#i love when two countdowns align

[lesbiansloveseokjin]

day 471/548 of seokjin’s military service

this selca was posted on 191205, on the day of MAMA 2019, with the caption:

We won the daesang. Thank you ARMY, I love you!!

(trans cr: Aditi @ bts-trans)

BTS episode filmed that day:

full live performance from that day:

[pinkheart22]

Why I think Taylor Swift will sing So It Goes... the night she announces Reputation Taylors Version

As far as I know on this European Leg of The Eras Tour Taylor hasnt sang So it goes...

She sang I did something bad tonight, knowing she hasnt sang it the entirety of the tour and that all the swifties are clowning that she would sing that and then announce reputation taylors version.

i did something bad was a red herring, and the precursor to her vanishing from the tour ( there is no tour date August 18 ) just like she vanished August 18 2017 with a full social media black out, before she resurfaced with a reputation announcement August 21. (But it's been two thousand one hundred and 90 days of our love blackout - glitch) she did something "bad", because she didnt announce anything and she let us think that, that would be the song she announced with

she will sing So it goes... because of the lyrics:

All Eyes on me I'm your illusionist - an illusionist is someone who performs tricks that deceive the eye; a magician.

All our eyes are on Taylor but she has been deceiving us - eg. the i did something bad performance

You make everyone disappear - Taylor is going to disappear August 18th

Who's counting? 1,2,3 - Taylor has been doing countdowns, holding up 3, 2, and 1 fingers during the reputation era at the eras tour, and using exclamation points in her instagram posts.

Cause baby, I know what you know, we can feel it - Taylor and the swifties know that reputation taylors version is coming

Gold Cage, hostage to my feelings - There is a gold cage in the look what you made me do music video. Reputation is hostage. And possibly a lost album is hostage.

And all the pieces fall, right into place - when she announces reputation taylors version all the pieces will be in place.

I'm yours to keep and I'm yours to lose - We can keep reputation taylors version, but we will also lose reputation

You know, I'm not a bad girl, but i do bad things with you - She's not bad, but she did something bad, hence why she sang it at Wembley night 6. She wants to experience reputation taylors version with us

Come here dressed in black now - I'm assuming Taylor will be dressed in black, and also come here to her new reputation taylor's version album, which is the black heart emoji album

ALSO, she sang my boy only breaks his favorite toys x coney island on Wembley night 6

in my boy only breaks his favorite toys she sings:

Puzzle pieces in the dead of night compare that to....

And all the pieces fall, right into place - So it goes..

New mastermind stars body suit the night before (wembley night 5)

wearing a full stars and crescent moon (all the stars aligned)

Checkmate, I couldn't lose - mastermind

All of this is like pieces of a board game, puzzles, and dominoes.

It's all going to cascade in a line when she announces reputation taylors version

@taylorswift @taylornation

[slexenskee]

JJK Recs

Got a comment on this and figured I'd turn it into a post. Here are some of my favorite Gojo-centric JJK recs that basically live rent-free in my head and also very much so helped me form my own characterization for Gojo. Most of these are GoYuu bc I'm a shameless fan.

I keep the warmest truth - dehawny: Gojo/Yuuji | just adore this ace!Gojo headcanon. lowkey so torn on Gojo's sexuality bc I absolutely can see him being asexual and maybe even a bit touch-averse with the whole Infinity thing, but I also can see him being a total slut lol. This is one of my favorites and the only ace!Gojo I've found I think? The tags are just perfect and very much so aligned with my own personal Gojo heacanon 😂 "Gojou is confident about everything and that includes his sexuality", "he's also good at everything except maybe communicating"

A Duty and Responsibility - googlehome: Gojo/Sukuna this fic definitely pushed my 'bottom Gojo agenda' idk I can see this man with any sexuality I swear. Another great characterization of Gojo, and also Sukuna. I adore very serious fics with a splash of humor in the narrative. I can't imagine Gojo as a person who takes himself entirely seriously, no matter how much responsibility he accepts, or how many burdens he carries for others, or what kind of nonsense gay crisis he ends up in, so I just love his voice in this.

Countdown - Rizna: Gojo/Yuuji a fandom classic as far as I'm concerned. This is such an excellent role reversal AU - if you're into S2 teenage brat Gojo, this delivers. I love all versions of Gojo, including mouthy teenage twink Gojo deeply obsessed with his adult sensei who's Trying His Best™ to be the adult in the relationship.

Enough (A Cinderalla Story) - athena_crikey: Gojo/Yuuji in an absolutely fucking hilarious twist of irony, I actually didn't read this story for a long time because it was a rockstar AU and when I first got into this fandom I was desperate for canon stuff. Meanwhile I then go on to bust out 400k+ words of my own rockstar!Gojo AU, so I guess I'm just a fucking clown.

Heart Laid Bare - athena_crikey: Gojo/Namami incredible introspection on how Gojo handles (or rather, doesn't handle) the burden of being invincible and the strongest told in Nanami's POV. I could wax poetic about this fic and the way Gojo comes across so multi-faceted as both a man who can do everything and also a man who can't even remember to adequately feed himself. I drew a lot of the inspiration for Gojo's cursed technique in my fic from this, how Infinity is both his blessing and his curse and the parallels to his overuse of RCT being a kind of toxic spiral.

Shared Infinity - athena_crikey: Gojo & Yuuji - read the tags on this one it deals with some heavy stuff (not with Gojo) I love the way this fic showcases Gojo as a mature adult deeply protective over his students while still maintaining his kind of flippant/uncaring outer persona we see in the show. Just completely love fics that really naile the dichotomy of Gojo being both caring and yet rather unkind.

Take Two - athena_crikey: Gojo/Yuuji - specifically love how this AU fic deals with the idea of Gojo's own fame being his shield between himself in the world around him where his Infinity technique doesn't exist. I love how Gojo is handled in this one, so jagged around the edges, and just his own worst enemy when it comes to his own feelings. Also love me a Gojo who can own up to his own mistakes, look at our baby go, showing emotional maturity and everything!!

Still, More Firsts - hngr4fngr: Gojo/Yuuji man do I adore this whole series. Great porn with ridiculously excellent plot/characterizations lol like I came here for the bottom!Gojo and left with way too many feelings about how Gojo deals with his trauma and how that would effect his sex life. Also has a super interesting take on how Infinity works!

little lamb to the slaughter - voxofthevoid: Gojo/Yuuji still obsessed with the astoundingly incredible smut, just absolutely shook by how god-tier this writing is, it is so hard to write good smut, just pacing, flow, word choice... this could be a masterclass on how to write really great smut that can actually pull a visceral reaction out of a reader. I think a great deal of that ability comes from a mastery of the tone of voice of the characters, too. Gojo is just incredible in this Yuuji POV, the way he describes Gojo is just utter perfection. On a related note, in general Yuuji's voice is so fucking funny in a way that doesn't detract at all from the mood of the story. In fact I think this would be too heavy without his hilarious occasional inputs.

there is no try (but it's still going to take a while) - juurensha: Gojo/Geto I love me a star wars AU jfc. I'm not even a fan of SatoSugu but this is just *chefs kiss* Jedi Master Gojo is such a mood.

anchor - valleykey: Gojo/Geto I love this one mainly for the Suguru characterization, which I truly never thought I'd say bc I'm just not normally a fan of his character/relationship with Gojo. He's just perfect in this fic though - it just makes so much more sense for his characterization, and idk, pulls it altogether in a way I think it falls flat in canon. That isn't to say Gojo's not great in this, he's just really not the main character at all. But it deals well with Gojo's loyalty to those he deems worthy of it (even if the recipient isn't considered 'proper' by jujutsu society) and just offers a good take on supportive (and smitten) Gojo

[penumbralwoods]

😇 5 paragraoh essay please ?

ok actually? it's been way too long since we talked about the narrator.

the main appeal of this ass (to me) is just how inconsistent they are. it's a bit but it's also a character trait; they'll say literally anything to get what they want without remorse. it's actually very important to me in portraying the narrator that i don't ever write genuine remorse. they'll SAY they're sorry, they'll REGRET things maybe, but they're never going to actually give a shit that something they did hurt stanley. it's a fun thing i pulled from one of if not my favorite fanfics ever- stanley has a sense of "going too far" and sets certain things off limits to protect the narrator, but it is by NO means mutual. because they are an ass.

heading back to canon for a second, it's incredibly interesting that they get annoyed if you go through the correct path too many times. they don't even ACTUALLY want that to be the choice every single time, but like everything else they're gonna lie about it. i think there's a lot you can do with an entity that thinks it's all-powerful and in control of everything, but not only is it wrong, it doesn't even actually want that. always a fan of what the character THINKS they want vs. what they actually want.

okay in my defense i went an entire two paragraphs before talking about the skip button WE HAVE TO DISCUSS THE SKIP BUTTON. first of all i think the entire section with the reviews is actually a pretty decent representation of rejection sensitive dysphoria, something that absolutely makes sense for the narrator to experience. and okay. the skip button itself. for those unaware the skip button has been the center of my interest in the stanley parable since i first got into it 2 years ago. alexis royce is largely to be blamed for this, but it's also just one of my favorite sequences, in any game, ever. it's one of those things that the more you think about it, the more horrifying it is. the narrator really did just sit and wait for stanley to come back. for an entire year. and that's the last time we know exactly how long a skip was. and their last (known) appearance is 5 presses later. it adds an entire other layer to the obvious projections on stanley- "he never functioned well by himself, and constantly needed support and guidance from others." <- guy about to do nothing but sit and wait for their boyfriend for millions of years

in an entirely different vein the countdown ending. oghhh the countdown ending. i'm always hesitant to say it's one of my favorites because i know exactly why it's YOU PEOPLE'S favorite. slash silly but i am a little sad that the rampant sex jokes have just. erased any actual analysis of it when it shows SO MUCH about the narrator. this is the main thing- at any given point, they have the potential to do something like this. at any given point, they are willing and able to torment, kill, manipulate, whatever you can think of. because it'll all reset anyway. it doesn't matter, and they know it doesn't matter, the end is never the end is never the end. and this is why i refuse to write them as remorseful. the countdown monologue makes it incredibly clear how detached and apathetic they can be, and i fully believe that even after an event like that in a clearer mindset they would still believe they were in the right. stanley pushes the wrong button, the narrator psychologically torments him for 3 minutes and then blows him up.

so tl;dr. the narrator is a character very very near and dear to my heart and despite the liberties i've taken (by the way, they/them isn't canonical, that's just me reasoning that it makes wayyyy more sense for it to be gender neutral/inhuman aligned) there is already SO much there in the game. they are the worst person on earth. they are painfully sympathetic. they are codependent and unable to function without stanley. they wrote him a love song. they blew him up. they waited for him for millions of years. they yell and insult him every time he makes the wrong choice. they get frustrated when he makes the right choice too often. absolute bastard of a character, and even 2 years later by far the easiest for me to write for. insert shameless plug for my ao3 i wrote 11 chapters of putting them in Situations

wow we actually made this thing 5 paragraphs go us. read my words boy

[vivisviolets]

hello.

how are you?

my initials are SB and my pronouns are she/her; my preferred gender is he/him and i love fashion, astrology and cats.

thank you. <3

SB ✨🍷♥️ ♧♤˚｡ The Tower (reversed), Three of Swords (reversed), Three of Cups, Five of Pentacles (reversed) (bonus), The Lovers (bottom of the deck) ♧♤˚｡ 321 (like a countdown), 333, 666, 3636, Aries/Taurus/Gemini placements (rising, Moon, Mercury), Virgo/Leo placements (Sun, Mercury, 6th house) 1st/2nd/3rd/6th house placements, modern romance, new year, year of the tiger/snake, channeled song, Je te laisserai des mots - Patrick Watson

