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psylunari · 2 years

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Comments: thoughts, types, how-tos, and etiquette (part 1 of 4)

I did a thing again! It's overly long. Who could've thought?

Commenting, or reviewing, is one of the backbones of fanfiction. It’s an integral part of any writing community. Writers and readers can grow and have fun helping each other.

This epic is going to be different from the Tips and Tricks one. There won’t be just bullet points on how to do X. I have thoughts on the matter, and I’m going to discuss them. I can’t possibly cover every topic ever, it’s a broad subject, so I might’ve missed your question.

While the technical info is precise, suggestions come from my experience. You don’t have to agree with me, everything is up for debate. Just keep it civil.

This is better read sequentially, but you can skip to any section. They are as numbered:

1) The basics

2) Thoughts on comment culture

3) Types of comments

4) Writing cohesive and coherent comments

5) Etiquette

6) Technical questions

7) Short-answer questions

8) Long-answer questions

Part 1: Sections 1 and 2 (you are here).

Part 2: Sections 3 and 4.

Part 3: Sections 5 and 6.

Part 4: Sections 7 and 8.

PDF version here, containing the whole thing. It has a table of contents and cute formatting.

♥ 1: The basics ♥

1.1 What is a comment anyway?

Feedback are “messages sent to the creators of fanworks in response to their works” (from Fanlore). I’m going to refer to it as “comments” like on Archive Of Our Own and Wattpad. They’re “reviews” on Fanfiction.net. There might be other names in other sites.

Commenting is usually a verbal expression of thoughts/feelings. It takes practice to be good at them. I don’t mean there are “rules”, but it can be easier, almost effortless. Like in regular writing, there are patterns to commenting, and guidelines left by people who were here before you are. You don’t have to start from square one.

Note that “comment” is a neutral word. It doesn’t mean “praise”, “criticism”, “hate”, or “invitation to chat”. It’s a message, and what you make of that message is up to you.

1.2 How to leave/reply to a comment on…

This subsection covers the Big Three™ fic sites: Archive Of Our Own, Fanfiction.net, and Wattpad. There might be perks I don’t know on other sites, like Quotev or RoyalRoad.

1.2.1 Archive Of Our Own (AO3)

You do not need an account to comment unless the fic is restricted to registered users or guest comments are disabled. The author can delete comments on their fic. If the author has turned off all comments, you cannot comment. If comment moderation is on, your comment will show up if they approve it.

The comment box appears below, near the end of the fic/chapter.

Type the comment and press “Comment”.

1.2.2 Fanfiction.net (FFN)

You do not need an account to comment on FFN. The author cannot:

lock the fic only for registered users;

disable guest comments;

moderate comments before they appear;

turn off comments entirely.

They cannot delete comments from registered users, but can delete guest comments.

The comment box appears below, near the end of the fic/chapter.

Type the comment and press “Post Review as [user/guest]”.

If you check the boxes on the bottom left, you’ll mark the story/author as favorite, or follow the story/author, when you comment. That only works if you’re logged in.

1.2.3 Wattpad

You need a verified account to comment on Wattpad. You cannot leave comments without an account, or without verifying the email address linked to your account. The author can delete comments on their fic.

There are two types of comments on Wattpad: regular comments, displayed at the end of a story part (like at the end of a chapter), and inline comments, displayed beside the text of the story (paragraph by paragraph).

The author cannot:

lock the fic only for registered users;

moderate comments before they appear;

turn off comments entirely, but they can turn off inline comments.

This is the speech bubble for inline comments:

Click on it to open the comment box. It appears as below. Forgive me for the UI not in English, I have tried.

The regular comments box (below) is near the end of the fic/chapter.

Type the comment in the desired box (inline/regular, doesn’t matter) and press “Post”.

1.3 Other ways to leave and receive comments

Comment sections are not the only way to leave/receive comments. Examples are:

emailing if the author has left a contact email;

sending an ask on Tumblr, if they have linked their account;

reblogging the fic on Tumblr, if you add your comment to the post/tags;

private messaging, if the host site has them as FFN does;

private messaging part 2, if the author has linked their social media.

♥ 2: Thoughts on comment culture ♥

2.1 Insights on the alleged “death of comment culture”

Subsection 2.1 will apparently go off-topic for a while, and contains a few ironic paragraphs. Proceed with caution.

Oh, the good old days. A distant past when readers would always R&R (read and review). Finished a chapter? A comment ensued, “can’t wait for the next one”. Finished a fic? A detailed, considerate analysis of plot points. People fearlessly shared their thoughts instead of clicking a “like” button. Likes can be so “empty”. Readers recommended fic to friends and group members. There were even rec lists! Awesome times to be a ficwriter, right?

Was there such a thing as “the golden years of feedback”, or are we just nostalgic?

From Fanlore:

Since the beginning of fannish time, fans have complained about the lack of feedback for their fiction and art. Letters of Comment in print zines in the 1970s and 80s, posts on USENET in the 1990s and early 2000s, online journal comments later—all are filled with complaints about a universal lack of feedback. One common refrain: “People used to be better about leaving feedback than they are now.” (source)

Even so, there is a shared perception among ficwriters from the 1990s and 2000s: people used to comment a lot more. And I do agree. I feel like feedback used to be more frequent. My writing was nowhere near good in 2010 or so, but my fics from that time had 10+ comments, even genfic one-shots in tiny fandoms. I posted exclusively on the local fic archive, in Portuguese. Wild guess? Zero percent of them spoke English as a first language. There were Brazilians like me, a handful of Portuguese people, and the occasional Angolan.

More than a decade has passed. I’m a much better writer. I translated and tweaked the same genfic one-shot to English, from the same tiny fandom, for 8 kudos on AO3 and zero comments. Having a favorite/kudos button, imitating the “like” button trend on social media, leaving people too comfortable, or even lazy. They don’t need to show love with words. It’s too much trouble. Little by little, they’ll quit commenting forever.

Where have I read a similar thing before?

Plato criticized this spread of written language as an impediment to wisdom. He said that writing is only a semblance of truth and that people will seem to know something when in fact they will know nothing. He complained that writing things down would eliminate the need for memory. Socrates, too, had decried the written word, and had said that one can ask questions of or argue with a speaker, but the written word may not be understood and may be interpreted falsely—a precursor of today's complaints about the lack of face-to-face communication. (source)

If ficwriters were never satisfied with the feedback they got, and “X technology will make the naive populace dumber” is as old as time, who’s to blame for the death of comment culture? Did it even exist one day? Did it really die?

It all boils down to context. Let’s consider a few things:

Excessive hours online are messing with our attention span, and reading requires concentration. Also, in 2001 (20+ years ago!), more than half of employed US people, 25 and over, already used computers at work. Not everyone has the brainpower and/or the attention span to stare at a screen all day and read fics later on another screen.

Most socialization now occurs on social media, which have algorithms behind them. In layman’s terms, a social media algorithm is a set of instructions for a website. It tells the website to prioritize and push 1) sponsored content (that someone paid to promote) and 2) high-engagement content (creating more user data, to show users accurate ads hoping they’ll buy stuff). In summary, whatever makes corporations profit. In algorithm-based websites and apps, “likes” will boost a post for more users; the algorithm sees it as engagement-worthy. FFN and AO3, on the other hand, have no algorithm. Some people don’t know about it and might think a simple favorite/kudos will “boost” the fic to more people.

Check these graphs for a percentage of US households (1984 to 2010) with a computer. Those are not numbers for households with an internet connection, but at least a few of them had it. Computers were pricey. Phones didn’t do much more than call, texting, and the Snake mini-game. Thing is, the internet was a smaller, more tight-knit community, even in the dawn of online fandom. Also, fandom people online were not only fans of pieces of media: there was an overlap with computer nerds, both ostracized groups. They searched for friends online with common interests and found them. It’s a lot easier to speak your mind to someone closer than an anonymous ficwriter you’ll never chat with.

Have you ever heard of sanitizing the internet? In case you didn’t, you probably should have. Long story short, corporations work for profit, and some of it comes from advertisers. Advertisers have requirements. A frequent one is “we do not want to associate with sites hosting Not Safe For Work (NSFW) content”. To sign a contract, social media corporations ban NSFW content and promise to delete it on sight. The problem is: lots of users are posting loads of things every second. Humans couldn’t possibly check all posts. Algorithms do the job via image recognition and such. If an image/video looks like it breaks the rules, it’ll be taken down. Those algorithms also scan keywords indicating animosity or hate speech. Social media users, especially the ones who couldn’t know the internet before social media, are used to the internet being “safer” now. They relaxed about it. When they stumble upon NSFW, unpleasant things, or just things they dislike or disagree with, they’re not used to seeing it. Their reaction is, oftentimes, disproportional.

What does the above topic have to do with the rest? Let’s do the math. First, you add lots and lots of users to the internet, to the point it’s not a small, intimate community anymore. Second, you “protect” those people from encountering unsettling content so easily, making them prone to lash out at the first sight of it. Third, you teach them all it takes to show appreciation, and make more people view “quality content” on their feed, is clicking a “like” button. The result: both readers and authors have never seen each other online, may or may not be sensitive to poorly worded sentences, may or may not react disproportionately to those sentences, and you have a “like” button right there. As a reader, clicking the button to show your love sounds a lot more fail-proof, and the fic goes commentless.

The fic I mentioned earlier? I used to be mildly relevant as a beta reader and blog writer on the local fic archive. That’s probably where my exposure came from. Being a recognizable face matters. The fandom? Nightwish. They were already big with metal fans and became a mainstream hit in 2004 with the single Nemo. It defied the looming decline of metal as a “genre of the youth, played on the radio” in the following years. I posted that fic in 2012 (already eight years after Nemo), and even if Nightwish was still decently popular, I posted the translated fic on AO3 in 2020 (sixteen years after Nemo), after said decline happened. It just wasn’t a thing anymore, like all trends and fads die out.

What do I conclude from all that? Things aren’t always what they seem to be, and there is more to it than readers being “lazy”. Note that those nuances do not apply to all cases of not getting comments on fics. They just help to paint the picture.

On a last note, I do think comment culture was greater in the 2000s, and probably was in the 1990s as well. People recognized each other a lot more in fandom and were all for how easy it was to comment on the internet. Mailing letters to fanzines, for example, was a bit of a hassle. So, in my eyes, there was a period of 10–20 years in which they commented more often.

Fighting against the 2020s state of the internet is kind of a losing game, but you can change how you interact with fandom, and influence people around you.

2.2 Why should you even comment on fics?

Readers don’t owe comments to anyone. The same goes for authors: they don’t owe you content. Their fics are not written for you. They are shared with you. And it’s fine! It should be a stress-free relationship where no one owes anyone anything, but add the human factor, and it all gets complicated. You’re not forced to comment, ever, and shouldn’t feel forced either, but it’s not my point.

Here are a few reasons to encourage readers to leave comments more often, even if you’re shy, feel like you have nothing to say, or don’t know how to say what you think:

It feels more personal than getting kudos. Someone took their time to write a message (of whatever length). Day = better!

It creates a sense of community. Writing can be a terribly lonely hobby. Most people don’t have beta readers or even friends in the same fandom. I myself was a lonely writer in a few fandoms for a while. While it made me find happiness in the act of creation, I love when someone gives me insights I didn’t have. It’s expanding on the microcosm I created. It likely wouldn’t happen if a reader disliked my fic, so I see it as praise.

An author might pick up an abandoned work again. Not saying it’s guaranteed, but I’ve heard of it before. People put fics on hiatus for various reasons, and one of them is struggling with low confidence. Ficwriters are people, they feel insecure at times.

It hones your critical thinking, feedback, and argumentation skills. If you write medium or long comments with in-depth analysis and impressions, it’s a zero cents writing exercise. Plus, much more fun than schoolwork.

You might become friends with the author, or with other readers. It depends on all parties agreeing to it, and there might be a shade of “never meet your heroes” to this. However, as ficwriters are people, some are nice folks.

Authors who ask for constructive criticism will thank you forever. While the current fandom culture doesn’t favor concrit a lot, some people are still open and eager for it. Yes, you can give concrit even if you don’t write fic yourself. You need knowledge, structure, and politeness, nothing more, nothing else.

Sharing your love and appreciation is enough of a reason. It doesn’t have to be perfect. There are no standards, metrics, or school grades.

2.3 What if you don’t want to leave a comment at the time?

Sometimes, you’ve downloaded the fic for your e-reader. Others, it’s four in the morning and all you want to do after a 100k binge read is sleep. Possibly, the author looks too intimidating, and you have no idea how they’ll respond. Perhaps, something else? It’s normal, we’ve all been there. Here are a few alternatives:

Favorite/kudos the fic. Return later if you want to comment, it’ll be in your history.

Create a reading list somewhere, write a memo to comment on another time. Google Keep is good for that. Some people even make spreadsheets for fics they’ve read.

Bookmark it with a note. Write “leave a comment later”, return if you want.

Type the comment somewhere else, save it, send later. It can be anywhere from an email to yourself to a note on your phone, your friend’s inbox, your notebook… anything.

2.4 What if you never, ever want to comment on fics?

It was said before, and I’ll say it again: readers don’t owe writers comments. You don’t have to apologize or justify yourself. If you want to show your love in other ways, they exist.

Favorite/kudos the fic.

Bookmark it, with or without notes. Make a bookmark into a recommendation by checking a box, if you want.

Create a rec list. You can post rec lists on social media, for example. You don’t even have to explain why you liked it. That was how we did it before algorithms took over.

Share it with friends/acquaintances. Maybe you have a shared taste?

Be open to changing your mind in the future. Don’t be strict on the “I never leave comments” stance. There are many arguments favoring comments and very few against them.

Part 2 // Part 3 // Part 4 are waiting for you.

#archive of our own #ao3 #fanfiction.net #ffn #wattpad #fanfiction #fanfiction tips #fandom etiquette #feedback #comments #comment culture #psyluna.txt

195 notes · View notes

koqabear · 9 months

Note

HELLOOOO i am back with my (hopefully) long awaited analysis/review!! i don't know what switch flipped in my brain last night but i woke up this morning with such an intense Yearning to read killer instinct after years an entire week and so... i did! i almost want to scold myself for how long it took me to finally read because why on earth was i depriving myself of yet another masterpiece?? literally as i was reading this i thought about how this could be just like that wattpad one direction fanfic that got turned into a movie with how good this is like you don't even get it...

i just finished reading so my brain is kind of all over the place huhu i wrote in my notes again because there's so much i want to touch on but nothing that i wrote is really coherent but i'm going to try my very best to write everything in a way that makes Sense. i think i might just spend an entire hour and a half, or even more, (edit: it took me even more, and not because i was typing but i because i got distracted) just trying to get through everything i want to talk about though because holy shit... there's literally just so much; i think i went straight into my notes just during the first scene where beomgyu and taehyun are trash talking each other just before their first ever fight, and i just couldn't stop thinking about that initial teaser warning about a "healthy dose of homosexual tension" because literally, the first note i wrote down was GOD THIS PLACE REEKS!! (read in the voice of that blue shark from spongebob that's like 'oh brother, this guy stinks!') i love it ofmmgmgng the cockiness. The undertones of homosexuality. Chef's kiss; in response to:

“If anything, I should be the one worried for you,” Taehyun mutters, a fake look of sympathy crossing his face at the thought, his voice patronizing as he continues, “I wouldn’t wanna ruin your pretty face.”

And then the way it just Kept Going when taehyun shows up at beomgyu's mom's restaurant and they're literally bickering at the counter like they're about to start fighting in the middle of said restaurant... you're crazy but i'm crazier because i was absolutely living for every second of it!

okay, in an effort to make this all Make Sense i'm just going to start off by saying i think one of my favorite parts of my whole experience with reading killer instinct was that it was written as if you were to read the alt text to an entire kdrama... which, in hindsight, i guess is kind of what literature for considering some kdramas are based off webtoons or some movies are live adaptations of books? lol? i don't know how to better explain this idea because it already makes sense in my head but i guess i really like the way everything flows so naturally into different scenes regardless of whether there was a cut or not and how you vividly depict the settings of scenes in a realistic way that it feels like the words i'm reading are happening around me or they're something i can easily visualize as if the setting was actually in front of me in the form of a show or movie; and this is something i really enjoy seeing... reading? when i read because i think it's just so so important that, as a reader, i can picture exactly what and where something is going on because not only does it add to the experience of reading, but it also i guess shows (?) in a way, what the writer was imagining as they were reading and... that's important! i feel like a lot of people kind of don't really pay attention to or focus on adding the details to describe the setting or atmosphere of where their story is happening and it's kind of just left up to everyone else's personal interpretation and imagination through word choice, dialogue, and whatnot. okay, so ig little tldr; i really like colorful descriptions! i can immerse myself better that way!

anyways back to the kdrama thing, the general idea of the plot i was getting in the beginning (i was still in that crazy bamtori headspace so my take was still very much centered around him and his existence... sorry <3) was like... it's supposed to trick viewers into thinking they know the obvious which is that the story is centered around beomgyu who's the average mischievous male "lead" — except he's not actually the male lead and they just want you to think he is — who is constantly getting himself into trouble and worrying his best friend, who just so happens to work at his mom's restaurant, sick because she has to go drag him out almost every time and then boom! here comes taehyun, and everything you thought you knew about what you were watching is chucked straight out the window because surprise! the male lead is actually the second one who you just met and not the first one you were suspecting the entire time.

also, kind of in addition to that, i kept getting like... mad at beomgyu lmfao? like mc was taking the words right out of my mouth!

“I asked for your help— three hours ago. Yet you still chose to be a brat and go back upstairs the moment your mother pitied you. You—“ cutting yourself off, you sigh, shaking your head before you’re picking the wet towel back off, turning your back to him, “I hope you realize how much she spoils you.”

possibly the realest thing mc could have ever said i was getting Real Life Angry because most of the time momma's boy boys (? words) are can be so evil like they'll KNOW they're in the wrong too for taking advantage of their mom's kindness like that too and as i kept reading i would just get more and more angry at the shit beomgyu would say like the whole:

“You know, for a mere worker, you sure are involved in our personal lives.” Beomgyu’s words are hissed out and sting like acid as your eyes widen, gritting your teeth together as you watch Beomgyu sit back in realization— as though he didn’t know what he said until now.

SOLFHJUSHGJIDURGH... i don't even think you understand how bad this triggered me, like i swear to god when i tell you i have never wanted to jump through a screen and hit a man so badly in my entire life... i genuinely wanted a go at him. you made it so hard to like him at all and be the crazy bamtori i am (this had to be on purposefudhughdrg) i genuinely hated him and before i started reading, i saw another anon send an ask about focusing on his character so i was like omg~ but noo. i literally wrote a note under this part saying, 'this man needs to die and go to hell. Mere worker.... MC IS HELPING YOUR MOM AND YOU LIVE. SHE GOES TO YOUR STUPID UNDERGROHND ILLEGAL FIGHT CLUBS BC SHES STILL WORRIED ABOUT YOUR WELLBEING AND YOUUU.... The belittling is fucking crazy im gonna die of cardiac explosion like a sim if he keeps this shit up' so for the entire first third of the story i was like JIN LET ME AT HIM!!!! also side note, it's kind of funny (as in coincidental) too because the other day i saw these tweets where it was basically like 'i think fathers lose their mind a little bit when they realize their daughters aren't as forgiving as their wives' and one of the responses to that tweet was 'husbands lose their minds a little when they realize their wives aren't as forgiving as their mothers'. now.. beomgyu is neither a father or husband in killer instinct, but he IS (or at least i thought he was at first!) a little bitch, so the way that both statements basically touch on how as men realize there's less and less bullshit they can get away with as there's more women surrounding them, i thought it was crazy to actually... be able to see that dynamic between beomgyu's extremely forgiving mother and mc who acts as this "uptight" older sister (and taehyun's instigating after made me absolutely livid i wanted to bite his head off) who always has to get him out of trouble just made me think of that and i was like damn! in essence, i was once again reminded that i hate men and the patriarchy, BUT as i kept reading i realized there were actually a lot more layers (what did i expect really... like of course there was, it's not a koqabear fic if there isn't insane characterization!) slowly unraveling as we get to the part where more about mc gets revealed and by the time jay was introduced, i had to stop reading just to write down everything i wanted to tell you that i noticed and liked because... seriously just by adding half of the industry into this story allowed it to be so much more jam packed with characterization and layers; i think you did a really good job writing their personalities and back stories and then when applicable, incorporating both of those into their fighting styles with characters like beomgyu and jay for example.

The things he could do with the prize money were endless— he already had a few ideas in mind, thinking back to his hardworking mother and how much she struggled to raise him on her own while still managing her restaurant. Then he thought about you, of the hard times he gave you, knowing how much you feared him going through the same things you did, of turning to a life dependent on fighting and gambling.

i wanted to jump off a building. So bad. and like i said, by the time jay got introduced i had gotten a pretty good gist of everything and i just want to say i love love love how everyone is characterized so differently and how you made it a point to acknowledge so many things when it came down to writing their fighting style and why they do it. i'm genuinely amazed at how detailed and intricate the world building for this fic is. it's absolutely insane. even though there's cliches like the spoiled rotten momma's boy who's an absolute menace to society and says or does things that make you want to slap him silly and tell him, just like many characters in the story had, to just use his brain for once and think. and then the weak kid who's filled with so much rage and a burning desire to protect himself with, what started as self defense, but allows/gets manipulated into having it become an unhealthy way of coping with his trauma and the only way he knows how to express his anger as he becomes the very same bloodthirsty monster he used to fear all those years ago the moment he steps into the cage... it's actually brilliant idk! i think there's just a whole, completely different and deeper sentiment you can get by simply reading it instead of watching it. being able to have this sort of epiphany, whether it was something you intended on incorporating or my overanalyzing, i think my general point still stands that it takes an amazing and extremely talented writer to take something that's generally viewed as a cliche or an overdone trope to the point that it's boring and express it in a way that feels new and even refreshing to read and realize.

like i mentioned before, i think it's just as important that there's characters like mc who feel like they're entitled to stop someone from going down the same path they did and feel responsible when they still do even though in actuality it's not their fault or doing at all, as well as beomgyu's mom like. ugh. i love how despite knowing mc's (and yoongi's!) history with those clubs, given they met there, his mom never once blamed or accused her for beomgyu's constant returns to those clubs or even implied that she was a bad influence on him. even when she gets the phone call that her son's in icu with an infection from getting stabbed at one of those clubs, instead of scolding mc or berating yoongi, two champions of the very illegal underground fight club she had to take beomgyu out of as an adolescent and now see him lay in a hospital bed in critical condition because of his involvement there again... she was happy and relieved to see them and to the point she gave them big ol' bear hugs like T_T i just love the little side found family you incorporated because being able to read the scene which is, essentially, what leads mc to be taken under beomgyu's mom's wing and out of that bad place with something as simple as "and you? will you be alright here?" followed by “if you’re ever hungry, you can always stop by. On the house,” then realize that that very same kindness without judgement she was shown is something she still remembers and cherishes is so beautiful and heartwarming idk like i can't even be ashamed if this is just me overanalyzing and being corny because i ate that shit up! licked the plate clean! not an ounce of anger or judgement in that fictional woman's body... having his mom, be a mom was just kind of the icing on the cake because there was still a character like her who existed in the world you created despite all the chaos within it. also joy too omg even though her time was fairly short, it was still nice to have that just-happy-to-be-here and carefree bubbly personality thrown into the mix of what is already a serious matter like illegal underground fighting, gambling, the welfare of character's like beomgyu; his mom; and mc herself because... like you wrote, mc's only there and out of where she came from because of beomgyu's mom and with him in icu racking up hospital bills from being in critical condition and getting treatment for it, his mom would be subjected to pay for all of that and it doesn't just affect her, but it affects mc too. just knowing that there was so much on the line for them, how mc blames herself for not doing better to save him and the years she's been trying to steer him out of that direction; there was just a sense of realism i experience reading and it was to the point that as i was taking these notes of what to say, i realized that in a way joy's character could even be angering to some...? because there's just so many things at stake and despite the rigorous physically taxing training to make ends meet by putting Everything on the line into this one, extremely dangerous glimmer of hope, there's still someone like joy who can lessen the blow just by existing and being there. This was not at all supposed to be this long but fuck it we ball!

all seriousness aside, because holy shit why did i start making comparisons to the real world when i was just talking about characters and personalities, there were so many times i laughed while reading this because even though. the story's not at all meant to be comical it is like in the very beginning i had to take a step back because no way my babygirls taehyun, beomgyu, jin, TAEYONG, and jeno are all here? also the whole thing where jungkook and mc very Clearly have something going and putting it in a TAEHYUN fic is so sick and twisted!! you know he taehyun looks up to him jungkook! 😭😭😭 the part where they're kind of having a little rival moment had me giggling because like beomgyu, i also wanted taehyun's head on a saucer in the beginning because aside from instigating and being a bitch with an attitude (telling mc to keep her nose out of beomgyu's business) after just having taken a jab at beomgyu by checking him when he said that him and mc are like family i was just. LIKE THAT'S CRAZY!?#@?! the little warning about him being a bitch was so necessary because i got whiplash reading how he'd interact with beomgyu and mc. just a very insane man, but he was still my silly little sharkcat (this is also a crazy thing to say sorry); despite them all being connected to very much Illegal and Shady things you kind of perfectly portrayed what being a "newbie" really is because there's seasoned veterans like mc and yoongi, aaand then there's taegyu. the part where he can't stop looking at where the gun is concealed took me out so bad like this poor boy 😭 he just wanted to fight and win some money fair and square then next thing he knows he's being sent on a mission to get that money back because his sparring partner got set up and, on top of that, stabbed??? HIS ASS DID NOT SIGN UP FOR THAT? also the way this next part flows so naturally had me laughing a little like. I feel like zendaya with tom holland right now but hear me out you were funny on Accident while writing this?

