#not a fan of the first half but its there for continuity sake

[raeny-thorns]

The Secret Morning

POV: first person told in the present tense

2,179 words

GN/M pairing

Minors DNI

Plot:

continuation/secret ending of Simeon's 2023 UR birthday card "The Secret Morning". Basically, Simeon and Mc have a sleepover alone in the HoL and have some domestic and intimate moments. In this fic, MC has sexual fantasies and wet dreams about Simeon and this sleepover is the perfect opportunity for them to act on their impulses.

Mc power bottoms//Simeon receives oral while telling MC about his fantasies//dirty thoughts/sexual fantasies/wet dreams//vanilla//sex with feelings//porn with plot//fluffy domestic moments

A/N: aa first actual post!! Firstly, thanks to @defnotremy for helping me with wording and editing, you're the best!! This is my first time writing a non-ironic smut fic (that I actually posted) so please be nice with your criticism!! Sorry if Simeon seems ooc, most of his lines are taken from the Devilgram. Might make a part 2 based on one of the chats from the card if I have the time.

"Aw, bathe all by yourself, handsome?" I tease when he comes back to my room, partially dry from his bath. I'm making the bed as he pulls his bathrobe over his pajamas.

"Right. I almost feel stupid for not inviting you in the first place" he brushes the back of his neck, tugging on his damp hair and chuckles. "Could you imagine?"

I could imagine. Us climbing in the tub together, me getting shy and trying to cover my body but you pull my hands away to see me in full. You whisper something embarrassing like, "beautiful" and I melt into your soft kisses. We don't have sex there but the way you wash my hair and body is more intimate than that. When we get out of the tub, you watch me get dressed and when I tease you for it, you don't get embarrassed. You smile and call me cute and that makes my heart leap.

"I'll put the kettle on." I say and leave to the kitchen. You follow me a few minutes later, dressed in your baby blue bathrobe and hug me from behind. You breathe on my neck, your lips brush me lightly. I shudder at the feeling and lean into you. I hardly notice the kettle getting ready to whistle as you move your hands from my waist to my thighs. I hardly notice you reach over and turn the stove off as you kiss my neck and lean further into me. I hardly notice the wind outside, threatening to blow in the house as you stretch my waistband under your fingertips and dip them below my underwear. I imagine it all.

"I'll put the kettle on," I smile, changing the subject, face warm with the thought of us. "Would you like Sleepytime with lavender syrup?"

-

The light of the stove illuminated the rest of the kitchen with shadowy figures that flickered restlessly on the walls. I was so lost in thought that I didn't hear him come in.

"The pot is ready," I almost jumped at his voice before turning the stove off and reaching for the kettle's handle.

"Ow, shit-" I muttered, flinching away from the hot handle and grabbing a cloth to grab the pot with. He walks over to me and asks if I'm okay. He's so close I can feel his breath on my neck, I shiver at the feeling. I nod and pour the water into the mugs, but he still takes my hand to inspect my burn. He watches my face as he rubs his finger over the burn and sees me falter.

"Run it under some cold water, I'll get us setup in the room."

It isn't that bad of a burn so I get to the room soon after him, feeling enough relief from the water.

He's at the table and trying to talk to Karusu. He mutters something about just wanting to listen to some music and I take his D.D.D. and start it for him.

"Ah, you're back." He stands up from his chair and I sit him back down and take the seat next to him. "Is your burn better?" He takes my hand in his and inspects it. His fingers are so warm. We drink our tea and talk, mostly about our respective living spaces. When we're done, there is a fight for who gets to take the mugs back to the kitchen, in the end we settle on me taking his and his mine.

"Can we sleep together?" I blurt out before feeling my face warm a bit. He looks surprised but giggles and rubs my hand.

"Of course. Why would I refuse?"

I can't look away from him as he crawls into my bed next to me. He probably can't see me in the dark but it still makes me embarrassed at the thought of him knowing.

"Hehe the bed sheets are already warm from your body heat." He brushes his hand against my arm before pulling away quickly. "Ah. Sorry, my hand brushed you." He shifts away from me.

"I like it when you touch me." My voice surprises me.

"Would you rather hold my hand or sleep on my arm?" I can hear his smile as he shifts back towards me.

"Arm pillow, please" I smile back.

"Hehe, I can smell your shampoo. We'll share the same perfume tonight. Goodnight." I listened to his heartbeat and let mine sync with his, falling asleep on his arm, clinging to the warmth of his skin.

-

He caresses my nude body with his fingertips, he breathes on me. His legs intertwine with mine, flexing and stretching. His kisses are passionate with love, he lusts for me but above all else he loves me and it seeps through every touch. He bites at my thighs, drawing bruise coloured hickies from my skin.

"I want to make you feel good," his voice was husk as he lightly bit at my earlobe. "Do you want me to make you feel good?"

Fuck. Another wet dream. And of course I woke up at the good part. Simeon is asleep next to me and I'm sexually frustrated from my dream. I look over at him for a moment. He's so peaceful, so cute. I contemplate just going back to sleep but I can't get the idea of him going down on me out of my head. I go to the bathroom to relieve myself before going back to bed.

-

"Rise and shine. Good morning!" He looks over at me and I turn my body to face him, my eyes still closed.

"I think I need a good morning kiss." Sleepily, I mutter. To my surprise he kisses my temple.

"How's that? Feeling better?" His hands run up my spine teasingly, my pajama top rolling up and exposing my lower back.

"Mmm...Five more minutes." I mutter and cover my face with my pillow to hide the heat on my face.

"Then I'll just tease you until you wake up," he laughs. "What should I do next?"

"Another kiss please." My pillow is pulled from my face as he pushes my body down, back onto the bed and leans over me to meet my eyes. The bed creaks from the pressure. The blanket stretches and pulls at my thighs, pinning me to the mattress.

"You're cuter than usual when you've just woken up." He brushes my hair out of my face and leans closer. "One for your eyes," his lips barely touch me. "And one for your nose," He kisses me so gingerly I don't breathe, thinking it will help me feel him clearer. But he pulls away. "No… this is no good. I won't be able to control myself at this rate." He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and lets his leg fall over the side of the bed to get off.

"So don't." I sat up, my arm outstretched towards him, reaching to pull him back to me. It came out more as a plea than a suggestion. Probably because it was. "Love me like you want to love me, Simeon. Please." He stares at me for a moment, considering it before reaching over and chastly kissing my lips.

It starts modestly before quickly becoming more desperate. His hand pushes up my shirt, massaging the small of my back while his other hand becomes entangled with my fingers. I throw an arm over his shoulder and lean him closer to me. He pulls back to breathe before kissing me again. My tongue brushes his lips and he parts them with a moan. Angelic. I'm sitting against my bed frame, my pillow that was behind me got shoved to the floor, the blanket that thinly seperated us is thrown off the bed as I pull him onto my lap to straddle me.

"Do you want to feel good?" His breath hitches as he nods at my question. I wipe the drool from his lip with my thumb. "Do you want me to make you feel good?" His face feels hot, he looks like he's going to come undone just being this close. He nods a yes. I undo his shirt buttons and feel his bare chest. I suck at his neck and work my way down to his v line. Fresh hickies stain his skin as I give extra attention to his love handles. They're so sensitive, he pushes against me, rutting himself against my thighs.

"Mm, you're so pretty," He half-moans, his voice is sweet and strained. He rubs the underside of my chin with his thumb and I meet his eyes. He's so needy.

"Do you need me?" I tease, "tell me that you need me and I'll give you what you need." He strains harder against me. The tent in his pants looks uncomfortable. He nods and goes to touch himself but I push his hand away and tell him to say it. I lightly palm at the outline of his length and watch him burn up and choke out a moan. The pants dampen a bit with pre-cum.

"Yes, I need you," his reply is shaky. "To use your mouth for my pleasure." He closes his eyes. "Don't tease me so much." He flushes more and I smirk. I roll his pants down his thighs. We do an awkward shimmy to get them off and he almost loses his balance. His clothes are strewn across the floor, underwear caught on the pole of the bed frame. He whines when I pull him off me to put the pillow back against the frame. He leans against it, and I make sure he's comfortable enough. His legs spread before me, and I kneel between them. His hand reaches up to cover his face when I pull his leg onto my shoulder but I push it away.

"I want to see your pretty face." I whisper and he nods. "Tell me, do you ever think about us doing this?" He stiffens at the question, embarrassed.

"Ah." He breathes. "I… have thoughts from time to time." I kiss his lower thigh, rubbing the back of his knees and he moans.

"Mm, what do you think about us doing?" I lick along under his thigh and his leg kicks out slightly.

"I… imagine you coming to me after a long day." His voice is hoarse as I lightly wrap my fingers along his length, still kissing and sucking along his thighs. "I give you a back massage while you lay in my bed with just underwear on-" I let some saliva drip onto his tip. "Shit."

"Language." I scold, continuing to stroke him. I lightly blow on the salivated parts. He winces.

"And while I'm rubbing your back," his breathing is getting heavier, "The sounds that you make are-" a moan interrupts him as I lick the vein at the base and he rutts against me. "I grind against you before rubbing myself between your thighs…"

I take him in my mouth, inch by inch, almost painfully slow while he explains. I relax my throat and look up at him to meet his eyes which are heavy lidded, his breath hitching. I moan around him and watch his face contort, his eyes squeeze shut and his mouth falls open in an 'o' shape. He's so beautiful.

I work my mouth up and down, flexing my tongue against his shaft. He explains what he fantasizes us doing, breathing heavily between a few words, his voice quivering.

"If Michael knew what I thought of you, he'd be horrified about how corrupt I've become." His hands grip the bed sheets. I squeeze his thighs, my nails dig soft crescents into his skin. I work my lips faster, sucking at his length.

"You feel so good," his hips buck into me. "Better than I thought." He looks like he is going to come undone soon. "Better than my hand," his hair is stuck to his forehead with sweat. "I love you-" I feel him twitch, his thighs shake and stretch outward. I watch his face as he gets closer to release then slow down. He groans and rolls his hips, trying to get more stimulation.

"Please," it comes out like a sob and he looks like he's going to pass out from exhaustion. I oblige and speed up. He cums down my throat. It's thick and warm and sweet. Everything an angel should be. I swallow as much as I can, but some dribbles down my chin. Slowly, I pull off of him, sucking off his tip with a pop.

We sit there, breathing for a few minutes before he chuckles and points to my chin.

"You missed a spot right there."

"Pfft-" I laugh and wipe it with my hand before licking it off. "Man, I'm hungry. What's a person got to do to get some breakfast around here?"

"Hmm I think a blowjob is worthy of a breakfast. How is a sandwich for your service?" He smiles softly.

"Sounds amazing, dear."

[opultea]

Me Instead

Younger! Ayato x GN Reader (No Pronouns)

Fluff - Drabble - Romantic - SFW - mutual pining - arranged marriage - happy ending

Word Count: 0.7k

Note: This drabble is set just after Ayato assumes his position as head of the Kamisato clan, so he may act more brashly due to his youth

"M-my lord, please, if you will only wait a moment-"

Ayato slid the paper door open a little too harshly, making it rattle in its rail as he stepped into your room.

“Ayato, you couldn’t have waited outside? For all you know I was changing,” You commented casually, almost jokingly.

The attendant fixing your hair was startled by the commissioner's entrance, but tried to continue her work with her slightly shaking hands.

“What do you think, is this fan too simple? I believe the Kado clan has always preferred more colourful designs,” Ayato’s chest heaved at your question.

“Why do you insist on giving such thought to the preferences of a man you’ve only met once?”

“This meeting matters to my parents, Ayato. A proposal would be their dream come true,”

“Yet it’s everything you would despise,”

You silently dismiss your attendant, who scrambles to bow before closing the door swiftly behind her.

“Ayato, please,”

“This isn’t what you want,”

“Don’t be naive, Ayato.” For the first time since he had entered, you looked him straight in the eye. The tired smile you gave unnerved him in a way he would never be able to shake. “You know that doesn’t matter,”

Ayato was new to his position as the Yashiro Commissioner. In the eyes of the Tri-Commission and the other noble families, he was only a boy, barely ready to take over such a cumbersome responsibility. Ayato knew well how the other commissioners thought of him, he knew they thought him naive. But hearing it from you was a different sort of sting. Did you truly think so little of him? Did you truly think so little of how he thought of you?

How could you say that you didn’t matter, when you were all that mattered to him?

“But it could matter, if you let it,” Ayato argued, his shoulders fixing themselves back to make his form stronger than his heart. When you sigh, he only presses on. “Don’t go today, I’ll give your parents an explanation. They are hardly in a position to defy the word of the commissioner, after all,”

“And they would only reschedule,” You shake your head, gently holding your temple as if the weight of your thoughts has finally become too much. “Besides, what would you even tell them?”

“That you are to marry me.”

The silence that follows has Ayato near sick. He tenses his jaw in hope that his sudden queasiness doesn't show. He doesn’t know if it’s better that you're not looking at him anymore.

“Marry… you?” You breathe. Ayato steels himself to explain.

"If it is a proposal that your parents desire then that is what we will provide. If you are willing, I will be dutiful and will care for you as you deserve. Never will you need to take concern in your comfort; I shall provide everything you feel you need. Not to mention a marriage between two people with a friendship established between them is more likely to be fruitful, and of course there will be no need to partake in any marriage acts that you are uncomfortable with-"

“Ayato!” It takes him a moment to realise this is the third time you have called his name. You stare at each other for a moment, your eyes catching as you slowly approach him. "I have no doubt that you would be a respectful and dutiful husband, as well as a continued friend. You'd certainly be better than the first son of the Kado clan, anyhow. He's actually quite boorish, really," You chuckle, making a puff of laughter escape Ayato's chest as he feels some of the weight release.

"So, is that perhaps a yes?"

"Well, you haven't actually proposed yet," Your lips shift into a smirk as you tease. Ayato clears his throat, half to shake off the mild embarrassment and half for the sake of dramaticism.

"Will you, my greatest friend, most resourceful ally, and most honoured critic, take my hand in marriage?" Neither of you seemed to notice how you had gradually shifted closer, not until your hands brushed together and your breaths were nearly shared.

"It would be my greatest pleasure,"

Ayato knew this was hardly the ideal circumstance for your engagement, but he supposed that if he was going to ask for your hand anyway, it was better sooner than too late.

[misrepresentedmorallygrey]

PROPAGANDA

John

This fella is Fascinating. just trust me on this he deserves to be here

He tried so hard to do the right thing, he feels bad and says things would be better if he was never born. He thinks he should've just stayed acting like a monster and continued to act threatening.

(LONG PROPAGANDA INCOMING)

John. Milgram. Here's a short description of the fortunes and misfortunes of the guy. It gets worse before it gets better (probably).

While MILGRAM is a prison that judges a bunch of sympathetic killers, it doesn't consider him to be one – it didn't even exactly know he existed until too little too late, when it got its grabby hands on the brain of prisoner 009, who claimed to not know anything about any murder he'd have committed. Then, footage from his brain was extracted, as MILGRAM does, into a music video, and… that was MeMe. Ninth prisoner, Kayano Mikoto, was revealed to have DID, and what obviously who do you think actually Killed Someone?

Enter John. Well. Mikoto is half deeply unaware half subconsciously scared of his existence, so the MV painted him in a rather. Deeply disturbing way, bathing in bloody baths and all that (not a blood bath though! easy mistake). Adding to that him showing up in the first Voice Drama for five seconds to punch the "protagonist" and yell for a bit, and the result wasn't. Assuring. The fandom proceeded to treat him like a cardboard cutout and variously dunk on MILGRAM for having a cliché "evil" character w/ DID despite the overall well handling of complex characters.

Two years time skip: second season ending. We get to prisoner 009 again. The protagonist Finally gets to chat with John: and voila, he's admitting to the crime, he's apparently "killed a bunch of people because they annoyed him", which means, as he's saying, Mikoto has nothing to do with the crime at all! And he, as per the judging system, should be forgiven, right! Well, he's so full of shit. The music video immediately reveals how protective he feels of Mikoto (and well, he definitely doesn't rebuke That one), that the events of murder were somehow tied in to Mikoto's job at a black company, his continuous overworking and him being mentally on the brink of breaking; that any committed violence was For The Sake of Mikoto and that John feels deeply horrible for messing up his life in any way. By making himself into the image of a "monster" he's trying to make Mikoto look good in comparison and be forgiven and all. He also mentioned if Mikoto is voted innocent he's gonna try to go dormant since he's The Issue, right, and the audience/protagonist hates him, Right, and Mikoto Also Hates him, Right?

I'm underselling the sheer devotion of this guy tbh.

Yeah, the fandom results were kinda mixed on that one. Lots of people immediately started to love him dearly and kinda forgot any people were maimed or killed with baseball bats; lots also got sold on him "messing up Mikoto's life" and actually voted Mikoto innocent Specifically because of John's promise to eventually "disappear". There's more of the babygirlifying kind in the English side of the fandom that I've seen, to be fair. And that's around where we are!