♧♤˚｡ AHA!- finally gotcha ;D~ I've tracked down your energy at long last- and oh my goodness it did not disappoint- the first keyword I heard was "modern romance"- there is like,, this element of innocence and youth to this connection, but there is also elegance and passion. similar to that in romance novels- *Timeless!* that is the adjective I'm looking for!! oh love~ this relationship is one for the books. it's like if one of those classic romance stories we're given a modern adaptation- with elements of individual growth and mundanity included, yet with that same warm glow of genuine human love flowing through each passing phase and scene with grace~ Ok head out of the clouds,- I feel like this might be an Earth/Air connection but with Piscean degrees/influence or smth- OH! Maybe you'll meet each other/be around each other most when Saturn is in Pisces! but anyway, the theme of "new year" was coming through, so you'll meet them during some kind of celebration, where there are themes of "fresh"/"new"... maybe someone here will be freshly moved on from a past relationship? (an example I'm hearing is if this meeting happens years down the line, like late 20s/early 30s and someone might be divorced?)- upon first meeting there will be fireworks- as in, it'll be like one of those classic scenes where before you two can further get to know each other, there'll be some loud interruption (maybe an actual explosion of fireworks 😭). but near right away, there will be a familiar feeling, could be a soul-family feeling, or it's the energy of you two somehow knowing each other since childhood, due to how matching your personalities are to each other, like even the individual parts of both of you that are different/should clash- blend together so perfectly- like- forgive the extra mood board but its giving:

the coloring is little bit much ik, but really if you were to melt down all the worldly/earthly-ness, this is what you'd have, this supercut of a found counterpart... and the thing is- when you find "the person", there's so many more elements to it then just that soul connection, there's chemical differences, and emotional/mental alignments. there are so many in-between times within this "soul-connection"(/whatever you want to call it) *supercut*- this is two humans, just walking this earth together, by choice. because you like each other. this relationship will be built on mutual appreciation/admiration of the other, you'll both look at each other in this- intellectual way, where you see the other as someone you can learn from. and not just that- but someone *safe* that you can learn from. this relationship may help both of you in breaking certain karmic ties/cycles, but that healing and growth won't come from hurting the other- instead, growth will happen through love. not through more pain. now that's not to say there will be no strife, this is a relationship between two humans, as it is between two souls- for example, you two in your shared living space will disagree on whether to get a cat or dog. BAHAH AWW, no but for real- aspects of your domestic life will be one of the few areas of clashing between you two,- but even then, you both are so willing to work together that the worst your disagreements will get will be an eye-roll, a sigh, and taking some space away (across the living room lol) for a few hours (which is fine cause you two are "quality over quantity" when it comes to talking, so taking time independently comes easy). there may be financial stress surrounding where you two will want to live for the long run, and how that ties into your work. there also might be a misunderstanding/clashing at first concerning your person's past, as they may have had difficult previous relationships, but as more trust is built, the more that history is shed... this energy was truly stunning, and an extra message I have for you, and how you'll eventually meet this individual- is trust. you two are meant to find each other! please just keep going forward in your own life, because truly- without even realizing it- you'll turn a corner, and they'll have met you. both of your energies meeting each other halfway, and right where both of you are supposed to be ♡. ☆🎆 *i hope this was helpful my darling ♡~ consider leaving a tip on my Patreon if you enjoyed, or follow and become a violet~ doesnt matter to me tho :>~ sending you on your wayyyy, bye bye!!*

[awildtei]

the summer day

[this is just a little ficlet I wrote based on my HC that Alvarez is Argentinian. It's also on AO3 here]

Catalina Álvarez has never had a white Christmas. She has never had a winter Christmas, actually.

On the flight to the States when she was fifteen (not her first one, but her first one without a return ticket), she told her dad she was excited about all the Christmas songs and paraphernalia (the pinetree, the Santas with their winter hats and gloves, the Disney songs about it being cold outside) aligning with the reality of the holiday for once.

Her mom didn't bother removing her eye mask as she said, “Cata, we’re going to California.”

Since her mom couldn’t see her, Catalina rolled her eyes. “Well, yeah, but we could go somewhere else for the holidays. New York, maybe, kill two birds with one stone: white Christmas and the ball drop on New Year’s.”

“We are going somewhere else for the holidays,” said her dad without putting his book down “Home.”

Home.

—

Summers in Buenos Aires are scorching hot, the pavement, concrete, and bricks of the city’s streets and buildings absorbing the heat and becoming a furnace, slow-roasting its sweaty inhabitants day and night. It’s a humid, heavy heat, one that sits on your skin like a physical weight and becomes the sole topic of small talk for the months it comes to stay.

The holidays are scattered throughout the summer holidays, three long months of school break sprinkled with Christmas, New Year’s, and Reyes Magos. They always celebrated Reyes at home, just the three of them with their gift-full shoes under the tree. When Catalina’s dad still had his mom and wasn’t yet estranged from his only brother, they spent New Year’s with them and Christmas with her mom’s side of the family.

Hebe Rodríguez’s house was squat and painted a soft blue, halfway down a quiet residential street where stray cats could still be spotted. Inside, it was teeming with plants (which Catalina loved) and pictures of her late husband, Roberto Álvarez (which Catalina found creepy as fuck).

(Two months before she died and five months before most of the remaining Álvarezes moved to the northern hemisphere, Hebe pulled Catalina aside. “Promise me this, Cata,” she asked. “Don’t do like the yankees and take your husband’s surname when you get married, okay? Just because they’re stuck in the Dark Ages doesn’t mean you have to put up with it. You are Catalina Álvarez, remember that.”

“I’m a lesbian, grandma,” she reminded her with a smile.

Her grandma blinked at her. “Oh. Right, I forgot. Alright, carry on, then,” and she patted her only grandchild on the shoulder with a decisive nod.)

Her uncle Luis would spend most of New Year’s Eve stuck to the TV screen. Some years, he would pop his head into the kitchen and grimly inform them, “Blackout tonight,” and they would all sigh, resigned. Better announced than unannounced, they supposed.

No blackout is welcome in 35°C temperatures, though. When the dark wave swept through the neighborhood, drowning out the lights of each house one by one like in the apocalyptic movies Catalina’s dad liked, they would have flashlights and candles ready, but the click of the ceiling fan and air-con turning off felt final and ominous. 

Those years (blackout-in-the-middle-of-New-Year’s-Eve-dinner years), they would sit out on the small patio in their white clothes to watch the stars and sip chilled wine. Conversation was hard to keep going when the humid air made breathing laborious, but the silence wasn’t bad. The electricity would usually return before midnight, and they would turn the TV on to a news channel and chant along to the countdown: cinco, cuatro, tres, dos, uno, ¡FELIZ AÑO NUEVO! before eating twelve raisins (which Catalina replaced with chocolate-covered cereal because she found raisins disgusting), one for each month, and running outside to see the fireworks.

Christmases, however, were always Catalina’s favorite. Her mom’s side of the family was a very different story from her dad’s: loud where they were quiet, numerous where they were sparse, posh where they were normal (her dad’s words, the ‘chetos’ said with undisguised derision, ignoring his mom’s resulting elbow to the ribs).

Catalina and her parents would make the forty-minute drive to Santa Bárbara, the definition of a swank gated community. Once past the guard booths, they would make the slow fifteen-minute drive down winding streets with their “Children Playing” signs to the big house at the end of the lane where Aunt Soledad and Uncle Tomás lived with their 2.5 kids and golden retriever. It was always lavishly decorated, with a life-size nativity scene on the front lawn and unseasonable snowflake cutouts and colorful strings of lights on the windowsills.

The afternoon before Christmas Eve was for riding bikes and swimming in the wide backyard pool and roller skating up and down the long wooden bridge over the expansive pond that was Santa Bárbara’s hallmark. Cousins Marcos, Agustín, Lara and Constanza were older than Catalina; Milagros, Sebastián and Santiago were younger. Then there were the babies, Benjamín and Pilar, but they stayed home with their respective parents, doing whatever babies did while kids played, so Catalina barely registered them for a few years.

At noon, they would run back to the house, Catalina and her cousins, and sit down for lunch under big striped patio umbrellas with minimal eye-rolling at their mothers’ fussing that they would get heatstroke and would they please play inside where it was cool? Uncle Tomás would serve the asado, delicious, juicy meat that was as much cultural ritual as it was meal, an excuse for the men to hover around the grill as though the whole thing would go up in flames without their combined expertise.

After lunch (an hours-long affair that included lengthy, inescapable post-lunch conversation), some of the adults would retreat to guest rooms to nap, others would lounge around on plastic chairs to sip mate and keep talking, and the kids would run again. Christmas Eve Eve always felt endless to Catalina, lovely and sweltering and carefree. Playing in the street was out of the question back in the city, had stopped being safe when her parents were children, but here it was fine, and she felt that freedom coursing through her veins with every running step she took down quiet streets lined with Aguaribay, American Ash, and Plane trees.

When the sun began to set, they would all, parents and children, slowly amble down to the pond to watch the orange-pink-red spectacle play on the water’s surface. Besides the two weeks she and her parents spent on the coast in Mar del Plata each February, it was the only time Catalina saw the horizon, the perfect straight line usually hidden by towering buildings.

Back at the house, the adults would start setting everything up for Christmas dinner, and the kids would banish the heat that still hung heavy in the air by playing mermaids and Marco Polo in the pool. When they were called inside, they would climb the pool ladder, grass sticking to their feet, trailing water all the way back into the house, and get changed into white dresses and shorts, airy and fresh, wet patches immediately appearing from their dripping hair.

Barefoot, smelling of chlorine, and worn from a day spent playing in the sun, they would sit at the table set with the good cutlery and linen napkins, jittery with the looming promise of Papá Noel’s visit (Catalina would never get used to the way U.S. Americans open presents on Christmas day instead of Christmas Eve, couldn’t fathom asking a child to go to sleep with that anticipation hanging over them). Dinner would be light due to the heat, salads and cold cuts, chilled wine and champagne for the adults, lemonade and Coke for the children, dessert for all.

When the excitement got to be too much for the youngest members of the family, one of the adults would say, “Hey, why don’t we go outside to wait for Papá Noel?” and guide a band of eager children to the backyard to search the stars for signs of an approaching reindeer-pulled sleigh. They were brighter here than in the city, and Catalina thought any one of them could be him.

Somehow, Santa always arrived when they were outside looking for him, and they would run back in to find a towering pile of presents waiting for them underneath the huge plastic Christmas tree. The rest of the evening usually unraveled in a loud mess of bright, noisy toys and sugar-high kids wanting to play with them even as the day caught up with them and made their jaws crack with their lion yawns.

The ones left standing by midnight were welcome to a glass of champagne to toast with the adults. Catalina always fought tooth and nail against her tiredness because she refused to miss out. After a sip or two of the bitter, bubbly liquid, she would kiss her parents goodnight and drag herself into the guest room she shared with her female cousins. The sheets smelled clean, the fan droned its merciful reprieve from the heat, and her heart felt full as she fell asleep.

On Christmas day, the boys would go to the fútbol field by the restaurant and wouldn’t let the girls join them, so Lara, Constanza, Catalina and Milagros would claim the backyard and invite the neighbors’ girls to play Exy with them. For years, that’s what Exy meant to Catalina: running with a pack of fierce girls under a furious summer sun, sweaty and happy and in charge. They would take pool breaks now and then, a quick dip and a pit stop for sunscreen reinforcement before resuming their game.

Lunch would consist of assorted leftovers and a dozen empanadas ordered from the restaurant two streets down. The knowledge that the day was about to end made it a less ebullient affair than the previous day, even the wildest of her cousins subdued by their impending departure.

After lunch, Aunt Soledad and Uncle Tomás would dress their kids up and walk down to the chapel five minutes away for Christmas Mass. Everyone else was allowed to join them, but only Aunt Carolina would sometimes go.

When the day slowly trickled down into night, the guest families would leave one by one, causing tantrums and loud protests as playmates were forced to say their goodbyes.

Catalina would get in the boiling car with her hair still dripping wet and an inevitable sunburn where she neglected to put on sunscreen. She would watch the trees pass them by on their slow crawl to the gates. Somewhere between the house and the highway, she would fall asleep. On the ride home, she would dream of grass and swimming pools and laughter and Exy and family.

—

The holidays are inevitably different now that she’s an adult. She goes from USC straight to LAX and meets her parents there. She sleeps most of the flight.

Buenos Aires is always the same, except for the ever-changing billboards and many old houses in her neighborhood being demolished to make room for mammoth apartment complexes. The summers are still scorching hot, only getting hotter with global warming.

Grandma Hebe is gone. Uncle Luis kept her house, but he and Catalina’s dad haven’t spoken in years, so she doesn’t know what became of that blue jungle, whether her grandad’s pictures still sprout among the plants like weeds.

Catalina and her parents spend both Christmas and New Year’s in Santa Bárbara with her aunt and uncle now. She and her cousins don’t run around all day anymore, but they do still sometimes play Exy in the backyard, with racquets they’ve outgrown and complaints from her opponents that being a college Exy player gives her an unfair advantage, which she gleefully ignores. 

There are still long evenings spent floating on her back in the swimming pool until her fingers prune and her skin smells of chlorine. There are still asados, even if Uncle Román isn’t part of the grill committee anymore since Aunt Carolina divorced him. 

