#hack pu

[lostinlovingrevery]

Old man Logan where reader asks for permission for everything she does “can I touch myself?” While giving him head, for example

Permissions

Old man Logan X F! Reader

May I?

A/N: I'm so sorry this took so long! so I hope you enjoy this!!!!! Def need old man logan being the boss of me...like. bad

Warning: SMUT <3, handjob/blowjob, f! masturbation, is this consider dom/sub? kinda orgasm denial/edging, uuuuh...not proofread....

He never had control over his life.

The beginning, to now. He was hurtling through chaos. Trapped in a vicious tornado that was life, barely able to grasp onto something long enough to keep him steady before the harsh winds pulled it away leaving him thrashing and fighting again.

After a century, he learned to live with it. Even grew to love the chaos at one point- he felt that he couldn't live without it, that it was meant for someone like him.

Even the points of his life where he may have appeared domestic, settled, hell- maybe living in something that was similar to peace; like with the X-men, was still a whirlwind for him. Every day was something new. Never a moment to breathe, a constant cycle of violence- but once again, he knew how to live with it. Never calling it quits, never waving that white flag, he pushes himself off the ground, spitting out blood and pus. That all you got, bub?

Now though, maybe he'd settle for a break.

His age was finally catching up to him, and then some.

It only meant more chaos. The adamantium that was melded to his bones, oh....40,50 years ago, was now wreaking havoc on his body. Causing him issues left and right, delayed healing factor, an annoying limp in his hip from when it rains- fuck he really was old- a hacking cough that made him feel like he was going to lose a lung.

It made him tired. Made him ready to throw in the towel.

Least, till you showed up.

The port in the storm. The first time he ever stopped- and took in the moment to breathe- to pause the cycle.

Sweet, pretty, eager thing you were. You looked at him like something desirable. Like he was the port in your storm. You looked up to him, trusted him.

You wanted nothing more than to please him.

He liked seeing you on your knees before him. The way you squirmed in subtle manners, pressing your thighs together, your hands clenching in frustration.

He could smell your arousal the second he walked in the door - you'd been eager for him to come home. Greeting him happily, pressing a chaste kiss to his lips- only for him to draw it out and make you more needy; then pull away as he walks over to the couch and plopping down with a dramatic sigh as the springs creaked from his weight. Acting as if you weren't standing there, full of hormones, the sweet scent of your longing for him filling the room and making his head cloudy.

It'd been a long day, no more different than every day though. Chauffeuring around assholes, parties and groups, all too drunk to even walk straight, too drunk to give decent tips either. Chaotic bunches. People he can't get to settle down as they yell and laugh, blaring music on their phones because he refuses to turn up the radio.

It's instinct for you at this point. You knew what he needed- to feel just even a grasp of control. It's what you needed too. Similar to Logan- you've lived a life of chaos, maybe not quite as...intense as Logan's was, but still there. Except for you, you wanted someone to take the reins. Someone to just...Take control. To feel like you'll be safe, taken care of- not having to worry about a thing. To be able to shut off your brain.

You liked giving in- letting him decide what to do. He gets his control, you get your comfort.

You followed him, while he pretended to be busy with getting comfortable- looking at him pleadingly. It's been a long day for you as well- and you wanted nothing more than to just...mindlessly suck him off.

"Lo?" You called his name and he finally looked at you. Biting your bottom lip, you scooted closer. "How was your day?"

"Usual." He says, eyeing you. "Yours, darling?" He reached over, tucking some hair behind your ear.

"Okay." You shrugged. Butterflies filled your stomach- even though you've been with Logan for a good amount of time now- he still makes you nervous. "Um..." You looked away shyly. "May I..." Your hand reached over to his thigh, fingers gently tracing downwards towards his zipper. "Play with you, for a bit?"

He smirked. "Well, ain't you polite?" He coos. He grabbed your hand, removing off him. "Don't recall you asking to touch first, though."

You frowned, a small pout on your lips.

"Don't give me that." He says.

"Sorry..."

He raised a brow and waited for you to continue. You looked back up at him. "May I touch you?"

"On your knees first darling."

You smiled, setting off the couch and moving to your knees between this spread legs. You looked up at him- giving him those doe- eyes you know he can't resist.

You waited for him to give you permission.

"Go on." He nods. "Take me out."

Your hands palmed his knees first, sliding up his thighs sensually until you reached his zipper. Slowly tugging it down, and undoing the button, you began to tug his pants down just enough to reach in and pull him out.

Only semi-erect, you spit in your hand, and grasped his base and looked up at him.

"Go ahead." He nods.

You started slow, beginning to pump your hand up and down his thick girth. Your spit being used as a lube- you watched his cock twitch in your hand as you reached to the base, before moving back up and fisting over his swollen head.

You felt your mouth watering as pre-cum beaded his tip. Your lips parted, unconsciously licking your lips as you became hypnotized with his cock as you stroked him.

He watched you with amusement- he loved watching you. The way you look at him like he's something...beautiful. He never thought he'd meet someone that would share that same passion he always wanted to share.

You looked up at him, meeting his eyes. He could feel your desire, your lust- he knew what you were going to say.

"May I taste you?"

He let out a breath. "Go ahead sugar."

With his permission, you leaned forward- sticking your tongue out and dipping it into the slit of his cock. His heady taste, salty and warm- made your eyes roll back and a soft moan escape you. You gripped the base of him, lowering your tongue down and licking him from the bottom to the top like an ice cream cone.

His cock jumped in your hand at the action. You could hear his breathing pick up- heavy, attempting to keep himself together.

You continued licking him like he was a delicate treat, savoring the flavor of his skin and sweat as you stroked him simultaneously. Logan's head tipped back, feeling himself get closer and closer to a finish- but he wasn't ready for that yet.

"Slow down. It's not going anywhere." He tells you. It made you whine- You didn't want to slow down, you wanted to take him whole, down your throat, to have your tongue covered with his essence- something you would end up tasting for the rest of the night into the next day.

Yet you still obeyed. Your hand slowed, and you gave him small kitten licks instead.

Your thighs pressed together, an attempt to relieve the ache that was between your legs. Your panties were drenched from your arousal- a throbbing ache in your clit that you need relief from.

You adjusted yourself on your knees, spreading them apart so you could pressed yourself onto the floor- the pressure relieving some of the tension you felt down there.

Continuing to stroke him, you watched pre-cum continuously bead out of him, and you chewed on your inner cheek- resisting the urge to lap him up.

"Lo-" Your voice tittered on a whine. "I want- Can I suck you off?"

A small laugh escaped him- making you frown. You're not sure what's so funny about that.

"I look that good huh sweetheart?"

"Mmhm." You nodded.

"Go ahead." He purrs, his hand reached over to curl into your hair and pull you closer.

You wrapped your lips around the head of his cock, swirling your tongue around him. Taking him deeper, you hollowed your cheeks, gagging slowly as he began to hit your throat- but you didn't stop.

Your tongue caressed the underside of his cock while your lips were flushed against his base and his salt-and-pepper hair that curled around his base tickled your nose.

A grunt escaped him, feeling you gag as your throat closed around the head of his cock- his hand tugged you back, pulling you off him completely until your mouth as hanging open, a string of spit connecting your lips to his cock.

"Fucking beautiful..." He mutters, before pulling you back down on him. You moaned, your eyes rolled back as you bobbed your head up and down his length, his hand that has ahold of you setting the pace.

You were unconsciously grinding against the floor- desperate for relief as you got him him. You took him down your throat again, choking on him and tears began to spill over your eyes from the pressure. You pulled yourself off of him and looking up at him pleadingly.

"Can I touch myself?" You asked breathlessly. Spit dribbling down your chin, your lips puffy and swollen.

He was half tempted to tell you no. To see you whine and squirm and beg- but you've been good.

"Do it baby." He says, his hand curling tighter into your hair. "Touch yourself for me."

You took his cock back into your mouth- as your hand climbed underneath the waist of your pants. Your fingers found your swollen clit- a soft whine escaping you as your fingers swirled fast and rough circles into your bud.

As much as he preferred to get you off himself- watching you do it while sucking him off? That was a different kind of power for him.

"Slow down." He orders. "Don't need to get yourself off so quickly darling. Enjoy it."

You whined with his cock in your mouth, and he tugged your hair hard. "Save it, or I'm telling you to stop."

You held back a cry- obliging as you slowed the pacing of your fingers, still working on sucking and savoring him.

A few minutes past- your orgasm never came- because Logan kept telling you to go faster, then slower- while controlling the pace of you sucking him off. It was almost scary how he knew how close you were to cumming every time- even when you tried to hide it. Afraid to ask him only to be denied again.

"Lo- Please." You gasped as you pulled off his cock. "May I cum? Please?"

He smirked, pushing you back down on him, all the way until his tip hit your throat again - your gag reflex was gone at this point.

"Go ahead darling-" He says, "Use both hands too."

A moan of relief escaped you. Your fingers worked tirelessly over your clit, as your free hand shoved your pants down your thighs so you could fit your other hand to your weeping hole.

Your cunt clenched around your fingers tight, as you began pumping them in and out of you. Moaning over his cock- Logans grip on you pulled you back and forth on his cock- allowing you to focus on getting yourself off while he fucked your mouth.

A cry escaped you as you came, your body trembling as you drenched your fingers with your arousal- pleasure racking through your body in waves.

Logan shoved his cock down your throat- a loud grunt escaping him as he spilled himself in ropes and coating your throat.

He pulled you off him, loud breathy pants escaping him as he tipped his head back. You stood up on shaky legs, and clambered onto his lap.

"Can I kiss you?" You asks, and he opened his eyes to look at you. Sweaty, spit and cum covered your lips and tears stained your cheeks. His hand reached to the back of your neck, pulling you closer,

"That's the one thing you don't have to ask for darling."

[vilnmelling]

NPMD Digital Ticket details!

Since not every can/can afford to/wants to buy the Digital Ticket for Nerdy Prudes Must Die (and the bonus material that comes with the purchase), for your inclusion purposes, here's a list of fun background details, funny moments and comments made in the track commentary, for you to use however you like!

Ruth doesn't actually need to wear her headgear anymore, but she wears it anyway because it makes her feel safe.

Jeff pitched a Nightmare Time episode about the problematic puppy from Steph's verse of High School Is Killing Me, meaning there is a story there.

In the line, "I learned that at the anti bullying assembly last month, fucknugget!" there's a long pause before "Fucknugget!" which really makes it sound like Max forgot to insult Richie and just threw the word out.

All of the little noises Ruth makes, she makes because she has more she wants to say, but she can't say them (presumably due to anxiety).

In the proshot, you can't see fully how low Richie goes while he and Ruth sneak up on Peter, but Jon is fully crouched down. He then uses Pete's pockets and elbows to climb up like he's climbing a mountain (he mimes using a pick or axe to get good hold).

While Steph is talking, Ruth and Richie try their best to hear through the phone by getting as close as they can to it.

The reason Max and Jason were in the Pasqualli's parking lot is that they were practicing their skateboarding. They do that at Pasqualli's instead of at school/at a skatepark because they don't want the smoke club and skater kids to make them look like noobs. (This was a cut bit from the Pasqualli's scene).

The line, "Some big... dumb... sexy... football star" is expanded. In the Digital Ticket, Grace says, "Some big... dumb... sexy... sweaty... hot... well-spoken... beautifully tall football star."

When they're in the boys bathroom, Steph jumps to see over the stalls.

Richie Naruto runs when they're going to Waylon Hall. Pete slaps his hands down, but after they pause to look at the house, Richie looks over his shoulders at Pete a couple of times before darting away from him, once again Naruto running.

Richie stops in the door at the Waylon Place, so Pete pushes him inside.

Ruth and Richie speak at the same time when they say, "I'm allergic to deodorant" and "I have overactive sweat glands."

Ruth goes straight to Richie to complain after the "pus in my pits" exchange with Steph.

When Steph suggests saying there's a party at the Waylon Place, Pete, Ruth and Richie all react negatively (mostly nervously groaning).

While Grace sings the "He's just a nerd in disguise!" line, Richie can be seen practicing the first move of the Bully the Bully dance.

After Ruth says, "We're gonna cut off his nips!" you can see Steph look confused and ask, "What?"

While Pete and Richie talk in the Waylon Place ("Am I reading as ghost or Lin Manuel Miranda" & "She came all the way out here just for you."), Ruth and Steph discuss and practice Ruth's skeleton moves.

Richie gets stuck in the dangling parts of Pete's costume when he says, "You could just hit it and quit it, bro!" He then aggressively detangles himself.

The line "He's just really fucking brave!" comes from Richie being jealous that he's not that brave.

Richie hypes Ruth up a bit after Max says her skeleton bit was really special.

Grace hides behind Ruth while Max is dying.

Richie rolls his eyes when Grace says "It was an act of god!" (Similarly, Shapiro sighs and looks away in disbelief when Grace later says "It was god's plan!")

Pete gags when Grace says "Hack all his limbs off." Richie can also be seen gagging and holding his stomach several times.

Ruth hands Max's nipples over to Grace after cutting them off.

Jeff Blim is the principal of Hatchetfield High. Not a character of Jeff's, just Jeff himself.

Brenda still seems quite judgmental after the two weeks have passed. She makes a lot of not-quite-friendly faces when the football team's talking about Richie smelling bad.

When Richie struggles to remove the Zeke the Fightin' Nighthawk costume, he accidentally removes his jacket as well, leading to Jon having to put it back on (which he also struggles with) (and which creates a funny situation, since Richie was supposed to go shower).

Richie seems to have hurt his leg by the second fall in Nerdy Prudes Must Die (the song).

