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pantoneyoongi · 2 years ago

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the sun & the stars | 01 | kth

title ; the sun & the stars pairing ; taehyung x you

word count ; 5.4k

description ;

taehyung’s known you almost his whole life - his sister’s best friend, the girl who invades his home and his life on the daily. you’re the one who gave his sister the nickname ‘sky’ to begin with - and also the one who relented when he whined about it at age five and said okay, you can be the stars, then.

it’s funny, because to him, you’re just the petty, mischievous neighbor from across the street with a penchant for stealing his snacks. but over the years, you’ve somehow landed yourself a reputation that stretches beyond the 1.5 year age gap he has with you - for someone who generally likes to keep things low key, you sure have a way of drawing attention.

sky’s friendly, teasing best friend is known for being cold, impassive, and immovable. which is weird, because when he’s around you, all he sees are unabashed grins and terrible jokes. until he realizes maybe he doesn’t know you like he thought he did. maybe they’re right - it just so happens that the walls you throw up around him look a little different from the walls you throw up around everyone else.

tracklist ; willow - taylor swift, give me your forever - zack tabudlo ft. billkin, limbo - keshi

notes ;

ok so i don’t have a masterlist for this yet but this is going to be part of a universe called the sun & the sky universe, about two besties and their love lives and friendship and originally it was supposed to be a one-shot for each character but i have spiraled wildly out of control and now this character (sun) has a mini-series, oops.

anyway this is the first installation in the sun & the sky universe and eventually i will get around to making a masterpost. thank u for reading !!

tags ; college!au, best friend’s little brother!au, childhood friends to lovers, you have a cold/ice princess reputation, angst, fluff, mentions of absent parents and financial instability, you’re referred to as ‘sun’, taehyung’s sister referred to as ‘sky’, mentions of some dude being kinda pushy at the beginning, some business major slander (sorry) (sort of), there will be pov switches later, there will also be seokjin slander (he’ll deserve it unfortunately i’m so sorry), slow burn?? i think??, brief mentions of infidelity at some point later too, honestly this whole fic is probably more about friendships than it is about romance but anyways, yes this is the fic that i wrote 10k for and then randomly decided to rewrite the entire thing bc i have no control over my life thank u very much, anyway here it is i hope u like it

to be very clear: you don’t like freshmen.

irritation crawls up your spine, and you spare just enough time to glance both ways before crossing the street to reach your friend, who looks increasingly uncomfortable. she’s already backed up enough that she’s only centimeters from the wall behind her, which, in case the relief on her face at the sight of you didn’t already spell it out, tells you plenty enough that this one’s persistent and unwelcome.

“hey.” you don’t raise your voice when you reach them. you generally make it a point not to expend more energy than absolutely necessary, but particularly when it comes to men, and especially when they’re harassing your best friend. you hardly look his way, instead speaking to your friend with a tilt of your head towards the campus dining hall. “let’s go.”

jinyoung calls you blunt and a little rude (affectionate), but you prefer the terms ‘concise’ and ‘clear’. as in, you are concisely and clearly indicating the freshman should leave. you know, something about a-b conversations and how he should c his way out.

your shoulders raise ever so slightly when, predictably, the freshman opens his mouth to argue. that’s the thing about freshmen. and transfers. and men who don’t know what’s good for them: they don’t know you, and they don’t know your reputation, and that causes more problems than you care to deal with.

lucky for him, he happens to know someone who’s been out of the womb for longer than the ten seconds this kid appears to have been. in your peripheral, you watch the freshman get yanked back by a junior you think might’ve been in one of your roman history lectures last semester. “what the fuck is wrong with you,” he hisses to his friend, eyes darting nervously between the boy and you. his voice raises to normal speaking levels. “i’m so sorry. he’s so sorry for bothering you,” and then he’s dragging the kid away with hushed, frantic whispers. you watch them cross the street and head down and away, before turning back to your friend.

“you good, sky?”

she gives you a half-smile. “i’d be better with food in me.”

your lips twitch, and you sling an arm over her shoulders, tugging her through the dining hall doors. “good thing that’s what we’re here for.”

your reputation is more tall tale than fact, but you let it carry you through the four years of high school and now clean through your four years of college, too. for a group of students who are so rarely capable of meeting your eyes, they speak fairly condescendingly about you. it probably has a lot to do with the ‘sun’ nickname, seeing as it just seems laughable to associate the most well-known star in the galaxy with you.

you’re not warm. you don’t light up a room. none of the good cliches line up with you, and to most people, the nickname is more irony than anything else. but you didn’t get the nickname from them, you got it from sky, shortly after you gave her hers when you were seven.

(seven year old you was a lot friendlier.)

your eyes slide closed, chin propped against your palm as you wait at the lunch table. sky is grabbing food while you save the table, waiting for her brother and his partner in crime to show up.

the four of you grew up on the same street - sky and taehyung in the house across from you, and jimin a couple doors down. jimin and taehyung are technically the same age, the way you and sky are too, but taehyung’s birthday is so late in the year that he’s two grades below you instead of just one. they say you and sky have been inseparable since day one, but taehyung and jimin must be conjoined at the hip - you don’t find one without seeing the other.

you feel someone brush past you, a hand hovering by your head, but before it can nudge you, you say with closed eyes, “watch it, kid.”

your eyes flutter open, finding jimin pouting in front of you, hand returning to his side. “how’d you know it was me?”

“who else would dare?” you arch an eyebrow, and he sucks his teeth, dropping into the seat diagonal from you. taehyung takes the seat to your left, nodding his head in greeting towards you.

your lips quirk to the side. “do i not deserve the honor of your voice today, taetae?” you give him doe eyes, just to watch him scowl at you.

growing up with taehyung and sky right across the street from you meant watching taehyung turn from an adorable toddler, to a mildly annoying child, into a definitely annoying teenager. this also included a two year stint in which taehyung refused to speak to you (or in general, really), only making vague grunting noises and giving you curt nods in an attempt to come off as stoic and brooding.

(as a shock to no one: it was ineffective as far as ‘stoic’ and ‘brooding’ go.)

ever since he decided to grace you with his voice again, you take any chance to remind him of it. you grin wickedly as he lolls his head back with a groan. “i was shy,” he protests, bordering on a whine.

you scoff. “i’ve known you since you were three, fuck outta here,” you cuff him lightly upside the head, taehyung’s lower lip jutting out at the action. “you were just an angsty teenager.”

sky makes her appearance at that moment, setting her tray down. “can confirm,” she agrees with zero proper context. “you were just an angsty teenager.”

taehyung huffs. you poke your tongue against your cheek, amusement lighting your eyes. he tries to glare but taehyung’s always been a little soft on you, even if he won’t admit it. he marks defeat with a switch in subject. “you look tired.”

you sputter out a laugh. “i’m a college student,” you smack his shoulder lightly. “i always look tired.” you redirect your attention back to jimin and sky, joining the conversation they’d started, but taehyung stays quiet, studying you. eventually he gets up to grab food, jimin following after him, but you opt to just lay your head against your forearm, letting sky pat your head sympathetically.

you raise your head only when the boys return, eyes widening slightly in surprise when taehyung comes back with two trays, sliding one in front of you wordlessly. “you raised him well,” jimin sighs dramatically to sky. “treats his elders with respect.”

“that makes one of you,” you quip, just as sky goes, “are you calling me an elder?”

the two of you burst into laughter at the look on jimin’s face, halfway between being offended by you and defensive against sky, and while you’re busy teasing jimin, you don’t notice taehyung watching you, wondering how anyone can see you as cold and standoffish, not when he sees you like this, voice loud and eyes crinkled in the corners, always the brightest whenever you make the people you love and care about laugh. they say you’re cruel and unforgiving, but he’s known you for years and he doesn’t really feel like you’ve changed much - still wildly dramatic and bitingly sarcastic - and also apparently still endlessly prone to stealing food from him and sky, he thinks dryly, as he throws you a dirty look for snagging a french fry off his plate despite having your own.

you smile pretty at him. “sharing is caring, taetae.”

he can’t retort when you blink your eyes at him like that because there’s just no winning when it comes to you. all he can do is let out a deep sigh and fight the smile making its way onto his face when your laughter chimes in his ear.

“what if,” you start, just for jinyoung to cut you off.

“no.”

you throw the towel down onto the table, affronted. “you didn’t let me finish.”

he stares flatly at you, then makes a jerky, ‘go-ahead’ gesture with his hand.

“what if,” you start again, pointing your finger at him. “i drop out of school-”

“what if,” jinyoung smiles like he’s got knives for teeth. “i get you fired?”

you scrunch your nose. “then i’d be young, dumb, and broke.”

“just like all the cool kids,” jinyoung sighs, clearly not giving a fuck. “hurry up, we got company.”

the bell above the restaurant door rings as probably an entire fraternity funnels in, forty-five minutes before your shift ends. “perfect,” you mutter, picking up your towel again, scrubbing the table clean while jinyoung puts on a (notably knifeless) smile for your customers. the closing shift can never end quietly, always some group coming in last minute to interrupt your peaceful night. you always know jinyoung happens to like you because he sidles up to the group with his full charm and a notepad, ready to take orders, letting you slink off to the back to finish cleaning up so the two of you can get out of here as quickly as possible as soon as the sign flips to ‘closed.’

jinyoung returns to the back to rattle off orders five minutes later, then leans with his back to the counter as you rinse dishes to put into the industrial dishwasher. “you should stop taking extra shifts. your eyebags have eyebags,” he informs you, as gently as he can. you glance at him, wondering if it’s worth it to flick him with water. but you know he’s just trying to be nice, so you opt against it.

you suck in a breath, setting another dish down onto the rack. “i can’t,” you shrug. “i am, in fact, young, dumb, and broke.”

he presses his lips together in a non-smile. like you, jinyoung is here on scholarship and part of the pity-party program your school has for kids who meet the criteria of “too poor to afford higher education.” you met him in said program over the summer, when you were all forced to come in for summer classes, just in case you came from a district without sufficient resources to teach you calculus.

he runs a tired hand through his hair, offering you a small smile before heading out with an array of dishes balanced impressively on his arm. the frat has approximately twenty minutes to shovel it all down before the restaurant officially calls it lights out. you have no doubts they’ll make it with time to spare.

you flip the settings for the dishwasher and let it run, tugging off your gloves and wandering towards the front. absently, you stare out the glass that makes up the storefront, eyes nearly glazing over until you spot them - your head lifting slowly as you lean forward a little to squint.

she’s a little too far out, but the person heading down the street looks an awful lot like sky, flanked by someone who looks half a foot taller than her, which is saying something, considering sky is half a foot taller than you. your head tilts, curious, but by the time you’ve blinked enough times to get your vision back in focus, they’re out of sight.

shaking it off, you check the clock to see that you’re ten minutes to closing, confirmed by the way you hear the frat boys noisily filing back out just the way they came in. jinyoung’s eyes meet yours and you give a tired nod, the two of you working in tandem to clear the remaining dishes to finish cleaning up and close up shop.

jinyoung bids you goodbye outside the restaurant with a pat on the shoulder, parting ways. it’s late, little ways past ten at night, and you slump your shoulders as you trudge down the street back to your apartment.

you take a half step back when taehyung’s face suddenly appears in front of yours, familiar dark eyes peering at you. he’s got his hands in his pockets and he’s bent over slightly to meet your height, and you frown at him. “what are you doing here?”

“jimin dragged me out,” he explains, straightening back up. “but now they’re getting drunk, so.”

of the four of you, jimin’s always been the only one with anything close to a social life. he parties, he drinks, he gets hungover, and then he gets straight a’s. go figure.

you hum, the two of you falling into step together. the silence is comfortable, padded with the general ruckus of the downtown, cars speeding past and drunk students being rowdy. you make your way back to the main streets on campus, taehyung slowing his steps to match your snail pace.

“sun,” he breaks the quiet between you. you look at him.

he opens his mouth to speak, but there’s only empty air, the words dying on his tongue when he sees how dull your eyes look after a long shift. your eyes have always sparkled, glinting with trouble and quick wit, so it sort of stings to see the light fade out with how weary you are.

“never mind,” he smiles, tilting his chin towards your building’s front door. “we’re here.”

you look confused but don’t press the matter, patting him on the arm with a warm smile. “get back safe. thanks for walking me home, tae.” you tip-toe to ruffle his hair, like you always have, despite the near foot of height he now towers over you with, then disappear into your building without a second glance back.

taehyung sighs, hand absently pressed to the spot where you’d touched his arm. he knows your smile better than anyone else’s, that dazzling grin of yours that you reserve only for your closest friends. even when taehyung went through his brooding phase, you always offered it out to him with a friendly wave.

the campus might not understand the nickname ‘sun,’ but taehyung knows it suits you perfectly.

“am i still allowed to live in your basement if i fail out of college?”

you punctuate the end of your question by dropping the bag of take-out you brought with you onto the table, though the end of your sentence sort of peeters off a little when you realize there’s someone else departing the table, a low voice murmuring a goodbye to your friend. you don’t catch his face before his tall frame walks away, but your brows furrow, puzzled. you don’t recognize him.

“i think you’d live in my basement regardless of what i say,” sky responds, seemingly unaware of your perplexion. “but unfortunately you’re not allowed to fail out of college.”

your eyes are still on the man who’d just left, even as you pull out the take-out and hand it over to sky. you’re tempted to ask, but when you glance back at her, she has an unnervingly neutral expression on her face, and you falter, deciding to drop it.

sky likes to keep her circle small. most of the time it’s just you, jimin, and taehyung, though both of you do still keep in touch with yoongi and hoseok from high school, and there is that one girl from her major, soojung. but for the most part, sky prefers keeping to herself, so much so that on occasion she’ll just drop off the grid without any warning. you suppose you’re like her in that way, though her version of dropping off the grid is usually more accidental (read: a new video game came out and she forgot she has to remind people she’s alive) whereas yours tends to be very intentional (read: you’re overwhelmed and so much as seeing or interacting with another person could equate to a new, special kind of torture, built explicitly for you).

you slide on a smile for her, settling down into your seat. “eat,” you gesture. “need at least one of us to make it past graduation if i’m gonna live in your basement.”

as sky tucks in, absently scrolling through her phone, your mind wanders. it’s not that you need to know every last detail of sky’s life, but she’s your best friend, and it just tends to happen, anyway. sky’s life is so heavily interwoven with yours, since you were five and moved into the house across the street from hers, and she let you into her home like you’d always belonged there.

then again, that was a boy you’d seen walking away. your eyes shift back to sky, who isn’t paying you much mind, and you look away again. the truth is, the tightly bound friendship you hold with sky feels as fragile as it does indestructible, and you have no one to blame but yourself.

food is your love language. giving it, receiving it, whatever the case is - it’s love. it might also be your sole motivator for doing just about anything, but that’s besides the point.

you use food as a means of taking care of the people around you. it’s not exactly a flashy show of affection, but you don’t have a particularly heartwarming vocabulary, or the disposition to shower people in your affection, so this is what you do. most people seem to take the hint. you figure that’s why taehyung puts up with you on at minimum a weekly basis, grabbing a meal together whenever he’s free.

today, he’s seated at your kitchen counter, glancing around your apartment like he hasn’t been here a million times before. you set your ever-gourmet pot of instant noodles down on top of a pot holder. “ta-da,” you beam at him, waving your hands dramatically. “my specialty.”

“you treat me so well,” he says dryly, but his eyes are affectionate and he’s still picking up his chopsticks almost immediately, tongue poking out at the corner of his lips in anticipation. you press your lips together to hide a smile, watching him gather noodles, messily sucking them into his mouth, flicking soup everywhere.

you click your tongue a little but don’t nag, though the look you give him makes him settle down a little, chewing slower and acting at least somewhat more like a civilized human being. he looks properly chastised, and the corner of your lips lift in a small smirk of amusement.

the two of you eat quietly, taehyung because he’s always been quiet and you because you’re lost in thought, enough so that you forget to entertain taehyung the way you usually do (read: complain about almost every class you’re in and lament your age, as if you’re anything more than a year and a half older than taehyung, max). your eyes are distant, chopsticks absently picking up noodles to eat, on autopilot.

you glance back to taehyung, who doesn’t seem to mind your quiet. he’s used to your noise, but you suppose at some point he also grew used to your quiet, too. maybe that’s just what decade-long friendships are like. you learn the usuals, the unusuals, and all of the in between.

teeth gnawing at your lower lip, you wonder if he knows about the guy who’s been hovering around sky. this guy who sky doesn’t want to introduce to you, not yet, which means he’s important enough to her that she cares whether you meet him or not. whether because your opinion matters or because of something else, you haven’t figured out yet.

taehyung’s eyes rise to meet yours, chopsticks halfway to his mouth when he sees the way you gaze at him thoughtfully, head tilted to the side. your brows are drawing in, and he wants to press his fingers to the crease in the middle, undo the tension, but instead he just asks, “something up?”

you hesitate. for just a fraction of a second, but he catches it. because that’s what decade-long friendships are like. but you’re too quick for him to push it, too easily pull on a smile and reach over to tug on his ear like he’s still a child, nagging at him. “i’m fine,” you admonish. “don’t you worry about me, kid.”

he grumbles something incoherent and swats at your hand, grumbles bordering on whines when you don’t let up, until he catches you grinning at him, mischievous as ever. you retract your hand, satisfied by the grumpy look on his face, though your smile falters a little when you see that it’s not enough to wipe the worry in his eyes.

you focus on your food instead, just so you can avoid that look. but you can still feel him staring at you, like he’s waiting for you to give in to him, so you lift your head back up with a beam and start rattling off, extensively, until he loses that look in his eyes. until he’s back to just regular taehyung, sky’s little brother taehyung, neighbor from across the street taehyung, and not grown-up taehyung, walks you home taehyung, eats with you weekly because he doesn’t want you to be lonely taehyung.

you’re not ready to admit it. taehyung’s only gotten more handsome and charming in his own right over the years. it makes it so that you can’t stand the way that he looks at you sometimes, like he can see right through you.

he’s not supposed to. he’s taehyung. he’s part of your safe, little bubble; the one you built, where the sun can only shine.

waking up is such a miserable experience, you muse.

it’s ass o’clock in the morning. honestly, any time you need to wake up before noon is ass o’clock, but you have to study for your exams and you have a help desk shift later too, so unfortunately, 7am it is.

you force yourself to roll out of bed, look vaguely human-shaped (aka: wear respectable enough clothes), and lug yourself to the library. you could study in your room but you’re a weak bitch and the bed being two feet away is too strong a temptation. therefore: library.

you find a corner to hide away in, scribbling away in your notebook in hopes of retaining an ounce of the information you’ve written down. the hours pass like that, and by some miracle, you don’t develop a stress-induced headache by the time you need to leave for your shift.

you toss your belongings into your backpack, tugging it onto your back, a quite physical reminder of the weight on your shoulders.

you don’t necessarily think that life is unkind to you. you just think everyone gets dealt their deck of cards, and yours happens to be slightly shittier. but hey, if you’re broke enough, you get free housing at the nicest set of apartments on campus, so you win some, you lose some, right?

the losing part right now is the multi-set of jobs running you into the ground. between the restaurant, your help desk job, and the work-study program, it’s a miracle you haven’t failed any of your courses.

you heave a sigh, letting yourself feel bad about it for a minute. you deserve at least that, in the quiet of the library this early in the morning, while most of campus is happily sleeping in on a saturday.

‘most’ is the key word here. you should’ve known your best friend has the integrity of a monk, seeing as she’s at the library at nearly 10am on a weekend.

you slink your way over to her, sneaking up behind her and slinging an arm over her shoulder, mouth already open to whisper-shout her name - that is, up until you spot the man standing before her.

the smile slides off your face immediately. for someone at his towering size, he’d been pretty well hidden behind the shelves. he looks suspiciously close in height to the person you’d seen that night at the restaurant, and the other day when you’d brought sky lunch.

he smiles politely at you, dimples denting in his cheeks. your frown deepens. you’re certain now, that you don’t recognize him in your catalog of sky’s acquaintances, and she seems comfortable around him, much more than she is around any of her classmates.

“hi, sun,” sky greets, gentle smile rising to her lips, though you’re too busy sizing up this guy she’s talking to. he’s sort of huge. he has kind eyes, though, hair swept off to the side, white tee tucked loosely into light colored jeans. but you still stand wary, too familiar with boys who have sweet dispositions and not enough good intentions.

see, the first thing anyone notices about sky is that she’s nice.

well, okay. the first thing most people notice about sky is that she’s pretty. elegant, like she was a princess in some past life, between her perpetual good posture (what college student do you know that isn’t hunched over like a gremlin at least 73% of the time?) and perfectly set hair, not a strand out of place. she’s pretty, in a way that carries into her personality, patient and open. she’s always listened to whatever blown-out-of-proportion story you have for her, letting you drag her into any and all of your bad ideas, no matter the consequences.

the point is that sky holds the sort of kindness that knows no boundaries. she’s content to go with the flow, and despite all the times she’s been let down by passing acquaintances who you’ve ensured can no longer call her a friend, she’s still willing to help. she gives out second, third, fourth chances, doesn’t let the hurt get in the way of her ability to care.

her walls don’t go up as high as yours do. so you make every effort to make sure that the people who take advantage of that never get a chance to hurt her.

“who’s this?”

sky blinks, looking between you and him. christ, he is massive. his biceps are probably the size of your head.

you mostly keep your eyes on him, but turn to glance at sky when she takes a minute longer than usual to answer. she looks a bit startled, like she’s just now realizing you’re actually here; moreover, that you don’t know who her new friend is.

“oh,” she says, lips turning downwards a little, conflicted. something inside you flinches. but then her expression clears and she smiles. “this is namjoon. we have class together.”

namjoon lifts a hand to wave even while you’re narrowing your eyes at him. but still, your hands return to your pockets and you take a step back, forcing your stiff shoulders to lower.

you’re intruding, you realize. sky is having a moment with this tall, handsome person who could probably twist you into a pretzel if he wanted to, and you’re intruding.

a weight sits on your chest at the realization, but you force a smile to your face for sky. you and your reputation and your trust issues need to step out of this.

“i.. i gotta get to work,” you say, anxious hands tugging at your backpack straps just for something to hold onto. “i just popped by ‘cause i saw you.” you glance towards namjoon, trying your best to maintain the smile you generally reserve only for close friends, but it turns too quickly into a grimace so you settle for a curt nod of acknowledgement, before lifting a hand to sky. “see you ‘round.”

you pretend not to notice how sky’s expression falters, heading out without turning around once. the discomfort rolls over in you, pulling at your heart, keeping your shoulders tense.

the way sky looks at namjoon is different. you can tell. two minutes in the same space, and you know sky isn’t just being polite like she was raised to be. she’s content to be around him, their eyes darting to meet each other in quick glances, like it’s difficult to let their gazes stray for too long.

namjoon doesn’t give you any immediate warning signs, and sky’s gotten a lot better at picking her friends. you don’t have to protect her, she’s perfectly capable of it herself. but you still feel wary, still worry that dimpled, unassuming namjoon will fuck her over like any number of people have in the past.

including you, your brain reminds you. you’re the worst one.

your heart tightens in your chest and you shoulder your way out the doors of the library, like barreling into something will shake off the memory any easier.

high school is hard for anyone. emotions are at all time highs; everything feels like it’s high stakes. grades, friendships, romances. everything is always, constantly, on the line.

sky always says it’s not your fault. kim seokjin was not your fault. you were teenagers - kids, really - but no matter how she spins it, you know you’re the one who messed up. even if sky doesn’t blame you, you still do.

how are you supposed to trust your instincts, when the last time you let your guard down for a boy with a disarming smile, he hurt not only you, but your best friend?

sky’s your most important person. her family was there when no one else was, and they didn’t ask questions, either. you don’t think you’ll forgive yourself for letting her down once, and you know you can’t afford to let it happen again. no matter how many times sky says you’ve never had anything to apologize for.

you’re so lost in your own head that you almost bump into someone, so wound up that you nearly fire off immediately before realizing it’s taehyung standing in front of you, looking equal parts amused and concerned. “i think i know what they mean now when they say, ‘blaze a path,’” he muses, and you scoff at him, shoving him to the side without any real force.