There is no searching for Santa among the stars, but presents are still exchanged, toasts still made. There are new guests, Agustín’s girlfriend, Marcos’s best friend, Milagros’s girlfriend. Their junior year of college, Catalina brings along Laila. 

There are long lunches that stretch into longer conversations. There is sunscreen and chilled champagne and the sun setting over the pond.

And on the plane ride back to California, where she will exchange gifts with Jeremy and Jean and the other Trojans, where she will train and study and keep growing up, Catalina dreams of grass and swimming pools and laughter and Exy and family.

[lamare-sims]

Hi 👋 I love all your mods, thank you for your contribution to this community.

I’d like to ask you, how would one go about adding a new placemat to your controller? I tried replacing the mesh of existing placemats (BB and LordCrumbs) , but for some reason they didn’t show up in game :(. Thank you!

Making New Placemats Recognized by the Mod

Here's a tutorial for editing placemats to be supported by the mod. Two tutorials, actually -- for placemats with and without intricate multiple states.

Preface

Older supported placemats are checked by GUID, so you don't have to worry about them: - SPX Murray Placemat by Xiomara - Useable place setting by SimAddict99 (for tables) - BB Sage Clutter Placemat by Buggybooz

I excluded a few existing placemats from the "supported" list because they either went in slots or required to be placed off-grid to align with sim's plates. The thing is, in gameplay, to be able to tell which placemat corresponds to which plate, the mod has to know exactly where the placemat is. I went by BB's, Xiomara's and SimAddict99's way of placement, because it's the best and most convenient way for players to place placemats, in my opinion. Not all placemats are made this way, this is why there are so few of them supported.

If you know of an old placemat that is placed the same as the ones I listed, let me know and I'll add it.

If you want to create or update your placemat, read further.

Static No Fancy States Type

If your placemat doesn't have states and you want it to just fully hide/unhide, this is for you. There are 2 important steps to this.

Add a "password" BHAV Create a dummy-returning-true BHAV named "CT - I Am Static Placemat" (without quotes). If you don't know how to do that, you can download the resource I made here and add it to your placemat's package: - unzip the zip file - open your package in SimPE and click Add… - add CT - I Am Static Placemat - if your placemat's existing bhavs have group number other than 0xFFFFFFFF, change the added bhav's group to that number - make sure the added bhav's instance number (10A0) is unused in your package, it must be unique. If there's another bhav with that instance, change the added bhav's instance number to something else.

Make sure your object follows placement rules You may have to edit the mesh for this! - Freestanding at table's height (NOT in table's slot); shiftable up from the floor is also fine - On the same tile as the table; quarter tile is fine - Direction -- facing the chair - Must NOT require off-grid placement -- must snap in a way so that it's right under a sim's plate; look at how supported placemats are placed - Optional, but highly recommended: allows object and person intersection

Dynamic Type With Multiple States

This one is more advanced. If you want your placemat to work like LordCrumps', with different states and interactions, you can start by cloning it. I'm not going to cover the cloning process here, make sure to follow all the common steps like changing GUIDs and all that. I'm going to focus on things that make a placemat go along with the auto mod.

The mod recognizes multi-state placemats by calling this "password" BHAV: CT - I Am Dynamic Placemat

States are changed by running these BHAVs: CT - State - Set CT - State - Eating CT - State - Empty Here, you change materials or even models that you want to use for different states. Apart from that, you should zero out object's hidden flags and lockout count in those procedures.

What is lockout count for? It's an automatic countdown measured in ticks, about 30 ticks per sim-minute. My auto mod doesn't reset a placemat to its default state if its lockout count is > 0. You can set lockout in an interaction, so that when players manually set the table, say, to prepare for a party, it stays this way for a while (I did it for LordCrumps' placemats).

What are hidden flags for? My mod may completely hide placemats in some cases, so we have to make sure that the object is unhidden when it changes to any of the visible states.

Additional stuff. You may include conditions like time of day, presence of the party controller, or a random coin flip to determine what your object should change into. For example, create different looks for breakfast and dinner, everyday and party.

What about attributes, interactions, etc.? Our placemats use attr 0 to keep track of states and have interactions to manually change them. You can copy our code or do something else, the mod doesn't care about any of that.

The mod cares about named BHAVs, lockout count, hidden flags, and placement rules. The latter are the same as above, but I'll repeat.

Freestanding at table's height (NOT in table's slot); shiftable up from the floor is also fine

On the same tile as the table; quarter tile is fine

Direction -- facing the chair

Must NOT require off-grid placement -- must snap in a way so that it's right under a sim's plate; look at how supported placemats are placed

Optional, but highly recommended: allows object and person intersection

You may have to edit the mesh to comply!

[rhysand-vs-fenrys]

Why did you have to do so much work for the timeline for that one fanfic? I don't really understand what "dueling timelines" are?

It's... very complicated.

Trying to figure out how to describe it without describing the plot of the entire trilogy... Which you can find at @valkyrie-echo if you want to read to see what I mean.

Basically it's what I said in the tags.

Project: Echo was an Avengers fanfic series, using Winter Soldier as it's jumping point (so acknowledging all canon through then, and I did later acknowledge the main plot of Age of Ultron, but I'd already written Clint and Natasha as a couple, so I ignored the stuff about his family).

The first 2 parts hinted at visions of the future that show Avengers Tower exploding, everyone dying, and a traitor being responsible. Those parts end with Bucky realizing he may be why the specific person became a traitor and deciding to fully leave and focus on his own recovery from the trauma of being the winter soldier.

Part 3 jumps forward like 7 years or so.

The dividing line between the two timelines is Avengers Tower finally exploding.

The "Countdown" timeline shows the Avengers 7 years in the future as a proper organization made up of 10 teams (8 teams of 4, one team that's only the leaders of those 8 teams, and one team that is kind of the extreme special ops). Bit by bit, events start happening that make it look like the leader of the special ops team has gone evil and eventually culminates in Avengers Tower exploding-- after the Special Ops leader has been fully ostracized and figured out who the real culprit is.

The other timeline is after the explosion, that Special Ops leader finding and dragging Bucky along into space (bringing in Asgard and the Guardians of the Galaxy briefly). Bucky was her torturer when she was a Hydra prisoner, but she forces him to accompany her as she tries to stay ahead of Sam Wilson and a large group of surviving Avengers (not the OG avengers, they're the ones who died) hell-bent on catching her and taking revenge.

But she alone believes the Avengers might be alive. Because she knows the truth about what happened in Avengers Tower.

So you have the Countdown Timeline following the story, the breakdown of trust in her, everyone turning against her fully, her realizing the truth of what is happening.

And then running exactly parallel to it you have Bucky suddenly thrown into it, his trust in her (already thin) breaking down, turning against her, realizing the truth of what is happening.

They happen in tandem because HER actions and emotions and what drives her is a direct response to the countdown timeline, and yet as the reader, you can't know what she knows yet.

So as you learn from one timeline, you see it reflected in the other, and how they both inform and mirror one another.

There were a couple of readers who had trouble keeping up with the dueling timelines, but the vast majority seemed to really love it because it was so complicated and so different from what they were used to seeing.

And to write that, I had to be able to title each thing "____ Days Before the Explosion" and "____ Days After the Explosion".

So I had to know intimately what was happening in what order on both ends of the timeline in order to track the dates and not trip over myself, so Day 0 on the Countdown aligns with the final battle in the After timeline.

[moxfirefly]

Welcome to October! Today being the first of the month I’ll be starting celebrations by posting the first of hopefully many spooky/kinktober fics for everyone’s enjoyment. We are starting of things in RE8 with Lycan!Heisenberg!

https://open.spotify.com/track/3S2yvrjwH1hruVD4UWDapM?si=ExSIk1ZST9eFs7FJBz9dFw&dl_branch=1

Rated Explicit (18+ only)

TW: Body horror, blood, menstrual cycle, possessive behavior, vouyerism, ns*w themes basically

The crunch of leafs beneath your boots seemed to be the loudest sound out here in the open. The cold autumn weather announcing itself with yet another harsh wind that blew your crimson cloak around you.

It’s in the games we play.

You felt that overwhelming presence that belonged only to him, it radiated off of him much like the cigar smoke you picked up as it faintly travelled across to you.

There was that conceited laugh of his as he approached you from behind.

“You really know how to haul ass when it concerns you, huh?” His breath tickled the back of. Your head and it took so much of your pride to not smile at the sound of his voice. You didn’t give him the satisfaction of turning, to let him see your eyes and the fire the burned in your gaze. “Letting you win isn’t my favorite past time to be frank” That laugh of his vibrated against your skin, so infectious, so very him.

“Oh kitten, I always win” He leaned in, nose to your hair and inhaled softly the scent he had memorized so well.

He could track you through storm and distances.

He would always find you.

And how he loved the chase, this little game you both played.

You felt as much as your heard his growl, the human sound that slowly dropped to a guttural baritone. His eyes, once the stormy hazel they were must be golden now and so very inhuman. As your heart picked up that drumming beat anticipation, you turned slightly to see that handsome smile of his sporting sharp teeth, canines so sharp and perfectly white.

How often you’d seen them sporting red and flesh.

“Come now little one, the games only starting!” He backed up with a bounce to his step, arms wiggling out of that coat he never left home without. You watched him kick off his boots and toss his hat to the quickly growing pile of clothes. There was a cracking sound as he unbuckled his belt, yanking the leather in one fell swoop, all you could do was swallow and bunch up the front of your dress to ready yourself. Heisenberg’s shoulders made a sickening crack, as if the bones had snapped under some unseen force, his finders followed suit and soon human flesh began to give way to something monstrous.

“Ten! Nine! Eight!-“ His voice dropped even lower, the growl nearly demonic in the air of the forest. Something cracked again, the sounds of bones snapping into their rightful position for this. You dug your heels, chest rising as you continued to watch Heisenberg change before your very eyes. “Seven! Six! Five!-“ Those silver locks grew, more patches of hair appearing as he grew in size himself with another crack of his knees, his face contorted, mouth ripping at the corners as a snout began to take form. His clothes tore, pieces of fabric falling or merely hanging by threads on his changing body. It was the half way point, where there was still some human features left but it was more lycan than man regardless.

His tail wiggled off some scraps of clothing, shoulders rolling back to crack them further into their new alignment. That grin, god even in his lycan form it still remained.

The human tone slipped further into just a husky growl as he finished his countdown.

“Four! Three! Two!-“

He howled out that last number, the sound of it drifting into the menacing boom that alerted you that now was the time to start fucking running.

And that you did.

Took off like bullet from a starting pistol, with the echo of your heart being drowned out by the monstrous growl Heisenberg unleashed as he chased after you.

The cold wind assaulted your face as you sprinted as quickly as you could, each step felt like it held the possibility of your doom, with some branches and rocks in place you could easily stumble.

Stumble and lose this little game prematurely.

A sadistic growl rang through the woods as you tried to take a hard left, the sounds of of something sliding and digging into the earth felt too close for comfort. There was a purpose to this game after all, aside from the hunt that Heisenberg derived pleasure from. The goal was to back track to the factory, if you could make it passed the damn bridge, enter his territory then maybe, maybe this time you could be crowned the victor.

But Heisenberg was so quick, even as you ran now with every ounce of adrenaline pumping into you, his presence was close.

Too fucking close.

Distant howling made you falter, feet nearly locking in place and making you trip onto the dirt. Those weren’t supposed to be nearby, the game had its rules after all. It would be rather unfair of him to call upon the rest of those bastards to side track you and truly make you dizzy with whom exactly was closest. Bunching up the front of your dress you were ready to sprint once more as an eerie quiet fell around you. Heisenberg’s heavy steps had seized and so had the howling, something was truly amiss.

The huff of your breath in the cold felt like a signal at this point, a beacon for anybody to find you. The sweat of your brow was chilled against your skin, for as much as your turned to any possible space in the forest it all showed that he could spring out at you any given second, the silence only served for the anxiety to kick in. He had a sadistic streak, naturally he would let the rest of the dogs mess with you if it meant he’d win in the end.

He always won though, why was tonight so different?

Just as you thought, you felt it. It could be mistaken for sweat, could’ve been so easily mistaken for it but you knew your body.

“Oh…fuck” You whispered as you hiked up your dress and saw the blood staining your underwear. The horrible realization that there would be no way to win settled and in what you could only describe as the world coming to a slow stop, you saw him.

