#slam sum stuff... in the mean time

[prettyoddfever]

the "Ryho" mindset is still happening

I didn’t like how part of the fandom treated Ryan during the pre-split years. This might end up being a lengthy explanation but bear with me because it’s relevant to the modern fandom.

So it was a well-known fact in 2006 that Ryan was straightedge/sober (Spencer was too, but he got less attention from the media). Being straightedge kind of became part of Ryan’s image (here’s a random example) and a lot of fans really connected with that. Then Ryan got drunk for the first time at the end of 2006, and we started seeing pictures of him partying with friends in early 2007 before the band even went to the cabin. 

By summer 2007 Ryan was like a completely different person. I get that the drugs & alcohol probably helped him become more outgoing, but I also think he was just becoming way more confident & comfortable as he grew up. And SO many fans seriously hated the change. Fans still randomly criticized the other 3 guys, but that stuff seemed more like the regular small complaints that happen just for the sake of complaining when people are bored (ex: Jon’s beard existing or vanishing). The stuff about Ryan was very different in tone and there were some consistent themes throughout the last half of 2007: Ryan was too in love with Keltie, he dressed like a hippie now, and he partied a lot. Basically, he was changing. He was no longer the same person that he was during the Fever era.

It honestly seemed like many fans were angry at this new version of Ryan for taking the old version away from them, as though they had some sort of ownership. There was tons of drama over the fact that we were seeing lots of pictures of Ryan partying with various friends (some of whom posted detailed stories about their nights or how drunk everyone was). Some fans said Ryan was a hypocrite or a liar and tried to make him out to be an alcoholic, as though he’d personally betrayed them by destroying who he was "supposed" to be.

However, I think most of the complaints were actually rooted in something bigger: Ryan looked happy.

I felt like a lot of the younger fans had latched onto the idea of a shy, wounded guitarist who needed to be saved or *understood* or whatever… you know the cliche I mean??  That was the vibe that the media sometimes tried to give him during the Fever era, so even they knew it would sell! But now Ryan was partying a lot with a wide range of friends, was dating Keltie, had completely abandoned his Fever-era aesthetic, and seemed to be closest with Jon in 2007 instead of Brendon. He was “destroying” the static image of Ryan that fangirls had taped onto their bedroom walls.

I remember a decent amount of fans actually admitting that they wished Ryan would go back to being depressed. Like they literally wanted him to be unhappy & unsure of himself because they liked him better that way. Others accepted that Ryan was changing and were happy for him, but still thought his bitter lyrics were better. And then even if other people wouldn’t admit that they were clinging onto an old version of Ryan, their main criticism still seemed to revolve around the fact that Ryan was living his life, having fun, and being different than he was the previous year.

I saved one fan’s post because it summed up some of the complaints this year:

The nickname “Ryho” really took off in late 2007.

Obviously a ton of fans loved Ryan (and the kids who were bashing him still claimed to love him too). The petty criticism just became annoying to me. People slammed his new clothes, his new hairstyles, the way he carried himself or talked, his weight/body, his “creepy” fingers, and the “girly” things he told Kerrang he liked (pumpkin spice candles, vanilla milkshakes, his puppy, and Titanic). Even the kids who used to love Ryan’s mild arrogance were now holding it against him. A lot of the fans who were criticizing Ryan in the last half of 2007 jumped right back to being his “fans” once the Pretty. Odd. era got going and things were interesting again, but I guess it shouldn’t have been surprising that so many fans were able to easily switch to bashing Ryan once again in spring 2009 when he was changing yet again. It’s like they were so focused on what Ryan wasn’t doing that spring (ex: recording the third Panic album) that they couldn’t see or accept what he was doing: building a whole new life for himself in a completely different music scene with the new crew of friends he’d been hanging out with for a while (Alex Greenwald’s scene).

One of the things that stuck out to me in late spring & summer 2009 was how many fans felt rejected by Ryan (and Jon). Those fans had basically idolized prior versions of Ryan and were hurt to slowly watch him destroy all of that as they realized he didn’t want to be part of the machine of the music scene that the fandom still loved. That hurt translated to them lashing out in anger.

So you know how I mentioned that in 2006 part of the fandom liked the idea of a shy, wounded guitarist who wrote bitter lyrics and needed to be *understood * and saved? And they resented Ryan for destroying that concept in 2007 and taking away the Ryan that they loved? They wanted to view him as a static character and couldn’t accept that he’s a constantly-evolving human. This is still happening today. Some fans are still upset that the version of Ryan that they want was taken away (ex: Ryan left the Fever era behind, left Panic behind). Except now instead of resenting Ryan for the choices that he made, some modern fans have rewritten the past to blame external forces like Brendon instead. I've been trying so hard to wrap my mind around this for a while, so here's my take on it... keep in mind that this is just my own observation/guess. Ryan isn't very visible now, so people are free to project a lot onto him. I think that by blaming Brendon (who is the visible one left), people can still happily view Ryan as a helpless victim who needs saving, and never feel rejected or betrayed by his choices... then it's like Ryan didn’t actually want to leave them, and could still be the person that they need him to be. Idk I'm still trying to comprehend what happened to the recent fandom tbh.

I'm absolutely not saying that all of Ryan's current fans are like this!! It's just that some little bits I've seen are concerning because they essentially take away Ryan’s agency & erase him. Even on a smaller scale, I've still noticed how some modern fans focus heavily on stories that dramatize Ryan's pain & portray him as a passive victim, regardless of whether those stories conflict with reality. Like why exactly is that angle a priority? Some examples:

Camisado is for dancing

the "funeral picture" isn't real

Lollapalooza was a fun show

June and July are different months

Ryan participated in the stage gay

some of the Ryden stuff could probably qualify too

Keep in mind that I'm saying this as a fan of Ryan. I am genuinely happy to see that he has so many newer fans! But sometimes I'm a little concerned that patterns might be repeating and maybe some people are more focused on their own creation of a character/image than an actual musician who has had many many phases.

[slutdilf]

A Quick Break

Paring: pedro pascal X male reader

Warnings: Smut, blowjob, dirty talk (a little?), established relationship

Note: I put them in a established relationship just to make it a little easier to write. Also had pedro speak Spanish a little because I’d be a puddle on the floor if he spoke to me in Spanish

Request by: @pedropascal111 : here’s an idea I’d say during the process of filming their was a kiss scene with him and someone else but he’d always make eye contact with you every time, then they have like a little break from filming say 10 minutes or sum and yknow stuff goes down but you gotta keep quiet then go back to filming like nothing happend 🧍‍♂️😭

“Ok and action!”

The director's call snaps you to attention. The scene has started. Pedro and the costar you've been trying hard not to compare yourself with move into position. They start talking, and even through their character's bickering the connection between them is apparent.

You catch Pedro glancing over at you- was that on purpose? Did he mean for you to see the smile in his eyes? You're not sure.

A few minutes pass. The scene is ramping up. They're moving closer together...

They're practically chest to chest now, the tension in the air as thick as smoke. You bite your lip, watching anxiously. Pedro is looking straight into the costar's eyes, but even as the other actor returns Pedro's gaze, you notice your boyfriend's eyes flick in your direction again.

The scene reaches its climax. They're nearly forehead to forehead, and it's almost as if the pair don't remember that the camera is there, that other people even exist. As their lips touch and the kiss begins. You feel the jealousy in your veins building up each time you see the their lips interlocking. Thinking of you wanted to just walk onto set, grab pedro and slam your lips into his to make sure the entire crew knows that he’s your boyfriend.

The director calls, "Cut, perfect, let’s take 10 and we can rendezvous for the final take of the episode. " The costars disengages fading into her dressing room as Pedro almost instinctively makes his way over towards you.

"Hey," he grins as he reaches you. "You alright?"

You nod, but you don't really know how to put into words the mix of emotions you're feeling.

Sensing your unease, Pedro takes your hand in his own and raises it to his lips, kissing it softly. "Come on. I've got a little break before the next scene. Let's go somewhere private."

He leads you over to a small room and closes the door behind you. The room contains little more than a couch, small table, and a mirror set up for makeup.

Pedro takes a seat next to you on the couch and tugs you into his lap. Pressing a kiss into your shoulder, he murmurs, "You looked so unhappy watching that scene. Jealous, perhaps?"

You freeze, not quite knowing how to respond. Pedro chuckles, wrapping his arms around your waist and pulling you closer against him.

"Don't be mad, cariño. Acting isn't real. I love *you*."

He nuzzles your neck softly, his lips caressing your sensitive skin.

Despite his reassurances, a little ember of jealousy still smolders in your chest. As Pedro continues to kiss along the column of your throat, his lips finding the spot just behind your ear that he knows you’re sensitive to, you pout a bit.

"It looked real," you mutter petulantly.

"Yeah, like I said, I'm an actor," he replies, nipping gently at your earlobe. "But it's all fake, I promise. I don't feel this way about anyone but you."

With a light movement, he rolls the two of you so that you're lying lengthwise on the couch, your head resting back on the arm rest as he cages you beneath his body.

He lowers his mouth to your neck once more, this time focusing on the junction where it meets your shoulder. You let out a soft gasp as he mouths the sensitive skin, his lips leaving a trail of heat as they move down towards the collar of your shirt.

Between kisses, he asks, "Am I going to have to prove myself to you?"

His lips have found the hollow of your collarbone, and he begins biting and sucking in a way that you know is going to leave a mark. You moan, the sound escaping from your lips before you can control it.

"*Yes,*" you reply in a strangled whisper.

"That's what I was hoping you'd say."

Pedro lifts his head just long enough to flash you a cocky grin before he dives right back into his work, his mouth closing over yours. The kiss is hot and hungry, his tongue pushing impatiently between your lips. He slides his hips forward, pressing his body down against yours.

The weight of his body on top of you, the pressure of his hips against your thighs- something about it is making it hard for you to think straight. You feel your hands slide up into his hair, your fingers wrapping around the dark strands and pulling him closer.

Pedro groans into your mouth, the sound more growl than anything else. He pulls his mouth away from yours just long enough to pant out, “can’t wait to get you home tonight”

His face lowers again, this time finding its target further down on your body. He mouths down your neck, across your chest, and when he reaches the V of exposed skin above your collarbone a shiver runs through you.

He tugs at the hem of your shirt. "But right now I’ve got 10 minutes so let’s make this quick."

The word comes out as a command, and the authority in his voice has you complying almost before you know what you're doing.

Your shirt hits the floor, and then his mouth is back on you again, teeth and lips teasing your skin. He drags his tongue along each rib, leaving a burning stripe in its wake. When he reaches your stomach he pauses, glancing up at you through his eyelashes.

"You still mad at me, mi amor?" he asks, his tone slightly mocking.

You open your mouth to protest, but can't manage to form any words when his tongue traces a slow line just above the waistband of your pants. The only thing that comes out is a breathless moan.

Pedro's eyes flash with satisfaction at the sound. "Thought so."

With a lazy smirk he sinks to his knees between your legs. His hands slide along your thighs, pushing your legs apart.

You gasp as he tugs you forward as much as the edge of the couch will allow, settling himself between your legs. Your hands tighten into fists around the material of the couch cushion as his fingers make quick work of the button of your pants.

He starts to ease the material down over your hips, and you lift them to help him. Soon your pants fall to the floor, and you're left in only your underwear and whatever will be left of your dignity.

Pedro grins as he takes in the sight of you. "Mi Carinõ," he exclaims, his Spanish voice melting you. He knew how much you melted into a puddle when he spoke in his native tongue. You didn’t know what about it made you so turned on, but Pedro knew it did and used to his advantage at any given moment.

Still keeping eye contact with you, he leans forward, his breath hot on your stomach. He places a small kiss on your abdomen, just below your belly button. And then another just below that. And another.

He continues the slow line of kisses all the way down to the edge of your underwear.

Pedro's hands are moving up and down your legs, caressing your skin like it's the most precious thing in the world. Every touch is sending sparks through your body, and you can feel the heat building between your legs.

"Pedro," you gasp, "please-"

He looks up at you again, one eyebrow raised. "Please? Please what, love?"

His tone is innocent, as if he's trying not to laugh, and you want to strangle him for acting like you weren’t completely at his mercy right now you wanted to strangle that teasing smirk and then kiss his stupid face so badly.

"You know what I mean," you whine, and immediately curse yourself for how pathetic it makes you sound.

Pedro chuckles darkly, his hands still roaming up and down your thighs. "Do I?" he teases. "I need you to use your words, cariño."

In response, you grind your hips up against him, desperate for any friction. A groan falls from his lips as the movement pushes your aching need against the line of his jaw, and you can practically feel his smirk on your skin as he nuzzles your bulge

He begins mouthing at the shape of you through your underwear, applying just the *perfect* amount of pressure. You let out a moan, unable to keep quiet anymore, and instantly one of Pedro's hands is over your mouth.

"Shhh," he hisses into your skin. "We're supposed to be being quick, remember? You don't want the whole crew to hear you, do you?"

You bite down on your lip, determined not to let any more sounds escape. Pedro grins. "That's a good boy."

With those words he hooks his fingers over the top of your underwear, and slowly, slowly begins working them down over your thighs.

“Mmm…” pedro hums burying his face into your groin and taking a deep breath as he looks at you with almost puppy dog eyes as if he’s just completely enamoured by your presence. You run your hand through his fluffy hair his brownish black locks tangling in your fingers.

Pedro moves his mouth down to your length taking you in his nose touching your abdomen as he takes you in whole. His tongue swirling around the head of your cock.

You were biting your lip hard you were sure you could taste a small amount of blood from just how much. But that was the least of your concerns right now. Soft small muffled quiet whimpers escaping your mouth as you try to keep quiet while Pedro works his mouth on your dick.

You wanted to scream in pure ecstasy and pleasure but you couldn’t you were doing everything you could to muffle those moans biting your lip, burying your head into the cushions of the sofa, biting the edge of the cushion. But nothing could stop the small little whimpers. As pedro bobs his head up and down pumping your hard length with his mouth. Your hand gripping his hair tightly tugging at him more and more as you could feel the pressure of your release

With almost every nerve your body has to stop the sounds from leaving your mouth. You let out a whimper that echos the room. As you cum. Followed by a deep groan from Pedro and then a small little gulp.

Pedro extracts his mouth from you and looks at you with those enamoured puppy dog eyes again. The remnants of your release on his lips.

So lost in the moment of both of your pure joyful and blissful thoughts you snap your head to the door as it knocks and the voice of a set boy is heard “Mr pascal we start in 30 seconds.”

“Be right there.” Pedro says back in a voice so nonchalant like he wasn’t just giving you the most wild blowjob you’ve gotten.

At that moment Pedro stands up and wipes his mouth and looks in the mirror “you ruined my hair.” He grumbles in a slight teasing tone. You got up and raised your hand into his hair ruffling it messing it more than it already was.

“You cheeky little-“ Pedro says in a laugh as he tries to comb it back to how it was prior to the break. With what little seconds you had to spare you both quickly got yourself into a normal looking state to head out.

Pedro heads out his hand intertwined in your hand as he walks to the set he looks at you as he raises your hand to his lips “be right back.” He whispers as he lets your hand go.

You saw his facial expression almost immediately change into his acting face as the director yelled “Action.”

You watched the rest of the filming process with less jealousy this time around knowing that pedro did indeed love you and that the work on set was just a fake experience.

[asirensrage]

the sum of all our parts - part 4

Title: the sum of all our parts

Fandom: Tokyo Revengers

Rating: Explicit

Pairing: Ran Haitani x OC x Rindou Haitani, side Ran x Rindou

Word count: 2306

Warnings: Dark!fic. Dub-con. Possessiveness. Obsession. Cruelty. Destruction of Property. Stalking. Family Dynamics. Sibling Rivalry. Jealousy. Bullying. Violence. Threats. Talk of incest. Pseudo-incest. Haitani-cest (incest between the Haitani brothers). Bonten is it’s own warning. *warnings are not exhaustive*

Summary: Reika loves her sister, even if they don’t always get along, but meeting the man Seira claims she’s in love with…doesn’t go the way either of them expect.

