#i’ve always preferred melee fighting so I would have loved to see this go down lol

[lesbianlovelanguage]

Thats a good answer for saving Billy. When I picture it, I would have liked for Steve to have had a big hero moment.

SO the part in the mall where everyone is blowing the fireworks comes. Steve sees Billy and El from up top and grabs his bat. Robin tries to stop him but he tells her he needs to save El, this is his moment to redeem himself.

in the time it takes Steve to make it down to them El has managed to bring Billy back out and Billy is standing up to the giant goo monster. Steve starts to go for El but she reaches for Billy, so Steve instinctively goes to help.

When the second tentacle comes for Billy. Steve bats it away, he swiftly ducks down under the tentacle Billy is holding and swings on the third that was about to hit.

Billy looks up at Steve shocked. Steve raises the bat up high and crushes the tentacle Billy is holding. They look at each other, Billy is super conflicted and Steve just looks proud. Fireworks lighting up the background.

Then a tentacle swipes at Steve sending him flying. Steve slams into the wall and is knocked unconscious. Dustin, Robin, and Max all scream out his name, this snaps Billy out of his shock.

Looking around Billy spots a crow bar and picks it up, Max grabs a stray metal bar and Mike starts to haul EL away. Steve starts to wake up, he looks up and tries to scramble away from a tentacle that is heading straight for him. Billy knocks it down and Max swings on one that's heading for El. Steve gets up and grabs his bat, they all fight together.

They switch back to Hopper and Joyce for their part. When they switch back they show two tentacles heading for Max, she gasps thinking one is going to hit her, but Billy knocks one down and grabs the other stopping it just inches from her face. 

Steve comes running and swings, but a tentacle grabs his bat with it's mouth and snaps it. Max swings at another tentacle that tries to attack Billy but it flings her away. Steve grabs the crow bar and stabs it into the tentacle Billy is still holding.

The monster reels away screeching. It switches back to Joyce and Hopper. When it switches back tentacles are heading straight for Steve and Billy, they are defenseless. Max and El scream for Billy, Dustin and Robin scream for Steve. JUst before the tentacles hit Joyce flips the switch.

Wow that's a lot! But, I’ve thought about it A LOT. lmao 

Oh this would have been really cool too!!!

[mrsjadecurtiss]

What do you think of Robert? What are your opinions on him, do you think that if the war never happened that he'd still go down this self destructive path?

I think Robert was fundamentally not made to be a king - He has the charisma and the looks and is an able warrior, but his negative character traits are indulged and enhanced by his position and led him down an almost unavoidable path.

Robert is someone who above all wants to enjoy and live an easy life:

"You need to come south," Robert told him. "You need a taste of summer before it flees. [...] Flowers everywhere, the markets bursting with food, the summerwines so cheap and so good that you can get drunk just breathing the air. Everyone is fat and drunk and rich." He laughed and slapped his own ample stomach a thump. "And the girls, Ned!" he exclaimed, his eyes sparkling. "I swear, women lose all modesty in the heat.[...]" The king laughed happily. Robert Baratheon had always been a man of huge appetites, a man who knew how to take his pleasures. - Eddard I, aGoT

"Robert wanted smiles and cheers, always, so he went where he found them, to his friends and his whores. Robert wanted to be loved." - Sansa IV, aCoK

He has just enough of a moral understanding to at least know when he is doing wrong and to even feel bad about it at times, but not enough to actually change anything about himself.

The rage was gone from him now; in his eyes Ned saw something sad and scared. "I should not have hit [Cersei]. That was not … that was not kingly." He stared down at his hands, as if he did not quite know what they were. - Eddard X, aGoT

Robert desires to have an easy life, he wants to be loved, he wants to have fun, but he does not want to deal with the hard and unpleasant things. In times of crisis, he wants to take the easy way out, and he prefers to avoid uncomfortable truths.

Lord Tywin stared at him as if he had lost his wits. "[...] When I laid those bodies before the throne, no man could doubt that we had forsaken House Targaryen forever. And Robert's relief was palpable. As stupid as he was, even he knew that Rhaegar's children had to die if his throne was ever to be secure. Yet he saw himself as a hero, and heroes do not kill children." - Tyrion VI, aSoS

"Well, now I know Jaime's dark sin, and the matter can be forgotten. I am heartily sick of secrets and squabbles and matters of state, Ned." - Eddard II, aGoT

"Most likely the king did not know," Littlefinger said. "It would not be the first time. Our good Robert is practiced at closing his eyes to things he would rather not see." - Eddard IV, aGoT

He feels most comfortable when he is surrounded by people who love him and know how to handle him/want the best for him, and steer him onto the right path in a way where he can still feel good about himself.

"These are difficult times. I need good men about me. Men like Jon Arryn. He served as Lord of the Eyrie, as Warden of the East, as the Hand of the King. He will not be easy to replace." - Eddard I, aGoT

In an environment that works against him, or goes against his wishes even if it is for the better, it creates a destructive energy in him. He cannot stand dissent to his wishes because it robs him of a pleasure he desires, and creates unwanted conflict. He also cannot handle constructive criticism because it makes him confront unpleasant truths - he always wants the easiest path with the least tension. If he is presented with a situation that strains his limits as there is no amiable solution to a difficult/disturbing problem, his reaction is a toxic one; turning to rage and violence even towards his own child.

Not for the first time, he wondered what he was doing here and why he had come. He was no Jon Arryn, to curb the wildness of his king and teach him wisdom. Robert would do what he pleased, as he always had, and nothing Ned could say or do would change that. - Eddard II, aGoT

He may act against what he knows is right, because it is the easiest route; like when he has the wolf Lady killed to please Cersei:

“A costly pelt,” Robert grumbled. “I want no part of this, woman. You can damn well buy your furs with Lannister gold.” [...] "We have a wolf," Cersei Lannister said. Her voice was very quiet, but her green eyes shone with triumph. It took them all a moment to comprehend her words, but when they did, the king shrugged irritably. "As you will. Have Ser Ilyn see to it." - “Robert, you cannot mean this,” Ned protested. The king was in no mood for more argument. “Enough, Ned, I will hear no more." - Eddard III, aGoT

"I am sorry for your girl, Ned. Truly. About the wolf, I mean. My son was lying, I'd stake my soul on it." - Eddard VII, aGoT

And when Ned reprimands him about Daenerys he will not hear dissent, even though he knows deep down that it is wrong:

He gave the king a long cool look. “Would [the man who spared Barristan] were here today.” Robert had shame enough to blush. “It was not the same,” he complained. “Ser Barristan was a knight of the Kingsguard.” - “Whereas Daenerys is a fourteen-year-old girl.”

[...] “Not another word. Have you forgotten who is king here?” - “No, Your Grace,” Ned replied. “Have you?” - “Enough!” the king bellowed. “I am sick of talk. I’ll be done with this, or be damned."

[...] “I will not be part of murder, Robert. Do as you will, but do not ask me to fix my seal to  it.” For a moment Robert did not seem to understand what Ned was saying. Defiance was not a dish he tasted often. Slowly his face changed as comprehension came. [...] “You are the King’s Hand, Lord Stark. You will do as I command you, or I’ll find me a Hand who will.” - “I wish him every success.” Ned [...] laid [his badge of office] on the table in front of the king, saddened by the memory of the man who had pinned it on him, the friend he had loved. “I thought you a better man than this, Robert. I thought we had made a nobler king.” Robert’s face was purple. “Out,” he croaked, choking on his rage. “[...] Go, run back to Winterfell. And make certain I never look on your face again, or I swear, I’ll have your head on a spike!” - Eddard VIII, aGoT

“Gods have mercy,” he muttered, swallowing his agony. “The girl. Daenerys. Only a child, you were right . . . that’s why, the girl . . . the gods sent the boar . . . sent to punish me . . .” - Eddard XIII, aGoT

Robert is a man who always wants it easy, he wants his demands to always be fulfilled, to be loved and have fun without dealing with the bad things; but an important theme that is repeated over and over in asoiaf is that you can only act good if you are willing to face the bad that may come with it, and if you cannot live with the consequences, your action might not be justified.*

Bran thought about it. "Can a man still be brave if he's afraid?" - "That is the only time a man can be brave." - Bran I, aGoT

"Sacrifice . . . is never easy, Davos. Or it is no true sacrifice." - Davos VI, aSoS

"The blood of the First Men still flows in the veins of the Starks, and we hold to the belief that the man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. If you would take a man's life, you owe it to him to look into his eyes and hear his final words. And if you cannot bear to do that, then perhaps the man does not deserve to die." - Bran I, aGoT

Ned stood, gently disengaging himself from Sansa's grasp. All the weariness of the past four days had returned to him. "Do it yourself then, Robert," he said in a voice cold and sharp as steel. "At least have the courage to do it yourself." - Robert looked at Ned with flat, dead eyes and left without a word, his footsteps heavy as lead. Silence filled the hall. - Eddard III, aGoT

This is why putting him on the throne was poison - all the power in the world, and noone who would dare go against his wishes. It indulges all of Robert's worst traits, and buries anything he had inside him that was salvageable.

Ser Barristan Selmy spoke up. "Your Grace," he said, "it is not seemly that the king should ride into the melee. It would not be a fair contest. Who would dare strike you?" - "Ser Barristan is right. There's not a man in the Seven Kingdoms who would dare risk your displeasure by hurting you." - Eddard VII, aGoT

I am surrounded by flatterers and fools, the king had insisted. Ned looked down the council table and wondered which were the flatterers and which the fools. He thought he knew already. - Eddard IV, aGoT

And Robert knows it - he knows being a king isn't for him, that he doesn't enjoy the actual work that goes into governing, that he doesn't have the personality for such politics or to deal with the people involved, and that he would much rather spend his time enjoying life and doing what he loves...

"Look at what kinging has done to me. Gods, too fat for my armor, how did it ever come to this? [...] I swear to you, I was never so alive as when I was winning this throne, or so dead as now that I’ve won it." - Eddard VII, aGoT

"I swear to you, sitting a throne is a thousand times harder than winning one. Laws are a tedious business and counting coppers is worse. And the people … there is no end of them. I sit on that damnable iron chair and listen to them complain until my mind is numb and my ass is raw. They all want something, money or land or justice. The lies they tell … and my lords and ladies are no better. I am surrounded by flatterers and fools. It can drive a man to madness, Ned. Half of them don't dare tell me the truth, and the other half can't find it. There are nights I wish we had lost at the Trident. Ah, no, not truly, but …" - Eddard I, aGoT

Robert groaned with good-humored impatience. "If I wanted to honor you, I'd let you retire. I am planning to make you run the kingdom and fight the wars while I eat and drink and wench myself into an early grave." - Eddard I, aGoT

"Let me tell you a secret, Ned. More than once, I have dreamed of giving up the crown. Take ship for the Free Cities with my horse and my hammer, spend my time warring and whoring, that's what I was made for. The sellsword king, how the singers would love me." - Eddard VII, aGoT

And yet he doesn't do anything about it and keeps staying at the position he hates - he does not want to deal with the uncomfortable consequences that would come with upsetting the status quo, or making changes to his own personality and going through growth, or confronting ugly truths about himself in a productive way, etc etc.

He does make a talk of changes at times during aGoT, and seems to have a sense of responsibility about his Job, but as it is his desire for changes came too late, and what responsibility he felt mostly served to paralyze him in place.

"The sellsword king, how the singers would love me. You know what stops me? The thought of Joffrey on the throne, with Cersei standing behind him whispering in his ear. My son. How could I have made a son like that, Ned?" - Eddard VII, aGoT

"I'm still young, and now that you're here with me, things will be different. We'll make this a reign to sing of, and damn the Lannisters to seven hells." - Eddard VII, aGoT

In a way Joffrey is to Robert what Ramsay is to Roose: an exploration of the inherent flaw in their way of life, demonstrated in the most extreme case. In Joffrey's case, it shows what happens to give someone unlimited power with noone daring to oppose them.

Do you think that if the war never happened that he'd still go down this self destructive path?

It's a little unclear which war you mean, so I will briefly touch on several points:

There could have been ideal circumstances where he might have worked out as a king, if he was surrounded by people who know the perfect way to deal with him and make him work past his flaws (intuitively doing the work of a modern therapist), but the average life is not ideal and grrm shows the realistic fate of a man like Robert.

I think by the time Ned arrived it was sadly too late to change - maybe if the Lannisters didn't exist, or this or that event hadn't happened, but Grrm shows that most of what lead to Robert's downfall was in the end caused by himself. Cersei kills him because she came to despise the man he was, and for good reason as he abused her during all her marriage - and while he has some scenes of feeling bad or even apologizing for it, he never made any attempts to actually change the terrible way he was treating her.

If Robert's Rebellion never happened, he would have probably made an able enough Lord of Storm's End; delegating his "boring" administrative duties to his advisors and maester, enjoying the privileges of highborn life, and having just enough responsibility to feel like the alpha male of his society yet not enough to do as lasting damage as he did for the throne. He would not have been the best Lord, but sadly there are many worse in Westeros, since the entire dynastic ruling system is inherently flawed. If he would have been a better person depends on who he is surrounded with, if circumstances would have motivated him to change, or if perhaps his position of power and outward influences would still just have indulged him into the man he was in aGoT. Ultimately, there are a lot of butterfly effects leading to different results that i’m sure have been explored in many fics.

"Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man's nature." - Eddard IX, aGoT

This was the boy he had grown up with, he thought; this was the Robert Baratheon he'd known and loved. If he could prove that the Lannisters were behind the attack on Bran, prove that they had murdered Jon Arryn, this man would listen. Then Cersei would fall, and the Kingslayer with her, and if Lord Tywin dared to rouse the west, Robert would smash him as he had smashed Rhaegar Targaryen on the Trident. He could see it all so clearly. - Eddard VII, aGoT    

What do you think of Robert?

Since i am someone who frequently enjoys morally grey and villainous characters, despite his many negative traits i have a fondness of Robert; I think he is an interesting character and very human in his flaws, and there is a lot of melancholy to his story that makes me somber about him even if it obviously does not excuse his bad actions. I also think he has a great character design that's fun to draw and some fun boisterous scenes, and some of his positive qualities remind me of people i know.

*Stannis is an interesting character as Robert’s brother, as he is the opposite to him in this regard, as well as in many aspects of their personality and even their outward presentation (like how Stannis crops his beard short to contrast Robert’s wild one)

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

Top 5 Reasons Javier Garcia’s Pretty Great

Of all the games in TWDG, A New Frontier seems to get the most shit. Stick around this fandom long enough and that’ll become apparently pretty quick, especially on other platforms such as reddit and instagram... and y’know, I get it. ANF is far from perfect, parts of the storyline go no where and characters don’t get the development they should have, a lot of people were upset that Clementine wasn’t the main playable protagonist, and certain character models look like... well, they look like potatoes. 

Hell, I’ve talked to some people who flat out say they don’t even consider ANF as part of the canon and skip it when they replay the series, which.... harsh, but you do you. However, if you do skip over ANF for whatever personal reasons you have, you are missing out on what I would consider the best part of that game: Javier Garcia. 

I love Javi, and I will stand by the fact that he’s a pretty damn good playable protagonist. I just wish more love and time was put into developing ANF to give him an even better story but y’know... Telltale was goin’ through shit, so we got this... 

But, I still wanna talk about how great I think Javi is so c’mon, let’s take a walk. 

5. Javi’s relationship with David

Now this might come off as a weird one, especially if your Javi has a more hostile relationship with David. Even so, I find the dynamic between Javi and David to be one of the more compelling aspects of ANF and I wish it was more front and center than it is but y’know. 

So we got Javi, who is the younger, more irresponsible brother who became this hotshot baseball star only to lose it all by gambling. Then you got older brother David who is a military man with a couple kids and a second wife, and he’s always felt a little overshadowed by Javi. This creates this dynamic of brothers who do love each other, but don’t always know how to communicate and confide in one another and it can lead to a lot of tension or hostility.

The route I usually take with a Javier who tries his best with David, who wants this connection despite everything, who made the promise to their father to look out for David and be there for him, to stand with him when he needs it, y’know? 

Some stand out moments for me is during the baseball flashback when David’s trying to open up about something, but struggles because Javi isn’t taking a hint about the serious nature, when they stand together on the roof, and the last conversation we see between them if David survives. 

Oh, and ya can’t forget the “I love you”’s when David is two seconds away from murdering Javi... that’s the good shit. 

And y’know, on the flip side where Javi is against David every step of the way, you can still argue that acts as a more tragic yet compelling story of two brothers who never saw eye to eye, never tried to, and it ended in tragedy... I personally don’t prefer this route, but to each their own. 

Again, this is at #5 because it’s not handled the greatest and it’s a bit of an unpopular choice.... but I don’t care, Javi and his relationship with David is one of my favorites. 

4. He’s pretty charming, isn’t he?

I’m sorry, I can’t help it.... if a charming character can make me laugh, then I almost always end up loving them. Javier Garcia is so damn funny and I love him for it. 

Yeah, ANF is a mess but this dude makes it so much better with his dialogue, a great performance by Jeff Schine, great facial expressions, and just an overall charismatic air around him. 

He’s just super likable, okay? Even when you play him as a total bastard, I have a hard time not enjoying his presence. I’ll be honest, if Javi wasn’t the playable protagonist or if he was this bland, watered down version of himself... I might be one of those people who skip over ANF. 

He’s easily one of my favorite parts of this game and one of the few redeeming things about it. 

3. His growth as a character

Like I mentioned in #5, when we first meet Javi he’s this irresponsible ex-professional baseball player who wasn’t around, even though his father was dying from cancer. After his father dies and he runs to try and make it home in time... he’s too late and David and their mother are pretty upset with him. 

And then his father turns into a walker, and the apocalypse happens. Javi is now trying to survive with Kate, Gabe, and Mariana while everything goes to hell around them. But for someone known to not be around or to skip out when things get a little tough, Javi doesn’t abandon them. Nope, he stays with them for years, traveling around and surviving, making sure they have what they need. 

By the end of the game? Javi’s proved to be a leader, proved that he’s better than he once was. Again, this is ANF so this growth isn’t super smooth or the greatest, but damn it, Javi makes it work. 

He and his family, no matter the combo you got, are staying in Richmond and they’re going to try to start over and rebuild it, make it better than it was.... which I can only assume they succeeded because after that they were never heard from again. 

Also, Javi is constantly having shit thrown his way and somehow he manages to pull through. 

So good job, Javi, you did it. 

2. Javi’s got a lot of force

Listen... Javi is so fun to play as. Like okay, I know that Telltale games don’t have the most complex combat system... you literally just push the buttons as they appear on screen. But I don’t care because Javi makes that fun. 

Javi really puts all of his weight into each hit and you feel it. I don’t know how to explain it, but there’s something satisfying about the way Javi fights with a melee weapon, and it’s not something you feel when you play as Lee or Clementine. You do get it a few times when you place as Michonne in the mini-series, but even then, I would argue that Javi did it better. 

It’s especially prominent towards the end of ep5 if you go after David and Gabe,  and Javi’s on this motorcycle with his damn bat knocking over walker after walker until he finds them... then you get all this intense force when Javi is just gunning and beating down walker after walker to get to the vehicle Gabe and David are trapped in. I love it so much, it’s easily one of my favorite moments in ANF. 

Don’t get me wrong, I have fun playing as Lee and Clementine, but Javier Garcia hits different, y’know? 

1.  He’s really trying his best to care for everyone, okay? 

When we think of Lee as a playable protagonist, we tend to think about how wise he was, how he always seemed to know what he was doing and how much he was willing to sacrifice for Clementine... and when we think of Clem as a playable protagonist in S2, we’ve got this sad little girl who gets punished no matter what she does, she’s smart and often underestimated, but she makes plenty of mistakes which she learns from.

And then we have Javi who has a bit of both in him. He’s older and can have his moments of wisdom [like with Gabe and Clem] but he also has plenty of mistakes he’s gotta learn from and sometimes no matter what he does, everything goes to hell... but Javi does manage to stand out on his own among these two. 

Javi does what he can, he tries his hardest to look after these kids even though he never planned to be a father figure, he works with Kate to make sure they’re safe. When he fucks up, he tries to make things right... even though it doesn’t always work out. He loves Gabe and Mariana, and you can see and feel his heartbreak when he’s the one to bury Mari after she’s killed.... and now he has Gabe, who’s hurting, and he does what he can to make sure he doesn’t meet the same fate which.... sometimes doesn’t work out depending on your ending.

I just-- he’s trying, okay? Javi is trying his best and I love him for it.  

---

Honorable Mentions

-Javi has some of the best deaths/fails moments... seriously, I could watch him confidently run right into those metal stairs and fall to his doom a hundred times. -He’s a literal disaster bi.   -He fucking loves pudding and I mean, who doesn’t? Y’know?  -His bromance with Tripp is pretty good until Tripp dies for death quota reasons. 

---

So what are your thoughts on Javier Garcia? Do you agree with these reasons, or do you have any to add? Lemme know, it’s always fun to have character discussions.

Have any suggestions for future T5F’s? Feel free to send ‘em in! :D

Next week’s T5F

[robininthelabyrinth]

Fire and Light (ao3) - on tumblr: part 1, part 2, part 3

- Chapter 4 -

Nie Mingjue attended his first discussion conference as a ward of the Wen sect rather than a son of the Nie sect and found it more or less the same misery as it had always been, except with the extra twist of everyone looking at him with pity in their eyes.

The Jiang sect averted their eyes the way they always did. For all his talk about attempting the impossible, the only impossible thing Jiang Fengmian had ever dreamt of was a peaceful life, and his wife was strong in power but bitter and vicious in spirit, parceling out her love and sympathy in small dollops as if she thought she would run out if she gave too much of it away. That being said, their indifference and purely superficial show of sympathy was still better than the steely eyes of the Jin sect, which looked right at him with nothing but empty calculation, as if weighing him to see what use they could get out of him.

Lan Qiren, at least, looked genuinely upset to see him standing there in Wen colors, a frown creasing his brow with distress. Nie Mingjue wondered cynically if the Lan sect would have preferred that he and his brother be dead as martyrs instead of living symbols of Wen cruelty that, despite all their high-flying talk of rules and ethics, the Lan sect would do absolutely nothing about.

Still, he had been the man’s student once, so he bowed his head politely and called him teacher when Lan Qiren came to speak with him during one of the rest periods between speeches.

“Are you well?” Lan Qiren asked. “You are not being mistreated…?”

“Would it make a difference if I was?” Nie Mingjue asked. When Lan Qiren flinched, he shrugged. “In that case, honorable teacher, I’m fine. If you’ll excuse me, I need to go find my brother; he needs to be properly prepared for the competitions later.”

A flimsy lie, intentionally so, and Nie Mingjue wondered if he really had picked up something of Qishan Wen cruelty after all. It was only that it hurt him to see them there, standing free and saying nothing – the Lan had once been the closest allies of the Nie sect, just as the Jiang and the Jin were often paired together – and he couldn’t quite resist wanting to make them hurt, too, no matter how much he knew it was beneath him.

You were friends with my father and they murdered him, he wanted to shout. Murdered him, and I had to watch him die twice over! How can I be well? How can you dare to ask that of me, have you been well, as if I were still free to speak my mind, to be straightforward and honest, without having to always think of the pain that will follow later?

Maybe Wen Ruohan’s lessons really were starting to sink in, he thought bitterly, and hated himself for it.

He still didn’t apologize to Lan Qiren, but he did go to find Nie Huaisang, making the lie into truth. There wasn’t any point in registering his useless brother in any of the physical competitions, of course, but at every discussion conference there were also smaller competitions in the arts – calligraphy, painting, poetry – and Nie Mingjue was more than willing to lose a little of the pocket money he received each month (pointlessly, since he wasn’t allowed to leave the main manor or visit the markets of the Nightless City for fear that he would try to run away or make a scene) in betting on his brother’s success in those.

He also bet on Wen Qing in the competition of doctors’ apprentices, and Wen Ning in alchemy, archery and weiqi; he even put some money on Wen Chao for mathematics and told him so.

Wen Chao gaped at him. “Me? Mathematics?”

“You always answer those questions faster than anyone else,” Nie Mingjue pointed out, and patted him on the head the way Wen Chao not-so-secretly liked. “Do your best. If you place in the top twenty, I’ll have the kitchens make something sweet that you won’t have to share, something just for you.”

“…could I share it anyway? If I wanted to.”

“Of course,” Nie Mingjue said, pleased by the unexpected question and happy to show it. “It’ll be yours. You can do anything you want with it, even share.”

There weren’t even a full forty people planning to compete in mathematics, so he was moderately confident that Wen Chao – who wasn’t as stupid as he sometimes let himself think he was – would be able to place somewhere decent, and even if he didn’t Nie Mingjue wouldn’t hold it against him. He wouldn’t demand perfection and then ignore it the way Wen Ruohan did.

“Mingjue-xiong!”

Nie Mingjue turned to see Lan Xichen hurrying over, insofar as the Lan sect ever hurried. Lan Xichen’s younger brother was probably also getting ready for the arts competition – the two of them would undoubtedly dominate the juniors’ music competition, as they always did, and probably many of the other juniors’ categories as well – so it wasn’t a surprise to see him there, but it was still nice. They’d only spent a few months together during the summer Nie Mingjue had spent at the Cloud Recesses, his father trying to get him away from politics for at least a short time, but they’d been friendly back then, maybe even friends, even though Lan Xichen was a couple of years younger than him.

“It’s good to see you,” Lan Xichen said, his voice warm. “I wanted to write you a letter, but everyone said it was a bad idea.”

“It probably is,” Nie Mingjue admitted. He didn’t even know what he’d say in response to such a letter – what he was allowed to say, and what he wasn’t. “It’s good to see you, too. Are you competing in the fights later on?”

“I am, though I’ve heard that the main competition this year – swordsmanship – is going to be melee style, which means you’re certain to wipe the floor with everyone. But I can at least hope to place, if nothing else.”

Melee style favored the saber and the aggressive style of the Nie, so Lan Xichen was probably right – it wasn’t as though the Nie sect had sent any disciples, given that it was still officially in mourning for its sect leader. Nie Mingjue should be in mourning, should be refusing to eat meat since he was too young for the obligation to refrain from sexual congress to matter much to him, but it had been pretty clear from his first day at the Nightless City that he would either eat meat or have it forced down his throat. In the end, he’d given up on all the rest of it as well. He could mourn later, when he was free.

Assuming he’d ever be free again.

“Pity you can’t bet on a competition you’re participating in,” he teased, and Lan Xichen did him the grace of at least pretending to smile back. “Maybe you can get ahead of me in archery instead.”

Lan Xichen snorted at that. “I’m still counted among the juniors for archery, while you’re with the seniors,” he reminded him. “But somehow I don’t think that would make much of a difference.”

“I’m not that good at archery,” Nie Mingjue protested cheerfully. “Besides, I haven’t been allowed to practice it in months, not since –”

He stopped, realizing what he’d just said, and what he’d been about to say, from the way Lan Xichen’s face turned pale.

“Don’t think about it,” he advised his friend, turning his head away. He didn’t want to see Lan Xichen’s face like that, all sick with grief. “I try not to.”

Lan Xichen squeezed his hands. “You’re still yourself,” he said. “As long as you can keep true to that, nothing else matters.”

Nie Mingjue hoped he was right.

-

Nie Mingjue won the melee but lost in archery to Wen Xu, which was a result that pleased them both – Nie Mingjue was still growing and didn’t have the arm strength necessary to fully pierce the target, which gave Wen Xu’s equally accurate hits the small advantage needed to win.

“You’ll win it next time,” Wen Xu told him, and Nie Mingjue shrugged. “You will! You’ve grown nearly a quarter chi in the time that I’ve known you, and you weren’t short to start with.”

