#this volume gave me a panic attack probably

[hannahssimblr]

The marquee holds extraordinary heat. It reminds me of the family holiday I took with Maureen and her kids to Florida, that phenomenal, stupefying heat, and the air like soup. I felt too tired to do anything but swim around in the resort pool for those two weeks, but that was the whole point. We went to laze about. I bobbed on a big yellow pool floater while the others slept on the deck chairs until the sun dipped over Daytona Beach and it was bearable enough to move again. 

Here, light permeates through polyester walls, diffusing a blue hue, and the air is constrictive like a panic attack. It smells too, of hot plastic and grass, and all the people who didn’t queue for the showers this morning. 

“It’s gross in here,” I comment, bellowing already because every voice in the whole marquee bounces off the walls and raises the volume to incomparable levels. 

Joe laughs and makes fun of my accent for Kasper’s benefit. “Gross, man, totally freakin’ gross, my dude.”

“Do you want to stay or go?”

“It’s Crystal Castles!”

“Okay, so, stay?”

“Yeah, duh.” With a hand on my back, Joe propels me into the crowd, where we push through, closer and closer to the front. The atmosphere is so unpleasant, so hot, so stuffy, and even though I’ve been drinking all afternoon, my head still twists with unwanted thoughts. I feel my phone vibrate. 

It’s Jen, as expected. 

Where are you? We’re going to see Slash now. Also, Evie has asked where you are a few times. 

I shove it back into my shorts pocket, and something crinkles against my hand.

Ah. I had forgotten about this.

I subtly pull out the baggie from yesterday, the one from Weed Alison, and turn it over in my hand. I know I shouldn’t, that I tell everyone who asks me that don’t do any of this anymore, but these little pink pills lure me in like a siren. They hold promises of escapism, if only just for an hour.

And then, what didn’t even seem like an option yesterday seems almost sensible today.

“Hey, do you want one?” I ask Joe, “you and Kasper. I’ve three.”

He cranes his neck. “What’s that?” 

“Ket.”

“Oh, I’ve never done that.”

“You want to try it?”

He looks to Kasper for reassurance, and his friend shrugs noncommittally. “Well, what’s it like?”

“Pretty strange.”

“Okay,” he says. I tip two tablets into his palm and one, the last, into my mouth.

He winces as we dry-swallow. “Ugh, it’s disgusting.” 

I suppress a cough. “Did you expect gourmet?”

“I didn’t expect pure shite.”

“Well, it’s probably worth it.”

“Probably?”

As I watch the stage, I eagerly anticipate the moment my soul separates from my body while the roadies prepare. Once the gig starts, the ground begins to sway like a fairground ride. It’s the same thrill too, the same loss of control as when you’re floating through the air, when the floor gives way beneath your feet and you’re weightless, like something caught on the wind. 

“Woah.” Joe cries at one point, and I am viewing both him and Kasper through a fisheye lens. I just laugh, because everything is silly, and nothing matters the way it did this morning. Thoughts derail like train carriages tipped off the line, and my brain emerges from a pool of cool water, washed clean of every thought that has ever held significance in my whole life. 

I was sceptical of Ketamine once, back before I understood it, and clung tightly to the edgy, but familiar high I got from cocaine. It was Alison who gave me some at a house party last summer, my first bump, and with plasticine limbs we danced in the kitchen to someone’s dad’s CD collection, with a sense that we could do whatever we liked, and it wouldn’t be weird. I hadn’t felt that way since I was nine. 

Kaleidoscopic lights mesmerise me in the marquee. The music is strange, but perhaps it is supposed to be. All music is strange, if you think about it. Who decides which beats and melodies sound good, anyway? How do we know that? The singer decides to crowd surf and comes close enough for me to touch her boot. It would be funny if I took it off. This is a fact. I lank at the laces while Kasper laughs, this maniacal, unselfconscious laugh, and I join in. I don’t know what I’ll do with the boot once it’s off, but it’s the funniest possible thing to do. Maybe I’ll display it in my college apartment one day, say it belonged to Alice Glass, and have to argue with everyone that doesn’t believe me. 

“I feel weird.” Joe says. 

“That’s good.” 

“No, I think- I feel wrong.”

“It’s not wrong. Don’t make it wrong.”

“I feel wrong,” and I look at him, with his pitch black eyes panicked, and then he heaves.

And he bolts out of the crowd.

“Oh.” I look at Kasper, and him at me, and realise my teeth are sweating. “Do you think it’s bad ket?”

“I don’t know.” He says, and I'm suddenly aware that if I attempt any more words, I will throw them up. 

Throwing up in a crowd is not the ideal place to do it, I know this, but it is difficult to escape with legs that feel lead-weighted, when the earth is tilted so dramatically that I am scaling it. 

“I’m going to vom.” I announce, and a path clears so quickly that it feels biblical. 

I hit the back of the tent, and it goes everywhere. Everywhere. It splashes on my shoes and up the walls, and Joe is there too, my partner in crime, vomiting just as violently as I am. I wonder if I should pat him on the back, or give him a high five, or something.

By the time Kasper falls in line and completes our trio, security is already on us, and all that seemed so easy and funny before now fills me with unspeakable dread.

“Outside,” one barks, grabbing fistfuls of my t-shirt and hauling me toward the door. “You’re pissed.”

“No,” I protest hoarsely, “We’re fine.”

Kasper retches again, inspiring another wave of nausea within me.

“Fuck sake!” the bouncer cries as I get sick on his trousers. “Youse are a disgrace. Get out.”

And we find ourselves the grass, lying face up as the clouds drift by, and the world is still tilting, like it wants to slide us right off the face of it.

“Should we do something?” Joe manages. 

“Like what?”

“Get a doctor?”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” I say, before I roll over to the side and throw up in the soil. 

Neil, the volunteer nurse, is very kind and patient with me for the time I spend in his company. 

“I imagine it’s all out of your system now.” He tells me. “How do you feel?”

“Tired,” I sigh, staring up at the ceiling I spent the last hour getting to know. I haven’t been sick since I got here, it seems I yacked it all out on the field, but I have been so thoroughly prodded and poked that I’ve become irritable, bored, even, as time ticks on and the festival rages on outside the flimsy doors of the medical tent. I turn my head to him, in his blue scrubs and the stethoscope he used on me slung around his neck, and the fear of his judgement arrives. It’s how I know the ket is gone. “That’s never happened to me before, by the way. That reaction was a new thing.”

“You said you’ve taken ketamine before?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, at festivals like this, you just don’t know where it’s coming from. It’s everywhere, but it’s so hard to know what exactly you’re getting. Those pills could have been cut with anything.”

I smile weakly. “Are you telling me off?”

“Not really. I’m just letting you know.”

“Cut with what, exactly?”

“Anything.” He reiterates. “I’m talking talcum powder to heroin and everything in between.”

“Ouch.”

He folds his arms and leans against a table. “Do you want to get in touch with a parent or guardian?”

“Is that mandatory?”

“It’s not, but you might find the best thing for you to do now is to get home and rest. You might like to let a parent know what’s happened today.”

I laugh, the kind of hollow, death-rattle of a laugh that could have come from a sick, elderly man. “Tempting, but no thanks. I think I’ll stay.”

Neil’s mouth flattens into a line, and he gives me a nod. “Well, I’ll just advise you to take it easy, right? And if you feel off at any point, please come straight back here. We’re open all night.”

“But in your medical opinion, I’m fine, right?”

“Yes, I think you’re fine.”

“Oh, good.” I sit up in the trolley and plant shaky, stockinged feet on the floor. “Because there are a few more bands I really wanted to see.”

“I understand.” He says, though he looks as though he doesn’t. “But listen.”

I look up. 

“Be wise, Jude.”

I laugh and lace up my vomit-splattered shoes. “Neil, I’m always wise.”

Beginning // Prev // Next

[jeidafei]

Komui's Lounge: Vol. 28 (Part 4/4)

>> Part 1

>> Part 2

>> Part 3

Q16: I would like to know if Hoshino-sensei ever felt super hyped while drawing a scene?

Hoshino: Lavi’s “Infinite Flame!! (火加減無し!!)” scene (vol.13)

(T/N: Lavi vs Road battle, below)

Lavi: Whoa! Hoshino just popped outta nowhere!

Allen: Goes to show we’re already screwed in regards to the word count, I guess.

Hoshino: If you know, then watch it!

Reever: She was also pretty hyped during Krory’s “I don’t need no coffin” scene, as well (Vol.11). (T/N: Krory vs Jasdevi battle. Thanks @looniecartooni for the raw!)

Q17: So Jasdevi has been called “monster” before?

Lenalee: Krory did mention them when we had a tea party some time ago. “Those Noah twins and I, we’re similar, so I have this feeling we’d meet again someday,” he said. I guess he must have been thinking what you’re thinking at some point.

Lavi: They’re weirdly simple-minded for their age. I guess it’s possible they’re nursing a wound in their heart.

Q18: Are there ever instances where a new accommodator eventually appeared for the Innocence shards of exorcists who died in the line of duty?

Reever: Yeah. Loads of them, in fact. Next!

Lavi: That was quick!

Allen: Mr. Reever, are they that strict about the word count limit this time?

Reever: The designer’s already at their limit from the looks of it, Allen. Whether we get to do this Lounge again next volume could depend on this!

Q19: Does Fo consume human food?

Allen: Fo doesn’t eat anything. That’s what I’ve heard back at the Asian Branch.

Lavi: Aaah, the Asian Branch’s Guardian Deity system is so interesting, really. Even Bookmen of old regarded the Chang Clan as a subject requiring special attention. Any clues on why they had their guardian deity take the form of a young lady?

Allen and Lenalee: Eh? No.

Kanda: …Didn’t Branch Head Bak’s great-grandfather who created the Guardian Deity system have it take the form of his late daughter?

Lavi: Wait, so Yu knew!

Reever: Who have you heard that from, Kanda?

Kanda: Alma said so.

Q20: A question for Allen-kun! If Kanda and General Cross were drowning in a river and you could save only one, whom would you save?

Reever: Al~righty!! Let’s wrap it up with this question.

Lavi: Welp, can’t be helped!! Welp, can’t be helped!! (T/N: Try reading it with a rhythm XD)

Allen: There must have been a better one in there! Come on!

Lenalee: Looks like Ms. Hoshino’s so nervous about the word count, she’s on the verge of a panic attack…(sweating). Let’s make do with this one for her, okay?

Kanda: If she’s gonna panic that much, then don’t do this Lounge thing, then.

Allen: No can do, huh…Or rather, these two don’t look like they’d ever find themselves drowning, seriously! Erm...Let’s see…I’ll save Master.

Lavi: And your reason behind that?!

Allen: Because Master could’ve been squirreling away the secret stash I’ve been saving!

Reever: Aaaaand we’re done! Thank you so much for being with us today! Now break it up! Chop chop! (Two big handclaps)

Lenalee: Would be nice if we managed to scrape a pass on the word count this time.

Allen: Which I reckon…we probably didn’t…

Lavi: Gave it our best shot, though……Alas, poor Hoshino……

Closing T/N:

Aaaand that’s it! Thank you so much for all your comments and tags. I had so much fun reading them.

@shashaspeaks The original Japanese dialogue for Allen cussing is the following:

ラビてめぇこの野郎なに口走ってんだよコラァ（ドス声）

(Rabi temee kono yarou nani kuchi hashitten dayo koraa//threatening voice).

It’s written with no punctuation, likely indicating he said it all in one breath XD.

//Don’t even get me started on Lenalee’s records gaaaaah what’s up now, Hoshino-sensei?!!

@candy-crackpot Again, thanks for the raws! Also super happy someone got my sneaky ATLA reference XD.

//Don’t worry, I know Komurin’s weakness is at the nape.

//Nah I think Cross is fascinated by the heartbeat of living beings precisely because he doesn’t have one. /ooooohh I think General Tiedoll would have approved of that burn.

//Highest Sci. Div. turnover rate prolly during Akuma Egg arc /oof!

@sauvechouris Yeah, I’m confused about the “kids OK but lovers NO-K” thing too. Like aren’t kids supposed to be even harder to leave behind, idk? LOL poor Bookman’s children, must have been one hell of a Daddy’s Issue for you all. Anyway, Past!Allen is Bookman’s kid headcanon anyone lmao?

@metiredlr YAAAAAAS MILF LINK

[ninjakk]

Hi! I’m currently reading the english volume III for MDZS and I got confused about something and my friends and me couldn’t figure it out so maybe you’d be able to😭

In the xuanwu cave, it’s said that the archery competition was held last year…But, after the massacre of the Jiang clan, Wen Ning said he met WWX 2 years ago in that same competition! We all thought that maybe a year passed between the cave and the massacre…But Wang Lingjiao says, the night she died, that she had been with WC for six months…So the cave couldn’t be before that…So how come WN met WWX 2 years ago?😭 Is that an error in the timeline or we’re missing something? I even read the fan translation and it was the same situation

Hi Anon,

Thanks for the ask 😊

According to the novel, the archery competition during the Qishan discussion conference was the year prior to the recent Xuanwu of Slaughter cave escapade. We see WWX recall the archery competition while at the Wen indoctrination:

Last year, attending the Discussion Conference of the QishanWen Sect, Wen Chao also entered the grounds along with Wei WuXian and the others, on the day of the archery competition.

Chapter 51 ExR

From the novel, we also know it has only been around half a month between WWX and LWJ escaping the cave and the Wen sect attacking Lotus Pier. WWX was essentially grounded from the time he arrived back at Lotus Pier after being rescued from the cave. According to the below snippet from the novel, it's been two weeks since he was rescued from the cave - which is when the Wen sect arrived at Lotus Pier.

Taking the opportunity, Madam Yu gave Wei WuXian a harsh talking-to and ordered him not to take one step out of the gates of Lotus Pier, not even to play in the lake. Thus, he could only shoot kites with the Jiang Sect’s disciples, day after day after day. No matter how fun a game was, playing it every day would eventually become tedious. And so, about half a month later, the boys' interest dwindled.

Chapter 57 ExR

So we can safely say, it's definitely been less than "two years" or "a few years" since the archery competition and more likely around a year ago.

Wen Ning spoke slowly, “I… A few years ago, during the Discussion Conference at Qishan, I… I… was shooting arrows…

Chapter 59 ExR

WN does indeed say "a few years ago", but we can put this down to him being flustered and trying hard to explain everything to WWX before he breaks his neck.

Then we get WWX also saying this just after the above:

Seeing how timid, pitiful, yet stammering he was, Wei WuXian seemed as though he had finally remembered something, The Discussion Conference at Qishan two years ago… The Discussion Conference… Shooting arrows… Ah, there really was someone like him!

Chapter 59 ExR

Which as you have pointed out, doesn't make sense - or match up to the above timeline evidence from the rest of the novel. It's also the same in 7s as you mentioned above.

So I've had my friend check the traditional Chinese version of the above text and they have said:

看他這幅膽小可憐又磕磕巴巴的模樣，魏無羨卻忽然想起來了點什麼：「前年的岐山百家清談盛會……百家清談盛會……射箭……啊，好像是有這麼個人!

The text in pink translates as "the year before", not "two years ago" as ExR or 7s have translated above. So when WWX starts to recall the conference, it seems there may have been a mistranslation on both 7s and ExR versions. From what I can gather anyway! My friend also confirmed WN does state "a few years" in the traditional Chinese version as well - but as I said earlier, this is probably due to him trying to convince WWX he is there to help him and in his panic, he forgets the details a little.

I think it's safe to assume WWX met WN last year at some point and WN was just struggling to communicate with WWX, as he had his hand around his neck. That's my guess anyway! I'm not sure why both 7s and ExR would mistranslate it though!

[kitchenlittle]

My Writober Story

I thought I'd share a story of something that happened to me a few years ago, that gave birth to my mask kink. I debated posting this but whats a better time than now?

Warnings: Mentions of (hot) scare actors, underage teens (don't worry nothing bad), flirting, general depictions of haunted house attractions and hay rides, mentions of weapons/fake blood/alcohol/bullying/cursing, revealing costumes, sexual fantasy, sex in general, and mentions of arousal.

Every year I go to a Halloween attraction, so far over the last few I've only gone to 2 haunted houses. (I have a habit of visiting the history museum or pumpkin patches instead since I'm a big scaredy cat) 'Safe to say I don’t think I’ll ever forget the second time ..3 years ago…an event that opened up Pandora's box for my poor mind…a day that changed my brain's chemistry forever. Many thoughts about that evening dig their heels into my nerves every time I see the pumpkin decor take over at my favorite stores. One specifically has plagued me for ages since..…I should’ve asked that employee to fuck my brains out. 

I remember it being chilly outside, likely because I decided to go on Hallows' Eve. The leaves were crunchy, hued with reddish-browns and mustard-yellows. I could hear the shrills of nearby people being driven hellishly down a sketchy dirt road. The lines were long but luckily the faint smells of fair food and an excited group of chatty teenagers complimenting my costume kept me sane. Slowly I watched as  each large group of people were packed into the school bus and taken to some unknown destination. Soon the familiar wafts of gasoline washed over me and not much later I shuffled my way down the isles of the vehicle, sitting in the back where I thought I was safe from any scares. That was my first rookie mistake, my second was trying to take in the scenery of the bus rather than keeping tabs on the Micheal Myers clad employee that was about to scare me shitless in a few minutes. When the bus started rev up I expected a mediocre experience, maybe some light scares here and there, rock music, maybe some funny lights. I was wrong... I realized that after the announcer asked that we all screamed as loud as we could. I don’t remember if he was dressed up like the rest of us guests but I remember his monotone voice as the lights flickered. 

“Alright everyone give us a nice scream before we make our journey!”

You would have thought he hated he hated living with the way he spoke, his energy energy even carried into our screams as they were low and uncaring, mine were muffled due to my rubber mask's unforgiving room for me to breathe. I saw him visibly roll his eyes and got a bit depressed at the thought of at least not getting a good jump that night. Well... I got one while I looked into the window to my right to distract myself. Suddenly my body jerked as the loudest blood curdling volume of Rob Zombie's “Living dead girl” blasted my ear drums, the door slammed shut, the once jittering lights above turned red, and the bus took off at a breakneck speed down the unfortunately UNEVEN, CURVE FILLED, DIRT ROAD. Memories of my favorite Child's Play movie flooded every crevice of my mind and a forgotten childish  terror bubbled up in my chest. We all really screamed then, which only added to my fright..As the lights turned turn on and off, blood started to pound in my eardrums. I remembered a crucial detail that would make my night just that much worse. It rained the day before, meaning the ground we were driving on was still soft and probably muddy. I panicked though, no one gave a fuck about my little panic attack since they were abou to have one of their own, a famous slasher decided he was going to be the first thing I saw as my eyes tried to escape the visual of the fleeing dirt paths infront of the bus. I ducked my head down like the scaredy cat I am, looking out to the side when I realized that there were more actors tugging at the windows, reaching in at guests, even walking and riding the top on the roof, banging at the metal and yelling every insult imaginable. My shock and feelings of wanted to piss myself finally subsided when I closed my teary eyes...and then the bus stopped. Surprisingly, the slashers were gone, everyone stopped screaming, and the scene was replaced with the sight of an impressively decorated haunted house. One that of course had another long line. In my boot heels, WW1 era nurse’s uniform, and a plague doctors mask I waddled out onto the sweet stationary grass under my trembling body. I swore that the bus driver's attitude was a ruse to get our guard down,especially after I saw his lazy smirk behind the glass. I'd never judge a book by it's cover again. Crazily enough after all that that wasn’t the life changing event....

I stomped through broken small twigs and branches to get close to the entrance of the haunted house.. With the groups of people waiting in front of me it was safe to assume I atleast had about an hour before I could enjoy its horrors. Another group of teenagers started to chat me up. Unfortunately they were drunk. They taunted me, while putting their beer stained hands on my mask, trying to get me to scare them…I was assumed to be a scare actor. Unfortunately knowing the climate of the people in this area of the South they'd likely to have a reason to be violent with me if I obliged. My nurse's uniform was figure hugging so at least if they did there was no way they couldn’t claim they didn’t know I was a girl. Luckily I wasn't dumb enough to provoke them or have sudden moves. A masked employee patrolling around came to my aid, hiding his effort to make sure they didn’t escalate as a way to have a close up stare down with me.  Like two slashers betting each other to make the first move I held eyes contact with him. Hw was fairly tall, clad in all black except for a halloween mask and machete thrown over his shoulder. Despite his stare down I had to be silly and tilt my head to the side at him.

