#how can somebody be so distant but so close at the same time

[rwsdarw]

lil song thing

[zosanbrainrot]

PART 4!!

01 02 03 04 05 06

I stg I'm kicking yall in the shins one last time, we're ALMOST done with the angst!

Let me tell you I had this finished(!) twice(!), but no, I had to go back and change it lmao

In my first go the fight scene was much more rough, it was hard for me to draw from the beginning, I'm not really good at this sort of thing. So I took a little break from the comic and when I got back to drawing the last two panels (static ch close ups) they turned out so GOOD and CRISP! I just had to go back and redraw the previous ones. Didn't change the composition back then, just made the drawings less sketchy and fixed minor mistakes. This panel in particular went through bigger fixes, I couldn't get the pose right:

I emphasized the arch in Zoro's back so it's more clear he's hunched over, the head is lower, and the hand on his stomach wasn't looking good, so I switched its direction and I feel it looks more natural now. The whole pose is shifted to the side now, whereas in the previous ones it was more straight up, but I wasn't conveying perspective well.

So after that I had it all exported, loaded into drafts and as I scroll it on my phone I'm like... There should be one more panel where Zoro's getting kicked : | Imma need to change it AGAIN.......

It just didn't flow well. I work on the comic in chunks so I haven't put these panels together before, I always saw them side by side in my main file.

I just didn't like how you go from Zoro getting kicked to him being thrown, it just felt disjointed to me.

So first I looked through the three sole volumes of BNHA that I have at home to maybe understand drawing fight scenes just a little bit better. That's how I got to the new version of Zoro getting kicked so there's more lines showing movement etc. but most importantly you have the kick and Zoro's reaction separate. So now Zoro's face has a bigger closeup, you can see his open eye.

In the previous version it was more distant, the closeup wasn't as big and you couldn't see his expression well. With just the side view you could only see he's in pain but nothing more than that,whereas when you have a full view of his face you can get much more from that. You see where he's looking, you know he's looking at Sanji when he kicks him in the guts.

I guess that's why, in the first version, I was trying to still show his face where he's being thrown off of Sanji bcs I felt the side profile wasn't doing it's job, but at the same time it felt off, like there was less force in the kick bcs his head wasn't following the movement idk. Also he was def too big in the frame. So now Zoro's smaller to emphasize the perspective more, the head is down, the right arm is more to the side and there's more lines, the flame is more aggressive now and bursts into the sides when it comes in contact with Zoro's body to show the impact. I know they could be better still, but this is the best I can do right now and I'm happy with the result!! I'm glad I kept pushing it! These poses were VERY confusing to draw lol

Alsooo, it would make more sense if Sanji threw Zoro in the other direction, over his head like in karate/judo, but I wanted to keep my directions consistent. I had to have Sanji standing back to the carriage, so he doesn't notice the spear being thrown and Zoro facing the carriage so he can get hit from the front, right after he gets up. It's like..... did he not see it? Did he get hit on purpose? You decide lmao

Though I'm probably too rigid with my 'camera', in BNHA you see the action from any and every direction, i guess it adds to the dynamism of it all, also there's just many MANY more panels in manga lmao

Judge giving me major "isn't there somebody you forgot to ask" vibes at the end there lmao I hope you forgot he's even there and this comes as a surprise!

[mionemymind]

The Actress & The Geek

Summary: A late night practice causes Y/n and Wanda to confess their feelings.

Warnings: Fluff, Kissing, Slight Angst

A/n: I might post another one shot like this with a similar layout but different setting, like what if they needed an understudy? Would y’all want that?

Word Count: 1.5k

Masterlist

“Wandaaaa, where are you taking me?” Y/n annoyingly asked. Her newfound friend, Wanda Maximoff, dragged her to the College’s stage room. “I need help practicing my lines and you’re the only person I know who would be up at this time.”

Y/n glanced at the hallway clock, it was close to midnight and by now, Wanda’s friends were either partying or asleep. “I don’t know why you’re panicking so much. Everyone knows you’re going to get the part.”

Wanda pushed through the doors and excitedly ran up the stage, leaving Y/n by the bottom of the steps. “You don’t know that. I heard rumors that Violet might get it over me.” Y/n sighed at Wanda’s poor excuse of a lie. “Now stop being a baby and come over here.”

Y/n rolled her eyes and slowly walked up the steps and in front of Wanda. “Turn to page 214. I’ll start us off, okay?” Y/n reluctantly opened the script and turned to the page. Once Wanda saw that Y/n was ready, she started.

“Did I do something?” Wanda asked nervously, a hint of hurt in her tone. Y/n was stunned for a moment at how quickly Wanda got into character. Not wanting to disappoint her friend, Y/n tried her best to act in the scene.

“What makes you ask that?” Wanda walked away with a sigh as she combed her hand through her hair. “Are you seriously acting clueless right now?” Wanda gave Y/n a ridiculous look.

“Answering with a question doesn’t quite help-”

“You’re avoiding me.” A small pause happened in the script as Y/n and Wanda stared at each other. Y/n turned away, “I honestly don’t know what you mean.”

Wanda groaned and stomped back to Y/n. She spun her around and grabbed her hand. “Quit acting like a child and talk to me.” Wanda’s character was desperate to hear anything from Y/n, her eyes pleaded for some truth.

“I don’t know if I can tell you.” Wanda’s mouth twitched into a frown. She dropped Y/n’s hand and took a step back. Looking at the ground, Wanda played with her hands, unable to look at Y/n. “You used to tell me everything…but now you barely hang out with me anymore.”

Wanda’s eyes started to water, she started to walk away until Y/n’s character held her hand. “If I tell you-,” Y/n groaned as her character didn’t know what the best choice of words was going to be. In a softer tone, she says, “If I tell you…we can’t go back to the way things were.”

Wanda appeared scared of the truth but things had already changed ever since Y/n became distant. So who cares if the truth changes everything? Maybe now it will help this obstacle between them.

“I-,” Y/n’s eyes looked over Wanda’s shoulder, acting as if there was a character back there. “Tell me you’re not in love with him,” Y/n desperately begged. Wanda looked back, her hand still in Y/n’s, and pretended to see somebody.

She faced Y/n again, searching Y/n’s eyes for the meaning behind this. “What?” Y/n pulled Wanda closer, their faces inches apart. “Tell me you’re not in love with him.”

“Why does that matter?” Wanda challenged. Y/n gulped at how little space was between them but still pushed through with the character. “Because if you’re in love with him - I cannot be with you.”

Wanda acted as if someone called her name, but on cue, Y/n cupped Wanda’s cheek and kissed her briefly. “Find me - when you do, tell me you feel the same.” Y/n let go of Wanda’s hand and backed away to the other side of the stage, leaving Wanda at the center.

With wide eyes, Wanda touched her lips, the feeling of Y/n’s lips lingered. Her brain rumbled for the next line, but all she could focus on was Y/n. “Uh Wanda, did you want to finish the scene or?”

“You kissed me,” Wanda whispered to herself, surprised that it happened. “Did you want to kiss me?” Wanda only dreamed of a moment like this ever since she met Y/n back in the fall semester. She remembered bumping into Y/n on day one of rehearsal. Ever since then, they’ve always remained friends, until the day Wanda wanted something more.

In the basement of the party, Wanda sat with a group of her friends that go way back to high school and her castmates from the play. Y/n sat beside her already five shots deep into the night. Everyone was socializing and having a great time as the play had phenomenally gone well.

“We should play spin the bottle,” one of the crew techs said. Everyone was in some agreement wanting to spice the night up. “Okay, I’ll go first,” Steve said. The semester was close to an end and all Steve wanted to do was loosen up. He spent the majority of the semester worrying about his grades, his scholarship, and his football career.

The bottle spun and low and behold, it landed on the very person he wanted to kiss. “You down Bucky?” The liquor in Steve gave him the confidence he needed, otherwise he would have hidden. “You don’t even have to ask.” The two met in the middle for a slow but passionate kiss.

The group screamed with delight as Bucky deepened the kiss, almost going in with his tongue. “Okay you two, break it up!” Bucky pulled away with a charming grin on his face as Steve sat back looking love-struck. “Up next!”

Carol was next to spin, “God, I hope I get a good kisser,” Y/n whispered yelling into Wanda’s ear. The brunette forced a grin as she suddenly felt ill at the thought of someone else kissing you. She tried to think of something clever to say but nothing came out.

Focusing back on the group, Carol had just gotten done kissing Maria, another duo in Wanda’s group that had crushes on each other. It was now Y/n’s turn. She spun the bottle with great anticipation of who she was going to kiss tonight.

Slowly but surely, the bottle was making its last spins until it passed Wanda and stopped to the girl beside her, Natasha. Wanda could feel her heart drop as the two girls looked at each other with mischievous smiles. “Looks like you have to kiss me Y/n - don’t worry, I don’t bite.”

Wanda closed her eyes as she saw the pair leaning in, praying it would be over quickly. And when she opened them back up, she couldn’t help but wish that the bottle landed on her.

“Yeah - I mean it was in the script. I didn’t - I thought you wanted me to commit to it.” Y/n walked back to Wanda scared that she accidentally hurt her friend. “Was it fake for you?” Y/n stood still for a moment, afraid to answer. Wanda walked forward, closing the distance between them. “Tell me - did that kiss mean anything to you.”

“Wanda - I - I’m sorry. I really thought you wanted me to-”

“-What I want is to know if you like me or not. So tell me,” Wanda declared. The beating in her heart could not stop as she waited for Y/n’s answer. “I thought you would do just a kiss on my cheek or would have said that you kissed me out loud. But you kissed me and I can’t go back now.”

Tears formed in Wanda’s eyes as Y/n wracked in her brain for words to say. “I’ve been wanting to kiss you for so long now - so please tell me that was real.” The tears fell to her cheeks as her heart beat in anticipation.

“Please say something,” Wanda begged.

“Please don’t cry,” Y/n whispered, her heart breaking at the sight of Wanda crying in front of her. “Why shouldn’t I?” Wanda wiped some tears with the back of her hand, feeling stupid for even confessing.

“‘Cause I never knew you felt the same.” Y/n pulled Wanda close and kissed her deeply, wishing to show that this was the kiss that Wanda deserved, not from some stupid play, but from the fact that Y/n truly loved Wanda.

Wanda steadied herself, placing her hands against Y/n’s chest as she fiercely kissed back. The more Wanda pushed to steady herself, the more Y/n leaned in, begging for more. Their gasps and labored breaths were in sync as the kiss went from passionate to needy.

With each kiss, Y/n poured her heart, wishing that she could stop tasting her tears. Pulling back slightly, Y/n heaved out, “Please stop crying.” Y/n used one hand to wipe away the tears. “You’re gonna make me cry.”

Wanda chuckled as she looked at Y/n with such adoration. “I think you owe it to me to redo the scene.”

“Want me to kiss you better?” Wanda pondered for a second, “Something like that plus you’re acting skills could use some practice.”

Y/n gasped, a feigned hurt expression on her face. “I think I was amazing. Might have to audition for lead love interest.”

“Guess we gotta practice our kiss scenes.”

“Way ahead of you Maixmoff.”

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[sorceresssundries]

Until We Wake

Pairing: Gale/Tav

Warnings: Talk of death, afterlife, angst.

Word Count: 1000 words

A/N - I wanted to try and write something different, and move away from my usual overly-descriptive style.

I hope you like it <3

You are dead.

It was easy in the end. Like taking off a coat you’d been wearing too long.

