#the worst part is i have paragraphs i really like in both sections that i dont think i'll be able to keep in the slower ver

[lyricalambrosia]

I'm struggling so much with how to start chapter 3 of can you feel the sun.....ive spent (checks notes) 2?? Days??? Just staring at the same three sections because the pacing feels so wrong to me but ive kind of put myself in a Situation™ here so. Ugh. Gonna have to rewrite already 😔

[a-court-of-moonlight-and-ire]

What is UP moonlight and ire nation, Im being tormented by intrusive thoughts rn, so I have decided to read a chapter of A Court of Mist and Fury and hope they stop when Im done with this. Last time on the Flames and Darkness Liveblog we had Lucien finally finding Feyre and Feyre being needlessly cruel to him until he left again. also, Feyre used her Tamlin-powers to shapeshift herself a pair of wings and I think that was pretty much it, I feel like not a lot happens in these chapters tbh. And yet I always have so much to say to say about them... Whatever, lets get into this

Chapter 48

Is Feyre smelling the other people at this inn having sex? what kinda smells and noises is she talking about

Theyre in a village that consists of just the inn theyre staying at, a tailor, a grocery store and a brothel? I mean presumably theres actual houses there too but that doest seem right. Also, if its as in-the-middle-of-nowhere as Feyre claims, where the hell are they getting groceries and what kind of groceries are they selling

of course theres only ONE BED and its soooooo small oh noooo do you guys think theyre gonna have sex or what

Oh and of course Feyre cant demand that Rhysand sleep on the floor because its too small to even do that theyre gonna have the wildest sex, and by wildest sex I mean theyre both gonna squeeze each other into the bed under the comically small ceiling of this broomcloset of a room and lay on top of each other without moving like a sandwhch made out of just faemeat

I feel like a cape thats cut to fit around these bigass illyrian wings would lose a lot of its functionality tbh, unless it was like, a wrapping for the wings to protect them from the cold, but I dont think thats the case with Rhysand's cape, i think it either just has holes or is some kind of weird shape, but I feel like if your in these harsh winter winds, having a cape fluttering around your wings would be pretty distracting considering how sensitive supposedly they are

WAIT. do we count this cape as a new Rhys-outfit or do we not. Im on the fence because on one hand, he's just wearing it with his usual illyrian leathers and its really just an accessoire, like I wouldnt count what he wore in the CoN as a new outfit just because he wore a crown with his black tunic, but on the other hand, I feel like a cape can really drastically alter the look of an outfit in a way most other acessoires cant. let me know what you think

of COURSE feyre would call the hypothetical painting she would make of Rhysand 'Death on Fast Wings' im gonna commit a crime

'"I love it when you look at me like that. [...] Like there's no reason to run away from my power. Like you're looking at me."' Does this imply that Rhysand identifies with the descriptor 'death on fast wings' because idk that seems weird. then again, he is a weirdo

Rhysand's pronouns are death/incarnate <- thought that popped into my head while I was writing the previous bullet point

By far the worst part about this book are all the sections where Feyre will just suck Rhysand off for a paragraph, she would not fucking say that

'"No, [you weren't afraid of me]. You were nervous, but you weren't afraid. I've felt pure fear often enough that I know the difference. Maybe that's why I couldn't leave you alone."' god, rhysand is such a creepy little freak. and not the good kind either

Feyre is being all like "oh, sure, the bed isnt small but we couldnt possibly both sleep in it without completely getting into each other's personal space, especially with his wings" girl??? tell him to put those thangs away???

god this paragraph is so annoying 'Fae-men were possessive, dominant and arrogant but the men of the Spring Court had a certain disregard [for my wishes] laying beneath the the surface' my brother in christ you have been in two and a half (2 1/2) courts and you know seven (7) fae-men personally

Also, this part where Feyre is like "if I was wasting away and Rhysand just stood by without doing anything about it, Cassian and Azriel would've gotten involved and given him a piece of their minds" is so funny knowing whats gonna happen in acosf, like no they fucking wouldnt! what are you talking about!

Oh man it just occurred to me. this is the chapter where Feyre finds out theyre mates isnt it. Or like, this part whre theyre at this inn is when she finds out, Im pretty sure itll last for multiple chapters

"[Rhysand] saw right through Ianthe the moment he met her." yeah because she broke into his bedroom and sexually harassed him and just outright told him that she wanted to have his children for the sake of power ?? I would hope he would see through that

I feel like theres been this pattern in this book of Feyre only being able to compliment Rhys in contrast with Tamlin and its very strange because you would think that after speedrunning their relationship development and spending about 500 pages worth of time with him, she would be able to point out some of his positives without immediately connecting them to her ex's negatives, but I guess thats too much to ask of this ROMANCE

Like, I forgot if this was something Feyre already said or if this is still coming up but I know theres a point in this book where she's like "I think I just loved Tamlin pre-UTM because I was so broken and traumatized from my shitty homelife that I fell for the first person to show me some kindness" and that is not how their relationship felt in ACOTAR at all atleast in my opinion, but that definitely is how Feysand feels in this book

I really hate it when male characters are described as having "hard muscles" it sounds so unpleasant. im saying this primarily as someone who likes to read about characters cuddling and prefers it when theyre soft for that, but even if we're just talking smut, does having sex with a "hard" guy sound pleasant to you? or, well. you know what i mean

!! NEW RHYS-OUTFIT DROPPED !! hes wearing wide thin pants (even though theyre sleeping in an ice cold broom closet) and a tight cotton shirt, both of unspecified color

Oh yeah, Rhysand is just sooooooo powerful you guys, he needs to constantly use his magic otherwise itll just take him over and turn him into the joker

'Everyone at his Court had a use, some kind of great ability. And here I was, a strange, unpredictable hybrid that was more trouble than it's worth.' girl you are literally fae jesus what the hell are you talking about

Maybe Im just in a bad mood but this part where Rhys n Feyre are telling each other about how they would tear the world apart if they were ever forcefully seperated is so deeply annoying to me

Im not gonna translate the shit Rhysand just said to Feyre, tldr he thinks shes hot and wants to fuck her but the room is too small for that woe is him, and ughhhh. Im struggling to explain this in a way that doesnt make me sound puritanical, but something about the horniness of their relationship makes it feel really gross to me, its not just the fact that this relationship is horny because I can very much enjoy a horny fictional relationship sometimes, but the horny relationships that I usually enjoy are like, warm and pleasant from the eroticism of it all, Feysand is just kinda gross and sticky to me

Feyre's negative self-talk in regards to her feelings for Rhysand and Tamlin feels so forced, like cmon man, you keep talking about how much Tamlin sucks ass and how much better Rhys is for you how are you still experiencing any kind of inner conflict about this

Also, Feyre talking about how she was constantly thinking about Rhysand even before she left the spring court is just, a lie. does SJM not expect her readers to remember anything

Now theyre spooning and Feyre is stroking his wings and Rhysand is humping her and its like, this isnt sexy to me this is just kinda weird

bro how come Ive never seen anyone talk about Rhysand being like "I love your boobs so much, oh, you dont even know how much I love them" thats so funny

The rest of this chapter was just Rhysand fingering Feyre and honestly, it wasnt too bad, with the extreme proximity and him warming her up I can see why some people would find it hot but idk. its still a sjm smut scene and its german which makes it pretty unpleasant for me

[maggot-monger]

lucifer gender symbolism essay part 10: villain gender in supernatural, comparisons

masterpost

i’m saying villains but i really mean villains, antagonists, and monsters.

i already said a lot of what i have to say about this in the mothers vs fathers section, in the women in white section, and in the white women section, but let’s bring it together i guess. 

villains in (especially early) spn have a few main functions. they steal safety and normalcy, rupturing characters’ feelings of safety and stability. they are deceptive and emphasize how no one but family is to be trusted, which in turn increases the insular, suffocating lifestyle the winchesters have. they make the main characters feel unfit to be around others, abnormal, dangerous, evil. they embody inescapable cycles of trauma and abuse, roping other people into their problems. they are predatory, feeding on others (often literally). they steal agency and autonomy through lies, manipulation, and literal body theft. etc.

these are mostly things that spn villains of all genders do. but there are some differences in how male and female villains tend to approach their villainy. so…here is an incomplete survey of that, and how it relates to lucifer. 

(none of these are clear-cut male villains vs female villain things…supernatural, like a lot of media, likes to toy with genderbending to tell us there is something Wrong with someone, so a lot of the villains are Problematically Androgynous or whatever. it’s also “a kind of masculine equivalent of those old-school bodice-ripper novels” and has a fair number of hardass women who complicate feminine gender roles, so while it is strict about gender in some senses, it also often really…isn’t. so. this is all pretty hand-wavey. but anyway i’ll do my best because if i’m going to spend thousands of words talking about lucifer being a feminine-ish villain i might as well also talk about why that’s significant.)

women are more likely to be portrayed explicitly as direct victims (and to be convinced of their own victimhood), whereas men are more likely to be portrayed as having lost someone. constance welch is like this; bloody mary is like this; madison (not a villain, but certainly a monster of the week) is like this; ruby is like this with her self-sacrificial “i remember what it was like to be human” thing; bela is like this; lizzie from ‘family remains’ is like this, etc etc etc — in contrast to, like, gordon (especially before he gets turned into a vampire), and john (i promise i’m not trying to make a statement about him being an antagonist or not; it’s just that a lot of his worst behaviors stem from him having lost mary), and even michael, donnie!raphael, and gabriel (who all lost god, stability, and lucifer). lucifer fits the female villain pattern better than the male villain pattern here, being a character who escalates conflicts because of sleights and attacks done against herself out of a sense of victimization, rather than because of the loss of someone close to her. 

i don’t think there’s much difference in tendency to be overtly cruel or violent, so i’m not going to get into that. i’m also not sure there’s much of a gender difference in being underhandedly cruel/violent? or even in tendency to falsify their identity to get close to someone in a way that is either deliberately or incidentally cruel…like, meg and ruby do that, but so do azazel and michael and demon brady and the siren and both ghouls in jump the shark etc etc. i think this is just a creepy thing, not a gendered thing.

[cw discussion of sexual assault and other sexual misconduct in this paragraph] female villains are somewhat more likely to be openly sensuous and/or sexual, though, maybe — especially with sam and dean. i’m fighting myself a little on this, because there are a lot of male/”male” villains who also get handsy or sultry with protagonists (e.g. azazel, alastair, crowley), but i think often the female characters can get away with being more overtly sexual about it because of heteronormativity, if nothing else. constance in ‘pilot’ states that she plans to force sex on sam to make him unfaithful; ruby has sex with sam under false pretenses; lilith tries to manipulate sam into having sex with her; various women like becky and the lady from ‘red sky at morning’ sexually harass sam…a lot of women and woman-presenting characters on supernatural do a lot of sexual misconduct when it comes to sam, whereas men and man-presenting characters are creepy in a less hands-on on-screen way with him. lucifer does this role both ways: as jess, she lies in bed with sam, touches him, and lets him touch her sensually while deceiving him about her identity — then, as nick in that same scene, lucifer takes his hands off sam’s bare skin and touches him much less, but remains on the bed with him until sam gets up. for the rest of season 5, lucifer is (overly) familiar with sam, but doesn’t touch him or attempt to do anything sexual with him. so, lucifer’s behavior as an antagonist reflects the gendered appearance of the body the character is wearing. 

female villains/antagonists/monsters also insinuate themselves into the protagonists’ lives differently to their male counterparts, often. a lot of male villains place themselves in sam and/or dean’s lives in a familial context, as a warped father or brother figure. female villains don’t do that as much; they’re more likely to try to relate to sam and/or dean as romantic/sexual partners. honestly i’d love to write more about this as a standalone concept but that will have to wait; i’ll leave this at michael and lucifer playing this out in a male and female way respectively, with michael appearing to dean as john and lucifer appearing to sam as jess. more on that here.

probably there are other examples, but i keep thinking of too many exceptions so i’m going to just leave it here. anyway, of the villain gender differences i can get any kind of real handle on, lucifer either fits better into the feminine pattern, or fluctuates between the feminine and masculine patterns.

part 9: sexual connotations of “vessels,” stabbing, and holes part 11: villain gender in supernatural, effects masterpost

[brett-is-afraid]

what's your experience with rpf to create trauma??

So, the tldr of it is that I had people write rpf of me (and the trauma I experienced as a child) when I was a minor (less than 16) and send it directly to me. They harassed me with it and would create new accounts to do so.

I'll explain everything more under the cut.

Massive trigger warning for sexual abuse of a child, harassment, stalking, incest, rape, suicide baiting, mentions of abortions, transphobia/misgendering, and generally people just being fucking awful??

I'll section off the part that's extremely graphic (this is the part where I get into the details of what was actually said/done explicitly) so you can avoid it. It has bold red letters telling you when it starts and finishes.

But like, this is not light. Please don't read further if you're bothered by this kind of stuff. But do keep in mind that I've healed a lot from this experience now.

So, I have a lot of trauma from my childhood. Both sexually and just generally.

I've never really gone into details about it online because frankly I just don't want to.

But when I was about 14, I was having a really difficult time with school and my real life. So, I decided to make a Tumblr account to connect with other people. (Worst idea ever, tbh. don't have a tumblr when you're 14 lol /hj)

I'd shared some of what had happened to me in anti circles because I used to be an anti. I was never telling anybody to kill themselves or anything like that, but I made TONS of posts talking about how toxic a certain ship was and anyone who defended it was weird and creepy.

I was generally very accepted within the anti circles and I got a lot of support for my sexual abuse.

However. At the age of about 15, I switched sides. I'd always liked ships that were also problematic, so I found it easy to kind of realize that "hey what I'm doing is shitty."

And that's when the issues started.

I was 15 years old with unfiltered access to the internet. And like a lot of 15 year olds, I did a lot of stupid shit.

But mainly, I was just very vocally pro ship. I'd reblog antis posts and tell them off. I'd make tons of posts of my own. I was just generally very open and very vocal. I was very, very argumentative. Like most teenagers with trauma online are.

I would often clap back at antis who compared fiction to csa and go "well I'm a victim of csa and I'm using it to cope" and "don't compare fictional content to actual sexual abuse."

And this is where stuff kinda got bad.

A bunch of antis, some of them being people I used to be friends with, started making callout posts about me.

And in these posts, they pointed out I had experienced sexual abuse as a child. And some details got leaked. Nothing major, just the ages I was when that kind of stuff started happening, but it was still part of my trauma that got shared without my consent.

And this is when stuff really started to get bad.

At some point when I was 15, I pissed off an adult so badly that they began harassing and stalking my account. They'd send me tons of hate messages and anons. They'd make new accounts to send me more if I blocked them.

Some of these things would be "stories" they wrote about me being abused and would then send directly to me.

People, for lack of a better word, wrote rpf of my real life trauma when I was 15 years old and sent it to me. They'd write paragraphs of "stories" where I was experiencing sexual trauma, sometimes where I was enjoying what was happening to me. And they'd ask if they got it right or if I enjoyed what they wrote. A lot of times they'd say "well she must like what I wrote cause she likes to write that kinda shit."

At the time, I didn't write or engage with rpf. I was a pro shipper in regular fictional fandoms, so this wasn't even an argument.

I dealt with a loooot of transphobia back then.

Extremely graphic part coming up

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In these messages, they'd tell me to kill myself a lot. And would detail how they thought I should do it. They'd send me gore and self-harm pics. To the point where I wouldn't even look at my messages anymore.

They also told me that I deserved my sexual abuse and they'd speculate on what had actually happened. They'd speculate on who had sexually abused me and what exactly they did.

Their favorite was writing short stories (a few paragraphs in length usually) where they'd go into detail about various male figures in my life abusing me in graphic detail. And enjoying it.

They'd send me messages where they'd discuss that I "probably liked" the abuse and that's why I was pro ship.

One thing I remember stuck out in particular to me was a time when I received a message where they told me they hoped I got raped so much that I needed to keep getting abortions and it "ruined my body."

After that, I received plenty of messages where they said that I probably already had. And that they hoped it kept happening to me.

I also remember that I was told a lot, "you seem like one of those kids whose dad's used their cock as a pacifier." Like, messages like this happened A LOT. I don't know what it is that made people cling to that sentiment, but they loved it. They'd switch out 'dad' for various other male figures and would change up the statement a little. But they were in the same vein.

Like I said before, a lot of people would just speculate on the details of what happened to me too and treat it like it was some funny game.

And keep in mind, a lot of different people made posts about/towards me. This wasn't just an isolated incident.

Not all of them were as severe, but I got tagged in posts telling me to kill myself, tagged in self-harm/gore a lot.

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Extremely graphic part over

It came to a point when a person made a tumblr account where they....I guess impersonated me? It was like a mix between impersonation and parody.

They used my username at the time, just changing one word out to make it more graphic. (So, if my username was something like foxlikebox, they changed it to foxlikecocks. This was not it, this is just an example.)

And they did their bio to make it seem like they were me. And they'd post all kinds of horrible stuff "as me." (Reminder, I was like 15 years old at the time.)

They'd also screenshot ALL of my posts that they could and they'd crop/edit them to be something bad. They'd constantly reblog my posts and do this kind of thing too. But most the time, it was them screenshotting it to make it seem like I'd said something bad.

I don't remember exactly how it stopped, but one day, it did. I've since deleted that account and any traces of it. And I hope I never have to deal with that again.

Having been through that, it always feels a little ridiculous when people hit me with "well what if people were writing smut about you" because people WERE. People were writing absolutely vile stuff about me. When I was 15 years old. And I still support rpf to this day because I think it's fine as long as you're not sending that type of content to the person. (And obviously not genuinely wishing them harm, ofc.)

[lilithdahobbit]

Two Lives Final Part (P21+22)

part 1  part 2  part 3  part 4  part 5  part 6  part 7  part 8  part 9  part 10  part 11  part 12  part 13  part 14  part 15  part 16  part 17  part 18  part 19  part 20  part 21/22(you’re here!)

CW: Torture, injury, blood, gore, knives, idk even know what else to include The first chapter here is in short, a torture chapter. I try to keep it to a minimum so it isn't drawn out and considered "torture porn" but well...it might come close. Enjoy? You could *hypothetically* skip the first chapter in this post but you'd miss out on some character stuff and any explanation on how they get out, if you really want to skip it though for whatever reason, I don't blame you. You can even just skip to the last few paragraphs. It's at least a short chapter! 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You wince as you are forced to listen to Adrian yell out in pain as the man does whatever he pleases. He knew how to torture you, you'll give him that. He hadn't even laid a hand on you yet but you were already ready to answer any question he threw at you. But he didn't. He never said anything that could even be construed as a question. He isn't doing this for information that he already has. He just wants to see those he had come to despise suffer.

Every pained sound you hear from Adrian pierces you deeply. You had been stabbed, shot, and shocked yet this is the worst pain you had experienced. You thought you understood the ten on the pain scale, thinking you had felt it merely hours ago. You were wrong. That bullet, that needle, that epinephrine were nothing compared to the anguish in your heart. You couldn't even do anything about it, the one thing you were there for and you had failed at that.

You know he had shocked him, stabbed him with the prod as he had done to you. As for everything else, you only have an inkling. That is the worst part, not knowing what is causing the devastating cries. Cries for help. Cries for it to stop. Desperate cries, wounded cries, the tortured sounds of the man you love. You almost wish he would get it over with, kill him, or better yet kill you. But you know that he would do no such thing, he wants to see you both cower, scream, and writhe under his wrath. You squeeze your eyes shut, as if that would make the sounds cease, pushing a tear from them, the first of many as you are forced to sit there, time no longer a concept you ascribed to.

"STOP!" You finally plead. You feel hot tears mix with the bloody snot on your face as the man stops and takes a few steps to look at you. Begging was not something you did often, nor did you think it would even work, but you realize the man was waiting for you to do so as you look up at him, eyes burning. You could've asked at any time, and he would've obliged. That was worse to you than not having any control.

"Would you?" He lifts a pair of bloodied shears as if to offer it to you. Your breath shakes as you try to take solace in the fact that Adrian was now only gasping and groaning. You refuse to answer the man's implied proposition and you watch him approach the table, hearing metal hit wood as he sets the shears down, clearly looking for some other way to hurt you. The sounds of him muttering to himself as he tries to pick something out like someone in the fruit section are quiet enough for you to not discern words, but loud enough for you to know what he was talking about. You can almost picture him lifting each prop like a melon, testing to see if it was just ripe enough for its intended use. Hearing the scraping sound of a tool being dragged to the edge of the wood, you know he had made a decision.

Each step he takes toward you only solidifies your fate more than the last. Your stomach churns from trepidation. He grabs your face, squeezing your cheeks as to make your lips pucker, before shoving pliers into your mouth. The taste of metal was sickening, your mouth itself tasting like it could rust. Before you're even able to try and get your tongue away from the foreign object, get it away from the taste, it clamps around a molar and your eyes widen. You try to squirm away as he twists and tries to wrench the tooth from your jaw. He places a hand on your dampened forehead and forces your head back, craning your neck to get a better angle. A whimper involuntarily escapes your throat as he does so and you swear you see a smile before he yanks one final time, snapping the roots and nerve that held the tooth in place. Your mouth and in turn throat immediately fill with blood, choking you as it had so many of your victims. You sputter for a moment before the man allows your head to move forward, and you spit the blood out onto the floor. Your jaw throbs and your tongue instinctively tries to fill the empty hole. While you try to recover, you hear the sound of a tooth bouncing off the floor. He takes no time between this, and plunging it to the back of your mouth again, bumping around in search of another tooth. Another molar. Unfortunately this time, the tooth does not evict your gums as smoothly as the previous. The man grips the pliers hard so as to not slip while your body whimpers without your permission. He tries to yank as he did before, but instead, the pliers close hard, shattering the tooth that so desperately wanted to not leave its home. He pulls away at the sound of it, and you let out an agonizing moan as you try to spit out the chunks like watermelon seeds. They clink against the tiled ground as the nerve throbs in your jaw, exposed to air it planned on never touching.

The man drops the pliers to the ground like a child bored with a plaything. Your saliva drips from your chin, crimson in color as it mixes with your blood. You try to focus on breathing after nearly drowning in your own blood and teeth pieces, paying no heed to the man as he grabs the simplest of the objects on the table. A thin, long stick with a tinge of green in it.

