#tailor writes

[tailorvizsla]

Title: Eighty Thousand Credits Pairing(s): Din Djarin x f!Reader Wordcount: ~4700 Rating: NC-17, minors DNI please!!! Warnings: Smut, sex pollen, dub!con, unprotected sex, PIV sex, rough sex, outdoor sex, a touch of feels at the end Author’s Notes: Hi y’all it’s been a minute since I last wrote anything for Din! This fic has been in the works for almost two years? A huuuuge thank you to @shadesofshatteredblue, @hdlynn, @bitchin-beskar, and @catsnkooks for encouraging and fanning the flames of thirst and thottiness. I whoreheartedly appreciate all of you lovelies.

📚 My Masterlist 📚 

This hunt is different from the ones you and Din have gone on. 

Rather than looking for a person, the target is a plant. The locals call it the ‘marriage bloom’. Apparently, the fruit has some sort of medicinal value to the population, but no one has been able to find any for ages now. Now, the local farmers are looking for a way to grow that fruit without destroying the local ecosystem. 

The money offered is extraordinary, so Din had taken the job, thinking it an easy source of money. He had found a caldera tucked between two dangerous stretches of forest. After checking it out, the two of you agreed that this was the best place to check – locals rarely ventured into this area, kept at bay by the unstable weather patterns and carnivorous plains-panthers. Because of that, the caldera has remained virtually untouched. If there was a place where the fruit could flourish, it would be here.

The weather is quite nice right now, with a soft, cool breeze whipping in from the north. It brings with it the scent of the forest and the nearby river. If it wasn’t for the ominous clouds roiling to the east, you would have considered asking Din to stay here just a bit longer to stretch your legs and relax. It’s been a long time since you last spent a few minutes in sunlight.

Creeping forward, you examine the bushes growing around you, looking for the vibrant blue fruit. A thousand credits for each fruit, you tell yourself, as you wave a bug away from your helmet. In your peripheral vision, you see a flash of blue nestled in the vegetation. You go to examine it and let out a soft cry of delight.

“Din!” you call out. “Over here!”

As you bend over to pick up the fruit, you notice that the flowers appear to be bulging. Shrugging to yourself, you continue sifting through the fruit, taking only the ones that look to be ripe. You also keep the vague warnings in mind. There are odd side effects if the pollen is inhaled. No one had explained further, saying only that this fruit was why so many married way back in the day. Din comes to your patch of vegetation, and he lets out a noise of approval as he sinks down onto his knees beside you.

“One full basket,” he says, more to himself than to you. “Easiest money we’ll ever make.”

You nod in agreement. Last hunt had been…messy, to say the least. Both figuratively and literally. You’re pretty sure Din’s still picking organic matter out of the intake manifolds.

Taking out your knife, you take a single fruit, flower, and leaf from each plant, being mindful to not take too many. The urge to profit is tempting, but the farmers had been clear – they wanted just enough to plant their own. You note that Din grabs a handful of the berries and places them into another pouch.

“For us,” he says. “It might help us through lean times.”

You nod in response. It doesn’t hurt to research possible alternatives in case your Tribe runs out of medication. As the wind starts to grow stronger, you notice that the flowers are starting to open up. Your hand brushes up against the petals and it explodes, filling the air with a thick plume of golden-yellow pollen. You and Din recoil, but it’s too late. You can taste something green and bitter in the back of your throat as you inhale.

You fall back onto your backside, coughing as you drag yourself away from the hazy cloud of pollen hanging in the air. Din falls to the ground next to you, coughing just as violently. After a few moments of silence, you feel a peculiar burn in your lungs – a slow, sensuous heat that feels like your body is wrapped in a sensuous embrace.

As you lie there on the round, you can feel it spreading through your chest. When the warmth hits your heart, it surges through the rest of your body with each pulse of your heart. In vain, you try to still your thoughts, to calm yourself down. No matter what you do, you cannot focus on a single thought for more than a few seconds. You leap from thought to thought as your heart climbs into your throat.

“Din,” you croak out to him. “So-something’s w-wrong - “

“Ship,” he says back to you. “Med kit.”

Summoning all your strength, you roll over onto your side. The ground under your hands and knees swims. As the two of you crawl back toward the ship, a foot at a time, Din gets ahead of you. He seems a lot less affected by whatever that pollen had done to the two of you. It feels like your armor is constricting your chest, preventing you from breathing. The cottony soft fabric of your undersuit feels like razorblades against your sensitive skin. With each breath, you can feel the lace on your brassiere pull and scrape against your skin.

Up ahead, you can see Din struggle to his feet. As you watch, you find yourself consumed by the thought of him. The way the dappled sunlight glints off his armor. The way his strong thighs quiver under the strain of holding his body up. His broad shoulders, heaving as he gasps for air. It sends a hot, sticky jolt straight to your pussy. You dig your teeth into the flesh of your lower lip to keep from moaning as he leans against the tree, revealing his perfect back to you -

Perfect for digging nails into - 

Shaking your head, you try to redirect your thoughts away from just how perfect he is. You stagger to your feet, and suddenly, things feel a lot…easier? Your momentum carries you forward to another tree, where you lean to rest. As you sink against it, your thighs press together, and you realize that your panties stick to you in an unpleasant way. Fuck, not now.

“Din, we need,” you stammer out. “Need to.”

Need help. But your lips won’t work. Your helmet suddenly feels claustrophobic, as if it has shrunk several sizes. You wriggle your fingers under the edge and lift, hoping to force some air into your lungs. You suck down some air, but you realize the mistake you’ve made when you see the clouds of pollen rising up off your armor. 

Fuck. 

It has to be the pollen. If a single sniff is making you this wet, you can’t imagine what prolonged exposure will do to you. You bite down on your inner cheek. That brief bit of pain gives you something to focus on. Something other than the throbbing heat between your legs.  Up ahead, you can see that Din is slipping further down his tree trunk. You stagger forward toward Din. He needs to be distracted, and so do you. Otherwise, you’re not making it back home.

“It’s the pollen,” you say as steadily as possible. “Need to…need to get to the ship.”

“Yeah,” he rasps out. “Agreed.”

You wrap one arm around him. Din lets out a little noise that you choose to interpret as pain. If you even think he’s moaning in pleasure…a hot shiver wracks through your entire body. Slowly, as you hold each other up, you stagger back to the ship. It’s only a few hundred meters away - you can see it through the underbrush.

“Almost there,” you whisper. “Almost.”

His arm slides down around your waist.

“I’m not gonna make it,” Din says bluntly. “Too far.”

“For eighty thousand credits, you’re going to make it,” you say bluntly, and he groans in response.

For eighty thousand credits, you’ll carry him all the way back to the Tribe. On foot.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t make it more than a couple of steps. He shoves himself away from you. Din grasps his helmet and pulls it off, throwing it aside. Exposing himself to even more pollen. Fuck. His helmet bounces uselessly off a log as he falls to his knees. As you see his messy, curly brown hair for the first time, it feels like everything around you has disappeared. There’s nothing here but you and the Mand’alor.

He stands up. Has he always been this tall? This muscular? You want to look away, to give him his privacy, but you can’t tear yourself away. You don’t realize your hands are moving until you’ve taken your helmet off. It’s a bad idea, but you cannot bring yourself to care. You drop it on the ground. Din freezes at the sound. Your heart skips a beat as he slowly turns to face you.

Your eyes sweep over his face hungrily, taking in his handsome visage. He has beautiful eyes, a strong nose, and plump lips. Beautiful, you think as you wet your lower lip. Your eyes snap up to his - they’re so dark. Dark with arousal and something else you can’t quite name. Your mouth goes dry at his unwavering stare, and you feel so, so small in front of him. Taking your helmet off had been such a bad idea. You take a half-step back.

It seems like your movement sets something off in him. He coils toward you, predator after his prey, as you feebly try to escape him. He matches each of your steps until your back slams into a tree. You stand there, paralyzed by something that isn’t quite fear and arousal, unable to do more than watch as he closes the distance between your bodies. 

“Din,” his name falls from your lips in a whisper. 

“The…the pollen,” he says hoarsely. “Can’t. Can’t fight it much longer.”

“What do we do?” your voice is unnaturally steady, even when the words lodge in your throat like molasses. His eyes drop to your lips as you moisten them again. “What…do you…what do you want, Din?”

Already, you can see the fine red mist climbing up his throat as he struggles to maintain control over himself. He looks away, taking a great shuddering breath.

“O-only one s-solution,” you offer softly. "But we don't have to..."

“Don’t want to hurt you,” he insists stubbornly, trying to back away.

Even that gap between your bodies leaves you with a keen sense of loss and you whine softly. His eyes snap up to your face. You don’t know how to tell him that you need his heat, his body against yours.

“Din, it’s okay,” you whisper to him. “Din, it’s okay.”

Your feelings of respect and affection for him are genuine. You are willing to give yourself to him to help save his life. Does he reciprocate? Does he want this with you?

