#it’s never going to be as seamless but they’re trying!

[hvseung]

unspoken truths - (p. sh)

pairing: skater!sunghoon x skater!reader (f)

genre: childhood friends who grew apart, ewb??

warnings: explicit smut, angst (just a tad), profanity, oral (m recieving), rough sex, cum eating, minor mouth play, fingering, degrading, unprotected sex🫣, minors DNI !

wc: 10.4k

🎵 now playing: love my harder by ariana grande

.｡.:*:.:**:.☆*.｡.:*:.:*.｡.:*:.:**:.☆*.｡.:*:.:*

The cold air inside the ice rink felt refreshing, a stark contrast to the sticky heat of the summer sun just outside the doors. The crisp clack of metal against ice echoes through the rink, polished blades gleaming with the promise of precision and grace. Today was another day of practice, another opportunity to perfect this routine and another chance to prove yourself. It was early, just after dawn, and the rink was almost empty. Almost.

Gliding effortlessly across the ice, Sunghoon was already practicing. His movements were fluid, each glide and turn a seamless display of expertise. They’re flawless, but there’s a certain detached precision to them. He didn’t seem to notice you at first, too focused on his routine, his breath measured, and his eyes fixed on some invisible point ahead. You tightened your grip on your skates and walked to the benches, trying to ignore the knot of tension that always formed in your stomach when Sunghoon was around. You hated Sunghoon, and Sunghoon hated you.

Sunghoon, with his effortless charm and silver-spoon origins, had always been surrounded by luxury. His path to the top was paved with privilege; he never had to struggle or scrape by, his every need catered to from an early age. He glided onto the ice with an air of nonchalance, his routines executed with the kind of polish that came from years of top-tier coaching and expensive training facilities.

In contrast, your journey to the elite level was marked by grit and determination. Each routine was the result of countless hours of practice on less-than-ideal rinks and under the scrutiny of a modest budget. You had worked tirelessly, often sacrificing personal comfort and financial stability to reach the same heights as Sunghoon. Every jump, every spin, was a testament to your resilience and relentless effort.

Off the ice, tensions were even higher. Sunghoon's casual arrogance clashed with your no-nonsense attitude. While he was used to people bending over backwards to accommodate him, you often felt you had to assert your value and demand respect that should have been freely given. Conversations between the two of you, when they happened, were laced with hostility, each remark carefully measured and barbed.

Things weren’t always like that though, in fact, they were the complete opposite. You and Sunghoon used to be very close, a rock to each other on the rink. He was your partner, after all. But as the years went on and pressure to be perfect rose, you grew apart. The distance between you caused a sour taste in both of your mouths, but you stayed supportive to each other nonetheless. Until Sunghoon decided to do a complete 180 one day. He began throwing petty remarks at you whenever he could about whatever he could, and after a while, the remarks turned into forward insults, which you would then reciprocate. You’re not even sure where things went wrong between the two of you, some stupid rumour apparently. But that obviously wasn’t the case, not that you were going to get the truth out of him now.

"Again," Your coach snapped, his voice carrying an edge that cut through the silence. "You need to nail this lift."

You exhaled sharply, rolling your eyes as you approached him. "Is this really necessary? I mean, why can’t he just do this routine with someone else?"

Sunghoon shot you a look that was heavy and that carried opposition. "Maybe if you actually listened for once, we wouldn’t be stuck here."

You planted your hands on your hips, trying to ignore his gaze. "Oh, right. Because clearly, it's all my fault that you keep messing up the timing."

The two of you faced each other, locked in a silent battle that spoke volumes. This wasn’t just about figure skating; it was about clashing wills and unspoken grievances. You both knew that you needed each other to succeed, but the ice was a battleground where that truth was often buried beneath layers of resentment.

Sunghoon's eyes narrowed, and he skated back to the starting position. "From the top, then. And try not to mess up this time."

You forced yourself to take a deep breath, focusing on the smooth, fluid movements that you both needed to execute flawlessly. It was a routine you’d practiced countless times, but today, each misstep felt like a personal affront.

As the music began to play, the same haunting melody you had grown to loathe, you couldn't help but wonder if the real performance was not the one on the ice, but the one you two were constantly rehearsing off it: the delicate dance of patience and frustration, the unspoken challenge of learning to work together, despite the discord that seemed to define every practice. But once again, one of us messes up one too many times.

“This is ridiculous!” Coach pinches the bridge of his nose, obviously at widths end. “Can’t you two just get along? For the sake of the routine.”

“That’s like asking for blood from a stone.” Sunghoon scoffs. Coach lets out a defeated sigh, holding his hands in surrender.

“I’ll see you both next week.” He turns on his heel “And those cones need to go away, can you both put them in the locker rooms?”

Sunghoon grumbles under his breath, not liking the idea of having to be in an enclosed space alone with you, even if it only was for a few seconds. But knowing better than to argue with the coach, he picks up the cones and heads towards the lockers. He can feel you trailing closely behind him, your presence making his skin crawl. He quickens his pace, trying to put some distance between the two of you as you approach the desolate space. You push through the double doors, placing the cones down in the far corner before getting changed. It was the closing hour, so Sunghoon was in a particular rush, and knowing he couldn’t lock up without you was pissing him off.

“You can hurry up, you know. I don’t have all night.” He leans against the wall, folding his arms. But his impatience only makes you move slower. He huffs loudly, annoyed at your attempts to spite him. “You’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you?”

“Obviously.”

Sunghoon pushes himself off the wall, taking a few steps closer to you. “Why do you have to be so difficult, huh? Can’t you just do what you’re told without being so annoying?”

“Not when you piss me off and rush me. Do you think I’m gonna listen to someone who’s rude to me?” You turn around to face him

He glares at you, his frustration growing by the second. “I’m rude to you because your no better.” he scoffs lowly “You act all sweet and innocent, but I know you, you’re just as stubborn and spiteful as I am.”

“Shut up.” You grit your teeth, turning away from him again to pack your bag.

“No, I won’t shut up, not when you won’t accept the truth.” He tsks, smirking slightly “You’re not the perfect little princess you pretend to be, it’s quite pathetic actually.”

“And your nothing more than a sad loser who thrives off of daddy’s money, isn’t that right?” You coo. This isn’t the first time you’ve brought up Sunghoon’s upbringing to gain the upper hand in an altercation. Sure, it’s a little low, but you deserve to poke at him after everything you’ve done to get here.

Sunghoon’s eyes darken, his jaw clenching. Calling him a loser was one thing, but to bring up his family and his background? “You know I hate it when you bring up money. You think I’m just some spoiled rich kid who had everything handed to him? You have no idea what I’ve been through.”

“Oh, don’t give me that bullshit Sunghoon. You should be grateful, some of us didn’t have money to aid them to where they are now.” You dig.

“You’re just jealous, aren’t you? Jealous that my life was easier than yours and your spiteful because I had money and opportunities you didn’t.” He laughs bitterly, stepping uncomfortably close to you. “You’re jealous that I’m better than you and I’ll always get further in this field than you ever will because I have actual talent. Talent that money didn't buy.”

“Fuck you.” You spit, shoving at his chest to create some more space between your heated bodies.

“Watch your mouth, princess. You don’t get to swear at me because you can’t accept the truth.” He closes that gap between you once again, pressing your back against a wall.

“You’re a lowlife Sunghoon and I fucking hate you.” You spit your venom at him, throwing your bag over your shoulder as you attempt to leave.

“You hate me, yeah? Well, I hate you too! I hate that you think you’re a perfect, good girl when all you do is put others down and tear them apart. You act all nice and innocent, but your just as cruel as I am. You can call me a low life all you want, YN, but at least I’m not a fake, two faced bitch!” He’s visibly angry, his eyebrows furrowed, and his pointed canines show as he retorts back. “don't push me.”

You scoff loudly, trying to cover up the obvious hurt in your voice as his words burn a hole in your chest. Part of you knew he was right, but another part of you knew that you only acted this way towards him because he made you like this. “Or what?”

“Or I might do something we’ll both regret.” Sunghoon’s eyes rake over your features as he pushes you further against the wall, completely closing any gap left between the two of you as his chest presses against yours, gripping your wrists. The tension between you was palpable, the air around you thick with anger and… desire? For a moment, his eyes flicker down to your lips before trailing back up to meet your eyes again, anger still present in both of you.

“Try me.”

That was all it took. All it took for Sunghoon to capture your lips in a rough and forceful kiss, a kiss fuelled by years of anger and pent-up need. His hands release your wrists, moving to grip your hips instead. Once your brain had fully processed the situation, you wrap your arms around his shoulders, kissing him back.

He grips your hips tighter, pulling you closer and swiping his tongue along your lower lip. The simple action elicits a soft moan from you, allowing his tongue to greedily explore your mouth. His fingers begin to trace the outline of your curves and up the length of your arm before settling on your cheek, holding you in place whilst he tilts his head to practically swallow your tongue. The kiss was sloppy and messy, if anyone walked in and witnessed it, they might have internally retched. But it was perfect, every ounce of anger and hatred seemed to dissipate in that one moment, replaced only by the raw and primal need that had been building for years.

“God, I hate you,” He mumbled against your now swollen lips “I hate you so much…”

“I hate you too.” I mumble back, playing with the hair on the back of his nape as he pulls away fully

“Prove it.” Sunghoon can’t help the wicked smirk that forms on his lips, moving his hands back to your hips to allow his thumbs to trace small circles on the skin.

“Prove it?” You push him down onto the bench beneath you, landing with a soft grunt. “You really can’t play nice? can you?”

You hover over him, leaning down to kiss him softly, almost ghosting over his lips. Sunghoons breathe hitches. Despite the tension earlier, even the gentle brush of your lips against his causes his body to react involuntarily, his head tilting back slightly to give you better access. He lets out a soft, almost meek noise at the feeling, his hands brushing against your thighs. But the pleasure is short lasting, as its not long before you’re pushing him away and sinking to your knees. Sunghoon opens his mouth to protest, but the words die in his throat as he gazes down at you, your head dangerously close to his growing bulge.

“Want me to show you how much I hate you?” You whisper breathlessly, his eyes darkening at your compromising position.

“Yeah? You gonna show me, princess?” He tries to control his body’s reaction as you reach for the drawstring of his shorts, but its futile. He lifts his hips up, letting you pull them past his thighs and down to his ankles, only the thin cloth of his underwear separating the two of you. The hardness between his legs was visible, and fuck- were you even going to be able to take all of that?

You lean up a little to kiss the outline of his prominent v-line, causing him to shiver a little. Your finger finds its way underneath his waistband, pulling it back before letting it snap against his skin. He whines, leading your hands to push them down. Without the fabric in the way, nothing was left to your imagination. Sunghoon’s breath hitches as his fingers thread through your hair, tugging on it lightly to encourage you. He can’t quite believe that this is actually happening, and that he’s just letting you do it.

You grasp his dick in your hands, the length making them almost look smaller. Pre-cum leaks from his red tip as he hisses, tipping his head back at the contact he has craved since the second he stepped foot in the locker room alone with you. You circle your finger over his tip, smearing the sticky fluid around before flattening your tongue, lapping up the mess you just made and teasing his sensitive slit. You swirl your tongue around his hot head, making him buck his hips up against your tongue.

“Fuck, YN,” he hisses, gripping your hair a little more to push your mouth closer to him. You close your lips around him, sucking and teasing his tip a little more, eliciting soft whines from him. “Take it deeper”

You open your mouth to protest, to tell him to have some patience, but instead he pushes your head down a little, shoving him further into your mouth and taking advantage of your relaxed throat. You gag at the sudden intrusion, your hands lifting to grip against his thighs. “Yeah, that’s it.”

Sunghoons eyes widen as your mouth envelopes him, a strangled gasp escaping his throat at the sudden sensation. His hips involuntarily buck upwards, his head falling back against the bench once more as he lets out an involuntary moan of pleasure.

He groans as you hollow your cheeks, trying your best to fit every inch in your mouth. Every AGONISING inch. You wrap your hands around his base, rubbing your hands up and down whatever you can’t fit in your mouth. “Yeah, that’s right baby.”

You moan as he tugs at your hair, bucking his hips a little faster to gently fuck your throat. His balls slap against the underside of your chin, causing your eyes to flutter closed as you focus on trying to keep his whole length down. He wraps his palm around your hair, creating a makeshift pony to pull you back.

He slaps his dick against your lips, watching as drool spills past and onto your chin. "You're enjoying this aren't you? You say you hate me but you love sucking my dick, isn't that right?" He pulls at your hair again, making you whimper and nod your head. "Yeah, that's what I thought."

He pushes you back down again, forcing you take every inch this time. Tears brim at your eyes as you slap his thighs a little. "Take it. You can take it, can’t you?"

You moan, his dominance making your pussy clench around nothing. You relax your throat even more as your nose presses against his lower abdomen. Tears spill past your eyelashes as you gag, bobbing your head up and down even more. You're determined at this point, determined to taste him.

You lift my hands to his balls, massaging them softly. Sunghoons head falls back, his breath escaping him in a sharp exhale. The sensation is overwhelming, his body shuddering at the contact. He lets out a soft, strangled moan, his hands clenching at the bench in a desperate attempt to keep himself anchored. He can feel himself getting closer and closer to the edge, his body coiled tight with tension. His fingers grip your hair more tightly, his breaths coming in sharp gasps as he struggles to hold on. 

"Dont stop, fuck you're so good-" He pants out, fucking into your mouth relentlessly. At this point, you're completely wrecked, drool spilling down your chin and onto your chest as hot tears sting your cheeks.  

You cry out around his dick, your tongue swiping the underside. You feel his balls tighten in your hands. "Im- fuck im-" he whines a warning (barely), practically ripping your hair out and his head falls back and his back arches. "Fuuuuck! Fuck YN!" he cries out. Who knew Park Sunghoon was so vocal?

You almost double your efforts as his orgasm hits, desperate to milk him for everything he has. His hips jerk forwards as he shoots his load down your throat, the salty liquid overwhelming your tastebuds. He collapses bonelessly against the bench, his chest heaving as he tries to catch his breath. His mind is hazy with pleasure, his body thrumming with aftershocks as he tries to regain his composure.

You pull your mouth from him, swallowing his cum with a soft moan. You push yourself up on his thighs, dusting your knees. Sunghoon watches, dazed, his body still sensitive and raw, as he stares up at you from his crumpled position on the bench. "That was- shit YN."

"Yeah, exactly. Fuck you." You snarl, grabbing your bag.

Sunghoon watches, his body still buzzing with the aftermath of their encounter. He manages to sit up, albeit a bit shakily, and looks up at you. His expression is a mixture of anger and confusion, his mind still reeling from the events that had just transpired.

"You... you're just going to leave? After that? You're just gonna walk away like it didn't happen?" He finally manages to find his voice, the anger and confusion evident in his tone.

"What else were we gonna do? Prance around and hold hands?" You scoff, almost laughing bitterly.

Sunghoon's jaw clenches as he considers your words. He knew you were right, that they weren't going to become some sappy couple after one moment of weakness. Still, the thought of you leaving after what just happened was irksome. "No, obviously not. But... we can't just continue acting like we normally do after this."

"Sure, we can. This was a one-time thing to settle some tension. We still hate each other..." You roll your eyes.

His gaze narrows. He's tempted to argue, but he knows deep down that your right. One moment didn't erase years of tension and animosity between the two of you. "Fine. It changes nothing. And I still hate you."

"Good, I still hate you too.”

──────────────────────

It had been almost a week since... whatever the fuck happened in that locker room, and Sunghoon couldn't stop thinking about you. He found himself unable to focus on virtually anything; training, schoolwork, his friends - nothing was able to keep his mind of those 15 minutes you had shared in the locker room. He couldn't understand why it was affecting him so much, why he couldn't shake the memories of your touch? He hated it. He hated that you were able to get under his skin like this. He was a rational person (mostly) who didn't let emotions get in the way of anything, yet here he was, his mind consumed by thoughts of you. It was so frustrating, so infuriating that he couldn't seem to push you away, no matter how hard he tried, especially after everything that had happened in the past. 

He tried throwing himself into training even more than usual, hoping the sheer exhaustion would drive you from his mind. But no matter how hard he pushed himself, no matter how much his muscles burned and ached, he couldn't find the peace he was looking for. You were like a ghost, haunting him at every turn. 

"Again!" The rink echoed for the tenth time today. "This is ridiculous."

Sunghoon watches with a critical eye as you attempt the jump again, his arms crossed over his chest. He can see your balance is off, your form flawed, and he feels the familiar irritation bubbling up in his chest. How can’t you get that right? He doesn't know why he's even irritated, your form on your jumps doesn't affect him whatsoever. But it's as if he can’t help it. Everything you do just stirs some sort of negative emotion within him.

"Im trying!" You snap back at coach, running your hand through your hair. Your facial features are etched with exhaustion and frustration. This jump was getting to you, and you didn't know why.

Coach's expression turns stern at your snappy reply at him. "Trying isn't good enough, YN. You cannot be skating with that kind of mistake. Focus."

Sunghoon's eyes flicker between you and coach, remaining quiet for the time being. He's not surprised you're exhausted already; your form has been off all day, and it's beginning to wear down on your stamina. He can’t help the shit-eating smirk that plasters his face as he watches you try and fail.... again.

"I think that's enough for today." Coach huffs. "Somethings obviously throwing you off. This needs fixed before regionals, got it?"

Sunghoons arms are still crossed as coach calls it a day. He can see the exhaustion clinging to you like a second skin, and a small twinge of sympathy pulls at his heart. He quickly snuffs the feeling, replacing it with his usual stoic, unreadable expression. But as you make your way the locker rooms, he can’t help but glance in your direction, that sympathy rearing its head again.

He trails idly behind you, his eyes watching the slump in your shoulders. Despite his best efforts, he can't seem to shake the feeling of sympathy gnawing at him. His usual irritation that he feels whenever he's around you are strangely toned down, replaced with the unsettling feeling of concern. He silently follows you as you push the double doors, watching as you start pulling your gear off in silence.

He stands by, watching as you start stripping off your gear. His eyes linger on your sweat-soaked figure, taking in the way the droplets cling to your skin, gleaming under the artificial light of the locker room. You're hyperaware of Sunghoons presence behind you as you strip yourself of your gear, but instead of the usual feeling of discomfort and irritation, knowing you weren't alone in the room was comforting? Especially after today's events.

Until he opened his mouth.

"You were a bit sloppy out there." The smirk evident in his tone. "Your form was horrendous."

You sighed loudly, almost groaning at the sound of his voice cutting through the comforting silence just to spit venom at you. "Not today Sunghoon."

"What? It's the truth. It's pitiful, really. Your jumps were pathetic. You're really going to compete in that state?" He chuckles bitterly

"I said not today." You snap, finally turning to face him. "Can’t you just shut the fuck up, for once?"