You look up right as he brings his arm back to swing. The searing pain as he whips you across the face is felt through to the bone, almost distracting you from every other hurt. You swear he was cutting through every layer of skin with each strike, pulling a yelp from you every time. The stick lashes your nose, aggravating it more, making you cringe and press your eyes shut. Seeing this, he grabs your nose, and you hear it crunch as the broken cartilage rustles around beneath the skin. Breathing through your teeth he pulls away, frustrated you aren't vocal enough. You could tell he was trying to take it slow, work up to the worst, hence why Adrian went through more than you. But he seemed impatient. You try again in vain to move your wrists out of their bonds. Your skin is raw at this point from your attempts. The man grabs your arm unexpectedly, before untying your bonds. Your mind frenzies, trying to determine why he released your arm before a loud pop is felt in your shoulder.

You don't feel it at first but as soon as he moves your arm around, twisting it to see if he had succeeded, you undeniably feel the pain of dislocation. With every movement he forces, there is an electric pain that makes you wish he just broke it. Once you show signs of severe discomfort he looks down your wrist and sees the wound you had inflicted yourself from the fibrous rope. He pulls your arm with him as he walks back to the table, making you shout in agony. He holds on to your wrist, forcing your shoulder to drift further from its proper place. Eventually, he finds what he is looking for. Salt. You try to protest, beg him to stop for a moment, to let go of your arm, anything. He doesn't relent, grinning as he pours the salt on the friction burn. You squirm, your body trying to get away from the torture inflicted upon it, only making your shoulder hurt more. Finally, you scream, satiating the man's desire. You shake as the salt burns and bores its way through your flesh, crying out much like Adrian. Without thinking, you manage to free yourself from your grip and slap him, your arm swinging to painfully hang by your side after. He looks at you, holding his cheek before grabbing the cattle prod once again.

You don't remember him tying you back up, just the electricity shooting through every vein, every nerve, ensuring you couldn't fight back if you wanted. Tensed muscles force you to stay in one position while he shoves it into various places, just to see what hurt more. Your stomach, your thigh, your neck, finally he hits your chest, unknowingly hitting your bullet wound. You don't hear the sound that you let out as the shock rips through you. Writhing you try to stay conscious as your body tries to simply give up and succumb. He could've held it there for hours, days, or just minutes. You would never know, as it seemed to go on forever yet while feeling as though it only just started.

He allows you a moment of rest, pulling away as you collapse into yourself, slouching and dripping blood from your mouth onto your legs. Twitching, the electrical currents still gnawing at what little sensation you have left that isn't pure agony. As soon as your breathing returns to as close as normalcy as you can get, he proceeds, knife in hand. He lifts up your shirt just enough to expose your abdomen to the air and slices the knife across. He made sure to not get deep enough to nick an organ and kill you, but enough for the skin to open to a near-mouth shape. You'd be grateful he didn't cut through to allow your guts to spill out but you are a little busy trying to breathe. Your lungs have no trouble filling with air, or at least no more trouble than earlier, it was the getting it out that was the problem. It is like screaming in a dream, screaming with no sound, no air, nothing to even show for the effort and pain put into the wail. Finally, you are able to get out choked cries, gasping, as blood starts spilling.

You hear him grab the box of salt he had used on you previously, realizing he had set it next to you when he arrived with the knife. You try to yell out, but he begins before a word leaves your lips. He haphazardly throws the grains at the wound, unable to just pour it on, before rubbing it in with his hands. The feeling of it dissolving into your flesh is bad enough, searing into it more with each second it stayed on. But the sensation of this man's fingers massaging the small rocks into the injury is far worse. You can feel him stroke over every exposed part, violating your insides lightly with nothing more than his hand. Every nerve tingles, twitches, and screams right along with you. Eventually, it subsides, as the salt begins to lessen with each addition, having burned away anything it could hurt more. The man steps away, off to look for another tool. Leaving you to slouch over, both in an attempt to close your dripping gash and from exhaustion. You wish he would just pick up something lethal, or slip up and kill you instead of torturing you further. He knows what he is doing, unfortunately, allowing you and Adrian to live out every little piece of abuse that he desired until he decided to let you die. You wouldn't be surprised if he patched you up after all this, just to see you survive another day of horrors. You know Adrian was openly protesting what was being done to you, hoping the man would listen to him as he had to you, but he didn't. Your mind chose to block him out, unable to take mental turmoil along with the physical. Watching the ground, you wonder where Chris was, if he was even still alive, if he could save Adrian now that you couldn't. You are arguably in the worst, most painful situation of your life and yet you couldn't think of your own wellbeing, only theirs. The ground offers you no comfort or answers though as you begin to see droplets of red hit it.

And then, you feel it, a tinge of static from the invention stuck to your neck. Perhaps it had a short battery life, was sensitive to electricity, or simply failed due to it being only a prototype. At least you hope that's what it was, and not just your imagination. Waiting to prove your theory, you continue to stare at the ground as his shoes enter your view.

He says something, you know that. What it was you couldn't care less about. You place all your focus on your ankle, paying no heed to the serated knife he held until he stuck it into your thigh. You shriek, your leg going through your restraint as you do so. Biting your cheek, you kick him in the shin and then the groin. He falls to his knees, allowing you to hit him across the face, completing his journey to laying on the ground. You lean forward, one ankle still tied, falling with your chair on top of his torso, your free knee forcing his throat into the tile beneath him. You ignore everything in your medic mind telling you not to, grab hold of the knife, and tug. You yell out in anger, agony, and revenge as you pull the blade from your leg, blood arching as you stab it into the man's horrifyingly confused face over and over.

Your chest heaves as you look down at the mutilated head of what once abused you. Your adrenaline had blocked out the pain in your shoulder, stomach, and everything else, but the dull throbbing quickly returned along with your sense. You immediately place your now untethered hands onto your leg. But you can't deny the weakness behind them, your lack of strength as the blood flows almost as freely as it had without them. You groan deeply, forcing your body up and the chair to the side. Making your way to Adrian, you hear shouting from the hall outside. You ignore it, focused on your one directive, the one thing keeping you conscious.

You get on your knees and release him from his bonds, and you watch him slowly move to hold his wrists, wincing out loud as he does. You try to stand, but your legs stay bent, your body swaying. You recognize the same darkness creeping in that you witnessed the last time you were here. The door agonizingly creaks one last time and you hear Chris's voice behind you. Adrian turns around to look back at you both as you allow your eyes to shut, the smallest bit of a smile on your lips as your head hits the hard, wet ground.

He's safe now.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The waking up process was slow at first. The rhythmic beeping. The buzzing of a light. Chatting from a hallway. The feeling of a needle in your arm, and bandages on your body. The realization of your location jolts you awake, almost throwing you out of your bed.

You were back in the hospital. Did you ever leave? Was that all a demented dream and Vigilante was still with the enemy? You reach beneath the thin blanket to feel gauze pressed to your thigh wound. Your wound. He stabbed you. You bring your hand to your nose, feeling that it is still swollen and you wince at the tenderness of the area. Moving your hand to your abdomen you can feel the large bandage wrapped around you to cover what you assume are stitches to keep you from reopening.

You can vaguely feel the pain medication course through your veins as you try to piece together all that happened. Staring at the cold wall in front of your bed your mind frantically replays everything you went through. The building, the kills, the rooms, the room, the table, the chairs, Vig...

"Adrian." You correct yourself out loud. Although saying it certainly does help in the realization of it all. "Adrian..." Your brows furrow as you repeat yourself.

Groaning you swing your legs over the side, bare feet touching the floor, sending chills through them. No matter how many times you spend in a hospital setting, you never get used to the temperature. You roll your head to stretch your neck, going through past events all over again. Every moment you shared with Adrian, you shared it with Vigilante. And every moment with Vigilante...

I am such an idiot.

All the times you viewed them as separate men, separate personalities, living two separate lives seemed stupid now. Of course he was Adrian. Who else had that goofy grin that lit up so many long nights at both Fennel Fields and the streets of Evergreen?

Who else made you laugh when they weren't even trying to? Who else would let you patch them up after a fight? Who else could you have fallen for? It all makes more sense, like you were forever missing the middle piece to a puzzle but never noticed until now. You can finally push it in, completing it. Every time he talked about his friends, about his partner, about you. When he tried to kiss you that night, it wasn't because he believed you were someone else, it was because you were exactly who he knew you were.

"Oh my god." The smile that you hadn't noticed forming on your face drops as you realize something more.

Chris knew. I told him. Vigilante told him. That fucker knew. That's what that damn expression was about.

Your brow furrows as your mind brings up another concern, making you finally jump out of bed, much to the dismay of your unprepared body.

Did they even make it out?

You search the room for your phone, hoping this was another situation where Chris was waiting outside. Luckily you find it hiding in plain sight, lit up with a notification telling you that he was once again waiting outside.

What about Adrian? How long have you been out? How badly injured was he? Where was he?

You express your worries to Chris, texting him to ask where Vigilante was. You pull out your IV while you await his reply, hoping they injected anything they needed to already. He relays his info, 'He's fine.' The statement didn't exactly satiate every question floating in your head, but you knew that was probably the best you'll get. As you bring yourself to the open doorway, you find yourself not wanting to walk through this hospital with only a gown again. Thankfully though, this "escape" is far less eventful. The only person who even notices you being a poor underpaid housekeeper who was clearly conflicted on whether or not they should tell someone a patient was walking out the door unattended, still wearing hospital property. Lucky for you, they don't, but the look on their face screams that they will regret that while eating dinner tonight.

You get into Chris's car, after startling him with a tap on the window. You laugh quietly at his surprised expression while getting comfortable in the seat. You note a few scrapes and cuts marking his face and arms, indicating that he didn't get through it all unscathed either. As he begins driving, words seem to tumble out of your mouth.

"I saw Vigilante's face."

"Well, nothing new there then."

"You know you could've told me who he was." You commented, making him loudly scoff.

"Really? And betray your guys' trust? And deal with your denial of it?"

"I wouldn't have denied it, Chris." You insist.

"I know damn well that if you saw him without his mask sooner, you would've said something like 'Oh wow, he looks an awful lot like my boyfriend that's a crazy coincidence.'"

"I would not."

"Would too."

"Would not."

"Would too."

"Would. Not."

"Tell me what happened whenever any evidence pointed to Vigilante being him then."

Adamant on proving him wrong, you continue arguing, "What evidence?"

"Oh gee I don't know maybe a corn maze?"

You can deny it no longer, he was right. You were a well and true idiot the whole time. Blind to the core. "Shut up."

"You owe me one. I had to sit through you two being the biggest dumbasses known to man for months."

"Okay but can you seriously blame me for not immediately thinking Vigilante would be a busboy in his spare time?"

"You're a host?! At the same place!?"

"Yeah, fair enough." You finally surrender.

"I did drop hints though. You can't say I didn't try."

You roll your eyes, just wanting to drop the subject and forget your ineptitude. "He's back at his place isn't he?"

"Why? Do you want to go there? He still won't let me park within two blocks but I'm sure you can direct me to the exact place."

You twist your mouth, desperate to make a decision. You could. You could knock on his door, see him again, see him out of that dreadful place, see him in a brand new light. But the memory of breaking his heart, of yelling at him at "target practice" sticks in your brain. It stops you like a fence. You could jump it, and risk making things worse, or you could respect its use as a fence and just stay out. You didn't want to just go back to your place, to just avoid him until it was impossible not to, but you have no idea if he wants to lay eyes on the very person who caused him so much emotional turmoil only weeks ago. Could you seriously risk looking into those eyes again and see nothing but sadness and animosity toward you? Could you seriously risk never looking into those eyes again?

_______________________________________________________

You lay your head back, neck bent over the back of your couch as a bag of frozen peas sits on your nose. The thawing frost coating the outside of the plastic pouch drips onto the fabric covering the cushion next to your ear. The rhythmic dripping becomes the soundtrack to your thoughts as they continue to relentlessly plague you. The what-ifs, the would haves, could haves, should haves. You almost don't hear the light knocking at your door as it almost blends into the sound of water hitting your couch. You sit up, bag falling into your lap, and wait for another knock to ensure it was actually coming from your door. The unknown visitor bangs gently on the door once more, with the incredibly familiar 'Shave and a Haircut'. You throw the bag down on the empty side of the couch, not even trying to think about who was at the door. You were still a little too focused on the pain of your swollen and healing wounds.

Opening the door, you take a moment to fidget with your nose to check its status before looking at the caller. Turning your head, thumb still on the side of your nose, you look back into the gazing eyes of your associate, your friend, your Adrian. He matches you with a scratched and bruised face, purple nose and lips, and various types of bandages littering his face. You spot a bit of gauze on the top of his left ear, his right arm in a sling, and bits of gauze stuck to the tips of random fingers. Despite all that though, he is as beautiful as the day you met him, even though that day could easily be debated as not being your first meeting.

"You look like shit." You bluntly remark.

"Says the person with a hole in their lung."

"Says the person with a broken arm." You teasingly retort.

"Broken collar bone actually. Turns out it doesn't take much to break it."

"Lucky for you, it doesn't take much to heal either."

"Can I please come in? I know you're all for the sarcasm and jokes whenever I'm actually trying to talk to you, but I'd really rather do this inside."

"Sorry." You breathe out, moving out of the way, allowing him inside like he wanted. He looks down at the bag of peas and the steadily growing puddles beneath it before looking back up at you in confusion. "To take down the swelling." You answer, pointing to your nose to drive the point home.

"Do you have a towel?" He holds it now with a few fingers as it drips more.

"Of course I have a towel you nimrod." You walk over and yank the dishtowel hanging from your fridge handle before setting it on the wet spot slowly being absorbed into the cotton filling of your couch. Adrian tosses the bag onto the table and sits on the towel, despite your protests. You insist you can sit there, but he is adamant about you sitting on the dry side so the two of you can start the conversation he was clearly there to initiate.

As soon as you feel yourself sink into the cushion slightly, Adrian questions you. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I could ask the same of you, you know."

He sighs, "I wanted to protect you."

"That's the generic answer." You pry, genuinely curious about his actual reasoning.

"But it's my answer." You raise your brows, signaling to him that you don't believe him, making him turn away to look at the peas on the table. "I don't know. I guess I just am so used to keeping it a secret I never thought to even tell you. I had one moment of weakness where I almost confessed but you stopped me. But you? Peacemaker knew your identity. And since the ferrets found out your identity so easily, it's not a reach to think he's not the first. You're different. So why didn't you tell me?"

"Protection?" You meekly reply, knowing that he won't take that as an answer.

"You literally just told me I couldn't use that as an answer."

"Not protection of you, Adrian." You look down at the ground before looking back at him, staring at his side profile like you had so many times before. The silhouette was different solely because of the state of his nose, but it was definitely the face you had studied every day since you met him. "It was protection for me." You force the words out, still finding it hard to accept your true reasoning behind it all.

He turns his head to meet your upset gaze, you see him almost reach for you to comfort you, but he stops himself. You know why, but you can't help but feel hurt by that small action. "For you?"

"You were the best thing to ever happen to me, Adrian. I didn't want to lose that. I was selfish and thought that if you knew me, the whole of me, you'd leave. I couldn't let that happen. I would have rather broken your heart and sent you away than taint the memory of our relationship by telling you who I was. Who I am."

"So that's what you did."

"So that's what I did..." You lightly nod as you repeat what he said, confirming them for him. The room rapidly fills with silence as the two of you process the words exchanged and what they really meant. You never came to terms with your reasons until now, always shoving it to the side whenever it wormed it's way into your mind.

"Why would you think it would ruin the memory?" Adrian finally speaks, genuine puzzlement in his tone.

You begin to chuckle, "To be honest I thought you wouldn't be okay with the killing."

His lips begin curling upward, "Are you serious?"

You nod rapidly, laughter growing, "Yeah." He breathes out a few chuckles before bursting into boisterous laughter with you.

Once you both calm back down, which does take a while, Adrian continues his interrogation. "So who was this 'someone else' you were in love with? Or was that a trick to try and make the break up easier?"

"You're gonna think it's stupid."

"As stupid as the other reason?"

You close your eyes inn anticipation of further embarrassment, "It's you."

"That makes zero sense."

"You as in...not you but still you." You try to explain, but as soon as you see his expression you can tell you failed. "Vigilante."

"Yes?"

"No you nimrod, I'm in love with Vigilante."

Adrian seems to be doing an invisible math problem in the air, attempting to make sense of your statement. "But I'm Vigilante. You know that right?"

"Yeah I know that now. But try telling that to me a few weeks ago when I was having a crisis over being in love with what I thought were two different men."

"You were in love with Vi-me?"

You breathe in deeply, "When I thought I was gonna die back there-"

"Which time?"

"Every time."

"Okay, just had to clarify."

You sigh, you are annoyed, but you expected you'd never be annoyed by him again. So annoyed was good, you welcomed annoyed. "I thought of a lot of stuff. My regrets, the things most important to me, the people I loved and cared about. You were in every single one. I'm terrible at recognizing my own feelings, I'll admit, but my dying mind isn't. I was in love with Vigilante and Adrian Chase. I was in love with you in more ways than I even knew." You watch him gaze into your eyes, making certain you were telling the truth. "Am in love. Present tense." You correct yourself.

He takes a good long while before speaking again, making you fear what he said next. "Would this be a bad time to kiss you?"

"What?" Your heart skips several beats as you are visibly surprised by his response.

"It just seems like a good moment but at the same time you were just talking about dying so-"

"Yes." You blurt out, not taking your eyes off him. His familiar grin begins to form right before you both lean into the other, sparks flying the moment your lips collide. You simultaneously wince at the discomfort of your broken noses being pressed into the other face, but you continue nonetheless. There is no hunger, no lust in the kiss. Only the comfort, the bliss of each other's warmth. You can smell the subtle aroma of triple antibiotic and the material of the bandages on him. All mixing with the lingering smell of his body wash. The fresh citrusy and floral fragrance of it. His lips are chapped and still slightly swollen, and you are as gentle as possible, hoping to not cause more pain. He brings his free hand up to your cheek, the gauze on his middle finger and pinky rough against your beaten cheeks while your hand is held by the one trapped in a sling. Your other hand resting on the back of his neck, a few strands of hair tickling your skin.

You mutually separate, hands still in their same position. "I thought of you too." Adrian whispers.

"I really hope you aren't trying to make me happy as possible to prepare me for the news that Miss Peacemaker starved to death or something." You remark, jokingly.

His brow furrows, "How could a cat starve after a few days with a full automatic feeder?"

"Good to hear she made it through this whole thing too." You couldn't wipe the smile off your face if you wanted to. You finally allow yourself to say the words you had denied for months, in fear of it going wrong. At this point, you didn't care if it went wrong, only that you said them. "I love you...newbie."

His grin returns and your stomach does backflips. You could get lost in the forest of his eyes if you weren't careful. But you didn't mind. To get lost in his gaze would be a pleasure of the highest kind. "I love you...oldie."

The End

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here we are at the end! Unless I have a random urge to write an epilogue because someone comments a good idea or a good question...

Hope you enjoyed reading this long ass story as much as I enjoyed writing it! It was actually supposed to be a short story but well...now it’s longer than the first Percy Jackson book. Maybe I'll print it all and put it on my bookshelf next to hits such as 'Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?' and 'Les Miserables' Laters gators!

taglist: @giovannanerc0lini​ @letskeepthislo-ki​ @trolllbogies​ @angels17324​ @beciiamsherlocked55​ @strawberriesandknives​ @reidsstuff​ @lovearne​

[hollyhomburg]

Before I Leave You (Part 1) (sneak peak)

(Omegaverse au, Mafia au, Bts x Reader)

Summary: Yoongi Disappears- leaving behind a shattered pack. 8 months later, Jimin finds Yoongi in an H-mart of all places.

Pairing: Beta! Yoongi, Omega! Reader, Omega! Jungkook, Omega! Seokjin, Alpha! Namjoon, Alpha! Hoseok, Alpha! Taehyung, Alpha! Jimin,

Tags: Angst, hurt/comfort, low-self esteem, abandonment, anxiety, brief implied suicidal thoughts (Tae), you can see it below in the teaser,

W/c: 7.0k

A/n: Here we go! I decided to move up posting this because of Bangbangcon, i didn’t want to post while it was going on which is when this was originally scheduled for. we’ve got some more angst but the good news is you finally get a peak at the m/c at the end! 

Prologue 

——————

Part 1: Sweet Regret

Taehyung puts his longing for Yoongi into words.

It’s been years since he wrote so much, since college when he finally got tired of the pessimist attitudes of his professors (according to them his works were always a little too grammatically incorrect and fanciful, a cross-section between poetry and prose). His creativity was too intimate and vulnerable to survive an appraising eye for long. He decided to protect that soft side of him that had something to say and save it only for Jimin.

The pieces of his sensitive heart hidden in longhand love letters that they’d send back and forth before Jimin had finally signed with an protection agency and moved to the city from the rural town they both grew up in.

Now he writes those longhand love letters for Yoongi- shoves them in-betweens pages of books so that he doesn’t have to think about them. compartmentalizing his hurt into sentences and paragraphs. No one loves me quite like you did he writes, red ink that might as well be his blood for how much it hurts to pen the words that Yoongi might never read. 

And yet, that pain is still a papercut compared to how much Taehyung hurts without Yoongi by his side.

These letters aren’t like the ones he wrote for Jimin all those years ago. No- those are saved and shared between the two of them when Jimin snaps at him and they fight (this happens more after the stress of Yoongi leaving and a very bad rut season- a perfect storm for their worst fight in years). They only open the shoebox that holds the love letters when he and Jimin need a reminder that the foundation of their love isn’t something that can be damaged by petty words.

but Jimin had never abandoned him the way that yoongi has; not when he wanted to go to an expensive school in the city away from their mountainside town. Leaving Jimin to work at the same martial arts studio as always. Not when they were so poor that they could only see each other once a month if they were lucky. only when jimin saved up enough money to take the train into the city. 

In one of the first love letters Taehyung ever wrote, it goes; ‘I wish I could meet you at the train station, my love, I crave the easy look you give me the first time you see me in months, where I am the earth and you the moon. And it feels dizzying like I am the person who you love most, your tornado and your torrent. under your eyes, I feel like a force of nature. kissing you tastes like colors I don't have words for.’  

