#they're all despair but only some are horrors

[aparticularbandit]

you know. sometimes when you're writing a thing you don't intend for something to be a big part of your character lore and then it just ends up being that way.

i may not keep all of junko's backstory the same from one fic to the next, but i might be keeping all the rocky horror stuff.

i mean.

junko enoshima and her cast of horrors.

[ackermonie]

“listen. i’m telling you again. we’re NOT telling her i got you that lego set for winning that fight, am i clear?”

megumi nods with a roll of his eyes, arms crossed over his chest. “i don’t think she’s gonna be as mad as you think she will be. this isnt the first time this happens, you know?”

“regardless, the lego set remains unmentioned,” satoru points at megumi with a serious index finger, to which megumi rolls his eyes again as he resumes setting the dining table. “the tone of her voice on the phone said she’s coming for blood. i don’t wanna be on her bad side.”

“oh? so you set me up instead?!” megumi lets go of the plates to cross his arms over his chest. “is the strongest really such a scaredy-cat, now?”

“i’m not scared!” satoru is offended, even though he’s about to piss his pants. “and I wasn’t the one that decided that beating up 8 fucking kids on one go was the brightest idea ever, was i?”

“but you rewarded me for it!”

“he did what?”

the two of them freeze in their place, eyes widening as they hold each other’s gazes, too scared to look at the source of the voice coming from the kitchen entrance.

they stay quiet for a solid amount of seconds, and you remain unmoving. gojo gestures for megumi to look at you first, to which megumi replies with a subtle shake of his head, a thin sheet of sweat breaking on his forehead.

“i asked a question.”

thunder is rumbling, and when gojo decides to, very slowly, shift his gaze to you, it’s a scene right out of a horror movie when lightening strikes and thunder rolls on cue. you’re standing at the entrance, drenched from head to toe, a cut or two fresh on your face. your uniform remains unscathed, save for the water dripping to make a little damp pool beneath your feet.

“you’re home early, sweets,” gojo tries to approach, but you pin him in place with a glare. his nervous grin gradually falls from his face. “how was the mission?”

he hears footsteps approaching quickly, and when tsumiki comes to a halt behind you, seeing the state you’re in, she begins to slowly retreat despite satoru’s look of despair at her.

“you rewarded him.” you echo megumi’s words. the 14 year old swallows hard, eyes sliding from you to the suddenly more interesting kitchen sink. “he almost gets expelled, and you reward him.”

“but he didn’t get expelled!” satoru chuckles cheerfully. “he apologized, and all! didn’t you, megumi?” he nudges the teenager’s shoulder pushing him a bit forwards so he can take some of the impact himself. he lowers himself a bit to mumble to him through his teeth. “who’s the scaredy -cat now, huh?”

“I-i—“

“i leave the house for a couple of days— not even a couple, this was a day and a half, and i have to wrap my mission up quickly because my son’s being turned into a delinquent with his dad’s support?”

it takes satoru a couple of seconds to register the words that just came out fo his partner's mouth. he immediately looks at the flustered teenager by his side, to find a light blush on his cheeks and neck.

something warm settles behind gojo's ribcage. it was never addressed, that they're practically family. the only d word megumi calls gojo is dick, but fuck, by the look on megumi's face, the way his skin is painted pink, he knows that the seemingly stoic kid feels the same.

satoru doesn't even think you realize the way you addressed them.

tsumiki peeks her head from behind you. there's a sweet smile growing on her sweet face that he catches. he tries not to smile, he really does, but something in his demeanor is shattering right before his eyes.

"satoru!" you raise your voice, a frustrated frown painting your features, but all satoru feels is the love spreading through his body, his fingertips buzzing with it and all. "this is not rewardable behavior!"

"don't be mad at him..." megumi mumbled, finally taking a step forward. your gaze shifts to him, but he's looking anywhere but you. "he only wanted to cheer me up. this is my fault."

your eyes can't help but soften. gojo watches the change of expression in awe.

"if it helps, they were bullies." satoru chimes in a much softer voice, matching the look on your face. he ruffles the boy's hair, who doesn't push his hand away for the first time in a while. "it's just that megumi here has his own way of doing good. peculiar," gojo pauses with a little laugh when the teenager finally pushes his hand away grumpily. "but he's still doing good."

you finally spot the scar on his cheekbone, one that's already been tended to by satoru it seems, but you still walk across and hold his cheeks in your hands to check it out. its really not that deep, but something still tugs at your heart.

and satoru is still watching the changes of your expression, taking note of every little one. he knows you all too well, you see, and he knows that you're about to start tearing up any second now.

"why don't you guys go fetch angry mom here a towel or two?" he addresses the children, grabbing your wrist to let go of megumi, who looks too guilty for his own good right now. he brings you closer to him instead. "I'm afraid she'll only be grumpier if she catches a cold."

megumi hesitates, but tsumiki calls for him, understanding the cue better than her younger brother.

once they were both out of sight, gojo chuckles in endearment when you shove your face in his chest, uncontrollable tears escaping past your heavy lids. he grabs your head with one hand while the other holds you to him, soaked and all.

"oh baby," he sighs. he doesn't think he's ever been happier than this moment right here. "you just called him my son."

you punch him right in the gut. he groans out in pain, but his hold never wavers on you. "he is your son."

"i think we both prefer the name long-term pain in the ass, but that will do." he raises your head to look at him, and when he sees that red nose and tears down your cheeks, he can't help but giggle some more. "god, you're literally the best thing to ever happen to me."

"shut up." your cheeks burn in his hands, and you're unable to look away. "I was so scared something had happened to him. i would've never forgiven myself."

"the fuck do you take me for?" satoru fakes offense, raising an eyebrow down at you. you roll your eyes at him, from which he takes even more offense, letting you go with a scoff of disbelief. he dramatically removes his sunglasses and crosses his fingers in front of him. "I'll hollow purple your ass so hard right now and you'll never live to tell the tale."

"sure, honey," you pat him on the chest with one hand and wipe away your tears with the other, beginning to turn away from him with a, now more subtle, eye-roll. "whatever you say."

he grabs you and pulls you flush to him again, this time capturing your lips in a sweet, chaste kiss that has your whole body letting loose right there in his arms. your arms wrap around his neck like a reflex, and he squeezes you into him, a dull ache beating in him to just merge your bodies into one,, to have you in his very bones, and maybe even then it wouldn't be quite enough.

"i would rather be torn in two than let something happen to any of you," he breaks away from the kiss to peck your nose. you look into his eyes, and it worries you just how true his statement is. "what else do I have to fight for?"

=====================================

more?

[balteus]

actually re: fromsoftware politics. i do think it's very interesting that the anti-colonialist RLF, ostensibly considered the 'good guys' of the game, were initially explicitly called the communist faction. armored core always has been a series critical of oligarchies and hyper-capitalism, but it's... very interesting to see just how blatant that is in ac6 specifically

you'd think that fromsoftware would eventually drop the ball on the "the ruling class will kill you and cannibalise itself in order to stay alive" considering that they're considered elite AAA devs rn, but thinking about elden ring and ac6's narratives, they've really only gotten more obvious about it - the horrors of colonialism and genocide and the sympathy given to the rage of its victims is something that's actually insane to see, to me, from such a big studio - fromsoft doesn't even attempt to be centrist about it.

for example, the frenzy flame ending. the only thing melina can tell you to dissuade you from pursuing it, ie literally destroying the world forever, is that there's still beauty in the world, apart from the suffering the golden order had caused. at no point however is the sheer despair of the people that the flame represents villanized. if anything, it's portrayed as a self-fulfilling prophecy, it is a tragedy. the only villain is the order who slaughtered all of these people, the flame of despair is something that emerged in them as they were buried alive. and the flame isn't even intended as a revenge upon the world, it's simply a means to end the pain they feel for being subjected to this.

their grief isn't something for the player to judge, it isn't something they're forced to overcome, it's simply a physical manifestation of the reality that was forced upon them. and these people, the merchants, are still kind to us, even knowing the order that we pursue. (in fact, the true, considered best ending of elden ring, is literally just sacrificing yourself in order to achieve complete anarchism. and getting a cool wife to endure the loneliness of space along the way)

in ac6 then, ayre is so terribly forgiving towards us, knowing what we are, knowing what made us, knowing what we participate in. some of this undoubtedly is because of her narrative role, she has to be a sympathetic character. but we do get to see her rage at the end, her grief for her species being seen as nothing more than a resource to be exploited or burned fully vocalized. but the RLF is sympathetic too as resistance fighters who want their home back. the only criticism the game ever leverages towards the RLF is that they're actually not radical enough in their pursuit of freedom, and that criticism is made by a villain.

it's so... i almost want to say optimistic? other games would have tried to pull a "ooh but what if the good guys did bad things (poor attempt at moral grayness)" but no, the RLF is justified at every step of the way. idk it makes me feel things. i dont particularly want to portray fromsoftware as these bastions of political correctness or sth - they're not perfect and i don't expect that ever lmao, but it's so fucking weird that their games are this progressive and have been for a long ass time.

[iliveforyouilongforyouvesuvia]

The Arcana HCs: M6 get kidnapped and tortured

~ an overdue sequel to MC gets kidnapped and tortured. CW for mentions of being restrained (in the scary way), having injuries, broken body parts, and trauma processing. enjoy! - brainrot ~

You'll never forgive yourself for how easy it was to lose your beloved.

It was just after breakfast - an unusually slow one, morning light spilling across the emptied dishes, a contented, carefree smile dancing from your lover's eyes to their lips and back again. They had stood slowly, bent to press a chaste kiss to your cheek, and stepped out to check briefly for wherever their familiar had disappeared to.

And then they didn't come back, and you didn't think to look for them until it was far, far too late.

The next time you saw them, it was in the back corner of a windowless cell, bound with their arms behind them to a wooden pillar, clothes tattered and bloodied and head slumped with the brokenness that can only come from despair and abandonment.

Julian

Apparently he's been surviving the last several weeks by dreaming of you, because he doesn't believe it's really you at first

He meets you with a dazed, faraway smile, barely wincing at the way it pulls at the bloodied bruise on his cheek. His good eye is bloodshot, and both retain an undercurrent of despair

His voice is hoarse and cracked from disuse when he invites you further in and apologizes for the poor space, telling you that you look as stunning as ever and wishing for the dream to last a while

Reality doesn't come crashing in on him until you're close enough to touch him. That's not possible for a figment of his imagination

He goes from tired condolences, asking you not to worry and to sit with him instead until you fade away, to staring up at you in shock and disbelief. It's you - it's you -

Does this mean it's finally over??

