#tragic romance destined to fail

[qingxin-dream]

“Righteousness”

summary | in another timeline, kunikuzushi never redeemed himself. he took interest in a different kind of heart—not the Gnosis, not a Vision—but yours. (art credits: @/Shiqaruki on twitter).

warnings | lore, kidnapping, kuni calls you ‘little songbird,’ profanity, brief mention of physical abuse, manipulation, praise & degradation, pining, obsessive/possessive, smut [18+, MDNI], dubcon, female-bodied reader (wears a dress & lingerie), dominant kuni, choking, yandere jealousy, murder/arson threats, worship, slapping, finger-fucking, mirror sex, kuni receives oral, deepthroating, edging/teasing, orgasm denial, mention of breeding

genre | yandere, smut with plot, canon-divergent

word count | 4.5k

pairing | kunikuzushi/scaramouche x reader

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In a time all but forgotten, a young boy sat on his knees, caressing a hand-sewn doll in his palms and looking up with childlike compassion to his companion.

“There once was a puppet solider whose greatest wish was to be with a ballerina doll forever and ever,” he began, his eyes reflecting the scene of his storytelling imagination.

He gently squeezed the doll in his hands, as if to comfort his companion before the truth spills from his lips. “But the solider didn’t have a heart and didn’t know where his feelings came from.”

“One day, his owner didn’t want him anymore and threw him away into a fire. But even in the flames, his eyes never left the ballerina,” he continued with a more somber tone, drawing attention to the gut-wrenching ending of a tragic romance.

However, his voice shifted, offering soft words of wisdom and hope to his distraught friend. “The next day, the people found a tiny heart in the ashes left by the fire.”

Instinctively, the beautiful puppet sitting before the young boy curled his lip in disdain. “Probably ashes in the shape of a heart… but that’s not a real heart.”

He could hear the affectionate smile pulling at the corners of the young boy’s mouth. “Maybe, but what if… hearts can be born from ashes?”

“What a joke. It’s just ashes,” the lonesome puppet can barely conjure up a breath in his agony. “Nothing left but ashes.”

As his chest twisted and clenched with the wretched filth of so-called human emotion, the divine puppet came to a profound realization. His body merely served as a hollow shell, cursed by the ghost of mortal weakness—a living testament to the depths of an Archon’s visceral mourning.

In his naïveté, he had trusted the boy he thought to be his friend. He had believed that silly little fairytale, that maybe he wasn’t as empty and worthless as he felt. There was no heart to be found in the cold vessel of a failed god.

Kunikuzushi would have to claim one for himself.

Sin.

The ultimate temptress of mortals. The manifestation of human greed and desire. That which demands repentance and atonement for fear of eternal damnation. It is hinged on the human condition that death is inevitable.

Mortals are easily persuaded by morals and ideology if it means life after death in a paradise that is not guaranteed. Humans create false narratives to exercise the sick satisfaction of controlling one other. When all is said and done, the real struggle is for power—namely the power to control fate itself.

For those who are destined to roam the world with no such motives, imprisoned in an earthly purgatory, sin and salvation are laughable notions.

There is no reason to live, for you cannot die; Sin knows no bounds and comes with no price.

“The sooner you accept this, the better,” Kunikuzushi laments, his face just inches from yours. The bewitching twinkle in his lavender irises has remained all these centuries, a cruel illusion masking the abyss beneath. “Nothing you say will change my decision.”

You were really quite the picture, if he was being honest, all tied up for him. Kunikuzushi loathed that just the sight of you was enough to make the void in his chest cavity ache with longing. A reminder of his imperfection.

Anyone else would have died a violent death for such a transgression. But you presented a unique opportunity.

“Kuni, please,” you whimpered, your pleas falling on deaf ears. On the contrary, he loves hearing your voice, especially when you beg so earnestly. “I-I don’t know what I did wrong… I’m scared. Please, let me go…”

The puppet hushes you lovingly, his lips brushing against your delicate skin toward your ear. “Hey, now. There’s no need for that. You’re safe with me, little songbird.”

You flinch, gasping and recoiling in fear, turning your head away defiantly. It’s not like you could push him away, your little limbs bound to a tall column in the kitchen nice and tight. Hot tears pricked at your eyes. It burns like hell.

“Untie me, Kuni!” you shrieked, squirming and struggling against the binds to no avail.

He snatches your face firmly between his thumb and two fingers, squishing your cheeks to the point you felt pressure on your skull. “Ungrateful slut. Didn’t I explain this to you already? Your heart beats for me from this day forward.”

Frozen in shock, your body stiffens involuntarily as fear floods your veins, rendering you utterly helpless. Even as he gazed upon you with an icy, detached stare, you couldn’t find it within yourself to fault Kuni for this act of desperation. He could never make sense of himself and the pain that came with betrayal after betrayal.

Why even try to embrace humanity if it would mercilessly punish you for not having a heart?

You still remember the day you found him, it was but a coincidence you both crossed paths. Kuni was a wandering traveler, or at least that’s how he introduced himself. He seemed kind enough. You were particularly taken by his appearance, so lovely it was almost inhuman.

It just so happened that you were willing to offer him a place to stay. It took a bit of convincing on your part, actually, but you were worried about the string of murders near your village recently. Someone must have had an insatiable vendetta against the blade-smithing arts, striking them down one by one.

A small knowing smile pulled at his lips, his eyes creasing slightly with amusement as he marveled at how you opened yourself up so easily. This was the first time he had talked to a human in who knows how long. Perhaps since the young boy’s passing many dreadful seasons ago.

Kuni found the void in his chest persuading him to entertain his curiosity about you.

He had to admit, once you both got to know each other, it was quite the impeccable arrangement. During the day, you provided the kind of mundane tranquility and domesticity he had always dreamed of. Thankfully, your residence was in a rural part of the countryside, which offered much appreciated security and seclusion from the world.

Once you were safely tucked into bed and sound asleep, he would lie restlessly in the guest room. Puppets have no need for sleep. On some lonely moonlit nights, he would entertain his own fantasies of you. In the absence of such desires, he was compelled to satisfy his blood thirst.

Though Kuni had long forsaken the human emotions that afflicted his existence with disappointment and abandonment, his burgeoning relationship with you had quickly proven to be the last remaining vestige of his innocent supplication for a purpose.

In fact, he demanded it, after witnessing you day in and day out slipping from his grasp. He was growing impatient, waiting for something more. You had always stopped short of taking a little leap of faith to hold his hand or kiss his forehead, leaving him yearning for your touch and attention. Why?

Even in your presence, he was not alleviated of his turmoil. A number of possibilities plagued him. Were you dissuaded by his artificial constitution? Did he make a fatal miscalculation? God forbid, was there someone else?

No matter how many times he twisted, folded, and bent reality in his mind, trying to make sense of you, he never came to an agreeable conclusion. By the time Kuni realized just how deep you had nestled yourself into the empty husk of his heart, it was too late for the both of you.

All of this mental anguish and pining was unbearable. Unacceptable. He loved you, yes, but needed you more.

The puppet’s chest fluttered as you willingly complied, tears staining your cheeks, but that’s okay. His soft pink lips brushed against your cheek once more, kissing away your precious tears. It was his first taste of you.

Kuni cradled you in his palms like a delicate doll, his thumbs ghosting your cheeks. He leaned in closer, indigo bangs tickling your face and his mouth parted with a breathless question. “Is your heart… truly mine?”

He had broken you, and you had no choice but to nod slowly.

“Say it for me, little songbird,” he encourages you with a warm intonation. His eyes were trained on your lips.

“I-I’m yours,” you replied weakly.

No sooner than you could speak were his plush lips pressed to yours, a breathy hum of relief exhaling through his nose. In turn, you muffled a whimper, overwhelmed by the sensation. He had untied you, knowing you couldn’t hurt him but he could certainly hurt you.

Kuni was gentle at first, relishing in his first kiss with you. He carefully took your wrists to guide your hands to his body, and he wrapped his arms around your waist to pull you against him. Still, you trembled in his grasp.

“There’s no need to fear,” he whispers between kisses, holding your face to his. “I will take care of you.”

He can’t bear to leave your lips. Guiding you towards him, he leans against the kitchen counter and tucks a stray lock of your hair behind your ear. A small prayer barely escapes his lips. “(Y/N), hold me… touch me… please.”

“Kuni,” you choke out, tears forming in the corner of your eyes again. You are silenced with increasingly fervent kisses, one of his hands trailing down to your neck just by his fingertips, giving you goosebumps in the wake of his featherlight touch.

“You are going to give yourself to me. Your heart is my heart, and I will not have you hiding any part of yourself from me,” his voice grows a bit more insistent, closing his fingers around your throat as a threat, but not yet squeezing. “Do you understand?”

You give a feeble nod, unable to look at him directly. Every time your gaze locked with his, it sent a pang of terror jolting through your fragile body. He brings you closer by your neck, kissing you with more confidence than before. There is a little part of you that is worried you are unable to discern fear from excitement.

The puppet lets his hand slip further, fingertips finding the contour of your chest. He hesitates briefly, then allows his palm to feel your plump breast. The act was enough to elicit a little whine from you, and he knew right then and there that he had to hear it again.

“Do you… have any inclination of how long I waited for you?” he whispers hotly onto your lips, feeling down your waist at an excruciatingly slow pace. He smoothed each wrinkle of your dress with his thumb, tracing the silhouette of your figure down until he felt the hem of your underwear through the thin fabric. His breath caught.

You were still not as receptive to his advances as he would like, and suddenly he scoops you up to hook your legs around his hips, pressing your back against the nearest wall in the hallway. Kuni was beginning to reveal his desperation for you in more ways than one, breathing a little heavier. He was determined to have you submit to him and if you weren’t responsive to his soft side, then so be it.

“Answer me,” Kuni lowers his voice with a commanding edge, his lips just inches from your neck while his messy indigo bangs tickled your jaw. You whimpered, involuntarily moving your hips against him at the mere thought of his mouth on you.

At long last, you found your voice—delicate and decadent with a tinge of spine-prickling anticipation. Perhaps you had lost part of yourself, your humanity, in him too. “H-how long, Kuni?”

You shivered slightly, feeling his mouth spread into a satisfied smile against the sensitive skin of your neck. His voice deepens further, sultry and needy, “Lifetimes… I’ve been so goddamn purposeless for too many fucking lifetimes, just waiting for you.”

Without warning, the touch-starved puppet sunk his teeth into the crevice of your shoulder at the base of your throat, sucking at the weak spot to bruise the skin with his mark. A surprised yelp fell from your mouth, and you so nicely turned your head to offer him more. He clutched your curves tightly, as if he was secretly wishing your bodies would just melt into each other.

Ba-dum… ba-dum… ba-dum…

Your precious heartbeat echoed through his chambers of his chest. Kuni craved that little pulse of yours, chasing it up your neck in heated, sloppy kisses. All the while, you encouraged him with sweet little sounds of pleasure, softly asking for more under your breath.

“It’s mine,” he reiterated, perhaps to help immortalize the sensation against his lips. With a faint growl and yet another love bite, he added, “You’re fucking mine, you hear me?”

If only he could be bothered to pull back and catch a glimpse of how the puppet had unraveled you beyond recognition, equally as intoxicated by the heat of the moment. No matter. He will have his fill of you in due time.

“Y-yours, mhmm,” you capture his wet lips halfway, experimentally swirling your tongue with his passionately. You were clinging onto his shoulders, entangling your fingers in the soft ends of his pretty hair resting on the back of his neck.

With a faint moan against your mouth, Kuni lifted you once more by slipping his hands under your dress to feel his digits press into the soft flesh of your ass. It was light work to carry you, giving him the opportunity to squeeze and smack your ass with a smirk.

Slipping into your bedroom, he set you down and turned you around by your hips so that you were facing the tall mirror just a few feet away from the mattress. He leans over your shoulder from behind and you blush heavily at the image reflected by the mirror. Both of his beautiful hands traveled up your body simultaneously, one feeling your stomach, ribs, breast, and resting around the bottom of your throat.

The other, however, caught the frilly ends of your dress, sliding it up your skin at a painstakingly slow rate. Kuni’s violet irises shimmered with obsessive desire, admiring every inch of your body that was exposed to him. He bunches the dress in his fist as he raises it above your hips, revealing the most angelic lacy undergarments accented with cute little ballerina pink ribbons. Kuni chuckled, his breath tickling your neck.

“Do me a favor, darling,” he whispers into the shell of your ear, kissing it lightly. He takes his time to unveil your breasts, each one perfectly shaped with lovely nipples begging to be pinched. “Open your mouth.”

You comply, watching yourself in the mirror with curious fascination, before Kuni stuffs the thin, light fabric of your dress into your mouth. He nibbles your ear playfully. “Hold that for me.”

His eyes marvel at your body. If you told him you were a goddess, he would believe you without hesitation. Divine or not, the puppet was hell-bent on worshipping you like he had been dreaming of. Kuni played with the intricate lace of your snow white lingerie, his thumb brushing your pelvis teasingly.

Instead, he takes two fingers and caresses your folds outside of the undergarment, pleased to feel your panties dampened with excitement. You quiver at the touch, moaning faintly. Kuni is enthralled by the sweet noise, taking the tiny lingerie by his thumbs and sweeping it down your pretty legs.

He immediately sits down on the edge of the bed, quickly pulling you into his lap and spreading your legs apart with his knees. There it was in the mirror. Your glistening flower framed with the loveliest soft petals.

Kuni couldn’t possibly restrain himself when you were presented so exquisitely, wasting no time to slide his fingers over your pussy. You groaned in pleasure, muffled by the dress in your mouth, relaxing against his chest as the puppet focused on rubbing circles around your clit. He kissed your neck and shoulders endlessly, admiring your reactions in the mirror and whispering lowly, “So good for me. So, so good for me, aren’t you, (Y/N)?”

Your thighs trembled. You desperately wanted to close your legs as his movements became faster on your clit, the stimulation swiftly overcoming you. Breathy moans soon evolved into incoherent pleas. Kuni held you steadfast with his legs, keeping you spread all nice, admiring how you twitched beneath him.

“What did I tell you?” his tone is one of warning, groping your right breast and littering your skin with a few more marks. “There are consequences to hiding yourself from me.”

The puppet suddenly swipes his middle finger over your leaking hole—causing you to moan lewdly—before slapping your pussy. It was a light but firm slap, sending an addicting concoction of both pain and pleasure through you.

After a brief moment, he returns to your folds to trace and admire it, then continuing his ministrations on your clit. Occasionally Kuni would let a finger slip to tease your entrance, finding that it drove you crazy.

“P-please, please, Kuni,” your words quivered like your body, bending easily to the pleasure he was so kindly bestowing you. It had to have been the hundredth small cry for relief tumbling from your throat, you were on the precipice of your climax. “I-I need it. Something, anything… fuck me.”

“You better not cum on my fingers,” the puppet orders, gathering your slick and gently inserting two fingers into your warm walls. You whined in frustrated pleasure as he stretched you slightly, pumping his digits in and out of you barely an inch but keeping you stuffed.

“I c-can’t, I’m…” you babble. Kuni knew you were on the brink already, but he wanted to at least try to prepare you for his cock. He suddenly pulls his fingers out, and with it escapes your climax. Tears were almost pricking your eyes. You could definitely feel them beneath the surface.

