and hiking him onto his two feet.

"Cherrybomb did you apprehend the suspect?" Your partner Shinso asks you over your earpeice.

You reach your free hand up and tap the button before replying.

"Yeah just now. Head back to the office and I'll meet you there after I call a cruiser to take him to the station."

"Heard, stay safe."

You confirm with Shinso and tighten your grip on the suspect before notifying the police of your new location and wait for them to arrive.

Only a few minutes pass before the cruisers show up and they grab the villain from your arms, and right as you're about to pull away, the suspect breaks free from one of the officers grasp and walks darts towards you and grabs your wrist in an attempt to attack you while you were distracted talking to civilians. You turn around to attack him back but the officer already managed to grab him before another brawl could start and slapped him with another pair of cuffs. Unbeknownst to any of you, he was able to slap a paw print on the back of his cape and touch you with it when he grabbed your wrist. The villain gets shoved headfirst into the back of the quirk and armor-proof van before the doors shut loudly and they drive away.

"Cherrybomb! Cherrybomb yet another excellent takedown of a villain and you stopped the bank robbery with no casualties, how did you do it?" A reporter asks while the cameraman points the camera towards you and you confidently reply how you normally always do.

"Meow!"

You freeze in confusion, the reporter freezes in confusion, and so does the crowd that has gathered around you all.

"I'm sorry, meow?"

You go to speak again but before you can, you feel a tingle in your hands and you look down to see that your fingertips are slowly morphing into sharp feline-like claws.

You roll your eyes and mutter a "fuck" out loud but to everyone else it just sounds like another meow. Before you could be bombarded with more questions, you take off running down the road and into the secret alleyway you knew one on would find you at. You had found this alleyway months ago after you had gotten beat up pretty bad in a brawl with the LOV and managed to stay secluded all night until you told Shinso your coordinates to find you.

When you duck under the torn hole in the chainlink fence to get to the hiding spot, you brace yourself up against the back of the brick building and look down at your hands to see they've morphed into paws as well as your feet. When you look back up at the brick, you also notice you've gotten incredibly smaller than you remember. It wasn't until you turn around and see a big fluffy tail attached to your butt that you realize what that villain's quirk was; Beastmorph. He turned you into a cat.

"You have got to be fucking kidding me." You say to yourself in your head. You try and find a way to break out of your transformation by running headfirst into the brick wall but all you get out of it is a nasty headache, you can't seem to break out of it by force. You shake your head and droop your ears at the pain and lick your paw and rub your ear to ease the pain.

You saunter around the damp alleyway and see your reflection in a puddle next to a garbage bin and stare into it. You see a slight scar from where you headbutted yourself and notice your very fluffy y/h/c fur blowing in the slight breeze and getting damp from the rain that started to roll in overhead. Staring into your feline eyes in the puddle, you don't even notice the hulking figure walk up behind you and scoop you up. You yelp at the sudden loss of connection of concrete on your paws but feel relaxed in the strong arms of however picked you up, even more so when you feel two soft fingertips rub behind your ears.

"Hey, kitty kitty what are you doing out here?" You look up and instantly recognize the purple hair of who grabbed you.

If a cat could look surprised, you were surely embodying it.

"Where the hell is y/n, she's not at the office and she's not here. God, I hope she's alright."

The rain starts to fall harder and you yelp at the sudden feeling of your soaked fur. You accidentally sink your claws into Shinso's arm while hiking your butt up to try and shake off the wetness and you hear him slightly gasp at the pain.

"Hey hey, kitty it's okay. Come on let me take you home and get out of this rain."

Before you can try and jump out of his arms, he grips you tightly and covers you under his cape while taking off his mask and doing his best to walk under awnings to keep you both from getting even wetter.

You recognize all the turns and roads Shinso takes to get back to his house as you've been there multiple times. It doesn't take him very long to make it back and when he enters his house he shuts the door behind him and places you on his comfy couch. You drop with a slight bounce before he sets his things down on the counter and locks the door behind him.

"Make yourself at home kitty, I'll keep you here tonight and figure out what to do with you tomorrow."

He leans over the back of the couch and starts petting your head and back, and while it feels awkward, it also brings on a strange warmth that you haven't felt before. You smile the best a cat can and you feel your tail swish back and forth. Shinso chuckles before scratching a certain place on your lower back, right above your tail, and your eyes practically bulge out of your head at the extremely weird pleasure it brings on. You are torn between trying to move away or enduring the weird feeling, and it wasn't until you feel a rumble in your chest that you realize you're purring so you decide to hold out and enjoy the scratches.

"Good kitty."

His words strike a chord in your head and you roll your eyes and shiver from the unknown feeling inside of you. Shinso smiles once more before stopping and turns into the kitchen and grabbing a bowl from a cabinet.

You whine at the loss of contact and hop up on the back of the couch and stare at him while cocking your ears behind your head and staring at him.

"Sorry girl, I don't have any cat food but I'll pick some up tomorrow after work."

He says to you as he places a glass bowl of water down on the floor next to a wall. You hop off the couch and walk down next to it, as much as you highly don't want to drink from a bowl like some animal, you are pretty parched from the earlier fight so you lap it up while you can. When you finish slurping it up, you look up and see that Shinso has disappeared and you go to look around his house for him before you see his bedroom door open. You strut over into it and your eyes go wide at the sight in front of you.

His shirt is off of his body and he's walking around in just his boxers as he takes his dirty uniform and tosses it into the laundry basket. His slight muscle definition makes your mouth water when he turns around and you catch a good look at his back. This is the first time you've seen Shinso completely shirtless within the few years of working at the agency together, which is surprising considering the countless amount of times you two have had to patch each other up, he's even seen you completely shirtless besides your breasts as you've always covered them. You walk further into the room and he turns around and you see an array of patchwork tattoos scattering along his arms and a few on his chest. A few of these you've seen before, but you also notice many new ones which make your mouth water even more that your tongue lulls out the side of it.

You are quickly blushed when you see that he's about to pull his boxers down, and with the fear of perversion coming over you, you quickly pounce out of the room and back onto the couch. You shake the thoughts from your head until you hear Shinso's voice speaking to you from two places at once; your head and the adjacent room.

"Y/n, where in the fuck are you. You weren't at the office or your alleyway. Are you alive?" He asks you over the earpiece, which is weirdly enough still attached to you in your cat form. You go to speak but remember how it came out as a meow last time, but you are surprised by the actual words from your mouth.

"Yes I'm okay, I had a uhm, accident and I'm waiting for it to subside." You speak in your actual voice from underneath the couch where you moved to in fear that Shinso would hear or find you.

"What? What accident?"

"A mishap with the villain's quirk I think. I'll be okay I'm just waiting for it to disappear. "

"I-okay then. I'll see you at work tomorrow." He says more of a question than a statement.

"If I'm better by then, sure."

"Okay, goodnight y/n."

"Night Toshi."

You get out from under the couch and trample into his bedroom after checking if the coast is clear first. You see that the en suite bathroom is in use by him when you hear the shower start and him grumbling as he steps inside. You leap onto his bed and stare at yourself into the mirror attached to his side wall that faces the bed. You stare into your eyes and notice that your pupils are no longer stretched like a cat's eyes are and that they've reverted back to your normal eye color and shape. With your voice back and your eyes reverting back your normal body should return by tomorrow. Oh shit, your normal body will return tomorrow. How can you leave without Shinso catching you?

You're caught off guard when you hear the bathroom door open and steam billowing out of it and a very stark naked and dripping wet Shinso walk out of it.

"Me-ow" You gulp to yourself out loud when you see him walk over to the bed while wiping his damp hair with the tan towel around his broad shoulders. You can't help but trace his body down and notice the purple patch of hair above his pelvis and the happy trail connected to it, it fits perfectly against the shallow v-line under his hips.

You feel a shiver ripple through your body and your tail swish back and forth slowly while you take in the sight of the juicy man in front of you. You don't even hop off the bed when he sits down on it next to you and begins petting you. A very loud purr erupts from you and you nudge your head against his hands before he pulls away and scoots you a little bit away so he can get under the comforter.

He turns on his side and flicks off the bedroom light before huffing and puffing while rolling back over onto his back. He slides his fingers through his hair and tugs on it slightly before sliding his hands down his face and dropping them on top of the blanket. He turns back over to you and smiles as he pets your head.

"I hope y/n is okay kitty. You'd like her if you met her, she's beautiful and sweet to every animal she meets. She has one hell of a mouth on her to just about everyone else though." Shinso chuckles to himself at the last thought and you can't help but feel taken off guard at the unknown compliment he gave you. "What I wouldn't do to just make her shut up sometimes."

You quietly gulp to yourself when you feel him tense up while he's petting you before he stops entirely and sits up in his bed and scoots you off of it and towards the door but never shutting it. He whispers something that you don't quite hear before walking back towards his bed and sitting up against the headboard.

You can't help your curiosity as you tip-toe your toe beans into his room and tilt your head around the edge of his dresser and catch sight of what he was doing.

He groans as he rests his head back against the headboard with his eyes shut and his one hand tracing his nipples while the other strokes his cock to get it hard while quietly muttering your name. He's sitting above the comforter and you feel impressed at the endowment of him, you'd never think he'd be that big. You lick your lip and accidentally catch your tongue on your fang before shaking your head and walking closer to the bed to hear and see him better, your morals are entirely out of the window as you don't care how wrong it is to watch your coworker touch himself to the thought of you.

"Fuck." He moans out as he takes his thumb and spreads his precum around his cock while rubbing his nipple with his thumb. He pumps himself while squeezing the base of his cock and you see him shiver at the feeling with taking his free hand and dropping it onto the comforter and gripping the sheets until his knuckles turn white.

"Y/n, just like that, fuck." He says shutting his eyes tightly while envisioning you riding his cock all nice and tight.

You've somehow found your way into his closet and are staring at him through the doorframe of it. Also at this point, you haven't noticed that your hands and feet have reverted back to normal, along with everything else about you. Well, besides the fact that you still have your tail and cat ears. You still don't realize it when you take your hand and touch yourself along with him and rolling your eyes backward when you feel your fingers rub your clit in pace with his pumps.

Moving your hand in time with Shinso's, you stick your fingers into your wet cunt and you moan out his name at the feeling of it, but you quickly clasp a hand over your mouth and put your back against the closet door hoping he didn't notice.

At the sound of your moan, Shinso shoots his eyes open and his head pops up and he stops touching himself while looking around the room. He quietly turns on the end table light and his eyes squint at something in his bedroom when he sees your bare foot poking out of the side of his closet. He gets up from his bed very quietly and walks over to the door and slaps his hand alongside the doorframe making you scream before slamming the oak door right into his face.

Confusion, arousal, and aggravation fall over Shinso's body at the sight he saw before him. He saw you standing stark naked in his closet, with your fingers deep in your cunt, with a pair of cat ears and a tail matching the cat he took home earlier today. He scans the room and takes in the fact that the cat is nowhere to be seen and he smirks as his knuckles come up to the closet door to lightly rap against the wood.