Dazai Osamu

He did bad things in the Mafia. He's trying to get better. He abused people but he also saved other people. Fans portraying him as an unforgivable abuser are WRONG. He perpetuated an abused cycle on Akutagawa thinking he was right to do that, because of trauma, before he could leave. But he left. He's still treating Akutagawa wrong because he's trying to be a better person but doesn't realize that it will not erase what he did and that he can't just ignore the past. Fans portraying him as a pure angel who didn't know what he was doing because he was sad are WRONG TOO. He abused Akutagawa. He was traumatized but it doesn't give him the right to traumatize innocent people. He's trying to be a better person but he can't keep ignoring Akutagawa. He needs to apologize. And even that won't erase what he did. Dazai is a complex character in a complex situation. He left the abuse cycle and tries to be a good person but did unforgivable things while he was still in this cycle and refuses to aknowledge them. He's not a monster but he's not innocent either.

Dazai used to be a mafia executive until his best friend (a former assassin who remained in the mafia but refused to kill) died. As the friend was dying he told him "I know you don't care about whether you're a good or bad person, so if it doesn't matter to you, be on the side that saves people." Despite that, I've seen countless people insisting that Dazai is a good person/trying his best to be a good person when he really only changed sides by joining a detective agency, while still continuing to do the same things he did while in the mafia (including but not limited to: harassing his coworkers for fun, manipulating people, killing people instead of just trying to incapacitate them, and even torturing an innocent man in one of the side stories). That being said, he's not evil either. Even when he does cruel things, it's not for the sake of being cruel (even when he harasses his coworkers he still has limits), it's just a means to an end. I think most of the confusion comes from a scene where he's talking to a young girl, another former mafia member, who asks if he thinks people can change and he assures her they can, but what the anime left out was that he was thinking about his former assassin friend during that discussion, not himself. The entire series is themed around gray morality, to the point where it's even reflected in the main protagonist and antagonist's designs (mainly white with a bit of black, and mainly black with a bit of white), so I feel like insisting that he's a good person now completely misses the point of the story.

[hepaidattention]

I'm v curious to see how the pjo show will portray Percabeth and Percy's feelings for her throughout the show.

cause imo, in the books Percy straight up doesn't even realize he has feelings for her until much muuuuuch later (whether it be oblivion or denial), but in like book 3 he's so worried for her he's starting fights with god's. she's literally all he thinks about in the Titans Curse, but never in a romantic way. Percy never thinks about her in a romantic way till probably book 4, when she kisses him, and even then it's a rare occurrence until book 5.

we just knew he had feelings cause he'd think stuff like "wow she's beautiful," or prints out a picture of her and keeps it with him, or constantly thinks about her when Rachel was around, or think Aphrodite looked like her. ACTIONS wise I know exactly why Annabeth was yelling at him by book 5. he never showed romantic feelings for her outwardly except for rare occasions that could be interupted as friends, even when she kissed him. not until, again, book 5 when he asks for a good luck kiss and literally screams at everyone not to touch her when she's injured.

anyway, so I'm interested to see how they're going to display it for the viewers on the screen when we won't have Percy's narration telling us obvious things that show us he loves her. I'm wondering if they're going to be more straight forward with it. in the books you knew Percy liked her but again only because of his thoughts, and not until book 3 tbh. but in the show s1 already had so much implied Percabeth. like Percy looked at her so many times like he wanted to marry her right then and there that is was shocking to me (not complaining) cause Percy really only acted like he saw her as a friend by that point in the books.

SO I wonder if they're going to continue this trend of just having Percy look at Annabeth longingly a lot and hope those who haven't read the books catch on, or will they go a step further and having him talk to people about his feelings? will Percy talk to Grover about her? in the books they would never, Percy didn't even know Grover had a girlfriend at one point. they weren't the type of bromance to talk about their feelings. however TV show Grover and Percy would easily talk about their feelings. they're more open and vulnerable around each other in the show.

and if they do that, then are they going to make it canon (canon to me is if Percy knew he had feelings for Annabeth before book 4 of 5 and said it himself. he never says he has feelings, and even talks about his feelings for other characters like Calypso and Rachel, so to me its not canon that he did know unless he said those words himself) that Percy is aware of his feelings before book 5?? or are they just gonna have scenes like in s1 with Luke where he calls them an old married couple and Percy and Annabeth ignore it. I could also see Grover just teasing him about her and Percy just acts like he never even thought about it

idk I'm really interested on how they're going to show us in TV form. half of me wants it to stay canon, but the other part of me wants to see a Percy verbally attest that he likes her but she'd never like him like that - or say something like Annabeth was too good for him (which I always got the feelings was half the reason why Percy didn't pursue anything till much later). even after Annabeth kisses him he's like "as friends???? hmmm???" and I truly do no think until she yells at him for being a coward that it occurs to Percy that "Oh, that WASN'T a good luck kiss then." like he WANTED to kiss her but he didn't think she liked him like that EVEN AFTER SHE KISSED HIM. sigh. sweet, dumn Percy. how I love thee.

but show Percy really isn't as a dumb as book Percy was in the first book, so there's a huge possibility they'll make it more obvious. I feel like for the sake of wanting fans invested in the ship, they'll make him more aware of his feelings imo. they already did so in s1, and book 1 truly was just Annabeth and Percy learning to be friends.

no matter what, I cannot wait for s3, because I would do anything to see Walker act out Percy worried about Annabeth. PERCY TRYING TO FIGHT MR. D CAUSE HES NOT WORRIED ENOUGH FOR ANNABETH???? I literally cannot wait.

[duckies27]

I'm not one to normally interact with drama, but at this point, I have waited way too long to just sit here in silence. There is a creator on this platform named Hamlet Unfortunately, also known as Kenny, and I can’t just stay sitting on this.

I despise this man for multiple reasons, and I'll get into all of them here. In my opinion, it's not fair that he continues to do this sort of thing and just gets away with it, getting love and attention while doing so. All while other people similar to me get 5 to 10 likes on some of our work. I don't want to spend this entire time just completely thrashing him. However, there’s too much evidence to just ignore.

My friend Dork (@zestfeast ) and I are on a server with another Discord friend (who I won't name for their own sake, I don't want to drag them into this whole thing). I met the two of them on the fan-made Stinky Dragon discord, and we bonded pretty quickly over our love of the characters and our love of the cast. The show was something we bonded over and we wanted to spend as much time together by talking about it, without other people getting in the way. So the third party made a server and invited the two of us. We had a great time for the first two and a half weeks. It was a safe space with all the people that I trusted. We are all afab and personally, that makes me more comfortable as someone who is a cis woman. We talked about all sorts of things mainly relating to our enjoyment of the characters, coming up with AUs, and coming up with stories, all of which were pretty fun. At the time of the start of the server, I was personally barely baby 18, while the other two were and are still minors. This may not seem like a problem, but the problem came when. Kenny or Hamlet Unfortunately, as you know him, joined the server.

He was a friend with the third party and both me and Dork were completely comfortable with him joining. It wasn't our place to choose considering it is the third party's actual server. We sat and talked for a little bit, but after joining he didn't say anything. I didn't think anything of it, I'm also pretty shy but he was just awkward. Once again, I didn't think anything of it but then we started talking more. He started talking more. I wasn't a part of this conversation simply because I was at work at the times he was more vocal. I'm super busy, I work from 3:00 to 7:00 every single day right after school and it's too much hands-on work for me to come and check Discord all the time. A lot of the big conversations would happen when I wasn't there, and while I was currently doing things that took my full attention. I am a custodian worker at a middle school, I'm constantly working around kids, I'm constantly working around other people and it makes it hard to be on my phone. I missed the majority of these conversations, but to make sure that this was fully correct, I made sure to read back to all of the things that he said. It's not fair to judge a book by its cover without fully reading the contents. I read over 600 messages all sent over the course of a few weeks and I'll be dead honest, they were pretty terrifying to read back. Especially someone who has been around victims of the jokes he was mentioning. These included sexual content, drug jokes, and stuff that no person should ever joke about, especially not with minors.

It started simple enough. We just were talking about art relating to the characters and I'll be honest, some things weren't exactly always super family-friendly. We try to keep it light and airy the majority of the time within the server, but we had a few dedicated chats for the not-so-family-friendly stuff that includes some maybe more suggestive fan art. Most of the time it was and is pretty clean. We tried our best to censor what wasn't, especially because we had two minors on the server and people could always glance over our shoulders. I was in, particular, very aware of this and made sure that I didn't post anything without censoring first. One of the first things Kenny said to one of our minors on the server was "I'll suck your dick", when talking about fan art that Dork had done. Dork is very young compared to me or possibly him. I don't know how old he is but I just know that this comment made me uncomfortable reading back on it, especially because Dork is like a brother to me. I would protect him with my life if I could. I love this kid and would unironically do anything for him. They continued talking and he was incredibly mean to Dork, often calling him stupid and often acting as if his actions were childish and not as important as Kenny’s actions. When Dork tried to bring up another subject, relating to theater, not only did Kenny call him a fool, but he also said “I don't want to suck your dick anymore" continuing the uncomfortable, NSFW environment that he was starting to form.

As many of you who've read my page know, I like writing angst but I also enjoy writing stuff that's not so family friendly. I like pushing my boundaries and learning how to write, as an adult now, because it's a way of expressing myself that people don't need to see. It was a personal server thing that I kept it censored to protect people who didn't want to see it at that time. At one point I put out a request question saying I would write anything anyone wanted smut, angst, or fluff. I like writing requests and I like writing gifts for friends. It's a personal love language of mine. Kenny stumbled around for a bit, trying to come up with an idea before eventually asking me for Sliqueborg smut. I don't like the ship. It's not my thing, I'm more into BrinkBorg or the canon Lynn Mer and Kyborg. So I asked, “what are your headcanons?” I might as well be proper when I write this story. I don't want to come up with some idea that he didn’t agree with. He went to the headcanon channel and gave me one of the most inappropriate and jarring strings of sentences I have ever heard. Not only did he make our beloved wood elf incredibly abusive, but he also took Slique’s character and destroyed it. It was horrible to listen to and even more horrible to read back. I am 18, a barely illegal adult and the other two are minors on this server. I was terrified to see that he willingly put this down on paper for anyone to see. He only censored the thing because I had personally asked him earlier on.

I already was feeling uncomfortable with this guy. He was being pushy and mean and a lot of his headcanons were hard to swallow, and more and more times he brought up sexual things. I have a personal headcanon for the Groethe crew that relates to the musical instruments they would play. Ella plays violin, Mathilde sings, Barney plays flute, and Chip plays French horn. I thought it was a cute thing because of how Ella and Chip would very well complement each other, but Kenny took the opportunity to make a very inappropriate joke. That made me very uncomfortable because it was about Chip, who I see as a close similarity to my father. Chip acts and says things like my father would, so hearing this very sexual joke automatically took me out of the conversation. I hated it. I hated the idea of it. Not only that but there was one point in time when Dork was opening up about something very personal (which I won't share here) However, I came in at the worst possible time because I was on break. It happened to be insanely out of context, so of course I was like “What the hell?” But I didn't say it in a mean way. I meant it in a kind, confused way, similar to how an older sibling would walk into a conversation that you're having, that happens to be weird. Kenny continued to then look down at Dork, calling them dear and darling as if they didn't understand what I was saying. I came in and I was like “Wow this is kind of weird”, but that was it. I didn't push or prod. I didn't judge them beyond just that it was a weird message to get out of context and went back to work. Kenny belittled Dork for another 20 minutes after I went back to work.

Dork came to me the next day or so, in tears. They were terrified. They felt horrible. Kenny was being such an asshole to him and he couldn't do anything about it. It's a third party’s server and Kenny was a friend to the third party member. We didn't feel comfortable talking right to her right away. So instead the two of us hopped on a 2-hour long call on Discord to talk about our grievances. I helped Dork write a message to Kenny but instead of apologizing in response, he just said that it was his humor, a mask to protect himself. As someone who uses a mask constantly to protect myself from trauma, this pissed me off. His mask was being a jerk, his mask was being mean, and most importantly his mask was being overly sexual when it wasn't required.

Another thing that he often did was make fun of drug culture. Make fun of the “druggies”, including snorting pain pills and other issues that should not be joked about, while talking about his headcanons relating to Slique and Kyborg. He also mentioned rape, which I am completely uncomfortable with as a cis woman who has dealt with uncomfortable situations that deal with my body. I hated this. He came in as a cis male (based on what he said himself) completely invading a comfortable and safe space. Kenny is not the type of person I would leave my drink with at a party. I felt uncomfortable talking to him the majority of the time but I didn't want to bring it up because I didn't want to hurt the third party's feelings. After Dork came to me in tears, I said enough is enough and I reached out to her anyway. Thankfully the third party was kind, kicked him out of the server and I haven't had to interact with him since.

However, I've seen issues within the Tumblr fandom, the fandom that's taken me so warmly and held me to a higher standard than I've held myself for years. I love to see the community interacting with my posts and I love seeing my moots talk to me in such a kind and happy way. However, I know there are multiple people within the community, one who I talked to and wishes not to be named, has had issues with him. Most people see SliqueBorg as a very abusive and toxic ship due to his headcanons. He's ruined a ship, that though I don't agree with, is valid. Not only that, but he also still ships Mudd with multiple characters including Gum Gum (This is just vague posting and suggestive tagging, but it's very easy to see him doing something like this). which is a huge issue on its own. He doesn't care about if someone is a minor and if they would even want to be in a relationship.

During the whole “Mudd Gate '', which is what I'm calling the one actual problem we've ever had within this community, when actual Aro ace people were coming out and talking about how they didn't like how Mudd was being shipped with characters. A lot of people agreed, including me, but Kenny came onto the server and started complaining along with the third party (who will again, stay unnamed). Both of them came with swinging swords, dragging down the entire Tumblr community saying it was unfair for them to completely block out a ship component just because of a canon sexuality given by Jon himself. It took me a little bit to feel comfortable within it as someone who's Demi who was personally was seeing Mudd as Demi. But now I see the issues of my ways. How little aro ace representation there really is in the world, that is untouched by fandoms. Just look at Alstor from Hazbin Hotel. He's constantly shipped with people despite being a canon Aro ace character.

Through this all, I just want to say that we should stop supporting him. We should stop giving him a platform. Not only is he a fake fan just with how he characterizes Kyborg but he also has issues with sensitive topics that he will continue to joke about until the very day that he dies. I can tell that he thinks a lot of people are sensitive. Just saying things are offensive for clout or some other reasons, but a lot of the things that he actually says are very offensive and very inappropriate around the people he's been around. His actions almost took Dork away from this fandom. It isn't as bad as some other things that have come up in the past relating to other communities (*cough cough* Wilbur *cough cough*) If you hate me for making this post then I'll just say I don't care. I am planning on blocking him after I finish this post or at least until after he can react. I don't want to just completely block him from seeing his criticism but I will stop supporting any posts I have seen. I will make sure that he is no longer on my dash because he has done things that I am severely uncomfortable with. He does not bring good vibes to this community and he especially should not be allowed to continue being in the fandom if he's going to spread such hate. This is a kind and loving fandom that has taken me and others with open arms in times of struggle and times of pain. He has made it uncomfortable to be in. I cannot support him and I implore the rest of you to do the same after his actions.

[yoursjaeyun]

missing you — lee heeseung.

pairing: heeseung x fem!reader

wc: 1740+

sypnosis. your boyfriend was always so busy with his schedules, world tours, anything an idol does. you want to spend time with him again, like when you two first met. where did those times go? what if he forgot about you? do you regret dating him? will this be the last time you’ll meet him?

warnings. one-shot, smut, (minors strictly dni), explicit language, oral (fem receiving), unprotected sex, (both receiving) a little angst (?), overuse of nicknames, a little crying. please tell me if i need to add more.

featuring. chaewon of le sserafim.

a/n. AAAAA i’m genuinely am excited for all of you guys to read my first ever fic !! (more like a drabble since its really short but anyway sjsj) this was actually really rushed because i finished more than half of it in a week 🥲 i will keep proof-reading it over and over again because there maybe some spelling mistakes 🙈 but other than that, i hope you all enjoy reading, and thank you for waiting so patiently 🥹 ugh i love you guys sm. and also as a beginner, thanks to the people who helped me a lot when i was struggling <33 ok i should stop talking, have fun reading <3333 (and i apologise if the smut part starts really quickly 😭)

read needing you for the continuation of this fic, thank you lovelies <3

your boyfriend was always so busy with his schedules, and obviously with his world tours coming up with flying overseas, fan meetings, etc. it was hard dating someone who was an idol.

it was only a matter of seconds when you finally got to meet him again, you missed everything, his touch, his kisses, his love. at the point, you wanted it to all be over. knowing nothing would change. nobody was there for you anymore, except for your one and only bestfriend.