He leans against a locker, a smug smile plastered on his face. Your irritation only serves to fuel his amusement. "Why are you being so sensitive today?" He asks, raising an eyebrow. "I'm just pointing out the obvious. You're tired, you're distracted and your form is shot to hell. You're going to embarrass yourself if you don't figure it out before the competition."

You don’t answer and turn away from him, the slump in your shoulders becoming more prominent. You pick your bag up, slinging it over your shoulder before walking to the doors silently. You don't have the patience, nor time for his bullshit today.

"And now you're running away." Sunghoon mutters, unable to stop himself from speaking. "You always do that. I point out an obvious flaw, and you run like a coward." He can't help the hint of irritation in his voice. Despite the sympathy thats clawing at his chest, he can't let himself show weakness. It's just who he is. 

He steps in front of the door, blocking your way out. He's unsure why he's even stopping you in the first place. Maybe it's the concern he feels deep inside, maybe it's his own stubborn pride. Whatever it is, he can't seem to stop himself. "Where are you going?" He asks, his eyes narrowing as he looks down at you. "Just ignoring me? Not even going to defend yourself?"

"Please Sunghoon." You avoid his gaze, not wanting to betray the obvious troubled look that’s etched into every line on your face. "Just let me go home."

Sunghoon's irritation falters for a moment as you speak. There's something in your voice - a mix of exhaustion and pleading. It tugs at that sympathy inside him like a fishing rod

"But..." He starts, his voice gruff, his eyes glued to you. "You can't just-" He cuts himself off, not fully understanding his own motivations, not wanting to admit the truth to himself. He lets out a frustrated, resigned sigh, running a hand through his hair in an attempt to calm himself down.

"Can you at least tell me what's been going on with you, lately? Why you're so... off your game." It's an olive branch, more sincere than anything else he's said to you.

"And why would I do that?" You scoff "So you can make fun of my personal life too?"

Sunghoons irritation flares back up at your snippy response, but then he looks at you, really looks at you. He sees your pained expression and the defeated look in your eyes. For once, he can't find it in himself to match your snark with more snark, can't find it in him to kick you while you're down like he usually does. 

"Look, I promise... I won't make fun of you. I just..." He takes a deep breath, his expression unusually vulnerable. Is he really going to say this? "I just... I don't like this.” He motions vaguely to you, trying to find the right words “I don't like seeing you like this. It's..." He hesitates, as if he's admitting something he'd rather keep to himself. "It's pissing me off."

"Pissing you off?" You finally look up from the ground. He holds your gaze, his eyes uncharacteristically soft and vulnerable. He's not used to being this open with you - hell, he's not used to being this open with anyone. It's new and unfamiliar, but for some reason... it feels right.

"Yeah, it's pissing me off." He repeats. "I don't like seeing you like this. Exhausted, frustrated, down on yourself. You're... you're supposed to be putting your all into the competition... into being better than me." He adds the last part quietly, almost as an afterthought.

"My parents are divorcing." You sigh, admitting quietly.

"Ah." Is all he can manage to say at first, unsure of how to respond. He's not a naturally comforting person, but his irritation at the situation shifts. He feels... sorry for you?

"There. Happy now?" You roll your eyes, waiting for the snarky comment or dig about your situation, like he always does.

"No," He says bluntly, not even trying to hide the compassion in his voice. He knows, instinctively, that you're trying to push him away, that you're waiting for him to throw some smartass remark or mean response. But he can’t bring himself to do it, to want to. He steps forward, slowly closing the distance between the two of you. He lifts a hand, hesitating for a moment before placing it gently on your shoulder. "I'm sorry." 

You tense at his touch. You weren’t expecting any sort of compassion from him, never mind physical comfort. But the comfort makes it real. You look away again as tears sting in your eyes, batting your eyelashes to push them back. He moves his hand from your shoulder to your chin, tilting your face back up. 

"Hey, don't look away from me." There's a hint of a command in his voice, but he keeps his tone soft, uncharacteristically comforting. He gently angles your face back up to him, his eyes searching yours. "You don't have to act so tough, you know. Not with me."

"You're the only person I have to be tough with." Your voice cracks, betraying your lack of control when it comes to your emotions. You were about to break.

The sound of your cracking voice has a strange effect on Sunghoon. Instead of the usual smug satisfaction that would accompany your emotional turmoil, he just feels... an aching in his chest. Seeing you so vulnerable, so open and bare, and knowing that you're only like this with him does something to him, and he's not sure how to handle it. He lifts his hand to your cheek, cradling it gently. "You can let go. I won't think any less of you."

As soon as the words of permission fall past his lips, a soft sob escape yours. It's as if your heart tore in half to allow all the emotions, all the frustration and anger that had been building up, flow out freely. You lift your hands to your face, almost shielding yourself from him, hiding from him.

The sight of you crying, the sound of your sobs echoing through the empty locker room- it goes against everything he knows about you. You're supposed to be strong and fierce, always giving as good as you get. He's never seen you like this before, completely shattered. But he's also the one you've decided to show this side to. Despite everything, you trust him enough to bear it all without judgement.

He steps even closer to you, gently pulling your hands away from your face and taking them in his own, his thumbs brushing against your knuckles in a soothing gesture. A strange, almost protective feeling washes over him, urging him to comfort you further. So, it's as if his arms move on their own when he reaches out to pull you into his chest, gently rubbing your back with one hand and threading his fingers through your hair with the other.

You don't know what even possessed you to allow yourself to be this vulnerable in front of him, and after a while, you calm down. You attempt to pull back, but it's as if he can’t bring himself to let you go. He's not sure if it's the vulnerability that you've just shown, or that damned aching in his chest, but he just needs to hold you for a little longer. 

And you don't resist. You relax against him completely, nuzzling into his chest almost. You needed this. You needed this comfort, and if Sunghoon was the only person willing to give it then so be it.

He feels you nuzzle against his chest, and his grip on you tightens slightly in response. He can almost feel the tension leaving your body, the way you're completely relaxed against him. And it feels good. It feels right. He's never felt this protective, this intimate, with anyone before. But with you... it feels natural. Almost easy.

"I'm sorry." You speak softly, lifting your head to meet his gaze. He's pitiful, and it's genuine. The sorrow on your face sparks a pang of guilt deep inside him. He's never really seen you look this this broken.

"Don't apologise." He says, his voice gruff but gentle. He lifts his hand from your back to brush away some of the tear stains on your cheeks. "You have nothing to apologise for."

He holds your gaze, his eyes searching yours, taking in every detail. The way your lashes are still wet with tears, the way your hair falls over your eyes, the way your bottom lip trembles slightly. He's not quite sure why he's still holding onto you so tightly, why he's still caressing you so gently. It's like his body is moving on its own, responding to all his confusing, new feelings.

Your arms practically move on their own, lifting to cup his cheeks, the intimacy of the situation stirring an in-ignorable need to touch him, to feel him. "Sunghoon..."  

The sound of his name falling from your lips, whispered so softly, sends a shiver down his spine. The new, almost unfamiliar vulnerability in your eyes, the way you're suddenly touching him so gently... it ignites something within him, that same protective, almost possessive feeling that's been stirring in his chest for the past 20 minutes. And as your hand presses against his cheek, he finds himself leaning into it, seeking your touch. His eyelids flutter shut as he savours the feeling of your fingers against his skin.

Your body fights with itself. It fights the urge to push him away and never show your face to the world again, and the opposing urge to lean in and do something you will probably- no, most definitely regret. But Sunghoon can practically feel the turmoil warring inside you, the conflicting needs playing out on your features. 

He knows he shouldn't act on these unfamiliar feelings, shouldn't give in to the need that's threatening to overcome him. But the way you're looking at him, the way you're holding onto him so mildly, it's as if he loses all control over himself. And then he's moving forward, closing the already diminished distance between them. 

He mirrors your touch, cupping your cheeks to smoothly guide you closer. He pauses for a moment, giving you a chance to pull away if you want to… but you don't. You stay exactly where you are, looking up at him with an expression he's never seen on your face before. And then he leans in, closing the remaining distance between you, pressing his lips to yours in a tender kiss.

This kiss was different to the one you shared in this exact same spot just last week. That kiss was filled with anger and sexual frustration, but this kiss was meaningful. It was romantic, an intimate connection between the two of you that went beyond physical at this point. Sunghoon doesn't care about the context in which you've kissed before. He doesn't care about the hatred and hostility that usually exists between the two of you. In this moment, all he cares about is the feel of your lips against his. Nothing else matters.

He pulls away after a while, his lips parting from yours with a soft, wet sound. He keeps his face close to yours, his breath warm against your cheek. He gently runs a thumb over your bottom lip, the pad of the digit tracing the soft, plump flesh.

"YN..." He whispers, his voice hoarse, his breathing ragged. It almost sounds as if he's in pain, as if he's struggling to control his own emotions. His eyes bore into yours, searching for something. He's not sure what he's looking for, but right now, with you so close to him, he feels... desperate. Desperate for something he can't even name. "What the fuck are you doing to me?"

"I could ask you the same question." You mutter, before pulling his lips to yours once again.

──────────────────────

Sunghoon's mind wouldn't shut off. Every time he closed his eyes, images of you flooded his mind. He relived their moment over and over, the memories replaying like a broken record in his head. He tried counting sheep, meditating, even reading a book - nothing worked. He was exhausted and losing his fucking mind.

He couldn't believe he was doing this; can't believe he was so desperate that he's resorted to texting you. He knows it's a bad idea, knows that it's bound to lead to more hassle than it's worth, but he can't seem to stop himself. He types out a quick message, his thumb hovering over the send button for a few moments before he finally presses it.

Part of him is hoping, no- praying that you're asleep and won't respond. But another part, a small, traitorous part, is hoping you are awake and might answer him. He doesn't want to admit it, even to himself, but he craves your attention. It doesn't matter what kind of attention he's getting; he just needed it. 

The notification jolts you a little as you just settle into sleep. You groan, reaching for your phone to turn the ringer off, but the contact on the notification momentarily stops me. You stare at your phone screen, eyes zeroing in. You hadn’t expected him to text you. You never texted each other, unless it was for information about training. Seeing his name causes something in you to stir, a mix of confusion, and as much as it pain you to admit it, hope.

SH: Hey, you awake? (12:18am)

You bite your lip, opening the message. You debated answering, weighing out the pros and cons. Which was ridiculous. It's just Sunghoon, what’s the big deal? But you had opened the message now, and you weren't heartless enough to ignore him, even if you wanted to.

YN: Unfortunately, what do you want? (12:20am)

Sunghoon lets out a sigh when he sees that you're awake, typing out a quick reply.

SH: Don't sound so enthusiastic, I could almost mistake it for kindness. (12:21am)

He leans back on his pillows, waiting for her response. He can't believe he's actually doing this, actually talking to you like your friends or something. But now he's stumped, he hadn't expected the conversation to get this far. 

Should he just be direct and ask you to come over? Should he come up with some stupid excuse to lure you to his apartment? He hesitates for a few more moments before sending another message.

SH: Come over. (12:25am)

You mentally curse yourself as the back of your knees press against the cold metal of the bed frame as your feet dangle over the edge of the mattress. Why did you even get up for this? "Are we just gonna sit here?"

Sunghoon eyes you silently from the other side of the bed, his expression giving away nothing. He's not sure what possessed him to text you, let alone ask you to come over. But now that you're here, he can't deny the thrill that's coursing through him. "Do you have anything better to be doing?"

"Yeah, actually, sleeping?"

He rolls his eyes at your response. Even now, you still irritate him. But then he notices the way you dangle your legs over the edge of the bed, looking small and almost vulnerable. His eyes rake over your form, taking in the way your oversized sweater swallows your slender frame. You look softer like this, less like the stubborn girl he's used to seeing every week. 

"You could've slept. No one forced you to come over." He pats the space next to him on the bed. "But now that you're here, you might as well make yourself comfortable."

"What do you think this is?" You scoff a little.

His eyes flash with a mixture of annoyance and amusement at your response. "You always have to argue, don't you? I'm just offering you a comfortable place to sit. Nothing more." He pats the bed again, gesturing for you to come closer.

You scan his face for something... anything? A smirk, a falter in his gaze, but his face remains stoic. OH, SO HES SERIOUS. "Im fine over here."

Sunghoon lets out a huff of frustration at your stubbornness. Why couldn't you just do as your told for once? "Come. here." He pats the bed a second time, his voice taking on a commanding tone. He doesn't understand why but right now, he wants you closer. Closer than the width of his king size bed would allow.

You roll your eyes, crawling over to sit next to him cross your legs and letting your knees brush against his thighs briefly. You and Sunghoon had known each other for years, even if most of those years weren't pleasant, but you had never been in such an intimate space like his bedroom before, and it nerved you. "Happy?"

He tries to ignore the way his chest clenches as your knees brush against his thighs. He tries to tell himself it's just a physical reaction, an involuntary response to the feeling of your body against his, but he knows deep down that there's something more to it. 

When you finally settle next to him on the bed, he leans back against the headboard, eyes studying your face, noticing things he's never noticed before. Your eyelashes, the way they fan out against your skin. The delicate curve of your nose, the rosy hue of your lips. "Yeah, I am."

"Well, I’m glad you're enjoying yourself." Your voice shakes a little at the proximity. This is normal, right? Giving your sworn rival a blowjob in the locker rooms, breaking down in front of him in the same said locker room, then coming to his house 5 days later? You try to convince yourself, but your attempts are futile. 

He reaches out, his fingers grazing your arm, feeling the softness of your skin. He's acutely aware of the fact that you're in his bed, that he has you this close, this vulnerable, and for once, he doesn't feel the need to provoke you. Instead, he's content just sitting in silence with you, his fingers continuing to trace your skin, feather-light.

He lets his fingers trail up your arm and across your collarbone, tracing the line of where your sweater meets your skin. He can feel the heat radiating off your body, the faint scent of your shampoo filling his nose. He wants to lean closer, to bury his face in your neck and just stay like that indefinitely, but he reigns in the impulse.

"Sunghoon what are you-"

He doesn't answer, his fingers continuing their path up your body. His hand moves up to your neck, gently wrapping around your throat. He applies just the slightest pressure, his thumb grazing against your pulse point. He can feel your heart beating faster under his fingers, and he loves it. Loves knowing that even with your tough exterior, you're just as affected by him as he is by you. So affected that it pisses him off. He wants more. He wants everything. "You're so confusing, you know that?"

"I-I'm confusing?" You can’t help but trip on your own words, the feeling of his fingers wrapped so delicately around your throat making your palms sweat. "You're the one touching me like this..."

His fingers tighten slightly around your throat, his hand now fully encircling the length of it. He can feel your breath hitch and sees the flutter of your eyelashes, the only indication of your discomfort. His eyes lock onto yours. He's always loved how expressive your eyes are, how they seem to mirror your every thought. They're filled with a mixture of confusion and desire, a combination that makes something in him stir. "And you're enjoying it, aren't you?"

You open your mouth to speak, but it's as if the words die on their way out, a meek "No" being the only thing that falls from your lips. 

"No?" He repeats, the word practically dripping with mockery. He tightens his hold on your throat, using his grip to tilt your head up, forcing you to look at him. His eyes roam over your face, taking in your flushed cheeks and widened eyes. He sees the mixture of defiance and vulnerability in your gaze, the way your lip trembles slightly under his grip. His own body responds to your helplessness, a heat pooling in his gut as he imagines all the things he could do to you in this state.

"Hoon..." You whine softly, the heat between your thighs too much to ignore now. Your panties were practically soaked through at this point, and as much as it killed you to admit it, this was affecting you.

He's unable to suppress the shiver that runs down his spine when you whine his name. Hearing his nickname in your voice, so soft and needy, practically drives him crazy. He tightens his grip on your throat again, relishing in the way the pressure makes your body squirm. "Yes, baby-girl?"

He lifts his thumb, ghosting it across your bottom lip again. He can't help but notice the way your lip trembles and parts slightly at his touch and he can't resist the urge to press his thumb deeper into your mouth. He wants to hear more of those little whimpers, wants to see you completely undone. He runs his thumb across your tongue, feeling it swirl around the digit. He can't believe you're letting him do this to you, that you're submitting instead of your usual resistance. It emboldens him, makes him want to push you further, to see how far you'll let him go.

"You have no idea how pretty you look like this." He murmurs, his voice hoarse with desire. He releases your throat, bringing his other hand up to cup your chin instead as his other thumb still rests against your tongue. He forces your head back, angling it so that your neck is fully exposed to him. You whimper softly, your lip quivering underneath his finger as he pushes it a little further into your mouth, your tongue flicking up to meet the salty digit. 

Sunghoon can't believe the sight before him, can't believe that he's seeing you like this, the tough girl that reciprocates his hatred, reduced to nothing but a whimpering mess from just a finger in her mouth. He can see the conflicting emotions warring on your face, the part of you that wants to fight back, to resist the desire that's coursing through you. But he also sees the way your legs shift restlessly on the covers, and he knows you're only holding back because you're stubborn and prideful. He pushes his finger deeper into your mouth, forcing you to take more as he leans in, his lips hovering just above your ear. "That's it, give in," 

You curse at the way your legs involuntarily and almost instantly spread the second his fingers meet the plump flesh of your inner thigh, the fabric of your pants riding up to reveal the expanse of smooth skin that's usually hidden underneath layers of clothing. You can’t help but let out the shaky breath that you didn't even realise you were holding as he traces small, delicate patterns, dangerously close to your pussy that was practically leaking through onto his bedsheets. 

Sunghoon can't help but relish in the fact that he's the one who's making you react like this, that no matter how much you push him away, you still subconsciously crave his touch. His fingers continue to trail up your inner thighs, his touch deliberately light, drawing soft noises from your throat. He loves the way your body betrays your attempts to keep some semblance of control, no matter how hard you try.

"Sunghoon, please-" You whine as he retracts his finger from your mouth.

"Please what?" He teases, his fingers still tracing patterns around your sensitive inner thighs, always stopping short of where you needed him the most. He knows exactly what you want, he can hear it in the way you whine, but he wants to hear you say it. He wants to hear you beg him; he wants you to give up your pride for him.

He gives your inner thigh a quick smack, his hand coming down harshly on the sensitive flesh there. You jolt forwards at the sudden contact, moaning softly. "Touch you where?"

"Touch my pussy Hoon, please." You whimper.

He pushes you down onto the mattress, manoeuvring to hover about you. He reaches one hand down to spread your sticky thighs, pressing his other palm beside your head. "That was easy, wasn't it?"

His hand finally connects with your aching core, teasing you through the thin material. "Fuck, baby. You're so wet, you're practically drenched through"

He pushes the material to the side, instantly slipping a singular digit into to your pulsing hole without giving you a second to register his actions, ca8using your head to spin. But he doesn't move the digit. "Beg for it."