After Steph tells Grace to "Leave Ruth alone!" in the principal's office, Ruth tries to grab Steph's hand.

The wig Joey wears when he plays Dan Reynolds isn't Dan's real hair. Dan Reynolds wears a toupée.

Trevor and Angela's drama student encourage each other after they finish rehearsing.

Additional line when Grace is lying to Shapiro: "Suddenly, I remembered a crucial detail that made everything make sense. A picture came flashing into my mind, like I was Enola Holmes!"

"My dad sells women shoe! Shoes!"

Angela misses the chair at Beanie's and falls on her ass, leading to her, Joey and Mariah (mostly Mariah) breaking character.

During The Summoning, Tinky focuses ONLY on Pete. The entire time, he looks like he's restricting himself from lunging out and attacking him. At one point, he points at the Bastard's Box while staring at Pete.

90% of the time during The Summoning, Pokey's staring at his own mask.

Steph facepalms after Max says "That's nasty! ... I like it!"

[holycowboytiger]

Poly!141 x Hacker!Reader

Now now now- hear me out..... add a twist ...

GN!Reader

(Autistic!Reader anyone?)

CW: NSFW, Reader sees TF141..doing the sideways tango, Reader is not as harmless as they seem, mentions of murder, canon violence,

You work on base as one of the ''pencil pushers'' one of the useless tech drones who are constantly overlooked despite putting in hours upon hours of overtime to avoid people stealing and potentially selling military trade secrets and keeping classified files classified and only within the contents of the licensed computers.

You keep to yourself, most of the tech drones aren't known for being the most social, but even by their standards you're a shut in, alot of them find you off-putting,, and awkward to make conversation with, but that's ok! you like working alone, by yourself, in your own space.,.. and truth is you hate the majority of the people you work with anyway.

Most of your co-workers absolutely adore the 141, would lick the dirt off their boots of they asked, they're seen as heros, and you're just about done with most of the men you work with claiming they could've joined that taskforce if they didn't break their knee when they were 15, you're actually two seconds from breaking their neck.... but you have to keep yourself in check...

''You don't believe me?''

''You take 25 minutes to recover from walking up two flights of stairs Peter, so I think you should focus on what you're barely good at, which is this job.''

''Woah.. ok damn''

You could care less for the group, were they impressive? yes, from the missions and files that you have access to, their stats and skills were something to gawk at, something to admire, but, the admiration slowly fades when the one by the name of Soap brings his disgusting laptop with sticky keys to you, claiming it has a virus talking about about ''the Russians hacking it''

''I- dinnae mean ta bother- its just been- freak'n out on me and i dinnae know what's happenin with it- d'ya think it's the Russians?''

''erm.... I don't think so..''

The admiration completely disappears when you dig deeper into the laptop and find the various porn sites your dear ''Hero'' Soap had been spending hours on, not to judge, everyone enjoys a bit of porn from time to time, but the fact that its on an actual tactical laptop, military property, that you now have to see, and you now have to confront what the soldier was into.

From ''Masked Military Men'' to ''Office Secretary'' ''Military Captain Punishe- you get the fucking gist. AND! the list goes on, youre pretty sure that the entire taskforce is fucking by the end of your sweep,,,, and it only confirms it when you discover a file that was taking up far too much space.

Soap had actually been complaining about the device running slow too, so you decided to take a look, before deleting the file, incase it was something important...

Jesus fucking christ you should not have, you actually should've thrown the computer at his head when he brought it to you, you should've actually just never signed up for this job and kept with your previous one,,, even if it was quite,,,, dangerous

The file contained 100s and 100s of videos of the 141... together... getting it on..doing the sideways tango? fornicatin- ok they were fucking. They were fucking RAW and NASTY, and you're so sure one of the videos contained a leash, ears, muzzle and a tail, but you clicked off before you ruin your eyes any further.

Now now- before the reader starts squinting, you weren't judging the taskforce for getting it on with eachother, frankly it was none of your business, you weren't disgusted, just,, uncomfortable, you've never met these men- properly, yet you've seen their dick and balls.... you're allowed to feel a little weird, that and- Soap had trusted you to remove a virus, not go snooping into his computer files, you felt as if you had overstepped, even if he was a shameless sex fiend by the amount of porn he consumed- you still felt as if you'd pushed into his laptop too far,, now,, what to do,,,

Do you: A: Let him know that you have seen the videos of him and his taskforce, and apologise to all hell and hopes he doesn't murder you,, or worse- report you to HR....is there a HR in the military...? B: Remind him that this is military property and should not be treated as a personal possession, kind of hinting at the fact that you saw.. something.....?

or C: Pretend you saw nothing and give the device back to him, and just hope and pray you never see him walking around again,, maybe pray that you never see his taskforce wondering the building,, you cannot look them all in the face knowing that you've seen them,,, in their birthday suits lets just say.

....SO- we all agree on C? Good because that's what you end up doing

You find Soap the next day, shove the computer into his hands and hope to god he never needs your help again.

He thanks you, but not before you scurry away to your cave (desk) and hope he doesn't remember where it is.

''Soap-.. Laptop.''

'Ye fixed it!? Thank fuck- it wasn't-''

''No Russians.''

''ahhh, whateve'r it was, thank ye mate''

''mhm.....welcome''

Now, to clear something up, your perception of him isn't ruined by some porn you found on his laptop, for fucks sake you had castrated a man before- oh.......uhhh,,, i mean,,,,,, you've,,, youv'e seen worse.... dark web stuff...Yeah!!! Dark web stuff!

ANYWAY. You didn't judge him, truly, he was still an ok dude, you just never had a taste for the taskforce, never really shared the weird admiration others had for them, and now with , it would just be weird if you adored them as much...

You hoped he didn't take your cold shoulder to heart, and hoped that some of your coworkers would sooner label you as a weirdo introvert so he doesn't take too much offense at your avoidance of him.

You felt a little guilty everytime you saw his smile drop when you didn't wave back at him, or nod at him when he walked past, but- your awkwardness was not enough to deter him, the man was like a damned puppy, he was just too friendly, he just wanted to see you smile at him once..

SO- what did you resort to? Being rude and standoffish,, and no you weren't proud of yourself, from the death glares to the snappiness when he greeted you, his friendly nature slowly faded as he realised day by day that you were NOT going to be his friend, in another life you may have gotten along, maybe you'd have the courage to actually tell him about what you found....

''Aye! Yo! Bon! How're-''

''I'm busy.''

'oh,,,uh- sorr-''

''its fine just,, quit botherin me''

But with your past and the weird barrier you had put infront of the taskforce, you stayed away, pushed him away..

you needed to keep him away, the closer he got, the more danger you could be in,, you could be exposed,,,, or were you just paranoid? being a murde- UHHH doing SOMETHING not so legal will make you that way...

The more upset Soap was, the more eyes you could feel drilling into the back of your skull.. 141 did not take kindly to you being so.... hostile towards their,,, teammate? boyfriend????? LOVER?? HUSBAN-ok lets not get too ahead of ourselves.

But you just couldn't face them ... you saw their penises,,,,,,, yeah no you cant.

From the glares to ''accidentally'' bumping you in the halls and your lunch going missing, you had started a petty office war with the taskforce,, which was hilarious because,,,, these are trained military men- bullying(?) you in work because you made their boyfriend sad.

he even thought they were being a little.. much

''Don't ye think yer being,,, alot?''

''Nah,,, they were being a bitch.''

''ah....''

Admiration for the men? They'd be lucky if you even had a good word to say about them fucking childishimmatureassholeswhoarefuckingeacotherfuckingbitchesughyouhatethemsomuch

Ok calm down you're lowkey going crazy... you are kind of insane, but PLEASE lets try to function like a normal person and ignore these fully grown men acting like school girls... lets focus on your job!!! Please before you go back to your previous one..... for the love of god please stay focused

You do not need friends in here, you need to make sure that people aren't stealing military data, you don't need the taskforce to appreciate the work you do, you don't need to make friends in your workplace, you don't need to eat your lunch with people or stand by the water cooler and gossip you don't need your coworkers to invite you out for drinks at the weekend

You're fully booked,,,, and by fully booked I mean you either have an ,,,,, ''target'' or you're going to rot away at home, bottle in hand while you find dirt on everyone in your personal life for shits and giggles, hey! Peter is cheating on his wife!.... if he pisses you off you should call her- .....maybe- or you could use it when you needed it.

As time went on, 141 slowly got bored of inconveniencing you, thinking you got the memo,, they still didn't like you,, and still glare at you- but hey! your lunch is still where you put it!

The whole ordeal is over, I mean, you're a little more hated in the office than you once were but, that means less people bothering you, and less people in your personal space trying to get you to ''open up''

You are officially alone, you dodged the bullet that is soaps friendship and you can just.. relax... until you realise the sites that your not friend has visited, and you slowly figure with at the rate he consumes porn he will find himself with another virus in his laptop... and he's going to go to one of your coworkers and ask them to fix it since you have proven to not be up for the task again...

Theyre gonna see,,,, oh- oh no the files, the videos,,, the search history-

''aye- Peter-- ' think there's somethin' wrong with me laptop''

oh fuck.

[lewistoferrari]

mdni

“stop being such a baby, garrick, and take the damn medicine.”

kyle eyes the tiny plastic cup in your hand with a look of disgust. he wasn’t drinking that. “i’d rather die,” he says, before having a coughing fit, that leaves him with a throbbing throat and a little chest pain.

when he’s done hacking up a lung, you give your husband an exasperated look. “if you keep coughing like that, you just might.”

“well then i guess i’ll die.”

you really don’t mean to, but a bubble of laughter leaves your mouth before you can stop it. leave it up to kyle to be so damn dramatic about a few milliliters of cough syrup.

“ky, please.”

“ky please,” he mimics in an awful voice that sounds nothing like yours, before smirking when you scowl at him. “if i take the medicine, do i get a reward?”

“no.”

“damn, not even a crumb of pu—”

you ignore the look of disappointment on his face. “not even that,” you huff, before rolling your eyes.

and much to your amusement, kyle actually has the audacity to fold his arms across his chest with a pout. when he tells you that he’s not taking the medicine since you refuse to reward him, you cave. you don’t agree because you’re thinking about the way your husband will have you face down with your ass up.

all you want is for kyle to stop being so damn stubborn and take the medicine, before his cold gets much worse. you don’t actually plan on letting him anywhere near you while he’s still contagious.

so you hold the cup out for kyle to take, your eyebrow raising a bit at the way he tosses the medicine back like it’s a shot. and as soon as he sets the medicine cup onto the nightstand, he pounces. he ignores your protests as he yanks you down and pins you to the bed.

“you’re gonna get me sick,” you whine while you try and fail to remove his hand away from the hem of your shirt.

“now, where’s my reward?” kyle asks with a grin, before tugging your shirt up further and taking a nipple into his mouth.

masterlist

[domjaehyun]

https://x.com/nctzoro/status/1884280714981695989?s=46&mx=2

a jaehyun ver. for I Love Nerds perhaps 🤓☝🏻??? going crazy over him in glasses ever since the content dropped HOW IS HE REAL??? 😭

nerd jaehyun earnestly and eagerly telling you allllll about the intentionality behind music theory and whole time you’re just thinking about how good he would feel on top of you.

when you decide to cut to the chase and put your hand on his leg, he just freezes, looks at it, looks up at you, and then smiles widely and goes back to talking (he has no idea what you’re doing). you’re getting a teeny bit frustrated at this point so you slip your hand up higher and maybe you even squeeze a little bit.

fortunately, this definitely gets his attention, and his sentence is rudely interrupted by his sudden, flustered coughing fit. whole time he’s coughing, his torso is pivoting and moving this way and that but you can’t help but notice that he’s doing everything in his power not to move the one leg that you’re holding onto while his body is wracked with coughs and dry hacking.

as ridiculous as he looks right now, his loud medical emergency unwittingly drawing attention to yourselves tucked away in the corner of the library, you can’t help but be endeared to him.

“jaehyunnnn,” you whine when he’s done coughing up what sounds like his gallbladder or some other internal organ. “i wanna go back to my dorm.”

his face falls—and it falls fast. “oh, i’m sorry,” he mumbles woefully, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose as he sniffs once and looks away from you.

“sorry?” you ask, confused. “for what?”

“for talking too much and making you want to go home,” he answers sadly, his brows starting to knit together in the middle as his emotions get the better of him. “sorry, i just got so excited, and i know you don’t care, so i shouldn’t have gone on the way i did—“

“jaehyun, i think you’re confused.” you say slowly. “i’m going to my dorm,” you explain, pointing at yourself.

he nods slowly in understanding.

you turn your hand to point at him. “and you’re going to my dorm.”

his eyes widen and he turns to look at you so suddenly that it sends his glasses slipping halfway down his nose. “i’m going to your dorm…?” he asks, a tinge of excitement and relief creeping into his voice.

“yes.” you nod.

“with you.”

“yes, with me.” you hold back your laugh.

“we’re going together.”

“yes, sir.”

“to your dorm.”

“indeed.”

“where we’ll be together… alone…”

“most definitely…”

“in your dorm.”

“you know what?” you chuckle, rising to your feet. “you take as long as you need to process this. i’m gonna head to the bathroom and you should be packing up or packed by the time i get back, okay?” you run your fingers through his hair, ruffling the strands into a messy, tousled look that screams effortlessly handsome, and if you’re not mistaken, he shivers a bit at your touch when your nails reach the back of his neck. experimentally, you drag your nails along the nape of his neck and lightly across the side of his jaw until you’re playfully tugging at his earlobe affectionately.

you maybe expected a giggle or a chuckle perhaps from him; maybe even a “stop, that tickles” or something of the sort. what you didn’t expect in the slightest was for his eyes to roll all the way back into his head and flutter shut as he lets out a low, delighted groan.