“What's going on?”

I giggled out to him through my words. I saw him roll his eyes playfully before giving me another look and walking away. The drunk teens had turned their attention to something else. Silently I thanked him l Despite him having a nice voice and towering over me that wasn’t the mind bending event either. I went through the line with no issues, walked up creaky wooden steps already showing wear and tear after being trampled on for weeks. It was a typical haunted house in the way that it did its job well enough. You know, doing it's job well enough scare the living hell out of me! Especially since their main gimmick was actors acting as decorations instead of being hidden behind walls and behind doors like I expected. The scares I got that night had me clutching my nonexistent pearls as I stumbled about. I unfortunately had to get into another line afterwards. The line was situated under a wooden pavilion, a lot of people were packed in like sardines but there were televisions tucked into corners playing, ‘Friday the 13th’. That pacified me enough to endure the snail paced walking for the next hour. Though I couldn’t help but listen in on the conversation of those behind me. Once again another group of teenagers but nicer and way more excited than I was expecting for a  simple hayride. Bored and heels digging into my ankles I decided to ask them about the hayride and what was so good about it. Eagerly they word vomited out a story of an infamous employee that worked on the ride.

“NO, NO, YOU DONT UNDERSTAND HE’s SO...FUCKiNG ...HOT!”

“Listen girl you will get  it when you get on, I’m asking for his number. He’s so fine that we had to get on twice!”

I stared at them. I thought, ‘how hot could he really be for them to think it’s worth waiting almost 2 -4 hours in the cold to see him again?’ No shade but as a southerner I've noticed that what some people consider hot is a lot of time mediocre  as there aren’t a lot of choices in the small town I’m from. I’ll admit I was skeptical. At most I was expecting some muscly guy dressed as Michael Myers or something , maybe even some Ghostface  dude with a cool voice. The group behind me practically squealed as we were seated on the wooden carriage to the woods. I sat on the hay and stared out onto the scenic path ahead. It was honestly inevitable for the first 3 minutes to not look around and just enjoy the gorgeous view. It was so pretty. One thing I can say about living in the country is that you can’t beat a full moon and a lush forest. Coupled with nice folks and delicious smells of the distant food court the weight seemed worth it. The blasts of cool air on my hot face was short lived as he came up to the first attraction, or theme? Zombie Hillbillies with what looked like oddly realistic guns? Yeah that scared all us when a zombie ran at a full sleep and a actor let off an actual shot near our heads as our carriage hightailed it out the premises. The track of the walking dead playing was unmistakable. Next? A Succubus den. A bunch of pretty girls wearing leather skin tight suits, beckoning my fellow riders and I to stay long enough to have our souls taken. Screaming, sighs, and even the cracking of a few whips overwhelmed us. We moved away, the red and purple lights we were basking in started to fade away and their siren song with it. They killed their roll, too bad I wasn't feeling it as much as some of the other guys and some girls on the wagon. I was feeling good, today had been fun but not too scary, something I preferred to just plain unfiltered fear on my favorite holiday.

We trudged through some more scenic forest until I heard the unmistakable melody of a circus music. I quickly reversed the direction of my gaze only to see what looked like a box with red light bleeding through its cracks. Two men with clown costumes opened its doors. I braced myself as I was sure this would be the last attraction of the night. I really couldn't miss the squealing of the teenagers I was seated next to. They were practically falling over themselves, grabbing at each others clothes and hyperventilating while giggling manically, though incoherent ramblings I heard words like ‘hot’, ‘fine’, and ‘he’s almost here!’. I had to tilt my head at them out of slight second-hand embarrassment and pure confusion. No one was inside, which was a uncharacteristic for this ride so far. It was until I heard the rattling of a chainsaw that I realized how close they really were. Most of the actors had been chilling behind the ride staring at us, it gave me the jumpscare of my life let's say. We were then bum rushed by a bunch of clowns, laughing and pulling at the ride to rock it back and forth. A contortionist showing off her skills on a nearby side stage. Some got uncomfortably close but then walked away quickly as I could tell they were trying to decipher if I was a fellow actor or not. For whatever reason they kept flirting with the woman sitting adjacent to me, despite her being enclosed in the arms of her husband. I quickly realized I was being a complete hater because she loved it and her husband was being a good sport about it. Regardless I still didn’t see anything extraordinary like they had promised. I simply shrugged my shoulders. Maybe the clowns were the main attraction of the night? Yeah some of them were fairly hot, as hot as a few guys in Halloween masks while cursing us all out could be. It seemed like the hay ride's shenanigans were wrapping up since the clowns were leaving. That was until the wagon we all were sitting on threw itself into overdrive. Gunning it, moving faster than it ever cared to before. I saw trees ride past me the same way it did on the bus, but the manic laughter continued . 'WAS IT NOT OVER?! TRACTORS CAN’T MOVE THIS FAST!…or at least it shouldn’t be…?Right?' Suddenly we came to screeching halt, but not really a stop more like a moderate slow down. My panic wasn't given any time to settle in before I felt a particularly sudden shift of weight on our wooden vehicle. I could barley see through my now foggy plague mask's goggles but it was an unmistakable figure. The squeals of my counterparts turned into full blown shrieks as the statuesque shadow entered our ride with a particularly large rifle, a clown mask on its face, and a particular malice in its stance. He didn’t need bullets since all of us were already floored. A sight to behold, curly dirty blonde locks peeked from behind the face covering, miles of freckled, pale, skin peaked from underneath his ripped overalls, and his attempts to subtly catch his breath sent chills down my spine. He was mouth watering, but honestly if the modest muscle exposed at his biceps and underneath his dungarees were a climax then his voice was the final act. One of the perks of living in the South to me has always been southern accents that some men have…but lord the sweet honey dripping from this man lips made me want to set my black ass to my factory settings. For some brief seconds I thought being barefoot and pregnant were the only way to live happily the minute he spoke. There wasn’t an instrument in existence that competed with the octave his baritone vocals were set on. I was slack jawed and flabbergasted. If my fellow southern black women in my area were to describe a man like this we’d say he said he had that ‘cowboy walk’. Meaning he was the perfect representation of why America was so smitten with the farm-hands throughout the decades. I couldn't say a word if I tried. I watched a particularly bold and familiar girl muster up the courage to speak to him as he was getting ready to point his gun at one at one of the riders.

“H-hi, do you remember me?”

Completely breaks character and acknowledges her presence. 

“Oh? Oh yeah, it’s you…*comes to a realization as he turns* *chuckles*  don’t tell me you came back to see me?”

“I-I did, um…so um.. -you have a girlfriend?”

Now everyone got quiet, even if the wagon was still high, telling down the moist dirt road. Now I knew the girl was young but she shouldn't be too much younger than us considering we were the same height. A dumb assumption I know but I assumed that she and her friends wouldn’t get this far only to be a kid….right? He seemed to have the same idea. 

“Depends…how old are you?”

Sheepishly I saw the surprise and disappointment spread like a virus from her face to theirs. Her porcelain fingers tremble around her phone as the prospect of getting his number become a a fleeting wish…surely she didn’t go this far and was-

“I’m…14…*nervous laugh*”

“Oh hell no”

He didn’t even give it a second thought before sighing and moving his rifle to his shoulder. He gave us all a reassuring nod and proceeded to backflip off the moving cart. She pouted while her friends comforted. I just stared back  into the abyss only to make eye contact with  the mysterious stranger. This is going to sound terrible, but I feel like that was a needed experience for her. (First all, she just ruined the  chance of anyone legal to get a taste of this guy, like me! Jk Jk) Even when I was her age, mind you I’m 21 now, no matter how many crushes I ha on my older peers , I still knew better not to ask them out. You had to be 18 or older to even work at this place. Though, I still felt terrible for her and my maternal urges wanted to go over there and comfort her since I knew that kinda stuff took a huge blow to one’s ego, and I knew she didn’t know any better. I had the chance to ask her if she was older before the little caravan came to a halt. They didn’t drop us off  exactly at the drop off spot though, we’d have to walk a quarter of a mile back to the lit up crowns in  the distance. Never in my life have I needed to walk more, being hot and bothered with a bunch of people around isn’t ideal ( for me at least). That cold air was doing more than its share at cooling me down, too bad the nearby lights were only coaxing me further into a daze as it neared.   I walked on the path  and stumbled through the bush. A recognizable voice poured itself a molasses-like tone right into my ears. 

“I’ll see you later right?”

I knew what he was referring to, he thought I was a fellow employee too, the workers would congregate after the attraction closed down, eat, intermangle, and then go home. I wish I could be there and see what he looked like and maybe a little more since he was single as long as whoever he was talking to was legal. I couldn't be happier that the rubber mask covered my lovestruck expression. 

“Of course”

He did his famous nod and retreated back into the leaves, to unintentionally seduce another group. Of course I didn’t go, I didn’t work there it was already 1 am, I needed to get home unfortunately. I still wondered though ‘what if I did go?’ and ‘why did he care if I was there or not?’. It wasn’t until I turned around in the mirror later on that I realized the culprit for his curiosity. Lets just as historically bum pads were made to take some weight off the back side  and  rear end look more ample and rounded, maybe even stand out a bit under heavy garments. Let's just say I’ve never needed one. 

Happy Halloween Everyone. Remember that despite this story, they do not harass scare actors, they are just doing their job and don;t deserve to be sexually harassed.

[1000sandwiches]

Tue, Feb 6, 2024

Lately I have become extremely nostalgic for the Web 1.0 era of the internet. It started with me looking at archived Usenet posts via Google Groups, but has turned into me spending hours on the Wayback Machine looking up sites I used to haunt back in the 90s and early 2000s. Stuff like The Gaming Intelligence Agency (which is still up somehow), Elfwood, Toriyama's World, or various rabbit holes from the Anime Web Turnpike. I really miss the days everyone had their own website (I had several if you're wondering. A Flame of Recca fan site, for example). I want to be one of the cool kids and join Neocities in hopes it'll give me a similar vibe, but I haven't done HTML in years and feel a bit intimidated by it. So for now maybe a Tumblr diary will do. So that's what this is, a rambling online diary like the kind I kept as a teenager. It seemed cheaper than therapy.

Rambling about being a new parent and venting about my in-laws below. It's not particularly interesting. Next time I'll just write about video games I'm playing, probably.

I became a dad in November 2023. My emotions and mental health have been sort of all over the place since the day we checked into the hospital. I had always wanted a family of my own, and my wife and I both felt we would regret not having at least one child. I have a lot of insecurities about being a first time father at my age. I'm 38 now, and I just keep thinking about how I'll be 43 when my son is 5, and worry I won't be able to keep up with him. But here we are.

My wife was induced and spent 30 hours in labor before the doctor finally gave us the option for a C-Section. She didn't even hesitate to say yes, honestly just relieved to get it over with. The operation went fine, but apparently I am a lightweight when it comes to gore. Seeing my partner's blood and guts all over the surgeons had my anxiety screaming. Also, no one will ever believe me, but during the surgery the anesthesiologist, Bob, was playing on his phone. All of a sudden an ad for homemade marinara started playing, and the whole room stopped to stare at him. Surgeons still covered in bloody bits. Bob just mumbled "bad timing" and turned the volume down. What an absolute legend. I love you, Bob!

The experience of holding our son for the first time was just as powerful as I had always heard. So many different feelings washed over me all at once. I'd never even held a baby before then. Seeing my son being held up against my significant other's head made me cry.

Unfortunately, I am a peon at a public library, and my wife works retail, so neither of us are great breadwinners. Oops. Sorry, baby! So now we have super fun medical bills while we also figure out a budget. Currently we are living with my in-laws. Having to adjust to both our newborn and their family routine has been a challenge for us both.

Some days are great. Others are hard. Especially in the first month, where some nights the baby would just scream his head off for hours. I knew I hated loud noises, but I never realized how triggering a baby's cry could be. I'm not suicidal, but I've spent several nights imagining a scenario where I'd jump into my car and driving off a cliff. This has gotten better recently as he now does fairly good job of sleeping through the night. It's a lot easier to be patient with his crying when we are not exhausted.

My wife had a few struggles with post-partum depression. The week after giving birth, her hormones were all over the place and she had frequent panic attacks. One morning she woke up, walked into the living room and saw our son, only to then throw up. She is over this now thankfully, and has put a lot of energy into figuring out how to be a mom. I'm very proud of her.

The In-laws are a huge help, but there are pros and cons to their assistance. There are times where my wife and I really need to learn how to deal with our son's tantrums by ourselves, but the grandparents will insist on taking him. I appreciate the help, but I worry about not being able to handle him myself. In fairness, I might struggle to get him down for an hour, but Grandma can get him to sleep on five minutes. It's like dark magic for grandparents, I swear.

I am also prone to feeling like a burden on the family. I notice a lot of little corrections. Stupid things like say I take some chips from the cupboard and I know I'll put them back in a moment. I might decide to leave the door open for a moment, but Grandma walks in and immediately shuts the cupboard. Other times I might leave a light on which Grandma turns off while I'm still using. I also feel like every interaction I have with my son is being judged. If he's crying and I set him down for a few minutes, someone feels the need to swoop in and take him from me. It's like leaving him be in his bassinet while he's awake his frowned upon.

My In-Laws also have a family culture where everyone hangs out in the living room together all day. This is completely new to me, and I'd rather be alone in my room most of the time. It doesn't help that they are a family that keeps their television on all day and I get very sick of hearing the news cycle repeat over and over. This recently had consequences when Grandpa came home from work sick, and apparently keeping the baby in another room, away from the sick guy, was never even considered.

As you might expect, our baby got sick. I was pissed. I just couldn't believe that I would come home from work to find grandpa coughing just a few feet away from him, and no one thought to keep them separated. Our son then passed his cold onto the rest of the household (not covid or flu, as several of us have tested negative).

So that brings us to now. A week after getting sick, I am still having issues with sinus drainage along with aches and pains. Our son is doing better, and you can't even tell my wife was ever sick. I'm very jealous. I should probably take a few moments to proof read all this, but I've already been typing on my phone for an hour and feel silly about posting this at all.

[wordsofapanda]

I told myself I needed to indulge in my hobbies to take some mental stress off my plate so I did. Completely backfired on me. I forgot that my ex warned me a long time ago that there’s this “scary” section of this game. I was like “eh” because I’ve been watching more horror movies, horror shows, and letplays of horror games so I thought I built up a tolerance. I’m not as spooked from some jump scares as before. I didn’t research much of this game so I didn’t anticipate this portion but once I “caught on” I tried to rush through it thinking it was a quick mission. My god it was not. It was like 4 tiny missions to open one door and then you do it one more time and then a boss battle. It was frustrating and annoying. About 5 minutes into it, that’s when it starts getting spooky spooky. And my lights are completely on, the volume isn’t loud but it’s just fucking creeeepy. And it eventually got creepy enough to make a jump scare work on me but then it gave me a panic attack. I literally felt like giving up and crawling into my ex’s arms because I was not mentally prepared. I had an anxiety attack; like I felt like I had a goddamn heart attack. I continued to try rushing through it but I will admit, they found other ways to throw me off and then I turned from having anxiety to being annoyed. Thankfully the ending was worth it but it took my dang soul. Good job for doing the scary section efficiently at the cost of my bones turning into mush. I’m probably just extra sensitive because I didn’t get any sleep and It was an intense day. I just want to cuddle my stuffed panda and drink. Maybe a cry too. A good cry always helps.

[dp1nk]

aleks, zelda and the dying braincells

i didn't think i would be here to type this. no seriously. things have escalated to a very disturbing level since i started humorously chronicling my efforts to get neighbors evicted for fucking with my air.

once in a while, one must put their head into the space of someone who knows what they're doing wrong and can't take the inevitable consequences. what would you do if you were knowingly turning an innocent single lesbian's upstairs apartment into a literal gas chamber, then were being threatened with a court case that would make it difficult for you to rent apartments for a few years?

you'd probably be pissed right? you'd throw away all your fucks and blow your apartment up even more, right? of course. i'm not stupid, i expected that, and expected to hear yelling and arguing between my neighbor and her stay-at-home boyfriend, who hasn't had the balls to confront me about this and sends her to do it.

what i didn't expect was to be having some wine last night, eating my pesto, and suddenly having an overpowering smell of bleach in my flat at 10 pm. and it smelled like pure chlorine, to the point that i couldn't get it out of my flat fast enough, and it made me dizzy and gave me the worst feeling of being on the verge of a panic attack.

and for almost the entire night, those two were arguing *loud*. so i left my noisemaker up (at a volume that isn't meant to annoy them), but lena and i spent some time bonding by chatting on our phone, because high stress makes us dissociate to the point that we get really scrambled and it's how we maintain composure. (it's one of the features of our disorder but it works, and it's why i go from i to we sometimes - it's a sign i'm under so much stress that my crewmates are more active, because our jobs are to keep these experiences from our host's consciousness - and it works, but we've been switching non stop because of this situation like a trainer with fainted pokemon. just some context.)

and we chatted with another friend aware of our did on discord til 5 am as usual, because this tobacco smoke reliably floods our flat and makes it very difficult to get to sleep. and we're incredibly worried about zelda, but trying to stay in the corners of rooms like roaches trying to avoid fumigation chemicals.

around 3 am there was an explosion that shook the whole building so hard, i thought it was going to come down. i thought the neighbors had started physically fighting and were throwing each other and i was ready to dial for the police... but when there was no noise to come, i decided it must have been a gas heater malfunctioning. they don't really make explosive noises; more like a big dull POOF sound, but they can easily and suddenly decimate a building - and there's tornadoes around here right now. if that was enough to shake the entire building how it did, a hurricane or tornado will not have trouble knocking it over.

but i digress. lena suddenly realized that it didn't seem to make sense that they would clean their flat at such an hour with such strong chlorine, then start randomly arguing. she assumed they literally murdered someone and used it to clean the scene. but it was gone and we spent a good while coming up with reasons why this was happening last night - to us, and just in general.

but, in the end, we decided we might be acting paranoid and that it couldn't be possible that it was some kind of deliberate attempt to gas us dead. how? why? they know they won't get away with it. we just want to believe we're dealing with responsible, working-class neighbors who happen to be huge, potentially homophobic assholes. (but i refuse to believe it! it can't be over our flag, it truly just can't!)

and so we decided to ignore it, went to sleep. woke up in 6 hours, adding 2 more to our really big sleep debt again. i'm unfathomably tired; hurricane week is here for me, and i'm at the end of my wits with this, but i can't let it go now.

(and even if i wanted to, i have no way to move and nowhere to go, and if i did that they'd just get away with continuing to terrorize someone else who moves in, so i think the better option is patiently hoping that this property manager is moving as quickly as she can knowing how i can sue the owners of the complex of so much money at this point. and it could very well come to that because a lawyer would be one of the only things i can afford right now .)

if my post is rambly this time around, it's because i'm so dissociated and fried from this new chlorine-like smell. it actually resembles ammonia too, and i genuinely assumed that because it seemed to accompany or follow the tobacco smoke, they were just trying to cover their tracks.

then, as i was sobbing helplessly in bed from the stress... lena grabbed our phone out of nowhere and asked it, in her cute little accent, "HEY GOOGLE... what's meth smoke smell like?"

...........guess what it fucking smells like. i had no idea it smells like cleaning chemicals. did you?

now you do. you're welcome.

putting all the clues together, it all suddenly makes so much sense; denying the smoke came from them, the smell last night (wednesday being their day off from work) resembling cleaning chemicals, their incredibly loud, violent arguing, making us dizzy, causing us to panic, making it hard to sleep...

they haven't been cleaning. they've been cooking and smoking meth all this time.

god... jesus... the bear from the regency square mall... help me and see me through this, and don't let me or my cat come out of it with complications. because i am at a loss of what i can do now, knowing i've done everything in my power and all i can do is wait and hope.

okay i gotta throw up now. i sure hope this doesn't get worse though.

[sailormoonsub]

................. dad what's going on

[writingfics-passingtime]

Under the Weather

~8600 words of Loki tickle fluff.

