#studying biology my beloved

[hurtcomfortficstilltheend]

Study sesh gone wrong.

Wanda Maximoff x gn! Reader (College Au)

Summary: It's finals week and you are overwhalmed, Wanda helps you get through a rough study session.

Warnings: Academic stress, being very overwhalmed, flow state is a bitch sometimes, feeling cold, hurt/comfort, fluff at the end.

A/N: Wrote this last year before a massive biology exam.

Word count: 862

You get to your room ten minutes after finishing your last lesson for the day. The space is cramped and the air stuffy, so you open the windows and make your bed to feel somewhat accomplished. 

You go to the bathroom and fill up a big jar with water. You are about to dive into a long study session, you can’t afford anything else, and you’ll need to at least be hydrated to keep focus.

If you stop to think about it, you know, deep down, that you are overdoing it. Ever since your academic performance started to be graded (back in high school) you feel like you need to get everything right. Every single exam you have ever taken and every essay you have ever written has either gotten an A or an A+, which for many would mean that you can relax now, right? You have a soft cushion to land if you are to get a bad grade, right?

Wrong! Cause what if you get sick, and then you can’t go to class, and then you fail your exams and have to redo the whole year? What if you get into a depressive episode and your professors think you are just being lazy? What if you get the bare minimum grades to graduate and then no one wants to hire you to be a scientist and then you die of hunger?

You can’t let that happen, and you won’t. If it takes not having any social life while on exam times and finals week, so be it.

You sit down on your small desk and get all of your notes and books out.

Hours pass by without you noticing. Tomorrow you have a biology test and you haven’t had time to study during the week, cause today there was a math exam that you -also- felt totally unprepared for.

You are so immersed in your work that you don’t notice when the door opens and your girlfriend and roommate, Wanda, comes in after knocking a few times.

“Hi babe! I brought takeout!” She notices you can’t hear her. She closes the door behind her and takes a few steps into the room. “Jeez, it’s freezing in here”.

You come out of your concentration induced trance and stare at Wanda while she closes the windows. You notice that it’s already dark outside.

“Hi Wans” you get up from your chair and almost fall, as your legs feel numb from sitting for so long. She catches you though, and engulfs you in her warm embrace.

“Honey, you’re ice-cold” she says in a worried tone. Only then you notice you’re shivering uncontrollably. You bury your face on the crook of her neck. Now that you're out of the flow state, you feel tired, hungry, and cold, very cold, all at once.

“I didn’t notice, sorry” you apologize unnecessarily “I was studying”. You take a step back to see her face. By the look of it you know she’s worried about you. You feel the tears well up in your eyes. You don’t understand why. “I’m really cold”.

“Baby…” And that’s all it takes for the dam to break. You feel the sobs in the back of your throat before you let them out into the air.

Wanda pulls you in again and strokes your back in calming circles. There are no words needed. After a while the crying turns into soft and sporadic hiccups. 

“We have to get you into warmer clothes, okay?” you nod in agreement, without enough energy to speak yet. She hands you a pile of fresh clothes: a pair of sweatpants, a long sleeve t-shirt and your -her- favorite hoodie.

She warms up water in an electric kettle while you change, and you choose your favorite tea from the makeshift cupboard.

You end up eating lukewarm chinese with rose tea while cuddling in bed, because your feet were cold as ice and you got worried that they would fall off if you didn’t get under the covers at that exact moment. 

The lights have been off for a while, when you whisper “I’m sorry” you think she’s already asleep until she asks “What for?” softly.

“I don’t know. I feel like I’ve ruined the evening for you” you admit. your face is resting in her chest, and you can feel how her breath catches. 

“You couldn’t ruin anything babe” she assures you. Her fingers run through your scalp in soothing patterns. She feels so lucky to be the one who gets to comfort you when you show this part of yourself, being that you are usually the most cheerful and optimistic person in the room. She feels special knowing you can unmask your insecurities and be vulnerable around her. “I love you, you know that, right?”

“I love you too” the tiniest of smiles makes its way to your face, you’re so lucky to have her by your side. You forget for a while about the biology exam, and all your studies for that matter. You drift off listening to your love’s heartbeat, with her arm around your shoulders, and her lovely voice in your head.

[nichtimhandelerhaeltlich]

Fics are going on the bottom of the to do list again, school is kicking my ass

[wolfish-trickster]

☆- put this star in the inbox of your favorite blogs. Its time to spread positivity ! 🌷

Right back at you Nex ♥

[sad--tree]

@ my brain stoooopppppppp !!!!!! thinking about !!!!! going back 2 college !!!!!! in an entirely different field !!!! than our current UNFINISHED (!!!!) fucking program !!!!!!

[crescentmp3]

it is pure tragedy that i must pick a numerical path and only focus on numerical lessons and then only on computer lessons in university if i want to be a computer scientist like i hope.

[plethodontidae]

everyone manifest i get to go to puerto rico this summer for an internship 🙏

[norareweforgiven-if]

hey guys, long time no talk. so i know a lot of you are most likely (probably not) still sticking around for the chapter 1 release, and while i have been working on it, there's something far more important i'm writing to you about today.

one of my friends was palestinian, she lived gaza, was born there, and lived there her entire life. she was seventeen, her name was noor, she liked baking pastries and making handicrafts. she loved reading, she loved her cat, she loved watching anime, and she'd spend hours upon hours analyzing her favorite characters and writing fic. she was eager to attend university next year to study biology to document native flora.

since i*rael has enacted a sanctioned genocide against the people of palestine she had updated me and her friends nearly every day on her continued survival. this past week she had gone entirely silent and after nearly six days of asking everyone i could i finally learned from her sister that she passed away after being struck by rubble from an explosion.

she would've survived had she received medical attention.

with the permission of her family, i am sharing her story with my followers to ask you to press your reps and lawmakers for a ceasefire. what happened to her was a preventable tragedy, and her blood is on the hands of everyone who not only continues to support this war but those who turn a blind eye to it.

noor was beloved and she will be dearly missed, please never forget her name and her humanity. the rage and sorrow i feel at her loss cannot be measured up to the rage and sorrow of the people who are suffering to this day and i pray that within my lifetime, their lifetime we see a free palestine.

[catboybiologist]

Hi! I’m CatboyBiologist.

Formerly a femboy, now a trans woman just starting HRT, and a PhD student in molecular biology. I started using this online persona as a fun, shitposty way to explore gender a few years ago. I post selfies (generally sfw, but somewhat sexy, so minors and ppl who don’t like that have been warned), rambles about science, tutorials and advice from the stuff I’ve learned by being a femboy in the past, nature pictures, stuff about the ocean, my adorable grumpy little tortoise, and unsolicited opinions on random nerdy topics. Any pronouns are fine. I don’t plan to socially transition for a while, and still present as a man most of the time, so I’m used to whatever you wanna use for me (for now, I’ll update this if that changes). Please send me pictures of your pets or other cute animals in your life!

As a scientist, I’m also documenting my transition! This google sheet will be updated at least monthly. I also have additional metrics I’m keeping to myself, and pictures that go with this, but I’m not sharing them publicly yet. Keep in mind that this is just one person’s experience with HRT, and may not represent universal trends!

Adding a little something here, bc I think it was an interesting bit a writing: if you want to see me respond to a transphobe about what "biologically female" means, here's a thing I wrote about it. CW for transphobia and discussion, obviously.

Also, if any of my measurements look weird, its entirely possible I fucked up. Let me know if anything looks off!

Here’s some of my favorite pre-HRT pictures:

If you want to see more of my pre-HRT selfies, browse the “femboy” tag on my blog!

And as of this writing, I’m only 2 days after the start of HRT, so here’s a picture with my tortoise that’s technically post-HRT (but with 0 time for actual changes):

If you want to see my future post-HRT selfies, browse the “trans selfie” tag on my blog!

Also here's another really cute picture and fanart of my tortoise by @whalesharkcat:

I have affectionately given my tortoise the title of The Grumpus.

I also wrote a couple of tutorials and general vibes about being a femboy before I started HRT:

Sometimes I make shitposts of myself, I don’t take myself too seriously:

This includes the way I came out on tumblr:

And here’s an overly serious, long ramble about trans thoughts and things that I wrote shortly afterwards:

Later addition: Someone asked how I take selfies, so I wrote a quick and dirty guide with some tips on how I do so in response to their ask:

Oh yeah and apparently I was a 196 microcelebrity? I never to thought I was popular enough for that but apparently some people do 🤷‍♀️. So uh, hi 196 tags, I'm abusing you for my pinned post LOL

As for terminology, I personally do think of myself as a “man who is becoming a woman” as opposed to having always been a woman. If that doesn’t resonate with your experience, I totally get that! But that’s why I freely call pre-HRT me a femboy, while still calling post-HRT me a trans woman. I’m also keeping the blog name as CatboyBiologist for the forseeable future, because at this point, Catboy just seems like a gender neutral term to me.

I’m also trying to put together a script for a podcast regarding how studying biology influenced my perspective on sex and gender- lmk if there’s any interest in that! It’s probably gonna be way too long and indulgent but oh well.

So uh. Yeah. I don’t end these types of things well. Byeeeeee

[courtofparrots]

A list of equipment in Luis Serra's lab and what he might use them for

My beloved mutual @geddy-leesbian put in a ton of effort and got these incredibly detailed screenshots of Luis's island lab, featured in this post, and I thought I would follow that up by comparing what he uses to what I use in my own lab. This was fun for me to do and I also thought it could be used as a resource for any writers that aren't as familiar with Luis's profession.

(for context if you don't know me, I am a microbiologist, bacterial geneticist if you want to be specific. I'll be earning my PhD hopefully this year, and I have been studying biology for 10 years, and actively working in various labs for 7)

Obviously this is a science fiction video game, so while I may be a scientist, I am still using some level of guesswork! This is just meant to be a fun little thing for my fellow resi nerds.