“walking with purpose is not what that metaphor means, tae,” you keep marching forward, not bothering to check if he’s matching pace. he’s got long legs, he’ll be fine. “‘blazing a path’ means-”

“sun,” taehyung interrupts, voice low enough that you actually stop lecturing him. his voice softens a little. “you alright? you look like-”

you don’t let him finish, nor give him the courtesy of even a glance his way. “i’m dandy, taetae. just going to my nine to five.”

“you don’t have a nine to five. you’re a student.”

“good job, einstein. wanna tell me how the sky is blue, too?”

“sun.”

you know you’re being curt. you’re lashing out at the wrong person and you stop in your steps to breathe in deeply, exhaling slowly.

“i’m just tired,” you finally spare him a look. you sigh. “i’m sorry. but i really do have to go to work, and if i don’t haul ass, i’m gonna be late.”

he looks at you like he doesn’t believe you, but you both know he’s going to drop it. “you should sleep more,” he settles on. you know he’s about to lecture you with a series of hard facts. “people need eight hours-”

you smirk at him, “you know damn well there’s not a single college student out there getting eight hours of sleep.”

he shrugs. “maybe the business majors?”

you snort. “no. they’re out partying.”

he snaps his fingers. “right. forgot about those.”

“you can forget about parties when your best friend is jimin?” you ask in mock amazement. he scoffs out a laugh in return.

“shut up, sun. i’m serious, you need more sleep. you look like death.”

“oooh,” you tease. “you really know how to make a girl feel pretty.”

taehyung turns his gaze skyward, and you know he’s asking some higher being for the patience to put up with you. you snicker, patting him on the arm. “you’ll get it when you’re older,” you blink forlorn eyes at him, smile overly sympathetic. he scowls back. you make a vague attempt at hiding your amusement, but otherwise continue towards the office, taehyung keeping you company. he doesn’t say anything else, just walks with you. you don’t ask where he was supposed to be headed before you bumped into him, and he doesn’t tell you, either.

it’s when you’re almost at the door that you break your silence, that nagging feeling pulling and pulling at you until you crack. “hey,” you spin towards him, stopping in your tracks right in front of the building. “do you know a namjoon?”

he tilts his head, surprised. “namjoon? yeah, he’s like uhh,” taehyung pauses to think. “i think he was sky’s project partner or something, and now they’re pretty good friends. they have class together. why?”

you make a noncommittal noise. “nothing. just saw them together earlier. sky’s never brought him up before.”

you try not to think too hard at the way taehyung’s eyebrows shoot up. it’s a sign that you’re not overthinking this, that it is weird that sky never mentioned him, because sky tells you everything.

but she didn’t tell you about namjoon.

#taehyung x you #taehyung x reader #taehyung x yn #taehyung #taehyung x y/n #series: tsns #series: kths

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inkdemonapologist · 4 years ago

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[BatIM Call of Cthulhu Masterpost]

WE STARTED.... A NEW SCENARIO..... as you may have read in Boo’s summary post, for some unknown reason aLL MUSICAL AND PERFORMANCE ABILITY SEEMS TO BE??? GONE??? Sammy woke up, realised he couldn’t hold even the simplest tune in his head, and immediately lost THIRTY-ONE SANITY in one hit

..... YOU KNOW THAT MAKES SENSE HONESTLY

anyway i have a some out-of-context quotes from the game for u all under the readmore if ur into that kinda thing!!!

[Sammy is played by me, Joey is played by Boo (inkyvendingmachine), Henry is played by Maf (inkcryptid), Jack is played by Mochi (whatyouwantedmetosee) and Thren (haunted-hijinxer) is our GM!]

[GM] It's a tough voice to do, so you can't be as choosy, and your resident Bendy cannot act to save his life, so that's no good-- [Joey] Uh-oh. [Jack] Sorry, Lurks. [Joey] I'm just so worried he's going to have to act now... [Jack] Clearly, he should've used the time between scenarios to train that! [GM] Yeah, that's just what everybody wants I'm sure, is the Lurker training in LYING. That sounds like a great idea!

[GM] *asking for dice rolls to see how well our actual jobs are going* We can do a little bit of mundanity to, to treasure, and keep you warm later!

[Henry] Should I spend Luck points on this? No, I'm not spending Luck on work. [Sammy] That's a good general life policy

[Jack] Does Jack have any contacts? [Joey] No, he has glasses! :D [Jack] noooo that's my job! It's my job to make Jack's puns! ....Contacts probably didn't exist in the 1930s, that's okay. [Sammy] No, don't say that! Boo's going to have to look it up now!

[GM] What spell is Joey working on? [Jack] (Spell of Make Investor Like You)

[Joey] I think he probably has filing cabinets specifically to put occult stuff in and lock. And then the rest of his office is just piles and tables of animation stuff that you're like "...shouldn't this??? be??? in the filing cabinet???"

[GM] Allison remarks, "The companions of our childhood always possess a certain power of our minds, which hardly any later friend can obtain." [Sammy] Y'know, normal, just nORMAL CASUAL CHATTER, [GM] Tom, working on the pipe, just kinda mutters, "I enjoy friends, dear not only by habit and association, but from their own merits." And she gives him a look! [Jack] ...love at first whATEVER THIS IS,

[Sammy] ...Sammy's not amused. [GM] The band's amused! [Jack] Jack is probably amused.

[GM] So far things are going very well, but y'know, [Jack] Only so long until we crit fail something! [Sammy] NEVER TOO LATE TO MESS IT UP!

[GM] Allison's vibe is like, I Didn't Study This Exactly, But I Was Hoping It Could Just Work Out! [Jack] ...She has a lot of practice at just... making things work out, huh....

[GM] Is there anything else Joey would try to show off? [Joey] Tries to think... what else is at the Studio... [Jack] "Do you wanna talk to our janitor? He's really cool!"

[Joey] I roll to see if Joey can put two brain cells together,

[Jack] I have to appreciate that Bendy said he didn’t have the keys today. He’s been stealing them before, but THIS TIME isn’t his doing!

[Sammy] If there’s anything he needs to do himself, then he’ll come in early, but I don’t know what state we’re in -- [Joey] Uh, New York. [Sammy] ...what? [Joey] You didn’t know what state we’re in. :) [Sammy] [Sammy] thanks

[Joey] Oh Joey’s absolutely coming in early. Joey woke up, and felt great, so he’s going to menace every other department today, because he has the energy to get his fingers into everything! [Sammy] *distressed sounds in the background*

[Sammy] Hey how come when we did a Halloween cartoon, we all went to Haiti, but we’re doing a cartoon about a fair and we’re not going to a fair? [Jack] [Jack] I think we all know why.

*trying to decide who goes to Joey’s fancy dinner with an investor* [Sammy] I don’t know if Sammy will help you... [Sammy] Unless you bring Sammy and put him on a piano, like a small child that needs to be immediately handed crayons.

[Joey] Joey will say that they’re essentially the second hands in each of the departments-- [Jack] Yeah, Abby, the second hand… entire Art Department director, [GM] Uh-huh. [Joey] She… she knows,, [GM] Joey, [Joey] She knows that Joey… is … Big Gay for Henry,,, [GM] This is true, but I think she likes nominal acknowledgement that she holds a position, [Jack] He can just say that they’re high-ranking, and not-- [Joey] No I rolled badly, Joey’s going to say that Sammy and Henry are busy, so he brought his second-best! :) [GM] Abby is massaging her temples. [Joey] Sorry, Abby. He is,, an idiot,,, [GM] I think she’d be a lot more bothered if she couldn’t go and commiserate with Henry about it. Like, “why can’t he keep it straight?” [GM] ……………….well. She knows why he can’t keep it straight.

[GM] It’s about midnight, and something... strange.... happens. The trumpet player, who is leading the band -- [Joey] -- has a trumpet for a head! [GM] what no

*Joey succeeds a sanity check, Jack fails it* [GM] Joey, roll 1d10! [Joey] Uh, 3? [GM] Okay, you’re only down three sanity, that’s not so bad! [GM] Jack, roll 6d10! [Jack] what? [Joey] Six??? SIX d10s????? [GM] Yeah! [Joey] nICE KNOWING YOU, JACK!!! It’s time for Sillytime Jack.

[Jack] Smash cut to Henry, curled up in bed, nice and cozy,

[GM] I will also note, you cannot seem to Fast Talk. [Joey] ...what else can I do? [GM] Just normal talk. Like a normal person.

[Jack] I feel like Jack probably has a hunch that it’s weird nightmarish horror nonsense, on account of he just lost nineteen sanity,

[GM] Abby’s gonna try to take him to the hospital. [Jack] Jack’s just going to let that happen, because he’s shaken enough that he doesn’t have any significantly better ideas! Other than AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA,

[Sammy] *rolling sanity damage* 9… 9, stop that…. 4, [Jack] You’ve already lost more than Jack! [Sammy] 2, ...6, and 1! [Joey] That’s 31. [GM] Okay, Sammy has six sanity! [Sammy] eXCUSE ME?????

[Joey] Joey does want to head home… what day is it? [GM] Friday, the 13th! [Jack] HM, [Sammy] I GUESS IT IS, ISN’T IT… I wasn’t keeping track, but I guess it sure is! [GM] A delightful treat for myself, when I was looking up days in July, in 1934, [Sammy] WAIT, NO, ITS ACTUALLY A COINCIDENCE? Oh my gosh, [Jack] Because Friday the 13th wouldn’t even be a spooky day at this point in time! [GM] It is now! [Jack] It’s spooky, but just for us!

[Sammy] Sammy would try to call Jack, he’d try to call Joey, he’d try to call Henry -- probably several times, [Henry] sammy gets jack’s cat [Henry] phone is answered with meows [Jack] That does seem fitting for a really bad luck roll; the phone gets answered, and Sammy’s really relieved -- and it’s just the cat. [Sammy] Sammy, at 6 sanity: “jack’s tuRNED INTO A CAT,”

[Joey] The phone kept on ringing, so the cat just batted it off the cradle, [Jack] I feel like Jack probably doesn’t usually get a significant number of calls, so like, this many calls in a row is just obnoxious! [Jack] Cat’s having none of it. [Jack] Phone ring isn’t breakfast! [Jack] Where is the soft provider of food.

[GM] Oh no, you know what’s going to happen? Henry’s gonna get through to Jack, and then when Sammy calls it’s busy! [Sammy] cALLS JACK IT’S BUSY, CALLS HENRY IT’S BUSY, [Jack] I was gonna say maybe Henry would call Sammy first, because Sammy was one of the original three. [Jack] …Henry calls Sammy, Sammy is busy because SAMMY is trying to call someone, and then Henry calls Jack, and Sammy tries to call Jack again-- [Sammy] *laughing* THE HORROR, The deep, bone-chilling horror of A TIME BEFORE CALL-WAITING!!

[Henry] Is Joey there? [Jack] Yeah. [Henry] Are you guys alright? [Jack] ……………….hm,

[Jack] Cat is just sat on Joey, purring. Something is wrong with the human. Purr to fix the human.

[Henry] I called Sammy to make sure he’s okay, but-- [Abby] Was he? [Henry] No.

[Joey] Joey is going to be… obstinate feels like the wrong word? [Joey] He’s being the cat where you put the leash on, and the cat just sits down. [Joey] That is the Joseph mood right now.

[Sammy] *muttering* First one boyfriend turns into a cat, now the other boyfriend’s voice is wrong, today is terrible,

[Joey] This is Joey’s everything. [Sammy] That’s Joey’s contribution to the party! That’s like, your bard can no longer play music. [Sammy] ……….which is also true, but Sammy contributes other things. [Jack] Like Intimidate! [Sammy] Right now he contributes paranoia!

#call of cthulu: haunted hijinx #when in doubt just keep drawing #sammy lawrence #IM STILL REELING FROM THIS

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watchmegetobsessed · 5 years ago

Text

VALERIE - Part IX. (Harry Styles)

yall are gonna hate me for this but it needed to be done IM SORRY! also, i can’t believe valerie is ending this week, just one more part to go! can’twait to read your reactions and thoughts on this part, even though i know yall gonna be upset lmao

word count: 5.6k

SERIES MASTERPOST

masterlist

Some days it truly feels like the universe has plotted against you to make every possible thing go wrong. As if it wants to see just how much you can take before breaking, experiment how long it can dance on your nerves before you end up one of those crazy people who shout at random strangers on the bus for no actual reason.

Starting the day you overslept awfully leaving you only ten minutes before you had to leave. In your hurry you ended up putting on socks that do not match and you were forced to buy a sandwich on your way as breakfast, but you promised you wouldn’t buy packed sandwiches for a reason, this one tasted like it’s been sitting on the shelf for weeks. Maybe it really has been.

You made it to work successfully, but then you realized that you’ve left your notebook at home, the one that had quite a lot of important information you need for your work, so you spent your first hour at work emailing different people for things you should now, explaining that you just left your notebook at home. Some didn’t really give a fuck and just answered you normally, but others didn’t shy away from commenting that you should be more responsible and careful.

This alone gave just the perfect foundation for the day. It was all downhill from then. Your boss loaded twice as much work on you than usually, everything with close deadlines, throwing even more anxiety into the mix as if you didn’t have enough already.

You met up with Marcus at lunch, but that didn’t go as planned either. It’s been getting more and more frustrating with him, the two of you have already had at least five fights this week and it’s only wednesday. It seems like even the smallest things push you over the edge these days and you easily pick a fight over anything. It didn’t happen differently this time either and by the time you got back to the office you were fuming. Worst part is that you always have a hard time ending a fight and tend to continue it through texts, the same thing happened today as well.

Now it’s a few minutes past five and you’re getting ready to go home, get changed and head to family dinner since today is Valerie’s first birthday, but even on the bus you’re still furiously typing away on your phone, sending a reply to Marcus, wanting nothing more than to throw the device right ot the window.

At one point you decide you’ve had enough. Turning your phone off you sink it into the depth of your bag and just try to focus on breathing, because even the smallest things seem to be hard tasks in such an upsetting state of mind.

These past few weeks things have taken an absurdly wrong turn between you and Marcus and you don’t know what to do about the whole situation. Every night you go to bed thinking that you should just let go of him, would do a favor for the both of you, but then that stupid little voice in the back of your mind tells you that if you break up with Marcus it’s game over for you, you’ll spend the rest of your life alone. It all ends up with you violently holding onto the pieces of what’s left from your relationship and you’ve been trying to figure out where it went wrong, but you have absolutely no idea.

After you changed into a pair of light washed jeans, a bright orange sweater and your black leather jacket it’s time for you to leave, though you already know you’ll be late. With a sigh deep you decided to turn your phone back on when you were sitting in the Uber, immediately deleting the notifications about the messages Marcus left you and going straight for the few ones from Rosa, your mom and Harry. They all arrived not too long ago asking when you’d be arriving, so you quickly typed your sorry and told them you’re on your way, you just got caught up at work. For Harry, you add something else too:

“Save me a seat and order me a tequila.”

His response came quickly.

“Done. Both.”

You let out a chuckle seeing his message. He knows you too well.

Walking into the small restaurant you don’t have a hard time spotting your family, three tables have been pushed together to make enough room in the back, taking up the small, kind of separated area of the place. Rosa smiles widely when she spots you, Valerie standing on her thighs, hands on the table as she is trying to snatch one of the glasses away, but her dad is pushing it further from her grasp.

“Sorry for being late,” you huff out and take the seat right next to Harry who watches you with a smile. “Well hello there, birthday girl! You’re so big now!” you babble at Valerie who giggles at you before her attention is averted once again.

You feel Harry’s elbow poking your side and turning to him you see him nod at the two shots on the table.

“Oh, fantastic. You’re drinking too?”

“No, I’m driving. Both for you.”

“If I didn’t have such a shitty day I would question what kind of alcoholic you think I am, but I kinda need both,” you sigh, taking the first one and downing it faster than ever. From the corner of your eyes you see your mother’s disapproving look, but you decide to ignore it for now.

“Wanna talk about it?” Harry asks, eyebrows furrowed in worry, but you shake your head, the alcohol still burning your throat.

“Not now. Can you give me a lift home tho?”

“Sure,” he nods, turning back to the conversation at the table.

You somehow succeed in putting everything that happened today behind and just focus on the time spent with your family. It helps that seemingly Harry works hard all evening to tell you about random things, just occupying your thoughts as much as he can. It’s nice to relax a little and forget everything that’s been weighing down on your shoulders recently.

“It’s so crazy she is one already,” you sigh when you and Harry are walking to his car.

“Right? It makes me feel incredibly old,” Harry huffs as he fishes his car keys out of his pocket.

“How old are you even?” you ask laughing, realizing you don’t even know how old he exactly is. There are quite a few things, small details you’ve just never gotten around to find out about Harry.

“I’m turning 27 in February. Wild, isn’t it?” he chuckles.

“Yeah, you’re basically a grandpa,” you tease him and he narrows his eyes at you, but you can’t miss the little smile hiding in the corners of his mouth.

“That makes you a grandma, because you’re turning 25 in April, don’t you?”

“You know when my birthday is?” It takes you by surprise, you don’t remember ever telling him when your birthday is.

The two of you reach his car and he clears his throat unlocking it. Seems like he doesn’t really want to answer, but your burning gaze on him kind of forces him into it.

“Uh, I do. I wanted to meet up with Steven last year the day you had your birthday party, but he said he had plans already. Tried to lure him into cancelling, but he didn’t even want to share where he was going. Then he admitted that it was your birthday party, but you told him and Rosa not to even mention it to me so I don’t show up.”

Your stomach drops hearing his version of a story you’ve only known from your own point of view. You remember that you indeed told them not to tell Harry about it, but now it seems like such a hate crime, when in real life, it was still when the two of you hated each other with passion.

“I’m… Harry I’m sorry. That was--”

“Don’t worry about it,” he smiles at you, starting the car. “We left it all behind, didn’t we?”

His smile seems genuine, but you still feel guilty for being such a bitch. It reminded you how much time and energy the two of you wasted for years hating each other when you could have been just like you are now. If only things happened in a different way…

Arriving at your building Harry parks the car and stops it. As the engine stops, the silence that’s been thickening the air just becomes even more obvious. He is waiting for you to say something about what’s gotten you so upset today, you know that, but you don’t feel like sitting around in his car.

“Want to come up for a little bit?” you ask and it’s a hidden message that you want to talk in the comfort of your own home. Luckily, Harry understands it right away and nodding he tells you to lead the way.

You make some tea and the two of you sit on your couch, Harry is sitting sideways so he can see you while you bring your knees up to your chest, staring down at the mug in your hands.

“I had a fight with Marcus,” you quietly start.

“Oh.”

“And… it wasn’t the first time. We’ve been constantly fighting lately and I’m just… so tired of it.”

Saying it out loud for the first time, having someone listen to you brings you an odd sense of relief, and it doesn’t feel weird that you’re talking to Harry about all of it. He has proven himself to be a great listener.

“We’ve been fighting constantly, over the smallest things and my… my patience is running short, at this point.”

You’re talking slowly, carefully putting your thoughts into words, trying your best to interpret them for Harry after boiling them only in your own head for so long.

“I just… I have no idea what I should do.”

“It seems like the relationship is not making you happy anymore,” Harry softly speaks up and you have nothing to bring up against what he just said. “So why are you trying to continue it?”

You were expecting the question, you just knew he would ask it, but it still brings a painful, stinging sensation into your chest as you try to find the words to answer him.

“Because…” you breath out and slowly turning your head, your eyes meet his gaze. “If I can’t make it work with him… then… who is it gonna be? There’s this voice in my head that keeps telling me, that he is literally my last choice, that if I mess this up it’s gonna be over for me.”

“Y/N, you know that’s not true,” Harry tells you tilting his head.

“Do I?” you chuckle bitterly, turning your gaze to the ceiling before you look back at him. “Because I don’t think I do. I’ve been literally feeling so miserable for weeks, yet I still can’t get me to move on, because I think I’m gonna die alone.”

“That’s not gonna happen, don’t say that. You’ll find the right person for you, you just… have to be patient.”

“But that’s the thing. I have lost my patience. I’m done, over it.” The tears form in your eyes in just a few seconds and the next thing you know is that you’re crying. “I’ve been trying so hard in my whole life, but somehow I always ended up… not being enough, or thrown away, stepped over, left behind. No matter what I did, I always ended up alone and I can’t help but notice a pattern in it. It has to be me, what else?”

“It’s not you, okay? You just had a few bad experiences.”

“Not a few,” you huff closing your eyes. “All of them are bad. I was… I was never enough for anyone and now that I found a guy that seemed to be just perfect… I’m ruining it.”

“I don’t think you’re ruining anything.”

“Then explain to me what’s happening, Harry!” you snap in despair and Harry stares back at you at a loss of words at first.

“Do you have feelings for him?” he then asks. You can’t answer right away and it tells him a lot.

“I… I’m not sure.”

“That sounded more like a no.”

“Okay, alright. No, I don’t. But… I could develop feelings eventually, couldn’t I?”

“That’s not how it works, Y/N. You can’t just torture yourself hoping that one day you wake up and you’ll be in love with him. It’s not gonna happen and you’re just wasting your time.”

“How do you know it’s not gonna happen? What makes you so sure of that I will not end up alone?”

Harry stays quiet, her green eyes are staring right into your soul and for a moment you forget about your misery. This man alone holds such a power over you, it’s starting to scare you.

“I know it, because… I know you. And I see you. You’re literally the funniest girl I know, so easy to talk with, you always know when to crack a joke and when you have to be serious. You have so much love for others, you care about your loved ones and you’re always there for your friends and family. You make it so easy for others to get comfortable around you and you make everyone feel safe around you.”

You listen to him intently, drinking up every word that leaves his lips. Harry looks down at his hands as he continues.

“And you’re beautiful. So fucking beautiful, it always baffles me when I see you.”

“What?” you breathe out.

“It’s the truth,” Harry chuckles lightly, he brushes his knuckles together nervously. “Every time you walk in, you just… make everyone turn their head at you, and I always wonder if you even notice that. The way you walk, your smile, your laugh, Y/N, you make every man go crazy about you.”

“You’re just saying that because you are trying to cheer me up,” you sniff, wiping a few more tears away from your eyes.

“I’m definitely not,” he chuckles and his eyes finally find yours. “I remember when we first met.”

“When you walked in on me changing,” you sigh, the memories living vividly in your mind.

“Yeah. I remember how… breathless I felt when I saw you standing there, your dress handing a little on your frame because of the zipper. I forgot my name for a moment. I offered to help with the zipper because I just… wanted to touch you in any kind of way. So I knew that you were real.”

“Harry…”

“I know this sounds made up, but I’m telling you, this is the truth. And I know I didn’t act like that for a long time, but I always thought that you were an amazing person and I know that any guy would be so lucky and incredibly happy to be with you. I hate the thought of you thinking otherwise of yourself, when you are literally such a delight and… just a gift to all of us. I don’t know what’s really been going on between you and Marcus, but if he can’t see your worth and can’t make you feel like you deserve… he is not worthy of your time.”

You feel your throat closing up, but you’re not sure Harry knows the reason behind it when the tears start rolling down your cheeks again.

Because it might look like his words touched you and made you tear up, but in reality, a bittersweet feeling has taken completely over you. If this is how he thinks about you, why did he act like that when he had the chance to be with you? Why didn’t he want you to stay? What did you do that made him want to throw you out?

It’s a spiral straight down and you can’t stop yourself from falling. Harry has always been the biggest mystery of your life, and now you’re just even more sure it was something you did or said that made him want to run.

He reaches out and easily scoops you into his arms and you let him hold you tight, face buried into his chest. You hold onto his shirt as the silent cries escape your lips. You want him to want you. You want him to mean all those things he just told you, but you just can’t seem to move on from the past even though you’ve agreed to forget about it. It keeps bugging you in the back of your mind that no matter what he says, you weren’t good enough to make him want to stay with you when he had the chance.

***

It doesn’t get better after that night. Harry stayed until after midnight, made sure you got into bed and told you he’ll check in on you the next day. And so he did.

