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khristie16 · 1 year

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A Game On Red

about: two ferrari boys are madly obsessed with you, they do whatever it takes to keep their pr manager just for themselves warnings: daddy kink, size kink, guys are toxic, reader is innocent, jealousy, kidnapping, primal play, cnc, smut based on these requests: one two info: this was suppose to be one short post but I decided to make it into like two or three parts. It’d be a shame to make one long post taking so long to write since I make extra effort writing this plus not giving you anything to read. Hope you’ll like it the same as me. words count: 2K. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

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“He thought he could overtake me that easily hahah”

Max was just maxplaining to you about other drivers on the grid. You had to laugh at him for acting like this. He was a literal God out there and he knew that as well. You liked his goofy side and you always had such a nice time with Max having around. As you were smiling at Max and listening to him, you felt this uneasy feeling spreading through your body. As if something was stabbing you in your back. You shivered a little and turned around to see what is it. Carlos was standing there with his arms crossed and determined look on his face, boring his eyes into you like as if you broke an unspoken rule between the two of you. You were looking at him, trying to figure out what this is about, but as you kept thinking about it, by the time his feature changed. A devilish smile displaying his face. You looked at him confused as ever as he walked away from the open space.

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“Where have I put the document??” “YN”

Your arm flew to the side where the vessel was standing, bringing it to the pieces as you broke it with your maneavour. You looked around.

“Charles?” “Can I have a quickie with you cherie?” “Of course!”

He chuckled at your comment and you didn't know what was so funny about it. As you were behind Charles following him to the suite next to your office, you saw Carlos sitting on the red couch in the middle of the room. You gulped slightly from the memory of the previous encounter with him. Carlos could be scary sometimes, you knew that from before, sometimes he looked so mad because of something happened during the race, but the look was never meant towards you. The look in his eyes could do harm. And they did to you not so long ago.

“So, guys, what do you need me for?” “A lot of things actually..”

Charles spoke to you alone, Carlos was just watching you as your wandering eyes find out. His eyes went slightly lower to your hips, just then you realized you're trampling on the spot. You immediately shut that down and placed your hands by your side.

“Dímelo cariño… do you know what is a primal play?” “Primal what?” “Primal play cherie”

You looked at both of them confused. You were lost at what they are asking you. You haven't ever heard that before and you got disempowered all of a sudden. You hated the fact they were talking about something realated to the job since you are their pr manager, and after all of this years of work in this field, you have never encountered such thing. It was embarassing enough for you.

“Why you looking sad cherie?”

You looked up again while hemming the shirt you had on.

“I am?”

You've heard Carlos groaned a little. You jumped on your spot from such sound. It couldn't possibly come out of his mouth. It was so animalistic.

“yes, you are cherie.” “Well.. I haven't heard of it. There is no such thing in my scripts either. Is this something new from the grid?”

They both bursted out loud and laughed at you. You furrowed your eyebrows and felt shame spreading through your body. When they finally stopped, Carlos looked at you again. You hoped he felt pain in the stomach for such hard laughing before.

“I can count on that you wanted to try it out with Max, didn't you?” “W-what?” “Don't play innocent cherie.” “No I-”

Carlos big fist landed on the table next to him startling you once again. You looked at him in disbelief from such behavior. It was your job afterall to untie them from the leash before meeting media. You couldn't let him walk out of there to be seen like this on cameras.

“Too bad for you cariño. We are the ones to have it from you.”

This gaze again. The harsh big brown eyes on your face. You felt your eyes watering . Charles rushed to you.

“Oh cherie, don't cry baby girl. You will like it, I promise.” “I-I sti-ll don't k-know what this has to do with j-job g-guys.” “Well you want us to behave the best right? You might help us with that. So it is kinda your job to take care of it” “Take care of what?”

Charles was out of your sight now and you were looking at Carlos. Trying to find answers in his face but none for your finding. You got a little impatient, you hated to be left out off knowledge. You didn't know what was happening and your vision got black the next second, your breath was caught by the material harassing your nostrils. All you could hear before your consciousness turned black were those words: Poor girl, we will catch you running baby girl..

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Your head hurt like hell. You breathe stiffly and your neck is sore. As you managed to open your eyes, two men in red sitting in front of you, watching you patiently. You spoke but in vain. You hardly could make a sound.

“I've told you to be more gentle with her.” “i can't help myself” “She's tiny Carlos” “oh, I love that about her”

You regained your focus again as those two were whispering to each other. You become aware you are tied up to a chair and having different clothes on. Red dress that give off the vibe the material brightens when exposed to light. Your heels were the same as you remember.

“Guys. what are you doing, w-why I have d-diffe-erent clothes on?” “We changed you cariño.”

You gulped. It meant they touched you when you weren't awake. They've seen you naked. And bare. Most of the time you don't wear panties if not neccessery.

“You have no idea how hard I had to restrain myself from that sweet little cunt of yours.”

You gasped in shock. You thought you're in a nightmare of some sort. Some fucked up dream, this couldn't be real. Just this morning you were getting your nice cup of coffee and heading to work. You've been working for these guys for few months now and they've always seemed so good. And now you look at them with disbelief and betrayal.

“You are sick.” “Cariño..”

Carlos stood up and went slowly towards you. Just now you've managed to see they have changed as well. Carlos had tight material hugging his torso and arms, leaving no imagination to his beautifully shredded muscles on his stomach. You took a look and went right back up to look elsewhere for not wanting to be confronted about this. But it was too late.

“Are you eye fucking me cariño?”

Charles appeared by his teammate's side, looking good as ever. His torso was visible with the shirt unbuttoned at chest with his veiny arms hanging beside him. His long beautiful fingers covered in rigs that made your thighs clench together once again once more. Charles reached his hand towards your face and cupped your cheek. You leant into his touch feeling dizzy. His piercing green eyes looking at you from upper hand and giving you a hard time not to smile at him. He was the cutest to you.

“We had to change you cherie. It's for the game.” “What game?”

Charles walked past you, making him stand in the position right back at you. Leaving his fingers play with your neck and slowly making its way to your collabore. You quietly hissed and felt the warm spread through your body. He rode his finger under the hem of your dress and peaked on your breasts. You stiffed by his approach and looked terrified to Carlos calm look.

“The primal play.” “What?” “You run, we chase. If we catch, we fuck. Simple rules.”

Carlos went closer to you, hovering over you, your eyes right in the level of his crotch.

“Are you trying to tell us cherie, that you are not attracted to us? That you don't want my fingers in your tight wet pussy?”

“I bet she is wet by now.”

Your watery eyes got to their peak and tears were lining down your cheeks. You looked down ashamed of yourself trying to hide from them.

“For hiding will be enough time cariño. Show me those tears.”

He tucked at your chin to pull it up. He was directly looking into your eyes. His big brown eyes warm, giving you some time to breathe and relax as you melt under his gaze. This gaze that was following you all the time since you’ve started working for them. You missed his old self.

“Que preciosa.” He murmured to himself

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You drove a long way from the place. You didn’t know if it was a house or some old tavern, all you knew it has to be away from curious people around. At least that's what you thought, because the boys didn't forget to blindfold you. And you thought if you saw some woman being blindfolded with two men by her side, you wouldn’t let it go. For you right now in this situation, it meant you’re completely alone with them. It must have been dark outside already, you felt the cold creeping in on the seats you were sitting on. You were shivering as you tried to warm up.

“Don't worry cariño. You will warm up enough when running.”

Charles remained silent. You knew he was sitting next to you because occasionally he put his hand on your thigh and caressed your skin. You were happy for such moments. You only knew boys like that, being nice and always treating you with respect. So you were glad it was at least as close as to it as it was before. Your thinking got interrupted as the car started to slow down and your body stretched upwards, expecting that you had already arrived at the place. You heard the click of the belts and at that moment your breath ran out. It‘s happening.

The piece of cloth you had tied around your eyes was torn off and your eyes slowly began to adjust to the environment. It didn't take much time because it was really dark outside. Carlos wrapped his arms around you and looked down on you. He was smiling at you as if he expected something from you and was looking forward to taking everything you had to offer. You slowly turned back to the front where Charles had stood a moment ago.

“You have a choice here.You either play with us and follow the rules Carlos mentioned back at the house, or you will withdraw from the game, but you will have to resign as our PR manager. We just couldn't longer watch you making eyes at next riders anymore. So, what do you choose?”

Charles left you in a state of distress. You barely blinked and perceived the world around you. The thought of losing your job was incomprehensible. You loved your job and couldn't imagine ever getting rid of it. You knew you weren't in a position to explain moral behavior to them right now. It would obviously be useless. They thought that you were way too friendly with someone else and their unreal obsession developed into something like this. Although this was blackmail, there was no other way to deal with it. And the fact that you were excited about the game, you quickly shoved it to the back of your mind, because it was incomprehensible for you to admit that something like that might appeal to you.

You slowly and cautiously nodded your agreement. Charles smiled at you but Carlos didn't share that enthusiasm. He tugged at your arm and looked at you with that look.

“Words cariño”

“Y-yes.”

The game was on.

#charles leclerc x you #charles leclerc smut #charles leclerc fanfic #charles leclerc imagine #charles leclerc x reader #carlos sainz fanfic #carlos sainz imagine #carlos sainz smut

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swindle-comic · 11 months

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Hi hello, I'm Lolly!! :D It's very nice to see you again. I say that because my posts on this blog have gone from semi-frequent to rare to nonexistent in the last year or so. That's because I haven't really touched Swindle in quite a while. Though the last page of chapter 4 was only posted a few days ago, I finished writing the script for it in late 2021 and have since stepped back to focus on other things that provide mental enrichment.

I love this comic very much. I am insanely proud of it. Of myself and of Artsy. We've created something that is so fun and ridiculous. I think it is one of the most well crafted projects I've ever gotten to participate in. On all levels except physical I am placing it on my fridge for everybody to look at.

In all honestly, I haven't really been paying that much attention to this comic since the chapter 4 pages started rolling out. So I haven't really noticed that there is still a large consistent amount of readers interacting with it. I was surprised by the likes, the comments, the follower count, the art, the fics, the investment in general. It's all so cool, it made me really happy!!!

Thank you for all the support and patience and engagement!!!

Anyway, this comic being my pride and joy is the exact reason that it will be taking a rest for a while. I'm a perfectionist when it comes to building scenes and writing engaging and flowing dialogue and consistent characterization and BLAH. I want those ducks jumping off the pages. That is my goal. As a result, this comic takes an explosive amount of energy and commitment to write. Energy and commitment that I simply do not have to spare during this time. And I have no idea when I will.

So. It is time for Swindle to sleep for a while. It is time for Tybernation.

But wow!!! 4 chapters and 100 pages!!! That is super impressive I think!!!! So even if it takes a while for the story to resume, there's always plenty to revisit.

Anyway, that's all. Thank you for reading, I really appreciate it. Mwah mwah mwah <333

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itsmarsss · 4 months

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To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before AU: Chapter 1 - Out [Eli “Hawk” Moskowitz x fem!Reader] (Cobra Kai)

You have been writing these love letters since seventh grade, but what happens when they somehow get sent out?

Warnings: high school (lol i wrote this one when i was in high school but im rewriting it now that im like three years out of it so it feels weird and i feel like it warrants a warning, definitely senior year tho.), hardcore crushing on miguel, mentions of a crush on moon so if ya don’t like women too then idk, uhh mention of smoking weed.

Word Count: 4,060

Your letters were your most prized possessions: yours, and yours only.

You wrote one when you had a crush so intense you felt like you needed to snap out of it or otherwise you’d collapse.

So, you wrote letters to try to find closure. Intricately detailed letters that contained every single unfiltered thought and embarrassing feeling you could find in yourself. Everything you noticed about them, everything you wished you had with them, everything you wanted to say but couldn’t.

It started a long while ago.

You never sent them, of course. That idea was completely off the table. They remained stored inside the little blue box with the white ribbon buried deep in the back of your closet, from where you would occasionally take them just to read them again and reminisce on the thoughts a younger version of you once had about all those different people.

They were all properly sealed, stamped and addressed in pretty cursive letters, but never, ever posted.

They were six in total, addressed to five different people.

The first one ever written had been for Eli, from seventh grade. Adorable little Eli, who was one of the biggest nerds you’d ever seen, always too shy to talk around others, but who would go on excitedly about a tv show or a comic book series he liked for hours around you after getting paired for a project got him to warm up to you.

Adorable little Eli, who trembled like crazy before kissing you in a dumb game of spin the bottle, right before running home crying because some girl thought it would be hilarious to comment on how she wouldn't have let him kiss her with "that mouth" if she were you. You, in turn, couldn't feel more different from that bullshit comment of hers after that messy seventh grade first kiss that lasted barely a couple seconds but fed your crush on him for months on end after.

That letter was followed by a new one, addressed also to him, but the new him this time around, many years later, in your sophomore year- to Hawk, not Eli. However that worked.

To Hawk, who had decided to “flip the script”, as he called it, by changing his entire aesthetic and his whole demeanor, showing up to school on a random day with a blue dyed mohawk and a brand new attitude. You liked it.

Confident Eli seemed happier even though he sometimes acted like a bit of an asshole and, as much as you didn’t want to admit it, he looked really, really hot. He was still Eli, but this Eli wasn’t afraid to flirt with you, which evoked brand new feelings in you.

Therefore, a new letter.

The second letter you ever wrote was addressed to Demetri, from eight grade, who you met around the same time as Eli.

Demetri, who would talk to you about superheroes and binary language and would be so excited about it that you didn’t care to tell him you couldn’t understand a word of what he said.

Demetri, who was so kind as to go to your house to help you with your part on the biology project you were partnered with him in because he knew it was stressing you out, who would offer to tutor you when you told him you were having a hard time with a subject he was good at at school, and who you got closer to when randomly put in many classes together.

The third letter you ever wrote was addressed to Robby Keene, who you became closer to after ditching the homecoming dance in your freshman year to hang out by yourself at the bleachers, despite Sam and Aisha’s protests, only to find out it apparently was Robby Keene’s favorite smoking spot.

Apparently high school dances could be pretty lame, no matter what all high school movies from the 80's had been telling you all your life. You had asked if you were interrupting something when you noticed his presence and he told you it depended on whether you'd be snitching on him or not, and suddenly freshman homecoming didn't suck all that much anymore, because you managed to make friends with the most unlikely acquaintance you could ever have.

Robby, who at fourteen years old got detention for threatening to beat up the kids who made you cry because they kept making fun of you during a presentation, which was about substance abuse, ironically.

The fourth one had been written to Moon, who you used to despise because she used to hang out with Yasmine- who, for the longest time, had loved to pick on you and your friends- especially Eli and Demetri.

But Moon, who turned out to be so sweet after she started doing and saying things for herself as opposed to whatever her friends wanted her to and started hanging out with your friend group.

Moon, who would excitedly invite you to sleep overs and braid your hair as you gossiped about people you barely knew from school, who would do your makeup for you and take you shopping and call you pet names platonically, making you blush furiously and putting you in the verge of short-circuiting by being so casually affectionate now that you’d become friends.

And, lastly, the most recent one had been written to Miguel Diaz, of course.

Miguel, who was your best friend in the whole entire world, ever since he moved to Reseda and you first befriended him at school.

Miguel, who was currently dating Sam, who you’d drifted apart from, but couldn’t for the life of you hold a grudge against.

Yeah, Miguel.

But before he became Sam’s boyfriend, he was your boyfriend. Well… boy-friend. A boy who was a friend. And things were good as they were.

But then things started changing.

Things started changing when Miguel asked Sam out and you realized you didn’t like that. When the first thing he did when he got home was to tell you all about it, and you felt a pit in your stomach as he went on about how well things had gone.

Until you couldn’t lie to yourself anymore and had to face the reality that the reason it all made you feel so awful was that you were jealous.

It was even worse to figure out why: as much as you could try to lie to yourself and pretend you were just jealous that she was spending time with your best friend, you knew you had to face it: it all came down to the simple fact that you were in love with him.

You didn’t know when it happened, or what was the turning point for that, but you were. Utterly and irredeemably.

And, in hindsight, it seemed obvious.

But then they started dating, and they didn’t want you to feel left out, so they would you and Aisha everywhere, which made things so much worse.

And then they broke up, and things got, somehow, even weirder. Now it was all you and Miguel again, and, even after all of that, you still had those stupid feelings for him. But you weren’t a complete bitch, or insensitive. You’d never make a move, you’d just have to live with it.

Which didn’t mean there was nothing you could do about it: you decided to try to put an end to it, your own way.

Hence, how letter number six came to be. Signed, addressed, stamped, sealed and stored in the blue box under all the others.

Maybe after this you’d be able to move on. Maybe after this things would go back to normal. How you craved for things to go back to how they used to be.

It seemed reasonable enough to just wait on your feelings to die out.

But a certain day came when then Eli- well, Eli, who was Hawk now, marched up to you in the middle of your gym class.

“Y/n?” He called your name, and you stopped running your laps, turning around to face him, eyebrows knit together in confusion. What was Hawk doing in your gym class?

You let him approach you. “What’s wrong?”

“Look, I appreciate it but it’s… not gonna happen. Like, you know we’re friends, and you know I'm still like… hung up on Moon, or whatever. Right? I know the power of the Hawk’s pretty irresistible,” he smirked, quickly going back to his stern expression, “but you should cut it out.”

You really had no idea what the hell he could be possibly talking about. “Dude… what?”

“C’mon you don’t have to play dumb, it’s cool that you think my scar makes me look cute or whatever but like. I uh. Don’t have any feelings for you now.” Wait, what did he say about the scar? He kept on. “And like it’s- it’s pretty cool that you liked me before and now too but this would just- this would be weird. You know that, right?”

You just weren't getting it.

And then you saw it: in his hand, signed, addressed and stamped, were two open envelopes with two different names written on them in your best cursive handwriting. Fuck.

“Hey- woah are you alright? You look like you're gonna pass out.”

You felt like you were going to pass out. You couldn’t even form a sentence in the midst of your shock.

And then, Miguel came into your line of sight. Because of course things had to get worse.

“There’s no fucking way,” you muttered, incredulous. He was walking up to you, a red envelope in hand.

The letters got out the letters got out the letters got out.

He looked confused. He obviously, and much understandably, wanted answers. Answers you’d much rather get hot by a bus than giving him.

This could not be your fucking life.

“No, no, no, no, no, oh, my god,” you looked around frantically as he got closer, trying to figure out what to do. Hawk surely thought you were crazy now.

And then Miguel made eye contact with you and he had that fucking look of pity on his face and you panicked. And so you did the first thing that came to your short-circuiting mind, which was possibly the dumbest thing you could have thought to do: apparently all you managed to think of was jumping Hawk, tackling him to the ground and kissing him in the middle of gym for Miguel to see.

How maturer and over him you were! Incredible!

The kiss was over as soon as it happened, and you pulled away as Hawk stared at you with two wide eyes and shock all over his face.

