#the only form nb knew him as lol

[vv-ispy]

nameless bard ameno archon au.............

[smolcinnamonchipmunk]

Mid-Fight Snack

(Elloooo. Been another while since I've been able to get around to posting actual stuff. I'd love to post or make more, but I have two animations I'm trying to work on and an entire cosplay that's taken up all my freebie because I don't know anything about sewing, lol. Obviously hasn't stopped me from thinking about Honkai a lot. Anyways, here's the Boothill vore writing finally! Hope it's not too bad, I'm a bit sleep deprived.)

Word count: 6233

TW/CW: Soft, safe m/nb G/t vore aaaaaand, I think that's literally it.

____________________________

“Behind ya, small-fry!” was about the only warning I had before being shouldered aside by a wall of metal, blinking in surprise as I spun around to see who just ran past me. I saw the retreating form of a very gray-toned humanoid with a red sash over their shoulder and white and black hair flaring out behind them as they ran, looking vaguely familiar. I squinted when I noticed the hat on their head. Was that the cowboy Dan Heng told us about that we met briefly in the Dreamscape?

I’d feel bad for not remembering his name if we hadn’t just barely met.

“Get back here!” was the only warning I had as I looked back at where the cowboy came from and saw a bunch of IPC personnel and robots charge around the corner towards him. And, in turn, me.

Having spent more time on the run than not in my time after joining the Express I ended up yelping and bolting down the hall after the cowboy. My footsteps were drowned out by the stampede of footsteps behind me and the sound of crashing and screaming ahead as the cowboy flung a few tables behind him as he passed, disturbing several guests and staff as he rushed past.

It wasn't until I rounded the corner after he turned down a hall that I realized that I probably should have just jumped out of the way because me running after the cowboy away from the IPC definitely made me look like an accomplice.

“Fucking damn it,” I hissed under my breath at the thought, jumping over the legs of another knocked over table. I realized too late that there was a couple still standing way too close on the other side but managed to avoid slamming into them. My shoe landed on a grape strewn on the carpet and I yelped as I almost slipped.

Narrowly avoiding faceplanting on the ground, I ended up straightening and locking eyes with the cowboy as he turned to look over his shoulder, seeing it widen slightly at seeing me. To be fair, I was only maybe twenty feet behind him compared to the IPC crowd that were chasing behind me still struggling with strewn furniture and passerbys.

My eyes widened as I saw something glint other than his exterior in his right hand, holding my hands slightly in front of me in a mock surrender to show that I was unarmed, quickly shouting, “I'm not IPC!”

“What the fudge are ya doing tailin’ me then?” the cowboy barked back at me, finger looking a bit too close to the trigger for my liking.

“I panicked when I saw the IPC guys running around the corner and it wasn't until I already started following that I realized I probably looked like-.”

“Criminal and accomplice west-bound towards main lobby elevators!” a robotic voice shouted behind us, one of the large, round robots that was way too quick for its size.

“Yeah, that,” I sighed, rolling my eyes and lowering my arms. It was weird holding my arms still while running.

All of IPC in the hotel probably knew about this chase. I only hoped that the Aventurine guy that almost cornered me in my room wouldn't show up. If fighting him in the dreamscape reflected anything about reality, I didn't want to be part of accidentally tearing the hotel apart fighting him to get away.

The cowboy stared intently at me for a second before growling low in his throat and holstering his gun with a flourishing twirl of his hand. I fully expected him to turn back forward and ignore me now that he determined I wasn't a threat, but instead he suddenly dropped pace to match me. He definitely was faster than me normally, but he’d been throwing so much stuff behind him and swerving through people that it slowed him a little whereas I was given almost clear passage in his wake.

“If you ain't IPC, why the fudge was your first thought at seeing these muddle-fudgers chasin’ after me to tag along,” he asked, voice sounding like he didn't fully believe I wasn't IPC.

“Well,” I replied, very glad that I had enough stamina to run and answer at the same time. I yelped when the cowboy suddenly twisted beside me, throwing down a tall potted plant as we ran around another corner, narrowly missing crashing into an elderly lady. “I haven't been around much, but everytime the Express has stopped somewhere there's been at least a couple times where we end up running from someone or something.

“Usually I'm with a group, so when you started running, my instinct was to follow like with them,” I finished sheepishly, looking to the side at him and almost startling. I'd been too focused on running to realize how fucking tall he was, needing to crane my neck a bit to look up at him.

“Well, fork me sideways and call me a son of a nice lady!” The cowboy exclaimed and laughed, showing off shark-like teeth. The eye not obscured by his hair glanced down and met my gaze for a moment, giving me a solid glimpse of dark gray iris with a red pupil and… was that a white crosshair in his eye? “You're one of them Astral folks with the Xianzhou fella!”

“And you must be the cowboy guy that broke onto the Express that Dan Heng told us about,” I blinked a bit at the realization, and a little at his odd speech patterns. One of the first things after waking up from the dreamscape being a check in with the other Astral Express crew with one of the weirdest things being Dan Heng messaging about how a cowboy got onto the Express. He had glossed over the fact that said cowboy showed up armed, but Pom Pom had been more than willing to share that fact in the chat. Looking back at the herd of IPC behind us, I asked, “Did you greet people at gunpoint again?”

“Where I come from, that’s just one of the many ways to say hello,” he chuckled. His face fell with mine as more IPC turned the corner at the end of the hall ahead while shouting, his expression turning into a scowl. Guests and staff alike glanced between the two walls of IPC personnel converging with us in the middle, most wisely making the decision to try and press against the walls or retreat back into their rooms to stay out of the way.

“Shit,” I started looking for other ways to turn, suddenly very much disliking the lengthy straight hallways. My eyes noticed a set of double doors to the right just as the cowboy shouted, “On the right!”.

I prepped myself to manifest my baseball bat to slam through the doors but the cowboy reached them first, sprinting ahead and spinning around to slam the back of his boot spur-first against the weak point of the handle. I’m not even sure if the doors had been locked, but I was glad we were both on the same page of better safe than sorry.

“After you, darlin’,” the cowboy paused just long enough to let me through first and I heard the rattling click of loading ammo as I passed, presumably taking out his gun again, the sound of his heels trailing behind on the carpet behind me.

“’Ppreciated, cowboy!”

I slowed slightly as the hallway ended up being incredibly short, leading to an expansive open area with tiled floor that we definitely only had a few seconds to take stock of before the IPC after us would start trickling in. Several types of gambling tables and a bar were in here, with a few scattered sitting areas with tables and luxurious plush chairs, and at least one pool table with the only thing breaking up the entire space being supporting pillars and various lamps or potted plants decorating the place.

At least a dozen eyes looked towards us as we ran in and I booked it towards what looked like the clearest path through the lounge, shouting, “Don’t mind us, just passing through!”

A crash behind me made me jolt and look behind myself, seeing the cowboy flip over a table as we ran by, scattering gambling chips, cards, and glasses of alcohol all over the ground as the people around the table scattered. Patrons started getting up and moving as far from us as possible, some making their way to the exits. Which, from the other sounds behind us, the exit where we came in was starting to be blocked by incoming IPC.

“Do you have to keep knocking shit over,” I asked, trying to temper some giddiness as I glanced back, the cowboy looking behind him with a smirk towards the exit. I saw a few of the smaller IPC run in from the short hall. “I like destruction too, but that wasn’t even in the way.”

The cowboy looked undeterred by my comment, seeming to be having fun with this chase. “Helps slow ‘em down.”

I scoffed in amusement as I turned my attention back forward, eyes widening at the sight of more IPC starting to pour in at the other end of the lounge. Glancing around for another exit that the two obvious ones I commented, “I don’t think slowing them down’ll help any when we’re blocked in!”

My shoes slid on the tile beneath me as I skid to a halt, the cowboy stopping only a second after me and overshooting me by a couple feet. His gun was already in hand, head turning as he also seemed to take stock of the room to see if there was a way to wriggle out of the situation. Unfortunately, it looked like the two exits the IPC came in from were the only ones to the lounge, leaving us cornered as the space filled with IPC personnel and robots.

“Hands in the air,” one of the larger bots demanded, probably carrying a high rank among the group. A bunch of them lifted rifles and guns to aim at us, the rest held large staffs with a glowing orange end for electrocuting. The other larger bots in the group lifted the yellow shields they had on their left arms while the one that spoke to us added, “And drop your weapons! You’re both going into IPC custody.

“You.” - the robot pointed to the cowboy, who raised his hands up without dropping his gun - “For a list of crimes that would have us here all day if I listed them all. And you-.”

I raised my arms slowly with the cowboy and narrowed my eyes at the robot as it gestured to me. I felt tense, internally coiled up like a snake ready to strike. I had a feeling that Criminal Cowboy wouldn’t be going without a fight, and neither was I. Question was just when to start and he seemed experienced enough with this that I was going to let him make the first move to avoid fucking it up for him.

“-for aiding and abetting a wanted criminal,” the robot concluded. Lowering its arm from pointing at us it gestured to one of the grunts, who produced a pair of glowing handcuffs and presumably had more. “Now, drop your weapon! I won’t be asking nicely a third time.”

“Heh,” the cowboy let out an amused exhale. “This ain’t my first showdown. But I’ll play your little game.”

I watched the cowboy intently as he loosened the grip on his gun until it started sliding out of his grip, dropping towards the tiled ground. My breath hitched in my throat in anticipation, seeing a few of the IPC around us relax slightly.

With a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it fluidity, the cowboy raised his left hand as his fingers contorted, shooting at the chest of the leader bot and striking true through its carapace. In almost the same moment his right leg shifted, the toe of his boot catching the dropped pistol and flicking his ankle up to throw it back into the air where he caught it in a twirl with his right hand.

“Get somewhere safe,” the cowboy said as the leader bot sparked and began to fall. He fired off another shot before the first even hit the ground, taking out two grunts that had been standing in an unfortunate overlap. Looking down at me, he had a wild grin on his face while the red in his eyes glowed. “I’ll handle these muddle-fudgers and find ya when the dust settles. Now, bring it on, baby!”

Without waiting for a response, he spun on his heel and popped off a couple more shots as the crowd of IPC jostled out of their shock. A couple peeled off and retreated from the room in a flight response but most immediately trained their attention on the cowboy as he charged towards the nearest cluster, giving another grunt an introduction to the back of his heel with a spur to the face.

“Oh, hell no,” I said to myself, focusing on the energy inside myself and felt my hands tingle as a black baseball bat manifested within my grasp, arcs of energy crackling off of it and my hands before dissipating. With almost everyone focusing on the cowboy bobbing around and firing shots, it was almost too easy for me to rush up behind about four people and wack them over the head before I also started getting some attention from the closest IPC personnel.

I had to roll out of the way of a grunt swinging a staff at my face, twisting to the side and tumbling before popping back up to my feet, darting around a pillar to hit someone else while shouting, “Staffs are a bit better when you’re not THAT close!”

With a bunch of IPC also now firing their guns, I didn’t notice the pause in the particular metal twangs from the cowboy’s pistol until I heard, “Son of a-, I told you to get somewhere safe!”

Looking over to where he dodged a few IPC bullets I saw him quick reload while glancing me up and down like he was reassessing me. I felt a surge of satisfaction and spite, running towards a few more IPC members and charging my bat up before swinging it in a sideways arc to hit three of them with a crackling smack that bowled over all three to the ground. Dodging a couple rounds myself, I kicked over one of the gambling tables and crouched behind it as I retorted, “This ain’t my first rodeo, cowboy! I can handle a knock around or two!”

“Fork, color me surprised, small-fry,” the cowboy chuckled, doing an impressive twirl to shoot one of the grunts with a rifle. Two grunts with staffs rushed forward to try and do some sort of pincer move on him but he jumped into the air and backflipped onto a pool table. He tilted his head in my direction and tipped his hat with his left hand. “I feel like a right ash-vole underestimatin’ ya.”

I opened my mouth to reply even as he turned his attention to some more ground grunts running at him with staffs, noticing movement behind him. A couple riflemen were peeking up from behind the counter of the bar, both shifting like they were talking amongst themselves. One rifleman jerked their head towards the standing cowboy and the other looked like they hesitated before slowly raising the barrel to aim at the cowboy’s torso while the other rifleman watched with their own rifle slightly over the counter.

“Hold still, you,” an angry robotic voice sounded on my right, one of the standing large bots about twenty feet away. Its entire body shook as compartments in its shoulders opened and it released a couple rounds in my direction.

Yelping at the sight, I hopped over the table I was crouched behind and weaved towards the cowboy as I warned, “Rifle behind you! I got the staff guys!”

Explosives went off where I had just been, no doubt destroying the unfortunate table. The cowboy looked towards me at my outburst then scowled and spun around, firing off a shot at the rifleman aiming at him. The first hit the counter but a quick second shot knocked the rifleman out of the game, the other ducking back beneath the bar counter.

Running up to the grunts trying to charge the pool table I conducted energy into my bat again, swinging another arc to get a cluster of them before singling out the last couple. Huffing, I straightened just in time to see the cowboy shoot off again towards the bar, the bullet ricocheting off the shelves behind the counter just right to hit the hiding rifleman that you could see in the behind the bar mirror.

“Nice shot,” I said, extremely impressed at his marksmanship. I tried shooting a rifle after a fight on Belebog once and was immediately berated by Dan Heng when the shot went wild due to inexperience.

“Plenty more where that came from,” the cowboy smirked, tumbling off the pool table and firing off another shot from his left hand, hearing the creaking and fall of another large bot. “We'll have the rest of these muddle-fudgers cleaned up in no ti-.”

"In here!"

Both of us turned our attention towards the loud shout, noticing the sound of more footsteps from both exits to the lounge. I didn't realize that some of the remaining IPC personnel had run off, probably one of them or the ones that retreated at the start of the fight calling for back up. And it looked like it unfortunately arrived.

The grunts still in the lounge looked at each other before switching from a more disheartened and intimidated demeanor to a rejuvenated stance at hearing the fresh onslaught of IPC coming to help.

"I think we might want to reassess that statement there, cowboy," I tossed my head to the side with a groan. I rotated my shoulders to try and loosen them a bit before rushing forward toward the grunts still in the lounge. I noticed one of them raise their rifle towards me and prepared to dodge, but a few shots from behind me went off and both the rifleman and a couple other grunts were thrown back to the ground.

Charging between a couple of the other personnel, I grunted as a staff clocked me in the back after taking out one, two, three IPC with my baseball bat, a jolt running up my spine from the active orange staff-end striking against me. It made my tumble out of the way a bit janky, rolling to a crouch right as a bullet struck the tile a bit too close to me and I looked up to see more IPC pouring in from the lounge exits.

“Put your hands in the air!” multiple IPC shouted, barely coherent over the chatter of their fellows who barked out commands and orders.

"Fucking- this place is supposed to be relaxing!" I rolled and sprinted between tables and pillars as a barrage of bullets came towards both the cowboy and I. Running behind a pillar I did a hard pivot to run back out on the same side to catch the IPC off guard, able to weave through and hit a few. "I don't think I've relaxed the entire fucking time I've been at this stupid hotel!

“In the month or so I’ve been cognizant,” a wall of yellow almost slammed into me, yelping as I barely managed to jump up in time to tumble over one of the large bot shields instead of being slammed by it and chucked across the room as it swung at me. I tried to distance myself from it for now, wacking a rifleman on the head as I ran by. “-we’ve gotten two days without fighting or dealing with stupid diplomacy! MAYBE!”

Tumbling beneath another swinging staff, I bounced back to my feet and spun around to conduct an arc of crackling energy behind me to throw back the nearest IPC, three dropping to the ground and one flinching as a residual spark lashed out at them. I almost slammed into a wall of metal as I spun around to keep running, about to raise my bat to swing at them before realizing it was the cowboy I'd stumbled into, firing off an entire round of bullets at the crowd with audible success.

"Quit yappin'!" the cowboy growled, flicking his pistol to the side to empty the chamber of empty shells that clattered on the tile. His tone was gruff but he was looking way too pleased about the fight prolonging. "Or you'll find yerself diggin' your own grave!"

"I'll bitch in the middle of a fight if I want," I retorted, gaze flicking from looking up at the cowboy towards more movement. A grunt rushed forward to try and take advantage of the cowboy quick reloading, and I saw him shift to probably give another kick to the IPCs skull but I darted around him and swung upwards to clock them in the jaw. “It’s cathartic! Heads up!”

The IPC fell back to the ground and I used the cowboy as a bit of a pillar to move around, backpedaling to avoid another staff swing from a grunt that was promptly shot.

“Nice shot,” I complimented the cowboy before running out from his reach again. I started getting into a good flow of rushing off, smacking a few IPC and then either finding my next target or kiting someone around for the cowboy to take out. Anyone who tried to bumrush me or run away had to deal with a bullet, and anyone who tried to get too close to the cowboy earned a fast pass for a bat to the face.

Something felt off the longer the fight went on, but I ignored it in favor of surviving. I was definitely kind of tired and I’d be sore after this, but it wasn’t anything I hadn’t dealt with.

One of the larger bots lumbered towards the cowboy with its shield raised, blocking the bullets that were fired off in its direction. Narrowing my focus onto it, I hit a couple grunts on the way as I dashed towards it, jumping on a nearby pool table to jump high enough to jump over the robots shield. I focused on my bat and channeled as much energy as I could into it, swinging it down on top of its head as I landed on its back.

The entire thing spasmed beneath me as its carapace dented from the impact and energy crackled through it, overloading its system. My eyes widened a little as I realized what the off feeling that was growing was, thinking that I was incredibly lucky to have lasted this long but also thinking that now was the WORST time for this to happen any minute.

“Uh, hey, cowboy!” I shouted down, hopping off the robot as it fell forward. A grunt tried to intercept me but I beat them off with a “Fuck off, dude, I’m busy!” as I trotted up to another group near the cowboy and started wacking them. “Uh, cowboy?”

“Kind of busy shootin’ sons of nice ladies, small-fry!” the cowboy replied, firing off a couple more shots before looking towards me. “Whaddya need?”

“So, I kind of have this… condition,” I hesitantly answered, grabbing a pool ball and smacking it with my baseball bat into the mask of an IPC grunt.

“Wha- are you forkin’ kiddin’ me?!” he snapped with an anger that caught me entirely off guard and would have led to me getting bodied if he didn’t shoot at the IPC nearest to me. “You wanna talk about some kind of forking terms and conditions while we’re in the middle of a muddle-fudging battle with IPC shirt-for-brains?!”

“What? No- No, what the fuck are you talking about? I’m talking about, like, medical conditions.”

“Aw shucks, ma bad.” The cowboy went from angry to apologetic fairly fast, though his voice was still tense as he continued firing. “Could yer condition wait until after we handle these forkers?”

“I don’t think so,” I replied, wacking another grunt. I felt mildly useless trying to stay relatively close to the cowboy because IPC was thinning around him, but I also didn’t want to charge out and get stepped on. I could feel my chest strain more as the Stellaron struggled to maintain my current size.“Unless you happen to have some Antimatter on you, which I highly doubt-.”

“Antimatter?” the cowboy asked in surprise.

“-then I’m just gonna need you to catch me before I hit the ground any minute now,” I finished, distracted trying to gauge the cowboy’s reaction. I didn’t notice the sound of footsteps that were closer than any of the other footsteps in the room, yelping when a sudden massive surge of electricity jolted through my side. With a fair amount of difficulty, I swung out at the grunt who hit me with a staff with an explosive charge of energy through the conduit of my bat.