He stares at you, face like stone, as he considers your words. You struggle to not squirm at the weight of his gaze – you’re so wet your trousers are sticking to your skin, all the way down to your knees. The two of you stare at each other for far too long, considering the next move to be made, the forest nearly silent, save for the sound of wind in the leaves. 

If this isn’t resolved soon, you are sure the medical side-effects will be lethal. And if the two of you do resolve it…there’s a real chance that your budding friendship won’t survive it. Would he be able to look at you the same if the two of you –

“Try to make it to the ship,” he rasps out. “Safer there…for us to…f…fuck.”

You nod in agreement and tear your eyes from his just as the wind shifts. 

Shimmering plumes of gold swirl through the dark leaves and settle lightly over every surface. As you look north, dread fills you as you realize you are downwind of at least two dozen clusters of flowers. Reflexively, you inhale deeply to try and hold your breath, but there’s no use. The fine yellow pollen has settled on your armor, in your hair, on your clothing. You can taste it - bitter and sweet and floral on your tongue. 

You inhale, and your entire body quivers.

“Din,” you whimper, and he moves.

He lets out a harsh expletive. Both leather-clad hands come to rest on the tree, one on either side of your shoulders, as Din leans in. The bag falls to the ground at your feet. His nose is almost touching yours, and you lose yourself in his dark eyes. Your pussy throbs and squeezes with each breath you take. He leans in and the world spins.

Din kisses you gently once, then he slants his mouth over yours. He forces his tongue into your mouth as you lace your arms around his neck, kissing him back just as hungrily. Your teeth clack against his as you grow more and more frantic for his touch. Din Djarin tastes divine. His teeth dig into your lower lip, and your entire body quivers from the exquisite pain. He kisses you again and again. You can hear the bark under his fingertips crumbling as he flexes his fingers.

You wonder if he’s trying to keep himself from touching you. To keep himself from guiding your pants down so he can fuck you properly. The thought of his cock inside you makes you moan. As you’re squirming, soundlessly begging for his touch, you squeeze your thighs together in a vain attempt to keep yourself from grinding up against his cuisse. That causes something to shift and snap in Din. He growls deep in his chest. Your pussy gushes as you start to grind against the hard metal between your thighs.

One hand clamps around the back of your neck for a bruising kiss as he pulls you toward him, tight and hard as an unyielding metal band as he takes control. The other falls to your waist as he pins you against his hard, tense body. Instead of resisting, you surrender to him, closing your eyes as his tongue maps the roof of your mouth. Relief fills you at the promise of satiating the agonizing need threatening to claw its way out of you.

There’s something dizzying about being so utterly helpless, unable to do anything but let your hunter do as he pleases with you. The hungry, desperate way he kisses you, as if your lips are the only thing keeping him alive. The way he grinds his codpiece into your belly, seeking friction to relieve his erection. Lifting your hands, you lace your fingers through his beautiful curls and tug. 

Din growls and you whine your frustration into his mouth. Your fevered thoughts take on a desperate tone - can’t he see that you need more than a kiss? Can’t he feel the way your body writhes and undulates in his hands? Can’t he feel the warmth of your arousal soaking through his trousers? 

“Please,” you beg softly. “Din, I need you…”

Din breaks away, his cheeks flushed vividly as he gasps for air. His eyes are wild, that sweet gentle part of him long gone. His black pupils are blown wide open, his arousal so intent it frightens you. Your armor suddenly feels too tight, constricting, so you begin to shed it. Din has no patience for that – he simply turns you around and shoves you forward.

You land hard on your hands and knees, yelping in protest.

“DIN!”

He ignores you as he kneels behind you. Two big hands wrap themselves around your hips and squeeze firmly, massaging your plump flesh as you struggle to unbuckle your belt. A thrill runs through you when you hear the zip of leather through his belt buckle. Finally, you get your pants down around your thighs. Din slips in the dry leaves littering the forest floor as he positions himself behind you. You brace yourself on all fours, arching your back as you feel the head of his cock brushing up against your fluttering, dripping hole. He thrusts sloppily, grunting in your ear, grinding up against your swollen clit. 

It’s not the first time you’ve had a hunter who couldn’t find your entrance, so you reach down between your thighs and guide him to your sweltering heat. Din braces himself as his fingers tighten painfully around your hips. He pushes in with one deep, devastating thrust. The noise that leaves you is guttural, somewhere between a sob of relief and a grunt of discomfort. 

His cock is nearly too much for you to take. He lets out a harsh noise as he finds the end of you, his body shivering. Then he slips halfway out and rolls his hips forward, seating himself deep inside you, your cunt protesting with an obscene, wet noise.

This changes everything between you and Din. From Mand’alor and loyal follower to…this. You aren’t sure what it is, or what it will become, but there’s no way you can walk away from this and still be the same. Not when you’ve had his desperate mouth against yours, or had his cock buried to the hilt inside you. Not when you’ve heard his needy, desperate moans. A shudder wracks your body, drawing him out of whatever thoughts he had been thinking.

He slips halfway out, giving your body a very brief moment of respite from his too-thick cock. Then you rock back against him in time with his thrusts. He seems hesitant, as if he is just as afraid of the future as you had been. Maybe he’s afraid of hurting you. You aren’t sure, and you don’t care. The next time he starts you pull out, you squeeze around him. 

His hand on your hip tightens painfully, to the point where you know there will be five pretty little bruises there in the morning. Din starts to move, pulling out halfway before sheathing himself completely, his flesh smacking wetly against yours.

Din reaches up and yanks your top open, sending buttons scattering through the dry leaves. Then he cups your tit and squeezes. Your moans and pleas run together into desperate whines. His cock barely leaves you before he’s filling you up again, driving away all coherent thought. You’re so full you can’t breathe. As you spiral closer and closer to the edge, your arms give out, and you settle on your elbows. Din keens and drives his cock in deeper another half-inch, making your eyes roll back in your head. 

If anyone walked by right now, you’d be horrified - you’re spread out in front of your Mand’alor as he ruts into you, both your helmets are off, and the evidence of your pleasure is dripping down your thighs. Biting down on your lower lip, you bury your face into your arms, breathing in the sweet, earthy smell of the forest. Din’s hand moves from your hip to your front. When his fingers brush up against your swollen, throbbing clit, a bolt of pure lightning shoots through you and your entire body stiffens in surprise. You suck in a breath and cry out sharply. The pleasure is intense - it’s almost too much, bordering on painful and prickly. Din traps your clit between his fingers as he strokes and your entire body shakes.

His name falls from your lips in a plea. Your breathing is erratic, spots swimming at the edges of your vision as your entire body tenses tight. You start to shake, tears pricking at your eyes, as you hover at the precipice. It’s too much - you’re not sure how much more your body can take - and with a final brush of his fingers, that pressure inside releases, like a dam bursting open and flooding your senses with pure pleasure. A feral noise escapes you as you finish, sweat dripping down your forehead as your cunt convulses around Din’s cock over and over again. He lets out a marvelous moan as he stutters to a halt. 

Din pulls you back into his lap. As your breathing and pulse slow back to normal, the heat dissipates, leaving you entirely aware of what had just transpired. Fuck. Din’s hands squeeze around your hips and  you know it’s time to move. Lifting your hips, you have to stifle a noise as his cock slides out with a wet noise. A warm, wet rush of cum follows. As you get to your feet, you take a peek back at Din. The crotch and thighs of his pants are drenched with your pleasure and his cum. 

You avert your eyes and pull up your pants. It almost feels disrespectful to see him in such a disheveled, dirtied way. You certainly had no right to any of it, your traitorous mind supplies. Blinking back tears of frustration, you grab random pieces of armor as you find them and stuff them into the bag with the flowers and fruit. When you’ve worked up your courage, you turn to look at Din once again. He’s holding his helmet in his hands, a frown furrowing his brow. As you start to speak, another gust of wind picks up, bringing with it more pollen. Din’s eyes widen as they meet yours.

Familiar heat settles in your belly. His cock - still wet and covered in creamy streaks of cum - twitches. Your insides protest with a dull ache. He pulls up his pants and tries to arrange himself more neatly.

“Ship,” you say. “We can talk later.”

He nods in agreement and the two of you run back toward the ship. Once inside, the two of you lean against the hull. Your breathing is erratic again. Once the two of you are safely isolated, you stagger to the captain’s quarters. The dull thuds of Din’s armor hitting the floor lets you know that Din is following. You are completely naked by the time Din makes it into the bedroom. The last of his clothing falls to the floor. This time, he hesitates. Sudden shyness fills you as you realize he’s watching you, his eyes roving from your eyes down to your toes. It almost feels like he is devouring you with his hungry gaze.

“Beautiful,” Din rasped. 

He closes his eyes and his lips move in what seems to be a silent prayer. Before you can speak, Din pounces, and a squeal escapes you. Din throws you down onto the bed, and as you settle on the mattress, he parts your thighs with one hand.