He slaps your pussy again as punishment for not listening to his commands. “Greedy sluts are not rewarded.”

“I-I’m sorry,” you mumble and he grunts, pushing you off of him and to your knees in front of the bed. Kuni makes quick work of his clothes, tossing his shirt aside and pulling his pants down enough to spring his throbbing cock free. You had certainly felt his hard length while you were in his lap, but seeing it rendered you speechless.

No different from the rest of the puppet’s beautiful body, Kuni’s cock was perfect. A few veins wrapped around his hard member, bulging under the flesh. Towards the tip, it was gradually flushed pink with hot need, a pearl of precum on his slit. You took him in your hand, butterflies swarming your stomach with the realization that he had more girth than you expected.

Kuni grabbed a fistful of your hair and shoved your face toward his cock with a simple demand. “Suck.”

You experimentally drag your tongue underneath his cock, licking your lips, and working your mouth on his tip to lubricate him first. Kuni’s eyes roll in the back of his head, resting one hand behind him on the bed as he moans deeply. “Fuck, (Y/N)…”

The sensation of you smiling with his cock in your mouth sent warmth through him. You eagerly fit more of him in your mouth, sucking and swirling your tongue just the way he likes it when you received praise. Yet, Kuni needed more.

“You can do better than that,” he scoffed.

His grip on your hair tightened, pushing your throat completely down on his cock just to feel it once. The puppet twitched in your throat, letting out a seductive growl of pleasure. You gagged slightly, before pulling back with a string of saliva connecting your lips to his tip. You coughed a little, but he cupped your chin and wiped it from your mouth sweetly.

“That’s my girl,” Kuni coos, guiding you up on the bed next to him and pushing you down onto your back. As much as he’d love to see you taking him in your mouth all evening, he had a prize more tantalizing waiting for him. Clothes on the floor, moonlight pouring over you both, the puppet vowed to never forget how you mewled as he dragged the pulsing tip of his cock along your wet folds.

Gasping, you achingly bucked your hips in tandem, utterly drunk on the delicious sensation of his thick length parting your pussy lips. You loved to be teased, that much was for sure and Kuni ate it up—the desperate crinkle of your brow in pleasure and how your breath became short.

He presses his tip at your warm hole, but never pushes it in.

You groan dramatically, sweat already forming on your forehead and you haven’t even began. Every bit of pressure he applies has you smitten, imagining the moment he finally fills you. “K-Kuni…”

The smug puppet smirks down at you knowingly, grinding his cock against you repeatedly, rubbing your clit just right. “Yes, my little songbird? Have something to say?”

Before you can speak, he kisses you to muffle your answer. You grow even more impatient, using your legs to keep his hips locked close to yours. Kuni peppers your jawline and neck with kisses and little playful licks of his tongue. “I’m listening.”

“Please,” you beg.

Kuni’s tone is unreadable. “Please what? Use your words.”

You give him a flustered look of desperation and he pins your hands on either side of your head, interlacing your fingers with his. You reply, biting your lower lip, “Fuck m-me, Kuni.”

A smile graces his face and his eyes soften, thumbs caressing your hand comfortingly to brace you for his length. “Is this… your first time, (Y/N)?”

Though you were a shy and kindhearted person, he should’ve known from the way you deepthroated his cock earlier that it wasn’t your first. He wasn’t your first. That means someone else was. Someone else defiled you.

Kuni’s electric purple eyes darkened like an impending storm as you shook your head.

“Indulge me,” the puppet asks. “What other men have been in my position?”

You are not in the right state of mind, still insatiably yearning for your climax and grinding your wet folds on his length. However, Kuni doesn’t accept your nonsensical mumblings and half-answers. His hands tighten around yours, pushing his cock into you with a guttural moan inch by inch until he bottoms out completely.

“Oh my fucking god,” you sputter out, sighing in sweet relief and a bit of pain. Your pussy is filled to the brim with his cock, stretching you out good. You try to turn your head away and close your eyes, but Kuni refuses to let you.

“That’s right,” Kuni’s voice is nothing short of alluring in the most raw way possible. “Treat me like your god and fucking look at me while you take my cock.”

He would be lying if he said he wasn’t also utterly euphoric as he sinks his large member into your tight walls. Gritting his teeth, he’s taken aback by how you squeeze him unknowingly, even your subconscious is unable to deny the pleasure he’s giving you. It took you a few seconds to adjust to his girth, your eyes drifting down his muscular chest and toned abdomen in admiration.

With the first drag of his cock out of you to his tip, hushed hum of pleasures are murmured by each of you, until he buries himself all the way back into you. Kuni continues in this rhythm with a few thrusts, unable to his stifle his own moans. He was no better, his climax already building within.

Pulling back, the puppet releases your hands to push your legs against your chest by your thighs to get just the right angle and perfect view of your folds. He hovers above you, fucking just his hot bulbous tip into your needy hole. In mere seconds, you cursed to yourself at how good it felt when he brushed against your sensitive entrance.

Your clit pulsated for attention. How could he not press his palm onto your pelvis and drag his thumb across the slightly swollen bud? His half-thrusts became shakier as you unexpectedly tightened around his cock—moans freely and loudly erupting from your throat. The feeling was beyond exhilarating and convinced him to push you to your limits.

“You think I’m going to let any other man put his hands on you like this?” Kuni sneers with jealous envy reflecting in his irises. “I’ll fucking snap his neck. I’d kill him.”

Impulsively, the obsessed puppet roughly plunges his entire cock into your soft pussy. He relishes in your loud moan of shock at the pleasure and slight discomfort in splitting you wide open. His cock pushes against that wonderful spot deep inside you, incredibly sensitive after all his torturous teasing. You were seeing more than stars.

“I bet they couldn’t fuck you like I can,” he scoffs, possessively pulling your closer by your legs and holding your ankles on his shoulders as he fucks you mercilessly. “Make you scream like I can. And—nghh—breed you.”

You were finer than a work of art, truly, in all your fucked-out glory as you chase your high on his thick cock. His thumb flitting over your clit messily, primal groans of bliss echoing throughout the bedroom at every divine flutter of your pussy milking his cock so well. Your words were simply unintelligible, mumbling breathy prayers wishing for his seed.

“No one can take you away from me,” Kuni himself is beginning to tremble with pleasure, but nevertheless he keeps up his brutal pace. Every crevice of your walls and your womb will know his essence. “You’re mine, and I’ll burn the whole damn world for you if that’s what it takes.”

In a rush of jealous envy at the mere thought of losing you, the puppet abruptly pushes your legs back onto your beautiful breasts by his chest. The erotic melody of your fluids coating the base of his cock and v-line with every sloppy thrust pushes you both over the edge of an impossible free fall of euphoria.

“Cum on me, (Y/N). C’mon, cum all over my fucking cock,” Kuni demands with salacious desperation, pounding into you again and again until you’ve ridden out every second of your climax. The sensation is indescribable as he swears he could feel your rapid heartbeat through your walls—your heartbeat in his hands like he’s the supreme god of your body.

And as such, he blesses you with ropes of hot cum to drown your pussy in his everlasting love. Kuni collapses and cradles you, wiping the tears of pleasure from your sweet, angelic cheeks.

Righteousness means nothing to gods, for whom salvation is too late and sin knows no price.

thanks for reading! reblogs are appreciated! my masterlist

[hermesmoly]

rate all the greek mytho married couples from most to least interesting (or your favorite to least favorite, depends on you!)

For fun I’ve split them into four categories:

The Really Interesting category, made their relationship everyone’s problem:

- Zeus and Hera (duh)

- Helen and Menelaus (happy ending)

- Helen and Paris (oof! ending)

- Odysseus and Penelope (has a whole word dedicated to their like-minded thinking)

- Rhea and Cronus (tragedy and cannibalism)

- Jason and Medea (tragedy and filicide)

- Clytemnestra and Agamemnon (tragedy and filicide and mariticide and matricide and misogyny and and OH gods-)

- Peleus and Thetis (the arranged mortal marriage blues, but in my head Thetis immortalized Peleus somehow by force and keeps him in her attic) (Because gods be damned if she will be the only one doomed to grieve Achilles)

- Orpheus and Eurydice (mf really went to hell for her and still didn’t get her back :<)

- Hector and Andromache (relatively the most normal ones in this category but still very tragic. Like don’t even ask.)

- Hecuba and Priam (them too)

The Really Cute couple category, bonus if it took them long to get there:

- Hephaestus and Aglaia

- Eros and Psyche

- Dionysus and Ariadne

- Perseus and Andromeda (they kinda remind me of Prince Philip and Aurora which is cute)

- Hebe and Heracles (listennn. they’re cute and important to the Heracles-Hera feud ending)

- Hippomenes and Atalanta (RIP Meleager)

- Philemon and Baucis (one of my fave Zeus myths)

- Alcestis and Admetus (Orpheus and Eurydice but with a happy ending thanks to the interference of Apollo)

- Iphis and Ianthe (trans man rep is good someone PLEASE write about them)

- Tethys and Oceanus (placing them here idc they are cute in my head!! The only titan couple who survived rip to Coeus/Phoebe and all the failed marriages thanks to the Titanomachy)

The Uhhh… Okay Category

- Hades and Persephone (placing them here because while I do think their relationship is interesting AND I find good various retellings of them (excluding LO) like Hades Supergiant, Hadestown, etc I long for more neutral/nuanced takes on the kidnapping, not just by their romance (or lack of romance) but Demeter’s role in the story to be more respected. (It also can’t be helped that HxP has the most over saturated greek mythology content everywhere that people get tired of seeing them, especially portrayed as the “only good greek myth couple” like okay get outta here)

- Gaia and Uranus (I like them, their relationship is clearly important for Cronus’ succession story, but their conflict to me seems so.. short lived? Like you have your son castrate your husband for imprisoning your less appealing babies but now the strife is gone and you work together to tell your son he is destined to be overthrown by his son and telling your grandson to cannibalize his wife as good advice??? Like good for them ig but Rhea and Cronus just do it better imo)

- Hypnos and Pasithea (getting ur wife from a deal with her mom that makes you commit treason by inducing your king with sleep… nothing sketchy about this at allll) (but maybe they’re cute and functional besides that who knows)

- Ceyx and Alcyone (in one version they didn’t do it, in the other they’re just… very dumb to call themselves Zeus and Hera.)

- Procris and Cephalus (eos RUINS lives)

- Hephaestus and Aphrodite (lets be glad it ended bc while they are interesting and Hephaestus did make their marital strife public, I just think they had a better relationship after the divorce)

The Kinda Boring category (to me, subjectively, put down the pitchforks)

- Poseidon and Amphitrite (do they have one myth together that isn’t the Delphin seduction myth… Amphitrite is nice to Poseidon’s worst son. That’s. That’s kinda it. I wish we had more, like how they are with their children or literally anything else to depict a dynamic between them. Especially since they ARE supposed to be the king and queen of the sea. But nope. At least with Oceanus and Tethys they’re both obscure in their personalities so headcanoning stuff is fun to me. Poseidon having a well established personality and Amphitrite… oh dear Amphitrite…)

- Cadmus and Harmonia (they’re a couple in order become ascendants of more tragic humans like Actaeon, Semele and that’s it. They become Snakes in the end to repent for Cadmus’ mistake. Nothing really about their relationship with each other)

- Deucalion and Pyrrha (The Greek rendition of Christianity’s Noah’s Ark and yeah. Thats it)

[piglet26]

Top Four Romances I'm Furious Didn't Get a Happy Ending

4. Jack and Rose

Blame the door. Blame Rose. Blame James Cameron. Blame science. I don't care. I, and everyone else, HATED that Jack died. After all that.......... he dies? Seemingly in a dumb way.

James Cameron has obviously expanded on his decision making skills regarding deciding to kill Jack. Obviously while it was about Jack's science and the pure significance of the sum of loss the true meaning was......Rose. Rose went from her mother, to Cal, to Jack. She was always dependent on someone for survival, status, guidance or permission to live. If she had gone with Jack she'd be living Jack's life. Jack dying is what forced Rose to finally take control of her own life. I get that. It's noble. I also wanted Jack to live. The audience did as well and it did look like if she just moved over.... he would have.

Don't even get me started on "My Heart Will Go On" cause imma cry.

3. Buffy and Angel

Probably the greatest more tragic romance ever. A couple that defined the 90s with electric chemistry that saved this couple from being creepy instead made it sweet and chaste. Angel fell in love with Buffy the moment he saw her. It was her that motivated him to become A Champion. He gave her the iconic Claddagh ring.  That night, they slept together for the first time, which resulted in Angel experiencing the "moment of true happiness" required to end his curse. He was alleviated of his soul, and reverted to the guiltless, sadistic Angelus........ breaking viewers hearts. Especially this viewer. While Spuffy grew on me and Bangle grew apart..... it became clear even in the worst of times they were connected by the heart.

A romance destined to end in disaster all the same. This one was for the history books.

2. Augustus “Gus” Waters and Hazel Grace Lancaster 

Working through their illnesses together, the two manage a relationship that is mature beyond their years. Part of what makes the end of this romance so difficult to watch is the fact that though Hazel is much sicker than Gus, his cancer ends up making an aggressive and unexpected return. We should have known it wasn't going to end well, but we were hopefully, THEY were hopefully. The scene when Hazel gets the phone call that Gus passed away, pain just pain. Shailene deserved at least the very a nominiation.

Reylo

We could have had it all. Ben and Rey could have had the best of both worlds, powerful light and powerful darkness, a balance. Their love story could have brought balanced to the force.

Ben had felt alone and abandoned for a really long time, and had tried to channel those feelings to gain more power, but was clearly failing and having doubts. Then along comes a girl with whom he shares a fate-like connection, with a similar past of parent abandonment/betrayal issues, who opens up to him & seems convinced that he is meant to be someone better.... will become someone better.

But the internet is why we can't have nice things. Reylo benefited from it's fandom, it also was severely wounded from people determined to paint Reylo as something that it wasn't due to their own issues.

[two-sides-samecoin]

I'm still a bit mad about s4 of Stranger Things because they turned both Robin and Steve into pathetic messes in order to make their dynamic work with Nancy, when in reality all three would struggle to be around each other.

Like Robin acted borderline pathetic for befriending Nancy, who was rude to her in the beginning. It's like she didn't care and threw herself at her. Plus, realistically, she would have side-eyed her for being Steve's ex. But her entire personality got thrown out the window in order to avoid conflict. Because let's be real, if Steve acted the way around her like Nancy did, Robin would have acted differently and called him out. She wouldn't let it slide, but it's Steve and not Nancy, who is perfect.

Steve acted pathetic around Nancy because he still loved her after all these years despite moving on in s3. It wouldn't be half as bad if it was more balanced, but we never saw Nancy being completely in love with Steve, even when they were together. It was always him who loved more, and now he still followed her around despite her actions in s2. Like the audience (at least some) knows Nancy cheated on him, which is a touchy subject for Steve, and yet all of his personality was ignored in order to worship his ex. I swear if he would know the truth about what happened at Murray's, I doubt he would act that way. But that would require the show acknowledging Jancy cheated, which would paint their relationship in a bad light, and the show wanted you to root for them (at least in s1-s2)

Not to forget how both Robin and Steve's other relationships got ignored for focusing on simping for Nancy. Stobin deserves an independent arc outside of romance. Like discussing their trauma from s3 and healing from it.