It knocked them away successfully and allowed me a couple seconds for my body to handle the electrical charge going through it, but I both felt and saw that the Stellaron had reached its limit of maintaining my form, a couple of stray arcs of energy dissipating from my fingertips and bat glitching before disappearing from my grasp.

“Wuh oh.”

Like a star collapsing on itself, I yelped as one last burst of energy flared out from my body like a flashbang, finding myself only a couple inches tall a few feet in the air as my form collapsed and shrunk into my centerpoint.

“Shit,” I exclaimed, bracing myself to impact the tile floor below. It was a survivable fall due to my durability, but it definitely wouldn’t be a pleasant one, knowing from personal experience with a lot of soreness and bruising. However I found myself stopping short of the ground, hitting an arguably harder surface as I was scooped from the air in a metal hand. I was a bit dazed from the impact, not very helped by the cowboy being naturally loud.

“Well, holy forkeroni,” the cowboy said, grey and red eye zeroed in on me in his palm as I sat up. His attention was briefly pulled away and I was jostled as he spun and fired off a couple rounds while dodging a few IPC bullets. “That all ya got, you shirt-for-brains?! Yer ‘bout knee-high to a grasshopper, small-fry!”

“I- sure? I guess? Is there anywhere around where you could either put me down or maybe just get out of here,” I asked, trying to shake off the vertigo and look around to find a safe spot or clear route for him but he was moving too much for me to see well.

“Not with all these forkers ‘round, and I need both my darn hands to fudging deal with ‘em. Tch, hang on.”

“Al-right!” The last half of the word was a yelp as his hand lifted suddenly, making my stomach drop and causing a wave of dizziness as the force messed with the blood flow to my head. Blinking it away, my vision was once more shifted as I was tossed a brief moment into something. The sudden sequence of motion and change in scenery had me instinctively manifesting my baseball bat again, stopping the area around me from closing.

Gravity shifted around me again as I barely managed to hold onto my bat with one hand, my left shoulder straining as all my weight came down on it, falling from whatever small, dark area I'd nearly been tossed into. It wasn't until I noticed the two rows of massive, sharp teeth on either side of my bat and heard the surprised noise from the cowboy that I realized he'd just tried to toss me in his mouth.

“Aeon ‘arn it, ‘all-’ry! Ah-n ‘ryna ‘elp ya,” the cowboy mumbled loudly around the baseball bat currently locking his jaws open. His left hand was cupped beneath me, poised to catch me if I fell, and I saw fingers twitch like he was debating how to go about this.

Well, if I'd been given any sort of heads up, I wouldn't have ended up panicking as much as I had. There'd been an odd abundance of me being put in mouths, but this was probably the most chaotic and fast-paced to date.

“Nngh, hold on,” I said, trying to pull myself up enough to grab the bat with my right hand. Extremely difficult with him still running. A noise escaped my throat as his hand surged upwards, uncertain to what he was doing as I felt the tips of his index, middle, and thumb fingers press against my back.

My world blurred as the cowboy suddenly halted on his heel and spun to avoid what I could only guess was a swing from a staff from the streak of grey and orange that streaked by. In the simultaneous moment that a gunshot went off so close that it could only be from the cowboy I found my grip forced from the baseball bat as the fingertips against my back pinched the back of my hoodie and yanked me from the two walls of teeth that were now below as I was lifted from the cowboy’s face.

With the most still thing in comparison to everything else being the cowboy, it was incredibly easy for me to focus on his jaws as they snapped shut around my tiny baseball bat, the manifestation shattering between the shark teeth and dissipating into cosmic sparks.

I caught a brief glimpse of the cowboy smiling before he opened wide again and I found myself popped inside before I could really process anything past the daze of being jostled around so much. In fact, it was almost a relief when the pseudo-bone clicked close behind me, allowing me a reprieve from the chaos of being dangled around and shot at.

It was warm and humid with the tongue beneath me surprisingly soft considering the mechanical nature of its host. It wasn't offensively pungent but the space smelt of oil, grease, and other more chemical scents that brought to mind repairing robots in Belebog.

Something clung to me like saliva, likely some kind of lubricant.

I was expecting some amount of tasting or slickening up considering that was necessary - to a point - so that whoever was eating me wouldn’t end up choking on me. But, I guess it wasn’t needed for the cyborg because I instantly found the space around me tilting.

“A-Ack, give me a mom-ent,” I yelped out as the tongue flexed beneath me in preparation for the imminent swallow, squashing me flat against the roof of his mouth. I was barely given a split second as the tongue pushed me back and I felt the throat entrance seize around my ankles in a gulp.

I'm not even sure if his throat actually made the sound of the swallow around me or if it was just a habitual noise from his voice box, carrying a slightly robotic undertone like when he spoke.

As I was pulled into the embrace of his gullet, it felt bizarrely close to being eaten by, for lack of a better term, an organic person. Whatever material that lined his throat was just as claustrophobic as a normal esophagus and almost as pliable as actual flesh. From what little I could gather from the small amount of exposed skin I had, it felt like some sort of rubber.

The cowboy didn't reply to me and I was barely out of his mouth when he exhaled around me with a gruff growl, my surroundings rumbling as he shouted, “‘lright, you muddle-fudgers! Let's forkin’ finish this!”

He was, understandably, far more concerned with fighting the remaining IPC. However, I feel like my ears would have burst if I had been a normal human.

“Which one of you shirt-bags wants to be first in line for a bullet?!”

I felt his body shift and twist chaotically as I slipped past what constituted his collarbone, everything muffling a bit from layers of metal and whatever a mechanical creature would count as internal organs. It was definitely surreal.

It got warmer the deeper I was pulled down like the insides of someone organic, but less slimy or stuffy. Instead of slipping past a beating heart and the breathing of lungs, the somewhat muffled chaos outside overplayed with the sound of whirring fans and mechanical parts shifting against each other as the cowboy moved erratically.

It wasn't long before I was ejected from the relative sturdiness of his esophagus. I didn't realize how much the cowboy was running and dodging until I slipped into a small chamber and immediately started being bounced around the space like a ping pong ball.

Fortunately, it seemed like the walls were made of the same flexible material at his throat. Unfortunately, the space wasn't completely empty. I felt other… bits bounce around with me, unable to make heads or tails of any of it while essentially inside the living bouncy house.

I'm not sure how long I spent tumbling around as the cowboy shouted mother-sanctioned insults at the IPC and fired shot after shot while I can only assume backflipping the entire time based on how much I was being shaken. Eventually, everything stopped and I was flopped onto the floor of the chamber. I felt like I was going to get bruises in places where I didn't even think bruises were possible.

“Ah, hell. You aight in there, small-fry?” I was pulled from my dazed stupor by one side of the chamber being pushed in slightly and the cowboys voice above. For someone who, in the minutes I'd known him, seemed reckless and unabashedly brazen he actually sounded a bit sheepish. “Reck’n I prolly shook you up more than the tail end of a rattler.”

“You’re fine,” I replied, slowly pushing myself off the floor of the chamber. Something gritty clung to my hands with the help of lubricant and whatever other small puddle of liquid that shared the space with me. I flicked my hands in instinctive disgust to try and get rid of the feeling.

“You're takin’ this pretty well.”

“This ain't the first time I've been eaten,” I sighed as I mustered the energy to summon a spark to take stock of my surroundings now that I wasn't tumbling around everywhere. “Definitely the most chaotic though.”

“What the fridge? I woulda thought that your biggest concern woulda been finding yerself under some ash-voles boot,” I felt the space begin to shift and sway as I looked around, probably from him starting to walk or something. The walls were dark gray and seemed to be made of the same rubbery material as his throat, and around me was a thin coating of some kind of thick, grainy, gray substance that had the glint of metal scattered around.

That explained the shallow cuts I could see on my hands now.

“I can't say that being stepped on hasn't been a concern,” I replied, frowning in confusion at the gritty stuff around me. Spurred on by curiosity I ran my finger through the substance and gave it a cautious sniff. I'd noticed the somewhat pungent scent permeating the space but wasn't able to recognize what it was until I got a closer smell. Dulled by the potent sting of what smelled like malt juice diluted by lubricant, the grains smelt of something that reminded me of explosives, I scrunched my face in confused surprise. “Is this fucking GUNPOWDER?!”

“Mmmhm,” the cowboy let out a pleased hum like remembering a particularly delicious snack. “Nine millimeter, baby. Had a couple earlier. Might sorry ‘bout the clutter, but didn't exactly have time to clean house before fighting the muddle-fudgin’ IPC.”

“I… I don't know what I was expecting a cyborg to eat, but it wasn't bullets,” I sighed, cleaning my hand off on my jacket. “Eh, whatever. Can you let me out and help me get to the Astral Express please?”

“Ehhh,” the space tilted and squished a little, only able to assume that he crouched down. Guessing the guys habits, I wouldn't be surprised if he was seeing if any of the IPC had anything worthwhile on them. “I can take you to your train, but ya might need a mechanic.”

“Wait, what? Why?” I asked, frowning in confusion.

“‘Cause I can't just make myself vomit on command,” the cowboy replied, able to feel him stand up. “So unless your folks have a mechanic or something to make me spit ya out, we might be stuck up a shirt creek without a paddle until I come across another mechanic.”

I blinked in the dark space, part of me appalled at the news. However, this was weirdly enough also not my first time stuck inside someone who couldn't just cough me up considering Sampo.

“Please, for the love of the Aeons, just get to the train and find Dan Heng.”

[another-lost-mc]

I hate how Mephistopheles has no lore. I'm making an OC that out ranks him and the fucker has no established rank??? Sir your whole goddamn thing is "I'm a noble, goddamn it" and like no rank? No bitches? No nobility??

So I'm picking one (Grand Dutches, technically?) and going with the punches, but how do you fix Solomare's near non-existent lore so well?? This shit is hard! Mad props!

I'm grateful that we got more Mephisto lore in Nightbringer, but like many characters, new info or interactions are few and far between except when it's needed as a plot device. lol

Even though Mephisto isn't a member of the Ars Goetia, he's a Faustian demon or what I call a "named" demon which has important relevance in my personal world building. Other than that, we know that his family has deep roots to the Devildom nobility, are highly influential, and that he was basically raised to be Diavolo's friend. We know his special power now thanks to Nightbringer, but my version of it is a bit sinister because, you know, demons.

Unless you're new around here, my solution to gaps in the game's lore or storytelling is solved by personal headcanons/world building and creating OCs. I knew I wanted to write more about Mephisto, and that meant exploring his relationships and history outside of what the game told us.

Before NB existed, I was already developing his little brother OC because using characters/info only found in the games limits the potential for complexity and drama. Plus, writing an OC for Mephisto's brother helped me develop my own interpretation of Mephisto's character too.

When the game only leaves us crumbs to work with, here's what my brainstorming looks like to try and explore possible ways to fill in the gaps:

Creating an OC for Mephisto's younger brother: Mephisto is a named demon and part of the demon nobility. My thought: his brother is probably a named demon of some importance too.

Naming Mephisto's little brother: After doing some reading, I learned Mephisto wasn't part of the Ars Goetia, but that didn't mean his brother couldn't be. Result: I just picked a name off the list that I liked. LOL

Note: I have friends that have OCs based off other Ars Goetia demons so I purposefully avoided choosing those names because I write about my version the Devildom assuming those OCs exist within it.

Developing Bathin as an OC: Okay, we have a name. Cool, that's usually the hard part. Now we have to build him up from nearly nothing! What I knew about his character before NB released: he was significantly younger than Mephisto (I imagined the same or slightly younger than Luke with a similar childlike appearance) and that Mephisto was a very attentive and doting older sibling. Based on the RAD Sports event in OG, I concluded if he was that protective of Luke, he would be even more protective of his younger brother as well. I also interpreted the events and assigned Mephisto his demonic trait (having a tail of some kind instead of wings). In my mind, demonic traits are something that might be part of the family's heritage, so I decided that Bathin would look similar to Mephisto in his human form and also his demon form.

Identifying gaps/issues with Bathin's character: The main concern I had to address for Bathin was his existence as a demon of the Ars Goetia. Solomon has pacts with all of them, and this implies that he would also have a pact with Bathin - a literal demon child. Oops!

Questions I needed to answer:

Why would Solomon want a pact with a child and how did this happen?

Are there any limitations/restrictions if a pact is made with a demon child that isn't mature/"of age"?

Should I change his name to something else to avoid this issue? Nah.

Solving Bathin's existence as a child in the Ars Goetia: I basically wrote a world building theory about demon death/exorcism and respawn cycles to explain which demons can respawn and which ones cannot. Naming conventions and the impact on existing pacts are part of this theory.

Conclusion using fill-in-the-gaps world building:

A form of the death & rebirth cycle exists for demons.

Using theory, Bathin can exist as a member of the Ars Goetia because he was killed/exorcised as a mature demon. His essence/power exists within the version of him that was reborn later.

Implications and things to continue developing:

Bathin made his pact with Solomon as a mature demon and the pact persisted through death, although as a child the pact is weak and practically unusable.

Demons who respawn usually have no memories of their previous existence, but Mephisto would remember him from before. That can explain why he might be close and very protective of his younger brother. Solomon would also have memories of past!Bathin as well and that could have some interesting effects on how Solomon interacts with Mephisto as well.

Demons that are exorcised and respawned might carry some lingering physical evidence of their death - for example, the power of an angel's grace maiming some part of their body. This helped me visualize Bathin's physical appearance and explain any potential scars or flaws he was born with.

Child!Bathin won't be a copy of his former self, so there is potential for drama/angst as those that knew him best before re-learn the "new" him.

The possibility to explore Mephisto as a child and how his friendship with Diavolo was fostered/pressured by those around him (and Bathin's feelings/attitudes about Mephisto's potential (mis)treatment).

Explaining past!Bathin's untimely demise in the first place and the characters/circumstances involved.

If you ever wondered how I take a random throwaway reference in the game and expand on it to create an OC, here's what the process looked like when I was developing Mephisto's brother. He's very precious and though I doubt we'll see much more of him in the game other than some vague references, I enjoy writing about Mephisto enough that dedicating an OC to his little brother was worthwhile.

I'll end this with a treat for those of you that decided to read through all this rambling:

[misc-obeyme]

Still micheal anon but I think that nb Michael is still obsessed with the brothers to a degree to the point that he's willing to do anything to bring them back. While og om Michael has come to terms with it more while still obviously missing them.

It kind of reminds me of a clingy child in that aspect, still extremely attached and unwilling to let go of them even though they themselves might have moved on from him.

I'm also curious about Raphael on this because for someone who just got impersonated he doesn't seem that upset about it. It probably has to do with him at this point in time being closest to Micheal and in his character introduction how he couldn't leave Michael alone after the brothers left. (And I'm glad he did bc even with Raphael Micheal definitely isn't in a sound place of mind but at least he still has Raphael.)

And I was doubting how close Raphael truly was but then I saw how much of an idiot Micheal seemed in the hard mode that reminded me a lot of my own younger brother that really stopped my doubts. It's clearly obvious to me that the Micheal mc knows and the Micheal the brothers and Raphael know are different.

Kinda lengthy again but I do enjoy hearing your thoughts, also for the past weeks I've been brain rotting about him and the possibilities and that really leaks into my asks.

Ugh yes the brain rot is real with this game! I enjoy hearing your thoughts as well, so thank you for sharing them with me!

I honestly hadn't considered the difference between NB Michael and OG Michael, but you're totally right. NB Michael has only just recently lost all his brothers. I guess I can cut him some slack because of that, it would certainly explain the way he seems like he'd do just about anything to get them back. Even if that means forcing them to choose between leaving Satan behind and possibly starting a war between the Celestial Realm and the Devildom. It's definitely a bit of an immature response, though, because even if he's doing it out of desperation, he's only considering his own feelings by doing it at all, in my opinion.

Honestly, I am starting to really like Raphael. He's a little unhinged, but he seems to have everyone's best interests at heart. I really thought that Raphael just knew all the stuff he did when he was in the Devildom because he was so close with Michael that Michael told him everything. I was not expecting that it was actually Michael disguised as Raphael at all. But I feel like Michael needs Raphael and it's good that Raphael is still around, just like you said. Though I did find it interesting that at the end of the hard lesson, Raphael said maybe he should have followed Lucifer when he had the chance. It makes me wonder why he decided not to. I think Simeon feels really guilty about not siding with Lucifer, but Raphael doesn't seem to have that same regret? It sounded more like he was saying that following Lucifer would have been easier than dealing with Michael now that Lucifer is gone lol.

I definitely think there's a bit of a theme with characters who act different depending on who they're around. Michael is always pretty formal with MC, even when he's pretending to be Raphael. And yet, when he's talking to Raphael, it's clear that he's something of a troublemaker and possibly doesn't actually know what he's doing at all. It seems like he's just using the formality of the Celestial Realm to make it seem like he knows what he's doing, but he absolutely doesn't.

All this is to say that I don't dislike Michael! I actually don't feel strongly one way or the other yet because we don't have enough information about him. I'm just not particularly pleased with the things he's been doing in the last couple of lessons. I get the feeling they're going to introduce him for real in the next season, so I think if we get to spend more time getting to know him, I'll be able to form a real opinion of him.

Though in the end I usually find reasons to love all the characters, so I suspect he'll grow on me just like Raphael has lol.

[dumbass-mha-simp]

AYO

BARBATOS X GN!READER

Smut

I know I've been gone awhile, sorry about that lol BUT Obey Me has consumed my entire life and I randomly wanted to write one of my scenarios down cause I'm possibly going crazy

There is no direct mentions of gendered genitals, so I believe it's gn but I did have an afab body in mind while writing it so if you spot any feminine terms I'd be more than happy to correct it! I hate the fact that most fanfiction is all female and afab and I would be absolutely happy to write for trans/nb readers!!

Warnings: sex, obviously. (I think that might be it so I'm just gonna list some other things.) Oral m!receiving, cockwarming, riding, mentions of demons being able to smell arousal?? Idk, Barb is such a gentleman smh how am I supposed to like real men when he exists

Not very long, around 650 words

Remember to take care of yourselves :)

-------------------------------------------------------

It had been barely noticeable at first. A quick brush against each other, a stolen glance, a soft leading hand against your lower back.

You convinced yourself that your imagination was forming something out of nothing. Until this morning.

It was odd knowing that demons could smell desire, it felt violating that they could tell. But perhaps that's what brought the small quirk of his lips. Barbatos knew what he was doing to you.

And here you were, basking in not only the pale moonlight but his presence. He looked up at your almost bare body with such wonder as his fingers gently glided against your sex.

You slid back down to begin working your mouth against his dick once more. He was too generous, too gentle. Always cupping your face or head instead of greedily pushing you farther. He respected you and wanted to make sure you knew that wholly.

As you sucked and bobbed your head against him, he softly played his gloved hands across your temples soothingly. His moans were no louder than a breath of begging for you. You name teased his wanting lips everytime it slipped past them.

He began to softly pull your face away from his cock, to which you looked questioningly back to him. He brought you back to sitting on his thighs as his right gloved hand gently turned your face.

"I'm afraid I wouldn't last much longer with you there. Please allow me to pleasure you, my love."

His lips softly worked at the exposed side of your neck, mouthing words of love and encouragement against your supple skin. You could do no more than whine his name again and again.

He softly leaned back up to your ear, "Dear, I am going to grab your hips and help guide you down, is that alright?"

You nodded feverishly, going in to excitedly press his lips to your own. He laughed softly at your eagerness. His smooth gloves grabbing a strong, but not bruising grip on your hips, bringing then forward and down till you could feel his head poke at your entrance.

