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stellocchia · 3 years

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Here we go with another Overly Long Analysis!

This is part 2 of my little 3 parter thing about the streams from the 28th. You can find part one where I discussed Sapnap's stream [Here]

As always I'll be talking about the characters, not the content creators unless stated otherwise, and the dialogue is color-coded so we'll have: Tommy, Dream, Phil, Ghostboo, Jack, Quackity, Eryn

Of course, this is an Overly Long Analysis so everything is under the cut.

(Little gift left from Eryn)

"If Dream really has escaped then he's gonna come for me. He's gonna come straight for me" (Turns out that Tommy really is the one who understands Dream's priorities the best, everyone else thought he'd go for his weapons first)

Tommy's first instinct is to build up his defenses: build walls, seal off the entrances, get resources, and such. He soon remembers about the Ax of Peace in the Exile area and decides that recovering has priority.

"Dream can't have the Ax of Peace! That would be far too much irony!" (Once again using humor to deal with highly stressful situations)

"The weather is such a clear juxtaposition to how I feel right now" (I just thought this was a pretty interesting example of Tommy showing he can be eloquent)

Tommy meets Tubbo outside the portal. Tubbo moves as if to follow him but Tommy shakes his head signaling him to stay put. I think that may be because, as he'd mentioned a few times, he actually expected Dream to get the ax and it is possible that he didn't want Tubbo to follow along because he didn't want to risk endangering him. (That's just a theory of course).

He gets to Logstedshire and finds the chest, but it's already empty. Dream isn't immediately noticeable when he gets out of the hole, what tips Tommy off is the now broken portal in fact:

This is a pretty big callback to Dream destroying the portal in Logstedshire the last time they were there to cut off Tommy from the rest of the server. This is, in fact, a pretty good way to isolate him physically as well, since it takes quite a while for anyone to get there in the overworld.

"Hey, welcome back to exile! Welcome back! Welcome! You’re back at home!" (I find it pretty interesting that, the way that is phrased, make it sound like Dream is welcoming Tommy back to their home. Not just Tommy's home, but both of theirs)

"Give me that ax, that's not yours. You can't hold the Ax of Peace" "Oh, it wasn't yours either" "Yeah but I earned it" "Oh, how'd you earn it?" "I earned it from fighting for- for doing the right thing Dream. Something you've- stand- stand back!" "I'm not gonna hurt you... yet"

From the opening here there's a lot to say. For one thing, Dream is pretty friendly here at the start, or faux friendly at least. He's fully aware that Tommy is scared of him, it would be hard to miss, but he's still playing this charade with him. It's somewhat similar to how he acted in exile, but the danger is much more clear, and it's intended to be that way (which is obvious by the threat of "yet" there at the end).

Another thing of notice is that Tommy starts responding that he earned the ax by fighting for [Techno], but immediately switches it up by saying that he actually earned it by doing the right thing. This is a pretty big callback to him taking the decision to leave Techno's destructive ways behind and actually help his friends during the Community House scene.

The last thing is: body language. Dream, in every single scene where he's with Tommy since exile always tends to crowd in on him. Doesn't give him much space most of the time, and here's not any different.

"I'm out. That means I'm meant to be out. I earned it!" "No no, please stand back... You didn't earn it I- you didn't earn anything! You stole! You manipulated! You d- you- you- you killed- Dream! One of the last times we were here you killed me just to prove a point! You- you haven't earned anything! Stand back alright? I've got my shield up"

This does go to show that Dream didn't think that his betterment was the objective of the prison. He earned being out by simply getting out. To Tommy it seems to be the opposite, the reason why Dream hasn't earned his freedom to him is the fact that he still hurt him. The last time they saw each other Dream killed him, so of course, he didn't earn his freedom. Also, notice the sheer number of times Tommy has to ask Dream to stand back? Yeah, Dream really doesn't know what personal space is when he's around Tommy.

"Maybe I'll kill you again⁓" "Don't- no you won't" "And then I'll revive you, and then I'll kill you again, and then I'll revive you, and then I'll kill you again, and then I'll revive you" "No you won't!" "And then I'll kill you again!" *Dream approaches Tommy again and Tommy hits him* "No you fucking won't!" "Don't hit me!" "Stop speaking like that!"

Once again it's interesting to notice when the pretenses fall with Dream. Tommy just disagreed with him, putting something Dream said into question ("I'm free I deserve it" vs "No you don't") much like it happened in the prison ("I can revive people" vs "No you can't") and that's when Dream stopped pretending. That said, even in this scene Dream is using the particular "soft" tone he often uses with Tommy, most likely because he knows that that specific tone is one of Tommy's triggers.

"Hey Tommy, you wanna- you wanna drop your items in a hole?" (Once again aiming for Tommy's triggers)

"Just me and you! No one knows we're here!" *Tommy hits Dream and Dream hits back* "Tommy don't fight me" (using "don't fight me" instead of using "don't hit me" again is an interesting choice. Especially considering the fact that Dream was trying to convince him to behave like he would back in exile again. So it can be interpreted as "don't fight my conditioning" as well)

An interesting thing to notice is also that Dream repeats the fact that they're alone and no one knows where they are multiple times. The tone he uses is one of fake reassurance that is anything but. But I do wonder if he's just trying to get Tommy back in that sort of mentality or if he's also noting that for himself. He does seem to be quite happy about being back there just the two of them once more.

"You could die right now and no one would know. No one would know. No one would care" "Every- dude, people would care, alright?! You're not doing this again!" "Oh who would care?" "You get into people's heads Dream!" "Who's your friend? Who's your friend?" "You get into people's heads alright?" "Tell me who your friends are Tommy! Who's your friend?" "Tubbo! Ranboo!" "Oh okay. What about- what about- what are they doing?" "They're my friends alright! They're not- none of them are gonna stand for your shit this time!"

And we're back on Dream's good old manipulations tactics. Only this time they don't really work for 2 main reasons: the only reason why Dream was able to make Tommy doubt his friends in exile was that they had just seriously hurt him with the exile itself, right now though he's pretty confident in his friendships because things have been going smoothly, the second reason is that Tommy knows how Dream's manipulation works by now. That doesn't make him immune to it, but it does mean that he's gonna question everything that comes from Dream's mouth.

"You wanna invite them to your party, Tommy? You wanna give them a little party? Come on, let’s go to the beach! Let’s have a little party, let’s have some tea-" (Dream using traumas he caused against Tommy instance number 3)

"You know you fucked me, Tommy. You put me in prison. I rotted in there. I was tortured by Quackity! I'm sure you knew about that. I'm sure- I'm sure you let it happen- I'm sure you wanted it to happen" "What...?"

Another interesting little exchange. This is Dream shifting the entire blame of what happened to him onto Tommy (despite Tommy having nothing to do with it) for the simple reason that taking his frustration out on Tommy is more fun than taking it out on Sam (the one who actually proposed to put Dream in prison and who escorted him there) and Quackity (the one responsible for the torture) would be. Because no one but Tommy is fun it seems. Also, this is the third instance of Tommy empathizing with his abuser because of something bad that happened to him (the first was during the Disc War Finale and the second in prison), which speaks volumes about his capacity for empathy.

"Tommy, I am going to make every day for you a living hell on this earth" "No, you’re not. No, you’re not" "I’m not gonna let you die, I’m not gonna let you die" "This isn’t happening, this isn’t happening" "I can bring people back. You’re living forever. You’ll be immortal, we’ll be immortal and I will fuck with you every single day"

I said this before, but Dream's way of speaking about Tommy becoming immortal has shifted from "We can become immortal together" which implies that that's a possibility, not a certainty (and even implies that Tommy may have some degree of choice in the matter, even if that was never the case) to what we have now. Now it's not a possibility any longer, it's a simple fact. And any pretense of choice Tommy had before is gone with the "I won't let you die".

"You're just the big bully alright? And this is just the school cafeteria" (Tommy using metaphors to simplify complex emotions he wouldn't be able to express otherwise, it's a pretty common thing he does to deal with stuff)

"Okay. How about- how about- why don’t you experience maybe- maybe, eh, 1000 years of the afterlife, Tommy" (Dream using traumas he caused against Tommy instance number 4)

We proceed to have a chase scene that lasts several minutes. It's several minutes of psychological torture in a row. There are also quite a few interesting exchanges during it:

"You can't do any of this Dream" "Tommy" "What?" "Who's gonna stop me?" (Does this remind anyone of the "how powerful I am and how powerless you are" scene?)

"Don't fight me Tommy! Don't fight me!" (again, same point as before. Using "fight" instead of "hit" or some variation of that feels like a rather interesting choice)

"People are gonna know this time Dream, They're gonna know that you did this!" "No they're not! And everyone is gonna think I changed Tommy while I make your life a living Hell" (This probably reinforced Tommy's belief that no one would believe him about what he's been through. Something that proves to be wrong later)

"You know I'm only on one life! No I can't- I can't go through that again!" "You know what Tommy? You're not on one life!" "I can't go through this shit again!" "You have infinite lives, Tommy! You're at infite lives! You have infinite lives Tommy!" (Once again, he talks about it in the present. Meaning that in Dream's mind immortality is not a thing he has to reach anymore, it's something he already has. Or, at least, something Tommy already has)

"I don’t have infinite lives, Dream, ‘cause every time you do- every time you do any of this, it hurts!" (PTSD coming back in full force)

"If this helps you sleep at night, that’s fine! But you’re gonna go down as the monster in history, alright! L’Manberg is remembered as a good thing! No one’s gonna remember you as a good thing, Dream! Your legacy-! No one’s ever gonna remember you, no one’s ever gonna love you, you’re gonna be alone" (Once again the theme of Legacy coming through. Multiple people tried to destroy L'Manburg's legacy but it still lives through people like Tommy, meanwhile Tommy's right, Most people definitely don't think about Dream in positive terms)

"I'm just- I'm just toying with you again Tommy. I- I- I probably could have killed you by now if I really wanted to. This is just fun"

Btw, this is the confirmation of what I said at the beginning. Dream knows that he simply shifted the blame on Tommy once more, but he doesn't care because for him this is fun. Chasing Tommy down, making him think that he's gonna kill him (even though he didn't have any actual intention to do so), hurting him, taunting him, that's what Dream has fun doing. Also callback to the Disc War Finale with the whole "I'm just toying with you" speech.

Finally, Tommy notices Techno's and Phil's beacon and goes towards them screaming for Phil. Dream is not pleased about this, but Tommy gets to Phil before he can stop him so he retreats. (Therefore starting his whole plan to mess with Tommy while everyone else is none the wiser). Phil doesn't see Dream anywhere, but he still does believe Tommy.

"He hit me Phil- he killed me. I can't go through- I can't go through that again Phil. I've spent all this time rebuilding myself up alone. Working on my- my self-confidence, my health and I- I- I can't go through it again Phil, alright?" "It's okay, it's okay" "When he killed me that sent me down the worse spiral I've ever been- I can't-" "Tommy, Tommy, you're safe"

This is the second time that day that Tommy tried to explain what happened to him amidst a full-blown panic attack (the first time was when he was explaining why Dream was bad to Eryn and Michael). Also, Phil tries his best here to calm him down, but, admittedly, there isn't much he can actually do.

"No Phil he was just there! I'm so- you- you believe me?! He was just there! Minutes before!" "I believe you. I- It's okay. It's okay. I believe you" (Again, Tommy is terrified of not being believed. Partly due to what Dream said, for sure, but partly also because he's been branded a liar before and people do generally assume the worst of him)

Tommy hides out in Phil's base and there's a little scene where he sees Wilbur's picture and sighs in relief (still finding safety in his older brother figure).