“You know I have a club to run, right?” it’s clear you’ve given up as you mutter a yeah yeah, softly, pouting like a child to the older man, “I can’t have this place running while you’re training that poor kid to death.”

“My regimen has results.” you say defensively, glaring at Seokjin, who simply puts up his hands in defeat, unphased by your attitude as he glances back at Taehyun.

“He looks like he’s about to pass out.”

the pacing was perfect? so was the forced proximity. LET ME GET ON WITH THIS. okay, so back to the kdrama point i made earlier. that still stands! the late night deep conversations and life stories shared at a convenience store over a bottle of soju and cheap instant ramen despite the whole world wanting to fall apart right under your feet and the sky is willing itself not to come crashing down on you... that's something i love to see! honestly, i think by the time taehyun and mc started making progress...? in their relationship there was already so much i had to process, it was too much for my brain to handle and thoroughly analyze to comment on, so i just kind of blacked out and regained consciousness when there was that kiss of adrenaline from winning and taehyun not being given the chance to process any of it. Also making out in front of a hospital is crazy? in a good way though! still definitely not as crazy as like. literally everything else going on but aside from that i think the laaasst compliment i have is that. you're getting way too good at writing that little turning point where the tension between mc and the member just kind of Explodes everywhere. it was like gyu from camera shy possessed taehyun through the keyboard like. Sorry but the parallel between “How are you gonna make it up to me now?” and “I won just for you... Don't you think I deserve a reward for working so hard?” is crazy i'm sick to my tummysgjdjgdh. I need to be held after reading this – ml

HI!! When i tell you your review absolutely FLOORED me, you were so detailed and went above and beyond with your thoughts/analysis, i feel so appreciated right now i could cry :((( you’re fueling my ego right now, this is a bit dangerous…

as always, i go into detail under the cut ! if it all sounds insane i apologize bc i did indeed go insane a little!

-[Taegyu and the intense… tension]

ACKSNDKS NO BE HEAR ME OUT. killer instinct was three seconds away from looking like a taegyu fic from how much tension i kept adding 😭😭 when i took a step back from the scene i remembered thinking “holy shit the mc hasn’t even showed up yet” like,,, i had to fight for my life to make her character relevant once she showed up??? this could’ve ended up as a serious bromance if i hadn’t been more careful 😭

-[descriptions and storytelling hehe]

thank you sm for picking up on this omg <///3 i think this story is one where i was really inclined to make everything really detailed? i feel like in a setting and world that intense, the environment is rlly important to include bc it adds to the storytelling!! especially in the opening scene, something must’ve possessed me bc i was just super determined to set the mood properly dksbdkd

i really appreciate you pointing that out !!

-[i almost made gyu a love interest… (hides in shame)]

omg lemme just say, throughout the beginning of the fic i almost considered adding a sprinkle of unrequited feelings from Beomgyu for the mc, but i decided against it bc the idea of a “love triangle” in a story like this was straight up unnecessary; im so glad i did tho, because it allowed me to focus on a different dynamic i’ll get into in a bit!

-[turning ml agianst beomgyu ?! / abt gyu, the menace to society.]

HAHAHA UR SO REAL FOR THIS 😭 when i was thinking of how i would write the mc, i knew i had to give her a reason as to why she was such a “bitch” to beomgyu— and lemme tell you, i absolutely despise a mommas boy, specifically one like beomgyu. he’s very childish and spoiled (on the surface, at least) especially bc his mother treated him like royalty growing up. she only gave him the best and always coddled him bc she was all he had and she wanted to give him the best life she could. so as a result, she raised a very rotten kid 😭 naturally, when the mc appeared and began acting as the strong and cold authority figure beomgyu never had, he didn’t really know how to react; which leads to him saying shit he has no business saying and acting like a damn fool. he’s learning, though!

-[A small look into the mc’s past and how it affected her relationships with others.]

“…fathers lose their mind a little bit when they realize their daughters aren't as forgiving…”

“…husbands lose their minds a little when they realize their wives aren't as forgiving…”

the way that both of those quotes had me in pieces. i think a big reason as to why i like the mc is bc of the relationships she’s made with the choi family and also bc of how she carries herself despite dealing with a lot of trauma. she’s a very strong and independent woman who refuses to take shit from anyone, especially men; i only briefly touch on her backstory bc i didn’t want to write anything triggering that didn’t really need to be written full-depth, but the mc doesn’t come from a loving family— at all. it’s the thing that led her to a life of crime in the first place, which is exactly why he became so protective of beomgyu; he has the one thing she’s only ever wanted, and that’s a loving parent that would go to the deepest pits of hell to rescue him. to me, adding the choi family was like granting the mc rest— which is why she was able to fit herself into their life so easily, and why she makes herself into a sister-figure that keeps beomgyu in line; just so she can prevent him from becoming another ruthless monster in the world.

-[me going insane over characterization]

again, thank you for pointing that out eee!!! one thing i always enjoy the most about writing is characterization! i genuinely find it fascinating to see how writers bring a character to life, so i find it very important to try and make my own characters interesting and layered 😭 i think my favorite part about having so many characters in killer instinct was the fact that i could add a deeper sense of life through the way they interacted with each other and the relationships they made! who they knew, whether they liked them, the way they acted and talked around/to them, it all aids in characterization ! it’s genuinely one of my favorite things about writing, so you bringing it up means a lot to me <3

-[wow, gyu’s all grown up.]

i think that by the time beomgyu decided to join in the fightx tournament, he really matured as both a son and a friend/family to the mc. sure, he had always used his reward money to help pay the expenses of the restaurant and rent, but it was only because it felt more like an obligation as a son to him— but as he grew older and became more involved in the underground fighting scene, he began to realize just how important his family was to him, even if it was too late to outwardly express it with confidence— even more so when the restaurant began struggling a bit and the mc had to overwork herself as a result. and yeah, he may have gotten a bit blinded and carried away by the prize money from fightx, but he only wanted to give back to the two people that raised him and never gave up on him, even when he grew to be a little bitch !

-[me rambling about fighting styles 😔]

not to keep geeking out abt my characters but i had soooo much fun writing everyone’s fighting styles— it really let their personalities shine through and it made me think about what each character was like on a deeper level. i think joy is one of my favorite (and more obvious) examples, but ya, choosing to do an mma au instead of simply boxing was the greatest decision ever :))

-[my thoughts on movie adaptations lol]

thank you so much, seriously omg :(((( i’m so glad that you think i gave these cliches justice haha, i honestly wondered if jays character was a bit… much..? but i do agree with the whole deeper sentiment through reading thing, because there’s just some things that can only be conveyed through words; i feel like that’s why i’ve found some movie adaptations a bit empty or lacking— because at the end of the day, i feel like even the smallest details and choice words really help elevate a character’s thoughts and emotions, but not everything can be expressed in a movie.

-[Ms. Choi is literally an angel idc]

Ms choi is both the sweetest and most emphatic character in that story <3 she’s an absolute sweetheart who, despite everything she’s gone through, has learned to always look on the bright side and not let the negativity get to her— after all, it wouldn’t be very good for beomgyu to grow up with a vindictive and resentful mother, right? in the end, everything about Ms Choi goes back to her son; which is why, during the scene where the mc and gyu first meet, Ms Choi is able to get a good grasp of the mc’s character— even more so when she opens herself up to visiting her restaurant to even working at it.

all that time of trust and growth only proved to Ms. Choi what she already knew of her (and yoongi, merely bc of the amount of time he spent glued to mc’s side while she worked) and that was the fact that deep inside, all she really longed for was the security and comfort of a good life, surrounded by loving people. and who was she to deny that from her ? <3

-[My weakness, the found family trope.]

if i had allowed myself to, i would’ve indulged in the whole found family aspect of this fic a lottt more. it’s genuinely one of my favorite tropes simply bc it destroys me every time, so the fact that you’re bringing it up is rlly satisfying to me :))

-[my thoughts about joy’s character]

i think joys character was also really refreshing to write; someone who, just like Ms. Choi, chose to cope with her situation and hardships by trying to remain positive and bubbly, even if the situation didn’t really call for it. and though her attitude may have made her seem insincere or insensitive, it’s just her trying to keep everyone on a lighter mood instead of letting them get too into their heads— and yeah, she’s definitely had times where people get angry and up in her face bc she seems to take everything as a joke, but that doesn’t stop her from caring in her own, unique way.

-[thoughts on choosing idols + tyun, an absolute psycho.]

NO BC IT WAS WAYYY TOO FUN PICKING THE IDOLS THAT WOULD FIT THE CHARACTERS 😭😭😭 like i know for a fact taeyong would be the last person in the universe to step into a shady and brutish place like that, but man does he have to appearance for it ! (along with jeno hehe)

as for the jk thing….. no comment! ^v^

but seriously, taehyun was a little batshit insane in killer instinct 😭😭 a true instigator and fiend at heart, he barely has the power to control his mouth before he’s spitting out stuff that’ll get him in serious trouble. which,, has happened before, so let’s just say he also got into fighting as a defense mechanism! 🤗 (that is a joke. kinda.)

(ALSO THE SHARKCAT THING IS SO FUNNY BUT ACCURATE???)

-[tyun, who did not sign up for any of this!!]

no bc i literally had so much fun when it was revealed that the mc was also a fighter 😭 it added another layer of superiority bc she now was both older and more experienced than tyun— so let’s just say the poor dude practically fell to his knees at the memory of him telling the mc she doesn’t know shit about the underground fighting scene skdbdkd

but the tyun fr just wanted to cope in his own way, what the hell do you mean he’s going up against a tyrant's prodigy??? what the fuck!!

i also enjoyed myself a bit too much when the mc interacted with jin or yoongi, simply bc she could allow herself to let loose around them haha

-[killer instinct and its lack of romance 😔]

i’m such a sucker for those types of typical scenes lmaooo like… can you tell i’m an avid kdrama watcher?? oooouuuh it’s showing isn’t it.

but i seriously feel a bit bad for those who expected this story to have more romance 😭 i did think about adding more honestly, but that would’ve made the story longer simply because their development had to be slowww if i was going to be detailed. there’s so many scenes i mentally cut out simply bc i was like “ok i fr should get on with this.”

one of them being a scene where they visit gyu and the mc gets to see the friendship between the two better— it allows her to see him in a new light and blah blah blah u get the gist huh

-[my secret thoughts about the smut ahhhh]

making out in front of a hospital is indeed insane and if the parking lot hadn’t been empty the two most definitely wouldn’t have had any peace!! like, hello?? ppl are dying over here!

i honestly did get reminded of camera shy gyu when i wrote that line 🫣 also a little confession, i was not satisfied with the smut like. at all 😭😭😭😭 i felt as though there was so much more room to play around with their dynamic but i just didn’t?? and i blame it on the fact that i was telling myself not to get carried away for the sake of how long it already was 😭

i actually wrote love fool bc i had finished killer instinct and was in a mood to write a more detailed smut out of pure spite 😭 love fool was neverrr supposed to see the light but i was so frustrated with myself that i decided well, fuck it!

-[ml you are everything to me, thank you </3]

ml (who, as i currently type this, is no longer ml, i guess?) i seriously can’t begin to tell you how thankful i am for this— like, i’ve never felt more grateful for the fact that you took the time to write such a detailed, long review??? you are straight out of a writer’s greatest dream, i will never stop loving the fact that you went into so much detail with this— when i first received your inbox, i started scrolling… then kept scrolling… then kept scrolling…. and when i tell you my eyes widened so bad and my jaw dropped, i had never been so happy while reading a review <3

writing is made even more enjoyable to me because of people like you, who give me the opportunity to share my thought process and talk about universes and stories i absolutely adore <3 you are seriously the best thing that’s ever happened to me on this blog, and i sincerely hope that other writers are able to experience this joy for themselves as well haha

#take a shot everytime i use the ‘😭’ emoji #LORD it’s EVERYWHERE #how are you guys not sick of me #thank you again you are literally the best ily sm <3 #rambles #koqabear asks #fic: killer instinct #masterlist anon!

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threewaysdivided · 10 months

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I just wanted to say: I love your art and especially your banner rn by talos! also your fic as well thank you for creating everything that you do for people, it’s awesome!

Second: what’s something that you’ve been chewing on lately, story wise? What character conflict, or plot point can you tell me about (that doesn’t spoil too much of course)? I wanna hear your thoughts about the characters you write and your head-cannons on them too! Just spit some word vomit at me!

Thank you!

My current banner art is actually a crop of the first paired piece I ever did to go with my Deathly Weapons fic. (Specifically Chapter 11, which I still have a soft spot for since it’s one of earliest chapters that really let me lean into scratching the thing-I-haven’t-seen-too-often-in-fanfic itch.)

I recently got my hands on a discounted Wacom (my digital art process got tanked a few years ago when my poor art-compatible hybrid tablet-laptop was tragically taken from us by a cracked motherboard) so I’m looking forward to getting into a faster art workflow again and maybe putting some new pieces out more easily. I’d like to do more comic art pieces for the Chapter 18 mission, and there’s a silly little concept drawing for the planned Mission 5 that might be new-blog-banner material if it turns out nicely. We’ll have to see how that goes.

As for what I’ve been chewing on story-wise lately… I’ve sort of been all over the place. I’m still on burnout recovery so I’ve been letting myself move non-sequentially, working on the bits my brain feels like focussing on rather than trying to force creativity where the juice isn’t flowing. (One of the things about being my type of writing-nerd is that “self-indulgent” for me means a story with plenty of material to analyse, which is very fun as a reader but has created a lot of work for myself as the writer. As mentioned in another post, I have a full-blown TV-show-style story-bible for this one.)

Recently, my authorial ping-pong-ing has been going into a fair bit of spoiler territory. There are some chunks of the Act III endgame plan which are underdeveloped in the specifics of what the big-boss bad-guys’ plan is, whether I want to involve the Anti-Ecto Acts more, and the logistics of both the counter-strategy our heroes are planning to use and how to make its more action-heavy parts look cool in writing. When I’m not doing that I’ve been focussing a lot on the upcoming Wally-centric chapters, which are a set I’ve been wanting to keep schtum about since there’s a small potential spoiler mixed in and I don’t want to risk giving the game up or pre-setting people’s expectations before they have a chance to blind read (even if a few people have already made some close guesses in the comments). It puts me in a bit of an odd-spot right now because the chapters I’m drafting are an immediate spoiler, the later sections I’m working on are a major spoiler and there’s a good chance that a lot of the character stuff going on in the middle won’t make a whole lot of coherent sense without prior context because of how I like to layer foreshadowing/development.

That said, Wally-centric chapters mean Wally thoughts, and of those I have plenty to share:

First of all, I want to establish that I really do like Wally as a character. The DW chapter set comprising Flashpoints through to Equilibrium is going to explore and develop some of his flaws and insecurities, which means he isn’t going to be looking his best, but it’s not meant to be a Ron The Death Eater situation. He’s just a complex person, and taking him warts and all means sometimes you have to get up close and personal on the warts.

Something that I’m maybe a bit over-conscious of when reviewing my DW story notes is worrying about letting Wally slide into just being punching-bag joke-fodder. Wally is quippy, irreverent, a little tactless and prone to being a bit of an impulsive goober who sometimes gets possessed by teenage boner-brain, which makes him easy to fall back on as a default source of incidental levity (whether cracking the joke or being the punchline). Because I’m now writing an 8-character ensemble where most non-focal characters only get a few lines per conversation, it’s easy for characters to slide into being defined by their strongest surface level trait(s)… and something I worry about with Wally is that his availability as a source of jokes runs the risk of Flanderisation into a disposable Scrappy/ Flirty Comic Relief, which isn’t his character. Wally is actually really important – not just for his scientific book-smarts but for his perceptiveness, earnestness and ability to function as one of the emotional barometers for the squad – so I always have it in the back of my mind to make sure I include enough moments that actually demonstrate those qualities and the other characters’ appreciation of them/ their friendship, so that it counterbalances the more light-hearted goofery.

I think he’s walking the same tightrope as Sokka from Avatar: the Last Airbender – yes, he tends to take the L more often than the others for comedy purposes and sometimes he gets stuck with supremely dumb side-plots for the sake of tonal balance, but to claim that it’s the entirety of his characterisation really misses the point by a wide mile.

On that note, I actually really like the decision YJ!Animated decided to go with in its first and only season (ahem) in giving Wally a normal and functional family background. I know that’s not the typical background for his comics counterparts (and no shade on other fan-writers who want to write AUs exploring the abuse dynamic, those are really interesting stories) but I think it was a smart deviation for the purposes of a large ensemble, and offered a fair bit of potential for cast-balance. It lets him serve an important role as the normal one – not only as an easy window into what the current lives of ordinary middle-class civilians look like (which is good because ordinary people are who our heroes are donning the masks to protect) but also as a touch-stone for the others, most of whom either come from different cultures or from very atypical backgrounds. Even if we discount the Impure Atlantean with military training, the ostracised White Martian and the Half-Alien clone-weapon, the other members of this line-up are an orphaned circus acrobat adopted by a billionaire, a girl from a dangerously dysfunctional criminal household where she was forced to fight her sibling, and a fledgling sorceress raised by an overprotective single Dad. The others might intellectually understand what a “normal” childhood and family look like but they don’t necessarily know it as intuitively and intimately as Wally does. That normality gives Wally the potential to be a more stable foundation for the others, a source of emotional contrast and of a necessary wholesome mundanity. That is a good thing for the Team to have. I think it also speaks volumes to the heart of his character. For this Wally, the Flash and heroism weren’t an escape from a bad personal situation. His life was actually pretty comfy and privileged - he didn’t experience a brutal wakeup to the injustices of the world or some other personal call to action. This is a Wally who opted into the game because he loves the players and sincerely believes in their values and mission. And while that might mean he has a more romanticised idea of what heroism entails – and will probably face some rough shocks down the line as that rosy vision runs into those more brutal realities – it also means he brings a sincere hopefulness to the job that is less hardened than a lot of his roughed-up, pre-jaded peers. Underneath the teen sarcasm and surface-level lancer/smart-guy traits, this Wally has as much power to be a stealth-Heart as any of his Flash!counterparts.

Something else I find interesting when using Wally is how a lot of his strengths and flaws feed into each other – and I think this alternate backstory is part of it. For all of his good heart Wally can come off as insensitive, and I think some of that could be read as a product of living a more charmed life. I think he’s susceptible to a thing that a lot of real people do – universalising their own personal experience as the default – and that while he is canonically a geek and somewhat genre-savvy about hero cliches, he’s a geek about in-universe media so he probably doesn’t think to apply those tropes to “real people” like himself or his colleagues. While this Wally is a skeptic, he’s not a cynic, and I think he might forget how much of an outlier he is in a world where things like living parents and loving parents are often mutually exclusive. He’s smart enough to connect dots but there’s a little blind-spot where he simply might not think to until one of the others jabs an elbow into his ribs, because his default view on humanity is in some ways a little kinder than typical due to that small but still significant amount of privilege.

At the same time, Wally is also someone who has probably run into (or watched his mentor run into) a lamp-post at high-speed at least once in his career. He contains multitudes and among those multitudes is an endless capacity for some absolute Looney-Tunes nonsense, which the world is 100% better off for having.

I love him, your honour.

#striking the balance between silly and genuine with Wally is a challenge but you gotta have both #young justice: deathly weapons #YJ:DW Meta #young justice #young justice (animated)#Young Justice Season 1 #Wally West #Kid Flash #DC Comics #potatoeofwisdom #3WD Answers

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pixelchills · 11 months

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Honestly I’d kind of prefer the dynamic in MDD to be a sibling relationship between Sun and Solar, a partnership between Sun and Moon, and some hesitant friendship between Solar and Moon that can turn into proper friendship(not that Solar would make that easy) but the idea of Solar seeing in Moon what Sun sees in him is also adorable if I’m honest. Not entirely sure how that would work on Moon’s end compatibility wise but I think you could make it work in a slow burn sort of way.

It is funny to imagine Solar trying to make it clear to Moon that he likes him in that sense because he seems like the type to tell someone that if they died he’d be so sad he’d kill himself if he could

…Or possibly the other way around and that if he manages it they can keep his bones or something

Lol yeaah, the problem is that MDD started just as a side swing without any proper planning, so I'm just going with the flow while trying to keep the story somewhat coherent.

Previously I was leaning more towards making them a polycule, but now I'm again leaning more towards the Sun & Solar siblingship.

As I said, both sides have such an interesting ways to expand upon, and I'd honestly love writing about a polyamorous relationship since I haven't done that before.

I will make my decision clear once it comes. One idea was suggested to me where I could write Solar and Sun's relationship as something that developes from platonic love to romantic this way:

- At first, Solar would see Sun as we've expected him to see him; innocent, naive, such a baby who needs to be protected from everyone and everything.

However, when Moon joins in and Sun and Moon's relationship goes to a deeper level, Solar realises he might have been looking at Sun a bit too narrowly.

After realising that Sun is not a little baby duckling that needs to be protected from everything, but an adult man who is capable of romantic feelings and relationships just like Solar himself. And that would make Solar see and maybe feel towards Sun a bit differently.

But that's just one option; it needs a very deep thought and careful building to work as intented, as I refuse to write siblings to lovers stories because that's not what I want to write.

- Another option is to keep Solar more of as a comic relief to Sun and Moon's relationship, where he might or might not end up as Moon's second boyfriend but stays in a sibling-level of relationship with Sun.

In this case, Solar would definetly be the annoying but overprotective older brother who just won't stop bothering Sun and Moon.

Your idea of Solar's eventual friendahip or even romantic feelings for Moon would most likely go that way; it is reaally hard to pick on them first because Solar is not always very trustworthy with his words and actions. So it would be really, really slowburn on their part for both, friendship and/or romance lol.

// Anyways, I'm still interested to hear yall's thoughts on which way the relationships should go. Most people I've asked on twitter lean more towards the polycule, while people on tumblr seem to prefer the idea of keeping Sun and Solar platonic. :>

Please share your thoughts! I'm sorry for swinging so much back and forth with it, but MDD did not have a plan like ANSSW had so I'm a bit lost with my decisions 😭

#asks #animutants #my dear daffodil #solar #sunrise #moondrop

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maaarine · 1 year

Text

for Easter I got my 9yo niece a French bande dessinée (comic book) that uses a ton of themes and tropes she likes (it’s called Lily Medialuna)

she’s a fan of magic (loves Harry Potter) and mythology (loves Percy Jackson) and is overall a head-in-the-clouds type of kid who loves reading

the characters in it apparently have a daimon-like animal that represents them, as well as some kind of stone, and a magical ability

as soon as she was finished reading it, she asked for a piece of paper and a pencil, and started writing down what her own animal and stone and power would be

she later came up to my sister-in-law and me: she’d found her stone and power, but needed our input on her animal, because she wanted all three to be coherent and true to her personality

she said: “I think I’d be a lion, what do you think?”

my SIL and I looked at each other like... this child ain’t a lion lol, it just doesn’t fit her vibe at all

so first I said: “you know lions are kinda lame and lazy as hell, lionesses do all the work”

and then I asked: “are you picking the lion because that’s your zodiac sign, or do you really believe that this animal is a good representation of you?”

niece: “I think I’m like a lion because I’m very expressive”

SIL and I looked at each other again, deeply puzzled, because “expressive” is neither the first nor the tenth word you’d use to describe her

niece: “when other kids annoy me too much and push me too far, I’m very expressive”

me: “ok so you mean that you’re ‘expressive’ in a ‘reactive’ kind of way, not in a ‘I freely and abundantly express my thoughts & feelings’ kind of way”

you could tell that she was a bit upset that we didn’t immediately see the connection between her soul and that of a lion, which in turn bothered me, because I’d hate for her to feel ~unseen~ by adults

my SIL suggested that a bird might be a better fit for her, to which my niece replied “an eagle!” — girl really digs that majestic alpha vibe, I guess?

then I looked at her piece of paper to check what she’d picked as her magical power

and god help me this fucking child had chosen the power to heal others

so I said: “you pick THAT power and come in here thinking that the lion is a coherent fit for your profile?!” (not in an asshole voice, but with a tone to convey that this is crazy town)

she agreed that it didn’t make sense

I said: “it’d be nice if you could have a tree instead of an animal, because trees help each other and share resources in this very cool way, that could be a good fit for you”

she did not agree that trees are cooler than lions, and I can see her point

there’s no ending to that story because she had to leave before she could settle on an animal

but my takeaway reflection is that, when I saw that she genuinely believed that she was a lion, and that the word “expressive” was somehow a good descriptor of her, I thought:

this is what happens every day in the MBTI universe, people are fucking clueless about what they’re like and what words mean, except that they don’t have the excuse of being 9 years old

#mytxt #tata marine #mbti

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struggling-author · 9 months

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Aang: "I'm all about peace and balance."