1. Liquid Nitrogen tank

These are used for flash-freezing biological samples for long-term storage. In the context of Luis’s research, he might flash-freeze plaga cells or dead plaga bodies in order to store them (typically at -80 Celsius) without them decaying or being damaged

2. Microcentrifuge

This is a veryyyyy common piece of equipment. You use them to spin samples so you can collect cells out of suspension. It’s like how they spin blood to separate it from plasma at blood donation centers

3. Light microscope

I’m sure everyone recognizes this one but still wanted to add the picture from my lab because I appreciate how detailed and accurate his equipment is

4. Shaking incubator

Used to grow tubes of cells! They are typically kept at 37C (body temperature) and they shake at like 200rpm to keep oxygen flowing through the culture so they stay healthy. You would do this to grow samples of whatever organism you desired so you could run experiments on it the next day (we call it making overnights or overnight cultures).

5. Maybe an anaerobic chamber?

These are slightly less common pieces of lab equipment so I was surprised to see it! We have one in our lab because we do some work on gut-dwelling bacteria that have to be grown without oxygen. As you can see, ours looks a little different so it might have some different uses, but generally the little cube on the right side is where you would place a sample (it’s an airlock) and then transfer it into the chamber. Seeing as Luis has it, I’m thinking maybe las plagas might need to be grown anaerobically at certain stages, I’d guess in early life when it’s really dependent on being in the human body.

I've got some other pictures to compare that I'll also be posting about in the coming days, about things like chemical management plus some other weird equipment things Luis has, but in the meantime if you have specific questions feel free to DM me! I hope this is helpful!

[fantasylandblues]

modern lucemond fics have had a real chokehold on me for a while so here's my attempt at a lucemond college au! (wanted to include some minor jacegon at some point but still dont know how's that gonna go lol.) this turned into a whole ass drabble but just hear me out (and pls be nice!!!):

Lucerys Velaryon (22) is an undergrad student majoring in ocean studies. Aemond Targaryen (26) is getting his post-grad in modern-age westerosi politics at the same institution, the Crownlands College of King's Landing, Westeros, of valyrian tradition.

in his free time, Lucerys takes theatre lessons at school. he has a scholarship and makes the best of it, although he wouldn't consider himself to be particularly bright (he also has some trouble focusing). he walks with the determination of someone who's got places to be, though maybe that's just to appear stronger or more confident than he actually is. Luce's got a somewhat tall build now, but years of being undermined by his peers have worn down his shoulders and his joyful, boyish appearence.

his older brother, Jacaerys (24), is the one who got him into theatre in the first place, although Jace now pursues his passion for the martial arts, teaching children and teenagers alike. he's known for being short tempered among his friends and family, but is as good with those kids as he once was with his little brother during their formative years. they currently share a two bedroom apartment and often hang out at their neighbors', Baela and Rhaena's, sisters who sometimes feel like perfect female versions of them.

Aemond lives alone, but often meets up with his confidant and cool sister Helaena (27) at the campus restaurant. Helaena is an English professor there at Crownlands with a passion for teaching medieval histories. she has the study of biology as her main hobby and is often seen carrying a book or two on entomology which she borrows from the library on her free time.

it's not uncommon to catch Aemond at the olympic pool well past everyone's school hours, swimming focusedly as a way to clear his mind. he comes from a somewhat influent family, the Targaryens, and knows he will soon be introduced to the actual world of westerosi politics, so he gets to focus all of his energy on his studies and training, almost as if striving to achieve the best version of himself. back home, he cares for his pet lizard, Vhagar - named after the goddess of war in valyrian mythology, a name only his sister could come up with.

he's lost his eye and gained that terrible scar in a scrap with his brother many years ago, which needless to say went too far. he remembers seeing Aegon with their father's letter opener in hand, and then waking up in the hospital to his mother's worried eyes. there are days in which he proudly wears unnatural, dark-colored prosthetics, and days in which he just puts in a clear one and patches it up.

his brother Aegon (29) works remotely as a manager in their grandfather's company, a job he doesn't particularly like but was left with no choice but to take. he is still recovering from the car accident that left him paralysed from the waist down and with severe burns along his body. with his little daughter by his side, he's been dealing with this new life surprisingly well, as well as finding a new joy for parenting.

despite being bitter for years on end, Aemond could no longer hold a grudge against him after the terrible accident. they have been finding ways to remedy their relationship ever since.

beloved by his colleagues, Lucerys is easy to talk to, somewhat extroverted and ballsy, even, although he would rather shield from too much intimacy. being gay is an issue he thinks he's got handled, thank you very much, if that means getting with guys in seedy corners and never bringing that up in conversation. people know, of course, but it bothers Jace that he's never ever heard a mention of a special name.

that day, he strides out of the school's pool bathrooms with the uneasiness that's left in the bottom of his stomach after one of those types of encounters. a few swimmers are packing their stuff up for the day, and he looks just so out of place in his jeans and t-shirt.

Aemond knows confidently what he wants, yet is hard to approach for those who haven't earned his trust, and would very much like to mantain that hardened image. but it doesn't bother him that he craves like a human being, that he craves small and he craves grabbable, just enough to leave small bruises where his hands have been, and he would definitely benefit from fisting a handful of those brown locks he's just laid eyes upon. or maybe he shouldn't be thinking that while clad in nothing but tight swim attire.

let me know if this is anything! my askbox is wide open baby~

[faedastudies]

01.07.2024

.

currently studying: cell biology

university has officially started again! I’m only doing one subject this semester because cell bio is very assignment heavy (especially towards the end of the semester) and that on top of tafe feels like a nightmare so I’m trying to not burn myself out.

I have also upgraded to taking notes on an iPad! Upgrades people upgrades!

(( featuring my strawberry matcha latte (my beloved) ))

[cryoculus]

— imagine being loved by me! ⟢

pairing: xiao | alatus x reader

summary: the one where your best friend gives you ten tattoos over the next ten years. the problem? you fall deeper in love each time the ink stains your skin.

word count: 7.1k words

tags: modern au, tattoo artist!xiao, childhood friends to lovers, angst with a happy ending, relationship study, non-explicit smut

warnings: emotionally stunted xiao but i fink everyone knows that already, mentions of needles, there's smut but it isn't detailed

notes: this blog's been dead for Months but i thought i'd revive it with this fic that my beloved @delvalentine commissioned me to make! i love u to DEATH, v, i hope i did your requests justice :')

header art cr: yuca7302 on twt

01.

“Ow, fuck! Can you be more careful?!”

“I am careful. You just have a shitty pain tolerance.”

“Wow, that’s not something you should say to your first willing client,” you huff, trying not to pull away as Xiao repeatedly punctures the skin of your forearm with pen ink and a not-so-sterile sewing needle. “My family could sue you if I die from a blood infection, you know.”

Xiao rolls his eyes. “Something this small won’t kill anyone. Plus, you came here on your own volition, so stop complaining.”

“Are you saying you’re just going to let me die of sepsis if everything goes to shit?”

“Pretty much.”

You didn’t know what to expect when your best friend of several years asked if you wanted a tattoo of your favorite constellation. It’s been a running joke between the both of you that the two moles on your forearm looked a lot like two-thirds of Orion’s belt, and that maybe, in another life, you would’ve been born with all three of its stars on your skin. 

You should’ve known that Xiao likes to blow your expectations out of the water—whether he intends to do so or not.

It’s sundown when he finishes embedding black pen ink beneath your slightly inflamed skin. Xiao doesn’t comment when you repeatedly complain about how much that fucking hurt, and that you’re never agreeing to do it again, but you don’t miss the way his eyes occasionally flit up to the starry sky before shifting to your new ‘tattoo’ as he walks you home.

You don’t think you’ll ever forget that night. How you admired the amateur handiwork in the soft glow of your nightlight while thinking about the boy who gave you a star fashioned with his own fingers where others would’ve given flowers instead.

But then you remember Xiao is nothing but your best friend, and it’s a little…weird to be thinking about him like that. 

Must be the sepsis fucking with my head, you muse before flicking off your nightlight, and the room is plunged into pitch black darkness. 

02. 

You’re eighteen when you realize Xiao is completely serious about this tattooing business.

It comes as a not-so-pleasant surprise to you one day when your high school’s guidance counselor approaches you while you’re hurrying over to your next class—asking if you’ve seen Xiao around these days because apparently, your best friend hasn’t been attending his classes for a better part of the semester. 

Of course, you receive the news with a scowl. While you don’t exactly see him all that much at school because of how different your schedules are, you never expected to find out he’s been playing hooky all this time. 

You don’t particularly like sticking your nose into other people’s business—especially not Xiao’s, since you know how he likes to keep to himself better than most. But for some reason, you aren’t able to resist, and end up calling him after excusing yourself from your two-hour Biology lecture. 

Once your classes are done, you head over to a nearby tattoo parlor whose address Xiao texted to you right after you squeezed his whereabouts out of him during that phone call. It’s located in one of the more run-down parts of town that your parents would’ve detested Xiao for inviting you to. But whatever prejudice you might’ve had about the denizens of this district all go up in smoke once you meet the owner herself.

“You should’a seen Xiao practicing with our machines a few months ago!” Beidou, as Xiao had sheepishly introduced earlier, barks out a laugh before slinging an arm around your best friend’s shoulders. “Said there’s someone he wanted to give permanent tatts to. I’m guessing you’re the guest of honor?”

“Beidou,” Xiao groans. “It’s not a big deal. I already practiced on her before.”

You don’t completely catch it when Beidou makes an inappropriate joke as a response to what Xiao just said—eyes trained on the fading dot on your forearm. It’s been two years since Xiao gave you your first ‘tattoo’, and even if the receding ink makes it look like one of Orion’s stars are starting to die out, it’s still there.

“Okay,” you say in the middle of their bickering, startling both Xiao and Beidou in the process. “I’ll let him ink me if he wants to.”

Xiao stares at you with brows furrowed. “You sure?”

No, you’re not sure because as much as you want to support Xiao in what seems to be a budding passion of his, you’re certain that your father is going to kill you when he sees a full-blown tattoo on any part of your body. You barely got away with the artificial mole that Xiao did for you a few years back.

“Positive.” You back your words up with an indignant huff before sifting through the pre-made designs on Beidou’s catalog. “You just have to put it somewhere not everyone can see, I guess.”

Beidou snorts out another jarring laugh when Xiao clicks his tongue to alleviate the embarrassment that’s painting his face just a touch of red. 