"What? No-" 

He gives your thigh another harsh smack, making you slam your legs closed around his palm, whining. "I said beg for it. Beg for me to touch your pussy."

"Please don’t make me-"

He gives you another smack, harder this time, and relishes the way your legs clamp down around his hand, trying to get some friction, any friction "Do you really think you're in a position to make demands?" He scoffs. "Beg."

"Please Hoon... please touch my pussy." You whine meekly. As soon as the words leave your lips, he moves the finger thats buried deep inside you, plunging it in and out.

"Thats a good girl." He smirks, his bottom lip tucked snuggly between his pointed canines. You can’t even reply, your mind too clouded with pleasure to come up with a response to his praise.

Sunghoon lets out a huff, taking in the look on your face, the way your eyes are squeezed shut in pleasure, your mouth open and panting. It's a satisfying sight, and one that he wants to take advantage of. He continues moving his fingers inside you, adding another thick digit and applying a little more pressure to your clit, enjoying the soft gasps and moans that escape you.

He can tell by the way your body trembles and the whiny, breathless noises falling from your lips, that you're close. He can feel it in the way your thighs squeeze around his hand, the way your walls clamp down on his fingers. "Thats it," He increases the pace of his fingers "are you gonna be a good girl and cum for me?"

"Mhm- wanna be a good girl." You whine, arching your back.

He lets out a moan, his fingers starting to work a little faster. He can feel the way your body starts to tense up, preparing for it. He wants to see you fall apart completely, wants to feel you come unraveled under his touch. "Then cum"

Your orgasm hits you like a ten-ton truck. Your hips stutter forwards and a guttural moan rips from your chest. "Fuuuck!"

Sunghoon watches the way your face twists in ecstasy, the way your eyes roll back, and your hands clawing at the sheets beneath you. He guides you through it, his fingers slowing until you come down from the high. He reluctantly pulls his fingers from you, bringing the glistening digits to his plump lips and sucking them clean with a chesty moan.

But he isn't done, not even close. 

He brings his hands to the bottom of your top, his fingers slowly tracing the hem, teasing the exposed skin of your stomach. 

"This needs to come off." He mutters, his hands pulling at the material, trying to lift it over your head. He's impatient, his desire overriding any attempts at gentleness. He wants to see all of you, wants to feel your bare skin against his hands and lips. 

As he finally gets the top off, he lets his eyes rake over your exposed body. He can't help but let out an appreciative moan, his hands coming up to grip at your waist, his fingers almost indenting into the soft flesh. He looks at you, the way your chest is heaving with each breath, he looks at the way your cheeks are still flushed from your previous release, and he knows he needs more.

You can’t help but shift uncomfortably under his heavy gaze, practically feeling the holes being burnt into your skin. And Sunghoon notices the way you shift, how your body tenses under his scrutiny. He's not trying to make you uncomfortable, he's just trying to take in every bit of you, to memorise every inch of your skin, to commit it all to memory.

"You're so beautiful" He whispers, his voice full of reverence, his fingers tracing the curve of your bra. He leans down, attaching his lips to your collarbone, his mouth trailing a path down your chest. He can hear your breathing pick up again, can feel your heart hammering in your chest. He's gentle, his lips and tongue exploring every inch of your skin, and his hands following suit.

He pulls himself further on top of you so that he's almost completely covering you, his weight pressing you down into the bed. He continues his path down your body, his mouth and hands working in tandem, every touch and caress designed to heighten your pleasure. He can't help the possessive desire that rises within him. He wants to leave his mark on you, wants to claim you in a way that no one else ever will. He bites down on the skin above your breast, enough to leave a small bruise, causing you to arch from the bed with a soft whine.

He can't get enough of the way you respond to his touch, the little gasps and whimpers that escape your lips fuelling his desire. He moves lower, his mouth now on your stomach, his tongue tracing the dip of your belly button, his teeth scraping across the sensitive skin. He wants to take his time, to savour every moment, but the need in his body, the need to claim you completely, is growing harder to ignore with each passing second. 

"Sunghoon," you whisper with soft moan, grabbing his attention "I can’t wait any longer."

"Neither can I." He mutters, his voice low and rough. His lips find yours, his tongue delving into your mouth as he kisses you hungrily, his hands roaming your body, everywhere he can reach. His hands slide down to your hips, hoisting them up so that you're pressed even closer to him, his bulge poking against your throbbing pussy as he kisses you feverishly. You tangle your hand in his soft lock, tugging at the roots.

"That's it," He moans lowly, mumbling against your lips. "Pull harder." He grinds his clothed dick against your clit, making you hiss and tug at his hair again, harder this time. 

He lets out another low moan, the feeling of your hands in his hair and your body against his almost too much to handle. "Keep pulling." He instructs you, his voice low and rough. He ruts against you harder, watching as your juices stain a wet patch on his sweats. It's so dirty, filthy even, but he fucking loves it.

You continue to tug on his hair, arching into his touch, the combination making his head spin. He lets out a strangled noise, his hands gripping at your hips as he starts to grind against you harder, faster. 

"Fuck me Sunghoon, need to feel you deep inside me" You pant, rolling your hips gently against his as you grow more impatient by the second.

Sunghoons breathe hitches at your words, the raw desire behind them almost too much to handle. He lets out a low, guttural groan, his eyes trailing over the curves of your body once more, his hands leaving bruises on your hips.

"Are you sure?" He asks, even though his body is already screaming to take you, to claim you completely. 

"Please." You meet his gaze, biting your lips as you continue to gently roll your hips against his. He doesn't waste another second before pushing his sweats down, his hard cock springing up. 

His tip was angry and leaking pre-cum. You whine at the sight, swiping the beads the continued to pour out before bringing it to your lips. But before you can do anything more, he rolls over so that you're on top of him, your body straddling his. His hands move to your waist, holding you in place as he bucks his hips up, running the veiny underside of his dick between your folds.

He tucks his bottom lip between his teeth, rutting against you like this a few more times before positioning his tip at your soaking hole. He slowly guides you down onto him, his eyes locked with yours. Sunghoon felt big when he was down your throat, but fuck, he was practically splitting you in half right now. He groaned as you sucked him in, watching as you tip your head back with a loud whine.

"Are you okay?" He mumbles, trying his best not to moan and ruin his moment of concern. 

You nod, manoeuvring yourself to your knees to sink down on him more, taking him deeper. Sunghoon, bucks his hips up involuntarily, causing you to jolt forward with a loud moan. 

"Fuck, you're so tight," he hisses, parting your legs to watch his dick disappear inside of you. "You feel so good."

You moan loudly, biting your lip to suppress any whines or whimpers that might give away your slight discomfort. He felt good, really good. But he was so big, big enough that it was a little painful. 

Despite your best efforts, he can tell that you're having a hard time taking him, that he's bigger than you're used to. He lets out a low moan, his hands moving to gently soothe your hips, trying to help you ease onto him carefully. His eyes are locked onto yours, taking in the way your face twists with the mix of pleasure and pain. He tries to go slow, to be gentle with you, not wanting to cause you any unnecessary pain. But he can only hold back so much, his body begging him to just lose control and take you as hard and fast as he can.

You gasp once you're fully seated on him, deliciously stretched and full to the brim with dick. You circle your hips, trying to adjust to him before lifting up a little and bouncing on him. You were slow at first, almost painfully slow, but once you had become accustomed to his size, nothing was stopping you.

“Oh fuck,” Sunghoon groans, tilting his head back as you slam down against his thighs, the wet squelching noise that emits from you almost making him dizzy. His back arches against the mattress, his eyes fluttering closed at the feeling of your hot walls wrapped so snuggly around his dick. “Ah, that’s- yeah just like that.”

You moan loudly, muttering soft curses under your breath as you continue your vigorous movements. Sunghoon lifts his hips, thrusting them up to meet yours, causing your body to jolt as he reaches that one pressure point deep inside you that sends you reeling. “Right there!”

“Yeah? Right there? Is that the spot baby?” He groans, gripping your hips to keep them still as he thrusts up into you relentlessly. You practically fall limp, your chest crashing against his as his tip kisses your cervix over and over again. “Fuck you feel so good, so fucking good princess.”

“D-don’t stop- gonna cum!” You cry out, reaching up to claw your nails at his bare chest, leaving red and angry bumps in their wake. But Sunghoon doesn’t have the time, nor the ability to care about the pain.

“I'm not gonna stop, not gonna stop.” He groans, before flipping you both over. He positions you on your hands and knees before pushing your chest against the mattress and slamming back into you, knocking the breath straight out of your lungs.

He continues his onslaught and you can feel the tightening in your stomach become almost unbearable. “Fuck I’m cumming!”

“No, your not.” He slams his palm down on the soft, plush skin of your ass as it jiggles against his lower abdomen before stopping his movements. You whine as you feel your release slipping from you.

“No!” You cry out, almost choking out a sob.

“Beg.”

“What?”

“Beg me to let you cum.” The shit-eating grin plastered on his face is prominent. Even if you can’t see it, you can hear it in his voice. He was loving this. Loving the power that he had over you and loving the fact that as much as you don’t to, you will follow his commands.

“Please let me cum.” You whine

“Oh come on. That was pathetic. Beg like you mean it.” He slaps your ass again, making you cry out.

“Please! Please let me cum! Please Sunghoon!” You circle your hips against his abdomen, causing him to hiss.

“Good fucking girl.” He slaps your ass again, harder this time, before moving his hips again. He pounds into you, his balls slapping against your clit. You’re teetering on the edge of release, and you’re not sure how much longer you can hold back.

“Can I cum? Fuck, please! Can I cum?” You plead, gripping onto the headboard in front of you.

At this point, Sunghoon can’t even deny his own release, never mind yours. “Cum baby. Cum for me like a good girl.”

At that was it. You shriek as he slams into you one last time, hitting your g-soot deliciously and sending you completely over the edge. Your pussy clamps down on him before fluttering as you cum, your juices spilling down your thighs.

“Fuuuuck!” Sunghoon cries, shooting his warm load into you. Into you. He stays nestled in the warmth of your velvety walls before reluctantly pulling out with a filthy squelch. He watches as his cum almost instantly pools out of you, also running down your thigh. He smirks, using two fingers to scoop up the liquid before leaning over and shoving the fingers into your mouth.

You gag at the unexpected intrusion, but once you realise what he’s doing, you clamp your lips down, sucking and swirling your tongue around the digits, letting the salty liquid flood over your tastebuds. You moan at the taste, almost craving more. He slips his fingers out and swipes the saliva down your cheek.

“Now this. This is not a one-time thing to settle tension.” He says, flopping down onto the mattress beside you, running his fingers through his sweaty hair that’s clinging desperately to his forehead.

“No way.”

──────────────────────

@ hvseung, 2024. do not repost or reuse in anyway. thankyou :)

──────────────────────

[ladykailitha]

Icarus Part 17

Hey, guys! Just a reminder after I post Caged Bird on Saturday I am going on a two week posting hiatus. I need the break and my backlog could use the boost. I will start posting again on Sept 1st.

I'm not sure if I'll keep the four days like I have been doing or go back to the three days a week. I guess we'll see.

In this we have Eddie messing around with his friends and we get to see The Fallen's new costumes.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15 Part 16

~

Steve and Spence pulled on the red polos with white medical crosses on the sleeves and MEDIC emblazoned on the back that would mark them as medical personnel. Simon was pulling on the dark blue polo that would signify him as a roadie for the band The Fallen. Shane and Robin stood off to the side wearing regular clothes but with lanyards that said they were PAs to the band.

Steve knocked the trailer’s door and Hopper opened it to let them out. Steve poked his head out and saw that no one was around. He nodded to Hopper and the rest of the band filed out.

“All right,” Robin said, checking her clipboard, “sound check is at four and we are after Corroded Coffin does their sound check. Eddie says he can distract the rest of his band long enough for you to get changed into daily wear.”

The band all nodded and they all went their separate ways. Steve and Spence went to the medic tent, Robin and Shane went to do what PAs do and that’s run around making sure everything was going well, and Simon went to join the the rest of the crew setting up.

Eddie was leaning against one of the pillars backstage watching them work. Jeff came up to him and threw an arm around his shoulders.

“They’re pretty flawless at this, aren’t they?” he said, after looking around to make sure no one was in earshot. “If I didn’t know what I know, I would have never thought they were anything other than their roles.”

Eddie nodded. It was seamless; as themselves they were peppy and cheerful. The guys he’d seen at party after party at Steve’s apartment. But he still remembered how they were on stage and they were so completely different.

“That security guy they got is certainly worth whatever they are paying him, that’s for sure,” he agreed.

“Gareth is vibrating out of his skin to see their sound check,” Jeff said with a nod. “Not even to see their new costumes, just their sound check, that’s how over the moon he is about this.”

Eddie hummed in agreement. “He’s in for a treat, that’s for sure.”

“Have you seen their new costumes?” Jeff asked, eyes still on the hive of activity in front of them.

“Nope!” Eddie said popping the P. “All I know is that they were designed by the daughter of their head of security. Apparently Ellie Hopper is an up and coming fashion designer and who better to clothe an up and coming metal band than her?”

Jeff rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I guess all of us are going to be in for a surprise tonight.” He patted his friend on the shoulder. “Do try to keep it in your pants, yeah?”

Eddie pushed him off of him with a “Fuck off!”

“Dustin still pissed he missed meeting her when they were in California?” Jeff asked, giggling.

Eddie grinned and bounced on the balls of his feet, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Yup!” he said cheerfully. “It was hilarious. All of Steve’s friends were talking about how awesome she was and how beautiful she was all the while Dustin is like in the middle of battlefield, but as predicted Suzie’s parents didn’t want them sharing the same room. So he was fighting with her parents and she was fighting with him for fighting with her parents.”

He pursed his lips to try and hide his smile but it was fruitless and he broke out into a wide grin. “He didn’t even last the month with them.”

“And then by the time he’d made it to Cali,” Jeff said, “she was back in New York preparing for New York Fashion week and was completely devastated he missed her.”

Chrissy came bounding up to them. “Hey, guys. They have everything ready for your sound check and Gare and Bri are waiting for you.”

Eddie and Jeff plugged in their guitars and Eddie hit the first note. He adjusted the peg and then hit it again, this time he nodded. He went through the solo on their latest single to warm up. Then each of the other members did the same.

“Sounding pretty good!” Chrissy called from the front row.

She started shouting suggestions and then they all played together and she shouted more suggestions. Soon their sound check was over with and they filed off the stage to let The Fallen’s roadies to set up their instruments.

The Fallen came out in what Eddie called their casual costumes. Regular hoodies and jeans in their ‘color’ and their masks.

Azrael counted off time on his drumsticks and they got down to business. Gareth was on the sidelines practically drooling. Eddie thought he would be panting after Abbadon, his favorite, but after seeing Azrael’s drum kit, it was all over.

The black metal fittings, the void black on the tops and front of the drums and glittering black on the sides. His setup. The way he looked like a god even in the back, sitting on the throne, black drumsticks in hand.

Gareth starting pawing on Eddie’s arm. “Eddie, Eddie, Eddie...” he whined. “I want one.”

Eddie raised an eyebrow at his friend. “The drummer or the kit?”

Gareth turned to him scandalized. He put his hand on his chest, eyes wide, gasping in shock. “How dare you imply that I am anything but a staunch professional?!”

“So definitely the drummer then.”

Eddie cackled as he ran from Gareth who chased him all the way to their tour bus. Eddie ducked inside and locked the door behind him. He didn’t mind missing this sound check, after all they had a whole on the road and roughly eighty shows to get through.

Both bands were out promoting new albums and being two of the biggest metal bands at the moment, made both labels push for as many dates as they could conceivably do without killing either band.

It was going to be long and exhausting, but holy fuck it’d one hell of a ride. Eddie smiled as he held door shut as Gareth tugged and tugged on the door handle.

~

Steve rolled his shoulders and began warming up his voice. The crowd was bigger than they were used to but he knew that at least a good portion of those fans were there to see him and his boys.

They got strapped into the winged harnesses, specially fitted to work with their new costumes.

Steve gave Spence a thumbs up and the other man returned it. They began lowering Azrael onto the stage. His raven wings glinting blue in the spotlight. His new costume had the sleeves of his hooded long coat removed, leaving him with more range of motion. He wore a long-sleeved black mesh shirt that ended at his black leather gloves. He wore black cargo pants tucked into combat boots. The boots and his belt had silver skulls that glinted and winked at the audience.

He landed deftly a couple of feet behind the drum kit. He tugged on the release cord and sent the wings back to the rafters. He sat down and pulled out a couple of his sticks and launched into his drum solo. The crowd started screaming as the announced his name.

Next was Shane. He rolled his shoulders, trying to get comfortable in the harness. Even though the dragonfly wings were lighter than the others, they were more awkward in their construction. He gave Steve the thumbs up and he was lowered to the stage with his bass guitar. He began playing as soon as he came into view.

The crowd roared its approval.

Astraeus landed on the stage soft as a butterfly’s wing. He pulled on the release cord and allowed his wings to go back to where they came.

The sleeves of his hooded jacket were pushed up to his elbows to show his painted arms. They were the same midnight blue of the rest of his costume. His tight leather pants were tucked into his knee-high boots. His chest was bare and painted blue with glitter swirling around into galaxies. When he moved the mask shifted between the moon phases.

Then it was Simon’s turn. Steve watched as Simon slipped into the persona of Asmodeus like an ill-fitting glove. It was always harder for Simon than the rest of them to get into his alter ego. But he chose it and he had to live with the consequences of being a sex god.

He was wearing a short, red, leather jacket with the hood attached. His broad chest on display with leather harness drawing attention to all the right curves. His red jeans were torn up from his knees to his hips and shoved into mid-calf high boots with chains on them, the jacket, and around his neck.

His large red bat wings spread out behind him as he was lowered on the stage. About two feet from the ground, he pulled the release cord and stomped to onto the stage to roaring applause.

Asmodeus wailed on his guitar making it screech and sing as his wings ascended back to the rafters. His fingers danced over the fret board and threw his hand back with reckless abandon.

Steve loved this part. He loved the roar of the crowd, the music his band was playing all for him. Robin would say that it was because his parents didn’t love him much and that he never had real friends before her, before his band. Children and boys he had a crush on for years didn’t count.

But he didn’t care. He loved being loved. More than anything.

He wore a white lace bodice under his long hooded coat, and like Astraeus his sleeves were pushed up, but his forearms were bare. The shorts he wore were obscenely tight on his ass and left little to the imagination. His white high heeled boots came just above his knee, leaving miles of his thighs on display.

Today his coat lining wasn’t red or blue or even black, like it usually was when he started off a tour. No. Not today. Today it was the Corroded Coffin logo. And when his coat billowed out as he descended the crowd went absolutely insane.