“why do you look so down today? thinking about your boyfriend hm?” chaewon said breaking the silence, looking you up and down. “i don’t know chae, what if he’s flirting with other girls? did he forget about me? what if he cheated?” you spat out, sighing after.

“okay hold on, forgetting you? after the two of you lovebirds doing it for the first time ever on my bed? theres no way.” she scoffed.

“god chaewon, please for fuck’s sake, stop talking about that.” you rolled your eyes at her as she chuckled.

 “heard from jake that he’s free after their concert tomorrow, why don’t you meet him then?” you sat up properly after hearing what she said.

 “yeah, maybe i will.”

_______________________

 it was the next day, and of course you wanted to look good in front of him after months, you chose to wear his favourite perfume, following with his favourite outfit.

you were sitting in the waiting room waiting for him to come out, ‘5 minutes left’ you thought. you then heard cheering and muffling sounds outside the room, making you jump,  fixing your hair and posture quickly.

“y/n?” he entered the room. “heeseung..” running up to hug him, inhaling his scent already making you melt in his touch. “i missed you so, so much.” your eyes became teary as he stroked your hair along with his other hand on your waist.

“baby..” he lifted your face with his index finger to stare at your eyes. “was i gone for too long?” you nodded. “i’m so sorry my love.” he whispered as he wiped your tears with his thumb before kissing your temple.

you instantly got touchy with him, you missed him so much to the point where you couldn’t control yourself the second you saw him walk in. you didn’t want to do it straight away, you didn’t want him to think the relationship is all just about sex. of course there was more to it.

but you desperately needed him so bad.

“let me make it up to you.” your eyebrows furrowed in confusion as he leaned closer, moving his hand to cup your cheek, he pulled your face in, your lips were inches away from eachother. “i’m here now, baby, its okay.” he whispered against your lips, then pressing them into yours.

 his words making you flutter, you slowly closed your eyes as the kiss went from being passionate, to just slightly aggressive. but he didn’t want to hurt you. stepping back a little giving him signs to go on the couch behind because of how your fresh blisters from your heels was killing you.

it wasn’t too long until he had already hovered over you, you put your hands on his shoulders to push him up with a little force as you then straddled his lap, his hands were roaming all over your body, tilting your head to the side to be able to give him more access inside your mouth, your arms around his neck pulling him in closer, he let out a whimper against your lips as you deepened the kiss.

he removed his hand from your waist to unbutton your shirt, undressing you. throwing your shirt to the side, he slowly moved his hand to your back, feeling his cold fingertips making you hum in his mouth. without hesitation, he unclasped your bra finally revealing your swollen boobs and your hard nipples. he then kissed down to your jaw, neck, then your chest, closing his mouth around one nipple, pushing his tongue down firmly as he licked your bud.

your head fell back in pleasure, sighing against his ear. “hee..” his other hand played with your other boob while he sneakily tries to slip off your skirt, you realised what he was doing so you helped him by lifting yourself up slightly for him to slip it off more easily. you sat back down feeling his bulge right through underneath your panties making you whimper, his hands were all over your body once again.

you gasped as he connected his lips onto yours again, his arms hugging your waist to pull you closer, your fingers ran through his hair vaguely pulling it, eliciting a groan from him. heeseung hovered you again making your back hit the couch. “fuck, your so pretty.. my pretty.” he whispered against your lips. he pulled over his shirt as well before leaning back to you, kissing you feverishly. you wrapped your legs around his waist, cupping his soft face as your teeth clashed together.

he went back down to your breasts, taking as much as he can. “heeseung..” you sighed. “what is it baby?” you tried catching your breath before saying anything. “i need words, sweetheart.” “i— i want you to fuck me so b- bad.. please.” you were getting impatient. “not yet.” he smirked as he started to kiss down your stomach, tugging on your waistband before pulling them off steadily. his fingers ran down your folds as you held back your moans.

“so fucking wet. only for me.” he gave soft kisses on your thighs before spreading them apart to be able to get a more clearer view of your pussy. you looked down seeing him smirk before he dived into your hole, you heaved biting back your lips, refusing to let out a moan so nobody can hear from outside the room. but luckily, heeseung locked the door earlier. “nuh-uh, i wanna hear it baby.” and so you obeyed, letting out the most angelic moans he had ever heard as he continued, his tongue going back and forth deep in and out of your hole eagerly.

you felt his nose prod against your folds everytime he buried his tongue deep inside. lapping at all the juices from every place. heeseung wanted to show how much he missed you, seeing you cry before made him feel worse about never seeing you again as he also felt the same.

he looked up as your eyes were closed shut from the extreme pleasure, his hands went to pat your hip in an assuring way. he decided to add a finger in to help you reach your high, along with his tongue synchronizing with it too. “hee, i’m s-so close, ah..” you squirmed, hearing your moans made him go faster, eating you out thoroughly.

you came all over his tongue, including his fingers. you looked down at him as he licked every corner of his mouth that still had your cum on it. you were now out of breath, but a part of you wanted to keep going.

“are you okay, baby?” heeseung went back up to you worriedly, he pushed away your sweaty strands, as you nodded at his question, not being able to say anything from how good your orgasm felt. “lets continue on later, okay?” you shook your head furiously, wanting to do everything right then and there. cupping his cheeks as you pulled him in for another kiss, tasting yourself from the leftover juices mixed with your cum in his mouth.

he pulled away from the kiss, standing up to take his shirt off and to unbuckle the belt to his pants. “heeseung, i need you so bad.” you muttered. “beg for it, princess.” he said climbing back on top of you again. “please.” you said staring at him with your hazy eyes. he stroked his cock a few times before lining it up in front of your entrance.

“good girl, my good girl.” he was already halfway in, but you were already a moaning mess. you dug your nails on his shoulders as he picked up the pace, slamming his hips into your swollen hole. your eyes rolled to the back of your head from the immense pleasure your boyfriend was giving you.

“your so fucking tight, baby.” ending his sentence with a low grunt. with all the strength you have left in your body, you pushed him up with both hands, straddling his lap again. you gasped feeling that it was more bigger when you sat down on him. “ride me.” he uttered against your ear. you complied to his words, rocking your hips back and forth on his cock.

now you doing all the work, heeseung gets to see how absolutely beautiful you look while riding him. “yeah, just like that, fuck.” he moaned as he threw his head back from how good you felt. your hands were on his knees, giving him a perfect view of your body. he took one hand from your waist to roll it on your boob, making you moan. “i missed you so fucking much.” he then pulled you in by your waist ending up in another kiss session, you didn’t have any energy left in yourself, but you wanted to do it for him trying your best to move while passively kissing him.

“heeseung, i’m close..” you whimpered against his lips. “i’m close too, fuck.” you both released at the same time as both your heads fell back together, the room filled with your moans. you plopped on his sweaty chest, not being able to move from how tired you are, he lifted your head up pushing away your sweaty strands of hair from your face, and wiping your tears, then pulling you in, gently kissing your forehead. “did you miss me that much?” he chuckled.  “so much.” you answered, leaving soft kisses on his neck.

“please don’t leave me again, hee.” he smiled at your words, realising how lucky he is to have you. “let’s get you cleaned up.” you nodded.

“come home with me, please..” you talked, but he didn’t want to answer because he can’t promise you. knowing this’ll be the last time you’ll both meet eachother. the next day he’ll have to leave you alone again for months, months that could turn into years.

and the day that your relationship will be over.

YOURSJAEYUN est. 2022. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

[cellphishthekaiju]

Crackpot Headcanon: The Emperor's 'Grand Design'

Goes without saying, that spoilers abound for Baldur's Gate 3 and course, lotta this is gonna be extrapolated ravings of a deluded fan reading too much into events, subtext, and the Forgotten Realms wiki.

This will be a lengthy doozy. I hope it's, at the least, enjoyable or useful.

The Emperor, a.k.a Balduran... our 'savior', ally, and back-stabbing squid friend who does nothing but pretend to have noble intentions from the moment he speaks with you under the guise of 'The Dreamer'. To Larian's credit, The Emperor is a very well-written character, as he can appear as either an ally or enemy based upon how players interact with not just him but the game overall. There are layers upon layers of secrets, deceit and half-truths when it comes.

But ultimately, The Emperor is the true antagonist of The Absolute crisis, only overshadowed by the Elder Brain itself, if the Player goes against him and puts the final nail in the coffin of his Grand Design.

So, first order of business; dissecting the squid's character as much as I can.

The Emperor has a very unique design when compared to illithids encountered in Baldur's Gate... which, granted, is not many as we only encounter one other named illithid and the 'common' enemy types seen, sparsely, across the game. The common sense case of this is because, obviously, this is an important character so of course they'd stand out extravagantly.

But it's this fanciful drip that leads me to believe The Emperor is much more than just some other illithid, that his deception about his opposition to The Absolute is far more sinister than the game makes it appear (and with the way the endings with The Emperor work, this feels further validated)

The Emperor may be a 'unique' breed of illithid known as a Ulitharid, a powerful and sinister 'evolution' of illithid that others view as godly, only second in power to Elder Brains... and this is what Elder Brains evolve from, usually at the Ulitharid's leisure but before it ages too far for its brain to be decrepit.

However, The Emperor's 'drip', attitude... just 'him' just screams he is an Ulitharid that broke away from The Absolute, yet has his own ambitions and no intention of furthering the Grand Design. He simply does not wish to rule a mere colony...

He IS the Grand Design (in his twisted squid brain, at least)

THIS DUDE TRIES TO SEDUCE YOU FOR GOD'S SAKE!

Anyway, The Emperor is quite powerful in his own right, both physically and mentally but when it comes to evolving, becoming an Elder Brain has its downsides; namely that he would become a massive brain forever floating in a jar or Morphic Pool. All that physical power he is proud of would be gone, forever. His mental strength would be unmatched but without a body... The Emperor doesn't seem to like that idea at all, especially if his host had been the 'great hero' Balduran, as he claims (confirmed by Ansur if one does Wyll's personal quest through Act 3)

At first, The Emperor passes himself off as The Dreamer, an entity within the Astral Prism that, repeatedly, tries to assure you that you both are in the same predicament, that The Absolute is a threat to you both and he protects you out of some noble benevolence... as well as that you need to embrace your illithid infection, consume other Netherese tadpoles to strengthen yourself, all for the 'sake' of your survival without actually explaining what is going on or who he is fighting within the Astral Prism (which turns out to be the Githyanki Honor Guard)

Once you hit Act 3, you learn of The Emperor's true nature (surprise, he's a squid!) and the reason he is able to guard you against The Absolute's attempts to transform you is due to dominating the mind of the trapped Githynki Prince to manipulate his unique psionic null-zone powers.

As you continue exploring Baldur's Gate itself, The Emperor continues to try and lure you to his 'side' of things but speaking of how he had once been an adventurer the illithids had captured and turned, how he escaped The Absolute and came back to his beloved city to protect it from the shadows (and how he took the moniker 'The Emperor) but through the course of this deceit, he seems to unintentionally reveal things about his true nature; how he was manipulating magistrates and politicians, such as his dear friend Stelmane.

This is further "supported" in-game by The Emperor attempting to seduce you.

Like guys... WHY?! What about this dude does it for some people? I'm a monster-fucker myself but like The Emperor inspires nothing aside from punching him in his squid face... with a sledgehammer.

When you reject him, The Emperor will still speak to you in a very passive tone (though a bit disappointed) but if you reject him more severely... basically call him a freak, the mask falls off and he will aggressively tell you that you are nothing more than a tool, a servant, to him

Nothing about The Emperor is noble or sincere, hell if you side with him and go full illithid, you are enslaved to him along with The Absolute, free to continue his own Grand Design to dominate the Sword Coast.

Alright, now that THAT part is over, let's move on ya.

So how the hell does The Absolute, the Crown of Karsus and the Astral Prism factor into all this?

*clears throat*

The theft of the Crown of Karsus and the Astral Prism are integral to the Emperor's plan; The Crown of Karsus would enable him to dominate and control the Elder Brain via the use of the Netherstones and the Astral Prism, due to Prince Orpheus's unique psionic abilities, would enable him to preserve and guard his mind (I assume to prevent his evolution into an Elder Brain and/or protect against other illithids, including Elder Brains)

However, he needed to orchestrate the theft of the Crown of Karsus, which lay in Mephistopheles's vault in Cania, the Eighth Layer of Baator (The Nine Hells) and the Astral Prism from some unknown location, likely guarded similarly to her phylactery (perhaps Larian referencing the old lvl 16-20 adventure module 'The Lich-Queen's Beloved')

The Dead Three were easy to manipulate, Chosen of godlings with grander ambitions but at odds with each other otherwise. Through them, The Emperor fostered his plan by managing to fool them into stealing the Crown of Karsus. Convincing and fooling the Dead Three into thinking an army of illithids, rehensible creatures without souls, was how Bhaal, Bane and Myrkul would ascend to Jergal's

This plan, in part, can be learned through finding texts in Kethric's personal quarters in Moonrise Towers along with looting Gortash's Vault in Baldur's Gate.

The theft of the Astral Prism, however, likely proved much trickier for The Emperor, since it was under the possession of, what is essentially the Apex Predator of illithids; The Githyanki Queen Vlaakith CVII. This is how Viconia and Shadowheart become involved. He needed a backup plan in the event the Dead Three failed to retrieve the object.

Manipulating disciples of Shar, especially Viconia DeVir, was likely the best answer, especially if he needed agents that had a chance to retrieve the Astral Prism, given how obsessively Vlaakith likely guarded the device and being a powerful lich, her safeguards would be powerful and many. The Emperor, and by extension the Dead Three and The Absolute would lose nothing.

Heh, irony amirite?

I suspect The Emperor found some means to convince DeVir, under the pretense of Shar's command, to put together a means to steal the Astral Prism. Unfortunately, all the game ever gives us is a list of who was on the strike force, including Shadowheart, who does have the Astral Prism when introduced.

However, there was always something that bugged me about this part and that is in the notes about the theft. The Dead Three were planning to make the theft themselves, using tadpoled agents and a nautiloid (though giving no indication WHERE they were going) with the assumption that The Emperor was leading the team (believing they controlled him and not the other way around).

This, kinda, explains the 'story' of how Tav and the rest of the characters are tadpoled on the nautiloid together. (The Dark Urge was tadpoled before but that's a whole other thing)

My thoughts?

Ready for more crazy?

The Emperor manipulates DeVir and the House of Grief into going after the Astral Prism. The Dead Three 'assign' The Emperor to go after the Astral Prism but he simply intends to 'retrieve' (ala kidnap and tadpole) what's left of the Sharran team and collect the Astral Prism for himself. We see the first signs of his duplicity in the opening cinematic, even. Several of the illithid crew are dead before the githyanki kith'rak attack the ship... but there's no indication as to how and why they were killed

(There's some thoughts to be had there)

Interestingly enough, The Emperor planeshifts the nautiloid to Yartar and starts attacking the city, which seems to draw the Githyanki raiders to attacking the ship... then he jumps it to what is (presumably) Cania, the 8th layer of Baator (where the Crown of Karsus had been stolen), then ultimately Avernus before taking shelter in the Astral Prism... which I think man explain why we find Shadowheart's pod seperated from the cauldera room Lae'zel and Tav (Any Origin) start in.

To make a long, lunatic story endless, the Emperor manipulated everything from the day he left The Absolute (his story about leaving The Absolute twice is absolute horseshite), envisioning himself ruling all of the Sword Coast with Baldur's Gate as his 'throne'.

Welp, this went on WAY longer than I expected but I hope it was, at least enjoyable. If folks enjoy my crackpot theories, ah... well, you're welcome to ask me stuff or a pitch. Asks are always open (I think)

[waitmyturtles]

Turtles Catches Up With Old GMMTV: The Bad Buddy Rewatch Edition, Part 3b -- More on BBS and Asian Cultural Touchpoints

[What’s going on here? After joining Tumblr and discovering Thai BLs through KinnPorsche in 2022, I began watching GMMTV’s new offerings -- and realized that I had a lot of history to catch up on, to appreciate the more recent works that I was delving into. From tropes to BL frameworks, what we’re watching now hails from somewhere, and I’m learning about Thai BL's history through what I’m calling the Old GMMTV Challenge (OGMMTVC). Starting with recommendations from @absolutebl on their post regarding how GMMTV is correcting for its mistakes with its shows today, I’ve made an expansive list to get me through a condensed history of essential/classic/significant Thai BLs produced by GMMTV and many other BL studios. My watchlist, pasted below, lists what I’ve watched and what’s upcoming, along with the reviews I’ve written so far. Today, I offer the second half of the third (ha!) of five posts on Bad Buddy. I'll look today at themes that myself and fellow Asian fans of Bad Buddy have caught and related to in this wonderful show.]