"Phil, I saw him break out of prison. I saw- did I see you? Did I see- I saw him, and Techno, and Ranboo I think, were you there?" "Yeah... yeah. Tommy, I- I got something to tell you. I... I- I helped- I helped break him out" "Phil... why? Why would you do that Phil? You don't- you- why- why- tell me why you did that, right now!" "Techno" "Tell me no reason I shouldn't burn down your entire house too, Phil" "Techno had to repay a favor" "So it wasn't your favor" "No" "Please just tell me I can trust you Phil!" "You can trust me, you can trust me" "Ever since L'Manburg I haven't- I- you know I haven't been able to go near anyone properly"

Okay, wow, long one. Alright, 3 things to say here:

1) This is an interesting look into Phil's mentality. Techno had to repay a favor so they were justified in freeing Tommy's abuser from prison. It was just a business transaction after all, freedom for the favor to be considered repaid. The consequences this would have on everyone else aren't even part of the equation for him.

2) Tommy's trust issues come back in full force. They have originated from a lot of things: Eret betraying them in the original war, Wilbur during Pogtopia, Dream during Pogtopia, Techno's betrayal, Tubbo betraying his trust by going back on his decision during the exile debacle, Dream's manipulation, and so on. Definitely having just passed a stressful 15 minutes with his abuser trying to convince him that no one cared once again didn't help

3) Much like we did for Tubbo, we now have the confirmation that Tommy too hasn't felt like he belonged to a community since L'Manburg. Which makes Phil's speech afterward about how they valued material items too much feel even more laughable and detached from reality.

"I get you didn't mean that, but sometimes Phil it's not- even for the right price Phil you have a r- r- r- a responsibility. You've not done the right thing" "I've done the right thing by Techno" "But Techno doesn't always do the right thing Phil!"

I'm guessing that here Tommy sees himself in Phil. Or, more so, how things could have gone for him, and he doesn't like it. Because he was in the same position before, he could have "done right by Techno" as Phil put it and stuck with him during the Community House confrontation. But he didn't, because to Tommy people have a responsibility to do the right thing, and destroying L'Manburg wasn't it.

"I wanted to make money because there's nothing else more valuable to me because I have no value" (He always sprinkles little self-deprecating sentences like this in the middle of his rants and it's rather worrying ngl)

"Fucking psychopath, he knows me so fucking well Phil" (Yeah, Dream by now can predict Tommy with ease most of the time. Not enough to find him boring, but enough for his stalkerish behaviour to be possible)

"The first thing he does when he gets out of prison is torment a child. I swear to God, I'm gonna fucking murder this Teletubby piece of shit next time I see him" (Guess we know Phil's opinion on the matter then. Also this does make Tommy feel a lot better)

"Will you walk me back to my base? I don't like it here in the snow. It reminds me of when I used to stay in there hiding from Dream. Ha... I'm just back, aren't I? My life is just one big hidey-hole from Dream, Phil. I've got no substance" (Once again, his self-deprecation coming through)

"If me and you are friends then Dream will know and he'll come for you, alright?" (A few examples of this in the past are Dream trying to kill Ghostbur, Dream killing MD, and Dream trying to kill Tubbo. All of them because they were close to Tommy. So this isn't an unfounded fear that Tommy has)

"He's gonna make me sound crazy, Phil! He's gonna make me sound fucking insane, but I'm not! I know I'm not!" (Now this is entirely a result of what Dream said previously. The fact that no one would believe Tommy because he'd make them think he changed while he's torturing Tommy. Which, btw, Dream tries to do immediately with Sapnap and fails miserably)

"Why did you- why did you do L'Manburg Phil? Why did you blow it up? Because you didn't- you know you and Techno didn't have to. You didn't have to" "We kinda did. It's the only way to get through. With, like, the message. I'm sorry you had to go through that" "What was- what was the message? I did Phil! I really had to go through it! You don't even know what I've had to go through!" "The message was Tommy- right, the message was Tommy that there's more important things than material items in this world. There's more important things than a country in this world. People- people are way more important, they're valuable, they're not here forever, okay?"

Let's take this one at a time again:

1) Tommy completely demolished Phil's point on why L'Manburg needed to be destroyed by simply not understanding the message. Proving once more that violence is not a universal language. People don't learn anything valuable through violence, they only learn to be scared of those harming them

2) One of the richest people in the server telling one of the poorest that he and the other rich f*cks had to teach the poor that material items weren't that important is just hypocrisy at its finest.

3) Phil went on a whole rant about how people are more important, which is fair, but Tommy mentioned just a while before how L'Manburg WAS people. L'Manburg was the only thing that gave many of them a sense of community. By destroying it Phil and Techno only harmed the people, they didn't teach them anything, they just split them up. Took away their sense of community, their sense of belonging

Also, Phil gave Tommy a speech about how better he must feel now that he's free of responsibility as if Tommy hadn't mentioned just a couple of minutes before that he'd been living in a never-ending spiral of bad mental and physical health ever since. Like, Phil, please.

"Sometimes is not just about the materials or the nation it's about- it's about the meaning behind it. You know my discs Phil?" "Yeah" "They're not just music discs now. They're a sign of victory, a sign of progression, a sign of- of- of health. I- I won something Phil! Because you know me, you know of- of my past histories, I never used to win, even before this Dream SMP I was always on the losing side. That was proof I won something"

This is the first time that Tommy actually put into words why the discs matter. Why everything matters actually. Because there are memories tied to the things we surround ourselves with. They are reminders of good times, sometimes reminders of bad times. But, regardless, it's natural and healthy to develop an attachment to things, as long as it doesn't become excessive (like, if you build a shrine made of pure gold for the things you're attached to maybe you've gone a tad too far).

"And now look back where we are, I'm just a shell! An anxious, paranoid, traumatized shell Phil! And it's-" "You're not. You're not Tommy. You're so much stronger than that, you're so much more than that" (This stream is truly the self-deprecation fest for Tommy. That said, it was about time someone actually told him out loud that he's worth more than he thinks)

"I forgive you for L'Manburg Phil. Not everyone else, not the incident itself, but you"

Now, I wanted to talk about this because A LOT of people complained about it. Before I say anything, it's important to take note of the fact that Tommy is forgiving Phil and only Phil on a personal level. He's not saying that he agrees with him, he's not saying that he's forgiving Doomsday as a whole, just Phil.

Why? Well, he mentions later that he appreciates Phil taking the time to explain things. Despite everything Tommy still holds the original values of L'Manburg, aka words over violence. To him, someone who uses words will always be stronger. Therefore this already makes him more inclined to forgiveness. On top of that there's the fact that Tommy agrees with part of what Phil is saying, he agrees that people are worth more than anything, he's shown this before. He doesn't agree with Phil's methods, but he agrees with that message. And also, of course, he was in an extremely vulnerable state of mind at that moment. He's been in an incessant self-deprecation spiral intermitted with panic attacks the whole day and Phil is the one who helped him with it, of course, he's gonna be grateful.

That said, after that discussion Tommy explains that he needs to put up some walls to protect the area of his base. Eryn gets there as well.

"Tommy's having a bit of a moment. He's, uh, he's working through it. He's working through it. I'm proud of him. I'm proud of him" (Pretty sure it's been a long ass time since anyone said they were proud of Tommy)

Eryn pushes Tommy a bit too much on what happened (not maliciously, he was just confused) and Tommy lashes out a bit and asks him to leave.

"We need Shroud, my beloved pet, in a box and safe. We need to make sure that nothing can happen to him. I can't- I can't relive what went through with Henry" (Just saying, the pet wars also gave him some traumas)

"You look different" "Yeah because I'm- it's because I'm dead" (Can't believe that people don't actually realize he's dead unless he tells them)

"Take this for a sec" *Tommy throws an allium to Ranboo* "Calm yourself" "Uuuuh, thank you! I like these ones! These ones are great" "Me too" (Allium duo moment everybody. Also Tommy actually admitted he likes flowers for once)

Ghostboo expresses a worrying amount of dislike towards Ranboo. It's pretty much the opposite of Wilbur as a situation. He does have all his memories though. And he gives Tommy an enchanted golden apple.

"When I take damage, especially if it's from Dream, it doesn't just hurt my body, it hurts my mind, alright?" (For those who think Tommy has "gotten over his fear of damage already" the answer is no, he's still traumatized)

"This is too much for one boy to handle" (Again, to those wondering if he's actually meant to be a kid? Yes, yes he is)

Quackity contacts Tommy and tells him to meet him in the Holy Land so that's where they meet, on top of the Holy Land's Tower. To be exact Quackity finds Tommy on a precarious wooden platform, which freaks him out quite a bit. Especially since it's the second time that Quackity sees Tommy on the edge of an extremely tall building. Still, after getting him back inside he tries to help Tommy. First he tries to get Tommy to accept the fact that Dream DID escape and that he IS out. Then he tries to get him to relax.

"You can't live under paranoia. I lived under paranoia, it started fucking with my brain and so much shit happened" (Quackity also being rather self-aware)

"First of all, as much as I appreciate this acting like a bit of a big brother I just, you know- I just- I've been with Wilbur. You know, after all that Las Nevadas stuff it's- you know it's still a little..." *Quackity laughs* "No no Tommy. No no no, forget about Wilbur. Listen, this is not- nothing to do with Las Nevadas. Forget Las Nevadas, forget Wilbur" (Not much to say, I just found it interesting that Tommy immediately assumed this was some kind of ploy)

Quackity actually takes off his armor to make Tommy more comfortable. Which is actually a big thing for both of them, for Tommy because he's generally the one in the weaker position when it comes to gear, and for Quackity because he generally doesn't trust many other people to do it around them.

"He fucking-! The first thing he does after getting out of jail is go and see you and- and fucking-" (..) "Stop! Tommy, first things first: you're not insane. Okay? Listen to me, you're not insane. That guy's a piece of shit, I think you and me know it very well, that guy's a fucking- he's the scum of Earth. I fucking hate him, Tommy, I despise him okay? I know what he's capable of, I know what he's done, okay?" (Once again, we know what Quckity's opinion on what happened is. Less surprising from him but he did manage to keep Tommy from spiraling)

"Listen, do walls help you feel safe? More comfortable? Less overwhelmed?" "Yes, I've got a good history with them. Whenever I've been in a wall with my friends it's been lovely! Those were the good times-" "Okay, listen, there you go"

Another moment that's important to both of them. For Quackity, walls have always been something that made him feel excluded, left out, which is why he's making sure that they're actually a good thing for Tommy before handing him over the materials for them (and he gives him obsidian and yellow concrete to emulate L'Manburg's walls, which was just lovely). Meanwhile, for Tommy they've always been a good thing, they remind him of a time when he was safe and content.

"I don't trust anyone but I think- I think I've learned something and it's that, if someone's looking out for you, at least one person, it doesn't hurt to have that person around, okay? I'll be that person for you Tommy, if you ever need anything from me, if you ever want anything just let me know" (Quackity is basically offering to be for Tommy what Slime was for him, someone Tommy can trust fully and that's unconditionally loyal to him)

Quackity mentions that he has people in Las Nevadas who protect him, and asks Tommy if there's someone who does that for him. Since Tommy denies that Quackity hands him his own armor so Tommy can get a full set of netherite. Again, normally Quackity is the one receiving armor, it's a big ass thing for him to be the one to give it away. Also, they canonically hugged.

