#literally anyone who would read a fic i wrote for them

[roseghoul26]

Cooper Howard | The Ghoul x fem!Reader

Tags: Teasing, Flirting, Developing Relationships, Injury, Kissing, Cunnilingus,  Synopsis: It had been apparent from the moment you met him that The Ghoul was Cooper Howard, your favorite actor. He had no idea that you knew who he was, so how could you not have some fun with it? Author’s Note: i’ve watched nothing but bridgerton recently and now i keep finding myself writing the way they speak also i’ve got no clue how radiation and water interact to just pretend what i wrote is true okay? also if you got the notif for the first upload of this fic, no you didn't :) Taglist: @ancientbeing10 @alex-does-art-things

The poster you stood in front of was in remarkable shape, with only hints of discoloration littering the page. The frame that held it had stood the test of time and came out victorious, with only a few scratches across the glass to show for it. A fond smile grew as you read the words emblazoned across it: The Man from Deadhorse. 

A man was also pictured riding on the back of his trusted steed, pistol in hand, aiming it toward an unpictured outlaw. A man that you knew to be Cooper Howard, the actor who you’d grown quite fond of during your life in the vault. You’re sure you’ve watched his entire discography or at least all his films that your vault had, which was a significant amount. 

So when said actor captured you after being exiled from your vault, albeit a little less human-looking, you couldn’t believe it. It took a second to clock it, but you managed to piece two and two together when you heard him talk and watched how he wielded his gun. Hell, he was still wearing the same clothes from the movie whose poster you stood in front of. It hadn’t been that difficult. 

Of course, he had no idea you knew who he was. You didn’t utter a word, not from when he first captured you to when he begrudgingly let you tag alongside him or even when you’d formed a bond. Friends, maybe not, but you trusted each other, and that was enough. 

You couldn’t help but admire the man on the poster, if just for a few more moments. Anyone could see that Cooper Howard was handsome, and his charisma added to that. As incredible of an actor as he was, you would admit that you didn’t watch his films just for his skills. He’d been your childhood crush, following you into your teenage years. 

And maybe it was still around, lingering at the back of your mind. Perhaps that would explain the butterflies in your stomach whenever you looked at The Ghoul. Even though his face had completely changed, you still believed he was just as handsome as before becoming a ghoul. His charisma and wit had just become sharper, and even though he sneered more than smiled, you still recognized that grin from the movies. 

You snuck a glance at your traveling partner, Cooper Howard, The Ghoul. He had yet to see the poster, or maybe he chose to ignore it. Either way, his back was to you, rifling through the desks of the building the two of you had entered. It was becoming evident now that this place was a movie theatre, someplace you thought, until now, they had entirely made up to mess with you in the vault. They knew your love of movies; why not tell you there was a place where you could see them on giant screens?

“You gonna stare at that fuckin’ poster all night, or are ya gonna help me?” So he had chosen to ignore it, then. 

You refrained from sighing, not wanting to annoy the man. Instead, you got to work on the other side of the theatre, where a few doors stood. Glancing into the first room, you found it filled with garbage. Literal garbage. Bags were piled from floor to ceiling, and even after all the time that had passed, it still smelled. Holding back a gag, you shut the door as best you could. Gross. 

The next door was a little more pleasant. It was a bathroom with three stalls lining the rightmost wall and a few sinks. A first aid kit had been bolted on the wall, and a slight, victorious noise left you when you found two stimpacks, a roll of bandages, and a small canister of water. You quickly deposited those into your bag before continuing to the stalls. 

Two were empty, but the third had something in the toilet. When you peered in, you chuckled. A teddy bear sat on the edge, a newspaper in its hands, a pair of broken glasses on its face. No matter how vicious the surface world was, people still managed to find humor in the small things, and you cherished it. 

The third and final room was locked, so taking out a bobby pin, you got to work unlocking it. It took you some time, as you weren’t nearly as quick as The Ghoul was, but eventually, the door swung open. Inside was what you presumed to be once an office, a desk with a terminal flush against the wall. A large safe was tucked into the corner, nearly hidden by bookshelves. Grinning at your new prize, you bent down in front of it, pulling the bobby pin and screwdriver back out. 

If the door took some time, the safe took even longer. A small pile of broken bobby pins had started to grow at your feet, and your back was beginning to ache from bending over for so long. You could feel that you were close; you just needed to move it a little more to the right…

Snap!

“Motherfucker…” you grumbled under your breath, adding another pin to your collection. The idea of admitting defeat flashed through your mind, but you shook it away. You needed to prove this to yourself. 

And to The Ghoul. 

You heard the sound of footsteps drawing closer, stopping when they reached the room you were currently in. You didn’t have to turn around to know who it was; you could hear his spurs. “The hell is takin’ you so long?” His gruff voice stopped you as you were about to insert another bobby pin. 

“This fuckin’ safe,” you sighed, resuming your attempt at lockpicking. Your back was really hurting now, and so you got down onto your knees, which helped a little. The concrete floor was uncomfortable, but sitting offered some respite, and you bent forward, returning to work. You had expected The Ghoul to have already left, so you were startled when you felt him crouch beside you. 

His gaze was locked onto the safe when you glanced at him, and he shifted almost nervously beside you. Weird. “Lemme do it.” His tone held no room for argument, yet you still shook your head at him. 

“No, I’ve got this.” 

“You’re gonna run outta fuckin’ bobby pins before ya open it,” he jabbed, nudging the pile with his foot. You didn’t bother to hide the glare you sent him. 

“Then I’ll just take yours.” You were pleasantly surprised when you turned the lock and were met with resistance an inch before it had turned all the way. You were close. 

“Oh, I’d like to see ya try, sweetheart.”

“Maybe I already have.” You had shifted the pin to the right and were met resistance way later, and a victorious smile grew on your face. “C’mom, baby, open up for me,” you whispered, voice dangerously low, and you missed the way the man beside you shifted even more. 

He didn’t offer any more arguments, and you let out a small laugh when the safe door finally opened. You’d barely gotten a glimpse of the contents inside when you saw a gloved hand sneak inside. You smacked it away, glaring at him. “Open your own fuckin’ safe,” you chastized.

He matched your expression, human-looking eyes glaring daggers into you, but you didn’t let up. It was a quick standoff, but he eventually backed down, not before muttering something under his breath. You didn’t hear what he said, but you didn’t care. 

Opening the door further allowed more light in, allowing you to see your prize. A stack of pre-war bills sat on the bottom, and you tucked them into your bag. There was a silver locket, which you also grabbed, knowing you could get some caps for it. A few unlabeled chem bottles were on the top shelf, all added to your bag. 

But you were most excited about the revolver tucked behind all the chems. It was heavy, heavier than the pistol on your hip, and in surprisingly good condition. The barrel's metal was mostly unscratched and shiny in the dim light. The wood grip, a deep brown oak, was cool in your hand, and it contrasted beautifully with the steel of the rest of the gun.

You raised a brow when he held a hand out expectantly, moving the gun a bit closer to your chest. “Are you gonna give it back?”

He let out a deep exhale. “Yes,” he responded before making a ‘give me’ motion with his upturned hand.

After some hesitation, you set it in his palm, observing as he tested it in his hand. His expression was difficult to read as he evaluated it, his eyes carefully roaming the gun. You had to bite back a laugh when he raised the gun to the right of him; he looked like he did on the poster you just saw. 

You must’ve done a worse job than you thought, holding back your laugh because he was fixing you with another glare. “Sorry,” you began between chuckles, “it’s just… you look like the guy on the poster.”

The Ghoul was good at hiding his emotions, and his face remained unreadable as he glared at you, but you swore you saw a bit of alarm behind the fire in his eyes. “Do I, now?” He asked, seemingly unbothered. 

“It’s not a bad thing,” you teased, an idea forming that made you grin. “I’d take it as a compliment, being compared to as handsome a man as Cooper Howard.”

The heat in his stare dimmed, replaced with a hint of surprise. He blinked at you for a moment, unsure what to make of your words. You continued. “What, you thought I watched his movies just for his acting skills?” You were careful not to use the word you, not wanting to let him in on the secret.

When he continued to just watch you, at a loss for words, you finally stood, your back crying out in relief. You stuck out a hand, gesturing to the gun in his hand, and he slowly gave it back to you. “Thank you,” you smiled sweetly at him, your confidence growing at how you managed to stun the man. “I’ll meet you out there. Help yourself to whatever is left in here.” With that, you tuned and left, your sweet smile turning to one of victory. 

Unbeknownst to you, the man you’d left in the room had a slight smile on his face before quickly coming to his senses. A groan left him, and he ran a gloved hand over his face as if he could wipe away the heat he felt in his cheeks. 

If he could blush, he was sure he would be bright red right now. 

─•~❉᯽❉~•─

“Why the hell were ya kicked outta your vault, anyway?”

Well, that certainly wasn’t the question you expected to hear today. You glanced behind you at The Ghoul, continuing down the long-since abandoned street the two of you were on. Even though it had been a few months, it still hurt, the wound never fully closing. “Why’d you ask?” You responded after some hesitation. 

“Do I gotta have a reason?” He shot back, and you sighed. 

“I suppose not,” you agreed before taking a few moments to formulate your answer. “They thought I was a threat to their way of life. I was too inquisitive for my own good, didn’t work well with authority, and constantly challenged said authority.”

“You? Disagreeable? Never.” 

“Well, fuck you too,” you huffed, turning away from him. Here you were, telling him about possibly the worst thing that happened in your life, and he was insulting you. Asshole. For a moment, you thought he was being genuinely friendly, wanting to learn about you. You were bitterly disappointed to find the opposite. 

A tense silence hung in the air as you continued to walk, not bothering to glance at him. He didn’t deserve your attention right now. Your somewhat positive mood was now ruined, both from having to bring up your past and because of him. 

“They really kicked ya out for that?” He finally spoke. It wasn’t an apology, but you could tell it was an attempt at relieving the dispute. 

“I think they were afraid I would change everything, and you know there’s nothing vault dwellers hate more than change. Even if change would improve their lives, they’d rather stay with what they know, not wanting to risk losing comfort and familiarity. They just couldn’t wrap their heads around the fact that change is a good thing. I don’t think they ever will.” The words had just tumbled from your mouth, anger making you ramble freely. When you finished, you finally glanced behind you, cringing at yourself. 

To your surprise and relief, you didn’t find a look of judgment on his face. Instead, he seemed almost pensive, not expecting to hear you voice your opinions like that. 

“Do ya miss it?”

“Fuck no. Even with all its dangers and obstacles, life up here is infinitely better than any life I could’ve had in a vault. At least up here, my life is mine. I make my own choices, for better or for worse. I exist for myself, not to fulfill some corporation’s quota or for some experiment. I am myself.” You let out a sigh. “There is one thing I do miss, though.”

He didn’t respond but nodded, gesturing for you to continue. “I miss the movie room,” you chuckled, almost bittersweet. “It’s silly, I know. But I miss lounging on one of the couches and getting lost in the story.”

“Did ya have a favorite?” He asked, and you swore he was reminiscing a bit as well. 

“Oh, plenty. The Wizard of Oz, The Man from Calabasas, and The Silence of the Lambs, to name a few.”

“The Man from Calabasas?”

“Have you seen it?” You knew damn well that he had done more than seen the movie. He had been the lead star of it.

“Somethin’ like that,” The Ghoul muttered in response. “You weren’t kiddin’, were you?”

“About liking Cooper Howard’s movies? No, I certainly was not. Hell, I’d go as far as to say he’s my favorite actor.”

Like always, his expression towards your response was unreadable. “Would ya, now?”

“Uh-huh. I had a crush on him growing up. Maybe I still do,” you laughed lightly, shrugging your shoulders. He faltered a bit, his eyes widening a fraction, and you had to return to facing forward, unable to hide the smirk on your face any longer. It was so fun to tease him. Every time you’d seen a poster with him on it for the past weeks, you were sure to point it out, always commenting on him.

“He’s much older than ya, sweetheart,” he finally responded after some time.

“It wasn’t like I was dating the man,” you laughed. “Not that it would’ve deterred me, though. I always liked them older.” 

The man behind you cleared his throat, and when you turned, you saw his eyes locked onto you, his jaw clenched, and a quickly growing fire in his eyes. Oh, this was so much fun. “You got something against that? Not that I’d change my mind based on your opinion.”

“Not a problem at all.” His words were clipped, strained. You halted in your tracks, holstering your gun, the revolver you’d just found a week ago. He cocked his head, watching you closely, stopping a good few feet behind you. His shoulders tensed when you approached him, his jaw never unclenching. 

“Everything alright?” You asked, innocence dripping from your words. “You seem… tense.”

“I’m fine,” he bit out. Giving him enough time to stop you as he spoke, you raised your hands to his coat, fixing the crooked lapels. Once they were straight, you ran your hands down them, resting them on his chest. You couldn’t feel it through all of this fabric, and it was quiet enough that you couldn’t hear it, but a small groan rumbled his chest.

“If you say so,” you teased, running your hands up one last time before letting him go. You took a few steps back, glancing around at the dilapidated scenery. “We should probably find shelter soon. Only an hour of sunlight left.”

“I… sure.” You’d never heard him sound so uncertain, completely taken aback by what you had done. A part of you worried that you had taken it a step too far, but you knew the man. He would not have let you touch him if he didn’t want it. As you turned back forward, you failed to see how his eyes trailed down your body hungrily, gloved hands lingering where yours had just been. 

─•~❉᯽❉~•─

Even though the bed was the comfiest thing you’d laid in in months, sleep would not come. No matter how much you tossed, turned, and readjusted, you just could not sleep. It wasn’t like your mind was preoccupied by anything. 

Well, that wasn’t true. You’d found your mind wandering to your traveling companion more and more these past weeks since you’d stopped and fixed his jacket right in the middle of the street. You thought he had been more affected than you, but ever since then, you hadn’t been able to stop thinking about how he felt under your hands and what he’d feel like elsewhere. 

With a huff and warm cheeks, you sat up, giving up on falling asleep. Slipping on your shoes, you kept your steps light as you crossed the room and made a pointed effort not to glance at the sleeping silhouette of The Ghoul. Grabbing your gun, you stepped outside, the cool night air doing wonders for your flushed skin. 

You sat on the edge of the barely standing porch of the house you were sleeping in. You balanced your gun in your lap, and from the pockets of your jeans, you pulled out a beat-up pack of cigarettes and a barely functioning lighter. It took a few moments for the flame to catch, the clicking noise filling the silent night, but you eventually had a lit cigarette between your lips, the smoke swirling comfortingly around your body.

You felt the wood creak before you heard it, and you whirred around, gun pointing at the new figure behind you. The figure let out a familiar chuckle, and you sighed in relief, putting the gun back down. “Didn’t mean to wake you,” you muttered as you turned back. 

The Ghoul sat beside you with a sigh, arms extended behind him. “You’re gonna attract unwanted attention with that,” he muttered, ignoring your previous statement. 

“Like you?”

He laughed. “You’d be lucky if the worst you got was me.”

“I suppose,” you conceded. “But your company isn’t exactly… unwelcome.”

He merely hummed in response, and you offered him the cigarette. He eyed it briefly, eyes flicking from it to your face, but he eventually grabbed it. Skin grazed yours, and it almost startled you when you realized he wasn’t wearing gloves, and it felt scandalous to see him without them. Still, you kept your composure, observing him silently as he took a drag. 

“Can’t sleep?” You heard him ask after some time, and you shook your head. “Me neither.”

“Sorry if my tossing and turning kept you up.”

“Ain’t your fault,” he sighed, passing the cigarette back to you. “Is… are ya alright?”

He’s been surprising you with the questions lately, and you couldn’t help the slight disbelief on your face, nearly choking on the smoke. “Just a lot on my mind” is what you finally went with. It was not entirely a lie, but it withheld specific details. 

He thankfully seemed to clock that you didn’t quite want to talk about it, so he left you in silence, taking the cigarette you passed to him. You both whipped your heads to the left when you heard the sound of something groaning, followed by a few more groans from other entities. Whether it was human or not, you couldn’t tell. He quickly smashed the cigarette under his boot, standing up slowly, hand inching towards his gun. 

His other hand extended towards you, and you didn’t give yourself time to second-guess before you interlocked your finger with his, letting him pull you up. You had barely gotten to your feet when he was dragging you inside, nearly making you stumble over the planks of wood sticking up.

Still, both of you managed to get inside quickly, the door being kicked soon shut by him, and you locked it. Peering out the blinds, you saw a horde of ferals shuffle their way down the street, some gathering where you were just sitting. You and The Ghoul probably could’ve bested the group, but you never knew. You noticed out of the corner of your eye that said companion wasn’t looking outside like you were but instead trained on you. 

When the horde continued further down the street, you let out a breath before switching your attention to the man. “What’s wrong?”

His eyes scanned over your face, something unreadable in them. You gasped lightly when you felt him squeeze your hand, your fingers interlocked with his. So that’s what was making him act so weird. 

A small smile graced your face as you looked down at your intertwined hands, neither of you making any move to pull apart yet. His hands were rougher than you were expecting, and even though you could feel the grooves of his marred skin, his fingertips were incredibly calloused as they rubbed into your skin. It was the most lovely thing you’d ever felt.

You’d never seen him regard something so gently when you looked back up at him. It was like you were catching a glimpse of the man he once was before the war. For a moment, you caught a glimpse of the actor, yet this was no scene from a movie. This moment was real, two lost souls finding some semblance of comfort with each other.

But just as soon as the gentle moment had started, it came to a screeching halt, and The Ghoul took a step back, pulling his hand from yours. You tried not to let it sting, but you couldn’t help the slight hurt in your heart as he backed away. “Good night,” he muttered out, his voice cold. 

You simply nodded in response, not trusting your voice, and you heard the receding footsteps of The Ghoul as he marched back towards where he was sleeping. You stayed locked by the door for a good moment, unable to move, and embarrassment and sadness locked you there. 

You don’t even remember walking back to your bed. All you remember is that you were suddenly looking up at the ceiling, sleep even further than it was before. You swore you could still feel his hand in yours, the heat from his skin, the texture of his skin beneath your fingers. Sighing, you rolled over on your side, back turned away from where The Ghoul was sleeping.

Sleep didn’t come to you that night, and when you finally got up hours later and saw the way The Ghoul sat hunched over the table, you knew he didn’t sleep either.

─•~❉᯽❉~•─

It had been days since that night, and things had been incredibly tense between the two of you since. Hours of travel, once filled with light conversation, were now done in silence. Soft glances were now guarded, lingering touches nonexistent. It was distracting, constantly on your mind, overanalyzing everything you’d done or said to him. 

Maybe that distraction was the reason you now sat bleeding out, half lying against an old car, your fingers clutching your stomach uselessly. Blood poured out between your fingers, every breath feeling like you were being stabbed all over again by that Raider. It had been a poorly hidden ambush, yet they still managed to catch you off-guard, your thoughts elsewhere. 

It had been fine until you’d gotten cut off from your companion and forced into a small alleyway. You’d managed to take down most of your attackers, but one had gotten lucky with a stab to the stomach. They currently lay dead on the floor as well, shot by your gun, but that had been after they got you. 

The sounds of gunfire had ceased about thirty seconds ago, making your ears ring. Or maybe it was the blood loss. You couldn’t tell.

You heard the sound of loud footfalls, and you reached for your gun with a crimson-covered hand, which made it difficult to grasp the weapon. Your arm shook like crazy as you raised your gun, training it on the entrance of the alleyway, waiting as silently as you could. Small gasps of pain kept pouring from your lips, and you blinked back tears. 

Relief flooded you when you heard your name being called by The Ghoul, his gruff voice never sounding so lovely. You managed to croak out a response, your arm falling to your lap, unable to hold it up any longer. He called out your name again, even closer this time, but you couldn’t bring yourself to respond, your energy quickly leaving. 

When you saw that familiar silhouette at the entrance, you couldn’t help the small smile on your face despite your incredible pain. He was by your side in a second, or maybe you blacked out for a bit. Everything was so blurry now. You cried out in pain when you felt him press down on your stomach, and you tried to squirm away, but he was much stronger than you. 

You sagged against the car, unable to fight him any longer. Your eyes felt heavy, but you tried your hardest to keep them open, especially when The Ghoul practically shook you awake. “You better keep those fuckin’ eyes open,” he snapped, and if you were more conscious, you would’ve been able to detect the panic in his voice. 

“Are you threatening me?” You wheezed out.

“If that’s what it takes to keep ya awake, then yes.” You felt cold air hit your stomach as he lifted your shirt, examining the wound. You didn’t look at his expression, not wanting to know how bad it was. 

“At least take me out to dinner,” you chuckled before a cough rattled your body. Something warm and sticky fell from your lips, making The Ghoul curse, who hurriedly looked for something in his bag. A small first aid kit clattered to the ground, and you cringed when you saw him pull out a needle and thread. 

“After this, I’ll take ya out to as many dinners as ya like,” The Ghoul murmured, and because of how hazy your vision was, you missed how his hands shook as he threaded the needle. 

“Is that a promise?” It was starting to get hard to get the words out now, as they were beginning to slur. 

“You know I don’t make promises I can’t keep, sweetheart.”

“I love it when you call me sweetheart,” you admitted, unable to stop yourself. Your smile turned into a wince when you felt the needle pierce your skin. He muttered an apology, but you just shook your head and leaned forward slightly as he worked quickly to sew your wound close. It was just close enough that you could see him clearly, and you unabashedly let your eyes roam his face.

Blood loss was kicking in now, and the world was spinning. You tried hard to keep your eyes open but found them fluttering close even more frequently, your head drooping to the car. He shook you gently whenever he felt you do it, promising that he was almost done. “We gotta get this close before I can give ya a stimpack.”

“You’re pretty,” you whispered before almost immediately breaking into laughter.

“And you’ve lost a lot of blood,” The Ghoul shook his head, working diligently. 