There’s no confusion. You know you are dead, and it’s okay…Was okay? Is okay? Time is strange here. Slippery.

You are sitting at the edge of a great lake. Well, not really sitting, not really by a lake, but that’s how it feels. There is no sunshine, but you can feel the warmth of it on your—skin? No, not skin. There isn’t any skin. There isn’t a body at all. You just… are.

It’s nice, actually.

“God?” A voice, though not a voice, fills the space around you.

“Erm, no. Sorry. There may be one around somewhere, though,” you reply.

You sense a kind of exasperation.

“No,” it says, more insistently. “Which God is yours? Who did you worship?”

“Oh!” That’s funny. If you had lungs, you would laugh. “I didn’t really worship one.”

The silence that follows is heavy.

You’ve probably given the wrong response and are now going to drift here for eternity in silence. That doesn’t seem so bad. There’s peace in it.

“But, uh, I felt close to Selûne. I knew her daughter, actually. Aylin? I saved her once—no, twice! From an eternal cycle of ritual torture and sacrifice. Twice!” You pause, waiting for the weight of your heroism to settle in. “Can you write that down? Are you writing things down? I don’t really know how this works.”

“I am not writing things down.”

“Right. Okay.”

More time passes—seconds, hours, centuries. It is hard to tell. If experience has taught you anything, it’s that you should probably be a little hesitant about listening to mysterious entities who appear in your unconsciousness. But, for whatever reason, you have no doubt that you’re safe.

“Who are you?” you ask.

“Nobody.”

“Oh.” Another eternal pause. “Sorry, I don’t know what that means. I know you don’t have a body. I don’t either. What I meant to ask is... what’s your purpose here?”

“To help”

“Ah.” You think about that. It feels distant, though, like the thought isn’t entirely yours. “Can Withers bring me back? He usually does.”

“No. Not this time.”

That’s alright, you realise. Everything ends.

“Can you tell me how you died?” the voice continues, unhurried.

If sadness existed here, you would feel it.

“I failed somebody. I couldn’t convince him he was deserving enough to live. He sacrificed himself. I stayed with him.”

“Gale Dekarios,” comes the response. Even now, even here, the sound of his name warms you.

“Yes! That’s him! Have you met him? Is he here too?”

“He is not.”

You pause, a moment of confusion or relief, it’s hard to say. Perhaps he’s with Mystra.

He had followed her order, hadn't he? He had used the orb. Perhaps he was cradled back in her starlit palm. Perhaps he was finally fulfilled.

“He’s probably with his Goddess,” you say, matter-of-factly.

“He forgot his Goddess. At the end, he thought only of you.”

Right. He had said something like that once. On a boat he had built out of hope and stardust. It felt like a lifetime ago. You wish you had said more to him—something different. You should have been more convincing, made him see he was more than magic, more than martyrdom. He was kind. Funny. So very human.

Not anymore.

“Will I see him again?”

“Maybe”

This voice that’s not a voice is not hugely helpful. It feels distant. Somehow big and small. Like many voices, or none, all at the same time.

“I let him down,” you whisper, though no sound leaves you.

“He forgives you.”

What do they know of Gale? This mysterious spectre. Maybe it’s just your own thoughts, your desperation, trying to clutch at forgiveness. Maybe death has splintered you into fragments of yourself whispering back and forth. Maybe the afterlife is nothing more than talking to yourself in the quiet, with no one left to answer. A conversation in circles, where you are both the call and the response.

“You loved him" they say. It isn't a question.

“I did. I do. I always will.”

It's lucky you don't have a heart. It would be in splinters.

“Would you like to try again?” The voice offers.

Your thoughts pause, grasping at the idea. “You mean, go back? To the start? Is that possible?”

“Sometimes. Under certain circumstances.”

A chance to try again. At what? Saving Gale? Having a better life? A better death? Eventually finding your way back to this place, with no regrets holding you back?

You would like that.

“Will I remember this?”

“No.”

“Will he?”

“No.”

You could have had this conversation hundreds of times before, or perhaps it is the first and only. It is impossible to know.

“Ok. Yes, please.”

You can feel the pieces of yourself starting to come apart, like threads of a tapestry being unspooled by the oldest and gentlest of hands.

You reach out for those delicate, golden threads on instinct, but they slip away, and it is hard to know whether you are letting go of them or they are letting go of you.

Scratch the Dog. Karlach’s laughter. Night Orchids. Sunlight on scarred skin. Homemade cookies. Gale. Magic. A kiss.

You try to hold them tighter.

“How do I know I won’t make the same mistakes all over again?” you ask.

“You don’t,” the voice that wasn’t a voice says.

A silver sword. A man with horns dancing. Pipe smoke and bear fur. Taverns and temples and soft touches. Gale.

You’re trying to hold so many of them, you have to let others go. What is your name again? How old are you? Who were your parents?

Moonlight through shadow. A boat on make-believe water. A hand in yours. A purple dagger.

“Will I still be me?” You’re no longer sure what that means.

“That depends.”

The lake that wasn’t a lake, the warmth that wasn’t the sun, all of it begins to fade. You feel yourself pulled away, or maybe pulled together. You aren’t sure which—you just know you’re going somewhere, somewhen.

The voice speaks a final time as everything ends. As everything begins.

“Who are you?”

[hiiragi7]

Dissociative realities, meeting again and again...

Growing up, I never knew anything to be real. I lived in a foggy dream, reality seeming to be an abstract concept that I did not ever experience. It kept me safe and distant; if nothing is real, neither am I, neither is the horror I was living through. If it's all fake, then, nothing could hurt me - if even "I" do not exist, nothing mattered much at all.

My survival was pathologized a variety of things; diagnosed anything from Schizophrenic to Bipolar, finally Dissociative Identity Disorder. It didn't matter much what the doctors called it. They gave me pills for what they called a disconnect from reality, took my blood on a regular schedule within their all-too-white hospital walls, myself spending my days staring out at the world from behind thick glass while I stood on top of a plastic anti-suicide chair. All I could see from there was a parking lot, and yet I yearned for it; we were not allowed even short trips to the outside world.

How was I meant to be connected to a reality I was kept from? I could not understand it, and it only reinforced what I already knew; this reality was not my own, it was not one I belonged to. It was not my home.

I was born an artist, and so I found my most vivid realities somewhere in the space between my hands and my work. Here is where I found fragments of my own story, viewing reenactments through the eyes of others who never shared my name. I expressed it all through gory, twisted, horrifying tales. I did not know a happy ending, and so neither did my creations.

How ironic it was, that I knew these creations so intimately, the details of their selves down to their dominant hand, all the while with no concept of myself. Who are you? What do you like? What do you dislike? What does being alive mean to you? Questions I could answer in an instant for my art, but would struggle for a single word for myself. I was never good at introductions.

And yet, I was found introducing myself over and over, each time sure it must be the first time. My friends, too, introduced themselves back to me, although they knew this had happened many times before. This is something I will always be immensely grateful for.

I whispered, "I don't know you. I'm scared. Who are you? Who am I?" and my friends would reply in gentle tones, reassuring me, sitting as close as I would allow them. As I grew older, I met many others like me; others with DID, others who could not remember themselves nor others.

We found each other in a dance, meeting each other over and over again. You're my best friend, you're a stranger; I hold so much love for you I can barely contain it, I don't know you at all; We have so many memories together, I just met you today.

Over time, something shifted in me. I don't know you, and yet I know you are familiar, you are safety and I love you. I don't know you, and yet I have this sense we have known each other a very long time. I don't know you, and yet all I want is to be close to you, to talk to you until both our voices are hoarse. A deep knowledge grew in me, one which cut through my dissociation - an understanding that you are my best friend, you are my lover, you are a precious somebody to me even when I have lost the details, even when I have lost your name. I know you on a level I cannot put words to, and I love you.

This understanding then expanded to myself, to the individual fragments and pieces of me so long dissociated and unknown to each other. A love encompassed my whole being, and I could finally begin to know myself. I met myself over and over, much in the same way I had met those outside of me again and again. I began to understand, each of those inside of me is someone I have known before and will continue to know again, these someones are myself. I began to see their faces in my artwork, in old photos, in stories others have told me, and then even in my own memories.

Through loving others, I learned to love myself. Through love, I have found a reality which is not only my own, one to belong to; it is one shared with many others, it is community, it is everything to me. The love of those precious to me became my own.

[fun-k-board]

Mortal Kombat 2021 with a Platonic, Child Reader

Characters included: Cole Young, Liu Kang, Kung Lao, Sonya Blade

Note(s): This is an 'AU' of sorts where they have more time to train and and Shang Tsung doesn't attack Raidens Temple.

This has been in my drafts for about a year now, enjoy!

Cole Young

Sleepovers with Emily? Yes. Absolutely. Cole and Allison get woken up at 5 AM by you two roasting Kano, he has to hold back punching the two of you because he knows that everyone in the Temple would make that personal.

When you're both training at Raiden's Temple, Cole always goes easy on you and views you as his own kid, he gets how finding your Arcana is difficult, especially when it seems like everybody else already has this figured out.

You probably don't have any fighting experience so he takes some extra time to help you, and while he can't teach you any deadly moves, mainly teaching you defense and how to knock out an opponent, he's still very helpful.

Cole gives you extras at dinner, it's not very sneaky, he doesn't even try to hide it. Cue the teasing from everybody else at the table.

If you have anxieties about the tournament he tries calming you down by reading a story, it helped Emily so he can only assume it will help you as well, even for your age it's childish, but it makes things melt away for a moment. There's no training, unfamiliar temple, or Outworld, just Cole and a story.

He gets a mix between anger and sadness whenever anybody mentions the fact you need to participate in the tournament, he's tried to convince Raiden to take you out, to no avail, it leaves him to spend more time with you, he's afraid he'll lose you when the time comes.

Has absolutely no medical experience, the best he can do is carry you to Liu Kang or other medics.

Liu Kang

Liu helps with your temper or anxieties a lot, he's basically always behind you putting a hand on your shoulder, and views himself as an older brother to you.

He's very sympathetic and will give you advice or just listen when you need it, no matter what situation you're in. Liu is extremely truthful as well, if you're in the wrong he will tell you but he'll let you down easy with it.

Liu has a watchful eye on you at all times, he visibly sweats whenever you get close to Kano, Kung Lao teases him for it constantly.

He's like your doctor, and usually won't take you to any other medic in the Temple unless it's necessary, if you're injured in any way he's helping you and you cannot stop him. That is if you ever manage to get hurt anyway, he doesn't let Kung Lao or Kano use their Arcana on you.

Actually your personal hype man, the living embodiment of 'you're doing great sweetie', regardless of how many times you fall over in training, he only counts the times you get up.

Speaking of training, he tends to use repeated attacks so you can learn how to defend against them more easily, he doesn't use his fire unless he's certain you can move away from it, and he's very unsure about using heavier attacks on you.

That's why he's mainly instructing a fight between you and somebody else, so he can set ground rules to keep you not injured while allowing you to learn.

Liu Kang won't talk to you about it, but he's had multiple arguments with Raiden over allowing you to be in the tournament in the first place. He believes that since you're a child, you shouldn't be risking your life. Raiden doesn't listen.

Kung Lao

Kung Lao is probably distant at first, he doesn't really know how to act around children, at least not as an adult. He shares the same opinion of all the chosen, you need to be taken out of the tournament, and while he won't say it out loud, he does back people up when the opinion is shared.