“Look at this gorgeous little pussy,” Din says, grasping his cock. He traces your soaked lips with the head, circling around your entrance. “Been wishin’...that I could kiss you…touch these tits…cum in this pussy. Make you mine…Have always wanted to make you mine…So perfect…”

His words make you inhale sharply. Does he mean what he’s saying, or is it the pollen? You push the thought aside - now is not the time for that train of thought. Din slurs his words, sounding very much like he’s drunk on something as he praises you. 

“I would have shot someone for you to look at me,” Din breathes, “For you to smile at me…can’t get enough of you…don’t think I ever will get enough of you…”

Din groans as he starts to slide in, spreading you around him in that familiar, arching way that sends lighting straight up your spine. You’re still sore and swollen from what had transpired outside, but you need him. Din changes his angle and sinks in easily, his entrance eased by the cum still left inside you. Din’s beautiful eyes close as he sighs with pleasure when his pubic bone meets your clit. 

You moan and mewl as he fucks into you, but it’s not like how it was outside. Outside was raw and primal. It was nothing more than two people fucking to alleviate the symptoms of pollen poisoning. But here…in the warmth of your bed…you feel more protected and cherished than you feel hunted and taken. His lips trace over your skin, each kiss like a brand, marking you in a way that his teeth never could.

“So fucking beautiful,” he pants. “Can’t…can’t stop myself…need you, mesh’la. Need all of you…”

His breath fans against you, making your skin break out in goosebumps at the intimacy of being so close to your Mand’alor. To be the one who has the privilege of having his cock buried so deep inside them. To be the one with his weight across their body, his muscles flexing and bunching between their thighs. You’re the one lucky enough to have his sweat puddling on their belly, and his cum clinging to their inner walls. A fine shudder travels through your body as you dig your heels into his ass. 

Running your fingers along his skin, you feel sweat dotting his back. Here and there, the texture of his skin changes, and you catalog the location of each scar. If there’s a repeat of today in the future…you want to kiss each one and thank the gods for granting him safety and for giving him these beautiful marks to prove his bravery.

You can feel the callouses on his hands as he skims his palms over the bumps and curves and planes of your body. He’s fucking you, but he’s not taking you, even though you had certainly enjoyed being taken before. This is different, and you wonder if the pollen only encouraged the passion that was already there between the two of you. As Din’s breathing grows heavier, and the tingling grows stronger, you dig your nails into Din’s back. He moans again, grinding his pubic bone against your clit in that way that makes you whimper and your eyes roll back.

Din kisses your lips, and then he bites gently. His tongue laps against the tingling bite marks, soothing away the pain. You wriggle a hand between your sweaty bodies and start stroking your clit. His breathing is erratic - he’s getting close, and so are you. The tingling becomes a fiery inferno, building higher and higher with each delicious stroke of his cock against your inner walls. Din rests his hands on the mattress, one on either side of your head, surging forward and hitting that spot that makes your toes curl against his lower back. Finally, the friction is too much for you to bear, and your back arches, welcoming him in deeper as you find completion.

The fiery inferno turns into a warm, sensuous heat that fills every molecule in your body. You stroke Din’s back and shoulders as he finishes, filling you with spurt after spurt of warm, wet cum. You clench tight around him, relishing the liquid heat inside. For a few moments, Din rests atop you, his weight on his forearms, his cock plugging his cum inside you. You stroke his back lazily, blowing one of his curls out of your face, as he drops his face onto your shoulder. He smells salty and sweaty, but it’s not unpleasant. He smells like himself and leather, and blaster residue. Maybe there’s a touch of pollen there, but you’re sure your nose is so saturated with it that you can’t smell it anymore.

As the sweat starts to cool, Din pulls out, and sits back on his heels for a moment, brushing his hair out of his eyes. You don’t hesitate to look at him, to properly take him in as you see his naked body for the first time. His hair is a mess, his curls tangled and wild. His torso is dotted with sweat. His flaccid cock is covered in creamy streaks and his dark pubes are saturated with cum and your slick. His scarred chest is heaving and flushed red. He’s the most beautiful sight you’ve ever seen in your life, you think to yourself, as he collapses onto the bed next to you. The heat leaves your body again, but instead of cold filling you, you’re left pleasantly sore and sticky.

Din wraps one arm around your waist and tugs you under the thin sheet with him. Neither of you speak as you give into the siren-sweet call of rest. Tomorrow will be a new day, and the two of you can deal with things then. He’s not the best with words, so he lets his actions speak. His hand falls to your belly, while he adjusts the other arm to act as your pillow. He pulls the blanket up around you and kisses your shoulder. You know then that Din cares about you, and that gives you hope for whatever tomorrow’s discussions bring. 

[confessedlyfannish]

Writing Prompt #12

Bruce is reading the paper when the pour of Tim's coffee goes abruptly quiet. It would be hard to pinpoint why this is disturbing if it wasn't for the way the soft, tinny sound the vent system in the manor makes cuts out for the first time since being updated in the 90s. The pour, Bruce realizes, has not slowed to a trickle before stopping. It has simply stopped. And there is no overeager clack of a the mug against the marble counter or the uncouth first slurp (nor muttered apology at Alfred's scolding look) immediately following the end of the pour.

Bruce fights the instinct to use all of his senses to investigate, and instead keeps his eyes on the byline of the article detailing the latest set of microearthquakes to hit the midwest in the last week. Microearthquakes aren't an unusual occurrence and aren't noticeable by human standards, which is why this article is regulated to page seven, but from several hundred a day worldwide to several hundred a day solely in the East North Central States, seismologists are baffled.

Bruce had been considering sending Superman to investigate under the guise of a Daily Planet article requested by Bruce Wayne (Wayne Industries does have an offshoot factory in the area) when everything had stopped twenty seconds ago. That is what he assumes has happened (having not moved a muscle to confirm) in the amount of time he assumes has passed. His million dollar Rolex does not quite audibly tick but in the absolute silence it should be heard, which confirms the silence to be exactly that—absolute.

While Bruce can hold his breath with the best of the Olympian swimmers, he has never accounted for a need to remain without blinking without being able to move one's eyes. Rotating the eyeballs will maintain lubrication such that one could go without blinking for up to ten minutes. But staring at the byline fixedly, he estimates another twenty seconds before tears start to form.

These are the thoughts Bruce distracts himself with, because he doesn't dare consider how Tim and Alfred haven't made a (living) sound in the past forty-five seconds. About Damian, packing his bag upstairs for school after a morning walk with Titus that was "just pushing it, Master Damian".

There is a knife to his right, if memory serves (it does). In the next five seconds—

"Your wards and guardian are fine, Mr. Wayne," the deepest voice Bruce has ever heard intones. For a dizzying moment, it is hard to pinpoint the location of the voice, for it comes from everywhere—like the chiming of a clocktower whilst inside the tower, so overpowering he is cocooned in its volume.

But it is not spoken loudly, just calmly, and when he puts the paper down, folds it, and looks to his right, a blue man sits in Dick's chair.

He wears a three piece suit made entirely of hues of violet, tie included. He has a black brooch in the shape of a cogwheel pinned to his chest pocket, a simple chain clipped to his lapel. Black leather gloves delicately thumb Bruce's watch (no longer on his wrist, somewhere between second 45 and 46 it has stopped being on his wrist), admiring it.

"You'll forgive me," the man says with surety. "Clocks are rather my thing, and this is an impressive piece." He turns it over and reveals the 'M. Brando' roughly scratched into the silver back. He frowns.

"What a shame," he says, placing it face side up on the table.

"Most would consider that the watch's most valuable characteristic." Bruce says, voice steady, hands neatly folded before him. Two inches from the knife. To his left, there is an open doorway to the kitchen. If he turns his head, he might be able to get a glance of Tim or Alfred.

He doesn't look away from the man.

"It is the arrogance of man," the man says, raising red eyes (sclera and all) to Bruce, "to think they can make their mark on time."

"...Is that supposed to be considered so literally?" Bruce asks, with a light smile he does not mean.

The man smiles lightly back, eyes crinkling at the corners. He looks to be in his mid thirties, clean-shaven. His skin is a dull blue, his hair a shock of white, and a jagged scar runs through one eye and curving down the side of his cheek, an even darker, rawer shade of blue-purple.

The man turns the watch back over and taps at the engraving. "Let me ask you this," he says. "When we deface a work of art, does it become part of the art? Does it add to its intrinsic meaning?"

Bruce forces his shoulders to shrug. "It's arbitrary," he says. "A teenager inscribes his name on the wall of an Ancient Egyptian temple and his parents are forced to publicly apologize. But runic inscriptions are found on the Hagia Sophia that equate to an errant Viking guard having inscribed 'Halfdan was here' and we consider it an artifact of a time in which the Byzantine Empire had established an alliance with the Norse and converted vikings to Christianity."