Saw how he roused into that frightening height of his, claws caked in dirt and fabric from your dress (shit he had been really close back there), you watched him as he approached you with slow calculated steps. His eyes never stopped being the attention driven spot, they felt like the only source of light in the darkness ironically enough. “I said no dogs, you’ve always known that you cheat” If that mandible could grin it would, the sneer was there but the muscles weren’t quite right given his form. There was a series of sounds that could easily be taken for laughter at your expense.

He hadn’t quite cheated though? The lycans had merely voiced their needs, they knew you were out here but to this point they had not shown up. His arms had extended in that of a motion, a ‘you see?’ To still your accusations of him. You would’ve stomped your foot like a child but that would only give further cause for him to mock you. Your eyes scanned the surrounding spaces but it would be futile.

For each step he took you took one backwards.

His tongue came out to lick his snout, the appendage long and slimy with spit. He was salivating, he had his prey before him with not manner of escape and actively bleeding. Your eyes went wide as you dropped the skirt of your dress and hoped that the only reason he was sniffing the air was because of passing scents. With his head upturned high, sniffing once more he dropped it rapidly to zero in on you and something quite like a demonic laughter left his chest.

“Kitty… bleed” The words were strained, caught between growls and actual sounds normal him would make. Heisenberg was the only lycan capable of speech, to a degree it’s very limited, but he enjoyed using it to torture when the two of you were to play like this. The flight response in your body was pressed and the very second you tried to make a run for it, you felt a large hairy arm wrap around your waist and lift you up. That damned howling laughter rang out as he readjusted you over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. “You cheat! You knew it would be today! That’s why you insisted so much on playing” You smacked him and yanked at his fur but a large clawed hand falling on your rear reminded you, to the winner goes the spoils.

A hard yank tore your cloak as he casted it towards the ground with every intention of making it into a small nest for you. You were dropped quite unceremoniously onto it, soon enough the dark sky was obscured by him and what a sight this monster of a man could be. You still played up your disappointed frown, even as he won it never truly meant you lost, fun was to be had after all. Those large claws dug into the ground on each side of your head as he hovered above. “Karl don’t salivate on me!” You grabbed his snout, giving it a playful shake much like you would any common dog, it wasn’t long before your were scratching him.

“You still cheated” You announced as you continued to scratch him, he shook himself much to your protesting shrieks. “Asshole-“ You words were cut short when the fabric of your skirt tore as one single claw cut it down the middle, great nothing like walking back home naked in the cold. For good measure you yanked his ear with a grin of your own, Heisenberg growled baring his teeth towards you. His tongue stuck out to lap at the sweat on your stomach, slowly the behemoth of a creature descended lower. Your eyes nearly bugged out and you wanted to yank him back up by the scraggly mop of hair on his head, but naturally he was too quick for you.

Both your wrist were enclosed in one massive clawed hand just as he swiped at the front of your underwear. He shuddered, a pleasant shiver running down his spine when he tasted your essence in every sense of the word. “Absolutely disgusting, you’re the wors-ah!” You shrieked when another simple flick of his claws tore open your underwear. “Silly… brat” Came that guttural tone accompanied by a swipe of his tongue over your folds. Your chest heaved, it never stopped feeling so odd, from the feel of it to how wide and long his tongue was, but it never proved to be unwelcome.

Your widened eyes watch the mass below you greedily lap up, even as he let go of your wrist and picked up your legs to properly spread them for his feast.

Those usually perfectly white teeth were now stained with blood. When he looked up at you.

“Disgusting dog” Was all you could retort with a smile, his tail wagged.

“Smells… good” He spoke at the inside of your thigh, the scrape of his teeth making the limb shake. One incorrect movement and there could be crimson lines adorning it. That animal instinct of his could override common sense and while there were perks for it, the negatives could be fatal. His nostrils flared for a second, the hard gust of air moving your hair. Heisenberg directed his gaze behind himself, several noises and howls leaving him. Curiosity had gotten the better of you, as you sat up to look behind him.

The lycans had gathered, a large number were cautiously approaching. Your hand dug into the fur his body in fear. “Karl?!” You questioned in a hushed whisper, they were communicating from the looks of it and at some point he had made it abundantly clear that would the closest they could get. He turned on his knees to fix you with a gaze that could only be described as pure mischief.

Son of a bitch had really planned this to a tee.

“You bastard, really?! You want them to watch?!” You yanked at his fur once again, his response was to bump his snout against your cheek and chin. It was his physical way of telling you to ‘relax’ and to seal it, he licked your mouth with as much tenderness as he could muster in this form. “You owe me for this, owe me big time” You scratched his head and gave his cheek a kiss before settling back on the ground. There was an excitement palpable in his body, from the way he gripped your hips and lifted your lower half so he could get one more taste from you. The long languid stripe he licked made you bite your lip, your eyes fell on the lycans watching with their steely gazes. You locked your ankles behind Heisenberg’s head to keep him there a little longer

There was something akin to jealousy in their gazes.

Your skin flushed, the furnace like heat Heisenberg exuded naturally making your skin balmy. His hands slid up your thighs, swiftly unhooking your ankles, you braced yourself as best as you could when he manhandled you onto your stomach…

And in perfect view of the rest of the lycans. You blew a strand of hair from your face, frowning as the howling of multiple dogs rang out. They all itched to be where Heisenberg was but only he could, and if any of them dared to disobey, oh it would get far more messier quickly. His snout bumped against your ear, a quick sharp inhale making the skin of your neck breakout in goosebumps. “Mine mine mine” He pushed out through a hiss. Your eyes flutter closed as he bit down gently onto your shoulder, he never closed down fully, but the threat of it being a possibility was enough to remind you. Heisenberg was hot and hard at your backside, the length of him making you bite the inside of your cheek.

Your gaze fell on one particular lycan, his eyes had glued themselves onto your face, the need behind his stare made you grin. A twist of your hair alerted you that Heisenberg knew and when he roared at the other, he in turn simply recoiled at his superiors rage. For your indiscretion he dug his hands into the meat of your rear, the sharpness of the claws reminding you.

Only his, no one else’s.

When he pushed in, the sharp intake of breath you took made you arch back and dig your hands into the soil. You could feel the drip of his saliva onto your lower back, each inch inside making him growl. You felt him maneuver you onto all fours, hands gripping your waist, dwarfing you seamlessly. You trembled as he sheathed more of his cock inside of you until you reached back to tap him on the hand that you had your limit of him. That first thrust always left you speechless, lacking oxygen and even a little dizzy. He was so large, so thick and lost in the sensation of owning you.

Owning you right in front of these mutts.

Those large hands found your arms and pulled back, if it weren’t for his strength you could’ve easily fallen face first but he held onto you and started to move. Eyes shutting tight, you felt your thighs began to shake at his strong movements. He was strong in his human form, but like this? It never stopped surprising you, never stopped exciting you that his strength was unmatched to the crowd of lycans before you. Not one single one of them made any moves to find for dominance and it was no secret that had Heisenberg deeply excited and filled to the brim with pride. There was a roar that startled you from your pleasure, he yanked you back towards him to further possessively hold you again himself.

He wanted you to watch.

Look at those envious dogs, his movements spoke. His snout came to rest on your shoulder, each huff of air from his nostrils felt cold on your heated skin. He thrusted faster, a need to claim urging him to smack his hips against you. His tongue snuck out and licked at your neck just as his movements were bordering on painful. This never stopped being messy, it never stopped being hot either. There was good reason to do this outside, although Heisenberg had others naturally. “So… good…. Mine” A large hand twisted both your breast into a painful grip, mindful of the sharpness his hold had but too far gone to not show his desires. That pulsing need could be felt in his movements, the insistent growling as his release approached.

It was in the way he held you against him.

Where his fur stuck against your sweaty skin and that insistent line of spit kept falling on your shoulder. Trapped in his embrace you could do little to show your lust but it surely was evident in the sounds you hadn’t stopped making since he had slid into you. The lycan’s stamina was nowhere near that of a human’s, and while Heisenberg knew your limitations he very well knew he could pump a few loads into your body regardless of you being a babbling mess beneath him. You felt your entire body seize up, the only thing holding you up being Heisenberg as he continued to thrust into you, with a scream of pleasure you alerted him that your end had approached and with that he pushed you down onto the fabric of your cloak to fuck the first of many loads into you. He roared, hand on the middle of your back trying to not dig those claws in. He filled you almost unbearably so, it leaked out so easily and made a mess down the inside of your thighs. You trembled with each spurt that shot into you, oversensitive thanks to your sudden predicament this evening. This only seemed to further drive him, it wasn’t the usual possessive need, if anything it felt cranked up to eleven.

When his hips had settled into a gentle sway, huffing breaths hitting your back, you knew it was his way of letting you settle. A slow drag of a claw down your back made you shiver, the rest of the lycans had begun to howl and become rowdy but another roar from Heisenberg put a stop to it.

You smiled tiredly, a soft chuckle mixing into your heavy breathing.

Heisenberg moved his hips once more, picked up the speed one thrust at a time. With a smirk you placed your hands behind your back, his almost delighted growl could be taken for laughter.

He gladly accepted your wrist, the show of submission for the rest of the dogs to see.

That you only belonged to him.

[pankowfruitsnackswriting]

new years day (r.c)

My work is NOT to be transferred, translated, reposted or copied to any other sites without my permission. That is plagiarism. But you can re-blog the heck out of it on here :)

paring(s): rafe x reader

summary: Spending New Year’s Day with Rafe Cameron (based off New Year’s Day by Taylor Swift)

warnings: nudity, sexual references, kissing, partying, drinking

 (master list) (tag list)

The Cameron's annual New Years party was in full swing. Everyone who was somebody was there, letting loose, flooding the main floors. Rafe, per usual, stood in front of the pong table, y/n wrapped underneath his arm. "Babe, call an island." Rafe cooed in her ear.

"I don't know. They are gonna laugh if I don't get it," she drunkenly whined.

"I'll beat them up if the do. If you at least try, New York won't be the only place a ball or two drops." The pair shared a devilish grin as she called it. "That's my girl. Line it up."

"Shut up." Y/n focused in on the last two cups, plunging it in.

"Fuck you!" Topper shouts. "You always win. Remind me to never play against her them, Kelce." Everyone chuckled. This happened every time they played.

"Well you can find someone else, I'm going to hang out with my pretty girl." Rafe grinned as he pulled her closer. The couple has always been right person, wrong time and they had their own issues to work through. But now the stars aligned and the two managed to find each other once more. Now they've spent the last four months or so cherishing one another.

Once rafe had her in a less crowded room, he pressed her back to a wall. "So do I get a little winners kiss?"

"Hmm. Not til midnight."

He checked his watch. "It's two minutes till."

"Rafe I love you. So, so much. But my rule still stands. No kisses today. Not until midnight." It was something she did just to tease him and he knew it.

"Fine." He dipped his head to her shoulder, starting a line of open mouth kisses. "Don't mind me. Just waiting til midnight." He knew he was driving her crazy, but Rafe missed the taste of strawberry flavored lipgloss.

"Rafael!" She squealed and squirmed. "That tickles." His fingers began to dig into her sides. "Rafe!"

Those around them moved out to the main area preparing for the infamous ball drop, pulling the nearest person closer. The two stayed back listening to the chanting of others, engaging in a countdown of thier own.

"10." Rafe pressed kiss to her nuckles. "9." A kiss to her inner wrist. "8, 7." Two moving up the shoulder. "6, 5, 4." It was as if time had slowed with each kiss up her neck. "3." Rafe made his way to her forehead and both cheeks!with a simple two and one. Cheers erupted from the other room.

Y/n was breathless. "What now, baby?" In a swift motion, the man spun her around, dipping her as if it was a scene from a movie.

"Happy New Years." He kissed her with everything he had, never wanting to let go.

"I think I was promised  a little victory gift." The way she bat her eyelashes, Rafe knew she would be the death of him.

"Let's go."

—

Rafe trailed his fingertips down the girl's spine, absolutely relishing in the way it felt. She was unquestionably the most beautiful being in all of Outer Banks and he had the privilege of being called hers. Vice versus, she was his.

"You're so beautiful," the older man mumbled as he pressed a kiss to her temple. The girl laid naked against his chest, a leg thrown over his waist.

Memories of the night before flooded his brain. For the first time in his life, Rafe believed he was doing something right when he kissed the girl at midnight, starting the new year in the most perfect way. He wasn't sure how he survived any other way and he would do anything to be the one to kiss her every year when the ball drops.

Y/n began to stir as he let his hand circle her perfectly plump bottom. "Mmm." She hummed, shifting herself to lay completely flat against his chest, her legs now resting between his. Every breath Rafe took woke y/n up even more, soothing her out of the dream state. "Mmm."