He's more willing to use his aracana and 'deadlier' methods of training, but he has such a control over his fighting style and hat that you've never gotten extremely injured. Anytime you do get injured, he picks you up, regardless of if the injury allows you to walk or not, and takes you to the infirmary himself.

He's not good at comforting words, if you're nervous for the tournament, the most he can say is that fate wouldn't have chosen you for this if it wasn't meant to be.

Kung Lao already despises Kano, but he makes one remark towards you and in his eyes he's about to be a dead man, Liu Kang has had to hold him back on a number of occasions.

Sneaks you extra, and makes some faces at the dinner table, it ends up making everybody else laugh more than anything, but their jokes at his expense make you laugh in turn. So, he technically didn't fail.

He's medically trained and can in fact help most injuries unless they're extremely fatal, like Jax's arms, and so most of them he can fix by simply walking to the infirmary and walking out a minute later, you with a bandaged injury.

Sonya Blade

Sonya is a bit annoyed that a literal child got a mark before her, but then she realises that means you'll need to fight in the tournament, and she proceeds to dedicate everything to training you.

Even if she's not technically allowed to train with you before she gets her mark, she does sneak out with you. While she understands it's not exactly her place, in the short time she's known you she's become attached, and she wants you to have every chance of survival.

As part of the special forces, she's an expert in all types of combat, and will almost definitely teach you how to kill, even if it weighs on her conscience that a child could have blood on their hands thanks to her.

Everybody already knows about this, but even Kung Lao decides to back off once he notices how much she cares for you.

Sonya will get violent with Kano the second he tries to mock or tease you, she won't go too far, but she's teaching him a lesson and she wanted an excuse for months to do so just let her have this one.

At dinner she's firm with your diet, making sure you eat more healthy options every time, which, makes everyone at the table laugh. She's not a complete control freak, she just understands that in situations like these what you're eating is very important.

She's not the best person to come to when you're injured, but not the worst, either, she's very calm unless it's a serious injury, and knows the basics of at least disinfecting the wound / putting pressure on it so it stops bleeding while she brings you to a medic in the Temple.

[lumiambrose]

Blue lock option matchup for @thecurrator

Matchup with Sae Itoshi

i’ve never matched anyone with sae before

no pressure, shit.

frankly i’m not one to judge comparability… BUT i see a lot of potential as you both have many similarities/habits that i think would compliment each other)

first and foremost, sae isn’t here for small talk and neither are you. you think small talk is a waste of time and sae frankly doesn’t care enough to engage in it, you two definitely bonded over that. 

quality time is the go to for you. despite sae’s busy schedule, he’ll always find time to spend with you. you might not be doing anything grand, but he’ll always make sure he doesn’t overpack his schedule so you two can go out or spend an evening together.

very common to find the two of you on the sofa together reading books or watching movies together. being in another's presence gives you both comfort that you can't find anywhere else. although if sae does have a busier day, just chill with him while he practises. you simply being there encourages him to give it his all.

(he’d totally make you lie under him while he does push ups so he can kiss you every time he sinks down.)

a relationship with sae is definitely complicated. it doesn’t really matter whether you’re introverted or extroverted with him, as long as he can connect with you. sae is pretty reserved and distant so he needs someone who can encourage him to open up. in general, it’s a staple for your partner to bring out the best in you in relationships.

but with sae you’re on extra hard mode… :’)

he wouldn’t date somebody without thoroughly knowing them, so the phase where you two were just friends was critical to his opinion of you.

his initial impression of you was neutral, leaning more towards good. he found you lukewarm at the beginning, like he would with everyone, but appreciated the fact you weren’t an eyesore or earsore. he respects people that can thrive on their own.

very awkward between the two of you for a while, neither really knew how to interact with the other. luckily you had plenty ~~annoying~~ lovely extroverts to save the day. if you befriended oliver or shidou, you can bet they’d drag you along to their outings, whether you like it or not. and of course, there’s no way they can’t bring japan's treasure along too.

you both would typically take a step back to just watch everyone's antics and that’s how the two of you spent the majority of your time together. it stayed like that until you let a thought slip past your tongue, thinking about the correlation of their off field antics and their play style, it wasn’t until then that you two had your first conversation.

sae, knowing the answers you sought, enlightened you and that was how it all started. on that day you two spent the outing following your extroverted friends around commenting on how their behaviour influences their play style, or similarities, even habits they may possess.

sae hasn’t talked that much in a very long time…

slow burn to the max. i wouldn’t be surprised if you were closed off, well surprise surprise, he is too. the adventure of getting to know each other and opening up to each other was complex. neither of you were really willing to open up at the beginning and it showed, but that didn’t stop you guys. 

instead of holding conversations about each other, you two got to know each other through conversations about others or scenarios surrounding you. delving into people in your day to day life or even simply strangers. you two could understand each other's thought process and think on the same wavelength without even getting to know each other.

you probably didn’t know basic shit for the longest time, like his favourite animal or colour, but despite that you knew him better than anyone out there.

once you open up to each other, yapper x listener all the way. “I love to talk to certain people and about things I find interesting, like my fixations or a fun hypothetical situation.” Sae would sit there listening to your thoughts all the way. it almost relaxes him when he hears your voice yapping about the most out of pocket shit.

keeps him on his toes you know, never knowing what you’re gonna say next.

if the topic actually interests him too (or he’s feeling chatty), he’ll entertain them. either he’ll give his own inputs or question the plausibility of whatever scenario you may have concocted in your head. he enjoys dissecting your thought process, seeing how logical you can keep whatever creative situation you may have cooked up.

i personally think you’d enjoy this. despite you saying you enjoy psychoanalysing people, being on the receiving end can also be extremely fun. cause it’s him i can see you enjoying the challenge and even giving him the same treatment when you two don’t particularly agree on something.

(you two could join fucking debate clubs after that :p)

frankly i doubt sae has social media himself. in general, he rarely uses his phone. he’ll only use his phone for two reasons, his work and you. he was definitely forced into creating social media for pr by his manager, but he personally prefers a much more quiet life. he values every aspect of privacy he can get.

he also avoids the paparazzi like the plague, has learnt all the ways to sneak past them and eventually teaches you once the relationship gets hard launched.

his phone is primarily filled with photos of you, beaches, meals he has cooked for you, gifts (for you) and date photos. he has literally zero games on his phone and the bare minimum contacts. to nobody's surprise, he rarely uses his phone.

though if you message him he somehow always replies in an instant… :p

personally i think your love languages match up almost perfectly. i think sae is very heavy on acts of service and quality time. i’ve hinted towards these earlier where you guys just spend most of your time in each others company, or sae cooking for you. i don’t think he’s very vulnerable with his words, so he prefers to show his love with actions.

on the other hand, he definitely appreciates acts of service himself. he’s a busy man with a busy schedule so he really appreciates whenever you help him out.

make him breakfast before work or pack him a lunch and he’ll melt. he will be in a good mood for the rest of the day and it will scare his teammates and manager.

he’s never really received many gifts before and the idea has never really crossed his mind. i absolutely cannot see him being into luxurious, expensive gifts. if he wants something like that he can simply buy it himself. handmade or personal gifts on the other hand, he has grown quite a liking to since getting together with you.

he was so unsure how to act when you first got him something. he’d give a confused thanks and probably just stare at it for an unreasonably long amount of time. he’d put it up somewhere where he could easily spot it all day and stare at it 24/7. after he got used to it, he definitely tries to be more affectionate. 

will hug you if you let him.

secretly has all your gifts stored somewhere for him to reminisce on if he gets lonely <3

[typellblog]

Suruga Devil - An Analysis

Something I’ve been thinking about is how even though Oshino disappeared six books ago, some way or another a specialist manages to crawl their way into every arc. Almost irregardless of the circumstances, these kids need someone to explain the problem to them. To bring them face to face with the truth they haven’t quite realised yet. 

In Hanamonogatari, though, advice might be the last thing that Kanbaru Suruga needs - despite, or perhaps because so many different people want to offer it to her. 

I’ll be riding my arc formula all the way from Bakemonogatari until the wheels fall off, so I think here I want to talk about the title again. 

Suruga Devil. Isn’t that odd? It almost sounds like we’re dealing with the exact same oddity as her first arc. Except there’s a different Devil-sama in this one, someone who has more devil parts than Suruga herself. Numachi Rouka is also an oddity, by virtue of being already dead, and by that logic Suruga must be the ‘victim’ of her haunting. 

The theory is floated here that all ghosts work similarly to Hachikuji. They hang around because of a certain regret, and people with a similar regret or issue are the only ones that can see them. What, then, is Rouka’s?

I think there’s something to be said for how obviously she wants to play basketball with Suruga again. 

Even in a series full of unreliable narrators Rouka is unique in that we don’t get to see her internal narration, just how she chooses to present her life story to Suruga. There are hints that she was spinning it a bit - Higasa mentions that ‘family issues’ Rouka hardly talked about also contributed to her suicide, not just the broken leg. 

Frankly I see in Rouka someone trying to put up a strong front to hide how severely something actually affected her. She refers to herself derisively as misfortunate, acknowledges the suffering that it caused her, but still tries to make herself seem distant from it, like it’s something she’s already dealt with. Like her misfortune-collecting has made her happy again. 

Her initial attitude is hostile, confrontational. She seems like she’s trying to upset Suruga, describing her own activities in a tone that makes it obvious how unapologetic she is about the scumminess of it all. She wants to feel powerful, in control of the situation, even if it means she has to come off as an asshole. 

In their final match Suruga leans into it, matching Rouka’s hostility and desire to compete with her rather than running away from it. I want to say it’s a way of paying her final respects.

Rouka says she didn’t feel like she ever suffered a clear loss in life. Her injury didn’t come from a dramatic final showdown. Losing her scholarship didn’t make it impossible to continue schooling. And her leg’s rehabilitation didn’t make it impossible for her to live on. But at the same time, all of these things ground her down until she didn’t know what to do. Rouka says you can run away from almost every problem, and she did. She ran away from school. She ran away from getting a job. And in the end, she ran away from life. 

Kaiki remarks to Suruga that she can’t run away from all her problems. In his case he makes it brutally literal, but in an emotional sense he’s not somebody Suruga can ignore either, this weird older dude that has a history with her mother. Koyomi and Hitagi apparently told her to run away as soon as she met him, but they must not have considered he might have no ill will towards Suruga, not do anything that justifies running away from him. 

When Rouka gets on top of Suruga and draws close enough to kiss, she could run. She knows she could run. She doesn’t. Did you want her to kiss you? Some things you can’t run away from, because deep down you don’t want to. Like the dark reverse side of a wish.

For Rouka, the Rainy Devil is a competitor. It actually does something to solve people’s problems, where her method allows these anxieties to work themselves out by having the people in question do nothing at all. Some things are only made worse by worrying about them - in the hands of the Rainy Devil these problems that may have worked themselves out over time instead get escalated into potentially life-destroying issues.  Rouka isn’t one to make use of the devil’s arm, Suruga thinks. She would simply run away from the problem, not rely on external means to solve it. She’s strong like that. Strong enough to pretend her problems don’t matter to her. 

Only to pretend, though. The phrase “It’s better to regret doing something than regret not doing it” comes up. Rouka is of course on the side of regretting not doing something. A third path between victory and defeat. It has its advantages, Suruga does acknowledge it. But it can’t resolve anything. Rouka’s problems still exist, she just isn’t facing them. What Suruga does is make Rouka confront her and in doing so symbolically confront everything. It gives her a clear reason for her loss. It lets her let go. 