“I mean it,” you practically pouted. “You’re so pretty.”

“I’m sure I’m quite the fuckin’ catch.”

“You’ve always been a catch,” you teased, and you tried to bring up one of your hands to caress his face, but it fell limply to your lap. 

For the first time, his eyes shot up to yours, confusion on his face. But they quickly returned to his work, shaking his head again. “Whatdya mean by that, sweetheart?” He asked, trying to keep you talking. Or maybe he was genuinely curious. 

“The entire time I’ve known you, I’ve thought you were beautiful,” the tiniest bit of tension left The Ghoul, “but even before then, I’ve always thought you were the most handsome man I’d ever seen-”

“You don’t mean-”

“Guess that’s why I’ve still got a crush on you,” you sighed, continuing despite his objections. But you didn’t get to see his reaction, the weight on your lids growing unbearable, and you let them fall close, unconsciousness finally claiming you. Your name being said like a plea was the last thing you remembered.

─•~❉᯽❉~•─

You weren’t sure how long you were out for. All you know is that the room you woke up in was unfamiliar, and everything in your body hurt. Wincing, you tried to sit up, only to collapse in pain, your stomach in agony. A shadow fell across your face, and through tears, you managed to see the familiar face of The Ghoul above you. 

He looked as terrible as you felt, the deep sockets of his eyes somehow even more pronounced. It looked like he hadn’t slept in days, the whites of his eyes bloodshot. His clothes were more rumpled, and he had discarded his hat somewhere in the room. If you weren’t in so much pain, you would’ve asked him why he looked like, well, shit. 

His lips moved, but you couldn’t hear the words, your ears ringing too loudly. You fought back when you felt a needle enter your skin, but you relaxed when the pain began to dim like a bright light covered with a blanket; the pain was still there but not nearly as noticeable. 

After a few more seconds, your ears finally stopped ringing, the man's gruff voice replacing it. “Just some painkillers,” he explained.

You tried to thank him, but your voice was too dry, and you broke into a coughing fit. With a lot of help from him, you could sit up enough to drink, greedily gulping down the canteen of water that he presented you. Despite your objections, he pulled it away from you when he deemed you had enough. 

You were starting to feel more alert now, and your vision was not as fuzzy as it was moments ago. The Ghoul sat in the chair you just noticed beside your bed, a soft sigh leaving him. The room was still unfamiliar, and you realized he had probably just dragged your unconscious body into the closest possible building. 

Glancing at him, you watched as he leaned back into his chair, his eyes never leaving your face. His expression was, as always, unreadable, but you couldn’t help but feel like you’d done something wrong. Well, something besides getting stabbed. “How long have I been out for?”

“Almost three days.” 

“Thank you.”

“For?”

You gestured to your body. “For saving me.”

In response, he made a vague noise, his arms crossing over his chest. His stare became scrutinizing, and you felt like he was picking you apart. You could feel your heartbeat accelerate, your nerves becoming terrible, yet you forced yourself to hold his gaze.

After what felt like hours of tense silence, he finally spoke. “Whatdya remember?”

“Well, not much, to be honest. I remember getting injured, and then you helped me, and then I passed out.”

“D’ya remember anythin’ you said?”

You furrowed your brows. “No? Did… did I say something bad?” When he didn’t respond, you grew even more worried. “Look, if I said something to offend you-”

“How long have ya known?”

You blinked. “What?”

“How long have ya known who I am?” His voice was surprisingly steady, not leaning towards any particular emotion. 

Internally, you were kicking yourself. Of course, you just had to let your secret slip while you were bleeding out. You figured it useless to attempt lying, so you just sighed deeply. “I’ve known since the moment we met,” you confessed. 

“So this entire time-”

“Yes.”

The chair creaked, and you jumped when you felt his elbows lean on the edge of your bed. “And ya didn’t fuckin’ think that was important to tell me?”

You leaned as far away from him as you physically could. “I’m sorry.”

He laughed at that, a bitter sound. You felt his fingers creep toward your hand beneath the covers, noticeably bare of gloves. Something dark crossed his features when he made contact, his fingers running along your hand tortuously slowly. You whispered out his name as a question, confused but not against this conversation's direction. “You know my real name, sweetheart. Might as well use it.”

Your throat suddenly became dry, but you didn’t dare reach for the canteen perched in his lap. “Cooper,” a small smile pulled at the corners of his mouth, “I thought you’d be… angrier.”

“Oh, I’m fuckin’ pissed.” You saw his eyes flash momentarily, making you want to shrink into a ball and hide. You’d never been on the receiving end of his anger, and you hated it. Or at least that's what you told yourself. “But there’s far more important things on my mind right now.”

“Like what?”

“Like keepin’ ya alive, for example.” His teasing tone turned somber. “You almost bled out.”

“Oh,” was all you could think to say. You hadn’t realized how severe the wound you’d gotten was. Tentatively, you lowered the sheet that was around your body, then raised the still bloody shirt that now had a hole in the front. “My poor shirt…”

He scoffed. “Ya got stabbed in the gut, and you’re worried ‘bout your shirt?”

“Do you know how hard it is to find intact clothing up here?” You shook your head before examining the stitched-up gash on your stomach. Well, the once stitched-up gash. Thanks to the magic of stimpacks, he had been able to take out your sutures, leaving behind a barely healed scar across your stomach. You supposed it was a miracle, too, that it hadn’t caused severe damage to any of your intestines. “Thanks, doc.” You tried to jest. 

He laughed, but it sounded forced even to you. His gaze locked on where he rubbed your hand, looking like he wanted to say something. “Was… was there anything else?” You asked carefully. 

He exhaled sharply, and for a moment, you thought he wouldn’t respond. “Did you mean it?”

“Mean what?”

An exasperated chuckle left him. “Everythin’. Every comment, every tease, every single fuckin’ thing you did that’s kept me awake for nights on end. Did you mean it?” To any other person, the way he re-asked the question would’ve sounded angry, pissed off. But you knew better. There was almost a sense of desperation in his words, his gaze boring into you as he waited for a response. 

“I am many things,” you began slowly. “A liar is not one of them. I meant it, every single thing.”

He paused. “Were your words only meant for the man I was?”

“Can they not be for the man you are as well?”

Your words seemed to catch him off-guard. “I guess they can,” he sighed, tilting his head down to break eye contact. Without thinking, you freed your hand from the blanket and his touch, and you gently tugged his chin until he was looking at you again. You were both equally surprised by the action, but you didn’t let yourself back down now. Not when you were so close to what you wanted. 

You gave him a moment to pull away from your touch if he was so pleased, and when he didn't, a gentle smile grew on your lips as you adjusted your hand so that you now held the side of his face. It was a stretch to do so, but seeing how he practically melted into your touch was worth it. You wondered how long it had been since someone had held him like this. 

“I rather like the man you are,” you admitted softly, your thumb running over his scarred cheek. “The man who put up with my constant teasing. The man who’s become the person I trust the most in this fucked up world. The man who just saved my life.” You sat up slowly, much to the complaint of your stomach and The Ghoul, but you ignored both. 

With one arm holding you up, you tugged him forward until he was half on the bed, one leg between your own, the other still firm on the floor. His hands braced on either side of you, face inches from yours as he leaned above you. He was close enough that you could feel his chest rise and fall, now slightly quicker than before. 

Human eyes flicked down to your lips, an unspoken question to which you already knew the answer. Instead of speaking, you let your actions do the talking, closing the distance until your lips brushed over his. But you didn’t let them connect. You wanted him to do it, to show you that this was what he wanted.

You heard your name said softly, a mix between a plea and a warning. It was the most beautiful thing you’d ever heard. 

“Cooper,” you sighed in response, and that seemed to do the trick. He finally closed the space between you two, lips surprisingly gentle against yours as he kissed you. It was everything you wanted, and you sighed happily, fingers trailing patterns across his skin. 

After a few moments, he pulled away, much to your audible displeasure, and chuckled. “I’m still fuckin’ angry at ya, sweetheart.”

“I’d expect nothing less,” you laughed lightly, “but be mad at me later.”

“Why would I do that?” 

“Because I want you to kiss me again.” 

“So fuckin’ needy,” he teased, a slight grin on his lips, but he brought himself back down to your lips. “I like it.”

He didn’t give you a chance to respond, his lips crashing against yours with noticeably less gentleness. You didn’t resist as the force of it pushed you back gently onto the bed, and your hand fell from his face to the front of his jacket, grabbing a fistful of the material. His lips were almost feverish against yours, a barely contained desperation in the act, and you felt fingers brush against your cheek. They were just as rough as you remembered.

The bed shifted as he finally put his entire body on it, one knee between your legs, the other resting by your hip. One hand still worked to keep himself from resting his whole body weight on you, the other tracing patterns into your skin, just like you had done to him. If he had any reservations left, they no longer existed. The only things on his mind were the way you felt beneath him and the way your lips felt against his. 

You gasped when you felt him move down your jaw, down to your neck, kissing and sucking the delicate skin there. No longer able to hold his jacket comfortably, you switched to holding the back of his head, nails scratching lightly against the skin. He practically shuddered, his arm buckling slightly, some of his body weight falling onto your lower body. 

A groan of pain tore through you when you felt him press against your stomach. It was almost funny how he seemed to jump off of you, hooded eyes immediately becoming alert. “Fuck, sweetheart, I’m sorry-”

“Get back down here,” you practically growled, reaching up for his shirt again. He stopped you, redirecting your hand to the bed, securing it with a firm hand when you tried to break free. 

“You’re injured,” he countered, stopping your continued attempts to break free with a look. 

“And?”

“And we just got ya stable. I’d be even more fuckin’ pissed if three days of work was all for nothin’.”

“We’ll just be careful, then,” you protested, desire making you irrational. You’d just gotten a taste, but you needed more of him. Hesitancy flashed across his features, making you nervous. “Unless you don’t want to…”

“Oh, I fuckin’ do,” he chuckled. “But I ain’t doin’ anythin’ to ya until you’re healed.”

“Anything? Not even a kiss?”

He sighed, shaking his head, but his face had a fond expression. “You’re difficult, ya know that?”

“I’ve been told,” you laughed. “So is that a ‘no’, then?”

You had to stop yourself from laughing when he kissed you. When he pulled away, he rested his head against yours. “There. Satisfied?”

Far from it. “For now,” you sighed, lying comfortably on the bed. Now that you didn’t have anything exciting in your near future, exhaustion slowly began to creep back in, making you yawn. He chuckled, moving to get up, but you halted him with a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Lay with me? Please?”

You could tell that he was ready to argue against it, but he relented. With a smile, you were able to roll over to one of the sides of the bed with limited amounts of pain, giving him enough room to squeeze in behind you. Immediately, you felt one of his arms tuck beneath the pillow, the other resting on your hip, being careful to avoid your injury. 

With his front pressed against your back, you let your eyes fall close, much less violently than previously. Your breathing eventually evened out, and you let your body fully relax against him. He must’ve thought you were asleep because you felt him brush away any hair that covered your face, and even though you couldn’t see him, you knew he was observing you. 

You manage to be still when his lips grazed the shell of your ear, a featherlight kiss, and his following words were just as light. “I’m glad you’re alright, sweetheart.”

─•~❉᯽❉~•─

You couldn’t believe the sight in front of you. 

You’d accidentally stumbled upon it, traveling a little too far off the beaten path, but you were so glad you did. In front of you were scattered pools of water, about six total, ranging from five to twenty feet across. Steam billowed off the top of the pools, the water bubbling by some unseen force, disturbing the clear water's surface. Set into rust-red stone, you couldn’t tell how deep the pools were, but you were eager to find out.

Stepping toward the edge of one of the larger pools, the rational part of your brain finally kicked in, and you took out your Geiger counter. You expected to hear the annoying ticking noise that accompanied said pools of water but were surprised when it remained silent. 

After checking it a few more times to be sure, you sat back on your heels, debating. It was then you finally heard the footfalls of your companions, huffing in annoyance because you ran off on him. “The hell ya doin’?” He asked, wary of how close you sat next to the water. 

“There’s no radiation!” You called back, glancing behind at him. “At least not enough to be a problem!”

The Ghoul crouched beside you, glancing from you to the pools of water. “Are you sure?” 

“I’m positive. Look!” You returned the counter to the water’s surface and received the same results. 

He hummed curiously. “This must’ve formed after the bombs.”

“What is it?”

“They’re hot springs,” he responded like it was the most obvious answer in the world. “Stick your hand in it.”

Cautiously, you let your fingers dip beneath the water's surface and were startled to find it quite warm. A small laugh left you as you pulled your fingers out, wiping your hands on your pants. “Are they safe?”

“Well, sayin’ as there isn’t any radiation, and no creature can live in waters like this, I’d say so.” He had just gotten the words out before you stood again, toeing off your ragged shoes and socks. “The hell you doin’?” He asked again, bewildered by your actions. 

Your bag hit the rocks with a thud right next to your shoes. “I’m getting in,” you stated, leaving no room for argument. “I’m filthy, sweaty, gross, and I desperately need a bath. You see any other options around?” 

“Well, no, but-”

“Turn around if you don’t wanna see me get undressed.” Your gunbelt and armor were next to join the ground, close enough to the edge that you could grab it if you’d like. 

“And if I wanna see?” he asked when your hands reached the hem of your shirt, still partially stained from the event the week before, a hastily sewed-on patch on the front. 

You finally glanced down at him, and he watched you with rapt attention. “Well,” you laughed lightly, “then enjoy the show.” Your shirt was off in one movement, joining the pile on the ground. You didn’t bother to look at the new scar on your stomach, which had become significantly less painful over the past week.

You knew you were toying with something dangerous, a line the two of you had been dancing on over the past week. Things hadn’t gone beyond kissing and lingering touches, and you were ready for more. You wanted more, and if the way he seemed to restrain himself each time he kissed you, you knew he felt the same. 

Your jeans were next, leaving you in only your undergarments. He was utterly transfixed, excitement visible on his face as you reached for the clasp of your bra. It had been weird; over the past week, you felt like he was becoming better at not hiding his expressions. Or you were getting better at reading him. 

You playfully threw the garment at him when it slid off your shoulders, obstructing his view momentarily. During that, you let your underwear slide down your legs, and you kicked it off your ankles, letting it join the pile. For a moment, you let his eyes hungrily roam your body before submerging yourself beneath the water’s surface. It was just deep enough that you could stand, and your head and shoulders were free, letting you breathe freely.

The sound you made when the hot water met your skin was unintentionally filthy, a mix between a moan and a curse. “Fuck, that feels good,” you laughed airily. The water was nearly unbearably hot, but you quickly grew acclimated.

Leaning back, you let your head submerge beneath the water, wetting your hair. At this angle, you could see him still, stunned, and still crouched by the water. Grinning, you adjusted back upright before reaching him, resting your arms on the rock face, and you rested your chin on them, looking up at him. “Are you getting in as well?”

That question broke him out of the semi-trance he was in, and he shook his head, much to your displeasure. “Someone’s gotta keep watch,” he grumbled.

“You’re no fun.”

“Is that so?”

You nodded. “C’mon, just for a little bit.”

“Sweetheart, you and I both know that if I get in there, it won’t be for ‘a little bit’.”

“And that’s a problem because…?”

He shook his head again but removed his gloves, making your grin wider. Backing away from the edge, you watched his hat come off next, then his gunbelt and coat. When he reached the buttons of his shirt, he paused, glancing into your eager eyes. “Turn around,” he requested, and you responded with a confused glance. “Do ya want me in there or not?”

You were still confused, but not wanting to push his comfort, you complied, distracting yourself from the scenery around you. It was hard to hear over the rolling water, but you listened to the sound of clothing hitting the rocks, making your breath hitch in excitement. Anticipation made your skin crawl, although not unpleasantly, and you waited for the sound of water splashing as he joined you. 

But after a moment passed and you were met with just the continued sound of bubbles, you shifted nervously yet didn’t dare look back. Time seemed to crawl on agonizingly slow, your breaths turning shallow. You nearly screamed when you felt an arm wrap around your midsection, still mindful of the injury, but relaxed almost immediately when the familiar timbre of his voice hit your ears. “Not even a peek, I’m impressed.”

“Is it truly that shocking that I can follow directions?” You scoffed, letting him ease you against his now bare chest. The contact was blissful, and you sighed out in content. “Can I turn around now?”

He made a noise of consideration before resting his head on your shoulder. When he spoke next, it was almost straight into your ear. “In a moment. Lemme hold ya for a bit longer.”

When he received no objections from you, he pressed a kiss to your shoulder. His other arm joined with the other, keeping your body wrapped up in his arms. It was a bit of an awkward angle, but you managed to reach around to hold the back of his head gently. You could feel him smile lightly when your nails scratched lightly.

“So, how’d you figure it out?”

It took a few moments of wracking your brain until you finally realized what he was talking about. “We’re having this conversation now?”

“Don’t see any better time. Besides, ya can’t run away from the questions now.” It was true; over the past week, you’d found an excuse not to answer his questions, finding something else to do as an excuse. Now it looked like he had you right where he wanted. 

Groaning, you hung your head, much to the amusement of him. “It was your voice, mainly,” you admitted. “When I first heard it, I thought I was just reaching. Then, it just clicked after watching the way you wield your gun, the way you carry yourself, everything. You even look a bit the same,” you chuckled. 

“And you thought the best thing to do next was to fuckin’ tease me?”

“You have to admit, it was kinda funny.”

You felt his shoulders shake, a light chuckle leaving him. “I ain’t admitting to nothin’, sweetheart.”

“Are you still upset about it?”

“Not for the reason you’re thinkin’.”

That piqued your curiosity. “Oh?”

“I wished ya told me sooner because I wouldn’t have had to wait this long to do this.” His arms tightened the tiniest amount around you. “D’you know how hard it's been these past weeks, months, haivn’ to bite my tongue every time you make one those comments, those touches.”

“Months?”

“That’s how long it’s been since we met, right?”

Shocked laughter left you, and you tried to turn in his arms. You could only get halfway around before his grip stopped you, but you had turned enough so that you could look at him. You weren’t expecting him to look so confident about his response; the muscles of his brow raised like he was daring you to say something. “You’ve wanted me for-”

“Since the moment ya stumbled into me that night.”

“You tried to kill me.”

He shrugged. “Still knew that I wanted ya.”

“How… romantic,” you scoffed. 

“And they say romance is dead.”

“You did promise to take me out to dinner.”

“Out of everythin’  from that conversation, that’s the fuckin’ thing you remember?” You felt his arm go lax for a second, but that was all you needed. Turning, you finally were facing him, your chest pressed into him, making him groan appreciatively. Your arms wrapped around his neck in an embrace, and you felt his hands begin to trail up your back. One settled on your ribs, the other continued up to the base of your neck, brushing your hairline. 

Any words you were about to say fell short when you felt him scratch lightly, a choked noise leaving you at the action, your body shivering. Your mind went blank, and he just chuckled knowingly. His fingers ran up even more, your body reacting similarly, and you both knew the conversation was over for now. 

You gasped when you felt him grab a fist of your hair and pull back; it was not rough enough to be incredibly painful, but it still stung a bit. But it wasn’t like you could feel the pain anyway, your desire being far more powerful. He leaned down into your space, face hovering above yours as he tilted yours back. “What, cat got your tongue?” He teased you for your sudden silence, which was uncharacteristic. 

“Fuck you,” you managed to whisper, making him laugh.

“We’ll get there, sweetheart.” 

His lips were on yours before you could respond, your senses now overwhelmed with him. His other hand wasn’t shy, grabbing and kneading at every piece of skin it could find, making you groan against his mouth. 

You laughed when you began to feel him back up to the edge of the pool, barely able to keep up with his eager movements. But you were confused when you felt his hands grip your waist and lift you so that you were now sitting on the rock edge. It was a warm day, but even the warm air wasn’t enough to stop you from shivering from the temperature difference. “I thought we were supposed to be getting clean,” you tried to protest.

It didn’t even cross your mind that your entire body was exposed to him now, and if you did remember, you doubted you’d even care. Not with how his eyes roamed your body like he was trying to memorize every inch of you. His hands gripped your thighs, pulling them apart so he could stand between them. He stood level with the base of your throat, wasting no time before he lavished it with kisses and bites. 

“We can do it after,” he murmured against your skin. “I need to fuckin’ taste ya, Now.”

Involuntarily, your legs tightened around his body at his words, laughing lightly in shock. You don’t think you’d ever had a partner so eager to go down on you. “Cooper-”

“I fuckin’ love hearin’ you say my name. I bet ya sound even better screamin’ it.” His lips had moved down to your breasts, fingers digging into the plush of your thighs. 

You tried not to think too much about the implications of his words. And you tried even harder not to let your body react any further, not wanting to fan the flame of his ego anymore. But you’d be a liar if you said you weren’t enjoying his cockiness. “Is that a promise?” You echoed the question from the previous week. 

You felt him smirk. “I wasn’t kiddin’ when I said I don’t make promises I can’t keep.” A soft nip made you jump slightly, and he soothed over the hurt with his tongue. “Lie back, sweetheart.”

Excitement and arousal buzzed in your veins, and you required no further encouragement before you were resting back on your elbows, unable to feel the stone beneath you. He pulled away when you leaned back, something almost like pride in his eyes at how easily you complied. 

He adjusted your legs so that they now rested on his shoulders, the heels of your feet resting on his back. It gave him perfect access to your center, and between your thighs, you saw how his eyes turned impossibly dark. They flicked to you one last time, looking for any hesitation, before leaning forward until you felt his breath caress the sensitive area. 

But he didn’t make contact where you wanted. Instead, you felt his lips ghost the insides of your thighs, teasing you. Groaning, you tried to close the distance with a roll of your hips, but he shut that down quickly. His hands no longer held your thighs open. Instead, they were splayed across your hips, keeping you pinned down to the rocks as he continued his light touches. 