Rafe couldn't understand what she was saying. His only thought focused on the way she tightened her grip around his torso. "Baby, are you with me?" He brushed a few strands of her hair behind the ear.

A small pout made way to her soft lips."No." The girl rest her chin so she could stare into his captivating blue eyes. "Not yet."

Rafe pulled her closer until his lips hovered over hers. "How about now?" He closed the gap, creating a slow and steady pace for the pair. His hands remained roaming every square inch of her skin, melting into her soft airy breath.

Y/n pulled away, smiled, then laid her back to her chest. "Can I, um," she rubbed her eyes. "Can I-" her voice trailed off, but Rafe just grinned.

"You want to go back to sleep?" The girl sheepishly nodded as Rafe allowed his palms to find home on her hips. "I wish we could stay like this forever."

Y/n's eyes fluttered, trying to stay awake. The way he felt against her made her want to take in every second of the moment. "Why can't we?"

"Well the house is a little trashed and I don't think dad and rose want to see it." He couldn't contain himself from planting more kisses on her face.

"Let's just get our own place and we don't have to clean it right away." Y/n shifted herself then adjusted her hair before laying back down. "Or better yet we hire people so then we can stay like this. Start off the year right."

"Not too bad." He grinned, mentally making note to look for housing. "But that doesn't change the fact we have to clean today."

Rafe lightly pushed her so she was sitting up right. "Are you really telling me I have to put on clothes? That's a first."

"I never said that. Sarah is at John B's. Wheezie when to some friend's party. It's just you and me." Her cheeks filled with heat at the thought. Next thing he sees was her completely bare, standing up, dragging him along.

"I think breakfast awaits."

Once he had his footing, he turned to her. "Loser makes the pancakes." Rafe was already halfway out the room.

—

"Rafe, I'm tired." She yelled from the opposite side of the house.

"We're almost done." Y/n could her the clanking of glass bottles from afar.

"But I miss you." It was true. Y/n hated being away from him for long, within reason that is, but being in the same house and so far apart was the nearest thing to a hell on earth. She busied herself with straighting the room. It was her last one and rafe was on his last one, so it wouldn't be too long. "Really bad."

"I have to take the bag out to the trash, then we have the whole day for whatever we want." His voice implied.

"I just want to hold you and be held by you." The girl walked her bag to where he was.

A toothy grin appeared on his face. "You look even more beautiful than I remember." The both were wearing boxers and she opted for her cropped graphic tee, just in case someone came home. "How could I ever resist you?"

Rafe set his garbage bag by the back door, his girlfriend following suit. "We can take it out tonight, right rafey?"

"God, I hate when you call me that." He playfully rolled his eyes. "Couch. Now, woman."

With that, the two spent the first day of the new year in each other's arms. "These are the memories I'm going to hold on to. When things get bad, these are what will hold me up." She whispered in his embraced.

He loved everything she had to say and wanted to hang on to her for the rest of his life. "Please don't ever become a strange."

[safespacespence]

burning your tongue on hot chocolate

COUNTDOWN TO CHRISTMAS: 2 DAYS

[summary] waking up to the smell of hot chocolate is perfect for any snowfall morning :) [pairing] spencer reid + gn!reader [warnings] nothing major, kisses get a little lusty. cussing. [category] fluff [word count] 0.8k [a/n] i can't wrap my head around the fact that there are two days til christmas. what. this was very simply written <3 hope you like it! tell me what you thought

you stepped into the living room, the kitchen being shyly lit, as the sun’s harsh rays were blurred by the fall of the snow. spencer was by the stove, still in the checkered pajamas that you both wore to match during the holidays.

“hey, what’re you up to?” you asked, voice cracked.

spencer turned on his heel, his face lighting up as soon as his eyes landed on you. he walked over towards you with his hands extended in front of him, which he did all the time to signify ‘come hold me’.

you smiled, and grabbed his hands. he quickly spun you around and landed his hands on your waist.

you blinked a couple of times to refocus your vision. “just woke up..still disoriented.”

he laughed inwardly. “good morning, beautiful.” he towered over you, and took that opportunity to see all of the parts of your face, in detail, and all at once. he memorised every inch of your face, but was still so easily mesmerized.

he took your cheek so gently, his fingertips barely grazing your skin. the lightness of his touch gave your body tiny little tremors that you struggled to control. but he fixed that immediately, aligning his lips onto yours, both of your eyes shutting closed involuntarily. both of your thoughts were hushed, concentrating on the way each of your lips felt on one another’s, a battle between lust and bliss.

as you both pulled away, spencer smirked. “never gets old.” you snorted. what a flirt. “you didn’t answer my question.” you rolled your eyes. “AH YES!” he exclaimed, like it came to him at that moment. “making hot chocolate from scratch. i’ve done a lot of reading and research on the best way to make hot chocolate and alas, this is what i have come up with.” he said proudly, pointing to the pot on the stove.

he wasn’t wrong, the smell of the chocolate was incredibly rich, but your instincts told you there was something missing.

“can i taste?” you asked. “yes, of course!” it was adorable how he was so giddy and proud of his creation. spencer was a little bit of a nuisance when cooking, because he fixated too much on what was going on chemically or physically instead of the love put into the dish.

he grabbed a spoon and lifted it to your mouth, and as soon as the piping hot liquid touched your tongue, your reflexes quickly jolted, moving away from the spoon. spencer reacted just as quickly, moving to get ice from the freezer. “oH SORRY SORRY SORRY” he started rambling nervously. his usual reaction to everything. you pushed your tongue against the roof of your mouth, as the scalded patch of tissue felt scratchy and numb. you were silent, processing the way the burnt area felt, even bringing your finger to physically feel it.

spencer held the ice to the patch on your tongue, swatting away your hand as you tried to feel it. you wanted to laugh. “i’m fine, spence, really.” he simply shook his head. “i should have cooled it before letting you taste. that’s my bad.” “it’s missing marshmallows.” you said nonchalantly.

he was taken aback, and moved the ice away from you. “excuse me?” he sassily asked. “the chocolate taste is PERFECT it does not need anything else.” you raised an eyebrow. “spencer, hot chocolate isn’t hot chocolate without the motherfucking marshmallows.” “YOU’RE DRINKING IT WRONG THEN!” “I AM NOT!” “YOU BARELY TASTED IT YOU BURNT YOUR TONGUE” “OH OKAY, MOCK THE ONE IN PAIN!” you made a very expressive face, to which spencer couldn’t hold his laughter in any further. you were confused, still pissy. “wait-wHY ARE YOU LAUGHING I DO WANT MARSHMALLOWS!” he clutched his stomach, and placed a hand on the counter to get ahold of himself. “yes, we can drink it with marshmallows.” he said smoothly, smirking too. “oh. okay.” “it’s funny watching you try to defend yourself.” he poked. “how’s your tongue?”

the way he switched from argumentative to smooth to caring made your processing move at a pace you couldn’t fathom. and you didn’t want to admit it, but it was a little attractive.

but you couldn’t possibly let him know that. “my tongue’s fine.” you said, crossing your arms.

he chuckled, knowing what you were trying to do. in a swift motion, he took control and clouded your mind again by just cupping his hand around the back of your neck, angling your face to look up at him. you always watched his eyes and liked seeing what they were eyeing.

it was your lips.

and he knew you were watching him eye it.

he ran a thumb over them as he licked his lips. a smirk formed, and he couldn’t hold himself back anymore. he went in for a kiss, alleviating any pain you were still experiencing. he bit your lip as he pulled back, now eyeing at the way your lips were glistening in the light. no words could describe the immense desire that was in that man’s eyes.

“you taste like chocolate.” he said, still yearning for more of you.

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[foodieforthoughts]

When the ball drops

Summary: It's your third year in the Big Apple and you still haven't found your midnight kiss for when the ball drops, until tonight.

Pairing: Henry x Reader

Word count: 1.7k

Warnings: Fluff!!!

A/N: Happy New Year to everyone! ✨ Watching the ball drop on New Year's Eve in Times Square is my ultimate bucket list! Also not beta read, so don't mind the errors, just had to get done in time before @infinite-shite celebrates New Year's before the rest of us! This baby deserves all the love in the world ❤️

*divider by @firefly-graphics

Title: When the ball drops

The cackle of people's laughter ringed through the pub as the hours ticked by. In contrast to the cold winter air of New York, the inside of the enclosed space felt warm. You quickly pulled on your apron and slid behind the bar, relieving your co-worker from their shift. He hugged you for the New Year that was to ring in about an hour later, happily weaving through the crowd towards the staff exit.

You sighed, grabbing the dish cloth to clean some glasses.

The excitement of coming to the Big Apple had quickly died down for you. You had dreamed of living in the city like the various shows potrayed, feeding lies that everything is magical and full of opportunities in this concrete jungle. But you could disagree with all the contradictions between facts and fictions and align them in a PowerPoint presentation. Not only were you yet to secure your dream job, you lived in a mediocre place with little to look forward to everyday.

Another sigh left your lips, your shoulders slumping despite the merriment around.

"That would be the second time you sigh." The crisp accented voice of a stranger sounded from across you. "What's the matter, love?"

You knew who he was. You ogled at his pictures on a regular basis, especially when he became Superman. But he looked nothing like the Henry Cavill you saw on the red carpets. Clad in a plain blue shirt, jaw sprinkled with the hint of a stubble and hair combed to perfection, Henry titled his head at you with a smile. You looked around at the other patrons, unsure if he was talking to you indeed.

Henry chuckled at your look of confusion. He took a seat at the barstool and grabbed the menu from the stand. With a dish cloth still inside the glass tumbler, you stared at the Hollywood heartthrob. The pub you worked at was frequented with celebs on a regular basis, the only downside being you usually worked for the day shift which meant by the time you rolled out of work, the big shots were only just waking up.

"Can I get-"

"Guinness?" You interrupted him. You meant to say it in your head but the word left your mouth before you could control your lips.

But Henry didn't flinch. He just smiled widely, the dimples in his chin dipping charmingly and his eyes shining like the brightest star under the flickering strobe lights. He slid the menu back towards you and clasped his hands together.

You blinked your eyes several times to rid yourself of the flutter in you belly as Henry smiled at you softly. He watched as you got him a glass and filled it up with his beer. Your hands trembled so much with the nervousness of serving an A list actor, who not only was doing well in industry but was exceptionally sexier in person, that you were worried the foam gathered at the top would dribbled down the sides. Noticing your struggle, Henry extended his hands and placed them over yours to secure his glass.

Electricity. In the most clichéd scenarios of romance movies, you felt a jolt of electricity when your hands touched his, the sparks travelling down your spine to your toes. Sucking in a sharp breath you handed him the glass, chiding yourself over your hyper aware mind.

"What is a pretty lady like you working in a bar at this hour?" He asked, sipping his fermented pint of alcohol.

"Coworker has plans with his girlfriend, like everyone tonight." You shrugged your shoulder, going over to another customer ordering drinks. You could feel Henry's eyes on you as you readied the customer's order. The sound of giggling girls pulled your attention just as the man left with his drink.

You walked back to where Henry sat, nursing his beer. "Anything to go with that?" you enquired, rearranging the shot glasses under the bar counter.

"I am still wondering how, in the world, a pretty woman like you, is stuck here."

You scoffed, more to yourself than him. "Because this supposed pretty woman is single as fuck." The mirth in your voice hid the sense of self pity edging at the corners of your mind. It had been three years since you had first arrived in the city with a possibility of reaching for the stars in both personal and professional life. You had been left disappointed with the jerks and assholes you ended up with, ultimately sitting at home and questioning your choices in men.

You noted the softness creasing at the corners of Henry's eyes. The last thing you wanted was to be seen as a miserable bartender at the end of the year, so you cleared your throat and smiled at him. "What is superman doing at a bar, in New York, alone?"

Henry chuckled. His gravelly thick laughter ringing louder than the music in your ears. "I was just stopping by the city, thought I'll stay to understand what the big deal is with the ball drop."

"Oh my God. Watching the ball drop and kissing at midnight is the most romantic thing you can do with your partner. You should be at Times Square!" Your excitement over the whole New Year's Eve shenanigan was flowing through in your speech.

"Too crowded." He shook his head, groaning and sipping his beer.

You rolled your eyes. "As opposed to this cramped pub?"

