#not for a side of the argument itself

[tsukana]

theres another universe where q!phil WASNT left behind by forever and bad for that final investigation, where q!phil was there for that federation office argument/explanation, and im so sad we didnt get to see it. Because it absolutely wouldve such an interesting turn to what we got. because we have-

forever, stuck between bad & baghera, whom he still considers himself a trio with, and tubbo, the drive of the investigation and stunning verbal proof of a kidnapping, but no physical. in addition to the personal aspects, he is still president, and might consider that part an obligation of some objectivity

baghera, who has promised bad not to tell, but dont mistake her personal support and loyalty to bad in this for a support of his actions in capturing and keeping WB011 locked away underground. she may be complicit now in onr aspect, but not supportive

phil, who is there having promised tubbo to back him, but dont mistake his support for tubbo as support for the federation. phil who respects bad and knows he would do anything to keep all of the eggs safe and bring them back. phil who bad in turn respects for taking in an egg who has become his own (he gets the feeling) and knows would do anything to keep them safe.

i dont remember where i was going with this fully but like. i feel like the addition to someone who in the conversation was solidly on q!tubbos side out of personal loyalty the way a!baghera was for q!bad wouldve made the scene a lot more even? if not interesting if only because i genuinely cant figure to what extent phil mightve joined in from cc!phil being tired af, or phil definitely being more anti-federation than ambivalent like tubbo is (aside from flying in the face of create rules and other general limitations), or also just because we definitely havent seen the full impact of cucurucho and the federation fucking gaslighting q!phil into thinking what happened with the birdhouse was a dream, and literally still feeling like he's unable to tell apart if something is reality or a dream

[titleofpersonage-p01]

[annyankers]

I’m once again irrationally mad about how people complain about the magic metaphors in buffy work (the whole dark magic=addiction, wicca = gay shit thing).

Like I cannot express how frustrating it is to see people bitching about how things like Dark Willow “don’t make sense” because “magic/Wicca was a originally metaphor for queerness“ or whatever as tho the first two major episodes in the series where magic was used (1x3 “Witch” and 2x8 “Dark Ages” ) weren’t all about the dark/inappropriate/destructive/abusive use of magic.

People loooooooveeeeee Giles’ past as Ripper and delight over things like “Band Candy” where we see him go Full Ripper but cannot for the life of them seem to remember that we first even LEARNED ABOUT THAT PART OF HIM IN DARK AGES WHERE HE TALKED ABOUT BASICALLY MAGICALLY PARTYING SO HARD HIS FRIEND DIED. THIS IS OUR FIRST MAJOR CHARACTER EPISODE THAT’S GOT MAGIC AS A MAIN FOCAL ELEMENT! THIS IS THE ORIGINAL METAPHOR!

The queerness is still kinda baked in there because of the Ethan Of It All but it’s first and foremost a metaphor about like, all the shit that classically leads to substance abuse and the worst outcomes that can come from it. Willow and Tara are an example of the “good” side of magic ( I’ll say Jenny is also in this section but they do so fucking little w/ her technopagan-ness so). They’re also pretty explicitly said to be “Wiccans” which I also have some issues with because of how Wicca is portrayed/talked about in the show (the Silver RavenWolf energy of it all is so galling). But like, that’s literally a whole fucking different subsection/practice of witchcraft/magic. This is like getting mad at water polo for muddling the metaphor of jet skiing. Like yes, they both are water sports but I think you’ll that they’re not the same fucking one and work completely differently.

Magic is not just 1 set of spells and rituals, it’s a multifaceted, multilayered, multi-pathed thing. With Giles we see how it can go Very Wrong and with Willow and Tara in S4-5 we see how it can go Very Right (and how it can be used to help get the Gay in the show around the Fox Censors). Willow increasingly having issues with magic/substance abuse is NOT a mixed metaphor/bad writing/ruining the gay metaphor and implying gays are bad. It’s USING THE OTHER ALREADY ESTABLISHED MAGIC METAPHOR AS PART OF HER CHARACTER ARC. WILLOW CAN BE QUEER AND ALSO HAVE A SUBSTANCE ABUSE ISSUE! GILES ARGUABLY DID IT FIRST ANYWAY (again, the Ethan Of It All)!

Willow has ALWAYS been insecure, a lil bit of a control freak, someone who wants to be HER REAL SELF and also someone TOTALLY DIFFERENT. Like she wants to be Willow but only if it’s a Willow who’s better/cooler/stronger/prettier etc. Someone who’s not the “pathetic loser” she still sees herself as even in season 6 and hasn’t totally shaken in season 7. These desires both to feel more In Control/Better and Not Yourself are classic reasons people will turn to substance abuse. For Willow is it MUCH easier to do a wizard spell to “fix” a problem than it is to like, fucking confront her issues of self-loathing and self-worth and like.... go to therapy. And that’s what gets her in trouble just like it has for so many others before her. Like in many ways Dark/Addict Willow is like seeing Giles’ Ripper Era live and on screen plus maybe a lil bit on steroids.

Magic can be used as part of more than 1 metaphor and the substance abuse metaphor came first. Stop pretending like it never existed in the show until season 6.

[the-duke-of-dick]

[thedevilandhisbride]

how will we ever get the spark to wonder, question, and think deeply about art when someone says a prompt or two into a generator, and out comes a painting that doesnt mean anything, because nobody took the time to tell a story within it? how can anybody do that if the art has no meaning like with ai art? when it isnt meticulously crafted by the complex mind of a creative human?

you cant tell an ai to convey the hurt and betrayal of a mortal against their own hubris as they fall off of the high horse they pitched themselves upon the way that a human would, because ai isnt human. it will never be human. and to compare ai art to human art and call them equals is dehumanization, and it strips art of every power it has ever had across the whole of human history.

[strike-another-match]

personally i feel the "you didn't actually make that" accusation against AI artists is normally, if not always, justified. i think it is possible to use any medium to make art, and that includes transformative art (like blackout poetry or collage) but - and this is a big but ‼️ - you have to contribute something of your own to it if you want others to look at it and agree that the artwork is at least partially yours

so in the end if you want authorship, you need control, and if you want control, you need skill. when someone with no knowledge of the visual arts types some words into a prompt box and gets a nice image, that image is nice precisely because the machine (in reality, the authors of the artwork the machine was trained with) took all the artistic decisions for them. that is why we say "you didn't actually make that"!

open the door for more user control and, akin to letting a passenger fly a plane, you will end up with a wreck - unless that person is willing to learn what they need to learn to be entrusted with those decisions. so what i'm trying to say is: you can use AI to make art, but it will take a similar set of skills and a similar amount of time to make than it would take to make any other kind of art

(of course, not everyone cares about this, and that's fine. this post is exclusively about the people that seek to claim artistic authorship of images generated through AI tools)

[screenviolense]

watching a movie that is giving me flashbacks to the worst experience i've ever had with assigned reading

[vulturevanity]

My lukewarm take is that while A:tlA did most of what it set out to do impeccably, "what it set out to do" was never really that good or groundbreaking

[cats-in-the-clouds]

it’s important to try very hard to be as patient and understanding and reasonable as possible and i tell myself aw c’mon how hard can it really be to just chill out and be nice? but every now and it hits me again how we’re all being subjected to a mass gaslighting campaign and then i’m like ah that’s why i’m exhausted deep in my soul all the time. i’m being made to think i’m utterly insane for wanting words to have actual meanings so maybe that makes me a bit cranky y’know

[x-birdsong-x]

@lockandkeyhyena said it first. Halloween Ends is.. something.