You’d forgotten how strong he was, and you found yourself unable to move your hips any longer, rendered completely still by him. You didn’t have to see him to know he was loving tormenting you, inching closer and closer to where he knew you desperately wanted him. “I thought you said you needed to taste me,” you reminded him, and repeating his filthy words made you warm. 

“I know what I said,” he breathed. “Consider this payback for the weeks of fuckin’ torture you’ve put me through.” A frustrated noise left you, and you tried to move away, but to no avail. Teeth dragged against your skin, up towards your center, halting right before reaching it. “You don’t get to run off on me now, sweetheart. You’re gonna take what I give ya.”

“Cooper, please.”

“As amazin’ as you sound beggin’, you ain’t gettin’ what you want that easy.” One of the hands holding you down moved up, calloused fingers grasping at your breast, making you whine. If you thought that because he let up one of his hands, you’d be able to move your hips freely, you thought wrong. All you could do was lay there and comply, much to his evident enjoyment. 

You’re not sure how long you sat there, time crawling on tortuously slow, as he continued to tease and rile you up. Occasionally, you felt his lips ghost over where you wanted him, and you’d think he was finally having mercy on you. But when he passed over, too light to provide any relief, you knew he was just working you up more. No matter how much you pleaded or begged, he didn’t relent, a wicked gleam in his eyes.

But he was only human, and he, too, had a limit to his patience. It broke when the hand groping your breasts snuck between your legs, fingers spreading you open. His breath hitched when he saw the evidence of your arousal. He sighed, an air of finality in the sound. 

“Oh, fuck this,” you heard him growl before his mouth was finally on you. Startled but oh so relieved, a jumble of words left your mouth, a mix of his name and curses. His tongue swept through you desperately, face burrowed deep between your thighs, a groan tearing from his lips as he finally tasted you. 

He was incessant, addicted now that he’d gotten a taste. Your thighs tightened around his head as he ate you out, but he didn’t seem to mind. It almost seemed to urge him on, knowing he was making you feel that good. He still had a hand holding you down, the one between your legs teasing at your entrance, making your eyes flutter close. 

When his tongue began to focus on your clit, you could barely keep yourself propped up any longer, and your arms started to shake. Desperate for something to hold on to, you grasped at the hand on your waist. He adjusted so that his forearm now pinned you, leaving his hand free for you to grab, which you did eagerly. It would’ve been funny how the two actions juxtaposed each other if he wasn’t making you see stars. 

His name was being said like a mantra, turning more and more breathy as pleasure began to build. It turned louder when you felt one of his fingers ease into you, and you could feel the various groves of his skin, all adding to the stimulation you felt. Slowly, he began to pump it in and out of you, his mouth continuing to toy with your clit. Peeling your eyes open, you dared to glance down at him, gasping lightly when you found him looking at you. 

He looked so eager, so hungry, his pupils blown out with lust as he watched you slowly begin to fall apart. You were caught in a trance, unable to look away from him anymore. Not that you’d want to look away from such a glorious sight. 

Keeping your gazes locked when you felt a second finger join became a challenge. The tension that he had so beautifully wound up inside you was on the verge of snapping, your breathing growing faster as you neared your release. You didn’t have to say anything to him; it seemed like he knew your body as well as you did. As he moved his fingers, you felt him crook his fingers in a ‘come here’ motion, making you cry out. 

Your thighs around his head begin to shake, your heels digging into his back almost painfully. You were so close, your grip turning vice-like on his hand. It was when you felt his lips latch onto your clit and suck when you finally fell apart. You had no idea how loudly you cried out his name, the sound of your ears ringing blocking out any other noise. White-hot pleasure washed over your body, your one arm finally going boneless beneath you, your back hitting the rock. 

It took a few moments of deep breaths to get your heart under control, the ringing in your ears becoming background noise. You didn’t have the energy to prop yourself up yet, so you just strained your neck until you could look at him. He was still between your thighs, fingers having been withdrawn, but he continued to lap at your release. You could feel the smirk on his face when you made eye contact.

Overstimulation quickly made itself known, and with a groan, you finally sat yourself up. Easing your legs off of him, he still didn’t let up, and so with a half-hearted shove, you backed him up. He didn’t stay away long, helping your back towards the edge of the rock, lips once again making contact with your throat. His hands caressed your body, but he didn’t do more than touch, giving you a few more moments to recover. “Told ya I’d make you scream,” he muttered, making you scoff.

“I wasn’t that loud.” Was I?

“Scared off a few birds.” He laughed when you slapped his shoulder in mock offense, making him look up. “Ouch,” he deadpanned. 

You rolled your eyes, shaky hands grabbing the sides of his face and bringing it close to yours. You snuck a quick kiss to his lips, but even though it was short, you could still taste yourself on it. It made your head spin, and you offered no objects as he tugged you into the water, the temperature shock making you gasp. 

You’d barely gotten your footing before he was on you, all lips and teeth against your skin. Hands skated down your slides, beneath your thighs, tugging one of them up until it wrapped around his body. You gasped when you felt his hard length press against you, and you rocked your hips eagerly. It got the response you wanted, a groan of your name leaving his lips. 

“C’mon, Cooper,” you gasped, hands grasping his shoulders, bracing yourself. “C’mon baby, let me feel you.”

An almost pained noise left his lips before he thrust into you, the mix of your arousal and the water around you allowing him to enter with ease. He didn’t give you any time to adjust, setting a brutal pace almost immediately, his hips snapping up into you. Your nails dug into his scarred skin, and once the initial shock wore off, moans tumbled from your lips. 

Water splashed up because of the movement, hitting the rocks, but neither of you paid any mind. How could you, when he was fucking you like it was the only thing he could do, wanted to do? His hand remained on your thigh, helping keep your leg propped up. His other hand held the side of your face, your mouth hung open and panting, and he pulled you in for a messy kiss. 

His tongue swept into your open mouth as if he owned it, a groan leaving you at the filthy act. There was so much happening, and like before, you could do nothing but just let it happen, reciprocating as best you could with soft noises and touches.

A particularly hard thrust left you gasping, breaking away from the kiss, choosing to just rest your head against his. Pleasure blossomed across your body, and you felt that familiar tension return. Sneaking a hand between your legs beneath the water, you began to rub at yourself, making you clench around him. 

“Hands up,” you barely managed to hear him hiss through a groan. “Keep those hands on me, sweetheart.”

You complied, returning your touch to his shoulders, but your lost additional pleasure was only momentary. His hand replaced yours, nimble fingers working you as well as you could, maybe even better. His fingers moved in slow, hard circles, a complete contrast to the rapid movement of his hips. The two different sensations drove you wild, your breathing coming out as short, hot pants. 

You could feel yourself getting close, and you knew he could feel it. The movement of his hips had turned more desperate about thirty seconds ago, and you knew he was close as well. Running your hands up his neck, you pulled his face against yours when they reached his jaw, on the verge of bruising your lips with how aggressively you smashed them against his. “Cooper, I’m so close,” you whispered between kisses. 

“Cum for me, sweetheart, fuckin’ fall apart.” You couldn’t tell if he was asking or pleading, but you would fulfill his request either way. 

It took a few more presses of his fingers and snaps of his hips until you came, shouting his name like you’d done before. You could barely see through the haze the satisfactory smirk on his lips, pleasure once again washing over your body. Every muscle in your body tensed, and that smirk immediately fell from his lips, turning into an almost scowl as he staved off his own release. “Where-”

“Inside.” You didn’t have to hear the whole question to know what he was asking. 

For the first time, he moaned, too caught up in his own pleasure to care. “Fuck, you gonna let me fill ya?” A small laugh of disbelief left him when you nodded. “Goddamn…” His words trailed off as he chased his release, the continued thrusts of his hips bordering on overstimulation. But you didn’t have to wait long, because with a much quieter groan of your name, his hips stilled, and you felt his release seep into you. 

For a moment, the two of you just held each other, catching your breaths. Your body felt like it was on fire, a mix of pleasure and the hot water around you, yet you made no move to leave, not wanting this moment to be over yet. 

Slowly, his hand let go of your leg, and even though the water helped ease the irritated muscle, you still let out a noise of discomfort. He eased out of you then as well, leaving you feeling empty. Some part of you feared that he would push you away next, but a relieved smile appeared on your face when he tugged you into his arms, a surprisingly gentle kiss placed on top of your damp head. 

“You alright?” You don’t think you’d ever heard him so soft, so genuine, and knowing it was aimed at you nearly brought tears to your eyes. 

Too many emotions swirled in your chest, and instead of facing them and the discomfort they could bring, you resorted to humor. “I’m surprised you lasted that long, Cooper Howard. You being an old man, after all.”

“Oh, I’ll fuckin’ show ya old, sweetheart.”

[kusakiguzen]

Yandere One Piece x Reader

A/N: just fic that i wrote when i was board! Hope you enjoy reading it as much i enjoyed writing it.

Imagine the Straw Hats being annoyed with Cultivator Reader who gets sea sick alot but was also clingy. Almost always in choppers office during storms or when there are big waves. Chewing on Lemon Grass, Cloves or just licking some salt to help with it since you don't want to bother chopper much.

It had gotten worse ever since you entered the new world, The unpredictable weather makes you feel worried that you hold the crew back. The crew on the other hand were very understanding at first but soon they started to get annoyed, even Sanji and Chopper. You felt so bad about it that you always had a clove in your mouth so even if the weather changes it won't affect you that much.

But one day... You over heard them saying how you shouldn't have joined the crew if you get so sea sick since, pirates literally travel through the sea on top of that you never leave anyone alone! Always stay with someone, stuck to them. To sum it up... they didn't want you here....

You immediately ran to the crows nest and cried for a good hour. You had never felt so humiliated in your life!! Your familiars came out to comfort you and you fell asleep on them.

Zoro was asked to fetch you, He went to your room where you'd usually be, but he was met with emptiness. H serched the whole ship annoyed but finally found you in the nest sleeping comfortably. He was kinda annoyed since he was shouting for you but you gave no response, since you were sleeping, its fine.

They were going to get off on the next island to restock on supplies. You joined them but to your horror it looked like you home town.... Your home town was destroyed because Marines deemed it dangerous. So how come this town looks so much alike? You immediately got off and excused yourself, the straw hats thought you felt sick hence went to find a restroom or a secluded area to vomit, But no... You were trying to find a familiar face, any face. Since all cultivators lived in harmony, and it was a small island, you knew almost every one.

You entered the closest weapon shop and to your surprise, found the old man who used to work there, when you were in the village. You called out to him and his eyes widened. He ran and hugged you crying saying how everyone thought you were dead. You started crying saying how you thought everyone was dead, since you went back to the village and it was completely destroyed.

He told you that they escaped by faking all their deaths, so that tragedy won't happen again. You were so glad to find them. The old man ran out the shop to tell everyone you were back and alive. They all started hugging you while crying, saying how glad they were. This commotion was seen by Robin and Brook who were confused as to why these people were coddling you so much.

You told the villagers how you were saved by the Straw hats and you joined their crew. The village called for celebration to thank the Straw hats, who were surprises to find out this was your home.

Then you met him again, your childhood sweet heart, Lóng Fēi. How long had it been? you can't remember. You just ran in his arms, falling in the process. Shoving your head in his shoulder, soft sobs escaping your lips. Fēi Immediately picked you up like a baby and took you to the forest since he knows you hate being seen weak. When in the woods, he plopped you on his lap, holding you close, kissing your tears away. After you calmed down, He picked you up again and you guys went on a walk around the forest, catching up about life. Out of nowhere , Fēi asked if you would mind if he joined the crew with you. You immediately said you don't mind and he should join since Fēi was strong.

Luffy agreed without hesitation, since more the merier right....? Wrong, your atittude towards the crew changed. You no longer cuddle with Zoro while he naps, you no longer sit behind Sanji while he cooks, you no longer stay with Nami and try to read her maps in secrete, you no longer read with Robin, you no longer play or sing with Brook, no longer help Frankie, you stopped going to Chopper to talk about medicine from your home. Finally, You never again asked Luffy to sit with you on the head of the sunny. All the thing you used to do with the Straw hats, Now yo do with Fēi, Everything. it was like you changed into a completely different person.

They Straw hats were relived that you left them alone, but soon realised you weren't paying attention to them at all. They tried asking you to do stuff with them but you politely turned them down saying you don't want to bother them. Your blunt favoritism hurt them. Do you not like them anymore? Is it something they did? (kinda)

Soon they started to lose it, draging you with the to spend time like you used to but Fēi still tagged along. Can't he see?? He is not wanted!!!

If this continued they just might kill Fēi. Or Fēi would kill them. I mean if there was an accident that killed them but you and Fēi survived, no one would be suspicious....... Right?

Well lets see who survives then?

A/N: A small imagine that was on top of my head. I have another one piece fic in my mind which i'll write.

Stay Safe, Healthy And Hydrated

[wonwoosthetic]

Can you recommend joel miller series?

Hii, of course!😊

I’m sure some of them have been recommended many many times before but that’s just bc they’re actually THAT good, so here are the ones that I’ve read multiple times by now ˙ᵕ˙

You want feels? You want emotions? You want drama and love? Overprotective hot Joel Miller?Read this:

i know who you are by @punkshort

What about a good slow-burn playing in Jackson where you just can’t help but want more from Joel than just a one night stand but it will take time? Here you go:

a stranger’s heart without a home by @morning-star-joy

As if these weren’t already enough emotional, get ready for this two-parter that will absolutely WRECK you in the best way possible😭 I never knew hurt/no comfort could ever be so beautiful:

“You’re the loss of my life” by @stylesispunk (warning: I cried ever time I’ve read this and it’s been about like five times 😭😭) also: another INCREDIBLE writer, you can honestly just read through her entire masterlist, you will NOT regret it!!!!!👏🏼🫶🏼

THIS is THE hurt/comfort series! I absolutely love the structure of this story so much, I’ve read it like four times already haha😬 Joel is just so irresistible that even after 20 years, this man has the audacity to captivate you again. Get ready for a wild ride of emotions with this:

Woman by @dancingtotuyo

But these aren’t enough? You want even more angst? You want to see Joel truly REGRET things? This one’s for you:

invisible string by @toomanystoriessolittletime

Okay, we’ve cried and screamed enough, time for something a little bit more gentle. Something that will pull you in and just not let you go? With just a bit of angst but the wonderful rom-com vibes that we all love? With the perfect neighbour!Joel storyline? This is the one:

Nicest Things by @schnarfer

Now what about a perfectly outlined AU with a fresh start and leaving the past behind only to find a hot Joel Miller as a sheriff?? If you’re interested:

somewhere to run by @punkshort (a second mention, so honestly, you can read absolutely everything she wrote, she’s an absolute genius and I’m in AWE of her talent)

Okay, now this one has become a Joel Miller classic but how dare I not mention it. It’s complicated, it’s unsure, but literally both are in love with each other and it’s perfect earning and UGH just incredible:

texas sun by @from-the-clouds

What about sneaking around with hot Jackson!Joel who cares all too much about Ellie but is also just so enthralled by you? Too jealous to let anyone else touch you but too much of an idiot to put a label on it? Here we go:

But I Would Die For You In Secret by @wheresarizona (I have to put a quick extra note right here: PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE read everything by her!!!! Learning to Live (Javier Peña x Reader) is literally one of my all time favourite series across all of the fandoms I’m in and September is also just INSANE, the writing talent this woman has is out of this world!!!!)

What do we want? THE SWEETEST JOEL? Where can we find him? RIGHT HERE! Get ready for just the most comfortable fic you’ll probably ever find and just UGH the cutest fucking Joel Miller:

Elks by @whocaresstillthelouvre

Loner Joel that makes you feel less lonely after you find your place in Jackson? Ooooh, that sounds good, right? Well, this story was perfectly written and you can read all about it here:

Yearling by @justagalwhowrites (edit: I realised way too late that this incredible writer also writes Lavender, which I read through on AO3 and I seriously couldn’t put my phone down and talked to my bestie who doesn’t even know about tlou and got her to read it!)

OKAY NOW LISTEN. This writer right here is one of my all time faves and I’ve read this series too many times to count and I just can’t get enough of it. SO, a perfectly written relationship with Joel Miller that gets you through the day of the Outbreak, all through those 20 years and even during your adventure with Ellie. This right here. You NEED to read this:

A Future Together by @kteague (note: if you want the best Frankie Morales fic ever, read Because Of You, istg the amount of times I’ve read it is insane and I still go back to it and re-read bc I just- it’s just- I can’t even put it into words)

I think we need some humour. We’ve had hurt, we’ve had comfort, romance, but what about a good collection of one shots that you can laugh to? Who would’ve thought going through a pregnancy can look this fun? Well, with someone like Joel Miller by your side, of course:

Joel Dealing with his Preggo Wife by @pedge-page

Most of the stories above have some smut in them (some more, some less), BUT, I know you guys. And I know myself. And I know that sometimes all you need is a good hoey story (Yes, I may have just made that word up). What do you do when you have a shitty boyfriend who lives with his hot fucking hunk of a single dad? Exactly, you fuck the dad:

boyfriend’s dad!joel by @joelscruff

Buuuuuuuut, what if you want to be live in a bit more delulu world where you can be a hot singer with a hot bodyguard that has to try to keep his hands off of you as hard as possibly can but just snaps? Warning: Hot hot HOT! Hehe, well, then I think you might enjoy this:

Her Bodyguard, His Shining Star by @mermaidgirl30

I also have to add: there’s one series where you match with Joel on Bumble (I think… maybe it was Tinder…) where Ellie and Sarah created a profile for him and I remember reading and absolutely LOVING it, but I can’t find it😭😭 so, if anyone else knows what I’m talking about, pls let me know! In the meantime, I’m keeping a placeholder for it here:

single dad!Joel Miller with daughters that just want what’s best for him by a fucking genius writer

I hope there’s something on here for everyone to enjoy! ˙ᵕ˙

If anyone has more recs that they think deserve a mention, please let me know or just mention them in the comments!!☺️ There’s so many amazing authors, I just went down my likes and saw what I had saved and what I remembered really enjoying, but I know there’s a lot more!!🫶🏼🤍

[rottingparts]

If you've seen the 2018 Bumblebee, could you do Bumblebee's reaction to his s/o being scared of him after seeing him get angry and his eyes turn red in that one scene where he fights those army soldiers and shoots everything. After Bumblebee turns back to normal, and reaches for them, His s/o backs away from him out of fear not wanting to go near him and runs away. ( temporarily from being scared and needs to collect themselves) how would Bumblebee react to seeing them be afraid of him?

I love scary Bee... he is scary and that's kinda hot... I wrote headcanons and also a fic that is under the read more!! Reader is GN!!

Bumblebee... Is devastated!

He didn't want to scare you... he was worried you were going to die and ew can't have that!

When he reverts to normal and grabs for you and you flinch back... Oh boy does he realize what he's done.

When he sees you running away his spark stops.

You're freaking out, wondering what went wrong (military found you, that's what went wrong...) and then see Bee crouched a little ways from you.

He is so willing to do literally whatever to make you feel better.

He reaches for you again, and you reach for him this time.

Never wants to make you this upset again. The absolute fear in your eyes?? Never wants to be the cause of that again.

When you get inside his alt mode, he will let you talk about what happened. He lets you vent and tell him how you felt. So receptive and understands why you were afraid.

Genuinely so sweet and tries his best to make you feel better.

-_-_-_-_-_-

“It’s okay!” You reassured the military surrounding you. “He isn’t going to hurt anyone!”

Your arms were up and you were trying to be calm. Your voice cracks were giving away your fear.

“Step away from the robot!” One of the men shouted.

You didn’t budge. Instead, you stood there motionless. Fear had kicked in fully, and instead of running or fighting… you were frozen. Your eyes widened even more when you noticed them closing in on you.

You were snatched up from in front of Bee, who was still being polite and quiet. Like you had asked of him in case anything like this were to ever happen.

“Remember, my love,” You would point up at him, “If anything ever happens, we have to stay civil! I don’t want something happening to you…”

So, he would be civil. For now.

You struggled slightly, your head turning towards Bee. When you saw other soldiers pulling out weird rods, you were growing panicked.

“No!” You screamed, “I promise! He isn’t hurting anything- He won’t hurt anything!”

As soon as the words left your mouth, the soldiers began to electrocute him. A scream ripped from your throat, and your struggling became more violent. You kicked and screamed and your foot hit hard against the soldier's shin. Suddenly, you were flung from the soldier’s arms and you hit the ground hard.

You let out a loud cry and looked over at Bee, who was being held down by the soldiers. You looked back up at the soldier who had been holding you down, and noticed he had something in his hand. A taser.

“Fuck.”

Briefly, you were unable to move. You were processing and it wasn’t computing. When the soldier was over you, fight or flight really hit, and you were fighting. Violently. You grabbed the soldier's wrist and tried to redirect his hand. Your knuckles were white in an instant and you felt like you were fighting for your life.

“Please!” You screamed, hoping he would hear you over all the commotion, “We were just hanging out in the desert!”

When the soldier grabbed your wrist with his free hand and broke your grip, you were sent into a bigger panic. You began to wail. You were pleading for release. For the military to leave you alone. And then, Bee’s name left your mouth. A loud, unmistakable shriek for Bee. For your boyfriend.

That’s all it took.

Your eyes shut tight, and you waited for the taser to hit your side. The shouting around you turned into screams of terror and suddenly you couldn’t hear the loud cracking of electricity anymore. You swallowed hard and when the soldier above you yelled, you opened your eyes and saw the soldier was gone, and Bee was standing over you. His gun pointed at the military and his stance was firm. Your eyes met his, and your stomach turned.

His optics were red and his brow ridges were furrowed. He was pissed. With good reason. And, you were terrified. Also with good reason.

“Bee…” Your voice was soft, barely above a whisper.