Tender Loki, protective Loki, and, of course, ruthless Loki.

This fic took three weeks to finish. Shoutout to @just-another-blog-of-fluff for encouraging me through it 😅

I got a request to write some more gender neutral readers, so this is my first time consciously trying to do that 💜

CW: sickness (vomiting, etc), poisoning, innuendo, needles

“Stay low,” you whispered, keeping your footsteps as quiet as possible while you crept through the lab with Loki right behind you. “They could be anywhere.”

Your eyes shot around as fast as they could to assess every possible thing that could happen. Between watching your path that enemies may jump into to attack, you saw beakers and test tubes, papers in disarray, clear signs this lab was quickly abandoned.

“Agent,” Loki said in his normal speaking volume. You whipped your head around to see him standing up tall and your eyes widened.

“Get down,” you hissed, but he gave you a sarcastic look.

”There’s no other life in here. Other than these organisms,” he scoffed and picked up a Petri dish with something clumpy that was an off-putting shade of yellowy-brown.

You gritted your teeth and stood, “Put that down, you don’t know what that is.“

Loki had good keen senses and, as much as you disdained being told what to do, you trusted he could tell if there was anyone else in this darkened lab. However, you couldn’t trust him to not be a little reckless and pick up something potentially dangerous.

“Bruce,” you spoke into your wrist.

“Tell me what you see,” his ever-nervous voice responded.

Looking around, you sighed. “They left a bunch of stuff but they’ve cleared out. I’d be surprised if they left anything incriminating here. It’s probably not worth sticking around to- Loki, WAIT!”

You’d seen the discarded test tube on the ground before he had, unfortunately not before his foot was already in the process of landing from his step. With a tiny crunch, the glass broke and a blue vaporous substance expanded with a terrifying spread. You lurched forward through the gas and shoved your hands over Loki’s nose and mouth, pushing him backwards and away from the unknown substance.

His eyes went wide when he realised what you were doing, and he scrambled to conjure a gas mask each. It was too late. By the time he was holding it out to you, he felt your hands over his face go weak. He whipped his mask on in time to catch you when you fell.

“Agent!” He called as best he could. Alarms started going off in the lab, an metal emergency containment door began lowering over the entrance he came in. The voice over the loudspeaker began shouting something in a slavic Midgardian language - one of the few he didn’t know, but it didn’t take a genius to deduce that this was an automated biohazard response.

You coughed hard before going limp in his arms. In several seconds, he’d slipped the mask over your head, dashed towards the lowering door and slid you underneath it just before it became too small for you to fit. Seconds before it touched down he thrust his hands underneath and fought to keep it open. With a surge of magic, and a surge of panic from seeing your body begin to shake a little, he lifted the door and ripped it inwards out of its tracks. A mighty electronic cracking told him he’d broken the mechanism. Peeling the door away, he slid between the gap and picked you back up, running out of the building before any more alarms could be triggered. He concealed you two with magic and frantically shouted to Banner through his ear, explaining what had happened and that you weren’t moving.

Loki found his way to the car, placed you down in the backseat and broke every traffic law you’d ever explained to him as he sped the five minutes back to the airfield. You were breathing loudly and heavily, coughing through your semi-unconscious state. As much as it tortured Loki to see you like his, knowing it was his fault, he was grateful he could at least hear you breathing.

The second he pulled up to the jet he saw Banner and Romanoff outside in full protective gear. That’s when Loki realised he still had his gas mask on. He didn’t bother to turn off the car before bursting out of it and pulling the back door open and pulling you out into his arms.

“There’s a containment unit in the jet. Follow Nat,“ Bruce signalled and Loki followed her up the ramp inside and into a room who’s door was framed with thick rubber that squeaked when the door was opened; it was airtight. Loki stepped in and Romanoff shut the door with you two inside. Loki eyed somewhat of a bed against the wall, more like a bench with a small cushion stretching over its six foot surface length. Once you were down, he conjured away the masks and took your head in his hands.

“Can you hear me?” He whispered loudly, shaking your head the smallest amount. You didn’t respond, only continued taking deep and laboured breaths. “Gods, you mortals… so foolish,“ he seethed, trying to calm himself down. “Why in Odin’s name would you protect me and not yourself?” He winced, noting his fear was bursting out in the form of frustration. Anger at you for not taking care of yourself. Anger at himself for somehow deceiving you into thinking he was someone worth protecting.

His furrowed brow dropped, along with his face, when he saw small bubbles start to form on the side of your mouth. “BANNER!” He roared, running up and reaching to rip the door open only to find it locked. He growled loudly and pounded on it, shouting for the doctor.

“Stay calm, Loki, I’m coming in.”

Banner entered in full protective gear and bearing a medical kit. Loki heard the engines engage and felt the jet begin to make its way towards the runway as Bruce knelt next to you and shone a light in your eyes, stuck sticks down your throat, took your pulse, took your blood.

“What was it?” The doctor asked.

“I don’t- we didn’t…“ Loki cursed himself for not grabbing a sample of the substance. Then, in a last ditch for hope he removed his boot and turned it over. “There some glass in my shoe. Could you get a sample from that?”

“Maybe,” Bruce sighed, his usual ’I don’t know what‘s goin’ on but this isn’t good’ sigh.

Now hooked up to a monitor, Loki watched your heart beat send signals to a screen he could watch. And watch he did, the entire hour back to the Compound. Banner had told him you two would be immediately placed in quarantine together until he could determine what was going on.

What looked to be a portable room met Loki at the base of the jet outside. He stepped into the large glass and metal box with you in his arms, still unconscious, and gave a solemn look to Romanoff before Banner accompanied the transportation room to the quarantine facility. The box almost seemed sentient, but Loki surmised it was on a pre-programmed route to go back to where you and he would be spending the next little while under lock and key.

He felt horrifically under-qualified to be the person you were trapped with. His magic was good to heal injuries: tears, cuts, even sometimes broken bones. However, the only internal turmoil his magic could heal was distress with a sleeping spell, and even that was temporary.

He imagined his mother giving him a disapproving look for not paying more attention when she would speak to him of herbs and potions, telling him he needed to learn more acute magic and not just the kind used in combat. Loki cursed his past self and did not distract himself, as he usually did, when he began to feel the sharp pain of missing Frigga. As the grief passed like a wave, he accepted it as a sort of punishment for hurting you, and more for not being able to help.

If you were awake, perhaps you’d remind him that any magical remedy he could have stirred or burned probably wouldn’t have its components and compounds readily available on Midgard. You were practical. You wouldn’t let self-hatred get in the way. How he wished you were awake to scold it out of him so he could reply with a snarky comeback and ignore you completely.

The containment room made its way well through the hangar attached to the compound, docking at a quarantine room on the outskirts of the building much like a spaceship docks to port. The doors sealed together with a suctioning sound and a green light flashed as the door slid open to a hallway.

Loki stepped inside and an automated voice told him a decontamination process was about to begin, and the mist wouldn’t harm the body’s airways. It started and ended quickly. Loki was surprised that he didn’t feel even feel damp afterwards. It was more of a fog than a mist, but he decided to trust it anyway. With you still in his arms he stepped over the threshold into the quarantine room.

He felt he’d stepped into a large single-room suite in a hotel, if not a bit less fancy. There were two twin beds against separate walls, each looking spacious and comfortable. A small lounging area held two armchairs and a larger couch centred around a rectangular coffee table adorned with some books on sea life and mountains. A cabinet next to a door, a door to the bathroom he could see, held a large number of books and medical supplies.

A ringing noise sounded from a small screen next to a sterile-looking unit in the wall next to where he entered. You were still in his arms, so he hit the accept call button with his elbow. Banner and Stark’s faces came up on the screen.

“What the hell am I supposed to do with the Agent?” Loki immediately stressed to them, holding up your lolling head.

”We’ve got some doctors scrubbing up and putting on protective gear. They’ll be in any minute. For now, just-“

“This is ridiculous!” Loki spat and immediately began arguing with them out of the pure anger, frustration and anxiety that no one seemed to know what was wrong with you. They instructed Loki to lay you on a bed and no sooner had he done that than there was a warning knock on the door and three doctors entered. Loki paced the room, trying not to look at you as they ran tests, took more blood, took your heart rate, blood pressure, temperature, everything they could think of. One of the doctors turned to him.

“How are you feeling, sir?” She asked.

“What?” He asked.

“You look a little warm. Are you feeling alright?”

He waved her off. “I’m fine. I didn’t get the brunt of it,” he sighed, looking to your still mostly unconscious body.

“Let us know if that changes,” she gave a polite smile behind her hazmat suit as the other doctors packed up their things. “The good news is that both of you seem to be okay. There’s no rapid deterioration we’re worried about and-“

“But you’ve no idea what it is.”

“For now,” she nodded. “But the bloods and tests Dr Banner ran on the jet aren’t showing us much to be concerned about.“ She looked back and you and then back to him. “You’ll need to be here for a few days at least. Keep yourselves hydrated, let us know of any new symptoms. We’ll know soon, when these tests are done, if anything has changed but we’re not concerned at this point.”

Admittedly, though not outwardly, Loki was beginning to feel ill himself. So he nodded and allowed the doctors to leave without further protest, stealing another look to where you lay. They’d given you some kind of pain relief and it seemed to settle you, but it seemed so out of sorts for them to just leave you here with him. Though, he supposed, if there was truly nothing they could do right now it made sense to not risk others getting sick.

A cough itched his throat and he spluttered it out. The itch sank deeper, deep into his stomach and his gut and twisted around. Taking a minute to lie down, he knew very quickly this wasn’t going to just go away. After an hour or so of nausea and coughing, Loki ran to the toilet and allowed himself to be sick. He grimaced and growled a bit from frustration of being incapacitated by a mortal concoction, but felt immediately better once he’d emptied the contents of his stomach. He cleaned himself and walked back into the room, suddenly a lot more worried for you.

He was stronger by nature and had was exposed to much less of the substance than you were. He shuddered to think what sickness might be awaiting your human body.

You and he had infiltrated the lab under the cover of late nightfall and he also had to admit that he was tired. So, after delicately pulling back the covers and settling you underneath them, he got into bed and uttered a few calming words to put himself to sleep.

A few hours later he awoke to a sound. It took him a few seconds to remember where he was, and he cursed himself for being so selfish as to fall asleep when you were potentially on death’s door. He looked over and saw your bed empty and the bathroom light on. Stepping barefoot onto the carpeted floor, he padded over to where the noise came from.

“Agent?” Loki knocked softly, the slightly ajar door opening a bit more under his touch. He didn’t hear any protests or any obvious signs that you were moving so he pushed it open slowly. Then, a searing concern struck his chest when he saw you slumped against the wall next to the toilet bowl with your head hanging weakly to the side. You were shivering, and your skin was more grey than it was any other colour. Your chest heaved with breathing that was deep and slow, but laboured, as it had been since exposure.

He brought himself at once to his knees in front of you and took your head in his hands to pull it upright. You made a noise of recognition but barely opened your eyes.

“Agent,” was all he could say again. He didn’t really know what to do in this situation. Your skin was burning hot and there were little droplets of sweat on your brow, but you were shivering. He grabbed the closest towel and dabbed it away. “Can you hear me?”

”Loki,” you croaked out. “I’m f-f-fine.” You voice sounded like pure gravel and your teeth chattered with every opening of your jaw. “D-don't get-t clos-s-ser, I-I'm gross-s-s. Y-you s-sh-should leave.”

”Not a chance,” he mumbled, then watched your eyes open a little more. Then, they widened and you pushed him back, weakly fumbling to get your head over the toilet bowl before your body attempted to throw up again.

You made the noises, your body shook with the force, but nothing came up because there was nothing left. Loki, not caring one bit about the sick and sweat, put a soothing hand between your shoulder blades and ran it down the length of your back over your sweat-soaked shirts. You wretched again then fell back against the wall, your head limply thudding against the wallpaper as your shoulders shook with the frozenness you felt.

He heard your teeth chattering harder as your eyes closed as you curled in on yourself trying to get warm, possibly not aware that you were already sweating profusely. Loki, not having spent much time with Midgardians before this stint, had never seen someone so deathly ill.

“You need water,” Loki urged, noticing your dry lips and remembering the hoarseness of your voice.

You shook your head weakly. “I-I n-need an IV.” Loki furrowed his brow in confusion and you noticed, pointing to the crook of your elbow. “D-direct line. I-in vein.”

“I’m not sure how,” Loki winced.

You gripped his forearm and put on a brave face, “I c-can do-do it m-myself. Just neheed to warm up.” Your fingers trembled against his arm.

Without a second thought, Loki stood to turn on the shower to a pleasantly hot temperature before turning to see you trying to get your sweaty sick-stained over shirt off. He knelt again, pulling it over your head. He saw you blush from the embarrassment of the mess, but it was the last thing on his mind. Sitting there shivering against the tile floor, Loki’s heart hurt for you. He quickly gathered you in his arms and pulled you to your feet. You tried to feebly apologise as your weight leaned against him, but he hushed you and stepped into the shower with you propped up against him.

“L-Loki!” You gasped as the water hit you both. “Y-you don’t have-“

”Quiet now,” He mumbled. Too weak to protest, you relaxed into his chest, leaning more weight against him than your own feet. Steam filled the shower but the water felt cool against your boiling skin. Loki reached up and detached the shower head, then brought it down and held it right up against your upper back, just below your neck. You breathed deeply in contentment as the water pressure hit your aching muscles, and as the flow spilled over the tops of your shoulders and down your back. Loki's hold around your waist was firm and strong, he gave no indication that holding up your entire body with one arm was causing him an exertion at all.

After a few minutes the shivering began to subside and your breathing seemed to return to something a little more normal, so he stepped out and wrapped a towel around you. Your legs were still weak so he pulled you into him and ran his hands soothingly up your back, over your shoulders and down your arms, repeating the pattern a few times until he felt it best to stop. He didn’t miss how you seemed to melt further into him, or the tiny noise of comfortable contentment you made against his chest.

Supporting nearly all of your weight, led you to the main room and then let you lead him towards an armchair.

”Grab that pole,” you motioned with your head to a hook-topped metal pole on a stand. “There’s saline in that cabinet,” you again motioned weakly with your head. “And there’s a small box. I’m gonna need your help.”

Loki obliged, helping you sit. He gathered the supplies, hung the saline bag on the hook under your instruction and opened the small box on your lap. You grabbed the IV needle and pulled the cap off with your teeth, breathing deeply to steady your hands.

“I’ve always hated needles,” you mumbled and chuckled nervously, looking at the thick IV you were about to insert into your own vein.

“What are you-“

Loki’s question was answered as you brought the needle down to the vein in your arm, piercing the skin and slipping it in with no more than a grimace.

“The tape,” you met his widened eyes and he quickly ripped off a piece much too large, but it didn’t matter. “Stick it over where my fingers are right now.” He, again, obliged. He then, under your instruction, handed you the end of the saline bag and watched as you hooked it into the IV in your arm. With a sigh of relief, you leaned back into the chair and watched the saline begin travelling down the tube to hydrate your severely dehydrated body.

As Loki watched you lean back, look at the tube, then close your eyes and let your head fall back, it was if he was seeing you in an entirely new light.

He always knew you were tough. You could hold your own in conversations, take a bullet like a champ, get back up every time you were thrown to the mat in a sparring match. But this was different. All that toughness sometimes made Loki forget how mortal you were, and this was a harsh reminder. You weren’t an Asgardian or a god or an ancient warrior - you were human. A fragile human who used their hands to protect him from the gas instead of yourself. He sat with you in silence, deep in thought, as the liquid in the bag flowed into your veins and you drifted into a light sleep. You stirred when it was almost done, looking up at the near-empty bag and then over at him.

"You shouldn't have done that, you know," Loki suddenly commented in a gentle yet firm voice. You furrowed your brow at his comment and he sighed. "I didn't need protecting from the substance as much as you did."

Your face softened into understanding, then into a somewhat sheepish impatience. "You don't know that."

"It wouldn't have hurt me as much," he countered, with a bit of edge to his voice. "I heal faster, I'm stronger. You know that. What you did was foolish."

You looked at him meaningfully, then shrugged with one shoulder. "I'm not going to apologise. My instinct is to protect my teammates and I’m proud of that."

"But what about you?"

“Don’t tell me you’re going soft, Loki,” you teased, smiled weakly and unhooked the saline line.

Loki gave a single laugh through his nose and cocked an eyebrow. “How dare you assume such heinous things.”

You smiled back, rolling your eyes and slowly removing the tape from your IV. Once the line was out you quickly pressed a piece of medical gauze against it. You looked at the tape and then at Loki, “Can you-“

You sighed in relief of having the needle out of you, placing it in the waste box for safe disposal. He picked the tape up, ripped a piece off and then stuck it over the gauze, gently smoothing out the edges with great care.

He looked up at you and caught you smiling. “That was pretty soft,” you mumbled, shooting him another teasing look. Loki glared playfully, but still helped you to your feet. You were clearly feeling stronger than you were, but still not very well.

With an arm around your waist he guided you towards your bed, careful not to hurt you, his fingers firmly gripped at your waist over your thin tank top. When you twisted to sit, his fingers shifted and traced over the skin of your lower back with your movement. His eyebrows shot up his head when you flinched away from his hand and unsuccessfully stifled a giggle.

“What was that?” Loki asked with a satisfied grin. You gave him a hard stare, trying to ignore the pricks of heat forming at your cheeks.

“Tickled. Sorry,” you mumbled as casually as you could, looking through your bag for a change of clothes.

Loki clicked his tongue and folded his arms, “Agent, you are lucky you’re in this state right now, telling the God of Mischief a thing like that.”

”I feel so lucky,” you rolled your eyes, trying to not show how flustered his threat made you. “Throwing up my guts, sticking needles in my own arm, stuck in close quarters with someone who loves to annoy me to no end…” you smirked good-naturedly.

Loki scoffed incredulously. “Last I checked, I’ve been very helpful over the course of your illness.“

“Mhmm,” you nodded, pulling out some clothes and standing weakly. “Like I said, going soft,” you winked.

Loki‘s smirk grew, but you could see the warmth behind it. He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes for a brief second. “You think because I won’t exploit your ticklishness now, that I won’t ever? Watch your tone, Agent.”

”Pfft,” you rolled your eyes again. “I’m not ticklish enough to be afraid of it. Sorry to disappoint,” you smiled playfully at him as you feebly began to make your way to the bathroom to change.

“Wait,” Loki held out a hand. ”You change here, I’ll go in there.”

He left no room for discussion, hastily excusing himself to save you the trip. When he entered the bathroom he began effortlessly waving his hands, cleaning it to be good as new. Even your shirt he picked up off the floor and shook in once with a magical touch, cleaning and drying it to be good as new. You called for him to let him know you were decent and he went back in, draping your shirt over the arm of the chair. He saw your eye catch it, saw you blush and bite your lip a little, and realised he probably should have left it. You were clearly embarrassed from how he’d seen you. He paused and held his breath as you winced pulling the covers over yourself. It was almost four in the morning.

“Is there anything you need?”

You smiled warmly and shook your head. “You’ve done so much. Far more than I’d ever ask.” Biting your lip, you looked at your hands. “Thanks for helping me out.”

“It is my fault you’re like this.”

You shook your head firmly. “It was an accident.”

Loki couldn’t help but feel inconsolably guilty. It was nice of you to say that, but the reality was that only he had missed that glass tube on the ground. You’d seen it, he hadn’t. He broke it, he got you sick. He opened his mouth to protest but you held a hand up.

“I don’t wanna hear it, Loki,” you shook your head, again, firmly. “An accident. That’s what happened. That’s what‘s going on the report. End of discussion.”

Loki looked at you for a moment and let a smile tug at one corner of his mouth. “Since when did you get so brave, ordering me around?”

“I’ve always ordered you around,” you sighed with a smile, settling yourself into the pillow. “The real question is… when did you start listening?”

You slept soundly for the rest of the morning and into the afternoon. Loki didn’t wake you when breakfast was delivered, or when Banner called with good news that they’d figured out what the makeup of the gas was. He and Tony were a mere hours away from their machines mixing up some kind of antidote. Loki told them about the night you’d had, that you’d given yourself fluids, you were now sleeping. They didn’t seem surprised at all.

