#i have full on gifsets that i never made public :

[dennisboobs]

any time my trash twins posts pop off again im always nervously patrolling the reblogs paranoid about Certain People reblogging but. seriously u have no idea how happy it makes me to see everyone talking about their sibling quirks and shit, man. i love them so much.

[emotionalcadaver]

You know what? I've gone out of my way to be nice. I've acknowledged that mob mentality and manipulation were at work. I've reached out to some of the people who were direct victims of Mr. McCreepy and his actions to check in on them and to extended my well wishes. I have made an effort not to victim blame or question anyone's experiences over what has happened.

But I do not appreciate my own experiences being questioned and belittled. No, he did not hurt me nearly as directly as he did many of you. But that does not change that he created an extremely hostile, unwelcoming, and anxiety inducing environment for myself, and many other people, simply because we happened to like a character that he didn't.

Many of you are missing the point. It was not simply because he disliked Grace that so many were turned off or upset by his behavior. It was because he went out of his way to comment on posts--like gifsets or textposts--spouting nasty things about her, purposefully picking fights with her fans, and openly bullying people for liking her or for trying to defend themselves when he burst onto their lovely gifs or other content they'd created spewing hated. That was the problem. And that's not even going into the issue that a lot of his posts on Grace crossed the line from simple character critique into full blown misogyny.

And so many of his fans engaged with that behavior and contributed to it. And by continuing to belittle and minimize the experiences of those who have tried to discuss this aspect of his public behavior and how it affected them and the fandom, you are proving that you never cared that he was hurting others. It was only when he hurt you personally that you started to give a damn.

I'm not even looking for an apology from anyone who engaged in the bullying. But I don't think that it's too much to ask that, after everything that has been revealed about this man, that you would stop trying to argue that his public behavior was acceptable. I am frankly flabbergasted to see so many people who are victims of him going out of their way to still defend him when it comes to this aspect of what he did.

This is a way that he has hurt and affected myself and others in the fandom, even when we chose not to directly engage with him. And it is just as valid as the other ways he hurt people on here. I am sorry if that makes you feel bad, because you happened to contribute to the bullying that created such an unwelcoming environment and quite likely drove some people out of the fandom entirely. But those of us who were impacted in this way have just as much right to express it as the rest of you.

[rosyjuly]

saw these gifs https://rosyjuly.tumblr.com/post/69882566823498547 and blacked out imagining: prince au, a few months after they've broken up, charles convinces alex to go to a rugby game with him and pierre (big strong men wrestling in the mud! what's not to like! it will be good for you to see some sexy men so you stop moping all the time) and they have some beers and it is quite fun actually, and alex can't think of the last time he did something like this, and then they get on the dance cam during half time and alex does a sheepish little boogie and charles starts grinding on pierre and the camera quickly cuts away-

MEANWHILE george is up in idk the royal box having a miserable time, but in the kind of placid way that he’s always having a miserable time these days so it’s not exactly standing out, but then he gets a glimpse of alex on the big screen, first time he’s seen him in months and he looks so happy, laughing and smiling… and the friends he’s with are so obviously gay. It makes a shamefully jealous self-hatred curdle inside him, that he was forcing alex to hide away with him, could never have him so joyful in public like this, how selfish was he to want to shackle alex to him forever ETC!!

when george ends up on the screen during a stoppage towards the end of the game, alex is completely unprepared for it, only looks up in time to see him smiling (which looks just like his normal smile except for all the ways it’s completely wrong) and then the smile falling off his face to this awful, hollow look. barely even notices the beautiful girl under his arm, heart is in his throat because george looks so unhappy and he shouldn’t care, it’s not his responsibility to care anymore, george made sure of that, but he can’t just turn it off.

so then they’re both just sitting in a stadium, together but so far away, feeling heartsick and miserable and missing each other. probably go home and have the world’s most despondent wanks.

UM as you can see this au has completely taken over my brain!! thank you (and the coauthors!) so much for sharing it with the world.. truly love to see those pretty boys suffer

anon the pure JOY you and this scholarly, brilliant ask brought to me and @prettydangrotten ... obviously i was at work when i received it and had to share your genius and how PERFECTLY it fits into prince au with gabby immediately and gaby was like "ROSY DID WE WRITE THIS????" meanwhile i had to carry on with work conversations as if my whole world hadn't shifted...

this is the gifset in question and your analysis... scarily accurate. gabby and i talked about football (european football) being a passion george somewhat shares with his posh 'mates' and the princes have gone to some games (in full suits lol). kiss and dance cams look so fun but unfortunately we don't have them here in europe :( to anglicize the scenario a lil bit so it can fit into the not-so-fun british context...

pierre gets a three tickets to a premier league game from the other department's manager (otmar? rossi?) who's trying to fuck him. it's an arsenal - manchester united game (don't think i have forgotten or forgiven pierre for being a man u fan) and although charles isn't much into football, he still comes because PL tickets are ridiculously expensive so. they take alex who already wants to die in advance because the sexual tension between pierre and charles has been even worse than usual.

and oh my god-- gabby said george'd arrive late due to a prior engagement and then they show him on the screens while waiting for a VAR decision or Xhaka arguing with the ref (ooohh he would never) and alex has that exact reaction you described... and it gets me SO BADLY every time i think of post-breakup alex because he can't get rid of george! he's there on the telly, he's trending on twitter, he'll be on the bbc radio in fifteen years giving his new years speech... and alex hates himself how he still cares for him, even though it was GEORGE who eradicated that possibility! feels pathetic for it, for how george clearly didn’t care enough for their relationship to even break up with him when he started dating his future wife!

meanwhile george barely catches a glimpse of someone who looks like alex and then when he's at home he keeps rewatching the clip over and over again. as gabby said: "Alex sips his drink, rolls his eyes at something his friend says, and then just as the three of them work out they’re on camera (one of his mates starts grinding on the other; George’s stomach flips), just as Alex’s face changes to like happy shock —-It cuts away." and i'm FERAL over how while alex can't ignore george, george's issue is that he doesn't know shit about alex anymore. he asks jenson every six months to check on alex, but only tell him if he's 1) alive 2) healthy 3) not in need of anything. he can't bear the thought of not helping out alex if he'd need it but he won't take advantage of the secret service or MI6 or whatever.

thank YOU so much for sending this ask, we feel so so so honored for the interest for this au... it makes us so happy that you're sharing your ideas and interpretations with us and i'm in absolute awe about how perfectly it fits into the universe? anon i will be personally delivering your invitation to the prince au picnic with a wax stamp and violins!!!!

[willgrahambf]

I posted 1,025 times in 2022

377 posts created (37%)

648 posts reblogged (63%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@willgrahambf

@peoplesoup

@willgrahamscock

@bloodstainedlamb

@dogmotif

I tagged 969 of my posts in 2022

Only 5% of my posts had no tags

#ask - 188 posts

#txt :my thoughts are not often tasty: - 112 posts

#hannibal - 104 posts

#nbc hannibal - 81 posts

#hannibal funnies - 71 posts

#hannigram - 51 posts

#hannibal meta - 47 posts

#hannibal comparative - 40 posts

#hugh dancy - 38 posts

#hannibal art - 36 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#if i did a review for every movie i watched it would take way too long bc i think too hard and can’t be concise and i don’t have enough time

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

hannibal crossing his legs when he sits is hot bc it works on a number of levels. it’s the elegance of the way that he carries himself, it’s the sensual lines that the body inherently makes in that position, it’s the refined repose that masks the predator underneath, it’s the departure from hyper-masculine posture, but most of all it’s bc he is bisexual

1,788 notes - Posted January 25, 2022

#4

i know that the shot of will laying his head against hannibal’s chest in twotl is one of the most iconic images of the show but like…. sometimes i think of it and it takes my breath away bc it’s one of the only times that will seeks physical touch from someone beyond touching a hand and bc i think laying your head on someone’s chest is one of the most tender and romantic things that you can do. it’s pure intimacy, and they really gave of us that between two men on cable television in 2015. it flies in the face of generally socially accepted ways for men to touch each other in american culture, and i know we rage against there being no kiss, but that’s bc to us as lgbtq people it’s obvious what’s between them, but i think it was radical in a way. a kiss would have been a distraction to the general public viewers bc all they’d be able to think about is the fact that it’s two men kissing. but will laying his head on hannibal’s chest, peaceful at last….. that is everything bc hannibal is his everything now, all else has been stripped away, and for the first time, in the entire show will rests without guilt in the only place that can offer it to him. not to go all “their relationship is something deeper than romance and sex” but like it really is. obv i’m of the belief that romance and sex is part of their relationship, but that would be nothing without the simple yet heart wrenching core of it — that they are the only ones who understand and see each other truly for what they are and they are the only ones who can change each other until they fit together perfectly. they made a place for each other there in each other, and the embrace is the physical representation of it. nothing fits like a head against a shoulder or an arm around the waist

2,032 notes - Posted January 26, 2022

#3

See the full post

2,084 notes - Posted June 28, 2022

#2

people who still get scared by hannibal trending on tumblr of all places are so funny like babes the show has been over for 7 yrs there’s not gonna be a s4 there was never gonna be a s4 we are all just mentally ill having ball up in this bitch with our funny little cannibal men and our silly little gifsets don’t even worry about it

2,213 notes - Posted April 5, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

no no no bc will asking hannibal, “how do you see me?” in episode one is so insane bc he wouldn’t have asked just anybody that. he was not inviting the scrutiny of anyone and i mean anyone. he didn’t want people to perceive him. the way he dresses, his glasses, his biting wit, his teacher persona… they’re all methods of self-protection to keep people from looking too closely. but he asks hannibal what he sees bc he really wants to know, and hannibal, who he has just met, doesn’t even hesitate to tell will something that no one else ever has before. something dangerous, something powerful said with admiration. with a smile.

2,608 notes - Posted September 2, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[accidentallyadramablog]

Dropped Dramas in 2022

I saw @rain-hat's drop list and was inspire to make my own. I dropped a lot this year because I've been trying more drama genres outside my comfort zone and finding that...they are still outside my comfort zone. Urban fantasy kdramas and fantasy sageuks are where I thrive.

Since most of these were dropped due to my dislike, I will not be tagging this so that I keep my criticism out of the tags. List under the cut with progress in parentheses.

A Business Proposal (8/12) I normally don't like CEO romances because I'm not a fan of those types of power dynamics and gave it a shot after I saw gifsets of the "removing glasses" kiss. I found it enjoyable until the hiking scene for the 2nd couple because I love hiking and I personally would have left her on the mountain. I can't stand immature characters.

Between Us (2/12) I watched UMWA and it's a favorite of mine but I was really taken aback seeing Dean & Pharm in so many scenes when I've seen their story already. I started fast-forwarding the drama and by the end of episode 2, I no longer cared. I am watching Waan & Tul play out in gifsets though. I will probably binge this on fast-forward once it's done.

Blue Birthday (3/16) Too slow for me

Check out the Series (2/12) I loved the special Episode 0 but the full treatment was a mess and I didn't find anyone likeable.

Cherry Blossom After Winter (5/8) Too young for me and a lot of places it was cringey for me to watch. Sometimes highschool/college dramas are just too immature for me. I'm over 40.

Cutie Pie (5/12) Miscommunication as a plot driver is not for me when it's not written well, and they had that with both main couples. I'm also not a fan of this power dynamic. They had chemistry, I'll give them that. The actors for the 3rd/side couple have a drama coming out next year and that's on my to-watch list.

Enchante (7/10) Honestly, I was working a lot when this came out and I was behind most of the people watching and talking about it. By the time the ending rolled around, it seemed like a messy end, so I figure I ended on a high note by not finishing it. I enjoyed the hijinks up to that point.

Extraordinary Attorney Woo (6/16) - I loved it! Except I was behind all of tumblr and basically was able to watch it all via gifsets and short clips without having to slog through the legal cases and mother drama. I only dropped it because I basically saw everything on social media and didn't see the need to watch the full episode when I got home from work. 10/10 recommended!!

First Love Again (3/6) I was bored. I also did not like the age gap or perhaps it was the boss/employee relationship.

Falling Into Your Smile (22/31) I just could not stand the way they wrote the leads' characters. There was a ton of sexual harassment of the FL on the part of the ML in their workplace and in the public and the writers tried to play it off as flirting. I would have filed a lawsuit. Jeez. Also, the director never let the FL emote. I know she can act as I've seen her in other projects. They even had her fall down the stairs at one point and her face never changed expression. This is a failure of the writers and directors.

In Your Heart (7/8) I stopped watching an episode before the sexual assault based on recommendations from reviewers on MDL.

KinnPorsche (8/14) As mentioned above, I'm not a fan of boss/employee relationships and I was tired of Kinn never having to apologize.

