#the thoughts no longer make sense

[imaredshirt]

Give me a Stan who thinks Fiddleford doesn't know how to throw a punch, much less defend himself in a fight with your average goon, so one morning he takes it upon himself to show the nerd a few basic jabs and hooks and maybe an uppercut or two behind the cabin, because let's face it, there's gonna be a time when Stan can't be there to take a hit for the guy or defend his nerd butt. So he's gonna teach him some stuff for his own peace of mind.

Fiddleford just kind of genially goes along with it, following Stan around the back of the cabin and watching with hands on his hips and a smile as Stan gets into position.

"This is one of the most basic punches in the world, so pay attention, 'cause I'm not gonna show you again," Stan says, knees slightly bent and fists up.

Fidds nods. "You've got my full attention, Stanley."

Stan isn't sure if he's imagining the way Fidds is eyeing him up and down, but he automatically flexes his arms a little more than he needs to. Up ahead, Ford is sitting on a tree stump and taking samples of the air or something (Stan had stopped listening to Ford's explanation once his words went from interesting to Big Science Shit that Stanley Does NOT Care About) and he's watching them with this amused grin, rolling his eyes skyward when Stan won't stop flexing and showing his arms off.

Stan ignores him and rolls his shoulders before jabbing his fists forward in a quick one-two. "There - you catch that?"

Fidds has got his arms crossed now and gives Stan a thumbs up. "Sure did!"

"See, just like this," Stan says, and shows him again despite saying earlier that he wouldn't.

He shows him a few more punches, going over each one a couple times before telling the engineer to mirror him, even getting in close to adjust the guy's scrawny arms and balled fists. He's being real professional about it and everything and doesn't understand why Ford keeps grinning and shaking his head at them, which is making him a little incensed but he stamps it down because Fidds is watching him with this nerdy, dopey smile while letting himself be maneuvered around and he's gotta learn to defend himself 'cause Stan can't stand the thought of some jerkwad wiping that smile off the nerd's face.

"See," he says near the end of the lesson, tapping his fist right against Fidds’s chin. "Do it right and your fist'll hit right here."

Fidds tilts his head a fraction at the touch. "Well alright then, seems easy enough."

"Yeah, like I said, if you do it right. Gimme your hand-" he takes Fidds’s wrist and taps the guy's balled fist against his own stubbly jaw. "Right here. You got that?"

Fidds nods. "Sure do!"

"Good." Stan drops Fidds’s wrist and gets into position again. "Then come on - lay one on me."

Fidds pulls back and blinks at him. "Come again?"

"Hit me!" Stan taps his jaw. "Right here!"

The guy suddenly looks nervous and galnces over at Ford for help. "Hit you? Stanley, I don't think-"

This is what Stan means. Fidds isn't always gonna be able to look to him or Ford to save him. He gets this weird, uncomfortable feeling in his chest at the thought of Fidds facing off against some asshat on his own, and that alone is enough to keep him from letting the guys off easy, if only to get rid of the weird feeling. Maybe a bit selfish but he doesn't care.

"Ah, come on, one little punch ain't gonna hurt ya, Fidds."

"I'm not worried about me," Fidds says, and then frowns when Stan barks a laugh.

"You think you're gonna hurt ME?"

Fidds is still frowning when Ford calls over in an amused, warning tone, "This is not a good idea, Stanely!"

"Just worry about your air test or whatever and leave us alone," Stan calls back. Ford shrugs and scribbles something in his journal, and when Stan turns back to Fidds, Fidds is finally getting into position.

He looks unsure, watching Stan nervously as Stan stands before him with his arms crossed.

"Hey, not bad form - you ready?"

"Well, I suppose so," Fidds says, accent coming in a little thicker than before. "Stan, if you're sure, I should probably warn ya-"

"Don't tell me nothing, just punch me!"

Fidds presses his lips into a line and throws his fist - and jabs Stan on the chin just hard enough to tilt Stan's head half an inch to the side.

"That's it?" Stan guffaws and shakes his head. "That was barely a tap!"

"I don't wanna hurt ya!" Fidds says, sounding so conflicted that Stan gets this urge to pull him into a headlock and ruffle his hair and drive the worry away.

Instead he riles him up.

"Please," he says. "Fidds, look - one of these days I'm not gonna be there to take a hit for you, and then what're you gonna do? Just let some jerk punch ya around?"

Fidds looks slightly perplexed. "Where is this all comin from? No, Stanley, I am NOT gonna just let some jerk punch me around."

"Good! So you gotta learn to defend yourself!" Fidds still looks unsure, so Stan tries a different angle. "Okay, how 'bout this - what if some jerks are beating up on me and Ford, huh? You're just gonna let em?"

Fidds looks up. "What? No, I am not!"

"You're gonna defend us?"

"Dangnabbit, Stan - of course I am!"

"Not gonna let us get our teeth kicked out?"

"What!? No!"

"Then show me!" Stan slaps a hand against his own chin. "Right here, come on! I'm some jerk who just threw your friend Stan to the ground and I'm about to kick him in the gut, what're ya gonna-"

The blow lands hard. Stan's head jerks to the side and he's thrown off balance, and he sees actual stars before his vision clears again and he realizes he's crumpled on the ground. His head swims as hands pull him around onto his back.

"Mother o pearl!" Fidds gasps. He's got his hands on Stan's face, careful touch at complete odds with the punch he'd just landed in the same place. "Are you alright? I am so sorry! I hit ya and you weren't even ready and - you just got me so riled up and I tried to tell ya and I shoulda said earlier instead o just lettin ya show me all those moves, but I just wanted to, well - goddangit, Ford, this ain't funny."

Ford's laughing as he comes up behind them, looking down at where Stan is staring kinda dazedly up at Fidds, who's kneeling by his side in the cool grass. "We did try to tell him, Fiddleford."

"Tell me what?" Stan demands. His jaw is already aching but Fidds’s hands feel kinda good so he doesn't tell him to move.

"Fiddleford was a boxing champion back back in his hometown," Ford says.

Stan blinks. "Bwuh-?"

"Not much of a champion," Fidds says with a wince, but he's blushing a bit as he goes on, "It was never anythin official, but - well, I did win more than a few matches at some backyard parties, see, and - well, people usually don't think I got any hittin power or can defend myself, but my Ma's been all too happy to teach me since I was little, and-"

The guy's rambling, and Stan quits being able to understand what he's saying half way through cause the accent is coming in thick and Ford’s chuckling and standing there looking proud of his best friend and Stan’s a little worried that he's still jarred from the hit, cause when he looks at Fidds kneeling there, one hand one Stan's chest and the other bashfully rubbing his neck while he rambles on - he's still seeing stars.

Later, while Stan sits in the living room with an bag of ice in his jaw and Fiddleford sitting next to him, still rambling about all the times he'd knocked a few guys into the mud in some backcountry hoedown get-together or whatever, Stan can lean back and relax and grin, knowing Fidds is gonna be just fine.

