#their friendship means the world to me actually

[fairyhaos]

◈ love of my life // yoon jeonghan

jeonghan x gn!reader, 2k+ words

tags: technically requested by lots of people bc everyone wants jeonghan fluff, childhood friends to lovers, fluff, crack, mutual pining, almost-confessions

warnings: light swearing

summary: in which your relationship with jeonghan isn't exactly platonic and isn't exactly romantic... but rather, it's a secret third thing.

It has to be at least two in the morning when Jeonghan's ringtone blares throughout his bedroom, and he rolls over with a groan, grappling blindly at his nightstand before finding his phone and pressing it against his cheek. 

“Who is this and what do you want?”

“Jeonghan, let's go on a date.”

He recognises your voice in an instant, even in his half-asleep state, and he huffs a laugh, flopping back against the pillows and rubbing his eyes. 

“Gee, at least ask me when it's not ass o'clock in the morning, won't you?”

“No, no, this only works if you get up right now,” you say. “Come on, Jeonghan, just go on a date with me. Right at this very moment.”

Jeonghan rubs his eyes, before taking his phone away from his cheek and peering at the screen so he can read the time. “See, you’re not presenting a very good argument,” he says, once he’s put the phone against his ear again. It’s almost three in the morning. What are you thinking? “I don’t wanna date you that much.”

You make a sad sound on the other end of the phone. “What will it take to get you out of the house?”

“Wire me an obscene amount of money right now and I’ll think about it.”

There’s a pause.

“No. Best I can offer is a pretty please.”

Jeonghan can’t help smiling at your dry tone, and he rubs his eyes once again with a yawn. “Fine. I guess I can’t expect anything better from you, anyway.” He can almost see you biting your lip in annoyance, wanting to quip something witty back at him but also wanting to keep quiet so he’ll actually come. 

“You know me so well.”

“Yes I do,” Jeonghan teases, and groggily hauls himself out of bed. “I’ll be ready in ten. Where do you want me to go?”

“Don’t worry, princess, I’ll pick you up,” you say, suddenly sounding excited. “Just wait for me and I’ll come over to take you out.”

Jeonghan raises an eyebrow. “Is that a threat?”

You laugh, bright and happy, like it’s not four in the morning and you’ve asked your best friend to go on a date with you. Jeonghan can’t help but smile again, even as he grapples blindly through his dark room to find some clothes.

“Don’t worry. It’s a promise.”

───────────── 🌘

Jeonghan is, admittedly, more than a little confused when you just take him to the nearest playground.

Sure, maybe this entire thing is weird—you calling him up during ridiculous hours of the morning to “go on a date” is definitely not something you’ve done before—but that’s just the kind of friendship he and you have. 

It’s like how, last year, he spent an entire month calling you increasingly ridiculous pet names, ranging from “beloved” to “honey butter snuggles bunny bear”, and purposefully took you out to public cafes and restaurants to test them out for everyone to see and hear, preventing you from punching him as hard as he probably deserved. 

So this is, like, nothing new. Just a funny and silly thing the two of you do, because you've known each other for the whole of your lives, and when it comes to the way your relationship works, the lines separating “platonic” and “romantic” have always been curiously nonexistent. 

It doesn’t mean anything. It’s never meant to mean anything.

But sometimes, sometimes, it feels like it should.

“I think I’m going to end up alone forever,” you say abruptly, and Jeonghan looks over at you in surprise. You’re sitting on the swings next to him, dragging yourself back and forth as you look up at the sky. There’s nothing to see up there, with the clouds obscuring any moonlight, so it's obvious that you're just looking away so he can't see your face. 

It's so quiet; Jeonghan didn't realise that the world could be this quiet at 2 in the morning, and it makes your words echo extra loud into the abyss, before they're swallowed by the darkness. 

Jeonghan shrugs. “Maybe you will.”

Instantly, you're leaning over to swat him on the arm, and he laughs. 

“Asshole,” you say, but there's no venom in your voice, even as you level him with a glare. “You're really no help. I'm trying to unload all my deepest fears for you, here, practically begging you to reassure me, and yet all you can do is be mean.”

“You said one thing,” Jeonghan points out. “I don't think that counts as unloading all your deepest fears.”

“Yeah, well, maybe it's my only deepest fear.”