Love Mechanics (2/10) I would have loved to finish it but I don't have WeTV and was too lazy to look for it on a grey site and then forgot about it when it was released for non-subscribers. The chemistry and War's acting made my sternum ache. A++ acting on his part. I will finish this one day. (I did watch the original short version.)

My Bossy Wife (7/12) I was in it for a webdrama with a crime solving noblewoman but there was some serious homophobic plotlines and they hated GNC women too much.

My Tooth Your Love (6/12) Cute but I was creeped out by the doctor-patient relationship. I was getting sucked in and then would get hit with how unprofessional it was.

Once Upon a Small Town (8/12) Cute but I was bored. Everyone was pretty.

Our Blues (2/20) I started watching for Shim Dal Gi and her cute HS romance before I realized it was an ensemble drama. I dropped because of Lee Byung Hun. Why would the drama gods pair Shin Min Ah with him? She deserves a better acting partner.

Plus & Minus (4/12) I was behind a couple of weeks and spoiled myself on the messy break-up and reconciliation. I dropped before I could watch that.

Senpai, Danjite Koidewa! (5/8) Not my style. I could not stand Kaneda's character being so completely in panic mode at all times. I tried, I really did, to stick it out to see if he ever got over it, but he didn't by ep 5.

Sh**ting Stars (11/16) Loved the main couple but the 2nd couple ruined it for me. Yoo Sung with Ho Yeong was icky for me because of the working relationship and the age gap. I was rooting for Seunghyub (I should confess to being a fan of N.Flying) and I thought they were more suitable with their ages and their personalities. Dropping was not the fault of Lee Sung Kyung or Kim Young Dae who were great. I love their style of comedy.

Star and Sky: Sky in Your Heart (3/8) I found Mek's character Khuafah unlikeable. Too bad, I liked Star in Your Mind (the first part of the series with JoongDunk).

The Eclipse (10/12) Perfect drama. Great chemistry. Loved this. I just hated the teachers and the school and noped out of that even though I ended up missing out on the couples getting together. There's always a supercut I can watch later. I will watch anything with Neo Trai in it. I hope he gets like a million lead roles down the line.

Vice Versa (6/12) Honestly? I'm just not a fan of Jimmy's acting (in this or in Bad Buddy) OR the way his character NEVER REVEALED HIS NAME UNTIL IT WAS TOO LATE. Eff that. Talay deserved better. I do like Sea and his acting. I want to see more and I hope he doesn't become co-branded with Jimmy. As mentioned above, I will watch anything with Neo Trai in it. I got excited when his character said Phuwadol was his type. I'd love to see a dude pursue a Tom in a Thai drama. Also, I was desperate for screen time for Jeab Lalana who I've loved since Club Friday.

You're My Sky (7/12) Good and it gave authentically queer vibes. The track stars were stressing me out though. Cheating story lines are not for me and I dropped it. The jock/nerd duo were more my style but they had less screen time. I also was completely bored by all the basketball so I tuned out the main couple.

[what-breaks-my-heart]

DanHwa Couple: Happy Ending versus Sad Ending

Note: I did plan to publish this post in conjunction with the last day of Run On Week when I came up with the idea for this post but I never thought this post would eventually be this long so I’m not going to ruin it for everyone 😂🙈

Previously, I’ve touched on the main theme of DanHwa’s storyline - goals & dreams.

Before I continue, I wish to extend my heartiest gratitude to @belsmultifandommess for taking my gif requests specifically so I could include them in this post ❤❤❤ You can click on “GIF by belsmultifandommess” to view the full sets from which the gifs I’ve included in this post were sourced. If you haven’t already, give some love to those beautiful gifsets.

This is going to be one hell of a long post so hydrate yourselves, get some snacks, prepare a box of tissues if you are a softie like me, and buckle up.

Previously in my series of write up on DanHwa storyline...

About Seo Dan Ah

Seo Dan Ah, Her Little Brother Seo Tae Woong, and A Planned Coup in Seomyung Group

Goals & Dreams - The Main Premise in the Live of Seo “Rapunzel” Dan Ah

Goals & Dreams - I Need You to Cooperate with Me

I have to be honest. The finale left me with so much feelings that made me struggle to understand how DanHwa’s storyline was concluded. There have been various takes on the conclusion of their storyline and I cannot totally disregard each of them because they do make sense in a way.

After seeing the preview for the finale, I did pose a question whether Young Hwa would agree to cooperate with Dan Ah’s potential goal to stop seeing each other, while still holding on to his dream of not breaking up with her.

As I was starting the finale, I saw the episode description on Netflix and giggled at how the storyline of DanHwa was described.

Mi-joo’s work gets a director noticed overseas. Yeong-hwa and Dan-ah achieve their own goals. Seon-gyeom officially becomes a sports agent.

Earlier, I did a write up about how Dan Ah was plotting a coup in Seomyung Group. Later in the finale, it was revealed that all along, she had been waiting for her father to pass away so she could take back what’s rightfully hers. I stand corrected. Dan Ah sweetie, I should have thought better than slandering you 🥺

True enough, she needed Tae Woong’s support in the coup, but she didn’t say the situation might call for him to turn against her because she wanted him to come clean about his paternity, but she said it because she knew how the bastard ‘older’ brother would blackmail Tae Woong into voting for him for the position of the successor in Seomyung Group by abusing his power and influence in Seomyung Group. I bet he was the one who started the rumour about Tae Woong’s paternity in order to control Tae Woong.

However, Dan Ah needed Tae Woong’s support as one of the major shareholders so that she could obtain enough support to be in a position of power in Seomyung Group. And thanks to his support, Dan Ah was promoted as the youngest Vice President of Seomyung Group. Yes, she was not yet wielding the power as the Chairwoman of Seomyung Group, but being a Vice President of Seomyung Group was itself a shorter-term goal, or a milestone towards achieving her dream of taking back what’s hers - her title as the rightful heiress of Seomyung Group.

Just like what Young Hwa - bless his young, optimistic yet immature self - told Dan Ah when she first came to his college after he kept crossing the line; if a dream seemed impossible to be achieved, focus instead on shorter-term goals while working towards chasing that dream.

By the way when I think of it, it was never made clear if the ‘older’ bastard son was appointed as President of Seomyung Group. Imagine if he was, because it wouldn’t be surprising, but he could never have things done his way because Dan Ah would keep having his ass handed to him by convincing the board room just how stupid his ways were.

Anyways, the way the story of DanHwa was concluded could be open to various interpretation, and I now believe it was intentionally done so. Why?

Exhibit 1

Young Hwa telling Dan Ah that his new goal was to watch her from a distance neither too far that he could not see her, nor too close that his field of vision would be blocked, so that he could always see her wherever he was.

He did so by asking her to just stay where she was. Of course the moment he said it, my alarms were buzzing because of how the story had compared her to Rapunzel living in a castle.

It was when Young Hwa looked “Seo Dan Ah” up on the internet when he later realised that he had forgotten how Dan Ah had been living in a castle that a peasant like him could never even dream of entering, since she was Rapunzel.

Exhibit 2

When Young Hwa and Dan Ah finally met again in front of his painting at the gallery, Dan Ah said that she was going to make that day to be her real birthday, before Young Hwa was finally able to wish her happy birthday.

These lines did seem rather out of place, but when I think more about it, it was Dan Ah cooperating with Young Hwa’s goal for both of them to celebrate her real birthday together.

This was in contrast to when she said her birthday was far away. This to me, seemed like both a literal and figurative remark.

In the literal sense, she was not sure at that point in time if they could still see each other when the day would eventually come.

Whereas in the figurative sense, celebrating her real birthday would symbolise a celebration of her successfully claiming her rightful title as the heiress of Seomyung Group - which seemed like a stretch to her at that time because she didn’t know about her father’s health condition.

But when they finally met again, she realised that there was someone who cherished her and kept her inside his radiant heart. And this person wanted to celebrate her real birthday with her because her being born was a miracle (just as other birth), because she was healthy, and because she was seeing him.

And he wanted to celebrate her real birthday with her as a way of expressing his gratitude to the heaven for all of these.

But ultimately, Young Hwa wanted to celebrate Dan Ah’s real birthday with her to get her heart in return.

And when Dan Ah decided to make the day they finally met again as her real birthday, it was symbolic that instead of obsessing over her dream of getting back her rightful title as the heiress of Seomyung Group which might require her staying in her castle, she finally gave her heart to Young Hwa, even though she was desperate to keep her heart intact due to her health condition. Maybe it’s just me but I think it’s poetic in a way.

And when she made the decision, it was symbolic to her accepting living with a fake birthday as long as someone truly cherishes her, because it may be fake, but her feeling was otherwise as real as it gets.

Exhibit 3

When the four besties met up and discussed about endings, Young Hwa told the group that his happy ending would be living well, giving birth to children like a rabbit with the person he loved (no joke that’s exactly what he said in Korean, hence the look of disgust on Dan Ah’s face).

And when he asked Dan Ah about what she wanted as her happy ending, he also asked if they could share the same happy ending, claiming their love would last forever (ah, the pure innocence of first loves).

Dan Ah then argued that she even faked a coming out to her family specifically because she did not want to get married, so sharing the same happy ending with Young Hwa like what he imagined would totally be out of the question.

Exhibit 4

DanHwa official Before poster

I’m sure many of us didn’t see this poster before the drama started airing. To be completely honest, I was not anticipating for this drama to air. There I was, minding my own business, when I saw gifs and screencaps from this drama’s first 2 episodes suddenly showing up on my dash. And then I read the usual caption spam by @dangermousie​ for those episodes and those caption spam actually piqued my interest.

You could see a sense of giddiness in this poster, as if they were playing a game of cat and mouse with each other. For those of you who don’t read hangul, the lines highlighted in this poster read as below:

“Don’t keep crossing the line.”

“But you came to see me because I crossed the line.”

DanHwa official After poster

And on the day the finale aired, JTBC released this official After poster. In this poster, both of them were portrayed to be lost in their own thoughts, no longer giddy and teasing each other.

Again, for those of you who don’t read hangul, there was only one line highlighted in this poster which reads:

“Don’t get sick, my first love.”

Special shoutout to @its-chelisey-stuff for highlighting the differences in these two posters in a post of its own.

Exhibit 5

After everything was said and done, the two of them kept hanging out together and seeing each other. They even went as each other’s plus one to the premier of Yook Ji Woo’s movie, Killing Day. And it was a public setting where people could gossip about them going together too, so it was clear she was not bothered by the possibility of people gossiping about it.

So with these 5 exhibits, it was clear that the drama was intentionally sending us viewers mixed signals about the conclusion of the story of DanHwa. But what exactly should we take from this intention?

Now, let’s talk about Young Hwa. Our precious little crybaby goof ball. We’ve seen lots of movies (or Young Hwa (영화), geddit??) with happy endings. Some gave us sad endings, but those sad endings were not unrealistic.

Throughout the drama, we could see the growth of both Dan Ah and Young Hwa since they first met each other.

In the beginning, Young Hwa told Dan Ah that he was too busy with what was in front of him (life of a college student coming from a small town in the rural area) that he never got to have a dream. When he finally had one, i.e., to not break up with Dan Ah, he gave her the assurance that he would make that dream comes true. He even tried delaying their breakup as soon as he realised that she would be breaking up with him. Not breaking up with Dan Ah was Young Hwa’s first dream ever, but he eventually learnt how hard it was to chase his dream.

But going back to the episode description, why did Netflix say that both Young Hwa and Dan Ah achieved their own goals? I’ve argued earlier in this post how Dan Ah’s appointment as the youngest Vice President of Seomyung Group could fit in this narrative. Young Hwa’s goal to keep watching Dan Ah from a distance neither too far nor too close could arguably fit in this narrative too.

I know, I know, the irony of me spending so much time thinking and talking about the ending is clear to me. But to me, the whole story of DanHwa was cleverly concluded. If we go back to episode 7, Dan Ah expressed her regret that she let go of her dream to play professional soccer (I much prefer the word ‘football’ but Koreans use the word ‘soccer’ so I’m sticking to it for consistency purpose) so easily and that she was still looking forward to having chances to kick the ball every now and then.

Later on, Dan Ah disclosed to Young Hwa how desperate she was to make time for her to go running to him despite time being of utmost importance to her, and how she desperately wanted to grab onto the little time she managed to make to be with him.

We also saw how despite being so desperate, she had initially tried to resist her urges to just run to him. Because to her, she could not afford to be distracted from running towards her dream. But she eventually ran towards him and gave in to her feeling nonetheless, albeit timing herself so she wouldn’t forget about her dream altogether.

I personally believe that their relationship would keep on going the same way it had been going - them chasing after their own individual goals, them cooperating with each other to make sure their individual goals would be achieved, Young Hwa keeping Dan Ah deep inside his heart with more subtlety just like how his painting evolved from a big drawing of Dan Ah to the silhouette of Dan Ah hiding in his painting which was displayed in Seomyung Art Gallery, while Dan Ah grabbing onto what little opportunity she would have to spend her time with Young Hwa, even if it was only for a short, sweet moment.