“And maybe next time the fighting won’t be melee,” Nie Mingjue pointed out. “There are formats that favor the sword more.”

Not to mention that next time, the main event wouldn’t be the sword, since discussion conferences generally rotated between the various martial skills.

Wen Xu rolled his eyes at him, though, clearly disregarding his words, and Nie Mingjue didn’t disagree - despite his words, he was proud of what he’d achieved.

He was even more proud of the younger children, though: Wen Qing was first in her competition and pleased as a well-fed cat about it, Nie Huaisang had placed second in calligraphy and fifth in poetry, and Wen Ning had gotten seventh in alchemy, his best result in years given his usual anxiety about performing in public. Wen Chao was the biggest surprise, having actually managed to come in fourth in mathematics, and everyone crowded around him, congratulating him, even as he stumbled around in a daze.

“He’d never tried to do well before,” Wen Xu said, catching Nie Mingjue’s gaze and his train of thought with it. “There wasn’t any point, since Father doesn’t care about the smaller competitions, only the main event, and mathematics is never a main event.”

“Surely the fun of winning is motivation enough?” Nie Mingjue asked. “He did well enough this year without advance study that he’d be sure to place in the top three in the next discussion conference if he really put in some effort.”

“He didn’t actually think he’d win,” Wen Xu said dryly. “He just didn’t want you to lose money.”

Nie Mingjue was about to explain that he didn’t care about the money – he wasn’t allowed to go spend it, as Wen Xu knew, and he didn’t see much point in hoarding it when it could be taken away just as easily as it was given – but then the children saw them coming and ran over.

Nie Huaisang in the lead, shouting, “Da-ge! Da-ge! You won!”

“Of course he won,” Wen Chao snapped at him, but in a good-natured, excited sort of way. “Who else did you think was going to win?”

“We all bet on you,” Wen Qing told him.

“Oh, come now,” he protested. “Someone should have bet on Wen Xu!”

“I would have told them off if they had,” Wen Xu said. “Well done. How much did we win?”

“We? Wen Xu! You can’t bet on your own matches!”

“Oh no,” Wen Xu said drolly. “Is that so? My mistake. I must have missed that.”

“Can’t you at least try to make it sound convincing…?”

-

Wen Ruohan was pleased with the results of the discussion conference. He made them stand up and recite their accomplishments at dinner, nodding as they did, and when he was done treating them like dancing monkeys, he told Wen Xu, “Next time, you come in first,” and swept out without another word.

“What a shitheel,” Nie Mingjue said, a little blankly. To not even give a single word of praise…!

“He can hear you,” Wen Chao hissed, horrified, glancing at the door.

“He was talking about someone else,” Nie Huaisang said quickly. “That person back at the conference – you remember?”

“Of course, of course, yes, I remember,” Wen Qing said. “That person. He was definitely a shitheel.”

Nie Mingjue felt the warmth of their affection, and it only made Wen Ruohan’s negligence rub his heart the wrong way even more.

“You all did wonderfully,” he told them, since someone should. “And I have no doubt that you will do even better at the next conference. You should be proud of yourselves. I’m certainly proud of you.”

He remembered that much, at least, when he woke up two days later, the magnitude of the beating he’d received for his impertinence having apparently knocked the rest of the day cleanly out of his head. There was some more afterwards that he’d said, apparently, but he remembered the important point, and he didn’t want to press any further; the others looked so miserable already.

“Maybe this’ll teach you a lesson,” Wen Xu said, and flinched when Wen Chao kicked him in the shins and ran away sobbing. “I didn’t - I just meant…”

“No, no, I understand,” Nie Mingjue said. The advice had been meant kindly, even if it was phrased badly.

Wen Qing huffed. “I bet you don’t,” she said, rubbing her nose, her own eyes suspiciously red. “What is it exactly you think you’ve learned?”

“Wait until he’s out of earshot to call him a –”

“I am going to smother you with your own robes,” Nie Huaisang announced. “Or at least gag you for your own good. Who’s with me?”

Nie Mingjue raised his one hand that still worked in surrender at the array of murderous glares in front of him. “Don’t attack me, I’m injured?”

No one seemed very impressed with that argument.

“You can’t do that again,” Wen Ning said quietly. His fingers were tight on the blanket. “Okay? You need to be more careful.”

“I don’t know if I can be,” Nie Mingjue said honestly. He was born with a mind as straightforward as the clean slice of a saber – what he felt, he thought; what he thought, he said. He was trying to learn politics and diplomacy, but it was hard on him, difficult. He was not and would not ever be a subtle man. “I’ll try, though.”

“Good,” Wen Xu said. “We need you to stick around.”

Nie Mingjue wasn’t sure why – he felt more and more extraneous these days, with no sect of his own to inherit and little purpose to life other than his determination that Nie Huaisang, and now the others, live as good a life as possible under Wen Ruohan’s endless tyranny – but he nodded agreeably.

They didn’t seem quite satisfied with that.

[fantasyinvader]

Beat Binding Blade tonight

So, right off the bat I'm going to admit. I abused the arena and save states. This is a really, really hard game. And while I enjoyed it, I'm going to give three things I didn't like about it.

1)Enemy reinforcements arrive at the end of the player phase, and can attack during the enemy phase. That is unfair, especially when I assume that parking a unit on the spawn point will prevent them (It doesn't) or my healer just happens to be in the area. I like difficult games, but when I fail at something in those I want to feel like it's my fault for doing so. When I die in Bloodborne or lose a unit in Fates Conquest, I'm willing to accept it because I felt it was fair (plus I'll just restart the chapter in Conquest anyway). I could have not died if I had played a little better. This game was not fair when it did that.

2)The supports. A lot of the stuff about the characters is locked away in their supports, since this is one of the old Fire Emblems where it throws units your way because it's assuming you didn't reset the game when one died. They don't get cutscenes to be important, and with only five supports per character (barring if one dies, then any unit that had supports with gets those supports back). And even then, getting an A rank doesn't pair up any units except for Roy. So you don't get to play love doctor here, it's only really there for the stat boosts. But in the case of my boy, he needs those supports in order for his character to fully come through.

3)I can take 8 units into the final battle, and they're the only ones who get full ending cards. Everyone else just gets a single line. Kinda weak if I use someone like Fir for most of the game, but bench her at the end to give Rutget Durandal.

Even with my cheating, I still enjoyed this game. Mostly for the story. When Fire Emblem first appeared in Smash Brothers Melee, as a kid it instantly caught my attention. Roy and Marth just looked so cool with their swords and armor (true fact: My favorite design for Link is the Skyward Sword design, simply because it has chainmail under the tunic. I get it, the tunic is iconic but SS's Link just looks practical), and I preferred Roy because I though his fully-charged shield breaker hurting him was cool. I even keep a Cipher card of his in my wallet for good luck. I wanted to know what Fire Emblem was, what kind of game it was. My friend showed me a screenshot of the upcoming GBA game in Nintendo power, which I got for the following Christmas (sadly, I didn't get Sacred Stones as I got a PS2 the following year). I loved that game, but the idea that I was playing as Roy's father always was a bit of a sour point for me. It's because of that game when I got a 2DS a decade later, because I wanted to game but kept getting pulled away from my console, I eventually went back to Fire Emblem.

And, I'm going to admit, Binding Blade hurt me because I played Blazing Blade first. It really did. I mean, Hector dies early on, Lyn is presumably dead hell a lot of my old comrades probably died in this war, Eliwood's wife dies shortly after they are married while Eliwood is more useless than ever, the kid I saved in Bern becomes a genocidal maniac, and the fact that the characters of Blazing Blade kinda caused this to happen by releasing the seals on the Legendary Weapons in their own quest... It kinda bugs me that the Legendary Weapons I used in Blazing Blade are in their trap filled storage places. Like, who returned them there? And if I have characters from that game returning in Binding, I find it strange they don't comment on needing them again. But this is a case of the game trying to be a prequel to a story that wasn't written with it in mind.

But at the end of the day, one thing just kept popping up in my mind. Binding Blade is the antithesis of the Crimson Flower route from Three Houses. I know they said Genealogy of the Holy War was an inspiration, but I can't help it. I've seen so many people try to praise that said route as some sort of denouncement of the rest of the franchise. That it's about putting power in the hands of the people (it's not) instead of having some Lord be the good king. Granted, the Mandate of Heaven seems like it's a running theme of the series, so without understanding what that is I can understand why people don't grasp what that part of the message. But Binding Blade, it just hit so many things on the nose that I needed to say something.

So without further adieu, I'm just going to bring up a few points.

With Regards to Humanity

It's interesting how both Zephiel and Edelgard come at this from different angles. Sure, they both lead wars of conquest across the entire continent, and I'm guessing Zeph didn't tell his troops what he was planning on doing once he won so there's likely a level of deception going on there as well. He really doesn't care for his fellow man, and the game goes out of it's way to show us why. Hatred, greed, or even selling out your people in the name of self-preservation. The game doesn't shy away from showing us any of this, saying that it's wrong and thus why Roy has to kick some guy's arse. Zephiel knows this, but in Edelgard's case? She's out there fighting for absolute power, destroying anyone who won't bend the knee to her while those who do out of self-preservation like House Gloucester are rewarded for it.

In essence, Edelgard is everything Zephiel saw wrong with the human race, she is why he felt we needed to go extinct. The very things he condemns humanity for are the things she reward. Zephiel would have actually handed over power to those he felt deserved it if he had won, whereas Edelgard is demonstrably shown to hold onto power until near the end of her life. One wants humanity dead, the other wants all the dragons. They even oppose each other in their classes. Edelgard is based on the red emperor archetype, she wears red, her class is the heavily-armored Emperor and her weapon of choice is an axe. Zephiel is a king, armoed but wearing purple and he uses a sword in battle.

Even if they both have screwed up history with their family's due to their father's inability to keep it in his pants, they're both presented as villains despite being ideologically opposed which goes to show with Fire Emblem the method IS the message.

Ancient Wars, Super Powered Weapons and Lies.

War of Heroes vs. The Scouring. The former is an event where the full details are shrouded in mystery, up to the player to piece together the clues and figure out the truth for themselves...or in Crimson Flower's case, ignore the truth and act out in your ignorance.With Binding Blade though, when the truth starts coming out, it hits hard. I mean, right from the beginning of the game we're told man was the one who broke the peace by attacking the dragons, but then we learn that those legendary weapons messed up the environment, resulting in dragons needing to use human forms only to be slaughtered by man. Dragons were blamed for the environment, the people who used those weapons were revered as heroes. We don't know why mankind launched their attack, but we do know that they weren't able to slay the Demon Dragon, one who had her soul destroyed in order to control her, because the Heroes felt sorry for her. It's making dragons out to be the victims here, much like the dragons in Three Houses. But Crimson Flower only serves to demonize them, acting like they can't understand humanity when the dragons in that game are a lot closer to humans emotionally than the ancient dragons in Elibe.

The Elites in comparison weren't heroes, and that lie has been confirmed as Rhea trying to make peace.

The good ending for Binding Blade is being able to save the dragon whose soul was destroyed, whereas Crimson Flower ends with slaying a dragon after you've spent the entire game triggering her (and is the ending that leads to oppressive rule under Edelgard, in addition to the only ending without sunlight. What? You thought you'd get the good ending when her final boss theme was playing on the last stage?). Also, you need all the Legendary weapons in order to unlock the final stages, which all play into the big mystery. Crimson Flower requires the player to not understand that the world-building was done to support fighting against Edelgard instead.

Merits of a leader

Let's not beat around the bush here, Roy will not carry you through Binding Blade. His bases are low, and while he has good growths he is unable to promote until the very end of the game. Even then, you need to save the Binding Blade's usage to ensure you get the good ending. Roy is also very unsure of himself, thrust into a position of leadership despite his young age. But look at what happens when he succeeds, he manages to overcome the odds and take down the mightiest army on the continent. At the end of the game, he's shown himself as more than capable of leading. Not to mention, he also believes that humans and dragons can live together, even seeing this in Acadia (and if Ninian was his mother, he's unknowingly proof of this as he is 1/4 dragon himself. May explain his poor bases). If he marries Liliana, he even becomes a King for likely much of the same reason Byleth does in SS/VW (most leaders are dead following the war, plus combining his territory with Ostia which had already taken over Lyn's land after she abdicated/married Hector). Roy learns the truth as already established.

Compare this to Crimson Flower Byleth. Byleth leads the Black Eagle Strike Force, but credit for it goes to Edelgard. Byleth never gets any recognition for this, no position of authority despite proving themselves, instead that goes to Caspar Jenkins of all people, and ends the war continuing to fight TWSITD from the shadows to support Edelgard's regime. And if you read between the lines, Edelgard is NOT a good leader, resorting to bribes, threats, cronyism, secret police, propaganda, and even TWSITD's support and later stolen tech in order to maintain her rule. Byleth lost whatever emotional development they got from White Clouds during this route, once again becoming the Ashen Demon, and is even willing to let themselves die if they can't keep their “humanity” in check showing a distaste for their own draconic heritage (showing humans and dragons can't live together in this timeline). They didn't grow into being a leader, they devolved into being Edelgard's unthinking muscle. Byleth never learns the truth in this route, falling for Edelgard's manipulations resulting in them losing Enlightened One/Nirvana status.

Not to mention, Heroes Relics have really low weapon levels. In theory, they can be used by anyone but only safely by those with Crests and most fully with a matching Crest. Legendary Weapons, on the other hand, can be used by anyone with an S rank in their type. Your characters have to EARN the right to use those things and you'll need them to deal with all the Manaketes during the final level, whereas Relics aren't exactly that level of broken.

Honestly, seeing the ending of Binding Blade and Idunn recovering put at least one tear in my eye. Crimson Flower's just made me feel like the game was calling me an idiot (which considering the Nirvana/Enlightenment thing, it kinda was). I would love if Binding Blade got the Echoes treatment, or even if they just did a GBA collection for the Switch. But after all these years, one thing is as certain now as it was when I was a kid.

In this house, ROY'S OUR BOY!

[aperrywilliams]

New blurbs-series: 10 days to my birthday!! (Day 3)

(Not my gif)

Author Masterlist - Series Masterlist

My birthday will be in 3 days from now. So I’m going to celebrate myself with 10 Spencer Reid’s blurbs. Enjoy!. Well, this can´t be called a blurb... maybe I need to change the name series to “mini-fics-series”.

Day 10 | Day 09 | Day 08 | Day 07 | Day 06 | Day 05 | Day 04 | Day 03 | Day 02 | Day 01

Day 03: Spencer Reid says he loves you for the first time.

Through the time you have worked at the BAU, your skills in the field improved considerably. In the beginning you avoided having physical contact with the unsubs - if you weren't trying to persuade them by negotiating, your best tactic was to point a gun at them. But as the months go by, melee fights were no longer a problem for you. You understood perfectly why Morgan liked to kick doors so much. Deep down inside you felt as you liked kicking asses. Which seemed to be a contradiction in itself but at the same time a good strategy: people seeing you would not think that you are a person who would opt for a hand-to-hand fight.

That earned you several injuries: after two years working at the BAU you had already been stabbed twice, shot in the leg once, shot in the shoulder twice, and earned some contusions on the head. You didn't consider yourself an reckless person in the field, just that sometimes the job demanded more exposure.

That was something your now three month-boyfriend Spencer didn't like at all. Whenever there was an operation in the field you could see how his body tensed just thinking what could happen to you this time.

“We have to use a bait, otherwise we won't be able to catch it,” were Hotch's words as you discussed your options during a case in Denver.

“Well, how do we do it?”. Rossi asked.

“We need to come back to the victimology,” Prentiss stated. Hotch nodded.

“White women, in their thirties, with an attractive personality...,” JJ began to describe. Spencer immediately shook his head.

“…With the same hair and eye color as (Y/N). No guys, that's not going to happen. We won't use (Y/N) as bait,” Spencer rushed to say. You immediately looked at him with a disapproving expression.

“Excuse me? I remind you guys that I am here and you are talking about me,” you said with some exhaustion. “And Spencer, I suppose it's a decision for me to make, right?”

“(Y/N) is right, it's her decision. But the way I see it, it seems like our best option,” Morgan stated.

“Okay, let's think about the pros and cons. What can go wrong?”. You asked to the team.

“Everything!”. Spencer started to raise his voice. “How can't everyone see it? Didn't you see the photographs of the victims? Do you realize what he did to them? He could do the same to (Y/N)!”. Spencer ran his hands through his hair in disbelief that no one would notice the impending danger.

“Reid, we know of your apprehensions, but it's the best we have right now. Besides (Y/N) won't be alone, we'll be covering all the entrances to the place and we'll have agents stationed inside too,” Hotch tried to reason with Spencer, but he only had his eyes fixed on you.

“Are you going to do it?”. He asked you. Spencer knew what your answer was going to be, so he knew perfectly well that he was cornering you in front of everyone.

“Yes, I will do it”, you told him without hesitation. Spencer got up and left the room without saying another word.

You really understood Spencer's concerns about your safety a lot, but that's what this job was like and when you took it you knew there could be situations like this. Furthermore, Spencer was not the example of self-care in the field: he had also been shot and beaten on more than one occasion. In addition to his inability to keep his bulletproof vest on.

Before starting the preparations for the night's operation, you tried to talk to him. Neither when you started to be friends nor now that you had been in a relationship for a few months have you both been upset with each other for long.

You found him sitting on a bench outside the station. When he saw you, he barely made eye contact with you. He preferred to look at his shoes again. You sat quietly, trying to find the right words to start that conversation.

“Spencer...”

“Yes, I know. I understand this job works this way. I have also done the same before. I’ve never doubted your capabilities (Y/N). If you felt that I'm sorry...,” he said without taking off his eyes off the floor.

“Please, look at me,” you asked almost in a whisper. It hurt to see him like this. He hesitated but did what you asked. “Spencer, I know you are worried about me and I’ve never wanted to contribute to that concern, but you’re right when you say that this is the way this job is. We all risk something more than once. It's not the idea, but sometimes it happens...”. You subtly tried to hold his hand and he let you.

“I know, but... but now it's different...,” he muttered trying to avoid your gaze again.

“Why do you say that?”. You asked him.

“Well, at least for me it's different. I mean, I've always been concerned about the safety of the whole team, but... thinking about the times you've been injured in the field and now that we're together... just thinking that something could happen to you... I don't know. Maybe it's selfish of me, but I wouldn't know what to do if something happened to you...,” he rambled.

“Spencer, for me being with you these three months has been one of the best things that has happened to me and of course I want to have the opportunity to continue discovering things with you...,” you tried to reassure him.

“You don't understand... it's not just that we're a couple... it's more than that…,” he trailed off.

You looked at him strangely. What was disturbing him in this way now that you hadn’t seen in the previous months? In the short time you guys had been in a formal relationship, you both made the decision not to rush things. And so far everything was working out fine. You were sure you loved Spencer, but you never told him precisely because you didn't want to overwhelm him. You knew that Spencer liked to take small but safe steps. And you were fine with that.

“So tell me, what is it about?”. You asked him to elaborate. At the time that Spencer was going to develop his idea, Prentiss with JJ approached where you were.

“(Y/N), we have to get you ready for the night,” Prentiss told you. You looked at Spencer who was silent again. Whatever he was going to say to you, it was no longer the time.

“Okay. We can talk about this later, right?”. You spoke to Spencer. He just nodded. You got up and went with the girls inside the police station.

The plan was simple and risky at the same time, but it seemed effective. The idea was that you were in a specific bar that they knew was frequented by the suspect. Given your resemblance to the victims, the bet was that you attracted their attention until they could make a safe arrest. As Hotch had promised, there were agents posted outside the bar and some undercover inside as well.

“Hey, I think I see the unsub,” you muttered into your earpiece, as well as described his appearance so that it would be known to the agents.

“Good job (Y/L/N), now you must get his attention,” Hotch instructed. That's how you approached the bar, right next to the unsub and ordered a drink. According to the profile that you had all developed, the subject fit perfectly. After engaging in conversation with him, you agreed to go with him to the alley behind the bar. You didn’t count on the fact that the unsub was not really ‘the’ unsub, but rather a bait of the real murderer whom you had not seen all night and of whom no one had a description. ‘Fuck!’, you mumbled when you felt a blow to your head. Hotch started calling you and when you didn't answer, everyone mobilized. The unsub dragged you to a property next to the bar, further from the alley which quickly filled with police officers and your team.

When the unsub was about to drag you inside a truck, you felt someone yell.

“Stop! FBI!”. You were dizzy but could immediately recognize Spencer's voice. The unsub turned around and pulled a knife from his vest which immediately pointed at your neck. Trying to recover you only saw Spencer's panicky face. This was one of the results that he had surely calculated and that could end very badly. In a second of thinking and not thinking at the same time, you elbowed the unsub in the stomach, who before releasing the knife managed to graze part of your skin, ripping it. Free from your captor's grip, you ran towards Spencer. He had lowered his gun without realizing that the unsub was pulling a revolver out of his boot, pointing and firing rapidly in Spencer's direction. Again, with the adrenaline pumping, you retraced your steps and jumped on the unsub, making him fall and dropping the gun. You hit him a couple of times for good measure until he stopped struggling and passed out.

Spencer's whines brought you back to reality. When you turned around you saw he was on the ground and was holding his arm in pain. The bastard had hit him on the shoulder. You ran in his direction again.

“Spencer!,” you knelt in front of him and began to inspect his wound.

“(Y/N), are you okay?,” he told you. Why he asked you that since he was the one who was shot? There you realized your white blouse was stained with blood, thanks to the cut made with the unsub's knife near your neck.

“Yeah… yeah. It must be superficial. Sorry, I screwed it up. I didn't realize it was a trap...,” you started to sob and ramble. Spencer tried to calm you down.

“Hey, it's okay. We'll be okay...”

The next few minutes were confusing. The police arrived at the scene, along with the entire team. Two ambulances also arrived: in one they brought Spencer up to check his wound. They took you to the other to see the cuts on your body. The unsub was arrested and taken to the station. The paramedic who checked you cleaned up and patched your cuts. When you were ready you went to the other ambulance to see Spencer. The shot had been shallow and the bullet only grazed his shoulder, so cleaning and bandaging would be fine.

“Hey...,” you said as Spencer got out of the ambulance and fixed his vest over his patched shoulder.

“Hey...,” he replied. “You're good?”.

“Yeah. You?”.

“I'll be fine,” he told you smiling. He knew you were stressed and needed words of encouragement.

“Spencer, look... I know things could have gone very wrong today and you had your apprehensions, and I respect them... and you were right, I never doubted it was risky, and I'm sorry. I'm sorry you got hurt. And thank you for saving my life again. If you hadn't been by my side, maybe the result would have been different...,” you began to ramble.

“I love you,” Spencer told you taking your hand. You stopped your speech immediately and looked at him dumbfounded.

“What…?”

“I love you. That is what I was trying to tell you this afternoon. It's not that I worry just because I have my apprehensions with everything and everyone. With you it’s different because I love you. And it scares the shit of me that something happens to you and lose you. I'm terrified (Y/N), because bad things happen to the people I love and I can't do anything to stop it. And if I hadn't told you this before, it's because that means I have to admit that I'm afraid...,” he trailed off. Your heart was about to explode. You was thrilled to know that Spencer loved you but it hurt he felt so vulnerable to confess it.

“God Spencer. I love you too. So so much... I didn't tell you because I didn't want to overwhelm you. We agreed to take things slow and I was fine with that”. You told him hugging him tight. He buried his head on your shoulder.

“And I know you are scared. I must confess that I am too. I have never felt this for anyone and it also scares me to lose you... I may not say it or not show it, but it is the truth. But, you know what? We can do this together. We can face our fears together. Would you do that with me?”. You asked as you pulled away from his embrace slightly to look at him.

“The truth?... I'm willing to do anything as long as it's with you, (Y/N),” he told you leaning down and sealing his vow with a deep kiss which you reciprocated with equal intensity.

That was the first time Spencer Reid said 'I love you' to you. The first of many. It was also the first time you pondered more strongly the importance of balancing self-care at work with duty. Both, you and Spencer, would have a lot to learn about it, but you would do it together.

——

Permanent Taglist: @dreatine​​​ @andiebeaword​​​ @paulaern​

[memethemastermonarch]

Mass Effect Tag Game, Except I Get No ME Mutuals

 To celebrate finishing 3, here I go!

Been a fan since: Late February 2022. I got into it from a combination of this Youtube video by a Tali simp about ME3 and I just finished Dragon Age Origins after watching some TikToks on it and figured I’d go on a Bioware marathon. I originally meant to switch between Dragon Age and Mass Effect to keep myself balanced. I ended up playing the whole ME Trilogy one after the other.

Favorite game in the series: Absolutely ME2. I love all the games for different reasons, ME1′s exploration and ME3′s combat, but 2 is the most balanced. The large cast, the companion side quests, the way the ship was bigger, WAY better outfits for Shepard, and the scanning feature were all so fun. My main gripe in MELE is that ME2 is the only game that limits your weapon arsenal. Why the hell do Vanguards need an SMG? They don’t hit hard and suck unless it’s the DLC one!!! Other than that it’s so full of content despite being shorter than 3 by how many hours I’ve played.

MShep or FemShep: FemShep. I am female and I always prefer female MC voices in games anyway. Although props to MShep’s VA, love VAs that interact with communities.

Earthborn, Colonist, or Spacer: Colonist. The side quest in ME1 is very sad and that one little clip of dialogue in 3... my heart.

Biotics or Tech: Biotics. Nothing beats floating enemies in the air or blasting them with Flare.

Paragon or Renegade: Paragade. I feel it fleshes out my Shepard more, although I’m a massive hypocrite sometimes with my choices of dialogue. It’s fun as hell though, and it’s how I could easily save both the Quarians and Geth.

Favorite Class: Vanguard supremacy! I also really love ME3′s Sentinel since I wanted to change up classes and wanted to keep up with my character’s biotics gig. Vanguard was super fun, but kind of hard to master for ME2. I’d say Vanguard would work best for me in 3 since I charge in or just run around the battlefield. I definitely want to do an Infiltrator playthrough though.

Favorite Companion: Garrus! I kinda of forced myself to use him and Liara in the first game to see why everyone likes them, but only Garrus stuck the mark for me. Liara’s cool, but Garrus surprisingly was so cool an in depth in 1 compared to many other characters for me. And how they develop him even further with the next games.. ugh! He’s amazing, like if Nick Valentine and Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd combined but before either was even an idea.

Least Favorite Companion: Zaheed is the only companion in the games I do not like, which actually shows how the casts is either very well written or at least likable. Not Zaheed. With how he and Kasumi’s dialogue was designed, it’s hard to get to know and understand him as a character. Plus he is a boring asshole WHO SET A FACTORY ON FIRE! Look, I’m all for revenge, I let Garrus kill that stupid traitor because that’s not something you can forgive, but don’t fucking put other people in danger for it. Dude even dies pathetically too in 3.

Squad Set Up: Garrus is always there like a little girl’s worn out teddy bear, balancing out my biotics. And Tali whenever she was avaliable. Liara, Kasumi, and Samara were my backup teammates

Favorite In-Game Romance: Garrus 100% all the way. I love his chemistry with Shepard, especially my Shepard. They are opposites in playstyles, and they are each other’s impulse control on stupid decision making. I love romances who banter like an old married couple but balance each other out on a deeper level.  I also have massive respect for Tali and Thane fans, Tali being my second favorite character, and Thane just being a sad character. Thane simps make me cry because those guys are the queens of angst.

Favorite NPC: Donnelly and Daniels by far. Going down to Engineering felt a lot more alive with them around. They were cute and really funny. I wish they got together :(

Favorite Antagonist: Uhhhhh... uh oh. I don’t really any particular favor towards any of thems. Saren is cool, that fight cutscene at the bomb area is way cooler than with the Salarians. The Illusive Man has cool motivations and corruption arc, especially with the comics. The Reapers being ruthless AI is cool. The Collectors are sad too. Nothing sticks out to me though. I’ll just say the ME2 final boss I guess. That shit was badass and made me so hyped up.

