#how are you any better than the men in the male dominated spaces?

[anxiously-scared]

i was thinking about playing love and deepspace even with it only having a female mc, bc i figured i could try it out. being seen as female is not smth im not used to but i certainly wouldve preferred different options, like different pronouns (not to mention from the preview pics your only option is thin & long hair, not very variety in skin colour) but its like. whatever this is 90% of otome games ill be fine. BUT THEN I READ THE REVIEWS. basically the comment i read was saying how 'this is a WOMAN space there should be NO MALE MC WOMEN ONLY' and some people responding even were fujoshi and like. uhm. girl.... relax a bit

basically her problem was that all gaming spaces are male centric (shes not necessarily wrong, a lot of them are) and that otome games are the only women-dominated ones (i dont think shes wrong here either but i bet theres other ones like come on). and like. HUH??? this isnt a war it doesnt matter whether a space is fucking male dominated or whatever it matters about the game!!!! yes it sucks that its mostly men in other areas but you can still play. the game!!!

i understand that people review bombed the game on playstore for not having a male mc or at least options to make it more male looking BC YOU KNOW. it sucks that you have to scramble so hard if ur gay and yearning lol

anyways not playing it bc of that comment idk it just kind of tainted it for me

EDIT: WHAT WAS THIS GIRL EVEN TALKING ABOUT

THIS IS NOT REVIEW BOMBING. she probably only saw a few reviews (like i did) and then decided that was what was happening 😭😭😭😭

[makoodles]

ミmy daddy didn't love me so i guess i've moved onto you

🍓 pairing: captain john price x fem reader

🍓 tags: nsfw, daddy kink, undefined age gap, oral sex, unprotected vaginal sex, rough(?) sex, both reader and price have a daddy kink that they indulge in with very little discussion, allusions to reader having a bad relationship with her father (but nothing concrete), price uses a lot of pet names for reader and also calls himself daddy several times

title is inspired by the song peter bogdanovich by my queen CMAT

masterlist

reblogs are always enormously appreciated!

If there’s one thing you know, it’s that you’re damn good at your job.

You have to be in order to survive in this ridiculous goddamn base. There are protocols to be followed, risk assessments to carry out, weapons and equipment requisition requests to send off, and you have to handle almost all of it for Task Force 141. That’s one thing about working with the military – they’re all about action, and rarely have the patience to fill in their paperwork, and then when they do it’s never done properly.

You’re patient when you need to be, willing to push when you have to, and you make sure shit gets done. It’s not an easy job; you work your ass off, and it’s often thankless. Most of your job is done behind the scenes, whether that’s requisitioning on-the-fly tactical or strategic airlifts, liaising with other units, or trying desperately to smooth over any little problems that might crop up with the higher-ups. 

It’s challenging and exhausting, and you love it, but damn, it can be fucking infuriating. Working in a male-dominated environment is a little bit soul-destroying, with every condescending comment and lascivious gaze that lingers over your body. But none of that matters, because you don’t need male approval to excel at your job. You don’t need male approval for anything.

You repeat it to yourself on the daily, which is something that you’ve never had to do before. But before, you weren’t working with Captain John Price.

He’s not… rude, per se. If anything, he’s always coolly polite. But it’s obvious, so obvious, that he just barely tolerates you. He’s gruff, short, to-the-point, and never speaks to you outside of brusque orders. It takes weeks for him to start trusting you with even the most basic of files, and even then chunks of information are often redacted. And it shouldn’t matter; you’ve worked for men like him before, you know how it goes, and if anything he’s one of the better ones.

In the beginning, when you had first been assigned to the task force, Price had not been happy about it. It had been a tough transition; your assignment had been approved by Laswell in order to take some of the strain of liaising off both her and Price, but the Captain hadn’t been too pleased about it. He had seen you as a sort of interloper, a silly little pencil-pusher sent in by the brass to do the grunt work of administration that no one else wants to do.

But you work hard, you always have done. And maybe… maybe, part of the reason that you end up busting your balls so hard is because you want– no. Maybe you need his approval. You’d prefer not to think about it; it’s easier to throw yourself into your work, and pretend that you’re doing it for you.

You’re not even sure how it started, but at some point, Price starts looking at you differently. Maybe he realises that you’re competent at your job, or maybe he just needs to get used to you. Maybe, you hope, he’s finally starting to realise that you’re good at what you do; that you can be an asset to the team, so long as they actually work with you. 

Whatever it is, he eases off. Stops being such a hard-ass, starts giving you space to do your thing. Eventually, he starts delegating too — stops hoarding the work like a miser, and finally starts treating you like you’re capable of something more than just photocopying.

He’s not a bad boss, not by a long shot. He’s kind, determined, patient when it matters, with a wry sense of humour. He’s also fiercely protective over his team, and that includes you now. 

But he’s also older, by at least fifteen years, and he’s not always the most diligent with paperwork. Typical man of action, you’ve seen it a hundred times before. There’s always something more important to do, and while he’s always so cognisant of your workload and careful not to add to it, he is also all too happy to let you take the reins when it comes to bureaucracy. You like to think that you’ve proved yourself to him, but maybe he just respects competency.

That should be it.

But you’re so ashamed to admit that even when Price stops treating you like you’re a hostile target, you can’t stop hoping for his attention. Your mental chants of I don’t need male approval for anything, I don’t need male approval for anything become a daily thing, and sometimes a several-times-a-day thing.

Because the thing is, Price can be a difficult man to please. He’s always so busy that he doesn’t have time to give you the approval that you’re straining for, but when he does it gives you the most shameful warm glow in your belly. 

A brief nod or a low grunted ‘Thanks, sweetheart’ is enough to fuel you for days now. Even better is when you’re walking along beside him, briefing him on the latest update from the higher-ups, and he leans his head in towards you as he listens intensely, sometimes even laying his large palm against the small of your back. Ostensibly, it’s to lead the way and guide you out of the path of the running cadets, but it just toes the line of professionalism and you flounder under the touch.

It’s stupid. You’re stupid. He’s just a coworker, and you need to keep your issues to yourself.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ

You’re perfectly self-aware enough to admit when you’re in a bad mood.

You start the day tired, and when you check your reflection in the mirror first thing that morning you’re greeted with the sight of a big, fuck-off pimple on your chin. It’s big, it’s throbbing, it practically has its own fucking heartbeat. You barely restrain the urge to pick at it, though you can feel it even when you’re not looking at it.

Your mood doesn’t improve when you get to the small kitchenette by your office and find that someone has used the last of the fancy French Vanilla flavoured coffee that you’ve stocked for yourself. As if that’s not bad enough, your little stash of chocolate digestives you keep for yourself for emergency bad days have disappeared too.

You clench your jaw and continue about your business. Whatever. You can survive without your coffee and chocolate.

Your resolve falters when you see the pile of paperwork on your desk, but whatever. It’s all part of the job. A little chocolate biscuit to nibble on would definitely make your job easier, but you’re a big girl and you’re just going to have to go without.

Then you get the phone call. One that makes you want to bang your head against your desk hard enough to knock yourself unconscious so that you don’t have to deal with this.

It’s time to update the TF141 personnel files. Orders from above, since there’s been significant changes to medical and surgical history in the last couple of months from injuries on missions.

 Normally, that’s not such a big deal. It just involves updating their medical and technical files, making sure that nothing major has changed with regards their addresses or other personal information, even though a big portion of it ends up redacted anyway. 

And, naturally, updating their photographs for their files.

You start easy. 

Gaz is happy to come to your office when you text him, and he stands obediently for you as you take his picture. He’s gotten a metal plate fitted in his kneecap from the last time his file has been updated, and he sits and chats easily with you as you go through his information. He’s a sweet guy, and so easy to talk to, and you sigh with the knowledge that no one is going to make your job as simple and leisurely as Gaz just has.

After he leaves, you target Soap. He comes to your office as easily as Gaz, but he’s significantly more difficult to photograph.

He just keeps smiling, no matter how many times you tell him to quit it. 

“It’s a personnel file photograph, not a photo for your Instagram.” You sigh, irritated. “I need you to have a blank, neutral expression. It’s like a passport photo, Sergeant. It’s for a government document.”

“Can’t help it, lass.” Soap says easily, that stupid grin not even dimming. “I see a camera, I smile. It’s muscle memory.”

You think that your irritation is only encouraging him, which only worsens your mood. In the end, you don’t get a single usable photograph of him for his file. You have to give up on him, swearing that you’ll come get him to try again later. He leaves your office still chuckling, like he thinks your frustration is cute.

You have tougher targets to tackle.

The difficult part isn’t even taking Ghost’s photo — the difficult part is catching him in the first place.

You spend almost three hours trying to track him down (because he won’t read your texts and your phone calls go unanswered), wobbling all over base in your stupid high heels and somehow missing him by mere moments every time. You arrive in the gym, the mess, the firing range, even the barracks, only to see the man’s enormous broad back disappearing out of the other door as soon as you get there.

You can only assume that Soap had given Ghost the heads up that you were on the prowl with a mission and a camera, because the lieutenant is avoiding you like the goddamn plague.

So yeah. You’re in a real bad fucking mood. But you can’t help it — some days your job is entirely thankless, and your mood drops so low that you feel like going home and crying. But you can’t, and you don’t want to show weakness in front of these military idiots, so all you can do is lock your jaw and go about your business the best you can.

You go back to your office, jaw and fists clenched tight, and collapse at your desk with your head in your hands. You have to take a few deep, slow breaths to try and calm yourself, but then you make the mistake of checking your reflection and your mood sinks lower again when you see that the stupid pimple on your chin has worsened.

God, this is just not your day. You have to get these stupid files updated, or it’ll fall on your head. 

Eventually, you reluctantly stand up. There’s no point moping; you have a job to do, whether you like it or not, and your next victim is Captain Price.

You walk to Price’s office swiftly, your feet aching in your stupid heels. You wish you had worn something more sensible, but… well. Even subconsciously, you want to impress.

When you reach his office, you throw the door open and march inside without even bothering to knock. 

Price is sitting behind his desk, and his head snaps up as soon as you walk in. His expression is set in a hard scowl, though it softens when he sees who it is. You guess you don’t exactly pose much of a threat, so he sees no use in posturing.

“I need you for a moment.” You bite out, allowing the door to slam shut behind you.

You hear Price sigh, before he leans back and settles into his chair, making himself comfortable. He’s wearing the same dark compression shirt that he usually wears for training exercises or to the gym, and he’s recently groomed his beard down too. He looks good, though it takes a colossal amount of effort for you to not notice, because you have other things you need to focus on right now.

“Hello to you too, love.” He grunts, wiping a hand over his eyes. “What’s the problem?”

You struggle not to react to that, his low voice both soothing and igniting something in your blood. You take a breath, try to calm down. You’re a professional, and you’re not here to embarrass yourself in front of the captain.

“I’m updating personnel files,” You say, and this time it comes out calm and steady, “I need to take a picture of you.”

Price’s gaze lingers on you, his stern brow softening a little. For a moment, you think that maybe this is actually going to be easy. That he’ll just stand up and take the fucking picture, so that the two of you can go back to your jobs and relax for the rest of the day.

But then–

“Jesus, kid.” He sighs, already shaking his head. “I’m up to my eyes right now. Leave it ‘till tomorrow.”

For a moment, you don’t react at all. You just stare at him, letting those dismissive words settle over you. He’s already looking back at his paperwork, mission briefings and maps littering the desk, and you feel so effectively dismissed. You feel small, so silly and stupid standing in front of him in a way that you haven’t felt since you first started working with the task force. You had thought that you were past this, that you had earned some meagre sort of respect from him.

“I need it done today.” You say, and your voice comes out a little hollow to your own ears.

You don’t need male validation. You don’t. But damn, you’ve had a rough day and the fact that your captain isn’t even bothering to look at you makes you want to cry.

Price sighs, and rubs at the crease between his eyes. He looks just as tired as you feel.

“Yeah, well. I don’t have time. Tomorrow.”

You swallow, pursing your lips. He’s so effortlessly dominant, which means that his careless dismissal stings all the more.

“I have to get the whole team done,” You say, struggling to keep your voice firm. “Soap wouldn’t stop smiling for the camera, I couldn’t find Farah anywhere, and Ghost–”

Price gives a sharp, derisive snort. “Forget Ghost.”

You scowl. “I need to do the whole squad.”

“Not Ghost.” Price repeats, this time slower and with more emphasis. “Simon doesn’t do photos.”

You take a deep breath, trying to stay calm. You’ve been working alongside the task force for a while now, and you’re familiar with Lieutenant Riley’s penchant for covering his face. It’s not something you have a problem with – usually.

“There’s no reason for him to be the exception to personnel photos, Captain.” You say through gritted teeth. “Everyone else is being photographed. The task force might be covert, but Lieutenant Riley is no more–”

“Christ, enough.” Price snaps, his voice a deep boom that has your mouth closing with a click. “The One Four One is my squad, in case you’ve forgotten. I know these lads, and I’m telling you to leave it out.”

You stare, a little taken aback by the harshness in his voice. He hasn’t been this sharp with you in months, not since you had started to prove yourself competent, useful. Now, you can see the warning signs of his bad mood; the circles under his eyes are pronounced, his skin dull in the ugly fluorescent lights of his office. He looks exhausted, his skin lined and dry like he hasn’t been drinking enough water.

You realise, a little too late, that you might have been pushing your luck by insisting on something as silly as personnel file photos. TF 141 had only returned from deployment at the beginning of the week, and Price has no doubt been drowning in reports since.

“This is why I told Laswell you weren’t necessary,” His snarl is entirely unlike him, and he rubs his face furiously, his palms rasping through his beard. “I don’t need someone coming in here and making demands of my squad for– for fucking photographs.”

You inhale shakily through your nose; to your utter horror, you can feel your eyes burn with hot wet tears. It’s stupid – you’ve dealt with far crueller words from far harsher men. The nature of your job often puts you in the firing line for frustration, and when it bubbles over it’s frequently directed at you. 

But this… this feels different, for some reason. You’ve been working your ass off to try and earn some recognition from Price, to show him that you’re a valuable asset to the team, and so his sharp, frustrated dismissal of you cuts deeper than it should.

You hate that your eyes are burning like this. You don’t want Price to think of you as useless, or as the silly little girl who was put on the team by the brass who can’t even do her job right. He was just starting to think of you as competent, and it hurts your ego to have to go to him for help with something that you should be more than capable of handling yourself in the first place.

“Right,” You say, and even you’re startled by the sharpness in your tone. “Fine. Forget the file updates, then.”

You step forward, jaw clenched hard, and toss the files you’ve been carrying around all day onto his desk. They hit the surface with a smack that feels uncomfortably loud in the tense silence that’s fallen over the room.

“I’ll tell the higher-ups that you’re handling it.” You continue, your voice coming out brattier than you’d like. “Since obviously I have no idea what I’m doing–”

“Oh, don’t do that.” Price sighs, as though you’re the one being unreasonable. “What I’m saying is, if you’re going to work with the team, you have to understand the team–”

That, you think, might just push you over the edge.

“Do you think I’m stupid?” You snap out, and Price’s mouth closes. “D’you think I’m– that I’m some kind of idiot?”

Price blinks. It seems like you’ve managed to take him by surprise, as though your bad mood rivals his just enough to pull him out of his own grumpy form entirely. He opens his mouth again, but you’re not ready to hear him speak again just yet.

“I’m here because Laswell put in a request for me to work with you and your squad, Captain. I’m considered an asset to the teams that I work with,” You’re scowling thunderously, all the tension and frustration that’s been mounting all day spilling over. “And I don’t have to put up with being dismissed and unappreciated when I know that I would be respected in other squads for the work that I do.”

Price raises his hands, a frown creasing his brow. “Kid, that’s not–”

Usually, being called ‘kid’ by Price has a warm glow settling in your stomach that you’re absolutely not interested in examining, but this time it only lights an infuriated fire in your belly. 

“Don’t!” You snap, your breath juddering unsteadily. “God, you think I enjoy being treated like an idiot? You think I haven’t had to deal with this from men my whole career? My whole life? Even my father–”

To your abject horror, a lump forms in your throat and you can’t finish that sentence. Your eyes are hot with unshed tears, and you’re pretty sure your lip is trembling. 

Price stands, his stern expression slackening into something like uncomfortable surprise as he moves to step around the desk.

“Hey,” He soothes, lifting his hands. “I’m not your father.”

“I know that!” You snap, irate. You’re frustrated with yourself, embarrassed at what you’ve unintentionally given away. “I wouldn’t want you to be!”

Price’s expression flickers, as though he can’t decide quite how to react to you. You’re more than aware that you’re being childish, but you find yourself unable to temper your overreactions. In the face of your tears and your frustrated anger, Price looks like he’s at a loss.

“All I’ve done is work hard, and tried to take the burden off you to make your job a little easier.” You continue before he can interrupt again. “And all I get in return is stress, and my chocolate biscuits eaten, and breakouts, and– and–”

“Kid–”

“The only person who wasn’t an absolute dickhead to me today was Garrick,” You rage, on a roll now. “Everyone else has just been so– and look how bad my skin has gotten from the stress of having to deal with men who want to act like children–”

Price watches you with an expression that is plainly bewildered as you gesture at the stupid pimple that’s been throbbing on your chin all day. You don’t even think you’re making sense, too lost in your frustration and humiliation to be properly aware of what you’re saying. 