They might live the rest of their lives together, or they might not. But what Run On managed to tell me is we should not be too obsessed with our endings which may or may not be far away from us. Instead, we should focus on what’s right in front of us.

Instead of obsessing over our dreams and happy endings which may demotivate us if we keep stumbling onto boulders while chasing our dreams and happy endings, we should focus on shorter-term goals. Because who knows what great opportunities and sweet moments are standing right in front of us, waiting to be grabbed, if only we allow ourselves to cherish them and in return, being cherished ourselves.

And that to me, is the biggest takeaway from the story of DanHwa.

[captainpikeswoman]

Hey! First off - I love your blog! You're an amazing writer and your stories and headcanons make my day on a regular basis. But ... I just saw that you started reposting gifs. Not just one or two, but you made a whole post with gifs without giving credit. I'm a gifmaker myself and it's considered really disrespectful. Some people aren't aware of that, so I thought I'd let you know. :( Sorry. I feel bad for calling you out, but yeah. I'm sure you wouldn't appreciate it if people started reposting bits and pieces of your stuff somewhere else ...

I know there aren't a lot of Bruce Greenwood fans on tumblr, but we do exist! :) Just the other day someone posted a new AOS gifset with Pike and Kirk! And gifmakers are generally more than happy to make someone gifset if they contact them and request one! Again, thanks for your wonderful blog. And I know there are far worse things going on in the world than uploading someone else's gif, but I feel this is a 'people in a small fandom respecting each other' thing. Have a great day!  <33333

My response:

I do apologise if I have caused anyone offence by not tagging the gif creators or owners etc in posts. That was not my intention at all. The fact of the matter simply is in the fact that the gifs or images I have used that are not from Tumblr, have been taken from Google a long time ago so I don’t know who created them, or sent to me by friends- so I do not know the provenance/where the gifs are from. I’ll try to stop using those gifs going forwards, I don’t wish to offend anyone.

With regards to whether people want to take or use anything I’ve created- they never need my permission. I don’t create anything on here to own it, hence it is free to access and totally in the public domain. If people want to “steal” or repost bits and pieces- even if they claim it as their own- then as far as I’m concerned they can go for it, I don’t claim ownership of any of it- I do it for people to enjoy, to take, to do with it whatever they want. All those people have to realise is they cannot claim the full monopoly of it either, just as I cannot for I did not invent the characters or the stories or anything.

Fandom is family, so I thank you for bringing this to my attention. I shall endeavour to do better in future.

Thank you

[imagining-in-the-margins]

Hi, sorry if I’m bothering you with this. But I had a writing blog here on tumblr, and I didn’t put an age minimum thing. Like let’s say, people who need to interact with me need to be a certain age in order to do so.

So I made mutuals who didn’t tell me their age nor didn’t say they were a minor in any part of their blog. And I decided to be friends with them, I’m also not the type to ask for ages unless the person is comfortable enough to say it by themselves. I discovered most of them were around 13-14 and it made me pretty uncomfortable but I was still kind to them and I didn’t say anything. I never discussed anything nsfw with them (even tho I’m still a minor it’s just something it makes me uncomfortable to discuss with someone younger)

My relationship with them was always like big sibling with a younger sibling, but still idk if I should cut ties or just let them be now that they are mutuals?

Also, would it be weird if someone who is 20 or older and runs a blog let minors interact with it or just have mutuals who are minors. This isn’t for me, is just a question out of curiosity.

Hey there! Not a bother, although I’m not sure how much help I’ll be. I want to preface my answer by saying this: if someone makes you uncomfortable, you are not obligated to continue speaking to them. No one is entitled to your time or thoughts… at all.

As for the rest, I think my perspective will be different because I am clearly at least 9 years older than you. We live in very different worlds 😅 Nonetheless, I will try to address everything with your perspective in mind.

First, please do not find it uncomfortable to ask someone their age — especially if conversations with younger people make you uncomfortable. You can always just ask. If they don’t want to answer, you can make a separate judgment of whether or not you want to continue talking to them (and if they do, if you believe them).

I do think you should be kind to everyone, but kindness does not mean unfettered access to you. You are allowed to assert boundaries. There is nothing shameful about that.

Which brings me to this: if you do decide to continue being friends, do it because you are comfortable making some space to be friends with them (not because you feel obligated).

Do this responsibly. Your age matters here. My conversations with minors are surface level, brief, and public (except for a few rare scenarios, like if I am telling someone that I am no longer comfortable with them in my space).

Being close friends with someone younger than you by an entire life stage (like middle school, high school, college) is weird (I’d argue it stops being strange to be friends with older people around your second year in college). You just don’t have a lot in common to develop a close friendship.

As I mentioned before, we live in very different worlds — and that’s fine. We can still occasionally chat about fandom stuff at a surface level. But you should not be sharing your secrets with me, and I should not be venting about Adult problems to you. You need friends your own age, and so do I.

If an adult allows minors in a space that is predominantly NSFW, that’s fucking whack. Block them. But a blog like mine, that doesn’t bother me. The vast majority of my posts are SFW. It would be silly to assume I could actually monitor every one of the thousands of interactions I have when most of my posts are SFW. It would quite literally take up more time than my full-time job on a scale like this.

DNIs are a nice sentiment, but ultimately difficult to enforce. I personally don’t care if minors interact with the gifsets I reblog or any of my SFW material. I do ask them not to interact with my NSFW fics, but those are very easy to avoid (they are labeled in multiple ways).

Finally: "Mutuals" culture is toxic. Feel free to let it go. I have never once looked to see if someone is following me unless someone asked, because I do not care. Clicking that little button does not make them any more or less entitled to your energy or time. If someone believes you owe them something because they are following your blog, you should reconsider engaging with that person.

Hope this helps! I'm not exactly an advice blog, but I do recognize people see me as some sort of authority. Friendly reminder, however, that I am just one person with one opinion. You are always free to ignore me, and I am not the arbitrator on the right way to do anything. I wish you the best of luck, and I'm sorry people made you uncomfortable.

[the-littlefangirl]

TFATWS episode 1 rewatch commentary

The first scene was so beautiful. I loved that we didn't start directly with the fight sequence. It feels way closer to the quiet beginning of CATWS and I love it so much.

The title is also SO NEAT, music's on point too but hey it’s Henry Jackman the one thing I’m sure it’s going to be great overall is the score.

The choreography is AMAZING, really well shot. Sam shielding himself with only one wing was MA-JES-TIC.

“WHAT'S UP” EXACTLY SAM EXACTLY

I did feel so uncomfortable in regards to the military aspect of it. Not that I was expecting anything else, but both here and in Captain Marvel the military we're good guys < 3 propaganda is so blatant and ugh:/ At least there wasn’t a literal recruitment spot like with CM. 

The yellow filter in the Tunisia scene BYE please stop with the yellow filters 2k21

"I've been working with the Air Force for six months now" So, did Sam even catch a break at all after Endgame? Or did he just throw himself to work like SOMEONE did after being iced for 70 years. Hmmm? Sam????

"Essentially, these people, they want a world that's unified without borders" OH NO! HOW AWFUL, how evil of these bad guys smh

Joaquin: SO about Steve

Sam: :)))))) nope

"Moon stuff" SAAAM

#1 cry with Sam's speech, full on chills.. Fuck. Me. His voice about to break before saying thank you bYE.

Shady politician: "It was the right decision" (FUCKKKKK YOUUU)

Rhodey: *press any key to doubt *

I need someone to analyze the different curation of the two exhibits pretty please

NOT THE PHOTO POST-AZZANO JFC. That photo is my weakness, Bucky sweetie (also I find hilarious that usually when there are articles about Stucky and/or #givecaptainamericaaboyfriend they aaaalways use that photo LMAO)

In case someone wants to read the transcription of the texts about Bucky: "In 1944, while on a mission to thwart a Hydra weapon transport in the Alps, Barnes was thrown from a train and believed to have been killed in action. It wasn't until 2014, over seventy years later, that it was revealed that Barnes was alive, having been found by Hydra operatives. Captain America himself (i can't read) the effort to bring Barnes in only to later aid in a escape from custody having been convinced of his innocence. Steve's loyalty to his old friend, coupled with his refusal to sign the Sokovia Accords, led to the dissolution of the Avengers and drove the Captain into hiding with other like-minded Avengers including Natasha Romanoff, Wanda Maximoff, and Sam Wilson. The current whereabouts of Barnes remains unknown, habing been labeled a fugitive following his escape from custody."

"current wherabout unknown" but not the government, interesting. Also, pretty good summary of CACW from the public's perspective, although one of the things I always wanted to see explored was the public's reaction of the fallout of them going into hiding after Civil War (which I'm hoping we'll get to see a little bit of in Black Widow).

Interesting point about the 70 years without having Captain America. Clearly the sacrifice play wasn't enough this time to fuel the nationalism so they went with a squeaky clean John Walker instead.

Sam saying the shield belongs to Steve I'm going to cry now excuse me. Sam. Sam sweetie.

The No. 1 Captain America comic in the display ugH fuck yes

See this is how you do a cameo that has actual meaning. Thank god for Malcolm Spellman being a competent writer. That scene was so well written.

HAVE YOU PRAISED ANTHONY MACKIE'S PERFORMANCE TODAY?? Holy shit that last shot fucked me up.

I'm loving the use of the wide shots, especially in the flashback. The camera movements are in synch with The Soldier's state of mind and mission focus, so good.

EVERYONE STAND UP FOR THE NATIONAL ANTHEM aka The Winter Soldier theme composed by Henry Jackman.

Without a doubt the most brutal TWS fight scene there has been, People involved in Punisher and John Wick are involved in this and it SHOWS. 

For the record, still stands that the only time we've seen him chocking someone with his right hand instead of the metal arm remains the Maria Stark assasination. I know it's probably because of blocking and the way the shot was composed but the implications are still bone chilling. God.

Uhhmmmm I'm very ambivalent about the "Hail Hydra". On one hand, it was 100% fanservice and the internet is probably going to go insane over it, and the dead way Sebastian Stan delivered the line. Good shit. Buuut what I love about CATWS is the way Bucky never, ever ever, mouths Hydra rethoric, and even when Pierce tries to gaslight him with it, it's just an empty effort. The Winter Soldier isn't doing anything because of ideological loyalty to Hydra, even if it's product of brainwashing, it's just sheer dehumanization. They don’t need him to say the words because he’s just An Asset. There are people who have put it more eloquently but yeah, I rather go with the fanon interpretation of that aspect.

The music growing louder with the shot of the keys. GOD.

I'm fine this is fine.

#2 cry with the therapy scene of fucking course.

The government monitoring Bucky is noooot going to end well lmao.

"We need to know that you're not gonna * slowmo stabbing motions *

Bucky: * nodding along slowly * 

I laughed out loud.

"It's passive agressive" I love him.

The way this scene just sucker punched me in the face, made me weep and then had me cracking up. Amazing.

Therapist: You can't do anything illegal

Bucky: yup yup check checkity check. What IS considered illegal tho?

*aggresive tablet finger pressing *

"Then why isn't it rule number one?" Bucky your Steve is showing.

I love the close up shot. I'll keep saying it. It's so good.

"I'm James Bucky Barnes" yeah you are🥺

That smile is nightmare fuel LMFAO I love it.

Uhm the way I'm kinning Bucky it's not funny anymore damn

That whole “are you lashing out at me” rambling is really reminiscent of the bar scene in CATFA and how he lashed out at Steve after Peggy left. Uhm yeah fuck.

"WHAT DO YOU WANT?" "Peace"

"That is UTTER BULLSHIT" "You're a terrible shrink"

yeah ugly crying to ugly laughing speedrun for me

"You're free" "To do what?" jesus. That entire scene. #3 and #4 and #5 cries for moi.

Ugh that Brooklyn shot. Someone needs to do a gifset compairing it to the one in CATFA asap.

"It's like Monique but it's got a "U" in there for uniqueness" "That's absurd" LMAO

"You can't keep fighting with your neighbors" uHM * redacted redacted i'm shifting into 1940s mode abort abort *

"Nobody passed 90" "So young. Such a shame" FGADHGA

🥺🥺 yes flex those flirting skills good for you

"It's a dance to this things. You can't… you gotta warm up and I haven't danced since 1943. Feels like." #6 cry I completely broke down into tears with that.

This Yori storyline is going to punch me in the face with a metal fist. Great!

The TWS theme when he looks at Yori fuuuuuck.

GREAT LET'S GO TO LOUISIANA THAT WAS GETTING HEAVY.

Those shots of Sam in the car. Immaculate. Showstoping. Yes.

Marvel, what if instead of promoting the military industrial complex you put a lot of publicity about cars?

"Uncle Sam!" LMAO subtle.

Everyone trying to have the wings lmao same.