“Why are you unloading your deepest fear on me?” Jeonghan asks, kicking his legs out in front of him. “We're on a date. Our first date, mind you, so this hardly seems appropriate.”

“Asshole,” you say again, but like before, the word has no bite. You glance over at him, before realising that he's looking at you, and then quickly raise your gaze to the sky. “I'm being serious about this, you know.”

Jeonghan says nothing for a long moment. Watches the way the pale light from a nearby lamppost gives you an unearthly, almost otherworldly glow. 

“I'm being serious too,” he decides to say, looking up at the cloudy sky with you. “You shouldn't be saying that stuff on a first date. Kinda makes it sound like you don't think things will work out between us, you know?”

You huff a confused laugh, looking over at him again. “Jeonghan, wha—?”

“And maybe you will end up alone,” he carries on, thoughtfully, as if he's talking to himself, forgetting that you're sitting there too. “But maybe you won't. I think you probably won't. And even if you do, it's fine, because I'll still be with you.”

It's a painfully vulnerable thing to say, made doubly so by the quietness of the night. Like a love confession, almost. Except it's not, because he's not in love with you. 

He isn't. 

“That's really sweet,” you say, almost begrudgingly, as if it pains you to admit that Jeonghan actually said something nice, and he laughs. “Though wrong. If you’re with me, then I'm not alone, am I?”

“Oh, I see. When you said alone, you meant in general. I thought you meant, like, romantically.”

“Well, maybe. But maybe I also meant overall,” you shrug. “I didn't think you'd want to spend the rest of your life with me.”

Jeonghan swallows, tilts back on the swings, head still raised to look at the sky. “I want to spend every life with you.”

You look away from the sky at his words, turning to face him in surprise. The echoes of what he’d just said were already fading away, muffled and pressed into the velvet dark of the night, but the surprisingly soft air that followed in its wake still remained.

 Now, he's the one avoiding your gaze, keeping his eyes firmly locked on the shapeless, misty blur of clouds above him so he doesn’t have to look at you. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see you tilt your head, and smile. 

“Oh, look at you, you sap,” you say, bright and teasing. “Face it, you like being with me. Oh! I bet you're in love with me, seeing as how you agreed to date me and everything! Isn't that right, Jeonghan? You love me.”

Jeonghan pulls a face, and you burst into laughter, so ridiculously loud and happy even though it's two in the morning and the whole playground is silent, the sound of your happiness ringing against the cool air of the night. He can't help but look at you then, exasperated and fond, shaking his head as you grip the swing chains and sway back and forth, still giggling to yourself. 

He sniffs, feigning annoyance as he leans to the side, making a dramatic show of pulling his swing away from you. 

“This isn't a real date. I could never date you.” He scrunches his face in faux disgust for good measure, and you laugh again, rolling your eyes. 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. And yet you still came out when I called, didn't you?” you tease, smiling widely, and Jeonghan has to admit that you're right. He's here because you asked him to be here. He’s here for you.

Hm. This was getting weirdly soul-baringly truthful for what he’d thought would be a silly little hangout in the middle of the night.

“Next time you call me at 2am, I’m blocking you forever,” he says dryly, giving you an exaggerated look of disdain just so he can revel in the laugh that it pulls out of you.

“No you won’t,” you say cheerily. “Because you looove me.”

“Um, lies.”

“No lies. You literally love me so much.”

“I don’t.”

“You do.”

“No, I don’t.”

“You do. You do, you do, you do, you’re actually genuinely in love with me and there’s nothing you can do to deny it, because it’s so obvious that I’m literally the love of your l—”

Jeonghan makes a clicking sound with his tongue and leans over to shove your arm, causing you to swing to the side as you cackle with delight at his reaction. He glares at you, again, sighing with exasperation as you continue to laugh.

“Yes, yes, I love you, just as much as you love me. Now if we’re not actually doing anything of importance, then can I go home?”

“What?” you say indignantly. “Of course not! If I can’t sleep, then that means you’re not allowed to sleep either.”

“I knew it. You called me out here because you couldn’t fall asleep.”

“Duh. Now come and push my swing, will you?”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes and stands up from his swing, groaning and holding his knees like he’s some kind of grumpy grandpa. You laugh, mocking him for his bad joints as he walks around to stand behind you, and he snarks back something ridiculously funny and rippling with light, twisting through the cool air.