Azula: "And I'm all about chaos and fabulousness. We balance each other out, sweetie."

This joke was written by AI. I‘m testing out ChatGPT (and possibly turning it into an Azulaang shipper) and here’s my thoughts so far

read under the cut

I‘ll start with the elephant in the room - do I think it can/will replace actual writers?

the simple answer is no.

ChatGPT (and other AI I‘ve tested) is okay at writing basic storylines that sound pretty decent at first glance but it lacks any understanding of nuance or symbolism. It also has a bad case of „tell don’t show“ and loves narrating. Overall it would probably do much better at writing backstories than actual scenes for any type of media.

to put a slight addendum to my answer, I think given the nature of capitalism people will certainly try to replace writers, and are already trying afaik, I just don’t think it will be very successful in the long run. this mostly comes back to my previous point, which I‘ll try to demonstrate with an example. chatgpt can write a story where the protagonist loses his mind, but it does not actually understand the process of losing your mind, it cannot write coherent reasons for why he does or what kind of actions he committs to support and manifest this process. certainly it cannot give you a meaningful symbolism for his turn to madness.

where a real author may write something like „the prince sits alone in his tower, staring at his hands. his sword lays discarded at the side, but his fingers still drip with blood. as he looks up at the mirror to sees his reflection smirking back at him. ’see, I told you this was your destiny, it always has been‘. the prince shakes his head frantically and covers his eyes with his hands, unable to bear the thought of what he’d done. in desperation, he lashes out smashing the mirror to bits - though as he opens his eyes again, the shards of his shattered mirror still show that same smiling face, with bloody handprints over his eyes now completing the look. despite his better judgment, he finds himself chuckling at the irony.“ (that wasn’t even good but you get the point)

the AI instead will write something like „the prince sits in his tower tormented by his inner demons, he is afraid of what he has become. as the demons creep up on him, he loses himself in his madness and becomes the very thing he feared.“

I am underselling the prose here, because AI is actually decent at that part and I am honestly not, but in terms of nuance this is pretty close to what you actually get. the reason this happens is because ai doesn’t actually think or research „how does a person turn insane“ and then think how to best represent that in writing. instead it just guesses the most likely array of words for how someone might write that process, based on the stories it has already read. if you want to insert any sort of nuance into this, you will habe to tell the ai specifically how to do it, thus you must have thought of it yourself already.

what this means is that in any type of creative process, the fundamental ideas all still have to come from the actual author. so do I think chatgpt and other AI will change the writing process? absolutely! but I think it will do so more as a tool for writers than as a replacement.

it can help with prose and formulations, especially for writing in non-native languages, can help with outlines and structure, (something that judging by this rambling mess I could definitely use) and it could maybe get you started with some basic ideas, but everything that makes writing great and everything that makes writing matter, the creative thought process behind it, all of that still has to come from a human author and I think current AI would inbreed itself to death before it could ever learn to replicate that (ai inbreeding as I call it is already happening with image generation, because the internet is now flooded with ai-art some bots are copying themselves and creating worse and worse results)

little side note at the end, what it has also been pretty good at is writing jokes, so I‘ll be posting those as well as probably some of my other „research results“ here in the next couple days

also if it wasn’t clear, I am still in full support of the writers strike going on, just wanted to share some of my personal thoughts and experiences - and offer what I consider a reasoned optimistic perspective

#azulaang #aiartist #ai #chatgpt #openai #writeblr #writerscommunity #writers on tumblr #writers strike #wga strike

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nobody15634684892 · 9 months

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DRUNK IN THE DARK ALLEY

A girl who lost everything who has long started being drunk to forget the pain. But the encounter at the dark alley brings yet another mystery in her life.

A/N: This is 3600+ words short story. enjoy!^-^!

“The following days will be stormy” was the headline of the weather forecast. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, would it? I asked myself. Getting drunk has become my daily way out of pain. The pain I have been bearing for long. I have always been the perfect daughter: good grades, polite and I loved helping my parents with their small business; life was going smoothly, until one day all of this changed for the worse. The happy days turned bitter. It seemed like never ending agony. My parents were killed by an assassin. Yes, assassin, but why? They have always been good people and humble in the way they leave their life, they have taught me and raised me morally. That day left a scar that will never heal, because I saw them being killed in the worst way possible too gory to even describe. I was left alone to die in agony.

It started getting dark indicating that is was the time of the evening. I wore my coat and left for my favorite liquor store so I can get wasted and feel nothing, but numb. After the usual amount of dose I started feeling light but I was still sober, and I disliked the mere idea of being awake and being able to process my thought. It didn’t end at the assassination, but the people that got my parents murdered kept sending me videos of the murder as if it was a good memory. I was on the verge of getting mad. And I think I have gone mad, if I hadn’t, I would be planning my revenge. Yes, revenge that is the best thought I have thought in years. Why haven’t I thought of it until now? Just why in the world did I play the victim for years? It is time for me to unleash my wrath. Since today there will be a storm ‘maybe the weather forecast has predicted the type of chaos I will create. I left the bar and started heading home the beast in me is awake and it won’t rest until it gets what it craves for. Yes revenge!

I was eager to get home and plan everything out. Today I chose a shortcut the dark alley that I have always dreaded even when I am drunk, but today I didn’t have the time to hesitate. I was passing through the dark alley fearlessly as if I owned this place, and that is how I know I am getting drunk. I started wobbling a bit as I kept walking. “Look at this bravery” I heard a male voice laced with malice. And soon there were a group of men around me. They looked at me like I was some kind of prey for them to hunt. I felt chills run down my spine, but I am not going to let them get in my way. They kept cornering me until I had no more space left to run to, but a solid wall of the building beside me. What is wrong with them I didn’t wear anything attractive let alone suggestive of their ill thoughts.

What do you want? I wanted to ask, but only a senseless blabber left my lips. “Oh, you are drunk and that only makes you more in danger.” One of them mocked. I looked at them dazed, but I could not speak properly. Why is this happening? The moment I decided to do something useful I had to face those hooligans. Let me go! I screamed, but nothing coherent left my mouth. I saw a bright flash before I heard another voice “leave her alone” he said and I don’t know if it was because of my drunken state, but I saw them disappearing into the nearest place they can find. I don’t know if I should feel grateful yet, because the person who just came might be worse.

I saw him coming close to me “are you okay?” he asked. I stared at him blankly and I was about to puke. “My bad you don’t seem to be okay, but don’t be scared. I have no ill intention towards you.” He tried to assure me, but to no avail. I was feeling awful for some reason my alcohol tolerance is low today, maybe someone mixed some drugs in it. I am not even thinking properly. I turned around to puke and he came from behind me to support me I didn’t have the energy to push him and the fact that I was puking left me powerless. By the time I was done he patted my back. “Thank you” I was able to utter in a hoarse voice. “it’s no trouble at all.” He replayed. “You don’t seem alright, where do you leave? I can drive you there.” The audacity this man has I wanted to refuse his help, but my body betrayed me before I can do anything defensive of his offer. I felt my knees weakening and my heart was beating like I just finished running a marathon. I can feel my breath turn more ragged by the second. What is happening to me? What did I drink I don’t get sick just from a glass or two of alcohol? All of a sudden, my vision started getting blurry, all I remember after that was utter darkness.

“You are going to be okay my little angel” I heard his voice again. I couldn’t open my eyes, but I can feel the motion of a car and a warm embrace, wait was he hugging me all this time? I forced my eyes open and yes, there he was. I was in his arms all this time I was unconscious. Who in the world does he think he is? I sat up startled and looked at him in confusion. Though, I wasn’t feeling any better I had some energy now which I can use to escape. “Who are you? Why am I in your car?” I asked him. My name is Leon, and you are here, because I didn’t know where to leave you and don’t worry, I will explain everything to you once we are at a much more private place” He answered my questions well not fully, but still it was better than being ignored. When he said his name was Leon, I felt a sting of pain in my chest for some reason my mother loved that name and I have no idea why.

“Now that I am awake can you drop me at the place you found me?” I asked him. “No, we are way to far from there; now how about you sleep some more?” he asked me back. “How can I trust you” I asked him. “Let’s say that I have known you for so long and we are relatives” he confused me even more. I raised an eyebrow at him in question. “Jake, am I lying to her?” he asked the person who was driving, and that is when I notice that I was in a luxurious car meant only for the rich. “No, as far as I know you have been looking for this girl.” Jake answered. What relative are they taking about? Do they think they can fool me like some five-year-old child? “Please stop joking” I chuckled, feeling tired and drowsy again. I leaned onto the car’s door on the right side, because I wanted to stay away from the insane human being on the left side; who in their right mind abducts a 19-year-old girl. “I am not joking I will prove everything I have said” he said while looking at me warmly. If he thinks that will trick me, he is gravely wrong.

We entered through an enormous gate into a huge mansion. I wondered if I was going to be a prisoner here. “don’t worry I won’t hold you against your will just for a few days until you recover” he said as if reading my mind. “I am not sick” I retorted. “Why can’t you punch me then?” he asked, wow how did he know I love punching people who trouble me? I kept the question to myself and glared at him silently. It was time to get of the car he got off first and turned around and opened the door for me. He held out his hand like a gentleman, But I didn’t take it. I got down on my own and started running to the gates. He just stared at me knowing that I can’t make it to the gate. And soon enough I fell down on the floor it was embarrassing. “What a foolish little girl you are’’ he mocked me. “And whose fault, is it?” I asked him in the same tone. He walked to where I am and helped me stand on my shaky knees. “You are too weak to even stand just how much did you drink?” “2 glasses” I answered.

“Look, now like it or not you my are going to let me help you!” he said in a very harsh tone, and picked me up and carried me on piggy backs despite my struggle. “This isn’t fair” I thrashed, but to no avail. He didn’t say any thing as he carried me into the mansion and then into a bedroom. By the time he opened the door I was unable to keep my eyes open because I started feeling sudden pain on my head. Black spots started clouding my vision until there was no more thing to see, but utter darkness. I felt him laying me down, taking off my shoes and then he covered my body with something warm and comfy. I think it was a comforter. I can hear the things happening around me, but I was too weak to open my eyes.

“I wonder how you are feeling right now, maybe you are scared of me or maybe life in general. I don’t even know where to start, but you my little angel have suffered so much. I wish it didn’t take me long to have you beside me again I wish I could turn back the time so I could have stopped the murder from happening maybe we wouldn’t lose them” he whispered I don’t think he knows I can hear him, is he talking about me. And he seems to know about the murder who is he really? I couldn’t think anymore and thus I welcomed the unconsciousness.

When I woke up, I wasn’t alone and, in my room, anymore, but in a new place with him of course. I remember what was happening to me before I lost consciousness. Leon was sitting beside me and he was holding some syringe. “What is that?” I asked him, while hugging my knees in fear I hate needles and to make things worse I don’t trust him. “This is a pain killer it will help you get rid of your headache” he said softly as if coaxing me to agree. “Why would I trust you?” I retorted, but he only smiled at my question. “If you want the truth, who am I not to tell you.” He looked at me as if confirming if I am ready for it. “My name is Leon and you are Ally right?” he asked me. How did he know my name I don’t remember telling him? “How do you know my name?” I asked him.

“I am your older brother Alice” he said and I had to think for a while to process what he was saying. I stared at him clearly for the first time since I met him. His features were shockingly familiar he his thick eyebrow, his nose his lips and everything about him looks like my fathers. And his eyes were brown just like my mothers. I felt so many emotions all at once I felt my heart sink at the miracle that I am in. I felt angry, for him not being with us for so long; at the same time, I felt relief maybe he would have died too if he was with us. I thought I was alone, but who knew maybe there was some one I can trust. I was feeling overwhelmed and stressed about everything. My eyes started watering and, I looked at him to find him crying. The person who was bulling me earlier is breaking down in front of me. He came forward and opened his arms welcoming me into his embrace.

“Don’t cry” he patted my back he has stopped crying already, but I kept on crying. “shh the night mare is over now for both of us its over no one is going to hunt us anymore!” he whispered into my ear. “How?” was the only word I uttered. “Because for me the nightmare was not having you with me, and for you it was the pain of losing our parents, and your wound needs time to heal.” “Try to sleep now I will tell you everything tomorrow.” He kissed my forehead tenderly. His hands were gently caressing my hair and my back. From the moment I met him I have felt some sort of familiarity, but I have ignored it.

He let me lean on to his shoulder and I fell asleep while crying, but after that I felt a prick of the needle he was holding and that was enough to send me back to the universe of deep slumber.

The next time I woke up was in the morning; and my emotions are still a mess. I was rolled up in the blanket like burrito. I heard the door open while I was still struggling to unwrap myself. “Good morning, dear did you sleep well?” Leon asked me. “I think so” I answered still wriggling around to find an opening. “That is good to here, how about I help you now hmm?” he asked referring to the blanket. “You should do it yourself because you did this to me” I said. He chuckled “what can I say? you were not wearing the blanket at all, so my genius mind came up with this idea.” He joked while untying the knots around me. He has been treating me nicely, but I had my questions too.

“How did you find me?” I asked him looking straight into his brown eyes. “I have always kept an eye on my family especially you. I was with you until you turned three and then I was forced to leave you all with no trace I was 18 at that time and our family had some connection with one of the largest mafias in the world. In fact, our father was supposed to be the leader, but he didn’t; when he met our mother he left everything to our grandfather,” “Grandfather” I interrupted him. “yes, our dad’s father, he is not that much of a good guy and when he was on his death bed he made me promise to take over his rule as such that made me the head of the mafia,” he looked at me assessing for any reaction I was listening to him dazed, but I started questioning if my parents death has anything to do with this. And he continued, “I didn’t want to take the responsibility, but as I told you our grandfather is a savage person so he threatened me using you as bait. He said that he will get you married forcefully at a young age to create an alliance, and the person he wanted to get you engaged to was not human at all; he was the definition of cruelty, and I didn’t want anything bad happening to you so I agreed. And then I left you all, because I didn’t want my enemies to trouble you that was why you were living a simple life; to avoid suspicion I gave up on my family that I love.” He explained everything patiently.

He gave me his hand and I placed mine in his, “since then I have always been your stalker, I would look at you at night sometimes when you go to school and so on, and sometimes I would talk to mother and father; that helped me keep my sanity. Then I wanted to be the good mafia who eradicates the bad guys and I was successful, so I went into med school shortly after. After that I started working both as a doctor and a mafia boss. Things were working out and I was planning to visit you, but I was called into an urgent duty to the city Viecron it was the prime minister and I was ordered to do his surgery I would have refused if I knew their plan, but unfortunately, I didn’t. our parents were killed that day and I didn’t here anything about it until the second day by the time I returned there was nothing I could do except keeping you away from any more attacks.” His voice was shaking as he told me this and I was crying all the while.

“When you started to drink to cope up with the pain, I went to the liquor shops you visited and threatened them not to give you any alcohol and, instead I gave them some anti-depressants to add on your cocktail which will make you sleepy and drowsy.” “So, I wasn’t drinking real alcohol, you tricked me? But thanks” I murmured in a tired voice. “And so, it was you who always returned me back home from the bars every night?” I asked him, but I already knew the answer.“Yes, sometimes it’s me, but mostly its your secret guard” he smiled as if thinking of a fond memory. “If I was not drinking alcohol then what happened to me yesterday?” another question from me. “Yesterday you drank real alcohol, looks like someone is in a huge trouble.” He said and I immediately knew he was talking about the bar tender.

“Can you spare him?” I asked, “only for this time, though I don’t think you will be able to set a foot in that type of place again” of course I knew I couldn’t anymore. I honestly don’t know how to express what I am feeling now. He is my brother I don’t need any verification to believe that because he was carbon copy of my parents every thing about him is strikingly familiar. Maybe my heart has always remembered him even though my brain has long forgotten his existence.

Days passed by and we were making up for the lost time, I got more and more closer to him. I started annoying him while he was working. We even played pillow fight; I started it of course.

We were sitting and watching demon slayer anime. It was my favorite and it has been my favorite ever since the moment I saw it. “I want to slay the people who killed our parents just like them” It slipped out of my lips. He turned the sound of the TV down and turned to look at me. “Do you think dirtying your hand with blood feels good?” he asked me. “I can’t help it I always want to kill them whenever I remember it” I replayed. “What if I told you those people are already punished?” he asked me and I stared at him blankly for a while. I should have known my brother being the mafia boss he might have already done what must be done. “And there is nothing more I can do?” I asked him with puppy eyes. “You know those puppy eyes are my ultimate weakness. But if you insist there is one more thing you can do” “what is it?” I asked eagerly. If there is something, I can do that can avenge for my parent’s blood I would do it. “You can go to college and learn what ever you want, I will give you time to decide that.” I could have never expected what he was saying. “But,” he cut me off, “there are no buts, listen to me, do you think our parents will be happy with what you are suggesting?” He asked me seriously. “They won’t be happy” I said.

“Which is why you should give up this idea. You won’t feel the satisfaction you are seeking even if you kill them. By the way for your information there is no one left to be killed. So, just focus on your school life, okay?” he said and took my hands in his. “okay, but you are a hypocrite” I said in anger. “and why is that?” he asked as if he didn’t know what I was talking about. “You avenged our parents’ death, but you are saying I can’t” he laughed at me for a few seconds. “Well, I don’t know how you can bring someone back from hell and kill them again, even though I know a lot of things in this world that is one of the exceptions.” He answered. “you’re right that’s impossible” I sighed.

“And if you learn, do good things and live an amazing life that’s also one way to make our parents proud. Don’t you think so?” he asked while squeezing my chicks. “Yes, big brother you are very, very, very right I agree with you” I said and he kissed my forehead tenderly. “It’s getting late you should be sleeping now, but look at me I am spoiling you too much” I smiled at him childishly “one more episode please? Please?” I asked him. “Okay, but you will sleep after that. You promise?” he made me promise, but we kept watching till the end of the season. My brother is overprotective like my parents, but I think he is just God’s gift and a softie on the inside. “Do you have any idea how much I have missed you” he said as he hugged me tighter.

TMA – THE END OF DRUNK IN THE DARK ALLEY.

authors note:

Let me know your thoughts, questions or if you need a part two *^_^*

email: [email protected]

#short story #thriller #comfort #dark alley #teenagers #mystery #comedy #chain of memories #return #better than revenge

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chrisrainicorn · 4 years

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Fair Game Week Day 6: Atlas Ball

Posting a little late than usual but it’s for a good reason!

Ok so, my original plan for this was to make a comic of a short scene that I had in my mind, but when I was typing out the dialogue to plan it, I realized wow this is going to be so big and a pain to draw in just a few days, I wish I could just write it instead :/

And then I realized there’s nothing stopping me from doing exactly that lmao. So yeah, I wrote it, and it allowed me to go waaay further than I would go with the comic! So you can read that short fic under the cut (warning for extremely cheesy fluff bellow):

The music coming from the ballroom was dulled by the passing breeze flowing through the spacious balcony. It brought him an immediate feeling of relief, he was already getting sick of the same lifeless background waltz playing in an endless loop anyway.

Qrow leaned his elbows against the marble rails, it felt cold to the touch and he appreciated the sensation. He had ditched the coat on his way up already, and now away from being surrounded by Atlas elite, fake laughs, boring music and trays of expensive drinks, he had to have some serious self-control to not jump off the railing and fly away from there.

He didn’t though. His nieces had been so excited about the ball and helping him pick his clothes, not being there when they would want to leave would break their hearts. And it’s not like the event was that bad, but he could only cause a certain number of waiters to stumble and see nearby couples stepping on each other's feet during their dance for so long before feeling like he needed to get out of there.

Yet it seemed he wasn’t going to be alone for long.

“Getting some fresh air?” He had heard the footsteps approach, only turning to look at the newcomer after the question. Clover stopped by his side, leaning against the railing in a position similar to his.

“Yeah, you could say that.” His lips curled up as he spoke. “This kind of thing can get boring real quick.”

“Tell me about it.” He let out a sigh, throwing his head back. His hairdo was slightly messier than usual, a few strands of his bangs refusing to stay up like the others, maybe he had been dancing… Qrow diverted his eyes away the moment Clover spoke up again. “The kids seem to be having fun though.”

“Yeah.” He chuckled lightly. Before leaving the main area, he had caught a glimpse of Yang and Blake on the dance floor and he would bet they would stay there for a while. Jaune, Oscar and Nora had been obsessing over the huge chocolate fountain, and it didn’t take long for them to drag poor Ren into their taste testing. Ruby had been by Weiss’ side, trying to distract her partner from being that close to people she previously was associated with - she also needed some support to walk on her stupid lady stilts so guess Weiss was there for that too. “It’s good to see them loosing up a bit.”

Clover didn’t say anything for a moment, Qrow looked over at him, finding him staring in that way that made the bottom of his stomach cold. “Don't you think that you should be trying to loosen up yourself?”

“I am-” No he wasn’t, if the way he had already had messed with his hair, taken off his coat and rolled his sleeves up, and he still felt like he needed to escape from something meant anything. “These events aren’t really my style.” Not a lie. “What about you? shouldn't you be charming the guest down there instead of acting like you're on patrol duty?”

“Ah, well...” Clover took his eyes off him a bit too quickly. And it took Qrow one more second for him to realize he had just used the word charming to describe his ways. “You can only put up polite smiles for so long before you need a break. And it's not like there's a lot to do…” He drummed his fingers on the marble for a moment before continuing, “I'm not much of a dancer.”

“Really?” He raised an eyebrow, sending him a sideways glance. He could honestly imagine him as being a guy who would sweep people off their feet on a dance floor…

“Yeah.” Clover let out a bashful chuckle. “Good luck can get me to not trip on anyone's foot, but it doesn't make me good at it.”

“Well, that's hard to believe.” He scoffed.

“Why?” Clover gave him a lopsided grin. “Want me to prove it to you?”

“Hm, what.” He snapped his head back to his direction, Clover stepped away from the railing.

"C'mon, we don't need to go on the dance floor though, it would be a disaster." He chuckled as he took his arm in a swift gesture, turning him away from the snowy landscape beyond the balcony. And Qrow followed without a word, without thinking, without resistance, just blinking as he was led towards the middle of the open space.

The music was still muffled by how far they were from the actual ballroom, and the sudden thudding inside his ears didn't help. They stopped in the center of the balcony, only a few feet apart, Clover switched the grip he had on his wrist for an offered open palm, and he waited.

Only when he started to look unsure because of his lack of response, Qrow's brain decided to respond - after all, it was pretty rare to see the lucky charm himself to act unsure about something.

Clearing his throat, he adjusted his hand over the one that had taken his arm. Clover's smile brightened up in such a way it almost caused him to choke on his works before they even came out. Still, Qrow managed to speak up. "It sounds like it will be a disaster one way or another…” He grinned with an eyebrow tilt, as if he was just exchanging playful jabber before a mission instead of being pulled close for a dance. “I don't have any luck stopping me from stepping on your feet."

"Well, you'll have to endure my terrible rhythm.” His tone was light as his laugh as Clover watched his own hand settle against Qrow’s side. Their eyes met then. “So I guess we are equal."

Equal. He said it with the same tone as his lucky you at the mines - he could tell because that single line had bounced inside his head for too long. And, of course, he ended this sentence with a wink as well.

“We’ll see about that, Lucky Charm.” He managed to splurt before it got too awkwardly late to add something to the conversation, diverting his gaze down at the same second, watching their feet so he could at least try to avoid stomping on his shoes as they tentatively started to move to the rhythm of the far-away music.

"Let's not turn this into a contest for who will do worse, okay?" He laughed lightly, and Qrow lifted his gaze up instinctively just to watch. "With my luck, I might win that one."

"Of course." Qrow rolled his eyes. And in that second, they tripped on each other's feet, the weird thing was that he wasn't sure who was the cause of it.

"Sorry." Clover scrunched his shoulders, giving his hand an apologetic squeeze.

"It's alright." He brushed it off with a lazy shrug. Just some time ago, he would have said something like it wasn't your fault, or any other comment about his semblance instead. But he knew his dance partner would probably lecture him if he did that, so he just let it slide - they were both not perfect dancers, so it happens.

"Let's just try again then." They tried to match the rhythm of the waltz one more time. He was warm, Qrow noted. Or he was the one too cold from his time outside enjoying the Atlas icy wind. The contrast was jarring nonetheless, there was still an inch of space between their bodies but he could more than well feel the heat coming from the proximity - the touch he had on Clover's shoulder and palm might as well be burning.