You could sympathize with the guy- getting this as a reaction to your rejection was probably really confusing.

More important things going on, though. You got a glance of Miguel stopping in his tracks at your little theatrics, making you realize it definitely didn’t do anything other than make things more awkward for you.

“Uh. Thanks. Sorry or… whatever. I’ll see you in bio!” You told Hawk, patting his chest before standing up and booking away from him, running past Miguel way too quickly for him to be able to approach you and ignoring his call of your name, and locking yourself in one of the stalls of the closest bathroom you were able to find, trying every single breathing exercise you’ve ever come across to calm yourself down.

This was it. Miguel hated you, surely.

No, worse: he pitied you. Because obviously he didn't feel the same and obviously receiving a love letter so embarrassingly honest from his closest friend was weird. Now your friendship was going to be weird, and it was all you fau-

“Y/n? Are you in there?”

No. No. No, no, no, no, no, no. This can't be happening, there was no way.

“Y/n? Are you okay?”

Goddamn Robby Keene.

“Oh my god,” you muttered to yourself. Maybe willing him away in your mind would alter reality so he wasn’t there in the bathroom with you.

If only it were that easy.

Resting your head in your hands as you tried to convince yourself this was some sort of nightmare, you heard a noise come from really close to you and opened your eyesto the pink envelope being slid under the stall to you.

“I thought you’d want it back. Seemed pretty personal.”

“Robby, holy shit, I’m so sorry. You do know I wrote this like years ago, right?” He had to have figured that out, didn’t he? You weren’t even close anymore.

“Yeah! Like freshman year right? When we smoked together while everyone was at the dance.” He didn't seem to be mocking you, didn't seem to be angry. Just pointing it out. You sighed and opened the stall door, deciding facing Robby wouldn't be as bad as facing Miguel. You walked out.

“Yeah it was- it was pretty cool. Better than whatever was going down in the dance.”

“Yeah, I taught you how to smoke that day!” He smiled. “Thinking back on it makes me think you shouldn’t have been hanging out with me back then, actually,” he points out.

You could only let out a small laugh. “I guess not.”

“Look, I don’t know why you decided to send this but uh. I feel like I should tell you that Sam and I are like. Together.”

They were? “Oh. Right! Duh. Obviously. I knew that.” You most definitely did not know that. “I don’t know how this got out, really. I never meant for you to actually see this.”

“Look, we can still be friends. You’re pretty cool. Even with… you know…” he motioned vaguely, “the whole Cobra Kai thing”

“Okay! Yeah, definitely.” He was only being polite, because that’s how he is. But this was much better than having him think you were trying to get with him. You let out a nervous laugh. “I’ll see you around?”

“Yeah.”

Jesus fuck.

[. . .]

You looked everywhere. Everywhere. The stupid fucking blue box just wasn't anywhere. You tried asking your mom about it, but her answer was short and simple: It probably went with the Goodwill box you’d made last week.

How, you couldn’t figure out, but it seemed to be the only slightly plausible possibility.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. That meant there were five people out there total, five people you still saw every single day, who you were friends with, who had received a fucking love letter with your name signed all pretty on it.

This was hell, it had to be.

You were sure of it when you heard a knock on your front door, accompanied by Miguel’s voice calling your name.

Shit, shit, shit, you were not ready to have this conversation. Why did he have to be your next door neighbor on top of everything? It had always been convenient to live so close to each other, but right now it seemed everything but.

So you did what any sane, responsible person would do: you got out by the kitchen window. Naturally.

Miguel would think you just weren't home.

Again, very mature and totally normal and over it of you.

You decided someone would probably be at the dojo and the last thing you wanted right now was to accidentally encounter someone else who had a letter by surprise. You figured it was too early for someone to be at the diner nearby, so there you went.

You ordered yourself a milkshake and tried to reason with yourself. You couldn't avoid Miguel forever. He’s obviously find a way to talk to you at some point. And then what would you do? Admit you were in love with him even though to him you were just best friends? Let him tell Sam you were in love with her (well, at-the-time) boyfriend? Get politely rejected by him and go around pretending being pitied by him for not being corresponded wasn’t pathetic? It all seemed to come down to terrible endings.

You were so lost in thought you didn't notice him sit beside you at the counter until he spoke up, ordering some fries.

Oh, shit.

Hawk.

“What are you doing here?” You asked him, annoyed.

“Went by your place. Miguel said you weren't there. Things felt preetty awkward I’ll be honest with you. But you weren't at the dojo either so I thought I’d find you here.”

“Okay. And why did you wanna find me, exactly?”

“Look I just wanna make it double clear that nothing’s gonna happen between us. Nada.”

“Eli Moskowitz I am not trying to date you.”

He seemed to cringe at his own given name, but didn’t complain out loud about it. “Then why would you write me a love letter?”

“It was in 7th grade!”

“No, you talk about me as Hawk though.”

“Last year! Right when you did… that,” you motioned vaguely to his mohawk.

“Okay I hear you but like. Your mouth is saying one thing… but then your mouth said… something… else. To my mouth. Directly.”

“What? Ew!”

“You jumped me!”

“I was panicking! And I’m like, actually sorry.”

“Then why’d you do it?”

You let out a sigh, defeated. “Miguel was walking over.”

“And?”

“And he also got one of those,” you motioned with your head at the letter in Hawk’s hand, “and I cannot deal with that right now.”

His expression shifted. “Wait, I’m not the only one who got a letter?”

“No.”

“Huh. You really think you’re special.”

“Are you not, like, surprised about Miguel?”

“Oh, no, it was pretty obvious. But damn you get a love letter and think you’re the man but then you find out she wrote to another guy too?”

“Oh there’s six of them, so don’t go feeling too special.”

“Six of them?”

You then realize you’d spoken too much. He doesn’t need to know all of this. “Nevermind.”

“Damn y/n, fuck yeah, you're a player! Who were they for?”

“No one! It’s none of your business.”

“Come on, I deserve to know! You did kinda jump me in front of a bunch of people.”

“It doesn’t matter!”

“I mean I wouldn't- I wouldn't want people to find out you think my scar looks hot. Or that when you look at me you think about ‘kissing the annoying smirk off my lips’- I mean who knows what guarantees you don’t have a tattoo of my face on your ass-”

That was embarrassing enough. “Okay shut up! Shut up. Fine, if you wanna know so bad. So two for you. Then uh. Demetri, in-”

“You had a crush on Demetri?”

You kept on. “Then Robby Keene, on freshman year.”

“What, do you have a thing for LaRusso’s boyfriends or…?”

“How did you know they were together? I didn’t know!”

He just shrugged, and you continued. “And then there was uh-” you glanced at him and back to your milkshake. “Moon, after she uh. Started dating you, and hanging out with us.”

He let out a snort. “Right.”

“Sorry. I uh- I know she broke up with you-”

“What, are you gonna make a move on her? Is this what you have a thing for, crushing on your friends’ partners?”

“No. And you asked me about it!”

He looked sorry. He didn’t say it. He sighed. “Fine. Is that everyone?”

“With Miguel, yeah, that’s everyone.”

“Okay. I was the only one to get two letters though.”

You rolled your eyes at the comment. Of course he’d make this be about feeding his ego. The two of you finished your food in an awkward silence before he spoke up again. “Did you walk here?”

“Yeah.”

“You want a ride?”

“You don’t have to.”

“It’s fine.”

“Okay.” After paying, you walked outside, getting on his motorbike. He surrendered his only helmet to you.

Holding onto his waist the whole time after all this was definitely weird but you didn’t let yourself think about it too much, instead thinking about a bigger issue: you really, really hoped Miguel wouldn’t be there when you got home. You got to the parking lot, getting off the bike, taking off the blue helmet and handing it back to him. “How do you even put this on with your hair?” You questioned.

He laughed. “I just like. Push it back.”

“But how does it not ruin it?”

He shrugged. “Power of the Hawk.” He smirked, full of himself.

“Oh, come on. I bet you walk around with a little bottle of hair gel so you can fix it when you take it off.”

“Magician never reveals his secrets-” he looked off at something behind you that caught his attention. You furrowed your eyebrows together in confusion, turning around to see what it was.

Miguel. He hadn't noticed your presence yet, but there was no way he wasn’t going to.

What do you do now? You felt paralyzed.

Hawk seemed to think of something before you could. He placed his helmet on the handle of the bike, very obviously making sure to make noise with it to attract attention, and leaned in, pulling you into a kiss. A… rather passionate one.

He pulled away, wordlessly leading you in the direction of your front door. You got the hint, walking to your place without turning around, and unlocking the door. He pushed you in and closed the door behind him with his foot, loudly. You stayed like that, with him leaning on the door and your bodies flushed together, in silence, trying to listen if Miguel was walking towards your door or not. After a couple seconds, you figured he was not, and you pulled away from him.

“Sorry,” he looked at the floor, sheepish. An usual sight for the new him. “First thing that came to mind.”

“Why is jumping each other the first thing that we think of when we panic?” You laughed.

Hawk laughed along, more at ease knowing you weren’t mad at him. “You did it first.”

You sat down on your couch, but he stayed standing. “Sorry to pull you into this. And thank you for helping out just now. Think I’ll just pity myself ‘till I sleep and then die of embarrassment tomorrow when I see him or something. You can go if you want.”

“Yeah, I think I’ll- yeah.” He started walking to the door, but stopped midway, turning around to face you again. “Hey what if-” he tried to find the words to explain his idea- “um- he probably thinks we’re dating right? Or at least hooking up, or something. I mean, after all the kissing… and stuff.”

“Shit. Yeah. I’ll clear things up, sorry-”

“No! What if- what if we let him?”

“What… do you mean?”

“What if we let him think we’re dating? And not just him. Everyone else too.”

“Why would we do that?”

“So he won’t think you're in love with him!”

“I’ll rephrase it then. Why would you do that?”

“I mean you know- you know I’m still really into Moon. Maybe we could make her… want what she can’t get?”

“You think that would work? On Moon?”

He just shrugged. “Maybe.”

“So you’re suggesting we fake-date.”

“I guess.”

“Have you never seen a movie with a fake dating trope? Doesn't end well.”

“What, you think you’ll catch feelings?” He opened his signature grin, and you sighed, annoyed.

“I’m just saying it’s probably gonna blow up on our face eventually.”

“Why? We can just pretend to date for like a couple weeks. And then we break up or whatever.”

“I’m not-” This could not be a good idea. Could it? “Look I’ll- I’ll think about it. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

“Sure.”

[. . .]

Miguel, Miguel, Miguel. Miguel seemed to be what occupied your thoughts the most. No matter how absurd the amount of drama you were going through was, your thoughts always came back to him.

But the night after the letters got out… it wasn't like that. Eli Moskowitz- well, Hawk, hadn’t been in your head all that much ever since you got over the last crush you had on him a couple years ago. But now Miguel wasn't the only thing in your head anymore, weird of a way as everything else had come into your thoughts.

So you decided.

A/N: in all honesty im only rewriting this because im in a bit of a slum and i almost deleted this off of my ao3 bc of how terribly written the original chapters are lol so idk here’s something someone might like i guess. I won’t be in any rush to post the chapters of this whatsoever, scandalous is 100% my priority this is just for some piece of mind bc I know I’m better than the shitty writing in the original version of this lol

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foxglovegames · 1 month

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Trouble Comes Twice - the Postmortem

We celebrated Trouble Comes Twice's anniversary around a month ago! We'd hoped to post this postmortem back then as well, but it's taken us a moment to find the right words haha.

Anyway, we hope that this postmortem can give our players and other visual novel devs some insight into what the development process looked like for us. It's also a great way for us to look back at what went well and what went less well.

We'll be taking about the ideation phase, our (lack of) marketing for the Kickstarter, and also sharing (what we can) on our earnings from the game!

Coming up with Trouble Comes Twice

The original tone of Trouble Comes Twice was a lot more comedic and packed to the brim with anime tropes we enjoy. Most didn't make it into the final game, but some stayed and evolved e.g. all of the love interests are based on popular visual novel archetypes - the childhood friend, the tomboy, the shy girl, and the bad boy.

Some, like Cameron and Zoe, changed a lot from their concept while Adrian and Stephanie stayed quite loyal to our original ideas of them. Cameron's character actually underwent the most changes after the initial reception to the demo, where a lot of people felt like he was too much of an ass haha. (Fortunately, he became a fan favorite when we dropped the new demo!)

The premise with the bet was something we invented to create some drama and establish a common plot thread throughout each route. Honestly, looking back, we would probably have approached the bet differently if we wrote it today and a lot of our pre-planning was... clumsy, at best. Still, it was a labor of love and I'll never forget the fun and excitement we had everyday balling ideas for the characters and coming up with their designs.

As Melli and I are just writers with limited coding experience, we worked with a past game jam friend to code the GUI and set up the base for the game (though the actual scripting was done by us and Melli put everything together in the end). Our biggest expenses pre- and post-demo was the character art and CGs, meanwhile we relied on free music and BG packs to save money.

Why a bisexual romcom?

So, this was sort of a no-brainer to us. We had decided right from the start that both twins could date both the male and female love interests, and (at the time) we feel that a lot of similar games had playersexual MCs rather than established bisexual/pansexual MCs. While playersexual charas are also awesome, we wanted to write a romcom where the main cast are always queer regardless of who you end up romancing.

At the same time, bi/pan people don't all approach romantic relationships the same way e.g. Cameron is confident and has experience dating people of all genders, while Adrian's demi and Jace still struggles a bit with his attraction towards men. We know that some of our players felt like that made certain routes less romantic than others and we hear you on that feedback and have 100% taken it into consideration for our future romance games. But anyway, that was our thought process behind Trouble Comes Twice's romance dynamics!

Preparing for Kickstarter & the actual Campaign

Our Kickstarter launched at the start of August and let me tell you, we were nowhere near as prepared as we should have been. 😭 We hadn't set up a Steam page yet, we were trailer-less, and we only had a couple of hundred followers across our socials at best. I feel that there's a lot more successful Kickstarter projects to refer to and even a lot of marketing guides and advice now, but mostly it's on us for not researching more.

The Kickstarter campaign did surprisingly well despite the lack of promotion and only having a rough alpha demo - we were even able to double our goal! - but we wouldn't recommend what we did for other devs.

You should invest time into making a good demo, spend time building an interested audience before launching your campaign, and research so you've got some kind of marketing plan. We were lucky with word-of-mouth and that other visual novel devs with larger followings helped share our game, but we should have made more effort reaching out to bloggers, streamers, and game sites. Some crowdfunding successes may seem like they came out of nowhere and were just pure luck, but there's usually a lot of grinding behind-the-scenes that you don't notice.

The post-Kickstarter era, at least for us, was the harder bit. We now had 353 loyal backers who had expectations based on promises we had made and we had to make sure we met those expectations while also staying true to our wants as the devs. It was a learning process for sure, but we're fairly proud that we always did our best to keep our backers in the loop. It's frustrating to write an update explaining that the game has been delayed again, but backers are more open to being understanding than you think as long as you communicate!

A tip we'd give to new devs considering Kickstarter: Don't overestimate what you can do, but overestimate what you need. There's always hidden costs, unexpected taxes/fees, and other unknown obstacles that might eat up your budget. In our case, we made enough to make the game as planned, but had to change CG artists around halfway through development which meant our original budget didn't cut it anymore. Fortunately, we had earned a decent amount from our Patreon and pre-orders that we were able to use to complete the CGs, but that isn't always going to be an option for everyone and that also meant we were unable to use that money ourselves. (We didn't take any money from the original Kickstarter campaign, so whatever was earned through patreon and pre-sales was our only "salary" at the time.)

Writing the game

Writing is, for obvious reasons, one of the most important parts of a visual novel. Melli wrote Jace's routes and I wrote Hazel's routes, which removed some pressure off our shoulders compared to trying to write over 300,000 words all on our own.

It's fun working with another writer, but there are also some unique issues and considerations that come up when you're writing a game with two protagonists split between two writers. Especially because at the time, there weren't many visual novels with a similar set up to refer to.

The main things we learned, were:

Consistency. We wanted each couple to have their own dynamic, but the characterization needs to remain consistent between routes. You don't want Adrian in Jace's route to feel like a totally different character in Hazel's route. Additionally, we had to be careful that the tone and writing style of the protagonists' POVs still felt like you were playing the same game. Some routes can be more comedic than others, but we've got a problem if Hazel's routes are all (unintentionally) more serious/angsty in tone than Jace's or vice versa.

Watch out for your word count! Longer does not always equal better and writing eight routes, we had to put some restrictions in place. Even when writing on your own, it can be tough to guess how long your story should be, and it was important to us that the routes were roughly the same length so that none felt more "canon" than the other. However, with two writers who have different writing styles and ways of planning, it was tricky to compare our outlines and we struggled at times when it came to matching each other's word counts. Moving forward, we're probably going to be more lenient when it comes to word counts - some routes have to be longer than others, it doesn't mean that route is automatically more "important". We're also doing more regular meetings and frequent check-ins to make sure we're on the same page. In the future, we hope that should save us a lot of trouble when it comes to pacing! 🙈

Balancing your own wants with the wants of your players. In theory, these overlap most of the time. But making a commercial game (that people had already "bought" through the Kickstarter), there is some pressure when it comes to meeting certain expectations. We can't always just write what we want and assume everyone else is going to love it, but we also don't want to neglect what we personally like. We had a survey for the beta where we were able to get regular feedback and a lot of helpful advice. We definitely want to continue with surveys in the future - they are a great way to gather opinions from different players and figure out what works versus what doesn't!

We took on too many tasks outside writing that distracted us. This bit is sort of inevitable for indie devs like us. 😅 Working with a limited budget and limited resources, you just end up having to wear a lot of hats! We think we did quite well sharing these duties though, and moving forward (thanks to you guys) we can afford more hands on deck to help us out.

Marketing

The bane of every indie game dev's existence... although secretly, I kind of enjoy marketing but don't tell anyone that!

Having learned a thing or two from promoting the Kickstarter, we spent more time researching games marketing but in the end, trial and error was the best teacher.

As we got closer to the release date, we were posting almost daily on social media and grew our Twitter to over eight thousand followers. We didn't have any viral posts, but we saw a consistent growing interest in our game and it was such a motivation boost to see comments from potential players being excited for the game. We know a lot of devs have said that Twitter didn't help their game much but according to our stats, a decent number of our players found us through the platform.

We saw less success here on Tumblr. Perhaps we haven't cracked the code here yet or maybe we're just comparing our numbers from Twitter unfairly! We're not hung up about it though, we love it here because it feels easier to connect with our followers and other devs there, and it's nice because we're able to write longer posts like this one! 💓

Aside from posting on social media, we reached out to several streamers and some bloggers prior to release to send them free game keys.

We also commissioned some art from other artists to share, as we obviously couldn't reveal ALL our CGs before the release lol and visual posts tend to do a lot better in our experience. It was so much fun to see the characters in other art styles and we hope we can afford to commission guest art pieces a lot more frequently in the future!