And then his hand presses against the small of your back, soft and yet sure, and suddenly all you can focus on is that gentle, feathery point of contact that connects you to him.

Your laughter subsides as he begins to gently push your swing, and you move up, and down, and up, and down, the fleeting warmth of his hand an intermittent pressure against your back. He doesn’t say a word. Everything is quiet, in your head. Like his touch alone could silence any worries that still floated around in your brain.

It’s one of the things you adore most about Jeonghan. He makes you feel safe.

“For the record, by the way,” you say, voice quiet, “I really do love you.”

There’s no noise but the metallic creak of the swing, sounding weirdly small in the yawning abyss of the dark. Jeonghan’s hand is still steady as he pushes you, again and again.

“As a friend?” he asks, eventually.

You can’t see him, and maybe that’s for the best. His voice is tinged with a colour, an emotion, that you can’t quite name, warm and cool and fleeting and present all at once.

Yet more silence greets his words. You continue swinging, and he continues helping.

It’s hard to know what he means by that. As a friend, in a hopeful way? As a friend, in a meaningful way? Or as a friend, in a way that could maybe, maybe, signal that he thinks, or wishes, that you mean... something else.

More.

These things are difficult to tell, when it comes to Jeonghan. Who wears his heart on his sleeve and yet also hides it away where no one can see.

“Yeah,” you say, after it has been far too long since he’d asked, but it’s clear that you were both waiting for your answer anyway. The word leaves you as a sigh, threadbare and thin. “As a friend.”

Jeonghan huffs a soft laugh. Maybe because he believes you, or maybe because he doesn’t. You’re not too sure.

“Okay,” he murmurs, pale as moonlight. “In which case, I love you too.”

fics tags: @jeonginssa @weird-bookworm @minhui896 @slytherinshua @haowrld @belladaises @moonlitskiiies @mirxzii @zozojella @kawennote09 @a-wandering-stay @abibliolife @doublasting @wonranghaeee @icyminghao @sweet-like-caramel @your-yxnnie @odxrilove @kyeomyun @crackedpumpkin @jeonride @kellesvt @eightlightstar @onlyyjeonghan @aaniag @starshuas @raevyng @isabellah29 @hrts4hanniehae @mcu-incorrect @dokyeomkyeom @suraandsugar @haodore @tulsa24 @melodicrabbit

[httpserb]

okay so while i work on chapter 2 (I'm so sorry its late I'm a highschool senior with 4 ap classes, 2 gifted classes, and insomnia. I'm trying my best i swear) I'm going to give out some content and stuff like things to expect in the fic this is friendships/relationships that will kage will experience with small explanations :D (these are out of order)

lev & kage - ok so I plan on having miwa and alisa get together so i find it funny if they were awkward but lev immediately attaches to kage and they're like brothers

akaashi & kage & kenma - ok so they're all introverted and i know kenma and akaashi are cool but like i can see akaashi realize kage is mean or angry just really awkward and weird at times so he recommends him to join his and kenma's game nights and one Minecraft world later they're all attached at the hip

atsumu & osamu & kage - originally i think atsu and kage have a rivalry and mutual respect for each other until atsu realizes samu and kage are good friends (bc kage is always eating samu's curry rice balls, he has become samu unofficial food tester lol) and atsu is obvi trying to be the better twin so they end up getting closer at setters like a more equal standing unlike oikawa & kage or suag & kage who were mentors (in a way looking at you sideways oikawa bc your teaching methods were ... interesting [don't misintterupt this i love oikawa])

ushijima & kage - ok so they're both autistic, you'd have to rip that headcannon out my dead cold hands, and i can see ushijima watching kage and realizing 'oh he is like me' and they just connect like bluetooth

kyotani & kage - i actually love them bc they're both similar to me (i also find oikawa and kyotani's relationship interesting as he is in personality and raw talent and skill similar to kage and ik oikawa felt threatened cb kage was a setter but him moving along with you after the kitagawa incident is very interesting tbh) anyways i imagine they'd accidently connect like at the same gym and bond by shitting on oikawa (i imagine he'd want to hit some of kage's kingly tosses too)

yachi & kage - wlw & mlm solidarity, i love them sm, yachi realizing after seeing kage awkwardly attempt to pet a cat that he is really cute but in a sibling or little kid way so she can no longer find him scary but gets protective and explains social situations for him when he doesn't understand