You felt guilty for loading all of it on Harry, so you decided it was the last time you ever talked about Marcus or your love life in general with him. You easily made yourself believe that he didn’t really care about it and he just listened to you because he was trying to be nice. It seemed the best to just try and forget about it all.

For a while you were contemplating breaking up with Marcus, but you didn’t have the strength to do it, telling yourself you have to give it another chance and some more patience. However it’s ending up to be quite draining, you gotta admit, but you are starting to get used to feeling numb every day.

Rosa invites you over, because she went through her closet and found some stuff she thought you’d like, so you head over not long after you get home from work. She mentioned that Harry would be over watching some kind of football game with Steven, so you are not surprised to see his car parking on their driveway.

“Hi guys!” you greet them when Rosa lets you in, the game is already on so they just wave in your way, intently watching the TV.

“Come on, I have everything in the bedroom,” Rosa nods in your way and you follow her upstairs. Valerie greets you with a loud shriek as you walk in, she is sitting in her crib, surrounded with a bunch of toys, seemingly having a great time.

“Hi there, Princess!” you coo at her, caressing her cheek before you sit on the edge of the bed that’s filled with piles of clothes. “What’s the big sorting?” you ask, grabbing a cardigan and taking a look at it.

“I just have way too much stuff, can’t fit new stuff into my wardrobe, so I needed to sort it all out.”

The two of you go through everything and just catch up while you try on what you like. At the end, you are just sitting on the bed playing with Valerie. You can tell there’s something Rosa wants to share, but she seems reserved about saying it out loud.

“So, the other day we were talking with Steven about how crazy it is that Val is over one year old,” she starts, eyes glued to the little girl, handing her another building block as Valerie works on… whatever it’s going to be when it's finished.

“Yeah, that’s what we talked about with Harry after her birthday dinner. Makes us feel old,” you chuckle.

“Exactly,” she sighs chuckling. “So then we talked about, maybe… having another kid sometime soon.”

You perk up and looking at Rosa you see the shy smile on her lips and you gasp, but she shakes her head.

“I’m not pregnant,” she assures you, but then adds: “Not yet.”

“Oh my God, so you’re trying for another baby?” you whisper, even though there’s no chance of the guys hearing the two of you. You can hear the sound of the TV up here, they have no clue what you’re talking about.

“I mean, it can take some time, so we thought we could… start now.”

“That’s fantastic!” you breathe out, truly happy for your sister. You just know Valerie will be such a good big sister. “Val, you want a baby sister or baby brother?” you ask her and she looks at you with a serious expression, holding out one of the blocks.

“Baba!” she exclaims.

“Yes, baba!” you chuckle. She’s been learning kind of real words lately and it won’t take too long before she’ll be bossing around everyone in the house.

When it’s getting late you pack the clothes you choose and head down to leave. The guys are still on the couch, but Harry’s head perks up when he hears your footsteps.

“You want me to give you a ride?”

“Um, I’m fine, don’t want to bother you while the game is on.”

“It’s ending in five. If you can wait a little it’s alright.”

“Okay,” you nod smiling so instead of going to the front door you stop in the kitchen to wait for Harry.

Rosa puts Valerie into her high chair and gets a banana for her while you check your phone just when Marcus calls you. Hesitantly, but you answer it.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Hi, just wanted to check in if the weekend is still on.”

“Uh, sure. It is.”

“Great. I’ll have to check again with my boss, but I think I’ll be able to pick you up.”

“Great. Talk to you later.”

“Bye, babe.”

The call ends and you find yourself facing a curious looking Rosa on the other side of the kitchen island.

“Marcus?” she asks and you nod. “How are things going?” You’ve only mentioned it to her that it’s been hard between the two of you, but you definitely didn’t go into details. Harry was the first and last person to hear the whole story.

“Um… neutral, I guess?”

“That doesn’t sound promising.”

“I know, but I’m just trying to figure it out. We are spending the weekend together, I hope it’ll help us to get a little more… settled? I guess, I don’t know,” you stammer, nervously fidgeting with your phone in your hands.

“That’s nice, was it his idea?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s good to know that Marcus is making the right attempts to smooth things out.”

“Attempts?” Harry’s voice makes both of you look in his way as he stands at the door, seemingly confused about what he just heard. “You’re still with Marcus?”

“Harry, I…”

“No, don’t try to explain it. I thought I talked sense into you last time.” He is clearly pissed, not holding back how upset he is to get the news that you are still dating Marcus. But on the other hand you can also feel yourself getting angry how he tries to control your life.

“You did, but I never said I’ll break things off with him.”

“Well, it surely sounded like you made up your mind,” he huffs.

“Well, I didn’t,” you scoff, crossing your arms on your chest.

“What the fuck, Y/N! You can’t keep doing this to yourself!” he snaps gesturing in your way. “I thought we were over this!”

“We? What do you mean we?” you grimace and now you are raising your voice as well. “Harry, there’s no we! This is my relationship and it’s nice that you care, but you can’t tell me what to do!”

Harry is vivid. He needs everything in him not to burst right then and there and for a moment you think he’s gonna just explode. But when he speaks up again his voice is quiet, however you can feel all the anger and frustration behind it.

“Get in the car, we’re leaving.”

“What?”

“Get in the fucking car, Y/N!” he barks making you jump. Rosa and Steven, who arrived to the kitchen in the middle of this madness, are just watching the scene unfold, completely unable to even say a word.

Slowly, you slide off the stool and grabbing the bag filled with clothes you turn to Rosa.

“Thanks for… these,” you mumble before walking out, Harry following you right behind.

Nothing is said as the two of you get into the car, Harry is clearly on the verge of anger outburst, but you’re pretty upset yourself. The drive back to your place is painfully quiet, but you can’t stop staring at his hands gripping the wheel. HIs fingers and knuckles are turning white from the way he is basically crushing the wheel in his hold. You wouldn’t be surprised if it had his grip’s imprint on it by the time you arrive to your building.

“What the fuck, Y/N?” he snaps once the car is parked.

“Would you stop pretending like you have a saying in what I do?”

“I do have a saying in it! Because when you break again I’ll be the one picking you up from the ground!”

“Well, sorry it’s such an inconvenience to be my friend. But don’t worry, I won’t come to you again,” you snap back with a grimace and try to open the door, but it’s locked. “Let me out, Harry!”

“Fuck no, not until we talk about this,” he scoffs and it’s the last straw for you.

“There’s nothing to talk about! It’s none of your business, Harry! Stop pretending like you care!”

“I do care!” he shouts back so forcefully you are taken aback, sinking into your seat. “Of course I fucking care! How would I not?! I care about you so fucking much, how do you not see it?!”

At this point, you’re certain Harry has lost all self control and he is about to load he has been holding back out on you, while you’re just sitting there, staring at him completely speechless over how his whole being is filled with anger and fury.

“Stop fucking telling me that I don’t care when all I think about is you! Every damn day! I can’t fucking stop thinking about you, because every time my mind snaps right back to you when I’m trying to think about something else! Do you know how fucking painful it is?! See you fucking waste your time with that dickhead when I want to be with you?!”

Eyes widened you forget to even breathe as the words leave his lips and soon enough realization hits him hard about what he just said. His chest is violently waving, eyes staring straight ahead. Next time he speaks up the shouting is over, he is clearly shocked at his own behavior.

“Y/N, I-- what you told me last time, about ending up alone, that wasn’t the first time you told me all of that.”

“What?” you gasp.

“You broke down the same way at the wedding. Told me all about how you think you are just simply unlovable and will probably die alone.” His eyes snap down at his hands on his lap as he continues. “I was shocked how you’d ever think that way about yourself, because I was… I was already falling in love with you and I barely just met you that night. I couldn’t imagine what happened to you that made you believe that nonsense. I never felt like that with anyone else before and it was so fucking scary. Every time you looked at me or touched me, I could feel… the sparks. The fucking sparks, Y/N,” he lets out a bitter chuckle. “I never believed in that, but you made me feel that way. Then… one thing happened after the other and we were up in my room. I saw the way you looked at me, like I was your fucking everything and I have never experienced that. You fell asleep in my arms and I told myself that this is exactly how I want to spend the rest of my life.”

Tears roll down your cheeks as you listen in complete shock as Harry is still avoiding to look at you.

“I wanted to be the person who shows you how lovable and amazing you are, how worthy you are to be loved. Like I found my mission all of a sudden.”

“Then what the fuck happened in the morning?” you ask choking out the words. Harry finally turns to face you and you see his watery eyes. He was crying.

“You fell asleep and I was just watching you… and I realized that… sooner or later I would do something to hurt you. Because that’s what I always do and I didn’t want that. You didn’t deserve that, but I just knew I won’t be able to give you what you wanted and needed. And you told me all about how you just want to be loved and… I didn’t want to disappoint you in any way.”

He rubs his eyes turning back to look straight ahead and you see his lips tremble before he speaks up again.

“I said all those stuff so you’d have a reason to hate me and you wouldn’t try to stay with me.”

“This is literally the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” you chuckle bitterly as the tears keep rolling down your cheeks. “Do you have any idea how fucking horrible I felt after that? I felt so ashamed for fucking weeks, Harry!”

“I-I know. I mean, I figured.”

“You made me feel unwanted and dirty, it took me so long to build my confidence back and be able to think of myself as more than just some used rug that was thrown out!”

Harry sits there in complete silence and just lets you load everything out on him, because he knows that’s what he deserves. He has tried to punish himself in so many different ways for what he did to you, but he knew he had to face you someday. Now the time has come and he is done trying to run away from the consequences of his actions in the past.

“I was blaming myself all this time, thinking that I must have done something wrong, when in reality it was you! It was fucking you!”

“I know, I’m so sorry, Y/N. I didn’t mean it to end like this.”

“You didn’t mean it to end like this?” you snap. “You literally continued to treat me like shit for years! If it wasn’t for Valerie, you’d still be a complete dick to me! And what was your intention with this now, huh? Why did you tell me all of this now?!”

“Because I couldn’t stop… seeing you be so unhappy with someone who clearly doesn’t deserve you in any way. I’m selfish and I realized that I made a mistake, but I now know what I should have done, because…” He finally turns to face you again, you see a tear roll down his cheek as he takes a deep breath before continuing. “I love you. I love you, Y/N, and I’m fucking done pretending like I don’t.”

You stare back at him, breath caught in your throat and it’s the breaking point. You reach over to his side and unlock the doors so you can open yours and you jump out of the car wanting to get as far away from him as possible. He can’t just throw all of this on you after everything the two of you went through, that’s not how it works. Does he even mean it? How are you supposed to believe him after years of hatred?

You try to get inside the building, but he is quick to catch up with you, he grabs your upper arm and pulls back, but you yank his hold away.

“Where are you going?!” he snaps towering above you.

“Home. And don’t fucking touch me!”

“But I literally just told you I love you, you’re not gonna say anything about that?”

At first you plan on not even answering, you make your way towards the door, but then you change your mind. Turning around you unload on him once again.

“You don’t have the right to tell me you love me! Not after all the shit I took from you! How am I supposed to believe it when you literally made me feel like shit for all these years, saying the meanest stuff to me every damn time we met! I was avoiding you like the plague because I can’t even count how many times you made me cry calling me names and treating me so fucking horrible! No, you are not just gonna waltz in here, tell me that I have to break up with my boyfriend because you’ve been in love with me all along. I don’t fucking believe you, Harry. So stay the fuck away from me,” you tell him and push your way inside. This time he doesn’t follow.

By the time you reach your front you’re sobbing, barely seeing from your own tears. With shaking hands you unlock the door and get inside shutting the door behind you before you collapse on the floor.

Harry lives in delusion if he thinks he can just unload all of this on you and make everything right magically. Not after more than three years of the shit you took from him. How are you supposed to believe that he is telling the truth? If he loved you all along, how could he treat you like that? That’s not what love should feel like. All those countless times when you came home after seeing him and you couldn’t help but cry after some of his meanest comments… and now he is trying to make you believe he did it all to protect you from him? Bullshit.

It doesn’t work like that and now he is gonna have to face the consequences of his actions.

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ambersky0319 · 5 years ago

Note

A human AU where the Light sides were all like a found family, until Logan runs away and they are determined to bring him back no matter what, only to find him with Dexter(Deceit) and Remus and looking far happier than with them. But Virgil hates it, pushing the two away from Logan and trying to force him back before screaming "They're fucking monsters, they could never love someone like you!" Which causes Logan to fight against him and leave the lights for good

Hope you’re happy with this! It was super fun to write but also fuck Virgil in this-

Can be seen as either platonic or romantic Intruloceit, your choice really

Warnings : Unsympathetic Virgil, Somewhat Unsympathetic/Highly Implied Unsympathetic Roman, Morally gray Patton, past suicide mention(none of the main characters), mention of a panic attack, lmk if I need to add anything else!

Masterpost

——————————–

It was just by chance, meeting Dexter and Remus. Though Logan had known about them for a while. They had a small community on YouTube for their random and often insane ideas, usually done in the name of “science”. They did have some more serious videos, though, one that caught Logan’s interest the most being one where they talked about toxic relationships. They had still made some jokes, mostly about their past experiences, but the video was extremely heartfelt and made Logan curious enough to do some research on his own.

What Logan didn’t know, was that Dexter and Remus actually lived in the same city as him.

Logan had left his and his friends’ house after a particularly harsh argument with Roman, and took a bus further into the city to find a place to relax. He remembered a coffee shop from a few weeks ago that Patton had dragged him to. While Patton didn’t really like it as much as he thought he would, Logan really liked it as the people inside always seemed to be full of life and had hearts of gold(seriously, the barista he talked to looked as though she was glowing in the afternoon light).

Stepping inside, there was only one table open which he took quickly, setting his things down before ordering his coffee. The barista, the same as last time he had visited(a shock to Logan in all honesty that she’d keep the job), made his drink quickly and handed it to him with a bright smile, wishing him a good afternoon. Once back at his table, he took out his laptop to work on one of his many projects. He lost himself in one of his favorites, a novel he was writing. Eventually though, he was pulled from his focus.

“Hey um, sir?”

Logan looked up, and he nearly gasped. Nearly. Standing before him was none other than Dexter, looking rather sheepish as he interrupted Logan.

“Sorry to bother you, but all the other tables are full and I was wondering if my friend and I could sit with you for now, at least until one opens up?” Dexter jabbed his thumb over to the counter, where Remus stood chatting with the barista as she made their drinks and another prepared some food for them. Logan almost forgot how to speak, and he cleared his throat.

“Um, yeah, sure. I don’t mind.” Dexter smiled and slid into the seat across from Logan. Remus joined them not long after.

“I’m Dexter, by the way. And this is Remus.” Dexter slung his arm around Remus once Remus settled beside him.

“I kinda knew. I really like your videos, they’re far more informational than I thought they would be.” And then, it was as if Logan just remembered that he didn’t know these two personally, and his cheeks felt a bit warmer all of a sudden. “Oh, and I’m Logan, by the way.”

“Well Logan, it’s always great to meet a fan,” Dexter said, taking a sip of his coffee.

“Yeah! Especially since most people just think we’re two idiots online, huh Dee?” Remus wasn’t really asking him, but he still got an affirmative hum. Remus tilted his head as he studied Logan for a moment. “Hey wait, I’ve seen you before! You’re in that one psych class!”

And that’s how the rest of Logan’s afternoon went. Other tables cleared, but Dexter and Remus didn’t leave Logan’s table as they spoke with him. And Logan’s computer was moved to his bag as he let himself open up to some people other than his main friend group. He wasn’t all too surprised that they had similar interests, and it was fun getting to complain with Remus about the number of projects their teachers gave them.

Over the following months, Logan continued to meet up with them and talk with them late into the night. He learned Dexter wasn’t in college and worked freelance as an artist to pay their house bills so Remus could focus on becoming a psychiatrist(Remus did do art commissions as well to chip in, but Dexter took care of finances the most). Logan also learned that Remus was the younger brother that Roman so often complained about, which initially pissed Logan off. When Remus learned that Logan was living with his brother, and heard of the things Roman had said, just shrugged and told Logan to not tell any of them they hung out. Dexter knew Virgil as well, though he was far less inclined to tell Logan what had happened, and just said they had a major fallout a few years back.

About two years into their friendship, Logan had sent the duo a text during their livestream(Logan had been doing homework and hadn’t noticed the two were busy). It was frantic, and Logan was stuffing essentials into his bag as he waited anxiously for either of them to text back. All Logan’s original text had said was “guys I need OUT”.

Dexter texted him back after ten agonizing minutes, asking what was wrong, and Logan called him, his voice unsteady as he explained the situation. Dexter listened as Remus ended their video so he could hear what was happening too. He and Virgil had gotten into a rather heated argument, and Roman had somehow been dragged into it. Normally Patton was there to calm them all down but he was working at the time, and Logan just couldn’t take any more arguing like this, not when it got so personal and to the point that Logan had been reduced to silence because of a panic attack.

“Do you want me to come pick you up? Lo, where are you?” Remus had snatched Dexter’s phone from his hand.

Logan swallowed thickly, his hand trembling on his own phone as he told them their address. “Virgil and Roman are both home though-”

“Just say you’re going to a last-minute meeting because our teacher is a jackass who does that and the things in your suitcase is this huge project he wanted us to do.” Further away from the phone, Remus called over to Dexter. “Got the keys?” Logan heard Dexter say something along the lines of ‘yes’ and Remus was back on the phone. “Alright, I’ll text you once we’re close by, kay?”

“Mhmm.” Logan took a deep breath, and before Remus could hang up he said, “Thank you, so much.”

He could almost see Remus grinning on the other end. “Don’t worry about it, Logan. See you in a bit.”

Twenty minutes later Logan was in the back of Dexter’s car, having faced no troubles in leaving the house and now on route to Remus and Dexter’s home. The drive was pretty quiet, the silence only filled by the radio playing some random songs softly.

They showed Logan to his new room, offering to take him out over the weekend to buy some paints if he liked and some other things Logan might want to add to his room. They had just given him their guest room, which was usually for the occasional friend to crash on(they claimed their friend Remy visited the most, but both were sure Remy wouldn’t care if Logan took the spare room). Logan declined their offer for going out shopping, saying that them just letting him stay was good enough.

He was able to move his things in quickly(he really didn’t have much while living with the others anyway), and Logan got to enjoy takeout with his new roommates as they lounged on the couch. Dexter was the first of the two to ask Logan if he wanted to talk about what had happened earlier with Roman and Virgil, to which Logan just shook his head.

“Maybe tomorrow,” Logan said after some thought, and Dexter hummed but didn’t push. He instead returned his attention to the documentary they had picked to watch.

Over the next few days, Logan ignored the explosion of texts he was getting from Roman, Virgil, and Patton, having already told them that he’d moved out about an hour after Logan had initially left. All of them just chose to ignore his message though, it seemed, and Logan actually grew frustrated with how many times the trio was calling him. Eventually, Logan just blocked their numbers and returned his focus to his papers that were due a few days from then.

About two weeks since Logan left the trio, and there’s an unwelcome knock on their door. Remus answers it when he realizes Logan is too caught up on writing and Dexter is busy making dinner, and he stares in shock at who he finds.

Logan looks up when he notices Remus frozen in the doorway to their home. “Rem?” He snaps Remus out of his daze, and Remus glances at him worriedly.

“Uhm.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Remus, just let us see him so we can talk this out!” Logan tenses at the voice, it’s unmistakably Roman’s, but then he just lets his shoulders fall and sighs. Taking this as an 'okay I’ll deal with it’, Remus lets Roman, Virgil, and Patton inside.

Logan closed his laptop, setting it to the side and staring up at the trio, the people he once called family. He still remembered the argument though, the words used which cut through him so badly Logan would have preferred to have been stabbed. “What is it?” He asked, resting his chin on his hand.

“What is it? Logan! You just up and disappeared for two weeks!” Patton exclaimed, throwing his hands into the air. “You can’t just do that and make us worry!”

“Roman and Virgil were truly worried about me?” Logan sounded unimpressed. Patton glanced at his other friends as if daring them to answer otherwise.

“Of course we were worried, Logan, you’re like family-”

“So your ideal family is where you threaten to prohibit my breathing? Or claim that I was so annoying, always ruining everyone’s fun and curiosity with my 'boring facts’ and 'unwanted ramblings’ and 'caution’, and that it would just be better if I could disappear for a few hours? And that was just from our last fight!”

Dexter appeared from the kitchen, leaning against the wall that separated it from the living room.

Virgil bit his lip before letting out a fake nervous laugh. “Lo, you know I was only-”

“Oh Stormcloud, don’t play it off as a joke. You knew damn well how that would affect Logan.” Dexter cut Virgil off.

“Plus so many other things you two said!” Remus sang as he plopped down next to Logan, glaring at his brother momentarily. “Honestly, hearing Logan recount the argument, plus so many others you lot apparently had? It’s like none of you changed since we last talked.” Remus slung his arm around Logan, giving his shoulder a gentle squeeze. “And Roman, reducing someone to a panic attack is low, even for you.”

Roman rolled his eyes, huffed, and blatantly ignored his brother. “Logan, c'mon, you can’t really just stay here.”

Logan glanced at Remus, then at Dexter across the room. He leaned into Remus’s embrace. “Actually, I can.”

Virgil glared, and he honestly hated how Logan didn’t even blink when he yelled. “But they’re fucking monsters! I mean, Dexter drove his mom to suicide and Remus is fucking Remus! What could either of them have that is even close to what you had with us?”

Dexter had wide eyes now, his confidence gone and Logan couldn’t tell if the look on Remus’s face was hurt or anger. Logan just stared at Virgil in shock.

“I mean, really! Neither of them could ever love someone like you, Logan, hardly anyone can put up with you-”

That got Logan to his feet, and as quick as the words had left Virgil’s mouth he was being shoved out the door, followed by Roman and then Patton(who was the only one of the trio to apologize to Dexter and Remus, and whisper his apology to Logan as he passed). Logan glared down at Virgil, and for once Virgil couldn’t come up with anything else to say.

“You know, there might have been the tiniest chance of me coming back. But now? Now I just hope you stay out of my damn life.” And with that, Logan slammed the door. He could hear Virgil and Roman argue with Patton about trying again, but it seemed Patton had convinced them to just leave.

Logan grabbed Dexter from where he was frozen by the kitchen entrance and dragged him over to the couch where Remus still sat. Once they both sat down, Dexter wiping away a few tears that had sprung to his eyes, both Dexter and Remus cuddled up to Logan. Remus laughed.

“Remind me to never get on your bad side!”

“Hush and enjoy the fact that the assholes are hopefully gone for good,” Logan muttered, and Dexter just hummed in appreciation. Their food was burned as they had all fallen asleep, and they just ordered a pizza and opted to watch some trashy horror film Remus had rented the day prior.

Midway through the movie, when Remus had passed out from sheer boredom, Dexter had looked up at Logan. “Lo?”

Logan looked away from their television just as one of the main characters was slaughtered(Logan couldn’t remember his name, he was destined to be murdered anyway so Logan didn’t bother to try and remember it). He tilted his head as he waited for Dexter to continue.

“You know we do love you, right?” Logan smiled slightly, looking back to the TV and he leaned his head on Dexter’s.

“I do. I love you guys, too.”

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eryiss · 5 years ago

Text

Fraxus Week 2020: Day 4 - Drunk

Summary: After a crappy post-college first year, Laxus jumped at the opportunity to leave town for a week for a road trip with his friends. He intended it just to be a week away with his friends, but when he meets an unfamiliar stranger, the vacation turns into something much more. [Fraxus Multichapter]

This is the fourth part of my Fraxus Week admissions, hosted by @fuckyeahfraxus. This year I’ve made the prompts into a single multi-chapter fic. You can see all the chapters in the Masterpost linked below. Hope you enjoy.

You can read this on Fanfiction, Archive of our Own, and under the cut. Read the other chapters from this masterlist.

Chapter Four – Out of the Rain

The contrast between the two days was ridiculous.