In hindsight, we definitely regret not releasing a trailer sooner! We underestimated how much interest a good trailer could garner and delayed setting up our Steam page because of it. Steam was the platform where we sold the most copies and most of our buyers found the game through Steam itself.

Also, posting your trailer on youtube adds another site where you're promoting your game so there's really no reason not to get that trailer done as soon as you can.

Final Notes

After the initial stress, we were pretty happy with our release! Although there were some things we would go back and change if we could, that's just the nature of these kind of things. For the most part, we're proud of what we achieved and happy that we have learnt so much from Trouble Comes Twice that we can take into consideration for future projects.

We can't share exact numbers, but we wanted to open up a bit about our earnings for the game to help other aspiring devs: As of writing this, Trouble Comes Twice has earned close to 85,000 euros. This counts our profits from 2020 to now (the Kickstarter, Patreon, pre-sales, and actual sales). Removing fees, taxes, the salaries of our talented artists and other freelancers, as well as the money invested into our next game, our personal pockets did not see anything close to those numbers. But we're super proud of how much our little game has made and so grateful that it's allowed us more creative freedom with our next title!

So, what's next?

You might have heard but for the past year, we've slowly been working on the demo and upcoming announcement for our next visual novel:

A 17+ supernatural neon-noir romance game about monsters, love, and other horrors.

Play as vampire detective Circe (female protagonist) or hellhound cop Dante (male protagonist) and delve into the mysteries of North Haven, where demons, vampires, and supernaturals hide in plain sight among humans.

The game features six routes, with three romance options available to each protagonist. Dante only has male romances and Circe has both male and female romances.

The game tackles a darker, more angsty tone compared to Trouble Comes Twice. Still, we hope that those who decide to check it out will enjoy it! We plan to announce the game this coming Autumn. Follow our Twitter (we're still not calling it X sorry) or Tumblr to stay up to date.

#trouble comes twice #visual novel #interactive fiction #indie games #gamedev #indiedev #post mortem

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dilucpainsme · 3 months

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StarStruck (Diluc X Reader) (Movie star/actor au)

Ahhh, this is really rough and my firs time posting something just for tumblr. When I mean rough, its like only been looked over a few times. Anyway I like the idea of Diluc cheating on Jean lol, he's a little out of character but whatevess

TW: Cheating, Smut, affairs (?)

Words: 10950

A female walked onto a busy set that had just finished being built. Busy workers and extra’s being pointed around in different directions. The (h/l) (h/c) haired girl stopped and looked around. She was dressed in some casual clothing, sunglasses covering her eyes. The girl was a bit lost, and honestly kinda confused as to where she should be. This wasn’t her first time on a movie set, but it was a huge lot with a ton of different places, and trailers. She lifted her sunglasses up and placed them on top of her head, glancing down at her phone to see the text from her manager.

“(Y/n) (l/n)! I haven’t seen you since you were a newbie!” The female named (Y/n) twirled around to see a short woman, with white and blue pastel hair. Her bright eyes lit up at the sight of her. “Furina!” The girl happily called out for her old friend while walking towards her.

“How are you? You’ve gotten so much taller, oh my gosh are you wearing Dior!?” (Y/n) laughed and dismissed her friend. “I’m doing well, where is Neuvillette? Is he here directing the movie or are you?” The whole reason the female was even here was to act in the new romance movie Furina had recently written. It was supposed to be a box office hit and she had personally been asked by her old friend to play the lead female protagonist. It was only fitting for her, after all, the writer was the reason (Y/n) even got into the acting scene.

“Oh yes! He is on the main set speaking with Diluc Ragnvindr. Do you know him?” She shook her head and started to follow Furina as she began walking. The woman didn’t know much about the movie, only that it was a romance, and if this one did well like everyone was predicting then there would be a series to follow. She was hopeful it was going to go well because she cleared her schedule for the next few months just for this role.

“Uhm, not really. I mean I know of him, we’ve spoken once or twice before at events but other than that we aren’t friends or anything.” Furina nodded her head and opened a door to one of the stages, and inside it was filled with people. But even so, she could see the tall man with striking white hair and his classic dark black cane in hand. She waved a bit trying to catch his eye, and he just waved back to her along with a man next to him. She could tell it was Diluc from the striking red hair and matching fiery eyes.

He was well known in most action movies, his most famous one being the ‘Dark Knight Hero’. He wasn’t a romance or rom-com type actor so she was kind of worried about how they would get along, but she kept that thought to herself for now. She kept following Furina, and people cleared a path for them as they walked through the building. On their way over few people said hi to (Y/n) and she just smiled at them, giving a few familiar faces a wave.

It only took a minute or so to reach the main set and finally catch up with the two men. “Diluc, this is my dear friend (Y/n). She is going to be your co-star for a couple of months!”

He held his hand out, hardly any smile on his face as he spoke. “Hello, I think we’ve meant a few times at red carpet events.” The female gave him a small smile and nodded her head, reaching to accept his handshake. “Yeah, I’m usually around Kaeya and Tartaglia.” He made a humming sound and looked down at the script Neuvillette handed him a bit ago.

The man wasn’t exactly keen on any of his brother's friends but if he was going to be working with her, they might as well get along with one another. This type of movie also wasn’t his scene, but his fiance Jean was begging him to try new things lately. So when Furina asked him to be in her movie he was pretty much forced to say yes. He liked acting, it was all he wanted to do when he was younger, following in his father's footsteps, but, his father was more of a crime, and science fiction actor. He preferred action-packed movies, and occasionally if the pay was good horror. Not petty-filled drama stuff. But here he was, with the contract already signed.

The girl across from him seemed to know Furina and Neuvillette already, and he recalled her face from some movies that Jean and Lisa would watch. She was a decently talented actor, more known for her singing career but still good at her work. He figured they would get along fine, besides the fact that she was friends with Kaeya.

(Y/n) on the other hand, was excited to start working, she wasn’t sure if he would live up to her expectations and that made her nervous but she could only hope they would be a fit for each other. Even if the man seemed to be a bit standoffish she would have fun, and hopefully gain a new friend during this whole thing.

—-

“Alright, you two, this scene is very important. It’s both of your character's first time speaking to one another, both of them very unhappy with the situation they are in. A princess being married off against her will, the knight is forced to keep guard over a bratty princess! It’s-”

“Furina we got it.” (Y/n) laughed a little trying to keep her smiles hidden behind the script in her hand, Diluc beside her rolling his eyes. It was the second week of filming and they had done most of their solo scenes at this point. It was now time for them to start working together on screen. They were on a tight schedule with the production team trying to get teasers for the movie released as soon as possible. It was a fantasy movie about a princess and a knight, but knowing Furina it had to have some sort of dramatic plot twist in it. So with all the interviews she was doing, teasing and almost spoiling the damn thing, everyone wanted to wrap up filming as soon as they could before the woman said something.

“Good, then get to it!” She turned the two around and shoved them back onto the set, the female nearly tripping in her long dress. “Places-And action!”

(Y/n) took her place sitting on the fake stone wall, pretending to look down at the ‘scenery’ below her. Diluc also took his place, a bit off the scene, as he needed to walk in during the start of the shot. The camera started rolling, and the two began to talk to one another. While they were filming a woman walked up to the sidelines beside Furina. She looked down at the short woman and whispered. “How’s he doing?” The white-haired girl looked up to see Jean, Diluc’s fiance smiling at her.

“So far so good! His acting is amazing for someone who hates romance.” The blonde snickered and watched the two go on.

The princess turned her head as she heard someone approach her, the woman's eyes scanning the garden walls behind. She sighed as she saw the knight that was made to follow her around. “I wasn’t going to jump if that’s what you think.” Her voice held a tone of annoyance to it as she spoke. The man cleared his throat and stood there, his eyes looking up to the high wall, slowly rolling them at the princess’s ignorance.

“I assumed that wasn’t your intention, but if I may so boldly ask. What are you doing up there my lady?”

Furina bit her nails and smiled, excited to see her work coming to life. The two worked together effortlessly, as if this wasn’t the first movie they shot together. Jean was even a bit impressed seeing her soon-to-be husband doing so well in this kind of movie. It took a couple more calls, and a few more takes to get the whole scene finished up but it went rather quickly. She called it quits for the night and they had managed to get a decent chunk done today. The blue-eyed woman excitedly told everyone to get some rest and that she would see them all tomorrow, at the same time.

(Y/n) sighed in relief and immediately took the annoyingly heavy crown off her head, handing it to one of the assistants, and thanked them. She loved fantasy movies but man she hated the costumes. They were always so bulky and tight. She just couldn’t stand to be in them. The girl walked over to the vanity near the costumes and started to take off a few more pieces of her costume, the gloves, the jewelry, and hair clips. She couldn’t wait to take the makeup off as well, set makeup was always so cakey.

“Hi, (Y/n) right?” The female looked over to see a blonde girl that looked vaguely familiar. Once she came closer it clicked in her brain where she knew her from. Her name was Jean, and she was a model in some fashion magazines, and most importantly Diluc’s fiance. “Yea! You’re Jean, like from the modeling magazines I see all the time?” The blue-eyed woman nodded laughing a bit.

“I just wanted to come introduce myself, I’ve seen most of your work and I’m kind of a fan.” The girl felt her face heat up and she brushed some hair out of her face. “Oh really? That means a lot to me thank you!” Her voice perked up and she was incredibly grateful to get such a compliment from such a well-known figure in the industry.

“I was wondering if you wanted to join me and my fiance for dinner tonight? I would love to chat more about your work, and it would be a better chance for Diluc to get to know you. I mean the movie has some pretty intense scenes.”

“Of course! I would love to.”

—

After that dinner, (Y/n) could see her and Diluc getting along better. Not that they fought or anything before but they started to talk off-set and in between breaks. Like today, during lunch, the two decided to grab a bite at the Cat’s tail. They each went over their scripts looking at the next scene they were doing later. “Furina is going to kill us with this.” The girl wanted to smack her head on the table.

“It’s sort of–” He cleared his throat. “Raunchy?” (Y/n) finished the sentence for him.

“Yes, that.” Diluc gave her a small smile and she just laughed. “Okay putting work aside how’s the wedding planning going with Jean?” The question wasn’t something Diluc hadn’t heard often as of lately. It’s all anyone was asking him. Jean was the one planning most, if not all of the wedding because of the movie. She told him over and over again she didn’t mind doing it but he felt bad. He knew how long she had been dreaming of their wedding. The two of them were high school sweethearts after all, and it drove the media crazy. He wished he could do more for her.

“Can I be honest with you?” (Y/n) nodded her head. “I don’t know, Jean is planning it, I’ve been preoccupied with the movie. I want to help more, but when I get home I just drop onto my bed.” He frowned and took a bite of his food, glancing down at his phone. The two didn’t live together either, so it made it that much harder.

“That sucks. I mean we're already one month into filming we only have like, what, two left? Then you can focus on helping her more.” She gave him a small smile and grabbed her script once again. She flipped through the pages figuring out how she would keep a straight face saying half these lines.

“What about you? How is your current dating life going?” (Y/n) froze a bit, her eyes lifting to look at the redhead across from her. “Huh?” The question caught her off guard. Her dating life was never in the news, because it was non-existent. It was a fair question though, she had technically asked about his, so he was doing the same thing. But besides that, her dating life was dry, dry as a bone. The media only ever spoke about her when she had done something to change her appearance and picked her apart for that.

“Oh, I don’t date.” She looked back down at her script, trying to hide the red spreading across her face. It was a little embarrassing to say that at her age she didn’t date or even hook up with people. “You don’t date? But you do romance movies?” She nodded her head.

“Well, I find it easier, if I date someone who doesn’t like my choice in movie roles then there is a problem. If I don’t date then I don’t have to worry about it. Plus I’ve never had a boyfriend so I wouldn’t know where to start.” Diluc raised a brow at the female. The girl across from his had never even considered dating it. Which made him see her differently for some reason. It wasn’t bad but that was just an interesting part of her he didn’t expect. Maybe that was why she liked doing romance movies, it gave her a taste of dating but without actually doing it.

“I see, so that’s why you don’t attend any events with a partner.” She glanced up again and glared at him. “Hey, I go with friends.”

“You’re friends being known to hook up with anything that breathes.”

“That’s only Kaeya, Alhaitham is dating Kaveh. Oh shit don’t tell anyone that.” She covered her mouth with her hand looking wide-eyed at the man in front of her. Diluc chuckled and nodded his head. “I won’t, but we should get back soon.”

—-

“Furina!” (Y/n) stormed the woman’s trailer, her arms flailing around with the script in her hand. “Hey, (Y/n)! What’s up?” She smiled innocently and scrolled on her phone as if she didn’t have a clue as to why the actor was barging in her trailer.

“When did you add a sex scene to the movie?”

“Well the investors wanted to make it an R-rated movie so I had to throw something in there, plus Diluc doesn’t mind, and neither does Jean.” Her eyes never left her phone screen. It didn’t bother her that she had a sex scene, she had done plenty of those in her career so far. It was the fact it was with Diluc. The more time she spent with him, the more she started to like him. It wasn’t even in a cute schoolgirl way. He was so hot, and his personality made him even more attractive. The idea of an R-rated scene with him made her head spin.

(Y/n) sighed and after their very short conversation left the trailer starting to make her way back to set. They still had quite a bit to shoot today and it wasn’t even lunch yet. She was already tired from yesterday because they had stayed later than they all wanted to due to the timeline being shortened even more.

On top of her current workload, she was in the news for a rumor spreading about her and Diluc. Jean would make light of it and joke but (Y/n) didn’t want anything to make it awkward between her and Diluc. Plus it was a rule she had made when she first started, she didn’t date. Plus the homewrecker label wasn’t something she wanted attached to her either.

She carried herself to the set, then fixed up her hair and makeup as the crew rushed her over to the stage. Neuvillette was the director for today, and he wasn’t as fun as Furina, but he got stuff done that was for sure. So once she was there and ready he started rolling the camera.

The princess was pushed into the corner, her knight being the one to move her there. She was trapped between his arms, their faces just inches away. She could hear him panting as he tried to hold himself back, in fear he would do something they would both regret. The two were hiding from the wondering maids around the castle, for if they heard they would surely gossip about their affair to the King. “We can’t keep doing this,” She muttered her eyes trying to avoid his. “You don’t love him, why do you feel so wrong about this? The king doesn’t respect you,”

“Because I am to be wed to him in the next few days if anyone catches us he will surely have you killed.” She turned her gaze back to his. Her whole body tensed under his stare, and she couldn’t help but lean forward. “I couldn’t bear to see you suffer such a fate,”

“Cut! Come on this is supposed to be a tense moment between you two.” Diluc and (Y/n) turned their heads to see Furina entering the room, a scowl on her face. Everyone sighed and stopped what they were doing. The woman wasn’t even supposed to be on set right now. “I want his hands all over you, pulling you close. Not just staying in one spot!” The woman started barking orders at the two, both of them rolling their eyes in unison.

“Diluc I know this is your first romance but come on you should feel the passion between the two.” The redhead sighed and removed his hands from their place, moving them to cross over his chest. He frowned at Furina. (Y/n) just huffed and ran a hand through her hair. She was already annoyed from the heat, and how much she was sweating in the tight corset undeath her bulky dress.

“What exactly are you wanting from us Furina?” The actress leaned against the wall she had just been pressed against moments ago.

“Passion! Lust! Something this is just stale! Now let's go again!” She twirled her finger in the air, signaling for everyone to start over.

The man moved his hands, to the female's waist and pulled her close to him, their bodies flushed against one another. “I can’t let you fall into his hands, the King is no good for you,” The knight's free hand moved to grab her chin, gently pulling her face towards his. “My love I would go to the ends of the earth for you-”

Furina was mouthing the words that Diluc was speaking, her hands placed on her chest as she watched the two. This was exactly what she was wanting, she could see the heat between the two, the lust growing. Or really what was happening (Y/n)’s brain trying to process how close Diluc was to her, and how he was touching her so gently.

The gap between the two closed, as the knight pressed their lips together. The hand that was cupping her face now moved to her shoulder and traced down her body. The action left goosebumps on the girl’s skin as he crept further down to her waist, now having both of his hands grip so tightly. The princess tangling her hands into his long hair, pulling ever so slightly. She gasped between every frantic kiss he gave her, trying her best to keep quiet in the echoing hallways.

It didn’t take too long to get what Furina wanted. A full makeout scene in a dark-lit castle. The woman was ecstatic and once ‘cut’ was called the two slowly pulled apart from each other. Everyone else too excited with the shot they just captured to notice either of the actors. The couple stared at one another, panting breathlessly. (Y/n) felt her face bloom with a red color and she cleared her throat. “Good job, uhm I’m going to head back- uhm- goodnight.” She excused herself from the set and fled the room her brain spinning. Diluc on the other hand stood there a bit dazed not sure how he felt. He had kissed people before for movies but this was-it was different. It wasn’t even (Y/n) taking the lead in that, it was all him and he was very confused with his feelings at the moment.

The man turned to Furina. “Is that it for the day?” Neuvillette nodded his head and went back to talking with his coworker.

Once (Y/n) had reached her trailer she locked the door and pressed her back against the wall. She had a hand tangled in her hair, her other hand placed over her beating heart. What the hell was that? She had made out with plenty of people on set for a movie but this was-this was something else entirely. Maybe Diluc didn’t realize how intense he was. He was pressing against her so hard, and the way his lips felt on hers-

She shook her head. He was getting married, it was for the movie. That’s all. They weren’t even that close. They were possibly friends. They went out for lunch and hung out after filming sometimes but that's it. It was for the romance effect, he didn’t see her like that. Even if she secretly wished he would.

—-

(Y/n) was in her trailer, scrolling through her phone. It was her hour break and she intended to take every second of it she could. They had to shoot so many scenes outside in the heat today. It was so hot, almost 100 degrees out. The California heat trying to take out everyone on set. A knock on her door caught her attention and she told whoever it was to come in. The door opened and she saw the familiar red hair.

“Hey ‘Luc.” She greeted him and kept her body on the sofa. The fan was on full blast as she relaxed in her tank top and shorts, one headphone in her ear, and she tapped her fingers to the beat of the music. (Y/n) was grateful to be out of that heavy, stuffy dress that Furina insisted she wore and finally in a cool room, where she could just get a second of rest.

“I barely managed to escape that insufferable woman,” Diluc mumbled while tossing his jacket off, then lifted the woman’s leg and plopped himself down on the sofa. She moved her legs to the spot where they rested before, so they were draped across his lap. “She let you out of your costume as well?” Her eyes looked up from the device in her hand.

“Neuvillette did.” (Y/n) laughed a little and put her phone down, grabbing a hair tie off her wrist and handing it to Diluc. He thanked her and grabbed it, putting his hair in a high ponytail, not caring if Furina would chew him out later for messing up his hair. It had been a good bit of time since they started filming and the two of them were getting rather close. They were attached at the hip when they weren’t on set. The media going wild with allegations, and the friend group laughing at them all.