Every time he took his eyes off their feet there was some kind of misstep, followed by apologizing chuckles and quiet affirmations about them being okay. He had imagined Clover being the type of person to charm people away on the dance floor, yes, but he hasn't actually considered he would do that with him. Well… he had, because he was the one imagining those kinds of things in the first place, but he didn't take it seriously! And he would have never guessed clumsy waltzing and sheepishly smiles as being part of his routine.

But here they were, not even on a dance floor but in an empty balcony just for themselves instead, taking overly careful steps while completely ignoring the beats of the background music, after a quick conversation that had consisted in, as his nieces would have put, a lot of gross flirting.

This was stupid. Because he had to admit those noisy brats were right. He couldn't deny anymore that that had been flirting. He couldn't pretend to not notice Clover's attempts to be closer. He couldn't just not say there was some real interest in there.

Especially with how he could feel Clover’s eyes locked on his face as they danced. He didn't know why he had been so hesitant from looking up from their shoes to meet them - they were adults for gods' sake! He was sure he was acting like a teenager right now.

Yet they were doing a slightly better job at keeping up with the music, until the point when it picked up as it arrived close to its end. Their steps became wider, and he was sure he was about to cause them both to fall when Clover decided to be risky and pulled him along for a swift spin.

He only noticed he had been holding his breath and had his eyes wide when they resumed to slow and steady side to side steps as the final and calmer seconds of waltz reached his ears.

"Looks like we're doing pretty good." Clover tilted his head knowingly, and Qrow finally relaxed and looked back at him.

He opened his mouth to respond, just to immediately trip on air and step on the edge of his shoe, making his leg bent in a weird way and bringing him down, exactly on the final note of the music.

He held back a curse as Clover held him in place, letting go of his hands to hold him by the waist with both his arms, pulling him closer and pressing their chests together as Qrow's hands instinctively acted to get a firmer grip, lacing themselves around his shoulders. The music in the ballroom faintly continued its endless loop. He let out a huff. "What were you saying?"

Clover dared to chuckle, and now they were too close, being able to watch the way his eyes curved with his smile and feel the puffs of air from his breathing. "I still think it went well."

"Hm, I didn't know stepping on feet and falling were part of a good dance now." His voice came out raspy and he had to clear his throat. They relaxed their position a bit, allowing Qrow to fully recover his footing, yet neither of them made a move to restore the previous distance they had between them. Clover’s arms were still around his waist and Qrow maintained his own around his shoulders, as if they had done this numerous times before.

"You know… I prefer that over any boring dance I just managed to go through it because of luck." Clover started, pausing for a second to run his tongue over his lips. “I had fun… with you. Can’t remember the last time I felt that way.”

Qrow let the single note escape after a moment of silence. “Oh.”

He had nothing else to say, because the implications from Clover’s words weren’t lost by him. He preferred a waltz full of missteps over a perfect one, he preferred to be with him.

“I… I had fun too.” He didn’t like how quiet he had sounded, so Qrow let go of a breath, letting out a chuckle before continuing. “Can’t remember the last time someone endured a full dance with me.”

“That’s a shame… You’re a good dancer, Qrow.”

“You have some messed up standards.” He had to hold back an incredulous laugh. “But, hm- Thanks, for all that.”

He had expected Clover to smile at his words, but not the way he had beamed, brightening up the entire balcony and making his heart skip a beat.

“Hm, what?” He was definitely not used to people staring at him like that, or holding him like that, or talking at him like that - just being with him like that. Gods, how long they had been flirting while hugging?

“You’re not dodging compliments anymore...” Clover’s words came out in a quiet breath, his eyes flickering all over his face.

“Ah.” He swallowed dry, he hadn’t even noticed… “Well- I guess... I know I would be up for a lecture if I did, so… yeah.”

“Good.” Clover’s smile was too close to a smirk now. “Because that means I can do that more often.”

Qrow just blinked, squinting at the smug, too confident, handsome bastard he had his arms around. He opened his mouth to speak. Nothing. Tried again right after, success. “... Why are you like this?”

“Like what?” He diverted his eyes for a second, Qrow could see he was holding back a bigger smile.

“You know-” He could feel his face burning.

“I don’t.”

“Clover...” It almost came out as a hiss.

“Qrow.” He bit his lip to contain a laugh.

“For gods’ sake- Just...” He let out a growl of frustration, bringing a hand to rub over his eyes with his thumb and forefinger.

“Yes?” Clover was having fun by seeing him get flustered, he could tell that very well.

“Just-” Stop? Keep going? What could he want?

What do I want?

He had the answer to that.

Taking his hand off his own burning face, he returned it to the back of Clover’s shoulder, sent a last challenging stare at the green eyes that shined a bit too mischievously for his liking, before closing his own, and pulling him in.

Clover kissed him back. Without even a split second of hesitation, not even giving a chance for Qrow to second guess his decision. And even if he knew that was probably the most probable outcome considering Clover's actions, it still blew his mind in the best way possible. It started just as clumsy as their dance. Maybe because he wasn't used to kissing someone who was smiling so much. What was the last time he did that anyway? What was the last time he was sober for it?

He only wondered that for less than a second, because that wasn't the time for it. And he didn't care. He was warm, Qrow noted. And he also sighed against his lips, and pulled him even closer, and breathed him in and tasted like mint and pineapples, he recognized the taste from the non-alcoholic beverages they had served downstairs.

They only pulled away when breathing became extremely necessary. Qrow kept his eyes shut for some lingering moments, he would think he was dreaming if he couldn't feel the warm puffs of air hitting his skin as Clover recovered his breathing.

And when he did open his eyes, he was rewarded by Clover's own staring back at him, with that softness that had taken him a good while to get used to, and now he didn't want to live without it.

"So, hm- another dance?" Qrow blurted. Because he didn't know what else to say in moments like these. Yet what he did know, is that he didn't want it to end.

Clover let out a quiet laugh, resting his forehead on his, the sound light and lively, just like the stare he had on him. "Thought you would never ask."

They got better as they went, there were still some missteps here and there. Yet, they paid no mind. That was what made their dances perfect, and they wouldn't have it any other way.

***

Hope you liked it! I might actually post this on ao3 later after I have more time to do some revising without having to worry about the deadline lol. So if while reading you found some awkward sentences, feel free to let me know! English is not my first language so it helps a ton! :D

#fair game #fairgameweek2020 #clover ebi #qrow branwen #rwby #my art #fics #my fics #sometimes i forget that im technically also a writer #bc it still feels too unreal lsdgj #i can type words and turn into a coherent story and people might like it? *screams*#still pretty happy with this for a first real try at fg

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duckprintspress · 3 years

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How can I return to writing after a long hiatus?

This post is based on a conversation we had in the Duck Prints Press LLC Discord, and all contributors comments have been used/paraphrased/integrated into this post with permission. The people who contributed ideas to this post are: @nottesilhouette, @ramblingandpie, @arialerendeair, @tryslora, @deansmultitudes, @theleakypen, Owlish Intergalactic, myself (I’m @unforth), and one who preferred to remain anonymous.

Few things are harder than coming back to writing after a long period of not writing. Being creative takes a lot of energy, and starting after not doing so for a period of time takes even more energy. The writers on our Discord had a really productive discussion, where we talked about strategies we’ve each personally used to help us get our writing mojo back. None of these methods work for everyone, but if you haven’t written in a while, maybe one of these will work for you!

How to Revive that Creative Writing Spark:

doing sprints with a friend - knowing you’re all in it together can really help!

talking with writing buddies about what you’re each working on - the shared enthusiasm can be really helpful,

journaling, about daily life, or about dreams you’ve had - turning the dream into something coherent can be a great strategy (or, don’t bother, and just write it however crazily it took place!)

pick a random story you wrote in the past and read a chapter, paragraph, or 500 word segment - and look at it as a reader, say things you liked about it, praise it, emphasize the good things about your own writing.

transcribe a song with lyrics you find inspiring, or crack open a favorite book and transcribe a few paragraphs. You can even do it with something you’ve written yourself!

set a low-pressure, low-word count deadline - make it public, if you’re the kind of person that helps, or keep it to yourself.

sign up for a zero-consequence challenge, such as a bingo, or the Duck Prints Press #drabbledaysaturday prompts on Twitter - something where no one will mind if you don’t succeed, but you might find some inspiration.

create a small goal, either daily, weekly, or monthly - it can be a time frame (I’ll write for 5 minutes a day!) or a word count (I’ll write 1,000 words a month!) or even something tiny (I’ll write one sentence a day!) or a public sharing goal (post a ficlet a day!) and then do your best to stick to it, and reward yourself when you succeed.

open your ask box or otherwise solicit short prompts - for example, do a “three sentence” meme (”send me a pairing and a trope and I’ll write a three sentence fill”) or a story title meme (”send me a story title and I’ll write a little about the story I’d create with that title”) or an emoji prompt (”send me three emojis and I’ll write a ficlet”) or make your own fun one that will bring you joy (one of our writers created a “name two characters and I’ll make them kiss in six sentences or less” meme that helped them a lot)

participate in a prompt month, something with no consequences for failure but with prompts that can inspire daily ficlet.

write without editing, and just throw what you create out into the world - anything to get the words flowing.

challenge yourself to write a drabble day, no more and no less.

try changing how or when you write - get a nice journal and write by hand, or if that’s your normal, try writing in a word document instead.

write at different times of day, and see if it’s easier for you over breakfast, or after lights out, or during your lunch break, or by stealing a few minutes while you’re “on the clock” at work.

make an attempt at different formats of writing - if you usually write prose, try a poem; if you usually write really long things, try a drabble.

look out your window, or find a place you like, and just describe what you see.

do some free association exercises - for example, use a random word generator (I use this one sometimes) and then write literally whatever word comes into your head next - keep going until you fill the page, or until it starts to turn into a story, or just until you don’t feel like it any longer.

pick a random sentence (the person who suggested this often uses “Just write anything”) to be the start of a story, and “pants” your way through whatever comes next, without worrying about grammar, continuity, logic, or much of anything.

plan ahead - schedule your writing time and don’t let yourself put it off (rewards for success are always good!) and/or visualize exactly what you want to write ahead so you’re ready when you sit down.

if you get hit by inspiration, don’t put it off - even if all you do is scrawl a sentence in your phone or on scratch paper between other tasks, get it out of your head. Even a single sentence is a creation!

get out of the spaces where your usual things are - go to a park, or on a hike, or in your backyard, or even a different room in your own home, and bring a journal or phone or laptop, and see what strikes you.

pick That Thing You Haven’t Been Letting Yourself Write and ignore all the things you Think You Should Be Writing and just...write what brings you joy

fanfiction can be very helpful, especially in canon using canon-compliant ships/characterizations - there’s no need to do the heavy lifting. Even if you just write the characters going to a grocery store, or talking about what movie they want to watch, or arguing over take out - something short and sweet that’s just for fun, with no expectations for yourself or anyone else.

alternatively, if you’re the type who writes better for others and you’re feeling down - knock out anything, even something short, and post it, and take joy even in a single like or kudos. Knowing even one person out there loved what you wrote can really help.

Any or all of these may help you, but there’s one final one that I, at least, think is the most important of all - and that’s helped me most.

FORGIVE YOURSELF. You have work in progress up. It’s okay to leave them. You told someone you’d write something for them. It’s okay not to. You have a deadline looming. It’s okay to ask for more time, or to withdraw, or - in the end - it’s even okay to ghost. You think what you’ve made is bad. It’s okay if it’s bad. You’ll never be able to create when you’re raking yourself over the coals. Everyone in fandom has “been there” - has missed deadlines, has left challenges, has abandoned works in progress, have reneged on a promise to a friend to write something. Until you forgive yourself, you’ll never be able to create anything, and isn’t even a single sentence that isn’t on that Big Important Thing better than no sentences on anything?

Forgive yourself, and find that spark, inspiration, muse, whatever you want to call it - and write things that bring you joy.

We believe in you!

YOU CAN DO IT!

#duck prints press #original content #writing advice

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amaranthineoceans · 3 years

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Everything Weird About Deltarune!

Spoiler Warning for Undertale and Both Chapters of Deltarune! Really! I Literally Go Through Everything I Can Remember About Them!

This is a long post so get comfortable. Also note that my brain doesn't process thoughts into words very well so some of these might not be worded in the best way. :)

Deltarune. The first teaser chapter was released on October 31, 2018, and it came out of nowhere. We've all gone through this, but I'll try and go through every single painstaking detail I can remember. Feel free to reblog and add/correct things.

The weirdness begins right off the bat. The title is an anagram of UNDERTALE. We all know Toby likes to use anagrams when he wants to indirectly tell us when things are related, so it's no surprise that when you go to download DELTARUNE, it warns you that the game is designed for people who have played UNDERTALE. You think, "Cool, so it's a sequel? Or maybe a prequel? A different perspective of UNDERTALE perhaps?" You were wrong; so terribly, terribly wrong! I'll elaborate on this later.

Before you download the application, the terms of service that you must agree to beforehand reads simply and plainly, "You accept everything that will happen from now on." This detail was kinda brushed off in the beginning, because, hey, it's Toby Fox. He does weird stuff all the time. But even in the first chapter, it's apparent that the concept of choice, or more accurately, the lack of it, is a very present theme in the game. I would like to remind you that Toby has announced that there will be one ending in the game. One. I'll elaborate on this later.

The program (as in, what the game is called in your files) is named SURVEY PROGRAM. Why not just call it Deltarune like it is when you download chapter two?

The game launches you, without a title screen, without any setting adjustment options, straight into a reference to the theme of the entire franchise: the lack of choice. A strange formless voice guides you through "making a vessel", with what we know now as a fountain in the background. You have the option to make some very disturbing choices in this character creator, such as making its favorite flavor "pain" or expressing your feelings about it with options such as "fear" and "disgust." You name your "creation," tell the formless voice your name (which is different from your vessel's name) and watch as said formless voice muses over your name at an agonizing pace. It thanks you for your time and tells you that your wonderful creation, (cue music cutout and background removal) will now be discarded. "No one can choose who they are in this world." The screen slowly turns white as the voice says, "Your... name... is..."

It gets weirder. The next scene appears from the whiteness and showcases Toriel calling "Kris" out of bed. Kris' area of the room is very bare in contrast to the other side, which we later discover is Asriel's.

It's Toriel. Why is Toriel here?

Kris is kind of an anagram of Frisk (the protagonist of UNDERTALE) but without the F. I highly doubt this is a coincidence.

Speaking with Noelle is the only reason you can proceed (see what i did there?) while finding a partner in the classroom. This means you can't go through the 1st chapter without knowing who she is. Is it because of the Snowgrave route?

Ralsei is just suspicious to me. There's no way he was just waiting in that castle his whole life alone without some mental toil. So either he's insane or he wasn't alone the whole time. What happened? Is it related to how he can close his eyes and see what Susie is going through when she's apart from the party? Was he just watching everything? Is he related to the formless voice?

Susie's icon is the only one without color in the Dark World.

Jevil's fight is more difficult than Sans'.

Your actions have little consequence in the first chapter. If you choose to go genocide, the only difference in the ending is being run out of the kingdom, and this doesn't carry over to the next chapter. Again, lack of choice, people.

If at the end of chapter one, you walk around town, it's mentioned (notably by Noelle) that you're usually not this talkative. If you go to the hospital and speak with the receptionist, they mention that you used to play the piano in the corner. If you decide to attempt to play the said piano, an out-of-key bash can be heard and the receptionist comments on how you used to play beautifully. If you try this in chapter two, the result is the same. All this is confirmation that Kris is acting noticeably weird.

When you leave the Dark World and walk around town, you can find Sans. He "pretends" to recognize you, and if you tell him you recognize him, he tells you it's funny, considering that you two have never met before. He winks. I'm pretty sure he knows that the player is there.

The mention of Papyrus in both games, but the purposeful lack of him. Like he's avoiding you.

If you go upstairs while inside Asgore's flower shop, there are flowers in glass cases resembling his SOUL collection in UNDERTALE. There's a red flower.

You can't enter the church.

The clock in the storage closet shows a different time than all the others in the school.

If you go all the way south in town and into the woods, the music stops and you come across a rusty, double door is in a hill covered in crass. It's locked. If you go this way in chapter two, however, you watch a cutscene where you and susie happen to find Monster Kid from UNDERTALE (or someone resembling them) and an owl kid in front of the door. The owl kid is pressuring Monster Kid to (presumably) break inside, telling them that they don't want to be a wimp like Kris. Does this imply that Kris is connected to this strange door somehow?

The ending. You know what I'm talking about.

Did Kris actually rip out the SOUL (I say "the" because I'm not entirely sure it's Kris') and knife because they wanted to eat the pie? Did they only eat the pie because Toriel caught them?

Why did they look at the player? Are they sick of being controlled? Is that why they freaked out after the Spamton fight? (later)

Anyway, now we're at chapter two.

DELTARUNE Chapter Two was released on September 17th, 2021. 17. Entry Number 17. Sound familiar?

Asriel's part of the room is different from the last chapter. I don't think this means anything sinister, but I think it means Kris notices different things about the room as the story progresses. My theory is that it will become more sinister in each chapter.

Ralsei getting super excited to see Susie and Kris after a day. As in he has separation anxiety and it breaks my heart. not anything suspicious but it makes me sad so it's on the list.

Kris and Susie's rooms. Ralsei REALLY doesn't want them to leave. Seriously get this boy a therapist. Or a stuffed animal. SOMETHING.

Kris having to gather everything from the storage closet so that people appear in the Dark World????? Why??????????????? They had to do the same thing for the computer lab too.

The golden door. I don't trust it.

How/why the heck did Noelle and Berdley go into the Computer Lab Dark World? I don't see either of them just walking into pulsing void doors without Susie.

Apparently the knight has been gone for a bit and can corrupt people's minds? The king in the first chapter doesn't seem like he can be redeemed but Queen just seems,,, not bad, but a little crazy. I wonder what happened.

Then again, name ONE person in this franchise without trauma.

Spamton.

Horror doesn't bother me. Spamton? Spamton bothers me.

SPAMTON. ENOUGH SAID.

A Kromer is a type of hat invented in the '70s. Nobody named Mike is associated with it, that I can find.

SPAMPTON. HOW DO I EVEN DESCRIBE IT.

HIS SONG IS THE ONLY ONE WITH WORDS.

The way he asks Kris is they want to be a heart on a chain their whole life. Like, dude, no wonder they were screaming after the fight.

WHERE DID THE YELLOW HEART COME FROM. YELLOW MEANS JUSTICE. WHY DOES JUSTICE APPLY.

Kris screaming after the fight and the player not being able to hear it. Don't you dare tell me that's just how the game is designed. There are sound effects characters make throughout the game. None that I can think of apply to Kris, apart from when they rip their soul out.

Ralsei brushing off the Spamton fight. Either that's his coping mechanism or he was trying to shut Susie and Kris up to protect them from... something. I'll touch on that in a minute.

According to Queen, DETERMINATION is a key factor in creating a fountain.

Also according to Queen, Kris, Noelle, and Susie all have DETERMINATION SOULS.

Ralsei freaking out about Berdley making a fountain implies that he may also have DETERMINATION. Why I'm bringing all this up will make sense soon.

How was Noelle able to cast Snowgrave... a spell that she, according to her, didn't know?

The Snowgrave route is so twisted.

You manipulate Noelle into killing Berdley and then, when you get back to the computer lab and investigate his corpse, the text box says that he doesn't seem to be awake. As if you're in denial?

Burgerpants recognizes you. Not Kris. As in the player.

The ending. I don't think I need to describe it. Kris is very methodical without the SOUL. (I say "the" because, again, I'm not 100% convinced it's theirs.) I'm saying this about how they left clues that someone broke into the This proves that they are NOT a mindless, vengeful husk.

HOW DID THEY MAKE THE FOUNTAIN WITHOUT THE SOUL INSIDE OF THEM. DID THEY FEED THE SOUL TO IT AFTERWARDS? IS THAT WHAT THAT WAS?

Another point I would like to make is my theory that Ralsei knows much more than he would have us believe. I might put this into a different post because I have yet to gather my points into a coherent bullet point list, so keep an eye out for that.

Anyway apart from Toriel and Susie being VERY heavy sleepers, I think I've gone through everything. I have a few theories.

1. Kris is possessed by the player and figured out that they could make a fountain from Queen and related to Spamton freaking out about freedom. They then decided to make a fountain going by the logic that "this would tick the player off." This is one of my top theories that assumes that the SOUL is theirs.

And 2. Kris is possessed by both the player and the knight. I think the formless voice at the very beginning of the game is the knight, and they somehow needed the player to possess someone with DETERMINATION. If so, then why Kris? We know from Queen that Noelle and Susie, and maybe even Berdley also have DETERMINATION. The most plausible thing I can think of is the fact that human souls are stronger than monster ones.

I do think that the popular theory (about the one that suggests that the Dark Word is nothing but a figment of a child's imagination, and the events that occur in said Dark World are simply children playing with toys) has been thoroughly dashed due to Berdley's murder in the genocide route of the second chapter. Unless he's not dead. Regardless, how the events (or lack thereof) that occur in the second chapter play through the next will be interesting, especially considering Toby's announcement about how there will be one ending to the game. So either Berdley isn't dead, or he will be.

Aaaand I think that's it! Sorry for the long post; let me know your thoughts and if I missed anything!

#deltarune #deltarune chapter 2 #deltarune theory #deltarune theories #deltarune chapter two theory #deltarune chapter two theories #snowgrave #pipis route #deltarune snowgrave #video games #indie game #deltarune spoilers #ralsei #kris #susie #undertale #sans

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kainscape · 3 years

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Slashers with an S/O who talks in their sleep

@chibizombiebehindyou: Could you do the slashers (including Asa and Jesse) with a reader who talks in their sleep?

A/N: Decided to do this in a short prompt type of writing piece so I can practice writing short stories without going way overboard

A/N: okay maybe it’s not as short as I thought but hey, it’s not over 2 pages- yeah no it’s pretty lengthy 💀 and it’s not proofread ‼️

Bo Sinclair

It was a consuming and bone-breaking job that the Sinclair brothers did. Therefore, sleep was never guaranteed. But, with you? You decided on your own that you would keep yourself awake to see Bo come home in one piece. He always brushed your worry off as your so called obsession with him. After a few times of butchering your sleep schedule, it wasn't long before you were fast asleep when Bo retuned home. He made his way up the stairs, shedding his boots at the top. Discarding his mechanic coveralls, he was left in a stained but washed grey t shirt and his boxers. He had heard some quiet mumbling but didn't really look into it. The noise had vanished as he pulled back some of the old cover, slowly resting his body beside you. You had looked dead asleep, your body contracting slow and steady breaths. Exempt your mouth moving and forming words. He smirked, realizing you were taking in your sleep. He had some assumptions about it when you would ask questions with no reasoning. He wasn’t too worried. He propped himself up on his elbow to look over at you. “What do you mean you didn’t see it?! It was as big as your ass dude!” That’s something he’s never heard before. He couldn’t help but genuinely laugh at your behavior, shaking his head until he heard his name. “Well, Bo, what else do you want me compare it to, your dick!? Yeah right.” His face deadpanned, furrowing his eyebrows. He scoffed, turning over dramatically as he rolled his eyes. He faced away from you, biting the inside of his cheek. In the morning, he might tease you or ask questions around what you said. Either way, he’s not bothered by it.

Vincent Sinclair

It had been a long day for the boys and you within Ambrose. What a better way to go to sleep cuddled up together and arise later in the day by Bo? Of course, you were always first within the bed, already dead asleep and dreaming of whatever your mind wander to. Vincent kept awareness of where the creeks were in the floorboards, avoiding them so he could peacefully lay in bed next to your sleeping form. Yet he heard some prominent mumbling coming from you, serving closer and gently easing up the blankets to slip in. He had removed his mask already, carefully turning to face you. You had your arm over your eyes, mouth open and moving from incoherent sentences. But one was clear as day, “I’m convinced Vincent uses Gucci conditioner and shampoo, my god.” You mumbled a few after that but he was utterly confused. Why were you talking about that weird brand you had showed him once, and why did it correlate to your dream?? He shook his head gently, scooting closer and resting his arm across your waist/stomach, pulling himself against your form until he fell asleep to your rhythmic breathing. Sometimes, he’s entertained by your night time conversations.

Lester Sinclair

Your boyfriend had a fairly easy job compared to his brothers, but when there were visitors piling up after one another, it took a whole lot longer to come back home to you and your shared bed. The frogs and cicadas were a whole lot louder than usuals, but it was like a lullaby to you by now. Which queues the small mumbling escaping your mouth. He was quiet when he came, but of course, Lester wasn’t the best at silence. Luckily you were to lost in your dream to realize he was already snuggling in beside you. He had took notice of your nonsense sentences from time to time, not that it bothered him. If anything, it was an entertaining thing to listen to before going to sleep. It gave him a sense of what your brain really thinks of. “Lester… if I dressed up as roadkill… would you pick me up too?” He tried so damn hard to stifle his laugh, his body almost shaking as you formed a stupid grin on your face. Lester took in a deep breath, biting the inside of his cheek as he buried his head into the side of your neck. “Sure, hun’” he was sure to keep his words to a hush, taking note to your shared silence. There was a comfortable coldness that covered your bodies compared to the blistering heat outside. What a way to end the day.