Doesn't say much beyond a stream of babbled "thank you"s and "I missed you"s and "are you sure this is real"s as you lead him out

Already knows the nature of his own injuries (he was, unfortunately, conscious and fully aware when they were made) and ends up talking you through how to treat and bandage them

Gets absolutely slammed with guilt in the following days as all the trauma and pain catches up with him and he watches you suffering in turn on his behalf. Thankfully, you're able to kiss it out of him

Tries to joke about liking pain anyways and can't do it, not for this

Asra

Their head snapped up as soon as they heard a new set of footsteps coming towards their cell, and they were already praying it wasn't you. You weren't ready for the look of horror when it was

He's already hoarsely begging as soon as you're in view. Get out of here. Run. It's too dangerous. He can't protect you here. Go -

Has a hard time believing you when you tell them that it's okay and that you're here to get them out. You can see them shaking their head in denial even as you kneel in front of them to free their hands

It's his hands that do you in. Apparently in an effort to keep him from trying any magic, his kidnappers have mangled them beyond recognition or functioning and you can't stand to look at them

As soon as they're free, they're scrambling to get both of you out. They were already putting together their own escape plan and have some scarily accurate guesses for effective escape routes

The look of terrified desperation doesn't leave his face until you're both out and you can prove that you won't be followed

They don't want to talk about it. They don't. want. to talk about it

He'll have to, eventually, as the waves of gratitude stop covering for his frustration at how slowly movement is returning to his hands and how often he has nightmares of his kidnappers taking you

They hate the discomfort of the process, but they're learning the sweetness of letting you take care of them for once

Won't sleep easy until he's magicked away all of the scarring

Nadia

You don't manage to say much when you make eye contact with her because the look in her eyes is leaving you breathless

You don't know what was done to her, you don't know what state she was in before you got here, but all you see in her eyes now is fire. If you're here, her courage and determination are boundless

Already pulling herself up against the wall and asking you to catch her up on the situation as you're removing her restraints

Are her captors aware you're here? How many have you fought? The big one, with the club - did you get him? Who else is with you? What's the plan? Give her your shoulder so she can walk with you

She runs on adrenaline and determination until you make it back home. She's reciting all the information she has and making strategic suggestions to ensure the group is wiped out completely

And then, when you make it home, she's collapsing

The following days show you a side of her you've only had glimpses of in the past. Her pride refuses to let anyone else near her, but

But you. You can stay. .... please stay

With her body broken and her mind haunted, all she wants is to be convinced of her support. She doesn't want to do this alone, all she wants is to lie down and know that it'll be okay for a bit

You begin to worry for a moment that she almost becomes too dependent, refusing to eat or sleep unless you're next to her

She comes out of it eventually, though she hates tight sleeves now

Muriel

You didn't know what to expect when you saw him, but it wasn't the deep shame that made it nearly impossible for him to meet your eyes. You don't know where this guilt came from

His first question is if you're in danger. As soon as you tell him it's all taken care of, he doesn't make another sound

Not a question about how you found him, not a grumble of discomfort or a grunt of pain, not even a sigh of relief as you undo the multitude of ropes tied so tight he could barely breathe before

He can barely stand to be touched by you as you brush his matted hair out of his eyes and take his hand to lead him out

He keeps stumbling. It's clear his captors were afraid of his strength, and had gone out of their way to damage his muscles and tendons and restrain him too tightly for the smallest motions

It's not until you're back in the hut and bandaging his wounds, with the door locked and Inanna at his side, that he's able to speak

He blames himself. He should have been aware of them when they came for him. He should have fought them off. He's been hunted for his strength his whole life, and suddenly, he didn't have it

It's your quiet testimony that he's allowed to be weak and still be precious that undoes him. With all the barriers out of the way, he doesn't have the energy to stop himself from being needy

Greedy, even, finally asking for hugs and snuggles and painkillers and second servings from dinner, and shocked when you say "yes"

Portia

You only catch a glimpse of the wavering hope on her face before she realizes it's you and her head falls back in sheer relief

You're here. You're here. Finally, you're here. She knew she could hold on another day, she knew there would be an end, she knew she could trust you not to give up on her, she knew you'd find her

And here you are. Her faith in you has paid off, and she's beyond happy to see you. She's pressing kisses to whatever part of you she can reach before you've even removed her restraints

When you do, she's all breathless, relieved, tearful giggles, and hugs as tight as she can manage with injured and bloodless arms

Her legs are broken, but that's okay, she'll just ride piggyback while she watches behind you for any pursuers. You've got this!

Never in your life have you been so grateful for a partner as relentlessly optimistic and resilient as she is. Even as the treatment of her painful wounds makes her wince and hiss, she's smiling

Of course, she can't act as though it never happened. She wishes she could, but the nightmares and the fatigue and the shooting pains and the crutches by her bedside suggest otherwise

Late night conversations venture to new confessions. How afraid she was. How out of control she felt. The lonely moments in her cell when her faith in you faltered and she wondered if this was it

It's hard to sit through her descriptions of what happened, of what was done to her, but you knowing it too brings you ever closer

Lucio

He'd like to say that he put on a brave face, but as soon as he saw you and knew he wasn't alone anymore he crumpled completely

He missed you. He missed you. He thought it would never end. He never wants to do this again, never, ever, ever, don't worry about the damn restraints, just kiss him and tell him it's okay, please

There's tears tracking through layers of grime and crusted blood and faint trails of his eyeliner - has he really not been able to clean himself in weeks? - and he's muffling his sobs into your shoulder

You keep wanting to tell him to hold still, the knots and locks are tricky to undo with the intense shaking through his body, but every pained cry wracking his frame is loaded with relief

When you finally get him freed, he's looping his arm around your neck and falling against you until you hold him

Hold him tight, hold him despite what a mess he is, hold him without worrying about his blood getting onto your clothes, hold him even if it hurts him, hold him so you can soothe his soul

And then get him out. He's clearly severely injured and in plenty of physical pain (which he will loudly make known to you once you're both safe) but he'll run limping next to you without complaint

It's a long time before he can bring himself to lift a blade or put the armored pieces on his gauntlet again. He still brags about his skills, but the way the light glints along the sharp metal makes him wince

Can't fall asleep by himself for a long, long time

[foone]

My one bit of advice I think every gamer should hear:

GO PLAY OUTER WILDS.

Seriously. It is easily one of my top 5 games of all time, and that's mainly because I'm being cagey about if it's the #1, because it probably is.

It's a game where you're a little alien who is taking their first flight into space, in their little spaceship. You go to space and find a mystery, and have to figure it out.

It's a game entirely about learning things about the world you're in: it's a tiny solar system modeled amazingly well, with varied planetary environments, archaeology, and quantum fun.

It's a game that's hard to talk about without spoiling, because it's about solving the mysteries. There used to be some other aliens here, they're long gone. What happened to them? Their whole society was built around trying to find something: what was it? Did they find it? And there's a weird disastrous event that keeps happening, why? Can you stop it? Should you stop it? Is it connected to the other weird things that keep happening? What happened to that ice planet that exploded with vines? One of the astronauts who came before you was the best pilot who ever lived, but they vanished. What happened to them? And why can you sometimes hear their harmonica over the radio when you point it at your own planet?

The game is wonderful and non-linear and the most unique approach to a Metroidvania I've seen years: it's basically "what if we did the Metroidvania idea but with no items or power ups? What if the thing that you got to unlock new areas WAS INSIDE THE PLAYER'S HEAD?"

Because you don't unlock the next area by picking up the high-jump boots, you unlock it by learning something new. Now you can do something you didn't realize you could before, but now you know you can.

And that's only one of the amazing concepts they stuffed in this game. The itemless Metroidvania, the tiny simulated solar system, the quantum mechanics... Each of these alone could be enough to carry an indie game. They stuffed them all in one game combined with a great story, and that's in a gamewith relatively little dialogue!

There's like a dozen people to talk to, but you spent a lot of time reading conversations left by the long-gone aliens. You get to know them, what they were working for, how they interacted, and what happened to them, thousands of years later. It's less the bioshock style audio-logs, and more like going over bits of ancient writing, making connections and correlations from the fragments you can find.

And don't get me wrong, this might sound like this game is going to be dry and boring: it is so very not. It is a game about mysteries in the void of space, the death of a civilization, and the potentially world-ending dangers that face a living one, and even bigger concepts. It could so easily be a cosmic horror, about the cold death of space and the universe itself, and the nihilism of realizing that even a race that could cross the gap between the stars and bend spacetime to their will... They too died out. If they couldn't make it, what hope do you have, in your little spaceship that's primarily made of WOOD?

And yet... The game is always engaging. It has a few scares, and space is never a safe place to be, but it maintains a sense of humor and wonder. Yes, the universe can be scary, but it's also amazing. And you're just a little salamander-guy who wants to see it all, and figure out all the things. Maybe you don't know something yet, but tomorrow is a new day, and you can go blasting off to another planet, find some writing in a city suspended upside down over a black hole, try to fly into the core of a water planet, dodge giant anglerfish inside the warped space of an exploded planet, and try to explore an ancient city that's slowly filling with sand. It is a game about Things Ending, and it refuses to give into despair. It is one of the most relentlessly optimistic games I have ever played.

And the experience of playing it is so unique. This isn't a game where you could watch a letsplay and only get spoiled on some plot points, it's a game where the fundamental gameplay loop is about learning things. You should try it for yourself. It's got hints and many different avenues to explore (and it even keeps track of them for you, in case you forget!), so you don't have to worry much about getting stuck for too long. You can always put aside a "puzzle" and come back later, after you've learned more. (I put puzzle in quotes because it's not exactly a puzzle game. It's more of a mystery game. You aren't solving a logic puzzle or putting the pegs into the right holes, you're asking "Why is this like this? Where does this go? What is this for?" and then figuring that out from clues)

It's like 25$ on steam, and you can get it for Playstation and Xboxes as well (sadly no Switch version. They were working on one but it seems that version has stalled, with no announced release date)

You can probably get it for like 10$ if you're patient and wait for a sale.

One final note: there's also a DLC. The DLC is fully self-contained, in that you won't miss anything playing the main game without it. It basically adds a huge side-area to the game which goes and fills in some gaps in the history, explains some things, and introduces some more variety to the Outer Wilds universe.

It's utterly amazing, too. It's basically Outer Wilds 2 in everything but name, but it's totally fine to just grab the base game and play that. You can always come back and grab the DLC later if you want more Outer Wilds.

Seriously. To sum up, Outer Wilds is one of the greatest games ever made, it won a ton of awards, and it should have won more. They should invent more gaming awards just to give to Outer Wilds. This is one of the games that is going to be talked about in future "history of gaming" classes and put on lists of the 50 most groundbreaking and influential games, alongside things like Myst and King's Quest and Zork and Mass Effect. It's just that good, that groundbreaking.

[yasminesboo]

Lookism chapter 514: little rant

This is stupid as fuck at this point, genuinely one of the worst lookism chapters i've read so far.