I think the reason that Rouka is so confrontational with Suruga, so eager to play basketball again, is because she knew this on some level. She prefers to regret not doing something, but of course that means she still regrets not doing something. She still wants to do it, still wants to play a proper match and finish off their middle-school rivalry.

I wondered what Rouka’s specific regret was, as a ghost, and while that game is about as close as anything, it still feels like I’m missing the big picture. Rouka doesn’t just collect misfortune, she collects devil parts. The things that show up physically on your body to prove you made a wish. The things that remain so long as that wish isn’t granted. The physical manifestation of regret for a choice that still has Suruga checking the news every morning to make sure she didn’t do anything during the night without remembering. 

Hachikuji gets people lost because she is lost. Rouka frees people from the regret of doing something because she herself never did anything about the situation she found herself in. It’s why she’s so interested in hearing the stories, along with the devil parts. People who did something she could never do. People who failed and became even more unfortunate than her, thus proving her right. 

She takes the devil parts from people who don’t want them anymore. You can’t run away from something if you really do still want it, but Suruga is well over it at this point. Consider how Suruga deals with the devil’s continued presence in her life. Refusing to run out of fear that someone might be faster than her. She used the arm to pursue Hitagi to the point of destruction, but in equal measure refused to do so, and in doing so was unable to replicate Koyomi’s success. In that sense, when Kaiki says you can’t outrun everything, he’s telling her that it’s okay to lose. It’s okay to try, and then fail. It’s okay to just hand the arm over to Rouka and move on. 

Higasa remarks that Suruga seems too positive of a person to have heard the Devil-sama rumor - because that’s the type of person Suruga is seen as. Polite, enthusiastic, direct, a star athlete, a hard worker,  a rich kid, a goody two-shoes. The type of person who would take issue with Rouka’s methods. Rouka expects a fight, because in a lot of ways Suruga is Rouka’s opposite, someone who would slap her in the face upon hearing about what she’s doing. 

At the same time, Suruga is the type of person to immediately second-guess that reaction. She lets Rouka’s hand sit on her chest for an uncomfortable length of time (the symbolic gesture associated with taking her devil arm!) because she feels bad about hitting her. Of course she would. She straps her arm to the wall at night because she’s scared of hitting someone again.

In other words, contrary to expectation, she’s the exact type of person that would encounter Rouka. The correct type of person to hear the Devil-sama rumor. The type of person that’s still burdened by the regret of a wish that turned into an obsession. Exactly the type of problem that can be solved, will be solved, simply by doing nothing. 

I said I still wanted to talk about the arc formula, and here it raises an interesting question of where exactly the specialist comes in. Kaiki, of course, is prominent in this novel - but even though he helps, he hardly explains anything. He has a policy, Rouka tells us, of only sharing half his information. It’s a little like Oshino’s rule of balance, but even less helpful. He shies away from the spotlight out of what I imagine is self-preservation - running away from Koyomi and Hitagi in Karen Bee, blatantly subverting their expectations that he explain Karen’s oddity. He does it anyway, but it’s pointless. The fever disappears on its own. 

Where Meme’s balance is to make sure he doesn’t interfere too much in others’ problems, ensure his surprisingly impressive spiritual abilities don’t create further disturbances in the course of solving them, Kaiki’s balance is to make sure he always has another opportunity to mess with people in the future, to ensure his practical-minded refusal to believe in spirits entirely doesn’t end up biting him in the ass. 

Even so, we’ve come to expect someone to come and clear things up, explain that which our protagonist was too slow to grasp on their own, put a neat little tie on the end of things. Like Tooe Gaen, perhaps? Deceased but apparently no less of an authority on the supernatural. “The motivation for justice is envy of evil,” we’re told, explaining precisely what left Suruga so unsettled about Rouka. Rouka did what she could never do, just like Suruga did what Rouka couldn’t. 

It’s a nice enough explanation, putting things into the dualistic perspective that Tooe seems to prefer. “If you can’t be medicine, then be poison, otherwise you’re just plain old water.” It doesn’t matter if you help others or hurt others as long as you do something, act in accordance with your nature, don’t let yourself be bound by the restrictions of society or conscience. Those are the type of people she seems most interested in, and the type of person Suruga ought to become as a result of this arc - someone who acts, as opposed to the inactive Rouka. 

And yet neither her nor Rouka seem to fit into Tooe’s format. Rouka, despite being plain water, is still muddy. A swamp. That mud, composed of everyday misfortune, is nothing nearly so interesting as to be called poison. Suruga is even more confused. A flash-flood, capable of clearing up the dirt that Rouka collected?

Suruga didn’t envy Rouka because she was evil. The implication there is that Rouka took pleasure in shattering social boundaries that Suruga felt obligated to stick to. But Suruga has already experienced what it’s like to violently pursue one’s own wishes in disregard of the feelings of others. It’s not fun! Suruga is jealous of, if anything, Rouka’s coolness. Her ability to roll with the punches, accept what happened to her with a laugh, shamelessly use her misfortune and pitiability as weapons. 

And Rouka, despite how she presents herself, was quite clearly not evil. Her offered ‘help’ is for entirely self-centered motives, and yet she’s much more concerned with the lives of others than her own. She does act like she doesn’t care about the people asking her for help, but all the same she does redirect those with more serious issues to the correct services. She did say she genuinely wanted to help Hanadori Rouka, the girl she met with the left leg, which is surprising from the perspective of Suruga’s vague animosity towards her, but completely understandable if you just think of Rouka as a normal girl. 

Suruga is neither good nor evil, as Koyomi puts it at the end of the book. She didn’t do the right thing, or the wrong thing. Neither did Rouka. They simply couldn’t look away from one another. Looking away, like running away, is only something you can do if you don’t really want to look. Even if Suruga ran away Rouka would have kept haunting her. She had the qualifications for it. Similarly, I feel like Rouka simply couldn’t look away from people’s misfortune, from the devil parts. Oddities arise for a reason, people have to want them on some level, and perhaps that’s true from the oddity’s side as well.

Speaking of Koyomi, though, he’s the last to give advice. He encounters Suruga at her lowest point, where she doesn’t know what to do, and quite literally helps her get back on her feet. His specialist qualifications are a bit iffy, but this is a timeskip - he’s in college, he’s more or less overcome his coming of age stuff. The thing is, his advice is to ignore everyone’s advice. For Suruga to act like herself, act on her instincts. To do neither the right thing or the wrong thing. 

Ironically, characteristically, she takes the advice anyway.

She’s immediately less unsettled around Rouka, more confident in how she wants to play it. I think about her bluntly stating she’s an exhibitionist. It’s a pervy joke, something that’s been oddly absent in this book so far. One of the things we realise, looking at the world from Suruga’s benefit, is that her perversion, her exhibitionism, frankly even her queerness and interest in BL was much played up for the benefit of Koyomi. At the same time, though, I don’t think that makes it somehow false or an inaccurate representation of herself. She was able to be more overt with these things around Koyomi, because he was accepting of it, and that’s a largely positive thing. 

It’s not a coincidence that her meeting with Koyomi gives her the confidence to be more like that with Rouka, or that this line about exhibitionism actually ties into an important part of her character. You see, right after, Rouka says it must have been tough for her to conceal the devil’s arm. 

I think about the arm as representative of the stigma of queerness, as something that paints her desire for Hitagi as animal and violent (even as it’s capable of finding perfectly healthy expression on the flip side), as something that she has to conceal from others. Recall how in Suruga Monkey her being a lesbian is revealed right after the arm itself, and it’s her sexuality that Koyomi finds the more shocking. 

From that perspective, you could think about Rouka as helping the devil part bearers integrate into society by removing the outward signs of their queerness, their difference. She takes it all on herself, with her oddly dyed hair, baggy tracksuit, put-on limp. She takes it all on herself because she no longer needs to live in normal society. No longer can. 

It kind of explains more of Suruga’s hesitance to let Rouka go. It’s not like she wants to keep the arm. It’s not like it represents the truth of her sexuality in itself. She was gay before the arm and will be after. I think it moreso represents Tooe’s approach to identity and self-change. You can be whatever you want, but becoming is an inherently painful process.

We’d like to think that Tooe’s message was that you should learn to change yourself rather than relying on suspicious magical artifacts, but the fact that she exposed Suruga to that risk in the first place indicates she’s fine with danger as a teaching device. Fine with her daughter becoming poison. Maybe even fine with her killing someone.

In the end, all the arm does is give her an inferiority complex. Her admiration of Hitagi, her graceful running style, is built on the fact that Suruga herself doesn’t feel she can run like that. She’s faster, but also uglier, more desperate. Her admiration of Koyomi, his self-sacrificing nature, is built on her shame over not being able to help Hitagi more herself. She’s self-effacing, but also uglier, more jealous. 

Suruga is glad to lose the arm, but she still feels uneasy about Rouka getting it. About being saved by someone else. Aren’t people supposed to just go ahead and save themselves? In this one thing, at least, Rouka is a more helpful specialist than even Oshino Meme. 

On that topic, the last person to give Suruga advice is Rouka herself. At the end of their second meeting, Rouka tells her to live a normal life. Do all the things I couldn’t do. She’s a negative example, telling people to not end up like her. Just stay in the closet. This, too, will pass.

That, kinda sucks though. Integrate into society? Drop all visible signs of your queerness? Get a boyfriend? Rouka’s channeling old tragic yuri tropes for the last time she thinks they’ll ever meet. 

Is that really what Rouka thinks? Does she really envy Suruga’s potential to be normal? To get a job? Because the opposite is precisely what Suruga envies about her - Rouka’s ability to ignore social expectations. The thing is, after their final match, the advice changes again. Who cares about studying for exams? Just start playing basketball again. This is really the only thing I can imagine Rouka envying Suruga for. It’s the path where she gets to make use of her arm again. 

Saying that basketball is representative of Suruga’s queerness here is even more of a stretch than applying that to her arm, but there’s at least one important respect in which the analogy kinda works. 

The way she wins the game. 

Basketball is a game for more than one player. The phrasing is a little awkward - ideally it would read “Basketball is a game for two players” to make the comparison to romance even more explicit, but - that isn’t true, is it. So the fact that there are exactly two of them playing becomes a little more significant, I think. 

They have to combine their efforts to get the ball into the hoop. That’s a disingenuous way of putting it, when they’re on opposite sides, but it’s still true. Rouka, after all, couldn’t get it in alone. That wasn’t her aim in the first place. She was just trying not to lose. 

Suruga didn’t just let her lose decisively for the first time, she also let Rouka win. Rouka wasn’t passed to, much, when she used to play. This is the first time she realises that basketball can’t be played alone.

And, well, when you put it in that sense, basketball isn’t just representative of romance, it’s representative of life in general. When you look back on Rouka’s backstory, at this point, one thing stands out. She never relied on anyone else. She never had anyone to rely on. It’s so bad that she ends up in Suruga’s orbit. The anime opening portrays what it might be like if they had a closer relationship, but that’s something that had to be invented in retrospect, because they really didn’t talk much. They didn’t even properly play against each other much. But when it comes down to it, Rouka is drawn to Suruga’s family inheritance of the devil parts, Suruga’s family inheritance of an annoying conman uncle, and in the end, back to Suruga herself. 

Suruga’s not the only person who ever truly understood her, as you might expect from a school rivalry situation. Suruga is simply the only person in a position where it’s even possible to truly understand her. The only person that could have drawn that final dunk out of her. The only person who could remind Rouka that she really did enjoy basketball, enjoy life.