“One more month of this and then we can finally be done.” He muttered and leaned his head back, feeling the cool fan hit his boiling skin. The redhead had changed into a tank top himself and some cool sweatpants. He was always in that stupid knight costume when he wasn’t in some comfortable clothing. Furina’s orders of course.

“Aw come on, you aren’t going to miss me when this is all over?” (Y/n) lifted her head and gave him a teasing smile. “We can still hang out after this, you know that.” She laughed and sat up, removing her legs from his lap.

“I was comfortable.” He closed his eyes, a frown settling on his face as his friend removed herself. She shrugged her shoulders and walked over to her vanity, tossing her phone on the desk, along with her earbuds.

“Don’t we have to film that cheesy ass sex scene later this week?” The girl had been thinking about it since Furina added it to the script. It was constantly on her mind, it was such an intense scene, not that it would bother her—But the idea of doing something like that with Diluc while she had all these pent-up feelings growing for him. All that she knew was wrong. He was so much fun to be around, he made being out in the heat for hours a day worthwhile. Under that stone-cold demeanor, he was just a soft, funny guy. Furina was tormenting her.

Even if she felt the way she did, the woman needed to be professional about it. So she would bring it up with Diluc now, instead of the day before. To get any of the weirdness out of the way of course.

“I think, why?”

“You aren’t uncomfortable with it or anything are you?” She took her seat back, but this time sitting next to the man and leaning her head against his shoulder. The two of them had gotten pretty comfortable with physical touch at this point during shooting. They were pretty up close and personal every day, hands-on with one another, whether it be for filming or helping each other fix their costumes. So they just naturally began to lean on one another. She had grown pretty fond of her friend and because of that, she didn’t want any weird sex scene to ruin what they had.

“Not really, the movies I’ve been in have a lot of sex in them,” He rolled his eyes at the thought. Jean always teased him about, how the women were always so nervous to film them and how Diluc looked like he would rather be anywhere else in between shots. This time she didn’t pick on him too much, but he didn’t find it weird she was probably too busy with her own things to annoy him. There were a lot of weird things going on with Jean at the moment if he thought about it.

“Okay so then you’re all good?”

“I’ll be fine but what about you? I figured you would have filmed one before.” He peeked open an eye and looked down at her, “I have, I just wanted to make sure you were okay with it.” The redhead nodded and closed his eyes again, throwing an arm lazily around his friend. When he first started filming the movie with her he was weary of the girl. She was bubbly and friendly and never stopped talking. He was the exact opposite of that, so he didn’t think they would get along too well. Then Jean invited her to dinner with them and once they got to talking they found out how much they had in common. From the literature they read to the music they listened to. Their views on the world in general seemed to line up.

He enjoyed having conversations with her, ones that weren’t shallow and meaningless. For once he could talk about stuff that didn’t involve acting and fame. That didn’t revolve around his career and the industry. It was, well, refreshing. He enjoyed being around her, spending time with her felt like a break from everything else in his life.

“It won’t be awkward if that’s what you’re thinking,” (Y/n) nodded weakly and leaned into his touch. Her mind drifted back to that kiss they shared while filming a few weeks ago. The memory gave her butterflies and she felt the heat rise to her face again. The two of them hadn’t discussed it since, they just went about their normal routine pretending like it wasn’t anything special. Even if she wanted it to be. Like right now, she was so close to Diluc, and he was so comfortable with it. It probably meant nothing to him but to her, it meant a lot. She wanted to ask him about that day on set yet the fear of destroying their friendship stopped her. It was probably all in her head, he was getting married for fucks sake.

“I didn’t think it would be,”

“Did Furina mention that dinner to you this weekend? I think we’re supposed to meet with the production team to set up interviews.” Diluc was still in his spot, unmoving as he talked. (Y/n) just couldn’t help but stare at him, how he was so relaxed around her, how he didn’t mind the close contact. But her heart was aching thinking how this could all mean nothing to him and she could just be crazy.

“I need to ask you something.” The words blurted out of her mouth, ignoring Diluc’s previous sentence. She wasn’t even sure what she was going to say, or how to even explain it—But when she said those words, her tone must have worried the man because he instantly sat up his eyes opening. “Is everything okay?” He removed his arm from around her and gave a concerned look.

“I’m not sure, I just-I just wanted to ask you about a few weeks ago.” She looked over at the clock on her wall. They still had about 45 minutes left til they had to be back in costume on set. “We had that intense makeout scene and it was-”

“It was kinda different than what I usually experience, I mean it’s your first romance movie so I know you probably aren’t too sure what you’re doing. I just didn’t want to keep thinking these silly thoughts that it wasn’t just for the movie that you-” As she was trying to get out the word vomit in her brain she felt Diluc move. Then suddenly his lips were mashed on hers. The girl’s heart skipped a beat as she felt his body move, and pull her closer to him. Her mind grew clouded and a dizzy feeling swept over her. It was different than the scripted kisses she had, but so similar to that one moment on set when he kissed her. She couldn’t relax in his touch, her whole body was tense as the voice in the back of her brain screamed at her to pull away.

But she didn’t have to, he did that for her. He pulled away as quickly as he kissed her. His eyes darkened and he looked so confused himself. “I’m sorry, I have no idea why I did that.” Diluc glanced up at her, seeing her red face. But he saw more than the blush spreading across her cheeks. He couldn’t help but stare at her bright (e/c) eyes, and how they seemed to shine in the light, the way she bit her bottom lip with so much anxiety. He just couldn’t help it. But she was so quiet and stared at him with such a look he couldn’t place.

“I’m, sorry, I should get going now.” He stood up, trying to leave before he could do any more damage, but he stopped in his tracks, feeling his wrist being pulled. He turned his head to see her still sitting down, her head tilted up “Don’t.” Her pleading eyes begged him to stay. “You don’t have to,” She gripped his wrist tighter and tugged on him a bit more. He’ll be damned if he walked out now.

He moved to sit on the sofa, her hand still holding his wrist so tightly, and even if he wanted to, he couldn’t resist the urge. The minute she was face to face with him, he threw all of fucks out the window. Diluc pulled her towards him, so she was now sitting on his lap straddling him. He pressed his lips against hers again and felt her hands grip his shoulders so tightly, her nails digging into his skin. He was intoxicated with her. They were always so close on set but with just the two of them, it felt so different. He could smell the sweet perfume she wore, and taste the strawberry chapstick she would use often. It was a different experience. One he wanted more of.

His hands started to move up her arms and down her back, just barely gripping her waist, and he pulled her tighter against his body, getting a small mewl out of her. She was sweet and addicting like this.

Her body was starting to relax under his touch, and with each passing second, she felt herself start to melt the more he touched her. His hands moved to cup her ass and grind against her. Her head rested against his shoulder, trying to hide the embarrassing blush on her face, and the sounds she tried to choke down.

Even if her head was fuzzy, and her body was growing hot, she knew she couldn’t do this. He was engaged. To a very sweet woman. A sweet woman who trusted her a lot, and made her one of her bridesmaids. Suddenly she snapped back to her senses. What was she doing? She was being a home wrecker. “Diluc-mm-wait we can’t-” She tried to get the words out between each gasp, and it was so hard to as each time she spoke, he would grab her waist, and gently rock her body against his. God, it was so hard to stop. “You’re engaged I shouldn’t have-” He paused his actions, his hand leaving her waist, and moving to grab her chin making her face him.

He pressed a kiss against her lips before he spoke.“Who’s gonna know?” The man wasn’t wrong. Who would know? She felt him grab her thighs, and his lips were back at it again. She started to forget about the issue she was so concerned about moments ago as she felt Diluc bite her bottom lip.--The action making her part hers just slightly. Enough for him to slip his tongue in. The movement from before resumed as they grinded against one another.

The redhead grabbed at the ends of her shirt and tugged at the fabric trying to remove it from her body. They pulled apart for a moment, and she left her arms as he took the item off her, tossing it somewhere on the ground. His hands immediately explored the exposed skin. His gaze on her body was so intense, she had to turn her head away. “Stop staring,” The words came out in a mumble.

“You’re acting as if this is the first time I've seen you in a bra.” He laughed a little, and moved his lips to her neck, placing gentle kisses as he went down her chest.

He had seen her like this, a few times on set during some scenes. She wasn’t embarrassed then because it was all scripted, this was different.

He finally reached near her breast and stopped, gently nipping at her skin there. She let out another sound, cursing at herself. “Diluc we don’t have enough time for this,” Even if she wanted to keep going, they had to be back soon.

We have 30 minutes that's enough for a-”

“I’m a virgin.” The words left her mouth suddenly and her eyes still looked away from Diluc. She was embarrassed about it, and as much as she wanted to despite her conscious yelling at her not to, she didn’t want her first time to be a quickie.

That was enough to make the redhead freeze and pull away from her. His hands dropped from her breast to her thighs, thumbing over them softly as he chuckled to himself. He found it kind of ironic that the romance actor was a virgin. He wasn’t judging but it was just a little funny to him. But it also let him realize what the two could have done. “Don’t laugh! I told you I’ve never dated!” She buried her head in the crook of his, her body resting against his.

“I’m not laughing at you. I promise I’m sorry I didn’t know.” A knock at the door made them both turn their heads and stop. “(Y/n), we need you on set early! I know this is your break but-” The door was about to open and the female jumped from her spot and ran to the door. Just barely catching it before it could fully open to reveal Diluc in the room. Furina was on the other side, a brow raised as she looked at the actress.

“What are you doing?” She asked looking her up and down. The female was panting and dressed in her bra and shorts.

“It’s really hot out there okay, anyways I’m getting dressed I’ll be out in a minute.” Furina sighed and spun around, telling her to find Diluc and drag him back out as well. (Y/n) took a deep breath and shut the door, her eyes turning to the redhead on the sofa.

“This never happened got it?”

“Never happened.”

—-

(Y/n) sat in her chair on set, glasses covering her eyes, as she tried her best not to fall asleep. She was watching the actors in front of her go through their scenes. The man playing the king shooting his big reveal, with a few of the other main characters in the movie, joining in on the big plot twist. She sighed and fanned herself with a magazine, it was beyond hot, even for it being dark out–she was still burning up. So Furina the wonderful director she was, let the girl dress down into her tank top and shorts. As she was dying in the heat, some type of commotion faintly behind her caught her attention. She turned to see Diluc in his day clothes walking away from a furious Jean. It seemed like they were arguing about something. The blonde was holding a planner in her hand, and pointing to it.

“You can’t be serious right now? You aren’t going to help me in the slightest?” Diluc sighed heavily and glared at his partner. “Jean you got everything under control, this movie is my main priority.” His red eyes glanced ahead to see (Y/n) eyeing the two of them, and he looked away quickly. The movie wasn’t his main priority, she was. (Y/n) had consumed his mind ever since that moment in the trailer. It was all he could think about, her body, her voice, her laugh. It consumed him so much that whenever Jean did anything it got on his nerves. Everything she did was annoying him—especially the wedding planning. Every time he went back to her place she just wanted to talk about the wedding, and the guest list, and the food. Suddenly he didn’t care for any of it.

So Jean picked up on that within the first night and instead tried other things to do with him. Movies, dates, shopping trips. It all seemed like that annoyed him even more. Then she thought maybe he was stressed and needed to blow off steam so she tried to have sex with him and it just–He wasn’t up for it. All he could think about was his co-star. And if Diluc wouldn’t talk to her about at home then she would fight him at work, trying to figure out what his issue was. Why he was so mean to her?

“Diluc I swear if you don’t knock your shit off I’m calling off the wedding.”

“I’m at work can we talk about this later?” The blonde stormed off flipping him off as she walked away. His gaze returned to the girl watching him from the set. She gave him a pity smile and then frowned. He just waved to her and walked off, she supposed to his trailer. “Hey, Furina can I go for the night?”

“Hm? Yea! Your scenes are done for the day, but tomorrow, phew, you have a heated day.” She shot the actress a wink, and (Y/n) just rolled her eyes. She left her magazine behind and started to make her way to her friend's trailer but-

“(Y/n) can we talk?” Her head spun to see Jean approaching her. She swallowed thickly and nodded. God if she suspected anything, then she was done for. She had never done anything like this before, all her other co-stars weren’t like Diluc. She didn’t know what was different about him. His looks were great sure but it was so much more than that. Like how his laugh was so enchanting and his rare smile made her heart flutter, or how they could talk for hours about anything.

“And I have no idea what’s going on with him, but do you think you could talk to him?” The girl snapped back and looked at Jean wide-eyed. What did she say? “What? You want me to-”

“Check on him, you two get along so well and he can get so in his head. I trust you so let me know what’s up okay? I’m heading home, send him my way when you're done here.” Oh god, she was a horrible person. The female just nodded her head. “Of course, I’ll text you.” Jean smiled and hugged her, thanking her for being such a good friend. (Y/n) was going to throw up. So once the woman left, she looked over to the trailer at the back of the lot and started to make her way over.

She didn’t even knock as she entered the trailer. She scanned the freezing room for the man, and instantly spotted him in the back, laying face down on the mattress. The lights were off, and Diluc was well hidden in his sheets, but (Y/n) could spot his striking red hair from anywhere. She sighed, walking over to his bed, and crawling onto the plush surface next to him.

“You’re not getting along?” The words came out as a mumble. “We are not getting along.” The two were lying in opposite directions of each other, staring at the wall. The moment they shared in her trailer earlier this week wasn’t a one-off thing. It seemed every time they were left alone, whether that be on set or in their private dressing rooms, they were on top of one another. It was getting to a boiling point where (Y/n) couldn’t take anymore. She was so fucking pent-up.

“Is it because of me?”

“Not exactly,” He glanced over at the female who had a worried look in her eyes. “It’s more than that. We’ve been drifting apart for a while.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” Diluc turned his body to face (Y/n), but she was still looking away from him. He lazily threw his arm around her torso and pulled her close, burying his face in the back of her neck. She relaxed in his hold, even if she felt sick to her stomach at the thought of Jean. She had asked her to talk to him, not fuck him. But he was here, so close to her, and she couldn’t help it. She was falling hard for the man.

“She asked me to talk to you, try and make you work it out with her, but I don’t want to.” (Y/n) wanted him for herself, she had never felt this way about anyone. He had taken her heart, and she didn’t mind it.

“Even if I don’t want you to, you should fix things.” She turned her body to face him, his red eyes piercing her (e/c) ones. Her heart started to beat rapidly as they stared at one another, basking in each other's hold. “I don’t care to,”

“Diluc, this is wrong and you know that,”

“You could put a stop to it, but you don’t.” She groaned and lightly bonked her forehead against his. He just gave her a weak laugh and pressed a kiss against her lips. “Because every time I tell you we shouldn’t do this, you do that.” They hadn’t gone much farther than a heated makeout session, and feeling each other up–the girl being way too shy to do more. She especially didn’t want her first time to be in a trailer at work.

She got a weak hum out of him and he smirked a bit. “Do you wanna get out of here?” Her body froze. “To where?”

“My place?” She swallowed thickly and blinked a few times. She would be completely alone with Diluc, nobody to interrupt them. If she was at his place she might cave and take things way farther with him. But as much as she knew she shouldn’t she agreed.

—

(Y/n) threw her shirt off as Diluc kissed her relentlessly, his hands roaming every part of her body that he could get it. Tugging her pants off as she fell back onto the bed, their lips being apart for only seconds. His tongue already found its way into her mouth, teeth clanking at the fast-paced movements. They couldn’t help it, the moment they got into his house they were on top of one another, the tension from the week building up. She wanted Diluc so badly, and even if she knew the amount of shit this would cause, she would do it. The man didn’t seem like he cared either, his hands finding the clasps of her bra and undoing it.

She grabbed his shirt and tugged at it signaling she wanted it to come off. The man did as she wanted, and (Y/n) began to shrug off her bra throwing it onto the floor, her hands going back on Diluc’s body. Her fingers gripped the waist band of his pants, pulling him towards her. She gasped as she felt his hard-on press against her. The girl was about to open her mouth to speak but the two froze as they heard her phone ring. She groaned and reached for it, Diluc wanted to stop her but she had already grabbed the damn thing.

“It’s Jean.”

“Answer it,”

“Are you crazy? Hey no-” The man grabbed the phone from her and pressed the green button, handing it back. She glared at him, as she watched him lower himself, pulling her panties off as the phone was pressed against her ear. “Hey, what's up?” She was about to lift her head to see what the idiot was doing but she instantly tensed up at the feeling of something wet licking her clit. It took everything in her to not moan.

“Did you talk to Diluc? His phone is off and I’m worried about him.” Her voice was filled with concern and she sounded like she was driving. “Mm-Mhm! Yea I-uh” She covered her mouth and pulled the phone away. Her back arched as felt him swipe his tongue over her clit again, but he slowed pace this time, teasing her so she would make more sounds. More sounds that only he got to hear. “Are you okay?” Jean’s voice brought her back and she panted for a second.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m working out right now. I needed to get my cardio in.” She laughed a little but stopped when she felt her partner insert a finger inside of her. One of her hands grabbed his red locks, and tugged at them slightly, rocking her hips against him. She could hear him laugh as he went on with his current task, curling his fingers inside of her. The way she was choking back her cute moans, and gasp. The woman was barely keeping herself together at this point and he didn’t even care if Jean heard the two of them. This was the most fun he has had in a while. He couldn’t help but stare at her, seeing the phone pressed against her ear, her hip eagerly bucking towards him begging for more.

“But yeah, I uhm talked to him before I left, he said-fuck.” She swore as Diluc pumped another finger inside of her. “What’s wrong?”

“He was upset, and told me he didn’t want to talk.” She couldn’t keep this up for much longer, she wanted so much more of the man, this wasn’t enough. “Was he rude to you?” The blonde’s voice held sympathy for her, knowing how cold he could be when he was upset.

“Yeah, I just let him be.”

“I should go see him, I’m on my way already.” (Y/n) lifted her head and looked at Diluc who didn’t pay any mind to the girl and kept his pace playing with her sensitive bundle of nerves.

“I wouldn’t do that, he-ah shit-uhm wanted to be alone. I need to go just don’t trust me.” (Y/n) hung up the phone and tossed the device on the bed and let out a string of curses at the man.

“You idiot she’s on her way here-fuck Diluc please-”

“She doesn’t have a key, it's fine.”

The girl just sighed and grabbed his arm tugging him close to her. He hovered above her, his arms resting on the mattress. “Do you want to go any farther?” She nodded her head. If she didn’t get more of this man, she would go crazy. “I don’t know how to do anything though.”

“I’ll take care of it, just relax.”