I've been here since 2020, I've felt a lot of things when reading lookism, excitement, giddiness, sadness, suspense but never have i ever felt actual "what the fuck is going on" rage ever while reading lookism.

Nothing in this whole "hunt for gun" arc makes sense, like literally nothing adds up. first we've got the ENTIRE verse assembling like the avengers to take down gun, like we're talking extras that haven't appeared in years. Then these seemingly amazing strong characters that went through so much character development and training arcs get the floor wiped with them, absolutely erasing all the progress they've made so far and get taken down within literally three panels. Not to mention how they deal fatal blows and this man hits super saiyan poses and gets up like nothing happened? Then he proceeds to randomly and casually plunging off a cliff above the mountain forest and lands on the highway in 0.00001 sec mid fight without taking any fall damage whatsoever and gets right back to swinging.

Anyways fast forward to the ridiculous fight he had with johan, which i find to be absolutely ridiculous johan should have 100% won that and the fight should'nt have been prolonged that much, not only was johan in perfect health and his vision was restored, but gun was also getting more and more "tired" and his state was pitiful. But SOMEHOW he still won that. Okay. Cool.

And now fast forward to today's chapter: gun's DUMBASS turns down goo's offer and now they're fighting. So naturally you'd expect gun to lose because goo is relatively equal (as stated multiple times by the narrative) to gun, and gun is in a pitiful state broken arm basically became a flesh and bones smoothie, not to mention his organs must have turned into slime from the amount of hits he has taken. His left eye is popped and bloodshot, his neck is sliced, he even has CLAW marks down his lower torso and forearm, excessive blood loss and nasty bruising everywhere... so obviously goo who is 100% in good shape and is proven to be a very powerful and impactful character will win right? Haha.

*internally screaming throwing up sobbing rolling on the floor in rage and despair*

HOW THE FUCK DID HE END UP ON THE FLOOR SQUISHED LIKE A BUG WITH A SWORD PIERCING THROUGH HIM???? The whole fight made me ENRAGED, i lost it when he blocked the sword with his mouth AND bit it off like are we sure we're still in a slice of life manhwa and not a horror one? I lost it even more when his mouth that was torn ear to ear because of the sword magically healed in the next panel like nothing happened, like that sword didn't just cut through his flesh. Speaking of swords cutting through flesh, how did goos sword sharp enough to cut through metal and concrete walls get stuck on his ankle? Dies this man have titanium bones or something?? How did the sword get stuck on the FLESH not even the bone itself. And the fact that he just walked it off again like nothing happened.. somehow goo only landed like two clean hits and gun magically dodged all the other ones.

Then PTJ proceeds to pull up the double suicide to end the fight in which BOTH goo and gun were stabbed but goo somehow is the one who ends up being squished on the floor like a bug.

This is unacceptable, idk wth ptj was expecting us to get hype after gun some fucking how is capable of weaseling himself out of every corner he's backed up to this is starting patterns that are very similar to jjk.. which i don't like at all. I'd like to say for the one billionth time again that PTJ writing gets progressively worse from the years, which only consists of stalling and dragging the arcs instead of moving on to other plot points, extreme plot armor, adding in an unbelievable number of minor characters, background characters, and extras just to neglect them after a few chapters. Some characters who supposedly were from the "main cast" were gone for YEARS dude, and the lacking female character writing (some may argue with this because it is true there are female characters that are badass and are really good written, but most are created only for the purpose of helping a certain male character with character development. Which he literally directly says on his author note for viral hit in which he says all the female characters form the main cast even the nurse were created for romantic interest, which is an insane thing to say.)

Anyhow, if you've read this far thank you for coming to my ted talk 😓. I know some things i said might be controversial but i just needed to let out some steam, because this is getting ridiculous. Everyone can see the pattern now like there is no way that he's so overpowered that the entirety of the verse wasn't able to take him down.

[cuubism]

Loooove the last post. Just imagining Dream doing an anti-magic STD laser for Hob's fun bits, only for five years later on an eclipse day and Hob to give Dream the gentlest of kisses only for his lover to explode into an eldritch horror because there was apparently dorment magic moon herpes that managed to escape notice and targets shapeshifters and only shapeshifters so Hob is just so confused as Dream is just over there becoming the physical embodiment of unknowable knowledge and everyone in The New Inn have passed out and Hob is just like Ah for fucks sake, not again before Dream pulls him into the Dreaming for a very fun impromptu weekend of monsterfucking since a certian Shaper of Forms can't hold down a consistant one. Finally Dream can isolate and eject the viral magic. It gets thrown into a black hole and now Hob is behind on grading but he knows that dating Dream comes with a whole lot of excitement, and he wouldn't change it for the world...though he does now go to a very awkward annual physical with an exhausted Johanna not-paid-enough-for-this-bullshit Constantine now to make sure that nothing else he's managed to pick up over his long life rears its ugly head.

LMAO I love Hob just being a time bomb of magical STDs, every time they have sex Dream is just taking his fucking life into his hands 😂 after the latest incident Dream is just like "my husband, you are a slut" and Hob's just like #no ragrets if you wanted to be exclusive you had 600 years to make it known, Dream. Hob may not have regrets but Dream does.

When Desire found out about it all they laughed until they fell apart into sweetheart candies, then went to find Hob just to shake his hand. "Safe sex is important Hobert, but if you wanted to get another STD there's one that's REALLY funny--" I'm imagining that supernatural STDs don't kill you they just do really weird things to you, like give you cat ears for a while, or make you float five inches off the ground. Or turn you green of course. The creation of many supernatural STDs was actually just PVP violence between jilted ex-lovers; they couldn't key each other's cars so instead they were like "virus be upon ye!" forgetting that viruses get spread to other people too. Oh well. A bunch of the other ones were a collab project between Desire and Despair. At least one was made by some anti-sex crazy guy that just really wanted to get his point across. The Kellogg of the supernatural community if you will.

Later on Hob's like "should I be a good person and do safe sex advocacy among the magical-but-not-supernatural community?" but then he tries and it turns out literally every other magical or immortal human in the whole world already knew about this except Hob. They're like "you just starting sleeping with people without asking?" he's like "yeah? you guys became unkillable and DIDN'T use it for crazy sexcapades?"

I think it's simply inevitable that Johanna misses one, and Hob and Dream have another 'incident'...

[honey-minded-hivemind]

imagine Nightcrawler ended up finding Sentinel!Reader's body in the frozen lake, in fact imagine he'd be tracking them down through peices of their body they tore off, probably racing to find them and panicking because they could be falling apart of getting attacked by something, hell maybe some delusions sprout from there

Maybe Kurt's found trying to put Reader back together while he's under the belief that they didn't do this to themself, something else must've attacked them- they wouldn't resort to this- right??-

Cube anon

He's panicking.

His heart is pounding, his hands are shaking, tears are starting to stream down his cheeks with each piece found, each drop of liquid, each frayed wire and muddy print...

He feels his heart go cold, plunging like a rock into his stomach, when he sees the lake... and the hole in it, with small drops of liquid by it, and no sign of Reader.

He goes into a blind terrified panic, clawing at the ice and trying to reach his hands in, trying with all his might to feel for Reader, to drag them up, to see that they can't possibly be gone-

Logan, Rogue, Scott, they- they can't be in there! They won't survive! They're wounded, their wires are exposed, they're missing their heating system, please, please please tell him they aren't in there, please, he's begging them-!

They eventually are able to break through the ice, and are able to drag Reader's body out of the water... damaged beyond repair, and broken all over...

***************************************************

The first thing they do, after getting Reader's body back and finding their memory files intact, decide to look through them to see who killed their friend...

Only, to their horror and guilt, find that it wasn't an unknown assailant or an old enemy... but Reader, who did this to themself.

That their pain was too much for them to handle, and feeling like they had no choice and feeling too hurt inside, decided to end their being.

No one takes it well.

Kurt is praying even more now, fervent and pleading and in misery, trying to find any comfort he can over what happened and why he's lost too many friends.

Rogue is there to comfort him, and tries to apologize, now feeling even more despairing because she's lost both Remy and Reader now.

Logan, Scott, Jean, and Ororo are losing sleep, kept up with the memories of Reader, and wishing they'd waited just a bit longer, hadn't said what they'd said, had tried to see the truth sooner... Reader was their own, a friend, a child to them, and they made them feel so bad, that they did this to themself... They get no sleep...

Hank and Charles and Erik are working on growing the bodies for the passed mutants, getting help to bring their spirits back, working on trying to make things right and not lose everything again. It distracts them from Gensoha, it distracts them from Bastion, it distracts them from Gambit and Reader... But the moment all that remains to be brought back are Gambit and Reader... they're making absolute sure no mistakes are made, and feel just a bit better, just a mite of hope, that Reader's spirit is in the afterlife with Gambit, amd had been with the other mutants...

I imagine a few of the extra friends Reader had made, such as Leech amd Jubilee and Roberto and Emma and Madelyn and Omega Red and Sabretooth (look, Reader's really sweet, so why not let them have really nice and really scary friends too?), are ready to see their old friend, who they've missed greatly, and who they think will enjoy this new home and its weird fruit and delicious juice... It would be nice, for everyone tp forget their worries... if they can even remember what they were worried about in the first place... But they can't wait to finally get their little buddy back-! They've missed them so so SO much!!!

Of course, the X-Men, when visiting the spirit realm, are going to have to somehow talk Gambit into letting himself amd Reader go with them, and breach the topic of Reader being a... sentinel... somehow...

Yeah...

Gambit gonna be p*ssed...

[lostcauses-noregrets]

Bad Boy

A few meta-type thoughts about Bad Boy, now the dust has started to settle.  There could hardly have been more hype in the run up to the release of Shingeki FLY, but Bad Boy certainly delivered.  It’s classic Isayama; for such a short chapter it really packs an emotional punch, blending real pathos and tragedy with shockingly graphic violence and body horror.  It doesn't really add anything to the over all plot, which is to be expected, but it does provide insight into Levi’s character and answers one question that fans have been speculating about for years.

The story of why Levi holds his tea cup in such a peculiar way isn’t new. Isayama mentioned this in a magazine interview (I think?) way back in 2014

Q: …why he has such way of holding cup? Isayama: About that, I was thinking of drawing this one day. When he was a kid, Levi was living in slums and poverty. He was yearning for a life in clean & neat environment (not rich life). When he finally obtained the tea and tea set those he has been desperately wanted, he was rejoicing that finally he can drink it. But when he started to grip on the handle and lift up the cup, the handle came off and his cup was shattered. He was so traumatised by this experience and that’s why he changed his way of holding cups to not using the handle.

