#not really but it wasn't long enough to justify me being this way

[aphroditesmoon]

wish you'd ask me

clarisse la rue x fem!demigod!reader

summary: you're not good at reading subtle hints, clarisse realises that maybe she should've been more upfront with her feelings for you.

warnings: fluff, oblivious!reader, clarisse is down bad, reader is very neurodivergent coded, kissing, flirting, title n fic inspired by 'Wish You'd Ask Me' by Matt Maltese.

A/N: thank you for 1.9k followers!! I love you all dearly, my ask box and dms r always open, im glad that my writing is being enjoyed by so many people<3

wc: 4.5k

You have been in camp half blood for more than 4 years. You have made yourself at home for the last several years. 

It was easy to view yourself as lesser or inadequate in comparison to other mortals during your days in the real world before you were sent to camp. The world has never failed to remind you of how different you were. Always too much or not good enough, always special and never normal

And it wasn't like you were dying for some sort of diagnosis to justify why you are the way you are, but upon discovering that you were actually a demigod, it felt like all the questions you've been harboring to yourself was finally answering themselves. 

Everything clicked. Everything made sense, though at the same time, it felt impossible. You were a very confused little girl when you first arrived at camp. A girl who just wanted someone to tell them that it'll all be alright in the end.

And you still remembered the first person to hold you by your shoulders and made you look into their eyes as they told you that it was all going to be okay.

The girl with beautiful long curls and dark piercing eyes. The girl that everyone else, apparently, was afraid of.

But you could never be afraid of Clarisse La Rue. 

Not with the way she smiles when every time she sees you, the way she never fails to make you feel included even in activities you're not capable of participating in. Not with the way your whole body electrifies every time your skin touches, when your hands brush against each other. 

It didn't matter what anyone think, because no one could change the perception you've built of her. Clarisse La Rue is good. Or at least she is to you.

When you first heard of the rumours surrounding her, you did think better than to force a friendship on her. You strayed away from her and stuck to your cabin siblings and your books, but you noticed daily how she'd still go out of her way to talk to you at least once a day.

It didn't need to be a long conversation, just a passing acknowledgement. An easygoing 'hey, how've you been doing.' Sometimes she'd even go as far as cracking a joke with you.

With how serious her face is whenever she make the jokes, you'd have to think twice as hard and thrice as faster than another person to try and guess if she was being genuine or not so you could fit in a necessary laugh when you needed to.

Even as her anger became more apparent because of the new kid's accidental climb to fame and embarrassing the Ares' cabin, she still found time to make a conversation with you.

It had been long since you tried to ignore or avoid her. You learned that her attention towards you is harmless, and that she seemed much more comfortable telling you certain things compared to others. If she has been viewing you as some sort of safe box, then you don't really mind it. You liked listening to her talk and keeping her heart's intent as your secret.

You too, talking to her. To some people, you are reserved,  

and to others, talkative. Either way, people find it easy to discard you at any moment they decide you are irritating.

But Clarisse listens. And she asks questions, she's patient- much patient that anyone could anticipate or guess. 

It may be hard for others to believe, but Clarisse is more complex than she seems. She had the capacity to be gentle, and she had the capacity to respect boundaries. The more time you spent with her, the more that side becomes easy for you to access.

Today, however,  marks a new record for your friendship with her. A few weeks ago, she had informed you of her newfound interest in the history of folklore monsters. What a coincidence that you were currently self-studying on that specific topic.

She insisted that you hook her in on whatever it is you're learning. She had even gotten you a doughnut to eat together outside the library as you told her of your insights of dragons and their theorized blindness and incapability to differentiate a variety of prey.

The conversation went well, she seemed immensely in awe of your knowledge and had no problem telling you how she felt. 

You even gave her some book recommendations, though you knew she wasn't much of a reader.

You felt a shift in your relationship that night and had spent the next three days studying more and more about the topic. And today, you had asked her to spend the evening with you. 

You shouldn't feel so nervous asking her to hang out. That is what friends do, after all.

She found you in the library, sitting on the floor in between two large bookshelves. She had been right on time and enthusiastically so. The two of you sat together, hidden by the shelves as some semblance of privacy. 

Clarisse looked confused when you had explained that you indeed wanted to spend the rest of the day in the library, but she accompanied you anyways.

You could never get sick of the smell of the books. Old and new, they all have some nostalgic past tied in between the pages, begging to be discovered. 

You had your back on the walls with tinted windows above your head as she's seated opposite of you in a criss-crossed position.

Today, the library isn't as packed as usual. There were still people walking in and out and checking out the books on the counter, but not too many that it became obnoxiously loud and annoying. 

After finishing another book of Monsters and how to spot them, you're feeling knowledgeable enough to explain the lore of the Giants to Clarisse, she had asked you about this the other day, giants have been long extinct to the point that some might even say they may have never even existed. And so you were interested in sharing with her all of the information you have learned about the majestic species of a beast.

You started with the general information. The basic understanding of what a Giant is the mythhs of Giants and the validity of those sources. Clarisse listened closely in the beginning, never interrupting you unless she had an actual question.

She seemed in awe of the stories you tell her of. You don't blame her, for you yourself have been most interested in the topic of Giants.

You were an hour an a half in when noticed her attention faltering. She leaned against the cases of books, her eyes twitched slightly when you began to explain the different types of giants, and the difference of how they operate.

Her hands are folded together on her lap, and you can feel her listening in on everything you're telling her as she adds in some commentary here and there, but you also felt that she wasn't entirely in on the conversation.

The dim lights of the library made the atmosphere feel warm and secluded, even with its vast space and many other campers hanging around in the other tables and shelves. You made sure to keep your voice low as you spoke in fear of the librarian kicking you out. 

You had a good reputation with the library workers, they liked how organized and polite you were. 

"A lot of people think their greatest strength is their size, which is valid, they are huge, but their real weapon is their mouth." You told Clarisse, ignoring the litter of books by your left that you had brought over for reference.

"They kiss you to death?" She asks suspiciously. You laughed shortly and shook your head. "No, I mean their breath."

She responds with an 'ohh.' 

"They're giants, so their mouth is large too, and you can easily tell what they had for breakfast even from their tall height. Their breaths are also known to be so rancid it could kill you, because they don't exactly eat what we eat." 

She raises a brow as she stretches her hands upwards. "Isn't that ogres?" 

"It's both." You confirmed.

You were about to continue your explanation but halted by instinct as you notice how her mouth keeps pursing together as if unsatisfied, and she has that look on her face that mimicked a confused expression. You're don't think there's anything to be confused of.

"Are you okay?" You asked her worriedly. Clarisse sits up straighter at the question and waved a hand off to assure you she's fine. "Of course, no yeah- I'm fine."

"You seem bored, you're not really interested in what I'm saying are you?” She opens her mouth to counter your words but hesitates to say anything. 

"I- well, I like giants-" She attempts, "-no you don't. " 

"No. I don't." She admits with a sigh. "But I thought you said you were interested in these kind of stuff?" You questioned her. "Well, yeah, like the general idea of it. I mean, I don't hate it, and I like hearing you talk about it." She answers with a shrug.

"Then why do you look disappointed? If you didn't want to come, you could've just told me. I wouldn't get mad." You told her honestly. It was conflicting for you to see her so confused on what to say, being so picky with the words she chooses.

You figured she's probably reluctant to hurt your feelings. That is a notion you're used to. You'd rather she tell you the truth to your face than to be catered around like a time ticking bomb that everyone's so afraid might explode at any time. 

"When you asked me out yesterday, you told me this would be an 'evening to remember." She tells you with such confidence like it was an explanation to her weird behaviour today.

"You don't think this is an evening to remember?" You sincerely inquire.

"No, I do! I just- well, when you said that I didn't think you'd mean we'd be doing this." Your frown deepens as you try to figure out what she means, eyeing her body language closely. “What do you mean? I told you I wanted to hang out.” 

A part of you is offended. She was the one who had said she liked hearing you speak, why would she be disappointed that this was your idea of spending time together?

"I don't know, I thought we'd just be doing...something else?"

It didn't matter what she had really meant with that. You felt completely embarrassed once she finished her sentence. Why was it that everyone else had no problem having long conversations with their friends, but when it came to you, it's all too awkward, unnecessary, and odd? 

You liked Clarisse, you considered her your friend. Sometimes you wonder if it could ever be more, but you never entertain those thoughts because you don't want to ruin what the two of you already have. 

But moments like these resemble a huge slap in the face by the universe.

You couldn't even be good friends with her, how ridiculous of you to think that there could ever be something more.

"Okay, um, maybe we should just go back to our cabin." You decided whilst standing up and picking up the stack of books you're currently borrowing from the library, ready to leave the place without waiting for her.

"Hey, wait." She called out as you walked past her. You spared her a glance, trying your best not to show how upset you are.  “We're friends." She says it so much like a question that you weren't sure if she's even sure of the fact herself until she continued speaking. "I like hanging out with you."

Another thing that you weren't sure if she really meant. "Sure." You replied thinking it's the most suitable response. 

Before she could say anything else, you turned around and started picking up your pace until you disappeared out of her sight.

—

You have been consistently ignoring Clarisse. Which proved to be harder than expected.

When you pass by her camp or the training ground, you make a mental note to always look down or to your front as to never accidentally cross eyes with her.

And everytime you hear her call out your name, you keep walking like you didn't even hear her, knowing that she wouldn't be bold enough to call for you again. After all, she still had a reputation to uphold.

If ignoring her wasn't hard enough, having to deal with how you felt for her is worse.

You've been avoiding confrontation with yourself for weeks even before you decided to go no contact with her.

And so far, you thought you've been handling it pretty well. Except for days where you don't see her where she's expected to be. You tell yourself that you don't care as you make your way to training in the day and reading in the evening, and yet you still go back on your own words when you asked a passerby Ares kid on where his cabin leader was.

"She's dunking some kid's head into a toilet bowl." Of course she was.

You thanked the dude and went back on your way to your cabin. It's close to dusk, the sky is turning orange and the sun is dipping itself below the earth. You take your time returning to your cabin as you enjoy the way the sun slowly removes itself from anyone's viewing.

You wondered to yourself if things like these are what makes you weird or off-putting to some people.

Was enjoying nature and having niche interests only cute when it's done by girls pretty enough to be cool or if it's only in romance movies or books.

You don't find yourself weird, in fact you think all of your hobbies are pretty common and usual, and yet the way Clarisse had spoken to you at the library last week had made you feel unnatural.

You had wanted to do normal people things with her, but maybe your perception of normal is different to her.

Either way, you are pretty hurt with how she reacted. You loved her still, of course. It's kind of hard to unlike the girl you've been obsessed with since you were 15.

Once you finally reach your cabin, you quickly put down all of your books and your tiny sling back by the side before making it to the shower to refresh yourself before dinner.

You thought it hilarious of how hard you're trying not to care about Clarisse, and yet as you're cleaning yourself up, changing your clothes and attempting to read at least 15 pages of your World's Most Dangerous Beasts book, you could only think of her.

What would it take for her to think that you're cool, what kind of things did she want to do instead of listening to you yap around for 2 hours on what is an equivalent of a boring dinosaur facts, not that you really think dinosaurs are boring.

During dinner, you kept to siblings and had to make yourself finish your plate as your anxiety wrecking thoughts have a way of deriving you of an appetite. You also had to convince yourself to not search for her at the other tables which took more strength than one would expect.

But you succeeded, and you were now sure that the only obstacle left for the day was to try and fall asleep without the thoughts of her keeping you up.

Clarisse is a force, a fierce daughter of Ares, and a cabin leader who had much better things to do then hole up at quiet small places with you.

And just because she was nice enough to mantain a good relationship with you for 4 years, does not mean that you're worth her time. Or at least that's what you tell yourself.

That night, you managed to fall asleep after an hour of recalling Harpy facts in repetition. Counting sheeps had never worked on you, so you had to find something much more active to tire out your brain.

You dreamed of Clarisse with her hair down, holding your hand and pulling you closer so she could slip a flower on your ear.

And just as she's looking down at you, moving closer to do what it seemed like to kiss you, you awoke with a jolt, swearing under your breath as if you'd just gotten jumpscared by a ghost.

Someone's palms moved to shut your lips as you're met with a girl, hovering over you in the dark. Clarisse's dark eyes were recognizable, but it sent a shot of adrenaline through your body still.

"Shh." She whispered to your face, hand still keeping your mouth shut. "I'm going to remove my hands now." She whispered again. You nod in understanding and waited for her to pry her hand away from your face.

"What are you doing here?!" You exclaimed as quiet as possible as she helped you sit up.

"I'm sneaking you out." She answers with a wink. "It's 2 in the morning." You waved your hand around at the darkness and sleeping children. "3 in the morning, and yeah, I know. That's why it's called sneaking around." She corrects you with a grin so devilish that if you hadn't known her for a long time, you'd assume she's about to turn you into a new toilet bowl or dumpster boxing victim.

You sighed loudly and glared at her despite your fast beating heart. Her hand remained on top of yours until the minute becomes more awkward and she removes it as if she just remembered that she's been holding your hand.

Without explanation,  she climbed out of your bed and tiptoes to the open cabin door. You're still sitting up and looking at her with conflicted feelings.

Only after she turns back to you, cocking her head towards the entrance, do you give into her request and softly leave the comfort of your bed and trail after her.

"Where are we going?" You asked after her as she kept walking. Instead of responding, she asks you another question back, "Can you swim?"

"We're going swimming?" You watch her shrug in return from behind her and became even more distressed.

"So, is this your idea of having fun and hanging out then?" She laughs drily and slowed down so you could catch up. You walked fast enough until you're beside her and waited for her to talk. "You sound surprised, I would've thought that after 4 years of friendship, you'd know by now that I love doing things that includes active movements."

You did know that, it's a bit hard to not notice how much working out, training and running fuels her even more.

"And why are we doing it in the middle of the night?" The walk towards the lake by the back of the forest was short, considering that your cabin is the closest to the location.

You almost tripped and fell over a stick, but Clarisse was quick to scoop you back up by the back of your shirt. "Thanks." You mumbled to her. "And you haven't answered my question."

Clarisse pulled her shirt over her head and tossed it on the ground without caring of your presence. You, having more moral obligations than her, twisted your face to your left when she began to pull her trousers off. "Too many people in broad daylight." She tells you.

That is a valid reason, this lake is mostly known as a hook up spot, and true to it's cause, many dating campers have been caught together here during dawn or late evenings.

You braved yourself to turn towards her again slowly and realised that she had already hopped into the water. She had a sports bra on and a boxer.

And though you yourself had a tank top and shorts on, you contemplate the idea of suicide as a better choice than having to strip in front of her.

"Are you gonna get in, or are you just gonna gawk at me from there?" You were grateful for the dark being able to hide your flushed face from her, but deep down, you knew that she probably saw it anyways because of the shining bright moonlight.

"I can't swim." You told her.

"That's fine, the water's not very deep." You ransacked your brain for reasons to decline her offer, but at the same time, a small part of you yearned to take this risk that you've been so afraid of for gods knows whatever reason.

Clarisse is there, in the water and under the moonlight. You are only a few steps away from her. And like she said, the water isn't deep, only waist length. She stares back at you with a raised brow like she's challenging you to join her.

"Turn around first." You tell her. She smirked slightly before slowly spinning to the opposite direction. "You know I've seen you naked before right?"

"What?" You choked out, aghast. "Who do you think changed your clothes for you when you first got to camp." Oh, that.

Your shoulder relaxes as you realize she's talking about the first time you met. "That's was a long time ago." You noted. She hummed im agreement. "Yeah, we've both grown since."

You told her she could turn around once you're inside the water. Forgetting about the heighy difference between you two, the water was high enough to reach your chest, trying your best not to trip underwater the way you always do on dry ground, your hand instinctively reached outnfor her shoulder.

Clarisse held your forearm tightly and drew your closer to her until you're inches away from eachother.

You breathed in sharply and felt the need to fill in the awkward silence. "So, you...like swimming, huh?"

"Yes, evidently so." She answered. "Right right, can't sit still and all that." She actually chuckled at your sarcasm, making you proud of yourself.

"You know, even before I came to camp Half Blood, I use to be a pretty active person, running track, volleyball, sometimes swimming." Your eyes widened in curiosity. "Really?" She nodded.

"The counselor told my mom that I just had so many untapped energy, which I guess is a code for anger issues." Her grip on your forearm moves higher until her palm is over your shoulder.  "She told her that it'd be best for me to find a...healthy way, to channel that energy, and for my strong competitiveness. So I joined what I could, and that's how I spent most of my free time there. Besides, I never was that good academically. So, I ought to at least be good at something, right?"

"You are good." You blurted out. Your embarrassment faded away when you saw her smile. "You think so?"

"Yeah." You assured her. Her other hand had snaked around your waist without you noticing. Only when you moved slightly do you notice her holding you softly.

"The moon is really nice tonight, isn't it?" You said, trying to diffuse the tension. You pointed your finger up to the sky at the singular white orb.

She glanced up and let out a 'huh.'

"I like it when it's bright and whole like this, the moon in all of its glory. You don't even notice the starts around it when it's glowing like that." You could stare at the moom forever, even longer than the way you've been staring at the sun.

You believed in it the way children do with their birthday candle. To you, the moon has always been a symbol of hope or comfort for your future. Your fascination for it existed from when you were a child, the way it'd follow you from behind as you gazed upon it from the back of the car seat whilst your parent drove down the road.

The way it moved above you as you walked home from school, like one of the gods themselves watching over you.

"Nothing compares to the moon." You announced aloud, watching as the clouds around it began to gather over it. "Yeah, It's beautiful." You hear Clarisse speak.

As your head snapped back to her, you found that she had already been facing you.