“oh?” you giggle, stroking the shell of his ear with one finger.

“holy shit, keep doing that,” he grunts.

“mm, yeah? feels good?” you can’t hide your smile and the smugness it’s tinted with, but it’s not like it matters—jaehyun is so wrapped up in your ministrations on his head that his eyes are shut tightly and his mouth is hanging open ever so slightly, shallow, almost ragged breaths leaving him.

“feels so good.” he admits in a slurred mumble as you proceed to scritch and scratch gently at his head with one hand and massage his ear with the other. to your surprise, he reaches up and loops an arm around the backs of your legs, pulling you between his slowly parting legs to bring you directly in front of him.

“hi,” you hum sweetly, and he looks up at you, pupils blown out with desire and an utterly overwhelmed look on his face.

“hi,” he mumbles shyly, watching you intently. when you resume massaging his ear, he turns his head in so his lips can press against the inside of your forearm. it starts off slowly, a brushing against each other so light that you think you imagined it. but when he sighs softly, his warm breath moistening your skin before he unmistakably presses his lips to your skin, you know it’s not all in your head.

he looks up at you for a reaction and when you just watch him wordlessly, intrigued and a bit amused with your head cocked to the side, he does it again. and again, lips shifting further up your forearm—and further still, until his lips are smooching the crook of your arm and you’re giggling in surprise—and even still, his fingers hurriedly pushing up your sleeve so he can kiss the newly exposed flesh.

“jaehyun,” you hum to get his attention.

“mm?” he hears you, you’re pretty sure, but it’s obvious he’s not truly listening as he kisses a path from your inner elbow, down your forearm, and to your hand, where he places kiss after kiss after kiss—your wrist, the very center of the palm of your hand, the fingertips of your middle and ring fingers, and when you attempt to pull your hand away to tilt his head up so you’re looking at each other, he grumbles something whiny in protest and his eyes scan your surroundings as if he’s looking for something.

your curiosity gets the better of you and you can’t help but ask. “jaehyun, baby, what are you looking around for?”

“i wanted to make sure you and i were actually alone and that nobody’s watching us.” he murmurs, but there’s an urgency to it you haven’t heard from him before, and that coupled with the dark, unwavering look in his eyes only piques your interest further.

“why?” you say slowly, dragging the word out a bit to emphasize your confusion.

“so i can do this,” he mumbles, eyes darting briefly around for good measure before he’s clutching the hand he’s been kissing and bringing your fingers to his mouth, pressing soft, gentle kisses to each pad of your fingers as you giggle shyly in delight. “feels good?” he murmurs, and you are absolutely certain you’re not hallucinating the suggestive, teasing lilt to his voice.

“yeah,” you sigh blissfully, and he chuckles with your fingers still pressed to his lips.

“what about this?” he doesn’t even give you time to reply before he’s leaning forward and taking your middle and index fingers into his mouth. you gasp in surprise—because of course you do; the very hot music nerd has you between his legs and your fingers in his warm, wet mouth and while you want this, oh, so very badly, this is not how you anticipated it to go.

he’s sucking on them eagerly, fingers looped tightly around your wrist so you couldn’t yank it away even if you wanted to. when his tongue comes into play, the mischievous wet muscle gliding along your fingers and swirling around them, you realize you might just be a goner.

he smirks—yes, smirks—when a small moan escapes you, and he slowly pulls your fingers from his mouth but doesn’t release your hand from its position, your fingertips dangling pointlessly just a breath away from his waiting mouth.

to your surprise, he stands up and haphazardly shoves his laptop and notebook in his bag before slinging it over his shoulder. he stretches his hand out for your bag, which you hand him readily without even really processing it fully. with a firm grasp on your bag and his bag securely on his back, he nods to you in agreement and starts to lead you out of the library.

“where are we going?” you wonder aloud as he leads you through the shelves and study tables with a sureness, a confidence and an energy that, once again, you don’t think you’ve ever seen from him.

“your dorm, baby. you forgot so soon?” he has the absolute audacity to tease you in response, a playful grin on his face as he regards you carefully.

all you can do is chuckle in response, now eagerly anticipating the moment you can get your revenge.

[lumpsbumpsandwhumps]

unpopular opinion but whump should and deserves to be messy

"Yeah duh there's plenty of scenarios with blood and tears--" no. I want more.

I want pink tinted spit dribbling out of Whumpee's mouth. I want strings of saliva connecting between their busted lip to Whumper's tongue. I want drool running down the corners of their mouths because of a gag that makes it difficult to swallow.

I want sweat making Whumpee feel sticky and clammy to the touch. I want their skin to be slick and soaking into their soiled clothes. I want them to squirm in discomfort of a dirty shirt clinging to their back from precious fluids that are going to risk further dehydration. I want their hair to be continuously damp and hanging in thick strands in their face.

I want the scabs to turn white with pus and black with infection. I want old wounds to tear open and bleed a thick red. I want the pink flesh underneath to pulse and quiver, the sight of yellow fat and cartilage. I want blood vessels and capillaries to burst and spread over an area, I want burns to start brown and peel away to a tender pink.

I want Whumpee to vomit out of their nose because their mouth is gagged. I want bile to reek on their clothing and on their tongue. I want them to grow use to the taste of bitter blood and burning chyme forever in the back of their throat. I want them to have to snort and hack to be able to spit out whatever was still caught on their tongue or risk swallowing it down.

I want their tears to remain unwiped and crusting over their eyes. I want snot to smear over their cheeks and leave their lips uncomfortably tacky. I want their face to remain blotchy and red because they just can't get it clean. I want dirt and blood and skin to build up under their fingernails to the point they risk infecting their own wounds if they try and mess with it. I want Whumpee to only be sprayed down with cold water and an old towel, never any soap and never in all the creases of their body.

I want their bodies caked in grime and viscera and bodily fluids. I want Whumper to never give them the luxury of feeling clean and in fact actively making them more filthy each time. I want Whumpee's clothes yellowed and their hair matted and their skin sickly. I want injuries to never properly heal so that the only option is to amputate the necrosis. I want Whumper to force Whumpee to clean up whatever kind of mess they made by licking it off the floor.

I want arteries to spew like a garden sprinkler. I want the exposed roots of pulled teeth to dangle freely in their mouth. I want Whumpee's hair, including all of their body hair, to grow to unruly lengths that are constantly tangled and ingrown. I want them to find comfort in starving because it means there's nothing to risk throwing up. I want them to scrub their skin raw and bleeding, uncaring how much it aggravates their injuries or how the soap stings, the first chance they're given for a real bath.

I want it to be nasty!!!!!!

[claymoresword]

I Choose Her | Stand Alone Series Chapter: 2

Hermione Granger x Slytherin Fem!Reader

Summary: Y/n and Hermione attempt to deal with the emotional and mental turmoil that came after the 'Battle Of Hogwarts' & everything else that led up to it.

Pairing: Hermione x Reader

Wordcount: 1.6k

Warnings: angst, depiction of cutting & self harm, death & violence, a bit of fluff somehow

Note: this one gets pretty graphic so please approach with caution. like stated there is mention of self-harm and a depiction of it so i have indicated that section with asterisks. if that sort of thing is triggering for you please skip and stay safe! but other than that, hope you enjoy. <3

Taglist: @aweidlich @xxsekhmet @poppyflower-22 @cocoyeehaw @blackbirdv98 @arcturusseer @cherryflavoredcoke @js-a-writer @baylegend6 @puta1 @t-wylia @raven-ss @unexpected-character @brocoliisscared @aki-ham @theheartwants-what-itwants

(comment to be added to or removed from the taglist)

You cover your ears, a feeble effort to dull the incessant ringing.

Squinting to find your way through the courtyard, the dust began to make your eyes water. Yet the sting was a welcomed distraction from the near deafening noise that reverberates through the air.

You gaze up at the sky and it only helps to disorient you further.

The sun is out, but there is no light.

“Harry Potter is dead!” A voice dulls the noise, his voice.

The large snake that slithers past your foot makes you recoil, it circles you continuously, as if stalking a prey.

You reach for your wand on instinct, but you find that it is not in your pocket.

Your breath catches in your throat as Voldermort advances towards you. Half of his body deteriorating into dust, yet a spine-chilling grin remained.

You attempt to call for help, but you have seemed to forget how. So instead, you take a frantic scan of your surroundings.

Your stomach turns as you catch sight of a bloodied arm, sticking out of a pile of rubble to your left. You shift closer, motivated by a curiosity that you quickly learn to regret.

What you once thought was rubble, turns out to be a mountain of corpses.

They lay limp and lifeless atop one another, some nearly burnt to ash– others bloodied beyond recognition.

Your schoolmates, reduced to pieces of charred flesh and bone.

The urge to wretch overcomes you again.

“Harry Potter is dead.”

Voldermort's voice again, now only above a whisper, still makes you wince. You followed the arm he has left outstretched, pointing to the highest point of the mountain.

There you spot Harry, laying on the top of the pile, unmoving.

Dead.

The noise that leaves you is involuntary when you notice Ginny pinned underneath him. Then there is Fred, Neville, Seamus– Ron.

All dead.

“No!” You cry out, this time your voice does make it past your lips.

At last, you are able to locate your wand, you retrieve it swiftly as you point it at Voldermort.

His face has changed again. This time he appears to you younger, human.

You are left staggered for a heartbeat, still you continue to aim your wand towards the man standing before you.

“The snake, y/n, you have to kill the snake.” Her voice carries through the courtyard. Hermione's voice.

Still, you can't see her.

You just barely manage to bite back a sob.

Her absence is like a dagger to your chest, twisting relentlessly.

“I will try.” You respond to no one.

The man's head morphs into one of a serpent, and soon, a bright flash of green erupts from the tip of your wand. With a large thud, the man before you drops to the ground.

It leaves you unsettled– killing still feels unnatural, it made you sick, and you vow to always feel that way. To never let it be a part of who you are, you cannot allow it to be.

You stand over the body now only to realize there is a serpent head no longer.

The corpse now bears a resemblance to someone you recognize all too well. A blade twists in your chest again, hacking away at your heart.

Hermione remains motionless as you kneeled over her. Frenzied, you pull her head onto your lap, feeling her pulse.

You did wish to see her, but not like this.

How can a sight you desperately yearned for, so suddenly turn into something you utterly dread?

“No, no. Wake up, my love. Please, wake up.” You beg in anguish, clutching her body close.

She is so cold.

The only bit of warmth you feel comes from the uncontrollable flood of tears that escape your eyes. You cannot sense the dagger anymore, and soon, you cease to feel much of anything.

Your chest– your very being, vacant.

You have killed Hermione, and the last bit of your soul in the process.

-

When you open your eyes again, you are in bed. You wake, alongside the familiar blinding ache in your arm.

All you can hear now is your quickened breathing, and the pounding of your heart as you sit up.

“Shit–” You mutter, clutching your head, your shirt sticking to your frame from sweat.

It wasn't real, only a dream.

The Dark Lord is gone, and you are safe.

Instinctively, you reach for Hermione, only to find the empty space next to you.

Panic sets in once more as you climb out of bed.

It can't be– it was only a nightmare.

“Hermione?” You call out into the darkness, but you receive no response.

You know she is alive. You spent the day with her and you went to bed with her.

It has been that way for weeks, you concede.

That is unless, you've managed to escape one nightmare only to wake up to an equally bleak reality.

The thought makes you shiver, you wrap your arms around yourself as you call out once more.

“Hermione?” You speak slightly louder as you enter the kitchen, still, she is nowhere.

You swallow uncomfortably, rubbing your throat when you realize just how parched you are.

You quickly approach the sink, retrieving a clean glass. “Aguamenti.” You watched silently as water started to fill it.

Soon you throw your head back, entirely emptying its contents.

You attempt to set the now empty glass down but a sudden sharp pain in your arm causes it to slip out of your fingers.

Before you can save it, the glass shatters across the counter.

The sudden noise causes you to flinch, but any shock you experience quickly morphs into pure anger as you observe the dark mark etched in your arm.

Truth be told, after the battle you had expected it to become dormant, obsolete. There is no use for it now that Voldermort is dead. but to your dismay, the effects only got worse and far more agitating.

Still driven by hot rage, you carelessly reach for a piece of glass, clutching it firmly.

Simply desperate to put an end to it all. The wretched memories– the pain and anguish that you carry with you every waking moment it is a result of this symbol in your arm.

***

Without another moment's thought, you run the sharp edge across your skin. You groan at the pain, but a queer sense of relief sets in as you watched the blood trickle down your arm.

The warm, red substance defaces the dark mark, you began to relish in the fact that you could hardly see the symbol now. So you decide to cut again.

You have no intentions to stop until it has been carved out of your arm entirely.

***

Although, you are only allowed to continue for a moment longer. You are caught by surprise when Hermione distrupts your plans. She wretches the piece of glass out of your hand in distress, it makes a loud crash as it lands it in the sink.

“What on earth are you doing?” Your girlfriend exclaims in horror. She immediately grabs a wash towel, quickly placing it over your arm to stifle the bleeding.

You don't respond for a prolonged moment, you can only afford to stare at Hermione. She is safe, she is alive.

You have not harmed her.

“Darling..” Hermione coos, you only realize you are crying when she gently wipes the tears from your cheeks.

“I just wanted it to stop.” Is all you can manage to utter, and your girlfriend's expression only grows more concerned.

She averts her gaze, lifting the towel to inspect your arm. Whereas, you mantain your stare upon Hermione– you cannot bear to acknowledge the damage you've inflicted upon yourself.