I wouldn't be so mad if Nancy was the driving force to make it work in s4. If she had reflected on her mistakes with Steve, it would be much more satisfying. It would make her befriending Robin much more meaningful and more natural to bring back Stancy. Because again, it's only one-sided, and Steve deserves someone who loves him as much as he loves his partner. Nancy never showed that in the show. It was always about Jonathan from s1 onwards. Her admitting she only chose Steve because Jonathan wasn't available put Stancy in such a tragic light for me. Because they never were to make it because Nancy wasn't in it 100%. It's not even the Barb thing, I'm sure it played into it, but Stancy failing is mostly due to Steve being the second choice from the beginning. Steve deserves to know that from her because he still has hopes and blames himself for the relationship's failure. And if they make Stancy endgame without Nancy putting in an ounce of work, I'll be pissed.

Also, if the show had included the messy problems within the teen group, the season ending in disaster would have been much more believable. Like the plan wouldn't have worked either way because of the tension and them not being on the same page and having trouble working together. They were destined to fail because of inner circle problems. I don't get this need of everyone being best buddies when there is so much conflict between them. It's boring tbh. And idk what the Duffers problem is that nobody is allowed to have negative feelings about Nancy or admitting that she hurt people. It's like the show is gaslighting us. You, as the audience, see how Nancy makes mistakes, and yet nobody in the show acknowledges it or is phased by it. The opposite happens because everyone simply loves her more for it. And then you're like, am I crazy??? Like when every other character makes mistakes, it's called out. People still give Steve shit about high school, but with Nancy, the same standard doesn't apply.

also this is going to be long so going to put under read more

oh my god same every time i think about how stobin just looks pathetic to show how nancy is this capable ‘leader’ drives me insane. because first of: steve and robin helped way more than nancy did. nancy just got told things and then shot a gun. that’s honestly all she did in season 4 except for create a plan that failed (which it would have failed either way but yeah). legit people think that stobin did nothing in the major fight which is because they put so much pressure on nancy’s shot that their contributions mean nothing.

honestly i will never understand robin wanting to make friends so fast with nancy meanwhile we saw last season that she called nancy a priss. also everyone complains about robin not having more talk about her sexuality and being outed which would have been good if right here we got it! robin is hesitant to be friends with nancy because maybe for her it’s always been weird for her to have friends that are girls. we could have gotten this expansion on how there’s homophobia in the 80s so perfectly with this storyline! but nope! yeah honestly they three out a bunch of robin’s characteristics and personality to just follow nancy around like a duck or a dog. and 100% robin would have called steve out if he acted like nancy did to her.

honestly yep that about steve! like he acts sooo whipped about nancy which to be fair he was while they were dating and even before. but why isn’t steve allowed a little bit resentment about how their relationship ended? why isn’t he allowed to be mad at nancy? god everytime i think about how steve is just now reduced to worshipping his ex i get so fucking annoyed. like i love how sweet steve is don’t get me wrong but can we also see him maybe experience some more negative emotions? it feels like after season 1 steve wasn’t allowed to feel anger at people/characters anymore. of course he’s bitchy and snippy but he doesn’t have any true anger moments! honestly lol the show will never acknowledge jancy cheating just like the people in the fandom who are delulu. also like lol just because you admit it doesn’t mean that you can’t still like them or that they’re evil people.

i am so fucking mad how stobin was just reduced to nancy! it even happens in the fandom: you can’t go two seconds about hearing the boat scene without hearing how ‘robin stared at nancy and look how she yelled nancy’s name’ meanwhile her bestie STEVE is dying. there are so many other dynamics but the show did stobin so dirty by just making their dynamic about nancy so fandom simply followed suit no matter how much they hate the duffers and what they write: they always seem to do exactly what the duffers are doing.

everything you said about nancy being the driving force. honestly it’s wild how nancy admits herself that she settled for steve because jonathan wasn’t available and people still think that she didn’t a) cheat by knowingly getting with another man despite the fact that she knew she wanted jonathan and b) just say that she went along with what steve was doing. i’m actually going to scream about that second one because how on earth do you want nancy to be her own person but then fucking willingly take away what she says she did of her own right?!? makes no sense: the math ain’t mathing. thank you for saying it’s not just barb! honestly people think it’s just about barb but no it’s legit because nancy just doesn’t love steve.

the way i love the messy dynamics but the duffers just breeze over it now bothers me. hell the fandom bothers me more when they do this lol. god everything here! this is already so long so i don’t want to add too much. but i do like nancy it’s just the fact that a) the show makes you believe that she’s right all the time! b) also her fans who just don’t want to criticize her or just won’t admit that she’s wrong in areas where she is also c) when her fans just make steve seem like an abuser. honestly the fans of hers have been pissing me off more than anything ngl but yeah i do love her just wish her flaws were more showed in a negative light and wish more people can acknowledge it

[almostsomewheremaybe]

The Situationship

It was never supposed to be like this. How much misery has been left bleeding upon that executioner’s block? It’s still true, though. When I first looked into her soft and dark eyes— soft and dark like midnight wolves— I should’ve known it would end in hatred. 

I had only gone over to my friend’s house that day to help them move. Every time a friend needs help moving, I’m one of the suckers who actually shows up. Carrying sofas, and Christian guilt in each of my arms. Praying that everyone keeps tally of all the good things I’ve ever done. I used to lie to myself about the kind of “good person” I was. Not anymore. Not after Rosalie and me’s situationship. I mean I was the kind of person who felt obligated to help our mutual friend move into his swanky new Hollywood studio, and she was the real no-bullshit type of New Yorker who made sure to show up only after the moving was done. She made every space she was in feel like a Bronx corner. She never cared if anyone thought she was a good person. I used to think that was a reason she wasn’t. One of her many character flaws I was sure proved she was the goddamn devil. But they weren’t sins. They were wings. Now, I sit in Hell envying her for the ways she could fly. 

It’s been four years since our situationship ended. I ignored what happened for a while, but these days it’s a ritual to remember. A destination resort of honeymooning nostalgia and vacationing hypotheticals. All the forgotten gray empty spaces have become prime real estate for overthinking developers. It wasn’t that bad was it? I ask myself that constantly. I mean we had great sex. All the time. All over the place. Wherever we failed each other, we didn’t there. Our carnal chemistry just synced. I suppose that was one of the problems, though. We exhausted our intimacy in clawing sheets and biting skin and raising heart rates and there I go again. Maybe we let great sex take the fall for all the ways we lied to each other. Cause we lied to each other. Rosalie had wings but she was no angel. She liked to cuss and argue at high volumes. The cussing was poetry and the arguing was jazz. The shouting was her saxophone solo. I know this because my family goes way back in New York as well. The people from there are just not normal. They make audible conflict an artistic affair. On our first date she told me she had family in Queens. Always the dumbass I replied, Oh like Aunt May? She laughed at me in my fucking face. I felt moronic and appreciated at the same time. She smiled in city blocks, and her eyes gleamed when she saw I could take it. That was the spark in the beginning. It was probably the same spark that eventually burned it all down. On our second date, I surprised her by taking her to an escape room. She was four years older than me. Stunning. Talented. Cutting like the rim of a can you weren’t careful with. Accomplished. Her career was taking off. I was nobody with not a penny to my name, but I still paid for her. I wanted so badly for her to see me the way I saw her. We do that don’t we? Overestimate the importance of symmetrical perspectives. She loved the date, though. It had been a while since someone brought a little fun into her life. I had done whirlwind romances, tragic love stories, friends to lovers, and so had she. I wanted love to be easy this time. I thought this would be the perfect start to a perfect story. Predictably, expectations melted giving way to miserable reality. In every room we questioned each other more than we found answers to their riddles. She yelled, Why don’t you listen to me? I listened to you about the headless dolls in the nursery! Okay, so listen to me again. You fucking men. You do it right once, and then you think you can start fucking around. That’s your problem. We probably wasted twenty minutes like this. It was cute then. Courting like that. A baby hippo is cute until it grows up big enough to crush you with its bite. We finally got to the last room, and a worker came over the speaker to give us a ten second countdown before our time ran out. The pressure made diamonds, and we hit a buzzer beater to win. It was so close that the worker entered the room to tell us we lost, and we told them that, actually, we had won. That tension between winning and losing was something we never escaped. That night we opened our ribs, uncaged the butterflies in our stomachs, and left them behind. We didn’t go on too many “real” dates after that. 

It’s interesting to me how a situationship is born. I had never been in one before Rosalie. She’d probably tell you most of her relationships were with men who treated them little different than what is considered a situationship. She’d probably be right, and I’d be indicted in that RICO case, but the fact remains— I had never done this before her. The only people I knew who had gone to Aspen to ski down the slippery situation-slopes, hadn’t done it like me and her. They were casually fucking, or friends with benefits who caught feelings. In the beginning we dated. Legitimately. The UN voted unanimously to approve us and everything. We dressed up for lunches. We talked trauma and fears under canopies of bed sheet. We exhaled childhood dreams across horizons of skin. All of that. But after two glorious weeks it was over. It became glaringly obvious we wouldn’t work. And then, by the sheer power of its own initial momentum,  it kept going…

But we called it off? Not once or twice. Probably like six or seven times altogether. Exclusively. Mutually. Privately. Those slippery slopes gave way to an avalanche of ambiguity. Our situationship was like Michael Meyers. You couldn’t kill it no matter what you did. 

If we had this supernatural spark between us, how come we didn’t prevail? For starters she was in Culver City and I was in the Valley. Her star was rising, and mine was plummeting to the ocean floor like the Titanic after medical icebergs began to rip me apart. (We’ll get into that later.) I moved into a shanty town studio just to be closer to her. Hoping it might help. We talked about our issues, and she made me listen. I sent her poems explaining how I felt. We tried. We really tried. And the contempt and distance between us grew up, married, and birthed a generation of resentment and distrust a thousand therapists couldn’t fix. But we stayed, together? The sex was still sexing. I still loved the smell of her hair in the morning. Taking walks with her dog and eating Ramen at our favorite spot on Melrose. She was still kind too. She would come over to my shit apartment, and sit with me in a sweltering unconditioned room, just so she could tell me things like,

You could be more confident. You shouldn’t count yourself out. And I would say, You shouldn’t either. You’re so smart. Creative. Hardworking. You give so much. Let me give you something. And I would try. I took her to see her first billboard on Sunset. She took me to get a new cellphone. We gave each other a lot of substitutions for trust, but your heart knows the difference between love and sweet gestures. Prior to being with me she had just left a seven year relationship. The fear of wasting her time was a bad omen marked upon my reason. A sleep paralysis demon that visited me every time I wanted to text her goodnight. Don’t send the wrong message. Don’t be too invasive. Don’t lead her on. The less she thinks of you, the less room there can be for disappointment. Now I told you early on that we lied to each other, and this was my untruth. I wasn’t hiding because I didn’t want to hurt her. I was hiding so someone else could do it first. Someone who could trump me as a greater evil, so I could obscure my own culpability and cowardice for not stepping up to the task of deserving her. I didn’t know it then, but the shame of it came later, and visits me often as I try to sleep alone in my dark room. She lied too, you know. I told you, yes, she had wings, but she was no angel. She was tough. Really tough. And really scared too. In the beginning when things started to unravel, she went and got with someone else out of spite. I didn’t hold it against her. We weren’t together. It was just a… situationship? Was there where it began? Either way it hurt. It hurt because I knew she wanted it to. Would she do it again? I was never the same after. She would repeat ad nauseam that she wasn’t looking for anything serious or long term. But she never meant it. She knew this untruth hurt so she stabbed me with it. Over and over. She’d made me feel so disposable. She’d toss me to the side, and text me six hours later to keep things going. She was so scared that I was another in a long line of many who had come to manipulate her, that she decided to be ahead of the curve this time. She’d use the oppressor's tools against him. It was fair. Rational. But it just wasn’t true. We never said I love you. We never really had a relationship. Like she said,

I told you I don’t want anything serious. But she was lying. She loved me, and I loved her too. That’s why it kept going. Even through the quarantine. We could lie and say it was hard to end because it was so intoxicating, but it was hard to say goodbye because we had a million unsaid I love you’s stuck in our throats— choking us. I love you was when we laid together in the shower listening to High School Musical, which I loved, or when she was sick and I’d rush over with chicken soup from the Mexican spot, she loved, or that Valentines day. 

We approached Valentines Day not as friends, or romantic partners, but as two people trapped somewhere between maybes and almosts. I had found this restaurant that cooked her favorite cuisine, but the closest one was in San Diego. Valentine’s Day arrived, and I don’t know... She was so sweet. So deserving. Even as her situationship, I couldn’t let her go uncherished on this special day. So we drove down that evening. On the car ride we played In the Heights, taking turns as different characters, and singing our hearts out. We had never been so kind to each other. No one was trying or not trying. We just shared the space like so many colorful flowers in a garden. Everyone could be beautiful and loved. The food was bomb, and the night was fun. But it was the car ride to San Diego where we were soft and everyday-kind and fell in love. 

We endured the quarantine as best we could. Towards the end of our thing I stopped the sex. I had this pipe dream that we could become just friends. One of my latest and greatest stupid ideas. I didn’t want us to lose each other. She knew it was already happening. When the riots in LA over George Floyd began I was out every night and day in the thick of it. She was worried about me, about my health and safety. My ankle had been bad for a while, and I should’ve seen a doctor, but the cause had called me into the streets. She looked sad every time I told her what was happening outside. The last day we spoke we were on FaceTime. I had to cut the conversation short, so I could get back out to the protests. Before I hung up I saw her face change. She had this strange somberness draped over her like a wedding veil. I told her I was sorry that I had to go. I had told her a billion sorry’s by that point, and had brought too few into union with changed behavior. She texted me after I got off the phone. She said, 

Ur a bit of jerk I think

I immediately called her and got no answer. Something felt different. I texted her back, how

And that was it. 

We never spoke again. I could tell she had broken free from this situationship prison. She was probably halfway to Cuba by now. It would’ve been wrong to fight for her back into this bullshit. It would’ve been wrong to tell her how much I missed her. Prayed for her. Thought about her every time I heard the music of two people arguing. I knew for her, freedom would require months of healing. If I really loved her, if we really ever had any love, now was the time to prove it. By letting it go. Shortly after, the doctor’s finally found my tumor. Originally I had a false positive for Leishmaniasis. I had passed out once coming out of the shower, and she had caught me before I hit the floor. No one had ever caught me before. Who was going to save me now? Chondroblastoma with secondary aneurysmal bone cysts in my left talas bone. That was the diagnosis. I never recovered. Not after three surgeries. I can barely walk today. Sometimes, I’m grateful she left when she did. This would have hurt her too much. Once in a while I check her instagram, and she seems really happy. I hope it’s true. I hope she stopped lying after our situationship. I know I did. We all have so much pain, and its truth will be heard, or its lies will be a reckoning. 

So what’s so different about that situationship you can’t seem to forget? Like mine with Rosalie. 