Here are links to part 1, part 2, and part 3a of the BBS OGMMTVC Meta Series. Today's post is a continuation of part 3a. Part 4 is here.

Yesterday, I began an unwinding about what I am calling the "Asian Cultural Touchpoints" of Bad Buddy -- the Asianness of Bad Buddy that is rooted and coded in the way people interact with each other.

As a quick recap from yesterday: I have been insanely lucky to engage in conversation with a number of legendary Asian BBS stans about the Asianness within Bad Buddy: huge shout-outs and thanks go to @grapejuicegay, @recentadultburnout, @telomeke, @neuroticbookworm, and @lurkingshan (who is not Asian, but has Asian relatives and is well-versed in the nuances of our cultures!). We captured a lengthy list of Asian cultural signposts in Bad Buddy and we've been having great discussion around them, including:

1) saving face, 2) intergenerational/inherited trauma, 3) the unique nature of secret-keeping in Asian cultures/societies, 4) enmeshed family boundaries, 5) setting up children to compete against each other for the sake of familial pride, 6) patriarchy, sexism, and the reversal of sexism among next generations, 7) the inset/assumed roles of family members based on patriarchy and elder respect, 8) assumed community within and external to one's family, usually based on where you live and where you go to school, 9) how one's identity is defined based on patriarchy and individualist vs. collectivist cultures, 10) how various cultures within an Asian nation live peacefully (or not) together (for example, what makes Pat and Pran different by way of Pat's Thai-Chinese heritage vs. Pran's ethnic Thai heritage),

and many more.

I unwound yesterday on the cultural touchpoints of saving face, intergenerational/inherited trauma (partly as a follow-up from my very first thesis on Bad Buddy), and the singular nature of secret-keeping in Asian cultures.

There's no way I can get through this entire list in two posts, but I do want to touch upon competition, enmeshed family (and friend, sometimes) boundaries, and patriarchy and sexism as three other cultural touchpoints that engendered quite a bit of conversation among our BBS mini-village.

Competition: ALL OVER BAD BUDDY. All over it, and we know it, and for the most part, we love Pran's and Pat's little love battles. Pat and Pran are constantly competing. Pat gets Chief Phupha into it in Our Skyy 2, dang it ("I'm Pha Pun Dao's top-notch," Phupha, psh). We don't know if the guys can function without having a competition going between them at any given point.

We know this structure started with their parents. As I talked about yesterday, considering the trauma that Ming and Dissaya faced in their young lives -- the trauma that they passed down to Pat and Pran, the rivalry and almost unbridled hatred that they expected Pat and Pran to embody -- all of that emanated through competition between the guys. Their parents asked them, daily, how the other kid was doing in school, making sure that their son was winning on top. As we know from Pat's rooftop monologue in episode 5, that was baggage he carried with him his entire life.

So many of these cultural touchpoints can be connected to the idea of saving face, as I wrote about yesterday. It is an overarching rule of any Asian child's life that Asian parents demand to be able to brag about their kids. Give me an Asian kid whose parents didn't do that to them, and I'll give that kid a huge hug, a gold medal, and a wish in an envelope that I could have had their childhood. Awards, top grades, top class positions, top university admissions: the need to be the best is neverending, for the sake of a parent not losing face for their child not succeeded at the top level of everything.

@telomeke notes the inherent cultural demands of Pran's and Pat's family in the competition paradigm that Pat outlines above.

[Re: Ming and Dissaya]: [E]very time [the children] do well, the bar often gets pushed a little higher. We actually see Ming doing this to Pat in Ep.1 ... when Pat tells him he was made class president. Ming says something like "get yourself a gold medal for rugby and then I'll let you brag"; Pat's achievement (though not dismissed) is downplayed rather than celebrated, and another goal is set. Anyway, my read is that both the boys had caliber to start with; it's natural to Pran (we don't see Dissaya really pushing him to excel), and I think he pushes himself to excel, to be the virtuous paragon of everything, as a barrier to the outside world, and to protect his vulnerable, secret interior. ... And Pat was pushed by Ming to match Pran's achievements, though not for the usual Asian parent reasons – it was to continue his own efforts to best Dissaya, IMO...

What @telomeke outlines here correlates perfectly with my own experiences of my Asian childhood: that even in the face of successes that my parents demanded, the reward was only a passive comment that I had to be doing more. There was never a moment where a parent's cup of happiness was truly filled from the child's perspective.

However, in the case of Pran and Pat specifically: @grapejuicegay had a further illumination that highlighted the utter pain and sadness of the outcomes and consequences of their lifelong competition. We know they were perfectly paired as a couple in love. But ultimately? Because of the pressures they faced as children vis à vis each other -- they also become the only people who could compete with each other. AND, because of that reality -- a new kind of empathy sprung up between them, what I called in part 1 of this series a radical empathy of a kind we don't always see between enemies to lovers. @grapejuicegay's thoughts:

I'm just thinking about the first family interactions we see for Pat and Pran and how Dissaya is framed as a concerned parent with her main worry being Pran taking on too much on his plate with being the head of the department. But also how that's so far removed from what her influence had made of him - an overachiever to the highest degree. ...[T]he whole point of Pat and Pran is that they're evenly matched in everything (which works so well because they're both such EXTRA little shits with so many lil' interests), and it's been there since the [original] trailer. They both keep competing to see who can get the most achievements to brag about, eventually settling down to a point where they help each other out because they're each other's only worthy competition because they're the only ones who can keep up with each other [emphasis mine]. So.... Dissaya's concern is nice and all, but she created this monster who not only can handle having so many responsibilities, but ENJOYS it. And Pat's help is always pushing him to do all of it, just have some help along the way so he's not doing it all alone. Wai helps, but he has to be manipulated into it. So the only person ACTIVELY helping Pran even when neither of them thinks he needs it is Pat ("I know you can do it, but I want to do it for you").

I was tremendously moved when @grapejuicegay shared her read with me on this, because not only did it land fully with me -- but it served to highlight the sadness and loneliness that existed in the gulf between Pran and Pat prior to their union. In other words, because they knew, so well, HOW to compete with each other -- if they needed help, they were the only ones who knew HOW to help each other. Pat showing up at the dilapidated bus station; Pran showing up at the empty auditorium. They could vibe when each other needed a little push. They knew WHEN and HOW to help each other, with the fluency they had ABOUT each other, even before their relationship began -- because they had been competing all their lives. As Pat said in Our Skyy 2: "we've been neighbors all our lives." They knew each other's ins and outs better than even their families did.

The competition that Pran and Pat engaged in had significant cultural roots. But the long-term impact of that competition? It rendered the guys on their own lonely island, a place where only the two of them could understand each other fully. It's a romantic conclusion -- to know your partner so well like that, it can fill your heart with nostalgic reckoning. But as Pat said above and to his father -- it was a bruising path, for the both of the guys.

There's a lot to enmeshed boundaries in Bad Buddy. The boundaries that SHOULD exist between two people that regularly get crossed. I definitely want to acknowledge, before I unwind on these boundaries, that Western vs. Asian viewers will have different expectations of exactly what enmeshment looks like and what it means. I'll have more on this in a bit.

When I think of enmeshed boundaries in Bad Buddy, I think of Dissaya having almost total control over Pran's physical placement. Of Ming knocking on Pat's dorm door, unannounced. Of Pat's expectation that Pa would do his laundry (which will speak to the sexism I'll talk about in a bit). @neuroticbookworm noted how hilariously Asian it was that Pat and Pa -- older brother and younger sister -- literally shared a dorm room. Pat could scuttle to Pran's solo room, to their love nest, to leave their shared room alone for Pa and Ink. But: what an Asian set-up, to have big bro sleeping on the floor, while little sister got the bed.

But besides what Western viewers might traditionally think of as "unhealthy" enmeshed boundaries, there's also a conversation about how Asian families engage -- or, don't engage -- with expectations of privacy. The biggest and most obvious example of a violation of personal privacy in BBS is that Pran's and Pat's parents forbid their children from having friendship with the kid next door. We know, in the end, that the parents cannot control that behavior of their kids, and yet, the parents try to do so anyway, with traumatic results.

@telomeke talked in our mini-village about the everyday functionality of Asian families crossing borders of assumed privacy. These are crossings that I fully relate to: for instance, I wasn't allowed to lock my bedroom door very often when I was growing up, to allow for complete access to my "private space," even and especially while I was in it.

I remember this as a thing growing up, that it's perfectly fine in [Asian countries] to drop in unannounced when it's family (though I think with widespread cellphone availability, people do check in beforehand now – however it could also be just to make sure there's someone in to receive them when they drop by!). It's a bit of a truism that the more traditional Asian parents will be in every part of your life and may not always know how to give you more distance when you grow older. ... For the more traditionally-minded, I think this phenomenon would be even more pronounced. And we definitely see this with Pat and Pa too.

The stories I heard about parents busting in on their Asian kids in compromising positions because the kids HAD to leave the doors unlocked? Stories about full-grown adults being interrupted in their intimacy because their parents came into the house? Countless stories. Us as Asians -- we might laugh about it, but there's also an unspoken and inherent sense of annoyance, of fear, of "how do I explain this now?" that's like a dull, permanent foreboding.

In thinking about how these boundary-crossings were inherited vis à vis Pat and Pran, into the next generation, of course -- all we have to think about are the many, many times we saw Pat crossing into Pran's threshold at Tinidee. That shot of Pat wrapped in his comforter as he shuffles to Pran's door.

However, @grapejuicegay flagged for me an utterly legendary Bad Buddy meta post written by @transpat now nearly two years ago, describing the Indian concept of haq, a concept I know very dearly well. To quote @transpat on the definition of haq:

in context of relationships, we use it to describe the entitlement ppl we keep close are allowed over us. in our culture, with every bond we form and built, we owe those ppl certain rights over us. like our filial duty to our parents, supporting our siblings and relatives emotionally and/or financially, the loyalty to our friends. lovers and spouses are ppl given all the rights of a family member by choice and obv other stuff like touching u in ways others can't, sharing worries and secrets you wouldn't indulge others w, the permission to carry and lighten ur burdens.

We know so well that Pat didn't just cross the hallway of Tinidee; he climbed through and over windows, over roofs, to get to Pran. And Pran... let him in. We know now what Pran's feelings were all that time, at least from 10th grade to university. Of course, Pran would let Pat in, because he had already let Pat into his heart. Maybe not into his psychological safety zone -- that had to take much longer. But in a much more primal sense, Pran had let Pat in, for so many reasons beautifully illustrated by @transpat in their piece, and for the examples up above, especially by way of the inadvertent closeness they achieved through their never-ending competing with each other.

I want to take a quick moment to highlight the two concepts I bolded above in @transpat's description of haq. I don't know if I have the words to describe this as well as @transpat, but to the point of entitlement and having rights over someone... there's a certain sense in Asian group dynamics, that one's business is everyone's business, if that makes sense. Think about cliques when you were growing up. Those cliques were formed on similar desires and interests -- being rich, beautiful, "cool," etc.

I feel like Asian group dynamics go a bit beyond this. Because you are in a group, it must go that any one single person's business is everyone's business. There is an entitlement to information about other people. In the States, we value individualism, and when these cliques are being formed in our youthful years, there's certainly a clash with people wanting to express themselves as individuals; very often, the group dynamics do not allow for individual expression. I would argue that that's even more strong in Asian circles.

If I could describe what I think was happening when Pat was climbing into Pran's window to, say, make that first deal about getting Wai to apologize -- I do very much believe that Pat felt it was his intimate right to go into Pran's room, as it had been established that they were, once more, schoolmates and neighbors, now that Pran was back in his family home. If Pran filled those roles -- schoolmate, neighbor -- it automatically clicked into Pat's social expectations that Pran was there to be talked to and engaged with, no matter if Pran would try to push him out. We know that Pran would give up on pushing Pat out, because Pran had feelings for Pat. BUT: what I love about @transpat's INCREDIBLE meditation is that Pat also clicked into unspoken social roles that allowed him to seek out a moment of friendly intimacy with Pran. (Besides the fact that it's more theorized now that Pat had unknown attraction for Pran during high school -- but I don't think attraction was what brought Pat into Pran's room to discuss that very first deal.)

I think this meditation on enmeshed boundaries, as I mentioned earlier, feeds nicely into the final points I want to make about the last cultural touchpoint for analysis, that of patriarchy and sexism in Asian families.

The BBS mini-village sliced and diced the incredibly overarching examples of patriarchy in this story, as emanating mostly from Ming: Ming's role as the head of the family and doling out roles; Ming ensuring that Pat would "not forget" Ming's reputation at university; Ming's parents doing nothing to interfere with Pa's role as serving Pat; Pat reinforcing that role to Pa in the family home.

Why Ming? As @telomeke broke it down for us: Ming is the head of the household of a Thai-Chinese family. It's not to say that patriarchy and sexism don't exist in ethnic Thai families -- but a patriarchal dynamic isn't shown in Pran's house, as Dissaya is the one who holds the emotional control over the Siridechawats. It's in the Jindapat household that we see old-fashioned roles of men and women doled out.

In traditional Chinese society (before the Communists came to power in China), sons had absolute pride of place in Chinese families, and we see Ming giving special treatment to Pat, while Pa was made to clean up after Mr. Jindapat Jr, doing his laundry, having the piece of chicken she wanted stolen by him in Ep.1, etc... Ming invited Pat home for a meal in Ep. 7, but didn't mention Pa, and Pat had to say he'd bring her along. But Pat and Pa, away from home didn't care for any of this, (e.g., when they were kids Pat let Pa win the bicycle race and skip washing up duties, in the Ep.1 flashback), and while Pa would begrudgingly do Pat's laundry, she would give as good as she got as well whenever they tussled (verbally). 

As @telomeke says above, we see Pat, within his generation, to Pa, in their own private space of bicycling outside or moving into his own dorm room, quietly dismantling that patriarchy and sexism of Ming's and Pat's mom -- letting Pa win the bicycle race; talking out of earshot of their parents about Pat protecting, instead of hurting, Pran. [Another great example, a little outside of the patriarchal example but still worth noting, is Wai's role, as a stand-in for Dissaya, sticking to the definitions of the role of Pran's best friend, but showing -- within the cohort of his own generation -- that he CAN change to accept Pat in Pran's life, as opposed to Dissaya's inability to do so (scroll down through the whole liveblog post for the commentary!).]

@telomeke mentioned in our conversation about patriarchy and sexism that he was surprised that he'd see a parent as young as Ming -- a parent to a student of Pat's age, much younger than myself and @telomeke -- keep up with these traditional, old-fashioned values. I think that's a great point, especially in the way that Ming ignores Pa only until the end of the series, when he's instead cut Pat mostly out of his caring reach for disobeying him. We know from the Soonvijarn analysis and reaction videos by Aof Noppharnach and his collegial community of filmmakers, that Aof took inspiration for Ming stealing the scholarship from Dissaya from a real-life occurrence of the same story. I think Aof intentionally had such strong patriarchal structures in Bad Buddy vis à vis the Jindapats in order to highlight what a stronghold old-fashioned notions of life have on generations -- and intended to have a conversation vis à vis Pat, Pran, Pa, and Wai, that the ways in which these old-fashioned notions are updated over time, is through the work of the subsequent generations of children growing up and learning and knowing better.

The coded Asianness of Bad Buddy... god. I could sit with my fellow Asians and talk about the coded Asianness of Bad Buddy for at least weeks, if not maybe even a year or two. We could laugh about the comedy of many of the experiences or traumas we have faced vis à vis the cultural touchpoints that I've listed and analyzed, and we could also share our shared pain, our shared joys, our shared ways in which we express emotion, love, our highs and lows, through our shared Asian cultures. Talking about this makes me tremendously glad that there's national and international fandoms watching Asian shows -- even if, say, Western viewers can't exactly pinpoint what's happening by way of a culturally contextual moment in Bad Buddy, at least there's a community of Asian bloggers out here that can unwind what might be confusing.

Once more, I want to thank @recentadultburnout, @grapejuicegay, @telomeke, @neuroticbookworm, and @lurkingshan for engaging me in such amazing and extensive conversation about the best show ever Bad Buddy. More than education -- the process was INCREDIBLY fun and rewarding.

(Tagging @dribs-and-drabbles, @solitaryandwandering, and @wen-kexing-apologist by request! If you'd like to be tagged in this series, please let me know!)

[WHEW! SEVENTH INNING STRETCH, FRIENDS, stand up and stretch yer arms as I crack my knuckles one more time for this fabulous show! My last post for the BBS OGMMTVC Series -- a breakdown of my theorized reasons and timing regarding Pran leaving for Singapore -- drops next week. Stay tuned!

And after this, I take the tiniest break from the OGMMTVC to review one of the most important shows of 2023: La Pluie. And then I'm back on my tip with Secret Crush On You and an end-of-the-year rewatch of KinnPorsche. So, much more to come!