Earlier in the day, you intended to scold your best friend for not taking his studies seriously, but ended up going home that day with a new piece inked onto the skin of your left hip: a little spruce twig that you last remember seeing in your old hometown—years before you even met Xiao. 

There’s no particular meaning behind it, apart from a hint of sentimentality and rebelliousness. It’s your first actual tattoo, and one of your best friends gave it to you, free of charge. Even if it hurts ten times more than Xiao’s novice needle method from two years ago, you end up loving it more than you thought. One time, you stare at Xiao’s intricate handiwork in the mirror for so long that you nearly run late for your first class of the day. 

(Another thing that makes this particular piece memorable is the process itself.

Xiao is a person who’s always been startlingly precise in everything he decides to put his head into. When you learned that he wanted to become a tattoo artist, you instantly felt like there’s no other path more perfect for him than this.

Yet you couldn’t help but notice how his fingers sometimes trembled as he gave you your first piece—with you lying chest-down on Beidou’s tattoo chair in nothing but your shirt and underwear. It shouldn’t have been strange. Xiao has seen you dressed down like this dozens of times before. 

But when all’s said and done, he refused to meet your eyes, and you don’t have the slightest clue why.)

03.

You just can’t stop staring when you see Xiao’s half-sleeve for the first time.

It’s meant to be a phoenix, he said, but you can’t really see it because the patterns are too abstract to make sense of. Still, the azure ink sits nicely on top of his built bicep, and you have to tell yourself that you’re just trying to find the stupid phoenix as an excuse to keep ogling him.

Thankfully, your weird fascination lasts for only about a week until you’re back to shitting on him like you always do. 

By some miracle, Xiao manages to graduate high school despite being on probation from his excessive absences. He’s actually smart if he makes the effort to hit the books, but you’re not sure if he’s planning on going to college with how comfortable he is with being one of Beidou’s most in-demand tattoo artists. 

You ask him about his future plans at a party being thrown by the previous captain of the football team in his parents’ lavish penthouse somewhere uptown. It took a great deal to force Xiao into tagging along with you as your plus one, and you’re going to make good on his acquiescence by interrogating him about things he normally skirts around.

“I told you, I didn’t take any entrance exams,” he grumbles against the rim of his red cup. “I’m managing just fine working for Beidou, so I don’t see any reason to go to college.”

You’re about to argue that Beidou’s tattoo parlor won’t be open forever, and that he needs to think about broadening his career options until a bunch of girls with linked arms shuffle closer to where you and Xiao were lounging on the couch. You don’t talk to them a lot, but everyone in your grade knows the infamous Pyro Trio.

“Hey, Xiaooo,” Hu Tao drawls with a smirk, pushing up her sleeve to reveal the branches of a cherry blossom tattooed on the delicate skin of her arm. Behind her, Xiangling and Xinyan snicker like it’s some sort of inside joke. 

You intend to shift your gaze elsewhere. Clearly, you’re not the person these girls want to speak with. But the sight of the ink on Hu Tao’s skin makes the back of your neck prickle with misplaced irritation. Xiao must’ve been the one who did her piece, which shouldn’t be a surprise. Though he’s this year’s most notable absentee, rumors about Xiao’s handiwork haven’t gone unnoticed among the students in your (now) alma mater. 

That doesn’t mean you have to like the idea of your best friend inking other people that aren't you, though.

You decide to excuse yourself from Xiao’s company—given that Hu Tao is giving him plenty of attention already as is. Your best friend utters something you don’t quite catch as you walk away, and you don’t bother turning around to ask him to repeat himself.

(As you stuff your face with shot after shot, you force yourself to just keep dancing to the rhythm of whatever song is blaring to the speakers. You didn’t give two shits about the fact that Hu Tao keeps feeling up the stupid phoenix tattoo on Xiao’s arm. Nor did you care about the fact that your best friend—who’s normally evasive when it comes to casual contact—seems like he doesn’t mind at all.)

The night ends with Xiao begrudgingly getting behind the wheel of your car, since you’re obviously in no state to be driving anyone home. When he announces that he’ll bring you back to your apartment, you slur out a drunken protest—asking if he can take you to the tattoo parlor instead.

“What?” he asks incredulously. “Why?”

You huff, curling in on yourself on the passenger seat. “The cherry blossoms you gave Hu Tao were ugly as shit. You can do a better piece on me. Y’know, as practice.” 

Both of you know that you’re bluffing. Xiao’s pieces are one of the most intricate you’ve ever seen, even if he is a rookie tattoo artist, and that you don’t have a lot of points of reference to compare to. But instead of taking offense at your mindless jab at his work, Xiao slots the keys into the ignition with a defeated sigh.

“Fine. You mentioned wanting spider lilies a while back,” he says before propping his arm against the car seat as he backed up on the street. It’s the perfect angle to moon over his not-so-phoenix tattoo, and if you were any more intoxicated, you would’ve reached out and squeezed his arm. 

“Where do you want it?”

You know he meant to ask where you wanted him to put your prospective tattoo, but the question sends your mind straight into the gutter. Thankfully, you still have some semblance of coherence lingering in your drunk thoughts, and you answer with:

“Right hip. Opposite end of the spruce twig.”

When Xiao heaves another sigh and steps on the gas pedal, you don’t think much of it—still convinced it’s completely normal to expose such intimate parts of yourself to your best friend so he can tattoo a fucking flower just above the swell of your thigh.

04.

“You have been watching way too much anime.”

“Come on! At least I’m not having you tattoo the names of my shitty ex-boyfriends on my ass, right? Just give me my modified Tanjiro hanafuda and Fullmetal Alchemist flamel!”

“...Is this your way of coping with taking up a nursing course? Is it that stressful?”

You whine as you hold your phone closer to your ear, already picturing the look of disbelief in Xiao’s face when you asked when he’s free to give you your next tattoos. You still go to college in the same city, but it’s been weeks since you last saw him. 

“You have no idea,” you groan. “It’s like my first year, and I’m already burned out! How is that even possible?”

Your best friend grunts on the other line. “Maybe if you stopped being such a perfectionist, then maybe you’ll learn to be more content. Less stress on your part, too.”

“Ah, no can do. I never do anything that isn’t perfect,” you chuckle. “

“Yeah, I saw you score at the top of your class during your, uh… what was it again? Biochem exam?” 

For someone who doesn’t exactly give a damn about anything outside tattooing and other similar forms of artistry, you find it endearing to know Xiao actually remembers all the things you rant about in the wee hours of the morning. You don’t hate biochem, but if you have to draw another chemical configuration, you might just pop a vein. 

“Okay, let’s say I agree to tattoo those weird doodles you sent,” Xiao propositions, “do you even have any free days? You usually study on weekends, right? I don’t think you’re free to drop by the shop even if you wanted to.”

Fuck. He’s right. You still have a few major exams coming up in the next two weeks. If you wait that long until you get your silly weeaboo tattoos from Xiao, you would’ve already gotten over your momentary hyperfixation on the TV shows that were salvaging your sanity in the middle of the semester. It wouldn’t feel as thrilling to get them anymore.

“I’m free…” You trail off, eyes darting to the digital clock by your desk then to the course notes you have opened on your laptop. You haven’t studied as much as you wanted to for your upcoming anatomy test, but…

“Right now, actually. Can you pick me up?”

You can hear him frowning. “Don’t you have a car?”

“I do, but I don’t wanna drive when I have plastic wrap all over my body.” 

“You’re exaggerating. It’s not all over your—”

“Jesus, get the hint, Xiao. I miss my best friend, and I want to have a quiet evening cruise on his motorcycle before he gets me inked again!” 

Xiao falls silent, and this time, you’re having some difficulty picturing what expression he’s wearing on his face. You like to think you’ve startled your un-startle-able best friend, but that’s pushing your influence too much. 

“Okay,” he says, more agreeable than you thought he’d be. “I’ll be there in thirty. Don’t you dare fall asleep on me.”

05. 

When you introduce your first serious boyfriend in a while to Xiao, you’re a bit annoyed with how prickly he’s being. 

Sure, it’s wired into his system to be the snarky asshole everyone knows and loves, but if there’s anyone else who knows about the tragedy that is your love life better than yourself, it’s Xiao. When you finally land a decent guy to settle down with, you at least expect him to be a bit more supportive.  

“Actually, we came here ‘cause we planned on getting matching tattoos,” your boyfriend, Yin, explains with a dimpled smile. “Isn’t that right?”

You stifle a soft laugh, a bit embarrassed to agree, but too in love with your boyfriend to protest. 

A few years ago, you distinctly remember drunkenly rambling to Xiao about how stupid it is to get couple tattoos especially when relationships these days are built on flimsy foundations. 

If you break up, what then? You have a physical reminder of that person on your body for eternity? No fucking thanks!

“Sorry, we’re closed right now, as you can see,” Xiao grunts before jabbing his thumb at the sign he just turned at the door. “You can try some other time, though.”

At the time, you were pissed at Xiao for denying your little request. He always agreed to ink you during ungodly hours of the day, but now he’s playing the ‘shop’s closed’ card just because he doesn’t like your boyfriend?

But then, you end up grateful for his attitude exactly a month later. 

“Fucking cheated on me with some bitch from his Physics lecture,” you sniffle on Xiao’s ratty sofa as he makes you some tea in his kitchen. “I can’t believe I nearly tattooed our anniversary on my wrist! I would’ve had to fucking amputate it in the end.”

Xiao sighs before placing a piping hot cup of honey lemon in front of you on his coffee table—crossing his legs together. He doesn’t tell you I told you so, like others probably would if they were in his shoes. Your best friend just stares at you with withering understanding, no matter how stupid the choice that got you here in the first place turned out to be.

That’s one of the many things you loved about him. 

“You were supposed to have ‘XV’ inked together, right?” he asks. 

You huff before tossing some of the soiled tissues you used into the bin. “Yeah. We made it official on September 15th.”

“Well, if you still want the tattoo, you could just give it a different meaning.”

Scowling, you stare at Xiao as if he just grew a second head. “What the hell are you talking about?” Is he really suggesting for you to get the same tattoo that he denied you and your ex a month ago?

Xiao shrugs noncommittally before taking a sip from the tea he prepared for you. “It’s been fifteen years since we became best friends. That’s worth commemorating, at least. Unless you suddenly don’t give a shit about that, too?”