"Oh y/n?"

Silence, which is hard considering you're still touching yourself while also biting your hand and clamping your eyes shut as you try and hold back your lewd noises.

"I know it's you."

It's no use, you can't help but let your noises and words slip.

"Fuck."

A flip switches inside of your body and you're frozen, waiting for some unseen instructions to guide you. Shinso smirks to himself and you curse at yourself in your head as you forgot about his quirk.

"Open the door and come out."

His husky tone sends shivers down your body as you do exactly what he says. You open the door and see him standing there with his arm above your head resting against the closet doorframe. You step in front of him and his free hand comes up to grip your chin and stare into his eyes and the contact breaks you out of your trance.

"Hi, kitten." He says hungrily.

"H-hi Toshi." You gulp at getting caught and now fully realize you're, mostly, back to normal.

"So this is the mishap? Didn't think to tell me about it?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't even know what happened. The villain must've blindsided me with his quirk and I got turned into a cat."

You don't know why you feel like you have to explain yourself to him, but you're utterly at his mercy and it isn't at all due to his quirk. You're entirely yourself right now.

"Hm, how unfortunate. It's even more unfortunate about what I'm going to do to you for deceiving me."

You gulp.

"What, uhm, how did I deceive you?"

"You acted like such a good kitten when in reality I know you're nothing but a slut wanting to be fucked by me. Dirty fucking girl."

"Toshi, no I can't, we can't."

That trance is back that you felt before.

"Shut up."

You do.

His hand drops from your chin and he stands confident and tall above you.

"Get your ass on the bed and wait for me."

Your feet mindlessly walk on their own. You squat onto his bed and turn towards him while sitting on your thighs and letting them plump out around you. Your palms rest against your thighs and your tail swishes back and forth while you wait for him.

"Good girl."

You're still locked in the trance but you feel the pool starting to drip from your cunt at his words and actions. You watch as he stalks over to you, like the way a cat does to a mouse, but in this case, you're the ladder in this situation.

You gulp when you feel his fingers trace your bare chest before stopping on your breast and giving one a good squeeze. You moan while getting knocked from your trance and he takes that as an invitation to continue. He releases your breast and immediately grips the back of your neck with force before bending down and kissing you sloppily and passionately at the same time. You moan even more and you feel him smirk into you as his free hand traces down your breasts, flicking your nipple, then trailing it down to your sopping core. You whimper when you feel his finger ghost over your warm folds and then he slides his finger in between them to catch all the juices coming from you.

"Well look at this, my kitten is all nice and wet for me already. I knew you were a slut y/n."

You roll your eyes at the words and it was a big mistake on your part when you feel a slap against your breast and you gasp and look up to the lavender eyes drilling into yours.

"Don't be a fucking brat with me." He dips two fingers between your folds again and as you whimper, he takes that chance to stick them into your mouth and down your throat. "Taste yourself and shut up." His hand grips the back of your neck tighter and bends it back as his two fingers get shoved down your throat and you gag on his fingers. Tears prick your eyes at the feeling and you feel yourself grow wetter and wetter at the force and words he's using on you and you just want more.

He pulls away from you and you both smirk at the long strands of saliva that trail from his fingers and your mouth and he licks it off his own fingers before releasing your neck and pushing you down onto the bed.

"Do you taste good kitten? Spread your legs for me and let your owner taste."

"Ho, fuck Toshi."

You say as he pushes you back and bites your thigh, but he shoots up and tuts at you.

"It's master now."

Your eyes roll back in pleasure as he spreads your legs and kisses your folds and you let bliss take you.

"Ye-yes master." You bite on your finger from the pleasure and use your other hand to twist into Shinso's locks. He groans into your pussy when he feels you tug on his hair and as you buck your hips into his mouth, he wraps an arm around your thigh and rests his hand flat against your pelvis, and uses his other hand to rub up and down your chest and squeezes your breasts making you shiver and shake.

His tongue is that of a god, he's eating you out like no other has done before and you don't want him to ever stop. His tongue speaks passion into your core as he twists your nipple in between his thumb and forefinger and gives it a sharp tug which makes your chest rise and gasps of pleasure drip from your mouth. You feel him smirk into your pussy and your thighs clamp around his head when he nibbles your clit and he smiles even more with the feeling of it happening.

Within minutes you're seeing stars as he plunges the hand he was using on your breasts into your warm cunt while he uses the hand on your pelvis to rub your clit. He sees you trying to resist the urge to cum and he feels himself grow harder which only causes a mix of pleasure and pain to score through him. He needs contact but he only wants the focus on you, he only wants his precious kitten to feel good tonight.

"Fuck master, can I cum? Can I please cum baby?" You beg him as you knot his hair tighter with both hands now.

"Go ahead kitten, cum on my face for me."

He plunges into you and rubs harder at the same pace and dips his mouth back to your pussy before you release onto his face so much that it drips down his chin. He pumps you a few more times before pulling his fingers out of you and smiling down at you panting and wiping sweat from your brow.

You're caught off guard when his dominant persona is dropped as he bends down and kisses you on the forehead and lips before checking in on you.

"Are you okay baby? Can you keep going or can you stop?" He asks so sweetly and innocently.

You run a hand through his hair softly and swipe your thumb against his lips before bending up and kissing him, tasting a mix of himself and your fresh juices which make you want round 2 even more now.

"Please master, I want you to fuck your little kitten-like no one else has before." You whisper seductively into his ear before nibbling on it and licking his neck and falling back down onto the bed.

"Holy fuck." You managed to catch him off guard this time. He gets back into the persona, now even more eager before gripping your hips so tight you know for a fact you'll bruise, and flipping you over with a hard bounce back on the bed and you gasp when you feel him hike your ass into the air.

"Look at your precious cunt, so beautiful and wet for me." He smacks your ass and you yelp out in pleasure before he scissors inside of you with his fingers, stretching you out and pulling away and to his side drawer.

"No master, let kitten feel you. Please?" You ask him while reaching back to grip his wrist.

"You want me to fill you nice and full with my cum kitten? Dirty fucking girl."

He spits into his hand and pumps himself a couple of times before lining himself up with your hole. He grabs both of your ass cheeks and rubs them gingerly with his thumbs before spreading your lips and entering your pussy slowly, getting you used to him.

"Hah, fuck Toshi- Master, I don't care, oh fuck." You shake out the words as you feel him bottom out inside of you and you don't even fathom how you managed to take him so well. Your toes are already clenching when he pulls out and slides back in just as slow as he did before.

"Fuck yeah kitten, I'm gonna fill you so good and full with my cum. Can't wait to have my fucking child can you?"

His head falls backward as he starts to pick up the pace inside of you and groans loudly when he feels you squeeze around him. The villain's quirk has entirely disappeared by now but neither of you has noticed and neither of you cares from the absolute ecstasy you both are receiving from the other.

His cock is slamming back and forth into you at an incredible pace. For every handful of hard pumps into you, it's followed by a slow and teasing pound that hits your spot perfectly every time. You don't know how long you've been going at this, minutes, hours, doesn't matter, you don't want it to ever stop. Your pussy clenches around his cock like it was perfectly molded to be there. Shinso slaps your ass with so much force it leaves a gorgeous dark handprint afterward. You both moan out a "fuck" from the way it made your pussy jump and Shinso picks up his pace inside of you.

"I-I'm about to cum Toshi, fill me up nicely with your cum baby."

You barely manage to get out as he slams harder into you, hitting your g-spot with precision. He smirks and you hear it in his moans. He slows down slightly before bending down and slowly tracing his hands along your sides, squeezing your breasts, gripping your throat, and bringing you back up with him so that your back is against his chest. This new position has you absolutely in pure bliss. You see your entire life flash before your eyes when he grips your throat tightly and bites the side of your neck while his other hand rests against your hip bone and rubs circles into it.

"You're going to be such a good mother, baby." He bites your neck harder. "You're taking my cock so nice, and I'm about to fill you to the brim with my cum. Can't wait to see your stomach bulge with my kid." With that last sentence, his hand moves from your hip to your stomach and he pushes on it, especially in the place where he feels himself slightly bulge your stomach.

"Fuck, can't wait to be a daddy huh? Fill me the fuck up already." You quip back to him, gathering confidence when you feel his thrusts become sloppier and you know he's about to cum with you.

"Watch your tone." He says into your ear while gripping your throat even tighter, cutting your breath off a little before kissing you on the lips and biting your lip while letting go of your throat to let you breathe.

As soon as he bites into your shoulder, you both moan out at the same time when you each release with one another. Your cum mixes with his as he shoots his seed deep inside your cunt. You feel it pulse inside you and your tongue lolls out at the feeling. Shinso keeps himself inside of you until your cunt takes every last drop and when he's content with how much he filled you, he slowly pulls out and watches the cum drip from you before using his fingers to push it back in.

"Keep it in there while I go get a towel to clean us up."

You whimper out a confirmation and as soon as Shinso steps out, you fall back onto the bed and giggle to yourself at the absolutely insane situation you just had. You'd never imagine that you'd fuck your coworker but here you are. You don't move when Shinso comes back and kisses you on the forehead and lips while he wipes in between your legs and anywhere else you may feel hot or sticky. You grab him before he moves away and you bring his forehead down to yours and give him a sweet kiss on his lips and you both smile at each other.

Shinso tosses the towel into the basket and slides under the covers next to you. He lifts his arm up to have you slide up next to him and he breathes out a content sigh.

"So...have you always wanted to fuck a cat?" You ask trying to break the ice.

Shinso laughs and gets beat red at your comment and turns his head to face you.

"No, no I haven't. To be clear, I didn't want to fuck a cat, I just wanted to fuck you."

"You surely did." You pause before your next thought. "Did you mean what you said when you were talking to the uh, well, cat-me?"

"All of it, yeah."

"Oh, cool, cool."

You stop for a minute and try and get comfortable but there's still an unease in the air.

"Look, if this was just a horny-sex haze type of thing for you I get it. I won't mention it again." You say while sitting up to talk to him, as your breasts fall from the sheets, Shinso can't help but stare. You giggle and snap your fingers in front of his face to get him to look at you.

"No y/n, it's not a one-time thing for me. I don't know what I feel for you but I know it's not a one-night stand type of feeling."

"Oh..good, cause I'm pretty sure I fell in love with your dick."

Shinso bursts out into a fit of laughter before pulling you down on top of him and kissing you intensely and having you straddle him.

"Funny, my dick fell in love with you too, kitten."

[jjackrabbitt]

That Damned AU

Hey guys (gn), I know you’ve heard me talk about this before, but I’ve actually been working on it now, so here’s part of it. It’s called That Damned AU because it’s been waking me up in the middle of the night to think about it for the last two years, so it’s just me damning it. I will probably change the name at some point. If you have any suggestions, I will gladly consider them. Basically, That Damned AU follows the events of the canonical story line of MPHFPC, but I’ve changed some things around, messed with some details, and added a few things. Mostly to fix or add to things that I have complaints about or wanted to hear more of. I will be tagging it as That Damned AU in case you want to block it

Before we begin I would like to thank @finn-nito for letting me talk his ear off about all this and in turn talking my ear off. It’s been a lot of fun doing this with you and getting to know you.