Was it the fact that when something is almost something, you can imagine it as you whatever you want it to be? Did it give us the space to see ourselves as full of possibilities? Digging deeper than conventions and traditions. I hope that’s how we saw it. When a situationship “ends” it’s not marked by anything except the paradox that maybe it never really even started. That somehow its shadowy form meant it wasn’t real, and didn’t matter. It doesn’t feel like that, though. We both left each other so often, I lost track of who really killed this thing, or why it hurt so much. Why did it hurt so much? When she first found out I was only twenty six, she told me,

I wish you were older. You have so much exploring to do. I’m now the age she was when we dated, and I have explored hospitals, and medical debt, and poverty, and disability, and I’ve never been able to give anyone what I gave to her. I don’t think I want to. I don’t think I ever will. But I want this situationship to be real, so the way she changed me can be too. I don’t lie so much now, not so that I can be a “good” person, but so that no one else gets hurt. Myself included. I want this experience to stick like a fridge magnet I’m not ashamed of, not hardened gum hidden beneath a school desk. 

The situationship, for us, was those first few glances we shared in our friend’s new apartment the day we met. They were unspoken. They lingered just a little too long. Those glances could’ve been just that, except they demanded for more, and though their revolution failed, I venerate our situationship as a most noble attempt to honor love in a vast and terrible world. I still see her wolf eyes in the dark of my room. Still hear what we lost, howling in the night-wind. 

She once said,  In New York, to say you hate someone, means you actually love them. But only in New York. 

So today, like any good paisan, I find myself smack dab on Arthur Avenue, just so I can say that I hate what the situationship did to us. I hate the roles we played in it. I hate what we did to each other as crabs escaping a barrel. I hate that we built that beautiful barrel. I hate how those memories descend upon me like harpies visiting Prometheus. I hate how I look up at an empty sky, and still anticipate you flying into view. I hate that you’ve flown so high, you can’t see me, down here, so low. I hate that we met. I hate that I’m not sorry we met. I hate our situationship. I hate all of it. I hate you. 

[auniverseforgotten]

Top 5 AUs of whatever you have cooking, whether they are in fics or just floating ideas :3c

HMMMMMMMM SOMEONE IS TRYING TO SNOOP I SEE UWU /j these are all FGO AUs because my Star Wars AU is honestly still killing me orz I have so many ideas but I can't get them arranged right for it [I wanna bring in Hondo IMMEDIATELY he is SO FUN but I have to make it make sense...] and Star Wars fans SCARY X'D

The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Grainne AU:

So this AU is one I don't honestly know if I'll ever finish all the way or publish. Mainly because while I've read several Pursuits now, there's a lot of other mythos knowledge I need and it's hard to find non-Anglicized sources for me??? Unless anyone has a resource to share dfxcghv it started from my love of Diarmuid from FGO and all of Tea's really good Diarmuid and Fionn headcanons and a specific fic of theirs, Oh, Darling, You Can Stop Drowning that got me realizing that yeah The Pursuit being portrayed as a tragic romance....when one party held all the power via magical curse and the other just. Was forced along. Yeah...BUT that's another reason I probably won't post it in the end; the entire thing is built up on Tea's headcanons, so it also feels like it's not really my right to write it or post it. I'm mostly writing it out to read myself because I just,,,,need the serotonin,,, dfgv

Anyway. Main differences in this AU:

-Fionn is not attending the engagement because he is engaged to Grainne, but because it would be an insult not to attend. I haven't decided if he simply didn't express interest or if Sadhbh is still alive in this AU [basically just making it an entire mythos au not just a pursuit one]. If it's the latter it adds another layer because uh yeah Sadhbh is also mad her husband's dearest friend got stolen away and she would like to know Grainne's location as well thank you Very much.

-Diarmuid leaves pretty clear signs that it wasn't a willing departure WHICH IT WASN'T IN THE FIRST PLACE he actually, in one version I found, tries to throw her off several times [and this is AFTER Grainne already tried and failed to make a pass at Oisin and maybe also Oscar in the version I saw, can't remember], but he pretty desperately tries to wake Fionn in this one, both out of concern for his friend and then realizing what is about to happen. Not a huge difference I'm just rambling now sdfxghcv

-When Fionn wakes up from the sleeping draught he sees that Diarmuid is gone and Immediately knows Grainne did something bcus Diarmuid mentioned her Attention earlier in the story. Following a HC of Tea's, this Pursuit is, rather than a "Dude that was MY fiance", a "RETURN. MY BEST FRIEND. TO ME. RIGHT. NOW." Pursuit.

-Undecided how I want it to end; if they make it the full seven years and somehow??? Diarmuid returns to Fionn after???? If Fionn catches up and Diarmuid can't calm him down and he kills Grainne,,,which is INSTANT POLITICAL RAMIFICATIONS bad ending,,,,if he catches up prior to the full seven years and somehow???? Breaks the geis???

ULTIMATELY doesn't matter since it'll prob just be for me to read BUT it's one that has consumed my brain sfdg

2. Vinyl Destination [named by Ye uwu] Avenger Agenda/Saliama AU! LESBIAN TRANS COMPOSERS T4T LESBIANS HELL YEAHHHHHHH LESBIAN POLYCULE IN GENERAL I've mentioned this one to you plenty I'm sure but, Salieri who leaves the classical world that will never accept her and she goes to purposefully try and make herself a laughingstock by starting a punk metal band, a failure, etc etc so that she can. Well. Feel justified let's put it that way. BUT INSTEAD they ROCKET up the charts and suddenly she has to keep living, has to keep going.

During all of this Mozart is still in the closet and doing her best to break free but still stay safe with her father constantly watching every move. It started as an au where Mozart is in classical and Salieri punk, covering each other's songs to annoy each other how did it end up like this HOW DID IT END UP LIKE THIS anyway it's Salieri/Dantes/Jalter [all ladies] with Salieri also dating Mozart [lady] and Jalter also dating Boudica [lady].

3. So this one has NOTHING written down about it anywhere at all, but Fairy Knight Bedivere AU. And by Fairy Knight I don't mean like the FGO ones I mean it in the sense of like. Magic Knight Rayearth. He has a pact with Fou [who can change sizes, sometimes he is Fou sizze sometimes he is mount size sometimes he is HUGE] and they just...travel together and help people. Low stakes, probably set after an apocalypse so I can get some fun post-apocalyptic shit in there, as Enrichment. Could possibly involve some BediTris because that's my main ship for him, but could also just be a gen little fic/series about Bedivere and Fou saving the world one person at a time.

4. Arguably my WEIRDEST most cracky AU is the Hatoful Boyfriend Salierik AU. This was originally started for the Dead Dove day of Rarepair week, bcus I legit started that week with FOUR PAIRINGS. Anyway I thought it would be funny to make a pun with Dead Dove bcus,,,Hatoful Boyfriend,,,Erik is a murderous Magpie and Salieri is a massive vulture constantly in pain bcus the virus didn't mutate his family right. The Dead Dove is also literal bcus it's hatoful boyfriend so you know it's got murder, teeeeeechnical cannibalism bcus one character is killed for her bones????, some fun little gaslighting, etc etc

Just an AU for me to lelt Erik be a funky freaky little murder birb [all for his darling Salieri ofc] this is like 50% because I thought it would be funny 50% I asked Wolfie enough questions that I Gotta do it now XD It's partly written but has a lot of gaps.

5. Unrequited Fionndiar hanahaki AU. ONCE AGAIN NO ONE IS SURPRISED this started with a Tea headcanon, linking it from when I reblogged it bcus some of my thoughts are spewed into the tags dfzsxvg anyway the whole reason why this is especially fun is, as it alludes to there, Diarmuid, in the myths where he DOES die, has one fated death at the hands of his brother who was turned into a boar. This is because Donn killed someone's kid btw so then that was just. Placed upon Diarmuid and his brother's heads.

SO ANYWAY he has to die that way, and any other deadly injury he just bounces back from. So he contracts lungflower [Tea's thought on an alt name], and he Immediately knows what it is and who it's for. Cue Diarmuid desperately trying to hide it, growing proficient at swallowing down petal and stem and thorn until he is alone and it forces its way back up, trying to keep Fionn from suspecting anything because Fionn would damn himself to unhappiness if it means saving Diarmuid pain.

And he learns how to hide it, how to manage it, everything he needs. but eventually he DOES die. And FIonn finds him, as he is dying, and Diarmuid is trying to desperately swallow flowers but Fionn forces his mouth open to pour water into and. Well. He knows who they're for, because Diarmuid never made his feelings secret. So like another layer of guilt onto the man about to lose his best friend

FLASH FORWARD TO CHALDEA and Diarmuid starts coughing up flowers again basically the Moment Fionn is summoned. He tries to hide it but the Second Fionn hears a cough he is on that shit. Considering??? Fionn wants to try a relationship with Diarmuid now at this point, but Diarmuid assumes he's only reaching out to spare him the flowers. LOTS OF ANGST.

THANKS FOR THE ASK SABUUUUUU

[tanoraqui]

as a secret fan of the trope “immortal being imprints on family but is initially 1 or more generations off from their actual Destined Romance in it, leading to tragic problems”, and an even bigger fan of relationships (romantic or otherwise) which are wildly awkward for everyone except the happy couple, I think it’d be great, actually, if:

Idril and Tuor decide to have another child at some point, really any time in the Second Age or later (just one, though—living in Aman is already kinda straining Tuor’s fëa; he’s fine, but parenting a half-elf is…a lot)

The Choice of Peredhil is innate, actually, though only for one generation out unless complicated by Maia blood. Their daughter (Name TBD) chooses to be an Elf with no hesitation—save 1 Man kept alive by dint of Ulmo being clingy a loyal friend and patron, everyone she knows are Elves, or Ainur! Why would she want to leave her family, friends and home?

Shortly after Maeglin gets out of Mandos (which takes longer than anyone in the family but the Fëanorians), they meet in circumstances wherein neither realizes who the other is, familially speaking, and nor does either introduce themselves properly

They almost just straight-up elope, but NameTBD Idriliel decides at the last moment that she really would like to introduce him to her parents first, and she to be introduced to his. Possibly all at once?

(Maeglin either genuinely thinks she knows who he is or by some contrivance fails to tell her between the proposal of this meeting and the meeting itself. Either way, he fully intends to introduce himself fully to her parents, and he has no intention of marrying this maiden whom he loves without her knowing his identity and dark first life.)

Absolutely nobody, including Maeglin, is adequately forewarned

Chaos ensues

[its-chelisey-stuff]

here's the extremely biased recap of my 2023 in dramaland:

also, happy holidays and merry christmas to all who celebrate!!

favorite drama: Because I can never pick just one and I know, it's a weird combination lol:

Moving (kdrama) Perfect, from beginning to end. Breaks your heart and heals it at the same time. Delivers on action, plot, family and romance. SO much romance.

Dr Romantic (kdrama) saw S2&S3 back to back. If you're in pain, you only need Teacher Kim and the Doldam team.

My School President (thai drama) still obsessed with the ost till now. A simple coming-of-age love story, executed perfectly. On par with Heartstopper. There, I said it.

I spent my time rewatching instead of making posts about any of these lol

Favorite Male lead: Jang ShinYu (Destined with you, kdrama). Excuse you, that show had 99 problems, but Rowoon wasn't one of them.

Runner Up: Seo Woojin (Dr. Romantic, kdrama).

Favorite female lead: I'm gonna be honest, I think they did dirty most female leads, especially in Korea, but the women from Dr. Romantic were all exceptional. So they're my pick.

Favorite OTPs: DoHa&YoungHwa (Moon in the Day, kdrama). ALL the ships in Moving. TinnGun (My School President, thai drama). KiHo&MokHa (Castway Diva, kdrama).

Favorite period drama: Under the Queen's Umbrella, (kdrama).

Runner Up: The Forbidden Marriage(kdrama) Also, i have just realised I didn't see many period dramas this year, but many dramas had a past life, that has to count, right?

Best chaebol romance: The third finger offered to a King (jdrama). Shame on you Korea, you failed to deliver on your area of expertise.

Runner up: A boss and a babe (thai drama). My Demon (kdrama)

Best makjang to keep you at the edge of your seat: Perfect Revenge Marriage . Runner Up: Celebrity. I know it's not exactly a makjang, but idk how else to describe it.

Best Mother: The Queen (Under the Queen's Umbrella, kdrama). Half of her problems were created by her own children, poor woman.

best father: Adoptive dad, Castaway Diva (kdrama). The man was a saint.

Runner Up: Kim Sabu, Dr. Romantic. He has like 20 children among his medical staff lmao

Best Daddy: Joo In Sung, Moving. I don't have to explain lol

Most intense high school romance&story: The Eclipse (thai drama). Runner Up: Never let me go (thai drama)

Best Musical drama: My School President (thai drama).

Runner Up: Castway Diva. Park Eun Bin can do everything. What a Queen.

Best Cohesive storytelling imo: My Lovely Liar. Not the best, but pretty good overall. Runner Up: Sountrack No 2 (kdrama). Worst thing about this is that it was so short, I needed more!!!

Swetest down to earth love story: Hidden Love, cdrama.

Runner Up: HeartLiming in Moonlight Chicken (thai drama). And basically all the other couples in there. The Last twilight Series (thai drama).

Most tragic love story: Moon in the day, kdrama. The competition was strong, but I think falling in love with the man who killed your whole family and caused the downfall of your kingdom is hard to top. Plus, she had to kill him in the end. And it took 1500+ years to get their HEA.

best wtf did I just watch but why was it so fun: My man is cupid (kdrama). Runner Up: Fish Upon the Sky (thai drama)

Best Live Action: From me to you, jdrama. Cute coming of age story. I still prefer the 2010 movie though.

Dishonorable mentions:

Biggest what if: Justice in the Dark (cdrama). I can't talk about this without crying lol Runner Up: Till the end of the moon. I need cdramas to be 40+ eps again!

biggest disappointment: It is with a heavy heart that I must say the Legend of Anle (cdrama). Still, I had my fun with it. I will always be biased about GongJun lol Runner up: King The Land, i mean where was the plot??

messiest past lives story, the theme of the year in kdramas: See You in my 19th life. Runner Up: Destined with You.

[trendingdrama]

I most recently saw ‘Destined With You’ and ‘Doom at Your Service’ and loved both. I want to watch something that is more serious than silly and I’ve discovered that I really like the whole theme of love that exists beyond time or just love happening despite tragic circumstances. ‘While You Were Sleeping’ is probably my most favorite kdrama. If there are some kdramas you can think of that have similar vibes to those, I’d love to hear about them.

at the outset with time travel or past lives / tragic love...I just know a few ...

Mystic popup bar :

this is more of mix of part comedy , drama , romance ( sub sub plot) and action. Weol Ju (played by hwang jung eum) is a pop up restraunt owner who sets her food tent at night where both the dead and the living can grab a drink and she helps people appease their grudges / problemswith a special drink...( i am sorry this synopsis seems weird but give it a go you might like this :) )

2.Hotel del luna

i think this a mix of romcom , fantasy and horror. The story revolves aroung jang man wol ( played gorgeously by IU ) who is the owner of the hotel del luna (she is bound by curse to look after the hotel for dead and make easy passage for them to the nether world). Things start to be different for manwol once she hires goo chan sung as the assistant manager ....While this synopsis sounds boring it is far from it ... It does explore on some thematic aspects of ' resentment ' letting go and found family themes . Also since you said you liked while you were sleeping it's from the same directors that's an added bonus. Also cinematography and OSTs are my absolute favs...