Spoilers in tags

[inkskinned]

no, actually, where is the whimsy?

my ex had a best friend named larry who asked me once: what do you think comes after irony?

we were at the bar where larry worked. it was a quiet night, and he'd hopped over to sit with us on the patron side. i swirled the lemon around my limoncello martini.

earnest positivity, i said, while my ex said, art self-destructs.

i stared at my ex. he stared at me.

his argument was the cinemasins argument: look how bad media is becoming! look at the loopholes and the dumb shit!

it was roughly 2011. galaxy print was still in. at the time, i had a favorite shirt that was a wolf howling at the moon. it got ripped in half in the wash and i honestly still mourn it. i dressed like effie stonem, because everyone did. and irony was the name of the thing. men liked MLP "ironically." the internet liked the kind of crass, "anti-mainstream" vibes of things like fuck romance, touch my butt and buy me pizza. we put cats in sunglasses everywhere, which was because we only liked things in irony.

and media had the same vibe in it: anti-hero white men would be "hard to love" and then storm off the scene. nobody was just earnestly trying to save the world: they were jaded, angry, unoriginal. mad you even asked them to try to help.

my ex ends up not being wrong. cinemasins becomes super popular. a lot of people start viewing media with this lens that is the cruelest, most jaded depiction. it's wrong for your character to have unexplained powers, even if the entire movie is about how strange it is she has unexplained powers - that is still considered a "loophole." characters make thoughtless, panicked choices? loophole. characters are actually kind people, despite hardship? loophole. features a woman doing literally anything without assistance? loophole. movies become hyper-aware of scrutiny, and now irony rules the media.

which means you go to a movie, and the character has to turn to the screen and say "beats me!!" or one of the side characters has to have some kind of quip like "are you seriously telling me that you think this is normal?" because nothing can happen in earnest. like a sitcom laugh track, we now anticipate the fourth-wall break: the moment that the media acknowledges it is telling a story. the media has to apologize for itself, or else someone like my ex rolls their eyes.

but here's the thing: i wasn't wrong either.

the difference might be that i am (and always have been) so soft-hearted that any crack in the light of this world will spear me into the ground. and i was the poet in the relationship. (he thought that was the same thing as being naïve and stupid). i was making things daily. i knew how all of us artists are driven by some strange desire to evolve. he notably liked to critique art, not to create it.

so yes, i've made things that are bitter and angry and even ironic. i've made long, sharp poems with all capital letters, and i've made poems about how the silence stretches out like a song. someone wrote once that we will spend our whole lives just circling the place we grew up. i think it's more that we spend our whole lives trying to remake a home. i think it's that as we age, it becomes less exciting to build the castle on the beach - we become aware of erosion, of windforce. we realize what we really want is to come home to our dog, castle or not.

and while art in the foreground is mired in white male violence and irony, and aggression, and not taking anything seriously - i don't think that's true of all art. i think more and more artists are leaning in to the things we love. the world has changed so much. they have taken so many things from us. the only thing we have left is love. at the bottom of the moving box - all we get is the faint sense that we have to appreciate what little we've got. i can't enjoy this stuff ironically anymore: what room do i have for irony? if it makes me happy, that is an amazing thing. there are so few happy places left for me. i want to be happy because of how leaves shiver beside each other like nestling birds. i want to be happy because of the color pink, and how magenta doesn't exist. i have spent so much of this life suffering, i have earned my right to a gentle ending. if nothing matters, i get to assign meaning to the nothing. i get to create meaning. i am an artist first and foremost, which means creation is my thing.

where is the whimsy? wherever i fucking put it. because if this is my last fucking chance to do any good in this world - i want to do it earnestly. i want to write things that make you happy. that make people feel heard and seen. what comes after irony has to be positivity.

it was close to my 21st birthday. in 7 years, i would end up writing a book about this relationship, which is hopefully coming out somewhere around May 2024. i come back to this bar scene in my memories a lot. i keep thinking of how pale my ex was. the look that crossed his face. how i looked back at him. how for a moment, both of us couldn't recognize the other person. like the gulf between us was a suddenly wide and cavernous thing. like we were alien to each other. he never took my opinion seriously, and he always seemed surprised whenever his manic-pixie-dream-girl ever broke free of the plot. like in the whole time we were together, i wasn't human enough.

this knowledge: where he said nothing comes after, my only instinct was what comes after is love.

[risuola]

YOU CRYIN'? — F. READER x GOJO SATORU

You and Gojo know each other since high school, and since then, you also hate each other. He bites and you always bite back, the constant argument creates tension that everybody, except you two, seem to notice. One time you said too much, causing Gojo’s self-control to snap.

cw: smut, unprotected sex, creampie, cursing, mentions of bullying (Satoru is a meanie, ok?), overstimulation, enemies to lovers kind of vibe, I feel like the "you cryin'?" line in itself is a warning if you heard the dub version of it, reader discretion is advised — 1,4k words

» PART TWO

"You cryin'?", Satoru taunted, thrusting his hips relentlessly into yours, with a handful of your hair in his unforgiving grip. Standing behind you, with one hand digging into the supple flesh of your side to steady himself, he was pounding behavior into you.

You and Satoru Gojo have a history of never-ending venom-spitting and it's safe to say you hated the man and the man hated you with passion for years now. It started in high school, where you just couldn't stand how full of himself he was, looking at everybody from above as if he was so much better than everyone and yes, you are aware of how powerful of an individual he is but the arrogance that came with it was just unbearable. Much more you liked his closest friend Suguru, but as years passed, you found yourself working closely with Gojo more and more often, because you decided to stay at Jujutsu high in Tokyo to help students learn. You were strong enough to be considered a high 1st grade sorcerer and everything you achieved, you earned by hard work and stubbornness but that didn’t stop the know-it-all from bullying you, no. He had an awful habit of pouring more fuel into the constant fire of argument between you two and you never owed him, always biting back. That being said, your constant bickering with Satoru successfully brought you to where you were now.

Pressed against the wooden desk, sweaty and exhausted as your body was chasing the fourth orgasm with no break in between. It was a torture – the way he was slamming his cock inside of you at the pace that left you breathless, it hurt from overstimulation and burned with pleasure at the same time. You always acted tough, but now you couldn't stop the tear rolling down your cheek as his grip on your hair tightened and his teeth sank into the delicate skin between your neck and shoulder.