Favorite Loyalty Mission: Miranda and Tali’s are so good!! They aren’t tedious like Thane and Samara’s, and the emotions I’ve felt during them were very sweet. Kasumi’s would be up here too if I didn’t suck at undercover missions.

Favorite Mission: Virmire is the mission in Mass Effect 1 that let me truly realize that my choices would be rewarded or punished VERY heavily at certain points. Doing Wrex’s mission before, choosing which teammate to sacrifice, and the hype before going to Ilos was what ruly made me enjoy this series. Mass Effect 1 is a good game. Virmire and beyond make it a great game.

Favorite DLC: CITADEL! CITADEL! CITADEL! CITADEL! Call it the inner weeb from me, but I do believe that the new Mass Effect would benefit from a companion system similar to like Three Houses or even Persona 5. I KNOW I KNOW it sound cringe but Citadel shows us that we love those moments between Shepard and the crew. AND they could get more character development and dialogue. No more calibrations! Or at least let us invite the gang to the bar or nightclub or just to watch a movie. I loved eating with my students in Three Houses, and I’d LOVE to go on dinner dates with Garrus and Tali. Other than Citadel, Omega and Shadow Broker are really good too! Aria’s Flare really made me know why you should not fuck with her. The Shadow Broker DLC was also a nice little archive for the squad’s personal information, getting money, and just watching people be stupid as hell in the vid showcase. Definitely has a nice reward for completing it.

Control, Synthesis, or Destroy: I chose Destroy in case we can port our Shepards from LE in the next game (I doubt it but I don’t like taking chances) but all of them feel sad. At least Control has a badass idea behind it. So... Idk I just want some Garrussy man. Just let me be happy in the next game

Favorite Weapons: I’m a very bad Vanguard. I like the geth assault rifle from the first game, and the Widow sniper rifle. Guess I have another reason to like Garrus. By 3 my Sentinel used snipers, assault rifles, and pistols in case I have no ammo. My power suffered as a result but I WAS RIGHT ABOUT AMMO AT THE END! I like to be prepared :(

Favorite Place: The Normandy SR2 before the Alliance fucked it up, and the Plaza from the Citadel DLC. I loved playing arcade games and getting decorations for my house and then hanging out with my friends :)))

Favorite Quotes: AHHH I SUCK AT REMEMBERING BUT THAT VOLUS THOUGH

“I am a biotic god! Fear me!”

-Niftu Cal, the Volus from Samara’s recruit mission

Thank you for reading this. I loved reading other people’s experiences and I hope more people get to have fun in the Milky Way in the future. I have no ME mutuals, so anyone is up to doing this too! I’d love to hear more opinions on the series.

[littlegrrl7]

“The Tiger and the Wren”

Ikemen Sengoku Shingen/OC 18+

Excerpt from Chapter 6 “Pain and Warmth”

Fluff

___

“Rough mission?” Sasuke eyed the bruise on Ren’s cheekbone, another was visible through her kimono collar, her gait was stiff as she walked down the hall. It had been a few weeks since they’d seen each other.

“I’ve had better.” She gave him a half-grin and a wink. “How goes your training under Kenshin?”

“I’m managing to avoid him more regularly, it helps that these cold months keep people indoors.” He lifted the hem of his top. “Look, for the first time in my scientific lifestyle, I have abs!”

Ren laughed, giving him a half hug as they walked down the hall, he noticed her bandaged hand and squinted at her.

“I’m fine. Honestly, my mark had two extremely well-trained shinobi in his employ. I took my lumps, but gave as good as I got.” She gave him a quick reassuring kiss on the cheek, then turned the corner.

 Speaking of abs…

Her face pressed into the heated flesh of Shingen’s bare chest, the edge of his kimono caressed her cheek, unconsciously she inhaled deeply. Ren hadn’t realized how much she had missed the sweet musk of his scent. Coming to her senses, she stumbled backward, Shingen caught her in his long arms holding her against him until she had regained her balance. She felt the heat rise to her cheeks. His hands caressed warmly down her back.

“My Goddess, if you are favoring mere mortals with kisses from your divine lips today, I’ll have the next one.” Holy cats! His voice was like buttered caramel, she gazed upward, his mirth filled grey eyes smoldered, her knees went weak.

 Dammit, girl pull yourself together!

“My Lord, I apologize.” She started to bow, her eyes shifting away from his burning gaze to the ground. Her heart threatened to beat its way out of her chest.

“Unnecessary, “ Shingen cupped her chin, lifting her gaze back to his. A thumb traced the edge of her bruise with concern, then continued to teasingly brush over her lower lip. “You are, as always, a pleasure to bump into Ren.” The tiger glinted in his eyes at the double entendre. He took her hand, playfully kissing the tips of her fingers. Her face burned red. With a smile, he nodded in greeting to Sasuke and continued on down the hall.

Ren gasped.

“Woah,” Sasuke’s lip twitched in a grin “I knew there was some unresolved sexual tension between you two, but I feel like I need a cold shower after that exchange. Is he always so-“

“Every damn time.”

“And you haven’t-“

“No.” Ren swallowed audibly. Sasuke peered at her flushed face then glanced down the hall.

“Ren…I’m straight, and I’d hit that, what are you waiting for? He’s obviously into you.”

She sighed, shaking herself off. “He’s my boss.”

“I don’t think that’s an issue for him.” Ren smacked her friend’s shoulder.

“Uggg, I need a soak. My body is one big bruise. I’ll catch up to you later, ok?”

Sasuke gave her a lip twitch smile and sauntered off down the hall.

It was rare Ren used the onsen as she was one of the few females at the castle with leave to make use of it. It was cold, but still, the light dusting of snow melted far before the edge of the water. Ren had tied a small tag to a scarf at the entrance, announcing the hot spring was in use by her then dropped her towel near the edge, sinking her naked bruised body into the steaming medicinal waters.

It had been a long time since she had taken a beating like that, and it was a sharp reminder to keep her skills honed. She had been sent to Oshu to ferret out some information, on her way out, she encountered two extremely well-trained Shinobi who appeared to be brothers. She was happy she escaped with her skin intact if varying shades of purple. At least she gave as good as she got, the dark-haired one had stayed at range, but the flirty blonde he called “Gen” was definitely hurting as much as she was. She turned to face the edge of the pool, laying her bruised cheek against the cool stone. Everything just ached, it was probably for the best she didn’t have a mirror. At least the wound on her hand was shallow, it was the only cut she took. She let her mind drift in the rising steam of the onsen, her eyes sliding closed.

Familiar steps came close, her eyes snapped back open.

“Hello Ren, mind if I join you? Sasuke said you were going for a soak and would like some company.”

 Shingen…damn, you Sasuke. You are going to wish Kenshin had killed you.

She flitted her eyes to the side, her breasts were pressed to the wall, her back faced him.

“I left a scarf indicating I was using the onsen.”

“I saw,” He chuckled. “Was it not an invitation?”

She turned a little more to look at him. Shingen stood on the other side of the natural pool, wearing only a small towel around his narrow hips. Her eyes traveled upward slowly, every line of his body was perfectly sculpted from his muscled abdomen to his smooth broad chest to shoulders so vast she felt like she’d swoon. Ren had never seen a more magnificent specimen of a male. If he were from her time, he would be a model and not one that needed the aid of photoshop. She let her eyes wander appreciatively back downward. He smiled, dropping the towel to slide into the steaming water.

 Yes, …everything was perfect. Whelp, there’s more fuel for that fantasy…

Ren averted her eyes, her face glowing red. “Just stay to your side.”

Him

He saw the bruises on her face from the last mission and winced internally. He knew the twins she ran up against. That she survived, was a testament to her skill. When Sasuke mentioned to him she was going to soak, Shingen picked up a container of salve to give her to help with the bruising. Seeing her in the onsen, he was sorry he sent her. The white flesh of her back was mottled in all shades of pain like she had either taken a beating or fallen hard. He realized by the way she covered herself, she was unused to casual nudity.

“I’m sorry I sent you.” His voice was sincere, he saw her eyes flash in surprise.

“Was the information I retrieved not what you desired?”

“It wasn’t worth the damage to your pearlescent skin, my angel. Are you ok? I brought you some salve to help with the pain and bruising.”

“Thank you, my Lord. That is very thoughtful of you.” To his surprise, she turned to face him, sinking down into the water. Her arms crossed over her bare chest. An angry blackened bruise striped across her shoulder to her collarbone on the left side, it looks like someone struck her there then it bounced off catching her cheek.

“Just Shingen, please.” He requested softly, “Would you tell me what happened?”

“I got cocky.” A self-deprecating laugh slipped from her lips. “I haven’t run up against anyone else here to match my skills, the other shinobi I’ve run into were sloppy or lacking in discipline, these two weren’t.”

Shingen listened quietly, watching the emotions play freely across her face. She was different today, unguarded. Possibly from fatigue. He found it very human of her, alluring, different than the self-assured cold demeanor she usually projected.

“I had just left the castle with the intel when the dark-haired shinobi started flinging kunai at me, he stayed at range the entire time. I never had a chance to bring out my bow because the blonde immediately closed at melee. We were evenly matched and disarmed each other as soon as he closed. The fight turned into unarmed combat with his brother flinging missiles at me. Thank goodness I was faster, he only managed a graze on my hand.” She gave a small shrug, wincing imperceivably at the roll of her shoulders. He found himself wanting to reach out to her to comfort her but knew she wouldn’t allow it in her current state of undress.

“The dark-haired man called him “Gen”. We beat on each other for some time, I gave as good as I got. I managed to knock him out, and I ran for it.” She paused and then added, “I would prefer not to be sent there again without backup.”

“Understood, again, I apologize for putting you in that position. I did not know they would both be present.”

Ren raised an eyebrow. “But you were aware at least one would be present? A warning would have been nice.”

“My goddess, I knew you could handle it, I have faith in you.”

She splashed him, “Ass.”

Shingen blinked at the unexpected sass then gave her a wolfish grin.

“Next time, warn me.” She smiled, it was radiant, and he felt his heart thump loud against his ribs.

“I promise.” He moved forward to sit by her and saw her eyes widen in panic. Shingen raised his hands.

“Just, keep to your side, mixed bathing isn’t really done by non-couples where I’m from.”

“We could change that.” Her eyes lit warily at his grin. “My angel, I would love to couple with you. "

“Pfffft!” Her laughter made him smile. “You and your silver tongue, do you ever stop flirting?”

“If you desired me to, I would stop. But I don’t think you do.”

“Guilty.” She rolled her eyes, then turned back around, giving him a view of her back to where the water lapped at her narrow waist. Another bruise started there and wrapped down under the water. His lips briefly tightened at the amount of pain she must be in.

“Ren, why don’t we go back to your room and I’ll help you with the salve? I use it when I’m injured. It will actually help more than the heat of the springs.”

She nodded, “would you close your eyes?”

“Hmmm?” He tilted his head.

“So, I can get out, would you please close your eyes?” The tips of her ears were scarlet, it had nothing to do with the heat of the springs. He smiled at how adorable she was.

“My eyes are closed.” He heard her leave the water, imagined it running off her flesh, pooling around her. Soft fabric rustled as she wrapped herself in the full towel.

“I’ll be in my room, thank you.”

Shingen waited until he could no longer hear her footsteps, then opening his eyes, he climbed out of the springs. He picked up the jar of salve and went to retrieve his kimono. He could have just given it to her, but the damage was so extreme she would never be able to reach all of it on her own.

 Tell yourself that old man.

This was not just an excuse to touch her, he wanted to help her.

 mmmhmmmm

He slid on his kimono…maybe he should just stop by and give her the salve, he could send a maid by to help her apply it. Yes, that is what he should do. He started walking toward her room with decisive strides.

He tapped on the door.

“Ren, it’s Shingen.”

“Come in.”

His breath hitched as he entered the room, and all thoughts of simply handing her the salve disappeared like smoke. She kneeled on her futon, her bare back to him. Her sleeping kimono was belted around her waist, but she had slid both arms out and merely held the cloth up to her chest. He had just seen her fully naked in the onsen, and yet this was far more intimate. He took a deep breath steeling himself. He was here to help her.

“I appreciate you helping me. I won’t lie, I’m very sore. It’s been a long time since I’ve been hurt this badly.” Her soft voice was hesitantly vulnerable.

Shingen kneeled behind her scooping some of the salve from the jar, he warmed it in his hands before spreading it gently onto her purpled flesh. Her skin was softer than he had imagined. He leaned in, rubbing the salve into the wound on her shoulder then moving lower down her back. His hands were gentle, reverent on her. The fact she was even letting him touch her so intimately surprised him.

“I saw one lower, near your waist?”

“Hmmm, yes, he hit me in the hip with a log.” She fidgeted a bit then opened the front of her kimono, dropping the fabric to display her purpled hip. He moved his hands over it, and she sighed in pleasure.

A smile tugged at his lips. He leaned in closer, letting his natural warmth roll over her. His hands continued to rub salve into her abused skin, but at this point, it was more of an excuse to touch her.

He slid both hands down her back, Ren let out a rumbling purr that ended in a moan. Then covered her mouth in embarrassment, her skin flushing to red.

“It appears I have discovered a tigress.” Shingen let his lips graze the nape of her neck, he couldn’t resist. The spice scent of her flesh was enticing. She turned her head toward him, snowy lashes fluttering to her cheeks.

“It just felt really good.” She admitted. The blush on her cheeks was beyond charming. He slid an arm around her cupping her chin.

“Let me see that cheek.” He caressed some salve over the bruise on her face. Her violet eyes caught his, he paused. There was desire in the depths of her eyes. She leaned back into his chest. He brought both arms around her in a warm embrace. His lips nuzzled into the back of her neck. He nipped her gently, suckling on tender flesh. Her breath came in short hot pants.

“Shingen, we shouldn’t.”

He grinned against her neck.

“You don’t want me to hold you?” he asked softly.

“I do, it feels nice.”

“Do you want me to kiss you?” his lips trailed against softly on her neck, nibbling at the uninjured flesh.

“I’m too hurt to make this enjoyable.”

He chuckled against her cheek. “I am enjoying you.”

She let out a frustrated little snort, he grinned wider. “You are adorable.” Shingen ruffled her short hair. “How could I not enjoy being close to you?”

She rolled her eyes. “Alright, I thank you for your help, I can get the ones in the front.”

“Or you could allow me to?”

Her

His hands, she was melting into the warmth of them. Everywhere he touched her, it tingled. Ren told herself it was just the medicinal salve, but her heart beating so fast in her chest told a different story. Her body still hurt, but now a different kind of ache was overlaying that. It was not a small effort to lean away from him, sliding her arms back into the sleeves of her kimono. She turned slightly with a wince and brushed her lips softly against his cheek.

“I really appreciate it thank you, I should get some rest.” She tried not to look him in the eye, Ren knew she’d lose her resolve if she did. It was already slipping. Every breath was full of his scent, his warmth, her body was screaming for him. She was holding onto her moral ground by her fingernails and slipping fast.

“It will only take a moment.” His eyes caught hers, concern and tenderness swirled in the soft grey. She was lost. Wordlessly she moved the cloth to the side, exposing the length of her left leg, the bruising on her thigh wrapping around down to her ankle. Shingen warmed the salve again in his hands, then slid them down over her muscled leg. She bit her lip holding back a moan, her eyes sliding closed. She rested her forehead to his shoulder. He made her feel too good to care anymore, the pain was replaced with his warmth. Her entire world focused down to the heat of his hands stroking over her calf, massaging the salve into her skin. Her breath came out in a long shaky sigh. Then to her surprise, he slid the kimono back over her leg, covering her. Shingen’s lips pressed warmly to her forehead.

“Get some rest, little bird. I’ll leave this with you.” He laid the jar next to her futon and stood. Her body hummed in protest at the loss of his warmth.

She let herself slide down into the bed, he leaned forward wrapping her warmly in the covers.

“Sweet dreams, my goddess.”

Continued on A03- long fic

https://archiveofourown.org/works/21712111/chapters/51789976

[lordofcrowns]

                                    ➤   “If I were to warn you, what would I say...?”

C A P T A I N  C Y R I L  S T A C Y

Cyril is highly defensive, hard to hit, and extremely quick to punish anyone that gets in his melee range. Melee to mid-range is where he’s the most dangerous, because that puts his opponent both within bullwhip range, and grabbing range. In combat, Cyril’s motive is always to subdue his adversary, not to kill. His goal is to force them to surrender, and he will employ whatever nefarious and cruel tactics he must in order to manage this swiftly. He will grapple, choke, bruise, beat and break bones without hesitation if he has to.

His bullwhip is the weapon he’s the most proficient and dangerous with, as well as being the weapon with which he can inflict the most pain and fear. Typically his whip is used for crowd control - it is most often utilized to halt someone’s retreat. It’s common for people to attempt to flee, only to be tangled up in the coils and yanked back into Cyril’s range. It’s common for individuals to suffer dislocated joints or snapped limbs when this happens, to say nothing of the way the whip cuts into the skin upon latching onto them.

Once someone is stunned, entangled, or otherwise slowed enough for Cyril to get a firm grasp, he can use his right hand to shock them and effectively paralyze them long enough to shackle or bind them. In most encounters, once he’s shocked someone, unless there is outside intervention - the fight between those two is over.

U N T O U C H A B L E

While it’s no secret the Captain keeps his right eye covered, the reason as to why widely remains a mystery. Those oblivious to his name and reputation will typically assume he lost that eye somehow, or perhaps that he keeps it covered as some sailors prefer to do, to allow for better sight in the darkness below decks as well as to sharpen one’s aim. Few ask, as it’s of course terribly rude to pry into such things.

Those who do know of him will often insist the covered eye is magic, a source of power and the very thing that renders him “untouchable”. Rumors often circulate that this magic eye is also the source of the crackling lightning that sparks and manifests from his right hand, allowing him to knock people down for the count so easily once he merely gets a hold of them.

As if to deliberately reinforce the frankly wild belief and ridiculous rumors that he is invincible, Cyril outwardly bears no scars nor marks on his body.

[ bold for often  //  italicize for situational  //  strikethrough for never ]

commander /  duelist / “honorable” / dishonorable / would have others do their fighting /  stealthy  / long-ranged / melee / technological / sorcery / superhuman abilities /  has fought in an illegal tourney / a lover of fighting / a hater of fighting  / cowardly / reckless / strategic / uses underhanded tricks  / renowned for their skill / trained ( sword and shield ) /  untrained / keeps skills secret / won a battle / lost a battle / ruthless / merciful

╳   F L A W S

moody | short-tempered | emotionally unstable | whiny | controlling | conceited | possessive | paranoid | liar | impatient | cowardly | bitter | selfish | power-hungry | greedy | lazy | judgmental | forgetful | impulsive | spiteful | stubborn | sadistic | petty | unlucky

♔   S T R E N G T H S

honest | trustworthy | thoughtful | caring | brave | patient | selfless | ambitious | tolerant | lucky | intelligent | confident | focused | humble | generous | merciful | observant | wise | clever | charming | cheerful | optimistic | decisive | adaptive | calm | loyal

Tagged by:  @whitherliliesbloom​​​ & @windupzenos​​​ ( Thank you both! )

Tagging: @verdandir​ @manawalls​ @finalvalor​ @noscean-scholar​ @wanderlust-spirits​ @cero-tia​ @menphinasbow​ @windup-dragoon​ @thebratcat​ @mystellis​ @reshaepocan​ @pearlescent-scales​ @bastets-ocs​ @alun-ura​ @finalsongxiv​ @amurr-reha​ @ennochian​ @mieyun​ @deviri​ @ashadowatthefork​ @unmend​ @candideangel​ @alinteau​ @sati-ffxiv​ @bolt-from-the-dark​ @ishgardianblossom​ @shroudblessings​ @sunnythanalan​​ @windupnamazu​ & anyone else interested!

[ I know I’m a bit late on this one, so no pressure & if you’ve already done it / been tagged - my apologies. Also, please feel free to use me as your tagger even if I didn’t mention you, I would love to read more of these! ]

Full stat breakdown & continued Cyril related ramblings under the cut:

C O M B A T  M O D E :  C A P T A I N  C Y R I L  S T A C Y

★★★★★★★★☆☆  —  STRENGTH ★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  OFFENSE ★★★★★★★★☆☆  —  DEFENSE ★★★★★★★★★☆  —  SPEED ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆  —  DURABILITY ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆  —  ACCURACY ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆  —  AGILITY ★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  STAMINA ★★★★★★★★★☆  —  TEAMWORK ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  STEALTH ★★★★★★★★★☆  —  MELEE ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  BLADES ★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  BLUNT ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  RANGED ☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  MAGIC ★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  TRAPS ☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  MEDIC & ★★★★★★★★★★  —  BULLWHIP

G E N T L E  D I S C L A I M E R : Cyril is written more akin to a thriller genre villain, sometimes teetering over into horror depending on the situation - while still being set in high fantasy. I just realize he might be a bit much, perhaps too dark or violent, depending on your preferred entertainment genre / expectations, so please consider this a soft warning if that’s not something you enjoy!

O V E R V I E W   [ C O N T I N U E D ] :

When in a fight, Cyril typically will come across collected, poised and honestly rather cocky. Cyril is something of an expert at breaking people’s morale and shattering their confidence, and that kind of behavior on his part often starts the very moment he and an opponent, or potential opponent, meet. Cyril will insult, belittle, talk down to, and make a great display of pity towards his adversary - this usually includes offering them ample opportunities to surrender to him before things get bloody.

In the inevitability that someone refuses to surrender, he’ll then dare them to prove themselves to him, which he will equate to proving themselves worthy of autonomy. Cyril will demand their attention and effort, and rather playfully jeer at them the whole time, especially if they seem distracted in any way [ say, for example, if he’s holding their loved one(s) hostage ]. That, however, is typically only his behavior at a distance, or as the fight begins and the two are getting a feel for one another.

Once a fight picks up, and especially once Cyril’s genuinely in melee range - you can expect him to start pushing and forcing himself into his opponent’s personal space. Definitely a byproduct of his confidence, but also typically something he can get away with due to sheer size and strength. He’ll grab, grope, and try to get people into uncomfortable holds they can’t easily wriggle out of. Choke-holds are common, whether he’s wrapped his arm about their neck from behind, or simply clasped his hand about their throat. Getting up in someone’s space may also mean pinning them to the wall, or pinning them down on the ground - he’s skilled at grappling and comfortable with either. It’s also common, both as a way to disorient as well dishearten, for Cyril to slap an opponent if he sees an opening. Usually a slap in the face is paired with an insult - maybe they let their guard down, maybe their footwork is poor - whatever it may be, Cyril will capitalize on any chance to humiliate his opponent.

In addition to getting uncomfortably close, one can expect him to snarl, shout, curse, and even growl at his opponents. Words may still be exchanged, but instead of playful banter one might instead hear whispered threats or extremely dark insinuations and other foul comments. It starts to sound like he’s finished being playful, though that isn’t necessarily the case. After all, he usually treats people like playthings, and encounters are often a game played at his leisure. Cyril likes to scare people, and he likes to see their reactions. He also just so happens to be entirely too willing to make good on any threat he whispers.

At his worst, if an opponent refuses to go down, or say his temper is getting the better of him - Cyril’s restraint will falter and he’ll start being unnecessarily violent. His temper is notoriously fickle, so whether his reaction is appropriate for the encounter he lashes out in or not is hard to say. He has a history of beating people bloody - be it with his whip, his body, or both - until they pass out. Cyril has kicked and crushed people under his boot hard enough to shatter bones and crack ribs, as well as doubtless inflicting many a concussion slamming people against this or that structure. His temper boiling over to such a degree as to see such behavior is rare... but not as rare as it should be.

O U T   O F  C H A R A C T E R  N O T E S :

Cyril is written to be a powerful and ideally ( if I’m doing my job right ;; ) terrifying villain to go up against. He’s supposed to feel impossible to overpower, coupled with losing to him of course having massive & heavy repercussions - both for a hero / heroine and for that individual’s loved ones. I really wanted him to be scary and unforgivable.

While not invincible in any way, he would like to have others believe he is. Therefore, he invests no small amount of effort into selling that invincible image, with a generally rather high success rate. Rumors abound of an “untouchable” Captain Stacy, who boasts no scars and loses no duel. Which... it’s true he’s not yet lost a duel, but why that is can be written about another time.

I’ve written Cyril to intentionally be a villain that someone cannot simply overpower with brute force. Winning against Cyril is going to take strategy, forethought, and ultimately in some cases, stooping to his level or even flirting with a diplomatic relationship. He is a pirate, after all, pirates love to parley.

He’s generally meant to put a hero / heroine in a difficult position, where they’re forced to make decisions and do things they wouldn’t ordinarily do in order to defeat him, because again - simply overpowering him is not going to work. And at the same time, he cannot just be ignored or avoided, because his trade and his tendencies are too cruel and intrusive to cast a blind eye towards. Morally, he cannot be allowed to continue what he does, and someone has to put an end to it. I wanted to make him a villain that challenged heroes on a deeper level than just physical strength.

At least, all of that is what I hope for when I write him. Did I succeed? Who knows. 

Thank you for reading! 🌹

[artificialqueens]

Not Nineteen Forever (17) (Branjie/Scyvie/Ninex) - Ortega

a/n: hey angels! thank u for ur patience, here is yet another chapter of the hellscape that is n19f. as i said on my blog, u will either love this chapter or hate it. either way let me know what u think!! this is a big chunky one at 13k (ik i’m treating u during this quarantine) so grab ur snacks and settle in. lots of love, byeee!

trigger warning: a little light drinking xo

please note: this fic contains young adults often behaving in irresponsible/unadvisable ways with regards to alcohol, drugs and sex. if you are someone who feels as if they could be heavily influenced by fic and incorporate what happens in the plot into ur own life, pls steer clear!

summary: Brooke, Yvie and Nina are three flatmates who forged a friendship in their first year of university and picked up some other waifs and strays along the way. Now in their final year, there are feelings that need to be unravelled and confessions to be made whilst navigating drunk nights, hungover mornings, takeaways, group chats, library meetups, cafe gossiping, and the small matter of getting a degree.

last chapter: Scarlet celebrated her birthday by helping Nina win back Monet, a surprise party organised by her girlfriend, and a suspiciously civil Brooke and Vanjie.

this chapter: from one birthday to another, the gang heads out to the country to celebrate Brooke and Akeria’s 22nd. everyone seems back on good terms, but will the combination of hide and seek, truth or dare, a hot tub and of course a lil bit of alcohol change anything?

***

“Holiday!...da-da-da-dum-dum-daaa, Celebrate!”

Brooke rolled her eyes, unable to help herself laughing as Nina rolled her suitcase towards Monet’s car. “It’s hardly a holiday, is it, girl? Overnighter in an airbnb in the middle of buttfuck nowhere?”

“Listen, I’ll take what I can get, thank you very much,” Nina raised her eyebrows, as Monet lifted the door of the boot up and Nina heaved her case inside.

“Oh, what a compliment,” Monet quipped from beside her, Brooke making a sick noise as Nina slid her arms around her girlfriend’s waist and gave her a squeeze.

“Not with girlfriends, obviously. You’re a Tesco Finest girlfriend. Not a smartprice girlfriend,” Nina explained, Monet smiling proudly and nuzzling their noses together. Brooke already wanted to vomit and she wasn’t even car sick yet.

“Pack it in, bitches, or Monet’s uninvited,” she deadpanned, pushing herself off the wall she was currently leaning against and looking up at her bedroom window, ignoring the girls’ shouts of indignation. “Right, have you got everything, yeah?”