Loki finally woke you when the antidote was delivered. He grimaced to see that it came in one of those same bags you had to hook into your vein. He didn’t mind the concept, he doubted he needed it, his grimace was for you now knowing you hated needles.

“Hey,” he placed a gentle hand on your shoulder to wake you from your silent slumber, and was a bit taken aback when your hand shot out to catch his, bending his wrist backwards with an impressive force. “Little cretin!“ He scolded with a laugh as your eyes widened and you retracted your hand.

“Instinct, sorry. What’s up?” You asked in a voice laced heavily with the desire to go back to sleep.

“I come bearing gifts.”

He held up the bags and watched you deduce that the resident scientists had figure it all out. You swung your legs out of the bed eagerly, still noticeably fragile, and made your way to the armchairs with Loki. “Stupid question… but have you ever had an IV?”

“No.”

“I can do yours for you.”

And so he watched as you knelt next to his chair, took his arm and tried to slide his fitted long sleeve up. He conjured himself a t-shirt to solve the problem and he saw you be a little taken-aback, before bumping your eyebrows once and cleaning the patch of skin where you’d insert the line.

Your touch was soft, considerate, yet as firm and intentional as he’d always known you to be. Instead of watching his arm as you located the vein and got to work, he found himself watching your eyes scan his skin, find their mark, squint ever so slightly, tense with the point of impact and relax as you knew you’d inserted it correctly. He felt no pain, he only felt your tender touch. When you looked up at him, he snapped out of his brief reverie and thanked his mind that half of it was paying attention, for out of some automated response he passed you the tape on the table between the armchairs.

Once you’d hooked him into the antidote, you got to work on yourself. You did it much quicker and with much more confidence than the early hours of the morning. Loki noticed how you hesitated right before inserting the needle, how your breath seemed to catch in your throat. He ripped off a bit of tape before you had to ask, and the smile you gave him was different than ones he’d seen from you. This was a smile of synchronicity, of an appreciation for the bond you two were forming stuck in this little room together.

As the clear liquid flowed into you two, you started a conversation by asking how the sick were tended to on Asgard. Loki appreciated the way you tried to take his mind away from feeling guilt, but he knew he wouldn’t feel better until long after you were well.

Thor would tell him that was a good thing, that he valued mortal life and happiness, but for now Loki longed for his younger and more careless self who wouldn’t feel such surges of guilt for causing pain to a Midgardian. You seemed okay, but he was well-versed in seeming okay when he was not, and he didn’t want to assume you were being honest. Loki found himself usually believing the best in you. He just didn’t know if, in this case, you thought the best version of yourself was honest about your pain, or shielding him from the reality of how sickly you felt.

The following morning, he got a bit of relief when you practically bounded out of bed to answer the video call by the door. There had been breakfast delivered, as meals had been for the past day or do, but you ignored it in favour of arguing for your freedom.

”Come on, two more days? We’re totally fine!” You stressed, doing a little spin. “Have a little faith in yourself, Bruce. The antidote worked great.”

“First of all,” Tony piped up. “This confirmed my suspicions that you are exactly the kind of person who gets bit by a zombie and doesn’t tell the team-“

”Hey!”

“Save it, I Am Legend, I got you figured out. Second, we need to make sure it’s out of your system before you return to the outside world.“

”We feel fine,” you argued. “Don’t we, Loki?”

He nodded, but knew you weren’t winning this fight. Alas, he was right, and you resigned yourself to another two days in quarantine.

“Is it really so bad to spend time with me,” Loki scoffed playfully. “Frankly, I’m offended.”

You shot him a look before settling down on the couch. “I just… I feel fine. It’s frustrating that we can’t do anything but sit in this room for another forty-eight hours.”

“Since it’s my fault you’re in here, it will be my duty to entertain you,” Loki said matter-of-factly. You raised an eyebrow, but seemed to bite. Loki’s heart lifted at your willingness to try to have a little fun, so he wanted to make it worth your while. “Let’s see what they’ve deemed worthy of our time, hmm?” He examined the shelves lined with books and opened a small door on the cabinet to find a number of board games. “Come,” he beckoned without looking over. You were by his side in a few seconds, looking over the games.

”This is ridiculous,” you laughed. He looked at you and saw you looked genuinely amused. “Loki, you’re an alien Prince and you’re asking me to play Monopoly with you?” You laughed harder and shook your head.

“Well what do you propose?” He laughed back. You grinned and picked up a box from the selection, beckoning him to go back to the couch.

“This is seriously ridiculous,“ you repeated. Loki bit back a grin at your sheer delight and settled on the opposite side of the couch to where you sat cross-legged. You pulled out a board with a grid on it, then passed him a small plastic bench. “Have you played Scrabble before?”

“We don’t have board games on Asgard, except for a more sophisticated version of the Midgardian game of chess. Our games are usually more weapons-based.”

“Loki, you surprise me,” You eyed him coyly. “You of all people should know words are some of the most effective weapons.”

“I’ll let you off the hook for how cliched that was by chalking it up to the sickness still affecting your brain,” he replied cooly.

You grinned. “Case and point.”

You explained the rules to him and passed a small green bag for him to select seven tiles.

“How many Midgardian languages do you know?” You asked after you arranged your tiles. “Ones with the Latin alphabet.“

“Most of them.”

“Usually this game is English words only. Let’s add… Latin, French and…”

”Norwegian.”

You looked at your tiles, rearranged a few, then nodded. “Excellent. You can start.” You looked up at him expectantly as he played his first word.

One after another you two played your words. You both knew the languages well, so there was no need for contesting what was played. He hadn’t yet laid a French word, but he’d done several Latin, one English and one Norwegian.

“Another 37 points. Jeez, Loki,” You laughed. “You’re kicking my ass.”

Loki bit back a smirk and wondered how long it would take you to catch on that he’d been magically altering the tiles in his hand to fit the words he wanted to play. Slowly, he saw the suspicion start to form. Then, he got a bit sloppy.

“That tile’s wrong,” your brow furrowed, but you looked at him accusingly.

“What do you mean?” He asked innocently, still continuing with the ruse.

”The S. It’s only worth one point, but… the one you just played has a two on it.”

“Well that’s simply not good enough,” Loki gasped in outrage. “You should complain to the manufacturers.”

The longer you looked, the more smug he became, then the more you caught on. “LOKI!” You yelled and picked up some of his words from the board and began pelting him with the small plastic letters, one for each word of outrage. “You’re- such- a- CHEATER!”

“You never said- hey! You never said I couldn’t change the tiles to suit my needs- ow!” Loki laughed, his argument only infuriating you further. He could tell you were frustrated, but more at yourself for not picking up on it earlier, for not seeing it coming.

“I’m gonna kick your ass,” you seethed. Loki smirked at your poorly-hidden grin of amusement as you picked up a cushion and swung it at him with a mighty roar. He made an involuntary noise of surprise when it hit him actually quite hard, knocking him a bit off-centre. You got to your knees, game forgotten as the tiles slid around the board as it was moved by you getting into stance to attack.

“Darling, you might not want to start something you can’t finish,” he warned with a serious face, fingers closing around a cushion of his own. “I know you’re deathly bored, but- OOF!” You hit him straight in the jaw and laughed at your move as you rolled over the back of the couch, expertly dodging his retaliatory swipe. He peered over to see you crouched in a fighting stance. “Ah,” he cocked his head as he stood. “Good to see you’re truly feeling better,” he chuckled.

“Bring it on, Your Highness.” You teasingly beckoned him as he stepped around to the back of the couch where there was more floor space.

“Now I won’t feel bad about decimating you in this little scuffle.” He brought the pillow down hard. You dodged again so it only clipped you in the shoulder. Doing a tuck and roll, you evaded his backswing and landed behind him, hitting the pillow cheekily against his backside.

“You going easy on me, Loki?”

“I figure it’s best to take magic off the table,” Loki shrugged, bringing the pillow down and hitting your feet as you rolled to your back and kicked them up to protect yourself. With another surge, you brought your feet over your head in a backwards roll, landing on your knees in time to duck a hit aimed at your head. Springing forward, you bowled into him with your pillow. The sheer size difference between you and this hulking deity meant it only slightly caused him to stumble. He tossed his pillow back onto the couch in favour of wrestling yours from you.

”HEY!” He pulled it from your hands with ease, holding it high above his head prepare to strike down. You held your hands above you to shield your head from his attack, but he held the tension.

“Any last words?”

“Really? Are you gonna monologue? That’s so unbecoming of- HA!” As he struck down you dodged it with a laugh, jumping under his arm behind him and backing away slowly. “You sure you’re feeling alright, Loki? Or are you just afraid to hurt me?“

He chuckled, gripping the pillow and taking a step forwards. You were beside the back of the couch, ready to pick up his discarded pillow. “Watch yourself,” he warned.

”You know…” your fingers inched towards the back of the couch, Loki eyed your hand and smirked, clocking your move. “I think you’re just going a bit soft Loki. You’re pulling your punches.”

“Going soft?” He scoffed, then had some kind of revelation you weren’t privy to. He dropped his pillow. “Oh, Agent,” he chuckled with an unnerving ferocity. “I did warn you.”

In less than a second you realised his intentions, reading it in the way he rounded on you with his outstretched hands. You felt the colour drain from your face, then you felt the colour return in a rush. “Loki, no.” You leapt over the couch and grabbed the pillow to protect yourself.

“You seem rather nervous,” he commented as he walked towards you calmly. Not taking your eye off him, you walked backwards as he stalked forwards. “Rather nervous for someone who said they didn’t fear a little tickling.”

“L-Loki,” you laughed nervously, tongue feeling heavy in your mouth. “You can’t.”

“We can continue this little cat and mouse if you so wish. However, those doors are staying shut for the next forty-seven hours,” he gestured to the entrance. “I’ll get you eventually.”

“J-just pick up your pillow,“ you eyed where it laid next to your feet, then kicked it over to him. “This is a pillow fight.”

“Have you learned nothing from our little board game? You need to define the rules before we begin, else it’s too late,” he grinned, a devious gleam in his eye catching in the light.

The bathroom. It was your only hope, but he stood between you and safety. So you kept circling the couch, eyes never leaving his predatory look and stance as you traded steps. When the bathroom door was finally behind you, you dared to take a step to close the ten or so feet between you and it. Loki raised his hand and the door slammed shut and locked. He looked rather unbothered.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” you sighed and bit the side of your tongue, knowing how this was eventually going to end.

“And let‘s do away with that,” he motioned to your pillow with his eyes and waved his hand. The fabric was ripped through your fingers towards him. He held it for a second before tossing it over to one of the beds. You held in a gasp but you knew you looked nervous.

”If I surrender, what’s in it for me?“

Loki smirked. “You have nothing to barter with.”

“There has to be somethi- ooh,” you winced and froze in spot, doubling over and grabbing your stomach. You weren’t in any pain, but perhaps if he-

”Feigning ill, are we?” Loki laughed sharply, closing the distance between you two with a few swift steps. You glowered up at where he towered over you and stood to your full height as he did. “Couch, bed or floor?”

“Where do you usually do it?” You taunted. He narrowed his eyes, and in less than a second you were thrown over his shoulder. “LOKI!” You pounded on his back as he walked over to the couch and dropped you on it, climbing on top of you before you had the chance to scramble over the back. He fought for your hands as you slapped him away while you still could, shouting profanities through your nervous laughter. “LOHOKI!” You whined as he caught your wrists and pinned them to your chest just below your neck.

“What was that about going soft?” He raised one eyebrow and smirk, trying to egg you into further incriminating yourself.

You scowled at him and huffed, letting your head fall back onto to the couch. “Get it over with,” you muttered.

“Oh, with pleasure,” he winked and roughly latched his fingers against one of your hips, digging and drilling with intent. Your eyes went wide with the overwhelming ticklish shockwaves and you immediately fell into desperate laughter, pleading with him to let up. He retracted his hand and laughed at your reaction. To your credit, it had been a long while since anyone tried this with you; you didn’t realise how bad it would be.

“Lokihi,” you whined, tugging on your wrists.

“You’re such a little liar,” he chuckled, bringing his hand down to softly scribble through your shirt at the centre of your belly. You burst into squealing high-pitched giggles and threw your head back against the couch, trying to explain you didn’t know, you didn’t lie, as you squirmed underneath weeding out your weak spots.

“P-Plehe-PLEHEASE!” You giggled and sniffed helplessly, dissolving into a more desperate cackle as he settled on a space on the side of your stomach and scratched softly and maddeningly at the sensitive area. “LOKI!” Your eyes shot open and you bucked under the relentless touch. “WHY-HY?!” You shrieked as he continued, not once letting up as he tightened his grip on your wrists and exploited the weak spot. “PLEHEASE ANYWHEHERE ELSE! DAHAMMIT!” You shrieked again, laughing harder as he grinned down and continued in the same damn place.

“What, and miss this endearing reaction?” Loki teased, scratching even quicker and laughing as you bucked again underneath him.

“LOKI!” You all but screamed, kicking your feet against the arm of the couch. Gasping for breath through your giggles, your head shook from side to side as you struggled underneath him. “P-plehease…” You gasped out and he finally relented. “G-gohod, Loki,” you coughed. He laughed and shifted so you assumed he was going to let you up, but your cheeks burned when you realised he wasn’t making moves to get off you. “Okay,” you laughed nervously. “You can let me go now.” Eyeing him warily, you grimaced when you saw his smirk return.

“Oh, but Agent,” he urged. “We’ve barely begun.”

“NO, LOKI, NO!” You struggled harder and whined at his threat, knowing full well he could and would be merciless. “I’m sorry, okay? You’re not going soft!”

”You’re certainly right about that,” he nodded. “Though I’d be remiss if I didn’t prove it to you.”

He suddenly leaned forward to hover more over you, prying your wrists from your chest and pulling them over your head. You gasped and opened your mouth to protest but his fingers were digging under one of your arms before the words could form. Instead, a shrill scream came out and was followed by a bout of loud laughter. Loki laughed along with you as he heard your feet searching for traction to throw him off, knowing there was nothing you could do to stop him.

Again, Loki was precise and relentless. Instead of moving his hands around your body in search of all the best spots, he found a place that worked and he stuck with it. By the gods, he stuck with it until you thought you might explode. His current target was the very lowest part of your underarm - the part that was pretty much your ribs. He’d tried pinching and digging, scratching at lightly trailing his fingers over the space, but found by far the best reaction when he slotted his found fingers around to scratch at the back of your uppermost ribs and drilled his thumb hard into the gap below your highest rib.

Your laughter was loud and frantic, tiny screams interlacing your bellowing belly-laughter as your body weakened beneath him. Loki knew mortals well enough to know when they were in genuine distress from games such as these and, much to his delight, he could sense that you were happily submitted to your ticklish fate. Oh, you fought and you pleaded and you laughed yourself senseless as he swapped his hands around to attack the other side. You begged for him to go easy on you and you looked terrified when he responded with silence and a devious look, but you never once told him to stop. You never once gave an indication that he was causing you discomfort.

“I can’t stop, Agent,” he taunted over your laughter. “You’ll think I’ve gone soft.”

“LOKI I’M GONNAHA KIHIHI-” you screamed again and couldn’t finish your sentence as you laughter turned hiccupy and a giggly whine bubbled over your lips. Sensing you needed air, Loki did relent on the terrible spot but still held you in place.

It was like the moment with the towel, when he’d tried in some way to comfort you. That was perhaps a bit more intimate than your working relationship had been in the past, but this was easy to continue. Loki didn’t see you get physical affection all that often, and he knew mortals well enough to know that a lack of it could take its toll. Even as he forced your laughter and your squeals, you seemed relaxed under him (when you weren’t searching for freedom). You seemed at ease having finally had someone close.

“Thihis isn’t fair,” you coughed the smallest amount.

”Perhaps you should work on your defensive skills,” Loki teased, giving you a swift tweak to the hip. You jolted and glared at him, trying to look firm but knowing you didn’t look mad at all.

“You’re the cheater!” You laughed and pulled on your arms. He released them and you folded them defiantly over your chest. Loki had to smile at that, but not just at the adorable nature of your look - at the fact that even now, as he trapped you beneath him and took your breath from your lungs, you blamed him for cheating at a game… not for trapping you in this room in the first place. That’s how he knew you really cared. You wouldn’t even entertain the idea that this whole kerfuffle was anything more an than accident.

“It should be you on the receiving end of this,” you muttered.

“That’ll be the day, Agent,” he grinned.

“Let me up.”

“Will you think I’ve gone soft?”

“I’d never do such a foolish thing,” you gasped in mock horror, then smiled as he climbed off you. It was stupid, really. Before the words left your mouth you regretted it. “… you big softie.”

Loki growled and snatched up your socked feet from the couch, locking them in the crook of his elbow as you shrieked in fear and apologised profusely. He tightened his hold and placed his fingers right before your soles.

“Big mistake.“

He raked his fingers from your heels to your toes as you immediately fell into belly-laughter, thrashing on the couch and tugging at your legs in vain. You grabbed a cushion and pressed it to your face as your screams of laughter shot out of you lungs, twitching desperately every time he found a new spot. You knew he was in search of the place to target - the place he’d focus his energy - and even though it’d been a while, you knew exactly where it was. The anticipation was killing you. Then, after a big jolt and squeal he paused for dramatic effect, retracting his hands. When you poked your eyes out from behind the pillow he grinned and dusted his fingers along the balls of your feet. You squeaked and jumped again, hiding your face once more. Then, he scratched at them both harshly and you let out a blood-curling scream. You heard him laugh, and then he descended.

Your laughter almost immediately went silent as your body reacted to the ticklish shockwaves racing through your skin, and the unbearable feeling of his blunt nails scratching at and below the balls of your feet through your thin socks. This is it, you thought, this is how it ends.

The fight was hard and valiant on your part, but there was really nothing you could do to stop him except surrender. Perhaps you held out for so long because you didn’t want to give into Loki, or perhaps it was because this kind of physical contact had been uncommon for you as of late. Well, not just this kind of contact, but any really. This was fun, playful, a little overwhelming but still mostly bearable. But as his fingers persisted, driving you further into hysterics, it suddenly crossed the line into unbearable. He was just too good at this.

You weakly batted your hand out, trying to catch his leg. When you found it you tapped weakly, but frantically. You heard his deep rumbling laugh and squeaked as his dragged his fingers down the length of your feet once more for good measure before letting them fall back down to the couch. Still with the pillow in front of your face, your arms fell to your sides as you breathed deeply. Loki lifted the pillow from your face and grinned down at you before lightly hitting you with it.

“I win,” he winked and lifted your legs, settling under them before letting them drape over his own. If you weren’t still gathering your breath you might have blushed, but you were thankful for the excuse to not address the contact right away. His hands settled atop your shins, and that felt final. It felt like he was comfortable, and wanted you to be as well. You smiled a bit through your search for air.

“I think I got a scrabble tile down my pants,” you muttered. He laughed and looked at the game discarded all over the floor.

“Perhaps a film would be better for now.” You opened your eyes to see him smiling kindly before reaching forward to lift the remote from the table and point it at the TV. Despite your struggle, you suddenly noticed that you were a bit cold. Loki seemed to notice first, because while one hand searched the titles, his other waved beside him and conjured a large thick blanket to drape across your body. He didn’t look at you as he did so, but you could tell half his mind was focused on how you were reacting to his acts of care. Instead of speaking your thanks out loud, you pulled the blanket higher and tucked it under your chin before letting out a content sigh.

Maybe forty-six hours, and then some, here in this room with Loki wouldn’t be too bad after all.

[absolutepokemontrash]

so i have adhd, and sometimes when i stim it gets a little weird. we’ve got the normal ones, like the leg jiggle, humming, and pen clicking. and then we’ve got the “adhd monster takes over”. that’s when it gets kind weird. like i will scream really loud sounds that vaguely are synonymous to an animal but are really just weird things my brain come up with. and then we’ve got the speaking gibberish stim, i’ll either say a very weird combination of words that shouldn’t go together or i’ll make up words and make it sound like i’m speaking an actual language. and then we’ve got the one that freaks my mom out, where i sit on the floor and rotate my upper body in circles like i’m in a trance for like 20 minutes. wow, that was much longer than it ever needed to be. anyways, the point of me saying this was that i was thinking about the boys reaction to it. like, “this might be slightly ironic of us to ask this but uh, are you possibly possessed?”