"You’re really cryin’”, he grinned teasingly and turned your head more to the side, kissing the tear away. Delighted at the sight, Satoru pulled back and flipped you over so he could see your pretty face when he pushed his girth back onto your swollen insides, kissing every oversensitive spot on his way while hooking your thighs over his hips. You dug fingers into his skin, leaving crescent moon shapes of your nails engraved into his flesh and you once again could feel his pace picking up. Naively, you grabbed at his hip, trying to slow him down but with no effect.

"So pretty, fuck, when you cry like that," he grunted, kissing along the salty trace on your face and down your neck to see the bruising mark of his teeth was already blooming with reds and purples. "Think you have few more in you?", he asked and the thought of few more orgasms terrified you. "You'll have to, 'm nowhere near to be done, wit' ya," a chuckle echoed in his chest and you couldn't tell if his objective was to kill you in the most humiliating way possible or what.

"N-no," you protested and he laughed once more, pulling out almost completely.

"No?", Satoru grined in his usual, annoyingly handsome manner but you barely saw him through the collage of stars in your sight, "'ts too bad you've been naughty lately. Need to fuck some behavior into you."

"Gojo-", you whined, helpless against his muscular body as he was ramming ruthlessly, abusing your swollen oversensitive insides to your limits.

"Nuh-uh", he wrapped his slender fingers around your throat, putting no pressure, but redirecting your head so you looked him in the eyes and you could drown in the crystalline blue tones surrounded by thick snowy eyelashes if you wouldn't know better. "That's not my name, sweetheart."

"Go to hell, Goj-, fuck", you whined and he thrusted harder, your back was slamming against the wooden counter but he was unbothered by the echoing pounding sound that clearly was indicating what was happening in his office.

"That's. not. my. name.", he growled, accentuating every word with a particularly sharp thrust and it was enough for you to drown in the haziness.

"Sa-, uh", you tried, but his pace was unforgiving, his cock fucking you dumb but he hummed teasingly, encouraging you to speak. "'toru- fuck. Satoru, please."

"There we go, wasn't that hard now, was it?", smiling, the sorcerer lifted you up, angling his hips upwards, his cock reaching even deeper although you thought it's impossible. The blunt head kissed every spot inside you and you felt another orgasm approaching. Satoru groaned at how your walls were flexing around his girth and this time, he chased his own, the first one, the one he's been denying himself in order to drive you insane.

He was panting heavily, groaning against your neck, profanities slipping through his mouth as he twitched inside you. Suddenly he grabbed you harshly, nails digging into your trembling thighs and he lowered himself on the expensive leathery chair, giving you a slap to the tender skin, silently ordering you to work. You straddled him, supporting your hands over his shoulders and you pushed him against the back rest, surely bruising his muscles with the harsh grip you had on him. You were desperate to finish him off, to put an end to the torture he’s subjected you to for talking too much. At this point you don’t even remember what caused his composure to snap, what has gotten you into the endless spiral of agonizing pleasure with a man you despised. The man that now you were riding with the last bits of your power, fighting the mind-numbing rush of your own release to bring him to his and you could tell how close he was. Satoru’s jaws were clenched, his fingers were digging harshly into the tender skin of your sides and his hips were bucking up uncontrollably, desperate to reach the blissful relief. His abs were flexing, cock was twitching and his tone became ragged as he groaned what sounded like your name entwined with endless amounts of fucks and yeses. His eyes closed shut and he threw his head back, suddenly overwhelmed by the feeling that began uncoiling in his entire body. You grabbed at his white hair, smearing open mouthed kisses all over his throat and collar bones, and your movements stuttered with your dripping pussy squelching for the nth time. That was enough for Satoru – he gave in, allowing his muscles to contract one last time as he spilled his load into you, filling you completely with warmth and you were quick to come right after him. Your ups and downs became sloppy, uneven as you slowly ride your highs out and finally, you raised your hips just enough to have him out.

Falling back heavily against his body, you leaned your head over his shoulder in hopes to calm the panting. You felt your heart drumming against your ribcage, you felt the concoction of juices running down your thigh and dripping onto Satoru’s legs, but you couldn’t care less. With his hands releasing your flesh that he was squeezing unwaveringly, you felt your body finally relaxing, your mind coming back to senses and it slowly came to you, what just happened.

Never, not even once in your life, you considered even willing to kiss Gojo Satoru. Yes, he’s annoyingly handsome; yes, his eyes are the most beautiful, magical blue crystalline spheres nature could ever create, and yes – there was a tension between you two since the day you met him, or at least everyone around always pointed that out but you never truly considered him an option and yet, you not only kissed him, but spend god-knows-how-long fucking him – or rather being fucked by him.

“You have to misbehave more often”, he teased, finally able to form his words coherently and you looked at him, eyes still cloudy but you could tell with no mistake that his lips were curled up in a smirk. You almost heard him smirking, that’s how obvious it was. You blinked, clearing your vision to take in his view. Gojo’s face was blissfully tired, he still was breathing though his mouth and the snowy peaks of his hair clung artistically to his sweaty forehead. He was stunning like this, so fucked out, he looked like he’s high and you took few mental pictures of his handsome daze. You also noted to yourself that you, indeed, need to misbehave more frequently.

» PART TWO

[hxltic]

ghost yellin pt. 2!! (and 2k followers. omg.)

(mention of blood n knives n stuff in here)

pt. 1~~~

It was still early in the morning when your puffy eyes blink open. Despite the mission that had your arrival around 3-ish in the morning, it was still the crack of dawn, which meant the start of your day, mission or not.

The warmth you had longed for encased you, but today, it felt unfamiliar.

You hadn’t forgotten about yesterday (or earlier today). And even though what happened upset you, you’d still wanted him, so you could feel the comfort your father never gave you after an argument. You’d never received a genuine apology from him, just an offer for new shoes or to go to your favorite restaurant that day.

Even in anguish after what he did, you still wanted his touch. Or that may have been what you thought, because now you were peeling his strong arms off you, and creeping to the bedside. You cautiously swing your legs over and slowly step to the door, but even though you were going unbelievably slow, the pain underneath your feet made you wince.

“Wait—”

There’s a gruff voice that your back is turned to, making you jump at the realization he was awake. You had been taught all your life to fight when your fight or flight response flickers, but he noticed how you almost bolted towards your room.

He had been awake the whole time. He’d vouched to himself he wouldn’t close his eyes until your breaths were regular again, but even after they had, he’d barely gotten any sleep. If he had tears left to cry, one would’ve slipped.

Whenever he did fall to the night, in any circumstance, his body physically would prevent him from staying such. He was a light sleeper to another extreme. His body was trained by none other than trauma and instinct. So when he felt you raising his arm, he’d awakened and watched you do everything silently.

He would’ve said something, but he didn’t know what. An apology would sound fake in this situation.

Ghost was a hands-on man, so he moved. His large body flipped the covers off him and hastily brought itself to you.

The last time you’d let him get close, he screamed in your face. You took an involuntary step back, but had you thought about it you probably would’ve taken it anyway. His quick steps pause.

He gazes into your frozen eyes, glistening and pretty even in upset, but underneath carrying fear and shock.

Seeing him, one side of you wanted to apologize for not taking your job seriously, even though you did, or say you were sorry for the other things he mentioned. And you may have when you were 13, but you were a strong woman that built off men’s bullshit over the years, so you hold your ground.