"The vikings were as errant as the teenager," the man says, "in my experience." He leans back in his chair. "I suppose you could say the difference is time. When time passes, we start to think of things as artistic, or historical. We find the beauty in even the rubble, or at least we find necessity in the destruction..."

He offers Bruce the watch. After a moment, Bruce takes it.

"The problem, Mr. Wayne, is that time does not pass for me. I see it all as it was, as it is, as it ever will be, at all times. There is no refuge from the horror or comfort in that one day..." he closes his hand, the leather squeaking. And then his face smooths out, the brief severity gone. He regards Bruce calmly.

"You can look left, Mr. Wayne."

Bruce looks left. Framed by the doorway, Tim looks like a photograph caught in time. A stream of coffee escapes the spout of the stainless steel pot he prefers over the Breville in the name of expediency, frozen as it makes its way to the thermos proclaiming BITCH I MIGHTWING. Tim regards his task with a face of mindless concentration, mouth slack, lashes in dark relief against his pale skin as he looks down at the mug. Behind him, Bruce can see Alfred's hand outstretched towards the refrigerator handle, equally and terrifyingly still.

"My name is Clockwork," the man says. "I have other names, ones you undoubtedly know, but this one will be bestowed upon me from the mouth of a child I cherish, and so I favor it above all else. I am the Keeper of Time."

"What do you want from me?" Bruce asks, shedding Wayne for Batman in the time it takes to meet Clockwork's eyes. The man acknowledges the change with a greeting nod.

"In a few days time, you will send Superman to the Midwest to investigate the unusual seismic activity. By then, it will be too late, the activity will be gone. They will have already muzzled him."

"Him."

"There is a boy with the power to rule the realm I come from. Your government has been watching him. The day he turned 18, they took him from his family and hid him away. I want you to retrieve him. I want you to do it today."

"Why me?"

"His parents do not have the resources you do, both as Batman and Bruce Wayne. You will dismantle the organization that is keen on keeping him imprisoned, and you will offer him a scholarship to the local University. You and yours will keep him safe within Gotham until he is able to take his place as my King."

This is a lot of information to take in, even for Bruce. The idea that there could be a boy powerful enough to rule over this (god, his mind whispers) entity and that somehow, he has slipped under all of their radars is as frustrating as it is overwhelming. But although Clockwork has seemed willing to converse, he doesn't know how many more questions he will get.

"You have the power to stop time," he decides on, "why don't you rescue him? Would he not be better suited with you and your people?"

"Within every monarchy, there is a court," Clockwork. "Mine will be unhappy with the choice I have made," he looks at Bruce's watch, head cocked. "In different worlds, they call you the Dark Knight. This will be your chance to serve before a True King."

Bruce bristles. "I bow to no one."

"You'll all serve him, one day," Clockwork says, patiently. "He is the ruler of realms where all souls go, new and old. When you finally take refuge, he will be your sanctuary." He frowns. "But your government rejects the idea of gods. All they know is he is other. Not human. Not meta. A weapon."

"A weapon you want me to bring to my city."

"I believe you call one of your weapons 'Clark', do you not?" Clockwork asks idly. "But you misunderstand me. They seek to weaponize him. He is not restrained for your safety, but for their gain."

"And if I don't take him?" Bruce asks, because a) Clockwork has implied he will be at the very least impeded, at worst destroyed over this, and b) he never did quite learn not to poke the bear. "You won't be around if I decide he's better off with the government."

"You will," Clockwork says, with the same certainty he's wielded this entire conversation. "Not because he is a child, though he is, nor because you are good, though you are, nor even because it is better power be close at hand than afar.

"I have told you my court will be unhappy with me. In truth, there are others who also defend the King. Together we will destroy the access to our world not long after this conversation. The court will be unable to touch him, but neither will we as we face the repercussions for our actions. I am telling you this, because in a timeline where I do not, you think I will be there to protect him. And so when he is in danger, even subconsciously, you choose to save him last, or not at all. And that is the wrong choice.

"So cement it in your head, Bruce Wayne," the man says, "You will go to him because I tell you to. And you will keep him safe until he is ready to return to us. He will find no safety net in me. So you will make the right choice, no matter the cost."

"Or, when our worlds connect again, and they will," his voice now echoes in triplicate with the voices of the many, the young, the old, Tim, Bruce's mother, Barry Allen, Bruce's own voice, "I will not be the only one who comes for you."

"Now," he says, producing a Wayne Industries branded BIC pen. "I will tell you the location the boy is being kept, and then I would like my medallion back, please. In that order."

Bruce glances down and sees a golden talisman, attached to a black ribbon that is draped haphazardly around the neck of his bathrobe, so light (too light, he still should have—) he has not felt its weight until this moment.

Bruce flips the paper over, takes the pen, and jots down the coordinates the being rattles off over the face of a senator. By his calculation, they do correspond with a location in the midwest.

"You will find him on B6. Take a left down the hallway and he will be in the third room down, the one with a reinforced steel door. Take Mr. Kent and Mr. Grayson with you, and when you leave take the staircase at the end of the hallway, not the elevator."

The man gets up, dusts off his impeccably clean pants, and offers him a hand to shake.

"We will not meet again for some time, Mr. Wayne."

Bruce looks at the creature, stands, and shakes his hand. It feels like nothing. The Keeper of Time sighs, although nothing has been said.

"Ask your question, Mr. Wayne."

"I have more than one."

"You do," Clockwork says. "But I have heard them all, and so they are one. Please ask, or I will not be inclined to answer it."

"What does this boy mean for the future, that you are willing to sacrifice yourself for him?"

There is a pause.

"So that is the one," Clockwork says, after a time. "Yes. I see. I should resolve this, I suppose."

"Resolve what?"

"It is not his future I mean to protect," the man says. "It is his present."

"You want to keep him safe now..." Bruce says, but he's not sure what the being is trying to say.

"I am not inclined," Clockwork repeats, stops. His expression turns solemn, red eyes widening. In their reflection, Bruce can see something. A rush of movement too quick to make heads or tails of, like playing fast forward on a videotape. "Superman reports no signs of unusual seismic activity. With nothing further to look into, you let it go in favor of other investigative pursuits. You do not find him, as you are not meant to. He stays there. His family, his friends, they cannot find him. His captors tell him they have moved on. He does not believe them, until he does. He stays there. He stays there until he is strong enough to save himself."

Clockwork speaks stiffly, rattling off the chain of events as if reading a Justice League debrief. "He is King. He will always be King. He is strong, and good, and compassionate, and he is great for my people because yours have betrayed his trust beyond repair. He throws himself into being the best to ever Be, because there is nothing Left for him otherwise. We love him. We love him. We love him. My King. Forevermore."

The red film in his eyes stall out, and Bruce is forced to look away from how bright the image is, barely making out a silhouette before they dull back to their regular red.

"I am not inclined," Clockwork says slowly, "To this future."

"Because of what it means in the present," Bruce finishes for him. "They're not just imprisoning him, are they."

"They will have already muzzled him."

Clockworks is right in front of him faster than he can process, fist gripping the medallion at his neck so tight he now feels the ribbon digging into his skin.

"Unlike you, Mr. Wayne," and for the first time, the god is angry, and the image of it will haunt Bruce for the rest of his life, "I do not believe in building a better future on the back of a broken child."

"Find him," the deity orders, and yanks the necklace so hard the ribbon rips—

Clack!

"sluuuuurp!"

"Master Timothy, honestly!"

"Sorry Alfred!"

[dhampling]

the gate girl!dadstarion, 1.5k

He knows vaguely where the building is - he’s sure he’s passed it on one of his late night jaunts - but you’re coming along too. He knows he’s prepared for this moment, down to the most minute detail.  - astarion is a school-gate dilf on his first pick-up adventure with you. wc: 1.5k a/n: dadstarion fridays! wooooo! hope you enjoy - love, dal x

“Come on. We’ll be late.”

Your hand meets his with a toothy grin.

Astarion teeters a little.

He knows vaguely where the building is - he’s sure he’s passed it on one of his late night jaunts - but you’re coming along too. 

He knows he’s prepared for this moment, down to the most minute detail. 

Weeks spent designing the overcoat now covering his clothes - almost feltish in texture, a deep blue with gentle golden threading. Brass buttons. The smallest red ribbon detailing in the seams. The fit is immaculate, despite the fact he had to take his own measurements. The gloves match beautifully, just as he’d intended.

Shoes polished within an inch of their lives. Shirt and trousers pressed to perfection. Hair neatly coiffed with assistance from your gentle hands.

He grimaces.

“She’s going to think I’m weird.”

“Is this for her, or you?’

He takes a moment. Examines both sides of his glove with a flex. Sniffs pointedly. 

‘She’s not going to think you’re any weirder than she already does. She’s your little freak.” You grab at his sides playfully and he shimmies around your clutches, breaking into a timid laugh. 