“This.. that was not the way to do it. What if you had cut too deep? Please, y/n, you can't do things like that. You frightened me half to death.” Hermione reprimands, her frustration entirely justified.

You nod in resignation, the fact is you weren't thinking, you simply acted, as you always do.

“I'm sorry.” You say with real remorse and Hermione swiftly wraps an arm around you.

She kisses the side of your face, embracing you tightly. The both of you remain like that, without speaking, for a while, simply taking comfort in each other's presence.

“Where were you?” You finally mumble against Hermione's shoulder. She pulls back to look at you properly before speaking.

“I couldn’t sleep, so I went out onto the balcony.” Your girlfriend explains, loosely gesturing to the sliding doors in the distance that remain open.

“I lost track of time because I was reading.” Hermione adds, more sheepishly, and it only makes you smile.

“Of course you were.” You quip.

Your girlfriend shifts her eyes away from yours once again to look at your arm. You observed as she set her bottom lip in between her teeth, always a sign that she was thinking.

“You know, I think it's almost romantic.” You say suddenly, and Hermione blinks at you in confusion.

“What is?” She asks but you don't allow her to ponder on your statement for too long as you reach for her left arm.

You lift it up. It is tough to see under the moonlight, but you could still somewhat make out the scarring on Hermione's forearm.

Her flesh once carved until bloody with the word ‘mudblood’, now fully healed, leaving only a thick scar.

“Now we're the same.” You remark with a smirk, an effort to make light of a otherwise grim situation.

Hermione scoffs, retracting her arm.

“You are an idiot.” She claims, but there is no bite to her words, and you catch a faint smile playing on her lips as she rolls her eyes at you.

“Come on, let's get you cleaned up.” Your girlfriend coaxes, tossing the bloodied wash towel into the sink.

[thatonetwig]

Dogday x Catnap headcanons! (+ some extra things!)

Catnap has a very strong tail and loves to use it to pick up Dogday from behind so he can give him cuddles and kisses.

Dogday always starts barking and jumping around in excitement when meeting Catnap after not seeing him (one day, one minute, doesn't matter).

They each wear two bracelets. One is a rainbow bracelet to represent their friendship with the other critters, and the other is a bracelet with each other's colors and charm to always serve as a reminder of the other.

Catnap generally isn't a fan of physical contact but completely melts into Dogday when it comes to his physical affection.

The two have gotten used to their scents overlapping with each other when cuddling. This is part of the reason why the other critters leave the room whenever they do this due to how nauseating the resulting smell is.

Dogday always wakes up fully energized and ready for the day, but that instantly changes to him convincing himself that he needs more sleep if Catnap happens to be lying on his stomach and sleeping soundly.

Bonus:

Craftycorn likes to make art of the two together, romantic stuff and whatnot. Something that both are unaware of. Bubba once walked in on her making this art, and they both silently agreed to never speak of it again; awkwardly nodding to each other as Bubba slowly closed the door.

Now, since I love these two and Vocaloid with all of my being, I wanted to give them some Vocaloid songs that I associate them with! I hope you all can find inspiration in these songs while thinking of these two the same way I did!

Dogday:

Moudoku Chuui - でんの子P (feat. Aoki Lapis

IDSMILE - Toa (feat. Hatsune Miku and Kagamine Rin)

Viva Happy - Mitchie M (feat. Hatsune Miku)

Catnap:

Paradichlorobenzene - オワタP (feat. Kagamine Len and Kagamine Rin)

Non-Breath Oblige - PinocchioP (feat. Hatsune Miku)

Nonsense and Me - RIProducer (feat. Kasane Teto)

Both:

Last Score - せきこみごはん (feat. Hatsune Miku)

Melt - ryo (feat. Hatsune Miku)

Magnet - Minato (feat. Hatsune Miku and Megurine Luka)

Finally, a small excerpt from an upcoming fic!

...

("I hope Dogday is gonna be okay."), Catnap thought to himself as he used his tail to stir the pot of vegetable soup he was making.

He had never seen him get sick before, but Catnap already hated it. He wouldn't stop whimpering and was nothing like the Dogday Catnap knew. The worst part of it, however, was that Catnap couldn't be next to him to comfort him.

Suddenly, Catnap felt a sharp pain on his tail.

"Yowch! What the heck?!", Catnap hissed, taking his tail out of the pot.

As it turned out, the soup had begun to boil over while he was thinking. Leaving some of it already on the floor.

("You've gotta be kidding me..."), Catnap thought as he grabbed a few paper towels to clean up the mess with.

...

...

("Is he still whimpering?"), he thought as he slowly walked to Dogday's room with a bowl of vegetable soup in his hands.

Sure enough, he could hear small but constant whimpers just a few feet down the hall.

Catnap then heard a loud groan come from his room before a series of coughs and hacks followed. This caused him to panic briefly and speed up his walking.

"Um- h-hey Dogday!", Catnap said, poking his head through the doorframe.

Dogday looked up from his blanket and saw his boyfriend standing there with the bowl of soup.

"O-oh...hi C-cat- ack- nap.", Dogday said, coughing as he forced a smile.

"I made you soup! Do you want me to bring it to you?"

"T-that sounds- huahh...nice. S-sure. But p-please keep your distance.", Dogday said, his voice sounding hoarse.

Catnap slowly walked over to the bed and held the bowl with his tail for Dogday to take.

"T-thanks Catnap...you're the best...", Dogday said, grabbing the bowl and taking a sip from it.

He took a few moments to chew the veggies and examine the taste of the soup.

"W-wow...this is really-"

Dogday looked up and saw Catnap standing just a few meters away from his face.

"W-what?! What are you doing?", Dogday said, pushing himself to the other side of the bed.

"What?", Catnap said innocently.

"Look, I-I miss being with you a-as much as you do, but I don't- ack- want you to get sick either. Y-you have to understand that.", Dogday explained.

Catnap's expression faltered, and he silently left the room, closing the door behind him.

Once he was out in the hallway, Catnap put his tail under his chin to think of something else to do.

Guess he would just have to try harder to get Dogday's affection.

[hp-hcs]

mattheo with sick! reader? idk something fluffy about mattheo taking care reader or angsty about reader trying to hide some sorta sickness or maybe mattheo's the sick one you ask for mattheo I shall deliver - yxdls

‼️WARNING: hella gross‼️ like, it goes into genuinely nauseating detail! i’m in a weird mood right now! i don’t know!

fine (chapter one of phoenix tears) — ex-death eater! injured! mattheo riddle x gn! reader

GRAPHIC GORE WARNING

seriously, don’t read if you’re easily grossed out. or eating. actually, just don’t read this at all. it’s pretty poorly written. i’m so sorry yxdls, for whatever this is 😭

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

“…and for which scenario would each of the following listed Charms work bes-”

Mattheo was cut off by another of his loud coughing bouts, hacking into his elbow.

Your brow furrowed. “Baby, that’s like, the seventh time you’ve coughed in the last five minutes. Are you sure you’re okay?”

He waved a hand in your direction. “I’m fine. Just a little cough.”

You set down your flashcards, leaning across your bed to lay the back of your hand against his forehead. “You’re burning up, baby.”

“So you think I’m hot?” He asks with a cheeky grin, waggling his eyebrows.

You roll your eyes and lightly smack his arm with the sleeve of your hoodie. “Yes, you idiot. But you also have a helluva fever.”

He grimaced. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it.”

~~~

It was, in fact, Not Fine™. It looked horrible. The skin was sunken in, to a worryingly deep degree, and the edges were blistered and raw, slowly leaking pus and refusing to scab over. Mattheo grimaced as he peeled off the old bandages, biting his bottom lip to keep from screaming when the gauze got caught on part of the torn edge. He was forced to look away as he hastily rewrapped his forearm, trying desperately not to vomit.

The minute he had deserted his father, his Dark Mark had begun to burn, to brand itself into his flesh. The tattoo sank deep into his skin, into his muscles, and into his tendons; Mattheo was convinced that at this point, it was entirely carved into the bone.

It would never go away.

The skin over the tattoo had first erupted with bright red blisters and a sickening rash, which sent Mattheo into a feverish daze for two days. Despite his friends’ protests, he refused to go to the hospital wing.

Nobody could see the Mark. They’d know. They’d know he had been a coward and a fool.

But then, his skin had begun to rot. It was unsettling. Not to mention that the Mark wriggled still, now more furiously than it ever had when he’d been a follower of his father. Combined with the state of his arm, the odd frantic movements of the tattoo felt like phantom maggots, crawling all over him, crawling under his skin, into his eyes, his mouth, Merlin-

~~~

“Riddle, man, you good?” Theodore nudged him and spoke quietly.

Mattheo startled, his eyes flying open from where he had begun to drift off standing up.

Sleep had become impossible. His arm was now constantly afflicted with burning, never-ending pain. Occasionally, random bursts of an even sharper agony would grate up his bones and make his teeth rattle. It felt like being Crucioed, but with no forewarning, no nothing.

“Mattheo!”

He startled again, not even aware that he’d started falling asleep again.

Theo put his hand on Mattheo’s shoulder, even just that small touch sending stomach-churning zaps of fresh pain down his arm. He bit his tongue to keep from crying out, squeezing his eyes shut as he did so.

Theo glanced around the room, waiting for the Herbology professor to turn her back before talking to Mattheo again.

“Dude, you seriously look like you’re about to keel over any second. You should go to the infirmary.”

“‘m fine,” Mattheo rubbed his eyes, his words slurred with feverish delirium. “Don’ need’a go anywhere.”

“Matty, dude, you look like a dead man walking.”

He opened his mouth to protest, when the worst pain he’d ever felt in his entire life struck him out of nowhere. It felt like what Mattheo imagined being beat with a baseball bat, run over by a semi-truck, and being Crucioed at the same time would feel like.