He can't wait to teach him wrestling.

[beneathsilverstars]

been thinking about the differences between SASASAP and ISAT lately. because looking just at ISAT and the two hats ending, you'd think loop went through the exact same house as our siffrin, but looking at SASASAP, it's different. it's mixed up. it's obviously a condensed prototype.

but. that doesn't have to mean it's a different universe entirely.

maybe that's just what happens after a thousand loops.

the house warped in act 5. siffrin lost their shit and the house got changed and corrupted, far past its baseline king uncanniness. so it wouldn't be too out-of-the-question for it to be able to warp in more subtle ways as well, due to a more subtle breakdown.

like a jpeg uploaded and downloaded a thousand times, siffrin changed, and the loops changed. over a thousand loops of efficiency, the house got more efficient. rooms combining. items moving. data compressing. and of course, run in a changed house, the script changed as well. it did so slowly, one bit at a time, over a thousand loops of zoned-out half-listening – and by the time siffrin would have noticed each difference, they were already used to it. (and in the moments that they did look at a room that was less familiar than it should be and realize that they had no idea where to find the key, well. that's just classic siffrin, isn't it.)

through sheer repetition, siffrin was corrupted, and the loops and the house along with them. all purpose lost, all signals distorted, until finally they couldn't recognize the meaning in any of it. it was all noise and despair.

so they made a wish. and the loop restarted. not just a reboot, but something more complete.

the data was backed up onto a star – a guide, a warning, a reference – and the loops were factory reset. and for the first time in a thousand loops, siffrin woke up to a clear mind and the crisp sound of birdsong.

[teddy-bear-d]

Gem and the Scotts, Scotts and the Gem

[bunnyboysrus]

Of Monsters and Omegas

I read this a/b/o thing a while ago, I don't even know who the original was by I can't find it again y-y

but it had a thing I'd never seen in a/b/o before, with an idea of an alpha, claim biting another alpha and turning them into an omega (talked to a friend and it turns out this is a thing that has been written about more than once, im just out of touch and its not even friday) and it was an amazing story, super well written, I just personally didn't like the ending cause I'm the #1 advocate for brat readers and not the biggest fan of crybabies or the total pheromone brainwashing that people write for omegas that make them do the complete opposite of what they would normally do, I'd like to think they have more resistance to the chemicals than that albeit at the cost of some physical and psychological pain. so im writing my own, thingy, with a different ending.

18+ Minors DNI - 6.3k words Content Warnings: stalking, obsession, death, fighting, violence, blood, torture(?), kidnapping, noncon touching, suggestive, gangs, some degradation, reader is referred to as 'princess' gender neutrally (im new to this so if theres anything i forgot pls let me know)

The heavy sounds of flesh hitting flesh echoed against the stone walls of the alleyway concealing the battered figures of the people fighting within it. One person lay dazed and immobile on the ground already, followed shortly by a second body, this one out cold before he even hit the ground. The last two fighters standing were locked in a desperate grapple, and despite having been beset upon by three assholes at once, the would-be victim who had been pulled into the alley on their way home from a long day of college classes gains the upper hand for the third and final time. Your muscles burn as you grunt and send the last assailant flying into the hard brick wall, one final crack ringing through the tight, dark space as they slide down the wall onto the dirty ground, right into an unfortunately placed puddle of dumpster juice. They leave a splatter of blood on the stone where the back of their head split on the stained grit.

Blood drips from the knuckles of the hand you run through the sweaty hair slicked to your forehead as you stoop and pick up your backpack from where it had been tossed to the side. You spot a wallet on the ground, knocked out of someone's pocket at some point during the fight, and pocket the cash from that too, for the inconvenience. These scumbags were lucky they weren't dead, yet, anyway. For this? They'd probably be killed within the week once you gave their ID's to your older sister.

You continue on your way back home, wiping the blood off your knuckles and face with the sleeve of your coat as you go.

Why those grunts had seemingly staked you out was beyond you, other than the obvious reason of being a member of their gang's most vicious and historied rival. Your family was a notorious one, a family business dealing mostly in drugs but with a few spare hands in money laundering and data gathering. You were fully aware that what your family did was illegal in a dozen different ways, but it was what you had grown up in, it was what paid for your lavish lifestyle, so who were you to be judgmental? Besides, to compromise within a morally gray area, you know your family prefers to keep things as bloodless as possible, less clean up and attention that way. As a fresh adult who was only in your second year of college however, you were ignorant to most of those details, and chose to be so. You understood why your family didn't want to involve you just yet, and you didn't care to dig into it, the longer you could go with less responsibilities, the better. So, for now, you were content to stay in the dark and live your carefree, well-funded life.

Of course, that didn't mean you were naive or anything. You know very well that you were in constant danger of being attacked or killed, even as you lived a perfectly normal college life. So, as any self-respecting alpha would, you worked out intensely and routinely, to the point of being intimidating even to other alphas. Running into a few punks here and there was nothing to you, even when they came in groups like they had today.

The remaining smears of blood on your knuckles have dried into a crust by the time you get home. Once you've kicked off your shoes at the door, you hide the gory evidence of your altercation in your coat pockets as you step into the living room of your family's manor. Your sisters, Nina, the youngest, and Esme, older than you but younger than your brothers, Leon and Silas, are sitting on the couch closest to the TV, a drama of some sort playing as they shared a bowl of strawberries. Nina beams at you from the couch.

"Hey! How was your day?"

Nina was still in high school, which in your opinion was way worse than college, so the fact that she still had the spunk and energy to greet you so enthusiastically warmed your heart. You smile back at her as you head for the stairs.

"It was pretty good, I finally finished that project so now I don't have to stay late at the library anymore."

"That's great! That means you'll be home early enough to watch Cats of Heaven with me!"

"I should have enough time for that, sure." You chuckle. You had no clue what that was, but if you had to guess, knowing your sister it was the newest silly cartoon that she had become infatuated with. At least she wasn't trying to get you to watch the insufferable dramas that she liked to watch with Leon and Esme, like what was on now, but you would never admit to your siblings how corny you thought those kinds of shows were. You could only hope Cats of Heaven was something more entertaining than the standard soap operas you'd observed.

"There's pizza in the kitchen." Esme calls to you as you start up the stairs.

Ah, so Leon isn't home yet. The oldest of your siblings was the one who normally cooked, more often than even your mother. You call back an acknowledgement before jogging up the stairs to your room. After cleaning yourself of the day's grime, and the blood of course, you change clothes and trot back downstairs, heading for the kitchen to obtain some of the aforementioned pizza. Getting past the group project you'd been working on for the past three months meant more free time after school for the immediate future, and you were all too keen to relax with your family, even if it meant slogging through a show that was potentially horrendous.