Laxus almost couldn't believe that it had been a day since he was lounging in the hot summer sun, whereas now he was narrowing his eyes as he drove the RV through the onslaught of rain. The storm had come from nowhere and according to the weather forecast, it would be sticking around for the rest of the night. The clouds were thick and covering the stars, meaning it was almost pitch black on the empty roads.

Unlike the day before, everyone was still awake as evening turned to night. They had spent the entire day driving, trying to catch up for the time they'd used at the water park. Bickslow had driven through the morning and early afternoon, and then had switched with Laxus.

At that moment, Laxus was fighting off sleep. They needed to find somewhere to park soon.

Not that they'd have a good night's sleep, though. The sound of rain battering down on the RV echoed loudly, and Laxus knew that it would sway and creak in the wind. It would be safe, but not anywhere near easy to sleep in. All he could do was hope that the forecast was wrong, and that the storm would end a lot quicker than they had stated.

He also hoped that he didn't fall asleep at the wheel.

"We have some money left over from renting the van, don't we?" Evergreen asked Bickslow, looking up from her phone.

"Yeah, a little over a hundred dollars. Why?" Bickslow asked, yawning into the thermos of coffee he was drinking.

"Well, there's nowhere close that'll let us park up and stay in the truck," Evergreen said, and Laxus cussed under his breath. "But there is a motel at the next rest stop. We should be able to get two double rooms with that."

"Sounds good," Laxus nodded. "Nobody's got a problem with that?"

When everyone agreed it was the best use of their spare money, Laxus got the directions from Evergreen and started to drive towards the motel. It was clearly a good choice, as soon after they made it lightning and thunder started splitting apart the sky, with even heavier rain following it. With his tired state, Laxus knew that it was best to get off the roads as soon as they could. It was certainly the safest thing to do.

Eventually they pulled off the highway and followed the illuminated signs to the motel. It was a nice enough looking place, which probably was a lot more welcoming in the day and when it wasn't a storm. It would certainly better than staying in the RV though the night.

Bickslow, who still had the money saved for the RV in his account, was the one who went to the reception. It took him a short while, but he eventually returned to them all with two keys from two double rooms, soaking wet with the water dripping off him. As he dried himself off with a beach towel they had brought yesterday, he claimed that he wished to share a room with Evergreen for the night.

"Why, exactly?" Freed asked, packing the clothes he would need for the night into a bag.

"Because I've had sleepovers with the two of you and you're both really boring," Bickslow claimed. "Evergreen lets me paint her nails and we gossip. You two just like sleeping."

Laxus was almost certain that it wasn't the real reason as to why he wanted to share his room with Evergreen. Given that both of them knew that Laxus had developed a crush on Freed, it seemed likely that this was some way for them to torture him by making him sleep in a room with him and nobody else. If the room they shared only had one bed, he was going to kill the bastard.

"It is appalling how we want to sleep at a sleepover," Freed commented, and Laxus sniggered.

"And that's the kind of boring attitude that makes me and Evergreen the best friends and you two the boring people on the side-lines," Bickslow grinned as he tossed a room key towards Freed, who managed to catch them without difficulty. It was an annoyingly attractive feat. "Room 203. Top floor."

Apparently leaving no room for argument, Bickslow turned is back and started to pack an impromptu overnight bag. Laxus and Freed shared a glance before picking up their own bags. They opened the door to the RV and winced at the rain they needed to walk to.

Despite the fact it had taken less than a minute to get under the protection of the building's veranda, both men had been drenched by the heavy rain. They quickly found their room and unlocked it, and Laxus let out a small breath when he realised that there were indeed two beds waiting for them. It was a nice enough room, with a small kitchenette – if a coffee machine, mini fridge, sink and microwave could be considered that – and a large enough TV mounted onto the wall. The large beds were rather appealing, given how Laxus had been curled up as he slept since they'd left Magnolia.

"It's better than I thought it'd be," Laxus commented, placing his bag at the foot of the nearest bed. "Kinda nice actually."

"It is," Freed agreed, walking to the bathroom and looking into it. "And a shower that might actually fit you inside of it."

Laxus grinned, mainly at the teasing tone in Freed's voice, and glanced into the bathroom to see that there was indeed a large shower. He reached over Freed and picked up one of the towel's hanging up. He started to dry himself off as Freed shucked off his jacket.

"I think I might have a shower before I go to sleep," Freed commented. "I need to wash my hair, might as well do it now."

"Sure," Laxus nodded, then he chuckled. "I get what Bickslow meant when he said we're boring."

"So do I," Freed said thoughtfully. "It's quite annoying that we're proving him right, isn't it," He sighed, and Laxus couldn't help but smirk. Freed really was quite a competitive person; Laxus enjoyed seeing it. "Why don't we try and prove him wrong instead?"

"How d'you suppose we do that?" Laxus asked with furrowed brows. He expected Freed wouldn't want to prove Bickslow wrong in any way Laxus was thinking.

"Well, our judgemental friend payed for this on his card, and all charges from the room will be his to pay," Freed commented absently as he walked towards the small kitchenette, and opened one of the cupboards. "And this place has a rather well stocked mini bar."

Laxus grinned when Freed pulled out a bottle of tequila.

"Sounds like fun."

~~~

"Oh come on," Laxus proclaimed with a slight slur in his voice. "That's bullshit."

"I told you, she's vicious," Freed said with a tipsy laugh. "It's why she always wins her fights."

They had gotten drunk. Well, maybe not drunk. But they had passed tipsy.

After they'd taken shots of the tequila, something that Laxus hadn't done since he was in college, they had both finished bottle of high percentage beer each. That was when they had turned on the TV, looking for something to watch to put off sleeping. That was how they had gotten where they were: sitting side by side on Freed's bed, a bowl of hot nuts, chips, and chocolate between them, watching The Real Housewives of… somewhere.

"She threw a plate at the guys face," Laxus argued. "It's bullshit."

"It's what she's paid to do, be stupidly annoying and start fights with people. It was probably staged anyway, so I wouldn't worry about it," Freed argued, reaching into the bowl of food between them. His head snapped up when the woman on the screen threw a champagne glass at the man she was arguing with.

"Bet that hurt," Laxus said with a grin. He was winning this argument.

"You can't be sure," Freed said indignantly.

"I can throw a mug at your face and we can see if it hurts ya," Laxus threatened with a grin.

Apparently, the alcohol in Freed's body had made the false threat hilarious, as he let out a loud and boisterous laugh. Laxus joined in, watching the shorter man as he almost doubled over as he laughed, the handful of food dropping onto his bedsheets.

"How often do you watch this crap," Laxus asked with a grin.

"Ever makes me watch it. Every night we went to one of our dorms common areas and watched something. Ever got obsessed with it, and then got Bickslow into it too," Freed laughed, shifting himself so he was sitting up again. "I would have complained about it, but Bickslow used to make me watch awful kids' films, so this is better."

Again, Freed started to laugh, and Laxus found himself unable to resist the charm of it and joined in too.

That was how they spent quite a lot of the night, eating the snacks that Bickslow would be overcharged for while watching crappy reality TV. They got a little bit more sober as time went on, as the only thing left in the minibar was champagne and they weren't going to be so cruel as to make Bickslow pay for that as well.

Part way through the night, Laxus had taken note of how close they were to each other. Their sides were pushed together, shoulder to shoulder and thigh to thigh. In his drunken state, Freed also seemed to be just a little bit more physical. He gesticulated a lot more, and Laxus often found himself with the other man's hand on his shoulder when he was making a point. At one point, Freed had even grabbed Laxus' wrist to get his attention, and it sent a thrill through Laxus that set his blood on fire.

On their third episode of rich people fighting, Laxus found his gaze on the man beside him. He was watching the show with contentment, a tipsy smile on his face as he made comments about the people on screen. It was endearing, and Laxus was left with an equally happy smile.

His smile faltered when Freed's did.

For a second, Laxus had thought that the other man had noticed him looking and was uncomfortable with it. But he didn't move away and Laxus realised he was now almost glaring at the TV. Laxus looked towards it to see that they were on the 'next time' part of the show. One of the women was shouting at a man, and it took a moment for him to realise that she was accusing him of cheating.

"He cheated on me," Freed commented, with a smile that was most likely sad. "My ex, not the man on the screen."

"Oh," Laxus mumbled, not sure of what else to say. "Sorry."

"Don't be," Freed sighed, closing his eyes. "I shouldn't be sad about it; I don't understand why I am. I wasn't in love with him, I'm not even sure if I particularly liked him by the end of the relationship. I was actually going to leave him, for heaven's sake. So I shouldn't feel bad that he found someone else, but I do."

"Well," Laxus began again, not sober enough to think of anything eloquent to say. "He cheated on ya. It's a shitty thing to do. You get to be pissed off at that."

"I suppose so," Freed sighed, almost as if he was disappointed in himself. "What does annoy me is how it happened, though. I didn't walk in on him, or find out myself. He just told me," He laughed bitterly at that. "Just sat me down, said he was seeing someone else and that we weren't together. I didn't get to be a dick about it, really. I didn't yell, or really react at all. It just sort of ended, and then I came back home again."

"Should have punched the fucker," Laxus commented indignantly. "Sent him to the other guy with a black eye."

"It wouldn't have been productive," Freed waved the idea off, eyes still closed. "It's a tempting thought though, I must admit."

"You can punch me if you wanna. Get it out of yer system, y'know," Laxus suggested, and it was clear the booze in his blood had made him suggest that. Freed looked to him with a small smile.

"You're far too good a man to be compared to him," Freed commented.

Laxus blushed a little at the compliment, even if it wasn't much. He looked down at the man, who was watching the TV and clearly trying to act like he wasn't affected by what he had just said. But even drunk, Laxus could tell that the man had lost his easy posture and his hands were clenched at his sides. Laxus frowned at this, reached for the remote and muted the show they were watching. Freed frowned and looked up at him.

"I'm sorry the bastard cheated on ya," Laxus said with as much seriousness in his tone as he could show. "I know that you said you wanted to leave him, and that ya think it's stupid you feel bad about it, but the guy betrayed ya. And you didn't deserve to feel like that, or to be treated like that. So, I'm sorry."

"As I said, you don't need to worry about it," Freed said with a sigh. "It's not your fault, and I'll get over it."

"But you shouldn't have t' get over it because you shouldn't have been cheated on," Laxus said with an insistent tone in his voice. "I mean if I were dating a guy like you, I wouldn't even think about looking at other guys. I mean who fucking would. Yer hot, you're and interesting, and know how to make a guy enjoy himself. Who wouldn't want that?"

"Well, it seems that my ex disagrees with you."

"Then he's stupid," Laxus said firmly. "Seriously, this guy is clearly a dick head. Because if he looks at you and thinks he wants something more, or different, then he's an idiot. Cause you're fucking… just look at yourself. Can't think of anything I'd change."

"Oh," Freed said, a little shocked. Was he blushing as well? Probably not. "Well, thank you. That… that's nice of you to say. I appreciate it."

Freed turned and looked towards him, and only then did Laxus realise just how close they were to each other. Their noses were almost touching, and Laxus' mind screamed to him that it would be easy to close the gap and press their lips together.

"Well, I mean it," Laxus shrugged.

With the booze flowing through him, and his good sense all but gone, Laxus listened to the voice in his head. He pushed his face forward, cupped Freed's face, and kissed him.

#fraxus week #Fraxus week 2020 #fraxus #Freed Justine #Laxus Dreyar #fairy tail #fanfic #writing #event #multichapter #Modern AU

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pynkhues · 5 years ago

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3 7 22!!

3. What is that one scene that you’ve always wanted to write but can’t be arsed to write all of the set-up and context it would need? (consider this permission to write it and/or share it anyway)

I answered this one here, but I will say I forever want to write more scenes with just the girls, particularly pre-canon scenes, so I thought I might share a scene from my ridiculously belated prompt-a-thon fill which is 10 times Ruby’s danced, and this scene is about Beth and Ruby while Beth’s in labour with Emma, and Ruby’s pregnant with Harry.

Below a cut to save your feeds!

“I kinda figured we’d just arrange the thing.”

She’s only half serious when she says it, but it’s worth it to see Beth’s head jerk, her eyebrows somewhere up near her forehead even as her cheeks are still flushed red, her chest still heaving.

“You have been watching way too many old romances,” she tells her, amusement thick in her tone, and Ruby shrugs, rocking the baby carrier beside her when Danny starts to whine.

“Please, you’re the one who made us go see Fiddler on the Roof three times at the Revival Theatre. If it wasn’t for that, I’d never even know about the whole matchmaker thing with your people.”

“My people,” Beth scoffs, red creeping up her neck. “Besides, the whole point of Fiddler on the Roof was that he had to learn how to let his daughters choose who they married. That they couldn’t just arrange - - ah.”

Beth exhales sharply, squirming back into her seat, hands balling, white knuckled at the arms of the chair, and she has to be close, Ruby thinks, dropping her hand to Beth’s back, rubbing soothing circles there as she tries to catch the attention of one of the nurses. They barely seem to even see them though amidst the crowded waiting room, beelining to patients with - - what even is that? A rash? Ruby side eyes the nurse taking the man out of the waiting room, before turning her attention back to Beth.

“What was that whole do you love me song about then, huh?” Ruby says. “Him and his wife had been matched, and those two were in it, y’know?”

“It’s generational. The parents do what they have to so the kids can have it better,” Beth insists, but she hasn’t opened her eyes yet, her eyelashes matted together with her clumping mascara and tears, and Ruby sighs, sitting forwards as best she can with her own pregnant belly in the way. New plan, Ruby tells herself. They are never pregnant at the same time again. One of them needs to run point, and she can’t send Stan out with Kenny and Sara forever.

“Where’s Dean?”

“I called Boland Motors,” Ruby promises. “He wasn’t at his desk, and honestly that new secretary of his is - -”

Well, Ruby thinks a little dryly.

She’s something.

Beth squirms back in her seat, panting a little now, and the contractions really are getting closer together, even if her waters haven’t broken yet. Maybe they’ll have to pop that bag for her – they had to do it with Danny after all –her gaze darts sideways to check on him in his stroller, but he’s fallen asleep again.

“So, how do you wanna do it?” Ruby asks, keeping her tone light. “We gotta get this thing on paper.”

It’s enough to make Beth twist her neck sideways, to peel open her watery eyes in confusion, and Ruby waits until she has Beth’s full attention before she gestures down to her own swollen belly.

“Stan Junior here is gonna be a catch. I’m just saying. Beth Junior there might want to lock it down.”

Beth’s laugh is strangled between her breathlessness, the pain of her contractions, but god, it’s music to Ruby’s ears.

“Oh, Stan Junior will definitely be a catch,” Beth agrees, the sweat curling her hair at her temples. The contraction seems to pass, and Beth smooths her own hand over her belly, still panting. “Lilies for the wedding?”

Ruby hums in approval, only to pause, squint a little below the bright glare of the hospital fluorescents.

“Wait. Do they get married at a church or a synagogue?”

“Neither,” Beth says, brushing her hair away from her face with a trembling hand, her eyes fixing briefly on Danny, sleeping in his stroller. “I feel like we should get a vacation out of it.”

“Oh, you’re planning a beach wedding now?” Ruby asks with a grin, the thing only faltering when the doors open again but - - no. Just a nurse, brandishing her clipboard. Still no Dean. Typical.

Beth hums, like she hadn’t even noticed, looking back at Ruby, her blue eyes bright, and there’s something that feels like Beth in it again, something warm, impish, as she wrinkles her nose, considering, and Ruby can’t help it, the way it feels like a key that unlocks her.

“White sand, the ocean,” Beth says. “We’d probably need to hire a marquee.”

“And a beach bar,” Ruby agrees, grinning a little when Beth rolls her eyes, waving a hand at her innocuously, before she says:

“Well, that goes without saying.”

And Ruby just laughs at that, sinking back briefly into her hard backed hospital chair (which is one-thousand percent not designed for anyone at all ever) before leaning forwards again, standing up two of her fingers like legs and walking them from one side of her belly to the other, over the arms of the chairs, and up the side of Beth’s twitching belly.

“Miss Boland, before you depart your mother, do you take this little man growing inside me to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

It really is magic, Ruby thinks again, the sound of Beth’s laugh. The real one she hears less and less often, the one that makes her throw her head back, her eyes crinkle, the sound a little low, a little husky, the one she knows Dean can never get out of her, and that at least feels like a truth. That Beth is still hers. That she’ll never lose her, not entirely, to Dean, no matter how many photo ops she goes to, no matter how many times she defers to him, no matter how much she dims her light to grow his.

Beth props her own fingers up then, mirroring Ruby’s action and walking them up over the swell of her own belly, meeting Ruby’s fingers in the middle.

“My daughter is running a little late, but I believe I have the permission to speak for her this evening,” Beth says gravely, lowering her voice. “And she says ‘I do’. Now, Mr. Hill, do you take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife?”

“He does,” Ruby says, face split in two with a grin. She lets her eyes slip shut and her tone lower in faux-seriousness. “Finally, our two houses united.”

“Well, our husbands’ houses,” Beth says wryly, and Ruby tilts her head, conceding.

“That’s true. I think ours have been united a lot longer than this.”

She smiles over at Beth affectionately, but it just - - it floors her, the look Beth gives her back. Her eyes wide open, suddenly wet again, pupils darting across Ruby’s face like she’s - - like she’s looking for the lie, and when she doesn’t see it, she tangles her fingers with Ruby’s, quick as she can, mumbling something about a first dance and holds Ruby’s hand tight to her belly, swaying a little – as if to hide the fact that maybe she just wanted to hold her.

To be held.

And Ruby holds her hand back all the tighter.

7. What do you think are the characteristics of your personal writing style? Would others agree?

I am sure everyone would love me to stop talking about light and using ‘- -’, haha.

But honestly? I actually don’t know how others perceive my style. Like I’ve said in other posts, I’ve been told my writing is extremely feminine by industry professionals, which I believe translates to being interested in women’s lives and writing fairly descriptively (masculine prose is usually v bare bones ala Raymond Carver and, of course, Hemingway).

I think some of the characteristics of my writing is that it’s sensory and descriptive, that I like untidy endings, that no relationship is perfect. I think (and hope) I prioritise relationships between women, even with shipper fic, that my sex scenes (again, hopefully, haha) never feel pointless or isolated from the story, and I think I’m pretty good at metaphor, but others might disagree! Who knows!

22. Do you reread your old works? How do you feel about them?

Y’know, I usually don’t? By the time I post something, I’ve usually re-read it so many times I lowkey hate it, haha, and reading it just makes me feel very self-conscious. I can see the machinery of my own writing I suppose. I can see the bits I’m proud of, sure, but I can also see the bits where I got lazy, the places where the pacing isn’t quite right, the parts where I think I’m too heavy-handed.

That said, I did re-read all of C&C recently as I was building the timeline masterpost I posted about a month ago now, but also building a better story bible for myself to write new stories, and I was really surprised by how much I enjoyed being in that world again as a reader?

Particularly the last installment I posted of Playing House - ‘Animalia’ (otherwise known as the zoo chapter, haha) - I really, really hated when I posted. I’d had a few set-backs in my original writing professionally at that time, and then I had seen someone make an unkind comment about my fics which just sort of hit a nerve at a bad time. It meant I was extra critical of my own writing, and I loved the story in my head, but felt it wasn’t translating well onto the page.

I got to a point where I was like - - well, whatever, I don’t want to look at it, and I know people like this ‘verse, so maybe they’ll overlook how crap it is’. I got such a lovely response to it at the time, but I still felt badly about it, and so re-reading it this time, and being like ‘hang on, Past Sophie, you’re an asshole, this is pretty good’ was a nice feeling, haha.

#fic memes #blue moon #my fic #welcome to my ama #ruby hill #beth boland #beth + ruby #sothischickshe

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suckishima · 5 years ago

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suckishima’s hq!! 30 day gif challenge masterpost

I’m doing the 30 Day Haikyu!! Gif/GFX challenge! But I’m slightly modifying the rules so it’s more fun for myself.

Link to the prompts here!

I’m skipping a few prompts because I felt like it lol. So I’m doing 22 of the 30 *shrugs*

I’m not allowed to repeat any characters, because if I did, well, basically the whole challenge would just be Tsukki gifsets and as much as I love him, that wouldn’t be much fun for me or for anyone else lol. This also works out for me because I’m generally bad at choosing definitive favorites, and now most everyone gets a turn.

I’m only choosing moments from the anime and therefore doing gifs only, because it would have just taken me too long to add colorings into the mix. Maybe one day I’ll do the challenge again but with only gfx/manga edits. That does sound fun lol, especially since a lot of my favorite moments haven’t actually been animated yet.

If I’ve done my math/timing right (and I stay on schedule) there should be one set every day from today until the second cour of Season 4 airs on October 2! So it’s kinda like a countdown event? idk lol

See which ones I’ve done so far here!

I’ve listed why I chose what I chose for each day under the cut if you wanna see me ramble on some more!

(I’ll update each prompt with a link to its post when it’s uploaded)

Favorite character: Yamaguchi Tadashi. Tsukki is probably more of my actual favorite, but he fits better for the character development category for me. So, I went with my second favorite, Yamaguchi! I love him so much, he’s such a sweetheart and I really like how we get to see him slowly grow more into his own. His big moments are some of my favorites of the entire series and I just really relate to his drive to just get to play with the rest of the first years.

Character first fell in love with: Hinata Shoyo. This one was easy peasy lol. Hinata is the light and love of my life and I’d honestly be surprised if anyone picked anyone other than Hinata for this prompt. He’s just so *clenches fist* good. Hard working, fun, determined, a little dumb, and so so caring and compassionate. And I’m so proud of him too tbh. I don’t care how cliche and overrated it is to say this, he is a ray of sunshine and I love him.

Character gradually warmed up to: Tendou Satori. Again, this could easily be Tsukki lmao since I didn’t like him at allll at first until he slowly began to grow on me in s2. Anyway, Tendou also grew on me. I tend not to like characters that feel chaotic just for the sake of it, and that’s how I felt about him at first. But as the Shiratorizawa match goes on, and especially in the Ball Boy arc as we see him interact with his teammates more I realized he just wants to have a good time and shame on me for wanting to be down on that. He’s funny, fun, doesn’t give a fuck what people think, and is a supportive friend. Nothing not to like tbh.

Favorite karasuno ship: Tsukkiyama. I mean, it’s my two favorite characters together lmao, it was bound to happen. Especially since a lot of the reasons they’re my favorites is because of their interactions together. I feel like each significant interaction between them isn’t just development for them together, but for them individually and I love that. There’s like this silent building each other up. They’re both there for each other without having to say anything, but then when they do voice it, it makes it that much more powerful. I just love how strong their friendship feels by the end of nationals arc, it feels so earned and genuine. I love that Tsukki is proud of how far Yamaguchi has grown, and that Yamaguchi is proud of not just Tsukki with volleyball, but Tsukki’s relationship with Akiteru. They’re both just so proud. I’m cool with all ships being just platonic too, but if we’re talking non-canonically, them being together just makes me happy. I’m a big ol’ sucker for friends to lovers.

Favorite episode/chapter: Illusionary Hero. Sensing a pattern yet? ha ha haaaa. The relationship between the Tsukishima brothers is one of my favorite in the series (i still cry over the peace signs), and this episode is where I really began to not only fall in love with Tsukki but the writing of the show. I too had been wondering “what IS the point of them working so hard,” and I loooooved how Furudate addresses that question through Tsukki’s backstory. Great stuff. (favorite manga chapter is 298 when yams and tsukki do their successful serve and block for the first time, if you were interested lol).

Favorite team: Karasuno. This was another easy choice. I love every single team in the series, truly. But I can’t just abandon my boys lmao. Karasuno is the heart and soul of the show, and they are also now my heart and soul.

Favorite position: Setter. “The setter is the information tower of the team” is the “the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell” of volleyball. Okay, not really, that quote was just repeating in my head while I made this set. I don’t have any cool meaningful reasons for this one. Setters are just cool.

Favorite wing spiker: Ushijima Wakatoshi. Ohhhh how I love Ushijima. At first you think he’s just big huge muscle baddie (and, like, he kinda is) BUT he’s also some of my absolute favorite comic relief in the whole series. He is so frickn earnest and blunt and doesn’t give a Fuck what people think and I love him.

Favorite middle blocker: Kuroo Tetsuro. This was a hard choice lol, because my top three favorite characters (tsukki, yamaguchi, and hinata) are all MBs, so I was like uhh which one do I choose? Aone was a close second to Kuroo too.

Favorite libero: Nishinoya Yuu. He’s just so dang cool.

Favorite setter: Kageyama Tobio. My boyyyyyy. God I love Kageyama. I’m not sure I can put into words how much he means to me. His character arc of shedding the King mantle only to pick it back up again with a new context is one of my favorite character developments of all time. His arc is all about learning to communicate and not only relying on others but learning to be relied on and I just ah - and the stuff about self care??? i love him.

Favorite captain: Sawamura Daichi. He just, is The Captain ya know. He’s got the vibe down pat. We love a good solid foundation for our team. He’s integral and Karasuno would have never made it as far as they do without him.

Favorite manager: Yachi Hitoka. I love Shimizu too, I do, but Yachi’s very unique brand of crazy is just too much fun lol. The first season feels so empty without her, and she brings so much joy to the team and to the show.

Favorite match: Shiratorizawa. Of the whole series, my favorites in order are actually, Nekoma, Inarizaki, Kamomedai and then Shiratorizawa, then Aoba Johsai 2. But since most of those aren’t animated yet, we get to focus on Shiratorizawa. Which I do still love, the hype is SO real the entire match, I still get chills at the end and during Tsukki’s Block.

Favorite non-match scene: BAR-BE-QUE!! Lmao tbh it was a close one between the fun of the bbq and heartwrench of the meal after the lose to Aoba Johsai in s1. Furudate said let them eat.

Favorite arc: Tokyo Training Camp. I love to see them improving and practicing and growing and ah it just makes me all warm and fuzzy inside.

Favorite underrated character: Tanaka Ryuunosuke. I LOVE HIM. HE IS SO FULL OF LOVE. And he’s so slept on I feel like. He is one of the most supportive characters in the show. He is always positive and is a great morale booster and is just an overall Good Boy. Yeah yeah he’s a bit intense with his crush, but he’s always respectful and I’ll fight anyone who thinks he’d do anything that makes Shimizu uncomfortable.

Favorite character development: Tsukishima Kei. Ah, we’re finally here lol. The top two reasons Tsukki is my favorite character is 1 because I relate to him sooo so much and I’ve never seen a character written in a way that feels so much like just how I personally think about and see things. 2, because of just how amazingly earned and cathartic his development is. I could ramble about this forever so I won’t. But when I found out he was still playing volleyball after the time-skip, I actually cried. Like, after everything, he’s still playing? He WANTS to play?? godddd.

Favorite non-player: Tsukishima Akiteru. Ah, I gotta say I relate to his struggle. Plus I love how expressive he is lmao, crying over like every little thing.

Favorite friendship(s): The Tsukishima Brothers. They are so important to me okay. The admiration, the falling out, the chasm for years that affects how they both interact and even see the world, the slowly piecing things back together, and then the reversal of the peace signs in the Kamomedai match, wow. (kageyama/hinata is a VERY close second, i’m bad at favorites)

Favorite pairing(s): Kageyama/Hinata, Bokuto/Akaashi, Shimizu/Yachi, Ushijima/Tendou. There’s so so many more tbh, but I had to narrow it down.

Favorite rare pair: skipped

1st, 2nd, or 3rd years: First Years. They’re my babies. I love them all and they way they all interact and I need them to be friends forever thanks.

Girls: skipped

Most relatable: skipped

Most like to be friends with: skipped

Most heartbreaking moment: skipped

Most heartwarming moment: skipped

Stage play day: skipped

Your choice: skipped

#i told my boyfriend i was working on this and he was like 'cool! like a haikyu advent calendar!'#ive been marking down times for months now lol and hoping to try some new techniques for a few of the sets #we'll see how it goes lol #hq #hq!!#*30days #haikyu #haikyu!!#long post #in case the read more doesnt work for some reason #x

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thechildoflightning · 5 years ago

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The Kübler-Ross Model Ch2- Anger

Title: The Kübler-Ross Model [Masterpost]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Pairings: background LAMP, Elliot/Mitchell

