#quantum red string

[mrfelixfischoeder]

“Okay, well I don’t need someone with a gun, I need someone who would be useful!” Stephen retorted, “Someone who might have any sort of experience with magic, which I highly doubt you do. The best out of all of you is her highness there.”

Shuri tensed at the thought. She was more than ready to go, but she liked Everett – she wasn’t here to stand on his toes. “I think Everett should go. He is a trained agent, gun or not, I am just a scientist.” She paused, “The brightest scientist in the world, though.” She didn’t like to downplay her part.

“No,” Stephen shook his head.

“Just take, someone. Doesn’t have to be me.” Everett asked, almost sounded like pleading. Stephen glared up at him.

“I’ll just go myself. But this might be the exact time that guy will attack, so, be careful. I can’t do anything until we both come back out.”

[ashe-fics]

Some wild Quantum Leap theorising ahead:

- Janis is paranoid but it's for good reason:

- ANYONE COULD BE A LEAPER. Including anybody at the Project.

- Any leaper could have an invisible hologram listening in on private conversations.

So when she says anyone could be listening to any word you speak, she's not kidding.

My theory is that QL tech got into the wrong hands in the future and that's what Ben wants to stop somehow. Addison must be involved in some way but who knows how.

Parts 5 and 6 of my fic Quinntum Leap deals with these themes quite a bit so that's how I made these connections 😅

[rhiaemrys]

Okay, okay thoughts on an absolute 180 for some of Tim's characterization in fanon.

Tim cannot, for the life of him, work a computer. Oh he can identify a chemical compound based on a series of tests that he memorized when he was 12, but if you asked him to run it through the Batcomputer? He'd fail so miserably and get seventeen viruses in the process. Oh he knows what an email is. And he can send one occasionally but by God do the computers never actually work with him.

Tim is excellent at cracking cold cases. Not through like, linking up crime maps and hacking cameras. No no, he takes his camera out, and hits the streets. His bedroom is a cobweb of red strings, red bull cans, and so many paper case files that Cass has printed out for him. Kon has nearly died entangled in kryptonite laced string that somehow got in there because Timmy ran outta normal string.

He has whiteboards full of equations that he's done with no calculator because he hit the stats button once and then started crying over the abbreviations.

Bruce tried to get Tim and Jason into understanding computers and both of them blanked. Tim said that doing high level quantum physics was better on a chalkboard and Jason got up and left halfway through overwhelmed by the concept of streaming services.

Tim did every single last genome calculation for cloning Kon in double cyphers in a notebook that's hidden Death Note Style under four more layers of hidden cubbyholes.

Let Tim be the cringe fail detective we all know he can be

[astroboots]

Issue #6

COLLABORATED WITH @THIRSTWORLDPROBLEMSS

Pairing: Miguel O'Hara x female reader

Summary: You and your unfriendly neighborhood Spiderman wind up far from your usual neighborhood and you need to find a way to leave before it's too late.

Word count: 2,600 words.

Series Masterlist | Spiderverse Masterlist | Astroboot’s Masterlist | thirstworldproblemss’ Masterlist

[Previous] [Next]

Your home is gone. 

Everything is gone. 

All you can see is white. A vast, empty space surrounding you, blank and endless as far as the eye can see. 

You suck in a surprised breath, already flinching because you expect a place so white and sterile to smell like sharp stinging disinfectant, but to your surprise it's the opposite. It smells of nothing in here.

“Mierda!”

You turn at the sound of his voice, and find Blue-Spiderman behind you.

“Shit!” he growls out. His hand comes up to his hair, fingers fisting into the poor strands as he starts tugging at them in frustration again. “Shit, shit, shit!”

“Wha– What happened?”

There was a helicopter, you think… darkness... a loud noise... the wall of your apartment exploding into a cloud of dust and rubble.

"Did... did a fucking helicopter just crash into my apartment!?"

He ignores your question, opting to fidget with his wristwatch instead, swearing and muttering to himself, while you try to make sense of what’s happening. 

“And… And then…” And then the otherworldly light show. At the time, you thought you were dying, but you’re clearly not dead. You’re just… someplace else. “What is this place?”

“We weren’t supposed to end up here,” he says, ignoring your question once again. He smacks at his watch repeatedly before swearing again and then leaves the poor thing alone.

“Come on.” He unceremoniously grabs your arm and starts marching forward, dragging you along.  He seems to have some destination in mind, though you don’t know how he can tell left from right in this expanse of nothingness, let alone where to go.

“Wait, wait,” you protest, “Where are we? What is this place?” Maybe if you repeat yourself enough he’ll finally give you an answer.

“We have to get out of here. We can’t waste time.” There is no pause in his steps, he marches on as if he’s expecting you to calmly accept the situation without further explanation.

"Can you please just stop for a second and tell me what’s going on?!" you say, digging your heels against his strength to try and stop him for even a second. 

He takes a deep breath, nostrils flaring with anger and irritation. “We’re in an interdimensional fabric where the interstitial domain emerges. It’s void of any discernible quantum fluctuations or energy-matter manifestations, constituting an absolute absence of existence or spatial-temporal coherency and–”

He’s still talking, throwing out a string of convoluted science terms, one after another in quick succession, but all you hear is an endless stream of jibberish. 

His words seem strangely far away, like your ears are plugged or something. You raise a hand to rub at one of them, then at your forehead when that doesn't make the sound go back to normal.

Normal. Ha! Who even knows what "normal" is for this place anyway. Everything since you left your apartment has been so bizarre that you're not surprised your head feels a little wonky.

And there's something weird with your hand too. You pull it back from your forehead and hold it in front of your face, staring at it.

Strange. The tone of it seems off, somehow. Opaque and lighter in shade then you’re used to. Almost like it’s fading.

It's only when he moves to stand in front of you that you realize you can see the red and blue of his suit though your hand. The whole of your palm is turning translucent.

“Shit!” he spits out and steps forward, grabbing and yanking your hand towards him as he inspects your palm.

Whatever he sees clearly doesn’t make him happy. His mouth is at an angle of irritation you had not thought was physically possible before.

"What's your name?" he demands.

"You know my name!" You scowl, tired of keeping up this farce, you know he knows it, and you're not playing this game with him. 

His annoyance seems to grow deeper. “Yes, I know your name. I'm asking if you remember it.”

What kind of stupid question is that!? Of course you remember your own name. What a condescending jerk! Does he get off on making everyone around him feel like an idiot?

Your name is… it’s... it's... uhm…

... huh.

The first syllable of your name is on the tip of your tongue. Your lips shape the sound, but nothing comes out because you don't remember what vowel comes next. Or what comes after that.

Your name... Why can't you remember your name?

“I–I don’t...” you hesitate, blinking in confusion. You don’t understand. How did you forget something so simple? “I don’t understand what’s happening. Where are we?”

“I just told you where we are,” he bursts out impatiently.

You wince at his words. God, he did explain, didn't he? You just... can't remember what he said. You know he used a lot of science-y words… Is that why you can't remember what he told you?

 “Look, it’s been a rough day. Can you explain it to me again, please, but like you’re talking to a 5 year old?”

In front of you, his expression softens ever so slightly, and he takes another deep breath before continuing more calmly.

“We’re in a space between worlds,” he explains, this time in plain speech, thank god. “It’s a void. Nothing exists here. If we stay too long, we won’t either.”

“Okay, but what am I supposed to–”

“Think happy thoughts,” he orders with a testy bite, which is not at all very helpful in making you think of happy thoughts.

“What, like think of a joke or…?”

He scowls at your question, as if it wasn’t a perfectly reasonable question to ask in the circumstances.

“No. Close your eyes and think of a happy memory. Something important. And personal. It’ll keep you tethered to your physical body,” he says, and despite the terse snappiness that remains in this rude man’s voice, you don’t put up a protest.

You close your eyes, trading out white for the black behind your eyelids. You try to form a memory—any memory—but nothing comes to you.

“I can’t think of anything,” you say, as worry starts creeping into your chest. You don’t understand why something that should be simple is so hard to do all of a sudden.

Then you hear his voice in the darkness.

“Think of someone you love. A day you spent together, or if you can’t think of something, then just think of their smile, or the color of their eyes,” he continues, and with each quality he lists out to you, there's a warmth that leaks through the hardness of his voice.

In your mind’s eye, a memory unfolds pixel by pixel. One of your favorite childhood memories of going camping upstate with your family. You’re wearing a pink ball cap, and your parents are standing by the tent, watching as the family dog runs up to you with a soggy tennis ball in her mouth.

Your mom is smiling at you as she waves from afar, gentle and patient. Her eyes are squinting against the bright sunlight, but you can’t remember the color of them. 

Gray hazy mist invades the edges of the memory, eating into the vivid colors, the picture distorts until the smiles of your parents morphs into a faceless blob.

Your eyes snap open, and you can’t keep the panic out of your voice. “What’s happening to me!?”

You don’t remember… You don’t remember what they look like. Who they were, you can’t–

“Hey, hey” his voice snaps you out of the fog, His warm palms come up to cup the apple of your cheeks, face mere inches from yours.

“Stay with me.”

And you're trying, you really are, but the panic is already here. Eating through your veins and crawling under your skin with an itch that won't go away.

“I– I can’t– I don’t–”

You can’t feel his hand anymore. Can’t feel your cheeks either. Can’t feel the clattering of your teeth from your trembling or the hard beating of your heart in your chest.

“I don’t remember her eyes.” Your fingers clutch onto his arms, but no matter how hard you dig in with your nails, it sinks into nothingness,  “I don’t– My mom. I– I don’t remember her name, her face, her–” 

Your feet seem to have fused to the spot you are standing on. They feel heavy and weightless at the same time. You try to move, but can't. Your body is no longer listening to you, and you’ve forgotten what it’s like to coordinate your feet, for the right foot to take a step forward and have the left one follow.

“Lyla,” he tells you, thumb smoothing over the apple of your cheeks, and you can feel the rasp of the rough calluses on it. “Your mom’s name was Lyla.”

The panic subsides at the familiar name. 

Lyla.

Your mom's face comes flooding back, the way her eyes would crinkle at the corner when she laughed, the proud smile she wore at your high school graduation, the soft sound of her voice singing you quiet lullabies as you drifted off to sleep.