You connect your lips to his again as to distract yourself from the slightly painful stretch of him entering you. You both slightly pull apart to moan into each others mouths as he's fully inside, giggling a bit at how you had the same idea.

You grab his shoulders supportedly as you move your legs to prepare yourself. He watches as you experimentally bounce for the first time, moaning into your shoulder after you come back down.

He bites and sucks against your neck as you continue bringing yourself up and down on his cock, just hard enough to leave marks only you could notice.

He lowers one hand down to play with you, bringing you closer to release with him.

You whine, "mmm Barb.. I'm.."

"Shhh sh sh sh, it's okay let it happen, dear."

You let out one last broken moan as your back arches and you release against him. He grunts quietly as he bucks his hips one last time, cumming with you.

Your head is fuzzy as your orgasm washes through your whole body, cause muscles to spasm. As you start to come back down you feel a hand gently brushing through your hair and one rubbing your back.

He softly pushes your head back down onto his shoulder and continues his ministrations. "Relax dear, you were so good for me."

You nuzzle your face against his neck, his dark hair teasing your face. He presses tender kisses to the side of your head closest to him. "Do you wish to sleep here tonight?" He questions, looking down at you and holding your face.

"I'll tell Lucifer I had business here, he can handle the brothers on his own again for one night." Barbatos softly laughed as he pressed you back against his shoulder.

[chitsangenthusiast]

Kath my beloved, I hope you have a good day! ♥️♥️ Tell me an assortment of Sokka, Zuko, and/or Zukka headcanons that make you lose it 😳

!!!! oh i would be HAPPY to!!! put under the cut bc i kinda got excited and went off lol

—

sokka in general <3 after the war, there was a period where sokka and toph sometimes, sometimes, traveled around the earth kingdom and swindled conniving market tricksters out of their money. katara does NOT know, zuko does NOT know it occasionally happens in the fire nation too, and aang DOES know and secretly hates he can’t tag along bc he’s far too recognizable now lol

sokka doesn’t like cooking, but unfortunately he’s great at creating delicious dishes so he’s often forced to go to be the one who cooks during camping trips. the only people who don’t get his complaining as he cooks for them, however, is gran-gran and bato

i’ve talked abt this before, but sokka keeping his hair shaved after the war to honor his lost childhood as well as acknowledge his warrior status in his own way is smth that can be so personal <3

also i....very quietly.......hc sokka as nb he/him....and sometimes also as a grey ace/demi/sex-positive ace bisexual....bc sometimes it's nice to imagine some form of representation for myself, even in the tiniest of aspects lol

zuko and family <3 for a long time after the war, ‘uncle’ was the title that meant the most to zuko. it’s smth that everyone quickly realized, so when the gaang started having kids they were adamant to make sure zuko knew he was their children’s uncle

(yes it took him off guard. yes he cried in private every single time, especially when the kids got old enough to actually start calling him ‘uncle zuko,’ even during formal events)

it’s not until he has izumi does he finally understand the weight behind the word ‘dad.’ babe was her first word, and zuko has been on cloud nine ever since

(the whole ‘uncle being the most important’ is basically why iroh never had to adopt zuko or anything - there was no need, and after chit sang wanders back into their lives and starts joking abt how he’s zuko’s father, both of them find it incredibly hilarious lol)

zukka letters <3 after the war, zuko and sokka used to send each other COPIOUS letters. zuko’s are normal. sokka’s are always sent as packets lol (he has a habit of writing down any and all passing thoughts on scrap paper that never get transferred into one single letter, so usually he ends up just compiling them by the day they were written and bundling them together)

also in their letters: they once joked about making doomsday clocks to track their daily feelings, and so now every letter starts with a tiny lil drawing of how close they are to midnight on the day they wrote it

(before they got together zuko’s midnight was ‘letting druk burn down the palace.’ after they got together, it changed to ‘moving to the swt without any warning and living with sokka,’ which sokka finds kinda adorable but also isn’t ready to be wrongly suspected of kidnapping yet)

zukka husbands and kids <3 along with being known as the fire lord who’s trying to foster in peace and love, he’s also known as the golden fire lord - and it’s entirely bc of sokka and ty lee bc they pick out all of his gold accessories and puppy-dog-eye him until he gives in to wear everything lol

after he and sokka get married, his nickname among the public changes to the ivory fire lord (which isn’t technically right. it’s whalebone that he’s wearing in place of most of the gold, but a lot of people don’t know the difference)

zukka have two kids uwu izumi was born first ofc! for their second daughter tho, it took them awhile to settle on a good name for her. at one point sokka suggests ‘verza’ bc it sounds nice and has a z in it, but as soon as he finds out it means cabbage he backtracks hard on it

zuko finds this mf hilarious - but, unfortunately to sokka, he also thinks it’s adorable and so their second daughter’s name is verza lol

[nightswithkookmin]

JIKOOK BE CONCEPT- EXTENDED ANALYSIS

ANON: Hey Goldy, so I want to ask, what makes you look at one moment and decide the tension in there is nothing but then in another moment you claim Jikook are having issues? I ask because of the conclusions you drew on the photoshoot video when you said they were fighting but in two other instances where we can all clearly see that the mood between Jikook is tense like Jimin's mood in the Be Concept Clip and the other interview you have said it's nothing. I don't mean this in a disrespectful way, I just want to understand your thought process if you can walk me through it. It's ok if you don't respond. I love your posts regardless. Keep it up.

Thanks for your question.

I think I try my best as much as possible to share my thought process on why I reach certain conclusions and in instances where I do not have much time to delve deeper into a conversation I state an NB indicating I would be talking further about that particular topic later on?

I think the first thing I can point out to you right off the bat in regards to your question is that we may most likely be having different understandings of tension as pertains to shipping simply because we ship Jikook in different ways.

Again, I do not mean to say my perspective is superior or that someone else's is inferior. I'm just saying we may be having different views on the topic based on the differences in our shipping styles.

To me tension is not just a sense or feeling or mood. It is one of the metrics I employ in assessing whether or not a ship is real- stay with me.

In my experience, while people may be good at hiding a relationship, they can never hide the intimacy of the relationship or the stress of keeping that relationship a secret. Secrets are stressful to keep and they leave stress trails in their wake. It's as simple as that. If any ship is real in BTS you will see its stress marks.

It's not easy standing there, watching your man's nipples being played with, or having another man grope your intimate partner for entertainment purposes while you stand there smiling for the cameras- you can smile, but it's going to be fake.

It's not easy hearing how your man sneaks into another man's shower to watch him bathe and compliment the size of his dick.

It's not easy hearing how you can't stand next to your man in a line up while another person takes that position even if it's just for work.

It's not easy pretending not to love your man, while watching everyone else love on him. It's not easy being told what you can do and not do with your partner much less by your own peers.

It's not easy hiding your love and affection for the person you love, holding yourself back from kissing them, or hugging them or doing any of the intimate stuff you are so used to doing with them- not when you have to be around them all the time.

It's not easy having cameras shoved in your face during your alone, private time with your man, when you are watching them on giant screens and they are right there next to you but you can't hold them- please listen to JK's demo Delcacomania which he released on his birthday last year and you will understand why he cried when JM flew from Paris to see him on his birthday. I cried too.

My point is, it's really not easy keeping a relationship a secret within the same work space as your partner. It's not as easy as other shippers make it seem. That shit is stressful and stress begets tensions and tensions begets conflicts- especially if there are other people attached to the parties in the relationship.

A secret gets heavy before it gets easy but you can never erase the stress that comes with hiding that secret especially not in a group as diverse in personalities as BTS. There are bound to be clashes, there are bound to be slip ups- moments where the fourth wall is breached and many others.

Stress is usually one of the first indicators of people keeping anything a secret. I've been called toxic for this, but I pay a lot of attention to conflicts and tensions within the group dynamics regardless of the degree of that tension because that conflict to me is a sign of stress.

I can tell you for a fact, any ship that is kumbaya in BTS is not real. Any ship whose existence doesn't stress out the group dynamics is a ship made in Disney heading for Never-land. Conflict and tension is a sign of stress and stress is a sign of keeping secrets.

That's not to say every single tension within the group, between Jikook or any other ship is as a result of them keeping that ship a secret. I think we can rule out all forms of contrived tensions at this point- you know which ones I'm talking about. Ain't no damn person up in there tryna steal nobody's man in BTS. The fuck?! Lmho.

Then there are those tensions that are as a result of mood swings, bad hair days, a call being delayed, a missed period- what? some of them have girlfriends, cough cough. Yea, Don't mind me.

Tension could be caused by anything really and so I think it's not enough to point out tensions but you have to try and ascertain the cause and effect of that tension to see if that tension is as a result of the stress that comes with keeping Jikook a secret or whether it is rather causing stress or going to cause a stress in their relationship dynamics-

C'mon, now y'all know if Jimin should thirst over another man that that is going cause a lot of stress not just for JK but the group as well because Jikook's mood affects them too.

Jimlous and Jeonlous are also signs of the stress that comes with keeping Jikook's relationship a secret. Let's be honest, if they were out all of those wouldn't be happening. People wouldn't cross their boundaries as much as they do.

From my perspective, both of Jikook are constantly reacting, poorly might I add, to their relationship being a secret. It seems to me they both hate what they have to do to keep eachother a secret within the group.

Jimin keeps JK a secret by acting as if he is available and JK keeps Jimin a secret by acting as if he doesn't want him- cold, nonchalant, and the way I see them I think it drives them both crazy. Lol.

Jimin doesn't want to come out but he doesn't want to be kept a secret either. He just wants to be in that glass closet whereas JK seems to want to be out or completely hidden- he is not about that middle ground life, I feel. But that doesn't mean he doesn't make compromises especially where Jm is concerned.

Jimin is very conscious and highly judgmental of himself and I think he projects a bit of that into their relationship dynamics. As such he is constantly worrying about feedback, about how their relationship is affecting the group's dynamics.

You see this in the way he runs to JK upon the least complaints by any member about JK. Like when Jin complained about JK not choosing his bag over JM's, or when RM complained about JK buying a birthday present for only JM and not the others.

Or when RM complained about JK showing a song he had written to JM first before showing it to him in a VLive- now they didn't mention who they were talking about exactly but I knew from the moment JM started reciting Jikook's go to response for whenever they are called out for constantly being together, the whole 'we just so happened to be together in that moment,' that they were talking about JK. I don't know, I could be wrong.

JM is constantly trying to mitigate Jungkook's tendencies for exclusivity in their relationship especially where it conflicts with the groups interest even though that exclusivity and preferential treatment feeds directly into his love language.

It's that kumbaya in him I keep talking about. He would sacrifice their happiness for the groups. In my opinion.

But JK aint about that life. His entire philosophy is to pursue personal happiness first. So often, you would see him weaponizing their relationship secret against JM- trying to out him and shit. which in turn, ends up causing their relationship a ton of stress.

The best illustration I can give for this is when JK posted Ending Scene in early parts of 2019 and people started speculating Jikook had broken up because it was a break up song. JM immediately responded to that post with two posts, one about the Calico cat or something and the other pointing out how that song was just a cover. Jimin hates it when JK does something to create the impression that they are not together especially when they are together.

But at the same time, he would take a step back from their relationship, ask for space to try and nurture his other relationships with friends and family when he feels JK coming on too strong on him- like Jimin what do you actually want! You drive me nuts!

What I'm trying to say is that when you point out that JM looks tensed, you should be able to explain why you think he looks tensed.

And if you think his tension goes to the root of their relationship, then you should be able to predict the consequences of that tension too. Lol.

For me, I filter their tensions through their established patterns of behavior, their personalities and the actions that arise from their personalities- listen, the Maknae line can be very melancholic for no reason sometimes. Not sure what goes on but boy can they brood!

You have to consider all these things.

Tensions are obvious, obviously. Or maybe not. Most of them are quite easy to spot. Some not so much. They do go undetected if you are not hyper focused on them in certain moments when they happen or aren't aware of the context or subtext behind such moments.

Perspective is everything. We all don't have the same perspective. But no one holds the truth when it comes to Jikook. We can only speculate in a way that holds meaning to us.

Take for example Jimin and Jin's call during Jimin's VLive in March this year. There are a fraction of shippers who do not believe that that call was intercepted by JK at all simply because they do not see the subtext of that moment. Why would JK do that and not just reveal his identity, they ask. A valid point.

Then there are those who see JK interrupting that call as plausible because they believe they can differentiate between JK and Jin's call voice. Equally valid point.

Then there's me, who think yes that was JK's voice but goes further to try and anwer the questions raised by the first group as that, JK was pushing the boundaries both with JM and Bighit for barring him from doing a live with JM.

As such, I believe that call was an act of rebellion on his part to be allowed to Jikook with his man on the VApp. All that protest would then lead to a pivotal moment of him and JM having their VLive but under heavy surveillance. Lol.

Actions have consequences whether good or bad. Whether positive or negative. It's the cause and effect principle. Every effect has a predictable cause and every action has a specific and predictable effect.

If a moment of tension is created between them that is substantial, it is going to produce a subsequent substantial reaction. Law of Newton- I can't make this shit up. Lmho.

Another moment of this nature for me would be the VMin's unit interview filmed in February/March and released in June during Festa.

Now, if you were following the tensions between V and JK around that period, the context and subtext of that Interview would be easily apparent to you- V was just shading JK left right left. Bless him.

All that random flirting with Jimin- JM lost his Mochi cheeks, his pinky has grown were just code for JM is a grown ass man now so stop being possessive over him.

I have said Jikook have been asserting themselves against eachother this year following the lows of late 2019 and especially around that time period.

For Jimin, that self assertion takes the form of checking JK's over possessiveness over him as that is a huge cause of tensions within the group throughout the years and something that I feel really bothered JM in the later half of 2019 and early half of 2020.

Why does it bother him when he used to be the one enabling that shit in JK? The members, keep up. Lol but not just the members. Remember I said earlier how, Jikook had come under heavy scrutiny with May 2019 to June this year. JM I feel wanted to keep things really on the low but JK- sigh.

Believe it or not, JK dumb whipped ass exposes Jikook more than JM does in their relationship. In the very least his possessiveness and chest puffing when anyone breathes near JM is one of the biggest tells.

We all know Tae is one of the members that have openly pointed out his displeasure with JK keeping JM to himself, cutting him off from his friends and all. Now we all know also that Jimin's pinky is a huge deal to JK. The moment he saw VMin comparing pinkies that's when he began screwing with us for real! Lmho.

JK made a big deal about JM's pinky and also seemed to have a thing for JM's Mochi cheeks too, calling him his Mochi and shit right in front of Tae's salad. Listen, TAE KNOWS. He knows!

So I found it interesting, how those parts of JM were specifically the things that V felt had changed about Jimin- I mean go back and look at Tae's facial expressions and smirk when he started talking about that. Lmho.

Then Jimin clapped back with that whole pinky line from their song Friends, pointing out how contradictory Tae was being. Lol.

To me that has always been one aspect of Tae and JK's ship dynamics that I enjoy so much. Tae is constantly teasing and shading JK and it's so subtle yet passive aggressive sometimes. you might miss it if you don't understand the context of him saying certain things in certain moments.

He don't spare JM sometimes either. Chileee. You never know with this man. Lol.

I mean did y'all catch his jab at JK during Festa when JK brought up the rain fight and he said, yea but that was a long time ago though- give it a rest. When I tell you, this man knew JK was trying to one up him over the whole dumpling fight thingy he had with JM. Lmho.

Then in that dynamite MV reaction VLive when JK and JM tried to eye fuck through the viewfinder? Let's not look into the camera he says so eloquently then side eyes JK- I LOVE THIS MAN!!! Please stay on their necks for me. They play too much! Lmho.

JK's possessiveness over JM is one of the causes of tension within the group I feel and JK have said his hyungs try to teach him not to be so possessive. Tae, RM and Suga to me are those hyungs who keep him in check the most, most times.

All that being said, just because there is tension present between them in a given moment doesn't necessarily mean it's as a result of a conflict between them as I have explained in past posts.

The inverse of this is similarly true. Truth is we can never know these things for sure. We can only speculate.

And personally, as I keep pointing out I have my own metrics for assessing these kinds of things. I get it wrong sometimes and when I do, I simply adjust my metrics and keep it pushing.

It's my own customized metrics, the lens through which I filter their interactions and make sense of their moments and It works for me. Isn't that what having an opinion is about?

I find, some of their interactions or moments follow an established pattern of behavior from their past moments and so it's much easier to call those.

For instance, you don't need a six foot page analysis to identify Jimlous or Jeonlous when you see it. You don't need a crystal ball to tell you when JK nibbles on Jimin's ear that Jimin is nervous. They did that in 2018, they did that in 2019, they've done that in 2020- to me that's become a pattern and when I see JK anywhere near Jimin's ear depending on the setting I will conclude JM is nervous and JK is trying to comfort him.

All that would be left for me to determine then is why Jimin is nervous at all in that moment and if I find he has no reason to be nervous in that instant my next assumption then would be that Jeon Jungkook is horny. I'm not kidding. Jk scares me. Lol.

Don't mind me.

He could be horny or he could be touchy, or he could be just expressing his affections through skinship. All of that is valid so I would employ an elimination approach?

I would rule out Jikook sexual foreplay in instances like that based on whether or not JK's gesture was a mission given to him by the staff based on Jimin's reaction to that gesture- He seemed pretty disappointed when he learned that JK bopping his nose was just a mission.

At times too I test out theories.

Yes, Jimin is an extrovert but does he freeze out JK when he is being an extrovert? He doesn't. We have seen him grabbing the Jeon titties in behind the scenes photoshoot, we have seen JK shove his butt in JM's dick face, we have seen 50 shades of JK grab JM's neck and dip his hand down his neck into his chest region to warm himself up. We have seen Jikook at behind the scenes photo shoots countless times. They gravitate towards eachother.

So if he is being his extrovert self with every body but JK, and JK is orbiting him but not interacting with him as they have done in the past then honestly I don't need my crystal ball to assume something is up between them. Why? Because Jikook's interactions behind the scenes aren't susceptible to false conditionings as compared to the intentional, exaggerated versions of their interactions on camera which sometimes can be laced with fanservice.

Jikook is not fanservice. Most of their behind cameras are moments of them breaching the forth wall. Like JM walking into JK's room without noticing there were cameras in the room. Their mood in there was not a performance and wasn't intended for the cameras and yet they were still close. Them taking a picture at the back of the track was equally that- unintended for the cameras.

What I'm saying is, we have seen Jikook when they are working on camera and when they are not working on camera and that mood in that behind the scenes photoshoot video doesn't fit either description of Jikook in those settings to me regardless of whether I know them personally or not.

What that moment fits into for me is a pattern of behavior that has been consistent with Jikook over the years. And I know people box JM into this whole extrovert personality but as I've said I don't believe anyone is completely extroverted or introverted.

JM to me has a certain degree of introvertedness in him and I've talked about this. He seems to have a bit of an avoidant personality too where he recoils into himself or shut people out in certain moments like how he says he drinks alone and becomes much quieter when he feels stressed out.

He doesn't open up as much about his problems it seems, he bottles it all up untill it eats him up- I'm glad he says when gets like that JK notices his mood and often comes around to do something that makes him laugh. Jimin does same for JK when he is feeling anxious- Please, Jikook is real ok?

So stop telling lies. Lol.

I think this avoidant personality becomes more prominent in moments when he fights or argues with people.

