#it's more that it's made me more aware of certain limitations and that i'm never really going to be considered my own person.

[ferrstappen]

max, the wag (for the third time) l Max Verstappen x reader

a/n: i was in the middle of writing this when news of Danny coming back to the grid!!! omg I'm so happy of seeing RIC and listening to his radios and everything, it wasn't the same without him <3

also, about requests. Please keep sending them, I've LOVED all the reqs I've gotten but right now im getting ready for my bar exam in a couple of weeks so my time is super super limited, but I promise I'll get to most of them (bc imsorry there are some reqs that I really can't connect with) after the exam, it's one of the things I'm looking forward to <3 but for now this kind of mediocre story telling will have to do...

ANYWAY, HOPE YOU LIKE THIS INSTALLMENT! you can find part 1 and 2 on the master list <3

summary: the continuation of your favorite paddock couple.

Max arrived to the track by himself.

If he was being honest, it wasn’t on his plans to walk alone with the photographers, Red Bull marketing team snatching him for stuff right after he swapped his credential. Even from far away he was able to hear chants of fans and more media than usual. 

But you weren’t right there next to him. 

He knew it wasn’t your fault, Silverstone not being a track where he was usually welcomed with opened arms and he was aware of you not wanting to be too in the eye of photographers who didn’t make questions to you, but there still were different WAGs and outfits or whatever accounts tracking your every step, especially with the new wave of partners and sudden break ups and polemics. 

Still, the selfish part of him wanted you to enter the track with him, even if it was a few steps ahead or behind him, holding your hand and smiling as you complained about the amount of credentials you had to carry: the usual green VIP Paddock, Red Bull something. You’d think after all these years they’d know me, you’d say and he’d laugh.

On the other hand, you finished getting ready and called the front desk to get a taxi to get there, feeling a bit guilty of letting Max go on his own, especially when there were more eyes on the track with Brad Pitt being there and a lot of important people who’d want to talk with him all day. 

Texting Max to let him know you were already by the guests entrance waiting when you noticed some intense flashes getting near. You’d been around a time or two to know this wasn’t usual, maybe in Miami but not when you were on the abandoned back entrance, not very glamorous and low key. 

But you saw her…

Shakira, are you visiting Lewis?

Who are you cheering today?

Shakira, third Grand Prix of the year! 

Did you talk to Lewis before? Is he nervous?

Your eyes followed her, mouth opening when you followed her small frame, exuding class and sympathy, even Alexandra who was also making her entrance stopped to get a closer look of the Colombian bombshell. 

Of course, they didn’t ask her to show and get accredited, she just walked by with a radiant smile leaving paparazzi behind as she kept talking with the friend she came with. 

But wasn’t that a Haas credential?

It didn’t matter, it wasn’t important, because right then your brain made the connections and started dialing Max while nervously biting your polished nails. 

“Baby, everything okay? Are you already inside?” Max answered, but his words were quiet and rushed. 

“Yes, but you’re never going to believe…”

“I’m sorry we have a meeting, please don’t go to the paddock, go straight to the driver’s lounge, okay? Love you” 

He hung up and you wanted to pull your hair out, knowing he is the one and only person you wanted to share this information with, and you were also certain he was the only person who would truly appreciate the gossip and speculation about his fellow driver’s love life. 

Max was able to leave the meeting almost forty minutes later, getting outside for some air until he remembered your call and that you probably were bored to death on the lounge. He was turning around to go there when…

When he saw the one and only Shakira in all of her glory. 

He wasn’t starstruck or anything, being immune to celebrities and the imaginary pedestal where most people placed them, but this wasn’t about that, it was about the way she was supposedly hiding under a cap walking towards the Mercedes garage.

He covered his mouth and hastily made his way to you. 

You didn’t greet each other with the usual peck on the lips and short hug; his slightly widened blue eyes told you exactly what you needed to know as he opened the door to his small room. 

“Please tell me that you saw her!” You said as soon as he closed the door. 

“Yes, just now she was walking to Mercedes,” Max was whisper shouting as if someone would hear him and it was the highest of secrets. 

“Did you see Lewis?” You asked Max but he said no. “What if you try to ask Brad Pitt if he saw her and like if they’re friends… with Shakira?” This time both you and your boyfriend laughed at the idea.

"I did see Sainz trying to go unnoticed with a tall brunette,do you think she is the new girlfriend?" Max asked and you nodded.

"I'm pretty sure he cheated on Isa with her, and I am almost certain she was in the Paddock Club in Monaco during qualifying," Max whistled at the new information.

Now he kissed you, lips fitting perfectly against each other, but your eyes suddenly opened and separated from him. What? Why? What happened? Max was disconcerted. 

“Please don’t laugh at me because this is a serious idea…” You told Max who had your entire attention. “What if we write to Deuxmoi?”

“Deux what?”

“They have all the inside scoops  and sightings, even your name’s popped up once or twice,” Max’s eyebrows rose at the information. “We should write that Shakira was seen on the British Grand Prix and I am one hundred percent sure someone will have more information!” You proposed and Max chuckled.

“Schatz, I can just ask Lewis why she’s here,” Max told you before embracing you, his arms circled around your waist.

You rolled your eyes before resting your head on his chest, but suddenly it hit you, swiftly lifting your head and facing Max. 

“Then why haven’t you asked him yet?!”

[creedslove]

DON'T DO THIS 💍

Husband's best man!Joel Miller x f!reader

Summary: He loves you and he can't bear the possibility of seeing you marry another man

Warnings: angst, cheating, unrequited love, mentions of smut

A/N: idk besties, I came up with the idea of a short drabble because of this picture as it gives serious Joel Miller vibes, but not just any kind of Joel Miller, it gives me best man at a wedding Joel Miller kinda vibes 🤩😜

0.9k words

“Please don't do this”

Joel's voice made you jump even if his tone was low, just a little bit more than a humble whisper, making you snap back into reality and turn around to face him.

“What are you doing here, Joel?! You were supposed to be at the altar now, right next to my fiance!” you replied in an urgent, almost annoyed tone.

Joel shouldn't be there, it wasn't his place to be, he was nothing more than your soon-to-be husband's best man, he shouldn't just barge into the room where you'd spent the last few hours getting ready for your wedding, where you'd put on your wedding dress, done your hair and makeup. It was invasive, not only that, it was heartbreaking and tempting. He was a man, a real one, he was broad and strong, he shouldn't be looking at you the way he was; sad and disappointed eyes as he took a step further and placed his hands on your side, locking you in a grip you didn't actually want to break free from, but you knew you had to.

“I thought I could do it, I thought I could watch you marrying him, but I can't, darling, I want you for myself, I know I'm selfish and I have no right to ask you this, but please, don't do this..”

“Joel, what we did… it was a one time thing, I shouldn't have happened, it wasn't right, I cheated on my fiance with you to begin with… I was upset and you were there, you held me and made me feel better. It was special, but it was wrong” you could see the way his face fell, he wanted you, he was willing to give you anything if you stepped out of that crazy idea of getting married and finally stayed with him. Joel wasn't stupid, he was well aware of the fact he didn't have much to offer, but he could give you his heart and all the love he felt for you. The love he gathered through the years, ever since his friend introduced you to him. He tried really hard to let go of that feeling, to play it off as a silly crush, a passing crush, but it was impossible. All Joel could think of was you. Your eyes, your smile, your voice, how beautiful and intelligent you were; suddenly, that man who swore he would never let any other woman break his heart, saw himself at your feet. Allowing you to break his heart a little bit every single day without even knowing. He just watched you from afar, loving you, knowing the man you'd chosen wouldn't treat you as good as Joel would. He wanted you and it killed him he couldn't have you.

You, on the other hand, didn't dismiss Joel from your life. Since the day you met, you were taken aback by the fact he was handsome, gentle, sweet, hard-working and it still baffled you a man like himself wasn't taken; you had a soft spot for Joel, he was attractive, but at the same time you were engaged, your fiance was Joel's friend and absolutely nothing would ever come from that.

Until the night you showed up knocking on his door; you weren't proud of that, it shouldn't have happened. But when you saw your fiance walking through the door covered in glitter and smelling like cheap perfume, you knew something had happened in that bachelor party. You weren't a jealous type, but things had a limit and you were certain it had gone way beyond a simple stripper lap dance. No matter how many times you questioned him, even if he wasn't that drunk, you knew your fiance wouldn't tell you the truth, there was only one man who wouldn't falter being honest with you.

Joel Miller.

So when Joel saw you standing in front of him, mascara smeared down your eyes as you blinked away tears, showing him all the hurt you felt after being played by your fiance, he had no doubts. That motherfucker didn't deserve you, he did. So he tried his best to show you he could be good for you, he could be what you were missing out, the way he held you that night, how you asked him for more and more. He stayed between your legs for what it felt like forever and it wasn't enough for him; he wanted to taste you for the rest of his life.

When dawn came, so did reality shattering him once more, you had got dressed and left, asking him not to call you again, which he did, against all his will. But when he saw the opportunity of seeing you again before you could make the worst mistake of your life, he didn't hesitate. Seeing you in a wedding dress was certainly bittersweet. He loved and dreaded that sight in the same intensity. You looked perfect, but you weren't his.

“You don't love him, you know that, it's not too late. You can be happy, you know I can make you happy, all I ask for is a chance and nothing more”

His hand stroked your cheek as you tried hard to fight the desire you felt for him. What if you simply dropped everything behind and went with Joel?! Would it be too bad? For once not looking back and focusing on your happiness first?! You wish you could do it, but unfortunately it was impossible.

“I'm sorry Joel, but no, I won't don't this”

You said and watched pure disappointment in his eyes, the way his hands let go of your body and he nodded, pursing his lips. The rejection stung so hard he didn't think it was possible, but he couldn't force you into loving him. He wished you good luck in nothing more than a whisper and left you, without looking back.