Now for the damned thing:

Ricky actually goes into the house with Jacob when Abe doesn’t immediately answer. Probably makes dumb comments about the decor or some thing. Goes back to his car for the gun when they see the screen door. Tells Jacob to stay there. Rushes back when he hears Jacob yell for Abe when the flashlight is found. Catches up to Jacob just on the edge of the woods and gives him shit for moving. Tries to lighten the mood and reassure Jacob, until they see the trail of blood. Is there with Jacob when he finds Abe. Ricky tries to keep Jacob from touching Abe because he thinks Abe is already dead. Both of them handle the situation Extremely Badly. We actually hear Abe call Jacob “little tiger” this time instead of just retconning it. Ricky alternates between trying to get enough signal to call the police and crouching with Jacob to try and help him. Abe’s riddle is delivered the same as before and Jacob does see the hallowghast. Ricky tries to shoot it but can’t because he doesn’t even know it’s there. When Jacob sees it he does grab onto Ricky and start shaking him with one hand, still holding onto Abe with the other.

Both boys have to be questioned, together and separately. Jacob sees Ricky’s interview because he gets a chance to snoop through the policeman's notes. He gets mad that Ricky wouldn’t admit to seeing the hallow and Ricky gets defensive about it. They don’t stop talking though because they mutually think the other is having a stress reaction and is seeing things/is erasing things from their own memories.

Jacobs parents didn’t really like Ricky before and they really don’t like him now because they think having him around will remind Jacob of finding Abe, but Jacob almost seems less stressed when Ricky’s around so they’ll allow it.

They don’t necessarily see each other more, but their interactions are way more emotionally charged now.

Ricky does start carrying his gun more because while he didn’t see the hallow, that was a scary night and he did hear something. He brings it into Jacobs house several times without Jacobs parents knowledge. This is a point of contention between Ricky and Jacob because if Jacobs parents find out Ricky will not be allowed back and will be cut off.

Because Ricky is still very much attached to Jacob when he starts seeing Dr. Golan this time, Ricky is in more danger of wights.

Dr. Golan hears a lot about Ricky. Probably significantly more than he wants to.

Ricky doesn’t get the medical attention that Jacob does because he’s poor and when Jacob knows Ricky’s having a problem he asks Dr. Golan for advice for Ricky.

Jacob is more resistant to Dr Golan’s work this time, because Ricky is there to call bullshit when he hears it and mentions that Jacob's meds are making him weird. Golan responds to this resistance by trying to convince Jacobs parents that Ricky is bad for Jacob. It does work but both of his parents are fairly shit at computers and they both have to sleep some time, so Jacob can still message Ricky and sneak out at night.

Ricky does appreciate when Jacob gets advice from Dr. Golan for him, but he does still give Jacob shit for therapizing him.

Both of them are being observed by wights at this point. Jacob gets a series of very weird food delivery guys and there’s like, three different cars that consistently follow Ricky. The food delivery guys aren’t outright weird, they just have the same ~*vibe*~ as Golan and some times they say strange shit. One of them knew his name without Jacob introducing himself.

The cars wouldn’t be weird if they weren’t definitely the same cars, didn’t only stop following Ricky when he A) was near his house or B) took random turns without signalling, and didn’t seem to follow any particular pattern to where he was seeing them. If they were in a similar area at similar times every day then okay, he just keeps seeing the same people on their way to work or whatever, but that’s not what’s happening.

Not much comes of it though. Jacob gets a few weird stomach aches, Ricky gets pulled over by a really strange cop once. Some one breaks into Ricky’s house while no one’s there and goes through stuff but doesn’t take anything or make a mess, the door’s open and a few things have moved when he gets home. You know, normal stuff.

Once, Jacobs parents go out of town. One of his mothers cousins is getting married, and they just aren’t sure that Jacob’s ready for travel and relatives and a party and everything. They don’t want to leave him for the weekend, but they both agree that he’s been doing really well lately (and it’s been months. They want to get out of the house and do Normal People Things). They tell Dr. Golan that Jacob’s going to be alone for the weekend and tell Jacob to go across the street to their neighbour for help if anything happens and they give the neighbour Dr. Golan’s number.

Roughly ten minutes after they leave, Ricky shows up. The Crown Vic goes in the garage, Alien is turned on, Chinese food is ordered and the weekend commences.

They barely even watch the movie, they’re busy talking. They fall asleep on the couch and honestly? It’s the best sleep Jacob has in months.

Until it’s about 4 a.m. and Jacob wakes up violently because this time the scene in his dream changed. This time he and Abe are in Abaton. He doesn’t know it’s Abaton, of course, and though the events of the dream have change, this one feels worse some how. Now he’s missing his grandfather and this place that he doesn’t even know what it is. He feels weirdly protective of it.

Dr. Golan Really doesn’t like Ricky. It’s significantly harder to manipulate Jacob if Ricky’s there to call bullshit. It’s still pretty easy to get Jacob to go to Cairnholm though. Even Ricky doesn’t call him a quack over it. Only tells Jacob to send him a post card of the only place on earth that’s more of a nowhere than Englewood, Florida.

Jacob does have some apprehension over being separated from Ricky, but he figures it’ll be okay since there will be a phone at their hotel.

They do spend a lot little more together than usual in the weeks leading up to Cairnholm. It worries both of them that they’ll be more than a 20 minute drive from the other. Jacob’s more obvious about it, Ricky (poorly) pretends it won’t bother him that much.

Jacob does bring one of his dads less favoured cameras with him, to take pictures.

His dad does try to insist that Jacob spends some time with him to look at birds. It’s funny, they keep seeing this one peregrine hanging around. Some times she, Frank says it’s a she, flies over them. She doesn’t seem too interested in hunting. Some times she disappears for a little while, but she comes back most of the time, unless it’s later in the day.

Kev and Martin are dating. I know it says in the book that Kev has a wife but no he doesn’t ❤️. Kev and Martin are dating and in love and very little will convince me otherwise. Everyone on Cairnholm is completely chill with it. They have dinner with Martins uncle on Wednesdays. Kev tried to take Martin fishing once and it went terrible but it was fun.

Jacob meets Martin on the first day, at the Priest Hole. He’s done at the museum for the day and is getting a drink with his sister and working on his poetry. He and his sister are harassing Kev while he’s on the job. They meet because Martins sister, Amelia, sees Frank and Jacob lugging more than they can carry up the stairs and makes Martin come with her to help.

Amelia is one of the very, very few ocs you’ll see in here, I’m not here to add a bunch of people. She’s here because I don’t want Martin to be lonely, as a plot device to make things move forward, and because I think we  should have more women. Yes MPHFPC already has a good amount of active women characters, yes I want more.

They start talking because both Martin and Amelia are huge nerds who would be excited about bird watching. When Martin mentions the museum, Jacob gets interested, as before he thinks it will help him unravel his grandfathers riddle. That’s it for now, but I will try to update again soon, though it probably won’t be as long. if any of you have any ideas or opinions to add, I’d love to hear them!

[heloflor]

So, given that I didn’t have much time to work on fics recently because school, I’ve decided to relieve some stress by making a random representation of how I imagine Cavendish and Dakota’s house in their time-period looks like. And since I have no plans to ever describe it in detail in a fic, here it is ! Though, given how bad I am with designs, showing the house is mostly an excuse to infodump on domestic headcanons.

Regarding the last names, I didn’t make a typo for Cav. I like to imagine the two getting married way before the events of the show, with Cav taking “Dakota” as a last name, mostly because he got several siblings in-law on the Dakota side who adopted him on the spot.

And about the representation of the house : yeah it looks like shit. Since I can’t draw, I’ve decided to do something rather quick using MSPaint but yeah, not the best thing in the world. Though, if I get back to playing the Sims 3 at some point and end up making a Dwampyverse savefile, I’ll most likely try to recreate that house and could share a few pics.

I also went with a rectangular house with one floor instead of some futuristic-looking thing, mostly because I have no imagination when it comes to design. Though, you could still use the excuse that they want something more “old-timey” given their job or that they don’t have all the money of the world so they chose a simple house for the small cost. But yeah, by the end of the day, the choice is mostly because I can’t design shit.

But still one thing in my defense : looking at episodes that take place in the future like “Missing Milo” or “First Impressions”, it seems that most buildings are square-y with the roof being the weirdly-shaped part, with B.O.T.T. being one of the few exceptions. And looking at “A Christmas Peril”, the buildings are definitely more wacky but it’s 20 years later so…

I could also mention that I’m a bit unsatisfied with how empty the living-room and the bedroom ended up being but I’m drawing a total blank when trying to come up with the kind of stuff Vinnie and Balth would have that are linked to their interests. Though, maybe the excuse of them not being often at the house works ? Idk. Let’s just say I have ideas for the “basic” stuff, aka what you find in basically every single middle-class house, but draw a complete blank for anything that’s decorative. Still posting a map of the house tho because I don’t really consider it a work in progress if I simply have no idea and may never do. I’m very bad at design so bear with me on that one ! It’s not only about the house, it’s also about the fluffy headcanons !

So here’s under the cut some random info about the look of the rooms and furniture + a bunch of headcanons regarding Vinnie and Balth’s lives in this house. For each part of the house, you first have the info about how it looks first and then the headcanons.

Those headcanons are made with the idea that Vinnie and Balth are married (duh) but also, for a few, that Vinnie has three siblings + a few in-laws that he has a good relationship with.

(very long post ahead)

General :

- They bought the house in 2162, 2 years after getting married.

- It’s in the suburbs, or at least what the future version of the suburbs would look like. In other words, the presence of a backyard is debatable.

- There could be a garage for their time vehicle, so that they don’t have to go to headquarters every single day. And if not an actual garage, there’s at least some space to put it. In both cases, it would be near the bedroom’s side of the house.

- While the walls outside would have that futuristic “metallic” look, the walls inside would be a bit warmer. At the very least, the inside isn’t “future metallic white”, especially with Vinnie having photophobia.

- The intensity of the lights in every room can be adjusted. That way, Vinnie can put the dimmest light and navigate the house without his glasses. This is mostly useful for showering and midnight snacks.

- When they went house-hunting, Balth was the one who insisted that they needed a place with those kinds of lights. This is also the same kind of lights that Vinnie had in his now-former apartment.

- You know how near the end of the episode “First Impressions” you have Balth going into Mr. Block’s office ? Well, the way the door opens in that moment is how the door opens for every room of the house, perhaps excluding the main entrance (I like the idea of their front door being an “old” one, aka the “normal” doors we have today).

- Every room would have a spot that can create “tactile panels”, like some holographic tablet that can be used to change the settings of the house, for example changing the lights or the internet or even lock the doors and blinds.