“She used to make the most disgusting mac ‘n’ cheese, and whenever you’re sad, it’s all you want to eat,” he reminds you and your mouth tingles at the memory of the thick layer of dripping cheap cheese, scalding hot on your tongue. 

You adjust your grip on him, and you can feel the texture of his suit under your fingertips now. Your fingers aren’t as numb anymore, neither is your face. 

“Food worked, huh?” The corner of his mouth tugs into a half smile, eyes soft as he gazes down at you. “Figures.”

He leans down, hunching over until his forehead rests against yours. “You know that pizza place down on Downing street that you always go to the day before payday? With the gross doughy crust and kimchi topping that you love so much? Think of that.”

You can picture it clearly. The brick brownhouses, the familiar waft of oven-baked dough, and hint of coal burning, and slowly but surely, your stomach warms at the thought of it. 

“Think of those ugly pink fur slippers you wear constantly at home when it gets cold,” he says, and you do, gradually become aware of the soles of your feet and the weight of your own body being held up by them.  

He goes on like that, listing off things about you. The way he talks about them is almost insulting, but there’s an undertone of fondness hidden underneath that you can’t make sense of. He describes your favorite cozy sweater, calling it “ratty”; your favorite corner of central park that he thinks reeks of piss; your favorite episode of Grey’s anatomy, the one where Cristina has to get cut out of her wedding dress, which you always watch when you need a good cry.

The sound of his voice seems to shiver through you, the warmth of it settling low in your belly.

The more he talks, the more you remember, memories bleeding back into your consciousness. The simplest things come first... The sensation of running your fingers through soft fabric. Stepping barefoot into grass on a summer day. What it feels like to want someone.

And, as he continues to talk, awareness of your body comes trickling back until you're acutely conscious of his forehead pressing against yours; his hands, big and gentle where they're wrapped around your upper arms; the heat radiating off his big body inches from yours as his deep voice lists off all sorts of intimate things about your life, things he has no business knowing. 

Control of your body is returning to you. You can blink now, even if it requires conscious effort, and you blink up at him as he pulls back to look down at you.

“You back with me?” he asks softly, one big, warm hand rising to cup the back of your neck in a way that makes you lightheaded.

You tip your head ever so slightly until you catch sight of your hands, now totally opaque instead of that eerily ghostly sheen, and you nod back at him. 

“I– I think so.”

“Good.” 

You’re still a little bit frazzled. Disorientated by the whole experience that it takes you a while longer to gather your thoughts together. 

You still don’t know where you are. You don’t know what the hell just happened. Or what this place is supposed to be. Calling it a ‘void’ doesn’t really explain as much as he seems to think it does. How on earth did you just lose control over your body like that? Why did your body literally start to disappear, fading into the nothingness? 

A chill trickles down your spine as you recall the lack of sensation, and you grip his arm underneath your fingers just a little bit tighter to remind yourself that, yeah, he’s still here. 

It makes you feel just the tiniest bit safer. 

With one arm still wrapped around your shoulders, he brings his other wrist to his mouth and speaks into the watch. “Lyla, have you got a lock down?” 

Huh? Lyla? What is he– You don’t understand. Wait, is he talking to your mom? What does he mean he’s locking down your mom!? 

There’s a crackle of static in your ears, and the endless white gives way to a burst of color as reality reforms around the two of you. A wall of masonry appears brick by brick before you, nothing but blue clear skies above. There’s a crunch of gravel on the concrete tiles beneath your feet, and when you look down to your right, you see the New York skyline below you. The bird’s eye view of the city is familiar. It’s one you’ve seen many, many times before. 

You’re on top of the Chrysler building. 

For a second you panic at the height. You clutch onto the man who has once again saved your life, and he lets you, holding you steady, with one big palm resting on the small of your back. 

“You’re okay,” he says, shushing you until you relax in his arms. “You’re okay.” 

You stay like that for some time, held in the safety of his arms, until your heartbeat slows, until the pulse racing in your throat is no longer in a clustered lump and you feel like you can breathe and think again. 

And now that you can think again, your brain is racing a mile a minute. All the things that have happened… All the things that this man said to you to bring you back to yourself. 

Things that no one except for you would know about. It’s too personal and intimate. Even if he had somehow been stalking you, he wouldn’t know these things unless he has been stalking you from childhood. The things he knows about you only comes through years of being with a person. Your habits. Your likes. Your dislikes. The things that upset you. The things that make it better when everything else has gone wrong. He knows all these things about you that he really only should know if he’s known you for a lifetime.  

"Who are you?" you ask him again, pulling back slightly to stare up into those blood red eyes inches away from your own, "Who are you really?"

"My name is Miguel O'Hara,” he says, holding your gaze, “and I’m Spiderman from another dimension."

~ Next

Dedication & Credits: To my sister clown in arms @thirstworldproblemss thank you for putting up with me since this series started, I have been bugging his poor woman every second of her waking day. Please give her all the love because I couldn't do this without her or even if I did, I wouldn't have 1/100000000000000000 of the fun I have now with her.

[stvrdrops]

soul ties ☆ | shuri x fem!reader

love at first sight was something everyone believed in. for wakandans, it was something entirely different. it was the belief that bast had created lines to connect each human to their perfect fit. shuri believed that you were the end of that line for her.

warnings : some fighting mentioned, mature themes, and cursing.

word count : 6.2k+

note : i would play the song right when the word "she" is highlighted. :) also this is the largest fic i've ever written so yayyy

song : un-thinkable (i'm ready) by alicia keys ft. drake

"shuri?" a voice peeks through shuri's daydreaming. when the princess looks slightly down to her left she sees riri speaking to her.

"are you even paying attention to the tour?"

"yes, of course i am." shuri says in a tone that sounds almost as if she were offended that riri would even ask such a question. even though she did in fact have her attention elsewhere.

"don't front. what do you see that's so important?"

riri follows shuri's eyesight across the quad, until it lands on you. her face lights up and her eyes widen.

of course. she thinks as she watches you in a world entirely of your own. your airpod maxes had been on and you were stuck in a studying session. your braided hair was tied back into a long ponytail, keeping the strands from falling in your face. riri could see even from afar that you were wearing very little makeup. your natural face was the one she preferred, and it was one shuri quickly grew attached to. you were in spandex shorts and a red hoodie that proudly repped MIT in white lettering.

"no."

shuri looks back over to riri, "what?"

"i said no. you're not going to get anywhere with her. no one has. not even i could crack that code." riri mumbles out, clearly butthurt.

"so, i'm hearing that you two know each other."

riri rolls her eyes, "yeah, we're friends. i tutored her last year."

"will you introduce me?"

"no."

"the dean said meeting fellow students would be a good idea. y'know, so i can be more accustomed."

"the dean ain't here though, is she?"

"oh don't be like that."

riri grumbles. she assumes that it can't hurt to introduce the two of you. it's not like any of the other generational wealth kids impressed you. however, a princess with panther powers just might do the trick.

"fine. you get five minutes."

shuri smiles and begins making her way towards you. with every step she noticed how much more beautiful you got. she also happened to notice how her heart would be tugged on, as if being pulled along on a string by you. you reminded her of the beauty she found in wakanda. with your rich skin and dark brown eyes, she couldn't help but notice you.

shadows of figures fall over your textbooks as you were reading over a line about quantum physics. annoyance began to bubble up, considering you had to have all of this material memorized by tomorrow afternoon for a test.

your eyes raise to meet the people causing the shadows, ready to ask them exactly what it was that they needed. that is, until you see riri, and a face you've only ever known in the news. your hands quickly find their way to your headphones, slipping them around your neck.

"hey y/n." riri says so casually that it shocks you. did she not know who was standing right beside her?

"uh, hey riri."

riri does her silly smile that she does every time you say her name. you knew she was utterly smitten with you, but you also knew that your friendship to her mattered more than anything.

"hi y/n." shuri says with a sultry wakandan accent. riri knew that wasn't how she usually talked, all sexy like that. a swift elbow was placed into shuri's side. due to her panther powers she could barely feel it.

"are you who i think you are?" you can't help but ask, struggling to pick your jaw up from the floor. shuri was someone you would say you looked up to. politics was something you were extremely interested in and watching her on tv speak about wakanda inspired you deeply. you wished so badly to visit wakanda since they opened up their borders, but their policy on foreigners remained the same. they were not to enter unless absolutely necessary. riri was only granted access because of her and shuri's close friendship, that riri never thought to mention until now.

she laughs, which makes your eyes light up. riri notices and figures it's just because you're starstruck. that's what you assume too, but it doesn't feel like that.

"yeah, this is the princess of wakanda, shuri." riri says as she rolls her dark brown eyes, "enough about her though," she slides next to you on the bench. "what are you studying?"

"i'm trying to study quantum physics right now. which is proving to be practically impossible." you say with a heavy sigh. at this rate you were doomed.

"oh, that's real easy baby. i can help you with it later tonight if you want." riri says as her eyes rake over the material in the book.

"very funny riri."

"no, i'm serious. i'm holding a little study session later for shuri to meet some friends. i know you don't hang out with my crew all like that but you're welcome to join."

the invite is enticing.

"i happen to know a decent amount of quantum physics myself." shuri says with a charming smile, "i can help you if you need it."

now the invite seems even more enticing.

"i mean, i guess. as long as we actually study. last time you had a 'study session' we all ended up high."

riri puts her arm around your shoulder, "yeah, but you passed that test the next morning, didn't you?"

a smile can't help but make its way across your face, "yeah, that's true."

"mhm, i thought so."

"shouldn't you be off giving the princess a tour?"

"shuri." the wakandan says.

"hm?" you ask, your eyes torn away from riri.

"you can just call me shuri." she says, "no need for formalities."

"oh, okay. shuri." you say, testing how her name sounds against your tongue. it feels natural and comfortable. shuri would be lying if she said her heart didn't flutter.

riri's eyes shift back and forth as they watch you and shuri.

"ookayyy. yeah, it's time for us to go shuri." riri speaks as she gets up from her spot next to you. she walks back over to shuri, who is still gazing at you. "see you later y/n."