"I like the moon...but not as much as I like you." She whispered loud enough for your ears only. Her face leans closer to yours, your noses brushing together. "Not as much as I like to hear your voice, when you tell me about your little harpy facts-"

"Oh, I haven't told you about the harpies yet." You cut her off. "I just finished that chapter this morning actually and-"

"-and, you can tell me about it after I'm done talking." You blushed and became silent, letting her speak.

Clarisse exhaled breathily, fanning your face with the subtle warm air. "I like doing things that friends do with you, but I don't want to be your friend anymore."

"Oh."

"I want to be more than friends." She elaborated.

"Oh." Oh.

You feel a sudden tightness in your chest, from anxiety or from butterflies is undecided. "You want to be best friends?" You joked, laughing nervously.

Clarisse snorted at your joke, but she was still grinning widely. "Best friends, If that's what you want to call it."

There was a moment of understanding shared between a second of shared gazes before her lips attached themselves to yours. An urgency, approval, meaning that can't be described by words.

Whatever gentleness there was inside of her before had vanished. Clarisse kissed you like a starved woman. Her lips craved yours like it'd be the last time she'll ever know how you taste like.

Your hands clasped on her shoulder and neck for support as she embraced you tighter to her body. You let her tongue slip into your mouth, meeting your own.

And as they danced together, inhaling all there is in your lips, every secret and every confession that have died on the tip ofnyour tongues, you are sure that no heaven nor hell could tear you open to see you back together like this.

You push her back abruptly, letting fresh air fill your empty lungs. "What's wrong?" Clarisse inquired worriedly.

"Last week." You sighed out, chest still heaving as your thoughts clicked together. "You thought I had asked you on a date, that's why you were disappointed."

She winced at the reminder, and for the first time in your life, you had been lucky enough to witness a flustered Clarisse.

"I'm right." Her silence confirmed. "Oh Clarisse, why didn't you just ask me?"

Huffing loudly, she rolls her eyes in irritation. "I thought I was obvious enough. "

Thinking back on it all, it did seem pretty obvious, but gods were you oblivious. The way you intepreted it all so wrongly.

"I've liked you for so long too." You admitted to her. Her scowl was gone at that, replaced by a teasing smile. "And what are you gonna do about it?" Her mouth returned to yours, letting go of all your fears and holding on to Clarisse like she's your anchor, you close the gap between your lips, welcoming the kind of pleasure that you've never tasted before.

[klausysworld]

I know it's a bit random, but I just had an idea for a Klaus story, which is that Reader goes on a long trip with Klaus and his siblings but they only have one car and Reader has to sit in Klaus lap due to space constraints. Reader and Klaus are kinda friends because she is Elena's little sister, but he often confidently flirts with her, but when she sits on his lap he unintentionally gets hard and that makes him super embarrassed. She notices and he apologizes quietly, trying to make sure his siblings don't notice + smut in the end

According To Plan

The mikaelson's originally ruined my life. They crash landed into an already chaotic town and destroyed it. First Elijah, then Klaus, then Rebekah, then Mikael, then Kol, Finn and finally Esther.

They put my sister, Elena, at risk all of the time and rarely cared about anyone but themselves. They didn't even care about each other...well I thought they didn't.

Klaus and Elijah scared me for a while and put me on edge because I knew I wasn't significant enough to keep alive but when Rebekah ended up out of her coffin and in town, she seemed to take a liking to me and that got be sucked into all of their family drama.

It started because I was the only girl in school that didn't just pretend she wasn't there. Despite her having a clear hatred toward Elena, she hadn't actually done anything harmful at that point so I didn't see why we were being cruel to her first.

I didn't expect to become her best and only friend in town after that day.

Rebekah hadn't ever laid a threatening hand on me, never spoke low of me or used me for information. She genuinely wanted a friend and I could feel that. I wasn't gonna turn her away because she was Klaus's sister, not until she did something that made her awful.

So I stuck about, helped her pick a homecoming dress which she didn't even get to go to which I was not happy about and neither was Klaus which he made abundantly clear when he accused me of hurting her.

I found her a while later in Damon's dumbass basement, knew I couldn't just wake her up without consequences so made a deal with Klaus. Bex's safety for Jeremy''s safety so I could justify it to Elena and her gang. He went with it and everything worked.

Until this stupid fuck decided to stick her back in a coffin and wait it out.

Shit went down when all the Mikaelsons were up and about. Bekah had me at the mansion the night after her siblings and mother were woken. Klaus and Kol were constantly bickering whilst Elijah looked paler than...well paler than usual and very anxious but Rebekah just shrugged it off. She was just happy to have her mother.

And also to throw a ball.

I was forced to get tailored and have a colour theory assessment to figure what colour, style and fabric my dress needed to be. Elena had always been my mother's focus, she was her miracle, her eldest. So Elena got to have her hair styled, nails done, dresses designed and I would sit at home with my hand-me-downs and Jeremy's toys that I'd steal. It was kinda nice to be dressed up and pretty. I had stared in the mirror for so long, picking every detail apart trying to decide if I loved it because it was me or loved it because it wasn't really me at all. That's when Klaus appeared in the doorway.

"Everyone's arriving, love. Rebekah's downstairs greeting people and waiting ever so eagerly for her dreary date but she wanted me to make sure you came down." He explained the situation and I nodded, taking a breath and heading out the room, brushing past him as I did. The door was pushed shut and he fell in step beside me. "You look gorgeous by the way." He muttered and I rolled my eyes.

"You practicing your lines for when Caroline gets here?" I asked and he let out a breath.

"No, I meant it." He argued and smirked to himself as he took my arm, pulling it to wrap around his own and 'helping' me down the staircase.

"Sure you did. But I wouldn't say 'gorgeous' to Caroline. She already knows she is, pick something a little less common." I muttered and his brows furrowed.

"Like what?" he questioned and I shrugged.

"I don't know...maybe like....ravishing" I whispered, dramatically and sarcastically as we got to the bottom and I let go of his arm, spotting Rebekah looking moody. "Good luck" I gave a thumbs up and he hummed.

"You too."

I won't lie, I did laugh when I overheard him actually call her ravishing. Rebekah didn't get it and just complained about how great Caroline looked, to which I just scoffed and told Bex to go look in the mirror and get a reality check.

The whole dance thing came around and I ended up starting with Kol which was way too funny, he would not stop. Klaus did not look amused when we swapped partners and I was spun into his arms next.

"Believe me, love, Kol is not that funny. You're over selling it and inflating his ego." He complained, a level of bitterness in his tone which I was not expecting.

"I'm sorry, have I offended you by laughing?" I asked, scoffing softly as he pulled my waist closer.

"You haven't offended me." He muttered and that was that.

Tense night guys, tense night. Not as tense as Bekah's though when she wound up in Damon's bed. Thankfully, I woke up in my own.

After that night, there was no way I was getting away from that family.

In a few months Rebekah was a better sister to me than Elena and a better friend than the ones I'd had since kindergarten.

So when everything went down with the cure, I wanted her to have it so that she could live the human life that she had always wanted.

I cried for Kol's life when I came home to his remains on my kitchen floor and Klaus trapped in my living room. Caroline and Tyler didn't say a word as I scraped his ashes into a box and in return I didn't give any argument when Klaus bit Caroline. Instead, I just sat on the sofa opposite Klaus, staring into space as I waited for my phone to light up with some good news from Rebekah, hoping she had the cure for herself after Klaus had revealed that there was only one dose.

Faintly I heard Caroline mumbling about Klaus being in love with her, that made me laugh and dying or not, she didn't like that.

"Oh come on...I mean, he's like a thousand years old Care. He wants to fuck you, he likes the chase because when he finally gets you it feels like a win. You think a dance and a date is the same as love? What's Tyler then? Your soulmate? Is Matt too?" I was taunting a reaction really. I was still mad about Kol, we had become pretty good friends and the others new that and didn't care in the slightest. So yeah, I wanted her to hurt. I wanted all of them to hurt but Caroline always made it clear that she was better than me so having the power in that moment felt especially good.

When Klaus finally gave her a drop of blood, she was storming out of my house and dragging Tyler. Klaus only gave me a look and head nod of some sort of understanding before he gestured to the seat beside him and I moved over. I stayed against him until the barrier dropped and he was able to sort his shit out.

Rebekah didn't get the cure, Silas went crazy on everyone and life fell to fuck again.

Just when things got a little better, Rebekah came bursting through the door.

"You will not believe what my twat of a brother has gone and done!" She yelled, eyes wide and borderline shocked.

"Klaus?"

"Obviously! You won't even believe- hybrids can reproduce!" She revealed and I choked on nothing.

"Woah- wait. What has he done now?" I asked and she nodded enthusiastically.

"He got some wolf girl pregnant! They're in New Orleans right now. Keeping the baby! Elijah's there too, convinced they'll be some happy family." She muttered and I stared, completely gobsmacked.

Took a week but eventually she agreed to go too and I was beyond curious as to how this was gonna play out so took my place and kept by them.

People were dying left right and centre, wolves and witches and vampires. It was a war zone 24/7 until the day Hope was born and pronounced dead only she wasn't dead. Never had I ever been so tired. It was like a never ending game of tennis, whacking problems back and forth non stop.

And yet, somehow, no matter who had just been slaughtered, Klaus would have a comment to throw at me. Whether it be as simple as "Who are we all dressed up today for?" on a random Tuesday or as vulgar as "Christ love, do you want the whole city tearing that dress off?" when Bex and I were heading out for a fun mnight.

Touching also became increasingly common. Hands on my shoulders when he's stood behind me or my hips to keep my still. Waist if I needed to be stuck at his side, like if there was a threat, and arm with his whenever there was a dance even when I wasn't his date.

Rebekah had made many comments, Hayley too but I was a firm denier. A very firm denier for years. Years.

Hope grew up to be a far to aware child. In fact she asked at least a dozen times if I was her second mommy because her daddy and I were in love. When I told her we weren't in love, she would raise both brows and say a very sarcastic "Okaaay, whatever you say." And leave me speechless every damn time.

Even Kol was laughing. Wasn't having it.

But that stupid trip was definitely a set up. Not just by Kol or Bekah or Hayley, every single last Mikaelson and their fuckers.

Hope wanted to see the grand canyon. Somehow it became an entire family holiday/trip/plan situation to go to Arizona for a week, maybe visit California and blah blah blah.

We had two five seater cars. And somehow eleven people were going.

The car situation needed to be considerate of how many hours we would be in the cars and how likely arguments were.

"I'm not being in a car with Kol for over twenty hours." Klaus protested immediately and Davina nodded.

"Please don't put me in a car with Klaus." She muttered whilst Kol just grinned.

"I wanna go with Auntie Bekah and Auntie Freya!" Hope chimmed in and both sisters laughed in agreement.

"I can drive one of the cars?" Keelin offered and they nodded.

"Woah, wait." Hayley shook her head. "If Rebekah's there, where's Marcel? He can't be with Klaus or Elijah if we want to make it there without screaming."

I just stared, there wasn't enough space and I technically wasn't family and I wasn't dating or married to anyone there so I was ready to just stay home.

"We can drive with you, Elijah and Klaus?" Keelin replied to Hayley, reffering to both her and Freya who nodded.

"Yeah, then Kol, Davina, Bex, Marcel and Hope can go together and Hope still gets Bex. We can swap around halfway? We'll need to stop and sleep at a hotel or something anyway." Freya summarised and everyone nodded before Rebekah's eyes fell on me, I just shook my head at her to tell her it was fine but once we started our silent conversation others began to take notice.

"Y/N, you'll be in the car with us" Hayley said as though it was obvious.

"Sure but there's no room. You, Elijah, Keelin, Freya and Klaus-"

"Why's my name last?" Klaus interjected and I rolled my eyes.

"-There's ten seats and eleven of us. It's fine, I can stay here and you know...water the plants and stuff." I muttered, glancing around at the neglected, very dead plants.

"Of course not, you have to come." Elijah argued and I was slightly surprised it was him to say anything first though we had gotten closer over the years.

They all started mumbling between themselves before Kol just piped up.

"Oh come on! Just sit in my lap darling, you know I wouldn't drop you" He winked and Davina smacked her lips before delivering a swift smack to the side of his head and relishing in his yelp.

That's when everyone's eyes darted to Klaus.

"Just...sit on Nik's lap." Rebekah shrugged and I was ready to slap this bitch.

"Really, I'll just stay here and see the pictures." I backed out and Klaus frowned.

"What's wrong with my lap, love? You didn't protest to Kol's. I'm a much better option and much safer than a seatbelt." He defended and I sighed.

"Klaus-"

"No, it's decided. You'll be with me."

And that was that. Nothing I said was even heard after that, by anyone I swear.

Which was how I ended up telling Klaus that I was not sitting on his hands.

"Oh don't act like you wouldn't love to feel my hands holding that tight-"

"Klaus. Finish that sentence and I'm gonna smack you before sitting on Elijah's lap." I warned and he shut his mouth with a cocky smirk on his face.

Keelin was driving, Freya in the passenger, Elijah at behind Freya, Hayley in the middle cuddled up to the suited original and Klaus sat behind Keelin with my begrudgingly on his lap. His arms were wrapped round my body acting the same as a seat belt and also forcing my back to be against his chest after I tried to just perch on his knee and he called me ridiculous.

I lasted fifteen minutes of him whispering teasing comments into my ear about other ways we could end up with me on his lap before I had my headphones on to block him out.

We planned to do a stop at the services after five hours, less if Hope needed to use the bathroom or got hungry for something other than the snacks.

I got comfy after the first hour, letting myself relax against him and enjoy the drive. Three hours in he got fidgety and I paused the song to try ask what he was doing but then I felt it.

I don't think he knew my music had stopped when he cussed quietly and tried to move his hips back a bit. I wasn't sure whether shifting would make it better or worse as his cock only seemed to be getting more prominent against my ass.

I glanced to the side, seeing Hayley and Elijah both with headphones in and watching a film on an ipad before glancing up front to Freya and Keelin who were singing along to the radio up front.

Slowly I reached and pulled my headphones down around my neck and cleared my throat softly. He tensed against me and sucked in a breath.

"You okay?" I whispered, making sure to keep quiet and he placed his hand against the side of the car, pushing himself up to sit straighter but it just felt lift he pressed against me more.

"Fuck- sorry" He muttered, his voice breaking a little and he sounded weirdly panicked.

I expected him to make a flirty comment like normal, maybe even get touchy but he was actually...embarrassed?

"It's...okay" I murmured and pulled myself forward so I wasn't touching his crotch. "It's not long till we stop now anyway" I told him as I glanced at the sat nav.

We stayed like that for a while before some cry pulled in front of us unexpectedly and Keelin had to slam the breaks. I felt my body go forward before Klaus's arms pulled my straight back against him before my face could hit the back of the seat in front. My hands grabbed onto his arms as my heart rate spiked with adrenaline and my breathing sped up.

"It's alright love." he whispered against my ear whilst Keelin called an apology back to us. We stayed pressed right against each other regardless of his hard-on.

By the time we got to the services Klaus had nearly thrust his hips at least six times.

He went straight for the bathroom when we got there while I headed for the McDonald’s queue with Hope and Kol.

By the time we were getting back in the car, Klaus looked rough,.

Face pink, eyes refusing to look anywhere other than straight and had most definitely not resolved his problem. That was clear when he sat back down in the car and grimaced to himself.

I sat back in his lap and bit down on my lip. The others hadn't gotten I yet, they were swapping Freya and Keelin for Rebekah and Marcel with high hopes for no tension before we got to a hotel.

"Is there anything I can do to-"

"Please don't offer anything right now." He whispered, his jaw clenching making me hold a laugh. I sighed and turned round in his lap to face him.

"It's not a big deal" I told him and he frowned.

"It's embarrassing and we still have hours." He muttered. Honestly this was the perfect opportunity to tease him like he does me usually but he was actually stressed.

"Klaus, I don't mind. It's flattering, really." I told him gently. "Besides you can't help it, I'm just great." I shrugged and he smiled.

"Mhm, you're irresistible love." he chuckled and I hummed.

"Exactly, anyone would get turned on with my tight ass on their lap." I tease, using his words from earlier to make him laugh but it also made his cock twitch beneath me. My eyes glanced down and it made him shift. "Did you try to uh...get rid of it?" I asked, referring to when he ran to the bathroom.

"I tried to." He mumbled and turned me around so my back was to him as the other doors opened and Rebekah slid in beside us, grinning brightly and leaning over to hug me.

We chatted for the majority of the second half, Bex complained that Kol wouldn't stop singing in the other car and so on. Klaus's hands would clench every now and then if I moved too much or the car jolted but that didn't happen very often with how sensibly Elijah drove.

We got to the chosen hotel a full thirty minutes later than the others because Elijah wouldn't drive a single mile faster than the speed limit.

When we arrived we were only handed three room keys. Kol had gotten himself and Davina a room, Keelin and Freya room, Bekah and Marcel, and then another double bed room and a family room. Hope wanted to be with her mom so she came out of Freyas to go with Hayley and Elijah to the family room and Klaus and I had to share.

It would have been a whole lot less awkward if he hadn't had his erection for the entire day pressed against me but we powered through. Rebekah could be heard giggling to Marcel when they closed their door, waving at me with cocky smiles.

Klaus went straight in the shower so I put the TV on to drown out whatever he was doing (we all know what he was doing). He came out over half an hour later, face still pink as he glanced at me. I couldn't help but look and much to my surprise his cock was still pressing against his sleep pants.

"Klaus-"

"I don't want to talk about it." He mumbled as he got in bed beside me and rolled to face the opposite direction. I sighed quietly and went to the bathroom to get into my travel pyjamas before laying down next to him. The bed was definitely only a queen, we were pretty much touching the whole time no matter how close to the edge I was. I stared up at the ceiling for ages. It was so dark that I could barely see anything but I could tell that he was awake too, especially when he moved round to face me. I turned my head to look at him, my eyes squinting to make out his face with the tiny bit of moonlight that slipped past the curtains.