You pad back into the living room, already halfway through one of the five slices of cheesy divinity on your plate. You were just sitting down between Esme and Nina when the sound of keys in the front foyer made you all perk up.

"I thought they weren't coming back for another few days?" Esme voices the question on all of your minds, 'they' being your parents and oldest brother, who had left on a business trip a little under a week ago.

"Maybe they finished work early and wanted it to be a surprise." Nina suggests happily, as the sound of footsteps in the hallway grows closer. You're hit with a sudden wave of apprehension at the same time as Esme, both of you standing abruptly to move in front of your youngest sister as a crowd of strangers step into the room with shameless casualness. Leading them, is an imposing alpha man with ink black hair tied at the nape of his neck and burning red eyes so piercing it almost made you shiver to be caught in their gaze. Almost.

The only thing that overpowered the rising fear was anger.

You sprint directly for the leader, arm pulled back for a haymaker, but some beta grunt gets in your way and takes the blow. It's clear from the confidence with which he steps in that he was unprepared for the force behind the fist, and ends up on his face on the floor, dead to the world. The first swing immediately spurs the others into action, and they surge around their leader to subdue you. It turns out to be a much harder endeavor than any of them anticipate, even when one lackey throws themself onto your back to weigh down your movement, you move as though the weight wasn't there at all, ramming backwards and crushing the brave idiot and one other against the wall. You're about to make another lunge for the leader, who has so far been lounging in an insufferably smug manner against the wall, watching the fight but not bothering to get involved, when you hear a shrill scream behind you that stops you cold.

You turn back to see Nina trapped in the arms of a muscly thug, and Esme thrashing on the ground at her feet, held down by two others. Your rage surges and you move to attack their captors, but the momentary distraction caused by your little sister's distress is all the time that's needed for three more men to jump on you and drag you to the ground. It takes 5 people altogether to hold you down as you curse and struggle against their hold trying to reach your sisters.

The leader of the home invasion chuckles condescendingly as he finally moves from his spot against the wall and walks closer, kneeling down by your face, a tight smile on his face that holds no amusement.

"You're just as feisty as ever, second youngest. I've heard all about your track record in fights, your unbroken win streak was so intimidating that I thought for sure it'd take more than that to subdue you. I'm a little disappointed."

"Fuck you!!!" It's all you can manage to spit out amongst your fury and exhaustion; normally you'd be able to throw off even five people, at least enough to get an arm free to strike out, but you were already worn out from your earlier fight. That, and a literal glob of spit that lands splat dab against the side of the assault leader's nose; damn, so close to hitting him in the eye.

The room goes cold and still, the thugs surrounding you and your siblings seem to take in a collective breath of anxiety, looking nervously to their leader for his reaction. To their surprise, he simply stares down intensely at the struggling alpha on the floor as he wipes the spit off his cheek... and licks it off his thumb.

"Oh, are you sure that's smart? You might not care about your own compromised position... but you care about theirs, right?" He glances over to the men holding down your sisters and in response to an unspoken signal, they draw knives and hold them menacingly against their throats. Esme growls furiously, but Nina screams again in fear as tears pour down her cheeks.

"Stop! Stop it, don't terrorize them! You're here for me, right?! Then just take me outside and beat me to death if that's what you want but leave them alone!!!" You still sound enraged, but even you are aware of the fear that leaks into your voice.

"Aww, worried for your sisters? Me too." The faux amusement in the alpha leader's voice is gone now, replaced with a cold fury chilling enough to send a zing of worry into your spine. The leader grabs a fistful of your hair in a painfully tight grip as he pulls your head up, his other hand spinning a set of keys around his finger. Your blood runs cold when you zero in on the plastic pink dolphin hanging on the ring.

Those are your mother's keys.

"You seem to think I'm here because you put a few grunts into the hospital. You're mistaken." The alpha tilts his head as his eyes pierce into yours, searching, but for what, you don't know. "You aren't aware of what your brother's been up to, are you?"

"You'll have to be more specific; I have two." You huff, trying not to stare too obviously at the dolphin, trying desperately not to think of what it might mean of your mother's fate for this asshole to be holding those keys.

"Silas." The alpha says icily, speaking the name like a curse.

Warily, you shake your head, the clawed grip on your head barely allowing the movement. "No, I'm not aware of anything my brothers and parents are involved in."

"That's unfortunate... But I'm already aware of that. It's cute, honestly, did they think leaving you out of the loop would keep you safe and uninvolved?" He gives your hair a sharp tug, eliciting a hiss from the fuming alpha. "All it did was make you the perfect tool for revenge."

"What the fuck are you even talking about you piece of shi-" The leader slams your face into the ground, and although the floor is carpeted, it only buffers the brunt force so much. When the leader lifts your head back up, your nose is dripping blood.

"I'm talking now. Unless you want me to kill your sisters in front of you, you'll shut the fuck up and listen like a good little bitch."

A growl rumbles through you which is met with another face first kiss into the floor, but the alpha doesn't signal anything to the thugs holding your sisters.

"Listen well, as I won't repeat myself. Silas kidnapped my sister, and I can only assume he claimed her. That, or he killed her, but I doubt it. Your mother was helping him to keep them both hidden, and to her credit she refused to sell him out, no matter how much we hurt her." The spinning of the keys stops abruptly as the leader catches them in his palm before dangling them in front of you. "I guess she didn't stop to think about what that choice might mean for her other children, left so innocent and unaware at home, alone. Maybe she had a favorite?"

Your blood runs cold as you take in the intruder's words. You had never been particularly close with Silas, hell, none of your siblings were. He had always been very distant with his siblings, while the rest of you went on to be incredibly close with one another, leaving Silas as the odd one out. That wasn't to say you hadn't all at some point tried to get closer with him, he had simply always made it clear he had no interest. This was probably also fueled by the coddling you had all observed from your mother; Silas had always been her golden boy, incapable of wrongdoing.

"I had no idea... None of us did." You can only hope the sincerity is clear in your voice and face; you genuinely had no idea your brother had done such a thing or was even capable of doing such. If the kidnapping was fueled by anything other than the feud between your families... The thought made you sick.

The leader considers your words, his chilling gaze never wavering in the slightest from yours.

"I believe you. From what I gather, based on what we were able to discern from the phone we took from your mother, she and he were the only ones in on it."

Your relief is short lived when a cruel, mirthless smirk creeps over the leader's face. There's a sudden sting in the side of your neck, you barely have time to register the pinch of pain before darkness rushes into your vision from all sides.

"However... That doesn't alleviate you of the consequences."

A sudden splash of cold drags you unwillingly out of the darkness. You open your eyes, gasping, taking in the dirty, gray stone, the puddle surrounding you; you're no longer in your living room. You now find yourself somewhere dark and cemented on all sides, the cold dampness pervading the space the kind that only comes from being underground. The only illumination comes from a single bare bulb swinging on a frayed wire over your head, the light it casts only making the space feel more unnerving.