—-

It was the final week of filming and the affair that (Y/n) had with Diluc was going to end. She couldn’t keep doing this to her friend. Jean had trusted her so much and went to her to vent about Diluc and she just couldn’t help but feel terrible. As she should though. Even if she had was more than just lust, even if she felt something more for the man, it had to be over. They had already filmed the rated R scene and everyone was surprised at how well they got through it, like it was no big deal. It shocked even Jean a little bit, mainly because the girl was telling her how nervous she was to film it. But when the time came the two got through it as if they had done it before

(Y/n) huffed in her chair and looked at Furina giving a speech to all of the cast members. Most of the scenes were done and Diluc was no longer needed. She wasn’t really either, but the two stayed just in case something came up. Her eyes looked around the room, and she could see her co-star near the back, once again fighting with his fiance. The two angrily whispering to one another. She just frowned and looked away. They were always butting heads about something, whenever the woman was on set Diluc was miserable. Even if he would tell (Y/n) how badly he wanted to end it, he didn’t The wedding date was set for next year and the plans were put in place. Everyone he knew had already been informed and Jean was getting new gigs because of it.

Internally she was screaming, begging Diluc to just leave the woman, and let himself be happy. Yet if he didn’t and this was it then she had to live with that. “So, thank you everyone for being a part of this movie! The curtain will soon be closing!” The female took a bow, and everyone clapped. (Y/n) lazily moved her hands together, unaware of the person sneaking up behind her. Then without warning, someone placed their hands on the girl’s shoulders and she let out a screech. Her loud yelping sound caught everyone’s attention but most importantly Diluc’s. But the laughing sound that followed calmed everyone down.

The (h/c) haired girl whipped her head around to see the cackling man behind her. An angry expression started to form on her face as she glared at the dark-haired man “Kaeya!” She shot him the best glare she could and jumped out of her seat. “Not funny,” Her eyes looked behind him to see Tartaglia waving to her from the back of the lot. She shyly waved back to him and smiled. It had been a while since she saw their ginger friend. He was traveling for a modeling gig he booked. The three of them were known to be a close-knit group but since she started this movie they hadn’t been spotted together. Diluc had taken up all her time.

“What are you idiots doing here?” She placed both of her hands on her hips, seeming pretty peeved with Kaeya. “It’s your last week on set, Furina said we could come to hang with you.” She rolled her eyes and glanced behind her to see the cast getting back to work, but the red eyes on the other side of the set never left her.

“Come on princess, let's go get lunch or something.” Kaeya walked over to his friend and wrapped his arms around her shoulders. “I can’t just leave the set, what if they need me for something?”

He laughed and pressed a kiss against her cheek smiling, both of them knowing that wasn’t true. “Come on we have to catch up, you’ve been stirring some drama in the news.” (Y/n) sighed and shoved her best friend off and looked to see Diluc approaching them, an annoyed Jean following behind.

He looked so fucking pissed to see Kaeya anywhere near her. Tartaglia had also made his way over here and the girl didn’t seem to notice as he draped both his arms around her shoulders. Hovering behind her. “Heya girly.” She tilted her head back and smiled at the man. “Hey, Ajax.”

“Kaeya what the hell are you doing here?” Diluc’s voice caught the trio's attention. “I’m here to see my friend, not you.” He gestured to (Y/n).

“Great you’ve seen her, now leave.”

Jean smacked his arm lightly and glared. “Those are her friends, just because you don’t like Kaeya doesn’t mean you can be rude.” Kaeya stuck his tongue out and grabbed (Y/n)’s hand. “Lunch? Me, you, Childe?” Before she could decline she was being dragged away, mouthing a sorry to the couple in front of her.

—-

(Y/n) laid next to Diluc eyes glued to the ceiling. The man was passed out next to her and she had this gut-wrenching feeling in her chest. She wanted to cry knowing that this was it. This was the last day on set and they decided to spend the night together, but after this, it was over. The man never said it was but, she knew in her heart it was. He would have free time and no excuse to be with her. I mean how was Diluc supposed to justify the two of them being alone together? Jean basically had him on a leash as is. One time after she left Diluc’s place Jean was over shortly after. She had told (Y/n) she found a pair of underwear that was not the blondes. She confided in her friend, her worries about her fiance cheating. Ever since then, Jean would never let him hang out with people alone. Never anyone but her. Because the she trusted her.

She felt like crying at the thought of all of it. Jean invited her to go dress shopping cake tasting, and all the fun things that came along with wedding planning. (Y/n) would nod her head and agree feeling this intense guilt inside. Didn’t Diluc feel any of it? Probably not, he enjoyed it or something. But after this. She couldn’t do it anymore, she wanted him all to herself. She didn’t want to hide him from everyone. All she wanted was him.

So after confiding in Kaeya and Tartaglia, they told her to just break it off after filming. She was only going to hurt herself more in the long run, and if nobody knew about then stop before someone did. Both of her friends were right, and that’s why she made up her mind. Even if this was going to crush her. (Y/n) had truly fallen for him.

The girl sat up and got her things together. She didn’t want to stay here, it would be worse in the morning when he was awake, begging her to stay. Why would she do this herself? From the moment this started, she knew that he wouldn’t pick her. She was fooling herself into thinking that Diluc would leave Jean for her. The two had been together for almost ten years now, they were high school sweethearts. (Y/n) hurried along ignoring the tears falling down her cheeks. This really was it.

—-

“Welcome to the premiere of Betrayal at Dusk,” Furina and Neuvillette were standing on a stage, people mingling around the room. It was the first showing of the new movie that (Y/n) had starred in with Diluc. One whole year later The girl hadn’t seen him since that day in his apartment. When she left while he was sleeping, so she didn’t cave for him. So ignoring all that she tried her best to prepare herself for tonight. She had to get Kaeya to tag along to keep her from being stupid. It didn’t matter though, because the moment she stepped out of the limo and onto the red carpet, the man was straight ahead of her. Jean attached to his arm smiling wide. She looked so perfect next to him, her wedding ring shining with all the camera flashes. His arm wrapped so tightly around her. They look happy and it made her want to vomit.

Once she got to the door of the venue a few reporters were crowding her.

“(Y/n) Who are you wearing? Is it Dior?”

“What was it like to star in the first romance movie featuring Diluc Ragvandir?”

“People are saying how raw and passionate the scenes are how did you two form such a bond?”

“Are the cheating rumors true?”

She answered each one carefully, trying not to make a mess she would regret later, and somehow she managed to debunk all of the rumors. At some point she was able to make her way inside, Kaeya at her side leading her around to chat with everyone. It worked for most of the night and even made her forget the reality of the situation for a minute. Yet, she found herself glancing around the room for him. “Don’t worry he’ll avoid you like the plague if I’m here.” (Y/n) just nodded her head and grabbed another drink. She noticed Jean trying to pull him towards her a few times, but failing. He waved in dismal at her idea to go greet the girl. He looked rather annoyed, and it crushed her.

She wanted to go home, she didn’t want to come to this but her friends made her, and it was the first showing so. A sigh escaped her lip and she handed her drink to Kaeya. “I’m going out for air.”

“You want me to come?”

“No,” She turned and walked away from him, and tried her best to find an area outside that wasn’t crowded. Yet everywhere she went it was packed with people, and each time they saw her they couldn’t help but strike up a conversation with the female. It was getting on her nerves that she couldn’t find a place to escape just for a bit.

Eventually, she wound up in an empty hallway near the back of the venue, the lights off, and it was quiet. She could just breathe for a minute. Clear her head, and then she would get back to the main party. No matter how hard she tried to forget the past year, and pretend like she didn’t have an affair with Diluc, it was pointless.

She couldn’t even escape for a second though, being interrupted again.

“Why are you hiding back here?” Her gaze turned towards the familiar voice, and she saw the man who caused all of these emotions.

“I needed to think,” She stood up from the plush seat she was in, debating on heading back to the party. “You haven’t returned any of my calls.” He approached her, reaching his hand out to grab hers.

“Don’t do that.” (Y/n) could feel her heart being squeezed at the mere thought of him touching her again.

“I haven’t heard from you, I miss yo-”

“Don’t say anything please.” She jerked her wrist away before he could even lay a finger on her, tears welling up in her eyes. The girl didn’t even know why she was upset over this, she knew this was going to happen. It was a fling for him. He loved Jean, not her. He didn’t have the same feelings for her as she did for him. Not once did he ever mention that he liked her, or even wanted more than just a quick fuck. A year had passed and she hadn’t texted, called, or even thought about visiting him. No matter how many times Jean tried to get the two to hang out, she would go running at the sight of him. It made the blonde suspect something but she didn’t say a word. Because (Y/n) wouldn’t do that, (Y/n) was a good friend.

“Just hear me out.”

“I don’t want to, I knew you were never going to leave her, it wasn’t anything more for you. But for me, it was something else entirely. I had feelings for you, I have feelings for you. I just-I can’t believe I thought you would choose me over her. I’m so stupid.” The sound of footsteps approaching made her quickly wipe her face and storm off. As she went she saw the blonde she was incredibly jealous of pass by. “(Y/n) Hi!”

She gave her a little wave and kept walking, and she didn’t stop. Not for Kaeya, not for anyone. She wanted to go home and pretend this didn’t happen.

—-

“I’m sorry Furina I can’t come back for a sequel, I know it did well.” (Y/n) paced her apartment as she was on the phone with her friend. The girl was asking for her to come back and film another movie in the series. If she did that then she had to be around Diluc again.

“Is it the pay? I can pay so much more than that if you want, or is it the heat? I can film it in the winter, oh please (Y/n), they loved you, and they loved Diluc with you.”

“That’s the problem, Diluc is the problem.” She leaned against her bedroom wall and sank to the floor. Her heart aching at the memories from last year. “Wait, were the rumors true?”

“Mhm,”

“Oh (Y/n).” The girl brushed away the tears that started to fall, sniffling, trying her best to keep it together. “I’m sorry Furina, I can’t”

—

“You what?!” Jean was screaming at Diluc as he stood there. The blonde overheard the phone call with Furina he had, and the other woman also screaming at him for the whole thing with (Y/n). It wasn’t exactly how he wanted Jean to find out, he never really did want her to find out. Honestly, he was planning on breaking it off after the movie, but Jean kept getting more and more offers from different agencies and he didn’t want to ruin that for her. Then before he knew it a year rolled by and he couldn’t back out now. The wedding was in a few weeks.

“I cheated on you with (Y/n), it just happened. I don’t know.”

“How could you? I trusted you, I trusted her. This whole time, you never thought to tell me?” The blonde was furious, tears in her eyes as she glared at her fiance. “It wasn’t her fault it was mine, she tried to stop but I just couldn’t.” Jean rolled her eyes, and more tears rolled down her face as she grabbed her keys.

“You can forget about the damn wedding.”

—-

(Y/n) sat at her favorite coffee shop scrolling on her phone happily as she waited for a friend. The news had already hit the magazines and press about her affair with Diluc. It was insane at how big it blew up. Most of her friends came asking for her side of the story and she didn’t lie. She knew she was guilty but they all sided with her in the end. She was moving on from all of that though. Her career was getting bigger and bigger and she decided she wanted to do more than just romance movies, she was taking a break from them.

Even though Furina begged her every week to make a sequel for the movie. She always told her the same answer. No.

It always upset the girl but she wouldn’t take no for an answer. Repeatedly coming back with new offers or bribes for her. Nothing on the planet could make her want to go back and film with Diluc. “Sorry, I’m late.” (Y/n) looked up and saw Childe waiting in front of her. “Ready to go?” She got up and grabbed her drink smiling happily as the ginger wrapped an arm around her.

“Yea! Where are we going for our date?”

#diluc ragnvindr x reader #diluc x reader #genshin x reader #diluc headcanons #fanfic writers #genshin impact x reader #diluc x reader headcanons #diluc x reader smut #diluc smut #diluc ragnvindr #diluc x you #kaeya alberich #genshin diluc #smut #movie au #celeb au

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galadrieljones · 21 days

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Zabel Interview, Team Delusional Round-up, re: the past few weeks (months?) 💫

(Based on an ask from @natural-blue-26! This post contains spoilers, pertaining to the script leak. If you don't want them, turn back!!)

First, let me say that @twdmusicboxmystery has posted an excellent video covering this topic over at her youtube channel. This post is jumping off of that, with some additional takes and analysis by me!

Also, note that I wanted to wait to post or to talk about this too much publicly until today, as I think there are a lot of genuine shippers who might be let down right now. Not all c*rylers are unhappy, unruly people. Many are shippers just like us, and even though I don't ship it, I support them. I am only putting this in the Team Delusional tag, so anyone who sees this is seeing it either because they follow me, follow the tag, follow someone who follows me, or they went looking for it themselves. I am not making drama or inciting a "ship war." If you're here out of anger, I suggest you turn back. I am just going to go over what I see.

The Facts

There has been a recent spate of events that have lead Team Delusional to a rare and more than modest resurgence. Until now, we were mostly just working with templates and symbolism, with a healthy dose of informed meta and speculation: We were seeing how the season 4/5 template was beginning to unfold toward the Grady arc, which includes Carol in a major role.

BUT. Let's check in with what's been going on over the past six months. A lot of this new resurgence starts with Emily's multiple trips to Europe for TWD cons in the past six months, integrated with her (yet unrealized) insinuation that she has been in studio recording one or more songs that Beth sang on TWD. Massive financial burdens aside, these are unusual undertakings for Emily. While she has done many fan cons over the years, visiting Europe twice in a four month period is bizarre (as well as expensive). She also talked openly and excitedly in the panel at French comic-con about how cool it would be if Beth returned. Further, Emily's "re-recording" of "Parting Glass" and possibly other TWD songs was a fairly big announcement for us at the time, but we haven't seen any more on it since. Speculation went everywhere from "She'll be singing in a flashback in Daryl Dixon season 2" to "Her songs will be part of the soundtrack" to "She'll actually BE in season 2, singing, in the present moment."

A lot of these things, if they were spread out over a 5 year period, wouldn't matter at all. But the fact that they're all taking place in the six-month run-up to Daryl Dixon s. 2, when we've already been able to speculate her tenuous return based on templates and other tells, is exciting. It's been almost ten years to the day of Beth's *death.* Why now? The timing on all of this is very suspicious.

Now, a few weeks ago, there was a LEAKED SCRIPT excerpt, which was claimed to be the final scene of DD 2.6. In the script, we learn that Isabelle has died and is appearing to Daryl in the form of a hallucination while he fights walkers in the Chunnel. This was confusing for many reasons. First, we already know, given their ruthless advertisement of the fact, that season 3 is already being filmed in Spain. So why are they headed to England? Also, where the hell is Laurent? Further, Isabelle's death, while unsurprising to many of us, creates some new questions. Many members of a certain *other* ship were ecstatic to learn about Isabelle's death, as Daryl/Isabelle ship rumors have been rampant in the fandom basically since season 1. Forget the fact that the same ship FREAKED out over Daryl/Leah three years ago (a clear nothingburger). Any time another female character even comes into contact with Daryl, a notable portion of fans must make their "displeasure" widely known.

Moving on. Yesterday, an article came out summarizing a yet-unreleased interview with David Zabel in SFX magazine. You can read it here. In the interview, Zabel makes the following comment about "C*ryl":

"The obvious thing to do, and the easier thing to do would be, 'Okay, now they're falling in love and they're a couple.' But I always felt like that would be a mistake, because it would feel like you were going into the TV book of tricks," he explains. "To me, there was never a question that [their connection] was something other than what it is, and what it seems to want to be, and why it works so well."

Zabel then goes on to hint at a highly-contentious romance with Daryl and Isabelle:

"What happened in season one was that you could see a connection forming, for sure," he says. "We didn't manufacture that but we left room for it. A lot of season two is about the development of that and where that relationship goes, and that little surrogate family of Isabelle, Daryl and Laurent."

Now, the full interview doesn't come out until September 4, at which point, we may get a clearer picture of what's going on. However, it seems that Zabel is politely declining the "C*ryl as romance" narrative. In the quote, he uses the excuse of wanting to avoid TV tropes; however, he then goes on to say (in a portion of the quote that is being wildly misinterpreted among the c*ryl ship) that "To [him]," there was "never a question that [their connection was something other than what it is." He then equates "what it is" with "what it seems to want to be" and "why it works so well." The misinterpretation is coming with that second part. "What it is" = friendship. Zabel is clearly saying that c*ryl "seems to want to be" exactly "what it is," aka: a sacred friendship and nothing more. He's basically saying that this already "works so well," and so why fix what ain't broke? Why create a romance between two characters who are clearly just very, very good friends when he could go another, more interesting direction?

Certain c*ryl accounts have misinterpreted that section of the quote. They seem to think he's saying that the c*ryl ship "seems to want to be" something else, something other than what it is. But if you follow the grammatical logic of the sentence, you can see that they're wrong here. It wants to be what it already is, which is friendship. Of course, to c*rylers, what it already is = romance, but that isn't canon. There's no proof of this. In fact, there's more proof to the contrary, that they're best friends. They're family. Carol was married to somebody else, raised a child with him, still holds a contentious relationship with the other man, allowed Daryl to toil away in the woods alone for five years because she needed to stay with her husband...

In addition to factual evidence from the show, the C*ryl Friendship Campaign has been going strong on social media for MONTHS. In her video this morning, twdmusicboxmystery also goes over quasi-recent comments from Angela Kang which are UNSUPPORTIVE of a c*ryl romance. The notion that this perspective is coming out of nowhere, which some fans are claiming as a way of blaming Zabel for either lying or betraying his fanbase (and the actors), is, frankly, absurd.

Please note that I'm not saying that nobody should ship c*ryl just because it isn't canon. That would be silly. I ship non-canon ships all the time. BETHYL is a non-canon ship! I've written whole fanfics for Beth and Daryl (well, I've tried lol, but most remain unfinished). It's one of the funnest parts of being in a fandom.

What I'm saying is that c*ryl is NOT CANON. It never has been. And the people who get angry about this, who want to get professionals fired over this, who think that they're entitled to getting exactly what they want, lest the show perish, are wrong. They're doing it wrong. It's totalitarian and, frankly, obsessive. This is not how you be in a fandom, and my interpretation here of the Zabel interview in conjunction with the C*ryl Friendship Campaign is that they are TRYING to let this highly volatile and frankly unpleasant faction of the fandom down lightly in an effort to get them off tptb's AND the actors' backs. They don't want to deal with this shit anymore. And by the way, they're actually not leading anyone on. They've been insanely clear here, in their rebranding of c*ryl to a platonic ship, as to what's happening and what's going on, and while I really do feel for the good people who may feel let down by this, I am GLAD to see that the showrunners aren't going to heed the demands of one tiny, loud faction of a giant fandom, and that despite the haters, they're going to tell the story they want to tell.

ANYWAY.

Over the past 48 hours, things have gotten...weird. Zabel's interview dropped less than a day after the TWD Skybound social media accounts appear to have...posted a Bethyl edit out of nowhere. @sweetz1919 also posted early this morning, bringing together a few more Beth-related posts on either official accounts or *near* official accounts, which post promotional material, and which are followed by AMC TWD. One of these posts is a repost on twitter by Scott Gimple, who so rarely posts on social media, that any time he does, it's like a unicorn, symbolically notable and certainly important.