3. Youth of May

this one not a fantasy but rather a sad romance melodrama.. but the directing acting the story was amazing . It revolves around old school romance of two strangers who met at the time of gwangju uprising. (And this drama made me look into south korean history ) It just gives you that nostalgia of what it is to be in love. Also because it is in the backdrop of a major event in sk history it does depicts deaths and cruel reality of the olden time. Anyway this was one of the best dramas i have watched ( please be ready with lots of tissues when watching this )

4. My dearest

Was released as a two part series with total of 21 episodes with each episodes were a art in itself , set in historical times of Qing invasion Yu Gil Chae is a pretty, bubbly, and a bit spoiled young lady who's called the 99 tailed fox of Neunggun-ri. She is also a bit of an outcast because other young ladies are jealous of her. They seem to think she's too straightforward and her behavior is inappropriate for a young lady, while young noblemen think highly of her. Gil Chae knows how to get men to fall for her but fails to capture the heart of the person she likes. Lee Jang Hyun is a mysterious man who suddenly appears in the Neunggun-ri social scene. Nobody really knows anything about him. Young nobles don't like him, but the elderly are wrapped around his finger. He's been dating around a lot, but he becomes curious about a certain 99 tailed fox, and one day, the said fox quite literally crash lands into his arms.

Once war is brewing, the pair finds themselves separated before they could even start to make sense of their feelings.

But the drama isn't just about their love it is much more than that it captivates it's viewers to empathize with emotions of ongoing war and how wthe invasion affects each and every character ( not just the main ) and the beautiful storytelling and the cinematography with added acting brilliance of nam goong min and ahn eunjin you keep yearning for more and more...

this is definitely the most serious one out of this lot.

JUST another rec of a not romance in fantasy but just a thriller fantasy drama that i am currently watching seems absolutely good

5. TOMORROW

Choi Joon Woong seeks a job, but it's hard for him to get hired. One night, he witnesses a man trying to end his life and decides to stop him. He gets acquainted with grim reapers Koo Ryeon and Im Ryoong Gu, who belong to a crisis management team. Their purpose is to prevent people from committing suicide. After Joon Woong ends up in a coma and becomes half-human and half-spirit, he is employed by a company of grim reapers as the newest member of the crisis management team.

other dramas: that fit love in tragic circumstances maybe :

queen for seven days

it's okay to not be okay ( tragic past )

extraordinary you ( not tragic but how love transcends two webtoons / two stories in fantasy based story where characters are in webtoon and one of the side character relaises THAT FACT !!)

it's okay that's love

[books-to-add-to-your-tbr]

Title: Gods & Monsters

Author: Janie Marie

Series or standalone: series

Publication year: 2019

Genres: fiction, fantasy, romance, paranormal, dystopia

Blurb: When the plague of all plagues begins its destruction, it isn't a miracle cure by scientists or even the military that saves them...no, their saviours are monsters. Jane appears to be nothing special; in fact, she's a sad sight to behold. Afflicted by the sorrow of her tragic past and failing marriage, the young mother of two is as terrified as every other soul when humanity faces doom...yet, when hope seems lost, Jane does something even her estranged husband fails to: she fights. And she's not alone. David and his companions are what her world has dismissed as mere legend. Their duty to the human race brings them across the country, and they all know it is no coincidence when they cross paths with Jane. As it happens, Jane is special. She's destined to rid the world of darkness. With monsters from every nightmare seeking her out, a noble immortal knight showing her what love truly feels like, a secret past that even Jane can't remember, and even more powerful beings wagering the fate of her soul, Jane will embark on an epic journey to save her family and the world...so what will happen when they realise she's the greatest monster of them all?

[xysidhe]

Break My Heart by Matt Hansen has jegulus vibes

You can’t convince me otherwise. Just. Listen. Look.

James-

Darling, I would break my heart If it was gonna make yours whole I would rip myself apart If it was gonna heal your soul

Woke up in a panic for a moment Forget that you told me that you had to go

Regulus-

And I’m scared but I don’t wanna show it Feels like it’s been weeks but it’s only been days And I’m slowly losin’ all my self-control There’s only one thing I can say it’s

I could spend forever always lovin’ ya But if I let you go, would you be happier?

James-

I would pick up all the pieces I don’t need a million reasons Oh, to break my heart for yours

I’ll be lyin’ if I said that it’d be easy To realize that I wouldn’t have you by my side But I’d do it, if that’s what you needed

Regulus-

I say that I could let you go And I pray, I never have to know You’ll always be the one I love the most

https://open.spotify.com/track/5nlKcuzD8Pd79njhGXt1vT?si=425fb9ce08ae412a

[saintobio]

sincerely not.

↳ gojou satoru/reader

with an arranged marriage set in place, the sacred bond is doomed with a wife who wants to make the relationship work and a husband who’s ready to ruin it all. unbeknown to him, a tragic fate already lies within the pages of his romance book.

genre. heavy angst, unrequited love, arranged marriage, modern au, 18+

tags/warnings. ooc, and nothing else except gojou is an ass

notes. a bit cliché but what’s stopping me from writing more gojo angst? bye idek why i still write at all jndsj rbs appreciated <3

series masterlist -> episode two

Marriage is a sacred bond.

With over seven billion people around the world, you were granted to have only one person to be your chosen life-long partner. As with every failed relationships, people would tell you that you just haven’t found the better half of your soul, the significant other who shared the same heart, or as some liked to put it, your twin flame. Carefully choosing a partner was the advice that you would hear from your elders again and again like a broken record. For years, they have nagged about how miserable it was that you were walking around as a twenty five year-old woman without a lover. But what made up for the lackluster romance in your life was hope. Hope that someday, at the right time and place, you were to be married to the perfect husband who would love and cherish you as a wife for the rest of your life.

That was the beauty of true love. It was unpredictable, yet gratifying once you had your fair share of it. You seek it, your search for it until you meet the person that was destined for you. And when that happens, everything else in the world would just take a halt. In that moment, when you and him have finally found each other, you believed that it would be one of the most blissful parts of your journey to adulthood.

All happy couples have their own romantic fate written in the stars, but in a situation where a husband was appointed to you, was that considered breaking the universe’s law of finding your special one?

Was that considered cheating your way into what fate could have had in store for you?

Arguably, you thought that maybe this was a push from fate, too. Perhaps you were just truly meant to be married to the man that you had grown fond of since you were young. Because his and your fathers were practically brothers by virtue, their unyielding friendship had now led you to this day, wearing an immaculate ivory gown in an expensive garden venue, to marry the perpetually handsome Satoru Gojou.

You had not seen him since the day it was announced by your father that you were going to marry his best friend’s only son. The whole marriage preparation was rushed, with everything else coordinated by the people hired by Satoru’s father to ensure that the wedding would be as perfect as it should be albeit done in haste. You weren’t exactly opposing the idea, but you were worried that Satoru might not be in complete agreement to be forever tied to a woman he didn’t love.

On the contrary, his grandmother told you otherwise.

“Darling, he is excited to see you.” For hours and hours, she cajoled you with reassuring words while she stroked your hair, eyes gleaming with delight as you saw them from the mirror’s reflection. It seemed as though she had noticed how nervous you were for this big day. “That young man couldn’t sleep. He must be overwhelmed.”

Inaudibly to her, a sigh of relief rolled off your lips. At least, you were glad to know how he felt about today’s ceremony. You had only ever heard from your father that Satoru had consented to the wedding, but you were spared of the other details for the past few months by being convinced that everyone was busy and that the only thing you needed to worry about was picking the perfect wedding dress.

“I probably should’ve spoken to him before the wedding just to make sure that he’s fine with everything, Nana,” you mused, staring at your airbrushed face and silently admiring how glamorous the hair and make-up artist made you look today. “I just couldn’t find the right time to talk to him because I was told he’s been on business trips for the past few weeks. I tried reaching out, but his secretary keeps telling me that he’s unavailable.”

“Why, there is no need to worry about such a thing. I guarantee that my Satoru is ready as ever. He’s blessed to have a woman like you.” The crease on his grandma’s forehead lessened the more she smiled, but a cough soon erased the gentleness on her face as she rubbed her chest for some relief. With your older sister standing next to her, she caressed the old woman’s back and guided her into tucking a porcelain floral headpiece just above your braided updo. “Ah, look how stunning. I’ll bet my buttons you two will give me the most beautiful grandchildren.”

Heat suffused your cheeks at the thought of having your own family with Satoru. As part of a married couple’s life, the product of your love would be represented by the children that you would soon bear for him. This was a fairytale that you once believed only existed in fiction, but with some inexplicable force of luck, you were now granted a prince charming to live with in real life.

Still and all, your stomach was in knots when you stood at the far side of the aisle with all eyes on you later that day. Your delicate fingers fidgeted as you held on to your bouquet, anxiety filling your heart at a dangerous rate. The garden was filled with people that you knew; from your relatives, friends, to your other acquaintances. On the other side was Satoru’s own guests and perhaps some really important people in his life, even shareholders and investors, who were all waiting to see him finally tie the knot.

“You know, sweetheart. I was nervous when I married your mom, too,” your dad offered a joke to lighten your anxious state after noticing how you tightened your grip around his arm. You shouldn’t be nervous when the garden that held your sacred exchange of love was the most enchanting floral paradise that you had seen in your life. Amaranthine flora covered the trellises, pastel shades colored the seats, ornate candelabras decorated the credence table, all combined with the redolence of vanilla and jasmine that greeted your nose with a creamy, velvety smell.

Timeless elegance and utmost sophistication was how you would describe your wedding day as though you were a modern-day Cinderella without a midnight time frame into being a princess. Chic, refined, coordinated in pearls and pastel palettes—you were left wonderstruck at how pristine everything was.

As you made slow strides towards the altar, you saw your older sister, Gen, smiling on the corner, unknowingly reminding you of her words this morning. “It may be arranged and all, but I hope you’ll have the happiest marriage. You deserve it.”

And then you saw him.

Standing at the far end of the aisle was Satoru, whose ivory hair was neatly styled in a natural pomade. He donned a classic three-piece tuxedo with a tie of the same color and satin lapels in champagne silk to emphasize the elegance in his look. The man radiated regality like a monarch of ancient times. His appearance was princely enough to make your heartbeat run faster than it already had and you wondered if you elicited the same feeling from him after seeing you in your custom wedding gown.

His hands were buried deep in his pockets as his eyes locked with yours in front of a smiling audience. It was typical for a groom to feel overwhelmed upon seeing his bride. Memories of his relationship with her would flash before his eyes and, most times, the thought of finally spending his forever with her would make the groom cry.

Satoru didn’t have all of that with you.

You couldn’t tell what thoughts were bubbling inside his head as you joined him at the altar. Even though his face reflected a genial smile, his eyes couldn’t veil its emptiness. His hands felt cold when you held it. His visage remained impassive even as you two faced the priest who would be blessing your sacred marriage. It was clear as day that being in here with you was the last thing he ever wanted.

For a bride who was getting married to a man of such saintly features, you certainly didn’t expect that you would have a broken heart on the day of your wedding. In an exchange of vows and I do’s, you were awakened to the thought of how this wedding was a torture to Satoru’s soul. He was masking his blues with an insincere smile, standing centimeters apart while his heart was miles away.

Even at that, you remained poised as you listened to the officiant’s words, taking every word deep into the vastness of your heart just like any woman who valued marriage as an important part of her life. You couldn’t possibly put the marriage to a stop, not now and not ever. Not when all eyes were fixed on the both of you, having spent the time and energy just to be in attendance to this special day.

“Satoru, do you promise to love, honor, cherish, and protect Y/N, forsaking all others, and holding only unto her forevermore?”

When he took a moment to answer with a blank gaze, you could feel tiny pricks being sent straight to your heart. Just a mere glance at his stolid mien was enough for you to believe that he was going to call off the wedding and run away. What else did you expect? He clearly didn’t want this as much as Nana nor his and your fathers made it seem. It shouldn’t surprise you if he took a step back and announced that he couldn’t go on in making an oath to offer the rest of his life with you. That he would rather get out of this hell hole and be somewhere else than to proclaim a love that was being forced out of him.

But he didn’t. The soles of his leather shoes remained intact on the ground.

“I do,” he professed, despite the inner turmoil that plagued his head.

Being surprised by his conclusion to proceed with the marriage, you made the bold to decision to also continue and return your own “I do” for when the pastor asked you of the same matrimonial question.

“Bride and Groom, you have heard the words of love and marriage, have exchanged your vows and made your promises, and celebrated your union with the giving and receiving of rings. It is at this time that I now pronounce you husband and wife,” the officiant declared, “you may now kiss the bride.”

As you turned on your heels to face each other, your groom slowly lifted the veil off your face where you had a clear view of his diamond blue eyes that trailed down on your lips before he leaned in to seal this marriage with a kiss.

It was brief—with his warm lips barely brushing against yours, but affectionate enough when he held your cheek along with it. The millisecond of having your lips enveloped on each other made you frozen in your spot as you absorbed the very idea that this marriage was indeed bona fide. The rings, the vows, the kiss. They were all proof of how real this marriage was. And when he pulled away, he was gazing at you with eyes that spoke a million words left unsaid.

There was no turning back now.

From this day forward, you were officially his and he was yours.

You would give credit where it was due. As much as you presumed that your groom didn’t like this marriage, Satoru was surprisingly a gentleman throughout the reception. He did little things that made you feel like you were an actual couple prior to the wedding—be it with the way he placed a hand on your back during your first dance or how he would scoot closer so you could whisper on his ear as you sat in front of curious eyes—quite the simple gestures, but enough to make your heart flutter.

Even though you had known him for years, you never really had a remarkable amount of interaction together. You two remained as neutral acquaintances throughout your teenage years, merely greeting each other whenever necessary, but unexpected that you would end up having to marry each other as grown adults. To some extent, it might be a little expected. You were on the same age bracket, same circle of families with generational wealth, and your father knew about your longtime crush on him back when you were younger, but never did you think that the day would come where your dad would coordinate with Satoru’s father to make sure that this marriage would happen.

Satoru was a very close family friend. Other than both of your fathers being the best of friends, your mothers were also from the same circle. Photographs of them hanging out since college were enough proof of how small the world was and how everything seemed to have connected yours and his parents to each other. Ironically enough, they both shared the same fate, too. Due to a terminal illness, your mother no longer existed in this world while Satoru’s parents were divorced for reasons you chose not to stick your nose into. His mother was alive, but no longer by his side after having remarried another man and he now had a stepmother who had been taking care of him since he turned eighteen.

It was also mainly the Gojous that wanted this arranged marriage because Nana favored you by a significant advantage. She had long been fond of you way back when your father would take you to their mansion as a kid, claiming that you were the granddaughter that she never had. The thing was, Satoru’s grandmother was battling through the downsides of old age which might have left her grandson with no choice but to comply to her last dying wish of welcoming you into their family.

You were aware of how Satoru loved her with every fiber of his body because she was the only blood-related maternal figure that he had left. You could only imagine how he would chastise himself for not fulfilling her wishes before it was too late.

