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jerich0l0ve · 2 days ago

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Can you do one where Noah and the reader are best friends and they both ended a relationship but agree on "helping each other"😉

But they actually like each other.

You don't have to but just a thought

Love you lots❤

I don't HAVE to but I did... and I did it with 1400 words lol 😏

Helping Each Other

18+ MDNI

Noah x Feminine Reader

CW: casually written smut, implied unprotected p in v, fingering, hj, vibrators mentioned, smooching.

It had been terribly long since the last time you had sex with someone… well 2 weeks to be exact. Despite the unfortunate situation where your boyfriend cheated on you, the one thing you actually missed was having a regular sex life.

And despite having a few vibrators, well they just weren’t cutting it. You equated that to the lack of intimacy you developed with the pink vibrating rabbit that lived in your nightstand drawer. Don’t get it wrong, she was a cut pink rabbit toy, but she wasn’t necessarily a gorgeous man to make out with while doing the deed was she?

After another failed attempt that afternoon, you decided to take your mind off of the burning need by inviting your friend Noah over for an anime night. You both were working your way through the monstrous production that was One Piece. Over 1,100 episodes, you both had plowed your way through 562 of them.

And you both happened to be lonely, Noah’s previous relationship ended a month prior to yours—she cheated on him with one of their crew members. To say it got messy was an understatement.

Noah sat beside you now, smelling heavenly as he always did, wearing his casual gym-like attire. He sat close, you both had been friends for many years and there was a certain type of intimate connection between the two of you. Nothing physical had ever happened, but there was a deeper connection there built on trust and honesty, a few shared traumatic experiences from your youth too.

Matter of fact, as you looked at Noah now there were a few little sparks that worked their way into your chest. He had always been quite handsome, but you equated the sudden urge to the other urges you had.

When Noah’s eyes met yours, he chuckled a little before placing a hand casually on your lower thigh. The jolts were almost too much to handle, you adjusted your seat a little.

“Is something wrong?” Noah asked nonchalantly, his eyes had returned to the show.

You smirked at him, glancing to the side, “I haven’t been touched by a man in SO long.”

Noah’s laugh filled the room, he was always a little flirty in his interactions but never overstepped the imaginary boundaries you both held, “I’m pretty sure being touch deprived for 2 weeks is alright… try a month and a half.”

You turned to your friend; eyes widened a bit. He wasn’t one to shy away from many casual hookups, especially after Bad Omens took off. The fact that he hadn’t so much as touched a woman since his breakup was a little surprising.

“Ah, no more fans on the roster I see,” you raised a brow, which earned a cheeky smile from Noah.

“There are always fans, y/n, but do I always want the fans? That’s the real question, isn’t it?” Noah said in his usual casual demeanor.

“It is, isn’t it?” You smiled a little, a thought popped into your head, but it was too wild to act on. It would break countless rules that kept you in place for years, rules you told yourself were supposed to protect your heart and his.

Noah held your gaze for a few moments longer, only interrupted by something intense happening in One Piece. You figured the conversation was over until Noah said, “You know, I wouldn’t be opposed to helping solve the little issue you’re having?”

“And what issue would that be, Noah?” You asked.

“I see it as a transactional agreement. I get a little something… you get a… big something. We can both happily proceed with our lives afterwards without a care in the world,” Noah’s finger traces the small tattoo above your knee. It was a small touch, but the whispers of his fingers felt heavenly against your skin.

You looked at your friend, “That would be dastardly, wouldn’t it? Couldn’t think of a worse idea honestly.”

Noah quickly picked up on the dry sarcasm laced within your words, “Oh it would be absolutely terribly irreversible damage.”

His body shifted moving closer, your legs quickly found their way around his waist as it fast approached.

“Honestly, how do you even run a business with decisions like these? Sounds like you’d tank it every day,” You smiled as he went flush with you, a very hard and exciting surprise awaiting already.

“I couldn’t tell you how I have survived this long.”

Inch by inch, Noah lowered his body until his lips pressed softly against yours, it started soft but immediately deepened as your legs pulled him in impossibly closer.

The kiss sent sparks through the air, One Piece completed disappeared as you both got lost in the kiss.

Tongue, teeth, lips, they all meshed together perfectly, all moved in the same rhythm that seemed to be inside you both for a long time now. A rhythm only the both of you understood, one that seemed it would never end no matter how terrible this idea was.

That rhythm continued as his hips grinded against yours, as clothes expertly ripped away and were thrown well across the room. Every inch of tattoos visible, every inch of skin—his skin.

It was soft against yours, your nipples perked up with each connection his chest made to yours. Lips moved there, making small marks over the sensitive areas and leaving nothing untouched. It was blissful, magical, something to write a song about.

His fingers played you like a guitar; one by one they entered with efficiency and skill. They were slick before he even got all the way in. Your hand wrapped around him now, both of you playing each other in tune to the loud heartbeats and breathing that filled the air.

It didn’t take long for the need to increase, for Noah to slip in smoothly. His hips didn’t move too fast, a slow pace that matched the circles he made with his tongue along your lips. That tongue found its way to your chin, your cheek, and tickled your ear.

Moans joined the choir now, moans that drowned out any noise from the apartment or the bustling city beyond. The pace never quickened though, Noah took his time showing you every inch that he had to offer—making sure you felt the small twitches as he grew near. Your pleasure built tightly, this was everything you needed and wanted, it was everything that felt right.

“Noah…” you gasped, his eyes opened lazily as they locked on yours.

He let out a small grunt before responding, “…Yes?”

The tension built and built. It became too much and everything you needed all at once, “I think… I think we… should do this… more often,” you said in between breaths.

Noah’s smile brightened his eyes, he slowed the pace down even more until it was unbearable, “You know I was thinking the same thing.”

His lips met yours, this kiss was different. It was soft and loving, unlike any kiss you had ever experienced from anyone before. A hidden message only you knew, held between the both of you as it sent you over the edge.

Sweaty foreheads met, eyes closed, and mouths held agape with small breathless moans escaping as you both rode the high. It sent you into existential bliss.

When it ended, there were already tears forming, Everything was perfect, and the crash down afterwards was enough to leave you wanting more for the rest of eternity.

Noah’s eyes opened and met yours, a lazy smile making its way to his lips, “Shall we actually do that again sometime?”

You took a breath, “You know I think we might have to. I’ve had a taste of bad decisions, and I don’t think I want to give it up yet.” You smiled cheekily.

“I promise you, y/n, if you continue to use my song titles in casual conversation, I will find a way to get you back,” Noah pulled himself away, careful not to stain the new couch you purchased the week prior.

“I can think of a few ways, but I’m not sure it would be a one-time thing… nor casual,” you added the last part, it was time to put everything on the line.

Noah smiled as he grabbed a few tissues to clean you both up with, “Now that would be absolutely dastardly indeed.”

Noah and you spent the rest of the evening exploring that idea, and the next, and the next…

xoxxox

#noah sebastian #jolly karlsson #nicholas ruffilo #nick folio #bad omens #sleep token #noah sebastian x reader #vessel sleep token #bad omens band #sleep token fanfiction

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vbluesss · 2 days ago

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I gotta admit, I'm really surprised by how the dynamic between Rick and Morty has evolved throughout the show.

At first it was a super one-sided relationship, where Rick was the genius, totally in control, dragging his grandson into messed up situations without caring much about what happened to him (except for those rare moments when he actually did care), Morty on the other hand, was the "dumb" sidekick who didn't know anything an was constantly humiliated, not just in adventures but in his everyday life (I’ll never forget that memory where Rick pushes him down the stairs just to embarrass him in front of some girls).

What's interesting is that since then Morty started develop this deep resentment toward Rick, and unlike his mother and sister, he did not idealize him, he saw Rick for who he really is.

“I wanted you to have a normal life, that’s something you can’t have when Rick shows up.

Everything real turns fake. Everything right is wrong.

All you know is that you know nothing and he knows everything.

He’s not a villain, Summer, but he shouldn’t be your hero. He’s more like a demon, or a super fucked up god.”

Whe the purge episode came out, I thought that if things kept going this way, Morty might actually end up killing Rick someday. Not in the sense that he would become Evil Morty, it's just... He was clearly full of repressed rage.

"Fuck you Rick! I'll purge you too, you old rickety piece of crap. This has been a long time coming! I'm gonna rip your fucking guts out and smear them all over you face!"

Then the third season premiered and in the very first episode, Morty shot Rick with the intention of killing him! Scenes like these made me so invested in their dynamic, but especially in Morty's development. Sooo here's a little analysis about it!

In early seasons, Morty hated Rick. He totally wanted to kill him at some point, but ofc he wouldn't because:

He was kinda ashamed of this violent part of himself.

Rick is his granda, and if only because of the family bond, he still cares about him.

We're talkin' about Rick Sanchez, motherfucker, like Morty ever stood a chance (or at least that what Morty thought, since we now know that it is not impossible.)

Anyway, the point is Morty was seriously done with Rick's crap, but it's not like he had much choice. They're family, and on top of that, Morty did enjoy the adventures. So he just tolerated it.

Thing's went on like that for a while, Morty started standing up to Rick more and more, and often paid the price of Rick's ego (The Vat Of Acid is the best example) but they always had a strong bond, bla bla bla.

But let's not to forget how Rick constantly manipulated him. I still remember this lines:

"I just took over the family Morty- and if you tell your mom or your sister any of this I'll deny it, and they'll take my side because I'm a hero"

"You can die when I say so. I control you. I control the universe!"

Just adding to the whole "Rick is a god" thing. Morty is perfectly aware, better than anyone else in the family, that Rick is a bad person and had a lot of power over everyone. Up to this point he even handled abandonment quite well, Beth and Summer were the ones who seemed more affected by it.

Still, Morty admires Rick. He needs him. He wants to be around him. As Rick had his moments of real care and and saved Morty, not just for convenience, but genuine affection. Also they got along pretty well.

In "Rest and Ricklaxation" it's even said outright that Rick has an irrational attachment to Morty, and I'd say that Morty also has an irrational attachment to Rick! Because again, he knows who Rick really is. But after so many adventures and those tiny moments of kindness, he can't help but cling to him.

Over time, Morty got more of his own voice, going from being a simple sidekick to being a companion (but not totally equal), and for his part, Rick started to respect his grandson more too (even if the power dynamic hadn't totally shifted)

Then their relationship becomes straight-up codependent.

Let's not forget the crows! That episode wrecked Morty emotionally, and man, I get it! The whole thing about being replaced was nothing more than an empty threat, the crows a way to annoy him. Until it happened. Rick replaces him and dumps him. Then when Rick comes back it's not even for Morty, it's because the crows dumped him first. But Morty still chooses him. Why? because he has no one and nothing else.

Even when Morty has the chance to start a new life far away from Rick, he choose to stay. The truth is that chaos and adventures with Rick is all he's ever known. How do you walk away from the one thing you've built your identity around?

Then S6E2, "Rick: A Mort Well Lived" happens. Morty's most independent, self-aware part gets trapped in a video game... I always feel that like a loss, but I guess it was necessary in some kind of way????? Idk... Anyways, I really liked the direction they took with Morty's codependency and fear of abandonment. After Marta (Morty's fragment) choose to stay in the game, I feek like Morty become more dependent on Rick.

But it's not just Morty who changes, it's also Rick.

Before the crows leave him, he ends up learning a bit about empathy (I think that's what it was) and recognizes that what he and Morty have is toxic, blablabla. I won't expand on this because the analysis is focused on Morty, not Rick, but I want to emphasize the sentence he says in S6E10, "Ricktional Mortpoon's Rickmas Mortcation"

"You called me boring! I've become dog shit to you"

Rick realizes he's lost control over Morty, and acts like the victim because he feels like one. Their bond is more damaged than ever because there is no balance between them. Things were tense since before the crows, add to that the revelation that Morty is not Rick's original grandson, and the Prime oobsession. Things keep spiraling... Still, by the end of the episode Rick brings Morty into the Prime hunt.

Now that I've already mentioned Prime we can go back to Morty, because after they finally found him and Rick got his unsatisfactory revenge, Morty was left marked by Evil Morty words:

"What happens if Rick actually kills this guy? You ever think about that? Maybe he'll kill himself next."

Next episode we see that Rick stopped having adventures for a while to start drinking too much, clearly depressed after the events of the previous episode. Again, this shakes up his bond with Morty.

Past all this, we finally get to one of the best episodes! The first one that really focuses on Morty's psychology: S7E10, Fear no Mort.

(SIDE NOTE: Before that! Something super important happens earlier: His breakup with Planetina (S5E3). Remember what he said to Beth?

"My whole life I've never fit in anywhere. Everything I have to say is always met with an eye roll, as if the act of hearing what I have to say is some exhausting chore. Nobody in this family thinks I can say or do anything right. I've been all over the universe, meet hundreds of people, and Planetina's the only one I've ever meet that makes me feel like I belong."

In Morty's words (and as we have seen throughout the series) there's no one, not even his own family, who doesn't treat Morty like he's an idiot. Everyone just seems tired of dealing with him. Morty always noticed it, cause he's not dumb like people thinks he is. It's not until he feels he's finally formed a real, honest, loving and (in his eyes) healthy connection that he confronts, in this case, his mom for trying to break them up.