coach ukai & kage - i imagine while coach takeda was hinata's coach, coach ukai was kage's bc he was blunt in a way kage understood and no extra words for needed, plus i like to think they were both very honest which each other so if ukai said kage was messing up he'd be upset but believe him and take a break

kage & tsuki - so i stand by the fact kage is smart but in odd strangely specific ways like physics but not general science and math and tsuki finds out and loses his shit bc kage is lowkey better than him but doesn't do anything with this, this kinda begins their actual friendship tho bc kage gets to talk about physics (esp astrophysic his favorite bc his dad's job [a personal headcannon])

kogane & kage - kogane worshipping the ground kage walks on bc he is such a good setter and kage trying to help teach kogane but he isn't good with words but despite this kogane understands him somehow!?

kuroo & kage - i think kuroo would recognize kage as someone similar to kenma but not only that but as hinata's best friend and as kenma's best friend who is friends with hinata he'd do some mental math to become kage's friend. plus i think he'd (like tsuki) recognize kage is dumb, but smart in different ways and try to draw it out of him (he also finds it funny to adopt/befriend all the karasuno first years [he has plans for yachi & yama])

tendou & kage - took one look and thought him and ushijima are of the same breed so he could befriend him (probably) but other than that i think tendou being seen as scary or freakish, even being referred to as a monster could relate to kage and his king od the court incident so maybe they'd bond through that ok that is all i can think of rn and if a friendship isn't on here it's because it probably something I'm already going to do. this list was mostly headcannon or me taking a small relationship, blowing it up, then putting it under a microscope for personal enjoyment

(here is some food: @youwerethedefeated @infinitemilk @ushouldwatchhaikyuu @kagehiner @cosmorom @greynoceur)

[myoonmii]

Edwin doesn't really understand the concept but he is very enthusiastic!!

[unclewaynemunson]

Pt2 to this post

'Is something wrong?' Nancy asks, not long after the two of them have taken their familiar spots on the hood of Steve's car. They're basking in what might be the last warm sunlight of the year, looking out over the quarry, at a safe distance from the edge.

It's become a tradition the two of them share, ever since they reconnected back in March. It calms them both, to just sit here and take in the view, no one around but each other. Nancy is one of the few people Steve can share a comfortable silence with: sometimes they sit here quietly for what feels like hours, side by side, listening to music or to nothing but the birds singing around them. But they also have their best conversations here: it's the place where Nancy entrusted him she wanted to break up with Jonathan; it's the place where they talked about their shared past and decided they would always love each other as friends; it's the place where they finally talked about Barbara in a way they couldn't when they were younger. It's where Nancy talked about the ghosts still haunting her and Steve talked about how lonely he sometimes felt.

Steve huffs. 'How did you guess?'

'When you frown, you always do it with your whole face,' Nancy notes. 'So it's hard to miss, really.'

Steve glances at her side profile. There's a serenity to her features that's still relatively new. It means she's healing, slowly learning how to be happy again. It means she stopped waiting for the end of the world and started believing in a real future again. It makes Steve proud of how far they both have come.

'I had a fight with Eddie,' he confesses. 'And with Dustin, I guess.'

'What happened?'

He sighs. 'It's complicated.'

'Wanna tell me about it?'

The look in her eyes is kind and inviting. Steve hesitates. He wants to, but he doesn't know if he can. It's a risk. It's scary.

But he can't imagine Nancy Wheeler ever being careless with his secrets. He can't imagine her judging him, can't imagine her being as small-minded as most people in this town.

He was planning on telling her anyway, because things had been going so well with Eddie lately and – no, he shouldn't think about that right now. But maybe it would actually be nice to talk about it with Nancy.

'So, um...' His throat feels tight and his hands are sweaty. 'I recently discovered some things about myself. I-' The words get stuck somewhere on the way to his mouth, and he clears his throat.

Nancy doesn't push, but only gives him an encouraging nod, waiting for him to find his voice again.

'I found out I like boys,' he finally manages to confess. 'And I need you to know that – that that doesn't mean that what I felt for you wasn't real. It was. I loved you, and now I fell in love with a boy. And-'

'Steve.' Nancy's hand suddenly covers his, causing him to finally jerk his head away from the view over the quarry, to focus on her face again instead.

Her eyes are wide, and she squeezes his hand.