However we now know that the cup belonged to his mother and the extraordinary lengths Levi went to recover it. What is new is that we finally have confirmation of when Levi’s Ackerpowers were awakened.  Fans have been arguing about this for years; some thought it was when he killed the man with the knife immediately before Kenny left, others suggested it was when Farlan and Isabel were killed. Now we finally have an answer.  It’s not exactly clear how much time has lapsed between Kenny taking Levi in, his powers awakening, and Kenny leaving, however the fact that Kuchel’s tea set hadn’t yet made its way to the surface suggests that not much time had passed at all. 

Levi’s description of his powers awakening is fascinating;  

“Strangely enough I didn’t doubt what was happening to me at that moment. The pain had vanished, my head was calm, as if it had been immersed in water. Clear instructions on what to do came to my mind. I simply followed them one by one.”

This is the most information we’ve ever had about the famous Ackerpowers and goes some way to explaining Levi and Mikasa’s preternatural calm and focus when they're fighting.   They really only succumb to panic and despair when their loved ones are threatened.  Think of Mikasa in Shiganshina and at Fort Salta, and Levi when Farlan and Isabel die and when he allows Zeke to escape after Erwin rode out to his death. 

The panel illustrating Levi’s powers awakening is also interesting as it looks very like a Titan transformation. This suggests there is more than a grain of truth in what the Yeagers said about Ackermans being a by-product of Titan science, who were able to access the power of the Titans without becoming Titans themselves.   

It’s not difficult to draw a direct line between the abuse and persecution Levi suffered as a child, with his determination to use his power to protect those in need.  Initially he used his strength to protect the vulnerable people of the Underground, such as Isabel, however once he met Erwin he was able to exert his power to serve an even higher goal - saving humanity. Isayama discussed this in the Answers Guidebook way back in 2006 and I think his comments are worth repeating here. 

Isayama With the heroes of American comics, conflicts dealing with the situation “with great power, comes great responsibility” have been depicted. In Levi’s case, if he had no power, he would probably have been an ordinary person with no responsibilities but, as a consequence of having power, that he became a person excessively burdened with responsibility. Kenny talked about “everyone… was a slave to something…”, when he put the question to Levi “what is yours!?”, Levi himself too perceived it. That he himself too was a slave in regard to his own strength. The sense of duty that “I must become a hero”. …the same thing can be said of Mikasa too but…, for the Ackerman family, in the service of their master, there are many people who are able to manifest their power to its maximum.

[Translation by @tsuki-no-ura]

I think it's also very in keeping with Levi's character that he remained devoted to saving humanity after the Rumbling; providing succour to the children in the refugee camp, and working to renew the environment destroyed by Eren's genocide, despite his injuries and regardless of whether he retained his Ackerpowers.

The title of the chapter, Bad Boy, is also interesting. No one actually calls Levi a “bad boy” in the chapter (though he is called worse) which suggests that this is how Levi sees himself.  It makes me wonder how much he internalised the thug’s insinuation that his mother would have been disappointed in him, and it also recalls Levi’s speech to Historia and the 104th, where he says he’s fine playing the role of the violent lunatic.  Poor baby.

Another point the chapter clarifies is the origin of Levi’s belief that Kenny was his father.  To be honest, it’s hardly surprising that Levi assumed this considering Kenny clearly had some kind of relationship with his mother and took him in without question. Still, knowing that the seed of that belief was planted by a thug who was willing to torture and kill a child, or sell him into sexual slavery, really twists the knife. 

[Translation by krtk.]

I am a little sad that we didn’t see more of Kenny in the chapter, but his presence certainly looms large.

I had expected to see more of Kuchel but at the same time I’m almost glad we didn’t.  Her life was brutal beyond measure and we’ve already seen her tragic death. Several fans have suggested that the reason we only see Kuchel in partial profile is because Levi’s memories of her are so hazy, all he really recalls is her grace 😢

It’s remarkable that Kuchel was able to retain such poise and grace despite living in such desperate squalor.  @momtaku has made the point that Kuchel appears to have been born into at least modest comfort, judging from Grandpa Ackermans’ home, which would explain where her elegance and also her fancy china came from.  It’s heartbreaking that both she and Levi clung on to this small memento of a better life. 

Levi’s devotion to his mother, his desire to emulate her grace and cling on to her belongings is devastating, is very much in keeping with everything we know about his character.  Levi has boundless compassion, is deeply loyal, and never forgets those he loves, whether it’s Farlan and Isabel, Erwin, or his squad.  He’s also very sentimental; saving his mother’s tea set, and drinking tea evokes a direct connection to Kuchel and the only good thing he remembers from the squalor and cruelty of his childhood. This makes Erwin’s willingness to indulge his sentimentality and bend the rules to procure a steady supply of high quality tea for Levi all the more poignant. 

There's been some debate about Gabi's reaction to Levi's story in the final panel...

Some people have interpreted her expression as holding back tears, while others have suggested she's trying not to laugh. I'm definitely in the stifled laughter camp. It just seems so very typical of Gabi and her relationship with Levi...

Gabi: - winds Levi up - Levi: - trauma dumps - Gabi: - stifled laughter / more wind up - Falco: - actually upset - "Would you guys stop??" Onyankopon: - shade -

It's also very typical of Isayama to poke fun at his characters like this, and it stops the story from tipping over into bathos.

There is one burning question that Bad Boy doesn’t answer and it’s this - what tf was kid Levi doing in Mr Smith’s classroom?? 

Despite hoping against hope, I never really expected Isayama to answer this, because he does love to troll his readers.  Is it too much to hope that sometime down the line he’ll reappear with another chapter called School Boy?? 

[chimerahyperfix]

You are a scientist. You like testing theories, making hypothesis. Working with dangerous materials that get you scolded. You are a scientist, and you are also a writer! You’ve swung at a few things before: sappy poems, work papers, crab, you’ve even attempted a horror short at Mirabelle’s inquiry. You’re favorite thing to write, though, are just basic letters.

You like to write letters. It's easier, to you, to write your thoughts on a piece of paper and hide it somewhere the recipient can find than to tell them what you think face-first. You’ve done it for years, long before you even came to the House to learn about the Change religion. A childhood habit that’s rolled over through your life like a wave on the sea.

So, of course, when time begins to loop, you write. Many, many letters. They all get lost to time when it twists back, and now, many loops in, that leaves a hole in your heart and a spot in your brain you can’t itch, for the words of each letter are mostly forgotten before you fight the King. It’s… fine, you guess? You can word things as many ways as you need to. Anything described can be described some more, after all.

For the first handful of loops, you wrote the same letters. Rather sappy, lovey things, your specialty. The furthest depths of your heart smeared onto a page for eternity, for you love and love and love, and you want those around you to know it.

Though as time trudges on, the same twenty four hours over and over in a nice single circuit built for it to run through, built by wishes and stars and twisted leaf-baring branches, so do your thoughts; therefore your letters move so, too, to adapt. More theoretical things. Questions. Ifs, ands ors buts and whys. Sadder ones after the bad loops, wailing and endlessly upset and mourning those who froze and those who were killed for standing in the King's way.

They get angrier as time goes on. More enraged. Wrath melts into the corners, edges fold and tear and warp under the weight. You stop delivering them, because you're here in this time loop hell to protect the ones you love, and you'd just make it worse if you gave them a letter like that.

You write a scathing letter, once. You write it after an absolutely abysmal loop, ending with blood and tears and probably the loudest you've ever screamed. It flows onto the page easily, and you leave it out on your desk, because you were hungry and hadn't eaten that loop with how beside yourself stressed you were.

Mirabelle finds it. Asks you, quite worried, if you're okay. You must've said something, and it had to be bad, because she flinched away from you like you'd tried to light her ablaze.

You panicked. Time looped.

Never again.

You hide them, after that. Shoved in your pillowcases or in piles of books, stacks of other papers. In the barrels. When you write only one or two you shove them in a bottle and push them to the back of your potions.

You're a shedding snake, a leopard changing its spots. Time is your prisoner and you are it's, and that melts into you as a human being until you are flesh and blood and twenty four hours that shouldn't continue.

Words spill from you, your mind, onto the page. You don't read them anymore. Just write and write and write, and tuck them away and pray no one finds them. You long for the days you could sit and write sappy love letters-- and sometimes, you still do them, but they're tinged with something, regret or rage or the absolute despair you feel, they're wrong, so they're tucked away as well. Letters just wrong, noticeably so. You’d be asked what’s wrong. Cornered. You can hear it now, “What’s wrong? What does this mean?�� And all you can think of is the horrors you’ve seen.

One of these loops, whenever you get out, you expect to have a pile of ramblings with time-burnt letters and tear-stained edges. Whenever you get out, if there are any, you'll burn them. As a rite of passage, or something. A Change. Because time changed you, and the less people have to know about it the better. You can't get rid of your rotten voice or the tiredness in your bones or the way your brain has twisted to think, but you CAN get rid of letters.

You like to write. The horrors you write, of twisted time and dying and what being frozen in time is like— it can go. No one needs to know. No one WILL know. It’ll all fall on you, like every other crabbing thing in the time loops. And that’s okay, it’s enough.

[see-arcane]

Oof augh argh my heart

Once again @re-dracula is proving to be THE only Dracula adaptation to do this story and its characters justice

The horror-sting in discovering not only that Dracula is trying to erase his tracks, but that it now has a body count (RIP to his agent)

The exuberance of Mina in Isabel Adomakoh Young's voice as she marches head-on into connecting the vital dots to realize where Dracula is and how to track him--and the ultimate chokehold on her courage and love as she must ultimately part ways with Jonathan for the final rush of the chase

The lacing of audio-action under Van Helsing's dialogue as he dishes out his last group-rousing speech where they're all together

The sharper dramatic tone under Jonathan's words as Ben Galpin finally, finally gets to give full heart-tearing voice to that brief but electric rant at--with biting emphasis--Professor van Helsing--about the danger he means to drag Mina into unexcused and unexplained, hammering home the reminder of what all there is to worry for in the future...

On the heels of that, Galpin and the soundscape design managed to bring new ominous life into something I had previously only half-noticed before:

"Do as you will," said Jonathan, with a sob that shook him all over, "we are in the hands of God!"

[...]

My only comfort is that we are in the hands of God. Only for that faith it would be easier to die than to live, and so be quit of all the trouble.

I never thought of those lines being delivered with such a subtle but disquieting pitch of despair rather than hope. As if the speaker very much does have faith in God, but he only knows so from God's proven fallibility--and knows that same fickle Power is the one carelessly juggling all their fates.

And that ending handful of lines, delivered with such a quiet crushing weight of the eerie:

It is a wild adventure we are on. Here, as we are rushing along through the darkness, with the cold from the river seeming to rise up and strike us; with all the mysterious voices of the night around us, it all comes home. We seem to be drifting into unknown places and unknown ways; into a whole world of dark and dreadful things. Godalming is shutting the furnace door....