“Have you seen the size of this bitch’s suitcase? I think she has literally managed to pack your kitchen sink,” Monet cocked an eyebrow at Nina, who elbowed her in the ribs. Nina produced her phone from the pocket of her dungaree dress.

“Hey Google, can you divorce your girlfriend?” she asked into the speaker, Monet howling a laugh and shoving her.

“Seriously, guys, I haven’t packed enough anti-sickness tablets for this,” Brooke said dryly, making her way to the passenger door.

“Oh, are you planning on recreating the great rail replacement bus fiasco of ‘18?” came a voice, Brooke turning round and narrowing her eyes at her smug flatmate, emerging through the door with her girlfriend and a small holdall bag.

“I was sat hungover opposite the toilet on a three hour coach journey, what the hell else was I expected to do?” Brooke defended herself. Yvie sat down on the wall outside their building, Scarlet joining her.

“Hmm, all I’ll say, Monet, is that I hope you have at least three empty plastic bags in the back seat with her,” she advised smugly, Brooke wishing she was still leaning against the wall so she could shove her off it.

“When is Plastique coming for you guys? Can I arrange for you to be sitting in the middle of the road when she drives up it?”

“Hey, what the fuck did I say?!” Scarlet yelped, outraged.

“You’re a bystander, Scarlet, and a bystander is worse than a bully,” Nina remarked sagely, Monet nodding along in support.

“Besides, I’m allowed to bully Brooke. It’s part of the lease,” Yvie shrugged, fixing the huge round sunglasses that had been on the top of her head and positioning them so they were right at the bridge of her nose. The March sunshine was welcome; it made Brooke feel happy, optimistic of things to come. Even the small scrub of grass out the front of their stairwell had bright purple, yellow and white bulbs poking through it, bringing a defiant sense of beauty to their surroundings. Brooke had been so pleased with the weather when she’d opened her curtains that morning that she’d packed a bunch of clothes she usually reserved for the summer. It felt odd wearing her denim skirt without the black tights she’d clad herself in for the past three months, but it was a welcome feeling. Yvie hadn’t really seemed to get the Summery memo other than her sunglasses- a huge knitted jumper covered in holes hung off her skinny frame and a pair of thick exercise leggings kept her legs warm.

“You couldn’t spruce yourself up a bit for my birthday, bitch? I feel like any minute now you’re going to start dancing around the street moulting straw singing about how you desperately want a brain,” Brooke smirked, Yvie simpering a fake smile and giving her the finger in response.

“It’s only fifteen degrees, Brooke, it’s hardly time to crack out the Kopparberg and blast T Shirt Weather yet,” Scarlet laughed. It was a bit hypocritical, Brooke thought as she looked Scarlet’s outfit up and down- a floaty, lacey dress and a pair of white Adidas- but of course she would defend her girlfriend. It wasn’t actually fair, contemplated Brooke. Scarlet and Yvie would always team up, so would Monet and Nina. Brooke had to fight all her battles herself.

“Besides, your birthday is over! Move on, hoe,” Yvie smiled, running forward and shaking Brooke’s shoulders relentlessly as the other girls laughed uproariously in the background.  Brooke laughed and batted her away, knowing she was just joking. As she shoved her friend off of her, a familiar grey Audi drove up their street and pulled in behind Monet’s car. Plastique gave her horn a little beep, waving and rolling down her window.

“Let’s ride, bitches! I’m so ready for this weekend,” she squealed, as Yvie and Scarlet rushed to shove their bags in the boot of her car.

“I think I’ve been ready since we booked it,” Nina sighed, stretching. “Right, let’s go, girls! Dun-duun-da-na-na-dun dun.”

As Nina continued singing Shania Twain and hopped in the passenger seat of Monet’s car, Brooke passed by Plastique’s window and gave her hand a squeeze. “You know how to get there, yeah?”

“Up the motorway then off at junction 4 and then just follow all the signs for the B road. We good,” she nodded, then gave a laugh. “Kiki’ll probably end up in France somehow, you know what her sense of direction is like.”

“Yeah, but she’s got Silky and Vanj to direct her. She’ll be fine,” Brooke shrugged, thumping on Plastique’s door and making for the other car. “Right, see you ladies at the airbnb!”

Monet blasted her horn once, twice, three times as Brooke dashed into the back seat and buckled up. As Nina connected her phone to the aux cord and started blasting typically Nina-ish cheesy music, Brooke felt an excited little smile creep up on her face, slapping her hands against her thighs to the beat. The past almost-a-month had gone by quickly, and Brooke and Akeria’s shared birthday trip away had arrived before Brooke had known it. It had been booked on a whim, an excited message from Akeria on the group chat about a potential birthday night out had grown arms and legs until suddenly the girls were all transferring her money for a night in the country to jointly celebrate her and Brooke’s birthdays. They had turned 22 within ten days of each other, and the girls had all decided that the amount of money they would have spent on two big nights out- Ubers, big bottles of vodka for pres, club entry, club drinks and cheesy chips at the end of the night- probably equated to the same, if not more, than the amount they would drop on a boujie house in the country. The house they had booked was huge- five big bedrooms with floor to ceiling windows, a lounge straight out of a murder mystery drama with plush sofas, towering bookshelves and a massive roaring fire, a kitchen with a table big enough to fit them all round and an aga with what seemed to be a thousand burners- though whether anyone would know how to work the damn thing was anyone’s guess, Brooke thought with a snort. The icing on the cake of the whole place, though, was a huge section of outdoor decking with a hot tub set in the middle of it. To most of the girls it would be like living somebody else’s life for the weekend, but, Brooke thought mischievously, to Plastique it would probably seem the same as a weekend at home.

Brooke was glad they could all do something like this, go away together after what had happened. She didn’t really know what had happened to Vanessa to make her warm up to her so unexpectedly. It had all started when they were preparing for Scarlet’s birthday surprise; Brooke remembered how hard her heart had been beating that morning as she’d known it was the first time she’d be properly seeing Vanessa since they broke up, having to wipe her sweaty palms on her jeans as the door to the kitchen had opened and Vanessa, Akeria and Silky had walked in. Akeria and Silky, to their credit, had been fine and normal with Brooke, despite the amount of dragging through the mud they had probably done to her name when they’d heard the news of her and Vanessa’s breakup. Vanessa, (understandably, thought Brooke) had hugged Yvie, Plastique and Nina, but not Brooke, the obviousness of the action lost in the frenetic melee of the girls seeing each other all at once. Brooke had preferred that, though. She wouldn’t have wanted the awkwardness of reminding herself how perfectly her arms seemed to fit around Vanessa, the brief scent of the Aussie shampoo she used in her hair, her head against her chest even for just the tiniest second.

After that, Vanessa had started with the digs. Brooke had thought she’d had malicious intent at first, until she got bored and decided to fire back.

(Yvie’s voice had yelled from the hallway. “Who’s made the cupcakes yet? Anyone?”

“Well if it’s Brooke, we all dyin’ tonight.”

“At least I can make something! How much do you drop on Deliveroo in a month, like, half your student loan?”)

With each verbal sparring match, Brooke had watched as the small, sardonic snorts Vanessa had given evolved into a full-blown beaming smile, the kind she always used to shoot Brooke’s way with the perfect white teeth and the tiny dimple and the little blush that hit her cheeks. It was almost painful knowing that Brooke had given up that smile. And that had been the moment. The moment that Brooke had finally admitted to herself what she’d been wanting to deny all this time- she deeply wished she hadn’t ended things with Vanessa, that she’d fought through the ick and given it at least more of a shot than she had. Now Vanessa had moved on and she was seeing someone else and she was happy. Happy without Brooke. Why had Brooke broken up with her so quickly?

She was an idiot.

“She was an idiot.”

Brooke snapped out of her trance, blinking and trying to figure out how Monet had managed to get inside her head. “What?”

“That woman. Blue car. Completely cut me off,” Monet rolled her eyes, frowning as she inched forward in the traffic until she was almost bumper to bumper with the car in question.

“Oh M'net, don’t start a fight,” Nina sighed, resting her knees against the glovebox.

“I’m not! I’m just letting a bitch know that her misconduct was noted,” Monet growled.

“Her misconduct was noted? God, you’re such a teacher,” Nina laughed, a big chuckle with loads of heart that made Brooke smile.

“Hey, so are you!”

“Stop fucking bickering or I will take your vocal cords and strangle you with them!” Brooke cried, tiring quickly. She watched Monet smirk in the rear view mirror.

“It’s alright, Neens. Just because Brooke’s jealous of happy couples and regrets breaking it off with Vanjie-”

“Wait what? I don’t…oh, Nina, for fuck’s sake! I told you not to tell anyone!” Brooke snapped, training accusatory eyes on her friend. After Scarlet’s birthday, she’d told Nina what she’d told Yvie, just in a little more detail, and she’d been more sympathetic than her other flatmate, making her tea and nodding understandingly as Brooke vented at her. Nina was usually good with secrets, a reliable and trustworthy friend. Brooke couldn’t understand why she would-

“Ahahaha!!! BITCH! You just totally exposed yourself! Oh my God!!” Monet screeched in time with her tyres, thumping her hand against the steering wheel. Brooke was confused, her heart still thudding. “Nina ain’t told me shit but I got eyes and ears, an’ I saw you two flirting at Scarlet’s. All damn day and night. You don’t act like that with someone you just broke up with.”  

“Yeah I’m afraid you just spilled your own secret, Brooke,” Nina deadpanned from the passenger seat, giving a little laugh.

“Shit,” Brooke sighed, putting her head in her hands. “Great. Well, you probably think I’m a total asshole, Monet.”

“Hey, I’m a very chill person! You do you, girl. You wanna get with Vanessa for 3 months, break up with her for one and then get back with her again, that’s no business of mine,” Monet shrugged, a twinkle in her eye.

“Yeah, I know I made a mistake, thanks,” Brooke sighed, biting her lip as she let her thoughts wash over her. Monet had a unique angle on the whole situation. She lived with Monique, of course, and that whole thing was still going on between her and Vanessa, if a message Vanessa had accidentally sent to the group chat last week was anything to go by. Brooke had wondered for days on end whether it had actually been an accident or not, the content of the message sending her crazy with jealousy as it was essentially just Vanessa begging Monique to come round and fuck her into the mattress. She’d considered whether or not it could have been deliberate, but the absolute roasting Vanessa had received afterwards from the other girls couldn’t have been worth it if it had. Brooke considered asking Monet for some inside knowledge, decided against it, and then did a U-turn as she concluded that her pride and dignity were already bruised so she might as well go the whole hog and shatter them.

“So, uh…Vanessa’s still seeing Monique.”

Monet ran her tongue over her teeth. “She’s certainly round at the flat a lot.”

“So is that, uh…I mean, do you think that’s going to turn into anything more, or…?”

“I don’t know, girl, I don’t know if it’s my place to say.”

This is like pulling teeth. “Do you think they-”

“They’re having a lot of sex.”

“Monet!” Nina burst out in a shocked laugh.

“What?! They are!”

“Excellent!” Brooke exclaimed sarcastically, staring out the window as the city around them turned into fields and the houses turned into service stations.

“C’mon, Brooke, you have to admit you do kinda deserve this a lil’ bit,” Monet laughed, Brooke rolling her eyes from the back seat.

“Right, both of you shut up. I’m officially banning any conversations about pining or relationships until we get to the house. We sing, we eat snacks, occasionally we play I Spy. That’s it,” Nina scolded them, turning around in her seat and staring Brooke down. Brooke had never felt more like a disgraced teenager in her life.

“Ughhhh, fine, Mom,” Monet groaned, changing up into fifth as they hit the motorway, the weekend becoming more real and making Brooke tingle with excitement despite the news she hadn’t wanted to hear.

Just as Nina had ordered them, the three girls spent the rest of the journey singing at the top of their lungs to Vengaboys, B*Witched and Cascada, Brooke on crisp duty as she passed the cavernous bag of barbecue rib McCoys forward every five minutes or so, Monet making hurried grabs at crinkle cut crisps in between changing gears. Brooke managed to avoid the dreaded travel-sickness that had plagued her since she was about six years old, much to Monet and Nina’s delight. The sun didn’t let up, and it still hung proudly in the sky as the girls pulled up the leafy, tree-lined driveway to the house they’d booked, the branches hanging low and curling around each other signalling they hadn’t been cut in a while. Spying Akeria’s Corsa and Plastique’s Audi already parked, Monet pulled up alongside the huge white house, the little set of three stone chimneys on the roof puffing out smoke and letting the girls know that at least one room wouldn’t be too cold inside. As Monet neatened up her parking, the sound of Silky’s screeching cut through the crunching of wheels against gravel, and the rest of the girls spilled out of the front door shortly afterwards. As soon as the car had stopped, Brooke excitedly hopped out of the passenger seat, hugging any girl she could reach. Before she knew it, she’d found herself pulling out of a quick hug with Vanessa, and the two were in front of each other.

“Hey,” Brooke decided quickly to speak first, setting the tone so there wouldn’t be any awkward pauses.

“Hey! How was your ride? Get here okay?” Vanessa asked politely, tucking a strand of her caramel hair behind one ear. She was dressed in a tiny little cropped black jumper and some faded grey jeans, Brooke trying to ignore her mind reminding her of how right it felt to wrap her arms around Vanessa again, how tiny her waist was and how much she wished she could go back for another hug- for fuck’s sake, cut that shit out.

“Uh, yeah! It was fine. Traffic wasn’t too bad. How about you?”

Vanessa let out a laugh. “Shit was like Wacky Races. Akeria nearly rammed some old cunt off the road. I’ve never seen road rage like it, we genuinely feared for our lives. Or her license. Oh my God, this house is insane. C’mon, you need to see it!”

There was a split-second where Brooke felt Vanessa tug at her hand, which was quickly dropped as if the action had never happened. It was almost as if Vanessa had been on automatic pilot; the ease with which she used to slip her hand into Brooke’s hadn’t been forgotten by either of them. And then Brooke felt Plastique leap onto her back like a monkey, and the girl was excitedly chattering away to her, and the moment had passed.

Brooke barely had time to take in the huge cream-painted hall with the varnished cream stairs stretching practically up to the ceiling when Plastique steered her down two steps and into the kitchen, grey stone tiles making Brooke’s feet feel cold even through her trainers and the huge wooden table overflowing with assorted snacks. Akeria and Scarlet clung to the rail of the AGA, the two girls clearly feeling the cold in the chilly kitchen.

“Did any of us actually bring a meal between us or are we just going to live off of Twirl Bites and Classic Dip Selections?” Yvie wondered, picking up a four-pack of various dips. Brooke laughed.

“Hey, there’s pizzas in the fridge! Do y’all really think I would let you starve?” Silky piped up, opening the huge fridge to reveal at least ten pizzas, more than they would eat in one night.

“Nobody goes hungry in the presence of Silky Nutmeg Ganache,” Plastique smiled proudly, holding her fist out for Silky to punch. As the girls’ fists connected, Brooke watched as Vanessa scraped a wooden chair out against the stone floor.

“You girls wanna have a munch and then get wrecked?”

“Hmm, if we get drunk too early then there’s no way we’ll be able to work this oven,” Scarlet shrugged, biting her lip and frowning.

“Yeah, we’re gonna struggle to operate this sober,” Monet considered, opening up one of the oven doors and investigating.

“Well how about we snack and then play a game? I wanna play hide and seek in here,” Nina bounced on the balls of her feet excitedly. Akeria snorted.

“Hide and seek, you’re such a child. But to be fair, that could be fun. Or sardines.”

“What’s that?” asked Brooke. “I don’t know if we had that but called it something else.”

“That one where one person hides and everyone else seeks,” Yvie explained. “It’s way better. Way more chaotic.”

“Sweet. I’m down,” Brooke shrugged. She was glad that all of the girls she was friends with were happy to dick about and play kids’ games for an afternoon, and it was the kind of thing she’d miss when she graduated and would have to find a job.

The girls were all feeling peckish after their long drive, though, so they all grabbed the nearest snacks they could and headed upstairs to the living room, where Akeria had managed to start the fire which was crackling warmly in the huge marble fireplace. They all dumped their food on the huge glass-topped coffee table and had a little explore around the house before they relaxed. There was a surplus of bedrooms, and it had been agreed that since they were celebrating Brooke and Akeria’s birthdays, the two girls should have a bedroom to themselves each. Brooke’s bedroom had a huge bay window out to the rear of the house where the fields stretched for miles, and an actual four-poster bed.

“I can’t help but feel like you guys should take this room and I should take yours,” Brooke said with a pang of guilt for Yvie and Scarlet, who had dumped their things in the room they were sharing and had come to investigate Brooke’s.

Scarlet made a noise of discouragement. “No, it’s fine! This’ll get cold anyway, it’s so big. Our room’s cosier.”

Brooke watched Scarlet share a smile with her girlfriend and wrap both of her arms around Yvie’s. “Yeah, honestly, Brooke, it’s fine. Scarlet would manage to bump her head and toe and Christ knows what else on all four of the posts anyway.”

Scarlet burst out into offended laughter, letting the girls know that she secretly agreed a little bit.

“How’re the others?” Brooke asked, peering down the little corridor with the exposed wooden beams and hearing chatter and Monet’s deep laughter coming from the other rooms.

“Plastique, Silk and Vanj are all in together. I think V drew the short straw so she’s on the sofa bed,” Scarlet gave a shrug.

“That’s unfortunate,” Yvie commented, raising her eyebrows at Brooke slightly.

“Behave,” Brooke smacked her, not appreciating the implication. Vanessa had only just become friends with her again. They were hardly going to spend the entire night going at it like rabbits just because Vanessa wasn’t looking at her like she wanted to kill her anymore. “Come on, lovebirds. I feel like I haven’t shovelled enough crisps down my throat today.”

The three girls made their way to the living room again, where Nina and Monet were draped over the sofa and snacking on some sort of jelly sweets. Gradually the other girls joined them in drips and drabs and they spent the time chatting and gossiping in their usual way- about anything and everything under the sun. Brooke kept finding her eyes being drawn to Vanessa. It wasn’t entirely her fault- she was sitting opposite her, and often Brooke would find her already looking her way. Although that could have just been Brooke’s imagination. God, she didn’t even know anymore.  

“Right!” Nina cried, as everyone looked dangerously close to slipping into a snack-induced coma. “Sardines time!”

“Kiki should hide first, it’s her birthday!” Silky argued immediately, Brooke only the tiniest bit affronted.

“Hey, hey, it’s Brooke’s birthday too. Also, I feel like y’all are way more enthusiastic than me about this, so I really don’t mind.”

“Brooke hides first!” Nina shouted unnecessarily. Brooke stood up from the sofa and rolled her eyes.

“Wait, so everyone is after me? Christ. This is like that nightmare I had about being on Hunted.”

“Good luck tryna squeeze that Jolly Green Giant-ass body into any of these cupboards, bitch!” Vanessa yelled across the room to uproarious laughter, Brooke turning round in time to see Vanessa stick her tongue out at her.

“Oh, like you can talk! Are you not the same size as an actual Subway sandwich?” Brooke bit back, sticking her tongue out right back and feeling an excited fizz in her stomach as she caught Vanessa blushing slightly as she laughed. As the other girls joined in with the mocking and all piled on each other, Brooke spotted two girls who weren’t laughing- Akeria and Silky were looking at each other knowingly, a look that seemed to convey disapproval. What the hell was their problem? If Vanessa was fine with her, then that meant there was no reason for the two of them to hold a grudge either, right?

Brooke frowned, trying not to read too much into it. She turned around and headed out the door. “Okay, count to 100 then, bitches!”

As she heard the others all start chanting descending numbers like a terrifying cult of mathematicians, Brooke began dashing around the house for a place to hide. She ran past the bedrooms, assuming that the others would check there straight away. Brooke considered going behind the porch door, but then thought that might end up being too obvious. She found herself in the kitchen, and to her delight she noticed a huge wooden door set into the wall that had to be a cupboard. Opening it, she saw what looked to be a pantry- shelves and shelves with only a couple of tins left by other guests at the house. It was good, but Brooke didn’t think it was a particularly great place to hide until she spotted another door at the very end of the pantry- slightly smaller with a little circular handle. As Brooke turned it, she was confronted with a tiny dark room, with only the blinking lights of the boiler that sat inside to illuminate it.

Perfect.

As Brooke hopped in, she could hear the blood roaring in her ears and her heart thumping. She wanted to giggle. This was exactly how it had felt to play hide and seek when she was little, and she couldn’t believe she was a grown-ass twenty-two year old still feeling the same way. Hell, she couldn’t believe she was a grown-ass twenty-two year old playing hide and seek. Gradually, she began to hear the sound of footsteps thundering above her, the old ceiling creaking and letting Brooke know the girls were on their way. Then, it all went silent for a while. Brooke breathed out heavily. Just then, she heard the door to the pantry open and one set of footsteps shuffle through it. They dashed to the end of the room and then seemed to be satisfied that there was nothing more to investigate- until Brooke heard them do what seemed to be a double-take. Keeping her breathing silent, Brooke stood frozen to the spot as she saw the door gradually open with a long, murder-mystery style creaaak…

Shit.

Vanessa stood at the doorframe to the cupboard, a shit-eating grin on her face. “I’ve been tellin’ Yvie I’m the best at hide and seek, but she ain’t believe me. What’d that take me, two minutes?”

“Yeah, good job, Poirot,” Brooke smirked, although it was hiding a multitude of nerves. Her and Vanessa, stuck in a tight, dark space together until the other girls found them. This was fine. This would be fine. “Right come on then, girl, you need to get in.”

“Fuck no, I ain’t goin’ in there! That’s a straight-up spiders’ nest, fuck that.”

“Just get in!” Brooke grabbed her gently but firmly by the wrist and dragged her inside, closing the door behind them. It was entirely dark except for the small strip of light where the door met the doorframe, which illuminated Vanessa’s hair and collarbones. There was a small beat of silence in which Brooke’s eyes adjusted to the darkness again, and when her vision had settled she could see Vanessa smiling at her cheekily. “What?”

“There’s a spider in your hair.”

Brooke rolled her eyes. “No there’s not.”

“There is! A big one. It’s some Harry Potter type shit, I swear.”

“Shut up, Vanessa, I’m not falling for that shit,” Brooke snorted a laugh, squashing the unease that began to creep up on her.

“It’s got, like, a billion eyes.”

“Has it.”

“An’ forty legs,” Vanessa bit her lip, trying not to laugh.

“What the fuck kind of biology classes did you go to? A spider with forty leg- JESUS!” Brooke all at once cut herself off, feeling a movement at her shoulder, her hair flicking against her neck slightly. She gave herself such a jolt that it felt like whiplash, and she watched as Vanessa laughed at her brushing wildly against her shoulder. Brooke was confused when her hand connected with another hand. Vanessa’s hand. How the hell she’d managed to reach up there without Brooke’s notice was anyone’s guess, but she’d certainly done what she’d set out to do. Brooke launched herself forward and squeezed a hand at Vanessa’s waist, laughing as the other girl screeched in response. The two girls descended into giggles, Brooke having to fend off Vanessa’s playful swipes as she berated her.

“Shut up, bitch! You’re going to get us caught!” Brooke laughed, grabbing one of Vanessa’s wrists in each hand. Suddenly, both girls paused, the compromising position they were in dawning on both of them. The memory of when she used to pin Vanessa to the bed with both her wrists and kiss her neck shot through Brooke’s mind like a hot iron, unwanted and welcome all at once. In the darkness, she could see Vanessa’s single raised eyebrow.

“You telling me you don’t wanna get caught?” she murmured, her voice low and making the atmosphere charged and thick with something that hadn’t been there before. Brooke squeezed her thighs together. This couldn’t turn into something else. She couldn’t let it.

“Well, that is the whole point of the game,” Brooke said, trying to inject as much level-headedness into her tone as she was able. To her dismay she watched as Vanessa’s eyes took on a dark twinkle.

“Oh, right, uh-huh. The game. Sure,” she smirked, Brooke only able to laugh in response because that way she wasn’t saying anything. This situation was fucked. It was so weird. Vanessa was flirting with her, unprompted. So what did this mean? That she still liked Brooke? That she wanted to be friends and was just playing? What did this mean for her and Monique? They couldn’t be that serious, then, if Vanessa was doing all this? Or maybe they’d fallen out and Vanessa wanted her to be jealous? But what was the point of making somebody jealous who wasn’t here? What if her and Monique were together and Vanessa was cheating? What if-

“AYYYYYY FUCKIN’ HOES! Yes! I’m shit-hot at this game, Jesus!” Silky threw the door open, screeching her head off and sending every thought that Brooke was overthinking into the stratosphere.

“Stop yellin’ bitch, and get in!” Vanessa laughed. As Silky squeezed into the ever-decreasing-in-space cupboard, Brooke felt her throat almost close up as Vanessa shuffled up against her to make more room, tilting her head up, locking eyes with Brooke and sending her a look that she couldn’t decipher before looking away and whispering to Silky.

They were eventually found by the other girls- namely because there was no space at all once Scarlet arrived so Plastique found half of the girls with one toe in the cupboard and the rest of their bodies outside of it. The game carried on, but Brooke’s head wasn’t properly in it. She would deliberately put in the bare minimum effort when she was looking for the girls because, really, she wouldn’t know what to do if she was stuck in another confined space with Vanessa. Why had it turned so weird before? All flirty and edged with something she couldn’t work out. It wasn’t right- Vanessa was meant to be mad at her, meant to hate her and never want to speak to her again and somehow they’d gone from civil, to nearly-friends, to eye-fucking each other in a boiler cupboard in the space of a month?

The encounter was still playing on Brooke’s mind as she got ready for dinner. The girls had all decided that they would “do a Love Island” (in the words of Akeria) and all get glammed up to sit in the living room and play games after they’d eaten. It felt funny to be putting on a dress, heels and fake lashes without the possibility of going out anywhere, but the methodical process of putting on her makeup was a welcome distraction from the swirling thoughts in Brooke’s head.

“Ayo,” came an unexpected voice, causing Brooke to flinch a little and drop the lipgloss she’d been applying moments before. Looking behind her in the mirror she saw it was just Yvie and Nina. Usually she’d have been happy to see them, but right now she was doing too much overthinking and couldn’t let on what had happened earlier between her and Vanessa. So Brooke just stuck on her best fake smile as she turned around to face them.

“Hey! You guys look so good,” she complimented them, Nina smiling and Yvie giving a little snort.

“Well I didn’t want to be accused of not making an effort for your birthday again,” she poked her tongue out at Brooke and tugged a little at the beads on the hem of her short gold dress.

“If you trip in those heels I hope you know that’s, like, instant paralysis,” Brooke commented, looking at the spikes of Yvie’s six inch stilettos. When the girl did glam, she did glam, Brooke had to give it to her.

“As if Yvie needs to be any taller than she already is,” Nina laughed playfully.

“Awh, she needs to be tall so she can look down on her smol bean uwu girlfriend,” Brooke teased, Nina continuing to giggle and Yvie giving an amused roll of her eyes.

“What’s up with you anyway, bitch? You’ve been, like, extra bitter around all the couples today. It’s supposed to be your birthday, cheer the fuck up,” Yvie gave her a little nudge with her foot. Brooke frowned. She didn’t think she had been being bitter, but maybe Yvie was right. Fuck, what had she even said today? Brooke hoped that Vanessa hadn’t noticed anything.

“No, that’s not true. I’m fine! Just…” Brooke sighed, the bingo-hall-style tombola spinning rapidly in her head to generate an excuse. “…exams are soon, you know, and I’ve not started revising yet-”

“Oh my God, bitch, they’re in May! This is March! Chill the hell out,” Yvie laughed, pulling Brooke up from her position on the floor by the long mirror in the corner of her room. “Let’s go eat pizza. If Monet and Plastique have worked out how to cook them in that 1920s horror oven.”