'You don't have to explain yourself to me,' she tells him. 'We're good. But thank you for telling me. For trusting me with this.'

Steve heaves out a relieved sigh, and Nancy smiles; it's that genuine kind of smile which reveals all kinds of dimples and soft lines across her face.

'We might be more similar than you thought,' she tells him, a faint blush spreading over her cheeks.

'Really?' Her words make his breath catch in his throat. He squints at her, trying to see her in this new light. 'Are you saying what I think you're saying?'

She shrugs. 'I don't know. I'm not sure yet,' she admits. 'Still figuring things out.'

'Take your time, there's no rush,' he tells her. 'But...' He bumps his shoulder against hers. 'When you're done figuring it out, talk to me, okay?'

She nods. 'Okay.'

For a while, it's quiet between the two of them. Some kind of raptor circles high above them in the sky. They both follow it with their eyes until it disappears among the tree tops west of the quarry.

'Is it Eddie?'

Steve blinks dumbly a couple of times.

'Wha- what?'

'The guy you were talking about. The one you fell in love with. It's Eddie, isn't it?'

'Jesus, Wheeler, what kind of sorceress are you?' Steve exclaims.

Nancy laughs again. 'You're not being as subtle as you think,' she tells him. 'The two of you have been hooking up for a while now, haven't you?'

Steve huffs dramatically. 'This is unfair. You know everything; I can't even tell you my own secrets anymore!'

'So what happened?' Nancy asks. 'You said you had a fight with him?'

'It's fucking stupid,' he sighs. 'Dustin was getting way too excited about the fact that I was gonna be hanging out with you, so I told him I was seeing someone. Next thing I knew, he was telling Eddie all about how I was seeing a girl.' He waves his hands around to make annoyed air quotations. 'I wanted to tell Eddie it was a misunderstanding, but Dustin was there, so I couldn't out us just like that, and he looked so betrayed and heartbroken... He didn't wanna listen to me.'

Steve sighs; he still can't manage to forget that look in Eddie's eyes when Dustin delivered the big news. 'I wish I would've talked about what I felt for him earlier. I should've been honest when I had the chance, y'know. But I was afraid he wouldn't wanna label what we had, that he wouldn't feel the same way – and now we're in this whole mess. God, he must hate me right now, Nance.'

To his surprise, Nancy gives him an unexpected slap against his arm.

'Ouch, what the hell was that for?!'

'What are you even doing here with me, Steve? You should've gone after him, tell him how you feel!'

'I tried, obviously, but he didn't wanna listen to me!'

'So make him listen! You're in love with him, he obviously feels the same way about you, and you let him leave to wallow in a broken heart he doesn't even need to have!' She rolls her eyes and slides off the car, adding something under her breath that sounds suspiciously like an exasperated 'Boys!' before she pulls Steve off the car as well. 'C'mon, time to get your ass over to the trailer park. Right. Now,' she says through gritted teeth. And, well, Steve knows better than to argue with a determined - and truthfully quite terrifying - Nancy Wheeler.

Read the last part here Taglist: @withacapitalp @ultimatedreamer104 @irregular-child @jcmadgirl @estrellami-1 @myguiltyartpleasure @hallucinatedjosten @jaybren @thew1ldblueyonder @melodymeddler @alycatavatar @zoeweee @lolawonsstuff @fairy-princette @saramelaniemoon @phirex22 @krazyperson @xxsky-shockxx (I only put people on this list who explicitly asked to be tagged. That's really no problem, I love to do that so dw about asking, but I got a lot of relatively vague reactions to the previous post that i'm not gonna dissect and interpret, bc I don't wanna clog anyone's notes unwanted. So just to be clear: i consider it a huge compliment if anyone asks for a tag but please do it clearly if you do!)

[sofiaruelle]

Sooooo the last few days i’ve been seeing stars and suddenly i’m juggling 6 sorcerer boyfriends. Whats a polar bear to do?

Also this is my MC, 🍨✨ Sorbetes ✨🍨.

Context why my MC is a sentient polar bear.

The MC doesn't have a set appearance and then there was this dialogue. And the emotes are polar bear themed 😂😂😂 is also literally its own spoiler

[hadesknockedupintheunderworld]

I have all of these extended thoughts on my head about the amazing way themes and character relationships are handled in Iruma-kun and the inclusion of queerness and the handling of the coming of age narrative in this shonen manga/anime

And every time all that comes out when I'm reccing it is "You should watch/read it"

Do it. Go watch/read Mairimashita! Iruma-kun/Welcome to Demon School Iruma-kun

Please.