On the way back Tommy meets Sam. Tommy is pissed at him for not improving the security after he himself broke in, meanwhile, Sam is just really glad that Tommy is alive. Sam also tells Tommy that Dream is gonna come for him (which Tommy definitely knew already), gives him a full set of enchanted netherite armor, and begs him not to go after Dream (Tommy promises, but he does so keeping his fingers crossed). Tommy asks Sam to keep an eye out for him and his base, and then they part ways.

"Oh dude, I feel safe in here man! This is just- I feel safe!" (A reminder of home was all he needed to feel a bit safer again)

Sam arrives to give Tommy some more obsidian and Tommy gives him one of his diamonds as payment (so guess Sam WAS keeping an eye out for the base). Jack arrives at the scene as well and Ghostboo immediately traps him in a box to the confusion and slight horror of Tommy.

"Dude, Jack, I don't wanna see you, your such a host- hotel-stealing piece of shit" (Guess Tommy is still upset about that. The resentment still goes both ways for them)

"Look, I don't give a shit about seeing you either, I just wanted to make sure you were alive and look: here you are, you're fine" "Why would you make sure I'm ali-?" "I just wanna make sure you're alive! That's fine! Dream's out, I just-"

Jack's feelings on Tommy are obviously still conflicted. But him checking on him to make sure he's alive still speaks volumes about the affection he still feels for him. Despite everything, they've gone through. It's also interesting how confused Tommy is about Jack thinking he could die, especially since he feared the same himself during the meeting with Dream. I don't know if it's because Tommy is more aware than he seems and he knows that Jack had wanted him dead before or if there's another reason for the confusion.

"No, you know what Jack? I- I- I- As ridiculous as this sounds I- you- you were there for- for when- for the good old days when it all started. I could do with you- will you help me? I need to put up these walls Jack" "Why should I? Why should I? When did you help me?" "Jack I'm not safe. And I- I need help. I can't always have Philza in the call with me going 'it's all gonna be alright mate', please" (...) "Please Jack. You remind me of a simpler time" "Why? Every time I do this, every time you go 'I'm in danger-" "Oh fine! Don't help me Jack Manifold! Fucking Hell man! It's not that big a deal!" "*sigh* I'm glad you're fine" "Thanks man"

This is actually the most productive conversation they had in a long time. They still talked past each other a bit, but way less than in other situations. Another thing that is worth noting is that, to Tommy, the friendship with Jack is important for the same reason the discs are important: he makes him think of better times, most likely actually making him feel safe, despite everything that happened between them. And lastly, Jack is clearly really conflicted. He resents Tommy deeply for a multitude of reasons, but still can't help worrying, and he's clearly frustrated with himself more than with Tommy at one point because hearing that Tommy is in danger probably made him as himself if he should help him after all. Also, the whole encounter ended on a positive note which is more unique than rare for them.

And, with Jack, all the people who are aware of Dream's obsession with Tommy checked up on him. No matter their current relationship with Tommy, knowing that was enough for all 3 of them to worry greatly.

(Phil's gift)

"Wilm isn't Wil- Like, to do with Wilbur though, is he? 'Cause Wilbur makes me feel safe, but in the kind of way that, like, having a knife- like two people shooting guns at each other makes you feel safe. Like, you got one at your side, but you also have one that's just not. And that's how I feel safe when I'm with Will. I don't feel, like, safe" (So, Wilbur is basically a double-edged sword to Tommy. He makes him feel safe to a certain degree, but he's also scared of getting hurt. And Wilbur is just as scared of people being afraid of him. These two would really benefit from a good talk)

"Ranboo, Ranboo, look at me, look at me, Ranboo, Ranboo" "Yes?" "Flowers duty? Can you get yellow flowers? Ghostboo, thank you" *Ranboo picks some yellow flowers from Tommy's lawn* "No, not these flowers, these are nice flowers" (Flower boy Tommy. Also I don't know if those are still the flowers that Ranboo planted for him, but it's still telling that that's the only memorial made for his death that Tommy keeps around)

"So why- why- why were you [Ranboo] in a prison?" "Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Sam just like- Sam just like- what happened right? Was like, Sam was just like *noises* 'I know what you- I know what you've done! You have to get in this prison' you know? And I was just like 'heh?' and then he was just like 'Oh, no, you need to be in here' and then uh-" "Wait, what have you done?" "I don't know man. Probably something bad"

So, we have the confirmation that Sam found out something Ranboo has done. If he was locked in prison for it, it probably was him exploding the TNT on top of the prison. After all, there is very little Sam would lock people up for: messing with the prison, helping Dream, and Connor seem to be the only possibilities. Sam could have found out about Ranboo helping to blow up the community house instead, or him helping Dream with the discs as well though. I just see the other option as more probable considering how seriously Sam always took the prison.

"Connor, by the way, never get locked up in prison with that guy, he will tell you everything you never wanted to know" (Connor lore?)

Ghostboo proceeds to tell Tommy and Phil what happened after he got out of the prison and how he died, but didn't receive much of a reaction from it. Ghostboo proceeds to recommend them death (wtf cc!Ranboo?) and Tommy answers he's been through it already and, while he didn't become a ghost (whether because he wasn't dead long enough, or if he was and just doesn't remember we don't know), he hated it. Tommy also asks about Ghostbur and Ghostboo mentioned that he kinda saw him, but didn't interact with him because he was crying and Ghotboo didn't know what to do about it.

They finally complete the initial layer of the wall.

"What does Dream wanna do to you? Is it kill?" "Hm, I think so. Kill, torture, murder, blow up my base, hit my family, yeah, sure" (Tommy be like: 'if I'm casual about this, I can avoid having my 20th panic attack today, it's genius!')

"If there's a fire on the outside. But last that I- last that I talked with Dream he only uses manipulation and stabbing. So, uh, I don't think he's used fire a lot" (Not much to say, he's just right)

"Oh, I really don't wanna obstruct this view [the view from the bench] though... Phil, what'd I do?" "Oh, you'll have to decide" "Oh, I don't want- this is my happy view!" (The bench is another thing that is important because of the meaning behind it, as it contains a lot of Tommy's happy memories. And not only his)

Tommy invites the other two to listen to one of his discs once he's satisfied with the walls. Ghostboo enthusiastically agrees and chooses Mellohi. Phil and Ghostboo have another conversation where Phil asks how come Ranboo only had one life, and Ghostboo responds that he has no idea.

"I miss Schlatt man. Well, okay, I really don't, he was actually awful. I just- I miss- I miss that one moment in that ball I had with Schlatt. Like, the perfect moment" (Again, nothing to add, it was just interesting)

Eryn arrives as well. He asks if he can sit on the bench as well, and gets extremely happy when he's given permission. The respect for the bench and what it represents in this stream was really nice. Also, Tommy asks Eryn to get him some gravel and sand, and he actually did it. Commitment.

Tommy and Eryn tear down "Poo House", which was the house Tommy made for Eryn since he wasn't using it and it was slightly obstructing the view from the bench. Then Tommy notices that Ghostboo was singing and stops him, as apparently if Ghostboo sings or dances he ceases to exist for good.

"Maybe I get a more aggressive stance and hunt him down. I don't know, there's just a big Dream problem that's gonna cause me anxiety until either he's dead or I'm dead" "I can- I can- I can help you out, 'cause, you know..." "Are you a fan of Dream or not? 'Cause it's unclear" "I'm a fan, look, man, I'm a fan of you" "Okay, thank you, but you avoided the- are you a fan of Dream? Because if you are then-" "I don't- I don't know the guys, like-" "No! That's- I've explained to you-" "Okay, I'm not, I'm not! I'm not, I'm not, I'm a Dream hater" "Okay, good"

This is just further proof that Eryn only cares about 2 things: Tommy and chaos. In fact, this same day Eryn got the chance to help a group of people (that didn't contain Tommy) to hunt down Dream and kill him, but he refused to do so because he didn't have enough information to decide if he thought that Dream deserved death or not. And yet, as soon as Tommy said that he may be going after Dream to kill him, Eryn immediately offered his help, with no hesitation. Likewise, he literally now decided that he's gonna be against Dream, not because he has any more info to judge whether he likes the man or not, just because his friend needed him to. It feels very "early clingy duo" of them.

They mess around for another couple of minutes and then the stream ends.

#dream smp #tommyinnit #dreamwastaken #philza #quackity #stream analysis #long post #tw manipulation #tw abuse #tw obsessive behavior #this is actually such a long one #maybe you can read it in sections #you know?#check out the interactions with the character you're interested in I don't know #I'm absolutely dead now #peace out

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lazyliars · 4 years

Text

/rp

Before I get into it, I want to state that is EXPLICITLY an analysis of the Characters, and is not intended to touch on how the cc’s played them in a meta sense unless specifically stated otherwise.

Also, this is technically a part two to my other post, which took a more in depth look at Techno and Phil’s reactions to Tommy’s death. It’s not necessary when reading this post, but I don’t address their reactions here.

So. The question must be asked.

Are we [the Syndicate] the baddies?

Yes.

The End.

Why are the Syndicate the baddies?

They got damn logo is a wither skull.

The End.

That's not how this works.

Yeah, yeah. You’re right.

The Syndicate's goals as an organization are not inherently bad. They seem to have good intentions behind them, and the focus on the freedom of it's individual group members is important to remember when talking about it; It is not a government. There is no hierarchical power system. No one is forced to do anything against their will, or surrender any of their rights or power to remain a member. It is not a government.

I also want to address Techno and Phil backing Ranboo into a corner – I see them getting a lot of flack for this, but I personally do not think it is relevant to the greater discussion, or necessarily representative of any contradictions within the organization. It was clearly played for laughs, and after they back off they clarify to Ranboo that they won't force him. Then later when Phil and Ranboo are alone, Ranboo feels safe enough to express that he felt like he was pressured into it, and Phil assures him he is allowed to leave whenever he wants; He is not being forced to do anything, and he is not being coerced or blackmailed.

None of the Syndicate members have done any wrongs against each other in the context of the Syndicate, OR gone against any of the Syndicate's core principles.

That, said, holy shit are they the baddies.

Listen, there's trying to telegraph a meaning or message to the audience and then there's having your logo be wither skulls on blackstone. That is straight out of the skit I keep referencing, seriously.

Okay, but, they laughed at it! It was played as a joke, just like the Ranboo thing!

The Ranboo thing was improv, the Syndicate's headquarters were planned – the artistic choices that they made reflect on what role they want the build and the organization inhabiting it to play in the future storylines.

Wither Skulls kind of have some CONNOTATIONS. Techno is an English major, I don't think he chose the most threatening imagery possible on accident, and then joked about the way people would interpret it just to stir the pot. This reads as hugely intentional.

And beyond that, the jokes they make during this part aren't “haha yeah, we look bad but we're actually good!” they're “you can tell by looking at these that we're the good guys wink wink, this is good guy stuff right here :)” It is a joke about how they are definitely not the good guys. This isn't even a case of unreliable narrators, this is one step down from flat out saying the meta intent.

But okay, I hear you, I'm talking about things that haven't happened yet. The Syndicate hasn't used any Withers, they could be an aesthetic choice. Lets look at what they do in practice.

So, they barge into private property, assess Snowchester's right to continue existing based entirely on their own ideals of what Freedom is, and then only once Tubbo assures them that they have no standing leader do they grant the place their approval to, and I gotta stress this part, continue existing.

In my Quackity meta, I already talked about how Government in the context of a M1necraft RP cannot be compared to IRL Governments on a one-to-one scale. They don't serve the same purposes or have the same type of power. What I didn't talk about was Agency in the context of m1necraft governments.

In an irl government, if you are born into one, you can't really leave without committing a massive overhaul on your life, which can be expensive and difficult, if not impossible for many people. Even in a “benevolent” government, the simple physicality of where you were born can prevent you from leaving it easily.