The part “Planetina's the only one I've ever met that makes me feel like I belong” reflects more than just teenage love. It's coming from someone who has been ignored, treated as annoying and irrelevant by his classmates, teachers, his family, and also, of course, Rick too.

Honestly, I think that after the breakup, Morty became even more emotionally vulnerable. Like, it made him cling to Rick even more because, as awful as Rick can be, he's still the only one who actually spends time with Morty, that listens to him (even if it's while complaining), and shown Morty that he matters to someone, even if it's just so Rick can use him.

When Morty breaks up with Planetina because she killed innocent people, his idealized, perfect vision of his girlfriend finally shatters. The problem isn't that Planetina killed people (Rick has already done that, even Morty killed before), the real issue is that there is no way to sustain this unrealistic vision Morty had for her anymore. She was supposed to be his safe space, something outside the caos. But after that, there's no way he can keep pretending she's who he thought she was.

This leaves a mark. And in the end, Morty goes to adventures with Rick as usual.

At this point, after so many adventures and failed relationships, Morty has internalized so much Rick's worldview. Since the pilot, Rick's been planting the idea that it should be just the two of them, going on adventures together forever and ever. Rick and Morty at 100 years, an emotional trap disguised as a fun promise of adventures from which Morty cannot escape, not only because circumstances have molded him to adapt Rick's vision of the world, love, his own worth and morality, but also because a big part of his identity revolves around Rick).

With all that said, we can finally talk about Fear No Mort!

First off, when they "come out" of the hole, Morty notices Rick staring into it looking genuinely sad, so he admits he's afraid of being responsible for his sadness.

"Hey Rick, you just looked real sad, which I’m afraid of. You know, of being responsible for your sadness.”

Then, once they're back to, Morty imagines basically an entire life with Rick by his side. At this point Morty can no longer project himself, even in his imagination, without him! And then it hits him: Rick was never really there in the first place. That's when Morty finally figures out what he's truly afraid of:

"I know what I'm afraid of! I'm afraid that you'd never say that [that he is irreplaceable] in real life. I'm afraid that if I jumped into a hole, you wouldn't even bother jumping in after me. You'd just stand there and watch. This entire thing has been about me! You're not even in the hole, are you?!"

THIS MOMENT. THIS IS THE EXACT MOMENT WHERE IT BECOMES CLEAR THAT MORTY IS EMOTIONALLY DEPENDENT ON RICK. His fear of rejection doesn't compare to his fear of meaning nothing to Rick, and the fact that his entire life now revolves around him.

The fear of relying on Rick.

So! Morty's no longer the same scared kid of early seasons who got dragged into adventures against his will, and slowly started resenting his grandpa to such extent that (in some moments) he thought about killing him. Not because he truly wanted to, deep down, but because the anger and frustration took over.

Now after everything that has been though (being replaced, literally losing the most rebellious part of himself, and suffering from a broken heart) Morty's now fully Rick Sanchez's grandson. Someone who enjoys adventures, no longer hesitate to kill people (his whole moral compass is another topic on its own), and who is totally unable to let go of his grandpa because is all he has, but also the only thing he wants too, since there's nothing better out there or on earth waiting for him.

Morty isn't trying to escape Rick anymore, he just wants to be loved by him.

The issue is that Morty reached a point where he needs Rick to feel like somebody. Right now he's emotionally dependent on Rick in an extreme way. It wasn't always like this, Morty used to care about him (or at least respect him), but he also kinda hated him. Thanks to all his arc and now that Rick's been slowly changing in recents seasons, Morty can live with this, even with his doubts and with the conscious fear that Rick doesn't love him or might leave him again, he's so hurt at this point that he'll take whatever Rick gives.

So yeah, we've gone from a Morty who was aware Rick was hurting him and still called him out, to one's who's fully resigned to this life.

(I bring back the scene where he had the opportunity to leave his life with Rick behind when Evil Morty offered him a way out of the Central Finite Curve. Rick admits that's the best option cause he has no plan, and we see the exact moment when Morty resigns and decides to stay with Rick, DESPITE what happened with the crows).

And you know why? Because Rick is changing too. Slowly, painfully, but it's happening. And Morty doesn't love Rick because he's good.

He loves him because that's the most he can expect from love.

To conclude:

Before, Morty had normal concerns. He wanted to go to school, be with Jessica (I miss her), and form a life like any other teeanger. Rick was something he tolerated because he was his grandpa, but clearly not the center of his life.

Now, that changed completely. He doesn't really have those desires anymore, now, what he wants is to go on adventure. He wants to keep exploring the universe with Rick, because its the only he has left and also, it's become the only thing he's truly passionate about. I'm not saying that he cannot fall in love again and be a regular teenager someday, but his priorities have shifted.

He genuinely enjoys those adventures, but specially enjoys being with Rick. He respects him, admires him, challenges him, understands him... and even with all the pain, he wants to stay by his side. For a 100 years.

Wow! this got way out of hand. It all started when I was like "Man, I miss when Morty used to stood up to Rick". Then the new episode dropped, and hey, turns out current Morty is confronting Rick again! I know they had arguments before, but that was mostly because their bond was super tense, almost broken. And in those fights, Rick always played the victim and Morty ended up feeling bad, like he was the one in the wrong. But now, in the first episode we get a clearly parallel between Morty and Evil Morty (that's a different topic I could go on about- I'll just say I think it perfectly shows why Morty would never become Evil Morty: because he loves Rick). And in the most recent one, beat the crap out of Rick for being an asshole, totally deserved.

Their behavior in this episode really made me think, it’s like Rick and Morty’s personalities are kinda... swapping places. Morty’s turning more into Rick (stronger, more assertive) and Rick’s becoming a bit more like Morty (more human, more vulnerable) But neither of them has stopped being who they are at the core.

Also, I gotta say, I love how their relationship is way more balanced now! Rick actually treats Morty with a bit more respect, and Morty’s pretty much on the same level as Rick when they go on adventures. They finally see each other as equals and treat each other like actual family (a super dysfunctional one, sure, but one that’s trying to get better). Honestly, it’s been a really nice shift. And that’s what surprises me the most.

I’ve been a fan since the beginning, and I NEVER thought they’d canonically turn their relationship into something this wholesome, because this show’s always been about tearing down traditional stuff: love, good vs evil, heroes, family, all that. But now? They’re actually giving us this slow redemption arc. Not just for Rick and Morty, but for the whole Smith family, piecing themselves back together from all the damage. Ooobviously Rick and Morty’s relationship isn’t perfect, but compared to how it all started? It’s honestly too wholesome sometimes. I used to think it’d stay toxic and abusive forever!

I just really hope that with Rick changing now, they don’t forget about Morty’s growth. Just because Rick’s evolving doesn’t mean Morty’s wounds magically disappeared. He faced his fears down in the hole, but that doesn’t mean he’s over them, he’s just living with the trauma now. (Even the line at the end of the new episode makes it super clear Morty’s still scared, or so I think.) But I'm sure they won't ignore it. We’re still seeing Rick fall into that self-pity mode, and Morty is aware of it.

I’m genuinely excited to see where they take things from here!!!

Anyway, there’s so much more I could’ve talked about, but it was 3 a.m., I was half-asleep and my body hurt all over, plus there are already tons of deep dives out there about their dynamic. What I wanted to do here was just focus on Morty’s evolution. That’s my little contribution! [:

#not a ship btw #dni proship #english isnt my first language #be nice to me #rick and morty #rick and morty season 8 #rick and morty analysis #rick sanchez #morty smith #analysis #first analysis!! yeiii #feel free to correct me #most of this is from memory #didnt rewatch all the episodes for this

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fairestbeard · 3 days ago

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Is Claire even a doctor?

One thing I love about on this show is their subtle use of some obvious tropes. You almost think it isn't there but it is because without tropes storytelling don't really have coherence and structure. It's how we're able to connect certain dots in any narrative. In The Bear, some if them are directional and some I believe are mis-directional.

That being said, I noticed some things that made me wonder if Claire really is an actual doctor. I don't know what would be the intention or relevance to the plot for her not to be one but I just noticed a few things that I want to point out.

Of course there has been a lot of chatter in the fandom about her having way too much free time for an ER resident. In my last meta, I pointed out that the possibility that she wasn't even that available, we just assumed because it was made to look that way. A lot of the tricks they pull relies on how much we assume.

But there's more discrepancies.

1) The overselling of Claire:

This one I call the too good to be true trope. It's kind of odd the way Claire is oversold in the show. It's like every pro-claire character in the show just becomes a desperate insurance salesman. She also seems to be pitching herself a little bit sometimes. She always has to qualify why she's good, why she's fun, etc. That has made a lot of people suspicious for good reason, paying more attention to her character and observing disturbing details, because when something presents itself to be too good to be true, it probably is.

I also find it very interesting that she said to Carmy she was "almost a doctor" but a resident IS a doctor already especially one with 6 months to go in residency. Lord, she even has plausible deniability, herself. She never said she was a doctor.

2) There's no definite markers for her job

She says she is a doctor. Everyone says she's a doctor. But when we see her there's nothing that definitively says this is a doctor except that she wears scrubs in a hospital. She's definitely a medical professional, but is she an emergency medical doctor? We've never seen a clear badge of any kind. It is purposely blurry in my opinion so that your brain makes out what it should be. In Sundae when she calls Carmy, she's right in front of the camera but the badge is either blurred or turned. Even scrubs like hers can be worn by any other medical worker at all.

Just a coincidence? Maybe.

But she's never even been seen in a doctor's coat. Even Syd has been dressed more like an actual doctor (M.D) than Claire has.

3) Nurse-y duties

Every task we've seen her perform in the hospital has also been very nursey. We've never seen her consulting patients or doing anything exclusive to doctors. She says she fixes TBNs, we see her fixing saline IVs and giving shots. Even when we see her fixing a bone, in a scene which could be very well in Carmy's imagination, we see a gloved hand that we can't definitively connect to her, she talks about saline flush again like a nurse and when she is asked what happened, she just describes the incident in lay man's terms instead of replying with medical jargon. And this is a show that dumps us in the deep side if culinary jargons without a care in the world.

We never seen her outside the nurses station and dispensing treatment. We also see her very casual and friendly with the someone at the nurses station in a very familiar peer-like way which suggests she that's where her duty is around and we never seen her with an actual doctor clique or anything.

6) The con in the wild trope

The final coincidence that ties all these other coincidences for me is how they seem to have used the con in the wild trope in this scene where the Faks visit her in the hospital.

You know those movies where someone lies about their identity and then someone finds them in an unexpected place and calls to them but it takes a while for them to realize they are the one being addressed? That's a little bit what the scene felt like to me.

She doesn't respond to "Dr Dunlap", "Dr Claire Dunlap" She rouses with a confused look at "Dr Claire" and only turns after "Dr Claire bear". Also her immediate reaction was to whisper and try to quiet the conversation. Of course, her hair also covers the badges very conveniently. Now, it's shot in a way that there's a good enough excuse for these and it doesn't raise that much suspicion, eg, she was too engrossed in her work and the shushing and looking around was because they were embarrassing her at her work by coming to intercede for her estranged boyfriend.

Ted even says "I was coming to look for Dr..." and trails of so there is once more no definite marker since the statement doesn't get completed to be confirmed or denied.

The whole scene just resembled a con in the wild scene too much for me not to consider the possibility.

It seems very unlikely, though, and doesn't make a lot of sense to me for her to not be a doctor but it's also very possible when you line up these coincidences. I wonder if it's a switcheroo they're planning and what it would mean. My best guess is that it's probably another misdirect but if it's not, I wonder how such a development would play out.