Here's the status of the Old GMMTV Challenge watchlist. Tumblr's web editor loves to jack with this list, so please head to this link for the very latest updates!

1) The Love of Siam (2007) (movie) (review here) 2) My Bromance (2014) (movie) (review here) 3) Love Sick and Love Sick 2 (2014 and 2015) (review here) 4) Gay OK Bangkok Season 1 (2016) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 5) Make It Right (2016) (review here) 6) SOTUS (2016-2017) (review here) 7) Gay OK Bangkok Season 2 (2017) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 8) Make It Right 2 (2017) (review here) 9) Together With Me (2017) (review here) 10) SOTUS S/Our Skyy x SOTUS (2017-2018) (review here) 11) Love By Chance (2018) (review here) 12) Kiss Me Again: PeteKao cuts (2018) (no review) 13) He’s Coming To Me (2019) (review here) 14) Dark Blue Kiss (2019) and Our Skyy x Kiss Me Again (2018) (review here) 15) TharnType (2019-2020) (review here) 16) Senior Secret Love: Puppy Honey (OffGun BL cuts) (2016 and 2017) (no review) 17) Theory of Love (2019) (review here) 18) 3 Will Be Free (2019) (a non-BL and an important harbinger of things to come in 2019 and beyond re: Jojo Tichakorn pushing queer content in non-BLs) (review here) 19) Dew the Movie (2019) (review here) 20) Until We Meet Again (2019-2020) (review here) (and notes on my UWMA rewatch here) 21) 2gether (2020) and Still 2gether (2020) (review here) 22) I Told Sunset About You (2020) (review here) 23) YYY (2020, out of chronological order) (review here) 24) Manner of Death (2020-2021) (not a true BL, but a MaxTul queer/gay romance set within a genre-based show that likely influenced Not Me and KinnPorsche) (review here) 25) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) (review here) 26) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For The Sake Of Rewatching Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (re-review here) 27) Lovely Writer (2021) (review here) 28) Last Twilight in Phuket (2021) (the mini-special before IPYTM) (review here) 29) I Promised You the Moon (2021) (review here) 30) Not Me (2021-2022) (review here) 31) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) (thesis here) 32) 55:15 Never Too Late (2021-2022) (not a BL, but a GMMTV drama that features a macro BL storyline about shipper culture and the BL industry) (review here) 33) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) and Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (2023) OGMMTVC Rewatch (The BBS OGMMTVC Meta Series is ongoing: preamble here, part 1 here, part 2 here, more reviews to come) 34) Secret Crush On You (2022) (on pause for La Pluie) 35) KinnPorsche (2022) (tag here) 36) KinnPorsche (2022) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For the Sake of Re-Analyzing the KP Cultural Zeitgeist 37) The Eclipse (2022) (tag here) 38) GAP (2022-2023) (Thailand’s first GL) 39) My School President (2022-2023) and Our Skyy 2 x My School President (2023) 40) Moonlight Chicken (2023) (tag here) 41) Bed Friend (2023) (tag here) 42) Be My Favorite (2023) (tag here)  43) Wedding Plan (2023)  44) Only Friends (2023) (tag here)]

[accirax]

Disventure Camp All Stars Power Ranking (Round 6)

And, we're back! I'm so glad that the leaking issue didn't wind up making the team have to delay their episode releases, both for their sake and ours. I've been highly anticipating this teaser release, and look forward to cracking into the next round of Power Rankings.

In case you didn't see my last power ranking for Episode 5, the Power Ranking Format is essentially a way of ranking how well each player is doing in the game. So, in essence, this is a long form way of predicting who I think will be eliminated from the competition in the next episode. There will be spoilers for last week's episode (obviously) and its power ranking, so make sure to read that first if you don't want to be spoiled on how I ranked our last boot. If you want more clarification on the rules, that first post will help you out as well. Furthermore, I'm going to be spoiling the preview for next episode, so if you want to go in TOTALLY blind, save this for later. Let's go!

Recap - Connor's Elimination

Current Point Total: 9 acquired/14 possible

'Cause now we have lore! >:D

Well, turns out that my assessment that the Season 2 cast was safe turned out to not be true. At least Connor was my second lowest positioned of the S2 characters, and my bad vibes about the Yellow Tribe were on point... Yeah, that's some copium right there. Seems this whole predicting business might be harder than I thought. Genuinely, though, I'm glad that Connor was at least in the better half of the contestants ranked (barely).

While I'm a little disappointed that Connor didn't make it farther this time around-- I think his placement was nearly identical to how he did in S2-- he wasn't particularly one of my favorite characters, so the loss didn't hurt me that deeply. Instead, he was an understandable sacrifice in terms of making the villains out to be more of a threat, much like what I theorized for Grett. Lesson learned that sometimes the most obvious boot from a tribe simply will be the boot.

Trailer Analysis

Looking back on the last power ranking, I feel like I could have done a lot better if I'd been paying more attention to what we were shown in the preview beyond the song snippet. So, combined with the fact that I'm just really excited to figure out what's going on next episode, I decided that this time around I'd take a closer look. I've never been a fan of analyzing a trailer so closely that you basically spoil the entire story before it happens, but, I don't think that'll happen here...? Depending on how accurate I am, maybe this section will suddenly disappear next time. Who knows.

So, a compilation of relevant things that I think will happen next episode:

Connor and Trevor will have a conversation. While I doubt that this will have anything to do with the elimination order, it is interesting. I'm guessing that Connor will give Trevor some sort of advice regarding his feelings for Derek? Or, even if it can't be counted as advice (given the L he took with Riya), Connor could at least relate. I don't think this is foretelling that Connor will reenter the competition now, though.

Somebody set up a trap to catch a squirrel. My guess is Tom, as a continuation to the drama between Gabby and the others over killing and eating animals. (Aiden confirms in Episode 5 that catching the chicken was "Tom's trap.") However, it could also be something related to Jensen and/or Trevor and Derek, if they started trying to kill the forest animals again.

Yul will take more orders from Emily to make Grett happy. This means that this is an ongoing plotline.

Tess and Ally will reunite at some point. Interesting.

Tom and Jake are definitely going to fight. Given that Tom looks surprised in one screenshot and regretful in the other, I think he's going to realize how much his relationship with Aiden has been hurting Jake.

The challenge will be contestants pushing balls of yarn(?) down towards other teams' arches, trying to score a goal, while other members of the teams try to block them. All teams appear to have arches and people pushing balls. This is definitely another challenge taken from Survivor, I think possibly Gabon...? I'm pretty sure that, in real life, they had to stop doing this challenge because it injured people too much, but that's the beauty of animation!

At least Yul and Aiden will be knocked down, which could be a good thing or a bad thing. Does that mean they gave it their all to stop a ball, or that the ball trampled their attempts to stop it...? Focusing on the second screenshot, though, the Cyan team is stopping yellow and magenta balls at the same time. Assuming the contestants have any say in where they aim, I wonder if the Yellow (Grett) and Magenta (Ashley, possibly Fiore?) teams will align to target Cyan because they have five members. That could be an in-universe reason to keep the teams even with a Cyan elimination, despite Cyan being pretty physically fit.

"Sure, princess. Whatever floats your boat~!"

Given Fiore's placement in both of these screenshots, it seems like one image must happen right before the other, so Fiore is probably addressing Jake. She sounds really confident and mocking... for some reason? Not saying that's out of character for Fiore, but did something happen to make that confidence warranted as opposed to her anger at being on the bottom? Here are my two guesses: 1) Fiore, Ashley, and Ally have made a girls' alliance, so Fiore is dismissive towards Jake because she knows he's on the bottom. 2) More likely, this might have something to do with Tom and Jake's fight. Jake ran in to urgently tell Fiore something, which could be about a development in Tom and Jake's relationship. Fiore doesn't care, so she gets sassy. I'm honestly kind of confused by this, but we'll see what happens.

Those are all of the scenes from the trailer that I thought were important/I was actually able to get something of value out of. Onto the main event: the actual Power Ranking!

Power Ranking

#1: Jake

Other than... being a S1 character, I guess? There really isn't anything that makes me think that Jake would be headed home this week. He's entrenched in drama, he seems to have the numbers on his tribe, and I don't even think that Magenta is going to tribal. To me, it's so clear cut that I don't have much to say. If he does go home, I'll be very surprised.

#2: Alec

Woah, check out that jump! From 12th to 2nd. Adventure Camp Dan wishes he could've had that when moving to Disventure Camp.

Now that Alec has survived one Yellow vote-- which turned out to be Connor-- I think he's pretty safe. The idea of Riya, Yul, and Grett suddenly now turning around and all working together to eliminate their leader feels laughable, given how dysfunctional the three of them are. Like, could Alec really lose that much social capital in the span of one episode, in a challenge he'll presumably be good at...? I'm kind of anticipating a merge at 12 (Episode 7), so I'm hoping this would confirm that Alec makes the merge.

#3: Ashley

Speaking of making the merge, I honestly think that Ashley will be there. After exploring some more of DC's behind the scenes content (the charity livestream they held 4 months ago and Silly Billy's S1 cast interviews), I've come to learn that the DC cast really likes Ashley... for some reason.

Look, it's not like I hate the gal! I just don't see her as the standout, heroic and hilarious character that a bunch of the voice actors seem to. Because I held this opinion, I was unaware of the possibility that Ashley was brought back because she was some huge fan favorite that everyone wanted to see done to justice. If that's the case, I have a hard time seeing the DC writers eliminating her as a premerger again.

I don't think Magenta is going to tribal, and I think that Fiore or Ally would be more natural boots than Ashley would be anyways. Congrats on ranking this high even though you're currently being hunted for sport, S1 girl. I still don't think you're going to win overall, but you'll probably make it through the day.

#4: Yul

Another big jump! Yul's new position is aided by two major factors. The first is that he's one of only two S2 boys left in the game, after James, Hunter, and Connor were eliminated (side note: I did NOT notice that the game only started with three boys from S1. I wonder what level of safety that grants them. Why did they bring back every S1 girl except Lill. That's so many.)

The second is that the plotline between him and Emily is clearly continuing to have relevance. Perhaps I'm relying too much on the rule of threes, but it would be strange, in my opinion, to have Yul lean on Emily for assistance more than once, but still only twice. Perhaps Emily's character was largely designed to assist a major Yul plotline, after all.

He also doesn't seem to have suffered too greatly from that stage light falling on his foot last episode, which bodes well for his odds. Unfortunately, it seems like the viewing public is going to be subjected to Yul for a little while longer (/lh).

#5: Aiden

Woohoo, the other surviving S2 boy. I honestly wanted to put him higher, but the fact that I'm really feeling like Cyan is headed for tribal couldn't let me justify higher than 5th place.

And, there are genuine reasons why I think he could go home now. If that conversation between Tom and Jake ends in them reconciling, the writers might not want Aiden around anymore to continue being a barrier between them. (And, now that the music episode has passed, they don't need to keep him around for his pipes, either ;).) It's been long enough now since Lake's elimination that I don't think Aiden's elimination would feel super weird. He's had a bit of a chance to play for himself, so if his fate now becomes to hang out in a cool hotel with his boyfriend and bestie for a couple of weeks, it wouldn't seem so bad.

...But I still think Aiden isn't going home, dammit! Knowing DC, I doubt Tom and Jake would make up so early unless one of them was going home, not Aiden. They love the drama. Tom and Jake's relationship is more likely to get worse before it gets better. Not to mention, I still find the "James returns" theory very compelling. Although the Cyan girls have plenty of reasons to eliminate Aiden, I still don't really think they would.

#6: Ally

Is it just me, or would Ally's elimination feel... really random right now? Like, how would it happen, and what narrative point would it serve? The show has very deliberately shown Ally bonding with each and every member of her team. She's had multiple one-on-one conversations with Ashley cementing their friendship, she grew closer to Jake by relating to him through song, and was always the one to defend Fiore from Hunter's attacks. All three of them have reasons to like her and want to work with her, so why would they let her go?

However, Ally doesn't cement a higher placement because I do think there are ways that they could swing her elimination. It's possible that the writers only established relationships between Ashley, Jake, and Ally so that there'll be high stakes and tension between which teammate Ashley and Jake will pair with if Magenta does go to another vote. For Ally to go home, they would have to choose to side with Fiore, but that's not totally unreasonable given how they voted last time.

The fact that Ally and Tess seem to reunite in this episode is also troubling. We have the dangling plot thread from last episode that Ally is worried that she and Hunter won't be able to spend that much time apart (which she believes is good for them) before they have to reexamine their relationship. If that fear turns out to be true, I could see that giving Ally an opportunity to quickly get some advice and closure from Tess would allow her to head to the Losers' Motel with a plan of how to handle Hunter in the future.

I still don't think that Ally or Magenta has anything to fear with tribal, though.

#7: Tess

A definite downgrade from last week, but still not that terrible. A lot of Tess' new placement is that, as I keep reiterating, I think Cyan is very likely to go to tribal, so it's hard to justify putting anyone on Cyan too high.

Having the opportunity to reconnect with Ally is also potentially bad for Tess, although probably less problematic for Tess than for Ally. If the writers were like, "well, Tess got one conversation with Hunter and one with Ally, now she's out!", that would be kind of silly, imo. But, still, that chat will eliminate the sort of "immunity" from getting booted that I gave Tess previously.

It's also not like there's no reason for the Cyans to take out Tess here. The swing vote is usually a fairly protected position, as both alliances should be looking to her for aid. But, if neither side finds her trustworthy enough, they could unite to take her out. I can definitely see a potential character arc of Tess' indecision taking her out from the game. If she can truly never make up her mind about whether to trust Ellie or not, everyone could unite to take out their unreliable teammate and save their own asses.

However, from a narrative perspective, this would further postpone the conflict between Ellie and Aiden, which could be kind of anticlimactic. It would also throw away Tess' character over a trait that wasn't even particularly pronounced in her original appearance. Then again, we saw what the writers did to Hunter, so we can't be too sure that Tess isn't headed in a similar direction.

#8: Grett

Much like Alec, I'm a bit less worried about Grett in this episode after we had the Yellow elimination last episode. She's also picking up points from (presumably) being involved in the ongoing Yul and Emily plotline, which could give her some plot armor moving forward.

If Yellow is headed to a vote, I don't really see why Alec and Riya would choose to eliminate Grett over Yul. Riya really dislikes Yul, he's still possibly injured, and Alec has a history of working with Grett, even if it ended on kind of bad terms.

Why put her so far below Yul, then? Well, first of all, Grett is a meta-threatened S1 girl, while Yul is a meta-protected S2 boy. Secondly, I do still think that Yul will probably be the cause of Grett's elimination at some point down the line, even if it's not this episode. Perhaps I should make an overall theory post talking about some of my thoughts on potential endings someday. And, third, I actually did think of one reason why Alec and Riya would choose to keep Yul over Grett... kind of. If Emily wanted to keep Yul in the show for whatever reasons, she could use the earpiece to instruct Yul on clever, strategic things to say that could also convince Alec and Riya that he turned over a new leaf. Basically, it's possible that Emily could girlboss her way into keeping Yul in the game, rather than Yul staying in due to his own merits.

There are other S1 girls (and others) that I believe to be in a spicier position now than Grett, though, so she lands at #8.

#9: Fiore

With Fiore, we enter the realm of players that I seriously believe could be in danger of elimination this episode. Yes, despite my claims that I think Fiore could be the winner, I do think that, if Magenta goes to tribal this episode, Fiore would be the boot. I just don't think Magenta really is going to tribal; ha ha!

It's really that whole, "whatever you say, princess~" that has me worried for Fiore. I'm concerned that, after getting a taste of power with the Hunter boot going her way, Fiore has become overconfident in thinking that Ally is definitely the next boot and that she will make the merge, whenever it is. (Basically, Fiore would think that Ally's presence gives her enough of a buffer that she thinks the merge is essentially secured.) If she goes back to demeaning Jake and Ashley, they could easily choose to turn on her and protect their newfound friendships with Ally instead. Fiore's status as a S1 girl isn't helping that read.

Again, I feel like all of the current Magenta team members are probably going to make the merge at this point, so Fiore should be safe. However, as (in my opinion) the most likely Magenta boot, Fiore winds up at #9 in case of emergency.

#10: Gabby

Thinking back on it, other than being a S1 girl, my reasoning behind Gabby's elimination wasn't that strong.

Or, maybe it was, before Ellie absorbed even more of the villainous energy last episode with her comments about torturing Jake. With comments like that, it becomes even harder to believe that Tom and Aiden would choose to target Gabby instead of Ellie. The farther Gabby makes it into All Stars, the less of an excuse there is for her to be eliminated with very little focus beforehand.

Still, I think Cyan is in trouble, blah blah blah. If some sort of twist does occur that gives Ellie individual immunity amidst her team-- and I don't think that would be a totem, as Ellie using a totem on herself and inadvertently sending Gabby home would basically require her to make her totem publicly known before the vote-- then they could target Gabby instead.