Notes: Things are progressing and Seira is starting to experience some of the consequences of her own choices… Thank you all for reading. As always, please comment and let me know what you think! I hope you enjoy it! Again, thank you to @hojoslutoru for beta reading this.

Part of the Club series

Prev part - Masterlist - also on ao3

The car ride is silent outside of the music playing softly. It feels weird. She watches the people they pass, the foreigners who crowd some of the corners looking lost as they search for what the Tokyo nightlife has to offer. She’s never been on vacation before. She wonders if it’s nice. 

Ran doesn’t press for conversation. He doesn’t even comment on the way she sniffles and tries to hide her tears. She tries to pay close attention to the route he takes, making sure he doesn’t stray from it. The music is comforting enough but it doesn’t ease the strange tension in her chest. This is weird. It is weird, she knows it is, but she doesn’t know what he wants. Or his brother. She just wants this night to end. 

Ran parks in the empty spot for their home. It makes her jaw clench and the tears return to burn in her eyes. The last time she was in this spot was after their parent’s funeral. A relative had driven them home and left them to discover how the silence of the house became permanent with only two.

“Thanks for the ride,” she says as she unbuckles herself and gets out. She pauses as she realizes that Ran is following.  “You don’t have to walk me to my door. I wasn’t drinking. I’m fine.”

“What makes you think I’m doing it for that?” Ran asks. “I want to see the art your sister says you make. Best chance is now when she’s not here, don’t you think?”

“Seira isn’t here. You can stop pretending.”

“Pretending what?” He moves around the car towards her. “I’m not pretending anything. I want to know what draws your attention.” His gaze is steady and he moves with intention. It’s not hard to see that she’s stuck in the same way she was when he offered her the ride in the first place. Except he’s not touching her this time. 

She slams the car door shut. “Fine. Let’s make it quick.”

He grins. “Can’t wait, sweetheart.”

🎨

Reika leads him into the house, ignoring the heat at her back from how close he stands when she unlocks the door and they take off their shoes as they enter. She leads the way to their living area, turns on the light and stands in the doorway, motioning in. “There. The painting on the wall is mine. So is the vase. I made them both a few years ago.” 

He peers into the room but doesn’t enter. Ran turns to look at her. “I didn’t mean the few things you leave on display for your sister’s public. I want to see the real stuff.”

“What do you know about art?” She asks, crossing her arms over her chest. “It’s all the same.”

“We both know that’s bullshit. Now are you gonna show me what I want or am I gonna have to look for it myself?” 

Her eyes narrow. “Who said you could?”

He shifts closer, following even as she steps back until she’s pressed against the door frame. “Come on,” he brushes a strand of hair that’s slipped out of the complicated bun she has it in out of her face. Her nose scrunches at the act. “You let me this far.” 

“You didn’t give me much of a choice. Stop touching me. Go back to your club. Seira’s there.” She watches the muscles in his jaw twitch as he clenches it. 

“Show me first.” 

“You’re growing more annoying every time we interact,” she huffs. “We don’t have to be friends if you’re dating my sister.”

“Who said I was dating her?” He laughs slightly. “Is that what she’s telling people? She’s persistent, I’ll give her that.” 

“Then you should tell her instead of stringing her along.” Reika heads up the stairs, ignoring the way he follows and trying not to think of the fact the skirt she’s been forced in might be short enough for him to see up. She should have made him go first, but she’s not used to being dressed like this. She wouldn’t have this concern in her own clothes. 

The door to Seira’s room is open and Reika tries not to snort at the way she knows her sister would be horrified at Ran seeing it in the disastrous state it’s currently. Seira treats her things as carelessly as she does everything else. Her room shows it. Bed unmade, clothes thrown haphazardly around and worse. Reika continues past it, hesitating before finally opening the door to her own. 

Her room is neatly organized. It has to be with the amount of stuff she accumulates in her crafting. She has shelves displaying her work and drawers filled with various materials she uses. She doesn't have the energy for this but she steps back and motions for him to look. She doesn't like anyone in her space outside of her sister, especially anyone who she hasn't invited. It feels like an intrusion, like an invasion of privacy despite the fact he's just looking at the art. Still, she stays in the doorway. She doesn't want Seira to get any ideas and start imagining more slights against her if she comes home now.

Ran gazes around the room before he heads for something specific. She watches him lean closer to one of the shelves before he reaches for a small ceramic animal. "What's this?"

"Be careful. That's fragile."

"All beautiful things are," he says, glancing at her with a look she can't fully decipher. "Well? What is it?"

"A Tanuki."

“Cute.” He carefully sets it down before turning back to his exploration of her creations, both finished and half-finished. She bites back her automatic demand not to touch anything as he runs his fingers over an embroidered cloth and silk flowers. He’s being careful, gentle enough that it’s clear he’s respecting the work he sees. Not everyone does. “When did you start this?” he asks softly.

“The tanuki? Or in general?”

“All of it.”

She shrugs. She doesn’t remember the first time. It started in school and continued from there. “I like to do things with my hands.”

“And your sister said you don’t sell them. Why not? Some of these would fetch a pretty profit.”

“I don’t make them for profit. I make it because I want to.” She leans against the doorframe, watching him. “Sometimes it’s just a desire to see if I can, other times it’s because I know that I can do it myself rather than paying someone else to make it for me.”

“If you need help setting up a business plan—”

“If I wanted to set one up, I already would have. I’m an accountant. I know how it works.”

That makes him look up in surprise. “An accountant? I thought you and your sister lived off of your inheritance.”

She straightens, eyes narrowing. “How do you know about that?”

“It’s obvious, isn’t it?” He shrugs, turning to face her. “You and your sister live alone in a house. Neither of you work in any major company.”

“Neither do you,” she points out.

His grin sharpens. “You don’t do the work I do. Wouldn’t want to get your pretty hands dirty.” Another nail in the coffin of her suspicions. “Besides, your sister confirmed it when she was bragging about her lifestyle, about how you take care of her.”

“She’s my sister.”

“I know,” Ran nods, taking a step towards her. “I get it. Trust me, I do. Nothing I wouldn’t do for Rindou.” He turns away, glancing at a small box on her desk. He picks it up, looking it over carefully. It has a design carved into it that she only painstakingly duplicated once; in a gift she gave to Seira that still sits in her sister’s room. “Think you could make us something?”

“What?”

“I don’t know,” he sets it back down. “Whatever comes to mind. Something that makes you think of us.”

“Nothing makes me think of you.”

He turns back towards her, looking far too amused. “I’m sure we can change that.” He moves forward until he’s less than a foot away. She could touch him if she reaches out. She won’t though. “Seira said you’ve never had a boyfriend. That true?”

This time it’s her jaw that clenches. “It’s none of your business.”

“That means yes.”

“If you’re done, get out of my room.”

He takes that last step forward, making it so Reika has to look up at him as their chests touch. She’d step back but that feels like giving in. “I’m just trying to get to know you better, sweetheart.”

“Don’t call me that. Even if you’re honest and not interested in my sister, she likes you. I won’t do that to her. So stop.”

His fingers move to the bottom of her chin, tilting her face up to meet his eyes. “See? It fits you. You’re a sweet, pretty thing, aren’t you?” He leans forward, his hand moving to the back of her head and tugging her bun loose so that her hair falls. He twists his fingers into it, holding her in place. Ran’s lips graze against her cheek as he whispers in her ear. “Or would you prefer something else? Princess? Darling? Baby? Love?”

The last word breaks through her shock and the way she’s been frozen in response. She shoves him away from her, as hard as she can even as it makes her head lurch forward from his grip in her hair. He stumbles, but it’s more for show than anything. She knows she’s not strong enough to stop him if he wanted. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” She demands, straightening as he removes his hand. “I said stop! I’m not Seira. I’m not my fucking sister who you can win over with a few words. You want her, she’s waiting, but get the fuck away from me.”

“I know,” his eyes meet hers. “I know you’re not your sister. I don’t fucking want Seira.”

Something leaps in her throat, in her stomach, but she shoves it down. She has to. “Get out of my house.”

He sighs, tugging his jacket back into place before he nods. “Sure,” he says. “I’ll leave, but we’re not done.”

“We are now.”

🎨

She’s curled up on the couch with tea, staring at the painting she made of the Okinawa shore from the last trip her parents had taken them on. She had gifted that painting to her mother, nervous at the way she tried to get the look right. She could see all the mistakes she had made now, but her mother hung it up with pride, making it a point to show it off to their visitors. Reika can’t bear to do anything with it, just like she still can’t bear to let either of them take over their parent’s bedroom. It doesn’t feel right.

The front door opens and slams shut.

She curls her fingers around the mug. Honestly, she hoped she had more time before Seira came home. She wanted to be in bed. She decides to just do that. Reika gets up and heads for the kitchen as she hears Seira swear as her sister tries to take off her heels before coming in. She washes her cup quickly, hoping she can get to her room before Seira realizes.

“You fucking bitch!”

It doesn’t work. Reika ignores her sister, heading for her room. She doesn’t want to deal with this. She’s exhausted. Seira doesn’t care.

Despite the fact Reika closes the door behind her, Seira follows, stumbling in.

“I thought you’d still be out.”

“Are you kidding me? After that?” Seira scowls down at her and Reika is tempted to point out how ugly she looks like that. She bites it back though, even if she wants to press into the emotional wound. She’s not her twin. “That was so fucking embarrassing! How could you?!”

“How could I what?” Reika asks, brushing out her hair. It’s past the small of her back now.

“You left with my boyfriend! You fucking bitch!” Seira snarls, reaching out and throwing something at her. Reika has to duck, flinching as she listens to it shatter.

“Nothing happened!” She glances down, throat tightening at the sight of the ceramic tanuki in pieces. How ironic that she chose that. “Can you not throw my shit?”

“Did you fuck him?”

“What? No!” Reika frowns before she stands. “Sei, I wouldn’t do that. I know how you feel about him, okay? But there’s something wrong with both of them. They’re not…they’re not safe, okay? I told him I was fine but he made me let him drive me home.”

Seira scoffs. “Are you fucking kidding me? What did you say to him? To Rindou?”

“Nothing, why?”

“Because he fucking kicked me out!”

Reika’s eyes widen. “What?”

“He must have been pissed that you left because he fucking kicked me out! You know how fucking embarrassing it is to get marched out by the bouncers?! To get told you’re banned in front of your friends?”

“Did…” Reika swallows tightly. “Did you do something after I left?”

Seira’s glare is cold and cutting. “You really asking me that?”

“Well?”

She doesn’t answer. Instead, Seira leaves, slamming the door hard enough behind her that the shelves rattle. Luckily, nothing else breaks.

Reika sighs, feeling more exhausted than ever. She knew she shouldn’t have gone to that club. She shouldn’t have given in to Seira but she does, every time. She cleans up the remains of the tanuki, setting it on her desk so she can attempt to repair it later and finishes getting ready for bed.

She doesn’t sleep.

She tries. She tosses and turns, her mind running over the events of the night. She’s never seen Seira so angry with her before. It’s easy to claim that she was drunk, but Reika has seen Seira drunk before. Has taken care of her like that before and it’s never been like this.

She doesn’t know what’s wrong, what’s changed. They were born together. It’s supposed to be them against the world…but Reika has been standing alone longer than she ever wants to admit. She tries to muffle her sobs into her pillow before she eventually forces herself out of bed. She can’t sleep.

She wants to blame Ran, wants to assign the problem to him and leave it at that, but she knows he wasn’t drunk. She can still hear the way he says that he doesn’t want her sister. It’s maddening. Everyone has always wanted Seira more than Reika. They’ve made sure of it. Instead, Ran was letting her sister make a fool of herself chasing after him. He had obviously given her enough attention to make Seira believe that she had a chance in the first place. So why did he follow her? It feels like a game, attempting to play two siblings against each other and seeing who comes out on top. Reika hates games like that. Seira always wins.

She moves to the desk, digging through a drawer for the container of superglue she keeps locked away before pulling the tanuki pieces closer. If she can’t sleep, at least maybe she can fix this.

🎨

taglist: @raith-way @zeleniafic @chickensarentcheap @residentdormouse @endless-oc-creations

@themaradwrites @kingsmakers @thatmagickjuju @awksrambles @hayatoseyepatch

tr tag: @mitsuwuyaa @blackfire2013 @bleach-your-panties @reiners-milkbiddies @tenjikusstuff4

[i-like-anything-water]

here, have sum crack:

The next time she'll see Rose and Juleka, she'll gift then a basket of treats. Some of said treats will also have some beef cubes rather than bean paste as a form of payback. Because, good God, she shouldn't have listened to them the moment they said:

"It's a story about a reincarnated girl and her bully but it's really nice!"

Marinette blinked at the duo, who were holding up a set of novels. They've decided to have a spontaneous anime marathon after school and because of different reasons, Alya, Mylene and Ivan couldn't join them.

She read the title of the novels, 'I favor the Villainess' in pink lettering.

The two girlfriends insisted on watching the anime which was apparently complete and there hadn't been an akuma attack yet so she let herself get dragged into it. The story was interesting, very very interesting.

And Claire seemed very very familiar.

Perhaps she should have stopped Juleka and Rose when it was already past 10 pm and it was a school night. Maybe she could have gotten some bit of sleep before an akuma decided to annoy everyone in Paris by rampaging across the city at bloody 2 AM. Ladybug was irritated, moreso when Chat almost slammed into a building out of sleepiness. Thankfully, the Akuma wasn't much of a nuisance.

The lack of sleep, however, made up for it.

Maybe she should ask Master Fu if there's any way to recruit more Miraculous holders incase of Akumas in ungodly hours. They were still students after all, plus she doubts Hawkmoth doesn't work as well. Maybe she could ask Hawkmoth instead to create a schedule for all the Akumas. Negotiate and stuff.

Anyways, going to school sleep deprived, irritated and having an anime marathon the night before was brewing for disaster. Maybe her Ladybug luck can spare her for today.

"Well if it isn't my favorite person, Marinette Dupain-Cheng."

Nope. Tough luck.

Marinette groaned, her irritation rising as Chloé's haughty voice reached her ears. Truthfully, the blonde wasn't that annoying anymore ever since she decided to get the help she needed. She's actually been doing pretty well, if her small progress at being a better version of herself was to go by.

However, Marinette was sleep deprived, hangry, and also very much a bisexual disaster.

Chloé Bourgeois, former bully turned hesitant all- wait, bully? Bully, bully, bull- oh. Aha, bingo. Didn't Rae almost made Claire back off because she kept flirting with her?

"What's with that creepy smile on your face, Dupain-Cheng?!"

Marinette smiled, her remaining braincells evaporating as she looked up at the startled blonde, "You're so pretty."

"W-what?!"

Marinette shrugged, completely unaware of everything happening around her, "I mean, if you're going to call me by my full name you can have it. Chloé Dupain-Cheng, it suits you."

Everything was dead silent. Dead ass? A voice eerily similar to Rae Taylor in her head, asked.

Dead ass, Marinette replied.

She doesn't remember much after what happened but she does remember Chloé going red in the face, sputtering something that was too fast that could give Hawkmoth's receding hairline a run for its money and Alya asking her after Chloé practically ran from the conversation if she's finally lost it.

Okay, Alya, rude.

After some explanation from Alya, a two hour breakdown and panic attack, and a three hour talk with Tikki, she was already down in their bakery on a school night to prepare Chloé's favorite treats.

Was she purposely making herself sleep deprived again to actually give the treats? Maybe. Would they talk about it? Hopefully.

Is she excited? Well.

Raise Y/our hands was playing in the background and Rae Taylor seemed to be lifting her spirits. And maybe her chances of being a masochist as well.