As Yvie excitedly strutted out of the room and Brooke made to join her, Nina reached out to squeeze her hand.

“You’re a crap liar, Brooke Lynn Hytes,” she hissed quietly, Brooke rolling her eyes and making to protest when Nina spoke again. “But I won’t push it. I just wish you’d open the fuck up more.”

Brooke felt guilty. “I just don’t…it’s something I don’t want to overthink, Nina. So the best way you can help is helping me stuff myself full of carbs then pouring a 24 pack of San Miguel down my throat.”

Nina nodded understandingly as they reached the top of the stairs, Brooke holding back a snort as she watched Yvie cling to the bannister for dear life as she descended. Nina gave her hand another squeeze, then dropped it. “I can do that. You look beautiful, by the way.”

Brooke shyly looked down at her short, black one-shoulder dress and smoothed it down. “Thanks, babe.”

Nina’s smile suddenly turned scheming. “And so does Vanessa.”

Before Brooke could protest, Nina was bounding down the stairs in her bright white Filas that she’d paired with her blue and white checked dress. It wasn’t as formal as Brooke’s or Yvie’s, but that was the beauty of having a glam night in a big house where it was just them- nobody could judge you for being over or underdressed.

As Brooke followed her flatmates into the kitchen, she was met with the sight of her friends all happy, chatting, and in their best outfits. Annoyed at herself, she found her eyes darting around to find Vanessa. She wanted to know why Nina had said what she’d said, wanted to know if she was just winding her up.

And then her eyes came to rest on the most gorgeous version of Vanessa she’d ever seen, and her anxiety dipped, did a loop, then spiked. They were both in black- some dumb coincidence that the earth had sent her way, no doubt- but Vanessa’s was shiny, a vinyl dress that clung to her as if it was made of latex and painfully highlighted every curve of her body. She’d paired it with red heels, which had straps that snaked their way up her calves and showcased her perfect skin. Her dark hair had been blow-dried out (probably by Akeria, Brooke guessed) and fell in perfect waves down her back and over her shoulders (had she fucking highlighted her collarbones?). Her makeup was, as usual, perfect, a dark shock of eyeshadow and an indecent red on her lips causing Brooke’s heart to race. The worst part, though, about the whole outfit, was the silver zip that ran from the top of the dress to the bottom, right in the middle at the front, and either Vanessa (or someone mucking about with her…probably Silky) had unzipped it just the tiniest amount. For about the hundredth time that month, Brooke cursed herself for breaking things off with Vanessa. It wasn’t just about her looks though, or her body, or how much she missed the sex. Their interaction in the cupboard made Brooke remember how funny Vanessa was, how much of an endearing goofball, how she was just a cheerful person whose only real wish in life was to be properly happy. And Brooke had hurt her, made her the exact opposite of that. Vanessa loved everything and everyone so deeply, was the most open of books, and was so unafraid of feeling. Meanwhile there was Brooke not even able to tell her own flatmates, the two girls that knew her best in the world, about her own feelings.

As she watched Vanessa’s eyes drift from Scarlet and Monet, who she’d been talking to, across the room to rest on her, Brooke felt her heart stop. Not giving a single thing away, Vanessa smiled, gave a little wave, and crossed the room to where Brooke stood.

“Hey!” she began, so confident and self-assured and making Brooke feel more like a trashbag than she already did. “Nice dress.”

“Thanks!” Brooke smiled, uncharacteristically flustered at the tiny compliment. “You look so beaud!”

Fuck. Brooke kicked herself for getting tongue tied, badly hoping Vanessa wouldn’t have noticed. As she watched a confused smile appear on her face, Brooke realised she’d have to explain herself. “I was going to say beautiful, then I changed it to good and they just sort of…mushed together.”

Brooke felt her face grow hot as Vanessa simply raised an eyebrow in a smirk. “I’ll take both. Beautiful and good.”

Just as Brooke was about to defend herself, Silky announced to the girls in her own Silky-esque way that the pizzas were ready, and, giving a cry of delight, Vanessa had dashed across the room and left Brooke forgotten about.

As they all ate, Brooke fought an internal battle. She had absolutely no right to feel sorry for herself, this mess was entirely of her own making. Besides, she had to put everything out of her head now; she had made her decision, Vanessa had moved on, and she had to let the whole thing drop. But despite all this, it didn’t stop her brain constantly pestering her with what-ifs.

It was still pestering her once they’d all finished their dinner and moved upstairs into the huge living room for drinks and games, so she was glad when Nina popped herself down beside her with two ice cold bottles of beer from the fridge.

“One for each hand,” she explained. Brooke burst out laughing. She fucking loved Nina so much.

“Where’s yours?”

“Monet’s making mojitos for me and her. I love having a girlfriend, it’s like a sexy butler that you get to have sex with and cuddle any time you want,” Nina mused wistfully, giving Brooke her second belly-laugh in the space of two minutes. As she composed herself, Monet came into the room with two huge tall glasses overflowing with crushed ice and garnished with lime and mint.

“Where the fuck did you get mint and limes?” Brooke asked, screwing her face up in confusion then scrambling to pull a slightly more attractive one as Vanessa came in flanked by Silky and Akeria.

“I brought them, bitch! Anyway what did I miss?”

“Nina called you a sexy butler,” Brooke said casually, sipping one of her two beers and smiling as she watched Nina grow flustered.

“Jesus Christ, I’m getting all the compliments today! First I was a Tesco Finest girlfriend, now I’m a sexy butler. You know how to treat a lady, Neens,” Monet teased, pulling her girlfriend in and smothering her with kisses on the cheek.

“Ugh, get that couple shit outta here,” Vanessa yelled from the other sofa, throwing a leftover crisp at them. Monet instantly snapped back.

“Uh, like you can talk, Vanj.”

“What the shit hell is that meant to mean?” Vanessa laughed, amused.

Akeria grew outraged as she turned around to face Vanessa, her long, straight hair swinging wildly as she flipped it over her shoulder. “NEED we remind you what you sent to the group chat last week?!”

Silky began yelling, mirroring the cries of woe and dismay that were circling through Brooke’s brain at being reminded that Monique was still very much in the picture. “NO we do NOT need reminded! I can’t go through that again, dear Jesus God…”

“Fuck babygirl, I need that mouth on me-” Akeria began reading dramatically from her screen, the girls cringing and laughing and every word feeling like a kick to Brooke’s gut as Vanessa, face bright red, wrestled with Akeria to get the phone out of her hands. “-I’m touching myself but you know it’s not the same- aw, V! Give it back!”

“I’m gonna eat this fuckin’ phone, Akeria Chanel Davenport, I swear,” Vanessa chided her furiously, holding the phone out of her reach then relenting, giving it back to her. Silky fanned herself dramatically, making the others laugh. As Brooke did her best fake laugh and joined in, she tried not to make eye contact with Vanessa’s embarrassed face.

“Aw, are we talking about the unfortunate dirty text incident?” Plastique’s voice came from the hall, everyone laughing again as she sat down in the armchair beside the fire. “Seriously, V, you should be a songwriter. I swear that whole thing could’ve been from a Kamille song or some shit-”

“Well, all sexts are a little bit cringey, aren’t they?” Nina offered kindly, attempting to cheer Vanjie up. In doing this, she only succeeded in earning herself an exasperated cry from Monet.

“V, do you wanna go out? I can’t stand this bitch any more, she just keeps insulting me.”

As everyone howled with laughter and Nina frantically smothered her girlfriend in kisses trying to get her back onside, Brooke sneaked a look at Vanessa. She was laughing, but her face was still a little red. Christ, she looked so cute. Idiot, idiot, idiot.

“Speaking of sex, I’m assuming Yvie and Scarlet went off to bang?” Plastique shrugged, everyone finally realising who was missing.

“Oh, fuck this! Save that shit for later!” Silky protested, Akeria laughing and whacking her.

“Hey, let them be happy! It’s my birthday so I’m sayin’ if they want to fuck, let ‘em. In the meantime I have an empty wine bottle and a room full of girls with secrets that need spilled,” Akeria announced. Plastique clapped excitedly, Silky cheered and Vanessa rolled her eyes.

“For Christ’s sake, Kiki, do we not already know all there is to know about each other?” she complained. Interesting. So Vanessa didn’t want to play truth or dare, a game she was usually always down for.

“Excuse the fuck outta me, we played that stupid tuna game earlier!”

“Sardines,” Brooke deadpanned, earning herself a laugh from the room.

“It was some type of fish, I got that much right.”

“How are you through a whole bottle of wine already?” Silky asked, impressed.

“Can I live? It’s my birthday! Now will you hoes stop pissing in my cereal and let’s play!” Akeria implored, setting the wine bottle down against the red carpet and spinning it so violently Brooke worried that it would smash on the marble grate. It slowed, turning round and round and finally resting right back at where Akeria leant down from the sofa. She let out a giggle. “Oops. Guess it’s me.”

“Keeks, truth or dare!” Plastique asked excitedly. Akeria tilted her head, deep in thought.

“Hmm. I ain’t drunk enough for dares yet, so let’s go truth.”

There was a beat of silence as everyone racked their brains to think of something. Monet was first with an idea.

“Fuck, marry, kill: Silk, Vanj or…uh…”

“Asia,” Vanessa said simply, sipping some coke and spirit concoction through a straw as Silky let out a screech. Brooke was confused. She met her eyes with Nina’s, who looked equally baffled.

“Wait, who’s Asia?” Nina asked. Akeria, to her credit, looked composed. To be fair, Brooke had hardly ever seen her look anything but.

“She’s a friend from my course. We did a paired project together an’ she came over to the flat to work on it the other week,” Vanessa shrugged. “Her an’ Kiki seemed to hit it off.”

“I don’t have a fuckin’ crush on the girl, Jesus. Don’t make it weird,” Akeria rolled her eyes, blinking slowly. If Brooke squinted she might’ve spotted a flush to Akeria’s face, but perhaps that came from the glow of the fire.

Monet muttered under her breath to Brooke and Nina as the three flatmates bickered away. “Is Akeria gay?”

Brooke blew out a bunch of air. “Fuck, I don’t even know who’s what anymore.”

“She’s never classed herself as straight,” Nina elaborated cautiously. “She talks about getting dicked down by guys a lot. Then again, it’s really only Silky that does that and Keeks just joins in.”

“Silk and Vanj know something we don’t,” Brooke reasoned, watching as the two girls laughed and Akeria sat, poised and smirking at them indulgently as if they were kids.

“Right, enough! ‘Keria, fuck marry kill: Vanjie, Silk or Asia, then,” Monet shrugged, sipping her mojito.

Akeria flipped some hair over her shoulder and tilted her head to the sky thoughtfully. “I honestly can’t decide who I’d rather kill, Silk or Vanj.”

“Oh, so you’re gonna fuck or marry Asia, correct?” Vanessa quipped, a little fire igniting in Brooke’s heart as she watched a wicked smile spread across her scheming face.

“No, I don’t know her well enough to have any strong feelings towards her either way. You and Silk, however…” Akeria raised her eyebrows long-sufferingly, coaxing a laugh out of the other girls. “Uhh, right, marry Asia, or whatever. Kill Silky.”

“Bitch! I’ll kill you for real,” Silky objected, pummeling Akeria’s arm with a cushion.

“Fuck Vanj because she likes girls anyway and if she’s going down on me it means she’s not talking with that fuckin’ gritter-truck voice of hers,” Akeria shrugged as she concluded, the room cheering and Vanessa doing a little celebratory bow. As she flipped her head up she caught Brooke’s eye, giving her a little wink. Brooke crossed her legs and tried not to think about Vanessa going down on anyone. Least of all her.

“Aight!” Akeria said, indicating to everyone that her turn was well and truly over. “We move.”

The bottle was spun once more, Brooke taking a long drink out of her bottle and draining it. She needed to be tipsier than this. Everyone else seemed a little more drunk than she was, apart from Vanessa who she noted was sipping her drink sparingly. Brooke shook her head a little, trying to stop bringing her focus to Vanessa every five minutes. She’d taken her heels off and tucked her legs up underneath her on the sofa, and her thighs looked good for it.

“Plastique, truth or dare!”

Plastique tucked her hair behind her ears. “Uhh, dare.”

Brooke knew what to do for this one. Plastique had taken Ariel on a couple of dates, but the girls were emotionally stunted and neither of them had properly articulated their feelings to the other yet. “Call Ariel and tell her how you feel about her. Properly.”

As the other girls “oooh"ed in appreciation, Plastique fixed Brooke with an unimpressed glare. "I’m not doing that.”

“Pussy,” Brooke shrugged, sipping her other beer. Vanessa let out a laugh from the other side of the room.

“Brooke Lynn’s telling someone else they’re a pussy for not being open about their feelings? Are we in the correct universe?"

As the other girls gave a laugh that was only the slightest bit uncomfortable, Brooke rolled her eyes. "Okay, well at the very least send her a heartfelt text.”

“Why are you pushing this so much, ma?” Plastique pouted as she relented and reached for her phone.

“Because I’m bored of sitting in lectures hearing you moan about how you can’t tell her how you feel because it would make it weird or how you don’t want to come across too intense!"

"We all had to listen to you pine after Vanjie for two and a half years but we never forced you into admitting anything,” Plastique shrugged, the room erupting into shrieks. Brooke gave a choke of a laugh, wanting the ground to open up and swallow her. She knew her face was bright red without having to look in a mirror and, as much as her brain was imploring her not to, she found her eyes darting quickly to Vanessa to catch a glimpse of her face.

Calm, smiling tight-lipped and smug. As if she’d won something.

“No, but you did start a sweepstake about us so get off the high horse, thanks!” Brooke sing-songed back, the slight hint of irritation to her voice letting Plastique know she was to drop it. Us. The word felt weird in Brooke’s mouth, it hadn’t been used in so long. Two and a half years. Had she really liked Vanessa for that long before everything had happened between them? Brooke had actually thrown away two and a half years of feelings for the sake of one feeling of indecision, a feeling that maybe they shouldn’t have been a they any more?

For Christ’s sake don’t look at Vanessa.

“Fine. I’ve put tonight’s really fun but I miss you, I always miss you when you’re not with me, hope you know how much I care about you. That heartfelt enough for you bitches?” Plastique muttered, embarrassed. Nina let out an “aaw”, Akeria made a sick noise.

“Acceptable,” Brooke shrugged, sipping on her beer again. Suddenly, a cheer went up from Akeria, Vanessa and Silky who could see who was coming through the living room door first. Yvie and Scarlet were walking close, holding a glass of red wine each and wearing matching poker faces.

“Oh, here they are! Nice of you to finally join us!” Nina cheered, Scarlet giving a small smile and smoothing her dress down, sitting beside Yvie on the last remaining couch.

“All the best people are fashionably late!” she shrugged. Yvie gave a snort and swept some hair over her shoulder to cover her neck. Brooke saw the action and jumped on it.

“Nice neckwear.”

Yvie turned only slightly red. “Thanks. Gucci.”

“Hear that? Yvie’s girlfriend is Gucci. Not Tesco Finest. Gucci,” Monet nudged Nina, setting another laugh off amongst the girls.

“We’re playing truth or dare,” Brooke explained to the two girls, as Plastique gave the glass bottle a bit of a pathetic spin.

“Vanjie!”

Vanessa shook her head. “Nah that spin was shit, it don’t count.”

“Like hell it don’t! Truth or dare, bitch?” Silky all but interrogated her. Vanessa thought about it for a moment, then decided.

“Truth.”

Brooke’ heart hammered in her chest. She hoped to God they wouldn’t ask Vanessa anything about her, anything about them.

“What’s going on with you and Monique, Vanjie?” Monet asked dramatically, Akeria giving a cry of delight and thumping her hands against her thighs.

Great.

As the room broke out into eager laughter, Vanessa just smiled.

“Well, Monique and I are good friends, and…we get on well. We both been, y'know, unlucky in love a lil’, so…” Vanessa trailed off, the room giving little chokes of anticipation and Brooke’s stomach twisting. “…if it’s one in the morning and one of us is maybe still up…y'know…”

Monet gave a tiny squeal through her teeth. Brooke wanted to wedge herself in between the sofa cushions and not emerge again til May of next year.

“Y'know, Monique’s very confident, very sure of herself, an’ that's…y'know, it’s attractive…” Vanessa trailed off, running her tongue over her teeth. Brooke knew that face, remembered the time when that face used to get directed at her before they’d fall into bed together, frantic kisses planted along collarbones and clothes discarded over the uneven floorboards of Vanessa’s room.

“But what’s actually going on? You’ve said so much but not actually said anything,” Yvie let out an unimpressed laugh. Vanessa composed herself and sat up straight, taking a rare sip of her drink.

“Well, we get on well. She’s a good person. And we’re friends,” Vanessa smiled coyly, causing the girls to laugh uproariously.

“Okay, okay, we all see it! We all get it!” Monet laughed, the knife twisting in Brooke’s stomach. Could it have been more obvious that they were obviously having each other in every type of position imaginable with any chance they got, or was it just Brooke being paranoid? She thought back to what Monet had said in the car earlier and concluded that, occasional hits of the bong aside, she was not being paranoid by any stretch of the imagination.

The game rolled along. Nina was made to do something vague and embarrassing with Monet that Brooke forgot quickly (or perhaps blocked out), Scarlet was forced to admit (rather proudly, Brooke thought) that her and Yvie had quickly fucked upstairs in the time they’d been away, and a few other of the girls did a couple of bland truths. As much as the bottle spun and spun, it never seemed to point Brooke’s way. Brooke was glad. She didn’t want to admit or say anything, and she also didn’t want to do anything remotely risky. However, when the bottle landed on Vanessa a second time, Brooke began to reconsider her thought process.

“Dare,” Vanessa smiled, a glint of danger in her eye flashing quickly as she darted her eyes quickly to Brooke.

Brooke tried not to look at Nina as she spoke. “Vanjie. Kiss the hottest girl in the room.”

“Oh, that’s a good one,” Plastique whispered quietly. It seemed as if the whole room held its breath. Brooke didn’t know if she was grateful to Nina for the setup or whether she wanted to descend into the earth’s core. She knew Vanessa had answered this question before with this group of girls, she knew that Vanessa thought the answer was her. But that was before everything had changed. Brooke felt her pulse race as Vanessa looked to the ceiling, deep in thought.

Slowly, she turned her gaze to Yvie and Scarlet.

“Yvie,” she began, a small sinking feeling lodging itself in Brooke’s chest. “Can I kiss your girlfriend?”

Yvie smiled at Scarlet proudly, happy for the compliment. “Dare’s a dare. Bring her back.”

“Scarlet, can I get a lil’ smooch?” Vanessa laughed, Scarlet laughing back and motioning for her to sit beside them on the sofa.

“C'mere, friend,” she laughed easily, Vanessa crossing the room and joining them. Brooke remembered when Vanessa had kissed Scarlet before- in the nightclub, before they were together and before Yvie and Scarlet were together. She remembered how it made her feel- a little irritated and sad all in one. Looking back, she realised it was plain and simple jealousy, and she knew her feelings weren’t going to change this time.

Quickly, Vanessa leaned in and met Scarlet’s lips, kissing her gently but slowly, her hand resting on Scarlet’s hip easily. It could only have been about three seconds long, but each one seemed to tick by agonisingly slowly, and Brooke hoped she wasn’t showing any of her fucked-up emotions on her face. As the two girls pulled away and the others whooped and whistled, Scarlet made a face.

“Bitch, all I tasted there was pepperoni. That was the least sexy kiss I’ve ever had.”

“You loved it, hoe!” Vanessa laughed, retreating back to her seat. Desperate to look at anything but Vanessa’s face, Brooke watched Yvie and Scarlet. Yvie had the satisfied grin of a mafia mob boss as Scarlet whispered something in her ear, then smiled seductively, kissing her once, twice, three times, red lipstick meeting purple.

“Well if I wasn’t bi before, I sure as hell am now,” Plastique fanned herself.

“We are the cornerstone of Plastique’s sexual identity. That’s a fucking compliment!” Scarlet cheered, Yvie laughing and wrapping her arms around her.

“Nah, you and Yvie are my parents. The Mums of the group,” Plastique explained.

“Fuck off, we’re not the Mums!” Yvie laughed, outraged. “Nina and Monet are literally right there!”

“Hey! That’s not fair!” Nina cried, outraged at the perceived injustice.

“Yeah, don’t lump me in with this dork!” Monet yelled, laughing with the other girls as Nina swatted her on the arm.

“Right! Spin, Vanj,” Yvie ordered, the girl spinning the bottle round obediently. Brooke watched as the top of the bottle whizzed by her once, twice, three times, past Yvie, Scarlet, the Antigua Road girls, slowed down as it reached Plastique, edged past Monet and Nina and then came to rest on Brooke.

“All RIGHT! About time this bitch spilt some tea,” Silky clapped in delight.

“Brooke,” Akeria said with the threat level of an MI5 employee. “Truth or dare?”

Brooke paused. Her go-to was usually a truth, however there was no way she was going for that this time, not while she was still a concrete mixer of feelings for Vanessa and not while there was a room full of people wanting to know exactly what was going on with them. She shrugged. “Dare.”

“Okay-” Akeria tailed off, making to stop and think. A practically evil smile spread across her face as realisation dawned on her. “Same dare. Kiss the hottest person in the room. Ten seconds.”

Silky let out a scream, growing so excitable on the sofa that Vanessa was almost sent through the ceiling. Scarlet whispered something to Yvie on the sofa, both of the girls looking at Brooke intently. Plastique shouted over something to Akeria that Brooke couldn’t hear. All she could focus on was how Vanessa had grabbed Silky and was laughing, but somewhat nervously. Her face had gone bright red. Brooke bit her lip. She thought back to their flirting in the cupboard earlier, how they were almost back to square one again, the weird bid Vanessa had made to make Brooke jealous. She could always kiss Yvie or Nina, take the easy way out. But the more she looked at Vanessa, the more drawn she became to her until before she knew what she was doing, Brooke had stood up from her place on the carpet and taken one, two, three steps to sit on the couch and look Vanessa in the eyes.

Brooke could hear everyone in the room screaming, and she knew Silky had run out of the room shouting incoherently, but all she seemed to hear was her blood roaring in her ears as Vanessa leaned in. Before she knew it, Brooke’s hand was resting on Vanessa’s bare thigh and they were kissing each other, slow and deep and lazy and in a way that Brooke never wanted to end. She felt Vanessa’s tongue licking at hers gently and immediately felt a throb of heat between her legs as she remembered 3ams spent between her sheets and Vanessa’s head buried between her thighs.

Christ, this was a bad idea, this was a bad idea-

“ZERO! And y’all can officially cut that shit out,” Brooke suddenly felt herself being wrenched away from Vanessa, Akeria’s voice cutting through her hazy thoughts and bringing her back down to earth with a bump.  

“Well, I feel like on that note,” Monet clapped her hands together decisively. “I’m away out to drink in the hot tub. Anyone else?”

One by one the girls agreed, dashing out of the room excitedly, and it was obvious to Brooke that everyone would be talking about what had just happened. Vanessa had run off quickly, her hand in Silky’s as the two dashed upstairs to get their swimwear on. The only girl that was left in the room as Brooke made to do the same was Akeria. She frowned at Brooke as they both left the room, a warning in her eyes which sent a chill down Brooke’s spine. Trying to ignore it, Brooke dashed upstairs, changed into her pink bikini and then ran outside to join the others. They wouldn’t talk about her and Vanessa’s kiss if she was there, so the less time she was away the better. Brooke grabbed a third beer from the fridge on her way out to the garden, and as she stepped outside she noticed how the moon already hung huge and bright in the sky, how the grass already had a shine of cold wet on it, and how everything looked almost a little bit magic. Joining the others and sitting between Yvie and Plastique, she tried to ignore Vanessa sitting opposite her in a black bikini that looked equally sinful as the outfit she’d been wearing before. Luckily the rest of the girls had no further desire to play drinking games, and talk instead turned to movies. Brooke didn’t join in. She couldn’t- too much was swirling around her mind, namely how good the kiss had felt. Scarlet had probably lied to make Yvie laugh- Vanessa had tasted like sugary coke, and the all too familiar scent of her perfume was still inexplicably clinging to Brooke. It had been weird to kiss after months of no contact at all. It had been a bad decision. Brooke had done yet another wrong thing.

So why did it feel somehow correct?

“Right!” Akeria said after a while, almost toppling over as she stood up. “I think I’m gettin’ a touch of the hypothermias. Who’s comin’ inside to watch Sister Act?”

“Bitch! That’s like, my favourite movie. Hell yes,” Monet sprang up, knocking Nina off her lap and into the middle of the hot tub. The girls erupted in a laugh, Brooke almost dropping her beer into the water. One by one, they all filed out of the water. Brooke was the last one left. Admittedly she didn’t want to leave- she was now tipsy enough to not feel the cold, and she could have lain back and stared at the white light of the full moon in the inky sky forever. Just as she was about to follow the others, she noticed that the second-to-last girl out of the hot tub was Vanessa. Brooke swallowed thickly, trying her best not to stare at how the small droplets of water clung to her thick thighs or how her tiny bikini barely covered her firm ass, or how her slick, wet hair cascaded down her back. Almost as if she could read Brooke’s mind, Vanessa slowly, tortuously turned around. She had a little wicked smile on her face, the kind she always used to wear when she flirted with Brooke. It made Brooke cross her legs and squeeze her thighs together.

“You got a good enough view from there?” she asked, playfulness coating her words as she spread both her arms out to lean against the back of the hot tub.

This was bad. This was not good. Brooke couldn’t flirt back. It would only lead to another really horrendous, catastrophic decision. Her mind was hot-wiring, and to her dismay she couldn’t come up with any form of quick-witted comeback. Noticing how long it was taking her to reply, Vanessa gave a throaty laugh.

“Hmm. I’ll take that as a yes, then,” she purred, crossing the water and sitting down close next to Brooke. Brooke tried her best not to choke as she took a sip from the bottle in her hand.

“Thought you were going to watch Sister Act?” she asked, trying to sound casual but cringing at how nervous she sounded as the words left her mouth. Her blood pressure dialled up a notch as Vanessa laced her fingers together, placed her hands on Brooke’s bare shoulder, then rested her head against her fingers.  

“I don’t know. Think I’d rather see what’s so special about this view you love so much,” Vanessa murmured softly, Brooke not missing the way she rushed out the word ‘love’ as if to distil any awkwardness. She didn’t need to worry, though, because right now all Brooke could focus on was how good Vanessa looked in that black bikini, and how her red lipstick still clung to her plump lips as if it had just been applied, and her beautiful dark gaze from under her fake lashes.

“Hmm. It’s a pretty good view. Pretty beautiful,” Brooke found herself whispering, eliciting a sparkle from Vanessa’s eyes. Fuck. Shit. She shouldn’t have said that, it just seemed to have happened, but with Vanessa sitting pressed up so close to her how else could she have possibly reacted? There was a small silence in which Vanessa gave a small giggle, looking down at the constantly popping bubbles. The jet stream pummeled Brooke’s back to bits.

“What’s funny?” she smiled cautiously. Vanessa looked at her, something nostalgic on her face.

“Your pickup lines are still cringey as fuck,” she smirked, Brooke rolling her eyes a little. She had to steer this conversation back to normality. Whatever the fuck normality was as far as her and Vanessa were concerned.

“That wasn’t a pickup line. If I was trying to pick you up, you’d know about it.”

“Oh, I know about it, baby. Don’ worry,” Vanessa hit back instantly, Brooke taking the pet name like a fatal shot. Brooke knew that Vanessa knew what that word did to her in the right context with the right tone. Fuck. Bad idea, bad idea. She was determined not to lose whatever game this was. She would not do anything stupid. She would not ruin the tiny, small beginnings of this foundation of their friendship that they were gradually re-building. She would stand up and go inside and watch Whoopi fucking Goldberg dance about in a fucking habit and all would be right with the world again.