Losing Yoongi feels sort of like that- disorienting, and Tae is unable to find a pattern in life without him. Sometimes he goes weeks without writing letters, other times- he writes Yoongi three times in the same day. Stained with as many tears as they are stained with ink.

One night Namjoon finds Tae asleep over some of them, he wakes with a start when the pack alpha skims a hand down tae’s back. waking him up softly to  drag him back to the nest. And Tae knows just from the soft look in Namjoon's eyes that he's read some of the words. Maybe the ink has bled onto Taehyung's cheek where it was pressed to the letter. 

Words like the tattoos on his soul, each of their names written over and over again. There is no more room left on Taehyung's soul, no more room for another name and no room left for another person to make a home out of his  heart- the same way Taehyung had found a home in Yoongi’s. 

(that's a little bit of a lie- Taehyung just hasn’t met you yet). 

Tae's worried about what namjoon might have read, he doesn't know if he could handle Namjoon trying to talk to him about his feelings right now. He hopes that Namjoon didn’t read "You were the knife to my cadaver. I understand that you had to leave, but what I don't understand is why you had to take so much of me with you. if you weren't planning on treasuring me, the least you could have done is leave me whole. Tossed me back into the ocean like a piece of sea glass that needs more polishing."

Or even worse, the lines that aren’t as pretty but just as true, “if I ever see you again, I think I’ll start crying on sight because I don’t think we’ll ever really meet again. Maybe we were just soulmates that met a lifetime too soon. Maybe in the next life, I will hold onto you better. Maybe at the pearly gates, you will be my only sweet regret. If you’re already dead, I’ll wish I was too. I wish I could hate you as much as I love you.”

Because no matter the words- Tae knows he's better off having known Yoongi. however fleeting their love story was. 

But that doesn't mean he's not fucking angry.

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

COMING: Monday April 12th @ 5pm

[digital-dhampirs]

vnc episode 12 thoughts

The thrilling conclusion to the Vanitas no Carte anime’s first cour is out, and I have thoughts! I’m still considering doing a full season/ fill cour review, but I have a Lot of episode 12- specific opinions, so this review / breakdown / thing will focus around e12!

A warning before we begin— review will contain spoilers for events that take place in the vnc manga and not in the anime, and will most likely spoil some sections of the anime’s next cour. With that, let’s get started!

Episode 12 of the VnC anime covers chapters 19, 21, 22, and 23 of the manga.

To begin this review in a brutally honest way, this episode was… in my opinion as a manga reader… bad. It did have some ok moments, but generally devoted a lot of its time to a plotline that (while adorable) isn’t actually super important compared to what was left on the wayside. Vanitas and Noé’s fight over blood drinking is fine, I guess, but why’d we get that minute long flashback compilation and not Dante’s conversation with Dominique, or Roland and Olivier’s complete conversation, or Astolfo’s excitement to hunt vampires, or Mikhail?

I really truly wish the show had taken some of the money and time that went into the Vanitas and Noé fight from chapter 23 and put it into the arguably much more important and interesting parts of this episode. Ruthven drinking Noé’s blood, Roland’s threat, and Chloé and Astolfo’s introductions all had some very janky stills and animations. It truly irked me to see that time and effort went into making Noé’s mouth move while he’s mentally monologuing about wanting to drink Vanitas’s blood, while Roland’s fantastic threat from Chapter 22 got… this. click on image for worse quality

The episode also decided to continue E11’s habit of chopping scenes up and mashing them together. In E11 this was a very not great decision, but was ultimately somewhat forgiveable from a tone point of view. In E12, meanwhile, it’s just all out chaos as the anime tries to string five completely separate scenes into something coherent (Noé and Vanitas in the hotel, Ruthven and Jeanne in the street, Domi and Dante on the stairs, Roland and Olivier in the chasseur compound, and a flashback to complete the Ruthven and Noé encounter from E11). Suffice it to say the anime does not succeed in this endeavor.

What really irritates me about this is that the manga already provided a framework for the anime to work these scenes together into. A frantic Vanitas reunites with Noé, Ruthven meets Jeanne in the street, Roland and Olivier speak about the beast, we see a mysterious flashback of Chloé calling for Jeanne as they talk, cut to Jeanne in the present as Dante and Ruthven’s attendants simultaneously tell Ruthven and Vanitas about the beast’s return.

I really wish the anime could’ve just given us the conclusion to the Ruthven scene at the start of the episode, done the OP, and then followed this series of events to a T. But it didn’t, and the result is a bit of a mess.

The anime’s choice to omit half of Roland and Olivier’s conversation means Dante’s announcement about the beast being back has no meaning or weight; Vanitas running to the hotel before we know what actually happened to Noé at the cafe ruins the drama and irony of the scene; Noé’s lack of memory of what happened at the cafe is muddled by the weirdly placed cafe flashback right afterwards; the anime putting Olivier’s “what that man believes in isn’t god” line seconds before the reveal of Roland’s intelligent and scheming nature doesn’t give the line enough room to breathe and stew; and the transition scene with Domi and Dante just doesn’t fit. I can honestly say I would have preferred Dante just teleporting from the streets of Paris to Vani and Noé’s windowsill than have that scene smack dab in the middle of what’s already a confusing mishmash of way too many unconnected events.

Wow. That was a long, critical paragraph. one might even say it was just as chaotic and disorganized as the episode itself. I feel like I’m really living up to my fullest potential as a bitter manga simp. So! Let’s turn things around and talk about some of the good parts of this episode!!

First and foremost I want to compliment this episode’s music..! The soundtrack of VnC is just all round fantastic no matter what— whether it’s playing during a goofy scene or a fight, it’s is bound to be fantastic. I think my favorite pieces are the ones that play at quiet, ominous moments— the music during Vanitas and Dante’s conversation about the beast is excellent, adding something truly incredible to the atmosphere created by the illustrations of the beast and the eerie green light of the scene. The way the music lines up with Olivier’s “what that man believes in…” line during that one flashback is similarly awesome.

This episode also has very nice voice acting..! Despite all of its struggles in the visual and plot department, pretty much everything to do with the VnC anime’s audio is stellar. I’ve become a big fan of Jeanne, Roland, and Olivier’s voices (I can’t wait to see how Olivier’s VA works with all his screaming in the Gévaudan arc); Astolfo’s voice is perfect for him (I am similarly excited to see his clipped, polite tone take a turn for the insane as the Gévaudan arc moves forwards); and as always our protagonists’ voices are great.

My one singular problem with the voice acting this episode is Chloé. I don’t know why, but she sounds like a catgirl from a fantasy anime rather than a multiple- centuries- old vampire. I don’t know what I was expecting from her voice, but this wasn’t it. I really hope Chloé’s voice will grow on me like Roland’s did, but there’s just something about it that feels off to me.

However! That one detriment doesn’t detract from the fact that this episode does have some very beautiful moments, especially during that one last scene with Chloé at the end. Visually, Chloé is absolutely spot on— I only hope the show has the budget to keep giving her pretty, pretty scenes like this. The scene where Vanitas and Dante discuss the beast is also very very nice to look at. The monochromatic red section of Ruthven and Noé’s scene is excellent. And, while I’m still annoyed that this scene got so much love put into it and others did not, Noé’s spotlight-lit monologue is aesthetically pleasing as well.

With that, we’ve covered all of my main thoughts on the final episode of the vnc anime’s first cour! My feelings towards this episode’s plot and pacing are overwhelmingly critical, and the episode’s visuals are a toss up (leaning on the side of bad, @/ that Roland screenshot), b u t the episode’s music and voice acting are both fantastic. And honestly? That’s kinda how I feel about this whole cour of the anime.

Episode 12 might not have been “good”, but I believe it’s a very neat representation of the best and worst of what Vanitas no Carte as an anime has to offer.

Despite all my critiques I am still legally obligated to love this anime, and can’t wait to see the Gévaudan arc in the next cour!

Fun Fact

The weirdly technological background when Noé realizes he’s hungry makes absolutely no sense for an anime set in 1889, but for some reason that just makes this scene funnier to me

[thekitschdiet]

my take on the literary masterpiece, the chic diet

Firstly, I am no one. It’s part of my charm. My fifteen minutes of fame was years ago, when I had an instagram niche meme page. I didn’t even take any brand deals! And my posts averaged six thousand likes! Anyhow. I am hardly literate and well hydrated and carry a small sephora-CVS-hybrid worth in my mini tote bag. Here is my guide on how to live like me, the intermediate kitsch-rat, aspiring influencer. But like, in an apathetic, somewhat dissonant, ironic way. I like saying I live by dogmatic principles. But a lot of it, um, is just eating disorder rituals. But that’s not really important. You’re as hot as you say you are, and as much an authority on what you write so long as you say it with, you know, conviction. It’s kind of venerable how fucking delusional I am, actually. Giving any sort of advice like I’m anywhere close to the ritzy ideal of the amphetamine-areyouami label-american. New York, ideally. West Village, preferably. But I guess the kind of guide I can write is better suited to someone living in a suburb, in a house with the twelve-paned windows. I always thought those were so chic. SO quaint, in a somewhat luxe way. Like, Connecticut vibes. My parents used to drive me up there as a child to buy books and ice cream. Nowadays I’d opt for a matcha latte with novelty ice cubes, but I guess at the time it was pretty sweet. 

Because I popped a Vyvanse at like, 10pm, this next little bit could go one of two ways. I will write the most articulate, brilliant piece of literature of my life. Magnum opus, if there was a skinnier word for it. Or, I will get wrapped up doing something like folding all my last-season knits (which is part of my look, okay! I don’t have a job!) and fixating on a paragraph on how a girl’s collarbones are almost as identifying as a fingerprint, or a signature. I’m not a graphologist, but if you write your A’s with the little tail on top (like on a computer), you’re probably a snake. Nothing personal, just an observation. Also, I do have a biology final to study for. Not that I’m super anal, or even particularly committed to academia, but even in my precariously manicured (read that as separate terms; I did a good job on my nail polish, okay? But I happen to also be teetering on the brink of an epiphany or a collapse. Hence the use of the word precarious.) state, I know it’s important enough I can let one of my countless side-quests sit idle for a couple more days. 

The first section seems only natural to be about hydration. And the whole idea of drinking things, really. There was a section in The Chic Diet about Adderall dry-mouth, which deeply resonated with me. Once I bit off a chunk of a Nivea Strawberry Shine (my favorite lip balm, more on that later) and swished it around my mouth. Didn’t help. Really, really didn’t. Anyway, I suppose that even if it served no purpose for combatting my prevacatingly ingenious cottonmouth solution, I was able to milk a sentence or two out of the experience. “Do it for the Vine”, all grown up! And wearing bananapapaya resin hoops too. Side note, that Etsy shop is a parasocial enemy of mine. It stems from jealousy, which sucks, but hating from inside a club I’m adjacent to is much healthier than being a hateful individual towards people I would, you know, interact with. Daily. Or something. I stopped going to therapy because I felt stupid about going and I don’t live in the right kind of town to warrant vacuous $300 hours. Bitching about my well-adjusted parents and how desperately I wished my anxiety would just “go away” was plainly gross, and a waste. Like, pretty sure almost every problem I have could be solved by a couple painful conversations taking place during a hurricane. Such a shame it doesn’t rain much here. Anyhow, I digress. 

Staying hydrated. It is essential to my character, my persona, if you will; to never be without either an elegant metal bottle (I’m loyal to the smooth enamelled S’well ones, printed to look like marble or a semi holographic solid) or a little 16oz tumbler with a metal straw. Hydroflasks were some of the worst things to happen to society. I want to preface this claim with the fact that I wanted one in the same way a teenage girl wants a new iPhone so she can keep up appearances with her dermatologist-dad friends who still have the XR, by the way. But I ended up spending the money on like, a minidress at Brandy Melville before it fled my city. Or maybe a Fresh Sugar tinted lipbalm. For the better, even though the dress has a busted zipper now and the lipbalm tube has inevitably gotten dinged and dented by the other contents of my mini-totebag. Unlike a car, though, a couple scuffs on your laptop or your luxury lipbalm tube looks kind of cool. Like, you’re not someone who values the pristine, unused quality of an item that was ambiguously intended to be used versus displayed on Instagram.  Now, I’m wondering why this paragraph about hydration is so fucking impossible to stay on track for. I literally drink several litres of water a day, and more tea on top of that. And sometimes an almond milk latte if I can budget it in. Not that I’m so anorexic I can’t afford a 45cal latte. They’re just not that important to me. Anyhow. Drinking lukewarm (on the cool side) water is better than ice-cold. Partially because I just get it out of the tap of my ensuite and I can’t be bothered to wait for it to run cold enough every time, and it just seems wasteful. Plus, there is something so.. skinny about drinking water at an “obscure” temperature. Trust me, I want to know why my thought process is like this too. My favorite tea is blueberry tea foraged in a side aisle at my local supermarket. I love a good commercial, high-end steep or fruit infusion as much as the next girl. Maybe more. My pantry is filled with tins labelled with things like “emerald jade organic” and “magic potion”, which is really just currants and butterfly pea flowers. But there is a necessary glamor about drinking dirt-cheap tea on the daily. Seriously, a box of 25 sachets is like, $3. At a higher point with my, um, Adderall problem, I spent like several times that on pills. I didn’t really need to include that, and could have linked the price point to the cost of a drugstore lipbalm, but I wrote it in. And I’m married to it, stubbornly, as all amateur writers should be when they wittle in a somewhat indecorous little joke. This tea is sooo good because it has a strong fruit-reminiscent taste (not as sweet as a fresh blueberry, but who wants that anyway?), it’s zero-calorie, it’s the most GORGEOUS color ever. The latte, the third drink in my little trifecta, is nothing special. But necessary. The trick is to use a milk frother to whip up sugar free syrup with instant coffee and a little bit of hot water in a glass. It’ll make the most luscious foam.. Top it off with almond milk. My dad is a coffee purist, owning both an upstairs keurig AND a downstairs one (among other more analogue methods, but I can’t name-drop, so what’s the point?), so he hates this drink. Now, calling oneself a plebian is so unglamorous and teetering on self-deprecating territory, dangerously close to insecurity. But I can use it here because I am at least posh enough to have a different pair of earrings for every outfit I could possibly come up with, and I only wear Patagonia if I am in a situation where I just have to wear fleece. Like I was saying. It’s such a simple drink, certainly not a delicacy, and… I had a joke about the word plebian but I keep getting up to refill my water and I fear I have forgotten about it. 

Next section; the importance of a good tinted balm

In the intro I alluded to how a girl’s collarbones function essentially as an identifier, the way a signature or fingerprint does. This is a lie, or at least an exaggeration. But one’s ultimate tinted lipbalm is  actually extremely indicative about who you are, as a person, as a member of society, even… 

If you are loyal to Dior Lipglow, I have a couple questions. One; did you shoplift one tube, once, and refill it with cheaper stuff afterwards? I did that. I consider it one of my better-kept secrets, but now you know. Might as well explain the catalyst for my parent’s first separation now, and the horrifying experience that was meeting my dad’s Manhattan sugar baby (?) at the age of thirteen, wearing an overalls dress from, like, Topshop or something else equally embarrassing. .. Kidding. I digress. It’s such a fancy lipbalm, and good too! It smells like thin mints! But I could just never justify cell phone monthly installation payment money on something I will inevitably talk off. I do own three, but two I stole (before I lost the nerve, somewhat unfortunately) and one, a boy(not)friend bought for me. This is not something I feel any remorse about, because his house was easily four thousand square feet and his sisters had a dedicated all-glass room for their shared peloton. Oil money. Ugh!

My personal favorite lip balm, and I have tried a frightening amount, has got to be the Nivea Fruit Shine collection. The frosted one is shit-ugly. Hideous. But the strawberry one is the love of my life. It’s such a pleasant red, looking healthy and rejuvenated and really completes any look. Only downside is it will always, hopefully not always, remind me of Charles. Kissing Charles, specifically. And him asking me what lipbalm it was, because he knew I was somewhat frivolous and definitive and would have a very long answer. But for whatever reason, I simply stated it was from “out of town”. Not really sure why I said that, but it plagues me (minorly) to this day. Of all the things to make up.. .. The peach one is a perfectly demure spring classic shade. Cherry exists too, but the only tube I have ever had the fortune of owning was purchased in Costa Rica and lost somewhere on the way home. Honestly tragic, it was the juiciest shade. Blackberry is perfect too, but I have to layer it with either peach or untinted lipbalm to avoid what I imagine TooPoor would choose if she believed in tinted lipbalm. I don’t mean this hatefully, I think she’s a queen, but super dark, smudgy makeup suits the eyes better in my opinion. Or something. Or something.

Afraid to bore the reader, I have to move on now. Maybe at a later date I will release an addendum on my ultimate lipbalm buying guide. But also, that is so deeply personal (and everyone needs the excuse of “hunting for the perfect staple shade!!”), so it is really not my place to have any authority on something so intimate and subjective. Etcetera. 

Moving on; Decorating your room

Here is a section I lifted out of my memoir document. It fits, because as enigmatic as I hope I am, I am also quite unchanging.

 I just pushed three hangers and two tiny strappy tops with the tags still on, off my bed. Most nights, all, these days, actually; I spend in my large but cluttered bedroom. I have a little ensuite with a jetted tub I’ve never used because I just never get around to it. There’s a plush grey rug, spanning the expanse of the room (covering an ugly cherry wood that doesn’t match the rest of the house; no clue why. I never asked, and the previous owners were eager to sell so they could finally ditch this town and retire in Montreal for the bagels, or Hawaii for the monk seals. Point is, I’ll never know) with loose beads and loose pills and little shards of glass from plier-crushed beads. I vacuum every day. The whole room tells you exactly the kind of person I am; the clutter I possess, the encapsulation of the projects I start, start, start and the hours I don’t sleep for and the clothes I tried on (these to sell, these to cut up with kitchen scissors; thrifted lululemon and aritzia and heaps of knits and plaid fabric..) I would not say the room is a mess. Lived in, maybe. Chopsticks and mugs and gum wrappers. Single dangle earrings. I just finished the last of my Creme Brulee eos lipbalm; disguised as a relic of 2015, I was gifted it Christmas of ‘20. I think my next waxy conquest will be a tinted Burt’s one I palmed a while back, before I lost the nerve. Peering around the room you will see shopping bags strewn about the mouth of my walk-in closet. Every surface has something shiny or colorful stacked up on it. Cluttered, busy, but intentional. Except for the walls, which are bare. Bare and gray and miles-tall when I lie flat on my back, high out of my mind, willing things to change but knowing I’m responsible for a first step I will always be too scared for. Bare, pristine, no gumtack. Empty, Like they’re waiting. I wait around a lot. It makes sense. That was an awful lot of words about my stupid blank walls when truly it does not bother me that much; I really just don’t get around to it. I have other things on the ground to tend to, like post-email nausea, addressing envelopes, marrying wire and bead.  Writing a document I care about because I am determined and I am alive, alive, alive, goddammit. 

Excerpt over. The memoir is coming out when I get famous, or something earth shattering happens. Like I become the world’s least remarkable entrepreneur, and I get retweeted by Colorpop. I don’t want to be the next Elizabeth Wurtzel. I read two of her memoirs one restless night, absorbing it to make up for the nutrients I didn’t that day (you can laugh. I think that is pretty clever), heart breaking a little bit. She writes about her struggles so intrinsically, you either get it, or you don’t. Anyway. She had the books and the fame from it, and she wrote more memoirs than I think a single person should. That is admirable. Aspirational, even. But I do not want to be like her. Where was I? Oh. Yes. Decorating/adorning/filling your room. Your room should serve as the kind of place to watch a movie (if you believe in film. I don’t) and put on ridiculous glittery eye makeup, or smoke an ~artistic cigarette~ or stay up all night on the phone, which is different from staying up all night simply on your phone. Chatting with someone you are tepidly in love with is much more exciting. Not chic as the whole affair is so juvenile, but fun regardless. It’s somewhere to keep your worldly possessions, too. I know I have a lot! Also, it is kind of thrilling to hide things in your room in little crevices only you know about. Now, unfortunately, everyone reading this will know too. But, like, I trust you not to really.. do anything about it. I keep my extra juul pods in the sliding box my apple pencil came in. That box is almost more useful than the pencil itself. I’m somewhat morally opposed to the iPad. Whole culture is so embarrassing! I have a tea tin with an ounce of golden teacher shrums in it. This is tossed in my closet among tins filled with other things, like lace trim and buttons. Which makes it actually a pretty terrible hiding spot, I see now… Anyhow. Keeping benign little secrets like that is so fun. You can tell I don’t have siblings. I sort of wish I did, but it is easier to believe there is something aristocratic about being an only child. Not sure if older-sister me would be egalitarian enough to share things. But that’s prophesying, which is kind of a waste of time. I live in the now, in a room positively cluttered with meaningless things that mean the world to me, chewing on my lip because my mouth is just so dry and 5gum is just not an after-8 indulgence. To live truly kitschly, you have to have somewhat hideous decor. Now, do not confuse dissonant, or incoherent, with what I mean by “hideous decor”. The kitsch room has as many surfaces to look at as possible, while also shying away from too many shelving units. Then you risk your room looking like a storage unit or something. When my mom renovated (re: paid someone to do it) our New York house so we could sell it, all our stuff was stacked up in a Cubesmart self storage. It was sort of horrifying, seeing my childhood home reduced to plastic storage tubs piled what felt like thirty feet high. Anyway. It’s just not an  inviting way to store things; I imagine it makes your room look like your stuff is all trapped in gelatin. The more fussy, tiny things you have out in the open, the better. Nail polish. Earring trees. Bowls full of rings and lighters and water color pans perched on your windowsill. A rack with the tackiest assortment of knits and bucket hats and baguette bags. And so forth.. Quickly surveying someone’s room is so telling. Bonus points if all your books are spine-in, except for your favorite ones, because you don’t want people to get the wrong idea. (that you read). 

[astralaffairs]

concept: first lady mc reads of fotp!tjeff’s speeches and edits them for all the things she thinks are stupid or unethical. and he’s like “sweetheart, my party isn’t ready for universal healthcare. i can’t be pissing people off within the first month of my presidency.” but she couldn’t give a fuck and continues marking up his speeches with a red pen all while insisting he gets a new speech writer.

y'all need 2 STOP hitting me w concepts i like this much i have 0 self control and WILL write every damn one of them. there are like 4 sitting in my inbox rn smh.