[rolandkaros]

That Igaryna gif is killing me 😭 Iga being completely oblivious to Aryna's awkwardness every time they interacted this year was hilarious. I do wonder why Aryna has become so weird (in a good way) about Iga, like why did she suddenly start talking about her in the media 24/7 and acting all nervous/awkward around her? It's very interesting

timing of this ask is incredible bc i literally just restrained myself from going crazy in the tags about them lmfao.

but THIS. is literally their whole vibe. and i was even gonna say like that gif is basically their whole dynamic summed up.

i think a lot of it is just timing tbh, because this i think is the first year where there was no obvious "gap" between the two of them (personal opinion that i think getting to no.1 last year was the big change for aryna). so whenever aryna talks about iga now it's not "my rival who is clearly better and way more successful than me" and instead "my rival who is somewhat more successful than me." and aryna even said it herself, that they're keeping it interesting, which i think circa 2022 was...not really the vibe. i think aryna is still in this position of thinking that she needs to play catch-up, and after winning two more grand slams + now with ye#1 and iga having a good season instead of an incredible season (lol), their levels look really comparable.

which is to say i think aryna is finally at the point where when she compares herself to iga and talks about their matches and their rivalry and competing for trophies and such, she doesn't feel like she has to undercut it with this tone of "ohh but she's just so much better than me so i'll just have to try my best and play my best tennis and hope that i can do enough" (<- literally what aryna sounded like in ~2022 talking about iga lol). so she is asked about/talks about iga because it's an actual conversation that can be had instead of just "what do you (#2 player with 0 gs) think about this player (#1 player with 3gs) who keeps kicking your butt"...like what could aryna even say. but now, like i said, they've actually quite evened out, so there's actually a lot of interesting conversations to be had about their rivalry.

i also think there's a couple things about iga that contribute. i think iga is very focused on herself (NOT in a conceited way lol, just that she tends to mind her own business) and as a result she doesn't really try to interact with aryna except if she's asked directly or they're playing each other. this was probably exacerbated as well by iga being #1 and previously quite far ahead of aryna, meaning there wasn't much reason (no offense) for her to talk about aryna other than being the next highest ranked player (which wasn't even always the case). so i think iga has naturally sort of been oblivious to aryna's opinion of her for the most part. and aryna is obviously quite extroverted so we see a lot more of her thoughts & feelings about stuff anyway.

additionally i think iga is very...how do i put this. her attitude is very clinical and logical with almost everything she does, and i think that affects both how she interacts with aryna on-court and how she talks about her off court. so like in that gif where she's clearly more focused on taking the picture than on what aryna's doing. if you watch her net handshakes most of them look almost the exact same from match to match (over-extending here to say it's like she decided at some point what the "right" handshake was and has been doing it ever since). even things like interviews, she has a very specific way of answering and talking about her tennis and whatnot. and obviously this isn't an iga-exclusive thing (it's called having a personality lol) but my point is that iga's personality and approach to tennis leads her to just not really notice or mention what others are doing in general, and to not output a lot of emotions or subjectivity of what she's doing herself.

all this leading to iga not really talking about aryna or interacting with her outside of tennis except to say "well yes of course aryna is a great tennis player we always have great challenging matches" and not much else. i think aryna conversely shares a more subjective perspective, which is partially due i think her personality but also because she just straight up has more to say about iga than iga has to say about her in terms of their competition.

going back to what i was saying at the beginning, i think this year was really the first time that they were in positions to interact with each other on level-footing (more or less). i think aryna would have been nervous/awkward around iga if they had interacted more previously but i lowkey think she viewed iga as out of her league (in a very literal tennis-sense lol). but now it's classic introvert/extrovert interactions where it's clear that they do not know how to act around each other and do not pick up on each other's cues or vibe.

which is how that gif happened. it was probably just instinctual from aryna to put her arm around whoever she's playing (extroverted) but the fact that there was clearly a moment where she went oh wait iga and i do not hug KILLED me. hilarious and devastating my god. and iga (as usual) is just not noticing at all because she's too focused on making sure she's doing the photo correctly.

also madrid where iga told aryna to her face "thank you for pushing me to be better" when aryna lost after having THREE MATCH POINTS and the worst part is iga was 100% being so sincere and aryna was contemplating murder because her rival basically just said "oop you almost got me haha."

also in cincinnati aryna was talking about "oh well yeah i had to keep it interesting because no one wants to watch a rivalry if its so obvious that one person's going to win over the other" and iga was like "oh yeah aryna i mean such a great player....what more is there to say?"

point being it's a pattern where iga is in her own little world doing her own little thing and aryna is Aware of Everything. summed up in that gif.

[ollieofthebeholder]

And If Thou Wilt, Forget: a TMA fanfic

Read from the beginning on Tumblr || AO3 || My Website

Chapter 25: Of labor you shall find the sum

“Did you know there’s a gym down the harbor?”

Tim paused in the act of stacking glasses in the cupboard and turned to frown at Gerry, who was busily engaged in scrubbing the remnants of breakfast out of their omelet pan. “What?”

“One of those bare bones things in an old warehouse,” Gerry clarified. “Caters to the dockworkers, I guess, so it doesn’t have a lot of fancy equipment. Lots of weightlifting stuff, chin-up bars, that sort of thing. Some kind of climbing structure, I think, not sure if it’s a rope or a wall or what, but that’s what I heard. There’s a bare knuckle boxing ring, too.”

This in no way, shape, or form had anything to do with what Tim was asking. “I—didn’t know that. What about it?”

Gerry shrugged. “It’s legitimate, I checked it out, so I thought it might be safer for you than, like, an underground fight club or one of those places you have to know someone who knows someone to get into. Less likely to wind up being a front for the Flesh or the Slaughter or whatever.”

“Why do you think I’m likely to get involved in an underground fight club?” Tim was getting more and more lost as the conversation progressed. “And why bring it up now?”

“Well, you need some way to vent that anger off, and there aren’t any academic conferences coming up for you to get into screaming matches about the orangutan in that Edgar Allen Poe story or the efficacy of EMP meters in paranormal detection,” Gerry said in a very matter of fact tone. “And the way you’re slamming those dishes around tells me you’re really, really close to taking a swing at the next person who pisses you off. While I’m perfectly happy to push your buttons until you pin me against the wall, I know you’ll feel guilty about that the second you come back to your senses and we’ll end up arguing for the rest of our lives about whether that counts as ‘consent’ or not, especially since both of us will be arguing that no, it doesn’t, but on behalf of the other person. And from the way you’ve described him, if you go into work giving off clear signals of ‘I will rip out the aorta of anyone who crosses me and keep it on my desk as a warning to others’, Martin will gladly take the brunt of what he perceives as his due punishment if it means you leave everyone else alone, and you’ll never forgive yourself for that, either.” He shut off the water and held out the omelet pan for Tim to dry. “So, you wanna bash me with this, or you wanna try the gym later?”

Tim stared at him for several seconds, mentally replaying the rest of the morning. He didn’t think he’d been particularly angry…but, okay, maybe he had been a bit forceful at putting the dishes away. Then his brain caught up to I checked it out and began reevaluating the last week or so.

“How long have you been putting up with me being like this?” he asked, taking the pan and then taking a step back, putting Gerry out of his reach, before he began to dry.

“Stop. I was joking about you hitting me. I know you’d never actually do that. You’re nothing like my mum.” Gerry crossed into Tim’s space, slipped under his arm, and kissed the tip of his nose before ducking back out of the way in the span of time it took Tim to process the casual way he flung that out there. “But you’ve been…let’s say annoyed since the night Sasha was attacked. At first I thought it was just that you weren’t getting enough sleep, but since you seemed okay in the mornings, I figured it was probably work related. This is the first day you haven’t slept it off, so I reckon whatever it is is starting to really get to you.” He took the pan from Tim’s suddenly nerveless fingers, hung it on the rack, then hitched himself onto the counter and pulled Tim closer by the lapels. “Talk to me, Stoker. What’s eating you? That’s my job.”

Tim couldn’t help but smile, even as he shook his head. “I don’t know. I didn’t even realize I was angry until you called me out on it. Although right now maybe I’m a little mad at Gertrude for destroying your mum before I had a chance to do it myself, but that’s definitely a ‘cherry on the shit sundae’ kind of situation.”

Gerry smiled back. “Well then. Do we have enough time before you need to leave for work to figure it out?”

“What’s Jon going to do? Fire me?”

“Aha, Watson. A clue.” Gerry cocked his head to one side and put on his best Basil Rathbone impersonation. “The shift in your tone of voice clearly indicates that at least some of your irritation is directed at one Mr. Jonathan Sims, as that was definitely not entirely jovial.” He dropped the persona. “What’s he done?”

“I—fuck.” Tim chewed his lip for a moment and thought, really thought, about it.

Ostensibly, nothing had really changed in the Archives. Sasha had returned to the Institute ten days after her encounter with the Distortion and resumed her research with, if anything, more fervor than before. Martin was still sleeping in Document Storage, and Jon had begun leaving less and less. Tim wanted to tell him to stop, to urge him to get out of there and just go home already, but Martin didn’t have that option right now; both he and Jon were convinced that Jane Prentiss was after him specifically, and although Tim was fairly certain it was the Archives she wanted, he kept his mouth shut about that. Elias was, unsurprisingly, still dragging his feet over upgrading the fire suppressant system but had at least provided them a few extra CO2 extinguishers, which at least made Martin feel a little better. Tim knew for a fact, because he’d sneaked into the Archives in the middle of the night to check on him at least once, that he slept clutching one like a teddy bear, or a security blanket. He’d found Jon passed out at his—the Archivist’s desk and tucked a spare blanket around him, but hadn’t said anything to either of them about it the next day.

They were…they were children. Tim couldn’t think of them any other way. Sasha had confided in him that she’d broken into Jon’s employment records and found out that Jon was actually ten weeks Martin’s junior, which meant both of them were twenty-seven. Tim would be thirty-four in three days, which was enough to make him feel a world older than them anyway, but more importantly, they were younger than Danny had been when he’d died. Sasha was probably about halfway between Danny and Tim in terms of age, but still young enough to count as a younger sibling sometimes and a playmate at others. And it was a bit disconcerting, because they were all adults and they didn’t need to be protected, but at the same time, they did. Maybe he was a little pissed by that because he hadn’t meant to get close to them, had been trying to think of them as temporary, but they were pretty much a part of the Archives now. Even Jon, even if he wasn’t going to be—

Oh, wait, hold on. Yep, there it was.

“He’s doing the Voice,” he said.

Gerry raised an eyebrow. “Okay, you’re going to have to explain that one. What voice?”

“Did you ever listen to Gertrude reading out a statement? She drops into this almost…trance state and gets this eerily calm, ominous tone to her voice. And you can feel the static, kind of.” Tim rolled his head back briefly. “I hadn’t been relistening to the tapes, Martin’s been mostly doing the transcriptions on the computer of Jon’s research, but I’ve been stalling him to keep him from relistening to the tapes. A few students doing dissertations came to me the other day about some issues with them, though, so I gave them a listen. And then I started listening to all of them.”

“And that explains why you came home tense and upset, because you drowned yourself in, what, twenty-odd real statements?” Gerry shook his head. “I should make you stay home today. That’s too much and you know it. Even if you aren’t the Archivist, you can’t do a ten-hour binge and expect to come out the other side unharmed.”

“I split it over a couple of days,” Tim said. “And I’m aware that’s not the point, but neither is what you said the point of what I said. My point is that Jon’s doing that exact same voice Gertrude does when he records the statements, and I can’t tell if it’s the Ceaseless Watcher influencing him and sinking him into the statements or if he’s just being dramatic.”

“Could be both,” Gerry pointed out. “They affect you, too, don’t they? You just…don’t get any energy from them, they drain you instead.”

“Debatable, but we’re not talking about that right now.”

“The fuck we aren’t—”

“But what if Jon’s starting to get energy from the statements?” Tim continued over top of Gerry’s (admittedly probably not unjustified) protests. “He’s not the Archivist, Gertrude is, and if he gets too locked into it…I still don’t know if the contracts they signed with Elias actually bound them to her or not, but if they didn’t, he can still walk away. Unless he’s at the point where it’s got its greedy little talons in him, in which case it’s too late either way.”

Gerry pursed his lips. Tim could see how hard he was struggling with the urge to circle back to the possibility of him getting energy from the statements. Finally, he said, “I could point out that it’s pretty likely he wouldn’t quit if he got the option, but I don’t think that’s your point either. So instead I’m going to do that thing you hate where I ask the question you’re avoiding admitting is the one you’re actually asking, which is, are you more concerned about the possibility of Jon getting bound to the Ceaseless Watcher, or are you more concerned about him becoming an Archivist and possibly usurping Gertrude’s position?”

“Jesus, Gerry,” Tim muttered, dropping his chin to his chest.

“No, you don’t get to avoid that question.” Gerry put two fingers under Tim’s chin and raised his head with a firmness that implied if Tim didn’t bend his neck voluntarily, it was likely to snap. “If that’s your fear, you have to at least address it. Are you worried he’s becoming an Archivist?”

Tim thought, really thought about it, as best as he could with Rowlf loudly drinking water in the corner. Finally, he said slowly, “Yes. But not because I think he’s going to supplant Gertrude. It’s not a Highlander ‘there can be only one’ kind of situation. Maybe we won’t all go as far as she has, but I think eventually everyone who works down there gets some of the Ceaseless Watcher’s power. I’m just…worried about him. I don’t think it’s been long enough that he should be doing that.”

Gerry gave him a faint smile and shook his head. “It’s been almost a year, Stoker.”

“Yeah, I know. And that’s how long it usually takes in fairy stories to earn your reward or your freedom or whatever. It’s either seven years or a year and a day.”

“This year was a leap year, so does that make it the eighteenth or the nineteenth that marks the end of the period of service?”

“The nineteenth. Most of the stories predate the Gregorian calendar, and a lot of them predate standard calendars, so it would have gone from, like, the first day of summer to the second day of the next summer.” Tim sighed. “If he’s getting that bad that fast, though—I mean, I didn’t.”

“You weren’t reading statements, either,” Gerry pointed out. “Not out loud. Sasha and Martin aren’t like that, are they? Jon’s doing the work, he’s going to get the brunt of the punishment.”

Tim chewed his lip for a moment. “Fuck. I need to figure out how bad it is, and stop him if he’s doing too much.”

“Any ideas on how to do that?”

“I’ll…get back to you on that,” Tim admitted. “I’m heading to work. Call me if you get any good ideas. Love you.”

“Love you, too.” Gerry caught Tim by the shirt again and pulled him in for one last kiss before he let him go.

It had started raining, not hard, but Tim needed to walk. He bought a newspaper from a stand on the corner and unfolded it over his head as he made his way to the Tube stop, then shook it out and at least skimmed the headlines. On a whim, he got off at Stockwell, changed to the Victoria line, and got off at Victoria, just to see what the walk was like for Sasha every day. To his surprise, she was standing just outside the entrance to the station when he exited, hovering in the slight protection afforded from the rain by the roof’s overhang and clutching her umbrella like a sword. The explanation was just on the corner, a tangled rainbow that erupted from the hand of a woman talking to a muscular person with red platform stiletto heels and a buzz cut and fractured out to terminate in eight or nine dogs of varying sizes and degrees of wetness. Sasha was eyeballing them as if one of them was likely to attack her at any moment, and to be fair, the chihuahua in its little white jumper did in fact look like it was considering it.

Still clutching his newspaper, he stepped up to her shoulder and put on his best schoolboy voice. “Carry your books, miss?”

Sasha started and turned. “Oh! Tim—I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“I come up the Northern line usually, same as Martin.” Tim interposed himself between Sasha and the dogs. “Decided today I’d see what the fuss was all about with this walk of yours.”

“I mean, I would have thought you’d drive on a day like this.”

Tim shrugged. “This rain isn’t going to last all morning, let alone all day. Come on, though, I don’t want to have to rush the last bit and risk slipping. Imagine the paperwork.”

Sasha unfurled her umbrella, then nudged Tim when he held up his newspaper. “I’ll share. Why didn’t you bring an umbrella if you were so set on walking?”

“Don’t have one,” Tim admitted sheepishly. “I usually just turn up the collar of my coat and wear a good hat.”

“You’re nuts, Stoker.”

“So I’ve been told. Mind the puddle.”