~~~

Chapter Title: Anger- Chapter Two

Summary:

Stage Two: Anger- Characterized by high energy and coped up frustrations that begin to pour out by lashing out at others or yourself.

In which Remy is angry about everything.

Warnings: Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Verbal Fights, Toxic Relationships (hinted at), Transphobia (mentioned), Exclusionary Rhetoric (mentioned), Ableism

[ao3 link]

~~~

Anger- Chapter Two

“Selected: Voicemail. One item. Tab one of one,” Remy’s phone says, sounding almost bitter. Remy sighs, at this point already knowing who it’s from. He puts his finger to the screen, sliding it around as he searches for the desired section.

“Voicemail.”

One finger down.

“Daniel Zurko. M-”

Double tap.

“Remy. This is childish and has gone on way too long. I canceled the credit card. I expect you to call me so we can get you home. I get that you’re upset, but this is not the way to deal with it. You think I’m the bad guy but I am doing what’s best for you Remy, I always have. You need to grow up. You’re an adult now, act like one. Call me. Come home. Now.”

Moving into the dorms is a surprisingly low-key event. Remy gets to move in early, as does Kai, so they're not trying to get things done in the time most of the freshman are piling in. It’s a lot nicer that way. They don’t have people on top of them- actually they have pretty much no one on top of them- and that lowers Remy’s stress by a lot.

Except, this definitely wasn’t something he’s stressing about.

Okay, maybe he's been stressing about it a little bit.

It’s well- it’s just this an entire new place and the campus is huge. He’s visited a few times now to start getting a layout, but he knows it’s going to take weeks before he can find his way around with ease. It’s nice to start on that when no one else is here yet. It gives Remy space and he feels a little bit less self-conscious.

(It’s stupid that he feels self-conscious at all, he shouldn’t, but he does, so there’s that).

Kai and him get their dorm set up and decorated as well.

Or well- it’s mostly Remy setting things up while Kai comments snarkily from the corner that the bed doesn’t line up perfectly. (They had to move everything a bit to make space for Cha-Cha). Remy doesn’t really mind because it’s nice to see Kai relaxing. He seemed uncomfortable and unsure when he admitted that he couldn’t do any of the heavy lifting, so Remy takes the return to teasing as a good sign.

They decorate the dorm next and it’s fun and it’s easy and Remy’s really thinking he’s found a friend in Kai.

Then Kai falls silent.

“Kai?” Remy asks when he stops making comments every two seconds.

“Yeah?”

“You good?”

Kai hesitates and Remy frowns. Remy’s about to ask a follow up question, but Kai beats him to speaking.

“Hey so, I brought two pride flags. I was hoping I could put them up in our room.”

Oh.

“Of course,” Remy says easily.

“I- yeah?”

“Yeah. Kai we’re literally in gender-inclusive dorming right now. But I mean, even if we weren't, yeah of course you can,” Remy insists, voice firm and even.

“Okay,” Kai says. He relaxes. “Okay.”

The tension in the room evaporates and Remy breathes out.

“Which flags?” he asks, curiosity peaking.

“Trans and demiboy,” Kai tells him.

Remy didn’t know you could be both trans and a demiboy. But that's probably better to google than to bug Kai with right now.

“I didn’t know there was a demiboy flag,” he admits.

The comment seems to perk Kai up and he explains to him the dark grey-grey-blue-white-and reverse of the demiboy flag. The two of them hang the flags up together.

Kai gives him a hard time about hanging one up the wrong way and it takes Remy a solid minute to remember that both flags are reversible. He flips Kai off and scowls. Kai just laughs. The conversation turns casual once more.

“Oh!” Kai says at one point, moving quickly to sift through a bag on the other side of the room, “I got a thing and you can tell me if you hate the thing and if so I can return it, but you said that you have some light perception so…” he trails off.

There was a pause for a moment where neither of them said anything.

“Thoughts?” Kai eventually asks again.

“On?”

“Ah man- you can’t see it?”

“Don’t know if we’ve talked about this yet but I’m blind actually,” Remy snarks back.

Kai groans.

“No just- okay catch.”

“Please tell me you’re not about to chuck something at a blind person Kai.”

The object lands softly next to him on the bed. Remy doesn’t know if that was intentional, or if Kai just failed to hit him. Either way Remy sighs and picks it up. The object is a box and has a thin circular button at one corner, but he still has no clue what it is.

“They’re fairy lights,” Kai explains, “Sorry. You said that you liked light and I thought you’d be able to see it because you said that you could see light.”

“Some light,” Remy says. He holds it up to his eyes and now he can barely see little tiny specs of light. “And I can kinda see it now. Is the box completely clear?”

“Yeah. Sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing?”

“Uh…”

“I told you I liked light. You went out of your way to get fairy lights for our dorm. It’s an awesome idea, not your fault my eyes don’t work.”

“Yeah but the gift kind of failed.”

“Well if you like them we can still keep them. And if not- well you said you can return them? Depending on where they’re from we can see if we can find fairy lights I can actually see,” Remy suggests.

“Oh my gosh we could- there was a ton of options.”

Remy nods and stands up.

“Okay, where too?”

“Right now?” Kai asks.

“I mean it depends on where you got these, but yeah? I mean we have the time.”

That they do, now that they’ve mostly finished.

“Target. So there’s gotta be one locally.”

They spend a few minutes online, figure out the address, and then Remy’s getting up to go. He gets Cha-Cha in her harness and grabs his things before opening the door for a swing and waiting for Kai. Kai joins him at the door, hesitates for a second, and then grabs something right next to the door. At first Remy thinks it’s the bag, but Kai’s already holding that. Remy exits after him.

“I have a cane,” Kai says quietly. Which okay- that was the object by the door.

“Okay,” Remy says. “Do you want to take the bus?”

“No.”

Remy listens. He knows if it were him, he would just want somebody to listen.

“Okay. Where’s the Target?”

Kai takes the lead and they’re off.

The Target is massive. But also Remy’s depth perception is shit so maybe it’s that but he’s pretty sure this is the largest Target he’s ever seen. By a lot.

“Holy shit this place is huge,” Kai remarks.

Remy murmurs his agreement. He hadn’t really known what living in a college town would mean. He’s starting to think he understands.

They make a beeline for the fairy lights which take up almost an entire aisle. They mess around, pressing all the buttons to light them up and see what their options are.

“I can’t see any of these,” Remy admits after a while, “The lights in here are too bright. But brighter and bigger is better, so if you find something that-”

“Remy there’s rainbow ones. Come here, come here, they’re shaped like rainbows.”

“We’re getting those.”

“They’re not that bright.”

“I literally do not care.”

They get the rainbow-shaped ones.

They head back- both a bit too excited about the rainbow-shaped lights to be considered socially acceptable. But also fuck socially acceptable so whatever. They’re adults and they can enjoy fairy lights. Step off.

Kai and him are talking when he suddenly stops and leaves Remy’s side.

“Hi,” Kai says, “Are you moving in today too?”

“I- uh- yeah- hi,” a person stutters.

“Oh cool! I’m Kai. He/they pronouns but he right now.” The jingling noise that follows is indication that Kai holds up his pronouns necklace. “And this is my roommate.”

It takes a second to long for Remy to realize he’s supposed to introduce himself.

“I’m Remy,” he says, turning to face the stranger. “He/him.”

Something inside of him clenches hard when he says those words. Clenches hards, grips his heart, and burns. It burns so much, choking Remy that he almost misses the strangers next words.

“I’m Elliot,” the now not-stranger says, “They/them.”

“Nice to meet you Elliot,” Kai says.

They don’t get must further in conversation because another person speaks up.

“El, hon? Who’s this?”

“I’m Kai, he/they, he right now. This is Remy, he/him. We just moved in here across the hall.”

“Oh you get to do that whole move in early stuff too? You’re blind, right?”

The second question is obviously directed at Remy, so he answers both.

“Yeah and yeah.”

“Huh. Well I’m Mitchell, I’m his boyfriend.”

A boyfriend who just misgendered their partner apparently. But Elliot doesn't say anything and Remy just met them so he doesn’t say anything either.

“Uh, nice to meet you,” Remy offers. Kai offers the same pleasantries.

“Okay. Well Elliot, we should get to finish moving you in. You still have a lot of stuff and if you’re going to make me help you I don’t want to be here all day.”

“If you need to go you can,” Elliot says.

“What, you trying to get rid of me already? Plus come on, you’re not going to be able to do it all yourself. And you’re wasting time. Let’s go.”

“Okay,” Elliot says, “Yeah.”

“He’ll talk to you later,” Mitchell tells the two of them.

“I- Right,” Kai says, “Well, Elliot I- we’re just down the hall. 204. So, anytime, pop by, yeah?”

“Yeah alright I-”

“Yeah he might, bye.”

“Elliot seems nice. But Mitchell doesn’t seem like the nicest guy,” Kai comments when the other two have presumably exited earshot. Remy gives a shrug and a slight nod in response. He pulls out his key and finds the lock on their door before pushing it open with a swing.

“Fairy lights?” he asks.

“Fairy lights,” Kai agrees.

Remy still ends up not being able to see them all that well- though they were certainly better than the first set. But rainbows, so he counts it as a win.

When they’ve finished decorating their room, Remy relaxes on his bed and pulls out his phone. He plugs in his headphones and opens google. Kai had both the trans and demiboy flags. Remy wants to know what that means.

He researches a lot about being non-binary and trans and he reads a lot about the exclusionist who demand you have to be identify as binary and experience crippling gender dysphoria to be considered trans. Everyone else is just faking or special or being dramatic. He thinks of Kai and he frowns. He ignores the exclusionists.

He finds celebrations of being trans and non-binary and being happy that way. He finds non-binary people who consider themselves trans and others who don’t. He finds the range of non-binary from androgynous presentation to falling to the extreme sides of masculine or feminine. He learns that people can also be assholes about that, about how many people expect non-binary people to look “watered down male.” He learns that non-binary looks like anything and everything. He finds people who are trans that use all sorts of labels. He finds people who are trans and are binary. He finds people who are trans with all levels of fluctuating dysphoria, stages of transition- including not transitioning at all, and more.

He learns that there’s so many more ways to be trans than he previously thought.

He hates it.

He hates it because it means something to him, means something to him more than just being an ally.

The transgender umbrella is amazing and beautiful and there’s so many people who have so many experiences, some they share, some they don’t. It’s a wonderful community and it’s gorgeous and Remy-

He’s angry.

He’s so fucking angry. Because he’s Remy and he’s a boy and he’s eighteen and he’s lived this way his entire life and this is who he is he’s Remy and he’s a cis guy and-

And what if he isn’t?

He squeezes his phone tightly in his hand. Hard enough apparently that Kai asks if anything’s wrong. He starts to answer no when he gets a phone call. From his dad.

He hits ignore angrily and stands up, shoving his phone in his pocket.

“I’m going for a walk,” he announces, and barely takes the time to grab his shoes before he’s slamming the door behind him. He doesn’t even bother with Cha-Cha, grabbing his cane instead.

That first week goes fast and soon enough everyone else moves in. They meet a few people, and start talking to Elliot. When Mitchell’s not around Elliot’s really funny. When Mitchell is around they short of shut down and Remy hates it. A little fire burns in his chest each time it happens.

They go to the freshman movie night and both Elliot and Kai are already learning to give a shitty description of what’s going on on screen and they all laugh and the people next to them hiss at them to be quiet. It’s okay. It’s nice.

Before long, classes start and Remy remembers how frustrating it can all be.

He’s been working with disability services since he committed to the school. Over the years he’s learned that early is almost always better, because everything just takes time and then there’s issues and delays, it’s a long process.

It’s also Remy’s first time doing this alone and he makes mistakes and he feels like an idiot and he can’t help but hate his dad a little bit because he’s been asking to do some of this himself for years now, to get used to it, get some practice. His dad had always refused and now Remy is woefully underprepared.

It reminds himself of when he was first going blind. When everything was new and confusing and he constantly felt lost and alone.

It’s been years since he felt like that.

He doesn’t like feeling like that.

He figures the accommodations out in the end and gets the things he needs to set up. Note taker, permission to record, extra time, accessibility devices approved, and requests to all his professors to have things ready and accessible. It should all be good to go. But, there’s of course hiccups because there always is. And a week into school, he still doesn’t have notes from one of his classes.

It’s absolutely infuriating.

Because now he has a paper to write and he has to listen to the entirety of three separate lectures to find the things he needs.

It sucks and it’s unfair and time consuming and Remy hates it. He clenches a fist as he pauses the recording and goes back once more.

It’s something so small but it makes him so goddamn frustrated.

He plays it again but he can’t hear it this time because at that exact moment Kai laughs from his corner of the room where he’s skyping his girlfriend.

He pauses the recording.

“Can you be quieter?” he hisses out, “I’m trying to write a paper.”

“Yeah. Sorry Rem. Want me to put in headphones?”

It’s a nice offer.

“Yes.”

“Okay,” Kai agrees. He gasps a bit when he stands, pauses for a moment. Remy doesn’t restart his recording and listens, slightly concerned. But Kai moves after a moment, grabbing his headphones from the desk next to Remy. He’s limping slightly.

When he returns to his bed and has the headphones in, Remy takes a breath and presses play.

And pauses a moment later because Kai’s a bit too loud again. It’s unfair- Remy knows it is- because Kai’s really not that loud. But it’s loud enough to be distracting and Remy cannot deal with this tonight.

“Can you shut up?” he snaps.

“...I ...Uh?”

Remy is so angry.

“Whatever. Forget it,” he huffs. He saves his work and shuts his laptop with a snap. He shoves it, his braille display, and the recorder in his bag. He grabs his phone and shoves it in his pocket. Grabbing his bag he heads for the door. He barely spends the time to get Cha-Cha in her harness.

“Remy- come on- wait-”

“I’m going out,” he hisses. The door slams behind him. It seems to be doing that a lot lately.

“Oh hey Remy,” Elliot says almost the moment he’s out the door.

“I’m going to the library,” Remy grumbles and moves past them.

“Okay,” Elliot says, running a few paces to catch up with him, “Can I join you? I have this thing for religions and-”

“No. You can’t join me,” Remy snarls, and pulls away.

Elliot stops, stumbling for words behind him. Remy leaves them behind. He doesn’t feel bad. He doesn’t.

He goes to the library and finds a corner that’s empty. He sets his things up and tries to focus.

He still can’t.

He had to keep rewinding and replaying the lecture because he still doesn’t have the notes even though he was told he’d start receiving them a week ago. He checked again the other day and he was told he’d definitely have them by today.

He doesn’t have the notes.

He doesn’t know what to do.

He’s mad and he’s angry and he’s frustrated and he’s so pissed and he thinks it’s a bit extreme but definitely not unreasonable. He hates this. Hates it.

He used to hate being blind. Over the years he’s learned that’s not the part that frustrates him. It was scary at the time, sure. But losing his sight wasn't the upsetting part- the upsetting part was being in a world who wasn’t willing to meet his needs. A world that was certainly able to meet his needs, or attempt to if they really couldn’t, but wasn’t willing to even try.

It’s ableism that he hates, not being blind.

With a sigh he packs up his things. He’s not getting anything else done tonight. He pulls out his phone and messes around with it a bit, trying to ward off the creeping frustrations that are starting to overwhelm him. He feels choked up and he’s not sure why.

Then he gets a call.

For a millisecond he thinks it might be Kai.

God he was a dick to Kai wasn’t he? If Kai’s calling him Remy can apologize. He can make things right and things will be fine. It’s fine.

It’s his dad.

Remy chucks his phone.

It’s extreme and so fucking stupid but he’s suddenly furious and he doesn’t know what to do about it. His phone goes skittering across the floor and the two people quietly murmuring near him fall silent. Remy sighs and hates himself a little bit.

He takes a breath.

It doesn't help.

He takes another.

It doesn’t help. Nothing’s helping.

He has Cha-Cha get his phone.

When she brings it back to him he checks it for cracks and then goes to his contacts. He finds the one he needs and double taps to call.

The phone rings twice before it’s answered.

“Hey,” Remy saus, “I- can I spend the night at your place?”

“Yes,” is Virgil’s immediate response, “Are you safe? Do you want a ride? I’m not home right now but I can text Patton.”

Remy checks the time. It’s not too late. The cool air will probably do him good anyways.

“I’m safe,” he confirms, “No to the ride. I’ll be there soon.”

“Okay,” Virgil says. He pauses, “Love you Remy.”

Something burns in his throat.

“Okay. Okay yeah,” Remy chokes out. He hangs up and blinks back tears, refusing to cry. He wants to scream. He doesn’t- everything’s just so much right now and he doesn’t know what he’s feeling anymore.

He packs his things up. Grabs Cha-Cha. Heads to Virgil’s apartment.

On his way there a random person grabs him by his shoulder and asks him if he needs help. He grits out a terse “no.” He gets a “well you don’t have to be rude about it. I was trying to help!” Remy’s teeth grit further, making an odd little screeching noise and causing pain to run all throughout his mouth. He doesn’t risk saying anything more, and just pushes past the stranger.

He knocks on the door when he arrives. He still has a key, but doesn’t really feel like digging through his bag.

It’s Patton who greets him.

Remy shuffles off his shoes at the door, mind blurring. He hears Patton say something about Virgil and the library, he should've texted you- but Remy misses all the details.

“Hey Remy, are you okay?”

Remy is not.

He’s going to tell Patton he’s fine. He is. He promises he is.

He doesn’t end up saying that, but even he isn’t expecting what he says next.

“Patton, how did you know you were trans?”

“Oh,” Patton says, “Oh.”

And that’s when Remy finally bursts into tears.

~~~

taglist below

-ask to be added or removed-

@mewithanie @eddies-spaghetti @lemonyellowlogic @savioursailor @goldteethandacurseforthistown @you-betcha-weirdo

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sparkles-and-trash · 6 years ago

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Trash’s Headcanons for Kenny McCormick, Masterpost

Trash Note: This is just a masterpost for all my existing headcanons for this character I’ve shared in other posts, there will be no new ones in this post, and I’ll keep adding new ones as they come, as suggested by an anon

- way smarter than he gives himself credit for

- the groups therapist

- actually, the whole school’s therapist

- knows everyones secrets, never tells anyone tho

- very friendly and approachable, but terribly hard to get close with

- lots and lots of walls, man

- works at Tweeks parents coffee shop, is kinda close with Tweek

- claims he doesn’t date (or anything else) because he puts family, friends, school and work first, which isn’t a lie, but

- totally also have big emotional and physical intimacy issues, but the only one he talk to about that are Kyle, but that’s rare too

- pan boi

- basically lives in hoodies, and somehow seems to have one in every color imaginable

- wears his hoodies, usually with the hood up, no matter if it’s freezing or a heatwave

- gap teeth, freckles on his nose, blue eyes and shaggy, borderline curly sandy blonde hair

- deep down he feels a little bad for Cartman, he’s def the one of his friends and peers who has the most insight when it comes to trauma and the effect of his upbringing and stuff, and he has a deep need to try to understand people the best he can

- he and Stan volunteers together at the local pet shelter and homeless shelter

- he doesn’t necessarily wear that much female targeted clothes anymore, just the occasional floral printed hoodie etc as hoodies is literally all he wears, but he still really like it and the older he gets, the more he gets into fashion and design and stuff

- he starts drawing a lot more, which he is okay at already, and he’s obsessed with couture fashion, even tho he think the pricing of the clothes and the fact that they’re only made for tall, think models are ridiculous

- he secretly dreams of making those types of clothes for all types of people, rich, poor, boys, girls, gender fluids, non-binary, tall, short, thin, thick, you know, just a very all inclusive type of thing

- when he’s not wearing a hood up he likes to wear some type of bandana to keep his hair out of his eyes

- the boy have a lot of hair okay

- loves youtube and twitch

- also likes to take pictures with an old ass polariod camera he got from a pawn shop

- falls asleep in class a lot, but always seems to know the answer if the teacher asks him something

- also has decent grades

- likes to wear some eyeliner every now and then

- and nail polish, but it’s like super clumsily put on and always chipped

- secretly wants to go to college at Boulder with Stan and Cartman and maybe Kyle

- but says he doesn’t since he’s worried about money and leaving his sibs, even tho they both want him to go, because they know he deserves it

- he knows that a bunch of people at school that doesn’t know him seems to think he sleeps around a lot

- while he have no idea why they think so, he decided a long time ago that it’s better to let them think that, than trying to explain the truth to anyone he doesn’t care about

- the truth is that he’s never even dated anyone besides a brief thing with a senior guy when he was a sophomore, because he can’t deal with the thought of letting anyone into his life and potentially introduce them to Karen etc, just for them to leave him later

- like I said, lots of walls

- at a point, everyone was talking about how Kenny’s older brother, Kevin, was autistic or if something else was wrong with him, while in reality he just struggles with extreme social anxiety, but he works trough it every day to go to work and take care of Kenny and Karen

- Kenny helps out money-wise with working at Tweeks parents coffee shop, which is a job he likes more than he wants to admit

- he’s also pretty good friends with Tweek because of it

- Kenny is the one who introduced Tweek to Shane Dawson and his conspiracy theory videos, Craig have never forgiven him for it

- zones out a lot

- “…what?”