He dropped like a rock, the unrelenting pain forcing the edges of his vision to darken and then fully go black.

~~~ Mattheo woke up to quiet.

His eyes slowly creaked open, and he was greeted with unfamiliar white walls. He blinked quickly to rid the sleep from his eyes, before surveying the room.

It didn’t look like the hospital wing at Hogwarts, but it was definitely a place of medicine, if the bleach-heavy air was anything to go by. Maybe St. Mungo’s?

The overhead lights were off, thank Merlin, leaving the room lit only by the overcast afternoon sky peeking through the window.

But he started to panic when he saw that his arm lay across his chest, freshly wrapped and sore as all hell.

Someone saw.

Somebody saw the Mark of his cowardice.

Of his yearning for his father’s approval.

Fat tears started to roll down Mattheo’s cheeks. His sobs became louder when he saw that you were there.

You probably knew. You probably saw.

Merlin damn it. Why wasn’t there a magical version of HIPAA?

You’d pulled up the visiting chair all the way to the side of Mattheo’s hospital bed, your crossed arms lying on top of the mattress, and your head resting on your arms as a sort of makeshift pillow.

At least you were asleep. Mattheo couldn’t even fathom what he’d have done if you’d been awake.

You surely must hate him now.

How couldn’t you?

He started to raise his right arm, his only currently working one, to wipe away his tears, but the movement was held back.

He had the fleeting but terrifying thought of those cliché leather restraints on hospital beds in horror movies. Honestly, it wasn’t even that far-fetched. He was a criminal. A traitor. A psycho.

Mattheo looked down, expecting the worst.

Instead, he saw your fingers interlaced with his, your thumb slowly skating over his knuckles in a soothing back and forth pattern.

You were holding his hand. Asleep still, yes, but you were actively holding his hand. You were choosing to be near him.

Mattheo burst into tears again, but this time in relief.

If you were still by his side, despite everything, then maybe things really were fine.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

chapter two

[noonaishere]

Music of the Heart [Jeong Yunho] - Masterlist

By: noonaishere (main blog: symphonyofmars)

Fic type: social media au / traditional

Pairing: Yunho x fem!reader

Genre: music industry setting, musician/producer, enemies to lovers, mutual pining, running from the past

Warnings: overbearing parents, verbal abuse, sexual harassment

Status: completed!

Synchronously posted with Online/Offline (any asterisked (*) chapters means they’re shared between both fics)

[intro post explaining y/n and t/n]

SYNOPSIS:

T/n has always loved music, though her experience of it wasn’t always the greatest. Forced by her parents to learn the violin - almost purely to climb the socio-economic ladder - she’s since forged her own path. She auditions at Wonderland Entertainment and becomes one of their studio musicians, but how will she deal with seeing her ex-best friend who also happens to be contracted under the company?

Also, how does t/n’s existence connect to y/n, someone she’s never met?

🎵 main cast

Chapters:

🎵 Prologue | a long time ago… in a town far, far away…

🎵 one | “local celebrity”

🎵 two | mahler

🎵 three | emperor nero

🎵 four | come meet the kids

🎵 five | duck and cover

🎵 six | his feefees were a little hurt

🎵 seven | homework

🎵 eight | give her my number

🎵 nine | canard et couverture parte deux

🎵 ten | a date?

🎵 eleven | the fight scene at the end of the count of monte cristo

🎵 twelve | we never talk

🎵 thirteen | youtube recommendations

🎵 fourteen | calendar man

🎵 fifteen | a ✨godsend✨

🎵 sixteen | no ducking nor covering

🎵 seventeen | he’s got pipes

🎵 eighteen | thinking about hats

🎵 nineteen | it is still apples

🎵 twenty | i know exactly who you are

🎵 twenty-one | busking

🎵 twenty-two | he got an audition or something

🎵 twenty-three | best friend

🎵 twenty-four | garage band

🎵 twenty-five | it’ll be worth it

🎵 twenty-six | more like “drone strike parenting”

🎵 twenty-seven | interrogation

🎵 twenty-eight | it’s over

🎵 twenty-nine | more like constipated

🎵 thirty | maybe

🎵 thirty-one | JUPiTER

🎵 thirty-two | no horses in space

🎵 thirty-three | Crom3r

🎵 thirty-four | punk rock

🎵 thirty-five | what a feeling

🎵 thirty-six | do we need a hot air balloon?

🎵 thirty-seven | gotta let the fans know

🎵 thirty-eight | i’ll bring the wine

🎵 thirty-nine | girl’s night

🎵 forty | that’s a no on the hot air balloon

🎵 forty-one | new kids

🎵 forty-two | splash fight

🎵 forty-three | a recluse and a traitor

🎵 forty-four | merch drop

🎵 forty-five | lol i’m screencapping

🎵 forty-six | do you know how to do cubes?

🎵 forty-seven | surprise modu girip baksu

🎵 forty-eight | sometimes the kickball inspires music

🎵 forty-nine | but what can you do

🎵 fifty | no need for sunglasses

🎵 fifty-one | need for sunglasses

🎵 fifty-two | D-Day

🎵 fifty-three | best friends forever

🎵 fifty-four | mission update

🎵 fifty-five | miss me?

🎵 fifty-six | that was really weird and I hated it

🎵 fifty-seven | good point

🎵 fifty-eight | the great outdoors

🎵 fifty-nine | please don’t use memes of yourself

🎵 sixty | ballad mashup with choi jongho!

🎵 sixty-one | scandal??

🎵 sixty-two | two giants

🎵 sixty-three | you really *are* a capitalist

🎵 sixty-four | benevolence and beef

🎵 sixty-five | lyrical content

🎵 sixty-six | principles

🎵 sixty-seven | well?

🎵 sixty-eight | can’t sleep

🎵 sixty-nine | what’d you say?

🎵 seventy | looking for an Ans:wer

🎵 seventy-one | whirlwind

🎵 seventy-two | she’s a me

🎵 seventy-three | solving problems

🎵 seventy-four | the great (less confined) indoors

🎵 seventy-five | pedagogy

🎵 seventy-six | going for a walk

🎵 seventy-seven* | WHAT?

🎵 seventy-eight | misc

🎵 seventy-nine | where the hell are you

🎵 eighty | chauffeur

🎵 eighty-one | public breakup

🎵 eighty-two | somewhere nice

🎵 eighty-three | the start of an apology

🎵 eighty-four | meeting ONiiX

🎵 eighty-five | sting operation

🎵 eighty-six | hack behavior

🎵 eighty-seven | doubleho7 reporting in

🎵 eighty-eight | being kind is punk

🎵 eighty-nine | listening to it for the background noise

🎵 ninety | Devious Deviants Devianting Deviously

🎵 ninety-one | it’s not gossiping, it’s ✨helping✨

🎵 ninety-two | lessons and small dogs

🎵 ninety-three | *distressed memeing*

🎵 ninety-four | fifteen minutes late with no starbucks

🎵 ninety-five | Game Day!

🎵 ninety-six | it’s a metaphor

🎵 ninety-seven* | suspicious group chat

🎵 ninety-eight* | more boba, less ice

🎵 ninety-nine* | ensemble transition (1/3)

🎵 ninety-nine* | ensemble transition (2/3)

🎵 ninety-nine* | ensemble transition (3/3)

🎵 one hundred* | an even more suspicious group chat

🎵 one hundred and one* | we’re both here now

🎵 one hundred and two | time off

🎵 one hundred and three | what’s it like having normal parents?

🎵 one hundred and four | kiddo

🎵 one hundred and five | cake and conversation

🎵 one hundred and six | confessions

🎵 one hundred and seven | the biggest idiot

🎵 one hundred and eight | ego death

🎵 one hundred and nine | what are you feeling?

🎵 one hundred and ten | take your time/get your shit together

🎵 one hundred and eleven* | pocket square

🎵 one hundred and twelve* | +2000% to self-respect

🎵 one hundred and thirteen | stupid teenaged yunho

🎵 one hundred and fourteen* | like a thunder

🎵 one hundred and fifteen* | apologies

🎵 one hundred and sixteen | *nods*

🎵 one hundred and seventeen* | true singularity

Epilogue 1

Epilogue 2

Epilogue 3

Epilogue 4

Epilogue 5

Epilogue 6

Epilogue 7

🎵🎵   [MAIN MASTERLIST]  🎵🎵

[two-white-butterflies]

best friend | LN4 | part three

Description: Lando has a crush on you, and everyone knows it. Everyone except you.

Pairing: lando norris/actress-singer!reader (filipina coded reader)

series masterlist | part two

Carlossainz55: He wants you to know that his twitter was hacked.

liked by yourname and 1,291,011 others

comments

landonorris: IT WAS NOT

yourname: DM ME FOR PICTURES OF LANDO'S DELETED TWEET!!!!!!!!

Carlossainz55: 🤣

yourname: akyat bahay caught on cam 🧡

(translation: robber caught on cam)

liked by landonorris, leasalonga and 82,192 others

comments

landonorris: Too handsome to steal 🥱 - yourname: are you a nurse din po? 🤣 (translation: are you a nurse too?)

Carlossainz55: Lando 😳

landonorris: She's not our August or our Betty. She's our Juliet. Happy birthday champ! 🧡😍

comments

yourname: landocakes, i'm gagged but YOU did not write that caption. 😅 - landonorris: mb I was supposed to put "She's my Juliet." - yourname: boom capiche uwian na hahahhahahaha - yourname: PICK UP THE PHONE I'M SERIOUS

danielricciardo: Happy birthday Y/N! Sending love from Melbin. 🇦🇺 - yourname: HAHAHAHA Melbin 🤣

danielricciardo: Might delete later.

liked by landonorris and 1,290,192 others

comments

landonorris: MIGHT DELETE LATER?

yourname: Bring Heidi and let's turn it into a 2 date. - danielricciardo: Sorry we only eat around people who's ages are past 25 💞 - yourname: Daniel Ricciardo, u r on my death note

yourname: Kunware p sha pero crush niya pala ako. Side note: He kinda looks like one of those dudes who played DOTA a few decades ago😭 Still looking good tho 😝 #ThankYouToMyMan

(Translation: He be acting like he tolerates me but he be crushing on my secretly.)

comments

landonorris: that's ur man - yourname: he doesn't have roaches or nothing

danielricciardo: Ship him back to the factory

maxverstappen1: Congratulations ❤️

echieee21: ITAAS MO ANG BANDERA NATIN MAMSH 🇵🇭 - yourname: Laban pilipinas! 😁

landonorris: Ganda mo naman te. May jowa ka na? (Translation: You look good miss (alt/direct trans: older sister). Do you have a boyfriend?)

comments

yourname: yeah but he doesn't have to know ;) - landonorris: pass sa gusto maging kabit - yourname: tngina mo (translation: pass to people who want to be mistresses) (translation: fuck you)

yourname: Kuya, pls ruin my life. Luluhuran, pagsisilbihan, chuchupain, jujugjugin tas tubig lang pahinga. 🤤

comments

landonorris: KUYA??????????

maryjane_L/N: Anak is this your new boyfriend from England,,,? - yourname: yes pu tita 😭 - - maryjane_L/N: Pogi,,,,👍🏻

@ssararuffoni @inejghafawifesblog @love4lando @hiraethrhapsody @allenajade-ite @driveswiftly13 @shouq @fdl305 @iloveyou3000morgan @lpab @ietss @inejghafawifesblog @ldynblack @jessblack394 @iissza @iamahallucinationnn @sialexia @allenajade-ite

[patriottruth]

The 2024 U.S. Elections Weren't The Only Time donald j. trump Worked With Russians Against United States' Interests: COVID-19, USA Patriot Act Sabotage, The Massive Russian SolarWinds Hack of the U.S. Government and Private Sector, and Russian 2024 Election Day Interference (compiled from Wikipedia):

In November 2019, a security researcher notified SolarWinds that credentials to a third party FTP server had a weak password of "solarwinds123", warning that "any hacker could upload malicious [code]" that would then be distributed to SolarWinds customers. The New York Times reported SolarWinds did not employ a chief information security officer and that employee passwords had been posted on GitHub in 2019.

December 1, 2019: COVID-19 pandemic: First known human case of Coronavirus disease 2019, in Wuhan, Hubei, China.

December 5, 2019: Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi asks the House Judiciary Committee to begin drafting the articles of impeachment against U.S. President Donald Trump.

December 9, 2019: The World Anti-Doping Agency votes unanimously to ban Russia from international sport for four years for doping offences, meaning it will be excluded from the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing and the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

December 10, 2019: Democrats in the United States House of Representatives announce formal charges against President Donald Trump, accusing him of abusing power and "obstructing Congress"; he becomes the third U.S. president in history to face impeachment.

December 18, 2019: The U.S. House of Representatives approves two articles of impeachment against President donald trump, making him the third president to be impeached in the nation's history.

December 29, 2019: The Taliban's ruling council agrees to a temporary cease-fire in Afghanistan, opening a door to a peace agreement with the United States.

In January and February 2020, U.S. intelligence agencies delivered over a dozen classified warnings in the President's Daily Brief about COVID-19, including its potential to inflict severe political and economic damage. President Donald Trump typically did not read daily briefs and often has "little patience" for oral summaries, The Washington Post reported. Each brief was also shared with other officials in the administration. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which produces the President's Daily Brief, denied that there were repeated mentions of COVID-19.

On January 8, 2020, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a health advisory regarding an outbreak of pneumonia in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, which was being caused by a yet-unidentified virus.

January 16, 2020: The first impeachment trial of the President of the United States, Donald Trump, begins in the U.S. Senate.

On January 27, 2020, Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, predicted that "things are going to get worse before they get better". Three days later, Fauci stated that the COVID-19 outbreak "could turn into a global pandemic".

On February 10, 2020, Trump stated that "a lot of people think that [COVID-19] goes away in April with the heat … Typically, that will go away in April" (later, on April 3, he denied ever having given "a date" for the departure of the virus)

On February 13, 2020, CDC director Robert Redfield contradicted Trump, saying that the "virus is probably with us beyond this season, beyond this year". Redfield also predicted that it "will become a community virus at some point in time, this year or next year".

On February 16, 2020, Anthony Fauci warned that it was not necessarily true that COVID-19 would "disappear with the warm weather."

February 25, 2020, was the day that the CDC first warned the American public to prepare for a local outbreak. That day, Nancy Messonnier, head of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said that "We are asking the American public to work with us to prepare for the expectation that this is going to be bad." Messonnier predicted that "we will see community spread in this country", and it was only a matter of time. As a result, "disruption to everyday life might be severe". Messonnier stated that the CDC is preparing, and "now is the time for hospitals, schools and everyday people to begin preparing as well."

On February 25, 2020, Anthony Fauci declared that given how COVID-19 was spreading in other nations, it was "inevitable that this will come to the United States" as well. On February 26, CDC Director Robert Redfield said it would be "prudent to assume this pathogen will be with us for some time to come".

On February 26, 2020, Trump contradicted Messonnier, stating: "I don't think it's inevitable" that a U.S. outbreak would occur, "It probably will, it possibly will … Whatever happens, we're totally prepared." Trump additionally declared that the number of infected was "going very substantially down, not up".

On February 27, 2020, The chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Richard Burr, who helped to write the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Act (PAHPA), which forms the framework for the federal response, warned a private group of his constituents that COVID-19 is much more aggressive in its transmission than anything that we have seen in recent history, and is probably more akin to the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic. "There will be, I'm sure, times that communities, probably some in North Carolina, have a transmission rate where they say, 'Let's close schools for two weeks. Everybody stay home,' We're going to send a military hospital there; it's going to be in tents and going to be set up on the ground somewhere, It's going to be a decision the president and DOD make."

On February 27, 2020, Trump said of the virus: "It's going to disappear. One day it's like a miracle, it will disappear. And from our shores, you know, it could get worse before it gets better. Could maybe go away. We'll see what happens. Nobody really knows." Also on February 27, Trump declared that the risk to the American public from COVID-19 "remains very low".