____

[viv-hollande]

Ok, so this is a post that I should have made sooner. I've been somewhat out of the loop with regards to current events and the state of discourse on this website courtesy of a pretty serious depressive episode from which I am only just now recovering. As I have emerged from this state I have been pushed towards a conclusion about this website and the state of discussion around the ongoing Israel-Gaza War that I had thus far avoided due in part to my barely possessing the energy to keep myself alive and due in part to my denial that the conclusion could be true. But that denial can no longer hold.

It has become openly apparent that the pro-Palestinian camp on this website has become popularly infused with a degree of blatant, aggressive antisemitism that I, in my naivety thought impossible in the days just after October 7. I am trying to avoid turning this into a mea culpa because that would be unproductive and feel self-serving, but I do feel an obligation to admit that I disregarded prescient warnings from Jewish users whose warnings I dismissed as over-blowing a problem that I felt was real, but more limited in scope than they made out.

I'm neither an idiot nor am I ignorant. I am well aware of the long history of antisemitism in leftist politics and in the Palestinian Liberation movement. Back at the beginning of this crisis I was prepared to see the occasional instance of antisemites using the inevitable, overwhelming Israeli retaliation as an excuse to air their hateful politics. I was prepared to see both the well-meaning but ignorant and the malicious alike sharing tweets from antisemitic pro-Palestine accounts, spreading and normalizing low-grade, subtle antisemitism. Make no mistake, this should have been condemned. Antisemitism, like all bigotries, has no 'safe' level. There is no background level of antisemitism that society should just accept as normal. But I was more focused on the inevitable cacophony of suffering that Israel would almost certainly begin meting out, and so I failed to act.

The fatal blow to my denial was the increasing prevalence of the use of quotation marks around the word "Israel" and "Israeli". The first few times I saw this, I didn't really understand what it meant. Still laboring under the belief that antisemitism was a manageable problem on the left, I was certain that most of the users on this site, well-intentioned, goodhearted, critically thinking people that they were, would have recognized and called out even disguised antisemitism before it took over a good 20-40% of all posts about the conflict. I was a damn naive fool. For those, like past me, who have not cottoned on to the meaning of the quotation marks, they have become a way to express the denial of the legitimacy or even existence of, individually or all together, the State of Israel, the Israeli people, or the right of either Jews or Israelis to identify as Israelis.

CONGRATULATIONS TUMBLR! You have successfully revived from depths of 4chan neo-Nazi boards the (((fucking echoes))).

Are you serious? Are you fuckers for real? This, right here, encapsulates the pitch-black absurdity of this whole situation and why I remained in denial for so long. Never, in a million years, would I imagine that the proudly pro-Social Justice, anti-fascist, 100% Certified SAFE-SPACE(tm) website would end up using the same language as the goddamn Nazis on 4chan. I thought this website was smarter than that. But noooo, it turns out that I was a damn naive fool.

This was where the post was originally going to end. I say my piece, hope to change a few minds, and commit myself to actually fighting antisemitism instead of sitting back and dismissing the problem. But I figure, while I'm here and while I still have the driving forces of anger and guilt pushing me along, I may as well put pen to paper and spew forth my other thoughts on the ongoing crisis. I am thus compiling a much longer post detailing my thoughts on some aspects of the current situation. [EDITED ~1:25 AM GMT, 5 Dec 2023: add link to finished post] That post will definitely be long, probably be angry, possibly wrong on some aspect of fact, and will absolutely be pretentious, preachy, self-righteous and hubristic to a positively Hellenistic degree. Brief, non-comprehensive summary so you can decide whether or not get mad at me ahead of time;

Israel does apartheid, or near enough for government work.

Israel is definitely conducting a campaign of forced displacement, possibly amounting to ethnic cleansing, but I remain unconvinced of the claim of genocide.

Hamas may or may not be a anti-colonialist revolutionary group, but it definitely is an antisemitic terrorist organization with genocidal aspirations and actively supporting them is morally indefensible. Yes, this includes the Al-Qassam Brigades.

Anti-colonial and other revolutionary movements do in fact have fundamental moral obligations and suffering oppression does not give you carte blanche to do terrorism, even when an oppressor attempts to render peaceful opposition impossible. There is a middle ground between peaceful marching and 850+ dead civilians; aim for that.

The left is just as prone to unhinged conspiracism as the right.

Verify your sources, for fuck's sake.

Use nuance. It won't kill you.

There's more, but it's a little difficult to summarize an unfinished post. If you want to argue with any of these points, go ahead, just keep in mind that a longer, more comprehensive post is in the works that might have the answer to your argument/complaint/insult/intellectual disagreement. If that post isn't up by midnight GMT on Friday, assume I forgot about it and argue away. In conclusion, antisemitism is bad, apartheid is also bad, Tumblr is a hellsite (derogatory), "From the river to the sea" is, in fact, antisemitic, seriously, stop saying it, take Jews seriously when they warn you about antisemitism instead of writing them off like a damn naive fool, and last but not least, free Palestine.

[inlove76]

are your request opened if not please ignore this but if they are can you make a yandere gojo r sukana with male reader where the male reader doesn't care about anything and is just like meh and when gojo r sukana sneaks in to readers house and reader wakes up and catches them going through his draws and stuff he's just like "uh ok" and then goes back to sleep leaving the other one confused and then after a few seconds reader realizes what's going on and just has a big oh shit moment

yes yes I can

stupid very stupid

yandre gojo and sukuna (separately) x male reader

so as many people noticed m/n was stupid. well not stupid just a little dense when it came to important stuff so as dense as he was he was completely unaware of a certain somebody having a complete and  utterly obsessive crush on him.

for him there was nothing wrong he was okay with everything.....

y'all: really? *judging*

alright let me rephrase that he didn't give two shits about anything or anyone.

y'all: that's better

anyways as m/n was on his way back home from his tiring job completely unaware of the person following close behind him and watching his every move.

m/n finally made it back to his home and how long that took was crazy. m/n was ready to pass out and so like any sane man he got in a shower and hopped into bed his eyes fluttering closed as he got comfy unaware of the person right underneath his bed

satoru gojo

gojo swiftly climbed from under your bed and stepped over to the right to watch you sleep. this kinda thing would have never been expected from gojo but he couldn't help it with the way you were kind to people but also didn't give a fuck about any of them it was intriguing to say the least but hey everyone's got something that makes them special

for gojo it was his obsessive love for you I guess anyways gojo had finally snapped out of the trance like state he was in and went over to your dresser the main reason gojo even bothered coming here was so he could find out more about you.

from his observations (stalking) you didn't like much and didn't do much either so to him you were a complete and utter mystery to solve. as gojo was going through your stuff: old pictures, dairies,notebooks and more he got startled by you waking up and sitting up to.

warm e/c eyes met beautiful blue ones. gojo froze preparing for the worst for you to realize he's not supposed to be there, for you to scream and back away throwing stuff at him. of course that didn't happen as you were too tired to process that gojo the gojo was in your room and going throw your stuff, but to be fair even if you did realize would you have honestly cared?

no. the answer is no you would not have cared and as gojo got ready for you to get freaked out, you went back to sleep

gojo stared at you in utter confusion "he just....fell asleep?" gojo mumbled to himself. gojo knew you liked sleeping from his um...investigation on you (stalking).

he waited a few minutes to see if you were actually aware he was here or not. it took your half asleep mind a few minutes to realize he was here and when you did you sat up rather quickly and wiped your head so fast he could swear he heard it crack over to gojo.

gojo just stayed there frozen and in shock "holy shit" you yelled and then sprung up out of bed

"who the hell are you and why are you in my house?" you asked the shocked white haired male in your room, it took gojo a minute to realize you were talking to him and he cleared his throat "I'm gojo..gojo satoru and I'm here to uh..." gojo trailed off not knowing what to say but one good look at your face and he realized he just gave himself away

"mhm okay yep I'm going to throw this knife at you if you don't tell me why your here" you explained as a knife just appeared out of thin air into your hand

"I was snooping trying to find out more about you" gojo blurted out for god knows why in all fairness gojo could easily kill you in a heart beat are you know limit your moving space but he didn't and wouldn't simply because you were you.

"....creep" you muttered as the knife vanished which was impressive since the whole time gojo has been watching (stalking) you you've never seemed the one to be a jujutsu sorcerer of any type

"if you wanted to know me you could've just asked to know more about me not break into my house and go throw my stuff" you had a point there but where was all the fun in that?

"well to be fair if I just randomly came up to you and asked you questions about your self would you have answered?" gojo asks fidgeting in place

"if you asked yes " you responded simply shocking gojo

"anyways since I'm tired and your here and woke me up you've gotta sleep with me"

.....

......

.....

"sleep with you huh?" gojo says with a grin forming on his lips before a pillow came in contact with his face "not like that you pervert" you huffed and flopped back onto bed getting comfy as gojo walked over to you.

"does that offer still stand" he asked as you gave a simple nod and before you knew it you were being squished into his chest as he rubbed you back soothingly "your still a creep" you mutter and fall asleep

"your mine" gojo mumbled and then fell asleep

Ryomen Sukuna

since sukuna was a curse it wasn't really all that hard to get information about you yet he still found it hard very hard.

even as sukuna looked through your stuff he still couldn't find anything it was like you were a locked book nothing could get out

with that being said and done as sukuna looked through your stuff he could sense you were waking up he turned around as soon as you sat up and rubbed the sleep out of your eyes even though it didn't work

'shit shit shit' sukuna thought as he looked over at you. red eyes meeting half asleep e/c eyes. sukuna didn't care if anyone liked him or not but the thought of YOU hating him. it hurt, he didn't want the second person he loved to leave not again he couldn't lose you he just couldn't

sukuna walked over to you and cupped your cheeks "go back to sleep" he said basically pleading

what he didn't expect was for you to listen and go right back to sleep "he...went back to sleep?" sukuna muttered to himself as he gazed down at you he was surprised to say the least

you just caught someone in your home correction you just caught a curse in your house and you went back to sleep so easily ,

he stared at you for awhile waiting for you to realize there's someone in your house, it took you a minute are two but you finally did get someone was in your house and sat up

"who are you"

"sukuna"

you both looked at eachother before you hopped up "HOLY SHIT" you yelled as you got out your pocket knife.