The silence was loud when his forehead pressed to mine and his eyes closed.

Thoughts come much easier when it's late. All ideas seem like good ones.

So I didn't really consider what I was doing when my hand slipped down to his crotch. He grunted softly when I cupped his bulge through the cotton. I looked down, watching my hand slip under his his waistband.

"Love..." He whispered before a groan left his lips when my fingers wrapped around his cock. My teeth bit down on my own tongue as I took his thickness into consideration. It was so quiet beside his heavy breathing as I stroked him firmly, his arm went around me and pulled me right up against him and his face nuzzled the crook of my neck.

It definitely wasn't a position I thought I'd end up in when this trip was planned but I couldn't say I wasn't enjoying it a bit. I let go of his length and he made a sound that closely resembled a whimper. I licked my hand a few times, coating my skin in saliva before sliding it along his shaft.

"Oh bloody hell" He muttered as his hips jumped up into my hand. I felt my eyes widen slightly at the full feel of him from tip to base. I squeezed him in my hand, feeling a sense of pride at how hard I had gotten him from doing literally nothing.

I felt his hand on the back of my head, pulling me down until our lips pressed together. His skin was warm against min and the sheets ensured that as our mouths moved in sync. His body moved like a wave to thrust his cock back and forth in my grip but I could feel him getting frustrated as he nipped my bottom lip, drawing blood.

I pulled away with a strained moan and squeezed his dick again. "Klaus, you gotta slow down" I whispered but he shook his head.

"I'm close-" he panted, "I just..." his hips kept bucking but I could tell he was struggling.

I opened my hand, letting go of him making him let out an angry cry. I knew he wanted to question me but his words halted in his throat when I moved my lips to his jaw, slowly but surely kissing lower down his body.

He went tense when I reached his cock before both his hands scooped my hair into a makeshift ponytail and I took his head into my mouth. We both took deep breathes for different reasons as he pushed my head down, I could feel my saliva dripping down his length as his head stroked the back of my mouth and teased my throat. I pulled up and his arms relaxed, letting me bob my head along his cock but taking him deeper when he pushed down. My eyes kept closing as I forced myself not to gag. I could taste him getting closer, his tip leaked against my tongue as I rolled it over the top half. His hands tightened their hold on my hair and his thighs tensed either side of me.

He held me down when he came making me gag as warm fluid hit the back of my throat. His hands dug into my scalp and I could hear him groaning as I swallowed it down.

My head shot up with a gasp for air and a soft laugh as he laid back against the pillows taking slow breaths. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and sat up.

I laid back down beside him and silence fell back over us but it wasn't as bad this time.

We must've fallen asleep sometime after because when I opened my eyes it was light in the room and my head was using Klaus's chest as a pillow.

For a second I thought that what had happened was a dream but when I pulled myself up the memories flooded in quickly and I looked down at Klaus who looked all the more ready to fuck me quite simply. Pupils blown, lips parted as he eyed me up and down like a piece of meat.

"Oh fuck." I cursed, running my hand through my hair and getting out of bed. I ignored his presence entirely and went to wash my face and get changed before leaving the room with my travel bag and knocking repeatedly on Rebekah's door.

She finally answered looking disheveled and very clearly just stopped having sex with Marcel but I didn't care.

"Breakfast now." I demanded, grabbing her arm and dragging her.

I wouldn't tell her what happened but she knew something had happened especially when everyone else arrived and Klaus just stared at me. Bekah glanced back and forth three times before raising both brows and sipping her coffee.

He seemed annoyed when I continued to ignore him for the next section of the car ride. So when we got to the services and I headed for the starbucks line, he was ride behind me. His hands were on my hips and I could feel his chest just brushing my shoulder-blades as we stood not so patiently.

"You're acting as though I've murdered your family pet, love." He murmured against the back of my ear making me sigh; I miss when he was embarrassed and quiet. I didn't reply to him and he huffed. "You weren't this rude last night-"

I elbowed him straight in the stomach making him wince before chuckling as his hands slipped round my waist. I wish I could say it made me feel uncomfortable but it just felt right in the most infuriating way. I continued to ignore him as I got to the till and made the order for myself, Bex and Hayley. Klaus got his card in before I could even reach into my pocket and I just went over to the waiting line. He was back on me in a second and pretty much breathing down my neck.

"Why are you being so cold, love? I thought we had a moment...or a few moments." He trailed and I clenched my jaw. He was teasing and it wasn't funny to me. I shouldn't have even thought about touching him like I had. He was my best friends brother for christs sake and I had to see him everyday, he was the worst person to get complicated with.

"You thought wrong." I mumbled and his hand squeezed my hip.

"Don't tell me you help out all of your friends like last ni-"

"Klaus would you just shut up? Last night was really, really stupid." I muttered.

"It wasn't stupid when you had your mouth on my cock, love." He hissed into my ear and I felt my face flush with embarrassment. Hated how the tables had turned.

I didn't bother saying anything else to him as I grabbed the drinks and shoved past him.

Back in the car we were both silent, so was everyone else. The tension was built.

When we finally got to the luxury hotel we were staying in I was quick to go to my own room, refusing help with my case and just going to set up for the next few days.

I'd just had a shower and done my hair when my door knocked. I had a robe wrapped round my otherwise bare body when I unlocked the door and opened it only to push it shut again but Klaus's hand caught it and he forced his way inside. "We have a lot to discuss."

"We really don't Klaus." I sighed as I sat down at the vanity.

"First of all-" He stared and I groaned, "last night was a long time coming. Perhaps not the blow job-"

"Klaus!" I scolded, throwing my arms up knowing that everyone's rooms were just behind a couple thin walls.

"-but the whole snapping of...lets say tension. Lets just be honest love, it's not exactly a surprise that we're attracted to each other." He chuckled and I narrowed my eyes.

"Well hold on. You're attracted to me, you're the one who couldn't get rid of his boner for an entire day. If I hadn't gotten rid of it then I would have had to've dealt with it all day today too." I defended but we both knew it was bullshit.

"Oh? So you didn't kiss me? Didn't look me in the eye whilst you wrapped your lips-"

"Why have you always got to make everything a big deal?"

"It is a big deal. I didn't ask you to do that, I didn't even tease the idea. You wanted it, you did it." He was getting angrier and it was worse because I knew I was wrong but I'd gone too far to succumb to that now.

"You could've just gone to sleep but you turned over and gave me that stupid look!" I argued and he scoffed.

"What look?"

"You know exactly what look. Your eyes do that thing."

His eyes narrowed momentarily and he stepped closer. "Oh? Am I doing it now?" He asked and I rolled my eyes.

"No." I muttered but as I glanced back up at him I could feel his gaze intensifying and the blue of them storming over.

"No?" He tilted his head and reached his hand out to cup my face. I clenched my jaw and stared at him uneasily. His fingers stroked along my jaw gently but his grip was rough as he crouched down in front of me to be eye-level.

"Stop it." I whispered but I didn't really mean it and he knew that so when he got closer and pressed his mouth along the length of my neck my protests were almost nonexistent.

"You've been cruel to me all day." He muttered as his hands pushed the fabric of my robe down. "Cold...rude..." He mumbled as he kissed the skin of my cleavage whilst his hands untied the material round my waist so it fell open.

"Klaus" I uttered, slight resistance in my tone as I become exposed to his eyes. I pressed my thighs together so he couldn't see between them as his eyes dragged down my body. His kisses kept going to my breasts alongside his hands.

"Is this stupid too, love?" He chuckled as he glided his tongue over my left nipple making my nerves light up.

"You have to stop" I whispered and he nipped the flesh in his mouth causing my body to jolt and a gasp leaving my throat.

"Why?" He chuckled

"You're Bekah's brother." I muttered and he fully laughed.

"Don't behave as if I was every just Rebekah's brother." He grinned and pinched both my nipples between his fingers making this a whole lot harder. "That second I saw you, I knew I'd have you. From that ball where you looked gorgeous whether you believed it or not...to seeing you hold my child, feeling you wash the blood from my hands, feeding me your blood when I needed it. You've always been mine." As if to make his point he pressed a kiss to my lips and slid both hands to my knees before pushing my legs apart.

I wave of embarrassment hit me but I wasn't strong enough to close them with his hands there. "I don't feel...gorgeous" I whispered, wanting to hide my body from his view.

"Well you should." He uttered back, a firmness to his voice which held no nonsense before his mouth pressed a series of kisses down my stomach before I felt the heat of his lips on my core.

My eyes drooped slightly at the sensation and my fingers slid into his hair, curling around the soft curls as my gaze met his and his tongue slid out from his soft lips to stroke my clit. He licked at me so slowly, heating my body up more and more with each delicate touch. His hands slide under my thighs and guided my legs over his shoulders so I was barely sat on the chair as his face disappeared between my legs and his mouth clung onto my pussy. My grip on his hair tightened and a series of cries left me.

His actions gained speed and pressure whilst he went. I could feel my lower stomach twisting in pleasure, wanting nothing more than to feel the high I knew he could give me.

As my eyes closed, I knew now why Klaus was as cocky as he was. Any man with this much power over a woman would be as cocky as he. I'd never felt so utterly vulnerable and yet completely uncaring for the consequences at once. The knowledge of the fact that his siblings and our friends might hear fell right out of my head as I moaned his name as loud and as often as I could as my body and mind expressed it's raw emotion to his touch.

My body went back and I pressed my hand to the chair to keep myself up as he buried into my thighs and plunged his talented tongue in and out of me without slowing. Heat spilled from inside of me, rushing into his mouth and fuelling him to suck and slurp. The sound brought an unbelievable surge of want through me; my hips ground up against his face and I felt a deep chuckle leave him and vibrate through me in response before he pulled off of me. He licked his lips and swiped his sleeve over his chin before grabbing my thighs again and lifting me up before swinging me round and tossing me down.

I felt the air leave my lungs as my back hit the bed.

He was on me before I could take a breath and the robe was dragged completely from my body. His hands grabbed my wrists and my arms were pinned above my head. I could feel my chest moving up at down, the only sound I could hear was my breathing. His lips were moving but no sound was coming out until a loud banging sound broke my daze.

Within seconds I had a sheet wrapped right round me and Klaus had me gathered behind him.

"Oh for fucks sake- We're going out for dinner! You could have waited-" Rebekah's voice shrieked and I felt hot for different reasons.

"Would you get out- we're coming!" Klaus yelled and Rebekah gagged making him scoff.

I felt him turn to me but I was just staring at the closed door. His hand rubbed down the back of my body slowly before he leant down to kiss my lips firmly but shortly.

"We'll finish this after dinner, I promise you love." He muttered into my ear before wrapping his arms around me and pulling me off the bed and grabbing my suitcase. "Let's get you dressed and get out of here before I somehow lose my clothes too" He teased.

By the time we got out there everyone was stood waiting bar Hayley, Elijah and Hope. I went to ask but Rebekah just grabbed my hand and dragged me. Immediately I went to apologise but she started before I could. "Oh my god! I mean, I thought the car ride would build some tension but I wasn't expecting it to snap so easily- did you two have sex in the hotel yesterday!? Wait no don't tell me ew!" She exasperated.

"No! We didn't...have..sex." I muttered and I could feel her staring.

"I wanna ask but I really also don't..." She whispered and I nodded.

"Good shout." I mumbled and we kept walking ahead of the others. "Hope-?" I questioned.

"Hayley took her to the restaurant early to check she liked the menu, thank god."

"Oh shut up. This is your fault. You planned this." I muttered.

"Well...me and everyone else."

I love that you can just read my moodswings through this as I just didn’t know whether to make it completely fluffy, angsty or smutty. I really loved the request but I’m not really sure I did it justice

[jadeylovesmarvelxo]

Insecurity ✨

Older Eddie Munson x Reader

The reader is in her twenties (mid to late, that's up to you) Eddie is 39.

My requests are open 💌✨

❤️

It was the start of an argument that had been growing since the two of you had left dinner. Eddie thought you were acting like a brat...and maybe you were just a little bit but you felt like it was justified.

Or maybe not so much. It wasn't Eddie's fault that Eddie's ex was at the same restaurant. She was with her boyfriend but you still felt inadequate just by looking after her. She was stunning, all blonde hair, big blue eyes and legs for miles. Of course, Eddie dated someone like her.

You tried to ignore the growing pit in your stomach, the one that asked what the hell Eddie saw in you. It was a slippery slope to go down and you knew it was silly to think that way but insecurities had ways of popping up at the most inopportune time didn't they?

Michelle had said a quick hello and she was just so graceful and elegant. She could be a model and she was Eddie's age, there wasn't an age gap and widely different life experiences.

Eddie's hand closes over yours as it rests on the table, you notice Michelle looking and she raises her eyebrows and looks at you in disbelief. Like what could Eddie see in you?

Eddie presses soft kisses to your knuckles as if sensing your problems, the look from Michelle chips away at your confidence and you look away feeling flustered.

It meant you were quiet and lost in thought, lost in stupid musings and worries. It ended up with Eddie thinking you were pissed about something, his hand in yours and circling your palm in soothing motions, trying to take away some of your worry.

By the end of the night though he had had enough and once your meal was finished he was staring at you expectantly.

"What's wrong?" he sighs and you shake your head and a soft groan of frustration issues from his throat. "let's get going okay" you frown and pout.

"I don't want to leave. I want another drink" You down another glass of champagne and Eddie's eyes darken.

"You've been sullen all through dinner, you've barely eaten and now you're acting like a brat. So what's the problem?" you wince and stand up, getting ready to leave.

He leads you outside and you're both quiet during the ride home, Eddie keeps glancing at you and anxiety pools in your gut. Maybe you should just say what's bothering you? Would Eddie understand or would he just think it was stupid?

Stupid. You wince at the word. Your ex before Eddie liked to throw that word around a lot. It's why you didn't date for a long time after Josh. Then you met Eddie and he was nothing like Josh, he was patient and kind, gentle with you.

Arguments between the two of you were uncharted territory though, you could count on your hand how many times you and Eddie had a disagreement.

Tonight was a first for everything though. By the time you get back to Eddie's the tension between the two of you is worse.

"Seriously what the fuck is going on with you? You've been quiet all night. I talk to you and all I get is shrugs or one-word answers. Do you want me to put you over my knee right fucking here?"

You stubbornly ignore him but the fact that Eddie is mad at you is making your anxiety worse.

"It's stupid and I don't want to talk about it okay, I know it's just me being silly and I want to just forget it" You don't want to snap at him and turn away shrugging off your coat and slip out of your heels.

"You're acting just like some bratty kid and I'm fucking sick of it" he huffs and the venom in his voice stops you in your tracks. Sick of you is what he's trying to say and your heart sinks. Fuck. Is that what he meant?

Josh was right. You were a nightmare to deal with, his words come back to you. All the little barbs he would say that burrowed under your skin and made you feel shit about yourself. Honestly, you really thought you were over those cruel words but obviously not.

A whimper escapes your mouth and Eddie turns to face you and his eyes widen, "Sweetheart" he whispers and you feel the tears coming but they don't stop and rush past Eddie and into the bedroom, cuddle into the bed while your body shakes with sobs.

💞

A little while later Eddie comes in and he closes the door, makes his way over to the bed and lies down beside you. You peer up at him and his big brown eyes fill with worry.

"Oh, princess. I'm so fucking sorry" he presses kisses to your head and you burrow your face into his neck.

"I'm sorry, I have been off all evening and I should have told you and not acted like...like a brat, I understand if you're sick of me" he stiffens.

"You're not a brat and I'm sorry, I shouldn't have shouted at you princess, fuck. I could never ever be sick of you. Why would you ever think that?" His eyes narrow after a few seconds and he growls under his breath.

"Josh right? Jesus h Christ, I would love to meet that limp dick little asshole. Might borrow Steve's bat, DIY castration" You giggle and he holds you tighter.

"I got jealous when I saw Michelle. She's so beautiful and I got lost in my head, didn't help the way she looked at me. Made me start thinking stupid things" his gaze softens.

"Princess, You mean so much to me. I've never felt this way about anyone" he assured you then his mouth pressed into a frown and his eyes flashed with fury. "What do you mean by the way she looked at you?"

Sighing you began to explain what you meant, "It was like oh what's he doing with someone like her kind of look" he growls deep in his throat.

"Fuck her. She's always been a mean bitch. It's why I broke up with her, we didn't mesh well and I meant what I said you're the only woman I've ever felt this way before about anyone sweetheart, I wish you could see that"

You stare at him confused, you want to know exactly what he means. "Tell me, how do you feel?" he softens and presses his lips to yours once, twice and then a third time.

"I'm so in love with you, how can you not see that? I love you so much, Princess" Your lip wobbles and you cuddle into his arms.

"It was just this little thing that grew into this big big. When I saw Michelle I just wondered what you saw in me and I hate that she made me feel that way but I love you Eddie and I guess I just had a major wobble" he softens.

"Oh sweetheart, Michelle, any other woman I've dated doesn't matter. I mean what I said I've never felt this way about anyone, not Michelle, not anyone. I fell in love with you the minute I saw you and trust me, that was a fucking surprise for someone who thought love was a load of bullshit. I was a cynical ass you could say"

He wipes the stray tear away from your eyes and holds you close. "Mmm, it took you long enough to admit it. Stubborn ass" you tease and he smiles, all dimples.

"Gonna tell you so much that you'll get sick of it Milady" he promises you and you smile. You could never get sick of hearing Eddie say those three little words.

And he would tell you so much, every single day in a million tiny different ways.