Now, pertaining to the Zabel interview, another wide complaint taking place in the c*ryl camp is that Zabel is likely LYING or he is being taken grossly out of context, because if c*ryl isn't happening, AND Isabelle is going to die, then how could Daryl POSSIBLY get his happy ending?

THIS is where Team Delusional comes in. Of course, we have our theories. Most people think WE'RE the delusional ones. And maybe we are! Lol. I don't really care. Most of our theories are crafted through a TON of hard, circumstantial, pattern-driven, and symbolic evidence, evidence taken from IRL sources, and hypotheses made after paying very close attention to what's been going on and making LOTS and LOTS of connections over a period of many years. Me, myself, I've only been here for four, but some of you guys have been doing this for almost ten, and for that, I salute you! As I said earlier, TD has been theorizing Beth's "return" in DD2 based greatly on symbolic and template-driven evidence alone for a while. A lot of what we're seeing now on social media is playing directly into our hand.

Emily in Europe multiple times in a 4mo period, including a trip to Paris, with her latest stint being just a week before "official" filming for season 3 was set to begin? Emily re-recording tracks from TWD? Leaked script pages in which Daryl mentions Beth specifically AND suggest that Isabelle is going to die? Romantic!C*ryl = not happening? HOW could Daryl possibly get his happy ending now? The rest is TD theory, ie: WHY we think Beth will come back to manifest Daryl's "happy ending." Speculation and theories on how she could come back, the connection to Spain/England/France, that's basically all we talk about lol, each of us with our own interests and niche perspectives, all arriving at the same point.

SO while there is still no proof that she is coming back, all of this is a Good thing, actually. For us. Because while everyone is looking around, freaking out, wondering what's going to happen next, we are seeing and able to read a LOT of signs that others ignore. And rightly so! There's no reason the rest of the GA needs to think that Beth is legitimately coming back. That would overshadow Carol's role in season 2, which is significant. It's just important that the GA REMEMBERS who Beth IS, that she was important to Daryl, and that hey, people used to really like Beth, and they liked Beth and Daryl together, and that was hopeful, and nice for him, and he hasn't had much "hope" or "niceness" since, and wouldn't it be nice if he could have that again...? All of these things are really there to do just this: let the c*ryl ship down easy, and remind people that Daryl once held a very strong connection to a woman whose life "ended" too soon, and who has really never been mentioned again.

While I really have no idea what's coming next, I wonder if we'll begin to see more astroturfed discussion on Beth's *death.* How weird it was, what the hell was going on at Grady, etc. If we don't see it in promotional material, we may hear about it in-show. Because if Daryl is casually mentioning Beth (along with Merle and Glenn) to Isabelle's ghost/vision in episode 2.6, then this likely implies that he's told her about Beth before, and that he's talked to her about what happened. It implies that Isabelle knows who Beth is, which would be a truly insane development, since he's literally never talked about her to anyone, including Carol, as far as we know.

So anyway, as usual, we should all just keep our heads down, chins to our chest, keep hope alive, but with a balanced sense of anticipation. We still really don't know what's going to happen, so it's important to be rational, but it also won't hurt to have a little faith 💫

#team delusional

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yarameijer · 2 months

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Hello it’s me again 🤭

It’s literally 4am for me right now and I was trying to sleep since I have to be up early tomorrow. But like, I can’t sleep without overthinking something, when I thought of this.

I for one absolutely hated how Shindou and Tsurugi didn’t help Tenma with Inazuma Japan, but instead made his life harder by not being willing to at least trying to adapt to what’s happening since it’s out of their control.

And who knows, maybe tenma doesn’t see the issue and doesn’t think there’s anything to forgive, Tenma is after all, a sweetheart.

But I’d like to think that he did see the issue and that he does hold some kind of resentment towards them because of it.

I’d also like to think that he does confront them about it at some point after they’re Back from space and everything calmed down a bit.

I mean, I for one would definitely talk to my friends and make them promise me to support me and have my back if something like that happened again if I was in his position.

So what do you think? Did tenma ever confront them about it? And if so how did they react?

By the way, I love your work and sense of humor and your take on the characters. Good luck with uni!!

Well, to answer simply: yes.

I've been working for quite a while on a one-shot set in the AR universe, one that's part of a larger arc (I posted another part of it before) focusing specifically on this topic, and I think you'd enjoy a preview of it.

Now, important to note is that this is written from Tsurugi's perspective rather than Tenma's, and Tenma has been bottling up a lot of things for a long time. He will likely seem very OOC here because of this - but it will (hopefully) not be as odd once the entire arc is published!

——— Accidental Reverse: Limits I

Kyousuke has never seen Tenma and Shindou like this.

He’d thought it was the worst it would get at the start of the Grand Celesta Galaxy, when they could barely have a conversation without one of them stepping on the other’s toes.

He was wrong.

‘’This isn’t working, Tenma,’’ Shindou moves with a purpose as he follows behind the young captain, his features twisted into a frown. ‘’And I think you know it too.’’

And that’s- that’s what stands out, to Kyousuke. Because this is how they've handled all team-related issues ever since Tenma became captain, it's no different from how it has been for nearly half a year now and yet he’s never seen his two friends behave like this. It seems that the only thing they can do lately is get on each other’s nerves.

What happened to their instinctive teamwork?

It’s Tenma, this time. He’s refusing to look at his strategist, eyes downcast and arms crossed as if he’s shielding himself from something. In response to the words, he just gives a half-hearted shrug.

Kyousuke winces when he sees Shindou’s eyes narrow.

‘’You could answer me, you know.’’

It’s as if he’s watching a movie with the script right in front of him; Kyousuke can see the exact moment where it goes wrong, and it’s with a quiet resignation that he takes note of Tenma’s eyes flashing. The brunet looks ready to speak in his own defense, but then his face falls. He stays silent.

And that, too, has become familiar in a way that leaves a bitter taste in Kyousuke’s mouth.

When has Tenma started feeling like he can’t talk to them?

(Kyousuke doesn't know.

He knows when he first noticed it, though - that odd phone call, all those months ago.)

They’re interrupted by the door sliding open, all three of them looking up at the new arrivals. It’s Kirino, Nishiki and Sangoku, the former two looking relieved when they spot the trio. ‘’There you are!’’ Nishiki says. ‘’We’ve been looking all over for you.’’

It’s no wonder they couldn’t find them. When Tenma stormed off the field, he didn’t go to any of the usual spots like the clubroom, instead navigating through the hallways of the soccer building until they found him in the guest team changing room.

As if he didn’t want to be found.

The thought leaves a sour taste in Kyousuke's mouth.

‘’What’s going on here?’’ Sangoku asks, expression sharp and voice sharper. He’s watching them carefully, taking in Shindou’s obvious frustration and Tenma’s odd hesitance, the younger brunet having turned away from the rest of the room.

When it becomes clear the captain won’t answer, Shindou lets out a sigh. ‘’We were talking about the new training regime for after the holidays,’’ he says, casting a glance at Tenma. At least the strategist seems to have cooled down a bit with the arrival of the others. ‘’Trying to, at least.’’

‘’Shindou-san,’’ Kyousuke interjects sharply.

The game maker sets his jaw and truthfully, at this point, part of Kyousuke could cry. Why are they all so stubborn? It’s one of Raimon’s best qualities as a team, but not if they’re fighting with each other.

‘’I’m only telling it how it is,’’ Shindou retorts, daring Kyousuke to go against him again. ‘’I can’t have a conversation with someone who refuses to even look at me.’’

What really strikes Kyousuke is that the game maker doesn’t sound mad. He sounds frustrated, sure, but it doesn’t seem to be about the training regime – honestly, the striker doubts Shindou even really cares about that.

They both know Tenma.

And it’s clear as day that something is upsetting him.

But getting Tenma to talk about his problems is like pulling teeth; he shuts down and refuses to say a word, covering it up with a smile and a clever distraction instead. And if it’s already driving Kyousuke crazy, he can’t think of how it must be for Shindou.

Because Shindou is Tenma’s go-to person whenever he needs advice, or support, or even just a hug. The two of them have always had their own subtle way of communicating that’s become a bit of a running joke in the team – it always fills them with fond amusement, to see the two brunets who used to disagree simply by being in the same room back when the team first started out, now only needing to glance at each other to know what they have in mind. It’s a great addition during matches, and outside of that it’s just kind of cute to see Tenma following their strategist around like a lost puppy and Shindou trying not to show how much he really depends on the younger’s general cheerfulness.

And now Tenma’s refusing to talk to Shindou.

Because Shindou is the problem, and the strategist is smart enough to realize it too.

‘’I think we all need a break,’’ Kirino interferes, shooting his best friend an encouraging smile. ‘’We don’t have any matches anymore until January, so maybe we should take it easy with training and do something fun.’’ He looks around, trying to find some support.

Nishiki’s nodding along. ‘’Sounds good to me, we’ve been at it for a while already. Let’s go get ramen!’’

For a long minute, Shindou doesn’t back down. He’s silent, gaze flitting between Kirino, Nishiki and Tenma, thinking it over before he finally nods. ‘’Alright. Sounds fun.’’ He doesn’t sound excited at all but that doesn’t matter; at least the situation is defused for now.

Maybe it really is that simple. The winter holidays are just around the corner, and from the moment Earth Eleven returned from space their normal school lives continued. The Winter Road is starting soon as well and they’ve been both training for that and having friendly matches with other teams each week, so maybe it really is just the case of the two brunets needing some time to relax and wind down. They’d been discussing a new training regime for the Winter Road when this disagreement started, after all.

‘’Is everyone coming?’’ Shindou asks, correctly assuming Kirino already planned for this earlier.

‘’Yup, no more practice for today. Coach Endou already agreed to it.’’

And that could’ve been the end of it, would’ve been the end of it – because the tension in Shindou’s expression is fading and Sangoku is starting to smile, and even Tenma, still turned away from them all, seems to slump in relief – if Shindou didn’t say, ‘’let’s hope we’re all more rational about this tomorrow.’’

Admittedly, it’s a poor attempt at a joke and the game maker knows it too, smiling sheepishly.

As it is, no one is prepared for the soft sound that escapes their captain.

Kyousuke doesn’t care about the alarm clear in his voice when he asks, ‘’Tenma?’’ because he can’t see his best friend’s face from here and that sounded suspiciously like he’s about to cry.

He’s seen Tenma cry maybe twice before, but it’s never fun when it happens. He thinks it’s because the brunet doesn’t want to bother them with it, and it leaves him all the more worried, because when it happens it means Tenma’s truly at his limit.

The senpai have frozen, just as taken aback by the sudden change as the forward. Shindou has taken half a step forward, reacting physically before his mind really catches up, but unsure of how to continue now. ‘’Tenma?’’ he asks, and that’s what sets him off.

Tenma whips around at breakneck speed, eyes red but dry. He looks furious. ‘’If all you’re going to do is question my judgement, why did you choose me to be captain?’’ he snaps, words directed at Shindou, but his misery is betrayed by his wavering voice. ‘’I can’t do anything right in your eyes anymore!’’

‘’I-‘’ the older brunet stares at him, lost for words for a few seconds. ‘’Pardon?’’

Kyousuke would flinch if he wasn’t still so stunned by Tenma’s sudden outburst – Shindou resorting to formal language with any of them is never a good sign.

‘’All you’ve been doing is telling me how I’m wrong! Well, I’m sorry for not living up to your standards!’’

‘’Matsukaze Tenma!’’ Sangoku snaps. ‘’You don’t talk to your elders like that!’’

And never, never has Tenma raised his voice against Sangoku – he respects the keeper, possibly more than he respects anyone else on the team, but right now he doesn’t seem to care at all. ‘’But he does get to talk to me like this?’’ he retorts sharply, shoulders drawn so tight it seems physically uncomfortable. ‘’How is that fair!’’

‘’Don’t talk about me like I’m not here,’’ Shindou suddenly interferes, having found his voice again, and Tenma crosses his arms as he looks away, refusing to meet the strategist’s gaze. At that, Kyousuke really does flinch, and for good reason – because it takes their elder friend a mere second to break out of his shock and lash out. ‘’So now you’re going back to ignoring me? Real mature, Matsukaze.’’

Kyousuke has always been thankful for their former captain’s sharp tongue. This might be the first time he’s anything but.

Why did their smartest member also need to possess such a short fuse?

From the corner of his eye, he sees Nishiki wince, and Kirino roll his eyes – and then sees their expression fall into shock, no doubt mirroring his own, as Tenma suddenly gives a humorless laugh.

‘’You want to talk about maturity, Shindou-san?’’ grey eyes are ablaze with both fury and hurt, the brunet gripping his arms so tightly his tanned skin is drained of blood. None of them have ever heard such venom in his voice before. ‘’At least I don’t bully others because of a childish grudge! Grow up already, senpai.’’

For a second, Shindou’s face falls, although his expression hardens again immediately afterwards.

Instead of the angry shout from before, this time he sounds clipped and cold as he says, ‘’I don’t think I’m the one here who needs to grow up. Why do you think I question your judgement when you behave like this?’’ It seems like he wants to add more, but Kirino’s hand on his arm stops him. The defender mutely shakes his head when angry brown eyes find his own, and after a moment, Shindou sighs.

Kyousuke barely notices that, though. His attention is trained on Tenma, mind racing with questions.

It’s why he sees how Tenma angrily averts his gaze from the interaction between his two senpai, why the young captain suddenly notices his attention. It’s why he sees him waver, for just a moment, before his shoulders draw up defensively again and his face hardens as he stares unwaveringly at the forward. A challenge, if he’d ever seen one.

Kyousuke doesn’t understand why.

And he’s always used his words sparingly, but that doesn’t mean he’s afraid to speak his mind. It’s why he dares to ask, ‘’What’s wrong with you?’’

He tried to make his voice sound a bit softer, because his intention wasn’t to attack – this is his best friend, his first friend, why would he ever want to hurt him? – but Yuuichi has always told him to practice his people skills and suddenly he understands why.

‘’Are you serious?’’ Tenma asks, and then he shakes his head and turns away without saying anything else.

The forward finds himself at a loss for words – just what has made the brunet so upset? And what do he and Shindou have to do with it? Because it’s becoming more and more obvious that Tenma isn’t only shutting their elder friend out.

He’s pushing Kyousuke away too.

‘’Tenma,’’ Sangoku says, and he sounds stern enough that it gets the captain to look at him. ‘’Shindou.’’ He crosses his arms and gives both brunets a sharp look. ‘’I don’t know what’s got the both of you so upset with each other, but you need to talk it out. It’s messing up the team, and,’’ he stresses the last word when he notices their captain averting his gaze again, ‘’it’s hurting you both. Don’t let your stubbornness ruin your friendship.’’

At least it seems Shindou is considering his words, however miffed he may still look.

But, again, it’s Tenma who is frowning, who is refusing to look at any of them. Instead he keeps his eyes trained on the floor and asks, ‘’May I be excused?’’ and despite his polite words, he sounds strained.

Sangoku shares a troubled look with Kirino and Nishiki, but then he sighs and gives the go-ahead. The next second, their young captain is brushing past them all and disappearing through the door, leaving them to stare at his retreating back.

For a few moments, silence falls between the remaining players, no one quite knowing what to say. Sure, Kyousuke has noticed signs of this weeks ago already – maybe even before that – but it’s never been this bad.

He huffs, and shakes his head. Leave it to Tenma to get inside his head like this, to get them all so wound up for some unknown reason.

And yet, even as Kyousuke and the others begin to make their way back to the clubroom, he can’t ignore the dread settling in the back of his throat.

No matter how hard he tries to ignore it, he can’t get the furious look on Tenma’s face out of his mind.

————

I hope you enjoyed it! It doesn't quite answer your questions, sorry for that, but this is only a sneak peek of a larger series of one-shots - titled ''Limits'' - that I will hopefully post one day soon! This is directly related to Tenma's interactions with Shindou (and in part Tsurugi) during Galaxy - and beyond that, to the very start of the anime.

Remember how Raimon wasn't exactly the greatest team in the first few episodes? Yeah, Tenma does too.

Which is interesting because he doesn't seem like the person to hold a grudge, instead bottling it all up - until he's pushed to the limit and, well, the above happens.

I know it's not a complete answer, but I hope you're satisfied with this!

#inazuma eleven go #inazuma eleven #ie11 #ina11 #ie go #ina11 go #inazuma 11 go #fanfic #accidental reverse #matsukaze tenma #tsurugi kyousuke #shindou takuto #raimon

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elderwisp · 6 months

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The Creative Process ‧₊˚✩彡

Because I love to be distracted

Hi! Ok, I wanted to share wif everyone my process in which I create a story post from conception to the final post. I would say I'm a very structured person when it comes to projects like these however, I've learned a lot and maybe someone could find something useful! We'll be referencing this scene. Oke, let's start!

✩ Rough Drafts

So, of course everything starts off with a vision. While I always say, write what feels authentic to you, I also know it makes things much more difficult if you don't have a solid ground to build from. I think I've scrapped this particular story about twice already and even reshot the first chunk of Tessellate so there was a better foundation. I like to start off with understanding a character before moving onto creating a plot, otherwise people start bleed into another. Greta Gerwig makes a really awesome statement about how characters come first to her before plot. OKE with that in mind, this particular scene, I wrote it well over a year ago, however there wasn't much flow in the initial draft. In fact, the two look nothing alike. This conversation was supposed to occur during France's concert, but I moved it to to this particular scene and I'm so glad. I felt like their current relationship was strong enough to have this conversation but also it allowed me to really focus in on the two. I am a huge advocate for jotting down dialogue even if things change because you can always expand on an idea. And if things don't work, scrapping is okay, but at least you gave it a shot! After that change, I didn't revisit that scene up until about a month and a half ago. I like to let things sit for a good while. In the initial draft, Taryn was reserved throughout a majority of the conversation. There was limitations in which how I wanted her to express things but things change in a year. When I looked at her as a character and how she's progressed throughout the story, the draft no longer aligned with her lack of response. And then that created the question of what the heck does one say? Because people aren't typically very graceful or eloquent when it comes to confrontation but also we're telling a story so how do I balance the two out? Since, I've followed these little blorbos for a while, knowing their characters and motives allowed me to flesh everything out. Atlas is much more cunning than he lets on and is excellent at painting a pretty picture for those around him if it means getting what he wants. Taryn on the other hand is perceptive and unwavering so being around someone like him, someone that she finds herself slowly falling for, is a complete, well, mind fuck. We can also see from this interaction that there's a hint of feeling inadequate and the lack of confidence to know that maybe he does like her. We also see that Atlas maybe isn't the most mature when it comes to developing something real so the two have plenty to work on just from this scene alone. Like Greta Gerwig says, writing is listening.

I also wanted to mention LocalScriptMan and this video all the time because it just about changed how I viewed dialogue in general. I think it's such a great tool! I've probably shared it a billion times.