"you sleep with a knife" sukuna asked surprised and impressed "you don't" you responded

after some more talking you and sukuna started getting along even tho you just caught him going through your stuff

"what's your favorite food?" sukuna asked as he had you in his lap playing with your h/c hair.

"f/c" you answered as he smiled

"you know you were quite calm when you first saw me in here why?" sukuna asked as you looked forward "well because you didn't come off as threat well not much of a threat" you answered "oh really" sukuna said as he moved his hands from you hair to you waist and started rubbing down

you didn't think much of it until his hands went inside your shirt and started playing with your nipples "ngh sukuna what are you doing" you half moaned out as his hands kept twisting and pulling at your hard nipples

and it ends here cause this is supposed to be fluff

[telleroftime]

I think I covered Vampire!Sukuna that's forced to respect the innate rules of a vampire before -- such as the one where they must be invited into ones home -- but I just had a few more ideas regarding it.

Well, in this case it would also be Fae!Reader, which is once again a pairing I'm pretty sure I mentioned before. Anyways, yes! Vampire!Sukuna that camps outside of Fae!Reader's bungalow. That or human!Reader that grew up with the fae and is much more aware of how the forest works than the mighty and evil Sukuna. Featuring Uraume in certain places.

When the Reader first notices Sukuna they aren't too worried. He may be a vampire now but he was born a human mortal so they know that the same tricks would work on him too. They set up precautions and change their presence around their territory. Namely a lot more fairy rings appear in key locations. The mythology surrounding fairy rings states that if humans dance on them they would be punished by the fairies and made to dance in the ring until they pass out. Reader knows that and very quickly shuts down Sukuna's game of cat and mouse by tricking him into walking on one.

And they would proceed to exploit such tricks. Not only the natural rules of fae but also the bodily limitations of a vampire. They'd be cosied up in their little cottage at night knowing well that Sukuna cannot enter without an invitation, and during the day they would traverse through patches of light whilst grinning in the directions of the shadows.

You'd think that Sukuna could use Uraume's human nature to get to Reader but that wouldn't work either. If the fae don't want to be found by a human then the human will never find them.

Now, the Reader wouldn't be too interested in tricking Sukuna into something much more malicious than simple tricks, especially not after growing familiar with his vampiric presence, so one way or another they would need to stop him from accidentally falling into a fae-bound deal. By that I mean they would have to interrupt him and Uraume whenever it sounded like they were about to say "thank you." Sukuna would never but Uraume might. Same with apologies.

I love the idea of Uraume thinking that Reader is simply being humble when they say "don't thank me" and "don't apologise to me" when in reality Reader is getting a headache from controlling the impulse to form a contract with them.

I also love the visual of Reader slapping a hand around Uraume's mouth when they are about to thank another fae.

When it comes to names, the first time Sukuna introduces himself to Reader they instantly know that's not his real name. Names hold power especially in the hands of the fae, though since it also wasn't a lie they wouldn't press him about it. Uraume on the other hand makes the mistake of handing them their name which to Reader means there's on less threat. A human whose name is revealed is of no power in the eyes of the forest.

And speaking of lies, Reader would be able to catch Sukuna out on every like he speaks. Not like he himself would lie (seeing as he never seemed to lie in the anime). Uraume too. But if he ever did Reader would know... Though that aspect of fae nature would easily backfire on the Reader since they themself wouldn't be able to speak a lie. Only finely chosen words. So you know, plot.

And since I spoke more about Fae!Reader...

The fae are weak to iron so Reader would avoid any metals and alloys containing it. It'd leave them using pure silver which Sukuna, as a vampire, would be weak to. He would stay away from silver alloys and would instead opt for, you guessed it, iron. His weapons would be made of iron.

Imagine Sukuna making fun of Reader's weakness to iron so they just throw a silver fork at him, or better yet some random log as they comment how a "wooden stake" could finish him off.

Outside of vampires being unable to enter a home without first being invited, another thing vampires cannot do is cross running water. So, imagine finally Sukuna gets to chase the Reader. Finally everything is in line for him to drink their blood. It's the middle of the night and the Reader is far away from the nearest fairy ring and he's about to grasp them... when they suddenly cross a river and Sukuna is stranded on the opposite side to them. He'd be so unhappy.

And yeah. I think that's it for now.

[prikarin]

Regarding Killer Trait Updates

Hello, everyone!

It's been a good minute since my last Killer Trait update, hasn't it?

A lot of people have been asking me about Killer Trait updates and when the full-game will be released so, after a lot of thought, I decided to make this post.

Here's the thing: my Patreon hasn't been doing well. It hasn't been doing well for several months now. While the decline started after Where Winter Crows Go's release in November of last year, it's gotten progressively worse from February 2024 onwards. And because of this I'm going to have to pause my billing for my current patrons from August onwards—at least until I have something new to post.

It'd be a lie if I said this didn't affect me, I'm only human after all, but I'm also well aware that Patreon is a tough thing to maintain in a way that's consistent and interesting.

Unfortunately, since I live in Argentina, my only real way to get funds for my games is through Patreon, donations on Ko-Fi and sales and donations on Itchio. While it definitely helps that I hire some people from Argentina for certain art related things (so I pay them in Argentine Pesos), most of the people I commission are from overseas, so it's always a must to be able to pay them in USD.

And that's the issue: since I don't have that much money anymore and I can't commission people as often... this inevitably delays my progress on both Killer Trait and Potion Pleasing (DEMO out now!) indefinitely. It's sucks for me too, but it's the reality: making games costs money.

As I mentioned in a previous post, Killer Trait will have re-designs for most of the characters (not counting Carl because his design was originally my own) since the ones in the DEMO were stock sprites I bought from an artist, not my own designs. And I want these characters to be 100% my own, which is why I decided to have them re-designed. I've talked about this in the past in more detail when I decided to have Crowe re-designed, you can find that post HERE.

Of course, for these new character sheets (with the exception of Oz's, which has already been finished) and the new sprites, I need game funds in order to commission the artist. Even after the sprites are done, there are a couple of backgrounds—the characters' rooms—that I'd like to have originally made (especially since the ones I bought from Minikle are very limiting and don't really fit with the characters' personalities). And this doesn't even account for CGs, which I'll probably have to postpone for a while because the sprites and the backgrounds are way more important.

Some might be thinking "What about Where Winter Crows Go?". While I was lucky that WWCG's first demo was so well received, I still spent a whole lot of money from my own pocket to make it. I bought a lot of assets and, when I got a few donations, I commissioned a few artists to help me. WWCG was NEVER a game made with only free resources.

Making the art book for WWCG was a way I found to get a little of that investment back, but I'm well aware that I'll never get all the money that I spent back. And that's okay! To this day, I don't regret having invested my money to make WWCG because it gave me a lot of experience, perspective and made me learn a lot.

Be that as it may, however, I can't realistically make the rest of my games free. As I mentioned before, game development is expensive in both money AND time. Without funds, it's a given that things are going to be delayed.

So... where does that leave things?

Well, after pondering on it for a while, I came to the conclusion that I'm not really ready for a crowdfunding campaign right now. Those are extremely hard and ALSO cost money to advertise well and make sure everything's in order. So... the temporary solution I arrived at is setting goals on Ko-Fi! 

How would this work? Basically, I would set a monetary goal of the amount of money needed for a certain asset in a certain game that needs to be made. For example: sprites & character sheets in Killer Trait. Once that goal is met, I'll commission the person in question so they can start working on it! After that, I'll set the next goal and so on 💪

I'm thinking of setting the first Ko-Fi goal once August starts. And from there... I'll see how it goes! If things don't go well, I'm also considering making Where Winter Crows Go paid for a while—don't worry, I would make an announcement first—because I honestly have no more ways of getting game funds for Killer Trait and Potion Pleasing and, as mentioned before, making games is really expensive (and I'm only one person).

Thank you so much for reading until the end and I hope you have an amazing day!

[dearweirdme]

https://www.tumblr.com/dearweirdme/756624824076468224/there-are-some-places-i-hope-to-never-be-and-one

Couldn’t we say the same thing about Jimin though? Wasn’t he the one who said his favourite thing was waking up to Jungkook? He’s the one who also sat infront of Tae and Jk and said Jk spends almost all his time in his room and he is the same one who has constantly taken his face right infront of Jk’s like he was going to kiss him on the mouth with Tae sitting right there, why do you think he would do things like this if Taekook were together and how would Tae have felt about those things? Jimin has done and said way more suggestive things about himself and Jk than Tae has ever done and that is one of the reasons why some tkkrs hate him so much because they believed he was being a bad friend to Tae. Y’all are just witnessing Jimin in his quiet phase. You needed to hear the things he constantly said and did prior to 2021 because if he was still the way he used to before, it would have been a bloodbath between these two ships because while we have tae dropping bombs, we would have had Jimin dropping even bigger ones lol.

Jk too has done a few things with Jimin that wouldn’t make sense for him to do if he was dating Tae, like that naked bed Live he did inviting himself to shower at Jimin’s place, (if you think Jimin should have a problem with Tae’s captions if he was with Jk then how do you think Tae should feel about Jk openly asking Jimin to let him come over and shower infront of 5 million fans?) or when he made that “thirst trap” birthday video for Jimin (many people interpreted it as one), or him making a blatant sexual innuendo Joke with Jimin on ITS “Do you want ramen? ” This is a conversation I probably shouldn’t be in because I personally don’t think the boys are dating each other but I think this logic works both ways and that is mainly the reason why we have jkkrs hating on Tae and tkkrs hating on Jimin because they feel like Vmin are crossing lines.