I've only had Sarah for a day but etc. Brooklyn 99 meme

Good mirroring about Steve and Sam family's legacy. Good shit. Goooood shit.

Sam is trying so hard ouch my heart. I can't imagine how painful the scene with them reuniting must have been. He 100% still feels a lot of guilt about being gone for those 5 years (and even longer before that).

"Maybe it is time for us to move on" uuuuuuuuuuh

"To the rescue" "Always" 🥺🥺 i love them so much already

That shot outside the restaurant is so beautiful. Can't wait to see the night scenes in Madripoor tbh.

"I tried the whole online dating thing. It's pretty crazy". Uhm well that is something that Bucky Barnes has now said. In canon. Damn.

"It's a lot" "You sound like my dad" LMAO

Every Bucky fanfic trope speedrun with this scene

"Wow you really can drink" OH you have no idea

Just realized we don't even know her name, well.

"You have any siblings?" "I have a sister" THE WAY I SCREECHED. We're definitely getting Becca

Well that escalated quickly. The important thing is to try?

I can't deal with this BUCKY SWEETIE #8 cry right there fuck

The wardrobe department is KILLING IT, there's such a difference between the outfits of the shows vs how ugly and generic it usually is.

"ThEre is NO such thiNg as on time. You're either EARLY or LATE . picK One" lmao the way he delivered that line

At first I thought the flag smashers had thrown two cars out of a window LMAO

"I don't know how jurisdiction works here, but I'mma have to place you under arrest" uhm yikes. The way they changed Joaquín Torres backstory to just random army nice guy #1 is not sitting well with me, what can I say.

Sam's wings motions I LOVE HIM YOUR HONOR

Fuuuuck this guy.

"Funny how thing's always thighten around us" "Look, I'm on your side. After all, he's a hero". This script is C R I S P as hell, great fucking job.

"I don't care, I'm not gonna quit" "What are you trying to prove? And who you trying to prove it to" SHIT HSIT SHIT!!! UGH amazing. Look it's not necessary to say the show's questions out loud but how they flow between the conversations is still very satisfactory without feeling in your face about it. Inner conflicts have been set up fucking perfectly everyone * claps *

Ugh here we fucking go.  I knew this was how the episode was going to end but my stomach still dropped like a rollercoster. God.

The score is on point. Damn. Damn.

God, Sam.🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

The captain america franchise's visuals in the credits are always so amazing.

Also, does anybody know why Mackie isn't first in the billing?  Uhm what's that about?

ANYWAY CONCLUSION THAT EPISODE WAS SO FUCKING GOOD LIKE HOLY SHIT. I love them so much. The balance between the personal conflicts and the political aspect (although the military aspect is still very much yikes) was on point and it was overall a joy to watch.

[firelxdykatara]

Hey, I've been following you for while now, and I've noticed that you are really good at being critical of the things you love, and I just wanna ask, how? This may not make sense, but whenever I love something I loathe to look at the bad sides of it, and I don't know to overcome this. I suspect it's because of the people around me(online spaces,, mostly) who take criticism way too far, and if something has bad stuff in it, they automatically think you're a bad person, if that makes sense?

Idk, I just wanna to like something while acknowledging the bad things, or could've-been-improved things about it lol

Ok, first of all, I want to let you know that being vocally critical about the things you love is not necessary.

What I mean by that is, you do not have to justify why you love a thing, no matter how 'problematic' it is, with 'i know it's problematic, but' or any variant thereof. You can just say 'I like this thing' and leave it at that, or reblog fandom posts, or whatever. Shipping and other forms of fandom engagement are not activism, and there's really no need to self-flagellate over your love of something that has issues, because everything has issues (especially if you dig hard enough), and no one else is entitled to that energy from you. It takes work to dig deep into a thing, especially if it's to critically analyze it, and not everyone feels the need or desire to do that work, and that's ok.

That said, you also shouldn't pretend that reasonable criticisms of the thing you love don't exist. As an example, if you love Kataang, you don't have to say 'i know the EIP kiss was problematic, but I still love their relationship and ship them together'. (Although if you do want to talk about the issues that exist in their canon development, while still loving them as a couple, that is also valid!) However, you absolutely shouldn't say 'I think it's totally fine that Aang kissed Katara without her consent and actually that's a healthy and romantic moment in their relationship' or 'it's fine that Aang never apologized because kissing her is what made Katara realize she liked him'. (Both of which being actual takes I've seen in my fandom excursions.) You can simply choose to enjoy the good parts of their relationship, reblog fics and art and gifsets and metas/headcanons you like, etc. Some people simply don't have the energy or even desire to do deep dives into fandoms for any reason, and this kind of passive engagement with a fandom is perfectly ok.

As for me, personally, I think it's because I just... have lots of words, and thoughts, all the time, about everything I consume. There are often things I notice--either at the time, or in hindsight when I go back and reread or rewatch something (see: how much more I loathe Xander Harris every time I watch btvs)--that I would've done differently or I think should have been changed, or that may sour certain aspects of the work for me, even if I still enjoy the whole. I love atla, but I also see the flaws in the worldbuilding and writing, and will talk about those because it often coincides with my other interests--like zutara, and how I think the story could have played out if that were the endgame rather than what canon actually gave us.

For a bit of a more controversial example--I still love Harry Potter. I don't engage with it as a fandom nearly as much as I used to--I'll reblog the occasional post, but otherwise it simply isn't an active interest of mine. But I know that the books themselves are full of issues, and I'd never begrudge anyone their dislike/hatred of the series given the author's own bigotry. I also refuse to give JKR a single cent of my money, and as a queer woman I can only hope that some day, when the series finally enters the public domain, the old bat rolls in her grave at the popular reboot featuring trans girl!Harry and her adventures. I completely understand why a lot of the flaws in the books are looked at much more critically now than they used to be, given recent revelations about the author's own beliefs--but the books are still important to me, were a formative influence on my life, and I can't hear so much as a single bar of Hedwig's Theme without wanting to burst into tears.

So, at the end of the day (i guess this would be the TL;DR:) your blog is your own space and it is for whatever thoughts you choose to put out into the blogosphere, whatever those may be. If focusing on the bad parts of something you love is distressing to you, then don't! As long as you know they are there (and don't begrudge other people who may feel differently or more strongly about those flaws than you), that's all that can really be expected--and, again, no one has the right to demand critical energy from you. Tumblr blogs are not hubs of social activism, and everyone has the right to decide what content they wish to create, spread, and consume. People may not want to follow you if you post a lot about something they think is deeply flawed without touching on those flaws, and that is their right, just as it's your right to post whatever you like on your blog. If someone is going to think you're a bad person based on what you do or don't say about fictional people and worlds on your blog, then that probably isn't someone you wanted following you or engaging with your content in the first place.

I kind of rambled a bit, I hope that I answered your question and you find this helpful!

[cinematicnomad]

(Whatever fandom you want!) what's one thing you wish you could change that's deeply embedded in the fandom? And what's something positive that also seems to be at the core of the fandom?

oh oh oh, i hate the tendency of certain corners of fandom (especially on like...fan twitter which i try to avoid at all costs) to totally cross boundaries with actors and writers and crew members etc. like, yes, love the show, engage with the content creators when they actively encourage it, but like...there's no need to go harass some actor in the comments of like, an IG post, or to like, tag them in shit when you're being explicitly sexual about their looks or like send lengthy twitter threads about how much you hate their acting choices or whatever. like, i'm not saying most people in fandom do this but i feel like that scene from men in black when tommy lee jones is like "a person is smart, people are dumb"??? like, yeah, there are great, intelligent, talented fans...but fandom is fucking dumb most of the time and sometimes fandom is fucking mean and unnecessarily personal with some random actor who you don't actually know bc you don't HAVE a personal relationship with them, you have a parasocial relationship and like...dude leave them alone but also protect yourself??? like What Is The Point you're not going to get what you want out of this relationship bc it's not a REAL relationship.

that was a bit of a rant, apologies.

and then something that i absolutely love is just?? talented people creating amazing, wonderful, beautiful things just for the joy of sharing something they love. like. fanart is FREE! fanfic is FREE! meta and gifsets and fanvids are all FREE! people are out there spending their time and energy just pouring their talent and their adoration and their love into something special and then just sharing it with you without asking for anything in return except for, like, some positive feedback and a little engagement. like, fandom doesn't EXIST without writers posting 100k+ slow burn canon divergent fics that i get to stay up late pouring over and ignoring my sleep schedule for. fandom doesn't EXIST without the talented artist spending hours painting a detailed portrait of a favorite character.

it's just this beautiful thing, this jOY, and everyone fucking wants to share it with each other and love it so much and man THIS is what i love about fandom, i don't need to engage with the actual actors or show creators, i just want to hang out with you guys and read all your meta and all your fics and reblog all the artwork and gifsets and cry over fanvids. like, fandom is like english lit class right? you sit there and you all consume the source material and then everyone talks about what they think about it and somebody points out this insane thing i never even noticed and it makes the source material SO MUCH BETTER. and then twitter is like? a public Q&A with the author where one half of the audience is full of assholes who stand up and go off on like, a 30 minute ramble about their own life that's totally irrelevant to anything and then asking the author some really cringe-y and patronizing question. like oh no, that part of fandom is not for me, i just want to be in my little english lit class LOVING this thing in private.

i don't know if this made any sense whoops

✨honesty hour✨

[indestinatus]

Come Home to Me

I don't really write angst but when @sweetsouldhavernas asked me to, I just couldn't say no <3 We partnered up to create a headcanon for her amazing gifset, which you can see here.

// After a fight with Tony, Ziva drowns her sorrows at a nearby bar. 

↳ read it on AO3 

As she downed another shot of too weak liquor, Ziva tried her best not to cry in that bar full of strangers. She asked for another one, wishing they had something stronger, at least to make her forget the bitter taste of her own words. Her heart felt numb but her mind was boiling, streams of good comebacks she could’ve given replaying in her head.

It didn’t make sense. He wanted her to make her own choices, but when she did that, he would blame her for it? What was the point of building a relationship with someone if they didn’t trust you enough to let you live your own life?

She knew she was cold - more than she knew it was healthy - but he was no example either. No, he always tried to stir up some reaction from her, thinking she was this lifeless robot who just didn’t feel enough. Well, he was wrong.

And he had won because it had been her the one who had stormed out of their apartment to seek shelter in the closest bar she could find.

“I know what you’re doing,” said Tony. “Don’t.”

“Yes? And what am I doing?”

Heat burned her face and made her not see clearly, but Ziva stormed out of the bathroom nonetheless. Tony followed her close behind, his presence awaking her senses to this acute attention, one she was used to. It had always bothered her, how helpless he’d made her feel.

“Pretending,” he accused. “Like you’ve always done.”

Ziva huffed. “Pretending what, exactly?”

“Not to care.”

“I do not remember you caring when I asked your opinion on it.”

She could remember quite clearly how vague his reply was to her new job proposition, one that would make her leave NCIS. There were pros and cons to it, like every other change in life, but a position of power in an organization such as the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants wasn’t something she could simply ignore.  

“I was trying to let you make your own choices,” Tony retorted.

“All my life is built around my own choices,” she bit back. “I do not need your help with that.”

“Clearly,” he scoffed.

Bile started to taste on her tongue. “We both knew this was important.” Well, at least it was important to her , she didn’t know if it mattered to him. She thought it did, it would change their routines completely, but apparently, he didn’t really care.

“So you could blame me when you regretted your own decisions?” Tony scowled, a frown marking his forehead. “I don’t care about what you do all day, as long as you’re home when it ends. It’s been two days, Ziva. I haven’t slept in two days.”

She needed some time alone. She knew it had been a mistake not telling him she had taken a few days off to think about it, but she thought it wouldn’t matter much. She could take care of herself and the thought of having to depend on someone else on a daily basis wasn’t something she could easily stomach.

With each passing day, though, it felt like an impossible task not to rely on him. He felt like an addiction, this question mark always hovering over her head like it was the one piece she couldn’t figure out. Wasn’t love supposed to complete someone? Why did it feel suffocating sometimes?

She had never felt like this, thinking more about someone else than herself. She tried to remember how her parents lived, but the memories of constant fighting and too loud screams made her want to forget. It felt like treading water, being that vulnerable. She really wasn’t looking for another heartbreak, but it felt more important this time. As if more were at risk.

Ziva needed time to breathe.  

“Playing the victim does not suit you as you think it does,” she replied.

“I don’t know if it’s important for you, Ziva, but we’re together now, okay?” His words stung as if she was drinking her own poison. Didn’t he know how much she cared?

“I have the right to know,” said Tony.

“To know what, exactly?” She snapped without thinking. “Every second of my every day?”

“Yeah, exactly that.” Tony scoffed, “I forgot you were unfamiliar with the concept of being a couple.”