Henry chuckled again, throwing a wink at you. You felt the familiar flutter in your belly. You peered at him under your lashes, Henry seemed to be having his eyes only for you tonight. The giggling ladies were desperately trying to grab his attention while sipping on their Margheritas wearing their embellished dresses with low cuts and frills. You glanced down at yourself and frowned. Over the faded blue jeans and white t-shirt, you wore the black apron with the pub's insignia on the left breast. You suddenly became profoundly aware of how 'basic' you might look in comparison to the other ladies.

Self doubt clouded your mind. You politely smiled at Henry and hurried to the other side of the bar to serve the other customers. Maybe Henry only wanted someone to play the horizontal hokey-pokey with him for the night, or maybe he was bored and since you were obligated to talk nicely with him, he had pitched a conversation. Whatever the reason, you did not like how the multiple scenarios would end. You knew your feeble, fragile heart. You would get hurt, one way or another.

"Hi," Henry appeared again in front of you. He had his beer in his hand, his other elbow resting on the counter. "Did I offend you in some way?"

"No. But you are pretty much making me realize, how miserable my life is." Your voice sounded bleak against the booming voices. Tucking your hair behind your ear, you watched the couples snuggle up to each other. It had been ages since you had felt the loving embrace of a man, even longer since you had shared a meaningful kiss with someone special.

"What would you have been doing instead?" Henry's voice pulled you out of your desolated reverie.

"I would be in Times Square, with my significant other, which I don't have. We would get some drinks while standing on the outskirts of the crowd and watch the countdown."

There was a stir of activity in the pub as someone announced that there were only 90 seconds to the ball drop. You hadn't even realized that time had passed so quickly whilst you had juggled your conversation with Henry.

"Well, you have the drinks," Henry reached forward to grab a glass and poured half of his beer in the empty tumbler. "We are at the outskirts of the crowd since everyone is huddled near the TV." You nodded as you watched the couples gather near the enormous flat screen mounted on the wall. "We aren't at the Times Square, but we are in New York."

The countdown read 60 seconds with the red numbers counting backwards. Henry stood up and leaned forward on the counter. You watched with bated breath as he grabbed the strap of your apron and pulled you towards him.

His hand rested lightly on your cheek, his thumb grazing your cheekbone. The smell of beer, his perfume and musk enveloped you, bundling you in everything that signified him. You gazed into his cerulean eyes, the fleck of brown going dark against the blue ocean. Your hands hung by your side, flabbergasted by the surprising turn of events.

"I might not be your significant other," His breath washed over your heated face, his eyes transfixed on yours. "But we can perhaps change that."

"Happy New Year!"

Like the fireworks going off on the One Times Square Building, when your lips collided with his, there was a burst of colorful sparks celebrating the union of two people from across the pond. Henry pulled your face closer to his by grabbing behind your head, his fingers threading through your hair. You finally could think straight as you moaned into the kiss, holding onto the collar of his shirt as the pub erupted with loud cheers. In that moment, everything seemed perfect in the world. You felt your legs turn to jelly as Henry pulled back, breathing through his mouth, tugging at your lower lip with his teeth.

The smug smile on his face returned as he sat back on his barstool. You grabbed onto the counter for support as you gulped lungful of air.

"Did that count as something for when the ball drops?" He asked, sipping his beer and watching you from the brim of his glass.

You nodded. The heat on your cheeks traveled down to your chest, a grin spreading on your lips. Biting your lip you reached for the other glass of beer Henry had poured. "Happy new year to me." You announced before clinking your glass with Henry's.

✨HAPPY NEW YEAR GUYS✨

[kaizokuou-ni-naru]

The Voyage So Far: Alabasta (Part Two)

east blue (1 | 2) || alabasta (1 | 2) || skypiea || water 7 || enies lobby || thriller bark || paramount war (1 | 2) || fishman island || punk hazard || dressrosa (1 | 2) || whole cake island || wano (1 | 2)

crocodile is one of my favorite villains in one piece for a number of reasons, and one of them is because he’s such a threat, the first real one faced in the grand line and one of the toughest in all of paradise. the villains from the arcs before this, like wapol or the agents from little garden, could barely even land a hit on luffy in actual combat. so crocodile is introduced here as an absolute force of nature, a complete contrast to recent villains and a very tangible threat. 

it’s an impression he very much lives up to later in the arc by crushing luffy not once but twice, which only makes luffy’s ultimate hard-won triumph feel all the better. luffy closes a huge gap over the course of alabasta in order to be able to beat crocodile, and giving us a sense of just how strong he is from the very start gives luffy clawing his way up to that level a lot more weight. 

the successive reveals of luffy’s family never fail to absolutely delight me, because in any other series they would almost certainly feel contrived, but knowing luffy, it is absolutely unsurprising he just never happened to mention his relatives. nobody asked! luffy’s unique brand of honesty is one of my favorite character quirks, because he’s very straightforward and in fact can’t lie for shit, but his priorities are so completely off the wall that he winds up omitting highly relevant information completely by accident. 

ace’s scene in alabasta really does impress me. oda’s said in an sbs that he knew ace’s fate from his introduction, which i find absolutely unsurprising given the intricacy of his story planning. that means he needed ace’s introduction to make him both likable and memorable enough in the space of just a couple chapters that the audience would be engaged when he became the focus of the story a couple hundred chapters on despite barely appearing at all in the intervening time, and he really succeeded. 

kohza is one of my favorite minor characters in the whole series, and i think he’s a big part of why alabasta’s civil war plotline works so well and feels so real. nobody on either side of the war actually wants to fight, but everyone has been driven to such desperation that they feel they have no other choice in order to save their country; and kohza exemplifies that. he's a good person who loves his country a lot, and who genuinely likes and cares about the royal family and vivi especially, and the only option he can see to save alabasta is terrible, but there’s nothing else he can do. 

it’s just fun for me to think about the fact that if crocodile was literally anything other than a very skilled logia, vivi would have ended the whole entire arc right here. 

i really like civil war storylines when they’re well-done, and i think alabasta is one of the best ones i’ve seen in media. most of it is down to what i mentioned earlier, about how nobody on either side actually wants to fight but feels like they have no choice but to. nobody here is actually in the wrong except for crocodile, and so until crocodile is defeated, nothing can be fixed- which is what luffy, of all people, is the one to realize. 

sanji’s mr. prince gambit is probably my single favorite part of alabasta, and i think one of the reasons i like it so much is because he basically beats crocodile at his own game. crocodile is terrifying in battle, but before anything else he’s a manipulator. he’s always working from the shadows, always deceiving people doing what he wants, and sanji manages to turn the tables on him and do the exact same back to him, twice. 

also sanji looks great in glasses

smoker and tashigi both get kind of unfortunately sidelined after this saga, but they’re both really great characters in alabasta. (tashigi especially; i’ll get to her later.) much like the rebel army, they’re good people trying to do the right thing in the tangled mess of tension and politics and resentment that is alabasta- and when that means working with pirates, they’ll buckle down and do it, despite how much it might contradict their worldviews. 

i love when events align in one piece so that people who don’t particularly like the strawhats wind up working with them for some common goal (as seen most prominently in impel down), and smoker and tashigi in alabasta are the first and still one of the best examples of that. 

the entirety of luffy versus crocodile round one is so well done. we’re a hundred and fifty chapters in, and although luffy has struggled in fights before now and then, we get the sense he hasn’t ever really been pushed to the brink, and he’s certainly never lost.

and then he does, completely and absolutely, without ever even landing a hit on his opponent, and it hits like a punch. 

oda seems to be a fan of characters just barely missing each other- the similar panel of robin and olvia running past each other from robin’s flashback comes to mind.

i’ve always liked that of all the strawhats, it’s usopp who gets the first “luffy is going to be king of the pirates” moment. they’ve all said it by the current chapters in wano (with the sole exception of robin, i believe), but usopp said it first, and that feels significant to me. he’s always been the one who feels the least secure in his place on the crew, but even so, he has so much faith in luffy. 

nami’s fight with miss doublefinger is pretty silly in places and i think it gets frequently (understandably, it must be said) overshadowed by zoro’s fight with mr. 1 directly afterwards, but i really like it nonetheless. it’s nami’s first real solo fight in the whole series, and once she finds her feet she kicks ass, and i really like that. it feels like a very satisfying development for her, to stand up and risk her life in direct combat for vivi’s sake. 

we’re now almost a thousand chapters in and its my firm belief that zoro versus mr. 1 is still one of the best fights in the entire series. i definitely think it’s probably zoro’s best fight- only his match with kaku compares. the narrative build over the course of the fight, from zoro struggling just to match mr. 1 (and getting shredded to pieces in the process) to cutting him down in one final stroke, is incredibly cool and satisfying to watch. it feels like a very tangible step forward for zoro in terms of ability, like a massive obstacle has been surmounted and, as he himself says, he’s now stronger for it. 

its also very cool that this is, i believe, the first appearance of what is probably observation haki, though it isn’t named or recognized as such. i’m always endlessly impressed by all the little moments of internal consistency that oda manages to sprinkle into his story. 

there’s barely any dialogue on these entire two pages, from crocodile dropping vivi to luffy and pell swooping in- the story is briefly told entirely through visuals- and i love that. it gives the impression of a single tense, frozen moment as vivi falls, which is then broken in spectacular fashion when luffy catches her. 

i really, really like the progression that runs through all three of luffy’s fights with crocodile. the gap between them goes from being impossible, with luffy unable to even land a hit and crocodile basically toying with him; to surmountable but still huge, with luffy able to land some hits but still outclassed; to finally putting them on basically even ground. and every inch of that growth on luffy’s part is hard-fought and hard-won and well-deserved. 

crocodile’s confidence in his abilities isn’t misplaced- he genuinely is that powerful. but if there’s anything we know about luffy by now, it’s that he doesn’t ever give up. it’s very fun to watch crocodile’s dismissiveness turn into disbelief turn into rage and frustration when luffy just won’t die. 

luffy is, additionally, pretty clearly a better brawler than crocodile (which makes sense, crocodile is clearly used to devastating long-range attacks with his powers while luffy grew up fighting giant wildlife with his bare hands), which means that by the time of their last fight, where they’re just whaling on each other in the catacombs and crocodile is starting to get sloppy and desperate and lose control, if anything it’s luffy who has the upper hand. 

zoro and sanji’s dynamic is always a favorite of mine, and one of the things i like best about them is how perfectly in sync they always manage to be when it comes to things that actually matter, despite fighting like cats and dogs pretty much every other time. i’ll never understand people who think they genuinely aren’t friends. 

tashigi is really good in alabasta, okay. she essentially has her own entire character growth arc. she goes from her stance in loguetown, where she isn’t even tolerant of (fully legal!) bounty hunters, to here, where she’s forced to confront that the world isn’t nearly as black and white as she’s always believed it to be, that sometimes pirates are good and allies of the government are bad, and ultimately makes the right choice to help the strawhats even though it clearly pains and frustrates her that she can’t do anything more herself. 

i’ll be forever mad that her only really significant appearance after this in punk hazard didn’t really live up to what her character deserved. 

i really like how the countdown sequence is done. the tension is ratcheting up and up and up as the clock ticks down in the final seconds, panels cutting all over the city to show all the different characters, everyone who’s caught up in this conflict and everyone who’ll die if the cannon fires-

and then the clock hits zero, and we get this panel that’s just... quiet, after all the madness, as we see how vivi stopped the detonation. i think oda is very good at setting up his pages so they have a flow to them, so no matter how quickly you actually read sometimes things feel like they’re going very fast and all happening at once and then it slows down and gives the reader a chance to breathe, if only to speed up again later. i think oda is really good at pacing in general, really, both on a micro level like this and on a larger scale. 

luffy’s greatest strength isn’t really his strength. he’s strong, absolutely, but that’s not really why he wins the fights he shouldn’t win. he wins because he just doesn’t fucking stay down. his fight with katakuri is probably the best example of this, because katakuri has him beat in pretty much every category except sheer endurance, and there as here, it’s that endurance that winds up getting luffy the win in the end. 

i do love that it’s the rain that ends the war. not the explosion and pell’s sacrifice, not vivi’s pleading, not even luffy kicking crocodile into the stratosphere, but the rain, the thing alabasta’s been missing for too long, the thing crocodile stole, the only thing all these people are fighting over. 

it’s crocodile’s symbolic defeat- at the same moment his power is broken by luffy, the stranglehold of dehydration he’s been using to foment war and rebellion is all at once gone, and he’s left with nothing at all, and alabasta can finally find peace and start to heal again. 

i always love the little moments that show, usually without words, just how much the strawhats love each other, and all of them unanimously waiting until vivi is out of sight to collapse so that she won’t worry, won’t see how ragged they ran themselves for their sake, is definitely one of them. 

i adore vivi’s sendoff, because while its sad she has to go, the certainty that someday they’ll meet again and that even if not they’ll always be crew manages to make this scene endlessly hopeful instead (which, i think, is also a good summary of one piece’s tone as a whole, at least in its more serious moments). luffy never says goodbye, after all, and nobody ever really leaves the strawhat pirates. 

i’m really looking forward to vivi’s re-entry to the story. i really, really want to see her reunion with the strawhats. 

hey look, it’s the panel my profile picture is from! 

the mystery surrounding robin and her past is built up in little ways long before enies lobby, from her harsh reaction when confronted with by tashigi to her aversion to being called by her given name to this flashback, of her talking to cobra about her dream. of them, the latter is my favorite, because i think it’s probably the most sincere she is until enies lobby- which makes sense, given she thinks she’s about to die. 

like many things about robin in alabasta, this gets cast in a new light by her backstory. if she dies here, so too does the entire legacy of ohara- but she’s so beaten down and hopeless that she really doesn’t see any light ahead to strive for. there’s no hope left, for her, and the whole world against her. 

and then there’s luffy, who creates hope everywhere he goes, who makes her live anyways. 

this is a hell of a spread to hook us very effectively right into the sky island saga. it’s a perfect reminder of just how much we still don’t know about all the endless mysteries of the grand line, and just how many adventures are still yet to be had.