(by which i mean pls keep sending me concepts like this i love writing fotp drabbles)

---

"What're you still doin' up?"

Y/N's eyebrows shot up as she looked up; a small, tired smile graced her lips as Thomas entered their bedroom, shaking his blazer off as the door fell shut behind him. "Hey. I'm glad you're back," she said softly. "I've just been tying up a few final loose ends with what I've been working on before I go to sleep."

"Can it wait until the morning?" he asked. He laid his blazer on the back of a chair at the side of the room before immediately starting to loosen his tie. "It's gettin' late. And I miss spendin' time with you. You work too much."

She scoffed, but her smile was only growing at his words. "Did you, the President of the United States, just tell me that I work too much?" He rolled his eyes as she spoke, just discarding his tie on the floor beside their bed. "That really is rich coming from you."

"Yeah, yeah, make fun all you want," he said, crossing the room to join her on their couch, "but you always overwork yourself, and you know it. You've been doin' it for as long as I've known you."

"Alright, I'll come to bed in a few minutes." He took a seat behind her, and when he rested his hand on her inner thigh, it sent shivers rippling across her skin. She looked up. "You go get some sleep. I'll finish this quickly. I promise."

"What're you workin' on, anyway?" She didn't protest when he withdrew the paper from her lap, glancing over it, and the corners of his lips quirked up. "Is this the address I'm givin' on Friday?"

"The very same."

"You shouldn't be losin' sleep over this," he said matter-of-factly, turning his head back toward her as he squeezed the top of her thigh lightly. "Either lose sleep spendin' time with your dear, sweet husband who's fucking sick of thinkin' about legislation, or just come to bed, hm?"

He passed her back the paper, instead looping an arm around her waist as he kicked his legs up onto their coffee table, and when he pulled her in to rest against his shoulder, she put up no protest.

"Just five more minutes. I promise." The barely-concealed yawn in her voice made Thomas look down at her skeptically.

"Alright, but I'm holdin' you to that. If you're still working in five minutes, I'll carry you to bed myself."

"No complaints here." She turned her head to kiss the corner of his mouth gently before she turned back to her paper, fidgeting with her red pen as she reached the last page of the document. Thomas's eyes had fallen shut; he was more than content to just sit there with her until she finished, as he had no desire whatsoever to think anymore about pushing his healthcare bill through Congress.

He opened his eyes when Y/N scoffed. Her pen ran down the page in a long slash, and she was pursing her lips as she jotted notes in the margins, but it made Thomas furrow his brow.

"Hey, now, what was so wrong with that paragraph?"

"Seriously?" She raised a skeptical eyebrow, glancing back at him. "You keep treating healthcare like it's some privilege that poor people should have to grovel at the feet of the rich to have access to. It can't be conditional like this."

"I'm not actin' like that," he defended. "I'm just sayin', hiking up taxes threefold isn't a sustainable way to fund this. It'd be an overreach from Congress. We've gotta use money efficiently."

"You fucking libertarian," she muttered. "The part of the bill about work requirements is gonna get killed in Congress. There's no way the House Democrats will vote to pass it unless you get rid of that."

"What's that got to do with my speech?"

"You're misrepresenting the legislation if you keep that paragraph," she said, proceeding to scribble out a sentence in the paragraph after. "And get rid of this. If you're trying to implement a public option, focusing on the private sector will get you nowhere. You're just gonna make people angry."

"I'm not 'misrepresenting' anything." He scowled. "Both those things are important for the bill."

"But this isn't a bill, Thomas; it's a speech," she huffed. "Anyway, the legislation needs to be universalized, or you can't 'mitigate poverty' how you claim to. Do you have any idea how many of the people who can't meet the work requirements on healthcare are going to end up in poverty because they can't afford the care they need?"

"I hear you," he started, "but this is the best way to make it more affordable without tankin' the economy."

"Have you even considered capital gains taxes?"

"That's gonna kill entrepreneurship."

"You're so full of it sometimes," Y/N scoffed. "'Entrepreneurs' won't be affected. It only affects, like, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, and they have so many assets that it literally doesn't matter."

"I'm not gonna sit here and argue with you about this. I'm not sayin' you're wrong, but I am sayin' this bill needs to be somethin' I can convince the Senate to pass," he said, and Y/N rolled her eyes.

"Then write a new bill that doesn't mean the people who are the worst off don't get coverage," she said, jotting that down on the side of the paper, "because this doesn't resolve the issue."

"I'll bring it up when I get the chance," he assured her, and she glanced back at him with a grateful smile. "Can I ask why this is so important to you?"

"Because I'm an empathetic person, and I care about people?" she replied, tone scathing, and he raised an eyebrow.

"Woah, there. That wasn't an attack, sweetheart," he said. "What's got you worked up?"

"I'm not 'worked up,'” she bit back, but when he gave her an apologetic look, gaze soft, her annoyance began to subside. “This is just a sore subject for me." Y/N finally lowered the paper in her lap, turning her head toward Thomas. "I know I've told you about how long my parents spent in the hospital before they passed."

"Yeah. Yeah, you have," he said softly. He turned, orienting himself in Y/N's direction so he could pull her into his lap, and while she sighed, she laid back against his chest.

"When they died, I was left with most of their healthcare debt," she continued. "I was living far below the poverty line for almost a decade because of it."

"I'm so sorry," he whispered, and she laced her fingers into his with his arms around her waist.

"It was a long time ago," she replied. "I just don't want anyone else to end up in anything like the situation I was in. Nobody deserves that."

"No, they don't. I'll see what I can get past Congress." He kissed the side of her neck, and she hummed contentedly, squeezing his hands. "But I've still gotta discuss my plan for healthcare on Friday, so stop demolishing my speech."

"You asked me to look over it," she said frankly, and though her eyes had fallen shut when she laid against him, she cracked one open to glance at him skeptically. "These are my edits. Change the bill."

"That's an awful weighty edit, sweetheart."

"Hey, I also improved your phrasing," she went on, holding his paper up where they could both see it. "I'm making your speech better, don't complain about it."

"You cut my section about deductibles?"

"No one wants to talk about deductibles, babe." She tapped the paper with the back of her pen. "They want to know whether they'll be insured or not. They won't listen to the nuances of your bill in your public address. You're going to need a press release for that."

"And the part about family values?"

"It was useless." She shrugged. "I know you're just pandering to your party and all, but it sounded stupid in the context of the speech."

"Harsh," Thomas said, and the offense in his voice was mostly dramatized. Y/N pursed her lips. "But I can't be breachin' party lines in this speech. I'm not gonna get anything done if I turn the Senate Republicans against me."

"Listen, I'm not a political strategist, so that's your prerogative," she said matter-of-factly. "But if you don't like my feedback on your speeches, then hire a damn speechwriter, Thomas."

He hummed reluctantly. "But havin' you review my speeches gives me an excuse to spend more time with you. I don't have a whole lotta interest in having even longer meetings with White House staffers."

"Then take my edits to heart." She pursed her lips. "You know very well that I'm the only reason you have bipartisan support. If I didn't pick fights with you once a week about green energy, all the Democrats would still oppose all your stances on it."

"I'll look back over the speech in the mornin', then," he decided, and she shifted on the couch to face him, legs still draped over his lap. "I trust you."

"Good," she replied, and she looped her arms around his neck as she pulled herself up to kiss him. "But stop exploiting my degree in journalism."

"I'm not exploitin' it."

"Then what do you consider asking your wife to edit your speeches pro-bono to be?"

"A nice li'l side effect of managin' to convince someone so smart to marry me." She laughed as he pulled her back in to kiss him, but she gasped when he bit her lip teasingly, and his mouth drifted down her neck. "I love you," he murmured against her skin.

"I love you, too."

With that, Thomas hooked his arm up under her legs, and his smile widened against her neck when she yelped as he picked her up. "Now, I seem to remember sayin' something about carryin' you to bed if you were workin' for more than five minutes, so you don't get to negotiate anymore."

She squirmed in his grasp, but any of her efforts to get out of his arms weren't in earnest. She huffed. "So much for respecting personal liberty. Just wait until your voting bloc finds out all that rhetoric was just a lie."

"Oh, hush, let's not pretend you mind," he said as he tossed her down onto their bed, and she bounced when her back hit the mattress. He didn't hesitate to climb on after her. Though she tried to pull herself up to rest on the throw pillows, Thomas was on his hands and knees above her; she didn't have much of a range of movement when he dipped down to kiss her. "If you did, you wouldn't have married me."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever, Jefferson," she grumbled, despite wrapping her arms around his neck. "Talk all you want, but I dunno how smug you're gonna be when I up and leave you one of these days."

He grinned. "You know I don't buy that for a second." She rolled her eyes, but the corners of her lips twitched upward when he kissed her forehead. "You love me too much."

Despite everything, Y/N could feel herself flush. "Just go put on some pajamas so we can go to sleep."

"Alright, if you insist," he huffed, rolling off of her. "Be right back."

"You'd better hurry, or I might run off with Dolley and elope," she called after him, and Thomas laughed.

"'S cute, but we both know you aren't goin' anywhere."

"And why not?"

He raised a confident brow. "I'll tie you down if that's what it takes to keep you here, sweetheart."

"Wouldn't be the first time," she mumbled, turning to discard the throw pillows from the bed onto the floor.

When she looked back at him, his grin was still wide, smug, but the look in his eyes was soft. She pursed her lips as her own smile broadened. "Now go change. I'm not going to sleep without you."

"Fine. You need some rest.”

“Yeah. So do you.”

[everyonewasabird]

Brickclub 3.5.5 ‘Poverty a good neighbor to misery’

Marius has stopped interacting with the world. He just wanders and dreams. People find him suspicious and off-putting, and he doesn’t notice, or care.

...Except that he dresses up and goes to the parties of his father’s old Bonapartist war buddies. He makes sure his shoes are shiny and presentable for them.

Which is to say: the only people whose opinions Marius bothers with are rich people whose moderate politics he likes. He’s Not on the good path here, and I really, really don’t think we’re supposed to think he is.

The narrator continues to praise without really criticizing. I don’t believe him.

@fremedon​ has pointed out that we’re discovering a new structure in this section, where the narrator praises things very highly, in grandiose terms--and then, after several paragraphs of talking up how great a thing is, he’ll introduce juuuust the slightest little caveat.

And you’re going to want to pay really close attention to the caveat.

In this case, he talks about the purity of Marius’s dreams and how “he had finally come hardly to look at anything but the sky, the only thing that truth can see from the bottom of her well.” Which sounds like a dig to me. He's seeing truth--I don’t believe the narrator outright lies, though he can be sarcastic--but it’s such a tiny sliver of truth as to be useless.

After that, at the end of this chapter, we’re presented with Marius noticing people in distress and performing a single good action by paying the Jondrettes’ rent.

I think that action is the counterargument to everything that came before it in this chapter. He’s glimpsed a tiny sliver of truth, which may even actually be the real truth! What greater thing is there?

NOTICING AND HELPING ACTUAL PEOPLE.

Marius in these post-”to be free” chapters reads to me like Valjean post-bishop. The Amis collectively hit him with a sharp shock that showed him the way he’d been living his life was wrong. They gave him brief directions for turning it around--but both Valjean and Marius can’t fully grok the revelation, so they run away and try to incorporate the new information into the worldview they already had. Marius internalized “to be free,” but he thinks that means perfect, atomized independence, not the interdependence the Amis live by.

In the new world Marius and Valjean glimpsed, the world was equitable and relational rather than transactional, and they didn’t need to be punished anymore. Both of them take it as a message on how to become more alone and punish themselves more effectively.

This second half of the book reads to me like a kind of pop quiz: the messages from part one have been remixed, can you still recognize them even when the narrator intentionally confuses you?

I think Hugo does really believe dreaming is good:

In fact, were it given to our eye of flesh to see into the consciences of others, we should judge a man much more surely from what he dreams than from what he thinks. There is will in the thought, there is none in the dream. The dream, which is completely spontaneous, takes and keeps, even in the gigantic and the ideal, the form of our mind.

I like this as another lens to view character through. With Javert we got the “men’s souls take the forms of the animals” character lens, and now we get the “judge a man by his dreams” character lens. Javert himself has “stern” dreams; Grantaire is the other person who springs to mind as having very telling dreams that tell us something important that his exterior doesn’t.

But neither of them are actually helpful people. Grantaire nullifies himself, but Javert causes immeasurable harm.

Dreams aren’t action, and that’s the point. This chapter ends with Marius suddenly being confronted with 1) other people exist 2) some of them live next door to him and 3) his next door neighbors are being evicted. Without thinking about it, he gives them 25 out of the 30 francs he owns, and it may be the single best thing he ever does.

Which is fascinating, because the absolute worst thing he does also takes the form of giving Thenardier money.

But that second time will be motivated by his stupid, awful internal system of debts and redress and owing everyone for everything. This time, for once, he simply sees and acts, out of compassion.

[ohnothewheatisonfire]

ok J&H Fandom, let’s talk:

“Popular” blog @thatsmyhyde​ is a prominent creator in the J&H Fandom. But here’s where the problem shows up: 

the content they make is concerning at least, and full of red flags at worst. 

DISCLAIMER: This is all information I have gathered through their tumblr blog - I am not aware of what other things they may be posting on other social medias or their written work.  ANOTHER DISCLAIMER: Please be polite, I am a minor, and am just creating this post to ward off / warn other minors from following this person. If you are an adult interacting with this post and blog, be mindful of your actions and be responsible

Trigger warnings for: discussions of homophobia, discussions of p//phillia, fat-shaming, fat-phobia (?), etc. Just be on general edge for this post, we’re talking about a lot of weird stuff

I will be linking their posts as I am not going to take screenshots of their art.

This is not a comprehensive list of all the things they’ve done - these are the ones I could think of and was able to adress. If you have anything additional you want to add to this post (such as concerning things they may do on other social media), feel free to reblog and add on the things you need to say, just please don’t be dumb. 

Let’s start with the premise: Henry Jekyll creates an alter ego, Edward Hyde. They begin a relationship - an emotional and physical one. Their AU features Jekyde (A popular ship in the fandom, the name stands for Jekyll x Hyde), people have various views on this ship. 

So far so fine, right? Here are the problems:

1. Their Henry Jekyll is an awful person. Now, let’s start by saying that of course you can have bad people in your works, those are, after-all: villains. The problem is,Henry Jekyll is a harmful walking gay sterotype, and an outlet for Biscuit’s obvious fat fetish. But their relationship isn’t just toxic it’s romanticised in how toxic it is.

a. The harmful stereotype - Their Henry Jekyll has a “thing” for younger men, even though he is in his middle-ages, and Hyde looks like a young child. (Age gap relationships are their own thing - they come with their own burdens, and this is not the post to discuss them. This topic will lead into the Edward  Hyde section of this post.) But, it was a known homophobic scare-mongering tactic of straight parents to accuse everyone who is gay that they are ‘out to prey on your youths’. This is a stereotype that stigmatized the LGBT community, and still harmfully affects them to this day. 

b. The fat fetish: Jekyll is frequently seen with cake (as seen here, here, and here)  or being self-loathing, to the point of suicide. (click the link here to acess a list of suicide and other crisis hotlines! you matter to me!). Now, the self-loathing could be a symptom of depression or other mental illness, so I am not going to talk about it, as a person with mental illnesses.  But the self-loathing in addition to him being fat is not good. Media is drowning in the “self-loathing fat person” and as someone who isn’t thin i’m tired of seeing this. 

- The fetish aspect comes in him constantly being referred to “Chonky”, a term usually used for overweight/obese cats and being drawn obsessed with cake. It fetishises his weight and dehumanises him into something people call their animals. Also, here’s more of Jekyll eating food and being embarassed by it, though this time because it’s seen as “servant’s food”. 

- Biscuit admits to liking them “Big and chunky” in posts like this. 

[Photo id: A string of texts that says: tantok, frankenstein, twink lore, dorian slipped through the cracks and got himself sketched by yours truly the other day because he brought lord henry along, he and the slime didn’t have to fight to the death because they’ve both got their own chonky old toxic henries to focus on, but this blog still ain’t big enough for the two of ‘em. end id]

- They also talk about how they ‘prefer’ to draw fat (chonky) people. Image attatched above. the thing that should be noticed is that they say ‘chonky old toxic henries’ . they, once again, are making fat people a fetish. 

[Photo id: Anonymous asks: are you gonna make a victor design tho biscuit responds: Oh, man, anon, I hate to disappoint but.....probably not. Aside from my non-humanoids and hellspwans (slime gremlins, corpse creatures, and etcetera), I’m extremely uninterested in drawing young thin men. I really need middle-aged chonk to hold my attention. If poor Victor Frankenstein had only been 40-something and round when he made his great creation, then he’d definitely get a design from yours truly. As it is though, he’s not holding my attention enough to want to. end id] 

Biscuit once again talks about how he doesn’t want to draw ‘thin men’, because he is only interested in older ‘round’ people. He, is, once again, bringing to light his fetish for fat people. 

2. Edward Hyde is basically a child - Edward Hyde is drawn in boy’s school clothes, is taken in and raised like a child after Jekyll’s death, and is constantly cooed over by the creator, even earning a nickname of ‘slime’ from them. In addition, he also has ‘family photos’ taken with Utterson, has his toenails kept, is the height of a child, and teeths. This, paired with the fact that he is in a toxic, abusive, relationship with a man in his middle ages is concerning and should not be romanticised. 

[Photo id: the text reads: In his first year of existence, Hyde lost teeth and regrew them in a mildly similar fashion to a kid losing baby teeth - except it wasn’t all of his teeth (Just the canines and some random molars) and they weren’t replaced with a larger set, just with teeth exactly the same as the ones that had been lost. No one knows what was up with this. the teeth are still in Jekyll’s study in a little jar. end id]

a. Hyde is treated like a child after Jekyll’s death. Hyde teething is concerning because that’s something infants do. He also clings to utterson like a child. The idea that he gets taken in by Utterson, whisked away to an estate out in the country, despite both of them having romantic feelings for Jekyll is. how do I put this: WEIRD. (seriously, imagine your father/father-figure dating ur significant other / having a crush on them before you two got together and after). 

b. Hyde dresses like a child, whilst being sexually active and wearing lingerie. Now, on their own, these traits aren’t a problem - but together? They are very much a problem.  

- Hyde dressing as a child is concerning because he is also treated like a child at certain points in their “lore”. After Jekyll’s death, Hyde becomes a singular entity, and is taken away by Utterson. To care for, like a child. This post sums it up well: he wears both children’s clothes and lingerie. 

- Hyde has a very strange appearance - if you compare it to his early design (which was less cartoony and looked more like a man in his twenties), Hyde’s current design is concerning. Why does he have the height of a child? Why does he have eyes that take up a grand part of his face? Now, one could argue that ‘he is not human’ - but if he is treated like a human, whilst wearing children’s/youthful clothes, teeths, and his general enchanment with the world - he appears as human (and looks eerily similar to a child), which is why him being sexually active, wearing lingerie, and being friendly with prostitutes (one that gave him underwear and other articles of clothing)  is concerning. 

- That said, Utterson is directly talked about being ‘adopted into gremlin fatherhood’ (paraphrasing). 

[Photo id: the text reads: 59. Jekyll is irresitibly attracted to everything about Hyde, but if he could somehow be forced to list hte most attractive physical attributes of Edward Hyde in his opinion, aside from Hyde’s youthful appearance in general it would be his eyes, his overbite (Jekyll perceived the way Hyde’s-) the screenshot cuts of the rest of the paragraph. end id] 

- Jekyll has a ‘thing’ for younger men. This is to the point that the most attractive part about Hyde is that he is young. (or looks like it), Hyde looking very young is concerning because that would make their verison of Doctor Jekyll a p*dophille . This is something the artist has either not recognized, realised, or simply does not acknowledge. 

3. The toxic relationship (and how it’s romanticised) - The relationship in this ‘AU’ is: love comes first, toxic nature comes second. If you scroll through the blog you may see some reference of ‘Henry Jekyll is such a toxic person teehee’ and a lot of them kissing, being together, smiling, or enjoying life. Now, obviously, an artist - if they do not want to - should not draw characters being toxic to each other. But it is concerning when the above points come into a factor, that the toxic nature of their relationship comes second to the highs of their relationship, at least on their blog. 

Here is one of the only examples I’ve seen of Biscuit talk about the relationship in a detailed negative light. 

4. The fandom - Whilst Biscuit says it’s ok for minors to interact with his blog (in that blog he says that he tags nsfw - which is true.) he does not regularly mention that his jekyde is toxic - not in a concerete way. He romanticises it (despite acknowledging it’s flaws), and the only way it may or may not be (i would not know) acknowledged is his fic: which is mature and not meant for minors. He does not tag his posts with regular triggers for things like: alcohol, drugs, mental illnesses, or abuse (any variants). They’re not even in his blog’s description! If Biscuit had acknowledged it in his blog, something along the lines of: “Hey! This blog has <content warnings> be warned when interacting! But no, he does not. 

- A lot of the people who draw things, or generally interact with Biscuit are minors. Being exposed to such a thing may be harmful to my peers, and I am worried. To minors who are fans of Biscuit: if you’ve made it this far, thank you, I know you’re mature and responsible, but being exposed to content creators like Biscuit could lead you down a dangerous path of having this kind of thing normalised to you. Be careful with the content you consume, please! And thank you for making it this far, I’m sure you’re a lovely person :)!

Thank you for taking the time to read this! Stay safe, tell the people you love that you love them. 

[yourfavouritetragedy]

“Great Party” by Frank Iero as c!wilbur (pogtopia era)

Okay I talked about this a tiny bit in a discord server but I just. It fits SO WELL. Here’s a line by line rundown. (also it’s technically by one of Frank’s bands but IDK their names)

Our hearts need work,

Wilbur tends to see Tommy as the same as him. l’manberg as a whole was fueled by heart, and since it was clearly bad, their hearts need work

I'm scared we're born to lose

Pogtopia. His villain complex. “we’re” — pulling Tommy along again.