He did not listen. He began to blast the soldiers surrounding the two of you. Their vehicles became caught in the crossfire. Bee moved himself over you and became a shield between you and the soldiers. They were dying, their vehicles were bursting into flames, and all you could do was think ‘It’s okay! He isn’t going to hurt anyone!’.

“Bee!” Your voice was louder now. But he was still shooting. Shooting at soldiers who were definitely retreating at that point.

“Bumblebee! Stop!”

Your voice was sharp. It was loud and full of command. Bee came to a halt. The remaining soldiers got into the remaining vehicles and promptly left. You stood up, your gut wrenching and your legs barely holding you.

Bee turned towards you, optics still red. You blinked up at him. And briefly wondered if he, your cute alien robot boyfriend, was about to murder you. His optics go back to blue and you take a step back. He leaned down and began to reach for you.

Once you flinched back, Bee did too. He retracted his servo and cocked his head at you. Adrenaline was still going strong, and fight or flight was still kicking, and you were not about to fight Bee.

You took off running in the opposite direction. The desert really didn’t have too many safe places to hide, but you did find a large rock. You pulled out your phone, a special one Optimus had made for you. You could reach the bots at any given time.

“Optimus!” Your voice was hushed, and you were trembling. “Please! The military found us! I don’t-”

The sound of metal beside you caught your attention and you gulped. Bumblebee was a few feet from you. He wanted to give you space, but he wanted to be close so badly. He was crouched down and his optics watched you closely. They were still blue.

“Is everything alright?” Optimus’ voice came through the phone.

You wanted to say no, instead you hung and looked at Bee. Your back was against the rock. Your breath caught in your throat, and suddenly you couldn't swallow. You knew deep down Bee was not going to hurt you, but watching him fire at those men, that was fear inducing. Watching him become someone you didn't know was terrifying.

“I- Won’t hurt you.” Bee switched through his radio channels to talk to you.

He reached out for you, once more, his movements slower and slightly more mindful. You inhaled sharply and reached out for his servo. Bee seemed to beam when you reached for him. He gently pulled you up, helping you stand. He was quick to dust you off, sand covered your back and butt.

“Hey!” A yell came from a few yards away. You looked towards the direction the voice came from. Crosshairs… “What happened?”

You blinked a few times and looked back at Bee. “We were trying to have a date.”

“Date doing what?” Crosshairs examined the destruction. “Blowing up military vehicles?”

Optimus and Drift rolled in behind Crosshair, quickly transforming from their alt modes.

“Are you alright?” Optimus neared you and Bee, “You sounded scared.”

“I’m-” You paused, “We’re okay... Thanks to Bee.”

“Glad to see you are both okay… We’ll need to figure this out… Also,” Optimus looked at you, crouching down, “never hang up on me again.”

Bee moved himself in between the both of you and you only nodded.

“We need to get back to Cade’s.”

“I’ll go with Bee.” You looked up at him,and he made a beeping noise, almost a chirping sound.

“Obviously,” Crosshairs rolled his eyes, “you two are-”

“Shut. Up!” Drift interrupted. “I don’t want to know what they do!”

Bee transformed into alt mode and his door opened. You were quick to get inside. “Can we talk about that back there? I think I need to process all of that..”

[staraxiaa]

sunflowers, the afterword:

author's corner/first thoughts.

okay. so. i am insane. i am a god. i just wrote 18k words for a fic that i thought of, planned, and created fully in less than two days, bc someone said i like to make ppl suffer and yes i do. but then i was like, i am GOING to write fluff and i took it personally. to that one reader, thank you!! anyways. i wrote this with the intent of using the prompt "you wanna kiss me so bad it makes you look stupid" and barely even ended up using it. i don't know whether to laugh or cry. i hope it doesn't flop but also it's okay if it does bc i literally spent almost 48 hours brainrotting and word vomiting like it's out of my brain now and this feels glorious. it was random unfiltered thoughts and grinding away at 3am until i am empty. no thoughts left in my head. can you see? i could eat the world raw, the itch has been scratched. the sheer amount of motivation i had w this fic is never happening again. cheers! will update as i think of things! sorry to anyone who ends up reading this fully. i have been unreasonably fixated and have brainrotted over this for two hours, inclusive of sleeptime. while sleeping. i kid you not. i would wake up and something would click and i would hop over to the laptop and fucking grind away i am so sick of myself

unwritten scenes, headcanons

you guys are 20. you haven't started dating yet. you're a doctor. you guys are yelling at each other. you say 'you want to kiss me so bad it makes you look stupid.' katsuki's so angry that he does. ⇁ this was the original ending btw but i thought this one kinda fit better he brings you sunflowers sometime. real ones. he's sneezing all the while. you take one look at him and you die of laughter. he's still sneezing. you tell him: you know i actually didn't even care about them until i found out you were allergic. ⇁ if i could write nsfw i would do it here like dude do u see the vision omfg a whole side plot where he's like what the fuck do you mean you weren't dating deku. you're like. what the fuck. are u stupid. someplace where you actually address how you treat midoriya, his lack of a quirk, and how you stood by and watched it all happen ua sports festival. you kick everyone's ass. #you have been trained by eraserhead and you are super duper cool i also don't remember if i included this, but: your mother asks you after the first evening. "you're not really friends are you." you say: "nope!" and it is the happiest she has ever seen you. the ua boys try to flirt with you and get hurt really stupidly a lot on purpose. you wonder why they've stopped showing up. it's bc katsuki gives them a whole earful. and you're like bitch what the fuck im a doctor and and hes just tsundere about it first kiss scene instead of the ending where he's like you care and you're like of course i do??? what the fuck?? are u stupid?? you guys start yelling at each other and you're both acting like ur 2. he calls you stupid and blind. you call him ugly. he's so mad he literally just lurches forward and kisses you. it's awkward and messy and you guys are so mad at each other. you literally headbutt him in the face. ah young love. ⇁ this was another alternative ending more exploration behind reader's character, her insecurities, and about some of the stuff i info dumped before the start of the katsuki povs? i feel like i didn't handle that as well as i could have, but i also didn't want to go on 10 billion tangents for things that had very little relevance to the story. i also think the transition to the last scene was a little abrupt, but tbh at that point i was just so ready to call it like. i just didn't see the point. i think it would have made for a more natural reading experience, so here's the tea: he's proud of u but u guys are angsty and ignore each other until after training camp. [more brainrot pining moments]. if i had to write the above scene, i think i'd do something along the lines of: you're first aid relief at the sports festival, not actively participating. dunno if you'd be nearly as badass, though. you definitely get pissed when they muzzle katsuki and probably get rly mad but ofc u cant show it. so u just unmuzzle him and walk away and hes staring after u. this is ur ??? elsa arc? i dont remember the disney princess. the training camp is torture. aizawa makes u run with them. you tell him straight up that u hate his guts. he grins like that is the best thing anyone has told him in his life. katsuki definitely blows up some earth monsters for u. but while ur not looking. he's angsty like that. the bath scene? oh lord u just know he blows mineta up. maybe he lowk fucks it up too and you have to heal it! the potential HAHAHA. i dont know how you end up getting kidnapped, but id probably just bullshit a reason like ur the #1 healer in the world hurr durr and afo wants u! idgaf if the plot makes sense or not this is entirely secondary to my scheming. katsuki just about loses it when he hears you're one of the targets -> how you get kidnapped? idk. you're not a remedial student, so you're probably participating in the game (odd number of ppl right). unsure of how i'd handle the news of your kidnapping: just know katsuki loses it again. for like the 5th time. yipppeeeeee

character notes, thoughts

your quirk is literally just you take people's injuries into your own body and heal it yourself. you're superhuman. i put 2 thoughts into this: 1) you're a healer and 2) i like cool characters. congratulations. you have now been born. i don't even remember if i kept the shouto scene. but anyways i think my bias was showing. just had to throw him in there. also the kuroo mention. sorry i'm totally normal and i mean it ⇁ btw i love you all (everyone who likes/interacts with my fics) but i joke to my friends everytime someone interacts w my first bakugo/midoriya ones from lacuna bc guys!!! my shoto fic is RIGHT THERE!!! the baby that launched the entire collection. please show him some love this reader is probably one of the favorite ones i have written, more of an oc at this point i think, and i wasn't expecting her to grow on me so much. but lowk i love her and am so proud of the way i wrote her growth!! i do feel like i wrote her very soft, but i hope her flaws were made very clear⏤ she is meant to be a sort of unreliable narrator, so she also is overly critical of her own, but there were several things that were not addressed as i was writing, particularly concerning midoriya. (quirk, the bullying, bystander's guilt.) however, i think that including them would have made me go off on a tangent, and detract more from the main point of the story i also do think i wrote katsuki a little ooc, if only because i didn't see the point of including what's already there in canon. sorry. my brainrot did not extend that far, and by the end of this, i was literally ready to drop. his perspective isn't meant to be all-encompassing (in the story, it may seem like it purely bc of how i paced it) but those are meant to be like. random thoughts that appear in several scenes. reader does not have bakugo living rent free in her head 24/7, and neither does he. they're just stupid and pining and i just wrote all the moments in my head where they do.

[scarrletmoon]

About Powder Blue

This is going to be long. There are going to be discussions of suicide and trauma. This is going to be a bit of a jumbled mess because I can't tell a linear story to save my life. Don't feel like you need to read this, now or ever.

If you're wondering what the issues with PB were, and looking for what's next, read the indented text and skip the rest if you want!

I've had a bit of a...tumultuous relationship with the OFMD fandom. I've made close friends and lost them, made even closer friends who've very patiently reminded me of my worth when I needed that. I'm at a point where I'm still struggling, but I'm getting better. I'm still working on not being afraid. It's a bit of an uphill battle, but I'm still pushing my little boulder. I'm not alone this time, which is nice.

I entered the fandom as a nobody. I had almost 50 fics on AO3 and two had mildly popped off while I wasn't looking, but I wasn't really known for anything. I was a fandom ghost, posting my little fanfics and sharing them with the world because I just enjoyed the characters so much. Like a lot of people, I dreamed of being known for something. I thought that'd be neat.

I'm still in a state of shock and confusion that I've written anything in the past 2 years that people remember and even love. It's weird to be in a place where I never imagined myself to be. I can't stress enough how much I did not write explicit fic before this fandom; in high school, I would've welcomed a porn ban. I was afraid of my own sexuality, convinced it was some sort of monster I had to control. Convinced I was dirty. To other people my age, I was a prude, naive and childish for not being comfortable with it. So I feel for people who lash out now, who insist that attraction is actually fetishization, that if we set enough rules, maybe if we resist temptation, we'll be saved. I see you, and I feel for you. I personally don't think that's a healthy way to live, but if you'd told me that 2 years ago, I would've cussed you out. It's really a realization you have to come to (or not) on your own terms.

Anyway.

I know it's tacky to talk about your own success but it doesn't feel real. I go back and forth, reading other people's work -- and my god, there's some unbelievable talent in this fandom -- and thinking "shit, why would anyone read anything I've written? My stories are kindergarten finger paintings next to museum masterpieces". I am learning, slowly -- very slowly -- that I can't bully myself into a shape I like better. I'll never abuse myself into the kind of writer I think I want to be.

The first chapter of Powder Blue was written on a random day of the week after work. I was in a server -- the first fandom server I'd properly joined and talked in, watching a convo about how funnyt it would be for Ed to be a middle aged sugar baby -- when I pulled out my laptop and wrote for an hour and then posted that chapter to the server. I hadn't written for five years before OFMD. I had never finished a multi chapter fic. I posted that chapter and went to make dinner, and assumed the Google Docs link would get lost in that channel after a few likes.

That's not what happened.

The next few months were...a lot. My 7 year old Twitter account blew up from about 200 followers to 1000 in a matter of months. I was misinterpreted half a dozen times. Suddenly, people knew who I was and had Opinions. Some of those Opinions were Not Nice. I was told to grow a thick skin and get over it. So I figured my extreme reactions -- physical shaking, intense fear, a spiking heart rate, like I was being chased -- were just me being weak. I thought if I just sucked it up and laughed it off, it'd stop affecting me.

Turns out RSD is real and not an excuse I was using to be a baby, and it literally didn't get better until I was medicated! Wild

(This -- "I'm just overreacting and everyone else is secretly handling it better" -- has been a pretty consistent pattern my entire life, so figuring out I'm actually AuDHD has been mindblowing. If you've been wondering why you're so weak your whole life, I've got some screening tests you might be interested in).

Anyway my point is, a few things happened over the course of 2023 that brought me to a level of emotional pain I've never experienced.

At the start of the year, I was taking a self imposed internet break, after being forced to apologize for a tweet thread about Izzy, where I'd made the mistake of suggesting that fans of his should consider thinking about why they enjoy his character, but to only do this if they wanted to and ignore me if they didn't. This was taken as me being a hypocrite, and accusing Izzy fans of being terrible people. I apologized, vowed to never mention him again, and left Twitter for a month. Around the same time, a few things in a very close friend group went very wrong. I assumed it was entirely my fault for misbehaving, picked myself up, and tried to punish myself into a shape that would be acceptable for other people.

It didn't work.

Since I was now marked as an anti-Izzy bully, I couldn't say anything -- either on Twitter or in private -- that wouldn't be interpreted as me trying to start fights, as me being passive aggressive, as me trying to send covert messages for others to decipher so they could come and grovel for my forgiveness. Some of this is my fault -- it took a long time to learn than my private locked Twitter account isn't a diary. it took even longer for me to learn that maybe the people I was hanging out with weren't my people.

During all of this, I was posting Powder Blue after months of tears, pain, heartbreak, frustration and stress. I still don't understand why people write books for work or FUN. It was the most horrific experience of my life. It was valuable and so rewarding but jesus christ did writing PB take a lot out of me.

So as I felt less connected to my friends, as I was trying to hide how I felt because I thought I didn't deserve to be upset about anything (everything is always my fault, you see, and if I just behaved better, these things wouldn't happen to me), someone came to me and said they'd noticed some issues with Powder Blue. I'll refer to this person as the reader.

I was more than happy to hear them out. And it's true that I made some mistakes. The environment that I published PB in was not the one that I wrote it in. I didn't read any other sugar daddy/sex work fics as I was working on PB. PB was never a reaction to those fics. But because of those stories, which had handled things is harmful ways, there was suddenly a responsibility I'd never expected to have. I've never done sex work, I've just spent a lot of time listening to sex workers and trying to understand the legislation and environment as much as I can as a lay person. And since I don't have a personal experience with sex work, I shared my finished but rough draft with the reader, who did.

The problem, ultimately, is not something I could ever have fixed to their satisfaction. The fic doesn't involve dubious consent on a level that I think warrants an archive warning tag -- I tried to make it explicitly clear that Ed never does anything he doesn't want to, and that he's never coerced. The issue is that the nature of Ed and Stede's relationship is inherently uneven -- Stede is rich, and although he gives Ed money that's his to keep, Ed still isn't as obscenely wealthy as Stede is. Ed is poor and has been for a while. He's good at whatever he chooses to do, but he's struggling. That's a very uncomfortable spot to put Ed in. I also put Ed through some things that I've personally been through, as a way to work through my feelings and to try and better understand myself. If I was acting like Ed in real life, the reader is right that it would be concerning. But, importantly, Ed's not real. Nothing in this story is happening to a real person. Nothing in this story is an endorsement of any of his behaviours or unhealthy coping mechanisms.

I still believe the reader had good intentions -- the amount of effort they put into coming to me would be utterly bizarre for someone who was just looking to be cruel for no reason. But that also doesn't change the fact that being told I was having a trauma response and needed to stop working on the fic immediately, pushed me into the most suicidal period I've ever experienced.

That's not their fault. I'm sure that wasn't their intention. I've chosen to not try and find out who they are, or try to contact them again to respect their privacy. Some of the things people said to me, publicly dismissing the reader's pain, were so harrowing to read that it made me feel worse for ever writing PB in the first place. They were right to stay anonymous.

I'm sure the reader never meant for me to have such a massive breakdown that I took down the entire fic and left Twitter (and a few friend groups). It's been difficult to understand that just because someone didn't mean to hurt me, doesn't change the fact that I was hurt.

One silver lining is that I did go and find a new therapist. She's great! And she also thinks that how the reader tried to bring things up to me was wrong. As the reader obviously saw, I have a lot of Trauma, so I'm still not entirely convinced that I didn't deserve what happened to me. I'm not angry at them. I appreciate their concern. I just can't do what they asked of me. In the end, Powder Blue was not a story that was right for them. And that's okay.

My point in detailing all of this, is that I stayed quiet for a long time because I didn't think I deserved to tell my part of the story. I was scared that when people said they respected my choice to take down the fic, that they agreed I'd some something impossibly harmful. People trusted my judgement but I didn't trust myself. But people didn't know that I didn't trust myself.

Additionally, reader can't speak on this without revealing themself in some way. I'm terrified that they might read this and say something anyway. My biggest fear is becoming the kind of writer who sees negative criticism and pushes on anyway, or even blocks people who disagree with me. I don't want to hurt anyone the way I've been hurt.

BUT I've been holding onto this for months. I cannot write a perfect fic that will never trigger anyone. I will never write a meaningful story that won't hurt someone, no matter my intentions. There IS a way to admit you fucked up, or a way to listen and disagree, without turning into a raging asshole. I'm struggling to find that line. I'm hoping I'm making the right choice here.

And honestly, I'm just soft. I am so fucking soft. I talk a big game but I am so soft that a single person poking at my trauma caused me to break down so severely that my partner was legitimately afraid for me. I am learning that this softness doesn't mean I should become a crueler person to cope. But it's hard. There are going to be people who see this post and think I'm being a whiny crybaby looking for attention and pity. And I just have to deal with that.

Anyway. All previous chapters of PB will be up soon. Read them or don't. I will do my best to add more detailed trigger warnings. And I would personally suggest that if you're worried about any of the content in the fic, to run these worries past a friend who's read the fic, because they'll know you better than I ever will. Please don't read Powder Blue if you think it'll harm you. I would rather have fewer readers than triggered ones.

If there's anything I've missed that you think I need to address, know that my inbox is open, that anon is on, and that I'm not in the business of retaliating against people who come to me with an issue, even if they're a dick to me while they're doing it. I'm not going to dismiss someone because they weren't nice to me while they were upset. I'm a bitch but I'm not that kind of bitch.

So. Thank you for waiting for this fic. Thank you for waiting for me. We've got something like 16 chapters to go, and I can't tell you when they'll be up, or if they'll be up soon. But thank you for loving this story. I can't tell you how much that means to me, especially now.

Love,

Scarr

[rowrory]

FAVORITES

Want fics that don't just revolve around smut? Read these!

Fandoms include: jjk, bnha, haikyuu, aot, marvel, tvd

GOJO SATORU

Intrinsic Warmth — thatdesklamp (ao3)

Summary: “So stay with me. Forever.”

You make a weak stab at a joke. “For Infinity, you mean?”

“Yeah.” Satoru turns to look at you and your heart jumps at the clear expression on his face. There’s not a hint of humour: for once, he’s fully and completely serious. “For the rest of my life, and for all the lives after.”

-

You meet Satoru on 7th September, 1996.

Some time later, you realise you love him.

Notes: HOLY FUCK I LOVED THIS SO MUCH!?!?!??! THE ANGST?!?!? THE PINING?!?!?!? I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS!!!!!!!! THE AUTHOR WASN'T FUCKING AROUND WHEN SHE WROTE THIS!!!

gods, monsters, monkeys — yuzudrops (ao3)

Summary: A grossly under-qualified graduate of Jujutsu High is hired to teach a class of Special Grades. They learn there is more to strength than power. It doesn't end well.

Notes: chefs kisses, literally one of THE best gojo fics out there

Keep a Place For Me — alkhale (ao3)

Summary: A quiet story that takes place a little before Gojo Satoru was born to be the greatest shaman of this era, his youth, triumphs, losses, and his inherent rise to a place unknown by anyone else.

And the one person who bore witness to it all.

Notes: IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THIS YET, YOU ARE SERIOUSLY MISSING OUT

take me down (to the depths of your depravity) — Innka (ao3)

Summary: The story starts with you standing in the pouring rain. All you remember are your orders.

Gojo Satoru. Look for the white hair and the baby blues.

"This will be easy," they said. "White hair and baby blues, eyes like the sky. Pull him in, fatten him up and send him to the devil. In and out, one and done."

"You can do this with your eyes closed," they said.

"This will be easy," they said.

They were wrong.

Notes: Read trigger warnings first

watermelon sugar why — Innka (ao3)

Summary: You had marched into his office, looking like your life was in his hands. You held out an excursion request. For a beach trip, of all things. By the time Gojo finished reading it, he had wanted to do exactly three things: sign the paper, laugh in your face, and bend you over on his desk to fuck you until you were screaming his name. 

Not necessarily in that order. 

Notes: this is a one shot but i live for pining satoru so

all that is solid melts into air — GrilledTandooriSmoke (ao3)

Summary: Curse user.

The words weigh heavy like lead on your tongue. Something that needs to be swished around before it's spat back out like the black gunk it is. Evil and vile jujutsu sorcerers who would dare turn on humanity in the never-ending war against curses.

And it just so happens you come from a family of them.

Alternatively: political machinations have you attending Jujutsu Tech at the same time as Gojo Satoru.

Notes: in love with this

among dawn flowers (the face of god) — unolvrs (ao3)

Summary: Your grandmother calls the young master of the Gojō Clan a boy-god, and you, his destined bride who will further the cause of the All-Seeing Eyes.

—or, you are raised to be Satoru’s bride and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. (Everything is.)

Notes: i love angst

the witches' brew — orphan_account (ao3)

Summary: You are the co-owner of a small café in a small, eccentric district in Tokyo that is notorious for bizarre murders and supernatural occurrences.

You think you’ve seen it all, but it turns out that nothing comes close to the man wearing a bad Kakashi cosplay who terrorizes you with his increasingly complicated and awful drink orders.