She insisted on stopping at her favorite café for her usual coffee, so Tim waited outside with the umbrella, idly scanning the faces of the people passing by and keeping an eye—no pun intended—out for anyone with distorted proportions. He hadn’t found any Michaels in her past so far in his digging, so maybe that was really what the Distortion was calling itself these days, but that didn’t mean he trusted it any further than he could throw it. Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, everyone walking past seemed normal. Key word was seemed.

Sasha emerged from the café with two cups of coffee, one of which she handed to Tim; he took it in surprise. “Uh, thanks. For me?”

“For you. I still owe you from…you know, that night. And you saved me from that vicious pack of ravenous hounds.” Sasha grinned, but the flash of fear in her eyes belied her joking expression—she was well and truly scared.

Tim bowed theatrically. “I live to serve, milady.”

“My knight in shining armor.” Sasha laughed as they set off.

Martin was just coming back into the Archives with two mugs of tea when Sasha and Tim arrived. He gave them a wan smile, looking like he hadn’t slept in a month. “Morning. How’s the weather out there?”

“Wet, but it’s tapering off.” Tim tossed his newspaper in the bin and crossed over to give Martin a one-armed hug. “Jon’s here already, I take it?”

Martin’s cheeks turned faintly pink, but he nodded. “He, um, he got in about an hour ago. I-I think he was going to do some recording.”

“Great, I wanted to talk to him about that,” Tim said, setting his coffee on his desk and unslinging the laptop bag from his shoulder. “What have you got going on for research?”

“I haven’t looked yet. I just finished all the ones Jon gave me last week, I think that’s what he’s got in there now, and he gave me a new stack.”

Tim tried—and failed—to remember if Martin had had anything he was taking point on that was real. He’d have to catch Jon before he hit that point. “Here—let me take that into him. Maybe he’ll be more receptive with some tea in him.”

“Receptive to what?” Martin asked, handing over Jon’s mug with—if Tim was any judge—considerable reluctance.

“Re-recording a few of those statements.” The sentence popped out of Tim’s mouth without conscious thought. He tried not to let his surprise show on his face, though. “You know, to get them up to the standards expected of so august an institution as the Magnus Institute.”

Sasha giggled, covering her mouth with her hand. “Tim, shh, he’ll hear you.”

Tim winked at Martin, who looked torn between amusement and mortification, and headed for the Archivist’s office. As he pulled the door open, he heard a very clear, exasperated, “Oh, goddammit.”

“Sorry, I’ve already been absolved for this week, you’ll have to ask again later,” Tim said, deadpan.

Jon looked up in the act of reaching over his laptop for something, a flash of panic running through his eyes. For just a second, Tim felt bad as he realized Jon—who tried so hard to be professional, and was probably just as terrified as Martin of getting fired—hadn’t even heard the door open and had had a moment of thinking Elias was the one who’d come in, or had come in behind Tim. It was written on his face plain as day. He recovered quickly, though. “Tim. What…?”

Tim decided to let him believe he hadn’t noticed the panic as he stepped fully into the office and shut the door. “Morning. Martin made your tea, and since I wanted to come in here and talk to you anyway, I said I’d bring it to you.” He came over and set it on the desk. “Hard at work already, I see.”

“I’ll never finish if I don’t get a head start,” Jon grumbled. He adjusted his glasses and took a sip of his tea, then set it to one side. “What did you need?”

Tim hesitated for a split second. He could see what Jon was reaching for now—the tape recorder, which meant he’d found a real one, tried recording it, come up on the issues, and had to start over, which was probably what he’d been swearing at. That was a plus, it meant he wasn’t so deep into it that he could just tell…like you can, a voice whispered in the back of his mind…but it also meant he’d started one of the real ones.

Well. He’d wanted to do a test of some kind, hadn’t he?

“It’s about some of the recordings,” he said, smoothly enough he was pretty sure Jon hadn’t noticed the hesitation. “There are some that need to be redone.”

Jon scowled. “Did the digital files get corrupted?”

“No, they’re not digital. But some of the ones that are on tape—”

That was as far as he got. Jon’s scowl deepened. “If the tapes aren’t working now either, I don’t know what else you want me to do. Engrave them on wax cylinders?”

“Easy there, Dr. Seward. The recordings themselves are fine. There are just some issues, little errors. If they’re going to be on a permanent record, or a semipermanent record anyway, they ought to be the best quality they can, shouldn’t they?”

The conversation did not noticeably improve from there. Jon was visibly irritated at the idea of redoing the taped statements, which Tim was secretly relieved by. It meant he wasn’t too terribly far gone; there was still hope for him. And he understood Jon not wanting to rerecord them.

He also knew, which Jon and the others did not, that these weren’t simple errors—well, maybe the switching names around in Von Closen’s statement, although that was debatable, Tim hadn’t tried reading the letter himself. The others, though…Tim knew Gertrude’s filing system inside out and backwards, and despite Jon’s snide remark she was always consistent with them; the numbers around Hill Top Road were a mess all right, but it wasn’t because of anything Jon had done, and that was something he needed to investigate, or ask her about when she got back, which had damn well better be sooner rather than later. And she’d doctored the dates in the dustman’s statement herself, he’d seen the signs on the original and kept his mouth shut. There were plenty of other things he’d noticed that he didn’t bring up, but it was wrong for a reason.

He kept pushing, though, for one very simple reason. He had to see if Jon would do it. Had to see if he could. That was probably the first test, the first…milestone, maybe? He wasn’t sure. Martin had interrupted him, so had Sasha, in the middle of recordings, but he’d gone straight back to them. Tim didn’t think Jon had stopped for more than the length of time it took to put a tape in the recorder since then, though.

And from the way he got progressively angrier, until Tim’s soft whoa recalled him to his professionalism, he wasn’t going to stop now, either.

Finally, Tim tried a desperate Hail Mary and brought up Martin’s concern from the other day about if his tongue looked infested. And for a minute, it seemed like it had broken Jon’s concentration, like he might set the statement aside and come back to it later, or—if Tim was lucky—not at all. But then he recovered, looking extremely tired, and more or less dismissed Tim.

He decided to bow out gracefully, if sadly.

“What did he say?” Martin asked as soon as Tim had come out and closed the door behind him again.

“Eh. He says they’re fine.” Tim shrugged one shoulder. “Actually, he said to put a sticky note on them or something and that he doesn’t actually care, so I guess that’s that. Maybe I’ll take a crack at fixing them myself.”

“I’ve got a spare recorder,” Martin offered. “If you want to borrow it.”

“I’ve got my own, but thanks, Martin.” Tim gave Martin a genuine grin and rumpled his hair, causing Martin to duck and swat halfheartedly at his hand. “Let’s get the regular work done first, then I can start thinking about taking on extra. Stick around after hours or something.”

Sasha swiveled around from Mister Megabytes. “Speaking of after hours. According to our files, someone has a birthday on Friday. We should all go out for a pint or something after work. Get you out of the Archives for a bit, Martin, and celebrate. Maybe your partner would like to come along.”

Tim knew a fishing expedition when he heard it and shook his head with a smile. “He’s not exactly a people person, but I’ll pass on the invitation. Actually, how about sushi? You like sushi?”

“I’ve…never had it, actually.”

Martin’s eyebrows shot up. “Wait, really?”

Tim grinned broadly. “Well then, that sounds like exactly what I want to do for my birthday. Which is actually Saturday, by the way, Miss James, but I’ll celebrate it Friday with you and keep Saturday for me.”

Hopefully they’d be able to get Jon out, he thought as he started setting up his laptop for the day’s work. He didn’t need to spend all his time in the Archives. Fear of leaving Martin alone or otherwise, the more time he spent here the worse he was going to get. The statements might not have been fueling him yet, but they were starting to irritate him if he tried to leave them unfinished, and that was how it started.

Gertrude needed to get back. Before it got any worse for him.

[titanicfreija]

Ergo Sum

"What is it?" Three picked it up and held it out.

Freija looked to see what she was looking at. "For all that edge is worth? It's a magic club. I've been collecting them." Sunny 'matted five more to the table. "They're like the other one-of-a-kind-thing-that-everyone-has, the stuff Xûr gives out. They all do different stuff, kinda like some of our guns, some of them. One's a lot of fun, you can send this wave out and jump up and swing at them, pop! Fire and chitin everywhere." She grinned.

Three looked at the spread. "I can smell 'em. You can see the make difference, too. Huh. I always wondered where Xûr got the shit, but at least those were the same thing."

"This is supposed to be the sword off the casket of some great legendary mother fucker, but no one's settled on who it is? But my guess has always been timeline crossing and interdimensional drift, since that's been everything I know about Xûr."

Three picked up one of the smaller blades and twisted it in her hand. "You can tell the Light in this one."

"You should try killing someone with-- not me--"

The Titan rolled off the back of the couch but couldn't reorient in time to stop the Hunter from slamming the sword into the top of her skull, stunning her and making room for the killing blow.

~

"You're right, that did feel really good," Three agreed when Freija got up. She was already equipped with a water bucket and scrubcloths. "So good that I don't even mind cleaning up after myself. And I don't even mean the getting-back-at-you-thing."

"You've killed me three times since then!" She rubbed her head as if it still hurt, and she went back to sorting out the swords, looking for overt copies to clean out. "How long are you gonna be getting this revenge?"

"I'm gonna keep doing it until I'm not mad anymore," Three declared.

Freija cut her eyes at Three, baring her teeth. "I'm gonna start fighting back."

Three stiffened. "Alright, fine," she huffed. She had no intention of quitting, only of ambushing, but hey.

For Destinytober

Fireteam story List here

Complete story list Here

[wuxiaphoenix]

On Writing: Title, Summary, Augh

AKA you wrote it, now what do you call it? And how do you sum it up - whether for a book blurb or a fic-posting site?

...Yeah, no, I’m not good at this. I face Title and Summary boxes with a look of stunned, deer-in-headlights, “Now what?” I spent all this time and effort coming up with an Idea and getting it down in words, and you expect me to sum it up?

Alas, we must. I mean, you can’t title a book “Every Neat Fictional Trope Slammed into a Firecracker of a Story!”

...Well, you could, but fitting it on your cover is going to be a bear and a half.

Which is a good place to start if you’re absolutely stuck on a title. What would look good on the front cover?

Hopefully this narrows down the horde of possibilities to something more manageable. Three to five words is usually good; if you’re using a one-word title like Dracula, you’re going to need a really good back cover blurb. If you’re using a subtitle, people usually think nonfiction. Things like that.

Puns, now. People have widely differing opinions on those. I personally consider a punny title one of the factors that will make me stop and read the cover blurb, and maybe the sample. I like puns. That said, if you have a punny title you’re implying there will be wry humor in the book as well. This fits for cozy mysteries, lighter fantasy and SF, and any other work where the characters can see some humor in their own situation. It’s not the vibe you want if you’re doing Deadly Serious stuff. The Wheel of Time? Serious. Eric Flint’s Pyramid Schemes? Not so much.

Also, puns generally don’t translate well, as anyone who’s written in an anime or foreign drama fandom can attest. This may or may not be important to you, but if you are trying to market internationally... well, it’s something to think about.

Proverbs may translate a bit better. I’ve been known to snag a saying or two as a title inspirations. Combine the right saying with a good cover, and you can strongly hint at the conflict of the story before your readers even read the blurb.

Or the summary. The two are not the same thing! A summary should give a general idea of the whole story. A blurb, in contrast, should only cover maybe the first third of the book, up to the first Major Conflict. Blurbs need to be short! Just enough to hook your reader in for more.

Remember, you don’t need to get them right the first time. Just like your story, it’s okay to do multiple drafts of your title, blurb, and so on.

Though do try to have the title final before you publish. It’s so much simpler that way.....

[monty-glasses-roxy]

Doomsday.

Win roxy found bonnie he was sitting in the back of the van they were storing stuff in. He was damage and was offline..

Cassie and roxy both talk a bit before taking action. Moving bonnie around so they cude fit all the minis music man in..

But Roxy had a new worry... the van.. had a dead battery.. but she remember that her and cassie are powered by a fusion core

(( like a fallout fusion core but dasent need to be replaced or recharged ))

So then roxy got the greatest idea.. she would try and jump the van off from her own power system... but lucky for her the van was diesel powered.

(( fun fact gasoline can go bad after six month or after a year if not used. But diesel can last up to a much longer time of it dasent have water in it or have moss growing in it. And there many types of diesel.

Like road diesel for road vehicles.

There red diesel/off road diesel/farm diesel witch isn't tax but is used in farm tractors.

And before you ask yes regular diesel and off road diesel is the same one is color red isn't tax and is illegal to put on a road vehicles.

There bio diesel. Witch is made of used cooking oil

And many other stuff can be turn into diesel fuel to )).

Roxy search Around and eventually found a set of jumper cables.. she would after seven to nine trys got the van to start and running.. as it ran she continued bonnie up to it by the jumper cables to let him charge up.

As roxy got into the driver seat and buckle up cassie ask.

Cassie. Umm roxy do you know how to drive a van ?

Roxy. Well no... but it not much difference from a go kart... it just got... a lot more complicated.. but hi if it make you feel better .. we don't have to Fallow road laws now !

And she throws the van into reverse and slams into a park car behind them before roxy sead anything she put it into drive and told cassie to never mention that moment to no one or even bonnie win he wakes.

So the next place roxy drove to was a older fazbare attraction that was abandoned a few year before the pizzaplex was built.

A place know as fazbare park a 1,500 acre amusement park witch is surrounded by a 12 ft tall brick wall and a steel metal gate at any entry point to the park..

What Roxy remembers she was onch a temporary attraction there before getting revamped into a glamrocks and sent to the pizzaplex.

(( like to think roxy work at the fazbare amusement park before getting a glamrocks upgrade and ship to the pizzaplex with her old memeorys ))

The park took hours to drive to and all the while cassie talk with roxy to keep her clam and to slow down on driving.. and of witch roxy name the van the van after her old friend... glamrocks chica by calling the van the chica-Mobile as tribute to her missing friend who is most likely store at a different fazbare site.

(( fun fact after fazbare amusement park close that were fazbare entertainment would dump all of there useless or useful stuff at a storage facility to keep it at least sum what maintained))

Ohhkay so the amusement park has been repurposed for storing old shit Fazbear wants out of the way? That makes sense but also sounds like an absolute fucking death trap because it's Fazbear and the shit they want out the way tends to be relating to lawsuits lmao

The amusement park sounds really interesting though. I made one up for the Mediocre Melodies in a Zombie AU a while back, abandoned amusement parks are such cool and interesting settings for things aren't they? And if Roxy is from there originally, that would probably mean she's quite literally built different to everyone else too. I mean, unless she happened to be the animatronic for a specifically indoor attraction like an arcade or something, she would have probably been made weatherproof at the very least.

I can imagine she's maybe more agile so as to better help in emergencies that might require her to navigate more difficult terrain, maybe she's hooked up to a weather forecast system so she always knows what to expect in the day, and probably has rougher paws (and possibly paws that are a little webbed like a lot of wolves) for whenever there's snow and frost. A weather forecast system is probably completely useless now as there's no one to make the weather reports to then make a forcast and send that forcast out to everyone anymore, but the rest is probably pretty useful!

And the emotional situation that would be for Roxy? Fucking hell man. My Foxy and Mangle are also transfers from another location that's more outdoors, and my first version of Roxy spent the entire start of her life outside so it's something I've thought of a lot, but you've put a different spin on this.

Your Roxy has been taken from her friends at the park, no longer has contact with them, and likely heard afterwards that the park, her home was shut down. She has a home she can never return to now, a home that's being left to rot in true Fazbear fashion like they don't even care and she has no idea what happened to the animatronics she started life with. Are they okay? Were they transferred too? Are they still there? Still active and wondering why no one came back?

I doubt Roxy would know or even be able to find out. Even if she did know it was being used as storage, she probably won't know any more than that. She will have been robbed of literally everything she once knew and shipped off to some random place with new faces that probably look very much like the ones she used to know and she's just had to deal with this the whole time.