❤️

[itspyon]

compilation post of commentary youtubers talking about dream, no drummyaches edition !

note, i might not exactly like 100% of the things said in these videos BUT they ultimately redeemed dream to a very large audience

starting with i think is the most viewed video right now, Will Dream's Response Actually Fix Anything? by Lessons in Meme Culture. it's 2:40 minutes long and the point is simply to open conversation about him being able to successfully redeem himself, but it has a lovely comment section if you want to scroll through that

Dream Just Responded To Everything by AugustTheDuck, had already spoken about Dream pretty positively, lovely guy, lovely summary [ touches earpiece the main studio is telling me august actually was a dream hater but turned around recently, so noting that down ]

Dream's Response was Perfect, But... by EntLaiser, who previously made a video actually speaking negatively of Dream, completely changed his opinion and talked about how meme culture is being used to justify mass harassment, along with being nice to Dream stans and defending them

Pyrocynical made a video. its bad. don't watch it. he gets cooked in the comments though so that's okay. Acheeto also made a video but i don't like the guy so i'm not linking that either, but it was a good video

Dream Finally Responded To The Allegations by sensitive soci3ty. i really like this video but i especially like the comments that bring up a lot of great points, it was refreshing scrolling through them

LIES! by Omni. Omni is really big on the commentary community so his input is valued, this video is long and goes through a lot of unrelated stuff because it's a news segment, but i linked to the timestamp he talks about Dream. it is long, it is thorough, he READS THE DESCRIPTION which i haven't seen anyone do, pretty good

Dream Might Actually Be Innocent by Saverino. this guy is like, the perfect representation of "i only consumed Dream content through social media for years", the most passive onlooker in the world. and his video is awesome, he took a lot of notes, he resumed Dream's video pretty well, and i feel the way he thinks of Dream is how people will look at dream from now on

Dream Finally Responded by Dolan Dark. it's a slob but it's fucking Dolan Dark and he says he believes he's innocent so who cares W for us

other creators we already know and knew they believed Dream, Hot Sauce Beats did a live reaction and so did Nate Alyn if you'd like to go and support them

Dream's Response Was Actually Good by Saamuel. dream hater admitting he was wrong. all is good in the world

Dream Finally Responded To The Allegations by Optimus. don't watch this video lol. he says a bunch of stupid shit, his comments call him out for it, but i am linking it because this guy is huge on the community, a lot of people were waiting on this video on twitter, and he's very clear on saying the allegations are fake, along with shaming twitter antis for their behaviour

Dream's Response Wasn't Good Enough by luhrix specifically talks about the reaction from antis on twitter to the video and how unreasonable some expectations are when it comes to responding to allegations

Does Dream's Response Make Him Innocent? by Blissolic who VERY BRAVELY calls out coyglone ( the guy behind the dreamwastalen account ) for being a piece of shit

Dream Responded... by Repzion. excellent video no notes, less about dream himself and more a critique of how people consume serious topics as "drama" and farm engagement through it

I Was In Dream's Video by orangepeanut. it's kind of ass but he is in dream's video ! he's the "dream sucked his own dick" guy. he says sorry for baiting and actually apologises to dream which is kind of funny, and he does say dream is innocent. just noting it down for reference

Dream's Response Was GREAT! by TekuToji. another excellent video, nice summary. he did thought the poki xqc dms were real but he corrected himself on the comments lol

Dream Has Returned ( and why you should be excited ) by PurpleMatter. sweet video ! go leave a nice comment :D

this is a different one as it is a full reaction, but it is by Kenji, a VERY famous vtuber, and he was awesome about it and called out his chat several times when they spoke misinformed shit. it's very fun and i'm glad a completely different audience now has a positive view of Dream

[joyoushyuck]

requested

00:56

Your hand is raised in front of the door, about to knock, when the door clicks open on its own. Donghyuck doesn't seem surprised by your presence; his expression is morphed into one of indifference. He is wearing his glasses and that white Celine shirt he loves to wear on special occasions. His long hair curls at his nape, a few curly strands beautifully swaying at the front. You would call him gorgeous if it wasn't for the pressing situation at hand. He walks past you into the kitchen and extracts a water bottle from the fridge. You flinch when he slams the door shut.

“Donghyuck,” you try. He chugs the water down, ignoring you. “Donghyuck list-”

A thud, water on your feet and a gasp leaving your mouth, and Donghyuck storms past you back into the bedroom. The blue baby shark bottle lays a few inches away from your legs with a broken hinge and a crack near the top.

You bite your lips in an attempt to keep your tears at bay. You brought this on yourself, you have no right to cry. If forgetting your anniversary was not enough of a fault, you went on to blame it on your workload and blame him for being upset. Not your smartest move.

Dejected, you walk back to the couch and lay down. You haven't slept properly in ages, you really were preoccupied with an important project at work, but even that isn't a good reason to stop doing the bare minimum. Donghyuck's anger is justified.

You don't have a blanket; no amount of hugging yourself provides you the warmth that Donghyuck’s body exudes. The pit of your stomach feels hollow with dread; the guilt weighs you down and threatens to swallow your being. After an hour of twisting and turning, you give up on the idea of sleep. There's no way you can sleep peacefully without resolving this conflict. Your throat constricts and heart sinks at the prospect of Donghyuck ending this relationship for his own good.

So you walk up to the door resolutely. If Donghyuck continues to give you the silent treatment, you know your resolve will take a hit pretty soon. However, doing something to show that you care is better than doing nothing.

“Hyuck,” you start, only to hear your voice crack. It pains you as much as it pains him to have landed in such a predicament. “I'm sorry, Donghyuck, it's my fault. Please, just open the door.”

You are met with silence. Did he fall asleep already? It seemed unlikely but you couldn't rule out the possibility.

“Hyuck, are you awake? Baby? Just please answer me.”

Still no response. But then, something drops, and you hear the old bed squeak, his feet shuffle and the spring in your mattress dip. So he's awake.

“Donghyuck, love, please talk to me.” You cringe at the desperation in your own voice. “I am sorry, I know I fucked up Hyuck. Shout at me, hit me, just-”

You clutch your hair, your back sliding against the door and butt hitting the cold floor. A shiver runs down your spine. Was it winter already?

“Just don't be quiet, please.”

You bury your face in your hands in a last ditch attempt to keep the sobs under control. It didn't seem to be working in your favour. The stress at work seems to be finally catching upto you as well. Donghyuck needs space. He doesn't need you annoying him now when all this could have been prevented had you been more mindful of your actions. You accept your fate and curl into a bundle, deciding to give it a rest for now.

That's how Donghyuck finds you a few hour laters.

You are hugging your knees close to your chest, head resting uncomfortably on the hard floor. When he takes a closer look, he can see the dried streak of tears on your cheek. You are trembling, and he realises you haven't even switched the heater on. Something in him breaks at the sight of you like this.

“Hey, baby,” he gently taps your cheek to wake you up. “Baby, you can't sleep here, come in.”

You make a little noise. He is met with the uncontrollable urge to coo at you, but stops himself given the situation.

“Wake up doll,” he tries again. “You are going to have a terrible back pain at this rate.”

You blink your eyes open sluggishly after a few moments. Donghyuck isn't wearing his glasses anymore and his hair is mussed up. “Hyuck?” You ask, your sleep muddled brain still not catching up. “Is everything alright?”

Donghyuck sighs, his fingers gently caressing your cheek. He loved you too much to stay mad at you for long, no matter what you did.

“Come sleep on the bed baby. We'll talk about the rest in the morning. Come in now.”

[femsolid]

When I was in domestic abuse support groups over on Facebook I quickly noticed that there were a lot of abusive men in it. They claimed to be victims of course. In fact they were convinced to be. They had read up on "narcissistic abuse" and truly believed that their partner or ex was one. In the group I'd see a daily flood of women describing the most horrid shit and the trauma inflicted on them. But men's most common complaint was that their wives had been "withholding sex" which really is a form of abuse they said. Another way these men suffered from domestic abuse was through being dumped. They described a woman leaving them as a form of abuse. So two of the most common ways men are abused are... by women exercising their own free will. Obviously when men describe abuse in such a way you know they are abusive. For example, the complaints about "withholding sex" as abusive are admissions of attempted rapes through coercion and guilt tripping.

Another way women abuse men is by letting them do chores of course. One kept spamming about it, taking before and after pictures of the dishes he did while his obviously mentally unstable cruel bitch of a wife was playing with the kids. I screenshoted everything and sent it to her. And yet another fascinating post was this man, obviously another victim, who saw his ex's new boyfriend while driving and decided to follow him, as victims do. He followed him for a long while, as victims do, before the new boyfriend supposedly parked near a motel where he met a woman. Our victim parked too and watched with glee as his ex was being cheated on. When I pointed out that, no, this is not what victims do and that he was telling on himself by describing how he follows people like a creep he cried that I wasn't allowed to question him because it's a safe space for victims and it's against the rules call a moderator please help etc. That's the thing with these groups: men go in there to feel vindicated and they are. Women immediately approve and help men pathologise women based on nothing and certainly not actual descriptions of abuse. The women don't realise that they are helping a man abuse a woman. Hundreds of comments calling a woman a narcissist and the man feeling justified in taking revenge on that woman. And me being told I'm too mean.

But you know what men write the most about in those groups? How we talk too much about women being abused and not enough about men. It upsets them to see women being listened to. And again, women approve by the hundreds, "yes poor men, women can be just as evil" and on and on, ironically disproving what men are claiming: men are not ignored, they are taken way too seriously as a matter of fact.

This guy posted about being abused again, how he "fell for it" once more, how he "should have known better". He had met a woman and she had "used" him you see. Cue to the choral of women offering him support without questions. So I asked one: how did she use you? He responded that, well, she didn't really use him per say, she asked him for help, he helped, she thanked him and that was it. They weren't dating. He had met a random woman and helped her and she hadn't offered him anything in return (like her vagina, you know) she had just thanked him and that's abuse. Imagine that. Traumatised women describing really disturbing and upsetting events and men whining about women not being on their hands and knees. And both sides cohabiting in one group under the pretense that one is not oppressing the other because "domestic abuse has no gender".

[descendant-of-truth]

Ohhh this scene. This one's a doozy

Nine is right to call this out about Sonic, of course. While he's definitely grown since the start of the show, he's never really been able to move past his tunnel vision and tendency to project onto the others.

He never thought to ask Nine what he wanted not because he doesn't care, but because he didn't think he needed to. He inherently assumes that the people he's working with are on the same page as him until told otherwise - in fact, it wasn't too long ago that he was similarly thrown off by Shadow in that very room.

(Love Shadow being used as a sort of "test run" for these kinds of conflicts by the way)

But here's the thing. While it's true that Sonic didn't really think about what Nine wanted and just assumed they were going to stick together no matter what... the same is true of Nine.

Look at how confused Nine looks when Sonic talks about coming back to Green Hill and restoring it:

Nine didn't ask what Sonic was wanting to do by repairing the Prism because he thought it was obvious that they were going back to the Grim together. I don't think it occurred to him that fixing Green Hill was even an option, or at least not one that he considered in favor of his original plans.

And just like Sonic, it's not that he only cares about himself - he went out of his way to engineer coconuts and (presumably) palm trees because he knew how much Sonic missed them. It was really sweet!

But, in what's becoming a pattern in this show, he doesn't understand why those trees matter to Sonic. They're not just cool plants, they're a reminder of home. And as Sonic aptly puts it at the start of the show, home is where your friends are.

I love that the conflict here is that both of them were convinced they knew what the other person wanted/would be okay with, because they think it'll naturally be the same thing they want, and then were both completely unprepared to handle a conflict of interest. It feels so natural and makes perfect sense with how they've been written up to this point.

But see, while I think it's pretty clear that Sonic and Nine fell into the exact same communication trap, I think it's going to take longer for Nine to realize his own fault in any of this.

Sonic spent the entire second half of that conversation looking devastated, and he's made it clear throughout the show that he's quick to feel remorse when he realizes he's hurt someone. In all likelihood, he's going to put all of the blame for that argument on himself, decide that Nine was right about everything, and leave it at that.

Nine, likewise, doesn't strike me as a particularly self-reflective type. He'd probably try to justify not needing Sonic to himself before anything else, and with that in mind, who else is there to make him see the situation with more nuance?

If I had to pick, I'd guess Shadow - our resident "smacking people in the face with their own flaws" extraordinaire.

Why would he bother with any sort of mediating between the two? Well, the funniest reason would be that he finds Sonic's self-pitying and Nine's self-righteousness equally annoying, but I'm inclined to assume any sort of confrontation between him and Nine would be a little more dramatic than that. (He might still use that reasoning as justification though)

Anyway I gotta cut this post short before I go too far into speculation territory or else I'll be here for another hour and this took long enough to write as is, case in point I love me a well-written and believable conflict

[targaryenrealnessdarling]

No Pain, No Gain | Part 1 | PersonalTrainer!Aemond x fem!reader

Summary: The personal trainer your roommate Baela recommended to you is rude, condescending but also hot as hell. Series Masterlist.

A/N: shoutout to my personal trainer Alex for rotting my brain. This is my first modern!Aemond fic, so any feedback is genuinely appreciated, I hope you enjoy this, it was an absolute ball to write (and there will be more!)

Also I could not post this without tagging some absolute modern!Aemond QUEENS who inspired me to write this. @valeskafics @oneeyedvisenya @sapphire-writes​ you’re the real ones! Also massive hug to @ewanmitchellcrumbs​ for hyping me up and being a parent to this child she didn't choose to create.

warnings: EVENTUAL SMUT, 18+, sexual tension, binge eating, mentions of breakup, cursing, dickhead Aemond, reader is horny af, English slang (soz), warnings will be added when needed

To say you were broken-hearted would be a bit of an understatement.

You were angry, annoyed, frustrated, wound up tight and pissed off to the highest degree.

And it showed in how you acted these days as you polished off the salty family-size bag of crisps on your own in 10 minutes flat.

You look over at your phone and sigh when you see it’s already 6 o’clock in the afternoon. Another day sat on the sofa, wallowing in self-pity, eating yourself into oblivion and fairly soon pouring a glass of Baela’s finest white wine (now that it was officially almost evening anyway and it was justified).

Scrolling through instagram was like twisting the dagger that was already in your chest. All that stupid fucking app could show you was ‘ex in the bar with his new girlfriend’, ‘ex in the drive-thru with his new girlfriend’, ‘ex on the beach with his new girlfriend’.

It made you want to throw your phone directly at the wall. But you settled for squeezing the life out of it, imagining it was your ex’s stupid face instead.

The absolute waste of space had broken up with you over text on the night you were supposed to go out on a date. And as if that was not bad enough, not even two weeks had gone by before he’d managed to stick his dick into someone else with a pulse. At the time, you were so angry that you didn’t accuse him of anything, he’d already broken up with you. But you did suspect that this ‘sudden’ relationship he’d gotten into wasn’t as recent as first thought. 

It’s been a month since you found out about the other woman.

And clearly you were coping really well.

Indulging wasn’t something you usually did, but now you feel you deserved it. 

“Hello~” the soft, ringing voice of your roommate Baela was at the door. You half-considered hiding all the packets of various foods you’d managed to stuff down your gob, but Baela had seen worse of you. She’d seen you while you were throwing your guts up after freshers week at university. Nothing was worse than that and you shuddered at the memory.

She walks in, looking more put together than you by a long way, having been hanging out with her sister all day. That’s what you like about Baela, she’s not judgemental, and so when she sees you’ve barely moved an inch she just flashes her usual smile.

“Good day then?” she says with a smirk. You raise your eyebrows in return.

“Apart from seeing him plastered all over instagram I’m great” 

“Got any left?” she asks, extending a greedy hand for a crisp. You offer her the bag with a sigh as she slumps on the sofa next to you. She watches boredly whatever you have on the TV,

"Why don't you just block him?" She asks. And to be fair, she has a point.

But you huff and shove another crisp in your mouth, whining, "Cos I'm a nosy bitch with no boundaries"

Baela sighs, pulling out her own phone and scrolling through her notifications, "As much as I love you y/n, this is pathetic, even for you"

You'd be offended if she wasn't completely right. And you know she's only half joking so you just shrug.

"How was Rhaena?" You ask.

"Yeah fine, usual shit with Dad. Oh I didn't tell you-" she starts.

She has that glint in her eye which spells trouble. She's got gossip and you raise your eyebrows in anticipation.

"Hold that thought, wine first?"

"Obviously"

After giggling and waltzing over to the counter to pour two glasses of the finest box wine you could get for under seven English pounds, you hand her one and wait almost too excitedly for her to spill whatever sweet gossip she has.

She sips it, almost like she needs the liquid courage to begin, and she hisses at the sweet, acidic taste.

"God that's foul" 

"It was 2 for 1!" You retort with a laugh, but she is right, it does taste foul, "Stop stalling, tell me tell me tell me" 

She looks at you as if to say bitch, you are not fucking ready.

“Dad’s married Rhaenyra” 

The force of which your jaw drops open is almost comical. You’d guessed for a while that they were at least fucking, but to just elope?!

“I need money, cos I betted on this shit happening!” 

“Oh my gosh, Rhaena was fucking hysterical. Jace and Luke aren’t surprised at all, but Alicent is beside herself in the family group chat, it should honestly be a reality TV show” Baela says scrolling through said group chat. From what you can see without being too nosy, is that there’s a lot of long paragraphs and angry emojis.

“What about Viserys, surely he’s…” you ask, trailing off to sip the pissy wine in your hands.

“Oh no, he’s thrilled. Which pisses Alicent off even more if that’s possible”

“Baela I think your Uncle’s gone insane” you bite your lip to stifle a laugh.

“No fucking kidding”

You slump back onto the sofa, “Holy shit, I am a genius. I knew the whole time” you say, smirking in victory.

“And so humble too” Baela gives a sarcastic grin which you return.

“How do you feel about it?”

Baela shucks her phone onto the coffee table, sighing, “Not bothered, we’re all adults now, so it hardly makes a difference to me. Suppose it’ll get Dad to stop bringing back random women now” she says exasperated, “but Rhaenyra gets the impression we’re all really bothered so she’s invited us all to a retreat for a week. Think she just wants to butter us up for marrying our Dad”

“Oh? Anywhere nice?”