#the bear #sydcarmy #carmy berzatto #the bear meta #sydney adamu #carmy x sydney #the bear fx #the bear hulu #sydney x carmy #syd x carmy

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marielle555 · 2 days ago

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Thank you so much! Everything you said is spot on. And helped me realize, what it is this feeling that at one time specifically ruined the perception of BG3. Metagaming. I'm a big fan of DnD and RPGs as well. Before I met BG3, I'd had the great pleasure of going through both Pathfinder games and a few other interesting games before that and they gave me quite a few amazing hours of immersion in a fantasy world. BG3 also first gave me that immersion, and then threw me out of it, making me become for a while an exceptionally sad average person from real life, sitting next to a PC screen and writing feedback, in which behind the “wall of text” hid the same meaning: "***! What the ***! Fix your *** in the game!" A unique gaming experience and a uniquely striking contrast, the likes of which I couldn't have imagined if I hadn't encountered in person - an amazing, truly extraordinary character - Astarion, who makes you fall in love with him so much, that you simply don't want anyone else, that I didn't want to give up on him “without a fight” after patch 6, and such, to put it mildly, “ flaws” in his romance, that if someone had told me about it in advance, before I had time to get attached to the character personally, I would not only never touch this game, but even the studio itself with any other projects I would probably avoid it like the plague. But thanks to this interaction with a real player, I learned a lot of new information - what a non-con is, what modern game-therapy approach to healing trauma is, how bad it is to sexualize game characters, and that “all modern vampires,” it turns out, are “tragic”…

Why should I even care what they have going on with “modern” vampires? I bought BG3 because I adored the BG series games, I need Faerûn to be there, my character needs to be a resident of it, and she fell in love with a vampire on Faerûn. This world exists separate from all this “modernity”, therapy language, all this ‘'sexualization’' stuff, some rules of ‘'healthy/unhealthy relationships’' and whatever else is fashionable at this particular stage concretely in Western culture. This world has its own lore, its own rules by which it exists. This idea of “vampire fetishization” that “should” bother a vampire-Astarion, living on Faerûn, completely spits on DnD's lore. And that "There's nothing more desirable in the world than a vampire, is there? “, which completely defies logic, and is in irresolvable contradiction with realistic and actual: ”People don't trust vampires - perhaps understandably - so I needed to get someone on my side“, makes Astarion cease to be Astarion, and become a signboard for those, who for some unknown reason wanted to declare vampire romance as something ‘bad’ and ”unhealthy". And replace it with a healthy sexualization of bears to “improve society”, no other way…

Up until Act 3, the game was going great. There were some rough edges and “stumbles” that didn't kill, but somewhat spoiled the immersion, like the inability to tell the companions trying to seduce Tav, that you are already in a relationship with Astarion. The first sense that you're not the hero of the story comes in the dialogue with Halsin, when that line about you already being in a relationship comes off as completely obnoxious, as if you're okay with Halsin's proposal despite Astarion's love... And you're no longer the heroine of the story, but a boring monogamous heterosexual woman, who has to realize that being monogamous isn't cool or modern. Okay, here I can still imagine that the heroine of the story, unlike me, is a slight-talker, and isn't going to spend any more time on Halsin than it takes to say one word: “No” and move on. But in Act 3 it's just not possible anymore, when you can't pick a line in a scene because they're all no good, but you have to poke your mouse at something or the game won't continue, it's a really awful feeling. And yeah, without spoilers we can't know for sure, without spoilers I honestly assumed that “I want your body” was also some other modern day bullshit, like “it's cool to talk frankly about sex” because the game itself is unabashedly sexualized, with everyone hitting on Tav all the time, including illithid. It was just done poorly, but without spoilers I didn't realize it was done intentionally.

And after the check with mind-reading and “you're degrading yourself...”, to which it is impossible to react, for the first time in my life I had an acute desire for negative interaction through “kinetic discussion” directly with the author of the scene, especially because of the combination of these rails with the ‘possibility’ of “kicking him in the balls”. Why was such an abomination added, filmed, and no normal reactions? I generally find it disgusting that the game has such an “opportunity” and the only way to justify it in and of itself would be if it was possible to hit everyone, absolutely everyone in the game in cutscenes - Karlach, Jaheira, Wyll, Shadowheart, Gale, Lae'zel, Halsin, Mystra (in Gale Origins), only then would it pass as an opportunity for roleplay. This kind of feeling seems to be due to a side effect of Welch's desire to constantly interact directly with the player rather than the character, the player also starts thinking about “Who wrote this?!” instead of enjoying their favorite escapism.

The only thing that makes the situation better and allows you to continue enjoying the game is the mods and the realization, that Astarion can't think you helped him ascend just because you're thirsty for vampire lords. I used to not be very fond of mods, even cosmetic ones, so as not to disrupt the original story in any way or bring something into the fantasy world that couldn't be in it. BG3 was an exception - mods become a “magic pill”, modders are amazingly talented and, what is especially nice, mods do not break immersion, but, on the contrary, help it, making the story better and more realistic.

I agree with you, and I can't say that Baudelaire Welch is a bad writer. It's entirely possible that they are a good writer. They are a bad scriptwriter for RPG games. A player character in an RPG should not be any kind of “narrative tool”, much less one with emotions spelled out by the author. Even Tav's inappropriate facial expressions at many plot points are annoying. This would be fine in a game with a pre-made character, who already has their own appearance, personality, and backstory, but in a game, where you create your own character, it spoils the game. And it could easily be avoided by simply moving the camera more often to companions or NPCs at times, when the PCs' emotional reactions might be different - the player knows how they feel about it, and besides, looking at a companion while talking to them is much more realistic than looking “at yourself”. And when you're a character in someone else's fanfic, why doesn't the game description say FPG (fanficplay game)? It would be better to invent a new genre than to cheat fans of a genre that has been around for a long time. And the very idea of inviting a fanfic author is really bad, since the script should be written by a professional screenwriter. Wouldn't Stephen Rooney, a professional screenwriter, have written the entire Astarion's romance on his own? A screenwriter of that caliber, who clearly doesn't need anyone to “help” him with his writing at all. Fane's romance in Divinity 2 was perfectly written, and if I'm not mistaken, there was no “special writer” for the romances when Larian did Divinity 2, and there were no major problems with the romances in Divinity either. The fanfiction community has always been perfectly fine gathering around any interesting game setting, people were perfectly fine realizing their fantasies using RPG plots written by professional screenwriters. And among the authors of Astarion fanfics there are people, who write better than Baudelaire Welch, Larian could at least organize a fair contest, if they wanted to add a fanfiction author to the scripting team....

And the anti-AA “fandom” is made up of people who don't understand a damn thing about roleplaying, RPGs, or DnD. Astarion “loses his soul” (I think that even sounds ridiculous to any DM or relatively experienced DnD player), then he has “textbook signs of abuser” (you can take a textbook, find signs of abuser in anti-AA themselves, find signs of abuser in Tav in the UA route - it's not hard, but I'd really like to do without textbooks at all, which can't be written on Faerûn). “Your Tav feels this or that, your Tav is ‘”asking for freedom“’, right down to multiple statements about real players really '”wanting a hot vampire daddy“, ”gooners", and so on. Maybe some “media literate” people need someone to write everything for them, including reality, need authorities to tell them what to think, what to say, and who are the ‘'gooners’' here, but I would hate to be forced to apply my own media literacy to games, figuring out what's the reason that my game is being ruined, what's the “agenda” and what's the preaching in honor of. When in the real world you need this very media literacy to be able to separate facts from lies, in a game you want to take a break from it all. The very essence of escapism is a temporary escape from reality. People whose level of “literary literacy” is at the level of a middle school student, when it is necessary to memorize from the textbook “what the author wanted to say”, to mumble it or write it in an essay and get praise for it, are probably attracted by such simplistic stories about “the cycle of abuse”, “power corrupts” and they accept the metagame and the author's attempts to “teach them”, the main thing is that it was clear, what button to press and how to sexualize someone correctly, so that they could write “good person” in their notebook for it. But I personally buy a book, when I want to read a book, and watch a movie, when I want to be a spectator, and the main pleasure of RPG is the possibility of immersion, the possibility of being inside these events, personal interaction with the characters. If you don't like a book, you can easily drop it, if the series has gone downhill, you can just stop watching it and find another one, but when your character in an RPG is replaced by a doppelgänger created by the author and you can't do anything about it - it's a completely different feeling. And when they try to force you to part with your beloved character, your LI, who looked at you through the screen and interacted with you and not with the heroine of the series - that's a completely different feeling too.

In Daeran romance (Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous) there is a moment, where you can kill the character Liotr, who has learned his secret. Daeran can also kill him himself, you can persuade Liotr, and not kill him. Funny thing is, I found out about the fact that you can choose not to kill him after playing the game by reading the guide, I also found out that it's killing a story NPC, turns out to be a very bad thing, “doing evil for Daeran's sake” according to some people. And I seem to have gotten what is considered his “evil ending” or not, I don't know, the ending was great and very happy, was too lazy to dig further on the internet to find out what it was called. The main thing is that the authors didn't try to “teach” me at all, there was no “very bad” in the game, immersion wasn't interrupted for a second. Pathfinder is perfectly playable blind, without requiring a single spoiler or any guides during the first playthrough. You can read the guides afterwards to marvel at the possible branching of the scenario and the thoughtfulness of the plot and wonder: “Wow, it was possible even that way!” I would never have thought, “being inside the plot”, that it would be possible to let someone who knows such a terrible secret of my beloved person live, and killing Liotr feels like a necessary decision. Yes, an evil act, but an evil act in a “do what you have to do” kind of way, sometimes you have to get your hands dirty, and I wasn't even robbed of the alignment of chaotic-good for that act. In Daeran's romance, there's a line for the PCs, “I will always support you” or “I will always be on your side” (not verbatim) that you choose, and interestingly enough, it's a non-alignment line - love has no alignments, it's something more important than '‘good’ and “evil”. In BG3 for Astarion, we don't have anything like that after he Ascended. Although there was a similar answer in one of the dialogs before that, in the dialog when Astarion wants to find the other spawns. Where did that intention then disappear to? In the same dialog with Daeran, next to this main line, there was also a line leaning the player's alignment “towards good” - something about “you can always be a better person”, something in memory directly giving away the waibes of the UA route. And the line “towards evil” - something about Daeran being a tool for you. When such a line is just there - well, maybe that's how someone roleplays, it doesn't get in the way. In a good RPG bad lines are not noticeable, you just slip a glance and choose another, “your” line, and they can not be called bad, when they are not imposed on anyone, when it is one of many options. In Daeran's romance, it's one “evil” line. In the dialog after the ritual, it's ALL lines. “I want to become a vampire” and “I want your body” - Astarion is seen as a “tool” for Tav + two lines for lecturing and scolding.

After I killed Liotr, Daeran didn't think I was “sexualizing” him. When Daeran says “freedom at last” and you ask him why, he says: “because it's the most beautiful thing, except life itself, and many fail to appreciate it”. The Ascended Astarion would probably think the same thing, not that I “lust for him as a vampire”. When I asked Daeran “does he feel lonely around me” in the romantic dialog, he said “no, especially after you got your hands dirty for me”. And Astarion has instead “You're degrading yourself by staying with him...” And one really gets sad for such a unique and wonderful character like Astarion, when you compare the writing of his romance to Daeran's romance, which was written by professional screenwriters.

“Escapism is the main point of any roleplaying game” - thank you, and I'd awfully like to see studios that produce roleplaying games have a sign with that inspirational phrase hanging in an office somewhere.

I often read that Astarion has two authors, Rooney and Welch. I'd be interested to know what influence Welch had on the AA story. Some also say that his story was "watered down" by Larian. Objectively, though, only Tav's facial expressions changed, so I don't know what else would have changed in his story. Thanks for your answer.

Baudelaire Welch, a former “the companion character designer lead” who has been working on Baldur's Gate 3 as “the romance feature lead”, in their own words, “wrote quite a few of the Astarion romance dialogues in the later period of production”. Unfortunately, this author's work, their views, and their personal perception of how game romances affect real-life romances have been largely a bad influence on the romance of Ascended Astarion. It was Welch's view that the Ascension was a “bad ending” for Astarion that was subsequently hyped by AA haters (Stephen Rooney, the author of Astarion, himself corrected this by saying that the Ascension was not Astarion's ‘bad’ ending, it was his “evil” ending). Their somewhat twisted understanding of romance and desire to make the players feel like failures was expressed in this one:

Article: "Baldur's Gate 3 writer's explanation of Astarion's 'bad' ending is a wake-up call for players lusting over RPG characters".

This kind of insult to the audience, the portrayal of players as sex-crazed (which was later used heavily against Astarion's fans) goes a long way towards explaining where this single mind-reading check in the game came from, which is impossible to react to, and provides no additional options for interaction. The author “wrote” a certain sex-crazed player, creating scenes without the possibility of any roleplay. Accordingly, the scene of dialog with the worst lines (“I want your body”, etc.) and the same impossibility of roleplay, also belongs to Welch's pen. As a player I can only reply: "I failed to see a good RPG in the third act. It's beyond my understanding of classic RPG games". These lines and this check have already been criticized and discussed many times, but the essence of the logic of this narrative is best conveyed here:

(Picture taken from Larian forum, author Ametris, was published on the forum during the period of active indignation of players after patch 6)

How the author managed to ascribe such motivation to the players is, of course, a mystery, as is where the theme of sex is traced during the Ascension ritual, why Astarion can be helped without having romance with him, and why sex can be refused (the romance is preserved). And of course, for submitting to this imposed narrative, the player who leaves Astarion a spawn forever will be rewarded with sex. But without the cutscene. As for the post-Ascension sex scene itself, Welch claimed she didn't know it existed.

Thank you so much to Larian's animation team! You are the best! We can roughly conclude from this that the Welch's authorship of the scene of the night after the Ascension may only include the lines. I even suppose that the very notes of the developers for this scene could belong to Stephen Rooney himself (but this is only an assumption, it is impossible to find information about who wrote these notes).

