#ill actually kill anyone who tags this as shipping

[severedegg]

hlvrai art request: coomer and benrey friendship? playing video games together ? just chillin

i did all of the above tehe Xo)) thank you for this request, it was really nice n got me thinkin about them <3

close-ups under the cut

[blouisparadise]

Upon request, today we have a rec list of bottom Louis fics where murder (or attempted murder) features in the story. Many of these fics have a darker tone and may have some triggers, so please be sure to read the tags and warnings on each fic carefully. We hope you enjoy these amazing stories and show them some love! If you enjoy our rec lists and want them to continue, please be sure to like and reblog this post to help spread the word. Happy reading!

1) A Gentleman And His Angel | Explicit | 2572 words

Harry is a killer (kinda got daddy issues) and Louis is his whole world.

2) Daisy | Explicit | 3575 words

An assassin who lurks in shadows, who kills with a detachment towards his victims, their death always displayed artfully for anyone who stumbles upon the corpse once his work is done.

Of course, no one knows his actual name. If they do get to know it by some ill twist of fate, their end follows quickly and swiftly.

He goes by Poison Ivy.

3) But I Want It (It's A Crime) | Explicit | 6590 words

Harry is hired to kill Louis. Louis thinks he's an idiot. They fuck.

4) And Up Until Now I Had Sworn To Myself That I'm Content With Loneliness | Mature | 14017 words

An high school AU Where Louis is a pretty omega and loves strawberries and Harry just wants to settle down and grow old together.

5) The Blood Is Rare (And Sweet As Cherry Wine) | Explicit | 14270 words

True Mates AU with a murder case to be solved and feelings to be unraveled.

6) Something Wicked This Way Comes | Explicit | 16719 words

A regency murder mystery au where Louis is married to an earl and Harry is a detective. Hatchets are buried but not everyone is as they seem.

7) Angel Of Small Death And The Murder Scene | Explicit | 20634 words

Ever since Louis read about the new up and coming Detective in town, he had immediately disliked the man, despite never having met him. So, naturally, it can only be the worst thing that could have happened to Louis when he gets stuck with Detective Styles trying to s

8) Your Eyes Of Blue, Your Kisses Too | Explicit | 21785 words

When they get out onto the streets away from the crowds Niall turns to walk backwards, “So did you get any leads?”

“Well- uh.”

Niall shakes his head, “Too busy kissing that pretty boy onstage, I see. Gonna blow the whole case for a piece of ass?”

9) Windsor Peaks | Not Rated | 23801 words

Louis Tomlinson lost his parents when he was 8 years old. He was moved to an orphanage in London where he stayed until he was old enough to leave. Louis moved back to his home town of Windsor Peaks, to study and make a life for himself where his parents had lived and wanted to raise him.

Louis life was going well, he was happy, until two detectives from London turn up. Harry Styles and Scott Wolf  are investigating a string of murders and a car accident that lead them to straight to Louis and his past.

Is Louis a suspect or is there something more sinister going on.

10) Once Upon A Dream | Explicit | 33319 words | Sequel

Louis is psychic and gets caught in the middle of a murder investigation led by FBI Special Agent Harry Styles.

11) Close To Nowhere | Explicit | 34589 words

Louis and Harry are psychics who kind of hate each other. They go to Tennessee to investigate a haunting.

12) No Easy Choice, But You’re Mine | Explicit | 45603 words

Louis is an omega hitman with one last job that goes a little sideways. Harry is the alpha bartender that looks a little too closely and cares a little too much.

13) Spoonful Of Sugar | Explicit | 42900 words | Sequel

Note: This fic is the sequel to this fic.

Louis Tomlinson cares for his family above all else, a fact that’s led him on a twisted path peddling drugs to support them. Just as he’s made the decision to jump ship, Louis gets snared between the two largest crime syndicates in the city. To keep his family safe he’s forced to trust the man that failed to keep his promise two years ago, the resident drug lord he’s unknowingly been working for, Harry Styles.

14) Yesterday Came Suddenly | Explicit | 48473 words

Harry, the deadliest member of the NYC assassins’ guild, is forced to face a seemingly impossible task in hopes of finally leaving the underground behind for good, but when ghosts from the past come back to haunt him, escaping the darkness becomes that much harder.

15) Tied Down | Explicit | 48551 words

The most interesting case in Liam and Niall’s careers falls directly into their laps, courtesy of an epic fuck-up of one Harry Styles, partner to the almost-infamous drug dealer Louis Tomlinson.   The investigation yields an unexpected yet satisfactory outcome for Liam and Niall.  For Harry and Louis, however, things are far more complicated.

16) Untamed Hearts Align | Explicit | 55786 words

For as long as Louis has known her, Lady Margaret Tomlinson has had two aspirations for the remaining years of her life. The first was to out-dress the Duchess of Kent at every soirée and gathering. The second was to marry off her omega nephew to the most honorable – and highly ranked – alpha suitor she could find.

He does not expect for her to arrange a marriage between him and the crown prince, and he certainly does not expect to fall for him. Everything changes when Harry disappears.

17) Let Your Damage, Damage Me | Explicit | 57077 words

A low and dangerous growl was ripped from the future King’s chest.

“Who the fuck do you think you are?” the alpha snarled, eyes dark and nostrils flared.

Even as anger rushed through him at the alpha’s brutish display, Louis felt breathless at the intense gaze of the man that was going to be his future mate.

‘Tomorrow I’m going to be under all that. He will be inside me, all muscles and rage.’ Louis felt his cheeks heat again, but refused to be cowed. So he put his best smirk on display, the one alphas despised to see, the one that assured them all he had the upper hand.

“Thought you were expecting me, dear husband. I’m your future mate.”

18) From Chaos | Explicit | 62764 words

“Your majesty, is everything okay?” a man, fully covered in a black armor from head to toe, harshly opened the door. Louis’ breath hitched, not quite registering the honorary term the man used for him but fully recognizing two things; first, the black crown of thorns on top of his head, making the dark veil that covered his face sit in place. There was a symbol on his chest, two serpents intertwined in what appeared to be a circle, who represented Orcus’ connection with life and death. A reminder to everyone in the order that death was constant, and infinite. The man who stood in front of him, tense and alert, was a knight, an Orcus’ knight. Louis took an uneven breath. What type of nightmare was this? Tale as old as time, a villain falls in love with an already taken hero who only wants to kill him.

19) Derail The Mind Of Me | Explicit | 77323 words

The Behavioral Analysis Unit gets called in to help a small town police department find the killer leaving behind a string of victims with a particularly jarring signature. FBI profiler Harry Styles must work with his team to uncover the unsub responsible for a slew of gruesome murders and just might discover his own hidden feelings for BAU Technical Analyst Louis Tomlinson along the way.

20) The Rose Of Whitechapel | Mature | 100182 words

Jack the Ripper au - Detective Constable Harry Styles and his partner, DC Liam Payne, lead the case on the Whitechapel murders. Louis Tomlinson, the Rose of Whitechapel, is harbouring secrets of his own, along with a dark and sordid past. When their paths cross, truths are revealed, and perhaps hearts are mended...

A darkness is brewing, and it's finally come to collect on the promise it was made.

21) Echoes & Omens | Mature | 100707 words

Echoes of the dead come in many forms. Their imprints forever tied to the ones who'd killed them.

Louis Tomlinson is able to track the dead using their echoes, they call to him. He's used that gift to aid Scotland Yard in their investigations, with the hopes of studying Criminology at Cambridge University. He's lived a life of privilege and good fortune as a Marquess, son of the late Duke Tomlinson, with his life mapped out since day one.

Until two terrible truths are revealed.

One, he's adopted.

Two, his biological parents are London's most notorious serial killers.

Against his family's wishes, Louis travels to Chicago to uncover the truth of their incarceration. Much to his dismay, his biological mother's Lawyer, Harry Styles, wants to take his case. Together, they work to uncover what really happened all those years ago, but perhaps more is revealed than they could've ever anticipated. Trapped in a whirlwind of portents and omens, Louis and Harry find themselves pitted against an enemy they'd not foreseen.

22) Beautiful War | Mature | 103379 words

Note: This fic has mentions of BH.

Five years ago, Louis was nearly the next victim in a string of murders plaguing Portland, Oregon. He managed to escape and the Angel Killer was apprehended and sent to prison. Now, Louis’ a best-selling author that assists state police with minor cases. He still suffers from the events of the days he’d been held hostage, but he’s found ways to cope.

That is, until the killings start up again. A body was found in the woods. A body that bared the same signature the media had dubbed: The Angel of Death.

Special Agent Harry Styles leads the case, and he doesn’t buy into the clairvoyant bullshit that Louis spewed to save face five years ago. He’s certain that Louis Tomlinson was involved.

Until they meet, and they’re both left questioning everything they’d thought to be true.

23) Shadow Dances | Mature | 101591 words

Louis Tomlinson has a begrudging gift, he’s able to communicate with the spirits of the dead. Often against his will, and almost always at the most inconvenient of times.

He and his partner, Zayn Malik, work for a covert division of the New Haven Federal Bureau of Investigations. They aid in all kinds of cases, though their talents lie in the obscure and unsolvable.

It’s when a strange new case falls onto their desks that they’re left questioning the extent of their abilities, and whether they were ever truly alone.

Harry Styles was brought into the FBI for not only his skills, but his ability to mitigate the influx of spirits surrounding the elusive and obnoxiously infuriating sharp-tongued medium he’d been assigned to. Louis gets under his skin, he’s impulsive and a risk to the team according to Harry.

They do however have to find a way to set aside their sordid history, and their reluctant attraction, to track down the murderer plaguing their coastal city.

24) Drops of Jupiter | Mature | 121826 words

In a small, sleepy town ruled by prejudice, Louis Tomlinson runs his grandmothers shop for the occult. He finds comfort in his tarot cards, his friends, and a dog that he doesn’t have room for. He thought the worst he’d have to deal with would be bigotry, until a new sheriff arrives with a headstrong little girl that’s impossible not to fall in love with.