The same hurdles do not exist in the Dream SMP. People who join M1necraft governments choose to. They want to, either at the beginning when they form one, or later on when they join up. So far, no Government has just Sprung Up and forced the current residents of an area to become dependent on them, except maybe the Eggpire, who's status as a government is... shakey.

And even when people want to leave or separate from the government, they have been historically able to do so without any trouble or any effort from said governments to stop them. Jack Manifold emancipated from Manberg. Fundy and Quackity both left to start new nations. In all cases they were allowed to do so without any attempts on the part of the governments to stop them, either through force, or institutions preventing them from doing so.

The most anyone has lost when leaving a government is their house, which is still usually their property anyway, and is something that is easily rebuilt elsewhere and is inconvenient to move anyway.

The only exceptions to this might be Schlatt exiling Wilbur and Tommy - but even then, they weren’t trying to leave, they were trying to get back in, and of course the original L’manberg revolution, where Dream attempted to force L’manberg back into the Dream SMP, which wasn’t even a government at that point in time.

I don’t consider Phil’s house arrest an example of a government forcing someone to stay a citizen - that was treated less as a matter of a citizen wanting to leave the country and more as a threat to national security. Still pretty fucked up, but it’s a different issue.

What I'm saying is, If Tubbo wants to create a government out in the middle of nowhere, threatening no one, forcing no one to join either through force or desperation, and allowing people to join willingly because they want to, then he should be allowed to do that.

The Irony of the Syndicate, a group of people consisting of some of the richest, strongest people on the server, going around and enforcing 'Freedom' that entails no one person having more power than any other, is absurd.

It shows an extreme lack of self-awareness and/or self-righteousness, as they seem to think that they deserve to be the ones who decide what constitutes a government.

Snowchester is a small independent nation - they shouldn’t have to live in fear of being obliterated if they don’t walk on eggshells to meet an arbitrary standard decided by people who’s only authority on the matter COMES FROM THEIR PERSONAL POWER. No one elected them! No one chose them! They were not “approved” by the server at large to enact this kind of law.

The Syndicate are not a government, but they are an unsupervised power structure exerting their ideals on a land that did not ask for them. Like, These people have invented an actual Authoritarian-Anarchist faction. How the hell did they manage this?????

Back on topic.

Tubbo shows them the crater left by his nukes. The reaction is oddly positive – the nukes are fine by the morals of the Syndicate, apparently. I'd argue that they come across as more impressed than anything else; they seem to respect Tubbo for having gotten ahold of “real” power.

(There's a few good memes out there about “We can excuse nuclear weaponry, but we draw the line at Government!”)

So. By the Syndicate's standards: A single person or group of acceptably equal persons with weapons of mass-destruction are only worth “keeping an eye on” because they might provoke other people.

Like, I consider Project Dreamcatcher to be one of, if not the most morally ambiguous thing Tubbo has ever done, largely because it was all on his own initiative. He holds some culpability for The Butcher Army and Phil's house arrest, but they weren't his ideas and he was mostly following Quackity at that point.

And Phil tells Tubbo, IMMEDIATELY AFTER SEEING THE NUCLEAR CRATER:

“Looks like you've reformed a little bit Tubbo, I'm proud.”

And it's fine. Crimes against nature? Fine. A sign of healing in fact!! Tubbo is having a sweeeelll time and he definitely didn't make these nukes specifically in fear of being attacked by these exact people! Tubbo is doing great. Tubbo is doing fine. Tubbo. is. FINE.

Anyway.

I don't think this presentation of the Syndicate was an accident. Looking at the greater lore of SMP right now, after the Egg is done, their list of enemies is slim, and considering that they seem solely invested in taking down governments, that leaves maybe Snowchester, Kinoko Kingdom, and Eret and the greater Dream SMP.

Snowchester has not been shown to be corrupt, evil, or have any intent to go down that route. The most ambiguous thing they've done is, again, is the nukes. Other than that, it's pretty much your average cottagecore snow village.

Kinoko is presented in an even more morally 'good' light, Karl having founded it specifically for his Time-travel library purposes, which are currently being treated by the narrative as a selfless act, if not downright heroic.

Eret is also a fairly 'good' aligned character atm. He's been on that redemption grind since the og betrayal, and doesn't seem keen on backtracking. He's actively tried to leverage his position as king to make things better, and hasn't been quiet about that. He was also 'validated' by Tommy*, a character who has been described both by his allies and enemies as “the hero,” so take that as you will.

What I'm getting at is, all of the current potential enemies for the Syndicate aside from the Egg, are currently being cast as 'good,' and if they were to be attacked, they would undoubtedly have the moral high-ground, unless something drastically changed.

The only potential shakeups I can think of is are a Dream escape and/or a Wilbur revival, both of which could draw the Syndicate's attention and ire, depending on how things go. That said, it's just as likely that either or both of them would join the Syndicate – Dream still has that favor, and Phil and Techno both seemed to think Wilbur would've agreed with their blowing up L'manberg.

Both of those characters are currently **villains – the fact that they're both prime candidates for the Syndicate is a huge indication of the direction it's going to go as the plot moves forward.

((*I know some people are gonna come at me for painting Tommy as the “deciding factor” of what is morally good, so lemme just stop you there. I'm not talking about Tommy somehow having the 'right' to decide who is and isn't good, and definitely not the right to decide who should and shouldn't be king. I'm saying that Tommy, a character who the narrative treats as, if not a good person, then a person who is trying to be good, was in support of Eret, a character who has also been trying to be good.

Eret doesn't gain the moral highground because Tommy said so, he gets it because a character who the narrative treats as trying to do better, acknowledged Eret's earnest attempts at doing the same.

**I'm referring to Wilbur here as a villain because Tommy seemed convinced he would be if he were to be brought back. There is always the possibility that he's wrong.))

So, to summarize this: I read the Syndicate as being intentionally positioned as future antagonists, if not outright villains of a future arc. They are NOT a Government but their goals are contradictory with their means, and it is important to keep in mind that they plan to enforce their own brand of freedom on people who did not grant them either the authority or permission to do so.

So, uh. Can you tell I loved these streams? They were seriously so good. I kept switching between Ranboo and Techno's POV's trying to keep up with everything. I still have to watch Niki's!

All in all, I'm super, super excited for whats coming next, egg stuff, Syndicate stuff, Tommy stuff, all of it.

#dream smp #tubbo #the syndicate #c!techno critical #c!phil critical #dream smp analysis #lazytext

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yanderecandystore · 3 years

Note

(nsfw kinda?) what would the twins do if they went to a party and then woke up next to someone after you-know-what and realize its s/o g/n? would they be shocked? scared? also remeber to drink water and get good sleep!

The irony boo is that I'm doing neither of those things lol-

But something I will do it's your request! It sounds really fun, boo!

I'm sorry this isn't better- I wish I could try this concept again on a full fledged fanfic but I'm not feeling the right mood yet, I think I would half-ass it because of that.

TW/Tags: nsfw/mentions of nsfw // short headcanon // the twins being both tsunderes and yanderes, I just really like the mixture XD // a slight memory loss before regaining everything cause I don't want to make this too dramatic // delusional thinking and possessive thoughts

🍭꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍰꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖🍭

Surprise slumber party [Yandere!Bully OCS x GN!Reader - Headcanon]:

→ Adrien Coldwell:

Ya know, the twins are known for bringing different people to sleep with them, normally just so they could have a one time fun with them and then leave- But this time it seems to be very different.

Adrien can't remember what happened the day before but after looking around and analysing his clues he has come to the conclusion that A: This is not the Coldwell mansion and B: HOLY SHIT why the FUCK are YOU sleeping next to them?-

Normally they tend to not care for who is sleeping next to them, just assuming that the warmth that comes from the body next to them is just another toy- Someone who is worth enough to sleep with them, but also not high enough in their standards to be considered a romantic partner.

But you?? You're not just a mere toy to them, you fool.

It's obvious that you two spent the night together in someone else's house, probably a friend of the twins. This confuses Adrien to no end, how were even invited to the party in the first place?? How did a loser like you get in here and how did a loser like you slept with him- YOU SLEPT WITH HIM, OH MY GOD-

Did you two… If you two really did fuck then why can't he remember anything?? This was supposed to be the most important memory in the moment yet he can't recall how you two ended up like this.

It's not his imagination either, there seems to be enough proof to support that you two did something together, but he can't tell how far it went- He wishes he could remember how it was.

Your body, naked next to him- Love bites that seem to be his on doing (he fucking hopes it's his on, or we're going to have a problem-), there doesn't seem to be any other marks- It wasn't rough and ruthless like he normally is with you, well, outside this scenario. Sounds like the perfect time that he can't. Fucking. Remember.

How inconsiderate. He can't even remember what he had imagined doing for so long. Maybe the memories will come back soon enough, he hopes they do.

Could you still remember? Probably not, you seem to be more unconscious than him- But he does hope you remember how it was, how HE was, was it like how he imagined- Was it how you imagined?

"- … Did you ever think about doing this with him at all? Was it- Was it actually love and not just-"

He is more confused than anything else, it was a very pleasant surprise but also so frustrating how he couldn't remember exactly how it went- Some parts seem to be coming back but not the whole scene, and in a foolish attempt at regaining his memories, he tries to redo his actions as his hand tries finding its way around your body once again-

If you wake up right now, you'll see the most confusing mixture of feelings into one single expression: fear, lost, yet an look of pure wonder- The scene before him is beautiful but the fact that only a couple of moments seem to play in his head makes him feel lost and fearful of what you might think of him.

Right now he feels so vulnerable, regretful that he couldn't have done this sooner- Sounds of last night echo through his mind. No one entered in this room except you two, and it's still really early in the morning so he can just go back and enjoy this moment- After all, what could be the best way to celebrate this moment if not by savouring his victory?

He finally got you by his side in the most intimate way possible and finally you can see that you belong to him- He won. He finally won...

→ Alexandra Coldwell:

Ya know, the twins are known for bringing different people to sleep with them, normally just so they could have a one time fun with them and then leave- But this time it seems to be very different.

Alexandra can't remember what happened the day before but after looking around and analysing her clues she has come to the conclusion that A: This is not the Coldwell mansion and B: HOLY SHIT why the FUCK are YOU sleeping next to them?-

But you?? You're not just a mere toy to them, you fool.

It's obvious that you two spent the night together in someone else's house, probably a friend of the twins.

Which by the way- How dare you?? Who invited you? Who allowed a loser like you inside this party in the first place?? Did you come with someone else- wait- why are you- WHY IS SHE NAKED?? Why are you BOTH NAKED??? Alexandra feels embarrassed as she can't remember how you two came to be in this position in the first place.

If you two really- Well, fucked- How can she not recall it?? Why can't she remember every single detail from last night?? It was supposed to be "the moment" yet she can only get a couple of scenes inside her head.

It's not a coincidence, it can't be! You two wouldn't be sharing a bed like this unless… No, it's clear that it happened- But why can't she just- Argh! How stressful, YOU are so stressful. You make her go to cloud nine every time she sees you yet she can't even remember if she made you pay for making her feel so- Bashful…

Look at you, naked and… A-And filled with stretch marks- It's clear that she used your body as a canvas for her sharp nails, yet they clearly don't look as painful as her other "victims". Your soft skin looks just as delectable as it always does, but the context of what could have happened makes this scenario so much better- But she still can't remember what got you two to this point, how inconsiderate.