“And you are? A man whose definition of commitment is a three day weekend?” Ziva should’ve sensed it coming, but only when she felt her cheeks wet did she realize she was in fact crying. She tried to remember when that had happened last.

“I am surprised we’ve come this far,” she let out before she could stop herself.

Tony gestured to her in accusation, “With you making everything ten times impossible, I’d rather we hadn’t tried at all.”

Ziva tried to stop crying, failing. “Then why are you still here?”

“I was here!” he snarled. “Where the hell were you?”

His words still rang on her mind hours later, making her nauseous. She downed another shot, suddenly recognizing the feeling at the pit of her stomach.

Regret.

Ziva had turned down the job offer almost immediately. She hadn’t told him that. Some selfish part of her wanted him to fight her to stay, even if for such a petty reason. When Tony hadn’t replied like she thought he would, her defenses overpowered her. It felt better to break her own heart than to have her heart broken by him. She had had too many losses for a lifetime.

Ziva looked at the phone screen again.

No messages. No calls. Nothing.

“He’s not worth your tears, sweetheart. Whoever he is.”

She looked up to meet the bartender’s eyes. It belonged to a middle-aged woman with dark skin, a faint smile as if she knew exactly why Ziva was crying. She hadn’t been good at keeping it in as she’d thought.

“The worst part,” Ziva chuckled bitterly, wiping her cheeks, “Is that he is. He’s the real deal.”

Ziva didn’t really know why she was telling her that, but she felt too tired to care. The woman narrowed her eyes, then nodded as if she knew it was better not to question any further. She placed a new glass in front of Ziva, pouring another type of liquid. Old whiskey, from the color of it.

Ziva downed that one too in one go, feeling it burn down her throat.

She wished nothing had even happened. She wished it still was two days before when they were laughing about laundry mistakes and arguing about movie choices. She wished she hadn’t spoken a thing. About the job, about her doubts, about anything. None of it had been true, the lies that her brain had conjured.

Ziva did care, she was just afraid. Terrified, for that matter. Not for her, but for losing him. She knew that what she felt for him was too strong, it was this unbreakable bond that had happened when she wasn’t expecting, one she had never felt with anyone else. She had never felt compatible with anyone, and now that she really wanted this to work, she couldn’t risk it to lose him.

She also didn’t feel like she was the person he deserved. What she didn’t show of her feelings, he showed it too much, his impulsiveness making it spill everywhere. She knew he loved her, and sometimes way too much. She wasn’t certain she could match that type of love, one that raw.

But then again, she couldn’t stop thinking about him.

Ziva pressed the side of her phone, seeing the empty screen light up again.

What did it mean? Was chasing her a waste of his time? She had stormed out of the apartment without looking back, but it hurt nonetheless. How he hadn’t asked her to stay. How he was waiting there for her still, only for her to show up eventually, guilty and clearly the wrong one between them.

She wished she was better at this. Relationships. Having no good examples in her life had really screwed up her training. She had asked for space, and he had given her and now she sat in a now emptying bar wishing his voice filled that silence.

How could she mess up something that felt so unbreakable?

Ziva sent the text message before her pride could stop herself.

Come take me home?

Her heart was in her throat while she waited for the little gray bubbles to appear next to his name, but nothing happened. Bitterness started to ache in her chest at the same time tears blurred her vision again, now any public shame forgotten. She couldn’t breathe.

The bartender put a glass of water in front of her, and Ziva tried to stop the stream of tears.

“If he really is your one, honey,” she smiled softly, “He wouldn’t want to see you crying.”

“No, he would not.”

Ziva felt her heart stop and then restart again, way too fast. She blinked away the tears to see Tony standing right next to her, his hair disheveled as if he’d stayed the last couple of hours running his hand through it. She thought she saw his face as puffy as hers felt, but she couldn’t confirm before throwing herself in his arms, not waiting for an invitation.

Almost immediately, he embraced her, letting her wet his shirt. She clung to it as if her life depended on it, listening to his heartbeat inside his chest. At that moment, it didn’t really care what he thought of them, she needed to show him how much she needed him.

It felt suffocating, but it also felt like breathing. It was as if he was the answer to a question she had never asked, the one puzzle she could spend a lifetime trying to solve and still be surprised from time to time.

He needed to know that. He needed to know she was terrified but also had never been as certain of something in her life as she had been of this.

"How did you know I was here?" she asked.

"One would think the sneaky Ziva David would choose a better place other than the bar around the corner to drown her sorrows, but I, unfortunately or not, know her too well."

She chuckled despite herself. “I declined,” Ziva inhaled deeply, swallowing the crying. “The job offer. As soon as they did.”

Tony didn’t react at first, as if he was picking his words with care.

“And why did you do that?”

“It wasn’t for me.”

She drew back then, meeting his eyes. She saw the sequence of worry, relief, and then calmness in them, and knew he’d caught the meaning behind her words.

That he was the one for her.

Tony nodded slightly, his hands cupping her cheeks. His thumbs wiped her tears before they settled on her temples. He tilted her face downwards to kiss her forehead.

“Let’s go home,” he said, visibly relaxing.

And with those words, Ziva knew she had finally understood.

What home really meant.

[i-am-just-a-kiddo]

2020 content creator review

i was tagged by @vishcount as usual, thank you  💕  i answered the questions below the cut, and everyone that is tagged is there too, if you just wanna skip my ramblings and go straight down there.  (also gosh i hope all the links work rip)

1. first creation and most recent creation of 2020: 

this lan wangji oneshot, apparently. i can’t remember when i actually wrote it, but my ao3 tells me i posted it in january 2020. i remember i just wanted to explore lwj’s time of mourning and dive into his mind of that time, even if it made me eternally sad?

my most recent 2020 creation that is public, is the second chapter to this casmund/edmund character study fic i started writing in 2016. i did not expect to return to that but rewatching the narnia movies did that to me. i guess it’s one of those ever-returning fandoms

2. one of your favorite creations from 2020: 

my niemo (nie huaisang/mo xuanyu) fic, no question. diving into this, i fully knew that this pairing probably has a tiny audience and honestly, i did not expect to churn out 30k for them. god. am still suffering because why the fuck did i do that to myself (and everyone reading). thank you vishie for standing by me all the time.

3. a new style you tried this year and a gifset edit that uses it: 

my historical taegi AU set in silla korea - i don’t think it’s actually a new style writing-wise, but it was an entirely different process of creating. i did a week of only research, diving into amounts of academic texts and sources to figure out my frame and setting. it was so much fun and in the end, with everything i learned, it felt like the fic was only just the ‘by-product’ of my research. though i must say, writing the story itself was challenging in a very different way, by that i mean that the characters made me furious and yet i had to write it like that cause i like to suffer :) 

as for gifset, am not sure? i can’t think of any so i am just linking the daechwita mv cause it’s iconic. i guess this mv is more joseon inspired, while my setting was silla somewhere between the end of 7th and beginning of 8th century; but it was the final straw to finally make me write that historical taegi au i always wanted to write with hwarang tae. also this mv inspired me to have yoongi as a tyrannical king cause why not amirite?

4. a creation to be proud of: 

my wei wuxian oneshot during burial mounds; i had a lot of fun writing him and projecting all my nightmares onto him. i went in without a plan and ended up with something i am actually quite proud of? it gave me so much space and room to just...pour out my words and not worry too much about anything else. 

5. a creation that took forever: 

my post-canon wangxian adventure or qinghe chaos, as i lovingly call it. i think i started writing it in november 2019? not entirely sure about that, i only know it took ages. i wanted to create a whole new political environment, as it takes place somewhere around 70 years after canon (they wanna be immortal, shut up) and it was fun thinking of new challenges and new obstacles that face the new generation of cultivators. unfortunately i did not have the capacity to write a full blown political conflict. that’s why i never really incorporated all my thoughts into the story itself, but hey, if anyone has questions i have notes (and vishie, once again, is the most blessed person to plot with me, ily)

6. your creation from 2020 that received the most notes: 

am gonna measure this by kudos on ao3 in that case, which would be the aforementioned lwj oneshot Cold Moon, Long Nights Moon. I feel incredibly fond of it and i’m really happy that people liked it. it feels special somehow and i just want to thank everyone who read that and liked it.

7. a creation you think deserved more notes: 

oh i wrote many fics that year for smaller fandoms, which makes me grateful for every single feedback i received. i think i had hoped my previously mentioned historical AU would receive more, but it’s okay because i still loved it. 

another one is this princess sook myung/ah roh fic that i wrote for my ‘make hwarang gay again’ series. i finally finished this show and it furstrated me so much - the gay potential that went to waste, the horrendous writing for female characters. i liked the chemistry between ah roh and the princess, and yes i get it, it’s a rare pair and this fandom is kinda dead, but. the girls deserve their shine and love (though still, i am grateful for every single kudos i receive and i am still proud of it)

8. a new fandom you joined and a creation you made for it: 

i joined many new fandoms this year for which i wrote, but i want to mention my shang xirui character study for winter begonia, because it was very interesting to explore that? and i had fun too, it was one of the first things i properly wrote after my hiatus, so i felt quite proud. also once again, this fandom has way too little content and the show is underrated. 

9. a creation you made that breaks your heart: 

i wanna mention two here. first is this wen ning & song lan oneshot that was a pure joy and also very sad to write. i just love these two so much, and i love them together even more. i have many thoughts how much comfort they could give each other and believe me, i have many more that i want to explore in the future. 

the second one is the mu nihuang & xiao jingyan oneshot i wrote for the nirvana in fire gift exchange 2020. it broke my heart, but at the same time it felt like something was healing too? it hurt at the pain both characters go through, but i also felt fond that maybe, they were not alone.

10. a ‘simple’ creation that you really love: 

hmm there are a few, i mostly want to mention my fei liu character study? it has no plot or anything, it is just an exploration of his mind and thoughts, which was an absolute joy to write and somehow so easy. 

i also quite like the yyy series i started - maybe i can write more for these two because they somehow give me the feels.

11. a favorite creation created by someone else: 

alright here we go folks:

first i want to mention my dearest @vishcount because newsflash!!! i am the biggest fan. of course i need to mention your wondeful, stunning, breathtaking masterpiece that is your xicheng novel (and yes it is a novel, i say so). it is still ongoing and you started it in 2019, but i need to mention it here because it truly is something that is lifechanging. i feel so blessed that i get the front seats and vip access to all the updates, to all your thoughts and ideas. you go through a lot with it and i am never not proud of you ❤️ another one i want to mention is this wei wuxian & mo xuanyu oneshot you wrote for me because i am still crying about it. i have no words.  honourable mentions: your easter islanders (lan wangji and jiang cheng) and this xicheng soulmate au 

another creator i want to mention is @the-cloud-whisperer and their nirvana in fire fic Heroic Woman（烈婦） , which is absolutely wonderful.  i found you through your ATLA fics (which i adore) and saw you posting about nirvana in fire and this year, finally, i watched the show and was blown away. i love your other NIF fics too, but this one feels very special because i always thought li yang’s character was so incredibly fascinating. thank you for writing this 💕

for more other creations just look at my bookmarks on ao3, there is the untamed, nirvana in fire, yyy the series, hwarang, winter begonia and original sin (from 2020 and many more if you scroll further) please give everyone i mentioned love!!!!!

12. your favorite content creators and blogs that you appreciate: 

oh boy here we go. once again @vishcount, @the-cloud-whisperer, @intyalote, @sassyassassy, @isabellaofparma, @passionpeachy, @finny-red, @guzhuangheaven  @honeyiling, @holmesandwhatson  @bloody-bee-tea, @leoyunxi, @gusucloud, @ohsehuns and many many more that must slip my mind.

all of you, consider yourself tagged in this game and even if we never spoke to each other, i greatly appreciate all of you and i want to give some love. if you feel like doing this, i hope you can have fun!  💕

[beca-mitchell]

we are the wild youth (1/5)

summary:  Beca needs some money to get out of Barden as quickly as possible. It just so happens that an opportunity all but drops in her lap: one Chloe Beale, desperately in need of a tutor to pass her last two classes to graduate.

Warnings for smut and angst and drama. Mainly smut. Rated M/E.

chapter one:  fever dream high

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

word count: 3,178

Rated M/E for depictions of coitus. This fic is an AU imagining of PP somewhat: Beca never joins the Bellas and is somewhat of a nerd, Chloe still stays back an extra three years, and there's backstory that was never part of the PP universe. But otherwise, it is set at Barden, Beca still loves music.

Fic title from “Youth” by Daughter. Chapter title from “Cruel Summer” by Taylor Swift. This fic is based on this gifset.

Read below or on AO3.

Beca just wants to graduate.

The deal she cut with her father is not the best deal in the world, but to him, a degree means something. Something meaningful. Meaningful enough that he’s willing to help her get the fuck out of Atlanta and move to New York. That kind of meaningful.