Half way down, the air tanks on his back set off and blew off the feathers on his wings leaving behind the bones. He landed on the stage behind the microphone. It was like Steve Tyler’s microphone as it was decorated in ribbons, but unlike his, Abbadon’s mic never changed. It always had four ribbons. Red, blue, black, and white, woven together up the stand to billow out around the top.

He welcomed the crowd and launched into the first single off their new album. “Hell’s Where All My Friends Are Going!” It spoke about growing up bisexual in a highly conservative household where he was told that queer folk were going to hell.

It was actually one of the first piece of writing Shane and Spence ever turned into a song, but the label was afraid of alienating their audience straight of out of the gate, so it was never recorded. But when they brought Bob in, him and Robin managed to convince the label that not only would Abbadon and Astraeus coming would be good for business, it would be great for the band, too. One less thing to hide.

Remarkably the label agreed.

And now he was going to debut it here to the whole world and he felt like he was flying free for the first time in his life.

Heaven could fuck off, he was diving into Hell!

~

Part 18 Part 19 Part 20 Part 21

Oops! I don't know how it got posted without the chapter but here it is!

Tag List: CLOSED

1- @mira-jadeamethyst @rozzieroos @itsall-taken @redfreckledwolf @zerokrox-blog

2- @gregre369 ​@a-little-unsteddie @chaosgremlinmunson @messrs-weasley @val-from-lawrence

3- @goodolefashionedloverboi @carlyv @wonderland-girl143-blog @irregular-child @blondie1006

4- @yikes-a-bee @bookworm0690 @anne-bennett-cosplayer @awkwardgravity1 @littlewildflowerkitten

5- @genderless-spoon @y4r3luv @dragonmama76 @ellietheasexylibrarian @thedragonsaunt

6- @disrespectedgoatman @eyehartart @dawners @thespaceantwhowrites @tinyplanet95

7- @iamthehybrid @croatoan-like-its-hot @papergrenade @cryptid-system @counting-dollars-counting-stars

8- @ravenfrog @w1ll0wtr33 @child-of-cthulhu @kultiras @dreamercec

9- @machete-inventory-manager @useless-nb-bisexual @stripey82 @dotdot-wierdlife @kal-ology

10- @sadisticaltarts @urkadop @chameleonhair @clockworkballerina @garden-of-gay

[writingwithfolklore]

How to Translate Feedback

              Beta readers are awesome because they see the work strictly from a reader’s perspective. However, this also means that their notes sometimes require a little interpreting to understand how it impacts the craft—translating, one could say.

Every interpretation of a piece is valuable, and often what your readers assume about things, what questions they have, and what they guess comes next is very telling for the messages your piece is delivering and how effective your lines are working together. Let’s get into some common comments you might receive:

“I was confused about this line…”

              Even if the line is explained in the next paragraph, or even the next sentence, don’t disregard this feedback. A confusing line is going to stop up readers, interrupting their mental image of the scene and sometimes concentration on the story. Confusion around a line tends to mean there isn’t enough context to make it feel seamless, or like it fits where it is. You shouldn’t have to be playing catch up with your descriptions.

              Take for example a story I wrote when I was in fourth grade (yes, literally):

Tracy took off her coat as she entered her cabin. She crept across the floor very silently. If she was too loud, she’d wake the howler monkeys and never be able to get to sleep!

              Notice how there’s no context provided for why she’s trying to be quiet, so you kind of get caught up on that line. I would fix it like this:

              Tracy took off her coat as she entered her cabin, eyeing the sleeping monkeys out of her window cautiously. She crept across the floor… etc.

              Now we have context, it reads a lot more seamlessly.

(If they guess something is coming that isn’t)

              This one hurts because I hate feeling like I’m letting down my readers, and an excited “ooh is this foreshadowing??” for something that definitely isn’t coming back up again feels like exactly that. Usually, when a reader guesses at a plot point or character detail that isn’t true or isn’t going to come back up again, it means you drew too much attention to it, making it seem more important than it is.

              I tend to take out the description of the thing, or adjust it so it points less heavily towards one thing and points more towards another. While yes, readers can make incorrect guesses all the time, it’s important to pay attention to where their expectations are being raised—both in the correct places and incorrect ones. Too many disappointments, and your story may leave a sour aftertaste.

“This feels out of character/I don’t understand the motivation”

              When writers get this note, they tend to want to add a paragraph explaining from the character’s POV why they’re doing what they’re doing. Unfortunately, all the explanation in the world isn’t going to fix something that feels out of character or out of the norm. This might mean that you’re trying to force a scene or plot point that doesn’t fit, or that the circumstances aren’t extreme enough to justify your character acting out of sorts.

              Try ramping up the stakes or intensity if a character has to make a tough decision that might seem unlike them—usually a time limit or ticking clock helps here. If you’re only using internal motivation, try adding an external force pushing them towards action (or vice versa).

              If all else fails, consider how you can progress the plot in a different way that’s more in-character.

Shoot me some more common notes you get and maybe we'll do a part 2 :-)

[ushiwhacka]

time skip! bokuto kōtarō + fem! reader | mdni | 1,578 words | established relationship, mirror sex, fingering, creampie, implied insecure reader, bokuto wants to show you how pretty you look for him <3

bokuto has been watching you all night, amber eyes following your fingers as they run over the stem of the wine glass, your hand wrapping around the thin strap sliding down your shoulder, chewing on your lips as you scan the room for him. he knows you hate it when he stares, but he can’t help it. you’re the prettiest girl in the room. the prettiest girl in the world. he’d look at you only for the rest of his life if he could. and maybe that’s impossible, but he can look at you only for the rest of the night.

now standing in front of the full-length mirror in your bedroom, he should be focusing on unbuttoning your dress. it’s already a difficult enough task for him, his fingers too large and clumsy to deal with the tiny, slippery buttons that run across the length of the dress. but how can he? you look breathtaking, skin glowing in the dimmed warm light and nearly feverish to the touch. maybe it was the wine that you had over dinner. or maybe you’re just flustered at how his eyes are raking over your form in the mirror, how his tongue peeks out just slightly to wet his lips, how he leans in to inhale the scent of you, hair tickling his nose. it’s both, probably. the feeling of your skin burns against his knuckles. and his breathing becomes more laboured with each breath as he fumbles with the delicate fabric. 

“you’re so beautiful,” kōtarō whispers before he presses his lips to the top of your ear, then trails little kisses down the side of your neck, your eyes meeting as he nips at your shoulder. he wraps his arms around your chest, brute strength keeping you in place. “do you know how beautiful you are, hm?”

he never tries to hide his feelings. his love is unreserved, so freely expressed, so overwhelming. and you yearn to bask in his warm, bright light, but your body is frozen in place. and you can’t silence the nagging voice that’s always questioning if you’re good enough for him. “kōtarō,” clutching at his arms, you try to squirm away from his grip, “please let go.”

but he’s slightly tipsy and very much in love with you, so he isn’t going to give up. “let me show you how i see you.” the faint whisper of his voice as he nuzzles his face in the crook of your neck makes your skin tingle. it feels like you’re holding his beating heart in your hands. and you yearn to see yourself through his eyes, shimmering and perfect. he waits until you nod to slip the straps down your shoulders and lets the beautiful dress he bought for you pool on the floor. 

you can hear your own heartbeat and the blood rushing through your veins as you stand in front of the mirror, bare aside from a pair of seamless panties. eyes darting across the room as you try to focus on anything but your naked form and how embarrassing it is to be so exposed.

his hands move to cup your breasts gently, thumbs circling your pebbling nipples. “they’re so pretty. look.” the pads of his digits sink into the fat of your tits as he squeezes them, pinching your hardened nubs between his thumb and forefinger until your eyes meet once again. “fit perfectly in my hands, see?”

words stick to your throat as you take in the reflection of your bodies intertwined. and you start to understand the appeal. your body looks so soft against the wall of corded muscles behind you. and his eyes are more of a burning fire than amber as he looks at you like you’re the only thing that exists in the universe. like he would die for you.

something about how he’s still completely clothed makes the blood rush to your head. and you start to notice little details, your chest heaving, lips swollen from biting down on them, and you think you might look like the heroine of one of those erotic novels you like to read in secret. and it makes your pussy flutter with excitement.

bokuto traces your spine, marking his way down with sloppy kisses as he kneels behind you. then his lips move to the back of your thighs and he tugs your soaked panties down until they’re lying around your feet. and you’re completely naked and his for the taking.

“you’re the prettiest girl in the whole world,” he says it like it’s an indisputable fact. and you believe he means it. and he believes it too. 

arms scramble to cover your bits as he pushes the tan leather armchair behind you to face the mirror. but then it all happens so quickly - bokuto sitting down, grabbing you by the hips to pull you onto his lap, and then forcing your feet on the armrests. your legs stretched so wide it’s painful. 

his lips are grazing your ear again. “fuck, baby, look at you.” your gaze is trained on his hand as it moves across your hip bone and down your pelvis. thick fingers teasing your plump pussy lips. skin so soft he almost feels like his touch might spoil it. “you see how cute your little cunt is?”

a pearlescent drop of slick drips from your hole, and god, you look sinful. like temptation itself. you should be embarrassed. gushing and throbbing at the tiniest of compliments. but you don’t. the only thing on your mind is how you want your boyfriend to do every nasty thing you’ve ever read, seen, and imagined in your most desperate moments. 

his grip on your chin keeps your eyes on the mirror while he uses his other hand to play with your pussy. you’re a whiny mess as he slowly runs his middle finger down your slit, cooing against your jaw. 

“is my baby needy?” 

you whimper at the friction as he dips two digits inside you. it’s cruel how he’s moving so slowly, working you open around his fingers. stretching your walls, but avoiding the soft, spongy spot you’re aching for him to touch. he notices your frustration by the way you squirm in his lap, the plush of your ass pressing into his dick which is so painfully hard at this point. but he can’t just give you what you want. you have to ask for it, take it for yourself.

“be a good girl and tell me what you want.”

brain foggy with lust, you scramble to string a few words together. “wan’ your cock, please, please, please.” it comes out slurred and pathetic but it’s good enough for him. he’s yours.

you buck your hips helplessly as he presses his length to your folds. and he’s going to give you just what you want but he’s never seen you so desperate for him, so horny and needy and he just wants a moment to memorise every detail. it’s the look in your eyes as you watch yourself grinding on his cock that almost stops his breath. he can’t hold back any longer. 

so he sheathes himself inside your tight pussy in one stroke and starts bouncing you on his cock, not sparing even a second for you to adjust to how he’s just about splitting you in half. but you forget all about it as your brain becomes foggy with the mess of your two bodies pressed together. his forearms straining and veins protruding from the effort of lifting you up and down so eagerly. his thick thighs spread and twitching below you. and then, the way your tits are bouncing and his large hands on your hips. and, fuck, the way his fat cock is stretching you open, your cunt fluttering around the girth. you think you can feel him all the way in your belly, no mercy as he’s bullying your insides. 

it feels even better when you allow yourself to let go. lips wet and parted and spilling the most delicious moans he has ever heard in his life. he’s not any less of a needy mess than you. “you’re taking me so well, fuck.” lips pressed to the crook of your neck and panting. “you’re such a good fucking girl.”

the most obscene sloshing, squishing sounds fill the room as your little pussy is leaking slick around his cock, dripping all the way down to his balls. “the best girl.” your eyes are rolling to the back of your head, so drunk on his cock, drunk on his praise. “the best pussy.” he’s nearly incoherent himself. and when he feels your cunt throbbing and clamping down around him, he pulls you down by the waist, bucking his hips up into your ass at an almost brutal pace. “f-fuck, let me hear how - fuck,” something about the way his voice cracks makes your walls squeeze tighter. “how sweet you sound.” and all you can do is blubber as he fucks you through your orgasm and fills your pussy so full of cum that it’s dripping down his length. and you think you might pass out.

but it’s not enough. you want more. you want to be stuffed full to the brim for as long as you can keep your eyes open. “i wan’ more cum.” your hips seem to move on their own as you whine and paw at bokuto’s thighs. “please just o-one more.”

thank you for reading! interaction is very much appreciated! ˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

[ghostofskywalker]

Hey, so sorry to hear that your semesters been rough, I hope it gets better. I am super excited you’re doing the spring ficlets though! Could I request one with Fives and hes just head over heels for this spunky hot-headed reader. Maybe idk they’re going off on someone (who deserves it) and hes just there making heart eyes? Idk do with it what you want, thank you so much! Have an amazing week!! 💖

thank you!! i LOVED your prompt and i hope you enjoy this!!

words: 884

summary: you prove that you aren't one to be messed with, and fives falls even more in love.

clone troopers masterlist

Smitten

“You know you’re staring again, right?” Rex’s voice cut through the ARC trooper’s daydream and Fives barely even acknowledged his commanding officer. 

“What? No I’m not.” That was a bold-faced lie, and everyone around him knew it. It really didn’t help that Fives had yet to take his eyes off you as you sparred with a shiny, who had been acting like he was a lot stronger than he was. Most of the battalion knew what was going to happen when you challenged him to a sparring match, and yet the trooper did not heed their warnings that he might be a little out of his depth. A rule was set that no outside weapons could be used in the fight (since you had a habit of keeping at least three concealed on your person at all times), and the spectacle began. 

Fives would never speak ill of his brothers, but there were certainly troopers who lacked in the manners department, who acted like they were Maker’s gift to the world around anyone they thought was attractive, and you certainly fit the bill. And given the fact that you weren’t always around (because the 501st didn’t need the help of a bounty hunter for every mission they went on), not everyone knew who you were when you arrived on Coruscant for a little friendly training and bonding before you headed off with the 104th for a campaign.  

“You’re so obvious at this point I’m shocked that they haven’t noticed yet,” Rex said. Both him and Fives were watching you dodge every single punch the shiny tried to throw at you, and Fives was desperately trying to keep his jaw from dropping. “I thought bounty hunters were supposed to be hyper-aware of their surroundings at all times.” 

Fives shrugged, still not done staring. 

“Maybe they’re just as oblivious as Fives,” Jesse cut in, walking across the room to stand next the two of them. “What do they say? ‘Love is blind’ or something like that?”

“Then we may need to get them an eye exam if they really can’t see Fives’ lovesick glances,” Hardcase had now joined the conversation, and Fives was really regretting standing here right now. 

“Shut up,” he said, rolling his eyes. “I’m not that obvious about my feelings.” 

“Scratch that, we may need to get you an eye exam!” 

Fives was about to respond, but his eyes were still drawn to the scene in front of him. 

The shiny had just lunged at you, and it was exactly what you wanted. Grabbing his outstretched arm, you turned, twisting your body so that you were using your strength and momentum to push the trooper upward and then send him careening to the floor. To the cheering spectators on the sidelines, it was clear that you had just flipped him, sending him flying through the air and landing (quite unpleasantly) on the padded floor of the training room. Fives had seen you use that move before, and it was just as seamless as the last time you used it on the battlefield, one fluid motion that proved you weren’t one to be messed with. 

“Well, I think they won,” Jesse remarked, and the shiny hadn’t yet gotten up off the ground. Everyone knew that he wasn’t really injured, given the floor padding and the armor he wore, but rather that he was embarrassed to have been beaten out by you, to have talked a big game and gotten his shebs handed to him in response. 

You caught Fives’ eye from across the room and made your way over to him, smiling and greeting all the other troopers of the 501st that you knew. “Did you kill him?” Jesse asked playfully, nodding back at your sparring victim. 

“Oh please, I didn’t even flip him that hard,” you said, a soft snort escaping your mouth. “It’s his ego that’s bruised more than anything.” 

“Maybe you and Fives should go a round then,” Hardcase joked. “He could be knocked down a few pegs.” 

“Hey!”

You just laughed. “I don’t think I’d want to spar with Fives though.” 

“Why? You afraid I’d win?” 

Jesse tried very hard to hide his laughter at Fives’ teasing words, and Rex didn’t seem to be faring any better. “No, I just wouldn’t want to ruin your gorgeous face,” you said, a smirk playing on your lips. 

Whatever Fives was expecting you to say, that wasn’t it, and he didn’t know what to do in response, his mind completely lost for words at the implication that you thought he was attractive. 

“I think you broke him,” Rex commented a smile crossing his face at the sight of his ARC trooper completely awestruck.  

The others around laughed, and you smiled. “Wow, and I didn’t even need to pin him down to do it.” 

Fives was still trying to form a sentence in response when your name was called across the room, and you waved to another trooper dressed in grey, the symbol of the Wolfpack adoring his armor. “Alright boys, duty calls,” you said. “I’ll see you soon, alright?” 

Right before you left, you leaned in to place a kiss on Fives’ cheek, and his brain short circuited all over again. You were going to be the death of him, that’s for sure. 

- the end -

[elderflowergin]

blood free v secret forest, a quick and dirty comparison:-

As someone who fell for Kdrama through Stranger, i loved it because it appeared seamless, grounded and weaved several systems and levels of privilege very elegantly. Most of all it seemed morally urgent, even if it was at its core a detective mystery. (Which, to be fair, Blood Free is as well.)

Secret Forest’s first success was that it held nuance for everyone in the middle of the road; LSY afforded so much thoughtful shading to those men. I often think they will never look as beautiful as they do on SF, and that’s only partly because of whoever did the lighting etc, but they’re not Kdrama glossy perfect; they’re real people trying to reckon with themselves and the moral calculus they have agreed to, and their dignity comes from the reckoning. Lee Chang-joon, Kang Won-chul, Lee Yeon-jae, even Seo Dong-jae for that matter, all have that advantage. LSY managed this for Jung Sung-il in the scant few minutes of screen time he had.

The second success was Cho Seung-woo and Bae Doona. If Secret Forest was a universe they were its gravitational field; it was their fierce sense of honour and morality that drives both seasons. And their moral decency is hard-won; it is tested constantly, and it’s burnished at each opportunity, which is why they are respected. It is a dream that people like that can influence or impact those around them, but you don’t question that they do, by the end of each season, and that’s the victory of writing, casting and the charisma of both leads.

That’s why that funeral scene in season 1 is so important (to me); it shows the gravity shifting. The prosecutors rely on their forest of secrets to keep the centre together, but Hwang Si-mok demonstrates how untenable this has become, how the roots must be pulled out so the weeds die; so new healthy things can grow. The chaebols are at the periphery, and they continue to be there because, most audaciously of all, they don’t matter if enough people shift their moral calculus. I think this gravitational pull happens to Lee Chang-joon in season 1 thanks to Hwang Si-mok and it happens to Choi Bit in season 2 thanks to Han Yeo-jin. They are easily some of the most powerful parts of the show.