February 27, 2020 stock market crash: Triggered by fears of the spreading of COVID-19, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) plunges by 1,190.95 points, or 4.4%, to close at 25,766.64, its largest one-day point decline at the time. This follows several days of large falls, marking the worst week for the index since the 2007–2008 financial crisis.

On February 29, 2020, Trump said that "additional cases in the United States are likely", but "there's no reason to panic at all." When a reporter asked Trump: "How should Americans prepare for this virus?" Trump answered: "I hope they don't change their routine".

February 29, 2020: A conditional peace agreement is signed between the United States and the Taliban. The U.S. begins gradually withdrawing combat troops from Afghanistan on March 10.

On March 4, 2020, donald trump appeared on Fox News's Hannity by phone, where he claimed a 3.4% mortality rate projected by the World Health Organization (WHO) was a "false number", and stated his "hunch" that the true figure would be "way under 1%". Trump also predicted that many people infected with COVID-19 would experience "very mild" symptoms, "get better very rapidly" and thus they "don't even call a doctor". Thus, there may be "hundreds of thousands of people that get better just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work—some of them go to work, but they get better."

From March 6 to March 12, 2020, donald trump stated on four occasions that the coronavirus would "go away". On March 10, Surgeon General Jerome Adams stated that "this is likely going to get worse before it gets better."

March 2020: The nightmare of empty grocery shelves begins. Stores capping/limiting purchases.

By March 11, 2020, the virus had spread to 110 countries, and the WHO officially declared a pandemic. The CDC had already warned that large numbers of people needing hospital care could overload the healthcare system, which would lead to otherwise preventable deaths. Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci said the mortality from COVID-19 was ten times higher than the common flu. By March 12, diagnosed cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. exceeded a thousand. Trump declared a national emergency on March 13. On March 16, the White House advised against any gatherings of more than ten people. Three days later, the United States Department of State advised U.S. citizens to avoid all international travel.

The USA Freedom Act, which became law on June 2, 2015, reenacted the expired USA Patriot Act sections through 2019. However, Section 215 of the law was amended to disallow the National Security Agency (NSA) to continue its mass phone data collection program. Instead, phone companies will retain the data and the NSA can obtain information about targeted individuals with a federal search warrant.

On August 14, 2019, the outgoing Director of National Intelligence sent a letter to Congress stating the Trump Administration's intention to seek permanent extension of the provisions of FISA that under the terms of the USA FREEDOM Act are scheduled to expire on December 15, 2019, namely the "lone wolf" authority allowing surveillance of a suspected terrorist who is inspired by foreign ideology but is not acting at the direction of a foreign party, the roving wiretap authority regarding surveillance of a terrorist who enters the United States and the authority to allow the Federal Bureau of Investigation to obtain certain business records in a national security investigation, as well as the call detail records program undertaken by the NSA. In reference to the latter authority, the letter announced that "The National Security Agency has suspended the call detail records program that uses this authority and deleted the call detail records acquired under this authority."

Jurisdiction over the reauthorization of the expiring FISA provisions is shared by the Judiciary and Intelligence committees in the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives; the House Committee on the Judiciary and the Senate Committee on the Judiciary held separate public hearings on the reauthorization in September 2019 and November 2019, respectively. Opposition to the call detail records program has led to some Congressional demands that the authority for the program not be renewed. Additional complications hindering reauthorization arose from a report of the US Department of Justice Inspector General finding fault with certain FISA applications in connection with the 2016 presidential campaign, which led some members of Congress to insist on reforms to FISA as a condition of reauthorizing the expiring USA FREEDOM Act provisions.With Congressional attention focused on dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States in 2020, the House of Representatives passed a long-term extension of the USA FREEDOM Act on March 11, 2020, just four days before the scheduled expiration of the Act on March 15, 2020, by a wide, bipartisan margin that kept the protections of the Act largely the same. Two months later, in May of 2020, the Senate passed an extension of the Act by an 80-16 vote that expanded some privacy protections, but the Senate version did not include protection of Americans’ internet browsing and search histories from warrantless surveillance, which was proposed by Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Steve Daines (R-Mont.) and failed by one vote.

According to former KGB major Yuri Shvets, donald trump became the target of a joint Czech intelligence services and KGB spying operation after he married Czech model Ivana Zelnickova and was cultivated as an "asset" by Russian intelligence since 1977: "Russian intelligence gained an interest in Trump as far back as 1977, viewing Trump as an exploitable target." Luke Harding writes that documents show Czechoslovakia spied on donald trump during the 1970s and 1980s, when he was married to Ivana Trump, his Czechoslovakia-born first wife. Harding writes that the Czechoslovakian government spied on donald trump because of his political ambitions and notability as a businessman. It is known that there were close ties between Czechoslovakia's StB and the USSR's KGB. Harding also describes how, already since 1987, the Soviet Union was interested in Trump. In his book Collusion, Harding asserts that the "top level of the Soviet diplomatic service arranged his 1987 Moscow visit. With assistance from the KGB." Then-KGB head Vladimir Kryuchkov "wanted KGB staff abroad to recruit more Americans". Harding proceeds to describe the KGB's cultivation process, and posits that they may have opened a file on Trump as early as 1977, when he married Ivana. "According to files in Prague, declassified in 2016, Czech spies kept a close eye on the couple in Manhattan, … [with] periodic surveillance of the trump family in the United States."

donald j. trump and His Republican Allies Allowed the USA PATRIOT ACT/FREEDOM ACT to Expire on March 15, 2020 and They Didn't Reinstate It until May of 2020.

March 2020: SolarWinds's Orion software hotfixes were released to 33,000 Orion customers.Hackers acquired superuser access to SAML token-signing certificates. This SAML certificate was then used to forge new tokens to allow hackers trusted and highly privileged access to networks. The attack used a backdoor in a SolarWinds library; when an update to SolarWinds occurred, the malicious attack would go unnoticed due to the trusted certificate. APT29, aka Cozy Bear, working for the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), was reported to be behind the 2020 attack. Victims of this attack include the cybersecurity firm FireEye, the US Treasury Department, the US Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration, as well as the US Department of Homeland Security. Prominent international SolarWinds customers investigating whether they were impacted include the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Parliament, UK Government Communications Headquarters, the UK Ministry of Defence, the UK National Health Service (NHS), the UK Home Office, and AstraZeneca.

December 13, 2020: SolarWinds begins notifying customers, including a post on its Twitter account, “SolarWinds asks all customers to upgrade immediately to Orion Platform version 2020.2.1 HF 1 to address a security vulnerability.”

December 15, 2020 SolarWinds Victims named and timeline moves back — Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. Commerce and Treasury Departments, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the National Institutes of Health, and the State Department were all affected. Various security officials and vendors expressed serious dismay that the attack was more widespread and began much earlier than expected. The initial attack date was now pegged to sometime in March 2020, which meant the attack had been underway for months before its detection.

December 17, 2020: New SolarWinds victims revealed — The Energy Department (DOE) and National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), which maintains the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, were publicly named as victims of the attack.

On December 21, 2020, Attorney General William Barr, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the FBI, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence all agreed that Russia was engaged in “a significant and ongoing cybersecurity campaign” against the United States. Russian asset, donald j. trump, immediately replied: “The Cyber Hack is far greater in the Fake News Media than in actuality,” Trump wrote. “I have been fully briefed and everything is well under control. Russia, Russia, Russia is the priority chant when anything happens because Lamestream is, for mostly financial reasons, petrified of discussing the possibility that it may be China (it may!).”

March 16, 2020: stock market crash: The the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) falls by 2,997.10, the single largest point drop in history and the second-largest percentage drop ever at 12.93%, an even greater crash than Black Monday (1929). This follows the U.S. Federal Reserve announcing that it will cut its target interest rate to 0–0.25%.

On March 19, 2020, donald trump told journalist Bob Woodward that he was deliberately downplaying the risk when communicating with the public. "I wanted to always play it down," Trump said. "I still like playing it down, because I don't want to create a panic."

On March 24, 2020, donald trump argued that: "We lose thousands and thousands of people a year to the flu … But we've never closed down the country for the flu." On March 27, he stated: "You can call it a flu. You can call it a virus. You know you can call it many different names. I'm not sure anybody even knows what it is."

On March 24, 2020, donald trump declared that "we begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel"; a day later the U.S. surpassed 1,000 COVID-19 deaths.

Throughout March and early April, several state, city, and county governments imposed "stay at home" quarantines on their populations to stem the spread of the virus. By March 26, The New York Times data showed the United States to have the highest number of known cases of any country. By March 27, the country had reported over 100,000 cases.

From March 30 to April 7, 2020, Trump stated on four occasions that COVID-19 would "go away".

On March 31, 2020, contradicting his many previous comparisons of COVID-19 to the flu, Trump said: "It's not the flu … It's vicious". When reporters asked him if his initial dismissive comments on the virus had misled Americans, he replied: "I want to give people a feeling of hope. I could be very negative … You know, I'm a cheerleader for the country." Asked further if he had known—despite his claims that the outbreak was under control—that the situation would turn out so severe, Trump replied: "I thought it could be. I knew everything. I knew it could be horrible, and I knew it could be maybe good."

On November 5, 2024, during the official Election Day, several non-credible bomb threats that originated from Russia briefly disrupted voting in two polling places in Fulton County, Georgia. Both re-opened after about 30 minutes. Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Russian interference was behind the Election Day bomb hoaxes. In a statement, the FBI said it was aware of non-credible bomb threats to polling locations in several states, with many of them originating from Russian email domains. The bomb threats were solely made against Democratic-leaning areas. On the same day, U.S. federal officials again reported that Russian sources were actively engaged in "influence operations", citing disinformation in specific videos that falsely claimed Kamala Harris had taken a bribe and false news stories about the Democratic Party and election fraud in Georgia.

On November 8, 2024 it was reported that one of the Russian email addresses behind Election Day bomb threats was used in June 2024 bomb threats targeting LGBTQ+ events in Massachusetts, Minnesota and Texas.

[squicky-fannish-discourse]

The Gauntlet!

In a world where BEGA wins, Beyblader Hiromi wants to create her own BBA. And she's dragging Kai along.

Author's note: I really want to post this on AO3, but I don't remember my password and it seems like most of the beyblading fans are on here?

But here's a Kaihil Au that I may or may not continue depending on how many ideas I get. I'll just update it in a different post or something.

Also, at this point, can be taken as platonic or romantic.

They are childhood friends in this AU

oh and also @citruscloudsandmoon who eggs me on hahah

Chapter 2 >>>

Main directory

.

Hiromi opens her eyes to the mid-afternoon blue skies. 

It’s been almost a year, and this is a BEGA hell-infested town, which is the home of the former G-Revs, now just nothing. She stares up at the birds which fly over.  

In any world where she beyblades, Hiromi thinks. She’s always been more interested in the ins and outs of beyblading rather than the glory and fame. So it makes sense that she gravitated towards street blading and their community of building hack builds and doing funny sciencey things with beyblading and street gangs. 

Streetblading will never die. Ever. They will always go underground, or so Maiko-nee tells her. Even when the whole world commercializes beyblading. 

Hiromi looks around at Hiwatari Kai. He stares at her.

”Why are you sleeping on the grass?” 

“Why are you watching me sleep like a big creep?” 

“Did you know,” he said slowly. “Some strange guy could be hiding in the bush watching you?” 

“You mean you?” she asked with a laugh as she held out a hand so he could pull her up, but he doesn’t take it, so she huffs at him. So she pulls herself up grumbling— “Oof! You don’t know how to treat a lady! You’re a big creep!” 

He’s her childhood friend. 

And the Bladebreakers are nothing but a scrambled bunch of kids who used to beyblade. Kinomiya’s in her class. She knows Max’s father owns a beyblade store, but his son doesn’t blade anymore. His friend, Rei has gone back to China. 

And Kai? Kai is focusing on highschool. She’s the only one she knows since they were childhood friends, and she came back from London. Crabbier than she remembered as a child, but when he’s immature, you can see child Kai.

Like now.

He smirked at her. 

Her Grandpa loves Kai for no good reason—coz he’s got a good business sense, and he’s old and likes the company news. And Kai’s had—for lack of better word—a no good grandfather at home, who his mom is taking care of. And he just doesn’t like going home either lately. 

So while her Grandfather is crabby, and complains. At least he has a civil sense of responsibility, Hiromi supposes. He did often look after Kai with them as a child, and was horrified to learn about the abbey. 

But her Grandpa associates beyblading with insanity anyway. 

Kai doesn’t blame Voltaire for the fall of BBA. But he doesn’t like being home. Or anywhere right now. Everything is suffocating, and they took the one thing he’s been ambivalent in his life about—beyblading. And now he’s just frustrated. So he probably did like it after all. At least that’s what Hiromi understands about him.  

And in return—on days like this—he shows up, and vents frustration in a match at her. 

“Let’s go.” 

“I wanted to visit Tsurugi and Maiko-san today,” Hiromi said. “I have been thinking of something crazy lately.” 

“Whatever. Give me a match, and then you can go off on your own merry way.” 

Hiromi wants to street blade, and she uses him as an excuse. Like oh, I’m with Kai. 

She’s not with Kai. 