So in that sense, her degree is meaningful to her too. No time for fucking around.

But, senior year kind of means that she can start to take it easy. She’s almost there. She just needs to continue keeping her guard up long enough to ensure that Jesse still gets the hint she’s not interested in him and she just needs to pass.

Hence why this beginning-of-year party is an anomaly, but she’ll take it if there’s free alcohol and maybe the chance to unwind. Bedmate optional.

Beca isn’t one for parties. Definitely not one for house parties at a frat house.

She supposes these are the people who will end up playing her music in the future, however. Peering around, she grimaces at the very-near-public sex happening right on a couch that looks a little too used. A little too comfortable.

Start-of-term parties are always memorable in their own way. They’re almost formulaic in a sense. Guy gets girl, something valuable will be broken—maybe a television, maybe a heart—and something will go wrong.

Beca likes observing all of this from the outskirts while Jesse, who is the only person daring enough to drag her out of her apartment, floats away like the social butterfly he is.

It’s not that she hates parties, nor is she a recluse, Beca is just kind of tired of college at this point. She had promised her parents at least two years in college before she could head out to Los Angeles and really fulfill her dreams, but it turns out that she kind of needs money for that. Money which she doesn’t really have even if she’s been saving up pennies and quarters since middle school.

School is a safety net. She’s been told that all her life, with no small measure of patronization.

It also kind of sucks that Beca inherited at least a portion of her father’s intelligence. The daughter of a professor? There was no way he was letting her leave Barden without at least degree. Realistically, she inherited his knack for school because she’s kind of good at it. Physics, at least, hasn’t been a problem. Or Calculus.

It’s just fucking boring and she doesn’t even intend on using her degree. And she only chose something deeply rooted in science and math because she thought it would piss him off.

Many errors have been made. Miscalculated, even. Or perhaps more on point, horribly erroneous like a series of wrong notes in the middle of a symphony.

Beca could go on.

She can hear her father’s voice, somehow cutting through the raucous party and lodging deep in her head: “But your little music gigs, Beca? It’s a hobby. Science and math? That’ll get you jobs.” Then in the same breath, without fail: “It’s what your mother would want.”

The forced reminder makes Beca take another swig of cheap beer before she makes her way over to the keg for more. As she turns the corner, she stumbles, bumping into a shockingly solid body. As she drops her thankfully-empty cup, she reaches up to grab on to the arms that have come around her back to steady her.

“Thanks,” she murmurs, lifting her gaze to make some kind of eye contact when she realizes the body she’s pressed against doesn’t belong to yet another generic frat boy. Instead, she feels soft, feminine curves and the slightest hint of firm muscle beneath the fabric of a thin leather jacket.

Shockingly blue eyes stare back at her. “Hi,” she greets.

“Hi,” Beca replies, still stunned. “Um,” she steps back from the stranger’s space. Or...somewhat of a stranger would be a more apt descriptor. She would be remiss if she didn’t acknowledge that she just nearly bowled over Chloe Beale whose last name just happens to be on at least two buildings around school. Chloe Beale who is devastatingly pretty with blue eyes to die for and red hair and a burning smile.

Chloe Beale who is staring at her like she’s seeing her for the first time.

(She probably is.)

“Beca, right?”

Beca swallows. “I—yeah. How…?” Beca shakes her head. “Sorry, I’m not usually this horribly awkward.”

Chloe smiles. “How are you, usually, then? Other than being the most talented radio host Barden has ever had.”

It’s the oddest interaction to be having with a stranger in the middle of a house party. Beca can barely hear her own thoughts.

Chloe seems to read her mind. “Want to go somewhere quieter?”

Beca has never agreed to a cliche more quickly in her life.

- - x - - 

It doesn’t take long—in fact, Beca barely gets out the question “How do you know my name?” before Chloe is in her space and pulling her in for a bruising kiss. Beca’s body immediately thrums with excitement and repressed energy and she quickly pushes back at Chloe, determined to at least put up some small measure of a fight against Chloe’s immediate dominance over her.

But she quickly realizes that it feels so much better, letting Chloe take control like this—Chloe whom Beca had no idea even knew she existed, let alone wanted to hook up with her.

Chloe’s breath is hot against her neck while she holds Beca against the dresser. “I’m going to fuck you so hard, Mitchell,” she breathes, voice dripping with promise and pure want.

Beca’s brain short-circuits then, a symphony of jangled notes and endless crescendos. She can only nod weakly, hands scrabbling up Chloe’s back and pulling at the thing fabric of her shirt uselessly before she grabs onto Chloe’s hair and pulls her in for another kiss.

Chloe groans and pushes back against Beca, tilting her further over the dresser and displacing bottles of cologne and accessories. Strong hands grab at her thighs and force her legs apart so Chloe’s hips can settle more firmly between Beca’s legs. The action alone sends shockwaves up Beca’s brain. Beca, who is no stranger to sex, realizes that she has never felt such strong arousal from just kissing before.

“Are we going to have sex?” Beca asks before she can help herself. She immediately regrets the question when it leaves her mouth. “Because I want to,” she says quickly before she loses it or before Chloe thinks that she’s having doubts. She isn’t. It’s just overwhelming, being so taken and consumed by a girl she barely knows.

Not for lack of trying, Beca supposes.

Of course, Beca has a stupid crush on Chloe Beale. It seemed like most people did, somehow. Chloe, popular by virtue of her wealth but also mysterious and aloof disposition, never seemed to be short on suitors.

A small measure of pride wells up in Beca before it is immediately replaced by a swooping tightening in her belly as Chloe’s teeth nip harshly at her neck. With the amount of suitors Chloe frequently wards off (and the smaller number that she seems to allow close to her), Beca assesses that it would also appear that Chloe didn’t need any encouraging at all. Much less direction.

Before Beca manages even a measly gasp or even a weak tug to Chloe’s hair, Chloe’s hands are already greedily grabbing at her hips, pushing and pulling at the fabric impatiently for a moment or so, getting a good grope in, before her fingers deftly find the button of Beca’s jeans.

Beca sucks in a breath.

It takes a moment, but Chloe pauses, lifting her head from her assault on Beca’s neck. Her eyes, dark and blown with desire, flicker with something nearly unrecognizable.

Beca’s eyes drift back down to Chloe’s lips in the ensuing silence.

“You’ve never had sex with a girl before, have you?” Chloe asks.

Beca blushes immediately, averting her eyes for a brief second before Chloe tilts her chin back up to catch her lips in a sweeping, full, wet kiss. It’s more romantic than it has any business being. Beca moans against her own will, lifting her hips up almost impatiently against Chloe’s still hand. She is so conscious of the ache between her legs. So conscious of how her previous encounters with men left her wanting and dissatisfied. Not all the time, but more often than not.

How she had always imagined what it would be like with a woman.

Chloe, maybe. Chloe, specifically. Chloe, who had occasionally seeped into her thoughts based on the occasional classes they shared together. Chloe, who ran around the track almost every morning, visible from Beca’s dorm window. Chloe, who had smiled at her just briefly from across the quad at the activities fair all those years ago and Beca hd simply just turned away—

Chloe, who is pressed against her, lips swollen from the force of their shared kisses.

Lips swollen from Beca.

“Beca?” Chloe asks, referring to Beca by her first name for the first time all evening.

“Yeah,” Beca rasps, hot against her newfound lover’s mouth.

It takes a few seconds for Beca to process sudden emptiness she feels—a lack of warmth, really—but she realizes belatedly that it is because Chloe is on her knees, pulling Beca’s jeans down her trembling legs. When Chloe looks up at her, fluttering long eyelashes, Beca feels an answering gush between her legs.

Fuck, Beca thinks with every last primal instinct coursing through her. Fuck me. She reaches out instinctively to thread her fingers through Chloe’s hair, swallowing at how natural it feels to tangle her hands in another girl’s hair. To enjoy it so much.

Chloe says nothing while she helps Beca step out of her jeans. The movements, though gentle and slow, do nothing to ease the growing tension gnawing at her stomach. She clenches again involuntarily and moans in response to her own actions causing Chloe to look up from where she still kneels in front of Beca.

For a moment, Beca feels powerful.

Then, Chloe’s fingertips gently hook into the elastic waistband of Beca’s underwear.

“Tell me how hard you want me to fuck you, Beca Mitchell,” Chloe murmurs, her voice permeating the thick fog of Beca’s brain. It almost stuns Beca into silence, but she realizes that what she wants even more than LA at that moment is Chloe’s fingers between her legs. Her tongue maybe. Lips. Beca’s hands through her hair, tangled all night.

The possibilities are seemingly endless.

“Hard,” she chokes out. “Just fuck me hard.”

Blue eyes flash with delight and the promise of everything to come.

- - x - -

She does come. Multiple times that night against the dresser. Then again when she invites Chloe back to her apartment. Against her own front door. In her bed, testing the strength of her boxspring mattress.

But none of that matters—what matters is how breathtaking Chloe looks when Beca unravels her. Breathless in her own way. Possessing Beca’s bed like she has nowhere else she’d rather be. The unmistakable tremble as Beca’s fingers sink into tight, wet heat. Choked off moans against Beca’s mouth.

And as Beca falls asleep, tired and spent, she thinks vaguely of the flash of red hair that fateful day at the activities fair. How she had pointedly avoided the pretty girl with blue eyes and red hair.

It feels like regret, chasing her into her dreams.

- - x - -

Beca isn’t one to dwell on things, however. She has no time for that kind of distraction, even if that distraction is the pleasant, fleeting sensation of Chloe’s lips pressing against the curve of her shoulder as she slips into a waking state.

There is something incredibly tender about the way Chloe’s fingers comb through her hair as she whispers a murmured goodbye into Beca’s ear. Her lips graze the sensitive skin on the shell of her ear, seeping into the peripheries of Beca’s dreaming state.

It feels like a dream, at least. All of it. Unattainable, super-senior Chloe Beale.

When Beca wakes up again, her bed is cold and empty and she’s pretty sure the aches coursing through her body have nothing to do with alcohol.

She peers blearily at her phone, unfortunately uncharged and nearly dead, and startles upon seeing that it is half past ten and she’s meant to meet a new student at eleven. She jolts out of bed and right into the shower, regrettably washing off all the remaining memories from the previous night. As she reaches between her own legs, she puffs out a heavy breath and tries not to think about how sure Chloe’s hands felt on her body the night before.

This new student is a special request from the Dean of Students himself, sent her way by her father. She had protested, barely, but the pretty monetary figure that had slid across her gaze had been enough to hold her attention.

“Just twice a week for the year. Both semesters. This student needs to pass,” her father emphasizes.

“Who is this student,” Beca demands, tucking the form into her jacket pocket. “Another entitled rich kid?”

Her father pinches his nose. “Look, I recommended you directly to Dean Sanders the moment I heard about this request. It’s from a special benefactor to the school and I know how much you need the money to go to L.A..”

“I wanted to go to L.A. three years ago.”

“Do you not want to go anymore?”

Beca bites her tongue to stop from saying anything else and looks away.

“I know you’re an adult, Becs, but I have your best interests in mind. I just want to see you try. If you do this, I’ll double what the benefactor pays you. I’ll match it and double it.”

Beca can hardly believe her ears. It’s a lot of money. Enough to be considered “safe”, even. “Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

Beca nearly trips multiple times on the way to the diner—an odd background for a tutoring session—but she somehow makes it there with a minute to spare. She realizes she has no idea who she’s even meeting with and slowly slides into the closest booth, keeping an eye out for anybody who looks especially lost.

She sits uncertainly for at least fifteen minutes, downs an entire cup of coffee, and fends off awkward inquiries from the server before she pulls out her phone intent on calling her father and giving him a piece of her mind. On cue, she gets a text.

Unknown Hey, my dad gave me this number. You’re my tutor, right? Rebecca? lol

Beca groans.

Beca hey, yep i’m your tutor. I’m at Carl’s, just got a booth at the back

The door jingles somewhere in the background and Beca glances up to meet Chloe Beale’s gaze dead-on.

“You’re fucking joking,” Beca mutters.

Chloe, for her part, does not look pleased at all as she tosses her bag into the booth before sliding in across from Beca.

“Small world,” Chloe comments.

“You’re telling me.”

Chloe looks like she might say something else and Beca braces herself for the potential innuendo or lust-laden comment, but nothing comes. Instead, Chloe simply folds her hands and watches Beca intently, looking every bit like an innocent college student with a desire to pass her class.

Beca’s gaze flickers down to the neatly folded fingers.

When she looks back up, Chloe’s expression morphs into one that makes Beca swallow nervously.

“Are you nervous?” Chloe asks. “It’s just me,” she says in a tone that implies that she knows exactly what inappropriate thoughts are floating through Beca’s mind.

Beca ignores that, both the words and the tone Chloe uses, and pulls out her notebook and binder. “You’re in calculus two...then statistics next semester?” Chloe nods. “Those are usually first-year requirements, how are you getting away with this? Is this a pre-med degree?”