But what happens when a string of break-ins leads to a brutal attack, and the towns’ darling is murdered right under their Sunday hats? A murder that just so happens to bear the same modus operandi as similar homicides in neighbouring states. Has the killer been circling Virginia, or is he a local of Lavender Hills?

And what will Louis do when the charming Sheriff Styles starts to suspect him of such a heinous crime?

25) Only You Can Be My Alpha | Mature | 212378 words

In a world where one was either an Alpha or an Omega wolf, Louis found himself in a body that could be neither. Born an Omega without the expected characteristics of one, he felt broken, choosing to live as Alpha a lifestyle as he could. Harboring a serious lack of respect for Alphas and their authority complexes, Louis managed to get himself banished from his home, forced to wander the unforgiving woods for years, facing the elements and fighting enemy rogues each time they arose.

Unbeknownst to Louis, in a tribe to the southwest of his home, there lived a dysfunctional Alpha, the orphaned pack leader Harry, who had never felt satisfied enough with anyone to settle down and continue his royal line. Living their lives apart thus far, the both of them assumed that they might be alone forever, making the best of things despite this even though it hurt.

Chance, luck, or maybe fate brings Louis to this tribe when he’d least expected to receive kindness and shelter from a stranger, and when he arrives, something in his soul pulls him to Harry like a raging river current. The two don’t get off to a good start, but everyone around them can sense the chemistry—and in time they do too.

26) Join Me In The Afterlife | Explicit | 262289 words

The one where Louis is a simple guy - all he wants from his summer break is to spend some quality time with his mother, get to know her new husband, and learn to play the guitar. Nothing out of the ordinary, that is for sure. However, life has a funny way of working and when Louis finds a strange boy sitting on his bed one sunny day, his summer break takes a turn for the better (or worse) when he discovers a ghost has stolen his heart from the get-go.

Check out our other fic rec lists by category here and by title here.

[lottieurl]

tagged by @sapphicscience to post 5 otps from 5 fandoms (thank you 💜) i chose to not list yellowjackets cause honestly it's hard for me to choose one pairing. it's the rare occasion when i'm multishipping happily and won't torture myself with trying to rank those cause it depends on the week

person of interest - root and shaw THEE ship of all time truly nothing will ever compare

killing eve - eve and villanelle i mean DUH but i ignore the entirety of s4

elementary - watson and moriarty LISTEN the sheer impact this had on me cannot be overestimated. the dynamic is SO good i wish they fucked about it in canon

the 100 - clarke and lexa cause like. i had a clexa renaissance last year and it actually is still so good. the ao3 less so but it does have my fave fic of all time and ngl that might be why they're listed. in the year of our lord 2023

dare me - addy and beth WHO DOESN’T LOVE GAY TOXIC GIRL BEST FRIENDS. ive seen the show six times and it makes me insane every single time. join me in mental illness

tagging @villanevehaus @whenfatecollides @ordinaryhorror @sameensass @merevide @tinygrumpshaw and anyone else who wants to do this

[madame-fear]

okay, so, hi... here to ask a serious question: is there anyone else here who finds the aemond/LUCERYS ship DEEPLY disturbing??? like really, really fucking bad. the disgusting, chris hansen vibes, "have a seat" kind of bad

LUCERYS is a CHILD killed by aemond in an accident. aemond's so called obsession with lucerys is due to his wounded pride and a missing eye, nothing else ffs. WHERE DID THESE PEOPLE FIND ANYTHING ROMANTIC IN THE POOR'S MAN ATTEMPT TO AVENGE HIS EARLY CHILDHOOD MUTILATION??? WHY SHIP AN OLDER (ae is like 17 while lucerys is 13), FULLY GROWN MAN LOOKING GUY WITH A LITERAL CHILD???

no fucks would've been given if this sick ship hadn't become one of the leading fanons in the fandom... it's even more popular than Aemond/Helaena (which is actually somewhat canon compliant). people are insane

SCREAM IT LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK NONNIE 🗣

No worries nonnie, I’m certain a LOT of people on this blog will agree with you — because I myself do. LIKE SERIOUSLY WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK????

I have all the tags related to that ship filtered because I can’t stand seeing it 🤢 And needless to say I swear to god I got fucking tired of seeing Lucemond art (WHICH IS SO WELL MADE I WANT TO CRY??? WHY CHOOSE THAT SHIP?) on my Pinterest feed that I had to see if I could block some users that did all things Lucemond related.

Also I seriously can’t believe it’s one of the leading ships in the fandom... I would’ve believed Daemyra, Alysmond, Rhaenicent, Helaemond are the leading ships — NOT LUCEMOND????? I mean I respect everyones ships but this crosses a big ass limit for me.

And on GOD trust me when I say I have blocked people with so badly sick content about this ship, my blocklist is long af. One of them did Bunny!Luke and Aemond fetishist content (... with... gasses and all of that I can’t even explain it because I literally physically recoil...), another one did MPreg Lucemond, other one Lucemond related tickle content???? I swear to god I get stomach aches and feel ill whenever I see something like that.

It’s just creepy not "enemies to lovers" trope, Aemond literally killed Luke in a poor attempt to hunt him down out of spite for what he did when they were children. It’s literally disgusting.

THANK YOU for speaking out about this. It had to be said and I sincerely feel tired of seeing this shitty ass ship every-fucking-where.

[trickstarbrave]

20 Questions for Writers

i got tagged by @throughtrialbyfire !!! idk who wants to be tagged though so if you see it. you can do it too :]

ill also answer under a read more

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

24!

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

572,669. i have a disease that makes me incapable of shutting up

3. What fandoms do you write for?

i write for TES right now tbh but i've also written for yugioh and fire emblem three houses

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Consequences (fe3h) 1,483 Our Den (fe3h) 1,244 The Secrets We Share to Those We Love (MHA) 946 The World Eater's Eyrie (skyrim) 666 (LMAOOOOO nice) Alduin's Bane (skyrim) 569 (also nice)

5. Do you respond to comments?

god i try to. i love getting comments i just sometimes dont know what to say. i try to stay on top of reading them and responding if i can. if i havent replied to ur comment. i am stupid.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

most of my fics dont have endings tbh. i have either never finished them or they are just nice little one shots. however Siblings (fe3h) with twin byleths where one kills the other was pretty angsty ngl

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

uhhhhhh this is a problem yet again where most of mine are just happy little one shots or are unfinished. but i think To Walk the World with You Again (morrowind) is very happy. it hurts a lot in the beginning but ends with a happy loving reunion :>

8. Do you get hate on fics?

the closest i got was someone saying on Consequences (fe3h) that it shouldnt be tagged as M/M and instead M/F bc byleth was trans but other ppl ripped into them. i havent gotten rly terrible hate since fanfiction.net

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

all the time. i think i am primarily a smut author if im being honest. i just wanna watch my blorbos bone. as for what kind uhhhhh theres multiple kinds????

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

i dont think i have. i am just boring tbh

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i know of

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

again not that i know of but if anyone wants to i wouldnt be against it

13. Have you ever co-written a fic?

YES the cannibal au for 5ds with my lil bro. i still think abt that au all the time tbh. it was angsty. it was dramatic. it was complicated. it was filled with hard moral dilemmas and gods with non-human morality and a lot of mythology shit. sad we never finished it tbh but life was getting hectic.

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

i dont know. rn i think its nerevoryn but trickstarshipping (where i got my url namesake from) still holds a special place in my heart <3)

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Ghosts of the Past (svsss). i really do like the story and had a bunch of it planned out mentally. qinghua's father was going to disown him when qinghua was going to tell him he was dating mobei and refused to hear qinghua out, there was gonna be drama with qinghua's family too where his dad says he firmly believes qinghua is actually the son of his identical twin brother who had an affair with qinghua's mother (his father was already cheating on his mom and she was wrong to do that, but no he is in fact the child of his bio-dad even being disowned). they then spend a summer vacation living together getting an apartment, go visit his uncle, and qinghua learns to enjoy his creative passions while finishing his degree with mobei and shen yuan's help, etc etc

the ending was going to be at a christmas party where qinghua's father catches a glimpse of qinghua at a company party. his wife (qinghua's former step-mother and the revealed mother of qinghua's half siblings rather than step siblings like qinghua grew up believing) thinks hes here to crash the party only for them to see he's there as mobei's boyfriend. his dad then tries to get in good with mobei who just brushes him off with "ah right, i know you. you're qinghua's uncle (since he refused to believe he is actually qinghua's father and it must be his twin brother he resented for being artistic and sensitive). i didnt think you were that close, why are you bothering me?"

qinghua goes on to be an accountant at the company, pretty high up too, and his father ends up quitting out of embarrassment and mobei being especially hard on him once he takes over for the company. he also continues to write his trashy novel while he and mobei plan to get married.

but tbh. i have morrowind brainworms. idk if i will ever finish it. sucks that one of the few stories i had all planned out with cdrama levels of bullshit i was really looking forward to going ham on i lost my motivation for when my hyperfixation changed.

i also wanna finish alduin's bane. i have a lot planned for that i could also spend an insane amount of time explaining. im hoping that the motivation for that one comes back though rather than me simply saying i probably wont finish it

16. What are your writing strengths?

i dont know 🧍‍♂️ if anyone wants to tell me i would appreciate it. i think it is like. i am primarily a romance author so i like working on dialogue, character interaction, stuff like that. ive also gotten compliments on my world building but idk if thats just my ideas or how i write them into the world.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

i feel like i struggle with pacing and motivation. as well as stuff like war tactics and full on battles. again i write mostly romance i dont know why i torture myself with stories about war

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

its very hard. ive seen ppl do it well but i find it difficult to read bc i am stupid. even with notes and flicking back and forth i feel like its a struggle to understand even if the goal was to obfuscate the meaning from the audience as well. usually i just do another language in bold font and make it clear the characters are speaking another language. but honestly do whatever you want forever

19. First fandom you wrote for?

i think it was in fact yugioh. i had ocs and daydreamed up storylines but i dont think i really sat down to write a fic until i was 12-13 and was writing a tendershipping fic in one of my notebooks at school lol

20. Favorite fic you've written?

tie between Alduin's Bane and Moon and Star. i love my long ass TES fics where i just go ham and play around with the world building and mythology. its a lot of fun and i feel like ive gotten to be very creative in the setting and make something unique and fun with the storylines given in both skyrim and morrowind

thanks for the tag <3 this was a lot of fun and thank u for reading if you did

[coulsonlives]

✨ I'm Alisha (she/they, 26), I'm a bi disaster and welcome to my space on the web! ✨🐌

I'm a friendly potato if you're friendly too, so make yourself comfy. Ship and let ship, kink tomato, we have critical thinking skills and don't do moral panics here. I personally don't ship 'taboo' dynamics, but it's fine if you do.