Your jaw hangs agape at the sudden reminder. October 15th. When you were four, you accidentally spilled orange juice all over Xiao’s teletubbies backpack, and when he forgave you on the spot, you crowned him as your first bestie. 

That was fifteen years ago. Holy shit.

He startles when you abruptly shoot back to your feet, earning yourself a perplexed stare from Xiao who just wants you to sit down and drink your damn tea—

“Is Beidou’s shop open?” you ask. “I want her to do our matching tatts.”

Xiao grimaces. “Our?”

You nod brusquely, tugging at his arm. “Yeah, I’m allowed to have matching tattoos with you, ‘cause you’ll never walk out of my life, right, Xiao?”

He’s always been a stubborn little shit, so you don’t really expect Xiao to relent as quickly as he does. You nearly stumble to the carpeted floor when he lets you pull him up—faces hovering so close to each other, you nearly choke on your own breath.

It doesn’t help that Xiao has definitely…put in a few inches of height. Back then, you used to tease him a lot for being taller than him, but now?

“Never,” he whispers so softly, you wouldn’t have heard it if you weren't as close to him as you are. “Now drink your stupid honey lemon tea so we can head to the shop.” 

About two and a half hours later, you’re sitting on the vacant seats in the shop’s waiting lounge—a familiar sting still sizzling beneath your ribcage from where you had your first matching piece with Xiao permanently inked. You made him swear to have his own ‘XV’ tattoo made on the same place, and he makes good on his promise when he emerges from the workroom, wearing nothing but his dark-washed jeans.

Unlike yourself, you rarely see Xiao in various states of undress. The most skin you could get out of him on most days is the lean muscle of his tattooed biceps, and sometimes those are enough to have you staring dumbly at him for several minutes.

Now, though?

You learn that he has several tattoos on his torso—spread across his skin like patchwork. It makes you wonder if he did some of them himself, or if he had Beidou work on them for him. Still, despite the plethora of new ink stains to gawk at, his weird phoenix tattoo remains as your personal favorite.

Along with the newest piece he got not five minutes earlier—the tattoo he shares with you.

“Are you happy now?” he grumbles, letting you marvel at the perfect roman numerals just below the jut of his ribs. “It’s a good thing Beidou gave it to us free of charge, you know.”

You giggle. “All of my tatts so far have been free of charge.”

“That’s only because you’re special to me,” Xiao sighs before freezing up in the next moment—like he didn’t mean to let that slip aloud.

You smirk. “Mm? What was that? I didn’t hear you.”

“Fuck off.”

06. 

Much to Xiao’s disappointment, your shitty taste in men doesn’t exactly end with Yin.

About three months after getting the tattoo to commemorate your fifteen years of best friendship, you meet Kaeya. He’s an exchange student, and you know better than to form any sort of attachment to someone who isn’t going to be in the same continent as you by next year. 

But you let him in anyway. 

You allow Kaeya to get to know you in ways that not even Xiao is familiar with. The smooth-talking foreigner likes to kiss every single one of your tattoos—lamenting the fact that they’re all inked in spots hidden from view. You laugh every time he brings it up, saying your parents are going to kill you and Xiao if they saw any of the pieces your best friend did for you over the last six years. 

“That best friend of yours…” Kaeya muses once he’s done bringing you to paradise and back, smoking a cigarette that makes you wrinkle your nose with distaste. He would’ve been perfect, if only he wasn’t such a chronic chainsmoker. “He’s in love with you, isn’t he?”

You nearly fall off the bed at his bold declaration.

“W-What the fuck are you talking about?” you stammer. Xiao? In love? With you? 

Kaeya shrugs. “I dunno, sweetheart. If I was a tattoo artist, I wouldn’t let anyone freeload my craft as many times as you did—even if you are my best friend. Unless I was down fucking bad for you, of course.”

Xiao doesn’t like Kaeya, but the reasoning behind it is a bit different from why he doesn’t like your ex. He knew Yin wasn’t a good match for you. Kaeya, though? The two of you had inarguable chemistry. The only problem was he was a free spirit that didn’t like to be tied down by commitments—something you clearly struggle with. 

When you reassured Xiao that Kaeya is nothing but a way to scratch a passing itch, he merely scoffed and told you to do whatever you wanted.

Could his dismissiveness be because…he’s in love with you? 

That can’t be right. You’re the one who knows Xiao best. If he hypothetically does catch feelings for someone—much less, you—you’ll surely be the first to notice, right?

Right?

Kaeya chuckles before tracing the XV tattoo along your ribcage with a cold finger—almost like he’s teasing. You roll your eyes before crawling back on top of your midnight lover, kissing him just to shut him up. 

When you drop by Beidou's the next day, Xiao is nowhere to be found.

“Didn’t he tell you?” She gapes. “Our boy’s starting his own shop downtown! He had the soft launch and everything a week ago. I was wondering where you were.”

“Uh…” 

You’re not sure how to break the news that Xiao has been giving you the cold shoulder ever since you got together with Kaeya. But finding out that he put up his own tattoo parlor without even telling you? 

If Kaeya turns out to be right, and your best friend really was in love with you, he sure as hell wasn’t acting like it. 

Deciding to play along with whatever game he’s playing, you make an appointment to get a new piece inked under a fake name. Xiao accepts it right away and schedules you for an early evening slot. You make it a point to arrive twenty minutes late just to get a rise out of him. 

When he sees you at the entrance to his shop, you almost let yourself feel smug about the unadulterated surprise on his face. Almost. You’re still pissed off that he didn’t invite you to one of the most important milestones of his life.

He fulfills your request in silence—the French word for green inked unassumingly on the underside of your shoulder blades. Xiao doesn’t say a word about his evasiveness, nor does he address the fact that you, his literal best friend, are standing in the shop he’s kept a secret for god knows how long. 

When he still refuses to talk, you slam your payment on top of a nearby table—intent on storming out of the building even if he hasn’t wrapped your newest piece in a protective layer of plastic yet. Xiao barks that he doesn’t want your fucking money, and you end up throwing your hands in the air, asking:

“Then what the hell do you want?”

You expected him to blow up in a fitful of rage. He’s never been good at anger management, you knew this well. But instead, he crosses the distance separating the two of you and crushes your mouths together.

“You,” he whispers hoarsely, desperately against your lips. “I’ve only ever wanted you.”

Kaeya calls you multiple times that night—even leaves a text message asking where you are and if you’re free. You aren’t able to answer any of them though. Not when you’re busy being railed into the next life by your best friend of fifteen—going sixteen—years in the same bed that Kaeya just had his way with you a week ago. 

When Xiao’s lips graze each and every tattoo he personally inked onto your pliant body, it’s leagues different from when Kaeya does it. It’s like your best friend is leaving a trail of fire sizzling beneath your skin everywhere his mouth trails along your hypersensitive flesh. 

Even the way he makes you fall apart from a blistering orgasm is ten times more intense than every session you had with Kaeya and Yin combined.

There’s no affection nor is there adoration in Xiao’s gaze as he fucks into you—golden eyes fueled by something carnal and zealous, but you knew better than to call that love. 

When morning comes, Xiao isn’t here with you, and you don’t know which emotion to feel. 

Kaeya, at least, has the decency to leave a note whenever he has to depart early. But all that your best friend leaves you with is a sinking feeling in your stomach, and a glaring realization that you did not want to make when you’re crying all alone in your apartment at the crack of dawn.

Kaeya was wrong. Xiao isn’t in love with you.

You’re in love with Xiao, and you immediately know you’re in deep fucking shit because of it.

07.

It’s two weeks into your mission of complete radio silence when Xiao finally breaks.

You’re in the middle of a pharmacology lecture when your phone buzzes in your pocket. You knew it wasn’t Kaeya because he’d already packed his things last week and headed back to his home country. The bastard even asked you for a quick farewell fuck, but you turned him down right away and gave him a kiss goodbye instead.

When you find out it’s a text message from the same person you’ve been trying to avoid all this time, you’re all too quick to parse through its contents.

Xiao: I'm sorry. Can we talk?

That’s how you wind up standing right outside of his new tattoo parlor. 

You haven’t been able to take a good look at it the last time you were here—too frustrated with your best friend to really make sense of your surroundings. But he’s put up his new shop in a pretty good part of town. You wonder how Xiao managed to afford it all. 

Then again, he’s been working at Beidou’s shop for years. You knew he had a decent number of regulars, as well as potential clients that are highly interested in his work. 

For once, you let yourself be proud of him. Even if he didn’t put your name on the guest list for his soft launch.

Xiao looks a little sheepish when he lets you inside and flips the sign on the front door to give the two of you some privacy. You aren’t faring any better. The last time you saw him, he was balls-deep inside of you—fucking you like you’re the most despicable woman in the world.

“So there’s this…collage piece I wanted to try,” he starts, and you fight the urge to roll your eyes. 

Of course when Xiao invites you over to talk, you shouldn’t have expected any actual talking to take place. That’s just not his style. He’d rather make up for whatever mistakes he made by inking another stupid tattoo on your body, but honestly? You’ll take whatever you can get.

When you saw his sketch of a Statue of David peppered with four-leaf clovers, you couldn’t even dream of parsing the meaning behind the piece. The only thing that makes you relent is an old memory of you and Xiao hunting for four-leaf clovers in your mother’s garden—even putting the effort to plant whatever you could find in a pot in hopes that they would grow bigger.

It takes him hours to complete the entire thing. This one is probably the most realistic piece he’s done for you, and you can’t help but watch the intense concentration on his face through the mirror on the wall as he inks it a few inches above the last tattoo he did for you. 

You’ve never really realized how…breathtaking he looks like this.

His fringe falling across his pretty gold eyes, the comfortable set of his jaw as he focuses on his work, and the soft slope of his cupid’s bow despite how harsh the words that come out of his mouth can be.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

You really are in love with this guy.

When he’s finally satisfied with his work, Xiao puts down his machine before wiping a sheen of sweat off his brow. He already looks so fucking good while he’s working. How is it fair for him to look even more gorgeous right after the entire process?

“Come on, let’s wrap it up,” he says before stretching his limbs. The action makes the cropped shirt he’s wearing ride up his torso a little, and you’re teased with a glimpse of the tattoo he matches with you.