Chloe smiles—a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “When your father’s name is on the school’s med school building, you kind of get things handed to you no matter how much you want to fight it. I can only control so much.”

Beca scoffs before she can help herself. “Well, I don’t know if that’s entirely true. I think that there are things out of our control sometimes, but there are definitely things within our control.” Like leaving calculus and statistics until the end. Like sleeping together and wanting to do it again, but resisting.

Chloe gazes at her with renewed interest. “You’re a tutor, huh?”

“Looks like it.”

“And my dad hired you.”

Beca shrugs. “Kind of...so I guess your dad will kill me in front of the entire student body if we don’t do this.” She clicks her pen. “Come on, show me your assignments.”

“I really don’t want to do what he wants,” Chloe says, fluttering her eyes at Beca. “Want to do something else instead?”

Beca scowls. “I’m your tutor, whether you like it or not.”

“Fuck that.”

Beca tries not to smile at that. Chloe has such a pleasant speaking voice and a generally pleasant expression on her face at all times that it isn’t hard to see why she’s probably one of the most well-liked people on campus. So well-liked that it is often overlooked that she’s going for a third round of her senior year.

Still, professionalism. Beca can do that, kind of. She tutored worse people in high school. “Let’s get this over with, okay?”

It is entirely the wrong thing to say. Chloe’s smile widens and she leans forward, her shoulders hunched like a predator just about to pounce. “That’s not what you were saying last night.”

“I...oh my God.” Beca purses her lips and looks around hurriedly before settling on the glass of water to her side. Grabbing it, she sips it delicately for a few long moments while avoiding Chloe’s gaze and quenching the sudden dryness in her throat.

The cool water sliding down her throat is a nice thing to focus on.

She’s not focusing on anything else. Not the phantom sensation of Chloe’s hands ghosting up her sides. Not the phantom sensation of Chloe making her hold on to her own headboard. Not the phantom sensation of Chloe’s lips against her thighs, leaving marks and hot, wet kisses.

Not the very real sensation from Chloe’s eyes boring a hole into her forehead, like she can see right into the recesses of Beca’s minds. Every last dark, lustful thought.

But the moment ends before Beca can really process everything, like how part of her wants to shove everything off the table so she can climb over and straddle Chloe’s lap.

Chloe sighs, opens her textbook, and points out the series of problems she has to complete for the week. “There,” she mutters.

Math—math, Beca can do. Calculus. Statistics.

Chloe, not so much.

(Even though she already did.)

/end chap. 1

read the rest: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

[justlightlysedated]

you're the only place that feels like home

inspired by this gifset by @vlamito

*

one.

Kyle thinks that he should get paid for being the Alex wrangler, apparently no one has seen him for days, and Liz had come back from the cabin looking worried, so Kyle had sighed and thought about it for all of thirteen seconds before he realized the only place Alex could possibly be at.

He tells Liz that he'll take care of it, and leaves her in his office as he takes the drive to the junkyard.

Alex's car isn't parked at the front, but neither is Michael's truck.

He gets out of his car and goes to the Airstream. It's early in the morning, and there are hardly any sounds, so he can make out the low whir of the generator running as the heater keeps the inside of the Airstream warm, and since Michael's average core temperature is somewhere above 108° there is only one other person who would be inside.

He knocks on the door, but no one answers.

He sighs, long and loud and wishes that he wasn't the only one of his friends who seems to have become an actual adult during the last ten years.

"Alex," he yells knocking on the door even louder, but still nothing.

"Alex!" He yells again. "Come on! I know you're in there!"

The door opens then, almost hitting Kyle in  the face, and Alex looks entirely like he's been spending the last couple of days he's been missing, sleeping.

His eyes are half lidded, and there are pillow marks on his cheek and his hair looks like a rat's nest and his clothes are all rumpled and not even his, and he also smells a little like he hasn't showered in all that time as well.

"What?" He asks, making an attempt to glare at Kyle and managing to just look really tired.

"I know you're catching up on your beauty sleep, but your friends are getting really worried about you."

Alex's brow furrows, "Why?"

The confusion on his voice is clear, and Kyle really doesn't want to be the person to tell him that no one knows where he is because no one thinks he and Michael are anything more than exes who made each other miserable.  

"Because they haven't seen you in days," Kyle explains carefully, like he's talking to a two year old.

Alex just rolls his eyes and rubs one of his eyes, yawning.

"At least send them a message that you're okay."

Alex gives him a sheepish look. 

"I left my phone at the cabin."

Kyle looks up to the sky to ask for patience and then sighs when he looks back to Alex to see him leaning back against the side of the entrance, eyes half closed.

"Fine," he says. "I'll let everyone know that you're okay, please try to make it to Friday Night Dinner at Isobel's this week so that people don't think I'm lying."

Alex just nods his head, and turns to go back inside.

Kyle rolls his eyes, and closes the door after him, turning around and getting into his car.

He should have at least taken a picture, but at least he tried, and that should be enough for Liz.

two.

Liz stuffs Michael's keys into her pocket so that she doesn't lose them and climbs up the steps to get into the Airstream, humming to herself as she does.

She looks around the small space for the desk area and stops short when she sees that she's not alone.

Alex looks entirely too comfortable, sitting down on the small cot, back towards the far plywood headboard. His laptop is balanced on top of his lap, and there are thick headphones covering his ears, and his fingers are moving quickly across the keyboard, but he doesn't seem like he's working. Not with the slight smirk curling his lips, like he's in the lead in a race that's about to finish.

Liz is just frozen staring at him, wondering what the hell he's doing there, when he raises his arms in the air in victory, doing a little shimmy and saying yes, before he looks up and spots Liz.

He doesn't look like he's been caught doing something he shouldn't, just a little surprised until he recognizes her and he smiles, pulling the headphones down to hang around his neck, and she can hear whatever it is he's listening to, which sounds like the victory music from Mortal Kombat.

"Hey," he says, like they're meeting in a public place by chance and not inside of Michael's Airstream.

"Hi," she says, feeling a little wrong footed. "What are you doing here?"

He raises an eyebrow at her like she's the one intruding into his space, "I think the better question is what are you doing here?"

Liz gives him a defiant look, "Michael gave me his keys and asked me to pick up the rest of the serum he left in here."

She raises an eyebrow at him expectantly.

"I have my own key and an open invitation that dates back ten years," he says giving her a sharp smile and then setting the laptop aside to drag himself to the other side of the cot and then he's knocking on the counter on the side and then on the top and the drawer opens up like he just did a magic trick.

"It gets stuck," he says like that explains anything.

He reaches into the drawer and pulls the two vials of serum out and holds them out to Liz.

Liz takes them, and just watches as Alex smiles, and says. "It was nice seeing you."

And then he's settling himself against the wall, hair illuminated by the sun coming through the window, and he slides his headphones back over his head and puts the laptop back on his lap and promptly forgets all about Liz.

Liz can tell that she's been dismissed so she tightens her hold on the vials and walks back out of the Airstream not bothering to lock it behind her.

three.

"Look," Michael says a little too loudly, sounding frustrated and tired, but Isobel doesn't really care. "I'm not saying that we shouldn't try. I'm just saying that we should wait until the next lightning storm, so that we can be at full power."

Isobel scoffs, "If only there were some resident brainiacs around that could synthesize a serum for that, oh wait!"

Michael rolls his eyes, and opens his mouth to argue, but then the door to the Airstream, opens with a loud squeak that drags both their attention to it, and Isobel's annoyance at the interruption turns to surprise.

Alex stands on the bottom step of the Airstream, looking like he just spent the last ten minutes tossing and turning and running his hands through his hair, trying to sleep, to no avail.

He looks like he hasn't slept in a while, and Isobel would feel sorry, but she had no idea that Michael had company, especially when he's still dating Maria.

She turns to him raising an eyebrow, and Michael is looking at Alex and grimacing.

"Sorry," he says, and Isobel hears Alex make a wordless noise that Michael apparently understands because he holds his hand out with the coffee that Isobel had brought him.

"What are you doing here, so early in the morning?" Isobel asks as he grabs the coffee from Michael's hands, voice implying the reason that she's thinking.

Alex and Michael turn to her in unison and it makes her feel odd to see it.

"I sleep here sometimes," Alex says.

"He sleeps here sometimes," Michael says at the same time.

Isobel's eyes narrow, but Alex takes a sip of the coffee and makes a face before handing it back to Michael.

Michael doesn't look too apologetic. "There's some from the office in the thermos on top of the counter."

Alex makes a low noise, that Isobel would classify as a moan of pleasure before he's moving fast, back to the Airstream.

Isobel watches Michael as he watches Alex go back inside, something fond in his gaze and she rolls her eyes so hard she sees the curvature of the Earth.

"Just think about it," she says sighing when it takes him a while to turn back to her. "And not just about the serum."

She raises an eyebrow pointedly, and he just gives her a confused look like he has no idea what she's talking about.

four.

Maria exhales roughly as she kills the ignition and tries not to feel like she's making another mistake.

Last night had been rough and long time coming, but she had also said some things that she really didn't mean.

She broke up with Michael last night and while she doesn't exactly regret, she does know that if Michael asks her for another chance she'll say yes.

Their relationship had more complications than she had been expecting when she slept with him in Texas, but there were moments that made the fights and the awful feeling in the pit of her stomach, like she had done something wrong, worth it.

She gets out of her truck and walks with determination to the Airstream.

Even if they don't get back together, at least she can let him know that she didn't actually mean it when she told him to never come back to the bar.

She stops right at the door and takes a deep breath before she knocks on it.

There is no answer.

She exhales in a rush and looks around herself and sees that Michael's truck is there, so unless he slept over at Isobel's, he should be here.

She looks at her watch and sees that it's almost noon, so Michael should be awake already, since he never sleeps in later than six on a good day.

She knocks on the door again, but once again, there is no answer.

Maria purses her mouth and then tries to open the door.

It opens easily, and she shakes her head at the amount of careless that Michael is, but she bites down on her lip. 

She didn't come here to start another fight.

She came here to fix things.

She walks into the Airstream, and looks over to the bed, and feels her heart jump into her throat.

She moves closer, almost like she's in a trance and stops right by the edge of the bed when her foot hits something heavy.

She looks down and feels dread creeping into her, until she picks up the bottle and notices that the seal hasn't been broken.

She looks back to the bed.

Michael and Alex are curled up like puppies on top of the bed, sheets tangled down by their feet. They're facing each other and their legs are overlapping and their hands are curled together in the small space between their chests, and their foreheads are pressed together.

Maria feels a pang in her chest, but also an overwhelming feeling of relief that at least Michael had someone to lean on when he was upset instead of drinking and setting back his progress.

She stares at them, at how they're still asleep even though she made enough noise walking in here, especially Alex who seems to have taken the Mad-Eye Moody's approach to life, and is constantly on edge making sure that he's always fully aware of everything.

She's seen Michael sleep that deep only once and it was settled in bed with Max and Isobel.

She wonders how they could get that comfortable in that small bed to sleep that well, but there is a small part of her that she doesn't want to acknowledge that it probably has nothing to do at all with the bed.

She tightens her fingers around the bottle and leaves, making sure to close the door behind her.

She'll call Michael later. And hopefully he'll actually pick up the phone now that they're  not dating.

five.

Alex is lying back on the tailgate, shirtless and wearing a pair of swim shorts and bug eyed sunglasses.

One of his hands is hanging from the edge, close enough that if Michael wanted to, he could hold it, but he doesn't.

He just lies back in the kid's swimming pool full of icy cold water that he set in the shade of the truck, to keep himself cool when it seems like the temperature wants to kill him, and stares at it, wondering what Alex would do if Michael reached out and threaded their fingers together.

Instead of doing that, he looks up to the sky, his own pair of shades protecting him from the deadly sunlight and asks the question he's been meaning to ask for a while.

"Why are you here?" He asks, and he can feel Alex freezing, even though he's not watching him. "I mean, you have your own place, and probably a more comfortable bed, and even a living room, but more importantly an AC unit, but still, you're always here."

There is a moment of silence before Alex moves, turning on his stomach and leaning his head on his arm to look down at Michael.

"Do you mind?" He asks, and Michael has to actually look at his face because it sounds like he's worried that Michael actually minds.

"No," Michael says like it should be obvious, and Alex smiles at him, a soft warm thing that Michael never sees him pull on anyone else.

It always sends a mad fluttering in his stomach.

"But you do have your own place," he repeats.

"Yeah," Alex says, wrinkling his nose. "But it doesn't feel like home." 

"And you feel at home here?" Michael asks, incredulous, but his heart starts racing as he waits for Alex to reply to the question.

Alex purses his mouth, and looks like he doesn't actually want to answer, but he sighs and lets his hand drop, to hang off the tailgate, fingers barely touching the water right by Michael's leg.