The way it's directed, the way it's voiced, the way it's all couched in the sort of cinematic beat of hush before the characters walk blindfolded into some fresh Hell, it all seems to turn over some mental stone in my head to reveal I've been walking past gold with each re-read of the novel.

Just

wow

Wow wow wow this podcast

It makes such a difference. There's so much more flavor and so many more facets in how Re: Dracula delivers the story beyond any mere audiobook, and worlds beyond any adaptation I've ever sat through. A million thank yous to the cast and crew.

Gonna go re-listen again

[brbsoulnomming]

Tell Me Sweet Little Lies Part 16

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 | AO3

-----

Eddie wakes up screaming.

He doesn't even remember the nightmare he must have had, just the overwhelming feeling of terror mixed all in with aching grief. He closes his eyes and he can taste lake water, hear the echo of Patrick McKinney's screams and the crunch of breaking bones like they're right there in the room with him. He opens his eyes and he sees Chrissy smiling at him, sitting at that picnic table looking so scared that he couldn't do anything other than try to make her laugh, try to make her feel a little less alone. He told her that he'd help her and then he left her, and she died just as scared and alone as she thought she'd been when she came to him for help, all by herself in a stranger's living room, with only a boy who'd rather run and hide than stay by her side.

Part of him is aware that his breath is coming in huge, hiccuping sobs, can feel the pain from the way it aggravates his injuries, knows he must be crying because his pillows are wet, but he can't break himself out of it, can't - he breathes, deep and gasping, picks up the smell of Steve's shampoo. Remembers how Steve had helped him breathe last night and tries to replicate it in his head.

It doesn't work nearly as well.

Steve finds him like that, huddled in bed and folded in on himself as much as he can manage, head between his knees as he trembles and pants. At least he isn't fucking crying anymore, but he still hadn't heard any sign that Steve'd gotten back, and when he finally does manage to look up at him, the concern in Steve's eyes tells him he'd probably said his name more than once.

Eddie doesn't mean to, but he flinches when Steve reaches out, and then he has to bite off a noise of protest when Steve steps back.

Steve stays frozen where he is, his expression unreadable. "What is it?"

Eddie laughs at him. It comes out sharp and hysterical and fuck, he knows it's only because it's either laugh or break into sobs again. Jesus Christ, what isn't it? There's a creeping, poisonous feeling roiling low in his gut that he can't quite name, that he's too afraid to look closely at, like fucking everything he does these days, apparently.

"Did something new happen?" Steve asks, apparently changing tactics.

It works well enough for Eddie to shake his head, though that doesn't make him feel any better.

"Okay," Steve says, letting out a rush of air, and Eddie only realizes that Steve'd been holding so much tension when he watches most of it drain out of him.

Then Steve sits on the edge of the bed, seemingly more steady now that he knows some new kind of horror hadn't gotten to Eddie while he was gone - that Eddie's only freaking out again over the old horrors, the ones that are yesterday's news now that they're a few days old, and fuck, how does he live like this?

How is Steve so calm? How has he been so calm, how did he watch someone get lifted up into the air and almost die, how did he get nearly drowned and bitten to hell and march barefoot through hell and go back into hell and drag Eddie out of it and stay so fucking calm and collected and confident? The whole damn time, Eddie never once saw him break, not even when Eddie had a broken bottle against his neck and was questioning his own sanity enough that he might have actually used it, not even when it was all over and they were in the hospital.

Shit, Eddie knows what's flooding through his veins. Steve's steady hands and soothing voice might have been a comfort every time before, but now it just makes him furious - makes him wonder what the fuck is wrong with Eddie that he's reacting like this when Steve fucking Harrington has been as strong and sure as any hero Eddie's ever read about.

"How can you just be like this?" Eddie asks, and he can hear the despair in his own voice.

He guesses Steve can, too, because he opens his mouth, and Eddie snaps.

"Don't," he says. "Shut up, okay, just don't, don't say anything, don't answer me when I'm not done."

Steve's jaw shuts with a click, and Eddie almost wants to look away from him, but fuck he's all fired up now, and he feels like if he doesn't get this out he's going to explode.

"I knew who I was before this," Eddie says angrily. "I'm the freak, okay, I'm loud and obnoxious and I'm scary and I could always back it up if someone tried to mess with me or my flock. Then this happens, this shit that should be right up my alley, and I fucking run! And don't tell me how you ran too, all right, because you ran for about fifteen seconds before you turned right back around to save your girl and the guy who punched you in the face, and I ran and hid for days like a rat. And I ran again and again, and the one time I didn't run I almost died, and now I realize that all those other times I thought I had it in me to do what it takes were a giant, steaming pile of crap. How do you just - how am I supposed to come back from that, man? How am I supposed to just keep going on?"

There's a long, long silence, and then Steve raises a pointed eyebrow at him.

"I'm done," Eddie says belatedly. "Yeah, I'm done, I'd like an answer to that."

God, he'd like a fucking answer to that.

"You aren't," Steve says quietly. "You aren't supposed to come back from that. I don't think any of us really have, not the same as we were before."

"Fuck," Eddie swears, mostly just to swear, because he knows Steve is right. It makes him deflate, the anger draining out of him and leaving a bone deep exhaustion. Still, he asks, "Can I get a different answer?"

Steve quirks a little smile. "All right, I got a couple of them. First - it was way longer than fifteen seconds. I'm pretty sure I stood there surrounded by Christmas lights shouting this is crazy for at least a solid thirty, and that was before the physical running."

Despite himself, Eddie barks out a little laugh, wincing as it pulls at his stitches. "Fuck you, dude, don't make me laugh."

The look he gets is entirely unapologetic. "Second - you're right. We can't really compare yours to mine. Eddie - my first brush with this was a demogorgon crawling out of the walls of the Byers house. Yeah, it was terrifying, and it haunted my dreams for a little bit, but it was still just one monster that I could whale on with my bat. You got hit with clock obsessed evil wizard who kills people with his mind right off the bat. That's like taking an all star little leaguer and dropping him right into the World Series, man, and you still held your own."

Eddie groans. "Again, with the sports metaphors?"

"Yup," Steve replies, shooting him another look. "Isn't it annoying when someone gives what's probably a really apt metaphor for the situation that people who aren't up to date on a specific terminology can barely understand?"

Eddie's brows narrow, but mostly to hide his snort of amusement. "I feel like I'm unfairly getting the brunt of a bunch of decisions made by a bunch of freshmen."

"Look, my point is that this is the kind of shit that no one expects to happen to them, ever. And you're not going to come back from that the same guy that you were before it. You're going to have to look at yourself in a different light, and there's going to be some things that you'll see that you won't like. But the great thing is - shit, man, you get to change them. You get to look at yourself and go no, I don't want that to be who I am, and I'm not going to let it. And yeah - the people that you couldn't save before you changed are going to haunt you. Maybe you'll always feel responsible. But the best thing is, you've got people on your side to remind you that you don't have to do any of it alone."

It's not a surprise that Steve sounds like he's talking from experience. It is a surprise that it makes Eddie feel… better. Makes him feel like he's not the only one who's freaking out about this, like someone else has not only gone through the same thing, but felt something similar.

"For the record," Steve says, very quietly, like he's not quite sure how to say this or where he's going with it. "It wasn't facing down the demobats that made you brave. It wasn't - redemption, or whatever, all right?"

Eddie feels caught out, like Steve's looked too closely at him and seen what he usually keeps all wrapped up and safe, like he knows the kind of stories that Eddie tells himself about the world, and the place he's thought he occupied in it this last week. "No? Then what was my redemption?"

"You didn't have one," Steve replies, and fuck, ouch. Steve must read something in his face, because he hurries to add, "You didn't need one. Every time you ran, you did exactly what you should have done, and when it came down to it you went with us to Mordor without hesitation. None of us ever thought you were a coward, man, you had nothing to prove to us."

"I did," is what comes out of his mouth, and he didn't realize until he said it that it's true, that he knows what he needs to tell Steve. "Look, I - I know in the grand scheme of all of this, high school doesn't really feel like it matters all that much anymore, but I was still a jerk. The way I treated Lucas wasn't all that different from what I've always said I was protecting those guys from, you know? Tearing him down, excluding him because he liked something we didn't think was cool. Took a murder rep and almost getting eaten to realize it, but, you know, I got there. I'm getting there."

Steve's looking at him like he's proud of him again, even after his little outburst, and it hits him even harder this time around. "You apologize to him?"

Eddie opens his mouth to say that he had, then closes it, frowning. "Uh. I mean, I told him I should have moved Hellfire and it wasn't okay the way I treated him? I'm not actually sure the sorry part made it out. But I will!"

Steve makes some kind of gesture that Eddie's going to interpret to mean there you go, but he doesn't say anything.

"Sorry," Eddie mutters, fingers twisting in the sheets. "For snapping at you."

Steve tips his head in acknowledgement. Doesn't say it's okay, doesn't say it isn't okay, just holds Eddie's gaze for a moment before he moves on.

Eddie is sharply, ridiculously grateful.

"I told the others they couldn't come over yet," Steve says. "They're probably going to invade tomorrow, though."

Eddie pulls in a breath and lets it out, slow and shaky, and very carefully unfolds himself more, stretching out his legs and letting his arms fall to his side. "Yeah. That's fine, I can get it together by tomorrow."

Steve's looking at him with these big, sad eyes, something like resignation in them.

"What?" Eddie asks.

"That's how I do it," Steve says. "When all this is going on - I just get it together, because I have to."

"What about when it's not going on?" He hadn't meant to ask that, he doesn't think, but it just slips out.

"Kind of feels like it's always going on," Steve says with a rueful little quirk to his smile, then shrugs. "I don't know, man, I'll get back to you when I've figured that out. But as far as I'm concerned, there's no wrong way to try to handle all this, all right?"

Eddie thinks about that for a moment. Then, "Who couldn't you save that you feel responsible for?"

He's not sure what possessed him to ask - maybe because he wants to give Steve the opportunity to be comforted over something the way Steve did for Eddie, maybe because he's too fucking curious for his own good, maybe because he selfishly wants to know how much from his own experience Steve was talking about. Still, he watches Steve closely, ready to back off if the question makes him shut down.

It doesn't. If anything, Steve looks like he was kind of expecting that.

"Barbara Holland."

Eddie frowns. "The girl that was killed by a chemical leak from Hawkins Lab? Nancy's friend?"

"Wasn't a chemical leak." Steve pushes his fingers through his hair. "It was a demogorgon, the very first one. Nancy and Tommy and Carol and Barb were all over at my house, and we were drinking and horsing around and shit. Barb cut her hand trying to shotgun a beer. Nance told her that she should head home, that Nancy was going to stay over. We all thought Barb left, but… she didn't. While we were all inside, the demogorgon grabbed her from my backyard, dragged her off to who knows where."