Notes: im devastated i didn't get to see who actually wrote this

5 + 1 — script_nef (orphan_account) (ao3)

Summary: 5 times Gojou had a date with you and 1 time you realised it was a date.

Alt title: Watch Gojou be really obvious about his crush but it goes completely over your head every time. Well, nearly every time.

Notes: kicked my feet a couple times while reading this

Ripverse — seoafin (ao3)

Summary: “You don't need to worry about anything like dying. I won't let anything happen to you," he says quietly, and it sounds like a promise.

You wait for the punchline. The part where he laughs it off as a joke, and then tells you to snap yourself out of it in a way you would’ve expected from him in the past. But he’s dead serious.

Notes: This is a series of one shots in the same univ with the same character, i just used the summary for the very first part

FUSHIGURO TOJI

(and your love is) standing next to me — shidouryusei (ao3)

Summary: “I wanna meet your son.”

You regret what you’ve said the second the words leave your lips.

“Why the hell do you wanna meet my kid?”

Notes: holy hell is this one of the best toji fics out there

BAKUGO KATSUKI

what heroes do — sugiwa (ao3)

Summary: Shouto didn't know much about his twin sister. She was an Edgeshot fan, had a raging collection of manga, and liked Natsuo the best.

She also wasn't supposed to be at U.A., but he sure as hell wasn't telling their father about it.

Notes: i am not kidding when i say that even tho this thing has almost 600k words (it's a monster!!), i have reread this so many times it's not even funny anymore

MIYA ATSUMU

WHITE NOISE — 1keshi (ao3)

Summary: you’ve always loved atsumu— that was the problem.

(alternatively, you force a therapist to listen to the story of how you fell in love with your childhood friend, because what else are you supposed to do?)

Notes: lovelovelove

You Found Me — Amy_Stark117 (ao3)

Summary: Miya Atsumu had his life goals set - volleyball, fame, and success. Nothing could stand in his way.

You threw all that out the window, simply by sitting next to him in class.

Life is really funny like that, isn't it?

Notes: 10/10

USHIJIMA WAKATOSHI

premonition of love — peacchy (ao3)

Summary: A day after the freak quick duo sneaks into Shiratorizawa campus grounds, Ushijima gets summoned by his school’s student disciplinary committee.

Rule breached?

Assisted Trespassing.

While he steps out of the office with more than just a case under his name, you (unknowingly) step into the affluent stratum of Miyagi’s controlled elite.

In a world of either-or’s, you’re caught in between.

And possibly something more.

Notes: yall listen before this, i was NOT an ushijima girlie. now, i am ;)) this ff also has a love triangle in it (ushijima x reader x sakusa) with alternative endings (though it's not completed yet)

Shoot the Ball — alkhale (ao3)

Summary: As captain of the dying Shiratorizawa Kyudo Club, you're sick and tired of the biased favoritism that goes to the showier sports. Especially the worst of them all—the boy's volleyball team.

You're determined to show the entire school how great archery is, get the funding your club deserves, and by the end of it all, make the entire school a fan of your archery.

You just didn't know you already had a fan from the start.

And he may or may not be captain of the one team on campus you have a personal vendetta against.

Notes: i love alkhale so much

LEVI ACKERMAN

1,000 Steps — BaddieCurlsXo (ao3)

Summary: You're being torn away to another world every new moon, unable to connect the dots or find any real meaning in your travels. That is, until one night you stumble upon a man with grey eyes and a green cape, who asks you, rather suspiciously, "what are you doing outside the walls?"

Notes: lovette

Death's Door — SongsOfApollo (ao3)

Summary: You spent years of your life under the guidance of Dr. Helfen, the greatest physician inside Wall Sina. Now a physician yourself, you work alongside him with pride: stitching up wounds, nursing the sick, and helping to save the lives of many. But after the Battle of Trost, rapid changes begin to take place, starting with an inquiry from none other than Commander Erwin Smith and Captain Levi of the Survey Corps.

You have heard many tales from surviving Survey Corps soldiers on what it’s like on the outside: to face a Titan, to feel overwhelming dread, to watch your fellow man perish in such an insulting, gruesome way. You’ve witnessed the effects of Titans on the people you’ve doctored. Now you are to experience the horror firsthand.

You are to join the Scout Regiment as their field surgeon, and you will do so under the direct command of Captain Levi.

Notes: one of my fav fics of levi

BUCKY BARNES

Vacant Mirrors — pilotisms (ao3)

Summary: Dr. Hart shares an office with Dr. Raynor.

You share a waiting room with Bucky Barnes.

Notes: felt like crying even tho the ending wasn't angsty

Safe with me — bitsandbobsandstuff (ao3)

Summary: When an unknown threat enters your life, protection is offered at the highest level. As Bucky Barnes comes into your life, the game changes, and you realise falling for the man tasked with keeping you safe is the last thing you expected.

Notes: Holy freaking heck was this beautiful. The plot? Chefs kisses. The writing? Chefs kisses. Reader's personality? Chefs kisses. The romance between reader and bucky? CHEFS FUCKING KISSESSSSS.

In The Shadow Of Your Wings — emmagnetised (ao3)

Summary: Margaret Stark is five years old when the Winter Soldier comes for her and her parents. But she survives the attack and is returned to her brother, though she's left broken and traumatised. She grows with a promise she made to herself on the night of the car crash. A mission.

This is the story of Maggie forging herself into her own hero, into something that no one expects: The Wyvern.

Notes: if you're a delulu marvel stan and haven't read anything by emmagnetised yet, are you even a delulu marvel stan?? p.s there is also an alternative for this story, go check it out on the author's acc on ao3 if you're interested!

STEVE ROGERS

The Siren — emmagnetised (ao3)

Summary: Austrian-born Alice Moser is new to Brooklyn when she meets and befriends a small blonde kid called Steve Rogers. Years later tragedy puts an ocean between them. When they meet again everything is different - Steve is about to go to war, and Alice is going to make the SSR an offer they can't refuse: her services as an undercover agent within the very heart of Nazi Germany.

The path is already written. The whole world knows the stories of Captain America and the Siren. Or do they?

Notes: ISTG IF U DON'T GO READ THIS MASTERPIECE RN

LOKI

A Twist of Marvel — GeneralofLoki (wattpad)

Summary: Naomi Swanson is fresh out of college, working as an assistant in a small paper supply company and inhaling coffee by the gallons. When an accident knocked her out, Naomi woke up in a world she had only seen through screens.

Armed only with her phone and a questionable data plan, Naomi attempts not to be killed as she comes face-to-face with the Avengers, and so much more.

Notes: do not and i repeat do NOT underestimate this just because it's a wattpad story ;)) it's literally the best girl goes to alternative dimension story in the mcu universe out there!!

KLAUS MIKAELSON

descent — tothelakes (wattpad)

Summary (since the summary on this one is a little long I'll be giving a brief description instead): Rory, the twin sister of Elena, unknowingly dates Klaus, the terrifying hybrid determined to sacrifice her sister. When the Mystic Falls events start, cue the beginning of their tumultuous journey as secrets are revealed and feelings come to light.

Notes: this is probably the best klaus fic to ever grace the world of fanfictions.

[theyoungeragrippina]

✨ 15 gentlebeard fic recs ✨

i have spent the last month trawling the pages of ao3 for you, dear reader, to find the best ofmd fics. all the works on this list:

are longer-form (generally 40k+)

have no steddyhands (simply not my thing)

are generally, all around brilliant (well-written, had me kicking my feet and giggling, laughing, or crying)

are complete!

part 2 and part 3

A Heart Unsated by roughwinds

48k, explicit

"Stede Bonnet has just moved into Orange Crescent. There’s a house on the corner, opposite Stede’s own, with a garden full of flowers and a gleaming motorbike on the driveway. He’s forgotten to buy sugar.

Edward Teach has his morning disturbed by his new neighbour. Enamoured at first sight, he invites Stede round for a chat, and then another, and then another.

This is the story of them."

man i normally avoid fics with lots of alma and louis in them because its just not for me, but literally every second of the family bonding in this was so wholesome i was forced to change my entire mind.

all you left me was a pearl by @sightofsea

88k, mature

"1717. The Golden Age of Piracy. Stede Bonnet sets about wooing the love of his life through any means necessary.

Things do not go as planned."

every day i wish for a precise memory erasing potion to be invented so i can read this again for the first time. i would devour like 2000k more words of this if it was offered to me. brilliant.

forgive & forget by @fool-for-luv

44k, mature

"It hits him then, like a wave breaking on sand, loud as thunder when it crashes, then trickling away into little rivulets flowing back home, murmuring one word over and over and over. Ed.

The problem is, Stede doesn’t recall ever having met anyone named Ed."

so sweet and wonderful, and i wish there was more.

#gentlebeard is trending! by regional_catastrophe

41k, teen

"In which Stede accidentally convinces the pirating world that Gentlebeard (or Blackbonnet or Stedward; there's a poll) is canon, reunites his crew, and gets his boyfriend back."

hilarious & silly & great, but also the most compelling notes of any fic i've ever read. a proper learning experience.

if music be the food of love (then darling, you're a feast) by @fool-for-luv

107k, unrated

"“Hey, so, those two, right, they get together in the end?” Ed asks.

“I would protest spoiling it, but I think it's rather obvious, isn't it?” Stede says. His nose wrinkles as he smiles. “The tension is certainly there from the beginning. It just takes them a while to get there.”

“Good. Would have been a shit story otherwise.""

i love sassy stede and i love ed who is a grump and i love that they share one single braincell at any given time.

If You Were Mine to Keep by @mysterybees

162k, explicit

"Caught between the gallows and the end of an English sword, Ed accepts the Act of Grace: marry into the aristocracy, leave the English ships alone, and live to sail another day. But who in their right mind would ever agree to marry the mad devil pirate Blackbeard?"

Worth every second of tiredness I felt after pulling an all nighter to finish reading.

It's Only Right by hexuponye

53k, explicit

"A modern AU based on Imagine Me & You, in which Edward is a florist who does the flowers for Stede's wedding."

mary gets to be a little silly sometimes too as a treat.

pliocene by unfortunatelyobsessed

75k, mature

""man, it's just ocean for miles.” Ed motions out to the waves, where there is no sign of any sort of ship, their small dinghy pulled far up on the sand. “I told you when the clouds look like seagulls you take fuckin' cover. Goddamn ocean mutinied me.”"

william golding wishes he did something this brilliant and significant when he wrote Lord of the Flies. the best deserted island story.

quite a career shift by @stedesparasol

157k, explicit

"Stede's been posting book reviews on Youtube for two months now. It's taken him that long to finally get a comment, and the person it comes from is rather unexpected."

rip stede you would've LOVED booktube. furious i can never really watch his content.

Semaphore by komodobits

124k, explicit

"Talking things through as a crew is easier said than done, and honest communication has never really been Stede’s strong suit. When it comes to Ed, he is willing to try."

so good that i was properly and truly laughing and gasping and 'oh no-ing' out loud while i read it.

Such Joie de Vivre by @louciferish

94k, explicit

"Professional thief Edward Teach is tired of hole in the wall apartments, shitty pub food, and skipping town every few months to keep the cops off their tail. He’s well past the age he meant to flee the country and retire, and all he needs is One Last Job to set him up for life. When he hears that some rich bastard outside of town has just the sort of treasure he’d trade his good knee for, Ed sets out in disguise to get the lay of the land."

i (so so foolishly) avoided reading this for a while because i simply didn't think i was one for nanny aus. i was so, terribly wrong. don't make the same mistakes i did. showstopping. incredible stuff.

The Chains of Flowers are Fragile Things by @grandmastattoo

62k, explicit

"Stede can't see the shop he's inherited from his late father as anything other than a burden, another insult added to a life that's going nowhere fast. Then he meets the charismatic man who owns the tattoo studio next door, and Stede finds himself forced to consider the idea of home."

maybe i love tattoo shop owner ed fics, sue me. i love this stede and i love his embarrassing mistake tattoo.

The Love Experiment by karawrites

65k, mature

a married at first sight (aus) au. i didn't know i needed it until i read it.

Water/line by @the-gentleman-mermaid

60k, teen

"During a raid on a smuggler ship, Ed finds a merman named Stede locked in the hold."

So good that I would actually pay the author real person money to do a similar story but where Ed is the mermaid.

Where the Daylight Begins by @xoxoemynn

116k words, explicit

"Modern day AU slow burn featuring a pining Ed, a clueless Stede, found family, roughly a million animals, and a very magical house."

This one sort of gave me House on the Cerulean Sea vibes; it was so much fun and genuinely necessitates a proper use of the word whimsical.

[firewasabeast]

do yall mind if i tell you how 911 kinda saved my life? I used to write fanfic all the time, like from the time I was 15 on. I wrote for many different fandoms until 2018, when my sister died. I just kinda dropped everything and stopped writing for years. Lost all interest in it when it was always one of my all time favorite things to do.

Then in march my dad died and I lost all desire to do literally anything at all. Turns out just a few weeks later I’d see on the news that the tv show 911 made one of their characters bi in season 7. I had watched lonestar before but never 911, and I was looking for something new to watch anyway and figured I’d try it out.

And suddenly I was surrounded by characters who loved each other and were a family and hurt and cried and helped one another, and I felt like I could relate to the pain and the loss they portrayed. Bobby reminded me of my dad, I feel like I get a visit from him when I watch the show, and Maddie reminds me of my sister because she was 9 years older than me and my best friend in the world.

You’d think that would make me feel worse but it didn’t, it made me want to write again. I don’t even care if my fics are good, don’t care if anyone reads them, I am just so happy to be writing again. To have something that I love that was missing from my life for so long. I am so grateful for that messy, crazy, soap opera of a tv show.

[calcifiedunderland]

Pride and Prejudice: A TWSTed AU

The Keeper of the Underworld: I. Shroud

Introduction, or Pick another route!

Idia x GN Reader (they/them)

Warnings: P&P-level angst and miscommunication, some cringe dialogue, parties, possibly ooc Idia, I wrote this before playing Book 6 so I apologize if there’s any inconsistencies

Notes: The level of overthinking I put into these fics is unreal 💀 First and foremost, thank you all for your patience!! Idia was hard to write, but I hope you enjoy, shrimpies~

———

Well this is certainly something, you thought. Of all the things you’d witnessed at NRC, (even overblots), you didn’t think you’d ever see Idia Shroud at one of Kalim’s parties.

You sipped on your drink when a shock of bright blue flames came in the corner of your eye, contrasting the orange-red of Scarabia. Kalim lead Idia into the dorm, bright and sunny, compared to the look on Idia’s face. Poor guy couldn’t even escape, because Cater and Rook ambled in behind him, chatting happily.

It was like the beginning of a joke: A sultan, a card soldier, a huntsman, and a blue flame-headed gamer walk into a room.

Kalim spotted you and grinned, grabbing Idia’s hoodie sleeve and dragging him over too. “Hey (name)! I’m glad you could make it!”

You smiled at the Scarabia Housewarden, “Thanks Kalim! I-“ At that moment, Jamil reached him to drag him away, mumbling exasperatedly to Kalim about being careful. Kalim laughed Jamil off, “sorry (name)! I’ll see you later, okay?” “Alright then…” you trailed off and turned to Idia, who looked like a deer in headlights.

“So…” you rocked on your heels. To be honest, you didn’t know how to approach him sometimes. Sure, you’d gamed with him a few times (with heavy insistence from Ortho) and you weren’t on his ‘avoid at all costs’ ranking list, but Idia did have his odd moments. Some days, you two would get along like a house on fire. Other times, it was like Idia hated you - avoiding you even in tablet-mode, and ghosting your chats.

You’d like to think that your more friendly moments were the ones that Idia counted, but sometimes it was hard to get a read on the guy.

“I didn’t know that you’d be at Kalim’s party today. I thought Ortho said there was an event in… um…?” You finished, cringing at your vagueness. You might not have known much about the game he played, even though he’d made you play it when you came over to Ignihyde, but you knew he probably didn’t want to be here of all places.

Idia’s hair flared a bit, and he looked resigned and moody. He pulled out his tablet. Ya, the event dropped today but I got mobbed by kalim + the extroverts. “That sucks,” you said, “I got dragged here by Ace. Still, it’s nice to see you.” In the oil lamp lighting, you could’ve sworn Idia’s hair turned a bit pink.

You were both silent, and you opened your mouth to speak when Lilia yelled out from the front, “let’s get this party started!” Kalim started drumming wildly, and then electric guitar swelled. Lilia began screaming heavy-metal-style into the mic. Around you, everyone started dancing, and even you found yourself moving to the rhythm.

You glanced at Idia every now and again, but he looked vaguely annoyed and tired despite the liveliness. He looks so over it, you thought. Probably since Kalim maybe dragged him here. You looked around, biting your lip when you noticed your friends having a grand old time on the dance floor, and kind of wanted to go too. Still, it wasn’t every day you saw Idia, and you wanted to do something with him. Especially since he was… well, here.

“So, Idia…” Idia’s eyes snapped to yours, dull. You rocked back on your feet, “do you dance?” Idia rolled his eyes, and you felt your heart sink, for some reason. Obvi not, id probs distract everyone anyway. And also id just rather not if I can help it. Your smile wavered, “c’mon Idia, anyone can dance, even if it’s not good!” Idia typed rapidly into the tablet, i mean ur not wrong. Like literally anyone can dance but ppl only do it bc its wat normies do.

You opened your mouth, then squared your shoulders, words failing you. Idia shoved a hand into his pockets and opened an app on the tablet, scrolling. You swayed for a bit, feeling awkward while Idia kept his eyes glued to the screen, a frown creasing his brows. Finally you shrugged your shoulders, trying to shake that sinking-feeling off.

You stepped into the crowd of dancing people, swaying to the music and trying not to look over at the blue flames swaying in the corner. Unknowing to you, Idia glanced up from his tablet every few minutes, trying to catch a glimpse of you, before trudging back to the cold chrome of Ignihyde, back to his dorm.

———

Ugh, could this get any worse?

Idia flopped onto his bed, shoving his headphones on and opening the mobile game on his phone. Not only did he get a late start on the game event, but he flubbed a chance to talk to you. Even if you did want to dance like all the other non-introverts at Scarabia. Thank Sevens Ortho didn’t know he missed his chance, otherwise the little robot would’ve torn Idia apart.

Idia shut his eyes and went over the details. Doing this IRL was trash-tier. Why couldn’t this just be a good-old-fashioned otome game, or romance anime? First you meet the love interest, then you find things they’re into, then you talk to them more. Then finally you confess, and cue the outro. He’d watched countless shojo and romance anime’s, and that was the basic outline. Eventually, the ethereal, gorgeous, smart, kind protagonist (aka you) would fall in love with their love interest (aka him) and it would all work out. Boom. Happily ever after.

Ah, yes. He could see it now.

Cherry blossom petals rained around both of you. Where are they coming from, this campus doesn’t grow cherry blossoms? Whatever, don’t question it. Anyway, the petals fluttered past your beautiful, sparkling eyes as you stared up at Idia with adoration and love. Idia stared down at you with full-rizz, kabedoning you against the wall.

“Oh, Idia-senpai!” You’d cry, eyes turning into hearts as sparkles and pink flower petals surround you both. “You’re so cool and not cringe at all! I could never want one of those normies! You’re the only one for me! Please date me!” And then Ortho would set off the heart-shaped fireworks and you two would finally kiss-kiss-fall-in-love, just like the popular anime Our High School Has A Host Club And The Leader Falls In Love With Me?!

“Whee hee hee…” Idia stared off into the distance, giggling ominously to himself and hair turning pink at the ends. His character on the screen went into idle mode, and he didn’t even hear when Ortho floated into the room. “Big brother?” Ortho gently tapped him on the shoulder, yanking him from his shojo daydream. Idia jumped, hair flaring. “AAAIIIIEEEE-“ Ortho jumped back, eyes wide but not detecting any signs of injury on Idia.

Idia breathed heavily, wide-eyed. “Ortho! Wh-when did-? I wasn’t-!” Ortho analyzed his heart beat, noting that Idia had traces of blush on his cheeks and his erratic behavior pointed to- “Were you thinking about (name) (last name)?” Ortho asked innocently, his theory proven when Idia flushed and went pinker. The younger boy suddenly got an idea.

“You know, (Name)’s heart rate goes up when they interact with you,” Ortho watched his brother’s eyes widen, “even when you’re not there, when you’re mentioned, their heart rate increases by 45% and they are more likely to be in a positive mood. 82% of the time, they regard you in a positive way.” His eyes lit up happily with realization, “If my calculations are correct, they have feelings for you!”

Idia sat there, thinking. What were the odds you would like him back? Sure, you made him happy, and more importantly made Ortho happy. And it was actually nice talking to you. And he never felt exhausted after interacting with you. And maybe you did enjoy the artificial light of Ignihyde to the spring sun above, and maybe you would like being with dreary, nerdy him.

Ortho could see his brother lost in thought, noting that Idia’s heart rate spiked when he mentioned you. “I also overheard them telling Grim about finding a partner,” he said casually, omitting that you’d been wanting a partner in Alchemy, and not necessarily a romantic partner.

That seemed to fire Idia up. Ortho could see the metaphorical cogs in Idia’s brain turning, an entire blueprint of a plan being made in his mind. At last, a wide cunning grin spread on his face, and he opened his arms, “well, who else but a genius could be partners with the MC?” He said arrogantly, “it’s not like just anybody can woo the protagonist!”

Ortho beamed, cheering, “all you need to do now is confess!” Idia immediately began sweating, freezing up. “H-huh?!”

——

You frowned at your textbook, rubbing your temples as you read through the alchemy procedure. Ugh, this couldn’t get any more confusing.

As you turned to begin writing, the door burst open. You flinched and immediately locked eyes with a frazzled Idia. His golden eyes were wide, and he was panting - he even looked sweaty. Somehow his blue fire hair seemed just as frazzled as him, looking pale-blue in shock. Could flames somehow look poofy?