“Your… skin.” He repeats, a little disbelieving. 

You whirl away, agitated. You’re not getting your point across well, and Price must think you’re simply demented. 

“Hey,” He says slowly, approaching from around the side of his desk. “I didn’t mean to suggest that you weren’t doing a decent job–”

“Whatever.” You mutter, running your hands over your skirt in an attempt to straighten out the creases. “Whatever.”

It’s too little, too late. He’s always been a bit of a hardass, and you’ve always tried so hard to please him, to impress him. But you can’t bear to make a fool of yourself like this any longer.

“I’ll leave the paperwork to you. Update it, or don’t. It doesn’t matter.” You say shortly, turning on your heel and marching towards the door.

“Wait,” Price calls out. His voice is firm, echoing with the grim certainty of a man who is used to being obeyed.

But you’re not one of his soldiers, and his command falls on deaf ears. Your skin is still prickling with humiliation; you don’t think you’ve ever been so desperate to get away from the Captain before.

“Sweetheart, just wait a minute,” Price says, and this time you can hear the exasperation in his voice. “I understand that you’re stressed, that’s normal. Everyone gets stressed in this line of work. But you can’t just go and get your knickers in a twist because some of the lads are bein’ difficult–”

“My knickers are none of your business!” You yell. Truthfully, it’s more of a shriek, high-pitched and unsteady enough to have Price’s eyes widening and darting towards the door as though worried about someone overhearing from the corridor.

“Whoa, okay,” Price says with the air of trying to soothe a spooked horse. “You're right. Your... knickers... ain't my concern. But helping keep this squad running smoothly is, and that can't happen if my admin is on edge."

“Oh, give me a break!” You’re beyond on-edge now, sailing right into fury. “You ignore me most of the time when you're not on deployment, you dismiss me when I’m just trying to do my job, but now you’re telling me you need me to not be on edge?”

You’ve reached the door now, your hand clenched tight around the doorhandle as you take one last moment to turn and look at him. He’s stepping towards you, no doubt with the intent to stop you before you can leave, but you don’t plan on giving him the chance.

“Kid, just hang on a damn minute–”

“Sort the files yourself, or do whatever you want.” You bite out, yanking the door open but pausing in the doorway. “I don’t even care anymore. It’s your squad, you do it.”

Price takes a breath, visibly fighting for patience. Truthfully, you don’t know how he hasn’t lost his head with you already. He was already exhausted and in an obviously bad mood when you had stormed in here, and it couldn’t be more obvious that you’ve just made it worse with all of your frenzied anger and borderline hysteria. 

The fact that Price is staying calm and level even in the face of your stress-induced meltdown only makes you feel all the more ridiculous. You wish he would get angry, that he would snap at you like he had when you had first walked in – at least that way you could pretend that you don’t notice the way his stressed scowl had melted into a look of concern as soon as he had seen the tears welling up in your stinging eyes.

“And you don’t have to wear that stupid hat, we’re indoors!” You yell, your voice teetering on the edge of hysteria.

You just have enough time to see his hand reach up to touch the brim of his boonie hat before you hurriedly bolt out of the room, escaping into the corridor before he can stop you.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ

“— just thinking that maybe I’d be better suited with another team, that’s all. I heard Kortac’s liaison is approaching maternity leave—”

“That position is going to be filled internally,” Laswell’s voice is calm over the secure phoneline, a stark contrast to the shaky undertone of stress in your own. “Besides, organising a transfer like that is more trouble than it’s worth.” There’s a pause, then a sigh crackles over the phone. “You still haven’t explained what happened. As far as I can see, you were doing good work there.”

Yeah, you think sourly, because all you see is the paperwork end of it.

“... Internal conflict.” You mutter, playing with the fraying edge of your sweater sleeve. 

There’s a long pause, protracted enough that it makes you squirm. You know what she’s thinking – in your line of work, it’s impossible to avoid clashing with some of the big dominant personalities who are used to getting away with whatever they want. But you’ve always been able to handle it, well-versed enough in diplomacy to know when to stand your ground and when to bow out to avoid unnecessary strife. 

“Internal conflict.” Laswell repeats, her voice as bland as you’ve ever heard it. “Meaning?”

God, it feels like you’re disappointing your mom or something. You scrub a hand over your face, pacing in the living room of your small apartment.

“I know how it sounds,” You say, “But– they don’t want to work with me. There’s only so much I can do if I’m being met with resistance at every corner–”

“You’ve worked with resistant squads before,” Laswell interrupts. “It’s part of the job.”

“Yes, but…” You start, before trailing off. 

She has a point, of course. It is part of the job. There’s no way to professionally explain to your superior that the reason this assignment is so difficult is because you have a mortifying crush on the Captain of the Task Force. It’s making you stupid, making all the stupid bullshit that you’re usually able to look past feel so much worse, especially because all you’ve ever wanted was Price’s approval.

Another sigh. This one, at least, sounds a little more sympathetic.

“Look,” Laswell says, and this time her voice is a little gentler. “I’ve never given you an assignment that I didn’t think you could handle. Whatever is going on, you need to sort it. You’re a capable girl, and the One Four One is far from the most difficult team you’ve had to deal with. There might be some big personalities there, but nothing that you shouldn’t be able to tackle.”

“Mhm.” You grunt noncommittally.

“Sort out whatever’s going on with you.” Laswell’s tone leaves no room for argument, her suggestion falling just short of a command. “If whatever issues you’re experiencing continue, I’ll talk to John–”

“No!” You blurt.

God, you can’t think of anything worse. You’ve already made a show of yourself in front of him, the last thing you need is for him to learn that you’ve gone crying to Laswell about the whole thing. You don’t want him to think of you as any more of a useless little girl than he doubtlessly already does.

“No,” You repeat, calmer this time as you clear your throat. “I’ll… sort it. Sorry to bother you with this, ma’am.”

Laswell hums, and you can imagine her eyes narrowing. Judging by the wind whistling in the background of the call, she’s not anywhere near her cushy office. You’ve interrupted her on whatever assignment she’s on, and she’s been kind enough to listen to your silly little complaints for at least fifteen minutes of her valuable time. You feel more ridiculous than ever, and you pinch at the bridge of your nose.

“... Right.” She says. “Fine. Keep me updated on the situation. I want a sitrep by the end of the week, understood?”

“Yes, ma’am.” 

You understand what’s not being said. Laswell expects you to work your own shit out, but you can hear the concern in her voice when she demands an update. All you can do is agree. Laswell has been by your side throughout your whole career, always having a hand in your assignments and your progression, and she’s always been an advocate for you and what you’re capable of. Now, after this conversation, you feel silly for getting so overwhelmed in the face of what is a relatively minor obstacle.

“Good. I’ll speak to you then.”

You hum, wish her goodbye and good luck, and hang up the phone.

For a long moment afterwards, you sit in silence in your living room. God, how did all of this spiral into such a mess?

For the last few days, you’ve been avoiding the base entirely. You have a few PTO days built up, and you’ve taken the opportunity to just chill out. It’s the first chance you’ve had to relax properly in months, since you had started working with the task force. The space is good, and it’s needed.

You get out of the headspace of work, and reports, and files and requisitions and debriefs, and instead treat yourself with full body self-care. You exfoliate, you moisturise, you use a hair mask, you take bubble baths. You even catch up on the trashy Netflix romance series that you had put on hold for ages, just waiting for some free time to indulge.

And you almost, almost, forget about why you’re hiding away in your little flat in the first place.

But your third day off creeps around, and you can’t help but feel as though your little bubble of isolation is about to pop. There’s only so much time away from the office that you’re able to swing, and the longer away the more you feel that your position on the team is untenable. No matter how you currently feel about the task force and your place with them, you’re not willing to let your hard work go down the drain just because you’re too cowardly to face them again after your little meltdown.

So, you go back to work after your little break away.

You manage to slink into your office mostly unseen, other than polite hello’s from other admin staff as you slip through the halls. Your office is far from prime real estate when it comes to office space on base – it’s well out of the way, down several corridors that no one ever goes down, and once you get past the main thoroughfares you don’t come across anyone. Even still, it feels a little like you’re doing a walk of shame, but you walk with your head held high before you finally get your office door closed behind you. 

To your surprise, your desk is clear. Typically, any slight break away from your desk results in work piling up on it, just waiting for your attention once you get back. You don’t know what to make of the absence of work; you can’t help but wonder, somewhat uncomfortably, if Price had taken your words to heart and dealt with all of the paperwork himself.

You check the drawers of your desk too, just in case, and come up empty yet again. 

Well. Okay, then. 

You sign into your desktop, waiting for the encryption program to load before accessing your emails. There’s a lot to catch up on, so you spend the next hour or so organising your to-do list in order of urgency.

You get lost in making your little lists, allowing yourself to relax into finding order in your schedule. You barely even look up until there’s a soft knock on your office door, and by the time you’ve raised your head the door has opened and Farah has slipped inside.

“Oh,” You straighten up in surprise. “Commander. What can I do for you?”

It’s a surprise to see her, especially since you hadn’t received any email correspondence. Your office is tucked away down a remote corridor, and soldier’s usually prefer to just email you their requests rather than make the trek down.

Farah offers a polite smile, approaching your desk. “I hear you are taking photographs.”

Your smile slips a little. “Oh. No, actually, I wasn’t–”

“Captain Price said I was to be photographed,” She says, pulling the chair out opposite you and watching you expectantly. “I tried to find you yesterday, and the day before, but I believe you weren't on base.”

You shift, feeling abruptly rather awkward. “Right. I was– Price said that to you?”

“Mhm.” Farah leans back in the chair, her dark eyes alert as they track over your face. “He said that you have been stressed.”

You feel your face heat, mortified. Oh, god. How embarrassing. Has Price given the team a goddamn debrief on your little meltdown? Farah tilts her head as though she knows what you’re thinking, and a tiny smile quirks at the corner of her lips.

“That’s all he said,” She says. “That, and that we should try to make your job a little easier.”

“Oh.” You shift, embarrassed and awkward. “I– Listen, I had a… rough day at work a few days ago, that’s all. I’m not– things are fine.”

Farah just nods as though that’s perfectly convincing, and you find yourself wildly appreciative of her for a moment.

“So, then,” She says, and raises her eyebrows. “The picture?”

You can’t find a way to explain that you had thrown that particular responsibility right back at Price in a fit of pique, but it turns out you don’t have to. Farah produces a slim folder that you hadn’t noticed her holding, and you realise with another flush of embarrassment that it’s her personnel file.

“There wasn’t much to update, just a recent blood work test.” She says as she lays it on your desk. 

“That’s… thanks.” You say weakly, taking the file in hand. You flick through it briefly, feeling something in your stomach squirm at the sight of Farah’s details all filled in – Price’s handwriting is unmistakable, the small neat blocky letters standing out amongst the messy scrawl of Farah’s medical report.

You dig out your camera, still a little flustered, and direct Farah to stand against your plain white-painted wall. She’s an easy subject to photograph; she stands perfectly still, unsmiling, and you get the perfect picture after only a couple of attempts.

“Lovely,” You murmur, flicking through the pictures. “Thank you.”

Farah hums. You’re expecting her to dismiss herself, and it takes a moment for you to realise that she’s still lingering. You glance up, blinking, only to find that she’s standing with her lips pursed, obviously considering something.

“The Captain is worried about you.” She says, as though it’s the most natural thing in the world. “Is everything alright?”

You gape at her like a moron, camera still hanging loosely from your hands. You feel uncomfortably seen; there’s no way that Farah could know what happened, but she’s looking at you with an awful lot of sympathy right now.

“What?” You squeak.

“You fought?” Farah speaks slowly, obviously conscious of overstepping her boundaries. “I don’t mean to pry, it’s just…”

“No, that’s okay.” You say hastily. “We didn’t– there was no fighting, exactly.”

She just nods, as if you’re making perfect sense, then smiles politely. She gathers herself up and steps towards the door, and you feel your head spinning as she turns to go. 

“You look tired,” Farah murmurs, low enough that you almost miss it. “When Price wants to fix things, let him.”

“Mhm.” You nod quickly without really hearing her. You’re pretty sure you’d agree to anything right now just to escape the knowing intensity of Farah’s gaze. “Yeah, of course.”

After Farah leaves, you feel like you need another day off. It’s all you can do to just sit in your comfortably padded office chair and groan like a moron, because Jesus Christ you’ve made such a mess of things. 

It was bad enough when you were pining like an idiot from afar; you’ve had crushes before, and you know that you would have outgrown it eventually. But then you had your stupid little meltdown in front of Price, and revealed more than you intended, and all of a sudden you’ve made yourself into a fool in front of the squad you’ve tried so hard to impress these last few months.

You have to try hard not to spiral. In fact, it’s a challenge not to cave and grab your phone to call Laswell all over again to demand a reassignment right this second. You have a pretty good idea of what she’d say to you in response, but still, the impulse remains.

All you can do is put it from your mind. You potter about, printing Farah’s photograph so you can tuck it neatly into her file with a paperclip, and then decide to start replying to the many emails that have built up in your absence.

The emails vary in tone, from polite enquiries to not-so-polite demands for you to solve some administrative issues, and you sigh quietly as you respond to some of the more snotty messages from upper management. And if you’re a little bit passive aggressive, then you don’t think anyone can blame you.

Your mind has finally quietened, focusing on your work as the buzz of your thoughts settle down, when another knock sounds out from your door. This one is firmer than Farah’s soft knock from earlier, and a little louder, though this time you don’t look up from your screen.

“Come in.” You call, chewing at your lip as you struggle to keep the wording of your email civil.

You’re half-expecting it to be Soap this time around, or maybe one of the recruits hoping to get you to sign off on their leave. So when you finally glance up only to catch sight of the broad, thick-shouldered figure of Captain Price stepping into your office, you think you might go into cardiac arrest.

Email abandoned, you half jolt to your feet before changing your mind mid-movement and attempting to sit back down. It ends up being a humiliating sort of jerky motion, and you pray that he somehow missed it entirely.

“Captain.” You wheeze, your voice coming out a little weak.

Price’s cool blue eyes dart over your face and then down the length of your body, and you become suddenly, mortifyingly aware of the state you’re in. You might not want to admit it, but your wardrobe definitely changes when the Captain isn’t on deployment. Instead of professional trousers, you wear your tight knee-length pencil skirts and fitted shirts, and totter around in your heels. And it’s silly, but… well, you can’t help but notice the way Price’s eyes follow you when you dress like that, and you like his attention on you.

Except today, you hadn’t been planning on running into Price. You hadn’t planned on seeing anyone, so you had dressed for comfort — you’re wearing a pair of frumpy grey wool trousers and a super over-sized soft purple sweater that practically swallows you whole. You haven’t even done your hair nicely, and you curse yourself. This has to be the least sexy you’ve looked in months.

“D’you’ve a moment, love?” 

His voice seems loud in the quiet of your office, even though realistically you know he’s only speaking in a murmur. In the quiet days you’ve spent alone in your apartment, you’d almost forgotten how lovely and low and gruff his voice is, and you feel your toes curl in your shoes at the sound of it.

It’s not as though you can refuse him, though you’re already embarrassingly aware of the way in which you had stormed off the last time you had seen him.

“Yeah.” You swallow thickly in an attempt to strengthen your voice, but it still comes out high and thready. “Sure.”

As if he had just been waiting for permission, Price steps into the room properly and closes the door behind him. All of a sudden, the room feels a little claustrophobic. Price is a big man, broad-shouldered and thickly built with a soft layer of fat cushioning those hard muscles, and you can’t help but feel as though his presence is sucking all of the air out of the room.

But still, he approaches slowly, like you’re some kind of feral cat. Those sharp eyes of his are still tracking over you; he never misses a beat, and you know that he’s taking stock of you in the same way he would for an enemy out on the field. You feel raw, uncomfortably vulnerable. You find yourself wishing wildly and ridiculously that you had worn your usual fitted shirt and pencil skirt, or at least put on a bit of makeup.

“You look rested.” He notes, coming to a slow stop just in front of your desk.

You suddenly curse your last minute choice to stay seated, because now Price’s big body is towering over you in a way that’s honestly making your head swim a little.

“Yeah.” Your voice is a little hoarse. “I guess.”

Price nods, inhales through his nose. A moment passes before he clears his throat and reaches out to place a handful of files on your desk. Despite the plain manila envelopes, you recognise them for what they are almost immediately; the personnel files for 141.

“Finished ‘em off for you while you were gone.” He says gruffly, as though it were no big deal. “Nearly had to nail Soap down to a chair for that damn photo.”

You stare at the files for a long moment, making no move to open them. You find yourself totally, utterly lost for words. 

“This is–” You start to say, and truthfully you’re not sure where you’re going with that. You think you’re about to thank him, but he doesn’t really give you the chance to.

“Why don’t we talk?” He says, and motions to the dinky little couch in the corner of the room as if he owns it.