“Two and a half years, huh? You had it bad, bitch, I never knew I had that kind of effect on you,” Vanessa laughed suddenly, Brooke trying not to blush as she remembered Plastique’s words from earlier.

“Not that you’re letting it go to your head,” Brooke shrugged, taking a sip.

Vanessa giggled again. Brooke wished she wouldn’t. “Never.”

“Good compliment for you, I guess.”

“Better than beaud,” Vanessa smirked, snorting a laugh as Brooke tipped her head back and cringed. As she quietly stopped laughing, Vanessa shrugged lightly. “An’ I mean, nice to know I’m the hottest girl in the room too.”

Brooke let out a small sigh at having to confront her decision. “I mean just because we’re not dating any more doesn’t mean it’s not objectively true. By Western beauty standards you probably are the hottest girl in the room.”

Vanessa laughed again. “Western beauty standards, my God. I’m not even white, you dumb bitch.”

“Yeah, but…you’ve got this gorgeous skin, and all your shiny hair. And your eyes that go all twinkly when you’re happy,” Brooke explained. Where was all this coming from? “And you have perfect white teeth, and the best smile. I feel like you light up the whole room when you laugh.”

Brooke’s heart gave a twinge as Vanessa’s face broke out into a smile, tilting her face to the side a little inquisitively. Brooke gave a little cough, aware of all the compliments she’d given her. “And you have a really good figure as well, so, yeah.”

“Oh, obviously. Well, we all know how much you like that,” Vanessa smirked cheekily, Brooke suddenly snapping her neck round to face her properly.

“What?”

“Liked that. Like, liked. Whatever. We’re friends now, we can laugh about it,” Vanessa shrugged, the words coming out of her mouth confirming their status at once relieving Brooke and putting her on edge. They were back to being friends. This was what Brooke wanted, right? Vanessa still had the little cheeky grin on her face as she spoke again. “Friends who still kiss each other, apparently.”

“Well, you kissed Scarlet,” Brooke said, trying to make it as nonchalant as possible. Judging by Vanessa’s smug reaction, she hadn’t succeeded.

“You seem pressed.”

“Not pressed! Just saying,” Brooke tried to protest gently but felt she came on way too heavy.

“Mhm. There’s just one problem about all this, though…” Vanessa murmured, her tone charged with something that immediately made the hairs on Brooke’s arm stand on end, giving her goosebumps.

And then, with one fluid movement, Vanessa moved to straddle her.

Shitshitshitshitshitshitshit.

Brooke’s heart almost flatlined as Vanessa spoke, her face still wearing the tiniest cocky smile that Brooke so badly wanted to kiss off of her. “It’s kinda hard to try an’ be friends with you when I know what you look like with no clothes on.”

Brooke tried her best to keep her voice level. “Well, it’s also kind of hard to try and be friends with you when you’re flirting with me.”

“It’s also hard to be friends with you when I know what your kinks are…” Vanessa brought her arms around Brooke’s neck and barely concealed a smile as she bucked her hips ever so slightly. “…Mami.”

Brooke felt the tiniest hiss escape her lips, glad it wasn’t the fuck that had immediately popped into her head.

“It’s kind of hard to be friends with you when you’re riding my thigh…or when you’re coming on to me like this,” Brooke replied, keeping one hand firmly on the side of the hot tub and the other wrapped around the glass bottle in her hand so tight she thought it would smash.

“Coming on to you?” Vanessa suddenly tipped her head back and laughed, Brooke immediately realising what she’d said. “That can be arranged, you want face, tongue or fingers?”

“Fuck’s sake, Vanessa,” Brooke laughed softly, letting one of her hands drop down under the water and rest against Vanessa’s thigh. As Brooke’s thumb rubbed at her skin softly, she tried to reason with herself. Just because she was stroking Vanessa’s skin, and had her on top of her, and was basically talking dirty to her, didn’t mean that anything was actually going to happen.

“I know you miss me, Brooke,” Vanessa said, her tone matter-of-fact as she straightened up a little in Brooke’s lap, Brooke eyeing the way her breasts were pushed up.

Brooke had to think carefully about her response. She knew she’d hurt Vanessa, so she had to keep things light. “I mean, it kind of looks like you miss me, baby.”

Oh fuck, that pet name was a mistake. Vanessa’s smile was sultry as she pushed one of her hands into Brooke’s hair. “Me? Nah, I’m just doin’ this because it’s fun. Monique’s treatin’ me very well.”

Jesus fucking Christ, Vanessa knew how to hit Brooke where it hurt. Brooke pursed her lips. She wanted to fight dirty, she would give as good as she got. “And that’s why you’re cheating on her?”

Vanessa burst out laughing. “Oh, bitch, please! Me and her aren’t exclusive! We ain’t even a thing! She vents to me about her ex, I vent to her about you, and then we fuck away our frustrations!”

A part of Brooke’s heart soared up into the black sky like a helium balloon. She didn’t think she’d shown her relief on her face until Vanessa gave a laugh. “So. You ain’t denied it.”

“Denied what?”

“That you miss me,” she shrugged, giving a little look down at Brooke’s hands on her thighs. Brooke couldn’t pinpoint when she’d brought the other one down under the water but apparently she had done. Her throat was dry as she considered her response. Before she could get there, Vanessa threw her mind into chaos as she brought her hands back behind her head, fidgeted for a moment, then suddenly threw her bikini top across the decking. As Brooke’s gaze flicked down to Vanessa’s full breasts, the other girl brought one finger up and tilted her chin up to face her. The heat between Brooke’s legs was unbearable, and she felt her paper-thin resolve rapidly melting away. Vanessa smirked. “You wanna kiss me so bad right now, don’t you? Like you kissed me earlier. You can’t even stay away.“

Vanessa seemed to edge closer to Brooke, although they were already so close that seemed an impossible feat. Brooke raised an eyebrow. “See, I feel like if Monique fucked you as good as you say she does, you wouldn’t be in my lap right now.”

Vanessa blinked slowly, mockingly. “Oh, baby. You don’t want to know the things I let her do to me.”

Brooke bristled. The tension between them and Vanessa’s teasing was getting her riled. “You’re right, I don’t.”

“Aww. You jealous, baby?” Vanessa pouted. This was going to drive Brooke insane. Her mind constantly swung between this being a bad idea and a good idea, and she had no idea which it would settle on.

Brooke locked eyes with Vanessa, the other girl’s gaze a challenge. “No.”

“You sure? You seemed jealous when I kissed Scarlet earlier, I saw your face.”

“I don’t get jealous,” Brooke repeated, holding her gaze with Vanessa. Their faces weren’t too close but their bodies were, and Brooke felt as if she was a ticking time bomb.

“So you ain’t jealous of Monique?” Vanessa murmured inquisitively. Brooke shook her head, now unable to tear her gaze away from her lips which had felt so perfect against her own earlier. “You ain’t jealous of the fact she gets to ride my face and get my pretty lil’ tongue working her clit? You ain’t jealous of the fact that it’s her name I’m crying out when I cum on her fingers? You ain’t-”

Frustrated, tense, and out of willpower, Brooke let out a low growl as she finally brought her hands up to Vanessa’s jaw and crashed their lips together, kissing her wildly and deeply and running her hands over every inch of Vanessa’s skin she was able to touch. She didn’t even care that she’d proven Vanessa right, because she had missed this, missed her, missed the way they just seemed to fit together like two pieces of a puzzle and dear sweet fucking Jesus she’d been an idiot to give up this sex. Brooke whined needily as she felt Vanessa pull away, the other girl laughing against her lips.

“You don’t kiss like a girl who ain’t jealous,” Vanessa tutted, a satisfied smirk on her face. "Or one that don’t miss me.”

Brooke ran her hands up and down her back and pouted. “Shut up.”

“Hmm. That ain’t no way to talk to me if you’re planning on getting what you want, lil’ brat,” Vanessa raised her eyebrows, bringing one of her hands down to rub at Brooke’s hipbone. Brooke let out a whimper and bucked her hips. She needed Vanessa so badly, and her words were only making things worse. Or better.

“Fuck, please, Vanessa, shit,” Brooke hissed, not caring about how pathetic and needy she looked now as she brought one of her hands up and rubbed a thumb over one of Vanessa’s nipples. Brooke felt her clit throb as Vanessa gave a little hum of delight at the contact. Her fingers had only been there for a second before Vanessa grabbed her wrist and held it down under the water, the sudden force causing Brooke’s eyes to grow wide.

“You broke my fuckin’ heart an’ now you really think I’m gonna make it that easy for you?” she barked a laugh, a guilty twinge tugging at Brooke’s rapid heart. “Fuck that. I want to hear you beg me to fuck you. You’re gonna have to work for me, baby. Shit’s on my terms.”

“Fuck, Vanessa, I really don’t give a shit how desperate I sound,” Brooke sighed, the shock of the prospect of Vanessa changing her mind about all this lighting a fire in Brooke. “Please, please, please, please, baby, I’m sorry, I’ll do anything you want, just fucking touch me, please-”

Brooke cut herself off with her own moan as Vanessa ran a hand down her body and lightly pressed two fingers against her, rubbing gently and making Brooke want to sob.

“Good girl,” Vanessa purred, Brooke writhing underneath her and completely past the point of thinking about any of the consequences of any of this. “You miss me, don’t you?”

“Fuck, so much.”

“You been missin’ this?”

“Shit yes, so much.”

Vanessa’s eyes were dark as Brooke looked up at her. “Nobody’s gonna fuck you like me, are they?”

Brooke’s eyes nearly rolled into the back of her head, thinking that at this point if Vanessa asked her to get married she probably would’ve booked the damn venue. “No, only you, baby, fuck.”

“Mm, such a good girl,” Vanessa smirked, Brooke’s clit giving a spasm as she thought now was really not the time to realise she had a praise kink. “I don’t know, though. You seemed pretty sure you wouldn’t miss me when you ended things.”

“I do miss you, 'Ness, I promise, I’m sorry, I’ll beg on my knees if you want me to, I don’t give a fuck, you’ve been driving me crazy all night…so fucking perfect, shit…"

"Mm…you would look so pretty on your knees,” Vanessa leaned in and murmured into Brooke’s ear, pressing the lightest little kiss to her neck and almost sending Brooke over the edge before anything had even happened yet.

“I’ll do whatever you want, baby, fuck, I want you to feel like you’re the most gorgeous fucking goddess in the world,” Brooke gasped as Vanessa brought her other hand down to touch herself, the sight of her working Brooke and herself into a frenzy the hottest thing she’d seen in months. Her mind short-circuited, and she struggled to know if anything she said made any sense. “Jesus Christ, Vanessa, please fuck me, I can’t take much more-"

Pride glinted in Vanessa’s eyes before she leaned in and kissed Brooke, hot and wet with her fingers still rubbing and teasing her through the material. Pulling away, she motioned to the decking around the hot tub. “Lie back then, baby.”

As Brooke almost drove her face into the decking in her haste to scramble out of the hot tub she ignored the little voice in the back of her head that told her everything about this was a bad idea, and instead focused on the one that screamed it was the best decision she’d made in months.s

[imagine-loki]

Ragnarok

TITLE: Ragnarok CHAPTER NO./ONE SHOT: Chapter 2: The Good Doctor AUTHOR: traveling-classicist ORIGINAL IMAGINE: Imagine you take care Odin when he was homeless on Midgard (based on the deleted scene from Ragnarok). You take him in and listen his crazy stories about Asgard and Thor thinking he’s just some crazy hobo who needs help. Then one day, Thor and Loki break into your apartment looking for their father. Hela returns in your living room and insanity ensues. RATING: T

AO3 Link: Here NOTES/WARNINGS: Mentions of homelessness, drug abuse, alcoholism, and parental disownment.

————————————————————————————————–

The next morning, Theo was woken harshly by a pounding on her bedroom door.

“Theo! Theo! Get up! The frost giants are attacking Midgard again! I must call upon the armies of Asgard to help!”

Theo groaned as she sat up. She rubbed her face as Odin continued to pound on the door. “Theo, you must get up now!” At least he wasn’t violating rule number six.

“Alright, alright. I’m coming,” she said yawning. She opened the door and Odin grabbed her arms and whisked her down the hallway. “Odin, stop! You’re hurting me!”

He loosened his grip as they reached the kitchen. He pointed out the window to the snow that had piled up outside.

“Look, there, they must have attacked in the night. Thor must be in trouble if they were able to take back the Casket of Ancient Winters. I must return to Asgard to help. Heimdall! Open the Bifrost!” he shouted.

“No, no. It’s too early for shouting,” Theo said, sleepily, putting her hand on Odin’s shoulder. “Odin, there are no frost giants attacking. It’s just the snow from the storm last night, remember?”

“The storm?” he said. He looked down, trying to remember.

“Mmm-hmm. Looks like it was one hell of a storm too. There’s probably two feet of snow down there.”

“Hela?” he muttered. He put his hands on his head and rocked back and forth a moment.

“Are you alright, Odin?” Theo asked, seeing his distress.

“I need to remember but I can’t,” he said, pounding his head with his fists.

“Oh, don’t do that. It’s alright. Here, just sit down a moment. I’ll make you some breakfast. How do bagels sound?”

“Breakfast?” he asked.

“Yeah! I’m going to make a bagel. I’ve got plain, blueberry, sesame seed, marble. What would you like?”

He was breathing hard and seemed confused. “I don’t know,” he said.

“I know, I just gave you a lot of choices there. You can never go wrong with a plain bagel and some cream cheese, though,” she said as she popped two bagels into the toaster. She put on some coffee and walked over to him, putting her hands on his shoulders, trying to calm him down.

“I’m sorry, Theo,” he said. “I am an old man and a fool.”

“Oh, no you’re not. Well, maybe you’re a little old, but you’re not a fool. Didn’t you tell me once you were fifty centuries old?”

“Yes, yes, I think I am,” he said, seeming to calm down.

“Well, sir, you’re older than dirt. Almost as old as the pyramids. I bet you’ve seen a lot in your time,” Theo joked with him.

He looked down, solemnly. “I have.”

The toaster popped. Theo made up his bagel, a banana, and a cup of coffee for him. “Here, have something to eat. It’ll cheer you up. You know I’m just joking with you, right? I don’t think you’re older than dirt,” she said, worried about his sudden solemnity. She didn’t want to hurt his feelings.

“Yes, I know,” he said. He seemed suddenly weak.

“If you’re still hungry later, I can make you up some eggs or maybe some bacon, if you’re up for it. Just let me know.”

“Alright,” he said and ate slowly.

Theo checked her emails again. She worked from home as a social media manager for several large tech businesses in New York, including Stark Industries. She enjoyed being able to work from the comfort of her apartment. She didn’t do well in office environments.

            “Odin, I need to get a bit of work done today, so I’ll be in my room for a few hours, but the door will be open if you need anything, okay? Just give a holler,” she said.

            “Work? What sort of work do you do, Theo?” he asked, seeming to come out of his funk.

            “Oh, well I work for a few big companies here in New York. I just manage their social media presence, keep an eye on their analytics, marketing, that sort of thing.”

            “Oh, is there any fighting involved?”

            “Fighting? Good Lord, no! Well, not the physical kind.”

            “What is your preferred weapon?”

            “Odin, I don’t have a preferred weapon!” Theo said, laughing, though a bit unnerved by his questions.

            “Oh, come now, sure you do! A strong lady such as yourself. My son loves the warhammer. Melee weapons are his specialty. Mine too, you know. I think he got that from me. My other son prefers magic and long-distance weapons but he’s still rather skilled, I suppose. He got that from his mother, of course.”

            “Ah,” Theo mused, trying to entertain his fantasies while she answered emails on her phone.

            “I apologize about all that business with the frost giants, earlier,” he said.

            “Oh, don’t worry about it, Odin. No harm done,” Theo said.

            “I am always concerned they will one day rise again. Especially, after what Loki did to them.”

            “Mmm-hmm,” Theo muttered, mouth full of bagel. She swallowed her last bite. “Odin, I’m going to go get some work done now. In my room. Why don’t you have a seat on the couch and read through a book? There are all kinds, like I said. Have your pick and if you need anything, I’ll be just down the hall, okay?”

            “Yes, alright,” he said, seeming rather agreeable, again.

            Theo sighed, feeling she could get some work done while he read. She went back to her room and opened her laptop. It was quiet and peaceful in the apartment for about ten minutes before Odin wandered into Theo’s room.

“Your chambers are very untidy,” he said, spooking Theo from her work.

“Odin!” she cried. “Rule number six, Odin! Please, at least knock first! Don’t sneak up on me, please!”

“Theo! I need to visit the Doctor, so I’ll be going now.”

“The doctor? What’s wrong? Are you feeling sick?”

“Sick? Oh no! I’m not a human, remember. I don’t get sick like you do. I’m going to visit the Doctor to see if he’s found out anything about Thor.”

“Is this that magician doctor you were telling me about?” Theo asked. She was not amused. Odin had told her about some crackpot ‘doctor’ he had found on Bleecker Street spouting all kinds of nonsense to him. She thought he was some nutjob crystal healer after Odin once told her he was talking about these infinity stones that could solve all the universes problems or destroy it.

Theo thought he was just another asshole looking to take advantage of an old man. What sort of medical doctor allowed an old man to go homeless after being turned out on the street by a defunct nursing home? Surely, there was something he could have done.

“Yes, Strange.”

“Yes, he is strange. Odin, it’s freezing outside, and I doubt the streets are even clear yet. Can we wait til after lunch at least?”

“Oh, alright. Can I have some whiskey?”

“I don’t have whiskey. You can have water, though.”

He grumbled and walked out of her room. She sighed and put her hands on her temples. She rolled her eyes and went back to work. She rushed through to get everything done in time to take Odin out. She did not want him going out alone. The last thing she needed was him getting lost or forgetting that he was living with her now or worse, being taken advantage of.

She hoped that by the time she finished and made him lunch, he would have forgotten about seeing his crazy doctor friend. She really did not want to go all the way downtown to see this bastard in the freezing cold.

When she had finished her work a few hours later, she emerged from room to see Odin sitting at the kitchen table with a book in his hands. His eye flitted across the pages as he read. She smiled at him.

“What are we reading?”

“Norse Mythology by this, this Neil Gaiman. Do you people really believe all this nonsense about us?”

“Ha! Well, I suppose there are still some people that believe in the Norse gods. And that is, of course, a work of fiction based on the old Norse myths. Why? Is some of that a little fantastical?”

“It’s rubbish! Is this actually popular?”

“I suppose, so. It must be, you’re nearly all the way through it!” Theo said, pointing at the book and laughing. Odin shook his head and continued reading. “What would you like to eat? I’ve got some cold cuts; we can make some sandwiches.”

“Yes, yes, that sounds fine. And maybe some beer?”

Theo rolled her eyes as she walked to the kitchen and pulled out some bread and meat and cheese for sandwiches. At least, he wasn’t asking to see that doctor anymore. She made him a sandwich and grabbed a bag of chips from the pantry.

“What if I made you some tea, instead of beer?”

“Meh, I don’t drink tea,” he grunted as she set the plate in front of him.

“Alright, well what about soda or juice or coffee or anything else?”

“What about mead? Do you have any mead?”

“Wha–? Mead? Are you some hipster brewer now?” Theo laughed. “No, I don’t have mead.”

“What sort of place are you running here? No mead?” he laughed.

“Not a hotel, you silly old fart.”

“I am not a fart, young lady,” he said.

“Sorry, my liege,” she mocked a curtsy.

“You should work on that, you know,” he retorted.

“Bite me.”

“You know, you remind me so much of my beautiful wife. She had such fire in her. I think,” he laughed to himself. “I think she passed a bit of it along to both our sons. Oh, I love her so much.”

“Aww,” Theo said. “She sounds lovely.”

            “Oh, she is,” Odin said. “I wish you could meet her. She likes you a lot.”

            “Does she?” Theo knew that his wife had passed away a long time ago. He had spoken a few times about her. “Is that Frigga?”

            “Yes, she thinks you’re very kind for taking care of an old fart like me… Agh, woman! I am not an old fart!”

            Theo could not help but sputter and laugh at Odin’s outburst. She wondered if she’d ever get tired of his weird fantasies. When she was young, she remembered her grandpa had had dementia when he was Odin’s age. He thought he was a fighter pilot in the Great War, dropping ‘bombs’ on his neighbors in the retirement home. The ‘bombs’ normally being unsolicited farts on little old ladies and grumpy old men.

During his time there, before he died, Theo had gotten used to her grandpa’s wacky stories, some of which she thought had some truth to them. He had been a fighter pilot in World War II, and he had dropped many actual bombs on people. Some of those stories he remembered rather vividly, like Odin remembered his sons and his wife.

“Well, you tell Frigga, you’re in good hands,” she replied.

She meant it. She had been preparing to take Odin in for months, even while she was helping Jacob and Emily before him. She was prepared to have Odin stay with her until… well, until the end. She wanted him to have a happy rest of his life. Not living out on the streets anymore.

“You’re a good lass, Theo,” Odin said. “Your parents are lucky.”

“Pfft, don’t tell them that,” Theo said, immediately wishing she hadn’t.

Odin looked at her questioningly. “Why not?”

“Oh, well, um, my parents and I don’t really talk anymore. They don’t want me in their life anymore. At all.”

Odin shook his head in disbelief. “Why not?”

“Um, that’s a good question,” Theo said, laughing to cover how uncomfortable she was by the topic. “We fell out a few years ago and haven’t spoken ever since. They sort of disowned me. They didn’t ‘agree’ with the choices I was making, as if they were really my choices. Anyways, we don’t talk anymore. They live upstate. Or at least, I think they still do. I send them birthday cards and Christmas cards and letters every now and then but I never get responses.”

“What sort of parents don’t want their children around?”

“Bad ones,” Theo muttered. She stood and took their plates to the kitchen, trying to end their uncomfortable conversation. She washed the dishes and put them on the rack. Odin sat in silence at the table. When she had finished with the dishes, she returned to the table and sat down.

“Theo?” Odin asked. “Do you think we could go visit the Doctor on Bleecker Street?”

Theo sighed. She looked out the window at the street below. The streets and sidewalks were rather clear now. “This man is a friend of yours?”

“Yes, he’s a good man. He’s very knowledgeable about the happenings of the universe.”

“Mmm-hmm, well, I wouldn’t want you to go by yourself, so let’s go.”

            “Are you sure this is the address?” Theo asked, teeth chattering in the cold. She looked up at the old, art deco apartment bloc with the ornate windowpane.

            “Yes, this is the one. 177A. He is the Sorcerer Supreme, so be nice,” Odin said, rather chipper even in the cold.

“What is that, like a sandwich?” Theo asked, sarcastically, laughing and rolling her eyes. Odin stepped up to the door and rang the bell.

“Hello, Doctor. It’s me, again. I’ve brought a guest. Please, don’t teleport her into space.”

            Theo turned her head slowly to face Odin, staring at him. She shook her head. Hopefully, this crackpot wasn’t home, and they could go home and get some hot chocolate. She wrapped herself up in her long scarf and coat.

            The door creaked open and a man appeared. He smiled at Odin.

            “Wong, hello, is the Doctor in?” Odin asked eagerly.

            “Hello, Odin. Yes, he is upstairs. Come in and I will go get him.”

            “Good. This is my friend, Theo. I am her roommate, now.”

            “Oh, very good. It is nice to meet you, Theo. My name is Wong,” he said, greeting Theo with a handshake.

            Theo shook his hand and smiled. “Hi,” she said.

            “Please, come in.”

            They both entered the large foyer. In front of them, a grand staircase led up to an upper floor. Wong ascended the stairs and disappeared. There were strange cases filled with artefacts, lining the walls. Theo walked up to one, examining the strange wooden item behind the glass.

            “Odin? Is this a museum?” Theo asked him.

            “Hmm, I suppose it is, of sorts. Of Midgardian magical artefacts.”

            “Magic?” Theo said, skeptically.

            “Odin!” A man’s voice rang out from the top of the stairs. He appeared in blue robes with a red cape. Theo raised a brow at him. “I have not heard from nor seen Thor. I’m sorry to disappoint you again. I will come straight to you as soon as I know anything, though. Oh—” the man broke off as he came down the stairs. Wong trailed behind him.

            “Ah, Doctor,” Odin began. “This is Theo, she is—”

            “Oh, Lord,” the doctor rolled his eyes. “Another drug addict.” He grabbed Theo’s arm.”

“Wha-? Excuse me?” Theo said, in disbelief, trying to pull away but his grip was strong.

“What is it? Heroin? Cocaine? Meth? Let me see,” he said, taking her sleeve.

            “Strange!” Wong shouted.

            He pulled up her sleeve to reveal the scars of old track marks. Silver dots and lines peppered her skins. Some still purple only just beginning to turn silver with their age. Theo gasped. The room fell eerily silent.

            “You know, they all start to look the same, these people—”

            The doctor broke off as Theo’s fist connected with his face.

“Get off me!” she shouted, putting as much force as she could into her swing.

He let go of her arm and collapsed onto the floor holding his bloodied nose. Theo was fuming. She ripped down her sleeve. Tears welled in her eyes. Her fists clenched. Her jaw tightened as she tried to find the words to rebuke this revolting piece of trash, excuse for a human at her feet. She wanted to kick him, but she knew she couldn’t.

            “You deserved that, Strange,” Wong said. “This young woman has been caring for Odin and you’ve insulted her.”

            “Indeed,” Odin butted in. “I’ve never seen such disgusting disregard for personal boundaries and I’m from another Realm. Come, Theo. We should not have come here.” Odin took her arm and started leading her towards the door.

            “Wait, Theo,” Wong said, running down the stairs and stepping over the doctor. She did not meet his eyes. “I am truly sorry for Steven’s actions. They were unwarranted. We are very grateful that someone is taking care of Odin.

“We’ve been very worried about him since we realized he was here. He is a very special case, as you surely know. We have tried to get in contact with the Avengers and SHIELD to notify them he is here, but no one is answering us. Steven has been trying to contact Thor, but he is too far for us to reach him.”

            “What are you talking about? This man is sick, and you knew and left him out on the streets? What are the Avengers or SHIELD gonna do? Blow him up? Spy on him? He needs care from a real doctor, not some moron with a mail order degree,” Theo spat and walked out the door with Odin. She raced down the sidewalk ahead of Odin until she reached the street. She felt so hot, she might melt the snow around her.

            “Theo?” Odin asked. She stopped and waited for him to catch up. She hugged herself, brushing away the tears with the back of her glove. Her breath was hot in the cold air. Her cheeks felt hot and red from the embarrassment and shame she felt. Odin walked up beside her and stood patiently.

            “I knew you had a preferred fighting style,” he said. “I just didn’t expect it to be your fists!” He laughed a little. She could tell he was trying to cheer her up. A little smile crept across her face. “Is your hand alright?” he asked.

            “Yes,” she replied, looking at her reddened knuckles. “It’s fine. I’m sure I’ve had worse. I’m sure I’ve punched worse. That guy’s a real ass, Odin. He wasn’t even nice to you. He was so dismissive. I don’t think he’s looking out for you, I really don’t.”

            “Mmm, perhaps you’re right. We won’t be returning here.”

            “I’d much rather take you to see a real doctor,” Theo began.

            “Oh no, I don’t need a human doctor. I’m not ill. I was just hoping Strange knew something of Thor.”

            Theo shook her head. She would work on convincing him to see a doctor some other time, right now she wanted hot chocolate and the biggest chocolate chip cookie New York had to offer.

            “Do you like hot chocolate?” she asked Odin.

            “What’s that?”

            “Oh my God, how can you even live in my house and not know what hot chocolate is? Come on, sir. We are going to get some hot chocolate and cookies.”