Hi @causeilikescience !

Posting this ask in good faith and trusting you are actually neutral in this.. please don't go crazy on me.. I just went through that with another blog last week 🙈.

I'm sure that when you are someone who doesn't believe any of the guys are dating all shipping fandoms look the same. I'm well aware that while I am answering this ask right now, most will look at my answer and say 'she's a Tkkr, she's delusional and not give my words any actual thought. And to be honest, most of my beliefs do stem from how I interpret Tae and Jk's interactions and the way their body's speak. My thoughts on that should not actually matter, because I am a stranger on the internet 😂.

I think for me, the biggest difference between how Tkkrs think and how Jkkrs think is that Jkkrs believe a queer couple from the same band are being allowed so much openness. I mean, Jk and Jm are not limited in their interactions at all. We can beat around the bush, but Jk and Jm are the main focus of Bh when it comes to BTS. They are made use of hugely. That does not undermine that their friendship is real (it's making use of your biggest strenghts really) but it does undermine that they are in a relationship, in my opinion. I do not believe that BH (a SK company) would treat an in band couple the way they treat Jm and JK.

I understand why Jkkrs believe though, at least.. to a certain point. The moments they use, like Rosebowl, like hickey gate, like those times Jm comes close to Jk's face and acting like he's about to kiss him.. those look sus when you isolate them BUt, when you look beyond those isolated moments, you know that that is exactly what they are. Jm has those moments with Hobi and Tae as well for instance. Probably not as often, because Hobi doesn't entertain it as much and Tae actually gets Jm flustered when he goes that way. Jk and Jm though have the same type of banter... they are.. matched in that way I think. They aren't actually flirting, they are play-flirting. And these are my words ofcourse and no-one will value those, because I'm a Taekooker, but I do think that that's what it is. Maybe because you are neutral, you recognize that that's what it is also. I don't see anything actually sus between Jm and Jk. I think everything they do fit easily in the realm of friendship. A friendship that has a lot of banter and is definitely deep, but a platonic friendship nevertheless. I never feel the need to downplay anything Jm and Jk do, because it just is what it is and I love that for them.

Tae and Jk is a whole different story though. And admittingly, you do have to believe in things being hidden and lies having been told. You have to believe that there are ugly parts to their story. I don't even really want to believe those parts, because they are hurtfull and they mean that Tae and Jk (and all members by association) have gone through shit. There will have been many tears and fights, and feelings of shame and insecurity. That's not something I want for them, but I do feel that has been a part of their lives. I think there is no way that a company like BH would allow a queer couple from the same band to freely interact. I think BH would have come up with a way to keep the band from being in a potential scandal. They had big plans for BTS (which they accomplished) and the risk of queer allegations becoming too strong would have been too high in the eyes of those who call the shots. What I see between Tae and Jk fits how I feel a queer idol couple would be treated in SK music industry. It does set us as a fandom up for misunderstandings though, it can't actually be any other way. So our thoughts willl always be hunches and never about having actual proof. A closeted couple can't give us proof. What we do have, is a ton of patterns and a ton of repetitive behavior. It's the shear amount of consistent bahavior that makes us feel strongly about them being together. You can only understand this, if you look into that amount.. it is simply not possible to understand this if you don't. Me explaining this with all the words I have will never do the actual situation justice. So basically this whole ask is just me ranting without actually being able to convey the realness of Takook 😂.

I think many people don't actually realize the amount of times Jk and Tae are holding back movements, and biting away smiles, or are holding back jealousy. It's something Tkkrs know, because we pay attention. It's not something we invent, the moments are there and people can just look them up. You will not find that between any other pairing within BTS. Another thing is that many people also don't realize how much Tae and Jk actually move towards each other. After 2016 they weren't the focus of footage much anymore, so people are quick to miss it. But in the background, when other members are the focus.. they gravitate to each other. Again, not something we make up.. it is all in the footage, people just don't notice.

Without wanting to open this up to Jm hate (and I'm gonna elaborate.. don't worry😁), I think Tae did have a problem with Jk and Jm at times. This is what I mean with the nasty parts that come with this. It's not all pretty, and it probably affected the other members too. It was pretty obvious actually at times. Rolling his eyes and whatnot. I'll do you one better. Jk also had a problem with Tae and other members at times, we can clearly see him annoyed at times when Tae was close with someone else. They were fickle about it though, there's times when they didn't care and there were times when it probably just hit differently. People are fickle in their reactions though. Different situations make for differnt reactions, that are influenced by many different factors. The reason why I don't blame Jm for this is that Jm did nothing wrong. On top of that, Tae, Jk and Jm know each other so much better than that fandom knows them. When Jm and Jk make a joke about ramen in front of Tae, Tae knows how to read that. When Jm goes to flirt with Tae, Jk knows how to read that. These men know each other, they know what each other's intentions are. Tae knows that Jm isn't trying to steal Jk from him.

I'm fully convinced that vminkook had conversations about the shipping wars. I think I see an adjustment in how they deal with it. It is clear to me, that Jm is aware of Tae and Jk. I think these three obviously chose to not let fandom shenanigans stand in the way of them interacting. While Tae was annoyed at Jkk moments at times, he cares about Jk and Jm too much to want them to adjust the way they interact. I can't speak for Jkkrs on this.. but I'd hope it's the same for them.

Comparing Tkk and Jkk is not something that I actually do when consuming BTS content. I know I've done it on here, because I literally get asked to do it 😂. But Jkk isn't a factor for me. Jm is their best friend. Obviously he plays a role in their lives, but I don't go and think.. wait Jm did this with Jk how does that affect Tae? I'm sure Jkkrs want to do the same, but yet everytime one of them comes here they hit me with the comparisons. I do wish that things were different. I think this is very unpleasant for Jm, Jk and Tae. Those men love each other to bits and I think large parts of fandom make it really hard for them to keep loving us.

Well, I'm sure this has been hugely unsatisfactory and I made no difference in your understanding of Tkk fandom😂 . I'm also a very small part in all this, I'm fully aware that there is madness going on everywhere.. Tkkrs are not excluded from that at all.

[sapphia]

so recently, scar has gotten good at minecraft. like, really good. if you watch his old stuff, it doesn't take much to see that scar's strengths generally used to lie outside of the actual, run-around-without-dying-especially-on-a-pvp-server level of play. and that's fine, it wasn't his jig, and the people he's playing with really are very good and very experienced at this sort of play. so it never needed to be something that scar was good at because his fanbase mostly watched him for other reasons, so that just wasn't something he needed to be able to do.

but for a while now, especially noticeable over the life series, he's been rapidly improving at the sorts of particular skills that the life smp server values (and also certain skillsets involved in MCC, too). The water bucket clutches spring to mind, as well as the hot-guy stuff that make him such a lethal force with a bow. (It's honestly a shame that life smp doesn't have elytra -- he regularly one-shots people from the air on hermitcraft, and it's a fantastic bit.)

And it's just so good to see because like... he didn't have to go and do that! he went and practiced those skills, and got good at them, and then came and showed them off. and it was awesome, but also he made it so creative and entertaining, and he really didn't have to do any of it at all if he hadn't wanted to. people don't play on life smp because they're good at the technical elements of the game. more than anyone else, scar's particular shenanigans and the energy he brings to the server are what make him a great fit for the series. there are plenty of players on life smp who aren't great PVPers but who get by on politicking, or scheming, or storytelling, or just generally being a good time to be around, and each of them makes the smp tick and are valuable in their own way.

not to mention that life smp is made up of such a wonderful group of human beings that they'll do whatever it takes for you to fit in. to make your thing, and your particular energy and abilities, a part of of the series. to make it that you aren't hampered by your abilities and handicaps, whatever they may be. when skizz dies early on to some early misfortune in limited life, people are pretty clearly aware that he's one of the weaker players and it might impede his ability to have a full series. but don't worry, because half the server are tripping over themselves to give him their time and lives and totems and to swear undying oaths of fealty to protect him at all costs. grian, martyn, tango, literally every one of the ties - not to mention everyone who stood around and watched as skizz killed tango - all are working together and giving up things, valuable things, to make sure this one player gets to keep time on the server, and therefore time on the series, just because that's who they are. that's what the server is. friends, playing together.

i'm sure that's also why grain stuck with scar in the first series: to make it fair. they want everyone to have a good time. To be able to do their own thing, whatever that thing is you bring to the server, be it your insane PVP skills or trying to scam players by selling them magic crystals.

which is a long way of saying: scar was under no obligation whatsoever to get good at these player-skill-based elements of minecraft. but it's wonderful that he did! he really said, "look, i know you all think i'm a walking disaster, but i need you to know, it's not because i'm bad at the game. it's because i'm me." and then he went and got crazy good at archery (well, okay, crazy good at one very specific archery move, but also pretty damn good at shooting things overall! and at flying!) and he started parkouring around a bunch and now he's mastered waterbucket clutches (and what a fucking display he got to show off in double life, too) and just all around Got Good at the things that he wasn't previously that good at.

and the best thing was that he's still such an irreverent force of chaos that it hasn't even mattered. he's still just as lethal to himself through his own terrible decisions and random lack of awareness or foresight. or even just his own desire to fun, no matter what. the man really went into a hardcore server and said alright, i'm gonna build my base up high enough to definitely kill me, and also make it out of trap doors, and oh grians here, oops i'm sure that won't go wrong. and then he went and died to his elytra failing. that's just the most scar thing I've ever seen. you can't even fault him because grain also died on that server. only joel properly made 100 hours and there's no surprises there, joel is insanely good. so its no mark against scar that he died. but how he plays it, it's just so him.

and you wouldn't have it any other way because this is why we watch him. he's entertaining because he's totally unpredictable and also predictable and good and bad and competent and incompetent all at the same time. he will waterbucket-clutch INTO an impossible situation to save a bunch of useless pandas that were almost definitely going to die and he'll get away with it. and then also he will die by setting off a trap he's trying to very obviously lure others into. yes also he fell into a pit of zombies, what of it? it's just scar and his wacky hijinks. will he die? lets find out!

scar really said the only thing holding me back is me, and then proved it.