He shrunk himself and moved effectively before you. No unnecessary movements.

“Please. Wait.”

You could tell he was trying to make his voice soft, but the octave and accent just did not allow it. He was trying though.

Do you book it, or stay?

You stay, to hear him. He recognizes your stance as one specifically military-taught, ready to move.

“I didn’t mean to yell at you. I should’ve been better,” he started. You’d come to realize even with small issues, he was an okay apologizer. “I’m sorry. You’re the last person who deserved that.”

He inspected the way you heard him but just stood there awkwardly. You were never awkward around him. In fact, he was the awkward one.

His heart dropped at how visibly uncomfortable you looked. He wanted to touch you—to take all your problems away, but it wouldn’t work this time. Not when he was the problem.

Ghost was the type of person to do anything for you, anything to get you back. You were the only one who saw him as Simon now, ever since the others died or were killed. He ruined that.

He let the mask get the best of him, finally turning into the murderous, scary man the world sees him as, everyone but you. You’d never been afraid of him, and he himself had changed that.

So in the silence he scans your beautiful eyes again, the brightness they usually reflect gone and replaced. You blink at him like a puppy. A small, scared puppy.

He’d made you cry. He’d made you cry.

He wasn’t expecting forgiveness, or your usual unconditional love, but the silence was too much to bear. He knows what he did, but he genuinely has no idea how he could make it up to you. Once you realize the conversation was over, and that’s all he had to say, you turn your head and limp past the doorway to your room. You were going to cry again.

But that was far from what he wanted to say.

He didn’t realize it when a tear of his own bundled up under his blonde eyelashes, a feeling so rare that people’s jokes about him being a robot could seem true. It had been so long, but watching you sadly walk away from him was enough.

The door was wide open, but he stood there, feeling more useless than he ever had.

These were the times he wished his mother was here. To tell him what to do. To spread the emotional knowledge of loving someone so much it pained you, something she had perfected over the years. Instead, he picked up the brutalities of his father. And he will never forgive him for that.

. .

You’d avoided him for an entire day, almost two, despite being in such close proximity and having to do everything with the squad. He didn’t know whether to leave you be or try again and again. Ultimately, he picked the first. That didn’t mean there weren’t subtle things to get your attention though.

He couldn’t think about yelling again. But it was only at you. So everyone else was graced with their lieutenant in a worse mood than he’s usually in, but they wouldn’t dare ask what was up or say anything to you. Actually, they had barely spoken to you like they had orders not to.

Ghost was rarely in the common room anyway, but now he was really tucked away in his quarters. He preserved his words, though even then they were still snappy. He had an attitude, yes, but he’d come to his senses enough to reflect and prevent himself from saying anything potentially hurtful.

He’d cherished the moments you had no choice but to be close to him a lot more than before, and his voice was barely even the tone of regular speech. Because now, he was scared.

He’d seen how bad relationships can turn, and it doesn’t help it was the man he’s seen all his life ruining what a woman gave him. He doesn’t want to be like that. And if he already has been, he tries to calm himself at night by running through his head “you’re already better than him by trying to fix it,” like a mantra. He’s cried the nights without you. He felt like he was floating away all the time, away from the Earth and the people around him. He barely knows himself anymore.

Little does he know, the time spent without him converted your sadness to anger. Rage.

He has the audacity to scream in your face? After all you do for him? After you put your life on the fucking line and take bullets for him every day?

With your father, it never did convert to anger, because you refused to let it. Being a child, you were way too dependent on him emotionally and physically. He was still your dad, you’d think.

And yes, while you loved Simon, there wasn’t the biological connection to pressure you to him. He was just a man. And if there’s anything you learned yourself, it was that you wouldn’t be pushed around by one.

So the day progressed on with an assignment. The troops were sent out, Ghost in charge.

He had made an order to surround the building, stay hidden in tall grass. A few would push in. They were armed and dangerous.

His voice was loud through the comms, going directly through the headset clear as day. Your team pressed forward alongside his. He had made every order around the fact that you needed to be right next to him, always in view, so he could keep his watchful eye out.

You crouched around the corner, waiting for command. You whisper in mic to your own squad, instructing them to watch for third-party while everyone’s idle.

The second he calls it, you all infiltrate right after smoke grenades set off. It was quickly cleared of the criminal within a few minutes because there weren’t many to take out, just a few in nooks and crannies, but one of them had caught you through a closet door. It had small blinded windows in it.

A quick sharp pain let you know there was a knife drilled into your side. It was small, and could be a lot deeper, but it still hurt like a bitch.

You had taken worse, so you gunned him down with a swift turn and ignored it. The adrenaline was medicine.

Once everyone returned to base with evac, people noticed the spot of red on your uniform but brushed it off as a battle scar. Until they saw the knife. It would be stupid to remove it.

“That looks pretty bad, you should get that patched up,” someone says. Someone you didn’t know, probably from another unit. You refrain from saying no shit and keep walking to the infirmary.

You finally decide remove it with added pressure to the wound, keeping the gauze close and the slim slit through your skin tight. The adrenaline was wearing off now and everything started to come back to you. You groan loudly when you touch it.

Red stains your fingers. It wasn’t deep but it had to be pulled out, and standing would be hard. You sit to see what you were doing.

“Fuck!” you yell.

The pain was ten times worse when you sat down, the fold of your body at the hip right underneath the opening. You feel like you could imagine the knife scraping other parts of your insides.

Suddenly the door opens. No one other than Ghost stands there, fully in gear, searching for the source of the cry. Once he locates you, you barely hear him murmur “bloody hell.” You glance up at him, then back down to what you were doing. He tries to ignore the equivalent stab in his heart at that, the one that matched the way his face drops at the sight of you. You would be able to see the white of his eyes through the mask if you’d look at him.

You were unconsciously trembling, attempting to mentally prepare yourself to pull the knife out slow. The man before you just watched.

“Get out,” you demanded.

“No,” he calmly replies. Once again, barely above a whisper, but heavy with accent.

You visibly roll your eyes and continue picking at the knife, trying to find the easiest way to retrieve it. Of course Ghost would take this time to be near you when you can’t run away from him.

He removes his gloves and opens the cabinets beside him, getting peroxide and other medical things. He walks to you with them in hand, and you bring it upon yourself to completely ignore him.

He steadily drops to a knee in front of you so you see eye to eye. You hiss when you pull at one side and it doesn’t work.

Softly, he breaks the silence, “When did this happen?”

No response. He was looking you dead in the eyes despite how horrible at eye contact he usually is.

“When did-“

“Earlier, Lieutenant.” You speak. He knows this was you digging at him. It worked, but he brushes it off.

He reaches his bare hands rid of the supplies up to help you. He was mad at nobody other than himself for not being there.

“Stop,” you shoo his hand away, tending back to your wound. Even though he wanted to help, he backed off.

To be honest, you had no idea what you were doing, and he’d probably had this happen a thousand times. He was inevitably better at medical anything compared to you.