            They went to Theo’s favorite hot chocolate café. It was, of course, extremely full since the weather outside was frightful but she knew the owner well and the next available table was cleared for them. She ordered her favorite hot chocolate for both of them and a plate of their fresh hot chocolate cookies.

While they waited, she felt tense. She did not want Odin to ask about what had happened. She sighed and looked out the window at the people and cars passing by outside.

“You don’t believe in the gods, do you?” Odin said.

“Hmm? What you mean like the Greek gods or the Norse gods?”

He nodded.

“No. I don’t,” she said. “But to be fair, I don’t believe in any gods. Not the old ones or the ones that are popular now. I don’t believe that there are such things.”

“Well, good. You shouldn’t because there aren’t.”

“Odin. You tell me on an almost daily basis that you’re the king of the Norse pantheon.”

“And I am. But I’m not a god.”

“You don’t make any sense.”

“I am Odin, the King of Asgard. But I am not a god.”

“Okay,” Theo said, thinking it better to agree with him than argue with him.

“Do you not believe in Thor, the Avenger?”

“I know who you’re talking about, yeah.”

“He’s my son,” Odin said.

“I… I…”

“You don’t believe me,” Odin said.

“Odin, I… It’s not that… I just… I find it hard to believe that an Avenger like Thor would put his dad in a home and then forget about him. If all this is true, why aren’t you on Asgard with him?”

Odin looked away, suddenly distraught. “I… I don’t know. I can’t remember,” he said. He put his hands on his head and started to hit himself. Theo jumped up, seeing that she had upset him.

“No, no. It’s alright, Odin,” she said, pulling his hands away from his head. “Don’t do that. It’s alright that you don’t remember right now. It’ll come to you. I’m sorry. Look, here comes our hot chocolate.”

He looked up, seemingly excited about the arrival of this new drink and food. The waiter set it on the table and rushed off to serve the next customer.

“Here,” Theo said, handing Odin his hot chocolate and the biggest chocolate chip cookie on the plate. “Give this a try. I always come here when I’m upset about something or in a bad mood or whatever. Even when it’s sweltering outside. Hot chocolate and cookies always makes me feel better.”

“Does it have alcohol in it?”

“No,” Theo laughed. “It doesn’t need alcohol. It has the next best thing: sugar!”

He took a sip and his eyebrows raised with the taste.

“Uh huh. It’s good, isn’t it?” Theo said. “It’s even better when you dip your cookie in it.” She broke her cookie in half and dunked it into the hot chocolate.

“How old are you, young lady?” Odin asked.

“Does it matter? You’re never too old for hot chocolate and cookies. Doesn’t matter if you’re my age or fifty centuries old.”

“Hmph,” he huffed, looking at his cookie.

Theo smiled. “Well, if you don’t want it, then I’ll have it,” she said, reaching across the table for his cookie.

He pulled away and gave her a steely glare. “No, it’s my cookie,” he said.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

When they had finished their hot chocolate and cookies, they started back towards the subway station. They passed by several shops along the way. Theo was getting cold again and when she was cold, she tended to get tunnel vision. Odin, on the other hand, enjoyed looking into the shop windows. He stopped suddenly, staring in at one of the shops.

At first, Theo didn’t notice and continued walking. When she glanced beside her to see her companion missing, her heart skipped a few beats. She turned around, frantically looking for him over the crowd. She stood on her toes to see over everyone’s heads and found his white hair standing close to a shop window. She pushed back through the busy sidewalk and came to stand next to him.

“What are we looking at?” she asked.

There were several large, professional photographs, hanging in the small, independent gallery. Odin was taken by a beautiful landscape photo. Tall forested mountains with a large body of water beneath.

“Where is this?” Odin asked.

“Mmm,” Theo mused, looking at the photo. “I’m not sure. Looks Scandinavian to me. Like the fjords in Norway. Let’s see, what does this little card say,” she leaned closer to the window to read the display card. “Aw, yes. It was taken in Bergen, Norway.”

“It’s beautiful. I’d like to go there someday,” he said and then lowered his head. “I don’t think I ever will.”

“Oh, don’t say that. It is a beautiful place, though isn’t it. I’d love to go hiking in those mountains. I bet the view from the top is amazing.”

“Mmm,” he said. “It reminds me of home.”

[rebelcourtesan]

My D&D 5e Build for Catra

Catra, possibly the most complex and endearing character of any reboot I’ve ever seen.  She wants to be loved, but because of an abusive mother figure, she doesn’t know how to open herself up to love others.  Been thinking about this for a while and decided to try my hand at recreating her as a DnD character.

Long Post Below

                                                  ***Stats****

Dexterity:  This must be Catra’s highest score as being a cat girl, she is very dexterous and quick on her feet.  She has to be when confront power bound She-Ra.  

Wisdom: Second highest, as Catra has a penchant for reading a person’s emotion.  It’s how she gets under Adora’s skin, can sense discomfort in the people she manipulates such as Entrapta and Hordak.

Charisma:  “Hi, Adora”, seductive, manipulative, and able to convince others to go along with her wishes.

Intelligence: Growing up among the Horde with its technology and basic education, Catra is no tech wiz, but is no dummy either.

Constitution: This is a touch low on the list as Catra’s best defense is not to get hit in the first place.  Once an insane She-Ra was able to grab hold of her and slam her down in White Out, she was almost out for the count.

Strength:  Dump stat.  Catra does not rely on strength so put your lowest score here.

                                                      ***Race***

This is a no brainer, Tabaxi of course!  A catlike race that comes with traits right up Catra’s alley.

Tabaxi automatically add a +2 to Dexterity and a +1 to Charisma, just perfect for Catra.  We want her Dex maxed out as soon as possible. 

 Cat’s Claws:  Tabaxi come with claws hands (just like Catra) which they use for climbing and fighting.  Climb speed is 20 ft and the claws are considered natural weapons which means that unarmed strikes for Catra are 1d4+Str. 

Don’t worry, I know I stated the strength should be dump stat, but it’ll make sense soon.

Cat’s Talent: Catra automatically gets proficiency in Stealth and Perception skills.  Perfect for when Catra to spy on enemies.   

Darkvision: Catra gets to see in the dark for 60 ft.  

Feline Agility: On a turn, Catra can choose to move double her speed as a move action.  However, the downside is she cannot use it again until she has moved 0 ft for one turn.  Still useful as Catra has ran on all fours to evade attacks from Glimmer and Hordak.

Choose the Adopted background.  Catra was adopted by the Horde and Shadow Weaver.  This would give her proficiency in Persuasion and Deception along with Stealth she received for being Tabaxi.

We’re going to start Catra off in Monk.  She prefers hand to hand combat because of her claws and agility. 

Lv 1  Choose the skills Acrobatics and Insight as Catra is agile and about to read people.  

Unarmored Defense: Since Catra doesn’t wear any armor, then she’s going to need this.  As long as she doesn’t wear armor her Armor Class is 10 + Dex + Wisdom, both of which are her highest scores! 

Martial Arts:  As long as Catra fights unarmed (or with Monk weapons) she can add her Dexterity (her highest stat) to her unarmed strikes which makes up for her low Strength.  Also, this allows her to make a second unarmed strike as a bonus action.  

Lv 2    Ki points will allow Catra to perform abilities that will give her an advantage over slower enemies such as She-Ra and Hordak. Flurry of Blows for extra attacks, Patient Defense to take Dodge as a bonus action, and Step of the Wind to Disengage or Dash as a bonus action and it also doubles her jump distance.   

Unarmored Movement:  Adds 10 ft to her movement which brings it up to 80 ft when she uses Feline Agility!  Catra can really move across the battlefield.

Lv 3   Choose Way of the Open Palm as a Monastic Tradition.  This will allow Catra to incapacitate her enemies with a Flurry of Blows.   

Deflect Missiles isn’t something we’ve seen Catra do in the show, but it’s a nice bonus nonetheless.

Lv 4  Ability Score Improvement should be used to boost her Dex and Wisdom in that order.   However, if you want to get a feat instead, I would recommend  Alert, Athletic, Mobility, or Observant.

Slow Fall allows Catra to reduce her falling damage as a reaction as cats tend to land on their feet.

Lv 5  Now Catra’s unarmed strikes do 1d6 damage and she gets an Extra Attack.  Stunning Strike will allow her to stun enemies who fail their Con Saving Throws.  

Lv 6  Unarmored Movement bumps up from 10 ft to 15 ft and Catra’s unarmed strikes are considered magical, allowing her to overcome magical immunizes such as Princesses and Sorceresses.  

Also, she gets Wholeness of Body which allows her to regain HP three times her monk level once between long rests.  Pretty handy as her low Constitution won’t have gained her many HP to begin with. 

  Lv 7  Evasion allows Catra to evade area effects such as Princess Magic. She can use her by now high Dexterity to evade damage or not take any damage at all.  

Catra’s stubborn nature protects her with Stillness of Mind which guards again being charmed or frightened.  

Lv 8  Ability Score Improvement.  Catra be maxing out Dexterity by now.  If it’s already maxed, then bump up Wisdom and Charisma.  Or you can grab a feat instead.  Alert, Athletic, Mobility, or Observant     

Lv 9 Unarmored Movement Improvement let’s Catra run up walls and across water.  I can see her running up walls, but yet to see her run across water.  Then again, she might rather have her feet get wet than the rest of her.

Also, her Proficiency should go up by 1.  

We’re going to take a dip in Fighter class here.

Lv 1  This will allow Catra access to martial weapons.  Get her a whip as soon as possible.  It has reach and finesse, but only deals 1d4 damage.  This will become important soon.

Choose Dueling to give the whip an extra +2 to damage rolls.

Also Second Wind is a great second to Wholeness of Body when Catra is in a tough fight.  Regain 1d10 + Fighter Level in hit points.  Not much, but a lot to a character with low Constitution. 

Now we go into Rogue.  

Choose the Intimidation skill as Catra put the fear of herself in the Crimson Wastelanders.     

Lv 1   Choose two already selected skills for Expertise.  This will double her proficiency in them.  Choose Insight and Stealth.   

Rogue’s get the Sneak Attack ability which adds 1d6 damage die to any attack with advantage or an ally is within 5 ft of target.  Talk to your DM about Catra using her clawed unarmed strikes for sneak attacks.  If they okay it, great!  If not, then no worries, that’s why Catra has a whip which is a finesse weapon.  

Lv 2  Cunning Action lets Catra disengage, dash, or hide as a bonus action.  Letting her escape with ease when the fight becomes too much.

Lv 3  Choose Swashbuckler as Rogue Archetype.  

Fancy Footwork lets Catra attack with a melee weapon and disengage without provoking attack of opportunity.  

Also, Sneak Attack damage die goes up to 2d6

Lv 4 Ability Score Improvement.  By now your Dexterity should be maxed out.  Go ahead and get Wisdom and Charisma up.  Or great a feat.  Alert, Athletic, Mobility, or Observant 

Lv 5   Uncanny Dodge will allow Catra to halve damage as a reaction when struck by a target she can see.  

Her Sneak Attack damage goes up to 3d6, more than making up for the whip’s low damage yield.

 Lv 6 Expertise again.  Choose Deception and Persuasion.  Catra has a talent for manipulation.

Lv 7  Sneak Attack damage bumps up to 4d6.  Catra is already enjoying Evasion from her levels in Monk.  

Lv 8  Ability Score Improvement.  Wisdom should be maxed out by now, so put points into Charisma.  The option for feats is always open.  Alert, Athletic, Mobility, or Observant 

Lv 9    Sneak Attack is up to 5d6.  Granting excellent damage with the whip she stole from Tung Lashor.  

Also Rakish Audacity lets her add Charisma modifier to Initiative.  Also, she no longers needs an advantage or an ally within five ft of enemy to do sneak attack damage.  As long there are no other creatures within five feet of Catra and she’s not rolling with disadvantage, she can cut lose with the whip. 

Lv 10  Ability Score Improvement   Wisdom should be maxed out by now, so put points into Charisma.  The option for feats is always open.  Alert, Athletic, Mobility, or Observant

And there you have it.  Catra as a D&D character. She’s an excellent hand to hand combatant and fearsome with a whip.  Agile and light on her feet, she can cross a battle field within one movement and also heal herself with Second Wind and Wholeness of Body if she gets overpowered.  With her Wisdom and Charisma skills, she can easily trick and deceive others, using their emotional problems against them.

Downside is that Catra is now a strong fighter and is better coupled with a front line fighter such as Scorpia.  She would have low health points compared to others, but her Dexterity and abilities should prevent too much damage and she can heal herself as needed.  

Feel free to let this girl loose in the battle against the Princess Alliance.  

[marvelousbirthdays]

Happy Birthday, bellemeri

December 5-Prompt: “Don’t get blood on your outfit. We have dinner reservations at seven.” Bucky with just about anyone though I have a preference for Darcy, for @bellemeri

Written by @thestarfishdancer

Sorry for the late posting. Hope you enjoy!

“Jane. Jane. JANE.” 

The scientist finally looked up from her sciente, her brow wrinkled in consternation. “You don’t have to shout.”

“Considering I’ve been trying to get your attention without shouting for the last five minutes?” Darcy countered. “Um, yes. I think I do.”

“Oh. Fair,” Jane said, blinking and pushing the notes she’d been scouring slightly aside and sitting up straight to give her friend her full attention, a gesture Darcy appreciate. “What do you need?”

“Nothing needed, just a reminder. It’s five now, and I’m out for the day. You are allowed to science for another hour and a half, but at six thirty, FRIDAY’s putting the lab in blackout and since I’m not here and Thor’s offworld at the moment…”

“The Dickinson Protocol is in effect.” Jane grimaced. “Yeah, I don’t ever want that to happen again.”

“Hey, it wasn’t all bad. You had to have a pretty good view of America’s ass.”

“While slung over Captain’s America’s shoulder like a sack of potatoes, then dropped unceremoniously in the common kitchen in front of half the tower’s residents?”

“Yeah.”

“It is a nice ass,” Jane admitted. “But all the nice asses in the world aren’t worth it.”

“Speaking of nice asses,” Darcy segued. “I’d better be off, ‘cause I’ve got a date with another owner of a very fine ass, and I’d better get out of here fast if I’m going to have time to curl my hair.”

“Oh, right, it’s yours and Bucky’s anniversary, isn’t it?”

“One year,” Darcy confirmed. “Who’d da thunk it, that a superhero super soldier would want to stick around for ordinary me for that long?”

“You aren’t ordinary, I hope said super soldier knows how lucky he is to have you, and we will be discussing this lack of self esteem if I have to program a new FRIDAY protocol, but I’m letting you off the hook for now because I know how long it takes you to get home.”

“The commute isn’t that bad,” Darcy said.

“It would be shorter if you lived in the tower,” Jane said, then cut Darcy off when she opened her mouth to repeat old arguments, waving them away. “We can argue another time. Go. You’re eating into my ‘sciencing’ time.”

Darcy grinned, then stuck her tongue out at Jane, then headed out of the lab.

“Have good sex!” Jane called cheekily as she left.

“Always do!” Darcy laughed back, then made her way to the elevator.

A few floors down, the elevator stopped, and who should step in but her boyfriend, with Sam, Steve, and Natasha.

“Hey, Darce,” Bucky said, leaning down to drop a quick kiss on her lips.

“Hey, babe,” she smiled up at him. “Where are you guys off to? No call to assemble, I hope.”

“Nah,” Bucky said. “Just doing a quick bit of patrolling in one of the boroughs, keeping trouble at bay.”

“Well. Don’t get blood on your outfit. We have dinner reservations at seven,” Darcy teased.

“We’ll keep him out of trouble,” Sam grinned at her. “And hose him off for you if needed.”

“I packed a spare outfit for him, just in case,” Steve said, his eyes twinkling.

“Great, so my shirt will be two sizes too small.”

“Darcy won’t complain,” Nat grinned. “Give the other restaurants some eye candy.”

“Why am I friends with these guys?” Bucky bemoaned as the elevator doors opened. Darcy just laughed and waved them off, then made her way to the subway.

The line was thankfully running on time, giving her plenty of time to pop on a showercap and have a nice steamy shower, then took her time curling her hair and applying her makeup. By the time she was pulling on the great red dress she knew her boyfriend was going to love taking off later, she was feeling pretty good about herself and the prospects for the evening. She topped the outfit off with a great pair of heels, then hurried out the door to hail a cab to the restaurant.

She’d never regretted not taking Stark up on his offers to send for one of his fleet of drivers he made available to lab staff. She’d lived in the city long enough that she was a master at public transportation, and finding a taxi was usually fairly quick and easy, more so than waiting for a driver to make it to her. Still, as rough hands grabbed her hard enough to leave bruises, shoving her toward the vehicle that definitely was not the cab she planned to wave down, she definitely was having regrets.

She fought back, kicking and screaming as she reached for her trusty taser. There were three of them, though, and only one of her.  One of the thugs grabbed her wrist, twisting. The sharp pain made her lose her grip on her taser. She managed to hit one of them in the nose, and he swore as it started to bleed, shoving her roughly away from him. She heard her dress tear as the other two manhandled her into the back of the van, and another one of the bruisers hit her in the face hard enough she saw stars. He grabbed her purse, throwing it onto the pavement before slamming the doors. The engine engaged, and then they were driving her to goodness knows where.

Darcy blinked back tears and took a deep breath. Took stock. Her wrist hurt like a bitch, a burn of an ache resonating through it, but it likely wasn’t broken. She’d lost one of her shoes in the melee, and though the other did have a stiletto heel, she wasn’t sure if it would be that great of a weapon. They’d thrown out her purse, so she didn’t have her taser or her pepper spray. They hadn’t counted on her secret weapon, though: her boobs.

Not a weapon in the traditional sense, of course. But through the course of her life since puberty, she’d found herself underestimated because of her breasts, as though her cup size meant she couldn’t be a savvy, resourceful young woman. And it wasn’t that she was expecting that her boobs, as great as they were, presented such a sight that baring them would stopped several trained henchman in their tracks.

No, her boobs were her secret weapon because, since her dressiest purse was pretty small, it wouldn’t fit her taser, pepper spray, lipstick, wallet and phone, and her cup size meant there was room to tuck her phone down one side of her bra. So there, in the back of the van, she dug it out, unlocked it with shaking fingers, and called in reinforcements.

It was all over fairly quickly after that. Bucky had thankfully still been with Nat, Steve, and Sam when she called. Thankfully because she could tell from the moment she told him what had happened, he’d seen red. Nat had been able to take over the call while Bucky imitated Bruce hulking out, Sam had pulled in Tony to trace her whereabouts, and then Steve had called an assembling or whatnot, and a rescue was mounted.

Whatever the thugs had been preparing for when they’d kidnapped her, they certainly weren’t ready for a full force of Avengers dropping on them while they were still driving the van out of the city. Within ten minutes of placing the call, the van was slamming to a stop, and mere seconds later, a familiar metal arm was ripping the door of the van right off its hinges.

Darcy scrambled toward Bucky even as he came to her, launching herself into his arms and laughing tearfully. He scooped her up and out of the van, and she clung to him as he moved them away from the fray, even as she could see if was very obviously dying down. A handful of thugs were definitely no match for a team of very angry superheroes.

“Are you okay, Darce?” Bucky asked, his eyes scanning her face.

“Yeah,” she said, then amended as he looked doubtful. “I’m a bit battered and bruised, and I could definitely use some ice for my wrist, but that’s really the worst of it. Except my dress. I’m pretty sure I ripped my dress, and I am pretty bummed about that actually.”

“It’s a really good dress,” Bucky said, “but I care more about the person in it, so…”

“The person in it is okay,” Darcy said. “Shaken, yes. Bruised, definitely. But I think I handled the situation pretty well, and I’m proud of how I kept my head, so there’s that. And hey! You didn’t even get any blood on your outfit.”

“I’m afraid I can’t say the same about you,” Bucky said grimly. “I thought you said you were just bruised.”

“Oh!” Darcy said, looking down to see that, sure enough, there was blood drying on the skirt of her dress. “That’s not mine. I hit one of the dudes in the nose, and I must have got him good.”

“Good,” Bucky replied darkly.

Darcy sighed, and snuggled into Bucky. The fight was definitely over, the others sort of milling as they waited on whatever transport was going to come for the bad guys. And maybe medical to check her out. Probably some SHIELD bureaucracy was going to happen now. The thought made Darcy groan.

“What’s wrong?” Bucky asked alarmed. “Does something new hurt?”

“No,” she said. “It’s just… we’re going to have to spend the rest of our anniversary debriefing to SHIELD, aren’t we?”

Bucky shook his head. “They can wait. Once medical clears you, I’m taking you home.”

“Oh, good. We can order in. They’ve probably given our reservation away, and I’m honestly not feeling up for out, at the moment.”

“I figured,” Bucky said. “We can reschedule. If they give us trouble, we can sic Pepper on them.”

Darcy smiled, then leaned back into him. “I hope medical clears me quickly. I just want to go home.”

“Speaking of home,” Bucky said, his voice taking on a weird quality she’d call nervous if her boyfriend did nervous. Which he didn’t. Did he? “I know this is going to sound like it’s coming out of what happened tonight, but I was planning on suggesting it tonight, and you should know that I’m not going to pressure you, though I suspect given tonight’s events the team might insist on some changes regardless and-“

“Spit it out, babe,” Darcy cut off his rambling, though not unkindly.

“I think we should move in together. It doesn’t have to be at the tower, if you don’t want, but… I love you, and I want to keep building a life together.”

Darcy smiled slowly. “I’d… I’d like that. Very much.”

“Really?”

“Yes,” she said. “I love you, too, and I absolutely want us to keep making a life together. So tonight, let’s go to your home, and tomorrow? Tomorrow, we can start figuring out what our home will be.”

“Perfect. I mean, that sounds perfect, but also, our home will be perfect. Because you’re there.”

“Why Buck, I didn’t know you were quite the sap,” a voice broke in.

“Shut it, Sam,” Bucky said without rancour. “You guys about done there?”

“SHIELD’s going to be a few,” Sam said, “but Stark’s offered to give you and your gal a lift if you don’t want to wait to get out of here.”

“What do you think, Darce? You up for it?”

“With you? I’m up for anything. Now let’s go home.”

[nullanythorm-ao3]

Hiccup/Hiro/Varian OT3 FFXIV Headcanons

Stuck on my next fanfiction update? Time to bust out one of my OT3 headcanon posts again! The next chapter of Chemistry in Motion IS on the way, I promise you. But for the time being I’m a bit braindead - and being obsessed with playing Final Fantasy XIV with my friends isn’t helping. Instead of Variro and Varian & Honey Lemon sibling fluff, my brain has thought, “Okay, but what if the OT3 either played FFXIV or just existed in Eorzea?” and hasn’t stopped. 

So, instead of the Camp Halfbood concepts I was planning on doing next, you get this. 

Let’s start with easy mode: races

This part was simple. The only one that really gave me any trouble was Varian, really. I have certain things I associate each of the boys with - and two of those things just so happen to have races in Final Fantasy, so let’s go!

Hiccup is an Au Ra. They’re half-dragon, all-awesome, and Au Ra males are some of the tallest characters in the game!!! Second only to Roegadyn, I think. So Hiccup is TOL. If this is a concept of an AU where they exist in Eorzea as Warriors of Light - I feel like Hiccup’s the type that seems intimidating at first, the tall half-dragon man - but is actually just a soft cinnamon roll who’s hopelessly in love with his two boyfriends, but we’ll get to that part, eventually.

Hiro is a Mi’qote! Maybe because of Mochi, but I just can’t stop associating him with cats. So, naturally, I’m just going to keep doing it. Mi’qote are a moderate, slightly below-average height race. Also cat ears and tails, and the “mission complete” screen after dungeons has male mi’qote do a little happy ear wriggle, and it’s cute. I feel like Hiccup and Varian play with his ears a lot - like, a lot of scratching behind them or rubbing them for cute, fluffy, affectionate moments. He’s small, sassy, and about to get some world-saving s*** done, okay?

Varian. Varian was difficult. On one end I considered Hyur - just a simple smol human (though you can’t really make Male Hyur that short in-game, closer to average height really). But then I thought maybe Lalafell, make him super smol and cute. But actually, I’m going with my favorite race in the game: Varian’s an Elezen. For two reasons. 1) if this is a matter of them playing the game - Varian’s the type I could see wanting to play a character taller than he is, and Elezen are pretty darn tall. 2) As for if they exist in Eorzea, we’ve seen through the examples of Alphinaud and Alisaie that young Elezen can be quite small!!! Varian with pointy elf ears is also adorable fight me. Anyway. I feel like he’d definitely be a “runt of the litter” Elezen. Taller than Hiro, but still on the short side. Maybe it comes from Ulla (if you include 7k in this) being an Elezen, but Quirin being a Hyur or another shorter race that kind of dwarfs his growth a bit? 

Okay, so let’s talk roles

Note: roles. Not classes. For the FFXIV uninitiated, one of the coolest things about this MMO is that you’re not tied down to one class. There are several classes within certain roles - Healer, Tank, Melee DPS, Ranged DPS, Magical DPS - and you can swap between those classes freely. There’s even disciple of the hand - crafting classes. And disciple of the land - gathering classes. We won’t talk about those as rolls, but I’ll bring them up when I talk about the squad’s main classes later. For now, let’s talk about the roles they prefer for adventuring, dungeons, raids, etc. 

Hiccup is a tank! Tank classes are his first choice, without a doubt. He’s kind of the leader of the squad without meaning to be. He protects Hiro and Varian, and kind of keeps the other two in line and out of trouble with the rest of the party (because these two are SASSY and will cause trouble, trust me), whether it’s only one other person just running a dungeon or a whole raid alliance. In large parties, he’s quick to defer to someone else if they want to be the main tank. He’s not the ‘fighting for dominance’ type. Other than tanking, he enjoys melee DPS and healing, and uses magic DPS the least.

Hiro usually plays ranged DPS! Honestly, his central roles are basically all the DPS roles, but he likes Ranged most because of mobility, and ability to take things out from afar without worrying about his DPS dropping too much from dodging big attacks. Other than that, he enjoys magical DPS for range and Melee for mobility. His least-used role is healing, because caretaker he is NOT. Some of his ranged DPS classes have utility, and that’s good enough for him. 

Then, for a well-rounded team, Varian’s main role is Healer. This comes mostly from his tendency to be “support” in most situations. He is, overall, a sweet boy who wants to look out for and help his friends (even if he can be self-centered). He’s definitely the sassy healer that will get passive aggressive with bad tanks in big parties or if Hiccup isn’t tanking. “I couldn’t keep up. So sorry, I’ll try harder next time if you try harder not to over-extend. Okay, thanks”, “The Dragoon is floor tanking? Guess who’s going back to the start of the dungeon because I’m not ressurecting them”, “Hiro, for the last time. We DODGE attacks first, shoot later. If you get hit for extensive damage because of a dumb mistake again I am NOT healing you”. THAT Healer. He’s also the best technical player of the three though (if this is the ‘they’re just playing the game’ situation), so he has the skill to back up the sass. Also, he flirts with Hiccup whenever he clutch heals him, or whenever Hiccup thanks him for heals, and it breaks Hiccup’s brain. Outside of healing, I think he’d like magical DPS and ranged DPS, and tanks the least.

On to actual classes/jobs now!

So here’s how this is going to work. We’ll be talking about the classes in their primary roles. What’s their main class, and ranking the classes within their main role in order of most to least used. After that, we’ll talk about some outlier classes. Classes from other roles they enjoy playing that they might play often or that I think suit them(A note: we’ll only be going over a couple, and no matter what outliers I mention, the role rankings from the previous section are the priority in knowing what and how they play). Then we’ll talk about their crafting/gathering classes of choice. 