Looming over you, face cast eerily in the darkness clumping up around the edges of the bulb's dingy light, is the leader of the home invasion. His red eyes are black in the shadow, but still alight with something cruel and mocking. He has a bucket in his hand, empty save for the last few drops of water clinging to the lip, the rest of it covering you.

"Good morning, princess. Sleep well?"

It's just the two of you, alone. No guards, no thugs, no sign of your sisters. You process this information a split second before you register the weight clamped down around your arms and waist, metal rattling loudly through the small space when you try to lunge for him, only to be stopped short by a chain attached to the wall behind you. You twist your arms violently, feeling the bite of handcuffs digging into your wrists, chains pulling taught where they're wrapped around your waist. Your captor laughs at your efforts.

It's when you growl in response to the taunting laughter that you feel more metal on your face. A muzzle. You can't suppress the fury thrashing around in your chest like a wild animal, growing more and more violent the more humiliation is piled on. The abduction, the laughter, the restraints, the muzzle. You kick and pull and yank and spit and snarl, don't stop even when the metal bites and blood makes your skin slippery against the cuffs.

"Aww, throwing a tantrum now? Cute." The words are barely enough warning before you're shoved onto your back, arms grinding painfully between the restrains and the dirty floor.

Your captor straddles you, his weight keeping your body pressed flat to the ground while one hand settles into the curve of your throat and squeezes. His palm presses lightly into your airway at the same time that his thumb rubs slow, pensive circles in the dip between your neck and collar. You shiver apprehensively when it brushes over the scent gland in your neck.

"I already told you I don't know where your sister is. Fucking kill me already so you can get even, just don't hurt my sisters. They're not involved!"

"Second time you've asked me to kill you... you seem quite keen on it." He smirks. "Unfortunately, you're all involved by virtue of simply being a part of that family. I know none of you are stupid enough to be completely ignorant to your family's doings."

Another growl bubbles up in your throat, only to be choked into silence when your captor tightens his grip around your neck.

"You know, I've thought for a while now that the older you've gotten, the less happy you've looked. The worst time, was right after your high school graduation, it was like the last of your light had left your eyes." His smile softens into something pitying, bordering on sympathetic even, but all you feel is chills running up and down your spine. "You always used to be so carefree, and spirited, it was crushing to see you looking so worn down and sad. It took me a while to realize what was killing the happy you I love so much."

The hands around your neck loosen as the leader leans down, hips shifting against your crotch as he moves, completely unbothered by the water soaking into his pants. He brings his face to your ear, lips grazing against the shell of it.

"Don't you think trying so hard to posture around like a big tough alpha is exhausting? I know it is, I know intimately the sort of shit we go through to come out on top as the strongest, the worthiest... But that struggle never suited you, did it? You've always seemed too sweet for it to me, more like an omega than an alpha."

You can't help but take the opportunity to thrust your head forward and slam it into your captor's face, forcing him back into his upright position. Ignoring the stalker shit this guy was just babbling was difficult, but you decided to skip it for now since honestly you didn't really wanna hear the details...

"You've gotta be shitting me, I've sent hundreds of you losers to the hospital and the grave since I was a middle schooler. If you're seriously trying to compare me to an omega, then I know you're full of it and just trying to piss me off."

He raises an eyebrow, surprisingly not retaliating against the bonk to his head, not yet at least.

"So, what would you call the manicures you get monthly with your sister?"

"I call that self-care and spending time with my sister. Fighting off all your fuckin' grunts wears my hands out and I'm not fond of scars. I deserve a relaxing hand massage for the trouble of beating your thugs up every week."

"And the mall trips where you spend hundreds on clothes which you follow up with a trip to that quaint little bakery where you always get a strawberry cream cake? That doesn't strike you as omega-ish?"

"Go to hell. For one thing, it's insanely creepy that you know all that, and for another, you're stereotyping like a motherfucker. Alphas aren't all meatheads that do nothing but eat raw steak, jerk off and work out, and all omegas aren't valley preps that do nothing but shop and primp. People who think like you are what's wrong with society."

The leader's deep red eyes stare intensely into your face for an eerily long moment before the corners of his lips twitch. At first its imperceptible, and while he clearly fights to keep a straight face, he can't keep down the chuckles bubbling out of his throat for long. He throws his head back in a burst of full body laughter, the least cruel sound he's made since you met him. When he finally manages to calm himself, the leader beams down at you as he wipes a tear out of his eye.

"My god... You're so fucking cute. Do you even hear yourself? You're only proving my point. You're meant to be pampered and taken care of, sheltered and safe from petty street fights and laborious expectations of strength and intimidation. You look so much cuter and happier getting your nails done than you do working out and swaggering around trying to be impressive and domineering."

This conversation had already been creepy since it started, but this was starting to genuinely unnerve you. You try to lean your head further away from the alpha on top of you, but he grabs the front of your muzzle, dragging you closer.

"Don't run away now tough guy. I thought a big bad alpha like you wasn't scared. How's it feel to be the one on bottom? Feeling threatened by the idea of someone putting you in your place? Scared?" He drags his tongue across the thin bars of the muzzle, his breath ghosting over your lips.

"What do you want from me?" You finally manage to ask, despite the tightness in your throat. As much as you expect to dread the answer, you can't stand any more of the back and forth while you wait in suspense for torture, for death, for something. Something other than whatever it is about this whole exchange that is making this guy so rock hard. You're trying to ignore it but, you've been feeling the unmistakable prod of this weirdo's boner against your crotch for almost the whole time you've been speaking.

"Still waiting on me to kill you? Knowing how proud you are, I bet you'd prefer death over what I have planned for you." The freak on top of you chuckles, his voice lowering to a husk as he leans down and nuzzles his nose into the crook between your neck and shoulder, inhaling deeply. "You smell so sweet even now, for an alpha...~ You'll smell even better soon."

Before you can ask what the hell he's talking about, you feel a kitten lick against your neck that makes you freeze. It's light at first, but quickly turns into broad strokes of his tongue and open mouth kisses from shoulder to jaw, wet and insistent.

No way. Nowaynowaynowaynoway. Obviously, no one is incapable of being sexually assaulted but it rarely ever happened to alphas, they weren't exactly the cute, easy targets creeps normally went for. It had never even been a passing concern for you up until now.

"Hey! Are you fucking-gh...!" You choke on your words when a sharp sting pulses through your neck. A heartbeat later, a deep and agonizing burning sensation starts to spread through your veins, up into your head where the white-hot burn is so blaring that it clouds your vision with spots, and down into your chest where your heart starts pounding against your ribs like it's trying to claw its way out. You can only gasp soundlessly as pain like you've never experienced rips through you, tearing screams from your lungs that die before they can even leave your throat, coming out only as gasping whimpers. It's after you feel a second bite and the pain is redoubled that you finally manage to shriek out loud, a sound so visceral and so unlike any sound or scream you've ever made that it doesn't even sound like you.