The dark skies of Deepwinter are primed to allow Astarion his first ever school pick-up. 

He hasn’t slept, you know that. Bag in hand holding the gift he’d spent the short day hidden away working on. Your matching scarves around your necks. The biting chill beyond the threshold of your hearth.  

Eyes round in a contemplative lax as his hand rests atop the door handle. 

“I’m being stupid, aren’t I?”

Your eyes roll fondly into your skull.

“Yes. Now, get moving.” 

It takes you enclosing your hand in his for the door to open, immediately facing a brutal fracas of ice-cold winds lapping at your face. 

“How in any realm is a child expected to walk home in this? Ridiculous!” He shuffles from foot to foot as he chunters while you lock the door and pocket the key, looking up to the stars.

“With a coat. And gloves. And…’

You point to the bag in his hand as you interlink your arms.

‘A scarf.’

Astarion gives a small smile, pressing a chaste kiss to your head.

‘Come on, now. We might get there in time to see her out the door.”

-

The walk there isn’t the leisurely gander Astarion had dreamt of when he’d thought of this moment. 

In his head it was always late summer. Sunblushed.

And yet as you turn your head to him in your giddy half-canter; cheeks flush and breath clouding the space around your perfect head, he can’t believe he ever imagined it any other way.

The stars overhead are familiar as they always have been. The slightest slippy tread of frost on the cobble. Windows around you lit with candles and the loud taverns you pass en-route seem well hunkered-down.

He finds himself pulling you closer with each corner turned, stumbling to keep with your gait.

And then, there it is.

A huddle of parents waiting out in the cold, hands rubbing together; a low hum of chatter. School gates still closed. When you greet some of them with familiarity - one or two even getting a hug as you make your way to your preferred circle - and introduce him as your husband, his heart swells. 

He didn’t realise you were friends with these people. That these fellow parents could be people to have anything in common with in the first place. Astarion is hardly the enigma he used to be within the city walls and they know of him. They know you’re with him.

But none have ever seen him in the flesh.

There’s a minute where he ponders what they think of him. How you’d described him, how they may have looked at your daughter under the orange gloaming light of Leaffall and wondered which features of hers came first from him as opposed to you. How they’d pieced him together in their minds.

He feels a little out of place as you chatter - hyper aware of each stolen glance in his direction. The whites of new eyes flickering in the darkness. 

It isn’t often he meets new people anymore. Even his client roster is exclusive. 

“Why would I tell you how good-looking he is when he isn’t even here to hear it?”

He tunes back in. They all look, you included.

“Hm?”

“Marta-’ 

A faux accusatory glance on your face as you look over to the human who - Astarion presumes - is Marta. 

‘Asked why I hadn’t told the group just how attractive you are.”

The way the most blinding smile breaks over your ruddied cheeks. He melts behind a scoff.

“Actually darling, Marta has a point. I’m hurt, frankly.”

Gods. They’re all laughing. Your gaggle of school-gate friends and he has them laughing.

“No, it’s just dark. See him by light. Then you’ll change your minds.”

You huddle closer despite the brazen lie and the group laughs away. He throws in a small chuckle for good measure and presses a kiss to your head once more.

They’re all relatively harmless, he decides.

What do school gate friends do? Why have you never invited them over for wine or something? 

“I mean - Astarion, what do you think?”

“Hm?”

“They’re showing a rather keen interest to come over one evening for dinner. Inconspicuous, I’m sure.” 

He looks around warily. Can they read his mind? Is someone here a weird school gate mind reader freak? What the fuck?

Your eyes narrow at Marta in jest.

Oh.

If you’re even showing the slightest hint at wanting the doting husband, the doting husband he will give you. Freely and willingly. Far too easily. Naturally.

“Oh! Whatever you want, my love. Anything.”

Astarion takes your head in his hands and brings you close for a warm kiss, eyes softening as he holds you in place. A gentle smile against the harsh wind.  

“What’s in the bag?” Another asks in a jarring fettle. Your head whips round. He answers softly. 

“I- I made the little one a scarf.” 

A coo arises from those huddled around the two of you. 

“He’s a tailor. A good one, too. Really good.” 

You nod with a smile, looking at him. You’re mid-cycle and the idea of your daughter spotting him with those big eyes makes you a bit weak.

A saccharine voice from somewhere in the mix - “He’s immaculate, honey. I’m a little jealous?” 

If he can blush, Astarion feels one coming on. This feels staged. 

“He can’t take his shoes off without kicking them up the wall. Or catch spiders.”

-

As you resume your quiet chatter amongst the group, Astarion catches the door open in the near distance and a soft amber glow pouring from it from the corner of his eye.

It’s a trance. He looks over the heads obscuring his view, the tips of his toes touching the ends of his pristine shoes. 

And there she is.

Absolutely perfect. Small, searching the crowd for the parent she knows will be here.

Then she sees him.

It’s not difficult from afar, even in the dark - she recognises the shock of white hair anywhere - and the look of sheer confusion painted on her face shifts to unfettered joy in seconds.

Gods. She’s running. Tiny legs, bag flailing in her hand. Shouting-

“DADDY!”

As she hurtles towards him, he realises he’s never seen her run like this. She can’t run like this in the house. It’d be enough to make him sad if he weren’t so wholly elated.

He crouches just in time for her to barrel into his open arms.

The way he cups the back of her head is as if he hasn’t seen her in years, spinning her as he stands and holds her at his hip. She’s babbling something wicked and all of it sounds like utter nonsense and he’s so besotted it doesn’t even matter.

His little girl, out in the world. Being a person. 

And it’s him that she chooses to run to. 

“Charming! Hello love!” You shuffle closer and plant a large kiss on the back of her head, taking the bags from her hand and hoisting them up over your back in a routine twirl.

You take Astarion’s hint of a glance toward his bag and roll your eyes fondly, feeling for the scarf and slipping it back into his hand.

“My little darling! Hello! I have something for you - close your eyes.”

He haphazardly wraps the scarf around her neck with one hand as she bristles against his hip, wiggling her shoulders in some impromptu happy dance.

“Look now! You match us!” He exclaims. 

She opens her eyes and squeals with glee you haven’t seen at the school gate before, ever.

And true to his word, the scarf wholly matches both of yours. Embroidered with small golden stars on navy fabric. Her name in some immaculate loopy hand. Far too big for her at present, but warm on this coldest of evenings.

“I love it daddy. I want another one.” She nods acutely and smatters his face in small kisses. 

As you look to Astarion, he raises both brows in amusement at her request. She tucks her head in under his chin.

“Come along now. Let’s get you warm by the fire.”

✦

[remember-to-be-gentle]

Friend, I just screamed. SCREAMED.

How about this~ if I may request an Enji that happens to see a perfect little darling happening by and can't help himself...

...I'll happily write a request for you in exchange!

You'll get yours 😈 when I think of one

Subject: BNHA, Enji Todoroki aka Endeavor

Title: Future

Trigger Warning: Obsessive behavior, kidnapping, fantasizing, breeding (mentioned), Enji is a Karen confirmed

Enji fumed walking to his tailor. He had received a message from one of his sidekicks stating that his presence was "unnegotiable" at tonight's charity gala and worse, he needed a new suit within a handful of hours because he'd put on so much muscle mass that he'd burst out of his old one. It was turning out to be a rough and irritating day.

He shoved open the door to the shop, the little bell jingling to make his presence known--as if he needed it when his heavy footsteps.

A tiny figure popped up from behind the counter. "Just a minute! Mr. Ao is currently working with another client but I'll be more than happy to help when I put these swatches away."

Great, the apprentice. Well, it didn't matter to him as long as you sewed his suit correctly. He was paying good money for the best possible service, after all.

He didn't pay much attention when you lead him to a private fitting room. It wasn't until you closed the door that he remembered where he was. The private room was decently sized with a rack of premade jackets to the side, three mirrors that caught every angle in the room, a small table full of sewing equipment, and of course the dark wooded chair for Enji to sit in.

In this room alone with you, he finally processed who he was looking at. You. With your pretty little sewing apron and messy hair. Your tiny but nimble hands unwrapping the measuring tape. The way you politely commanded him to lift his arms as if you could possibly command him to do anything...

He wanted you. Bad.

Feeling your hard-working hands wrap around the meat of his muscles, giving a gentle squeeze to measure the give for the fabric. Your short arms struggling to wrap around his waist, pulling the measuring tape taught against the planes of his abs and dragging it up to the full curves of his sculpted pecs. He shivered when the tape scraped his nipples through his shirt.

"Are you cold?" You asked.

God, even your voice was cute.

"I don't get cold," Enji said. He was still grumpy, you being the cutest thing he'd ever seen hadn't changed that.

"Oh, okay." You picked up his old suit and examined it, comparing your new measurements with the old recorded in Ao's customer book. "Wow, you sure gained a lot of muscle Mr. Todoroki. Looks about a whole three inches of girth all around."