"bye girls." you say as you watch them walk away. riri is saying something to shuri with a weird look on her face, but you can't tell what it is. you're just surprised you kept your cool in shuri's company.

then almost as if by clockwork, your phone begins to ring. you stare at the name on the screen and a sigh leaves you. of course he's calling.

"y/n is here!" riri shouts to the rest of the guests in the room. the couch had been filled with the couple guests riri had waiting in her living room. you thought this was going to be a small gathering, which granted it was. six people, including yourself, wasn't even all that bad. you just felt like you weren't going to actually study tonight after seeing them all. also, you were the only one with a school book in your hand. you weren't surprised to see a few people you knew, with the exception of one girl who had been in the kitchen with shuri.

you set the book onto the table as you take a seat on a beanbag. you notice the girl you're unfamiliar with is hanging onto shuri in the kitchen, keeping her preoccupied with conversation. however, when she feels a gaze lingering on her she's not shocked to see that it's yours. despite how fast you looked away, she knew you were staring.

"you want a hit?" a girl you recognize as karly says before extending her arm out to you. you can't help but look at riri, who just shrugs at you.

"sure." it can't hurt to relax if everyone else was. besides, this might be exactly what you needed. if you took a break from studying maybe you'd do better on the test type deal.

you take a hit of the blunt, making sure to show off how much experience you have with one. it felt good as it scratched the back of your throat. it took you some time to get used to the feeling. now you could successfully take in large amounts without coughing your guts out.

"we got a pro over there." riri says with a smirk on her face. she moves closer to you and sits on the floor. you pass her the blunt and she takes a hit equivalent to yours.

"with the amount of times you persuade me to smoke with you i should be a pro by now."

she laughs at your remark and passes the blunt onto someone else.

shuri makes her way into the room after watching the conversation for a while. you could tell from her eyes that she had already had the blunt a couple times. you wondered how she looked as she smoked. she takes a spot on a chair opposite of the beanbag.

"ri, so you ain't gonna update us on you and justice? i saw you sneak back into the apartments with her. it's almost like you forget that just because you stay in the bougie ass campus apartments means we can't spy on you."

"she not important."

"mhm, not like how y/n is."

riri narrows her eyes at her friends.

you laugh though, the weed taking your edge off. "i don't think my boyfriend would like that very much."

the whole room's eyes are now on you. your smile slowly dissipates from your face and your eyes go wide when you realize what you've said.

"boyfriend? since when the fuck do you have a boyfriend?" riri asks, a bit hurt that you never bothered to tell her this information.

"since my senior year of high school. he goes to a different school out of state." you say this so matter of factly. you weren't lying, you did have a boyfriend. he did also attend an out of state school. he was studying computer engineering. he was pissed when he didn't get into MIT and you did. he viewed it as an insult to his intelligence. that should've been one of your first of many red flags. you two talked at max five times a day. any more than that would just be a headache. two busy schedules don't mix well, especially when sometimes you're filling up your schedule just to make sure you had a solid excuse for missed calls.

"you didn't think that was important to tell us? no wonder someone hasn't been walking on campus bragging about how they nailed you." jacari says, a mutual friends of your's and riri's.

"lay off, at least she's faithful." karly says, staring daggers at him.

"i mean, you guys don't really ask me about my romantic life because you assumed there wasn't one."

"is there one? if he's out of state i'm sure that's hard to deal with." shuri can't help but say. the entire room turns to look at her, surprised she's asked such a question like that. she barely knew you. the one fact that she now did know about you was that you had a boyfriend that you didn't like to bring up. that was something she wasn't hoping to learn at all.

"yes, i have a very happy relationship with him." you say, knowing it's a lie. why are you lying? are you still trying to convince yourself? just today when he called you as you studied you argued with him. he wanted to stay where he was at for spring break and you wanted him to come visit you. it was months away, but you had to plan these things in advance with him. he never came to see you anymore. just this past christmas he lied saying he couldn't get out of his internship, but instead he was at his mother's house opening presents as she asked where you were.

you should have broken up with him by now. however, he was comfortable for you. did you really have the time to get to know someone entirely new? did you want to relearn someone's favorite color, zodiac sign, dreams, and goals? granted, there were plenty of choices in front of you that you already knew. such as riri, who you could see yourself being with. however, you prized her friendship so much more.

"that was intrusive, forgive me." shuri apologizes. her thick accent making your skin crawl.

"it's okay.." you mutter out.

"what's his name?" she asks, desperate to get any more information out of you. really, she just likes to hear your voice.

"monty." you say, his nickname rolling so easily off of your tongue, "i mean, his real name is montell. i call him monty."

"he sounds nerdy as fuck." riri can't help but say out of her own saltiness.

"i mean, he is."

"oh my god, so when was the last time you had an orgasm?" the mystery girl can't help but ask.

now this was a question shuri was interested in.

"i don't know. the beginning of this past summer." you wouldn't dare tell them that it had been one you pulled out of yourself.

"sis, you're kidding." jacari says, shocked at how long it had been. "y'all don't have phone sex?"

not even once.

"nah, it just never comes up for us." you try to say in a nonchalant manner, as if it doesn't bother you how you don't get turned on for him anymore. as if you ever did.

"that sounds miserable."

"it is." you can't lie as you laugh, "i've been itching to have sex for a while now. guess it'll just have to wait."

"whew, you're better than i am. i would've fucked half the campus by now if i were you." jacari continues on before taking a hit.

the conversation ends abruptly when riri's roommate comes out of her room and towards you.

"i need my beanbag please." she says, standing right over you. "i'm about to start studying and i'd rather not do it on my bed."

it takes a second to realize what she's saying to you through your high.

"yeah, of course." you say as you get up, pulling the chair from beside you and handing it to her.

"thanks." she says kindly, and then glares at riri. she goes back into her room, leaving you to stand.

"that bitch is always tripping. she didn't need her damn chair. she's just mad i have people over." riri says as she glares towards the door.

shuri notices you're standing and her mouth begins to speak before she can stop herself.

"do you want to sit in my lap? it's probably more comfortable than the floor." shuri offers up, everyone looking at her with wide eyes. it was a bold move that she was practically flirting with you despite finding out you have a boyfriend. also, after insulting the said relationship between the two of you.

of course, you didn't pick up on how charged that question really was. you were naturally oblivious to that stuff.

"yeah, okay. thanks." you say as you sit on her lap, or more specifically her knee. your spandex shorts made it so that practically every inch of your exposed skin was touching with hers, considering she had on shorts as well. you could tell they were riri's.

maybe it was the weed, or maybe it was the lack of sexual release. all you knew was that it felt damn good to have yourself pressed up against her knee. it was like she was teasing you, without even having to do it on purpose. you felt embarrassed as you felt yourself pulse from the closeness and how wonderful it felt. you attempted to get up, scared that she might know how you were feeling. however, her arm quickly found its way around your waist as she held you down onto her lap. your skin covered itself with goosebumps from the dominating grab. it was hard to act like you were interested in whatever conversation riri and her friends had been having with one another. shuri, on the other hand, had no problem continuing in the conversation as she felt how warm you were.

really shuri had not noticed just how bold her movements were. she had this want to protect you, as if you were hers. she wondered if it was because of her panther powers. however, she also wondered if it was something more. the reality that you had a boyfriend kept her from doing anything unwanted. she didn't know the way you felt towards her, if you had any feelings at all. if she couldn't get to know you in a romantic way then a friendly manner would have to do. even if she would ache for something more despite just meeting you this afternoon. shuri recalled a moment with her brother earlier in her life that left her thinking for the rest of the day after meeting you.

"when did you know nakia was the one for you, brother?"

he chuckles, "when i saw her."

shuri couldn't believe it, "what kind of hopeless romantic answer is that?"

"exactly what i just said. bast created soul ties underneath the rich vibranium soils that our eyes are unable to see. even us panthers can not view where the lines lead us. however, we can see when they have reached their destination. when you see that person, you just know that this is where your line ends. you know that bast made you for one another. you also know that you no longer need to search for that line."

"is there a chance that bast would forget to create a line for me? or at least, in the same way she created nakia's to you?" shuri began to wonder, scared because when she was young she didn't know where her sexuality laid.

"oh sweet little sister," he sighs, "bast would never forget to make you a person. after all, your annoying tendencies were made for someone to love."

"ugh, you suck!" shuri says, a wide smile on her face as she playfully hits her brother. he just smiles in return.

shuri believed that she saw the soul tie that connected to you. an american girl who she had never seen before. her brother was gone, but he was right.

your phone that is sitting in your lap starts to buzz, interrupting your train of thought as you attempt to uphold your composure and try not to seem too high. you squint your eyes at the bright screen.

"hi monty." you answer the phone, buzzed enough to sound happy that he's called. shuri watches the phone out of the corner of her eye. she's too curious to see what her competition looks like. he's sun kissed and has a buzz cut. he looked just as nerdy as his name sounded.

"where are you at?" he asks, not greeting her back.

"i'm at riri's."

shuri watches as his face turns into one of disgust. "i thought i told you to stop going over there. all she ever does is get you high."

riri is far too buzzed and in her own world to realize what he's said. shuri heard it though, and furrowed her brows.

"getting high is my own choice, monty. i know you get high with your frat bros in north carolina."

"it's different."

no it isn't.

"wait a minute, are you sitting on some other dude's lap?" he asks, as all he can see is shuri's curly hair.

"no, this is shuri. like the princess of wakanda shuri." you whisper that last part into the phone. it shows just how truly geeked you are.

"you're lying. that's a fucking dude."

before you can say anything, shuri takes the phone from you and puts it on her own face. you watch as monty's face goes wide and for once he has nothing to say.

"hello montell."

"oh, um. i-i'm sorry, princess." monty is scrambling to find the words and shuri can tell he wants to hang up. he always hated to be embarrassed. being embarrassed by royalty was the lowest it could get.

you take the phone back before he gets the chance to hang up, "wait, monty, what were you calling for?"

"well, i thought about what you were saying earlier. i'll come home for spring break. i miss you baby."

his voice sounded so insincere and shuri cringed at it. this was the man who got to claim you as his own? you had a beauty unrivaled and here you were wasting it on some man who couldn't even seem excited about seeing you. she felt offended for you, even though you were use to this by now.