In Manila it was that moment where he noticed JK staring at him and so be moved his seat back to avoid JK's gaze. In VMin dumpling fight, it was him going out to drink with Suga after the fight- classic avoidant behavior. In Yoonmin it was him asking Suga not to touch him when Suga put his hand on his back even though Suga was sat right next to him.

In 2017- was it the behind scenes photoshoot for the billiard pool games? We saw JM literally running away from JK. Lol. He literally side-eyed the fuck out of JK, yeeted himself away from JK the moment he finished posing for the cameras. In that OT7 footage where V was playing with JK's hair, again, he yeeted himself out of there real quick at the end of filming- dude literally said deuces bitches. Lol.

And in the Jin birthday VLive 2019, he pulled away instinctively when JK's knee touched his. In all these instances, JM was keeping up the facade. Smiling and interacting like his normal slytherin/ honorary hufflepuff self but his instinctual reactions is what gave him away. In my opinion.

To me that is a pattern of behavior on JM's part. When he is angry or mad st someone- he avoids them. And it's harder if he has to be within the same space with such person.... I'll circle back to this.

All the times since 2015 when he's been 'mad' at JK he's done just that- Akekeking with everyone else, amplifying his extrovertedness, latching on to his 'clutches' within the group, all the while keeping JK at bay while stealing glances at him to see his reaction at the same time.

And when he notices how that's affecting JK- he literally smirks in satisfaction. Meet evil chim everyone- And I say this with love, he is vindictive as fuck. I mean this is the same person who didnt hesitate to kill Army in a game just for disobeying him- allegedly. Same person who said he would whoop his bandmates except of course for JK and force them to bow at his feet if he was ruler. Did y'all see Tae turning to check JM's reaction when JK made fun of his singing in run? Did you see his passive aggressive reaction to JK after that clowning?

Listen, we all should be scared of Park Jimin. He is sweet and all but fuck with him... I dare you. PJMs are gonna revoke my PJM membership are they not? Oh God! Lol

JK is similar to JM in this regard. He avoids when he is angry or edgy. Try touching him in that state and he is pulling away. He did it with Tae in the Dynamite MV behind scenes where Tae tried to touch him and he pulled away and the whole not wanting to hold hands with Tae at the KBS interview thingy- it actually broke my heart watching that bit. JK. Sigh. Will post and delete the Taekook video I am talking about as soon as I post this- out of respect for their shippers.

JK does the same to JM too sometimes when JM irritates him. Manila and also around On promo when they had that Alex Almanto whatever unit shoot- they were all having fun, there's a cut and suddenly he is pulling away when JM holds him, does the lip thingy, and glares at JM. He turns away to look at Hobi, which I just think he was trying to hide his expression from the camera lol- JM almost burst out into laughter and I nearly peed myself watching that bit- JK can be very petty sometimes. Lmho

He did the same in this controversial photoshoot. He was mad at both JM and Namjoon which explains the part he was dragging his feet when he was walking away from JM. It wasn't because he was waiting for Jimin. He was avoiding Namjoon who was walking ahead of him. In my opinion. And the part he stood with Jin and RM- JM did something hilarious JK giggled a little but turned immediately to Namjoon and when he noticed RM laughing too he stopped laughing. Then he did that thing were he put the fear of God in RM when RM stood close to JM. JK was so angry he forgot his manners when he bumped into Jin in that moment and again, like always. He looked away to avoid the scenery.

Now I don't know what had gone on there but I'm still trying to reconstruct that moment to figure it out. All I know is something went on involving those three and may be Tae too as I have pointed out in previous posts.

JM was mad at JK, JK was mildly mad at JM but heavily mad at RM.

All these things I've mentioned are patterns of behavior that have repeated over the years from my delusional point of view of Jikook's interactions and of their interactions as against the group dynamics.

Circling back to the Be concept clip and JM's mood in there, I gotta ask. Do you think Jimin's mood was as a result of the stress of keeping their relationship a secret in that moment?

It wasn't to me. Even after looking away from JK he went back to looking at JK again. When their eyes met he smiled a little. Whatever was going on with him had nothing to do with JK or their relationship. If it did, he would have been much more hostile than that and frankly JK wouldn't be sat there cheesing the way he was doing in that instance. His butt would have been on fire.

JM seemed- serene and peaceful to me. I actually enjoy him most in his moments of quiet like these.

RM's reaction to that Jikook moment however is an indication of stress to me. He seemed excited, probably wanted to play with his Jiminie but when he noticed JM had looked away his instincts was to check JK's reaction. Not anybody else, JK.

When he noticed JK was smiling at JM he dropped his hands and seemed a bit deflated. That deflation right there is one of the signs of the stress I'm talking about.

RM isn't just the leader he is their friend. Like V his bond with JM suffers from time to time due to our elephant in the room. I am often fascinated by RM and JM's friendship dynamics and would definitely love to have conversation about their dynamics.

I hope this answers your question?

Please keep supporting Jikook. Jikool is real.

Signed,

GOLDY

[beastlywritings]

Beginnings

Pairing: Eskel/OC (Lae’elan) AFAB NB (but gender doesn’t come into it until later)

Summary: Eskel comes across a shapeshifter (Or she comes across him) and they make nice. 

Rating for this chapter: PG-13 for sexual innuendo and suggested sexual acts, as well as talk of masturbation

TW (this chapter): stalking (kind of), manipulation, injuring another on purpose, mention of dissociation and the feeling of it, mentions of orphanage, mention of lost love, selfconsciousness about scars and appearance, gratuitous use of italics for thoughts

AN: Unbeta-ed. If you wanna beta just ask lol (help me). If you wanna gimme some concrit, I’d be grateful; this is my first time posting fic in years and I’m rusty as hell. Gonna be a long fic.

This chapter is mostly just intro to Lan, who is quite literally me if my kintype was a reality. She comes with much of my baggage and personality.

From her perch in the tree opposite the witcher, the apparent chickadee watched the man as he went about building his fire, placing each branch and split wood neatly and setting it ablaze with a quick hand motion. She’d followed him all day, in various forms, from the moment she’d spotted his cat-like amber eyes across the market. A witcher could have access to information she didn’t. A chance to finally find out what she was. Following him had been easy for her. No one expects a quiet but friendly dog, a flighty squirrel, or a singing songbird of malice, not even a witcher; and no one expects all those creatures to be one and the same. And, she knew from past experience, her powers only set off their medallions if she touched them while shifting. So reconnaissance? Recon was child’s play. 

She worked through the questions that mattered. 

What school is he from? Cats and vipers were dangerous, both schools cut-throat havens, less likely to help a sentient magical creature and more likely to kill first and ask questions later at the first signs of non-human traits. Wolves and griffins tended to be more code-bound and willing to listen. Her eyes narrowed in on his chest. She was in luck-- a wolf medallion peeked out of the collar of his open gambeson, laying on the cream of his shirt. I won’t even have to bother with proper manners, she thought to herself, remembering the last time she’d dealt with a witcher from the school of the griffin. 

What’s his personality; which method would work best to get what she wanted? She knew that Kaer Morhen had been sacked, had heard rumors of who and when, even out in the wilderness. But surely some books had survived. She hadn’t been successful in gaining entry to the keep proper in her youth, but this could be her second chance. What sequence of events would more likely get her invited to Kaer Morhen and access to the library there? 

The man seemed soft spoken; his voice could easily be a booming baritone, but he kept his voice quiet and calm to not spook the women in the town square. He was kind and friendly and polite, even smiling and saying ‘thank you,’ when he bought supplies in the open market. He tried to be as non-threatening as possible, as well, trying to make himself less of an obstruction in the throngs of people in town and pulling his large arms to himself instead of letting them hang loosely by his sides. He’d even stooped to help a woman pick up her fallen goods, though it had gotten him a scowl and a barked ‘hands off!’ Perhaps a spot of friendliness to warm him up to her, break down the walls that no doubt he had constructed over the years, then switch to some seduction. 

Her eyes roamed over him, eyeing up the deep facial scars, the bit of white tooth visible where the scar tissue pulled (adorable); to his strong forearms of corded muscle, bare to the elbow with veins snaking along his golden skin; up to his silky, dark hair that ruffled in the breeze; and finally to the crotch of his pants, where there were little red bows keeping a codpiece in place. Seducing him,  she thought to herself with a purr, poofing up her feathers and preening them some, would be no hardship. A handsome lay and the knowledge she’d been seeking since she was young? No better deal would ever come her way. Just keep the long game in mind, Lae’elan, and this could be it. Finally feeling she had enough information and having made up her mind, Lae’elan fluttered down to land quietly among the leaf litter behind the tree the witcher sat propped up against, her tiny feet making a bit of a ruckus. Muscles popping and bones creaking, she shifted into her true form. Or, well, most of it. She’d need to know him a bit better before she deigned to show him her wings. She pulled clothes out of the ether of her pocket dimension and over her head with less than half a thought. Vulpine legs peeked out beneath a woad-blue dress, as did her long succubus-like tail. Before she’d even taken a full step to the side, she heard the witcher reaching for his swords and decided she’d best show herself before he put one of them through her. Just because it wouldn’t kill her didn’t mean it wouldn’t hurt.

“That spot taken?” Lae’elan asked as she rounded the tree, her hands visible in the air beside her head, one clawed finger pointing to the space on the other side of the fire. There was indeed a sword leveled at her, a cross witcher standing at the other end. She hadn’t even registered the sounds of him getting up. Looking down at the sword, she found he got more interesting. Steel. He assumed human or common beast. Huh.

“How did you-!” His eyes darted around behind her for a flash second. 

“Sneak up? Shapeshifter. I was a bird a few minutes ago,” she said breezily, even pointing to the branch she’d been perched upon. Smartly, he did not look. Well trained. Eyeing the blade poised at her neck, she continued, “Could you put the blade away from my neck? Don’t need you to put it away, just… preferably not immediately pointed at my jugular would be lovely,” She smiled kindly. 

He eyed her warily, but lowered the blade a fraction. This close she realized his eyes were actually just a shade or two deeper than her own. They looked into each other’s eyes for a moment. He seemed to not hate what he saw because the sword lowered another few inches. 

“Just want to sit, maybe chat.”

His eyes narrowed warily and his gaze wandered over her. The horns atop her head, the long ears, her golden eyes, sharp canid-like teeth, fingers ending in curved claws instead of human fingernails. The gears working in his head, trying to make sense of what she was, were visible in his expression. Wouldn’t we all like to know, she thought. 

“Why?” he asked, finally.

“Why wha-at?” 

“Why chat,” he buried the tip of his sword in the dirt, acquiescing, and sat. She stepped around the fire and settled herself on the other side.

“Why does anyone chat?” She asked, but quickly followed, “Because it’s exceedingly rare to find someone I can be myself around in these times. Humans can be decent conversation, but they tend to be sticklers for shoes,” she looked to her feet-- her paws-- and wiggled her toes, “and too often make remarks I’m not fond of. Same ones you no doubt prefer not to hear as well.” He just looked at her over the fire. 

“I’ll be honest, I’ve spent half my day following you today, trying to figure out if you were safe or not,”

“And you’ve decided…?”

“That you’re safe enough,” she chuckled. She’d get a proper conversation out of him yet. 

“Oh?”

“Never known a wolf to attack on sight,” she nodded to his medallion, “and you were kind and gracious to each person I saw you interact with,” she continued. Waiting for a response, but not wanting to push, she looked into the fire and drew her legs to the side, leaning her weight on one hip.

“I would have noticed if a single bird had followed me all day,” he grunted. That wasn’t quite what she expected as a reply, but it showed intelligence and caution. 

“A dog, two birds, and a squirrel” she replied.

“What?”

“I was a dog in the market, a sparrow in the town square, a squirrel on your way out of town and into the forest, and a chickadee for the past hour,” she looked to his eyes to gauge his reaction, “I’m no spring chicken. Reconnaissance is important to my staying alive, let alone having fulfilling conversations.” He paused after that, seemingly looking at the fire, but she knew that he was watching her in the edge of his vision. He was chewing over the fact that she had so many forms. Not many things could change into even three forms, let alone potentially the five he’d have been able to spot today. 

“And what, little stalker, do you propose we talk about?” he asked, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back on the tree. She ignored the jab. 

“Pretty much anything other than children-” she spotted the minute twitch of his eye, “Whatever you want to talk about, really, as long as I can keep my tail out,” she flicked her hairless, red-black tail for emphasis, “Gets itchy if I’m in this form for long without it,” 

“Don’t know of any kind of shapeshifter that can do that many forms in such a short period,” he squinted at her. She tried to hide that that made her crestfallen. His eyes darting around her face said she hadn’t done a very good job. Just because he doesn’t know off the top of his head doesn’t mean the library doesn’t have something, she reminded herself. Sighing, she replied honestly,

“Other than me, neither have I,”

“What are you?” he asked, not unkindly, losing the wary, almost clinical tone he’d had. Of course honesty would be what got him. She should have predicted that. 

“I’ve no idea,” she answered, a bit quietly, surprising herself at the admission. He scratched his scar absentmindedly. Lae’elan wondered if it was terribly itchy or if his scratching was just a nervous tic.

“Don’t know, or won’t tell?”

“Don’t know. Honestly. Earliest memory is at a temple of Melitele for children, the office specifically, but the sisters told me I’d been left on the front stoop in the night,” Again, she was spilling truths freely. If it gets you closer to him, what’s it matter? Gets you closer to that library? He raised his eyebrows, but shrugged. 

“And you can just…”

“If I can figure out how it works, or might work, I can turn into it,”

“And that’s your face?” She rolled her eyes at the question. 

“Not a doppler. Here, I’ll prove it,” she said, sitting up straighter so she could reach around the fire, hand out loosely, palm towards the ground. As if she were a maiden offering her hand to a suitor to kiss. Nodding to his sword in its sheath at his side, she continued “Touch your silver to my hand,” When he didn’t do it immediately, she nudged her hand forward again and tilted her head to the sword, looking him dead in the eye, urging him to just do it. He tilted his head curiously, but unsheathed it. Moving slowly, he placed the flat of the blade on her hand without hesitation. There was, as she knew there would be, no sizzling of flesh. Just cool metal on a dainty, pale hand. Slowly, he turned the blade so that the edge sat atop her hand, but not enough pressure to cut. He piqued one eyebrow in askance. Lae’elan sighed, but nodded, and he immediately made a shallow slice. Her nose wrinkled a bit at the sting, but nothing happened. No hissing of melting doppler flesh. He wiped the blood off the blade onto his pants and replaced it in its sheath. 

“I can do faces, but to do so makes me… uneasy. Like an out of body experience, but the bad kind a human might have as a poor reaction to some drug. Ah, there’s a word for it…” she trailed off before licking at the cut on her hand to get rid of the blood and watching the sliced flesh knit itself back together. 

“Dissociation?” the witcher filled in before she had to think much. He eyed her hand curiously. 

“That’s it exactly!” she nodded, “Most I ever change is my nose. Other than, you know, making myself look human,” she circled her face with a finger, drawing attention to the obvious non-human features. He snorted at the obvious gesture. She huffed a chuckle back.

“Eskel,” he said, suddenly.

“Hm?”

“My name. I’m Eskel,”

“Oh!” she said, pleased, “Lae’elan,” she stuck out a hand to shake. He gently took the hand in his and shook it once. His hands are so much bigger than mine, she thought briefly before-

“Odd name. It’s not a-”

“It’s a bastardized attempt at a human making up an elven name. The sisters thought I was an elf,” she said, flicking one of her long ears, “They were shorter then, and I hadn’t grown a tail or horns or paws or wings at that point. Those didn’t come till later,”

“You looked-? Wait. Wings?” He looked at her shoulder, as if trying to see if he had missed something on her back. He was tilting his head to the side again, like a puppy. Melitele it’s more endearing every time he does it. 

“I have wings as well, but I don’t show those off until I really trust someone,” she explained, looking around the tiny clearing, “Besides, it’s a wee bit cramped for them to stretch out here.” The witcher-- Eskel, she corrected herself-- looked about the patch of dirt.

“They must be quite big, then,” 

“Big, unwieldy, and very sensitive to curious hands if you get my meaning.” He made an ‘ah, I see’ face and seemed a tad embarrassed. She wondered if the old tales of witchers not being able to blush was true, and if it wasn’t, would he be blushing now? Ah shit, maybe we do need to be less crass with this one afterall, she scolded herself. 

“But enough about what I can and can’t do, Eskel,” she laughed, and found she rather liked the sound of his name on her tongue, “Surely there’s something more interesting to talk about. Witcher like you must have some good stories or unique interests to talk about,”

“What are you, my brother’s bard?” He griped, smiling ever so slightly. The shapeshifter just raised an eyebrow. 

“Ah, my brother’s the White Wolf, Geralt of Rivia.” Another blank stare. 

“The famous witcher? The bard Jaskier, his songs, they’re all about him?”

“You’ll have to forgive me,” she began, “I.. don’t come out into human society very often, and when I do I tend to stay away from the more gossipy crowds. I’m afraid I have no idea who or what you’re talking about,”

“Oh,” he looked a bit startled at the fact she was so out of the loop, but the look melded into a bit of bashfulness, “Well then I suppose I feel a bit honored to have been your choice of companion, then,” he said, smiling lightly before gathering his thoughts.

“My brother, Geralt, has bright white hair and is known for not staying out of the affairs of men as we’re meant to. He met a bard, that’s Jaskier, who latched on to Geralt’s pantleg and became rather famous as his barker. Has an entire song cycle about Geralt,” and, mumbling quieter than a human could hear, “You’d think that it wouldn’t take Ger 20 bloody years to figure out the kid is as in love with him as he Jaskier.” She couldn’t help but snort loudly, surprised at the comment. Eskel’s eyes shot up to her. She flicked her ear again. 

“You’ll have to remember I’m not human. Ears are big for a reason. I can likely hear better than even you,” she laughed again, “20 years?”

“Longer, 20 years of pining before they finally got their heads out of their asses and realized,” 

“Fuck, even I’m not that bad. Longest I’ve lasted is two years before giving in,”

“Yeah, well. It’s different when you're a witcher,” he said, mood souring.

“Oh?”

“We live a long time. You watch everyone around you grow old, die, their kids die. Even if you decide watching them die is worth it, being with a witcher is sure death, whether it comes from exposure to the elements, a monster getting them, or a vindictive witcher-hater,” 

“It’s not worth the experience of love? Of companionship?”

“They’ve decided it is,” he said, poking the fire with a stick, “Others? Me? I’m not so sure,”

They sat in silence for a minute, Lae’elan watching him as he moodily poked the sticks around.

“Eskel, how old do you think I am,” She asked, curious. He looked up sharply before looking her up and down. 

“20… 30?” she scratched his scar again, “I have trouble telling with humans,” She laughed softly, thinking of times long, long gone. 

“Try somewhere around 250, my dear,” she smiled and looked him in the eye, her own head tilting to the side now. If she didn’t impart anything on him but this, it might be worth it anyway, “And I have to agree with your brother and his bard. It’s worth it. Even if it kills a part of you when they go, it’s worth it.” He stared into her eyes for a minute, looking for something. 

“I’m… sorry,” he said quietly, turning his head to look at the ground to the side of the fire. 

“It’s ok. 80 years does a lot of healing,” her smile was sad, but brightening as she took up his idle mantle and poked the fire with a stick, prodding to move a bit that had fallen so that the fire could breathe better. 

“250?” he asked, looking her over again, “Really?”