It is harder to predict DC than Survivor because DC has more of a penchant for pulling random shit out of nowhere, like that vote in S1 where Gabby just straight up obliterated Ashley. I wonder if that relationship will reemerge later in All Stars... Gabby would probably need to be around for it to happen, so, clearly, she should stay in.

#11: Tom

When I was drafting out my initial thoughts for this list, I originally put Tom really high. Like, top 3 high. But, the more I thought about it, the more I started to feel like Tom could be on the chopping block this episode.

For starters, the love triangle. I said last episode that, because Tom is the central leg between Jake and Aiden, he wouldn't be at risk of elimination. Well... I take those words back, sort of.

Let's look at it this way: if you eliminated any one of Jake, Aiden, or Tom, what would happen? If you eliminate Jake, Aiden and Tom are left. That's pretty boring, because then they could just be friends without any particularly strong (or at least personally motivated) opposition. If you eliminate Aiden, Jake and Tom are left. That's definitely better, because Jake and Tom could simply continue the will-they-won't-they plotline on their own, but you'd still lose Aiden as an obstacle without Jake having any hand in it.

If you eliminate Tom, Jake and Aiden are left. In my opinion, this is by far the spiciest option. Jake would probably be super mad at Aiden for not doing enough to protect Tom from getting voted out, leading to Aiden being justifiably angry that Jake has been so aggressive towards him despite Aiden not wanting Tom to go home, either. I think that having Tom's two "love interests" left to fight each other without him actually being there is the most interesting way in which one corner of the triangle could be eliminated.

But that's all about why Tom "should" be eliminated; what about why he would get eliminated? There are a couple of possibilities here, too. First of all, that argument between Jake and Tom in the preview, which ended with Tom pretty clearly being remorseful about what he did. If Tom gets super demoralized about screwing things up with Jake, it could cause him to be seen as a liability. Or, in an extreme case, Tom could feel so guilty about his and Aiden's kiss that he would ask the girls to target him instead of Aiden.

Alternatively (or even additionally), we also saw that squirrel trap in the trailer, which I said could be hinting at further conflict between Tom and Gabby over the team's diet. If Gabby got really fed up with Tom's carnivore side, she could ask Ellie if they could target Tom instead of Aiden, which Ellie might agree to.

Despite all this, I can also totally understand why the writers would want to keep Tom around. After his kiss with Aiden, his visibility and importance seem higher than ever. If James does return to the competition later, having him chat with Tom would be... interesting, even given James not caring that his boyfriend was stage-kissing another man. And, Tom potentially has a winner plot set up, given that the writers found it important enough to tell us what Tom would do with the prize. With Cyan likely going to tribal, however, the possibility of a surprise Tom boot felt more viable than ever. I'm not putting him in last place, but if Tom does wind up going home, I'm gonna feel pretty smart.

#12: Riya

Much like Fiore, Riya is here as my safety net for who I think would go home if Yellow does wind up going to tribal instead of Cyan. However, I feel like a third Yellow tribal is, on the whole, more likely than a third Magenta tribal, so Riya gets kicked all the way down here.

Without Connor as a shield, Riya is in a much worse position. Yul already dislikes Riya in general, but that only increased after she caused the light to fall on him, and would only increase more if he ever learns that Riya was the one to fire that stray vote at him. Grett would probably work with Yul, which is already 50% of the votes against her.

Alec is definitely Riya's best lifeline, and it could work out in her favor. After all, if Alec continues working with Grett and Yul, if they go to tribal again, the couple would most likely vote him out. However, I think it's really a question of how much longer Alec thinks he has before the merge.

Here's my logic: if Alec thinks there's still a long time until the merge, then, yes, it would be better to work with Riya to have a chance to eliminate Grett or Yul. That's because, the more team challenges there are, the greater opportunity Yellow has to lose again, and the greater possibility that Grett and Yul vote him out.

However, if Alec thinks that the merge is soon, it's better to vote out Riya. If Alec and Riya managed to eliminate, let's say, Yul, then Alec is essentially losing two members of his villains alliance-- one due to Yul's elimination, and one due to Grett presumably withdrawing. Alec has already burned her once before.

That would cause the villains alliance to go into the merge with a maximum of only four members: Alec, Riya, Fiore, and Ellie. The other teams have already been primed to believe that the villains are a huge threat, and with such small numbers, they would be very easily eradicated. Even beyond others, Fiore and Ellie might also be mad at Alec for him dragging them onto his sinking ship of a plan, and try to desert as well. My point is, sticking with Riya could go really badly for Alec.

So, combining that doomsday scenario with me at least thinking that the merge probably will be soon, and the fact that Alec choosing to side with Riya would only put them at a 50:50, NOT a majority, and I can totally see why Alec would choose to vote for Riya.

And, that's not even taking into account Riya's poor behavior! The Yellow Team did lose the singing challenge due to Riya's influence, and they suffered during the diving challenge due to her fear of the depths, too. She's a challenge liability. She was also shown hogging the shower, and is now sunbathing during camp life, proving that she's not a team player. She has way too much confidence in her "power position," as she put it last episode, for where her game actually is. If it's not Cyan that goes to tribal, I can totally see the threads coming together to lead to a Riya elimination.

#13: Ellie

It's just simple math for me at this point. I think that Cyan is almost certainly going to tribal next episode + I think Ellie is by far the most likely boot for Cyan's next tribal = I think Ellie is really, really likely to be the next boot. She's even a S1 girl.

My argument is pretty much the exact same things I said last episode, except now they're even worse. The screenshots from the challenge now make me think that Cyan will go to tribal next episode, as opposed to my confusion about why Cyan would lose a music challenge. We also saw that Ellie has begun to prioritize suffering over strategy, which both increases the odds that people like Tess would want to take her out and decreases the odds that she'd be able to pull off an intellectual move to save herself.

I'll honestly be pretty surprised if Ellie doesn't go home next episode... but, hey, I was surprised by Connor's boot last episode, too! If Ellie does manage to survive another episode, I wonder if I'll have to start reconsidering putting her so close to the bottom. Part of it would depend on how she survives, of course.

The only way to know for sure is to actually watch the episode myself, so, see y'all on Thursday! Thanks for reading!

[trexrambling]

Broken Heels (III / III)

Request: “There's a protective Dean and Sam some kind of thing. They're friends with fem!reader, a shy and graceful girl. A long time ago the brothers took her in and a deep friendship was born. She only helps with research because she suffers from a heart failure, which leads to her being often dizzy nauseated and breathless. The brother care for her and always keep an eye out on her. Dean is secretly in love with her and vice versa. But neither of them admits it. One night Dean brings home some of his flings and the girl is really cruel to the reader.... Reader spirals into a rabbit hole, taking the things the bitch said to her to heart.... And shit hits the fan?! Some angst, drama and fluff, protective Winchesters.” - by anon

Word Count: 2,120

Warnings: language, negative self-talk, heated/arguing conversation, angst, fluff

A/N: I broke this request into two three parts because it ended up being much longer than expected. This last part took me forever to finish, still not sure I love how it turned out but here it is. No beta, all mistakes are mine, please message me if you see any! Watercolor heart from the header image credit.

(Read Part 1) (Read Part 2)

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You’re not really sure where he’s driving you, because it’s not back to the town you were hunting in, and it’s not towards home, either. It feels aimless, like he’s picking turns at random for the sake of the familiarness of being behind the wheel, like it’s the only thing that’s grounding him right now. The sun has made its venture into the sky, climbing with each passing minute and painting the wisps of clouds in orange and pink. The quiet in the car is becoming unbearable, the inevitable conversation that’s about to take place encroaching with each passing second.

You decide to just go for it, like that first jump into a cold pool. Just get it over with. It’s either that or tuck and roll out the passenger door. Though…the latter option might prove to be less painful when all is said and done.

“So…” you start quietly, “where’s Sam?”

“Oh, Sam’s still working on the case.” Every word is wrapped in frustration. His jaw is tight, fingers gripping the wheel with more force than necessary. You don’t have to check for a speed limit sign to know that he’s exceeding it.

“You left Sam?”

In a split second you find yourself almost relocated to the floorboards of the car, the lap belt cutting into your waist the only thing keeping you from sliding off the seat as Dean slams on the brakes. You manage to catch the upper half of your body weight with a hand on the dash, eyes wide as he veers off the side of the road and continues right on into the neighboring grassy field. The Impala’s wheels find a small rut, bumps in and out of it, the frame vibrating from the uneven ground. He goes a few more feet and then comes to a complete halt, throws the gears into park and shuts off the engine. You quickly undo the seatbelt to rub your stomach.

“Dean, what the hell-”

But he’s already opened his door and is exiting the vehicle, the loud slam of it shutting making you flinch. You watch him through the windshield as he walks a short distance into the field, then he stops and just stands there with his hands in his jacket pockets, his back to you.

You stay in your seat, staring at him, a bit stunned. You’ve known Dean for years, and in that time you’ve seen his rough edges, watched him dissolve into anger that would leave him unable to speak, observed his elated highs alongside the dismal lows. But you’ve never seen him like this… At least, not with you. Not because of you.

A steady breeze is blowing the tall, spring wildflowers around his legs, pushing small tufts of his hair in all directions. His stiff posture is a direct contrast to the serenity around him; a tranquil view from a distance that’s lacking all of its peace up close.

“Ah, screw it,” you mutter to yourself. You pop your door open and step out, the immediate onslaught of wind attacking your hair as you walk across the grass to stand beside him. You’re not really sure how you feel, not sure what to think. A short hour ago you’d been on a bus, trying to get as far away from him as possible. And now…

“Alright, spill. What’s going on with you?”

He turns sharply, fire in his eyes. “With me? What’s going on with me? Are you serious right now?”

He wants to pick a fight, to throw everything that’s built up out into the open, and part of you does, too. You fold your arms, meet his glare with a steady one of your own. “Yes, with you. How could you leave Sam to work a case by himself?”

Air snorts out of his nose in disbelief. “I left the case? Are we forgetting that you’re the one who just up and hopped a bus in the middle of the night? Without saying anything?”

“I texted Sam.”

“Oh, you texted Sam. Of course. My bad.”

You throw your hands up in the air in exasperation. “You literally just drove god knows how many miles and tried to run a bus off the road, and you’re acting like I’m the crazy one. I have every right to go wherever I damn well choose to. I’m not a child, Dean, I don’t need to get permission from you.”

“You didn’t even pick up your phone, Y/N. I’ve been calling you for hours, and I just kept getting your voicemail. What was I supposed to do, supposed to think? Since when do we not talk to each other? What the hell happened?”

His voice has progressively gotten louder with each question, and though he’s not quite yelling, the harshness has you blinking back an unanticipated bout of tears. Your mood shifts, the fight leaving you as doubt and dejection take its place.

Dean notices the change, and his eyes lose some of their sharpness. He rubs a hand on the back of his neck and lets out a deep breath. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to… I just don’t understand much of anything that’s been happening the past few hours. Why did you take off? Why did you just leave us like that?”

You wrap your arms tightly around your midsection, fixate on the grass beneath your feet, and manage to softly say -

“Do you… do you really not know?”

He doesn’t say anything, which is ten times worse than all of the worst possible things you’re imagining he could say. You gnaw on your lower lip, anxiety building with each second that he doesn’t speak. You can’t take it anymore, can’t take this, whatever this is. So, like a broken dam, you open your mouth and let it all flood out.

“I know that we’re not equals. I know I could never hold my own on a hunt with you. Hell, I proved that last month, didn’t I? And you deserve someone who can have your back, someone who can actually help you when the time comes. I know you guys say I help, but that’s different. It’s reading lore and making lasagna, and anyone can do that. And to top it all off, I’m an absolute mess. I cough up blood and I can’t walk a mile without feeling like I'm going to faint. I’m like this broken thing, this deadweight that you keep dragging along with you for some reason. And I don’t get it. I really don’t understand why I’m still here, because…because you don’t need me.”

He’s still not saying anything. You give in to the weakness in your knees and sink down onto the ground, tugging your jacket around you and staring out at the borderline of trees in the distance as your fingers absentmindedly pick at the surrounding grass and flower stems.

“And then I was waiting in your room for you to come back from the bar, and instead that woman showed up. And she was just-” you chuckle dryly- “so delightful, by the way. A real charmer. And you didn’t ask her to leave, so I left. I got out of your way. And I just… I couldn't stay, Dean. Don’t you get that?”

He joins you on the ground, close but not quite touching you. You dare to glance at him from the corner of your eye, surprised by the solemness his features carry.

“You don’t-” he clears his throat, digs his fingers into the dirt- “you don’t really want me, Y/N. Not the way you think you do.”

You turn your head sideways, rest your ear on your bent knee so you can look at him. He avoids your gaze, but keeps talking.

“That girl…she’s easy. Someone I can lie to when she asks me questions, that I can be a completely different person for. It’s just an escape, a night that doesn’t matter because I’ll never have to see her again, never have to think about her again, worry about her again.”

Your face tightens. “And you want that?”

“It’s been pointless to want anything else. To let myself want something else. This life…it’s not safe to let yourself get close to anyone.”

“Well…sometimes you can’t help it. Sometimes it just happens.”

He looks at you then, the right corner of his mouth turning up slightly. “Yeah. Yeah it does.”

There’s a moment of hesitation, and then in one swift motion his arm goes up and around your shoulders, firmly scooping you into his side. You shuffle close and willingly lean in, resting your head in the crook of his neck. One of his hands stays wrapped around your arm, the other finding yours in your lap. A deep sigh leaves your body with the contact, the pent up tension you’d been carrying since last night dissolving with his touch.

“You’re the farthest thing from broken, you know,” he says softly. “And don’t you ever let me hear you say that we don’t need you. Sam and I are damn lucky to have you.”

“It doesn't always feel that way,” you whisper. “I still feel like I’m broken all the time. And not just because of my heart problems, but because of everything that’s happened to me, every mistake I’ve made, all the things I want to do, want to change… but I just can’t ever seem to get there.”

“I get that,” Dean says, giving you a small squeeze. “I’ve been there. But if I’ve learned anything, from Sam or Cas or anyone else in our lives, it’s that the broken heals. You just have to be willing to let it.”

You smile faintly, tilt your head up to look at him.

“Dean?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks for chasing me down. Literally.”

He meets your eyes, his face serious. “I didn’t sleep with her, you know.”

Your blink, surprised. “Okay…why not?”

He bites the inside of his cheek, but doesn’t answer.

You squeeze his hand. “You know, you deserve to be with someone you can fully be yourself with. Someone you can talk to without having to fabricate your life, someone that actually gets it. And it may not be easier, but…I think it might be worth it.”

His features change then, and he’s suddenly looking at you in a way that takes you back to a flour filled kitchen, with mixing bowls and a pie waiting on the counter while he’s standing over you, your hand in his, heat and tension and a deep underlying desire filling the small space between. You swallow deeply, take in a shaky breath through your nose.

“Dean-”

His lips on yours cut you off, no hesitation as he tilts your chin up with his hand to draw your face closer. Warm fingertips trail down your cheek and then tangle in your hair as he gently pulls at your bottom lip. It’s a single, long, perfect kiss, and you can’t breathe properly, but you don’t really want to. He pulls away, kisses you lightly again, once, twice. And your head is spinning and your breathing is ragged and you can feel a goofy grin stretched wide across your face.

“You good?”

You nod, breathless, still smiling. You’re not sure if you can stop at this point. You’ve wanted this for the longest time, wanted him. And now that it’s happening, you still can’t believe that it’s real. It feels like a dream you never want to wake up from.

Dean releases his hold on you and stands up, snapping you from the moment. He stretches his hand out, a smile on his face. “Ready to go?”

You raise your eyebrows, still trying to collect yourself. “Go? Go where?”

Your smile fades, uncertainty underlying the pure flood of euphoria you’d just experienced. Were things already back to normal? Just like that? Did you imagine the last few minutes? Did the bus you were on crash, and you’re actually in a coma?

He’s smiling at you, waiting expectantly, and your face flushes from embarrassment. You grasp his hand, and he effortlessly pulls you to your feet. He doesn’t give you a chance to step away, though. He keeps a firm hold on your hand and tugs you back into him. Toe to toe, your chest flush against his, he cups the side of your face, erasing any of the doubt as he says -

“I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time.”

And then he’s kissing you again, firmly holding you tight against him while he steals the breath from your lungs.

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Tags: @iprobablyshipit91​ @senjoritanana​ @amythyststorm33​ @morgiex​ @sushiumex​ @akshi8278​

^Thank you for reading! You guys and your feedback are the reason I kept writing this one :) 

[chryso0]

What is the relationship between Kuroda and Asami? And what does Kuroda think of Aki?