“How did it happen?” He waits. Wasting time talking to him will have you bleeding out. The knife was a little under halfway visible.

“I was taking my job seriously, Lieutenant.”

He cringes at the words he’s shameful to call his own. He wants nothing more than for you to at least be on speaking terms with him, but even that he knows he doesn’t deserve. He sighs deeply.

“I’m sorry, let me help you. Please,” he begs.

“I don’t want your help, and you don’t want mine. So we can keep it that way.”

What he said that night was far from true; you did more than just help him. He was dependent on you. He surveys the way you hiss at the straining feeling, attempting to take deep breaths between tugs, but only making it worse. He won’t let everything you’re throwing at him break him down in this state.

“Grab it from the top, do it all at once. Then stop the blood immediately.”

You huff in annoyance at his words, causing yourself pain from your own irritation. But, he did know what he was doing, so you followed the orders. He inspects you.

You tug on the knife with a painful deep breath and moan at the pain, shutting your eyes. The view alone gives Simon whatever you’re feeling tenfold.

It only goes up about a centimeter. It hurt so bad though, your breaths were heavy and enhancing the stinging sensation. Your audible whimper was enough for the man in front of you to take action.

You almost forgot how mad you were at him from the pain, so when his hands reached up to you, you just let them. His right applied pressure to the sides. He couldn’t care that it stained his rough, pale hands. The left rests on your hand planted on the seat, then he instructs you to lay down. It’ll avoid scratching any more areas inside by stretching out.

“Relax. It’ll hurt, but you got it.”

You don’t respond to this, and stare up at the ceiling. You still didn’t want to look at him.

Simon has to remember you were still fairly untouched in comparison to his background in the military, the scars and scratches proof to where he’s been. He’s not used to being gentle. He’s around grown men for god’s sake.

And while he knows you’re strong, he wishes someone took the time to allow him some vulnerability back then.

You’re on your back, awaiting his next move. He hovers over you.

“I’mna to count to three, alright? I know you can do it.”

You blink, but he knows you can hear him. Somehow it hurts worse to breathe so your chest runs shallow.

“One,” he starts.

Were you ready? He was going to-

You scream loud enough to have the entire base questioning what was going on before he gets to three, but Simon’s face doesn’t falter from his soft expression as he accurately rips the object out of you. Your hands subconsciously reach for his, then grip him with a pure strength you didn’t even know you possessed. You yelled a long line of curses with tears pricking at the corners of your eyes until it all ended as fast as it came.

You were heaving and your face was hot, sweat gathering along your hairline.

“There you go,” he praises, his movements were quick and efficient. The tape was being placed over the filled injury. “Good girl.”

You were breathless, tired, and red. You wanted to lay down.

“It hurts, Simon,” you whisper.

“I know baby, I know.”

. .

You laid in bed with the dinner one of the soldiers brought you. Simon walks in sometime later, his hand cupped.

“You alright?”

He steps in beside your bed, sitting on the covers. He releases some painkillers right next to the water on your nightstand.

You just nod.

He nods approvingly back, then rests his forearms on his thighs. There’s an uncomfortable silence. An uncomfortable silence.

The ink on his arm was visible along with the scars he’s carried. Some new, some old. It’s a simple t-shirt that stops at the bicep, but he never likes to have his arms out because he’s never comfortable with them showing.

“I just wanted to say—”

“I…don’t want to hear it.” You shut him down.

“Please?”

His ocean eyes survey yours for some type of mercy, some hint you’ll hear him out again. He has concluded that he can speak, but the worst that can happen is you’ll stop listening. You can’t really walk away.

And this was the first time his please seemed to end with a question mark.

“I didn’t mean to yell, but I did, and it hurt you. Even though I just aided you, I did it as a partner. Not just a comrade. You are great at what you do, but you mean a lot more to me than just business—I love you, because you see me differently than everyone else.”

Knowing Simon, it probably did take him the whole day and a half to come up with that and relay it. This tugged your heart strings a little, but then it all came back to you.

“On top of calling me useless you yelled in my face. What were you so angry for anyway?”

Truthfully, he felt that had he told you the real reason, It’d make him look worse. But you deserved it.

“One of the soldiers in another unit looked into my background. Found out about an old mission and the people behind it.”

You hadn’t known much about Simon’s life, because he never talks about it, but you knew enough. It was the mission where he was set up. Betrayed.

You would be pissed too.

But his head hung low in shame, angry that he let an old part of him rekindle in the form of fury. He let out said fury on you.

“Regardless, it was uncalled for. Just think on it, yeah?” He pleads. He’s not sure what he’s telling you to think on, though he doesn’t know the active status of your relationship. But he understands how degrading what he did was, and he’ll never forgive himself for it.

But you already had an answer.

“I don’t have to think on it,” you say.

His head whips around, the sadness on his face replaced with shock, and the crinkles coming to form between his brows in confusion. He’d expected the worst, but the worst was what he deserved.

“I’m still very upset. But I don’t hate you. I want you to go to therapy,” you insist.

On the inside, Simon was thrilled. This is the best outcome, better than anything he’d conjured up in his head, and he’d been told a billion times to go to therapy. If it meant being able to hold you again, he’d stay the whole day on a little couch instead of downing prescribed medication that wasn’t working every night.

“I’ll think about what to do from there. But I don’t want it to happen again, because I promise I know what my decision will be the next time,” you declare. He took this message more seriously than he takes Price some days. There was a fire in your eyes to show him how serious you were, and that you’d get up extra close to him just to point your finger in his face if you could.

He understood you hadn’t forgave him, but was giving him some type of redemption. So he could prove himself.

And he was damn good at proving himself worthy of things, hence the Lieutenant in front of his name.

this a lil long. @thesecretwriter @jemandderkeinenusernamenfindet @jjmoonjj @bigmannico @bloodyquillink-blog @boggiesho @earth-to-lottie @e1fade @instantplaiddream @mentallyillartist @stillinracooncity @missborntodiex @rhyanna6012 @hao-ming-8 @starrrchiato @goth-boi-atlas @keiva1000 @pampeop @sleepy-time-dreamy @laurenbenoit70 @tojis-big-daddy-milkers @jstarrs23423 @madameducyberversailles @eri-channnnnnn @schmelscorner @commandertorinshepard @lua83727 @1234ilikecowsthanyoumore @nyannyanmochi020 @p1nkliquor

[caparrucia]

Full offense and pun fully intended, but I genuinely think the very existence of "dead dove, do not eat" was a fucking canary in the mines, and no one really paid attention.

Because the tag itself was created as a response to a fandom-wide tendency to disregard warnings and assume tagging was exaggerated. And then the same fucking idiots reading those tags describing things they found upsetting or disturbing or just not to their taste would STILL click into the stories and give the writer's grief about it.

And as a response writers began using the tag to signal "no, really, I MEAN the tags!"

But like.

If you really think about it, that's a solution to a different problem. The solution to "I know you tagged your story appropriately but I chose to disregard the tags and warnings by reading it anyway, even though I knew it would upset me, so now I'm upset and making it your problem" is frankly a block, a ban and wide-spread blacklisting. But fandom as a whole is fucking awful at handling bad faith, insidious arguments that appeal to community inclusion and weaponize the fact most people participating in fandom want to share the space with others, as opposed to hurting people.