That's already pretty awful, but then you factor in the fact the Pizzaplex is entirely indoors. Amusement parks don't tend to be like that and it doesn't sound like this one is either so not only did they rob her of her friends and her home, they also robbed her of the world.

The sun, the moon, the stars, the wind, the rain, the grass, the snow... it's all gone now. As I like to say for my old Roxy, they took the sky from her.

If she has a weather forcaster built in, then she's spent all this time in the pizzaplex, knowing exactly what she's missing out on. She knows when it's raining, when it's stormy and when the next heatwave will be hitting, but she never gets to experience it again. She's built to withstand heavy rains and to be able to navigate blizzards with as much ease as possible, but the only breeze she's felt in a long time is when she's speeding along the race track or running as fast as she can.

I can imagine anyone in that situation feeling so incredibly trapped that it's probably suffocating her being in that Pizzaplex. It probably drives her insane. Outside, the world is always changing, with birds to chase and local tabby cats that come in to explore, the clouds different shapes and the seasons always shifting. Inside the Plex though, everything is stagnant and still, never shifting and never changing. It's always the same, and any deviations from that are scrubbed away almost as soon as they're noticed. It's boring and it's lifeless compared to the outside world

Watching her is probably like watching a tiger pace up and down the length of its cage. I can imagine she's probably done a lot of shit to break up the monotony.

And at the same time, I bet it's a sensory nightmare. When you're outside, sound travels further than when it's in an enclosed space which can make it sound very different to when you're inside. The shows are probably insanely fucking loud to her as the sound has nowhere to travel, the lights are probably so much brighter because there's no natural light to offset it, and it's probably incredibly difficult to find a calm, dark place in the Plex that isn't in some shitty basement hallway to unwind in because there's no difference between day and night.

It sounds like hell, I gotta be honest, and with no day and night cycle, it's probably also a nightmare of never feeling the passage of time, like her time in the Pizzaplex is just one huge blur of sounds and colours in it's own little pocket dimension away from the rest of reality.

Despite the situation, being able to leave the Pizzaplex has probably felt like her chains have been broken. She's finally free to run and run and run and run forever and there's no more walls left to contain her. Stepping into the outside world for the first time in so long... I dunno I feel like she might cry or a gut instinct will kick in to run away while she has the chance and Cassie will have to find her like eight hours later looking like she's been dragged through a muddy thornbush backwards with the giddiest smile she's ever seen on her face.

Honestly, I think Cassie would love that for her and love joining in with it, but also maybe feel like she needs a fucking leash for a while lmao

On another note, I feel like this would also mean that Roxy would go back to the Plex for everyone, but still be extremely hesitant to set foot in there again. Like she'll be a nervous, antsy mess the entire time they're in there, just desperate to find what they're looking for and get the fuck out again before they're stuck there forever again, even if that's not a possibility anymore. At this point, I feel like Cassie would suggest using the van to get around and Roxy would just give her a look of betrayal with the sad puppy noises to match. It would probably grow on her if they have a lot of stuff to carry though...

But also this is Roxy and she's probably stubborn enough to be like "nah I can carry this!" and insist she's absolutely fine even after she's completely blown past her limits carrying this shit lmao

I bet the loading dock doors are completely open while this is happening too. Like, the second they were open, Roxy decided they were never closing ever again. Cassie looking around for stuff that could be helpful while Roxy is doing that too, but also stacking crates in the doorways so if they fail and try to close again for any reason, the crates will keep them open. Or Cassie and Roxy take a break outside and Cassie makes the decision to go back in and finish the search of the loading dock on her own. Roxy would still be there of course, right by the door watching her and talking to her and stuff, just not inside the building, ya know?

A situation with this would probably be a real issue with Bonnie in the mix though. If he's powered back on, then he's going to want to expect to be in the Plex. Unlike Roxy, he won't have ever known anything outside of the Plex. For Roxy and Cassie to take him away before they switch him back on, and then for Roxy to - very understandably - refuse to ever go back, probably never even humouring the idea of going back and never once considering why anyone would want to go back there... well isn't that pretty much what happened to Roxy in the first place? She was taken away from the park without her consent and locked into a situation in which she could never return. Exactly like what's happening to Bonnie right now.

Doesn't sound very fun to me, but a very interesting situation!

Anyway, I'm willing to bet Roxy knows how to drive a van. I can see her hotwiring vans in the loading dock and figuring out how to drive through trial, error, and crashing into the walls. Sometimes even on purpose. Fazbear probably realised that sending Roxy to the Plex was maybe a terrible decision real quick lmao

And uhh I've never played Fallout. I know next to nothing about Fallout. There was a German Shepard in one of them and they had that song "Wanderer" on the trailer or something and that blonde guy in the blue jumpsuit thing doing a thumbs up is from the games, but that is all I know. Telling me the fusion core is like the ones in Fallout means absolutely nothing to me

But uhhh if I might ask, why not have Roxy and Cassie be powered by biofuel? If it's good enough using old cooking oil and foods for the van, why not them as well? Even if the van was petrol or was electric with powerful solar panels on the roof of it, you could still use the tank of the van to store the fuel they need for themselves maybe? And it would mean you could give Roxy the ability to eat and Cassie could then be tasked with making sure she doesn't eat anything stupid, because of course she wouldn't fully understand what is and isn't edible if this was never a concern for her before.

And also, if Roxy is from an outdoor amusment park originally, that would mean she's probably seen owls eat mice and pigeons, and cats rodents, bugs and random plants. Meaning that Cassie would have a very human understanding of food, while Roxy's is more on par with a stray cat licking the grease off a pizza box. Of course, Roxy knows what humans eat and don't eat, but her understanding of what's edible is gonna be different, ya know? And she's never seen herself as human anyway, so why would she have to follow the same rules as humans do? That wouldn't make sense, right?

It could be funny having Cassie just having to get used to the fact Roxy has decided she agrees with the seagulls and that this one specific beetle is just really fucking tasty or something lmao

Roxy feeling incredibly vindicated and smug as fuck when they find a book in a library on foods of the world and discover that eating insects is a completely normal thing that happens in a lot of countries. It's probably the only thing that could possibly convince Cassie to try it lmao

That's just a thought though. I dunno how the fusion cores work so it might work better than this or just suit the story you want to tell better, I really have no way of knowing.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to finding out what's in the amusement park when they get there. I'm hoping it's the animatronics from the Pizzaplex and the animatronics Roxy would have known from before her transfer so there can be a big ol' reunion and they can go on a road trip around the post-fallout world together, I'm sure you've got something good in mind whether it's that or not!

[tauforged]

there they are!!!!!

fwiw, driftlaz and oplaz are both "retired" for lack of a better word -- when paradox!laz came into existence when the other two met, they both basically decied "oh thank god, this guy can handle this mess for us. im tired. i want to go lie down." and basically threw laz prime to the wolves and both fucked off. driftlaz went out as far as he could get into the middle of nowhere on earth and built himself a little shack and fends off anyone and everyoen who tries to approach him with a gun. hes done with all this tenno shit. laz prime tries to visit him with stuff from their garden every now and then and he accepts the food and seeds but slams the door in his face otherwise. nothing against him personally, he just hates accepting help or interacting with other people. deep down, he really does miss duviri, and eventually he will probably accept that he's "homesick" and go back, even if it's just to do the same thing on one of the more remote islands out there . he misses the security of being in the time loop </3 hate to see it

oplaz spends most of his time bouncing around between relays and other neutral zones (cetus, fortuna etc) bullshitting and killing time . he's "on break" for his "mental health" . which means he hangs out in his orbiter nearly 24/7 playing on his ludoplex and pretending none of his problems exist. he's uh. well he's like 17 so he'll probably figure it out eventually but in the meantime i do NOT blame him for not having his shit together. he really enjoys hanging out around cetus the most, and i think eventually he will just decide to stay there someday. he's very much not fond of onkko or the quills though he just wants to fish and play silly games with the other kids and enjoy his life instead of doing all this child soldier shit...

while they do both find their own "happy ending" eventually, neither of them have much of anything to do with the actual storyline of the game anymore -- that's ALL laz prime all the time now :) he was never meant to exist but ends up being something greater than the sum of his parts, which is something i just think is neat :Dc

finally settled on a design i like for driftlaz, so i can now present you all with a new and improved Laz Field Guide! since he’s a guy who’s actually three guys, having a handy dandy visual tool to tell the different versions of him running around apart can be helpful sometimes, especially since they all exist at the same time and can and do have the potential to interact. (don’t ask him why or how any of this is possible. he tooootally bombed his eternalism test. he’s got no clue what’s goin on)

[theundercoversquid]

Awkward first encounters

Pairing: Pierre Gasly x Reader

Request: Hey hey. I love your story’s. Can I maybe request a story where you meet Pierre and Charles when you just started your study in Monaco. That Pierre and the girl fall in love with each other instantly and Charles notices. Add some stuff if you want to.

I would love this!! Thank you, you are amazing!!!! - @justthatgirlxox​​

Warnings: 

Part 2

Masterlist

Stepping off the campus, you tipped your head up to the sun. Breathing in the warm salty air, you still couldn't believe that this wasn't a dream. You were still waiting for your alarm clock to go off. And for you to wake back up in your bed back at your university. But this wasn't a dream. No matter how much you pinched yourself, this wasn't a dream. You really were getting to study abroad in Monaco for a year.

Your eyes still to the sky, you turned on your heel. Heading to the library to study. The problem with that was that instead of turning towards the library, you slammed into a wall of muscle.

Immediately throwing yourself backwards out of surprise, you nearly lost your balance. Just as you tipped backwards, a pair of arms snapped out. Catching you and pulling you back onto the wall of muscle.

"I'm so sorry." You frantically apologised as you tried to disentangle yourself from the arms and step away, just without falling over this time.

"It's okay." A deep french male voice assured you. Only letting go of you when they were sure that you were safely and steadily on your feet.

You briefly looked up only to meet the most beautiful blue eyes. And you could practically see the mischief in them. Ducking your head from his piercing gaze, you released that you had dropped your books on the floor. 

Ducking down, you quickly scrambled to pick them up. And your mystery man quickly joined you on the floor to pick them up. The one problem is that your hands met as you both met trying to grab the same book. And god, did you feel like you were in some trashing cliche romance novel. 

Stuttering out another thank you, you rushed away from him. Disappearing around a corner, you rested your head against the stone, a self-berating inner monologue running through your head.

You didn't see the handsome stranger bending down to pick up your missing textbook. In your haste to get away from the handsome stranger, you had managed to leave one of your textbooks behind.

Pierre didn’t think that he was that scary. As he bent down to pick up your textbook. Looking up he tried to see if you had re-appear. But sadly you had completely despaired leaving Pierre enchanted and stranded. The only clue as to who you were was the textbook he had clasped in his hands.

Cradling it to his body Pierre carried on his journey of where he was travelling to meet Charles. 

“I don’t think you are smart enough to study, my friend.” Charles teased when he saw his friend round the corner with a book clasped firmly in his clutches.

“It's not mine,” Pierre admitted sheepishly.

“Then why do you have it?”

“Because a cute girl bumped into me and dropped it.” Pierre admitted. His hand came up to rub the back of his neck.

“So you stole it?” Charles squawked.

“No,” Pierre rapidly denied, shaking his head. “I bent down to help her pick up her books but she ran away before I could give it back to her.”

“You could just give it to the lost and found.” Charles suggested.

“No,” Pierre shook his head. “I want to give it back to her in person.”

“Oh.” Charles nodded his head as if everything suddenly made sense.

“What do you mean ‘oh’.” Pierre demanded from his friend.

“You thought she was pretty and you want to meet her again.” Charles summarised. Summing up precisely what Pierre wanted.

God you felt stupid. Not only had you run into the cute boy, you had then run away from him. Managing to leave one of your textbooks behind. God you were an idiot.

Deciding to ignore it you threw yourself into your studies and hoped that you would forget about it. The only problem was that you were missing one of your textbooks. 

Huffing you gave up trying to study and started clearing up your stuff to leave. When you heard your phone ringing you glanced over at it to see an unknown number. Huffing you went back to what you were doing. You were in no mood to deal with spam callers. But the moment it finished ringing it started up again. Huffing you leaned over to grab your phone. Whoever was trying to call was persistent, you would give them that. But equally you were not having a good day and you didn't need to deal with incessant spam.

“Yes.” You answered already fed up with whoever was on the other side.

All you got was a tentative reciting of your name.

“Yes.” you replied, just this time you were a little more intrigued and a little less annoyed.

“I have your textbook.” The voice on the other side of the phone told you.

“You are a lifesaver.” You beamed. “When can I get it back from you?”

“I can bring it to you now.” The voice suggested.

“Yes please.” You grinned. “Where do you want to meet?”

“How about I meet you where you left it.” They suggested. “That way we both know where we are going.”

“I will see you there.” You grinned packing up the last of your stuff as they hung up.

Dashing to where you had originally bumped into the handsome stranger you kept an eye out for anybody carrying your book. 

Now really you shouldn't have been surprised when it was the handsome stranger walking towards you with your book in his hands. But somehow your brain hadn't thought of that. After the incident you had convinced yourself that you would never see them again. Yet here they were walking towards you.

Taking a deep breath you summed up all the courage you had.

“Thank you so much for returning my book to me.” You thanked them firmly staring at your book. Too embarrassed to meet them in the eyes. “And I'm sorry for bumping into you.”

“Don't worry,” They assured you as they passed the book back to you. “On both counts.”

“Is there anything I could do to thank you?” You mouth asked before your brain had a chance to tell it not to.

“Go on a date with me?” The handsome stranger asked you.

“Okay.” You nodded before you had any time to think better of it.

And maybe it would go down in flames. But right now you couldn't bring yourself to care.

[moonwalker94writes]

Opera

He could hear the shouted voices drifting into the common room before reaching the stairs to the dorms. A few first years threw him nervous glances as he brushed past, while others were giggling quietly.

“You’re such an idiot, Sirius!”

“Takes one to know one!”

“Oh, how mature of you.”

“Yer mum.”

“Leave my mother out of it!”

“Oi!” James yelled, slamming the door shut behind him. Remus and Sirius were practically at each other’s throats, shouting at one another over Peter’s head, who was keeping them both at arm’s length and looked very relieved to see James just now. “What the hell is going on?”

“Sirius is being a conceited prick!” Remus snarled, a deep growl rumbling through his chest.

Sirius scoffed, treating Remus to one of his haughtiest expressions. “Remus is a selfish bastard.”

“No, both of you, shut up!” James shot them a warning glance, which seemed effective enough as they, albeit reluctantly and with gritted teeth, receded. “Peter?”

“Sirius stole one of Remus’ jumpers, Remus wanted it back but Sirius was taking ages in the bathroom so he went through Sirius’ stuff to get it himself,” Peter summed up easily.

“So they’re both being idiots?”

“Indeed they are.”

“You know what that means, boys,” James said, giving them both a pointed look. He gestured to the middle of the room, waiting.

“I’m not doing th—AHH! Bloody hell, Prongs!” James twirled his wand in his hand innocently as Sirius glared at him.

“Do it, or more stingers are coming for your stubborn arse, Padfoot.”

Sirius glanced back at Remus, who scuffed his feet a little, giving a tiny shrug. Sirius sighed then, opening his arms with an irritated huff. James arched an expectant eyebrow at Remus, who rolled his eyes at him, but stepped closer anyway, returning the embrace.

“’m sorry,” Remus mumbled to the top of Sirius’ head.

“Me too.” Sirius’ grunted apology landed somewhere against Remus’ collarbone.

James grinned as they hugged for a few more moments, then tried to pull away, only to realise that they couldn’t. Marauders rule number 17: Never underestimate the worth of a well-placed sticking charm.

“What the fuck, James!”

“What’s this good for?!”

“You’re not done yet,” James stated, wagging his finger at the pair. He then bounded across the dorm, plucking A Night At The Opera from the stack of vinyl on Remus’ bedside table, and lowered it on the record player, bringing the needle to the right place. The music started and Freddy Mercury’s voice floated through the dorm a moment later. “Sing or sting,” he pointed out, tapping his wand against the palm of his other hand. “It’s up to you.”