“Prefect!” He squeaked. “Idia?” You questioned, what’s he doing here? It was odd that he’d be out of his room at six in the afternoon, not to mention he looked afraid of you. It wasn’t like you were a stranger, even though as of late, he treated you like one.

He stared at you from the door for an uncomfortable amount of time, then sped-walked to stand in front of you. You looked up at him from your seat, tapping your fingers. You awkwardly asked “do you wanna sit down?” He shook his head quickly, the ends of his hair were turning pink. You frowned, “…dude, are you okay?”

Idia flinched. He pivoted on his heel, “no, no, can’t do it, not today-“ he scuttled out of the room and slammed the door, screeching to himself and pulling his hood over his head. You stared at the door, vaguely hearing Idia freaking out to… was that Ortho? You heard the little robot boy’s voice through the door, probably calming Idia down, along with an odd spraying sound.

It went quiet and you assumed they’d left. Whatever, weirder things have happened at NRC. As you went back to writing, the door slammed open again. You jumped, heart beating wildly. Idia stormed over to you, hair blazing a trail behind him. He slammed his hands down on the desk, and your eyes watered with the scent of overpowering cologne bodyspray.

“Prefect! I need to tell you something!” Idia’s eyes steeled in determination, and he looked you dead in the eye. He was breathing heavily, and his flamed hair blazed and curled more than usual, turning deep pinkish-red near the ends. The last time you saw his hair similar to that, was when he was rage-playing during one of your gaming sessions. How pissed is he? You felt your heart leap into your throat.

“Idia,” you began, freaked out, “I think you should sit down-“ Idia blazed on, “this is honestly a horrible decision for you and definitely for me. I don’t even want to think about what Mother and Father would say, not to mention how this’d affect Styx.” He was tunnel visioning now. “Plus you don’t even have magic and this might not even work out anyway ‘cause I don’t see us working out TBH…” Slowly his hair began fizzling out, voice getting quieter and quieter as he mumbled to himself.

This was a terrible idea, Idia realized. After everything that had happened with Styx, not to mention everything you had to deal with personally, it wouldn’t be good to get involved with him. You could be in danger, especially as a non-magic user. No, it would be selfish of him to ask you to be with him. Why would you, anyway? There were other guys at NRC, not to mention the entire Sage’s Island, who would be a better fit for not. Especially ones who didn’t kidnap your friends and Grim. Especially someone like Idia.

No, he concluded. He shouldn’t have come.

You frowned deeply. “Idia, what…?” Your alchemy work definitely wasn’t done yet and Idia was making zero sense. He sighed, as if tired all of a sudden. “Nope, no… this isn’t going to work.” He stood abruptly and sped-walked out the door, brushing past Ortho. You overheard the boy try to get his brother to come back, but Idia didn’t stop. You could feel your heartbeat in your ears. So that’s what this is about? Idia didn’t want to be friends with you anymore? All because you weren’t… what? A tech whiz? Good at gaming? Magical? Your heart dropped. Because you were just too different from him? So you weren’t good enough to be even friends with him?

Your eyes stung at the thought. Fine. If Idia wanted to be that way, then fine. You shoved your books into you bag and headed back to Ramshackle. You doubted you’d be able to focus, anyway.

———

Poor Ortho was confused.

After running simulation after simulation, scouring the Internet for any clues, and piecing together what Idia said after running out of the classroom, he just couldn’t understand what happened. That was a first, considering it was Ortho.

Idia had ran out of the room in a hurry, mumbling incoherently. “Brother! What’s happening?” Ortho flew to him, scanning his vitals. Idia seemed to be ok, but his brother seemed… strangely melancholic. “Ortho, it won’t work out,” he said dejectedly, not wanting to talk about it.

Ortho called after him, trailing behind “What did (name) (last name) say? There was a high probability they’d accept your-” Idia sighed in exasperation, shaking his head. “It won’t work. I should’ve never left the dorm…” As Idia trudged back to Ignihyde, Ortho was left with more questions.

He hovered for a moment, before heading back to the alchemy room for you, only to not find you there. Ortho thought hard, thinking back to what Idia said. ‘It won’t work out,’ was what he said - not a flat-out rejection from you. So that meant…

He began floating back to Ignihyde, determined. I can still save this!

———

You were taking overthinking to a new level.

You bit your lip, staring at the game’s chatbox in front of you. Idia was online, and probably didn’t realize you were too. You leaned against the Heartslabyul common room couch (curse Ramshackle’s lack of internet!), and hit send.

Hey is everything ok??

You watched Idia’s game icon immediately switch to “online less than 1 minute ago,” and groaned.

Cater exited the kitchens, leaning over the couch back. “Hey~ what’s got my fave frosh so worked up?” He chirped, looking at your phone. “Ohh, isn’t that the popular game that’s been trending? Wait, didn’t you say Idia got you into it?” Cater immediately had his phone in hand, “that’s supes adorable, playing with friends is so fun-“

You cut him off, throwing your hands up, “that’s it! Idia just doesn’t want to talk to me! He- he just-!” You grabbed a throw pillow and smashed your face into it, groaning. Cater patted your shoulder sympathetically, “well, we’re playing at another one of Kalim’s parties tonight, you want in?” You sniffed dramatically, thinking. “Well, I guess. Sure, why not?”

Later that evening, you stepped into the Scarabia mirror. You and Cater made your way to the food table. As you both munched on Jamil’s cooking (damn, the guy made a good curry), you watched everyone dancing. “Y’know, it was weird seeing Idia at a party,” you commented, while Cater nodded. “Yeah! We decided to bring him along that day, it was fun seeing him.”

You sighed, “yeah, it was, but… it’s not really often that we can hang out in person. I kinda wanted to dance with him last time, but he sort of… blew me off? I guess maybe it wasn’t the best idea.” You winced, while Cater’s eyebrows rose. “You didn’t tell me that. So, he did that and also told you he didn’t want to be friends?” You nodded, frustration flooding back, “Yeah! And I just don’t understand how he can be so conceited about him being so high and smart, and not like me because I don’t-“

“Prefect,” Cater cleared his throat. You looked up mid-rant, meeting Ortho’s eyes, and jumped. He just snuck up on you both like it was nothing. Did he hear you? Hopefully he wouldn’t be mad. In your mind, Idia started it.

“Hello (name) (last name)!” Ortho said pleasantly, so you assumed he hadn’t heard you. Great. “I didn’t know you’d be here! What a coincidence!” That was a lie, Ortho overheard you and Cater talking about the party when you were walking to Scarabia. He absolutely knew. And he dragged Idia here because of it.

“Yep,” you smiled at Ortho, “it’s nice to see you.” Ortho mentally readied himself and remembered every bit of acting advice Vil gave him. “I almost forgot!” His eyes widened, while your eyes narrowed. Ortho was a robot. He didn’t forget shit. “Big brother is here, and he wanted to ask you to dance!” What? Your neck snapped around, looking for Idia’s bright blue hair. Cater elbowed you, bringing you back to reality.

“I-well, I- had not-“ you stammered, fumbling for an excuse. Ortho’s eyes shone at you like puppy eyes, and your anger at Idia cracked. “…yeah, sure,” you watched Ortho rise a bit in the air happily, “Yippee! I’ll go get him!” He zipped off, and you rubbed your temples. Cater twisted a strand of his hair, eyes wide. “Yikes…” “tell me about it,” you groaned.

A few minutes later, you both looked up when Kalim tapped the mic. You didn’t miss Ortho hovering a ways behind Kalim. “Hey everyone! Thanks for coming!” When the cheering died down, Kalim continued, “We’re gonna try something different! Everyone, find a partner and join the dance floor!”

Cater glanced at you, mischievous. “Welp, I can’t leave them hanging~ TTYL, Prefect!” And he left faster than you could say ‘Magicam.’ Sweet.

You hesitantly stepped to the dance floor, half expecting Ortho to float up to you and sheepishly tell you Idia left. Your mind drifted back to that day in the alchemy room. I guess it wouldn’t work, anyway.

To your surprise, a finger tapped your shoulder. You turned, seeing Idia with a with a flushed expression, wearing a casual-but-chic blazer. His hair looked a bit tamer than normal, and cascaded down his back in a low ponytail, bangs flickering over his forehead. Undoubtedly, this was the work of Ortho, who definitely got pointers from Vil.

You both stared at each other, unmoving, until slow music began playing. You averted your eyes. Idia gulped, eyes widening until waving caught his eye. Ortho was flying upwards a little ways away from the slowly-crowding dance floor, gesturing wildly at you. As if that wasn’t enough, he projected words above his head: DANCE WITH THEM!

Idia was lucky that everyone else was more interested in dancing with their partner than Ortho. His eyes snapped back to you, “s-so I guess you wanna-“ he swallowed thickly, eyes shifting to the dance floor. You shrugged, feigning nonchalance and looked ahead. Idia looked back at Ortho, who was pointing wildly at the words. He thought to himself, this is fine. It’s just the mandatory side quest. It’s not fighting the boss. It’s…

It’s charming the love interest. It’s solidifying your route!

Idia steeled himself and forced your hand into his. Your eyes shot to his in surprise, and he walked stiffly to the dance floor. Your hand clasped his, and you both swayed gently to the soft rock from the stage. Your brows furrowed, but Idia locked his gaze onto you, focusing only on you.

Yes, he thought. This is just the player’s pov on the screen, and he was only focusing on the love interest. The other waltzers didn’t exist. The party didn’t exist. It was just you and him.

Meanwhile, you were at a loss for words. While Idia seemed taciturn, you glanced up at the stage. Cater, Kalim, and Lilia were in their own little bubble jamming out, so that wasn’t a lifeline. After a little while of swaying with Idia, you hummed, “I haven’t seen you in a while. Since that day.” Idia’s hands felt clammy, and in the dimmed lights you saw a small pink dusting Idia’s cheeks. You saw him swallow heavily, but he didn’t say a word.

The tension grew between you two, and despite feeling hurt, you felt a little bad. Still, you wanted some answers out of Idia, after the incident in the alchemy room. “Y’know, you never used to be this… odd around me.” Was it the crowd that made him quiet, or… You felt a lump in your throat. Was it you?

Idia’s eyebrows shot up, thinking fast on what to say. Why can't conversations irl have ready-made dialogue?! “I… we c-can talk about wh-whatever you want? I guess?” He tried, kicking himself internally for leaving his tablet with Ortho. You bit the inside of your cheek as you stepped with him, that’ll do for now. “Scarabia parties are a little much, but they’re more pleasant than the Pomefiore mock balls,” you tried “wouldn’t you say?” After an uncomfortable pause, expecting a reply, you mumbled to yourself, “I guess we can stop talking now.”

“...is it like a rule for normies to chat while dancing? Isn’t the act of moving enough?” Idia mumbled in exasperation, hand tightening a little on your own. You bit your lip, your eyes burning. “No, I prefer to not talk to my friends at all and tell them we can’t be friends. It’s so much fun, right?” Idia’s eyes widened, and he scrambled for words, “I- I didn’t mean…” You stopped swaying abruptly, both of your clasped hands in the air. “Why are you here, Idia?”

A chill went through Idia. “T-To be honest, I didn’t even want to come to this stupid IRL dance,” he rushed out, “TBH Ortho had to make me come ‘cause he told me you’d be here-“ “You didn’t want…?” You cut Idia off, heart dropping. The other dancing couples swirled around you, but all the commotion around you felt like nothing more than idle chatter. Hurt flashed in your eyes, and Idia seemed shocked, which made you angry.

“I guess you wouldn’t want to be friends with someone who’s magicless, especially since you have STYX right?”

Idia’s eyes were wider than the Heartslabyul tea saucers. For once, he didn’t have a smart-ass reply. “Um, what? Obvi, I’m kind of stuck with STYX-” You let go of his hand and took a step back, almost bumping into a waltzing couple. “Yeah, wouldn’t want me to mess things up. Make any bad decisions and all that, right?” You felt your eyes water, despite yourself.

Furiously balling a fist and wiping your eyes, “Since you said we wouldnt work out n’stuff.” Idia suddenly remembered everything he’d muttered to himself, from the moment he’d stormed into the room to when he’d left dejectedly. When he’d made his choice and left before you could even get your word in.

Like a coward.

Idia’s heart pounded but shakingly, he reached a hand out to you. “P-prefect, I-I-!” You dodged the crowd, and ran out of Scarabia. You didn’t look back until you crashed through Ramshackle’s door, raced up the stairs, and fell onto your bed, Grim yelping in surprise as you tried your darndest to forget everything that just happened.

Back in Scarabia, Idia somehow stumbled off the dance floor, staggering to a table and breathing heavily. Mentally he replayed everything that just happened. Ortho floated over to him, “Brother? I don’t understand, why would (name) (last name) not accept your feelings?” Ortho went over the footage when he was observing you both dancing, and frowned.

“My senses indicate that based on their body language, they were upset with you. What happened?” Idia swallowed heavily, “I-I said it wouldn’t work out between us c-cuz they don’t have magic,” he stammered, eyes wide, “a-and STYX and-...” Ortho’s eyes widened, then narrowed, “That shouldn’t be a problem! You know that!”

“I meant for them, Ortho.” Idia sighed heavily, sinking into the chair. “I don’t want them to get hurt. Not when…” his mind wandered to Ortho, before NRC. He fell into deep thought. “In the end, I couldn’t even tell them...” He frowned deeply.

Ortho fell quiet, computing. Idia stared at the table, dejected, until Ortho spoke. “You know (Name) (lastname) doesn’t back down easily from a challenge.” That’s true. From playing games with Idia to taking down overblots, you weren’t someone who ran away when it mattered. Maybe that’s why Idia liked you - you were like the protagonists in animes, who found a way to make the world their own.

“You shouldn’t make (name) (last name)’s decision for them.” Idia looked up at his brother. Ortho continued, head angling to the side, Idia shook his head dejectedly, “it won’t work-”

“Your lil’ bro is right, y’know,” Cater walked over, shaking his hair out with his guitar slung over his shoulder. “Sry, I overheard you two,” Cater could piece together what happened. He did see you blow up at Idia (although he couldn’t hear you), and after spamming your phone with no reply after you ran out, now he had an idea of what was going on. “Y’know, if you didn’t tell them how you felt, then how could you know you were making the right choice?”

Idia looked down. Ortho piped up, “Cater Diamond is right.” Idia shut his eyes, then stood up, hands tightening into fists. Cater jumped back as Idia’s hair flared up bright blue, and the Ignihyde housewarden headed straight to the exit. Ortho called out, “thank you, Cater Diamond!” and floated after Idia, “Brother! Wait!”

“Lets go, Ortho,” Idia’s golden eyes steeled in determination, “I can fix this.”

—----

A knock on the door jolted you from your reading of Prejudice and Pride.

It was early morning. Somehow, even though it was the weekend and you’d stayed up all night, you still woke up at an ungodly early hour. After being unable to fall asleep (totally not because of Grim’s snoring and sleep-munching) you decided to go to your living room and read. You were sure that you didn’t have a guest coming, so why would…?

You got up and opened the door, expecting Ace or Deuce or something. The annoyed look on your face turned to shock when you saw Idia standing on your porch. In one hand, he held a bouquet of pomegranate-red roses and some flowers you recognized to be asphodel.

You both stared at each other, unwilling to move. “Idia,” you breathed, “why are you here?” Idia shuffled awkwardly, “I wanted to see you.” You crossed your arms, looking around. “Where’s Ortho?” You were sure the little robot boy made his brother come. Otherwise, why would Idia be here? Idia rubbed the back of his neck, “Ortho isn’t here. I… I wanted to see you,” he repeated.

Wordlessly, he thrust the flowers into your arms, and you wrapped your arm around it instinctively. “I- um,” you looked everywhere but Idia, who was staring at the Ramshackle doorway. “Idia,” you cleared your throat, “about what happened-” “Prefect, I… I wanted to apologize.” Your eyes widened, but Idia continued.

“I… I didn’t mean what I said that day.” Idia looked bashful, face turning pink and the ends of his hair turning a deep blush. He kept talking, rambling on and fighting he urge to grab his tablet and let the device speak for him. “I… really like being friends with you.” The words came out quietly from him, and even though he looked like he wanted to sink into his hoodie, Idia didn’t shirk away.

A lump rose in your throat as you didn’t make eye contact with him, instead playing with the flower bouquet, “I like being friends with you too,” you bit your lip, rubbing an asphodel petal, “I like you, Idia.”

Idia’s eyes widened and went rigid. Both his face and his hair went deep pink. Your own eyes widened at the color, and you felt your face grow hot. So that’s what it meant…? Not anger…?Wordlessly, without thinking, you dropped the bouquet. Your body moved on its own, and you flung yourself at Idia, wrapping your arms around his shoulders and squeezing your eyes shut.

Idia staggered back from the momentum with a squeak, but wrapped his arms around your torso with an iron grip. You gripped his hoodie tightly, finally understanding what had gone on for so long. Your cheek was pressed against his, and despite the early morning chill, you both felt warm.

High above, Ortho hovered in the distance over the tree canopies from afar. He zoomed in on you and Idia, and behind his face mask, he beamed. In midair, he did a heart-shaped loop-de-loop in happiness, and hovered back to Ignihyde.

After a few minutes, you leaned back in Idia’s arms, the both of you chuckling in happy disbelief. You looked up and saw a little blue streak leaving a smoke trail of a heart, and laughed to yourself. Idia turned around, seeing his brother above, a soft reminiscent look on his face.

“…guess Ortho was right.”

~END

——-

Fun fact: the beginning is inspired by idia’s school uniform vignette!!!

Me, while writing this: wow Idia and Cater’s dialogue are unique, they’d be hard to write

Also me: *puts both of them in this fic and suffers*

Writing Idia was SO HARD but I hope I managed to get him right-ish. Trying to balance his reactions with the dialogue was hard 😭

anyway thanks for reading~ please leave a comment/reblog!! <3

Taglist: @cerisescherries, @eclecticprincecollector, @ars-tral, @thehollowwriter, @twst-eeps, @casperandcats, @ttokkisbee, @mitsuriswaifu, @parad-ice-lostandfound, @sad-sie, @moyo5653

(If your user is in bold, I wasn’t able to tag you properly)

[janovavalen]

im gonna be like the little devil on your shoulder politely asking for grover fics (im the person who requested the hurt/comfort one :D) I WANNA SAY A) THE FICS FANTASTIC LOVED IT SM B) DO YOU ONLY WRITE FOR FEM READER?? ASKIN OUT OF CURIOSITY BECAUSE IM NON BINARY IF NOT TOTALLY FINE OBVI

now askin for another one because im silly like that grover x gn(if you do gn if not then fem obvi) reader angst. i want to feel pain AND TYSM FOR READING THIS AND SOING THIS IF YOU DO ILYSM FOR DOING GROVER /P 🫶🫶(ps sorry for making this rly long i have lots to say)

a/n: omg HIII i was hoping you liked it anon!! i literally was like ‘bro what if they hate this sm imma be mad embarrassed’ bc i was rubbing on coffee and water when i wrote that😭 BUT YES ILL TRY TO WRITE WHAT U ASKED FORR, i’m a little scared bc i never wrote gn reader before and i don’t wanna like fuck it up for anyone but i’ll try<3

✧I WISH YOU SAW YOURSELF HOW I SEE YOU || grover underwood x gn!reader

summary: when grover comes back from his quest with percy and annabeth, he can’t help but notice that y/n has grown closer and closer to luke, causing him a bit of worry for the two of them.

word count: 1237 (this was rushed bc i was trying to get something out to you guys in so sorryyy)

warnings: misunderstanding, HORRID CLUTCHING jealousy, reader not knowing, grover giving the cold shoulder, slight hurt but comfort and hugs in the end<3

grover had just gotten back to one of his quests with annabeth and percy. and he was esthetic to get back to camp.

they meant everything to him. when they first met, they had been very quiet, reserved but polite and never ever put one in their place if needed. they didn’t take up bullying and they wouldn’t stop now.

when grover had met them however, they had been in the lake taking a small swim on the hot day, he had been there to just sit under the sun. which they allowed, the two of them didn’t talk until they had decided since they were both there and in the same camp, the two of them might as well know each other.

and from then on, they had been nonstop talking to each other, hanging out, laughing and chatting at all the meal times and sooner or later, grover felt his crush on them developing faster and faster. they had been eighteen, the prime age for an adult so he didn’t feel weirded out—even though they told him not to feel that way.

when he looked around for them, he found that they were nowhere to be found which concerned him a little. usually y/n is always waiting for him at the front of the cabin but this time, they weren’t ?

a little concerned he began to ask around for y/n, everyone saying they didn’t really know or they saw them just a second ago.

‘where could they be…’ he asked himself while turning around to look over his shoulder.

just as he walked near the bows and arrows and there they were. standing there with a wide warm smile on their face, only..they weren’t alone? once somebody moved away from where this mysterious person was there stood luke castellan. a wide smile on his own face while he shook his head at y/n who must have told a joke.

grover wouldn’t particularly care or mind in this situation but…he felt something was a bit different about the way y/n had been laughing. it was over excessive and a bit different then the way they laughed at him?

when y/n laughed at him—with him, they usually would look away or clear their throat, but with luke? they stayed their eyes locked and or they’d bend down to laugh while covering their mouth.

y/n usually didn’t cover their mouth with him. could this be a sign that he was in the friend zone the whole time.

clutching his hand into a fist next to his side he walked away, unknowingly to him, y/n had called out his name with a smile but it immediately dropped when he didn’t turn their way making y/n extremely confused a the tiniest bit of embarrassed at how they was ignored so openly.

ㆍ୨୧ㆍ

later that day at dinner time, y/n had happily made their way over to grover and percy who had been speaking but when she sat down he got quiet. started to pick at his horns very subtly but noticing to y/n.

‘uhm…so how did the quest go?’ y/n asked while looking over at percy who shrugged and to grover who didn’t look up.