On the other hand, we have Blood Free. I’m not sure who the moral gravitational field of this show is meant to be. Maybe it’s Yun Ja-yu and/or Woo Chae-woon. Maybe it’s Lee Mu-saeng. Maybe it’s about the ethical dilemma of experimentation and whether that’s a worthwhile price to pay for the scientific advancements in cultured meat and seafood. Perhaps we need more time to really see the middle of the road characters, but four episodes in there’s not much to go on: there’s Lee Mu-saeng, there’s Queen Dowager as a VP, here’s Jeon Seok-ho. There are three chaebols, all of whom seem like one-note characters to me. (Why ask a talented sketch artist to produce cartoons like these? Unless they’re not, but nothing seems to suggest otherwise.)

The most interesting insight from episode 4 was about Yun Jayu - when offered 72 trillion won for her company, she actually considers it because it means she doesn’t have to face investors and can focus on research. She has influence and money but these are means to an end, for her. I wish we could see more of that, and not necessarily through exposition alone.

When she gives deft, cool answers to reporters, did that come naturally to her or did she work at it? Is she the face of the company because she hated it a little less than Lee Mu-saeng did? If so, why? What comparative advantage did they determine she had? When she wears Chanel tweed skirts and smiles her way through presentations, is that a natural extension of her work or is that a mask she wears? Give me process, guys! Give us the backstory, the way the markets work, the environment for cutting-edge bio research in Korea, the reaction of Big Meat, the interplay of new rich and old rich, some indication of her actual influence (which must be considerably more than what we see on the show, although what little we see, while uncomfortable, is frankly not that inconceivable in a world where you’re constantly connected.) I am so interested in her, and yet I feel I am made to watch the story of her reacting to chaebols and to the mystery of corporate sabotage rather than her being the fulcrum of her own universe. And at no point does the mystery seem morally urgent to me, and it’s because 1) why does it matter if all this is is a giant M&A negotiation 2) why should we care if it doesn’t feel real to us? So what if there’s sabotage? Why on earth isn’t this company guarded like fucking Fort Knox? Why is this company ostensibly so influential, so powerful and yet capable of unusually amateurish errors that are the centre of the show so far and not on the periphery of it? Where is the moral quandary that is meant to grab us by the throat?

Is it a question of the writing? Have her interests shifted and did she want to do a show without having to do too much character work? If anyone has earned a vibes-only moment it’s Lee Soo-yeon, and I respect that for her. I hope the direction isn’t stifling the writing, because that means there is an arresting, politically trenchant drama underneath this dry procedural, and that’s upsetting to consider. We still have a ways to go and I think there is potential, but I have to remind myself not to expect something like SF, that maybe you can’t bottle that formula. That it’s the gold standard for a reason. But honestly, Disney, in the words of TikTok star imo_unusual, you’ve made this show like God was dozing off when the angels were working, now RELEASE US (and LSY writernim)

[qierxing]

i’m the previous lads anon and i got rafayel’s latest 5* star and… him and xavier are dangerous;; the worst part is rafa has the whole “i’m lemurian :( we’re just built like that” excuse loaded and ready to go the minute you so much as question what he’s doing. and it’s like… well if he really is built like that how much can you ask him to against it? plus he’s so lonely all the time just let him be kind of weird and clingy, can’t a man love in peace? and so does xavier as he’s not from here and old as fuck, so he can go “ah i’m just old school and where i’m from it’s totally normal so it’s not weird at all don’t look into it too much though :)” and he says it so causally you just believe him because when has he lied or hurt you? zayn, on the other hand, is a doctor and can just pull the “i’m a doctor i know what’s good” and since he’s a childhood friend and your physician it’s like… he is right, he is looking out for you, when has he not? and i’ve gotten to know sylus better and… wow he is not subtle at all he doesn’t even try to excuse it he just does the crazy shit and gives no explanation whatsoever and you can’t really question him because he doesn’t even answer the question. all these men are like different stages of crazy but they’re all cut from the same cloth… i have so many thoughts, if i didn’t have commissions lined up i would be writing like crazy for them - especially xavier and rafa because they’re the least aggressive looking but they’re not even hiding it half the time

Now that I've read more of Rafayel's story and events, it's less so that he hides behind his Lemurian roots as an excuse and more of the fact he knows how to play you like a fiddle. Being practically a celebrity and being used to entertaining the masses means he knows exactly what to say when you're not happy or whether he should break out the puppy eyes and pouty lips. You're tired, he gets it, but he just wanted to spend some time together, y'know? It wouldn't kill you if you just stayed the night and kept him company.......never mind the fact your dinner might just be laced with drugs to make you stay longer :) who knows, really?

Xavier...........you bastard(affectionate). He toes the line between chill friend or making it so that you have no one else to hang out with. You don't notice your friends texting you less and less, not when Xavier's asking if you wanna get takeout or to see a game event together. So natural, so seamless. When he gets locked out of his apartment, you offer him your key, and suddenly, it's like the two of you are living together. You don't quite realize how much your life revolved around him until you realize one day that, you don't really have anyone else to talk to after an argument with him. No matter, he'll smooth over this patch so you won't realize how possessive he is.

Ahh.....see I know people will resort to Zayne doing medical malpractice to keep his darling close but. My hot take is that he wouldn't. He's much too professional and kind, seeing how much he cares about his other patients, and he's not that street savvy to cover up his dirty tracks if he were to do so. No, it's much more easier for him to leverage the tedious bureaucracy of medical procedures, meaning that if you even forget to schedule an appointment, it means that the system is now forcing you to be under 24/7 monitoring under your doctor. That's just the law! It's totally not because Zayne purposely didn't send you the reminder email. There's a lot of leeway and manipulation he can get away with just by being your doctor; and it grows with each and every little slip you give him.

[drgrlfriend]

Chrome Plated Heart

It's here! My first-bidder auction winners in the Marvel Trumps Hate 2022 auction graciously allowed me to put their (35k and counting) fic on hold so I could write my second-bidder auction, and here it is -- a Marvel Pacific Rim AU featuring Winterhawk! I've posted the prologue and chapter 1 together, and will be updating one chapter per week until I post the last chapter and epilogue together. Enjoy!

Chrome Plated Heart by dr_girlfriend

Excerpt:

“Hey.”  Steve nudges Bucky’s shoulder and tilts his head toward the door of the canteen.  “New blood.”

Riley and Sam turn all the way around to look, not in the least bit subtle as the newcomers follow Coulson in and grab trays.

They are an odd match to be drift compatible — the man as tall and broad-shouldered as the woman is small and slender.  Similar in age, so probably siblings or romantic partners.  Or just new recruits from the Pan Pacific Defense Corps, maybe.  There’s not a jaeger in the assembly line anywhere near to done, but having a backup team on hand is never a bad idea with how high the casualty count has been lately.  Fewer minutes on the war clock after every event, and he heard Pietro Maximoff took a hard hit in Scarlet Sentry the other day — enough to put him out of commission for at least a few weeks.

“Interesting,” Steve says.  “They could almost pass for —” He stops, the forkful of macaroni arrested halfway to his mouth.  “Holy geez,” he says reverently.  “That’s —”

“Lucky Striker,” Bucky finishes.  “Sonuvabitch!”

Romanoff and Barton.  They’re legends, the very first team to establish a neural handshake once Stark nearly blew out his heart trying to pilot a jaeger alone and realized it only works with a shared neural and physical load.

They have more kills than any other team out there.  Hong Kong, Vladivostok, Lima — Lucky Striker has held the line at almost every ‘dome on the rim.  Steve and Bucky have pored over the footage of every single one of their kills, marveling at the way their jaeger moves.  Fluid, seamless, graceful.  And most of all, of course, deadly.

“Think they’re just visiting or they’re here to fight?” Steve asks.

“Either way, we’ll probably at least get to see them in the kwoon,” Riley drawls.  “Shee-it, won’t that be sweet?  Whaddaya think they’ll use?  Staffs?  Nunchaku?  Or just hand-to-hand?”

“Whatever it is, it’s gonna be fuckin’ beautiful,” Bucky says.  

He can’t take his eyes off of Barton.  In the recruitment posters and news clips he’s handsome, sure — tall and blond with an easy smile.  In person though, he’s not nearly as polished.  His hair is all mussed up like he just tumbled out of bed, his faded t-shirt has a hole near the collar, and he’s got about four days’ worth of stubble shadowing his jaw.  There are bright purple hearing aids looped behind each ear, a Wonder Woman bandaid across the bridge of his nose, and a scrape along his cheekbone.  Bucky thinks this scuffed up and scruffy version of Barton is about a million times more appealing than the airbrushed PanPac posterboy.

As Bucky watches, Barton reaches out to snag a piece of lemon meringue pie.  He puts his thumb right into it as he tries to fit it onto his already-full tray.

“Aw, pie, no,” Bucky hears him say mournfully over the background hum of conversation.  He balances the overfull tray on one forearm, bicep threatening to split the seams of that threadbare t-shirt, and sticks his thumb in his mouth, sucking off the smudge of lemon and meringue.

Bucky feels his heart stutter as he watches that thumb going into Barton’s lush mouth and coming back out, leaving both it and Barton’s lips pink and wet and shiny.  “Fuckin’ beautiful,” he breathes.

[jades-typurriter]

Seamless Transition

A short POV story about getting gender euphoria from being a cat instead of a human, and being made of fabric instead of flesh.

CW: Needles (like, the sewing kind, but they still pierce the skin, so what difference does it make)

You take the needle out of its container. Sturdy plastic. It pops open with a thock, revealing the slender, shining piece of metal. You pry it free of the frame keeping it in place, plastic snapping out of the way as you move it. This is... impressive. This is a whole-ass sharps container. It was even wrapped in that heavy cellophane to keep it sterile. All this from one witch selling body mods out of her house? Your friend sure is something.

You’ve known her long enough that you watched her go from experimenting on herself--she didn’t seem to know what she was looking for, and even though she’s found some things that she liked, she still hasn’t ever settled--to getting asked for help doing the same, to making a living out of the whole process. You haven’t seen her turn a customer away yet. Even if she doesn’t know how to make something work, you can bet she’ll work her ass off to find out. That kind of passion for making the most of yourself has made her well-known, trusted to Hell and back. There’s a whole community supporting her, just people like her exploring what they can become and giving back what they can.

And now here you are, having bought from her.

You suppose that’s only fitting. You’ve looked up to her for so long... You only realized recently that maybe part of that was admiration of what she had for herself. Which brings you to, the needle.

You look at it, pinched between your fingers. Roll it between them. There’s a silvery sheen to the metal, but that’s the wrong magical substrate. It’s cold iron, instead--if it can interact with the fey, it can certainly restitch your little patch of fate’s tapestry. The eye is rather large, and the short length of thread tied through it rather unusual. It’s a Yarn. Not a piece of yarn, but a physical manifestation of a story. They’re normally the byproduct of the transfer of information, forming like stalagmites out of air charged with the excitement of a good adventure, tense with the hungry curiosity of an eager student. Often, they’re found in libraries, cluttering up the pages of books and the corners of shelves, mistaken for cobwebs.

Your friend, however, found a way to make them on purpose. A way to encode specific information straight into them. You compared them to magical instructions, at first, a sort of conceptual DNA, but she insisted that they were still very much stories. Addenda, she said. Revisions. Alternate twists, another flourish here or there. One of the people who volunteered to help her test them out said they were like headcanons. The possibilities were practically endless, she said, when you could take the narrative into your own hands. After a very, very long conversation--lots of questions, she wanted to get this right for someone so important to her, and eve more answers you didn’t think you had until they jumped from your lips all by themselves--she took what she knew of you, and what she had learned, and spun a Yarn just for you.

It’s in your hands, now.

You’ve given yourself injections before, and you were told it’d be just like that. You’ve never done it with this kind of needle, though, and after pulling your clothes out of the way, you aren’t sure how exactly to hold it. You try putting it between your first two fingers and bracing your thumb against the eye, but that... doesn’t feel right. You try holding it like a pencil, and...? No? You try a few more grips, and when none work, you huff, let go of your clothes, and pull out your phone. How... to... hold... a... sewiiiiiiing, needle. Fuck it, let’s try that. You hold your fingers like a hand puppet, a bla-bla-blah motion, and pinch the needle between them. Okay, that feels right, and waitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwait okay. Okay. Wait.

For a moment, there was total certainty about what to do. Like you could do it with your eyes closed. Like you could do it without even thinking about it. In the same breath, the weight of doing it crashed through that clarity like a brick through a glass. You take a deep breath. You raise the needle again. You pull your clothes out of the way again.

The metal seems to thrum in your fingers. The magic it was made with? Maybe it’s just your hands trembling. The anticipation of the poke, like before, or perhaps of the change. It feels heavier in your hand, but now you’re thinking about it so hard. It hurts less when you aren’t looking at the needle, right? Right. You close your eyes, take another breath to steady yourself, and hold the needle at an angle. You drive it gently toward yourself, forcing it along with your thumb. It breaks the skin. You don’t know what you expected--at this point, you normally squeeze out the medicine and pull the needle back out, but you’re this far and you just can’t fathom backing up now. Something deep--not instinct, you think--guides you, and you pinch the skin. You push the needle further, completing a stitch in your flesh, and pull the needle out through the other side. The Yarn unravels as it passes through you, weaving itself into you; it sheds wispy fibers of light as it enters, dissipating as your hand completes the motion. You blink, and after a moment process that you didn’t even feel the huge eye of this thing as you pulled it through your fucking skin. Your friend really is something.

The thought is interrupted by a warm sensation from the spot where you poked yourself. You touch it and find that the skin is softening. Not as in “smooth and supple”; you’re seeing “like touching velvet”. Dude, it’s happening. It’s fucking happening. It starts to spread from the spot, slowly radiating outwards, up your torso, down your arms and legs. The hair on your body thickens, starting from the same spot. It grows out thick, rapidly becoming a blanket of fuzz, growing as you watch like a timelapse of a seed sprouting from the soil. Its texture changes, too; not coarser, but becoming more like tiny, tiny threads. The hair--fur--catches up with your softening skin, and overtakes it, the wave crashing along the remainder of your body with a fwoomf. 

You feel it along your face, and reach up to find whiskers, stiff and plasticky. Your ears must’ve been carried along with the tide, because you miss them when you squish down the fur on your cheeks. You find them sitting on the top of your head instead, two cute and springy little triangles. They perk up involuntarily as you rustle your hair around them--you suppose you’ll learn to flick them around on purpose with time.

In some spots, your chest, along your arms and thighs, the fur is much thicker. A few inches long, deep enough to sink your hand into. As you relish the feel of it, wide-eyed, you feel a strange sort of tension in your hands. You clench them tightly, rolling your fingers as though you were stretching your knuckles, and as they curl, you watch them thicken. When you relax them, they’re huge--each easily the size of your face, the fingers rounded and covered with a pad each, just like your palms. You close them again, open them again. You take in the feeling of the fur between your fingers sliding past itself. They don’t curl quite like they did before, and they look like the gloves of a mascot suit, but they’re your hands. You feel something pop at each fingertip and watch as little, hard plastic claws, colorful and shiny, emerge.

You look down and find your feet much the same: replaced with paws that squish down under your weight, cushioning your steps as you pace around on them for the first time. Walking like this doesn’t feel quite right... You give your legs a stretch, straightening your ankles as far as they’ll go, and they just keep straightening and straightening until you find you can’t bend them back forward again. The joint now sits at about the height that your knees were just a moment before; you have to hold your weight in a slightly different spot, now, but the spring in your step is... wonderful. You take to your new gait in just a few seconds, but your balance still doesn’t feel quite riIGHT DID YOUR SPINE JUST SLIDE OUT OF YOUR BACK???

You twist around and see a tail hanging just above your hips, even fuzzier than the rest of you and coming to a rounded end. It’s a BIG one, too. You give it an experimental swish--another thing to practice, but it does seem to finally straighten out your posture! You try walking again, and it feels off every time you’re mid-stride. You try flicking your tail back and forth in time with your footfalls and BAM oh my GOD you feel like you’re walking down a runway. You’re fucking working it!!! Your hips are swaying and if you weren’t bouncing with excitement anyway you sure would be just on account of the way your legs are SHAPED now holy SHIT!!!

You press a paw into one of your thighs, just to see if they’re as soft as they look--and they look SOFT now. It sinks in further than you expect. Much further. You feel like you really should’ve reached the bone, at this point?? You pull away, and your leg holds a deep imprint of your paw. Slowly, it begins to return to its full bulk, and it occurs to you that you don’t just feel lighter because of the new way you hold your weight, but because you are literally lighter. Your insides feel airy; your limbs squish against themselves as you bend them. You wrap your arms around your chest and give yourself a squeeze, eyes shut tight and smile wide, marveling at how SOFT you are.

You feel a buzzing sensation at the nape of your neck, which quickly spreads in all directions. Up behind your ears, meeting at the crown of your head, and down and around your neck to either side; down the sides of your torso; along the backs of your arms over the elbows; along your legs on the inside and outside of your thighs. Each feels like a pull tab being dragged along your skin, joining some unseen zipper. You twist your arm around in front of you, hoping to catch a glimpse of whatever’s causing it, and see threads working their way along your body, dipping under and poking back over your fur. When they reach the ends of your limbs, they form a cuff at each of your joints, circles of stitches holding together your wrists and ankles, your knees and elbows, your shoulders and hips. They don’t do much in the way of actually making you sturdier, and you were already in one piece without them, but looking at them... 

You run a paw pad--literally padded, it finally sinks in--along the stitch on your arm. The feeling under your fingertip evokes a fresh scab. Stretch marks. Old scars. The healing and the growing that have brought you to finally making the choice to be something, someone, you want to be. The marks left on you, chronicled on your very skin, of the changes that lead up to this. These stitches are the edge of an old couch, catching you as you collapse for your well-deserved rest, exhausted or sick or heartbroken. These stitches are the hem of a top that you had pinned your hopes on, hoping to make an impression on someone or trying to present as yourself for the first time. These stitches are the seams on a beloved doll, the creases on a loved one’s skin, comforting and familiar, even in spite of how new they are. 

Compared to everything else that's different now--better now--they're pretty small, but this wouldn't be complete without them. You wouldn't be complete without them. The way they stretch at your widest points, pinch at all the little turns, accentuates your new, pillowy nature. They're impossible to miss, and show everyone that you are a constructed thing; a you that you designed yourself, and with a little bit of help, made real yourself; a body purpose-built for the things that matter to you, built for closeness, and warmth, and being a source of comfort for the people you love. More than anything, they're an ever-present reminder that you were made with care. 

You realize that, despite the feeling of your eyes welling up with joy, the tightness in your foam-filled chest that comes from crying, the fur on your face isn’t actually getting wet. The oddness of the sensation brings you back to the present, and you rub your face to collect yourself (dwarfing it with your new paws). You look around for the needle and realize that you’re noticeably bigger than you were before. It might be a pain to squeeze out of them, but you’re suddenly thankful that your new body has more give than your clothes. Despite the haystack now being a bit harder to navigate, you make sure you don’t lose the damn thing. You plan on going back to your friend to see if she can set you up with a chain to run through the eye of the needle. You have a feeling she will; it’s like her to think that far ahead. It’s going to make a lovely memento, and it’s only practical for a brand new plushie like yourself to have a needle handy while they get used to things.