“Somewhere between that and 260, I’d guess. Some bits get hazy on the years what with being a hermit for years at a time, and, well, I don’t know how old I was when I turned up at that orphanage,” she shrugged, “Apparently I looked to be about three, but when I ran away four years later, when I should have been 7, I looked closer to 11. My aging’s rather fucked up. So… my age is a mystery just like the fucking rest of me.” Her stomach chose that moment to growl lightly.

“I’ll go-”

“You can check those snares I saw you set up,” she cut in, rising to her feet and stretching her arms above her, “But I can catch my own food,” 

“I wouldn’t… I mean I didn’t-” He began. She chuckled. 

“I know you wouldn’t try to poison me or assume I can’t hunt for myself, Eskel, I just enjoy catching my own meals too much to let someone else.” With that, she shifted, her bones snapping into new forms, her russet hair turning into pale cream and brown fur, until a wolf wrestled its way out of her dress. She took off like a shot into the undergrowth, but not before noting Eskel’s discomfort at the sight. Have to unpack that later, she thought as she bounded in the direction she’d heard a deer about half an hour ago. 

Taglist: @its--fandom--darling

[savage-rhi]

​❛ merry crisis ! ❜ higgs & die-hardman lol

Hope you like this one hon lmao :D!

It seemed today there was one crisis after the next when it came work-life at the UCA, so much to the point where Diehardman had received hundreds of emails detailing the circumstances. He let out a deep sigh as he sat in his chair, combing through a couple colorful subject lines and skimmed through the first five or so. 

Someone replaced all the toilet paper with duct tape in the upper division of the colony. IDK what the hell to do! --TK

It appears that all the photos, paintings, and classic art that had been saved before the Death Stranding have been vandalized with cut out pictures of Deadman’s face making weird gestures. An intern passed out discovering one such face pasted to the inside of the toilet seat lid when she went to the bathroom. She hasn’t woken up in twenty minutes. A concussion is immenent.--GC

All the computer lab equipment in the central area of the UCA has been wrapped up in aluminum foil. Please send extra staff to clean up. It’s gonna be a long day trying to make our tools look less like baked potatoes...-KW

Someone painted the conference room with black chalkboard paint and proceeded to write a mad lib all over it. It was actually quite poetic until staff at environmental development read, “I enjoy long, evil walks on the beach, getting assaulted in the rain and serendipitous encounters with walruses. I really like Pina Coladas mixed with pee, and romantic, candle-lit Frenchmen. I am well-read from Dr. Seuss to Vlad the Impaler. I travel frequently, especially to Hell, when I am not busy with work. (I am a bomber.) I am looking for spite and beauty in the form of a Hell Demon goddess. She should have the physique of Sam Bridges and the bombers of chick. I would prefer if she knew how to cook, clean, and wash my kibbles and bits. We cannot flog the milk. I know I'm not very attractive in my picture, but it was taken 9,001 days ago, and I have since become more insane.” This was only a fraction of what was on one side of the four walls. God help us.--NB

Some porters tried to take a vehicle, and when they backed out and hit the gas a giant condom inflated from the exhaust pipe and when it blew up the noise was so loud that everyone thought a bomb had gone off in the terminal and we had to go into lockdown. Most staff didn’t find it amusing but some of the guys are trying to repair the giant condom “for science”--DMQ

Whoever took everything in the main offices (computers, pencils, chairs etc.) and somehow stuck them upside down on the ceiling haha we are amused and wondering how the fuck you pulled it off.--FR

Someone highjacked our TVs in the mess hall. A woman saying Mario and Princess Beach followed by airhorns and porters doing the can-can with BT whales has been playing for five hours straight. I want to die :)--LN

Diehardman had to stop himself from reading anymore. It was too chaotic. Sighing he rubbed his forehead, contemplating on staff who could have wrecked this much havoc in such a short amount of time. He decided to take a moment to eat something. Opening up a boxed pizza lunch Diehardman nearly feel out of his seat as glitter and confetti launched itself out of the compartment, hitting him right in the face as he grimaced and yelled feeling the small bits of plastic collide against his eyes. 

Diehardman spent around ten minutes smacking himself blind, until finally blinking enough and wiping away at his face that he saw the note at the bottom of lunch box reading the following:

Merry Crisis! 

Your humble ex-terrorist pal, HM

PS. Eat shit 😎

[onthepageoftears]

An Old Friend (Five Hargreeves x Assassin!reader) (platonic)//Umbrella Academy

A/N: This took a bit longer than I wanted it to, but I’ve been working on Pull It Together and totally forgot about it. It’s pretty short, but I didn’t really know where else to go with it. Anyway, I hope you enjoy, as I’m probably not going to be posting imagines for a little while. <3

Also, thank you guys for 400 followers!! You are all amazing and thank you for putting up with the mess that I am :’)

Request: Could I request an nb reader & Five being friends fic? Maybe Reader is another renegade from the Commission that Five thought was dead until they run into each other? I just think it'd be cool if he had someone with a similar background in time murder to talk to

Warnings: friendship lol

Words: 712

Please Don’t Plagiarize My Work!

Three knocks.

That’s all you gave to the large mansion in front of you.

It didn’t take you too long to track it down, since you knew Five was one of the Umbrella Academy kids. You found it a bit strange that the address was so easily found: you were always one to love a challenge. Still, you were on a time strain, and it was probably for the best that it only took a couple hours to get where you needed to be.

It was a few moments before the large front doors creaked open, and you placed a hand on your holster out of habit. But where you thought might be a large security guard or already fulfilled assassin, was instead a small boy in a crappy uniform.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” you stated dryly, eyeing the knowing smile that formed on his face. You frowned and looked to the house behind him. There was no one around, but surely an adult would be needed to look after the twerp. You were trying to crane your neck towards what looked like a living room when you realized the boy was sipping on a margarita. “Shouldn’t there be an adult around here to tell you not to drink that?”

“What, you don’t recognize me?” His smile stretched on his face, the glint in his eye sparking the recognition in your brain.

“Five?”

“Y/N, it’s nice to see you.”

You couldn’t believe it. When Five told you he was going to try to go back in time, you thought something strange would happen, but nothing like this. He was stuck in his child body, in the same state that he left in. It was pretty funny, to be honest, but Five already glared at you enough for laughing. Now, the two of you were sitting at the nicely stocked bar, and you waited for Five to respond to all the information you gave him.

He cleared his throat, making you tear your eyes away from the large portrait that hung over the fireplace. “So they sent you back here to kill me.”

You shifted uncomfortably next to him, still not used to the fact that his…vessel, if you would, was a 13 year old kid. “Simply put, yeah.”

Five’s eyes flicked to the gun that was attached to your hip, then back to your face. “Are you going to do that?”

“No, of course not.” You rolled your eyes. “I came to warn you.”

He laughed. “Warn me? I already knew the apocalypse was coming, what more could you warn me about?”

“There are more. Other assassins.”

“The ones with the weird masks?” He took a sip of his martini and nodded his head. “Yeah, I’ve already seen them a couple times.”

“Oh. Well in that case-” You slumped your shoulders, letting yourself relax for the first time since arriving at this time period.“-I guess we could probably catch up, then.” 

“Or figure out how to stop the apocalypse.”

“That too.”

The two of you sat in silence again. After years of working together, silence wasn’t as awkward as it was for other people. It was an understanding for you two, that your minds were working at a pace that wouldn’t allow for words to be spoken. It was never awkward, because you two had gotten over that awkward phase years ago.

“My siblings are useless.” Five broke your thoughts and took another sip of his margarita. “They can’t even focus on the bigger issues. Like the world ending.”

You considered his words and pursed your lips. “Well, how would you feel if someone randomly told you the apocalypse would happen in less than a week?”

He nodded thoughtfully, sending a are smile in your direction. “I guess you’re right.”

“I’m always right.” You shifted in your seat, not bothering to hide your pride with a smile. “So how does it feel to go through puberty again?”

“Shut up,” Five glared, but couldn’t hide his smirk. It was like you two were never apart, almost like the apocalypse wasn’t just around the corner. And for some reason, you felt like everything would be okay. Because you may have been smart on your own, but you and Five together were nearly unstoppable.

[the-uk-is-jk]

Hello! Anon from Cat's page. When writing a non binary or trans character, is there anything I should avoid? Things that people sometimes write that just... aren't correct or are seen as offensive? Can you give me a few tips on how to work around those problems? Thanks!!

Hi, so sorry for not responding any sooner!

I do have some things to avoid. Anyone who reads this can obviously leave more or perhaps disagree with something I said. I’m no expert on this. This is all from my own experience and knowledge :) Anyway, this is gonna be a long post...

Don’t introduce them as trans That’s very important to me (hence why it’s the first thing I name lol). You can make it clear through descriptions - “her face was a little sharp and she was very tall”  “he had a remarkably high-pitched voice and clearly never had to shave it before”  “no one could really say if this was a man or a woman and those who knew them didn’t seem to care” - Do not make these about their genitals, since it’s first of all not very appropriate and second of all a somewhat painful topic for most trans people. Make it clear they are their gender with some remarkable details. Don’t go “he had an almost woman-like face” but rather something along the lines of “he had a round face and such soft, clean skin that I could only dream of looking that perfect one day too.” Don’t go “her shoulders looked remarkably manly,” but rather “her angular, broad shoulders looked like the perfect thing to lay your head on after a long day.”  You can of course leave the compliments out, that just depends on what the reader is supposed to think of them. Just, don’t give body parts a gender, specifically not with trans people. Also, with a description: first work out if they’re dysphoric about any body part of theirs and if so, which. If a trans woman is for example dysphoric about the shape of her shoulders, then don’t use that description of those being broad and angular. If she isn’t, it must be fine. (Examples of what people might be dysphoric about: genitals, hips, voice, shoulders, body and facial hair, shape of face) You can also make clear they’re trans by putting it somewhere in a conversation. Whether that conversation is about them being trans or it’s about something else. In the latter case you can simply slip in a witty remark (coming from themselves, preferably) If you want, I could give you some examples of that as well...

Don’t make being trans their sole personality trait This seems quite obvious, but it’s a dangerous thing. It’s very easy for a character to become defined only by their transness: it’s almost the only thing they ever talk about and if others talk about them, they only talk about that too. Or it’s the only thing about them that’s relevant to the plot. It can be relevant to the plot, but there is more to trans people than just being trans. Please, give them a personality like any other character :) This also comes with not introducing them as trans, by the way. If you introduce someone as being trans and figure out their personality from there on, it will be the first and foremost (and maybe even the only) thing anyone thinks about when talking about that character. Introduce them as the person they are and give small hints, and only later actually make it clear. (This also makes it fun to reread later and see all the little hints you didn’t see before)

Transphobia I don’t know about your world, but if there’s transphobia, please not that it doesn’t start with insults, JK Rowling or worse. It starts with the small things, like anything else. Getting constantly misgendered, or gendered in general, especially if it’s on purpose (if it’s not, it obv isn’t transphobia, but it hurts and it is some form of ignorance). Filling in a form and having to choose between man or woman. This is obviously no fun for nb peeps, but trans people can also be bothered by it, not knowing if they have to give up their actual gender or their birth gender. And there’s public bathrooms, sometimes people’s choice of words, and there are a lot more small things in daily life that point out the seperation of men and women, which is bothersome for both nb’s and most trans people.

Do. Not. Sexualize them. Especially not upon a first meeting/when seeing them from afar:  “His face looked so soft, she could barely resist to stroke/kiss it.”  “Her hair looked so soft, I really wanted to ruffle my hand through it and feel it against my face/skin.”  “Their hands were very pretty and he really wanted to feel those on him.” These are all kinda inappropriate on a first meeting. We are people. We aren’t objects you can just touch whenever you like. Harassment is already a huge problem, but it’s especially a huge issue with trans people, I believe. So, do not. I’m very bad with examples for this (those ^ were all pretty mild, right), cause I luckily never experienced it, and I’m asexual. But just, any thoughts you wouldn’t want to have about other people, or at least wouldn’t write down in a book. Just treat them like any other person.

Again, this is my experience and knowledge. This is in no way complete, but I hope it’s a good, like, basis. Please add onto this, if you can, and you may very well disagree with anything I said. Everyone’s experience is different.

I hope this helps you in any way, and let me know, if, and when and where, I might be able to read it; I would love to :D

[theasstour]

0104. Allegro di molto.

Tuesday, 4 November 2014

FIC PAGE | CHAPTER SYMPHONY | WORD COUNT: 7.1k

NB: explicit language, the doctor lol

VOTE FOR SOY HERE💞

Becky groaned. “Someone stole some of my butter again.” She looked down into the open carton, a disgusted expression on her face. “There’s crumbs in it.”

“Bloody Ian again, I tell you.” Tiana said from her position by the kitchen table, eating her bowl of cereal.

“Minging.” Becky threw her butter away, taking her phone out to message the groupchat to complain, something Y/N thought Becky was rather good at. All the girls sat in the kitchen eating breakfast together, none in much of a hurry. Y/N was sitting by the window, watching a cat walk over the grass between house three and house five, chewing on a slice of toast with pâté, a glass of apple juice beside her. Annie – who was sitting next to Y/N – was done eating, and Tiana – sitting opposite Y/N – was still eating her cereal. It was quiet, no music blaring from Ian’s room and Finn, who seemed to have mates over, weren’t being as loud as he usually was. Calm, Y/N thought, leaning her head against the wall and taking another bite of her bread.

“By the way,” Becky said, crossing her arms and sighing dramatically. “Did you guys hear Harry Styles got lucky last Friday?”

Tiana gasped, face turning into an instant and interested grin. She loved gossip.

“Yea,” Becky nodded, looking almost offended. “He was snogging someone in the kitchen Molly said.”

“Molly who?”

“Jones, she’s a course mate of mine.” Becky explained. “Anyway, she saw him snogging someone in the kitchen, looking all fit in all black. She didn’t see her face.”

Tiana poked her bottom lip out, clearly sorry for Becky. For some reason, Y/N didn’t really know what to make of this. Harry had obviously been very drunk last Friday, and she wasn’t one to judge people, but she could not for the life of her understand why Becky would want to shag Harry when he was so plainly legless. Through all of this conversation, Y/N brought her glass up to take a sip of her apple juice, ignoring the tinge of curiosity inside her that screamed at her to find out who Harry had been making out with.

“Heard he shagged someone in the bathroom as well.” Tiana mumbled, making Becky groan.

“Why are men pigs?” She asked no one in particular, stomping her foot. “I mean,” she rolled her eyes. “Good for him, I guess, I just wish it had been me.”

“And so do we, babes, but your time will come and he’ll not be able to keep his hands off you.” Tiana reassured Becky, making her giggle. “How are you all liking your course so far, by the way?” Tiana asked, drinking the remainder of milk left in her bowl.

“Good.” Becky said, getting some apple juice from the fridge. “Thought some of the modules on Psychology sounded boring at first, but now it’s really fun. I love it.”

“That’s so nice!” Tiana smiled. “I’m really enjoying uni so far. It’s weird, I never pictured myself going to uni, but now I’m here and I’m really enjoying it. It feels like I just know what to do with my life now.” Tiana twirled a lock of hair around her index finger. “Which is very nice.”

Y/N, putting her glass down after having taken a sip, cleared her throat when Tiana looked at her. “It’s okay. I’m stressed out all the time, but I think that’s a part of it.”

“Oh, me too!” Becky groaned. “We have this essay due next week,” Becky gestured at Annie who was taking the same course, though Annie seemed to be somewhere else entirely. “And just choosing an essay question is stressing me out. I don’t even know how to choose one or how to research.”

“That’ll come naturally, like we’ll write so many essays our time here so when it comes to your dissertation your final year, you’ll know what to do.” Tiana reassured Becky, getting up and walking to the sink to clean her bowl. “I handed in my second essay yesterday, and just thinking about it makes me want to literally be sick.”

“An it’s such a big uni as well, so the lecturers aren’t as familiar with you or helpful as the were in Sixth Form.” Becky sighed. “I’m just scared I’m going to fuck it up.”

“You won’t.” Tiana said.

The two girls continued to talk while Y/N’s eyes landed on Annie, who hadn’t said a word. Not really knowing what to do in a situation like this one, Y/N only stared at her flatmate, unsure of what were the right words to say and scared of uttering the wrong ones. She took another bite of her toast, racking her brain for something to say to Annie, for something to get an easy conversation going between the two. But Y/N was lost of ideas this early in the morning, empty of anything resembling social skills. So, swallowing her toast, she looked down at her plate, noting how many crumbs hand landed on and around it. Suddenly, the sound of the kitchen door opening sounded, and Becky and Tiana’s conversation were brought to an abrupt stop. Y/N knew it would be one of the boys, most likely Ian who were late for yet another lecture. Y/N wondered how it was possible for someone to be that lazy, so unorganised that it was hard to show up on time for anything. Grabbing her glass, she took a long sip until she had emptied it, then put it back on the table.

“Which cupboard is Finn’s?”

Y/N’s eyes shot up. Heart racing, she saw the one and only Harry Styles standing by the door into their kitchen, letting the door fall shut behind him. He was wearing his glasses, hair as tousled as usual, a tight fitted white tee shirt on along with some beige trousers that were hooked to some brown suspenders. Trousers rolled up, his ankles showed, and a pair of taupe grey lace-ups covered his feet, making everything about him seem relaxed but very classy at the same time. Y/N had not imagined Harry to show up, and did not for the life of her know how to react. Were they friends? Should she give him a smile? Or was that too much? Should she ignore him and whip her phone out? Or would that be rude? Y/N was suddenly a little too aware of everything about herself. From the cream roll neck boxy jumper, to the black and yellow grid check trousers and white panelled curved sole trainers. For some reason, she drew a hand through her hair, hopefully looking a little more refreshed. She hadn’t even had the time to do her make-up yet. Why did he have to show up now? Of all times, now?

“That one.” Becky said, pointing to the one closest to the kitchen table and where Y/N and Annie were sitting.

“Cheers.” Harry started walking over to the cupboard, a slow smile stretching out across his lips as his eyes fell on Y/N. Biting her bottom lip, she watched as he walked closer, noticing the sway of his hips and the effortless beauty of him. She hated that she noticed these things about him because… well, he was annoying. So, for him to be unbelievably peng and at the same time make her want to drag all her fingernails out in frustration, to say she hated him for it would be to put it almost mildly.

Y/N drew her eyes away from him to see Becky’s mouth wide open and Tiana smile at her. Fanning herself, Becky made Tiana laugh and the two girls mouthed words to each other that Y/N could barely make out. Though she could read ‘fucking hell’ and ‘sexy’ when she saw it. As her eyes met Harry’s again, she saw he was already staring at her from the cupboard, the door open and yet to reach in and take a glass. Amusement reached his eyes and the tips of his lips as they twitched into an involuntary smile. Y/N noticed then, on the inside of his right arm, down from the inside of his elbow and down to his wrist, were a list of numbers. In a typewriter font, the list was long, some numbers with dots between them, and others standing alone. Y/N couldn’t help but wonder what the numbers stood for, what the meaning behind his tattoos was. His skin was bare besides those numbers, which meant, at least in Y/N’s head, that they had to be of some type of value to him. Only when Y/N looked at him did he get the glass he needed, closing the cupboard before he walked over to Becky and Tiana by the sink. His back was muscular, you could see his shoulder blades stretch against the fabric of the shirt, his shoulder so broad Y/N was wondering how often he worked out to maintain the build he had.