Sirius and Remus gave him another exasperated look, before turning to each other, weighing their options. It was Sirius now, who shrugged and started the verse.

“Ooh, you're the best friend that I ever had, I've been with you such a long time, you're my sunshine,” he sang, nudging Remus a little.

Remus smiled bashfully before joining in, eliciting a grin from Sirius. “And I want you to know, that my feelings are true, I really love you, ooh, you're my best friend.”

They began harmonising, getting progressively louder until they were both laughing and rocking back and forth in each other’s arms. James patted himself on the back mentally, seeing as all was well in the world again.

“I think it’s safe to un-stick them now,” Peter said to James as Sirius started whirling Remus round and round.

“I lifted the spell as soon as the music started,” James winked. “This is all them now.”

“Should we tell them?”

“Of course not.”

Ooh, you’re my best friend…

Written for @wolfstarmicrofic.

[crazyfor-toby]

Honesty [Smau]

[005]

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You Walked into the school building looking for your best friend Lyra while heading towards your locker. You heard a familiar voice behind you as you turned the corner. "Hey y/n" said Randy catching up to you now walking beside you. "Did you hear what happened yesterday?" he enthused as you both stopped at your locker.

"No, what happened?" you said turning the padlock three times to reset it.

"You know Zoe, right? Well, I guess she tried to start a fight with one of the twins, I think it was the older one-" he said trying to remember her name.

"Kelly?" you asked opening up your locker and collecting the stuff you needed for your first three classes.

"Yeah, her. Anyways, Zoe asked her to fight and when she said no, I guess Zoe started cussing her out and called her a bitch or sum but they basically got into it and now Zoe has a bald spot and black eye." Randy chuckled,

"Wait, how'd she get a bald spot? Did Kelly rip out her hair or something?" you asked in shock while closing your locker.

"Yeah actually, Kelly punched her then pulled a chunk of her hair out before getting pulled off of her by a bunch of teachers. But I don't know why she got so mad over being called a bitch I mean if I was Zoe, I would've said a lot worse then again if I was Zoe, I wouldn't get my ass beat. But I guess Zoe's moving back to her old school now." Randy said now leaning against one of the lockers.

"Y/nn!" Someone said before two arms wrapped around your neck.

"Lyraa!" you exclaimed putting one of your hands behind you in an attempt to hug her while the other one was occupied holding your books.

"See you in class y/n." Randy said walking away to his first class that you shared with him.

"Lyra where have you been! I was waiting for you but then Randy started to talk to me" you groaned as you both let go of each other so you could face her.

"Long story short my parents got into a fight and made me miss the bus then I was going to drive but guess what?! My window was frosted! So my mom had to bring me and Toby to school." Lyra sighed as she opened up the locker next to yours. "We should totally skip class," Lyra said slamming her locker shut.

"I don't know it's pretty risky and I can't fail this class." You said as she groaned.

"Come on! I do it all the time plus, we have like 10 minutes left of free time before class so just think about it then. You have plenty of time to catch up on work anyways and if you need help, I can always tutor you!" she smirked nudging you.

"Fine,"

[nyctophilin]

Fake affection | I

sweet anon: Can I request a dom! Han Jisung smut? Where he and the reader are fake dating because Jisung want's to make someone jealous but ends up fucking the reader instead? I love your writings so much!!

Chapter I, Chapter II, Chapter III, Chapter IV, Epilogue

Description: Han Jisung has been rejected by the girl he likes one to many times. He decides that he has had enough and is set on making her want him back. What could possibly make her want him more than seeing him with her rival after she boldly assumed he can’t find anyone better. That way Jisung and Y/N are stuck in a fake relationship until Jisung’s crush falls for him. Or he falls for someone else.

All rights reserved © nyctophilin 2020. Re-posting, copying and translating any of my works is prohibited.

Pairing: Han x fem!Reader, Hyunjin x fem!Reader

Word count: 4.5k

Genre: College!AU, Fake dating!AU, Angst, Fluff, eventual Smut

Warnings: swearing, mention of masturbation

A/N: Wow, so it looks like I am unable of making short fics, haha. I planed for this to be a one-shot but it’s already this long and I don’t want to bore you guys with long fics so I will make a second part and a third if needed but I doubt. I really hope you guys like this one. Feedback is very much appreciated.

      Y/N was tapping her finger on the desk, her head resting in her palm. She was watching the professor walk around in front of the class explaining something but she wasn’t paying attention. Her mind was filled with thoughts about whether or not she was going to get the role. 

      Some people from her university that were majoring in Film Production had to write a script for a short movie and the best five got chosen to be produced. Initially, she believed that only Theater and Film Majors could participate at the auditions but the administration of the school made an announcement one morning informing them that everyone could take part in the audition process. That meant she had to deal with more competitors for the role she wanted.

      Initially, Y/N was the only one who wanted to audition for the main role of one of the movies since people didn’t really catch its concept that well. When the audition day finally came, one Modern Dance major showed up out of nowhere and auditioned as well. The apparition of that particular character made her blood boil with anger.

      Her competitor for the role was none other than Mina, her so-called enemy. They weren’t enemies in the real sense of the word. They just simply didn’t click with one another and silently agreed a long time ago to ignore each other. They weren’t pulling childish stunts on each other, they didn’t speak each other's names unless necessary, they didn’t try to win each other in grades or parties or body counts. They were just mutually ignoring one another. And everything was fine until she showed up there.

      Y/N wasn’t going to lie and say that Mina wasn’t good. Her performance wasn’t exceptional but for someone that has never done that before, she was fairly good. That had her worried about her chances of getting chosen.

      When the bell finally rang ending her suffering she got up in the split of a second and left the room. She could not bear to hear any more of the professor’s babbling. Her boots let out quiet thuds every time they touched the concrete floors. She found herself in front of the announcement board but the paper that was supposed to tell her if she got chosen or not, was missing. Thinking to herself that they probably will put it up later she turned on her heels and made her way towards the cafeteria.

      She met her friend Hayoon there and they sat down at a table situated in the centre of the cafeteria. They talked about how they had been up until then and Hayoon complained about one of her classes and how she’s going to fail it.

      The chatter in the cafeteria died down when the door was slammed open and Mina stomped in, a bitter expression on her face. “I can not believe that they made me a stunt double! What does that even mean?” Her voice was louder than it should have been as she addressed her friends. Her intention was most probably to attract attention.

      A smirk crept on Y/N’s face as she realised that she did, in fact, get the main role. She gave her friend a suggestive eyebrow raise as she slowly took the chopstick to her mouth. Her face dropped when she heard the stomping approaching her. “Hey, loser, what’s a stunt double?” Mina’s voice was scratching her ears. How she managed to sound like one of those toys for dogs sometimes, she’ll never understand.

      “I can’t believe you’ve auditioned for a role without knowing what a stunt double is.” Y/N rolled her eyes at the other girl and a few people from around them chuckled. Mina’s face caught a crimson colour as the embarrassment settled in.

      “Haha, you are so funny!” It was clear by now that the girl was trying to mask her flustered form by trying to embarrass Y/N back.

      The truth was that she didn’t mean to make fun of her. She just let her first thoughts leave her mouth. “I wasn’t trying to be funny.” A sigh left her lips. “A stunt double is a person that executes all the dangerous or action scenes for the main actor so they don’t get injured. Stunt doubles are usually gymnasts, people that know martial arts and all that jazz. They probably chose you because of your dance background.”

      “I can’t believe it. Not only they didn’t give me the role, but they are also going to use me to protect you?” Mina had an annoyed expression.

      “Oh please! Did you really think they were going to choose you? You entered that room without even knowing the concept and somehow managed to get the feel right a couple of times. Meanwhile, some of us actually prepared for that audition.” Y/N was fed up with Mina’s princess behaviour. Always thinking that everything is rightfully hers and expecting everyone to kiss her ass. All that just because her father was donating a big sum of money to the university every term. They are donations at the end of the day and she should not be expecting special treatment just for that.

      Mina’s face became a crimson red for the second time in ten minutes and she stomped away from Y/N’s table. The few people that were watching them averted their eyes when Y/N took a look around.

      From the corner of the cafeteria, someone was watching them with a smirk on their face. Oh, how he got just the perfect idea.

            Y/N sat in the second closest row to the professor. She was in “Canto class” as she liked to call it. It was one of the optional classes she chose to take that year. It wasn’t a compulsory class for Theater and Film majors since you don’t necessarily have to know how to sing to be an actress but she took it anyway because she thought it would be fun. And so far it was.

      A loud bang invaded her left ear and she turned to find Han Jisung having his back to her and chatting with his friends that were seated a few rows behind them. She raised her eyebrow but didn’t question it. It wasn’t like the seat was occupied and she definitely had nothing against him sitting next to her. He probably just wanted to pay more attention since he and his friends are always distracted during class. 

      Y/N turned back to her stuff and opened her notebook to take another look at the notes from last class. Soon after the professor entered the classroom and the chatter died down. 

      She was vigorously writing in her notebook everything the professor was explaining to them. Suddenly she felt a touch on her left elbow and stopped for a second. She immediately resumed her writing, convinced that he probably did that by mistake. Not even a minute later she felt another touch on her elbow this time more evident. She ignored it again not paying much mind to it. Jisung’s elbow collided with hers causing her to push her notebook and scribble on it.

      She snapped her head towards him and felt anger overcome her when she noticed the smirk on his face. “What?” She whispers yelled in his direction.

      “Hi!” He did a short wave of his hand in her direction and she clenched her jaw. She closed her eyes and exhaled deeply before going back to her note-taking. She had only five minutes of peace before he poked her side again. She smacked his hand away from her and continued to mind her own business.

      Throughout the class, Jisung kept bothering her and trying to talk to her despite her obvious wish to let her take notes. When the bell rang she got up quickly, her blood boiling and left the room in a hurry hoping she could lose Jisung on the busy halls. As she was hurriedly making her way between the sea of people she felt an arm going over her shoulders and she crashed with the owner of the arm.

      “Why are you in such a hurry babe?” Jisung’s voice rang in her ear as they were practically glued to each other. She grabbed his hand and swung his arm away from her shoulders.

      “For the love of God, what do you want from me Han Jisung?” Exasperation was present in her voice as she threw him an ugly look.

      She couldn’t guess what he needed from her to annoy her to that extent. They were acquaintances and nothing more. They knew each other from that one class they shared and the longest interaction they had was when the professor prepared an interactive class once and they had to work in groups of five.

      He was the university’s “heartthrob” as people liked to call him. Y/N personally thought that that title should be given to Hwang Hyunjin who was majoring in Modern Dance. He was more mature than the rest of his friends, he was friendly with everyone and wasn’t pulling pranks on innocent people to entertain some brainless creatures. But who was she to oppose the masses?

      On top of doing all those things, Jisung was also in a relationship with Mina. Every time they are together they will target someone and will start making fun of them. More Mina than Jisung but he was still entertaining her actions and that made him as guilty as she was.

      “I need to ask you something. Or better, make you a proposal.” He winked at her and she felt an uncomfortable shiver run through her. How disgusting.

      “Ok, and what is it?” She threw him an expectant look and he started looking around.

      “Let’s talk outside where there are fewer people. You got a free period, right?” Confusion made its way on her face.

      “How do you know that? Are you weirdo following me?” She has never talked with him as friends and they share only one class. How on earth would he know her schedule?

      “What? No! I see you hanging out around the university all the time after our class.” She rolled her eyes at his answer and gestured her hand towards the closest exit out of the building signalling him to lead the way.

      Very soon they were seated on a bench under a tree somewhere behind the university. It was her first time coming there. Y/N usually liked to remain at the front of the building since couples usually liked to come there and make out sometimes even fuck.

      “I think we should start dating.” He blurted out and she froze for a second before jumping to her feet startling the man.

      “I knew you were fucking weird. I’m leaving!” What in the actual fuck did she think when she came here. For a second she expected a real conversation but Jisung’s main skills were flirting and making bad jokes. She set her expectations way too high for that conversation.

      She picked her bag from the bench and started leaving only to have Jisung grab her wrist and stop her. “Wait, let me explain. I swear you’ll understand better after.” Y/n wanted to turn and leave but the puppy dog eyes he gave her made her stay and listen to him. Now, don’t get her wrong, his expression didn’t soften her but if he was desperate enough to try the puppy eyes on her then it must be important to him.

      She plopped down on the bench and waited for him to start talking. “Look, I’m pretty sure you know Mina. And I know you two aren’t on great terms. I say we date so you can get back at her for all the things she has done to you.” He raised his eyebrows at her and pursed his lips.

      Y/N was the one that raised her eyebrow next as she leaned her head to the side. “Aren’t you and Mina dating?” 

      “Obviously not.” Jisung used a tone that pissed Y/N off. A tone that said ‘It was so obvious, how can you not know?’ and she didn’t like it one bit.

      “Oh, I’m so sorry! I must have read the signs the wrong way. I mean, it's not like you are always together and you carry her backpack around and you hang out outside of school six days out of seven and kiss before classes and make out behind the university probably right on this bench.”

      A smirk appeared on Jisung’s face. “Who’s following who now?”

      “Don’t flatter yourself. Mina’s voice is so annoying I could hear her every time she talked. When I would turn to see what was up now you two were most times engaged in some sort of PDA.” She spoke fast trying to prove that she wasn’t following him. She didn’t know why she felt the need to do that but the thought of Jisung thinking that she has some sort of interest in him was terrifying. He completely humiliated the last “unpopular” girl that confessed her feelings to him and at that moment the last thing she needed was for him to go around saying she is a stalker.

      “Well, we are getting there. I asked her out and she said that she’ll love to but it’s too fun to tease me. When I asked her ‘What if I get a girlfriend?’ she told me I can not find anyone better for me than her. When I saw you fighting in the cafeteria earlier I knew I found my perfect girl. Not only are you hot, but she also hates you.” Y/N raised an eyebrow at his words.

      “Hot?” Her tone was untrusting as this was the first time someone from uni had said that to her. 

      “Yeah. You didn’t think that guys came to last year’s theatre spectacles because they were actually interested in theatre, right?” A laugh left his mouth at her dumbfounded face as she registered his words. A blank expression adorned her face immediately after trying not to seem so surprised.

      “Well, not anymore.” She let her tongue trace her bottom lip before biting the flesh. “Ok, so tell me what you actually want us to do.” Uneasiness settled inside Jisung as he watched her bored face.

      “Well, I mean what I said. We should date. Or fake dating if you will. That way I can make Mina jealous and push her to run into my arms. I bet she can’t stand seeing me with you for too long.” He looked into her eyes hopefully thinking that maybe he convinced her but his hope was quickly shattered when she opened her mouth.

      “What are you? Five? I don’t want to get back at her and I have absolutely no reason to help you in your sick plan. I’m out of here!” Once again she picked up her bag to leave only for Jisung to grab her wrist and stop her, again.

      “Please Y/N! I’m desperate. I’ve been trying to date her for a year and a half already.” That was pathetic. She had absolutely no reason to help him. None at all. But something pushed her to stay and accept his offer. Maybe she could take advantage of the situation.

      Turning her head towards her she tried to keep a straight face as best as she could. “What do I get out of it?”

      Jisung’s face brightened instantly at her question and he held her hand with both of his. “Anything you want. If it’s possible I’ll do it.” His eyes were pouring into hers and a stupid sparkle was present in them.

      “I guess you were going to do that anyway but I want you to present me to your friends.” The same bored expression that she had on for almost the entirety of their conversation was adorning her face. Jisung was amazed at the lack of emotions she managed to show but she was an actress. Maybe she’s just good at her job.

      “Why? Do you have a crush on any of them?” A smirk was enveloping his facial features and he had a teasing tone. Y/N rolled her eyes at his comment.

      “No. Some of them seem like really interesting people but their only defect was hanging out with you. Now that I have to hang out with you too I might as well start talking to them.” She shook his hands off hers before putting it in her front pocket. “Now I have to go to class cause my free period is almost over. See you later, babe!” She winked at him before turning around and making her way to her next class.