You were pretty much on the same page, too.

You grew up with extremely strict parents which ultimately became the reason why you had very few experiences when it came to men. At your current age, it was a true shame to see your friends settling down while you were still claiming to be an independent career woman as an excuse to your lack of romantic relationships. None of the guys you had dated ever earned your father’s approval until you no longer had anyone chasing you because they must have realized that you weren’t worth all that trouble.

You were the youngest between you and your sister who was happily married by her own choice. Unlike her, you didn’t really have anyone that pursued you the way her husband did for fifteen years. Such dedication paid off with earning your dad’s support and respect.

Your father thought that you were better off married to someone that he knew, and that became the very reason of yours and Satoru’s marriage.

At least, in your point of view, you hoped that it could work. You already had a prior attraction to him during your teenage years so it would be easy to fall back into that abyss of overflowing romantic emotions for the sake of your marriage. You were willing to be the best wife that he could ever ask for, only if he was ready to accept you.

“Congrats, you two.” A woman with long brown hair approached you and your husband during the reception. You recognized her as Shoko Ieiri, one of Satoru’s closest friends since high school. You were quick to greet her kindly in return. “I can’t believe you’re married, Gojou.”

The man stood high, peering around the ballroom to see the multitude of guests that filled the place. “I can’t believe it, either,” his response was rather monotonous, not giving anything away.

You tried to speak your mind and looped an arm around his, smiling gently as you looked at his angelic face, “I’m actually surprised that he showed up.”

Rather than acknowledging you, he seemed all blasé about your words by simply turning to his best man, the dashing Suguru Getou, who was walking behind Shoko.

“You’re getting wasted at my wedding?” Satoru joked, exchanging fist bumps with his best friend. “I’m the one who should be drinking.”

Suguru’s eyes turned into moon crescents as he shot you a friendly smile. “Hey, Y/N,” he greeted before facing your husband. “You can’t drink, you rascal. You have a long night ahead with your wife. They say honeymoon stage is the best.”

He was teasing the both of you by wiggling his eyebrows that garnered yours and Shoko’s chuckles. On one hand, Satoru was holding his breath with a face that concealed his distaste for the thought. His countenance was what forced you to withdraw your arm that was loosely hooked around his, gauging on his reaction and noticing the way his Adam’s apple rose up and down. It looked like he was almost disgusted.

Before you could say anything else, he snatched the glass of whiskey from his best friend’s hand and took a swig in heavy gulps. “I just wanna get this shit over with.”

You started the day with a half-contented heart. You were made a fool for thinking that Satoru was looking forward to being married to you because you were gullible enough to listen to yours and his family’s words. Of course, they would tell you that he was excited even if he was far from it. Why would they ruin a special day by telling you that the reason they kept Satoru away from you for the past two months was because they knew that he would tell you just how much he despised this wedding?

There was no doubt that he was only being civil in front of your families. He would hold your hand, walk side by side with you, and even smile at you—but through it all, there was a thin line between being genuine and simply acting. It was obvious in Satoru’s cerulean eyes that he was doing the latter. Because every time he noticed that no one was looking, he would brush your hand away and walk three steps forward without looking back. He would glance at you with a sharp gaze, never truly looking at you to notice the pain that painted your face in dejection.

He must have dreaded this day too much. Even as the reception ended and both of your families sent you off to a black sedan as newlyweds, Satoru was building an impenetrable wall that bordered his intentions and yours in a way to wake you up from your daydream.

Life was not a fairytale, and he was the reality that pulled you back to your feet.

“You probably couldn’t wait for this day to happen, huh?” His question reeked with disgust as the two of you sat on the backseat of the sedan. He had his arms crossed and back reclined against the backrest, staring at the view of the city like they were of better interest than his own wife.

You tried to swallow the weakness in your voice. “Satoru, I-I wouldn’t have agreed to this if I knew that you didn’t want it.”

For the first time that night, he turned to look at your face with eyes that bore heavily into yours. “What makes you think I ever wanted it?”

He didn’t hold back from saying those venomous words regardless if they sent knives to your aching heart. He looked even more bothered at the fact that his personal driver could hear just how revolted he was with you, exposing how this marriage was nothing but forced out of his will and that you were responsible for all of this. When you dreamed about weddings as a child, you didn’t picture out that you would be fighting with your husband on the first night.

But for what it was worth, he didn’t really consider you as a wife. Only by contract did this bond make you a legal partner, not through his personal feelings nor his own wishes.

“I’m sorry.” You didn’t know why you said those words in silent acquiescence. You didn’t know if you were saying it to him or to yourself for being oblivious to the reality that awaited you.

He didn’t care. He stepped out of the car without looking behind to see if you had caught up with his hasty strides. He didn’t speak another word as you got inside the express elevator to his upscale apartment building, later entering the penthouse that you now called your home. Such a home almost emitted a gasp from you the minute you entered the topmost apartment. Everything was luxurious—from the high ceilings, the lush furniture, to the infinity rooftop pool. The glass panels offered a gorgeous view of the Tokyo skyline and you stood mesmerized by the cityscape that reflected a constellation of different lights.

“Are you gonna keep standing there or what?”

You got out of trance at the sound of Satoru’s voice who stood outside of a bedroom, unbuttoning his shirt with a moue on display. “I’m just... Is this where you live?” you inquired, following him inside the room where a king-sized bed was laid in front of you.

“Yeah.” While you stood meekly on one corner, Satoru had already gotten rid of his shirt to be completely bare-chested and you didn’t expect that he was that toned under his clothes. The man may be your husband now, but you felt awkward around him at a situation where he would walk around half-naked as if you had seen all of him before. “Your stuff’s in the closet if you wanna change.”

You gave him a small nod. “Okay.”

What do married couples do on the first night? God. You were panicking on the inside as you made your way towards Satoru’s walk-in closet that housed a significant amount of expensive corporate suits and ties. The right side of the spacious wardrobe was where all of your clothes and shoes were neatly organized and were seemingly done by the housemaids back at your father’s house.

It just started to fully sink into you that you were actually married and this setup was what you considered normal now. In two years, five years, or ten years from now, sharing the same living arrangement with Satoru would no longer be considerably new to you. You would be accustomed to his daily routines in your domestic household, perhaps with kids running around the house in a year or two.

For now, the biggest challenge was your own husband. The same man who grabbed you by the wrist and pinned you against the wall, staring down at you in blatant scrutiny. The look of intent that he sent you was close enough to be a glower, one that brought you sudden fright and increased the speed of your heartbeat.

“S-Satoru,” you mumbled, pulling your wrist away. “What are you—”

He lightly cupped your jaw and you could feel the heavy rise and fall of his chest that signaled his growing ire. His gaze was sharp and unforgiving, ready to ruin your entirety even with just his rancorous words. “Let’s set things straight here,” he spoke in a domineering voice, “You and I will never work.”

It was pointless to restrain your emotions with no one else around for you to play pretend. In spite of that, you held onto the ring around your finger to try and clear your intentions, “I know you’re not happy with this... but I wanna try.”

“Try?” he scoffed, leaning in closer until you could feel his warm but minty breath against your cheek. “You’re the one who initiated this marriage, right? Since you had that stupid crush on me for fuck knows how long and no one else wanted you?”

You immediately shook your head in denial. How did he even the get that impression? “Th-That’s not true,” you stated firmly, “I’d never force anything! I was just complying to our dads’ requests just like you did.”

His eyebrows furrowed at your claim. “Bullshit. Why did he say he’ll pull out all of his investments if I didn’t agree to marry you?”

Your eyes widened at the newfound information because never did it cross your mind that your dad would even do such a thing. Moreover, it wasn’t in his character to give an ultimatum of that scale for the sake of marrying off his youngest daughter. Was he bluffing? With those facts alone, you refused to believe your husband’s words. “My dad wouldn’t do that. He would never say that.”

“Whatever, then.” Satoru’s frown lessened, but the hand that cupped your jaw remained still. “If you really wanna try, then stay the fuck away from me when no one’s around. Get it?”

You couldn’t understand this. No, you were failing to grasp why you were being subjected to such hostility when you had no ill intentions when you agreed to this marriage. Had you known that Satoru would treat you unfairly for it, you never would have agreed. You would have continued your life as a lonely woman in her mid-twenty’s without a husband who was ready to give you hell.

The antagonism in his stance induced a faint tear on your eye as you searched for the minuscule kindness in his. “Why do you hate me so much?” you asked, chest heaving from the oncoming surge of tears. “You weren’t like this before.”

While he released his hold on you, he spat out words that stung your heart with fatal poison. “You married me,” it was his simple answer, “that’s why.”

He was already walking away before you could respond. He was already stepping on your heart, thrashing it, pulverizing every artery before you could even think of living in bliss at the false pretense that he could learn to love you just as how willing you were to love him.

“You can sleep on the couch,” he offered, apathetic to the pain that swallowed you inside, “I’m not sharing a bed with you.”

[someoneimsure]

What are some of your all time favorite charcters?

Oh, that's simple! I've never ranked them together before so this is gonna be fun.

BATMAN, Bruce Wayne from DCAU BTAS & JLU. Batman's core character was a man who cared so much about his city that he willingly dressed up as a bat to scare criminals off the streets because he would never want anyone to experience the horror he suffered as a child. This is the Batman who would sit next to Ace and hold her hand as she died. This is the Batman who would threaten the United States government if he thought it would save lives. This man is a freaking legend. (Not to be confused with the Batman of TNBA. Fuck that guy. He's a hollowed out shell of his former self and it makes no sense to me at all how BTAS Batman became JLU Batman and then TNBA Batman. The timelines don't add up at all.)

RED HOOD, Jason Todd from the DCAMU Under the Red Hood. I watched the movie before I read the comics, and I honestly prefer the movie ending over the comic book ending. It's what got me into reading the comics. He just fascinates me so much. Like, I love his ugliness and the way his story made me open my mind and think about the possibilities. Even now, I honestly want to sit down for a minute one of theses days and write a version of UTRH for BTAS. (It also honestly still confuses the hell out of me why Nightwing was there in the beginning and never came back for the end in the movie version. Like there wasn't a storyline going on in Bludhaven in the movies that would require him disappearing for the second half of the plot--just think of the possibilities!)

RED ROBIN, Tim Drake-Wayne from the Red Robin run. This man has an identity crisis every other issue, I swear, when he isn't falling to his death and thinking about how he only wishes he could see Conner again. The homoerotic subtext and subtle un-reciprocated romance has sold me on the Timkon. That's not to mention his most basic and fundamental trait: He exists as Batman's anchor. That's what his entire reason for becoming a hero is all about: keeping the Batman grounded and preventing him from becoming a violent maniac that needs to be put down. Because, deep down, Tim is intelligent. Yes, I do think he is a genius. Is he the smartest Robin? Dependson how you define intelligence. He's certainly not the most skilled and fundamentally he is kind of a loser, but he understands The Mission without being told, understands the "necessity" of Batman, doesn't need a tragic backstory to do what it takes to save a hero, and that makes him a hero in my book.

ROBIN V, Damian Wayne from the comics. It's hard to pin down exactly what storyline I like about Damian because I haven't read any good ones yet but my all time favorite panels are those with him and Jon Kent. Specifically, Damian telling Jon not to doubt himself because he was made for the purpose of becoming Superman--a sentiment Damian also shares. I didn't understand the character all that much before that, but I was sold. I literally look at every panel with him in it differently because of it. Damian is an "I am destined to be Batman. Everyone else needs to get over it" son of a gun, and I can totally get behind that attitude of "This is me, deal with it." He is my spirit animal, and him loving animals and being a piece of shit is just a bonus.

THE FLASH, Wally West from DCAU JLU. My all time favorite episode of the entire JL&JLU run was his. He set the bar for superheros for me and everyone else simply fails if they cannot reach that bar. I still remember the episode of Flash and Substance where The Flash asks Batman and Orion to make an appearance at the opening of the Flash Museum. My favorite all time scene was him sitting next to The Trickster and just talking to him to convince him to give up his enemies. They have such a good rep that The Trickster willingly agrees to turn himself into the police just for The Flash. That's such good writing. Now, in my mind, a superhero should help everyone, even their enemies.

SUPERBOY, Conner Kent from the Young Justice comics. I haven't read his solo run yet and it's in the queue but I'll get there eventually, but the tone of the Young Justice comics and his growth as a character throughout has rapidly made him my all time favorite YJ character. My absolute favorite part about him is the black and white morality he has and the conflict between him and Tim. Like, I understand in real life that black and white morality is a child's dream, but I like heroes who have lines they will absolutely not cross. (He's better than the YJTV version which feels like a blank slate and an over all bland character who should have run off and rebelled against his 'destiny' long ago.)

I was going to include my favorite characters from other franchises but my memory is shit if I'm not looking directly at the thing I want to talk about so I hope just the DC stuff is okay.

[huayno]

from neon genesis evangelion, vol. 12

The Mysterious Stranger

The Anime, the Manga, and the Mark Twain Novella

"God will provide for this kitten." "What makes you think so?" Ursula's eyes snapped with anger. "Because I know it!" she said. "Not a sparrow falls to the ground without His seeing it." "But it falls, just the same. What good is seeing it fall?"

—from The Mysterious Stranger

There is a short novel by Mark Twain, written near the end of his life and published posthumously, entitled The Mysterious Stranger. The tale is set in a small village in 16th century Austria, where three boys one day meet a young man different from themselves: "he had new and good clothes on, and was handsome and had a winning face and a pleasant voice, and was easy and graceful and unembarrassed, not slouchy and awkward and diffident, like other boys."

The mysterious stranger starts to do small but amazing tricks for them—causing water to turn to ice; conjuring grapes and bread out of air; even making birds that can fly out of clay. At last one boy, the story's narrator, works up the courage to ask the stranger who he is:

"'An angel,' he said, quite simply, and set another bird free and clapped his hands and made it flyaway."

The angel then proceeds to really impress them by making an entire toy castle, complete with five hundred miniature soldiers and workmen that move around by themselves. Naturally the boys get involved with this ultimate playset, making their own knights and cannon and cavalry, and although they get rather nervous again when the angel reveals his name is Satan, he assures them he is not that Satan, but only named after the fallen one.

"We others are still ignorant of sin; we are not able to commit it; we are without blemish, and we shall abide in that estate always." Distracted by two of the miniature workmen, "Satan reached out his hand and crushed the life out of them with his fingers... and went on talking where he had left off: 'We cannot do wrong; neither have we any disposition to do it, for we do not know what it is." Horrified as the other boys are, "he made us drunk with the joy of being with him and of looking into the heaven of his eyes, and of feeling the ecstasy that thrilled along our veins from the touch of his hand.'"

Yes, Kaworu Nagisa made quite an impression on the fans of Neon Genesis Evange/ion, despite the fact that, in the original broadcast version of the TV show (before it got all director's-cutted, box-setted, special-editioned, and platinum-lined) he shows up for only slightly less than thirteen minutes of total screen time, the climax of which being an entire minute where nothing happens at all.