"really? what made you change your mind?"

"i don't know. i guess i'll see you over break though. we can talk more about this at another time."

you knew what he meant by this.

"i'm not out partying, monty."

"you are. at least be a responsible adult and get up for your classes tomorrow. bye."

"bye." you say back, unwilling to fight.

when he hangs the phone up you realize the everyone is looking at you. your face heats up from noticing that everyone probably witnessed that entire exchange. of course they caught him on a night where he was being a dick. it was pretty much every night, so this did make your case to defend him a little harder. you didn't want to get up from shuri's knee considering it felt so nice up against you. however, you also didn't want to hear any comments from the gallery.

"i'm going to go home." you say, pulling yourself into sobriety after that conversation. "hope you all have a good night."

shuri lets you up from her lap. she feels bad you're walking home but it's not like you've never done it before. the heat you resonated leaves her feeling cold when you stand away from her. everything inside of her is screaming for her to grab you back into her arms and keep you there. a part of you wanted that too, but it was unrecognizable.

riri hands you the physics book on the table. "get home safe, y/n."

"i always do."

you got home safe that night. you also searched for an orgasm multiple times that night as you recalled how good you felt against her. you replicated her knee with a pillow and held on tight to yourself with your free hand. you tried so desperately to think of monty as you rocked against it. however, nothing worked. all you could do was imagine your head placed in the crook of the princess's neck, smelling her enticing cologne. you could hear her wakandan accent telling you how good you were doing and how badly she craved you. they were all words that monty could never say to you. they were words you searched so bad for because you ached for her praise. only when you moaned out her name as you finished made you so self aware to what you had been doing. this made you dig your head into your pillow, still heaving from the high.

what you did weighed heavy on your conscience. especially when you had been practically spending every day with shuri. she was basically attached to your hip. she joined your study sessions, she came with you to try american cuisine, her favorite being wingstop for some strange reason, and she even waited for you after every class. she was your best friend, making riri fall into second place.

at one point a rumor had been going around campus that the two of you were in a relationship, despite the fact you had a boyfriend. after all, who could deny a princess of the most powerful and advanced nation in the world? you could deny her as much as you wanted. however, you knew deep down that you couldn't do it for long. you didn't know how much longer you'd keep stringing monty and yourself along. commitment was something you were scared of. commitment to a future leader of a nation was something entirely different. what if you had decided to dump monty for a potential happy relationship with shuri? what would happen if it ended? you'd rather not think of all the possibilities, instead you preferred self sabotage. you appreciated shuri so dearly, in the a.m. and in the p.m. when you would finish to thoughts of her. whether it be how she played with your hair when she got bored, how she laughed so sweetly at your jokes, or how she constantly had her hand in yours or on your waist. you knew friends didn't do that. you knew that she also knew that.

the more time you spent with shuri meant the more time you spent ignoring monty. he saw paparazzi pictures that his friends would show him of the two of you together. he felt some type of way of course, blowing up your phone with "she might as well be your boyfriend the way she's touching on you." your only response being a swift "okay" and an "i'm sorry." you weren't sure how else to respond to him, knowing that you were cheating emotionally and even somewhat physically. you imagined that monty couldn't have stayed loyal to you with the lying he did. so what did it matter if you told a couple white lies too?

you didn't even realize that at one point whenever you brought him up you'd start referring to him again as his birth name, montell.

"montell?" you can't help but ask in surprise as you open the door to your dorm.

"surprise!" he says with the most emotion you've heard out of him in weeks. a bouquet of flowers are in his large hands. a nice turtleneck adorned his chest, which had gotten bigger. he must've been putting his frustration into working out. "you back to calling me by my birth name?"

he pushes his way into the dorm, looking around at your space that you shared with your roommate who had been out of town.

"um, you're early. a week early." you express to him, rubbing your forehead. you weren't prepared for his arrival in the slightest. your hair had been pulled into a bun and your face was bare. you adorned some grey sweatpants that did not belong to you. shuri had left them here the last time she slept over. she claimed it was "too warm" in the room to wear such pants. instead she wore a pair of your shorts that you never got back.

"you weren't going to tell me that your spring break started a week earlier than mine? i just decided to do my coursework ahead of time and then surprise you."

"honestly it slipped my mind." you say, which was the truth.

he sets the bouquet down.

"you look pretty." he says as he gets closer to you. his hands grab your waist, pulling you in and looking at you as if he wanted to devour you. it was almost as if he had forgotten how pretty you were. or maybe he was just jealous, because he knew the pants were too big for you.

you wanted to pull away, not wanting to kiss him despite thinking that you had been missing him all this time.

"not right now, i kinda just woke up." you say, which was a lie. it was eight p.m. on a rainy night. you could never sleep when it rained.

"okay, i guess later then when we go out to dinner. you looked like you were expecting somebody though with the way you opened up the door. is it that stupid princess you've been hanging around?"

there was the montell you were used to. a jealous, insecure, fucking man child.

"no." you say, a lie. your face scrunches up in disgust that he would refer to her in that tone.

he knows you're lying.

"okay. so if i wait up around in here she's not gonna show up?"

"i don't know. i can't control what she does."

"bullshit. you've got her walking around behind you like you're the one who's royalty. call her."

what?

"no."

"i said, fucking call her."

before you can say anything he's attempting to grab your phone. you put up a good fight, causing the phone to get launched right into his face. you gasp when you've realized what you did. instant regret fills your body as you spurt out countless apologizes.

"it would've been better if you just fucked her, y/n. cause then i could confidently say i don't give a fuck about you and finally tell you about all the girls i've been nailing since i went away. heh, just like how you've been. guess we finally have something in common."

your eyes go wide at his words. there it was. there was the truth that you had been begging to hear in some deep part of your brain. those were the words that could allow you to finally let him go. this was the moment you decided that you weren't okay with being 'comfortable' anymore. you were utterly repulsed at him and yourself for letting this go on for so long. for months you refused to act on impulses that you craved so badly to have. your lip trembled when you thought about how you could've kissed shuri ten times over by now. you had been holding onto something that you didn't realize had no real value to you anymore. and for what? to be treated like some idiot? you didn't deserve that.

"get the fuck out. you should've never come home."

"yeah i should've stayed with my other girlfriend. at least she doesn't flaunt herself around with other people in fucking tabloids. it's embarrassing you know that? when your buddies send you links of some bitch having her arm wrapped around your girlfriend? they teased me about it in my frat for weeks after she got caught playing in your hair and looking so lovey dovey with you. they called me a pussy for not coming back home sooner."

"so that's why you came back? to prove yourself to some idiot frat boys who are gonna be stuck drinking out of kegs the rest of their life while you write all their code, making them the millionaires? get the fuck out montell."

"you bitch-"

"i said leave."

you don't have to tell him again before he's grabbing up his roses and muttering curse words at you under his breath. you held your composure until he slammed the door shut. when surrounded in your own hospitality you finally crack. the tears fall down your face and plop as they hit the wooden floor. you were crying because you were upset about losing someone you loved. you were crying because you had let yourself be played for a fool for so long. a part of you feels liberated as the weight of montell is lifted off of your shoulders.

"y/n?" a voice says from behind the door. you recognize it's shuri.

attempting to speak only results in you being choked up. the door opens as you raise your head to look up at her.

her grey hoodie that says MIT has raindrops all over it. her curls are wet and drip against the wood floors. she looked beautiful despite being soaked. the fact she looked so beautiful made you cry even more.

when she lays her eyes on you she can't help but immediately rush over. she drops the books about physics she had in her hand. she had every intention on coming over here to study with you, but now she didn't care about any of that. she had never seen you like this before. her only priority was you. her heart was set solely on you.

"what happened?" she asks, her arms wrapped around your body as you huddled into yourself. you don't dare to look at her, feeling too ashamed.

"montell.. i'm so stupid." you manage to choke out.

shuri puts it all together. she thought that man she had passed in the hallway just now looked familiar. she knew even more that something was up when he gave her a glare that could've had him killed. had she known he left you like this, she would've killed him herself. how dare he cause such pain to someone who did nothing but care for others?

"whatever happened, you are not stupid. you are one of the brightest girls i know, and that's saying a lot."

you somehow manage to laugh and look back up at her. she's still holding on tight, making you feel warm in her embrace. it reminds you of the study session at riri's. it feels pure. it feels like you're the only person in the world to her.

she wipes away your tears with the pads of her thumbs, her eyebrows contorted into a face that resembles worry.

"please don't cry. you are too pretty to cry over such ugly things. i hate to see you cry."

you think that this is exactly how love is supposed to feel as she says those words to you.

"shuri.."

"y/n. you make me feel things that i've never felt before. you're something that is so impossible to ignore that i can't help but spend every second with you. you put up with my annoying tendencies. you put up with my clinginess. you put up with my lack of american pop culture knowledge. you denied me my feelings because you knew it was the wrong thing to do if you fell into my temptation. i know you know deep down how i feel for you. it is quite obvious. you are an angel among men, y/n. you are my angel. you've saved me in ways that you can't even begin to think of. i never had any intentions on falling in love with you, but it has happened. you may not be in love with me but you are what makes my world spin. you are what makes my oceans flow and earth quake. you are exactly who bast intended me for and i can't ignore this anymore. i can't let you sit here and think you are foolish when you are anything but. you are considerate, you are kind, you are a person worthy of being a queen. you are my queen, wakanda's future queen."

her words have shocked you as you sit there, eyes wide and your mouth partly gaped open. you thought you'd want to hear those words from montell, but really it had been shuri all along. you couldn't ignore your feelings towards her after a love confession of such caliber. it had shaken you to your core and it took you out of your sadness. your heart was beating at a dangerous tempo, but it was aligned with hers. you didn't know what she meant by her goddess creating you for her, but you could feel it. you could feel it because you knew she was made for you as well.

you hadn't realized, but you knew everything about her. you knew shuri's favorite color was purple. you knew her zodiac sign was sagittarius. you knew her dreams and goals of advancing wakanda. you also knew how scared she was to become the future queen as she once cried in your arms.

you love shuri. you love her so much that it made you blind. you'd rather ignore that feeling than feed into it, but that's all changed now. she took the lead tonight and now it was time for you to express what came to your mind.

so you did.

your lips connected to hers in a wild frenzy. finally you were quenching this thirst you had been searching for since she came into your life. after all this time you were doing the unthinkable. you were allowing yourself to be her's, rather than anyone else's. your fears of commitment felt like things of the past when your hands made their way to her face. her skin felt so soft against yours, as it got wet from your tears. her plump lips are attached to your soft ones. it felt like you were intertwining yourself with her. for shuri, it felt like the soul ties were becoming knotted into one. finally she had you and she had no plans of ever letting you go. this was the unthinkable and it was so beautiful as you held onto each other, placing intimate kisses one one another. this was you saying you loved her just as deeply as she loved you, in very little words.

you were ready. after all this time you were ready to see what was right in front of you this whole time. you could never go back to what it was before. she was your soulmate.