Will Graham

Go to work, panic, panic some more and get no sleep. This was Wills routine even with you trying to hassle him into bed. He was always focused on something, or just simply to stubborn to let himself rest for once. But tonight, he had one hell of an excuse. Jack had kept him for a lot longer than both of you would like. But you knew what you signed up for when you accepted to go on a date with Will. You figured out after multiple nights of fruitless attempts at staying up and waiting for your boyfriend, you just gave in and went to sleep on your own terms. This gave Will the opportunity to overthink in peace without the guilt of making you worry. The job had took a huge toll on his physical capacity, leading him to shrugging off his clothing while he made his way to the side of the bed. He rubbed his eye, yawning as he lifted the blanket to the new queen bed you guys had bought, giving more room for dogs and the two of you. He stopped his motions, watching closely as you turned your body towards him. You were mouthing words but they were quiet and blotched. Will slowly slid underneath the covers, feeling his body sink in the end to a relaxed position. He had took not of your sleep talking, not bothered by it. To be honest, he likes to hear what you would say when you weren’t conscious of it. “I wish we had one of those stress powered lightbulbs…” A very quiet and short chuckle made its way out of you, “of course it’s for you, you could probably power Russia with how much stress you have.” And with that, he scoffed and turned the other way, mumbling to himself before attempting to sleep.

Jason Voorhees

Jason always makes sure you’re getting enough rest for your health. He’s adamant about you being your best self with a healthy body and mind. But, he’s never really surprised to see you up waiting for him time to time, honestly he can’t complain. He loves seeing you there in the cabin with the fire still going as you greet him with that beautiful smile. It’s truly warming for him. The rest of the nights, you’re always in the dark comfort of your shared room, resting atop the creaking bed and under the quilt blankets. The cabin door whipped open, quickly caught by the giant hand wrestling against the harsh winter wind. He tried his best to quietly close the door, pushing the lock in place he had added after a break in from a trespasser happened. He observed the room, laying his machete within the kitchen sink after shedding his jacket and laying it on the chair around the wood table. Expertly avoiding the creaks in the floor, he gently pushed open the bedroom door, slipping in without a sound. There was a severely dim light coming from the window, which shadowed over your face just right so he could see you. Jason had took off his boots while he listening to the common small talk from your sleeping form. You guys had decided to look in all the cabins, landing on the jackpot of a bigger bed so you could have more room. Therefore, it wasn’t a huge hassle for Jason to slip into the bed without the alarm of waking you. You were turned away from him, slow breaths from to body. The hockey mask laid on the dusty end table, facing up as Jason looked down at you. A small smile formed on his lips, listening as your talking grew a little more coherent. “Come on Jason, you got all that cake.. and you’re not gonna give me none?” His smile slowly faded, realizing what you meant by ‘cake.’ It ha mentioned before, especially when you went out of your way to slap his ass and look him in eyes to say, “a whole damn bakery back there..” Jason took it on himself to get used to it, not bothered by the comments. He shook his head, inching down so he could pull you closer to his chest, a very strong arm wrapped around you.

Michael Myers

There’s never a sleep schedule with the two of you. There’s times where Michael is out for days at time, retuning only when your asleep and unknowing. There are those very rare times like this one where you’re aware of Michaels presence in the bed while you drift of into sleep. He’s definitely not the type to pull you close or make a move to hold you, but he’s not going to push you away if you wrap yourself around him. Which is where you lay on his chest, listening to his eternally calmed heart beat as you knocked out. It had took a damn long time, but you achieved the privilege of seeing Michael without the infamous mask you grew accustomed too. His eyes usually zeroed in on the ceiling, waiting until he need to close his eyes came. But this time, he looked down at you shifting a bit in his chest, a few words spoken. “I really don’t know how people can’t smell you form your hiding places.. I can literally smell you before you walk in a room.. it’s not a good thing either.” His eyebrows furrowed together, trying to understand why you were composing about how he.. smelled. Yet here you are, your face completely shoved into his chest. He gave you an unimpressed eye roll, turning his head on the pillow for an attempt at some sleep. He found it rather amusing that you would speak whatever you thought without restrictions when you would sleep talk. Something to quietly tease you about.

Jesse Cromeans

He had already experienced your sleep taking, the cameras in his house capturing anything you did. Sometimes you asked questions or said random comments, all that made Jesse smirk or silently laugh. He had also taken notice to the earlier times you went to bed, your stubborn idea to stay up and wait for him dying down. He didn’t mind this, satisfied with your healthy sleep schedule returning. He set the tapes in a box for tomorrow’s checking. Jesse eased open the bedroom door, a small ray of light traveling across the room to reveal the bed you laid in. The black silk sheets covering your sound figure. He pushed the door back closed, taking off all his work attire to be left in his boxers and undershirt. He shimmied underneath the covers, slowly scooting closer to your body. Of course, there were some unconscious words to be shared. “I just realized I’ve got to sleep in every room…” there was some silence before you spoke again, “why?… look don’t even worry about.” There was humorous tone in the last sentence, one that felt oddly genuine for someone asleep. He shook his head, smiling while he took in your scent that comforted him. His hands caressed any exposed skin as the room fell silent, including his mind as you both shared a deep sleep.

Asa Emory

It wasn’t something he really cared to take notice about, never really sleeping at the same time as you due to his large amounts of work he took on. It was to the point he would drift off into a dreamless sleep on his desk. Not that you could really do anything about it with his stubborn view point, so you kept to yourself and went to your bed without him. Well, went to bed also meant brining a pillow and blanket down to Asas work place and sleeping the the chair. You just wanted to feel your boyfriends presence before you fell asleep. He only looked up for a few before looking back down at the scatter of papers, shuffling though some before writing. You made yourself as comfortable as you could get, sighing as you let your body relax. The sleep came easier than expected, the few sniffles sounding in the room letting you know Asa was still there. It was oddly comforting. A flash of worry did strike you, the worry that your sleep talking would annoy him, causing you to have to leave. But it was worth the few bits of it. Asa sighed, running his hand down his face as he battled the tired feeling back. Lending back in his seat, he crossed his arms while looking up to you in the leather chair. Without a warning, a question was asked out loud from you, “What color box would I get if I was one of your butterflies?” He tilted his head, furrowing his eyebrows before humoring himself by answering, “Red. To match the original one.” It seems like your dream had answered for you, the words quiet on your tongue as your chest arose slowly. Asa took in another breath before rising to his feet, walking over to you. He brought a hand up to your resting face, his thumb brushing your drink. What a beautiful butterfly you would be.

#bo sinclair #slashers #house of wax #lester sinclair #slasher #vincent sinclair #slasher x reader #x reader #fan fiction #bo sinclair x reader #lester sinclair x reader #vincent sinclair x s/o #jason voorhees #jesse cromeans x s/o #asa emory x reader #michael myers x s/o #will graham x reader #hannibal 2013 #will graham

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taestefully-in-luv · 3 years

Text

The Island | KTH (One)

Summary: You’re just two strangers waking up in a room on a lonely island where a company in the business of love has placed you. They believe that thanks to their in depth research you two are destined soulmates. What happens when your ‘soulmate’ and you want nothing to do with each other but falling in love is the only way to leave?

Pairing: Taehyung x Female reader

Genre: strangers to lovers, slight enemies to lovers, soulmates au, roommate au, slow burn, fluff, smut, angst, slight crack, and drama.

Word Count: 9.3k

Warnings: swearing

Notes: Alright here is the first ch to my new story! I am super nervous to post this because it is a completely different vibe. But I hope you guys enjoy! Don’t worry, it turns fluffier later:) let me know if you want to be added to the taglist, or send an ask if just want to chat!:)

Taglist: @ggukkieland @monvieesdaebak @707sblog @peacedreamer14

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Your room is blinding from the soft yet striking sunrise, each beam of light swims through the blinds in piercing waves. The intense glow hits you in your sleepy state, causing you to wake from your glorious slumber. Too bright. You sit up in your bed, attempting to rub away the sleep that crusts your eyes. You begin to slowly open one lid at a time, taking in the neat appearance of your room. Your room looks the same as always—there is a nightstand next to your wooden framed bed, it holds a pale lamp and a photo of mountainous scenery. A dresser sits comfortably in front of you, it is dressed in simple décor and a large mirror. Yup, the same as always. You glance over to your sheer curtained window where the sun very offendedly washes over the room—wait. Hold on a god damn second.

Quickly, you begin to open your eyes just a bit wider—where is your royal purple ottoman? The art that hangs on your walls? Your dresser is brown not black for Christ’s sake! You ball your hand in the sheets…these don’t even feel like your sheets, yours aren’t this silky. This is not your room. Your eyebrows climb to the top of your forehead as you jerk your head around. Where the hell are you? Suddenly, you feel something rustle against your side. No…not something—someone.

Your eyes dart to the right of you, where this someone moves against the sheets. Not just someone. A man. His dark, ruffled hair sticks out between the sheets and pillow below his head. Why is there a man in bed with you? Is it…his bed? Oh god. Immediately, your mind tries to recall the night before. Did you go out and drink too much? Go home with a rando? Super unlike you though. You pull your hair as your mind races.

Sitting up in bed, worry crosses all of your features. You try to face all the possibilities that could maybe end up being your reality. But going out and partying is nowhere in your memories. You begin gnawing on your bottom lip, knowing you stayed home last night. And that you fell asleep in your own bed…alone, you might add. So where the hell are you? And why is there another person? Fear enters the picture now, this is the last place you wanted to go. You know, that horrible, terrible, dark place? The one that says your reality is that some creepy man kidnapped you and plans on doing murder-y type things to you. Yup, that place.

You tug on the end of your hair again, you know, you know, a bad habit. But you can’t help it as anxiety grows deeper within you. Were you really kidnapped? Fuck. You have to think. You’re trying to, at least. But breathing is becoming a chore. Your breaths are quick and sharp like you are on the brink of a panic attack. Shit, maybe you are. You try to eye the room again, taking in its appearance more carefully. You can’t help the shiver that speeds down your spine when you notice how perfect this single bedroom is…it actually almost resembles your guest bedroom at home. Which is creepy in itself. You continue to eye the room curiously, while staying absolutely frozen.

The dresser has more photos of pretty scenery sitting on top, as well as a few small vases that complement the rest of the décor. Anxiety continues to grow within you, shaking you to the core. You hate the way your hands tremble in your lap. You want to do something. You truly do but fuck, you can’t even move a muscle. Your breathing begins to pick up even more. Where are you? Why are you here? Who is this man sleeping so fucking peacefully next to you? Your thoughts are going 100 miles per minute, screaming at you, taunting you, giving you the middle finger.

Before you can think through your many obvious questions and answer them, the man next to you begins to stir in his sleep. You watch with wide eyes as he slowly moves to his back from his side. You stare down at him, too scared to move. Too scared to scream bloody murder. Too scared to do anything. And nothing disappoints you more. That you are nothing but a coward. You look down at your future murderer and wait for him to wake.

Future murderer slowly opens his eyes but he shies away instantly from the beaming sunlight.

“Ahhhh.” He lets go in one long breath, rubbing at his eyes in a sleepy manner. You sit still, your own breath caught in your throat. You want to move but fear has you frozen like an evening in the arctic. The man, or Future Murderer as you seemed to have named him, begins sitting up, stretching his arms out above him and yawns a song of sleep. He finally opens his eyes fully and soaks in the room before him. His head moves around quickly, his expression becoming rather…confused.

“What the fuck?”

Yup, those are his first words. Should have been yours too, if you’re being honest. This guy gets it.

Future Murderer’s facial expression grows bewildered as he looks around the room and when he finally feels your presence, he turns his head your way.

“Uh…” the Murderer narrows his eyes at you, “Hi?”

You don’t even realize the sigh of relief that pushes past your lips, but his confusion seems…genuine. And this allows you to relax your shoulders a little bit. Maybe he is a victim to whatever is going on too? You take in his disheveled appearance; he has brown wavy hair that rests above his brow line, eyes darker than the deepest part of the sea and full pouting lips. You would totally admit he’s attractive as hell but considering the fact you’re trying to convince yourself he isn’t going to murder you and the state you’re in, you’re going to push that thought away.

“Uh, who are you?” His brows knit together as he expectantly waits for an answer.

“No, who are you?” You squint at him. How dare he ask like you aren’t the one totally frazzled here? But somehow it’s comforting that he seems as confused as you are. Mystery man (his new name, since he doesn’t appear to want to murder you) (maybe) raises a single brow at you before answering,

“Taehyung.”

You listen to his name roll off his tongue and absorb it. Taehyung, huh? You hesitate for a second before finally giving your own name.

“y/n.”

Taehyung then, has the audacity to pinch his nose in annoyance. To be fair, it looks like the one he’s annoyed with is himself and not you.

“Look, sorry…” he begins, “If we hooked up last night, I don’t really remember and I—"

Your eyes widen at his words and you begin to frantically shake your head,

“No! We didn’t—we didn’t…”

“Oh?” Taehyung gives you a curious look then has the audacity to scoot several inches away from you. Then you feel his eyes on you, they search you from head to toe. You’re wearing your cat printed PJ shorts and a simple purple t shirt. You admit your hair is probably pretty wild, so you card your fingers through your locks. You start to feel insecure under his gaze as he so shamelessly eyes you.

“I don’t know who you are or where I am…do you know where we are?” you question, looking off to the side.

Taehyung pulls his eyes away from you, his head moving around to look around the room, his arms flailing.

“Does it look like I know where I am?”

You only blink at him and he rolls his eyes, “No, I don’t.” he admits.

Moments of silence pass between the two of you. You don’t know what to say at this point even though you have a million things you would like to say. But you can’t form one, coherent sentence apparently. You don’t know anything. You’re fucking clueless and you hate it. You’re trying to gather your thoughts when you feel Taehyung rise from the bed, startling you like he just committed a crime. God, you are such a coward. What? Do you really think the bed is apparently some super safe place that will protect you from the evils of the world? Taehyung walks toward the dresser and other corners of the room, inspecting it carefully.

“Fucking weird, but nice room, right?” he asks under his breath. Taehyung throws a glance over at you. “You don’t know where you are…I don’t know where I am…we both wake up in a strange room and neither of us have any recollection of how we got here.” Taehyung takes a pause to gather his thoughts. “Have you heard anything? You know, from outside the room? There could be other people.” He waits for you to answer but you stay quiet. Yes, you are on that level of coward.

You stay in the bed, anxiety building up, growing fiercer by the second. While it seems Taehyung’s attention is being stolen by the large window where the sun invites him to come take a peak. He tip toes over to the window, lifting the blinds and exposes something you imagine takes his breath way due to his audible gasp.

“Where…the fuck are we?” he asks breathlessly.

Instead of looking for yourself, you stay seated. But are we surprised? You study Taehyung’s expressions, watching for his reactions. His face falls into one of awe but after only a few moments in settles back into confusion. He reaches for the bottom of the window sill and lifts upwards, opening the window and releasing the sound of…is that waves? You continue to observe him, too afraid to see for yourself. He stands there for several long moments before turning your way and he clears his throat.

“I—I don’t…I don’t know where we are, like, really.” He takes a hesitant step towards the bed. “But something tells me neither of us are from here.”

You need a minute. Yeah, you need a minute to process his words. Because what the fuck does he mean by that? You aren’t ‘from here’? Are you on another planet or some shit? This man needs to work on his wording, for Christ’s sake. You feel your hand move just the slightest. Then your other hand. Your toes curl in and out. Seems you aren’t so frozen anymore. Things are, yes things as in waking up with a total stranger and him saying you are in an unknown place, are starting to wake you up. You’re so ashamed your solution to all of this was to stay seated in bed…but for some reason a rushing sensation of bravery washes over you.

You rise from the sheets and step one foot on to the floor. It’s not lava. So you step down with both feet and make your way over to Taehyung. You stop in front of him, tilting your head up since he has several inches over you—but nothing too intimidating, you decide. His eyes find yours and you lock eyes for a few moments. Both of you trying to search the other for answers. You break contact to face the window and wow. Your eyes animatedly widen at the sight. Palm trees and water for miles and miles it seems. No other buildings or sign of life. An island? But not the kind of island where this room is a part of some fancy resort, no, not that kind. Instead the kind where a plane crashes and a group of people have to survive.

You blink down at your new reality. First of all, you live nowhere near an island, so there’s that. You feel the anxiety and frustrations begin to surface again and you can’t help that your eyes begin to gloss over. You snap your head back to get a look at your fellow victim and he looks just as lost as you feel.

“We need to find out what’s going on.” Taehyung takes a deep breath, lifting his head up. He locks his eyes with yours again but you break contact to look at your feet.

“We don’t know anything…would if it’s not safe?” you quietly try to reason.

“Exactly, we don’t know anything and that’s a problem. You don’t expect us to stay in this room forever, do you?”

He has a point and you know it. You want to follow him out of this room but your feet seem to be glued to the floor.

“Well, no. But—”

“Didn’t think so.” He turns away from you, his body shuffling towards the bedrooms door but before he can become out of reach your hand flies to his shirt sleeve, tugging it softly.

“Wait! Just hold on—” Your voice wavers and Taehyung rolls his eyes. Rolls his fucking eyes at you!

“Listen, come. Or don’t. I don’t really care.” Taehyung releases your hold on his shirt, unsticking your fingers and throwing your hand towards your body. “Decide.” He states before swiftly turning around to head towards the door.

Oh. So this guy is a fucking asshole. Noted.

You end up following him because although he was rude about it, feeling someone’s touch when you feel so scared was slightly comforting and yes, you are aware of how fucking pathetic that is.

Taehyung stands in front of the door, his hand reaching for the knob when he turns his head to say, “Just trust me.”

And now you are the one rolling your eyes. Trust him? You just met the dude! 10 minutes ago his name was Future Murderer. How could you possibly trust this asshole?

“How can I trust you? I literally just met you.” The scowl on your face deepens when he smirks.

“Are you always such a fucking baby?”

“Are you always such a fucking baby?” you mock, eyes rolling so far into the back of your head. Okay, you admit you aren’t being the most mature here. But Taehyung doesn’t seem to take offense to it by the way he gasps and throws a hand over his heart as if wounded.

“Oh? She’s got some sass?” His question and raised brows only piss you off.

“Whatever. Let’s go.” You aren’t entirely sure where the confidence comes from but you don’t question it. You’re breezing past him, your shoulder knocking into his as you approach the door.

You feel Taehyung’s eyes on you and hear him mumble a lame, ‘that’s the spirit’ from behind you. And with that, in one swift action you are opening the door.

You stand in the open doorway, once again frozen in place. Not feeling as confident as you were 15 second ago—maybe you just need this dude to piss you off again. Speak of the devil, Taehyung steps besides you, poking his head out into the hallway searching for any sign of life.

“It’s quiet.” He takes a few steps forward, now in the middle of the hall. You glance around, the hallway has walls full of beautiful artwork, and to the right is 3 doors and to the left is a wide staircase. An exit. Bingo.

“Let’s check each room.” And of course he wants to do the opposite.

“No, let’s just get out of here.”

You turn on your feet towards the stairs and stop at the first step and raise a brow over your shoulder, “Aren’t you coming?”

Taehyung looks conflicted to say the least. He exhales deeply, looking between you and the 3 doors.

“Shouldn’t we just—”

“No! come on…” You must sound pleading and convincing because you can see him falter, just a bit. “I just want to go home…” You say, averting his gaze. Taehyung only stares at you for what feels like an eternity before he’s finally agreeing with the nod of his head.

The two of you very cautiously step down the stairs, each foot that follows the other slightly trembles in the fear of the unknown. You two finally reach the bottom and your eyes go wide at the sight. This is basically your fucking dream house. The floor plan is very open. At the center is a gorgeous grand piano, you don’t play but it’s aesthetically pleasing you guess? To the right is a long table with picture frames and décor and down the hall there seems to be more rooms.

You scan the downstairs as you slide your fingers along the edge of this table and stop when you come across a framed photo. What the actual fuck. Your eyebrows rise and your eyes grow twice their size. You very hesitantly pick up the picture as your eyes blink down at the frame in hand when your breathing begins to pick up again. It’s a framed photo of you and your sister . Now why the hell would this be here? Why is there a picture of you and your sister?? Why would someone have this? The framed photo sits in your trembling hands as you stare down at it. Taehyung notices your shaky grip on this picture and takes it from you to take a look himself. His eyes also go wide…you look between him and the picture.

“Why…why the hell is this here?” your voice betrays you as it shakes with every word.

Taehyung glances down at the table and notices his own photos with friends and family that are disgustingly and proudly displayed.

“What the actual fuck?” Taehyung whispers to no one but himself. What the hell is going on? Why does this house have pictures of the two of you? Who is doing this? Is this some sort of sick joke?

“What’s happening Taehyung?” you step closer to him feeling entirely…creeped out.

“Does it look like I fucking know?” he snaps. He sees you flinch and his eyes soften, “Sorry…Its just… this is going too far.” He finally looks as disturbed as you feel. The two of you stay quiet for a few moments, neither of you knowing how to react to this eerie discovery.

You shudder at how ominous this all is. This is becoming way too much. How much more of this can you handle? You almost want to jump into this assholes arms and sob into his navy blue t shirt.

“We should…” Taehyung wipes his sweaty hands on his sweats, “keep going.”

The two of you nod your heads in unison and turn to your left where there is an entry way to the kitchen and living room. Taehyung stops before stepping through while you join him at his side. You two glance around to soak in your surroundings—it’s also an open space, the two open areas sharing a space. The kitchen is covered in black granite and wooden cabinets with a door that probably leads outside. The living room has two matching sofas, a wide screen TV that hangs on the wall over a fireplace and built in shelves on either side, full of books, movies and games.

Taehyung and you share a look before walking through to the kitchen and living room. You approach the rooms slowly and carefully, afraid of what you might find. What surprises could be lurking. Suddenly the white glow of the TV can be seen, making you jump with its sudden brightness. Why the hell did the TV just turn on? Is this like, a haunted house? Are you being fucking haunted? Okay, maybe that’s dramatic.

The screen is bright white with nothing else on it. You turn to face Taehyung who is already staring at you with brows pinched together in confusion. Same Taehyung, same. The two of you decide to walk closer to the TV when dark, bold numbers appear.

“10….9…8…..”

The sound of soft music can be heard playing from the TV, similar to the music that’s played in an elevator, as numbers counting down from 10 begins. You feel your insides twist and turn.

“….7….6…..”

Panicked, the two of you inch closer and closer. You two stand here waiting for something, anything to occur because these might be the longest 10 seconds of your life. The millions of questions you have only multiplying. With the seconds counting down and getting closer to zero, your breathing about fucking stops. What is going to happen? You can feel your palms grow sweaty as your heart beats out of your chest. It feels like the countdown to the end of the world.

“….5….4….3…”

You don’t think Taehyung realizes just how close he is to you, his shoulders bumping into yours. You guess fear does funny things even between strangers.

“….2…..1…….”

And then it finally happens. The timer finally reaches fucking zero. And it is safe to safe your attention has been caught…anyone’s would be if a screen greets them with their god damn names.

“Welcome Kim Taehyung and Y/N Y/LN”

Your names on the screen has you automatically feeling nauseas. What sort of sick game is this? Is someone setting you up? Pranking you? If so, shits not funny. But also, why is Taehyung here? Your eyes focus on the screen as it moves to the next slide.

“It is a great honor that you two have made it this far. You have been carefully selected in this company’s project. After a lot of consideration and impressive results—we have decided to move you to the next phase.”

Naturally, very naturally you become even more confused than you fucking started. What projects? What company? You can hear Taehyung swallow hard, his nerves spiking with each word he reads. Then the slides continue.

“To put it simply, we are in the business of love.”

Huh? Huh?

Taehyung and you break your focus on the screen to steal a glance as one another very briefly before turning your heads back to the TV. What the hell they mean love? What is this absolute nonsense?

“Our use of science, technology and logic has got us here today. We test and heavily observe our chosen subjects and decide if they are the perfect match. We then move them to the final phase: The Island. This is where the two subjects meet and get along for the first time. The place they will undoubtedly fall in love.”

You can’t help that your mouth falls open, you are sure your eyes are bulging out of your head. You dare to turn to look at Taehyung and he isn’t looking much better.

Before you can really gather any thoughts the slides continue.

“Our success rate is 99%. You WILL fall in love here, it is most probable. Other subjects will come to fall in love quickly, other will take their time. BUT don’t take too long~ If two subjects are taking too long to make progress we will send a ‘Request’ to move things along and if you fail to meet said request there will be a penalty. And you have 24 hours to complete the request. This is to help you.”

You shiver while reading the words before you. You are now too anxious to even look at Taehyung right now…you don’t want to even see his reaction to all of this. Is he anxious like you? Is he laughing because there’s no way this is real? Is he nodding along taking notes because he believes it? You don’t want to fucking know!

“We give soulmates the opportunity to meet and thrive. This particular project has been in the works for well over a year.”