In doing so, it serves as a reminder to herself, as well. 

Thanks for reading, everyone! Call this the Pride Month special, even though I didn’t discuss the queer themes of this story as much as I would have liked. Next: Otori. Oh boy.

[steviewashere]

Words Like A Bullet, Wounding My Soul

(also on ao3)

This is Part One, Part Two is Posted Here!

CW: Implied/Referenced Sex, Safeword Use (No Smut, Though) Rating: Teen

WC: 2,543

Tags: Post Vecna, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Arguing, Eddie Being Mean, Steve Harrington is a Sweetheart, Emotionally Hurt Steve Harrington, Insecure Eddie Munson, Insecure Steve Harrington, Safeword Use, NO SMUT, Using a Safeword While Arguing, Hard of Hearing Steve Harrington, Dialogue Heavy

Relationships: Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson

Characters: Steve Harrington, Eddie Munson

----------------- Eddie Munson and Steve Harrington were two forces not to be reckoned with. Everybody knew this. If Eddie was snippy and rough and loud—then people zipped their lips, threw away the key, and sat on their hands. If Steve was cold and distant and biting with every word—then the others knew to be warm and inviting and leave the past in the past.

These were known facts.

It was also known that Eddie and Steve were a pair. They were gentle with each other and all soft and gooey around the edges. Often, they'd circulate each other in public—skimming fingertips over backs of hands, sharing straws because somebody "forgot" to grab another—or behind the privacy of closed doors—entangled on the couch during movie nights and washing dishes after large dinners and exchanging quiet glances that everyone knew meant, "Horny and Impatient."

But they definitely knew how to choke each other out. Insecurities ran deep and were easy to point out. Like mold on bread slices.

So it makes perfect senes that they constantly argued, too. Usually mundane situations. Things like: "Ugh, Steve! It's my turn to choose what we watch, enough with the basketball!" and "Eddie, stop leaving your dishes strewn about!" and "No, I'll pick up everybody and drop them off!" Though, these were quickly resolved. A deep breath taken, a compromise made, and a few warm pecks exchanged.

However, on a slow Thursday evening in the middle of November, things go haywire.

They've been neck at neck for hours. Biting back and forth about the usual. The dishes. Your sports game. No, I'll do this. No, I can do it. Yet, everything comes crashing down the moment Eddie says:

"God, you're being so stupid!" Shouted and spitting. He's red faced and wild. His body lanky and petrifying the way a molten skeleton in some very graphic thriller movie would be.

Steve stops where he's been pacing in the living room. Now glancing back over to Eddie on the couch. "What?" he asks in a quiet, shaking voice. He doesn't remember anything about the argument, but he can definitely hear the way Eddie's voice echoes now. Doesn't know where the snarky remarks were going, how they dissolved now into this.

This being the two of them several feet apart in the same room. Not looking at each other, trying to find the most convenient and decorated corner of the Harrington's living room. Spitting and biting and growling.

"You're being so stupid!" Eddie shouts again. "I feel like every time I try to explain something to you, I'm just talking to a brick wall! Do you even listen to me? Or are you just a fucking space cadet all the time?" He runs a frustrated hand down his face, pulling at his features exaggeratingly. "For once, I wish you'd listen to me, just once!"

There's a tense moment where Steve just stands rigid and Eddie must take this as some sort of confirmation. Because he hefts himself up from the couch and makes his way around the coffee table to where Steve is just standing. A bony finger stabs into Steve's chest. Eddie closes in, voice low and husky. Face centimeters away, eyes lit with ingenuine mirth and teeth glinting in the shape of fangs. "See?" he questions lowly. "Can't even fucking give me an answer."

And something finally wakes up in Steve. He takes a wobbling step back, feeling cold air rush around him. "Wh-what? Of course I listen to you. I just—"

"You just what?" Eddie raises. His voice itching to be loud and louder. "You just listen to what you want to hear? Want me to call you pretty names and tell you how good you are and how excited I am to see you?" he taunts. "But when it's something I care about—"

Steve flinches at his wording.

"—when it's something I care about, you just can't bother," Eddie growls. "If it isn't fascinating to you, then you just tune me out. Your brain fucking implodes and shrivels back down to being jock sized and empty." He takes a hefty step forward, once again in Steve's orbit. A palm raises in Steve's line of sight, it shoves hard at his chest. Not sending him to the floor, but stumbling enough that he wheezes from the impact.

Eddie moves again to try it once more, to make Steve feel small.

But, Steve sidesteps him. "That's not true," he tries to argue, but it sounds too soft and tiny to be anything. "You were talking about D&D and I tried to follow along, but you know how I am with that stuff. It doesn't—"

"It doesn't connect," Eddie mocks. "Fuck you, Harrington. I've heard that a million times before and each one of those times, I've explained this shit to you. Over and over and—"

"Fuck me?! Fuck you, Eddie!" Save finally screams back. "Do you even hear yourself right now? You're being such an asshole, you know how I am with being called du—"

Eddie scoffs. "Oh, so for years, you and your little pack of high school bullies can mock me for shit. Call me names. Toss me around. And the one time I finally call you out on this, it's suddenly too much?!" he roars. "You're so—" He grunts, groans, screams nearly.

"Stop, Eddie," Steve demands. Tome firm first.

But Eddie barrels on anyway. "You're such a dick. You think everything revolves around you. You don't care for anything I have to say. You—"

"Stop," Steve pleads.

"You don't really care for anybody around you, do you?" he questions darkly. "'Just wanted to help,' my ass. Just wanted to clear your name, more like. Am I right? And now you're just stuck here, fucking jumping to whatever conclusions you want, following the wording you want to hear—"

"Red!" Steve screams. "Red, red, red!" he shouts before turning towards the couch and sitting down heavily. Head in his hands, fingers pulling at the hair around his ears. His throat feels like it's on fire and his head is pounding and there's definitely tears threatening to pour from his eyes. Peeking between the gap of his palms, the carpet is a mirage of blended colors, not a single one making a complete picture. But he can't look up from it. Not after having to practically safeword out of an argument.

Eddie is now startled into silence. His body turns to face his boyfriend. Where he sits, shaking and choking on quiet sobs. There's a brief moment where Eddie can literally feel his heart parachute to his stomach. Can hear the sizzling of his organ and the rush of his own blood. He's never heard Steve get loud like this. Usually he's so quiet and pensive and passive aggressive, but this, this is a new side. And Eddie doesn't like it at all.

It was common between them to try new things out and see what pleasure can be derived. And if things were taken too far or something immediately felt off-putting or terrible, they were allowed to exit the scene at any time. The stoplight system. Their shared word being "Asparagus." Things that could easily be heard and shut down everything at once, forcing them into a gentle lull where they share whispered praises and warm compliments and careful touches with a soft rag or just fingers.

So it's not unusual for Eddie to hear it. He's had to comfort Steve after a few scenes. And Steve's done the same for him.

What gets him is the context now. How tense the room feels, like walking into an already heated up sauna. Like walking into a hot tub set to one thousand degrees, in nothing—absolutely nothing.

And even though they’re fighting, Eddie’s immediate care kicks into overdrive. He forces his body to skitter over to the couch, plop down by Steve’s side, and reach out to rub a palm over his back. But when his skin makes contact, Steve flinches away.

“Don’t fucking touch me right now,” he growls. And when his eyes look deep into Eddie’s, there’s something tragic there. “You—You don’t get to say shit like that to me and then try to—Try to,” he chokes. A sob caught between a gag and a phlegm cough cracks open from his chest. “I don’t understand what I did wrong,” he cries out.

Eddie is once again quiet, keeping his hands to himself. Running them nervously over his thighs. It takes everything in him to not reach out and scoop Steve up and run fingers through his hair. He swallows and breathes. Opting to not respond. Maybe this will teach him to shut his mouth, for once.

Steve cries loud and harsh. And Eddie bears witness to it all. The contortion of his body, the reddening of his skin, the pulling of his hair, especially the wailing that’s spilling from his closing throat.

“I was listening,” Steve hiccups. “I was, I swear. I didn’t—“ His breath stutters through his next inhale. Lip sucking inwards when he does attempt a deep breath; it’s not like it lasts, merely only sitting in his lungs for three seconds before punching back between them. “I couldn’t hear you!” He exclaims. 

There’s no residual anger in Steve’s tone, though Eddie thinks there should be. God, he feels like a pile of shit just for the way Steve is holding himself right now. How his body is giving up on him. The way he continues to writhe through each stabbing cough and sob and gag and—He just feels like shit.

Though, alarms are going off in Eddie’s head. What Steve just said, that doesn’t make any sense. They were facing each other. They were sitting only two inches apart, practically every open area of skin clinging to one another. For a moment, Eddie once again feels anger spike through him. But the other part of him is overcome with deep concern, rippling in his blood, pouring out in the way his eyes widen and his eyebrows furrow and his mouth shifts downturned.

“You couldn’t hear me?” He parrots.

Steve nods his head. A bobblehead who’s spring is wound too loose, head flopping almost over its shoulders. “I—I was going to tell you, I swear. But I—You were talking and talking and I couldn’t read your lips because that’s really hard and you talk super fast and when you talk fast you mumble and—“ He gags. Slams his back behind into the couch, head dropping over the curved edge. He blinks rapidly, swallows so aggressive that his Adam’s apple appears to be plunging from behind his tongue. A deep breath, short lived. Two more deep breaths and they wheeze through him, but it must be enough because he carries on. “And then you got mad and you were so mean and I swear I was listening, I was interested, I just didn’t understand. And you get so tired of having to reexplain things that I didn’t want to ask and then you got even more mad and now—I was listening, I swear!” He cries out once more.

In response, Eddie’s jaw is dropped slack. He couldn’t hear me, he realizes. Genuinely, really.Scrambling, he whispers, “And I got mad and I called you stupid and then…” And then he called red, you idiot, Eddie self-chastises.

God, he is really a steaming back of flaming dog shit.

Taking another breath, Steve exhales with, “I was listening.” He tilts his head to look directly at Eddie. Eyes open and pleading. Begging to be understood. “I’m losing my hearing, Eds. I was going to tell you, but I didn’t—I didn’t get the chance. And then you were—“

“I was being mean. I was being an asshole. I wasn’t listening to you,” Eddie lists off. “I was doing the things that I accused you of,” he realizes.

Steve nods against the back of the couch. Blinking and blinking and swallowing and trembling.

“Oh my god, you couldn’t hear me, you couldn’t understand me,” Eddie whispers. Suddenly, he shoots upwards. Nearly startling Steve into another frantic round of panic. “How long, Steve?”

“Since March,” Steve admits, almost shamefully. “My head slammed into the wall inside of the Creel house and I ended up with another concussion. And that was the start of it,” he elaborates. “It’s just been going from there.”

As he talks, Eddie begins to silently cry. And when Steve’s done, Eddie sobs.

“And this entire time…Oh my god,” he mumbles. “Oh my god,” he repeats. Choking through his next breath. “Baby—“ Steve perks up at that. “—Baby why didn’t you mention this earlier?”

Steve shrugs. “Everybody else had it worse off. It didn’t seem important.” He sniffs. “Guess now it kind of is though, right?” A humorless chuckle. “If that’s how you’ve been thinking of me.”