Why did you have to say girth? Now he was thinking about those little hands wrapped around the meat of his cock. Would those tiny hands of yours even be able to wrap around his balls? God, feeling you cup them would be amazing, desperately trying to wring his cum from them--

Now was not the time to be fantasizing, he reminded himself.

"Where's my tea?" Enji demanded, trying to get his mind off of you. "Mr. Ao always has tea prepared for his guests."

"Right! Sorry, sir." You skittered out of the room and returned with a paper cup of steaming green tea. When your hands brushed his for that split second of transference, Enji could have sworn he felt sparks.

When he married Rei it hadn't been for love. It had been about power when he spread her open and bred her. Enji knew of love and saw it everything and everyone but himself. But now... He felt it. This was love. Or at the very least, this was his breeding instincts begging for one last round in the ring.

Would you be a good girl for him, like Rei? Or would you fight him every step of the way? He could imagine you clawing at the wide expanse of his back, your tiny legs wrapped around his waist as he plowed into you hard enough to ensure you couldn't escape him the next day. You wouldn't want for anything under him, nothing but freedom--assuming you were coherent enough from his cock that you remembered you wanted it.

Shit, you were talking again. Oh you pretty little thing, didn't you know what you were doing to him? You had to know.

It took him everything to focus on what you were saying, "Since we don't have time to make a whole new suit, I thought maybe we could change the design to add more fabric in a fashionable capacity." You picked up a tablet and showed him a rough sketch of his jacket with red fabric inlaid in the seams to accommodate his size. Frankly he knew nothing about fashion so it looked good to him.

He just wanted you to touch him again.

"That's fine," he said. "As long as I have full use of my arms and legs. You wouldn't know anything about being a hero, but even the clothes we wear outside of work need to accommodate our movement as well as be quirk resistant."

"Of course, sir! Hero work is really intense. I can get started on your suit right away and have it delivered to your address with time to spare. Should I have Mr. Ao bill to the usual account?"

"Will you be the one delivering it?"

"Ah, no. We usually outsource deliveries, sir."

"Hm. I think it would be best if you did. That way you can come with me to the gala." What was he saying! "It would be... Uh, it would be a good way for you to show off your work, maybe make some connections. People from all walks of life will be there, I'm sure that this could be a good opportunity for you."

"I... I don't know what to say." You blushed, sweet and shy, confidence slipping in the face of opportunity. "I would love to."

"Excellent, my driver can take us there and back. Just dress nicely."

"Of course, sir, and thank you again. I'm going to get started on the modifications."

"Please do." Enji stood up, turning away from you quickly and coldy to walk out the door so you couldn't see the outline of his hardening cock in his pants.

He reminded himself to be patient.

Later that night when you arrived in your pretty, slim fitting dress and his bold but fashionable tux, Enji said, "You're a little early. Please come in. I'll make you some tea before I change."

"Oh, I don't want to bother you Mr. Todoroki!"

"It's no bother." He gestured for you to come inside and the moment your foot crossed the threshold of your new home, Enji firmly closed the door and locked it. "Now, why don't we talk about your future?"

[57sfinest]

kim is such a funny little guy like he emphasizes how little the rcm salary is when you ask about it (5500 reál annually- 460/mo) but here he is with his nice electronic sports watch and his little instant camera and his fancy revolutionary cosplay for plainclothes and he's living in the GRIH which can't be cheap and he's got his fancy little mnemotechnique notebooks which are like the moleskine of elysium i guess and his fancy little ballpoints that he does NOT want to share with you which i bet is because they cost him like a week of salary. and this is the rcm he's not getting stipends for supplies or watches or housing or probably even the gas for the kineema. poor as fuck but he is going to buy himself his little treats god damn it. if he lived in our world you know he'd be out getting himself a $9 vanilla soy milk half caf dirty chai iced latte every morning on the way to the station and eating instant noodles every night to claw out room in the budget for it

[threadbaresweater]

hey, uh, I want you to know that the number of notes you get on a fic is absolutely meaningless. don't place your worth in numbers, or you'll never be satisfied. you'll always be chasing more, more, more. reblogs, likes, and comments are awesome, but don't let the lack thereof discourage you from telling your stories. I know it's hard. I know it's discouraging. I know that social media has conditioned us to covet those big numbers, but they're not as important as your mental health, and they never will be.

[vaguely-concerned]

Silly Garashir ficlet, Teen and Up-ish, mostly banter! CW: copious amounts of blood but like. Purely in a comedy capacity (don’t worry none of it is Garak’s)

“Good god,” Julian breathed, unable to do anything but stare for a moment. 

“Oh, don’t worry, none of this is mine,” Garak said, dripping puddles of crimson onto the floor, calm blue eyes the only thing peeking out from the solid layer of blood covering his face and upper torso. “The gravest injury has been to my wardrobe, I assure you. As you might have gathered, I encountered our suspected evildoer as they sought to make their escape.”

“From the looks of things, I’d hazard it’s more accurate to say that they encountered you,” Julian said. He shook himself out of his momentary petrification and raised the medical tricorder to make sure Garak’s reports of being unharmed hadn’t been greatly exaggerated, as would sometimes be the case with him. 

“However you would prefer to frame it,” Garak said, dipping his chin modestly and blinking globs of blood from his eyelashes. “I’m sorry to say I couldn’t ascertain many details about them, neither in terms of species or other identifying details. They were masked and coming at me with a knife at the time, which in the moment tends to blot out other considerations in one’s mind.”

Despite himself, Julian grinned at the performative airiness of Garak’s tone. He did seem to be basically fine. “I think that’s understandable under the circumstances, Garak. Odo’s probably going to track them down pretty quick, if they’re leaving a trail of blood across the station. Do you, er… want a handkerchief or something?” 

“It’s very kind of you to offer, but I don’t think that’s going to do the job in this case.”  

“No,” Julian had to admit, “no, you’re — probably right. I’ll let you go for a thorough sonic and peace and quiet once I’m done with this. I’m sure Odo will want a word with you later, though.”

Garak parted his lips to say something, and grimaced. “Ugh. Well, if it’s any help in figuring out the identity of our culprit, that’s definitely the taste of Napean blood. As you mentioned there will of course also likely be other clues, like them bleeding profusely as they sprint across the Promenade, but I always strive to be helpful wherever I can.” 

“Garak!” Julian yelped, shooting him an alarmed look and continuing his inspection of the tricorder readings with renewed worry. 

“Hm? Yes? You can run whatever tests you want on it to be sure, of course, but I am quite certain in my conclusion. There is a… distinctive tang to —”

“That’s so medically unsafe, you can’t go around ingesting —” 

“Well, I hardly meant to ingest anything, Doctor, but it did end up all over my person in a way that makes it hard to entirely avoid,” Garak snapped, though he tolerated Julian going in for a second, even more thorough examination without complaint. “Maybe if this person hadn’t so rudely insisted on venting the contents of their arteries straight into my face during our tussle — ”

“Yes, yes, I understand, sorry, I wasn’t suggesting you did it on purpose or anything, but it does mean I really do need to monitor you for any allergic reactions or bloodborne… wait, wait, hang on, how do you even know what Napean blood — ”

Smiling in a way that aimed for beatific and missed it by way of too many bared teeth, in a manner that would probably be quite unsettling if Julian wasn’t so used to (so fond of, whispered a treacherous little voice in the back of his head) Garak’s face, Garak dabbed daintily at the worst of the blood dripping off his nose with his sleeve and said: “Do you really want to know, or is this your outsized curiosity running ahead of your better judgment again?”

“I’m going to be wondering about it all night, but no, I don’t think I want to know, actually. If I come back in a week and still can’t put it out of my mind, feel free to tell me, though. Or use that time to come up with a good story, I don’t mind.”

“Never any but the best for you, my friend,” Garak said fondly. 

[impybutt]

Sezak had never seen a leather jacket before. What cause would someone ever have to wear another's skin? It struck him as alarming, to say the least.

Exposure risk wasn't something he or many others ever considered: His people were designed for efficiency, just like the rest of the spacefaring races. Or, that's what he assumed. It's common knowledge, isn't it?

Genome mapping is just the norm, and entire civilisations have been curated from raw materials, Sezak's included. It's far more energy and resource efficient than terraforming, in any case. That's what it takes to reach the stars: curated efficiency.

No one ever did it just by trial-and-error, did they?

But here was Suri, a Human, wearing the skin of... what did she call it? Some other kind of mammal, he forgot the name. Something absurdly simple. Anyway, apparently this is just normal for Humans!

"But why?" Sezak asked, incredulous. "What's the point?"

"Well, these days thanks to climate control and artificial atmosphere, it's mostly a style thing. But you know, early humans back on earth, why would you just leave a perfectly good skin to rot when you could wear it for protection?"