[dem-obscure-imagines]

New Year’s Eve Drabbles 2020

Fandoms: Jumanji, Rise of the Guardians, Ben 10 Alien Force, Maleficent, the Hunger Games

Note: Happy New Year! Here’s to hoping 2021 is a little kinder. I did a set of New Year’s Eve drabbles a few years ago and it was a lot of fun, so here you go! I hope you like them!

Warnings: Hunger Games spoilers

Alex “Seapilot” Vreeke x Reader

Word Count: 0.4k

The idea of a new year, admittedly, made Alex a little nervous. It was only a few months before that you had found your way into Jumanji with your new friends, rescued Alex, and brought him with you to modern day. And the six of you had figured: What better way to celebrate the new year than to have a little party?

So, you’d helped Bethany and Martha get the living room of Bethany’s house ready while Spencer, Fridge, and Alex picked up pizza, snacks, and drinks. You set some party favors out on the table. There were cute glasses proclaiming the new year, noise makers, candy, streamers, balloons, and some confetti.

When the boys got back, you helped set up the kitchen and Alex walked over to you, helping you unload the pizza and breadsticks and garlic knots. You kept catching him glancing at you, but every time you looked at him, he glanced away nervously, chuckling to himself.

“What?” You asked.

He shook his head. “Nothing. It’s just…I have this irrational fear that when midnight hits, all of this will go away.” He exhaled a long breath. “And I’ll be there all over again.”

“Hey.” You grabbed his arm, grounding him in the moment. “That’s not gonna happen, alright? You’re not going anywhere, and neither are we.”

“You’re stuck with us, Vreeke.” Fridge said, giving Alex a pat on the shoulder. “Nothin’s gonna happen. It’s over. The game is gone.”

“I know, but…It’s just stuck in my head.”

“It’s gonna be okay, alright? I’ll…” you bit your lip, thinking. “I’ll take your mind off of it.”

“Okay,” He nodded. And he didn’t know exactly what you meant, but he trusted you.

So, when 11:59 rolled around, you walked right over to where Alex was standing, his hands shaking, his eyes fixated on the TV screen, and you cupped his cheeks in your hands, turning his face to yours.

“Stay with me. Stay right here with me.” You whispered to him, your eyes focused on his. “No numbers, no countdown, just us. Just you and me.”

“I like the sound of that.” He whispered back, his hands resting on top of yours for a second before sliding down to your waist and tugging you closer.

And so you stayed there, and when the clock struck midnight, your lips met his, soft and sweet and everything he ever dreamed they’d be. When you pulled away, he exhaled a long breath, his eyes sparkling.

“That’s the first time I’ve been kissed in twenty years.” He said softly.

“You want a second one?” You asked.

He didn’t even reply, just pulled you closer and aligned his lips with yours once more.

Jack Frost x Reader

Word Count: 0.3k

The relationship you had with Jack was, well, complicated. You were a college student. You’d been friends with Jack for a few years because you were, what he called, the oldest believer. Even long after Santa had stopped bringing you presents, you still believed, and therefore, when Jack had flown past your window one night and your jaw dropped, he decided to loop back around.

The rest was history.

You were at a college party to celebrate the new year, but honestly, you just weren’t feeling it. So, you wandered up the stairs, found an empty bedroom, and opened the window to get some air.

“Oh come on, party girl, tapping out already?” Jack said, floating just outside the window.

“What are you doing here?”

“I was in the neighborhood.” He shrugged. “What’s up?”

“New Year’s Eve party.” You told him. “It’s hot down there. And loud.”

Just as you said it, all the people in the lower level of the house started shouting numbers.

“Sounds like it’s almost over, though.” He floated closer and sat on the windowsill. “Hey, uh…” he reached up to scratch the back of his neck, his icy blue eyes landing on yours. “Do you mind if I do something I’ve been wanting to for a really, really long time?”

“What would that be?”

“Well, it’s a surprise.” He tilted his head. “Can you close your eyes?”

And while you knew Jack was a trickster in every meaning of the word, you closed your eyes, waiting in the window, the cold air refreshing on your face and in your lungs. And then, a few moments later, you felt something cold and soft against your lips. You couldn’t help but kiss him back.

Ben Tennyson x Reader

Word Count: 0.4k

It was Kevin’s idea to have a little New Year’s Eve party. Of course, it was just the four of you, the team, celebrating. You had been exiled to the back seat with Ben and because you were on patrol, there was no champagne to be had.

Gwen had, however, brought along some plastic wine glasses and a bottle of sparkling grape juice. It was better than nothing, and though you didn’t admit it, you were glad you were with the other three of them. It was better than spending the night alone.

Kevin drove the car out into the middle of the field and parked, tuning the radio to a New Year’s Eve broadcast. It was then that the four of you split into pairs. Kevin wrapped an arm around Gwen and they stepped off away from you and Ben, who stayed closer to the car.

“Want me to top you off?” He asked, holding up the bottle of sparkling juice.

“Sure, thanks.” You held up your glass and he poured more juice into it.

“A new year, huh?”

“Yeah…” You nodded an took a sip. “Weird.”

“Weird.” He agreed. “I have this weird, funny feeling that things are just gonna get weirder from here on out.”

“It always seems to where the four of us are involved.” You chuckled, sitting on the front of Kevin’s car.

Ben joined you.

You motioned to Kevin and Gwen, off in their own little world. “They’re good together, you know?”

“They are.” Ben chuckled, shaking his head. “That’s weird too, but…it’s getting less weird.”

“Mmhmm.” You nodded. You sighed and looked up at the stars. There were so many. So many planets and solar systems and galaxies in the vast, vast universe spread out before you. “It’s gorgeous.”

“It is.” He agreed, but he wasn’t looking at the sky. He was looking at you.

About twenty minutes later, the countdown started. You’d never had feelings for Ben. You didn’t know why. He was cute, he was confident, and yet, you’d never felt anything romantic for him. Well, until tonight. When the countdown got dangerously low, he looked at you and you looked at him and it just…clicked.

So, under the sparkling stars, side by side, you brought in the New Year with Ben Tennyson, his lips interlocked with yours.

Diaval x Reader

Word Count: 0.3k

You had to hand it to her, Maleficent threw quite the party. It was the eve of the new year, and to celebrate, Maleficent had called together all of the people of Aurora’s kingdom and all the fae of the Moors.

You were an enchantress from the kingdom, someone who was magical, but unaccustomed to the woods. You were wearing a fine silver gown made of silk and a moonstone circlet around your head. In your hand, you held a goblet of champagne, and as you walked through the forests, which were lit up with the gentle glowing magic of the creatures who inhabited it, you couldn’t help but be amazed by their beauty and grace.

You continued through the Moors and, inevitably, ran into a tall stranger. Quite literally. You found yourself standing right in front of a tall man with dark hair hanging in his face. It took you a moment to recognize him. This was Diaval, Maleficent’s companion and shapeshifter.

“Pardon me, didn’t see you there.” You apologized.

“I blend into the dark, I’m afraid.” He chuckled. It was true, with his dark hair, dressed in all black, he did indeed blend in with the shadows.

“No harm done.” You smiled. “I’m (Y/N).”

“Of the (L/N) house?” He asked, his eyes widening. “You’re the enchantress.”

“I am.” You nodded, smiling softly.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” He said, taking your hand in his and raising it to his lips. “Maleficent has mentioned introducing the two of us, but she’s been…busy, it seems.”

“I can imagine taking care of two kingdoms would be quite the task,” you mused softly. “Well, the pleasure is mine, Diaval. I will admit, your abilities are intriguing to me.”

“Oh. They’re not mine. It’s Maleficent’s magic that granted me this form. Usually, I’m a raven.” He admitted, a sheepish smile finding his face.

“Fascinating.” You said, your eyes alight with awe. “Well, Diaval, what do you say to accompanying me for the evening?”

He slipped his arm through yours, his dark eyes sparkling and a promise written in his smile. “I’d be honored.”

Peeta Mellark x Reader

Word Count: 0.7k

Another New Year’s Eve alone with your books. You couldn’t complain, though. It was quiet. It was nice. It was you, the TV, your cat, and the Hunger Games books. Specifically, you were reading the first book, starting the series over again for what felt like the thirtieth time. Your books were very worn, the spines cracked beyond repair. You loved them and everything they stood for.

So, you opened the cover and pulled the bookmark out. You were nearing the end of the games. Peeta was hiding from the careers somewhere while Katniss took care of Rue. And when she died, as she always did, you cried. A few of your tears landed on the page of the book, and when the third tear landed on the paper, you heard a thud in your kitchen.

Looking up, you searched the room for your cat, but you spotted him on the chair across from you, notably, not making a mess in the kitchen. So, slowly, you walked through your apartment until you reached the doorway of the kitchen. You thought maybe one of your barstools had fallen over or something. But no, sitting in the middle of your kitchen, a shocked look on his face and a large gash on his leg, was none other than Peeta Mellark, right down to the District 12 jacket and the Josh Hutcherson face.

“What the fuck.”

“Is this…Where…where am I?”

“In my kitchen. In my apartment. Are you…You’re Peeta Mellark.”

“How did I get here?”

“I don’t know.” You shook your head. You looked at his leg, the shock of a fictional character sitting in your kitchen wearing off when you realized he was injured and bleeding pretty badly. “Shit, you’re bleeding! Um, I’ll get a first aid kit. Stay right here.”

You ran to your bathroom and back, carrying your first aid kit. He was lucky you knew your shit. He was also lucky he’d landed there before it got too badly infected.

“What district is this?” He asked, looking around your apartment, still sitting on your tile floor. “Where am I?”

“Peeta, I don’t know how to tell you this.” You sat down and opened your first aid kit, pulling out some ointment and bandages. “This isn’t one of the districts. This is another…world? Reality? I don’t know the terminology, but…”

“What do you mean?”

“Once I patch you up I will try to explain everything, okay?” You applied some hydrogen peroxide to his cut and then put ointment on it, wrapping it up in bandages. “Is that too tight?”

“No, it’s fine. Thank you.” His eyes were grateful, but you could tell he was still shaken up.

You helped him to his feet and he limped to the living room with his arm over your shoulder for support. Once you got him settled in a chair, you walked back out to the kitchen and got him a glass of water and the leftover half of a Subway sandwich that was in your fridge. You were planning on eating it for lunch the next day, but he needed it more than you did.

“You must be starving. Here.”

“Thank you so much.” He said, taking an eager few gups of water. You knew he was definitely dehydrated. “I’m pretty sure this is just some amazing dream.”

“It might be.” You shook your head, chuckling to yourself. “I don’t know how to explain this to you, but, here…” You handed him all three of the Hunger Games books and watched his face as he looked them over, curious but sullen.

“This…this is a joke, right? I’m not…this is…how…?”

“I don’t know either. But, um, you’re welcome to stay here as long as you need to. Or as long as you want to. I can’t imagine going back to a place like that. To the games…”

“You’ve read these a lot, huh?” He noticed how beat-up they were and looked up at you. “Why?”

“They give me hope. Things are pretty bad in my country right now, and it gives me hope that even though things are bleak, they can get better.”

“So they do get better?”