It's the moment she would dream off every night, yet only a couple of scenes and sounds seem to be appearing in her very foggy mind. Maybe later she'll remember how it all went down, but she still needs to know some very important details right now-

Was it… Fun? To you, that is- Was it, like she dreamed off? O-or maybe it was more like one of your dreams- Although she shouldn't expect you to have nice dreams about her, they're all probably nightmares…

Was she good to you like you are to her?

"- Was I sweet… like you are? Was this love or just…"

She feels ashamed more than anything else, now she can't even remember if she looked good while topping you (if she finds out she went bottom mode with you on your first night she'll commit "not living anymore"-). As she caresses your body in hopes of triggering her memory back she can't deny that you look really appetizing, like something she could just take another bite off but never feel satisfied- Or maybe like someone that she can love, and love and love again yet never feel bored of it.

Her expression would be one of- Well, embarrassment mixed with a look of worship- This is probably the most vulnerable she has felt in a long time, yet this is the first time she feels so close to someone, that's a part of her that wants to wake you up and try to show you how much she adores you all over again.

But right now she should control herself, it's already morning, it's a new day. There are probably lots of party guests around the house, and even if the door is locked she doesn't want anyone to know of this. Let her enjoy this alone with you, goddamnit.

She won… Can you believe that?? She won. She won, she won! After so long she finally has you here with her, and even if she can't tell what happened and how far it went, it is still pretty clear that after so long of you denying it- You have accepted it.

You have successfully accepted your place next to her, not only just in bed. This is perfect- This moment, it's perfect.

You are hers now- Always have been!...

🍭꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍰꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖🍭

#sheep's stuff #yandere oc #yandere bully #yandere #yandere x reader #yandere oc x reader #yandere bully x reader #yandere x g/n reader #yandere bully x g/n reader #yandere headcanon #yandere oc headcanon #special delivery headcanons #special delivery request

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benevolentbirdgal · 4 years

Text

Purim: a Jewish holiday and wild ride from start to finish

So let me tell you about the absolute soap opera that is the Jewish holiday of Purim. The scene is set in ancient (appx. 4th century B.C.E.) Persia during the first Jewish Diaspora, in the city of Shushan (typically identified in secular sources as Susa, a now-abandoned ancient city in what is now Iran). I’m telling you, as a work of literature (even beyond theological implications for Jewish people), this book has everything: love, drama, royalty, intrigue, ego, plots, irony, mystery, and a strong female lead.

[some non-slur swearing below]

Ahasuerus, party-loving king of Persia executed or exiled (translations argue) his wife Vashti, and had to find a new queen. Why did he do this, you ask? Well, it really starts with an 180-day party across his kingdom for all his subjects to celebrate the third year of his reign. After that absolute rager, party-bro KA has another one immediately after for a week, this time just for the capital city of Shushan. Vashti was having a woman’s party in her quarters, presumably living her best life, when party-bro sends his top seven yes-men to deliver a message to Vashti. This sleaze-ball wants her to appear at his party in front of everyone, wearing her crown, with the clear implication being only her crown. Vashti more or less tells him to pound sand (I mean, not the literal translation, but that’s the sentiment).

KA’s advisors convince him that this is not only an offense against the king but also against all the men in the country (ah, the joys of ancient patriarchy and toxic af masculinity). KA writes a degree that women must respect their husbands so he has an official reason to get rid of Vashti. Vashti is soon thereafter out of the picture and the king is short a queen. Whether she was a Wise Lady With A Point Who Got Screwed Over or a Vicious Jew-Hating Adulteress Who Had It Coming has been a matter of furious debate for over two millennia (the Babylonian Talmud and the Jerusalem Talmud vociferously disagree on her). In any case, KA regrets it pretty quick and wants a new queen.

At the behest of his advisors (you know, since their last advice worked out soooooo well), KA had a big contest/forcible gathering of young women from around his kingdom and a Jewish woman, Hadassah, was the winner. Hadassah was an orphan raised by her cousin Mordechai in the city of Shushan. Hadassah is more commonly known as Esther, because she changed her name to hide her identity as a Jew (at the behest of Mordechai). In any case, KA decided he liked Esther best and she became queen (it’s specifically mentioned both that he loved her most and that the palace staff liked her because she was nice to them-it’s unclear how much of an influence the latter was).

Concurrently, a wicked man named Haman was the top advisor to the king and the king would basically rubber-stamp whatever Haman wanted. Haman was a raging Jew-hater-this will be relevant later.

Some time into Esther’s reign as queen, Mordechai, who has taken to hanging around the gates of the palace to keep in touch with Esther, overhears a plot by two guards, Bigthan and Teresh, to kill the king. Mordechai alerts his cousin, and she tells the king. It’s recorded in the book of deeds and life keeps moving.

Some time later, Haman decides (after a promotion to head lackey) that he wants all to bow to him as he passes. Mordechai refused to bow to Haman every single day (citing that as a Jew he bowed to no man), and that did not sit well with Haman. So despite being prime minister and presumably having more important things to do, “genocide the Jews” made it to the top of to-do list. He didn’t like them before, and Mordechai refusing to treat him like a special snowflake was something he took really, really personally (totally can’t think of any modern politicians like that, nope). He told KA, who frankly doesn’t seem to ask enough questions, that there was a people disrespecting the king and his laws throughout the land, and could he pretty-please exterminate them. As a bonus, Haman would “donate” 10,000 silver kikar to the royal treasury (modern conversion vary, but all agree this an absurd amount on money).

KA handed him the royal seal to do so. Haman was feeling lucky I guess so he decided the best course of action was to draw lots to pick the day for the massacre. [Purim is lots in Hebrew, so that’s where the name of the holiday came from]. The message went out to all the provinces that on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, that they citizens and leaders should murder all of the Jews, young and old, man, woman, and child, rich and poor and take their possessions as spoils.

As this wasn’t exactly a state secret, the Jews knew and were quite distressed. The planned slaughter was like a year out, but what the actual fuck were they supposed to do? If you lived in Persia at that point that, the empire was functionally your entire world, unless you were fabulously/ridiculously wealthy and well-connected. Having several months notice the other locals and your rules were going to slaughter you and take your stuff isn’t particularly useful when there’s really nowhere to go.

In Shushan, Mordechai (who, although not explicitly in text, is in oral/Talmudic tradition a leader of the Jewish community) goes into mourning. He dresses in sackcloth and ashes, he weeps, and he fasts at the gates of the palace, as Jews throughout shushan and the kingdom are doing. Esther hears of her cousin’s mourning behavior and tries to send along nice clothes through a messenger, which he refuses. It is then that she learns of the decree. Mordechai (through the messenger) implores her to go ask the king if the Jews not getting murdered could be a thing. Esther explains that she could be killed for approaching the king unsummoned. Mordechai stresses the severity of the situation. Esther agrees to ask the king and tells Mordechai to have the Shushan Jewish community fast day and night (as opposed to just day as prior) for three days, and she and her handmaidens will fast too (no word on what the handmaidens thought of this).

On the third day, Esther bravely approached the king, asked him if she could request something. He said anything, up to half his kingdom (which implies to me that homedude, for all his flaws, was actually into her). Esther invited him to a party, where he and Haman would be the only guests. At the party she asks if she can another request. KA is open to it and she invites him to another party the next night. Party-bro king is obviously down and Haman is tickled to death at this second invitation.

He goes home to brag to his wife, Zeresh, about the invite and also to bitch about how angsty he is Mordechai is still alive (this angst reignited by passing him on the way home). Zeresh suggests he have fifty-foot gallows built to make Mordechai an example on, with the king’s permission, ASAP. Haman orders the building of the gallows, feeling secure in the knowledge that his bestie the king will execute Mordechai on them.

Back at the castle KA can’t sleep. He demands a bedtime story from the his records, because those will presumably put him to sleep. The story that gets read, ~coincidentally~, is of Mordechai saving KA’s life. Haman had sidled on up to the castle to speak to the king about killing Mordechai, and the king called him in. KA asks Haman, if he were to honor someone, what should he do? Haman is thinking “this is obvi about me” and tells the king that the honoree should be donned in royal clothing, and ride through the streets on a fancy horse with people someone shouting how great he is. KA is like great, love it, perf, go do that for Mordechai. Haman is not a happy camper but does the thing. After that, he goes home and tells Zeresh about it, who warns him that this is a very bad sign.

Finally, that night is the night of Esther’s second soiree. Haman and KA attend. The latter offers to Esther anything she wants, up to half of his kingdom. Esther asks that her life, and the life of her people be spared. KA is like “whomst” and Esther revealed it was Haman. At this point Ahasuerus.exe stops working and he takes a walk to the gardens. He comes back to see Haman begging Esther for his life, and KA thinks Haman is assaulting her. Haman was seized by nearby guards.

One of the chamberlains is then like, hey, KA, coincidentally there’s these super high gallows Haman just had built. Why not take care of the problem that way? (The fact that the random nearby chamberlain was like yup, that dude, hang ‘em in the morning, probably says a lot about how Haman treated most people around him, even more than forcing all to bow to him). KA orders it be done.

Not that Haman was around to be sad about it, but what happened next would have massively pissed him off, as his old job then went to Mordechai. Esther then implored of the king that the degree to allow the massacre of the Jews be reversed. The king couldn’t Cntrl+Z the order to murder-all-the-Jews, but he could issue an order that they could fight back. The proclamation was sent throughout the land, and the Jews were able to prepare. Since the royal decree had been amended, the governments (princes, governors, satraps) largely reformulated their plans accordingly, but plenty of Jew-haters still wanted to use the opportunity. The ability to self-defend meant that the communities weren’t massacred. In most of the kingdom, the Jews were now safe. Outside of Shushan, the fourteenth of Adar became a feast day.

Shushan was still not safe though. Antisemites were still out and mad (and apparently had not learned from the previous day), so Esther asked the Jews of Shushan to be allowed to defend themselves once more. Her wish was granted, and the Shushan Jews were able to defend themselves once more (so Purim is celebrated a day later in walled cities).

The story ends with the decision to write it down, and although there some debate on authorship, it is traditionally attributed to Esther herself cowriting with Mordechai.

Nowhere in the book is God mentioned. Nowhere is there divine intervention (at least not explicitly). Just Jews sticking up for themselves, being brave in the face of mortal peril, and a metric fucktown of chutzpah.

#jumblr #purim #purim story #jewish soap opera for real though #purim 2021 #purim 5781 #what is purim #purim explained #jewblr

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buckyownsmylife · 3 years

Text

daddy issues - chapter xv

The one where Ransom doesn’t feel ready to become a father, but he should have thought about it before sleeping with a complete stranger.

When Ransom’s latest one night stand lets him know that he’s going to become a father, he finds himself looking for the qualities he never believed to have so he can become the parent he never got to witness as a child.

for general warnings and author’s notes, please go to the fic’s masterlist.

A/N for this chapter: this is 3.2k of unedited drama and I am so fucking proud of it. I wrote this entire thing today, and it’s easily one of the pieces I’m most proud of. So I haven’t been able to fit a proper conversation between the reader and Harlan - I couldn’t make the scene justified if his presence was there, since he does seem to be the one thing that keeps the family on the line - but that means I had some ideas of how I can make up for it in the future! Extra chapter? Perhaps. We are approaching the end though. I only have two more chapter planned for this fic and an epilogue. We’ll see how that goes!

Y/N’s P.O.V.

“Hey!” I got into the car excited to see him again, but I tried to reason with myself that it was all because of his visit to his grandfather’s publishing company, of course. I wanted to know how that went and I was curious as to what Harlan’s plans were, that was mostly it.

The fact that I had genuinely missed the man by my side after spending just four hours away from him had very little to do with it, or so I tried to tell myself. I didn’t know how to deal with depending so much on someone yet.