No specific theme here. I post funny things, art I like, cute animals, and lots of things about censorship. I try to catch the most important tags in each post, tell me if I forget something.

I appreciate everyone who follows me even if I don't follow back.

I block assholes who hurt and/or target other people. This includes making threats and death wishes, guilt-tripping people into clicking poll options that involve killing people, harassing people, or insulting people you don't like by calling them the r-slur, inbred, or other things. Let's not synonymize disabilities and mental illness with being a bad person. No, I don't care who the person is. Same with telling people to die with no chance to better themselves. We do reparative, restorative justice in this house, I can't even with the death penalty talk.

I don't wanna see people being shitty to someone strictly based on their innate race gender orientation etc either, and yes this includes cishet and white people. Your labels don't give you a free pass to be a jerk.

Some of my popular posts: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Check out my comics here!

I don't reblog chain letters, superstitious 'reblog and this will happen' posts, reblog bait, or fundraising posts.

You can like or reblog my posts, no pressure! I'm not gonna guilt trip you into doing one or the other, I get that posts don't always match the themes of blogs, and that posting isn't activism and all that other stuff.

I have good media literacy and I'm strongly against censorship. And no, censorship is not something 'only chronically online people care about'. Censorship movements have happened for decades eg DND, pokemon, book bans. Just because fandom has labels for where you stand on censorship it doesn't mean people won't understand why it's bad. They do. Censorship affects everyone, and everyone cares about it, even if you don't wanna talk about it online (which is ok)! Needless to say, censorship-happy people with unhealthy views of media consumption get blocked on sight, I don't dance with em.

I don't have a DNI. They're a naive control fantasy that assumes everyone is actually who they say they are and will respect your wishes. Vague DNIs with 'etc' and 'basic DNI criteria' are even worse, because idek what they mean. I chose not to make my blog password protected, and I can live with what that means. If I see someone with a stinky personality, I block them. I expect y'all to do the same if you see someone you don't like, it ain't my responsibility to curate your space for you.

One last thing:

Obviously I can't control what people do, but I instantly block anyone who claims they have DID. Just a heads up, peeps. I've been through enough with my former friend's malingering to care for one second about validating mistakes and attention-seeking behaviour someone won't get help for, because there's maybe a handful of people who actually have this disorder, and I refuse to risk getting involved with more people like my friend. It's obvious when you're faking, or just convincing yourself you have DID, when the symptoms don't line up with the MOST BASIC ways the disorder works. I'll say this once: get off tiktok and twitter, you were given bad information further up the line by someone equally mistaken. You gotta figure out the real source of your problems, and it's almost guaranteed to not be DID, even if you have trauma! I'm sorry your needs aren't being met, but you can't get it like this, you convinced yourself you have something you don't, this is literally what's happening with you. And it's delaying whatever diagnosis you actually need. Professionals aren't always right, believe me I know lmao, but sometimes they are. You gotta learn how to think critically, instead of relying on tiktoks and parasocial groups that just confirm your biases over and over again. Get out of those echo chambers, it's insanely unhealthy and it's seriously gonna screw you up.

Anyways, that's all the tough love for today.

Peace!

[dryades-angeli]

𝕆𝕋ℙ 𝔾𝕒𝕞𝕖

╔═══════════════════════════════════════╗

x ~ღ Let´s play the "One true Pairing"-Game ღ~ x

╚═══════════════════════════════════════╝

~ 𝕋𝕙𝕖 ℝ𝕦𝕝𝕖𝕤 ~ ♥ Write drown the Shippingname ♥ Write down the names of characters you ship ♥ Write down from witch fandom they are ♥ Post an Picture of them (Originals, no Fanwork) ♥ Introduce your shipping and how they are connected to each other ♥ Write down why exactly these two are your absolute OTP ♥ If you like, tag some friends who would like to do this ☻ Leave other ships out of your stories. Use the share function to participate. Anyone can participate, if they want. Even without being tagged.The goal is to get others excited about your OTP and to cheer on the shipping community a little. ❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰ღ⊱❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰ღ⊱❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰ ~Template~ ------------------ 𝕊𝕙𝕚𝕡𝕡𝕚𝕟𝕘𝕟𝕒𝕞𝕖: ℂ𝕙𝕒𝕣𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕤: 𝔽𝕒𝕟𝕕𝕠𝕞: ℙ𝕚𝕔𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕖 𝕀𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕕𝕦𝕔𝕚𝕠𝕟: 𝕋𝕙𝕖𝕪 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕞𝕪 𝕆𝕋ℙ, 𝕓𝕖𝕔𝕒𝕦𝕤𝕖: 𝕀 𝕥𝕒𝕘𝕘: ❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰ღ⊱❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰ღ⊱❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰

𝕊𝕙𝕚𝕡𝕡𝕚𝕟𝕘𝕟𝕒𝕞𝕖: OttoKallen ℂ𝕙𝕒𝕣𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕤: Otto Apocalypse, Kallen Kaslana 𝔽𝕒𝕟𝕕𝕠𝕞: Honkai Impact the 3rd (Game) ℙ𝕚𝕔𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕖:

Screenshot from the official Webcomics. 𝕀𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕕𝕦𝕔𝕚𝕠𝕟: Honkai Impact 3rd is set in a modern world infested with a mysterious energy called "Honkai". "Valkyries", brave girls with an anti-Honkai genome, lead humanity in a war for sheer survival. Otto Apocalypse is the youngest son of the Bishop of Schicksal. Schicksal is an organization that protects humanity from Honkai. Because Otto was very ill as a small child, he was not well regarded in his family. Because of this, he spent his time creating inventions. One day he met Kallen, who praised his invention, making him feel useful. The two became friends. For her part, Kallen is the strongest Valkyrie of Fate and House Kaslana. Her duty, which she later inherits from her father, is to protect humanity from the Honkai. The two remain friends until Kallen eventually realizes that destiny is corrupt and uses humans as experiments. It is all the worse for her when she learns that her friend Otto is involved in these experiments. She thinks destiny and her boyfriend are power hungry. But actually at least Otto has good intentions and sacrificed people for a greater good. Kallen, whose highest good is the protection of people, cannot understand this and leaves Schicksal. In doing so, she takes the cube, a strange energy source that was tested on young girls, with her and is injured while escaping. Eventually, she finds a fox girl named Sakura, who comes into contact with the cube and becomes possessed by it. So that Sakura doesn't hurt the people in her village, she asks Kallen to kill her and attacks them while controlling the Cube. However, Kallen refuses, which leads to Sakura ultimately killing herself. But that way she understands Otto's motives. Eventually she is recaptured by fate and sentenced to death for her betrayal. 𝕋𝕙𝕖𝕪 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕞𝕪 𝕆𝕋ℙ, 𝕓𝕖𝕔𝕒𝕦𝕤𝕖: Their love is reflected in the subtext. Otto loves Kallen so much that he will do anything to revive her for 500 years. But not only the revival of Kallen drives him, he also wants to help humanity and he does that by committing numerous crimes. Her thoughts and his love are always with Kallen. For example, he tries to clone her or designs a game about her in which he can marry her. Besides, he always supported Kallen before her death and was there for her. It also shows that he suffers from her loss and that he always feared that she would die one day. You don't really notice Kallen's feelings for Otto. She hides it well. The important thing here is the conversation. Which led her to the dungeon shortly before her sentencing. Otto had offered to marry her. But she refused because otherwise she would have become the pawn of fate. But her last words were "Maybe in another world..," implying that otherwise she would have gladly married him. She also sends him a farewell letter to which she encloses two red roses. These stand for a love returned. In the end, Otto sacrifices himself to bring her back to life, creating a new timeline. And in one of many timelines, he manages to elope with her before she is sentenced and marries her. This couple has one of the most beautiful love stories imaginable. 𝕀 𝕥𝕒𝕘𝕘: @mikotofubar

❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰ღ⊱❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰ღ⊱❥⊰ღ⊱┈──╌❊╌──┈⊰

[wiihtigo]

24, 42, and 49 for the last character you were thinking of/searched for

24. Ship(s) that makes you cringe.

dickbabs SWEEEEEEEEEEP

its actually incredible to me that i was completely neutral on barbara and dick as a couple before the current romance arc involving them written by TOM TAYLOR (<-enemy) in the current nightwing run. The thing is that i think theyre cute as a couple but only when theyre batgirl and robin. I think it was like a cute kid crush thing that they grow out of. and even though thats my ideal dick and barbara in birds of prey were pretty cute too (especially with the added comedy of dick gnawing off his arm with jealousy because he thinks ted kord is stealing his girl when in actuality. Um. hes not.)

dickbabs vs dickory is such a stupid ass team jacob vs team edward argument but its becoming increasingly harder not to want to shoot them both with missiles whenever i see them now. and that has to do both with what dc is doing to my girl barbara and also tom taylors writing right now is obviously him trying to own the haters and its so embarrassing and cringe. which is sad bcuz oracle and nightwing are two of my absolute favorite gotham heroes (well bludhaven for dick. yknow what i mean)

42. What’s a fandom trope you hate?

i resent bea being reduced to boosters sassy third wheel to his and teds relationship especially since its like my favorite thing that booster and bea are like funhouse mirrors of eachothers mental illness. like why does booster get all the fun in being fucked up and crazy. beas crazy too! did you see what she was doing with sigrid nansen! beatora has so little fancontent in comparison to boostle but both relationships have a lot of parallels with eachother...(listen i know my tags ratios are uneven as well but i promise i have more in the back)

49. What’s [x]’s worst character trait?

hmm well on the topic of barbara gordon, and i need to preface this with saying that i dont hate this about her i actually think its awesome and interesting. I dont hate any of my faves worst traits its what i love hte most about them....