“Sorry, ladies.” Harry said, filling the glass with cold water before he walked over to lean against one of the fridges. Their eyes met again, and Harry smiled that lopsided beam of his, making Y/N blush. God, she hated him. He made her all… all… blushy. The door opened again, and this time Finn walked in with two other friends following him.

“Ahh, see you found me cupboard.” Finn said, giving Harry’s shoulder a slap before he opened on of the fridges and got a yogurt out. “Everybody,” he announced as he turned around from the fridge, looking at the girls of his flat. “You’ve already met Wade,” Finn gestured at the familiar face, and Y/N gave him a little smile when their eyes met. “And this is Sai, he’s one of Harry’s course mates, and he’s absolutely bloody insane.”

“I am.” Sai agreed, nodding his head. He was of Indian descent, Y/N noted, with dark hair, a slight beard and tall figure. Sai was the tallest of the gang, an easy grace about him that the others lacked. He was very charismatic, very charming, and it was hard to take your eyes off of him once you had recognised his beauty. Just like Harry, Y/N thought to herself. What?! No! Stop that! Jesus Christ! She ran a hand through her hair, eyes falling to Harry who was already looking at her, holding his glass of water to his chest. A curl had fallen in front of his glasses and he whipped it out of the way, chin tipped upward as that smug smile formed across his face, clearly liking when Y/N was looking at him. She looked away and at Finn.

Finn walked over to the table to sit down beside Annie, the rest of his gang following. Instant panic rose in Y/N’s chest as Harry walked to her side and sat down, putting his glass down on the table beside hers. His knee was just barely not touching hers, his elbow so close to her that she didn’t properly know how to breathe without coughing. Y/N didn’t hear a word of what Finn was saying, but it must’ve been something funny as all the boys laughed and so did Becky and Tiana who was standing beside the table. Y/N felt a little out of place, the whole situation overwhelming her as the only thing she could focus on was how the presence of Harry’s knee so close to hers sent a shiver of something up her spine. All she could think about was their last interaction at the Halloween party last Friday. How Harry’s pink lips had formed out the words she had chosen not to utter her whole life for a reason unknown to her. How good it sounded leaving his lips. How low the octave of his voice had been as he let his front teeth part from his bottom lip long enough to take her breath away. Y/N stared straight ahead as Annie who stared back at her, raising her eyebrows in question.

“Fuck.”

Y/N shoved away from the table, pushing the chair in and taking her plate and glass. Sai was talking and didn’t stop as Y/N walked over to the sink, pushing her sleeves up her arms before running water over her used kitchenware. It was hard not to look to her right and over at the table, see if Harry had even noticed her leaving, to see his reaction. But she bit her tongue and let herself focus on the task at hand, not letting the thought of Harry bloody Styles make her give in to stupid actions. Once she was done, she dried her plate and glass and put them both back in her cupboard, pushing the sleeved of her cream jumper down. Looking back at the table Y/N saw Becky sit down in her seat, giving Harry a smile as she did so. He returned it, and before he got to engage in the discussion about which café in Clapham they’d go chill at today, Becky was taking to him. She made him smile and Y/N bit her lip, not really knowing what she expected. Crossing her arms, she gave Tiana who was staring at her a smile, and then she walked to her room, being careful not to let the door slam behind her as she went.

“Try it again.” Teresa urged, giving Y/N an encouraging smile. The two were in one of the study rooms in the Arts building, rehearsing for their exam in exactly one month. Goddard had sent everyone off to go rehearse on their own, him sitting in their classroom if anyone needed help with anything. Y/N and Teresa had quickly ran off to find a study room where they could practise in peace and quiet. Y/N had listened to Teresa sing first, a beautiful cover of Hand of God by Jon Bellion that took Y/N’s breath away. And now it was Y/N’s turn. She had messed it up a few times already, the sheer nervousness of someone listening to her play taking over. Caprice No. 24 stood on a music sheet in front of Y/N, and she already regretted picking this piece. Niccolo Paganini was known for his Caprices, creating some of the hardest solo violin pieces to play. But Y/N wanted to impress her tutor. And to make herself proud.

Slowly, Y/N brought the violin up, resting it to her chin, and closing her eyes before bringing the bow up as she straightened her back. She started playing the piece, eyes shut, and heart filled with determination. She wanted – needed – to get it right, to know that she was capable to playing such a complicated and beautiful solo. Only opening her eyes to glue them to the music sheet before her, Y/N tried to forget where she was, what she was doing, and why she was doing it. Playing the violin usually calmed her; brought her to an instant state of belonging that she didn’t feel anyplace, anytime, anywhere but when she played the violin. It was weird how this simple action of playing music could bring her to a place so peaceful and euphoric, how the sound of the violin was her home. Her fingers glided over the strings, holding onto the neck so hard it started hurting her fingers.

And as quickly as she had disappeared off to the place of concentration and peace, Y/N lost it. She failed to hit a note, and once she started being slow and not hitting them, the rest followed. Groaning, Y/N lowered her violin and let her head slump against her chest, feeling so disappointed in herself that it was hard not to cry. Teresa didn’t say a word, just looked at Y/N as she tried to calm herself down, already knowing that there was no way she could comfort her new friend without accidentally making it worse. She just had to practise, day and night for another month, and she would know Caprice No. 24 inside and out. And that was really as she could do, because if she wanted to impress Goddard and get a first on this assignment and module, then she would have to nail it December 9th.

Teresa got up from her chair, putting her book into her rucksack. “Seminar is over in 5, wanna head out?”

Y/N nodded, putting her violin away in its case. She draped her navy puffer jacket on, a dark grey scarf around her neck, hauled the violin case onto her back and through both her arms like a rucksack, and put her natural cotton carrier with all her books and notebooks on her shoulder before the two walked out. Y/N excused herself to the loo and Teresa promised she’d text Y/N her library plans this weekend so they could head in together. The two friends parted ways and Y/N walked to the loo, dragging both her hands frustratingly through her hair. It was one thing to mess up a solo by yourself in your room, but doing it multiple times in front of someone else? Friends or not, Y/N was embarrassed Teresa had witnessed it, though she knew Teresa would never hold it against her or think her untalented, she still felt mad at herself. Once she was done in the loo, Y/N looked at herself in the mirror, staring herself down. A feeling of not belonging flooded her, like maybe she wasn’t doing the right course. Maybe she had done wrong applying and going to university, because she was clearly not good enough to play a single solo in front of one single friend. If she ever had hopes of playing in an orchestra, she would have to finish uni, but how would she do that when she could barely get through her first semester?

Tightening her scarf so it would shelter her from the harsh autumn winds outside, Y/N got her leather gloves out, putting them on before she exited the toilet. She walked through the corridor of seminar and lectures rooms, looking in through some of them while hooking her thumb through the straps of her violin case. She felt distant from everything, like maybe she should be home on Picot Farm tending to the Christmas trees her father would ship out to different parts of Hampshire and London soon. Maybe this wasn’t the place for her after all. Maybe she had been wrong.

“Y/N.”

She stopped in her tracks halfway through the huge foyer of the Antonin Artaud Building at the sound of a very familiar voice she had last heard this morning. Leaning by the wall leading into the corridor she had just walked out of, the same corridor she had her seminar every Tuesday, Harry stood. He wasn’t waring his glasses anymore, and the black Borg lined denim jacket with a brown cardigan underneath looked very cosy and comfortable. His suspenders and white tee shirt were visible, making Y/N instantly think back to this morning and how utterly at loss for words she had been at seeing him in her flat. Hands in the pockets of his jacket, Harry pushed away from the wall and walked over to her, the left side of his mouth tipping upward.

“Harry.” Y/N said, a little out of breath. “What are you doing here? Did you come with Finn?”

Harry let out a short chuckle, eyes falling to the ground between them before he looked up at her through his dark eyelashes. “No.”

“No?”

“Finn, Wade and Sai are still in Clapham. Came back because I know where you have your seminar on Tuesdays.”

Y/N blinked. “You… know where I have my seminars on Tuesdays?”

“Only on Tuesdays because that’s when I’ve seen you walk out of the same room Finn walks into.” Harry explained further, giving Y/N another smile. “You seem shocked. Are you creeped out by me yet?”

“I don’t know.” Y/N admitted, narrowing her eyes. “You’re so confusing to me.”

Harry raised his eyebrows, smile growing wider. “Am I now?”

“Yea, so confusing.” Y/N faced him head on. “One second you’re all quiet and don’t really care about anyone or anything. The next you show up in my kitchen early in the morning not even saying a single word to me. And then you show up outside the room I have my seminar ‘because that’s where you’ve seen me walk out of the same room Finn walks into’.”

“So, what you’re saying is you don’t get me?”

“Not at all.”

“Maybe you would start to if you gave me your number?”

Y/N was so dumfounded she found herself taking a step back. Never had anyone ever been this blunt and straight-forward with her before, and she wasn’t sure if she really liked it or wanted to ask what was wrong with him. But Harry just smiled at her, a dimple in his left cheek increasing in visibility as the silence stretched on between them. People were milling about, a quiet hum of voices rose around them, but Y/N couldn’t make out what any of them were saying or trying to get across because all she could think about was Harry before her. Harry; who she could not get a good grip of. Harry; who seemed cold one minute, but the next would turn around and give you one of those dimpled smiles. Y/N couldn’t pin point him, couldn’t point to one specific stereotype of men or characteristic and say that was Harry. Because everything about him kept surprising her.

“You’re thinking long and hard about this.” Harry said, chuckling. “Like to keep a lad waiting, ey?”

“Why do you want my number?”

Harry shrugged his shoulders. “It’s fine if you don’t want to give it to me. Might break my heart a little, but it’s your choice, darling.”

“I’ll give it to you on one condition.” Y/N said, taking her gloves off to type her number into Harry’s phone. He smiled, getting his phone out of his jacket pocket.

“Anything.”

“Please don’t spam my phones with texts.”

Harry laughed, giving her his iPhone and watched as she punched her number into it.

“Fine,” Harry said. “Only if you please, for the love of God, don’t send me nudes.”

Y/N huffed, handing him his phone before taking her gloves back on.

“I know it’s going to be hard to resist, but please-“

“-Don’t you worry.” Y/N gave him a smile. “I won’t. I’m just scared you’re actually going to start texting me now. Like we’re friends.”

“You fucking wish.” Harry said, snickering.

“Wish you’d text me? No thanks, don’t want to talk to you more than absolutely necessary.” Y/N bit her lip, crossing her arms as she watched him write her name out as the contact name and then put his phone away in his pocket. Staring up at her, Harry looked so smug, like he had won again, and Y/N supposed he had. She had given in and given hi her number, hadn’t she?

“Heard you got lucky last Friday.”

It came out of Y/N before she was even registering what she was saying. Biting her lips together, she looked at Harry with her heart beating in her ears and mortification swimming along every veins of her body. You idiot. You absolute headless-

“What?” Harry frowned, sounding genuinely confused.

“You-“ Y/N stopped herself, clearing her throat as she found herself very uncomfortable talking about this. “You got some.”

“I did?” Harry put his hands on his hips, exhaling loudly. “If I did then I don’t remember much of it, which is a bloody shame, innit?”

Y/N frowned. “Becky said Molly told her she saw you snogging a girl in the kitchen and then heard you have a round in the bathroom.”

Harry laughed, throwing his head back and looking so confused and giddy Y/N couldn’t help but smile through her disoriented state. “The only girl I was with in the kitchen last Friday was you.” He said joyfully, eyes hidden behind his high cheekbones as he obviously found this all very funny. “And as for a round in the bathroom… I pissed in the back garden once and deeply regret it. Not something a Law student should be doing, is it?”

Y/N shifted her weight from one foot to the other, scratching at her jaw like she usually did when she didn’t really know what to say.

“And that was the only time I really went to the loo during that house party, am I afraid.” He explained, looking disgustingly satisfied with himself. “Seems like you’re my mystery girl, but don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.”

“You study Law?” Y/N bit her lips together again, not knowing where all these questions were coming from and why she was so good at finding the most awkward way to ask them. He just told you all of this, and that’s what you end up wondering about? You absolute puff, Y/N thought to herself, hoping he didn’t find her too weird for changing the subject. Though he probably does, he most likely thinks I’m weird. Oh God, oh God.

Harry let out a single chuckle. “European Legal Studies.”

“And you didn’t shag someone last Friday?”

Harry shook his head. “Complete tosh. Was with me mates and on one occasion I talked to a mystery girl dressed as a vampire in the kitchen, but that’s about it, really.”

Y/N couldn’t help her smile, and it seemed at the sight of it, Harry started smiling a little wider as well. “Hope you find that mystery girl of yours. Sounds like you have a Cinderella situation on your hands.”

Harry’s teeth showed and he chuckled. “Believe me, no one hopes I find her more than I do.”

Y/N looked down at the time on her phone, having planned a FaceTime date with Edward for when she got home from her seminar. She hated to keep him waiting.

“Say… if I asked the mystery girl out for a coffee at the Costa across campus next Friday at 5, do you think she would be up for it?”

Y/N looked up at Harry so fast she felt a pull in her neck. He was smiling at her still, seemingly knowing the exact effect he had on her, which made her wish he didn’t have said effect because it would make everything so much easier. Raising his eyebrows, Harry urged her to answer, to tell her if she was free or not. Y/N opened her mouth, then closed it again. Opened it; closed it. Was he asking her out on a date? Or was this making plans with a friend? She simply could not tell. No one had ever asked her out before. Not like this at least, and she felt her heart quicken a little too quickly at the thought.

“Yes.” Y/N said, voice low.

“Wicked.” Harry smiled, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets. “Sick. Can’t wait to meet her again.”

Y/N smiled back, not wanting for Harry to see just how much she was looking forward to it as well, so she turned around and started walking away. Mouthing an oh my God to herself on her way to the exit, Y/N fisted her hands into balls to contain herself until she at least was out of sight of Harry.

“Y/N!”

She stopped, looked over her shoulder at him.

He motioned at the violin case on her back. “Will I ever hear you play?”

She smiled. “In your dreams.”

“But you’re already there,” he said, grinning. “Playing the violin.”

Y/N huffed, rolling her eyes at him. “God, I hope not.”

But she really did. And she couldn’t help but smile a little too wide as she walked off, hearing Harry laugh behind her.

Edward never took long to pick up his phone, that was just a fact of life. Whenever someone called him, they could expect him to answer within the first three rings. He loved talking, loved being around people and having everyone’s eyes on him, which was so different to Y/N’s character who hated beyond anything to have people pay attention to her. She rarely answered her phone unless it was someone she knew very well, and the only person she ever really called was Eddie. She was laid in her bed now, having changed into lounge wear, and snuggled under a blanket, phone in hand. Edward answered the FaceTime call rather quickly, beaming at his phone when he saw Y/N’s face.

“Goose!”

“Hi, Maverick, you alright?”

“Mum’s making tikka masala for dinner, I’m splendid.” Edward said, putting his phone on his lap as he rolled himself away from the kitchen and into the living room where he wouldn’t be disturbed by all the noises their mum were creating making dinner. “How was the seminar?”

“Medium. We got to rehearse for the exam, but I suck at my Caprice so far.”

“Doubt that. Why would you say you suck?”

“Because I pissed it, Eddie. I always mess it up when I play it.” Y/N looked away from the phone, feeling ashamed to admit that she was having trouble, but at the same time relieved to put words to it and tell someone. Besides, Edward always listened, knowing her better than she knew herself and he always found the right words to say to calm her down.

Edward gave the phone a smile a she picked it back up again. “When’s the exam?”

“December 9th.”

“Then you got plenty of time, Y/N. Don’t fret too much, you’ll find a way to play it flawlessly and your lecturer will be blown away, I promise.”

Y/N smiled, nodding at her brother. “How was the doctor?”

When Y/N lived at home, she would accompany Edward to a hospital in Oxford where he went once a month to check up on his back. Because of his serious condition of spina bifida, the doctors wanted to check on his spine every month to make sure he didn’t have any infections because if he did, then everything would turn bad very quick. An infection in his spine would be fatal and so dangerous that he would have to live at the hospital until said infection was gone. He could die if he had an infection. And so, Y/N had always come with him because if her brother was going to be told he had an infection in his spine, then she wanted to be there to ask the doctors all kinds of questions about further treatment and so forth. But she hadn’t come with him in October, and neither had she in November, though she was really hoping she could tag along when she went home for Christmas in a month.

“Okay.” Eddie answered, shrugging. “Not as fun as when you come with, though.”

“Obviously.”

Edward giggled.

“Did you wear the necklace?”

Edward nodded, showing Y/N the silver necklace around his neck. When he was 10 and Y/N 12, the two had gone to the monthly check up, their dad tagging along, of course. And ever since Y/N could remember, this one woman had helped Edward out and been his doctor. Her name had been Claudia Parr, a blonde woman with the warmest smile Y/N had ever seen and a way with Edward that was incredible. Treating him like porcelain and with respect, Claudia had always made Edward and Y/N’s trips to Oxford amazing. But there had been this one time when Edward’s back had hurt him more than usual, and he had been so terrified of having an infection that his 10-year-old self started crying on the check-up table. Claudia had unhooked that necklace from around her neck and given it to Edward, told him that it had always brought her luck and now it would do the same for him. He didn’t have an infection. Edward got to keep it, and whenever he saw her after he offered to give it back, but Claudia told him to hold onto it just in case. And some months later Edward got a new doctor for some weird reason that neither him nor Y/N ever got a valid explanation for. After a year, their father told them Claudia had moved to Scotland, and thought both had been devastated, she had left her source of luck behind for Edward to keep, and for that they were forever grateful.

“Yea.” Edward said. “I wore it. Of course I did.”

“Good.” Y/N sighed, sinking into her mountain of pillows. “Now, tell me what the house smells like. I need to remember mum’s tikka.”

Friday, 14 November 2014

Y/N looked at herself in her dodgy mirror for what must have been the 99th time. She wasn’t wearing anything special, just some checked trousers and her navy puffer Y/Net, some make-up on her face and nothing particular done to her hair. Harry had told her not to be a second too late in that one text message he had sent her an hour ago, and now it was 3pm and she was all ready to go to Costa. Two hours before they were actually supposed to meet him. God, she groaned at herself, she was being so unbelievably pathetic. They were just going to chill at Costa like two normal friends usually did. There was nothing special about it. No need to freak out. But in the nature of who she was as a person, Y/N was freaking out. Big time.

She sat down by her desk, urging herself to not see too much into all of this as she would only be let down. And though she was telling herself that, she knew she would look too much into all of this and probably have her heart slightly broken when she found out he only wanted to be friends. She wasn’t even sure she knew what she was feeling for him yet, everything about Harry confused her. About to take her puffer Y/Net off and bring her laptop out and find something to do on there, a knock sounded from Y/N’s door. Opening it, Tiana stood on the other side, wide eyed and hands folded before her.

“I need you to come with me.”

Y/N stared at her for a bit. “Come… with you? Where?”

“To the doctor, I booked an appointment yesterday for today at 5pm.”

“The doctor?” Y/N took a step toward Tiana, panic prickling her fingertips. “What- W-Why? What’s going on?”

“I think I might be pregnant.”

Y/N’s mouth fell open, eyes blinking as she let the shock of it all sink in. “You…” She couldn’t say it, because where she was from, in tiny Hawkley, no one got pregnant until they were at least 30, married and financially stable. This whole situation was so weird to her that Y/N felt a little faint. “Is… is the doctor even open that late on a Friday?”

“This one is.” Tiana said, walking toward her room to get ready to leave. “Can we go there now? I cannot be inside this flat anymore.”