Most of what we know about their relationship is from the lite novel Finder No Souen. Which has not been officially translated into English but I have read a fan made translation so I’ll give you a run down of the events.

The events take place when both Asami and Kuroda are in high school, which they go to the same elite tokyo prep school. At the time, Kuroda is being bullied by a group of random street thugs who wait outside for him and beat him up, and threaten to hurt his sister. He is paying them off, to stop them and its kinda not working and they continue to extort money from him. He’s very ashamed but feels he can’t go to anyone for help, thinking the situation will only esculate.

One day while he is heading to the place where he usually meets the thugs to pay them off, he finds them in the middle of a fight— with Asami. Asami easily deals with them and Kuroda is watching it all from the sidelines in total shock. He recognizes Asami from his school but knows nothing about him. After Asami deals with the thugs he sees Kuroda but they don’t say anything to each other and Asami just leaves.

They kinda accidently meet again and Kuroda sorta just finds him to be cool. He notices when he hangs out with Asami the thugs stay away from him, so he feels very safe around Asami despite him hearing bad and mysterious rumors about Asami from fellow students. They start a kind of budding friendship, mostly because Kuroda follows Asami around. He goes to Asami’s work place — which is a bar that Asami works in. Asami cooks for him one time or makes him drinks, and Kuroda studies at the bar while Asami is setting up for the evening.

The major part of the story is that - Kuroda gets kidnapped by the thugs. It’s kinda a long story, but basically the thugs were targetting Kuroda in the first place because his dad, who is a Judge, was the one that put their buddy/older brother dude in jail. It was in revenge for that. But this buddy of theirs gets out of jail and immediately wants to take revenge so they kidnap him. It’s pretty graphic at that point…I won’t get into detail. But its very horrid and he’s trapped with them for a few days, and he gets drugged. Asami finds out and rescues him, and takes him back to his house where he nurses him for a few days.

Kuroda owes Asami his life. This is where his extreme loyality comes from, and why he semi- works for Asami. In that he leaks him information and does things that benefit Asami like cleaning up messes. We know that Kuroda had a hand in cleaning up what happen in Tokyo after Fei Long came and took Akihito. The details on that are kinda iffy but i would guess that Kuroda is corrupt and maybe destroys evidence or withholds evidence for Asami’s sake.

Kuroda is truly one of Asami’s only friends.

In No Souen everything is in Kuroda’s perspecitive and he thinks very highly of Asami, and sometimes notes…a little too often, about his attractiveness, and how otherwise amazing he is. It’s possible this relationship could have turned into a romance —or more likely turned into Kuroda having one sidely felt something. Which i am more inclined to believe because I do not sense attraction from Asami at all. Kuroda on one hand, becomes too tramatized after what happen so I feel any sense of romance maybe died for him — but he still felt immensely grateful and loyal towards Asami. On the otherside, Asami left before it could turn into anything, as Papa Asami basically blackmails Asami to return to his side after the events of No Souen.

We know Asami left Tokyo for a while after that, he became a mercenary for his fathers organization shortly after the events of No Souen and we dont know when he returned to Japan after however long he worked for his father. Maybe they didnt reconnect until Kuroda had finished law school and was starting to work as a prosecutor.

Now lets get to the second half of your question. What does Kuroda think of Aki?

Their meeting in vol 7 is very memorable! Kuroda was being super salty! I think he just wanted information out of Akihito and as a prosecutor he can be kinda sly about getting that information. When he’s originally grilling Akihito, its very clear to me that he knows very little about their relationship. Which makes sense because I dont think Asami is the type to gossip about that. Kuroda didn’t even know that they were living together — he only guesses and Akihito gets tricked into revealing that they are living together.

I think all of his questions were test. Kuroda is loyal to Asami, and wants to know who he is assoicating with and who he might be living with.

On the surface the rumors about Akihito Takaba make him out to be nothing more than a boy toy. But imagine hearing those rumors is probably confusing to someone like Kuroda who knows Asami very well. And knows how closed off Asami actually is, and how he doesn’t usually let people inside his life. Kuroda also knows about what happened in Hong Kong and he knows that Asami isn’t someone who would be rushing off to Hong Kong for just anybody— So he somewhat knows that Akihito is somebody to Asami.

That question he asks - “How much are you a night?” It was so bold and kinda crude! But he isnt looking for a real answer to that— he is only looking to see Akihito’s reaction! Is he going to get indignant? Is he gonna blow a fuse? Kuroda basically calls him a whore, and he wants to see how Akihito will react to that!

Well Aki being Aki just goes into completely shock and can’t respond properly at all. He goes bright red! Which I think is meant to tell Kuroda that aki is a total innocent— and that he is in fact not just Asami’s boy toy nor is he a whore.

That “answer” Kuroda recieves— It’s hard to know how he feels about it. But there is a small scene after he leaves that I think maybe says he’s a tiny bit jealous… When he turns away to leave he leaves behind a rolled up magaize. Which Akihito picks up and sees that Kuroda squeezed it so hard that he left finger marks. Which must have been made in the moment Akihito “answered”

I can kinda interpret that as being a little jealous, but maybe it is simply because he wants to hold the special title of being the “closest” to Asami — but that title is now being taken over by Akihito. I feel he holds no ill will against Akihito — he is not the same as Sudo in this situation. I think he is just confused by Asami’s reasoning for keeping Akihito around.

Because in his mind Asami doesn’t associate with people who don’t have “uses”. Kuroda is still useful to Asami because of his job and how he cleans up after Asami or gives him information. In a way, even though Kuroda is Asami’s friend their relationship is still somewhat transactional. He still recieves favors and gifts for helping Asami. This is his way of staying in Asami’s life is by proving his worth and his useful-ness. But in his mind Kuroda doesn’t understand what “use” Akihito has in Asami’s life.

Later when Kuroda meets Asami at his apartment, he is still making snide comments about Akihito. Calling him a “problem child” and other kinda of back handed things. He makes another snide remark to Akihito as he is leaving the apartment - “Iv already had my fill” which sounds very jealous too me! and almost like he is trying to gode Akihito into thinking Asami and him have a special relationship.

But Kuroda i think maybe warms up to him a bit, when he sees Akihito in action and sees he’s clever. He even outright explains to Akihito that he doesnt want people with “half-assed feeling” to get close to Asami. Meaning his entire behavior towards Akihito, is just his way of protecting Asami from people who might want to use him, and he maybe once considered Akihito to be that kind of person.

But I do think he realizes that Akihito is important to Asami. Kuroda is definitely the person who told Asami that Akihito was taken by Sudo, after Akihito was drugged in that underground brothel. Which is why Asami shows up at the right moment to shot at Aaron when he’s shotting at Suod, and Kuroda in the ware house. Kuroda is also the one that acted to find Akihito right away, and is the reason the police raid that warehouse and arrested Sudo.

I made another post awhile ago about that scene when Sudo gets shot, and how I think Kuroda came running to Akihito and took a bullet meant for him (x) Even though all his earlier bluster and treating akihito like a bratty kid. Even if he doesn’t particularly like it — he understand that Asami treats Akihito differently. And so Akihito is very important to Asami and that if Akihito gets hurt or killed — it would hurt Asami. In that moment I do think Kuroda showed he was very selfless when it comes to Asami, even if he found Akihito to be annoying or he doesnt really understand their relationship — he still wants Asami to be happy. And if this dumby bratty kid is the thing that Asami seems to find annoyingly important and is constantly protecting, then thats enough reason for Kuroda to also want to protect Akihito as well.

[buriedalienfma]

This week saw the release of the season finale of 'My Adventures with Superman', and instead of talking about just the one episode, I'm going to talk about the entire season, and what I felt about the series as a whole. Obviously there will be spoilers here for the entire season, so take that into consideration.

Let's get this out of the way : Is this show perfect ? No. It has glaring flaws in the writing, the pacing and how it handles some of its characters. I consider this show to be a spiritual successor to the some of the more experimental superhero cartoons of the early 2000s such as the 2004 Batman cartoon or the MTV Spider-Man series, both of which took some extreme liberties with the source material and had some obvious flaws in how they were written. And yet I love those cartoons dearly, since they were, and still are, such fresh and unique takes on the two superheroes with the MTV Spider-Man being a gloriously edgy 2000s Spider-Man cartoon and The Batman being an anime inspired action show.

I remember those cartoons being criticized when they came out for how non-traditional they were compared to the comics and previous adaptations, but now they're considered cult classics, and I think the same is going to happen to 'My Adventures with Superman'. For the most part, I think the show is still quite good despite some of its flaws.

In any case, lets get those flaws out of the way, so that I can talk about what the show does right. The biggest point of contention is the pacing which is quite rushed in certain areas. I think the romance between Lois and Clark is extremely rushed since they fall in love and start dating a little too quickly for my tastes. The early episodes very much made it seem like the characters were just beginning to get to know each other, only for them to start dating in the next two of three episodes. I suspect that's why people complained about the dramatic cliffhanger in episode 5, since it feels like the characters aren't quite as close as they should be for them to have a falling out that works with how the characters have been written. Still, I think one can overlook that because the two characters are cute together and have excellent chemistry. The show transitions from the episodic narrative of the first few episodes to a more serialized structure in the second half, and I don't think it's as seamless as it should be, particularly since the show is still throwing a lot of new concepts at the audience in the second half and it doesn't land the way it should.

Some characters seem to be introduced and then quickly forgotten when the show has no need for them. In Episode three, the trio of Cat Grant, Steve Lombard and Ronnie Troupe are introduced only to be forgotten within the episode itself and the rest of the show. At least Steve Lombard gets one spotlight episode, but even that feels weird since he fades away into the background in subsequent episodes. Wouldn't it make more sense for Cat Grant to be the one who goes around interviewing the people of Metropolis in Episode eight instead of introducing a whole new character in Vicki Vale ? That would have given the show a stronger sense of continuity. 

And as a lot of people have already pointed out, the villains are underwhelming. There are some standouts like the General, Amanda Waller, Mxyzptlk and to a certain extent, Parasite. But the rest of the villains are pretty bland. I'm not going to complain about how the villains are different compared to the source material. As I've stated before, the cartoon is allowed to change things for the sake of the story. And yet, I still feel like the villains are the weakest part of the show since they mostly serve as obstacles for Superman. 

Some episodes are weaker than others. I was not fan of Episode 6 since I feel like the characters and concepts in that episode belong in a different show. And I also have some gripes about how the show handles the multiverse aspect in episode 7. 

Despite it's flaws, the show does have a lot of positive aspects, and one of them is how it handles the main character itself. I've said this before and I'll say it again. This show totally gets Superman. It's not just that he's a kind and compassionate man who wants to help everyone, including his enemies. This show understands that Superman is an alienated character. He has some deep seated anxieties about not being a 'normal' person, something that's set up in the very first episode. He's given a character arc where he has to slowly come to terms with the fact that he isn't normal and that doesn't have to be a bad thing.

Clark is also not a perfect person, as he does hide his true identity from his friends, which does drive a wedge between them, but stuff like that only makes him more relatable. I absolutely love that Clark has no real idea of where he comes from, and is even led to believe that he is part of an alien species that will invade Earth. Not only does that fuel his anxieties even more, as we see in the series finale, but it's just another part of his ongoing character arc, where he has to face his worst fears about himself and eventually conquer them. One thing that I liked about this show is that Superman seems to be subconsciously holding his powers back, which unfortunately gets him beaten up a lot in the fight scenes. I know a lot of Superman fans like to see a more powerful Superman, but the various fight scenes feel so much more visceral and tense when it feels like Superman is at risk of actually dying. Jack Quaid, the voice actor for Superman, absolutely nails the performance especially in the more emotional scenes.

The other characters are also great. I like that Jimmy is given more of a spotlight in this show, and gets his fair share of moments where he gets to save the day. I also like that he helps to ground both Clark and Lois as the voice of reason. Certainly hope that he gets a lot more spotlight and that the show adapts the Matt Fraction Jimmy Olsen comics, especially with how the season ends with Jimmy apparently becoming rich which is one of the major plot points in the Fraction comics. Lois is also quite excellent. She's a little different from traditional portrayals of the character, as she seems to lack the cynical and snarky edge that some versions of Lois have. This version of Lois is much more perky and emotional, but it works for what the show is going for. Both Lois and Jimmy have excellent voice actors in Alice Lee and Ishmel Sahid. If the show were to go on for longer, they, along with Jack Quaid, could very well become the definitive voice actors for these characters.

The romance between Lois and Clark is extremely well done, even if it is a little rushed. You totally buy the two as a couple since there's plenty of heartwarming and wholesome moments between the two. 

Speaking of that, I was a little worried that the show might just be nothing but a toothless wholesome and fluffy Superman show. I know a lot of people certainly expected the show to go in that direction, but we were definitely wrong about that. This show has its fair share of dramatic and even dark moments, and that's not a bad thing. Tension and conflict are at the heart of the best stories, and this show has plenty of that. I love the action scenes in this show. They get significantly more ambitious and exciting starting with the fight in episode five and it only gets better from there. 

So that's the first season of 'My Adventures with Superman'. It is by no means a perfect show, but its positive aspects outweigh the negative. If I may speculate on the upcoming plot points for the next season, I hope that the show subverts the idea that the Kryptonians are evil. I've said it before, but that would miss the point of Superman's story. That idea works for characters like Goku, but not for Superman. It does seem like the show is leaning in that direction considering how it ends with the Jor-El hologram saving Clark. On the whole I love this show and would recommend it to anyone who's still on the fence. It's quite different from traditional Superman shows and movies, but that only makes it feel more fresh and exciting. 

[wutheringmights]

2023 Reading Wrap Up

I tried starting this post about 20 times already, and no introduction is really hitting. I am quite a bit hungover, and in dire need of a rest. But alas, I want to talk about all the books I read last year.

So I had the goal of reading as much as I physically could last year. Why? After finishing my degree, I was having trouble reading for the sake of reading. I wanted to be someone who read a lot, but my self-motivated reading habit was in the dumps. My sibling and I ended up making a bet to see who could read more in 2023, and I was determined to win.

I did win, but that's besides the point. My importantly, I am now back in the habit of reading again.

I really enjoyed starting my reading tag and making little write-ups summarizing my thoughts. I really appreciate everyone being so patient with my book-posting, especially as I gradually went from writing a sentence or two to rambling bullet point lists to well-thought out reviews. If you ever interacted with one of those posts-- thank you so much! I hope to continue in this upcoming year.

So to wrap up my year of reading, I figured I would rank all of the books I read. If I read an entire series, I'll count it as one entry on the list. Also, the ranking is going to be determined less by quality and more by personal enjoyment.

All that being said, let's go~

Ranking My 2023 Reads

#17) Breaking Time by Sasha Alsberg - This was my first read of the year, and my worst. This book is near unreadable in terms of prose, and features one of the most infuriating lines I have ever read in my entire life:

Add the most unoriginal plot I have ever seen, and this makes for one bad read. I knew it was going to be bad going on, but the levels of incompetency on display here was mind-boggling.

#16) Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan - Is this the worst book I read this year? No. But it definitely pissed me off more than the others. I didn't need this book to be good; I just wanted it to be fun, but it couldn't commit to a plot line long enough to do so. I will give this book credit for having one of the unintentionally funniest villains I have ever read. That man failed upwards and it was GREAT. No notes.

#15) Ariadne by Jennifer Saint - I don't think this book is terrible, but its flaws are the most glaring to me. Structurally, it's a mess. The prose tries to use imagery to cover up how much telling it's truly doing. Both hampered an overall decent plot.

#14) Red, White, & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston - This book wasn't really for me. It was an entertaining read, but the references to pop-culture were more cringey than humorous. I also could not stand how the book was ashamed to be escapist literature and tried to uplift itself with shallow critiques of American politics.

#13) Lightlark by Alex Aster - That I am putting this book so high on the list is a crime and an insult against every book ranked below it. If I was ranking off of quality alone, it would be the second worst book I read this year. Unfortunately, I started an inside joke with my friends about how I'm Lightlark's #1 Fan, which ended up increasingly my enjoyment of this very stupid book exponentially. #TeamOro

#12) Garrison Girl by Rachel Aarons - This book really isn't anything special, but its place in publishing and anime history tickles my brain. It's not bad but it's not all that good either.

#11) The End of Everything: (Astrophysically Speaking) by Katie Mack - Someone with a more thorough baseline on science would probably find this book more enjoyable than me. As is, I didn't understand half of it.

#10) The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid - A fast, enjoyable read. I think it reveals its hand a bit too quickly, but the plot overall is really fascinating. Lacking on prose, but it didn't need a lot of it. This is a book begging to be made into a movie (which will probably be better than the book itself).

#9) A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes - What this book lacks in originality and plot, it makes up for with comprehensiveness. As much as I enjoyed reading all of its varied perspectives, I am still peeved by how Penelope's perspective was wasted and how Haynes had no interest in writing from Helen's perspective.