I love that shes straight up not very good with kids. Shes good buddies with tim because hes a super genius little boy so he can hang with her on her intellectual level. but barabara gets frustrated easily and impatient when people arent as smart or as capable as her. and i think thats awesome and really interesting. shes not cruel by any means and im thinking specifically of her mentorship of cassandra cain in batgirl 2000. throughout the whole comic they have a very close sisterly bond as barbara, as oracle, mentors her in being batgirl. For anyone who doesnt know cassandra, she cant read and is non verbal most of the time. when she does speak its in short or one word responses and a lot of times she copies what she hears on tv or mixes up words in her inner monologue. Here she needed to read a kill switch phrase to stop a robot from fucking shit up, but she cant read what it says and barbara snaps at her.

this causes a rift in their relationship for a long time and they dont speak for a lot of it. to be fair barbara here was uunder a ton of stress and was operating on like 1 hr of sleep and she did apologize but this really hurt cassandra and she didnt accept her apology (right away)

while reading this does hurt its one of my favorite barbara moments because its like. shes multifaceted bitch. her snapping at her in this way makes sense and is believable for her as a character. barbara has her strengths and her weaknesses and I just think putting herself at the level of teenagers is one of her weaknesses that i think is really interesting

[roseworth]

3, 6, 9, and 13😝

choose violence ask game

3. screenshot or description of the worst take you've seen on tumblr

idk what the WORST take ive seen is but i bravely held myself back from saying anything when i saw this one but now ill talk about it <3

there was one time i saw someone make a post about "batfam morality codes" or something then gave a quick description of everyones. and JASONS was "everyone deserves a second chance." and respectfully what the fuck were they on about. JASON. aka the one that i really hope everyone understands is the one that kills people. now to be fair i think theres a lot to say about jason and his attitude towards second chances but what we all know for damn sure is that he does NOT believe Everyone deserves a second chance. thats the whole reason he kills people. do you think he kills them and goes "but you can still change <3" BESTIE THEYRE DEAD

6. which ship fans are the most annoying?

please dont throw things at me. timkon fans.

LISTEN i like timkon, its my prob favorite ship for both of them. however their fans are constantly so annoying. if i see one more person say that steph or cassie would be homophobic upon hearing that tim and kon are dating i might actually hunt them down and hit them with my car. not to mention soooo much of timkon is kon being Tims Boyfriend instead of acknowledging anything about his character

anyways thats obviously excluding all the ships that i hate for other reasons. like ill take a timkon fan over a batcest fan any day but i think i just find timkon fans more annoying bc i have the tags of ships that i hate blocked so i only have to deal with the fans of ships that i do like

9. worst part of canon

answered here but ill think of another 🤭

is it too general to say the new52 bc. that is the worst thing that has ever happened to dc and im not even exaggerating. literally ripped away actual backstories and nuances of so many characters then tore other characters out of existence and there wasnt a single character that got out of that unscathed. so many characters havent been remotely the same since it happened (my girls 😔😔😔) and no matter how much they try to come back from it they still cant fix it

i think its possible that comics would still be almost as shallow and disconnected as they are now if the new52 didnt happen but it definitely made it worse in a way that they may never actually recover from

13. worst blorboficiation

SLADE. FUCK. im tired of slade fans saying "but old man hot 🥺" or acting like hes a good father to any of his kids. hes homeless divorced his kids hate him. thats his entire deal and you cant take that away from him. hes just a pedophile and i dont think im being too harsh when i say that anyone who tries to say hes "misunderstood" should die

[anistarrose]

20 questions for fic writers, tagged by @holdmecloser-gandydancer (thanks reese!) tagging @fexalted @3hobbitsinatrenchcoat @novantinuum and anyone else who wants to!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

86, very soon to be 87!

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

397,102. my god.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

The majority (over half) of my total fics on AO3 are Gravity Falls, but my current passion right now is obviously TAZ Balance, which is a pretty close runner-up. TOH is a lot further behind, but I have at least one WIP I want to finish up early next year!

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Some Sunny Day (Gravity Falls), Tulip's Return (Infinity Train), Stan and Ford Vs. The Future (GF), Fateful Detours (GF/IT crossover), Missteps and Miscommunication (GF).

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Usually, and especially when they give me a chance to infodump about the writing process! I just don't necessarily respond quickly lol

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

In recent memory, it might be but the strange lights in the sky were shining (TAZ). I write more happy/bittersweet endings than sad ones, but that one... that one has one of my absolute favorite twists :)

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

to eat from a poisoned plate (TAZ) is one that I almost didn't write a happy ending for, but I'm so glad that I did, because I go back and reread that one a lot, admittedly.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Usually no more than annoying but generic "please update" comments, but back in the Gravity Falls fandom, there was this one person that you've probably heard of/encountered if you wrote a lot about Bill Cipher back in the day.

They were a guest account user who'd get so mad if you killed off Bill, to the point of making threats (albeit exaggerated, not really realistic ones), and also one time they told me I should go read a particular MLP fic and take inspiration from it in my own. Which, no shade against MLP, but as someone who's never been in that fandom, that's literally the funniest entitled comment I've received in my life.

9. Do you write smut?

Nope, but I do occasionally write characters being horny. There's a huge difference between those things for me, and that probably has everything to do with where I lie on the ace spectrum lmao

10. Do you write crossovers?

A couple times, though I used to be way more into them than I am now. There was the aforementioned GF/Infinity Train one, and my gateway into writing TAZ fic was actually a very silly "what if the Pines family were the protags of TAZ Balance" fic.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not to my knowledge, and fingers crossed it doesn't happen 🤞

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes, a few times! My buddy @yourbonesarenowmycoat translated several of my Gravity Falls fics into Spanish back in the day, for one thing!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Nope!

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

This should come as no surprise but it's Blupjeans forever and ever <3

15. What's the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Oh, god. Probably the one that I wrote like 9 chapters (out of 10 planned ones) to cope with being chronically ill and to convince myself to go to therapy, and then abruptly stopped writing when it was almost done because I figured out how to manage my chronic illness and soon after, started going to therapy. On the one hand, it would be tragic for it to never see the light of day, but on the other hand, it kinda... served its purpose for me already?

16. What are your writing strengths?

Fic as character study! Sometimes I set out with the goal of elucidating a particular theme or character motivation, and sometimes it just happens along the way, but I am a genius with regards to character analysis and my brain is galaxy and I'm not afraid to share it.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Dialogue is one thing for sure, I get a lot of compliments on it but it's also such a challenge for me. Possibly because I, personally, don't talk like a remotely normal human person irl. The other thing is brevity and killing my darlings — I literally can't count the number of times one of my fics exceeded the expected word count by orders of magnitude.

The aforementioned character study thing? Yeah, that's also a weakness, because a lot of my fics (even including some very, very long ones!) exist to explore themes I couldn't figure out how to word in a simple headcanon post. In fact, I'm probably gonna post a fic of that exact variety this weekend, lmao.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

Definitely not fluent enough in any language to do it on any larger scale, unless I get serious about learning Spanish again.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Not on AO3, but in general, it was definitely Pokémon! I was writing time travel stories set in Sinnoh before Legends Arceus made it cool.

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

As previously mentioned... probably "to eat from a poisoned plate". In the vaguest possible terms, learning to love cooking again in spite of some prior bad experiences has been a struggle for me, too, and I truly think that without having written that fic, I wouldn't be succeeding.

On a related note, I'm about to spend my afternoon making a blueberry pie.

[androgynealienfemme]

Twitter reminded me once again of the stupid anti/proship wars but also how now there’s a whole generation of fandom engaged youth who genuinely believe that anyone who reads fiction about taboo subjects wants the subject in question to happen irl or thinks it’s a good thing and also that anyone who reads “bad fiction” can at any point suddenly turn into a predator because of the “bad content” and it’s depressing as hell.

They’re literally developing mental illnesses panicking about if they’re “bad people” because they like to read fics tagged “dead dove” and also they’re actually abusing each over this? Like people have been beaten up, pets killed, people actually doxxed and threatened and OUTED to their FAMILIES over fictional ships now. It’s not great!

[youthofpandas]

Limbus talk 1, 16, 23!!

WOOO lets go limbus let's go. my select group of friends and i are the only one who understands them. Under the cut so if anyone who doesn't follow me sees this while searching the tags you are free to ignore it <3

1) the character everyone gets wrong - I was going to do a Meursault hot take here but I am kind of afraid of his fans and how badly they misunderstand him in a desire to make him fit some "secret heart of gold" trope. Which he very much does not have. Well I guess I just did that anyways. I still really like him as a character, the way he cares more about the job than his own morals because he Has None and Cannot Have Them. like it's interesting ! i wish he had more lines sometimes ! The babyfication of Sinclair also needs a shout out of course <3 get away from him. He doesn't just kill people he murders them, just because he's crying while he's doing it doesn't make him an innocent little baby who can do no wrong.

16) you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc) - okay here is a hot take. what the fuck does "not insane kromer" mean. why does it exist. her whole character is being a fascist cult leader. what if she went UwU and was a normal girl is sooo like. why are you doing that to her... also i am normally not someone who gets mad about the use of "insane" in contexts like these, I use it casually like that all the time but sometimes it is just So Strange to see people call it specifically a "not insane" AU and then still very much view her as mentally ill, just no longer into genocide. I don't know, I've been having a lot of Kromer fanon thoughts lately as I try to write her in my fic and I am realllllyyy uncomfortable with the way the fandom views her ideology to kill the people she doesn't view as real humans worth of life and whatever is going on with her brain. It feels really gross and uninformed. Stop it. Get some Help.