And so they went. Tiana’s arm linked with Y/N’s and silence wrapped around them like a suffocating blanket. Time went by fast and very slow at the same time. The waiting room was too bright, hurting Y/N’s eyes a little, and she tried not to let her eyes wander too much. Tiana was breathing very fast beside her, holding onto Y/N for dear life, and Y/N let her, not really knowing what else she could do for her flatmate besides be there for her. Not really knowing how to manage a situation like this one without handling it the wrong way, making Tiana cry, or just making everyone in the waiting room hate her.

After a long while, Y/N asked Tiana who she thought the father was, to which Tiana huffed very loudly and told her that of course it was Danny’s. And no, she had not told him she was at the doctor’s to check of her two pregnancy tests were indeed telling the truth. Tiana sighed heavily, looking at Y/N.

“Do you think this is stupid? Am I overreacting?”

Y/N could sense it in her voice that she was genuinely scared either were true, that Y/N thought she was these things. So, Y/N shook her head, which was an honest answer.

“You’re not.” Y/N assured her. “You’re scared which is very understandable in a situation like this one. You don’t know what’s going on.”

“Very true.” Tiana agreed. “Maybe a little too true. I have no idea what’s going on, what I’m doing, why I’m doing it, if this is even the right decision, why I haven’t told Danny yet, what if I am pregnant-“

“-Ti.” Y/N took her hand, squeezing it lightly. “Tiana, it’s going to be fine, yea? You’re going to be fine.”

Tiana inhaled slowly, then exhaled. Tears started forming in her eyes, and cocking her head at Y/N, her bottom lip started wobbling. “What am I going to do if I’m pregnant, Y/N? I haven’t even finished my first semester at uni yet, and I’m bloody up the duff.”

“Don’t think about any of that now, okay? Let’s hear what the doctor has to say first, and then you can think about what to do. There is no reason planning a future that might never happen, especially now.” Y/N squeezed Tiana’s hand again. “Especially that one.”

Tiana nodded, knowing full well that her friend was right. “Yea. I need to calm down.”

“Basically.”

“But it’s so hard.”

“Think about something else.” Y/N suggested. “How uni is going. You said it yourself a week ago that you were really enjoying it.”

Tiana started talking about uni, and Y/N knew once she got her chatting, she would not stop. So, nodding every once in a while, and asking follow-up questions, Y/N kept Tiana entertained for at least an hour. Her mind drifted off as Tiana talked as it usually did because she could only focus in on a conversation for so long. There was something so incredibly comforting about being the first person Tiana went to about this problem. She had much more in common with Becky, had hung out more with her over the last few months and Y/N knew she had made loads of course mates, but she had still come knocking on Y/N’s door. Still asked Y/N to come with her. And here they were, holding hands, Y/N comforting her like she knew Tiana would comfort her if there ever was something. For some reason, both girls had a bit of an understanding that they were better friends than their different personalities might tell them. And Y/N felt very special, despite the circumstances, because Tiana wanted her here. As all of this rushed through Y/N’s mind, she gave Tiana’s hand a little squeeze, and her friend returned it with a smile, talking about something Y/N didn’t really know the context of.

The doctor called Tiana in after a little while and the two walked in together, Y/N following Tiana. Y/N zoned out for most of it, knowing that despite Tiana being her friend, this was not her place and she wasn’t about to disrespect her in any way. Tiana walked to the bathroom to do the urine test, coming back a few minutes later and handing the small cylinder to the doctor. As the doctor started talking, Y/N felt her phone vibrate. Getting it out of her pocket, she saw a name she had completely forgotten about in the midst of all of this.

Harry You far away, Miss Winning-at-life?

Oh God. Y/N swallowed thickly, looking up at Tiana as she started talking to the doctor. They were talking about the test results and how they showed Tiana wasn’t pregnant after all. The doctor started asking all kinds of follow-up questions about what made her believe she was pregnant and if she had been having unprotected sex. Y/N’s phone vibrated again.

Harry Y/N?

She couldn’t just storm out, couldn’t tell Tiana she had to leave because whether her friend was pregnant or not, Tiana needed her here. And she might need her later. If it was one thing Y/N was not, then it was disloyal to her friends. Even when she had made plans with Harry a week prior. Tiana needed her, and she wasn’t going to leave her side tonight. So, sighing heavily Y/N started typing out a message to Harry.

Y/N Find myself in a bit of an emergency kind of situation. Another time?

Tiana was thanking the doctor, shaking her hand before taking her coat back on. The appointment was clearly over, Tiana ready to get out of here and back to the flat.

Harry What’s up? You good?

Y/N Yea, something just came up. I’m sorry.

“Jesus fuck.” Tiana groaned as they walked out into the cold London air, buttoning her coat. “I could fly off to heaven now, I’m so relieved.”

Harry But you are good? You’re okay?

“I kind of blocked everything out because it’s your business now mine-“

“-Rubbish, my business is your business, Y/N.” Tiana smiled. “Can we order Domino’s and watch Friends, please? I feel like chilling.”

Y/N smiled, nodding her head. It sounded like a perfect Friday night. Tiana squealed and clapped her hands, groaning once again in relief.

Y/N I’m okay.

“Who are you texting? Saw you on your phone the whole time.” Tiana asked, no accusation in her voice, just curiosity.

“Mum.” Y/N said, watching her breath turn white as it left her mouth.

“Better have had something bloody interesting to say.” Tiana grinned, winking at Y/N who only giggled. “Chuffed to devour a large Domino’s pizza and cookies now. It’s what I deserve.”

While Tiana clicked on the button for the green man to show and them to be able to cross the busy road, Y/N’s phone vibrated for the last time that night.

Harry Then that’s all that matters.

TAGLIST

@swayingnoodlelove @littlestyles @showk1ndness @sydneysuit @hallwayharry @emotionally-imbruised @fuckyeahimahobbit @beksjewels @harryisadogperson @harryrocksagoodsuit @ifiwereaboy2323 @tiostyles @maroonmolly @harrysroguecurl @awomanindeniall @justsaying20 @ot4narrie @miss-nxvxcaine @sunflowersandrockstars @hard-on-harry @emma070900 @shitibitmytonge @my--heroine @rainbowbutterflyboy @shegotthesalt @harrytreatspeoplewithkindnesss @mleestiles @bloodcastle30155 @harryskiwi2 @brielyse11 @for-fucks-sake-h @treat-harry-with-love @permanentllyharry

Would you like to be notified when I update Symphonies of You? Tell me here and I’ll add you to the taglist!

[cruddyborderlandstheories]

Fl4k Fl4k Fl4k Fl4k Fl-

i didn’t die i just fell in love with that skill tree creator and have done nothing for the past few days but make skill trees and sleep for 3 hour intervals. im very excited for the gameplay on Wednesday but oh man oh me oh my i gotta catch up on a lot of posts lol

tl;dr: Fl4k is a badass. Stop misgendering them or I’ll show up at your home at 3am local time every time and then eat your spine. Bonus: Mr. Chew being an ‘Eridian skag’ is probably due to some funky mutation from eridium/slag/eridian stuff. Kinda like how Threshers have the ability to make singularities because they are native to Elpis, which is a big ol’ Eridian base (which i totally addressed in this post lol). I also gave my opinion on Fl4k’s skills in general, if you’re interested in that. Overall, a very awesome trailer! Definitely lived up to the hype.

i said it before, this trailer was one of the best ones. definitely #2 for me, Zane is still at #1 because i actually laughed during it. the music in this one is definitely the best out of all 4 tho. seems like they’re all variations of the same song, i like this one best. I need this soundtrack sooo bad.

also i know probably no one else following this blog watches one piece but like

that first footstep with the studded boot and the sound effect immediately flung me back to katakuri. god katakuri was a badass. i was so excited to see that fight animated.

mr chew spinning around is my favorite thing ever. i love that you can tell the personality of the pets just from watching the intro. 

i know fl4k is like a real badass in this trailer, but i get the feeling they’re going to end up being at least a little soft for their pets. i mean... they have stuffed animals of them ffs.

so... we’re near Sanctuary-III in this trailer? I gotta keep my eye out then. i also want to see if that one claptrap area guess i had is correct or not... this looks like an entryway for the garage so im guessing i wasn’t, but let’s seeeee

there is a raised bit up and to the left

also im wondering if this means we’re going to have to rescue ellie from the CoV.

hmmmmmmmm

hmmmmm i don’t think the signs match up.

mr chew is the goodest boy. im so glad we can pet/interact with him!! i want to know what the names of the other pets are

also, a bit off topic but

i could have sworn fl4k’s jabber was cryo/shock. it was blue, wasn’t it? i wonder if they changed it or if it’s skill upgrades change its color. i thought the upgrades just gave it better guns.

yeah it was! i guess possibly upgrading it with the guns gives it a new color scheme? maybe? this could be the gunslinger upgrade!

it looks like their jabber went through the most design changes out of all of the pets. that or this is yet another upgrade (since each pet has 3 states). maybe this is the beefcake version.

‘bitch’. i love how expressive fl4k is with just the eye. very well done.

ohhh you know what that building is in the back?

[we’re near the intro to the game!]*

and tbh i don’t think this place has the building for Ellie’s Scrap in it... i don’t see it anywhere. maybe this is the actual scrapyard and the building is on the other side?

not quite sure tbh. but at least we know this place may also be near sanc-iii, just maybe not the same area as the actual Ellie’s Scrap.

i mean... there IS a shitload of cars everywhere. i wouldn’t surprised if it’s near her garage cause it looks like a scrapyard.

but also where in the fuck are all these ‘normal’ looking cars coming from?? it’s not like we see them being used on pandora. all the ones we see in bl1/2 are clearly dilapidated and rusting. big thonk. at least the vans/busses kinda make sense.

oh yeah that is definitely the same building. [it’s the recruitment center!]*

this scene with the rakk is my favorite out of all the trailers. so fuckin cool

i do hope the jabber goes back to being blue at some point. i like the red design too, don’t get me wrong, but i much prefer the glowy blue. it’s my favorite color and you guys know i love glowing things 👀

<Huge Selection!!!> lol

cat/doggo/monkey. mr chew is my favorite pet but i love the jabber panting like a dog lol

i never knew this is where spiderant mouths were

i always assumed they were below that... f r e a k y

“he likes to chase cars”

fl4k probably took them to the scrapyard for this exact reason ngl. fl4k being a big softie to their pets confirmed

(also, notice how fl4k uses ‘he’ for mr chew. it’s almost as if they understand the concept of gender, chose their own pronouns, and your argument that they only are nonbinary only because they “don’t understand yet” is invalid! Fl4k is canonically nonbinary and uses they/them/theirs pronouns as confirmed by both SungWon Cho and their in-game skills. 

Now that you know, use they/them/theirs for Fl4k or get off my blog. Because by not doing so, you are disrespecting the devs’ wishes for this character AND the nonbinary people who find representation in them and I won’t support that. if you feel like arguing your reasons to purposefully misgender them even after knowing this, please DM me so I can block you. thanks! 

For those of you out there actually making an effort: mistakes happen, especially if Fl4k is the first NB person you’ve learned about. Just make sure to correct yourself then move on, and we’re okay. Everyone has to learn sometime and it’s better to put in the effort than not care at all. It will become second nature.)

Fl4k is such a badass, they really are way different than i expected (personality-wise), but i am not complaining. gearbox knows me better than i know myself, so i know i’m going to end up loving Fl4k anyway. ProZD did such a fantastic job, i honestly did not recognize him at first! i can tell with certain words now, but wow i am blown away. 

i hope we’re able to climb that bird’s nest lookin’ thing in the back. it would be perfect for sniping and/or placing ur clone for maximum coverage.

seriously, what a badass.

idk i feel obligated to give my opinions of Fl4k over here since they were recently released. I am digging them 100%, tho i was kinda surprised (not in a bad way) they’re not as... i guess soft as i was expecting from their character design with the plushes and the face on the backpack and the smiley face pin, but i imagine that’s different when they’re interacting with their pets. im super curious to see how this VH group’s dynamic is going to go. 

mechanically, their skills seem perfect for people who loved sniper Zer0 and in general Mordecai, with a splash of Salvador tossed in for good luck. I am a dirty melee Zer0 main and i prefered Phasewalking over Bloodwing (altho i still play mordy bc he’s best bl1 VH) so, while I am definitely going to give Fl4k a go, they’re not my main bl3 Vault Hunter, that’s reserved for Zane and his lovely ability to befuddle enemies and run around. Funnily enough, I’m not even a fan of pet classes, so Fl4k being second in my play order is pretty funny. Tho, yeah, Amara being last is also pretty weird. I guess I don’t necessarily enjoy melee, I just enjoy messing with the bad guys lol

ohh, also, I am most interested in the upgrade for mr. chew that gives him the ability to create singularities and is called ‘Eridian Skag’. 

so I’m not saying my theory that the threshers on the moon were connected to Eridians was right, I’m just saying they’re the only form of wildlife we know that has a singularity ability (outside of Mr. Chew, apparently). 

im just saying gearbox, you should hire me to write your deep lore for you cause i’d do it for free

im wondering if we’ll be seeing skags with wormhole abilities in bl3. maybe the constant exposure to slag is starting to mutate them further beyond just elemental bonuses (on badass skags). We know Maya’s phaselock has a singularity ability (so does Amara’s phasegrasp), and that is sorta ‘occurring naturally’ (you know, as natural as siren powers can get) unlike the singularity grenades we encounter which use our known technology. plus, uh, whatever happened to the destroyer’s eye in TPS that made it create a singularity/wormhole by injecting it with a fuckload of slag. that probably has something to do with this as well.

but geez i really hope mr. chew is okay with being all slag/eridium-ed up. i guess being badass elemental skags doesn’t appear to hurt them, just make them more powerful, unlike humans. maybe that has something to do with sentience, if slag/eridium/eridian stuff actually is driving bandits crazy. could explain why/if the jabber doesn’t get an element like the skag (eridian skag) and spiderant (fire) do, since they’re described as semi-sentient...

anyway.

Fl4k is cool. Definitely a neat trailer- my second favorite for sure- and the skill tree drop blew me away because i was not expecting it. im expecting a lot of Fl4k mains in the first few weeks of gameplay because they look like a lot of fun!

EDIT: i was wrong, in the newest IGN vid, it turns out we ARE near the recruitment center, because that IS the recruitment center

they gave them little orange flags! good to know!!

[gibaraltar]

idk where im gonna put all my headcanons in the long run but look. ok Titanfall and thus Apex are in the nebulous far future, but with the drawbacks of technology having to be generally very practical due to (I assume) the wars, the comparatively sudden large-scale exploration into deep space, and so on. CW: surgery, dysphoria, trans health What im trying to say is trans healthcare has come a really long way, probably. I think that despite this, its kind of function over form even though the form aspect is beyond what we might expect today. Things like minimization/avoiding of scarring are important and possible to an extent we see only rarely now, but i think only prioritized in high visibility areas or if its the primary concern of the patient. Instead, the focus is keeping or improving functionality and lining up the form with the patient’s vision on an individual level, and as such results and expectations are pretty highly variable! tl;dr while I drew trans mirage with top surgery scars for me, pretty much, I do have a few hcs on how mirage being trans would pan out in canon context (i have been percolating for a WHILE so this is long):

1) Always Knew he pretty much looks like a cis dude. He went on puberty blockers/similar early (thanks to supportive mother and brothers) and has a pretty much fully functional bottom situation, & what little scar care there was, it was easier when he was younger and had the time and space and spent more time staying at home fiddling with tech, so there isnt much that “gives it away” per se. As an nb/trans guy i really like this one because like. personally, the idea of just. a reasonable amount of effort to pretty much align my brain and body seems appealing! but probably the only way this one gets drawn by me is finishing a trans gibraltar/trans mirage comic idea i had where they were both like “i have something to tell you before we-- WAIT HOLD ON YOU TOO???” because it would actually involve the things that would make this different from just drawing mirage cis lmao,,, All said its not exactly unrealistic for mirage to just be running around like “IM TRANS AND LOVE MY KINGS QUEENS AND EVERYTHING OTHER AND INBETWEENS IN THE TRANS COMMUNITY ✊🏽😤 RESPECT AND GRATITUDE LEGENDS ONLY!!!!!” rather than being stealth LOL 2) The Classic transitioned a little later but has still been on T for like a decade+. Did have to have non-minor top surgery, but this would have been not apparent if he could sit still, wait the appropriate time after surgery, and practice proper care but he absolutely could not for the life of him LMAO he fidgeted, took off anything uncomfortable a little earlier than he should have, and started working out and running around doing errands too quick. In his defense, I’d imagine this was when he and his mother were realizing they might be alone for longer than they’d hoped (and also during a tumultuous wartime period where Mirage may have also been trying to keep fit in case of being drafted or wanting to follow his brothers) but not sure how that would line up timeline wise. This would be the one I drew! I like to think that while sometimes he regrets not taking better care of them, for the most part, the scars are a point of pride. 3) The Homebody absolutely no surgery, partially out of feeling he didn’t need it, but also out of discomfort and questioning. Still on hormones though, and slowly coming around to at least considering surgery instead of putting it out of his mind or dismissing it. I have also drawn this Mirage but its nsfw lmao so i cant... show it... here at least. This is also Big Projection candidate #1. im valid though ok AAAANYWAY I always have like infinite sometimes clashing hcs for this stuff so to me none of these are more valid than another and ofc however you personally envision trans mirage and also trans care in the titanfall/apex universe is equally valid, i just. this is the only place i can say this stuff out loud LMAO so!! fwiw the other trans hcs i have are for Gibraltar, Lifeline, and Octane but also everyone is trans i dont make the rules 🤷🏽

[dumbgaybitch]

à la folie (thor x loki)

Ok so I wrote a kind of AU but I don’t even know what I did, really, it ended up as an angsty one-shot description of weird feelings. So. Here’s 1k of pure shit lol you have been warned.

(I was supposed to post this for Loki’s birthday but I’m late and deeply unsatisfied by this so oh well.)

Hope you guys enjoy it anyway ♥ 

NB: aimer à la folie means “to be madly in love” in French

Characters: Thor, Loki

Pairings: Thor x Loki

Universe: Asgard AU

Words: 1,344

Trigger warning: incest? But like, not really?

Summary: After several years of war, calm has finally returned to Asgard. Thor, newly crowned king, has chosen his adopted brother Loki as consort, but this decision does not seem to sit well with the rest of the Asgardians.

Read it on AO3

Loki woke up to the soft snores of Thor, laying besides him with his arms wrapped around the younger man’s waist. The corner of his lips quirked into a smile as he watched him sleep. The strong, fierce warrior Asgard named its king was so soft, so vulnerable in this bed. He was perfectly relaxed, lips parted and breathing slow, his worries far away and his dreams a peaceful cocoon around his thoughts. Loki was surprised his brother could spend such calm nights. He himself would usually wake up in the middle of the night, wisps of nightmares still hanging like webs in his head, horrific images refusing to leave his mind’s eye. He would spend hours on end standing near the glass windows and staring out at Asgard, the people, the buildings, the stars, everything that could make him feel small and insignificant, but also part of something bigger and important. A piece in the puzzle of space and life, a thread in the great tapestry of things.

But he never felt like he belonged quite as much as he did when he was wrapped up in Thor’s arms. They didn’t understand each other well. They weren’t even capable of communicating well. They just… fit together well. They completed each other’s flaws and qualities, they fueled each other’s ideas and plans, they gave meaning to each other’s existence.

That’s quite enough Loki, you’re being sentimental.