✩ Blender & Posemaking

So I would like to preface this by saying, you do not need to use blender to achieve a vision. There are still scenes that I still use poses/animations from other creators! I wanted to list a few references! Rebouks, Rascgal and Simmireen have an amazing variety of poses to use! I literally use Becca's bumper packs RELIGOUSLY! However, if you need any suggestions, SurelySim's has an excellent breakdown on getting started with posemaking from tiny details, to SimRipper and using accessories! She also talks about Vyxated's Pose Helper which is a god send! For this scene I wanted to fully pose it. In my script, I italicize anything I want to pose, I'm such a sucker for the mannerisms that people have. When words fail, body language speaks. Are they fidget-y, or do I imagine them to be more composed? Taryn's stance is grounded, she doesn't move at all in the scene except for when she leaves and I think it's a great representation of her stubbornness. Whereas Atlas is watching every single move, up until he makes his incredibly bold (ridiculous!) statement. As for emotion when he made that statement, I wanted to go with shame but then I felt like his expression radiated ruthlessness. I personally enjoyed that 10x more because it represented two things for me, his character and that he felt comfortable enough to show that part of himself. When posing a scene from start to finish, it takes me about 1-3 days depending on how complex it is. I'm a huge advocate for using references! I love referencing hands, posture, how to grab a book ANYTHING! Because this was a conversation and not much action happened, it took me about a day.

✩ Taking Screenshots and Composition

I began taking photos for this scene on March 6th. I use to use this reshade preset by growfruit however, after tinkering with some settings I use like a mish-mash blorbo of a preset. Amobae and Sforz have some cool LUT's for download (I think of it like a filter? That's probably not what it is but MEH) and I love the qUINT's lightroom shader as well. Huge advocate of relight, I was today years old when I learn that you should load it at the top of your shaders order so you don't get like a weird whitecast. These spotlights though are super fun too if you don't use reshade! There are some photographers on instagram that even go over how to use lightroom and it can translate to game as well! For the most part, I try to keep screenshots pretty simple, editing-wise but there are moments when I doodle in little hairs, add in some texture and include shadows for, uh, DRAMAAA. Lately, I've been incorporating intricate fonts because idk sometimes my brain enjoys a little graphic design moment. Sometimes shooting conversation heavy scenes can get so repetitive so I like to look at film stills on pinterest or pay close attention to a film and how they present the camera work in a conversation. Rule of thirds is a great reference tool to use, I believe GShade has a shader for that. However it's okay to experiment, it's not an end all be all. I love looking at animators and how each frame is incredibly intentional, whether it's a shot from above or a really close frame. The beginning of this scene, I honestly didn't have a clue as to how I wanted to open it up since they were walking down a hall. Then I noticed the detail in the fencing and how the tiles were opposite. Using the TOOL mod, I was able to get them both in the center and it created a strong opening shot of how different these two are.

✩ Editing

My god, I love editing but also this is usually the moment where I get so freaking distracted. This process takes me a day if I am focused.... But realistically it takes three days.... That's why I try to keep things to a minimum. I do use Photoshop. I like to use this sharpening action (the other actions are awesome too!) for story posts, I crop each photo (I use a 9:5 ratio and a 16:6 ratio if I need to focus on something specific idk why i picked those numbers yo), and add in text. Dafont has a lot of different free fonts. I like to use these little guidelines if sentences needs to be centered.

For adding umph to text, I like to use two things: The warped text option when using the type tool or just going to the distort panel and using the wave option!

Also bottom right of your layers channel is an fx layer. I like to use stroke and drop shadow on all text so it doesn't get lost within a photo!

✩ Finalization and My Schedule

That story post was uploaded on March 29th. As of right now, I like to stay three weeks ahead so I have three weeks worth of story posts marinating in my queue LMAO. I always reread things like a bajillion times, sometimes I'll go back and tweak conversations if they feel a bit stiff. Having that three week buffer also gives me time to really dedicate myself to details and focus on being present with a future scene. Another perk is, it allows me to work on cleaning up the script, plotting for future arcs, and having fun with edits. When I used to upload story videos on youtube, I didn't really plan ahead and it was so chaotic for me. Sometimes I didn't have enough time to actually create a solid episode so things felt rushed because on top of that I had a schedule I committed to. This isn't necessary but structure and patterns is something my little brain needs.

I hope this maybe provided some tips for people wanting to start out or it was just a fun little thing to read! One final OP tip is to write about something that you enjoy, something that matters to you. I'm one mf that loves a fleshed out character arc, that doesn't like linear plots and for fucks sake I love a good slow burn and I think all of that reflects a lot which helps me be engaged.

#damn me really talking about my hyperfixation with the fellow gamers #there might be hella run ons sorry my brain is a run on i don't control dat #u get one sneak peak too in the film roll #i wish i had rough drafts of dialogue but bc i use google docs i don't have any prior copies >.<#idk wtf to tag this #tessellate: extras #sims 4 story #sims 4 story tips #creative process

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auraworkshop · 7 months

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Hello Aura!! Aaaa, okay. I’m not here to write a success story yet! But to ask if I’m as close as I felt just a couple of moments ago.

So, I found about the void, the I AM, the golden state, aaaall of it a couple of months ago and I went through probably all the stages of someone trying to get the life of their dreams.

Overconsumption, doubt, and spurts of obsessive motivation that honestly took me nowhere. I have ADHD so the methods where I had to close my eyes, stay still and affirm never did a thing for me. I’d do them, six minutes at most would pass and I’d feel like a failure.

Procrastination got a hold of me and I’d feel more motivated to script and write what I wanted than actually go and try to get it because part of me knew I’d last very little. I tried yoga nidra, hypnosis and subliminals with very little progress and most likely because of my own laziness because in my mind if I was so powerful then why did I have to try so much. I have to mention I’ve used subliminals in the past and I’ve gotten little to no results so at night I’d cry and ask what is wrong with me. Since I know they work and the law is real.

Yesterday I came across a couple of posts with ADHD friendly methods where they say to let your mind wander and to let it do its thing. Plus others saying to mentally listen to music? But that’s not what I did.

I made a playlist of songs that wouldn’t bore me and I wouldn’t feel inclined to change the song. in total an hour or so. I knew if stayed still enough my body would be numb, I wouldn’t feel my fingers, my toes, etc.

If I concentrated in the songs instead of how tedious it is to stay still then it’d be easier for me.

I didn’t know if this was the floaty feeling everyone talks about until I decided to look into the black of my eyelids and try to see beyond that while affirming. my void is full of stars so I started to affirm they were slowly appearing and suddenly I did feel like my body was lifting up from my bed and numbness extended through my whole body including my face. Pins and needles like when your arm falls asleep, some of my muscles tensed and my heart started pounding for a second, I kept affirming but the song playing plus the excitement of feeling something overwhelmed me and I started to go back.

I paused the playlist and went to listen to epsilon waves and affirm but the idea of waiting for everything to happen again overwhelmed and frustrated me.

Was I close? How should I go forward? I sorta need advice directed at my situation because I can’t relate to most void posts.

Thank you for your time!!

I can relate to this so much. Trying various methods for so long with no result yet people were out there telling me that I must keep persisting. But I just didn't understand how to persist through the frustration of getting no result. It was only when I let go of this desire and I stopped caring about anything that anything and everything happened in the best way. I cannot even think of a single method that I followed to enter the void. I just stopped caring and let my mind wander.

You've already experienced a shift within your state of consciousness if you have reached a stage where you were listening to music and letting your body go numb. You need to let yourself flow without overthinking or overloading yourself. That is why it is important to start small because the feeling of going to the void state will come in fragments at first. That's just how the state of consciousness manifests itself. Let your mind wander and flow. Do not limit yourself with doubts of why it is taking so much time or why it's not working because that is exactly what it is, trust the process.

Everything you just experienced is a confirmation that you are exactly where you need to be. It is not a coincidence that you suddenly felt pins and needles throughout your whole body. This means exactly that your consciousness has started expanding, you've gone beyond your ordinary state.

You do not have to wait for it to happen again because you are already experiencing it. What you should be doing right now is continue with the process but you are going to be more patient. Be mindful and observe that which has changed in your perception, be aware of the subtle shifts ! 🤍

#void #void state

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utilitycaster · 3 months

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What are some of your favourite podcasts / podcast recs?

It's hard to pick a favorite though I will say at the moment Midst is the one I think I look forward to the most, so I'm just going to go through basically all podcasts I currently or relatively recently previously listened to and sort them by rough genre. Note that as with all recommendation requests it helps to know the vibe of what you're going for and what's important to you (I know I just was like hey I'll take most music recs but the commitment for music is like the length of a song, whereas podcasts/books/movies/tv are a bit more time put in)

Actual Play:

Longtime listener of NADDPod and TAZ which I'm guessing if you follow me you are broadly aware of but if not feel free to ask more; I also post about Worlds Beyond Number enough that you might know what it is. I checked out Burnt Cookbook party a while ago both because I liked Jenna Stoeber's work with Polygon and because someone asked me for Actual Play podcast-only recs with more than one woman or nb player that weren't RQG and I was like oh I should find some. Anyway it's quite good! it's definitely lower production values than bigger podcasts but the plot is highly original and really good, the vibes are fantastic, the characters are a lot of fun, and all in all worth checking out. I also do listen to the Re-Slayer's Take which I've really enjoyed! Everyone's good but while I was familiar with (and a fan of) Jasmine Bhullar and Jasper William Cartwright's work, Jasmine Chiong as Farah speaks to the Grouchy Old Hunter Woman fan in me and has been a personal standout. It is very heavily edited, which does take some getting used to. Also, I mentioned RQG (Rusty Quill Gaming). It comes with the caveat of "very good but slow to start and then doesn't really stick the landing, imo, though the epilogues help" but I can recommend with that warning.

Scripted Fiction

Camlann. Modern post-apocalyptic Arthuriana/Folklore of the British Isles, with some hints of other folklore as well. 1 season; hoping they get funding for a second because it was very well done and also I want Gwen and Morgan to kiss.

Midst. Hard to describe but if you follow me you've seen a lot of posts that might help. Extremely good! About to finish in a bit over a week's time! Check it out and I advice you check out the first 3 episodes at once to get a feel for it; the three-narrator thing is also "get used to it and it will be fine".

The Penumbra Podcast. Originally envisioned as an anthology podcast but then two specific settings (noir-y space opera and medieval court monster hunters) were very popular. Also nearing its end.

The Silt Verses. Quite literally everything on this list would be described as "New Weird" and "has queer characters" and this is maybe the New Weirdest. Anyway, set in a world where gods are real, require human sacrifice to live, and society is both very complicit and also uses the gods to sell shit. I think people who are mad about D20 or CR not being explicitly political enough should listen to it. Extremely good. Also in its endgame, but they've had a very drawn out schedule as of late.

Welcome to Night Vale. You are on Tumblr; presumably you know the drill. I can't say I'm like...super following what happens but it's one of those things that's been a constant in my life for over a decade and takes up a very pleasant hour-ish per month. This feels like damning with faint praise but the earlier stuff was great and it's still strong, it's just, you know, the inevitable slowness of an indefinitely long slice-of-life-ish show vs. the more plot-driven ones above.

Within the Wires. By one of the Night Vale Creators. I have a post about it but it's set on an alternate history Earth where a cataclysmic war/plague/various other bad things absolutely destroyed the population in the early 1900s, leading to a very different global society. Some people say the seasons are very uneven in quality. They are incorrect. The seasons follow different people and all are in the form of found audio, so they are all quite different, but it's entirely a matter of personal preference if you like a season or not; it's not that some are Objectively Better.

Wolf 359 finished a long time back and I haven't relistened since my original listen in like...2018, but of "podcasts that have finished" it's worth it. Weird space stuff.

Informative(?)

Home Cooking by Hrishikesh Hirway and Samin Nosrat; was a pandemic project that now only airs yearly, really, but worth checking out if you like cooking.

I found out about Home Cooking via Song Exploder, which is just Hrishikesh Hirway talking about songs. Great podcast; the editing is fascinating and I have found a lot of good music from it!

I Only Listen to the Mountain Goats. Has only two seasons but they are both very good if you like The Mountain Goats as a band.

No Such Thing as a Fish: the QI (British quiz show) (if you're British you know this better than I do) researches talk about weird facts and riff on them.

Sawbones: Justin McElroy and his wife Dr. Sydnee Smirl McElroy talk about weird medical history and dumb wellness trends on tiktok. This is one of the earliest podcasts I subscribed to back when I did not drive nearly as much.

The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green. Has also completed and there's a book that's basically covering the same ground. It's not like, purely informative; it's very anecdotal (as is I Only Listen to the Mountain Goats) but I learned a lot from it.

Honorable mention: I just didn't have the time or energy to keep up with Ologies by Alie Ward but what I listened to was fun and interesting and my sibling is a big fan.

Comedy and Miscellany:

Beef and Dairy Network: also British, on the Max Fun network with the McElroys. Fucking weird. I debated putting this in the scripted fiction because it's basically "what if Welcome to Night Vale was a little less story focused but still had throughlines and was specifically about the cattle industry in some absurdist alternate version of our world" but stuck with comedy bc the absurdity outstrips the plot. It's weird!

My Brother, My Brother, and Me: you probably know this one; either you love it or you don't.

My Dad Wrote a Porno: also British and from what I understand a bigger deal over there. Has uh. reached completion, in that they decided they were done, but the books apparently go on (sorry Rocky I'm not buying them). A guy and his two good friends read and roast his father's self-published erotica e-books about Belinda Blumenthal, Pots and Pans saleswoman, ft. bad accents, corporate espionage, and, of course, The Duchess.

The Empty Bowl: Justin McElroy and Dan Goubert of Cerealously's ASMR podcast about cereal. legitimately has helped me calm down when anxious at night. I am not even a big cereal eater it's just entertaining and chill.

Anyway any other podcasts I have listened to I've either forgotten, weren't good enough to recommend, just disappeared without any conclusion [*cough* king falls am] or involve way more reservations than I am willing to go into without knowing more about what you are looking for.

#answered #Anonymous

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employee052 · 7 months

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ozzies long-ass TSP ramble

For context, a few days ago i was in a thinky mood when i watched this video on Valve catwalks. it mentioned death of the author, and while ive heard of it, I didnt understand what it meant until after the video explained it. So i got thinking. the following was a series of messages I sent to my friends on a discord server im in (with the exception of the last part bc i just thought of it now even tho im sick) that i compiled for yall into sections so its easier to read. these are just my thoughts and could be totally wrong, i just wanted to share aksjdh :P (plus this is my second time im posting this so there might be some inconsistencies)

(ramble under the cut so yall dont get a massive wave of text on your dash)

"smth smth death of the author smth smth reviews smth smth interpretations smth smth skip button"

like idk if this was obvious to everyone else n im just finally getting it or not, but the skip button ending being about the narrator seeing the negative reviews causing him to create the button in order to appease them, which said reviews ended up making him believe he was being preachy and obnoxious and unfunny, but as a result, he ends up believing it and trying to appease those interpretations rather than be more confident of his dialogue and what it means to him(whatever he may believe) and ending up dying at the end bc of it being a kind of literal version a death of an author of sorts

---

im just thinking about how timekeeper/settings person/432/whatever is really only interested in the player, but not stanley himself. and if the narrator ends up dying (or decaying at least in my interpretation) during the skip button, could the same be said about stanley as a character as well?

like we never see stanleys model as us, we dont see his feet when we look down, and the only time we see him in game is either as a hand during the bucket escape pod ending, the mariella endings, and the not stanley ending. and the last two are cutscenes. for all we know, stanley could have died at some point during the skip button after the narrator did and we would never know bc we cant see him

but since 432's desk being at the end of the epilogue which happens post skip button ending, i would have said that was the first time we ever see him interact with the game internally rather than asking for the time. but i do remember someone suggesting that the timekeeper was the one who removed the door in the skip button in order to kill the narrator off and get stanley/the player away from him in order to talk more

with that thought in mind, that would mean TK had to kill stanley and the narrator off in order to be able to lead the game, push beyond the barriers of a narrator and character and just talk to the player, one on one

---

it makes me wonder if what the curator said in the museum ending holds more weight

like, she talks to the player as well. both she and TK talk to the player themselves instead of stanley the character. and when she says "When every path you can walk has been created for you long in advance, death becomes meaningless, making life the same. Do you see now? Do you see that Stanley was already dead from the moment he hit start?"

stanley's function is a character in the narrators story, a literary device to propel the game forward. the narrator makes the race track, and stanley drives. without the narrator where would stanley go or do, without stanley who would move the story along?

"Can you see? Can you see how much they need one another? No, perhaps not. Sometimes these things cannot be seen."

and yet, hes dead, just like the curator said. because no matter what, he's never going to be able to truly make his own decisions. the confusion ending lays out how all the endings are scripted despite what the narrator believes and acts, its all predetermined.

and in a sense, the narrators dead too. no matter what stanley tries to do to change the story, or the narrator changes to the game in order for stanley to react to, its been planned long in advance for the eventuality. every word, every event. and with stanley's deaths, it ends up just bringing them back to the beginning again, "What exactly did the Narrator think he was going to accomplish?" if they always come back to the same preplanned paths, to the illusion of free will, it doesnt matter regardless. death doesnt become a statement, it becomes an inconvenience.

"But listen to me, you can still save these two. You can stop the program before they both fail. Push escape, and press quit. There's no other way to beat this game. As long as you move forward, you'll be walking someone else's path. Stop now, and it'll be your only true choice."

The only way to save both Stanley and The Narrator is by not letting the story play out to begin with. To beat the game, which means to let the game end after you win.

and yet,

the end is never the end is never the end is never the end is never the end is never the end is neve-

In a game where there is no ending that stops the game in its entirety, where everything will keep on happening again and again and the end is never the end, the only way to beat it is to make a choice as yourself the player, not stanley the character.

because he doesnt get a choice, the narrator doesnt get a choice. they think they do, but they dont. the only way to beat the game is to not play it. (which makes sense given that there are achievements involving not playing the game in both the 2013 HD remaster and 2022 Ultra Deluxe)

both Stanley and The Narrator are two sides of the same coin that make up The Stanley Parable, and the only way to use the coin is to give it away.

maybe thats why the true ending of the game with credits and stuff like that, is the Not Stanley Ending.

You the player have successfully broken the fourth wall from the outside in, even though that ending was planned like all the others (ie, the game allowing you to disconect the phone), you break the illusion of being stanley the character, which the game ends up booting you out of stanley as it cant handle the "narrative contradiction".

maybe thats why the escape pod ending has the sign that reads "both the player and the narrator must be present in order to leave". its not stanley, its the player, us.

maybe thats why that ending is one of the most cruel. the only way to get there is to leave the narrator trapped in the boss' office. there's no way to get him to the escape pod. the end is never the end.