Tired of acting tough when I should've known better

Shouldn’t have started L’manberg. Being the leader is exhausting for Wilbur but he has to keep it up.

Our words get stuck so we taught ourselves to smile Yours shines so bright that it makes me shiver

cr-crimeboys. crimeboys. also the smile is a lie about how they’re feeling.

Just when you thought it can't get worse, always it does Just when you thought it can't get worse, always it does

cwilbur in pogtopia. I don’t think I need to elaborate.

We ignored the signs,

Nobody really does anything about the very clear signs of c!wilbur’s mental spiral. From c!wilbur’s perspective, this can be about L’Manberg not being meant to be

got lost for miles and miles

hopelessness.

Know what buttons to push with both middle fingers

!!! button room, pogtopia covered in the buttons and they’re falling apart. both middle fingers because one is for the world and one is for himself!

I'm out of touch, your ticks are out of time

hahah. like. like the tntduo song. but yeah he’s out of touch. “your ticks are out of time” could be his paranoia about everyone else not actually being on his side.

Couldn't wait to get gone. Yea, you're a real go getter

first part: suicidal. second part is kinda sarcastic. kinda like “we accomplished a lot, but is that a positive thing?” also cwilbur’s ambition is so key to his character. (I can kinda see cphil telling cwilbur this as an over-achiever teen.) If he feels like his value comes from getting things done, when he’s unable to do that, it’s like a taunt.

Just when you thought it can't get worse, always it does Just when you thought I can't get worse, I'm off my meds

Wilbur displays symptoms of many mental illness, but most salient here is Bipolar Disorder. It’s very easy to see him going off his meds sometime between the beginning of L’Manberg and his worst in Pogtopia. I haven’t closely watched the Pogtopia arc, but I see him as going through a long mixed episode in Pogtopia. (That paragraph in Hitting on 16… litcheterally mania…) 

I'm wondering is it me, is it me, that made you feel so sad?

crimeboysssss. he feels it’s his fault! he’s bad for tommy! but he cares about tommy so much too. also like, wondering if he’s bringing down the people around him in general. or wondering if they’re actually behaving the way they are around him because they notice his depression, like “is it really me that is making you act like this, or do you not care?.”  

I miss you so much I miss you sober I hope you don't mind I miss you so much I miss you sober

this section can be read as c!tommy and the rest of pogtopia at Wilbur, tntduo, or even cWilbur at schlatt.

I hope you don't mind I won't call

the letters to philza stopping, wilbur doesn’t talk to/trust people around him

Is it me, is it me, that brings you down?

worried it’s all his fault, doesn’t want to hurt tommy. re: the “feel so sad line”

My heart needs work, it does what it wants to

Wilbur admits that he has problems but accepts them as a part of him instead of trying to improve

Keeps falling in love when I should've known better

tntduo. but also the idea of L’Manberg. maybe even caring about the l’manberg citizens.

My words get stuck so I taught myself to smile

It’s hard for him to be honest about his poor mental health, so he just pretends he’s fine.

So sick of us, and I hope I never get better

!!! Wilbur gives up! He doesn’t want to get better — this characterizes every rock-bottom moment, and Wilbur was certainly at his worst in Pogtopia.

[blackjack-15]

Adoration to Ashes, Dust to Just — Thoughts on: Alibi in Ashes (ASH)

Previous Metas: SCK/SCK2, STFD, MHM, TRT, FIN, SSH, DOG, CAR, DDI, SHA, CUR, CLK, TRN, DAN, CRE, ICE, CRY, VEN, HAU, RAN, WAC, TOT, SAW, CAP

Hello and welcome to a Nancy Drew meta series! 30 metas, 30 Nancy Drew Games that I’m comfortable with doing meta about. Hot takes, cold takes, and just Takes will abound, but one thing’s for sure: they’ll all be longer than I mean them to be.

Each meta will have different distinct sections: an Introduction, an exploration of the Title, an explanation of the Mystery, a run-through of the Suspects. Then, I’ll tackle some of my favorite and least favorite things about the game, and finish it off with ideas on how to improve it.

If any game requires an extra section or two, they’ll be listed in the paragraphs above, along with my list of previous metas.

These metas are not spoiler free, though I’ll list any games/media that they might spoil here: ASH; mention of a whole host of previous games with the Hardy Boys in them; mention of SCK; mention of STFD; mention of FIN; mention of DED; small spoilers for SPY; unflattering mention of the Nancy Drew: Girl Detective series; brief mention of erotic-shifter-romance book Bearllionaire.

The Intro:

Welcome to the Nancy Games, lads!

Before we begin, since we’re at the beginning of a new “section” of games, let’s go over exact what the “Nancy Games” entail. Unlike the other games, this section (which runs from ASH through SPY) of games is most concerned with Nancy’s personality, growth, and showing her through a different character foil each game.

These games not only give us a better picture of who Nancy is, but also how she fits (or doesn’t fit) into the world around her and with the people that she meets. Rather than solving the case, these games are made to make Nancy react to things; rather than ‘where is Nancy Drew’ or ‘what case is Nancy Drew tackling’, the preeminent question for ASH and the four games after it is simple: ‘Who Is Nancy Drew?’.

Though only possible because of the nature of the miscellaneous games (WAC, TOT) and the Faerietale Games (SAW, CAP), the Nancy Games have been sorely needed since the series graduated past the first few cases. For a lot of the series, the games weren’t really concerned with the main character of the series, preferring her to be a blank slate that players could superimpose themselves onto…which, as recent media (such as Twilight, and Twilight But With Bondage This Time), isn’t a good basis for a character outside of a dime-store bodice ripper.

But these games aren’t Bearllionaire, they’re detective stories, and detective stories need a strong main detective to carry the story — not to mention the stakes.

That’s where these games come in. Building obviously to the story in SPY, each game explores another facet of Nancy’s personality, and shows what she could become — or could have become, in a few instances — should she let the more negative sides of her personality take over, or if she trusts the wrong kind of people and makes the wrong friends.

How better to illustrate than by showing exactly the kinds of people that Nancy’s friends are? That’s what ASH is primarily concerned about — showing who Nancy is by showing the reactions of people who have known her all her life to a crisis. The only difference between Nancy and her Foil in this game is the fact that Nancy has good people — good friends — fighting for her. It’s how she gets herself out of jail, and how she manages to solve the crime.

And it’s a fun (if a bit clunky) game mechanic as well.

This is why this story can only happen in Nancy’s hometown. Not only is it delightful for fans to see (modern-day, as we saw the old version in CLK) River Heights for the first time and get to explore a bit around the town, but hometowns in media are quite significant when looking at who a character is.

Almost always, a hometown is used as sort of a microcosm for the character, giving us a bit of a cheat sheet into who they are as a person just by showing their environment. Think about it — how many times in cop shows (which are the most blatant offenders by far) are we told that a character is from a small town, and thus they’re intent on proving themselves, probably a ridiculously hard worker (to get out of “that place”), and a bit more innocent than their inner-city colleagues? Or that a character grew up overseas to justify their interest in international crime, establish them as a bit of a wildcard, and handwave them knowing about 16 languages? Or that they grew up “on the streets”, justifying a hidden juvenile record, skills in hand-to-hand combat, and a soft spot for Youths Just Like Them?

(But enough about Criminal Minds. I’d rather focus on something that actually has thought put into it.)

The same thing is happening here in ASH; from River Heights, we can extrapolate that Nancy is well-off, straight-forward, comfortable largely around adults (think about it — ignoring the usual phone characters, we only meet one person around Nancy’s age in RH, and she hates her), and has a drive to be Somewhere Other than her small town.

Another interesting point is that River Heights is chosen as the backdrop for something that has only happened twice in the series, and only once been done well: a personal revenge story against Nancy herself. Sure, RAN attempted it, but RAN’s story is — if you haven’t read that meta, spoilers — hot, flaming garbage, and the personal revenge plotline is bungled to the extreme, resulting in it not putting across that theme very effectively.

ASH is different; from the very beginning, it’s obvious that whoever is doing this is working off of a person grudge against Nancy specifically — and burned down the town hall in order to implicate her, so they’re not playing around. It’s the reason that the culprit search is so focused, which really benefits the games as well. The question isn’t really “who would want to get rid of Town Hall”, it’s “who hates Nancy enough to burn down a building to get her in trouble”. It makes questioning so much more interesting — and very full of mines, which is Great — when it’s the person, rather than the specific crime, that matters.

The last thing I’ll touch on in this introduction is a question that the fandom has posed both seriously and jokingly many times over the last….almost exactly 10 years (10 years!!! I need to lie down my land!!!) since the game first came out: where are the Hardy Boys? Surely, if there was ever a game where they made sense to appear, it would be this one; their friend is in prison and needs the help of practiced investigators — you’d think that even if Carson wouldn’t think of hiring them (which, as desperate as he was, he totally would have), that Nancy would have given them a call, if only to see if ATAC had anything on the suspects.

There are two reasons why the Hardy Boys don’t appear, from a storytelling perspective (ignoring the issue of how much money it would cost to include them or any other technical considerations), no matter how much I would have liked them here, or how much sense it would have been to at least name drop them, if not make them phone friends.

The first is to keep the game centered on River Heights. Everyone in the game — both suspects and allies — is from River Heights and is a part of the town’s makeup. Our suspects reporter, a politician-slash-ice-cream-store-owner, an ex-detective-turned-antiques-dealer, and a college student born and raised in RH. They represent different facets of the town — the media, the political, the business, and the rising generation — and so each represent a part of the town. Nancy’s allies all fall under the “rising generation” — the “Future of the Town”, if you will — or under the justice system category, with Carson. Even the Chief represents another facet — the law — that can both hurt and help Nancy in turn. By keeping all suspects and allies tied to the town, the mystery and the story can focus on exactly what’s going down in River Heights, without any distractions.

The second reason that the Hardy Boys don’t appear is a little less obvious and a little less cut-and-dried plain fact, but I find it compelling enough to mention here: Ned is present. Other than as a foil in CAP (and an oddity in CRE/VEN), the Hardy Boys don’t appear in the games where Ned is present — it tends to be an either/or thing as far as phone characters are concerned. The why of this is, admittedly, conjecture, but I do find it fascinating that the two (three, technically) don’t intersect — and when they do, it’s to compare them.

Also there are not enough fics of the time Nancy sent Ned to hang out with the Hardy Boys like their house was a vacation kennel and Joe broke Ned’s car. Just saying.

Ned represents River Heights, safety, security, constancy, and comfort — the same things that the other River Heights phone friends (Carson, George, Bess, Hannah) do, albeit to a slightly lesser extent. The Hardy Boys, on the other hand, represent excitement, danger, the unknown, new discoveries, and growth — as do, in different extents, the non-River Heights returning phone friends (Hotchkiss, Savannah, Prudence).

Nancy sits squarely in the middle of these two extremes; she’s from River Heights, but she’s not exactly of River Heights, if you get my meaning. As the games have progressed, they’ve shown Nancy moving further and further away from safe, small, friend-related cases to professional jobs with more than a few people actively trying to kill her. For me, that’s the reason we don’t see the Hardy Boys and Ned mostly in the same games; they represent different spheres of Nancy’s life.

And, had competent writer(s) stayed and the games not, well, imploded due to Penny being one of the worst business people I’ve ever encountered, it would have been interesting to see that push-and-pull dynamic being expressed in Nancy’s relationships. As it is…thank Heaven for AO3, am I right?

Now, let’s refocus on ASH in specific, and talk about its composite parts, shall we?

The Title:

Other than being catchy and evocative (and telling us exactly what crime was committed here — that of arson), Alibi in Ashes is also a notable title for its flexibility in meaning. Like CAP, there are so many different connotations for “fire”, and all of them apply neatly to this game.

First, we’re dealing with the literal fire that sends Town Hall up in smoke, and the inciting incident for our mystery (and Nancy’s jail time). Next, we have the word “fire” standing in for “emergency” — as in “where’s the fire” — and there seems to be a new emergency every five minutes in this game — the fire, Nancy’s arrest, Bess breaking the vase, Carson’s absence, etc.

After that, we venture even further down the abstract hole, and dive into the political — whistleblowing, which is often referred to as “setting a/the fire”. This is partially what Nancy does, and is also what Brenda likes to do, no matter the accuracy of the report. Finally, we stay with Brenda for the term “media wildfire” – which is exactly what Nancy’s arrest (due to Brenda’s machinations) causes.

The title in total — “Alibi in Ashes” — also works in a few different senses. Literally speaking, Nancy’s alibi — and the evidence to prove it — is in the ashes of Town Hall, waiting to be discovered. More metaphorically, due to the work of the culprit, Nancy’s alibi (aka her innocence) is in pieces, in ashes — it’s been destroyed. Finally, in a literary sense, Nancy’s situation can be shown in the “ashes” of a past life — in the “wildfire” that destroyed Alexei’s life and career as a detective.

Its acronym being “ASH” is also pretty awesome, not gonna lie.

It’s the multifaceted nature of the title that really gives it its staying power, catchiness aside. Many titles are just as good as ASH’s, but almost none work harder at having so many possible meanings that are all represented in the text of the game itself.

The Mystery:

Sufficiently chastened into spending more time at home (at least for a few days), Nancy comes home in order to spearhead her team (consisting of Ned, Bess, and George) to victory in the River Heights Clues Challenge. This friendly little competition that included No Cheating Whatsoever on the part of Other Teams heats up, however, when a clue leads Nancy to the historic Town Hall — only to have it erupt in flames minutes later. Coughing but still moving, Nancy escapes the inferno…only to be greeted by the suspicious press, declaring her guilty of setting a beloved building on fire.

Things only get worse when Chief McGinnis shows up the next day, taking Nancy into custody due to political pressure in the town. An arsonist is afoot in River Heights, and unless her friends can dig up some dirt on someone — or everyone — else, it looks like Nancy Drew won’t just be convicted by the press, but by the town that raised her…

As a mystery, ASH has some great personal stakes — for Nancy and for our suspects — and pretty layered motivations. The cast comes alive through their relations to Nancy, especially as she’s unprotected with Carson being in Australia. The shift in the mystery that occurs when Nancy can finally get out and speak to the suspects — and seeing how differently they treat her than how they treated the other members of the cast — really helps to add something new to a mystery that’s tying itself up a bit, and give it the last push of gas it needs to get us to the conclusion.

While it’s not the most involved, complex, or thematic Nancy Drew mystery ever, it does what it needs to do, and does it well – and that’s honestly all I want in a game more devoted (as it should be) to character than it is to a twisty plot.

The Suspects:

ASH has a rather full cast (not because of the size of the suspect pool, but because there are so many people involved that should be mentioned), so let’s get started with our suspects, then move on to our other cast members.

Brenda Carlton, resident Reporter of River Heights News and perpetual thorn in Nancy’s side, is both our first suspect and our culprit, proving once again that the media cannot be trusted. We haven’t had a reporter be our culprit in 21 games (TRT’s Lisa being the previous example), so I guess we were due, but Brenda is a delightfully hateful example of just how bad the media can be, so kudos for that.

And this game didn’t even come out in an election year. How refreshing.

As a suspect, Brenda is awesome. Catty, arrogant, and with a penchant for dressing up as Nancy – titian wig and all! – to perform her dastardly, dastardly acts, the game doesn’t try to be subtle for one second that she’s up to no good. While Nancy and Brenda are equally as interested — and equally as talented, by all appearances – in ferreting out a good story, Brenda takes it a step further and makes one if she can’t find one – and nurses a grudge against Nancy for exposing her for it.

Up next is ice cream shop owner and scaly politician Antonia “Toni” Scallari, a woman with a bright-eyed, smiling public face — and if you don’t like that face, don’t worry…she has others. Toni is your typical politician — pretends to be nice and pleasant, is actually a scheming villain, hates people who do honest work, and thinks that fairness in government is a luxury – but the game does stop shy of making her The Villain, preferring instead to show the crimes she’s committed in her search for money and power and letting her quietly bow out of the election.

So definitely better than she deserved, but at least the game shows her corrupt nature rather than sweeping it under the rug.

As a suspect, Toni would have made a decent villain, but it would have turned the game into a tale of cold political expediency and machinations, rather than hot-blooded revenge, and that would have been a shame. I’m a fan of how the games from about TOT on always have multiple characters who Do Crimes and Bad Things, and Toni is a prime example of a bad guy who just happens not to be The Bad Guy.

Third on the docket of suspects is our resident grumpy old man (and Nancy’s foil in this game) Alexei Markovic, who provides not only some of the best voice work in the game, but whose age is also proof that Nancy’s dad really is the silver-haired DILF we’ve been waiting for.

C’mon, he prosecuted Alexei when Alexei was 20. The youngest Carson could have been was 25 if he booked it through college, took no breaks to study for the LSAT, and blazed through law school — and immediately got a job the day after graduation. And seeing as Alexei has the “old coot” personality and grey hair…well, Carson is probably straddling the line between DILF and GILF.

(I’m so sorry for that aside, guys, it got away from me. I’m equally sorry for the first recorded use of the term “GILF” in the Nancy Drew fandom. It’s not the legacy I wanted, but perhaps the legacy I deserve.)

Back to Alexei!

Alexei is a great character, full-stop, and his VA just improves the experience more. Bitter and jaded, but by no means uncaring or evil or myopic about his troubles, Alexei is, where Nancy is concerned, a bleeding heart whose blood happens to run cold. While he could be bitter about Carson playing a part in taking away everything he had, and thus treat Nancy poorly, he instead empathizes deeply, wants to help, and, in effect, treats her the way that somebody — anybody — should have treated him.

As a suspect, Alexei, as Nancy’s foil in the game, would have been a poor choice; he’s not really there to be suspicious, he’s there to show the stakes of the mystery. No matter if Carson could find a world-class defender to get Nancy off the charges, no matter if they couldn’t even indict her, the stakes aren’t “Nancy will go to jail for Realsies” — the stakes are the town turning its back, she loses those she loves, and is unable to do the job that is the essence of who she is. In other words, if things go poorly, Nancy becomes Alexei.

One of the reasons that Alexei is such a good character is that he recognizes this immediately, and is determined to do all he can to prevent that. Sure, he knows the odds are stacked against him, and the whole town is his enemy, and he won’t get anything for helping out — but at his heart, he’s still the Magnificent Markovic; “no case too big, no fee too small,” remember?

Last of the actual suspects is noted red-light runner and girl in envious, envious green, Deirdre Shannon. Deirdre’s a rather divisive character in the fandom — especially of late — but is a character I stand firmly on the side of great, for a few reasons.

The first is that the games took a 1-dimensional, wouldn’t-cast-a-shadow-if-you-turned-her-sideways character from the Girl Detective books, there purely to make Nancy look good, and instead gave her a fully realized character, sympathetic motivations, and a whip-sharp tongue.

The second is her hilarious banter with the River Heights crew and wry sense of humor, which would be enough to make her a favorite character of mine alone.

Annoyed by constant, unflattering comparisons to Nancy from her parents (her father also being a lawyer in River Heights), she’s amused when Nancy’s arrested — though, if you read in between the lines, never suspects Nancy actually set the fire nor thinks Nancy will ultimately get the blame — though not as amused at Bess’ spying on her. She harbors a not-secret crush on Ned and enjoys spending time with him, girlfriend or no girlfriend — though it should be noted that even Ned isn’t spared her sharp tongue.

As a culprit, Deirdre would have been the obvious choice for writers who were the caliber of…well, of the Girl Detective series writers, but thankfully we’re on a higher playing field with Nik, Cathy, and the rest of the crew behind ASH. Deirdre is a snarky observer, but that’s as far as her ‘evil’ goes — and looking at her methodology for solving the Clues Challenge clues (and her commentary on her compatriots) is a joy — real detective work, indeed!

After our suspects, let’s talk about our players on the side of Right — or at least, on the side of Nancy — starting with the girl detective herself (as we will for all of the Nancy Games). ASH provides a better look at Nancy than we’ve had before (as befitting the first of the Nancy Games)

Nancy Drew is our main character, sometimes-protagonist, and at times villain protagonist — especially in the eyes of our culprits — when it comes to unearthing long-buried hurts and wrongs. Stuck in jail for a crime she didn’t commit due to political and community pressure, for the first time, the girl detective can’t really do anything by herself, and is relegated to “phone friend” while her boyfriend and childhood friends are running around frantically trying to introduce reasonable doubt in a frame-up par excellence.

Our source in SPY refers to Nancy as an autodidact — one who teaches themselves — and that’s a perfect summation of Nancy’s character. She’s no museum expert, nor cowgirl, nor entomologist, nor any other hat she’s put on — but she can fake it if someone hums a few bars. Her other big pluses as a detective are (once again according to the source in SPY) in interrogation and code/puzzle breaking — and the differences in the questions that Ned et al pose and the questions Nancy poses to our suspects does bear out the first point, at the very least. Her code and puzzle skills are the usual fallback for the games’ mysteries, more so in the modern games than in older ones (which is both a good and bad thing, depending on what types of puzzles you like).

In ASH, we learn about a key trait of Nancy’s — self-sufficiency, and, more importantly, the limits of that self-sufficiency. Able to fake most things until she makes it, Nancy is finally put in a situation where she can’t do anything by herself, and it’s a source of frustration and impatience to her that overrides other feelings (“Also, I’m in jail, and I would really like to get out,” anyone?). It’s rather stunning that Nancy goes from a triumphant Girl in the Dress to stuck in a police station, relying on the phone and her own intuition, and it does some good for her character exposure and development.

Next up is Edward “Ned” Nickerson, erstwhile boyfriend and long-suffering Emerson College student, Ned is part of an honors fraternity and is in River Heights for the Clues Challenge — and to see his girlfriend, of course. While his attempts to be Detective Ned have really only resulting in finding the keys that were in his pocket, Ned is nevertheless quite useful in getting information out of Deirdre (and is responsible for one of the funniest bits of dialogue in the game that’s not spoken directly by Deirdre).

According to the files from SPY, Ned’s defining characteristics are his honestly and his loyalty, both of which mean that he’s the ideal ‘phone friend’ when Nancy’s in a pickle — and means of course he’d be front and center, ready to do anything he needs to in order to help clear Nancy’s name. His main role in the game, however (and very interesting, as one of 6 or so Neirdre shippers in the fandom!) is to be the object of Deirdre’s window-shopping affections and to be made fun of (good-naturedly, of course) by his friends.