[416piastri]

im missing them so badly can’t wait for the season to start to get more content

[cerealmonster15]

images that bring me peace. u simply dont understand. !!!!

[snugglylime]

JWCT Countdown Day#2: Favorite Duo/Friendship - Darius and Yaz

This is a snippet from my hybrids AU, though I've nailed down more of the details since my original post. Hope you guys enjoy!

Darius has long since lost track of the days. They’ve stopped being memorable and follow such a meandering sameness that they’re not worth keeping track of. There’s no real point in keeping a mental calendar either because there are no dates for him to look forward to.

Birthdays and holidays are off the table, and counting down the hours to weekends or anything else to be excited about has become entirely meaningless. Every day is the same, and every day he laments his lack of appreciation for the time before this horrible block of temporal sameness. 

But then, as abruptly as it’d started, the sameness stops.

No one comes to check on him today. The lights around the bend down the hall continue to cast shadows into his cell, and he can still hear the persistent humming of the generators and fluorescent lights, but the sameness of the world beyond his cell is obscured by the absence of footsteps and hushed voices.

It’s entirely quiet. 

So he makes a note of today. It’s a quiet, hungry, and lonely kind of day. Even if he hates the doctors with every fiber of his being- as much as he’s able to hate anyone, that is- it’s good to interact with things that aren’t just the mind-numbingly white walls of his cell. 

The day continues as silently and uneventfully as it started, which is to say it adopted a new kind of sameness that’s somehow worse than the last. Just yesterday, and for the dozens of yesterdays before that, he could occupy his mind with eavesdropping or putting images to the vague sounds filtering to him from down the hall, but now there’s nothing. Nothing stirs beyond his cell. The lights don’t go out when they’re supposed to, and no one brings him dinner, which is concerning because if no one feeds him, he very well could starve to death. 

Calm down, he scolds himself. You’re not some animal. It’s only been a day. 

He tries to sleep, but with the bright lights and compounding hunger in his gut, it’s futile. He tosses and turns on his sorry excuse for a mattress and tries to wake from this new, hellish sameness that must be a nightmare. 

Funny that he would prefer to be awake in the world where he gets poked and prodded by all manner of needles and instruments on a daily basis than the one where he’s just perpetually bored, hungry, and lonely. He really has been reduced to his basest instincts, hasn’t he? 

He can almost imagine a morally corrupt psychologist sitting outside his cell, pen and clipboard in hand, taking notes on the slow deterioration of his mind. The psychologist would say that this is all just another test, just without the usual invasion of his personal space and intraveneal injections. 

But no such psychologist exists, and the quiet, lonely, sameness persists long into the night (or what he assumes to be night in this windowless prison of his). 

Then, just as he’s about to fall into a shallow sleep, there’s a soft click followed by a familiar whoosh of air. Within an instant, the door to his cell inches open. The lights flicker and somewhere down the hall the generators make the sound of something long-suffering. 

He stares at the newly formed crack between the cell wall and the door. He’s heard that tell-tale click dozens of times, but with it has always been a doctor (or two, depending on the day and the extent of the testing he’s to be subjected to), and the set of restraints he’s grown as accustomed to as the clothes on his back.

Now there is neither, just the thin strip of light leading to the lab down the hall. 

He thinks of the non-existent psychologist and how all this must be some new experiment. The isolation and hunger of the past day- or however long it’s been since he’s started keeping track of the passage of time- make it impossible for him to think straight. As he cautiously creeps out of his cell, he feels like a little kid walking into his kindergarten classroom for the first time, seeing everything with new eyes, even though he’s made this trek as many times as he’s heard the opening click of his cell door. 

But even if this is some sort of test for obedience or to measure the extent to which his human brain still operates beneath the suffocating layer of prehistoric instinct and hunger they’ve injected him with, he can’t help but leap at the opportunity. 

Besides, out here is where the food comes from and he’s only getting hungrier. The more logical (and generally quieter) side of his brain scolds him for acting like an animal, but he can’t bring himself to care too much. All he cares about is finding food. 