He scowled and squiggled out of Thor’s embrace. He stood up, stretching his long limbs to the ceiling, offering his bare body to the glory of the morning. The god of mischief was always the first to rise, especially since most of the time he woke up in the middle of the night and wasn’t capable of falling back asleep again. He liked watching the sun rise, the rays glancing off the buildings in all their golden glory, lighting up yet another day. He felt powerful in those moments, as if the sun was lending him some strength, some purpose. Days seemed a lot more filled with possibilities when you saw the sun rise over them.

He stepped into the bathroom, heating up the water in the big wooden bathtub with a simple flick of his wrist. It felt infinitely nice to be able to use his magic so freely. It was something he couldn’t do outside of his protected cocoon, high up in the castle. Asgardians were wary, scared of the differences the Frost Giant sported. They didn’t trust him. And he couldn’t blame them. He had almost never used his powers for good, unlike his older brother. He would never be a hero, that much he knew. He could try righting his wrongs, but he didn’t even know if his people would be capable of forgiving his mistakes one day, let alone loving him for who he was. Of course, they had to pretend, they had to make do with Thor’s decision to choose him as consort. But that was respect, that was force. And Loki wasn’t sure that was what he wanted.

He slid into the warm water, a sigh of satisfaction leaving his lips. He was already tired of the sheer amount of thoughts flooding his brain. If only he could close his eyes and just stop thinking for one second… How blissful that would be… But for all his powers, that was impossible. He slipped under the water, head immersed in the liquid, feelings drowning in the spiral of his thoughts.

Thor woke up to find the space next to him terribly empty and terribly cold. That didn’t immediately alarm him; his brother was a naturally cold being, after all, and he usually woke up earlier than his king did. But he wasn’t standing in front of the big glass windows, he wasn’t sitting next to the bed reading a book, he wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Thor tried to listen for some noise, some inkling that his favorite trickster was somewhere near, but he couldn’t hear anything. No movement, no commotion, nothing. Fear struck his heart like a match and he was up in seconds, grabbing breeches and storming into the bathroom. He immediately spotted the dark-haired man, laying seemingly peacefully under the surface of the water. “Goddamn you, Loki,” he grumbled, before plunging his hand into the lukewarm water and grabbing his younger brother by the arm to pull him up towards himself and a viable supply of oxygen. “You scared me, you goof.”

Loki blinked his eyes open, breathing calmly by his nose as if he hadn’t just spent several minutes under water. “You definitely spent too much time with those humans. I am a god, you know. No need to worry like that. I’m fine.” Thor cocked his head. He knew him too well to fall for that.

“I’m not sure you are, brother.”

The younger one scowled. “I told you I am. Now let me be.” He turned his back to the king of Asgard and crossed his arms, clearly signifying the end of the conversation. But that was underestimating the blonde warrior. He kneeled next to the bathtub, taking Loki’s soaking wet body into his arms, the chill of his back igniting goosebumps on his own warmer skin, and murmured into his hair: “Tell me what’s wrong. I’m here for you, remember?”

Loki leaned into the embrace almost against his will. It felt like such a normal, natural thing to do. He belonged there, and that was that. Resistance was futile. “Do you trust me?”

“I love you.”

“That doesn’t answer the question.”

Thor’s arms tensed around Loki’s torso, his teeth grinding together in an effort to remain calm. “No, I don’t trust you.” He sighed, not letting go of his consort. “You’ve never really given me any reason to.”

“Am I not loyal? Have I not done everything for Asgard and its people?”

“You love Asgard, and you want Asgard to love you. I understand that, I really do. Just give them some time to sort through the good and the bad, alright?”

“I’m not sure they’ll ever be able to love me, Thor.” The bitterness in his voice struck the warrior full-on. “They tolerate me because you’ve chosen me as your consort. But they don’t love me, they don’t respect me, they don’t trust me. They never will.”

“Give them time. You can’t say this, you don’t know. Just… Give them a reason to believe in you. You can’t erase your mistakes, that much is sure, but if you show how much it affects you -and I know it does, Loki, otherwise you’d be able to sleep at night, to see your reflection in the mirror- if you show them that you’re human, vulnerable, not so different from them, they’ll forgive and forget. They’re only waiting for you to show flaws they can recognize themselves in.”

Loki turned around, facing Thor head-on. His green eyes were deep with a sadness and a sorrow his older brother had no idea of. “I’m nothing like you. I’m selfish, and insecure, and I make bad decisions, and-”

“And I love you, in spite of that,” the blonde-haired man answered, his hands coming up to cup the other’s face in a delicate caress. “Or maybe because of that.”

Loki’s smile was painted in watercolors on his face, but he felt reassured. Here in Thor’s gaze, he felt as if he was able to do anything. He wanted to think that he could, at least. And maybe he was willing to try. “Ok, enough talking, king of Asgard. Get in here.”

Thor laughed and undressed, slipping into the water behind his consort. Embracing Loki, he set his chin on his younger brother’s shoulder. He felt whole, holding his entire world in his arms. And his entire world seemed pretty relaxed, too, because his skin slowly returned to its natural blue shade, the one Thor loved so much, because it was Loki in his purest, most unguarded form and that was the way he loved him. For who he was.

[mostlyvoidpartiallysmog]

Just finished the second Night Vale novel It Devours! that I got my hands on when I got a hold of my pre-order yesterday. (So sue me. College strike up here gave me some free time)

So some thoughts?

BIIIIG SPOILERS obviously.

Firstly I’d just like to say that I LOVE the ending. Specifically I love the way the relationship between Nilanjana and Darryl ends. GOD that was so refreshing! Honestly their relationship felt rushed and empty anyway and it was SO fucking nice to see a realistic potential end to a new adult relationship.

In regards to the early parts of the relationship? The writing seemed to have a preoccupation with kisses and lips that squicked me more then anything, but I’ve never been a big kissing person in general so maybe it’s just that.

The sex mentioned, especially with how explicitly they did so, kind of felt... I’m just going to say it, a little annoying? *sigh* Now I get that there aren’t too many places where even this minor level of detail and frankness about sex could come up, but seeing what felt like the first slightly more explicit handling of it then like, Carlos jokingly getting turned on by science or some such as the podcast has done (Not counting the semi-obscure and one time live show they recently did of course. Night Vale after dark I THINK it might have been called? With Cecil and Dylan reading some nsfw content?) what felt like the first more explicit handling went to... well a hetero sex scene and, eh, call me a bitter queer but like, ANY thing else would have felt more interesting. Idk, I was just rather meh about the whole thing.

Oh and well I’m at it, “Sex in Night Vale take’s a little longer, but when it starts it happens much like anywhere else.” also felt kind off to me. Just picky queer sex positive feminist things I guess. It ain’t a big thing, but if anyone else had written it I’d be rolling my eyes going “yo there’s more then one way to fuck my hetero dude friend. It’s not all about cis ass, able bodied penis in vaginal sex.) but again, that’s just me being picky as SHIT because I, to be frank, expect a heckuva lot from Night Vale what with them consistently delivering for 3 year (Specifically how long I’ve been listening I mean. Don’t recall how many year’s they’ve been around in general.)

Also like, the lead up TO the sex was weird? We had a window into both their heads but at no point were we lead to believe they were physically particularly attracted to each other before the sex? It jumped from “maybe he’s kind of cute” to fucking? Like give us a few bits of her (preferably her because fuck yes not shying away from female sexuality) eyes getting caught on his body or some overt desire or something. Direct us to something that says “physical” attraction. (and let’s REALLY not have it be a possessive stereotype about her getting jealous over some female friend of his and taking it out by getting touchy feely with a guy she barely knows for that matter) It just felt really flat. Really lacking it what should have been easy build up. Minor build up, because sex can absolutely and should absolutely be shown sometimes as something human, and pleasant, and potentially just chill and fun to do, but like, we have an internal view of their heads, as such we should have seen SOME small nudge of physical attraction before hand. Some tug. Don’t give the audience nothing and then expect them to buy a relationship that, as it turns out in the end, was largely just based on good/fun sex.

Um, also; IF anyone else had written that whole “let’s cosign forms and get blood work done, lol look how long this is taking” pre-sex bit, then I honestly would have taken it as a “consent is a mood breaker and millennials are prudish idiots ruining sex with their safe sex and their checks for consent.” Idk. That joke felt a little off the mark. Just me being picky again.

Another thing? Nilanjana is fat! Yaaay! That was unexpectedly cool! (Would have preferred if they had said “fat” versus “overweight”. Fat’s not a dirty word, being fat isn’t a reflection on your morals and all that, but hey, not everyone is up with the latest fat acceptance stuff I guess. But like, “over” weight. Over whose weight? Over what supposed perfect weight? Is that supposed to be your short hand for “doesn’t exercise” ‘cause those sure as hell aren’t inherently connected. Correlation doesn’t equal causation. Pbthhh. >.>)

Speaking of being picky, or maybe this was just a very clever sign that Darryl and Nilanjana’s relationship wouldn’t work out in the long term, did Nilanjana REALLY have to get so jealous and competitive with Stephanie? Did she have to instantly dislike and distrust her because of “the way Darryl looked at her”? Because to recap that made all the women in the book in relation to Nilanjana, judgemental, shallow, and foolish (Lusia), cold, untrustworthy, and naive (Stephanie. “Naive” because of her religion in Nilanjana’s books and soooort of by the narrative as well), literally just a world threatening zealous cultist (Munn), or a goofy, initially untrustworthy sidekick (Jamillah).

I mean even Josh Crayton got better billing in this round then either his mum or Jackie who got tiny cameo’s each. =/ I would have liked to see more of those two.

While we’re on the subject of female characters. NIGHT VALE PLEASE. PLEASE give us some more background or remotely confirmed wlw!!! Jeeze. Seriously! We got another random background guy, or at least person getting refereed to with he/him pronouns who got a boyfriend, (The helicopter fellow) and though we already knew Josh was bi/pan otherwise not straight, he got a briefly mentioned boyfriend in this one! And of course the show focus is always Cecil and Carlos which racks the points waaay up for amazing, awesome mlm representation. We DID get a tiny cameo from Basimah Bashara which was neat, and a small moment with Michael Nguyen, but that’s the thing with those two and wlw in Night Vale in general isn’t it? While one can... hope? Somewhat with evidence? That Maureen and Michael might be a couple now, might be positive wlw representation, that was never actually made super clear. (Looking back on it it WAS made super clear with Basimah, so good on them with that!)

There’s also Jackie and Sheriff Sam. I HAVE to say, I was absolutely PREYING Jackie and Dana got together when Jackie mentioned she was dating someone from “high up in the government” so the let down I felt from finding out it was Sam instead came mostly from that. =p (Give Dana a girlfrieeend. Sure there’s always Alice Isn’t Dead but that ain’t the same. =p) Sam uses they/them pronouns and we can probably safely assume from that that they’re meant to be NB, genderqueer, genderfuild, or otherwise just not a cis character, so that’s wonderful, and Jackie dating them pretty much pings her as some variety of queer (or at least queer friendly, but then the majority of Night Vale is.) as well, so that’s also neat! I dooon’t think we had that from her before? Maybe there was something in the first book I’m forgetting. (I am personally mad happy that Jackie is queer or at least chill with nb folk, as she reminds me of myself in way too many ways. Awkward high-fives and “dude’s” and all.) That being said, how old is Sheriff Sam? I always pictured them at like 40 something from the voice. >.> Lol apparently not.

So on a more world building, less representation based note; Kevin.

Kevin is a prophet in the churches lore apparently. That’s neat? I guess? Here’s the thing, when WAS the Joyous Congregation founded? And my main concern; when did Kevin go through the Old Oak Door that showed him the smiling god for the first time??? The Congregation, or at least the general concept of the religion of the smiling god seems fully formed back during the Strex arc, and more then that Kevin hasn’t (as far as we know. Also please Finknor give us more Kevin. Triptych Broke. My. Heart. and I’m begging you.) been back to Night Vale or otherwise out of the desert other world since the time Steve pushed him in at the end of the Strex arc.

I don’t WANT to think that Kevin founded the whole religion. It’s always seemed very much like a thing that existed before him and more importantly not a thing he did before Strex!him if you will, but who knows I guess. =/

That’s the thing. I always thought of the smiling god AS ENTIRELY a Strex concept, and I’m going to wager a guess that at least at the start Finknor did too. It’s so tied into Strex. Inseparable from Strex’s meaning and purpose. Smile. Work. Be empty. Pretend to be happy. Smiling IS Strex, it’s a Strex thing, so it kind of made me feel... like it felt a bit rewrite-y to not even mention Strex at all during this book?

I mean was the smiling god NOT behind Strex? Was the congregation not at least back a couple years ago indistinguishable from Strex? Idk. These are all questions I have.

Talking about things that feel rewrite-y, I’m not sure I did the idea of Carlos actually being in the desert other world for TEN YEARS. Here’s the thing. We were, at the very least, as the audience lead to believe that Cecil and Carlos were thinking of LIVING there. Of moving there. a MASSIVE freaking part of the Carlos in the desert other world arc had us second guessing Carlos and Cecil’s whole relationship ffs! That WAS the subtext of the arc! The purpose! That Carlos seemed more interested in science and research of the desert other world then getting back to freaking Cecil! And now you’re going to claim that not only was he there ten years, which we had NO foreshadowing of during the arc at ALL as far as I can see, but he only ever wanted desperately to get home? Again the twist at the end of the desert other world arc is Cecil unexpectedly NOT MOVING THERE. WHAT? Nah man. That was some silly re-write stuff right there. Contradicting what world building we have on the desert other world until now.

Another thing highly related to that? Where the fuck was the nomadic giant army?? Or hell, even just Kevin and that dumb roller coaster they built? (I GUESS you could say that they all... died... ? And the roller coaster... vanished completely? But nah. Not really because aging doesn’t work there now does it?) Doug and Elisha thanks? Yet more stuff that made Carlos seem at home (and for that matter time passing relatively similarly from the sort of relationships he formed and reported on) in the desert other world. Ugh. I really don’t like that whole ten years thing. It seemed excessive too. Like two or even three years would have been more believable from what we saw of Carlos during that time, and even with only the single year I could already understand Carlos being traumatized from the event. Idk.

Speaking of world building for the desert other world? Assuming we keep with previous would building regarding it we are NOT done with it yet. Or rather, we probably shouldn’t be. There’s WAY too much going on there. Kevin’s still in there, he named it DESERT BLUFFS ffs. (I’m still waiting for the day we get the plot twist that the other world IS the desert bluffs we know from the past or something very similar to that. I also noticed a hella conspicuous absence of talk about desert bluffs OR the desert other world during the Huntokar revelations of the last finished arc. That place is MAD secret to the point that it’s not even on the radar of Huntokar, and probably The Glow Cloud, Distant Prince, Woman from Italy and other elder god type things.)

Then there’s Dana’s drawings up on the mountain. The spiraling murals of triangles I believe it was? We are NOT done with that place. I know at the end Darryl is like “well maybe the smiling god wasn’t that stupid centipede” and we’re supposed to at least sort of think like Nilanjana and be like “Yea huh. Sure. You just want to think that to protect your beliefs.” but honestly yeah, I don’t remotely think the centipede was really... the smiling god? Unless like I said, Kevin started the religion all together which I very much hope he didn’t? So yea, probably not the smiling god, DEFINITELY not the biggest threat in the desert other world. Up until now the “light” trying to get into Night Vale has been really obtuse and obscure. Really vague and therefore menacing and cool. I don’t think Finknor are bad enough writers to just toss all that away on a giant centipede. I’m a cynical person. Usually I’d add “At least I hope not” to that sentence, but damn it all if I don’t KNOW that Finknor are better writers then that.

Also there was the whole “hey wait the “ritual” to summon the god probably wasn’t just a coincidence” idea dropped in there to explore. So yeah. Lot’s to look at still.

Speaking of the ritual? Did you guys caaaaatch iiiiiit??? The jumping. How frantic jumping was a big part of the ritual? Maybe I’m just reaching but it sounded SO much like Kevin’s narration jumping bit from way back in The Sandstorm that Cecil mirrors with his own narration bit in his episode.

I’m SOOOO glad we got a glimpse into additional meaning for that kid jumping trying to recapture the feeling of flight scene for Kevin. It would be cool if more meaning was discovered for it in the future.

I’ve always read Cecil’s retrospective kid scene in those episodes as maybe relating too whatever happens in Cassette Tapes, or maaaybe some weird shit with Kevin himself in a metaphorical or otherwise obscured reference to why the heck the whole doubles thing happens anyway. (Also again, doubles, Desert bluff weirdness. Another thing I attributed to possibly the smiling god that could definitely not be if it were just a centipede, but honestly whether it’s a centipede or not I think it would be much more interesting if the smiling god was only a corrupting force for Desert bluffs and not the “weird Night Vale thing” that causes them to exist in the first place. And like I said? What’s cool is that it seems to not be Huntokar’s fault either that Desert Bluffs exists so that’s neat. That mean’s there’s some other weird shit going on there for us to find out.)

Ok one thing I forgot about the time rules of the desert other world and Kevin? You don’t AGE in the desert other world. Kevin when he contact Cecil in the last section of Triptych say’s he is very old. Now he could mean ancient as in “lived a very long time” but he specifically says “very old” and seems like his health might even me failing. Certainly he puts on a different voice. Anyway, all that leading up to the theory that we can extrapolate from that that Kevin will escape the desert other world at some point. Which isn’t too much of a stretch, and I think we all kind of expected (and I desperately hoped for after Triptych tyvm. FFS Cecil if you know how he ends up and also what he used to be like why not GO SAVE KEVIN FROM THAT FATE! Jeeze man! I really wish that had been part of the arc following Triptych and genuinely thought it might be. Like please. Cecil how can you just leave him there???)

All and all I liked the first novel a LOT more, but I liked this novel. Heck if it it wasn’t from Night Vale crew, meaning I had kind of hyped standards for it already, it probably would have been super awesome.

I mean there were some parts of the first novel I didn’t like, and I’m feeling some similar feelings regarding how the smiling god and desert other world turned out looking a bit mundane in this story and left a lot of “but if they were really just this, then why this old plot point” feelings just like the Man in the Tan Jacket did last novel (WHY was he interested in the underground city damn it? Especially with what we now know about Huntokar? WHY was he working with the Apache Tracker? What the hell were they doing? What was the post office all about?) but all and all I still preferred the first novel to this one. It felt more... human I guess. Had that good good recognizable story about a mom and her kid, growing up, parents, relationships, becoming an adult and a helluva lot of other stuff. Not that this one didn’t have a neat story about religion and science (that part honestly felt a little too basic for me) and fitting into one’s communities (that part was alright) but the first novel just hit the right cords more. Personally at least I felt more attached to everyone AND enjoyed the treatment of the themes more. Idk exacccctly why, but I absolutely enjoyed the first novel way more. It felt more like it’s own entity. A valid reason to use a different medium. A really new and cool thing where we could step into the shoes of likeable, fully rounded characters. This novel felt a lot more like a sometimes wacky one off live show with new characters or something. =/ I still enjoyed it, but not as much, and mostly the parts I did enjoy were all humor and surreal Night Vale goodness.

Alright. Well. That ends my rambling for now. I’m sure I’ll have many instances of trying to get to sleep and thoughts of the novel bouncing around in my head begging me to write them down or otherwise talk about them, so I guess I gotta emphasize the “for now” part.

This is long as shit and I’d be mildly surprised and utterly flattered if anyone can make it through my rambling.