You hesitate a moment, a little peeved about the effortless way he takes command in your own office, but relent and push yourself up from the desk. You don’t make eye contact with Price as you step around him, walking to the corner, but you can feel his eyes on you all the same.

 The couch had come with the office, and you don’t even really want to think about how old it is, but you sink down awkwardly onto it anyway. The cushions are worn and threadbare and the springs creak gratingly when you settle your weight onto it, but it’s fine. It does the job.

You’re half-expecting Price to drag the spare chair at your desk over so he can sit opposite you – you’re not expecting him to step right up next to you before he drops down next to you, sighing as his thick thighs spread wide.

You barely bite back a squeak, a little bewildered. You’re not surprised that he’s asked to talk to you. Your behaviour had been wildly inappropriate, and you couldn’t exactly protest if he’s decided to caution you or something.

But you had expected it to be a more formal affair; sitting together on the pathetic, dingy little couch in your office feels entirely too casual for the dressing down you’re sure you’re about to receive.

“Think we’re due a discussion about the other day.” He says, gentler than you had been expecting.

You avoid his eyes, though you can feel his stare boring into the side of your face. Ugh. Time to eat humble pie, you think miserably. 

“I’m sorry, sir.” You keep your voice as dispassionate and prim as possible. “My behaviour was unprofessional and entirely unacceptable, and I have no excuse. It won’t happen again, I assure you.”

It’s as professional an apology as you can manage, and you chance a quick side glance at him to see his reaction. Your stomach sinks when you see that his brow is creased in a frown, and you panic a little at the realisation that your apology hasn’t helped matters at all.

“Well,” His voice is gruff enough to elicit a little shiver from you. “I wasn’t–” He clears his throat. “I wasn’t looking for an apology.”

That finally makes you turn properly, your eyes darting nervously over his face. He’s already watching you, his blue eyes searing under the brim of his stupid hat. He’s trimmed his beard since the last time you saw him; the salt and pepper bristles of his moustache and chops are neat and shortened. He looks good, though you try not to notice. He doesn’t look as dehydrated or drained as he did a few days ago either, though he still leans into the couch with an air of quiet exhaustion.

“Paperwork has never been my favourite thing in the world,” He confesses with an air of chagrin that’s painfully endearing to you. “Always found it a pain, to be honest. Puts me right out of sorts. I was… short with you, the other day.”

You frown, making yourself small on the couch. “You said I wasn’t necessary.”

Price winces, then reaches up and pulls his boonie hat off his head so that he can drag a hand over his short-cropped hair. Though you had insulted it only the other day, it strikes you as odd to see him with a bare head.

“Shouldn’t have said that.” He mumbles, resting his elbows on his knees and letting his hat hang from his hands. “You’ve been great these last few months. Don’t know what I’d have done without you, sometimes.”

You’re stupid. It’s the only reason you can think of to explain the way blood rushes to your head and turns your face hot, your whole body going hot and prickly in response to his low praise. You fidget, glance away, and pray he doesn’t notice. 

“You know I’m no good at deskwork,” He says, and leans in a little closer like he thinks you’re not listening properly. “Don’t have the head for it. I think you’re the reason the team runs so smoothly in the first place, love.”

The flattery is being laid on a little too thick, but it works. You fall for it entirely, a warm glow settling over you like a blanket, wrapping around you tight and soothing the jagged edges of your anger and anxiety. You hate that you’re so easy to appease, a couple of sweet compliments and assurances falling from your Captain’s lips assuaging all that upset that you’ve been carrying around with you for days now.

But still, part of you isn’t quite willing to let go of the sting, the hurt that his words and his harsh tone had caused. 

“Is this you apologising, then?” You ask, watching him from the corner of your eye.

He smiles, close-mouthed. “Yeah. It is. Not doin’ too good, am I?”

“You’re doing okay.” You murmur, before deciding to try to be a bit cheeky. “But you can keep going, if you’d like.”

Price laughs, rich and warm and low. You don’t think you’ve ever actually heard him laugh in all the months you’ve been working with the task force, and the sound of it rumbles right into your bones, settling something inside of you and finally allowing you to relax. No longer tense with stress, you melt a little into the corner of the couch.

“Shouldn’t have snapped at you,” He says slowly. “You do good work. Great work. You shouldn’t feel like you’re not a valued member of the team.”

You swallow thickly. You feel too warm, your head swimming a little. His attention feels too heavy, heating your blood and going straight to your head.

“I overreacted,” You mumble reluctantly. “I shouldn’t… your hat isn’t stupid.”

That gets another bark of laughter out of Price, and he slaps a hand down onto your knee. The contact makes you jolt, eyes widening, but Price’s hand doesn’t shift. His palm is so large, spread across your thigh as his fingers curl over your knee. The touch feels almost scorching even through the thick fabric of your trousers.

All of a sudden, your tongue feels very thick in your mouth. The hand on your knee is not in any way suggestive; it’s chaste, innocent, just resting there like a reminder that he wants your attention on him (as if it could be anywhere else). But your nerves are jangling all of a sudden, every one of your senses straining towards him as you hold your breath.

“The hat isn’t the problem,” Price mutters, though you barely hear him. “I wanted to ask you about something else you said, love. Something you said about your father.”

That has some of the heat in your veins cooling, your eyes blowing wide. “I– what?”

To your bewilderment, Price’s cheeks have reddened beneath the whiskers of his beard and moustache. Despite his clear chagrin, he doesn’t break eye contact with you, his thick fingers squeezing cautiously around your knee. 

“Don’t mean to overstep,” He assures you quietly. “And– and don’t mind me if I’m talkin’ nonsense. But I know that you’ve been working so hard, and you’ve got a tough job. Can’t be easy. And I just wanted to say that if you'd like some… guidance – someone to steer you on the right path, that is– well, that I’m here if you ever want to talk."

Oh god. You feel your mouth go dry. 

It’s funny, because even though Price isn’t even yet forty, he’s always seemed so much older. Maybe it’s the weight of the responsibility that he carries on his shoulders, or the battle-hardened icy blue eyes, or the paternal sense of protectiveness that he shows over his team. He’s always been like an almost father figure for the squad, regardless of age; you’ve seen the way he’s so protective over Ghost, the way he claps Soap on the back or shoulders in praise to boost him up, the way he beams with pride when Farah excels, the way he always makes time to guide or give advice to Gaz.

It’s sweet. He’s always been sweet, so aware of the personalities on his team, even when he’s acting like that typical military authority figure. 

"Sounds like you want to be my daddy." You mean to say it in a derogatory fashion, laughing as though it's ridiculous, though when it comes out you can hear that it’s missing some of the sarcasm you had intended.

Price reacts instantly. He reels back, eyes widening, the pink in his cheeks flares into a deep red flush, and you see his chest heave as his breath catches. You hadn’t been expecting a reaction like this; Price looks as though the words have hit him like a physical slap.

“Jesus. That’s not–” He says, and the gravelly hoarseness in his voice is a shock. “That’s not what I meant.”

There’s a moment of charged silence. Fuck, what have you done? Why would you say that? Why would you say that, to the captain of your task force? Hadn’t you embarrassed yourself enough in front of him the day you had had your silly little meltdown? It’s like you just can’t keep your damn mouth shut around him, like your brain turns to mush the second he looks at you and you just lose the run of yourself.

“I’m sorry.” You blurt. “I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t know what– I didn’t mean it.”

The next silence is even worse than the last, tension humming between you like a live wire. He’s so close to you that his scent fills your nose – a blend of sweet cigar smoke, sharp gunpowder, and a heady masculine musk. You feel so fucking stupid, and more than a little panicked. You don’t think you could survive the humiliation of having to call Laswell and beg for a reassignment twice in one day just because you’ve completely humiliated yourself in front of the Captain again.

Price swallows, the sound painfully loud in the silence.

“Right.” He says slowly, before coughing roughly to clear his throat. “Mm. ‘Course. I didn’t mean to– perhaps I overstepped. Since you mentioned your father–”

“I don’t want to talk about my father.” You say swiftly.

God, you feel like your issues are out on display with a big damn spotlight. You feel so pathetic, so damn pitiful, as though your desperate need for approval and affection from an older male authority figure is written across your forehead.

But if your issues are on display, then so are Price’s, because you can’t help but notice that the vibrant red flush on his cheeks hasn’t faded. If anything, that deep flush has spread down his throat and over his chest; you can see how the skin that’s stretched over his pectoral muscles is glowing crimson beneath his shirt.

A niggling boldness begins to creep in, and you find yourself straightening on the couch. You turn, bring one of your legs up on the couch so that you can turn your whole body towards him, one of your elbows resting on the back cushion of the couch. 

Price’s eyes sharpen when your body turns towards him, and his body draws tense. Those cool blue eyes dart over you, and you’re surprised to see heat in them despite your oversized purple jumper and unflattering wool trousers. The whisper of his fatigues brushing against the fabric of your own trousers is both a distraction and an invitation, your thighs sliding surreptitiously against each other.

“What if I did mean it?” You blurt out before your courage can flee you.

Price goes so still it looks preternatural, even the breaths in his chest slowing. 

“Kid.” He says, and it sounds like a warning.

You don’t heed it, adjusting yourself so that you’re shuffling closer yet again. You don’t think you’ve ever been so close to him, his scent and his body and his heated gaze filling up your consciousness until he’s all that you’re aware of.

“What if I meant it?” You ask again, the whisper coming out low but charged. 

Price takes a breath that sounds like a groan, and it surprises you. You hadn’t expected that reaction; it sends a trickle of heated desire running down your spine, and you’re startled by how much you want him in this moment.

“D’you know what you’re asking for?” He asks, the gravel in his voice flooding wet heat between your legs. 

His carefully laced words linger in the space between you, daring you to accept, to shred the formal boundary that looms between the two of you. You get the sense that you’re walking a fine line here, that you’re getting close to the point of no return. 

“Yes.” You breathe, although you’re not entirely sure that you do know what you’re asking for. All you know is that he’s so close, and he’s staring at you with an expression of such hunger that it’s making you feel weak.

Price moves fast for such a big man, and all you can do is let out a soft sound of surprise when one of his big hands wraps around the back of your neck to pull you in. A deep, guttural sound escapes him when his lips crash into yours, his mouth demanding and greedy.

It feels like you go both lax and rigid simultaneously, before you positively light up. The hand that Price has wrapped around the back of your neck keeps you grounded, and before you can stop yourself you’re burrowing closer. It feels like the tension, your childish argument, the sexual friction – everything has culminated to this electrifying moment, where Price’s full lips are consuming yours, the hair of his beard rubbing over your cheeks and chin and keeping your nerves straining towards him.

The kiss doesn’t start out slow; it skips straight to hungry, fast and dirty, with Price’s big hands on your hip and the back of your neck, holding and guiding you. Overwhelming. 

Price’s big fucking body is leaning in, caging you against the couch. The wide shoulders and barrel-chested mass of him pressing you into the cushions is just short of breath-taking, but it’s not enough. You want to be right up against him, under his skin.

You swing your leg over Price’s, and climb up into his lap. His thighs are thick beneath you, wide and muscled, but you’re still hesitant to fully settle your weight against him. You just want to be closer, to feel the heat of him pressed against you, but the second you start moving Price grabs at your hips and pulls you down properly, uncaring of your weight.

“I’ve been–” You manage to say in between kisses, your words muffled and a little wet. “I’ve been working my ass off, for the squad, for you, and you never say or do anything–”

Price grunts, grappling with his sudden lapful of you. His eyes meet yours, and in them, you think you might see the spark of admiration, for your brave stupidity if nothing else. 

“Sh, I know,” He says as he grips at your hips under your oversized jumper, encouraging you to settle down your full weight on his thighs. “I know, love, you’ve been working so hard. What would I do without you, huh?”

And the thing is, you’re a very capable woman. You’ve had to be, in order to survive in your line of work. You know that you’re capable, you know that you do good work, you know that you help keep the wheels greased and everything moving behind the scenes for the 141, but even still, Price’s praise sinks into you like warm honey.

“Watching you walk around in those tight little skirts, Christ.” He hums, and his big palms land on your ass and squeeze there suggestively. “And those heels– completely impractical for a military base like this.”

You wheeze a laugh, clutching at his shoulders. It feels completely surreal that you’re currently perched in your Captain’s lap, with his big shovel-like hands groping your bum as he nips at your lips and confesses that he’s been watching you. It goes straight to your head, makes you dizzy, makes you wish wildly that you had worn one of those skirts for him today.

Oh, you could get used to this. Realistically you know the size difference between you two isn’t that immense, but Price is built like a man whose reality is all war, and when he shifts beneath you his muscles roll, unwittingly showing off his physique. You think you could stay here forever, feeling safe in a big man’s lap, cushioned by his body as he tells you that you’re valuable, and important.

“Fuckin’ hell,” Price groans, nipping at your lower lip before capturing your mouth wholly again. “You’re a handful.”

You’d love to argue that – you like to think that you’re perfectly measured and sensible, after all – but you’re already squirming in his lap, your legs spread wide over his thighs. Arousal pools in your stomach, makes you slick your knickers, and you can’t stop the slow grind your hips trace against his thigh.

Price’s breath shudders out of his chest, and his hands clench tight around your hips. “Hang on a sec,” He breathes, “Hold on. I’m still– I’m still your Captain–”

You think that it’s meant to be a warning, or at least a word of caution about the precarious situation you’re in regarding professionalism and inappropriate workplace relationships. What you’re doing right now is ridiculous, after all. You’re still on base, you’re in your office, and if the two of you get caught you don’t even want to think about the consequences. The fraternisation rule shouldn’t apply here, since you’re only considered part of the team by a mere technicality, but even in your lust-hazed mind you can still recognise that sitting on his lap and kissing like this at your workplace is wildly inappropriate.

But if it is a warning, it doesn’t work. The reminder of his authority only inflames you further, and a quiet whimper is torn from your throat when you rock against his lap.

He swears, and beneath you his cock stirs in his fatigues. You can feel the way it fills out where it’s pressed against the seam of your trousers, right between your legs. You reflexively squish your thighs together, tightening them around his hips.

“Christ,” He grits out like a curse. “Alright, then.”

He moves quickly, his hands secure on your back as he lunges forward, flipping you over so that you’re laying on your back on the shoddy, worn-down couch. You go so easily – 

you’re soft now, pliable and eager to please, and he could direct you anywhere he wanted.

He’s too large to be climbing on top of you on a couch like this, but somehow it doesn’t even matter. Now that he’s above you, holding himself up with those strong arms on either side of your head, he looks down on you with an expression that you don’t know what to make of. His eyes are still intense, but the lines around them are softened as he stares down, his gaze tracing your face. 

“You think I haven’t been looking?” He asks, and his voice isn’t as harsh or gritty as you’d been expecting. It’s softer now, fond, almost. “How could I fuckin’ miss you? Always so pretty, always workin’ so hard. ‘Course I noticed.”

When his fingers creep beneath your big purple jumper, you launch into helping him remove it, eagerly stripping it off so you’re laying in your bra. It’s one of your simple utilitarian ones, and you curse yourself for not wearing a sexier one.

But Price groans at the sight of your simple white cotton as though it’s premium lace. His palms are rough as they trace up your sides, the callouses on his fingers coarse against the soft squishy flesh of your belly. He leans forward and nuzzles at your ear, kissing behind your lobe before scraping his teeth along your jaw until he’s kissing messily at your mouth all over again.

“So gorgeous.” He says, his voice a low rumble that has your nerves buzzing. “I was too mean to you before, wasn’t I? Too harsh, when all you were trying to do was help.”

“Yes.” You whisper, though you feel a little bit petulant for it.

“Let me make up for it, darling,” He whispers back, and it sounds like a plea. “Hm? I’ll show you how good you’ve been.”

You’re nodding before he even finishes, desperate. God, yes. You’re not even sure what it is that he’s offering, but you know that you’ll take anything that he has to give you.

He’s looming over you, so large, as his hands fall to the closure on your work trousers. His fingers are so thick that he fumbles with the delicate button and little zip, and it takes him a couple of tries to pull it open and down. When he’s got it, he shucks your trousers off easily and tosses them aside, then stares down at you in your ugly shapeless underwear as though you’re wearing something else entirely.

Even though you’re laying unclothed and vulnerable, squirming and wanting, Price is so slow to get moving. He doesn’t grab at you, or grope greedily, or take impatiently. He acts as though he’s got all the time in the world, leisurely looking you over as though he’s committing you to memory.

“Need you to say it,” He says, strained like he’s trying to hold himself back. “Need you to say it out loud.”

“Want you to show me how good I’ve been.” You say immediately, your desire leaving no room for shame. “Want you to look after me.”

The request comes out a little bit plaintive, and Price sighs out before ducking his head and kissing you again. He’s so much more affectionate than you had ever imagined, and you feel as though you’re drowning in it. His attention is like a warm blanket, settling every craving you’ve ever had.

“I will,” He breathes like it’s a promise. “Oh, I will.”

His palms are rough and hot as they drag over your skin, deceptively gentle as he reaches your tits and pushes your bra up so that he can knead at the soft flesh there. He doesn’t even bother to unclasp it, impatient enough that shoving the cups up so to free your breasts is enough for him. 