"i'm sorry." you whisper out after you pull away to breathe.

her hands begin caressing your face as her eyebrows furrow. "what are you sorry for, my love?"

"i'm sorry for not doing this any sooner. i'm so sorry."

"you never have to apologize to me. i would've waited until the end of time for you."

you smile, feeling your heart swell.

as the rain falls down around outside of your dorm walls, you stay in her embrace. shuri could feel her brother smiling at her from a distant plane, knowing in death that he was right. he had been smiling even brighter at the prospect that shuri did indeed find her nakia.

˖⁺｡˚⋆˙✧⋆｡°✩☼⋆｡°✩☽︎

[speaker-of-the-void-cats]

Writing it up now to make sure I'm reading correct and not going nuts with the red string like usual, but I just reread Revelation and Parting the Veil and am 99% sure there's evidence between the two to suggest that the K1 Anomaly was indeed transmitting the signal of the Veil, and that the K1 crew and the Ishtar team on Neptune had similar experiences because of this interaction with the Veil.

I also think that there might be a very long chain of events that link the Veil to, I shit you not, the creation of SIVA. There's a reason both the K1 Crew (under the watchful eye of Clovis Bray) and the Ishtar team both came to conclusions about self-replicating quantum distributed networks after experiencing "reverie" while interacting with these objects. They were working off of the same prototype.

[elonmuskfansgossipblog]

part 6

Now we are free.

After a heady, orgiastic night, she woke up changed, feeling as if she had the power of many minds, full of energy and good humor, and when she thought about him she felt something like an electric discharge in her head. Hmm... baffling- she thought. She turned on the computer, and very strange wallpaper appeared on the screen, some animation, two red and blue balls, swirled, merged, exploded into the words "quantum entanglement" and then disappeared. oh! It's going to be an interesting day, glitch in a matrix. She turned on the radio and from the speakers came:

You were standing (you know it's true) I was there (worlds collided) Two worlds collided (we're shining through) And they could never tear us apart

-Is this some joke? - she laughed loudly.

She sat down in the armchair and was about to do her business when she heard a whisper: leave it all and write for me, I want to know how it ends.

- Damn, I need to see a psychiatrist, my dreams have been crazy lately, but the voices when I'm awake?! - she wanted to write a note in her phone, but she couldn't find it - I probably left it in her purse - the purse was nowhere to be found either. She sat on the bed to collect her thoughts, when suddenly in her mind's eye she saw a large cinema screen and on it she saw him, riding the Cybertruck and listening to music. Her heart started pounding like crazy, she could see him live! He looked happy, he was whistling a tune quietly, he was just turning a corner when a huge, terrifying fart split the air in the cabin. She saw him jump up, scared like a panda. "Oops, another tire inflated" he laughed loudly and mockingly. Then the image blurred and disappeared, probably because she was also bursting with laughter and tuned out of the signal. All in all, she wasn't too surprised, she could see remotely, but it never occurred to her to spy on him, especially since time didn't matter here, she could see any moment at any time. She relaxed again and thought "Well, let's see how you did in Baldur's Gate 3, I was lynched on the blog for that." This time, she wanted to see the scene from his perspective, she had mastered connecting with the consciousness of another mind quite well in her dreams, but would it work the same in waking life? She will most likely see the most exciting moment, such moments leave the clearest trace when new emotions occur. An image appeared, the scene flashed briefly, she didn't need to see more, she burst into laughter again, howled with laughter because she saw him having sex with a bear! She was ecstatic, he was so disarmingly human in everything he did, and for a moment she was fooled into the illusion that he was completely normal. She lay down on the bed to think for a while, she could, it was Sunday morning, nothing was chasing her. "Hey, little one, it works both ways" she heard. There was music in the room, Air On A G String, she saw him lying in his bed with his phone in his hand, he was reading part 2 of the story and thinking about her, probably quite intensely, she felt his arousal as her own, his penis was already ready, sticking out like the Washington Monument, lightly stroked by his hand, and with each movement her excitement grew. "Come to me" she heard his tender whisper. The transfer was immediate, and at the same moment she gave her inner consent, she was next to him. She was sitting between his legs, his thighs were so hot, the wonderful smell of Shalimar spread in the room "mhm... art deco even in the air..." She leaned over him, first her tongue enjoyed it, and then she covered it with her mouth, mmm... ice cream so good , yes yes yes and his rocket was ready to fly. She sat on him so thirsty, he grabbed her waist and she sucked him with her pussy. They came together. It was the most delicious breakfast you could have on a Sunday morning accompanied by a cello.

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

[carionto]

Bon voyage!

Wait, who's going? Where?!?

The time had arrived for Humanity's first colony ship to depart. A behemoth among the giants of the Human fleet. Thirty five kilometers long, fourteen wide, seven tall, capable of housing up to twenty one million people, and fully self sustaining. It's destination - Andromeda!

Wait, Andromeda? As in, a different galaxy?

"Yeah, that's the general idea, though this ship in particular, called The Herald of The Chosen, is privately funded by the Church of the Unforgotten and can kinda bypass a lot of red tape that's holding up the others. Twenty eight thousand members are aboard. Notice the pattern? Seven is a holy number to them and they really stick to it."

Wait wait wait, privately funded? As in, your government isn't involved? How is that even feasible? Like, logistically or legally?

"Well, back when we accidentally blew a reactor 700 years ago and caused what most saw as beyond a biblical apocalypse, there were more than enough people who became convinced of a lot of things that were kinda hard to argue against at the time.

The fact we had 'vanished' three centuries prior and there was no sun or moon or stars in the sky but things still functioned as if they were set a firm foundation for a lot of religious movements and reinforced some existing ones.

So, while most people aren't all that into faith, the ones who are are firm believers. Just so happens several big-shots are part of the Unforgotten and pulled a lot of strings and set aside many differences once the Earth 'reappeared' in real space. And now just over a year later, we have this Andromeda voyage."

Right. We're still processing that a private Human organization outperforms most of our industrial shipwright systems. We're getting used to that happening more often. Anyway, why so far, can't they establish their colony somewhere in this galaxy?

"Uhh, kinda pointless don't you think? It takes like what... six months to hyperjump from one end of the Milky Way to the other. We can colonize in-galaxy with just regular transports. Oh, I guess since your generators can't charge your hyperdrives while mid-jump it would take you a lot longer, huh. Something like five or six years, right?"

Wait. What? WHAT? You charge AND discharge hyperdrives while IN HYPERSPACE? AND YOU DON'T EXPLODE!?!

"Well, not over short jumps. We did find it becomes wobbly if you do both for over forty days straight, and then, yeah, it does blow up. We're working on a re-router. It'll be fine. Current fix is to just have two drives and switch from one to the other at regular intervals. No issues since we solved the synchronization bug that jumped half the ship clean off into a different hypertunnel.

You'd think warp gates would be the way to go, but we found that going through a literal tear in space-time causes quantum entanglement to break, among other potential problems, human testing is still a while away, so you'd end up cut off from all communication. Even the most ardent zealots still want access to the extranet."

Meanwhile, as the alien delegates swear and fumble and possibly hurts itself in its confusion due to exposure to "Humans being typical Humans", The Herald of The Chosen drifts gently into open space, to a medium sized open broadcast fanfare from fellow Unforgotten members who were not chosen. Then, as unceremonious as hyperdrives are, the act of a vessel of such magnitude jumping away still left an impression as everyone became aware of the suddenly vacated space.

[shiguangism]

Link Click Fic Rec - by me!

It's time because I love this fandom, and I want to share all my appreciation for these stories and writers 🥰

I'm going through my AO3 bookmarks!

Between a Rock and an Idiot - by SmileOrGrimace

Lu Guang should have realized that he wouldn’t be greeted by normalcy when he returned home, but he didn’t. He's not nearly as affected by the stab wound as he is by Xiaoshi's reaction to it all. There's something acutely painful about watching someone self-destruct in front of you, and Lu Guang, frankly, doesn't know what he's supposed to do about it. It would help if the world could let him chill for long enough to figure it out. –- Two emotionally stunted young men navigate trauma, subtext, and the misery of trying to feed yourself like a competent adult, all while solving other people’s problems. In for a penny in for a pound, as they say.

姻緣紅線 ~Red String of Fate~ - by TRANScendtheBInary

(MWI) is an interpretation of quantum mechanics that asserts that the universal wave-function is objectively real, and that there is no wave function collapse. This implies that all possible outcomes of quantum measurements are physically realized in some "world" or universe. The many-worlds interpretation implies that there are most likely an uncountably infinite number of universes, time is merely a many-branched tree, wherein every possible quantum outcome is realized." ~Cheng Xiaoshi Possesses a young Lu Guang, Learns About Science, And Gets Tortured~ Lu Guang Backstory because we were lacking. Mind the tags, not explicit but still present.

resistance is futile anyway - by animegoil

To find a misplaced document, Cheng Xiaoshi dives into a photo Lu Guang took. It's easy - all he has to do is wait around for a while... and shower while in Lu Guang's body. He brushes the tip of his fingernail experimentally against Lu Guang’s nipple, only to feel that spark run through him again. “Fuck, you really are that sensitive.” You already know this, Lu Guang deadpans. Now can you move on with it? Cheng Xiaoshi smirks. “C’mon, Lu Guang. What’s a little shower fun going to do to the past, hmm?” The responding silence is all he needs as an answer.