You 🤝(ADHD stimming making us look possessed) 🤝 Me

I gotchu fam

MC Are you Stimming Or Possessed?

Lucifer

MC’s normal stimming behaviours and twitches don’t really stand out to Lucifer too much. Both Mammon and Levi stim and he’s lived with them since humans thought the sky was a dome.

But… why is the human speaking in tongues? Oh shit OH SHIT- WHO HAS POSSESSED MC?! Wait… they’re fine? MC is fine? It’s just a thing they do..? Okay then.

Lucifer adapts really quickly, but sometimes the random animal screeches give him miniature heart attacks. We ask that MC give Lucifer a bit of a warning before they belt out a sound any chimpanzee would be jealous of.

The floor circles? He probably just walked into MC’s room without knocking and caught them doing it. He’s honestly seen weirder.

Mammon

Same hat! Same hat! It’s nice to have someone else who stims a whole lot too! But dammit! MC shoulda warned him before they let out a hyena cackle at top volume! >:(

It scared Mammon so bad he knocked over his giant pile of Grimm he was countin’! Geez human… after the first time, he still gets mildly freaked out until he realizes it’s just his human doing there thing.

The speaking gibberish was a bit of a surprise, Mammon deadass thought MC forgot how to speak for a second.

The spinning in circles on the floor one was less of a shock, it was more… amusing? Mammon hopped down onto the floor next to MC to try and see what the fuss was about, and now suddenly he’s doing it too XD it’s fun!

Leviathan

*Spider-Man pointing meme*

H-he does that too! P-p-pfff… normie copying him… he isn’t glad that there’s someone else that gets it… totally not.

But as happy as Levi is that there’s someone who’s less weirded out by his stimming behaviour, the sudden animal noises/gibberish never fails to send him into cardiac arrest. I-is he misunderstanding a different language or is MC just making up vaguely word sounding noises?

When MC explains, he does panic less.

The sit-circles don’t exactly bother him, whenever MC starts, he’ll pull out some manga and start reading until they’re done.

Satan

Hmmmm… inchresting…

Satan doesn’t actually stim, he’s never felt the need to, but since Mammon and Levi do, he knows what’s up.

He finds it really interesting though, like… does it feel good? What’s the purpose? Also, why are they meowing? That’s cute stop-

Satan also walked in on the spinny stim and freaked because he thought some jackass had stolen MC’s body. After being thoroughly shaken by the Avatar of wrath, MC should take the time to explain it’s just a thing they do.

Asmodeus

Okay hear me out, if MC has any kind of texture sensitivity or uses certain textures to stim, Asmo wants to know.

“What do you think of this shirt?” “Does not pass the vibe check.”

When MC starts speaking nonsense, Asmo just calmly asks if they drank something Solomon gave them and how long until it’ll wear off.

The spinny stims? Yeah no, he doesn’t vibe with that. He just slowly closes the door and checks in later.

Beelzebub

Y-you good, human? Beelie is confizzled to say the least. Here he was, just eating some brownies, when all of a sudden he hears a sound he’s only ever heard on nature documentaries.

When MC explains themselves they’re met with an “oh. Okay.”

But still please try and hold off on the screeching when Beel is eating, it always surprises him and giving him the Heimlich is real hard :/

Spinny stims are also met with confusion, and then indifference. Just another MC quirk! Nothing to worry about.

Belphegor

Being real, MC probably woke this bastard up from a damn good nap with the screech stim. Listen, he can get the appeal of a nice calming texture, but dude, does the human have to be so loud????

He chucks a pillow at them and tries to go back to sleep.

But the possessed looking stim, yeah that immediately caused him to panic. He was once again, napping, but he heard a screech and then complete silence, he opens his eyes to berate MC for waking him up, then just sees them staring into the abyss and moving their torso in circles. Needless to say, his sleep addled brain PANICS.

Belph is out of bed and shaking MC in less than a second. “GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY HUMAN’S BODY YOU-” “Oh, hello Belphie.” “…” “…” “I’m going back to bed.”

————————

Sorry if these answers got a bit repetitive! Im sure the boys would all be a little shocked at first, then be like “oh lol, just MC doing their thing.”

[oumaheroes]

Christmas Drabble (3)

Summary: In which Canada makes a foolish decision

Word Count: 920

Characters: America, Canada, Sealand

Parts 1, 2

----

‘What do you mean “where is he”?’

Canada’s voice had a note of stressed panic to it that made America turn down the volume on the TV ever so slightly in interest. Immediately, Sealand voiced his disapproval and America shushed him, trying to hear more.

‘No, he’s not here,’ the creaking of floorboards as Canada began walking down the hallway, ‘just me, Alfred and Peter.’

Sealand raised an eyebrow and mouthed ‘Dad’. America shrugged and paused their game completely. Sealand didn’t complain.

‘He’s not been here all night, from what I know. He was in London to finish bits off- he was supposed to pick you up?’

America made a low noise of pleasure. It wasn’t even Christmas yet and things were already interesting.

More floorboards creaking closer and then Canada was in the doorway to the fancy living room, the one England did not like any of them using when he wasn’t around to supervise. The good Christmas tree was there, along with all of the presents carefully wrapped underneath and it was exactly for this Christmassy atmosphere that America and Sealand had wanted to settle there. Canada caught sight of them both, new PS5 hooked up to the TV and squatted on the floor in a mound of sofa cushions, and frowned, ‘Yeah,’ he said into his phone, flapping a free hand frantically at America, ‘Yeah no, I’m not sure.’

He put his hand over the speaker and hissed at them quietly, ‘Put this away!’

‘What?’ Alfred mouthed, pointing to his ear. Sealand giggled, ‘I can’t hear you?’

Quicker than should be possible for someone so lanky, Canada crossed the room and swatted him on the back of the head, continuing his conversation at the same time, ‘Of course, don’t worry about it. I’ll come down.’

‘Shit mate, that’ll be a right help. You know there’s no public transport all the way out there, he’s in the middle of fucking nowhere.’ Australia’s tinny voice could just about be heard from this close and America settled back against the cushions, feeling somewhat satisfied Canada wouldn’t keep attacking him now that he had a task to do.

‘No problem. I’ll text you when I’m on my way.’ Canada said his goodbyes and hung up the phone before looking at it in concern.

‘Why didn’t he call me?’

Canada blinked, ‘What?’

America nodded at the phone in his hand, ‘Why didn’t Jack call me? He knows I’m here too.’ America already knew the answer but it was fun to watch Canada squirm against the truth of it sometimes.

‘I don’t know,’ Canada looked away uncomfortably, ‘but we need to go.’

‘Woah woah, wait,’ America sat up again, ‘we?’

‘Yeah, why we?’ Sealand peered around him to getting a better look at Canada.

‘You can’t both stay here.’

‘Erm…’ America looked about the living room as if searching for something dangerous that might explain his misgivings, like a deadly weapon or a house fire. There was nothing but a decorative skull on the mantlepiece, fairy light in the eye sockets twinkling cheerfully, ‘Why not?’

Canada gave him a flat look that spoke volumes, ‘I’m not leaving you two here alone with the presents.’

‘Hang on, wait a sec,’ America placed a hand on his chest and feigned a look of hurt, ‘you really think we’re so bad that we can’t wait till Christmas?’

‘Either of you on your own? No. Together? Yes.’ Canada walked behind the sofa and gently tugged on the back of Sealand’s collar, ‘Come on, up.’

‘This infringes upon my independent rights,’ Sealand huffed but stood up regardless, throwing his controller on the sofa, ‘Also, I’m nowhere near as bad as Alfred.’

‘Ouch, double whammy? I’m getting attacked from both sides here.’

‘Al, please…’

‘Look,’ America stood up, ‘The old man probably got distracted at work and will be home at any minute all stressed out. Me and Peter can stay here and clean up, get the place all nice and ready, and put the kettle on. And we promise that we won’t open anything.’

Canada looked extremely unconvinced and America continued before he could say anything else, ‘It makes no sense for us all to go: Jack and Alex will have all of their stuff with them and it’s wasted space just because you might not trust-‘

‘I don’t trust you.’

‘-because you don’t trust us. It works better if we stay here and help out.’

Canada’s eyes narrowed, ‘You promise you won’t open anything?’

America crossed his heart, ‘By the time you get back, the living room will be tidy and the presents will all be wrapped.’

‘God damn it,’ Canada shook his head but looked away in defeat, flipping his phone over in one hand, ‘I’m an idiot.’

‘Well…’

‘Don’t push it, Al.’

America held up his hands placatingly, ‘Just joking. Go on, and stop worrying. This is supposed to be a holiday. That means you need to enjoy yourself.’

‘Try to get a hold of Dad and see where he is,’ Canada ignored him but gave America a warm pat on the arm.

‘Yeah, I will. Drive safe, okay?’

‘Will do,’ Canada waved a hand in farewell and disappeared back into the hallway. America watched him go in silence, waiting until the creak of the floorboards told him that Canada was moving back through the house and towards the door that led out to the garage.

‘We’re gonna open the presents now, right?’ Sealand asked in a whisper.

'After all of that? Hell yeah.'

Part 4

----

AN:

I headcanon that many of the Commonwealth like to head over to England’s for Christmas, who’s hosted a yearly get together for his family and friends for centuries in his big fancy countryside house. The people who go changes each year but the UK bros are a constant, (their once a year attempt at 'friendly family time') as is Canada, usually. To help me keep these drabbles under 1000 words though, I’m restricting the attendees like a cruel overlord.

[labarch]

Witch Hats and Prejudice Part II

<-- Part I

Olruggio, my love, my man, I’m sorry your proposal to Qifrey in chapter 40 didn’t go as you hoped, let’s sit down and discuss your workaholism, temper issues and saviour complex, yes? Yes. It’s couple therapy time at last, we’ll have a look at Qifrey and Olruggio’s relationship and at chapter 40 in particular through the following points:

-Panelling in the Orufrey conversation in chapter 40

-Prejudice and power imbalance in Qifrey and Olruggio’s interactions

-Help as a collaboration between equals (spoiler: they haven’t made it to that stage yet)

-What Olruggio wants from Qifrey

 Panelling in the Orufrey conversation in chapter 40

The conversation in chapter 40 is never framed as a happy reunion. If we reuse the analysis of the panels from Coco and Qifrey’s conversation I made in my previous post, we find the same markers of unease between Olruggio and Qifrey. Most of the panels are narrow, and get darker and darker as night falls. Qifrey and Olruggio rarely share a panel, and even when they do, they rarely make direct eye contact: Qifrey looks down, or Olruggio walks away from him, or they are curled in on themselves or standing on a slope at different eye level. For a while Qifrey is up in the air and mostly talking to himself. Oh yeah, and there’s a hat that gets in the way at some point.

It gives the sense that they are having two separate conversations, and that they never truly achieve the connection that we saw between Qifrey and Coco. On top of that, while the conversation is supposed to be about comforting Qifrey and earning his trust, Olruggio never manages to get a smile out of him, except for wobbly, miserable little grimaces. So what’s going through both of their heads, and why are they failing to meet halfway?

The chapter has an outward pull to it. The scene takes place on a slope that leads away from the atelier. The chapter opens with a herd of dragons flying away and into the night. Then Qifrey takes flight to look into the distance, while giving a very contradictory speech about how fulfilling yet dull his life is here, how happy yet trapped in an illusion he feels. He has to hold on to his cape as it flaps in the wind. It brings those dragons back to mind, like they are a metaphor for the side of him that wishes to escape. Qifrey’s migration season is just starting folks, it’s a confusing time for him okay.

In contrast to Qifrey looking ahead into a dark wilderness, Olruggio in this chapter is almost always looking back. He walks away from Qifrey to talk to him over his shoulder, or he looks back towards the atelier. In the only scene where he faces Qifrey full-on, the past is so present on his mind that he de-ages them both. It’s interesting, because it adds a caveat to his pledge of listening to everything Qifrey has to say: he is not so much trying to adapt to Qifrey’s new situation as he is trying to bring them back to the childhood stage of their friendship, when they were always together and kept no secret.

This whole looking ahead / looking back dichotomy brings me back to the mentality of the Great Hall, a society obsessed with keeping itself in an insulated bubble, wrapping itself in good intentions and noble ideals, and ignoring its own inner darkness and complexity. Qifrey, because of his inability to be content and stay in place, threatens that delicate balance. That sends the other witches around him into such a state of panic and outrage that even those who genuinely love him end up lashing out at him with uncharacteristic brutality.

Prejudice and power imbalance in Qifrey and Olruggio’s interactions

I have described in my previous post how vicious and oddly personal Beldaruit got in his attacks against Qifrey in chapter 36, but you can make the same case for Olruggio, especially since the two scenes run in parallel. There is something excessive about the violence with which Olruggio confronts his friend. For one, he is choosing a hell of a time to do it: the girls are safe, there is no urgency to press Qifrey for answers right this instant – except if he is hoping to shock Qifrey into honesty while he’s disoriented. Qifrey has just woken up from a three-day coma; he is half-naked in a place Olruggio knows worsens his nightmares; his scar is exposed; he is half-blind because Olruggio has taken his glasses; Olruggio is literally an angry dark blob looming over him. I’ve often heard it say that Qifrey is manipulative towards Olruggio, but in return Olruggio isn’t above using intimidation tactics against him, consciously or not.

There is also the staggering lack of empathy of the approach: what started this whole thing is that Olruggio learnt about Qifrey’s impending blindness. And his knee-jerk reaction was to attack Qifrey about it. Like, um, my dude, your friend almost died, he is going to go blind and lose his job, you wanna try being sensitive about it? (Note that Qifrey running after the Brimhats didn’t trouble Olruggio that much at first: after his interview with the Knights Moralis he is mainly concerned with “getting his story straight with Qifrey”; it’s only later on, when we see him staring at the glasses he’s just repaired, that he starts voicing his doubts about Qifrey’s intentions). He may be right to suspect that Qifrey is hiding things from him, but there’s a pretty big leap between “you are keeping secrets” and “you are wilfully using your own child as bait”.

This whole suspicious climate, that makes Olruggio jump straight to the ugliest conclusion possible, is once again a feature of the Great Hall mentality. The mind of a person who has been in contact with forbidden magic is forever corrupt, and his actions are forever suspect. Had Qifrey been anyone else, he would probably have been given the benefit of the doubt for losing track of his students while he was, you know, extremely concussed and suffering from blood loss. Interestingly, Olruggio’s concern – whether, when faced with a chance to go after the Brimhats, Qifrey would choose his quest over his students’ safety – is addressed as early as chapter 22: after an instinctive movement to rush into danger, Qifrey pulls himself back and takes measures to keep Coco and Tetia safe, and even plans to call Olruggio and the Knights Moralis as reinforcements to help rescue the others. Then he gets hit in the head by a giant snake golem, and the rest is history.

In general, Beldaruit’s and Olruggio’s accusations that Qifrey is using Coco as bait without caring for her wellbeing just don’t hold up. First, all the attacks by the Brimhats so far have occurred in completely mundane, teaching-related settings with other adults present (at the stationary shop, or during an exam), so pushing blame onto Qifrey clearly comes from prejudice rather than evidence. Second, if Qifrey’s sole aim was to get clues on the Brimhats, he would pressure Coco into taking the Librarian test as early as possible, but we keep seeing the opposite: he encourages her to take breaks and to enjoy her training rather than be laser-focused on her goals. Hilariously, out of the two tests Coco passed so far, Qifrey gave his approval for none, thinking it was too early for her (extra-hilariously, Beldaruit is the one who speed-ran Coco through her second test). I’m just saying, if Olruggio hasn’t noticed any of this and can’t take it in consideration before bringing out the accusations and threats, maybe he’s not doing that good a job as a Watchful Eye.  

Another thing about this climate of suspicion, added to the power imbalance between Qifrey and Olruggio, is that it prevents them from having a healthy fight. Olruggio invokes his duties as Watchful Eye to berate Qifrey whenever he steps out of line, but when Olruggio lets his temper carry him too far and misuses his own power (when he drags Coco out to the Knights Moralis even though she had already been officially accepted as an apprentice in volume 2, or when he accuses Qifrey of using Coco as bait in volume 7 without proof), Qifrey never criticises him for doing so. It’s not that he is shy about speaking up to power – he is more than happy to yell at Beldaruit and Easthies when they mistreat his students. But when it comes to Olruggio, Qifrey is compelled to shoulder as much blame as he can, and seems almost afraid of saying anything negative to him.

It would have been justified for Qifrey to start chapter 40 by getting mad at Olruggio for his earlier accusations: Olruggio had been insensitive, unhelpful and completely out of line. But instead Qifrey pretty much encourages Olruggio to attack him again: from his “I thought you might be mad at me” to frantically denying that Olruggio might have ever done anything wrong. In return, there is something defensive in Olruggio’s delivery during the “I’m angry that I wasn’t someone you could trust” segment: he walks away from Qifrey as he gives the non-apology, and it comes out sandwiched between criticisms of Qifrey for being reckless and a long speech of Olruggio praising himself, and how everything would be alright if only Qifrey behaved himself and relied on him more. It’s an issue that this old distribution of roles is so well-entrenched between them, with Olruggio as the golden student and Qifrey as the eternal problem child.

Qifrey’s exaggerated gentleness and praise towards Olruggio participates in the feeling of wrongness that weighs on chapter 40. The memory erasure scene is framed like a kiss, and Qifrey keeps complimenting him even after sending him into an unnatural sleep. It would come across as condescending and manipulative, except for how fervently Qifrey seems to want to believe that Olruggio is perfect, and that any dysfunction in their relationship has to come from him.

Qifrey, focused as he is on his own dark secrets, is utterly unwilling to see any darkness in Olruggio. It makes sense when you consider that Qifrey has also been absorbing the prejudices of the Great Hall: he thinks very little of himself, and has probably been looking up to Olruggio as a moral compass ever since Olruggio took him under his wing as a child. He must also comfort himself with the thought that, when/if his quest drags him away from the atelier, Olruggio will be a perfect teacher for the girls. Having to come to terms with Olruggio’s flaws must be terrifying to him. But what about Olruggio’s perspective in all this?

Olruggio is an example of how even those who materially benefit from an elitist, close-minded society are damaged by it in some way. He grew up in the Great Hall as a bright-eyed, idealistic genius, and even as an adult he clings to the principles of that society like a mantra: “bring the blessings of magic to the people”. He is successful and respected by his peers, popular with the nobles and well-liked among the commoners. Yet somewhere along the way he became a ragged, workaholic hermit.

I have mentioned in previous posts that I suspect Olruggio of grappling with his own, deep-seated fear of being unwanted and left behind. He betrays that fear in the way he is attacking Qifrey: his concerns about Qifrey’s treatment of Coco aren’t based on evidence, and underneath that veneer he is mostly complaining that Qifrey is neglecting him. “Be straight with me”, “Don’t lie to me”, “You wouldn’t even tell me about it”, “You took her as a student without a word to me first”. There again, Olruggio is being a bit hazy on how far his influence goes as Watchful Eye: from what we know, Watchful Eyes are meant to ensure that students don’t get mistreated, but they don’t get a say in who teaches whom: it’s the disciples who choose their masters. Olruggio grumbling about Qifrey adopting more and more children behind his back is cute when we treat them as a couple. But from the perspective of their professional relationship, Olruggio is claiming the right to veto Qifrey’s students and take them away from him without any evidence of abuse.

The problem is that Olruggio is very bad at expressing his feelings without using his job, and therefore his authority, as a crutch. It’s endearing when he uses it to explain away his gifts to the girls (“I just want them to test a prototype”) or his marks of affection and care (“Drying your hair so you don’t catch a cold is part of my duties as Watchful Eye!”). However, it adds a layer of threat to his arguments with Qifrey, because he is constantly dangling that authority over his head, even when he is urging Qifrey to trust him. In his more agitated moments, it turns into a one-man good-cop / bad-cop performance (“Step out of line and I’ll report you” / “Why won’t you confide in me? I’m your best friend!”). Sure, he is willing to side with Qifrey against the Knights Moralis when he deems it appropriate, but here’s the catch: Olruggio gets to decide where the line in the sand lies, and that line seems to shift depending on how hot his temper is flaring at any given time.