[misofist]

You first heard about me from some of your kinky friends. They said you should talk to me, but were pretty evasive on any further details.

You looked me up on Fetlife. You noticed we live in the same area and we have a bunch of mutuals, but strangely you've never seen me at any munches. You reached out to me.

We started with some casual conversations about fetishes and ethical frameworks. But pretty soon I asked if you'd be interested in doing a scene with me, and we got into the nitty gritty of discussing limits. You're pretty kinky, aren't you? You're ok with group play with strangers, as long as they've all recently been tested. You're ok with being filmed. You're ok with psychological scenes. Pain play, abandonment play, free use, a real kinky slut.

Before you know it, you're stepping out into the state forest, the Uber driving away down the access trail. You're wearing a light sundress, but the weather is mild and the breeze feels pleasant against your skin. You look at your phone and pull up the photo I sent you, showing you the exact meeting place. You look around, and walk a short distance.

A few minutes later, your phone rings. You answer, and it's me.

"Hey, I just wanted to go through some last minute checks. You are <your name>, right? Ok excellent. And you're the person I've been talking to on Fetlife? You understand what we've got planned? Are you still up for it? You know you can... ok ok great. Alright, and can you just repeat for me what your safe words are, both verbal and non-verbal? Awesome.

Alright I'm really sorry but I'm running a little late, I'll be there in 30 minutes. Sorry about that. Anyway, after this call ends I'll be in character. Anything more you want to say? No? Alright, see you soon."

Now that you're standing still, the air feels like it's taken on a slight chill. Not enough for you to be uncomfortable, but enough that you're aware of it. (And so are your nipples.) You start to drink in the sounds of the forest, and in doing so you begin to feel small. Humans are used to considering themselves above nature, but now that you're outside of the sterile, safe urban environment and without a vehicle, you realise how large the forest is and how small you are within it.

You hear a stick snap behind you, and spin around. You can't see any signs of movement, nothing out of place. There have always been rumours about kidnappers lurking in this forest, but you calm your fears. They're just scary stories for kids, your fear isn't rational. The stick must've been broken by an animal, you guess. You're unfamiliar with the environment and how sounds carry, so you can't even estimate how far away the sound was. Maybe it was off in the far distance.

You turn back towards the road, and jump. On the other side of the road there's a ghillie-suited, masked person walking carefully towards you. The adrenaline hits and your brain kicks into overdrive. You've only been waiting 5 minutes, and I said I'd be there in 30. This person has clearly been here for a while, as you haven't heard any vehicles since your Uber left. Who are they?

Running away along the road would be the easiest thing to do, but you've never been a good runner. You're certain this person would catch you. But you've got some agility, so perhaps if you duck and weave enough you'll be able to lose them in the bush. You spin on one foot, deliberately overbalancing as you do so. Then you kick off, using your displaced centre of gravity to quickly lunge into a sprint.

You can hear the footsteps pursuing you. They aren't gaining on you, but you aren't losing them either. Fear provides you more energy, and you force yourself to run faster. To run more frantically, more carelessly. Your sundress snags on branches and brush, but it's made of a light material and parts of it rip off without slowing you down. There's a crest ahead, and you figure if you can make it over that you can probably sprint, slide, and skid down the other side at a good pace. You're probably more desperate to get away than your pursuer is to catch you, so hopefully they won't be so willing to risk injury and you can lose them.

But then ahead, you see three more camouflaged individuals rise from seemingly nowhere. You make a swift course correction to the left, but a fifth figure appears there too. And now they've got you surrounded. They close in. There are 5 of them and one of you. Not only that, but you're weak. Probably any one of them could've overpowered you without breaking a sweat. Against all 5 you have no chance.

Roughly holding each of your limbs, they carry you over the crest and down the other side. They carry you further and further into the bush.

Your phone rings. One of your captors grabs it. They answer it, deftly muting the microphone and putting it on loudspeaker.

It's me. "Hey uhhh, we're at the rendesvous point and we can't find you. Did you get cold feet? Or were you wasting our time from the start? Was this your idea of a prank?" The captor hangs up the call.

You'd been clinging to the hope that one of these captors was secretly me, that the whole thing had been an elaborate mind game. That seems unlikely now. But part of you still wonders... You could find out easily at any time, you could use your safe word. But... do you really want this to stop? You have to admit to yourself that you enjoyed the thrill of the chase, enjoyed the despair of being captured, and are still enjoying the feeling of powerlessness and lack-of-control. You're even enjoying the uncertainty: is this consensual non-consent, or is it just straight up non-consent? Are you in danger? It thrills you.

Your captors come to a clearing. There's a pile of sharpened branches and a mallet next to them. One of them grabs a branch that's sharpened on both ends, and using only his hands shoves it upright into the dirt. Only about 30cm of it protrude from the earth. The remaining four captors forcibly bend you over the spike. They each pin one of your limbs, holding you face-down ass-up. You engage your core muscles to avoid the spiked stick.

In the edge of your vision, you see a sixth masked figure emerge from the bushes. The two assailants not pinning your limbs grab more stakes, and using the mallet they drive them into the dirt diagonally around your neck, wrists, and ankles.

The people pinning your limbs retreat, and you find that you are firmly held in place by these triangles of wood.

Your captors toy with you. They use long grass to tickle you. They pour water over your head and force your face into the mud. They cane your exposed ass with a thin stick. Then with a thick one. They pinch, pull, suck, and bite on all of your protrusions. They tease, finger, and fuck all of your intrusions.

You can't help but feel pleasure from what they're doing, but they never do the same thing for long enough for that pleasure to build into an orgasm. You are kept frustrated, unable to anticipate their fickle touches and abuses. It's obvious they don't care about your pleasure, they just like provoking your reactions.

One roughly turns your head to the side, pins it down, and facefucks you. It's an awkward and uncomfortable angle, but they don't care. The others keep beating you, rubbing you, penetrating you, prodding, twisting, stretching, stroking.

You can't gather your thoughts. Are you overstimulated or understimulated? You're desperate and it shows. You're rocking back and forth, trying to hump the air. They One end has been whittled into a rounded shape, and it looks like it's been sanded too. It's wide, much wider than the other branches. It scares you a little bit, but you understand the message you're being given.

You beg. Not verbally, the sounds you're making could not be considered speech. But your moans and whimpers and eyes do the begging for you. In their manerisms, you can tell the person holding the improvised dildo wants and expects more from you. You give up more of your dignity. Tears run down your face, and your whimpers turn to sobs. Your eyes are hungry. You have never needed something this much before in your life. You aren't even human any more, you're a creature with a single evolutionary purpose, a brain that can only hold one thought. Your entire reason for being is that dildo.

You feel the dildo pushing against your starving hole. It's so big. You shy away from it. It's pushed with some pressure, but it's not going in. You want your captor to push harder, but they keep holding it firmly in place. They expect you to do this yourself, to show that your need outweighs the pain. You push against it as hard as you can, straining against your restraints. It slides in and you gasp.

You lie there panting, breathless. It's in. But it's still. You start rocking back and forth, rhythmically tilting your hips and grinding. Your breathing gets even faster. Your movements are becoming less controlled. Each time you rock too far forward or backward, you feel the sharp stick against your belly. You don't care. Faster and faster, more and more. You're finally going to be able to cum. You're so close. You hope you're providing enough amusement to your captors for them to let you finish. The thought of that dildo, your lifeline, being taken away gives you a renewed desperation and you fuck it even more frantically.

Your circular thoughts, your mantra, your desire, your purpose, it speeds up in your head until it blurs together into a single incoherent thought. It grows in brightness, your head a pure white glow of incomprehensible pleasure and needfulness.

When you regain your senses, you are still bound. You have slumped in your restraints, and you're gradually becoming more and more aware of the pain of the point pressed against your stomach.

One of your captors squats down beside your head. I remove my mask and ask you "how was that, sweetie? did you have fun?"

Later, you find yourself in a campervan, chilling with 6 people you've never met before. We've helped get you all cleaned up, we've given you fresh comfy clothes. You're sitting on a thin mattress, but it's the softest thing you've ever felt in your life. I've got a laptop, and I'm pulling in footage from all the GoPro SD cards. Some were mounted to our chests, and others were placed around the bush and clearings like trail cams.

On the screen, you can see me lying in the bushes with binoculars, watching the rendesvous point. You see yourself arrive, you see yourself answer the phone. I've got the recorded audio from the phone call, you can see your lips mouthing the words. Once I've confirmed that we're looking at the right person and re-confirmed your consent, you can hear me radio the others to commence the operation.

You see me desperately chasing you. But to your surprise, when the others pop up from the crest, I hide behind a tree. One of my friends pops up and takes my place. I spend a few minutes catching my breath, and then start walking over to join you and the others in the clearing. I guess this is ruining the magic a little.

We have a two hour drive back to the city. You spend this time curled up in my arms, helping me to edit the movie.

[bat-writer]

Hi! Couldn't find rules so I hope this is alright!

Could I please request Bruce Wayne getting close to a suspect just to see if she's going to be dangerous but ends up falling hard for her? She's not dangerous but she's a bit of an anti-hero and is an accomplice to a bigger villain, how's that like for him? She doesn't really do anything bad, she just doesn't do anything when the villain she's accompanying does something bad

Ty!!