He bends his head down, and licks a stripe over your nipple. His tongue feels scorching against you, like you’re hypersensitive to his touch, and he groans against your skin as though he’s tasting something incredible.

You writhe, hips arching up in search of some kind of friction, but Price doesn’t give it to you. He’s too distracted, peppering dozens of kisses over your tits as though they’re something precious even as his hands coast down your back to grope at your ass again where your plain cotton underwear is riding up.

“So pretty, ain’tcha?” He groans against your chest. “Fuck, even when you were walkin’ around with a face on you like a slapped arse, I thought you were the sweetest fuckin’ thing I’d ever seen.”

“Charming.” You snap, but there’s no anger in your tone anymore. In fact, you don’t think there’s a lick of anger anywhere in your whole body anymore, like Price’s hands and mouth on you have washed it all away.

All the brattiness, and the prickliness of your bad mood, is entirely forgotten now that you’re laid out and squirming beneath him. You can hardly even remember what you had been so stressed and angry with him for.

He finally reaches around to unclasp your bra, then tosses it to the side to let it slump sadly to the floor. His next target is your underwear, pulled from you roughly enough that you think the fabric might tear even as his hands cradle the plush flesh of your ass like it’s a treasure.

“Mm, so gorgeous, princess,” It seems like the name just slips out of his mouth, and you feel your whole body draw tense and hot. “So lovely, and I bet you taste even better than you look… like sugar, my sweet girl.”

Jesus Christ. You think your whole fucking body throbs, blood pounding and nerves straining as you wish so desperately for him to touch you. You can’t handle him talking to you like that, so fondly, as if you haven’t just acted like the biggest brat in the world for several days straight.

You can hardly even reconcile this man with the usual stern, gruff man that acts as your Captain, and you let out a choked whine of bewilderment as he slides down your body.

Your thighs are clamped together, shy under his gaze despite how desperately eager you are. You want this, you want him, but you can’t help but feel so mortified by the vulnerability of being nude beneath him on the couch while his big formidable body is still entirely clothed.

Price’s fingers stroke against your hip, his tone low and rich as his lips find your throat again. You can feel his tongue darting out against your skin, his hunger so palpable now that it’s infectious.

“Let daddy see you,” He croaks against the hollow of your throat. “Spread your legs, sweetheart.”

It’s not like you could ever say no to that. The request sends liquid heat shooting straight to your cunt, making you hot and sticky. You spread your thighs, and feel embarrassment flare when there’s a squelch as your cunt unsticks. And– Jesus, Price’s eyes fucking light up, and you realise that he’s clocked your reaction to his honeyed words, the way he calls himself daddy.

The kiss he gives you is claiming and hungry, consuming your lips with a fervour that leaves no room for doubt about his intentions. It’s a taste of both command and reverence — in equal measure. When he pulls away from your mouth you’re breathless, still gasping softly even as he pushes himself down the length of your body.

In the blink of an eye, he’s there — between your welcoming thighs, his hands resting securely on your soft hips, as much a lifeline as a promise of what’s to come. Your pussy is already sloppy, slick and wet in anticipation of him. He shoves his head between your thighs, using his thumbs to spread apart your folds and just look at you.

Your back arches at even the suggestion of his touch, feeling his breath ghost over the heated slick flesh of your cunt. Despite your obvious willingness, and his apparent eagerness, he doesn’t immediately touch you.

You crane your neck to see that he’s staring at your pussy as though the sight of it is earth-shattering. His gaze drinks you in, heated blue eyes taking in the sight of your swollen sticky folds, no doubt throbbing invitingly under his attention. You’ve never seen a man look so hungry, like he’s about to risk anything for it. A dark, groaned "fuck" escapes him as he kneels between your spread legs, head bowed as if in reverence.

"Daddy needs a taste, sweet girl," His deep voice a heavy rumble, vibrating against your soft inner thighs. 

It takes a beat for you to realise that he’s holding himself back, that he’s essentially asking for permission to lay his mouth on you, but then you gasp, “Yes, fuck, yes, please–”

Price takes it as the enthusiastic invitation that it is and bursts into movement immediately, reaching out and guiding your legs wider so that he can muscle in between them properly, before leaning in and finally getting his mouth on you.

You choke, hips aching as you try to spread your legs even further. Price drags the flat of his tongue along the seam of your cunt, groaning as though he’s savouring the taste of you, before wrapping his arms around your thighs to keep you all spread open for him as his tongue rasps over your sensitive flesh.

You want to call out for him, but his name stalls on your tongue. What would you call him – Price? John? Captain? Daddy? You think you would die if you said it out loud.

Then his tongue finds your clit, and your thoughts scatter. He flicks the tip of his tongue over you, back and forth, then flattens it to grind eagerly. You had thought, given the way he had taken that moment just to look at you before he’d pressed his mouth to you, that he would start slow. But instead, he gives you everything he has.

You cry out as he devours your cunt, his bushy eyebrows pulling up in delight as you give him your first moan. While your legs had spread wide in the beginning, eager to let him in, you now close them tight around his head to keep him in place. You have a brief, hazy thought that maybe this is an asshole move of you, a little like if a man were to hold your head down while you were sucking cock, but Price doesn’t seem to mind. If anything, judging by the snarl he lets out when your thighs close around his ears, he likes it.

You toss your head back against the worn couch cushions as jolts of white-hot heat spread from where his mouth is working at you, playing with you, tongue painting long, broad strokes up and down your pussy. 

Your cunt is syrupy hot, throbbing as his tongue rubs relentlessly at your clit. You’re so fucking wet, and you can’t help yourself from rolling your hips more assertively into his mouth. You’re leaking on his mouth, his tongue, your slick drenching his cheeks and his beard.

Seized by a sudden urge to watch, you clumsily raise your head so you can look down. It feels entirely illicit, watching Price’s head between your legs as he buries his face so enthusiastically into your folds. His eyes flash as he glances up, the bottom half of his face hidden entirely in your pussy as his jaw works, the soft hair of his beard tickling your sensitive inner thighs.

With a jolt, you realise that one of his hands has fallen to his lap, his trousers hastily pushed open. He’s fisting at his dripping cock, red and angry and still begging for release against the thick dark hair of his stomach. Sticky pre-cum leaks from his flushed head, pooling into his skin and clothes as his cock bobs and twitches at the sounds of your moans.

The sudden realisation that Price is getting off on this, on the taste of you and the smell of you and the way you’re whining, sets you aflame. He grunts, one of his big hand’s wrapping around his throbbing skin to pump his length to the rhythm of his tongue inside of you.

“Oh, oh fuck,” You press your lips together, stomach pulling tight as his tongue thrusts up inside of you, “Fuck, fuck, fuck that’s so good, oh god, Captain–”

“Yeah,” Price grunts, his words all wetly muffled, his arms wrapped tight around your thighs to keep you in place as he feasts on you, sucking on your clit like it’s a sweet. “I know, baby, I know.”

He’s so accommodating, so nice to you. You tilt your hips up and grind your cunt into his mouth, sighing in satisfaction as his tongue drags along your clit before dipping to lick inside of you. He barely even shifts when you hump your pussy into his face; he only opens his mouth wider, licks at you more enthusiastically as though your desperation is contagious. 

Your belly goes hot and tight, and a high-pitched whimper is torn from your throat. It feels as though you’ve been strung high and taut for months now, and your breath catches at your imminent orgasm. You’ve just been so stressed, and having Price hunched over you on the couch like this with your legs thrown up around his shoulders as he licks and sucks at you so eagerly that it has your eyes rolling in your head feels like it’s curing you.

You think, somewhat madly, that an orgasm like this, with Price’s mouth sealed over your cunt, will solve every damn problem you have right now.

“Wanna come, wanna come, Jesus fucking Christ, please please–” Your chest heaves as you scramble, one of your hands reaching down to cup Price’s head to keep him in place, face buried in your cunt. “Oh god, please make me come–”

Maybe it’s not fair to be so demanding of him, but to his credit Price responds with restless enthusiasm. You double over in pleasure as he heeds your broken little pleas, your nails scraping into the couch as you cling on for dear life. His tongue swirls over your clit quickly and with fervour, tight circles to make your vision go blurry.

You’re lost in the sensation of his hot, wet mouth in your cunt, the way he licks into you like a starving man tasting his first meal. It feels like a sensation overload, as though you’re just completely lost to your own desire, but you just want more of what he is offering. 

You grab his hair again and pull him closer, greedy with need, and he hums in affirmation as he allows you to guide his mouth to exactly where you need it. Arching your hips up, you grind into his mouth, chasing your orgasm. You groan, eyelids fluttering as you wrap your other leg around Price’s shoulders, up around his neck, and his hand snakes around your thigh to anchor you there.

Price’s fingers are gripping at your hips, surely hard enough to leave bruises there. You smile, almost deliriously; you could live with some souvenirs from tonight.

Your feeble gasps start to spiral into whimpers as that hot coil begins to tighten in your belly, and your toes start to curl. When your climax finally hits, it does so with a sense of relief that almost knocks you flat. Your body winds tight then releases, and you convulse in a wave of shudders that has you sobbing out loud.

Your chest heaves as you sob, squirming as Price licks at your clit insistently. It feels like your breath has caught in your chest, your toes curling so hard that your feet cramp. You’re panting like a damn dog as your orgasm rocks through you, until the waves of it subside and you can finally get a full breath again.

From one second to the next your nerves turn red-hot and oversensitive, and you clamp your thighs shut around Price’s ears and whimper-whine pathetically. Mercifully, he gets your unspoken message easily, and finally pulls back, chuckling breathlessly to himself as he pushes your legs apart in order to retreat.

“Fuck,” He says, and his voice comes out as harsh and gravelly as you’ve ever heard it. “Jesus Christ. Knew you’d taste sweet, knew that you’d come so pretty.”

The praise practically slams into you, ripping through you like a forest fire. It feels like you’ve lost your breath all over again, and ridiculously you suddenly feel shy. 

“I–That–” You start to say, but you still feel a little fuzzy-headed from your orgasm and your thoughts fizz away like TV static. 

“Mhm, I know, sweet girl.” He murmurs hoarsely as though you had said something coherent. 

When Price finally sits up, you blink hazily. He had been all hunched over you, crammed into the corner of the couch in order to squeeze himself between your thighs like that, but now that he’s straightening back up again you’re reminded with a tired jolt just how big and broad and strong he is.

A small, self-conscious part of your brain screams at you to close your legs. Your thighs are still spread wide, your cunt on display; you’re still all sloppy and wet, spit-slick and dripping, all puffy from the attention Price had lavished on you with his mouth.

But instead of closing your legs, you let your thighs fall open a little wider and shift restlessly under his intense gaze. Your desire makes you stupid – how could you ever experience anything as mundane as self-consciousness when he’s staring at you like that? He’s looking at you like he wants to fall atop you all over again, and you feel yourself throb – you feel so empty, your body craving something to fill you.

And Price notices the way you keep yourself all spread for him, the way you don’t make any move to cover yourself. Beneath his beard, his face splits into a wide smile, the apples of his cheeks practically glowing with pride.

“Oh, my girl, you're so pretty. Just the loveliest girl in the world with your beautiful face and your hair all wild like that.” He leans in then, and presses a hungry  kiss to your mouth. He tastes salty-sweet, the iron tang of yourself lingering on his lips. His beard is wet too, practically soaked through.

You gasp when he pulls back, overwhelmed by the kiss and the praise and the electric aftershocks of your orgasm. “Your beard is wet.” You observe dumbly.

He chuckles, as though you’ve said something terribly endearing. “Of course it is, sweetheart. That’s all you.”

You mumble a little incoherently, mostly because you’ve just spotted the way his trousers are still unbuttoned and his hard, swollen cock is jutting out from the band of his boxers. It’s angry looking, the head of it so red it looks a little painful, and you feel a sudden urge to return the favour seize you.

But when you reach out, Price is quick to grab your wrist. He transfers his grip to your hand swiftly so you don’t feel as though you’re being held down, his wide palm and thick fingers winding around yours.

“Don’t have to do that, love.” He grunts, shifting. He’s looming over you, hips tilted towards you and his wide shoulders blocking out your view of the office. “D’you think you could take me?”

It takes you a moment for your slow, stupid brain to catch up and process what he’s asking you. Then you nod swiftly, eyes widening. You're wet and sticky and so so empty, and you have no doubt your body is so ready to take him inside. 

You’re still a little limp and drained from the satisfaction of your orgasm, but you keep your thighs spread and wait eagerly for him to touch you again. He doesn’t keep you waiting long; he coos softly at you as he adjusts himself, kissing your tummy then up your sternum and back to your throat. The soft, sweet kisses distract you as he presses his hips between your thighs.

You gasp softly, your clit sensitive enough that when his cock rubs against it, you jolt. Despite the overload of sensation, you find yourself grinding back against him, so desperate for something. As if he can sense what you need, he presses a kiss to your jaw and dips a hand between your thighs. Two thick, calloused fingers circle your clit for a moment and make you whimper, only to dip lower and press inside you.

His fingers are larger than yours, but they still slip into you so damn easily that it’s embarrassing. You barely even feel a stretch, your body so eager for him that your cunt practically sucks his fingers up.

The worst part is the way Price laughs, all soft and breathy as he rubs his callous-roughened fingers into the spongey walls of your cunt. 

“Oh, fuck,” He murmurs, his lips dragging over your overheated skin. “Yeah, you’ll take me just fine.”

You burn with embarrassment, but you still don’t close your legs. It’s silly, but there’s still an element of pride as his fingers rub against the soft inside of your pussy; you want him to see how much you want him, how well you’ll take him. It’s obvious how wet you are, and you hope he’s imagining how good you’ll feel on the inside.

“Need you to turn over for me, love.” He murmurs, gripping at your hips and easing you over so that you’re on your belly beneath him. “That’s it, arse up. My knees aren’t what they used to be. Make it easy for me.”

You usually would make a joke about that, some sort of jab about being old before his time, but you simply don’t have the mental capacity for it. You’re too busy dropping to rest your weight on your elbows as you stick your ass up towards him, arching your back and hoping you look pretty.

He doesn’t waste any more time, much to your relief. Your mouth drops open with a sigh as you feel the blunt head of his cock glide between your slick folds, tapping once against your clit just to watch the way your legs jerk, then finally lining up with your entrance and pressing lightly in. His cock notches, catches, then slides in so slowly that it makes you want to scream.

“Gotta let me in, petal.” He says, using his grip on your hips to pull you back onto his cock in increments. “Relax, relax.”

You had wanted this, you’re more eager than you think you’ve ever been for anyone in your life, and yet Price is a big man and the stretch makes your breath stall in your lungs. Your cunt is sucking his cock in further with a hunger that’s almost embarrassing, even as you wince a little at the feeling of being stretched out to your limits. Though you’re wet and eager and ready, two of Price’s fingers briefly testing inside weren’t quite enough to prepare you for how fat his cock is. 

Your head is spinning. You’ve never taken a cock this big with so little stretching, but neither you nor Price are patient enough to wait. But the stretch feels good, and you find yourself wheezing like a moron as he presses inside inch by inch.

“Fuck… you alright, love?” Price breathes, adjusting his knees on the couch behind you and wrapping his hands around your hips. The motion only succeeds in shifting him far enough away to make you aware of the feeling of him sliding into you again. You both groan, and you feel Price twitch, deep inside you.

“Fuck,” You moan, breath gasping out of you. “You’re fucking huge.”

It feels like you’re learning for the very first time what it really means to be full. For a few seconds, it feels like you can’t even breathe. It feels like his cock is lodged somewhere in your belly, forcing the breath from your lungs as he nestles his way deeper into the eager clutch of your body.

“Am I– s’it too much, honey?” He asks, his voice rough and low as his hands squeeze at the flesh at your hips. “Need me to take it out?”

“No!” You blurt, and your body clenches up hard as though you’re trying to lock him in and keep him from escaping. “Don’t you dare!”

His cock still feels so big, and when you tighten up as hard as you do it almost feels as though he’s fucking impaling you. Price groans as though he’s been shot, and his head lowers so that he’s burying his face into the space between your shoulderblades. His body lowers too until his chest is pressed to your back, joined at the hips as he rocks inside of you. 

“Okay,” He grunts, and you can feel his chest expand as he takes a breath. “Okay, love, but you need to relax. You’re going to squeeze my cock right off.”

“Sorry.” You try to do as he asks, taking a deep breath and allowing your body to go limp and pliant. He grunts in appreciation, and you feel his whiskery beard rasp against your throat as he presses a kiss to your neck as if to reward you.

Your spine is still taut from the pressure of being all stretched out around his cock, and you reach back clumsily to grasp at his belly, the soft fabric of his shirt rucking up between your fingers. Price reaches back and grabs at the neck of his own shirt, tearing it over his head then tossing it aside. Your eyes are all hazy and a little blurred from your overwhelmed tears, but you look back over your shoulder and blink frantically in an attempt to get a proper look at him. 