Because of his relationship (such as it is) with an overtly antagonistic character, Ned’s a lot of fun in ASH. I feel like he gets a lot of characterization that he often lacks in most other games (excepting CAP and SPY, of course), and it just makes me like him more.

George Fayne is also here to help — though, irritatingly, not required the same way Bess and Ned are — with her knowledge of technology and impeccable Togo-watching skills. George is a great character in the OG Nancy Drew books – the ultra-modern, straightforward, clumsy flapper, to contrast Bess’ more genteel sensibilities and Nancy’s down to earth, practical, yet fashionable nature — and one of the greatest disservices that the 60s rewrites, post-60s ND books, and, yes, the game series has done to the ND universe is to turn her into a “hurr-durr tomboy because name George like boy name” sort of mockery of her original character.

And no, I’m not crediting her as “Georgia”, because that was not her name in the books. Her name was George, full stop — once again, quite fashionable of her to have a “boy’s” name in the 20s/30s — named after her grandfather. You may fight me on this, but you will not win.

George is noted to have above-average skills in mechanical engineering, and indeed creates a jammer to stop Brenda’s broadcast in the game, but is otherwise…well, kind of pushed to the side in favor of Bess and Ned, her enmity with Deirdre notwithstanding. I’ll address this issue more in The Un-Favorite and The Fix, but a few tweaks while developing the game would have gone a long way towards defining George as a character — we’re ignoring MED wholesale, don’t worry — and helping the gameplay be a bit more varied.

George’s maternal cousin, Elizabeth “Bess” Marvin, on the other hand, is basically required to get what you need to know from Toni, but is very much not the favorite person of Alexei, due to her breaking an antique vase upon coming into his shop.

When a vase can survive the Nazis but not Bess Marvin, it seems a shame that Bess didn’t go to France with Nancy during DAN. They would have found that secret room with the artwork in like a minute and a half.

Bess is mentioned to lack judgment (her reveal of George’s crush on the snack shop boy illustrates that pretty well) but to have above-average intuition and, while manipulated easily enough, is too honest for that manipulation to really cause any lasting harm. Because of her sweet, open nature — and her open pocketbook when it comes to ice cream — she’s a favorite of Toni’s, and uses that in order to try to clear Nancy’s name and discover just what illegal, corrupt pies Toni has her grubby little politician hands in.

Going a little less friendly and a little less college-aged for our next helper, we turn to Chief McGinnis, a grumpy pushover of a cop who’s really only important for letting Nancy walk around a Police Station and solve a crime while under arrest because he didn’t wanna do his job, and for a hilarious diatribe about Pancake City.

Seriously, I go and watch that scene every so often when I need a good laugh. ASH has some fabulous comic writing, and McGinnis’ rant is a prime example.

McGinnis is pretty ineffectual as a helper, but he does allow for the first 2/3 of the game to happen by locking Nancy up (“You cannot leave jail! This is a very basic concept!), and for that, we salute him.

Rounding out our cast of Nancy-supporters is Carson Drew, who is (frustratingly, to him) stuck in Australia when all this goes down, and thus cannot use his legal prowess to free her.

Of course, as a prosecutor, I’m not sure how much help he’d be anyway, but hey, a lawyer is a lawyer is a lawyer, at least in the ever-wise eyes of HER Interactive.

Carson’s really just there (or not there, as the case may be) to explain how Nancy can be locked up with such a powerful lawyer father, honestly, but he gets some good lines in, so we’ll forgive it. He’s also there to round out the “River Heights Cast”, but I can’t help feeling that, if we were gonna have another Drew in this game, I would have taken the puppy over the golf ball. #Togo4Ever

The Favorite:

There’s a lot to love in ASH, so I’m going to focus on the biggest things. Suffice to say if a part of the game isn’t in this section but isn’t in the Un-Favorite, I love it.

I’m going to start off just by saying that the dialogue in ASH is wonderful. We’ve got distinct individual voices, sarcasm galore, enough cattiness to fuel the Halle Berry movie, and great interpersonal work, especially with Alexei.

One of the places Nik truly shines is dialogue, and a small-town environment like River Heights really shows off his skill. I sometimes hear the charge that “no one talks like this!!” leveled against the Nik games but, honestly, I talk to people every day who speak similarly to Nik’s characters, allowing for the differences in written and spoken speech, and so do most people I know. Allusions, analogies, metaphors, and aphorisms aren’t just for English class — they’re part of speaking well.

If you really wanna see dialogue where “no one talks like this,” look at the early ND games. FIN is a particularly bad offender, but SCK and STFD aren’t much better.

My favorite puzzle in the game is the letter swap puzzle inside of Scoop, by far. Sure, I enjoy other puzzles — Alexei’s number box, fingerprinting, the suspect board — immensely, and have a blast doing them, but I can spend hours figuring out old quotes on that aqua background and not notice the time passing one jot. It’s fun, references old games, and is exactly the kind of puzzle that gets me excited anyway, and I love it to pieces.

My favorite moment in the game is probably the moment Nancy takes control and goes and talks to Toni, oddly enough. The stark difference in what Toni says about Nancy while she’s in the station to what she says to her face is like a brick wall to the chest, and is, every time, the moment when you see exactly how River Heights turned on Alexei so completely as to push him out of his job and into the antique business. It’s a moment of almost stomach-sinking disgust, and I absolutely adore the game for not pulling its punches and instead keeping true to one of its major themes — that you need to see who people are in the dark, not when they’re facing you.

In the light of day, Alexei is just a cantankerous old man; Toni is a smiling, motherly ice cream store owner, Brenda is a hard-hitting reporter, and Deirdre is a vapid Queen Bee type. Under the cover of darkness, however, we see Alexei’s charity and heart, Toni’s corruption and two-faced nature, Brenda’s unethical and illegal means to her ends, and Deirdre’s soft center. And I love the game for pointing out the world of difference it makes to see what someone truly is.

For my last point, there are two characters are of note in this game that I love for very different reasons.

The first is Alexei, who is the inspiration behind the title of the meta. There’s something incredibly compelling about Alexei’s down-to-earth nature and the way he deals with being dealt the poorest hand in the world without ever dipping into “woe is me” or any other self-indulgent crap. Insatiably curious, bright, and caustic, Alexei feels like the perfect person to sit down, drink a cup of something warm, and talk about puzzles, antiques, and harsh truths with.

He’s a character who watched his entire life fall apart with one bad person’s actions — “one time, just once, I tried to speak truth to power, and man if I didn’t pay the price” — but still had it in him to keep going, even if it wasn’t what he was doing before. He went from being the town’s golden boy to a pariah, and yet still looks after River Heights and its history, even becoming the curator of the River Heights Museum (when it opens). The difference between his reaction to being falsely accused to, say, Noisette Tornade’s (DAN) reaction to being “falsely” accused is huge and, I think, rather inspiring.

The second is Deirdre Shannon, if you couldn’t tell by my gushing about her above, and, can I just say, I love everything about her. There’s a temptation to assume at first blush that she’s your average boy-stealing popular rich girl a la WAC, but actually looking at her tells a different story.

Sure, the rich part is true — but so is Nancy, and from the looks of their houses and all the trips/vacations they do, the Marvins and Faynes seem pretty well off as well. She shares the tendency for a sharp tongue with Nancy as well (as befitting her status as Nancy’s foil in DED, stay tuned!). Deirdre also doesn’t qualify as popular — her two “friends” that she hangs out with in ASH for the Clues Challenge are still in their “free trial”, and aren’t really her friends.

And her feelings for Ned? While she openly flirts with him (even if Ned doesn’t get it until the girls tell him), Deirdre isn’t looking to actually cause damage (if only because she sees Ned as completely unobtainable), and is up-front about everything she does to Nancy’s face. Putting yourself in her shoes, she’s a bright girl, in love with a boy who is the definition of out-of-reach, is constantly (and negatively) compared to the boy’s girlfriend, and feels stuck in her small town, desperate to move beyond the boredom. In other words, in any other story, she’s the protagonist. It just so happens — as she’s acutely aware — not to be her story. And that’s the kind of character that it’s impossible for me not to love.

And speaking of things impossible to love…

The Un-Favorite:

My biggest problem with ASH, as was mentioned above, is the fact that George is relegated mechanically and interpersonally to the “unimportant” bin. Nancy, Bess, and Ned all have suspects that like and don’t like them, while all George gets is a note that her and Deirdre particularly don’t get along — no extrapolation, no explanation. It makes the decision to include her as a playable character feel a bit like a last-minute decision, like Bess and Ned were planned and George was supposed to be watching Togo until the very end when she makes the jammer or something.

My least favorite puzzle in the game has got to be the stacking of the boxes and crawling towards the exit at the start to escape the fire; it’s a time-sensitive puzzle, which are usually my least favorite, and takes the mechanics of Renate’s bag puzzle and small visual distinctions, which we’ve already noted in the last meta are not particularly my jam either. I wouldn’t replace or get rid of it, it’s just my least favorite. I tend to start my game from a save I have after the puzzle — while I have to refresh on the opening occasionally, it’s better than the frustration from the combined puzzle.

I don’t have a least favorite moment from the game, to be quite honest, so let’s move on to the last section of this meta.

The Fix:

So how would I fix Alibi in Ashes?

The big thing I would change would to be to ensure that each member of Team Danger should have one culprit that likes them and one culprit that hates especially them. Nancy already has Alexei for her plus and Brenda for her minus, and Bess should keep Toni and Alexei, respectively, but both Ned and George need one more. Luckily, with four friends and four suspects, they’ll divide up evenly very easily.

My fix would be to have Ned keep Deirdre as his plus and give him Toni as his minus (local business owners usually don’t like football players for being rowdy and taking up a lot of seats, plus he’s Nancy’s boyfriend and staunchest defender).

George, meanwhile, keeps Deirdre as her minus (though flesh it out a bit more — what exactly went wrong there?) and gains Brenda as her plus. Not only would this make the endgame where she creates the jammer a little more interesting, I’d note that George and Brenda have a bit in common, due to Brenda’s technical and mechanical prowess that we see throughout the game. Throw in something with George having done a technical internship with the River Heights broadcasting network or something during high school, and we’d get a slightly different side of Brenda, even though George still dislikes her privately.        

Just fixing this issue would be enough to where nothing in ASH would stand out as a real negative, but for my second, smaller fix, I’d make the friends able to call each other to change off, instead of having to call Nancy, then have her call the other person. That slows the game down and is needlessly clunky, and I’m still not quite sure why they did it.

Once those two things are fixed, there’s nothing in the way of ASH being a truly excellent game. Sure, it’s not as thematic as the few games preceding it, but it’s not supposed to be — it’s supposed to have an entertaining mystery while showing us a little more of who Nancy really is and why she does what she does, and on those (and most other) fronts, ASH is an incredibly solid, enjoyable game that I replay whenever I get the chance.

[lightneverfades]

That Damned Gazebo

Frostiron Holiday Wishes Challenge ❆ 🎅🎄 Prompt by @snarkyship Fic written by @worstloki Note: AH! So sorry this is a late post, tumblr messed up and I didn’t receive this on Xmas day! Ah! Thank you @worstloki for resending! TwT <3333

Wish (Prompt/Idea): Human/no powers AU. Sort-of-enemies to friends to lovers.Tony rents this house/bungalow by the sea for the summer, with a kind of private beach where there is also a cute gazebo. Only that the gazebo is exactly halfway with the other property (by some mistake?). And the tenant of the neighbour bungalow is Loki, who's not so keen on sharing. So Loki&Tony will start a "war" to gain possession of the gazebo, doing their worst using the excuse of "this is my half, I can use it as I want". ((Optional: there is a table right in the middle, so at the beginning they sit at their own side glaring at each other, before starting deploying more convoluted tactics)).Mischief after mischief, they will start to know each other and of course everything will end with one of them inviting the other to their half for a romantic dinner and they'll end up sharing more than the gazebo <3((I hope it's enough clear and but also not too detailed??)) 

Stupid cute bungalow. Stupid cute gazebo. Stupid cute neighbour.

All Tony wanted was a vacation; a break from running a business and having to argue for his ideas to get accepted by the marketing teams and just some time to lay low and relax.

All Loki wanted was a break from being upstaged in his section of the family business by his brother; some time off to cool down and de-stress and lay low and relax.

But instead only half their regular favourite beach house was available no matter how much cash they offered to throw at the real estate company renting it out. Could they have picked a different place to stay? Maybe. But none of the other decent rentables this far west have a gazebo, and they would have nowhere to sit alone and admire the waves from afar if they took a place without one.

And, of course, that’s where it all started— that gazebo.

That damned gazebo.

———

Day 1

Tony Stark, genius, entrepreneur, philanthropist, makes his way unsteadily down the sandy-grassy slope from the bungalow to the beach, arms filled with an excessive amount of floating supplies, a personalized towel, sunglasses only half on, a fun-sized bottle of the finest sun lotion, a laptop because he may leave the stock market but the stock market may not leave him, a black Prada shirt over khaki Hawaiian shorts, a speaker for music, hot-rod red flip flops, a bag of snacks, a thin multipurpose blanket, and a polaroid.

He almost slips a few times on his way down, and he thinks he sees a crab and swears, but he does make it down to the brilliant white-sand beach of Malibu unharmed.

His plan is simple: spend the day in the shade of the wooden gazebo, sneak a peek at how his business is holding up, check his emails, play some Tetris, sunbathe around noon when the sun is highest, back under the shelter till the sun starts going down, into the water for some splashing, drying off as the sun sets, listen to some tunes while laying under the stars for a while.

Just a regular day off at his favourite beach.

He walks to the shaded gazebo area and draws the curtain to enter, and dumps the entire contents within his arms over the table in the center. He turns to open up the curtains on all sides but is interrupted by an ahem.

Tony turns, and, in the curtained darkness, makes out the figure of a person.

He must be the one who booked out the other half of the house, Tony thinks, eying the stranger sitting at the opposite end of the table with only a book and bottle of water. Show-off minimalists, Tony thinks, saltily.

“I would prefer if you didn’t open those,” he says, and Tony doesn’t recognize the accent, but there definitely is one. Maybe it’s a blend?

“But what’s the point of sitting under a gazebo on a beach if you can’t see the view?” Tony asks, pulling one open, letting in some light.

The man practically hisses at Tony for doing it, which, okay, weird, but that’s normal when you’re assaulted with bright light and have been sitting in the dark.

“How were you reading in the dark anyway? Don’t you know it’s bad for your eyes?”

“I assure you I was able to read just fine.”

“Yeah… I’m opening the rest of these too…” Tony says, reaching for the curtain by the other side.

“Not if you wish to share this table, you won’t,” the man threatens.

“Are you… trying to bribe me?” Tony asks, shocked, because who does this guy think he is?

“Compromise with,” the man has the gall to say. “And with table space, yes,” and Tony sputters. What can he even say to this. He’s here for a vacation, not to argue with strangers who are taking up half the gazebo space that should be his!

“Half,” Tony suggests, because he will not sit in the dark all day and miss out on his beach-view just so he gets to use the table. “You get half of this space, and I get the other half, and we can do whatever we want on our sides.”

The man sighs. “Fine. That sounds fair.”

The two of them spend the entire rest of the day sitting at opposite sides of the table pretending they’re not intentionally glaring and making crazy faces and trying to telepathically get rid of the other when they’re not looking.

Tony doesn’t comment on how the man barely gets any reading done and the man in turn doesn’t comment on how much equipment Tony brought down that he doesn’t use at any point in favour of using the laptop to retain his spot under the gazebo.

Schedule be damned, Tony is going to enjoy his vacation, and that means enjoying his duplex bungalow, even if someone else is renting half, and enjoying his gazebo that may be in-between the properties and they both may be paying for but is 100% actually his.

They wait each other out, and both head up to their houses at the same time; around midnight.

———

Day 2

Loki wakes at his usual time, showers, pointedly gets dressed into anything but the black shirt he has that matches what the man had on yesterday, and grabs his book before he heads down to the beach.

Having to share the same table was, simply put, incredibly awkward, but Loki has faith in it not happening again. He’s just going to make his way down to the gazebo and spend the day relaxing and rereading his favourite series without a pretentious-bearded neighbour showing up and making things weird.

“YOU!” Loki hears, and turns to find the same man from yesterday rushing down the slope towards him, “WHY ARE YOU UP AT THIS TIME?!”

Loki takes in the sight of the man dressed in a half-buttoned-up hawaiian shirt and pajama pants, with only a laptop and towel in hand, hair clearly fresh from bed, and, before he thinks better of it, counters eloquently with, “why are you half dressed?”

The man waves his arms in frustration, “I was tired! And in a rush! You don’t get to judge me, you’re the other f*ck who woke up this early!”

“I… normally get up this early…” Loki informs him, backing away slowly.

He can’t believe he’s going to have to deal with this guy again.

At least his sweatshirt has a green hood so he can block the guy out of his sight, right? He won’t spend the entire day rereading paragraphs because the man at the other end of the table is making him feel anxious, right? Surely the man is bringing the towel to lay in the sand which means he won’t be needing the gazebo, right?

Loki literally booked this bungalow because it’s in Malibu, and no one pays for a place like this in Malibu when you can rent a lower quality place and spend the money on beach parties and drinks. The fact that it’s far enough from home to make him feel safer was a bonus, but he really just wanted to be alone for a few days.

Loki takes a seat, and crosses one leg over the other, getting comfy so he can lean the book on the table. He tries not to get annoyed that the curtains are still parted halfway. He wouldn’t mind if the ones on his side were open too, but at this point he’s not acquiescing a point to the stranger.

The man pulls the wooden chair out and sits down opposite him.

Of course he does.

Why wouldn’t he.

“So you’re really going to keep reading in the dark?” he says, flipping open his laptop.

“Yep, and that suits me just fine, thank you,” Loki answers neutrally.

“Does my no-light-reading-neighbour have a name?”

“Do you?”

“Tony.”

“Loki.”

“Nice to meet you, Loki,”

“Thank you.”

Loki uses his bookmark to flip to his page, and starts reading. He will not get distracted by this Tony. It’s totally normal to share this table. It’s not huge, but it’s built for at least six, so there’s space. Maybe not enough to lay on, but it’s enough distance to ignore the clicking of Tony’s keyboard as he frantically presses keys.

Loki is two hours into enjoying his reading time, and he thinks he was doing well.

He’d smiled every time Tony yawned because with eye-rubbing and deep sighs that man was not used to getting up early, but he’d actually gotten through nearly three chapters without incident.

Then, the infuriating man had plunked a speaker onto the table and started playing AC/DC.

Now he’s reread this one line at least fourteen times and still doesn’t know what the red-head was doing with Jon.

“Why?” Loki asks, “Why must you do this? You can see me reading, you’re blocking out the distant sound of waves hitting the shore, it’s not even at a decent volume, so, why?!”

“Sorry, what was that?” Tony answers, “Did you say something? Because I couldn’t hear you over the music, but it sounded like you had an issue with what I was doing on my side.”

“Your music is not staying on your side!” Loki argues, but only receives a shrug and an increase in volume.

He presses his lips together.

Fine. If you’re going to be petty about this, then I can too.

Under the table, Loki kicks Tony.

He hasn’t got shoes on, but he’s always had a knack for aiming very well, and Tony’s whimper (?) (it’s hard to tell with the music so loud) assures him he hit the shin bone well enough.

By the time Tony is done cradling his leg and looks up at Loki with a mix of anger/betrayal, Loki is already reading again, the perfect image of serenity.

Loki tries not to laugh as Tony discovers his legs are not long enough to kick back.

———

Day 3

Tony didn’t bother trying to wake up before Loki this time.

He went at his own pace, and remembered to change out of the pajamas, brushed his hair, had coffee, and took the time to make himself a few sandwiches to enjoy through the day.

Yesterday he even went for a quick swim around ten at night and headed straight back up to his side of the bungalow, because he’s a responsible adult who doesn’t need to out-do a stranger’s sleep-schedule. Or leg-length. Or laugh.

It isn’t a competition or anything.

By the time he makes it down to the beach, he finds Loki sitting under the gazebo, alone, with all the curtains tied open.  

He’s also... wearing a black Prada shirt which matches the one Tony threw on this morning?? What?! Taking up half the space on his side of the table with 1 (one) bottle of water wasn’t enough, he also has to taunt him by wearing the exact same thing?!

He storms to his side of the gazebo and slams his palms down, taking satisfaction in the fact that Loki was startled and drops his book onto the table. Tony hopes he’s lost the page he was on.

“What do you think you’re doing?!”

“Hello, neighbour,” Loki greets, gingerly picking up his book again and giving a hesitant smile. “I didn’t realise you would be wearing the same shirt again, but I was hoping we could get off on a different foot today?”

Huh, well, would ya look at that, Tony thinks, I actually won. The sucker is gonna admit I’m too much and wave the white flag.

“That... actually sounds great,” Tony answers with his award-winning client-smile, sitting down opposite him. “This whole thing with splitting the table and curtains in half was a bit ridiculou—”

Tony yelps and stands up and starts frantically rubbing his hand over his butt which is stinging— he looks down at his seat and sees the culprit —a crab, menacing in all it’s crabby glory.

“Are you... okay?” Loki asks, far too confused, far too innocently, far too worried for it to be genuine, “what’s wrong?”

Tony, outraged, yells at Loki, “DID YOU FRICKIN PUT A CRAB IN MY SEAT?!”

“I— what?”

“WHO THE F*CK CALLS A PARLEY AND CRABS SOMEONE?!”

“No! I didn’t— are you okay??” Loki says, and he’s gotten up and rushing over and...okay, MAYBE he didn’t mastermind the crab.

“NO, I AM NOT, BUT THANK YOU FOR ASKING,” Tony screams, backing away from Loki, and running towards his bungalow.

Running in sand is hard, but Tony discovers it’s much harder when your butt is stinging.

———

Loki… did not put a crab on Tony’s seat.

He’d honestly wanted to draw up a truce, maybe have an actual conversation with Tony, and he even brought a towel and wore a change of clothes underneath in the event that the man wanted to go for a swim and wouldn’t mind if Loki joined.

He’d even brought snacks to share.

But now he feels bad.