Baela looks over, giving you a wearied look.

“What?”

“Well that brings me to you”

“Oh god, what” you ask, dropping the tone to emphasise the seriousness of the talk all of a sudden.

Baela fiddles with the remote, in an attempt to appear cute, “Well~ There’s a spare ticket going and you’re my bestest friend. And I would hate to endure a week of watching my Dad eat Rhaenyra’s face off, so come with me please?” she begs.

You sigh, “Baela usually I would love to sponge off you like that but-”

“Pleasepleaseplease~” she begs, “Rhaena’s bringing her boyfriend and we’re basically together!” 

You fake a gagging sound.

“Oh come on, a week on a beach in bikinis,sweltering weather with as many cocktails as you can hold isn’t exactly torture”

You give her an incredulous look, opening your arms to emphasise all the bags of junk food around you, “Do I look beach body ready to you?!”

“Oh fuck off, you’re hot and have an ass that can keep the world fed” 

“I know I am hot, I just don’t feel hot” you stare blankly at the TV, trying to ignore her and stuff another crisp into your mouth.

Baela sighs, “I was just thinking it would be a nice distraction, that’s all” 

“I want to it’s just…” you start, trying to think of the right words, “...I don’t feel my best”

Baela gives you a playful slap on your arm, “Look, forget your ex, he’s dumb as fuck and it’s not solving anything by staying inside with the curtains drawn all day. If you want to feel better, might be worth taking care of yourself a bit, hm?” 

Fuck her, you think, rolling your eyes, she’s right.

You hate how often she’s right. Because she gets that look on her face when she is. Always has done.

“How about that gym membership you’ve not used since February?” she asks,

“Okay firstly, ouch. Secondly, I realised I don’t know the first thing about how to work out in a gym, besides the guys there were…weird”

You shudder at the thought. It was January and so all the new year’s resolution guys were at it in full swing, using the gym as a means to try and pick up girls. And since graduating you find that more often than not the guys who hit on you were students. Maybe it was different now?

Baela pokes her cheek with her tongue, racking her brain.

“One of my cousins is a personal trainer? I could text him to see if he’s happy to take you on. Mates rates” she smiles.

You side-eye her hard. You’ve heard briefly about her cousins. Some of the stories are a bit more…eccentric than others. And even though you’ve never met them, you’ve heard enough stories to satisfy your curiosity. 

“This isn’t the manwhore cousin, right? Because if it is then no” 

She scoffs, “No. Aegon hasn’t set food in a gym since graduating and he only went cos it was free. The personal trainer one is Aemond. He’s a bit…anti-social?” she pulls a face when she says it.

“He’s anti-social and he’s a personal trainer?” you ask, eyebrow raised, “makes so much sense”

Baela scrolls through her contacts, “Yeahhh. Don’t worry though, he’s just grumpy” she explains, “want me to text him?”

Your head falls to the edge of the sofa in a huff. You want to go and on top of that, it might be nice to finally have a break. That and you’d love to shove it in your exes face when he sees you’re on holiday looking your hottest. 

“How long ‘til the holiday?”

Baela grins victoriously, “A month and a bit. He does a month course for stuff like this, I can ask him about it”

What the fuck am I getting myself into, you think briefly.

Fuck it.

“Fine”

The force at which Baela’s nails tap against the screen is almost desperate.

Baela snorts a laugh at the message and turns her phone to show you the messages.

“He seems lovely” you roll your eyes sarcastically.

“Like I said, he’s just grumpy. He’ll be professional though” she says.

You sigh, crushing the empty bag of crisps in your hands.

“Can’t wait” 

After following him on instagram, you did a bit of shameless stalking. You’d heard a little bit about Aemond from Baela talking about her family, but he seemed the most mysterious out of all of them (save for the youngest whose name she struggled to even remember). 

He had very little photos of himself, mainly progress pictures of other clients he’s helped. And he seems to be pretty successful so far. A girl with a similar body to you managed to get toned on his one-month program and looked hot afterwards, so you had some high hopes that it was possible for you as well. But you did wonder what he looked like. There were only two photos where he was in frame, and he’d been tagged by another person, looking away from the camera.

From what you could see, he was very tall, lithe and slim but built, with silver hair that had been pulled up into a bun. Ah, so he’s a man-bun type of guy. Yikes. 

Unfortunately, the photo showed very little of his face, so you couldn’t be too nosy.

You sent a very brief message, introducing yourself, trying not to cringe at the idea that he might be doing the exact same stalking to your instagram right at this moment. A shiver went up your spine at the thought. 

It’s only when you’re in TKMaxx with Baela, shopping for gym gear the next day, that you finally get a reply from him. 

“What do you think of just wearing a sports bra?” Baela says, eyeing up a black shirt.

You’re too busy staring at the message, “Hm? Oh, I’d just go in gym leggings and a bra yeah. Just got a reply from your mysterious cousin”

Baela hops over, “What’s he said? Nothing bad I hope” she grins.

 You show her the screen.

Baela raises her eyebrows, “Very formal. Guess I shouldn’t be surprised” she says, seeming surprised that he’s at least cordial.

“It’s very ‘serial-killer-esque’ of him not to have a profile picture” you joke, locking your phone again.

Baela picks out a black gym set. Black leggings with a mesh pocket on the side for your phone and a black sports bra. You nod, “Yeah looks good to me”

“Oh please you’re gonna look hot in this” she smirks, leading you over to the counter to pay.

She rewards you for your efforts by driving you to McDonald's drive-thru. A send off to junk-food so to speak.

And when Monday rolls around, you nod in the mirror. She was right, it does look hot on you. At least in the safety of your flat where there’s nobody to look at you. In a gym, surrounded by other fit people and a personal trainer you’ve never met? It might feel slightly different.

There’s a faint swirl of anxiety in your gut but you pull your trainers on, grab a hair tie from your nightstand and drive to the gym you’ve agreed to meet at. Luckily it’s your local gym, large and packed to the brim with some good equipment at least. And you briefly wonder what kind of workouts you’ll be doing before pulling into the car park.

You see him as soon as you enter the gym. He’s very tall, slender but muscular and fucking gorgeous. What the fuck, is all you can think when you shamelessly scan him from head to toe. Like the pictures, he has his long silver hair in a bun, with a few pieces having come free and falling around his face. His legs are miles long in the black sweats he’s wearing, as well as the black top that sticks a bit too snugly to his front and shoulders, making your mouth water a bit.

And you can’t help but admire his side profile, how his jaw just so naturally and sharply juts into his chin. How his cheekbones sit so prominently and high on his face, framing his features. His sharp, defined nose. And you can’t see from here because he’s looking down at his phone, but his eyelashes are unnaturally long for a man. It’s just unfair, frankly.

Shaking yourself briefly from the trance you were in, you right yourself and approach him.

He looks up to see you before you even have a chance to open your mouth. Now that he's looking at you face on, you can see the shocking blue of his right eye and the paler, soft hue of the other. Not only that but the angry scar that ran down the side of his face, extending from his forehead to the mid part of his cheek, straight through the eye.

You look at it for a split second, surmising that perhaps he's partially sighted or blind in that eye. But you choose not to say anything and instead smile with an awkward wave.

"Hey, you must be Aemond"

He openly drags his eyes over you, from head to toe, just like you did a moment ago without his knowledge. But now that you're standing right in front of him, in the gym gear that you totally don't feel a bit self conscious in, it feels a bit weird.

He doesn't reply for a moment.

"I'm y/n" you say, forcing a smile to your nervous face.

"Hm" he responds lowly, "Baela's friend" 

You pull an awkward face and nod.

You feel so stupidly small against this absolute giraffe of a man and you daren't step forward any more, for fear of looking even smaller under his judgemental and indifferent gaze.

He sighs and gestures for you to follow him, seeming disinterested as he looks down at his phone. For a brief second you wonder how this guy keeps his clients if he's this rude, but you shake the thought away, not wanting to judge too quickly.

He leads you into one of the consultation rooms, separate from the rest of the gym. He sits on one of the seats, sighing as if he's had the hardest day in the world and taking a swig of water from his bottle.

Sat across from him, you feel a bit small under his gaze. He's quite intimidating, you now find.

"Have you ever worked out before" he asks flatly.

You shrug, "I've tried I guess, but never super seriously" you laugh awkwardly, but he doesn't return it.

He runs his eyes over you again, as if to say yeah I can see that.

"Stand up. Shoes off. We're going to take your weight and measurements" he orders, going to his bag to grab some things.

It's beyond awkward and quiet in the room with him as he idly takes down your weight, height and current eating habits, which you've had to be more honest about than you'd cared to admit.

Standing in the middle of the room, he twirls his measuring tape on his fingers. He measures your upper body first, which isn't too bad until he gets to your bust. You try and look anywhere else in the room while he measures across it, his fingers landing softly at either arm, taking a note of the measurement. You internally scold yourself, he is so much taller and surely must be able to see right down the sports bra. It only serves to make your face heat up with embarrassment.

If that wasn't enough, he gets to your lower body, measuring your hips and then thighs. He gets to his knees to do it and you resist the urge to pull your hands into fists at the proximity of him to your intimate area, separated only by a thin pair of gym leggings and underwear.

He doesn't seem to bother himself with the awkwardness. And every time you look at his face, he seems indifferent, bored even. Even then, his face is unnaturally beautiful, even with the scar.

He must really not like people.

Aemond sighs having taken all his notes.

"We'll do one training session and see how much weight we can do" he instructs. You nod.

"I expect you to be in the gym four times a week, three in the week and once at the weekend. We'll do one session together a week so I can check your progress" 

His tone is so flat, all you can do is nod. He looks at you,

"Got it?" 

Your cheeks heat up, "Um, yeah"

"Good"

He leads you outside to the actual gym floor which luckily isn't too busy, side-eyeing you massively when you pull your hair up into a ponytail to get it off your neck.

His large form leads you over to where the mats are kept, haphazardly throwing two to the floor.

He doesn't say anything past one or two word commands and it's incredibly difficult to not look in the mirror in front of you to watch him as he stretches. The way he stretches his arms over his head and it lifts the hem of his shirt a little, showing his happy trail, biceps rippling.

And when he does leg stretches, instructing you to do the same, you can't help but stare at how his thighs are basically bulging out from his sweats. It takes all of your strength and will to not look any higher than that towards his hips.

He watches your form as you try and copy him stretching. And your heart almost leaps into your chest when he uses his hand to move your ankle slightly, so that you put pressure on a certain muscle. But he focuses completely, professional.

Fuck, be professional.

All caution is thrown completely to the wind when he gets you on machines. He demonstrates some of them first, starting with the so-called 'easier' ones, like the inner and outer thigh machines that look way too…suggestive.

Of course, he's got it on a ridiculous weight to demonstrate which makes you scoff a bit. And when you get on the inner thigh machine, it locks into place with your legs spread. You thank every god there is that there's no mirror in front of you on this machine.

"You have to start with your legs spread as much as possible" he states simply, pushing the pads against your legs even further. It makes your eyes widen, sinful thoughts pop up in your head. But before they take root you shake them away.

It's ridiculously hard the first few times and he raises an eyebrow.

"Really?" He mocks a bit, the tiniest of smirks on his face "you're only on 14kg" 

"Fuck off" you mutter under your breath. He tuts and changes it to 9kg, bruising your ego a bit. But you finish the set nonetheless.

You think he's a bit of a psycho, because after that little remark he has you on every leg machine available. Making fun every time you have to be on the lowest weight.

After the session, you're aching in places you didn't even know existed and you haven't even rested yet. Knowing full well you'll be achy as fuck tomorrow and even wlrse than right now. The faintest sheen of sweet is visible on your pinkened chest.

"You're weaker than I thought" 

He runs his long fingers through his hair and you want to slap that stupid fucking self-indulgent look off his smug face seeing you all out of puff like this.

"Thanks, means a lot" you say sarcastically, drinking from a water bottle. He raises an eyebrow at the attitude.

"I'll send you your workout plan. If you have any issues do me a favour and don't bother me with them" he retorts.

"Charming" you mutter under your breath once he's gone past you. You watch as he walks away, briefly appreciating his broad shoulders, until the sour taste of his poor behaviour settles in. And you huff, texting Baela immediately.

You curse every god there is that you drive a manual car, because right now the thought of having your aching leg pressing on the clutch pedal might actually drive you to mass-murder.

This is going to be a long month.

Taglist: @mrsgrwy @lovelykhaleesiii

[genericpuff]

someone responded to me on reddit with their own theory as to what's going on with the eisners so i'm gonna share it here because it's worth reading 🍵

like there's definitely the aspect of it being a Webtoons Originals at play as well, I obviously can't feasibly prove that WT's is paying out the Eisners for their wins and that's not an accusation I wanna be throwing around willy-nilly, but the brand affiliation alone almost definitely factors into it all (and it definitely doesn't help the Eisners seem legit when they keep awarding the same comic 3 years in a row).

There was also a comment I found in the /r/comicbooks sub from the perspective of a former judge-

Considering how much work it would take to properly read the entirety of the nominees - as most webcomics are long-form and will require starting from scratch - I wouldn't be shocked at all if the win came down to "well we know this one won last year, and it has 6 million subscribers, so yeah, that one". Again, I don't want to accuse the judges or the organization of anything, but I do think at best the results of the judging are going to be affected if not outright stunted by the process itself.

All that said, it doesn't take a genius to look at how LO has fared over the last three years and understand that even from a purely objective point of view, nothing about the comic stacks up against the other nominees. It's dumb af because I'm seeing some people arguing "well there were only FOUR other nominees, which one do YOU think should win? you don't read those other four comics?? well then OBVIOUSLY LO deserves the win!" because... no? That's not how that works? It's such a strawman argument to justify defaulting the win to LO just because people on IG might not have ever read a comic like Matchmaker or Asturias before. Just because the people complaining about the LO win might not be familiar with the other nominees doesn't mean those nominees aren't bringing more to the table than LO. Which a lot of them very much are. Shit, Evan Dahm alone has been creating comics online since like the mid 2000's (??) he's an incredibly prolific creator with a lot of successful works under his belt, but apparently LO should get the win anyways... because LO's readers have never read 3rd Voice before? Come on. This is like that time when TOOL beat out Taylor Swift in their album release sales and a bunch of Swifties were upset because they had no idea who TOOL was, meanwhile all the dedicated middle aged dads were over the moon to finally see some recognition for a classic band that absolutely 100% deserved the spotlight after going so long without a new album. Swift has more than enough victories under her belt, she'll live lmao

At best this was definitely the "retired athlete on their way out" win, as a pal so gracefully put it-

And really, that last sentence really does get across the essence of LO in a nutshell - it's celebrated for being a story that never really existed to anyone who never actually looked closer. A lot of the things that the comic is praised for is often made up by an audience of people projecting their headcanon into what they were reading, because without it the comic had nothing to say. LO has to be good, because that's what they were told from day one, because if it wasn't good it certainly wouldn't be advertised this much or winning all these awards or getting all these merch opportunities or getting all this 'jealous' hate... right?

[babyrdie]

Any Patroclus headcanon?

Okay, I don't know how common this headcanon is, but I like reversing Achilles and Patroclus' roles in their childhood. Since Patroclus doesn't have much content about his childhood, I suppose I'll fill in the blanks with headcanons!

I like to think that, as a child, Patroclus was more impatient and aggressive and so an accident over something silly like dice resulted in Clysonimus' death (I'm combining different versions in this).

Reading The Iliad, it seemed to me that Patroclus used to be royalty (he's called a prince), while reading Pindar I got the impression that Menoetius was a noble since it's said that his family wasn't originally from Opus, but the king of Opus valued them and gave them part of the land. He's also one of Helen's suitors in more than one source, and I imagine most of those who dared to be there or send their sons there at least had status to offer. I generally prefer the idea that he was a prince, but regardless…in both cases, Patroclus was raised in a high-status household. Mentions of his sister Myrto (in Aristides) and his brother Abderos (in the Photius' Bibliotheca) are both late, which makes me think that it's possible that for a long time Patroclus was established as an only child. Can you imagine what it was like to be an only child of high status? Let's be honest, I don't believe someone like that would be a docile and humble child.

So I think that Patroclus as a child was really what you would expect from a prince/son of a noble who is an only child and can most likely get away with the trouble he causes easily. I can imagine someone like that getting angry enough over dices to accidentally kill someone. I think being exiled to Phithia hit him hard, not because he was sad but because he felt offended. So Patroclus wasn't really good company when he arrived on Phithia. If anything, he was irritated to see Achilles in the position he used to be in, even more irritated because they're cousins ​​and used to have similar privileges and now it was as if Patroclus was just like any other of the servants there. Ironically Achilles, having been raised mainly by Chiron, used to be much more humble and controlled than Patroclus just as Peleus expected (yes, I was inspired by Iphigenia at Aulis here. Also, in my chronology, Achilles in Pelion is before Patroclus because Hesiod justifies Achilles' absence among Helen's suitors with the explanation that he was in Pelion at the time and The Iliad implies that Patroclus wasn't in Pelion, since it says that Achilles learned to heal from Chiron and then passed this on to Patroclus rather than Patroclus learning it together)

I like to think that Patroclus' personality change happened on Phithia. He no longer had the status to protect him from her bad attitude like he once did. In some ways, Peleus was still lenient with him. Peleus used to be prince of Aegina and also lost his status when he was exiled because of someone's death (his half-brother Phocus. However, unlike Patroclus, in most versions Phocus' death wasn't accidental), and he was only able to have a good life again because the king of Phithia, to which Peleus fled, at the time was a generous host to him. Peleus wished to be something similar to Patroclus, even more so because they were also related (here I am considering the version in which they're related by Aegina, which makes Patroclus cousin once removed to Achilles. But, of course, there are other versions of the blood relationship). Still, Peleus wasn't as indulgent as Menoetius (who was lenient enough to have gotten to that point).