23) ship you've unwillingly come around to - meurdon and yiclair. while thinking over how wrong 90% of meur fans are I realized they were actually cooking with the don thing. yiclair was tough because the vast majority of art I've seen of it makes sinclair look like he's 12 years old and it makes me see red but the more i think about yi sang and him being little freaks together and how the yi sang weird speech habits are kinda Demian-ish the more I'm like okaayyy they are on to something

[antidotefortheawkward-art]

Petition for Lady Yin to adopt Ao Bing

[eroticcannibal]

Hey look its all my opinions in one post so you can just block me instead of crying at me

Children are the most oppressed group

What is commonly declared "good for children" and "good parenting" is actually incredibly traumatic and only convenient for the state

School does not exist to benefit children and is largely just abuse

Behaviourism is shit and needs to stop being used on children

"Naughty" children do not exist

Children deserve to understand themselves, their situations and have a say in their upbringing

Less parental rights, more childrens rights

Social services exists more to enforce assimilation, masking of disabilities, gender conformity and that children turn out as the state desires far more than to combat abuse

FII is largely a bullshit "diagnosis" used to punish caring parents for having disabled children

Purity culture is counter productive and infantilising and does nothing to protect children

Treating a child as gifted is child abuse

Modifying a child's body outside of medical necessity without informed consent is abuse and yes that includes piercing

Piercing a child with piercing guns even if they consent is child abuse

Intersex surgery outside of medical necessity is abuse

Autonomy is a fundamental right and must never be compromised

Yes that does mean its ok for people to participate in kink

Yes even the kinks you don't like

Yes ESPECIALLY rape kink its fucking pretend grow up

Yes it does also mean crazy people can refuse treatment

Yes even if it means they will kill themselves

Psychiatry is fake anyway and much of what we view as mental illness is actually either natural variance or expected and healthy reactions

Recovery is optional

Neurodivergence doesn't make anyone abusive (yes this includes NPD)

Pedophiles who do not offend are fine but people who go round identifying as "non offending" pedos are probably lying.

Radical feminism is disgusting, yes all of it, you cannot be a good radical feminist

Sex work is work and should be decriminalised

Porn is fucking fine

Drugs are great, use responsibly

How we view self harm is bullshit and is far more about what society isn't comfortable with than intent to harm the self

Gatekeeping is bullshit

Queer is a valid identity and a great word

Aspecs are a part of the communit

Pronouns do not equal gender

Bi lesbians are great

Mspecs are incredible

All genders are real yes even the ones you think are cringe

Otherkin are neat

All systems are real and valid and the medicalised view of systems is kinda definately bullshit

Fat people can in fact be healthy

But also no one fucking owes you health

Crime is good actually

Complete prison abolition is something we must always work towards even if it is ultimately impossible

Capitalism bad

Some countries do have more racism, more forms of racism and different forms of racism to other countries. (And the same applies for all other -isms but ppl only care about arguing about the racism one)

Mixed race people aren't white

Light skinned poc aren't white

Mocking lower class accents and food is just classism actually

Americans are annoying

I dont care what you fucking ship shipping doesn't matter

Creating gross media is fine just tag it

I will expand on this later and as more Discourse happens

[sazandorable]

About moderating and banning content on AO3!

Okay so! I haven’t had the spoons to do this for a while but I cracked and ranted about it on twitter which is... not... conducive to long rants, so!

This is a h u g e discussion part of the l o n g history that led to the creation of AO3, which older, more informed, and more articulate people have talked about at length and can be found around if you look (I reblog some of it in my AO3 and fandom history tags for the curious). So I won’t go into that here, nor into the practical reasons why it’s not even possible to put that system in place anyway.

Arbitrarily, or the purpose of this post, because it’s the biggest topic I’ve seen brought up lately, I’ll be talking about fic depicting underage characters in se*ual situations, but honestly I could hold the exact same conversation on literally any controversial content.

This is about why you, specifically, if you are a content creator and especially if you are marginalised and especially if you are queer and especially especially if you are sensitive to fiction depicting certain things... do not, actually, want a banning system on AO3.

What? Of course we do. There’s a lot of p*do shit on AO3 and p*do shit is gross. No one should condone that, wtf? It would be easy to do — just periodically delete the entire Underage tag!

What will happen if that is done is that people will re-upload and continue to write it, they’ll just stop tagging and you will run into it with zero warning nor ability to filter it out. Again, this is not a theoretical — we know this is what happens. When I was a teen, adult content (all adult content) was not allowed on FF.NET; it was everywhere regardless, and without tags. The exact same thing happened on tumblr when adult content was banned as well. It’s not a matter of “staff not handling it well” — it just doesn’t work.

To keep safe the people who need to be able to exclude that tag, that tag needs to exist and be used.

Well, shucks. A reporting system then?

A reporting system would operate in one of two ways:

-an algorithm, which would delete a lot of stuff we wouldn’t want it to delete.

-humans, which is... the bigger problem.

An algorithm sounds great. We do want it to delete everything.

Okay. What about the daddy k*nk fics between consenting adult characters? What about the fics featuring characters that are children in the canon but are adults in the fic? What about the fics about teenagers exploring their se*uality together, written by adults about the experiences they remember having or wish they could have had? What about the thousands of SasuNaru and Drarry and other shounen and YA fics that will get written, by teens or by people who remember being teens? What about the se*ually explicit fic written by teens who are se*ually active in real life? What about the fics about CSA as trauma, about healing from it? What about the fics written by survivors of CSA to cope about their trauma? What about the fics that clearly show that it’s evil and traumatic? What about the super dark, harrowing, but beautiful and artistic that I’m glad I read even though it fucked me up for days? What about the ones that were really shitty but also horribly hot?

Well, some of these are still not okay, but maybe some might be. It depends on how it’s written. We’ll have humans moderating content and deciding, then.

Okay.

The thing is, I don’t know which of the things I just listed were okay for you to be depicted in fiction and which were too much. Odds are I don’t agree with you. Odds are if I asked 10 people randomly picked off the street, not everyone would agree.

Odds are, even if AO3 arbitrarily decided on which of those are allowed and which are not, you would not agree with their choice, and you would still be unhappy with the decision. (Or you would be happy, but your friends wouldn’t.)

Odds are, different AO3 content moderators might not agree on whether a given fic qualifies or not — is it artistic enough? Does it show enough that these actions are evil and wrong? Can the author prove they’re a teenager? Can the author prove they are a CSA victim? Can the author prove that this is to help them cope with their trauma? The author seem to be functioning alright, they mustn’t really be traumatised!

You know what I mean! There’s absolute, objectively gross shit out there that is not artistic and should not be published.

I agree that there’s vile stuff out there that makes me sick and that I think is very clearly just ped*philic trash. But there is no way to, 1) stop those from getting published anyway, 2) take those down and preserve the safety of everything else.

If we start forbidding some things, there’s two ways to go about it.

One single, clear, arbitrary rule — for instance, absolutely no adult content featuring characters under 18 (leaving aside the fact that this would not even work for the reason cited above). So we lose all the stuff from teenagers, all the coming of age stories about adolescence, all the stuff from CSA survivors; people who need to write it can’t publish it anymore, and people who need to read it can’t anymore either (and as a cool bonus, they’re told it’s wrong and made to feel bad about it). Depending on whether the rules applies to characters that are under 18 in the canon, we lose entire fandoms.

Or, subjective moderation by humans, according to what they estimate to be gross.

Let’s assume all moderators can agree on what’s gross or not.

If there is a system in place to ban some underage works because “gross shit”, then that means other gross stuff can be taken down on account of being gross and harmful.

Yeah! Gross stuff should be taken down! Come on, surely everyone agrees on what’s gross and harmful.

Ah.

But the problem is.

Here is a list of things I have seen — with my eyes seen — called harmful to be depicted in fiction:

Murder

Non-con

Inc*st

Cannibalism

Torture

Self-harm

Mental illness

Drugs

Racism

K*nk

Non-negotiated k*nk, but healthy k*nk is ok

Spanking k*nk

BDSM where the woman is a bottom, but woman top is ok

Healthy depictions of BDSM

Unhealthy depictions of BDSM

Queer people doing bad things

Abusive relationships

Rival/Enemies to lovers

Redemption stories

A happy relationship between a 17 yo and an 18 yo

A happy relationship between a 20 yo and a 60 yo

A happy relationship between a boss and their employee, or a college teacher and a student

A happy relationship between a 14 yo boy and an older teenage boy, because that’s reminiscent of older men preying on younger gay boys IRL

Se*ual content featuring a character whose age is unclear in canon and some people headcanon them as being underage, some as being a young adult

Loving, consensual fluff between characters that are evil villains, because it romanticises them and their actions

Dark content shipping female characters

Fluffy content shipping female characters, because it’s misogynistic to act like lesbians are only soft all the time

Consensual s*x featuring a canonically asexual character, because it implies that all aces can and should still have se*

Fics about the same canonically asexual character hating s*x, because that erases the experience of s*x-positive aces

Shipping a character who is perceived by some fans as queer-coded with a character of a different s*x

The tendency to ship a black character with white characters

Fluffy drunk s*x, because that’s not actually consensual

Sleep s*x, because that’s not actually consensual

Trans characters not experiencing dysphoria, because that idealises the trans experience

Consensual s*x between adults that are not married

LGBT+ content, because kids shouldn’t see that.

I guarantee you: you, I, and 10 random people plucked from the street will not agree on what, in that list, is and isn’t okay to publish and consume fiction of.

So why should your taste be the one followed? Why should it be the taste of mods you don’t know? Why should anyone get to dictate? What if the mods think your OTP is gross and your NOTP is fine?

This is the slippery slope argument.