[bakuliwrites]

Serenity- Satoru Gojo x Reader

Rating: 18+ (MINORS DNI)

Fandom: Jujutsu Kaisen

Relationship: Satoru Gojo x Reader

Tags: JJK 0 Spoilers, Fluff, Angst, Smut, Penetrative S*x, Oral S*x, soft Gojo, past Gojo x Geto x Reader, Secret Relationship, Romance, Gender-Neutral Reader Pronouns, Mentions of Death, Romance

Summary: Gojo moves like liquid, even in this cramped space. His motions are seamless, the ebb and flow of his cursed energy mesmerizing. If you weren’t in the midst of exorcising the mimic curse right alongside him, you’d pause to watch. You can feel the voltaic thrum of his very soul with every powerful attack he makes. His wrath bursts in rays of light and his brutality is icy cold. You understand why Satoru Gojo is called The Honored One. He’s using minimal effort and still, his motions are awe-inspiring.

You and Gojo go on what is supposed to be a simple mission, but are met with more than you bargained for.

Read here in this post or over on my AO3

When Gojo asked you to accompany him into the city, you knew it wasn’t going to be a trip for pleasure. It never is. The only pleasure that will come out of it is the multitude of sweet treats he’ll inevitably purchase along the way, which you can look forward to partaking in as well. Otherwise, his request is for work and nothing more. The first time he’d asked you, you’d been over the moon. To you, it meant he trusted you at his side, as a partner, as a sorcerer. Now, it’s become a bit more like babysitting a full grown man, trying to make sure he doesn’t give himself a tummy ache from eating too many daifuku or any number of other desserts. 

Today’s mission will be relatively simple: scoping out a place for the first-years to practice. There’s a relatively low level curse in an abandoned building nearby, one that would be perfect for students to exorcise. 

As you walk the busy streets of Tokyo, Gojo chatters away at you, occasionally stopping to excitedly point out a creperie or an ice cream parlor. He always seems to wander in an aimless fashion, but deep-down, you know he’s got his own map going in his head. It’s carefully curated to hit his favorite sweet stores, while also leading you towards your end destination. Though, by this point in your relationship, you already know all his favorite spots. You could easily tune out, follow blindly, not bothering to observe the shifting throng of people around you. But that’s not how sorcerers do things. No, your eyes are alert behind your dark sunglasses, observing your surroundings keenly, watching out for curses. So far, so good though, so you engage in a bit of light chit-chat with the lanky sorcerer beside you. 

“So, how do you think the first-years are doing?” he ventures, his tone casual and bright. He takes a bite of a crepe filled to the brim with strawberries and cream. 

“I think they’re promising,” you return sincerely, watching as Gojo licks a bit of chocolate syrup off his thumb, “Fushiguro is quiet, but seems confident in his ability. Nobara is certainly talented and seems sure of herself. And Itadori is getting stronger every day.”

He nods quietly, considering your opinion. He ultimately seems to agree with you, giving you a thumbs-up, his mouth too full of pastry to verbally respond. 

“Remind you of us, huh?” he returns, nudging you teasingly with his elbow. You smile wistfully, thinking back to your own years at Jujutsu High.

“Yeah, they do,” you muse, a sudden flood of memories, both good and bad, filling you almost to the brim. They’re overwhelming. You and Shoko poking fun at Geto and Gojo, training together, going on missions, lounging around on hot summer days. You generally try not to think about the past. Not because you have any animosity towards your upbringing at the high school. No, quite the opposite. Those joyful memories mark such a painful period in your life. In all the lives of those who knew and loved Suguru Geto. There’s a hollow in your heart where you keep the memories of your high school experience. Where you keep the feeling of Suguru, a powerhouse even in his noticeable absence. They’re kept warm there, alive, stimulated by the rush of your blood.

“Those were some pretty good days,” you hear Gojo distantly say. He stuffs his free hand in his pocket, gazing through his blindfold up at the clear sky above. He’s silent for a beat and it’s strange. It’s always strange when he’s quiet. For as many years as you’ve known him, Satoru Gojo has been a troublemaker. A chatterbox. Gregarious, cocky, and playful. But his moments of silence feel real to you. More real than the boisterous attitude he usually puts on.   

Walking beside Gojo on the busy streets of Tokyo, you can see his quiet intensity, hidden beneath a showy bravado meant to throw others off. You, Suguru, Shoko: you’re some of the lucky few that have bore witness to Gojo’s quieter moments. These moments are marked by a static electricity, a strange and voltaic charge that hovers in the air. There’s something entirely unpredictable about Gojo, especially in his silence. It makes you nervous: not because you’re scared he’s going to hurt you or do something awful. But because you can almost feel the chilly void his sorrow rests in.

“You still enjoying teaching at Jujutsu High?” he questions after a while, discarding his empty crepe wrapper in a nearby trash can. You offer him one of your extra napkins so he can clean off his hands, which he graciously accepts, plucking it from your grasp. The tension dissipates. The lightness of your earlier conversation returns. 

“I am,” you beam, proud of your profession. You came back to teach there a couple of years ago, after trying to unsuccessfully branch out on your own. You’re not new anymore, but Gojo still likes to check in with you every once in a while.

“I love getting to know the students,” you go on, pausing to let Gojo tenderly wipe off a little bit of whipped cream from the corner of your mouth, “And teaching the next generation is an honor.”

“Sure, sure. But-” he gives you another nudge and you can imagine him winking behind his blindfold, “We all know you came back because you missed me.” 

“Pshh,” you return, folding your arms over your chest and rolling your eyes, “You wish, Toru.”

Entirely too proud of himself, Gojo’s cackling seems to echo through the empty alleyway you’ve suddenly found yourself in. You’ve gone from a densely populated area to an abandoned side street in a matter of moments. You can barely even hear the sounds of the city, which really isn’t all that far away. The air is stifling here, the desolation seeming to permeate the very marrow in your bones. The air feels entirely devoid of human activity, filled instead with a noxious, leaden weight. Before you can take another step, Gojo holds his arm out protectively in front of you.

“Something’s off,” he states just barely above a whisper. You can undoubtedly sense the rancid energy pulsing through the building to your left. This doesn’t feel like the low-level curse you and Gojo had initially believed it to be. This power feels- immense . Not something the two of you can’t handle, but certainly not what you were originally prepared to face. And certainly not something you’d want to send a couple of rookie first-years in to deal with. Not knowingly, at least. 

You steel yourself, flashing Gojo a serious look before he silently nods and takes a step towards a rusty metal door. It screeches with age as Gojo wrenches it open. You’re met with a crushing darkness on the other side, a putrid smell immediately assaulting your nose. You can just barely make out some formless shapes scattered about an otherwise empty expanse of a warehouse. The unpleasant, sweet smell of rot weaves through the air as you take a couple cautious steps forward. Gojo is tense, alert. He’s following the trail of cursed energy radiating from whatever entity is holed up inside. It feels like it might be a semi-grade one, whatever it is. 

As you trail Gojo through dark corridors piled up with refuse and barrels filled with unidentifiable liquids, you think you can hear something skittering about above you. In the silence, it feels closer than it probably is. You feel like you’re breathing too loud, walking too loud. Like your footsteps fall heavier than usual. 

Just as you round a corner into a stairwell, you hear your name echo softly down the hallway you just came from. You freeze, looking back, only to see impenetrable darkness. Gojo halts right alongside you, one foot on the first step. 

“Did you hear-” you start, brows knit together, trailing off when your name is called yet again.

“Shoko?” you and Gojo finish together, quietly so as not to alert whoever or whatever is clearly impersonating your childhood friend. All the hairs on your body suddenly stand on end, an overwhelming sense of dread washing over you. Gojo, less reactive, feels it, too. He gently places his hand on your shoulder, dismounting from the stairs and moving to stand beside you. 

“Gojo?” Shoko’s voice tries, but this time it sounds like it’s coming from above you. 

Is it throwing its voice? you wonder to yourself, not quite ready to address how this thing knows both your name and Gojo’s. Though you suppose in the world of curses and sorcerers, Gojo’s name is pretty well known. Something rumbles in the air vent just above you. Wordlessly, you and your companion acknowledge your plan of action. You’ve worked together enough times to know how the other operates, to play to one another's strengths. 

“Pretty low of you to impersonate a friend of ours,” Gojo returns, his jaw set, irritation spreading. His tone is sharp, cutting. This creature is an affront to Gojo, to you. He makes it patently obvious in the harshness of his accusation, the hard set of his jaw. 

“Gojoooooo,” the creature calls out again, the voice of Shoko melting into something grotesque and gravelly.

“And cowardly to not even show your face,” Gojo continues, every word out of his mouth dripping with poison. There’s a gentle laugh, an eerily familiar one. 

“Gojo, you wound me,” Geto’s voice sounds. Gojo’s brows raise, taken aback by this shift in voice. But he doesn’t let it rattle him. 

You ready yourself, knowing what’s coming, when suddenly, without much warning, the cover to the air vent flies off, smacking the opposite wall with a metallic pang . In a rush of foul air and many limbs, a massive curse comes clambering out of the cramped ventilation system. How it fit in there, you’re not sure. It fills the stairwell, curving upwards like a bloated snake. Its sallow skin looks slimy to the touch and it seems to gaze through eyeless hollows at you and Gojo, a toothy mouth splitting into a horrendous grin. You stand frozen, feet planted firmly to the ground, eyes wide with horror. It’s rare for you to freeze in the face of a curse. But the curse’s desecration of your most cherished friends’ voices fills you with a rage, a fear you’ve never felt before. 

“You wouldn’t hurt me, would you, Gojo?” it rumbles, Geto’s voice distorting with every word. 

“You’re pretty disgusting,” Gojo goes on, casually inspecting the curse from his distance and making you roll your eyes. He always manages to work in as many insults as he can before he attacks. You also know it’s a self-defense mechanism. Humor to dispel how deeply uncomfortable he is to hear Geto’s voice again, and for it to be coming from something that’s such a parody of humanity. To be honest, his casual attitude is somewhat of a comfort to you, as well. 

“Probably not very smart either, huh?” he continues, snickering as he turns towards you, “Don’t you think?”

“Are you just going to stand there and roast it to death or are we actually going to exorcise it?” you shoot back, trying to re-center Gojo. Though his humor is a comfort sometimes, it’s also pretty distracting. However, before Gojo can respond with yet another quip, the curse turns its attention towards you.

“You wouldn’t hurt meeeeeeee,” it creaks. 

“Don’t listen to it,” Gojo tries, a slight quiver in his voice, one you’ve never heard before. Is he worried? No time to think about that right now, you realize. 

“You wouldn’t hurt meeeeeeee,” the curse repeats, and this time, you’ve had enough. And so has Gojo. He charges up, rushing the creature, with you not far behind.

Gojo moves like liquid, even in this cramped space. His motions are seamless, the ebb and flow of his cursed energy mesmerizing. If you weren’t in the midst of exorcising the mimic curse right alongside him, you’d pause to watch. You can feel the voltaic thrum of his very soul with every powerful attack he makes. His wrath bursts in rays of light and his brutality is icy cold. You understand why Satoru Gojo is called The Honored One. He’s using minimal effort and still, his motions are awe-inspiring. 

In less than a second, his demeanor shifted from joking and casual to chilly and focused. It’s almost like he becomes an entirely different person in battle. No, not a different person. It’s merely that the saccharine outer layers of him slough off and he reveals who he truly is. A dark star in the center of a lacuna.  

In no time, the two of you have managed to exorcise the spirit. It shrivels, withers like starved ivy in the rays of a harsh sun, before disintegrating into dust. Gojo stands proudly over its remains.

“Good job! Look at that quick work!” he praises, lifting a small corner of his blindfold to wink at you. He’s back to being Casual Gojo, beloved and enigmatic sensei who never takes anything seriously. It’s all a front, and you know this well. There is pain in Satoru, deep-seated and immense. It’s as if he sits huddled at the bottom of an endless, empty well, light just barely reaching his shivering form. His barrier is cold to the touch, icy and impenetrable. A wall of infinity surrounds him.

You stare at him blankly, unsure of why you can’t be happy at this moment. Of why you can’t rejoice alongside him. Maybe it was your earlier conversation about the first years, the flood of memories, the mimicry of familiar voices. It all swirls around in your head, foggy and confusing. 

“Hey, you alright?” he ventures, hands stuffed in his pockets as he approaches you, head tilted in confusion. 

“Um,” you try, voice quivering. You clear your throat, trying to steady yourself, “I think I need some air.” 

You climb the stairs, heading up towards the roof of the building, both to ensure you’ve taken care of everything that needs to be taken care of (it seems there’s no cursed energy remaining from any other entities, luckily) and to search for some clean air. Not the oppressive air from the alley outside. Gojo takes the lead, his long strides carrying him up the stairs faster than you. But he’s oddly gracious today, and slows down when he realizes you’re lagging behind. 

A cool breeze blasts your face as soon as you open the creaky door leading out to the rooftop. It’s much appreciated as you inhale deeply and feel the fog lift from your mind. It’s dark already, the city lights twinkling all around you. In the distance, you can hear the sound of evening traffic and human activity. It’s a relief to be reminded that not all of the world is inhabited by curses. Not all of the world is a travesty of the past.

Silently, you take a seat, dangling your feet over the edge of the flat roof. From up here, everything looks so small. You are acutely aware of Gojo plopping down beside you. You peek at him out of the corner of your eye. He removes his blindfold, wrapping it up around his left hand. His snowy lashes create shadows on his cheekbones with the light from a nearby neon sign and the thin strands of his hair blow about lazily in the wind. 

“It was gross-” he begins in a low voice, staring out at the city, “-to hear his voice coming from something so grotesque. ” 

He flicks his gaze over to you, cerulean eyes like pooling wells of sorrow. All you can do is nod, desperately willing yourself not to cry. You can feel the tightness in your chest, the threat of oncoming tears. 

“I just felt so- so helpless, when it came to Suguru,” you explain, thinking back to when he defected, to his death, “And every reminder of him is just another jab in my psyche. Another painful reminder of how-”

Of how I failed him, you want to finish, Of how we failed him. It’s something that’s haunted you for years now. And you know it’s haunted Gojo just as much, probably more. 

“I know what you mean,” he finishes for you, not needing to hear what’s going through your head to understand. He knows you so well at this point. You could probably have full conversations without any words if Gojo weren’t so much of a chatterbox. 

“What’s the point of being the strongest if you can’t even protect the people that mean the most to you?” he breathes, staring out at the distant stars. You gaze up at him, his eyes searching a sky that seems to reflect back into them. Blue discs that contain the multitude of the universe. 

You could sit here and list off a bunch of platitudes about how life is cruel. About how things don’t always work out how we want, despite our efforts. But what good would that do? So you just sit in silence with him, letting yourself slowly tip sideways until you’re leaning against his shoulder. He doesn’t pull away. In fact, he softens, before gently resting his head atop yours. 

The burdens a sorcerer experiences in the world of Jujutsu are many. Protecting the innocent, the unaware. Maintaining order. Training the next generation, and making sure they don’t die in the process. All of these are things that you have chosen to experience. Things you’ve put upon yourself in your pursuit of a life goal. Gojo, however, is burdened by expectation, a birthright he didn’t ask for. Pre-ordained to be relied on. To surpass all those who came before him. 

“Sorry, didn’t mean to make it all about me,” he chuckles, “I guess what I mean is that it’s hard not to feel responsible for someone you care about.”

“Even if it’s not your fault,” you add, looking pointedly up at him. You know he blames himself the most for what happened. You know he wishes he could turn back the clock, rectify what cannot be rectified. He makes a small, “hmph,” paired with a rueful smile. 

“You’re too nice,” he returns, picking at a loose string on your pants. He’s always fidgeting with loose strings on your clothes or locks of your hair. It’s something he’s done since he was a teenager, a little habit that hasn’t seemed to change over the years. You smile to yourself, comforted by one of the few things in your life that seems stable: Gojo’s endless fidgeting. 

“I don’t wanna curse anyone, Satoru,” you mumble after a long beat of silence, staring out into the empty windows in the building across from you. It looks like a decrepit office building, long abandoned. It doesn’t seem to be inhabited by curses, thank goodness, but it looks sad to you, for some reason.

“What do you mean?” he exclaims, raising up a bit to give you a showy, flabbergasted look, like he always does when he’s trying to lighten the mood if your conversations start to get heavy. 

“You know what I mean,” you go on, matching his shock with a look of exasperation, wanting him to take something seriously for once. His goofy look fades, replaced with one of understanding. Gojo has his soft moments, and you’re appreciative of this. 

“I know what you mean,” he comforts, wrapping his arm around you and scooting you closer. There’s little more that either of you can say to one another. Sometimes, that’s just the reality of things. 

At least curse me a little at the very end, rings in your mind. But it’s in Gojo’s voice, because he recounted it to you. Because you only got there after the damage had been done. And the guilt of not being there gnaws at you everyday. 

“Don’t curse me at the end,” you whisper, resting your hand on Gojo’s knee and squeezing tight, “I won’t curse you, either.” 

You feel his strong grip on your shoulder, tugging you even closer, like he’s trying to press you into his body. Like he’s trying to merge the two of you.

“How about this?” he replies, pulling back so he can look you in the eye, “Promise me you won’t get into any trouble, huh?” 

He laughs, his usual cheery demeanor returning, and you can’t help but smile a little. But you can hear what he really means, Don’t let me lose you, too. That’s not a promise you can keep, and he knows it. His soft smile seems to say, Just indulge me. Say you promise, even though I know you can’t.

“Promise,” you lie, trying so hard not to let the tears stinging the corners of your eyes escape their fragile confines. You are unsuccessful, the dam breaking and tears flooding your vision. 

“Hey,” Gojo breathes, cupping your cheeks, his thumbs wiping away the tears now streaming down your face, “I didn’t mean to make you cry!”

“Sorry,” you sniffle, gripping his hands and holding them in place, fearing that if you let go he’ll fade out of existence before your very eyes, “I just-”

The loss is endless. It will never stop. And one day, you know that either you’ll lose Gojo, or Gojo will lose you. In some capacity or another.  

“Hey, c’mon,” he hushes, pressing a featherlight kiss to your lips before helping to lift you to your feet, “Let’s head back.” 

He only ever kisses you in private, because no one is supposed to know about the two of you. Because he’s sure the higher ups would use it as some kind of ammo against him. Against you. This gentle secret is one of the few things that has kept you sane over the years. Stolen kisses after missions alone together, secret rendezvous’ whenever you have a moment to spare. You’re honestly astounded Gojo has managed to keep it to himself after all this time. The only other person that knows is Shoko. And she wouldn’t breathe a word to anyone. 