So instead of upfront ridiculing this kind of maladaptive attempt to foster one's own emotional self-regulation onto random strangers on the internet, fandom compromised and came up with a redundant tag in a good faith attempt to address an imaginary nuance.

There is no nuance to this.

A writer's job is to tag their work correctly. It's not to tag it exhaustively. It's not even to tag it extensively. A writer's sole obligation, as far as AO3 and arguably fandom spaces are concerned, is to make damn sure that the tags they put on their story actually match whatever is going on in that story.

That's it.

That's all.

"But what if I don't want to read X?" Well, you don't read fic that's tagged X.

"But what if I read something that wasn't tagged X?" Well, that's very unfortunate for you, but if it is genuinely that upsetting, you have a responsibility to yourself to only browse things explicitly tagged to not include X.

"But that's not a lot of fic!" Hi, you must be new here, yes, welcome to fandom. Most of our spaces are built explicitly as a reaction to There's Not Enough Of The Thing I Want, both in canon and fandom.

"But there are things on the internet that I don't like!" Yeah, and they are also out there, offline. And, here's the thing, things existing even though we personally dislike or even hate or even flat out find offensive/gross/immoral/unspeakable existing is the price we pay to secure our right to exist as individuals and creators, regardless of who finds US personally unpleasant, hateful or flat out offensive/gross/immoral/unspeakable.

"But what about [illegal thing]?!" So the thing itself is illegal, because the thing itself has been deemed harmful. But your goddamn cop-poisoned authoritarian little heart needs to learn that sometimes things are illegal that aren't harmful, and defaulting to "but illegal!" is a surefire way to end up on the wrong side of the fascism pop quiz. You're not a figure of authority and the more you demand to control and exercise authority by command, rather than leadership, the less impressive you seem. You know how you make actual, genuine change in a community? You center harm and argue in good faith to find accommodations and spread awareness of real, actual problems.

But let's play your game. Let's pretend we're all brainwashed cop-abiding little cogs that do not own a single working brain cell to exercise critical thinking with. 99% of the time, when you cry about any given thing "being illegal!!!" you're correct only so far as the THING itself being illegal. The act or object is illegal. Depiction of it is not. You know why, dipshit? Because if depiction of the thing were illegal, you wouldn't be able to talk about it. You wouldn't be able to educate about it. You wouldn't be able to reexamine and discuss and understand the thing, how and why and where it happens and how to prevent it. And yeah, depiction being legal opens the door for people to make depictions that are in bad taste or probably not appropriate. Sure. But that's the price we pay, creating tools to demystify some of the most horrific things in the world and support the people who've survived them. The net good of those tools existing outweighs the harm of people misusing them.

"You're defending the indefensible!" No, you're clumsily stumbling into a conversation that's been going on for centuries, with your elementary school understanding of morality and your bone-deep police state rot filtering your perception of reality, and insisting you figured it out and everyone else at the table is an idiot for not agreeing with you. Shut the fuck up, sit the fuck down and read a goddamn book.

[vauxxy]

SETTLE DOWN!

luke castellan x reader

★ “for crying out loud, settle down!”

ABOUT - you hate his guts. he hates yours. but you’d by lying if you said you didn’t want to make out with him until his lips start bleeding. and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t like that idea.

WARNINGS - sexual references, sexual comments, enemies to lovers, steamy makeout scenes, no explicit smut. both luke and reader are very horny and very mean sooo two red flags lol

A/N - please don’t make fun of my english/australian vocabulary. i know americans don’t use the word ‘fit’ but LET ME LIVE IN PEACE!!!let me know if you’d fancy a part 2 <3

WC - 3.7k words

it’s hard to recall when exactly your distaste towards luke castellan first developed.

maybe it started off as rude comments and shoved shoulders, or simply the act of tripping over each other's shoes, paired with a few nasty glances. either way, you hated his guts.

this sentiment was obviously returned by luke, who was eager to constantly egg you on and rile you up. maybe he found it amusing- watching the ever so calm and collected eldest daughter of the hypnos cabin going absolutely ballistic whenever luke did something slightly annoying. he loved the way her mature and gentle persona shattered as soon as he provoked her.

it was rather strange how quickly they let their masks slip, letting themselves shout foul obscenities at each other as soon as a conflict arose between the two of them. it was like being near each other was the primary catalyst for their arguments and squabbles- not the actual contents of the disagreement itself, but the players involved.

curiously, luke’s terrible attitude was never extended to anyone other than you. around everyone else at camp half-blood, luke was the perfect gentleman. warm and welcoming to anyone who happened to walk past him, a great swordsman, well-kept, respectful and polite, the list goes on. he was perfect. but as soon as his eyes met yours, his entire body shifted. he became something colder, something ravenous- something hungry. he was out for blood, he just didn’t understand why.

you were slumped over a picnic table near the cabins, tiredly observing all handful of half-blood kids from various cabins making friendship bracelets.

it was dark out, the moon and the embers of the nearby fire acting as the sole providers of light for the camp that night.

truthfully, you didn’t want to be there. you would rather be in bed, coddled up between your sheets for hours before heading down to the infirmary to help out the younger kids with their sleeping troubles. maybe afterwards you could go down to the theatre and join in on a few songs with the apollo kids, or even practice sparring with clarisse.

whatever it was, you didn’t want to be there. not with luke castellan’s eyes studying your every move. you didn’t need to lift your head to know he was looking at you- you could feel it. the arrogance was radiating off him and you could smell his pride from across the picnic table. your nose easily picked up on notes of wet grass, a neutral deodorant, pure spite, and vanilla candles.

after what seemed like an eternity, you eventually shot your head up to meet luke’s unwavering gaze.

“someone’s sleepy.” he smirked, his voice calm and cold. he looked satisfied; content with watching you slowly rise in anger as he began to coddle you and patronise your every move.

you ran a hand through your hair, fixing the messy state it was in after laying down for so long. “i’m not sleepy, just bored.” you retorted, letting your hands hold up your head as you stared deeply into his eyes, not breaking eye contact.

luke played along, refusing to blink as he picked up on the competitive gesture. “bored, huh?” he mused, shooting you a cocky grin as he leaned forward over the table. “you’re never satisfied, are you, princess?”

you rolled your eyes, letting your pupils meet the back of your head as you stifled a groan. you slowly covered one side of your face in your hand, hiding your pink cheeks as a result of his use of the nickname ‘princess’.

“don’t you have a loser convention to get to?” you asked, referring to the cabin councillors meeting that he was supposed to be at.

luke shrugged, looking to his side as he watched a young demeter boy making a bracelet. “got cancelled. now i get to look at your pretty little face for an hour straight.”