These developer notes clearly describe how Astarion and Tav love each other and how Astarion is powerful and free. So, thanks for everything we love about this scene, to the animators and to Neil and his beautiful acting. And if you compare the lines for the player, you'll see a strong difference in the quality of writing compared to other scenes of Astarion's romance - Act 1 scene (this scene is written by Stephen Rooney and it's great) everything is fine with the roleplay, Act 3 is a scene of 4 bad lines, it's just impossible to make a choice while maintaining immersion. You can even just compare Tav's facial expression in act 1 scene (when you offer Astarion your neck and he bites you) - the facial expression is adequate to the situation, it's real, as it should be - a smile, you can see that Tav is enjoying it, and in act 3 they imposed a stupid frowning face, and the surprise is as if it's the first time Astarion bit you, and in general everything is bad and Tav just tolerates it. One is left to fantasize about how great the romance could have been if Stephen Rooney had written the entire story of Astarion and every line in it by himself. “A Gentle Line” would have been beautiful for sure. But these are dreams, and in reality, unfortunately, the post-Ascension scene was regularly made worse starting in patch 4:

(From Larian Forum, author Ametris)

Also in this interview with Welch and Schick: “Baldur's Gate 3 Writers Break Down the Craft of Video Game Sex and Romance” you can learn more about the writers' approach to romance. Interesting that:

“In contrast, romance was baked into Baldur’s Gate 3 from the beginning, and Larian developed its dynamic animation system to account for characters having to hug and kiss.” As a result, we have one hug in the Act 2 scene (and that in this scene for confession of feelings for me this action seems too weak, compared to the possibility to open the mind, which I find more serious and sincere). Except it's possible to regularly load a save just to hug Astarion, but within the story Astarion wasn't hugged once until the mod.

“It used to be set up so that the only way that romances could begin was this one night in the party, where you could only pick one character,” Welch says, “And then basically, that character would end up being your love interest for the whole rest of the game.”

This locked fans into dating the same character simply due to a few choices made toward the start of the game. As a fan before coming to work at Larian, though, Welch wished players could experience love triangles and multiple partners.”

It's unfortunate the resources went into this. I was honestly rather saddened to learn that BG3 was originally intended to be a good classic RPG with a romance with a single companion. I can imagine how rich the romance could have been, if all the resources wasted on bears, cheating, “choices between the two” and whatnot had been shared between the romances with LI. For Act 1 there's 2 hours of extra content created for all those triangles (including lines, scenes, and companion reactions), but a hug for Astarion - no, not even in the epilogue, just as there's no kiss in the epilogue, nor is there any opportunity for a “gentle” romance.

And to this:

“People often write fanfiction that is deeply about conflict, about angst, about actual challenges that are being overcome in a relationship,” Welch says. “There are quite a lot of really heartbreaking break-up scenes that happen in Baldur’s Gate 3. That’s the thing that people don’t necessarily consider being an important part of romance.”

I think there's a reason people don't consider breakups an important part of romance. Games are about escapism and fun after all. There's no way I'd pay $70 to get frustrated and get something as unpleasant as a relationship breakup in a game. Fine, let it be, if someone likes it, as an extra option that doesn't get in the way and doesn't take a lot of resources away from the main romance line. I believe that romance in the game and lines for the player should be made for those players, who love the character, and all this side stuff like breakups and fights can be added as an option for those, who want to break up the romantic relationship, but not in the amount of tons of nasty lines for Tav for more than half of the content with no possibility to say “I love you”, hug and kiss gently (which is unfortunately the case in the Ascended Astarion romance). The possibility of a breakup is a common sideline for romance, yes, it should exist in RPGs, but to give it so much importance, to define the romance by it, is ridiculous. But the haters really fucked up AA fans with their “you can't break up with him”. And it's worth pointing out the hypocrisy of praising “Endless Thirsty Fan Art” and sex speedruns on the one hand, and on the other - note the very title of the article, “Baldur's Gate 3 writer's explanation of Astarion's ‘bad’ ending is a wake-up call for players lusting over RPG characters.” Players are being insulted and called gooners for… Wanting to help their beloved character in a plot quest! Just to prevent a tragic outcome for him with “Astarion will remain a spawn forever” and a finale that looks and is essentially a poorly executed quest for an evil companion. And I'm not at all against the first one, I fully support diversity and providing different options in games so people can fulfill whatever sexual fantasies they want without any judgment, but just without this kind of hypocrisy and trying to insult and ruin the game for a portion of the audience who paid the same price for the game as everyone else.

In the game Baudelaire Welch seems to have decided to “shame” fans of vampire romance - in the dialog of non-romantic Astarion after meeting Oblodra in Act 2 we can hear his line: “There's nothing more desirable in the world than a vampire, is there?” and their favorite “degradation” (“It's degrading that people like her fall for it”). This gives haters the opportunity to compare fans of the Ascended Astarion to this very same Oblodra. In order to learn about Oblodra's attraction to Astarion one must play through the game without having a romance with him. Otherwise the meaning of the insult slips away (as it did for me the first time I saw such a comparison, thanks to Arachnomancer for commenting on my previous post with detailed lines). How unrealistic this line sounds in the world of Faerûn, where vampires are feared and clearly not “desired”, well, it's a pretty well known phenomenon that when the agenda comes to the forefront, the lore of the world, realism and other things of little importance to preach cease to matter. It's possible to imagine that Astarion might have encountered something similar in the past, but in the rest of the game, except for this place, attitudes towards vampires are shown differently. In the romantic dialog, Astarion can say, “People don't trust vampires - perhaps understandably - so I needed to get someone on my side. And seducing you was easy, frankly.” He needed protection, because people don't trust vampires, which sounds logical. And the motivation to seduce Tav for the sake of that protection made sense too. Astarion admits that Tav was his first (in terms of a bite, the first person to voluntarily give him their blood, and Astarion took it as a gift “This is a gift, you know. Thank you - I won't forget it.") And he definitely was hiding the fact that he was a vampire, when he was forced to seduce victims for Cazador. The Curse of the Vampyr book (the first of which is literally right in the first tomb) - also illustrates how vampires are treated in the world of Faerûn. Companion reactions after the bite scene. The girl in the sewers (whom Petras has invited, in order to drink her dry, celebrating what he thought would become his freedom), we can tell her that the guy she's waiting for is a vampire, and she'll be scared and completely unwilling to stay waiting for the most desirable lover. Astarion also didn't want to risk stirring our desire too quickly and hid the fact that he was a vampire, early in the adventure. What fans of vampire romance got was preachy, and RPG fans got degradation. The degradation of the genre, when in Act 3 you suddenly get an RPG novelization.

And it's funny how with one hand, bestiality is added to the game (Baudelaire Welch also authored the infamous bear scene, which they say was done for the sake of some “horny shitposting” fans who do it with their friends on Discord, you can see more about it in their “Romance Design in Video Games” lecture below, and game magazines have also written about it, “A sort of shit-eating grin was on my face when I was pitching it”), and the other hand is an accusation for players who like vampire romance. Well, okay, they don't accuse all vampire sexualizers (if you don't let Astarion Ascend, he won't stop being a vampire, but he is allowed to be sexualized), they only accuse players who like healthy vampire romance (when the vampire is healthy, not burning or starving), and try to claim that we're “experiencing the pleasure of degradation”.

But, the main thing is that Larian did not force players to finally break up with the game and changed Tav's facial expressions in the kisses to adequate ones. The animations of the D/s scenes for Ascended Astarion's kisses were filmed separately, and the words “scared, sad and pained”, (were discovered by the modders in the game's code) were used in order to draw the facial expressions of a rape victim on the faces of the player characters as a “Valentine's Day gift”. There is no confirmation that this was the entire studio's idea. Stephen Rooney, sadly, left Larian before patch 6 was released and he had nothing to do with these disgusting scenes. Patch 7 fixed this, and most likely led the kissing to the version of the content that was previously intended as fanservice. During Larian's appearance at PAX West 2024, when answering a question about sexuality in BG3, Adam Smith mentioned that they purposely added "kinky" sexual scenes into the game to make things more authentic, and that they consider that a good thing that they're proud of. He said, "We wanted it to feel authentic... I don't think sexuality should be controversial; different kinks, arousals, fetishes, whatever it might be... I think it's okay for things to be sexy.” Larian positioned the romance in BG3 as a dating simulator before, and by including BDSM romance, they chose Astarion for the dominant role because he's best suited for it. And the horrible faces for the player character is like Welch's attempt to “finish their novel” (as their fans used to threaten that “the novel must be finished”) at the expense of a wonderful character written by Stephen Rooney and at the expense of cheating players (patch 6 in regards to Astarion's fanservice was a fraud and consumer deception - given that the genre of the game purchased was RPG and the roleplay in the romance line was absent and replaced with low quality fanfic). Unfortunately, these scenes were also triggering and triggered PTSD in many people. (“New Astarion kisses in Baldur's Gate 3 have a disturbing effect on fans and here's why”).

Perhaps Mx Welch thought this was some kind of uniquely innovative approach. In his lecture Romance Design in Video Games:

youtube

Welch presented a list of what they think will make romances in games more interesting for players (and what I would call “A Practical Guide: How to Make a Player Unhappy in Your Game with Romantic Relationships.”):

It seems like the disgusting “kisses” designed to victimize the player by stripping them of agency and painting horrible faces on their characters was a failed attempt at realizing point 6. And the haters “fandom” with their “Cazador 2.0”, “soul loss” and other nonsense that is based on nothing is a realized point 5. So seeing gaslighting in a BG3 game definitely succeeded, albeit not in the romance of the game, but in the fandom. In AA romance, there's an opportunity for a roleplay of a toxic partner, all the negativity goes through Tav - lines for Tav (like “You're like Cazador”), imposed facial expressions, no opportunity for roleplay there, where it might have elicited some particular deep emotional reaction from Astarion (you can see the potential of AA's romance in chatbots, even in hater's chatbots, how much he loves and reacts if the player has the opportunity to write their lines, but, in the game, alas, we have a scene of 4 negative lines). Plus “mind-reading” with “degradation” is an imposition on the writer's (Welch's) position. It's a tricky screenwriting move (but “tricky” in a bad way) - the line reflects Astarion's inner state, combined with his character, his inner pain and his self-esteem because of his trauma, and that's what Welch used. But combined with the inability to do anything about it, we get trapped. We have to validate this self-perception of his, while at the same time allowing the author to stigmatize ourselves and fit us to their narrative, as in the tale of the Little Mermaid, who gives her voice to the Witch to save the prince. Plus it gives an opportunity for someone to take that line as if Astarion sees Tav as inferior to himself, or twist it to favor their propaganda. The dialogue scene before this is also a deliberate violation of all laws of the RPG genre - it's purposely done this way, in order to make the player look like a “sexualizer” and give a “feel bad ending”. I believe Welch's contribution is primarily Tav and the lines for Tav (yes, and all those relationship-breaking lines). Of course, Welch did some good stuff ("Aeterna Amantes. Lovers forever, until the world falls down” is their line, according to their fans, the scene of Act 2 is also good and very touching). Exactly what other Ascended Astarion lines belong to their pen is probably unlikely to be known for sure. I've read that Stephen Rooney wrote the epilogue and Astarion at the party after the epilogue, but I have no confirmed evidence of that. But it seems true - the adorable animations of Astarion at the party - the bat, the costume, the way Astarion throws the cup, plays with daggers, etc. seem to me to match Rooney's writing. And the lack of hugs and kisses just for us, just for our fandom, just for our Astarion is more like Welch's solution. Although, considering that even after Welch left, even though they changed our faces, none of the other requests were fulfilled, perhaps the blame for the deterioration of Astarion's romance also lies with those who officially own the rights to the BG3 characters - Wizards of the Coast. Shortly before Patch 6, Wizards of the Coast had mass layoffs of people, many of whom had worked with Larian and interacted with them about the BG3 game. At the very least, don't blame it solely on Welch, there were probably other individuals willing to shove this trashy preaching to players in romance and label Astarion as an “abuser”.

I would also like to call attention to this quote from the Baudelaire Welch lecture:

“In this dialogue, I directly wanted to make the player feel bad for having learned the mentality of click-the-right-dialogue-options-to-get-sex-in-video-games, as that's kind of been baked into us as romance players of previous generations of RPGs. In this scene, it's you click the sex options and you'll further traumatize a traumatized person.”

Yes, this is referring not to the Ascended Astarion romance, but the heavy and rare scene where Tav can force Astarion to have sex with them during the act 2 confession scene. Yes, it's a hard scene, I watched it on video, Astarion is really painful to watch. But… Where has the esteemed author seen players with this “mentality,” who will actually click on lines with a hint of sex in any situation? Specifically this scene in BG3 is only experienced by game testers, with the desire to check all of Astarion's reactions, to watch maximum content, and they choose every possible option to get to know the game and the character from all sides. Well, or post a rare scene on their youtube channel. Even the very first line that leads to this scene, “I was hoping that as a reward for my support you'd throw yourself to me” is for a roleplay of an extremely weird character, to whom a headshot won't damage their brain. And even though the scene itself is strong, heavy and tough, but no one sees it, “roleplaying themselves” and choosing what they want to choose. Treating the players like idiots, that will actually choose this and wanting to “teach them something”? Again, there's no problem with that in this scene, it's not in the main playthrough, you can watch it from youtubers, you can play it yourself in “test mode” to analyze the character and learn more about Astarion. But, ahem, isn't the same attitude shown already in the main story scenes, like the dialog after the Ascension and the attempt to show/impose something through a check that you can only agree with? I really wish that authors of games in the RPG genre, where player agency and choice are supposed to be present, would realize that players are mostly adults and are not going to “learn” anything in games, much less dislike any kind of “preaching” towards them. And if you consider the audience to be idiots, it might produce bad writing, and the audience, in turn, will certainly judge the quality of such writing and criticize it. True wordsmiths may influence the audience, but they don't try to “teach” or “force”. They tell a story - logical, coherent, with room for roleplay and choice. You probably need to be a genius and a master of manipulation to introduce some ideas without being noticed, but it's very difficult, it's better to just write a good script.