Hiccup

 So, we mostly see Hiccup with a sword and shield, so naturally his main job is Paladin. It was what stuck out in my head, especially since I wanted him to main tank. It’s the balanced, all-rounder tank as well - which I think suits Hiccup. After that, there’s Warrior. Our big, brutal axe swingers. This one’s focused more on his viking heritage. Battle Axes run in that blood, don’t they? Then, there’s Dark Knight. The enormous sword is cool, but Hiccup isn’t really the ‘dark, brooding, edgy’ type. So I don’t think DK would really be his style aesthetically. Gunbreaker is the one he’d use least. It’s a cool class, but the more modern gunblade just doesn’t scream “Hiccup” to me. I think he’d enjoy the damage output, but feels better with normal weapons like swords and axes in his hands. 

So the first outlier for Hiccup is something FFXIV fans might see coming. Dragoon. Hiccup with a spear is cool, but this is mostly for the lore. For those who don’t know - Dragoon’s lore is all about dragon slaying. They’re spearmen trained in Ishgard as part of the Dragonsong war - valiant defender of the city and slayers of dragons. Sound familiar? Similar to his actual story, I love Hiccup picking up the spear and being ready to fight dragons - but he’s a sweet bean and still tries his best to broker a peace when he learns how intelligent dragons are. 

The other outlier I’d like to discuss for Hiccup is White Mage. The ‘taking from the spirits and nature’ vibe I think really suits his personality. He loves his island, and the dragons that live there, and everything around him. Not QUITE a tree hugger or anything, but preserving nature and caring for its creatures would definitely be important to him. It’s probably his main healer role.  

As for crafting and gathering. Blacksmithing and Armorsmithing are probably his central crafts, so he probably does a lot of mining as his gathering class. He spends a lot of time in the forge, after all! I could also see him delving into a little carpentry, what with all the tinkering and mechanics he works with. 

Hiro

When I thought about Hiro, my first thought was “machinist”. The steampunk vibe it has fits Hiro being the most modern of the three boys, I think. Also, a robotic/automaton partner/minion? YES. After that is Dancer. He probably picked it up for a laugh, not expecting much, then wound up hooked. He enjoys making either Hiccup or Varian his dance partner and flirting with whoever it is incessantly. With Varian, it’s just a back-and-forth of witty flirting and laughing. With Hiccup, he actively takes up a two-sided flirting front with Varian and well... if Hiccup breaks with just Varian flirting, adding Hiro makes it worse. He plays Bard the least, but still enjoys it. “He’s not much of a singer”, he often jokes whenever he stretches his Bard muscles. In the ‘they’re just playing the game’ universe, I feel like he forgets his song utility a lot and just focuses on doing as much damage as possible. Because that’s kind of his schtick. 

An outlier for him would be Red Mage. I think he’d like the quick, easy casting with Dualcast, and the fun melee rotation. He’d be the type that enjoys using Displacement just for the flair - and always gets a talking to from Varian whenever he accidentally flips off the edge of a platform. So, you’re not allowed to play Dragoon, Hiro (he plays it anyway).

And the other outlier is Gunbreaker. Again with giving the guns to the more modern member of the squad. However (and I’ve hardly touched my tank  classes so I can’t say anything here), it’s a running joke that Gunbreaker is for “people who want to try tank, but still kind of want to be DPS”, and I love that. It’s kind of perfect for Hiro. 

So for crafting and gathering. Hiro would probably be a Goldsmith and Leatherworker. Leatherworker for practicality - because I think Hiro’s definitely the most practical  of the three. Goldsmith because he likes to tinker with things and I can definitely see the precision work of accessory making suiting him. Now, normally that would probably mean he’d spend most of his time mining - but there are exactly three gathering classes in the game, so I like to think they’d try to round each other out. So, Hiro’s going to spend most of his time fishing. One, because cats and fish jokes. Two, because it’s just kind of chill and less work (or at least labor) and knowing Hiro I could see him going for that.

Varian

Varian’s main class would most DEFINITELY be scholar. He just seems to gravitate toward my favorite things. I think of all the magic-based classes. The arcanist set would be his favorite since it focuses more on logic and strategy. Scholar, especially, deals with hunting down a centuries-old plague on an ancient civilization and a lot of things I can very easily equate to the black rocks and dark kingdom. Also, he gets to summon a fairy and COME ON. That’s adorable. He probably talks to the fairy (usually Eos), because that’s just him. Second main healing class is White Mage, similar to Hiccup. The nature vibe just seems to suit him. He seems good with animals and the whole natural element just works since he seems to enjoy the outdoors and comes from a farming family/village, let’s not forget! Then Astrologian would be last. He wouldn’t really be into the astrology/future sight but I think he would have fun with the star vibes and (in Eorzea universe) would learn the uses of the future reading and get more invested in it, eventually. 

An outlier of mention for Varian is Summoner. I mentioned before that he enjoys arcanima for its focus on logic, strategy, and value of intelligence, so, naturally, Scholar’s opposite would work well with him too. Also the carbuncles make me think of Ruddiger for whatever reason. Look at him! I love the concept of him summoning his carbuncle and it just crawling up his back and wrapping around his shoulders. He summons the Egis too! He knows how to play his job! He just really loves the carbuncles. 

The other outlier for him of special mention is Bard. I think he’d like it, because he can be DPS but still give the party utility. Also. Come on, this boy can SING and he’s going to take advantage of it. God-tier bard for his singing voice alone, right here. Hiccup and Hiro low-key get excited whenever he pulls out the bow, because it means they get to hear their boy sing (because even in the universe where it’s just a game, Varian totally sings on whatever method of call they use for a lot of the dungeon whenever he plays bard). 

Crafting classes. It surprises no one. He’s an Alchemist. Possibly a culinarian. His gathering class is botanist, the only one left. He spends a lot of time with plants, natural elements, and alchemy to make potions and all that jazz. He is very passionate about his crafting job and is probably the biggest crafter of the group. ALCHEMY!

And now for some miscellaneous headcanons

So, if it’s just the OT3 playing the game - Varian is the biggest roleplayer, no question. He slips into character ALL the time and it makes Hiro and Hiccup chuckle a little, but they always play along. He got the two of them to enjoy the roleplaying aspect, even. 

They each have their own squads/groups they play/adventure with, and they almost always change up their roles with those groups. 

For Hiccup - he’s basically in a group full of people who want to be tanks. It’s a constant battle for dominance (that Astrid almost always wins, unless she gives a pity win to Snotlout occasionally or lets Hiccup take out of respect for his tanking ability). Most of the time, Hiccup just shrugs it off and goes DPS or healer depending on if Fishlegs is there to heal or not.

Hiro usually tanks for his team. Mostly because Gogo refuses to level anything but DPS, Wasabi suffers from tanxiety and usually either heals or goes ranged, Honey Lemon does whatever Wasabi isn’t doing, and Fred is... Fred. 

Varian’s group is well-balanced, but they each have their preferences. Cass or Lance are usually the tank, Eugene’s usually a melee DPS (probably ninja), and Rapunzel is almost always the squad healer (tho she defers to Varian for that role occasionally). So he’s usually DPS in that group. 

Still, they work best together in their main roles. Their favorite times are when they’re adventuring together, as much as they love their friends. 

Hiccup and Varian occasionally tease Hiro for being the shortest of the group - to which he usually groans and complains. But they use their tank/healer status to prevent him from messing with them because “I can always turn off my tank stance you know”, or “I mean if you don’t want healing, by all means”. He hates it when they do that.

They usually make up for it by giving him a TON of presents, though. They’re both frugal with gil compared to him, so if there’s some new shiny, expensive thing on the market he wants and doesn’t have the money for, Varian or Hiccup can usually swing it for him.

Hiccup likes to surprise Varian with gifts too. It’s the one one time he can make Varian flustered, and he quite enjoys it. 

If any Elezen bully Varian for being a runt (in the setting where they’re adventurers in Eorzea), they can expect to meet with the business end of Hiccup or Hiro’s weapons. They won’t hesitate. 

[the-kiwi-is-not-a-pewee]

Every Single Grievance I have with Fable 3

I don’t hate Fable 3.

I swear I don’t, especially after a second playthrough that helped me get over the jarring change of mechanics from Fable 2. Heck, I don’t even think it’s a bad game. But I have a lot of problems with it.

Like, quite a few. And I did say I was never gonna stop ragging on it, so this list of grievances is the result. It’s not comprehensive, it’s going off of pure memory so YES I will get details wrong but this wasn’t made with perfect accuracy in mind.

It’s a lot of minor things and if anyone can explain why some of these things are like this, please tell me.

Enjoy my complaining.

1. Where the Fuck Am I?

Sanctuary map oh Sanctuary map, where the fuck am I???

I actually have a couple problems with the Sanctuary map, one of which being that it is a terrible map. Oh, it does decently well in places that don’t have many multi-level areas like Brightwall, but in places like Mistpeak? Where the terrain can range from very high to low? 

Navigating with the map is an absolute nightmare.

And I say this after trying to find the Mistpeak Demon Door using just the Sanctuary map. The result of that adventure was me looking up a YouTube video instead.

Nothing is where you think it is, areas are hard to pinpoint in relation to each other because you either can’t see them or there are other obstacles in the way. And the map doesn’t show you where YOU are so you have to either rely on the golden trail or do guesswork.

Not that the golden trail is reliable because the thing fizzles like a candle in the wind and it can’t lead you to locations that are not quests or fast-travel locations.

And... oh boy. Fast travel.

How the fuck does this game determine where you end up when you fast-travel to a location? Fast-travelling to Brightwall especially is a gamble, you either end up all the way outside the gates where you enter from Mistpeak Valley or you end up in the square. Why is it not always the square? Why can you end up outside the village? There’s nothing interesting there that would warrant it.

2. Dying in Slow-Motion

This isn’t about the hidden health bar. I’ll get to that later. This is about the gratuitous amount of slow-motion shots you get while fighting.

It’s... frankly a little absurd, like someone really REALLY liked that mechanic in Fable 2 and decided to crank it up to 11.

I get it, some nice slow-motion so we, the players, can appreciate the flourishes. But sometimes I don’t even hit anything so I’ve just wasted a few seconds watching my character miss, and sometimes if you’re swarmed you get a lovely slow-mo shot of your character about to get bodied.

It’s not as annoying as some other things, but I have to ask. Why??

3. Skill Tree Nuance

Fable 3 absolutely stripped any nuance of upgrading the Heroic disciplines. Fable and Fable 2 at least had you choose what ASPECT of each of the disciplines you wanted to level up, so you had to at least make a decision of what you valued most of each one. Was Accuracy more important to you because of the type of gun you were using or perhaps you liked shooting things more? Did you prefer a bigger health bar at this point in time over hitting harder? Did you want the greater power of Shock over the ability to hit more targets with Inferno? (These examples are all from Fable 2 because I’m not familiar enough with Fable to pull from that.)

In Fable 3 your hardest decision leveling up in skills is merely deciding if you like melee, shooting, or magic better. With a side of selecting what spells you want.

Nice.

And no, having the Guild Seals act as your experience and unlockables currency does not make the choice much more complex. You’re still choosing to upgrade the entire skill and not upgrade choice aspects of it.

4. Why is My Health Bar the Entire Screen

Listen. I meant it when I said I don’t hate Fable 3, and a big reason is because I can play around most of the stuff that is annoying or unfamiliar to me.

Except.

The.

Health.

Bar.

For those who don’t know, Fable 3 does not have a health bar. Or, rather, it does, but you, the player, are not privy to it. Instead, the entire screen turns gray and the edges turn red like it’s a fucking FPS shooter. Fable 3 is not an FPS shooter. Fable as a SERIES is not an FPS shooter.

It is not the type of game where you should have to guess EXACTLY how low your health is, because while the screen change gives you an approximation, it’s absolute garbage for making a quick estimate of how many hits you can take before you’re knocked out.

You also can’t even increase the health bar on the Road to Rule. At least, not as far as I’m aware because I CAN’T FUCKING SEE IT. Speaking of the Road to Rule...

5. Road to Rule is Not Terrible, But Half of it is Unnecessary

I get that the Road to Rule is supposed to be a replacement for the menu level-up systems in the other two games but the thing is, since leveling up was dumbed down the Road to Rule doesn’t have much going for it aside from being Theresa’s pocket dimension where she can talk to the Hero of Brightwall. But even then it’s unnecessary because, as seen in the last part of the game when she shows up for the last time, she can apparently stop time itself.

The thing is, half the shit in the Road Rule makes no sense to be locked behind progression. Sure, dyes maybe I can get (even though they’re superficial), but expression packs? I need to progress to even gain the ability to make friends with someone? I have to wait and shell out Guild Seals just to buy property?

Why? Because of the second half of the game? 

Wasn’t the point of that being the gold amount was set so ridiculously high you still have to put in time or job grinding so regardless you have to invest something? Being able to buy property earlier in the game isn’t going to impact it that much, which just makes it being barred in the Road to Rule very... unnecessary. Like the job level ups being in the Road to Rule instead of leveling up in the job itself and thus breaking any impression that your character was getting better at the task by doing it instead of just suddenly shooting up in skill.

6. Why is the Guild Seal so Fucking Huge and Logan’s “Enough!”

Nothing major here, just like... why is the guild seal so huge? It requires like 2 hands to pick up. Sparrow traveled with that thing for like, gods know how many years as well as the Heroes from ages past. Why is the damn thing so big, it’d be so inconvenient to carry.

Also in the cutscene where Walter confronts Logan and the Hero of Brightwall tries to stop him, there’s this moment where Walter tries to protest and Logan goes “Enough!”. But the thing is, he says it in the same tone you’d take if you were cutting someone off, and Walter stops speaking before Logan says it. It’s just a little awkward.

7. Side Cast

I really actually have only one issue with the side cast. Other than that, I think Fable 3 has a very well-developed side cast. Walter is really cool, Jasper is amusing, and Page and Ben are enjoyable and mark their personalities out starkly. I could go on, but you get the idea. I feel like I know these characters as people, much better than I do in Fable 2.

But the thing is, while that is true, some relationships are straight-up neglected. For example: any sort of dynamic between the Hero of Brightwall and Logan and the relationship between the Hero and their dog. Fable and Fable 2 at least gave their characters if not equal time, at least SOME time. The dog gets a few cute tidbits and honestly I didn’t expect a retread of the connection from Fable 2, but half the time I forget the dog is even there. The relationship between the dog and Hero does not impact anything unless you count Traitor’s Keep, but we’re not since it’s DLC. Nothing impactful is really connected to the dog.

Logan. Oh, Logan. You got did so dirty by this game. Fable 3 had the opportunity to do something with the player choosing to spare Logan, but it goes nowhere. It doesn’t offset your new money goal or increase it if you choose to execute Logan because of his soldiers leaving or staying depending on the choice, the Hero and Logan basically never talk in the second half of the game, heck, you don’t even see him again until he’s all “Imma just go” at the end. I’m not asking for a lot here, just something. I get that forcing your sibling to choose between the life of their childhood friend/lover and the lives of protesters will damage any semblance of a sibling bond they would have, but it would’ve been a wonderful opportunity to delve even deeper into why Logan made the choices he did and how they affected him. Does he feel remorse for what he did now that he’s off the throne? Would he do it all again? We’ll never know, because he vanishes off the face of Albion until the end where he says he’s leaving.

8. Some Plot Holes and Other Plot Issues

As much as I like Logan and believe he’s easily the most complex major antagonist the Fable series has had, uh... as much of the Fable community has pointed out, his secrecy makes no sense. At first I thought maybe he kept quiet because he thought no one would believe him when he said the Darkness was coming and Walter and the Hero of Brightwall only believed him because they experienced it for themselves. And that’d be a perfectly plausible explanation.

If the entirety of Aurora couldn’t back up his statement.

Seriously, it wouldn’t be just Logan’s word, he has the remnants of an entire nation to back him up. He already made a promise to Kalin and she’s been portrayed as a perfectly reasonable leader, I can’t see why she’d not help Logan convince Albion of the danger. It’d be in her best interests as well because it would increase the likelihood that Aurora would get aid from Albion.

Logan also doesn’t look great or even effective as a leader. Theresa tells you that he can’t defeat the darkness because... reasons, and I actually believe her. Because this guy has apparently been taking what was essentially the evil path to getting gold and only raised... 400,000 gold in 4 years. And you can piss that all away in one of your first choices as ruler. That’s like... really pathetic and unbelievable, because the evil choices are supposed to give more gold. That’s the whole reason why Logan decided heinous actions were okay in the first place! 400,000 gold doesn’t convince me of that!

Also, the second half of the game really suffers because of the Good/Bad duality choice system. It gives you little room for compromise. Why can’t I tell Samuel to wait one more fricken year before Brightwall Academy is reopened? Why does the orphanage have to be torn down to make room for a brothel, was there no other buildings or empty space?

See what I mean here?

9. Gamebreaking Glitch I Encountered And Am Still Salty About

Apparently, there’s a gamebreaking glitch in Fable 3 where you load the game up... and you never leave the loading screen. Yeah. That’s a thing. And I know, because I got it. The only way you can re-enter the game is by deleting your save file, because Fable 3 is so allergic to menus that you can’t even switch Heroes in the Sanctuary since that requires you to enter the game first. Yes, I am still salty about this.

10. This Is Just Here Because I Don’t Like The Number 9

Elise/Elliot don’t have a lot of emotional impact on me. You don’t really spend a lot of time with them like you do with Rose or even see them killed in front of you like with Rose OR Scarlet Robe. Like, you meet them in the garden then you get pulled away for a swordfighting tutorial lesson and then there’s a cutscene and you make a choice and they’re either dead or not. Aside from their unique presence in the kidnapped quest, they’re kinda just... there, especially if you choose to save them.

11. I Forgot This When I was Originally Writing the Post

Interacting with NPCs outside of the story-relevant ones in Fable 3 is... awkward. You are forced to interact with them one-on-one and do quests just to get them to like you. And I get the quest part, for it to force some personalized connection between the two of you, but the quests are all the same! Fetch this, deliver that, dig up this. You don’t even get to choose what expression you can do to them because the game only lets you see three options at a time.

Fable 2′s NPCs were not exactly deep and complex either, but they had personality! They had likes and dislikes and favorite places and shit. AND you could choose exactly what expression to do. Stores are not great either, the wares are so limited and unreliable its difficult to find anything specific.

Some Good Points About Fable 3 Because This was Too Much Negativity

Walter, as a final boss, is foreshadowed and built up much better than the Great Shard in Fable 2. While I do love the Perfect World section of Fable 2, it works better narratively than it does gameplay-wise. Lucien is built up to be Sparrow’s ultimate confrontation and he just... falls and dies after you suck the power out of him. Not exactly riveting.

The Hero of Brightwall follows the trend of having a semblance of personality and not being an entirely blank slate mouthpiece for the player. Fable’s Heroes have always been slightly more than just player avatars, to me at least. There are these little moments where they act like their own person. Like the Hero of Oakvale having a PTSD flashback of his village being burned down, or Hammer commenting on how quiet Sparrow is, or the Hero of Brightwall being a bit cheeky at times like giving Saker a playful punch before pulling him to his feet or saying “This is the last party I’m taking you to” (or something of the like) to Page at Reaver’s mansion. I dunno, it’s just this tiny detail I always liked about Fable.

THE FASHION IS SO MUCH BETTER IN FABLE 3. Gods I don’t know why I get so hung up on this but every dress and most of the shoes in Fable 2 look TERRIBLE. Fable 2 just doesn’t have a lot of appealing clothing options for me, thus why I dress mostly the same in a lot of my playthroughs of Fable 2. But Fable 3 has much nicer looking clothing. I only lament that I can’t snag something like Page’s masquerade dress, that thing was gorgeous.

I spent way too much time on this.

[alannah-corvaine]

alannah; neverending survey

BASICS.

FULL NAME: Alannah Ailíse Caireann Corvaine Outway

NICKNAME: Little Bird (Faron only) 

AGE:  almost 23

BIRTHDAY:   10/16

ETHNIC GROUP: Midlander Hyur

NATIONALITY: Thanalanian

LANGUAGE/S: Common, a hodgepodge of things she's picked up from books

SEXUAL ORIENTATION : Demisexual

ROMANTIC ORIENTATION : Biromantic

RELATIONSHIP STATUS:  Married (verse dependent)

HOME TOWN / AREA:  Drybone, Eastern Thanalan

CURRENT HOME:  The Grey Fleet, Lower LaNoscea

PROFESSION: Professional White Mage™, Healer, Purifier

PHYSICAL.

HAIR: Rich, dark brown with white streaks extending from her roots (magical scars)

EYES: Sea Green

FACE: Slightly angular, but still has baby fat

LIPS: Full, pouty, usually covered in neutral tone gloss

COMPLEXION: Sickly pale

BLEMISHES:  Birthmark under her left eye, constant red splotchy patches due to allergies

SCARS:  The white in her hair, a mark between her shoulderblades where she was kicked by an aldgoat as a child

TATTOOS: Flowery vines crawling up the left side of her ribcage (permanent), stabilizing arcanima symbols all over her arms (temporary, reapplied daily)

HEIGHT:  5′2″

WEIGHT: 135 ponze

BUILD:  Petite 

FEATURES:  Extremely striking eyes, more girlish than womanly facial structure

ALLERGIES:  Severe pollen and pet allergies, mildly allergic to some foods and perfumes

USUAL HAIR STYLE:  Worn long, down to her hips. Either in a sidebraid, high ponytail with various small braids, or loose

USUAL FACE LOOK :  Lost in thought

USUAL CLOTHING:  Loose, flowing, bohemian style. Lots of white, lots of bangles, delicate necklaces and rings. Sometimes hair ornaments. Barefoot or sandals, doesn't believe in socks. While "working" she prefers trenchcoats open at the waist, shorts, and knee-high boots.

PSYCHOLOGY.

FEAR/S: Failure, guns, the excited laugh her daughter makes when she's found something "interesting"

ASPIRATION/S:  To be a powerful mage, fix her borked aether, and to be a better mother to her daughter than Christaine was to her

POSITIVE TRAITS: Insatiably curious, focused, dedicated, protective, kind, funny, generous

NEGATIVE TRAITS: Emotionally distant, petty, wrathful, impulsive, reckless, gets lost in her own head and forgets to come back out

TEMPERAMENT:   Melancholic

SOUL TYPE/S:  Artisan

ANIMALS:  --

VICE HABIT/S: Swearing, letting her temper get the best of her, alcohol (very rarely, because it ends badly)

FAITH: Hail Hydra Hydaelyn

GHOSTS?: ...verse dependent (lol)

AFTERLIFE?: Not so much an afterlife as much as being recycled by the Lifestream.

REINCARNATION?:  Yes

POLITICAL ALIGNMENT: I mean...she might be a bit of an ecoterrorist?

EDUCATION LEVEL:  Self taught through an ungodly amount of reading

FAMILY.

FATHER : Aedan Corvaine

MOTHER :  Christaine Harlow Corvaine (deceased)

SIBLINGS : Faron, Ean, Davon, Brennan

EXTENDED FAMILY: Nine Outway (husband), Aislinn Outway (daughter), Moira Corvaine (aunt), Fayre Harlow (maternal grandmother), Fasshon Fuqushon (step-grandfather), Veronique Corvaine (sister-in-law), Isobel Corvaine (niece), Octavia Outway (sister-in-law)

NAME MEANING/S: You know, I spent hours looking up names with fitting means for Alannah’s family members way back when, but I am absolutely too lazy to go find them again

HISTORICAL CONNECTION?: None.

FAVORITES.

BOOK:  Technical studies on the properties and workings of aether, historical volumes, adventure and fantasy stories, and sometimes a romance novel

DEITY: Hail Hydra Hydaelyn

HOLIDAY:  Starlight

MONTH: July

SEASON:  Summer

PLACE: La Noscea

WEATHER: Snow

SOUND / S: The almost electric hum of magic, the sound that Nine makes when she scratches his head

SCENT / S:  White musk, fresh bread baking, old books, lemongrass

TASTE / S:  Wine, dandelion tea, almond cream croissants

FEEL / S:  Being magically powerful, sleeping on fresh sheets, wearing her husband’s shirts, snuggling with her daughter

ANIMAL / S:  Fish, since they’re the only thing that doesn’t maker her sneeze

NUMBER: 9 (lol)

COLORS: White, black, any pastel or sherbet colors

EXTRA.

TALENTS: Retaining large amounts of information. magical aptitude (even if she has to fight her unstable aether for it), large scale destruction, cooking exactly one meal, tripping on flat surfaces, the ability to braid anything

BAD AT:  Wielding any kind of melee weapon, seeing without her glasses, remembering where she put her glasses, keeping up a conversation without getting lost in her thoughts, public speaking, remembering to drink her tea before it gets cold

TURN ONS: Patience, humor, calloused hands, empathy, confidence, kindness

TURN OFFS: Arrogance, cruelty, smarminess, apathy, insensitivity

HOBBIES: Researching, reading, sketching, playing the harp, traveling/seeing new places, teaching her daughter how to human, using her husband as a nap pillow

TROPES: (oh god there are so many, these are just a few) Caged Bird Metaphor, Grass is Greener, Kitsch Collection, Misery Builds Character, Now Let Me Carry You, #1 Dime, Wake-up Call, Grew a Spine, Rage Breaking Point, Big Screwed Up Family, Black Sheep

QUOTES :  “my bitterness was sometimes rest and sometimes ecstacy grace or rage, always the two opposites ready to annihilate each other and to rise from the ruins of the vanquished.”

MUN QUESTIONS.

Q1 : If you could write your character your way in their own movie,  what would it be called, what style would it be filmed in, and what would it be about?          

A1 :  Listen, I shamelessly love YA dystopian fiction, so it would be something in that vein, where Alannah is OP as fuck running around and blowing shit up as the young heroine main focus. Also there’s all of the romance tropes (sandwiched between developmental angst, of course), because I like them, and nobody’s allowed to bitch about it.

Q2 :  What would their soundtrack/score sound like?          

A2 :  It would be scored by a collaboration of Two Steps From Hell, Hans Zimmer, Jeremy Soule, and Zack Hemsey, and my ears would orgasm.

Q3 :  Why did you start writing this character?          

A3 : I don’t like doing the whole “my character is just me or an extension of me” thing, it just never feels right. I also can’t just look at the avatar I’m using and see nothing but pixels and just “play the game.” She has to have a personality, a backstory, a reason for what she’s doing. Also it’s a great creative outlet for me because I love coming up with stories in my head as I go. And thus Alannah was born from the soup of inspiration made up of many various characters I’ve loved over the years.

Q4 :   What first attracted you to this character?          

A4 : She was supposed to be something new, a kind of character that I’ve never written before. All of my female characters end up badass, overpowered, and full of personal angst, because that’s just my thing. And yeah, Alannah’s reached that point, but the point is I tried.

Q5 :  Describe the biggest thing you dislike about your muse.

A5 : I feel like I can never get her voice right, she always just ends up sounding like me.

Q6 :  What do you have in common with your muse?          

A6 :   The longer she’s around, the more of my traits she absorbs by osmosis. At this point she shares like 80% of my personality and traits and is completely unrecognizable from my original concept for her.

Q7 :   How does your muse feel about you?          

A7 :   I am a generous god.

Q8 :  What characters does your muse have interesting interactions with ?        

A8 :   My favorite thing to explore, if it isn’t grossly obvious, is her different relationships with each of her siblings, probably because I have none. 

Q9 :  What gives you inspiration to write your muse ?        

A9 : Mostly music and books, sometimes games. I have so many AUs for Alannah. Actually writing things, however, is another matter entirely.

Q10 : How long did this take you to complete ?          

A10 : I had it done by the end of the work day after working on it between things I had to do, but then SOMEBODY tumblr drafts had to blow it up so I had to start over from the halfway point. I am not amused.

tagged by: @resistance-ranger [thankyou♥]

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