Your heart nearly leaps to your throat, and if it weren’t for the dull sting of your newest tattoo, you would’ve been entranced by the sight of him entirely.

“Sure,” you say, even if your heart is begging for you to just be honest with him. To let him know how you’ve felt all this time because frankly, you can’t keep carrying the weight of your own feelings for much longer.

But then you remember how…apathetic Xiao looked like the night he dared to tell you he wanted you. There was no love to be found in his animalistic gaze, and you fear that he’ll turn you even further away at the slightest hint of more-than-friendly affection from your end. 

You can live with this. His fleeting yet heated touches. His deep, piercing stares. 

You’ll do anything to preserve what you have with him now—even if that means sacrificing everything else you could still dream of.

08.

Sometimes, you think Xiao is making you hope on purpose.

Sure, your friendship was more or less salvaged after offering your Statue of David tattoo as a quiet apology. You’re back to teasing him for all the most minuscule things, and Xiao is back to being your voice of reason in no time.

These days, though, you don’t really have much time to hang out with him like you usually do. You’re in the last year of your nursing degree, and your shifts at the hospital on top of your regular academic workload render you much too exhausted to catch up with any of your friends. Xiao included.

But there comes a night when he visits you in your apartment when you’re busy studying for a tricky surgery exam—a bucket full of fried chicken, and a bottle of sparkling water in hand. What kind of fiend would turn away an unannounced blessing like that ? 

You munch through the midnight snack Xiao brought for you all while forcing him to do your flashcards with you. He knows the drill, anyways. Though he’s been out of school for years, Xiao is still familiar enough with your study habits to be of substantial help during these trying times.

While you’re in the middle of differentiating the different types of sutures, though, he proposes an idea.

“It’s been a while since I inked you with a sewing needle and pen ink, isn’t it?”

You narrow your eyes, taking a swig of your carbonated drink as your gaze flickers to the pseudo-Orion’s belt on your right forearm. The third star has all but faded from view over the years.

“Yeah, why are you asking?”

Xiao rummages through his knapsack for a few seconds before bringing out what seems to be a small sewing kit, and a jar labeled ‘Indian ink’. You gulp in equal parts dread and anticipation.

“I figured out how to make the tatts stay longer,” he says, a gentle smile settling over his face. “You want me to give you a new one? I can even revive good old Orion, too.”

You sigh. Who are you to turn the love of your life down anyway?

Xiao gets to work while you’re lying sideways on your bed, flinching every now and again because he decided to outline the spitting image of the flower vase sitting on top of your nightstand along the curve of your waist. 

Unlike your first experience with manual needling, your pain tolerance is much better. The only reason you’re squirming every time Xiao embeds the ink into your skin is because you’re fucking ticklish. All those years of being intimately acquainted with Beidou’s tattoo machine were all the sensory training you needed, it seems. 

When Xiao is done with this piece, he pulls you into an upright position, making you hold out your arm so he could resurrect the first tattoo he ever gave you. You roll your eyes, but let him do as he pleases anyway.

At this point, you’ll let him do anything with you.

It’s nearly three in the morning when you’re putting away the dishes and glasses you and Xiao used for the night. He’s kind enough to throw out the trash while you clean up in the kitchen, and when he meets you back in the living room to exchange farewells, you don’t really want him to go.

“You have morning classes tomorrow, right?” he murmurs as he pulls you into a firm embrace, careful not to press down too hard on your new tattoo. “Take care. Don’t burn yourself out too much. All your hard work will be for nothing if you end up keeling over before graduation.”

You can’t help it. The soft timbre of his voice coupled with the fond look in his eyes tears all your defenses asunder. As you look up to meet Xiao’s uncharacteristically doting gaze, your chest twists more and more as you keep yourself from lunging in for a kiss.

“You’re such a pessimist, it’s almost funny how caring you sound,” you chuckle. “Go on, now. Shoo. It’s late.”

Before you can push him out of the door, however, Xiao catches you by surprise when he leans down to peck your lips. You stay frozen in place even as he pulls away—smiling so prettily, you can hardly believe this guy is your perpetually pissed off best friend.

“Good night.” 

Unlike the last time he left you all alone in your apartment, you’re filled to the brim with an emotion you can’t quite name. It’s far from the emptiness that made a home in your heart when you thought you were in love with someone who didn’t love you back. But you’re not about to call it happiness either.

Whatever this strange feeling is, you let it sit in your chest for a while longer, and it lingers even when the memory of Xiao’s lips stops prickling against the skin of your own.

09.

On the day of your graduation, Xiao asks you to drop by his shop after the rites have concluded. You tell him that he’s self-centered as fuck, and that this is your day, so if he wants to use your body as a practice canvas again, he’s going to have to wait tomorrow.

You don’t tell him that you’re sulking because he didn’t even show up to congratulate you for surviving four gruesome years of nursing. But you suppose that someone who never went to college in the first place wouldn’t be the best at sympathizing with this particular milestone in your life.

He shows you his latest sketch when you make it to his shop the next morning—and you can’t contain the look of disbelief that colors your features when you realize what it is.

“A bouquet that’ll never wilt,” he chuckles, one finger expertly pointing out the flowers he’s drawn on the neat page. “Orchids and hydrangeas: your favorite. Violets: you press a bunch of these in books every summertime. Pink baby’s breath ‘cause you wouldn’t stop gushing about them at your sister’s wedding.”

You aren’t able to stifle the flattered giggle that spills from your lips. “Can’t believe you actually remember all that. What’s the lily of the valley doing there though?”

“Oh, this?” Xiao hums with one brow raised. “Your mom had lots of them in her old garden. Those are my favorite.”

“And, pray tell, why is your favorite flower going to be permanently tattooed on my body?”

Xiao doesn’t humor you with a verbal answer right away. Instead, he wheels his revolving seat closer to you so that he’s close enough to press your foreheads together. Your breath hitches when his mouth curves into a loving smile you’re starting to get used to seeing.

“Because you’re mine,” he says simply. “Now, are you going to tell me where you want me to ink your eternal bouquet or not?”

10.

You’re a complete sap when it comes to weddings. Everyone knows this.

It’s for that reason that none of your guests are surprised when you end up crying in the middle of exchanging vows with your fiancé. Xiao sighs before taking out a handkerchief from his front pocket, dabbing at the tears streaming down your face. For someone who comes on so tough to other people, you’re awfully sentimental.

“Sorry, sorry—” you sniffle, thanking every single god out there for the invention of waterproof mascara. “Okay, I’m ready now.”

The rest of the session proceeds swiftly. You get to kiss your best friend of more than two decades and call him your husband in front of some friends and family. The matrimonial rites were held in a private resort at the base of a mountain. Both you and Xiao wanted to preserve the intimacy of your wedding as much as you could. After all, you didn’t need all that flashy and grandiose wedding prep to prove to the world just how much you want to spend the rest of your life with Xiao. 

Your thoughts stay the same even as he lays you down in the king-sized bed of the cabin you had to yourselves. He sighs in between kisses as he strips you off your wedding garbs. You’re surprised he’s taking his time with you. Xiao has been eye-fucking you since you started walking down the aisle. It was so bad that even Beidou made a few off-hand remarks about the sexual tension during the reception. 

“I was thinking,” you breathe as he grinds his hips against yours, “of getting another tattoo. My last one.” 

Xiao lifts his head for a moment, one brow arched. “You’re married to a tattoo artist, and you think the tattoo you’re getting after the wedding is your last one? You’re dreaming, princess.”

“Fine. Point taken.” You roll your eyes. “But anyway, I want a dragon tattoo riiiight…here.”

Your husband watches with rapt attention as you guide his hand to the spot you’re talking about—just below the collection of your favorite flowers inked above your waist is a blank stretch of skin. Xiao’s lips twitch into a fond smile as his calloused fingers graze your flesh.

“Still against having showy tatts?” he asks before pressing a soft kiss on the spot you pointed at. 

“Mhmm. You see, my dad doesn’t care if I’m married and have my own life. If he sees that I have tattoos, he’s still going to murder me,” you chuckle. “So yeah, tatts are staying under my clothes until he grows old enough and forgets that he hates seeing ink on other people’s skin.” 

“I’ll keep that in mind then.”

When Xiao ravishes you for the first time as your husband, your chest overflows with love for him. Not everyone is lucky enough to have their best friends by their sides for as long as you did, yet you ended up tying the knot with yours. Although the entire process was more than twenty years in the making, you suppose there’s no point in rushing anything.

After all, Xiao is as permanent in your life just as much as the ink stains on your body.

“Look,” you chuckle once Xiao is done cleaning up in the bathroom and settles down right next to you on the bed, “Kaeya sent us a postcard. He says congrats on overcoming the emotional constipation.”

“Throw that thing away,” your husband grumbles, pulling you away from the pile of postcards on the nightstand. “Why are you even keeping touch with him still?”

“So I can use him as an excuse to get you jealous, and have you fuck me rough?”

“Oh, princess. If you wanted it rough…” he starts with a sigh, rolling his neck with a smirk. You gulp, wondering if you’ve bitten off more than you can chew this time around.

“All you had to do was ask.”

⟢ end notes: it's been a while since i wrote for genshin, so i hope you liked it! thank you sm for reading ^^

[puddle-nerd]

Hì’i Payoang (Little Fish)

Summary: When Tonowari chose you, he chose not only your Avatar, he chose your tawtute body too.

Prompt 15 (Size Kink) for my submission for LunasKinktober2023

Inspired by makdoodles’ good loving on AO3, this is taken from a WIP I’m haven’t started posting yet for a full-length story where an OFC was sent to study the Metkayina people around the same time that Jake arrived on Pandora and had to go through something similar of earning their trust by learning their ways. I did change the tenses around to 2nd POV from 3rd. Na’vi Translation: Hì’i – little (size) | small Oel ngati kameie – “I see you” (spiritually (joyful feeling) ) Payoang – fish Tawtute – human | Sky Person Tewng – loincloth Yawntu – loved one | lover | beloved person Story Tags: No use of Y/N, Female Reader, Size Kink, Eating out, Interspecies Relationships, Interspecies Sex, Metkayina | Reef People Clan, Na’vi Biology, P in V, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex, Creampie

You sat up in your transfer pod and rubbed your face, your eyes burning with emotion as you thought to yourself, ‘What the fuck am I doing?’