God, he’s so big and strong, his chest furred with a layer of brown hair curling in whorls over his nipples and down over his belly. You feel yourself pulse in response, your mouth dropping open in a thoughtless gasp of desire. He’s exactly the kind of man you think of when you think of masculinity, and your belly tightens in anticipation when he presses all up against you, heavy and hot.

When he begins to pull out and press back in, the noise you make is utterly pathetic. It feels like he cleaving you in two, carving out a space for his cock every time he fucks back into you. He’s cautious at first, conscious of hurting you, but when your thighs close around his hips he grunts and begins to pick his pace up.

“Christ, you’re tight,” Price says, his voice all rough and muffled against your shoulder. “And you're all mine, love, my own sweet girl, ain’t that right? And daddy's gonna love you so good, isn’t he?”

“Yes,” You gasp stupidly, pressing your face into the couch cushions.

Typically, you find that doggy style can be a position that’s a little detached – usually, you like seeing the face of the person you’re fucking. But right now, with Price plastering his whole hairy body against your back as he ruts into you and the sweet filthy words he’s murmuring to you, this position feels so far from detached that it has your head spinning. It feels like he’s blanketing you, the heat from his skin igniting what feels like an inferno between the two of you. Sweat beads at your forehead, and you moan softly as Price begins to fuck you properly.

You’re bouncing against the couch, clutching at the cushions as your body moves under the weight of Price’s powerful thrusts. The sound of it is sloppy and wet, your bodies smacking together quick and hard. And fuck, it feels good. His cock is hitting that perfect spot deep inside of you, and your entire body jolts with pleasure every time he pounds back in. 

It’s enough to make you squeal, your nails scrabbling desperately for purchase on the threadbare couch cushions in an attempt to stabilise yourself. Your nipples are sensitive from Price’s licking at sucking at them, and your toes curl as your tits are pressed into the rough-textured cushions, electrifying your nerves to the point of almost too-much. 

The noises you make are entirely undignified, and you struggle to muffle them into the couch. Little burbling ah ah ah’s are being torn from your throat every time Price fucks into you, the sensation of his furred balls slapping against you with every thrust has your eyes rolling.

Your body is all loose and pliant from your earlier orgasm, and you whimper as though you’re being fucked absolutely stupid. It’s not that he’s fucking you all that hard, but he’s filling you up so deliciously and knowing that it’s him, your Captain, the man that you’ve worked so damn hard to impress and to please, makes you feel like you’re going to explode. Even through the haze of desire and pleasure, a little part of you is still so aware of making him happy. You keep your back arched, practically waving your ass up in the air as he fucks into you.

“Tell me how you like it, sweetheart. Tell me how it feels.” Price says in a low, rough purr. His chest is still pressed to your back even as the two of you pant and sweat as you rock together. “Tell daddy how good he's making you feel.”

Jesus Christ, Price feels like a fucking furnace against you. It feels almost as though you’ve been glued together, your skin sweat slick as he ruts into you like an animal. Your lungs are burning, and your mind is completely scattered. Getting fucked like this feels feels primal, an exchange of power through pleasure; you’re aware that he’s asked you a question, but you can hardly string two thoughts together. All you can do is squirm and whimper in below him as his weight pins you in place.

“Good,” You groan, vaguely aware that tears are leaking from your eyes and soaking the couch beneath you. Your vision is blurred, and you can’t even see straight. “I just– it’s so much–”

“I know,” He rumbles. “But you can take it, can’t you? You’ve been so good, sweetheart.”

The praise does exactly what he’s hoping for; you practically melt into a puddle beneath him. Your thoughts are slow and sluggish, and your jaw hangs open as you fucking drool. Even still, you manage to nod your head clumsily. You can take him – it feels like a point of pride to prove it now, to show off how good you can be.

Price’s rhythm is practically machine-like, and you make a quiet sound of pure appreciation when his cock slams into that gummy spot inside of you that makes you lose your breath. It’s as though he takes note of it, because from that point on he stays absolutely jackhammering into that little spot, making you see stars and have to bite your lip to stifle your moans. His balls would slam against your clit in a repeated motion that made your underbelly tighten like a coil so close to snapping.

He groans every time he sinks into you, his growls rumbling into your back and ratcheting up the intensity another notch. You feel lost in a sea of sensation, moored only by the places of contact between you and Price. Your hips are humping back against Price’s cock unconsciously, unable to help yourself and unable to get enough of him.

“I wanna come again,” You say, and it comes out in a demanding sort of whine. It’s a little humbling to hear yourself and realise that you sound so honest to god bratty, but you can’t bring yourself to care when Price is apparently in such a giving mood today. 

“You’re gonna come, love.” He promises. His voice has that tone to it, the one you’ve always tried to ignore during work because it makes you so horny. The authoritative one, when it drops just a bit in pitch, when it sounds just a little like a threat.

But despite his promise, he doesn’t change his steady pace. You’re just this side of overwhelmed, but you still need more to push you over the edge into the second orgasm that’s simmering in your lower stomach. 

“Please, daddy,” You let the name pass your lips on a whimper, finally giving in and calling him by the title he’s so clearly craving. He’s fucked all the shame out of your body at this point, leaving you with nothing but white hot desperation. “Please, please make me come again–”

“Fuckin’ Christ–”

Price’s arm reaches around your front, and you’re startled when his big palm wraps around your throat. You think for a moment that you’re about to get choked, but no pressure follows. He just grips you there, gentle and secure, before using his hold on you to pull you back against him so that he’s rutting up into you at a speed that’s overwhelming in the best way. His other arm reaches around your belly so that he can rub at your clit as he rails you into the couch. His soft grip on your throat ensures that no matter how much you try to squirm your way back into meeting his thrusts, you’re forced into stillness. 

It’s exactly what you wanted, and it has you wheezing and hiccuping out moans on every stroke. It’s better than you ever could have hoped for, and you’re nearly sobbing from the sheer sensation of it all. You feel your abdomen drawing tight, heat beginning to build rapidly in the bottom of your belly as he strokes at your clit hard and fast at a pace that matches his fucking.

You know that you’re already starting to shake, trembling from head to toe. You can’t even keep your back arched anymore, though you don’t think Price gives a shit because he just nuzzles at the base of your shoulder as he fucks into you. Between his cock and his fingers, everything just feels too much but your body is strung taut as you proverbially climb higher and higher.

“Oh god, I’m– yes, yes, yes–” You chant, your voice high and reedy and so damn needy.

Then the world falls out from under you. With one last whimpering moan, your body convulses beneath the heavy weight of your captain’s big body. Your vision practically wipes out, and you squeeze down around Price’s dick and pulse. Your whole body rocks with the flood of pleasure, the warm fuzzy feeling that makes you feel as though you’re losing your mind. You know that your hips are twitching madly, simultaneously trying to get more and less as you get overwhelmed by the feeling of him fucking you through it all.

You’re still coming down from the sweet release of your orgasm when Price practically tears himself away from you, leaving you cruelly empty and clenching around nothing. You let out a sharp sound of loss, startled that he’s pulled away so suddenly, and you find yourself slumping bonelessly against the couch now that his hands are no longer supporting you.

The wet shlurping sounds from behind you prompt you to glance lazily over your shoulder from where your face is smushed against the cushions, and you’re blessed with the sight of Price tugging his cock furiously behind you. His cheeks are bright red as he stares at the mess he’s made of you, his jaw soft and his mouth open as he pants.

He sees you looking, and whatever expression is on your face seems to be his undoing. He takes in your tear-clumped eyelashes and your dazed expression, and you can practically see the moment he hurtles over the edge. He practically snarls, his nose scrunching in a way that’s unexpectedly adorable right as his cock gives one fat pump of thick white come, then several smaller sputterings that collect in a creamy puddle right at the base of your spine, just over the swell of your ass.

You sigh, your eyelids fluttering lazily shut as you relish the feeling of his hot come hitting your skin. You still can’t manage to pull yourself together, feeling loose and floaty like you’re on another fucking planet entirely. You’re only distantly aware of his big palm rubbing gentle circles on the small of his back; you think for a second that he’s just trying to soothe you, until your fucked out brain catches up and you realise that he’s rubbing his come into you like it’s goddamn lotion. Your cunt gives a tired throb at the realisation, fluttering as though it’s sad that he didn’t come inside.

“Fuck…” You hear him rumble from behind you, then a hot heavy weight settling over you yet again. This time, he pulls you back into his arms to hold you tight against his chest. 

You go perfectly limp, curling into him and nuzzling into his sweaty hairy chest. Despite yourself, you’re reminded of cuddling with a massive teddy bear. All you can do is hum, basking in the affection and hardly able to think at this point after he’s turned your brain into a slurry of feelings without thoughts.

“You okay, love?” Price asks. You can feel his nose nuzzling against your temple, though you can’t quite summon the energy to open your eyes again. “Did I go too hard on you?”

Your legs are still shaky, your hamstrings aching and your back throbbing a little from the pounding you’ve just taken. But Price is being so lovely and soft, so gentle with you right now. His hands coast over your hips, your back, your waist, squeezing a little bit just because he seems to like the way you feel in his hands.

“Shhh,” You drawl shakily. “Don’t make me think right now.”

A low chuckle, and you feel his broad chest rumble with it where your head is laying atop him. His fingers run up the length of your spine, the touch making you shiver. He touches you like you’re delicate, a stark contrast to the way he’d just fucked you into your sad little office couch. It makes something in your belly squirm.

“Alright. My girl just needed to switch off for a while, hm?” He murmurs, and you can hear the clear undertone of amusement in his voice. “How are you going to finish out work today if you’re all sleepy like this, huh?”

That wakes you up a little, and you finally blink your eyes open again in order to look up at him. An edge of panic is beginning to creep in as awareness comes back to you, and you take a deep breath as your hands curl against his chest.

“Oh my god.” You blurt, eyes growing wide. “I– we’re at work!”

“Sharp as ever, darling.”

Not even Price’s lazy wryness can distract you now. You try to wiggle off the couch, already craning your head around in search of your clothes, but Price’s thick arm locks tight around your middle and keeps you pressed to him.

“We have to– oh my god, we have to get dressed, what if someone walks in–”

“Shh, shhh, I locked the door when I came in,” Price grumbles. He doesn’t appear too impressed with the way you’re attempting to wiggle away, but it doesn’t matter so much; even with one arm he’s perfectly capable of keeping you pinned in place against his chest. “Lie back down, love.”

Slowly, you let yourself relax back into him. It’s hard to hold onto your panic when he’s so obviously unbothered, so you end up hesitantly snuggling back up against his chest as his arms come up to close around you. Despite his encouragement, you’re unsure whether or not you’re allowed to be touching him like this. But his hands don’t stray from you, not even once, and gradually you return to your previous state of being a puddle of limbs and pliant muscle.

“That’s it, relax.” He coaxes, clearly pleased now that you’re melting back into him. 

“I have so much work to catch up on.” You grumble, though you have no intention of actually going anywhere now that he’s given you the greenlight to stay like this.

His chest vibrates beneath your cheek, and you realise he’s chuckling again. It feels good, and you sigh softly as your fingers stroke lightly over the defined shape of his soft pecs.

“You think I wasn’t capable of keeping the ship afloat for the couple of days you were gone?” He asks, one hand stroking over your flank then dipping lower to flatten his palm over your left asscheek. “I finished out those little files you were stressin’ over. No picture of Ghost for his, but like I said, that’s standard.”

You had known that he had finished updating the files for you when you had seen Farah’s, but hearing it straight from his mouth is something else entirely. You purse your lips and lower your eyes, still embarrassed about your little freak out despite his apologies. 

“Thank you.” You mumble. 

You try to hide your face in his chest again, but a large hand on your jaw stops you by tilting your head back and forcing you to look at him. A thumb strokes over your cheek, and then he’s leaning in and pressing a sweet kiss to your mouth. You respond tiredly but eagerly, still hardly able to believe that your boss that you’ve been mooning after for months is being so affectionate and intimate with you.

Price pulls back slightly so that your lips are just barely touching, breathing each other’s air for a moment.

“Ask for help when you need it, sweetheart.” He murmurs, his lips dragging over yours. “That’s what I’m here for. We help each other with the workload, alright?”

“Yeah,” You breathe, leaning in eagerly in the hopes of getting another kiss. “Alright.”

Price smiles, his cheeks going all full and round as his eyes crinkle, and you feel your heart throb so violently it feels as though it jumps right up into your throat. He leans in and kisses you again, soft and sweet as his beard rasps against your chin.

You want to stay like this forever, wrapped up so warm and cosy and safe in his arms. He makes you feel so safe, like you’re valued and appreciated, and you can’t even feel bad about being lazy because he so clearly doesn’t want to move either.

“Let me come home with you tonight,” He says suddenly, and you feel his bicep contract as he squeezes you closer. “You have an apartment off base, don’t you? I’ll… why don’t I cook you dinner, hm? Want to show you how much I appreciate all the work you do.”

There’s a pause, then he adds cautiously, “If I’m not being presumptuous, that is.”

You can’t stop the shy smile from overtaking your face. He’s so sweet, and being on the receiving end of this kind of attention from him is more than you ever could have expected. Ridiculously, he seems a little nervous as well, and you come to the slow realisation that he had been vulnerable with you as well when it came to his interests when he had fucked you.

“I thought this was you appreciating the work I do.” You say coyly, glancing pointedly at all of your bare skin pressed up against his.

“Mm. You do a lot of work, and I’m very appreciative.” Price murmurs, squeezing teasingly at your ass.

You giggle despite yourself, relishing the light-hearted air between the two of you. At the sound of your laugh, Price’s expression brightens further; it’s strange, seeing your usually stern, stressed captain being so sweet with you. You’re so used to seeing him with that flinty determined look in his eyes, or barking orders, or with his eyes sagging with exhaustion after a long deployment only to return to a pile of mission reports. Seeing him like this, with those soft eyes and a fond smile, makes your heart feel as though it’s beating out of rhythm.

“I said I’d look after you, sweetheart.” He murmurs, and this time his voice is missing that teasing undertone from before. He sounds so earnest now, almost painfully so. “You just need to let me.”

Yeah, you think to yourself as you let yourself succumb to the drowsy haze that’s been tugging at you, allowing your eyes to slide shut as you nuzzle into Price’s bare chest. You think letting John Price look after you might just be the easiest thing you’ve ever done.

[darcytaylor]

I have a bit of a unique perspective on Luke if anyone's interested. I think he's one of those people who adapt to any environment they're in, which is great if you're an actor, but in your personal life you can just drift, going along with whatever the stronger personalities in your life are doing.

If anyone has observed male friendships closely, they might notice that they're very different from female ones - they're more surface level and more focused on not disrupting the status quo in the group. Where women will cheer each other on when one succeeds, men will unspokenly hold each other back (I'm not saying there isn't jealousy or toxicity in female friendships, it's just that it rises to the surface and either gets addressed or explodes the friendship).

I witnessed this dynamic in particular at uni, where guys who were suddenly doing very well in their studies because they'd found their niche felt the need to conform to wherever their buddies were at, especially if it was an established, long-time friend group from childhood or school. They'd go home over the holidays and come back a different person, like it was shameful to do well at something, especially if the guy in question wasn't the "alpha" of the group. Many guys who had potential to do well in our more academic field but moved back home post-uni ended up taking jobs that were beneath their ability because that was what their friends were doing or what was considered "cool" where they were from (think bartending, club promoting, etc.). I think this is precisely what Luke is trying to navigate with respect to his own friend group and why we're all so confused by his behavior.

Now, he has referred multiple times to how important friends are to him, how some have been there for him during hard times and how he's generous with them. He has always been a good looking guy, while maybe not everyone's cup of tea, and his styling on the show in S1&2 wasn't doing him any favors if we're being honest, and it's undeniable that he underwent a major transformation for S3. All of a sudden, he got this veritable onslaught of female attention and thirst that I'm assuming he hadn't experienced the likes of before. And this coupled with the season's success changed his status within the group and in the world at large. This is where the tension starts. He's trying to adapt to his new reality while everyone around him is expecting him to stay the same, not act like he's "better than them" now, even though he might be. In this situation, he has two options - to hold himself back and default to the proverbial average of the 5 people closest to him, or do a balancing act of "a rising tide lifts all boats" type of deal by sharing the fruits of his success with the group. I think that being the loving guy he is, he's caught in this liminal space of trying to find his personal footing while doing "right" by everyone around him. These are choppy waters for anyone to navigate, especially as his friends are themselves experiencing ups and downs and the collective context is ever-changing.

Do I think him dating someone like A is a choice that he thinks someone in his newfound position would make? Yes. Do I think she's probably a very nice girl and they're having a good time together? Sure. Do I think she's on his level? No. Do I think she'll be old news if he (or she) gets slammed with work? Most likely. It's ultimately their respective availability that's holding that relationship together. Well, that and the light ego stroke of dating a woman who looks a certain way - it's how he's projecting his new "league" out into the world. But also, if they were indeed introduced by a friend, he might perceive her as "approved" by those around him and thus not disruptive of the delicate pH balance of the group. I don't know anything about his friends and who they are or aren't dating, but rest assured that if the most dominant among them were to hit a life milestone like getting engaged or married, the rest of them would follow suit in quick succession so as not to disrupt group cohesion or their collective lifestyle, regardless of whether the person they happen to be with at the time is "the one". I've seen this play out so many times that it's a bit of a cliche.