And her Grandfather’s just fine with that. 

“I’m planning on dragging you though,” she said. 

“What is it?” he asked her in annoyance. 

“Just come along!” 

So instead of them going to the bey-dish which they usually go to, she just grabbed him by his arm, and he nearly tripped over a rock.

”I can walk myself,” he called out. 

“I don’t know if you’ll run away though!! You're not trustworthy at all! Like the neighborhood cat,” she said.

”Maybe it knows you’re pushy as hell,” he calls out, annoyed, but she’s basically dragging him.

“C’mon!!! I just want to show you something.”

Has he been working out? Hiromi wonders off handedly. 

✧.*

Hiromi thinks that this place—-which isn’t much at all like the bigger street blading communities—but it’s kind of homey anyway, located in the middle of a bit of an empty industrial abandoned area near the coast. It smells of fish and rust and sometimes funny. There’s parts you can’t enter.  

The city knows that they frequent this place, and they allowed them to build this indoor ramp in the warehouse. And they cordoned off other bits. 

The older college kids—and now highschool kids who come here to beyblade as part of “Bakuten’s Street blading Resistance” or BSR for short—come here. It’s very tongue in cheek. 

Trade parts. Yammer about beyblading. Host mini-competitions. Because they’ll never switch to BEGA. 

Street blading will never die.  Ever. Hiromi thinks with a happy smile. After all, where else does she go to mess around and debate physics with? It’s her best subject because of street blading. 

They built a half-pipe skateboarding ramp right smack in the middle of the warehouse. 

”Hibiki!” Tsurugi called. “What are you doing?” 

“Trying to test out this beyblade,” he said. He was releasing a wonky beyblade. 

”Can you help me fix up these lights? Someone?!” he called out. No one’s listening. “Oi—“ He called out to Kai. “Think you could hand me one of those bulbs?” 

Kai wordlessly helps him as he reaches into a messy pile of tools and things over to hand over the bulbs.

The warehouse lights up.

”Finally!” 

“Wow, it kind of looks cinematic,” Hiromi says, as she steps atop the ramp. “Like I’m a model in a runway!” 

“Ooo!” Maiko said. “This could be funny if we used it as a concert venue too.” 

“Can we stick to beyblading alone?!” 

“I’ll bring my band.” 

“And now it’s the best place in the city,” Hiromi announced. “We have lights—ramps, everything. Our tournie is going to be a blast.” 

Kai stares at her in slow confusion.

”What?” 

“We’re hosting a tournament,” she said happily. “The biggest tournament that ever tournamented!” 

“It’s not even that big,” Tsurugi siad. “But Hiromi’s been pretty awfully excited about it.” 

“I’m going to call it gauntlet, and we’ll be so popular, we’ll overtake BEGA’s popularity.” 

She spread out her arms. 

He stares at her.

”Well,” Tsurugi said with a laugh. “It was Hiromi-chan’s idea, and she’s been trying to source everything. I’m Tsurugi by the way—the oldest one in this group. Don’t ask my age. I’ll feel old.” 

“He knows Hitoshi!” Hiromi said as she got off the ramp. 

“Maiko-chan!” the girl called out. “I’m the same age as Hitoshi. Myself and HIbiki went to highschool together with him. He's kinda of a butt. We’re supposedly going to college together. But he quit for what’s it—Bitbeast archaeology?” 

“Where is Hitoshi anyway?” the one called Hibiki asked.

“Heck if I know.” Tsurugi asked with a laugh. “That brat doesn’t even call me.” 

"He's vague as hell, about what he's doing."

He’s… older than Takao’s brother. 

“Is that Kai Hiwatari?” one of the highschool kids called out. They don’t go to Hiromi’s highschool—but they are in the area. 

Kai stiffened up awkwardly, unsure of how to respond as the others were looking at him.

”He’s joining us!” Hiromi announced. “He’s like m’childhood friend.” 

”What?”

”Your’re joining our tournie?” 

”The prize is like—one pack of gum,” another girl announced. “S’all I got.” 

He just awkwardly shrugs. They all shrug. 

“Hiromi!” one of the boys yells. “Give me a match for last time!” 

“Okay!” she calls out with a laugh. “Wanna go right now? We’re up first!” She climbs the staircase to the top. “Whooo! It’s wobbly!” 

“It ain’t known for it’s safety,” Hibiki called out. “Don’t fall or die.” 

“Hibiki, your dad’s a carpenter, right? Can’t you get him to come and inspect this?” 

“Yeah, I could, but he’s so done with me beyblading when I should be looking for a job.” 

She angles Suzumebachi over the skateboard ramp, while he glares at her and he launches his own bey, and Suzumebachi speeds up through the platform, downhill, knocking him out flat to the left. 

“Hahaha! Having no sides to this ‘beydish’ is actually kind of fun.” 

“Increases the pace of the battle though,” Tsurugi said. “On either side. You either increase in velocity.” 

“Or get punted out ahhahaha!” 

“Helps the folks here who aren’t Hiromi,” Maiko said with a laugh. “She knocks you out in three seconds flat with her speed build.”  

Kai thinks that they are relatively nice though. 

He looked around at the warehouse. The skateramps are built of steel.

”This thing will fall apart in a bad-beybattle,” he said slowly, expecting someone to get mad. 

They looked contemplative. 

”You think so?” one of the other kids asked. He noticed that none of them were very hostile or weird towards him. “Think it’s good for a start.” 

“Why didn’t we stick to a traditional bowl?” he asked. 

“Hiromi-chan suggested a skate rink instead of a beydish. Less traditional and more control needed.” 

“Maybe we should invest in bamboo.” 

“And have it catch fire?” 

“If the city gave us a permit,” Maiko said. “We should just built several rinks or something—into the ground.” 

“I still think we should solder toy train tracks onto it,” Hiromi said. “And someone controls it at the side!” 

”Hiromi-chan sure comes up with the most ambitious ideas.” 

“But they are quite fun though!” 

"Hear me out thoughhh! If we remote controll it! Rig it to a beat or something!"

✧.*

The chewing gum pack was a prize you got in the mini “Street tournie.” 

Hiromi glared at Kai.

He blew a bubble slowly.

It popped in her face.

Hiromi opened her mouth in annoyance. 

He chewed again with a grin. 

”Hey!!” she yelled as he laughed. The match came down to the two of them, because he managed to really blow off steam, because she's really annoying to beat. “Heyyyy!”

He won. 

“Maybe,” he said. “I can acquire the warehouse,” he said. 

“That’s a lot of money.”

”Wow,” he said sardonically. “Sure pays to be rich. Did you want gum?"

"I don't want the cavities."

“Let’s go home,” he said. 

“Your home?” 

“No. I’m dropping you off, and then I’m going back home.” 

“You could just hang out with us,” she said as she caught up to him, because he walks fast. “Grandpa loves you honestly. He’s better than your weird Grandpa.  Better yet, just live with us. But wait, then what would I use as an alibi? Also what if you just steal my beyblade parts.” 

“It’s astonishing the amount of beyblade parts you’ve managed to hoard. What the… hell are you doing?” 

She grinned impishly. He wants to flick her nose or something.

“Not telling youuu.” 

✧.*

Later that night—at Hiromi’s place, hearing the sounds of Grandpa and her Father talking downstairs, and Hiromi talking to one of her British street blading friends beside her about ‘The tourney is an absolute success! Lou!” He closes his eyes.

”Hiromi!” Grandpa yelled. “Go to sleep!” 

And their family cat, Mochi enters through the door, and climbs atop the bed. 

Unsurprisingly, of the four of them, Kai’s more at ease right now. He has the Tachibana family to thank to just… anchor him back down. Hiromi’s the type of person who’s comforting to be around with, and she just has that excitement which he finds infectious sometimes. 

Suddenly the door opens. He opens his eyes to see her peeking in. Hiromi blinks. He stares her down. 

“What?” 

She propped her hands on the bed. 

“Kai!” 

“What?” 

She grins brightly.

“So, will you tell your team to join the street tournie?” 

He stares at her. Then he reaches over to her face.

And he flicks her nose. 

“Ow! Hey!! Why are you hurting m’nose for?” she whines. 

“Kinomiya’s in your class. Just go ask him.” 

“He’s kinda closed off though,” Hiromi said as she crouched, and she peeked at him. “Maybe it’ll come out better from you. Like hey—my childhood friend, Hiromi. She’s so amazing and even better than me at beyblading.” He scoffed. “I am though! I did win like 4 out of 5 matches.” 

“2 out of five!” 

“Mochi disagrees. He believes Hiromi wins all the time.” 

“Right."  

“And she’d like to take us street blading. It ain’t BBA, but it’s something. We’re callin’ it the gauntlet! All Hiromi’s idea. Then mebbe I could meet Rei for real?” 

He rolled his eyes. 

“He’s not to come all the way from China just for a street beyblading match.” 

She pouted, as she rested her chin on his bed edge.

“Buuuuut, what if we go worldwide.” 

“Oh okay,” he said. “You do that then I call Rei.” 

She flapped her arms happily. 

“We’ll be so amazing. Oooh! I have more ideas. We’ll be called the Gauntlet. The more challenging BEGA, Mochi!” Mochi flicked his tail lazily as he stared at her. “With extreme bey-dishes, I can see the VISION!” 

He wants to say something sarcastic, but in all honesty, Kai doesn’t think it’s a bad idea. Because she and streetbladers world wide are resisting BEGA by making their own parts and building their own extreme ramps or bey-dishes. 

They could very well create something like this—including himself. 

He takes a deep breath.

“I don’t want to talk to Kinomiya.” 

“Huh?!” 

“I think you should go talk to him.” 

 “He’s nice to his fangirls, so I could probably approach him like that.” 

“Approach him like a normal person. What’s the worst he’s going to say? No? Or maybe you should talk to Max first.” 

Hiromi’s eyes lit up at him like a million stars.

✧.*

Chapter 2 >>>

Main directory

[ceasarslegion]

Tell me about the person who made you quit weed forever, please (and sorry for the typo in the last one, hit send too fast)

It was my last (and only, other than her I've lived on my own ever since I moved out) roommate.

I was a recreational smoker before I lived with her. I would toke up at parties or if the social occasion called for it. Would also sometimes take edibles before a funny movie to make it even better (i saw both sonic movies on edibles in the cinema). Was never all that hardcore, wouldn't call myself a stoner at all.

And then I moved in with my last roommate. For those who haven't heard the deep lore about that, everything about her was shit and she was the most disgusting person I've ever met. Like, I had to pick her used pads off the bathroom floor multiple times kind of disgusting.

She was also one of those people who was high 24/7. Every minute of every day, she had to smoke weed. She did it inside. The whole place reeked of weed every minute of every day. Her boyfriend was even worse. She couldn't do ANYTHING unless she was high as a kite. She was completely non-functional without it.

I also had never, not even once, saw her clean that bong of hers. It had black sludge coating the insides of it. She would often complain about hacking up pus and tar after using it. And she used it. Every minute. Of every day. I swear to God she might have been the first person on earth to get physically addicted to Marijuana.

She grossed me out so much with her smoking habits that it turned me off of weed forever. I can't smell it anymore without wanting to vomit because it reminds me of the sludge in her bong and the used pads I had to pick up off the bathroom floor. I don't care if other people smoke it around me, I just don't want a puff anymore.

I'll stick to alcohol for now, thanks.

[jamevaa]

I've been wanting to get back into writing, so will try to post a drabble/ficlet every week using a randomized trope generator. Happy Wincest Wednesday!

Week 1 - Fake dating, Exes

Dean steps out of Ms Woodford’s house (just Dahlia, dear) rubbing a hand across his mouth, his skin too-tight and ready to split at the seams. He barely registers sitting behind the wheel, flexing his fingers and feeling his knuckles ache. He waits for Sam to join him, just as quiet. The ride back is heavy, sodden and cold like a blanket forgotten outside during a thunderstorm. Sam tries once - “Dean-”, but goes no further. 

He goes straight for the heavy stuff once they’re back at the motel, takes three healthy swallows from the bottle and doesn’t flinch at the burn when the whiskey hits his throat. 

This wasn’t supposed to go this way. 

When he turns back around Sam is just standing there, shoulders taut like he’s expecting a fight. He’s got an empty plastic cup in his hands; he tips it forward. A silent olive branch. 

Dean pours him a healthy dose and raises the bottle in salute, taking another drag. It warms his belly, but the blood in his veins is already molten from the Mark.

“Dean,” Sam starts again, stops, his jaw working. He drinks. “About what we said–”. He stops again because how do you pick up a conversation like that?

They’d gone in faking, playing a part, nothing unusual. Pretending to be a couple attending marriage counseling was a new one, and uncomfortable, but a case is case. They were just starting to be ok again, the air still fragile and brittle between them. Ms Woodford was a posturing hack, a would-be holistic energy therapist that paled against the real powers they knew, and yet. And yet, within a matter of a few sentences, she’d found the cracks, wedged them open with words, and watched the pus and venom ooze out.

Dean sits on the edge of one of the beds, not-looking at Sam. “It’s fine, it didn’t mean anything,” Dean finally manages, a bit too rough. “She’s just a fraud.”

They have to go back the day after tomorrow, continue their consultations. She’s their only link to the victims. The only suspect, so far. 

“Bullshit.”

Dean does look up then, eyebrows climbing high. 

“Dean, it’s not – a lot of shit’s happened.” Sam is serious but still manages a quirk of lips, wry and raw.

Becoming a demon, hunting his little brother, yeah, you could call that shit. A long, unending stream of shit.

Sam takes two steps forward; he hesitates, but finally sits on the bed beside Dean. He feels his hip dip sideways, his side compensate. Muscle, blood, bones. Components he just couldn’t rearrange as anything but Sam’s. 

“Yeah,” he agrees, managing a snort. “There’s always something.”

“Look,” Sam starts again. Fits and starts, an engine that wants to purr to life but something is misaligned. “I made my decision, ok?”

Dean startles when Sam places a hand on the back of his neck. It’s warm and firm, thumb on his pulse and – they haven’t – cases and injuries and bumps, sure, but not like this. Not in a really long time. He’s almost afraid to move, that Sam will spook. Maybe that he’ll spook.

He looks up at his little brother, because there’s nothing else for it, and there must be more on his face than he wants to show because Sam’s expression solidifies into this intense look he gets sometimes when he really needs Dean to understand what he means.

“I did, Dean. I’m not going back on it.”

There’s whiskey in his belly, poison in his blood, and his brother’s open warmth against his skin and – ok. He looks at Sam and searches his face before he leans, the pull inexorable. They keep trying to break away but they’re in decaying orbits. They were never going to succeed.

The kiss is simple, warm, lips a little wet from alcohol. It’s not a revelation, there are no fireworks, they don’t tumble into each other. It opens up Dean’s ribs and it feels like it’s the first time he can take a proper breath since – he couldn’t even say. Dean pulls away just enough to keep his head against Sam’s, eyes closed. Sam is still holding his neck, his thumb rubbing circles into his skin, and Dean got a hold of his hip along the way. 

“Alright, Sammy,” he answers, questions spoken and unspoken. “Alright.”

[dragons-clause]

The Dragon's Clause

Sabo x Fem Reader CW: Forced marriage, intrigue, character death, fantasy violence, blood, magic, language, smut, 18+ mdni

Tag List: @mfreedomstuff @manachiichan

Chapter 10: Delicious

You hadn’t seen much of the Duke after your initial meeting over tea, until the two of you had dinner together. He’d been busy with work he’d been unable to do during the campaign along the border, and according to Koala it would take him a couple days to get caught up, even with help from Hack.