You’d come to Pandora on the same ship that had brought one of your older brothers, but instead of staying in the jungles near him and the Omatikaya Clan while Jake took charge of your deceased brother’s Avatar, you’d been shipped off towards the coast where another, smaller tawtute encampment had been built, this one called Hades’ Vault. All because you’d found out that you had a proficiency for marine biology instead of the zoology and botany Tommy had been becoming an expert in. From there, you’d been introduced to one of the villages and had been invited to learn their ways and at some point, you had begun falling for one of the young divers. What had started out with cautious curiosity had developed into a flirtatious friendship until earlier this evening after you’d passed the dream hut ritual where you had been injected with toxins from an arachnid and swallowed a glow worm to induce a prophetic vision. There had been a chance you could have died from the toxins but the vision that you had seen… a tulkun with a missing fin, a young male Forest Na’vi holding hands with a young female Reef Na’vi, a tawtute ship on fire and sinking, and a group of Forest Na’vi circling a body… well, you weren’t sure what to make of it. And you had survived.

Which led you to ‘the incident’ as you decided you were going to dub it.

You had wandered away from the celebration to take a breather, and the diver you were infatuated with had decided to follow you. You had begun to flirt, which had turned into touching which had turned into…

You shuddered as you remembered the pleasure, he had made you feel and pushed yourself to your feet, stumbling slightly. “You good, kiddo? I take it the dream hut went well?” your supervisor asked. You nodded and he grinned, patting you on your shoulder, reminding you, “Take it easy, do your vid-log, go get yourself something to eat, and relax.” You gave him a thumbs up and ate your dinner while you told the video recording about most of your day, holding back the more intimate details. Whoever ended up watching your videos, well, they didn’t need to know how you’d dug your nails into his back and cried out in ecstasy as he had fucked you over and over again until you had passed out.

Fed and showered, you were feeling restless and decided to take a midnight swim. And what better way to swim in the Pandoran ocean than to put on the faux tail you had made for your tawtute body?

Made of neoprene and silicone, the material of your faux tail settled around your hips and stuck to your plush backside, your thighs, you’re your calves in gold and pink and dark purple, molded to look like palm-sized scales, the end fins wide and long with extra tendrils along the sides to assist your movements in the water. It had been a very, very expensive going away present from a group of your friends for your journey since you’d been dreaming for years about swimming in clean ocean water.

It was one of your most favorite tawtute things in the world.

Underwater mask fasted onto your face, faux tail secured about your hips with only a sports bra as your other covering, you let yourself out of the encampment through a smaller security door and out into the night. You swam down into the coral reefs, smiling as you took in the beauty of the underwater world so unlike your home world. You were safe, closer to the compound, a lot of the bigger predators keeping away, but that didn’t stop the shadow from passing over you. Fear of being eaten raced through you and you ducked into one of the coral reefs, eyes widening as you saw a huge shadow pass over you again, though you still couldn’t make out what had caused it.

Something grabbed your fin.

Yelping, you tried to grab onto the coral but failed as you were dragged out into the open water oh so easily, a band of steel wrapping around your waist and dragging you to the surface of the ocean. “You shouldn’t be out here, hì’i payoang, you heard rumbling into your ear the moment you both were above the water.

“Tonowari, what…” you gasped in shocked surprise as he hauled your body up with one hand so very easily onto the back of his skimwing, his grip still secure about your waist as he carted you both to a tiny, nearby island, leaving Hades’ Vault as an unnaturally bright blight upon the horizon. “You are the one who shouldn’t be out here. Didn’t your uncle specifically say that he didn’t want any Na’vi coming close to us tawtutes by themselves? He’ll be furious with you if he finds out.” The diver hummed as his scaled mount neared the shore and Tonowari scooped you up, carrying you, faux tail and all up onto the shore towards a small mauri secured above the sand between huge mangrove roots.

“I woke with your body in my arms only to realize you weren’t actually inhabiting it,” the male Na’vi replied. You flinched, ducking your face so he couldn’t see your emotions. “Don’t worry,” he added, stepping into the hut and sitting down with you laying out in his lap, “I moved your other form into my personal mauri pod and came to see you. I didn’t expect you to be swimming around like a hì’i payoang, though. What is this that surrounds your leg?”

He brushed his hand over your faux tail, examining the material in curiosity.

“In my language, we call it a mermaid tail,” you said. “Mermaids are fictious creatures that would look something like this.” You gesture to yourself, adding, “Only, their scales would be real, not made of material called neoprene or silicon. I had a fake tail created for me before I left Earth so I could swim easier in the water here. Plus, it’s really pretty.” You lifted your legs slightly, showing off just a tad and heard him chuckle. You stared up at him for a moment until he met your gaze, his eyes so warm it made your heart hurt in your chest. “Why are you here, Tonowari?”

His ears twitched and he settled back, getting a little more comfortable with you resting your backside upon his tewng. “We chose each other when we became one earlier tonight, hì’i payoang,” he replied softly, rubbing his fingers over your faux tail once more. “You reside in two bodies, though… but how could I choose one and not the other? I told you earlier I choose you in your Na’vi body. So, hear me now as a tawtute. I choose you. Even if you are so very small now.”

You couldn’t help the giggle that escaped you at his last comment.

Then you looked up at him, replying, “Oel ngati kameie, Tonowari.”

He smiled and bent himself nearly in half, touching his forehead to the top of your mask, replying, “Oel ngati kameie.” He looked down at your faux tail and asked, running his fingers over the material again, “How does this come off, hì’i payoang?” You giggled and with some struggle, you managed to remove it, freeing your bare lower half to his view. His interest immediately stuck as he saw your biological similarities and touched you experimentally between your thighs. “What is the purpose of the hair here?” Tonowari asked, his brow creased in perplexity as he dragged his fingers through the thatch of your pubic hair.

“Oh, it’s, uh, it grows, um, when you – I mean, when a tawtute – reaches sexual maturity,” you say, embarrassed that, while you did clean yourself up down there recently, you hadn’t shaved yourself completely, “and it’s supposed to prevent dust and dirt and germs from… from getting inside to, uh, to prevent infection as well as, uh, to offer protection from friction.”

You let out a whimper as he commented huskily, “You are so small here. So tight… I may not fit… at first.”

Did he mean to…? But he was so much larger than you.

His finger brushing over the hood of your clit with his thumb and pressing between the lips of your cunt with his index finger was your only warning. “Oh,” you moaned, spreading your legs as he pushed in deep until he couldn’t push in any further. Your pleasured little noises seemed to encourage him because he began to finger fuck you, making a soft grunt of amusement.

“You are even softer down here, hì’i payoang,” he teased, “and so wet. I think you like this.”

“Don’t tease,” you moaned. He raised a brow and slid his fingers from your body, chuckling as you whined in protest. He manhandled you out of his lap and onto a cushion, twisting onto his stomach and bullying his way between your thighs. He leaned in, nose snuffling as he scented your pussy, releasing a low groan.

“It’s not teasing if I intend to follow through, yawntu,” he replied, rubbing his nose between the lips of your cunt. “You smell so sweet.” Before you can react, his hot, eager tongue – rough and sandpapery almost like a feline’s – slid along the seam of your pussy lips. Because it was slick and damp with his saliva, though, it felt so enjoyable against your swollen and over-heated flesh and a wail slid from your throat, your hips arching up into his mouth. He chuckled and pressed your hips back down, keeping you still and lapped at you again. “Relax hì’i payoang… I’ll make sure you feel good.”

You nodded and laid back, whimpering as Tonowari pulled your thighs up and over his shoulders, hooking your heels in such a way to keep you open to him. His one arm over your hips and belly assisted in keeping them pressed down and lessen your ability to squirm as he started to lap his rough tongue in the slick trickling out of your cunt. You whimpered and shivered when his tongue dragged over your clit, your hips jolting out of control at the glorious sensation.

“Oh, oh god, oh fuck,” you whined in English, hips making aborted jerking motions against his mouth. “Don’t stop! Please don’t stop!”

Tonowari hummed against you, and while he commented that he didn’t understand your words, he took it as a sign he was doing something right and doubled down, making your toes curl as he lapped at your pussy and clit like a man starved, your whimpers and whines revealing to him what you liked most. Trying not to grab at his hair – it was a huge display of trust and intimacy for Na’vi and you wouldn’t touch him there unless he allowed it of you – you dug your fingers into the woven fabric of the cushion below you. When your breath hitched, he bore his weight down onto you and then it overwhelmed you, your orgasm rushing through you, pleasure so intense you feel close to blacking out as you scream, writhing in his grip. He held you fast, continuing with kitten licks until your body slumped, your breath coming out in heavy pants, fogging up the inside of your mask.

“Holy fuck,” you breathed, trying to catch your breath. “I think that was more intense than earlier tonight.”

Tonowari was still nuzzling his wide, flat nose into your inner thigh as he scented your arousal. Shifting slightly, he eased a finger inside of you and smirked, purring quietly. “Still so small and tight. I think one more will help stretch you further, hì’i payoang…” he commented, kissing your clit and curling his fingers inside of you.

You let out a sharp squealing wail, arching into his touch as best as you can with the sensation of being stretched out sending pleasure skittering like fire through your veins as he slides a second finger inside of you. He feasted on your clit, thrusting his fingers into you at a rapid place. When he curled them in such a way that he discovered the spongey spot that had you seeing stars, body shuddering as you get closer and closer to your second climax.

And then her purred.

It was like having your vibrator pushed up to its max setting and pressed against you in all the right places. It only took a couple more licks to your clit and finger curls inside of your and you came again, the scream you released making your throat go raw. You could feel Tonowari smirk against you as he held you tightly making sure you couldn’t flee from the onslaught of pleasure, rolling his fingers deeper than any human male ever got inside of you.

This second orgasm crashed through you like a tsunami, overwhelming your senses and causing you to actually black out for a moment, this time.