A/N: I'm not sure if this is exactly what you were looking for but I hope you enjoy! 😭

Warnings; language | ~~~~: time skip

 ‿̩͙‿ ༺ ♰ ༻ ‿̩͙‿   ‿̩͙‿ ༺ ♰ ༻ ‿̩͙‿

"Hey Alred, how have you been since the last time?" you ask taking the tea cup he served you. Now this was not a regular visit to just a friend. No, no, this was an interrogation.

By the Batman.

Now you weren't villain but you also weren't a hero. Not your style. You just needed benefits to get by, get fed, and have your bills paid. You'd pair with villains and simply get the information they needed. Bruce's issue with you is that you knew too information. The way that he would find out information is the same way you did. Only you were faster, more detailed and you always slipped away at the last minute.

Luckily you didn't provide information that would put other people in harms way. Although sometimes you did end up stealing or blackmailing those of higher social class into benefiting those who really needed it. However, he can't hold you to any crimes since, you never committed them nor were you an accessory at the scene. It has gotten to the point however that you come to the Batcave often to be asked questions. Even Alfred and you interact and even trade secrets to house keeping and cooking.

"So batman, what do we have questions about today?" you ask as the tall stoic hero comes into the room.

"You're aiming for certain organizations. Ones that are in charge of rebuilding a school. Why?" he asked with his signature glare

"looks bats," you sigh "those organizations aren't what you'd think they were. Sure they're made to look like they're for a good cause, but in the end they're all greedy assholes"

He huffs underneath the mask "So, stealing from-"

"The corrupt rich correct." you smile "And it's not just limited to snobby rich boys, but bigger villains like Penguin, Two-face, even Riddler had a couple of dollars to take just to name a couple."

"They don't donate," he added

"I know, but I need some way to keep my rent paid and keep them from blowing shit up, causing more work for you." you smirked at him

"I'm keeping you here for a couple of days just to lighten things up" he said as he pushed the buttons on his panel to open a clear cell.

"Ugh the cell again?" you groan "Wasn't I doing what a good citizen does though Bats?" you ask as you walk along side him. This wasn't the first time you spent the weekend with the Bat. But, since you weren't a threat to society, yourself or him, he was pretty relaxed around you. He opens the door for you to enter but you stop before stepping in

"pay me a visit after you patrol?" you said looking up at him seductively as your hand slides over his armored chest. You just loved teasing the ever so strong hero of Gotham "I get lonely ya know" you smile

"For now the books will keep you company. Alfred is here if you need help." he said stepping away.

Under neath that mask and armor was also a man who would yearn for the feeling of love. However, because of who he was, what he was - it was complicated.

"Alfred I'm heading out"

"Of course sir, anything I should be aware of?" he asks

"Nothing that I can recall. Y/N is in the cell for today and tomorrow night" he said getting into his bat mobile

"So no love affairs for tonight then?" he asks as the advanced vehicle closes with a hiss

"Keep things in control please" he asked dodging the question. This wasn't the first time this has happened. There has been playful banter, some flirting and maybe even a kiss on the cheek. Alfred would tease the hero in his own nonchalant way. And just like that, the billionaire hero skids from the cave and into the night.

"Looks like it's you and me tonight Alfred" you wave at the butler with a smile.

"I do believe there is a new episode of butlers 7 bucks tonight miss Y/N, would you care to join?" he said changing the large screen in the cave causing you to smile