‘i hope good?’ they said once more to get grover’s attention only for him to not even stop picking at his food. with a sigh of sadness, they grabbed their food and got up to another table with their siblings.

percy looked and was dumbfounded—‘grover? what was that?’

‘nothing?’ grover shook his head while frowning his eyebrows.

‘nothing? dude, you flat out ignored y/n and on top of that hurt their feelings? i thought you were all…on the side of doing nothing but making them happy?’ percy asked once more while setting his blueberries down.

‘okay…well, they seemed to have enough happiness with luke when they were talking…they can find happiness with him better than me apparently.’ he sighed while trying his hardest not to look over at y/n who’s mood had completely died at that table he sat at.

percy scoffed and rolled his eyes—‘are you kidding me? dude y/n is literally in love with you? and for you to think they like luke castellan more than you when they specifically stated they saw him as a brother and nothing more…is insane.’ percy finished shaking his head at grover who had sat up more and groaned.

placing his hands on his face while mentally beating himself up at the fact he treated y/n that way with no hesitation.

‘your kidding me…oh my’ grover mumbled while slowly looking over to y/n who wasn’t there. getting up in a hurry, grover went to ask luke, annabeth and the others sitting at the table with y/n where they went.

‘oh…they went to take a walk in the forest, said their head was hurting…you wouldn’t be the reason right…’ annabeth eyed him dangerously and warningly, making him hurry and shake his head but annabeth could see through him.

‘what did you do’ she groaned. grover sighed and explained leaving luke a bit speechless and annabeth to roll her eyes with a sigh.

‘well stop standing here any longer and go find her you pea brain’ annabeth pointed over to the forest leaving grover to hurry and run to it.

ㆍ୨୧ㆍ

‘y/n!’ he shouted while cupping his mouth to make it a bit louder. when no answers came through he shouted their name over and over until.

‘what?’ along with a sniffle and a shaky voice. feeling his heart burst and his strings pull, he say y/n sitting with their legs close to their chest and their face pressed on their knees. seeing them this way because of him made him almost cry.

‘y/n…listen i’m so, so sorry. i—i thought you’d move on from me when i was on my quest to luke so i was so upset and so jealous because luke is a great guy and who wouldn’t want to be with him—‘

‘me grover…i don’t. i want you, i made that so very known and i don’t get why you can’t see that—‘

‘i know! i know, im so sorry, okay? i’m sorry’ he whispered while making his way over to y/n who’d shed a tear but wiped it immediately with their hand. when grover placed himself next to y/n, he was quick to hold them in his comfortable arms.

as y/n buried their head into his neck they mumbled—‘i wish you saw yourself how i see you’ they mumbled making him almost cry with a huge smile.

not being able to stop himself he ambushed y/n with hundreds of apology kisses while y/n laughed and fell back into the grass with their arms trying to push him away.

he did pull away, but only to close his eyes and make his way down and over their lips. y/n kissed back immediately with their hands cupping his cheeks.

‘i think i really love you y/n l/n’ he confessed. y/n let out a small giggle and licked her lip.

‘and i think i really love you too grover underwood’ pulling his face in for another kiss which he took.

[riacte]

Space Opera AU dashboard simulator

🥧 syrupstars Follow

Anyone else think that Red King racer is a little... y'know... fruity?

👑 falsewellsupremacy Follow

He literally says "ladies, gentlemen, everyone in between, get in line" so I think that answers your question.

🥧 syrupstars Follow

What about the "#Ally4Life 🏳️‍🌈" on his Twilight handle?

👑 falsewellsupremacy Follow

I genuinely have no idea. Maybe he thinks it's about him being an ally to cishet people

#idk ren's just like that sometimes #void knows what he's doing #also prev tags you do not want to get into the black hole of who ren has dated #he has rumours with 3/4 of the grid #edit: WHO MENTIONED BAD BOY TEENAGE REN IN MY NOTES #the shippers are here... oh no #edit 2: not ren at the club.

74 notes

🛑 bluebatshater Follow

oh my voiddd ofc That Duo got p1 again... i need them to dnf in the race. i hope they crash and burn and die and i need crastle to get podium for ONCE. i am so mad. i am calling for the goddess tsuki to curse them. dnf dnf crash burn DIE

🌻 lesbianlumian Follow

the goddess tsuki LITERALLY protects racers and that's why they pray to her? you think the goddess tsuki, creator of lumians, will curse an actual lumian? be so fucking fr

🛑 bluebatshater Follow

if you dont have anything productive to say get off my post. freak

#those blue bats stannies are SO ANNOYING THEY ARE EVERYWHERE #they're overshadowing all the other teams #cant even be a bitchy hater in peace #salt #negativity #hateposting

12 notes

🔮 queenofstarz03 Follow

OMG FALSE IS SO PRETTY SHES MY QUEEN OF HEARTS OMG OMGOMGOGM 💖💖💖💖💖💖 i tihnk im gonna pass out. HER HAIR FLYING IN THE WIND AND HER RED FRECKLES AND HER SMILE WHY IS MY HEART BEATING SO FAST and Ren is hot I guess he's tall like a ferris wheel

🔮 queenofstarz03 Follow

Looking at posts from five years ago is funny like how did I ever believe I was straight

🍦 jelliepopsicle Follow

OP, I think I recognise your url... did you write that viral Bad Boy Ren x QoH fic on Launchpad?

🔮 queenofstarz03 Follow

💀 Shut the fuck up right NOWWW!!

#STOP MENTIONING THAT FIC I WFOTE WHEN I WAS THIRTEEEN!!! #everything before my gay awakening is not canon. sorry #tbh... as much as a nightmare it was i kinda miss that stupid fic #it was from a simpler time #now im in university trying to contact my groupmates and i think one of them got lost in a blackhole last tuesday (again) #sigh. this keeps on happening to me #my cousin worked on one of the moons last summer for two weeks and came back like he'd aged six months #my friend's ex got sucked into a black hole and was briefly spaghettified but they managed to revive her and she gloats that she's finally taller than my friend's ex #whoops sorry for dumping in the notes #anyways. bad boy rk x good girl queen of hearts. awful idea. even more awful fic. yet i wrote it #i regret everything and nothing

25 notes

🗣️ peace-and-planets-deactivated63891092

PSA: Sunblr user @/summerheavens writes RPF of the Exterra 1 racers. She is a big name fan in the Miraculous Laserbug fandom so I thought you all would like to know. This is gross and disgusting behaviour and I implore you to stop.

🍬 summerheavens Follow

umm @/peace-and-planets i literally saw your kudos on my fic. the evidence is out there. girl what are YOU doing at the devil's sacrament. what are you doing on my roseduo rpf titled "hang your head low in the glow of the vending machine (we're not trying)".

but i'm glad you liked it enough to give it a kudos ^_^ will certainly be putting more on the starchive!

❄️ justwingit Follow

LMFAOOOO OP DEACTIVATEDDDDD 😭😭😭 sunblr user got killed by a rpf author. if you're gonna secretly read rpf maybe not leave a kudos?????

🚀 exterrablrheritage

Exterra 1 Heritage Post

⚡ littlewoodbabygirl69

It's been ten years since this post... @/summerheavens are you okay after recent developments

🍬 summerheavens Follow

am i okay? is ANYONE okay??? in these trying times??????? with the most chaotic gp to ever exist?????? i am PULLING OUT WIPS i dropped out of respect ten years ago. i've got to send my kid to daycare but once i'm done you bet you're seeing me on the starchive. miss swift even dropped her 20th album just in time for me to use lyrics as titles. i am LIVING and i am THRIVING

#ohhhhhhhhhh #let's go #also can't believe taylor finally addressed the vehicle manslaughter rumours from like twenty years ago #how fitting #also littlewood needs to get his shit together #why does he look like he's the one who hasn't seen his man in 32738102371 years and got his soul shattered #he's weak and won't survive the winter

27,408 notes

🧈 butteredbread Follow

WHAT is wrong with that lykos. i desire him carnally

🌳 treebark

@/handoftheking

🪓 handoftheking

I mean... yeah. Let's face it, we're all like that 🤷

⭐ nonbinarystar Follow

MR LITTLEWOOD WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE

#WHAT IS WRONG WITH HIM #I HATE HIM SO MUCH #PARASOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS CAN ALSO BE ABOUT HATE #THIS GLOWSTICK MF IS MY WORST ENEMY #he just canonised treebark for the sixth time #also prev tags so real #need to slingshot him into a faraway galaxy

34,091 notes

🫃 spaceshipmpreg Follow

Who put that Just a Dream FalseRen AMV on my dash again

🔮 queenofstarz03 Follow

Respect your roots!! That 125M views Just a Dream AMV raised a generation. Every kid in my school played it on loop on their ipods during recess

🔮 queenofstarz03 Follow

wait op can you explain your url

🫃 spaceshipmpreg Follow

No 👍

#i think we should get the dogwarts freighter pregnant

6 notes

[zmediaoutlet]

Survey results time.

At time of downloading the data we got just over 300 responses, which is not bad for a survey that was long and complicated to take! I'm sure my shamelessness helped. Being a survey for a specific crowd, we also didn't get anyone (as far as I could tell) taking the survey in bad faith, which is a legit surprise. Special shout-out to the several people who, when asked to write literally anything to say they understood what was going on, wrote "literally anything"; additional shout-out to the person who wrote "penus and hole" (sic). You get it, anonymous person.

I'm going to share the top results for the questions here, but I'll also include the raw data as a sheet at the end in case anyone wants to actually go through it with a fine-tooth comb. This is not a survey where cute pie charts or graphs would be useful or readable, so get ready for some sweet-ass numbers:

Story Genre

Unsurprisingly, our leaderboard for most favorite story genre in the 'Anytime!' category is as follows:

Hurt/comfort (153 votes)

Angst (142 votes)

PWP (139 votes)

We just like the guys to get the shit beaten out of them, angstily, and then they can feel better by jerking off about it. The ideal evening.

The big loser in genre, with 34 buds flat out saying "not for me", was Dark!fic. That said, Dark!fic also got 112 votes (third highest) for "has to be JUST right," so we can probably take from there that while as a group we don't hate dark content, we have pretty strict definitions for a) what counts as dark, and b) what kind of dark we're willing to take.

Gencest/gen was arguably the most 'eh, idk?' of the genres, with respectable showings in every category from Anytime to No; most people don't hate it, but people aren't really seeking it out either. It's definitely There.

Story Setting

The winner of most 'Anytime!' votes for story setting is close to my heart; the podium is:

Bunker era (142 votes)

Canon-close, codas, etc (129 votes)

Pre-series/weechesters (126 votes)

It feels good to know that canon is on our side. This may help explain why various alternate universe settings didn't do so hot with the respondents -- the least fave according to this survey is an age!swap AU, followed by a raised apart!AU. Writers who are making Sam the big brother who lives in Cleveland while baby Dean lives in Seattle, you keep living your truth, but readers are rearing back.

That being said, while Canon Divergence isn't an overall winner, it has a full 149 votes in the 'Dig it' category; so, while we may generally prefer canon, we're willing to be led on a garden path away from it. We just want canon to be within shouting distance, at least.

Canonical Character Variants

Here's where the survey gets more complex. I've always been interested in how and why people are fandoming about things, and simple 'yes/no' surveys rarely dig into that meat. The point of the superego/ego/id separation is to really interrogate -- hey, do you like to read about (for example) soulless!Sam because you find it interesting on a high-minded level, or because your heart-strings are getting tugged even if you think it's kinda dumb, or just because it makes you so hornt-up you can't think straight? All are valid, and all are possible simultaneously, but it's interesting to prod at to see how the interest is working. You might also just be like, eh, it's fine, or GOD, STOP, and that's fine too. So, with all that said:

Superego winners:

demon powers!Sam (202 votes)

soulless!Sam (177 votes)

blood addict!Sam (160 votes)

Y'all like to really brain about how Sam is fucked up. I get it.

Ego winners:

Trials of Hell!Sam (186 votes)

blood addict!Sam (180 votes)

demon powers!Sam (161 votes)

Still all Sam, and no surprise that his saintly pale sleeplessness is winning the heartstrings battle.

Id winners:

demon!Dean (205 votes)

demon powers!Sam (175 votes)

blood addict!Sam (165 votes)

Again, no surprise: fandom girlies (gn) love their bad boys, lol. Soulless snuck in at #4 here with 163, presumably because working out still wearing a belt was juuuust dorky enough to kick him off the podium; #5 was Smith & Wesson at 162, probably because if they'd been left in that AU for ten more minutes they would have been fucking over the top of Dean Smith's desk. Glad we're all on the same page, there.

The nopes here were an interesting mix. In the full-on No Thank You category we had Michael!Dean and Gadreel!Sam (with 52 and 53 votes respectively) -- it would be interesting to know if that was due to dread of the storyline specifically, or just how No Bad Wrong it felt to have it happening. These two also led the 'meh' category, although they were joined on the podium of bad by Endverse!Dean (128 Meh votes), which frankly shocked me. Y'all aren't into his thigh holster? C'mon now. Sure, he murders his friends without compunction, but -- thigh holster!

Story Tropes

These ones were fascinatingly all over the place, which is exactly why I wanted to do this. Going to just run down the S/E/I podiums real quick, then 'Hard sell', then No --

Superego winners:

Outsider!POV (211)

Someone Finds Out (191)

Mental health issues (190)

Ego winners:

Mutual pining (252)

First time (242) AND Sick/injured (242)

First time in a long time (235)

Id winners:

Jealousy/possessiveness (224)

First time (218)

First time in a long time (180)

Now, part of what's interesting about these is how they fall off in other categories. Outsider POV wins handily at Superego with 211, but then drops all the way down to 92 votes at Id -- which isn't nothing, but clearly it's preferred to have a heckin' think about how other people view the incest relationship, rather than thinking it's just So Hot that people might. Similarly, while people do think it's so so hot for one brother or the other (or both!) to be possessive at 224 votes, when it comes to the superego that drops right down to 134 votes, presumably as the brain wakes up and goes RED FLAG!

Entering the land of no thank you, we shall have two anti-podiums:

Real hard sell:

Infidelity (127)

magic/powers!Dean (125)

Unrequited/no relationship upgrade (110) AND "Carver Edlund" fandom

This is a much more mixed bag. Infidelity and Unrequited are no surprise here, because it Feels Bad, Man; magic!Dean also not really a surprise, given that most of our respondents prefer being closer to canon, and Dean is very much our mundane buddy in the show as presented. (A delightful buddy, but a distinctly nonmagical one.) Carver Edlund fandom makes me laugh mostly because it's such a bananas thing to exist in the show. Sam and Dean reading big bang fics about each other? Collectively we just... don't know what to do with that. Weird.

Squick/No/Maybe one exception:

Permanent character death (140)

Infidelity (108)

Eating disorders (102)

Again, no surprise in the anti-winners of 1 or 2 here, but number 3 surprised me, personally. ED fic used to be a pretty big wedge of common tropes that people would seek out. Perhaps it's gotten less popular over the years? Or perhaps just that the people who like it REALLY like it and so chat about it out loud, while those who don't quietly bury it in sand, lo as a cat does with their leavings.

Most extreme delta in 'general interest' (whether that be S,E, or I) to 'ehh' (whether that be Hard Sell or Squick) is first time. Y'all loooove your first time.

Sexy Tropes, Vol. 1

This is where I really wanted to know if people could pull apart their interests between brain and heart and guts. Hopefully people were honest, as requested. Some of them we know are slight liar answers, because the hits on AO3 tell a story that can't be refuted -- nevertheless, here's what people were willing to admit to.

Bulletproof kink/will read any version:

Bedsharing (158)

Incest kink (139)

Size kink (133)

your friendly neighborhood survey creator is jumping up and down going 'wooo' that size kink made the podium. also I hope everyone understood that incest kink meant, like, indulging in the incest of it all via 'oh you're so totes my brother and i want to suck your dingle for that reason specifically', but I realize that could've been clearer.

Easy sell/you don't have to work hard for me to enjoy:

shameless bottom!Dean stuff (151)

switching (147)

voyeurism (138)

the first one here genuinely surprises me considering what I see getting written most often; is this a case of just not being in the right venn diagrams, or the 'easy sell' just not matching up with what people are being sold? Curiouser and curiouser.

Medium sell/not my fave, but I can see how it appeals:

bad/awkward sex (120)

phone sex (114)

in [drug/alcohol] veritas (110)

edging into awkward town in a few ways here: we don't love these, but we can see how it'd be fun. or not fun, in the case of bad sex.

Hard sell/this is unbelievable or uninteresting so you have to work hard to get me to enjoy it:

always-another-gender!AU (84)

multiple Sams or Deans (73)

genderswap (magic) (72)

so, in general, we prefer to keep the penises around and intact, but just one Sam penis and one Dean penis, please. Here, I'm interested that the volume is much lower than in the top category: maxing out at 84 hard sells compared to 158 bulletproof options means that we're willing to give more of these tropes a chance, even if they're not our faves. How accepting we are!

Squick/no/maybe one exception:

always-another-gender!AU (83)

A/B/O elements (65)

multiple Sams or Deans (51)

strong overlap with the hard sell; and, keeping in mind that people were able to choose multiple options, it's possible that some of those were identical votes. Again, please keep the penises straightforward and only two at a time. A/B/O is interesting here, especially given what we know of how well it does on AO3; while it's a big squick for a lot of people, it also has decently high votes in bulletproof/easy, averaging 82 votes. Mixed bag!

Sexy Tropes Vol. 2, Electric Boogaloo

Bulletproof kink/will read any version:

Possessive/claiming sex (129)

Marking (hickeys/bruising) (116)

Hair pulling (103)

Let's glance back up at the Id winners in the story tropes above, hmm quietly to ourselves, and move on.

Easy sell/you don't have to work hard for me to enjoy:

Marking (hickeys/bruising) (135)

Hair pulling (130)

Possessive/claiming sex (121)

Well, that's boring. So let's expand so as not to be repetitive:

4. Dub-con (116) 5. Dom/sub (113) AND Underage (113) 6. Knifeplay (107)

There we go. Pretty easy to put all of those into one fic, too.

Medium sell/not my fave, but I can see how it appeals:

Blindfolds (128)

Painplay (116)

Shibari/rope play (112)

We're starting to lose interest as accessories come into play. Interesting to compare D/s and its relative success against painplay -- so, tell him what to do, but don't hit him while you're doing it. Fair enough.

Hard sell/this is unbelievable or uninteresting so you have to work hard to get me to enjoy it:

Fucking machines (94)

Vore (80)

Mommy!kink (77)

Entertaining mix here, haha. General feasibility may be rearing its head here. (Also, for my own entertainment: daddy!kink got 67 Hard Sell votes. People generally prefer to keep it as horizontal incest, not vertical incest.)

Squick/no/maybe one exception:

Feederism (164)

Vore (161)

Extreme underage (157)

No surprises here, although some fans of the nibbly variety of wincest may be disappointed by vore's poor placement. Note also that 'extreme' is in the eye of the beholder; we'll leave aside value judgments, as we have for the whole survey, and note that people are not indulging in a version of underage they find to be personally past the line, or at least are not admitting to that.

At a glance, the closest matchup between bulletproof for some and a squick to others is bloodplay, with just 1 vote separating the two categories: 44 bulletproof, 43 squick. Next time someone tries to tell you that 'everyone' likes or doesn't like something, please take it with an entire shaker full of salt.

Dynamic & Position Preferences

I tried to encourage people not to think too hard about this one and just answer on instinct. Who knows if that worked. But here are some overview takes:

Toppy/dominant: Sam takes the lead here, with 69% of respondents being in the 'Love it!' category. Nice. (217 votes)

Dom Dean earned a respectable 52% of 'Love it!' votes (163).

However, I was also interested to check out the inverse --

subby!Sam: 44 'Very no thank' votes (13%) subby!Dean: 27 'Very no thank' votes (8%)

It's interesting to leap way back up and compare that against 'shameless bottom!Dean stuff' doing so well in the rated E categories. Makes you ponder.

Actual sex position: Frequently switching takes the win here, with 61% of the vote (194 votes). Sam always topping edges out if people must choose, with 144 votes; Dean always topping is our lowest choice, with 112.

Service!topping: this is a fairly niche fic type, but it does still exist -- I guess in a world of bottoms someone's got to actually get up and do something, and it is hilariously an almost perfectly even split:

service!top Sam: 50.17% (151 votes) service!top Dean: 51.50% (155 votes)

A healthy percentage of people said they didn't care about these questions either way, and more power to them. However, they were wildly outvoted by those who did.

Multishipping Time

Our final categories are when other people get their grubby hands on Sam or Dean, either canonically(ish) or in our fandom activities.

Canonical relationships for Sam

Jess wins, quelle surprise. :) 161 people Dug It and who can blame them.

Amelia LOSES, shocking no one: 112 people said Fuck That.

Eileen was definitely a mixed bag; her results, in order, were: Meh: 92; Fuck that: 76; Worse than meh: 66; Dug it: 44.

Canonical(ish) relationships for Dean

Note here: it was too unbalanced if we only went with people Dean officially dated. However, the show leaned hard into a few unrequited male relationships for him, which we included here, and no one sent me hate about it so I guess that was fine.

Benny wins the Love It! category with 129 votes, barely edging out Cassie at 122. Benny is best boy, so that fits.

Cas loses with a full 99 Fuck That votes, which is probably what we'd expect from a wincest survey. That said, he also got 93 Dug It votes, so it's a pretty balanced showing.

Poor Lisa sits firmly at Meh with 148 votes. It's not that we hate you, Lisa; we just don't really know what to do with you. Which is pretty much how the relationship went in the show.

Shipping Sam like FedEx

We returned to the S/E/I model for shipping as we did for tropes, because it means something very different to go 'oh sure, I can see how that would be interesting' vs saying 'I want them to fuck rawnasty and I don't care why they're doing it.' Apologies if I left out your favorite side-ship but, shit, there's only so much time in the day.