Conversely, if one of them starts dating someone, let's say, of "higher status", we'd probably see that reflected across the friend group as well. All this is to say, I don't think A is end game and he knows it too, he's been straining to acknowledge her so as not to lose her but at the same time, I think deep down he knows she's just Ms. Right Now so he's not leaning into this as hard as he was with J. I think he's still subconsciously shopping around for the future Mrs. Newton but he's a relationship kind of guy and he's trying to ride this one out for as long as it'll hold. I think that if a semi-famous woman at a similar level of recognition as him showed an interest in him, A would become old news fast, especially if he manages to mentally integrate the changes that have happened in this life over time. I think she's a buffer for his anxiety to a large extent, which is why he takes her with him everywhere. Once he settles into more of a groove, we might start seeing a more recognizable version of him.

Just my two cents.

This is very well thought out and while this is all speculation, all of it is plausible!

I don't even have much to say in response to this because I think your take speaks for itself!

[hadesoftheladies]

answering TRA, MRA, and feminist's arguments against separatism speedrun:

-"it's sex segregation"

segregation is organized by the oppressor, separatism is organized by the oppressed. hope this helps.

-"separatism is disconnected from reality"

bad faith take of the propositions of separatism. serious separatism is mainly focused on not participating in the delusion or perpetuation of patriarchy (that is male power and dominance) by divesting from relations that empower it (e.g. relationships with men, marriage, etc) since sex-based oppression is primarily relational. in the sense that it is men who benefit from relationships (sexual or emotional) with women, and women who are disadvantaged in relationships (sexually, emotionally and financially) with men. an ideal form of separatism is escaping to womyn's land, but it is not the only (or most popular) form of separatism. furthermore, patriarchy is not inevitable reality, it is made up bs imposed on us. it is a culture, a way of relating, that can and must be resisted.

think of it as drawing a boundary that excludes people who are prejudiced against you and take more than they are willing to give :)

-"separatism is for lesbians"

. . . the male­-defined concept of woman is one who is sexually for a man, one who is to be fucked by a man. This concept denies women an independent existence. Indeed, 'for a woman to be independent means she can’t be a woman – she must be a dyke'. . . Women cannot overcome their oppression if they cannot imagine surviving it, which is to say, if they cannot imagine themselves as other than men have defined them. -Kate M. Phalen

-"separatism is not intersectional"

you know what isn't intersectional? misogyny. do black women share racial oppression with black men? yeah. black men also share male privilege with white men which is why it hasn't stopped them from betraying black women in support of white male misogyny. same for every other demographic of men.

furthermore, there is little evidence that being with men benefits poor women. if anything, they live in more abuse, are more likely to face domestic violence and sexual assault, and are more likely to be femicide victims. the problem (men) cannot be the solution, regardless. (which is why the lucky ones are rescued by outsiders and taken to shelters, also usually women's only spaces). if women cannot do basic separatism, then they likely can't do any feminist activism (boycotting, petitioning, etc) for the same reasons, which means they are the kind that need rescuing by feminist activists in the first place. (and most of them go to rape or dv shelters, so separatism is still a solution).

also, you can be a separatist and still engage with men on a professional basis, that is, in the corporate sphere and in activism. you can still do other activism with men. you can march with them in the streets. the main concern is not to invest in male hegemony and to focus your energy on female community. (you can still do this if you have sons or are married to a man, even though the most effective mode of separatism is still not marrying or dating men.)

-"separatism is bad/individualist activism and bad for activism"

it would be bad activism for something like "men's rights" but it is absolutely integral to feminist activism. one, because it promotes consciousness-raising, a prerequisite to feminist thinking. most women only see their suffering as deliberate exploitation in women-only spaces. furthermore, most only ever feel free to talk about how this affects/bothers them in separatist circles.

two, because it energizes the community and genuinely empowers them to fight back. not only do women-only spaces inform women, they revitalize and radicalize women, mobilizing them to demand better. there is never going to be female liberation without the de-centering of men. so long as women regard men as default, inevitable, authoritative, they will default to them, their wishes and feelings. which is exactly what patriarchy says women are for. separatism is not only necessary to feminist activism, it empowers all other forms of activism.

-"separatism is a cult/encourages groupthink"

patriarchy is groupthink, lol. male supremacy is an ideology based on nothing but male pee-pee. secondly, separatism has no leaders. that's like saying marching is groupthink. it's group action. furthermore, it is community building. women need women's spaces to create female culture. female culture is needed to fight (mentally and physically) patriarchy. women's spaces are the only places where authentic female culture can develop. and no liberation movement has succeeded without a defined culture.

one of the most morally and intellectually courageous things a human can do is oppose male supremacy in every way they can.

feminism is radically anti status quo and exists in a world that is ideologically postured against it. we are born hearing the "other side." we grow up reading and breathing men's perspectives. if anyone is to more afflicted by bias, it has to be misogynists/anti-feminists.

-"separatists are hateful towards men"

men are hateful towards women by raping, beating, killing, humiliating, selling, abusing, torturing, starving and cheating women. when you walk down the street, do you fear separatists? or is our greatest sin against you simply annoying you?

[transmascpetewentz]

Moving The Goalposts: Infighting, Exorsexism, and Transandrophobia

I want to start this off not by getting directly into the meat of my theory, but instead by showing all of you a post that I came across today that illustrates exactly what I am talking about when I say that transandrophobes, and specifically TEHMs in this case, move the goalposts in a way that causes infighting within the trans(masc) community. This is a post by a pretty well-known TEHM whose blog I've been watching for a while.

What Jackson is doing here seems pretty obvious on the surface. He's making fun of nonbinary people who were AFAB because he perceives them as fakers and/or trenders. However, when you take a look at some of the other things that he believes, you realize that it just isn't that simple.

This is a post by one of Jackson's mutuals on here. If you don't know what some of these phrases mean, "trans heterosexual" refers to gay trans people (in this case, it's likely focusing on transmascs, but this rhetoric harms transfem lesbians too), and "trans homosexual" refers to straight trans people. What lavenderlad is trying to do is infantilize non-straight trans people, acting like we are complaining about nothing (maybe hysterical, even) for pointing out the oppression that we face from cishets and cis queers alike.

But it goes even deeper.

This right here is a very interesting post, specifically because lavenderlad seems to have changed his tune completely. As opposed to infantilizing us like in the previous post, he has now switched to transandrophobic conspiracy theories about how we are apparently some sort of dominant societal force despite being less than 2% of the population. My antisemitism radar is going off right now, too, because this sounds suspiciously like your average antisemite talking about Jews. He went very quickly from treating us like we're little girls who can't do anything to treating us like evil, scary men who are trying to invade his space.

He moved the goalposts because it was convenient for him at this moment to contribute to the oppression of gay trans men.

To elaborate, there's a specific type of transandrophobia seen in these circles that Jackson and lavenderlad are using. They are applying both maleness and femaleness to us. They infantilize us like we are women, and use our perceived femininity to justify gatekeeping us out of their spaces, while also using very common anti-gay male and generally anti-marginalized male stereotypes such as us being inherently aggressive, invaders, our bodies disgusting, etc. It's exorsexism, plain and simple.

And I feel like these posts show us how transandrophobes and transphobes in general can cause infighting within the trans community. A feminine nonbinary person might look at Jackson's first post and go "see! trans men have so much better than me!" but in fact, trans men, both binary and nonbinary, aren't actually treated any better. The grass is not greener. Trans men who try to conceal our birth sex and/or transness are considered liars, trying to invade spaces we don't belong, and more; but trans men and transmascs who do not try to pass, who don't try to conceal our transness, are accused of being "not really dysphoric."

Do not be fooled into thinking that transandrophobes would like you better if your gender expression was different. They don't want trans men to be displaying our transness, they don't want us to go stealth, and they don't want anything in between. They want us to be cis. Do not argue with your trans brothers about who society hates more; because society will see you as whatever will prove a transandrophobe's point. Address the root problems of patriarchy and transandrophobia instead of letting infighting eat us alive.

[doberbutts]

(asking in good faith) do you not think any trans men experience male privilege, and if so, do you think anyone truly experiences male privilege, and if not, what do you think male privilege is, and what sort of man experiences it?

I think that the privilege conversation as it exists both online and in progressive spaces irl is extremely bastardized from its original context to mean “have” and “have not” rather than an actual complex look at what’s going on.

Do trans men have male privilege? On an individual level, at times, if perceived as men, an individual trans man may benefit from male privilege during a specific interaction. On a societal level, it very much depends, because the transgender part of his manhood impacts the way society treats him.

Is it easier for a trans man to have an abortion than a cis woman? No, in fact, it’s often harder. Is it easier for a trans man to receive government aid? No, again, it’s often harder. Do trans men win more of their court cases? No, most of the time they lose, if they manage to survive whatever encounter led them to court in the first place. Are trans men in STEM and other high paying jobs at similar rates to cis men? Are they there more than trans women? To the first, not at all. To the second, it’s difficult to find an exact number due to these high paying jobs almost universally requiring stealth or being closeted, but I’d wager it’s probably equal. Are trans men free from worry about rape or domestic violence? No, it’s often occurring at higher rates than cis women. Have trans men historically been free from being considered their family’s property to be sold to the highest bidder for their husband? No, in fact, some trans men still experience this to this day. Have trans men historically been able to perform male-dominated or male-only jobs? Not unless they were stealth, and if they were found out they were usually immediately jailed or killed. Have trans men historically been able to own property, have credit cards, or use bank accounts in their name? No, to the point where when this began to be challenged entire laws were written up to prevent this from happening. Are trans men free from the societal shame regarding menstruation cycles? Not unless they’ve had a hysterectomy or have some other reason to not menstruate, just like a cis woman. 

Has there ever been a trans man as president or otherwise leader of an entire country? Have any trans men held any meaningful office for long enough to actually create policy and write laws? Are trans men running huge multi-million or multi-billion dollar companies? How many CEOs are trans men? How many characters in the media are trans men- actual trans men, not “trans-coded”, not “probably transgender”, not “popular fanon trans”, but actually trans men? How many of them are played by actors who are trans men and not just cis women? How many religious leaders are trans men, and how many religions value trans men as actual men instead of as woman-lite or disobedient women?

Again, in specific situations, an individual trans man who passes in the moment may benefit briefly from male privilege. A particularly lucky individual may be able to live as stealth for the bulk of his life and never be questioned. But the mistake of considering “passing privilege” the same as “cis male privilege” is especially egregious when considering that this just isn’t the life of the majority of trans men- not even taking into account that many trans mascs are not men, they are non-binary, but they are being lumped in with men all the same despite not being men or passing as men at all.

I think all privilege, not just male, is highly conditional when in individual contexts and depends incredibly on the giver’s bias rather than the receiver’s identity. A gay man may have “straight privilege” if he is closeted, and may enjoy a life free from homophobic attacks due to being perceived as straight, but that doesn’t mean society at large somehow got better for gay people. It just means he had to hide in order to be spared, and I don’t think being forced to hide is a privilege.

Rather, I think when discussing who “has privilege”, it’s better to consider the broader picture of society rather than pointing at an individual and deciding for them how their life and experiences worked. Certainly, if that individual tells you, “I’ve never thought of [blind spot]”, that is an example of that person’s privilege. But I think it’s better to say male privilege is better shown in the examples I brought up, and how it’s societal, rather than pointing to someone you don’t know and saying “you’ve never had to deal with this”.

Especially when the discussion becomes warped to the point of “trans men received male privilege from birth because they’re men.”

[velvetvexations]

can you explain the motivation behind your misgendering kink and how it works? i think i have one too lol

I like indulgent scenarios where I'm assuming this stereotypical and negative role, exerting the sort of power and duplicitous social advantages they tag trans women with. It tingles my sadism and masochism at the same time to be called an abominably creepy freak with (play-)aggressive intent.

That's somewhat rare, though. Most of what exists is more detrans kink, which I'm not really into but is like "oh you need to be made into the true alpha male that you are" or something like that. I don't want to fantasize about not being trans, I want to fantasize about a world where being trans is a bad thing lol.

I've sometimes wondered if there's a similar dynamic going on with kinks centered around Black men dominating white women, which I've been incidentally exposed to a lot in kink spaces because it's so overwhelmingly popular compared to the very niche stuff I have to scour sites for. A lot of it strikes me as a hyperbolic exaggeration of racist fears over miscegenation.

But I can relate to anyone else of any category who's like "...okay, well, that's a ridiculous to accuse me of, but after having these expectations drilled into me for years I'm ngl it's started to sound kinna hot and in a world where I'm being brutally oppressed while being cast as the villain I'm going to blow off steam by imagining a world where I am actually the villain with all the power in this situation."

With other trans people it takes different forms, of course. Misgendering kinks for AFAB trans people, from what I've seen trying to find content for myself,* is mainly an extension of misogyny kink with the added detrans layer, not too awfully different from like, that one fetish sequence where the butch punk girl is turned into a housewife. I don't say that because to make it sound like it's less radical than the AMAB version, and I could be minimizing and generalizing, I lovingly invite correction, but it's just such a radically different beast from what I like about fetishized misgendering, or at least it typically appears so to me. Like it's not better or worse, just very different, which is groovy and cool. Infinite diversity in infinite combinations.

*and there is a lot you have to scroll through to find good AMAB content! nothing but happy for AFAB misgendering kinksters though I love you and am so glad yall are getting what you want out of it

[sicasole]

Why I Love Kpop (I think)

I’ve joked before that everyone who likes kpop secretly wants to be in a polycule, but like most jokes the more I think about that statement, the more truth I find in it. After all, kpop disrupts the way we think about homosocial relationships, and it often presents queer dynamics for its audience to ponder and sometimes even obsess over. Lately, (and by lately I mean for almost 8 years) I’ve been captivated by the question of why I and so many other queer people love kpop so much. The following is a stream-of-consiousness attempt at answering that question. I’ll be speaking from the perspective of a queer femme fan who listens to and watches mostly male idols, but of course I know this topic is richer than just this one dynamic. I don’t speak for all queer people or all kpop fans.

For as long as I can remember I’ve been listening to, performing, and analyzing music, but when I think about kpop, I’m thinking about it very differently than any other musical media. Because yes, kpop is about the music but it’s also about so much else. It’s about queerness and bodily autonomy and relationships both toxic and beneficial. I, like a lot of queer people, love fantasy worlds and characters because they present their audiences with beings who live outside the norm, people and places unbounded by logic and social constraints. They offer us an escape from a world that is unaccepting of our ever-expansive queer identities, and a vision of the possibility for a better one.

But kpop occupies this intensely fascinating space between fantasy and reality. Fans online talk about idols more like they’re fictional characters than real people, frequently speculating about an idol’s time away from the narrative their company puts out the way someone might headcanon a fictional character. These group narratives a company creates give idols an air of fantasy and mystery, allowing for this fan speculation to run amok on social media as they attempt to “fill in the blanks.” But kpop offers a grounding in reality that pure fiction cannot. Here exists a fantasy world you can really see and hear and walk through. These characters you project onto are actually real people.

So why do I love kpop? The answer changes almost daily, but lately I think it's because in many ways, kpop seems to be made to be enjoyed by queer people. The 20th century had gay men who were devoted to Judy Garland, and now we have the Jungkook lesbians.

Queers have always dominated fandom spaces. As people who are more likely to lack role models in our everyday lives, we’ll often turn to fandom media for guidance about how to love and how to be. I think “straight” mass media lately is obsessed with being “relatable” but queer people don’t usually relate to the narratives put out by the heterosexual media machine. This is why kpop is really appealing to members of the community. It’s overwhelmingly uninterested in being relatable, instead, it's aspirational. This parallels the queer self, who is often more invested in the journey of becoming than it is in running towards a more clean-cut goal like home ownership or a nuclear family.

But when I think about kpop, I also think about my own body and its autonomy (or lack thereof). I think about the performance of femininity. This feels a bit strange and vulnerable to admit, but a part of me has always been willing to hand over my body in exchange for love and devotion. This is the kind of transaction a kpop idol makes when they sign a contract. It’s easy to criticize when we see it put in front of us so plainly, but queer people (especially trans people) and those assigned female at birth have always been aware that they don’t entirely own their bodies or decide their actions.

Idols capture exactly the level of freedom I believe is currently possible for me because frequently as a queer person and a feminine person I feel like the only way I can be accepted and safe is if I offer up my body and self in a way that is sanitized and therefore marketable and commodifiable.

Queerness is more accepted today than it was even a few years ago, but there are still limitations to that acceptance. Queer people who remind the dominant heterosexual power structures of tropes and stereotypes are more accepted than those who are living their lives in active opposition to straight expectations. Of course, we know that stereotypes are oppressive tools used to dehumanize people, which is why the pressure many members of the community feel to censor their identities in order to fit into these tropes and stereotypes (while often done for their own safety) is especially demoralizing.