When he bites into your scent gland for a third time, the pressure building behind your eyes from the pain and the lightheadedness of screaming without pause for breath snaps. You can feel yourself losing consciousness again, and this time you couldn't be more grateful for it.

Your return to the waking world is much slower this time. Whereas before you were yanked out of the darkness with a splash of cold water, this time you find yourself wading through it, a lake of sludge thicker than cold syrup, and it was just as sticky and unpleasant as you imagine such a thing would be. Despite what feels like physical pounds of exhaustion weighing them down, you manage to drag your eyes open.

You feel cold and damp all over, a fresh drop of sweat rolling down your neck. A full body ache that sinks deep into your bones covers you; you feel like you're made of glass, fragile, weak and sore.

A strip of dim, greyed light is shining on the ceiling over your head; its all you can focus on as your awareness swims to the surface and clambers out of the heavy lake still trying to drag it down. You shift and lift one of your arms out from under the thick blanket covering you and notice gauze wrapped around your wrist. A small, delicate gasp to your side makes you turn your head. Nina is sitting in a chair by your bedside, clutching your other hand tightly between hers.

"You're awake! Y-You were sleeping so long I thought you'd never..." She sniffles, holding your hand to her cheek as hot tears drip onto your wrist. You slowly turn your hand to press your palm against her cheek, smiling softly.

"It's okay Nina, I'm alive, it's alright." Your voice is barely more than a croak, scratching painfully out of your throat. Nina grabs a cup of water from a bedside table and gently helps you take a few sips. When you've managed to drain the whole cup, you lay back in the bed with a wearied sigh.

"What happened? I thought for sure I was dying, I..." You trail off, thinking back to the odd conversation you'd had with the alpha who had led your home's invasion. Your head is pounding, and you feel so weak, like you're just waking up from the worst part of a flu, still feeling traces of a fever in the heat trapped in your blankets and the sweat clinging to your skin. A growl from the window pulls your attention away from your condition.

"That motherfucker... He did something to you." Esme is leaning against the frame of the large window casting the gray light over the ceiling a few feet away from where you and Nina are sitting, a cigarette crushed in half in her hand. You can't help but be faintly alarmed at the sight of it; Nina had expressly forbidden Esme from smoking, and she hadn't been caught with a cigarette in over a year. To see her with one in front of Nina, and for Nina to not be making any fuss over it, means something is seriously wrong. A distant rumble punctuates the tense silence that falls over you all, and you notice that the slim strip of sky visible through the partially parted curtains over the window is blotted out with storm gray.

"Did what to me?" You press. Your sisters exchange a look that is far too loaded to discern anything from other than Nina's palpable concern and Esme's frustration. You quickly get tired of waiting for one of them to tell you what is going on.

"Will one of you please tell me what is making you both look at me like I've caught some kind of fatal disease?" You huff, anxiety bleeding into your words. Nina glances one more time to Esme, who adamantly refuses to look away from the window as she throws down her ruined cigarette and retrieves a new one.

"You... Er, well you were... claimed. By Emil." Nina says quietly, staring down at her hands in her lap rather than you.

You stare at her blankly. What she's saying makes sense objectively, but you can't make sense of what it could have to do with you. Claiming was something exclusively done between alphas and omegas. You almost want to laugh and call it absurd, when you remember the sharp, burning pain of something piercing your neck. You shiver as you recall that the pain had been sourced in the same area as your scent gland. Your hand slowly, shakily, reaches up to press two probing fingers to your neck. Pain pulses faintly through you again when the tips of your fingers find gauze wrapped around it.

The weakness pervading your entire body, the nervousness underlying all of the other emotions swirling in your gut, the foreign sensation settled in your lower abdomen... Somehow, you know instinctively what it all means before your sister even says it.

"He bitched you. You're an omega now." Esme's voice has dropped to a low, hard to hear octave. You almost want to believe you imagined what you just heard, but you know deep down that what she says is true. The despair must show on your face, as Nina grabs your hand again, squeezing it tightly between both of hers.

"I-It'll be okay...! Emil is actually very nice, and he's genuinely-" She's cut off by the sharp slam of Esme's fist against the wall.

"Bullshit! Don't even start Nina. He bitched you and he expects you to roll over and be happy about it, but I say fuck that!" She snarls, her new cigarette meeting the same fate as its predecessor as she crushes it in her fist and throws it to the ground. "He's gone on and on at us trying to prove that this is all somehow what's best for you, but he just sounds deranged! He's a sick, obsessive freak, and he wants you to-!"

The sound of a door opening stops her short, and all three siblings jerk around to look at the newcomer entering through the door on the far side of the room from the bed. A woman in scrub pants and a sweater glowers down at all three siblings, looking supremely exhausted.

"You two, you were told you would only be allowed in if you didn't cause trouble. Are you distressing the patient right after they wake up?" She asks in a cold, droning voice.

Nina and Esme exchange defeated, worried glances before Nina speaks up.

"N-No ma'am, we weren't trying to be disruptive we were just-"

"Overwhelming someone coming out of a physically taxing ordeal that left them comatose for almost two weeks." She interjects dryly. "Come on, visitation's over, both of you out."

You expect your sisters to argue, to tell her off for expecting them to leave you alone and insist on staying with you, but to your shock your sisters resignedly stand up and head for the door. Once they've both shuffled out, the nurse (?) shuts the door behind them and trudges over to you. You flinch away from her touch, but she grabs you in firm but gentle hands, holding you still as she looks you over.

"I expected you to stay out for a few more days, but you're one tough little cookie. How are you feeling?"

Bewildered but too shell shocked to question, you answer the questions she asks you as she goes about taking your temperature and blood pressure. One impromptu physical later, she steps away from your bed with a satisfied nod.

"Alright, it looks like your recovery is progressing better than expected. You'll probably be up and about like nothing happened within a few days." You listen to her ramble about your condition before you can bring yourself to ask.

"What happened to me? Is... Is what my sister said true? Am I an omega?"

The nurse goes silent. The pitying look she gives you is all the confirmation you need.

"You should go back to sleep for now. Your body probably still feels very weak. Food will be brought to you shortly but try not to stress yourself out in the meantime." It's all she says before she hurries to the door, shutting your questions down with a firm slam. You scramble to your feet, swaying violently as soon as you try to stand. You power through it, holding down a lurching sensation akin to being on the verge of throwing up as you stagger to the door and wrench at the knob. Locked.

Fear and worry overtake you as you start slamming your hands and body into the door, though what you're trying to accomplish, not even you know. You're too weak to even stand, let alone break down a door, and before long, cold rushes into your limbs and you find yourself sliding down onto the floor, trembling and barely keeping down the bile crawling up your throat. You curl up into a ball and close your eyes.