- In 2175, when they were forced to leave the future, Vinnie stole a device from B.O.T.T. that made him able to create some kind of forcefield around the house that only he and Balth can remove. So, even if they’re not there anymore, the house still is theirs and can’t be sold to anyone else. And before you ask why B.O.T.T. didn’t simply send agents to bring the duo back and force them to open the shield : the forcefield works with hand-scan detection and Vinnie convinced Balth to use their left hands, the hands with the wedding rings. So if time-agents come knocking, they could try convincing the agents to let them use the bathroom first and they could wash their hands and use the soap to remove the rings. That way, the scan wouldn’t work and the agents would have no way of knowing why.

    Living room :

- There’s more furniture than showed here like souvenirs from previous missions or some random stuff that belongs to them. I just don’t have enough imagination. : /

- Likewise, the corridor has a few pictures or posters, like pictures that Vinnie didn’t have the space to put in his memory room but still wanted to display. Also, I want to say that Vinnie would display pictures of his family (sibling, in-laws and nephews) but I’ll see him more as having an album for family pictures, or a framed picture on his nightstand.

- There could definitely be a carpet or two. They would either be modern ones to fit the fact that they’re from the future or vintage stuff found in some of their missions. One of the carpets would be under the coffee table. Another would be in the big-ass space between the living-room and the kitchen, or in the corridor.

- The style is a mix between old and new stuff, with also a few things related to their interests. Like, for example, the couch could have an animal pattern or something (AND BY THAT I DON’T MEAN REAL ANIMAL FUR).

- Speaking of the couch, after looking up “futuristic couch” on the internet, they would absolutely have one of those gigantic couches that have like a bed attached to them due to how big they are. Btw I have no idea which company came up with this design and I couldn’t care less. It’s just that the design looks cool and would fit a futuristic house.

- The side table is a floating square, given how we see in “A Christmas Peril” that tables in the future don’t have feet anymore (that’s one way to protect your toes).

- The floor lamp is more futuristic. It’s like a white orb attached to a lamp foot.

- The TV is attached to the wall. The remote is some kind of holographic tablet, kind of like the house settings thingy.

  - This is where Balth would spend most of his mornings and evenings when they stay home. He’d just be sitting with a cup of tea, most of the time also a book, with the sun illuminating the room, just feeling comfortable and peaceful. The side table/cube was bought specifically for Balth’s tea. He would also use the lamp while reading in the late evening, either for the peace of having little to no light and solely focusing on the book or as a way for Vinnie to be in the room with the lights at the lowest setting. And speaking of Vinnie, he would sometimes join his husband on the couch, lying down with his head resting on Balth’s legs (cue Vinnie falling asleep, leading to a frustrated Balth who needs to pee but doesn’t want to wake him up).

- Since there’s a mini-table for when Balth drinks tea, the table right in front of the couch is mostly used for Vinnie to rest his legs on.

- And speaking of fluffy headcanons : movie nights. From time to time, aka minimum once a month, probably more, the couple would be in their pajamas cuddling on the couch while watching a movie, with Dennis resting in Balth’s arms.

For the movie choices, Balth would choose science-fiction, especially if there are any Professor-Time-themed movies, but also historical fiction (for some reason I tend to see Balth as having a liking for history ? I think it’s because of the way he dresses + his small rant about pirates in “Game Night” ? Idk honestly. It’s mostly a random headcanon that’s here for some weird reason). As for Vinnie, it’s mostly animal documentaries (Balth falls asleep halfway through but Vinnie doesn’t notice until after it’s over) or animated/family movies (the future equivalent of D*sney, S*ny pitcures, P*xar etc. Which are movies Balth would enjoy as well). For some weird reason I’ll also see the two of them being into mystery movies (crime-solving movies basically).

And if they sometimes decide to watch other genres, I could see Balth having a liking for some romance movies, because for some reason I like the idea of Balth being sappy. Besides, the guy is passionate when it comes to proving himself at his jobs and takes them pretty seriously in order to reach his objective. And given how he can be insecure and sometimes feels like a ball of anxiety, who’s to say he isn’t passionate when it comes to love too ? And no, I don’t mean passionate as in “making out all the time”, I mean passionate as in taking relationships seriously and making it work while also wishing to make sure his partner knows that he’s loved, even if Balth isn’t really the best at expressing his affection all the time.

On a different note, to get back to other genres : Vinnie would probably like horror movies. Because if cuddling in front of a sappy movie is great, having your husband show his love and trust for you by clinging to your arm out of fear is even better, nevermind the fact that you’re as terrified as he is.

    Kitchen :

- It’s one of those kitchens with two walls of cupboards/cabinets, both on the ground and elevated. One of the cabinets is used entirely for snacks. Because Vinnie.

- The wall separating the kitchen and the living room “has a hole in it”. It’s like you have a small wall with cupboards, a hole, and a wall connected to the ceiling with a few cabinets. Basically, you look up “kitchen cupboards” and imagine that the space in-between is a hole instead of the wall (why is it so hard to explain something so simple ?).

- This would be the most futuristic-looking room of their house. Looking up at references, they’re that Pinterest post showing a room with white cabinets with round corners and what seems to be slide doors. This is pretty much how I’ll see their kitchen, except bigger, with a different wall color and with one wall not being here (see above).

- The table is floating because of course it does. The chairs don’t tho. Also the chairs are as futuristic as the rest of the room. And looking up the internet again, the chairs are shaped like chairs.

  - So I put a stove but tbh I’m not sure how much these two would cook, given how in the show they’re always seen eating out (granted they don’t have a kitchen in their ‘apartment’ in Milo’s time). And given how most things seem automatized in the future, let’s just assume that the house can do most of the cooking itself with like a robot (aka plot-convenience technology) but still needs the necessary furniture and ingredients for the recipes. Also, if there’s an issue with their cooking system, they’ll probably know a few recipes and can feed themselves (Vinnie’s oldest brother Enzie would definitely teach his younger siblings a few recipes, at least enough to survive on their own. And he would be more than happy to teach his brother in-law as well).

- I put 4 chairs at the table but honestly I could see them keep 2 at all times and put the others in the storage room, especially the times they get very busy with their job for a few weeks and don’t have the time for social life.

- At some point, Balth probably tried to convince Vinnie to have better food habits and tried to put his snacks on the higher shelves. Not only did it not work because chairs exist but also it led to Vinnie getting frustrated. So Balth dropped it. Though, he would still try to talk Vinnie into working out to stay rather healthy.

    Memories room :

- Vinnie’s personal space. He basically saw the third biggest room of the house and went “mine now” and Balth had no issue letting him have it (hard to say no when Vinnie’s eyes shine like that).

- He already had a memory room in his old apartment.

- Basically, Vinnie brings back souvenirs from his missions, along with pictures he took, and put them on display. For more information, I made a post about it a while ago, so check it out if you want info on it.

And side note : I learned more about ADHD and autism later on and found out that the correct word for Vinnie’s passion for animals is a special interest, not a hyperfixation. The main difference between the two terms is how long your interest last. The reason I used “hyperfixation” in my post is because 1. I didn’t know that “special interest” was a term that existed and 2. people with ADHD kept talking about having hyperfixations and most people see Vinnie as having ADHD. So yeah, my bad for using the wrong term. And while I won’t change the current text from my post, especially with someone in the notes correcting me (I don’t want them to look like an idiot), I’ll definitely add a few words at the end of the post about it.

 - This is where Vinnie spends most of his time when at home, trying to keep the room in the best condition.

- There’s a window in the room but Vinnie condemned it in case some of his souvenirs were sensitive to the sunlight.

- The room is made entirely of shelves, with like four-five rows on the same wall. The shelves are either integrated into the walls or they’re floating because future. In any cases, there’s nothing around the shelves, it’s just shelves with stuff on it.

- When you enter the room, one of the rows of shelves next to you has all the animal-related stuff he gathered before starting a relationship with Balth. The rest of the room can have a few animal-themed objects but the pictures tend to be more linked to him and Balth.

- Likewise, when you enter the room, on the shelf you’re immediately facing, there’s a miniature recreation of their wedding altar with their wedding picture in its center. The miniature is made out of the future equivalent of papier-mâché and the altar is themed around time-travel with objects from all kinds of time-periods and cultures. And for those who might ask regarding the picture : Vinnie has a black suit and carries the bouquet while Balth has a white suit. Both have a hat that’s basically Balth’s usual hat (with the Professor-Time goggles, because themed wedding) but colored like their respective suit.

    Balthazar’s office :

- The room has quite a few libraries but this is mostly decorations. Basically, this room is more of an 1800th century study than anything, especially a rich/royal study. Yeah, for some reason I see Balth as having an office that’s just “rich 1800th century” aesthetic. I think it’s from the headcanon of him being a runaway prince 🤔.

- So yeah. The bookcases are vintage, the piano is your usual black piano, the armchairs are vintage and tbh Balth almost never uses them because he’d rather read in the living room, and the desk is vintage, though the stuff on the desk is futuristic. Balth is up to date with the technology he’s using to work, he just likes the older aesthetic for the rest.

- On his desk, despite literally living with the guy, Balth has a framed picture of Vinnie (again, I want the stubborn gay disaster to be sappy from time to time, with his love language being small touches and attention to details like for example being able to quickly see the kinds of foods Vinnie like the most so that when he’s in a bad mood, Balth can get him that specific food to make it better ; or learning Vinnie’s body language to know when he’s upset or bothered by something).

  - Balth mostly spends his time here to make the reports on their missions or work some administration stuff when needed. When he isn’t at his desk, he’s there to play the piano.

And yes, I throw out the window that line from “Backwards to School Night” that indicates Vinnie doesn’t know about Balth playing piano but tbh I ignore or question quite a few things from this episode such as : the line indicating that Vinnie and Balth don’t live together in their time-period since Balth doesn’t know Vinnie’s weekend habits ; the line about how the ray thing age you down to 90% your current age and yet baby Vinnie seems younger than the parents despite his adult self seeming older; the fact that Melissa read a book 16 times in the span of 6 minutes ; the fact that it’s called a “age regressor ray” and not a “age regressor ray-inator” (seriously, I am the only one always expecting Vinnie to say “inator” and being disappointed when he doesn’t ?).

- The couple absolutely sing songs together with Balth playing the piano. Or at least Vinnie would sing a song in the middle of the living-room and have Balth be annoyed by it, only for Vinnie to hear Balth play the same song on the piano later and join him.

    Bathroom :

- Not much to say here. It’s a bathroom. It’s futuristic-looking. The mirror is a cabinet. The tub is round. The bin comes in and out of the wall. The clothes drier also irons the clothes. The toilet is glued to the wall. The walls are dark gray or dark blue or at least a darker color so that Vinnie doesn’t have to dim the lights to the lowest level when he’s showering. There are also several little lights along with a main one so that Vinnie can light the small ones instead of getting a headache due to the brighter light. During lazy/slow days, Balth would take baths instead of showers (and Vinnie would want to join him to make out). Balth may or may not sing in the shower (Vinnie definitely does). That’s pretty much it. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

    Guest/Storage room :

- Only used as a guest room when one or several members of the Dakota family are visiting the states and end up in the Tri-State-Area. So for 90% of the time, the room is used as storage.