Kpop also relies heavily on tropes when it comes to constructing the narrative of their groups’ dynamics. We know that much of this is done to make the group marketable and commodifiable. But one positive is that a performative self can protect a kpop idol’s privacy from a world that demands celebrities provide their fans with an endless stream of details about themselves and their lives. In the same way, a performative self can protect a queer person from persecution.

This begs the question of how much someone can stand to perform an inauthentic self, even if that performance helps keep them safe. Lately, this is where I see myself most in the idol on my screen. Like me, I feel he is constantly engaged in a horrific balancing act, asking himself how much he can stand to inhabit a performative self for his own safety. Like me, I feel he is questioning whether an authentic self even exists and if it does, will its appearance cut him off from the audience’s love? Like me, I feel he is screaming for a way out.

These men have been locked into a performance their overwhelmingly queer and female fanbases are all too familiar with. Their personal and financial livelihood depends on their ability to appeal to their audience just as the safety of queer people is dependent on the way they are viewed by the domineering heterosexual power. The relationship between idol and fanbase is both symbiotic and toxic. Idols become what they think their audiences want, and this performance is terrifyingly reflected in the lives of their marginalized fans.

This is the point in my thinking where I ask myself what I even hope to gain from this line of inquiry. Is it some sort of twisted self reflection? Is it an unhinged brain-ego trip? Is there even anything here worth exploring? I believe (and hope) there is. I and most people who analyze media today are pushing back on the idea that someone has to be exactly like you for you to relate to them. On the surface, the male idol is nothing like me, but the aspirational nature of kpop media invites me to see him and myself as more hauntingly alike than I would sometimes like to admit. He is androgynous in ways I could only ever dream of, yet he is yearning like me. He is queer like me.

One of the pillars of anthropology (so much so that it’s almost become a cliche) is that its goal is to make the strange familiar and the familiar strange. To the untrained eye, kpop might look like a shallower reflection of our everyday world, one that’s even more image-conscious and subjugated by the demands of capitalism. It certainly can be those things, but when I look at kpop I see the current human condition distilled. Most of us alive today have been trained to constantly seek validation from those around us. Kpop is both familiar and strange because it reminds us of the ways we perform for audiences either real or imagined. It can make us uncomfortable because it shows us just how much we are willing to sacrifice to satisfy the demands of those audiences. In censoring ourselves, we become our own voyeurs and are left wondering who has more power, observed or observer?

So why do I love kpop? I’m not always entirely sure that I do. What I do know is that it’s not really about some fantasy of receiving affection. I don’t turn to idols for tenderness. I never wanted to feel loved, I just wanted to see something beautiful up close. I wanted to see someone who was suffering in the same way I was. I wanted to seek some unprovable personal truth, that perhaps this ethereal creature I saw on my screen was, in fact, just like me. Sure, they had a surface-level beauty I could never reach, but we were alike in all the ways that mattered.

And here I am now, with all of this behind me, wondering if I am (and continue to be) just some more than slightly messed up and lonely child looking for connection in all the wrong places. But then again, aren’t we all?

[zumurruds]

talk about laurent the way laurent fans talk about damen

oh, this is going to be fun!

"i have to get this meta off my chest, because the way laurent fans interpet his character is upsetting - they want to erase his shortcomings and make him boring, when the only thing interesting about him is his flaws :/ first and foremost pacat wrote laurent intentionally as a white supremacist, and we're not supposed to sympethize with him. he represents privilege, patriarchy, prejudice, classism, feudalism, misogyny, narcissism, xenophobia, toxicity, abuse, mesopedia, colonialization, racism and in fact all the -isms you can think of. he's the ultimate white slave master archetype, and people who like and sympathize with him are doing it wrong. when we're first introduced to laurent, he's a parallel to the regent. they're mirror villains. they're both second sons who use their intellect for evil, and love wielding rape as a punishment. they both exist to uphold the systems of sexual abuse, patriarchy and white male supremacy, and sadistically relish in the control they have over others.

laurent fans love to forget that he is a blood purist: he hates all illegimate children, despite their birth being out of their control. the way laurent calls innocent children "bastards" throughout the books, and genuinely thinks they "curse the line, and sour the milk, ruin the crops, and drag the sun out of the sky" is horrific and backwards, and only furthers the harmful patriarchal ideals of blood purity and legitimacy. laurent literally prioritizes marital status over individual worth and i never see any of his fans talk about it. i love how pacat intentionally wrote laurent and all veretians upholding systematic inequality and social exclusion, unjustly burdening innocent children with shame and psychological distress. it really makes his villainous character so interesting and layered...

but burdening innocent children with pyschological distress isn't new to laurent, seeing as he unapologetically bullies and manipulates an impoverished, lowborn child (nicaise) who is being sexually abused by his uncle, and is ultimately responsible for his death. he also later tells damen that it is better for a veretian pedophile (the regent) to rape and sexually exploit nicaise, than to be a slave in akielos, where every slave in akielos is of age, and according to the author, consents to being in a "safe space for erotic escapism: the slaves are chosen because they have pre-existing submissive tendencies, and the masters are culturally bount to treat them well. [a slave's] desire to submit is in no way a pro-slavery argument." source, source. when laurent is crowned king, he does not abolish the pet system that victimized children like nicaise in the first place, further compounding his hatred for children and other victims of abuse. we love a villain who turns into the very thing that he feared most!

i also love the way pacat exposed laurent's misogyny in the series... veretian men aren't allowed to spend time with women becaues it's forbidden, isolating them from the opposite sex, which really manifests in laurent in disturbing ways. in prince's gambit, his misogyny comes to a forefront when he bribes a poor lowborn woman who cannot refuse a prince's order to give govart, a known violent rapist, oral sex, knowing exactly how govart abuses his "partners"... and then when laurent is hiding in the brothel with damen, he commands prostitutes to have sex with damen against his will, treating both the women and damen like sex objects without any regard for what they want or feel, reinforcing to readers that he's a sociopath with toxic masculinity due to his obsessive need to dominate and control others sexually.

laurent also wants to indescriminately annihilate every akielon off the face of the earth, playing a game of "kill all the Akielons and restore the old empire" with auguste as early as childhood. this deep-seated racism and prejudice informs the way he abuses, rapes and tortures damen in the books, and how he sadistically treats all the akielon slaves in the series. he doesn't give a shit about them at all, and is only coerced to help them after he is bribed to by damen. when damen confronts laurent's gaurds about letting govart rape erasmus, laurent's response was: "The Prince's Gaurd doesn't intefere with the Regency. Govart can stick his cock into anything of my uncle's he likes", displaying a callous disregard for the well-being and dignity of others, as well as a troubling acceptance of abuse and exploitation within his own ranks. it doesn't only stop in the first book, this is a patterned behavior that continues into kings rising, where laurent forces a poor slave, isander, to kneel and kiss his boots in order to humiliate him and anger other akielons, and then forces isander to serve and feed him against his will, establishing his white supremacy in the books.

laurent fans love to erase the fact that he's a black-and-white thinker, possibly the most black-and-white thinker lacking any nuance in the whole series. he genuinely believes someone being killed in battle means they were murdered in cold blood, and not defending their country. he believes anyone who does this deserves to be raped, tortured and killed, despite the fact that he and auguste have also killed people in battle, and by this logic, deserve to be raped, tortured and killed by those fallen soldier's family members too. he's a hypocrite, and his fans who try to pretend he's a "good person" are completely missing the point of the series, which is a critique on the white, mediocre, blond, evil character trope like lestat, draco, etc.

laurent fans love to focus on his "trauma" and make it his entire personality, which is annoying because he doesn't really have trauma, he's just spoiled and privileged. in fact, he actually loved the regent and enjoyed their relationship, and only started hating him because the regent left him for a prettier person. stop being petty laurent! i also find it amusing how laurent keeps playing his uncle's game and believes he won't kill laurent despite years of his uncle openly trying to do just that... laurent's blind trust and love for his family is a huge character flaw that should definitely be held against him. he's super dumb and the most oblivious character in the series, like seriously a kindergartner could see that the regent is bad and would try to kill him.

it's so obvious that pacat meant to write laurent as a villain who has gone off the deep end, and must attone for his crimes against damen and others by attempting to kill himself in king's rising, and when that is foiled by damen's heroic efforts, makes laurent promise to atone to damen for the rest of his life in the summer palace because that's the only way to rehabilitate and redeem a character like laurent whose sole purpose in the books is to offer a scathing critique of white supremacy and toxic abusers.

anyways, i obviously love laurent and understand his character better than anyone else, and it's really weird that his fans try to erase his flaws because they are doing laurent a disservice and making his character boring, because his villainy is the only thing that is interesting about him. in fact, if you write any positive post about laurent and DON'T preface it with how much he is a villainous slave-owner and bad person, then you really don't love or understand laurent, and are endorsing every bad thing he does. muah send post xoxo #meta #characteranalysis #villainlaurent #canon."

the way laurent fans would be shitting bricks, puking, moaning, crying, etc if damen fans posted "character analysis" like this under the guise of "loving his character" every 5 minutes in the tags the way they do about damen is hilarious. they'll put genuine effort into trying to undestand laurent's background and motives, and give laurent endless grace and approach his character with nuance, but with damen they're hellbent on twisting his character, motives and background with the intent of villifying him and making him out to be something he's not. the amount of victim-blaming, bad faith takes, mental gymnastics, and full-blown racism i've seen laurent fans engage in while making these "analyses" of damen is genuinely disturbing, moreso because nobody in their own circles are willing to call it out. instead, they try to gaslight everyone and deflect by claiming its canon and attack anyone else who doesn't share the same toxic hive mind. anyone can write bad faith takes, but it certainly doesn't make it valid.

every single damen fan i've met likes laurent, but every single person who makes loving laurent their only personality trait seems truly resentful and bitter towards damen's character and constantly feel the need to willfully misinterpret his character to make up for laurent's flaws. instead of enjoying both characters separately, they turn it into a competition of morality, attempting to make damen out to be the ignorant bad guy who needs laurent to rehabilitate him, while portraying laurent as the true voice of morality, compassion and modernity in the books. the old fandom trend of trying to make the "noble, heroic" character (pacat's words, not mine) really the bad guy of the series, and laurent the "true good one who must teach damen right from wrong" is so tired and boring. do better, guys.

[blubushie]

i've seen some blogs i follow say that misandry isn't real and men aren't opressed for being men and honestly the former doesn't sit right with me. misandry is not systemic like misogyny but your answers about your experiences prove that it does indeed happen in queer spaces. masculine queer men have to prove that they aren't a threat by making themselves a walking gay caricature.

Hell men aren't just oppressed in female-dominant "cultures" (like queer spaces) but they're also oppressed by patriarchy and, in some ways, legally. They're just not oppressed in the same way women are.

Men are considered inherently stronger/better, which means women can't compete with us, which means any time a man is a victim of a woman it's automatically his fault for ALLOWING himself to be. How are you, a man, gonna let a woman hit you? (It's because even if you defend yourself, and you make the call the police, YOU'LL be arrested as the aggressor. It's your word against hers, and in domestic violence they will always favour hers.)

We are simultaneously shit on for defending ourselves, because how dare a man ever put his hands on a woman even in self defence, but at the same time if we DON'T do that, it's our fault for being abused because we didn't "resist" our abuser. This is the male version of being asked about what you were wearing when you were victimised. The only way men are ALLOWED to be recognised as victims is if you're a child and your abuser is an adult man. If it's an adult woman? Hell, kid, you're lucky.

A lot of people think men can't be raped—either because we "always want sex", or because we're expected to physically resist our rapist and win. Contrast this to women, who are told to piss themselves or scream, or just take it because maybe if you do your rapist won't kill you. (If you ask me a firearm makes a helluva equaliser, but that's a conversation for another day.) Legislation even reflects this—in the UK, for example, according to UK law, it isn't possible for a women to rape a man unless she penetrates him with an object. A woman violently raping a man, even a child, by restraining him or otherwise and forcing him into penetrating her, is merely considered sexual assault and carries a much lighter sentence than rape.

And that really sucks for someone like me, who was raped by two women while I was drunk. Who didn't even realise I was raped until a mate explained it to me, because it's normalised that women can have sex with a drunk man and that's not considered rape—not even if he blacks out and asks them to stop when he wakes up, and they keep going while he blacks out again. Like what happened to me. An even bigger kicker—a man is always considered responsible in sex. So if a drunk man and a drunk woman both agree to sex while both are intoxicated, legally HE is raping HER despite both being unable to actually consent.

This in addition to men being expected to be sole providers for a home by society—look at the current rise of women looking for a sugar daddy or red-flagging a man because he only has one car instead of two, or of men never being favoured in family court even when the mother is unable to care for the children or is abusive, or how women will weaponise visitation against fathers for spite because they know the court will side with her regardless of how good of a father he is, or the lack of men's shelters, or how DV shelters won't take women with minor children who are boys older than 12 so a woman has to either go back to her abuser with her children or leave her sons behind alone with an abusive father, of people laughing at the male loneliness epidemic and treating it like a good thing/deserved reckoning instead of recognising it as a warning sign for a flood of lost teens and young men drifting down the Andrew Tate or rapist incel misogyny pipeline, of people laughing at men's mental health month posts and outright encouraging men to commit suicide under them while men already statistically commit suicide at a higher rate than women...

Men are oppressed in some ways, I'd argue some of those ways are systemic, but no one talks or cares about it. There was a feminism wave in the 90s of "patriarchy harms everyone", which is true, but now we're on a different wave of "men are biologically evil", which is absolutely batshit fucking insane and helps no one. Bioessentialism helps no one. (Plus it's transphobic and intersexist.)

Anyway I'm gonna go back to working on my ute now.

[thebutchtheory]

saw a post about a trans woman talking about her experiences with now gender essentialist anti-maleness/masculinity harmed her personal experiences with coming out because she thought that she wasn't "good enough" to be a woman. can't find it now, but i wanted to talk more about that phenomenon in the community.

how hatred of maleness/masculinity (even perceived) hurts trans women, and how hatred of maleness and masculinity doesn't help the community at all.

it's what forces trans women to bleed themselves dry trying to purge any sense of maleness from themselves possible so they aren't perceived in any way as male or masculine. to distance themselves from any ounce of maleness and masculinity, otherwise they're just fetishizing womanhood and they aren't really trans women.

even then, it doesn't work because people see their status as trans women as masculinity in and of itself because they were AMAB, and for some, no amount of destroying themselves to rid themselves of maleness and masculinity will ever let them see trans women as female.

and god forbid a trans woman be a butch or a stud.

this gender essentialism and this hatred of maleness and masculinity and its perception as inherently predatory and evil is a core part of transmisogyny.

this hatred of maleness/masculinity gets butches and studs labeled as predatory and sexually deviant even within WLW spaces, where whiteness, purity, daintiness and femininity are generally the dominant themes.

this hatred of maleness/masculinity gets transmascs erased from history as "powerful women", those seeking safety/privilege, because they could never be men or have agency over their identities. it gets transmascs harassed for coming out as transmasc, even among other queers, because men are awful and evil and ugly, why would you want to be one?

this hatred of maleness/masculinity is part of what gets masc bears and leather daddies and butch gay men labeled as predatory and sexually deviant, doubly so if they're older men. it gets MLM harassed for being attracted to men by other queers because "men are gross, evil and ugly, so why would you ever be attracted to them?"

particularly with the last two, it leaves these mascs/men feeling dirty for being or being attracted to men. ashamed for "going to the dark side", and not being or being attracted to "the fairer sex" as it were.

this isn't the sole root of the whole community's problems, but the community has a deep rooted problem with valuing femininity and seeing femininity as inherently safer and better than masculinity, and it harms *everyone*.

[thethirdromana]

Romana II's costumes, rated

Most screengrabs from the BBC image gallery, all opinions from me.

As seen in Destiny of the Daleks.

What a costume to open on. I love this. I love that it reminds us that Romana - even this younger-looking, more playful Romana - remains the Doctor's equal, being his costume, but pink. I love the details - the necklace, the white shirt with the pink pinstripes, the weird high-waisted pink trousers that we barely see, and the first of many outstanding pairs of boots. Above all I straightforwardly love how good this looks. Pink is undeniably Lalla Ward's colour. 10/10, setting the bar high.

As seen in City of Death.

So this costume has a very sweet backstory behind it. Lalla Ward hated wearing school uniform, and thought that the little girls watching Doctor Who might feel better about school if they saw a favourite character wearing the same kind of thing as they had to wear. Which is adorable. And then she got heaps of letters from pervy man. Which is... less so. 3/10, for the thought?

As seen in the Creature from the Pit.

I could either get a decent photo or one that showed the whole costume, so I chose the former. You're not missing much in the bottom half, it's a sort of floaty Grecian affair with a wide belt. They seem to have dressed Lalla Ward as Mary Tamm for this one. Her hair looks pretty, though. 5/10.

As seen in Nightmare of Eden.

This is it, this is the worst Romana costume. There's a sort of institutional vibe, like it might have been sewn from prison curtains. Every decorative detail - the massive bow, whatever's going on with the skirt - makes it worse. How did they manage to make Lalla Ward look so drab? And it looks at least a size too big for her, too. 0/10.

As seen in The Horns of Nimon.