But I was trying to.

Ransom’s silence alerted me that something was different. I stopped trying to fix myself to look to the side and find him staring out the window, face expressionless and eyes void of any sentiment.

“Ransom, what’s wrong?” Reaching over, I squeezed his thigh to get his attention, and he jerked as if he was genuinely surprise by my presence in the small vehicle. “You look stressed,” I clarified, eyebrows furrowed in worry as I reached over to push away a strand of hair that had fallen out of place.

He just stared at me for a while and still I couldn’t read what he was thinking. Was he mad at me? Had I done something wrong? After what felt like eternity, he sighed, gripping the steering wheel as he looked on his lap and admitted, “I’m gonna have to go to this family dinner on Friday.”

Immediately, I breathed deeply in relief, suddenly realizing just how worried I actually was that his mood had something to do with me. But then I was reminded of the little that Ransom had told me about this family - even that little felt like too much.

I could only imagine the anxiety he was feeling, and my heart ached to soothe him as best as I could. “Do you want me to go with you?” I asked, running my digits over his nape calmly, keeping my voice as soft as possible to help him relax.

Still, his head snapped up so he could meet my eyes, his wide as two saucers as he struggled to process what I’d said. “… You’d do that?” He sounded so surprised, so genuinely shocked by my offer, that I couldn’t stop myself from giggling, taking both of his hands on mine and squeezing them gently.

“Of course I would, honey.” Ransom’s eyes were so soft as they stared into mine, even as my heart doubled its size in its effort to reach out for his, I found myself justifying, “You went with me to see my parents!”

The way his smile dropped at my explanation had me feeling cold and empty, desperate to see him look at me the same way he was doing only seconds ago.

“Besides,” I forced myself to admit it, trying not to sound as breathless as I felt while I opened my heart to him. “I-I don’t want you to go through that alone. I wanna be there for you, like you were for me.”

Immediately, I felt rewarded on my effort to open up by the smile he gave me. “Thank you, baby.” He squeezed my hand this time, and when he leaned over and connected our lips on a quick peck, my heart skipped a beat.

I was in love with this man.

Ransom’s P.O.V.

I sighed as we stood in front of my grandfather’s front door, trying to adjust my sweater that suddenly felt uncomfortable. Beside me, she seemed to be doing the exact same thing, fingers pulling on the end of the dress she was wearing, making me smile.

The dress highlighted her bump - it was now undeniable that she was pregnant and even if I’d never been particularly attracted to women in this stage of life, I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her now.

It was like she shined from within. Her beauty amazed me, and so when she noticed me staring and stopped fiddling with her clothes, straightening herself up to ask, “Do I look okay?” I had to stop myself from laughing.

“Yes.” More than okay. “But are you sure you won’t be cold?” We’d gone through this argument before leaving the house, so I was prepared to see her rolling her eyes as she reached out to take my hand in hers.

“Unless your family has the habit of dining outdoors regardless of the weather, I think we’ll be alright.” I chuckled, rubbing my thumb on the back of her hand, but it sounded nervous even to my own ears. It didn’t surprise me that she noticed it. “Are you ready?” She questioned, voice in that soothing tone she used whenever she noticed my stress.

“Not at all,” I admitted, but in all honesty, the prospect of joining my family for dinner didn’t seem as bad as it usually did. Not with her by my side.

“I’m here for you.” Hearing her say those words meant more to me than I was able to properly express at that moment so I just stared at her, taking in the fact that this incredible person actually cared about me.

“Just… don’t leave me alone, okay?” Her immediate nod had me smiling. It prompted me to once again lean over and connect our lips, only this time, when I tried to pull away, she kept me close with her hand on the back of my neck.

Who knows where this kiss might have led us if the door hadn’t open right at that moment, revealing my lousy uncle who stared from me to her with wide eyes?

“… She’s pregnant? With your baby?” A groan was all I could muster as a response, tugging her into the house with me. “When were you going to tell your family?”

“For fuck’s sake,” I cursed, looking around the living room for the bar. “Where’s the goddamn alcohol?” There was no way I’d be able to survive this night without it, as much as I wanted to be supportive of Y/N.

“I think that’s a bottle of scotch,” I heard her whispering next to me, pointing towards a corner of the room, and I sighed in relief at her understanding.

“Thanks, sweetheart.”

Y/N’s P.O.V.

An hour into the evening and I had already understood why Ransom was the way that he was - and why he liked his grandfather so much, despite how he felt about the rest of the family.

Harlan was gentle where all of his children were… prickly. In fact, he was the only one who addressed me at all, but I found myself feeling grateful for it, since when the dinner actually started, I wanted the rest of the family to forget about me completely.

“I am so sorry,” Harlan apologized, rubbing his hands nervously as he stared at the rest of the family who was walking towards the dining room. “I sleep early, everyone knows that, but this is the only time they could all gather and since they didn’t know you were coming…”

I waved away his apologies, offering him a hug as I wished him good night. “Just as long as you’ve had your dinner, Harlan. Thanks for welcoming me into your home.”

He accepted my embrace easily, taking advantage of the proximity to whisper in my ear, “Just hang on to him, dear. I promise it’ll be worth it.” I smiled when we parted, nodding in confirmation to his words.

“It already is,” I assured him, but he only sighed.

“Make sure to remember that during dinner…” Now I understood why. It started with a simple question, one of the maids offered me some meat, and when I hesitated to answer…

“God, are you daft, girl? Have you never eaten lamb?” My eyes widened in surprise, but before Ransom could have the chance to throw himself at his mother, I just squeezed his thigh.

“I was going to ask her if there was any oregano in the sauce. It’s been making me feel sick.” I didn’t need to add why - the reminder of my situation, of what led me to be there with them in this dining room was very clear in me.

And still, that didn’t stop them.

“That’s a pretty necklace…” Ransom’s father commented before we could even grab a bite. I chuckled to myself, immediately catching onto what he wasn’t saying.

“Thanks, I got it at a little boutique back home. It was a gift for myself after I got my first paycheck.” I could feel Ransom’s gaze on me, the waves of pride rolling from him in waves. It made me smile, but it was just the calm before the storm.

“Ransom, have you contacted a lawyer?” This question came from his uncle’s wife, Donna - I think that’s what she was called. Not that she tried to introduce herself to me or anything, but Harlan made sure I knew everyone’s name as soon as I stepped inside the house.

“Why?” Ransom’s tone was vicious and his squinted eyes alerted everyone that he was prepared for a strike, but the fact that he still hadn’t anticipated what was coming almost made me laugh.

Even Donna herself hesitated, unbelieving that he was going to make her say it. “There’s no way you’re that stupid.” And just like that, the doors to hell were opened up.

Ransom’s P.O.V.

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, but then again, was I really surprised?

“You should make sure to draw a prenup,” Donna insisted, while the rest of the family pretended not to hear, undoubtedly coming up with their own ways to insult Y/N. “Something that will assure only your kid has access to your money.”

I could hear Y/N quietly laughing to herself next to me, but while she was able to find the irony in the situation amusing, all I felt was blinding rage.

“God, do you even hear the shit you say? I never asked for your input, this, right here, is precisely why I didn’t tell any of you all about my baby.” I saw Y/N flinch from the corner of my eyes before I heard my mother’s fork drop against the precious porcelain dish she was pretending to eat from. I knew this was the sorest topic of discussion for her. I knew this was why she had been pretending Y/N wasn’t even there, hadn’t even been invited to dinner with me.

“Fair enough,” she spoke, lying back against her chair as she finally raised her eyes to meet mine. “I don’t know if we even should learn anything about this child, considering it most likely isn’t even yours.”

It was like someone had thrown a bucket of ice over me. Y/N was oddly quiet now, seemingly as frozen as me - and when I realized that, my anger returned with twice its power.

“Watch your fucking mouth,” I warned, just as my mother retorted, “Don’t you talk like that to me.” I didn’t even have the chance to talk back when she stroke again. “You fuck so many ransom desperate chicks, I’m surprised this is the first you knocked up.”

This was as insulting to her as it was to me, and it also struck a chord in me because of how I feared this was just reinforcing Y/N’s views of me. “Don’t say shit like that,” I threatened, to no avail. “Don’t talk about her like that.”

“Ransom…” Her sweet voice tried to intervene, but I was too far gone to hold myself back now. I couldn’t stand the thought that I was hurting her because I was the reason she was here in the first place.

“You know nothing about her, and yet you feel comfortable judging her,” I continued, ignoring her completely. “She’s a lawyer, actually. You would know it if you had even bothered to talk to her. If there was ever the need for a prenup, I’d have her draw it.”

Maybe they thought I’d stop at that - I thought so myself, until I realized there was still so much I wanted to get out, and I was going to do that now.

“And you know what? I trust her more than I trust you, and I came out of you. So maybe you should consider that before you attack the one person I try to introduce to my family.” I hated everything about this. I hated how they still managed to get to me, how the fact that my own mother, who I didn’t even respect, still managed to make me feel inadequate about the one thing in my life that made me excited.

I knew I’d always lose with them. They just had this way of inciting the beast in me - they brought out the worst in me, and I felt helpless to fight it.

“Okay, so she’s not some random skank,” my uncle oh-so-helplessly interrupted, immediately making me want to punch him in his stupid face. “But this just means she’s the one playing you.”

“Oh, shut up!” I threw my hands up, pushing my chair away from the table, fully intended to storm out of the room until Meg was the one who stopped me dead in my tracks.

“Did you even get a paternity test, Ransom?” She seemed almost uncomfortable to voice it, eyes darting from me to Y/N, but I could read her apologetic smile perfectly.

She just didn’t want someone else to get Harlan’s attention and interest because that would potentially mean less money to each and everyone of the people in this room, as he’d add one more person to his aid list.

My father took advantage of what Meg said, waving in her direction. “Don’t you know how important this family is? How quickly she could rise in any job because of a connection to us?”

My mother scoffed, finally ready to interfere again. “Knowing she’s actually smart leaves me even more surprised that you’ve relented and decided to become someone’s little plaything until this baby pops out. I’m assuming a few months with a screaming kid and you’re just gonna abandon her anyway. Which is fine by me, I won’t have to pretend to be a grandmother for long.”

Y/N’s P.O.V.

All I could think was how grateful I was that I had accompanied him to this dinner tonight. As I watched his chest heaving with fury, I could not imagine how he would have felt having to deal with all of this on his own.

“Ransom,” I tried to catch his attention, pulling him back to his seat. “Ransom, it’s okay,” I tried to appease him, but he was too fucking gone to care.

“No, it’s not okay, he pushed my hand away, getting up from his chair to lean over the table, both hands on top of it as he stared at his mother. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” He yelled, making me flinch, although Linda hardly seemed bothered by it.

Then, much to my surprise, Ransom straightened up, running a hand through his hair as an emotionless chuckle escaped him. “No, you know what? You’re right. You’re not gonna be a grandmother. I’m gonna be a father, Harlan’s gonna be a great-grandfather, but that’s it. I’m not gonna keep taking your shit anymore, Linda, you know why? Even if this child wasn’t mine, I’d still want her and this kid.”

My heartbeat pumped out of control as he continued, “She’s not just someone who’s carrying my child. I care about her. And if you can’t respect her, than I guess I was right in keeping this pregnancy from you.”

I held my breath as Ransom apparently caught his, my head swirling with the different emotions running through me - my infatuation for this man, who had so fiercely defended me from his entire family, the adrenaline from witnessing such a vicious argument.

I truly believed this would be the end of it. I didn’t know where they could go from here - that was, of course, until Linda decided to attack him.