Yes, it is the slippery slope argument. Because we know it happens. Because we’ve been there, because I’ve seen it happen myself twice already and I’m not even thirty. Because we know people do complain loudly about all of these things.

And because the second there is a banning system in place, assholes will use the system to abuse it and get stuff they just don’t like taken down using the “it is gross” argument, and one day you’ll wake up and the beautiful fic that helped you come to terms with your abuse/trauma/identity/orientation/k*nk for feet will be taken down and wonderful vulnerable creative people will have been harassed out of fandom because they argued with 1 person who didn’t like their foot k*nk fic that happened to also feature, for instance, a CSA trauma backstory.

Again: not exaggerating. Not theoretical. It happens, we know it happens, AO3 was created literally because it happens.

I still fucking hate that stuff.

That is completely fine and normal. No one likes everything. Me too! Most of the dark stuff is niche and the creators know only few people will like it the same way they do.

(For the record, I get grossed out and triggered by fics about an asexual character who does not like s*x having s*x with their partner to make them happy. Deep in my gut everything screams that that’s fucked up, terrifying and harmful, how can people write that. But I recognise that there are people who love and need that, and I leave those people and their content alone.

OTOH, I read a lot of otherwise dark shit and I enjoy it in the same way I enjoyed, say, Hannibal, in the same way some people enjoy true crime documentaries, horror movies or r*pe fantasy k*nk. It helps me explore stuff that I like to see in fiction, in a safe, controlled way. I’m also asexual, 90% s*x-repulsed IRL, and, obviously, I would never abuse a child. For that matter, I wouldn’t kill and eat people, either, nor would I do 90% of the tamer k*nky stuff I read.

Of course, Hannibal was fucked up and lots of people probably think Hannibal was gross and should not have been aired — but as exemplified by the fact that it was created, aired and watched, lots of people thought it was fine, interesting and even fun to watch.)

You can and should curate your experience and protect yourself. The AO3 website now allows you to exclude certain tags, and people have developed tools to help with that such as plugins that save your filters or hide fics that contain certain words.

But no, it isn’t going to, and it shouldn’t, get banned.

[ckneal]

There’s a midam AU idea that’s been living in the back of my mind for months now, but it’s been slow going. Mainly because I suspect that doing the idea justice is going to mean doing more research than I’m used to, and maybe even rewatching the series proper to help me fill in some of the weak spots, and I have so many other story ideas that are frankly just easier to work on, two of which are already slated to be multi-chapter works. . . But I’m in the mood to type up something longwinded, so here we go. Keep reading if you’d like to see a rough outline of the first few chapters of this story I really hope to write out properly sometime.

(Warning, this is a long one.)

So, this story is loosely based on the Hundred Years War that took place between England and France from 1337-1453. But it’s only very loosely inspired. Very, very loosely. As in, I was reading a book, I read about one thing that happened, it germinated in my head, and then suddenly I had a plot developing that featured my current favorite ship. Additional sources of inspiration include one of my favorite fantasy series, and a personally beloved trashy romance novel. Because it’s fanfiction, folks. There are no rules here.

Of course, in this AU, the entire world is going to be made up, with neither side of the war distinctly being assigned the role of England or France—or Flanders or Burgundy, for that matter. I barrowed an inciting incident, and few smaller details from history to help things along here and there, but with no regard for keeping all the French things assigned to one group and the English ones to another.

That said, the inciting incident took its inspiration from the Battle of Poiters, a conflict during which England not only won against the French, but also took their king hostage. King Jean II was later ransomed back to his people, but at a sum that was so high, France could not afford to pay it all at once. England still returned France’s king, but new hostages were provided to serve as collateral during the interim, including the King’s son.

So. . .crown Prince Michael Shurley completely decimates King John Winchester on the battlefield, and sends his demands to John’s queen, Mary Winchester. The two kingdoms have been locked in a territory dispute for several decades, and this is one of the more humiliating events to befall the smaller kingdom yet, especially since they are unable to meet all of Michael’s demands. When the Winchesters begrudgingly admit this to the Shurley representatives, they’re caught off guard when they’re offered a trade: John Winchester will be returned, so long Dean Winchester takes his place as collateral.

Things are less than stable in the Winchester kingdom however, with more than a few factions quietly scheming for power. John and Mary were an arranged marriage that was originally held up like a fairytale when the two seemingly fell madly in love during their mandated courtship, but the years afterward had changed them. Civil unrest sparked by the war had brought out a lot of disagreements between the Winchesters and the Campbells and their approaches to governing.

John’s supporters are the ones to step forward with a plan, and convince Mary that it’s vitally important the people are not alarmed by their king’s capture. Mary initially finds it distasteful, but it’s talked around and adjusted and reframed, as John’s people ferret out more and more information about the vital party involved, until she finally agrees.

Because John Winchester just happened to have a bastard son. The resemblance to Dean might not be particularly remarkable, but no one at the Shurley court has ever seen the Winchester heir before. Plus, Adam Milligan has spent the entirety of his teen years studying to become a physician, of all things. He’s perfect for their purposes. 

Ten years prior, the Shurley court had had to deal with its own bout of civil unrest, when King Chuck Shurley’s second eldest son had attempted to overthrow him with the support of several nobles from one the kingdom’s richest providences. Lucifer had allegedly been driven into exile following his defeat, and Chuck had been said to have contracted some sort of mysterious illness. According to rumors, the king had shut himself up in his private chambers and refused to admit anyone apart from his remaining children. Even servants were barred from tending him directly.

They snatch Adam away from his studies and force him into compliance by dusting off an archaic law left over from before the start of the war, when the kingdom relied on a conscription military force rather than a standing army full of career military professionals—this law empowering the crown to call on any of its citizens for a minimum forty days of military service per year. They tell Adam that his mission seems more dangerous than it is—really, all he has to do is pretend to be Dean, and use his medical knowledge to figure out exactly what mysterious illness has bedridden the enemy monarch.

Sam and Dean—the proverbial heir and spare of the kingdom—are not at court to meet their younger brother, when he’s hastily fitted for a royal wardrobe and put through a crash course on court etiquette. Sam is very publicly put on display at a holiday festival in another part of the kingdom, while Dean is sent orders to quietly stay behind at a country estate while his valet, Kevin Tran, is sent on to court. Neither of the princes is told about the plan until after Adam has already been shipped out, with Kevin in toe to help Adam along with the impersonation.

No one involved is in anyway comfortable with the mission. But it was only supposed to be for forty days. Adam was assured that the necessary funds to pay off the ransom would either be raised by the end of the minimum mandated service, or they would make contact to extract him. The Campbells and the Winchesters both allegedly had spies in the Shurley court, and they would make themselves known when the time was right.

Adam is given the impression that the latter had been told to him with the intention of making him feel safer. It did not work.

He’s terrified when he arrives—almost would have preferred being promptly thrown into a dungeon upon arrival, instead of a room full of foreign nobility who one and all give off the impression that if cut they’d bleed straight silver, and look at “Dean,” the hostage prince and purported military genius from the tiny, vicious country across the channel, as a curiosity to be studied. He’s assigned two guards (who I decided will be Anael and Samandriel, based entirely on the tags I threw together at then end of this post, during which I decided that I love these three together), who follow him around relentlessly, but beyond that, he’s. . .pretty much treated like a guest. If a stiflingly monitored one. There are limitations on where he can go and what he can do, but for the most part he’s just sort of. . .there.

Most unnerving of all, however, is the small package that Adam finds in his room when he first settles in. Kevin swears he has no idea who left it. It has the Campbell’s insignia clearly worked into the pattern of the paper it’s wrapped in, and inside he finds a knife small enough to conceal on his person, and a number of different herbs and powders that he recognizes from his studies—though of course, he’s more familiar with remedies to counteract their effects.

In other words, he finds an assassin’s-first-kill-job kit, and instructions on how and when to use it, if opportunity arises. This had not been part of the deal when Adam reluctantly signed on.

Unbeknownst to Adam however—though suspected by some parties in the Winchester court—Adam cannot assassinate Chuck Shurley, because Chuck is not there. Shortly after Lucifer’s insurrection, Chuck had quietly disappeared. Michael had only been a teenager at the time. He invented the story about Chuck being ill on impulse, certain that Chuck would be back sooner than later, and Raphael had gone along with it because, being twelve years old, Raphael was not yet old enough to question Michael’s judgement. It is now an awkward point between them.

Adam soon becomes another.

Michael regularly checks in to see how Adam’s getting on, in a way that Kevin assures Adam is entirely appropriate, since Michael is under the impression that Adam is going to be a fellow monarch someday, and is likely trying to be courteous. Adam inherently feels somewhat flustered around Michael though, which is not helped by the fact that Michael is somehow always present whenever Adam puts his foot in his mouth socially. On more than one occasion, he’s thankful that almost no one has actually been to his homeland, allowing Adam to blame an astonishing number of fuck ups on cultural differences.

Michael and Adam’s early one on one interaction are intensely awkward. Adam will forget to wear gloves, and then Michael will comment that Adam’s hands are oddly devoid of callouses for someone who’d practically been raised with a sword in his hand, leaving Adam to scramble for some flimsy excuse about hand cream. Adam will inquisitively ask questions about what sort of illness would be severe enough to leave someone bedridden for a decade but not kill them in that time (Kevin frantically motioning over Michael’s shoulder to convey that that is NOT the right way to fish for details on such a sensitive subject), and Michael will struggle to find an excuse around the quietly bubbling panic, because he hasn’t had to try to explain anything about his father since that first year, and he is not a particularly gifted liar.  

And then there’s Raphael.

Unlike Michael, Raphael is suspicious of “Dean” right from the start, pulling Michael aside to point out things that don’t seem quite right according to what their informants have told them about Dean Winchester.

“Doesn’t he look a bit young?”

“Some people look younger than they are, Raphael.”

“I was told Dean Winchester had dark hair.”

“Dark blond is dark.”

“Aren’t his eyes supposed to be green?”