You came to, to Tonowari pulling at your sports bra. You moaned and swatted at his fingers, pushing yourself up on weak arms to sit up. Carefully pulling off the tight material, you moaned, your skin having gone a little red from the prolonged wear. He frowned, caressing the marks left by your bra. “Your tawtute clothing caused you pain, yawntu,” he grumbled. “I much prefer you in a tewng anyway…” His voice trailed off as his focus remained upon your breasts. He groped them gently, blue eyes darkening as he reveled in the softness of them. “I think I might come to enjoy your little tawtute body.”

You smirked until he leaned back down over you and lapped at your breast with that rough tongue of his, sucking the whole swell of it into his large mouth. “Oh, fuck,” you muttered, grabbing onto his shoulders as he slurped upon your breast like a hungry baby.

And while him nuzzling and suckling upon your breasts felt good, great even… he had whetted your appetite.

And you were ready for more.

You whimpered and reached down his body but your arms were just a touch too short to touch him. “‘Wari,” you moaned, pushing at his chest. He pulled back reluctantly. Meeting his blue gaze, you whispered, “I want you. Will you fuck me, now, please?”

Tonowari smirked and reached for the ties of his tewng, stripping himself of the only covering he had on at the moment. The breath whooshed out of you like a gust. He was comparable to your forearm and while you’d seen him earlier this evening when you had fucked him in your Avatar form, in your smaller body he looks absolutely massive. Of course, being that he was over nine and a half feet tall, it would make sense he would be absolutely stacked. Seeing the darker turquoise veiny, little ridges and nubs along each stripe and bioluminescent freckles that decorated the full length of him to the light pink tip of his cock that matched the pink of his nose made your mouth water. The foreskin, however, was a lighter blue and had started to pull back from the pink tip to reveal a delicate little trickle of pearlescent precum tinged silvery blue.

Tonowari breathed deep and smirked, ears flicking forward, blue eyes darkening. His cock bobbed. “I can smell you, hì’i payoang. Are you ready for me?”

“Oh, yes,” you nodded emphatically. “I am so ready.”

This made him smirk and he reached down between you, guiding his cock to your slicked entrance and nudging the head between your puffy lips. “Breathe, yawntu,” he whispered, taking each of your legs into either hand and spreading you wider as he slowly pushed into you. You whined as he slowly worked his way into you. The previous climaxes had definitely helped relax and loosen you but his size is still alot and the stretch of him pressing deeper and deeper inside of your gummy walls stung. You sucked in a shaky breath as he worked himself further into your channel, the pressure of the almost ridiculous sensation of fullness made your body tighten and loosen to consecutively receive his thickness and seizing up to try to shove him back out of your body. Tonowari went as slow as he could, trying not to overwhelm you.

“Oh, fuck,” you whined, clinging to the cushion beneath you with your hips twitching as he inched his way closer and closer to the end of you.

“Don’t force it, hì’i payoang,” he groaned, stroking his thumb over the side of your calf in an attempt to soothe your while he continued slowly sinking further into you. “I know you can take it. Just relax for me, yawntu.” You whined as he continued forward, finally getting to the end of your channel, leaving a little bit left of his length outside of your pussy but you’re stuffed so full and the pressure left you breathless. “How do you feel, hì’i tawtute?”

You panted shakily, whispering, “Need a moment. Sorry. Just give me a moment.”

Your answer made him smirk, pride radiating from his every pore before you inadvertently clenched down on him and his eyes rolled as you squeezed upon his cock. His collected himself and adjusted himself upon his knees, the slight movements making you whimper and clench down upon him harder. “It’s alright, yawntu. You’re alright. Everything’s going to feel even better in a moment.”

Finally, Tonowari began to move.

His first couple of thrusts were measured, tentative as he examined your features closely to see which angle made you feel the most satisfaction. When he shifted inside you and it had your eyes crossing, he smirked once again and began to set himself at a steadier pace, giving off a rumbling purr as he did so.

The pleasure was building up inside of you again as he moved into your cunt with a relentless rhythm that made you whine as that familiar coil in your stomach began to tighten again, a wail working its way up and out of your throat as you slowly rocketed towards your third orgasm all due to Tonowari’s consistent pace. However, as he felt you squeezing down on him harder, that steady rhythm seemed to be unravelling, sweet, hot pleasure building between your legs and causing you to shake and tremble and whine. Your mind was going blank as he rutted into you harder, his hands clenching down on your calves in a grip so powerful it was near bruising. With his sloppier thrusts and his animalistic grunting, his cock suddenly shifted and shoved against the spongey part his fingers had discovered earlier and you began to sob, reaching down between you to touch your clit as he pounded away deep inside of your cunt. He snarled through gritted teeth as he watched you flick and caress your button in the way you liked best, grinding himself deep inside of you and causing the pressure in your belly to intensify to the point of near pain as your orgasm crept closer and closer.

“‘Wari!” you sobbed loudly. “‘Wari!”

It felt like a super nova going off inside your body. Your cunt spasmed around his massive cock, clamping down upon him like a vice so tightly that he only fucked into your pussy with three more pumps before he came with a deep, rumbling snarl. Your cunt grew hotter with your sweet but overwhelming release, pleasure causing your limbs to shake, your eyes to roll back into your head, and your mind to go blank once more, your spine arching as you cum the hardest you have ever cum before in your life, your whole body feeling like it’s breaking apart and being put back together a million times over as your orgasm drowns you in wonderful sensation as his own seed sprayed deep into your womb, so much of it causing your belly to bulge slightly, as if you were pregnant. He moans, glancing down to see you and grinds his cock into that spongey spot once more and you black out.

This time when you came to, sort of because you felt absolutely exhausted and ready to sleep for the rest of the night, Tonowari had settled the both of you into the hammock deeper into the mauri pod. He must have cleaned you up because while you feel only a slight trickle sliding out of your body.

You moaned and snuggled your masked face into his neck.

“Awake at last hì’i payoang,” he asked, kissing your forehead. You hummed again. He chuckled and glanced over at where he had left your faux tail. He smiled, adding, “Perhaps in the morning, we can go for a swim together.” You hummed and settled your much smaller body against his, your fatigue catching up with you. He kissed your forehead again and closed his eyes, snuggling your tiny body upon his chest because he had chosen you to be his, no matter which form you took.

𖥸 · ─────── · 𖥸 · ─────── · 𖥸

Originally Posted: 15 October 2023 Word Count: 3,541

AO3

@pandoraslxna, @eyweveng @teyamsatan @lovefrommeelise

[fandomsandfairytales]

Fic Recs for Elrond Week 2024

Hello! Here’s a last-minute handful of Elrond-centric fic recs to wrap up Elrond Week 2024. (Time got away from me this week!)

These fics are all rated G or T, and I’ve loosely categorized them into groups so it’s a bit easier to parse through them. I also noted ones I recc’d in my 2023 Fic Recs list, which I posted on my main blog, @awwyeah107. I'm tagging each author in this list once (if they have a Tumblr account), although there may be more than one story from an author in the list.

Also, to clarify, none of these were written *for* Elrond Week—these are all simply fics about our beloved peredhel that I've enjoyed and wanted to share/recommend.

Massive shoutout to @meluiloth for putting on Elrond Week! I’ve greatly enjoyed seeing all the posts this week cross my dash. Also, thank you to all of the fic authors, fan artists, and meta writers out there who celebrate Elrond ❤️

Elrond & [Biological or Married] Family

The Complexities of Avian Biology by @runawaymun Celebrían takes on a charity case. Elrond helps, because of course he does. Some Celrond fluff by request. (Oneshot, G, 776 words)

Without depth or bound by waitingfover Love is never an easy emotion to navigate, particularly if you also hate the other person's guts. or Elrond doesn’t like Celebrían’s attitude, Celebrían hates Elrond’s guts, Gil-Galad is determined to play matchmaker, and Celebrimbor just wants to be left out of this drama. (23 chapters, complete! T, 29k words)

Wealth Enough of Joy by @starspray Elladan and Elrohir are born at twilight in summer. (Oneshot, G, 1.6k words. Recc’d this in my 2023 Fic Recs list)

Athelas by erulisse_starchild Estel gets a lesson in herb-lore from Elrond. (Oneshot, G, 831 words)

Hiding Places by @sweetteaanddragons (Drag0nst0rm on AO3) It had been a long time since Elrond was last under a bed. The novelty was probably good for him. (Oneshot, G, 437 words)

Kind as Summer by @arofili (starlightwalking on AO3) Elrond and his family, after the First Age. A collection of ficlets from tumblr prompts, loosely related to one another. (8 chapters, complete! G, 2.1k words)

More than the Stars Above by sweetteaanddragons (Drag0nst0rm on AO3) Elrond had lived without his parents for this long. He could certainly continue to do so if they proved to be indifferent. That didn't stop his hand from shaking when he reached out to knock on the door. (2 chapters, complete! G, 5.6k words. Recc’d this in my 2023 Fic Recs list)

Blossoming Red by @bralesscommie Snapshots of Elrond throughout his life. A character study. Elrond dealing with his trauma, and finding his rare moments of joy. (Oneshot, T, 4.9k words)

Elrond & Friends

Demons by @theheirofashandfire (ScribeofArda on AO3) On a dark night in Imladris, with the Watchful Peace having come to a bloody end, one elf finds that the darkness brings back unwanted memories of flames and fear. And Glorfindel can remember all of the fall of Gondolin. (Oneshot, T, 4.5k words)

Old Swords by StarSpray Elrond and Gandalf chat about Glamdring. (Oneshot, G, 661 words)

Primary Sources by @cycas (bunn on AO3) Bilbo Baggins, now living in Rivendell is working on his Translations from the Elvish and needs some help. He learns a few things about Elven board games, plumbing and housework in Rivendell, a little bit about the War of Wrath, and something about Elrond's family. It might just be that making songs about Eärendil in the House of Elrond was not something that Elrond himself considered to be over Bilbo's head. (Oneshot, G, 4.4k words)

Kidnap Fam

Note: All of the Kidnap Fam fics here are Elrond-centric—either they are from his perspective, or they primarily focus on Elrond and Maglor and/or Maedhros.