You blink lazily at that. Well over a year? WELL OVER A YEAR? They’ve been watching you for over a year?!

“We have carefully observed each one of you in great detail. There is nothing we don’t know. We have matched you two to be most compatible.”

Nothing they don’t know? What the hell does that mean? How exactly did they fucking observe you two? You stand here with eyes wide open and mouth agape. Taehyung mirrors your expression. He doesn’t want to believe this either.

“And you two are finally ready to proceed with The Island.”

The two of you stand in the living room, dumbstruck. Absolutely dumbstruck. You aren’t even able to look at one another for more than a hot second. A harsh blush creeping on your face and you cringe because there’s no way you could blush for this asshole.

You just…you cannot believe any of this. You refuse to. This is ridiculous. Insane.

“This island is only for the two of you. Designed specifically for you. You are being constantly monitored. Hidden cameras are placed all around the house. Minus the bedrooms and bathrooms. The décor and food is to each of your likings, we want you to feel at home as possible. Everything including books, movies, games and rooms are to your likings and match your hobbies.”

Wait a minute. You frantically shake your head, blinking furiously. Constantly being monitored? AKA you’re being fucked spied on? How are you supposed to do anything knowing you’re being watched?

“Your families have already been notified of your absence.”

You feel your heart drop. You didn’t even consider how they might feel.

“You will return safely once we feel we are satisfied with the results. This can be 3 months, 6 months, a year or even more.”

You feel Taehyung spin to face you in complete shock.

“We understand this may seem awkward at first but things will evolve naturally. So you should not worry.”

These words do not bring the least bit of comfort.

“Besides the ‘Requests’ we will not interfere. This is YOUR time to fall in love.”

“Thank you so much for your ongoing participation and please enjoy your new home and of course, each other. <3”

The added heart at the end of the last slide has both of you scrunching your faces in disgust. With that, the TV shuts off, showing nothing but the dark black screen and the reflection of two ghosts. What. The. Fuck.

You’re sure your expression is as clear as day; a mix between anger and hopelessness. You don’t want to look at Taehyung, not after everything you just read but you know you should. So you tip your head to the side to get a good look at him. Worry. All you see is worry. Look, he might be hot as hell but there ain’t no way you can fall in love with this dude. But also, you don’t know anything. You gulp, there is one thing you know. You’re going to be sick.

Your nausea is so built up, it’s at the entrance of your throat begging for release. You stand here, running a clammy hand through your hair. You are going to puke, you know it.

Without any further thinking, you run towards the back door in the kitchen that thankfully leads to outside. You run down a path that you pray to the God’s that this path does lead to the ocean so you can drown yourself in some good ol’ waves. Your anxiety has you out of breath before the run does. You finally reach sand that is warm and grainy under your bare feet and follow it to the shore.

It’s beautiful actually. The view. You wish you could really take it all in and let the calmness of the waves relax you but you are seconds away from upchucking last night’s pizza rolls. But it never comes. Your guts never make it out of your body but the anxiety remains. Falling to the ground, you pull your knees into your chest, trying to breathe and most importantly trying not to cry. This is no use though and to be honest you don’t try very hard because tears are cascading down your face within seconds. You can feel the burning in your chest as hot tears fall onto the warmth of your cheeks and it breaks you further. You sit here and wonder if you are really stuck here in this place and with a complete and total stranger. The same thought stays with you as you ball into yourself.

You sit here, indulging in quiet sobs until they finally ease into soft sniffles. You reach up to wipe your eyes, ridding yourself of tears and the thoughts that came along with them. You need to think more clearly. Okay, positive thoughts. Come on y/n, you can do this. Positive thoughts. First off, you’re not alone. You are not the only victim here. You have an acquaintance here who you are sure isn’t very pleased about this either. But wait—would if this guy is a total weirdo? A psycho? Okay, maybe being positive is harder than you thought. Plus he was a total asshole to you earlier. But maybe that will change?

You stand to your feet, feeling more determined than before. You are going to try to make the best out of this shitty situation. You brush away the annoying leftover grains of sand from your legs and your behind and turn around to make your journey back to the house, your ‘home’. Ew, you did not just call it that, you shudder at the thought. Before you start walking, you spot Taehyung aka your ‘soulmate’ ew, you did not just him call him that— sitting, leaning against a tree. Yup, right next to where you just had snot running down your nose. Before spiraling into embarrassment, you take a good look at him and oh. You step towards him and his eyes follow your movements until you are seated next to him. He’s tense, that’s for sure. But you can’t really blame him, now can you? You are a little bit selfish, aren’t you? He is clearly freaking out too yet you ran out on him. You can see his expressions now: confused, anger, upset. And something you can’t quite figure out.

Taehyung looks your way and offers you a small, tense smile and then turns his head away from you to face the ocean again, a sigh escaping his lips.

“I’m not going to fall in love with you.”

You really don’t want to feel offended because hey, that’s fair. But still, this asshole doesn’t even know you so you roll your eyes.

“I’m not going to fall in love with you dude.”

Taehyung glances at you and gives you a look, like he knows that’s impossible.

“Sure.” He says.

“You don’t fall in love with me.” You snap back, feeling like you won something.

“Yeah, that won’t be a problem.” He deadpans.

“Listen…you’re not a psycho, are you?” You narrow your eyes at him. Taehyung stares at you for a second before he dramatically rolls his eyes at you, then he narrows his own eyes.

“I’m not a psycho,” he defends, a serious expression drawn on his face. “But how do I know you’re not?”

You bite down on your lip as if really contemplating,

“Fair point.” You smile cheekily but then your face falls into a frown. “This isn’t…real, right?” you try to brush back your hair behind your ear but the wind makes it difficult. “The TV…this is a joke, right?”

Taehyung looks on towards the ocean, the big blue waves crashing in the distance. He is silent for several long, annoyingly long moments. You can’t help but wonder what goes inside his head, what is he thinking? What is he feeling? It’s got to be similar to you, right?

“Let’s say it is real. There’s a company who…who…spied on us for a year. What does that mean? They hacked our phones? Hacked our homes? How far did they go? They said they know everything…” Taehyung pauses, flinching at his own words. “So, say they do. They believe after all their research we make a good match…the perfect match, apparently.”

“Yeah, I highly doubt that.” You cut in. “We couldn’t even get along in the first 10 minutes—”

“That’s because you were being a baby.”

“That’s because you were being a—Shut up.” You huff.

“Who’s being rude now?” Taehyung smirks. “Listen, I think it’s best if we just play it safe. But I am serious…I won’t be falling in love with you. And I am not a psycho.”

“And I am serious too, I won’t.” you remind him, annoyed. “It’s you who should be careful.” You poke your tongue out and Taehyung rolls his eyes.

“So do you like pancakes? Mister Not Psycho.” You look at him with a playful smirk and he wastes no time to curve his lips downwards.

“Pancakes?” he lifts his brows but then a scowl takes over, “I’m not falling in love with you even if you make me pancakes. I still can’t get over this…they spied on us for a year y/n. Invaded our privacy…this is too much. Too much to be thinking about god damn pancakes”

“Yeah but it seems like we’re stuck together,” you reason, “Whether we like it or not. So you can maybe try not to be such an asshole to me? When I’m just as much of a victim as you are. And we still have to eat.”

Taehyung’s mouth drops a little, then he closes it, screwing his eyes shut. “You’re right…I’m sorry,” he stands to his feet. “This is all just so crazy and a lot to take in…”

“I know…” you pause, “It’s sort of like being on a vacation—”

“Just stop.”

Taehyung walks past you, heading back inside the house. Leaving you alone with nothing but the ocean.