Damn him, Eddie thinks. Damn him and stu—and his unnecessary self-sacrificial nature. “Sweetheart, you’re not stupid. I swear, you’re not stupid. Steve, you are one of the most intelligent people I have ever had the fortune of coming across. You know just what to say, when to say it. You’ve got that interest in classic literature, which I fucking adore by the way. And you know almost too much about any sport in the world. That’s—Your sport stuff is like D&D for me.

“God, you’re not stupid. Not by a mile. I just—I’ve always been treated like shit for the things I like. And I know that’s not an excuse, it’s just the way I’ve had to adapt and grow, y’know?” He asks rhetorically. “If I got defensive and angry and vicious, then people left me alone. And I could enjoy my stuff in peace. But when I tried to share the things I liked, people were fast to tune me out and shrug me off.” Eddie slowly inches in again, gauging Steve’s reaction. When he doesn’t flinch, but instead moves close, Eddie shoves a hand into the back of his hair and slings his other arm over Steve’s lap. Thumb rubbing at Steve’s denim thigh. He says, “You’ve never been stupid. I just thought you didn’t care. Nobody has ever cared about me the way you care about me, I swear it.”

Steve nuzzles in closer. He breathes against Eddie’s neck. Murmurs, “Everything you like is special to me. And I want to be able to understand. I’m trying.”

“I know baby, I see that now,” Eddie whispers. “I’m so sorry for the way I treated you previously and today. Sweetheart, I’m so sorry.”

He squeezes Steve tighter. An attempt to meld their bodies into one.

“I love you so much, Steve. We’re going to figure something out. Learn a language or raise some money for a hearing aid, whatever you want.”

Against Eddie’s chest, Steve nods. “I love you too,” he whispers. Presses a kiss over Eddie’s left pec. “You’re gonna have to show me though.”

“Whatever you fucking want, Steve. You can have anything you want from me.” And he can feel the smirk against his neck. But Eddie is willing and able to give. “Take anything you want from me.”

----------------- Part Two is Here!

[oceandirtcountry]

the most fun part about shipping is making kids, both for me and for the characters *ba dum tss*

Aurelia Rose: After kidnapping Ruby and Ben’s Necrofridgian child, doctor Animo planned to torment Ben by turning the two into ungodly abominations. However, he didn’t factor in how absolutely batshit insane Ben can get when maternal instincts of all things kick in, and Ben accidentally fries the machinery, splicing the Necrofridgian child with Ruby’s DNA and making her an identical genetic clone.

Due to her Necrofridgian DNA, Aurelia lacks the ability to make most facial features. Hence, she seems cold and distant from everyone but her close ones. In reality, she’s very close to her mother in talking about her interests.

She sports an upgraded version of Ruby’s Semblance that she dubbed “Freeze Tag”, combining the abilities of super speed from Ruby, plus the cryokinesis and intangibility from Big Chill.

The oldest of Ben and Ruby’s kids, and the biggest handful considering she can disappear at will.

She took her mother’s name, because Ben didn’t think it was right to name her after himself.

Kenny Tennyson: Kenny was conceived naturally, four years after Aurelia. Ruby felt like another one couldn’t be so bad.

Kenny is a splitting image of his dad, but is far more reserved and introverted. He doesn’t like talking to people, and takes a really long time to warm up to somebody—to the point where he doesn’t smack talk his villains.

He received his very own Omnitrix at age 10. An Ectonurite actually took host in the Omnitrix Ben built for him, but Kenny bonded with the visitor and has Ghostfreak as one of his favourite aliens. The Ectonurite, named Kasper, tags along and takes over Kenny’s fighting when he’s too weak to fight.

Kenny feels that violence is never the answer and will attempt to be as peaceful as possible.

After unlocking his dormant Anodite abilities, he swaps to battling with energy-based weaponry. By then, Kasper was appointed as his Plumber partner, so he ends up passing the Omnitrix to Charlie, his little sister.

He took his dad’s name as Ruby wanted to have one kid taking Ben’s surname as well, just to be fair.

Charlie Tennyson-Rose: Charlie was the wildcard that nobody was expecting. Basically, somebody forgot to use protection.

Two years younger than Kenny, Charlie is the bundle of joy that takes after her dad. At family gatherings, she basically talks with everyone, and resembles her aunt Yang more than Ruby or Ben.

Charlie is the only one to have an irrational fear, being flamingoes. Her dad has vowed to never bring them to the bird park.

Having no special abilities, taking after her dad’s lack of Semblance, Charlie runs her mouth giving logistic help to her siblings and other Huntsmen from the backlines while still training her fighting skills. Eventually, after Kenny hands her the Omnitrix, she dons the title “Charlie 20”, twice as good as Ben.

Her favourite transformation is Jetray, and like her dad, subjects it to overuse.

She takes both surnames because Ben and Ruby were running out of reasons.

Summer Cunningham: Wanting to distance herself more from the Schnee family name and paying homage to the greatest Huntress to ever live, Weiss let Cunningham’s surname take the spotlight. Summer is unable to wield the Ninja mask, much to her dad’s disappointment. However, her Semblance of Schnee summoning and some Ninja Earth attack allows her to influence her summons with Dust.

However, Winter spoils her rotten, and she’s probably the next candidate for the Winter Maiden powers.

Summer acts close to her namesake, being bright, bubbly and positive, but is really airheaded. Randy and Weiss have made sure that she’s really nice, but she very much doesn’t understand what it’s like to be middle class, spending money for her friends like water.

She’s the same age as Kenny, and the two have some odd feelings in between them that remind Ben of his own.

Randy has retired off the Ninja role post Salem’s death, but since he’s unable to pass it on to his kid, he decides to give it to Rex’s son.

Jake Xiao-Long: One of Yang and Blake’s twin son’s (which you shouldn’t ask me how they had him), Jake is about as stubborn as Yang. His Semblance is a bolster to this, leaving behind an explosive imprint of himself—he can leave clones, which he can detonate at will.

Yang starts to feel the real pinch of how her dad raised her, as Jake is as much of a crazy party animal, literally as a lion Faunus, and picks fights about every couple minutes. However, his heart (and hair) of gold means that he often does so to stand up for those he cares about.

He’s oddly closer with Blake, as she knows how to keep him in check as compared to Yang, who’s still working on keeping herself in check.

Ruby dotes on him because he chose a scythe that splits into twin sickles as his weapon of choice.

(it’s low hanging fruit. I have to name the kid Jake Long. He’s…it’s so…it fits…)

Sherri Xiao-Long: Sherri is a jackass. Coming off as quiet, shy and unassuming, she loves to play pranks on everyone, and nobody suspects her. Her twin brother finds her a little obnoxious, but they mostly end up being partners in crime as Sherri helps him sneak out of the house.

Her Semblance allows her to create a field of heat-induced hallucinations, the illusions seeming almost solid due to Blake’s cloning abilities being amped up.

A Panther Faunus, Sherri isn’t exactly lacking in the power department either, but would much rather not fight, and when she does, it’s with underhanded techniques and borderline cheating.

She longs to become the Ninja with all its fun gadgets and abilities, but she can’t.

Pietro (Junior) Salazar: Penny and Rex’s only son. Not wanting to burden their son with nanites, they made sure that he was nanite-free. It left him with Penny’s weapon-telekinesis abilities, which didn’t work as well until Randy offered him the Ninja mask “in secret”.

Now armed with an entire Ninja arsenal, Pietro whoops ass on the battlefield and keeps Bash, the heir to McFist’s company, from trying anything.

Pietro is calculative and tends to focus on the smaller things, and can seem hard on many people. However, he opens up to those he’s close with, which is extremely rare.

And yeah that’s it

[universe-friday]

EXCERPT #28:

Hello. I hope somebody is listening.

[...]

I haven’t seen her since I last spoke to you, old sport. It’s been harder to wander the streets of the City these days. It’s been harder to get up and get the day started. Thalia and I were so close… We went from spending all our time with each other, to not speaking for days at a time.

What possible reason could she have…? For someone who cares the same way, she certainly doesn’t enjoy showing it.

It is so hard to read her mind. She doesn’t give me much to base any guesses on… If only she would talk to me. Have a conversation with me. One that doesn’t lead to her deflecting, or running away.

Every time I think we’re so close, but then the tide just goes back in again. And when that wave comes crashing back into shore, are we ever able to ebb and flow the way we once did?

Or am I back to drowning, waves crashing into my lungs I am no longer able to scream…? Did she ever hear me? Can she hear me?

I suppose I never recalled walking to the beach in the first place, old sport. But I found comfort in the waves. I found myself in the waves.

[A small and distant knock is heard in the background. Equipment rattles. Radio stutters in astonishment.]

Hello…?

THALIA: Can I come in…?

[Beat.]

THALIA:  Please, Radio. Can we talk?

RADIO: …Okay. Come in.

[Door squeaks open, footsteps approach.]

RADIO: Hold on. Let me just mute this call quickly.

[A button is pressed, but sound continues to play. A chair squeaks and footsteps get further away. A conversation begins from afar, distant and quiet.]

THALIA: Radio, I… I am so sorry.

RADIO: I know. You say this every time… Do you want to get to a point?

THALIA: I want to be with you. But… I can’t.

RADIO: What do you mean, Thalia? What do you mean, ‘you can’t’?

THALIA: I mean that I can’t. I care for you… So much. I have never met anyone else like you. But, I just can’t be with you.

RADIO: I don’t understand… That makes zero sense, Thalia.

THALIA: I know. And I’m sorry. I can’t… I can’t explain it very well. I just- I have other commitments-

RADIO: Other commitments?

THALIA: In the City. And I-

RADIO: What can even be meant by ‘other commitments’? There’s someone else?

THALIA: No, Radio. There’s no one else. I just… I can’t be with you.

RADIO: We’re in the City… What possible- What do you mean… I… How could you have other commitments? You don’t have time? How is it possible to have that problem here, Thalia? I run out of things to keep myself occupied, stuck here. And with you gone, even fewer things. And I just have to be stuck here while you go and do other stuff? Leave me, even though I love you?

[Silence. A quiet, but suppressed sob is heard as it breaks past Radio’s boundaries.]

THALIA: It’ll pass…

RADIO: But what if-

THALIA: I love you too. And it’ll pass.

[A much louder sob is heard. It comes from both Radio and Thalia, this time.]

RADIO: [Quietly, through tears] Will I ever see you again…?

[Beat.]

THALIA: I think… that wouldn’t be good for either of us.

[The conversation fades into radio static. After a while, this fades to silence. Until a melody softly begins to play.]

♪ There’s nothing left for us anymore Why aren’t you listening? Why aren’t you listening to me? There’s nothing left. ♪

[azureforreal]

Can you give us some facts about Splendid and Splendon't?

Didn't expect someone to be interested on them, all right

Do you enjoy reading? Cuz there will be a lot of that, had to draw some things tho QHAUAHUAHUAHAU

Get ready cuz this is a rideeeeeee

First I need to explain their relationship from the very beginning

Its a big

"I did what I thought was the best for you"

(AND ITS BOTH SIDES)

Growing up Splendid ended being that child who does everything, "the jack of all trades" kid, or being called "the gifted kid". He basically did things using recognition and praise as fuel until hie ended up crashing with a big burnout and a lot of high expectations on his back. Its to a point were he was being taken for granted, "Of course he would do that, he's Splendid after all"

In the end he noticed he had never lived for himself, it was always for the wishes of others.

And he wanted to protect his brother from that. He wanted him to have his own life, free from the gaze of others.

So he decided to take everything to himself so his brother wouldn't face the pressure or constant glares, of course, it came with the price of him growing distant from his brother for being way too busy.