And Love Repaid by sweetteaanddragons (Drag0nst0rm on AO3) It was never about owing. (Oneshot, G, 2.3k words)

See How They Grow by @grundyscribbling (Grundy on AO3) Elrond wasn't born a great healer. Some would have said living among Feanorians was an unlikely place to start that journey. (Maglor probably would have agreed with them.) (Oneshot, G, 11.7k words)

Rosemary, Fennel, & Rue by grundyscribbling (Grundy on AO3) Maedhros stumbles onto an unhealthy secret Elrond has been keeping. Elrond is surprised to find Maedhros has experience in these matters. (Oneshot, G, 5.7k words)

Once They Were Wolves by @elentarial (BaccaratBlack on AO3) After receiving an unexpected Midwinter gift, Elrond learns something new about one of his captors fathers. (2 chapters, complete! G, 2.4k words)

Quiet by sweetteaanddragons (Drag0nst0rm on AO3) Dust blanketed Maglor’s harp where it sat undisturbed in the corner. (Oneshot, G, 566 words)

Series

On Elrond Peredhel by @elvinye (leodesic on AO3) A series examining Elrond's kidnap-adoption [and Elrond himself] from a variety of different perspectives. (In-progress series of 13 works, each between 1-2 chapters, all rated T or G. Only AO3 users can read this fic.) (Note: For anyone who does not ship Russingon—like me—the series does contain it, but it is minor and can be skipped over fairly easily.)

Return to Aman by cycas (bunn on AO3) A series of stories about Elrond's return to Aman at the end of the Third Age. All these assume that Maglor son of Fëanor was one of the other unnamed Elves who accompanied Elrond, Galadriel, Gandalf, Frodo and Bilbo on the ship when they left Middle-earth. Point of view is usually either Maglor or Elrond, but occasionally someone else (Celebrian, Lalwen, Nerdanel...) (Complete series of 15 works, each between 1-5 chapters, all rated G. Recc’d this in my 2023 Fic Recs list)

AUs

The Last Homely Hostel by sweetteaanddragons (Drag0nst0rm on AO3) Barin was nearly entirely sure this hostel wasn't supposed to be here. It won't be the last unexpected appearance of the night. (Oneshot, G, 5k words)

we will make this place our home by @leucisticpuffin Elrond and Elros are sent to live with their distant cousins in a house that is crumbling slowly to pieces. They aren't especially happy about this. For Maedhros and Maglor, the twins are a rare chance to start living again. It will take a lot of work to turn a house full of ghosts into anything resembling a home. (70 chapters, in-progress! G, 259.5k words. Only AO3 users can read this fic. Recc’d this in my 2023 Fic Recs list)

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@elrondweek

Other Fic Rec Lists: 2023 Fic Recs (on my main blog)

[wachtelspinat]

Hey ! I’ve been seeing your art going around since your midnight crew stuff and I just recently stubble across your tumblr, thank to your beautiful overwatch art for our beloveds junkers ! I’ve been scrolling through your account and read about your experience of being a former graphic designer who is a doctor now. And damn. I can’t emphasize how much I admire you, especially as someone who is struggling really hard to choose between 2 careers paths ( with one of them being art related ). This is why I was wondering if you would be open to talk about how and why you switched from art to medecine ? Especially because most of the time I feel it happens more the other way around ? ( If it’s too personal just ignore this ask + sorry if you already talked about it before )

hey ! no worries, i don't expect ppl to scroll through my tumblr to find an answer for a question they might have. first of all thanks for your nice words, means a lot <3

i switched from art to medicine because my early 20-something-self was even more anxiety-ridden than my present-self, and being in art school and having to "perform" regularly was a nightmare. i'm talking about a time in which i was so scared of being perceived that i often skipped grocery shopping, just so i could avoid being around people. so like, pitching art related projects to peers and profs was eeh... especially because art is so personal oh my god. i still hate it when someone tries to sneak a peek while i'm drawing, makes me wanna throw my sketchbook and myself off the bridge. anyways so i always felt a 110% inadequate (plus i got a gf during that time who was so good to me and tried to get me out of my funk on multiple occasions (she was and still is an artist and has now a career as a freelancer and i'm rly proud of her) but i couldn't see that because i just compared the two of us all the time and sabotaged any attempt she made for having fun with drawing with her) that i sat down at some point and asked myself if i could do this any longer, and i came to the conclusion that no, it really kills me rn.

what made me go into the health sector? i don't even know anymore, i think it was a mixture of "i loved biology, esp. the human body in school" and "my mum is an icu nurse and talks a lot about hospitals, maybe i should check it out"... it was not a well thought through decision, which is so funny because studying medicine was a hell of a meatgrinder ride (also my anxiety and self hatred? still there, but now i wasn't judged anymore because of my art but instead being called a dumb idiot collectively with all the other students because nobody likes med students) and for some reason i was able to get through that despite it not being my passion at all, but i couldn't stand up for myself in art school. i don't even know if i could work through it nowadays, but the good thing is i don't have to ask myself this question anymore, because being a doctor pays the bills, and ever since i left art school i was able to just draw without consequence. which is nice to a degree, my artistic output is not tied to the means of generating money. on the other hand... idk, in another life with more confidence and less worries, i'd love to be some sort of character designer T_T

so yeah that's basically it. at some times i cherished my career decisions, at other times i regretted them deeply, worst thing is i know it has a lot to do with personality, but the fact that we can't change who we are with a blink of an eye gives me the framework to think that the path i took was ok. as in. things happened for a reason and maybe i'm just not cut out for that kind of work. you have to be aware of the conditions of a job to decide if you are up for it. because being an artist doesn't end with "just draw". i myself had an unrealistic view of the job back then too. and the fact that i could not seperate between personal aspects and "doing a job here" was crucial.

yeah, idk if this is helpful at all. i think the one thing that is super important here is to have a realistic view on the conditions of work you are about to head into, and i know this is mostly very difficult to aquire. because unless you really work in a sector there is often no way to fully grasp the situations you can find yourself in (this applied for me also in the health sector, which made me fall into a depression a year ago, but what do you do after you spent 6 years of studying :') ). doing internships and just trying to get to know a lot of things really helps. and - idk how old you are, but if you're really young: it's ok to switch careers at some point. it's even ok to do so when you are older (trying to end on a positive note here because it feels like i just said a lot of depressing things... like don't get me wrong i like my job, the conditions are just fucked up, and again my personality prevents me from switching again but it's also not that easy in germany, BUT it's a valid thing to do, being versatile is good! just... make sure you don't end up with a job that you absolutely hate because that kills it all)

[hogans-heroes]

can i ask about the learning curve wip? maybe get a snippet? 😊

Of course! My most beloved wip rn, my chaptered Alex pov. I made a descriptive post about it here and posted a snippet here! (with mini visuals). But I'll give you another longer snippit because I love you and your writing! (Also, as much as I love this fic I've been getting stuck with it lately so am writing other stuff atm. Will get back to it very soon).

Alex’s dad was a psychologist, and boy would he have a field day at Stalag Luft III.

He could practically hear his father’s voice in his head as he watched the guys mill around the camp compound, narrating their actions and picking them apart to gently expose what was inside, for their own good, to study them like wild creatures who in extreme circumstances often reverted back to cavemen, to more raw forms of behavior.

He can’t use his words, his dad would say. Because at some point he tried and tried and tried, and they never worked. “To hell with this,” the brain says, “we’re gonna go back to the basics,” and that’s usually physical expression.

There’s really only two core emotions at the heart of a human. If you keep peeling at the bottom of every action and reaction, every visible emotion, you’ll find either love, or fear. And they’re usually connected. That’s all humans are really made of.

So his dad might have gotten a little philosophical too. At least it gave Alex more thoughts to keep himself busy and not go crazy locked up. It was fun in a way, collecting bits of information and arranging them like a child would blocks. That Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry and Biology he had earned before the war wouldn’t do him much good if it didn’t at least help keep him alive for the duration. The camp was only a new study he could apply the scientific method to.

So far it had been going well, and every piece fit together in its place. The one thing Alex could not grasp however, that was driving him crazy, was the two majors from the 100th.

Egan and Cleven? Buck and Bucky? John and Gale? Alex wasn't sure what combination of names he should be using or even who was who most of the time, but the names always went together. Not a single person Alex had encountered had ever used the names separately. The way prisoners talked about them, anyone would have thought they were some dual-soul deity the stalag had built a religion around, yet since Alex had been assigned to their barrack room all his careful study of them had only resulted with a handful of pieces that didn’t fit together. Major Gale Cleven “Call me Buck,” with eyes that could pierce your soul like an x-ray and “just” John Egan. Buck, whose impossible gentleness was at odds with his rock-wall presence at the front of his men, and Egan, who treated Alex like a disease though it didn’t seem to be for the usual reasons, he treated everyone that way, walked around with volcanic ash trailing from cracks that Alex wondered if only he could see. What pieces Alex had gathered of the two of them wasn’t the same as what he was hearing from the 100th. The supposed yin-and-yang duo vacillated like a metronome between hostile and devoted and it drove Alex insane.

Pain shot up his leg and he caught himself on Daniels’ outstretched arm, jerking him back to his body moving one foot in front of the other and two comrades beside him, having lost count how many times they had circumnavigated the camp. They were passing their own hut again and this time Buck was sitting on the steps with his nose in a book, his messy hair fallen over his forehead and long fingers clenching the worn cover with more force necessary for a book on native plants of Ireland (Alex had read it the week before). He remained laser focused on the page with a furrow in his brow, scars on his cheeks contrasting sharply with the soft angles of his face, and Alex jumped when Macon knocked him on the arm. 

“Pay attention man,” Macon quipped. “We’re still on for our escape, the last thing we need is for you to adopt some sad-eyed White boy.”

Alex wasn’t sure if he should be insulted, but frowned anyway. “Buck’s my friend,” he retorted. 

“Oh it’s Buck now? That’s a fuckin’ major, man. A squadron commander with more flight hours than actual goddamn birds and you’re calling that Buck?”

“Just don't get too attached,” Daniels interjected. “The less people we trust here the better.”

The image of Buck sitting in the library with his chin on his knees, gentle blue eyes giving undivided attention as Alex explained some fighter plane or science subject made his stomach twist at the suggestion of not trusting him, or even worse, leaving him behind. Alex had spent most of his life being teased for being too soft, too kind, too trusting. He’d gotten himself in a bad spot several times because of that too, so he probably should be more careful, but sue him, he was tired and aching inside and Buck had actually listened.