“They’re obviously blue.”

“That’s exactly my point.”

The forty days come and go with Adam and Kevin nervously waiting for some sort of sign from home. Roughly two weeks later, a messenger arrives with unexpected news for Michael’s court: the Campbells have officially broken ties with the Winchesters in a violent bid for power that has left the kingdom at war with itself.

According to Kevin, the civil war has probably slowed things down a bit, if it’s as bad as the rumors say. . .

Adam and Kevin are stranded.

“Don’t worry though—I know Dean, and he knows our necks are on the line. He’ll keep out of sight until they manage to get us out of here.”

Adam finds it difficult to put faith in the virtues of a brother he’s never met, but doesn’t have it in him to question Kevin’s faith. He worries about his mother, who might have been safe in the countryside, but also might have made the trek to the capitol when it came out that Adam had been abducted for the sake of persevering the royal family's throne. He can’t be sure.

And to top it off, Michael takes to stopping by Adam’s room every couple of days to privately talk about the movements of the various factions—who has been sighted where and in what condition, where they’re rumored to be headed. Adam interprets it as an attempt to shake out inside information. One day, Adam finally tries to set him straight by saying it doesn’t matter how many ugly details Michael throws at him, Adam can’t help him because he doesn’t know anything—and is promptly put to shame when Michael looks at him in surprise and says, “You misunderstand. I assumed that you would want to know these things, because they are your family.”

Michael leaves, and Adam’s guards exchange a look. When asked, Samandriel awkwardly tells Adam that the royal family used to have a fourth child. Gabriel. He was lost during Lucifer’s insurrection. Pirates overtook his ship. They’d never received a ransom. Michael had purportedly offered a standing reward for any news of Gabriel, and put an unwise amount of resources into searching for him until it threatened the war effort.

Adam and Michael start talking more frequently from there, starting with an apology on Adam’s part. It’s tricky at first, because Michael starts out asking questions about Dean Winchester's military exploits—it is the most likely common ground between them, after all—and Adam has to hastily change the subject every time. By the two month mark, they’re talking affably, and rumors start to circulate through the courts as Michael's routine check ins on Adam start getting less formal and more frequent.

On the four month mark, rumors get even worse. Raphael finally sits Michael down and really gets into all of the things about “Dean” that don’t add up, item by item. If he’s trying to pretend he doesn’t know anything about his country’s military exploits, he’s far too convincing given his reported record, and Raphael has it on good authority that more than half of those “cultural differences” in etiquette that keep cropping up are completely unfounded—and look here, three different informants have sent lists of Dean Winchester’s physical characteristics, and the foreign prince DOES NOT MATCH.

“Michael, something is not right here.”

“Fine, I’ll talk to him about it now.”

And Michael storms off to address “Dean,” while Raphael calls after him that he should wait until morning. Because it is the middle of the night.

Adam just happens to be up reading. Michael’s familiar with the book. Michael gets distracted, and they talk all night. The sun’s coming up when Michael finally leaves, and a servant happens to see him slipping out of Adam’s room. Suggestive conjectures promptly follow, and Raphael exasperatedly admits they only have themself to blame.

And this only gets worse, because now Adam and Michael have transitioned into being friends. No more guarded conversations where one is convinced the other is about to catch them in some sort of lie. When Raphael mentions that some of the lesser nobles are starting to think Michael and Adam are courting, Michael’s fidgeting is not at all lost on them, as Michael assures them that of course that isn't the case. He and Dean are merely establishing friendly relations that will serve them well down the road politically—

“After the war is over?”

“Of course, after the war is over.”

Adam’s been stranded in the Shurley court for almost a year by the time that he finally slips into his room and sees a sealed message set out on his bed. Adam doesn’t recognize the insignia as belonging to either the Winchesters or the Campbells, but it’s signed with the initials “SW” at the bottom. It mostly contains a lot of vague phrases that make Adam wonder if he was supposed to be versed in some sort of code. As far as he’s concerned, the only important information comes at the end: Kate Milligan has been safely relocated for the duration of the civil war.

Relieved, Adam goes down to dinner, where some sort of seasonal holiday is being celebrated, and has a bit more wine than he normally would. The Shurley court is one of those stuffy courts where seating is stiffly dictated by tradition. As a foreign prince, Adam’s assigned seat is at the same table as Michael, although, according to Kevin, his placement's much further down due to his being a hostage. After a few drinks, and after most of the nobles have cleared off from the table to talk and celebrate elsewhere in the hall, Adam sees no reason not to get up and relocate down the line of chairs to sit closer to Michael. It was against the rules, but Adam was aware enough not to sit in Raphael’s empty seat, and he’d been seen with Michael so often that Anael and Samandriel barely even blinked, because Adam obviously wasn’t about to attack their prince or anything.

However, it is worth noting that while talking to Adam, Michael consumes a decent amount more wine than he would normally have as well.

Later that night, Michael’s walking Adam back to his room, and he starts to comment that Adam seems happier than usual. But even when sober, Michael would struggle to say something like that—if he’d even attempt it while sober—and Adam winds up biting his lip as he watches Michael’s mounting embarrassment, as a simple compliment inexplicably morphs—words seemingly forcing their way out as Michael tries and utterly fails to stop them—into a compliment about how Adam is beautiful—that is, he’s always beautiful—that is, Michael can’t help noticing Adam most days—that is. . .

. . .Michael is adorable. And in a moment of pure, thoughtless impulse, Adam leans in and kisses Michael right there in the corridor.

Michael is profoundly shocked, and his reaction delayed. Adam had only gone in intending to briefly press his lips against Michael’s, but as he’s pulling away Michael abruptly leans in and reseals the kiss, and Adam in turn takes that as an invitation to pull Michael closer. And a few minutes later, Raphael happens to walk down the hallway and find the two of them enthusiastically kissing against the wall.

And Raphael promptly turns around and goes back the way they came, only stopping at one point to flag down a servant and order them not to let anyone else walk down that particular corridor for at least an hour, hoping that Michael and Adam’s “friendly relations” wouldn’t result in anything too inappropriate.

As it happens, nothing particularly inappropriate happens. Nonetheless, Michael still wakes up the next morning, fully clothed in his own bed, in panic because the first thought to distinctly make its way through the ungodly pain in his head is that he’d taken liberties with a guest the night before. The heir to a foreign power at that, a peer, a hostage! Michael never thought he was capable of something so dishonorable--he’d had Dean pressed up against the wall as if they were a couple of ill-bred urchins, and how does one even go about apologizing for something like that?

(Of course, if Michael were thinking clearly, he might have remembered that Adam had actually been the one to back himself up against the wall, with Michael obligingly following along, quite malleable to whatever positioning Adam wanted so long as Adam kept kissing him.)

Michael’s behavior was beyond unacceptable. If his father hadn’t already abandoned them, he’d likely disown Michael out of pure shame. There was no telling what kind of damage he’d done to the relationship between their kingdoms. At best, Michael’s uncouth actions would be a dirty secret between them in the years to come, after Dean married, and Michael was left barely able to look Dean’s spouse in the eye. If Michael were a lesser noble, his parents might demand he married Dean outright.

And suddenly Michael sat up in bed, realizing he could marry Dean. His mind begins racing, because of course he could marry Dean! It made perfect sense. They enjoyed each other’s company, and with both of them being heir to their respective kingdoms, their union would effectively end the war. It might be complicated—especially given some of the odd customs Dean had introduced to Michael’s court—but marriages had been used to cemented alliances often enough, and the thought of marrying Dean elicited a curiously hot feeling in Michael’s stomach, remembering the way Adam had pulled him close the night before.

(Fun fact, England and France actually did try to do this with the Treaty of Troyes in 1420; it did not go as planned.)

Michael goes through the rest of his day in an uncharacteristically upbeat mindset, because now it all seems to just be a matter of organizing things, and he is good at organizing. He would have to write to either John or Mary Winchester as soon as the situation in their kingdom settled, and formally ask for Dean’s hand, and he and Dean should have a chaperone present at all times moving forward to avoid scandal--though there would be no way to sidestep scandal altogether, of course. Adam was still technically Michael’s prisoner. 

More than likely, the Winchesters or Campbells would demand Michael relinquish his claim to at least half of the territories that they’d spent the last few decades fighting over, but that would be fine. It’s traditional in Michael’s country to give gifts to one’s in-laws, and Dean is a future monarch. Anything too little would be insulting, and all would be consolidated eventually when Dean and Michael assumed their respective thrones. . .

Michael is still walking around delightfully living in his own head when Raphael pulls him into an empty room to discuss what they witnessed the night before. While not the most shocking scenario they could have imagined, they were not expecting to hear their brother announce that he and Dean Winchester would be getting married.

“And how are we to explain away our father’s absence during the proceedings, Michael?”

Michael’s good mood promptly withers. Because of course Chuck would be expected to play some part in arranging his son’s wedding. Ill or not, at the very least, he would be expected to make an appearance at the wedding. To have no part in it at all would be suspicious, not to mention rude.

While Raphael intended to snap Michael back to his senses, they had not meant to shake Michael into an immediate depression. They try for a gentler tone.

“You know, Michael. Our father has been gone for over a decade. He left no formal plans, he's sent no word. By any standard, he's abdicated. Perhaps this isn’t the right time to introduce a political marriage. Perhaps we should consider your assuming the kingship, and then come back around to formalizing your relationship with Dean—”

Michael, of course, is against this. Because their father is alive, and he will come back, and it will not be to find that another one of his sons had greedily tried to usurp the throne.

Seeing Michael about to fall back onto a familiar tangent, Raphael chooses the lesser of two evils and takes the conversation back to “Dean.” They ask which out of the two of them proposed to the other.

Michael abruptly realizes that he's forgotten something.

Meanwhile, Adam starts his morning on a much happier note. His headache is less punishing than Michael’s, and while feeling the normal amount of embarrassment that comes with drinking a little too much, the feeling does not extend to kissing Michael. His mother’s safe, he’s nailing his Dean impression, and Michael apparently likes him. Things could not be better. Until Adam remembers how the latter two items on that list are linked.