Wouldn't Mind Being Yours - by UrsaMajorStories

The link between them was only supposed to be present during dives. But when Lu Guang goes quiet for a little too long, and Cheng Xiaoshi panics, they find that their powers are able to do more than they originally thought. (Or in other words, their powers literally telling them to just kiss already, at the very least, if not bang).

11th Hour - by miyasjacket

Cheng Xiaoshi’s heart bursts at the seams like a dam, heavy and threatening to drown everyone in its wake. Lu Guang does not flinch. He continues to swim despite it. Three (3) different perspectives on two (2) idiots messing around together and learning the ups and downs of falling in love.

The Hardest Thing About Love (Is Noodles) - by NoomiShroomy

The first time Lu Guang slips up, he chalks it up to forgetfulness. The second time he does, it catches him off guard. The third time he does, he’s almost fully convinced that it’s become a bad habit. And its name is Cheng Xiaoshi.

The person who can't fall in love (And the gay couple that acompanny her) - by AlissZ

Qiao Ling lives in a world of Alphas, Betas and Omegas. Qiao Ling is an Omega. Qiao Ling is supposed to have someone for her. Someone unique and made for her. Someone she is made for. It's a terrifying thought rather than a comforting one. Or; Qiao Ling can't fall in love and a gay couple helps her to understand that that's not bad.

[mrfelixfischoeder]

“You’re really that sensitive, huh?!” he taunted, “Your wife got in the way, Doc. You understand the concept of collateral damage, right?”

“Harry, you’re a hateful little boy.” Otto hissed through gritted teeth, and Harry winced behind his mask. “Your father would be proud, I suppose.”

“My father? What do you know about my father!” Harry had his own sensitivities, it seemed. Otto could have bet money on it.

[celenawrites]

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celena. 21. she/they. desi.

comp sci student | writer | reader | artist

interests - tarot/astrology/divination, witchcraft, coffee, tea, chocolates, reading, books, journaling, writing, libraries, sudoku, art, literature, theater, music, astronomy, quantum physics, academia, et cetera.

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[sanctaignorantia]

Unmei no Akai Ito

A legend says that fate connects people with a red cord on the little finger (for the Japanese and the ankle for the Chinese) and regardless of time or distance, these people will meet and make history, be it love or hate.

The bonds can continue in another life if fate so chooses. Treating your bonds with care is creating good karma and perhaps breaking the karmic cycle.

Akai ito is not limited to loving couples. It connects us to important people in our lives.

The string can contract and tangle, but never break. Those who are linked by destiny are destined to create a history together.

If there is a link between unmei no akai ito and science, perhaps it can be compared to quantum entanglement. When two objects (or anything in existence) are interconnected in such a way that it is impossible to mention one without mentioning the other. x

Guys, I don't want to bother you again, but you know it's really impossible to shut your mind when it comes to Death Stranding...

[aimmyarrowshigh]

What are your thoughts on Kamala taking lead with the Young Avengers?

In the MCU? I like it -- I feel like her fandom of Carol and the Avengers makes it fit to have her go out and try to create a new superhero team of other young heroes, because she would be the one sitting there thinking about it and going, "The Avengers are gone, but the world still has problems. I can't solve them all on my own/learned teamwork with Monica and Carol/can honor Monica by being a hero/love other nerds who love superheroes," you know?

And especially given Secret Invasion, it wouldn't make any sense to have Fury be the one to put together the Young Avengers. Although the timeline with him is fucky because they switched the release dates of The Marvels and Secret Invasion, so whatever.

And in the comics, Kamala was the leader of the Champions, so it totally makes sense that she'd lead the MCU Champions/Young Avengers crossover team (because they're not going to have both, let's be real. There's also so many fucking movies/shows). Billy and Tommy are currently too young AND have THE most confusing backstory in comics, so putting either of them in charge wouldn't make the most sense. Cassie is on the West Coast. Kate is, as she tells Kamala, a bit older, and also Hawkeyes tend to be pretty solitary workers. Skar is... whatever the fuck is going on there that I'm pretending isn't going on over there. Peter is busy trying to eke out a living on his own in this universe, so he's probably both busy AND too traumatized to make new connections this soon. Eli hasn't made his heroic debut yet, although we've seen him. Yelena's a Thunderbolt. Love Thorsdottir is way too young. Phyla-Vel is in space. Toussaint/T'Challa and Morgan are too young. I feel like Kamala's the only one who COULD do it in a reasonable way, you know?

I feel like I'm forgetting someone. RIRI! Riri could do it, but again, she's older in this universe (college) and my insane "the MCU could make sense if they would do [X]" brain keeps insisting that she's going to be MJ's roommate at MIT in Ironheart or SM4. BECAUSE THEY'RE BOTH AT MIT. AND MIT CAN'T BE *THAT* BIG. IT WOULD MAKE SENSE, MARVEL. PLEASE MAKE SENSE.

I want the Young Avengers to be so good that it knocks me on my ass. I want it to be so good that it knocks Trendy MCU Haters on their asses. And I want Kamala to get to have that. Iman is SO wonderful and Kamala is SO great, and I want people to love her the way she deserves, dammit.

Also, if VisionQuest isn't canceled (which, who the fuck knows) -- I want it to be exactly Vision (2015), which is just exactly WandaVision but this time Vision's the one who created a fake family out of heartbroken madness. And I want Viv Vision in the MCU. I love Viv Vision so fucking much.

Also, I want My Blorbo Nadia! It could happen!!! Hank banged a lady named Linda while Janet was boinking Bill Murray in the Quantum Realm, so Hank could TOTALLY have a daughter that was in the Red Room (WHOM NATASHA AND YELENA FREED??? IN BLACK WIDOW??? MY HEART?!!?) and is a science genius who comes to find the Pym/Van Dynes and is just like, "Hello, I am here now, I love you, family!"

I don't know how they can reasonably have Hulkling after the MCU's version of Secret Invasion AND how the MCU Kree are so unilaterally evil. But also, the MCU is homophobic af so they probably won't have Hulkling anyway. >:(

Just... ::exhale:: There are so many fucking threads open within the MCU thOH MY GOD I FORGOT AMERICA CHAVEZ ALSO THERE ARE SO MANY OPEN THREADS AND I'M TRYING TO TIE THEM TOGETHER ON MY RED STRING BOARD AND THEY WON'T TIE TOGETHER, HOLLIE, THEY WON'T TIE TOGETHER.

I just want. The MCU. To be cohesive. And make sense. And close its plotholes in ways that are narratively satisfying. And also, Steve is on the moon.

[ariibees]

*climbs into your askbox like an old friend* I just wanted to come and say I vibe so hard with your feelings about Outer Wilds! Unfortunately for stupid reasons of physical impediment I'm unable to play games with a controller and it is, as it turns out, pretty impossible to play on mouse and keyboard, so i had to experience it through other people's playthroughs which was a huge shame. but nevertheless, I absolutely agree with "rewrote my brain"!!

Interestingly enough, I had the exact opposite experience with the control schemes -- I played the game using keyboard & mouse pretty comfortably, and absolutely would have suffered with controller. In the early game the controls do take some getting used to (particularly the delayed jump and zero-gravity maneuvering) and I was using a pretty awful button mapping setup earlier on, but with the exception of [THAT SECTION] that controller can arguably-slightly-cheese I preferred the ease of looking around and aiming my scout that kb&m provided. Though I'll admit I'm biased in that regard, as I've gone to pretty comical lengths to avoid having to use a controller for anything (looking at you, Sonic Adventure 2) and thus never really learned how to hold/use them.

That aside, even though you didn't get to play the game on your own, I'm glad you were able to enjoy other folks' playthroughs -- there are some seriously awesome ones out there. Since it's impossible to replay Outer Wilds for obvious reasons I always try to push people towards experiencing it on their own first, but in a situation where you can't I'm glad you still got to see it through one way or another.

As for the actual point of the ask hahaha, yeah, gosh, this game just fundamentally dug into me in a way others haven't. I legitimately went through the five stages of grief over the game's ending.

The game is also just great at putting you in the shoes of the Hatchling. With the exception of like, continuing a save after getting the kazoo meme ending which technically "doesn't happen," you explore the world and learn everything entirely in-character, which made it all hit much harder for me. It didn't feel like I was observing a story, it felt like I was the one making it and uncovering the mystery and having all of this happen to me. That and the fact that I had some personal things going on in my life around when I played Outer Wilds that aligned with the game's themes, leading to it kinda taking me out on a very personal level.

Outer Wilds also just seemed perfectly engineered to suck me in, haha. It's got computer simulations! Black holes! Quantum mechanics! I was the kinda kid who lived for space documentaries so getting to fly around and explore everything was amazing. Going through environmental puzzles, reading adorable exchanges with the nomai, getting to see the most incredible sights (the door falling away at the [SPOILER] and having to make a leap of faith to get across the gap was amazing), and putting it all together in a wild red-string conspiracy board...I completed the entire game over the course of like, 2-3 days as I recall? Just entirely immersed for that time.

It's inspired me so much in my stories and how I think about mysteries. It's the best time-loop game out there, and the presentation of the sandbox mystery is just unparalleled in any other game. Hence why everyone who's played it is left looking up Youtube playthroughs and chasing that high again -- personally I think going into the original Subnautica game blind touches some of the same feelings, but you're never really gonna get the Outer Wilds Experience again.

The mechanics are great, the mystery is presented wonderfully; I fell in love with the environments and the characters and the dialogue. The themes were tied into the story very naturally and hit me right in my core. Obviously I can't really replay it, but I do sometimes boot it up just to reread some sections or go hang out on Giant's Deep for the ambiance; it's comforting and nostalgic in a weird sort of way.

Sorry that this response isn't anywhere near coherent. I'm very, very tired right now, and I love Outer Wilds a lot and won't pass up a chance to ramble about how great it is. It's a very special game to my heart and dug into me in a way other games often can't do. It's not for everyone, but if it is for you it's REALLY for you. Clearly I like it and clearly you like it. So thanks for climbing into my askbox and setting me off, haha.

[unhinged-summer-fun]

she went west to chase her dreams

Part 1 of lost in time and space series.

Marcus Moreno x F!Reader (22+ only)

Summary: When you're called in to rescue Marcus Moreno in the field, you both get a little more than you bargained for.