“Oh, and you think you’re going to be so great with it?” My blood boiled when her words turned against her own son so easily. Attack me and my dignity? That was okay, these people didn’t know me.

But seeing her attack Ransom was just too much for me.

“Do you think she’ll want to keep you around once she realizes she’ll be raising two children with you to weigh her down?” Ransom visibly faltered, like she had slapped him, and that’s when I had enough. “You’ll never be able to give her the emotional support that she needs and you know that.”

I rose to my feet at that, holding onto my lower back as I softly slapped Ransom’s back in an attempt to calm him down. “I got this, babe.” He was so surprised - and still so hurt by his mother’s statements - that he didn’t even try to stop me. In fact, I think he didn’t even realize what was going on until I turned to Linda and started talking.

“Do you really think that poorly of your son that you can’t believe he has anything to offer in a relationship?” Now she was the one who looked up at me with an expression that looked like I had physically hurt her.

“Is it that unbelievable to you, that someone would be able to like him for him?” She didn’t seem to be able to find anything to answer to me, and when I turned to Richard, I was also met with silence.

Ransom’s P.O.V.

“Well, I do,” she announced, like it was the single most obvious thing, the simplest fact to deduce in the world, while I stood back watching her with my mouth hanging open. “I like him enough to be willing to open up to him even if one day he might leave me because to me, he is worth any possibility of future pain.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I’d never had anyone defend me like this, not even Harlan - not even my parents, when I was a kid and the bigger children decided to bully me.

No, back then all I got was a talk about how “real men don’t cry” and if my father ever caught me cowering from someone else again he’d give me a real reason to be afraid.

“And I do say possibility,” she continued, not having raised her voice for even a second and still to effortlessly able to catch the attention of everyone in the room, assure herself the ground to speak her mind without the fear of interruptions. “Because Ransom’s actions have never given me any reason to think that outcome is even remotely probable.”

“So maybe you think about your own opinions of your son’s character and see if they don’t reflect your own more than they reflect his actions.” She turned around after that, tiny hand encircling my wrist as she began to yank me in the direction of the front door.

“Let’s go.”

#ransom drysdale x reader #ransom drysdale reader #my series #ransom drysdale reader insert #ransom drysdale reader inserts #ransom drysdale fanfiction #ransom drysdale series #ransom drysdale writings

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kamipyre · 2 years

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AND AND 📝 + Yong, if possible (feel free to skip any of these; have a fANTASTIC DAY, FERRE!!)

instead of suki rambling u get ferre!! ( ft. meta time with @theimpalpable )

send me “📝 + A Character” for me to go all out about the relationship between my muse and that character!!

okay so when I think of these two I think of mellow giant ( bc yong is a tall birb ) with chaotic gremlin ( bc suki is short in comparison to at least all of her friends so far….she needs to find shorter friends really 🥲 ) BUT ALSO…it’s because based on what we’ve plotted for these two so far and also from my understanding of yong ( so far- do correct me if I’m wrong tho!! ), he’s not the kind of person to necessarily get riled by the small things UNLESS it’s hurting someone he cares about. ( this is why suki’s here- so she can complain for him…she has enough salt and pettiness to complain for both her AND yong JFKSLJF ) So in this case, I would like to introduce u to this image….bc it?? Screams them?? KINDA??

But back to them!! I love that suki is perpetually confusing yong with her thoughts 24/7 and how they’re almost opposites in how suki is just go, go, go, and yong is more chill, mellow again might be the right word?? Like I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s completely go-with-the-flow, but it’s more like…he’s a warm sunny day by the the river…peaceful. A breath of fresh air, even and especially for someone like suki, who is almost always on her toes out a. habit but also b. a necessity since her job is very demanding and not to mention her coworkers are very similar to her in that they are also….go-getters. yong is very nice if not NECESSARY change for her pace as since he’s lived for a long while ( at least by human years ), he’s probably seen and experienced a lot…also just that he tends to wait and think things through first before making a decision…something that suki decidedly does not do more often than not JFKLSDJFSL but also as I’ve said before, she doesn’t’ make friends easily so when she makes someone, pls know she is clingy af….alexa play ‘never gonna give you up, never gonna say goodbye’ JFLKSJDKLFJS

on yong’s end though, I hope that suki provides him with a certain…freshness to life again? Like of course he has his sibling and someone he’s crushing on BUT also suki is well…u see her, someone who very much would kneel to the side to smell the roses even if she’s seen it for the nth/ someone who would take a moment to look at a lizard bc she?? Wants to and needs no other reason to do so :’D basically, what I’m trying to say is that suki might give?? yong a little variation in his life as she is quite unpredictable….good thing yong is more than happy to follow along FJKSLDJF

but also i love the irony in their friendship how yong is the chosen one of a korean phoenix, which still means he does have the motif of fire and then there’s suki….with a severe pyrophobia AND YET?? They still get along SO WELL :D I think that also comes with despite having different demeanors, they do share some crucial traits, like how they both aren’t incredibly open about their respective histories and traumas ( did I mention I’m gonna KICK THOSE PPLS BUTTS BTW; WHY WOULD YOU DO SUCH A THING TO SWEET TOL’ BIRB D-:< ) and how they both have unique habits ( ie. Suki- the paper thing, yong- clicking pens ) to cope with stress….it’s in that sense I like to think suki can relate to yong even if she doesn’t necessarily know a lot about him….

Honestly, when I think of yong, I think of a hearth fire- true it’s still fire, but it’s also controlled and tranquil, the kind of fire that suki these days is more comfortable and when she begins to really push to overcome her pyrophobia, the kind of fire she practices her exposure with….but also pls consider!! Suki asking yong to use his powers around her when she starts looking to overcome it bc he’s got the most access to fire AKA he can also turn it off, BUT ALSO when those mean people come back trying to find yong pls know suki is more than willing to get in front of yong bc even if she is a pipsqueak and DEFINITELY not the most physically intimidating, is she going to try and fite them?? yes absolutely ( but also pls consider on a lighter note, suki getting worked up at least once and trying to fite someone….only for yong to hold her back by the back of her shirt JFKLSJDLF )- she’ll probably break her hand in the process but anything for her friend, okay?

as for her discovering he’s a superhuman…well she’s seen pretty weird ( ie. See ace attorney trilogy ) so if she can handle spirit world shenaganians then while it might take some time, I think she wouldn’t be too surprised…if ppl can talk to the dead, then why not everything else as well?? I do think she would try to see where the intersections of the supernatural and science can be applied as well ( ethically, of course )….

As for where they can go….well I was thinking about her cinders verse and therefore her BLACK KNIGHT VERSE and just…if you’re okay with this, but yong being one of the ppl she confides in when she initially quits the lapd?? But also in her black knight verse, not her meeting up with yong occasionally for lunch and just maybe?? The two of them talking about the same person ( ie. The pigeon man ) but knowing him by a different name JFLSJDFJKL

#theimpalpable #theimpalpable ( yong. )#tbt ( ft. yong & suki )#( alex!! thank you so much for this one too!! ;-; )#( apologies for getting to it late BUT ALSO I HAD...A LOT OF THOUGHTS TOO :'D )#( not these two being birb friends..... but is young suki's impulse control?? probably!! )#( but also pls have a wonderful day and we absolutely do NOT have to go with any of this....and if I've misinterpreted anything about )#( yong here do let me know and I will fix it :D )#( queue. )

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13uswntimagines · 4 years

Text

I Should Sleep With You More Often (Sam x Reader)

Sequel to Works Like a Charm where Sam and Reader finally get together. It’s a very fluffy piece, with a little bit of late night breakfast making and a surprise kiss.

special thanks to @literaryhedgehog cause this wouldn’t have happened without her.

Hello?”

“Hey, I can’t sleep.” Sam’s voice comes over the phone, getting straight to the point with frustration.

“And you’re calling me about it? At 3 am. I could have been asleep you know.” You huff into the phone, pinning it between your chin and your shoulder.

“Were you?” She asks, and you can almost see her eyebrow quirking up.

You look down at the frying pan where you were about to pour your egg-cheese scramble. “No. But still.”

“Don’t worry, I appreciate the irony of the situation,” she says, with an attempt at humor. “can I come over?”

“Sure. You can split my omelet.” You hum, your tongue poking out as you make sure the entire omelet landed on the plate instead of the floor.

“Omelette?” Sam asked, sounding amused. “I thought you weren’t supposed to --”

“Eat anything after 9 pm I know, I know. But I woke up and was hungry, and couldn’t just ignore it to fall back asleep for two hours. I had to eat something or I was going to get nauseous.” You interrupted her, waving your hand dismissively.

“What?” Sam asked entirely confused.

“You know that feeling, where you’re like, so hungry that you get kind of nauseous?” You tried to explain again.

“No…” She trailed off.

“Oh, well it’s the worst. I like to try to eat something before it gets too bad because otherwise, the food won’t do anything. Anyway, I made enough you can have half of it, just let me know when you get here so I can send down the elevator for you.” You said, whipping your hands off and walking towards the door.

“I’m actually just parking,” Sam’s voice came sheepishly over the phone. In the background, you heard the unmistakable sound of her car being locked. She always insisted on clicking the lock button twice so it would beep, like she didn’t trust it to lock the first time.

You shook your head and left your apartment to buzz her into the building. “You’re telling me that at 3 am, before even checking to see if I was awake, you just decided to come to my apartment because you couldn’t sleep?”

“Yes?”

“You’re insane,” you said, hanging up the phone as the elevator door opened to reveal her tall frame.

She ruffled the hair at the back of her neck, grinning. “I knew you would be awake?”

“Bullshit.” You led the way back to your apartment and grabbed two plates from the cabinet. “You want soy milk?”

“What?”

“Soy milk. I’ve got vanilla or dark chocolate.” For some reason, soy milk helped reduce the insomnia nausea more than anything else most days. Still, the omelet smelled amazing.

“Um sure, vanilla please.” She shrugged, and you rolled your eyes. Vanilla was for the weak.

You pulled out both cartons and two glasses, before cutting the omelet in half and handing her a fork.

“Don’t I get my own plate?” Sam whined, cutting off a piece of the Omelet and popping it into her mouth.

“People who come barging into my apartment at 3 AM have to share with the host. Unless you wanna do dishes?” You raised your eyebrow at her, pointing your fork in her direction, smirking when she emphatically shook her head no.

She quickly changed the subject, avoiding your eyes as she ate. “So how are you liking your apartment, it’s new right?”

“Yeah, I moved in four months ago, you know when I suddenly got traded to North Carolina,” you said, a very bitter edge in your voice. How Mark could let you leave the thorns you would never know, but at least Hinkle was retiring.

You took another bite “So why couldn’t you sleep? At camp, you’re usually snoring like a freight train by now.”

Sam paused mid-bite, fork in the air. She looked like she was debating how to answer then, stuffed her last piece of omelet in her mouth. “I donb snowe.”

“You totally do. Rose even sent me the video evidence if you wanna see it,” you smirked, standing to go get your phone.

“No!” Sam jumped up and you sprinted across the kitchen to get out of her reach, grinning. “You really don’t have to do that, it’s not a big deal.”

“Oh, but I really don’t mind,” you taunted, starting for your phone before Sam tackled you. Well, it wasn’t a tackle so much as a grab, but she had a good foot and a half on you, so same difference really.

“Put me down. This is highly unnecessary,” you sputtered, laughing from Sam’s shoulder. “I’m not supposed to exercise within an hour of bed. My therapist would be unhappy with so much activity.”

“Yeah cause eating an Omelette at 3 am is totally something she would approve,” Sam rolled her eyes, as she tossed you onto your couch.