- can fall asleep anywhere

- is the one of the main boys who gets along the best with Craig and those guys

- actually hangs out with them from time to time, so does Butters

- it low-key drives the others crazy

- doesn’t mind being the life of the party, but prefers to observe, he loves people-watching

- usually never fights with his sibs

- but when he does it’s with Karen, usually because he’s worried about her and it’s nor pretty

- none of them can stay mad at each other for long tho

#kenny mccormick #south park #south park headcanon #sp #sp headcanons #kenny headcanons #sp kenny

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cruddyborderlandstheories · 6 years ago

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Athenas Masterpost

This is going to cover everything Athenas, like the official page and trailer, both new trailers, the art book preview, and some stuff shown in the ign trailers. It’s a lot.

There will NOT be endgame spoilers in this post. If there’s anything that comes up that I want to discuss, you can find it in a spoiler post I’ll be making soon :) I DO discuss a thing that occurs during the first 3 hours of BL3, though I think that’s pretty okay with y’all lol

tl;dr: there’s too much to summarize. 13 days until bl3. lmao im screaming on the inside.

“A misty, tranquil planet that has recently attracted the wrong kind of attention. Athenas is mostly uninhabited, save for a sect of monks known as the Order of the Impending Storm who have made their home in the high peaks of the mountains. What secrets do they guard here, inside ancient walls that were built long before humans set foot on Athenas?”

We definitely got a lot less info for Athenas than the other planets, and I can see why. They want to keep it mysterious.

Also, I’m not saying I totally called it that the pyramid was Eridian, but I totally called it. I am surprised it’s implying that the entire area was built by them, but what can ya do 🤷‍♂️

Anyway, since this post is long overdue, let’s just jump right in!

The Athenas video is nearly half the time of the Eden-6 one, so there’s not a lot to cover unfortunately:

We’ve seen this shot multiple times before

also the emphasis that Athenas is ‘tranquil’ and ‘peaceful’ ahahahaha no it’s not.

i love these dudes! Order of the Impending Storm!!! I wonder if their funky goggle things have anything to do with Sirens, like how they have Siren-trackers. I also really love their outfits. lowkey want one of these robes.

a great overview look of the area leading up to the pyramid. I got more to say about this... but it’s probably best if i leave it for later on in the post after we get more info

also, note the water and the rocks and stuff on the left there. This will come into play later... not even in this post. a later post.

also i totally called this being an ancient aliens reference lol

Vault logo on the flag there. definitely shows how much these guys worship the Vaults

This!!! I have so much to talk about here!

alright so now that we know what the vault keys look like.... this doesn’t appear to be part of any of the Vault Keys we’ve seen. especially not the Promethean one. not even the pyramid shaped one.

im mostly interested in this because this is obviously a monk, her robes match the ones we saw above with the hood. she doesn’t appear to be Eridian because we’ve seen the Watcher and the other Guardians, who are built in the image of the Eridians, and she looks wayyy too human. We’ve also seen statues of the Eridians in that one shot of the Pandora temple.

so it seems like the monks have gone inside the pyramid before and... built this statue? for some reason??? It’s interesting that she has an extra pair of arms as well. I wonder if she is like the Siren ancestor of Amara. which could prove my theory that the next successor of Amara would have another set of arms... it might also explain why Amara’s tattoos are everywhere on the buildings (outside of her being the Tiger)

it would also explain this shot, the skeleton with the book, which we now know we’ve seen before with Maya:

so even though they’re protecting the pyramid/temple, i don’t think they’ve been avoiding it entirely- at least not for the first time after discovering it. maybe they stopped going in after they discovered something bad, somethin like iunno... the Rampagers?

it would be Really Weird if the Eridians built that statue, especially when they probably didn’t know what humans looked like at the time. unless of course they helped shape humanity or smth. meaning they probably personally created Sirens. oh that’d be wild... i wonder if we’re going to learn about how early Sirens shaped humanity in that case. discovering fire could be entirely different lol

“hallowed land”

i wonder if this is where we’ll have anointed gear explained to us... i imagine the order is still worshipping Eridian/Siren stuff, so them having all sorta knowledge of this stuff would make sense

more Maliwan. you guys notice we see cultists purely on Eden-6 (outside of the crashed ship), but Maliwan purely on Athenas? a mix on Promethea, tho that’s bc we’ve actually gotten gameplay.

So my guess is Maliwan has joined up with the cult (be it through whatever means: Maliwan is in) and they’re looking for the Promethea key. which makes sense. they’re attacking Rhys on Promethea, so when he helps us out, word probably gets back to Maliwan (somehow) and they swap from wanting to take over Atlas (either by defeating them w/ Zer0/that giant space laser/whatever or just changing priorities) to wanting to open that fuckin Vault. Teaming up with the CoV is the best way to ensure that happens. I’m sure there will oodles of betrayal going on between the two parties.

I LOVE THESE THINGS

THEY’RE AMAZING

GOOD BOYS

in all seriousness, actually, im curious why we don’t see these good boys on Promethea. maybe they’re only for the top-tier squads? (mechanically, probably higher-level enemies) they look super high tech, so i would not be surprised if Maliwan thought Atlas would be an easy takeover so they didn’t send everything they could have

Nog! not much to say here tbqh

“Protect Athenas Before It’s Too Late”

I imagine before Maliwan gets the Vault Key or some other wild power, like power over the Rampagers. seriously, in the We Are Mayhem trailer, there’s a rampager are fighting on the side of Maliwan (altho if this is The One Rampager, or just One of Many is hard to tell. it could morph depending on which element it is. we just don’t know. personally i think there’s 1 per planet... i’ll explain later)

From the Art Book Preview:

Alright yes. “Maliwan forces have already seized control of the monastery, where part of the Promethean Vault Key has been located, turning a simply recovery mission into a vicious firefight...... A large and foreboding crypt built into the side of the mountain was also designed, and might perhaps have housed the Vault Key fragment deep within its gloomy interiors”

i don’t think this means the crypt is like an actual area. it would be interesting to discover that the pyramid is a giant crypt because... jesus. it would fit with the whole pyramid theme, at least. altho im wondering if this is more like a labyrinth situation where they’re trying to keep a Rampager inside as well as the treasure... which MAY be a Vault Key Fragment

Actually, this brings up a great point: did Atlas spread the Vault Key out throughout the planets? Is this where Typhon originally found that Key fragment? wtf was in the Vault that Atlas needed to disassemble the Key and return its fragments? oh boy i hope it’s something scary

From the Moze Eden-6 E3 Gameplay:

oh ye this. okay so this is definitely 100% Eridian. I’m guessing we get this from Athenas because this seems like a fairly important object and, well, Athenas is all about Eridian stuff. When we go through the next few videos, keep an eye out for the temples. You’ll see the glowing red diamond shape constantly reappearing there.

one of the devs admitted that there are hunks of Eridian Writing left around the world that will ‘open up’ things for the players, so I imagine this is exactly what we’ll use to get to it. If this IS only for endgame stuff I’ll be slightly disappointed. I know we have access to this before Eden-6, since there are gameplay videos that show the player breaking the Eridium chunks with this thing. the above one is from the Moze Eden-6 gameplay, tho I’ve also seen newer footage from the Balex gameplay with this same tool

The following clips can be found in this video:

im mostly interested in the wall art here

what looks like a sun or a planet

this symbol which makes an appearance elsewhere

these two are the same area, im imagining this is the fight up to the pyramid, with Maliwan forces and barricades everywhere

the sun again in the background (middle top)

this cool piece (bottom left of the above pic) which looks like a hand covered in glowing blue. i imagine this is some sorta representation of Phaselock? mainly because of the blue orb in the palm of her hand

not much to say about this area tbh. looks like a residential area to me, so possibly not in the residential district

writing on the top mid-right.

idk why i just noticed these trees are green and not red but yeah, that’s interesting. so probably a different area from Amara’s trailer aka: not Partali

and yet we see amara’s tattoos on the building in the back right. sorry for such terrible quality btw, tumblr ate these images and spit them back out

These clips can be found in the Borderlands are Yours trailer:

looks like the small building we see directly next to Maya and Ava

altho very clearly not the same exact area so im curious what these are supposed to represent. tbh im kinda reminded of graveyards. i really hope there aren’t corpses in those omg

another better look at the two pieces of art. i imagine the one on the right has something to do with the eridians given its in a diamond shape, which we know has something to do with the eridians now

also im not playing amara first (possibly last. depending on how i feel fl4k may go last) but HOLY SHIT her action skills are beautiful

THIS FUCKER

i know he’s probably a vault monster but like...

idk i feel its kinda sad gearbox is showing off a VAULT MONSTER of all things in so much promo material. like why is he fighting with Maliwan/the cult in the We are Mayhem trailer??

sup with that?

does he have multiple stages?? is that’s why he changes elements? goes from two heads to wings to extended necks. like wtf is up with this guy?? he definitely looks like he can be elementally charged given his eye sockets aren’t glowing when he emerges like they do

here but then

this dude looks like he has an entirely different skull like...

this dude is a corrosive one who also seems to be working with Maya (who i guess IS probably the corrosive aligned siren)

and we’re guessing the nuclear charged one is the one from Athenas... for reasons i’ll explain below

AND honestly i've been thinking and maybe the fire one is actually from Promethea? and maybe there’s another that’s on Eden-6 and another on Pandora?

alright so i have 2 reasons for this. one involves spoiler talk with the cloth map, so that won’t be discussed here (but if you see the map and the planets, you’ll understand what i’m alluding to here, most likely). the other is that in this screenshot of all the quests from the Eden-6 demo:

we see immediately after “hostile takeover” is the quest “the impending storm”. which is, indeedy, a reference to the Order of the Impending Storm. We know they’re on Athenas, so I imagine we run over to Athenas to get part of the Vault Key. We’ve established from the art book that’s where it is.

but then after The Impending Storm, Space-Laser Tag (which we all know is that giant-ass laser thing in the asteroid belt), and Atlas, at Last, there’s a quest called Beneath the Meridian.

And we know this area... is definitely underground. we’ve seen with the fire-y boy that the ceiling is just rocks

then we see this shot with the nuclear (?) one where the window outside is clearly showing off mountains/sky, which we know is kinda Athenas’s deal

and we know these two areas are the same v ^

since there’s the same ‘Vault’ in the background

so my only problem with this entire theory that there’s multiple rampagers is that

we see the twins killing/absorbing the red/fire one’s power which is also on athenas since the background is the same as the vault area from the above two pictures. unless there’s a similar vault-thing on promethea and eden-6. we know there’s one on Pandora, but that one is outside so.

so i guess they are the same beasty boy but... why why why show us one of the vault monsters

it’s so cool going in blind and not knowing what you’re going to get out of it.

so im going to say this is a minor vault monster (especially given it’s not exactly the same rock-like design as the other vault monsters) and the ‘vaults’ are actually something smaller. maybe they hold keys, or the pieces of the keys, or they’re part of that teleportation network i keep talking about (and i guess i should just make a seperate post about it) but i don’t know if these are actual Big Boy Vaults. especially when the Rampager doesn’t match actual Eridian-created Vault Monsters

that said given we see a bunch of dead guardians on the floor, its possible the rampager killed them? but i get the feeling we might actually be the ones to pull the trigger cause... combat is fun

so. yeah. if the rampager is guarding something that’s fine. i wanna believe teleportation network. i’d love to see the twins come in, walk out of that vault, absorb the rampager’s powers, and then walk out after locking us in like ‘peace’ and we have to use the teleportation system to make it back to promethea with the vault key fragment or whatever

[im here after the cloth map reveal like... uh huh. i see. u dumb bitchard.]

idk i just thought this was a fun screenshot lol

BoRdErLaNdS

ah yes

that’s eridium

this also appears to be in the temple, but, like, again if there’s more than one temple this could also be on Pandora or even Eden-6. Kinda leaning towards Pandora. HOWEVER since we only know for certain this sort of temple area is on Athenas (from that one statue shot), we’re gonna analyze this bad boy right now (also lowkey think this is Pandora because of the varkid nests but shhh)

what do i actually have to say about it? uhhh not much tbh. i think i’ve said all that needs to be said concerning the twins mutating cultists with slag/eridium.

i will say im pretty shocked at, like, the eridium HORNS and shit. so maybe this is just some cool little miniboss. (okay not mini because look how big he’s gotten!! just like Bloodwing :D)

you know what, it looks like he’s standing on one of these

floor tile things, and now im super curious. is the fire part of a trap? is it powering this lad up? i definitely know he’s a cultist because he’s got the neon light tubes on his shoulder pad

see here

you can see these on other cultists like goliaths and such and such

also this is pretty similar to what we’ve seen in the LLE (especially the powersuits) given their bodies also form eridium crystals when they’ve ascended

i feel like its powering him up

you know during the fight with bloodwing when Jack powers up bloodwing using the elemental flamethrower things? would be interesting if this is similar to that.

like dis

yeahhh

the radiation boy is back and he’s actually elementally charged this time

huzzah

also i love the chest mouth lmao

has anyone here seen stretch armstrong? like that one episode where Gabe (crostini man) gets turned into a bunch of flexarium monster chunks

but yeah, awesome mouth my guy.

im curious if it’s being elementally charged to cryo or if it’s stopped being charged. if this is like a cutscene between different stages in the fight, etc etc.

this also looks fairly similar to this area here

but red this time. which... may tie into the elemental stages. which maaaaay tie into those floor platforms elementally charging that demon baby up above. bloodwing 2.0!

You can find the following clips in the Official Guide to the Borderlands:

god i keep telling myself to be on the lookout for athenas clips but i get so distracted by the gorgeousness of this fucking game i forget and have to keep going back

if that dude in the back floating was t-posing i would have lost my shit

new Siren tattoos!!! we haven’t seen these before. they’re very flowy, i love them. i hope we get to meet the siren with them!

i also loooooove this area in the back. i hope we get to climb it and explore. i would love to just be able to climb to high up areas in bl3 and look down and see the area i just came from. it’s possible! we have the technology! thousand cuts / bnk3r ascension 2.0!!!

more of amara’s awesome looking powers

zane has 2 trans pride skins im so happy 😄

also look at how teeny tiny that ‘Vault’ is in the back!!! it’s only like 2x the size of Iron Bear!!! gimme BIG vaults!! GIANT VAULTS

also also

the VOID vault

i get a feeling these are connected somehow.

sniper spoooot

not much to say about this tbh. zane’s claw things look fucking dope tho. i want one irl.

we’ve seen this shot a few times before already

alright before you get mad, let me explain why i think this is athenas

you see this picture

this maliwan jackass. the building to his left is 100% athenas architecture.

the rocks in the top picture look identical to the ones next to him. plus we’ve seen water in the distance of some of the areas of Athenas

it could also be Eden-6 (which honestly i would not be surprised if it is instead) but given the ivy and the rocks i felt it was worthwhile to put in. plus the moving eridian structures are so cool looking. i feel like that’s going to be a puzzle.

oh oh also

maybe that area leads into/exits from here? because they’re both underground in cavern-like areas

but like... it could also be eden-6... because of that one shot of the temple area in the side of the cliff ASDFHDGJFJGFHSD

still radiation charged.

also seriously this ‘Vault’ is wayyyy smaller than a regular Vault. like... the one in BL2 that you can walk right up to... huge. and nothing even comes out of it. the Warrior climbs up from over the edge

the bl1 is much bigger than this one, too. also the vault of the traveller, i would argue is the biggest out of all of them but eh

for the Vault of the Sentinel, the actual arch we see... i’ve already gone over why i don’t think that’s a ‘real’ vault and that its all more of a simulation, but you can read that whole thing here bc i am trying my damndest to not get off topic for this post because holy fucking shit. this got long.

Alright so. Onto the website pictures

another cool shot of the academic district, really showing off the pyramid in the background. god i wanna know what that is. could be the temple (underground things notwithstanding). it’s probably holding that statue with the vault keys in either arm

you know the one, it’s at the beginning of this post. but damn that thing is huge!! i am hoping it holds more than just the promethean vault key.

did i already talk about how there are siren tattoos written along the edges of this area??? because... damn.

also the symbol for what is probably Vault Key sitting right smack dab in the middle??

also sorry i just noticed those blue shapes are moving. like a fountain or something?? weird light.

i mean... the trees are also warping in the background. wonder wtf is going on here...

anyway whatever she’s holding actually doesn’t match up with any of the vault keys we’ve seen so... wtf are you???

a very nice shot overlooking the water. also a wind turbine in the background. i think the area on the left is where we’ve seen ava and maya? but dont hold me to that lol

definitely looks the same. even has the tree

another shot of that area i think we’ve seen Amara fighting in

big shot of the pyramid with the vault symbol everywhere. and the planet with the beams coming out of it. which in retrospect...

anyway that’s spoiler talk so let’s talk in another post.

another shot of athenas from a slightly different angle, we’ve seen this one before, too, and i remember because i complemented the road signs

annnnd im tired. good night everybody.

#borderlands #bl3 #borderlands 3 #athenas

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virmillion · 6 years ago

Text

Ibytm - T minus 58 seconds

Masterpost - Previous Chapter - Next Chapter - ao3

Words: 2,594

Aside from the one confrontation post-petticoat ukulele conspiracy, Logan still hasn’t talked with Cadmium. Really, truly talked to the guy. Tagging along on his tours doesn’t count. Granted, a fair amount of his Tuesdays and Thursdays are occupied with thoughts of Cadmium, but Logan does still have a life outside of him. It comes with no small amount of annoyance that this other life involves dealing with unsolvable problems at his internship.

“I heard there’s no real answer,” Cassidy says. She stabs her pen in the air, writing imaginary equations and scowling at the empty space.

“I heard they had this problem, like, years ago,” Joy says. Logan steeples his fingers under his chin with his elbows propped on his knees, watching Joy spin circles on her chair with her nose pointed at the ceiling. “I bet they already know the answer, and any intern that can’t crack it gets kicked to the curb.”

“Somehow, I feel like excessive alliteration isn’t the answer, Joy,” Micah calls from the water jug. His perspective might seem more valuable if his cheek weren’t flattened against the top of the machine in an utterly pitiful display of boredom.

“Oh, and I bet you already figured it out, huh, smart guy?” Joy’s retort also seems less valuable, as it comes at the same moment that she smacks her ankle into the leg of her desk, her spinning cut short. Logan is getting the sinking feeling that he chose the wrong scientific field.

“Maybe we’re looking at it from the wrong angle. Does someone want to read it again, and we all think of it with clean slates?” Logan glances around the room, hoping that his non-contribution will be sufficient. “Or, hey, Alex, have you got an idea? You haven’t said too much yet.”

Alex’s shock of dyed yellow hair jolts as they lift their eyes to peer over the top of the computer. “Can I get you a handkerchief, or did you dodge the splashback when you threw me under the bus just now?”

“ I’ll read it, you bunch of babies,” Cassidy sighs. “Okay. Riddle me this, folks. Thought experiments for the modern era.”

“Lay off the Mcelroy references and finish the question,” Micah grumbles.

Cassidy wrinkles her nose and sticks out her tongue before continuing. “The ship of Theseus proposes that a ship leaves a location and has every single part of itself periodically replaced before reaching a second location. The question is whether the ship to arrive is a different ship than the one to depart. Bear this in mind while assuming all cultural divides and disparities—cultural, political, scientific, or otherwise—are held in an impenetrable stasis that has no effect on the contents of the riddle, and conclusively solve the following. Jeez, talk about a run-on sentence.

“NASA launches a rocket to Neptune, and the only passenger is the child of a Russian and an American, where the parents were born on Earth and the child on Mars. The inhabited rocket was built half of parts from NASA and half of parts from Roscosmos. It contains enough parts to make an entirely new rocket, all of which were created on the moon. Allowing adequate suspensions of disbelief in favor of the passenger’s ability to build the new rocket and touch down on Neptune alive, which flag should be placed on Neptune as the first to arrive: That of Mars, the Moon, Earth, America, or Russia?”

“Does the moon even have its own flag?” Micah muses.

Joy slams the side of her fist on her desk hard enough to rattle the pens scattered across the floor. “This is such a stupid question. It barely even has anything to do with space!”

“It is about non-mathematical rocket science,” Alex points out.

“You could take the exact same problem and change a few key words to make it about a fish being flushed down a toilet,” Logan counters, “and nothing would change.”

“Is the fish dead?” Micah asks. “Because now you’re introducing aquatic zombies to the equation.”

“No aquatic zombies!” Joy and Alex shout in unison. Logan joins in the cry with a muttered mimic of his own, and even Cassidy looks quite done with Micah, who traces his finger along the side of the water tank before patting the top.

“Aquatic zombies,” he whispers forlornly. Logan isn’t entirely sure how Micah managed to weasel his way into an internship here, but he stopped questioning it a long time ago.

“It’s the moon, isn’t it?” Cassidy tries. This brings about a chaotic storm of argued disagreements through which Logan couldn’t possibly begin to sort.

“But the passenger was born on Mars, so it’s the Martian flag.”

“But their parents were of Earth, do we know where the passenger was conceived? Earthling parents mean it can’t be Mars’ flag.”

“Oh, like the Opportunity rover would plant a flag on Neptune.”

“Rip in pieces, Oppy.”

“Well, wouldn’t it be the country of origin of the mom, since she’s the one that had to carry the passenger to term?”

“That’s sexist, and we don’t know which parent is which.”

“It’s heretonormative, anyway.”

“You mean cisnormative.”

“I know what I meant to mean.”

“Unless you meant both. Trans father for the win.”

“Trans father, transformer, illuminati?”

“Does Earth even have a flag?”

“Where was the passenger raised? That might change the answer.”

The door opposite the stairs slams open as another intern with dirty blond hair and a beanie stumbles in looking particularly disheveled—well, more so than usual, at least.

“The passenger opened a wormhole immediately after being born, and raised themself on Neptune,” Logan deadpans. “Roman, if you haven’t got any good news, I swear to—”

“They cancelled the level eight project,” the man at the door says. Were it not for the bright gold name embroidered along the breast pocket of his shirt—Roman—Logan might believe him to be a random guy from off the street. “They figured out the missing sections—without our input, obviously—and decided the clearance rate was excessive. Basically, they said a toddler with a functioning search engine could crack it, so we should stop wasting our time.”

“Has the toddler ever been to Neptune?” Logan asks dryly. A hollow chorus of laughs ricochets around the room, quieted only by the click of the hour hand on the only analog clock hung on the wall. It must’ve been ages since Logan souped up the old thing to announce clockins, breaks, and clockouts.

“For the next hour,” Joy declares, “Neptune does not exist.”

“Seconded,” the other interns agree, putting their respective monitors to sleep and shuffling for the break room.

Roman lags behind to enter after Logan, prodding the small of his back and tilting his head toward the computers. He clears his throat meaningfully. Logan sighs, casting one last doleful look into the breakroom before joining Roman out on the floor again.

“They did want me to give you this,” Roman murmurs, “but keep it cazh.”