Gojo re-wraps his blindfold around his head and places his hand on the small of your back, guiding you out of the building and towards the exit. Your walk home is filled with more of his idle chatter, but honestly, you’re grateful for it. Anything to distract you from the nasty feeling that abandoned building has left you with. 

The highschool is silent when you return. None of the lights are on. You’re greeted by the sorcerer on patrol before you slip inside the teachers quarters. You pull Gojo into your room, certain that no one sees, and quietly shut the door behind you. As soon as you’re inside, his lips are on yours as he gently presses you against the nearest wall. He tastes sweet, like strawberries and cream. Gojo rests his hands on your waist, his fingertips playing with the hem of your shirt. He drops his Infinity for you, allowing you to feel him, actually him and not the barrier that would normally stop others. His skin is soft, warm, and you can feel the flutter of his heart beneath his breast. 

For a while, this is as far as you go, letting him encompass you in his arms, pushed safely against the wall, warm in Gojo’s embrace. The only sounds that fill your ears are soft gasps, the shifting of fabric as Gojo’s large hands start to explore, and the small plip your lips make when they press against one another. Before long, though, Gojo lifts you into his arms and carries you towards your bed. 

Carefully, he lays you down, tugging at his shirt and letting his pants slip down to his ankles while you work on getting rid of all your clothing. As soon as the two of you are free, he climbs on top of you, laying his lips against yours once again. When he’s with you, it feels as if he’s wrapped you in his Infinity. As if by encompassing you in his arms, he’s encompassed you in a limitless, protective realm. 

“May I?” you ask quietly, gesturing to his blindfold. 

“Only if you wanna get lost in them,” he teases, smirking. 

“You are ridiculous,” you return with probably the nth eyeroll of the day. He peppers your face with kisses amidst his laughing, before acquiescing and letting you unfurl his blindfold. You let it fall to the sheets beneath you as you’re met with blue eyes that hold infinity in them. Indeed, you find yourself lost in them. But for once, instead of making a joke about it, Gojo simply smiles. This moment is soft, quiet. In fact, it’s the quietest you’ve ever heard him. 

He stares at you for a while, eyes roving over your face, drinking you in while one hand tucks some errant strands of hair behind your ear. You rest one palm on his chin, your thumb on his lips, caressing the dip in his cupid’s bow. In the darkness, in the sanctity of your room, he’s vulnerable for a moment. He’s the strongest, but he reminds you that he’s human. That he’s just as fragile as you are. He looks at you like you are everything. He looks at you like he looked at Suguru. Like you looked at Suguru. There’s an intimacy between the three of you that perhaps no one else will ever understand. An intimacy that sadly only endured for two. 

“I won’t ever curse you,” he breathes, pressing his forehead to yours, “And you’re not going to curse anyone either. I’m sure of it.” 

Something in you shatters a little at his words. Nothing is ever a guarantee, but for some reason when Satoru says it, you believe him. He pulls back just enough to kiss you and you feel him smile against you. 

“I want to say something,” you venture, “But I’m scared it will curse you if I do.” 

He gives you that damned lopsided smile, that dopey, cocky look. 

“You’re not gonna curse me,” he reassures, “Just say it. Besides, I’m the strongest, aren’t I? I can handle it.” 

You stare at him for a moment, considering his words. You’ve heard him talk about the most twisted curse of all. You’re well aware of its power, its ability to fell even the strongest of sorcerers. But you suppose that both you and Gojo have experienced that curse already. With Suguru. And to you, when he says, “You’re not gonna curse me,” you know that what he really means is, We’ve both been cursed already. What’s one more curse to pile on? 

“I love you, Satoru,” you whisper in this sacred silence, half expecting the very foundation of the earth to crumble beneath you, “And that’s not me cursing you. I swear it.”

He pauses, eyes still searching. Always searching. But his silence isn’t unnerving. You know he’s grappling with this confession, with your words. Words that you’ve never had to say to one another before because it’s always just been inherently true. Suddenly, they’re out in the open. Raw. Naked. Delicate. And yet they carry a strength that is unsurpassable. Unbeatable. 

“I love you, too,” he returns, his eyes glimmering in the darkness, “And that’s not me cursing you, either.” 

He says it with such conviction, with such confidence. As if to say, “Fuck you,” to any curse that might try to imbue itself in your tender admission. Into his. Nothing will taint this feeling. Just as nothing could taint what you and Gojo felt for Suguru. 

This might be the first time you’ve formally said those three words, but it’s certainly not the first time you’ve felt it for him. And it’s not the first time that either of you have said something in a similar vein to one another. Often, your love is unspoken. You’ve never needed to say it or to hear it to know that Satoru Gojo loves you. You never said it to Suguru Geto and neither did he. So you reason to yourself that it doesn’t matter if you say it or not. A curse is a curse, spoken or unspoken. 

You put these thoughts to rest as Gojo trails kisses down your neck, sucking on the tender flesh just beneath your ear, drawing constrained moans from you. You’re trying so hard to keep quiet, but it’s difficult when you feel Gojo’s erection graze your inner thigh. He buries his face further into your neck when you start to stroke his cock, languid pumps causing him to mewl pathetically into you. He’s particularly noisy, which has been both a source of amusement and argument for the two of you. Tonight, however, he’s doing his best to muffle his sounds. 

You can tell he’s exhausted from the day, all his motions unhurried, purposeful. He seems to want to take his time with you, to feel close. He’s never one to outright admit how he’s feeling, but you know him better than anyone. And you can tell he’s probably traumatized a bit by this afternoon’s cursed entity. By the voice of a long dead companion. He’s just as much in need of comfort as you are. 

The night passes slowly, but in the best of ways. You and Gojo are intertwined, a tangle of limbs as he gradually eases himself into you. The two of you rest on your sides, your back pressed to his chest, a pillow between your legs to give you better leverage. And Gojo a better angle. When he’s got his full length inside you, he holds you close, his hand resting on your abdomen while one of yours reaches up to tangle in his hair.  

“Toru,” you whisper gently, running your fingers through his pale locks, each strand soft between your fingers. You feel his breath fanning against the shell of your ear as he leans in to nip gently at your lobe. 

He starts to rock his hips, rolling deeply, taking his sweet time. He’s got a lot of stamina in that lithe body of his, so he’s not worried about tiring himself out. But he’s sure to take breaks when you need them. 

The air is hot, heavy, so you crack open a window to let in the night breeze. A beam of moonlight creeps through, illuminating a long, thin strip of your bedroom. Gojo’s hair looks like starlight in the silver light of the moon and his cheeks are rosy. You come together the first time, your core tight before it blissfully releases as Satoru spills into you. His cum runs down your leg, drips onto the sheets, fills you with a welcome warmth. His kisses afterwards are desperate, hungry, utterly sloppy. 

The second time, all he really seems to want is his head buried between your thighs. He laps you up like he’s parched. Like he’s been stranded in a desert and you’re an oasis. You have to bite a pillow to muffle your overstimulated cry when your walls pulse and release. When Gojo crashes his lips into yours, he tastes like you. 

“Best dessert of the day,” he winks, before it’s his turn. You delight in his muffled, needy moans. His desperate keens as you swirl the tip of your tongue around the swollen tip of his dick. He wants to finish on you, if you’ll let him, and you do. His cum is warm as he releases threads over your abdomen. The two of you have to stealthily find your way to the bathroom, in the dark, and hope that no one hears you tidying up. You and Gojo giggle for a while once you return to your bedroom, finding amusement in how you have to constantly sneak around like you have some sort of curfew or something.

Your final time that night, he’s sheathed deep inside you again, but he picks up the pace a little towards the end, at your request. You’re both covered in a thin layer of sweat by the end of it, your bodies flushed and muscles shaky. Gojo flops down on top of you once he’s spent himself, piercing gaze rolling up to meet yours. His chin rests on your soft stomach. He looks at you like he’s looking at the stars for the very first time.

“I like it better when I can see you without the blindfold,” he practically coos. A pink blush blooms over your cheeks and it’s now that Gojo takes the opportunity to tease once again.

“Awww, did I embarrass you?” he starts, ruining your tender moment with his snickering. But his laughter is muffled when you smash your lips against his.

“You’re rude, Toru,” you scold between kisses. 

“You just like having an excuse to shut me up,” he winks. The faint hint of exhaustion creeps into his eyes. He goes back to laying down on top of you, perhaps his favorite position to rest. He doesn’t do it for long, though, knowing he’ll probably cut off your circulation after a while. But feeling his weight on you is a comfort, like one of those weighted blankets. And he seems to find comfort in your softness, in your closeness. He’s all limbs, lanky and willowy, practically spread out across the whole bed as he lays on top of you. Absently, Gojo kneads your hip bone, occasionally pecking tiny kisses along your abdomen. He chit-chats for a while with you, this time about his plans for tomorrow, asking if you’d like to join him. 

“Of course,” you return, knowing he’s worried that maybe today’s events might’ve scared you off. He seems pleased, going on to tell you all about something he read in a gossip magazine earlier that week. Eventually, he starts to trail off, until finally, you hear Satoru’s soft snoring. Hearing him sleep, seeing him relax fills you with an unbridled joy. He’s always on the go, always busy, always doing something. These peaceful moments with him are truly ones to be cherished. You shift so he’s not resting directly on top of you anymore, careful as to not wake him. You snuggle up in his arms, pressing a featherlight kiss to the tip of his nose before falling fast asleep in his embrace. 

A/N: Inspiration for this fic struck me suddenly last week, so I've been working on it every chance I've gotten over the last couple days. I do love how complicated Gojo is, and his relationship with Geto. Wanted to write a little Gojo x Reader that explored some of that (and also some background poly Gojo x Geto x Reader, because if you've read any of my other stuff, then you will know I love all things poly). Thank you so much for reading! As always, it is a joy to write fanfic and get to share it with people just as passionate about these fandoms. Likes and reblogs are greatly appreciated! Lots of love 💜

[big-cheesy-productions]

My (mostly) Spoiler Free Review of the Fallout Show:

Set design? Amazing. So much of it was practical or at least pretty seamless. It looked great.

The opening scene? Haunting.

It takes place in LA so it’s got more of the New Vegas wasteland and cowboys feel, which rocks.

Badass cowboy bounty hunter ghoul man

Stuck with canon. Didn’t try to rewrite it, and instead expanded on it *cough* Halo and Avatar shows *cough*

Plenty of Easter eggs for the game lovers

Loved that they kept in the campiness over top of the horror, just like the games.

They set Lucy up to not be a Mary Sue and explained how she could hold her own. She was silly, but still badass. I liked her a lot.

Maximus was a very interesting character too. Loved that they showed the Brotherhood as an over-zealous cult, essentially.

Loved that we got to learn more behind-the-scenes of Vault-Tec

Some of the dialogue and pacing was a little eh, but I can forgive that because I had fun watching it.

I’m not sure how much someone who hasn’t played Fallout would enjoy it, because they’re are A LOT of Easter eggs, but I think going with 3 characters from different worlds within Fallout was a good way to go for audiences who are unfamiliar (ie one from a Vault, one from the surface/brotherhood, and one from Pre-war times.

I like that they kept monsters to a minimum so they didn’t go too nuts with the CGI. They chose their moments so they could make it look pretty good, and I appreciate that.

Some of the lore around ghouls was a little off? They never really explained them or ferals for audiences, and they made it so ghouls have to take a special drug to stay sentient? A little weird, but whatevs. It was cool we got to see ghouls in various states of decay/going feral.

Give Goggins blackout contact lenses. I need it.

Love how the mystery of the Vault unfolded. It paid off and tied everyone’s stories together.

Love that Lucy was sex positive and not a virgin. She was down to pound, and I respect that.

In conclusion, if you like Fallout, give it a watch! I had a great time!

[projectilestardust]

If they remembered...

I think we can all agree that the ending was slightly lackluster. Them just forgetting everything we had watched them go through so here’s what I think would have been cool. Like I think what a really interesting dynamic would have been was that the players all remember and that would have opened up a possible S3 of them re-navigating their place in the world with PTSD and becoming closer with players than the friends they had before. Almost like in shows like Manifest or The Hollow. That way the borderlands can still exist in the player's minds without going against the canon of the meteor.

Like imagine Arisu getting discharged and he's living with his dad and brother again but he's a completely changed man. 

He goes from sleeping till 11 to not sleeping at all or on the nights he does sleep it usually ends in screams and a cold sweat with a knife under his pillow. His beds too soft now so he sleeps on the floor. He's constantly pinching himself or trying to wake up from a dream that his family don't understand. Every little detail of his life he now calculates, before it was just within his games but now its the average temperature of everyday, what kind of cars be sees from his bedroom window, when the milk expires... everything. He, seemingly overnight becomes inseparable from this girl named Usagi and his new gang are completely different from Chota and Karabe, their teamwork is seamless and they all seem to understand each other on a level that's incomprehensible. Imagine his father and brother trying to understand how a forensic scientist, a doctor, a kickass martial artistist/boutique clerk, the daughter of a famed climber, and a jobless gamer somehow new each other like the back of their hands. And everytime someone asks them about it they’re always met with the same response. “Sorry, I can’t tell you.” 

Arisu’s brother one day walks into him having a panic attack- he’s crumpled on the floor, basically unresponsive just frantically muttering to himself over and over. Your fault your fault yourfaultyourfault- they didn’t deserve to die. His brother eventually puts its together that he’s talking about the death of both Chota and Karube. His brother explains that it wasn’t his fault, and that he was lucky to survive. But I killed them. And everything is wrong because now he doesn’t have his anchors, the people who held him in place when he was at the edge- and he’s never felt so truly alone in a world where he has more people on his side then ever before. 

Imagine all the now ex-players are convinced that this is just the next level, that they're still playing some sort of game and now after so long of living in almost total freedom from social restraints are finding it difficult to just exist among unchanged people.

[divinekangaroo]

When writing Tommy and Lizzie I frequently remind myself of the Uber-rich aged mining magnate in my home town whose second wife was his many years younger ‘maid’

Yep his ‘maid’

Frequent articles digging up her diverse past employment in shady not-quite-brothels

The absolute media….not quite scandal, but hilarity this generated:

-he’s cock-led

-he’s weak

-she fucked him into compliance because no one else would fuck him (very ugly rich dude)

-she’s a schemer and a scammer

-his whole family hated her and when he died funded a massive investigation trying to prove she killed him (because he left her a lot in his will) - unfounded

Yet she was literally the only one left by his side while he got old and very sick and died slowly and painfully, and she constantly tried to win over the media like ‘why shouldn’t I be grateful’, ‘why shouldnt things like this happen’, ‘why shouldn’t I be proud I was born into nothing and now have 1000 shoes and seventeen charities’, ‘I’m the only one who takes care of him’ etc and even *he* tried some interviews talking her up and it was all presented so squirmy and embarrassing (while he continued to roll in the billions)

—

I think about this external social perception of a newly-rich man marrying his prostitute, particularly in the scenes where Tommy brings a dressed up Lizzie into the more upper class events, and his particular choice of dialogue (usually massively amping up his less than upper class origin), how he can’t look at her, how he won’t riff off/support her dialogue (lovely earrings; thanks I stole them he says, throwing Lizzie off already), and just generally they struggle with how to behave around each other in these settings — all while there’s still this incredible tangible physical link between them in how they stand or sit near and next to each other, frequently mirroring but never looking at each other.

It’s interesting: they’re aware of how people are considering them and Tommy’s probably boiling fury with it but also has to focus on the job at hand: and as he usually does when boiling fury but has a job to do, he sort of pushes Lizzie away (like when he refused to see her when she was pregnant) maybe to protect her? Or because he can’t *also* protect her? But then he’s carrying the shame of having dragged her into this situation, so he tries, and it comes off really bad at face value, but something else entirely is going on at body language level.

Anyway I’m glad they didn’t magically transform Lizzie into this seamless socialite integrator type, it’s much more interesting watching them fumble around each other in these scenes unable to find the right rhythm

[makemeanangelpure]

🩵May 30, 2024 - 113.0

🪽Day 1 of the 442 hour liquid fast

🤍I’m 13.5 hours in, 428 hours to go

☕️Today’s Cal limit: 140

I slept roughly 2 hours. Trouble falling asleep, waking up to pee every hour or thirty minutes and needing a minuscule sip of water. A little tired now but I’ll have my 5 hour energy and finish my 50 cal of coffee and go into a 7.5 hour shift. Truck day, so essentially 3 hours of cardio/weight lifting for me and 5 hours of on my feet slight lifting and reviving material. I’ll burn a good amount of extra calories today and tomorrow though, no truck then just the repackaging, maybe a few heavier things to haul around. I’m going to have one stall of celery when I get home. I’ll wait to have it at 7:42 pm where my partner can witness, alongside 2 baby carrots. That’ll put me at 75 cal for the day, and I get home around 1:30, so ill have a cup of tea while I wait for time to go, run the dishwasher and restock that, bath and shower, maybe wait to shave Thursday. Yesterday I drank a hard mike and a hard peach tea, ate a few things, threw up beforehand. Ended at 775. After I drank I didn’t have an urge to eat which is unusual but I’m assuming because I took medicine. It’s for adhd, not mine but I took it because I’d been thinking about it, thinking I might take one once a week and they’d never notice, just so I won’t get hungry. They’ve been taking it a few days and have been barely eating, I ate more than then the past two days and wanted to wring my own neck. They keep telling me about items of clothing getting looser, about our friends telling them they look like they lost weight, and they have, they do look different than a few months back. They’re taller than me and we’re in the 200-210 range and are now 189-199 and when you’re bigger, it comes off faster, it’s more noticeable. Really said something that messed with me yesterday.. and it was ignorance.. that if 10 pounds on me wasn’t that much different to them why would 10 more pounds be.. which they’ve seen pictures of me when I was 15-20 pounds lighter, they just haven’t been around me like that. I was heavier.. 10 pounds heavier than I am now when I started living here last year and if they don’t notice how I’ve dropped weight and my fucking face isn’t so round after just 10 pounds, I’ll just have to make them see and if anything they’ll feel a difference when they lift me up. Always picking me up around the house and carrying me places, jostling me but I want it to be easier. I want to hear them say that I feel lighter in some kind of form or fashion. The goal is to be 20 pounds lighter by June 28 so I’d be 93 which would break my old low weight:94, from 3 fucking years ago now. A baby shower on the 22 to go to so by then I’m going to try to be 97 for. The mother is someone who always copied me in highschool, and afterward and I just want her to really see how different we are. I also want to be the thinnest at a friend group gathering and I want her nosey mother to gossip to the others about how “ sick” I look. I want to eat a piece of cake with them and have it look seamless for me, because I’ll have worked hard to not worry about 350 cal of sugar for a day or whatever. To eat a little of what is made, not finish my food or my cake, and throw a tiny bit away.. like a quarter I guess. On Friday I’ll weigh and measure my waist, on the 22 I’m measure everything and then again on the 28. I last weighed last Friday so I’m going off that. My period seemed to skip a month but it’s irregular anyhow. My partner said it’s cause I’m not eating enough but I beg to differ. A lot of my days have been 1000-2000 days the past few weeks. I think it’s stress related. By the 28th, I’m going to drink again. Get blush wine and have two cups to celebrate things being better and I’ll be smaller and feel more put together, feel prettier when we get kissy buzzy and cuddle up close. Saturday I’m making a favorite dinner for them… I’m going to pick the smallest chicken for myself, cut it in half and then cut it into ( I’ll figure out how many pieces) 7 pieces of course 44 for a bite, 313 roughly for the whole chicken. One bite cause it’s a 75 cal day. I know he’ll cut it for me and be sweet.