Warnings: Tentacle Sex, oviposition (E G G), horny interdimensional space cephalopods, first time/getting together, fuck or die if you squint, the concept of Now You're Fucking With Portals, science but make it horny

Word Count: 4183

A/N: This was written in tandem with @ezrasbirdie (go read her tentacle Moreno RIGHT NOW it's so fucking sweet and sassy). Thank you so much for betaing this monstrosity for me, bb <3 Love u to the moon n back.

P.S. - This isn't written for Danktober (today's fic will be posted today as well.... in addition to another din djarin fic.... pls send help and wine thx)

P.S.S. - with the Flaggageddeon happening to some accts, only the reblogs of this will use tumblr tags. Get it together tumbros.

Regardless ENJOY!

You were called in for this particular problem because you dealt in... particular problems.

Marcus Moreno was trapped underneath 700 tons of concrete, steel, glass, and octopus. The Hammy Milton Memorial Aquarium had been lifted into the air as a last-ditch effort to defeat the Heroics leader on the seventh and final day of the Battle of Boundary Bay, and it had been dropped on top of the man in a great screech of noise. No one had ever thought to imagine what the cacophony of an aquarium air-strike would sound like, but the poor Canadians in the surrounding twenty miles thirty-two kilometers didn't need to imagine after that day.

Those that survived.

You were technically a Heroic. The more precise term was that you were a controlled substance, seeing as you had the tendency to become literal antimatter when you were sad enough. You'd spent an immeasurable amount of time studying the very boundaries of space-time, and a slightly less immeasurable amount of time pushing said boundaries before the Heroics politely asked you to stop.

Being ten years old, you complied, and were sent to live in Austin with the rest of the team. You trained catty-corner to the others, and while they went out to rescue firemen from 80-story buildings, you were sent to work in the labs. You were useless to take into battle anyway, as when you were scared of being hit, the atoms in your body tended to go hyperactive, allowing your assailant's fist to go straight through you. It was enough of a perfect defense mechanism that the trainers simply didn't bother honing your skills after that.

Anita Moreno had hovered her hand over your head in lieu of patting it, and said she'd think of something for you to do to help. There's always something for everyone.

Something was being relegated to the Heroics Archives, where you maintained the most important secrets of the organization in a quantum encryption server only Anita, and later Marcus Moreno, knew about. You were rarely sent out into the field, and whenever you were, it was typically to clean up messes of astronomical proportion, property damage in the billions, the like.

It felt a lot like being used, whatever this something was.

You didn't even have a super-secret nickname for your hero persona, that was how little they sent you out. Usually you were deployed with a handler and a gravity-well dampener, to make sure you didn't go full supernova when retuning the strings of the universe like a guitar. Most of the time, it was one of the anonymous, black-suited, besunglassed field agents that never seemed unique enough to remember, in retrospect. They never spoke to you, but they did hold the gravity-well dampener like the Presidential Nuclear Football, which made you uneasy.

But once, it was Marcus Moreno watching you work.

It had been in Berlin, after a zombie uprising had uprooted the city's graveyards and nearly destroyed the transportation infrastructure surrounding it. You'd been back in Texas, fiddling around with the Archives when the big red phone rang in your office. You'd scrambled to answer it, and when you were given a beacon, you zapped yourself between electrons and arrived.

"Hi!" You'd said, to a very surprised Marcus Moreno, who was looking around at the wreckage with his hands on his hips. His katanas were poking over his shoulders just like all the posters back home. "What's the status?"

He'd given you a very long list of problems, and you'd given him a very short wait for solutions. In all honesty, you'd probably over-exerted yourself in an effort to show off. Marcus had just taken over the Junior Heroics when you'd entered the program, which firmly cemented him in your mind (as cemented as anything could be) as your first and forever crush ever ever ever.

He hadn't been leader of the Heroics for long. His mother had retired maybe three years prior at the time of the Zom-Berliners, but time was funny for someone like you. Most everything that normal people considered material seemed funny to you. But either way, he was wholly impressed when you finished, headstones back in place, along with every German sidewalk and traffic light that had been knocked even a little off-kilter in the incident. When your feet touched the ground, you swayed a little, leaning on a gravestone for support before realizing what you were doing.

"Are you alright?" He'd asked instantly, which was new. Whenever you were tired after cleaning up this reality, your handlers just stood impassively, still as the statues in the graveyard you'd nearly passed out in. But Marcus was reaching for you, Marcus was helping you up with a hand on your elbow that didn't even pass through. And your heart was pounding loud enough for the both of you to hear.

"I..." you hadn't explained the love struck look on your face, the blush on your cheeks, or the rapid heartbeat. "Get home safe!" You blurted out before zipping back to Texas and screaming into the couch in your office.

But that had been two weeks ago. Ancient history in your books. It was also like two seconds ago, at the same time. And now your phone was ringing again, and you were being called to help out in Vancouver: not as cleanup, but as a real honest-to-goodness Heroic. They even had a belt buckle for you. The belt buckle didn't do anything, but you were still very, very proud of it.

You arrived next to Miracle Guy in the fraction of a second, hair flying every which way from the latent wind of the universe that no one else seemed to feel. Maybe except for Lava Girl. "What's going on?" You asked the man.

"Marcus is under there!" He said frantically. In all your time working in the Archives, categorizing news footage and coverage for each Heroic response, you'd never seen or heard him act like this. You looked at the very-crumpled aquarium sitting on top of what used to be an aquarium parking lot.

"I'll get him."

You zipped between electrons to get closer to his beacon, but something strange was hindering your progress. It was like there was... something else with you, down in that quantum space as well. You didn't have time to think about your co-traveler, though. You had to think of something witty and cool to tell Marcus when you saw him.

All at once, something grabbed your ankle and dragged you back into reality. You screeched, flailing and hitting concrete when you felt able to breathe again. You could hear dripping.

And groaning.

And not all of it was coming from the depleting structural integrity of the wreck.

"Marcus?" You called, unable to see very well in the dark.

"Over here," his voice came, that low rasp sending a shiver down your spine. Not now, hindbrain. Down, girl.

You felt your way around, wishing you had literally anything but your powers to help you with. You could manipulate most of spacetime with a snap of your fingers, but you still couldn't see in the dark. Your foot hit something slimy, and you gasped.

"Marcus?" You squeaked again. "Are you. Is that...?"

"No, that's a dead cephalopod."

"Oh. Um. Are you trapped? I mean more than is obvious."

"Not... really. I'm not really suited to get out of here, though."

"What? Marcus, this whole thing could collapse and squish us."

"Something... the Badways, they were doing something down here. It was a lab, not a parking garage. They were trying to experiment, manipulate spacetime—!" He cut himself off and hissed in what sounded like agony.

"We don't have time to talk right now, I can, I can try to zip us out, and—?"

"No!" His voice sounded pained, and it made your stomach drop.

"We gotta get you out of here, though."

"Just—can you drop me off somewhere? Like portal me somewhere... somewhere isolated?"

You paused. Something audibly squelched.

"Are you touching my ankle right now?" You asked after a moment of silence.

"In a sense."

"I'm getting us out. Breathe in, and then out. Hope your breakfast wasn't spicy."

You hadn't zipped many people before, but Marcus was important, and despite whatever the fuck else was going on, you needed to get the both of you out of there before you became the calamari side-dish no one wanted you to be. You could still hear Marcus's screams even after you dropped the both of you off miles and miles outside the city. In fact, you had no idea where you were.

You were near some kind of rocky lake, beautiful sea glass lining the waterfront in the dappled sunlight through the trees. The mini gravity-well dampener on your wrist had survived the zips, but your communicator didn't seem to have the same fate.

"Marcus, does—?"

You stopped way the fuck short at what you saw.

Marcus was still on the ground, and now you could see why. Poking out of his body in various places, and writhing beneath his t-shirt and pants, were what looked like heavy, green tentacles. Upon closer inspection, shocked into awed silence, you noticed a purple iridescence to them, shining in the late afternoon sun like a damn jewel.

"These are... new."

"No fucking kidding, Quantie."

"What'd you call me?" You said, still trying to figure out what exactly the energy signature was on those things. They were all over the place, and certainly not like anything you'd seen on regular tentacles.

"We. Oh fuck. Sometimes we call you the Quantum Crew. Because you do the job of so many people by yourself."

You were once again shocked silent. "You nicknamed me?" You said softly.

His face nearly crumpled. "It's not—we aren't teasing, we just, you never get to come with us, and you're so mysterious and everyone keeps teasing me about—oh, oh fuck fuck fuck, oh no." He arched his back, arms shaking as he— "Oh, oh fuck, fuck!"

Was he...?

Oh.

He was.

Marcus Moreno was cumming on the ground at your feet, with a bunch of probably-interdimensional tentacles just happening to him. You wanted to know more.

More than that, you wanted to be the one to make him make that noise again.

"Are you okay?" You managed to ask, heat flaring across your face like the surface of the sun. And you knew what that felt like.

"F-fiiiine." He laughed, a little hysterical, but managed to blink his eyes and clear the foggy look that had been there before. "I was trying to tell you about the uh, the—the..."

"The tentacles?"

"Yeah. Fuck this feels so weird."

"Is it... are they inside you?" You asked, feeling obscene.

"Yes and no?" He raised his hand, where you could see one sprouting out of a glowing pink hole in his wrist. It was curled around his thumb almost shyly, like how a toddler holds the leg of a parent.

"Wait. Let me see." You took his arm and peered closer. The little third thumb of a tendril booped you on the nose when you got close enough. You attempted to link your mind with it.

Hello.

!

Where did you come from?

!!!!!!!...!!

Why are you here?

HERE?

Oh dear.

"Marcus, you have interdimensional portals."

"Have? Like is that your diagnosis?" He exclaimed. "I'm infected with portals?!"

"Calm down, I'm... I need you to tell me what happened. I might be able to fix this."

Through another three spontaneous orgasms, Marcus managed to get through the whole story. The Badways, the world's current organization of supervillains, were working on some kind of quantum continuum harness generator in their lab - which was, as it turned out, where Marcus had been when they dropped an aquarium on top of him. Rather than try to kill Marcus alone, they'd thought covering up their entire attempt at mad science would have been better. When the crash happened, Marcus was standing near the mostly-built harness generator, and by his accounts, the portals opened up all over his body soon after. He'd explained this all in a rough, low moan.