Baudelaire Welch is also very fond of fanfics:

“The last part of how do we make our romance feel better for players? Wish fulfillment is forgettable. Players who go to write fanfiction are just as interested in hurt as they are in joy. Hurt is something to analyze. Hurt is a dilemma, and behind it is a moral choice.”

“I know because I was writing fan fiction about Baldur's Gate 3 before I worked on it”.

“It feels like a watershed moment in gaming history, where the fanfiction community felt like we were not a subculture within a fandom, but the majority audience that the game was catering to”.

Well, it doesn't take a statistical expert to realize that the main audience is still just playing the game and not writing fanfics. And those who do write, write completely diverse plots and completely varying quality. There are quite a few beautiful, strong and interesting works written about Ascended Astarion, but there are also some nausea-inducing “abuser” fantasies. Patch 6 was only suitable as a video insert for this, rather disgusting, mediocre and very far from the real image of Astarion category of fanfics. It's not the best option to take a small fraction of the total number of players (those who write fanfics at all), from them choose an even smaller fraction - those who write crappy fanfics, and make a romance for them, screwing up the story for the main consumer - those who bought the game according to its genre (RPG) and with faith in the already known Baldur's Gate setting.

Welch is also known to have worked on Dark Urge and on Astarion's dialog for Dark Urge:

The post with this message has been removed from Reddit. An Imgur link with a screenshot of the post was saved by one of the commenters. The quality is poor, so here's a reprint:

"It was me! So thank you! I am the Dark Urge writer, but I worked on writing for Astarion for several months during crunch. Because I had the opportunity to, I added a lot of extra interactions between the two characters. That’s why Astarion gets a bunch of I dialogues for the Dark Urge, and none of the other characters do. I'm sure we would have liked to have every character repeatedly check in on the dark urge, but there wasn't really time/budget for it. I just was working on the two characters at the same time and wanted to squeak in him being super supportive and worried about you throughout the game.

Neil absolutely killed it, though. I'd totally forgotten I'd added the scene where you try to break up with Astarion because you're worried about endangering him, and he absolutely doesn't let you.

But the Neil delivery of those lines have now totally burned that moment into my brain endurindly, he's just so sweet and anxious for you there".

Baudelaire Welch was selected for the role by Swen Vincke himself because their "mother worked partially on the script for Silence of the Lambs, the movie". (source: "The lead writer of Baldur's Gate 3's Dark Urge was extremely squeamish at first, which shows you can do just about anything if you set your mind to it.")

In general, that's the major of what I know about Baudelaire Welch's contribution to AA history (I apologize for the occasional digression in the form of my own assessments of this or that aspect, but it affected me a lot as a player at the one time). And about what you said about “the story was watered down” even though it was really only the expression on Tav's face that changed - the player character (!), a character that in RPGs has always belonged to the player and the job of a good writer is to provide enough choices and reactions for the roleplay so that the player can find a suitable option and make their own choices - that's a good point. Haters constantly claim that we were demanding a “rewrite of AA”, whereas we were demanding a return of agency, actually, something that has always been there in the same wonderful old games that Mx Welch criticized for supposedly superficial romance. These games didn't have such superb motion capture as BG3, thanks to that and Neil Newbon's superb play Astarion and his romance was so beautiful and clingy, and of course thanks to Stephen Rooney for creating Astarion (a character like Astarion hasn't been in any game before either). But the romance in these old games was written perfectly. I never had such problems with roleplaying as in BG3, in any RPG game I've played, I always had enough lines and reactions, so it can't be called some kind of picky or inflated requirements, if all other games of this genre were fine with it. In interactive novels, where you play as some ready-made character with their own prescribed personality, who act independently in some scenes, and somewhere you can choose options/replies for them and these options are limited - this approach is perceived normally and will not be an imposition, you may not like the character, but it happens. But for an RPG, having the player create their own character/self is just bad writing. As if you “have to” feel, perceive events the way the author demands. No, it's authors who have to write in such a way that immersion is not interrupted. And those whining about “rewriting AA” basically wanted the PCs to be part of their “story” and Astarion had nothing to do with it. By the way, Astarion himself is really great in the romance, I love all his lines, so for the lines of Astarion that were written by Baudelaire Welch, I can only thank them. But not for “Tav.” In general, the very idea of forcing a reaction and trying to fit the PC to “their own vision” is a big mistake. I'll make my decision to buy the next Larian game based on whether they'll treat Tav as a “storytelling tool” or make an RPG with enough roleplay and choices. And whether they'll listen to some next bunch of haters who want other players' beloved character to “not have a happy ending”. After patch 6, Astarion's “romance” looked like this:

(From Larian Forum, by Ametris)

Fortunately, this “novel” was not completed, and player agency is now present in the game, at least for those players who are fans of D/s romance. Modders have returned agency to the rest of us (at least PC players).

And yes, if someone starts “accusing” me and other people who gave negative criticism of Welch's work of “hating”, I would ask them to first find out the difference between “hating” and evaluating the author's work. Well, and evaluating the author's attitude towards the audience, based on their statements (it's pretty weird to spit at an audience and expect the audience to take it enthusiastically). Baudelaire Welch is currently no longer at Larian, and I wish them every success in their future endeavors.

#ascended astarion #astarion #bg3 #baldurs gate 3 #astarion ancunin #bg3 astarion #baldur's gate 3 #astarion bg3 #baldurs gate astarion #lord astarion #astarion romance

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liltaireissocute · 5 months ago

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[PERC'ILDAN]

A phrase said by Vax in ep 29 3:50:30 had absolutely shattered my mind and soul with how much care, understanding and concern for Percy are in those words

+ version without subtitles

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momentomori24 · 9 months ago

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I saw a "Yttd hot takes" post yesterday and it actually tickles my brain a bit how the majority of responses are not hot takes at all and mostly boil down to not caring for/hating Midori and saying that he's not deep or interesting at all and very surface level, thinking soushin is "proship" and if you like it you're probably an abuser irl or that you're ""romanticising"" abuse (that word needs to be put on the highest possible shelf btw) if you interpret it as romantic and that the greenblings reveal sucks because somehow it means that Sou and Kanna aren't found family anymore. There's having hot takes and then there's misunderstanding characters/dynamics and spouting the same dangerous bs all fandoms do, and 95% of the responses leaned heavily towards the latter options.

I have opinions on that greenblings take, but those soushin and Midori takes are something else and by that I mean not at all. Like, I'm sorry, but if your "hot take" doesn't oppose the general consensus of the fandom you're in, it's not a hot take. You're serving me white rice with unseasoned chicken and bland curry and I call that false advertising.

#yttd #your turn to die #i'm actually a lot more amused than mad cuz it's comically silly #how do you think “i don't care for this character and its main relationships at all and can't find anything worth analysing or interesting-#-so fans of this character are just reaching cuz there's nothing there tbh" and not connect the dots XD yeah gee golly i wonder why that is #this is just classic yttd twitter being yttd twitter so it's nothing surprising but c'mon at least give me something actually spicy #i want to hear opinions that are not just the same “x character/ship is overrated/mid/underrated” over and over again #give me something that challenges a popular headcanon without bastardising the character to do it #highlight a legit issue in the fandom that barely anyone talks about cuz they all buy into it #i deadass need someone to be like “i actually ship keisara and think it fits the characters and their personalities” or something like that #regardless of if i agree or not i can respect someone saying that with their whole chest in a fandom as puritanical and antiship as yttd's #well the temperature of that take changes depending on where you say it but i'm talking about the western side of the fandom specifically #if your hot take doesn't make people wanna crucify you then what's the point #momento rambles

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thatone-churro · 2 years ago

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y’know just as soon as i start getting comfortable with the idea of being open/relying on my dad and him being more comfortable with my choices than i feared, i can essentially throw all that out the window with how vehemently he yelled at me at the thought of my getting my septum pierced (even though i never said i was yet. i said my side before i decide anything else). also making underhanded remarks of me never getting tattoos other than the one for my mom. like okay don’t ask me why i don’t tell you about anything or talk to you or anything. what the fuck.

#‘i love you no matter what’ and ‘you’re an adult and as long as your choices make you happy’ out the window i guess.#are we too sober for those statements to apply all of a sudden?#and again i didn’t even say i was getting it any time soon. i said my sister wants to take me to get my first non-ear piercing.#she’s getting hers repierced & i want to get my side.#and then he started going off on me for it for no reason. and brought up the one tattoo i want to get for my mom.#and THEN made an off handed remark of a similar vein about dyed hair.#i hope he knows he’s literally the only reason i don’t have piercings or tattoos or dyed hair or like anything that lets me look how i wanna #like deadass. i know i’m your ‘baby.’ but can i please actually embrace myself. i don’t care if you don’t like alt culture. i do.#he would shun the girls i crush on fr like oh my god.#like if he knew what i really wanted to look like i think he’d disown me. won’t even have to bring up my funky relationship with gender.#literally as soon as i start thinking i can be open with this man he pulls this shit and then asks why i’m slowly getting more distant.#like wow it’s almost like i’ve been regulated and raised according to what you want and not what i want.#and you wonder why my sisters (especially my oldest who has a lot of piercings & tattoos like i want) aren’t close either? isn’t that wild?#how we never got much of a chance to explore this without reprimand until we were moved out? even as legal adults?#absolutely WILD correlation there i wonder if the causation lines up here pa. what the fuck.#anyway i’m gonna go now and not cry because my roommates are home but i’m gonna go sulk because i’m sick of this ✌️#oh wait convenient that the showdog poem went up tonight too isn’t that crazy. man calls himself out so hard lol #grace being stupid #text post #personal

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kodokberjamur · 3 months ago

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<333

why do you like treyjade so much? what is the thing about that relationship that draws you to it, and what is it that draws them to each other?

honestly this is why i keep thinking that i am not the best person a person can get their supply of treyjade from i don't have enough braincell to deliver them justice, bcs both of them are intellectual individuals in disguise that needs deeper clever writing INSTEAD U GOT THEM IN WHATEVER MESS I WROTE THEM IN FHSDH, that's why it's hard to understand how lovely their dynamic can be.

To start, these are their similarities. They have same vice duties. Jade loves growing things at botanical garden, Trey is in science club which also spends time at botanical garden. Trey bake, Jade brew tea. Trey cook, Jade eat. Simple enough.

And when they are together...

I love that Jade is completely off work/butler mode when with Trey. He is just a very spoiled someone who is very tired and just wants to be comforted with Trey. And of course Trey can be comforted the same way. This is easily one thing that brings connection between them.

Here's what my favorite couple is usually about. I can easily see them as adults that gets into meaningful long lasting relationship. Thanks to the japanese fandom, they are usually drawn in domestic relationship. Just living in the same house, spending their comfortable life together as an adult couple.

Jade can sense there are more under Trey's normality mask. If u consume more smart writing from other artists, Jade is /that/ curious about Trey that he tries to make Trey mad to see how it is if he loses his composure.

But Trey being actually smart, he can actually repel or counter Jade's taunting attempt with underlying smarter move. Which makes it even more interesting to Jade to keep on trying.

And another certain artist has Jade actually convincing Trey, that he doesn't have to stay normal, because he knows what Trey truly wants is abnormality. Trey just stays normal, because after getting Riddle in trouble & stirring trouble with Riddle's mom, it kinda traumatized him in a way. so in this other case, Jade just knows Trey is as messed up as Jade can be if Trey just let himself free, and he wants to unleash him & be (evil) partner hand in hand.

♡♡♡ Well, it's a secret. But Trey is actually bolder than you think. He is not easily repulsed or disgusted as you think. He would even break a 'law' or two to do things with Jade, like ... doing it in the school ground. (Riddle would be so mad, don't tell him) Which make them actually able cater on each other desires & quirks.

THIS PART MAKES JADE SO MOE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love that IT MAKES JADE ACTS SMALL THAN TREY WHO IS ACTUALLY SMALLER THAN HIM WHICH SUPPOSEDLY DOESN'T MAKE SENSE BUT HE DID IT!!!!!!! H E IS A B A B Y !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

DAINTY TALLER JADE AND WELL BUILT SHORTER TREY????? SIGN ME UPPP!!!!!!!!!! THIS IS A BALANCE I CANNOT RESIST!!!!!

FSHDSHS CAN'T U SEE HOW MOE ITT IS FOR JADE TO BE THE TALLER ONE, WHEN TREY IS THE HEAD IN THE RELATIONSHIP????????