But for Splendont, it ended with him becoming the child who was aways being compared, the "not good enough" one. So he just accepted that becoming his bitter self, becoming the opposite of his brother and not giving a fuck about what others think.

Then the war came and Splendid wanted to enlist with the intention of freeing himself from the weight of expectations for a while and trying to have some time to himself, perhaps follow his dreams of escapism that he had while reading comics.

And to his surprise, his brother wanted to enlist too. Splendid was against it but when Splendont set his mind or something, its too late.

Fast forward to after the war, it still a difficult relationship for both of them

Its not something they can just shake hands and be happy go lucky best brothers, there was a lot of negligence and postponing things for later until it was too late.

And they are too prideful to settle things down first or ask for help, in that aspect, you can see how much they are alike

NOW LETS GO BACK TO SILLY STUFF

Splendid is the oldest twin just by a few minutes

They live in the same house and this makes a scene in chapter 3 hilarious, Splendid knew exactly were his brother went after leaving him alone in the street "Bro, I literally live with you"

They have nicknames, Splendid can be called as Did and Splendont can be called as Don (yeah, without the "t" because the amount of puns it was possible doing with it made him soooooo mad XD)

Splendid had a wish of becoming a photographer, the idea of freezing memories eternally console him from his reality, but OH BOI, do we have some news for him

Splendont doesn't like wearing the hat from his uniform, the first chance he gets, he's taking it off, Splendid its not a fan of it too, but he tries to hide it and show he follows the rules.

They do dumb competitions against each other (Splendid wont admit it out loud but he's extremely competitive), like getting to the end of a corridor first, getting in the line first etc

Sometimes they will team up to piss off Flippy, they have many inside jokes about acting like is the end of the world every time Flippy shows any respect

They would look like this in human form. As they are twins, Splendont is basically a red Splendid if he didn't tie his hair, and yes, they have an ahoge, NOBODY IS STOPPING MEEEEEEEEEEEE

They are conventionally handsome while Flippy is that one analogue horror looking friend, so you can imagine what the three look like together (Flaky has shoujo filters in her eyes, she grew up with him)

Splendid has a bad vision when it comes to reading things up close. He sees it as a weakness someone could use against him, so he tries to hide it, sometimes he forgets his glasses at home

but somebody dont.

Then he proceeds to throw a chair at him

"NOW you can see it coming" XDDDDDDD

As much as Did tries his best to keeps things civilized, sometimes he has a huge family drama fight at work with his brother while Flippy is in the background asking himself "Could I use this as blackmail?" QHAUHUHAUAHUAHUAHUAHAHA

But why Splendont decided to join the army in the first place? I leave that interpretation to you, what do you think it was? kekekekeke

[but-the-library-of-alexandria]

man so many people don't realise just how much comfort and wisdom we can find in history - generic ass history - just as regular people day to day. maybe I'm biased because of my job and it probably sounds like propaganda coming from me lol, but in These Difficult Times history is my first and greatest source of reassurance. every time I'm on the verge of panicking because I'm pretty sure this is the end of the world, I remember that people have been sure they were witnessing the end of the for thousands of years, and the world is still here. I look back at every crisis of the past - the fall of Rome, the world wars, famines and floods galore - and here we are, alive, looking back on 'the end of everything' as a distant human memory.

I walk around my village and look at the old houses where the poor used to live, and the not so old houses where the poor live now, and I think - a hundred, three hundred, a thousand years ago, there were people here with the same worries as me: worried about money, about the climate, about the rich and powerful stripping them of their rights. they suffered, they knew loss, they were afraid. but sometimes the church bells rang on a saturday and a young couple were cheered through the churchyard, excited to start a life together. an overworked and underpaid quarryman hauled his aching bones to the pub and shared a drink and a laugh with his friends, and halved his problems. a woman lay awake all night wondering whether that law would pass in parliament, what it would mean for her daughters, and then the sun rose warm and beautiful, and she got up, cut herself a piece of bread, and sat outside her cottage bathing in the light and listening to the dawn chorus, and she closed her eyes and smiled. the last thursday of October everyone put on their favourite hats and went out to see the ponies at the fair, and danced into the night. someone said 'help me, I dont know what to do', and somebody else said, 'I can take care of that for you.' they struggled, they found the light and they lived.

all the awful things happening now have happened before, and we have endured. the sun still rises, the bells still ring, the music still plays, the people are still here. our predecessors hand their memories to us through the ages: this is what happened last time. this is how we survived. it was hard, it hurt, and not everyone made it, but enough of us did. and we smiled, we laughed, we knew joy. you can do it. they can't keep us down. life will continue to live.

[liviavanrouge]

Grandmother

Livia: *Huffs then walks away* Whatever...

Kalim: LIV!!! WATCH OUT!!

Jamil: KALIM NO!!!!

Kalim: *Shoves Livia out of the way, venom hitting his leg*

Azul: *Rushes over as Kalim screamed* KALIM!!

Livia: *Hurries over, her eyes wide as Azul and Jamil inspected the venom eating away at the spot it landed on*

Livia: *Whips around to the watching crowd* SOMEONE HELP HIM!!

Azul: *Yells in alarm when his healing magic backfired* Ouch...

Handy: Healing magic won't work, neither will potions, fae jaguar venom is complex and it has it's own magic...

Livia: *Looks around desperately* THEN SOMEBODY CURE HIM! PLEASE!! ANYBODY!!!

Lenia: We don't share our cure with outsiders, your friend had his leg hit so, he will survive but he'll be unable to walk again

Livia: So, you're just gonna leave him in pain....

Lenia: We're sor-

Livia: I HATE BEING ONE OF YOU GUYS!!!!

Lenia: *Steps back as gasps of alarm and offense ran through the crowd*

Livia: I HATE BEING A FAE JAGUAR!!! I WAS HATED FOR FOUR YEARS OF MY LIFE BECAUSE OF YOU ALL AND YOUR CHOICES!!

Livia: EVEN WITH THE LAW GONE, EVEN WITH ME BEING A PRIME EXAMPLE OF WHAT YOU ALL COULD BE, I'M STILL HATED!! I'M HATED FOR THE CHOICES YOU GUYS MAKE AND NOT FOR ANY I MAKE!!

Honey: *Stares with wide eyes, stepping from the crowd*

Livia: YOU'RE WILLING TO LET SOMEONE GO THROUGH PAIN RATHER THAN HELP THEM!!

Livia: WELL I'M NOT LIKE THAT!! I'M NOT LIKE YOU ALL!!!!

Lenia: You'd need a relative, that's all I can say but we don't know who's related to you here

Livia: *Looks around, tears falling down her cheeks* THEN TRY EVERYONE!! ANYBODY TRY!!

Lenia: It might worsen the effects if it's the wrong person-

Livia: YOU TRY THEN! TRY IT WITH ME!! PLEASE!!!!

Lenia: *Shakes her head* I'm sorry...

Livia: *Stares with wide eyes, squashing down the emotions showing in her hair*

Kalim: Liv...

Livia: *Turns away and lays beside Kalim, her chin resting on his shoulder* You're gonna be okay...

Kalim: This isn't so bad, I'd take a venom wound again and again for you guys...

Azul: *Smiles slightly* We know, idiot

Jamil: Thanks...but please don't take one for me

Kalim: *Laughs quietly, his chin resting on Azul's arm*

Honey: Child, who's your mother!?

Livia: Huh...

Honey: You look like my daughter

Livia: My mother is Thea...

Honey: *Stares in shock as the crowd murmured* Pink hair?!

Livia: *Nods* Yes

Honey: Who is your father!??

Livia: Lilia Vanrouge..why?

Honey: *Stumbles back surprised* THEY GOT MARRIED

Livia: Yes, why-

Honey: *Pulls Livia over with her wing to Kalim's leg* Shoot your venom with me at the same time!

Livia: WHAT!??

Honey: Trust me!! NOW!!!

Livia and Honey: *Unhinges their jaws, firing venom at Kalim's leg, the venom turning white when they mixed*

Kalim: *Looks at his leg, his eyes widening when the effects reversed*

Jamil: How? *Runs a finger over Kalim's now unharmed skin* What....

Kalim: *Grabs Azul's offered hand, testing his leg* It doesn't hurt! I can walk!!

Livia: How?

Honey: Shooting venom at the same time of a relative distant or close can heal a venom wound, no matter how big

Honey: Like Handy says, the venom had magic that protects it as it harms the victim but relatives venom mixing reverses the damage it'll deal and instead it heals

Livia: Thank the sevens...

Livia: *Looks at Honey* Who are you supposed to be then?

Honey: Your grandmother

Livia: *Perks up surprised* Oh!

Honey: You were raised right, Livia, never before have I seen a fae jaguar show so much emotion and care

Livia: *Smiles slightly, Honey patting her head*

Honey: Your parents did right on you, little one

Livia: Thanks...

Honey: *Places a hand on Livia's shoulder then points to her friends*

Azul: *Smiles, walking over, helping Kalim walk*

Honey: It'll take half an hour for him to fully heal, just rest

Livia: Kalim, don't ever do that again!

Kalim: *Laughs* I probably will, after all you guys are my friends!

Azul: So you trust us?

Kalim: *Throws him a bright grin* Don't I eat the food you guys offer me?

Livia and Azul: *Laughs, smiling at him*

Jamil: *Sighs and smiles, chuckling*

Honey: *Watches them smiling, fluttering her wings* You raised her right, Thea....

@queen-of-twisted

[bellewintersroe]

Another idea which is quite angsty is if for example joe having a crush on reader but she choses to be in a relationship with shifty like will he be jealous, angry or happy for them

You honestly send in some of the best ideas, thank you 🥰🥰🥰 can’t wait to write this ! Joe Liebgott reacts to crush!reader being in relationship with Shifty Powers:

Ok first of all I feel like Joe’s feeling for you would never ever be spoken about, like as cocky and confident as he can portray himself to be he’s deeply and secretively sensitive and worried about his feelings not being reciprocated.

your friends for a longggg time through the war and you’re probably blind to his soft spot to you, sure you see he’s a little more gentle with you, but you’d never take this as him having feelings for you?

Anyway I think Joe would be semi blind to you and Shifty at first? Joe is very aware he holds no ownership over you in the slightest, so he’s not all eager eyed searching for competition.

He’s accepted that you’re just his friend, yanno?

Buttttttt, let’s say one day he overhears people teasing you or Shifty and he gets all confused, like, “what the hell ya’ talkin’ about?”

when he finds out you and Shifty kissed- not even that you’re just getting close, he’s momentarily shocked.

you? And Shifty? You and his good friend shifty? Joe doesn’t believe it at first, but he feels his face heating up before anything else, then comes an unsettling feeling in his chest- oh shit he’s jealous.

I don’t think Joe would ever be a bad friend, not to Shifty, so he would NEVER disrespect him for being with you no matter how jealous he feels.

lays I’m his bed overthinking, just staring at the roof. He figures he’s just gonna get over it and ignore his feelings- therefore pushing you away in the process.

He can’t stand the idea of being rude or harsh to Shifty, but he unconsciously nudges the blame onto you and decides it would just be easier to push you away.

you’re right under his nose, grinning and gazing up to Shifty with a glimmer in your eye that Joe has never seen before. That’s what breaks his heart.

I think at first he’d kinda be caught up in jealousy to realise he doesn’t need to be salty, so when you try to talk to him, he kinda goes cold and makes any excuse to end the conversation.