When you awake for the third time, you don't feel nearly as ill. The ache in your limbs is still there, a mild constant, but it doesn't feel as debilitating as it did before. As you are in the middle of waking, you feel a cool hand brushing through your hair, and smell a sweet scent around you that puts you at ease. You can't help but lean your face into the hand petting you as your eyes slowly open. Snuggled against you, both arms wrapped securely around you... is that fucking freak.

You jerk away from the home invasion leader's hand, pulling him out of what looks like a deep reverie as you scramble to the side of the bed farthest from him. He smiles at you in amusement as he sits up, leaning his cheek against a fist propped on his knee.

"Good morning, princess. How are you feeling?"

You rub your hand over your neck, now free of gauze, feeling the bite marks in your skin in hyper-detail.

"You fucking... y-you, what did you do...?!" You demand, your voice a slightly higher pitch than you recall it being and shaking.

He chuckles like this was exactly what he was expecting, looking at you with a coy condescension that makes your skin crawl.

"I helped you; the first step to setting up our beautiful romance was making you an omega so I could care for you without any power struggles getting in the way. I'm not saying I look down on alphas having relationships with other alphas, but it just wasn't for me." His grin broadens as he crawls closer to you, closing the distance you'd put between you. You try to back up further, but he corners you against the headboard, arms caging you in on either side. He leans his head down, you shrink into yourself as he does but its not far enough, and his cheek brushes yours as he licks up the side of your neck. When his tongue glides over the bites on your neck, a shudder runs through you unbidden. A sudden rush of wetness between your legs shocks you to a frozen standstill. The freak looming over you takes a deep inhale, shuddering in ecstasy.

"I was right... You smell so much sweeter like this!" He presses against you, one knee parting your legs as one of his hands rubs the burning heat between your thighs. You reach to grab his wrist and pull it away, but his free hand catches yours and holds it down. The uncomfortable wetness gets worse as a heat purrs through your core, goaded by his touching.

You feel a foreign sensation crawling through your brain, sickeningly warm and disorienting. It urges you to pull your hands away, spread yourself open willingly before the alpha in front of you. It promises bliss in submission, ecstasy in relinquishing control to someone bigger and stronger than you, someone who could protect and ravish you-

A jolt runs through you as your captor's hand drifts up to dip underneath the waistband of your pants, his face lifting up from your neck to direct his affections to your lips. His attempt to take a kiss is stopped short violently by a fist slamming into his nose. He falls backwards off the side of the bed with an undignified yelp, curling up on the floor for an agonizing moment to hold his face as blood rushes between his fingers.

"W-What the hell... Aren't you...?"

"GO TO HELL YOU UGLY FREAK!!!" The panic you feel is pushed down, rage swallowing it entirely. The alpha on the floor quickly backs up as you get to your feet, fists clenched and shaking in fury.

"But I claimed you...! You can't-"

"I don't give a shit what you did! Did you seriously think I'd tolerate you touching me?! Get the hell OUT!!!!!" You scream loud enough to make your voice hoarse in your already aching throat, grabbing anything you can to hurl at him. Pillows and plastic cups chase him out as he scrambles back to the door, muttering a promise to visit again once you're in a better mood. A pillow smacks into the door with alarming force in the spot where his head had been just a split second earlier. As for the idea of you ever being in any mood that would make you tolerate being in his presence...

Fat chance of that.

[darlingod]

It’s just… it is everything that Cardan thought Jude would notice his “SO OBVIOUS” exile riddle and thinks Jude to not hesitate to come back. Beside his certainty of her cleverness to piece the riddle together, he believed he was that clear about his feelings toward her; he had thought she absolutely ought to know how he feels for her.

Like oh buddy. BUDDY. Your wife had thought of the answer to your little riddle like you thought she would. But guess what? She has detrimental TRUST ISSUES. (Like… Ur super mean and hot, I can’t blame her.) Anyway.. it’s SUPER adorable of him to so wholeheartedly believe she wouldn’t question his trust. It reveals so much about his pov of thier relationship.

Jude thought Cardan’s (silly) trick was a (vile) trick, when it was simply a: “Im trying to impress/pay you back in kind with our romantic metaphorical sparring and eventually get you out of political drama for a bit,” trick.

I’m fucking laughing wow these delusional ass children I fucking love them.

[1nflicted]

it was interesting to see the fight between rhaenyra and daemon because it could be interpreted in many different ways. the one way that stood out to me the most though, was the idea of her never loving him from the start. in my mind, daemon is one of the only men rhaenyra knows, so naturally she clung/went to him. i mean she said it herself, she never fully trusted him. perhaps she's waking up to the truth: the version of daemon she created in her head, is different from the real daemon.

i could be wrong but these are just my thoughts!

[caeslxys]

Something I think is extremely interesting thematically when it comes to connecting what Downfall and the ideas it tackled to the overarching narrative of campaign three is that the things Downfall made a point to showcase of Aeor—Cassida, Hallis, the visual of an aeormaton proposing to her partner, the specific and intentional decision to shed light on a far from insignificant amount of the population being civilians or refugees—is that it plays in perfect parallel across from what is happening (and, really, has been happening) to the ruidusborn on Exandria in present.

Bear with me for a moment. Aeor is ultimately a city that was collectively punished for the decisions of its leadership. We could (and, judging by the amount of discourse around this particular topic already, probably will) argue about what the Gods’ motivation for all of this was—whether it be that they could not, in the end, bear to kill their siblings or that they were terrified at the prospect of mortality—for me it is a very healthy dose of both—but for this I am much more interested in the latter. They were scared. That, really, is the driving force behind both this arc and their role in c3 as a whole.

Why I point this out is: It is far more interesting to me, especially as we go back to Bells Hells this week, to dissect the Gods and their decisions not purely on sympathetic motivation alone but as beings in the highest seat of power in the highest social class in Exandria.

So, having established that the Gods (in relation to mortals) are more a higher social class than anything we could compare to our real life understanding of divinity and that Aeor was eviscerated largely because of their fear—what is the difference between those innocents in Aeor caught in the trappings of their autocratic government leadership and a divine war on the ground, and those of the ruidusborn being manipulated both by Ludinus and by the very thing that inspired such visceral fear in the Gods to start with. I would argue very little.

I think of Cassida, doing what she genuinely thought was right and good and would save people, her son, and the object of her worship—and how that did not matter enough to any of them to spare her because of the fear they held at the very concept of mortality. I think of Liliana and Imogen, one of which we know begged for the gods to help her or send her a sign for years on years, and how every single one of their largest struggles could have been avoided had the gods loved them, their supposed children, as much as they feared what they could be. I think of how the thing that did save Imogen, in the end, was a woman who herself existed in direct defiance of the gods will. I think of that young boy, sixteen years old, that Laudna exalted on Ruidus.