It’s no wonder their conversation lends them in a dead-end when it is so one-sided. Thourghout the manga, and in volume 8 in particular, the author explores the idea that help should be a collaborative effort between equals, that encourages both parties to grow and learn more about themselves. Trying to unilaterally “save” someone is almost guaranteed to miss the mark and come across as condescending; it might even cause further harm.

Help as a collaboration between equals

Therefore, Qifrey and Olruggio can’t really come to any connection unless they make it clear that they are helping each other, not just endlessly acting out their roles as the golden student who knows all the right answers, and the problem child who must be saved from himself.

Aside from the framing, help as an equivalent exchange is the other key difference between chapter 40 and Qifrey and Coco’s dialogue earlier in the volume. In order to counter Coco’s doubts and growing self-hatred, Qifrey reinforces everything he admires about Coco: from her social skills and capacity for teamwork to her practical skills and her straight lines. He reminds her of all the things that she achieved so far. He also strongly hints that her fight is his fight, too, and that they should hold onto hope for each other’s sake. Finally, he makes a (pretty dramatic, unnecessarily literal and definitely unsafe, but still awesome) leap of faith by letting her decide what direction she wants to take next. His support isn’t conditional on Coco making the “right” choice, but freely offered. In return, Coco makes a display of saving Qifrey as well, saying she wants him right by her side while she figures out her path. The rescue itself is symbolic (it would actually have been safer for Qifrey to go back on his own), but Qifrey’s gratitude is genuine, because Coco made him feel valued, irreplaceable, just as Beldaruit and Olruggio were making him doubt his place as a teacher.

By contrast, Olruggio’s speech of friendship contains a grand total of ONE compliment, served in such a back-handed way that it sounds almost like a warning: “To Coco, you are a good teacher, so don’t betray that trust”. This is weighted against a slurry of criticisms about Qifrey’s recklessness, and heaps of self-praise. Olruggio is making a case for why Qifrey needs help and why Olruggio is best-qualified to deliver that help, like he is making a sales pitch to a client. It’s probably not a coincidence that Olruggio is remembering his successful bout of diplomacy in chapter 39 as he gears himself for his conversation with Qifrey. Olruggio, look, I get that you have more faith in your professional persona than in your regular self, but you can’t talk to your best friend like you are doing customer service, it just doesn’t work that way.

The help that Olruggio offers leaves no room for Qifrey’s input: once Qifrey has confided everything and laid himself bare, Olruggio will pick apart “where he needs the help” and “when he is about to do something stupid”, and either support or stop him as he judges appropriate. It reinforces Qifrey’s inferiority complex and interiorised guilt, by implying that his moral compass can’t be trusted. It also places the blame for Qifrey’s rash actions solely on his lack of judgement, rather than on having to grapple with complex, life-threatening situations and being caught in a pincer between a terrorist group and an oppressive system. There’s no mention that the definition of what’s “lawful” and “responsible” and “just” has gotten a bit messed up lately, and that Olruggio himself has had to compromise with his duties to cover for the kids. Olruggio fakes confidence in his capacity to fix everything, and pretends that things can go back to the way they were, but it would have been more honest of him to ask Qifrey to work with him so they can form a united front to face their new, complex reality.

Instead, by claiming that he is helping Qifrey out of a sense of duty, as Watchful Eye and as a friend, Olruggio reinforces the feeling that Qifrey is a burden to him. This gives Qifrey more incentive to keep his friend away from his investigations, and to see himself as expendable. In that light, since their friendship brings Olruggio so much trouble and so few benefits, betraying him and stealing the memories that relate to Qifrey’s secrets start to look like the lesser evil.

The only way that the conversation in chapter 40 could have gone well is if they both freely admitted to needing each other. However, it is too early in Olruggio’s character arc to be honest about his own feelings and worries. And it is too early in Qifrey’s character arc to see past his own self-loathing and recognize that his “perfect” friend also needs support and guidance. Yet, when they do, it is hinted that Olruggio can draw inspiration from Qifrey, and help Qifrey in a more meaningful way by highlighting how Qifrey matters to him, letting them reach this stage of true collaboration.

What Olruggio wants from Qifrey

I think Olruggio is repressing a sense of disillusionment about his work, the fairness of the system, and his usefulness as a witch. We see glimpses of his anxiety in chapter 39 notably. While he says that his true role is to help the commoners, circumstances keep reminding him that like it or not, his main function is decorative. He gets dragged in on short notice to be yanked around by petty nobles and arrange light shows at weddings; he has to act in secret to help the destitute, and even then can only do so much before the rules of magic society get in his way. So far he manages to keep his head above water, using his talent for diplomacy and showmanship to keep the nobles appeased, and finding small, creative ways to help commoners without breaking any law. But it leaves him with the feeling of being trapped in an increasingly constraining role, and is slowly pushing him towards a burn out.

He seems to feel a kinship with princess Mia, who like him is used as a tool in petty squabbles between nobles. He even metaphorically puts himself in her shoes: after likening her situation to being trapped in the spotlight in a dance she doesn’t want, he applies the same metaphor to himself and his inability to act outside the narrow constraints of witch rules, of being constantly watched and judged. And then, adorably enough, Olruggio actually brings Qifrey into the metaphor. He muses that Qifrey, who has gone against established rules before, might be the key to escaping that dance.

For all that the “problem child” / “star student” dichotomy has been weighing on Olruggio and Qifrey and warping their friendship, there is a flip side to it as well. As a prodigy who always pressures himself to perform perfectly (to the point where he will work himself to a zombie-like state and then hide behind a mask to look perfect and pristine in front of his clients at parties, Olruggio no), Qifrey provides a chance at escapism. For all that he berates him for causing trouble, Olruggio seems to fondly remember their old adventures. It’s possible that he valued the opportunity to do rebellious, forbidden things without having to jeopardise his reputation. His fear of being left behind by Qifrey is then also a fear of losing his hope that, when the pressure of being the perfect witch becomes too much to bear, Qifrey will be there to break him free.

In summary, Olruggio wants Qifrey to be his rebellious prince who breaks him free from the ballroom, and we respect him for it. Qifrey had his reasons for not being able to confide in him, and they both have a lot of character development to do before they can reach a stage of actual collaboration and trust. But I don’t dispute that taking his memories was a dick move. Thank you for coming to my ted talk.  

[invisibleanonymousmonsters]

my body is a cage.

ObNeSummary: Y/N’s worst nightmare has become a reality. Her only saving grace is that she doesn’t have to do it alone. 

Pairing: Jason Todd x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 4,000+ [One Shot]

Warning: Feminist Issues, Adult/Mature Themes (NOT smut)

Y/N could feel her heart start racing faster as she studied the doctor’s office. Now she was starting to sweat as well. 

Her doctor were running late and that meant Y/N was stuck looking at the nondescript walls and smelling that sterile scent for 20 minutes. It felt like an hour. 

It was just a follow-up appointment. There was no bad news expected to be given. But that didn’t stop Y/N’s anxiety. 

Y/N finally gave up on trying to calm herself down through breathing and reached down to grab her cellphone out of her purse. 

There was a two text message notifications: one from her mom and one from Jason. 

She opened the one from Jason. 

– Good luck at your appointment today. Remember to breathe. 

Y/N smirked at the message. Jason knew how stressed out Y/N got for literally any type of doctor’s appointments. Even if it was just your usual checkup – like today – it caused her anxiety for some reason. 

Jason must’ve sent it right before passing out after patrol. 

Finally the doctor came in, making Y/N jump and almost drop her phone. She hid her scare well and quickly put her phone back into her purse. 

“Hi Y/N, so we finally got your blood work back,” she began. 

“Great. Will I be able to get a prescription and pick it up today?” Y/N asked quickly, wanting to get out of there as quickly as possible. 

“So one of the many reasons we get blood drawn before prescribing this medication is to make sure you’re not pregnant before going on it.” Before Y/N could speak, she quickly added. “You’re test results came back positive.” 

Y/N’s mouth opened at the statement. 

Her mind was going a million miles a second, trying to process what the doctor has just told her. 

When was the last time she had her period?

Why did it feel 20 degrees hotter in here all of the sudden?

This couldn’t be happening. No. No. No. This really couldn’t be happening. She tried so, so hard to make sure this didn’t happen. This was her nightmare. This was her fucking nightmare coming to fucking life. 

By some miracle, the doctor didn’t smile with joy and exclaim a congratulations. She seemed to sense that Y/N was on the brink of having an anxiety attack. 

“I remember you saying you did’t intend on ever having any kids, so I’m sure this is a lot to process,” the doctor told her gently. “Why don’t we hold off on this medication – even if it’s just for a couple of days? Just give yourself a second to process and come up with a plan.” Then she gave Y/N an encouraging smile. “When you want to make another appointment, I’ll make sure reception squeezes you in. Alright?” 

Y/N couldn’t do anything but nod – and even that was far too delayed. 

“Do you want me to call someone for you?” The doctor asked softly. 

But Y/N shook her head. 

When Y/N got out of the doctor’s office and back on the streets of Gotham, she seemed to snap out of it a bit. 

Her ears weren’t ringing any longer and the cold, winter air was doing miracles. 

‘Get to Jason,’ Y/N’s heart suddenly screamed at her. 

And just like that, Y/N went into autopilot, grabbed a cab, and gave them her address. As she watched the buildings go by, Y/N’s mind was simultaneously thinking a million things and thinking nothing at all. It was almost a buzz. 

When she got back to her apartment, the TV was on but the volume was off. Sometimes Jason would watch it after patrol and hope it would bore him to sleep. But her giant, vigilante of a boyfriend wasn’t sleeping on the couch, so that meant he was in their bed. 

Y/N toed off her shoes, tossed her keys on the side table by the door, and hung her denim jacket – no, Jason’s denim jacket – on the coat rack. 

She slowly pushed the bedroom door open to find Jason passed out on his side. His arm was reached over to the other side of the bed as if his body had searched out for hers in his sleep and came up empty. 

Y/N tiptoed to the bed and carefully slid into the empty side of the bed. 

Jason stayed asleep, meaning he must’ve been really exhausted. Usually her presence would stir him, even if it was just for a few seconds. 

Sometimes Y/N would come in here when she got back from work and take a cat nap with him before getting started on dinner or leaving to work out. Sometimes she would just cuddle with him, he would wake up and sleepily ask about her day while bringing her into his – even when she told him to go back to sleep. 

Now Y/N laid on her side and watched him sleep. 

Even when he looked exhausted and various scars were scattered across his face, Jason Todd was beautiful. 

And when he was sleeping like this, he looked so young. Y/N wondered if that was how Jason always looked to Bruce: innocent, vulnerable, forever young.

Y/N reached forward shakily and brushed the white streak of his hair off his face. His hair was getting shaggier than usually allowed. She wondered if he’d ask her to cut it again or if he’d finally listen to her and go to a barber. 

“You run your hands through my hair and I’ll be putty in your hands,” he mumbled with his eyes still closed. 

Y/N froze and stopped her combing, her hands shooting back to her chest. 

Her silence and pause made Jason’s eyes squint open. 

Those blue eyes of his were always perception, especially when it came to the woman he loved with all his heart. And as soon as they locked with Y/Ns, they immediately knew that something was wrong. 

His brow wrinkled. “You OK?” His voice laced with worry and concern.

Suddenly… Y/N’s mind and body were given the chance to release the reaction they wanted to have since the news was broken.

Her bottom lip trembled a moment before tears burst from her eyes. 

And then Y/N was shoving her face into her boyfriend’s chest. 

“Hey, hey, hey,” Jason consoled. “What happened? What’s going on?” 

But Y/N couldn’t even form words. She was fully hyperventilating. 

Her chest literally hurt as the sobs escaped. She was shaking as if it was freezing in the room, despite Jason’s body basically being her own personal furnace. And she felt like she was going to throw up at any second. 

Was that morning sickness? Or was the just good ol’ fashioned nausea?

Jason quickly realized he wasn’t going to get any verbal communication right now. So he just held her in his arms, letting her cry it out as he rubbed a hand up and down her back. 

But his mind was shuffling through all of the possibilities. 

Had someone hurt her? Did she get fired? Did a group of assholes catcall her on the way home? 

But none of those seemed like things that would upset Y/N in such a manner. 

“Breathe, Y/N. Take a deep breath,” he told her calmly as he kissed the top of her head. 

She barely gave a nod to show that she was trying to do what he advised. 

With her eyes wet and bloodshot from tears and her face swollen, Y/N finally pulled away from Jason’s chest so he could see her. 

“Deep breath,” he reminded her again gently. “Can you tell me what’s gotten you so upset? Can you do that for me?”

Y/N sniffled, really just to buy herself a second before she said it. 

“I’m pregnant.”

Jason’s body tensed. His eyes studied hers, looking for any sign that she was not being absolutely serious. 

“Fuckin’ Christ,” Jason muttered, now realizing why she’d had such a reaction. 

But then he quickly recovered, realizing that she still needed him because she was freaking the fuck out. Obviously. She just had a full-on panic attack in his arms. And she was probably moments away from possibly having another. 

“Hey,” he whispered. “Hey, look at me.”

She took in a deep breath and did as he asked. 

“No one is going to make you do anything you don’t want to. OK?”

She just stared at him. 

“OK?” He asked again, making sure she understood what he was telling her. 

She nodded. 

“I don’t want it,” Y/N exhaled. 

The words came out on their own, like she had no control over them. 

Jason winced, not at her statement, but because she sounded so desperate and scared. 

He gave her a sympathetic look and cupped her cheek. “I know, Y/N. I know.” 

Then he brought her back into his arms, holding her protectively, as usual – but protecting her from something he never had to before. 

“I know how you feel about it. I’ve always did,” he told her softly. “Just try to relax. OK?”

She nodded. 

Jason didn’t try to fill the silence. He didn’t try to say comfort after comfort. His touch did more things for Y/N then he words ever did. She needed to be held, not lectured or verbally coddled.

After a few moments, he looked down at her. “We can order from your favorite place, OK? Have a little movie marathon or finish watching that show.”

She gave him a small, shy smile at that.

“Sound good,” he asked. 

She nodded again. 

———

30 minutes later, Jason was scrolling the internet, researching Planned Parenthood locations while waiting for their takeout to get there. 

Y/N, exhausted from her emotional and mental breakdown, had fallen asleep a few minutes after telling Jason the news. 

Jason figured the least he could do is take the logistical weight off Y/N’s shoulders. All of this was happening to her and it was his fault. He knew she’d never frame it that way, but that’s how he felt right now. And he’d do anything to make it easier for her. 

But all of the sudden, the hairs on the back of Jason’s neck suddenly stood on end. 

The next millisecond, he grabbed the nearest hidden gun, shot to his feet, and pointed it at the window. 

“Relax, Todd.”

“Demon Spawn, what the fuck are you doing here?” Jason lowered the gun. 

To Jason’s annoyance, Damian jumped down from the window and into the apartment, dressed in his full Robin uniform. 

“When you texted about covering your patrol tonight, father asked me to check on you.”

Jason narrowed his eyes. “Liar. No, he didn’t.”

“So, why aren’t you on patrol?” 

“Y/N needed me.”

Damian’s body tensed. 

For as much of hard time as Damian gave Jason, he didn’t mind his girlfriend. However, the preteen would never admit to actually liking her or enjoying time spent with her. But the whole family saw it anyway. 

“Is she sick?” 

Jason just nodded, not really having the energy to compose a big lie. 

Then Damian caught sight of the laptop screen and saw what Jason had been researching. 

“Oh,” Damian blurted out without thinking. It was a very unusual reaction from him. He always had something to say.  

“Just…keep it to yourself, k?” Jason asked. 

The last thing he needed right now was Damian blabbing around about Y/N. 

But Damian nodded, not giving any further reaction to his discovery. 

———

“What’s Alfred the Cat doing here?” Y/N asked as she cradled the cat and walking into the kitchen the next morning. 

“Damian,” was all Jason provided.

Y/N laughed at his crypticness. “Did he need a cat sitter?”

Jason shook his head. “He came snooping when I told them I wasn’t going on patrol. And…Well, he’s Bruce’s kid, so you can imagine how quickly he put it together.”

Y/N’s amusement dropped when she realized what Jason was saying. 

“He brought some of human Alfred’s cookies for you, too.” Jason added quickly, maybe to soften the blow a bit. 

“That was sweet of him,” was all Y/N mumbled in return. 

“I think he was worried about you. Figured some cookies and cuddles from Alfred would make you feel better,” Jason explained. “Of course, he didn’t verbally express any of that because he’s emotionally constipated.”

Y/N managed to force a smirk at the joke. 

Silence filled the kitchen. 

“I made you an appointment today,” Jason told her gently. “Not that I’m trying to force you to do anything. You can cancel it if you want to. I was just trying to–”

“Thank you,” Y/N cut him off and dropped the cat to wrap Jason in a hug. “Thank you, Jason.” She repeated, mumbled this time, since her face was now buried in his chest. 

“Of course,” he told her before kissing her head. “Want some breakfast?”

He chuckled when he felt her nodding enthusiastically against him. 

“Your favorite?”

She nodded again. 

“You gonna let me go so I can make it?”

She shook her head no. 

“Alright, spider monkey, let’s do this.”

Y/N’s laughter filled the room as Jason somehow managed to maneuver her body so she was on his back with her arms wrapped around his neck. And she piggybacked around the kitchen with him as he made them breakfast. 

———

“Welp,” Y/N said bitterly as she looked at the building from across the street. “Don’t know how I wasn’t expecting this.”

Jason sighed as he watched too. 

There were a dozen people with picket signs. One said, “It’s a child, not a choice.” Another said, “Jesus loves you both.” One of the men had a megaphone. One woman held a box with figurines that inaccurately showed how far along the fetus would be when it’s aborted. 

“Wait here,” was all Jason said. 

“Wait, what? Jason! Jason, don’t!” Y/N hissed. 

But Jason was already halfway across the street. With the traffic and general noice of Gotham, Y/N could hear nothing. But it was clear that he was talking to him. 

“Oh, for christ’s sake,” Y/N sighed when she saw all of their faces shift to utter horror. Whatever he was saying to them had clearly terrified them. 

It only took a minute before Jason jogged back to her and offered his hand. 

“Come on,” he said encouragingly. 

“What the fuck did you just do?” She asked him. 

“I told them all of their names, social security numbers, and addresses,” Jason told her lightly. “Oh! And their top porn searched.” He gave them a glance. “And said if they even so much as looked at you, I would do what I wanted with that information."

“So…you threatened them.”

Jason tilted his head and shrugged innocently. “I wouldn’t put it that way…”

“Jason…” she groaned. 

“I thought you would be proud. I didn’t use physical violence. I’m growing!”

Y/N couldn’t help but laugh. 

But lo and behold, none of the protesters so much as faced their direction as they walked past. 

Y/N wondered how long it took Jason to memorize all that information. Did he ask Tim to hack street cameras and use face recognition to even find all of them? 

In the most messed up way, it warmed Y/N’s heart. It just showed a new angle of Jason’s protectiveness. Guess that was just another perk of dating a dangerous vigilante with too many connections and resources. 

Besides his little threat, Jason hadn’t let go of Y/N’s hand since they left the apartment – even now, as they sat in the waiting room. 

If he was anxious at all, he was doing a beautiful job of hiding it.

Y/N guessed that’s what happened when someone had the history of Jason. This was like a walk in the park for him.  

But when they called her name, Y/N looked at Jason with slight panic. 

“I can’t go with you. It’s against policy,” he told her softly. “But I’ll be right here when you get out. OK?”

She nodded. 

He must’ve learned that when he was doing all his research. 

“You good? Huh?” He whispered, keeping eye contact. 

She nodded again. 

“You’ll be fine,” then he kissed her. 

Just as Y/N reached the nurse, she turned to her boyfriend again. “I love you,” she mouthed to him. 

“I love you too,” he mouthed back. 

———

Y/N had been drained when they finally got back to their apartment. 

All she wanted was to take a nap with her boyfriend. 

A couple hours later, she had finally had the energy to stay awake. 

But neither of them had any interest in getting out of bed. So instead they stayed cuddled close.