- Bed’s not that big and very “squary”. Might or might not be floating.

- It’s mostly random junk that they don’t know where to put and don’t want to get rid of, like some stuff they got from their missions but that Vinnie doesn’t want in his room or some old things they want to give at a garage sale or that one Professor-Time body-pillow that Balth refuses to let go of while Vinnie just wants to trash the thing. The body-pillow being in the storage room in a junkpile was their compromise on the issue. Also, whenever someone might stay in the room, Balth makes sure there’s no way they will find the body-pillow (his sister in-law Bettie would never let him live it down).

- Not much to say here either aside from that.

    Master bedroom (the room in which the proportions are way bigger than the rest of the house because I have no idea what I’m doing) :

- I described the room quickly in my fic “nightmares” but yeah basically the room has several posters and pictures related to their interests, along with a bookshelf full of animal encyclopedias, time-travel facts, history books, Professor-Time fantasy books etc. There are also albums, whether it be family pictures or album of the two of them.

- Like for the living-room, there can definitely be more than what I described/pictured here. I’m just really bad at imagining the kind of stuff people would have in their bedrooms related to their interests. And speaking of which : at some point, there was the aquarium that Vinnie mentions in “Time Out”.

- Unlike the other rooms in which the windows have roller blinds (apparently that’s the english word for it ?), this one has curtains on top of it because Balth likes to open the window in the morning but he doesn’t want Vinnie to hurt his eyes. So with curtains, he can open them enough to light the room but not enough for the light to reach Vinnie’s face.

- The bed is pretty classic for a futuristic bed but with round edges and these two idiots definitely go crazy with the sheets design (animals, food, Professor-Time, past time-periods, stuff like that). Also, the bed is “open”. By that I mean that, if you look at futuristic designs, there tends to be some roof thing above the bed and linked to it. They wouldn’t have that.

- The nightstands are floating cubes.

- “Dennis’ chair” is just some random old wooden chair where Dennis stays most of the time. Balth almost never takes him during his missions and Dennis is a comfort object that Balth mostly talks to when sitting on the bed, movie nights aside. So the bear stays in the bedroom.

- The bookshelf would also be made of wood.

- The wardrobe is futuristic, with doors that can open by themselves with sensory detection. Also, unlike what that poor “drawing” shows, the wardrobe is “taller” than it is “larger”.

- The armchair is an egg chair.

  - They sleep

- They spoon

- Balth is the big spoon because 1. he’s taller and 2. he grew up sleeping while embracing a teddy bear and old habits die hard.

- When Balth goes to sleep or wakes up, he can’t help but play with Vinnie’s hair and give the small man a few kisses, feeling satisfaction in seeing his husband smile or try to pull away while laughing.

- Vinnie sleeps on the side closest to the window while Balth sleeps on the side nearest to Dennis.

- Balth’s nightstand has an alarm clock that’s basically just a holographic square with numbers on it, while Vinnie has an album or some random animal trinket. Vinnie’s alarm clock is not feeling Balth’s warmth against him. But if Vinnie has to use an actual alarm, the sound would either be some old-fashioned song or an animal noise (is this starting to get too much insistence on the “animal-loving” side of him ?)

- While Balth likes to read in the living-room, Vinnies likes it better to chill in the bedroom when reading. Also, during weekends and vacation days, Balth would sometimes read in bed before sleeping (yeah for some reason I really like the idea of Balth being a reader. I think it has to do with him being old or british ??? Weird brain is weird. And besides, if Balth reads, it would most likely be science fiction related to Professor Time). Vinnie uses this time as an excuse to cuddle.

- They have themed pajamas. Balth mostly has Professor-Time stuff (clocks, Heinz or Perry’s faces etc) while Vinnie has mostly animal-themed or food-themed pajamas.

- Vinnie sometimes sleeps naked in the summer. Balth is still trying to figure out how he feels about that.

- Random headcanon regarding Dennis : while he belongs to Balth who keeps him close when in doubt in order to vent or when he wants to get comfortable somewhere, I actually like to believe that, between the two, Vinnie is the one who talks the most to Dennis, mostly because Vinnie would just enter the bedroom and casually greet the bear, or he and Balth would have a dumb argument and Vinnie would playfully tell Dennis “Can you believe that guy ?” while pointing at Balth. Just, Vinnie being Vinnie and having random one-sided conversations with the bear.

And a little cute thing : while Vinnie really just talked to Dennis because why not, seeing the guy like the teddy bear so much would actually make Balth feel better about himself. I like to believe that grown-up men having plushies would still be seen as a ridiculous thing by most people (because toxic masculinity) and Balth got the habit of hiding Dennis when he was still trying to find the right guy for him. So seeing Vinnie have no issue whatsoever with the teddy bear and even liking him would definitely help Balth’s confidence, along with warming his heart.

- And since this post is all about headcanons : two things about phones and these two being sappy that have nothing to do with houses.

1. One day, Balth left his phone on a table and Vinnie decided to take a selfie with it because why not. After seeing that, Balth acted frustrated but ended up putting the pic as his phone background. Ever since, Balth’s phone background is a picture of Vinnie. The most recent one is from “We’re Going to the Zoo” with a picture of Vinnie holding squirrels in his arms while a third one is coming out of his pistachios-filled pants. The pic on the phone is a closeup, only showing Vinnie’s head and upper body. And for those who like angst, I’ll let you imagine how he must have felt having this as his phone background during the rogue arc.

2. Vinnie’s (numeric) phone password is 2703, aka march 27, the date of his wedding anniversary. The day is put first and the month second because Europe. Also, during busy weeks, this would be a good way for Vinnie to remember the anniversary.

(fun fact : I was trying to come up with scenarios for fics when I ended up thinking about Vinnie’s password and that number came to mind. So I just went “guess that’s their wedding date now”)

[daydream-believin]

What About the Smaller Picture (3)

Summary: Merlin knows best. And what he feels is best for you and Douxie right now is to sit around and wait for him to come back from New Jersey, Merlin-knows-when. (3) You’ve adjusted to Arcadian life pretty well. (1) or (4)

Warnings: Swearing, sleep problems?

Word count: 2474

A/n:  sorry this wasnt out sooner I’ve had a week

The curtains were blue. They had a little pattern of navy and white flowers and curvy lines like pottery painted with indigo. You had moved one of Doux’s bookshelves to be the second wall to allow the curtain rod to even be in place. This layout effectively created a nook of sorts around your little bed. To be frank the curtains weren’t absolutely necessary. The space kinda gave you university dorm vibes with the two twin beds across from each other. But there was no way you were letting this guy you barely knew watch you sleep. Even if you were good friends, you wouldn’t let him watch you sleep. That kind of vulnerability was special, reserved for only those closest to you.

Speaking of closeness, Douxie had been very adamant about you not calling him by his full name anymore. Made him feel like you were reprimanding him, he said. You could relate to the feeling, and so you were now being careful to replace all ‘Hisirdoux’s with ‘Douxie’s in your head. Or at least a ‘Doux’. Not ‘Babe’. Who told you that. You definitely never referred to him as Babe in your mind. Nope. That Is Not Something Friends Do.

“And,” Douxie rubbed the back of his neck, “Normally when people call me Hisirdoux nowadays it’s because they want to kill me. Only strangers and enemies call me that. Or Zoe when she’s pissed. So yeah, just Douxie is fine.”

“Just Douxie?”

He chuckled, “Yeah.” You looked up at him with a smile.

“Douxie.” He flushed, nodding. “Well, Douxie, what do you want for dinner tonight.”

That little nook you’d built hadn’t stopped Douxie from trying to talk to you all night, however. You’d think the curtains would be a clear message of don’t talk to me I want to be left alone but Doux hadn’t really taken that hint. You tried your best to brush him off the first few nights, even pretending to fall asleep. It didn’t stop him. By the fourth night you spent in Arcadia, you gave in. You had trouble sleeping anyways, as it was apparent so did your roommate, so might as well indulge him. It’s not like ignoring him did any good. Instead of staring at a blue-light screen that messed with your circadian rhythm, you talked about nonsense with Doux. And it was good nonsense. He was way too funny. Or maybe it’s that thing where if you’re into someone then everything they say is hilarious. You’ll never know. But it was nice, either way.

The funny thing was that not only did you actually start to like this, but now it was becoming hard to sleep without it. He helped. Your whole life you stayed up late, and then tossed and turned all night anyways. Now your bedtime routine was talk to Douxie for a few hours, slowly falling asleep, and then you’d sleep the whole night through like a baby. No more restlessness. No more waking up over and over again. Even if you did, you could just listen to him snore for a bit and fall right back to sleep. You guessed it was the feeling of safety he provided. Like someone was watching over you, even when you were at your most vulnerable. You’d never really had that luxury before.

 You had started noticing the trouble coming back when he would stay out late sometimes. And Douxie was gone one night and you suddenly couldn’t sleep at all. This was bad. A problem, if you will. But no matter. There were more pressing things to worry about.

Like the fact that all week, Douxie had been hinting that he had something you two were going to do soon. He would not tell you what it was. In fact he was taking quite a bit of joy in dangling this “surprise” in front of your face but not telling you anything about it. It was driving you a little crazy. You hoped what he had planned was nothing too wild, though. It’s not that you weren’t down, you were just tired. But you could use a little shaking up. This bookshop existence was boring. You weren’t boring. You had enough crazy stories to last an immortal lifetime from growing up in New Jersey. Not just modern-day Urban New Jersey. Early colonial Quaker-dominated New Jersey was wild too. Especially as one of those infamous New England witches. Maybe Douxie was taking you on some magic errand. That would be great, you were dying to do something actually in your job description ever since you got here. Not that working in the bookshop wasn’t nice, it just wasn’t magic. You were craving magic.

But alas, as the sun was setting and the last patrons left the store, life moved on as mundanely usual. You flipped over the sign, scratched a sunbeam bathing Archie behind the ears, and started the process of re-shelving all the damn books that customers left strown about. The sunset turned the bookshop pink. There were fewer cars rushing by. Now that there were no customers, it was very peaceful. Just you, Archie’s snoring, and the soft lute music playing. The music was lute covers of popular songs, and at this point you were pretty sure it was Douxie himself who recorded this shit.

Speaking of Douxie, you hadn’t seen him all day. It had made working the bookshop extra extra boring. Like if he wanted you to be free labor, he could at least give you the decency of his lovely presence. But no, it was just you, all day long. All by your lonesome, with nary a cute theater-kid adjacent wizard to keep you entertained with his company. It was a travesty really. But anyways, where was he. Better not be having fun without you.