Michael is not like a classmate back home, who he could chat up, get a drink with, and maybe start seeing regularly if all things went well. Michael is, in fact, the acting ruler of one of the most powerful countries in the world, which just so happens to be at war with Adam’s, and under the explicit impression that Adam is similarly situated in the world.

Adam promptly begins freaking out.

And then Michael finds him.

Adam’s in the library at the time. Michael walks in and quietly dismisses Adam’s guards, and Kevin, leaving the two of them completely alone. Adam doesn’t realize what Michael’s doing right away, though he’s spent enough time with Michael to recognize how nervous he is as he starts talking about a proposal to end the war—selling the idea, as if Michael wouldn’t be enough on his own—and then sheepishly tapering into the idea that both he and Adam seem to have feelings for one another. And if Adam were able to go back in time and strangle his tipsy past self, he would, because then he wouldn’t have to see the look on Michael’s face when he says no.

And no, Michael does not understand.

Adam can hear years of living in the public eye at work in Michael voice, as he just manages to keep his voice level in asking, “Even if it would mean peace?”

"I'm sorry, I just—I can't."

". . .I see."

Michael excuses himself, and Adam collapses onto a couch, assuring himself that no was the only right answer, and he shouldn’t feel terrible—which, of course, since Adam’s spent the last couple of months flirting with Michael while posing as someone else, is not an easy idea to buy into.

Michael and Adam avoid eye contact at dinner, even as Raphael—who has zero doubts as to who initiated what the night before—practically burns holes into Adam’s skin with the looks they shoot down the table.

And then a messenger comes in. One of the wealthiest duchies in the kingdom (the same one that had once supported Lucifer, and of course would be populated with demon characters in the narrative) has declared its independence, having formed an alliance with the Campbells, and has launched an attack not far from the castle. Several villages have already been attacked along the way. Michael accompanies the armed forces he sends out to quash the uprising.

Raphael is left behind to fortify the castle and take in the refugees, who the messenger assured them are not far behind. Unlike Michael, Raphael rarely saw combat. Officially, it was because Raphael had adamantly insisted on training as a healer rather than a warrior, which was true enough. Unofficially though, Michael and Raphael are both fully aware that if anything happened to Michael, Raphael is the only one left to inherent the crown.

Samandirel and Anael escort Adam back to his room. Samandriel assures Adam that no one thinks he had anything to do with the duchy double crossing them, but it would probably just be safer for Adam to stay out of sight until things calm down. Anael is more closed-lipped about the situation.

From his window, Adam watches the first of the villagers come trickling in, and even from his vantage point he can make out burn wounds, makeshift bandages and hastily thrown together tourniquets, and he’s in hell, because it seems the only two options in front of him are to worry about Michael, or feel absolutely sick with guilt because he’s a trained physician and he should be down there helping.

Finally he pokes his head out into the corridor and asks if someone can find Kevin for him. Anael raises an eyebrow that “Dean,” who’s usually inordinately self-suffice for a prince, is suddenly insisting that he needs to see his manservant, but Samandriel is already helpfully heading down the hall. A few minutes later, Kevin is in Adam’s room, confused, as Adam asks him to take off his clothes.

“You can have mine, just switch with me, okay?”

“Uuh. . . Don’t you think mine will be a little tight on you—”

“Less talk! Strip!”

Michael had probably errored in assigning the same two guards to watch over Adam. After a year, the three of them had gotten to be on fairly familiar terms. Adam waited until Samandriel started to get chatty, and slipped quietly out of his room when Anael was distracted—neither of them having had any reason to think Adam would try to escape, because he had been nothing but compliant since the day he arrived.

From there, he goes straight to the infirmary.

Raphael had set up tents in the courtyard to accommodate the high number of people in need of care. Adam was a year out of practice, but the atmosphere was still familiar to him, and he slipped into the chaos unnoticed. Raphael doesn’t notice him until they are well into the thick of things, and Adam’s as covered in grime and gore as anyone else present. Adam had just gone for more bandages and the two of them nearly ran into each other, and for a split second Adam thinks Raphael just might not recognize him until hand closes around his arm like a vice.

“What exactly are YOU doing here?”

Then Raphael notices the stitches Adam had just finished putting in for his latest patient—and Adam’s stitchwork is immaculate, not the clumsy, half-hazard work of a solider who picked up the mechanics of it over the course of their career.

"YOU did that?"

Adam starts to fumble out an answer, but they are interrupted because then Michael is being brought in. The fighting is over. Raphael and Adam promptly drop everything.

Michael has a concussion. He’s also been lightly stabbed. You know, just lightly. Needs stitches though. Raphael is adamant that Adam leave immediately, but Michael, who is delirious, sees Adam and absolutely refuses to let Raphael send him away. Raphael winds up patching Michael together while Adam—annoyingly, to Raphael—is sat next to him, holding Michael’s hand. Adam winds up sitting next to Michael all night, because it’s the only way to keep Michael from getting up and tearing his stitches like a feverish moron.

Initially, Raphael refuses to leave too, not trusting their brother’s suspiciously competent love interest, whose family was purportedly allied with the traitors who’d just attacked their people. There are still more wounded to tend to, however, and Raphael begrudgingly has to step away—making sure to leave orders that a guard be present in the room the entire time that Raphael is gone.

Little does Raphael know, Adam would have lowkey given a limb to have Raphael stay. Michael’s demeanor is a lot less closed off when he’s feverish and concussed. Shortly after Raphael leaves, Michael starts apologizing for proposing earlier, and Adam feels like he’s been stabbed in the gut. And as he’s lying there, looking at Adam’s hand in his, Michael starts saying things he would not normally blurt out—like that ending the war was not the main reason he wanted to marry Adam, because the last year has been the best he can remember, and it is entirely due to spending time with Adam—even if Adam was only there by obligation—and he would do anything to make Adam happy, even if they weren’t together—and Adam is just stuck there, highkey dying on the inside.

Then Michael sees his face.

"I apologize, you’ve already said you do not want to marry me, I should not have brought this up—”

Michael starts to get out of bed completely unconcerned about his stab wounds, and as Adam’s pushing him back down, the words “That’s not true!” just sort of. . .fly out.

Then Michael’s suddenly looking at Adam, and his face is suddenly very sober, and Adam can feel his own face turning red.

"That is, I. . ." Adam realizes, suddenly, that he’s fucked. Telling Michael the truth is somehow both the right and wrong thing to do at the same time, and Michael is definitely in no condition to hear it either way. “How about, if you still want to marry me when all this is over, then I’ll say yes?”

The next morning is a string of stressful events for Adam. Raphael shooed him out of Michael room at dawn, and Adam went straight back to his own. Kevin, Samandriel, and Anael had all been reprimanded for Adam’s escape, with the latter two being replaced as Adam’s guard under Raphael’s orders. His first interaction with Ishim and Maribel does not bode well for them becoming friends.

When Adam tells Kevin that he’s thinking about coming clean to Michael, Kevin panics. News from the Winchesters had dried up weeks ago, even for Michael and Raphael’s sources. Kevin argues that they’d be better off attempting to escape on their own if the charade was getting to be too much for Adam, especially after last night—but even then, they should wait awhile longer. Why take any chances right now? And Adam doesn’t know how to go about explaining the why. . .

And it gets taken out of his hands anyway, when they step out of the room and find that it’s somehow leaked that Adam and Michael—who had completely misunderstood what Adam meant by “when all this is over”—are engaged.

Kevin doesn’t get another moment alone with Adam to discuss how stupidly dangerous this whole situation is, and Adam, no matter how hard he tries—can’t seem to get a moment alone with his fiancé to try to explain that the situation is not what he thinks it is. Everyone had vastly underestimated how far the rumors about Michael and Adam secretly courting had gone, and Adam can barely take three steps without a noble or courtier or someone pulling him aside to offer their congratulations, and as Adam gets closer to Michael’s chambers, there’s Raphael, circling like a shark and Adam does not want to make his confession to Raphael before he sees Michael.

Come dinner time, Adam finds that his seat had been reassigned. He now sits directly to Michael’s left. He keeps trying to convince Michael to step out into the hall with him for a second, while Raphael, seated in their normal place to Michael’s right, continuously circumvents him, firmly believing that Adam has done more than enough in private.

Then there’s a scream. A servant comes running out into the dining hall, carrying a bloody knife. They run up to Michael—up until the guards step forward to stop her, but she’s not attacking. Instead she hands over the knife and says that she found in the corridor outside the king’s chambers. She had been worried, so she broke protocol and went in. The king’s bed was drenched in blood.

Adam looks over and feels a chill when he recognizes the same knife that had been included in the murder kit he found in his room on day one.

If Raphael had looked up, Adam had no doubt that Raphael would have read something in his face, but they didn’t get the chance to. Michael and Raphael are busy staring at each, the only ones in the room who know beyond any doubt that the implication could not be true, because there had not been anyone in that bed to assassinate in over ten years. Neither of them is given the chance to try to spin the knife’s implications in any direction, however. While the court is still reeling in shocked silence, a guard walks in—completely oblivious—and announces that a messenger has arrived with urgent news.

Adam looks up, and finds he has room to panic more, when he sees Anna Milton walk in, a serving maid in the Winchester court, and as she drops a curtsey to Michael, she identifies herself as one of Raphael’s spies. She had held her place in the Winchester court for as long as she could, but when her real identity had been uncovered she’d had no choice but to flee, and she’s come with monumental news. The civil war across the channel has ended, the Campbells having been forced to seek asylum with their allies outside the kingdom, John Winchester deposed, and Dean Winchester installed on the throne in his place. She had witnessed his coronation herself the very day they identified her.

And Adam feels very cold, as if his blood had actually managed to turn into ice, which would have explained why he couldn’t seem to move, as every eye in the room immediately turns to him.

 And that would be the end of part one.