#8) The Broken Earth Trilogy by N.K. Jemisin - A prime example of a book series that is objectively excellent, but was simply not for me. My interests didn't align with what the narrative thought was important. However, the characters are fantastic and what there is of the central conflict between mother and daughter is earth shattering.

#7) The Poppy War Trilogy by R.F. Kuang - An incredible fantasy series with some excellent characters and ideas. While I do think that the series is a little simplistic, it makes up for it by being endlessly entertaining. Except for the last book, which leaned too heavily into its grimdark flares.

#6) Beowulf by Unknown (Translated by Seamus Heaney) - A reread featuring a fantastic introduction from Heaney that connects the text to his Irish roots. The translation itself, while good, prioritized brevity a bit too much for my taste.

#5) Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson - A long overdue reread that reaffirmed why I found this book life changing when I first read it in junior high. Lyrical, brutal, and surprisingly funny, this book paints an honest picture of depression and trauma in adolescence.

#4) In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado - A lyrical, dreamy exploration of an abusive relationship. I love how this memoir pushes the limits of its own medium as it also tries to establish a canon for abusive queer relationships. Machado's imagery is insane, and I devour it every time.

#3) The Catcher In the Rye by J.D. Salinger - My last and most surprising read of the year. I did not expect to love this novel as much as I do. I will never forgive the world for insisting that Holden Caulfield is an archetypal male manipulator when he's a traumatized kid (albeit a bratty one) who desperately wants to be feel happy.

#2) Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings by Neil Price - An incredible, comprehensive look on the history, culture, and legacy of the vikings. Price parses through popular fiction to bring humanity back to a historical group of people every subculture wants to claim as their own, for better and for worse. This book broke a damn in my head that was preventing me from doing world building for a piece of original fiction I want to write.

#1) The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas - I have been haunted by this book since I was a little kid, promising myself that I would one day gather the courage to read this behemoth of a story. As long as it is, every word was worth it. It was both parts entertaining and stimulating, and I ended by the book knowing why so many people call this the best book ever written.

--

And that was my year! Please feel free to share what you read this year. Let me know if there's anything I should try to read in 2024. You can also fight me about any of my opinions lol

[brookheimer]

what a fuckin episode huh. im sure everyone is opinion dumping in ur askbox but I NEED TO DO IT TOO.

ok. fuck tom as ceo, to me it made no sense but i think shivs resolution was kinda understandable. to me it honestly felt like she was making a sacrifice? if that makes sense? shes seeing kendall become more and more like their father every second, and roman continually collapsing under what little remains of him. i think she knows she needs to stop it for their sake, even if it means shes becoming her mother. its INSANE to me that people are trying to call her a villain over this. again, despite it all, she fucking loves her brothers, she would absolutely put herself in that position to save them. i think it definitely comes with being the ONLY daughter in the family, having to be the one to make that sacrifice.

idk. im having thoughts and feelings in my peabrain. killing myself in the club rn <3

opiniondump in my inbox as much as u want i fuckin love it fr!

first yeah not the huuuugest fan of tom ceo but honestly i think a) i can’t imagine a “better” ending (i really do think none of the kids should get CEO and who else would it have been then? fucking greg? no thanks) and b) if it had been built up to more in previous episodes (mattson slowly coming around to/eyeing tom, mencken mentioning liking tom, etc. but really the mattson part in particular could and should have been built to throughout the season instead of having him get a lightbulb moment when shiv says tom will suck the biggest dick in the room in the finale) i would like it a lot more. i also think that it would have more meaning thematically if the show continued to emphasize the concept of interlopers the way they did in episode 4 of this season — where all of these random people were trying to act as if they knew logan best etc after his death and all that. i think that while the ‘interlopers’ concept has been a throughline of succession (w tom and greg, willa, marcia, kerry, etc) it kind of fell off in the latter half of this season because there was just so much ground to cover, and the tom win would feel more meaningful to me if there had been some continuous groundwork laid throughout the season rather than trailing off after ep 4. like, tom and greg had no real meaning as interlopers for most of this szn, so much so that i literally had no idea why greg was even fucking there for most of it. i think the show was a lot better at centering that concept and making it interesting in earlier seasons, which is when tom ceo was conceived, but in recent episodes it had fallen by the wayside somewhat which made the ending weaker than it could’ve been in my opinion. succession has always been a show about outsiders, about interlopers, but less and less so with each season as theyve focused inwards into the sibling competition (which is personally my favorite part of the show so yknow no complaints there), but if they were building to a tom ceo end (which they were) it would’ve been beneficial to maintain that commentary rather than sideline it or briefly reference it once in a while. i think one way this could’ve been done is through the wives and consorts — marcia, kerry, willa, tom, etc. there used to be so many interesting parallels drawn between them (remember the family therapy episode with marcia willa and tom talking while the others did ‘therapy’ etc?) but, again, with so much that needed to be done this season, focus on ‘side’ characters petered out. tbh the more i think ab this season the more i feel like it could really have benefited from a few more episodes — not a full season and not one after the finale, but just some more room to cover the things that needed to be covered while making space for the teasing out of certain dynamics, threads, and themes so they wouldn’t be slammed in suddenly in the final episode

that got long sorry but ANYWAYS re: shiv — personally i disagree with the sacrifice take as i feel her decision wasn’t made out of altruism at all, it was pure gut instinct self destructive ‘fuck no anything but this.’ i’ve posted ab this a lot in the past few days so instead of sounding even more like a broken record i’ll just link to some posts here lmao

however i do agree that the ‘villain’ takes are fucking ridiculous and that 99% of the time they’re rooted in that Skylar White Is The Devil brand of misogyny prestige television fans are so susceptible to. she’s not a villain she’s just a fucking person who made an objectively irrational, self-destructive, emotionally fueled choice because she simply could not stomach the alternative — and if someone says they haven’t done the same in their own lives before, they’re lying. straight up. but yeah no thinking of succession in terms of heroes and villains is just about as braindead and media illiterate you can get imo

and yup mass suicide in the club rn babe we r all in it together!!!

[mcl38]

so like ignoring the part abt the silly reasons to hate zak bc as ive said before i find that valid and funny, imagine missing the point so bad....

'Ultimately we weren't getting the results that we needed and we're a year-and-a-half into this,' Brown told Fox Motorsport host Jess Yates at the Bathurst 1000. 'We've all tried extremely hard, we love Daniel, he's great to work with and continues to be great to work with. 'But we're in the results business and the results weren't coming and we felt we tried everything. 'We don't really know why it didn't click, it's kind of nobody's fault. We gave it our best. He gave it his best ... we just kind of ran out of things to try.' (...) 'But my job, along with Andreas (Seidl), is to make the tough decisions and because we didn't really see progress happening, it was like, 'Well I think we just need to make a change for both of our sakes and hopefully get him in the situation where he can be competitive again and in a Formula One car wherever he ends up racing', but (it's been) a huge disappointment.' 

i genuinely dont understand how this stuff is 'doing daniel dirty' and 'painting daniel as totally incompetent'?? like as a ceo obvs he doesnt have the specificity in his language that an engineer would have but this quote is pretty much what he says almost every time - we really did try our best, we know daniel tried his best, but there's something going on between daniel and the car and we know it's not productive or pleasant for either us or him to keep trying to make this happen. and he also usually adds stuff like how hes still a big fan of daniel or 'has a soft spot' for him or about how monza was obvs zak's first (and only) win at mclaren. which - how is all that not reasonable?

like genuine question - do u think if daniel was still at mclaren in 2023 would he have been so seriously considered by red bull as a possible replacement for checo (knock on wood)? and a bit more meanspirited of a question - considering the fact that in 2021 and 2022 mclaren only barely missed out on 3rd and 4th in the wcc respectively, do you think if daniel was still at mclaren in 2023 that mclaren would've reached 4th ahead of aston? i think its just so clearly for the best for both parties and i think i can afford to say that especially now w the retrospective knowledge that its not in fact daniels f1 doom and he DOES get back on the grid very soon after being dropped

anyways if any of u talk about twinks in the tags of my posts again ur getting blocked jsyk this is my last warning. #justsayfag

[rotshop]

hiyaaa !! this request might sound a little weird but how would deimos react to a vampire!reader who has big bat wings and/or could shapeshift into a bat ? ::0 sorry if this rq sounds weird lol-

ITS NOT WEIRD AT ALL !! u are talking 2 the wlfgrl bitch no non-standard reader is weird 2 me ,,,, sorr y the wings / bat things aren't a SUPER big element here X[ ,,

[ some violence against reader (by aahw agents) ]

-ok . lets say hypothetically for the sake of the argument you were just some random experiment at the facility deimos was stationed in during his time with the agency. At first, he just kinda views you from afar with pity tbh . He hates the way you thrash or hiss at any of the soldats or scientists around and the way they back you into corners and the way you'll make runs for it only to get caught within seconds and thrown to the ground and-

-It's safe to say he finds himself being distressed over it for longer than he thought he really would. Maybe its just because he happens to be posted around the area you're usually in most times, maybe its just random chance- all he knows is he can't help but watch while biting his cheek in anxiety at the sight.

-Eventually he feels like hes about to explode if he doesn't do something. Sure, he can't exactly just make a run for it with you (they'd kill the both of you before you could even step outside), but .. hopefully, he can give you something worthwhile. It starts out small, whenever you pass he'll try and give you something of a reassuring smile (he can't help the way his heart breaks when you noticeably tense up or shift back at the sight of his sharp teeth, misinterpreting it as malicious or mocking) or some other non-verbal little 'hey this sucks but just try to get through it please.'

-Nobody really even notices it other than you, to the point they get confused when you're staring back at him while you continue down the hall. Sure, he might get caught a few times, expression falling to more of a grimace at the withering glare one of the soldats at your side sends him but fuck it, nobody here's been his biggest fan anyway.

-Through some sort of dumb luck, he figures out a time where he can visit you without anyone else bugging you or asking him what he's doing. sure, it's late at night and he's usually dead tired by then, but he still visits you regularly. the first few times, you'd backed away from the door, mentally preparing yourself for whatever vile thing he was about to throw your way. it's mostly one sided conversation- him sitting cross legged on the floor while he goes on about his day, telling you what he seen earlier that day or heard of. if he lies a little bit it really doesn't mean anything, does it? i mean, could you blame him for stretching the truth a little when you're slowly inching your way towards him with interest.

-It becomes something of a bonding experience, he'll come tell you about his day and you'll occasionally return the favor in kind. Though, you'd usually talk about something other than your day. You didn't like the way he'd grimace or scowl whenever you recalled some unpleasant little test or move an agent had made. He didn't particularly like how you'd awkwardly trail off and stare at the floor in thought whenever you recalled the events of the day, too lost in your thoughts to really react to whatever he could even try and say.

-Eventually, he'll start asking questions about your wings. He'll admit, he'd always had some kind of a curiosity about them but ... he didn't exactly wanna start off whatever relationship the two of you had by talking about the things you were poked and prodded at for all day. he doesn't push his luck too much- just asking a few light-hearted little questions about what they can do and if they feel comfortable to you. If he jokingly asks if you sleep upside down to get you to half-laugh-half-scoff at him than who knows, maybe it was just curiosity. he does his best to be mindful (if anything, a little too much. it's an appreicated gesture but it's a little Silly for him to quickly look away whenever he so much as glances at them), but ... he might make a request or two here-and-there. you can still recall how he'd held his tongue for a long moment, giving them a cautious look as he repeatedly started and stopped speaking over and over. Eventually, between the stammering and fidgeting, he'd managed to ask a simple enough question.

-"You mind if I touch them?"

-Luckily for him (and his nerves) you nod. He's still careful when he reaches through the bars of the shoddy little cell they keep you in to brush up against them. He can't help the way he smiles and perks up when you lean into his touch. Maybe at a certain point his thoughts shift from curiosity to tracing along the sections and segments purely because you seem to enjoy it- not like you'd ever know, of course. Maybe if you oh so happen to fall asleep he hesitates for a long moment before slowly pulling his hand away to take his leave, biting back a smile (pointlessly, it's evidently there) at the way you huff from the lack of contact. Maybe he can't help but stare up at the ceiling for a good long while after the fact, mind never drifting from the memory of the moment (and plenty others before it) as he fidgets with the thin blanket pulled over himself. Maybe he puts his hands over his face and groans as it hits him just how head over heels he is.

-It continues on like this for a while longer, he'd wait till late at night to come visit you, you'd talk for a while until he had to go or you fell asleep, he'd go back to his quarters to sleep, rinse and repeat. It gives him something to look forward to that isn't riddled with the same anxiety and stress escaping from this place is. He's just able to sit down and breath for a moment with you, not having to worry about anyone getting on his ass or anything. It's nice- therapeutic, even. He just hopes that it's just as beneficial for you. He at least hopes thats why you'll excitedly look his way or shuffle towards the bars whenever you hear him coming. Of course, though, there was bound to be a hiccup or two along the way.

-To make a long story i simply can't write short; you get found out. You'd both been talking when you'd picked up on the sound of heels on the tiled floors heading towards the both of you, unsure of whether to try and shove Dei away or pull him closer as though you could yank him through the bars and hide him. Of course, neither of these would've worked- it was too late. Perhaps that was why he'd given you a weakly reassuring smile littered with his own fear as he stood and turned in the direction of the other. You'd started to wish you'd shoved him when he'd begun talking, shifting the blame entirely to himself, that you had no part in his visits and it was soley him who made the choice for him to keep coming back (Sure, it was ultimately his choice, but you'd made clear you wanted him to come back with how you'd consistently ask if he'd be back the next day before he left for the night). You could only hope this stranger would take some kind of pity- or at the very least just not want to bother with properly reporting him to the higher ups. It was difficult to tell with the shades (pitch black as opposed to the typical red, it was almost irritating. seriously, who even wears those this late at night? It wasn't uncommon to see agents without their shades during the day, let alone in the dark of night.), but you could only hope the silence he was in was a contemplative one.

-By some stroke of luck, once Deimos had finally stopped rambling on about how you were completely innocent (much to your annoyance), they'd spoken up. They'd reassured they wouldn't say anything to anyone about this, it 'wasn't their business' but that it was late. While you at least had some sort of verbal reassurance to hold onto now, you still couldn't help the dread that'd lingered in the pit of your stomach. You couldn't help how much you wished you could just break the door down and get out of this godforsaken cell when Dei had shot one last weak smile back at you, along with a little 'Hey, I'll see you tomorrow. Alright?' (it only worsened your feelings with the uncertainty that hung under his general tone), before walking away with the other figure.

-Anyway yeah everythings fine obvi lmao. He comes back the next night (with the same company as the previous one) and introduces you to him properly- Sanford. You're still on edge with him, but you're a little too busy freaking out over 'hey you're ok like you're fine right like everything is good right they didn't sell us out for realsies right????' while Dei repeatedly tries to reassure you that YES, he is fine. If he weren't so focused on getting you to calm down he could laugh at seeing you so frazzled. The nights continue on with you two talking, Sanford eventually being incorporated into the conversations with enough of Dei trying to get you two to mutually warm up to one another. It doesn't take long for the talks to go from general, to personal, to your goals. Those goals being a mutually shared one of getting out of here.

-skipping ahead 2 SQ days lol / more general hcs

-please know Dei is ur number one supporter. he can, will, and DOES talk and brag about you constantly. Oh, someone needs to get up to a different floor quickly?? How fortunate that HIS s/o can FLY right up there and cut time so easily huh. Oh, someone can't see something in the dark?? that's crazy, his s/o would toootally be able to tell where these agents are by the smallest little hitch of their breath. it would be more annoying if people knew he mainly does it just to get a rise out of you and because you're important to him.

-If you ever fly him around it's fun until he's digging his nails into your arm because you jokingly loosened your grip on him for a nanosecond. For someone who's flown a helicopter before, he's certainly not a fan of being suspended in the air like this. Don't be mean he WILL cry (read. clutch onto you and whine that he tooootally could've fallen and like, DIED if you weren't more careful mannnn ..... once again, he's just trying to get a rise out of you because he thinks its funny to get on your nerves. just a little bit. a healthy dosage of annoyance <33 /j)

-not literally but he is the werewolf to your vampire does this make any sense. you know what i mean.

-TOTALLY loves it if you're intimidating by any means. Something about the way the blood instantly drains from people's faces once they notice your red eyes in the dark somewhere above him and those huge wings of yours stretching out after they just rejected some work offer of his makes it impossible for him to bite back a grin. he thinks you're sick as FUCK (/pos) and he'll tell you as much afterwards, practically smothering you in kisses while going on about how cool you looked and how you absolutely scared that guy shitless

-if you ever use your wings as a blanket (either for yourself or him) he'll cry and sob so hard. he just leans against the nearest wall like 'ohhh my god i need a minute.' (POSITIVELY he just thinks its cute and it kills him to death)