[rqgnarok]

you knew what it was (he is in love)

I don’t want you to be alone, Pepa had said, but she had also hugged him goodbye with a kiss on the cheek and a murmur of say hi to Evan from me.

read in ao3

____

And the longer you’re alone, the easier it is. I don’t want that for you. 

Pepa’s words haunt Eddie the whole drive back home. Streetlights paint the inside of his truck golden and the last of Los Angeles’ sunrays are hiding behind the horizon. He tries not to zone out too much- there’s a reason why he prefers Buck to drive them around everywhere, his thoughts get away from him too easily- but the more he thinks about it, the more he hyperfixiates on the entire situation.

Truth be told, he’d felt blindsided about being set up not only because of the whole principle of him being unable to take care of his own personal life, but ever since he got back to therapy and to the 118th, he hadn’t felt alone. The team had family get togethers every few weekends when their schedules allowed it, he got together with Hen and Karen for drinks and gossip, movies with Chim, afternoons with Buck-

And mornings with Buck. And evenings. Entire days, sometimes more than that whenever he stayed over to cook them breakfast in the morning and just- wouldn’t leave.

Not that Eddie minded. Ever since the lightning strike he preferred to keep Buck close, where he could see him and reach for his wrist to feel for a pulse every time Eddie’s brain tried to play tricks on him. 

They’re closer than ever before and he likes that. He likes their routine, how intertwined they’ve become. There was a time- a long, achingly endless stream of years- in which Eddie thought they’d never get it right. It was Taylor, and then Ana, and then both and neither. It was the shooting, Maddie and Chim leaving, Eddie’s panic and the distance that kept building between them.

And then it dissipated. Eddie got better and he came back home. Buck almost died and he realized he was worthy of other people’s love, that the lack of it from his parents didn’t really matter to him anymore, now that they were so willing to give it. It’s not that they were too late, but Buck had filled that void inside him created by them with Eddie and Chris and the 118. People who loved him without him having to ask. 

He’s good. They both are. Great, even. Their seamlessness at work is stronger than ever, and that harmony doesn’t cut off when it’s time to go home. Eddie follows him back to his place or Buck follows him home and they just- exist in each other’s general vicinity. Buck takes over his kitchen and helps Chris with his homework and falls asleep on the couch sitting up with his mouth open and snores stuck in his throat. 

In return, Eddie orders takeout and steals Buck’s chair in front of the TV. He uses his phone as a speaker and puts some music while they drink beers in the balcony as they stare out into LA traffic, he disagrees with Buck regarding some point in their favorite true crime podcast so he can watch him flush with offense and rant for hours about something he believes in. Eddie just stares, feeling almost overwhelmed by the fondness, and watches his best friend rage from the other side of the counter.

He’s not alone. His life has never been fuller of people who know and love him like he is. Eddie’s so greedy with it, trying to swallow the experience whole whenever he’s with them that he forgets sometimes- he gets to have this. He’ll see them again, this isn’t a one time thing. There’s no clock ticking, not another shoe waiting to drop. He gets to keep his life.

Which is why Pepa’s words bothered him so much. He’s not actually mad at her- annoyed, maybe- Eddie knows she did it because she loves him and wants him to be happy- but Eddie already is. He is happy, and the sudden implication that he’s not, that he needs to fill his free time going on not so casual dates- 

It had put a dent in Buck’s smile, momentary and gone in a blink, but Eddie had caught it. He’d told him about it while they were on their way to work, and Eddie had watched his hands tighten on the wheel, his jaw clenching before he forced himself to loosen up. 

He’d joked around during breakfast and grinned at Hen and Chim in all the right places, but Eddie had carried that image of tension all through the day and into the date. He’d barely realized she was planning on letting him down easy because he’d been too busy wondering what he’d do about Buck when he came back from dinner.

Buck, who’d been waiting for him at home, asleep on his couch after helping Chris to bed. Buck, who seemed to lose all traces of sleep when he asked Eddie how the date had gone even if he’d already told him there wasn’t gonna be a second one. Buck, who melted back into the plush blue cover when Eddie assured him of this and grinned at him, asking him to hand him a beer. 

Buck, who’s at Eddie’s place right now, even if Chris is still at school and Eddie isn’t there. Buck, who has been using his key with the freedom Eddie had spent years trying to convince him is more than well deserved. 

Buck, who Eddie’s coming home to.  

I don’t want you to be alone, Pepa had said, but she had also hugged him goodbye with a kiss on the cheek and a murmur of say hi to Evan from me. 

Eddie curses to himself as he nearly misses his exit. Fuck, did Pepa know? Has Eddie been so obvious about his feelings that everyone has him all figured out? He’d told the team that first dates usually felt like a performance to him, and even though Hen had tried to reassure him that most new relationships actually were, Eddie saw the look she shared with Chim and Buck. Eddie knows the breakthroughs he’s had about Buck in therapy aren’t exactly platonic- he didn’t need Frank’s direction to know that I want to build a life with him wasn’t something you said about your best friend.

Still, he’d been handling it. Or so he’d thought, he babbled and stammered his way through an explanation of why he didn’t want Pepa to set him up. He couldn’t say I have plans with Buck because it would open the door on a conversation he wasn’t ready for. The same one people have been having with him ever since they met, along the way of one day one will chose to have a relationship and what will you do then? What happens when one of you leaves and it all falls apart?

But Buck had promised. And so had he, in different ways and at different times, so Eddie can’t really give a shit about what other people think. They don’t understand, they don’t get how they work, how tightly intertwined their lives so easily became. How willing Eddie is, everyday and one day at a time, to let go of the control he’s so terrified of losing and giving it to him. How easy it was to sign his name on the documents that gave Buck the chance to be a part of their family.

Sometimes he thinks Buck doesn’t either. He made the mistake of not speaking about many things right after getting shot and this apparently had given Buck the idea that him getting Christopher was a back up plan. A break-the-glass-in-case-of-emergency situation, something that would only happen in the worst of scenarios in which Eddie didn’t get to come home to see Chris finally get the other parent he deserved.

It’s not, Eddie mutters to himself as he finally makes it into his driveway, breathing out in relief and taking the keys out of the ignition. Buck has never been in any way his back up, the man proved himself to be worth so much more than that almost as soon as they met. 

There’s nothing marginal about Buck. Along with Christopher, placing him at the epicenter of Eddie’s life was the most seamless thing that’s ever happened. He didn’t even realize it had until he was bleeding out on a random Los Angeles street, reaching towards his best friend until his sight went blurry and the pain overpowered his every sense. 

God, Eddie thinks, unlocking the door and taking off his shoes and jacket as soon as he closes it behind him, hanging the keys in their rightful place. He’s gonna have to tell him soon, he’s driving around LA fully dissasociated from his surroundings because he’s too busy thinking about how nice it’d be to kiss the best friend that he loves like no one else, only second to his son. 

“Hey,” hablando del rey de Roma, Eddie thinks as he’s met with Buck’s head popping out from the kitchen. “You’re back early.”

“Pepa sent me home with my tail between my legs,” Eddie replies, going into the kitchen and dropping himself on the table defeatedly. The entire house smells like freshly made frijoles and his stomach grumbles despite having just eaten. He feels like a cartoon character that’s dazedly floated into the kitchen by the smell of something nice cooking in the background.

“She figured it out then?”

“Apparently I’m not a very good liar,” Eddie grumbles.

“I could’ve told you that, I caught every single tell of yours at the poker game last week,” Buck points a wooden spoon at him as he goes to search into the fridge and serve him a glass of water. “That means she didn’t give you any leftovers from breakfast?”

“That’s cause you know me too well,” Eddie holds the glass tenderly in two hands, like it’s a precious gift Buck had handed him instead of a drink from his own fridge. “And we ate out. She says hi, by the way.”

“Oh,” Buck’s grin is soft and pleased, a flush high on his cheeks from being thought about despite not being in the room. If he only knew how much time Eddie spent thinking about him, there’d be a permanent pink stain on his face. “That’s nice. I’ll text her sometime. I still wanted to ask her if she managed to get that hibiscus stain off the tablecloth.”

“You know she doesn’t blame you for that, right?” Eddie wonders with a raised brow. “It’s not your fault you’re not in control of your limbs yet. You’re still going through puberty.”

“Ha, ha,” Buck deadpans with an eye roll that fills Eddie with giddiness. The sip of cold water he takes does nothing to relieve the warmth of his insides. “I’m serious. I offered to buy her a new one but she said no. I just hope it’s not some precious family heirloom that I ruined and accidentally cursed your family.”

“No such thing,” Eddie says innocently, making cow eyes at him. “What would the Gods do in retaliation, hit you with lightning?”

“You’re such an asshole,” Buck throws a bean at him from absolute nowhere. It lands square on his forehead and Eddie only pops it into his mouth happily. “See if I ever heat up the frijoles for you ever again.”

“Your pronunciation is horrendous,” Eddie’s response is automatic, but he can’t hide the fact that he’s a little charmed. “Smells good though. You’re really getting the hang of it.”

“Yeah?” Buck wonders in earnest honesty, expression lighting up. Eddie doesn’t draw back his chair to stand up and kiss him, but it’s a close thing. “I thought about making them with salsa, but I figured Chris should try them fist and add it himself if he wants.”

“That’s wise,” Eddie knows, feeling high on something that keeps him opening his mouth and giving out compliments like they’re free. Anything to keep Buck happy and flushed, apparently. “Other than you, he’s the worst at figuring out how much spice he can handle.”

“You love us,” Buck says proudly, and Eddie can’t do anything else other than smile at him indulgently. Bastard doesn’t know how right he is. “So, was it that bad with Pepa that you don’t want to talk about it, or?”

“I didn’t say that,” Eddie takes another sip, emptying the glas.. “But she was onto me from the beginning. I kinda felt bad, considering she’s trying to help me in a way. A very tía, conservative way of you need to be married to be happy, but it comes from the right place, I guess.”

“Should I schedule myself for more babysitting, then?” Buck asks, and Eddie doesn’t miss how he grows a little tense, just like that day in the car and the night after the goddamned date. 

Eddie isn’t sure what it means, but he hopes. Christ almighty, does he hope. It’s the very same hope that has him opening his mouth and saying the stupidest thing he can come up with. 

“Nah,” he says, casual, as if he hasn’t been hit with the epiphany of his feelings for Buck at least twelve times in the past two years. “Next date I have you’ll be coming with me.”

Buck blinks at him. Eddie drinks happily from his glass.

“Um,” Buck says when his brain has finished resetting. He frowns. “You mean- like a double date? Because, I, um, I mean I’m flattered Pepa wants to- but I’m not really looking right now-”

“Not even if your date’s handsome, fluent in Spanish, and has an adorable soon to be teenage son?” Eddie raises a brow like his heart isn’t about to beat out of his chest. He feels anxiety churning at the bottom of his stomach, but it’s not panic. It’s not catastrophe waiting for him at the next turn, but rather the possibility of something good. Something better. “He’s a little bit of a work in progress but he’ll want to make it work with you. You’re not worth anything less.”

“Eddie,” Buck says, a little devastated. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying,” Eddie stands up and walks to him, takes the wooden spoon he was stirring the frijoles with from his hand and leaves it on the counter, tilts his head down to search for Buck’s eyes and stares at them, all bright blue and unshed emotions Eddie knows are reflected in his own. “That this whole thing with Pepa knocked some sense into me and made me realize that I don’t need to go on more dates with other people. I’ve already got the one I want. Even if he looks ridiculous in an apron and is as blind about the whole thing as I am.”

“What’s the thing?” Buck murmurs, shoulders tight and jaw locked as he stares ardently at Eddie, like he’s trying to keep himself at bay until he can confirm the type of conversation they’re having.

“I love you,” Eddie shrugs, his lips tilting upwards involuntarily when Buck’s breath catches in surprise. “I’ve loved you. Even when I didn’t put a name to it, I loved you. When we were seeing other people and when I swung a bat to everything I own and when I tried to reach for you in the middle of a storm and your heart stopped beating.”

“For three minutes and seventeen seconds,” Buck recites quietly, looking all over Eddie’s face like he’s a wonder he can’t figure out.

“The longest of my life,” Eddie confirms. He wants to touch him so, so badly, doesn’t feel like he’s getting his point across unless he reaches and holds Buck’s face in his hands, soothes over his cheeks and presses his mouth to his birthmark and the corner of his mouth before- “I don’t wanna waste more time, Buck. I don’t want to be set up or have you drive home at the end of the day or pretend that what I feel is anything other than-”

“Eddie,” Buck says, placing his hands on Eddie’s chest like he’s trying to prove he’s real. His grin is wide and his eyes are wet. “Kiss me.”

Something in Eddie’s chest stutters and flips. “Yeah?”

“I love you,” Buck tells him, sliding his hold from Eddie’s chest slowly up his neck until he’s cradling his face, as if expecting to be denied at any second. Eddie shivers, takes a step closer without even realizing it. Buck’s breath is warm against his mouth. “I didn’t think- if this is all I had then I’d take it, of course I would, but you and Chris, you’re-”

He leans in for a kiss, firm and close mouthed, over sooner than Eddie would like. He didn’t even get a chance to touch him back. “You’re my life, both of you. You know that, right, you gotta know.”

“Sweetheart,” Eddie tries, feels something inside him soften when Buck makes a little sound at the back of his throat, helpless. “Come here.”

Eddie reaches first this time, slotting their mouths together and letting his hands fall to grip Buck’s hips, leaning them both back against the counter. Buck runs his fingers through Eddie’s hair, opening his mouth and swallowing Eddie’s noise of contentment. 

When they part to heaving breaths moments later, Eddie noses at his cheek, voice warm and molten. “Is that a yes to the date?”

“As many as you’d like,” Buck assures, sounding a little emotional. Eddie lets it pass for now, knows that this moment has been years in the making and he can check in on his partner later when the high has rushed off. If it ever does. “I’m sorry I wasn’t ready before.”

“I wasn’t either,” Buck soothes his hurt with a slow hand up and down Eddie’s back. Eddie nestles close against him, tucking his nose against his neck. “I don’t think- I don’t think I would’ve believed you, if you’d told me before. So it’s. It’s good now.”

“Yeah?” Eddie wonders.

“Yeah,” Buck assures, no trace of doubt in his voice. “We’re gonna have to send Pepa a gift basket or something, aren’t we?”

“I think letting her say te lo dije will suffice,” Eddie doesn’t look forward to it, but Buck’s laughing and untangling Eddie’s octopus like grip to find his mouth and kiss him again. Eddie melts into it and thinks yeah. Yeah, maybe he can bear a billion ‘I told you so’s for the rest of his life as long as he gets to be in Buck’s arms for it. 

____

hablando del rey de roma / speak of the devil

te lo dije / i told you so

[enigmatist17]

Blind Loyalty (Clone Wars)(Spoilers)

This is following the Umbara Arc which literally destroyed me :(

--------------------------------------

They had murdered their own brothers.

They had murdered their own brothers.

They had murdered their own brothers.

They had murdered their own brothers.

Dogma had told what General Krell had done to the Council, standing tall as he was heard for trial. Despite his seamless call to attention, every single person in the room could see the guilt resting on his shoulders.

He had acted too late, blinded to the betrayal by his loyalty.

The same loyalty that runs through each and every clone in this war. News of what had happened to the 212th and 501st divisions on Umbara had spread like wildfire, and when the survivors finally limped back to Coruscant, they were met by just about every off-duty clone that could cram into the loading dock. All of them mirrored the same looks of sorrow, anger, and relief, heavy armor and weapons handed off as the small crew was led to the barracks.

They didn’t have to speak, not a single one of them had to. Krell had really shown that, Separatist or not, that the clones were viewed as tools of war, and not soldiers, not people.

Sure, not everyone they worked with thought that, but it shook a lot of them to their core. Fives was the first to stand, a mug of caf in his hand as his eyes flickered over to Rex. The captain easily looked the most worn down, just giving the other a weary wave. He hadn’t said a word on the trip back, just etching a tally mark for every single soldier who had died on Umbara inside of his arm guards.

“Men, I…I have something to say.” Fives scowled, glancing into his drink for a moment. “What we went through on Umbara, with Krell, was distasteful and dishonorable. Don’t seek out Dogma for revenge, he did what none of the rest of us could do.”

“He killed a superior officer.” One clone spoke up, but he didn't sound upset.

“A Separatist who tried to kill them all first!” Another spits back in anger, being held in his seat by those around him.

“It was justice!” Another yells, and soon the room is engulfed with opinions and yelling.

“QUIET.”

You could hear a pin drop as Rex got to his feet, rows, and rows of eyes all trained on him.

“This is not a debate. What’s done is done, and Dogma will hopefully be treated fairly,” He began, just sounding so exhausted. “We must push on, to celebrate the brothers we killed, and to ensure they’re not forgotten.”

“You can’t just go back to the way it was.” Fives started to argue but stopped when Rex put up a hand.

“We are here to help the Republic, to fight with our generals, our superiors.” Rex makes eye contact with as many men as he could, not really sure what he was trying to do exactly. “However, there is a lesson that I want to spread to all of our brothers. While we are to serve our generals, do not ever fear questioning their methods, their strategies. General Skywalker has always listened, maybe not always acted, but listened and made sure we brought as many of us home as possible. General Krell only succeeded in his casualty rates because we did not think, we did not question, and we did not remind that we are people. We are here to fight, but that doesn’t mean we have to be blind sheep to the slaughter. Spread this message far and wide, tell them all that if they have any worries or concerns, that I personally will address them.” He looked around the room again, face set in resolve.

“We will not submit like with Krell, we must look out for each other.”

No one has anything to say against his words, and eventually, the survivors are left to mourn.

Thousands of squadrons are sent a vid of his speech, and if they weren’t languishing with the news of Krell’s betrayal, they’re all talking.

They will never murder another brother by their own hands ever again.