I think it’s completely fair to judge Aeor’s overall society as deeply corrupt—it was!—but its leadership and police force are not a reflection of every one of its citizens. Similarly, it is fair to judge the Ruby Vanguard as corrupt—it is!—but its multiple heads of leadership and even the god-eater further are not a reflection of every one of its members.

Notably, and what I think the Hells will latch onto, this did not matter to the Gods. It did not matter that Cassida was trying to help. She was still too much of a risk. Will it matter, what Imogen does? Will it matter, if that young boy is in the blast radius when they decide to take no further chances?

I’ve seen a lot of people say that the Hells will side with the gods and I don’t think I agree. Especially as Imogen has been scolded and villainized over and over for daring to try and save her mother—who herself has been seen by some as an irredeemable evil in spite of her drive being the exact same—her family—but when it’s the Gods it’s justified? When it’s the Gods, it’s sympathetic? Too sympathetic to criticize further than “they’re family”?

I obviously do not think the Gods should die or be eaten or what have you, and I certainly don’t agree with Ludinus (though I find him much more compelling than just a variation of hubris wizard), but when talking about the Gods in Aeor and in present it isn’t really at all about their motivation or their family. It can’t be. Too many people, including our active protagonists, lives have been effected for it to be as cut and dry as “they’re family”. These are your children. They are your family, too.

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

butterfly Howdy... he must be the prettiest girl at the party.... also so so tired

[pizzaqueen]

464 words of pre-slash pining fluff for day one of @steddie-week / rated G or T

It’s not as tight a fit in the listening booth as Eddie hoped it would be, but it does get him closer to Steve than he’s been all day. (Well, except for when he draped himself all over Steve at their table in the food court, or when they were pressed close in the photo booth, Eddie goading Steve into making goofy faces, or when their knees were resting together at the movies earlier.)

But they’re in their own bubble here. The rest of the world completely shut out. Just the two of them, one set of headphones, and a song shared between them.

Eddie has the album at home, and he wouldn’t be surprised if Steve knows that, but he didn’t resist when Eddie dragged him in here with one hand curled around Steve’s wrist, the other clutching the album they’re listening to now.

The song is so familiar and it fades to the background as Eddie watches Steve sidelong; the drums keep time with the beat of his heart, the howling guitar could be the singing in his blood. He catches Steve looking at him, once, twice, three times, his pulse skipping whenever their gazes lock.

This is almost everything Eddie wants. Listening to music with Steve, forgetting about the world beyond the song and the space between them. It would be perfect if he was sure that Steve’s heart is beating as hard as his, that his skin tingles at the nearness of Eddie, the way Eddie’s skin is tingling, now, being so close to Steve. The way his stomach swoops, and his chest feels full to bursting, how he’s every single fucking hopelessly in love cliche whenever they’re together, and even more when they’re not.

But he doesn’t know. He has no fucking clue. Sometimes, maybe, he thinks—hopes—but how can he be sure? He’s out of his depths here. It drives him crazy but, fuck, in moments like this he wouldn’t have it any other way.

Steve shifts, their hips bumping together, the brush of his arm against Eddie’s sending electricity through him. It draws Steve closer and he doesn’t move away, so they listen to the rest of the song pressed close, like the booth is half the size.

“So”—Eddie pulls his side of the headphones away from his ear when the song ends—“what did you think?” He bites his lip, kicks Steve’s foot.

“I think I liked it.” Steve’s gaze flicks outside the booth, then fixes back on Eddie. His eyes twinkle, warm and dark, and he turns so he’s facing Eddie fully. He licks his lips and leans in, saying, “But maybe we could listen to it again?”

“Yeah,” Eddie says, a smile forming, “maybe we could,” and he starts the song over.

[daylighteclipsed]

Y’all ever think about if Sora falls to darkness that inside his heart will look like the Destiny Islands falling again

[sirazaroff]

How do you think Velvet flirts with Coco?

This is one of the funniest asks I ever got and im glad cause this is just gold. Like how does the Bun™️ woo her stupid bozo??
————


I have my biased takes on what Coco and Velvet are like as characters, but to start off I wanna focus on what Vel brings to the table.

I think a lot of people have moe’d her down to a nervous/scaredy bunny girl and…that’s not her at all. She’s a real multilayered character who can and will kick your ass flat. She’s also…

- very very attentive to people

- excellent at memorizing things she sees and hears, and quickly at that

- very emotionally in tune with people, herself included

- insanely kind and helpful

- honest about her feelings and will voice her thoughts when ready

Also she’s a bunny like come on. Is baby. It’s impossible to not find her likable.

I can go on forever, but I think these are enough likable traits to work with.


Time to shift. Now we focus on what I think Coco likes in a person:

- Hot girls

- Complexity

- Someone true to their nature

- Some sense of honor

- Someone striving to learn and to better themselves

Hopefully it’s not lost here, but there’s some compatibility don’t you think? Velvet’s got some of those traits that Coco likes.

————

So where’s the flirting? It’s coming I swear, I just needed the background info to help support the answers.

Bun bun flirts two ways: intentionally and unintentionally. The latter is usually what’s happening most often.

Her intentional flirting is what you would expect. Some cheeky words, being a playful tease in her actions like when she flashed her camera in After the Fall. I think she would 1000% take advantage of her physique and incredibly vast skillsets. She is totally totally showing off during training and sparring. Coco might hide her gaze under her glasses but that dumb bitch is so easy. So so easy…

Now her unintentional flirting is basically that Velvet is just doing her thing. She’s comfortable and loved by her team. With them she’s able to be herself and have fun, and that’s what coco loves most. Seeing Velvet thrive and not feel like she has to hide herself away from the world, and with it comes moments and actions that make Coco, much to her surprise, fall for Velvet.

I guess simply put, Velvet flirts by being her cheeky self around Coco, and her leader falls for her every time.

[galacticlamps]

I don't want to get too caught up on semantics but I have to say I really feel like it's an unfair reading of the situation to call what Charles does in the Staircase Scene a "rejection."

I've already talked about how I think that scene's strength lies in the act of telling itself and Edwin's confession as the conclusion of his self-discovery arc. And I understand how the fact that that arc involved things like sexuality & attraction left it open to being viewed under a sort of romance-plot-specific lens, but evaluating the whole thing on that criteria still feels like a misrepresentation.

I don't think Edwin is saying "Love me" in that scene. Maybe he would've been asking for that, if this had all happened under different circumstances - and sure, generally, he'd presumably like that to happen - but it'd still be a kind of insane request for him to make right as he's being literally rescued from hell. (Especially since, even though the audience & Charles can both see the rescue as so in-character we might take it for granted, Edwin clearly didn't, if his consistently surprised confused & appalled reactions to Charles being there are anything to go by). I think he's feeling very loved already at that point, and I have a hard time believing desperation to simply have that reiterated is what drove him to speak up at such an inopportune moment.