Barely holds eye contact with you, can’t bare to look at you in the eye and not see the same spark that you look at Shifty with.

I imagine Joe physically smacking himself when he realises he’s acting like a dick and his feelings aren’t exactly super covert if he continues to act like this.

Somebody probably calls him a child, Perconte or somebody honest.

I think in some way he’d really see how serious you were about Shifty after he was in the car accident that left him severely wounded. He sees the worry in your eye, and realises it’s not his place to act distant or brash just cos of a stupid crush, you and Shifty actually do work super well together.

Thank god you chose Shifty out of everybody, I don’t think Joe would’ve tolerated them like he would Shifty.

Joe probably does make sure with you it’s all good and he’s treating you right (obviously cos Shifty is an Angel) but just in case.

probably never lets his feelings out, even if you or anybody else have the slightest idea he might be a little jealous, he denies, denies, denies.

his poor little heart, somebody play mini violins cos be really feels bad for himself.

[lythea-creation]

Brighten My World - Tasneem x fem reader (Chapter 1)

summary: After Layan's death (f/n)'s struggling to cope. But when she finds out about Tasneem's eating disorder she knows she can't just stand by and watch.

warnings: grief, signs of depression, eating disorder

word count: 2.348

Author's note: Feel free to check out my Masterlists and make requests. No reposting please! Reblogging, comments and requests are always appreciated! If you like the story/my writing, please don't be shy to say it via comments or asks! It takes you a few seconds and might make my day. It's the best appreciation you can show to a writer you like.

Requested by @hiimnewheresblog

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Lately everything seemed to be a nuance darker. The sun was not as bright as it used to be. The sky not as blue. The air not fresh enough to provide me with sufficient oxygen. Breathing had turned out to become more laborious as my chest was feeling to tight for my lungs.

Yet I dragged myself to school every day where it was all came crushing down on me even more. After all I did not have a choice.

Since Layan's death nothing had been the same and yet it felt like nobody truly cared. Not about Layan herself. At best they cared about the fact that one of their students was not alive anymore.

Everyone was just moving on, stopping here and there to stare at the signs that Layan had actually existed. But to me it was so much more. She had been one of my best friends, basically my only friend considering that nobody was wondering about my sudden distant nature.

Maybe I was even more unseen than Layan. I had turned into a shadow.

Miss Abeer was actually the only one recognizing me.

I noticed her concerned glances when I was only staring at Layan's old seat in class. She was even calling me in to talk to me from time to time. But sadly that was not enough to lighten the pain.

Right now I was hiding inside one of the bathroom stalls throughout the break. Somehow the close space was giving me some kind of comfort, like my world was confined to these four walls. Plus you did not have to explain yourself when you were crying in there.

I was startled though when I heard somebody throwing up. Honestly I did not want to risk getting such a tiresome infection. So I decided to leave as soon as that student had left as well.

Out of curiosity or rather to know who I should avoid for the rest of the day, I took a peek through the slit between my door and door frame.

To my surprise it was none other than Tasneem.

Of course I took notice of her sitting in class later on as if nothing had happened. But it did not seem like a big deal to me. She could have eaten something she could not stomach after all.

But that changed when I accidentally caught her throwing up once again a few days later.

This time I decided to confront her with it.

“Tasneem”, I called out while getting out of my stall.

She jumped as she obviously had not noticed my presence before.

“(f/n). How long have you been in here?”, she inquired, insecurity resounding in her voice.

I had to admit that I was surprised she even knew my name.

“Long enough to know about your eating disorder”, I enlightened her.

The gasp and the literal panic written all over her face were making me continue quickly: “Don't worry! I won't tell anyone. Under certain conditions.”

Her body language changed as she crossed her arms in front of her chest, a defensive almost angry look on her face.

“What do you want?”, she questioned, her voice resembling her non-verbal language.

“I want you to talk to me about it”, I proposed.

There was a short moment of silence between us before she spoke up again: “Seriously? Why the bother? You can already screw me with knowing about it at all. You won't get anything out of it”, she noted.

“But maybe you will”, I considered.

“I don't get it”, she confessed. “Why would you do that?”

“Because I want you to get better. This is serious, Tasneem”, I pointed out. “How long has it been going on?”

“I dunno. Maybe a year or so. I don't really remember”, she admitted.

“Have you tried talking to your mom about it?”, I wondered.

“It's complicated”, she claimed.

“Okay. The break is almost over. Do you mind meeting up after school?”

“You won't let this go, right?”, she reassured.

I shook my head no.

“You can come over to my place if you want. I'm getting a riding anyway. So you can just come along”, she offered.

“Okay, I will”, I agreed.

As soon as we left the restroom, our relationship was unchanged. She did not pay attention to me at all.

But a few hours later I was sitting on a chair next to her bed she was sitting on.

“So what else do you want to know?”, she inquired.

“Can you come to me or call me whenever you feel the need to do it?”, I requested.

“How would that help?”, she remarked. “You don't even know me. This whole thing is ridiculous.”

“You're upset”, I noticed.

“Obviously”, she shot back. “You're completely ignoring my privacy.”

“Keep on ranting if it helps”, I encouraged her.

“Who do you even think you are? How highly do you think of yourself to suppose that you out of all people could help me? You can't save me”, she exclaimed.

“Probably”, I whispered.

“You think I could be your project just because you don't have anything else to do as you have no friends. You don't even try to get along with people. You're a weirdo”, she continued.

My eyes fixated on my fidgeting hands. Despite my recent lack of experiencing my emotions, her words were somehow hurting me. Most likely because she was right.

After a short moment of silence I asked her if she was finished.

“(f/n), sorry. I ...”

I interrupted her: “Don't be. Just come to me when you need to vent. I'll listen to you. I'll try to help even if I'm just an imposter.”

“I didn't mean it like that”, she insisted. “It's just … nobody knows about this except you.”

“It's okay to be scared, Tasneem”, I assured her. “Everybody feels that way from time to time.”

“You sure don't”, she mumbled.

“What?”

“You always seem collected, wearing a poker face. You don't even try to participate in class. I've never seen you hang out with anyone. Yet you appear indifferent, calm, like you don't care”, she explained.

“If I didn't care I wouldn't be here, would I?”, I replied.

“But why me out of all people? I'm privileged, have all the resources I could need. So why are you still wanting to help me?”, she wondered.

“Coincidence? You're right. Everybody's dealing with something heavy and there a plenty of people who don't have as much money or connections. But you're still struggling. So the right piece you need seems to be missing. I couldn't forgive myself if I knew and didn't act on it. I know that it's selfish”, I confessed.

“Okay”, she stated.

“Huh?”

“I will try to come to you. But it's gonna be hard for me to do so, especially because I don't really know you. So I need to be selfish as well and make a condition”, she announced.

I waited for her to continue.

“I want you to tell me about yourself as well and become my friend. It wouldn't be fair if this whole thing was one-sided after all.”

“We have a deal then”, I agreed and shook her hand with a smile.

Over the course of the next months we grew into our roles.

Tasneem actually came to me at school whenever she was feeling overwhelmed. And she would call me when I was too far away to quickly get to her.

I would talk to her, try to make her work through her emotions in another way.

I let her squeeze my hands as tightly as she needed to when she was suppressing the urge to binge.

I gave her a pep talk when everyone else talked her down.

I hugged her when she felt like nobody cared about her, but only her performance.

I told her bedtime stories when she could not sleep out of stress.

I was sitting in the front row during her most vulnerable moments and for the first time since Layan's death I was fully experiencing my life again, with all the unbearably strong emotions that belonged to it.

“(f/n)?” Tasneem softly uttered my name as we were laying on her bed.

It was not unusual for me to visit her anymore, not even to sleep over at her place. Sometimes it was helping her to hold me to fall asleep or the other way around. It was frightening to feel this close to her. Like I might lose her in the blink of an eye, just as quickly as it all had begun.

“Yeah?”, I answered, turning a bit to face her properly.

“You've changed”, she noted.

“You too”, I noted, smiling at her.

She smiled back at me. But it vanished too quickly.

“What is it really?”, I questioned.

“You're the only one who truly sees me”, she proposed. “I know that it hurts you when I fall back into my bad habits and yet you never blame me for it. You're always supportive, giving me whatever I need, whenever I need it.”

Was that a compliment? I was not used to this kind of conversation.

“When you visited me for the first time, I was an asshole. But you still stayed. Even though I talked you down. It didn't seem to affect you”, she remembered. “Do you still feel that way? Now that you know me better, would it hurt if I talked to you like that?”

“It did hurt back then”, I admitted. “But it would be more painful now.”

“How can you always stay so calm then?”, she inquired. “No matter how upset I am, you don't freak out. Instead you get me to calm down as well.”

I avoided looking at her when she said that. My hands started fidgeting again.

“You aren't”, she realized. “You want to come off as invincible, to mask it. But you're not. You're just better at hiding it.”

I stayed silent at her statement because she was right. I had picked up that skill a long time ago, maybe had it my whole life. But it had become worse with Layan's death. So bad that I sometimes could not see through my own act.

“What is your thing you're dealing with? It's gotta be a big deal since you never brought it up”, she assumed.

“I dunno if I can talk about it”, I confessed, my voice already cracking slightly as tears were flooding my eyes at the mere thought of Layan.

I had not gotten any chance to deal with my grief yet. Otherwise I would have broken down completely and there was no way my parents would let that happen. They thought it would simply go away after some time, like the person I had felt closest to had not just been killed by her own brother. Like I would be able to talk to her again, like she would call me to tell me whatever was bothering her. Like she would sing for me when I was feeling down.

Without realizing I started crying as the memories flooded my mind. I just noticed when I saw Tasneem's expression before she pulled me into her arms.

My tears transformed into painful sobs as I could not hold it in any longer. When I was too exhausted to continue crying I fell asleep in her arms.

I woke up in the middle of the night.

Tasneem was holding me so tightly that there was no way to get out of bed without waking her up. So instead I tried my best to enjoy the moment despite my head screaming at me to run.

The fear was getting stronger the closer we got. It was unlikely that Tasneem was going to die soon. But I had not expected Layan to die either. So rational thinking was not helping me in any way.

“Hey”, Tasneem greeted me.

Her voice was groggy from sleep. It was absolutely adorable.

“Hey”, I mumbled back.

She loosened her arms around me to give me a chance to move. “How are you feeling?”

Great question now that I was so out of touch with my feelings. But I had to be honest with her. After she had opened up to me so many times it was not fair to keep everything about me to myself.

“Scared”, I uttered.

“Why?”, she worried.

“I … really care about you. A lot. I don't wanna lose you”, I revealed, pushing myself against her again to make sure she had not already disappeared.

“I won't leave”, she promised.

“You never know”, I declared. “What if it isn't your choice?”

She cupped my cheek with her hand, leading me to look up at her.

“I won't leave”, she repeated. “So please don't leave either.”

“Even if I didn't wanna be your friend anymore?”, I questioned.

“What?” Horror was taking over her face.

“I'm sorry, but … I love you”, I confessed.

For a moment she froze, scaring me to no end. But that all vanished when she closed the last tiny gap between us to kiss me.

When she pulled back again, she complained: “You really scared me for a second, you know?”

I laughed at her reaction and after pouting for a few seconds she joined in. Just now I realized how much I had missed laughing like this.

I was aware that my pain would not just fade away this easily. That I had a lot to work on and that being with Tasneem would not be enough to solve all my problems. But it was moments like these who were crucial to help turning my world brighter again. One step at a time.

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