"It's more like," he says in a low voice, almost like he doesn't want Michael to hear. "I feel at home wherever you are."

Michael feels his stomach clench and his heart race, and he wants to drag Alex down from the tailgate and settle him on his lap and kiss him until they forget that they're not together, but instead he reaches out and takes Alex's hand.

He feels the way that Alex freezes, and holds his breath for a second.

Alex slowly exhales, and he slowly threads their fingers together.

Michael feels a warmth in the pit of his stomach, and he smiles before he looks back to Alex who Michael can tell is staring at their hands even though he can't see his eyes.

"You feel like home to me, too," he says in an equally low and secret tone.

Alex smiles and squeezes his fingers.

[akathecentimetre]

So here’s the thing.

Of course I love The Old Guard. Like, of COURSE I do. It is everything I like and everything you all have gotten used to knowing I like, from found family to unconditional love to the yummy yummy historical tidbits. It’s going to have a truly Great fandom.

But watching it was not, for me, some huge revelatory experience in media because - well, I’ve written it before. Many times, in scattered pieces, across a lot of my fic. And what made me cry last night when I finally watched it was that it’s the spitting image of an epic vampire story that I wrote, over a decade ago, with Rio (@aumerle-that-was​).

Who is now dead. Recently dead. [I wrote a post about her here.]

The Barrens will most likely never make it to publication. It’s huge, and unwieldy, and full of unnecessary crack because I was an 18-19-20-year-old virgin when we were spending the most time on it. But it’s 232,761 words of memories, of laughter, of love, and, as I mentioned in my previous post, of me learning how to write at all.

I miss her. I wish she was still here, to see The Old Guard and love it (GOD she would have loved it). I wish she was here so she could write the most beautiful, unbearable, Italianate fic of Joe & Nicky that anyone could have ever imagined. They deserve a gifset set to her Coldplay “roman cavalry choirs” singing. 

Here’s some tiny images of what we wrote, focusing on various characters (including one called Rio, of no relation; this epic started, if you can believe, as a football/soccer RPF AU). I’ve picked out some character moments rather than historical bits, but fair warning that there’s mention of some nasty/upsetting stuff.

*

It was the need to eat, and the need to live, and the need to go on, and it was, as the last sliver of sun splintered on the deep blue of Capri's sea, utterly unendurable, because he knew that he would, he would get up, he would go on, he would feed, and he would keep living. He would keep living, and the grief and anguish in his mind would keep on with him, the raw, still-bleeding edges of the severed bond breathing with him, and the new fear and hatred he had learned keeping him company with them.

He would just refuse to think, that was all. That couldn't be so hard.

It couldn't.

*

He closed his eyes, and swallowed, shutting down memories and envy and misery at once, and drew a deep, unnecessary breath before he looked out at the Mouth of Truth again. He walked over to it slowly, and put his hand in. "I don't miss you," he said. "And you needed to die." Robin whined sadly behind him. The Mouth stayed open.

*

Things were shutting down, blowing out like lamps at night, and all he could think was thank God, because he didn't want this anymore, couldn't stand it, and he thought it might be his life that was guttering out like a candle, and it was really too much effort to care, because peace.

...but as bad as dying was, it was nothing compared to waking up again.

Fingers were tapping him sharply on one cheek. "'Ey. 'Ey, come on, wake up."

He opened his eyes. And immediately shouted out in a mix of pain, terror, and absolutely overwhelming confusion, because his head hurt so badly he thought he just might have been brained with an axe, and when he struggled into a sitting position it was to the realization that his clothes were soaked with blood, and that just couldn't be good at all. His hands shot to his throat, but when he found that there was nothing there - no torn flesh, no blood, no wound, no nothing - all he could let out was a horrified sort of squeak.

There was the odd laugh again, and it didn't help at all to realize he could feel it now, as if he was tapped into the other man's amusement like some barrel of watered beer left running.

"Very good," the man's voice rumbled, making him jump again, because he didn't just hear it, it was like it was in his ear. "Now then. Follow these regles" - a piece of crumpled paper was thrust into his bloody palm - "and you shall be just fine, yes? Yes. I think you shall be fine." And then the man stood, stepped over him, and opened the door, pushing Rio's nerveless legs aside as it swung on its hinges. "I think I had better go. Too much - commotion. Bonsoir!"

"And fuck you," Rio managed to croak with some vehemence, feeling the amusement fade out and vanish, as though it had never been there at all. If it weren't for the way his head felt and the state of his hands and clothes, he'd have thought he'd dreamed it - got coshed, maybe, and dreamed it. The crumpled piece of paper was telling him otherwise. The slightly-mangled syntax was bad enough without it apparently being straight out of a child's fairy tale.

Never kill when you drink. Never go out in the sun unless you have strength enough. If it is possible, no churches. NEVER TOUCH SILVER. Run from Hunters, do not fight. Be polite when you use your mind, otherwise it will hurt.

Bonds of love are forever.

*

He had got as far as the steps when the world began to shatter, as though cacophony could be made into feeling, sending him in a kind of sideways fall against the stone balustrade, and wondering how he had never known there was this much pain in the world, because it was worse even than the night he had been left to bleed his life out on a London street, worse than silver, worse than anything he could begin to think of as comparison. It was the utter definition of agony, and all he could think was that he needed it to stop, it had to stop, before his mind fragmented and splintered along with it.

It came to him, distant and heartwrenching, that this was what Cruyff had meant by letting go, that he had to withdraw or risk going irrevocably mad, but - fuck, fuck, how could he let go of everything, Cruyff was everything, it was impossible that he should be - imposs -

He fell against the wall, toppled onto his knees, and screamed.

*

“And if you want immortality for someone, the last thing you want is to find yourself becoming a murderer. Unless you're Marco..."  he trailed off with a sigh, and shook his head. "Marco seduced a girl in Babylon --"

"Babylon --!"  Rio gaped.  Babylon didn't even exist any more, God, what sort of timescale were they talking about here?

"He went with Alexander," Gullit said patiently, "and if you want to know more about that, read a book."

*

Gullit bristled and snarled without actually saying anything, giving Rio the distinct impression that the master vampire was more of a real wolf than Robin would ever be. "Go on then," he snapped. "Tell me to my face that you will be able to wake up tomorrow night and do what you have to do. That is all the time I will allow you - and I will know if you are lying."

Rio swallowed.  He thought of silver, and the way it burned even when it wasn't a knife, thought of how it tainted everything, how the thought even of being there one more second alongside that pain was almost impossible.  He thought of how it was now his knife, how he had earned the pain and the ability both, and owned them by name and by right.

He thought, deliberately, of the scars on Ed's body, of the look in his eyes that first night at Stevie's, as though the world were a place of ash and horror and nothing good could even be imagined.

He thought of Gullit, whose sons were dead and had no-one to lay claim to him or who he could be part of but Marco, and who carried on, scarred and limping and casting his damn spells, trying to earn something Rio thought just might be the forgiveness of the twice-dead.

"Yeah," he said then, looking straight into Gullit's dark, hot eyes.  "I could."

"Could you really," Gullit said thoughtfully.  It wasn't, terrifyingly, anywhere near a question.

*

I can make no predictions, so consider this an indefinite promise: you are not going back.

Rio's mind turned into a perfect, careful blank of pure incomprehension.

Back here? he ventured, because if that was it, he really didn't understand, since how not coming back here was anything but good was absolutely and completely beyond him.  How he was supposed to feel anything but thank-you-God about even the idea of never coming back here was apparently a mental leap he was incapable of making.

There was a snort of derision, the horrid sound failing to arouse even a twitch of amusement from anyone. No, Rio, Gullit whispered. He had to live with the possibility of never - that his pain would never end. And now you’re going to live with it too. You’re going to live with the thought that you might never kill Marco... and, due to the extremes of unpredictability this world - and especially Marco - goes to, you’re going to live with the idea that you might never see, or be able to love, Edwin ever again.

He wasn't sure if he was being manipulated, or if it was real, but the sense of something that wasn't even grief – that was beyond grief, was nothing as human as grief – was shocking and immediate and all-consuming.  It was the knowledge that the last memories he might ever be able to make that were his own – even now, as his brain stuttered in a void, he knew that what he had seen here was not his for the taking – the last memories he could truly take for himself would be the look of joy in Ed's eyes, and the clean-cut Roman profile of the vampire who had been able to give and be all he had ever wanted.  The last memory he might ever be able to bring out of his mind in all the days that were his to pass from now until the end of some infinite horror was one of loss.  

It was devastation, wilderness, wasteland, the barrens.

It was exile, and eternity, and Christ! Laurent had given him no such thing as a gift of life, he had given him a curse.

Bonds of love are forever.

And without the ability to love, with only the bonds, with only shackles for his heart and soul worse than those that lay open in front of his mind's eye – with the only thing he had always known suddenly ripped from him and held up to the clear light of unforgiving truth, and shown as worthless, forever didn't seem like any kind of promise at all.

*

He had only recently started getting used to the concept of communicating with his mind, and what glimpses he had gotten of Ruud's had only convinced him that there was more in there than he could ever possibly hope to understand - so he didn't try. But he did know that London was important, and that something was going to happen, so he finished packing very carefully before moving on to Ruud's things, which were still scattered carelessly around the room (a rarity, because normally the captain was as neat as a pin). "You don't deserve this," he heard Ruud say quietly, and he shrugged without looking over his shoulder. "Well. I'm alive, sir." "No you're not," Ruud said - not unkindly.

"I'm here?"

"Yes," Ruud said. He sounded exhausted. "You are. Hooray for you."

*

"Give me one solitary fucking reason why I shouldn't throw you through this wall."

Ruud didn't have the energy to come up with something honest. "Goodwill towards your fellow man?"

He ended up flat on his back in the remains of what had been a parked cab instead, but he was pretty sure it hurt the same amount.

"Fellow man? You don't count," Rio said, sounding horrible and raspy from somewhere off to the side, as Ruud blinked away some interestingly-coloured sparkles and waited for his leg to heal up the nerve-endings enough for things to start being excruciating. "I'm not sure you count as a fucking vampire, you shit."

"No," Ruud grunted, swaying up to a seated position just in time to get punched in the face and fall back again with a broken nose, and the sparkles deciding to take up permanent residence behind his eyelids. "I don't. Tell me how he is."

Rio's skull-face didn't look any better in lamplight and through floating small pinpricks of fake stars. "Sorry, was that you asking for something?"

"Yes," he ground out, lifting a weary hand to his mouth and shoving a crooked incisor back into its place. "And you're going to tell me. I don't care if you feel like disembowelling me, though don't get any ideas - you're going to."

"I'm off disembowelling for the next century, don't worry yourself," Rio growled, and that was the nastiest way Ruud had ever got an answer in his life, and knowing he'd deserved it didn't help at all. "Fuck's sake. How do you think? You left." Right, so apparently git stood for Great Incompetent Tosser.

*

"Like you what?" the man said, getting right to the heart of Rio's inadequacy in the same death-warmed-up voice, and put a shaking hand down against the floor to try and pull his rag-covered body out of the bunk. "He said it would save me. Are you saved?"

Maybe he would just use the hook on Laurent, instead. "Um. Not - really, no." He hoped like hell the man wasn't talking about in the sight of God, because that was one can of worms Rio was never going anywhere near. "He made me, though, too. Just like he did you. So we don't die....yet." Life, Laurent had told him, and hadn't that been a terrifyingly unfunny joke? Rio didn't want to have to use the word 'vampire' among all these living corpses, but he was getting a nasty feeling that between necessary obliquity and whatever arsing terrible explanation Laurent had buggered off after giving, he was going to have to.

He straightened up without the help of Rio's hands, and for the first time Rio could put a face to the voice - he was Rio's height, and big, or should have been were it not for the thinness of his limbs, wrists and forearms Rio could have encircled with two fingers end-to-end, and a broad, now-pinched face which spoke of a starvation perhaps beyond all else Rio had seen, because he knew without even asking this man had not known, at least not consciously, to drink, and yet the strength of the vampire would have kept him from expiring even had he begged for it.

Laurent would have fed him, though. Laurent would have let him know at least what it took to keep going - wouldn't he? Perhaps not, any kind of feeding here was a death sentence to the donor, willing or not, and considering Laurent's one and only set of instructions, Rio guessed that the bastard had just been hoping for the best to work itself out - and in the meantime, what the fuck was he going to do? "Means you're my brother," he said at last, because that was what mattered, in the end, wasn't it, that was why he was here, why he'd ended up in a kind of Hell no-one had even thought of until now, not even the living dead. "An' I'm Rio." He'd first introduced himself as who and what he was so many lifetimes ago that he was amazed it still struck a chord of memory inside him, hearing his voice in the little hut as though he were back in the room in London, wondering why he'd saved a vamp who didn't even have the sense not to kill. "It's - we're gonna be all right. Honest."