"Of course I would"

~~~~~

Walking into the bat cave he didn't find much but you were right about villains pilling money for their own personal gain. But from the other organizations? He'll figure that out as Bruce Wayne. Looking over into the cell he sees you had fallen asleep, curled up to be as comfortable as possible.

Opening the door he takes off his cape and drapes it over your figure. Over to the next day he lets you go early since there really wasn't much more information you could give. Since you were somewhat a target for his usual villains, he'd check up every now and then to see if you were safe.

"So I'm free to go Batman?" you ask waltzing out of your cell "or is this another interrogation?"

"No more questions but I will pop in every now and then."

So every now and then he'd drop by your window and sometimes he'd stay a while and listen to you about your day. There was even one time where you had a pretty rough day and without asking you were comforted by this typically cold and quiet hero.

He held you much longer than a hug that was. You didn’t complain or push away, this felt more than a pity hug. There was want behind it, you felt his warmth. You look up at him with those e/c he loves to look into. Almost as if it were magnetic your lips come into contact with one another in a slow short kiss.

For what felt like hours staring into his eyes while his nose brushes against your own, you could feel your heart skip multiple beats. This then started happening multiple nights in a row.

Some night were sweet and innocent with some pecks or playful flirting. Some were even close to hot and heavy. Carrying you over to your countertop to enjoy your make out session as your bodies stay flush together. He’s sometimes stay a bit longer outside of your window until you fell asleep, as a precaution.

On a certain night however you were in this strange state of a passionate but also very delicate kiss. As if you had kissing for both the first and 100th time. His large hands cradling your face as he practically made you melt on the spot. You pull away to finally speak up on how you felt but, before you could even focus your vision or get your head straight he was ready to leave.

“Wait! Batman! Come on you can’t just leave like this!” You stop him

“…this Wouldn’t work Y/N. You know why…” he said trying not to sound defeated

“…i know but….couldn’t we try?” You ask teaching a hand out but drawing it back in hesitation

“We Can…but you won’t like what May come of me…” he said looking over his shoulder

“…but I could learn to like that version of you as well…” you try and plead with your eyes to him. He looks as though he wanted to elaborate on things but held himself back

“Take care of yourself, know that you aren’t in harms way” he says as he swoops off into the night.

“Ans just like that, the bat is gone” you groan as you “UGH. What am I thinking ?! This is the Batman not some guy I met at a-“ you stop as you see something stuck to your windowsill. A single piece of paper with a note

“Friday at 6. Dress nicely. -B”

“Huh, but bad bats…not bad at all” you from as you shut your blinds for the night. Tomorrow first thing in your list was to buy a dress.

~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~

I hope this was somewhat what you were looking for! -Kitty 🐈‍⬛

[couldnt-think-of-a-funny-name]

I like your blog, we've been mutuals for years. But blogging about the met gala when there are children dying in Gaza? Fuck the met gala and your celebrity worship

at what point have I made it seem like I don't care about/support what's happening in gaza? I don't share a lot about it, but that's because most of what I see have graphic images and videos attached to the posts, and while I understand the thought process behind sharing them to make it seem more real to people, I'm uncomfortable with it because I know that if I was in that situation, vulnerable and injured or dead, I wouldn't want people gawking at me online just so they can pat themselves on the back for 'suffering in solidarity' by making themselves uncomfortable and miserable looking at me. I'm trying to be respectful. I've still reblogged things about gaza though. but honestly, if you've been following me for years, you'd know I'm a pacifist and wouldn't need me to make a statement saying I don't support people being killed. my God, dude.

also, celebrity worship? I can't even tell you who half the people at the met even were. I just like fashion. I post about a bunch of different things on this blog, and you haven't complained about that, so where's the threshold for things people are allowed to enjoy while bad things are happening in the world? fashion is off limits, but doctor who isn't? I can still post about musicals and not support murder, but aesthetic pictures are on par with launching a bomb myself? I truly hate to break it to you, but sharing links on tumblr is not going to fix this situation. denying yourself any shred of entertainment or enjoyment does not give you a moral high ground. what's happening is horrendous, but even if this is somehow magically peacefully solved tomorrow, there will still be other atrocities happening elsewhere in the world. that's unfortunately just how life goes. in no world am I saying we shouldn't care about every single atrocity that happens, I'm just saying if you can't find some time to be happy in your own life just because bad things are happening to others, you will never truly live a life at all. it sucks! but that's how it is. it's like when someone close to you dies, and the first time you laugh after you've started grieving feels like you're betraying them. but you aren't betraying them for continuing to live, just like you aren't betraying anyone else in the world who's suffering just because you don't spend 24/7 thinking and talking about them.

I do truly, genuinely, hope this all comes to a peaceful end, and soon. I'm not naive enough to believe for certain that it will. but I do know, at the end of the day, people are already aware of it. people know what's going on. sharing photos of dead and mutilated babies will not make any difference. you, and I, and everyone else online are not going to personally save gaza. pressure needs to be put on the people who can actually do something to make a change, and they don't care about what's online. arguing with people because you don't perceive them as doing 'enough' isn't going to accomplish anything other than getting them to a point of making them eye roll whenever they see you post, because at the end of the day, unless you're literally a top politician, you are doing the exact same amount to help as someone who reblogs less posts than you. sorry.

[vimara00]

Jealous Dabi! X F! Reader

Hi everyone, it's Vi!✨ I decided to write something about jealous Dabi. Hope you enjoy! ❤️

Pd: Sorry I haven't been posting but I was on vacation and didn't have good connection hahaha

(Again, sorry if there are any grammatical mistakes, english is not my first language 🙏🏻)

All characters reservations to Horikoshi

Warnings: suggestive maybe? but not really smut

• Well, let's imagine you are Hawks' quirkless secretary and certain day he asked you to attend to a LOV meeting with him in order to record what they'll say

• Everything was going smooth till a very tall guy with pursing blue eyes sat next to you and asked "what is a woman like you doing in a place like this?" You tried to not be affected by this intense staring and said "I'm here with Hawks since I'm his secretary I need to involve myself for the cause too" Apparently that piece of information caught his attention and gave you an curious look but before letting him speak again you continued saying "Anyways, what do you mean a woman like me?" And he smirked while saying" I meant a delicate and beautiful lady like you being in a shitty hole like this" You were blushing like a tomato and Touya thought it was really cute

• Since that day, Dabi tried to be as near to you as possible every time you were on reunions together. Also, he would text you and appear out of the blue at the end of you shift just to spend time with you even if it meant getting caught by the heroes. At first, Touya thought he could manipulated you to gain information but after a while, he realised you weren't aware of your surroundings and he started to feel the need to protected you from this society. Something in Hawks didn't sit well with Dabi's interested in you but he choose to ignore it and take advantage of it.

• Some time before the heroes attack to the LOV's base, Dabi was waiting for you to get out of work hiding at an alley. It been fifteen minutes and there was no sight of you but before he started to torture some sidekicks about your wereouts, you and Hawks appeared from the sky to land safely at the entrance of the agency. The hero had you prestressed against his chest with his arms around your waist and your hands grabbing his t shirt. This act itself made Dabi's blood boild and without realising, fire started to came out of his arm. How dare that pathetic asshole put his hands on his girl. Yeah, you two didn't have a title yet but that didn't mean he could be touching you like that. He thought everybody knew you were off limits but apparently, he needed to make thing more clear for those stupid heroes that wanted to take you away from him. Oh and he was gonna make Hawks pay but he needed to control himself before he did something infront of you that'll make you scared.

• That night Hawks offered to take you to your house when Dabi appeared next to you wrapping his arm around your waist and giving it a squeeze while pulling you closer "She doesn't need a ride. I'll take her home. We have a long night, don't we love?" He looked at you with range and lust on his eyes while grabbing your chin with his index finger. You weren't sure what he exactly meant by that cause' you both only had shared kisses now and then but never got to something more sexual. However, his words and the way he was staring at you said otherwise.

• "We are going now, doll" They started to walk but Dabi turned around a little to looked at Hawks dead on the eye as if challenging him. Touya knew the hero felt something towards his girl so he wanted to make very clear for him that she was his and his only and that he won't let him get away with those actions.

• Once at your apartment, you were slammed against the door as Touya force you to look at him by grabbing your jaw "I think I haven't been cleared enough with you so let me get this straight" He got near your mouth while looking lustfully at you and said "There is a big difference between that stupid hero and me. He would definitely sacrifice you for the world's benefit while I would burn the whole world just for you (hear this on tik tok and it fits him hahaha well)" He then traced your lips with his thumb as he said "You are mine. You belong to me since the fist day I lay eyes on you and I won't let some idiot believe he can take whats mine. Am I clear?" You simply nodded as he attacked your lips while wrapping his hand around your neck. Once he broke the kiss, his hand remained on your neck and he added a bit of pressure on it demanding for you to say you were his. Then he applied open mouth kisses on your neck while leaving marks on your sweet skin so Hawks and other assholes would see you belong to him. That was just the start of a very long night and let's just say you couldn't go to work the next day.

[rockybloo]

what are some of your favorite aspects of jack and nana’s dynamic? please unleash the red beans thoughts into the world 😭❤️

personally i love how flirtatious nana is with jack (and only jack!), it’s a complete subversion of what you’d expect from her personality

Oh there are SO many aspects.

I love that Jack is a clumsy goofball who is willing to do anything for Nana and wouldn't hesitate getting into a fight for her because no one is talking bad about Nana in his presence.

Nana learning to come out of her shell a bit more due to her friendship with Jack but not because he's telling her she has to. Jack actually works with her antisocialness and learns about her boundaries and limits. Nana just likes being around him and would like to be around him more. But in order to do that, she knows she has to stop holding herself back from interacting with everyone by staying in her room or the Lupine forest.

There's the fact Nana is the one who teaches Jack how to fight in hand-to-hand combat. Xia def has their hand in teaching him but Nana is what makes the lessons stick (she also is the one who teaches him how to use his elongated canines). That lad learned how to bite and make it count from his girlfriend.

The fact they both have their own "dark" sides that they are a bit self conscious about while ironically loving the other's alternate side and wishing they'd be more comfortable about it.

Nana is very aware of the fact Jack likes sweets and always makes some for him when she gets the chance, but she also knows he needs to eat healthy foods too. And sometimes, getting Jack to eat that good stuff is like pulling teeth. So, in the early days before she fully moved into Briar Patch, she'd bring homecooked food with her for Jack to make sure he's eating SOMETHING that ain't jam packed with sugar. And she knows because she made it, he'll eat it.

I also very much love that Nana is so flirtatious with Jack even though she's so reclusive around people she doesn't know and can be super pokerfaced around her own friends. She does express herself around Pin, Ashe, and Kai, but Jack is the one who fully sees her other sides. She wasn't planning on having him be the only one either, but he makes her feel so comfortable she tends to drop that limit she has on her emotions.

What's funny too is that she wasn't planning on being the flirty type, nor did she intend to be, but one day she did something and Jack responded a certain way and something inside her woke up. She learned she really liked how Jack gets when she flusters him.

I think what my absolute favorite part of their dynamic is the fact that Nana never intended to fall in love with Jack. She was fully planning on just never falling in love...ever. She was fully avoidant of such a thing and never thought it would happen to her. And then Jack came stumbling into her life and accidentally breaking down the walls she built around herself by just being a genuinely nice guy and good friend and she realized "Shit I got it bad for the farm boy."

There's something about a character trying to suppress their feelings for someone because they are scared of getting hurt and/or just have low hopes for life, only for the ball of sunshine to be head-over-heels for them leading to them spending more time around the latter and having them grow fonder and fonder. And then one day they snap and just have that realization when they are by themselves one day "SHIT I'M IN LOVE"

The list of the things I love about Jack and Nana and their interactions together would literally be endless but they are just super fun and comfy for me to write and draw together.

[kebriones]

I get where you're going with this but they very much did have extreme stress back then. Usually about if they were going to have enough to eat

(summary of my ramblings at the bottom!) I apologise in advance for the essay, I might be in the wrong here, i'm not an anthropologist or a historian but I do have strong feelings about how all humans around me are stressed out of their damn minds to the point of being empty husks so here goes. i'm also posting this in case anyone has a different opinion/more knowledge. My grandmother was raised in the german occupation. Famously a period when people here starved to death. But it was mostly the people in Athens who did. My grandma didn't have proper food as a kid, but she ate weeds and slugs and fruit. And when the occupation ended, they were still dirt-poor, but there were legumes and chickens and bread to eat, even though our agriculture was obliterated by the war. I'm sure this differs from place to place, but for people in rural areas, living off of the land if they know how to grow a few crops is very much possible.

My parents are working all day at jobs that demand them to be mentally there at all times and behave a certain way, they often work during their free time at home, and they're still stressed about how to afford groceries and rent and bills, and they owe thousands to the bank. My great-grandmother had time to weave, take care of her garden and animals, go to church as much as she wanted, get a full night's sleep and have friends. She couldn't read or write but she didn't have debts to anyone nor any bills to pay (because that village got electricity only in the 80s). the pace of life and the amount of responsibilties we have to keep track of now is a constant source of stress that never ever stops. Not to mention the constant influx of information about everything, which we are not made to handle. I'm not saying it's a bad thing that we're always aware of what's going on in the entire world, I think it will bring about necessary social changes one way or another, but it has to get evened out and reduced at some point. There is always, constantly, many things to worry about. How many people have the luxury of letting their mind wander during their work hours? how many people have the luxury of saying, I am not feeling well today and it's raining, I'll just nibble on some bread and veggies and stay inside and not work? I absolutely wouldn't want to live back then because I do like running water and toothpaste and modern medicine and electricity, but specifically for the stress and anxiety, I believe we're at a very bad place right now.