This is more like it. It's clearly a fox-hunting outfit, which in the UK has connotations that are... let's just go with problematic. But Romana doesn't hunt any foxes in this episode, as far as I can remember, so I think it's OK for me to like the costume. Which I do. 9/10.

As (not*) seen in Shada.

Yes! Some people have faces that belong in a particular era, and doesn't Lalla Ward have such an Edwardian face? No wonder, then, that this is such a wonderful costume. I want to wear it myself, and then spend a day lounging in a punt with a good book. The only danger is that I would try to eat the trim on the hat. 100/10.

*because it never aired.

As seen in the Leisure Hive.

Apparently the Edwardian look was so good in Shada, they decided to do it again? This time Romana appears to be in an Edwardian boy's sailor suit. As an aside, I love how her costumes switch back and forth between historical men's styling and traditional feminine dresses. This costume is more fun than flattering, but I like it. 7/10.

As seen in Meglos.

This costume is... a lot. I mean, even next to what Lexa's got on, it's a lot. There's actually so much texture on this, I can't fully make out what's going on, and that's before we get to the world's largest sleeves. I think this is one of the few times that it feels like the costume dominates Romana, which is a pity, because I would otherwise be on board with the Henry VIII vibe. 4/10.

As seen in Full Circle.

I wish I had a decent-quality full-length photo of this costume, because it includes a long red skirt that's quite fetching. I enjoy the contrast between the military jacket and the dainty lace shirt. Red is a good colour on Romana II. 8/10.

As seen in State of Decay.

Another one where Romana is essentially in historical male drag, in the kind of outfit you would expect a gentleman to wear in the country. Only she has her hair down and it's all carefully fitted to Lalla Ward's figure, so it barely registers as GNC. I think that's a really fun costuming decision, and also I want this outfit. 10/10.

As seen in Warriors' Gate.

A disappointing costume to end on. I mean, it's perfectly nice. But if I decided that I wanted to dress for the job I want (Time Lady in E-Space) rather than the job I have (middle management) and rocked up to the office in this, I doubt anyone would register it as unusual. Which makes it rather less exciting than most of the other options on this list. 5/10.

Now I just need to see if I can track down an Edwardian lace dress.

[davekat-sucks]

Sorry for yet another long post but I think someone was yelling at you? I'm unsure, the post was written as if it was incoherent screaming to me. All I know is that they called you racist and to learn to read a map. Learning that Benin is the birthplace of voodoo isn't going to change anything. It doesn't matter how educated or uneducated one is, we can all call a spade a spade. We know English speaking fandom has gone to the dogs. Every three blogs you click you're going to see a DNI list and people will tell you to kys for being too visible.

Did that anon go off on you for assuming that Japanese fandom spaces are different than western ones? They are. South Koreans and Japanese fandoms have changed in recent era, but not the way that American spaces have in the past twenty years. American fandoms need to see ALL fiction be the representation of the real world that they personally want to see. You're not allowed to make nsfw art for Jade Harley because she was introduced as a 13 year old so she will always be a 13 year old! But if you wanted to you can make porn of Roxy because HE is trans. Homestuck might have these dark themes and explore them but you can't! But now they decided that you can, but only if you're talking about gender issues. Japanese fandom doesn't really think the same way Americans do about fiction. They do have futanari porn and what American fandom calls "cuntboys," but from what I've seen the art comes off less as a political statement or an exploration of gender issues, and more of pornography the artists make because it's interesting and erotic. It is a completely different tone. Sex positivity in western fandoms has eroded so much people need to make excuses to showcase their fetishes. Japanese people... don't really need to. BUT they have changed to be more "progressive" though. That I can tell. Japanese people depict different races in their art more often now. Still at times I think Japanese people make characters with dark skin because they think it's stylish, they aren't really depicting black people. Koreans care more about feminism now too. You see it in the splatoon fandom a lot. That's just my observation. I don't understand the Korean language so someone else might know better. But I do understand Japanese enough to know the vibe is worlds apart from American fandom. I mostly hang around fandoms that are female dominated though, you know, the parts with BL? Female dominated fandom is different than the male dominated parts. I don't really care to know what the manly-man side of Japanese fandoms are doing, I assume it's similar to Americans. Where men make pornography of any character and they hardly get a slap on the wrist for it. You'll see one people in the comments point out that misty was underage in the show, but then people will jump in to defend the art saying "she was 18 in the games." It seems like most the male artists making the porn they want to get more and more support. Ever noticed it's mostly women policing other women behavior in western fandom?

We're also leaving out something crucial. The Russian/Slavic side of the fandom is fun as hell. People literally can do anything they want. If you see a fanartist is from Russia, you know you're going to see some wild m/m parings.

Anywhere that's not North America or parts of Europe (mostly United Kingdom), just enjoy the things they like and not bother others for stupid things like accusing if one person is racist for making a lighting on a dark skin character. And yeah, it's women policing other women. So much for feminism empowerment if said girls also put down other females for just doing what they like. But then again, most of feminism has been about being only one kind of girl that is accepted and girls acting something else is a sin. It ain't better than the shit before women's rights ideal of what a lady should act like.

[scribe-of-maat]

Iron Widow & Zachary Ying

I read both back to back.

Xiran Jay Zhao is my new favorite author.

They’re, so so real.

On Iron Widow:

It’s not hard for me to put into words how much I knew I was going to like Iron Widow early on into it. I’m not exaggerating when I said I’ve never read something like it, and I doubt I ever will again. The moment I knew this was going to be good was when the protagonist was revealed to be disabled.

I didn’t know anything about Wu Zetian or that era of Chinese history before going into this (I didn’t realize they hadn’t made those names up until I read Zachary Ying, for instance) but the world they build is so interesting and it’s obvious they’re pulling from real injustices.

But they don’t gloss over the EMOTION that comes with being a minority trapped in an unjust system. My favorite thing about Wu Zetian is the implacable rage she feels at the patriarchal monsters lording their power over her. She hates the system that took away Ruyi, her older sister, and she hates the men profiting in that system at the expense of any girl unlucky enough to be born into it.

To not belabor the point, I wish I could read that climactic scene where the Sages try to use her family against her for the first time again. Her parents capacity familial love being what ultimately dooms them, since it proves they could always have chosen to be better, and never did. It’s an odd feeling to cheer as the protagonist murders their family, but good god you love to see it.

She kills seven named characters over the course of the book - Yang Guang, An Lushan, Ma Xiuying and her husband, and her parents and brother - and I’ve never felt so satisfied. I’ve never read a woman exacting sweet, sweet vengeance and on her oppressors and coming out both alive and more heroic for having done so (in the eyes of the reader).

I knew going in that the love triangle ends in a poly relationship. This was also extremely avant-garde, especially for a YA novel. I realized I didn’t know if they were all in a relationship with each other at the same time or if they had separate but just as intense 1-on-1 relationships with each other, but either way, more power to ‘em.

The power system was also very interesting, especially with how they tie into the explorations of gender. It wasn’t lost on me that Zetian’s most dominant qi was Metal, the one seated at the dead center of the yin-yang spectrum, after she’d talked about not really feeling female or male. Fun fact, when it was revealed Li Shimin had feminine products in his bunker and wasn’t the rapist Zetian thought he was, I thought it was going to be revealed he was actually a woman, to further tie into the gender themes. 

But Xiran excellently captures the feeling of being a space and being so angry about the fact that everyone around you has an undeserved power over you, systematically stolen and enforced on pain of death. I’m the opposite of a tiny East Asian woman but I absolutely understood wanting to tear that down and end anyone profiting off it.

On Zachary Ying:

I though I would like Iron Widow much more, but this ended being about as enjoyable, and is what solidified the fact that Xiran is a YA writer who will absolutely wear her progressive politics on her sleeve much more openly than your white fave (R*** R******).

Her tale of female empowerment isn’t written for the Male Gaze and her tale of the hero’s journey isn’t written for the White Gaze. Zachary Ying is a gay Hui-Chinese Muslim and absolutely the ONLY YA hero of his kind. I’d go on to say he’s the only protagonist of his kind in literally any kind of media without researching that one bit.

The early parts of the books go to great pains to establish that the Chinese government and its people are separate entities, that yeah, there’s injustice there but it’s not like it’s any different anywhere else. When Qin Shi Huang specifically calls out how American heroes like George Washington were enslavers, this had my total buy-in.

Okay, well, that’s not really true. But it just became more total. I’ve never experienced it, but I know from online reading that a lot of immigrant children to the US who are subjected to the perpetual foreigner stereotype get made fun of for their food, and when the book opens with him experiencing this (and Xiran making it obvious he has a crush on his male bully) THAT’S where I was bought-in.

I think what I enjoyed most about this was the explanations of all the Chinese culture, like Di Renjie being Chinese Sherlock Holmes or the lengthy conversation about how Chinese dynasties like the Tang were incredibly diverse. The first hint of Qin Shi Huang not being above his ultimate sacrifice is that he saw himself in Zachary, chose someone like him who a lot people, definitely not just Chinese, wouldn’t.

It feels like a YA novel that takes place in the 2020s as well, written by someone who actually knows what it’s like to be a young person. Zack references a ton of contemporary media and multiple times talks about his powers as waterbending. The game he plays is pretty much Pokemon GO, to boot.

But like I said earlier, it ain’t written for the White Gaze. Just like in Iron Widow, there are extended scenes of characters espousing super duper left leaning ideologies and it dawned on me that I’d never seen politics I agreed with being stated so plainly in a fantasy series.

Oh sure, Rick’ll do things like have TJ and Mallory get into it over he killing thralls, but Magnus walks away before anything concrete has to be stated. Six of The Seven round on Jason for Roman demigods fighting for the Confederacy in the American Civil War, but Percy and Annabeth are never given any guff whatsoever about Greek demigods who did the same. Carter has like one instance of kind of alluding to the fact that police are racist but he sweeps past it.

Because those books are ultimately beholden to the White Gaze. They can’t be anything else, by virtue of being written by a white guy who’ll always, on some level, prioritize his comfort and the comfort of the audience he knows he has to court.  

But not here. They call out a bunch of Yellow Peril nonsense in the book and contrast it with how horrible Western rulers like Nero are remarked upon in detached reverence while Qin Shi Huang is demonized. Zack gets to see that Muslims, at least in the East of China, aren’t being slaughtered wholesale or anything. 

If you haven’t already, you seriously need to read these masterpieces. I love these books.

[the-white-soul]

Backup, huh? Don't you know humans are stronger than monsters? This should be easy for you.

*A rampage of vines suddenly burst out if the ground surrounding the flower, stealing weapons and stabbing and slicing and ripping apart anything that comes close. Blood stains the sand. He smiles in amusement. If anyone stays back, paralyzed by fear at this point, the vines reach out towards them and drag them in before he crushes their skulls. Except for Jack. Throughout this, all he did to Jack was tie him up and steal his gun/ whatever other weapon he might have and add it to his pile underground. He gives a tinkly laugh as he reapproaches the last man alive.*

Wowza~ What happened to all your men~? All you had to do was kill me. A weak, pitiful monster. *The vines are nearly crushing him with the strength. Flowey's smile fades into a blank yet intense stare as he growls harshly to Jack.*

Now what do I do with you?

*Yet another vine snakes up to his face this time and makes a slow and deep cut in his face right below his eye.* What I will do to you will be a fraction of the pain you've inflicted onto monsters, let alone your own kind.

Don't worry, I'm not giving you the satisfaction of killing you yet. Now stay still. I'm going to make a little note to remind me of something for later. *The vines holding Jack extend to hold his head still as Flowey soaks his vine in the blood leaking from the cut. He drags the along his skin, painting a line over his throat.*

If you live through this and I see you anywhere near Chara, I won't hesitate to fill in that mark and listen to the sound of you choking on your own blood.

*He threads the end of a vine around the fingers of Jack’s dominant hand and stretches one back further and further until it cracks with a burning pain. One by one he goes along. He makes sure to speak slowly and viciously, so that his words would get through to the head of anyone despite how distracted by pain they are.*

You won't be touching them ever again, even if it's not in the same way. You're not Chara's father. You're not a policeman. You're a waste of life, and I want nothing more for you to bleed out and rot away at a funeral that no one would care to even put together. They despise you.

*Flowey looks down and points to the space between Jack’s legs.* There's the male reproductive organ in humans, right? *He stares him in the eye coldly, waiting for an answer as he draws a dagger. Confirmed or not, he suddenly jabs the blade through flesh and muscle, sinking the knife into his body to destroy sin itself his before pulling it out and stabbing him again, and again, and again. A deep red spreads on the cloth covering him and the knife.*

*He finally stops, watching with a twisted satisfaction as Jack writhes against his constraints. He just ties the ends of the vines into knots so it'd hold tightly even without Flowey trying. Flowey wipes the blade clean on his shirt and then cuts off his own vines without flinching. Dragging the raft closer, he quickly ties the other ends to the wood and hauls Jack closer to the water.*

I am going to push you into the water in one minute, or less if I so decide. You will be floating out into the ocean to either flip over from a wave and drown, starve to death, or be eaten by some animal. If I find someone cared enough to to save you before any of that happens, you had better be a changed man or I’ll kill you and the person who took you back to shore right then and there.

Do you want to say anything before I push you out? Or are you too shocked? I better hear you scream apologies to Chara as your last words. *Flowey steadily brings the knife to Jack’s throat, the cold metal pressing lightly against that red line of blood, but doesn't cut it.*

(Jack) "You are a freak, aren't you? Oh I know I'm going to die if I will go swimming. I won't survive and I won't try to! Congrats you've won. I hope that'll send hundreds of monsters to their death bead happy. Of course, I knew someone like you would show up at one point so I told my friend if I died to block off the exits to the courtroom and shoot any and all people and monsters and take anyone who survives be tortured by dissolving each part of their body parts into acid, one by one. I've actually calculated the amount of monsters in there. Over 40000. I made the courtroom big for that reason alone. But who cares right? Kill me! *He smiles a psychotic smile* After all I enjoyed that feeling with Chara! You never realize how terribly attractive kids are until you try it. Chara, their lips smelled like cherries. Oh, I'm not done yet! How did it feel to have her in the ocean just like here in fact I remember a few feet from here when I actually put it in my mouth. They cried until I stopped and then I said, 'I don't know what saltier, the sea, your tears, or some other liquid.' Okay now kill me!!! Come on do it! Let those monsters die! Chara was a good daughter and an even better lover!"

[papirouge]

Weak tradfems on this site or twitter will claim that hypergamy is evil only for their male audience. Because they seek allies in their male audience that don’t follow them to be “friends” their mal audience is full of chronically online weak links that absorb tate and manosphere material to compensate for their lack of masculinity identity that can only be achieved through self reflection and meditation.

But I don’t have a male audience and never will want one so I can comfortably say that it’s based for women to only choose the top male she can so her life and her children’s are better off than if she settles. Males will gaslit many girls into believing that we all settle for our partners but this is unhealthy for long term commitment. If you want to live a good life as a good wife, the best husband for you is one you must look for hard and take your time.

PERIOD. 🍵🔥🔥🔥

That's the whole fraud of those red pill (trad) women (especially on YouTube) whose entire audience is made of incels while they pretend being Feminity coach 🤡. And those women KNOW IT but they act dumb bc they know those incels are those who keep them relevant. Beyond than "allies" : they want that male validation through viewership and engagement.

I'll never understand tradfem being so icky about hypergamy bc hypergamy is extremely traditional. Dating and marrying bums without any real standards (financially) for your future husband is very modern. Men throughout history have always been comitted to provide for their entire family so it was natural for women to seek after financially secure men. But today, most "modern" men would call a woman a gold digger for simply refusing to split the bills (mind you, some of those are the same ones complaining abt feminism, when said feminism is what made women capable to make them split the bill.....🙄).

Real hypergamy channel ARE female dominated in their audience. High quality men are a scarcity, so a hypergamy channel calling women to step up their standards and pay average men dust is gonna make most of men get in their feelings and not follow/support such content 🥴

Female trad red pillers never address much criticism against men - it's mostly aimed torwards women (maybe that's why they might delusion themselves into think they're relevant for women...), so men are so comfortable following them ; because they know they'll never be held accountable on such space. And God knows that incels HATE accountability.

Chrissie (which is an actual hypergamy channel) clocks redpillers precisely on that hypocrisy. This video is mostly abt White female redpillers pandering to Black men (who for the most part are extremely colorist and will elevate women of other race over their own) but she pulls out extremely good point about how these red pill female guru are hypocritical snakes. Especially the "how can those red pill women call themselves 'Feminity Coach' when their whole audience are men?" 💀💀

btw if you're curious about the 'red pill women finesser' she's talking about, JustPearlyThings is one of them. Go check her YouTube channel because...damn girl is a piece of work 💀

Her video titles are a literal caricature of the red pill pickme it's insane :stupidly clickbaity, with cringe BUZZWORDS WORDED IN BIG LETTERS LIKE AN ANTI SJW FROM 2014....💀 So embarrassing... But this pandering (especially towards Black men) seems to work ; homegirl has 1+ million subscribers after only 3 years of existence... That White woman knows what she's doing👀