“How are you feeling?” Jason asked her. 

“Physically or mentally?” 

“Both.”

“Physically, fine mostly. Some cramping. They said that was normal. But my period is ten times worse.” Then she sighed. “Mentally…like…I’m in control. Does that make sense?”

Jason nodded. 

“And relieved. Fuck,” she half laughed. “I can’t tell you how relieved I am.” 

“I’m glad.”

Then Y/N smirked mischievously. “Are you sad you won’t see me wearing those stupid overalls with a baby bump,” then she dramatically fanned her hands, “as we have a montage of us painting a nursery?”

Jason laughed at that. “OK. Well I don’t live in a fucking Lifetime commercial.” Then he smirked. “I’ll take the overalls without the baby bump, though.” 

She giggled at that. 

“But it’s a real shame we couldn’t have a gender reveal party and burn down all of Gotham accidentally…” Jason thought aloud. 

Y/N tried to suppress a smile, “…you do realize the point of those parties is to reveal the baby’s gender and not to burn a city down, right?” 

“Well, fuck.” Jason played dumb. “The only appealing part of that was the arson.”

“It would’ve been funny to fuck with people, though.” Y/N’s eyes went distant as she thought about it. “Put in black balloons or just a rainbow assortment. And just see how everyone reacted.”

“Missed opportunity,” Jason sighed. 

“Why are traditions so stupid and embarrassing?”

They both laughed. 

“I’d have to suffer through a stupid baby shower. And then you’d get to come in at the very end and just wave at everyone. Men really got it made, huh? Just show up, and everyone applauds.” 

Jason laughed, knowing she was absolutely right. Enough of the Justice League had kids for him to know that was how it worked. 

“Like those videos where dads do their daughter’s hair and everyone loses their mind and praises him. But name one time a video has gone viral of a mom doing her kid’s hair.”

“The bar’s low,” he reminded Y/N. 

But then Jason watched Y/N’s smile fall from her face as she got lost in her head. 

“What?”

Her brow furrowed. “Do you think I’m a bad person?”

“What?” He gripped her chin. “Absolutely not.”

“I don’t feel bad. There’s no remorse,” Y/N mumbled with as her eyes zoned out. “All I feel is weight lifted off of me.”

“Hey,” his voice was low and serious. “Hey, look at me.” 

He waited for her to do what he asked. “You’re not a bad person. You hear me?” 

Then he started making himself angry with the thought that anyone would ever tell Y/N otherwise. 

“You know what a bad person looks like? Someone who doesn’t take having a child seriously. Someone who makes that decision half-assed, knowing they’re bringing a child into a toxic environment or that they can’t properly take care of them.”

Jason made himself calm down. “That doesn’t make you a bad person. It just proves that you did exactly what you knew was best.” 

She nodded, finally convinced by his words. 

Y/N reached forward and brushed some hair off his face. 

Jason was so god damn handsome. No wonder I got pregnant, she thought darkly. This is exactly how she got into this mess. It was hard just to keep her hands off of him. 

“If I ask you something, do you promise you’ll tell me the truth?” 

He cocked an eyebrow at her. “I’ll try my best.”

Her eyes twisted into something somber and afraid. 

“Do you really never want kids?” 

Jason should’ve expected this question at some point. 

Even though Y/N didn’t verbalize it, Jason knew that one of her biggest fear throughout all of this was that it would change their relationship. She was scared that he would resent her, that he would change his mind and beg her to keep it. 

Maybe it was her tone that was really the thing that caught him off guard. She sounded so scared of what he would say. 

Jason rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Not because he wanted to hide the truth by stopping her from staring into his eyes. He just wanted to make sure he collected al of this thoughts. She deserved a proper answer. 

“I never planned on being a father,” the statement was unwavering. “You know how my childhood went. And I see the same thing happening to kids all over Gotham today – some of them have it so much worse than I did.”

Y/N reached forward and placed her palm on his chest, right over his heart. Without thinking, his hand went to grip it. 

“But you would never be like that,” she assured him. “You’re a good man, Jason. I mean, just look at how you are with Damian – no matter how hard you try to hide your soft spot for that boy.”

“I know I can be a good father. Except before you were in my life, I didn’t know that.” 

If he were really tell the truth, he would tell Y/N that without her, there most likely wouldn’t even be a Jason Todd...only Red Hood. 

He looked away from the ceiling and back at her. “But that doesn’t want I want to be.” 

“So you can honestly say that you never want a family? Even if wasn’t with me?” 

“Y/N, look at my family,” Jason laughed. “None of us our related. Bruce is a mess of a father. His biological son was basically artificially inseminated. The butler is more like our grandma who raised us. All of them tried to take me down and imprison me at one point or another...”

He shook his head at the ridiculousness. “The point is that I know more than anyone that family can look like a million different things. And the perfect outline society has forced onto us doesn’t actually mean shit.”

He grinned. “My family is a group of vigilantes who don’t know how to quit.” His eyes softened. “And then there’s you. You’re my family, too. I don’t need add anything else for that to be true.” 

Y/N couldn’t help herself and she practically tackled him into a kiss. 

Jason gripped her waist and twisted them so she was straddling his waist, and his hands traced up and down the side of her ribcage. 

After their lips separate, Y/N looked down at him lovingly. 

She let a moment pass. 

“What if I changed my mind?”

“I think you and I both know you never will.”

“But what if I did?” She insisted. 

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “I really don’t.”

Y/N just wanted to challenge him. She wanted to go through all the scenarios her mind wouldn’t stop thinking about. She needed answers to the hypothetical scenarios that would never come to be. 

“I’m not going to change my mind,” she told him certainly. 

“I know, Y/N.”

She kissed him again. “Thank you for supporting me through all of this.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” he scoffed. “It’s my fault.” 

And he meant it. Most days, Jason had to convince himself he was worthy of her love. What kind of man would be lucky enough to have Y/N as their girl and not do everything in his power to make sure it stayed that way?

“No, it wasn’t,” she corrected him seriously. “It was both of us.” 

“You can’t scare me away,” Jason told her. “Nothing is ever gonna stop me from loving you. Got it?”

She nodded. 

But before she could say anything more, Jason wrapped her in a heated kiss. 

He knew these questions were her anxiety manifesting itself. And Y/N had enough stress for today. So he’d turned off her mind with his touches. 

She deserved a break. 

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

I don’t know how I managed to write yet another one of these fics. But I realized it was easier to give it a new twist since Jason Todd has a sense of humor and an edge that Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers do not. Also, he wasn’t raised in the 1930s. lol

Please, please, please let me know if you liked it!!!

If anyone is interested in movies on this topic, I highly recommend these:

Never Rarely Sometimes Always 

Unpregnant 

4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days

Obvious Child

[itsclydebitches]

I’ve been seeing an uptick in “anti-RWDE” posts lately  — which is a phenomenon I’d like to comment on at a later date  — but for now one of them (quite unintentionally) made me realize something about the finale that I haven’t seen others discuss yet. 

So RWBYJNOR saves everyone, right? Let’s just put aside the animation for a moment  — which didn’t show any army members making it out  — as well as the forgotten side characters  — Maria, Pietro, Qrow’s group isn’t forgotten, but still left behind  — and take things on good faith here. We’ll read the finale through the thematic intention: RWBYJNOR saved “everyone” in the Kingdom of Atlas in Volume 8, deliberately contrasting them with Ironwood who was willing to sacrifice a chunk of the Kingdom in Volume 7. Forget all the messiness and just accept that regardless of the consequences  — like a destroyed Kingdom and a “dead” team  — the heroes are heroic because they didn’t give into a “lesser evil” thinking and managed to save everyone. 

Now, how was that possible? 

Let’s go back to the beginning of the seventh episode of Volume 8, “War.” Salem’s grimm have just burrowed through Atlas’ defenses and taken them out. The shields are gone. She flies Monstra into the fields and releases an army of darkness that immediately heads for the city. What’s the very first thing Ironwood does? 

Soldier: Yes, sir?

Ironwood: I am evacuating all citizens to the subway. Prepare Manta Squad Omega, and dispatch to every part of Atlas.

Soldier: But sir-

Ironwood: Now!

He evacuates the people, with “the people” meaning all the Atlesians and however many Mantle folk got to the city prior to Salem’s arrival. When this episode aired I mentioned being confused as to why the soldier was so hesitant. Why wouldn’t you want the people to get to safety when a grimm army is heading their way? Fans against Ironwood took the soldier’s side, claiming that Mountain Glenn proved that any underground evacuation is a death sentence and thus he obviously doesn’t really care about the peoples’ safety. Fans in support of/neutral towards Ironwood pointed out that this is a pretty big leap, no one is coming up with a better idea for what he should do instead, and that within these circumstances it reads like the soldiers is illogically against this idea simply because everyone is against Ironwood now. The show wants characters criticizing his decisions and making him out to look like a crazed dictator... even during moments when it doesn’t make any sense to be upset with him. Shooting the councilman yes, trying to keep the people safe no. Basically, this small exchange was a mess, but the rest of the volume proved that this was a sound call. The subway never collapsed and no grimm ever made it to that enclosed space to pick the civilians off like fish in an underground barrel. 

So, why didn’t that happen? Well, one answer is because Oscar and Ozpin destroyed the whale. But how did they have time to do that? Without the people dying while they were being tortured, talking to Hazel, escaping with Emerald, fighting Salem, etc.? A lot happened between Salem starting her attack and Oscar ending it, so why wasn’t 2/3rds of the Kingdom’s population decimated during that time? 

Because Ironwood sent his army out to keep the grimm occupied. 

Outside of Ironwood’s cartoon villain actions  — random murders and bomb threats  — which get the most attention due to how deliberately, over-the-top horrific they are, these are the two actions that get the most negative attention from both the story and the fanbase. The soldier seems horrified by the order to evacuate. Marrow is devastated that young adults are fighting in this battle. The fandom is disgusted by both aspects of Ironwood’s character: giving orders that, as general, he expects to be obeyed and having an army that follows those orders. Putting side that cartoon villainy, this is what supposedly makes Ironwood the antagonist here. These are the qualities that have existed since Volume 2, resulting in a “he was always a bad guy” interpretation. These are the qualities that have resulted in anyone who likes his character being labeled as a “bootlicker.” We know these qualities make the fandom hate him because otherwise, more people would be confused as to why a presumably heroic character randomly shot Oscar. Orders, armies, and general military associations are at the heart of Ironwood’s presumed villainy. 

So let’s remove them. 

Ironwood has no evil army. Ironwood gives no evil orders. Power and control lies solely in the hands of our non-military heroes. Everything is better! 

...well, no. Because we saw in Volume 8 precisely the choices our heroes made when the attack started: half of them focused on saving a single individual (Oscar) and the other half kept to the sidelines. At no point did our RWB group act after sending the message and prior to securing the Staff. AKA, during the attack of Salem’s army. We got a very explicit moment in which Ruby looked out the window at the battle going on and turned away from it, continuing to discuss ethics instead of joining the fight. The people of Atlas (which, again, includes many Mantle citizens) had no one but Ironwood and his army because a third of the group was trying to rescue Oscar (they never even had a plan to blow up Monstra — that was also Ironwood), a third of the group was up in Amity, and a third was sitting in the mansion. They did nothing to help the people of Atlas being attacked by grimm. 

Thus, if you remove Ironwood’s actions, everything goes to hell. There is no longer an order to evacuate to the subway. Maybe some people go there anyway. Most probably don’t. They run in a panic wherever they can. Hide wherever they can. Go back home for some semblance of safety. 

There’s no longer an army. Either it doesn’t exist because we’ve determined it’s simplistically bad despite RWBY’s grimm-specific context, or Ironwood likewise never gives the order to protect Atlas’ border. Salem’s army moves unimpeded through the city, killing countless people as it goes. How do we know? Because they’re civilians who can’t defend themselves and there’s literally no one else to help. Remember: Ironwood is not giving orders, there is no army, RWB is in the mansion, YJOR is in the whale, Penny is out of commission, the Happy Huntresses are in Mantle. Those in Atlas are entirely alone. In time, Oscar destroys the whale, but by then it’s too late. There’s no concrete way to theorize how many have died, but it’s inevitably a lot. Everyone else is scatted across the city, trying to survive. 

So this scene 

no longer exists. 

When the group gets the Staff and creates portals for “everyone” to escape through, Mantle is ready to go. They’ve gotten everyone into the crater and can funnel them straight to Vacuo. Atlas, however, is in chaos. When Jaune enters the subway there’s only a few people there, many of which may be wounded or dying. He’s right back where he started, in Mantle at the beginning of Volume 8: needing to go door-to-door to find where people have hidden themselves, trying to convince them all to follow him (remember Oscar commenting to Ozpin about how difficult that was?). Except now, he and Nora are the only ones trying to get people to safey, the city is filled with far more grimm, a significant amount of time has passed for people to be killed or injured (making evacuating them even harder, both due to injuries and an unwillingness to leave hurt/dead/missing loved ones behind), he’s trying to convince these panicking people to go through magic portals, not just walk to a crater, and he’s aware that there’s a very short time limit for this task. 

Jaune returns in a panic of his own, explaining how difficult it will be to get that 2/3rds of the Kingdom to Vacuo. How many are already dead. Barricaded. Missing. Closeup on Ruby looking horrified, but then she rallies. They can do it. Atlas is falling, but residual dust gives them just enough time to find, calm, and evacuate those people. They’re heroes after all. Beating the odds is what they do. 

Then Cinder attacks. 

Suddenly, the group can’t evacuate people because they’re trying to keep themselves safe from her. Maybe Cinder gets the powers because Jaune was off looking for civilians, leaving Penny without a mercy kill. Maybe Nora dies because she’s still trying to help people on the city that plows into the one below. Regardless of how details might change, they’re not getting a spread out, decimated population through those portals before Cinder changes the wish and makes them disappear.  

In this version, the story starts with Ironwood wanting to sacrifice 1/3rd of the population to save 2/3rds and the future of the war. It ends with 2/3rds of the population dying instead. 

This is what I mean when I say the majority of the fandom wants to view a very complex situation through a ridiculously simple lens. The fandom wants to denounce every bit of RWBY’s fictionalized military, the context issues of that aside. The story wants to paint RWBYJNOR as the only heroes, in part because they succeeded in saving everyone (“everyone”) in the Kingdom when Ironwood gave up. 

But they only managed to save everyone because of Ironwood. Because he kept fighting for his people to the bitter end. This is why, though his horrific actions obviously exist in the story, they make no sense (he’ll threaten to kill his people so he can... save his people?) and mess up what little is working in the finale. The story wants us to celebrate the group for evacuating Mantle and Atlas, but the Atlas evacuation would not have happened if not for Ironwood’s actions  — the actions that are ignored in favor of having Winter blame him for everything and then killing him off. The rescue of “everyone” was very much a joint effort. RWBYJNOR’s win is not actually a contrast to Ironwood’s intended sacrifice, for the simple reason that their win depended entirely on Ironwood’s actions. 

If we’re going to celebrate the group getting everyone to safety, we should probably also celebrate the guy who got them all to an easy evacuation point and ensured they weren’t eaten before then. Does that mean Ironwood never did anything wrong? Of course not. As established, the story went out of its way to make him into a villain. Rather, it means that other parts of the story failed to maintain that black and white view, complicating the heroism of RWBYJNOR in the process. If we want Ironwood to be incapable of heroic action, always the bad guy, nothing good to say about him whatsoever... then we likewise need to accept that the group is rather unheroic in many regards too. That, on their own, they would have failed to save everyone, just as Ironwood’s plan failed to save everyone at the end of Volume 7. Because they chose their friend over a kingdom. Because they sat around in a mansion. Because by the time they took action again and tried to escape, without Ironwood’s help they would have lost a larger majority than they originally insisted be saved. 

[weirdthinkingdragon]

Welcome To The Family (6/???)

1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / here

Yandere EraserMic household x reader

Fun fact- Tadao was a sudden decision I made up on the spot after chapter 3 and wasn’t expecting to really make him a character other than a mentioned person with a mold/fungus quirk. I did though, and already love him as an OC more than I should. Oops. 

It might be a long while before the next chapter. I think I may have drained myself a bit from focusing on this story so much. 

Warnings- swearing, slight coercion I think? Not really sure but better safe than sorry. 

I promise the darker stuff is coming soon. 

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

I wake up to someone calling me. Hitoshi? Why is he calling me at… 9 in the morning? Come on dude, I want to sleep more for dinner tonight. My fault for hanging out with Tadao a bit later last night than usual. He’s started walking with me to our apartment for the past few days. I wonder why we haven’t hung out until now. Meanwhile, Ryo and I seemed to drift apart. They refuse to even look at me now when I saw them last night. 

Ugh, might as well answer it. “Hey, Hitoshi. You need something?” I tiredly slur from just waking up. 

“Sorry for waking you…” Apologized the familiar voice of Eri. Wait, Eri? Why does she have Hitoshi’s phone? The wonder why she has his phone wakes me up a bit more. 

“Oh, hey, Eri. Is something wrong?” A slight panic enters me in the possibility something bad could have happened to one of the guys. “Wait, is everyone okay?” 

“We’re good. Just wanted to talk a bit with you before tonight.” Pipes up the familiar voice of Hitoshi in the background. 

Relief floods me. “That’s good. What about?” 

“Our dads!” Eri cheerfully informs. 

My eyes narrow in confusion. “What about them?” 

“What do you think of them?” Hitoshi asks. Huh? Why does this need to be talked about now? Maybe because more likely than not the two adults are asleep, and won’t hear the conversation? 

I’m too tired to be filtered right now, so whatever comes to mind is whatever is going to be said. “They’re… An interesting two, to say the least. Hizashi seems like someone I can rely on to cheer me up pretty easily if I’m ever down, and after that day Shouta was sick, I realize Shouta’s secretly a lot more caring than he lets on. Still wouldn’t want to pi- anger him.” Ugh, it’s too early. I nearly just swore with Eri there! Well, saying “piss him off” wouldn’t have been that bad, but she needs to keep that innocence at least for a while yet. 

Hitoshi laughs, probably catching on with what I almost said. “Seen it first-hand with his class. Can’t say I recommend it either.”

“What about looks?” Eri suddenly asks, catching me off-guard. What do their looks have to do with anything? They’re also a married couple, so whatever I think is invalid anyways. 

“Well, had this weird thought of wondering what Hizashi would look like with his hair fully down when we went to the festival, but that’s really not something that I need to tell him. It’s something I probably shouldn’t be wondering in the first place.”

“What’s the problem in wondering that? It’s just hair.” 

“Says the one who always looks like he stuck his head out a car window and hair decided to stay that way.” 

“Can’t argue with that.” 

I go back onto the topic. “Otherwise, I’m not really sure what to talk about with them. It’s their choices of what they wear. Though it IS pretty funny imagining Hizashi forcing Shouta to wear something he normally wouldn’t.”

“It’s happened more than once before.” 

I tiredly let out a laugh. “I believe it.”  

“Daddy made him wear a dress!” 

An almost inhuman sound comes out of me at the thought of Shouta deeply frowning with a strapless hot pink dress forced onto him, and the only reason he does it is Hizashi would probably keep pestering him otherwise. 

“Maybe sometime we could get him to do it again with you here. It’s quite a thing to see.” 

“Oh, really? How did he not kill you for laughing?”

“He almost did,” he replies jokingly. 

“If he tries to attack me when I’m there, you’re taking the blow.” I joke back. 

He goes silent for a moment. “He wouldn’t dare. If he did, he’d have an angry little girl scolding him.”

“Toooshiiii!”

“What? You know I’m right.” 

“Hmph.” 

“Anyway, want to tell them what you’ll wear?”

“No! It’s a surprise!”

“Right back at you two,” I inform the slightly bickering duo.

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

We both hung up after a bit more of talking about tonight. I could swear there was someone talking in the background for a second, but I brushed it off as the T.V. Eri was probably watching something earlier and forgot to lower the volume. 

After playing on my computer for a while since it’s close to my bed, I decided to just get up and get ready. There are not many fancy things I have, so it’s quite limited on what to wear. Hopefully, they don’t mind if it’s a bit more casual than fancy. There’s plenty of time to shop for something, but I’m honestly too lazy to go anywhere. Just something of my favorite color and slightly more fancy than my daily clothes should work. 