That's what being a beautiful angel will do for you, especially when you make the most of your thirteen minutes on Earth by having a Whirlwind romance with the main character that ends in a lover's quarrel with Prog Knives and finally a voluntary martyrdom at the hand of your boy here. Relationships don't come any more tragic than that of Kaworu Nagisa and Shinji Ikari, and when fans (including this one) first saw it on TV, the affair was so brief and shocking the story logic of it didn't click in until much later.

In the anime, Kaworu is acknowledged as the Final Messenger, and, of all the Angels Shinji has to fight, this is the most ruthless battle, won at the highest possible cost to himself. It took even longer for me to realize that the showdown in episode 24 had also taken us full circle from Shinji's first fight in episodes 1 and 2, which emphasized his personal helplessness against the looming Angel Sachiel. Against Kaworu, it is the Angel who becomes the small, helpless figure, while Shinji is represented only by the gargantuan, frightful helm and arm of his Eva Unit-O1. We never see Shinji's human face once throughout the whole final minute of decision.

So as Col. Trautman would have said instead of Major Katsuragi, "It's over, Shinji! IT'S OVER!" Kaworu v. Shinji (or Kaworu x Shinji, in the doujinshi) was the big final showdown between humanity and the Angels. And with the outcome leaving Shinji at his most wretched ever, wouldn't it be nice if everyone just died—your wish being Eva's command, as it turns out that fortunately humanity hardly ever needed the Angels to slaughter itself.

"I am perishing already—I am failing—I am passing away. In a little while you will be alone in shoreless space, to wander its limitless solitudes without friend or comrade forever...But I, your poor servant, have revealed you to yourself and set you free. Dream other dreams, and better!"

—from The Mysterious Stranger

Satan's words near the end of Mark Twain's story also uncannily prefigure the end of the world and the Instrumentality project, both of which follow his death in the TV show in such quick order you picture Anno as a hairnetted fry cook dinging the counter bell. By now you see Sadamoto's handling of Kaworu, and perhaps nothing illustrates the different experiences of the manga and the anime better than his handling of this critical character.

No longer the last Angel to be fought, Kaworu actually becomes an active Eva pilot and fights an Angel—the dude even has the nerve to observe the fight is fixed, based on his knowledge of SEELE's prophecies. Sadamoto of course introduces him at an earlier point in the narrative—at the equivalent of episode 19's end—and then sends him to NERV near the equivalent of episode 22's beginning—before certain important events, to put it mildly, can occur. When one notes this kind of thing, of course, it's important to restate that the Evangelion manga has always been a separate but equal "official" version of Eva, with no particular obligation to align itself with the anime, and indeed it was with Book Five, the first released after The End of Evangelion, that Sadamoto began to truly seem free to go in his own direction.

Nevertheless, as the "other" official version of the Eva story, it is reasonable for fans to view it as an "alternate history" relative to the anime, and the way Kaworu has been introduced makes us realize the manga may end very differently indeed. Despite the fact we know here that Kaworu is an Angel from the very beginning, he appears destined to at least hang around long enough to pick up a few paychecks. It's not clear when your health benefits kick in at NERV, although if Ritsuko is your primary caregiver it might be best to forego them.

Sadamoto's remarks upon visiting the U.S. in 2003 indicated that the Eva manga might (might) be planned as a twelve-volume series in all. There is still plenty of room for speculation, as the slow working pace to which the artist himself often refers has of late become almost relativistic—as of this writing, it has been eight months since Sadamoto has drawn a new installment of Eva in Japan, and hence a Volume Ten is nowhere in sight. It may be small comfort, but those of you reading this are pretty much in the same drifting boat as the Japanese fans.

"An angel's love is sublime, adorable, divine, beyond the imagination of man—infinitely beyond it! But it is limited to his own august order. If it fell upon one of your race for only an instant, it would consume its object to ashes. No, we cannot love men but we can be harmlessly indifferent to them; we can also like them, sometimes."

—from The Mysterious Stranger

And with Book Nine we see the most staggering difference thus far between the manga and the anime; Sadamoto's Shinji doesn't even like Kaworu, much less love him. Of course, you could say the less-ethereal Kaworu of the manga is harder to love. I can't believe Sadamoto had him tell Rei he thought she'd be "heftier." And yet he did.

I don't think any A.T. Fields actually got penetrated in the anime; while I do think Shinji felt sexually attracted to Kaworu, and that you the audience are supposed to feel that he felt it, what Kaworu himself thought was a very different matter. Like Rei, I believe Kaworu to be innocent—coyly, he appears not to be so, because while Rei needed to be reached out to, Kaworu has come to reach out; whereas Rei has spent her existence being observed; Kaworu has come to observe.

Indeed, in the manga, Shinji's irritation about Kaworu's invasion of his personal space seems almost a parody of his attitude in the anime. In the TV show, when Kaworu put his hand on Shinji's, he flinched but did not pull away; whereas in the manga it's easy to imagine Shinji slugging him. Instead he goes to run after Rei, hoping to get closer to her again.

I hardly think the change reflects any phobia on Sadamoto's part (after all, we even get to see Shinji's "Unit One" in the manga), but the fact the manga Shinji is less emotionally bleak and empty, and hence less vulnerable. Shinji's just as negative in the manga, of course, but it's an active variety, rather than the passive negative creep (in the best Nirvana song sense) we know from the anime. We don't have to imagine him slugging Gendo; from the look of surprise on Dad's face in Book Seven he would have smacked the beard off his face if Kaji hadn't stopped him.

Neither is Shinji in a positive emotional situation where we leave him here, either; indeed at this point in the manga there's arguably no one he can turn to—the more brutal fate that befell Toji has cut him off from his school friends, Rei has become hesitant, Kaji is dead, and his perennial self-esteem booster Asuka is going to need to rebuild her internal supply before she can even get back to calling him a loser and idiot.

So, like Misato trying to put her own hand on Shinji's, all I can do for now while we wait for Sadamoto-sensei is to recommend for your winter vacation reading list The Mysterious Stranger, which I can almost guarantee will give you new angles to think about Kaworu, and may even earn you class credit besides. A quick look at the novel's comments on Amazon list a teacher who says fundamentalist students walked out of his class when he taught it; another compares it to The Matrix; those who dislike it call it "sick," "bitter," and "twisted." Sounds like good old Evangelion to me!

—Carl Gustav Horn

[a drawing of Kaworu holding a kitten]

Although The Mysterious Stranger can also be found in a number of print editions, including The Portable Mark Twain from Penguin (haw haw), the story, being from the days when mp3s came on shellacked cylinders, is legally available online at http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/TwaMyst.html. The same site has a book called The Holy Bible, King James Version, which fans of Evangelion might also enjoy, although it's technically "Editor's Choice."

[a-for-alternative]

Hello, A! So I was wondering do you have any headcannons about how you and B were like at Wammy's together? PS. I thought dead men tell no tales lol (sorry about the joke if you didn't like it)

// Oh do I ever... Alternative has such potential to highlight things about B’s character that develops him into the killer of Mello’s novel. The lore surrounding the first generation (and the notion of Mello writing about a dead successor that previously filled his position - his predecessor) is more poignant than I think it was intended to come across but here are some headcanons~

Wammys House:

A & B are the first to receive their secondary alias after which it becomes a kind of right of passage for other successors, choosing their own (though often not official) - to A & B, only theirs will ever be legitimate.

A is introduced to B after only 1-2 years of being at the house

A, before becoming a letter, was taken into Wammy’s due to his intellect but only later is selected as the first attempted L-backup, probably pulled from a satellite home 

Alternative & Backup (A’s perspective):

His introduction to B is a pivotal moment for him. After so much loss, he sees this as an opportunity for redemption and a return to a clear path forward, and now it is under threat. B represents for A the physical manifestation apathetic fate, he is foreign in every sense, they cannot even communicate when they are initially introduced. His presence signifies A’s disposability - B is the backup plan for when A fails, like a vulture circling over head, it looms over him like a prophesy he is trying to outrun..  though, B can also overtake him at anytime, relegating him to a future that, from A’s perspective, is neither known nor the success story that he has put so much hope in. The world for Alternative at this point in his life is an unreasonable and precarious place. All he knows, up to this point as a seven year old, is that everything is fragile and must be hard won - and there is no guarantee that one can keep what they have fought or sacrificed to obtain. --- after all, he is in line to replace L and L is about as far from vulnerable as he believes a person can get --- Maybe, B also represents a challenge that requires a level of maturity that he does not yet possess - the inevitable dilemma, that this position is of such consequence to the world, that it needs the best person for it, — and that may not be him...

There is nothing genuine in the sweet smile.

The way he extends an open hand, how his soft, his boyish voice offering “ Hello, Alternative ” …  

A feels an unpleasant sensation snake up his spine like a fever’s chill, empathetic aptitude ringing in his ears with all the incongruence rolling off this boy.

His gentleness feels scripted, words trilling out of his mouth- practiced and angular; absolutely, wholly contrived. A has never meet anyone with such an emptiness in their words and actions…

A returns the greeting with a stony, silent stare - I know what you are. 

They slide up from the open palm to meet the foreign boy’s gaze - Blue eyes resting soft, knowing and stormy, heaven’s skies empty of angels. Alternative is standing his ground, refusing to pretend they are not here for a reason, telling himself, “I’m not afraid…”

 But,  he has never seen anyone with such deep eyes.

 They are the windows into an empty soul, a black abyss,                                                                                             absolutely apocalyptic…

Alternative is capricious in his treatment of B, vacillating between animosity and empathy- at times he’s even conspiratorial , allying himself with B and undermining their superiors- beginning to identify with B (even in spite of the language barriers). Backup is clever and naïve and careless, and unreserved in a way that A wishes he felt safe to be. B is the only one that can truly grasp what he is going through but he is also very strange... -- Alternative struggles with trials & setbacks that roll off Backup’s back with ease. B is several years into his understanding of his eyes and it shapes how he moves through the world, what he feels is worth his pain, what ultimately just doesn’t matter. A is, in some ways, what B might have become if he were a little more ignorant, spared the ever present reminder that this is all so temporary.

Alternative has many faces that none are as acutely aware of as B- it is why he doesn’t take the quips and backhanded apologies personally. Alternative’s identity has been tailored to his circumstances — so much of it he had to leave behind to become this -- to his superiors, he is mature, disciplined and motivated -- exemplary if not a bit too austere. To those that benefit him, he is considerate and trustworthy- and honest. To those that he fears will take advantage of him, he is an arrogant and harsh - conniving and spoiled. When he is caught without a persona on hand, he is awkward, reclusive, and reserved. Despite this, his cardinal traits are eloquence and persistence, he thinks deeply about his place in the world and who he should be but not enough on who he is — Only B is audience to moments when he is short sighted and immature, when he is undone or humiliated - when he is elated or truly.. afraid of what lay ahead of them. When he is sick or less than who he wants to present himself as, B has been there whether he wanted him to be or not.

Alternative is attracted to B though it is initially a disquieting realization, one even he doesn’t entirely understand. It isn’t that B is unusually good looking or charming — though perhaps A has peculiar tastes that B unintentionally satisfies (I can’t imagine him actually trying)... The level of intimacy involved in knowing someone this long, on such a personal and inescapable level has made B a source of unwavering acceptance, — because he had to be. The alternative would have been sleeping next to someone he would gradually come to despise any who really wants to live that way? Yet, B comes to represent stability and unconditional regard that feels a lot like love. There is a fraternal element to it in that B anchors who he is. B is someone that has a history with him that hasn’t been erased or eroded -- that contradicts A’s perception of the world as fragile or finite - it is comforting to have something seemingly permanent ... and terrifying that he cannot start anew, if he doesn’t like who he is and cannot be hidden in the obscurity that L enjoys.

When B begins to insinuate an interest in something more, A is not initially receptive and becomes genuinely distressed. This doesn’t translate with any logical sense to B, who believes it’s born out of A’s latent fears of realizing his own sexuality...  But, by the time they are entering late adolescence, A is more concerned with the prospect of romance and that becoming L is destined to be a lonely path. He sees their childhood in it’s twilight as a tragic loss that cannot be reclaimed or rewritten, and B’s subtle advances as destructive to the purity of their friendship -- but he can’t stay a child forever even if he feels a sense of unfinished business surrounding it and he can’t keep B there either... It takes B’s attention shifting elsewhere for A to begin softening to the idea that B isn't ruining what's between them but expanding on it.

Alternative has experienced depression -- at some point he was prescribed SSRIs, as a part of basic care for successors. While it does alleviate the depth of his lows, he begins to worry that it is dulling the sharpness of his mind, which he has come to see as central to his self-worth. It may have no foundation in reality but A develops an inconsistent relationship with any medication prescribed to him out of those fears. In the end, - there are some things medicine cannot fix...

A few other small things:

- A loves the smell of lavender and grass, it reminds him of his home though as he gets older this memory is more elusive and he begins to wonder if they memories from funeral flowers or even if they are impressions left over from a dreams.. did he even attend his parents funeral?

- A knows they aren’t allowed to take pictures of each other in Wammy’s for good reason but when Y sneaks a camera into the house one summer evening, he is can’t deny there is something precious about having pictures of B perched on the railing of the back steps - his hair sweep by the wind just as he turns his eyes to look, soft unfocused, — like the tender look he gives him just as he wakes up in the morning before he remembers who they are. A traces the lines of his face while lying beneath his bed, where he tucks it between the boards. It’s only a few years later that he will see how much his friend has matured. -- B hates photographs and will place them face down when they go into Roger’s office. Roger has never understood why.

- A drinks his coffee and tea black as tar. B thinks it is terribly bitter but will bring it to him anyway, unaltered. There is something uniquely enjoyable in knowing that B doesn’t need to be told what he likes~

- A is borderline masochistic though perhaps only B has any inkling of it. He would probably never acknowledge it openly... it is degrading to get a charge out of being hurt.

- A loses his faith around age 10 but still believes that he might as well act as though there is a purpose in being good and not just adept and ruthless. The only alternative, from A’s perspective, is to believe that everything he has been through meant nothing and he will ultimately change nothing. And, that may be too painful a philosophy for him to embrace. 

- A’s worst injury occurred when he was deliberately shoved off the roof by an irate B ( thatvhe provoked). While it was a watershed event for A coming so close to death and experiencing the consequences of pushing B beyond that point of caring about consequences... For Backup, this a was also critically informative event, an exercise proving the numbers were infallible -- he was genuinely surprised that A survived the fall and, to a greater degree, surprised that he felt regret in having done it ... left alone in their room to wonder for days, searching for the contraband pictures from that summer A had hidden that could prove if A was even still alive....

[lesyeuxdeflwr]

NOTRE AMOUR INTERDIT. [ OUR FORBIDDEN LOVE. ]

☆ warnings : cursing ( probably ) BOLD IS NARRATOR’S DIALOGUE. BOLD ITALIC IS [BLONDIE] RED LOCKS’ CHANNEL. Character names are kind of cringey since I based it on Ever After High characters.

☆ pairing : kuroo tetsurou x reader <3

☆ AU : EVER AFTER HIGH! x HAIKYUU!