Patroclus's relationship with Achilles was initially turbulent. Achilles was raised by someone as wise as Chiron, but in the end he was still mostly raised away from other humans being taught by a centaur teacher and looked after by nymphs (inspired by Argonautica). As such, he was simply very bad at understanding common mortals, which was the case with Patroclus. It took him a while to realize that Patroclus was angry with him because he had resentment and envy, and when he did he wasn't really…err sensitive about it. He was like "oh you envy me" in a surprised tone, which only made Patroclus even more irritated. For Patroclus, it didn't make sense for someone so oblivious to be a prince and, consequently, to be destined to lead people. How could Achilles be a good leader if he cannot understand those who serve him at all? The idea of ​​swearing loyalty to someone like that seemed absurd.

Because Achilles saw how different Peleus and Phoenix acted towards Patroclus compared to the other servants, he became interested. The problem is that, having almost no emotional or social awareness, everything Achilles did only seemed to make Patroclus' temper worse. Meanwhile, Patroclus tried his best to restrain himself, after all he knew that a servant couldn't deal with a prince. Unfortunately, his temper sometimes won, which caused him to fight with Achilles. Every now and then, even physically, which later developed into them sparring together. But in the end Achilles would still go after him, sometimes trying to please him with things like offering an expensive delicacy that Patroclus supposedly should no longer be entitled to, and Achilles even taught him things he learned in Pelion (yes, inspired by The Iliad).. Achilles was so oblivious that he insisted on continuing to call Patroclus a prince, which to Patroclus seemed like a mockery of his current status (it wasn't. And yes, inspired by The Iliad).

However, seeing how Achilles remains much more controlled than him made Patroclus feel even worse. And so, he felt that reacting aggressively would lead to nothing in the end. Achilles wasn't being affected by this, and Patroclus just seemed like an idiot who wouldn't stop complaining. He knew he was lucky that Achilles saw him as a weird kind of entertainment. Otherwise, Achilles might have taken offense and used his status as a prince to make his life unbearable. He was already getting away with Peleus' indulgence, and now he was getting away with Achilles' curiosity. Having gradually become friends with other servants and seeing how they noticed the privileges Patroclus still had over them, Patroclus realized the situation. While his friends were trying so hard and were hardly improving their lives, Patroclus was doing everything wrong and still having a better life than them. It didn't seem fair, and now that he was living closely with the servants it became evident. He wasn't so angry anymore, he was embarrassed.

If he was going to get away with not doing the work and if he was going to continue to experience the expensive things that Achilles kept offering him while his friends continued to stagnate despite their best efforts, then Patroclus felt he should at least earn it. Otherwise, how could he look at others who were supposedly in the same position as him? It wasn't even about Peleus being disappointed or Achilles being confused, it was really about the other servants, people that Patroclus didn't often think about when he was the one being served. In particular, Patroclus became very good at taking care of horses, animals he was interested in and even rode in Opus but never needed to take care of (after all, he had servants who did that for him).

In Phithia, Patroclus' main reference was Phoenix. Phoenix used to be a prince (son of King Amyntor) and also became a vassal when he sought protection in Phithia, where Peleus accepted him just as he accepted Patroclus (I like to think that Peleus did this precisely because of the hospitality he received from the previous king of Phithia during his exile, as I already said). Phoenix was an advisor and, being Patroclus' main reference, that's why Patroclus later also became a kind of advisor to Achilles. Wishing to be as respectful as Phoenix was despite no longer being a prince, Patroclus tried to become more controlled, mature, and wise. He might not have had the wise centaur mentor to teach him like Achilles had, but Patroclus had something that Achilles didn't and that was normal interaction with other people.

No matter how hard Achilles tried, he was still distant. He was too much strict, too much aloof, too much polite, too much divine, someone like that hardly seemed spontaneous in the eyes of other people, especially other children his age (inspired by his characterization in Iphigenia at Aulis). But Patroclus, being so spontaneous and humanly flawed and having even changed because of his friends, became more and more popular. He was a "man of the people", so to speak.

And then it was Achilles' turn to envy him. Because Achilles could have a divine mother, still be a prince, have superhuman speed and strength, have an exceptional education, but he couldn't become as loved as Patroclus, who didn't have a divine mother, was no longer a prince, wasn't superhuman and didn't have a Pelion education. While Patroclus once envied how different Achilles was from other mortals, Achilles envied how much Patroclus was just like other mortals. Patroclus then began trying to help him with this, sometimes acting as his intermediary. They became complementary, with Achilles making Patroclus better in his fighting skills and knowledge while Patroclus helped him to deal better with other people.

When Patroclus met Thetis, he was absolutely impressed. Looking at her, he was able to see everything in her that reminded him of Achilles, which only reminded him of Achilles' divine blood, which he had forgotten about because of their friendship (it's a little hard to remember that your best-friend is a prophetized demigod when he's younger than you and acts insecure when it comes to making friends). And yet, what Patroclus felt was not fear, but admiration. Thetis, wishing the best possible for her son, was happy to see that Achilles had someone to help him understand mortals. After all, this role Thetis could never play, nor did she want to (she certainly didn't have good memories of mortals and didn't miss it when she still lived in Phithia. Returning to the sea was a decision she never regretted).

Over the years, Patroclus and Achilles reversed. Patroclus, raised as someone of high status who could get away with his bad temper, went from being a selfish and impulsive person to being patient and empathetic. On the other hand, Achilles, raised far from the evil of the world, went from an extremely innocent child to someone who would seek and maintain his glory at any cost. They remained complementary, but in opposite directions to how they began.

And the reason Patroclus tried to console Briseis is precisely because of the slaves he befriended in Phithia (which, mind you, didn't stop him from accepting Iphis when Achilles gave her to him). In turn, Achilles planned for Patroclus to take care of Neoptolemus after his death (not my invention, it's in The Iliad) because he admired Patroclus' evolution and how well he took care of him, and he couldn't help but wish Neoptolemus had someone like this. Of course, unfortunately that didn't happen.

In Book 16 of The Iliad, Zeus is an agent of Patroclus' death in order to make him disobey Achilles' order not to come too close to Troy (because Achilles was afraid that one of the gods on the Trojan side would kill him). I like to think that the bloodthirsty, petty, debauched and mocking personality we see in Book 16, so different from how he is portrayed in the rest of The Iliad, was Zeus resurfacing in Patroclus who he used to be. It's not that it's not Patroclus, but that it's a part of him that he had learned to control. At his death, Patroclus used his last words to mock Hector (for those who don't remember, he says that Hector only won because of Zeus and Apollo, that Patroclus would have beaten several Hectors if it weren't for that and that Achilles will kick his ass), ignoring the part of him that had learned not to be too proud and thus dying without denying himself (no matter how flawed he was).

Ironically, it was this behavior that made his disguise as Achilles more believable, since he behaved similarly to Achilles when on the battlefield. Because their completeness wasn't just about their differences, but about the similarities they had. Patroclus was only able to be Achilles because, deep inside, they had some essence that made them similar (although not all the time, since in The Iliad eventually the Trojans recognize him. Yes, contrary to what is generally said, Patroclus wasn't only recognized when the armor was removed from him). If someone had asked, for example, Antilochus to do this, I doubt it would have worked even for a short time.

So basically that's my headcanon about the evolution of Patroclus's personality. But of course, that's just a headcanon!

[factsilike]

I've seen so many takes about this so here's mine;

Stella is an abuser, a horrible wife and an equally horrible mother. That's all she is. She is not complex, she is not meant to be sympathised with, her role in the story is to be an antagonist to the main characters, because that's the way she was written. And it's not bad writing, like people claim it is.

If you don't like that and want that to change, well that's literally what fanfiction is for! Write your own fix it, your own version of her character where she's morally grey or complex or whatever, but don't jump to saying that she is badly written or that Vizie is a bad writer for no reason. Because all that seems to show is that she is not written the way you wanted her to be written, or a story you wanted to see. Write your own, then!

Because you can say that she was forced into this marriage as well or that she was cheated on so she has a right to feel aggrieved about that, and you would be right. Sure, as a child she could be sullen and miserable about this marriage and no one could blame her, but as an adult you become responsible for your actions, and you cannot continue to be bitter and take out your anger out on your partner for no reason. Because that quickly turns into abuse. Her poisonous nature had no base in the early stages of their relationship. Neither are we shown any care from her for her only daughter.

And from what we saw of her childhood picture, she seemed to be deeply unpleasant as a child anyway, so it's probably in her nature. I'd give her a pass as a child, but she didn't shed that behaviour as she grew up, or work on it to become better, so.

And of course Stolas was forced into this marriage as well, yet he, as is shown multiple times in the show, tries to make it work, was never actively malicious to her as she is and endured her abuse silently for so long, at least a decade or two. Honestly I think he does not get enough credit for that, because that takes some strength and resilience. And how utterly depressed he is all the time, because that is the result of those twenty long miserable years. He also clearly adores his daughter, who cannot for some reason see that which really frustrates me, but that is another post.

And as for the cheating-

If you watch carefully you'll notice that Stella wasn't really bothered by Stolas bedding someone else, so much as that someone else was an imp. She was more angered by that fact, that her husband had an affair with an imp, the lowest of the low classes in hell, because clearly she was classist, just like Stolas' father. She felt that it was a huge blow to her ego and reputation that her husband would rather be with an imp than her. So I would say that again, her anger was not really justified on that end.

Sometimes antagonists are meant to be just that. We are not given any reasons to sympathise with them, so we seem to make up reasons, because of course that horrible character must have good reason to be that horrible, right? It makes no sense otherwise!

This post is a result of me being really tired of people going with surface level analysis about villains and antagonists, like "she's Complex!!" or "He's soooo misunderstood and I'm the only one who truly understands him 😤" and "he's sooo tragic 🥺" like please. Look a little deeper and past what you want to see, I beg you.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for trying to block evade?

This happened several years ago, so I'll put the ages that we were at the time.

I [17F at the time], had an extremely close friend [17F] of 3+ years, and I still haven't found any kind of friendship that came close to the level of trust / openness that was there. So some of this backstory ranges from 14yrs to 17yrs.

My home was abusive, and she and her mom helped me figure out what was rational vs irrational, normal vs not normal, and pointing out local resources to get help - which was absolutely amazing and I could not thank them enough.

She invited me to her house pretty regularly, a couple times a week. We'd have hours of skype calls. She got me roped into Undertale & the fandom. Well, not that we really interacted with the fandom at large. We only publically posted some of the art and barely got noticed haha. Between the two of us, we had something like 26 AUs and had a lot of rp with multiverse shenanigans - like over 1200+ pages of google docs rp, because that's where we did like 90% of it. After we hit like 100-200 pages, we'd make a new doc so it wouldn't take so long to load. And we had like, at least like 9 docs I think. I was mostly in it for her, because it was really fun to just make up stories together. I could've done it with any fandom she threw at me, undertale is just the one that was popular at the time.

At one point, I think when we were around 16, I asked her if she wanted to start dating. She said something along the lines of maybe in the future, but not right now - she wanted to focus on school. Even though she declined at the time, she did say she appreciated me asking and that it meant a lot to her. And there were 0 hard feelings about the answer, we just kept on going the way we were going.

She got hit with a really bad level of depression, and stopped coming to school. After 2-3 days, I started calling her every day around lunch time just to check in on her and see how she was doing. See if there was anything I could do to help - bring some snacks, catch her up on classwork for the couple classes we shared, stuff like that. This was for couple months. More than just a mental health day, and the only reason she gave was Depression.

After a week or two of the daily calls, there was probably an aspect of toxic positivity on my end. Like "You gotta Do Something to avoid being trapped in your misery, even if it's just baby steps like sitting outside on the porch or going on a walk down the block" Not maliciously, but more out of not knowing how to handle a situation like this & genuinely wanting to help her because of all the help she's offered me in the past & fueled a little bit by fear because Depresssion is the excuse that my abusive parents used to justify their shitty behavior & neglect. Not because I was afraid of what she'd do to me, but more what she'd do to herself. That's one of the only things I could think where I went wrong, which I completely acknowledge and understand now.

She was still inviting me to her house, and we were still doing our normal thing there. Drawing and writing stories together.

After 4-5 weeks [? estimate, time is an illusion] of her not showing up to school, I can't remember if I asked if it was helpful or if she suggested that I stop calling every day. Calling every day was making her feel worse.

I did end up calling the next day or two at lunch - crossing the boundary was not my intent. We had planned to hang out on the weekend again, lunch is just when I remembered & had time to call to ask if she still wanted to hang out or if she wanted some space. I think she said yes to hanging out, didn't mention anything about crossing the boundary. Same with the next day - there was something I needed to ask clarification on, it wasn't a check in, nothing was mentioned of the boundary. I can't remember what it was now. This is another one of the places where I think I went wrong, which I acknowledge & understand.

I did stop the check ins like requested though. After those two off days, I did stop calling her every day at lunch.

She finished out the school year having shown up to class maybe 3ish times, I think.

Again, we were still hanging out regularly. There was no indication that I was doing anything wrong, there was no indication that anything I was doing was wrong. She was still the one inviting me to hang out at least half the time.

There were some problems that I was noticing that I just wanted to have a casual chat about and figure out, but she kept pushing it off as a "I don't have the energy right now, we can talk about it later" and we'd go back to the fun things. I don't really remember what those problems were.

In the summer, I went to a different state to visit my older sister that I hadn't seen in years. I talked to her about it, I was excited for it. We were still chatting regularly during my trip over skype or discord.

And then, during my trip that I was so excited about, she drops this bombshell. She sends me several massive messages detailing out a bullet point list of everything I've done wrong, that she's explicitly breaking off the friendship, and blocks me. 95% of things on that list either flat weren't true, or gross misunderstandings of what happened.

It was genuinely horrible things too.

For example, one of the things on the list was "Suicide baiting" or "Suicide guilt tripping" or something along those lines, which had happened several months if not a year before this. -I've only ever communicated feeling acutely suicidal to her 1 time. -Long before that, she made me promise that if I ever felt suicidal that I was supposed to immediately talk to her about it, for her own peace of mind so she wouldn't worry about me. -I reached a point of feeling acutely suicidal due to abuse at home & general existential dread, that happened to be during a time we had an issue.

I purposefully waited until after the issue was resolved, like 2 weeks, before telling her. I did that specifically so it would not be taken as a guilt trip or a form of coercion while still holding as true as I could to my promise. She made me promise to tell her, it was something very important to her. I made very clear to say "this is something I experienced a couple weeks ago due to unrelated things, it is resolved now, I got help through xyz means and genuinely feel better. You made me promise to tell you so I am telling you, I didn't want to say anything while we were having a problem for xyz reason." I just wanted to talk, and clear up the misunderstandings. I wanted to have a good conversation about figuring out where the communication went wrong, try and figure out how she came to these conclusions, and how that differs from my point of view. Do something to work it out, and just talk about it, and try and salvage this 3+ year friendship.

After I realized I was blocked, I was going through so so many emotions all at once. The whiplash of going from 5 to 100, Upset that I wasn't given any sort of chance to explain, the 5 stages of grief, being thrown away like the gum off your shoe, worrying about her and if this was the stage of isolation for depression, holding out the hope that we could still just talk and work things out, angry that she kept pushing off and refusing to have any sort of serious talk before this, doubting if anything she had said on 'normal vs not normal' - particularly communication styles, thoughts that maybe she was abusive and manipulative all along, maybe I was continuing the cycle of abuse, trauma flashbacks, anxieties that I had since squashed as 'irrational', fear that this was a sign that she was about to fucking kill herself and maybe the whole list was a lie so I wouldn't try and reach out and stop her, doubting my own reality and maybe the entire list she sent me was true and she was justified in her actions.

Simultaneously trying to process intense feelings and realities if it was true and I'm really secretly a horrible monster, if it wasn't true and she was about to die, and old traumas getting dug out of the grave.

God I was such an emotional wreck and did not know how to process or understand anything that was happening.

This is where the AITA comes in -

I was pushing through back to back panic attacks trying to contact her and figure out what was going on. I didn't want her to die, if that's what was happening. I didn't want to be discarded and thrown away like a piece of trash, if that's what was happening. I didn't want to have 0 chance of learning & growing as a person even if this friendship wasn't salvageable due to my monstrous nature, if that's what was happening.

So I block evaded like fckn crazy. Gmail, pet game sites, discord, skype, deviantart, whatever online platform that we shared that had messaging enabled. I called her phone several times. On the 3-4th call, her mom picked up and told me that none of the above was true. That she wasn't about to die, that I wasn't being thrown away like trash, and that I wasn't a monster. She didn't agree with her daughters actions and thought it unfair to me, but ultimately it was my friend's choice. All simultaneously which just did not compute.

If the list she sent me was true, I was a shitty horrible person. If it wasn't, and she isn't about to die, then not be able to just have a calm sit-down conversation at some point about it and clear it up - if I wasn't worth even attempting to make that effort then I was being thrown away like trash. I kept trying for days afterwards to talk to her - just, anything at all. Nothing got through, she never responded to anything.

And... that was that.

I didn't have a chance to talk to her again. I didn't have a chance to clear up misunderstandings, or understand what I did actually wrong and where, or any sort of closure.

Sometimes if I'm remembering it and feeling paranoid, I'll check and see if she's alive by looking at her online profiles for any activity. Like, maybe once a year tops now. According to the petgame sites, she's still alive at least. I'm assuming she got new social media. Literally it's just a "is she alive, do I have to worry about causing her suicide" check, I don't stalk or look into anything further than that.

Anyway, AITA for how extensively & desperately I was block evading?

What are these acronyms?

[twistedwriting]

Azul Ashengrotto Character Analysis

I have many thoughts of Azul, yet not a single word comes to mind when I try to write them down but I will try my best.