“i’m going to bed.” you grumbled, standing up from the picnic table, an unfinished friendship bracelet left discarded. you walked away, hearing little to no protests from the rest of the table.

luke’s eyes met the bracelet you left behind, studying it for a moment. the colours were cute and the beads were placed strategically along the string, creating an interesting and visually pleasing combination of textures and shapes. luke’s hand wandered over to the bracelet, quickly snatching it before securely tying it and stuffing it in his pocket.

luke wasn’t sure why he stole the bracelet. maybe he thought he could taunt you with it, or maybe he could just wear it for shits and gigs. it was a pretty bracelet- why wouldn’t he want to wear it?

a week passed by, and it was time for capture the flag.

luke had consistently come out of the games a champion, securing his place as the best swordsman at camp half-blood whenever possible.

you were tired of it. you promised yourself that when the opportunity arose, you would beat him to it. you would earn the praise he revived so effortlessly.

your determination to win capture the flag was also partially encouraged by the events of the previous tuesday.

you, luke, and a few other older demi-gods were forced to monitor the younger campers on a trip to the nearby lake. simple, right? wrong.

things went south fast when luke ‘accidentally’ nudged your shoulder a bit too hard, forcing you to fall into the lake. luckily, you were a strong enough swimmer and were able to get back on land safely.

“sorry about that, y/n. maybe next time you should keep out of the way?” he leaned in close, whispering in your ear.

luke smirked lightly as his dry hand rubbed the soaking wet and now transparent fabric covering your shoulder. his lips softly grazed your neck as you released yourself from his grip, shooting him a dirty look.

“you should watch your step, castellan. things like this happen to anyone.”

luke scoffed, looking you up and down as he took in the sight of your shivering body. “do they now?” he asked, his head turning to follow your figure as you walked past him.

as you walked away, luke couldn’t help but study your body as it became revealed by the fabric of the camp t-shirt sticking to your skin. how could he not admire the way he could see the vague outline of a lacy black bra underneath your top? or the way your wet hair was framing your angry little face? how you stared him down as your friend offered you a towel.

if you weren’t so acutely aware of how your figure was on full display, you would’ve pushed him in as well- but you were way too infuriated to even get close to him at this point… as well as the fact you didn’t think you could handle the idea of him taking off your shirt in front of you, all wet as his hair let water droplets roll down his torso.

maybe you could handle hitting him with a baseball bat a few times, but the idea of his face all beaten and bloodied was strangely appetising as well.

in all fairness, luke’s actions were not unprovoked. it’s not like you didn’t also tease him and fuck around with his temper.

for example, the very day before the incident at the lake, you had used your abilities as a daughter of hypnos to put him to sleep… for 19 hours, causing him to miss out on camp activities and lose hours of valuable training time.

you felt pure bliss watching him as he stepped out of the hermes cabin, confused and disoriented as hoards of campers instantly surrounded him.

“are you okay luke?”

“i heard you were in a coma!”

“we thought you were a goner,”

luke blocked out the concerned comments of his peers as soon as he caught you gazing over at him from the deck of the hypnos cabin.

with that ‘i got you good’ smirk plastered across your face, luke knew he had to get you back. getting to see your semi-exposed and cold, shuddering body in the process of doing so was only a bonus.

he felt a high from getting to see what he caused. what he did to you. it made him hungry for more. how else could he anger you? get you to show him more? how could you return the favour? would you? he didn’t know if you realised the effect you had on him- but he was going to do anything in his power for you to feel it too.

but those incidents were nothing compared to what was about to go down.

2 hours into capture the flag, and you had managed to fool and scare off enough members of the blue team, causing many individual members to go off track. those hours practising sword fighting with clarisse were definitely worth it.

you leaned against a nearby tree, closing your eyes for a moment as you fiddled with your sword. lost in thought, you heard something coming. more specifically, someone. you didn’t even have to open your eyes to know who it was.

“oh, hey castellan. isn’t it past your bedtime?” you asked, rubbing your eyes open as you lazily swung your sword back and forth.

luke scoffed, taking a step towards you. “i think i like you better when you’re drenched in lake water.” he smirked, looking into your eyes without breaking contact. he couldn’t look away. it wasn’t even because he wanted to intimidate you; he simply couldn’t stand to have you exit his field of vision. not right now, at least.

you look a step backwards, getting into position as you use your shield to protect yourself. “are you gonna try to maim me or what?”

luke took another step forward, mirroring your stance as he took the defensive. “and hurt your pretty little body? i’d rather die.”

you turned red, your mouth agape as you processed what he had said. “excuse me?” you spat, your voice breathy as your eyes widened.

“you heard me,” he smiled innocently, deceiving you before beginning to attack. you blocked every move, pacing around the area as you swung your sword at him. “you’re such a fucking prick!” you grumbled, trying to catch your breath as you struggled to mark him with your blade.

“language, princess.” he scolded, still smiling at you as he continued his attempts at disarming you.

that was the moment when you realised something.

you can play dirty.

not with your sleep-themed party tricks or your weak little fists, but with the power of unpredictability. the element of surprise.

you let him get closer to you, pretending to settle down before him. luke chuckled at the sight of your loosened grip on your shield and increasingly tired eyes, noticing the way your footsteps shuffled backwards and forwards.

“someone’s getting tired-“ his cocky sentiment was quickly cut off by the feeling of your hands tightly gripping his arm- his shock only furthering as your teeth dug into the soft skin on his wrist.

he instantly dropped his shield, his sword still held firmly in his other hand. you quickly released him from your bite, taking a step forwards as you put your weight on his shield. “ow- what the fuck?!” he stammered, looking up at you with red cheeks and a bleeding hand.

you were stumped. you hadn’t thought further than getting rid of his shield. “i didn’t mean to break skin to be honest. sorry.” you shrugged, picking up his shield and throwing it far away while he was still frozen in shock.

luke continued looking at you, silent as he became overwhelmed by the feeling of a ruthless war finally coming to an end within his mind.

obviously, he found you attractive. you were a pretty girl. sure, a lot of girls at camp half-blood were pretty. but for some odd reason, he thought you were much prettier. the type of pretty girl that deserved to be called cute nicknames every day and covered in gentle kisses every night. he wanted to kiss you softly, hold you tightly, say you looked gorgeous, make you tacky beaded bracelets that were the same colour as your eyes. he wanted to make you feel loved.

but he also thought you were a brat. always teasing him and only him. driving him insane with targeted comments and insults. purposefully making him look stupid in front of the younger campers and even patronising him for it. luke wanted to put you in your place. he wanted nothing more than to push you onto his bed in the dead of night, marking you as his. he yearned to hear your strained voice whimpering his name as he towered over you. he wanted to exchange knowing glances and pretend nothing had changed, despite the images of your hands gripping his bedsheets as you let out stifled moans etched into his mind.

luke often wondered how the two could overlap. how the fuck could these two perceptions of this one girl coexist? but luke didn’t wonder how it was possible to think about anymore, he didn’t care about that. now, he wondered if it was possible to act on both of his separate desires for her. he wondered if she even wanted him as much as he wanted her- if she wanted him at all.

“hey, i said i was sorry for making you bleed!” you called out, snapping him out of it.