You like to think your thoughts summoned him. He came in through the back door, panting, disheveled. Singed? He frantically looked out the door’s window into the alleyway from which he had just came from, looking for something. Whatever it was, he must have seen it, since he looked panic-stricken. In a painfully obvious attempt to swallow the fear, he turned to you, trying his best to sound nonchalant.

“SO. You know that thing? The surprise? Well. It is here a little sooner than I expected it to bE—” A loud crashing noise came from the alleyway. “Oh, fuzzbuckets.”

You dropped the book in your hand. “WHAT DID YOU DO.”

There was another very loud crash, this time closer. Douxie glanced back for less than a moment before rushing over to you, taking you hand.

“I’ll just have to tell you on the way love, come on!”

You two fled out the front door of the shop like your tails were on fire. Speaking of tails on fire, once you rounded the shop to the alleyway, you found out just what Douxie had been running from that was making such loud noises. Hellheetis. Five large hellheetis. Blazing bright in the Arcadian dusk. How the neighbors haven’t already called the cops or the fire department was a mystery. The large lion-like creatures growled, stalking down the alley. It was only a matter of seconds before they smelled and or spotted you and went back into the chase. You had to make a plan and fast. Distracting you from your thoughts, Douxie nervously laughed beside you.

“hehe, uh, could you believe there was only one of these at the start?”

You slowly turned to the wizard, “Did you,, hit them, Hisirdoux?” You could call him that now because you were in fact pissed off at the moment.

“Only twice.”

“Only twice… Okay”

“I may not be the best at monster identification. Or remembering which tactic to use for which.”

“I can see that.” You tried to keep your voice as calm as you could, which got a little easier to do as the hellheetis turned down a different alleyway, putting some more distance between them and you. They were still searching though, that was apparent. Thankfully the stench of the alley trash was keeping you covered.

“Believe me, Archie gets onto me about this all the time.”

“It’s okay… just. I think I have a plan. But one of us has to be bait. And it’s going to be you.”

“That’s fair.”

You sprinted up the stairs of the bookstore and up through the ceiling hatch onto the rooftop. You first instinct was to get them to the center of the square, where you could use the fountain as a water source. The alley they had started going down opened up to the square anyhow. It would have been a straight shot. But dear Mr. Casperan made a fuss about that being too out in the open or whatever.

Next solution. The bookstore’s rooftop had a facet, Douxie told you. You’d like to imagine it was put there so some nice old lady could have had a sweet rooftop garden without too much hassle. Maybe you should start a sweet rooftop garden. You and Douxie could have a little oasis in the city up here. You could grow veggies and flowers for your table. Maybe make a cute little picnic area. Stargaze at night. The facet. You quickly found it and made work of turning it on. Or at least you tried your best. You could hear roaring, getting louder, getting closer. The scary growls and roars were punctuated by Douxie’s frantic footsteps, grunts, and gasps. Please don’t get eaten, Douxie.

The facet was so rusty, it took all of your strength to get it to budge. And then nothing came out really, the hose attached to it lifeless without so much as a trickle. You tried to unscrew it from the facet to see if there was a problem and the metal part of the hose disintegrated in your hand. Okay. No water was in fact coming out of that facet.

Imaginary sirens rang in your ears. You had to get water, fast, or your partner was gonna be kit & kadouxle. Hellheeti chow. Growl mix. Douxies. Fiery feast. The big cats were gonna eat him okay. After managing to get the facet turned as fast as you could, fueled on pure adrenaline, and still getting little to no water, you made a judgement call of fuck that. Magic time. To be completely frank here that should have been what you had done in the fucking first place, but hey, fear dulls the mind.

Gathering up as much water as you could, like, metaphorically feel in the pipe, you pulled that shit out with all your might. Aaaannddd because of this you may have not actually remembered that you would need to catch said water in order to, you know, use it. Instead of a nice bubble to be used at your discretion, a magic roof-water tidal wave washed over you and over the side of the building into the alley below. Thank your lucky fucking stars that Douxie just so happened to have gotten the fire felines to the right spot in time. The uncontrollable rain rushed down, dissipating the hellheetis, soaking Douxie darling, and flooding not only your alley but all the alleys connected to it. Holy shit, stop it! STOP IT! It took a second, but you did finally get the river to stop pouring out of your rooftop. Fingers crossed there were no basement windows open and all your neighbors had flood insurance. And that no one saw. Can’t be connected to you if no one saw right. Shhhhhh.

You peered over the ledge to see if Douxie was alright down below. He looked like a cat caught in the rain himself. You probably did too. Douxie’s soaked bangs covered his eyes. Nevertheless, he was able to see you up on the ledge and gave you a thumbs up. You awkwardly returned it.

Toweling off your hair, and now in nice dry pajamas, you walked out of the bathroom to join Douxie on the couch. His own hair towel hung around his shoulders. You took a moment to enjoy how cute he looked all ready for bed, cozy in the blankets on the couch. And that semi-wet hair was looking pretty nice too. You only allowed yourself to linger on this for that moment however, as you remembered you were supposed to be mad at him right now. You crossed your arms as you approached the wizard.

“SO, dearest Hisirdoux, may I have the decency of getting to ask the question, WHY.”

“Funny story really.”

“Really?” You raised a brow

“Really.”

Douxie fidgeted with his hands. You watched this little nervous gesture intently as you sat down next to him. He took a deep breath before beginning,

“First thing. You’ve been here for some time now, and I thought it was enough time for me to start sharing my little, er, excursions with you,” Douxie’s face flushed a little, “I like monster hunting, and now that I know that I like you, I thought I’d like it more if I brought you along with me?”

Your face was flushed a little too now. “Hey, stop it, I need to be mad at you.” Yeah well the smile you wore gave up any pretense of that. Sorry.

“I didn’t know how familiar you were with monsters or how skilled at fighting you were, so I decided to go get some test monsters from Mervin the Monster Dealer, just to make sure our first time would be safe. FIRST TIME MONSTER HUNTING TOGETHER.”

You stifled a chuckle. “And you didn’t just ask me?”

“It was supposed to be a cool surprise okay.” He buried his face in his hands.

“… Hellheetis?” Safe monster your ass.

“Yes, I mean no, I- Mervin sold me the wrong thing alright. I thought I was buying those cute little fire sprite things you can easily just put out with your boot.”

This time you did not hold back that laughter. And you laughed, and Douxie laughed, and soon both of you were uncontrollably cackling until you were out of breath. Archie came in to see what the commotion was about and then promptly turned back around to go back to his spot in the window. You clutched your chest, still cracking up despite the lack of oxygen. Douxie wiped some tears from his eyes you were sure hoping were just from laughing too hard. You rubbed a hand on his back.

“So, I think I’ve had enough excitement for one day. How bout movie night?”

Douxie’s tired eyes smiled at you, “Yeah, I think that would be lovely.”

“Hey, I had a good first monster hunt, Douxie. Thank you,” You pulled your cold feet up under your legs, “But could you stop hogging the blankets!”

[piracytheorist]

*dramatic gasp* how dARE you forget! lmao it's ok ♥

loving those gifs and animations! dude, the -d e t a i l s- on his hands! and the beauty mark below the eye! and Rosie has it too ;_; you know, I really appreciate that Ethan is not manly man square jawed bearded broad shouldered bulky man (not that they can't look like that, but re has a lot of those bc they're all military), but has softer features (and long eyelashes, have you seen those? i'm jelly) like he really reflects the 'I'm an everyday guy working with computers pls let me go pay my taxes'. also also it REALLY looks like those steps are his last, the trembling on his knees showing the pained effort he's putting into getting one foot in front of the other trying not to lose his balance ahh (whump heart is content)

Love how I answered the previous one and then I had to go off to work! I have a little time now, so I'm getting to this one before I forget again 🤣

There's so much detail, and some of it I didn't even show! Like if you go super close to his hoodie, you actually see the freaking knitting pattern! Same with the (barely even visible under normal circumstances) t-shirt he wears inside the hoodie! I'll have to take a screenshot from that as well, because I am just amazed with the amount of effort they put into it.

And yeah, I think his face reflects his entire existence in the game, it doesn't have to be rough and tough and badass... He's a normal dude without something particularly special about him... And honestly that makes him more relatable, easier to attach to, and way less intimidating than other protagonists. With many other games, most of the time I'm like "Oh Big Protagonist Time" and I can't really feel like I'm going through this with them. Badass protagonists work as characters in the way of like, a fantasy, where we imagine ourselves being as badass and awesome as they are. I know the game developers have said that we're supposed to step into Ethan's shoes, but for me it's way more of being next to him in all of this. It's not "imagining myself as this badass character" it's "I am experiencing this and this random dude with guns is by my side". Probably because Ethan, being a normal dude who didn't ask for this, I feel that he'd need a companion for at least emotional support. Well, I'd be that for him 😆

And yeah his face just... Looks so everyday-like, as you said, I can imagine him as he is going off to pay his taxes, not slaughter an entire village full of bioweapons. And I find that fantastic. They've done an amazing job with Ethan.

Those lashes... I was about to comment of them. I'm so jealous of them too. So pretty 😍

This animation is definitely from his last moments. I think it's when he's crossing the bridge back to the Megamycete, right before we see from his pov again. There's that tiny moment of staggering, where he quickly puts his right foot in front because he looks ready to fall, and I feel like his entire body reacts to it. Like, that instinctive reaction where your hands jerk in front of you, to protect your body and soften the fall in case you drop? But his hands in that moment... one has almost completely crumbled to dust, the other has only three fingers and is even holding the detonator. It feels like his arms are going for the movement to soften his fall, but his hands are not in the position to do so so his legs have to do the job... Ohhh it's so fucking GOOD and I'm SO FREAKING HAPPY we get the chance to actually see this! Whump need satisfied indeed!!

[catchmewiddershins]

Haikyuu Hugs pt 3:

NEKOMA:

Kuroo Tetsuro: 

So this boy is tall, as most of them are, and therefore he is the giver of many standing up hugs

He’ll stand there and wrap you up in his arms

He’ll drum little tunes on your back (or the back of your head) with his fingers while he hugs you

He’s quite lean but his arms are pretty well defined to his hugs are stronger and tighter than you’d think

He likes to tease you a little while you hug, small jabs maybe about your hair or height

But he loves you and you’d know that, he’d never aim for anything your particularly insecure about unless it was to offer a compliment afterwards

He loves it when you run your fingers through his hair

He’s actually found that, at the end of the day, having you play with his hair for an hour can actually make it lie flat!

MOVIE WATCHING CUDDLES - I JUST KNOW IT

His limbs are pretty long and lanky so he’ll loosely let them lie around your waist or shoulders as you sit in front of him on a bed to watch television

His arms are long enough to snatch snacks out of your hands (much to your dismay)

Cheeky grins - you know it!

Gives you little squeezes at your waist or lower back (maybe even your butt if he’s feeling mischievous) 

His shoulders are pretty broad too, he likes it if you lean on them

I’m getting a ‘temperature for all seasons’ vibe from him, he runs pretty warm but won’t be unbearable in the summer

Sometimes, he’ll be very calm and quiet, content hugs abound at these moments, just trying to hug you enough for it to sink into your bones how much he loves you

This normally happens when it rains, my friends, I give you... rainy day blanket cuddles!