"Goddamn. That was, what, 1983?"

Steve hums an affirmative. "November 83, yeah."

All the way back then, and Eddie didn't have any idea this was going on. "How'd you know it was from your backyard?"

"Jonathan was out in the woods looking for Will, and he snapped some pictures of all of us. He caught Barb sitting alone at the pool, bleeding, with the demogorgon coming out of the woods behind her."

Eddie's brows slam down before he can help it. "Wait, that actually happened? I mean, everyone heard the rumor that Jonathan was a perv, lurking in people's yards and taking pictures through their windows, I just kind of figured it was exaggerated."

Steve gives a little laugh, short and humorless. "It was exaggerated. I don't think he did it again, but, yeah. Nicole caught him developing the pictures at the school. A couple of them were of Nancy getting undressed when she and I were in my bedroom. Nancy forgave him, though, said it ended up being a good thing considering what they found out because of it."

Eddie - doesn't really know what to think about that. "What about you?"

Steve wrinkles his nose. "I called him a perv and broke his camera."

Eddie's eyebrows shoot up. "You broke his camera?"

"I told you I really was a douchebag." Steve glances away from him, and Eddie can see the line of his jaw tighten a little. "I felt bad about it after everything, got him a new one."

"No, I meant - did you forgive him?"

Steve looks back at him, brows furrowed like he wasn't expecting that question.

Eddie's stomach clenches a little. "Steve," he says softly. "Has no one asked you that before?"

Steve's frowning still, and for a moment Eddie thinks he won't answer, then he says, "I haven't really talked about it with anyone who didn't already know about it. It's not - it's not like I have anything to forgive, you know? Nancy was the one undressing in the picture."

"Sure," Eddie agrees, biting his lip for a moment as he tries to decide if he wants to let this drop or to keep going. "But - it was your house, Steve. Your window, your bedroom. You were there, too."

Steve's quiet for a very long moment.

"It's not-" Eddie starts, then stops, considering. "You didn't ask to have someone take pictures of you like that. It doesn't make it okay just because you're both guys."

"No, that's not-" Steve stops, too, and Eddie wonders if as he said it, he realized that he was thinking something like that. "I guess I've just never really thought about it like that before. I was pissed because of Nancy, and when she let it go, I kind of figured I should, too."

"And now?" Eddie prompts.

Steve shrugs. "I still don't know. I'll talk to Robin about it, I guess." There's a pause, and then he freezes, seeming to realize what he just said. "Uh, not that-"

"Dude, it's fine," Eddie cuts him off with a laugh. "I'm not offended that you'd rather process that with someone you've known a little longer."

Steve shoots him a grateful little smile. "I'm going to go down and make dinner," he says. "You wanna come with?"

Eddie considers that for a moment. He's not sure he wants to be alone again, but - he's more sure he doesn't feel up for tackling the stairs, not even with Steve's help.

Especially with Steve's help. He needs a breather away from being pressed all close to him, particularly since he knows he's going to have to ask Steve to stay in the room with him again tonight.

He shakes his head. "I'm good up here. Just, uh. Leave the door open?"

Steve leaves the door open, and a couple of minutes after he goes downstairs, Eddie can hear music playing. Queen. It makes Eddie smile, makes him wonder if he'd normally put music on while he was cooking or if he'd done it specifically for Eddie. Either way, it makes something fond and warm settle in his chest.

Damn, Eddie's got it bad. He should be embarrassed, should be feeling too vulnerable and caught out after all of that, but he doesn't. He feels…

Safe. It's fucking with his head, so he tries not to focus on it too much.

Dinner is tomato soup and mac and cheese, split between them as they sit across from each other on the bed. Eddie eats half of each of his and then mixes them together, just to get Steve to make faces at him as he happily digs in.

"It's just like dunking grilled cheese into tomato soup, Steve!" he insists.

"Grilled cheese has a crunch that makes sense, that's just mush on top of mush," Steve replies, pointing his spoon at him as if for emphasis.

He can't get Steve to try it, but it doesn't really matter. After everything, it feels good just to mess around like this.

Steve clears their dishes away when they're done, then comes back and says, "All right, let's go."

Eddie raises an eyebrow. "We're going where, exactly?"

"My room," Steve replies. "If we're sticking together again tonight, my bed's a lot better and it has my bat within reach."

For a moment, Eddie considers teasing him about calling it sticking together instead of what it is, but decides against it. For one, the first thing that'd came to his mind is to say what, trying to avoid making it sound like you're inviting Eddie The Freak Munson into your bed? which sounds perfectly light and teasing in his head, but would probably come out a little too serious, and he doesn't actually want an answer to that. For another, well. It just reminds him that sticking together is what it is.

Despite how chill Steve'd been this morning with Mike's reaction, despite that Eddie still can't seem to completely smash his hopes down, he knows what this is. The only reason that Steve Harrington slept in the same bed with him last night is because they're both beat to hell and can't sleep without someone there who understands what they've been through, and the only reason Steve's inviting him into his bed now is to try to ward off nightmares, or at least make any that crop up a little easier to deal with.

He hasn't even gotten up the courage yet to tell Steve that he thinks they might be soulmates, he can't let himself get too lost in believing it might be romantic.

So he just says, "Lead the way to your chambers, then, your Majesty."

Steve rolls his eyes at him, helps him out of bed and stays by his side as they head down the hall. Eddie only needs to lean on him a little, which makes him feel pretty damn good, and he's even up for heading into Steve's bathroom to get ready for bed first. There's a brand new toothbrush there, still in its packaging, and Eddie assumes it's for him, so he adds brushing his teeth to the list of activities he can manage on his own now.

They swap when Eddie's done, and he climbs into Steve's bed without waiting for him - mostly because he doesn't want to overexert himself, and because he knows which side of the bed Steve prefers to sleep on now, which. Is definitely not helping his hopes stay shoved down where they should be.

Steve leaves the bathroom door open a crack, just enough that he can hear him bustling around in there, can hear him humming to himself. It's pretty - Eddie can't place whatever it is, but Steve sounds good.

He shuts off the overhead light when he comes out of the bathroom, but leaves a lamp on.

"Sounds nice." Eddie yawns. "Didn't know you could sing."

"Humming isn't singing," Steve counters, but he gives him a soft little smile as he climbs into his side of the bed.

"What song is it?" Eddie asks, and feels his heart kick up a little when Steve scrunches his nose.

"You're gonna make fun of me."

"I won't!" Eddie insists.

Steve scratches his nose. "It's a kid's song, I think it's based on a poem. I learned it from Robin, and I'd sing it sometimes when they couldn't sleep after Starcourt."

Eddie should probably let it go so they can both get some sleep, but he's so eager to learn more about this world that was going on right under his nose that he can't help but ask, "After Starcourt?"

Steve hums an affirmative. "Remember I said it wasn't my first time having someone stay over in the aftermath? We usually check on each other for a while. That first time, it was mostly me and Nance, and we'd check in on Jonathan sometimes. She made me talk to Mike a few times."

Oh, shit. Eddie practically vibrates with the urge to pounce on that with all the glee of a cat distracted by a laser pointer, but - no, no, he has to stay strong, he -

"How'd that work out for you?"

Damn it.

Steve snorts. "He was barely twelve, so not all that bad. It was when we all thought El was still gone, and he just - he really missed her, and Nancy didn't know how to talk to him. I told her to ask him how Will was doing. Mike's a little asshole, but he cares so much about his friends, you know? Asking about Will meant she wasn't asking him about his feelings, she was asking about his friend. She made me come with her, and it kind of worked. I dunno. We talked about what they might be feeling, what they used to do for fun, and how they should get back to it. Nancy reminded him how much they loved that game you guys are all obsessed with, so they started playing again."

Eddie looks up at him, remembering looking up at Steve Harrington in the comic and games shop, watching him try to figure out what to get Will Byers for a going away present, and thinking about what a jackass he was.

God, Eddie's never been more glad to have been so wrong.

Steve still takes the silence as a cue to keep going, though, and he runs his fingers through his hair. "The second time, Dustin just showed up at my house, and the rest of the little shitheads followed pretty quick. They had movie nights and invaded my pool and ate everything in my kitchen, and sometimes they'd sleep over. Dustin was here more often than he wasn't for a while."

Eddie tilts his head, glad to be back on more even ground. "What'd you guys even do?"

Steve shrugs one shoulder. "I dunno, stuff. I drove Dustin to his first school dance, helped him get ready, watched Star Wars, talked about girls and his science camp and my job searching. He was away at camp when I started working at Scoops, but I used the back entrance to get the rest of them into the movies. Lucas and I played ball, Max'd come over and we'd make dinner sometimes."

"You really are friends with them." It's soft and awed, but Eddie knows the moment it comes out that it doesn't sound like he meant it to. "I mean - being the babysitter and the paladin's one thing. It's obvious that you step up when shit's going down and they need you. But you're still there, even when the world's not ending."

Steve smiles at him, a little pleased, a little surprised. "I try, anyway. Hit or miss on it now that they're all in high school." Another shrug. "Anyway, it - after Starcourt, Robin and Dustin and Erica and I were in pretty close touch for a bit. Robin stayed over most nights, and Dustin when he could, and Erica'd say she was fine but she'd walkie us a lot, 'specially the first week or two. I got in the habit of singing it for them, and it seemed to work."

Eddie just watches him. He doesn't have nearly enough mental power to try to process the way Steve keeps getting to him, digging his way deeper and deeper under his skin - barely has enough to acknowledge the want that lingers on his tongue, sharp and bittersweet. They've built a family, this little rag-tag party, and Eddie wants to keep being folded into it so bad he can taste it - just as much as the very thought scares the shit out of him.

"Will you sing it for me?"

"You will a hundred percent make fun of me," Steve protests, but it isn't a no.

"I won't," Eddie promises softly.

Steve sighs, the same way Eddie's heard him do right before he gives into one of the others, and Eddie can't stop his wide smile.

"Close your eyes, at least," Steve insists, and Eddie obeys.

There's a few moments of silence, as if Steve is hyping himself up, and then his humming starts again.

"Lavender blue, dilly dilly, lavender green," Steve croons softly.

The absurdity of the situation hits him hard - he's in Steve Harrington's bed, while the man himself sings him a lullaby about lavender that includes the words dilly dilly. He manages not to let out a slightly hysterical giggle, but his face must do something, because Steve's singing cuts off.

"See?" Steve demands.

"I'm not!" Eddie protests. He lets his hand move, fingertips just barely pressing against Steve's arm. "I'm not, I promise. Please?"