There are certainly a few topics that are questionable or even judged upon the fandom, some also seem to forget that Azul is more than his contracts and his shady ass business. Some view him as manipulative while I believe he just saw stupidity in humanity and took this weakness of mankind and turned it against those who were foolish enough to not ask questions. Azul has never lied in his contracts, not a single time. He provided what he had offered and taken what he was entitled to take. Let's take the main issue of Book 3: The contract Ace, Deuce, Grim and many others had signed: Offering their magic for a study guide - If they'd make it to the top 50, they'd get their magic back. If not, they become the Sea anemones that are to follow Azuls every order. He provided the guide and it helped everyone who has gotten their hands on it - Did he lie? He didn't. All he did was *exactly* what people had asked - Nothing less and nothing *more*. And that is the exact point: He didn't give information if he wasn't asked for it. Or Yuus contract: He took Ramshakle, he provided what the Freshmen needed - He didn't lie. In fact, he offered more than he had to: The Potion. The twins interfered but was it against the contract? It wasn't. As I see it, Azuls contracts are much like the wish of a genie: If you wish, be most specific or live with the consequences. You don't want anyone interfering with your stealing? Should've said so, simple as that.

What Azul made the "Villain" was the naivety of those who signed their name on the contract.

But there's more of Azul than this. I think it's justified of what he does. People are stupid, people are naive but most importantly: People are cruel. Especially kids are worse than any demon from hell. If you're being bullied as a child or even up to being a teenager, you'll be emotionally fucked for a long time, if not forever. You'll become insecure of whatever you've been bullied of for something that'll feel like eternity. You want to avoid this very thing, no matter how important it is supposed to be in your life. It'll cause you to break down at some point just for you to pretend like nothing happened afterwards - Especially if you've built up the very picture of someone who's got it all together like Azul did. While he pretends there's no issue, I refuse to believe that he doesn't have an Eating Disorder. Being bullied for your weight as a child (which is - in his case - not even really justified since you basically compare an octopus to a fish. A comparison that is found in every sense of the equation) leaves a mark. A deep, burning mark. Avoiding mirrors, pictures, tight clothes or being seen by anyone without your clothes. You can't tell me he's willing to get rid of his childhood and not have an eating disorder, that he wants to pretend the little healthy octopus child didn't exist and that he can look in the mirror without suffering. It's Canon that he's strictly taking care of his weight - But it's also Canon that his favorite food is fried chicken, possibly the worst choice for strictly keeping your weight. A diet is all good and stuff but strictly starving your body of certain things will only cause mental distress.

I can see he's a sensitive soul, trying to hide behind the mask of sheer confidence and superiority. His only friends are the two weird guys who didn't leave him alone - Sure, they're not the best choice but having two eels by your side is better than being alone. Whether the relation between these three is toxic or not, they depend on each other - especially Azul depends on Jade and Floyd and by the way the twins reacted to Azuls overblot, I'm confident to say that they also depend on him. After all, they might "Can't stand" each other as they'd say, they still stuck around even though there are many reasons to be "like the others" and turn away.

There was something else I had in mind but it just won't come to me right now, so I'll leave it at that for now. All I'm gonna add is that I'd really like to hug Baby Azul and tell him that he's perfect the way he is. To be his friend and let him know that it doesn't matter how he looks like because no matter how much you Weight, if your nose is crooked or if you're labeled "ugly" by modern society, it's your heart and soul that is meant to be you; not your mortal vessel.

[monalogs]

uhhh I dunno really but — maybe a fic of reader just walking in the forest because they r lost then getting caught in a bear trap nyen set up and uh he does something fucked up to reader, like fucks them then kills them or something? Or something heavy gore related while he fucks them.. sorryyy ahhh (I’m a damn masochist.)

The Lost Camper | Nyen

➷ Paring - Nyen x Fem!Reader [Randal's Friends / Ranfren]

➷ CWs - noncon, unsafe sex, fear play, knife play, blood kink, stabbing, sadism, fingering, violence, degradation, dacryphilla, READER DEATH

a/n - this came out to 4k words :') i know anon described a bear trap/hunting-esque situation but i felt making the reader a more cryptic-like being of the woods made a bit more sense (and easier to fit in) either way, reminder that this is DARK. there isn't a happy ending and the reader does freakin' die. (though rebirth is implied. see it how ya' do) i apologize for any mistakes as this is my longest work to date (whoop whoop) thank you for your comments and requests on both ao3 and tumblr. keeps me motivated ^^ currently working on a Randal fic and some Luther headcannons :3 inbox open as always. ANYWAYS ENOUGH

You aren't sure why you decided to hop over the Ivory household's security measures and rummage through their things while they slept. You’ve seen campers before in these woods plenty of times. Hundreds, if you kept count… but you don't.

You also don't ever interact with campers these days either. They didn’t tend to be special and they didn’t ever really get in the way. Maybe you’ll spook them by hovering around behind the greenery, sticks cracking underneath rugged boots. They don't interest you anymore beyond listening to them talk about their boring, human lives. 

It doesn't make them completely irrelevant to you though, as you’ve gained a habit of sneaking onto their campsites. You steal – quite often. Well, as often as people come this deep into the woods. It's how you justify it, how else are you supposed to get canned food and new clothes? And so what if you also take a couple of books you can't read and stuffed animals whose furs mat under dirty hands. The mossy den you reside in could always use new things, even if you have no use for them.

For as long as you remember, it has been like this. A being of the woods, you’ve become a cryptic-like legend. “The Lost Camper”, you’re called. Whatever that means. You aren't sure what life is like past bark and muddy soil, clothes messy and hands rough. You were never lost, this is all you know.

Is it all so bad? So bad that humans go out of their way to tell campfire stories about your existence? The grass gives you more comfort than any sleeping bag can. 

So there really wasn't any need for you to be past that fence they set up. The truth was that they were… interesting. More interesting than any other family who ventured out here. You saw as they gathered around and talked, well, two were doing most of the talking. Brothers, apparently. (despite not looking much alike) 

They tagged along a couple more… characters. Notably, these two catmen that hovered around the older one of the brothers. They looked more alike, cat ears dawning their similar haircuts. You could tell them apart by their clothes – easier, their demeanors. 

The blue haired one stood hunched, staring at his… ”master” talk. Immediately, you could tell he was the more timid of the two. You observed the other pinkish haired one smoke a cigarette a few steps away from the group. His eyes – eye, actually – looked low and dark. The patch on one of them leaves you to wonder what might've happened for it to be left in such a state. Catching his name from his master, “Nyen”, which made sense considering his appearance.

You must have been staring too long, because suddenly Nyen lifts his head and his sunless eye meets yours for a second. Ducking quickly behind the trees, it should have been your sign to leave, to go on your merry way of collecting berries and getting high off of mushrooms for entertainment. 

But of course – you didn't. Instead, you retreated to the comfort of the conifer and stood idly. The sun set faster than you expected, any thoughts of simply leaving long gone hours ago. An eager smile spread across your face, these unique campers were asleep and you were going to rein free on their grounds. This was going to be the most fun you’ve had in ages!

As you tiptoe to their spot, you point out the odd set up. They had a truck and two tents, but only one tent actually seemed to be occupied. They also left a plethora of things outside unattended. Great for you. 

Nimbly, you start pocketing random things into your large well-loved leather crossbody bag. You’ve rummaged through many people’s unattended things before, but they definitely take it to a different level. This place was filled with bizarre stuff, stuff you’ve never seen before. 

Why the fuck were they carrying several wooden carvings of beavers and… birthday cake flavored “lube”... unsure what the latter was. Either way, you found it all the more entertaining to stuff these random things into your bag, giggling slightly when you pulled out a photorealistic framed drawing of a blue pony with a rainbow mane. 

You were so intrigued by all these things that you didn't realize masked, narrow eyes staring at your figure past the of the darkness camp. 

-

Nyen had been waiting for this. How stupid can you be? He saw you past the trees when the sun was still up, staring with a stable gaze – observing. Your face was shaded by the leaves, but he could see the grip you had on the tree trunk you stood behind. You looked rugged, you weren't just another camper or hitchhiker. He huffs his cigarette, more freaks. Nyen moves his eyes towards his master, clearly already stressed with the hitchhiker they had picked up hours before. Another huff.

His eyes meet yours when he decides to look up again and just as quickly – you're gone. 

Once Luther hears about this, his brows furrow slightly at the idea of another thing to deal with. “Oh dear, I just can't catch a break.” Nyen waits for his master to continue.

Randal (who totally wasn't eavesdropping) perks up once he recognizes who they were talking about, “Oh! Oh! You mean the…” He pauses for dramatic effect, “The Lost Camper…” Luther twists his head to stare at his brother, “Is that the name?” 

Randal nods excitedly, “I’ve read all about her! Apparently, she’s a ghost. Or like a cavewoman. Or an animal-hybrid. I actually didn't read that much.” He shrugs, “She doesn't hurt people, I think. Just swipes a few things and wonders around. Which is a little boring, would love it if something tried to kill us! AGAIN!”

Luther shakes his head and looks back at Nyen, “Hm, it’s too late now to move everything back inside…” He places a finger on his chin, “If that's true, then deal with her if she becomes a problem, alright?” 

Nyen nods, “Yes sir.”

From what Randal said, he knew you would most likely lurk in the incognito of the night. So he took his stance outside the tent everyone else slept in. 

He almost giddily twirls the handle of the knife, waiting and waiting. Hours pass, he doesn't have a watch but his internal clock tells him it’s around 3 am when he finally spots you. Look at you, being a problem.

Your back is faced away from him. Through the darkness, (and thanks to his skill of seeing well in the dark) he witnesses the silhouette of your thievery. Nyen can't point out exactly what you are taking but all he can imagine is his master’s upset face if he sees things are missing. The grip on his knife tightens.

He needs to wait again, wait for the perfect moment, wait to pounce . Nyen hears giggles escape your mouth – small, but he hears it. His jaw clenches. How dare you tee-hee while taking his family's very important stuff? He almost wants to lunge at you straight away, but he decides against it. Nyen wants to stab you in the throat and watch the blood splurt once you turn around. He just needs to get a bit closer…

SNAP

How irritating. Nyen just had to step on a twig. 

Your reaction time is just as fast as his, darting into the dark woods with him quickly trailing behind you.

Nyen huffs to himself. He wanted to make this quick, but he certainly doesn’t mind a chase.

-

Holy shit, shit, shit. Thoughts race a thousand miles per hour, with your legs following right behind. You admittedly got too into it that you weren’t focusing, now you have to make a great escape. 

This isn’t the first time you’ve had to run away from a camper, there was a time where a woman got spooked by you on her way to take a piss. Her scream was so loud that you immediately dashed past her, dropping the clothes you had stolen. Her husband (presumably an experienced outdoorsman) actually trekked through the woods with a shotgun for a while as you held your breath in the branches above. Ultimately, her family was gone before the sun was down. 

But you aren't sure you can just avoid this one. You allow yourself to turn peek behind you and see him . The smoking catman, Nyen. The shade of the night is heavy, but you’ve adapted to see well in the dark. You’re sure he has that skill too with the way his gaze is steady, hard, and right on yo u through terrifying masked eyes. Where did his eyepatch go?

Shaky hands clutch the filled crossbody bag that jumps with your every movement. If you had to go through this, you at least want to keep the stuff. 

Just tire him out, you think. It's reassuring that you know these woods like the back of your hand. You’ve tread several miles, exploring and wondering, though never finding a road. (Odd.)

Agilely weaving him past trees and fallen logs, your boots try to find leaf covered ground in an attempt to not leave visible tracks, but that would cause you to move slower – and you can't afford that. You assume with enough loops and turns, he will lose your trail.

A loud, gravelly yell can be heard behind you, “You can't run forever!” It makes your heart hammer because it's true. You aren't sure how long you’ve been running now but it feels like hours .

Periodically, you pause to catch your breath, but it isn't long before you hear his heavy steps get closer and closer, forcing the chase to start again.

It’s terrifying. You have amazing stamina. It's part of being in these woods, moving a lot. Nyen is different though, you don't think he’s stopped once. He’s a hunter, a bit slower than his prey but always behind. 

Huffing, you duck under branches and jump over uneven ground with aching legs, barely catching yourself a few times. It’s strenuous to carry on like this, so close to giving out. It’s impossible to focus with this adrenaline pumping through your veins, are you going in circles? Herbage you’re so used to begin to feel like a labyrinth of ever consuming moss and vines. 

Managing to keep your distance, you start to believe that maybe you’ve lost him when the echo of rushed footsteps begin to fade. There’s a wave of relief when all that can be heard is the sound of heavy panting and earth stirring underneath sore feet. 

You close your eyes as you continue to move forward, wind flowing through your hair with momentum. It’s just for a second, for a moment of clarity. It's a terrible second. Your right ankle rolls horribly on a rock, making you tumble down with shriek. It reverberates past trees and you’re sure he's heard it. 

He’s already closing the gap, leaves shuffling behind you. Regaining composure with gritted teeth, you come to the conclusion that he can have his damn things. It’s not worth running forever. Peeking at your quickly growing swollen ankle, you aren't sure you even could.

Finding an area where the trees thin out with patches of soft grass, you use the last of your excretion to exclaim, “Wait, wait!” Facing him finally, he stops feet away from you. 

You finally get a closer look at him. His stance is still aggressive, as if you are about to take off at any moment. You see his glare filled with pure disdain, thin lips curling in a snarl. His eyes go beyond his bizarre mask, it feels like he's piercing you with them.

“Say it.” It's a husky voice that makes the anxiety in your stomach swirl. You realize you haven't been face to face with someone in… a while.

Croaking out with a strained voice, “Look, here. Have it back, I don't want it anymore.” With shaking hands, you tug the worn leather over your body and drop it onto the ground in between you two. Gulping, you scan his figure for any type of reaction.

That's when you notice a glint in his hand – a knife. Maybe it was foolish to assume he wouldn't have a weapon on him, he was chasing you after all. But it dawns on you that you don't have one. 

Nyen seems to pick up on your sudden stiffening, taking a step forward. It takes everything in you to not take off, but you know it would be fruitless with a sore ankle. 

“I know who you are.” You shake, “You do?” He nods slowly, “Randal told me about you. ‘The Lost Camper’, a habitual thief and urban legend. A fucking pussy too.” 

A low laugh escapes his lips, he’s getting closer. “So, you think you can just get away with this?” Sweat builds even heavier on your brow and you shake your head, “No, no. I’m – I’m sorry. I didn't mean to–” He cuts you off, “You knew exactly what the fuck you were doing. You need to be dealt with. ”

Your flight instinct kicks in and despite the light injury you sustained, your feet begin to move on their own. It's not fast enough though, he lunges at you and the sudden weight causes you to fall down with a pained hiss.

There's a tackle, he's grabbing at you while you try to force yourself up under him. It’s incredibly rough, there isn't enough room to struggle around with how his weight presses you down.

You watch terribly as Nyen brings his knife up in the air. The pale moon shines on the blade, and for a second, you see the reflection of your terrified face before it stains red. 

A guttural scream forces out of your mouth, making you throw your head back before it crooks back down to see crimson blood seep through your jeans down the side of your thigh. 

Nyen doesn't waste time in pulling the blade back, watching how you writhe in pain. Through teary eyes, you see pure excitement spread across his shaded face. He’s enjoying this. 

You can barely resist when he's forcing your thick jacket off your body – not satisfied with how the material lessens the cuts he’s adorning your body. “Don't do this…” It’s meek and pathetic, you know but you can't help it. He stands above, blood staining his hands. 

“It's already happening.” It's deep and low, and you feel every drip of venom that laces his words. 

You witness Nyen begin to rub the growing bulge in his tan jeans, causing your stomach to twist in a way that you're scared you may vomit out of the fear and pain. The catman groans, “Fuck… I’m going to make a mess out of you.”

Soon enough, he strips you of your worn shirt and jeans clothes. It's scary how Nyen handles you like a ragdoll, no concern for the twists and gashes your injured body has to endure. 

“So this is what you were hiding under all that? Lucky me.” It’s so condescending that you grit your teeth. For any chance of keeping your dignity, an attempt of covering yourself and moving is made – but it’s met with a swift kick to your ribs that results in burning heaving.

A cold hand slips under your bra, lifting it over and groping at your chest. Whimpering, you attempt to shy away from his touch but he draws you back with an even colder tip of a blade that swipes across your skin. 

Red drapes over your body like a warm blanket in contrast to the cool chill of the forest air. You can almost stare off into the starry night you are so used to while you try to regain bated breath, just for an escape.

Nyen doesn't allow this though. He flips you over roughly onto your stomach, ripping away the comforting sky from your vision. Again, you want to at least protest when he greedily spreads your legs open, hand prodding at your sensitive heat.

Shit. You don't remember the last time you ventured into anything sexual. Maybe you’d rub one out when the idea popped up, but it never really did. You’ve seen a… er– dildo (if you remember correctly what it was called) once or twice when snooping around camps. It gave you a good laugh then, but you would ultimately leave it. 

Now you can feel how his hard length presses up against you. It’s an uncommon sensation, and fuck – why does it have to be big? 

Cutting your underwear off, his long fingers soon dip into the heat of your pussy, pushing in and out. You gasp and tremble underneath his touch. He doesn't wait for you, curling his digits up as growing wetness coats his knuckles. It's disgustingly good, making your traitorous body clench around his fingers. 

Nyen looms over you, wiping the soaked knife onto dark long sleeves, helping him keep his grip on the handle. Then, he pulls his fingers out of you, tauntingly slow to hear how you whimper pathetically. “Look at you, bitch. You're fucking dripping.” He mixes the juices with your blood, “Heh, in more ways than one.”

With unbuckled jeans, he moves fully on top of you, knees pining the sides of you down as he grunts against your soft ass. Nyen then grips your hair and pulls your head back, curving your spine into an uncomfortable position. His knife finds its way to your exposed neck. 