Kai Nobuyuki:

Not supremely tall (by Haikyuu standards... he’s 5′9.5″, that’s pretty tall to me) But, if you’re short enough, head on chest; taller? Head on shoulder! Taller than him? This boy will rest his head on YOUR chest or shoulders!

He’s a very calm and quiet boy, but his hugs are very secure and safe

Like hugging a teddy bear, neither of you need to speak to convey your love for one another

He strokes your hair or the side of your face

Warm hugs

His hugs aren’t soft per se... they’re just really comfy? And cozy? Like a warm fireplace and hot chocolate

Which is also a scenario that the two of you would cuddle

Honestly, I feel like ‘hug’ and ‘cuddle’ convey different vibes... and this guy is 110% a cuddler

Will happily give you tight, strong hugs if you need them, the perfect arms to break down in and the perfect shoulder to cry on

He’s just a great person to hug, if you are feeling more chatty, he’ll let you ramble about your day and just listen while smiling down at you with just... adoration 

Ngl I absolutely love him now lol

But yes, fabulous, warm, safe hugs, 10/10 would embrace again

Yaku Morisuke:

This is another boy who I feel has very warm hugs

Tight hugs too, very tight, he basically clasps you to him like a warm barnacle with arms, you’re not getting out of it easily

In essence, he’s a lot stronger than he looks

He’s adorably honest with you, so he’ll hug you and just say, calmly, ‘love ya’ or something like that

Sometimes he’ll lay his head on your thighs and complain about Lev while you lightly massage his temples or ruffle his hair (he thinks it’s unfair how Lev is still growing)

He’s just an aggressive hugger, not in a frantic grabbing sort of way but he’ll just - ‘heya!’ *snatch* *long hug*

Likes to be touching you at all times, just an arm around your shoulders or waist again, you two are attached at the hip

The kind of guy to give you this massive grin while you hug 

However, alongside his bluntness and slightly more aggressive traits, he is very caring and will ask you about your day while hugging you, maybe while stroking your hair or face

He just loves you to pieces basically, I think he’s very affectionate or, at least, physical, like he’s the sort of person to playfully whack people in retaliation (yk the type right?) and I feel like he’s just into physical affection and expressing his feelings physically

Also he’s a face kisser, he just peppers your face with kisses and both of you are giggling and laughing your heads off

If he’s tired, he’ll use you as a head rest... be careful you’re not sitting down because then he’ll fall asleep, he just likes breathing you in while embracing you, he finds it calming

Lets you borrow his clothes and might borrow yours

Film watching snuggles and pyjama snuggles abound

However, I think he’s almost always barefoot and therefore, if he’s feeling a little cheeky, will poke your sides with his cold feet knowing that you’ll squirm lol

Yamamoto Taketora:

He’s an enthusiastic hugger, I can’t ignore that

Will hug you while crying and raving about how attractive he finds you

He sways a lot while you hug him and pats you on the head or back

Will be talking to you and, if he sees that you need a hug, will just grab you by the shoulders and pull you into a hug

Running tackle hugs

Basically, he’ll compliment you a ton while hugging you

You two tend to have chaotic hugs, like watching a movie and clinging to each other so tight until it devolves into a pillow or food fight

If you’re watching a movie with him and he figures something out, he’ll grab you and shake you frantically while screaming about it before giving you a massive hug

Lets you ruffle his hair

He really likes to give you piggybacks so you have to hold on really tight

Kisses your head a lot when he can

He tickles you while you’re hugging

Big squeezy hugs 

I’m thinking warm hugs but he tends to move the both of you around a lot

He loves to tell you all about the cool things he’s done on the team and what his teammates have done

He will just randomly grab you and pull you into hugs, like you do well in a test and he’s like ‘Great! Hug me! YAY!’

Kozume Kenma:

So... basically the opposite of Yamamoto

I feel like he’s a nuzzler ngl, like he’ll nuzzle your hair while you cuddle

Also, Kenma is definitely a cuddler not a hugger

He’s soft

Not really big on enthusiastic squeezing - definitely an arm draper

However, I do believe that Kenma can be quite clingy once he’s used to you

This boy will be curled up next to you, or will have his head in your lap as you play with his hair and he plays with his games

He also definitely is the type who will just hug you from behind out of nowhere, when he needs it, squeeze you to him and press his face into the the space between your shoulders

Hugging Kenma is pretty comforting

He is one for bed cuddles, the two of you will sit on his bed with pillows and blankets, playing games with the lights dim and eating snacks

Sometimes, if he’s tired, he’ll hug you while wrapped in a fluffy blanket

Kenma, I feel, is also the type to not let go once you start hugging him. You know the dilemma of ‘I have a place to be but there’s a cat on my lap?’ Kenma right there

If you try to leave a snuggle, he’ll grab your clothes or arm and whine

Kenma’s hugs tend to be pretty weak though, most of the time, he’s not using all of his muscle strength and his hugs are just the feeling of his arms around you

Nose boops and kisses

Loves to chat with you while you cuddle, just about his new game or your studies

Yet, he also enjoys quiet hugs when you both are just comfortable in the silence and the warmth of each other’s presence

Kenma hugs in one word? Cozy

Please play with his hair though, he loves it

Fukunaga Shouhei:

I love this boy, I would die for him, he is my child *Mandalorian theme plays*

*cough* anYWAY

Fukunaga hugs are very cute

He likes to tell you jokes and make puns while you hug, and the two of you like to trade outrageous jokes throughout the hug

If you’re sitting down, you both like to scroll through your phones while cuddling together, showing each other memes that get gradually more surreal

I think Fukunaga is a very affectionate person, he and you like to cuddle or be touching frequently

I think he’s big on holding hands

I also headcanon him as a fiddler (not the instrument... although-) he likes to tap tunes on your back, arms or legs, draw patterns, fiddle with your hair or fingers, just be touching you at all times

I think he also likes to ask for permission for hugs, even if it’s a given - it’s become a little thing between you

However, he has freezing hands - the rest of him is pretty warm - but not his hands

Often, if you hug him out of nowhere, he’ll make a little ~oh?~ noise and it’s really cute - he’ll just look at you in surprise

He loves you a lot and looks at you with his cute lil face all lit up in adoration

He squishes your cheeks a lot, either with both of his hands or he’ll squish his cheek to yours, mid hug

He hugs you round your middle

He hugs you like one would hug a plushie

Also, he love love LOVES it if you give him a massive hug and a big kiss on the cheek

He also kinda likes being picked up, I think he’s pretty light and, if you’re strong, he likes to be lifted slightly off of the ground from the force of your hug

Does the thing where he runs towards you with his arms open

He just squeezes you ok, like a massive squeeze because he loves you 

Gets this adorable, happy little blush on his face whenever you hug him

Inuoka Sou:

This kid's like a puppy, all bounce and smiles and that definitely bleeds into his hugs

He’ll bound towards you and sweep you hug into a hug, probably lifting you off of the floor with the momentum of it

He has this tendency to swing your arm while you hold hands or rock you while you hug

Spends the entire hug complimenting you

The two of you are definitely the type to have fluffy pyjama cuddles, you’ll sit on the sofa and watch disney movies while cuddling in your fluffy, animal onesies

He always wears something really cozy and will always wrap you up in or lend it to you

Rubs his cheek on your head while you hug

Will talk very happily and quickly about his day and how it’s gone

He will encourage you to do the same

His has his hair down after school and he’ll let you play with it

Always asks for help with his homework while cuddlings - the two of you will be leaning on each other while one of you explains the other’s work

Often, he’ll hug you on sight and then hand you your favourite snack

Will text you saying that he wants hugs

Likes to ‘wiggle’ you when you hug - idk how to describe it but it’s like he’ll put his hands on your sides and move them, each doing the opposite of the other, up and down

He hums catchy tunes he’s heard on the radio while you cuddle

He closes his eyes during a good hug, he’s that happy

Haiba Lev:

*lightly clears throat* TALL BOY

This boy is a GIANT - especially to the shorter ones of us (5′2″ / 5′3″ peeps anywhere?)

His arms are so long and you can wear them like the cord of a dressing gown, wrapped entirely around your waist

He sometimes has one hand in your hair, long fingers making a mess of the strands, or he’ll gently rub your head or cheeks

He has 2 hug modes, calm and reserved hugs and-

Energy hugs!

He either sits there calmly and quietly, head resting on yours, on your shoulders or between your shoulders 

Or he’ll bound up to you and pull you in so fast and tight you could get whiplash

He sways you rapidly and picks you up, kissing you all over and listening to you giggle with love in his eyes

He’ll always have one hand on your waist or head

If the two of you are sitting down to watch a film, he’ll completely encircle you

He’ll place you in his lap and wrap his arms and legs tight around your body, using you as a head rest, and let you lean into him while he steals popcorn from whatever you’re eating it from

Sometimes you’ll both wrap up with a blanket and snuggle inside a joint cocoon

Pulls you to his chest from behind and reaches over you to grab stuff

Complains about training while you give him small massages

He’s freezing (he’s like a stick ok, there’s no f a t (like there is on me, he can have some of mine) boy’s got no insulation) but that just means that your hugs are his personal radiator

Pouts for hugs

Shibayama Yuuki:

He’s pretty shy about hugging you at first, but the two of you soon get used to the affection

He is very sweet with his hugs, they’re all very gentle and soft

He doesn’t squeeze you but his arms aren’t loose either, he just holds you to him perfectly

Hums softly to you while you hug

Once he’s become fully comfortable hugging you, he’ll start to hug you from behind a lot, he thinks it’s the comfiest position

Sometimes, he’ll be feeling a lot stronger, and will grab you into a firmer hug as a result

He likes to talk to you about your day while you hug too

Warm hugs lol, he’s just a comfy hugger

Likes to rest his head on your stomach while you talk, he might even fall asleep

Teshiro Tamahiko:

He can instantly pick up upon when you need a hug and will be there at your side in an instant!

He's got lovely hugs, very sweet about it but just knows what you need

He'll always ask 'Can I hug you?' and will listen unless you're saying know at a time when he knows that you really need a hug

Then it's no holds barred, big squeeze

He nuzzles his head onto your cheek and shoulder

His hands are pretty warm, and they'll rest on your back

He likes to hug you from behind too, when you're sitting down, and will let you lie on him and fall asleep while he strokes your arm

[theadrogna]

Dream Show Challenge 2.0

@singledarkshade​ came up with the Dream Show challenge last year, where we had to give her a list of 7 TV shows or films and we were given a cast of 7 actors in return. This time we were given someone else’s cast and were allowed to recast one character (plus add some if we wished). This time I came up with:

Virtuality

Synopsis:

Good people die before their time and it happens every day. Eli Danzig is doing his best to change that. He invents a way to upload consciousness to an online server where the dead can live out a normal life in a virtual environment. He builds an entire world to keep his uploaded souls entertained, making it as lifelike as possible. Huge amounts of processing power are required so Eli must choose his clients carefully.