Early next morning you were at the training grounds, warming up when Sabo came out to join you. The estate guards were lined up around the training grounds, at ease and talking amongst themselves while they waited. Word had gone through the entire estate like wildfire, and you were certain there were quite a few servants watching as closely as they dared.

Over dinner you’d both talked about certain limitations to the spar, and agreed on wooden swords, and no magic. It wasn’t that you couldn’t use it, it was that you’d never been allowed the chance to meld your magic and your sword play together. The kind of magic needed for it was advanced, and that level of magic left evidence that you couldn’t risk. You didn’t believe your Uncle was himself checking to see what magic residue was in your room, nor was he requesting someone else check.

But the risk was beyond what you were willing to take, and practicing your forms alone was enough to appease your own desires.

That conversation at dinner is probably how the entire estate knew by morning. Not that you could blame anyone, if you were a maid in a household and heard the Lord and his new fiance talking about crossing swords, you wouldn’t be able to keep your mouth shut either.

Sabo yawns mightily as he stands across from you, and gives you a smile as Hack and Koala sit down nearby. “Koala thinks you might break my nose, since I didn’t get much sleep last night, but I promise if you do I’ll accept it as my own fault.” His smile is bright, despite the weariness in his eyes.

He appeared to be in the same clothes he had on yesterday, having shed the dress coat, in nothing but loose long-sleeved shirt and a vest. The pants and the boots were the same, but there was no ruffled tie around his neck, and no pocket watch chain at his belt. He might have prioritized his work, but he wasn’t being dismissive of the spar by any stretch.

“That’s reassuring to hear, your grace.” You say, stepping into your opening stance.

The sword style your father favored, the one that he taught all the northern border knights, was more fluid than other styles of the continent. It was developed for the beasts of the wild, but it was just as effective against human opponents. The differences in shifting from one form to another could be disorienting, and when paired with magic created a larger effect than should be possible.

To you, that was what made it beautiful, and while there was no magic dancing around your blade you’d always been able to envision it. You were looking forward to requesting the right to begin training it properly from Sabo. Win or lose, your current impression of him is that he wouldn’t deny you.

The stances for the forms were also a little wider than was common, and the actions were less like stone and more like water. The sharp clipped movements of most knights were efficient and effective, but the fluid transition of your style wasted less energy, maintaining movement and momentum from one step to the next. It was harder to learn, and harder to master, so it wasn’t ideal for large groups to learn.

“Are you requesting I go easy on you?” You question as he moves into position himself.

A smile slips across his lips. “Not at all, my lady.”

You dash toward him, watching as his eyes widened a little, his wooden sword coming up to meet yours almost a split second too late. The parry was at an awkward angle for him, but he was heavier than you and shifting his weight was enough to give him a chance to push your sword away and give himself a little space. The flurry you unleashed after that was knocked aside a little more easily than the first strike and you smiled.

“You’re much faster than I expected, Lady Lulusia.” He admits.

“You’re a little slower than I expected, my lord.” You reply with a devious grin.

Sabo’s smile twitches a bit. “It wouldn’t do to disappoint you,” he says, a soft growl prowling at the corners of his tone as he seems to wake up before your eyes. His completely defensive actions shift and he begins to test for openings in your moves to push you back.

“I wouldn’t be disappointed,” you clarify, focusing more of your movements on trying to keep him off-balance at least a little. The wooden swords are well-crafted, but you didn’t want to test if the Duke’s strength was enough to break one when you needed it to block a strike. “Though I could offer to instruct you-.”

You clip the tip of his sword, knocking it away by snapping the upward arc of your follow through to break his momentum, and then using the tip of your sword to keep his pushed wide as you stepped in close. Almost nose to nose you watch as blues eyes, wide with shock, look away from his sword into your smiling eyes. Instead of landing a blow you stepped away as quickly as you’d stepped in, putting space between the two of you as he brought his sword back in. “-alongside your guards?”

Sabo steps back from you, putting a more comfortable space between the two of you. His eyes flick from the tip of his sword to you, keeping you in sight while trying to discern how you knocked his weapon so wide.

“How’d you do that?” He questions, body tense and more on guard than he was a moment ago.

“Leverage.” You answer casually, stepping lightly and shifting your lead foot before stepping in again. You double stepped again just before crossing swords, putting your dominate foot ahead again to cross the blow from Sabo.

You shifted lower and slid your blade against his, repeating the move from earlier, but instead of knocking his sword wide, he twisted it and broke the connection between the two. You moved through the release, not letting it put you off-balance, and brought your arm up into his elbow as you moved under his shoulder.

Ducked down as you were you let yourself tumble forward, somersaulting against the ground before coming back up to your feet. It gave you enough space to avoid being struck in the back as you cleared the reach of his weapon before turning back to face him.

“So this is how that style works.” He muses, pivoting to face you again. “The precision of the strikes must make it difficult to master.”

You nod. “Most of the people my father taught knew at least one other style. He always said any sword was good enough if it could fell a beast and protect a knight.”

“Why such a difficult style then?”

“Two reasons, but -.” You dash in again and aren’t surprised to see Sabo’s handling your strikes much better now that he’s seen them. “I can’t demonstrate the main reason.”

Sabo manages to adjust to the angle of your strikes, and the swords lock for a second before he moves to shove you back. Once you feel him lean in you drop your stance again, using your lower center of gravity to bring him forward. His foot shifts ahead of him and you feel the wood of his sword press against your back as yours presses into his chest.

“I’ll have to practice more.” You say, trying to ignore just how close the young Duke is right now. The two of you part slowly, the shape of his amused smile lingering in the back of your head.

“The primary reason is that causes a kind of magical feedback, right?” Sabo questions and you nod. “Secondary to that it seems like a style that is meant to give better odds to a singular fighter versus multiple enemies. I imagine when coupled with magic it’s quite terrifying.”

“I’m surprised, usually people think the secondary part is giving an advantage to a smaller fighter. Since most beasts in the wilds are larger than a single human.” You say stepping back a couple paces.

“Height between humans wouldn’t vary enough.” Sabo shrugs. “The stance already starts a little wider than most, and drops lower with ease, so it’s a core part of the style to be sure your center of gravity is lower than your opponents, but the fluid style also allows you to steal your opponent’s momentum. The end result in both cases, is someone who is skilled at staying within the striking range of their opponent regardless of size.

“If you can’t outrun what you’re fighting, being able to fight right against a singular opponent forces the others to stay back and wait. Even beasts won’t lash out against their own.” He agrees. “It loses some value in a one on one fight, but it’s so unconventional compared to most other styles that it makes up for that loss easily.”

You just smile through his evaluation.

“Ahhh, you had me when you come in after knocking my sword aside.” He sighs, admitting defeat from the earlier maneuver where you pointedly avoided striking him. “How embarrassing.”

“Best two of three, your grace?” You offer and Sabo laughs.

“It would be my pleasure,” he says, dashing toward you this time without giving you a chance to begin things.

The Duke’s style was more dependent on his magic, but his skill wasn’t lacking by any means. A quick study and a man tested in far more combat than you were, his blows came in efficient and heavy. You could feel the strikes rattle all the way up your arm even as you turned them aside.

Whether he was finally awake and warmed up, or if he’d stopped holding back out of concern, didn’t matter to you. Getting to see more of his skill was as interesting to you as his getting to see your style was interesting to him. You understood now that the estate guards weren’t necessarily lacking. They were border guards in training whose skills hadn’t developed enough for a campaign. Their style was identical to Sabo’s, but far less practiced and controlled.

There was less being said this round, but more being learned as the two of you took in all the small details of one another. The line of sweat that made his hair stick to his face, the sharp line of his jaw, the tension of his swing that started practically in his neck, and slid down his arm. The repetition of skill that was drilled into each taut muscle.

A dedication you both knew well. A clear understanding shared between you both, even if the style of your skills were different, the hours and years of effort were similar. Sabo’s own experience out pacing yours simply by virtue of his position. In this particular instance, however, his skill and power were a hindrance, as he was constantly on alert not to hurt you even in the midst of the spar.

It was a testament to his skill that he’d been able to walk such a fine line this entire time, especially on so little sleep. You wanted to prolong this, to entertain all three rounds. It was fun, and challenging besides, but a third round would only keep him from work that had piled up, and that would keep him from sleeping, and you could the lack of sleep at the edges of his eyes.

And at the edges of his swings.

You stepped into the swing, blocking it and taking the full brunt of the blow. Sabo stumbled, he’d expected you to slide under the swing again and had adjusted accordingly. Instead you’d leaned into things and forced him a half step off balance, giving you enough room to smack your sword into his side, with enough force to make him grunt.

“You’re a bit more ruthless than expected.” He admits with a smile.

“Your considerations were appreciated.” You reply with a smile. “But I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to use them to my advantage.”

“Alas, it seems my break from work has ended then.” He looks completely crushed, with a sigh almost as dramatic as his forlorn expression.

“I promise I won’t start any rumors about having bested you in a sword fight.” You say with a smile, tapping your wooden sword under his chin once to get his attention.

“Oh but I will.” Koala says, as her and Hack come over to the two of you. “No matter how many times I see you fight, it’s always so beautiful.”

“There’s not much beauty in losing,” Sabo huffs, nearly pouting.

“I wasn’t talking about your sword style, your grace.” Koala corrects, smiling tersely. The Duke sighs, hanging his head even lower in defeat. “Honestly you look like a troll with a club comparatively.”

“I mean it was developed with pipes, so that’s hardly surprising.” Hack interjects. Your eyes widen a bit at the implication, but you decide not to ask any questions.

Despite the teasing there’s no tension in the air and Sabo’s smiling kindly when he straightens up and gives you a small bow.

“Defeat is never sweet,” He says, looking at you and ignoring Koala. “But it was still my pleasure, Lady Lulusia, thank you for indulging me.”

“Thank you for your kindness as well, your grace.” You say in return, curtsying.

“Eh?” He tilts his head, feigning confusion, but you can see pink dusting his cheeks. He’s been caught and he’s realized the fact a second too late.

“Magic or no, you’re certainly strong enough to shatter a wooden sword.” You say evenly, shaking the tingle that was still in your fingers from blocking his blow so directly. Koala’s eyes go wide as she looks from you to Sabo. “I appreciate your restraint.”

“I may have held back my strength for the sake of the swords, my lady, but don’t doubt the skill you possess.” He insists. “I really meant to claim that second round as my win.”

“Hmm… but not the first one?” You muse.

“Ah, haha, I… am disinclined to answer that.” He says, his flustered expression taking on a more serious tone. “Excuse me, but I do have a lot of work to get done, will you be okay having breakfast by yourself?”

“Of course, your grace.” You reply with a smile. You’d been eating your meals by yourself for a while, and it would be more efficient for him to eat while he worked.

“Your understanding is appreciated.” He bows a little more deeply, before leaving with Hack close behind.

Koala looks over at you and smiles. There’s a question on that smile she’s only holding back due to etiquette, but you don’t need her to ask it.

“It was nice to be challenged, thank you.” You answer, handing over the practice swords to a guard before heading to your room with Koala beside you.

“Of course. We can spar tomorrow morning if you’d like.”

“Oh? I didn’t realize you were a swordsman, Koala.”

“More of a marksman, but I have skill enough.” She clarifies with a smile.

“It would be my pleasure then.”

.

.

.

.

.

“Reach out to the Kingdoms,” Sabo instructs, sitting down at his desk, inwardly sighing at the stacks of paperwork still left to review and file.

“Your grace?” Hack is rarely confused by Sabo’s requests, but he’s not sure he’s following this time.

“Yes, my father will not be happy when word of the engagement party reaches him. We need to inform the other kingdoms and invite them first.” He clarifies. “I’ll let the others know.”

“The Lady is staying then?”

“Unless she requests otherwise, Hack, yes.”

“Seems the spar was not a waste of time, my apologies.”

“It was not. For better or worse though, it means there’s much more work to do. Even if it was by father’s decree, the idea that I would be wed before Sterry is going to cause a stir, but now might be the right time to use that to our advantage.”

“Truly?”

“Mm, depending on a few other factors, yes. Germa has stabilized, and Dawn will see it’s crowned prince made King soon. Alabasta and the Queendom will support, I’m sure. My only concern is Ilisia.”

“They have Wano to consider, they won’t be able to make any hasty moves.”

“… True.” Sabo bites his lip and then shakes his head. “The statesman is still in position?”

“Yes, Inazuma is still working well with them too.”

“Good, and Karasu,” Sabo starts and after a second the man in question forms seemingly from the shadows. “Keep an eye on her for her safety.”

“Nothing more?” Karasu raises a brow.

“Nothing more.” He asserts, not looking up from his paperwork. “You’re going to be busy with Ilisia, use the energy you would have otherwise spent and just… find me some reassurance.”

“I will do my best, your grace.” He says, disappearing from sight again.

“A timeline, your grace.”

“Thre-.” Sabo pauses, setting the quill back in the ink jar and thinking. “Three months, Hack, but please speak to the Lady Lulusia. The time line considers many factors, but I would prefer her input be taken into consideration as well.”

“I shall speak with her after breakfast. Which, for you, I’ll go and fetch now.”

“Yes, thank you.” Sabo leans back in his chair after Hack leaves and closes his eyes for a moment.

The way you moved, the control of the sword. The style was certainly authentic, and your skill was no mere pretense. Three months for the engagement party, and six months for the wedding, barring any other variables. Nine months was a long time, and with your skill, it should be more than sufficient to allow you to merge magic with your sword.

Would it be enough time? And would you agree to things when the time came?

Your smile flashes across his vision, the words buzzing in his ears.

“You’re a little slower than I expected, my lord.”

He smiled. So long as your skill passed the threshold he had no doubt you would agree.