But when the corridor spits him out, he doesn’t find food. Instead, he finds the lab, eerily devoid of its occupants, both animate and not. The doctors- as well as their personal effects- are all gone save for a few backpacks and pencils strewn across the floor. The embryonic chambers, usually clouded with cold fog, are clear and devoid of the canisters of their prenatal residents. All the desks have been emptied and the endless rows of filing cabinets have been gutted, some of their contents lying amongst the backpacks and pencils and whatever else managed to find its way to the floor.

The lights flicker again. The generators belch and wheeze. 

If not for the gnawing hunger in his gut, he might’ve been skeeved out by the situation. But as things stand, he only feels mildly disturbed by the prospect of standing in the middle of a scene ripped straight out of a horror movie. 

Not that his whole life these past few months hasn’t been a horror movie. At least this is kind of exciting.

He decides to follow the left hall. He’s never been down here before, always having been ushered to the right where all the medical offices and examination tables are. But he knows those places like the back of his hand by now, and so he knows that there’s no food there. Which must mean that the food somehow comes from the left hall.

Maybe. 

Like most of his memories from his time on the island before his abduction, his memories of the tour of this place he went on so many months ago are little more than a fuzzy blotch in the back of his mind, doing nothing to guide him where he needs to go. 

It doesn’t help that all the walls and offices here look identical, right down to the creaky ceiling fans and plywood desks. No expenses were spared except for when it came to the busy-bodies running this place. 

By the looks of things, they were about as well off as he was in his cell.

He rounds a corner and is suddenly accosted by a cacophony of clicks and bangs, like something heavy is hitting one of the white brick walls. He hesitates between the choice of going right and investigating, or going left towards a neon green exit sign. 

After a moment, he starts down the right hall. He’s still hungry, but he’s also lonely, and chances are that whatever’s making that thumping noise is more alive than anything else here. Maybe the clicking is a doctor typing at a keyboard, though how anyone could continue to work in conditions as chaotic as these he has no idea. 

Then again, he has no idea what caused these conditions in the first place. For all he knows, this whole situation could just be another experiment that he’s being subjected to.

Will he ever stop feeling like a lab rat? 

He follows the noises down a corridor not unlike the one leading to his cell. The tall, undecorated walls funnel him around a bend until he’s face to face with thick metal bars, just like the ones he’s stared at every day for as long as he can clearly remember. 

He freezes. There’s no way he managed to make one big loop- he may not know much about this place, but he knows for a fact that the building isn’t one big circle. And even if it was, this hall is all wrong, like a mirror image of the one containing his cell.

This is someplace different. 

He cautiously approaches the bars, realizing with dawning horror that the noises, having seemed so distant before, are coming from the darkness right in front of him. Then they stop so suddenly he thinks he might’ve imagined them. But now he’s standing just a few feet from the bars and can get a good look at what’s behind them, noisy creature or not. At least, he would have if not for the hand being flung into his face. 

He screams and stumbles backward. The unnatural weight of his feet and the awkward bend to his legs set him off balance enough to send him tumbling shoulder-first into the wall. He grunts and licks the two, sharp teeth protruding from the gums where his canines used to be. 

He’s still not entirely used to the feeling of them in his mouth, but he knows they’ll be useful in a fight if it comes down to it. 

“Darius?” A voice hisses. He recognizes it instantly, even though the memories it’s attached to are fuzzy. 

“Yaz?” Darius breathes. He hasn’t heard her voice in… well, however long it’s been since the abduction. Months at the very least, if not longer. 

“It’s me,” Yaz sighs. Then, as if to prove her point, she steps into the thin triangle of light cast through the bars of her cell. 

From the waist up, she looks exactly how he remembers. But as he looks closer, he realizes that’s not entirely true. Her skin has a pale, blueish quality to it and her eyes, stark against the abnormal pallor of her skin, are striking and unnaturally bright, like she’s seeing right through him. And below her waist, more shocking than anything else about her, are the leathery, awkwardly bent legs of a velociraptor.

Darius stares, transfixed at the homunculi standing before him. She looks like the product of a poor attempt at photoshopping a dinosaur’s legs onto a human’s body; her waist is too thin to properly accommodate the girth of the reptilian legs, and the dark, scaly flesh of them disappears beneath her shorts only to reappear as the perfectly smooth human skin of her barely exposed stomach. 