You stare off into the wide unknown, the oceans blue emptiness swallowing you whole. This looks like a dream vacation spot, if you’re being honest. But this? This was about to be the vacation from Hell.

~~~~~~~~

You and Taehyung walk through the door back into the kitchen, a look of grimace on his face while you frown. You two decide to check out what this place has to offer. You’re both clearly skeptical of this whole entire situation, well at least he is. He feels like the only one who is acting appropriately. But he can safely assume you probably are feeling a bit skeptical yourself. You two check to see is there is anything safe to eat—if there even is food. He doesn’t know what to believe. Was this situation, he doesn’t know…real? True? Every word he read, is a loud echo in his mind screaming at him. How could he even take this seriously? How could you take this seriously? This is fucking insane! He looks over at you, who is rummaging through cabinets, you look the same as a few minutes ago—calm with an unsure expression painting your features. He hates how calm you look, he can’t help but feel so annoyed by you.

He takes a look in the large, silver fridge and is pleasantly surprised to see many foods that he likes; lots of fresh fruits, juices, milk, sandwich meats, so on. It is fully stocked. He reaches inside the fridge for a bowl a fresh fruit, his other hand grabbing for a can of whipped cream. He gives you a look and nods towards the bowl.

“Should we test them? See if we die from poison or some shit?” he half jokes, his bitter tone shining through. You try to ignore his bad attitude and smile.

“We’re testing them with a can of whipped cream?” you go for a lighter approach but he just rolls his eyes.

“Go big or go home, am I right ladies?”

You snort. Real life snort. And you consider being embarrassed but you see Taehyung’s eyes light up in amusement before they’re darkening again.

You reach for a strawberry and pop that thang in your mouth, so he does the same. You two chew cautiously, the flavor and juices bursting. These might be the best god damn strawberries either of you have ever had. Such a shame they are being enjoyed in such a situation. He turns to face you, the you who is now stuffing your face with strawberry after strawberry, he can’t help but let a chuckle slip between his lips.

“What? Go big or go home…” you pause, a smirk playing at your lips. “Right ladies?” Taehyung only rolls his eyes at your smart mouth, he won’t allow himself to laugh.

Taehyung is still trying to gather his impression of you. When you first met you were a total cry baby, then you were just annoying and now you’re trying your best to be calm. He recalls how you ugly cried just outside—god, you have been a roller coaster of a person but considering your situation he understands why.

He believes he was more unbothered and brave after having first woken up…but after seeing those framed photos he got freaked the fuck out, to put it simply. Then the TV…everything just went downhill from there. And he sees what you’re doing…you’re trying to be strong. And he hates you for it. Why is he being the weak one here? How are you doing it with such ease? He’s spiraling. His whole life just got put on pause. His dreams and aspirations? Pause. Friends and family? Pause. His love life? P-Pause? He can’t help but worry over every detail, not to mention…is any of this the truth? Are you two just supposed to believe the god forsaken words that you read on the TV screen? And you went on about this being like a damn vacation. Unbelievable! But all he can do right now is breathe in and breathe out and try to be himself. Which at the moment is a really unhappy person.

You and Taehyung continue reaching into the bowl for more refreshing fruit, your fingers brushing against one another like this is a god damn Hallmark movie, but you don’t seem to be fazed by it so he won’t either. Even though it’s driving him crazy, he doesn’t want to touch you. He wonders what your thoughts are on the whole ‘love’ thing? It’s ridiculous. Don’t get him wrong, in a different situation he could see himself getting along with someone like you, maybe even hook up…but fall in love? Not likely. Plus he already has someone. Sort of.

“Ah, wait…” He pauses mid bite.

“Hm?” you hum, mouth full.

“Aren’t we like, supposed to be finding pancake mix or whatever shit you wanted to find?”

With a roll of your eyes, you lick your fingers clean while the other hand lays rest on you hip. (And no, his eyes did not linger when you sucked on your fingers and no, they did not travel down to your hand that rest comfortably on your nice hips.)(And no, he did not just think your hips are nice.)

“Couldn’t find any!” you dramatically yell out, “You guys FAILED us!” you then look over at him with a smirk, “So much for being experts right?” you scoff, he almost wants to laugh at your dramatics but he just stares at you blankly.

But soon that blank stare is changing into a sour one when he realizes just who you are talking to…the very company that trapped you here. The one that’s watching over you right now. Or so they say.

“We should inspect the whole house.” He says seriously, “You know, get to know this ‘vacation home’ or whatever bullshit you said.”

You look down at your feet, feeling fucking embarrassed.

“Sorry for calling it that I—”

“I know,” Taehyung kind of smiles, “You were just trying to make us feel better. I get it.” His tone is softer than even he intended.

“It didn’t really help, did it?” you scratch the top of your head, feeling sheepish.

“Not really.” He answers honestly, with hard eyes. “Now come on, let’s check things out.”

You nod your head with an eye roll, he still chooses to be dickish.

The two of you walk into the living room to the entertainment center. The TV is surrounded by shelves of books, movies, and games. Apparently all to your liking, so you guess you will see how true that is.

“Woah, there’s Mortal Kombat. Sweet.” You comment, the game case in your hand.

“Woah, I can kick your ass at Mortal Kombat. Sweet.” Taehyung plainly responds while shuffling other games between his hands.

“Don’t even. I will play you right now.” You try lightening the mood but he just rolls his eyes.

“We have other important things to do, need I remind you?” he begins lecturing you and you scoff.

“You don’t need to remind me our shitty situation. Your stupid face is reminder enough.” You bite.

“Oh?” Taehyung continues to look through cases, barely paying attention to you.

“Anyway,” you clear your throat. “There’s tons of movies here and TV shows as well,” you gesture toward the bottom of the shelf. “Some I have never seen before,” you squat down, your fingers brushing against DVD cases until you stop at one in particular, pulling it out. “Like, what the hell is ‘Castaway on the Moon’?”

Taehyung’s eyes widen, “UH, only my most favorite movie ever?” he says, taking the case from you.

“Looks weird.” You comment plainly.

“Weird—it’s not weird! It’s actually really good I swear, actually you know what?” Taehyung huffs out, it’s the first time you’re seeing him get so worked up. It’s amusing. “I don’t have to explain myself to you.” He pouts, clearly wounded you would think to call his favorite movie ‘weird’.

“Plus, who’s weird?” he asks, “What’s with all this anime? I know it ain’t mine.”

You jut out your bottom lip in guilt, your cheeks turning a rosy pink.

“Well, well…”

“Well, well…” he mocks, feeling satisfied.

You raise your eyes to meet his and walk an inch towards him, never breaking contact.

“I’ll give yours a shot, if you give mine a shot?” you challenge, sticking out your hand. He guesses you want him to shake it.

He takes a moment to let his eyes linger on yours. They’re dark. Plain. Boring. Nothing special. He looks away and scoffs but the idea of sharing his favorite movie with someone does pique his interest.

“Deal.” He says, going in for the handshake. He feels your hand in his and doesn’t expect your skin to be so soft.

“Deal.” You say with an evil glint in your eye. “I’m going to make you watch so much good shit.” You continue to hold on to his hand, you look down at them and become slightly shy. You just remembered your situation. You keep staring for an odd amount of time before you drop his hand and shake your head.

“Should we check out the other rooms?” you start walking towards the entry way back into the main area of the house, but stop to turn and look at him.

“Yeah, I suppose we can do that.” He answers back, trying to sound as neutral as possible.

The two of you walk back into the main area where the rooms are located. He hesitantly creaks open the first door. He’s met with a room so fitting. A room full of art supplies. Drawing boards, brushes, paint, etc. He feels his palms pool with sweat.

“Do you make art?” you question, looking up at him.

“Yeah.” He gulps, feeling creeped out all over again. “They really did their research, huh?” he whispers to himself.

You two stand in the doorway, taking it all in. Taking in what this could really mean for you two. It begs the question: Were they really spying on you for over a year? Do they really know everything there is to know about you two?

You softly nudge Taehyung, “Why don’t we move on to the next room?” you suggest. He turns his head to face you as he swallows hard, nodding his head in agreement.

The next room is nothing spectacular, just a home gym.

“You work out?” he asks.

“Barely,” you admit, a small smile tugging at your lips. “I always have the excuse of not having time or not wanting to go all the way to a gym. Guess I have no excuse now.” You look up at him with a sheepish grin. It’s hard to believe you don’t work out, Taehyung thinks. You have great legs.

“I see.” He turns his back to you, exiting the room.

The next room really wows Taehyung. He doesn’t mean for it to. He wants to hate this place.

It’s a room full of musical instruments and recording equipment.

“Holy shit.” He accidentally lets out. He walks around the room, touching things with just his fingertips. “This is like grade A equipment, I could only dream of owning shit like this.” He truly does not mean to be in awe of the music room, you know, because the enemies gave it to him but holy shit!

There’s only one room left and you swear to god it better be for you. You two slowly open the door together to reveal an interests of yours.

“Is this…? Like, a dance studio or something?” He questions, glancing around the room, “Are you a dancer?” he finally looks at you and he seems quite impressed.

You look…surprised, to say the least. Your brows shooting up all the way toward your hairline, your eyes darting all around the room.

“N-Not exactly…I mean, kind of?” you admit, your eyes falling to your hands. He tilts his head in confusion.

“I…I just have a serious interest I guess you could say,” you look all around the room again, “But I,” you play with your fingers. “I have never said it out loud to anyone.”

“Oh.” Taehyung breathes out in understanding. So, these fuckers really did spy on you guys. In depth. You both feel goosebumps rise on your arms, making you both feel a chill.

“Let’s head upstairs. Shall we?”

The upstairs has 4 doors in total. You both know the door closest to the staircase is the bedroom you woke up in.

“There’s no bathroom in this room,” he motions towards the door. “And the closet was empty. So, it’s not the master and that—”

“That means there’s multiple bedrooms.” you finish for him, and you both sigh in relief.

He means, this place has a goal of getting you together, so he wouldn’t be surprised if they only offered you one bedroom, but thank the God that he doesn’t believe in that there’s more than one bedroom.

“Yeah exactly,” he breathes out. “I’m willing to bet the door at the end of the hall is the master. Wanna just skip ahead?”

“Sure,” you agree, walking past him to beat him to the door at the end of hall. But you wait for him to reach the door as well before you’re reaching for the knob and slowly turning it, swinging the door open.

The room is big, a huge king size bed in the center of the back wall. Thankfully, the drapes are dark so not a lot of natural sunlight enters the room, Taehyung thinks.

“Hell yeah, dark curtains.” You say excitedly. Obviously reading his mind.

He follows behind you, keeping his comments to himself as you ooh and aah at your surroundings. He is impressed by the rooms simple yet he guesses you could say intriguing décor. Definitely fits his style, but he won’t say that out loud. As an artist himself, the paintings on the walls are very pleasing to the eye. He wonders if they suit you as well. If you’re his ‘soulmate’ they would, he thinks bitterly. He could see himself adding his own artwork to this room. He wonders if you would be okay with that as well—wait. What is he saying? It’s not like you two will be sharing this room!

You drag your fingers across the comforter on the bed.

“Soft.” You mumble to yourself.

He chews on his lips for a moment before speaking, “You can have it…” he shifts from one foot to the other. “The room, I mean. I’ll just take the other bedroom.”

“Really? You sure?” The excitement is evident in your voice. “Wait no—that’s not very fair. We could thumb wrestle for it or—”

He raises a brow, “Thumb wrestle? Really?”

“Mortal Kombat?” you offer.

“That just wouldn’t be fair, I would win too easily.” He says, not impressed. “Just take the room. I’m sure.”

“Fine…thank you.” you bow your head down in defeat.

The two of you walk towards the master bath and your eyes come close to popping out of your heads. It is huge! And super fancy! He’s not good at fancy words but he’ll put it simply, the countertop is long with two sinks. Two sinks. The shower has one of those rain shower head things and woah. That’s for like, rich people. The way you are gawking at this bathroom tells him you’re having the same thoughts as him. Yours are probably fancy like, “This extravagant marble bathtub looks exquisite against these cream colored walls. Very…dashing.” Or some wild shit like that.

The closet is next, He’ll be completely honest. He forgot you would need clothes and shit. But holy moly, there are rows and rows of clothes, both yours and his. There is jewelry (Not really sure why that’s necessary but like, okay) and shoes on shelves against the walls. It was more than he owned himself back at home.

“Honestly I forgot about needing clothes…since we like…live here now.” The words are sour leaving your mouth, he can tell. But also, you are obviously reading his mind again.

“What? You thought you would be wearing your cute little PJ’s 24/7 or what? Wear nothing at all maybe?” he asks, shuffling from one foot to the other. He’s uncomfortable.

“ha-ha.” you deadpan. “I just haven’t really thought about what this all entails is all.”

He frowns at your words,

“We should probably talk about it, right? What this all means, I mean.” His questions causes a shift in the atmosphere. The air becoming a little thicker.

You only nod and turn on your feet to head back into the bedroom. He quickly follows behind you, both of you stopping at the foot of the bed.

“Let’s talk then.” You bite your lip, swaying side to side.

He needs to be honest. He is clearly so confused about all this. Fucking puzzled. He means, what if just what if this company was real? And this company was…right? Are you really a match made in heaven? No, that can’t be. That would be fucking ridiculous. He’s being ridiculous for even considering it. But you two obviously need to talk. Have a fucking chit chat.

You plop down on the edge of the bed and he follows your lead, finding a spot right next to you. Your knee shakes up and down quickly while you play with the hem of your shirt. You’re obviously nervous as fuck, which he can’t really blame you. He watches you for a few moments before hesitantly placing a hand over your shaking knee, trying to stop the anxious movement and hoping to God he is not crossing any serious lines, he’s just really getting annoyed by your shaking knee and needs that shit to stop. You turn your head to face him and he is met with a look of frustration. He turns his head to face straight ahead and with a heavy sigh he says, “I feel that way too.” Because it’s true, you both must feel the same. It’s not like you want to be stuck here with him either. Right?

You finally let out a long breath, “How long?” you whisper. “How long will we be stuck here?” you begin to sniffle as your eyes become wet. Shit. He brings his hands to his lap and interlocks his fingers together.

“I…I don’t know.” He answers honestly. “But what are your thoughts? On what we read…” he clears his throat, clarifying as if it wasn’t already obvious.

You suck in a sharp breath, “I don’t know what to believe.” You admit. “But we are…” you gesture between you two, “This is—This is not happening.”

Taehyung rolls his eyes as if that wasn't the most obvious statement in the world. He. Could. Not. Agree. More.

You continue, “Someone deciding for me? On this part of my life? That doesn’t sit right with me. No fucking thank you.”

“Yeah, me either.”

“I mean,” you turn to face him, “You seem decent and all, when you’re not being an ass, but this is all insane. Just insane.” You wear an annoyed expression, shaking your head in disbelief. He breathes out of his nose in attempt to laugh.

“Yeah, you’re telling me.”

“But…” you pause, choosing your next words carefully…you have to be careful with this next part. “But if it’s real? What are we—” and yup, just as expected, you are cut off with just a look. He furrows his brows together and pushes his head back in surprise.

“This can’t be forced y/n.” he states firmly. You raise your hands up in surrender.

“Oh my god, Taehyung. I know that! I fucking know, jeez. But we have to talk about all the possibilities.” You say firmly, “We’re stuck here for who knows how long and you read the same thing as me, right?” you push on, “3 months? 6 months? A fucking year?” you drag a heavy hand down your tired face. “And don’t even get me started on these damn ‘Requests’ and whatever they are!” You are clearly very frustrated…Taehyung looks at you with the same pity you’re sure he feels for himself.

“Okay, okay.” For the first time Taehyung speaks to you much more softly. “Listen, they can’t keep us here forever? We are going to prove we are that 1%. We just got to stay out of one another’s way and just wait it out until they return us home.” Then his frown deepens, “But wait, what about the ‘Requests’?” he asks, concern lacing his voice.

You strum your fingers on your thigh, staring down at your lap, in deep thought.

“I know this is weird but…” Taehyung starts.

“I know, we have to talk about it.” You finally look up at him and your entire face has gone pink.

“If the ‘Requests’ are, I don’t know, “pure” enough, we could just like do them?” you look at him with doe eyes, “Or like, if the penalty isn’t that bad…. I don’t know.” You ramble on.

The thing is, neither of you know what to expect from these ‘Requests’ and their penalties. It’s one huge mystery. And neither you nor Taehyung are a fan of mysteries. Taehyung watches as you begin shaking your knee in total panic again when he clears his throat.

“Hey…I think we can worry about that when or if the time comes, okay?”

“When or if…” you repeat slowly. “Okay.”

He stands from his place at the bed and begins walking towards the bedroom door.

“As long as we stay out of each other’s way, we should be good.”

“Stay out of each other’s way…” you nibble on your lips, “Like, we don’t talk or anything?”

“Precisely. You do your thing, I’ll do mine.”

“But—”

“That’s just the way it’s got to be.”

“Fine.” You speak bitterly, “Fine by me.”

Stuck on a beautiful island in a beautiful house with a beau—with a man. What could possibly go wrong? Vacation from hell, here we go.

#bts #bts smut #bts fluff #bts angst #kim taehyung #taehyung x reader #bts fanfic #taehyung smut #taehyung #taehyung angst #taehyung fluff #the island chapter 1

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rocorambles · 3 years

Text

Hit It Till It Breaks

Pairing: Oikawa x Reader

Genre/Warnings: Yandere, Mafia AU, NSFW, Drug Dealing, Dub-Con/Non-Con Sex, Dub-Con/Non-Con Drug Consumption, Drug Addiction, Manipulation, Humiliation, Degradation, Prostitution, Slight Pet Play

Prompt: Hard At Work

Summary: Growing up, you’d always loved fairy tales and happy endings. You’d always believed that despite how bad things might seem or get, there would be a light at the end of the tunnel. But you’re quickly realizing that this isn’t a fairy tale, that there is no happy ending, and that sometimes, you only go downhill, farther and farther from the light.

Author’s Note: This is my contribution for my HQ Discord Server’s NSFW collaboration. There are so many talented writers on the server and I highly encourage you to check out the collaboration masterlist to see how everyone decided to run with this spicy prompt.

(Thank you as always @sawamooora for helping me keep this a coherent degenerate mess~)

It’s hard to believe that bright eyed girl holding her college diploma in the photo on your nightstand was you not that long ago. And your heart clenches when you remember how hopeful you had been. So excited to venture out and experience life. Ready to enter the job market. Ready to be an adult.

Doors opened and closed. But you hadn’t let it deter you at first. It just wasn’t meant to be. You can’t expect to get the first job you interview for!

But then more and more doors opened, only to be shut in your face.Your rose-tinted glasses began to crack as your funds quickly dwindled, as you lowered your standards, desperately mass applying to any small time company vaguely related to your major, only to be turned away at every step.

And now, here you are, barely able to make rent, barely able to even feed yourself with the little you have from odd part-time jobs you’ve managed to stitch together into some sort of financial life line.

Well, you HAD been barely able to make rent, but your hands tremble when you stare at the letter notifying you that your rent will begin to increase starting next month, mind speeding into a panicked haze as you unsuccessfully try to think of what to do, how you can possibly afford to live even in this dump anymore. And before you even realize what you’re doing, you’re scrambling, stumbling to your bathroom, throwing open your medicine cabinet as you rummage for the little pills that you know will help slow down your racing thoughts and provide much needed clarity.

You swear everything seems clearer as soon as the smooth texture hits your tongue and you can finally breathe, slumping down on the cold tiles of your floor, pill bottle still clutched in your hand as you allow yourself to relax, praying for any ideas to flow through you. And it hits you like a ton of bricks when your grip on the plastic container accidentally loosens and the bottle clangs against the floor.

A humorless chuckle slips past your lips as you stare at the rolling cylinder.

Drug dealing. Fucking drug dealing.

You can’t believe you’re even thinking of going down this route, but your mind flashes back to old roommates, old friends, old classmates who had nonchalantly made a pretty bundle on the side, carelessly tossing around and selling all types of prescription drugs on campus. And you vividly remember how simple they had made it seem, how they had all gotten away with it. Scrumptious meals, pricey alcohol, far beyond a college palette, and beautiful clothing were the only “consequences” for their crimes.

If they could do it, you could too. Or so you’d like to think.

But as naive and ignorant as you are about this line of work, even you know there’s a difference between selling to silly college students on campus, and selling it at a popular nightclub owned by an infamous crime syndicate.

Even as far removed as you are from the more seedy underbelly of the new city you live in, you know of the Seijoh Syndicate. Everyone in town does. It’s hard not to when they literally run and own the entire place.

Oikawa Tooru and the rest of the Seijoh Four run their domain with an iron fist. They’re practically nonexistent, merely a scary story to keep people in line, for those who abide by the laws and keep their noses out of trouble, but an all too real nightmare for those who choose to defy them. And you shudder, remembering the horror stories you had heard of exactly what happens to those who decide to try and start their own nefarious business and practices on Seijoh streets without Oikawa’s permission.

But surely they wouldn’t pay you any mind? Right? Surely a mere girl in her early twenties selling the leftover prescription medicine she has in her cabinets for one night won’t do any harm?

Maybe it’s stupid to go to such a prevalent and well known club, especially one that’s notoriously favored by the Seijoh Four. But you convince yourself that it’s the most crowded venue in the area with a target demographic who’s guaranteed to buy you out, even at the obscene prices you plan on charging. How would anyone even notice you? Where else could you go? What options do you even have?

So despite the nervous pit swelling in your stomach, you soldier on, plastering a cheery smile at the bouncer who easily waves you in without a second glance, slipping into the sweaty mass of bodies, going deeper and deeper until you’re surrounded - skin, bones, and muscles pressing against you on all sides, safe from any prying eyes.

Or so you believe.

You know who the Seijoh Four are. You even know their names. But never have you met them, never have you ever seen a picture of what they each look like. Not that it would help you if you did when you’re so laser focused on finding potential customers, not even bothering to look around to see if anyone’s watching you. So you carry on, unaware of the four sets of eyes looking at you in amusement from their roost high above the writhing crowds.

There’s nothing subtle about the way you sloppily nudge people, practically shoving your pills in stranger’s faces, almost wildly waving your merchandise around you in a desperate attempt to pull in buyers. Sweaty nervous hands fumble as you exchange little plastic baggies for wads of cash and Matsukawa raises a brow in disbelief while Hanamaki cackles when you drop your merch and payment, getting on all fours on the trashed dance floor to recollect your goods.

It might be the most amusing show they’ve had in a while, but Iwaizumi feels a pang of pity at the wild hopeless look in your eyes and he swiftly stands, brusquely telling the other three that he’s going to go down and tell you off with just a warning, only to be stopped when Oikawa smoothly stands to his feet, effectively blocking Iwaizumi’s path.

“Now, now Iwa-chan. Don’t be so hasty. Let me go talk to the cutie. I’ve been so bored recently and she looks like she’ll be fun! Plus you’ll make her cry with that scary face of yours.”

Suddenly the sight of you bumbling around isn’t quite as entertaining as the remaining three men watch the brunette prowl towards you, heavy realization of what’s to come sombering the mood.

You’re frantic, flitting about the throngs of flailing limbs and swaying bodies, frustration from not being able to get through your supplies fast enough weighing at your conscious. Sure, you’ve managed to accrue some cash, but it’s not enough, not nearly enough to even feed yourself for the coming week let alone make a dent in the daunting rent that looms over you. And you can feel hot tears prick at the corner of your eyes when you see that it’s almost closing time and you’re still stuck with more than half your inventory, no closer to figuring out how to survive. So when a hand firmly rests on your shoulder, you whip around, ready to take your anger out on the poor soul who’s managed to catch you at the worst time. But you freeze, vicious words stuck in your mouth when you see the handsome man beaming down at you, a thick wad of rolled up bills haphazardly dangling from his fingers.

“I heard you might have some stuff I’d be interested in.”

You wonder if this is all a dream, if the man in front of you is (ironically a devilishly) handsome angel swooping into save you when he casually asks you how much stuff you still have, how much you’d be willing to sell everything for, not even blinking an eye at your outrageous price tag. You’re so stunned by how quick he is to call it a done deal, not resisting even a bit as he wraps his hand around your wrist, pulling you after him, saying some vague comments about wanting to go somewhere a little more private since it’s a bigger trade. All you can think about is how you’ll finally be able to eat something other than instant noodles and not have to worry about rent as you throw yourself back into interviewing, too lost in thoughts to be wary of how you’re being dragged farther and farther away from the rowdy crowd.

But the sound of a door slamming shut behind you jolts you back to reality and Oikawa fights back a laugh at how adorable you are, eyes blown wide like a deer in headlights as your head swivels side to side, dismay and panic making you tremble when you survey the private room you’re in, throat nervously gulping when you notice the three other occupants.

You’re so predictable and Oikawa just rolls his eyes fondly at how you swiftly turn around, trying to lunge towards the door in an attempt to escape, taking his time to leisurely make his way towards you, brown orbs taking in every inch of you as Matsukawa and Hanamaki hold your writhing body in place.

It’s so satisfying watching you crumble to pieces before his very eyes at just the mention of his name, despair and fear swirling beautifully on your face when he continues to introduce the rest of the Seijoh Four. It never gets old, that deliciously addicting feeling of power he feels when people tremble from just a few syllables and he relishes in your pleading apologies and your tears, patiently waiting for you to finish your little sob story, barely listening to the details as he focuses in on how gorgeous you are, broken and vulnerable.

And really, there’s no need for him to pay close attention to your blabbering anyway. It always comes down to one thing…

“So you need money, cutie? How about working for me?”

“Oye! Oikawa-”

“I’m just asking her some questions, Iwa-chan.”

There’s tense silence and your eyes nervously flicker back and forth between the two imposing figures staring each other down, green and brown eyes clashing in a silent argument. But as if they’ve somehow come to a conclusion, Iwaizumi tsks and looks away while Oikawa turns his attention back to you, a sickeningly cheerful grin on his face.

Blood curling fear lances through you and you’re almost grateful for the two pairs of strong arms holding you tight, their grip keeping you from falling to your knees as your legs threaten to give out under the pressure you feel as Oikawa thoughtfully looks at you.

You know the smart answer would be to adamantly say no and promptly figure out a way to leave this moment far behind you, even if it means forfeiting any money you had made tonight. But...a job is a job, right? And surely a job in the Seijoh Syndicate would be more lucrative than anything you’re doing now, right?

Oikawa hides a smile at the way he can see the cogs in your head turn, apprehension turning to curiosity as you stutter out questions about pay and what the job would entail. Desperation is a good look on anyone, but it suits you particularly well and just like that, hook, line, and sinker, he has a new cute live-in maid to replace the recently vacated role.

Working as Oikawa’s maid is more...normal than you would have expected. Not that you’re complaining and other than the embarrassing maid outfit he makes you wear, complete with frilly bow and garters, the chores are mundane. Bring breakfast to him and wake him. Clean his room and do his laundry when he’s away at meetings or jobs. Make sure guests have refreshments when they come over to his large estate, a mansion you now also call home.

If you’re honest, it’s much more relaxing than the multiple part-time jobs you had been juggling previously, and with free board, free food, and the substantial paycheck that regularly makes its way to your bank account, you can see your future brightening up again. When your duties are done for the day, you resume practicing for interviews and keeping up with the industry, feeling emboldened and empowered to finally resume working towards the career path you had always dreamed of.

But the more time you spend with Oikawa, the closer and more entangled in your life the brunette becomes. Alarm bells ring wildly in your head as you’re forced to join him for meals, forced to dress in elaborate gowns and jewelry while you’re waltzed around on his arm, forced to travel around the world with him, and attend to him like a glorified assistant. He’s too charming, too familiar, too bold, and you can’t help but feel like you’re racing towards some inevitable crash as he easily brushes aside any boundaries between the two of you.

You know so many women would kill to be in your shoes and you can understand why, not completely immune to his playful smile and the lilt of his voice yourself. But you know better, know exactly how dangerous it would be to get involved with a man like Oikawa Tooru.

It’s clear from the crimson stains on the clothes he leaves for you to either dispose of, or have cleaned. It’s clear from the wails and sobs of woman after woman he uses and tosses aside like garbage on an almost daily basis. It’s clear from the guns, knives, and weapons, most of which you don’t even know the name of, filling up all the walls, drawers, and cabinets.

So you do your best to keep your distance, building titanium walls around your heart. Always polite, too terrified of what would happen if you pissed him off, but cold enough to deter him from more amorously or intimately testing his boundaries.

And it seems to work as he turns his eyes towards other women, leaving you alone after throwing a few flirty comments and winks your way and ultimately falling in bed with some other poor damsel. But you nervously gulp when it’s just the two of you one night and just as you’re ready to make yourself scarce after turning down his bed and laying out his pajamas, his voice beckons you over and you anxiously bite your lower lip at the sight of pills of all shapes and sizes splayed out across his desk.

Other than your prescription medicine, you don’t have a lot of experience with drugs other than the few blunts here and there during your college years and you had always strictly kept to your recommended doses, never even entertaining the idea of taking more. So the sight in front of you is overwhelming and you hesitantly stare anywhere but at the table surface, anxiously waiting for Oikawa to explain why he called you over. But what you’re not expecting is the warm hand gently grasping your wrist and holding your arm out, small objects being carefully placed in your outstretched palm, and soft coaxing from Oikawa to “give them a try”.

Every part of you is screaming to throw the pills and make a run for it, begging you to come up with some excuse or just outright reject his offer. But it’s as if your body is frozen and he firmly pushes your hand to your mouth, grip tightening enough to make you wince when you hesitate to listen. The slight pain is enough to remind you that you’re not exactly in any position to negotiate and you force yourself to down the pills and gulp down the glass of water he holds to your lips.

The last thing you remember is the unsettling feeling of beginning a descent to an unknown place from which there is no return as Oikawa pulls you to his bed. And then euphoria floods through you as your body slots against his larger frame.

It feels good. Too good. Unnaturally good. But it’s intoxicating and you can’t help but let yourself drown in the hazy waves crashing down upon you, feeling lighter, freer, happier than you have for years. You vaguely register roaming hands, a hot wet mouth, a body on top of yours, something hard pressing against the apex of your thighs, filling you, consuming you in heady pleasure only amplified by the drugs coating your insides.

Bliss. Pleasure. Pure unadulterated joy. And then nothing.

When you come to, the weight of what had happened last night comes crashing down on you, making your foggy mind throb even more and you can feel bile rising inside of you as a toned arm around your waist tightens its hold on you. Oikawa grunts in annoyance when you claw your way out from his hold, scampering on shaky legs to his bathroom, heaving and expelling the contents of your stomach, trying futilely to cleanse yourself of your employer’s touch.

You flinch when you hear footsteps approach, shrinking into the corner of the tiled room, body crouched and curled into a tight ball as you try to save any shred of dignity you still have by hiding your naked body as much as you can from his prying eyes. Salty drops threaten to trail down your face when he hovers over you, sweetly cooing down at you “not to be like this”, “you liked it so much last night”, “come back to bed with me” only to stream down your face when his countenance swiftly changes, handsome face glowering down at you before brusquely turning away and snapping at you to “get on with your work then if you’re going to be an annoying bitch”.

It’s easy to convince yourself that you’re just being smart, just trying to survive as you obediently wash up and don your humiliating uniform, that it isn’t just you being a coward as you submissively go about your usual work day, still sitting with thighs pressed against Oikawa’s legs at meals, making no move to brush off the heavy arm he slings around your shoulders, only slightly flinching when his fingertips teasingly play with the hem of your skirt as he converses with the rest of the Seijoh Four.

But you can’t deny that all you are is a weak fool, desperate to live when you shakily accept the pills he pushes towards you again that night, silently crying yet not doing anything to prevent the inevitable as you swallow any self-respect or pride you had along with the smooth pellets under his watchful gaze, too scared of the glimmer of gunmetal you see on the inside of his jacket to even think of resisting.

And history repeats itself. Over and over again.

Oikawa smiles at how different you are from that skittish creature who fled from his every touch, smirking at how naive and innocent you still are as you try to hide how eager you are for your daily dose, unaware of how he’s slowly been increasing it every night, ignorant of how you unconsciously lean into his touches, pretty lips wrapping around his fingers as he hand feeds you.

Do you know what an animal you are in bed these days? Do you realize how little there is left to differentiate you from one of his filthy whores when you’re so doped up on whatever he gives you, moaning like a pornstar and leaving vicious red claw marks on his skin as you bounce on his cock?

And he knows it’s time to move onto the next phase of your conditioning when there’s not even a speck of shame in your clear eyes when the sunlight begins to filter through the window, knowingly smiling in satisfaction when instead of slinking off to wallow in your regret you shimmy down between his legs and begin to nuzzle and mouth his morning wood, face full of nothing but wanton desire as you take his cock in your mouth.

He doesn’t give you anything that night. Or the next night. Or the one after that. He doesn’t so much as even look at you outside of your usual eye contact, not a single flirtatious word slipping past his lips.

You should be grateful. This is what you wanted, right? To keep things strictly professional between the two of you. To not be coerced into the artificial pleasure you’ve been swallowing on a daily basis for the last month now. To not feel like just another warm body for Oikawa to taint.

Your interview notes and open tab of job listings are right there, begging for your attention, practically screaming at you to pursue the life you’ve always dreamed of.

Yet here you are, not even a week later, on your knees in between Oikawa’s legs as he leisurely reclines in his chair, peppering his inner thighs with kisses and rubbing your face against the growing bulge in his trousers, begging and pleading for another dose, feeling utterly empty and cold inside, unable to sleep, unable to focus, unable to function without the nights of hazy ecstasy.

Your heart drops at the long disappointed sigh the brunette releases.

“Drugs are expensive, cutie. I was just being nice and letting you try some new batches we’ve been producing, but now that they’re on the market, I can’t just keep on giving them to you for free.”