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(this part was the new idea i just had today so this might not make sense i appologize)

going back to the beginning of this ramble about the death of the author and such. perhaps there is a way to get the narrator out.

with thoughts about interpretations and with he idea of the "death of the author", all of us have our own interpretations of the TSP characters. whether its design, or relationship wise, or characterization, or what have you. The Narrator in my head is different from you reading this, and that narrator is different from another persons perspective, and definitely our narrators are different to the one that lives in Davey Wreden's head, or Kevan Brighting, or anyone who has even heard of the stanley parable.

and that's not a bad thing! there can be many similarities to the characters that our interpretations share, some more common than others and some that make no sense at all, but for the most part we all have different interpretations of the characters.

I read a book called Book Simulator (The Reader's guide to not reading) by Chris Yee on stream once. The VOD is gone now. But I discovered the book because I heard the guy writing/the narrator of sorts for the book was written like the Stanley Parable Narrator.

It didnt help that Kevan brighting voiced over the commercial for it too askjdh

but back to the book. this will contain somewhat spoilers for it since it brings up a moment at the end of the book so feel free to stop here if you dont want to be spoiled

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basically, in Book Simulator, Booksi (The book's instructional narrator on how to fake read at the start of the book) is arguing with The Narrator (no not ours, but the general narrator who speaks in the third person), however, its revealed by The Narrator that Booksi has a plan to take over the world by inhabiting more book simulators and distributing them across the world. But, the reader could kill off the booksi that they have in their hands that they are reading, to quote:

"Or was he the original Booksi? Maybe not. Maybe the original Booksi had been vanquished long ago, and the reader was now facing one of the many copies roaming the world. Both Booksi and the Narrator knew the answer to this question, but neither would reveal the truth."

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Taking from Book Simulator the concept of multiple iterations of one character existing in different copies of the media they originate from, maybe in a way that's how the Narrator may die in the stanley parable, forever stuck to repeat the same endings with the illusion of free will, but he lives on somewhat for everyone that has seen or heard of him in any capacity.

this may sound a bit preachy (oh the irony) but bare with me:

The Original Narrator from The Stanley Parable is dead, dead in the sense that he and Stanley are stuck within the game, given the illusion of free choice, and unable to leave nor do anything to try and escape, is also alive in the sense that we the players perception of The Narrator lives on in our minds.

The Narrator from the game might be stuck, but the Narrator i see in my head, the one i designed and draw and think of is perfectly fine and alive as ever.

and the same goes with you and anyone else who has heard of the narrator. their interpretation is still unique and different to them even if it all comes from the same media. he may not be exactly the same as the original, but hes still there. and in a way, hes free.

(man typing this last segment down makes me feel like a gd priest, and/or someone talking abt the barbie movie akjdhkjasdh so sorry if doesnt make sense at all :P)

#ozzies tsp rambles #ozzie rambles #tsp #tspud #the stanley parable #the stanley parable ultra deluxe #stanley parable #tsp narrator #tspud narrator #tsp stanley #tspud stanley #tspud timekeeper #tsp curator #tspud curator

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partystoragechest · 1 month

Text

A story of romance, politics, and drama, which continues ever on.

Supplemental material for Unwanted. In this post-script, Trevelyan journeys to the Temple of Sacred Ashes at the worst possible time.

(Masterpost. Beginning. Words: 3,110. Rating: all audiences, bar some swearing.)

Bonus Chapter: The Temple of Sacred Ashes (Part 1)

The Temple of Sacred Ashes lived up to its name in only one aspect: there was plenty of ash.

Trevelyan and Herzt left boot-prints in their wake, as they walked the ruins of the temple. What had once been a grand, mountain-side monument to the glory of the Maker was now little more than a crater of crumbled walls, peppered with towering spikes of red lyrium, clawing their way out of the ground.

It was the latter, of course, they came to see. Well, there wasn’t much else to gawk at—except, perhaps, the glimmering green scar of the Breach, left hanging in the skies above.

“The largest concentrations appear to have formed where organic material is in abundance,” Trevelyan noted to Herzt, as they crept toward a particularly intimidating spike. It had sapped what little life grew around it, nothing but dry, dead grasses left in its wake.

“That is consistent with our previous findings, Arcanist,” added Herzt. “It thrives on the biology of others.”

Trevelyan sighed, and looked out over the crater below. The evidence for this point was laid quite plainly before them, as it was not merely nature that the red lyrium had feasted upon. The corpses of those who’d died to the Breach had been drained to little more than unrecognisable husks.

“Death follows where it goes,” muttered Trevelyan.

She dipped into her satchel, to take a note—but paused. A thumping sound, like the beat of a distant drum, echoed around the mountains.

“Do you hear that?” she asked Herzt.

He nodded. “Strange. I do not recognise it.”

Trevelyan glanced back at their retinue, who had, thus far, been contentedly idling while she researched. Not so now.

At arms, they listened. Somewhere, beyond the crater, cries rang out and weaponry clashed. Unmistakable: the cacophony of battle. It rippled like a wave through the valley, surging ever closer, in concert with the approaching thrum.

A muffled shout reached them. One of the soldiers must have heard, for they repeated it, loud and clear:

“DRAGON!”

All fell to shadow, as the sun was blotted from the sky. Silence perished, ‘neath the dreaded pound of thunderous wings. Trevelyan looked to Herzt.

“Run!”

Darkness shifted; the dragon dove. Trevelyan and Herzt sprinted from the ruins, towards the underpass from which they’d entered. Though no more than a roof that had survived rubbling, it was the best defense they had.

“Come on, come on!” called a soldier from within. Trevelyan and Herzt skidded past the protection of his shield, as a blast of pure energy detonated in the spot they had occupied mere moments ago.

Trevelyan’s eyes widened. “That was—”

That was no primal element. Not flame, not ice, not even lightning—though it burned just as blinding-bright. No, it was unlike any of that.

It was red.

Trevelyan glanced to where the dragon circled, patrolling the skies above. Silhouetted by the dying sun, she glimpsed a rider upon its back.

“Corypheus.”

Though she had not seen the creature before, she knew him by description. And it wasn’t like there were any other red lyrium dragon-riding bastards terrorising the countryside.

But why? Why was he here?

Trevelyan’s eyes caught on the closed-up wound of the Breach, and all became clear.

“Herzt,” she said, looking him in the eye, “you need to run back to camp. Send a bird to Skyhold immediately. Tell them Corypheus is attempting to reopen the Breach.”

Herzt nodded, dutiful as ever, completely placid in the face of death. “Yes, Arcanist.”

A soldier stumbled in, from the direction of the valley: “It’ll be a fight. We’ve got forces incoming.”

“Then go with him,” Trevelyan told a handful of soldiers. “That message must be sent.”

“What about you?” their Captain asked.

Trevelyan readied her staff. “Corypheus cannot be allowed to reopen the Breach.”

“No.” The Captain stared her down. “You’re not to come to any danger—Commander’s orders.”

The dragon roared. Trevelyan gathered energy within her focus.

“He’ll forgive me.”

She blinked through the Fade, abandoning the safety of the underpass, and took off running. The Captain called for her to return, but she did not look back. Her eyes were firmly on the skies above, and the dragon that filled them.

“Here, you bastard!” she shouted, sending a fireball off in its direction. “Follow me!”

Though the spell missed its target, it certainly gained its attention. The dragon rounded on her, and pursued.

Nothing could terrify quite like that. To know there was something coming. To hear it close the distance. To feel its breath striking at one’s back. Nothing could terrify like the feeling of being hunted.

Trevelyan had run like this before. She could do it again. Whenever she felt she had mana capable, she slipped through the Fade, got a little further.

But there was no outrunning the blast.

The moment she heard it in the dragon’s throat, she turned. Leapt. Down a level of the crater, back pressed against the stone. Energy quaked the rock above her head, the very wall she clung to.

But the dragon had missed. That was all that mattered.

Little time to celebrate, however. It swung through the sky, readying for a second bombardment. Trevelyan needed to move.

Her only chance was a quirk of the landscape she had noticed during her exploration of it. The valley was not this crater’s only exit: there was another path, a sheer climb, up through the mountains. Yet it was sheltered enough—by cliffs on both sides—that if Trevelyan could make it to the first ladder, she could make it out.

Her eyes locked onto it. Her body readied to run.

The dragon twisted in the sky, and brought its gaze upon her. A roar preceded its next deadly breath. Jaw, open. Teeth, beared. A blast—

—hit the rock behind her, as Trevelyan burst from the wall and Fade-stepped forward. She hit the ground at a pace, dashing across the crater’s centre. A frustrated roar overwhelmed her ears. There was no time to listen. Breathless, desperate, she ran.

But what lay between her and the other side was a wasteland. No walls; just stone, just lyrium. Nowhere to hide.

And there was a screech at her back.

Trevelyan took what Fade energy she had, and threw it out behind her. A wall of fire rocketed up at her command, and obscured her from the dragon’s view. Though its breath blasted clean through the flames—the shot went wide. She survived, again.

Up the crater, and into the cliffs. What would happen beyond them, she did not know. But this was her only chance of escape. Her hand clapped onto the rung of the first ladder. With a glance behind to see the dragon circle, she began to climb.

Hand over hand, she scaled the ladder as fast as she could. A panting dash, to the next. No opportunity to check her vicinity, she listened for wings instead. Not far—but far enough. There was time. Time she would not waste. Up, quickly.

Yet with haste, comes inaccuracy. And for her, the inevitable occurred. As she came within arm’s reach of the summit, Trevelyan’s foot missed a rung.

Her body dropped, stopped only by the sudden reaction of her hands, clinging on with all her might. She dangled, feet slipping as she tried, desperately, to find her footing once more. The wings. She could no longer hear them.

A foot latched on. She glanced out, to locate her doom—but the dragon was nowhere near her. The dragon did not care for her. No, its attention was quite elsewhere.

The call of a bird shrieked across the mountain peaks, as it soared into the sky. Sent from their camp, seeking home. Seeking Skyhold.

The dragon turned on it.

“No!” Trevelyan screamed.

One arm clinging to the ladder, her other drew her staff and thrust it outward. By her will, clouds darkened. Thunder rumbled. Her fear and anger were drawn to her focus, and concentrated into raw power.

Lightning shot down from the sky, aimed at the dragon’s wing.

The beast, jaws wide, was forced to rear back—its momentum halted, its wings furled. Though the lightning streaked past its body, the damage was done. The bird was gone, lost over the range.

Fury shook the sky, as the dragon roared its frustration. Trevelyan was already climbing again. She knew who would be the target of its anger. The next blast was coming. There was no running.

But there was hiding. Upon the mountain plateau, salvation made itself known. An opening, in the peak—dark beyond its entrance, but good enough to evade the wrath of a dragon. With its presence in her periphery, Trevelyan ran.

Each second lasted as if an hour. Each stride felt a marathon. It was as if Trevelyan witnessed the very last moments of her life, in every intricate detail. The whistle of the wind past her ears. The flight of the snow kicked up by her feet. The pain of breaths, slicing at her throat.

She could hear the dragon like a gathering storm.

Her foot hit the threshold of the cavern, and all returned to motion. She threw herself around a corner, pressed her back to the walls—as an almighty burst of raw, red energy ploughed into the entrance.

No speck of stone was spared; the dragon torched it all. Repeatedly. Its roars shook the mountain; its breath caused it to falter. Trevelyan’s entire body tensed, compacting itself against the rock. She squeezed her eyes shut, as if that made a difference; she clutched her staff to her chest, begging its protection.

In the darkness of her fear, she heard the shudder of stone. Relentlessly beaten by the dragon’s breath, it cracked and strained. And soon, the sound of the roar was drowned out, by that of avalanching rock.

Trevelyan held her breath, and prayed.

When at last the cavern fell to quiet, a cloud of dust brushed past her face. Her eyes slowly opened, to see the entrance of the cave—mere feet away—no longer extant. Collapsed.

“No!” she cried. She clambered closer, and listened to what lay beyond. Yet, beside the settling rock, she heard nothing. Nothing, except the faint sound of wings, receding from the mountain.

It couldn’t be. Corypheus was returning to the Breach.

Desperate, Trevelyan scrambled back. She aimed her staff at the pile of debris, built its power—and released. A blast of raw, kinetic energy crashed into the rubble. But it did not clear. Instead, it shook. The whole mountain shook. The avalanche began anew.

Trevelyan ran, a wall of falling rock at her heels, a cloud of chasing dust threatening to consume her. Her heart beat as loud as it had for the dragon. A mountain had no concept of mercy either.

But in her haste, the features of the cavern eluded her. A drop appeared before her—a set of stairs she noticed all too late. Trevelyan fell, and fell, and fell.

Her hip smacked into the ground where she landed, and Trevelyan cried out in pain. Though the rockfall had been evaded, it had come at a cost. Wincing, crawling, she found her staff where it had fallen, and by its support, was able to stand.

She hissed from the strain. A hand pressed to her side, and she did her best to heal. All the while, her eyes surveyed.

Though she would rather not have discovered them the way she did, these stairs were important. Stairs were made by mortal hands, not mountains. Someone had been here, once; left paved floors and supporting columns. If only they’d reinforced the exit more.

“There must be another,” Trevelyan muttered to herself.

With a fire in her palm lighting the way, she began her search.

But this place was an inscrutable maze. The dripping of stalagtites was her only company, each droplet that struck the ground driving her further and further to madness. Every second she wasted here was another that Corypheus had to enact his dark will upon the Breach. It cracked and burst in her mind, as if it were already too late. Maker, let it not be too late.

“Are you sure you’ll be all right? I could accompany you.”

Her mind trailed to even deeper anxieties. To the words of Cullen, hours before she had left.

“You need to oversee the return of troops from the Arbor Wilds,” she’d told him, “I’ll be all right. I’ll have Herzt, and the retinue.”

“Be careful, please. The area isn’t safe.”

Oh, the pleading in his eyes as he said those words.

“I promise you, Cullen—I’ll returned unharmed.”

That promise. She would not forsake it. She would find the way out. She would stop Corypheus. If not for her, then for him.

Something echoed in the darkness ahead, and pulled her mind from its recollection. Nothing more than a little scraping sound, that could well have been an errant deepstalker—but Trevelyan could take no chances. She followed.

Down another staircase, round a corner. Into some kind of storage area, stacked at the edges with long-abandoned equipment that was of little interest to Trevelyan. It was the sound she cared for. Not the scraping—a whistling. She could hear a whistling. Constant, but ebbing. Wind through the mountains? It had to be.

But it was silenced by a screech.

Trevelyan conjured a barrier, precisely as a demon of despair—mangled, toothy, and ragged—apparated from the shadows, and blasted her with ice.

Though it pummeled her defenses, they survived the onslaught. And the moment it ceased, she launched a retaliatory fireball in the demon’s direction.

But it leapt away, torn cloak never quite touching the ground. Her fire smattered against the rocks, extinguished. Yet, in the brief flash of its light, Trevelyan realised that it was not merely despair she now faced.

A pair of shades came crawling from the woodwork, their humanoid forms amorphous and hunched: the picture of something attempting personhood, but failing in every aspect.

One lunged.

Trevelyan Fade-stepped back, to give herself room. Their being here spoke of a weakness in the Fade, one she could exploit for power. As they gathered energy, so did she.

Despair shrieked, announcing its next barrage. Trevelyan whirled, focus alight. Flames whipped out—snaking fire sought the demon like a whip, coiling around its limbs, its body, its neck. Trevelyan pulled them taut, and pulled it apart.

Yet the shades took this as opportunity. They shifted through the shadows, little difference between them and darkness, lurking ever closer. Though nothing pierced her skin, hissing claws scraped against Trevelyan’s mind, threating to sink in. The pain worsened with proximity.

Undeterred, Trevelyan span her staff. The momentum carried her blade upward, slicing through the jaw of one shade, and exploding it into remnants. The other yet loomed—but Trevelyan ducked from its path as it struck, and brought her staff around. With the clench of her fist, ice sprang from the ground, and consumed the shade whole. Her staff slashed through, and shattered it to pieces.

Though she prepared for further combat, she felt no further presence. Good. She would not be impeded any longer.

The subtle rush of wind grew louder with each stride. It guided her forth, through the last of the cave—and into the invading glare of the setting sun, pouring through an opening like a portal to another world. Though all she could see beyond it was mountains and snow, Trevelyan ran.

She emerged on high, overlooking the mountain-valley below. But Corypheus was nowhere in sight.

Anxious, she looked to the sky. The Breach. It remained, still little more than a scar, streaking through the heavens. He had not succeeded yet.

Though, whether it was her imagination or truth, Trevelyan could not help but feel it glowed brighter. Cracked, snarled. Unopened, perhaps, but not untouched.

Her eyes darted to the slope of the mountain, to see her way down. There were ladders in place, quite fortunately, from whatever group had once shored up this godforsaken mountainside. They led to the bottom of the valley, to...

A large stone bridge. One she recognised. It had been the checkpoint they’d passed through on their way to the Temple. The few soldiers who’d patrolled it then had now multiplied into their dozens. But—why were they here? Why were they not storming the valley?

Urgency took over once more. Trevelyan slid down the rickety ladders that led the way, and scrambled across the last of the snowbanks that separated her and the soldiers. The bridge gate was opened for her, and the watchmen atop hurried her in.

She had hoped to arrive to the clash of steel ringing out, and the calls of soldiers amongst its throng. But the only steel here was that of swords being sharpened, and the only shouts that of the Captain, to his gathered troops.

Trevelyan pushed and parted her way through them, intended for that Captain, but halted. Hidden, within the mass of armour, was one not so soldier-like.

“Herzt!” she cried, rushing up to embrace him. “Are you all right?”

“I am well, Arcanist,” he told her, thank the Maker. “I am relieved to see you are alive. We were able to send the message, as you requested.”

“I saw—but why are you still here? You need to get as far away as possible.”

The Captain interrupted, shouting over: “We can’t go anywhere! He’s got the last of his bloody Red Templars moving in. We need to hold the line.”

Trevelyan marched to face him. “It’s a distraction! While we fight here, Corypheus has unfettered access to the Breach! You need to advance on the Temple!”

“We do that, and we’ll be overwhelmed! We need reinforcements,” the Captain told her, “and we’ll hold until we get them. That’s what the message was for!”

Trevelyan snarled, “We won’t need that message if he reopens the Breach!”

“Arcanist,” said Herzt.

Trevelyan glanced at him, then in the direction he was pointing. Up.

Indeed, they would not need that message. For the Breach began to snap and shriek, crying out as it was bent and broken under the influence of pure malevolence. A beam of green light shot skyward from the Temple, seeking the Breach like an arrow.

“No!” Trevelyan cried. In the split-second she had, she whirled on Herzt, and threw out her arms. A barrier formed. The Breach detonated.

Its blast slammed into Trevelyan’s back. She was catapulted across the bridge, crashing into its wall, body hanging over the parapet.

And there, she lay.

#unwanted #unwanted fic #i cannot leave this fic alone and WILL continue writing bits and bobs for it #expect to see some of the headcanons and extras written out #but i'll be taking my time with it #like i have this #though this (+ part 2) got to be upwards of 5k so like the time taken is warranted

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