"Protection from what!? Under what circumstance are you finding an unused skin?? Wait-- is this another religious thing? I've heard that Humans have a lot of those, and they don't always make sense from the outside."

Suri looked confused (or constipated? Human faces are deceptively complex, it takes a long time to learn how to read them), and seemed to be studying Sezak for a moment. Her eyes darted over his synthetic clothing briefly, with its cultural flairs and decorative adornments, all carrying the signature texture of replicated matter.

Then, with sudden clarity, "Oh! Humans weren't curated, mostly we're organic."

Well, that's just absurd.

Sezak muffled his involuntary 'kek-kek' with a quick apology, covering his mandibles.

"Pardon me, that means your entire lineage came from raw evolution. That takes billions of years, I find it very unlikely."

"Yeah," Suri was nonplussed. "The leather is a throwback to when our ancestors had to survive in the wild. We hunted our meat, then used what was left for tools and clothing. It's actually a pretty proud part of our history; Earth was habitable, but definitely not easy."

Now it was Sezak's turn to look constipated, which never happened because his people weren't curated with such a terrible design flaw.

"So humans just bumbled their way into space on their own, like a larva figuring out how to fly? All... clumsy and inelegant, and... Messy? Without any outside help? Without any climate-matching!? Is that why you have those absurd suits!?"

"Yeah, it's also why our bodies just malfunction in weird ways for no obvious reason," Suri looked a little too amused at Sezak's undisguised horror - not that Humans are essentially raw nebula mobilised by a star's age of convenient mutations, but that they exist in such a state of volatility with no apparent qualms about it.

"Oh great wells," Sezak breathed, reeling from his new perspective. "So many of you wear leather. Hold on, is that why Vikram is always visiting the health centre?"

Suri's eyes crinkled, and she bared her teeth -- in a laugh, okay. Sezak recognised the 'kek-kek' noise humans make in thrill, though theirs is a more glottal 'hach-hach'.

"Yes, Vikram has auto-immune issues. Which means that sometimes, his immune system will attack his own body depending on the irritant. Or weather. Or his cortisol levels."

Sezak stared at Suri for a long time, trying to figure out if she was pranking him.

"I think I have a lot of reading to do," he muttered, incredulous.

"Start with the human eye, it's an absolute mess. Do you know how little it takes to detach a human retina?"

"WHY ARE YOU TELLING ME THIS"

[smileyfacemojisworld]

Eah Fanfic Ideas

For Mind-Blocks

Dexter and Darling asking Raven to help them switch bodies and their experiences

Dexter and Raven going to a Tailor Quick concert together (/with Apple and Darling as a double date?)

Royals and Rebels switch sides and each character’s experience in the other side

The Hood-Badwolf family having a secret picnic(Hunter and Ashlynn unexpectedly came across them? Or Cedar)

Melody and Justine perform together for the talent show

Adventures of the Trios: Briar, Cupid and Hopper; Daring, Dexter and Darling; Maddie, Kitty and Lizzie; Apple, Briar and Blondie?

A day in the life of:*insert character name*

Duchess’s Journey of finding a Happily Ever After

“Family Moments”

Blondie’s and Cupid’s podcasts collab

COMMENT A SHIP PLEASE AND I WILL LIST DOWN FANFIC IDEAS

[astraltrickster]

I find it genuinely fascinating and disturbing alike how the stereotype of autism, at least in many left-leaning spaces, has shifted in recent years from being a tragic, isolating white boys' disease, that tears families apart and is truly a fate worse than death for the sufferer, to a frivolous and #aesthetic white GIRLS' quirk that never has any ACTUALLY detrimental effects, not even any social difficulties, all these girls on TikTok can mask well and talk Normally and only flap cutely so what's YOUR excuse?

We spent maybe 5 figurative minutes talking about how autism mommy culture is abusively ableist in the way it simultaneously bends over backward to avoid teaching autistic kids - ESPECIALLY autistic boys - any meaningful coping skills, writing the whole concept off as just truly impossible (it's just the nature of The Autism Winning, these poor poor children are just tragically locked in their own heads, and if they're boys, well, Boys Will Be Boys, there's certainly nothing to be done for the meltdowns, stress reduction and clearer communication is a hopeless endeavor, he's just Acting Out completely arbitrarily, no I haven't actually TRIED I don't need to I Just Know), but simultaneously demands that kids learn these skills on their own because their parents just refuse to communicate with them on their own terms - then the fidget spinner trend happened, we got a whole stim toy industry, it blended with influencer and wannabe-influencer culture, and now...we just have a whole new stereotype that's no better; what it reduces in potential as eugenics propaganda, it makes up for in denial of support needs and misogynistic overtones.

In short, I fucking hate it.

[tailorvizsla]

Psst Tailor post it I TRIPLE DOG DARE YOU

hehehehehehehehehe ugh why does he seem so wholesome

Yes, Sir - Captain Ed Mercer x f!Reader smut

Thigh riding and a lovely cream pie for his favorite Ensign ❤️

[oddinary4bts]

YO GUESS WHO FINISHED WRITING HER FIRST BOOK?!? DAMN RIGHT THAT’S MEEEE✨✨✨

[ageofzero]

Yuna is the antagonist of a potential Final Fantasy X-3, thank you for coming to my TED Talk

edit: okay I'll put it under a read more since it'll be a long post (but not as long as my entire conversation was), but what's promised is due.

Now that I have to make the post for real I had to do some wiki reading on what the actual Things going on in the novella were, and… well, a lot of my theorycrafting was based on incomplete and kinda inaccurate information. BUT I can’t read Japanese, the book was never released here, and I am going to go with rule of cool for a little bit of this even as I keep the stuff that sounds kinda dumb on the surface. I’ll be the first to say that Tidus exploding from a bomb he thinks is a blitzball is dumb (true), and Chuami thinking she’s Auron’s daughter is a dumb plot beat (petty), but I’m weaving this bridge and I’m not going to rewrite those. I am going to change some contexts and make them exist in a narrative that I hope is compelling. That’s my disclaimer, now I’m gonna get into it.

SO.

The scenario from the novella and audio drama is thus: Tidus died again in an accident, and Yuna brings him back. But he’s not back in the same way that the Fayth gave this dream a real living body at the end of X-2. The official term for it is “beckoned”, but I probably won’t use that to describe him based on my previous understanding. No matter if he’s beckoned or not, or whatever terminology you want to use, the thing is that Yuna summoned him back. She’s holding him to life, and he can never know. It’s been a year since the moment Tidus died, and Yuna has seemingly regressed into patterns that put her into what was once Yevon’s circle. Tidus is looking injured/weakened (“Chuami: It wasn’t just [Tidus’s] words that felt hollow. When I shook his hand, his grip felt weak and lifeless... I think he’s injured. Or maybe he’s sick or something.”), and people are looking to Yuna for help or information regarding the strange not-quite Unsent (the beckoned) that are appearing in places in Spira. Help she is not capable of giving. Wakka and Lulu are protecting her as she prays in Besaid Temple. The world is seemingly acting out, with a second shoopuf appearing in the Moonflow and its energies overflowing and drawing more illusions into reality. (“Yuna: The Moonflow energy is responding to the will of the living. It’s as if… we’re in the Farplane.”) And it’s more vivid than what the Farplane is capable of, even breaking the rules of “beckoning”. This is something new, something worse. Something worse enough to bring back Sin (which I thought was just me extrapolating a potential, but they actually mention it in the audio drama that it happens). Yuna promises the people that she will defeat Sin, but Wakka tries to keep her from being made to promise such a thing at first, which is an interesting choice (“Wakka: Yuna, let’s go back to Besaid. They’ll push this all on you… Sin is for summoners, in their minds.”).

Where does the world go in this present circumstances? Why IS Yuna seemingly content to do what chafed her in the Eternal Calm short movie and stay praying in Besaid and helping the elders who are lost now that Yevon as they knew it is in shambles? Why are Lulu and Wakka enabling and protecting her in that? Why is Tidus looking injured and weak and why is Yuna keeping him at arm’s length? Why does she tell him that she’s fallen in love with someone else?

I know the typical story beat interpretation is “Yuna told him that and pushed him away so he wouldn’t be in danger for what she needs to do, bc defeating Sin caused his death last time”. But hear me out. Yuna knows Tidus isn’t alive. She knows that revealing that information to him will cause him to disappear again. She’s actively summoning him back to life and he has no idea (but he must suspect something is wrong, even before Yuna formally pulls away from him, he’s weakening and he probably doesn’t feel right in his own skin). I posit that her maintaining Tidus’s life is what she’s really doing praying in the Besaid Temple. She doesn’t want to get involved with the Moonflow situation, the shoopuf or the overflowing energy of the Moonflow itself. She doesn’t even really act when seeing all the ghosts in the crowd, and actively stops Kurgum from acting (plausible deniability: she and everyone else decide that sending them in that moment would be the wrong call and riots would break out, but that density of ghosts means that’s a significant amount of pyreflies that could become fiends at any moment).