I have to dig much deeper into my closet to find said clothing from not wearing it too often. 

One of my favorite color is grabbed. Nope, that’s not it. 

I move a few more. Wait, there it is! I move a few more pieces of clothing and grab it, pulling it out. Hopefully, it still fits. Welp, time to try. I take off my pajamas. 

.

.

.

.

Like a glove. Perfect! 

Just to make sure there are no new forgotten holes or something, I look at myself in my body mirror. Huh, I actually look pretty good in this! I might have to wear it more often. Something feels like it’s missing though. Maybe a ring or something would help? 

I look over to the select few rings I have, including the forgotten one Ryo gave me. My heart slightly twinges at remembering they gave it as a best friends type of ring years ago. A ring with real blue topaz fitting my middle finger. 

Might as well wear it. I slip it on and decide to leave my room, though they won’t be here for a while yet. Maybe Tadao will be around. 

My body instinctively starts looking around for the familiar- oh, not again. Does he LIKE sleeping on the floor in the hall or something? I walk up to his sleeping form. I gently nudge him to move with my foot. 

He groans, and curls his head deeper onto his arm, also bringing his legs up so he’s a ball. “Come on dude, I know your quirk is related to mold and all, but you’re not supposed to BECOME it.” 

“I am one with the floor… I shall be the floor…” He mumbles, probably sleep talking.  

I nudge him harder, making him open his eyes to look up at me. “Heyyy Y/N. What time is it?” He sluggishly asks. 

I check my phone. “Already half-past noon.” 

That got his attention. Both of his eyes snapped open as he shot to sit up. He grabs his rather cracked phone and looks at it. There are a few messages on the screen without him unlocking it. They’re impossible to read as he seems frantic after looking at them. “Already!? Man, I gotta get ready! I’ll be late for work!” 

I don’t even get the chance to ask him anything since he gets to his feet and sprints off past my door, probably to his. 

Glancing at Ryo’s door, the thought of checking on them arises. No, they’re deciding on acting out like this. Crawling to them could only continue this childish way again at some point. Ugh, what to do now though? It will be boring to just sit around for the next few hours. The park could be good for a few hours. 

The villains around though? Nah. Welp, more computer time.

Familiar brown hair in the corner of my eye catches my attention before returning to my door. It’s the woman that glared at me with Hizashi at the studio. What’s she doing around here? Never saw her around before, and she doesn’t exactly strike me as the type to like parties. Funny if she’s attracted to Hizashi like he told me. 

She keeps her glare on me as she… Knocks on Ryo’s door? Oh hell no. There’s no way Ryo is hanging out with someone like that. I’m proven wrong though as Ryo opens the door and pulls them in without looking at me. 

I- What? What’s going on lately?

Also, okay, what the ever-loving fuck Ryo!? 

Calm down, give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe the woman hasn’t told Ryo anything about my work, and maybe it can just be a sudden meeting they did at one point, and it’s an opposites attract type of friendship. After all, I haven’t really been around. They were bound to try to find someone else to hang out with I suppose. Should this be a concern to bring up with Hizashi and Shouta though? 

I stand there still staring at Ryo’s door and blink confusedly. They couldn’t have found anyone better to hang out with? Even a villain would have been better than her in my opinion. Sure, more trouble from me being around two- basically three- heroes could arise, but I’d be willing to keep that kind of secret for them. But this? This gives me a bad feeling.

What if she’s the reason Ryo is acting so odd? 

Next Sunday will be the day to get some answers from them. If they will talk to me, that is. 

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

Time seems to slip by while being on my computer. My phone notifies me of a text message. I look at it to see it’s from Hizashi. 

“Hitoshi’s coming in to get ya! We’re waiting!” My eyes widen noticing it’s already past six at night. 

I try to text him ASAP to not let Hitoshi come in. They won’t be happy with my living place. “That will be fine, call him off. I’ll be out shortly.” 

“Too late! Sorry!” 

I sigh. He doesn’t even know which one mine is! I put my computer away and quickly left. Looking left and right, there’s familiar purple hair far down on the right. Obviously, it’s Hitoshi. He is staring with great disgust at the peeling walls and ripped-up flooring.  Oh boy, it’s probably a disaster with what is about to happen in the vehicle now. 

The hallway is rather dimly lit now, making it slightly hard to see, but it’s easy to tell he’s wearing a suit matching his eye color. I’m feeling pretty underdressed now. 

“Hey, Hitoshi. You could have waited outside. Uh… You probably should have no offense.” 

He glares at a piece of wall that falls off onto the floor. “How do you live in this?” 

I shrug. “Eh, you get used to it,” I noticed his frustrated expression. He’s about to ask me why I don’t move or something since I clearly could with my pay. “And before you say anything, I rather like it here. It’s where a lot of my closest friends are.”   

His eyes narrow at me. “You could still visit instead of living here.” 

Someone jumps upstairs, making the place shake, and a piece of the ceiling on this level chips off and falls next to the wall piece on the floor. 

“That’s new,” I comment. It’s true, the ceiling has never fallen before. Makes me wonder when this whole building is going to collapse. Bit worried for my friends here now.

Hitoshi looks at me like I just told him the world is going to end tomorrow. 

I start walking to the exit, having Hitoshi follow behind me too closely for my taste. Makes sense if he’s doing it for my protection, but he obviously doesn’t know these people as I do. He almost could be felt against my back. “You mind standing back a bit? You’re rather close.”

He does, but just barely. 

It doesn't take long for us to get to the vehicle. Just like before, I get in the center and hug Eri. The slight light in the car makes it hard to see her dress, but I'm pretty sure it's a bright silverish blue. The light wasn't on long enough to notice the two up front. 

They do seem to notice Hitoshi in a slightly on edge type of way. For the moment the light was on. 

"What's wrong, little hypno-man?" 

"Their apartment is not fitting to live in."

"What?" Hizashi's tone almost drastically changes. I'm glad I can't see them right now. I focus on the scenery past Hitoshi to try ignoring the growing unease of him whistleblowing to them. 

"It's falling apart. A part of the wall fell to the floor. The inside is much worse than the outside." 

"Why are you still living there? You can easily move with the money we give you." Shouta pipes up. 

"Because I like living there. It's a walking distance from your place, and all my friends are there."

"You could visit them some other time if you moved. We'd pay a bus for you if needed." 

"Exactly! Or I could drive ya to our place! It wouldn't be a problem, and it would give me a little somethin' to do while the grump wakes up in the morning!" 

I don't feel comfortable at the thought of having to rely on them like that. They're already so busy themselves, it really wouldn't be fair to them despite what they say. 

“Uh… no. Thanks for the offer, but my place is good for now.”

The air is rather tense, telling me that they want to push more on the subject, but decide not to for now. 

I decided to bring up what happened earlier.  “Remember that bad woman from before?”

“You mean Chiyo?” Shouta spits her name with such hate, someone would think he’d murder her if he could. Hizashi must have told him about our meeting in his studio. Wait, Isn’t that a first name?

As if reading my mind, Hizashi answers for Shouta. “She doesn’t deserve the respect of last name. What about her?” 

“I discovered today she might be hanging out with one of my closest friends that doesn’t seem to be too happy with me lately. Isn’t it a bit of a concern she might tell them that I babysit for you guys?” 

“That’s confidential information. Like it was said to you before you started, you can’t tell anyone our identities. They can get into serious trouble if they do, and they signed a contract accepting they wouldn’t.” Shouta replies. 

“That’s good to know.” I say, sounding relieved. They could be told how Ryo thinks they’re bad parents for me babysitting so often, but that’s something that probably doesn’t need to be brought up. Especially if she can’t tell Ryo about it. 

Hizashi pulls up and parks in front of the restaurant we must be dining in. wait- fuck, I’ve heard of this place. It’s one of the most expensive restaurants around here! We exit and enter the restaurant. The first thing I noticed was how well-dressed the two men were. Shouta was wearing a navy blue suit, white undershirt, and a light brown tie. Oddly, he’s also wearing glasses. When did he need glasses? 

Hizashi was wearing a cream-colored suit with a dark grey undershirt and a tie matching his eye color. Looking at the four of them and the others around, I am… severely underdressed. Doesn’t feel much better with everyone that stares at me from their tables for a moment. 

Wait- Hizashi’s. Hair. Is. Fully. Down. I whip my head towards Hitoshi and glare in betrayal. 

He notices with a smirk, and puts his hands in front of himself in mock-defense. “Don’t look at me. He was there then, just didn’t speak.” 

My eyes narrow. “So it really WASN’T the T.V.” Seriously though!? That’s so embarrassing! He must have heard everything! 

Him and Hizashi chuckle at me, making me feel worse.

A woman comes up from the counter. “Please tell me the name of your reservation.” 

“The Aizawa’s.” Um… I’m not exactly a part of this family? Well, it does make sense though I guess just to do a last name. Hizashi smirks at Shouta while he glares in return. 

“Right this way please.” She starts to lead the five of us to a table farther in the back. The enormous chandeliers overhead from the really tall ceiling are slightly intimidating if I’m to be honest. Each crystal is taller than Hizashi from the top of his hair in his hero costume to his feet. 

The white and gold walls of the place give a surprisingly calming type of effect. It’s rather cool in here as well. Probably to help combat the ones who wear layers of clothes to be more fancy or something.  

“You couldn’t have chosen anything else?” Shouta hisses quietly enough for the woman not to hear, but I’m close enough that I can. I’m right between them from behind while Hitoshi and Eri are behind me. I can swear Hitoshi keeps trying to nudge me forward closer to them. 

“Aw, don’t worry ‘bout it babe! Besides, you and I both know you’re known much less than me! This way they won’t know us!” He leans even closer to Shouta. “And don’t deny it, you know you like the thought of me bein’ called an Aizawa~” 

I can see red start to cover the side of Shouta’s face even though he tries his best to hide and prevent it. Ha! Now he’s the one to be embarrassed! 

I let out a chuckle, making Hizashi turn and give me a toothy grin. 

We get to a table with booth seats. The color of them is surprisingly similar to Eri’s dress. 

I go to sit with Hitoshi and Eri, but like before, Hizashi grabs my wrist and has me sit between him and Shouta. Why do you keep doing this to me dude!? Shouta is on my right by the wall with Hizashi on my left by the opening. 

Eri is sitting by the wall with Hitoshi by the opening in front of us. I didn’t notice before, but her dress has some candy apple red jewels the shape of diamonds, adorning the dress even more than it already was. Must be new since it’s never been seen by me before.  

… I don’t like the closeness of the two men beside me again. Saying it is uncomfortable is an understatement. A difference than before is the heat of their thighs radiating through their pants onto mine. 

The woman hands us menus. “Someone will be here to take your orders shortly.” 

I try to brush them off while looking at the menu. 

“Hey Y/N, are ya datin’ anyone?” 

“Maybe.” They don’t need to know I’m not. 

“That’s a yes or no question.” Shouta states with slight annoyance. He must have forgotten I told him I’m not the day he was sick.  

“They better not be a villain. We’d hate to have to do something to you and them. Better be honest, you’re not looking the best right now.” Hitoshi accuses. 

What the heck Hitoshi!? You’re just going to turn on me like this!? Why I ought to come over there and smack the back of your head myself! 

My saving grace as the waiter comes- Tadao!? This is where he works!? He comes up to our table with a notepad in front of him. "Hello, I’m Ito, and I’ll be your waiter for tonight. What can I get you started with?” 

“Tadao, you work here?” 

His head snaps up from the notepad, and looks at me. “Oh hey, Y/N!” His face becomes a smirk. “What happened to calling me glowstick?” 

“Well, you’re not really glowing right now in this light, are you?”

“Ha, you got me there.” 

The three men look between us with some look I don’t really understand. 

“Ya know each other?” 

“You could say we’re close.” Tadao informs. They grow rather deep frowns at the news.

He clears his throat and brings his notepad up. “What drinks could I start you guys with?” We each tell him our drinks and he writes them down. “All right, drinks coming right up!” He leaves to go get them. 

“He’s one of the reasons I don’t move out of my apartment. Especially now. We’ve become really close recently.” 

“You should stay away from him. He seems like bad news.” Hitoshi informs. 

??? huh? “Why, do you know he has a villain record or something?” 

“He could be using you. Stay away from him or we might have to make sure he doesn’t do anything.” 

Okay, THAT pisses me off. “First of all, you guys can’t tell me who I can and can’t hang out with outside of babysitting hours. Second of all, I’d really appreciate it if you guys could be less judging of him, because he has never done anything even slightly villainous whenever we met.” My slightly edged tone makes them back off the topic. I wanted to add third of all being he walks with me at night to our apartment place, but that seems like a bad idea if their reaction is this so far. 

It grows awkwardly silent between us all for a moment. Maybe I should have kept the others to myself too, but damn it, they need to have more respect for my decisions they were never a part of, and have no need to be a part of. 

Tadao comes with our drinks. He places them down, and Hizashi immediately takes a big drink of his.

“Here you guys go, and one drink for one special person.” He jokingly winks at me. 

I roll my eyes in response. “Sometimes I truly wonder if I hate you.” I tease.

He rolls his eyes in return. “Admit it, you know you love me.”

Hizashi chokes on his drink. I don’t help him from still being a bit upset. He should be fine anyways after a bit. 

He does, and is able to manage keeping his quirk down as well. 

“Do I?” I question teasingly. 

The three men glare at him. Sheesh, what’s their problem? 

He seems rather uncomfortable by it and leaves in a rush immediately after taking our orders. After I almost had a heart attack from the beyond insane prices, of course. Even the cheapest thing is over half the money I’m given a day for babysitting. 

I’m getting pretty upset with these guys right now. Starting to wonder if they got hit with some odd quirk again or something. 

That calms me down a bit since it would kind of make sense that’s why they’re acting odd. How long will it last though? Better not be long. I don’t know if I can handle them like this without losing my mind. 

“Hey, Y/N. We have something for you,” Hitoshi pipes up, and nods towards Hizashi. 

“Right!” He reaches into one of his pockets and pulls out a… necklace? It has my favorite type of jewel in it, encased behind and around the edges with what looks like real gold. A different shine is on it, like something is covering the gold to prevent it from easily being destroyed by weather or wear. The shape is in a rather large teardrop. It looks custom-made as well. Never seen anything even close to what this looks like before. 

“It’s a gift!” Eri cheerfully chimes in.

“That she helped us pick for you.” Shouta informs. 

Please don’t tell me it’s authentic. It looks real though. I can’t even begin to imagine the price of what it must have cost to create it if it is real. “I’m sorry, but I can’t accept this! It feels too much like I’m just using you guys if I do!” 

The three of them frown. Even Eri seems a bit disappointed. 

Eri asking me my favorite jewel kind of makes sense now, but why would they want to give this to me? 

“C’mon, let’s put it on ya!” He hands it over to Hitoshi and stands up, pulling me to stand up with him. Hitoshi stands as well. 

“Did you guys not hear me? I- I can’t accept it!” 

Hizashi shakes his head. “Don’t be so worried, dear little lovesong! We want you to have it! Ya can’t just say no, we spent too much for it to go to waste now!” 

Hitoshi goes behind me with the necklace and is able to put it on while I’m still rather reluctant to accept such a gift.

Eri’s eyes almost seem to sparkle when the clasp gets shut on it. “You look amazing!”  

I freeze in my tracks to notice everyone is staring at us yet again. This time with slightly different reactions. A couple of them seem to be with envy, making me want to shrivel up and hide in a hole, and others seem to be appreciative I have something more expensive than my clothes now or something.  

At least Shouta seems to give me mercy by pulling me back down in the booth and glaring at them all in such a way that they all stop staring. I’m feeling a bit like a ragdoll at this point. 

Hitoshi joins him, making sure they truly stop. The glare combined of those two could probably curdle the blood of All Might himself. 

The restaurant seems to grow quiet between all of us. 

I decide to escape by using the bathroom. Hizashi didn’t have time to sit back down before it was necessary. “Stay here, it won’t take me long.” They still seem reluctant to let me go alone. 

Getting to the bathrooms, I didn’t have to go, just wanted to get out of the stares and whispers for a little bit. Despite the men’s glares, of course there was still going to be gossip of someone in here who looks so out of place. 

“Hey, Y/N, be careful around them, alright? They’re pretty strange.” Pipes up the familiar voice of Tadao behind me. 

I play dumb. He probably shouldn’t know I know they must have been hit with some kind of quirk. “How do you know? They could just be being cautious since their children are with.”

“I admit, I did watch you a bit at the festival. More so the men you were with when they came. Something about them isn’t... “ He seems to be struggling with figuring out how to explain it. “It’s wrong. I just can’t quite put my finger on what it is. Again, just be careful, alright?” 

I just nod and enter the bathroom. 

A bit after cooling off, I go back to the dinner table, them all still waiting and chatting about school. Well, Shouta being nearly silent as usual. Hizashi quickly stands up to let me sit between them again. Ugh, I really don’t want to. 

Yet I do, just to be kind. The least I can do is sit through this since they went through the effort of such a gift, even though to me it seems highly unnecessary. 

Tadao comes with our food not much later with a secret frown on his face. He’s smiling, but I’ve learned him well enough by now it’s worry he has instead of a cheerful personality. It slightly drops to reveal his true emotions when he notices the guys glaring at him yet again. He doesn’t say a word, just drops all of the food off and leaves. 

This feels like a really ruined dinner, even though this food is incredibly good. The atmosphere has definitely become shit. I seem to be the only one to notice. Hizashi looks over towards me and gives me another grin, not giving much comfort. What’s worse is every time I stop for a moment and rest my hand on my lap, Shouta seems to try to grab it. It led me to just keeping the utensil for my dinner in my hand. 

I’ll have to apologize to Tadao for their behavior tomorrow. Easier said than done since I still can’t exactly tell him who they are. Cursed contract. 

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

taglist-

@dabi-s-whore, @angelicblackwolf, @fuegy-fuegy   

Double fun fact- Did you know slapping someone’s back if they’re choking is actually worse than letting them try to get it out themselves, especially if it’s food? The food can actually get lodged deeper in their throat at the impact. Huh, First Aid is quite interesting.

[zeyan]

self introspection post ignore me

thinking a lot lately about how my behaviors very very do not line up with the anxiety disorder everyones told me I have like. things like "oh nobody's actually going to make fun of you for just existing it's all in your head :)" don't help bc people LITERALLY made fun of me for existing bc I acted weird. I'm worried people don't like me because I can't tell when someone's being genuine, I see people who seem to be on good terms with eachother talk shit when their back is turned and my brain just can't tell the difference. strongly been thinking lately that I am ND in some way (maybe autisim?) but the only thing a diagnosis would do (if I could even get one as an afab adult) is give doctors another reason to not believe me when I go to the hospital for something. I made up a long list of things I think might be ND behaviors that I do in case I ever do get to see a therapist/psychiatrist again but I probably never will, and I wasted all the time I actually got with one talking about my stupid family problems instead of getting to talk about my actual issues. I've wanted to go again ever since getting a job bc it's given me a lot more insight on what might be wrong with me. like going to work and coming home crying after only being there for 4 hours because there were too many sounds that day is not normal. and being told that it's just anxiety didn't help bc my brain just went oh this is probably one of those panic attacks you're supposed to have :) and ppl are like “oh don't assume you have something bc you share 1 or 2 symptoms” but that was enough for them to just slap the anxiety label on me and give me medications that either didn't work or actively made me worse. a lot of my issues WAY more strongly align with ND things than with an anxiety disorder. like yeah I talk quiet sometimes but I also talk REALLY loud at other times, I can't control my volume both ways. I don't like chatting with strangers but it's not bc I'm afraid of them it's bc I don't know how to have a conversation. I was afraid to go to the airport by myself but when my friends gave me clear step by step instructions on what to do once I got there it was FINE like having a list of what to do so I don't "mess up" fixed the problem and made it easy. also just like. with the way I acted as a kid before I learned to shut up and be quiet makes me wonder why none of my teachers ever told my mom to get me tested for something. there's a lot of other things on the list between my food texture issues/ not liking to be hugged or touched but it's difficult for me to describe in detail. I guess I just wish I didn't have to fight to know what's wrong with me. and i wish the result didn't have consequences so i could just know :[