He rolls his eyes when you adamantly tell him you’ll pay whatever the price is, a condescending smirk splitting his face from how quick you are to shut up, soul crushed when he reveals the extravagant cost, a price he knows you can’t afford with the salary he’s providing you with.

But he artfully softens his smile as he begins to unbuckle his pants, sliding the fabric down and letting his throbbing cock spring into view, chuckling when it lightly slaps your face as it’s released from its confines, wondering if you’re drooling from the sight of his erection or the pills he’s playfully placing along the length of it.

“I know you don’t have that money, cutie. But I’d be willing to accept other forms of payments.”

The words are barely out of his mouth before you’re rushing to take him in his mouth and he loudly laughs at how obscene you look, slobbering all over his length, fervently bobbing your head up and down, hastily trying to deep throat him to reach the pill strategically placed right at the base of his shaft, lips puckering as you inhale the drugs, swallowing around him in a way that has him groaning as you stuff your face full of chemicals and pre-cum. And it doesn’t take much longer for him to wash your mouth and throat with warm rivulets of sticky white fluids as he watches the goods take effect, his balls tightening and cock straining with arousal as you reach between your legs, fingers playing with your tight dripping hole while your lewd moans vibrate against him.

It’s pathetically endearing how you can’t keep off of him after that, insisting on sitting on his lap during meals, your cute ass grinding against his clothed cock, always dropping to your knees in between chores, warming his cock in your greedy mouth, always asking him how many pills you’ve earned so far. You really are just his little slutty drug addict now, aren’t you?

But he needs you to be more than that, needs you to learn that you belong to anyone who’s willing to give you the high you crave, needs you to realize that you’re just a free use drug addicted whore for anyone and everyone to use.

So despite how tempting it is to just plunge balls deep inside your tight little pussy, he shoves you off of him one night as you try to grind against his body, feigning exhaustion and boredom of your body, watching in amusement at the panicked crazed look that flashes across your face at his words. Well aren’t you a beautiful sight, throwing yourself at his feet and groveling, saying you’ll do anything for another dose.

Anything, huh?

In your defense, even through the daze of your withdrawal, there’s still a wary expression on your face when Matsukawa and Hanamaki enter the room. Maybe you aren’t as broken as Oikawa had thought. But when you see the little baggies filled with the tablets you’ve become far too familiar with twirling between the duo’s fingers, you practically lunge at them and Oikawa finally allows himself the pleasure of reaching into his pants and stroking himself to the debauched sight playing out in front of him.

Maybe he needs to fuck you in front of a mirror more often if this is what you look like from an outside perspective. It’s like you were made to be used, to be just a warm toy for men to use and Oikawa can’t help but think you look best like this, cocks penetrating both your front and back holes, your body squeezed between two bodies. And he fondly smiles at how you have Hanamaki’s face between the palms of your hands, your lips locked in a sloppy kiss as your tongue ravages the strawberry blonde’s mouth, searching for the pills the man had playfully placed on the tip of his tongue in front of your very eyes before winking at you and telling you to come and get them yourself if you wanted them so badly.

They keep your daily training a surprise, mixing up who gets to wreck your body each day, how many cocks and rounds of cum you’ll need to pay with, what pills and dosage you get. Always keeping you lost and confused, making sure your mind is just a muddled mess that can only think of reaching your next high by any means necessary.

Hell, even Iwaizumi takes part when he realizes that you’re beyond the point of no return, that Oikawa wasn’t joking when he said that there is no other choice for you anymore. This is your life now. This is who you are now. This is your “happily ever after”. He knows all that, can see all that in the way your dazed eyes only come to life at the sight of your addiction, your otherwise listless body perking up at the sound of the tiny objects rattling in their container. And yet a small sliver of guilt has him growling at you to get on all fours, ensuring your face isn’t visible, turning you into just another body for him to mindlessly use as he pleases.

It’s an uncomfortable position, borderline painful as your knees rock back and forth on the hard floor with every brutal thrust of Iwaizumi’s hips. But you don’t care, the aching pain in your legs just dull background noise as you fixate on the tablets scattered on the floor in front of your face, dropping your entire upper body low to the ground, only your hips raised high as your mouth snaps forward. You’re so close and you mewl as your lips make contact with the first pill, uncaring of the pitiful sight you make licking and lapping the floor, whimpering when a hand firmly grabs you by the hair and roughly pulls your face away from your feast.

“Maybe we should get you a dog bowl, cutie. It’s humiliating even for you to be eating from the dirty floor like that. Hold her hair for me, Iwa-chan.”

You crane your neck back and forth, jaw jutting forward as you frantically fight against the tight grip holding you back, mouth drooling and tongue extending like a ravenous animal. But it’s no use and you whine, too focused on your unfinished “meal” to notice how Oikawa is still standing in front of you, cock pulled out from his pants, his hands rapidly fisting the shaft. And only when thick white spurts glaze the remaining pills do you whip your attention towards him, staring with hopeful wide eyes when he crouches in front of you and grabs your face.

“When Iwa-chan lets go of your hair, you’ll get to have the rest of your treats, but you also have to eat the special seasoning I’ve generously given you, okay? If I see even a speck of it left, you’re not getting anything tomorrow, understand?”

Oikawa laughs at how vigorously you nod your head and with a nod in Iwaizumi’s direction, you’re released and the two men watch on as you lick the floor until it’s sparkling clean, slumping your face in the mess of your own drying saliva as you reach euphoria once more. You wail as Iwaizumi shoves you off a cliff and into floating clouds of bliss with one last thrust, the drugs in your system weaving a comforting cocoon around you that you melt into, unable to escape its soothing pull, giggling in content as his seed fills you to the brim.

There’s silence as Iwaizumi pulls out of you, tucking himself back into his pants before sitting besides Oikawa, joining him as he continues observing your used and drugged up body sprawled across the floor, a dopey smile on your face as cum begins to leak out of your spent pussy.

Minutes pass and Iwaizumi sighs, knowing what Oikawa is waiting for him to ask despite how insistent he has been over the years about not wanting to be involved in this particular side of the business...

“Are you going to have her start working at the brothel soon? She seems just about ready.”

“Not yet. I want to give her a few test runs first before I have her work full-time at that establishment. She’s only been with the four of us, so I’m curious to see how she is with a complete stranger. It’s perfect timing too since Sawamura is coming over for a meeting soon and I know he won’t damage the goods if I gift her to him for a night or two. Plus, she hasn’t completely lost her mind yet so we can get some more use out of her before we toss her aside...”

The brunette rambles on, tone light and airy as if he’s just discussing the weather or a TV show he watched, as if he’s not mere feet away from a woman he’s utterly destroyed and rebuilt into just another brainless profit-making doll.

And Iwaizumi tunes him out, already having heard almost this exact speech countless times by now, unable to even keep track of how many others like you there have been in the past, unwilling to think about how many more there will be in the future. But he snorts at Oikawa’s typical closing line.

“I guess it’s almost time to find a new cute maid.”

#haikyuu smut #yandere haikyuu #yandere oikawa #yandere oikawa x reader #oikawa x reader #tw: yandere #tw: drugging #tw: drugs #tw: addiction #tw: noncon #tw: dubcon

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ares-would-be-proud · 3 years

Text

Anon said Is it alright to request some head cannons-nsfw preferably for Reiner being in love with his precious step-sister? Like he has to take care of her so no one hurts her, and who better to take care of her then himself?

Reiner thinking he's the only man good enough for you, his precious step-sister.

{ Reiner x fem!reader | tw:stepcest, tw:possessiveness, tw:overprotective, tw:overstimulation | smut, forbidden love | modern }

{ "Mars and Venus, Allegory of Peace" 1770 by Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée 1724 - 1805 } (ha! Get it? Bc they're also siblings)

Sees it as his own job to protect and dot on you, not letting you go somewhere alone without him by your side, keeping an arm around you at all times.

Dotting in the way he never forgets your favourite snacks each time he goes to the store, takes over cooking duty when your dad and his mom go out, makes sure you're sleeping and eating well.

Being skeptical of your friends, and making his own friends get on edge if their eyes happen to stare at you for a bit too long for his liking.

Bertolt never meets your eyes because of that, even Annie just glues her eyes to her phone whenever you walk in the room.

Will literally intimidate people from even thinking of approaching you by his presence alone, you could safely walk anywhere anytime with him by your side.

And yet, with you he melts at every flutter of your eyelashes and twirl. Becoming putty in your hands with every soft touch and small peak you give his cheek.

His brain almost stops each time you smile.

And while to everyone else it seems like he's just an overprotective big brother, behind closed doors it's another story.

His hand trailing up your thighs under the dinner table while his mom tells you about her day.

His lips kissing down your neck whenever you wear that low-cut top, hands going under the fabric and tugging down your bra till your breasts spill over them.

Turning a deaf ear to your protest's about being late to your friend's house, his attention solely on sucking marks down your chest before taking a nipple between his lips and sucking while flickering the other.

By the end of it, you had to change into a long neck shirt from the amount of hickies and marks he took his sweet time leaving behind.

Is the type to take you with him places, his own personal cheerleader.

Loves making you call him big brother, even if you weren't younger he'd still demand it.

I say "demand" but in reality he's just pouting with puppy eyes.

Since your dad married his mom, he was smitten the day he saw you at the wedding.

Oh and he will literally buy you anything if you play your cards right, even if he goes broke.

Really easy to manipulate if you're willing to play the role of the cheering sweet little sister, his heart easily swaying with the sway of your short skirt, throat going dry at your honey filled voice calling him the best big brother.

Really really wants to take care of you.

Like really, will find excuses to let him take care of you and do stuff for you.

Although nothing comes without a price…

Let's just say what's normal sex for him is overstimulation for the normal person, he has insane stamina

And his cooing for you that you can give him another orgasm, just one more.

You both could be sitting on the couch, watching a movie you've been wanting to watch for a while, and he will pop a boner because the way you giggled at a scene was really adorable-

Even while knowing that his mom was just a room away—fixing both of you some dinner in the kitchen—it didn't stop your step brother from trailing his big hands up your legs, squeezing the plump of your thighs before pulling at the hem of your shorts, an intense stare in his eyes.

"Come here" he says while patting his thighs, "really missed you baby, wanna feel you against me."

Coaxing you into giving in, not wait for a reply before letting his hands do all the work to sit you on his lap. Burying his face in your neck as his hot breath tickles your skin, almost whining about how tiring today was while his hands rub circles on your back.

You don't miss the curving of his lips when he asks if you could kiss it better for him, make your big brother feel better.

His hands start trailing up and down your back instead, feeling the softness of your shirt, the curve of your ass, circling around your waist before going up again, adding just enough pressure to loosen any tense muscle you might have.

You try not to give in despite his coaxing, mouth in a frown as you stare at the remote still clutched in your hand, the sound of the movie you were watching still playing in the background almost mocking you.

"Reiner can't this wa-" you try to brush him off but the rocking of his knee between your legs shuts you up, making your grind back against them to get more friction as you press your thighs together.

Eyes glossy as your brain gets clouded by the pleasure, your older brother bouncing you on his leg till your toes curl and mewls escape your lips.

You hear him shushing you, murmuring how your step mom might hear you, only to grind against your dampening shorts faster.

The knot in your stomach gets tighter and tighter as you get closer to the edge, biting down on his shoulder to muffle your moans, your own hips pushing back against him.

His arms get a firm hold of your hips, stilling them as he stops his own leg too, mere seconds before you get that final push.

"Want your brother to make you feel really good? Want me to take care of you huh?"

You quickly nod without thinking, aching for any sort of relief. He rewards you with a kiss, slow and gentle as if you're some delicate soft thing he needs to pamper.

And to him, you are. That's why he took you to his room despite the growing urge to push you against the nearest surface and ram inside you,

No, your big brother would never. He sees it as his duty to protect you from everything and so it follows that he wouldn't settle for less than a soft bed and a pillow under your back.

That's why he tucks you against him the second you get on the bed, his back to the headboard with you sitting between his legs, back against his chest.

His hand slipping past the elastic band of your panties, fingers painfully slowly moving up and down your slit before parting your lips.

Your back arching when they start toying with your puffy clit, rubbing circles around it and flickering it till your soaked panties start clinging to your wet pussy.

Brain turning into mush when his fingers shove into your sopping hole, the faster he goes the louder your whimpers get as his thick fingers thrust in and out.

His other hand put enough pressure against your stomach to keep you in place when your thighs began to quiver, the more you squirm in place when his thumb presses down your now swollen clit the more your back rubs against his hardening cock.

"Fuck- just like that." Groans slip past his lips with each roll of his hips against your ass, precum starting to seep through the fabric of his pants.

He's as desperate as you are.

It's not long before he has you creaming on his fingers, watching you unfold and shake before gushing against his hand. He slowly pulls his fingers out as sticky lines cling to them, looking at you panting with your legs still shaking, before shoving them back in and fucking your own mess back inside you.

You let out a strangled scream at the punishing pace, head lolling to the side from the overstimulation and mind going completely blank.

All sorts of compliments and soft words leave his lips, praising you as he forces a second orgasm out of you, having you turn into putty in his hand.

Too much- it's too much, you're too sensitive and barely able to form coherent sentences, a shaking quivering babbling mess, too high in pleasure to notice the tear stains down your cheeks. Attempting to finally catch your breath now that your brother is satisfied.

If only.

"You're ready for me sweetheart?" He says, voice laced with anticipation as he pats your messy cunt, making your knees buck. "Ready for your big brother's cock filling up this pretty pussy?"

One second he's tugging your soaked paintes to the side, cold sending shivers up your spine, the next he's tapping the head of his cock against your hole, pushing up your slippery folds till the tip rubs against your sensitive clit, making more tears collect clouding your vision.

Cock throbbing at just the idea of your gummy walls squeezing him inside, making his thrusts stutter and grip almost bruising against your skin. Filling his room with the sound of skin on skin slapping as his hips slam against your wet thighs

The image of your knees folded against your chest till the base of his cock disappears inside, reaching impossibly deep till he's kissing the entrance of your womb before slamming against the rough patch of skin that makes you drool.

It's driving him crazy with lust.

And despitet how much he wants nothing more than to fuck his cum inside you, fill you up and plug you with his cock, really make sure that you're tied to him for life and no other man will even think of looking your way with, he will still pull out.

Sprouts of cum rushing out his swollen cock as he pulls out with a wet pop, whie ropes painting your stomach and chest instead, going down your thighs and the curve of your ass before staining the sheets.

Just have your brain swimming in milk and honey as you take in the afterglow, he'll run soothing circles up your thighs while you doze off to the rise and fall of his chest.

The scenes play out in perfect order in his mind. Yeah, just the thought alone is enough to make him want to go for three rounds at least till he's cumming dry.

"Alright, spread your legs more for me, yeah just like that."

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buckys-black-dress · 3 years

Text

✄ chapter three: losin' grip on my doin'

a/n: okay, let's goooo! chapter 3 :) things are buildin up... get ready ;) chapter 4 will be posed tonight or tomorrow :)

wc: 4.1k

[fratboy!bucky barnes x fem!reader]

series masterlist

To say the least, waking up the next morning in the most coveted after playboy's bed was a shock. You wake up nestled into Bucky Barnes' side, and you wonder if this is what it felt like.

If this is what every conquest that's been brought to his room feels like when they wake up.

You're very much aware of a metal arm slung over your waist, and you feel panic rise up in your throat. Once you recognize you're fully clothed, you release a breath and feel the tension disintegrating from your body.

You can feel Bucky Barnes' heavy breaths under your head from where you're situated on his chest, and you take a moment and pause.

You would never think you'd find yourself in this situation; sidled up in bed with your university's most notorious fratboy. Someone girls and guys coveted after, and who would do anything to get in bed with him.

Yet, here you are. You don't want to admit to yourself that you quite like it here. You feel comfortable, safe. Fitted perfectly right under his arm, listening to his even breaths as you replay the night before's events in your mind like a film reel.

You meet him.

You play pong with him.

You talk to him.

You go up to his room with him.

And now you're awake in his bed. Fully clothed.

How?

Before you could ask too many questions and drown into a spiral, you hear Bucky draw in a sharp breath, signaling his awakening. You look up at him, wondering how he's going to react to you being here. Not only you being here, but also how you two woke up.

"Mornin', doll." He smiles down at you, and his morning voice sends a shiver down your spine at the raspiness.

"H-Hi." You simply say. You can't quite draw any coherent thoughts at the moment, as Bucky's arm tightens around you and draws you closer to his body.

"Sleep well?" He asks, still looking down at you fond look that makes your heart swell in your chest.

"Hm," you hum, "better than I expected, honestly." You laugh.

"Good, spent way too much on this mattress for it to not please my guests." Bucky smirks, and you get lost in his blue eyes for a moment.

But then, you think about his word choice. Guests. Plural. And although you know nothing happened between you two, you still feel a wave of shame wash over you at the notion.

Bucky's had guests in this bed before. You aren't the first girl to sleep in this bed, and you probably weren't the last.

You feel Bucky shift underneath you, seeing his expression turn to worry at the way you're clearly lost in thought.

"Everythin' alright?" He asks, and you nod quickly.

"Yeah, everything's fine. Just peachy." You give a quick smile, trying to not show how your stomach was churning at the thought of all the girls who've been here before you.

"Wanna go grab some breakfast?" Bucky asks, and you pause.

He wants to stay with me? He's not kicking me out, asking me to leave?

“Sure, uh, where did you wanna go?” You ask gently, worrying that you might scare him off, that he’s delusional right now and he doesn’t really want to spend time with you. You’re beyond confused right now.

“We can head to the diner if you’re good with that? My treat.” He says as he stands up, pulling on a shirt to avoid the chill of the room.

It’s a red henley, and the way you see his muscles straining in the sleeves of the shirt has a blush crawling up your neck.

“Yeah, that’s fine.” You croak, getting out of the bed.

By the time you get up and get dressed, sweatpants courtesy of Bucky, and head to the diner, it’s already noon. It’s a Saturday morning, so most people are still in bed while recovering from their hangovers.

“So, how come I haven’t seen you at one of our parties before last night?” Bucky asks while you seat yourselves at a booth in the back of the diner.

“I uhm, I don’t really go out too much. Natasha basically begged me to come out, and I only did it to get her off my case and stop asking me.” You reply while taking a sip of the scalding coffee in front of you that a nice waitress poured for the two of you.

“Really? Well, I’d say you should come more often,” he gives you this smile, and your brain is short-circuiting at how handsome he looks. “You were a great pong partner.”

The emphasis on the word and his tone indicate that he was very much so being sarcastic, and you give a bashful chuckle at his words.

“Oh yeah, definitely. I have nothing on Natasha and Sam.” You laugh, and the same waitress comes by to take your orders.

Once she flutters back behind the counter to put the orders in, you’re reading a text on your phone that you felt vibrate while it was in the pocket of Bucky’s sweater you were sporting.

Natasha:

(12:08 PM) Hey, did you end up getting back safe last night? Sorry I kind of bailed, I just ended up crashing when I got to Sam’s room.

She punctuates her sentence with a face palm emoji in embarrassment, and you smile at the text.

Y/N:

(12:10 PM) Hi, I just crashed in Bucky’s room last night. No funny business tho, so don’t get any ideas in your head.

As you send off the message, you turn off your phone and place is face-down on the table, deciding you’ll deal with Nat’s freak out about you spending the night with Bucky later.

“Everythin’ okay?” Bucky’s voice startles you out of your thoughts, and you snap your eyes up to his.

“Yeah, Nat was just making sure I didn’t end up dead in a ditch last night.” You laugh, shaking your head at how dramatic your roommate could be at times.

“Hey, it’s good to know she cares about you.” He responds, and you nod at his words.

“I mean, yeah. No matter how much she might bug me about going out or getting a boyfriend, she’s still like my sister. I don’t know what I’d do without her.” A sigh leaves your mouth, thinking about Nat. She’s been there for you through everything in your life, and it was true. She was your biggest supporter, and you’re glad you have someone who cares so much for you.

“She seems like a great friend. Sam and Steve are the same for me. I mean, although I grew up with Steve, Sam was like the third brother we never even knew we needed.” He stares off into the distance with a soft look in his eyes, and you smile fondly at his words.

In that moment, you feel like you’re seeing a side of Bucky that not many people get to see. This is Bucky, a guy from Brooklyn who’s just trying to get by in college. Not a man-whore, or a guy who just wants to ge his dick wet like everyone says.

Before you could come up with a response to what he’s said, the same lady comes and places your hot food in front of the both of you, leaving with a ‘enjoy!’ before she whirls away again.

You eat while making small talk, just about life, school, and hobbies. Before you know it, Bucky asks for the check, and even though you know he said he’d pick it up earlier, you still fight him on paying for half the bill.

In the end, Bucky becomes so frustrated with your antics that he simply gets up and hands the waitress his card, and you simply watch with a dropped jaw at his actions.

“You didn’t have to do that!” You exclaim, albeit quietly, but enough to show your frustration.

“Doll, I’m treating you to brunch. Just let me.” Is all Bucky says, effectively shutting you up.

On your walk back to campus, Bucky asks what you’re doing for the rest of the day, asking if you wanted to come back to his room.

“I should head back, Natasha’s probably waiting for me with a million questions.” You bashfully look up to your window from the bottom of your dorm building.

“Oh, okay doll.” Bucky wraps his arms around you, pulling you into an unexpected hug. You feel your body tense at the action, but once you realize what’s happening, you relax again, letting yourself melt into his body.

“See ya later?” He asks with a raised brow.

“Uh, yeah. I don’t know what I’ll be doing later, but we can talk later.” You smile up at him, slowly moving out of his grip and towards the door.

Before you could fully open the door, you hear Bucky’s voice call out to you one more time.

“Y/N, wait!” He yells, jogging over to you at the door. “Can I uh, get your number? So I can text you later?” He asks, his metal hand rubbing the back of his neck.

“O-Oh, sure! Yeah!” You reply a bit louder than you had intended, just out of pure shock at his question.

You open a new message on your phone, allowing Bucky to type in his number and save his contact. Once he hands the device back to you, you see his name saved as Bucky Barnes <3.

Before you can say anything about the heart he added himself, he pecks your cheek and runs off, with a distant ‘I’ll see ya later, doll!’

You essentially float up to your room, not feeling like you were on the planet right now. You felt like you were up in the clouds, unaware of your own actions. You unlock the door to your room, and Natasha is perched upon her bed, looking down at two outfits she has held up against her form.

“Hey! You didn’t answer my messages, you little bitch! Tell me everything!” She turns around at the sound of you entering, already berating you.

But it all sounds muffled in your ears, not fully comprehending what she was saying to you.

“Hey, you okay? Earth to Y/N?” The redhead says again, waving a hand in front of your face at your spacey expression.

“I-I, yeah, I’m fine. Just… shocked.” You breathe out.

“So? Tell me what happened!”

At first, you could barely get the words out of your mouth, trying to explain everything that occurred in the past 24 hours. You get through the story, a little bit challenged at trying to organize your thoughts, but eventually you get Natasha up to speed.

“So… you didn’t have sex with him?” Your roommate says, and you shake your head no.

“Nat, you know how I feel about having sex. I don’t want to rush into it, and I don’t want my first time to be with some… random guy from a frat. I want it to be with someone I trust, someone I’m comfortable with.” You tell her like a broken record, because over the course of the time that you’ve been friends with Natasha, you’ve had this conversation with her several times. Sometimes, you wondered why she was so hellbent on you losing your virginity.

As much as you loved her and understood her intentions with the question, you were getting tired of having to defend yourself every time.

“I- I know! I just… I want you to be happy, with whoever you want. I never want you to think I’m rushing you though, Y/N. I love you.” Natasha explains, putting her hand on your arm in consolation.

“I know, Nat. But trust me, you’ll be the first to know when I do… do it. Don’t worry.” You laugh at how ridiculous you sounded.

She’s looking back down at her bed now, looking between the outfits she was holding earlier.

“Okay… now, help me pick an outfit! Sam wants to go on a date tonight!” She says, showing you the different options.

As you two banter and talk about last night, you interrupt Natasha’s tirade about Sam and ‘what a gentleman he is!’

“Bucky gave me his number earlier.” Saying it out loud makes it sound all the more ridiculous. You feel like a high-schooler at your words, and the way Natasha stops all movement makes you feel all the more insane.

“His number?” She asks, like she couldn’t figure out what to really say.

“Yeah. He even saved a heart next to his name in my phone. What does that even mean?” You wonder out loud, and now you’re sure you’ve gone crazy.

“I… I’m not sure. I think he likes you.” She says nonchalantly, and you scoff.

“Yeah, because Bucky Barnes is very interested in a girl he met last night who didn’t want to sleep with him. He must be going crazy over a girl like me.” You finish with an incredulous laugh, like it never even crossed your mind that he could like you.

“Well… he acted very different from you’ve been telling me. He usually just fucks a girl and she leaves the next morning, nothing more, nothing less. The fact that he didn’t fuck you and took you out to brunch says a lot about this whole situation.” She explains, and you’re still having a hard time grasping this information.

Just as you’re about to find a rationale as to why her explanation isn’t plausible, you feel your phone buzz.

With furrowed brows, you open your texts.

Bucky Barnes <3:

(2:01 PM) Hey doll, do you wanna come by to another party we’re having tonight? Could use my trusty pong champ ;)

Your mouth dries at the message, words lodged in your throat.

“Look what he just texted me.” You flip your screen to Nat and she reads with an unreadable expression, which quickly turns into her brows shooting up.

“A winky face! Y/N/N, he fucking likes you! He wants to see you again!” She exclaims, and you don’t even know what to say.

“How do I respond?” You feel so unexperienced, asking your roommate for advice on how to text a guy.

“Here, gimme,” she snatches the phone out of your grasp, quickly typing something and handing the phone back to you.

You read what she sent with wide eyes.

Y/N Y/L/N:

(2:11 PM) I’ll be there ;) Should I bring clothes to change into for tonight?

“Nat! Why would you say that? You’re making it sound like I wanna have sex with him tonight!” You rise up from your spot on her bed in a panic, pacing the area of your small room.

“Y/N, relax! He-” Before she could finish, your phone buzzed again.

Bucky Barnes <3

(2:13 PM) Hilarious, doll. You don’t have to, but if you wanna crash here again tonight, you can definitely bring your own stuff if that makes you more comfy :)

“Oh my God. He’s so sweet!” Nat giggles, covering her mouth with her hand. “You have to go now!”

“Nat… doesn’t this look a little… suspicious? From what I’ve heard, this isn’t how he usually acts.” You say wearily, the worry clear in your tone.

“Y/N, look at me.” Natasha's hands come to the sides of your head, urging your gaze to meet hers. “You’re a great girl. You deserve someone who treats you well and gets excited to see you, like Bucky is right now. Don’t push him away. You deserve something good.”

At her words, your eyes soften and you feel the distant sting of tears behind your eyes. You give her a nod, not knowing how to express your gratitude to her in words at the moment. She pulls you into a hug and you hold her tight against you, like she might disappear if you let go.

“Now, we need to get you ready for tonight. You’re gonna make Bucky wish he fucked you.” Natasha smirks an evil one.

“Nat!”

The party was in full swing upon your arrival. You were all alone when you walked through the doors of the fraternity house, as Natasha had gone on her dinner date with Sam. She’d promised she’d come by after dinner, and you were practically shaking while searching for Bucky in the packed house.

There were people everywhere, and the longer it took for you to find Bucky, the more anxious you were becoming about being here.

“Y/N!” You hear distantly, and your head whips around in search of the owner of the voice.

You feel a hand slide around your waist, and you smell Bucky before you see him. If it weren’t for the distinct smell of his cologne and mint, you would’ve slapped the hand away long ago.

“Hey! Been wonderin’ when you’d show up.” Bucky has a smile on his face, showing off his pearly whites.

“Sorry, I got held up at home with Natasha.” You tell him, looking around at the crowd. You could feel your breathing shorten at the sheer amount of people around you, and your stomach churns in anxiety.

As if Bucky senses your discomfort, he rubs the hand on your waist along the expanse of your back.

“You okay?” He asks, visibly concerned at your demeanor.

You nod wordlessly, trying to make it seem like you weren’t extremely stressed right now. You would’ve loved to let loose tonight, but yesterday was already pushing it in terms of going out.

“Do you wanna head upstairs?” Bucky asks in clear concern at your demeanor right now. He feels a wave of guilt wash over him. If he knew just how much you were going to become uncomfortable by just being here tonight, he wouldn’t have asked you to come. He would’ve simply asked you on a date, or done a night in with you.

You nod again, not allowing the words to leave your throat. You feel as though your mouth is full of cotton, not even being able to form any coherent thoughts at the moment.

Bucky’s cool metal arm guides you by your lower back to the stairs, and you’re once again reminded of the previous night. His cool metal hand is the only thing grounding you at the moment, and you think you would’ve ended up on the dirty bathroom floor downstairs in a puddle of tears if Bucky had taken any longer to find you.

You pass through his doorway, and Bucky’s arm is holding you against him as the door shuts behind you two.

He wordlessly caresses you, running a soothing hand up and down your back, which is partially open because of your outfit. You’re wearing a dress from Natasha’s closet, which she claimed made you look ‘hotter than the motherfucking sun, Y/N’, and you were basically forced into.

“For what it’s worth, honey, you look stunning tonight.” You feel Bucky’s chest rumble from his speaking from where you’re placed against him, and you give a light laugh.

“Thanks,” you return quietly, unable to really come up with anything witty to say. “I’m sorry I’m ruining tonight for you.” Your voice comes after a few moments of silence, but suddenly you’re pulled away from his body.

“Hey,” his hands are on your shoulders, “you are not ruining anything, doll. Parties ’ll come and go, but I don’t want to do it if it isn’t with you.” He tells you in earnest, and you feel an indistinguishable ache in your chest at his words.

Where did this man come from? It seems as though the perfect guy, one who respects you, one who doesn’t force you into anything, one who seems to care too much about you has just... fallen into your lap.

It almost seems too good to be true.

“Bucky…” You trail off, unable to find any words of gratitude at the moment.

“Yeah, doll?”

“Can we just… lay down? Maybe watch a movie?” You ask.

“Of course we can, honey. Anythin’ you want.” He smiles brightly again as your mood seems to lighten a bit. “Do you need a change of clothes?”

“Yes, please. If you don’t mind.” You can’t really bring yourself to look at him. You feel embarrassed that you’ve pulled him away from his own party. Although he constantly reassures you that he doesn’t mind, you’re still bashful.

“Here, honey,” he hands you the same garments from last night, “you look good in these.” He laughs, and you feel your cheeks turn bright red.

“I- I’ll be right back.” You give a tight smile and retreat to the bathroom.

While Bucky waits outside, he begins to get lost in his thoughts. He liked you. A lot. How did he get himself into this mess? He’s not stupid. He knows what he did to get here. And now it was looking really, really, stupid.

Unfortunately, there was no getting it out of it now, though. He could try and reason with the person he’d made a promise to, but he was stubborn. There was little to no chance he would be able to get out of this one.

But he thinks of it on the flip side. He’s been seen bringing you up to his room two nights in a row, and he knows how it makes both of you look.

For him, he looks like he’s keeping up with reputation.

Take a girl home.

Fuck her.

Leave it at that.

No one quite knew you on campus except for your friends, so they weren’t worried about you or who you were.

All that mattered was that Bucky Barnes was keeping up with his usual antics that were expected of him. There was nothing out of the ordinary for him, other than the fact that he wasn’t actually fucking you.

Bucky snaps out of his train of thought when he hears the bathroom door click open, his eyes meeting yours once again.

But his eyes quickly divert to your body, once again covered by his baggy clothing. You were watching his stare move down your body and felt a wave of insecurity wash over you.

You probably weren’t half as gorgeous as the girls he’s brought back here before. You knew what kind of girls guys like him preferred. Long, cascading hair, big, bright eyes, thin waists, legs that went on for what seemed like miles.

You just weren’t that.

It made you come back to the thoughts that had plagued your mind previously.

Where did Bucky’s interest in you come from?

Why was he suddenly feel the need to coddle you, take care of you, to reassure you?

Your concern was quickly washed away when Bucky settled in his bed, patting his spot next to him under the covers.

“You comin’?” He asks in a raspy, quiet voice that makes your knees wobble.

You don’t say anything while you situate yourself beside him.

“Bucky, can I ask you something?” You begin meekly, not making eye contact with him.

“Anythin’, doll. Somethin’ wrong?” He looks down at you in a worried gaze, and you shake your head.

“I just… what made you want to approach me? I- I know I’m not like those other girls you’ve been with before, and I can’t help but think that you… you want something else from me?” You explain with little ease. You feel bile rising in your throat as you speak because you can’t bear to think that Bucky really ulterior motives for all this time you’ve spent together.

You’ve only just met him, yet you feel like you’ve known him forever. You’re comfortable with him, more than you usually would be with a stranger, and it freaks you out.

“Y/N… can you look at me?” Bucky tilts his head down to try and meet your eyes, which is something you can barely do at the moment. “I want you to know, before this goes anywhere else; you are an amazing girl. I don’t know why it took me so long to talk to you, but I think you’re one the most genuine, kind, beautiful girls I’ve ever met. I… I know I have a reputation that precedes me, but you… you’re different.” He speaks so genuinely to you that you feel a slight sting behind your eyes.

“I… I never want you to doubt yourself ever again, doll. You’re perfect, just as you are. I’m sorry it looked like I was after anything else before.” Bucky finishes, and you can’t seem to find any words at the moment.

You just nod fervently, and then you feel yourself being pulled into Bucky’s large arms.

“Please, don’t let anyone make you doubt yourself again. You’re worth it.”

That night, you fall into the most comfortable and deep sleep of your life, wrapped safely in Bucky’s arms.

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