You were getting nearly uncomfortably wet as you listened and fiddled with the grav-well. It was kind of distracting to hear him use quantum physics terms in that tone of voice. "Not that I'm complaining, but what's with the orgasms?" you asked, still not fully convinced that this wasn't all just some crazy dream.

He laughed, and thunked his head against the grass. "My best bet? Some kind of interdimensional monster is curious about our world, and poking themselves through wh-whatever hole will work." You blanched at his matter-of-fact explanation. "My consciousness has somewhat blended, or empathically connected with its mind, and apparently, it's the thing's mating season."

"Can't you tell it to fuck off?" you asked, eyeing the tendrils warily. A few of them had wound around you, almost as thick as a tree branch. There seemed to be about a dozen, and around half of them were... pulsing.

Marcus instead groaned. "Don't talk about fucking," he pleaded. "It... oh shit."

"What?" you asked, leaning over him worriedly.

"It's connected with me as well. It... it knows what I want." His eyes were wild and desperate, a look you'd never seen in all the hours of footage you archived for the Heroics, a look none of the tabloids or news outlets had seen either.

"What do you want, Marcus?" you asked, the words pulled out of you as if on a string.

"You," he said instantly. "I want you. I want to—fuck, I want so much of you. With you. For you." His whole body gave a shiver, eyes squeezing closed. "Right now, I feel like I'm going to die if I don't fuck you. The - it - the monster, it needs you."

##

"Fuck, Marcus—" you moaned into his mouth, trying not to lose your mind too early in the fun. "You can feel that? Feel me?"

One of the tentacles from behind his shoulder had snaked around him to slide into your pants. You tended to wear looser clothes at work. No one ever came down into the Archives to see you, so you let yourself be comfortable where you could. As a result, the tentacle had unfettered access to your core, slipping deftly around the soaked gusset of your panties and pressing in, in, in until you were gasping at the full feeling. You expected it to be cold, and slimy, but if you closed your eyes, it could have felt just like any other cock. But you didn't want to close your eyes. You wanted to remember this.

"I can feel you," Marcus nodded, a high blush settling across his cheeks as he held you close. He rocked his hips, grinding his cock against the inside of his already-ruined tactical pants with a groan. One of the tendrils was apparently growing out of a portal right next to his prostate, and the feedback loop of pleasure and attention had been to blame for his rather... spirited retelling of what had gotten you to this point. "Feel so wet around me. Warm for me," he moaned.

The two of you shared another kiss, and you reached down to undo your pants, shuddering as the tentacle rubs fully against your g-spot. You gasped harshly and nearly collapsed back down onto Marcus, but had you. His strong hands finished the job, divesting you of as much of your clothes as he could. "Fuck, you're so beautiful, been thinking of this for so long."

You whimpered at the praise and attention. "W-wanted you too," you assured him, though you were pretty sure it sounded like a formless garble. The sentiment was passed, though, from the warm look he gave you next. He seemed extremely grateful for your consent, and you were certain that he would have rather let himself die than violate you. You would have never taken advantage of him in this state either. Your bodies may have defied laws of physics, but they still followed morals and the like.

Finally, you were stripped from the waist-down, clothes strewn across the grassy hill near the lakeside you'd landed by. It was idyllic and beautiful, and completely insane. It was just the kind of getting together that suited you.

Marcus got a little furrow in his brow as he concentrated, and all at once, you felt the other tentacles begin to move around you, tracing delicately at the insides of your thighs, holding your wrists together above your head, and keeping your legs open. Even the tiny one by his thumb was part of the fun: that one was given the honor of flicking against your clit in unbelievably tight strokes. The sensations were the result of a well-orchestrated bout of concentration on Marcus's part, born of years of honing his self-control and his powers.

"M-Marcus, I need my hands," you slurred. "Gotta adjust the dampener—"

"It's all hands on deck right now, baby," he grunted, his lip sucked behind his teeth in a gasp as he felt you clench down at the pet name. "Let me take the edge off of this guy and I'll let you be as smart as you want, sweetheart."

You doubted you'd be able to muster the brainpower to do what you'd promised, but rocked your hips to signal your acquiescence to his suggestion. Marcus's eyes darkened considerably more as he dug his feet into the earth and fucked you with all he had.

The shout that bubbled from your chest echoed in the forest for a little bit before it was lost to the treetops. Two other tendrils came up to circle your breasts, squeezing them and tweaking your nipples in time with the thrusts up into your cunt. Another tendril snaked up and around your shoulders, leaving you feeling wrapped up and completely surrounded. You opened your mouth to take the tendril into the wet heat, and Marcus made a noise like he'd been shot. You sucked harder on the tentacle, working up a rhythm. The whole thing felt like an unholy ritual, with you and Marcus playing the parts of the extremely willing sacrifices.

"Look so good for me like this. So pretty with something in your mouth. When this is done you wanna ride my cock like that, pretty girl? My smart fucking girl?" he gritted out, freeing his cock from his pants before deciding on joining you in the half-nude. The tendrils at your breasts gained the deftness of Marcus's fingers, unclipping your bra and leaving you bare for him. Marcus's noise of appreciation was nearly lost in the squelch of slick between your legs.

His eyes went wide. "Uh. Fuck. Holy shit."

You made a questioning noise, but didn't dare to pull off the tentacle brushing the back of your throat. The one in your cunt was... thickening. You could feel the pulsating feeling inside of you growing faster, stronger, until there was a breach and you had to pull off just to breathe and make sense of what you knew was happening.

There was.

It was.

"Egg." Marcus said weakly.

"Egg?!" you squealed.

"Egg!" His voice grew tight and the tentacle ended up plunging ever-deeper into you, forcing the ovule as close to your womb as it could be. One, two, three in quick succession filled you, leaving you feeling heavy and a little disoriented.

His hand found yours, dropping down from the hold he'd kept them in. It grounded you back to earth, and you were glad - the sudden spike of fear in your veins almost made you liquefy all over him. That would have been more mortifying than carrying his eggs in you, to be sure.

"I've got you, I've got you, pretty girl, not gonna let go. Stay with me." He leaned up to kiss you, drawing noises and whines from your lips the way you'd drawn the eggs into yourself.

Your thighs shook as the tendril slid out of your wet cunt, the throbbing now stopped, its goal complete. You and Marcus watched as the tentacle retracted into the glowing pink portal on his hip, before disappearing completely, like it had never been there. Silence and the quiet shuffling of tentacles was the only thing that followed. "Did it just—?"

"I think it—"

"F-further testing should yield a—"

"A better theory. Which one next, baby?"

##

One by one, each of the tentacles disappeared into his body, the portals closing behind them after they laid their eggs inside you. All sizes filled your cunt and a few more filled your ass, distending your lower abdomen slightly and leaving you feeling wrecked as fuck. The eggs sloshed around inside of you whenever you tried to move, so you tried not to, from your position on all fours. Marcus was fully naked on his knees in front of you, running his hands all over his body to check for any last hangers-on that hadn't fucked their fill of you.

"They're gone," he rasped, his voice much deeper and rougher than it had been at the start of this.

"Thank fuck," you whined, voice nearly gone from the number of times he'd made you cum, both with the tentacles he controlled and his hands and mouth.

Something like hesitation flitted across his features as he looked down at you. "I... Quantie."

"I didn't forget," you said weakly. "And I want to, I just don't think you'd fit."

"You want me to help take some out?"

"Please. Then fuck me."

Marcus moved fast, having you bear down on his fingers as he guided the eggs out of you. They glowed that same green-purple shimmer as the tentacles, rolling away from you down the hill to the water's edge. The relief from the tension in your tummy was a godsend, and the moment it became bearable you reached back, clawing your hand at his hip to encourage him forward. "That's enough, c'mon, please, please fill me up too, Marcus."

He gave a long moan, leaning down to kiss the small of your back before pressing inside of you. The feeling of his cock in you was much different than the tentacle train that had just finished. He moved much more confidently with this appendage, fucking into you and gasping as the eggs made your cunt seem that much tighter. You fell onto your elbows, rocking back onto him with desperation. The end of this whole ordeal was in sight, but you would stay in this sex-addled haze just a few minutes longer.

He covered your body with his, no more, no less. You still felt just as safe and protected by him as you were before, which surprised you. The tender feeling took you off guard, sending your body into an unexpected orgasm, aided by the hushed praise and encouragement whispered in your ear. "Gonna take care of you, good girl, such a good girl for me, cumming for me like that. We'll get you taken care of. You're not leaving my arms for a good long while, b-baby. I've got you. Fuck, you feel amazing. Wanted this for so long." It brought tears to your eyes to think that his sexual desire was so strong even before you'd ever touched.

Well. The graveyard didn't really count.

He came almost nothing, having been more than spent over the last three hours. Still, he didn't leave your body, letting the two of you fall to the wet grass in your embrace, the afternoon sunlight keeping you warm and happy. You didn't know how long you laid like that, but when you came to, Marcus was carrying you into the lake to help you wash off. The cold water came as a shock, making you gasp while he apologized and chuckled at your flailing. He was able to coax a few more eggs out of you with his fingers, but you'd get the rest out later.

Hopefully.

The eggs that he'd extracted earlier were floating like lilypads along the surface of the lake, bobbing happily along without any care in the world. "What do you think will happen to them?" you asked, feeling strangely morose over the thought of leaving those eggs unattended. Perhaps you'd connected with the tentacle monster as well, to have such a sudden maternal affection over them. It appeared Marcus was in the same boat, frowning out at them.

"I don't know. We can come back and check in a few weeks, though." He held you around the shoulders in the lake, keeping you warm against his chest. He kissed the top of your head. "So uh, this won't be going in the report, but... I wanna take you out. We kinda did this backwards."

"Backwards is one of my favorite directions of time," you said, holding onto his forearm.

"What are the other ones?" he asked, moving to kiss at the shell of your ear.

"I think I'd need to spend a whole lifetime explaining that," you laughed.

"Well... I'm listening."