THE WAY TREY CAN STILL 'TOP' THE RELATIONSHIP DESPITE THE HEIGHT DIFFERENCE!!!!!!! THE WAY HE HAS NO FEARR OF THE TALLERR JADEEE AND JUST HOLD HIS NECK FROM BEHIND AND KISSES HIM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SCREEAMSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This might be similar to the previous questions ago, but to me, they are more of themselves when they are together. They break from their usual duty masks. Trey is not just caring others out of responsibility. He actually have great fun feeding Jade and seeing him eats.

And Jade is not just following behind like a serving servant. He actually wants to be a baby girl, get on to Trey's lap, be patted, and bury his head over Trey's shoulder. AND U SHOULD LET HIM!! FSHDSHD

Jade not able to fly? CUTE! Jade always hungry? CUTE! Jade passionate about something? CUTE!! Jade love mushroom SENSELESS?? CUTE!! JADE PRETENDS HE IS DAINTY BUT HE CAN EASILY FIGHT A GROUP OF HOOLIGANS HIMSELF????? CUTTTEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!

(EH ? ? TREY . T R E Y . P L EA S E C OM E B A C K T O Y O U R S EN S E . ;;;;)

Jade is so beautiful, how can he resist ? Despite being so dangerous, Jade is so ? C u t e ? ? how can he resist ? ? Does mermaid just naturally chant enhancement on human? O H , how can he reisist ? ? ? ? A R E H I S G L A S S E S J U S T F A U L T Y ? ? ? ? ? ? Oh Trey. Keep on guessing.

Mountain hiking? Camping? Cooking? Planting things? Alright, let's go. Outdoor wear Trey's lines said, "People get to research whatever they want in the Science Club which means I get to hear about all sorts of fascinating stuff" "Rook lectured me on proper hiking technique before we left. His tips have been pretty helpful" He actually listens, man. It seems like he is deliberately packing himself with LOADS of information so he can handle any possible situation. But he listens & actually digests the information Jade rambles to him. And that's the important thing.

O H ! The never ending fun ! ! Trey is a tough nut to crack. His defence meter skyrocketed up to the space. He is like an enrichment toy for Jade. But does Jade know that Trey is accumulating plan to also get back on Jade? Maybe not as evil. Maybe not as mean. But a win, is a win! U're gonna for sure make that pouty face, Jade.

You said what you said, Trey! No takesies, backsies! Have u seen Trey in Octavinelle uniform tho??? HE LOOKS LIKE, he's AT HOME! And for sure, Jade is muffling his voice at the corner right now. ♡♡♡

Their relationship can be sweet and direct, calculated but sweet; or attached but detached at the same time. Some artists took their individuality in more serious manner. Despite how it seems, their relationship doesn't go like actual cliche. They are not foolishly in love. They have first and foremost, sound logic of what they want. I remember this image has jade holding trey's hands while walking to the direction of the sea while the waves crashes on him, saying "sorry i can't go with you". It may seem cold. But in a way it's refreshing. It is a good material for pain for us who watches them. And they are not fake. They do not pretend that love is everything above all. They do not pretend they are actually a good person. They are what they are. And I love them for that. pixiv : (1) (2) (3) (4)

You understand what i mean?

Despite of lacking true ability to deliver how the true treyjade love is like, these are the things that make me fall in love with them. (I may feel like i missed talking about some points after posting this, i'm sure. Because i really love them in many different ways)

Since u come this far, u shall be rewarded. These are drawings from one of my top treyjade artist, toccamia, that has their account locked that you can't exactly re-live the moment I went through to get to this point. If these heavenly pictures still cannot convince you how beautiful their relationship can be . . . G o d k n o w s I ' v e t r i e d .

That's the end your journey of this post. Thank you very much for reading the rambling of lil' me.

#i just really love the amount of contrast they have to one another #and yet they are also eerily similar to each other #both of them have this calm dependable façade going on #but jade does it to catch people off guard. he does it to manipulate. he does it to stab you in the back #trey? he wants 0 trouble. he wants to be the “normal” guy. but he actually knows a LOT. a lot of information that he stores in his head—#—that can come in handy at any moment.#the two are observant. very much so; trey is observant of others; less to take advantage of situations and more to sidestep problems #but he can also take control of the situation #however he tends to “rewrite” problems; temporary solutions. much like his signature spell.#jade on the other hand; he's observant to get the upper hand. he's always watching to note your weak points waiting to exploit at any momen #with that; they also OBSERVE each other #just like this post says! jade observes trey; pokes on his “weak points” but trey can actually deflect and counter jade's advances #which is intriguing. because trey just NEVER falls for his manipulations #eventually the intrigue becomes something... more.#the way these two fit like two puzzle pieces that are meant for each other #other than their obviously matching interests and skills of course #they bring out different sides of the other #trey lets jade become vulnerable without fear. when someone as guarded as trey TRUSTS you... it's something else.#and jade brings out the more mischievous side of trey. trey doesn't have to be the perfect vice-housewarden around jade #basically they can take off their masks when it's just the two of them.#it's like dancing with someone in a masquerade ball #both always wear masks. both are participating in this careful dance #elegantly following the same rhythm. keeping up with each other. it isn't clear who leads the dance.#but what if the mask slips?#guys they have so many parallels with each other. i just can't mention them all #tl;dr—the way their personalities seem to clash yet also fit so well... it's so unique #thank you for feeding us the treyjade content that we need #and for understanding their nuance in so much depth; so so well #reblog!!!#torejei...

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mw00nie · 1 month ago

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older boyfriend nanami headcanons

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A/N: i have exams soon so i have lots of ideas to write so i'm posting as much as i can rn 😭😭 also these contain some nsfw

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older boyfriend!nanami who always adjusts his pace to match yours. whether you're walking down a busy street or folding laundry side by side. He’s not rushing anywhere when he's with you. Being present with you is the point.

older boyfriend!nanami who folds your laundry exactly the way you like it. even your silly socks. even your oversized tshirts. he’s meticulous and thoughtful, and you didn’t even ask him to do it.

older boyfriend!nanami who keeps track of the smallest details: how you take your tea, what skincare products you’re running low on, that one book you said you wanted but never bought. He doesn’t announce it. You just find things quietly replaced or added to your shelf.

older boyfriend!nanami who doesn’t mind being teased for being a little bit of an old man. You’ll call him grandpa for drinking herbal tea before bed or sighing when he sits down, and he’ll just raise an eyebrow and say, “And yet you still insist on keeping me around.”

older boyfriend!nanami who keeps one of your hair ties around his wrist even though his hair is short. says it’s “just in case,” but you’ve never actually seen him use it. You catch him playing with it absentmindedly during meetings.

older boyfriend!nanami who calls you “darling” when he’s tired and his guard is down. It slips out like second nature; warm, low, reverent.

older boyfriend!nanami who always makes sure you’re walking on the inside of the sidewalk. It’s instinctive, not performative. If you switch sides by accident, he’ll gently guide you back with a hand on your lower back, no need to comment on it.

older boyfriend!nanami who sends you articles and short stories during his lunch break that “reminded me of you” sometimes it’s thoughtful, sometimes it’s hilarious, but every time it’s his way of saying I’m thinking about you.

older boyfriend!nanami who reads to you in bed when you’re too tired to focus. voice low and steady, thumb rubbing slow circles into your thigh as your head rests against his shoulder.

older boyfriend!nanami who doesn’t raise his voice when he’s upset. His anger shows in restraint. longer silences, slower breaths, the way he closes his eyes for a second like he’s trying to steady the weight of what he feels instead of letting it lash out.

older boyfriend!nanami who apologizes when he’s wrong. sincerely, without ego, and who listens when you’re upset. even if he’s tired. even if the day was long. You matter more.

older boyfriend!nanami who listens when you talk about your day. actually listens. Not just nodding along, but making thoughtful comments, remembering coworkers’ names, and offering advice only if you ask. Sometimes he just says, “That sounds exhausting. I’m proud of you for handling it.”

older boyfriend!nanami who takes his time undressing you, piece by piece, like every layer is a gift. You get the sense that he doesn’t see it as just getting you naked. it’s about revealing the parts of you you trust him with.

older boyfriend!nanami who is very aware of his size, not just in height but everywhere. He’s careful, unless you ask him not to be. And when you do? His restraint crumbles just a little. He’ll fuck you slow but deep, jaw tight, voice strained with want.

older boyfriend!nanami who is unexpectedly vocal in bed. low praise, soft groans, breathy murmurs of “just like that” and “you’re doing so well.” Always with a hand somewhere on your skin like he’s grounding himself through touch.

older boyfriend!nanami who isn’t into degrading or overly rough stuff, but dirty talk? Soft filth murmured into your ear while he’s deep inside you? Absolutely. “You’re taking me so well.” “You don’t even know what you do to me.” “I’d give you anything.”

older boyfriend!nanami who fucks you with his whole body, not just his hips. His arms around you. His lips on your skin. One large hand holding your jaw gently while he kisses you deep and slow like he’s reminding you (and himself) that you’re real, and his.

older boyfriend!nanami who prefers intimacy over performance. He’s not interested in theatrics. he wants to feel you, slow and deep, with your hands tangled in his, your breath on his neck, your voice in his ear.

older boyfriend!nanami who’s very composed most of the time, but the second you take control, straddle him, or kiss down his chest, that composure cracks. his voice gets breathier. his grip on your hips tightens. you see the restraint unraveling in real time.

older boyfriend!nanami who gets possessive in subtle, understated ways. he doesn’t say “you’re mine” in bed, he shows it in the way he touches you like you're sacred, the way his voice deepens when someone else flirts with you, the way he fucks you slow and deep like he’s leaving something behind.

older boyfriend!nanami who loves aftercare. loves wiping you down, pulling you into his arms, holding your hand against his chest. He’ll murmur, “You okay?” with his lips at your hairline, and doesn’t fall asleep until you do.

older boyfriend!nanami who takes his time during aftercare. he wipes you down with warm towels, gets you water, runs a bath if you're too sore. he massages your thighs, kisses your forehead, and holds you close with his arms tucked protectively around your waist.

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#x yn #fanfic #fluff #jjk nanami #jjk #jjk x reader #jjk smut #nanami x reader #nanami kento #jjk kento #kento x reader #kento smut #kento x y/n #kento fluff #kento nanami

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rexhya · 2 months ago

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note — i accidentally posted the hcs before i was done! >~<, more anul content :>

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yandere!prince who drives himself mad over every interaction you have with another male, it's an unspoken rule that no one is allowed to look you in the eyes because the clingy bastard has a careful and constant eye watching over you

anul hardly ever lets you out of his sight, he goes, you go, you go, he goes. it's law.

so on the rare cases where he does have to leave your side, safe to say he's more than just a little grumpy. ( he slit the throat of his personal advisor because he was talking to loud )

your just doing you job, the job you were meant to do, cleaning and preparing for a party held for nobles in his upcoming inauguration. anul is obviously dreading this party, his father is being picky about evey little thing and said he'd banish you if he tries to bring you along. (he doesn't actually care he just is waiting patiently for the day he becomes king and his fathers word will mean nothing)

whats worse is theres this insect on his arm, buzzing nosily to him about nothing, the only good thing that actually came from it's mouth was when she asked about you.

"Oh you mean [Name], she's perfect isn't she?" He doesn't wait for a response, Anetha is dying listening to him go on and on and on about you, and she hardly gets it anyway! Your a maid, born from slum and you're hardly that pretty anyway, what did the Prince of Salttion see in you.

She makes a horrible mistake and tries to find out herself.

"Hello m'lady how may I he—" you don't get to finish your sentence before Anethea's gaurds are stomping you into the ground. It's not like you havent been in a situation like this before, but it's the fear of not knowing if you'd be able to escape let alone survive that makes you sob tears into your blood.

You're shoved into a closet before your found, Anul had tore every room apart looking for you ( literally, the door came flying off it's hinges as you fell to the ground unconscious. ) and sees pure, blood raging red when he cradleds your head in his lap. not even his father tries to reprimand him for his attentiveness to you, who ever had done this would pay in blood.

He can't control his breathing as they cart you away, he's right there with you of course, Anetha watching pleasantly, he catches the look and saves it for later.

When you finally wake up you feel sore, definitely brtter then when you were bloody and hurting in the dank closet but sore nonetheless. Anul is right besides you, his long violet hair wafting on your bed, his face planted into the cushions of the mattress breathing softly. How long had you been out? How long had the prince been here? He certainly didn't look like himself, hair messy, clothes rumpled.

You hesitated for a moment, reaching out to stroke his soft wavy hair, then without warning his jumped up and statched at your wrist. His eyes were bloodshot, (had he been crying, did something else happen while you were out?) and the hold on your wrist was only getting tighter.

"A-Anul, you're hurting me." he lets go in an instant and immediately sits up to hold you in his arms.

"Oh god, I thought you—" he choked and let go to place a kiss on your lips. they were chapped, but warm.

you only blinked, he didn't care that you hadn't kissed him back. "I am going to gut that pig alive you hear me?" he said squeezing your cheeks.