I posit that Yuna’s powers are working, that people close to her think her powers aren’t working (Lulu and Wakka), and she’s hiding it from everyone else. That her powers aren’t working because she’s currently using them to maintain Tidus’s existence. And this maintaining is breaking the Farplane in half, because she’s powerful but has no idea what she’s doing. (Why would she really know what she’s doing or the consequences? Who has any information of what she’s doing and what will happen if she does it?) I posit that Yuna’s love for Tidus is so strong that it corrupts her sense of right and wrong. X-2 is Yuna largely going on a personal quest, and incidentally helping people but separating herself from the title of High Summoner and doing something she wants to do. Rikku encourages her to do something for herself for a change right before she agrees and runs off to become a sphere hunter. She still saves the world, this time from an ancient danger Old Yevon buried and an Unsent is threatening to use (for love, notably), but she did it in the course of looking for Tidus. Who the Fayth return to life, who she hugs and is so so relieved to have in her arms again.

She’s not going to let him go, she couldn’t let him die again so much that she called him back to life.

(side note: I never truly knew how this happened so I had to consult the wiki page on the novella, and I suspect what original information I was working with was misrepresented and misinterpreted. I openly admit that the wiki page doesn’t really help me fully understand what happened, aside from explaining how Tidus ended up in proximity to a bomb. My understanding from someone’s explanation was that an Unsent summoner on the island Yuna and Tidus got washed up on after a storm told her she could call back the dead if she wanted, as a summoner. They’re all made of pyreflies, Aeons and Fiends and People and Unsent alike, and summoners are in the business of manipulating pyreflies. Either calling them from the Fayth to form an Aeon, or Sending them to the Farplane so they do not become Fiends. A summoner with enough power could summon someone back from the dead, could they not? And this Unsent summoner knew how it worked, and told Yuna how to do it. But I don’t know how real that scene could be, or how accurate it is to what’s written in the book. It’s my rule of cool moment, though, and I worked with that as my understanding when I made this theory. We have to make our peace with that, if you’ll allow me this extrapolation of Spira’s rules and a summoner’s powers.)

(The meme is Tidus kicking a blitzball and it turned out it was a bomb and his head gets blown off, but wiki says they ended up on a vision of a Besaid from 1000 years ago, and the bomb was something neither Tidus or Yuna had seen before and to them it looked like a blitzball. So, Tidus approached what he thought was a blitzball, wondering who’s ball it was, and it exploded as he reached it. I still think that’s really dumb but I’m not editing it out bc Tidus’s death creates very interesting consequences.)

So, if Yuna is summoning Tidus back to life, and she desperately doesn’t want him to find this out so she avoids him and pushes him away through any means necessary, but he’s still weakening and fading enough to be noticeable by people… perhaps also himself… Yuna returning to Yevon in some capacity could just as likely be her looking for a means to keep feeding power to this summoning she’s doing so she doesn’t lose him. And what kind of consequences does it have to do this? He’s being summoned, but he’s not actually an Aeon. He’s not an Unsent, he’s not just being beckoned. He wasn’t even real, he was a dream in a summon held together by the raw power of Yu Yevon turning into Sin. The Moonflow overflowing and seeing a long-dead shoopuf is the least of the consequences. The Farplane is delicate, it requires careful maintenance, and here Yuna is shoving her foot in the door and holding it open for a solid year! And no one knows she’s doing this! Spira’s past is full of history, some of that long-buried secrets that no one was supposed to find again. Sin wasn’t supposed to be able to come back, but the ghosts aren’t staying ghosts anymore (“Lulu: I mean Sin came back, right? What’s to stop anything else from coming back?”).

Even people who only know her by reputation seem to think she’s acting strangely (“Kurgum: I thought Lady Yuna was… a righteous person.”), because something is wrong and no one can put their finger on what. Who would have the pieces to put any of this together, and who would even suspect Yuna in the first place? She’s actively not getting involved in politics, she’s locked herself in Besaid, she seems reluctant to answer someone she worked with and should be amicable with now (Baralai).

I think the story should follow down this path, I think it should find Yuna at the end of it, once savior and now destroyer. She’s willing to let the world rip apart in order to keep Tidus, and I think that’s a compelling premise for X-3. The past surging forward like ghosts, vengeful and lost and wanted and terrifying. Who sides with Yuna (Wakka, Lulu) and covers up the problem? Who bands together to face down the High Summoner (Tidus, Rikku)? Who doesn’t know where to place their allegiance, or who changes sides when they realize the extent of what Yuna’s hiding? What does she do when she’s faced with her friends, and the person she loves so much, telling her to stop?

There’s a line in Eternal Calm where Yaibal (named in X-2 but not in the movie itself), after asking about whether or not she’d be joining one of the factions, if she’d be making a faction of her own. And I think in this potential X-3, she’s making her own faction through the actions of becoming antagonist. She’s made Wakka cover for her, she acts in a way that make Lulu and Wakka both protect her regardless of whether or not they know what she’s doing. I think it would be so fascinating to make this a conscious decision on her part. Things have broken so utterly, and she’s desperate to hold them together, and becomes the antagonist in the process.

Squeenix would never do it, they’d never be so bold as to make Yuna the antagonist and follow through on this trajectory of her lying to people to hide that she’s the one breaking the world in half (up to returning the ghost of Sin itself to terrorize Spira). Sin isn’t the final boss in this one, it’d have to be Yuna, we have to stop her and fix what went wrong. It’s not ever gonna happen, but I still think Yuna should be the antagonist of X-3.

[idlesuperstar]

The My-Eyeballs-Are-So-Happy Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy Bluray Watch

Episode 5: Tinker Tailor

- You don't break exactly, you just run out of stories to tell.

[silcoitus]

Tailor-Made (Chp 14)

Previous chapter: Chapter 13

Tailor-Made Masterlist

Rating: Explicit. Minors DNI 

Chapter tags: Silco x Fem!Reader, Reader-Insert, Eventual Smut, Eventual Romance, Slow Burn, Set between Acts 1 and 2 of Arcane; fear of heights

Chapter word count: 4.7k

Chapter Beta Readers: @medic-simp @deny-the-issue

Total word count: 46k

Chapter 14—View from the Top on AO3

Stay tuned for Chapter 15!

A/N: I told you I haven't abandoned this fic! I just needed some time away from it. That said, I have outlines for the next two chapters but neither of them have been written yet. So timing is just one big shrug. Thanks for your patience with me!

Taglist: @averagecrastinator @mazikomo @writingmysanity @insult-2-injury @ariaud @jennrosefx @ins0mniac-whack @steponmesilco  @sherwood-forests @leave-me-alone-silco @givemebeansnow @aeryntheofficial @dreamyonahill @lostbunn @eurydicethesage @thepineapplesimp @whatisafandom @violet-19999 @juicboxd @sageandberries-png @delta-is-here @sirenofzaun @blissfulip @rhynestonez @0muzzle0mutt0 @glitterandgoldfinds @pinkrose1422 @asterisms-room @cloudroomblog @jennithejester @dad-dumpster @stilllivindue2spite

Join my taglist!

[prince-liest]

A couple (2) people have expressed interest in the Hazbin Hotel OC I mentioned in the latest chapter of 666, which is exactly all of the encouragement I needed to post about them! They're like 50% OC and 50% sona. This lovely sketch is by @gendermeh!! I got permission to post it even though they are also turning it into a really lovely digital art piece! <3

They are a former seraphim and exorcist that, to steal a phrase from Good Omens, didn't so much fall as saunter vaguely downward. Sera's weird sibling that liked flexing their power a little too much and got sent to the murderous girl scouts to work it out of their system, which backfired tremendously when they liked hell too much and decided to stay.

Nowadays they spend most of their time nesting in the Pride Ring, collecting friends (contracts) to show off for, avoiding Lucifer like the plague while contemplating whether they should maybe reach out, and carousing around whichever part of hell currently feels like it would be the most entertaining to throw their celestial-class weight around in.

Factoids about the creature otherwise known as Tzafael!

7.5 feet tall.

While the halo always hovers above their head, its actual orientation is always such that the center of it faces heaven, like a satellite dish that still receives exorcist communications.

The little feather antennae are fully mobile and rise and fall based on their current expressiveness. If they get particularly spooked or annoyed, most of the feathers in their hair (and wings) start bristling up and out.

The eyes on the wings are fully functional and blink in tandem with the ones on their face. They also don't vanish when they make their wings disappear, instead remaining as a floating halo of eyeballs.

Powers include localized omniscience and minor foresight, good for: being hard to hit in a fight, and being obnoxious by unintentionally interrupting people who are still speaking.

Yes, the umbrella tip is angelic steel.

Just like Sera, they have a birdform, though they rarely use it! They are magpie-shaped.

VERY good grip strength.

They like fish. :) To eat? To keep in an aquarium? Yes.