Had kicking him under the table every time Tony had put the volume too loud or managed to slide low enough to kick him back or played We're Taking the Hobbits to Isengard been bad? Had it been too much? Why else would Tony assume he’d actually try and hurt him?

The glare-offs had just been fun, faces when they thought the other couldn’t see wasn’t bad-intentioned, the kicking hadn’t meant to injure. Loki had thought they were getting along. Perhaps he had misunderstood? Perhaps the other had not felt they were fun little pranks?

He owes Tony an apology.

———

Tony has been icing his butt for an hour. If he had any duct tape, he would’ve duct taped the peas to his butt.

Tony is thinking about how if he had any duct tape he would’ve duct taped the peas to his butt by now when someone bangs at his door.

Gee, I wonder who it could be, Tony thinks, as he goes to answer the door. Just so many people who visit this private beach residence. In all honesty it’s kind of sweet that Loki would turn up to check on him at all really.

Tony leaves the pea packet on the nearest counter and goes to answer the door. Good thing about this bungalow: it has many spare counters for things like dumping peas. An excessive amount of counters, even, and he questions what the designer had been thinking.

Tony swings the door open, “Hey there, crab-man.”

“I’m sorry,” Loki blurts.

“Hey, it’s okay, it doesn’t even hurt that much anymore, but at least you’re owning to it.”

“I didn’t set that up! I wouldn’t actually try to cause any lasting damage,” Loki explains.

Tony sighs.

“Yeah, I figured, I was just caught up in the moment and shouldn’t have blamed you.”

“Would’ve been a very Shakespearean betrayal too…” Loki muses.

“So… anything else you came to say?” Tony asks. Although he’s not sure why.

“Would you be feeling up to sharing the table like normal people?”

“Oh, come on, where would be the fun in that?” Tony jokes.

“You… weren’t hurt or offended when I kicked you or said your music taste is dumb?”

“Course not. We’ve all had wild college nights out, believe me, kick to the shins was nothing.”

“Crab grabs though…”

“If you want to share the table like normal people we will not be mentioning the crab grab.”

“Deal,” Loki says, and he’s beaming as if he’s won a prize. Which is really cute. Which is why Tony doesn’t regret slamming the door in his face.

Stupid cute neighbour.

He needs to change anyway.

———

Loki and Tony hang out under the gazebo, and they share the table.

Every so often Loki will read a line or two aloud and Tony will find himself snickering in response to Loki’s comments on the lines if not the lines themselves. Every now and then Tony tells Loki to look over at his screen as he invests in either the stock market or a round of Tetris.

Around noon Tony asks if Loki would like to sunbathe with him and Loki sees no reason not to join in. He doesn’t have any sunscreen of his own but Tony has plenty and is happy to share.

They talk about their work, and what they’re avoiding (family) in their little getaways from home, just things about life generally.

The sun is going to set soon when Loki asks if Tony would like to spend some time by the water with him.

The two of them spend a good thirty minutes hitting each other with floaties when they aren't sitting around in them, and, despite wading in till their knees, and flinging water at each other, they manage not to get too wet.

They sit in the sand watching the sun set in beautiful streaks of purples and orange as they dry off their feet.

Loki brought two towels in case of such a scenario (which Tony finds very endearing and sweet) and they lay on them as they watch the sky darken to reveal the stars. Loki tries to point out some constellations but Tony is convinced he’s making them up. Maybe he is.

The two of them share sandwiches and chips and chocolates and decide to head up early at around nine.

Tony invites Loki over for a movie, and how can Loki say no? He only just met him, but he’d rather be stuck sharing this bungalow and beach and gazebo with him than have to return home in a few days.

The house is huge, and there is plenty of room on the couch for them to be spaced out, but they choose to share a blanket and stay close because they want to.

Loki hadn’t planned on sleeping over, but he stays late and falls asleep in the middle of a movie and Tony doesn’t mind at all. It’s hard for him to mind when he’s also fallen asleep.

———

Day 4

Tony wakes early.

Not Loki-early, but earlier than usual, because he’s looking forward to spending time with Loki.

Hmm. Maybe it is technicallyyy still Loki-early. Whatever.

Except, Tony wakes up alone and walks down the slope to the gazebo, and finds it empty. A quick scan of the beach also yields no results. Which is concerning, but not overly so. Maybe he just has something else to do today?

Tony gets through a few hours by rotating through Tetris, League of Legends, and Galaga, before he gives in and walks up to Loki’s half of the duplex bungalow.

He bangs his fist on the door and waits.

About a minute later, Loki answers, in green-plaid pants and a vintagey AC/DC band shirt, hair looking only half brushed.

“Are you seriously wearing that kind of shirt as pajamas?”

“Yes. And good... morning?”

“Morning!” Tony cheerily greets in return, before his expression gets less so, “why aren’t you out today?”

“Good afternoon? I... just wasn’t feeling too well, a bad day I guess,” Loki explains, which Tony understands. “And I already over-lived my stay with you yesterday, so I thought you could have the gazebo all to yourself today, since I’m not really in a beach mood anyway.”

And that’s a big no in Tony’s book because no he didn’t go too far or over-stay anything and no he doesn’t owe him anything and no in general because Tony liked spending time with him! He’s fun and caring and Tony’s wondering where this guy was for every other vacation he spent here because Tony considers him a friend!

“That’s sweet,” Tony lies, “I’m not really in a beach mood either.”

“Ah. Would you… like to come in?” Loki asks, hesitant.

“Of course buddy, if my friend wants to stay home I’m sticking with him.”

Loki stands aside, letting Tony into the bungalow that he’s used to owning on his own, but, shockingly enough, doesn’t mind sharing anymore.

“Would it be bad to ask what kind of bad mood?” Tony questions, taking a seat by the TV. It’s off and he doesn’t see a remote.

“A bit, yes, but I value the thought,” Loki answers, checking the kitchen cupboards.

“So what were you doing in here all alone without me, beach buddy?”

“Reading.”

Hmm. Tony considers. They did do what he had wanted yesterday.

“Can I join?” Tony inquires, “if you have any spare books, that is.”

“I didn’t know you could read.” Loki says with half-hearted disgust, walking behind the couch to a small bookshelf.

“Harry Potter, you got me,” Tony states in the driest tone, “Ha ha.”

“I’ve got the second Game of Thrones—“

“There’s a book?!”

“And the series hasn’t updated in years.”

“Bummer, hate when they do that, but at least the show ended?”

“Yeah, badly,” Loki points out. “I’ve got the Lord of the Rings trilogy.”

“I thought you didn’t like the hobbits being taken to Isengard,” Tony pouts.

“Not when it’s on loop and happening the sixth time in a row,” Loki says, dropping the book into Tony’s lap roughly.

Yeah, okay, the man isn’t feeling well, maybe he should leave? But Tony doesn’t want to leave him alone if he’s feeling bad either!

Tony opens the book, skipping through the contents and prologue-y pages. He will enjoy the book and he’ll do it while sitting on the opposite side of the couch because if Loki doesn’t want to lay across and tangle their legs under a blanket that’s up to him. Besides, that’s more an afternoon activity, and Tony isn’t tired at all, so he’s sitting up properly. Which contrasts with Loki’s slouchy leaning-into-the-couch.

“You know, if it’s too quiet, or the book doesn’t interest you, you can just watch something, I won’t be offended.”

“Not so fast, crab-man, I’m doing this to have fun and try something you enjoy, because I like spending time with you, and think that’s fair,” Tony states, and oh sh*t Loki looks devastated. Quick, something fun, something fun, “So I will definitely be trying to read it... at least a bit, before I do anything else… because I may vehemently not-like reading, but I do enjoy your company.”

“Okay,” Loki verbosely replies.

Tony tries to figure out what he’s done wrong but Loki’s opened his book up already.

Tony manages to get through the book in about two hours. Which means he didn’t actually read through it, he just tried, and kept skipping to pages further along that looked more interesting. To be fair, there is a lot of exposition and world building that he knows doesn’t matter because it’s not in the movies.

Loki’s been shifting how he’s sitting at twenty minute intervals, but Tony hasn’t moved lest he come off as restless and not loving the book.

“You can put something on,” Loki suggests, having noticed that Tony is done.

“It won’t disturb you?”

“Not if you don’t have it unreasonably high.”

Tony looks around for the remote, and doesn’t see it. “Any idea where the remote is?”

“Eh, it’ll be lying around somewhere. Maybe check the kitchen?”

And so, Tony sets out on a quest to find the remote.

He doesn’t find it.

He looks through every inch of the couch and in every kitchen cupboard but all he finds are pop tarts and pennies.

At some point Loki puts his book aside and decides to watch him look. He’s even smiling a tiny bit which Tony takes for a good sign.

“Hey, so, I couldn’t find the remote.”

“That’s a shame,” Loki says, and he’s definitely smiling, “would be horrible if someone knows where it is.”

“YOU!” Tony says, rounding in on him, depression be damned, he’s been looking everywhere for an hour now! “Where is it?!”

“Wh— why do you think I would know?” Loki says, turning his face away, his arms crossed pretentiously.

“You’re laughing!” Tony says, pointing a finger at him. “I spend ages looking for this legendary remote and find out you’ve been playing me the entire time” —Tony pokes a finger in the center of his chest for emphasis— “and you’re laughing!”

And okay, it’s a little funny, and Loki’s having fun, so Tony huffs a laugh too.

“I’m not laughing,” Loki tries to say flatly, face turned away, as he clearly tries not to laugh.

Tony being Tony does the only respectable thing in this kind of scenario and jumps onto the couch, straddling Loki, so he can turn his face back towards him.

“Where’s the remote!” Tony yells, to no avail, not even a reaction to having sat on his legs. Is Loki even breathing? His smile is clearly becoming harder to hold…

“Tell me where the remote is” — Tony grabs the thick novel Loki had been reading — “or I’ll take out your bookmark!”

“No!!!” Loki says, trying to grab hold of his book. “Not the bookmark!!! That’s my one weakness! Please, no! Anything but the bookmark!!!”

“Don’t make me do it!! Because I will!!”

Loki chuckles.

“Fine, you win, here” —Loki reaches a hand under the pillow behind him, and holds up the remote.  

Tony snatches it immediately, and gives Loki a peck on the cheek thanks before getting off and going back to his side of the couch.

If Loki looks a little confused about the quick kiss, it’s gone by the time Tony is done flicking through the channels and decides a nature documentary is something they could both enjoy. When Mr Attenborough mentions otters holding hands when they’re happy and Loki asks if he can hold Tony’s hand of course Tony says yes.

Later, when Loki insists on cooking for the two of them he throws together some instant noodles and adds in carrots and peas and egg and mushrooms, and he asks if Tony would like to share the meal down by the beach, he agrees.

“You sure you’re up for this? I don’t mind eating back in the bungalow, and if you’re feeling uncomfortable I’d rather just go back,” Tony makes clear.

“I don’t actually know why I thought staying home would make me feel any better,” Loki says lightly.

“Hey man, sometimes you’ve just gotta stay home, it happens, don’t worry about it,” Tony consoles, carefully going down the sandy grassy slope to the beach, his huge bowl of noodles held in both hands. It smells great. “Besides, focus on the date for now.”

“This isn’t a date, I just asked you out to the beach to eat some comfort food with me.”

“The very definition of my ideal date,” Tony says, listing, “I was invited, there’s comfort food, we’re both already in our sexy pjs, there’s a beach, I think you’re a great friend and we could be more if you wanted, I’ve got my speaker in case we want some romantic classical music, the sunset will happen soon, what more could I want?”

“We also held hands for ages earlier and you kissed my cheek.” Loki winces, “this is totally a date.”

“Sure is.”

“How did I miss that?”

“If it’s any consolation, I was kidding, but you seem on-board, so… it’s a date?”

“It’s a date,” Loki confirms.

“Noodles on a beach is actually one of my secret fantasies,” Tony says, deadpan.

“Well,” Loki suggests, also deadpan, “there’s plenty of space under the gazebo.”

“Table is kinda obstructive,” Tony points out.

“Only if you’re not creative,” Loki counters.

Tony wriggles his eyebrows, and they both laugh.

———

Loki twists the last of his noodles and stabs his last carrot on his fork and puts it in his mouth. He looks into Tony’s bowl, and finds he’s actually finished first.

“You’re an even slower eater than me,” Loki notes aloud.

“Am not!” Tony blubbers out through a mouthful of noodles, “I’m just taking my time to savour it.”

Loki hums, and puts an elbow on the table to watch him finish up.

“So, what do you want to do now?”

Tony slurps up the rest of his food. “Well, now that I’m done, kiss?”

“I was thinking we could stand by the shoreline and get our feet wet, maybe walk up and down the beach a bit…”

“I mean, I’d rather walk up and down you,” Tony says, making a show of looking over Loki, who in turn snickers.

“I’m sorry, that was terrible,” Tony laughs, “it’s just, walk on the beach, that’s so freakin romantic, yeah I’m up for that.”

And it’s nice knowing that they can still hang out as friends, even if Loki is admittedly also intent on the kissing part.

They leave their bowls and flip flops in a pile in the sand and walk to the shore together.

Tony’s hand is warm in his as they swing their arms gently and just take in the salty air and talk about things; just facts about themselves and stories about life and things they like.

Loki’s not sure how much time has passed but it’s dark and only the night sky and it’s reflection on the water provide any light when he presses a hand under Tony’s chin to tip his face up so he can kiss him. It’s slow and sweet, and Tony— even though Loki finds it hard to believe in the moment —kisses back.

They pull apart, and everything is irrelevant in the face of the happiness they feel in having found each other, even by chance.

They kiss again; slower, deeper, and with an urgency ill-befitting of the time and space they have available.

———

Day 5

All records of the final entry have been [REDACTED] until further notice to maintain the rating of this fic.

It can be recalled that the [REDACTED] information featured notable involvement of local gazebo space not limited to below, above, and/or against the table, various uses of the excessive counters both halves of the rented space, more than banging on doors, and future plans for the continued entanglement of [REDACTED] leg distribution underneath blankets.

The reader is warned not to attempt searching for and/or to develop any interest in a desire to search for [REDACTED] records in future placements.

(The End.)

[silverkoushi]

haikyuu!! headcanons

⇢ scenario: how you’d spend the holidays with them!! pt.2 | read pt. 1 here! ⇢ feat. : tsukki (karasuno), bokuto (fukurodani) & kuroo (nekoma) x gn!reader ⇢  wc & warnings:  3.3k, slightly suggestive for kuroo

ʕ·ᴥ·ʔ not @ me having the phattest crush on kuroo as you can probably tell here... dear god that man is something edit: omo for some reason the paragraphs got messed up n i just checked it after hours of posting... i fixed it now so hopefully it makes more sense ahh my apologies!! ><

tsukishima kei

୨୧ ˻˳˯ₑ*॰¨̮  idk about you but i think tsukki secretly enjoys the holidays? like he’d think the music is overbearing, the movies are disgustingly cliche, and the amount of people gathering in places is one of his worst nightmares— those aren’t the things that he looks forward to. i think tsukki loves winter, maybe because i see him as a softie who collects sweaters, hoodies, and sweatpants that keep him comfy and cozy during cold nights and chilly mornings! WITH THAT BEING SAID, tsukki dies inside when he sees you wearing any of those following outfits of his. he might get annoyed at first that you don’t ask because he was planning on wearing them that day, but when you show up at his dorm clad in his night blue sweater with a little moon stitched on the side, there are no words coming out of his mouth. he will try to look menacing, eyes in a deadpan expression but you know he’s lying, and just stare at him with a doe-like face and put his hands in yours, swinging it back and forth as you drag him out of his room and into the snowy field. you don’t even think twice about getting matching sweaters because the boy will hate you for the rest of his life, but at least you got him to wear a reindeer headband for 2 seconds in the photobooth!! most of the time, you basically just bring him to anywhere you want to go. you guys look at the humongous christmas tree they placed in the center of the plaza, and you ask someone walking by if you can get a picture of the two of you in front of him. this way, tsukki can’t complain and will be semi-forced to pose with you hehe. you thought he’d just be standing there, arms to his side with a nonchalant expression but you actually feel him put his arm around your waist and lean his head down on top of yours. 

you can’t help the cheeky smile show on your face as you tiptoe just enough to reach his cheek, and once the guy said, “ok one more!” you steal a kiss on the side of tsukki’s small smile. “hey, what was—” “thanks, mister!! happy holidays!!” you avoid his stare, and get your phone back from the guy as you scroll through the pics he took (thank god only a few were blurry). tsukki keeps glaring at you, and you understand he’s not big into pda but uh, he started it with holding you close to him like that >:( “what?? you look so cute here, though!!” you whine to him, hoping he doesn’t ask that you delete it :( tsukki gives it a once over, a warm feeling creeping on his cheeks as he studies the picture: damn, is he whipped for you. he dismisses the overreaction on his part (for once), and takes your hand in his once more, asking where it is you wanted to go next. you’re surprised he left it like that, but you’re taking advantage of this situation and drag him to more festive stuff around the plaza <3

with your parents spending the holidays abroad and working overtime, tsukki’s mom invited you to their place instead and you’re!! more than happy and oh so grateful!! tsukki doesn’t show it but he’s actually extremely nervous,, what if you don’t like his family?? what if his brother is too annoying for you, what if this isn’t the kind of in-laws you were expecting— wait, he’s thinking too far ahead and you’re looking at him with raised eyebrows. quick! he turns away from your gaze, biting his lip at getting caught with his overthinking. “tsukki, you okay?” you ask gently, looping your arm around his as you guys near his house. “yeah…” he responds lamely, and you’re not sure if he wanted you at his house for the holidays or what… but you shake the negativity away and tell yourself that this is an opportunity to show your own personality to his family!! you’re greeted by a boisterous even taller guy at the door, and his also really tall mom waving at you from the kitchen, finishing up the grand dinner. “mom and i thought you were just pretending about your relationship, tsukki~” akiteru nudges him, and you chuckle at your boyfriend’s helpless look on his face, as if telling you this is what i dealt with during my childhood. but the holiday celebration with his family went super smooth!! his mom cooked amazing homemade dishes, and tsukki was actually smiling and laughing along the poor jokes akiteru made, it was so endearing to watch. you asked to help with the clean up as tsukki and his brother play volleyball outside in the cold. 

“i’m so glad he has you,” his mom comforts you, and you nod your head in thanks while you wipe the plates clean. “i’ve never seen him so… cheerful like this, you know?” what a heartwarming thing to say :(( and yet you thought he was just finally letting loose because he’s at home!! his mom turns in early that eve of christmas, and his brother goes out to have a nightly beer sesh with his hometown friends before christmas morning tomorrow. you and tsukki are left alone in his room as you marvel at the many dinosaur related merch, posters, and even stuffies he has in his childhood room!! “don’t say it,” he threatens you lightly, even though you’ve been well-aware of his fascination for the species. a little tired from the trip earlier and ngl you’re both full from the food, you lay down on the floor, pillows supporting your sleepy heads as tsukki shares the other side of his earphones. you listen to calming, lofi music for the night and at some point, he finds your fingers in his again. “thank you for having me, tsukki,” you whisper with a yawn, remembering the night days ago where you cried into his shoulder about missing your own family during this season. tsukki doesn’t respond as he hears your light snoring, and instead turns his body towards you as he caresses the side of your face, smiling at the beauty before him. “you’re always welcome here, dummy. you’ll always have me.”

bokuto koutarou

୨୧ ˻˳˯ₑ*॰¨̮  oof!! so many holiday parties!! gift giving exchanges!! dancing and singing, drinking and having the time of your lives! of course, bokuto asks first and foremost if you’re okay going to all of these celebrations with him as he has gathered a lot of friends from different majors, clubs, and such. you didn’t expect to come with him to all of them, tbh, but since he seems so excited to bring you along you found yourself nodding along! OOPS, what a wild ride it was to meet friends you didn’t even know he had. first, bokuto asked you to help him find some gifts for the exchange parties and you comply— you love thinking up presents for diff kinds of people! “would akaashi want this?” he points at a set of compression socks for sports “you’d want that more, bo” “oh oh!! how about this for kuroo?!” he leads you to the beauty section, hairspray littering the aisle “i think that’s more of an insult than a gift…” he’ll pout at his failure to think of the best gifts for his friends, but you cling to him with your linked arms and tell him not to worry— you kinda figured the kind of people his best friends are, so you suggest things off the bat: film roll for akaashi the photography minor, a mug with a pun-ny chem joke for kuroo, and a new case for kenma’s switch lite!! “wah! you know them better than i do,” he exclaims, eyes shining in excitement as you bring the gifts and other extra stuff to his apartment to help him wrap them. with this, bokuto came up with an idea to wrap the presents in the most creative way possible, and you just stare at him in awe as he tries to disguise the mug as.. a gingerbread man?? you don’t even know how he did it! as you tape up the finishing touches with the others, you eye a small gift wrapped box on the island counter along with a card next to it, all glittery and a name scribbled on top that you can’t make out where you were seated. 