"I am going to peel her insides till they look like confetti alright?" he said desperately, "I failed to protect you, and look what happened. Oh my baby, my poor baby." he cried, kissing your cheeks lettinf his tears fall freely on his face.

"And you [Name], are to never leave my side again, I've already made arrangements for you to sleep with me so it won't be a problem." you flinched at the finality in his words but Anul couldn't tell.

All he could see waa the bruising of your face and a lot of bodies he'd have to dispose of, because he wasn't just going after that noble who'd set you up.

For generations he declared then and there anyone involved (directly or indirectly) in the attempted murder of his wife, would die a shameful and slow death.

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lgbtlunaverse · 1 year ago

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I've seen a good number of people ask a question along the lines of "why do characters like Falin and hate Laios when they're so similar?" and i've also seen good analysis on the differences in how the touden siblings carry themselves that would, despite their shared traits, make a person gravitate to one more than the other.

But i feel like we've overseen one very central thing here.

People don't like Falin

Like... the average person in dungeon meshi doesn't like Falin. She was deeply ostrasized by her home village, in magic school she had zero friends before Marcille and the others generally saw her as strange and a bit offputting.

Characters like Namari and Chilchuck like her well enough but not necessarily more than any other member of their party, including Laios. Neither Kabru nor his party think much of her. The canaries don't give a fuck about her. Toshiro's retainers don't see her as anything else than the weird foreign girl their boss has a crush on.

The reason we think everyone loves Falin is because, despite all the indifferent side characters, the 2 most important and central characters of the story are Laios and Marcille. Who are NOT representative of the average attitudes to Falin! But necromancy georg number 1 and 2 are our main eyes into the story and they love Falin so much that it colours our perspective of the whole world.

The only side character who qualifies as liking Falin and not Laios is Toshiro (at least at first, as he ends the story on much better terms with Laios) and that says a lot about his character, with him drifting to the quiet Falin precisely because of her oddness but being both uncomfortable with and deeply jealous of Laios' much more open expression of that oddness. Because he's a repressed guy from a culture where etiquette is incredibly important.

But like I said, that's a specific aspect of him, not to the world at large.

Because there's also people that click more with laios than with Falin.

Kabru, for one, who is initially distrustful of laios but clearly also deeply fascinated by him and drawn to him.

Minor spoilers, and you don't have to read too deeply into this, because I don't think Kabru particularly dislikes Falin or anything. But it's interesting that when he talks about his distrust of the toudens in ch.32 he's talking about them both. But his big friendship declaration in chapter 76 is aimed squarely at Laios, he doesn't say "you and your sister" he says "you"

And Senshi!! He instantly clicks with Laios, well before he does so with anyone else in the party– who he also becomes friends with, it just takes a bit longer– specifically because they bond over their shared special interest in monsters!! Senshi is kind towards Falin and cares for her wellbeing, but he also... doesn't know her. The reason he is even here, helping to save her, is because he and Laios bonded over monsters and he wants to help his new friends out!

Of course, the theme of neurodivergent isolation is very present in Laios' story. I'm not denying that. He does turn people off, without meaning to and unable to fully understand why! But so does Falin. And just like there are people who like her despite of or even because of those traits, there are people who do the same with him.

In conclusion: "Average person loves Falin and hates Laios" factoid actually statistical error. Average person is neutral on both Falin and Laios. Georcille, Laiorg and Geoshiro, who live in the dungeon and think over 10,000 Falin-loving thoughts a day, are statistical outliers adn should not have been counted.

#dungeon meshi #laios touden #falin touden #yes dungeon meshi is a story about the neurodivergent experience (and many many other things)#but through that lens it is also basically autistic wishfullfillment #where people come to see and appreciate you for who you are and your specific special interest is tantamount to saving the world!#and so OF COURSE the two most obviously autistic characters are going to have people who deeply care about them #both despite and because of their autistic traits!!

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darlingsblackbook · 6 days ago

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Zayne x CrushingNurse!Reader | Part Five

Where has your smile gone? ANGST PT.2

Part One • Part Two • Part Three • Part Four

Love and Deepspace Masterlist

I | Zayne drops his voice a little lower than necessary while standing beside you knowing it will usually make you nervous, murmuring, “You’ve stopped stuttering. I almost miss it.” Your heart skips a beat but you keep your face neutral, “I practiced.”, you reply before walking away.

II | Zayne purposely asks you to help with something simple, things he could easily do himself. He knew it made you nervous, he could always feel the ice around his heart melt everytime he saw your hands shake as you tried to help. What he loved even more was teasing you about it. “Hands shaking today?” he asks lightly- carefully. You don’t even smile. “Not at all." He frowns.

III | “Your notes are unusually thorough, much more than usual. Am I making you nervous again?”

“No.”

He pauses. He pauses in that way that would always make you squirm, eye darting everywhere but his way, fingers twisting in the cloth of your scrubs.Now, you don’t even blush.

IV | During rounds, he lingers at your side a beat too long- long enough that you’d normally turn tomato-red and trip over your words. Now, you just shift away and keep taking notes. He stares at you. Silent.

V | You haven't brought him coffee today, nor did you yesterday - or the day before that actually. A routine you had been stuck to for months, suddenly halted. Zayne tried to recall the few days before you started acting so distant, had he done something? Said something? Where has your smile gone? Zayne thought, just as he saw you walk past his office- cup of coffee in hand.

VI | He bumps your shoulder very lightly while reaching for a chart. “Careful,” he says dryly, “wouldn't want our nurse to fall and get hurt." You reply, “There are things that cause a lot more pain than just a fall." He stops mid-motion, like what?

VII | He starts standing closer when reviewing reports with you—close enough that your elbow brushes his. You used to flinch. Now you don’t even react. You shift your chair away and don't even look his way.

VIII | “Nurse." Zayne calls out one day, "Could I speak to you for a moment?" You hesitated for a moment before taking a step forward before halting again at the faint sound of giggles. "I'm busy, Doctor." “Yeah." Zayne mutters, eyes locked on you, "You seem to be a lot these days.” You could barely keep your bottom lip from trembling, responding with a simple, "Yeah." before you walked away.

IX | Zayne starts correcting your minor errors in a purposely sharp voice, just enough to gurantuee a reaction from you - at least it used to. You only say, “Thanks for pointing it out." and fix it. It feels too calm. Too clinical. Nothing like his nurse.

X | He tries to joke during a lull between patients: “Still not a slightest hint of a smile. Should I be worried?” You just reply, “Probably not,” without even looking up. Zayne’s smile falters just slightly.

XI | He casually mentions, “You haven’t tripped over the IV cart all week.” You respond, “I learned how to walk.” There’s no laughter in your voice. It doesn’t sit right with him at all.

XII | He walks up behind you while you’re writing and says your name. A few weeks ago that would’ve made you jump and stammer. Now, you turn slowly, blink, and wait.

“…Yes, Doctor?”

It irritates him- if only you knew how much.

XV | He's done, he can't take it anymore. He corners you one day, just as you're about to leavs, quietly and not so casually this time, “Did I… do something?”

You give him a polite smile. “Of course not.”

"Then why? Why have you been acting like this? Who hurt you?" He fires one question after another.

You feel the tears pool in your eyes but you don't say a word. Not one. You just push those tears back and smile sadly, breaking the doctor's heart into a millions of pieces and walk past him and out of the door.

This is a bit of a filler part but it is needed to fill the gap between the last part and the next one ( a lot of drama will go down )

Taglist : @sylusgirlie7 @jeonjenny @notsurewhattocallthisblog8888 @draftbeerbibi @weebinator01 @satorustorm @asilaydead @ninaandtuna @gremlinartstudio @keyiswatching @dreamlesssleepsaga @eurynam @amerti @neobitch127 @m30wk1ttycat @yuurisfavblog @dysphxriaii @zainaaryam @floofycookie @beesin03 @thatpersonnamedrook @chiikasevennn @ollie-the-fae @dramaticalsachan @babylilxc @minsified @destinysrequiem @xsammijoanneex @hirostrvw @pepperushia @starllight613 @seris-the-amious @moonlight-inthe-sea @luvvhue @gojosballsack69

If I have missed anyone, please let me know! I'll make sure to add you for the next parts♡

#love and deepspace x reader #love and deepspace #lads x reader #lads x you #lads zayne #zayne x you #zayne fluff #zayne love and deepspace #zayne x reader #l&ds zayne #lnds zayne #zayne angst #zayne x nurse!reader #zayne x non mc #zayne x y/n

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stellamarielu · 2 months ago

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soft

jack abbot x female reader

summary: jack gets injured on his shift and you’re there to help him get stitched up, making it impossible for him to ignore the soft side you bring out in him— especially when it makes his heart rate jump alarmingly high.

content: just a whole lot of fluff, reader is a resident on robby’s shift and jack has a capital c crush, i’m talking down astronomically bad, cursing, lots of cheesy banter between robby and jack bc i couldn’t help myself, reader is described to be upbeat and positive, very sunshine x grump coded, also the reader wears bright colors and patterns from time to time [sorry if that’s not your jam it just has to be that way for the plot, you get it], mentions of a brief altercation, mentions of blood and stitches, bad medical terminology [don’t yell at me i tried my best]

word count: 3.5k

author’s note: ok so hi this is my submission for the A DOCTOR A DAY event! but it's also a request from the lovely and talented @letsgobarbs so I thought I'd put them together and make this bad boy. thank you loops for the extraordinary idea, and thank you to my lovely babies, @clubsoft @ananonymousaffair and @letsgobarbs for putting on such an incredible little event! very very excited to see all the entires! my assigned dialogue was, “nothing defines a man like love that makes him soft.” and the color i got was green!

A reoccurring psych patient, and an elbow straight to the eye, landed Jack a seat in his own emergency department.

“I’m fine,” his voice came out with a twinge of annoyance, and a profusion of frustration as he side-eyed Robby from across the room.

But he was indeed, not fine. He was annoyed— borderline livid— at the current situation.

He should be on his way home, not sitting in an open treatment room with blood trickling down the side of his face.

It was completely unintentional, just an unstable patient throwing limbs in an effort to avoid an IV. What he thought would be his last case of the day, was now the reason for his friend making jokes at his expense, while Jack waited to get his brow sutured up so he could finally go home.

“Yeah Okay. Whatever you wanna tell yourself.” Robby’s voice filled the room as he gathered supplies for the simple procedure.

“If Gloria found out you got a work related injury and walked out of those doors without somebody clearing you— on my shift? She’d have my neck.”

“Whatever, just make it fast.”

All Jack could think about was how last night’s shift felt like the longest one he’d worked in a while. Taking a hit straight to the face was just the cherry on top of a dreadful night. The comfort of his bed was starting to look unbelievably far away as his presence at the hospital persisted long after it was supposed to.

“What’s the rush? You got a hot date I don’t know about?” Robby’s expression was a little too amused for Jack’s taste, as he placed a pulse oximeter on his finger.

“Yeah actually, her name is a breakfast bagel from Cal’s and 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep.” Jack stared down at the contraption sitting on his pointer finger, almost chuckling to himself at Robby’s commitment to care.

“A pulse ox? You’re really serious about this whole Gloria thing huh?”

“Yeah she’s been on my ass lately. Plus you got hit pretty hard, gotta make sure you don’t go down on us. Your risk for a heart attack is only going up with your age.” The smug curl of Robby’s lips as he pulled at the latex of his glove, made Jack instinctively roll his eyes.

Before Robby could start stitching, Dana’s voice carried into the room as she passed by the open door, “Robby, we’ve got a motorcyclist coming in. Multiple open fractures, severe blood loss with trauma to the head, and a possible pneumothorax, about 3 minutes out.”

Robby shot Jack a knowing look as if to say, sorry buddy, duty calls.

“Oh c’mon, you’ve got this in three minutes.” Jack was desperate to get out of the hospital and on his way home. He was right, they both knew Robby was more than capable of lacing up two or three quick stitches before he was needed on the incoming trauma.

“As much as I would love to sit here and miss potentially the best case of my day to be ridiculed by you, I’m gonna have to make your fucked up eyebrow somebody else’s problem. Don’t worry, I’ll leave you in good hands.”

The sudden smirk Robby shot his way, had confusion clouding Jack’s mind. It wasn’t until the smug attending was calling out your name, that Jack understood the motive behind Robby’s words.

“Oh, you have to be kidding me.” The murmured annoyance from Jack’s lips sent Robby chuckling.

The laugh was no doubt caused by the memory of a shared confession over a couple of beers not more than three weeks ago.

Jack and Robby went out for drinks on their day off. It was a regular occurrence, but that specific night was a little different, because that night, Jack let it slip that he thought you were pretty.

The men were sat side by side at the bar, recounting some of their best cases of the week, when Robby brought up your impressive intubation record.

Jack’s comment on your abilities had Robby stunned into a quick moment of silence.

“Pretty and she knows how to clear an airway.”

It was a subconscious declaration of affection from Jack, spoken into his glass as he took a sip of beer.