So, we return to the podiums:

Superego:

Ruby (132)

Rowena (121)

Cas (102)

Ego:

Rowena (121)

Cas (106)

Ruby (90)

Id:

Ruby (125)

John (121)

Rowena (118)

So that was going on sedately until Dad came in like a hammer. Fascinating. On the other hand:

No:

Lisa (234)

Donna (222)

Claire (219)

Interesting to me that these three are ladies that Sam theoretically could have got up in but people are not into it, regardless. This is slightly different to Dean's 'no' category -- spoilers for three inches of screen space!

Dean, Shipped by UPS

Superego:

John (129)

Benny (115)

Lisa (99)

Ego:

Benny (134)

John (116)

Lisa (102)

Id:

John (147)

Benny (128)

Crowley (114)

Well. That tells a slightly different story, ahem. Enjoy the various tropes that will be applied, Dean! And then we get:

No:

Amelia (245)

Kevin (223)

Gabriel (217)

Comparing to the Sam 'no' above -- these three are slightly more 'traditional' Sam ships, though the wincest shippers are nevertheless not into them for Sam, either. Dean literally never spoke to or saw Amelia on screen, so it'd be a determined shipper who'd make that happen. Not undoable, though!

Conclusion

Syke: there isn't one to be made. This really shows how diverse the taste is in the wincest community, or at least in the wincest community that a) happened to see this survey over the last five days and b) bothered to take it. This particular group leans slightly toward e.g. toppy Sam, or slightly toward switching, but when you look at raw numbers what you see is that at least one person LOVES every single one of these things, and at least one person fucking HATES every single one of these things, and so -- so what? Write what you want. If you see a niche of something that you love where you feel like not enough people are writing or reading, try to fill it. If you're worried "no one" will like it, well -- you're wrong. Someone will. It just needs to get seen by the right people.

That's where fandom comes in, to spread the love even if something isn't bulletproof for us -- reblogging a post to say, 'hey, my mutual made this thing, look at it!' What a joy it'd be if someone saw it and loved it to absolute shattering bits, and then found their little bulletproof community, and happiness was made. What's the point, if we're not making each other happy.

Thanks for participating if you did, and reading all this if you did. Here's a link to a google sheet (read only) with all the tables of raw data if you're interested. I'll post some of the more entertaining fill-in answers later.

s&d shipping survey results: November 1, 2023 - Google Sheets

[aangelinakii]

JUSTICE LEAGUE ROMANCE TROPES.

characters written about in this piece: bruce wayne, clark kent, diana prince, barry allen, oliver queen, dinah lance

note : i LOVED this idea so much i literally like it is literally 5 in the morning i wrote it in an hour i was so hyped !! hopefully it was what you were asking for, thanks for requesting !

BRUCE WAYNE — grumpy x sunshine

okay you guys saw this coming. he's literally batman, and there's a lot of debate about whether or not batman is the real persona,, so NATURALLY i think a grumpy x sunshine thing would go well with him. i did also read somewhere that his sexuality is villains, but who says a villain can't be happy go lucky ???? wait because i literally feel a fic coming up... batman x golden retriever!villain like... ????? but it's like, batman / bruce is known as just this rain cloud, no emotion, but with you he just melts and his heart grows warm, as does his tough exterior. he's used to having a family now, going through failed relationships (whore lol) but meeting you is just different. has he been dating the wrong people all his life ?

CLARK KENT — strangers to lovers

a romance blossoms with clark as a chance encounter. two tired office workers caught in the rain, the bus is late, they agree to flag down a taxi and share one together, but fuck you've forgotten your wallet (just your luck) so clark insists it's okay that he can pay, but you're not leaving that easy, you ask for his business card so you can call him when you're free to pay him back (you say you'll pay him half, but you actually pay him full). when you meet him again, you either ask to meet halfway at a park somewhere, or go up to the daily planet. "just in case a situation like this ever happens again" clark asks for your card too, but instead just calls you one night as you're eating a takeaway in front of your tv to (really shyly) ask you if you're seeing anyone and if you'd like him to take you out sometime :)))

DIANA PRINCE — "who did this to you?"

I JUST SCREAMed at protective!diana LIKE ???? i was going through pinterest looking for ideas to help and i saw this microtrope and i was like yes this is the one. like imagine heavily injured / on the brink of death, laying in a hospital bed or in the infirmary of the jl station, and your lover ( / friend / enemy / ????? ) diana storms in maddd as hell and shés like "who did this to you??? are you okay??? what happened??? more importantly who tf hurt you ????" so you tell her, and she spends some time with you, but as soon as your eyes begin to droop closed, she is Gone. diana isn't one to kill i don't think, she tries to see the good in everybody, but this person hurt you. maybe death isn't what's coming for them, but she'll make sure it counts.

BARRY ALLEN — best friends to lovers

what better way to form a romantic relationship with someone, than through a platonic friendship with them? barry knows you like the back of his hand, you know him like the back of yours. you've watched each other go through relationship after relationship, always wondering why your heart droops at the news of a new person in the mix, slightly altering your dynamic, but pings up again once it finds out the relationship had sizzled out. there was something aching between you, but that was just what friendships were like, right ? so why didn't you feel it with anyone else ? it turned into something more when external people began noticing too, asking if you were already dating,, and it became more obvious that perhaps your friendship could be something else.

OLIVER QUEEN — flirt x oblivious

ollie queen is a crippling flirt. he's used to a mere wink sending the ladies whirling, add an "oh yeah?" to the end of his sentence and he can see the dust of a blush along someone's cheeks. he knows the ins and outs. so why can't he flirt with you ??? WHY WONT YOU BLUSH ??? OR EVEN FLIRT BACK ??? you're oblivious !!!! he will compliment your appearance, the way you fight in battle, the way you spar (and purposely pin you down, but get off with a huff when you chuckle and say he's got you down already, no need to keep you there). he starts spending so much time with you, offering himself up to go on patrol / missions just so he can spend time bugging you. but it starts getting too much, until he realises he can't say a word around you. why is he getting tongue tied ?? he doesn't ?? oh god *gag* he.. likes you ???? it isn't until now, with him being more nervous around you, beginning to actually avoid you, that you start to notice.

DINAH LANCE — rivals to lovers

when i say rivals i don't mean properly pitting against each other, not by any means,, i mean say you're also in the justice league as well, a hero, whatever you like,,,, whenever you're put together on a mission together, it's a competition between who can take out the most bad guys, save the most innocents, who gets there the fastest etc. it's technically friendly bants but there's some competitiveness behind it that isn't exactly fake. you're friends / acquaintances for sure, but what happens when a kiss is on the stakes ??? "person who takes out the most of joker's henchmen gets a kiss from the winner"

[profoundmakerdreamerss-blog]

Omniscient Reader Fic recs:

Kimcom time travels force feed Kim Dokja love:

1.

This is that one fic that will make you cry and smile at the same time. It is one of the crackiest angst I have ever read. It is a fic that made me so happy, yet so terribly sad. But all in all, this is a fic that will make you laugh. And make you remember/ fall in love with the characters all over again. It's a wip sadly, but each chapter is so damn lovely, that I just keep going back and read over and over again.

2.

This is a soft, soft fic, it's also the fic that made me fall in love with damn premise of Kim Dokja getting love before the apocalypse. It is a fic about dokja realizing that he is loved. It is a fic that I wish to see completed one day — but I doubt it would be 😭 but the chapters that are out are again, very satisfying. And I loved it.

3.

“You are loved,” said Yoo Jonghyuk. “This is a threat,” said Yoo Jonghyuk.

This is a fic that is already really popular but this is a fic I'd recommend people to read after finishing the epilogue. Because it is gives you those soft fuzzy feelings, it sews back the torn heart that is caused by the actual book and it makes you believe in everything that is good in the world. This is fic where everyone is happy and Dokja is with them. And basically everything I ever wanted.

(these are sadly the only fics I remember reading with the premise of kimcom going back to the past 😭 but yeah they made an impression on me and I don't think I can recover.)

Moving on to the fics I'd recommend after the reading the novel as in post-epilogue:

Post-epilogue fics to heal your heart:

This is a fic I would recommend a 100 times over to anyone who would listen. This is the first fic I ever bookmarked, even after having an ao3 for YEARS, first fic I ever commented and in general one of my most favorite fic to ever written. This is a fic that healed me, that made me remember everything about I loved omniscient reader, that made me so happy that I have no words. To me, this fic is the epilogue they all got, the happy ending they deserved and it will always be canon to my mind. The way the writer wrote all of them made me cry and I'd always forever be grateful that this fic was written.

This fic is also every healing, and it hurts so damn good. The way the author build up the emotions, kimcom bonding and literally everything. The way the author writes their relationship and the way Dokja perceives them. This fic deserves so much more recognition. It is beautiful and it's also very healing. And soft with harsh edges that is soothed as you keep reading. It's basically Kim Dokja getting to learn love without his memories, it's about baby dokja healing and it is about kimcom being desperate to teach dokja that he isn't alone.

This is just soft, soft and soft. This is just fluffy, this is just what they all deserve. This is another fic that deserves so much more. This is just another dose of happiness, to read when you're having a bad day. The way the author writes the relationship between each characters, the slow healing, the love that comes so easy between them because they went through the end of the world together is fucking beautiful.

I bookmarked this on September 2022 and I still cry when I re-read it. This is a beautiful piece of how healing takes time, and how hard learning to love yourself can be and how beautiful this fic is and how I'd always hold it close to my heart no matter what. This piece also deserves so much more. This is a fic about how even after reaching the end, healing can seem out of reach. It is a fic about patience and love and just beautiul.

This is again another fic that deserves so much. This is such a beautiful depictions how healing hurts. How it is a long damn road and sometimes you might stumble and it is hard. It might be a long road but when you finally begin healing and when you learn to finally trust — isn't that the most beautiful thing ever?

I'm surprised this fic isn't more popular honestly. This is one of the fics that depicts how ugly healing. And how it is so painful painful painful when the person you love more than the world itself doesn't realize their worth and they still try. And also joonghyuk has a garden????!!!! This fic is wrapped up so beautifully and leaves on such a hopeful note. It's written really well, and the characters are so beautiful, so damn real.

-

(ANYWAYS I'll just rec these one's for now LMAO I mostly tried to rec underrated ones bc they are hidden gems, and they deserve love too. I'll make a separate post for orv Isekai/alternate world/modern world fics that needs more love because there's A LOT underrated gems. This post is mostly dedicated to @rozz-eokkk @cielelyse ; since they asked for it and I'm so sorry it took so long 😭 )

[autistichalsin]

I'm going to go off here just because I'm so frustrated.

So this drama all started when someone- a self-identified anti- posted a rant that I "wrote Halsin rape fantasy fiction." I was annoyed, as anyone would be, but even more because such a fiction didn't exist! But also, it sounded like a great fic, Halsin using a rape fantasy/consensual nonconsent to work through his Underdark traumas. So I said "you know what, I can't let the fake version of me you invented be cooler than the real me, can I?" And then I set to work plotting out Too Many Burdens to Bear, which would take about another month to be ready to post after that.

The group were angry at this, and soon after, they started a callout, cancelled me, harassed me, whatever word you want to use for this nonsense. They couldn't keep their story straight, from the start. Some of them claimed it was the simple fact that the fic was CNC that was wrong. Others, who were okay with CNC themselves but still wanted to have a reason to hate me, said my fic WASN'T CNC, and obviously that was the problem, it would be different "if" it was just CNC. (Then, when they were corrected, they....... never changed their tune.) Another said I was planning to write a fic about "Halsin being raped again" and had said "getting raped would help Halsin heal from his traumas."

It's like they're playing a game of telephone, but instead of changing a single word, the goal is to change the entire sentence.

Others insisted the problem was that I wrote it to "spite" the person who "only said they were uncomfortable with rape" (lol, then don't read it, you fucking dumbass!!!) I got told I was retraumatizing myself and others, that I didn't care about/fetishized rape, etc. They have since gone on to claim I posted the fic untagged, hoping to trigger the anti who started this.

These are the tags on the fic in question, which they would know if they bothered to LOOK at what they were criticizing.

Could this possibly be ANY better tagged? I even had someone who is squicked by PIV sex reach out to thank me because no one EVER warns for that. That's how above and beyond I went in avoiding squicking anyone.

Like, literally everything this group claimed about my actions being problematic falls apart with the most cursory check at the ACTUALITY of what has been posted.

And these people, who claim care SO much about rape, who care SO MUCH about survivors? Yesterday, Mish made a post about Neil (as in, Astarion's actor) getting sexually harassed, and one of these people replied that it was "hypocritical" to say so while supporting me, who writes CNC. When someone replied that this was about a real human, not fiction, they literally said they DIDN'T CARE. They care more about defending the honor of Halsin, a fictional survivor of rape, than they care about the real person who played Astarion, who is a REAL survivor of rape.

When Mish and I said we are both survivors of rape and sexual abuse, respectively, these people said we were "playing the survivor card" (an utterly vile thing to say). I received an anon questioning whether I was really sexually abused.

They also, at the same time as the initial bout of drama over my CNC fic, began calling me a pedophile because of an omegaverse Halsin headcanon I made. For those unaware, omegaverse is an AU with many related tropes. Which ones get used vary by the author, but they always include heats and animalistic behavior, and often include knotting, mpreg, themes of subjugation based on gender, breeding kink, and others. However, while the trope started as a kink one, it has since branched out, and some write fics without smut at all, instead focusing on gender dynamics, kidfic, or other aspects of the universe.

I made a headcanon that Halsin, who in that universe I headcanon as an omega- who, in omegaverse stories, can get pregnant, and have heats- would want children of his own. I headcanoned that after taking care of children at his commune after the ending, that this might trigger a heat for him.

A normal person would look at this and go "aw, Halsin has baby fever! Cute!"

These are not normal people, so they looked at it and went "ewww, this pedo thinks Halsin gets turned on by being around kids!"

They literally said this. While also admitting that they do not read omegaverse stories. Multiple people who do read them tried to explain that it's just how reproduction works in that AU, but this person just stuck their fingers in their ears and yelled "lalala HEATS ARE HORNY IF YOU WRITE HEATS IT'S ONLY TO BE HORNY HORNY HORNY! NOT LISTENING!"

After they accused me of being a pedophile for this, I fired back and said "if you can look at this headcanon and think it has anything to do with attraction to children, you're the pedophile." I should not have called them one back, and I apologize for it, but this person has since gone on to lie and play the victim, saying "I just said their tweet was a bit sus and they called me a pedophile FOR NO REASON." They also said that they "wouldn't have been so quick to call it pedo if [I] wasn't so open about being a proshipper."

If I wasn't so open about saying that fiction is not morality, you wouldn't have been so quick to say that my fiction represented my morality? Hmmm.

If you notice, their posts all have the same formulaic deception and manipulative slant to them: they will say something about the fiction I write/enjoy, or the characters I don't like, etc, with a personal attack against my character. When I respond, they will then claim to have been attacked, violently and without provocation, "just because" they (x), where (x) is the most blatant glossing over of their actions. Them calling me a pedophile became "just saying their tweet was sus." Them harassing me for weeks over a CNC fic that HADN'T EVEN BEEN WRITTEN YET was "just saying we aren't comfortable with rape." So uncomfortable with rape, remember, that they said they DIDN'T CARE about Neil being harassed, because CNC about Halsin was worse.

You would think these two things alone would be enough to utterly destroy this group's credibility; they are either blatant liars, or their perception of reality is so poor that nothing they say is to be trusted. Anyone who prioritizes a fictional character's rape over a real person's is not living in reality. Anyone who thinks baby fever is pedophilia should not be trusted on, well, anything. It would be like trusting a flat-earther to give geography lessons.

But unfortunately, people wanted to listen to them over Mish and I, and sadly, it's easy to see why. The antis positioned themselves so that if you disagreed with their harassment, you were "pro rape". And no one wants a label that toxic associated with them, so they jumped ship on principle. Even though Mish is the nicest person in the entire fandom and has never hurt anyone at all, even though Mish is an IRL advocate for rape survivors and against gender-based violence in her country and has thus done more for rape survivors than these people ever have or will. It doesn't matter to them.

Other equally bizarre accusations have been lobbed at us; I'm "lesbophobic" and "called all lesbians TERFs" (I called the rhetoric from a group of like five people TERF-ish, but since they think they represent all lesbians, they claimed it was against all lesbians- WHICH, by the way, is my identity as well. They are calling me a self-hating lesbian over this.)

This group has a history of starting harassment against people, then cry-bullying that the pushback they get is a form of lesbophoia; for example, a few months ago, they harassed a bi woman off of Twitter who asked them to stop being biphobic by calling it gross to ship Shadowheart, a canonically bisexual woman, with men. They branded this user lesbophobic and harassed her until she permanently deactivated. They posted that it was gross to ship Karlach with Dammon, too, and when a user, who is herself lesbian, headcanons Karlach as a lesbian, and doesn't ship her with Dammon chimed in to say why OTHERS ship it, they attacked her too. They attacked the actor for Rolan for sharing/supporting a fan petition for Rolan to be romanceable. They called Dave, Halsin's actor, a creep for sharing NSFW art of Halsin on his page, and tried to insinuate he was a pedophile (saying they wouldn't be surprised if he had a scandal like "that Genshin actor," who, for those who don't know, was found to have groomed a child online.)

They claimed that I "called everyone who doesn't like Halsin ableist", when what was actually said was that IF we call everyone who doesn't like Minthara lesbophobic because a lot of her fans are lesbians (which is a thing that one of them had just said), THEN using the same logic, we could say that hating Halsin is ableist because a lot of his fans are autistic. (Sidenote: this group of people repeatedly mocked my special interest (making meta essays) after being told it was my special interest, which is pretty gross, to me.)

It genuinely boggles my mind that a group of people can be so toxic to the actors and still given a platform in the fandom. This is entirely new behavior to me- even in the most toxic fandom's I've been in or rubbernecked on, harassing the actors was always considered the line not to cross and would make you persona non grata. It was the one thing everyone could agree on as unacceptable. Yet these people are openly attacking Dave's character and are still not only listened to when they make up allegations against people, but they are well-respected in the fandom. Either people don't think harassing an actor is a big deal anymore, these fans secretly AGREE with the harassment and slander against him, or (most generous explanation) they don't know who they're actually supporting here.

These people gleefully mocked my abuse from my mother. I said that some of Minthara's abusive actions (poisoning a romanced player without her consent) reminded me of similar actions my mom did, and are part of my aversion to the character. I posted this untagged- I even censored Minthara's name so that her fans wouldn't find it. But because they were cyberstalking me so obsessively, they QRTed it and proceeded to bring it up multiple times to snark about "the essential oils". When someone called them out and asked if they really thought it was funny, they answered, without hesitation, yes. They said that I had already "mocked my own abuse" by bringing up how Minthara triggers memories of her, so they therefore had every right to laugh at the bodily harm I faced when my mother would deliberately cause me asthma attacks by forcing me to inhale essential oils. Because I said that a fictional character's similar actions triggered memories of it. That was worthy of mocking to them.

So they support survivors of rape and abuse who have triggers related to fiction, unless that survivor is a survivor of child abuse who is triggered by their favorite character, in which case they deserve to be mocked. I guess they don't believe in supporting survivors who have trigger reactions to fiction after all... what a surprise. Almost like they never cared about anything they claimed to.

They're actually remarkably transparent about not actually caring about ANY issue they claim to champion. They claim to be fighting for rape survivors while harassing not one but two survivors from the fandom into mental breakdowns (the tweet about my mom was so bad it made me have a flashback, and their harassment of Mish did similar to her) and saying they DON'T CARE about Neil's sexual harassment because fiction about Halsin is more important. They claim to oppose lesbophobia while repeatedly attacking lesbians who disagree with them on anything from shipping to whether queer male sexuality is inherently predatory. I could go on.

Somehow, no matter how blatant it is that they don't actually care about anything, and are just using fake moralizing as a vehicle for sadism, people still keep taking them at face value. Again, I get it. They have positioned themselves as fighting against rape and abuse, so by extension, they have positioned it so that anyone who is against them is liable to be accused of supporting rape and abuse. It's a great system for them, really; bullying is a behavior that would otherwise be reviled, but by framing everyone they don't like as a bad person, as an existential threat to marginalized communities (who, conveniently, always have their own marginalized identities ignored until it becomes convenient to bring it up again to harass them for it), they turn their bullying into not only something acceptable, but into a moral act to be commended. A moral obligation, even, because don't pedos deserve to be hunted for sport? (This is the same reason why the alt-right is obsessively pedojacketing the entire LGBT community as they move to censor queer fiction, for the record.)

I don't know what else to say besides that I really, really hope that people are waking up to that group's nonsense, or at least that they will soon, and will realize that fiction is not reality, and that that group of known disingenuous liars and manipulators are being... disingenuous liars and manipulators, yet again.

Unfortunately, it's too late since they've already chased Mish out of the fandom, and I will honestly never forgive that group of people and their enablers for it. But I have hope that maybe the rest of the fandom will come around, especially because, as all of us who have experience with antis know, they are never going to stop. They aren't going to stop targeting people for everything from making a harmless mod that turns Scratch into Astarion to saying it's okay to ship Karlach/Dammon or Shadowheart/men to writing a fic about Halsin using kink to explore his trauma from being enslaved to being an actor for the show who retweets NSFW art of his character to making a headcanon that Astarion wants to dance with Tav to making an omegaverse headcanon... I could go on and on.

Sorry for the novel, and I hope this is the last post I make about this drama, but I am so beyond tired and frustrated. This hurt Mish deeply- the nicest person in the entire fandom- and seeing the raw sadism from her bullies, sadism that is being praised, makes me feel physically ill, honestly.

I won't be using any fandom tags for this post, but I will be tagging this with various proship related things since I feel this is relevant.