This is why I mentioned other animals. They might struggle to find food and go hungry often in the wild, but if you put them in a limited space with constant interaction not on their own terms or crowded conditions or lack of peace and quiet or disrupt their natural day-to-day cycle they will 100% be miserable and die faster than they would in the wild, especially "smarter" animals.

TLDR: occasionally going hungry isn't the same as living your every day full of comparatively milder stress without breaks ever. our lives are way too full of responsibilities and keeping track of things now.

[bellaxgiornata]

Headcanon: I think all of the boys have complicated relationships with holidays and birthdays. On the one hand, they all have happy memories for those. But on the other hand, they all also suffered tragic losses that makes those memories bittersweet.

Holidays at St. Agnes were celebrated but there was limited resources and Matt was very firmly in his shell. Frank probably experiences a certain guilt for every holiday or birthday he missed with Maria and the kids while serving overseas. And I doubt Michael found much to celebrate about being in prison for the manslaughter of his wife and not contact with his daughter.

I honestly agree with you on this, though I think theses big days tend to be more depressing than anything for them. It's sad to think about, but I bet every year when the big days roll back around, all three men hate it for different reasons. I put my thoughts for each of our boys below the cut for this and I'm sorry it took so long to answer this one!! There's also Kin spoilers in my Mikey answer, FYI.

For Matt, I imagine holidays and birthdays are bittersweet because at the very least, he has the fond memories of celebrating with his father before he passed to help offset his memories from the orphanage. Because I don't doubt for a minute that Jack didn't do the best he could to give young Matt memorable birthdays and holidays despite them not having much to begin with.

I honestly picture Jack making a boxed cake mix for Matt's birthday every year because he wanted Matt to at least have a cake. And I imagine him always doing his best to get Matt something, even if it was a little present just wrapped in newspaper. I also picture Jack making as much of a feast as he could for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners even though they probably mostly celebrated alone and certainly didn't have much money. Maybe Jack made a roast chicken instead of a turkey every year for Thanksgiving. And at Christmas, I picture the focus being more on the pair of them being together and making their own yearly traditions (and for some reason I personally just always picture Jack making blueberry pancakes Christmas morning--don't ask me why).

But after Jack passed, Matt was just one of many at an orphanage while struggling with his heightened senses. I don't imagine they celebrated birthdays at St. Agnes, so I certainly doubt he ever had a birthday cake again after his dad passed. And I'm sure there was never a feast for Thanksgiving (gluttony is a sin after all), but rather a focus on giving thanks and maybe giving back to the community. Holidays like Christmas and Easter would obviously be focused on the religious meaning and not the "fun" aspect that children generally associate with them--so no presents under the tree or fun egg hunts.

I think as an adult, Matt probably treats his birthday as just any other day (and I have long since had plans for FFTD Reader to eventually do something big for when the timeline reaches his birthday again because this idea deeply saddens me). I think he's grateful that Foggy's family took him in for holidays though, and I think that helped Matt to maybe associate happier memories with the holidays in his adulthood at least, but I think he's also still very aware that they're not his family, too. Which I think continues to add to that bittersweet feeling on holidays.

For Frank, I can't say I know much about his childhood (I haven't binged Punisher enough to remember if much was ever said), but I think he hates holidays and birthdays now. Not only did he certainly miss spending his birthdays and holidays with his family when he was in the Marines, but I'm sure he missed many birthdays for Maria and the kids during that time, too.

But it's not just that he missed those days when he was gone, but now they're all gone. And I promise you that man has not forgotten a single birthday for any of them whenever the day rolls around again. Always thinking about how much older Frank Jr. would be or what new thing Lisa might be into. He might be thinking about how he'd have liked to celebrate Maria with the kids on her birthday. He thinks about them all on Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Halloween, Easter--hell, I'm sure he thinks about them on the Fourth of July because he probably took the kids to firework shows whenever he was home. But now every single one of those days is just so painfully empty for him, no matter what happy memories he had for them in the past. Now it all just hurts him to think about how things were and just reminds him of how lonely he is now.

So yeah, Frank hates birthdays and holidays.

I think Michael has a lot of mixed feelings over birthdays and holidays, too. We don't know too much about his past, but he was raised by Bren--and Bren is an absolute abusive and disgusting piece of shit (we don't even fully know what all he did to Mikey). So did Mikey get cake and presents on his birthday? Probably, but you can guarantee that cake came from Birdie and not his father. If a party was planned, it certainly wasn't because Bren did anything. I'm almost positive I remember something about Mikey being 16 and Bren taking him to go kill someone for the first time--so no, I don't think Bren was celebrating holidays and birthdays with Michael and Jimmy.

But then Michael had his daughter, Anna. And while we know next to nothing about his deceased wife, we do know that Michael loves Anna and was very active in her life. He damn well celebrated her birthdays and holidays--and we know he certainly had the money to do it. He would've never missed the opportunity to spoil her. Until, of course, he goes to prison and misses 8 years of birthdays and holidays with her. And you know he was sitting in that prison thinking about her for every one of those big days and hating himself for missing it, though I get the feeling he also considered it extra punishment. Because whether he really was responsible for Allison's death or not, he does make a comment that he felt he was responsible and that he deserved to serve that prison time.

This was a very sad topic to think about for all of our boys 😭 But at least fanfiction gives us the opportunity to give them happier memories for these days. Because deep down, I know all three of them just want that familial love that was lost or taken from them for one reason or another, and big moments in your life make you painfully aware of when you don't have those people to celebrate with.

[chainofclovers]

(apparently i will never stop having) ted lasso s3 thoughts

It was such an interesting and weird experience to mostly really like TL s3 because it kind of felt like agreeing to go on a vacation with a large group of people and at the end I was like "well there were some ups and downs but that was a good time and I'm going to put together a scrapbook of this special vacation that broke my heart in ways I kind of appreciated" and then many fellow travelers were like "I can't believe I was stupid enough to get tricked to go on this shitty vacation and that we're all having such a bad time." And also it was like that at every checkpoint throughout the travels. I obviously wasn't alone in loving plenty of things about the season; I feel lucky that there are people who feel similarly enough to me that it wasn't totally lonely, and also of course it doesn't truly matter that everyone has different opinions about the same thing. I don't need a bunch of identical opinions to feel like I've earned the right to my own. It's more that there were multiple points where I was genuinely questioning whether my brain was just working totally differently in a way I should actually explore more because of how I felt about the intentions/intentionality and execution behind certain things on the show. Things that if I'd been watching sans fandom experience but with a similar level of obsession, I think I'd have been pretty unphased by and peaceful with. And it made me genuinely sad to feel like so many people I care about were having such a bad time with something that I, for whatever reason, was just having a mostly good time with in ways that I wish I could have transferred over.

Also, I'm clearly still trying to figure out how I feel because I did have an extremely emotional reaction to the show ending, more akin to something deeply earth-shattering happening in my own actual 3d life. There was a 72-ish hour period in which I cried more than I had in probably a year or two combined before that. I cried in the bathroom at a baseball game because baseball >>> sports >>> Ted. I cried about things I wanted to see on my screen that I did not get to see. I cried about the absolute unfairness of a human being only being able to exist in one physical space at a time. I cried about having a community that was centered around a shared interest and the sheer stress that goes into that. All through the summer and even now, although I am no longer crying about Ted per se, I feel like my ability to cry is way more close to the surface than it used to be.

So it's not that I had some kind of super simple reaction to the show that just made me willing to bop along to everything, even if some of my crying was just about mourning the end of something and appreciating it. There are definitely things I'd change if I'd been involved, including:

Zava's presence would have been a far more short-lived dalliance with the team that would allow them to do the same exact stuff in terms of Zava's recruitment allowing the show to more explicitly discuss Rupert's manipulation of both Rebecca and Nate (I loved that Zava initially felt like a device that would allow Rebecca to make those observations with full awareness that this is what was happening to Nate, and I thought her backstory coupled with Nate's scenes with Rupert were super well done)...but it would not have dragged into so many other episodes (and this would have freed up time for one of the main things I felt was missing, which was a more explicit discussion of the legacy of coaching, which Ted and Roy [and also Beard and Trent via the book and eventually Nate] all needed more room to discuss)

Shandy's role in KJPR would have been more explicitly about mentorship and its limitations and would have afforded Keeley more onscreen contemplation time

Instead of backtracking into raging out with jealousy over Keeley in the final episode, Jamie and Roy would have had their fight sooner in the season and would've spent the finale navigating the ambiguities of simply not knowing what was going to happen with all their relationships (which is what we basically get in the montage, and I believe those characters would get there, but even as a non-linear progress enthusiast I found their final scenes together annoying after having really loved most of their scenes together throughout the entire series...I have no trouble believing that Roy and Keeley would likely reunite in the future, or that they might really pull off the throuple, and I didn't personally need to see that happen on my screen, but I did want a more concretely sunk in growth moment for Roy)

One (1) fewer ambiguous facial expression from Michelle Keller, please, mostly because of how much I've hated talking about it

Ted and Roy would have gotten a goodbye(-for-now) that alluded to their overlapping traumas and things they had observed about each other and appreciated in each other

BUT. In general, I felt like the characters were never unrecognizable (including Ted in 3x12, who was not emotionless and dead inside and cruel and would not need to grovel if/when he returns to the UK and I will totally die on that hill), and the various missed opportunities and unfinished business and open-ended trailings off into the future did nothing to ruin the perfect beauty of s1 (which will always be soooo special and great) or the (often more clunky than s3 in my opinion) complications of s2 (which I did love in its way).

I think I'm just basically at my core someone whose favorite show is this one? So I'd rather, when my brain presents the options, take the more generous interpretation of certain things in a way that allows me to engage more fully than I would otherwise, if disappointment was ruling my viewing experience. And I think a kitchen metaphor is the only way I can make sense of this whole experience and why I'm kinda here for it and find post-canon a compelling place to explore.

I think of a cook performing mise en place to get a dish ready to cook. Or a baker getting all their ingredients out on the counter so they can more easily assemble the cookies or whatever. But if you're making more than one thing, which I think Ted Lasso the show was doing (and your mileage may vary on how well that went), you've got your assembled thing in the oven and then you're also doing prep for the next thing and you're loading the dishes in the sink from the old thing and it's kind of a constant state of prep and action and clean-up. And agree with it or not, s3 ends when pretty much every character has a messy kitchen. I absolutely include Ted in this. The montage at the end feels like Ted's attempt to neaten up the kitchens of every person he knows so that he can survive making his choice to take a long physical break from actually being in those kitchens. (Linked post describes how I feel about that scene, which I do think was reality rather than a dream, but highly filtered through one person's consciousness.)

(((Whispers: and the thing that mystifies me the most about fan reactions--other than the literal threats of violence against creators--is the whole "I guess Ted and Rebecca didn't have any meaningful connection after all and the parallels were just accidents or cruel jokes" thing...which is not something I have really read or seen online much recently at all if you're wondering. Because their parallel journeys matter so much! And the main way I can make sense of it all is by feeling like they did have all the ingredients out for the meal that would allow them to have gotten together during the 3 season arc, and because of Ted's very necessary choice they could not do that, and that doesn't mean the ingredients and their particular arrangement are meaningless even if hurts. That is genuinely what I see. And I completely understand why the missed opportunities or lack of acknowledgment of certain parallels is frustrating, but what i don't understand is the belief that the things we actually did get shouldn't have even been there if they weren't gonna kiss. I feel similarly about where Ted and Beard end up, actually, but that may be a post for another time [or the inside of my brain only] because I'm already very self-conscious about how long this is. The "Jason I am in your walls what was the reason for any of this" stuff just makes me feel so. Incredibly. Tired. The reasons were in the show!)))

Ted Lasso's finale attempted to put one last dish in the oven and bake it and bring it out, but just behind the outstretched arms with the neatly presented dish is a kitchen (a whole ensemble's worth of kitchens) in absolute disarray, no matter how much good stuff the characters have learned about mise en place and being a loving person and all that. Because the dishes literally never stop when you're a person, and neither does the hunger. I am not necessarily interested in analyzing how other shows whose endings I've loved or hated handle their character's figurative kitchens, but I do think that the way this show handled it is a big reason why the finale (and whole final season) was so divisive. I would love to remain as happily obsessed with it as I am while figuring out how to feel less intense feelings about how much some of the communal elements of it stress me out! I am an adult! I get how opinions work! I just have lots of feelings, I guess. :/