“hey, bo, who’s that for?” you point at the suspecting box, and almost immediately bokuto body slams you on the ground, obstructing your view of the gift. “bokuto i can’t breathe—” you wheeze, laughing at the way he scrambles to get up from the position but his feet slips against the unused wrapping paper on the floor. “sorry, sorry i just— STOP LOOKING” he pleads, caging you with his arms either side your figure. the both of you pause, realizing the predicament you’re in until bokuto unleashes a sly smirk, eyes pointed at you with a mischievous glint. you know that look, so you start wiggling out of his way until he plops down on you again (mind you, he’s MANY inches taller than you and his built...whew, but that’s part of the problem right now!!) and blows raspberries on your neck, the audacity!! “tell me,” he whispers against your ear after a while, voice suddenly low in tone and your senses perk up. “have you been naughty or nice recently?” he continues hoarsely, and it doesn’t take long until you burst out laughing at his attempt of being flirty right now. he finally releases you, feigns hurt from your reaction but he knows what a goofball he is.

anyway, you put all the gifts in the car and head to the many parties he was invited to!! and honestly, you enjoyed yourself albeit it got really tiring to show up with much enthusiasm compared to the last. but bokuto on the other hand never runs out of energy for some reason!! he’s still winning the games, singing his heart out with his friends, and trying all the foods in the potluck, even shamelessly!! feeding you too! it’s embarrassing >< but in a way your heart swells with the thought of bokuto being very openly proud of his relationship with you, and how his friends seem to like you as well! pictures were taken, holiday spirits and gifts were exchanged and finally, he’s free for the night <3 you’ve been waiting for the right moment to give him your personal gift to your boyf (it’s an edited picture of the two of you at one of his winning games!! you can’t draw for sht but you are the best at adding lil stickers and cute petnames all around the photo hehe) you had it inserted in a picture frame too so the gift was relatively medium sized and rectangular. when you crash at his place, you ready yourself to give it to him, having second thoughts with how corny it must seem like… as you psych yourself up on the couch, you feel his arms suddenly wrap themselves around you as he starts peppering your neck with lazy kisses. your chest tightens, eyes closed at the warmth of his lips on your skin but— you can’t get distracted!! “bo, i have something for you—” “i saved the best gift for last—” o, you say it at the same time and so you look at each other with blank stares, and then laugh at your awkwardness!! 

he lets you go first, your nerves slowly dissipating at the excited gleam in his irises, he’s so cute!! as he unwraps it, he hitches a breath, looks at you then the picture and you again and— let’s say your face was just full on bokuto territory only ;-) as much as you were enjoying his attention all on you, his gift wasn’t opened yet!! bokuto went from confident to shy mode again, hiding his face with only one eye peeking out to watch you…. for some reason, since it was a tiny box you blurted out, “don’t tell me it’s a ring, bo.” as a joke but bokuto suddenly freezes at your words. and you had to stop unboxing to make sure he doesn’t go all pale on you, but also??? was he really???? GOING TO???-- “DID YOU WANT ME TO GET YOU A RING?? I CAN RETURN THE EARRINGS TODAY, I THINK I STILL HAVE THE RECEIPT—” “bo, it’s okay!!! omg no T_T” you take his hands off his face to look at him lovingly, a kiss on his pouty lips as you reassure him his presence is all that you can ever want, but whatever it was he gave you, you’ll cherish just the same!! so finally, once you take the lid off the box you see an adorable pair of owl earrings!! it’s so cute and it reminds you of him and thats probably why he got that for you :’)))) “i also wrote you a letter but please read it when i’m asleep or something…” aww shy bokuto!! >< you never thought you’d see the day :’)

kuroo tetsurou

୨୧ ˻˳˯ₑ*॰¨̮  man.. i just know this guy wouldn’t want to let leave… the bed… with him… on christmas day. imagine something like having to stay until he can for his duties at work which ended up til late christmas eve :( you were looking forward to spending time with him back at his hometown since you don’t necessarily celebrate the specific holiday, but being with tetsurou for almost a year now and knowing he does— you wanted it to be special and memorable for him! he felt really bad making you stay at his apartment until he finishes up work, really zooming through all the documents and stuff he needed to complete just so he can spend at least a few hours of christmas eve with you. when he got home, his heart dropped to his stomach at the sight of you falling asleep on the couch, right next to the lit up christmas tree you two decorated a week ago (thats how busy he has been! you opted to fix the tree yourself, but tetsu insisted on doing it together since it’s your first holiday with him!). your favorite blanket was wrapped around you but your feet were dangling midway with no socks on and he just >:( had to carry you to bed and tuck you in— all of you!! 

he changes to a sweater and pjs before readying himself to carry you against his chest. his own body is exhausted from working non-stop, but he doesn’t let it get to him as he passes by the hallway and plops you gently on your side of the bed. you stir groggily, eyes refusing to open but you notice your surroundings are different. the room is dimly lit but the figure walking around the place isn’t amiss; with his hair sticking up and his wide shoulders, you know it’s your tired boyfriend finally home for the holidays. you smile, still sleep-induced but you try to reach over for him. “tetsu… come to bed, please,” you mumble but he hears you, and his back is against you but he smiles at your half-awake tone. “i’ll be right there,” he lets you know softly, and true to his word you feel the dip in the mattress with his warmth slowly exuding onto your own body, his hands easily finding themselves over you. you wiggle into his grasp, head against his chest and hands holding onto his waist. he feels warm, he feels like home, and you press a kiss where his neck meets his collarbones. “mm, merry christm…” you mutter, losing consciousness but he doesn’t mind. he lets you snore your way into dreamland, watching your eyelashes tickle the surface of your skin, lips partly open as you breathe in and out. suddenly, his tense muscles relax with your presence oh so close to you, and he sleeps soundly after a few minutes of admiring your face.

as the sunlight filters thru the windows, kuroo wakes up first but knowing it’s his day off (finally), he relaxes into the bed and just observes the tiny details of your face, same as the night before but with some of the brightly shining rays of the sun hitting the right spots— you’re breathtaking to him. he feels you stir in his embrace so he pretends to snore because he knows you like to get up as soon as you feel awake. “tetsu…” you mumble, popping out your head from his grasp to peer your eyes at him pretending to not hear you. “you’re a lousy liar, i know you’re up,” you tell him, rubbing your nose against him as a form of an eskimo kiss. it takes so much out of his restraint to bite his lip in pure love for you, so he gives in and kisses you on the lips. 

you are taken aback for a split second until you comply to his request, and you spend your first christmas morning with him in bed just like that <3 he still asks if you guys can spend the whole day just tangled into each other’s embrace but you lecture him playfully, knowing that he had a christmas party to attend to in the afternoon with his closest friends (bokuto, akaashi, kenma, and others) and you have a lovely dinner planned in the evening. he wiggles his eyebrows, fingertips tracing the exposed skin on your chest, “what if we skip all of that and i just have you for dinner instead?” “KUROO TETSUROU IT IS TOO EARLY FOR YOU TO SAY THAT RIGHT NOW—” you swear to god, it is his teasing and malicious intent that will kill you one day. but the blush on your face doesn’t go unnoticed, and yet kuroo complies with your light nagging, getting up and getting ready for the day. you’re happy that he finally has the day off, and being with his friends during the party truly lightened up his mood. afterwards, he then asks where you got a reservation during the busiest time of the year, and you just winked at him and zipped your mouth. 

since you ate a bit at the party, you knew you had some time to finish prepping the food you had prepared the night before, it all just needed to bake or be cooked on the pan. and bec of his exhaustion last night, he didn’t even open the fridge at all so there were zero suspicious at your surprise dinner. urging him to take a long, hot bath, he drags you with him. “you seriously want me to take a bath by myself?” he says in shock horror, and normally you would join him hah but you tell him that your parents are calling, just wanting to say hello. a little sad, kuroo nods in understanding and so he goes about his way while you cook the food with haste. he likes to take his time in there but you know you won’t finish beforehand, so once he’s out of the bathroom, you immediately go right in front of him to hide the view of the kitchen. you played yourself, seeing kuroo only in his bathrobe with his chest exposed, you slap him right at the center to ignore the sensation in the pit of your stomach. “what?? what’d i do???” “existing right in front of me like that!!” kuroo laughs at your embarrassment, but kisses you on the forehead nonetheless. he ignores the obvious smell of pasta and chicken in the apartment, ignores the messy apron you forgot to take off because he thinks you really wanted to surprise him. so he goes to the room to change, thinking about how lucky he is to have you in his life. the rest of the night ends up with the both of you having a romantic dinner in the dining room, talking about everything you already know about each other—but it never feels repetitive. he always feels so renewed with you, falling in love every day. 

[lettersnorth]

Flowers for Wyda

Cravendy had left another letter on Lin’s door - meandering paragraphs that asked about how she was doing, what she was up to, and then letting her know how Dirtpatch was faring. As the paper was running out of space, Cravs had fit what she really wanted to ask in a narrow sliver sandwiched between small talk and the edge of the page. ‘I’m going to visit the Isles of Umbra to visit Wyda. Meet me at Aleport if you want to come along, and bring flowers.’

Cravendy waits by the docks, the sun burning high in the clear skies. In her right hand, she holds a bouquet of slightly wilted wildflowers, though at the center of it is a metal rose twisted from wire.

For the whole length of the letter that Lin found on her door, it was the last few lines, squished in along the bottom of the parchment that packed the punch and scatter the rest of the words like so much chaff. Not to take anything away from the work done to Dirtpatch or the strides the villagers had made. But some things simply hit harder than others. And this, Aislinn had learned, would always be one of them. So at the appointed time she arrives on Aleport's dock, her own bundle of flowers, a collection of pastels, held in the crook of her arm. Bright, happy, cheerful colors someone like her had no business holding but did nevertheless. Catching sight of Cravendy, she makes her way over to the woman and manages a sort of smile. A sketch of one, anyroads. "Got your letter." she says by way of greeting.

Cravendy turns at the sound of Lin’s voice and similarly forces a smile onto her own face. Ever present was an anxiety hooked between her heart and her throat, one that pushed her to expect the worst. To expect Lin to not show up. But it was often proven wrong, and seeing Lin brought a sense of relief to Cravs.

“Aye, and I see ye brought flowers. Are ye ready to push off?” Cravs gestures to a boat behind her. It’s the same one that had delivered them to Dirtpatch several times before, though this time, it would embark on a voyage to somewhere darkly familiar.

Aislinn glances at the boat, the question settling like lead in the pit of her stomach though for Cravendy's sake she bravely attempts to hold her barely there smile in place. Something very dark flickered in the back of the woman's eyes. She hadn't stepped foot on Umbra since that day. "Ready as a person can be." she said with a bright patch of honesty. Nevertheless, she nods. "Let's head out."

Cravendy nods and goes to step down onto the boat, balance naturally found on the rocking vessel. She can tell Lin is nervous, because Cravs is as well. The Isles had only been regarded at a safe distance, as shadows on the horizon since that day. But today, they would walk back into that place. Once the anchor is raised and the sails are drawn, she turns to offer a hand to Lin to help her step onto the boat as well. To go on this journey, together.

Inhaling a breath, Aislinn takes Cravendy's offered hand briefly. Her hop into the boat feeling filled with a sense of finality. A tacit agreement that yes, she would do this and no, there would be no turning back. She sets her bundle of flowers down carefully in one of the ship's holds, along with Cravendy's own and goes about helping the Seawolf shove off and make way. She thinks about making small talk but she never was very good at that sort of thing even at the best of times. So she settles for something direct. "Was it the lanterns Dirtpatch released that brought this to mind?"

“That was the trigger. But...I’ve always wanted to come back here. Been too scared to do so until now, but...” Cravs trails off, careful to not let her worries soak into her voice.

The ride over is quiet, the winds calm. Just saltwater splashing gently against the wooden body of the boat. And the Isles are, as usual, an eerily haunted place. Like stepping into an old overgrown garden that had once been loved...though the memories attached to this place were not of love, but of pain.

The exact spot where the battle had taken place is untouched. Where a fireball had turned sand into glass pincushion, where sections of the cliff had been chipped off - it’s all still there, though worn by time. However, one thing is different. To the side is a pile of sand with blue forget-me-nots growing around it in spirals. At its center is a stick with a red ribbon tied to it, blowing slightly in the wind.

Cravendy fidgets with her bunch of flowers. Now that she’s here...now that she’s here? Maybe she wasn’t ready to face this.

By now Aislinn was no stranger to stepping into difficult situations. This was all at once no different and nowhere near the same. As they moved in tandem across the gloaming beach, she breathed easy, slow breaths, her footsteps moving almost of their own accord until suddenly, they were there. She froze then, staring at the battle-scarred cliff face, the crater of glass and for a moment she can feel the heat of the fire, the rush as the aether leaves her and her shields shatter, Rising and Rolanda yelling and then...darkenss. Swiftly, she shakes her head as though tossing off something truly unpleasant. She refocuses on Cravendy, noting her shifting movements. "Not exactly easy to stand here, is it?" she murmurs. "With it all almost the same way we left it." she pauses and notes the flowers and ribbon with a furrowed brow. "Except for that. Where did that come from?" She approaches the spiral of blue flowers slowly, the sight of them by far a greater comfort to look at than anything else here.

Cravendy focuses on the shape of the fluttering ribbon and brings a hand up to her own. Of course, they had been here to clean up. Cravs had known that Percy and Barnable, old crewmates, were cured of their tempering, that they went to the east to chase down their errant captain. If only she was strong enough to be here earlier. “I think my old crewmates came ‘ere. This is both Wyda’s and Dot’s resting spot, after all,” she says, and the sound of her own voice surprises her. That there’s any voice at all. She steps over and kneels down to observe the flowers. It was unusual for these to be growing in sand and salt water.

Aislinn is quiet a moment as she lets that sink in, a tumult of emotion barely contained beneath a tightening of her lips. Nothing more. She understood she only knew a small fraction of Red Argos story and it was likely the poorest part. Instead, she reaches down and settles her bundle of flowers next to the stake. Cravendy shadows Lin’s movement, placing her own bouquet next to the other woman’s. The silence of the Isles unsettles her, like it ought to be filled with something other than cold sand. That she needs to fill the air with something warm. Cravs leans back and takes a seat, as if having a picnic with the marker. “I’m sorry it came to this, and that I came so late. I was so scared of makin’ a mistake, it was like I was paralyzed. Wouldn’t do anythin’, or worse, I’d...” Cravs swallows, mouth feeling dry all of the sudden. But she carries on talking to the grave. “But bein’ scared doesn’t change the outcome. That by not makin’ a choice, I was makin’ one anyway. One where I did nothin’.”

Cravendy sighs and shifts her head to the left, now addressing Lin. “I’ve been tryin’ to do good with this life I’ve got. The one Wyda gave to me. And I’ve been tryin’ to come to terms with everythin’ that’s ‘appened. I still remember what ye said that day. Accept that it ‘appened, move on. There’s only did and didn’t ‘appen. Maybe it’s the only way of ‘ealin’. To accept that they’re gone, that it was bad. To accept the...permanence of the past.”

Aislinn stands silent as Cravendy addressed the grave, her gaze fixed on the red ribbon fluttering softly in the breeze. Her head turns ever so slighty in Cravendy's direction as the Seawolf speaks to her. The churning depth of feeling forcing her to press her hands to her stomach, to take measure and try to translate the ache within into words. "It's not so easy as that though, is it?" she replies. "Acceptance and moving on. Like I can stuff it in a box, lock the lid and never look back on it. You weren't wrong either, that day on the range. That's what I was trying to do. But acceptance doesn't mean forgetting."

She sighs softly and sits down next to Cravendy, shifting in her seat. "I miss her. I know she'd have a lot to say about some of the things I'd catch her up on. Things I'd confide in her." her gaze flickered to Cravendy and then away, embarrassed. "Sometimes I try to imagine what advice she would give me. What jest she might come up with to make it all seem silly. How she'd laugh in delight and tease me about some things right about now." Another soft sigh escapes her. "I'll admit my imagination is a poor substitute. I'm too serious by half."

“At first, I thought healin’ was meant forgettin’. That otherwise, ye’d be burnin’ with the full pain of it all, forever. And that was the only way ye could pay back the fallen,,” Cravs notes. A pang of shame stings her, as denial had brought Wyda into existence. She shakes her head, disappointment weighing heavily on her shoulders. “But it’s not like that. Ye never forget or stop missin’ someone, and healin’ is simply...well. It’s just like ‘ow Dirtpatch rebuilt itself, but the scars are still there. Ye may as well refer to it as existin’ instead. We live and carry on.”

Cravendy Hound catches the small look Lin sends her way. “Ye really are too serious for yer own good. I’ll be sure to grab ye on whatever bullshitery I get myself into, to mix things up for ye. To remind ye I’m ‘ere.” She grins slightly. “Oh, and, I’ve been meanin’ to ask...’ow ‘ave ye farin’? Somethin’ keepin’ ye busy as of late?”

Aislinn nods slowly. "I think I like that way of looking at it. People we lose leave a scar and we're changed. But we don't forget where the scar came from." As Cravendy affirms her earlier observation, she puffs out a breath. "Suppose if another person sees it, it must be true. Some bullshittery might do me good." As for the question, she pauses unsure how Cravendy would respond to her idea she feared she was becoming akin to a bad luck charm. She shakes her head. "Office work for Heartwood's been keeping me at the House. That and the clinic. I'm sorry I missed the last bit of work at Dirtpatch. But they're up and running now?"

Cravendy Hound: “Aye, better than before, really. The place has become quite the fishin’ ‘ub, and the docks ‘ave never been busier. Although I told them it was fine, they were adamant about payin’ ‘eartwood back financially for the rebuildin’ support. So expect a check from them every now and again.” Cravendy sniffs, and it's followed by a shiver. Lin was just Lin, and she looked fine. But something seemed off. Cravs can’t put a finger on what she’s feeling though. “Are ye sure yer okay? Don’t ‘ave a fever or somethin’?”

Aislinn's 'tsk' sounds sharp in the soft silence surrounding them. It's in response to hearing Dirtpatch is going to be sending gil Heartwood's way. "Suppose we can turn around and take that money to buy fish or somesuch from them, maybe twice above asking or do you think they'd see that coming?" she pauses and sends a calculating look Cravendy's way. "Maybe ask Bertram to do the buying. That way it doesn't look like its coming from Heartwood."

As Cravendy presses, Lin leans back a bit. As if doing so could keep the Seawolf from sensing what she knows the woman must be sensing. The corrupted aether she's storing like some living, breathing cursed relic. "Maybe I'm a bit off considering where we are and all." it wasn't exactly a lie, she told herself. Therefore she wasn't -exactly- a hypocrite and it still would never come as easy to her as some people she knew. She comforted herself with this logic. This was different!

Cravendy Hound: “And what would we do with all that fish? If we eat it day in day out, I’m sure someone’ll file a complaint,” Cravs jests, a smile spreading on her face as she imagines the halls being filled with buckets of excess seafood. “And Dirtpatch’ll see what we’re doin’ anyway. Maybe, we could...buy their fish, and sell it in Gridania for them. That way it’ll ‘elp get them more customers. But I do like the idea of sendin’ Bertram to do it. Full time fish courier, heh. What a job title.”

Cravendy plainly takes what Lin says at face value. It seemed a reasonable explanation, and who wouldn’t feel off given the circumstances surrounding this place? Cravs nods. “Aye well. If whatever yer feelin’ gets worse, let me know, alright? Ain’t good to let somethin’ bad fester...believe me. I know.” Aislinn finds she can't look directly at Cravendy as she nods in what should be a wordless agreement to not let something like this fester. Affirming it with words seemed a step too far into 'definite lies' territory.

Cravendy sighs, eyes fixed to the flowers they’ve left on the sand. The truth was, Cravs felt there was something off with herself as well. She had chalked it up to being primal-puppeted for the past year, and had always assumed it’d go away eventually. But it didn’t. “Maybe I’m the one who’s off, and not ye? I know we’ve been talkin’ about ‘ealin’ and everything, but there’s something...wrong.” "Wrong how?" Aislinn asks, shifting her attention to Cravendy once more. "With you?"

Cravendy Hound: “Funnily enough, not with me, but...” Cravs hesitates, After all this talk of carrying on, to bring this up would be like ripping the wound open again. Or, at the very least, would make her sound like a broken record. “Okay, just so ye don’t think I’m crazy. All this stuff we’ve said? It sunk in, alright? Ye can’t bring back the dead, nor should ye.”

Cravendy scratches the back of her head, deciding to just go for it. “But no, not with me. But with...Wyda? I get that she’s gone, but...I don’t know. I can’t put my finger on it.”

Cravendy Hound: “Ye know what, there’s definitely somethin’ wrong with me. I definitely ‘ave more than a few marbles loose,” Cravs jokes as she kicks her legs out and leans back.

Aislinn didn't think it needed to be said. "Of course you don't bring back the dead." Whether or not one -could-, well, that was a different story and Lin knew very well what black magic could do. She felt a shudder slide all the way down her spine. "What do you mean...wrong with Wyda? How...why do you think its something to do with her and not...I don't know." Aislinn was traveling into deep waters she knew next to nothing about. "You shared the same space, didn't you? Could it be something residual to do with that?"

Aislinn North shifted to face Cravendy fully now.

Cravendy Hound: “I...never really put this into words. I don’t really know, it’s just a feelin’, and it’s ‘ard to tease out when exactly it started. When yer ‘ands are full from keepin’ yerself together, ye don’t keep track of the details.” Cravs shrugs to herself. “But now that things ‘ave gotten better on my side, I noticed it. Kinda like when ye can sometimes ‘ear a ‘igh pitched sound ringin’ in yer ears, and other times, not ‘ear it at all.”

Cravendy meets eyes with Lin for a second, but finds the stare a little too intense to hold for too long. “I’m probably just bein’ paranoid.”

Aislinn doesn't know what to make of what Cravendy is telling her. Logically, -logically-, she knows it can't be Wyda and she tamps down any wild speculation before it can even begin. She won't let herself go there. She turns and watches the ribbon tethered to the stake dance in the breeze. But then again, Wyda herself was impossible, wasn't she? A primal. "I...don't know what to say to that. Other than to say intuition is a hell of a thing. You said something's off. Don't ignore that. I'm...just not sure what it would have to do with Wyda."

Cravendy‘s gaze falls to the small blue flowers dotted around the grave. “Yer right. I just don’t know ‘ow to act on this feelin’ yet, since it’s so vague and all. And maybe this is just what it’s like to miss someone.” But missing someone didn’t mean their skills were transferred to you. And if the person was dead, it didn’t usually entail worrying about their well being. Cravs grumbles something about sleeping earlier today and gets up.

Cravendy Hound: “Ye know, now that we’ve been ‘ere awhile, it’s not as dauntin’ anymore. Still sad, but that’s fine.” Cravs brushes the sand off of her arms and legs, then holds a hand out to Lin to help her up. “Time to ‘ead back?”

A low noise comes from Aislinn's throat that says that though she couldn't agree entirely with Cravendy, as long as she remained focused on the flowers and the ribbon, she could see how it might not appear to be so bad. Taking the Seawolf's hand, she heaves herself up with a word of thanks. "Yeah...time to head back." she agrees as she likewise brushes the sand from her clothes.

"This was a good idea, Cravendy. Coming out here. I think she would have liked it." She takes one last look at the spiral of forget-me-nots and the ribboned stake with the addition of the flowers they had brought. With a breath, she nods to the makeshift grave and turns to join Cravendy on their way back to the ship.