“stop sulking! what, do you want me to kiss it better or something?”

luke blinked for the first time in what felt like centuries, shrugging as he let a sly smile creepy onto his face. “oh, im not sulking.” he insisted as he stepped closer towards the shorter girl.

he extended his wrist out towards you, a deep and bleeding bite mark engraved into the skin. “you gonna kiss it better, or…?”

you turned red, shaking your head. “i was just joking, castellan.” you murmured coldly, trying to avoid his gaze.

he kept his hand extended towards you, temping you to just take it and kiss it to get him to leave. “fucking loser…” you grumbled, holding his hand in yours as you gave his wrist a soft kiss.

“there, better?” you scoffed before luke’s hands began to tightly grip your wrist, spinning you gently onto your back as he pushed you to the ground, hovering over you. luckily, you still had your sword in your hand. you quickly moved it in front of you, holding the blade close to his neck.

“be careful, princess” he cooed, his sword digging into the dirt ground, standing upright in is position as the skin of your right thigh pressed against the blade. his hands gripped your shoulder and waist, keeping you bound to the floor as you began to squirm under his grip. “ugh, are you kidding me?!” you huffed, your face red from the feeling of intimacy between the two of you arising.

luke was basking in it, relishing the moment as he became almost addicted to the feeling of your skin against his. he let out a hitched breath, his eyes trailing down her frame as he finally realised just how close they were. the vulnerable yet stubborn look in her eyes set off a switch in him. you watched him curiously as he suddenly became a flustered mess, quickly scrambling off of you and standing up.

you lifted your back off the ground, using your hands to rid yourself of the dirt that had accumulated on your shirt.

“are you gonna explain whatever the fuck just happened, luke?” you asked, calling out to him from your spot on the ground.

he rolled his eyes, turning around to face you. “shit, y/n- are you fucking stupid?” he questioned, his voice reeking of irritation and frustration. you furrowed your brows, standing up as you approached him, sword and shield in hand. “oh, alright. forgive me for wondering why the dickhead who threw me into a lake a few days ago was pinning me to the ground in the middle of capture the flag for no reason?” i explained, seething as i pushed him back by the shoulders.

“what the fuck is your problem?” you asked again, letting yourself back him up against a nearby tree.

the game didn’t matter to you anymore. what mattered was getting to the bottom of why this prick was fucking around with you. sure, you liked how it felt being pushed against the ground. you liked the feeling of his blade pressing against your thigh. but you liked the boy more than his actions. you hated yourself for it, of course. this was the dude who’s been teasing you about and pushing you around for 3 summers straight- so why the fuck did you think he was the fittest guy you had ever laid your eyes on?

why did you want him to run his hands through your hair? suck on your neck till it went purple? why on earth did you spend countless nights dreaming about him holding you close as he slept next to you?

you were the eldest hypnos daughter at camp half-blood. you could’ve changed your dream easily; came up with literally any other fantasy at the drop of a hat- but you didn’t. you let it continue. because as much as you hated to admit it, you liked him. you wanted him bad. every last inch of him.

luke let your words echo through his mind for a bit. ‘what is my problem?’ he thought, his expression blank as he stared at you. “i don’t know, y/n! maybe my problem is you?” he said, his voice strained, yet still snarky and somewhat dramatic.

you rolled your eyes again, stepping forward. you kept your hands on his shoulders, pressing him further against the tree he was pinned against. “i’m your problem?!” you asked angrily, holding your sword against his neck once more.

“yes! you make me feel fucking weak.” luke confessed, gripping your wrist tightly as he pushed your hand away in order to create some space between his neck and the sword. “i can’t control myself around you.” he exclaimed, pushing his hand against yours as you retracted the blade from his neck.

“you bring out the worst in me, and i hate you for that.” you arched your brows, leaning forward. “that sounds like a you problem.” you quipped, defeatedly pushing the top of the blade of your sword into the ground as you let your newly free hand grip his chin- forcing him to look down at you.

luke’s hand wandered over to your face, his thumb softly grazing your bottom lip as you tilted his chin downwards, letting him look you in the eyes.

“don’t act like you don’t get exactly what i mean, princess.” he cooed, his voice low as his fingers traced over your lips and cheekbones, his other hand gently caressing your jawline as his fingertips wrapped around your neck.

you grumbled, standing on your toes to reach his height. “you’re a prick.” you scoffed, your eyes fluttering closed as you eagerly kissed him on the lips, his cheeks turning red as he mirrored your movements. he let his hands run through you hair, his other hand resting on your waist as he turned you around- pushing you against the tree now.

his hands ravenously scattered across your delicate frame, trying to feel every curve and dent on your face, back and waist. you pressed your body against his as his hands travelled across your form, closing any and all distance between the two.

after a few straight minutes of violently making out, you pulled away for air, staring into his eyes as your lower lip trembled in shock. you both tried to steady your breathing, lost in each other's eyes as your heartbeats returned back to normal.

“i’ll kiss you again if you turn around and let us win.” you said quickly, the offer seemingly the first thing you could think to say.

luke stayed quiet for a moment, before bursting out into hesitant laughter. “i mean, that’s a pretty good offer…” he said softly, letting his fingers trace your facial features as he studied the colour of your eyes.

“sure.” he said, a little smile on his face as you both leaned in again, the kiss a lot more passionate this time around. you held a clump of his hair in your hand, lightly pulling on on it as luke’s fingers jumped between gripping your neck and shoulders- the other hand running up and down your waist and hips.

you felt his knee hit the bark of the tree, slightly bent as it lightly pressed against the inside of your thigh. that’s when your hands began to grip the back of his shirt, your lips gliding down to the side of his neck. quiet moans escaped luke’s lips, only encouraging you to keep going. he moved his hand downwards, tracing circles into your hips as he moved his other arm hand upwards, cupping the space on the side of your breast with his thumb, lightly rubbing your ribcage.

the moment was only increasing in intensity- before luke was cut off my the sounds of someone calling his name. he quickly pulled away, leaving a gentle kiss on your lips before stepping back.

“right, time to hold up my end of the deal.” he chirped up, leaving one more needy kiss on your forehead.

“oh, by the way-“ he paused, before quickly pulling the bracelet you made the week before out of his pocket. “did you want this back, princess? or can i have it?” he asked cheerfully, his voice low as he looked over you.

“keep it.” you said hastily, your cheeks a vibrant shade of red. luke nodded, giving you one final kiss on the lips as he put the bracelet on the same wrist you had bitten earlier. he gave you a subtle wink and a smile, before jogging away- leaving you frozen in place.

you could hear him talking to his friend from a distance, noting on how he lied to effortlessly- saving your arse over a few kisses.

needless to say, the red team won capture the flag. but luke couldn’t bring himself to care about losing. how could he care about anything other than y/n and her hands and her smile and her eyes? her witty comments and remarks? the way she tilted her head up to look up at him? the way his face fits perfectly in her palm? how could he care about anything else ever again?

[oflgtfol]

if this is yet another episode about how much the new republic sucks no mandos in sight etc etc …. come on man i mean i love galactic politics but this is not and never has been the show to explore it in put this in a different show theres a time and place for everything