There's a moment of silence, and Eddie struggles to keep his eyes closed and wait patiently, but then Steve starts humming again. It goes on a little longer this time, like he's either skipping past some things or making sure Eddie's face isn't going to do whatever it was doing before, but then he starts singing again.

"I told myself, dilly dilly, I told me so."

There's more lyrics, but Eddie stops paying attention to them, feeling himself relax more and more. It's not about the words, really, it's - it's about the melody, the repetitive flow. It's Steve's voice, lovely and soft, it's knowing someone's with you, someone who's been through the same things you have, someone who cares. After everything, knowing you're not alone.

"Let the birds sing, dilly dilly, and the lambs play," Steve sings, as Eddie's limbs grow heavy and sleep hovers so closely he could almost melt into it. "We shall be safe, dilly dilly, out of harm's way."

It's not about the words.

"Lavender's green, dilly dilly, lavender's blue. If you love me, dilly dilly, I will love you."

God, Eddie is so fucked.

The bit about Nancy making Steve talk to Mike after season one is from one of the Stranger Things free comic book day issues, because I saw it and immediately loved its dorkiness. The song/nursery rhyme Steve is referencing is this, for anyone curious!

-----

Part 17

I've got the next two parts mostly written up, and we'll be diving into the start of the soulmate reveals.

Tag list (always happy to add more, even if I'm still figuring these out!): @vampireinthesun @koibug @estrellami-1 @mentalcyborg @allbimyself26 @questionablequeeries @the-s-is-silent @whimsicalwitchm @a-gae-af-racoon @tinyplanet95 @n0-1-important @velocitytimes2 @swimmingbirdrunningrock @newtstabber @jcmadgirl @roblingoblin285 @lexyvey @paperbackribs @goodolefashionedloverboi @evix-syne666 @raisedbylibrarians @stxrcrossed186 @nightmareglitter @greekgeek24 @starman-jpg @crazyhatlady86 @imfinereallyy @manda-panda-monium @deleataecount @prideandsensibility @chaoticvictorianspirit @maydillydally @disrespectedgoatman @scarlet-malfoy @i-less-than-three-you @hbyrde36 @hallucinatedjosten @dragonsandgayships @arepaconchocolate @g4ys0n @novelnovella @bisexualdisastersworld @ghostofyourvampiregf @scarletyeager @pettrichore @nerd-and-nervous @hiimlevi @queenie-ofthe-void @cinnamon-mushroomabomination

[eccentricallygothic]

Ok and just hear me out so like some of the Chris evans characters like Lloyd,ari,ransom,jensen, and Andy like let’s say they all shared reader there little bunny and one one sunny day she was in there pool because it was hot and she was limited to a certain time because they wanted her inside so she didn’t get cold from the water and they all come outside and see her playing and tell her to come in but she’s throwing a fit and being a brat so they tried getting her out but eventually Ari jumped in and she seen so she tried swimming away but she was a little slow so Ari grabbed her by the hips and dragged her closer to him turning her around and she hides in her face into his neck knowing she’s in trouble for pulling her little stunt

Idk it’s just something I thought of☕️😍

!!!!!

Warning(s): Ddlg vibes, bratty!you, polyamorous relationship, brat!tamer Daddies Ari, Lloyd, Jensen, Andy and Ransom, one spank and mentions of punishment, stripping, fluff(?), bunny!you. Browse at your own discretion. 18+

You already know the stricter and older Daddies (Andy, Lloyd and Ari) have their massive arms crossed over their broad chests in disapproval as they watch your little form. 

"Nooo, Daddy! Bunny wanna swim more, ugh!" You brattily huff and throw your feet against the water as you stomp away from the side of the pool they're standing on. 

Ransom and Jensen get the blame for spoiling you so much when the truth is, all of them are equally whipped and can't help but pamper you in every way possible. 

That is exactly why you have been getting brattier and brattier. 

"Bunny…" Lloyd warns as he walks along the length of the pool to try and stop you without spoiling his work fit. "Out, now." 

You turn to only stick your tongue out at him, your little barbie and ducky floaties that Jensen had practically forced upon you, helping you drift away from him and towards the middle of the pool.

The men warningly watched you now, trying to intimidate you into obedience but you were following the strict rule of if I can't see them, they can't get me.

Andy loosened his tie as he sighed. He had just gotten home.

"I'll count to 5" the oldest male warned, expecting you to fold as usual.

But you really wanted to be punished today, didn't you?

A few moments passed as you ignored the concerned men, giggling at how the wrinkles caused by the pool water were increasing along the tips of your fingers and toes. 

"That's it!" Ari was the least fancy out of them all. A literal giant with a stature of 6 foot five inches, he was a rough and tough man that did not have much patience for bullshit. 

Kicking his shoes off, the man pulled his plaid and tee off next. While you stayed high on your brat cloud, Ari shrugged his pants off before diving into the pool like a professional swimmer.

You turned to look behind you in horror when the loud splash of water sounded a small distance away from you.

Ari was bringing the proximity to a very quick close with the help of his fast movements and large limbs.

"NUUU! NOT FAIR!" You screeched as you flailed your arms about you, winding one of your legs back before you started to kick down at the water to get away from the nearing doom.

"Come here, you!" Another screech left you when in your attempt to flee your persuer you accidentally swam a little close to Ransom and his hand lunged towards you to grab a hold. 

Although you successfully dodged him with a quick manouvre, your smaller body was no match in speed to Ari's and before you could recover from Ransom's grab, thick and built hairy arms were closing around your form after your hips were pulled in his direction with the tips of his strong fingers.

"NOOOOO!" You protested in despair, flailing your limbs to express yourself as Ari turned you around to face him. 

The moment his strict eyes that were rather rare but brought you to tears every time they came out, met with yours, you became a mum and whimpering mess.

The lips that the men loved (to play with) so much formed a pout as you weakly buried your face in the conjunction between his shoulder and neck.

The best little girl is a quiet one. 

The older Daddies had taught you this.

"There we go" Ari crooned as he caressed your back while bringing you both to the edge where the other Daddies were standing. 

Jensen pulled you up and out by your shoulders while Ari supported your legs so you wouldn't end up with sore limbs from the force of it. 

But you weren't placed on the ground. 

Instead you were made to dangle like the little bunny doll that you were between the men as Ransom stepped forward to peal your floaties and wet bikini off of you. 

"And now we are just a weak little pathetic pouting brat" Daddy Lloyd's condescending tut along with the sudden nakedness had you blushing furiously as you stared anywhere but at your owners. 

Andy being the most authoritative one was the one you were handed to -more like tucked against his hip as he had an arm around your sorry form to keep you levitated- as you were carried inside.

"Such a spoilt little bunny, aren't we?" The sharp smack he landed on your ass had you whining. 

You were in for a long evening with your cross Daddies.

Omg thank you so much for this ask! I absolutely loved it and your brain because this made me all hot and shy! I know I am responding to this a bit late but I wanted to do it justice 🥵❤️

[viaviv124]

Cotl Orphan AU

So bc i would never in a million years finish writing this as a fic i'll just write everything i have so far here so its out of my head and y'all can also do whatever you want with it. This will be a long ass post so get a drink and get cozy. Of course i won't get on full Detail like characterizations etc, in this post at least, so feel free to ask questions! I'd love to answer them!

This post includes content warnings for all sorts of very dark topics, but especially murder, body horror, torture, cannibalism, suicide, depression, slightly implied sexual abuse, implied abuse in general and other stuff like that. If you're sensible to this please click off or proceed with caution.

It all starts with 5 siblings, Shamura(16), Kallamar(14), Narinder(13), Heket(10) and Leshy(8). When Leshy was barely able to walk they ended up on the streets because one of their parents killed the other before taking their own life. They struggled a lot but they got by.

One day, when Narinder was out looking for food, he found an injured lamb, around his age, in an ally. They seemed starved and the life had already left their eyes as they barely managed to look up at him. Being unable to just leave them there he knelt down to them, ripped off parts of his own clothes to wrap around them as makeshift bandages and left them all the food he gathered so far whilst telling them to keep living, that they shouldnt have to die like this. Once making sure the lamb will be fine alone he left, thinking he can just collect some more food anyway.

Around 3 - 4 years pass and in that time 4 of the siblings were gravely injured. Shamura suffered a devistating blow to the head from someone they stole food from, cracking their skull just enough to keep them alive but also to damage the brain. Kallamar's ears were ripped off by other homeless people that succumbed to insanity. Heket's throat was slit by an older, privileged child who thought it was funny after Heket expressed that she didn't want anything to do with them. Leshy's eyes were all shot during a heist, requiring his siblings to gouge out the remains. It's unclear how they survived all that. From then on the siblings, espacially Narinder, decided that murder is okay and justified if necessary.

More years pass and they reach their current ages. Due to a dispute they're chased out of the current ally they lived in for a long time. Now they're on the search for a new home, but it's very hard. Once they're on the other side of town, where they've never been before, yet still unable to find a suitable place especially Shamura starts to despair, blaming themself internally for being unable to help their siblings. Narinder and Kallamar do their best to try and reassure them.

One night, as they're wandering, they get found by a lamb dressed in rags, covered in scars and dirt and wearing a bag, they're around Narinder's age, who smiles kindly at them and offers a hand, promising a secure home and food. All of the siblings distrust this child, however out of necessity Shamura feels forced to accept the offer, they take the lambs hand. The lamb's smile turns gentler as they introduce themself as Belphy before starting to lead the way.

Belphy leads them to an old, abandoned factory at the outskirts of town, in which are several children of various ages and states, some coming to greet Belphy and asking if they brought new friends. At first the siblings don't trust anyone, keeping to eachother instead of interacting with the others, however eventually Leshy starts to get along with a yellow cat barely younger than him and with a missing arm. Heket becomes friends a bunny girl, who's quite the oddball, detesting touch in one moment and then clinging to Heket the next. Seeing their siblings get along with the other children Shamura and Kallamar also slowly start interacting with the others. However, Narinder only really socializes with Belphy, as they seem to cling to him whenever they're not busy. Seeing them first as an annoyance, Narinder soon learns to trust and appreciate this strange lamb. He also learns that this is the lamb he helped many years ago, being the leading cause of Belphy helping other children in need too.

However, Narinder notices some very odd behaviour from Belphy. He can't say what exactly it is, but it bothers him. But no matter how often he decides to trail them when they go out, they seem to always be a step ahead of him, greeting him with a sweet smile and going home with him before he could even get a rough glance of anything the lamb was doing. Whenever he asks questions Belphy smoothly avoids them or tells him not to worry about it, that everything is fine and nothing's out of the ordinary. Narinder can't help but get a bit scared, though. Because as nice and sweet as the lamb is, whatever they hide, he knows they must hide something, must be horrifying.