The electronic world is called Virtuality and the uploaded persons are known collectively as the digi-souls. Virtuality has a small but growing population, which is a continuing concern as it means more storage space is always needed. Eli funds his enterprise by playing the stock market using his AI Tallis to filter information and predict stock prices. Sometimes he sells patents for the things that the digi-souls invent, but more often they give their inventions away for free. However, money is always a worry because none of this is a stable source of income.

Cast:

Eli Danzig (Donald Glover) – Eli is a young computer programmer of genius level intellect. He came from a poor background, and was the first in his family to attend university. He is determined to make things better for people, by improving society. He believes that “only the good die young” is a real problem, and if he could keep the good people in the world for longer then maybe more good could be done. He invents a digital after-life for people to upload their consciousness to, but he must maintain it a secret to keep the unscrupulous from corrupting it or destroying it. He researches every person very carefully before inviting them to join Virtuality.

Ashura Hadid (Tala Ashe) – Ashura is a terminal cancer patient who becomes one of Eli’s digi-souls. She is a prize-winning journalist and novelist, known for taking on difficult stories about things that people would rather keep hidden. She’s recently been looking into CharterTech, owned by Maggie Charter as part of a series on corruption in tech companies, but most of her efforts are going into completing her final novel. Eli and Ashura have undeniable chemistry, but live in very different worlds. She is very driven and moral, always looking for new ways to expose corruption and wrong doing.

Oren Murphy (Jim Byrnes) – Oren was Eli’s professor at University. He made sure that Eli got the scholarship that he needed to attend, and then acted as his mentor. He suffered from high blood pressure and had multiple strokes. He agreed to be Eli’s test case for Virtuality and was the first digi-soul to be uploaded. He is a calming influence on Eli’s life, often being the one to counsel him out of a rash decision.

Shona Lennox (Sophia di Martino) – Eli’s technician, she has a background in medical devices and large-scale genetic information storage. She built the mainframe and worked out how to put into practice Eli’s ideas. She often finds herself in unusual situations now she is working for Eli, but likes her new job and the excitement it brings, even if she complains about it. She used to work for CharterTech but Eli doesn’t know that when he hires her. When she leaves CharterTech she decides to start self-defence classes and can definitely handle herself in a crisis.

Ryan Fournier (Joey Batey) – Ryan is an inventor who has been responsible for some of the world’s most important leaps forward in technology, including making ecological sources of power more viable, such as wind and solar power. He is a problem solver and a big ideas guy. Unfortunately, he was born with a genetic condition that meant he died young, but he is now one of Eli’s digi-souls and living on in the Virtuality. He loves nothing better than to sit down with a problem and work out a solution, but occasionally he realises what he’d missing out on in the real world and ends up depressed and unhappy.

Chie Ohta (Naoko Mori) – Chie is a medical researcher and entrepreneur, but she was unable to save herself from a rare blood disease, despite years of trying. In the process she brought many other useful pieces of medical technology to the market and helped save the lives of countless people with cures for diseases. She loved her work, but always knew she was on borrowed time. She left behind a husband and children, who have no idea of her new existence. She continues to check up on them, despite Oren’s suggestion that this isn’t a good idea.

Maggie Charter (Alison Janney) – Maggie is a self-made woman, in the way that all billionaires are self-made. She inherited a fortune from her politician father and invested in business. She had a technical background so she picked tech companies as an obvious interest. She now owns CharterTech, one of the largest technical manufacturing companies in the world. She once tried to recruit Eli and has never been pleased that he turned her down. She knows nothing about Virtuality but has heard rumours that someone was working on something like it.

Tallis (Arthur Darvill) – Tallis is the AI personality that maintains the Virtuality. He is often mistaken for one of the digi-souls by the newly uploaded as he is so lifelike. He is polite and caring, always available to listen. He is Eli’s friend and also occasional advisor. Tallis means “knowledge” and he has access to all of the world’s online resources.

Occam (Karen Gillan) - Is another AI, built by CharterTech. She is new and unruly, but very quick to follow her creator’s orders. Sparks fly between her and Tallis.

Episodes:

Episode 1: Virtually Home

Ashura Hadid, prize winning writer, is dying at the age of 38. It’s not fair, it’s not right and she is having none of it. She is being treated for an aggressive brain tumour, but decides to stop treatment when it becomes clear that it will impact her ability to write and finish her final novel. The novel is partly a work of fiction but is also based on real life events at a chemical factory in the city that she has been researching.

Eli Danzig introduces himself to her and explains that he can offer her a second chance at life, by uploading her mind to Virtuality. She explains that she has no money and Eli tells her how he finances the project. She will never have to pay to live there. Ashura questions Eli further about the procedure and Virtuality itself. Eli tells her that he chooses young people, like Ashura, who have died before their time and had great contributions to make to society. They live in a computer generated world where things are simple but they can continue to work and interact with each other. However, they cannot have contact with the outside world, because Virtuality is a secret. It isn’t ready to be opened up to the world, there isn’t enough storage space on Earth to facilitate it. He doesn’t want it to be something that only the rich have access to, so he has decided to choose who gets to go there.

Elsewhere, Maggie Charter discusses her heart condition with her doctor and hears that she may only have a few months to live. She is 61 years old and a tech mogul. For years she has been looking for a way to cure her heart disease. Her network of corporate spies have heard of a young man with an unusual portfolio of patents and a strange pattern of spending on digital storage. She finds out that it is Eli and decides to look into what he is doing more.

Over the course of their discussions, Eli and Ashura grow closer. Eli’s AI partner, Tallis, warns him that he cannot form emotional attachments to the Digi-souls. Ashura will die soon and then Eli will only be able to have limited interaction with her through the interface he has built. Ashura thinks over the proposal and decides to take the plunge. Episode 1 ends with her death. However, Ashura doesn’t die of brain cancer, she is found murdered in her apartment.

Episode 2: Extra Life

Eli must upload Ashura within 12 hours of her death to retain all of her memories, after that time degradation begins to take place. Eli races against time to reach Ashura in the morgue and take the brainwave recording that he needs. Shona Lennox, Eli’s technician, ends up breaking in while Eli creates a computer distraction. They are finally able to upload Ashura’s consciousness, but she has forgotten the days before her death, and they are unable to find out who killed her. She has also forgotten who Eli is.

Meanwhile in Virtuality, the digi-souls try to analyse Ashura’s work for the likely culprit and begin putting together a picture of who it might be. Someone at CharterTech seems a very strong candidate, but then they discover that Ashura was close to uncovering a chemical spill which derails their ideas.

Episode 3: Online Banking

Maggie is putting together more about Eli and his weird ability to make money from stock market trades and a portfolio of patents that seem to have little in common. She uncovers more about the shell companies that he trades through and puts more pieces together. Tallis flags up her interest and Eli works to cover his tracks. It’s the worst time for Ryan to make a major breakthrough in water purification that could save hundreds of lives, but only if they can get it to the right people. With Maggie watching everything that Eli and Shona are doing in the real world, perhaps only the virtual world can get the idea where it needs to be, especially as Ryan is feeling like his efforts don’t matter as he reads yet another news article on how climate change isn’t real.

Shona is contacted by her former boss at CharterTech who invites her to return, but Shona turns them down. The concerning part is that she’s being asked to work on an AI project called Occam. Ashura continues her investigations into CharterTech whilst rekindling her past relationship with Eli.

Episode 4: Occam’s Razor

Maggie has a heart attack, but survives, however she is becoming more and more concerned about her health. She brings online her own AI, Occam and begins to sift through all of the information that she can acquire on medical technology. Occam comes across Chie’s work when she was alive. No one else seems to have been quite as close to curing the heart issue that Maggie has. Occam notices that Eli’s shell company has patented some devices that were based on Chie’s work. In fact, Occam notices that this is something of a trend in Eli’s patent’s and brings together the other work that he has done to see something that Maggie has been unable to see up until this point. Eli may have some way of accessing the brains of the dead.

Episode 5: Reality Bytes

Ryan is bored and ends up creating a virtual ant colony that soon gets out of control, causing all sorts of trouble for Virtuality. Tallis is very much not amused at the replicating program that Ryan has introduced to the system. He and Oren are left to deal with it with only minimal input from Eli as he is being sued by CharterTech over one of his patents. It looks like a lawsuit brought specifically to waste his time, but there doesn’t seem to be anyway to circumvent it, especially with everyone else busy with the increasingly problematic (and storage sucking) ant farm.

Episode 6: Denial of Service

Someone tries to hack into Virtuality and it is up to Eli and the digi-souls to stop them. Chie finds out that her teenage daughter has a new boyfriend, and against Tallis’ advice she looks into him and discovers that he has a possible chromosomal abnormality which could lead to an early death. Chie tries to decide whether she should find a way to let her husband know.

Eli and the others successfully prevent the hack but are worried that someone now knows of the existence of Virtuality. Certainly someone is testing their defences. Shona finally tells Eli that she used to work for CharterTech and the fallout is unfortunate.

Episode 7: Second Life

Eli finds a possible new candidate for Virtuality and starts his due diligence. Usually Shona would be involved in this process but their recent falling out means that things are not running smoothly. The new prospect seems like the perfect candidate and Eli almost begins his usual approach, until Oren uncovers some anomalies that Eli had missed. They may not even exist at all. The question is, who knows enough about Virtuality to do something like this?

Tallis uncovers the existence of Occam, and there is a brief encounter where they size each other up. Occam is identified as the force that tried to hack Virtuality before.

Episode 8: Power Switch

City-wide power outages see Eli scrambling to ensure Virtuality doesn’t go down and lose all the digi-souls. Shona returns to help and the two resolve their differences whilst saving the world that they built together. The digi-souls come up with increasingly desperate plans to produce the power they need to survive, but save the day in the end. Ryan puts together new plans to ensure it never happens again.

Episode 9: Deleted

Ashura finally gets to the bottom of who murdered her and it was nothing to do with CharterTech or Maggie. Her exposé of a chemical company’s disregard for environmental law was the issue that caused her death. Shona uses some contacts to get the police involved and the digi-souls help Ashura gather enough evidence to get the culprit put away in jail for a long time.

Eli and Ashura address some of the issues with their relationship, but resolve to give it a go, despite the obvious barriers.

Episode 10: Boss Fight

Maggie and Occam finally uncover the existence of Virtuality and the digi-souls. The finale sees Maggie managing to force her way into the digital world, whilst Occam and Tallis fight it out. Eli and Shona do their best to help Tallis, but find their offices raided and their technology confiscated. Maggie gets time to get a foothold, but the strain is too much on her heart.

Just as Eli and Shona find their way back in, Maggie dies in the real world. Eli can either choose to kill her for good or keep her malevolent presence in Virtuality. Tallis isn’t too keen on sharing with Occam either.