★ sypnosis : You and kuroo weren’t the least ideal pairing if you were to be a teensy weensy honest to your own uneasy and scattered thoughts. Okay maybe SCARTCH THAT, you had to be MASSIVELY honest. I mean for real, the daughter of Belle and the Beast, a royal; coupled up with the son of the vicious Gaston, a rebel? Both of your parents and Headmaster Grimm thinks the both of you can seriously do much better. "If you’re a Royal. You must marry a Royal. If you’re a Rebel, you must marry a Rebel." The bullshit they would say. Apparently Kuroo and you thought the opposite.

★ author’s note : I haven’t wrote in so long 😇🙏 I myself find this absolutely cringe worthy but I tried 😬😬. I was and still absolutely in love with Ever After High so I just wanted to give it a try, like the idea just popped into my mind and wow "seems cool" 😱😔🙏😯✋🤨❌😐🙏

You and kuroo never wished to be stucked in both of your parents wretched legacies. It was something you never asked for and will never ever need. And ever since you knew you were destined to dump his ass just for a so Prince Charming and for you to be able to live happily ever after with that so called 'Prince', it was an definite no. Your story was just like any other tragic heck of of a love story. Just like Romeo and Juliet..but definitely without the dying part, you thought. And this time you were dedicated to stop the multiple dragging of the stereotypical cycle that had been stretched on for long ages and decades, it had absolutely sicken you to death. Kuroo and you were just teenagers. Both who love each other to death to even have the biggest confidence to rebel against your parents. Plus Kuroo wasn’t anything like his dad. His dad was arrogant, vicious, overly narcissistic, obsessive, and chauvinistic. While, him. He was everything you wanted. They never deciphered who he was, to them he was the exact embodiment of his old man. But to you he was just another smart closeted nerd who gave unfunny jokes, to you he was a dorky simp who’d make flower crowns whenever you had dreamy secret garden dates, to you he looked just about like a puppy when waking up with his unusually messier bed hair, to you he was your twin flame, your other half. Though definitely he was surely narcissistic from time to time but he was nothing too overbearing. It wouldn’t make sense if he was Gaston’s son and wasn’t at all manifesting and voicing out his arrogant opinions about his looks once in a while, right?

But you couldn’t really blame him either, he was just out-rightly plain handsome. You giggled lightly a hand over your mouth, that was your first thought about him. In your first meeting. It wasn’t really a fond memory of yours at first, before you started seeing each other. You two clashed bad, hardly any space to confine in between the both your petty arguments towards each other. You were as sensitive as him as he was as sarcastic as you. You’ve never even thought of about standing two feet near his as you’d say before 'Rebel ass'. But now here you were stroking his abnormally large rooster bed hair lightly while he had his head laid on your lap humming a cute song that had been both of your favorite song ever since you’ve introduced him to the diverse beauty of music. You should thank the Cupid of Ever After High, Yachi Hitoka for having you slowly grown off your slow burn wattpad kind of story and into the land of sweetness and absolute love. "Have you ever heard of the song 'Line without a hook'?" Kuroo had asked you kissing the top of your right, soft, and feminine hand as he stood up into a sitting position, laying his head on your comfortable and long neck. "No? Is that like a type of figure of speech or a slang term I missed hearing about? I swear Alisa always tells me the new slangs." Kuroo nodded through the crook of your warm neck. "It’s kind of like me telling you that I don’t think I’ll be able to live without you. You’re a big deal, a Royal, a princess, and I’m just a Rebel, a villain whose job was to ruin everything they surrounded. I’m a line without a hook, except I do have the hook. You. you were and will always be the hook to my line. But I’m beginning to wonder if you would really want to be with me. I mean you’re just so wonderful? So beautiful, so admirable—" Before he could even process on with his ramble you’ve already chapped his lips on yours, kissing him desperately like it was the end of the cruel world— a demanding but soft kiss. It wasn’t the even the first time you kissed but holy fuck, Kuroo had still heard his loud heart beating, enough to get him into a frenzy as he felt his knees grow weaker and weaker to your touch. The way you curled your fingers around his own, your own fragrance that he loved ever since, smelled like books with a hint of freshly baked cinnamon and strawberries. He wasn’t sure if nature rooted for this moment or if his mind tricked him into a perfect present, but every breath he took smelled like jasmine and for the first time since he’d known himself, he didn’t feel insecure because you who had been there for him, although he was too blinded with his own doubtful thoughts to see. Had basked him with affection and the warmth your body gave off. This time around he draped both arms around your own small frame and met your lips again halfway.

You’ve finally decided to rip the both of your lips from each other as you made eye contact with his soft hazel eyes, it reflecting so ethereally under the winsome hues of orange tangerine, mellow yellow, murky red the sunset had offered. "To start with I choose you and I will never choose anyone else, Kuroo. I will never not love you. You are so beautiful, so handsome. My love for you is so strong that neither a bank full of riches could break it down. Kuroo I love you, and I always will. Let’s go through this together, yeah? You don’t need to carry the burden for your own self, love. We’re in this, the two of us, together." Kuroo couldn’t help but spread a euphoric grin to his face as he tackled you into a tight hug under the cherry blossom tea. "I love you so much."

Lunch had came to Ever After High as you and Kuroo had pretended to despise each other through your expressions but something was different. He wasn’t as intense with his glares, it looked more nervous than it should have. Wait why is he standing up? Why is he carrying an enormous amount of pink roses in a big bouquet? Why are birds dropping petals around him, singing angelic and melodic tunes? Is he going towards your direction? You thought he wanted the both of you to be an unknown secret? Thoughts go through your thick head as you hadn’t notice Kuroo had already been in front of you. "You had made me realize that maybe, just maybe, we can be able to defy against all odds and stop the stereotypical cicrcle once and for all. So will you Beauty Y/n accept my public confession and mark this as our first day of not having to spend days and nights planning out hidden dates?" Before you could have comprehend your own body was not cooperating, your legs giving out as you find yourself already wrapped in kuroo’s sweet smell as he held you high up twirling you around, arms balancing you, and two goofy smiles plastered on your face. "Y/n? You and Kuroo a-are dating?" Alisa Haiba White, daughter of Snow White had asked so hesitantly. "B-but you’re a Royal? And he’s a..Rebel?!" She had opened both of her hands that looked like she was offering, transitioning over to you and Kuroo. "Totally awkward!" Terushima Yuuji Hood, son of Robin hood. Singing as he played a small rock tune on his guitar along with it. You ignored her and Hood as you stroll to the opposite side of their direction pulling Kuroo with you, he gave her an apologetic look shrugging his shoulders and obediently following you.

"A Royal dating a Rebel? That’s just not how the tale is told."

"The followed their true hearts! After all that’s kind of the things you do in True heart’s day? It’s in the title!"

"So fellow Fairy Tales! Red Locks here aka Tendou Satori, to give you reaction to the Royal Rebellious romance!"

"I think it’s hexcellent! Y/n and Kuroo decided to rewrite their destinies, what’s wrong with that?" Alisa can be heard and seen from the back, her cries and tantrums shown throughout the interview. — Interview answered by Sugawara Queen Koushi, son of the Evil Queen.

"I feel for them. I mean keeping secrets is hard.." Terushima can be seen trying to steal Kenma’s food failing as the red hooded boy, threatened him with his piercing gold eyes. —Interview answered by Kenma Kozume Hood, son of Red Riding Hood.

"A Royal and a Rebel? Heh. They’re from two different worlds—" Hot blazing fire shots towards Oikawa’s strong shield, a big and buff dragon towering over him. "I am trying to do an interview here!" He threw the shield on the ground as the dragon let out a whimper and sulked in fear. — Interview answered by Prince Oikawa Tooru Charming, son of Prince Charming.

"I’m worried about Y/n and Kuroo. If they don’t follow their destinies, their books could close...forever." — Interview answered by Alisa Haiba White, daughter of Snow White.

"Remember our quiz tomorrow, on Tiara sighs and future neck problems." You begrudgingly stride towards your best friend. "Alisa we need to talk." Alisa stopd up a sorrowful and worried look plastered on her face. "N/n this is hard for me. Which is a first because I usually handle everything so very well. I’m just surprised you didn’t trust me enough to tell me." Alisa’s hand shapes into a small crunched heart as she places it under her chin midway, into her second sentence. "I know. I just didn’t think you’d understand, well mostly because you’re very much strict in following our own destinies." Alisa creases both her eyebrows hand staying staying still under her chin. "I guess I don’t? It just doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t want to see anything bad happen to someone I care so much about." At this point Alisa’s arms were crosses against each other the clash of her eyebrows going even deeper.

"And so you’re telling me all these heart-shaped cakes are for your play...?" Headmaster Grimm had asked as he opened the white boxes that was offered. Cute shades of pink are shown throughout the exquisite designs of the heart-shaped cakes as it is shown in his line of sight. "Y-yeah for the play! T-they’re for the really funny scene, where Suna throws them at Yamomoto!" Yamomoto Taketora, the son of the Frog Prince. Had looked so done with his life blustering out a small, "Excuse me?!" Suna Rintarou, son of sleeping beauty. Went down the the Headmaster, as he winds up his shoulder throwing the heart-shaped cake at Yamomoto. "Very well." Both Yachi, Suna, and Yamomoto had sauntered down their shoulders a hard sigh of relief passing through their throats and out their mouths.

You walked through the rocky roads as multiple clothing, hair, shoe shops surrounded every corner of the side roads. You stopped at the shop Alisa was in your right hand touching the window as your longing gaze intenses, of course you would miss your best friend. "Hi Y/n." Duch Kōrai Hoshiumi, son of the Swan Queen had appeared in front of you suddenly as his voice held a gentle and almost desperate tone. "Duch. What do you want?" You let go of your lingering touch on the window as you walked to the opposite direction of the latter. "What do I want? My own happily every after, of course! And now that everyone knows that you’re dating a Rebel it looks like there’s one available. No hard cover books for you, boo." You look at him hurt and worried. You didn’t know whether to be worried of how he was so invested in ruining others life just because he won’t have his own happily ever after. Or be hurt by the way he told you that publicly dating Kuroo was the biggest mistake of you life. Why not just write your own destiny, like me, like Kuroo, like the both of us? "So you’re happy about Kuroo and I are dating, while my best friends aren’t happy? Maybe I did make a mistake..." Hoshiumi widens his eyes mentally slapping himself as the guilt slips in, he shakes his head. Not like he would tell anyone what he was actually feeling. "What?! No! You’re totally doing the right thing! Follow your heart...and..uh all of that.. sappy stuff.." He was too late for you were already running around the corners, laying in your shared dorm room with Suna. Am I taking back what I said to him? Am I doing the opposite of what I’ve promised to him myself? Am I going to stop ‘never not loving him'? But I can’t. I love him too much. But what about Alisa. You know what, fuck this. If she can’t accept who I love it’s not worth it to continue our friendship. We’ll keep on holding on to the person who we thought each other was rather than the present persona we have right now.

That’s what you thought.

"Sorry but I’m saving this for Y/n." Kuroo mutters placing a mirror frame with a picture of the both of you together, cuddly and kissy. The lanky teenage boy who had been rejected begins to find another seat but not without a nasty glare and an ugly leer to spare. Kuroo whistles a high pitches tune with his fingers between his lips. A squirrel and a bunny hop their way to the table wearing cute mini suits, arranging a fancy dinner plate set and an extra extravagant candle that lit up the moment it touches the table. "Hey Y/n!" Kuroo waves his thinly hand at you, clearing his dry throat. Two birds pass by you dropping your favorite kind of flowers. Tulips. And finally a hand-made flower crown is over her head, now dropping. He made the flower crown the way you like it. "Kuroo.. we need to talk." Kuroo has this sense of urgency, just from telling by the way you talked he could already comprehend it was something bad and he wasn’t ready. "Uhh..Y/n?" He never was and never will be. "I just— I thought this would be a good thing. You showing us we’re dating to the whole school. I thought it would take the pressure off but now...everything is worse." Kuroo can’t bare to look at you, if he did he would’ve broken down here and now. "W-what do you mean? I thought we were through this together? I thought I didn’t have to do this alone? Why does it feel like I’m drifting away from you again, but this time. This time it’s you whose the cause of it?" You could already feel the horror and grief you would during the aftermath of these heartbreaking events. "I-i don’t know, but what will happen to our stories, to our legacies, to our destinies. I swear I’m being such a hypocrite now but what if it is best? What if we really actually were not supposed to be for each other? I don’t want anything bad to happen to us, to you. I think— I think we should break-up."

"And so, as the Sun set in Ever After High. The students were getting fairest for the big dance."

You looked at the the side of your mirror a clear picture of you and Kuroo placed with a heart-shaped sticker. The frown on your face had become much more frowny, if that was even possible.

"Give it up for Semi Eita Piper!" Loud cheers of hilarity can be heard from the whole room as they danced to their hearts content to the cool music and beats Semi Eita Piper, the son of Peter Piper had in stored for them. "Now since True Heart’s Day hasn’t been spelebrated in such a long time I wanted to tell everyone what it’s all about. Once upon a time, there grew a very special tree. The Heart Tree. And even if the winter was harsh, and the other’s failed to bloom; the Heart Tree blossomed no matter what. And so, our Fairy Tale ancestors gave the blossoms to each other on True Heart’s Day. To show that even though it’s not always easy true love will always find a way. And so to encourage all of us to follow our true heart—" Petite and ethereal fairies fly all over the room dropping multiple numbers of hearts to the students inside each receiving colors of hot hot pink and lovely red. "Make sure to give yours to someone special to you!" Before you knew it you were already on stage with your friend, Yachi as you ask to take the mic from her and prepare for your small speech towards the only love of your life. "Excuse me— uhm can I? Kuroo? When I listened to my true heart, it tells me that you’re the only one. You’re my Prince Charming, villain or not. You’re my love, my everything, my twin flame. And I think you’re a fairy tale. I think you’re magical , and brave, and exquisite. And I hope you’ll let me be in your story once again." Kuroo was about to say something but Tendou beat him to it as his curious personality spikes him up as the son of Goldie Locks. "But how can you be a Royal and date Kuroo?" He looks at you intently as if waiting for your answer, hoping it would be a good one. "If writing our own 'Happily Ever After' means I can’t be a Royal then call me Beauty Y/n the Rebel!" You pointed your left pointing finger as the once worry wart look on your face had disappeared and was replaced with a jovial and confident smirk. "Kuroo? I want to give this to you, if you’ll have it." You grin at him awkwardly offering the small heart to him. "Of course I will, I can never resist you no matter what." He would’ve begged you either way to come back to him after the part but this was a hundred times better.

"Alisa! I-i’m so sorry I just had to do it and I love him so mu—" Alisa had approached you with a frown on her face offering her small heart just like how you offered Kuroo your own heart. "I might be worried about you, and I might think you’re doing the wrong thing, but I want you to know we’ll always be friends. That’s what’s in my True heart." You smiled widely at her, finally coming into good terms and resolved the issue once and for all. "Thank you Alisa!" You let out an insanely jovial glee at her. Dragging your bed headed boyfriend, you slow danced with him. "Do you think we could have cuddly sessions after these?" He asks hesitantly playing with the hem of your silk dress. "At our cottage in the forest Sir yes Sir." You bluntly said so serious that Kuroo can’t help but laugh because you were just absolutely too cute for your own good. He leans in your forehead, ignorant to both your height differences as he basks in his own enjoyment, happiness, and joy he is now currently feeling. He is happy, you are happy, both of you are happy.