“Nothing is less ‘cazh’ than you shortening the word ‘casual’ like that,” Logan says, nonchalantly stretching an arm over his head. On the downswing, he takes the item from Roman’s hand and threads it between his fingers.

“I think I got the same deal, but don’t mention it, yeah?” Roman steps into the breakroom first, allowing Logan a moment to dawdle and inspect his acquisition. A flat disc, about the size of a well-used roll of scotch tape, with the NASA logo on both sides. Logan pinches the edges beside the first and last letter experimentally, and a USB plug pops out from the bottom of the logo. He pinches again, and it slides away. It looks for all the world like an overly expensive keychain one might find in a cheap museum. Logan shrugs, pockets it, and joins the others in the breakroom.

Only Roman appears to be in any semblance of a good mood—then again, he got clearance to visit the upper offices while everyone else pondered that stupid riddle. After teasing Roman about how he was probably about to get The Talk (the firing talk, that is) from the higher ups, it only took the rest of the floor about five minutes to give up on individual glory and try to solve the problem together. Obviously, it didn’t help.

“We could send someone for coffee,” Cassidy says. At least, Logan thinks that’s what she said. Her voice is a little muffled, what with how her face is pressed against the table.

“And get yelled at for prioritizing caffeine over the crappy cloud juice we’ve already got here?” Alex replies, tracing their finger over the glass front of the vending machine. Its only products are bottled water and expired heath candy bars. Four bucks a pop. “I’d rather dehydrate than take that kind of reprimanding.”

“I am literally going to commit multiple federal and moral crimes if I don’t get some real bean juice in my system in the next hour,” Joy grumbles. A true testament to her name.

Micah, apparently having moved on from the destruction of his aquatic zombie idea, springs to his feet from where he was sprawled across the floor. “We could use Logan’s app!”

This might be a good time to mention that, in padding his resume to apply for this extended internship, Logan made a brief foray into coding, which resulted in an app he dubbed ‘fetch quest.’ Basically a personalized coffee order service, more specialized than door dash, where instead of ordering food straight to your location, you put out a request for coffees—usually from Starbucks, Tim Hortons, Biggby, the like—to be delivered by the colloquially nicknamed fetch kids. Upon getting their coffee, the buyer reimburses the fetch kid for the coffee, as well as an obligatory tip so the fetch kid can turn a quick buck.

To tell the truth, Logan was genuinely too lazy to walk to the campus cafeteria for a coffee while working on homework, and paid his roommate five dollars to do it for him. (He paid in nickels, by the way.) So lazy was Logan, in fact, that he made an app to avoid ever dealing with the inconvenience again.

“I’m down for that,” Cassidy mumbles. “Who’s got the app? Seems kinda rude to do six separate orders, y’know, like ordering a different personal pizza from different locations and having them arrive at the same time, then fight to the death for the right to deliver their pizza first, so they miss the thirty minute limit and no one gets paid.”

“Okay, so Cassidy gets a decaf,” Alex says, swiping around on their phone. “Everyone just getting their usuals? Same as the last fetch quest?” Grunts of agreement are their only answer—aside from Roman, who peers over Alex’s shoulder to design an obscenely personalized drink.

“Pitch in a five dollar tip for the barista,” Logan calls. “I’ll cover it.” Roman perks up at that as Alex taps the appropriate button on their phone. Before he can ask, Logan nods, saying, “I’ll spot you the six dollars.”

“It’s actually closer to seven,” Roman admits, rubbing at the back of his neck sheepishly. “I got a dairy substitute, don’t sue me. I’m broke, anyway, so it wouldn’t help if you won the suit.”

“This is a paid internship,” Joy points out.

Roman looks aghast. “You guys are getting paid?” It’s unclear whether he’s kidding.

“Order placed and transaction pending,” Alex announces, “so start up the charitable donation pool to my wallet.” Roman initiates the process, pulling the beanie off his head and carrying it around the room for everyone to toss their bills in. He can only manage a weak smile when Logan tosses in double what he ought to.

“Wait, Logan,” Micah says, “you didn’t get anything last time.”

“Shoot, yeah, what can I get you? No one’s picked it up yet,” Alex says, pulling the wads of bills from Roman’s hat.

“Just do a fetch kid’s delight, I guess. Price limit five.” Roman darts across the room to grab the proffered bill from Logan, attempting (and spectacularly failing) to parkour over the chair on his way back. The rickety plastic flies out from underneath him and his chin smacks the carpet as he goes down. Before anyone thinks about moving to help, he jumps to his feet and dusts off his knees, pretending as if nothing happened.

“It’s been accepted,” Alex announces.

“Maybe the trick is to work out whether the rocket, being from the moon, is the first to land, or if it has to be a life form in order to count for reaching Neptune first,” Joy suggests. Cassidy lifts her head to respond, thinks better of it, and drops her face back onto the table.

“That’s only assuming you give the rocket living rights to plant the flag,” Micah says.

“Did you guys consider the ramifications of the nationalities of each parent?” Roman asks.

“Yes,” everyone else groans in unison. Even Logan says it, now thoroughly annoyed by how much inconvenience Roman was able to skip in favor of retrieving a little flashdrive.

“Do we need to take into account the heritage of the parents?” Cassidy tries.

“It wasn’t included in the information backing up the question, and we’re only supposed to get an answer based on what we concretely know already,” Alex replies.

“We don’t concretely know already which flag they plant,” Logan offers, “so maybe the answer is that we aren’t supposed to have one.”

“That’s exactly what someone who knows the answer would say,” Joy mutters. This manner of conversation continues for another fifteen minutes or so, until someone knocks on the door at the top of the stairs.

“Liquid inspiration!” Roman shouts, vaulting over the empty chairs on his sprint for the door. As he swings it open to reveal a very familiar silhouette, Alex clicks a few times on their phone, finalizing the transaction upon receival.

Apart from the grey and red plaid scarf wrapped around his neck, Cadmium looks like he walked straight out of one of his own tours, down to the maroon cardigan and black skinny jeans. “Fetch quest fulfillment for Ally-oopsy-olly—”

“Yep, yes, that’s me,” Alex interrupts quickly, not letting him finish saying the username. They take a couple of the cups from Cadmium, stepping aside to let Joy and Micah help with the rest. Cadmium makes eye contact with Logan for a split second, inclines his chin, and turns to leave. He pulls out his phone, the screen angled enough for Logan to see the fetch quest home screen loading in more requests.

“Wait, we didn’t tip you,” Logan calls, surging past the other interns to catch up.

“Yeah, we did,” Alex says, “I put in your five, and I have my account set for an auto-gratuity of twenty—”

“Shut up , Alex,” Logan hisses over his shoulder. He turns to Cadmium, who looks somewhere between amused and bewildered. If he landed on Neptune, which emotion would touch down first? “Here y’are. Thanks.” Logan allows the last word to linger in the air, implying an unvoiced request for a name as he passes Cadmium a ten.

Cadmium glances from his phone—now proudly displaying a cheerful reimbursement and tip breakdown message—to the bill and back to his phone. He nods slowly, taking the ten and heading down the stairs. Logan blinks, watching him go.

“Wow,” Roman says, coming closer to rest his elbow on Logan’s shoulder. “You’ve got it bad, my guy.”

“Oh, shove off.”

#labhwrites #mine #i'll bring you the moon #ibytm

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gg-astrology · 6 years ago

Note

I'm pretty sure you're still doing these but libra sun/virgo moon? I checked your masterpost and it said to please request this placement so here I am lol

Hey there!!! 💞💞💞💞 yessss perfect I’ll do this now thank u for requesting!! 💞💞💞

[Below Cut: Libra Sun - Virgo Moon 🍢]

SMART but like subtle and sometimes a simplier unconventional kind of smart y know?

Clever would be a better world, these people are clever clever alecs

First of all Witty and BanterFULL!! You might often identify yourself through your quick witted-ness banter with others, intellectual stimulation is how u keep it 💯 with people around you!

When you can be honest, speak your truths say what you mean straight-forwardly it means you trust them to an extent (because you’re usually v aware/senses people’s comfortability level with you and that Matters to you)

Combine that with joking/having a sense of humour that’s compatible to yours ---you Know those who can take/handle it are Keepers 💯 for u!

It’s in the MIND that’s important, social relationship is important yes and with the Libra/Virgo combination-- sometimes you’re really bashful of compliments, or direct/heavy praises because both these signs are light-weight (air/mercury) and you also tend to think of yourself as y know, just being a good person/friend and lending an ear to someone.

Even when you don’t have to (so nice) you do kind of want to be low-key rewarded with people having a good impression of you, of being well-liked enough that you don’t have to approach someone, but they approach you instead (Libra/Virgo) of having a good social standing and presentation (Libra) -- that’s why you do your best to be kind, pleasant, cordial.

Common sense and judgement combined makes for someone who’s supportive of others, lenient but also no-nonsense (controlling occasionally, wants the best for others, brings up valid points) look out/take care of others subtlety in your own ways.

You’re kind but also you’re protective of that kindness-- that it could be taken advantage of by certain people at certain time if you’re ‘weak’ or give into obsession with something/someone too much.

Your Virgo Moon is logical and rational, combine that with Libra’s astuteness makes for someone who can be polite usually, level-headed and sometimes even professional ‘cold’ when you want to be (not like, overt aggression even though you may vent inside)

Your environment is a big deal considering your Virgo placement-- it’s kind of like an amplifier for Libra. If there’s tension in your environment, if anything is in disarray, if something catches your eyes or your environment isn’t up to your standard/preference--- your perfectionist streak comes out and you start obsessing over it because your Libra cannOT handle this (amped up by Virgo making it y know-- clonk in your mind until your Libra has to deal with it NOW instead of later)

Also,, you Do Not Get Emotionally Vulnerable About your Deepest Darkest Personal Fear About Another Person Ever

Things like feeling cheap, used, feeling like you’re not worth much. Feeling like you’re disposable or not valuable enough for others to see worth in/worth keeping.

These fear of ‘possibilities/future’ that has to do with yourself (and low key your self-worth with another person) is Never Going To See the Light with those around you.

Intimacy is the thing?? Like you may be scared of unequal relationship. With Libra/Virgo person there’s a certain degree of independence and Knowing You’re the Shit because you CAN Control it (which is why you pull your energy into manifestation in work, in yourself, in keeping yourself contained --- demand respect, rationalize why you deserve it. Know how others/yourself should be treated because of distance/tact/personal diplomacy that you have.)

---But when it comes to others?? And how they think/feel/treat you?? Yikes sometimes you fear that they might treat you wrong, abuse or mistreat you. And it’s that cautious and highly critical part of Virgo moon (imagination vs practicality) that makes you kind of afraid that things you can’t control (others) is going to hurt you if you give it too much power/surrender yourself to it

It’s not a big deal in everyday life, but long-term wise it’s important to figure out your own fears. Libra sun would absolutely REFUSE to acknowledge their own emotional need for others (aka their love/want for romantic intimacy and their fantasies for them) and your Virgo Moon enables that. You’re creating a system that’s sabotaging your goals/wants/needs to ‘settle for something more realistic/less personal’ even though you want romance?? You want all the good gooey shit you just?? Don’t want to acknowledge or work for it??? (and can sometimes overdo your niceness to make up for it, or let your timidity makes you reserved or cold towards others even though you want to stand up and show them who you are, feel valued and desired)

Virgo Moon in their everyday life sort through things and goes ‘this is unproductive?? what can i/am i going to do about it??' -- nothing you can change, or work on, so keep it out of sight and out of mind. You toss out the thought and work on the now but its STILL a part of your motivation, your anxiety, why you put your energy into other things so hard and much. Because THIS tension inside of you ISN’T released y know?

It’s MUTABLE so you’re always going to be nervous, slightly anxious about it. You need need want but you’re afraid (and low-key lazy) at sorting through your personal wants/needs desires and putting your foot down to do it.

Self-discipline is important, learning to look and acknowledge. To come to terms with true self-love and not self-sabotage is important for you.

You’re afraid of acknowledging and getting what you finally want, because most of the time you procrastinate or put off long-term life-changing manifestation because you don’t want to ‘commit’

Be good to yourself, treat yourself well. Buckle down sometimes and learn how to --- y know, express yourself fully and vulnerably.

Talk to someone who can give you a listen, who can wait for you to finally admit your true desires out loud and let you work through it yourself.

With your combination, it’s just a matter of self-admittance that’s hard. You don’t really need anyone to come along and tell you what you want/need, you intuitively know what it is you’re just afraid to say it into existence because it makes things ‘real’.

Get to talking-- it’s how your Moon works. What your Virgo needs is jus a little self-discipline because Libra in your sun (ego) can make you delude yourself into thinking you can wait around longer or not talk about it. It’s important that you learn how to make your Virgo speak up, get some clarity. Because you’re always going to want to please others somewhat and it BOTHERS you and this is the way to?? actually get to resolving it. You just have a problem with confrontation in yourself (and thus, lack of self-assertion as the consequence of it)

Once you start talking, even though it’ll take time (earth moon) you’ll slowly uncover parts of yourself and become stronger through realizing your vulnerabilities isn’t something that is bad at all (or as serious as you think, rather it’s normal and a shared experience other people also feel as well!)

You’ll learn how to use it to strengthen you and work through it healthily, instead of avoiding the problem which you tend to do!

Let me put it this way? Some Libras (you) have a hard time understanding because your emotions runs deep/heavy and you’re kinda low-key terrified you’re gonna scare people off ??

That’s why you never talk about shit unless you can ‘sense’ that the other person is receptive or open to it, heavy stuff drains you so you never really try as much to keep it going (once in a while). Your emotionality is kinda dried up sometimes, not your anxiety but your actual vulnerabilities.

Sometimes you may like to keep it cool--- keep it contained and smoothened out on the surface. Problems?? Nah maybe This and This but NEVER That haha ;; -- letting others in or know your problem is hard. But the key lesson here is to communicate.

Combine Virgo-- a nocturnal mercury sign-- with Libra’s venusian/social relationship trait. Utilize Libra’s cardinal nature to make it happen for you!

In order to do that you have to communicate first. Bring the self out so others can catch you and be there with you (emotionally)

Being able to feel like you belong, as part of a group/community and that your fears/feelings are validated is important. Becoming truly emotionally empathetic to others because your own hurt/pain/secret is out in the light now is important for your growth/self-development too!

It’s the way your practical nature and good-head-on-the-shoulder Libra/Virgo nature can shine honestly and freely (without the stress/tension you carry prior). It becomes more open and honest, more willing to learn. Release?? Tension within yourself??

Because what you were doing before is keeping it in?? Keeping it contained and that’s self-protection ok but ALSO burdening/heavy on you. Learn to trust others to carry your weight this way too.

Phew anyways!!💓💓💓 I hope this is helpful!! 💓💓 Good luck!! 💓💓💓

#libra sun #virgo moon #libra-virgo #anon #asks

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spaceorphan18 · 6 years ago

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Finding Kurt Hummel: 2009

Masterpost

6x12: 2009

And... here we are, back to the start of all the things. I don’t necessarily count this as part of the finale - I feel like this and Dreams Come True were two separate entities that they decided to throw together to make it seem like a two hour finale. But I’m glad that we got this kind of an episode - because I feel like it’s a way to show just how far this show came in it’s short six years. I know there’s discussion as to whether or not this would have been a good ender instead of DCT, and while I do see the appeal of the circular narrative, I prefer how it was aired -- looking back before closing the book for good.

Hello, My Name is Kurt Hummel

The first half of the episode is dedicated to reframing the characters we’ve grown to love and we get to start with Kurt. I kind of love that we spend time with the characters who weren’t developed in the pilot - not only because it gives us a different perspective of the pilot, but because these are the characters who the show gravitated to, and who really became solidified in our hearts. And of course, Kurt gets to go first - because he wasn’t even in the pilot to begin with - and now this character is the male lead of the show. It’s kind of poetic really.

But before we get too deep, I need to point something out. It’s funny to me that we can all look back at things and remember how they were - but there is a reality to the fact that we can never really go back. The truth is - in the six years being on the show, Chris Colfer grew up - going from a slightly chubby-faced kid, into a full-fledged adult. And no matter how hard they try, they can’t undo puberty.

Chris is amazing in a lot of ways - he holds himself inward like he did in the first season, he tries to mirror the same mannerisms, he even tries to speak slightly higher again. But you can’t mask the obvious - this kid is, well, not a kid anymore, and it shows. Just needed to point that out ;)

Anyway - when we open with Kurt, we see this very lonely and sad kid, slumping through the halls, still getting rammed into lockers by Karofsky (and Puck), and talking about how no one notices that he even exists.

I like that he mentions his mom here - that he says she said he was a happy child. And I have to wonder in these lonely days, if he misses his mom more. She was a kind soul - a contrast to his dad’s gruffness, that soothed his unique heart. He could be different - but his mom always loved him. Mom isn’t around anymore, and the world seems cold and lonely.

He mentions in this voice over that he wonders if anyone would notice if he was gone. Yes - Kurt was situational depressed before he joined glee. And yes, he was toyed with suicide -- maybe not to the extent that he’d try anything (he had his dad to look out for - and I feel like that always kept him going) but it was definitely a thing the show wants to point out as real. And in the middle seasons - when Burt says glee saved his kid’s life - this is what Burt was referring to.

Well - lucky for Kurt, as strange and awkward as Ms. Pillsbury is, she does do her job - and she does notice Kurt. And really, let’s give Emma some credit here, because if Emma hadn’t talked to Burt, Kurt probably wouldn’t have joined glee - and who knows what would have happened.

I like the little scene between Emma and Burt. Burt knows something’s different about Kurt - and has suspected for a long time that he’s gay - but really doesn’t want to go there, and still thinks there might be some time for Kurt to grow out of being gay. Luckily Emma kinda brushes pass that and explains to Burt that Kurt’s depressed and might possibly hurt himself. And Burt, being the good dad that he is takes it seriously.

Joining a Team

Hey! It’s Kurt’s old room - complete with weird bird cage chair and a sewing machine. And those very white walls. I’m surprised Kurt hadn’t already redesigned it into something more spectacular - but if he was feeling depressed, well then he probably didn’t feel like doing much of anything. Anyway... Burt comes down to talk to him, and we get little snippets of what their life is like with each other.

Kurt comments about making dinner -- which is what he probably does a lot of the time. He likes cooking, Burt probably doesn’t, so Burt’s probably okay with him doing a majority of the meals. Burt isn’t that comfortable talking about things - but makes an effort (which is huge!). But within the conversation, Burt comments that they’re usually doing their own things and not really being a big part of each other’s lives.

Burt, I don’t think, really knows how to handle the situation - and his solution is to get Kurt some friends, and find something that Kurt’s happy to do. I don’t think yelling at his kid to join the football team is great advice, but I also don’t think Burt really knows what to do in this situation either, and reaches out in the only way he knows how.

It’s interesting to me that Burt comments that Kurt’s basically alone all the time down there in his room. And it made me think about how Burt was probably all alone too - not having met Carol yet, and probably feeling low-key depression (or just apathy) since his wife died. Sure, Burt probably played poker with his buddies every once in a while, too -- but I get the impression that Burt is as lonely and isolated inwardly as Kurt is outwardly portraying. It’s just an interesting dynamic here before they kind of turn a corner in Preggers.

Rachel Berry

Burt made a demand that Kurt has to join something by the end of the week... So Kurt, to his credit at least tries. But first - I’d like to point out Kurt awkwardly needs to find a place to sit for lunch - and through our trek through the lunch room, we’ve got all the cliques and groups hanging around. And this isn’t 2009, this is almost 1989. Everything’s so stereotypical - it might as well have been a Saved by the Bell episode. Oh Ryan Murphy and your issues regarding being in high school that play out through your numerous shows....

Anyway - back to Kurt. He finds Rachel Berry and promptly sits down. And then tells her how wonderful she is (cause he watches her MySpace videos) **headdesk** And this, folks, is what we call retconning because I don’t actually believe that season 1 Kurt would be watching Rachel’s anything. But the show is trying to connect its characters - and set up the Hummelberry friendship, so fine, I’ll let you pass. The revert to early Rachel Berry is pretty funny.

I’m not entirely sure what’s going on with Kurt’s hair during this episode. They kind of go through all of Kurt’s iconic looks throughout season 1 and 2, which may have been the point. Or maybe they forgot that Kurt wore his hair in one way during all of season 1. Hard to say.

Anyway... oh Rachel. Kurt says he needs to join a club and Rachel says speech club is closed (man - why didn’t we get to see Rachel in speech club, that would have been hilarious). But then goes into a whole thing about how glee club is now open and looking for members. And Kurt kind of hangs on for dear life as Rachel rambles on in her run-on sentences.

I should mention, though, a contrast between Rachel and Kurt here, though. Kurt claims he’s kinda toying with acting while Rachel says she’s going to be on Broadway and that’s it - she’s determined and unstoppable. And I think it kind of speaks to their characters. Sure, Kurt does have ambition, but he also is able to put his relationships before his career - while Rachel will do the opposite. Idk - nice little bit of continuity here.

Popular

And... we get Kurt wearing the same, weird, glasses shirt he was wearing in the pilot when he goes to sign up! Anyway, Rachel has agreed to help Kurt with his singing, and of course - they decide to do a Wicked song (nice throwback to the diva-off in Wheels) about making one over to be popular. Could their be a more perfect song for them as their last duet? I think not.

I do like Kurt’s looks as Rachel (through the song) comments on his livelyhood - and how he won’t be an easy case to make over. We do get a bit of that old school Kurt shining through here in his facial expressions. And I do kinda love that it puts Kurt’s making over her in season 1 have even more context, which is fun (whether they intended that or not).

I’m not sure if I have a whole lot to say about the song itself. It’s pretty self explanatory - a conversation about being popular (which is a nice tie-in with the original theme of the show). And it’s also a way for Kurt and Rachel to begin the bonding process (again, even if I don’t fully buy the retcon here).

But more so - this is the last duet for Chris and Lea and they really just sell it. It’s been a long time, actually, since we’ve had a Kurt and Rachel duet - and it’s nice to have again. Their voices complement each other very well - and they have great give and take on stage. This performance just works - is funny, well sung, and all around entertaining. I have nothing but positive things to say about it.

As the show wraps up - Kurt is happy and excited, wanting to do the audition together with Rachel. However, Rachel has this weird idea in her head that you can’t team up to do auditions (even though Tina and Artie totally audition together). Rachel dramatically storms off - claiming that this is show choir and it’s every man for himself. Which is weird... because the purpose of show choir is to function as a full unit, not fight for solos, but I don’t think Glee really ever understood that concept.

Kurt stands there stunned - and again alone.

Mercedes Jones

Well - I’m glad it doesn’t take much to light a fire under Kurt’s butt. Since Rachel isn’t willing - Kurt goes out and seeks someone else (the same day!) - and it happens to be Mercedes Jones - future BFF. Kurt’s already enamored with her (which is adorable), and asks for her help preparing something for his audition.

She thinks he’s adorable (she calls him a pale, sexy, keibler elf - let that sink in for a minute) but she also calls him out for slinking around the school and his loud sense of style. He says that he feels more inside, but isn’t sure how to express it - and we get confirmation that Kurt lets his clothes express himself as a way that he can’t yet verbalize. Well - luckily for Kurt (man does he get lucky having some great women in his life) Mercedes takes pity on him - and decides to help him out -- even picking out his audition song.

Audition

So - we get the reprisal of Mr. Cellophane - what Kurt sang for his audition way back in the pilot. And I love that we get it from the back side. It’s not only a way to hide Chris’s growth into adulthood, but a neat way to show a new perspective.

In case you were wondering what Will’s notes are:

Great Breath Support

Impressive Range

Earsplitting falsetto (Note - does Will or the writers know that that’s not Kurt’s falsetto but his actual range?)

Gay. (Oy, whatever Will, not sure why that’s relevant)

Sweet Kid!!! (Will added the exclamation points)

Hummel Tires and Lube

With all the throwbacks, I’m realizing this is the last time we get to see all these places. Awww....