But one day, on the day he finds out. This time he wasn't even trailing Belphy, he was just out on a walk of his own when he suddenly heard a scream. He hid behind the corner and glanced into the back ally, having never seen something so horrifying before. In the ally was a bloodbath, Belphy in the middle of it, surrounded by two or three gruesomely mutilated corpses. Belphy licked the blood off their hand with a terrifyingly satisfied smile as the black knife in their other hand turned into a black snake with only a red eye as a face and curled around their arm, conveniantly hidden under the fleece. Confused by the transformation of the knife-snake they looked at their arm "Hmm? What was that for? I'm not done yet." As they look up again their eyes meet Narinders and Narinders blood runs cold as he freezes. His heart beats up and almost out of his chest as Belphys smile softens and they walk torwards him, covered in blood. The closer Belphy gets, the faster and louder Narinders heart beats as he squeezes his eyes shut.

Despite his expectations Belphy just gently cups his face, pulls his head down to their height and leans their forehead against his. They gently caress him and with a soft and gentle voice they attempt to soothe him, telling him that everything is okay, that he is okay and that he doesnt have to be scared. They tell him to breathe. To Narinders own surprise this works unexpectedly well and he manages to steady his breathing and calm down a little, however once he can move again he moves away from Belphy, opening his eyes only for a glare as his fear turns to fury. Narinder hisses not to touch him.

Belphy smiles and puts their hands in the air to show they're not a threat, the snake, now more exposed, stares at Narinder. When Narinder demands answers, Belphy complies with no hesitation.

They tell him that the snake found Belphy several years ago, not too long after their first encounter with Narinder. It said it needed blood and if Belphy provides it'll help them in turn too. So as proof it turned into a black crown with its red eye in the middle, its true form it said, and sat on Belphys head, healing every wound as good as it could it its weakened state. Once Belphy agreed to do it the crown now turned into a combat knife. Belphy only ever kills adults. When they first killed they let out all their pain and sorrows, following the crown's advice to make it easier, and as a result they came to like it. Torturing and killing adults, the ones that made their life so horrible in the first place. Now these despicable creatures are at their mercy as they scream and cry in pain, just like the lamb did too, before taking their lifes at last. Over the years they also grew fond of the taste of their victim's blood and flesh, what once was a necessity now was a guilty pleasure, allthough, they added, they cannot stand the smell.

Belphy reassures Narinder, who is a mix of heavily disturbed and (for reasons he doesnt quite understand) somewhat unfazed, that they won't ever harm him, the other children and his siblings, not now and not when they're all grown. They also make him promise to please not tell anyone, not even his siblings, before suggesting he can help them if he'd like.

With that Narinder is now Belphys partner in crime. He did come with them on a few massacres, he calls it that because of how messy Belphy is, and whilst he's still somewhat disturbed, mainly by Belphy's cannibalistic tendencies and a level of merciless sadism he didn't expect of them considering their sweet and gentle demeanour, he can't help but admit that he also bears a deep rooted spite for adults and that this is a great way to vent all this pain, it made him discover he might also be more sadistic than he thought. Maybe murder for fun was okay and not just a necessity.

Yet all of this still bothered him. Deep inside he was not only scared of Belphy but also himself. Shamura noticed Narinder's off behaviour and after weeks, maybe months, of observing him they finally asked what's going on. Narinder's deep trust in Shamura makes him forget about the promise he made and so he tells the everything. Everything about Belphy, the murders, his own sadistic tendencies, his fears and worries about all of this. Shamura didn't say much about it. They just held him close as he spoke.

It took less than a day for Belphy to find out. They're not happy. And Narinder is going to feel the consequences of a broken promise. Some cuts and bruises, maybe a broken bone or two, but nothing more than a severed finger. They care too much about him to do more. They cant bring themself to do more. So this'll do. It should teach Narinder to keep a promise next time.

They did it. They hurt him. As much as they hate seeing him scared, him accepting their embrace for comfort afterwards was very nice, considering how often he told them to not touch him. Maybe they'll ask the crown to heal Narinder, the message they wanted to send seemed to arrive so there's no need for him to be in even more pain.

AND THATS ALL I HAVE FOR NOW :D Thank you so much reading through this! If you have any questions about the AU and characters etc, feel free to ask!!

[panem-crustus]

SOUDOUGH SALUTATIONS!!!

I am the one and only Carbohydramancer on/ in the @wizard-island-trading-co! I am a Carbohydramancer, that is, a manipulator of Carbohydrates. A bread wizard, basically. My magics are based mostly on semantics. If it can technically be called bread, I can make it.

Pronouns: He/Him

CURRENT STOCK

Battery Acid Hawaiian Buns: An extremely potent electromagical power source. Boosts the power of any electromagical devices and machines hooked up to it. Requires Bottled Lightning and Lithium to bake. Handle only with insulated gloves.

Loaf of Armorsoul: Temporarily boosts defense In organic beings and repairs Automatons when consumed. Any bread baked using @odd-animated-armor's chest cavity results in this bread. This is the only way I've been able to replicate the recipe thus far.

_________________________

UPDATED: Starlight Sourdough: A mystical, mostly untested recipe. A potent, edible source of mana that is arguably more appetizing than a vial of purple goo. I used the Spores of a rare Starlight Mushroom as yeast for a Sourdough Starter, resulting in a promising way to cultivate the notoriously finicky fungus. The recipe has been stabilized, and is being used as a mana power source for @wizard-island-trading-co's Moon-Garden Dyson-Swarm.

Starlight Sourdough-Based effects (made to order):

Total Cleansing: clears all magical status effects and transformations, aside from Trans Magics.

Vitality Enhancement: Enhances your body to handle deadly poisons and fight off any disease or other foreign infection .

SPONTANEOUS MANA COMBUSTION: Causes your mana pathways to overload and have a meltdown that deals devastating damage at the cost of your ability to use magic, at least until you can be properly healed. ⚠️USE WITH EXTREME CAUTION⚠️

_________________________

Bread Bowls full of The Stew: They're bread bowls full of The Stew. Delicious. Mmmm stew. NOT LIABLE FOR ANY INJURY CAUSED BY THE STEW.

Accursed Garlic Bread of Breath Cleansing: Asexual Vampires Rejoice! Consumable for vampires and freshens the breath! All the good of garlic bread with none of the bad! Hurrah! Huzzah!

Sunlight Loaf: Imbued with Radiant Energy, this bread is a bite of sunshine on even the cloudiest of days. It perfectly replicates the nostalgia of Mom's cooking (or nostalgic equivalent) to give a bit of comfort when you need it.

Moonlight Loaf: Baked with Midnight Flour, this bread is a taste of darkness on even the sunniest of days. It perfectly replicates the traumatic experiences of your youth (or any point in your life) to add a dash of despair when you just need a good cry.

CUSTOM ORDERS!!!

Need a pita with a purpose? A magical managerie of baked goods can be at your fingertips! Just tell me the desired effects and I'll see what I can do. I don't take money for my services, however. I take exotic ingredients from which to craft new and exciting pastries.

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SOURDOUGH SAYONARA!!!

SECRET BLACK MARKET BREADS:

Biscuit of Testicular Torsion: Leave this unsuspecting biscuit in your victim's fridge. They will eat it, guaranteed. Just wait and listen for the screams. Does not work on those who lack testes.

Baked Horrors: do not. dont. Don't do it you won't like it. Neither will they. Dont.

Bread That Gives @the-gnomish-bastard a migraine every time you take a bite of it: This bread's effects are a mystery.

Not Bread: this is just some gravel I shoveled off of a riverbed.

[markantonys]

thoughts on the people of falme cheering over learning that the dragon has been reborn

1) their city was just getting blown up and now it's not. they're happy about this.

2) their city had been occupied by the seanchan for weeks (months?) and now it's not. they're happy about this.

3) the average layperson may not even recognize the dragon symbol; maybe they're just thinking someone's putting on a nice fireworks show to celebrate the attack being over.

4) but assuming they do recognize it, this is not unlike the immediate reaction to rand declaring himself in the stone in TDR. all the onlookers kneel before him and take up chanting "the dragon has been reborn!" it's not a celebratory moment, exactly, but it's far from a fearful one. it's only in the little coda afterwards that mat tells us the news is being met with both awe and fright as it's being spread; in the immediate moment, "awe" is definitely the main emotion.

5) there is book precedent for rand being welcomed into a city for whom he did a good deed, rather than being met with hatred or fear (illian). maybe the people of falme, in this immediate post-battle moment, care less about the vague future notion of the last battle and more about the fact that whoever's up on that tower did them a solid by helping get rid of the seanchan and the whitecloaks.

6) elayne noted that the people of falme act like they've been seanchan all their lives. perhaps their cheering for the dragon reborn who's just conquered their conquerors is meant to show a Series Theme about how the average layperson doesn't care about who's in charge or about what's going on in the world at large as long as their own individual life isn't affected too badly.

7) in the books, the idea that the general populace is afraid of rand/the dragon reborn really doesn't emerge strongly until TSR, after he's been publicly out as the dragon for more than 5 seconds. no reason to assume the show will never get to this idea just because it hasn't yet. this series has 1 million Themes and not all of them can fit in the first 2 seasons of the show. since everybody was going to be split up for most of this season, they chose "the vulnerability of isolation vs. the strength of togtherness" as the Focal Theme for the season and the big moment of togetherness in the final scene is the conclusion of this Theme. (and this was all necessitated in part by barney's departure; rafe said that the changes to mat's story are what made them decide to double down on the isolation theme for season 2.)

8) simple storytelling and Making Emotionally Satisfying Television reasons. season 2 was a very heavy season of isolation, despair, and loss (and i saw more than one mid-season critic review & show-only comment begging for some light because things had been so painful for so long). thus, they wanted to end the season on a note of unity, hope, and triumph, to give the audience some much-needed positive catharsis. the final scene being everybody screaming in horror and recoiling in terror from rand would've been, you know, kind of a downer.

9) even if the people are celebrating, rand himself is CLEARLY not happy. rest assured that the show is aware of the "it sucks to be the chosen one" Theme and is not going to make being the dragon reborn any less of a burden for rand than it is in the books (just in case the whole thing where he spent the entire season hating himself and having nightmares about killing everyone he loves didn't already give you that impression).

plus, just like in TGH&TDR, this season rand's inner struggle was only about being a male channeler because he had no idea his dragon reborn duties weren't over until the last few episodes. only now that he has officially taken up the mantle of the dragon reborn will it be time for us to see how much being the chosen one weighs on him. so, just the same timing as it was in the books. (and frankly, i think season 1's emphasis on rand having concrete plans for a future in emond's field which he now has to abandon already sold this idea more than the first 2 or 3 books alone did; as a show-only for s1 i was so upset about rand not getting to be a stay-at-home cottagecore dad, my show-only mom was so upset about it, and i've seen plenty of other show-onlys being upset about it too.)