Shaking, it nips at your skin as shallow breaths escape you. He brings himself closer . “Should I just kill you now? What do you think, slut?” Adrenaline rushes through your body, a shameful cry escapes you, “No, no! Don't– don't!” 

He grinds against you, “Then beg.” Shaking your head, you respond – “Please. Please let me go, I’m sorry.” A deep sinister chuckle responds, “No, bitch.” He yanks your head back even farther. Feeling his hot breath against your face, he spits, “Beg for me to fuck you.” 

Tears pool in your eyes, shutting tightly when his blade grazes hurt skin once more. His hard length prods at your entrance – waiting. With a deep breath, you whisper oh-so pathetically. “Please fuck me.” You pray it's enough.

“Better than that. C'mon, or I’ll slit your pretty little fucking throat.” He yanks your hair, pushing into your skin. You panic, fat tears streaming down your face. “No! Don't kill me! Please, please just fuck me. Please.”  

Your screams turn into loud cries, echoing onto the tall trees that surround the scene. Nyen relishes in your wails, nails digging into the back of your scalp before his cock sinks into you roughly. You squirm with a loud pained gasp, you weren't close to ready for him. 

His knife (thankfully) removes itself from your neck, grip on the handle still iron strong. It doesn't give you anything to distract from as he stretches you out incredibly painfully. Inch by inch, your muscles contract and try to adjust to his size – but it's not nearly enough when he begins to start to move. 

“You're so fucking tight.” He lets out a sharp grunt, skin slapping against yours. “You've never fucked, haven’t you?” All you can do is cry. “Perfect.”

Forgetting the threat of his knife, he reminds you with a deep slash across your back. Pain vibrates through you, hands grip at soil and blades of grass in an attempt to stiffen the burning sensation that consumes you. Nausea festers and chokes at the back of your throat, certain that if you had eaten this morning it’d be spilling out your mouth by now.

It's an entrancing sight for Nyen, the large gash displays the crimson beautiful blood dripping down your arched back and onto your asscheeks as he slams into you. It’s a lot of blood. So much so that he feels how you physically weaken under him, fully incapacitated.

He decides to flip you back onto your back once again like the ragdoll you are. There, he can see how the light in your eyes start to dim. Red, and swollen, and tear rimmed – they stare back at him, wordlessly pleading for any type of mercy.

Nyen ignores it, choosing to grab your injured thighs and hike them over his broad shoulders, angling even deeper inside of you. Tight muscles draw him closer, grunting at the feeling of your warmth enveloping him. “Shit, you're a greedy fucking thing, aren't you?” He spits at you, grabbing your face to make sure your eyes stay on him, inches separating your faces. 

You don't respond, hoarse cries and moans are all the sounds you can make. Nyen’s mask taunts you, wide eyes never leaving yours as his nails scratch at your chest and waist, marking and trailing. Nyen’s nails even have the nerve to dig into your open wounds, forcing the blood to escape even faster. 

Any pleas you can muster out fall on deaf ears, and you almost wish he killed you before all this. But then it clicks that this is all just a game to him – you're simply a toy. The evil grin on his face is evident of this, he's truly enjoying watching this horrible scene come undone by his hands. The chase, the torture, your cries . It only makes his heavy cock harder and his thrusts sloppier. 

Your head is woozy and your vision is getting blurry. Numbness circuits through your body, the only thing you can feel is the sensation of his cock ramming into you over and over again. 

Nyen lets go of your face and chooses to grab at your bouncing tits, squeezing hard enough to create bruises. His twitching cock then rubs inside of you perfectly . A loud whine follows that causes Nyen’s jaw clench at the sudden extra pressure around his length, “Ah, hgh,– take my cum like the pathetic bitch you are,”

Stars in your vision soon mix with the stars in the night sky, you can't feel your legs anymore, neither your arms. Blood loss is getting to you – and quickly.

His body drives into yours, the sensation of gore under you squelches around against skin and dirt. Then, the knot building inside your numbing abdomen finally snaps, your breath hitches and you keen loudly – writhing around him.

Nyen soon follows, basically growling at how your pulsating pussy feverishly sucks him in and empties his balls. He rides the orgasm, fucking his cum deep inside you, and basking in the gripping release.

When he pulls out and off of you, your body limps on the ground. Overlooking, he can see how your lungs shallowly take in much needed air. Blood glistens off your cut adorned skin, and god is it a fucking beautiful sight.

He tucks his cock back into his blood soaked jeans, and he can already hear about how it's extra laundry to do now. But frankly, he doesn't care. Nyen gives you a once over, just to make sure the image of you really seeps into his brain. After well enough, he pockets his knife and walks over to the criminal leather bag that started this all. 

Suddenly, a weak grip holds onto his ankle. You.

You look at him with big, lidded eyes and croak out, “Wait… wait– am I… am I going to die?” He stares back at your frightened face with his reactionless one. It's quick before he gives you a sinister smile, then he yanks his ankle out from your grasp and grabs the bag that lays beside you. 

“Yeah, probably.” He then pulls a cigarette out of his back pocket and lights it, flicking hot ash onto your chest. 

“You were a good fuck though, I’ll give you that.” It’s patronizing. A final tear streams down your cheek as you watch him walk into the fog of the trees without another word.

You stare at the sky once again, leaves sway above and let moonlight peek through. Your inhales seem to be getting shorter and shorter, but you don't realize. You just pay attention to the movement of the leaves and the formation of stars. 

Grass picks at the back of your head, it’s soft – one of the only things you can feel besides excruciating pain. You let it be your pillow, the comfort that is ever fleeting from your grasp. 

This wasn't a fate you ever expected to have, it wasn't even proper death. It all makes you want to get up and fight for yourself. To live. He wasn't going to win. 

But reality sinks in when your vision fills with black spots, and you remember you're actively bleeding out, abused and hurt. Dying. It hurts to move, and the lone thought of welcoming it reverberates in your mind. It’s okay… It’s okay… 

With a final breath and ringing ears, darkness finally mercifully consumes you. 

To the dirt you were born, to the dirt you return to. 

And to the dirt you will rise up from again. 

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Hey Raven, hope your doing well. I was rewatching book 5 and something struck me. Crowly stills does his thing to get yuu/mc to host the NRC tribe at Ramshackle. But compare to previous chapters hes seems a little nicer, i guess? He offering renovations and upgrades ( a positive), instead of just threatening to cut yuu's food budget or something (a negative).

Where im going with this is, do you think Crowley may have felt a tiny tinge for his (in) action in book 4? Or atleast, realized he actually screwed up. He did give Yuu in case of an emergency.... and promptly ignored it (or just turned it off) when he went on break. He likely had to have heard what happened over the break...an likely saw his missed calls and put 2 and 2 together. Sure he may not feel bad enough to apologize (at least openly), but he does seem to make himself scarce early in b5. That could just be him being, well, the headmage. Maybe he's just not sure how to deal with MC or how they'd react to seeing him? So instead of threatening Yuu, he offers them something instead? Idk, maybe im reaching. Crowley relationship with Yuu is complicated. I do like to believe he has some empathy or regret (or maybe he just has more respect for yuu by b5?) After everything up to that point

Like i said, i may be reaching here. Wanted to get your input. Sorry for the long ask. Have a good one :)

In many fandom depictions of Crowley, he often serves as Yuu's guardian who is incompetent but well-meaning. I'm also guilty of doing this, Crowley is considered my OC's father figure (even if my OC isn't a Yuu). That's how we choose to engage with the characters and the world that we love! However, I don't believe that Crowley has that sort of tenderness for Yuu in canon, whether at the start or as their relationship develops over the course of the main story. Now, that's not to say that I think Crowley is cold or hateful towards Yuu. Far from it! He does care for them, but in the same way that a teacher might care about nurturing their students and preparing them for the world beyond graduation. Crowley demonstrates a similar attitude towards other NRC students, with one very clear example being in his Raven Jacket vignettes. In those stories, he likens his students to apple trees that he raises and nurtures, hoping that one day they might bear fruit. He does not particularly grant Yuu special treatment unless it's a scenario where he wants them to do a favor for him. (Though here I would also argue he does the same for other students when he wants them to resolve an issue in his place, which happens frequently in event stories; in Fairy Gala, he warns the boys they'll be held back if classes cannot proceed due to the wacky weather. In Ghost Marriage, Crowley shames the boys for not expressing interest in rescuing Idia, etc.)

I also want to set the record straight regarding how exactly Crowley gets Yuu to comply with his requests. Reviewing all avaliable books in the main story, Crowley rarely outright threatens Yuu if they refuse to help him:

Prologue — Crowley does not initially ask anything of Yuu, but he does provide them a temporary home and food until they can sort something out. During Yuu's stay, they are meant to do handiwork to earn their keep. However, Crowley tries to expel them after their involvement in breaking what is considered a precious chandelier. In this case, his anger is somewhat justified but it's still the one major example of Crowley leveraging something to force Yuu to act in a way that he desires. The thing is, it's revealed in chapter 19 that Crowley did not believe Yuu could acquire the magestone he asked for and was all set to finalize the expulsion papers. So really, he wasn't serious at all in giving Yuu a chance to redeem themselves and was going to expel Yuu anyway (until they happened to prove their "usefulness"). Whether this counts as an example of Crowley "threatening" Yuu, then, is up to individual interpretation.

Book 1 — Crowley makes no specific request to Yuu. He shows up late in the book and suggests to the frustrated Adeuce that they fight Riddle to claim his seat as dorm leader, but does not tell Yuu to do anything in this situation. Recall that it was Ace that marched up to Ramshackle's front door and demanded that he be allowed to stay overnight; Crowley had no part in that.

Book 2 — In 2-7, Crowley asks Yuu to investigate the strange string of accidents that has befallen the students set to play in the upcoming inter-dorm magift/spelldrive tournament. There is a part where Crowley says he "never promised to cover living expenses". You, as Yuu, have the option to ask him "Is that a threat...?" to which Crowley never properly responds. Interpret that how you wish. He then offers Grim and Yuu a chance to participate in said tournament if they succeed, seeing as they lacked the 7 players needed to form a team. Crowley even says he will find 5 other players to fill in their missing team seats for them.

Book 3 — Here in 3-6, Crowley never actually threatens to cut off food. Instead, he is trying to earn pity from Yuu by guilt tripping them and emphasizing that he, the headmaster, is so busy with his tasks (like finding Yuu a way home) and will provide them with the funds they need regardless because he is so very kind. He's trying to tug at their heartstrings by pointing out the things he selflessly does for them, so they feel obligated to do something for him in return. Once Yuu agrees to help, he lavishes them with praise and says it is "expected" of someone he personally chose.

But!! I want to add that in the Episode of Octavinelle manga, this same scene is depicted as Crowley threatening to cut their food budget. I'm not sure if this is just a different interpretation (since Yuuta seems to prepare more food than is usually implied in the game; this would explain why their food costs go up significantly) or if Crowley truly was also threatening to cut the budget in the game.

Book 4 — Crowley makes a reasonable request in 4-2; he asks Yuu and Grim to tend to the fire fairies over winter break since it's a task no one else will be present to handle. In exchange, he says he will give them a banquet of tasty foods (which is not an empty promise; in 4-39, the Ramshackle Ghosts tell Yuu and Grim that the headmaster has left them with a ton of food as thanks.

Book 5 — Crowley appears in 5-21 asking that Yuu allow the NRC Tribe to stay at Ramshackle for their month-long training camp. He explains that Vil and Rook are willing to give up their share of the prize money if Yuu agrees to these terms. It is then that Crowley adds that he will help with renovation too, most likely to sweeten the deal with his word.

Book 6 — Crowley does not ask anything of Yuu. He does, however, call in STYX in 6-2 because he becomes concerned about the threat that Grim poses after consuming multiple crystallized blots. After Grim is taken, Crowley instructs Yuu in 6-4 to wait until Grim has recovered and been evaluated by a third party to speak with him again.

Book 7 — Crowley makes no specific requests to Yuu.

You can see in almost all instances that Crowley uses a variety of tactics to get his students to do what he wants them to. He bribes, shames/guilts them, points out very real consequences if the problem at hand is not resolved, and, yes, occasionally makes what can be interpreted as a vague threat. Despite this, the fact remains that he was always nice, not just post-book 4 (in fact, Crowley was also nice during book 4). I don't see the circumstances as "anything before or during book 4 is him being negative and threatening to punish Yuu and anything after book 4 is him being kind and positive to Yuu". In most cases with Yuu, he is offering them something they would want. His go-to strategy isn't threats, it tends to be the promise of a reward.

I wouldn't tie any of Crowley's actions to feeling a sense of remorse or guilt on his own part. While it's true we don't really get to see inside of his head, from what we see of him... this man is utterly shameless. He's willing to resort to emotional manipulation to convince literal children to solve problems that he, the powerful mage and adult, should be dealing with. What's more, he praises himself for Yuu's competence and willingness to step up. That's him placing a lot of faith in his students, and I don't think he feels any guilt in doing this. Why else would he send them into dangerous situations over and over again? He must, to some extent, believe they can already handle themselves just fine, otherwise he's creating tons of legal liabilities for himself by purposefully throwing children of tons of affluent families into the line of fire. Besides, he's a highly skilled mage himself--if any true, TRUE danger were to befall them, surely he could save the day himself. My thought is that he has sort of a "tough love" approach where he tosses his students into the fires and sees how they get out of it in one piece, but it's just presented in a "devil-may-care" way because of his lackadaisical attitude.

Regarding book 4, I personally see Crowley giving his cell phone number as just a means to provide reassurance to Grim and Yuu, since they (especially Grim) are protesting about him seemingly leaving on vacation. It's an empty gesture so he can have his getaway without much of a fuss; I totally believe that Crowley did not ever intend to answer his phone. When he returns in book 5, he's already asking another favor of Yuu, so I get the sense he isn't really bothered by what happened. I would even say that Crowley still has several major appearances in book 5, not that he has made himself scarcer. He appears to ask the favor, appears again to evaluate their performance, and then a third time at the cultural festival to speak with the headmaster of RSA. Crowley gets plenty of screen time here, much more then in books 6 and 7. If he truly felt bad or actively wanted to avoid Yuu, he could easily just tell other students (ie Vil) or even school staff (ghosts, teachers, etc.) to relay the deal for him.

Again, I want to be clear: THIS IS NOT CROWLEY BASHING. The only thing I am expressing in this post is that while I do love this bird-brained goober and think he cares for his students, I don't believe it's done in the conventional sense you're thinking of. Crowley can be selfish and callous and throw his students into danger, and that's okay! Sometimes we want to love a useless man who's trying his best, even if his best is pretty lousy/j

Whew, that was a lot of brain dumping! I hope I properly responded to all your thoughts and that you found this read semi-entertaining~

[eitaababe]

EVEN IF IT'S A LIE !

chapter nineteen. tables turned.

[ a/n ; wowza i literally died anyways last part and then epilogue!]

[ warnings ; lil bit of cursing and a mention of virginity lol ]

series masterlist. | previous / epilogue

— written portion below.

you miss the way spiders face falls at your truth, but his tone hides it all too well.

"no," he breathes out honestly. "even- even if the whole thing went down the way it did, your truth is still your truth."

you laugh humorously, wiping away a few tears. "i probably sound crazy, huh?"

"you're not crazy for being in love, y/n," spider laughs with you, a hint of longing in his voice. "and you can't control who you love. and if you believe that someone can feel the same way about you, i can't blame you."

"you ever been in love, spider-boy?"

he peers down to look at you, really look at you, and he's grateful that you're too busy hiding your puffy eyes to notice the soft look in his eyes.

"yeah. i have."

"lucky girl." you smile at him, and spider can't help the way his heart squeezes when he looks at you. because he knows how you feel— it isn't the same.

because spider looks at you as if you're the world, and you look at him like just another friend.

and he hates that ao'nung wasn't smart enough to take the opportunity right in front of him.

— written portion.

"hi."

the one voice you've been dreading to hear, the one that used to whisper sweet nothings into your ear at night, is one you now wince at. you're met with ao'nung's tired eyes, and id you had any energy left, you'd be mad that he looks just as miserable as you.

"hey." is all you can bring yourself to say back, silently inviting him inside. he wastes no time, stepping in and letting the door fall closed behind him, sighing as he stands there— awkward and out of place.

and it doesn't feel right, seeing ao'nung without his confidence.

but as you watch him quietly, you realize, *maybe this is truest side of him you've ever gotten to see.*

"i-" he starts, breaking the silence before closing his mouth. you let the quiet brew even more, letting him collect his thoughts.

"when i said i love you, i really did mean it-"

"i don't care if you meant it or not," you snap suddenly, and he realizes that your silence is a lot scarier than what he originally thought. "you could tell me it over and over again and i honestly don't think it would make a difference right now."

"y/n, please-"

"for once would you shut up and just listen?" you say exasperated, needing an outlet for everything you've been feeling. "imagine getting asked out, falling in love, getting your fucking virginity taken, just to find out it was all a lie! and then you think coming over here and saying 'i love you' is gonna fix it?"

"i know it doesn't," ao'nung shakes his head, distraught as tears start to well. "and i know none of it was right. i'm not expecting to fix any of this but if i could do it again," he pauses, reaching for your hands. "then there's not a doubt i would."

you immediately retract your hands, scoffing. "stop," you say, voice quiet. "stop trying to justify yourself. you made a mistake. and not the type you can fix."

"so that's it? this is all- we're just- done?"

"there is no this, ao'nung. don't you get it? none of this was real. you made sure of it."

"please." he begs hopelessly, eyes shut.

any other day, any other time before this, you would've begged to have ao'nung like this. to have him pleading for your love and a chance to be with you.

but you know better now.

"you need to go." there’s a sense of finality in your voice, and ao'nung knows there's nothing he can say or do to fix this.

"i really am sorry, just know that," he says as he walks towards the door. "and whether you believe it or not," he breathes out shakily, at the doorframe.

"i love you."

you watch him slip out the room, and effectively out of your life.

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