So, Kurt comes bouncing into his dad’s shop all happy about joining the glee club, and Burt’s excited for him. (I love that Burt thinks Beyonce is a kid in Kurt’s class.) I kind of side eye that a) you can only bond with other people within competition - but from Burt’s perspective I get it and b) the fact that Kurt feels they need a strong male lead. I get that Kurt might not feel confident yet to be a lead -- and that the show wants to bring back Finn (or at least his essence). But I’ve had this issue with the show all along. Kurt (and Artie) can be male leads - just because they aren’t ‘traditional’ doesn’t mean they can’t be. Oy show.

But the real bittersweet (and brilliant) moment of this scene comes at the end - and is a stark reminder of where we once were. His dad is proud of him, and clearly loves him. But Kurt still holds on to a deep secret - that he’s gay. And he just doesn’t know how to tell his dad that. We know what happens - we know that Burt’s going to officiate at Kurt’s wedding to a man some day. We know that everything’s gonna play out alright. But at one point in time - Kurt didn’t know. And this scene really puts us back in the mind set.

Also - I’d like to take a moment to mention that they use all the season 1 scoring - which a nice throwback to season 1, but also in building the atmosphere of the time period. It’s just a nice touch.

Little Moments

Kurt’s spotlight segment is over - but there’s still much more to this episode. As Tina and Artie are figuring out their own auditions (which they’re dared to do) Kurt and Rachel are busy getting lunch thrown on them. Ah kiddos...

[Guys - when they do the throwback to class where the fury is complaining about Rachel - check the chalkboard - there’s a history of Lima there and it’s kinda funny]

Also - Kurt is back to doing stunning background moments, because he storms behind giving a death glare to the punk group Artie and Tina are in - it’s glorious.

First Glee Club Meetings

Hey! It’s our first glee club meeting... Will’s not very good at this, but at least he’s enthusiastic. I don’t fully understand the need for the gloves though.

Of course - everyone’s already fighting over solos. Will at least says they’re going to take turns, but we all know how that’ll turn out. Meanwhile - Will wants to do a medley from Grease (ah, set up I see...) and Kurt raises his hand to do the Sandy part. Remember that weird, awkward Kurt gender stuff - hey it’s back.

And then we get into some really uncomfortable stuff as Rachel says that the solos shouldn’t be about race, or disability, or ‘whatever’ as she points to Tina and Kurt (eesh). And yeah - Rachel - sit down, you are being racist. This is supposed to set up Mercedes breaking down though - and I am glad they finally, even if it’s at the end, address some of the racial stuff with Mercedes here.

Kurt, though, looks annoyed (rightfully) at be labeled as a ‘whatever’ - and looks to Will for some kind of support - or at least wanting to shut Rachel down. But this is Will - and he’ll learn that he’ll never really be able to do that.

Kurt doesn’t say anything here - but let’s take a moment to appreciate Chris’s background acting again. Ah, welcome back to season 1.

Lima Bean

So - Kurt and Mercedes are already hanging out together - lovely! I totally get season 3 Kurt vibes from this scene, but ah well - who cares, it’s cute.

Finn has joined the club by now - and Kurt’s complaining cause despite scenes ago saying they need a male lead - Kurt’s now irritated (as he should be) about being ignored for something more ‘traditional’.

The point of this conversation is kind of to prop up Finn as needing them as much as they, supposedly, need him. Mercedes is kind about the whole thing - and tries to see the positives, while Kurt goes on about being pushed out, and that the popular people seem perfect and don’t have issues. (I feel like there’s some commentary about celebrity culture in here, too)

But what I like is that Mercedes is constantly positive. Kurt’s kind of a negative person by nature - and she does bring out this brighter side of him, which is great! I do think it’s fun that they throw a nod into Mercedes’s crush. Kurt kind of shrugs it off as nothing, but it’s a cute moment.

Also - we get a throwback to Finn saying Mercedes should do the costumes - and Kurt says he’ll be the one helping her do that. Cracks me up that they use this episode to ‘fix’ some weird/minor issues in the pilot. Retcons ;)

I’d also like to point out -- do you know who is standing right behind Mercedes at the moment -- where Kurt can see that blazered back (that he’ll probably see a lot of over his life time - now that I think of it...). BLAINE!!!!

I’m so glad they let Blaine have a little moment in this episode.

We get this super cute inner monologue of Kurt wrestling with himself over his crush on Finn as his future husband makes his way behind him. I love that. I love that they let that little crossing paths moment happen.

Anyway - Kurt’s gotten to Mercedes enough that she’s going to call an emergency meeting about Finn joining the club.

Emergency Meeting

And... we get rather meta in this scene - I love that they mention DSB being a nod to The Sopranos Ending - which was a legit thing I heard way back when.

But mostly, this is where everyone bands together and decides Finn isn’t so bad. Yay Finn! Sure.

Everyone goes around saying how Finn has been kind to them. Kurt references his first scene of the show - being able to take off his Marc Jacobs jacket before being thrown in the dumpster (and then twitches - cause comedy).

As Rachel throws out the message of the episode, and the show, about accepting of each other for being different (sure, fine) we get a camera lingering on Kurt. And - omg. This brings me season 2 feels. And remember the time when Kurt often looked into the middle distance wistfully? Oh kiddos - it does get better. Or it has Bette Midler. Which ever you prefer, really.

But really - this scene, more than any other in this episode, really captures young Kurt. I mean, Chris does angst so well, and it’s a nice little reminder of how this lonely and awkward kid grew into something incredibly special.

Back to the Start

And then we get Don’t Stop Believin’ - as it was way back in the pilot. It’s edited differently, more so to feature Finn (personally I like the original edit better - but I can see why they did it this way).

But it’s a sweet little moment. Remember when this show was filled with hopes and dreams and went out of its way to make people feel special? Remember when this show was an anthem for people who were weird or different or awkward or just plain didn’t fit in? Remember when this show was fresh and not bogged down by baggage and bts drama? For a moment - we can listen to Don’t Stop Believin’ and remember way back when and think about all the possibilities that were open to us.

As a final confession - I would like to say this - I actually like this episode much more than the pilot - and probably would have been more invested in the show had it started with this. But as much as they tried to recreate the feeling of season 1 - they just didn’t capture the dark and grittiness that accompanied it. And this is a pilot to something that would have been vastly different. And that’s okay.

I am glad that we got this episode (I wish they had done more episodes like this, tbh), and I’m glad we got to dig in just a little deeper to Kurt’s story. It’s been a fun journey, and I do think it was brilliant to have this episode right before the end. But as I said at the start - I’m glad it wasn’t.

There’s room for just a little more of the story, time to close everything up....

#finding kh #kurt hummel

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krakenator · 6 years ago

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CHAPTER 1 aka “Stranger Danger”

I’m rereading The Property of Hate by @modmad and overanalyzing it to hell and back because i can’t stop thinking about the story and getting madder and madder about the PUNS I keep finding. I’m scratching the itch and trying to find All The Details. Current plan is just to go chapter by chapter, feel free to chime in with stuff I miss! There’ll be a masterpost up soon linking everything in one spot

SPOILERS are sprinkled around extremely liberally. Masterpost

Okay, so just a million things right off the bat on page fucking one

‘The Hook’ is of course a term for the beginning of a story. Grabbing one’s attention and convincing them to go off on an adventure, so to speak

Speechboxes! Everybody’s got their own distinctive ‘way of speaking’ in this story. RGB’s are rectangular, but those straight edges are offset by these really loopy, meandering, and elegant speech tails. It’s just. Such immediate characterization.

Like, even the pose. The way RGB introduces himself by crouching on her drawers like an incredibly dapper gremlin. It creates a similar contrast to his speechbubbles- prim and proper existing simultaneously with fae and kinda ridiculous

So considering we’ve got a fairly detailed picture of roses up on Hero’s wall on the comics opening page I think we can assume this is some type of Important maybe. Just off the top of my head, isn’t the rose Englands national flower? IDK how relevant that is outside of RGB being incredibly, incredibly British

Oh god damnit I just scrolled down to go to the next page and fffFFFUCKING BLUE ROSES ON THE BUTTONS okay. Blue rose symbolism! They don’t exist naturally. You won’t just find one in the wild outdoors, so they represent the impossible, the mysterious and achievable.

Seeing blue roses right off the bat = important story theme probably. Impossible dreams are my first thought. RGB’s seemingly hopeless plan to save a world everyone else has given up to be doomed. Hero’s wish to go the fuck back home please after she’s had her fill of deadly adventure. RGB and Hero are setting out to achieve the impossible, defeat Her, and save the World of Make Believe

Last point for the first page; RGB’s drool. Except it’s not drool, we later learn it’s equivalent to blood, and he bleeds emotions he’s feeling. While recruiting Hero, RGB’s prominent feelings are, unsurprisingly in hindsight, a fair load of sadness but tinged with a dose of cheer. His last Hero failed, and every single one before that, but he’s still daring to have hope, the absolute madman. What he’s actually dripping most though is what looks like curiosity- it may be mixed with a bit of anger, which I wouldn’t begrudge the guy. Angry that he has to start over, again, angry that his world is dying, angry that he’d the only one doing anything about it

Ok but imagine you woke up to find a man crouched on your bedside table smiling this super-wide “TRUST ME!! :)” smile and blood dribbling out of it and welling up between the teeth. Like, I’m laughing, but I’d be screaming

OKAY BUT FINALLY WE’RE PAST THE FIRST PAGE. We get a clear look at Hero’s drawings taped to the wall, and check it- one kinda looks like the Idea they run into a few chapters ahead. The other picture might also be showing the House of Paint? I mean, there’s a sun there so that’s off, but the clouds and steps leading up to Madras’ door look right

And now we get Hero’s speechboxes! They’re circular in contrast to RGB’s boxes, and colored orange. The balloon tails don’t loop-de-loop all over the page like RGBs but they’re not ‘standard’ either- there’s always this little jag to them closer to the text

RGB’s speechbubbles are actually one of the plainest/most conventional in the entire story

Excluding the tails of course. Those never ever take the most direct or efficient path to his face. Yeah, it adds an impression of silliness, but also speaks to the fact that RGB takes creative and weird solutions out of situations. I’ll laugh about the entire Click arc later but like really. REALLY. RGB DID ALL OF THAT

I love how Hero’s first actual words to RGB send him immediately into ?????????????. He keeps up this huge grin for most of The Hook and this is the first time his “I’m your friendly neighborhood TV nothing to see here!!” demeanor gets shaken up

the ladder hurts Hero’s feet, so why does she sleep on the top bunk? The bottom bunk doesn’t have any bedding on it so it’s not like she’s regulated to the top by any kind of sibling dibs

Weird... weird detail to be showing us modmad.....

“Are you a monster?” “the very worst one” that’s a lotta blue dripping off yer chin there, stop crying

The mom is a character for two (2) seconds and even she gets her own unique speechbox; blue, fuzzy and barely connected, which does a really great job of communicating that she’s basically still asleep without ever having to see her

‘happy boi about to bring newest kidnapping to the sky world’

That’s a Mary Poppins reference, that is. RGB exclaiming ‘spit spot!’ earlier also got be thinking of Poppins

Clouds look so fluffy out of airplane windows, I’m honestly jealous

Doors! Gotta wonder where they all lead. Gotta wonder if they’ll get more use past this outside Hero’s recovery Time

I’ve just spend like 15m trying to figure out what the symbols above the doors are and I THINK it’s alchemy? “libra sign upside down” is luckily an easily searchable term, and that symbol in particular is for gas becoming liquid

I think the door beyond that has the alchemical symbol for gold? I’m not having luck on the others, including the door they actually go through here/its sister door Hero opens after the Elastic Valley fiasco.

RGB are you pissed that you had to tell this kid your name yourself? Are you upset about manners?? She’s like 7 dude cmon have you met a 7 year old. Thinking about it, possibly not, all the confirmed Other Heroes are definitely older- they all come across to me as adults

well, actually, who even knows how old Assok is. They might be the exception

The little ‘peephole’ eye popping open when the right key is close is nice atmospheric detail, but it kinda makes me wonder if there’s a person like. Seeing out of that eye. Whether someone gets a little notification every time one of these doors is opened

It’s the World of Make Believe! Stupendous! Break-taking! Modmad is exceptional at colors and beautiful environments full of personality! Hero’s last chance to turn back is gone!

Hero only being awake for 20 minutes before becoming Instantly Tired = biggest actual mood, my god. Me too sweetie

Except I can’t blame trees. And a sort of magical jet-lag effect. Yo, are sleeping tree’s making you sleepy the same sorta thing where when one person yawns everyone yawns

I just really like how this tail loops around RGB’s physical actual legs. It makes it seem like speech is a tangible thing that interacts with the world and that you could, like, touch or something. all it’s missing is a shadow

God, fuck me. That’s the yellow brick road. God dammit. Son of a bitch.

RGB, pg 14: do not touch me, do not look at me, don’t speak to me, you have tentative permission to breathe

RGB from the Market onwards: carries her multiple times (admittedly, almost always exactly like you shouldn’t), picks her up, swings her around, hugs her when she’s scared of the dark, ‘I Have Longer Legs, Hop On’ piggybacks, protecting her by putting his own bod in harms way, general Manhandling of Child

I kid, I kid, it’s more complex than that. For one, RGB doesn’t want Hero getting hurt cause she’s Important and has Heroing she can’t do if she’s injured. Second, that whole “don’t get attached” thing gets thrown out the window on like day 2

“I’ve only known Hero for a day and a half but if anything happened to her I’d kill everyone in this room and then myself”

RGB is honestly... super bad at not attaching to people. honestly, actually terrible at it

Ooh! Those flowers! I didn’t realize those always happen when Hero’s sleeping. They also look like she’s drawn them herself! That’s honestly… lethally adorable

Fun fact technicolor dream shell snail changes colors every panel

RGB bleeds static? What emotion is that? I dig it, unconscious is an emotion and i feel it in my soul

w...white noise.... god DAMMIT

ey, the tree’s look different in the light of day- all those blurry fairy light ‘leaves’ are gone now.

!! Hero glows the exact same way when she’s asleep! RGB, however, is not. Tree’s have leaves when they dream, huh

oh god tree’s have LEAVES when they DREAM

...we’ll come back to this thought when we get to the sick sun tree cause that thing is a whole other can of Lore worms

In a different direction, there must be some sort of difference between Tree Dreaming and People Dreaming, because dreaming trees do NOT trigger RGB’s weird stuntman nightmares

these particular trees are also see-through; i can’t remember if they’re all like this throughout the world? will have to pay attention and see

oh- OH. also just made the connection for why trees provide a saf(er) haven- bottled nightmares will very shortly be used to dispel fears. Dreams repel Fears! It’s best to sleep near tree’s because just you dreaming might not be enough to keep things at bay while your rest

And the chapter’s finished off with a new character and new speechbox to go with it! It’s the first to use a different font and text color to our main characters

Honestly though, what is UP with the Butterfly? It’s clearly keeping close tabs on them, and only speaks to Hero when RGB is unconscious or otherwise occupied. It clearly doesn’t wanna be seen by him, which is shady. It shows up like twice? And the other time RGB and Hero don’t even know it’s there and listening. Between that and the Eyes, like… does it have it’s own agenda and interests or is it an agent of Hate? Idk man maybe I’ll pick up on more Butterfly stuff on this readthrough

*notices that the plant it was resting on withers once it flies away* ... that’s no good. especially if that butterfly can do the same to trees

...... ah. it kinda can. Consider, please, Hate’s likely role in the demise of the Sun, and Her confirmed ability to smother them in [-----]

Butterfly’s parting words: “be wise”. Hero’s next and immediate action: doodle RGB’s face

And that’s the Hook! Join me next time when Hero has a fun play date with some new friends everything goes wrong almost instantly.

#tpoh #the property of hate #tpoh meta #the specific tag for this adventure will be...#tpoh time with Gill #i assure all of you i make these posts out of love

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mihanada · 7 years ago

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Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation

(back to masterpost)

Oooh boy was this a wild chapter. but! this is also the end of this arc! So tiny!

Chapter 62: Evil (Part 2)

“Wei WuXian had clearly been a bright, high-spirited boy...Yet, this person was entirely enveloped in a cold, dark energy. He was handsome, yet pale-faced, his smile eerie.”

Here it is, the transition from Wei Wuxian the first disciple of the Yunmeng Jiang Sect to the Yiling Patriarch.

“All of the flesh on his legs had been sliced off, piece by piece. And, likely… all of the flesh had been eaten by himself!”

Hey. Hey. Just in case you forgot that this novel was low-key gross and gory.

This is some great horror material. And remember when Wei Wuxian mentioned that he of all people would know about torture methods? (I forgot when he said this, but he did.) WELL. This is the source of that statement.

He was really going for both physically and mentally breaking Wen Chao here, and it succeeded big time.

Imagine how Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji watching from above must feel? It’s like Wei Wuxian is a totally different person.

“...half of Wei WuXian’s face was in the light, the other half in the dark.”

is the symbolism smacking you in the face yet

“Holding what he had fed it in its mouth, it turned around and sat down. Hugging his leg, it chewed fiercely as it glowered at Wen ZhuLiu with cold, glistening eyes.”

yikes it’s the scary baby again. why is it always scary undead babies.

uM eating Wen Chao’s fingers.

(so just how did this happen anyways...was Wen Zhuliu too far away to get to Wen Chao and Wei Wuxian tortured him during that time, or was Wen Zhuliu occupied with fighting some corpses or. It’s likely that Wei Wuxian let them run away like I mentioned last chapter. gotta employ that psychological warfare!)

“Wen ZhuLiu, “I can’t fail to repay the debt I owe their generosity.”

i mean, at this point I think it’s been paid in full what the heck did they even do for you.

“Why is it that the debt you owe has to be repaid at the expense of others!”

idk I just like this line. Also, it hits a sore spot, and he loses a bit of his composure and gets angry.

“Burned skin was naturally weak to begin with...The uneven, bald head immediately became a bloody, bald head.”

how is Wen Chao still ALIVE. being a cultivator has its downfalls, probably their bodies are a little sturdier than regular people. which is not a good thing.

Also, with Wen Chao being pitiful and wailing in fear this entire chapter, it creates some weird dissonance.

On one hand, you don’t feel pity for him, he’s a terrible person.

On the other hand, who deserves this level of torture inflicted upon them?

The more you read, the more excessive it becomes.

“The ghoul child, however, had bit out an entire chunk of the flesh on his hand and spat it out. He continued to devour the palm.”

this is a lovely image. your core melting hand can’t help you now.

“Wen ZhuLiu’s large, heavy body had been lifted up by the surging whip and was now dangling in the air.”

Ok, a lot happens in the span of these two paragraphs. I did a little cheer when Jiang Cheng managed to get ahold of this guy. He deserves more than a little catharsis after what he went through.

“At the same time, Wei WuXian’s pupils shrunk. He took out a flute from beside his waist and spun around, standing up.”

To his credit, his first reaction is to recall the ghouls/corpses so they don’t attack the wrong people.

“He looked down at Suibian and only responded after a pause, “… Thank you.”

there’s something seriously wrong here, if the torture and controlling corpses wasn’t enough of a hint. That lackluster, soulless response.

“Although the sentence itself seemed to scold him, his tone was full of joy.”

my heart kinda started breaking here. Jiang Cheng seems so happy to have him back, he is willing to ignore all the things that are wrong about this boy he grew up with. And that is not a healthy thing for anyone involved, but realistically, after what they’ve gone through would you expect any other reaction?

“A few moments later, he struck him as well, “Haha, it’s a long story, it’s a long story!”

And now Wei Wuxian tries to answer in kind, tries to act like his usual self.

“...threw me to some hell of a place to suffer.”

If you would have elaborated here...maybe it would have given them some context for what happened to you. But, Wei Wuxian is the type to conceal his suffering for one reason or another, whether it’s to protect others or just because he doesn’t need to justify himself to people. So, he won’t elaborate. It’s done and gone, what’s the point in playing the pity party when they’ve got other business to attend to?

the ghouls are really creepy though.

“If I say that I found a mysterious cave somewhere and there was a mysterious book that a mysterious expert had left, and then when I came out I was this powerful, would you believe me?”

you troll. you tragic troll.

“Jiang Cheng murmured the words ‘as long as you’re back’ a couple of times before hitting him again, “You really are…! You live on even after being captured by Wen-dogs!”

D: this is also breaking my heart ok.

“To play around, play with them until they die. Straight up killing all of them at once would be too easy on them. Much better killing them in front of one another one by one, one slice after another.”

deefinitely getting unhinged here.

and it really is sad, when you consider who he was before all this terrible shit happened.

“He wanted to protect him, but I wanted to make him see how in his hands, Wen Chao would become more and more distorted, unlike a man but also unlike a monster.”

So the torture was Wen Chao’s punishment. The releasing them and chasing them down was Wen Zhuliu’s punishment.

it’s fitting isn’t it. after Wen Zhuliu’s hands caused so much grief, ripping people’s cores from them, in the end the person he wanted to protect also disintegrated under his touch. but, also perhaps a reflection of what happened with Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian. Jiang Cheng turned into a shadow of himself due to those hands, although he was alive he was already dead inside, and Wei Wuxian couldn’t do anything to help him (until he did, but before that)

“It is not that I want to denounce him.”

This starts Lan Wangji’s really bad communication skills.

Lan Wangji might be seen as the epitome of a righteous cultivator by everyone in-story, but he’s actually quite the flawed person. This is one of his faults. If he could actually explain himself clearly, would this chapter have ended in such on such an uneasy, awkward note?

“Wei Ying, for cultivating an evil path you would eventually have to pay. Throughout time, there has not been a single exception.” “The path would not only damage your body, but your heart as well.”

This is a good example of a passage where the context of the sentence really matters.

How could Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng take this as anything but Lan Wangji criticizing him for demonic cultivation? If you just read those words, you can’t tell if Lan Wangji has another motive.

That’s what I like about this story’s narrative. Technically, you know just as much as the main character does. Really, if you didn’t know Lan Wangji was the love interest and already had a small crush on him, how would you ever interpret this differently from Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng?

“Wei WuXian, “I can pay.” “Of course I can control it.”

I love his youthful confidence and resolve. it’s so foolish, but so fitting.

“After all, on the topic of how my heart is, what could other people know about it? Why should other people care about it?”

this is sad stop ripping my heart out Wei Wuxian

1) he doesn’t think himself worthy of other people’s affections or love, platonic or not, he doesn’t think anyone would care about him

2) the question of: can we really ever know the content of another’s heart?

“Lan WangJi paused. He had suddenly been angered, “… Wei WuXian!”

I’d be kind of angry too. Even objectively, do you really think no one cares about you? the answer is, well, yes in a way. Wei Wuxian can clearly see that Jiang Cheng at least was happy to see him. Yet, in Wei Wuxian’s eyes, his status is as a servant and Jiang Cheng is the “Sect Leaer”, who doesn’t have to worry about his subordinate’s heart.

“The two knew how to continue each other’s words ever since they were young. Now, one sentence after another, the argument flowed seamlessly...”

knowing this all goes to hell later makes me sad

They used to get along so well.

“Hearing this, Lan WangJi’s expression froze. He looked up at Wei WuXian, the lump at his throat trembling, “I…”

probably a response to: “No matter whom he goes back with, it wouldn’t be you.”

but, again, bad communication skills.

“They had both showed him expressions of either despair, anguish, or deep-set hatred. However, right now, their faces above him had the same cold smile, the same cold eyes.”

the symmetry is really nice

“Wei WuXian, “Of course it’d be with a certain thing gone.”

>.>

they went there

“The eyes he looked at Wen Chao and Wen ZhuLiu with glistened, and his grin was both excited and cruel. Jiang Cheng had on him the same expression. Both of them had been buried within the overwhelming pleasure of revenge. Neither had the concern to deal with an outsider.”

You again get that weird mix of satisfaction and dissatisfaction. It’s disturbing, or disconcerting at least.

“The night had passed. The sun in the sky was about to rise.

And the sun on the ground was falling.”

a very simple, but impactful few sentences of description.

The real sun in the heavens is rising.

But the false sun on earth is falling.

(quotes from ExR’s translations)

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