      The next day she met with Jisung in front of the cafeteria so they could walk in together and “announce” their relationship. Somehow he got hold of her number and they texted the night prior about the terms of their little deal. She felt like laughing when she saw how serious he was about it. If he really did end up dating Mina she’ll be convinced that both of them are idiots.

      His arm was over her shoulders as they walked through the tables. Multiple people were staring at them but she decided to ignore them. Upon reaching the table she placed her tray down and took a seat. The people at the table were looking confused at one another and some were throwing Jisung questioning looks.

      “Everyone, meet my girlfriend.” He spoke gesturing with a hand towards her. She smiled at them and waved her hand, muttering a soft ‘Hi!’.

      One of them, who she recognised to be Lee Minho, a Modern Dance major cleared his throat. “Hey. It’s nice to meet you.” He had an awkward smile on. “What are you majoring in?”

      “Yeah, I don’t recall seeing you around campus.” Seo Changbin, a Music Production major added.

      “Oh, I…” She started talking but a puff coming from her left stopped her.

      “Seriously dude? You share a class. She’s L/N Y/N from your Theory and Improvisation class.” The voice belonged to Hwang Hyunjin and she felt a funny feeling in her stomach at the realisation that he knows her. Everyone around the table was throwing him weird looks.

      “You are right but how do you know that? I’m pretty sure you don’t take that class.” There was a trace of embarrassment in her voice.

      “I don’t but sometimes when I wait for those guys outside of the classroom I see you walking out.” He said that with nonchalance taking a bite from his food.

      “And how do you know her? She’s not a Music Production major otherwise we would have known. And she’s not a Dance major either otherwise Minho and Felix would have known about her as well.”Changbin’s tone was almost provoking as if Hyunjin had done something bad and he was about to reveal it.

      “She’s a Theatre and Film major. Last year when we went to all those theatre spectacles to support Jeongin I was actually paying attention to the plays. She had either the main role or the lead. I remember her being really good.” She felt her cheeks heat at his comment.

      “Thank you!” She threw him a smile. However, she got ignored as Lee Felix started talking.

      “Do you know her Jeongin?” She somehow felt offended by his question. Maybe that wasn’t his intention but he should have used a different tone.

      “Of course I do. We share almost all of our classes and last year we worked on multiple plays together.” Annoyance was present in his voice caused by his friends' ignorance.

      She knew Jeongin from the first day. He was the first to speak to her although they didn’t exactly become friends. They kept on working on plays together throughout the entirety of the first year of college but they kept everything mostly professional since they both had their own group of friends and she kind of disliked most of his friends.

      “Then how come you never talk about her?” Now, wasn’t Changbin an annoying one? She rolled her eyes discreetly at his question.

      “Because we are not the best of friends. Why don’t you talk about Kim Gina from your degree?” The youngest question was a good one. They were acquaintances and barely knew something about each other. What was he supposed to talk about?

      “Gina is not hot. What am I supposed to talk about?” The older male said calmly with a shrug of his shoulders.

      The water she was just drinking got stuck in her throat and she started coughing violently. Jisung started hitting her back repeatedly trying to help her swallow. When she finally calmed down she looked at him annoyed.

      “Who she is, is not important. What’s important is that she is my girlfriend” he gave Changbin a side look ”and you have to accept that. Stop talking about her like she is not sitting right in front of you.” A few of them raised their hands in defeat while some of them averted their eyes. Minho and Changbin rolled their eyes.

      She felt her blood pressure spike up at their action. She remembered why she never wanted to talk to any of them. Arrogant pricks.

      “Ok, Mister protective boyfriend. Just tell us when you break up.” Minho took a bite of his food done with the younger man’s antics. Everyone knew that he was in love with Mina. The moment she shows some interest in him he would probably leave this one in a heartbeat.

      Y/N sucked in a breath discreetly. He really got her worked up and she hated it. She put an arm around Jisungs shoulders and yanked him towards her, his face close to her chest. With her other hand, she grabbed the sides of his face making him look up at her and forcefully pursing his lips. 

      “Break up? Do you wanna break up with me, babe?” Y/N’s voice was mocking as if she was talking with a child. Jisung swallowed hard before shaking his head. She smiled at his response and used the hand from around his shoulders to ruffle his hair. “That’s what I thought.” She placed a short kiss on his lips before releasing him and turning back to her food.

      Everyone at the table was looking at both of them shocked, especially Minho and Changbin. She wanted to let a proud smile escape her but she controlled herself.

      For the rest of the lunch, she decided not to engage in any more discussions with Jisung’s friends. She continued eating her food and listened to them talking about things that didn’t involve her, occasionally responding to Hayoon’s texts.

      She was the first one to get up, impatient to go to her next class and not have to see them. “Bye guys. It was lovely meeting you!” She smiled at them, a smile half true because she did like some of them. “Bye babe. See you later!” She grabbed the sides of his face again placing another kiss on his lips before taking her empty tray and leaving them alone.

      The men all watched her as she made her way out of the cafeteria. When she closed the door behind her they all burst into laughter. Jisung was biting the inside of his cheek irked by their action. When the laughter stopped, Seungmin that was sitting next to him put his hand on his shoulder.

      “I absolutely adore your girlfriend. She knows how to keep her ‘babe’ in check I see.” Seungmin tried cupping his face as Y/N did but Jisung slapped his hand away.

      “Are you her good boy, Jisungie? Does she give you rewards if you listen to her?” Minho cooed at him and Jisung held back an insult.

      “Shut the fuck up. It’s not like that. She surprised me as well. Who the fuck knew she was going to do that?” When he proposed the whole fake dating thing to her he thought it would be easier. Looking at it now he can’t understand why he thought that. He saw the way her fights with Mina unfold and he knew she was an actress which meant that she was probably either crazy confident or really good at faking it. For some reason, he thought she would be easier to tease and control but it would be a lie if he said it didn’t intrigue him. He liked a challenge and if the prize was Mina he would try his best.

      “And you man” Chan spoke for the first time “what the fuck was that? Do you know her entire biography?” He was looking at Hyunjin who rolled his eyes.

      “I told you I paid attention to last year’s plays. On top of that, she’s hot. I remember that after one spectacle I and the guys from my dance group at the time talked about her for like a month. She was so..” The man let out a groan and threw his head back trying to explain what he meant.

      “Sure, tell me more. Did you masturbate to the thought of my girlfriend? Perhaps got any wet dreams about her?” Jisung commented, raising an eyebrow.

      Hyunjin winked at him as a smirk made its way on his face. Some of the guys simultaneously let out disgusted sounds at his gesture.

      “But how did this whole thing happen? I can’t remember a moment when you talked about her or when you were together.” Felix’s deep voice rang making everyone pay attention to him.

      Changbin suddenly let a gasp out and dramatically covered his mouth. “Yesterday our little Jisungie sat next to her in Theory and Improvisation and when the class ended he ran after her. I think he might have had a secret crush!” The older man teased.

      “Yeah, but she looked really annoyed with him. Hence why she sprinted out of the class. Why would she accept to date him if she looked like she’d rather listen to Mr Jung talk about the first piano ever invented.” Chan intervened making Jisung shrug his shoulders.

      “She was annoyed with me but what can I say? I’m so charming she couldn’t refuse me.” He leaned back in his chair putting his arms over the back of the chair. 

      “I think she did it out of pity. When she realized you’ve been trying to get Mina for a year and a half now she probably felt so bad for you she decided to sacrifice herself so you look less like a loser.” Hyunjin said his tone way to serious to be a joke.

      Jisung threw the man a deadly stare. “At least I didn’t masturbate to the thought of her like a fucking virgin.” He spat in the other man’s face.

      “Touche.”

[teddy06writes]

sum angst for sapnap x quackity x karl x reader if requests are open, i dont remember if they are, and if u feel up to it

sapnap x karl x quackity x reader + sleepy bois x sibling!reader

trigger warnings: yelling, swearing, character death

this is an in game au so be aware of that

premise: you’ve been on the inside, spying on Shlatt for pogtopia, you thought you had had him convinced that the spy was Tubbo (Who knew just about nothing about pogtopia) but during the festival Shlatt asks you to make a speech... after the festival, things begin to fall apart

(y/n/n)- your nickname

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“And you’re sure about this? You’re positive that it’s him and not Quackity?” Shlatt asked.

The festival was in two days, Wilbur’s plan to blow Manburg was in place, and suddenly huge evidence of things you had berried was piling up. Your entire position as Pogopia’s spy was at risk.

“I’m positive Mr. President. I caught Tuboo poking around in some tunnels, trying to talk to TommyInnt just yesterday,” You lied straight through your teeth, “The log I found behind the files proves it.”

You held up the book, truly a work of your own notes, signed in you co workers hand.

Shlatt took it, quickly skimming through the pages, “Hmmm, this is significant evidence to condemn the kid. We’ll have to do something about.”

“Maybe we should exile him, like Wilbur and Tommy.” You suggested carefully.

He considered it for a moment, a wide jagged grin spreading across his face, “Or... we could execute him,” He seemed to take pleasure in your shock, “Publicly. We have been needing a slam finish for that festival.”

“Shlatt Tubbo is just a child!”

Shlatt glared down at you, “Sorry, what was that? It almost sounded like you were trying to go against the word of the president.”

The threat chilled you to the core, and you strained to stay calm, “With all due respect Mr. President, Tubbo is only 16, and there are other ways to deal with insurgents.”

“Insurgents? As in there's multiple now?” Alex strode into the room, wrapping an arm around your shoulders as you breathed a slight sigh of relief.

“Yes, your partner here has just informed me that our dear Tubbo is a traitor,” Shlatt slammed the journal onto the desk, ignoring the glare Alex gave him when you jumped, “He’s been spying on Manburg for Pogtopia.”

Alex reached for the book, flipping to the last page and reading allowed, “If there is ever a time to strike, it would be during the Manburg festival, though it is worth noting Wilbur’s plan of destroying L’Manburg should be put off as long as possible.”

“When I caught them in the tunnels under the city, they were talking about tnt,” You said, the shake in your voice all too real, as forced tears began to prick in your eyes, “Wilbur’s going to blow it up.”

Shlatt looked at you clearly searching for something, but giving up once you fully began to cry, turning to burry your face in your boyfriends shoulder.

The president sighed, annoyed, “Get them outta here Quackity, I can’t work when there's fucking crying in my office.”

“It’s probably just the stress, sir. I’ll get them home.” Alex carefully led you out of the white house, and you were grateful, unknowing how much of the emotion was real or not.

“Oh god! Is (y/n) okay?” Karl asked as soon as Alex had gotten you to where he was decorating party island.

“Yeah, they’ll uh- they’ll be alright. Shlatt, Manburg, stress, you know?” He eased you down to sit on one of the benches, and quickly Karl moved to sit and wrap his arms around you.

“Hey, I’ve gotta get back to work. I’ll see you guys tonight.” Alex quickly pecked at your cheek, and then Karl’s lips before heading back in the direction of the white house.

“What happened?” Karl asked softly once he had gone.

You sniffled, leaning into his embrace, “Work’s stuff. The festival’s getting stressful.”

“Yeah, well I’m helping Tubbo with the last of the decorating tomorrow,” He paused, “You’re missing Wilbur and Tommy aren’t you?”

You nodded, “I miss them and Techno and Phil. I miss home.”

Your duties as a spy didn’t entail much seeing your brothers, just taking down notes of what was going on in Manburg and leaving them in a remote chest for Wilbur to collect later.

“We all miss home. But think about it this way, if you hadn’t come here, you wouldn’t’ve found me, or Alex, or Nick,” Karl said, looking out at the rest of Manburg, “We wouldn’t have this place without you or your brothers, and even Shlatt can’t change that.”

You smiled a bit at that, “Thanks Karl.”

“And! You don’t have to worry about decorations for the festival cause I’m helping Tubbo with it tomorrow!”

Though it was meant to cheer you up you felt your heart sink lower, he and Nick still didn’t know, and wouldn’t about what would be planned for the festival, but hopefully Alex would understand the burden.

~~

“So why is there a festival?”

Nick had just arrived back in Manburg from a while’s stay in the SMP, and was very confused by the posters lining the streets.

“Shlatt wants to celebrate democracy, so he’s had Tubbo and I organize a festival.” You explained.

He cocked an eyebrow, “And what does Wilbur think of this?”

Nick was still the only one who’d found out about your allegiances to Pogtopia, only by mistake, when he’d caught you making the journey back from the cavern.

“Wilbur thinks it’s an opportunity,” You sighed, quickly scribbling down a new messege to the boys, “Techno think’s it’s a waste of time and energy, the anarchist energy’s been shining through more and more lately.”

“So who do you agree with?” He asked carefully.

“Neither, Wilbur’s gone manic, Techno is- well he’s Technoblade, and Tommy just goes along with what Wil says.” You tucked each note into an envelope, folding them between the pages of the newest set of notes.

You looked up to meet Nick’s eyes, “I’m worried about what Friday will bring. I’ve tried to throw Shlatt off my trail and it seems like it’s working I just-”

You broke off as Nick wrapped his arms around you, “Hey, it’ll be okay. And if he tries anything, I’ll be there to protect you,” He chuckled, “Hell, maybe it’ll be the only time your brothers and I agree.”

“Maybe.” You mumbled.

“Woah! Are you guys cuddling without us?” Karl feigned shock as he came into the living room with Alex.

“I would never!” You forced a laugh.

~~

“(y/n), come on, we’ve gotta go get ready to meet Shlatt.” Alex nudged you.

You sighed, starting to snuggle back into Nick’s grip, wishing the small amount of morning calm would last, “Do we have too?”

“Yeah, you know he won’t be happy if we’re late.”

You looked at Karl and Nick, still mostly asleep, and then back at him, quietly admitting, “I’m scared today could change everything.”

He sighed, immediately shifting back down into be, “I suppose we could stay a bit longer.”

Slowly, the other boys woke up, but the room remained in silence, as if everyone could feel the coming tension, as if even moving would shatter the peace of the day.

Carefully, Karl broke the silence, “We’re gonna be okay guys. The festival is gonna be awesome. Wilbur wouldn’t do anything to ruin it for (y/n).”

“If what they found out is true, you guys could all be at risk.” Alex murmured.

Nick sighed, “I don’t care who’s bad side I get on, it’s gonna be anything to keep you all safe.”

Each of you heard a different meaning behind his words, but still none of you spoke.

“Whatever happens today, we’ll make it through, the country, may not.” You said, voice wavering, but still with a note of finality.

~~

By midday the festival was in full swing, and surprising your older brother had actually shown up for the festivities.

“Strange seeing you here,” You laughed, nudging him, “A celebration of a government.”

“It’d be rude to turn down an invitation ta one a these,” He sighed, glancing around, “Where’s your boyfriends hanging around at, I haven’t threatened them yet today.”

You chuckled, “Q’s helping Shlatt with the last of the prep for the speeches. Sapnap’s supposedly trying to figure a way to cheat Fundy’s dunk tank and Karl’s over there.” You gestured to where he, Tubbo, Sam and Bad were running around at Party Island.

“mmm, hey, uh, your note the other day, you weren’t serious about framing the kid right?”

You sucked in a breath, tightening the grip on the sword at your side, “It was him or Al- Quackity, I couldn’t do that to him. Whatever they’re planning I’m going to stop them.”

Techno look back at the stage warily, “I’ll back you up if I can.”

Soon everyone was being called to take there seats in the audience as you, Tubbo, Alex, and Shlatt took to the stage.

“Well everyone!” Shlatt addressed the crowd, “Thank you for coming to this wonderful celebration of democracy! Things sure have gotten bet around here, I’m gonna give the mic to Tubbo, the main organizer of this event, for his speech.”

Tubbo grinned, shuffling his notecards as he took Shlatt’s spot in front of the microphone, “Hello everyone! I’m honestly so excited to be here right now!”

As Tubbo rambled on about Wilbur and Tommy’s banishment, you stood back, wishing you could’ve stood on the same side of the stage as Alex.