“They will, Peeta. It’ll get worse first, but they will get better.”

He smiled a soft but painfilled smile.

Your TV announced that the new year had arrived, and when you looked, it was indeed midnight.

“Happy New Year,” you said quietly.

He nodded and let out a long sigh before repeating, “Happy New Year.”

[moxfirefly]

Not sure if you've been asked yet, but re: the WIP tag meme I'm super interested in a little snipper from the Lycan!Karl one if you wanna share! 👀

You know I’m not one to do this but for you friend, I shall 🖤

This is going to be hopefully out really soon, like the first of October to commence spooky season right. It’s still in the beginning stages but I hope it pleases you and gets you hyped.

Preview for Lycan!Heisenberg one shot:

The crunch of leaves beneath your boots seemed to be the loudest sound out here in the forest. The cold autumn weather announcing itself with yet another harsh wind that blew your crimson cloak billowed around you.

It’s in the games we play.

You felt that overwhelming presence that belonged only to him, it radiated off of him much like the cigar smoke you picked up as it faintly travelled across to you.

There was that conceited laugh of his as he approached you from behind.

“You really know how to haul ass when it concerns you, huh?” His breath tickled the back of. Your head and it took so much of your pride to not smile at the sound of his voice. You didn’t give him the satisfaction of turning, to let him see your eyes and the fire that burned in your gaze. “Letting you win isn’t my favorite past time to be frank” That laugh of his vibrated against your skin, so infectious, so very him.

“Oh kitten, I always win” He leaned in, nose to your hair and inhaled softly the scent he had memorized so well.

He could track you through storm and distance.

He would always find you.

And how he loved the chase, this little game.

You felt as much as your heard his growl, the human sound that slowly dropped to a guttural baritone. His eyes, once the stormy hazel they were must be golden now and so very inhuman. As your heart picked up that drumming beat, you turned slightly to see that handsome smile of his sporting sharp teeth, canines so pointed and perfectly white.

How often you’d seen them sporting red and flesh.

“Come now little one, the games only starting!” He backed up with a bounce to his step, arms wiggling out of that coat he never left home without. You watched him kick off his boots and toss his hat to the quickly growing pile of clothes. There was a cracking sound as he unbuckled his belt, yanking the leather in one fell swoop, all you could do was swallow and bunch up the front of your dress to ready yourself.

“Ten! Nine! Eight!-“ His voice dropped even lower, the growl nearly demonic in the air of the forest. Something cracked again, the sounds of bones snapping into their rightful position for this. You dug your heels, chest rising as you continued to watch Heisenberg change before your very eyes. “Seven! Six! Five!-“ Those silver locks grew, more patches of hair appearing as he grew in size, his face contorted, mouth ripping at the corners as a snout began to take form. His clothes tore, pieces of fabric falling or merely hanging by threads on his changing body. It was the half way point, where there was still some human features left but it was more lycan than man regardless.

His tail wiggled off some scraps of clothing, shoulders rolling back to crack them further into their new alignment. That grin, god even in his lycan form it still remained.

The human tone slipped further into just a husky growl as he finished his countdown.

“Four! Three! Two!-“

He howled out that last number, the sound of it drifting into the menacing boom that alerted you that now was the time to start fucking running.

And that you did.

Took off like a bullet from a starting pistol, with the echo of your heart being drowned out by the monstrous growl Heisenberg unleashed as he chased after you…

[julyarchives]

Elysian || (M)

Spending Valentine’s day with your boyfriend is always special, and Changgu knows how to make you happy in every possible way.

→ Pairing: Yeo One x Female Reader

→ Genre: Smut

→ Words:  1.9K

→ Contains: Smut; Established Relationship AU; Bath Tub Sex; Cockwarming;

→ A/N: Happy Valentine's Day to our beautiful followers! We hope you all like it and remember to celebrate this day radiating love to everyone, including yourselves ❤

The place was fancier than you could imagine. Changgu was waiting for you at the door with a flower bouquet of roses and sunflowers, always so thoughtful, remembering your favorite flowers. The carpet floor was covered in rose petals and a bunch of candles scattered across the room made the perfect romantic mood. It’s been months since you two have last seen each other. Dating an idol is putting up with tour and promotion schedules, which means limited dating time. But he made it. He worked things out with his managers so he could have free time to celebrate Valentine's together. You never doubted he would do it, he was a boyfriend out of a fairy tale.

You gently put the flowers in the vase on the nightstand as he took your suitcase away. As you two finished your tasks, you just looked at each other, and without saying a word you both knew what had to be done. Rushing to each other, he took you into his embrace like you were never meant to leave it. His lips crashing against your said all the unspoken words of longing and desire.

“Happy Valentine's Day, baby” he whispered between pecs. “I missed you so much”

His low voice sent chills down your spine

“I miss you too, Changgu” you beamed "happy valentine's"

He kissed you passionately, pushing your body against his, your hands exploring his toned back muscles. God, you missed that man.

“That is not all,” he broke the kiss “c’mon”

He took your hand and guided you to the bathroom.

It was luxurious and so spacious, a big window with a great view of the city, and the floor was high enough to not worry about privacy. The bathtub was already full with warm water and bubbles, the scented candles smelling amazingly like vanilla and cinnamon. Next to it, a side table with wine and chocolate-covered strawberries was meticulously arranged between more flowers.

“Shall we get in?” he places his hands on your shoulder, snaking in slowly down your back until reaching your dresse’s zipper, gently pulling it down as he planted kisses on your neck. You inevitably shivered, arousal shooting down your core.

He carefully undressed you, letting your dress pool at your feet, revealing your lack of underwear. Changgu chuckled amused, his hand caressed the curve of your bottom, and a slight squeeze took you by surprise

“You know just how I like it, huh?” he said and you bit your lip, reaching for him behind you.

You hooked your hand on his neck before turning around and kissing him slow and deeply. You could feel his smirk through the kiss, and you just knew that he was getting his dom on. You took the chance to start unbuttoning his dress shirt without breaking the kiss, and the feel of his warm skin against your bare body was overwhelmingly delicious. He held onto your waist. Although you didn’t have a small frame, his big strong hands made you feel petite.

“Why don’t you go ahead and get in, I’m gonna put us a glass of wine.” he said, the smirk not leaving his lips.

You followed his suggestion, enjoying the welcoming warm water and relaxing bubbles. He soon joined you, sitting across the thub, which was big enough to fit you two comfortably. The wine was the right kind of sweet just how you like it, and the strawberry, that he made sure to be the one to feed you, was perfectly harmonizing. The room was sensual and soothing, and you never felt so relaxed before. Changgu always knew how to treat you well.

Speaking of him, your eyes wouldn’t leave his figure. His freshly dyed hair was complimenting his tanned skin. His strong shoulders and chest had always been your favorite, it just made you want to touch him all over. You sipped your wine just admiring his beauty for a while, eager to just end all the pent up craving of him.

He noticed your stare.

“Like what you see, babe?” he took you out of your bubble, that smug smile still splattered across his face.

“Well, I guess I do” you winked back.

He moved closer to you, not breaking the eye contact, slowly like he was preying on you. All you could do was hold his gaze, but not daring to react, and you didn’t trust your words either. You were just hypnotized. His face was close enough that you could feel his breath touching your cheeks. His eyes trained on you, he took the glass from your hand and carefully placed it aside. Next, he grabbed you by the waist and in one swift motion he pulled you against him, so he sat back and you were now straddling him. Not missing the opportunity, he snaked his hand up your back, your foreheads touching now, you two just breathing each other in.

“You have no idea how much I wanted to have you like this again, it was all I could think about”

You held onto his shoulder, digging teasingly your nails in it. 

“You have me here, Changgu” you said his name slowly, knowing he loves when you do it. “What now?”

He didn’t wait time with words, his hand tugged your hair and closed the distance between your lips. His kiss was more eager now, hungry for yours. His other hand went down to your ass, guiding your hips to move as he pleases. He trailed hot wet kisses down your neck, finding your sweet spot and you couldn’t hold back your moans. You could already feel his member hardening against you. 

You reached down and stroke him slowly. Painfully slow. You just couldn’t resist being a tease, knowing that even though he likes to tell you what to do, in the end you knew just how to get what you wanted from him. And he loved it.

He pulled your hair stronger.

“Don’t get too confident, you know who’s in charge here” he said before biting your earlobe gently.

All you could respond was his name in a moan.

“Please, touch me” you plead

“All you had to do was ask” he answered with a mischievous glint in his eyes.

The feel of his fingers stroking you, the warm water surrounding you was so pleasing. You were already melting in his touch. You closed your eyes and arched your back, enjoying every second of it, when you felt his teeth grazing your nipples. He took it in his mouth, sucking and swirling his tongue around it, causing a million sensations to flow down your body. You hooked your fingers in his hair at the back of the head, encouraging him to keep going. You felt him hardening even more in your hands.

You couldn’t wait any longer, you needed to feel him inside you, so you started hinting, pushing your hips down to meet his’ as he bucked up to help with the friccion. He opened his mouth in small gasps against your breasts, so you knew he was liking it.

You pushed back, using his shoulders as leverage, to slightly lift yourself. There was no need to exchange words, Changgu knew what both of you wanted, so he wasted no time in aligning your hips as you sank down on him, earning a long slow moan out of him. You started grinding on him, biting your lip as an instinct. The steam from the hot water mixing your sweat was making everything more intense, and making Changgu look even better with his hair sticking to his forehead, as he watched you with hungry eyes. You two shared an intense kiss, his hands guiding once more your hips the way he liked it, always in control, grunting low and sexy and you bounced on his cock.

His hand soon slid down, grabbing your ass and dictating your movements, his lips not once leaving yours'. You started digging your nails in his shoulders involuntarily when he started hitting just the right spot inside you, and by now it was hard to keep your voice down, having to stop kissing because you couldn't hold back your noises.

"I missed those beautiful moans" he whispered right before nibbling your earlobe.

He started thrusting up, encouraged by your responses, and the water started splashing everywhere, but it wasn't like anybody was paying attention to that.

You took one hand away from him and started touching your clit, feeling your orgasm so close.

"Do you really think I'll let you cum that easy, baby girl?" Changgu said, smirking mischievously 

"Changgu, please" you cried, slowing down your hand so you wouldn't disobey him. You would never dare.

"You only get to do it when I said so." he said eloquently. 

"I'm so close, Changgu, please" 

"I'm gonna count to ten," he explained slowly, in between grunts "and then you can cum. You're gonna cum with me"

He didn't slow down or went any easier on you, his movements never lost pace. He kissed your neck, sucking and biting spots that you knew it would leave a mark later.

"One…" he whispered.

Vou moved your hand slowly, keeping yourself on edge, tugging the door on the back of his neck while he marked your skin.

"Two…"

You already felt like you were going to explode, but then he started pulling your hips down, getting deeper inside you. A scream escaped your lips and you almost lost balance, both of your hands returning to his shoulders for support.

"You're doing great, baby girl." He praised you, barely holding his moans himself "Three."

You buried your face in the crook of his neck, trying to control yourself. You dared teasing some light bites onto it, to which Changgu hissed before a long breathy moan.

"Four." He grunted, pulling your hair and forcing you to sit up arching your back, your breast bouncing on full display to him.

You grabbed the wrist of the hand who was holding your hair into a make-do ponytails and pulled it, showing you could take more.

"Five." 

Your other hand found your clit again, throbbing and eager to be touched.

"Six"

The countdown was speeding up and you knew that meant Changgu was getting closer too. You allowed yourself to moan loudly, repeating his name a few times, anything to drive him mad.

"Seven, baby" he panted "don't stop"

"Changgu, please, let me cum" you whined "let me cum all over your cock" 

"Soon, baby girl" he practically growled "Eight"

You sped up your movements on yourself and his thrusts became sloppier as he called the next number. 

He jointed foreheads with you, his heavy breath tickling your face and his lips brushing sensually against yours.

"You can cum now, baby" he finally said "ten."

It was all it took for your orgasm to hit you like an explosion, neither one minding the volume now, just sharing the simultaneous high of you two. You called his name like a prayer as you rode your climax until you were both finally done.

With him still inside you, you laid your whole front against him, hiding against the crook of his neck, only this time it was just for seeking comfort.

He ran his hands all over your back, softly caressing you. 

"You did so good, baby" he patted your head. 

You stayed in silence, just enjoying his warm embrace on you and catching your breath. You trailed with soft kisses your way to his lips, which he gladly attributed.

"So" he said after one last peck "will you be my valentine?" 

"Always and forever, my love"