I think what he's really saying there is "Hear me" - and as a listener and a confidant, Charles does anything but reject him. Maybe it's splitting hairs a bit, but if the distinction between "please don't turn me down" and "please understand the person in front of you" matters anywhere, it's in relation to Charles' response because he is so accepting of the confession as a confession. Not only does he take what Edwin tells him well, despite it being the sort of thing that might rock the foundation of the most important relationship in his existence, he also accepts the fact that Edwin is in such a vulnerable and worked up state that he has to do it right now despite it endangering them both. Charles would, truthfully, be totally justified in mostly ignoring it or passing over it quickly and inconclusively, insisting that this wasn't the time or place - but instead everything he says and does in that scene is geared toward giving Edwin's announcement the attention & understanding he needs so badly - and that includes responding with honesty about his own feelings, even if they might not otherwise be exactly what you'd want to hear after declaring your love for someone. Charles takes his time (perhaps foolishly, but certainly necessarily) and gives Edwin a response that is warm and familiar, while also being kind, affectionate, open, serious, and above all correspondingly worthy of the weight of the thing Edwin has just entrusted him with. That seems an awful lot to pass over simply because he doesn't also happen to be in love with him too.

Edwin's confession is so not a come-on that whether or not Charles reciprocates the romantic element is, at best, secondary to his overall reaction, and using that piece of it to call the whole thing a rejection feels like a very inaccurate shorthand to get in the habit of using as a summary of his role in the scene.

[khihi]

i'm not gonna be able to put my thoughts on this into the kind of wording they deserve because my brain is burned to a crisp at the moment, but now we've got all the chapters i'm sort of piecing together a narrative...

the story starts with kris, whose photos are very tender and exposing – they seem to be about him learning to being comfortable in himself, letting himself be soft and let out his emotions in a healthy way (the shower that washes away the black and white to reveal the gold).

there's comfort and relief in the solitude of his photos – it feels like he's embracing a fresh start for himself – the first new chapter. his nudity isn't for show as much as it is in the others' chapters; it feels more like an innocent "naked as you were born" kind of situation.

then you get bojan, who is the opposite of kris; instead of water, we have fire as the main element, and also a lot more focus on props and costume to tell the story of this guy who finds himself being close to burnout so much. but also perhaps to hide and protect himself.

unlike kris, we're seeing someone who finds little relief or healing in the loneliness of his images; in fact, he never really feels alone in most of his images — he stares down the lens with such intensity it's making it clear to us that he's up there in the spotlight surrounded by an audience. unlike kris, any of his nudity's all for show.

then chapters four and five; jan and nace both expressing a turmoil of emotions in their own shoots – nace's internal stress and strain being put on show, paired with jan's determination to keep the messiness of his own emotions in the dark as much as he can – they're both uncomfortable with themsleves in some way on their own...

but then they come together, and there's happiness and love and support. they look at the audience, but there's no fear or worry there like there is in bojan's shoots; just a silent determination that they're there to protect and care for each other.

then, finally, we've got jure's pictures. which are clearly meant to be sexy as fuck. i think it's interesting how the story began with kris being comfortable and unbothered by any potential onlookers while half naked, then progressed to bojan putting on an uncomfortable show of his half-naked body for any spectators, then on to jan and nace not really showing off much of their bodies at all, and now the story concludes with jure very much putting on a show for the audience but feeling totally comfortable in doing so. he's lounging around in most of the photos – hell, he's got the goddamn baby boo socks on, he seems very comfortable, even playful about letting us look.

so the arc – one of the arcs, at least – i'm reading into this story is finding a healthy balance between showing yourself off - giving the intimate parts of yourself away, if you like - and hiding yourself away from all the discomfort too many eyes on you leads to. it's being confident and comfortable in yourself enough to have fun in revealing enough of yourself without letting it burn you out.

at the end of a good story, the protagonist is usually changed to the point of no return. there's no going back to the innocent, relaxed state that we began with in kris' photos, not after having gone through bojan and jan and nace's photos. but we can find a happy ending within jure's photos, even if changed.

the relief and comfort found in jan and nace's photos together leads us very nicely to the reason behind this happy ending, i think; they feel safest and most supported when together. and that goes, i think, for all of them. while jure might be on his own here, he's surrounded by images of his bandmates. he can be comfortable and confident in himself because he's got his friends behind him. art intertwined.

[dozydawn]

Model: Nancy Dutiel.

[hororona]

nico robin and her smile

hiiii ok has anyone else ever thought about the person robin was before joining the straw hats? like who she was when she was at her worst? because i do. a lot. so go along with me here

from her introduction, robin has this very small smile that feels cunning and is seemingly meant to taunt luffy and co. it creates a sense that there's a canyon's depth of difference in power between her and the others.

robin's is a subtle character in her expressions compared to most other major characters in the series. and i think it fits her background of having to work in subterfuge. (???)

she maintains this expression throughout multiple scenes. the same shape of her smile that is so exact that it has to be with intention. this is the face of ms. all sunday. this is the person robin had to be in order to survive.

and yet each one still has it's differences and that's robin being not so perfect at hiding her true feelings (which btw i love that robin will always be exactly who she is). she's stressed or even strained at times. while also feeling perfectly at ease, but still performing a role.

i think for the most part. robin didn't mind what she had to do or who she had to be. because she's pragmatic, but she was definitely bothered by vivi and the strawhats. they're the ones who cause robin to show anything other than that static smile. notably when she is faced with vivi and luffy's determination.

and i've rambled about it once before robin is a kind woman at heart and who has a soft spot for the crew + vivi. their earnestness breaks through her own desire/need to not care for the effect her actions have on the lives of others.

notably the only times robin does seem to genuinely smile is in small sudden outbursts around luffy when something he does makes her laugh.

and throughout the rest of the alabasta arc. robin's clearly uncomfortable with facing the real destruction of alabasta at crocodile and her hands. later revealing that she never planned on helping him obtain the poseidon weapon. she never once smiles, instead dropping everything to focus on getting to the poneglyph.

after that though? she does her miss all sunday smile one last time when she asks luffy to join his crew. it's a famous panel, we all know it, we all love it.

the longer robin was with the straw hats. the more she began to genuinely smile. it's well established that being on the crew brought back joy and laughter into robin's life, that being with them gave her a reason to live again. but it was a slow start until we got to see this robin more often and more freely who is cheered by everyone's bright youth and excitement in being alive in a ways that she never had been allowed.

[kacievvbbbb]

I think Mihawk would be a psychologist wet dream

Like what the fuck is exactly wrong with him? Who fucking knows not them.

Like he is literally just this scene from b99

Rosa and Amy are obviously represented by Benn and Shanks respectively and this is a red haired party with another crew. Benn was assigned to making sure an overstimulated mihawk doesn’t kill anyone duty while Shanks plays the ever gracious host. Who knows why the psychologists are there I don’t