Looking out over the crowd gathered you tried not to let your gaze wander to Tommy and Wilbur, who you knew were perched on the top of a near by building.

“And uh yeah! To democracy!” Tubbo concluded.

You could almost here Alex chuckle as he started to turn to the chest on the side of the stage, ready to grab the materials to box the boy in.

“That was nice, hey, uh, (y/n), dear (y/n), my secretary of state, I uh, I hate to put you on the spot here, but uh, why don’t you come up and make a speech?” You blood ran cold at Shlatts words.

On the other side of the stage Alex froze as well, out in the crowd no one suspect anything, so you clasped your hands behind your back to hide the tremors and moved in front of the microphone.

“Well, uh hi guys! I honestly didn’t except to be up here making a speech today, so I’m not quite sure if this will even turn out coherent,” You laughed, out of the corner of your eye you noticed Tommy tensing, “I remember, soon after I followed my brothers to this land, we fought in a war. L’manburg’s war for independence was long and hard, and I often thought we would never see a better time, but standing here, it is very clear to me that this country has changed since the election.

“This country, since gaining it’s independence has changed my life, and it weighs on my heart that My L’manburg has a ruler such as Mr. JShlatt. We fought for this land, my brothers and I, and here we are today, with so much progress made! So, my friends, my colleges, here's to Our L’manburg!”

Everyone began to cheer, only to be cut off my Shlatt’s harsh laugh, “Oh, (y/n), it’s Manburg now remember? or did you forget while you were off conspiring with your brothers in Pogtopia?”

Tubbo pushed a still frozen Alex out of the way to grab the materials, beginning to box you in.

“S- shlatt?” You quickly turned on the emotion, turning frantically as they caged you in, “Shlatt what are you talking about?”

“Shlatt what the hell are you doing?” Alex asked.

“Oh, you didn't know? Your partners a traitor!” Shlatt laughed again.

Alex turned to you, now trapped between the throne and the mic stand, looking betrayed.

“I didn’t do anything! Shlatt! Please!” Though a few days before most of the emotion had been real, but now you were thankful for your acting skills, blubbering, “Alex! Alex look at me it wasn’t me! I didn’t do anything!”

Down in the stands Nick was halfway to standing, pushing Karl back down into his own seat.

“Or really? So that book wasn’t forged? That chest you used to pass messages? You tried to turn them against me!” Tubbo exclaimed.

“I didn’t- I- I would never betray my country!” You sobbed, forcing tears to leak from your eyes.

“Oh shut up,” Shlatt turned to the crowd, “Technoblade, front and center, get up here.”

Shakily Techno stood, quietly moving up to stand on the stage as Alex backed off the stage, looking between you and Shlatt with mixes of betrayal and shock.

“What uh, what you need me up here for Shlatt?”

“I want you to take care of them, make a public example.”

Techno coughed awkwardly, “You- you want me ta kill m’ sibling?”

“No!” You exclaimed, “Techno please...”

Shlatt glared at you, “Cut the crap (y/n)! We all know you aren’t actually this god damn emotional!”

Sapnap was fully in the isle now, sword drawn, and up on the roof You saw Wilbur clamping a hand over Tommy’s mouth to keep him to keep him from giving them away.

Sighing you wiped away the fake tears, “You have to admit, Shlatt, you believed me, you trusted me!”

Shlatt just rolled his eyes, “Techno get on it, snap too! I’ve got places to be.”

Techno slung his crossbow off his shoulder uncertainly, “(y/n)?”

All the fear from the morning came flooding back, but you shoved it down, leaning forward, to make eye contact with Shlatt, “You kill me now and nothing will change! This place will still go down hill and my brothers will still plot against you! All my secrets go down with me!”

“Shut your mouth and die already!”

Your nails dug into your palms, “Don’t make them watch Shlatt, have some mercy, if you want to kill me kill me, but don’t make my boys watch, don’t make Techno do it.”

“Get it over with!”

You leaned forward, gritting your teeth, “You heard the man, kill me.”

“(y/n), I can’t- you- yo- I-”

“Do it.” You hissed.

Time slowed, and Techno slowly raised the crossbow.

You looked out, past him, over the rolling fields of L’manburg, your home.

Niki out in the crowd wore a look of horror, hiding her face in Eret’s shoulder, who wore a simillar look for fear. Fundy wore a steely expression clearly close to breaking, Sam looked down right terrified, as Bad hid his eyes in his hands.

To your left Tubbo looked scared even though he’d put you in the cage, you were glad it was you and not him.

Shlatt wore his usual evil grin, pupil’s dilated.

Up on the roof, Tommy, your little brother looked horrified, Wilbur still holding him back with a neutral expression, Techno, now directly in front of you, was nearly in tears, your big brother, who swore to protect you, now being your end, it seemed almost poetic.

Behind him Nick was running up the isle, sword drawn, though you knew he’d be to late, Karl, lip quivering sat frozen, and Alex, his face still was filled with betrayal.

You looked up, took a deep breath and then time resumed, Techno pulled the trigger and everything went black.

{(y/n) went off with a bang}

~~

It was cold.

Dark.

You didn’t now where you were as you drifted through a world you barley recognized.

Where was this?

How did you get there?

Vaguely you remembered a festival, your brothers, plus your boyfriends, oh how you loved them.

Your friends had been there too.

You looked back down to see L’manburg, ‘home!’ you thought happily.

You drifted towards your house, a voice in the back of your brain wondering, ‘why am I not walking?’

“What the fuck was that?” A loud voice cut through the air.

‘Nicky!’ you thought happily, following the sound.

“What the hell do you mean?”

‘Alex!’

You entered the room, finding them standing on opposite side, Karl, huddled in the corner.

“You are so fucking stupid! You know that? You let them die! They’re fucking dead because of you!”

“They were a fucking traitor! They got what was coming to them!”

“They loved you!” Nick screamed back, “They loved you and me and Karl, and their brothers! And now there gone! Because of You and Fucking Shlatt!”

What were they talking about?

“They fucking betrayed us! They betrayed Manburg! You saw the fucking acting they did! How do you know they ever loved us!”

From the corner Karl sobbed, and instinctively you moved to comfort him, but instead you passed right through.

‘what the hell?’

You had no time to dwell however because Nick shouted, “Etheir way you let them die! They’d be here if you’d interfered!”

“But I didn’t wooupdy do! They were a traitor!”

“They were trying to save their home!”

“WELL MAYBE THEY SHOULD’VE CONSIDERED THAT I WAS TRYING TO BUILD IT UP!”

“You and Shlatt never did anything but tare this place to the ground.” It was only a whisper, but Nick’s words sent Alex spinning on his heel and heading out the door.

“Fuck you! Fuck you! I am aware that my best isn’t good enough! So fuck you!”

The door slammed, and Nick only blinked a moment before Karl quietly asked, “Why did you do that?”

“What?”

“Now he’s gone too!”

Karl’s voice made your heart shatter.

“You think that’s my fault?! Clearly he didn’t give a shit about us, or them, other wise he would’ve stopped Shlatt.”

“They said we’d be okay! But we’re not!” Karl sobbed.

“I can fucking see that! God damn Karl! What did you except?”

“I-”

Before he could finish the door was slamming again.

Karl leaned back against the wall, staring straight through you whispering, “Why did you have to go (y/n/n)? You only just brought us together! We only just figured it out.”

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL

May 2021 Wk 3

Being a highly subjective assessment of one tiny corner of the interwebs.

It’s a cray cray Friday when Vietnam gets its eng subs up before GMMTV Thailand. What alter-reality are we in? Well, the Vietnamese offerings are better right now anyway. (Oooo, feel that burn.) 

Ongoing Series - Thai

Top Secret Together Ep 2 - pulping it up in the best possible way. Sure sound and production values are pants, and in classic Thai fashion the editing in post is exacerbating (rather than fixing) pacing issues, but it’s still CUTE AF. I don’t even mind the added university storyline, because they’ve got good chemistry (and a confident gay fresher after a panicked gay hazer is an old favorite... what can I say, SOTUS was my first love). We aren’t spending too much time with any one couple, so it’s weighted a lot better than Brothers was, but also character development is slow. 

Siew Sum Noi Ep 2 - Unfortunately, it’s just too hard to find, plus no subs. I’m dropping it in the hopes it comes back on my radar some day. 

Y-Destiny Ep 8 - (Thurs) It’s rough having a ghost boyfriend, half your friends are scared, the other half think you’re crazy, and kissing shortens your lifespan. This was a cute couple even if I wasn’t wild about the surrounding story. 

Close Friend Ep 5: (Dear My Star/JimmyTommy) - about high school penpals. It had to rely entirely on voice over work as the actors only meet face to face at the end. It’s a good thing they are appealing screen presences on their own, with good vocal control. It’s hard to imagine any other BL pair carrying this kinda plot. It’s by far my favorite of the series so far, and I’m not even a big JimmyTommy fan. 

Fish Upon The Sky Ep 7 - no subs. Do we care? Not really. Because we have... 

Nitiman Ep 3 - currently my favorite out of Thailand. It’s the university Thai BL i’ve been waiting for since... when was the last good one? My Engineer? Yowza. Anyway we got: head on my shoulder, baby is a floppy drunk (but still wants to be in control), proximity alert, boyfriend’s closet, seme gets seriously jelly, and a cute twist on feeding him. There’s something fun and complex about Jin’s character. He’s not a panicked bi. He knows exactly what’s going on, he just hasn’t decided if he wants Bb or not. He clearly enjoys being looked after, the compliments, and the attention, but he’s not sure if he’s going to like what happens if he gives in. I like that twist on the usual tsundere uke archetype a lot, cautious rather than willfully obtuse or freaked out. We can see Jin realizing in stages: I like this person, I like that they like me, I like the romantic attentiveness. But in the background is... do I actually want to f*k him? It’s a dynamic we don’t often see on BL. 

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

HIStory 4: Close To You (Taiwan) Ep 10 fin - the most ridiculous show using BLs worst tropes in a sort of weird smoothie of bitter greens and too ripe banana. The ending was the sappiest cheesiest thing ever, like cheese syrup tapped from the cheese tree. So of course I loved it, but I’m pretty sure I giggled through all the bits meant to be profound. Because, in the end, to tolerate this show at all, you just can’t take ANY of it seriously. RECOMMENDED (with some SERIOUS reservations and trigger warnings.) Full review here. 

Be Loved in House: I Do (Taiwan) Ep 1-2 - I don’t mind a damaged seme character but this one is a bit weird for me. Like creepy Cheese in the Trap level weird. On the bright side, the story has given our tsundere uke good motivation for his angst and great existing friendships, loyalty, and likability. Plus I’m invested in the cafe owner/innocent puppy side dishes. So if it’s only the seme character I’m not jiving with, and he’s the most established actor, it should all turn out fine. I believe in you, Taiwanese BL. 

Papa & Daddy (Taiwan) Ep 6 fin - speaking of belief. This such a good show but they gave us a cliffhanger ending. Now we must hope against hope for season two. That’s never guaranteed with Taiwan tho. So, I’m docking a few points and saying, RECOMMENDED so long as you realize it’s a cliffhanger. 

Love is Science? (Taiwan) Ep 1-9 (BL subplot) - this is a good het romance, but the fact that the BL subplot is a beautifully acted disaster bi + confident gay means you’re hearing about it whether you want to or not. Plus they just added in some GL! Come on! I gotta support Taiwan normalizing queer to this extent. They are fighting the good fight and if I also have to watch a career lady and her much younger softest straight boi get it on, too? Twist my arm with that service sub subtext. Go on Taiwan, TWIST IT. It’s on Viki. Join the revolution.   * Incidentally if you actually like the D/s het dynamic of this show, I highly recommend Japanese Kimi wa Petto - career woman keeps a hot young dancer boy as a pet. Oh yes, an actual pet, that IS the pitch. Never doubt Japan when kink is on the line. It’s also on Viki. Go get your kink on, thank me later. (If it helps: That was not a request.)  

Most Peaceful Place 2 (Vietnam) Ep 2 (AKA 5) - love triangles aren’t my thing, but if you’re gonna do it short form, by all means bring in the lead’s other BL pairing so the chemistry is on point. Now I've no idea who I want him to end up with. Can’t they just be in a poly triad? 

My Lascivious Boss (Vietnam) Ep 7 - I’m still enjoying it a lot. It’s still unabashedly queer and the tension is ramping up. We now have secret identity, blackmail, femme fatale, faen fatale, and incoming seme confrontation. Best of all, the series is still airing, which makes it longer than any other Vietnamese BL I’ve seen (aside from Tein Bromance - which is just too weird to count). 

Gossip - Thai BL 

SEVEN PROJECT TEASERS

No one is entirely sure what Studio Wabi Sabi’s Seven Project/7Project will entail. 

It might be like Close Friend (1 episode per couple, no linking), 

or Y-Destiny (2 episodes per couple, loosely linked), 

or The En of Love (4 episodes per couple, linked but independent consecutive stories). 

They’re giving the couple’s arcs separate titles. So each one would be what? Seven Project: Once Upon a Time or the like? We’re in Taiwanese title territory people and NO ONE WANTS TO GO THERE. Anygay... 

Once Upon a Time is the BounPrem (og UWMA) anchor story, and seems to be the most dramatic and likely saddest. These two can handle most of what’s thrown at them at this juncture, so it should be good. 

Vs Love is a BoomPeak (og Make it Right) university vehicle. Since I thought Boom was done with our nonsense, I couldn’t be more thrilled and surprised this pair is doing another show together. I don’t think either of them are the greatest actors but I find Peak very endearing and Boom charismatic on screen, so I’ll watch. 

Would You be My Love is the hotly anticipated SantaEarth launch. They’re a (cultivated) IRL ship and Earth is an established BL actor. They have great chemistry and high energy so this could be lots of fun. 

We are also getting a GL from this series from established BL actresses Samantha and Pineare. Nothing teased yet on that, but I’m looking forward to this installment the most. Also curious to see how the ladies handle the branding and promo side, not to mention the culture. (Thailand variety shows gonna force *girls* to play the Pepero game?) 

Secret Crush on You upcoming Thai BL with no release date, co-produced by and featuring (but NOT staring) Saint and directed by Cheewin (sigh) with all fresh faces. (Previously known as Stalker the series.) It looks like pure pulp and I’m not wild about the plot but could be better than expected as it’s adapted from a novel. Cheewin is an okay director when he has an actual story to follow. 

Don’t Say No the series. Coming from the producers of TharnType this is the JaFirst vehicle many have been waiting for. Friends to lovers + a good boy/bad boy pairing on a sports romance foundation. It’s basketball so they tapped Meen as well (he’s semi-pro). The bad news? You get one guess as to who is writing the darn thing? Yep it’s MAME. So, ya know, expect some slam dunk kidnapping, a light dribbling of rape, and me turning into a basketcase. AKA... 

Will I have to live blog this series in order to survive it? That seems to be the only way I can. So probably. Which means the bad sports puns will continue. Look, if I’m suffering, SO ARE YOU! 

Rumors of a new YinWar vehicle The Best Story (mini series) coming in July. Also rumors that their previously announced Love Mechanics (full length series) has either been delayed, is facing money issues, or is moving studios, or all three. 

Breaking News 

DELAYED (I’m talking these three off the watch list until we get new airing dates) 

Love Area’s release was pushed out but it got a trailer. 

Golden Blood was supposed to drop Weds but comments in MDL report that it is delayed due to C19.  

Love’s Outlet (Taiwan) is supposed to have started a 50 episode run (only 3-5 min each, what utter nonsense). Sadly, this delay is due to a surge in cases in Taiwan which was doing so well, but also doesn’t have many inoculations. 

Bad Buddy has started workshopping at GMMTV actual. 

Kang Insoo’s BTS for Nobleman Ryu’s Wedding is SO FLIPPING CUTE. You have to watch it. Trust me, I don’t rec behind the scenes stuff often. 

Next Week Looks Like This: 

Some shows may be listed later than actual air date for International accessibility reasons.

Upcoming 2021 BL master post here.

Links to watch are provided when possible, ask in a comment if I missed something.