“What is it?” Yaz demands, startling Darius out of his thoughts. Despite the roughness of her voice- has it always sounded like that?- her lips are turned into a nervous frown like she’s embarrassed. 

“You…” he trails off, unable to find the words. He stiffens as a tail suddenly appears out of the darkness and swishes back and forth behind her body like the pendulum of an upside-down metronome. “Wow.”

“You don’t look much better,” she says with a strained grimace. 

“Oh, right,” his cheeks flush. He’d nearly forgotten about the state of his own body, not that he’d ever gotten a real good look at it. He’s been denied the privilege of a mirror, and while he can feel all the strange anomalies in his stature and movement, he doesn’t have a good idea of what it all looks like. Then he shakes his head and realizes who he’s talking to. “Not that you look bad or anything. I think the… ah… tail suits you. Yeah.”

Yaz blinks at him before turning away with a muffled snort. “Shut up. Yours suits you more, dino-nerd.”

Oh. Right. He’d almost forgotten about the heavy appendage sprouting from his tailbone. Not that he’d like to remember it. How he got to be this way is a process he’d prefer to forget, but it looks like he’s not the only one to have experienced it.

Which means that in all likelihood, he and Yaz aren’t alone. The others must be around here somewhere, too.

“Sure does,” Darius grins, suddenly feeling more excited than he has in months. He grabs the handle of her cell door and cocks his head. “Ready to get out of here?”

[skipblebee]

Frederick and Werner doodle from the au I was talking about :] They're drinking hot chocolate and Frederick is telling him cool bird facts!!!

[xelidonia]

I'm obsessed with this line from Touga. "It's wrong of me to flirt with you since you're my equal (for now)." It's so insidious. It's got the same vibes as those guys who claim that being attracted to a muscular women is gay

[capricioussun]

I'm always constantly torn on several directions when it comes to how to portray Levi and Edge's relationship. Like, I love the idea of her being an incredibly gruff but ultimately caring mentor, sort of, but with the way things are in my uf, it doesn't seem to suit. I think she'd honestly take a similar approach to Sans almost in that she'd feel compelled to create distance more than anything. One, to keep herself safe and not too attached to him, and two, to not encourage Papyrus's own softness. Especially in the versions where Papyrus didn't pursue becoming a guard and was forced into it.

It's really difficult to find a good balance between the fact I think she would, reluctantly, still really care about him, and her own troubled upbringing/using harsh methods to keep him tough. Even in the versions Papyrus did willingly join, he does try hard to be merciful, a protector. Maybe it doesn't mean much at the end of the day, but the little differences can be just as important to him. And that would undoubtedly frustrate Undyne.

Especially given a lot of how things are involves the idea that they need to toughen up, strengthen themselves, so when the war against human comes, they'll be prepared. Papyrus's determination to help and protect 'isn't doing anyone any favors'. Even though Undyne herself frequently doubts and questions, she's learned not to let that hamper her. So Papyrus's 'stubbornness' grates against this terribly.

I think there's also a chance she may even resent him a little. Probably wouldn't even necessarily be aware of it, but I don't doubt she feels a significant amount of pressure from Asgore to conform, especially given everything he's done for her. She wants to side with him, even when it's difficult. But Papyrus. He stays true to himself, despite her efforts, Asgore's efforts, even his own brother's. And he 'gets away with it'. I'd imagine his disobedience antagonizes her all the more because of this.

He was so young when he joined/was forced into it, I can't imagine she didn't know, even if he lied. There's no way she doesn't at least have some protective streak for him. And even a reluctant admiration of his commitment to his own rules.

It's just so hard to strike a good balance between them where it's not too close and caring, but you can tell, despite the ice frozen thickly over top it, that it's there.

[canonically47]

no you don't get it gwuncan is SO GOOD but only in theory because it's SO BAD in canon but if it was strictly a fanon ship it would be flying off the shelves

[softavasilva]

"keep defending alba as she deserves the world" is gonna get tattooed onto my forehead btw

[joelletwo]

[The Final sugi dying kitten betrayal -> utsuro-gin fight -> sakura boat imagination -> completely tonally consistent with these ginpachi-sensei closer]

now listen. u know i would rather die than post five nearly-uninterrupted minutes of a fight scene. so take that into consideration.

[herrmit]

not to start shit but. tell me you didn't understand princess jellyfish without telling me you didn't understand princess jellyfish