A meek confession that Robby clung to, because he’d always noticed it— the way Jack’s stare lingered a little too long on you in those fleeting minutes when your shifts overlapped.

It was impossible for him to miss his friend’s not-so-subtle flirting when you were around. He’d been patient, waiting for Jack to bring it up first.

“Just your type.”

Robby’s words met Jack in the same way, stumbling off his lips and into his glass before taking a swig.

You were one of Robby’s residents. One of his favorites actually. A phenomenal doctor, always one step ahead of everyone else and charting your own course without having to be told what to do, it made Robby’s life a whole lot easier. What didn’t make Robby’s life easier? Watching his best friend dance around his undeniable attraction to you. He knew better than anyone that Jack had been out of the game for a while.

In fact, he hadn’t seen him show interest in anyone until you came along. Over the three months of shy smiles and round-about compliments paid to each other in passing, you and Jack's interactions had become impossible for Robby to ignore. He'd even tried bringing them up multiple times to see if Jack would admit to having a crush on you, only for him to jokingly brush it off every time.

“You could ask her out, you know?” Robby kept nursing his drink, trying to look nonchalant because the moment he put too much attention on the topic, he knew Jack would shut it down.

“Yeah, we’re not doing this.”

And there it was, right on cue. Shut it down, and brush it off, like he did every time.

“Oh come on Jack. She’s great, you’re great, I see the way your demeanor changes when she's around.”

“Oh does it now?” Deciding to indulge in Robby’s incessant need to meddle in his lovelife, Jack fed into his friend’s accusation with raised brows and chuckle on his lips.

“Yeah you get a little softer.”

“And, what makes you think I’m not just tired after a long night of people griping at me.”

Robby let a brief blanket of silence fall over the two of them before adding one final thought to the conversation.

“Nothing defines a man like love that makes him soft.” Robby smiled as he said it. He knew Jack would give him a hard time for saying something so introspectively cheesy, but he also knew it would resonate with him whether Jack chose to admit it or not.

“I’m sorry?” Jack nearly choked on his IPA at the abnormally poetic words leaving Robby’s mouth.

“Did you just pull that right out of your ass or what?” He was giving Robby a hard time, but couldn’t deny the truth hiding in the statement.

That night he went home and lost more sleep than usual thinking about you— playing out past conversations over and over again in his mind, just to hear you say his name, or to see the captivating curve of your lips. The visions kept him up, even if it was just glimpses of you in his memory.

Robby didn't bring up Jack's comment about you after that night.

A few lingering stares and silent chuckles slipped from him when he watched the two of you interact, but he decided against bringing up that specific conversation. He knew Jack would just dismiss him, and keep to his stubborn reservations when it came to you, so he didn't push.

This was the first time Robby took a chance, venturing into the territory of Jack’s confessed feelings. The timing was impeccable, with him needing to find someone else to do Jack’s sutures. He couldn’t pass up the opportunity to force the two of you to be alone in a room together.

“What can I say? I like watching you squirm,” a low giggle remained on his lips as Robby aimed his words at Jack, just before you appeared in the doorway.

“Hey, what’s going on?”

Soothing with a gentle glimmer of energy, your voice flooded the room in mellow twilight and shimmering stars, hitting Jack’s ears in a way that instantly made his face heat up.

“Dr. Abbot here, took an elbow straight to the face first thing this morning. I was gonna stitch it up, but they need me on the incoming trauma.” Robby barely looked your direction as he spoke, but Jack couldn’t take his eyes off you, only a few feet from him, watching from the doorframe.

“Think you can handle it?” Robby glanced over at you as he joked, a grin stretching across his face.

“I’ve got it covered, boss.” You matched his playful tone, and the whimsical change of your voice made Jack’s eyes divert to the ceiling because— fuck Robby for doing this to him.

“Make sure to keep an eye on his vitals, he took a pretty hard hit.” Robby’s voice carried from down the hall as he walked out of the room, leaving you and Jack alone.

You took to the space in front of Jack.

Your body slid so effortlessly next to him, that he had to fight not to adjust his position under the sudden nervousness of having you so close.

Drawing a quiet breath at the feeling of your thigh resting next to his, he sat still on the edge of the cot. You were on his right side, your left leg gently pressed against him as you leaned closer toward his body to get a good look at his face.

“Damn that’s bad. Someone really had it out for you this morning, huh?” Your fingertips barely touched his temple as you examined his forehead. An audible swallow pushed down his throat at the contact.

He didn’t know what was more embarrassing, his body’s immediate response to your touch, or the fact that he’d nearly been taken out by a patient, and you were the one witnessing him in such a vulnerable position.

“Yeah well, he had a really effective defense response. I'll give him that.”

Thank god his voice didn’t betray him. His words came out clear and concise, despite the fluttering in his chest at your body right next to his.

Then you laughed.

He really loved your laugh. In fact, he went out of his way to make jokes just to hear it. It was soft, but rich. The kind of distinctive, infectious sound you could hear in a crowded room ten years later and know exactly who it belonged to.

“Well, I’m sorry you had to be on the receiving end of it.”

The laughter fizzled from your voice and was replaced with genuine concern as you cleaned his brow. The gentle passes of gauze against his forehead made his mouth go dry, only because he knew it was your fingertips behind the motion.

“Somebody’s gotta take one for the team.” His response was quick as he focused on the words leaving his mouth, trying not to think about the way your hands were working so carefully to take care of him.

Your presence made him nervous enough, but your touch? He couldn’t get a handle on the distraction of your fingers on his skin, even if there was a veil of latex and gauze in between.

You bent further forward into his body, the warmth of your thigh pressing harder against his as your hands carefully angled his head where you needed it, fingertips underneath his jaw, and at his temple. He forced his stare to the floor out of fear that looking into your eyes would send him straight into cardiac arrest.

Looking down at your shoes, he memorized the pattern of your laces to keep himself from thinking about the mildly intoxicating scent radiating from your body. He’d never been this close to you before— close enough to get a whiff of something fresh and so distinctively you.

Maybe it was your shampoo, or laundry detergent? Perfume perhaps?

Shoes. Back to your shoes. It was the same pair of white sneakers you wore most days, but the green socks peeking out at your ankles made him grin. A subtle smile that he was sure you wouldn’t notice as you prepared a needle at your fingertips.

You always wore a pop of color, something to bring your own personal style into the doldrum of the ER.

It was something he shouldn’t have noticed; the patterned shirts you sometimes wore under your scrub top, the red hair tie you left on your wrist every so often, the memorable collection of colorful socks you constantly sported with your tennis shoes…

The subtle excitement of your accessories matched the bright charisma you brought into the building every time you walked through the doors. You appeared every morning like his own personal ray of sunshine, equipped with an irresistible laugh, sweet smile, and lime green socks.

“Are you feeling okay?” His sock induced trance was broken at the sound of your voice— abrupt and concerned.

“Yeah, I’m good.” His eyes peered up only to notice your stare fixed on the pulse ox resting on his finger.

He almost forgot about it entirely, busy with the distraction of your proximity taking over his entire being.

“Your heart rate is just really high.”

Of course it was.

His heart was nearly beating out of his chest from the moment Robby called out your name earlier.

“I’m fine.” He tried to move his hand further from your view, hoping to brush it under the rug, and get a move on with the mortifying interaction.

“Are you sure? If he hit you hard enough to break skin maybe-”

“I promise. I’m fine.” He pulled out a tone in his voice that people usually didn’t argue with. It was a deep, commanding timbre that he had perfected over the years. It came in handy when he had an especially combative patient, or in this case an extremely beautiful woman hounding him for an incredibly humiliating confession as to why he couldn’t get a grip on his bodily reaction to her presence.

“Whatever you say, Dr. Abbot.” Finally giving up the fight, you let a spirited air back into your words. Jokingly dismissing your concern, and trading it in for weary trust as you let him convince you that he was okay despite his alarmingly high heart rate.

“But if you go AFib on me…”

“I won’t,” his voice still held the same robust sound as he looked you straight in the eyes.

“Just stress.” He looked at you as he spoke, and the desperation in his eyes contradicting the tone of his voice.

His stare was tender, and almost pleading while his words spread through the room, sturdy and sure.

“Or adrenaline or something… I’ll be fine.” He didn’t look away as he continued explaining the reason for his quickening pulse. You found it slightly unnerving, and undeniably endearing as he kept his eyes fixed on yours for far too long. His words began to trail quietly, slowly losing their robust momentum.

Jack was in a complete daze. He made the mistake of looking up into your eyes, and now he was stuck, getting lost in the all too familiar color, illuminated by the concentration in your gentle stare. He was enamored.

“Well I’ll be quick so you can get out of here.” You reached down to grab some supplies before bringing your hands back up to Jack’s face, finally starting to suture his brow.

“Although I’m sure Robby would’ve been done by now.” Your eyes zoned in on his injury, while Jack’s stare stayed trained on your face.

“Eh, I’m glad you’re here and not him.” His voice was amiable and subdued, dripping with a delicate sound you’d never heard from him before.

“Why’s that?” Still watching the careful work of the needle threading at his forehead, your eyes narrowed in focus, as the question formed on your lips.

“I’d have to deal with his smartass jokes. Plus, he’s too perky in the mornings.”

“And I’m not?”

He wanted to laugh at your question. Of course you weren’t too perky in the mornings. You weren’t too anything. You were perfect.

“I don’t mind it when you are.” Your movements paused for a split second when the words left his mouth in that same strange, fragile tone.

You could feel his eyes watching- peering up, as you tried your best to keep your attention on your hands.

He felt you stop, internally panicking that he’d said something wrong, he kept talking.

“I just- you’re different.” The words stumbled out, losing a bit of their fragility as they tripped over each other in an effort to reassure you.

Your brows furrowed slightly at the word and Jack was convinced he’d just dug a deeper hole to bury himself in.

“Different?” The one word question left your lips as they struggled to withhold a smile.

You were amused at the way Jack was fumbling over his words.

It was rare to catch him in such a flustered state. You chalked it up to the fresh wound he’d just received, and his abnormally high heart rate that he really should be paying more attention to.

“Pleasant.”

Then you stopped. Longer this time. It must’ve been at least 30 seconds that your fingers paused their threading, as you glanced down at the pulse ox between sutures. Sure enough his heart was racing again.

110 bpm.

You would be concerned about his inevitable descent into a questionable cardiac rhythm if it weren’t for the way his eyes were fixed on yours. His stare was so deliberate, you could feel your own pulse quickening underneath the growing heat of your skin.

“Pleasant? How so?”

112 bpm.

“You just have this way of making everyone happy. It’s subtle. You’re always smiling and positive, but it’s never performative, it’s just who you are.”

A warmth spreads through your body at the compliment, rolling like waves as each of his words washed over you, completely enveloping you in a state of coy flattery.

“You’re just easy to be around.”

The heat threatened to reach your face, as he continued talking. His words were nearly a whisper with his voice floating up to you, low and smooth.

“I like being around you.”

115 bpm.

You open your mouth before you’ve even decided how you want to respond to Jack’s innocent confession, then unexpectedly, a voice that’s not yours fills the room.

“Still not done in here?” Robby came barreling into the room. His presence was loud and boisterous compared to the sheepish exchange taking place between you and Jack.

He stopped a few feet into the room. Seeing your body so close to Jack’s, with your hands still working at the injury on his forehead, and your eyes locked on each other, seemed to make him apprehensive about continuing into the room, like he was interrupting something.

“Jesus, let the man go home.” His chuckle echoed around you as he decided to come closer, inspecting your work.

“That was fast. What happened to that being the best case of your day?” Jack piped up from underneath your touch. He was careful not to move his head as he aimed his question at Robby, eyes averting to the man standing next to you.

“Yeah, it went south pretty quick.” Robby’s voice finally found a level close to silence, as he watched in concentration while you tied off the last stitch.

“You need some help there? I could send in one of the medical students-” He joked looking over at you. He knew you were quick. The way you were taking your time, being overly methodical with Jack, was out of character for you.

“Very funny. I’m done.” You softly glared over at Robby as you took a step back, pulling your gloves off.

“See what I mean about the smartass jokes?” Jack’s eyes were on you, still holding a lingering softness from your unfinished conversation just moments prior.

“Oh so I leave you two alone for a few minutes and you just use it to talk bad about me?” Pretending to be offended, Robby scoffed at the notion of you two discussing his comedic timing, watching as you and Jack just stared at one another.

“Something like that.”

Your response was hidden behind a smile while you and Jack stayed submerged in a brief moment of smitten eye contact and unquestionable curiosity, before you made your way to the open door.

“I’m gonna get back out there. Try not to take anymore elbows to the face Dr. Abbot,” You joked before taking a single step into the hallway, turning your back for a split second to look at him one last time.

“and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

With that, you were already halfway down the hall, onto the next patient.

Robby stared at Jack with a goofy smile forming on his mouth as your absence left the room silent.

“Don’t.”

The single word snapped from Jack as he brushed past Robby, leaving the room before he could be hit with his friend’s smug confrontation.

He left for the day, but not before stopping by the triage desk on his way out, purposefully walking past you just to get one last glimpse of your smile for the day.

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