“Lies and slander. I won’t get the alleged snoring video, but seriously. Why are you here?”

Sam sighs, and slouches onto the couch next to you, dropping her head into your lap. You smile down at her, liking this new angle. While you certainly didn’t mind being the baby of the team, it was kind of nice to do the petting for once.

“I don’t know,” Sam said, furrowing her eyebrows.

“You were never a good liar. It’s why everyone catches you when you try to pull pranks. I hear it helps if you talk about it,” You murmured, using your thumb to smooth out the crease that formed between her eyes.

“Fine, I couldn’t sleep because I kept having nightmares. It felt like, I was tossing and turning for hours, and then every time I dozed off, my brain came up with these fucked up images. Like, silence of the lambs shit. I could sell some horror film director the plotlines and make bank, I’m telling you. And since Rose and Wilma moved out, my place has felt so empty. It felt like, the panic attacks I used to have before games. When I had to always bring a bag with me to hyperventilate into before I could get my mind on the game.”

You frowned. “I don’t remember that.”

“Once you became my bus buddy I didn’t have that problem. You got me out of my own head with fun word games and stupid jokes. Remember that time you gave me the sentence ‘The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog?’ You kept grinning telling me to stop stressing out, it would be alright, to just guess a letter.”

“Because whatever you guessed would be right.” You hum smiling down at her.

“You couldn’t take that shit-eating grin off your face, you jerk, but like, it helped me stop second-guessing myself. Sitting on the bus with you, I’ve never felt more calm going into a season. And so I just thought. It’s dumb but I hoped coming here would help.” She shrugged.

“It’s not dumb Sammy. You help me sleep too. Why do you think all the vets insist I sit with you?” You said softly, leaning down to kiss her forehead.

“Because you used to fall asleep literally everywhere and they hoped I could get across the aisle and catch you before you hit your head?” She giggled and you snapped her shoulder lightly.

“Wow. Thanks.” You said in a monotone, “Or maybe it’s ‘cause you’re my favorite teddy bear.”

“If anyone is the teddy it’s you. You’re like half my size,” She giggled.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” you muttered, playfully pushing her head off your lap. “Come on you giant.”

“Where are you going?” She asked, allowing you to pull her to her feet.

“To go grab you a toothbrush and a fresh pillowcase for the bed.” You said, your tugging getting a little more insistent. You really wanted to get to sleep tonight. You had been so good lately (ignoring the random omelet you cooked tonight).

“Oh, um. I was hoping we could just watch television on your couch and I would fall asleep,” Sam rambled, eyes wide. “I mean, not that I mind, but I didn’t want to like, invade on your--”

“Just come up to my room. It’s no big deal, it’s large enough for both of us, and I honestly don’t think that couch is even big enough to fit you. Besides, maybe it will help you sleep to be on a mattress actually purchased in this century.”

“Hey, I like my mattress!” She grumbled indignantly, crossing her arms.

“You flip it twice a month because it keeps forming an indention where you’ve slept!” You said exasperated. That sleepover had been a terrible idea and you stood by that. At least your bed didn’t spit out feathers when you turned over too fast.

“Well, I. um. No comment.” you hear her say as you go to take your turn in the bathroom.

When Sam gets back from brushing her teeth you’ve done everything except turn out the lights. You look up from your side of the bed as she pauses in the doorway.

“Is this… Welcome to Night Vale?”

“It helps me ignore my thoughts. Can you get the lights please?”

You had to replay the podcast the next day after Sam left. You couldn’t remember anything after “Wednesday has been canceled due to a scheduling error” because within moments you were asleep.

*****

You thought that sleeping with Sam was only supposed to be a one-night thing, but it wasn’t. One night turned into two, which turned into the two of you usually crashing at each other's places.

If you were being honest, it was the best sleep you had ever gotten. It was nice to have someone there to hold onto, to protect you from the bad dreams. The problem was that your feelings were edging past the line of friendship, and you had no idea what to do about it.

It started with a team party you both went to, where Sam offered to be the designated driver. After she dropped everyone else off, you told her she might as well stay the night at your place since it was already so late and she did. And you both slept great. And then you had your usual Saturday spa night the next night, and you were several shots in and it wouldn’t have been responsible to drive home. And you both slept a solid seven hours.

Not that Sam was a magical cure to your insomnia. You still had nights where your brain was like a train running off the rails, unstoppable no matter how hard you tried. Yet, having her there helped. She made sure blue lights went off when they were supposed to, and your late-night breakfast-making was kept to a minimum. AND after the first few nights, you realized that she was amusingly clingy in her sleep. Which meant that occasionally if you woke up and tried to get out of bed, she would sleepily grab you and hold you in place murmuring about whatever was happening in her dream. Since you couldn’t get up you had to just lay there, which normally might have been boring, but with her was amusing as you listened to her rambling state of consciousness.

You sighed, staring up at the ceiling. You really needed to get your shit together and just ask her out. But what if she said no, and you lost your cuddle buddy? That would suck royally, and if you lost your bus seat it might completely curse the USWNT.

“Alright, I can practically feel the steam coming out of your ears, spill,” Sam groaned, rolling over and throwing an arm around your waist.

“Isn’t it weird?”

“What?”

“Time. Like someone decided that seconds were a thing and a certain number of seconds equaled a minute and there were a certain number of minutes in a day. Like someone just decided it was a thing, and everyone went along with it and now we all have to plan our lives around this arbitrary system. I wonder if that asshole realized that people would use it to put kids in detention and force them to cram so they could regurgitate facts in a specified amount of his made-up system. And like the Romans made a Calendar and the Mayans did one too…” Your rambling was cut off by Sams’s soft lips touching your own in a quick peck before she collapsed back into the pillow. “Just blame capitalism babe.”

You stared at her for a minute, shocked, before she bolted upright. “SHIT. Sorry, I just. I forgot to ask for consent. I just forgot--”

“I consent, yes, more of this please,” you said, leaning over to kiss her again. Your hands cupped her cheeks and her fingers tangled into the baby hairs at the back of your neck.

After a few minutes, Sam broke off the kiss, both of you breathing heavily. “Um, wow. You know, I’m not sure this is helping you get to sleep, love.”

You smirk, biting your lip and straddling her hips before you lean in to kiss her again, slowly. “You’re the one who said you needed to sleep with me more often.”

#uswnt imagine #uswnt imagines #uswnt x reader #sam mewis imagine #sam mewis x reader #literalhedgehog

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princess-of-the-corner · 3 years

Note

.... .... ... I hate my brain sometimes...

Miraculous Ladybug A/U where some of the characters are actually the children of the Lords of Hell and are just living on Earth to just learn about humans in order to rule Hell better. However... Some of the kids don't really act like they're the kids of their respective Sin unless certain conditions are met.

Marinette is the daughter of Satan, Lord or Wrath. Pretty much her canon self with some peppers of being mischievous, unless you threaten what she loves. (Plot-twist Satan's human form is Sabine!).

Kim is the son of Lucifer, Lord of Pride. Uh, more or less his canon self but he takes a lot of pride in being the best athlete in school and is smarter than he lets on.

Mylene is the daughter of Mammon, Lord of Greed. It's just irony on this one because she adores helping out the environment, though she can be very, um, "Determined" to protect what she deems as important.

Nino is the son of Leviathan, Lord of Envy. Again, irony because Nino's pretty chilled and understanding of others. However, he can feel when others are feeling "envious".

Sabrina is the daughter of Belphegor, Lord of Sloth. Again, irony because Sabrina's a very hard worker, though she does know all the best ways to relax and de-stress.

Nathaniel is the son Beelzebub, Lord of Gluttony. Even more irony with Nath was born with ageusia (the inability to taste food) in this A/U, thus isn't all that picky about food and will eat anything on his plate w/o much care. Though the one type of food/dish he doesn't enjoy is soup and does try his best to avoid eating soup or soup-like dishes (so he and Chloe have something to bond over).

And lastly...

Max is the son of Asmodeus, Lord of Lust. ... ... ... Max actually has two human forms, the one he uses for everyday life in Paris (Max) and the other is this super attractive model (that he calls Xam [pronounced like Sam]) that sometimes works with Adrien. Max just uses his Xam form to earn extra money for his engineering projects (Since Max's "Lust" is more for knowledge and desire to learn [since Lust isn't just about sex or sexual desires]).

}i{

Fun little facts in this A/U!

All the Sin Kids have known each other since they were babies, so they've got some fun banters with each other. The most obvious one being Kim loving to teases Max on how cute he is in his everyday human form.

The Miraculous of the Ladybug and Black Cat are handed out in the same way, but Tikki was the one to freak when she realized that she was given to the daughter of Satan and Mari was pretty chilled during the first meeting!

The other Sin Kids all know about Marinette being Devil-Bug (might as well highlight the irony of this, lol) and about Tikki, who is less than thrilled about it but knows she can't do much about it. (Hey, at least Mari has a support system in this!).

Chloe accidentally discovers the Sin Kids' and had a bit of a crisis afterwards (doesn't know about Tikki or Mari being Devil-Bug). She got over it and became somewhat friends with them and realized that they were all just dorky kids and likes being around them.

No one else at the school is aware of the Sin Kids being the children of the Lords of Hell. Though Mylene is debating on whether or not she should tell Ivan about it.

Adrien has a bit of a bi crisis because he has a crush on both the mysterious Xam and the wonderfully heroic Devil-Bug!

Mari finds it amusing that Alya is a total fangirl over a hero that can be demonic if needed and likes to poke fun at the DeviBlogger about having a certain type when it comes to heroes.

Fu is completely shock at his mistake and has been trying to get the Ladybug Miraculous back, not that he has a chance of doing so. But he does learns that Devil-Bug is a pretty good hero in her own right and decides to train both the Holders to be Guardians. (Yeah... the Su-Han episode isn't going to end well for those Guardians with the Lords of Hell being rather, um, "protective" of their children... No one is going to find their bodies... Though tbh, Master Fu wouldn't notice if they go missing since he hasn't seen any of them is over a hundred years.)

In regards to Lila in this... Um... She is severely underestimating Marinette in this... Because the LAST THING you want to do is threaten/piss off the daughter of Wrath! (The other Sin Kids have popcorn ready to watch this shit show when it happens).

Rip Lila

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incorrect-lalins-curse · 3 years

Note

Ok this has probably been thought of before but: the gang plays among us. Bonus points if there is irony (vis a vis cody being imposter Felix dying first (I'm sorry), etc.).

NO WAIT I ACTUALLY LOVE THIS OK

David

-hates being the impostor because he's not very good at lying on the spot

-"guys i got stuck in the vent how do i get out :("

-whenever his fellow impostor is about to get caught, he always does his best to defend them, often accidentally outing himself in the process. he refuses to throw his fellow impostor under the bus for any reason.

-he never sabotages unless he's a ghost. he forgets the button is there

-he's a really good crewmate though. he always stays focused on his tasks, and is great at sniffing out who the impostor is.

-most of the time his accusations will be based on purely gut instinct with little to no solid evidence, but he ends up being right 75% of the time so everyone else just goes with it

-it's for this reason that he usually dies first, especially when felix is the impostor, so that the crewmates will lose their best detective. that, and he makes himself a really easy target by never getting suspicious when people follow him.

-he always continues to do his tasks when he's a ghost.

-always apologizes to the people he kills as the impostor in the lobby once the game ends

-go-to skin is yellow with the astronaut helmet, he also has the alien pet

Felix

-LOVES being the impostor, but is not especially good at it because of his temper. he just enjoys messing with his friends.

-always goes for david or eric first

-not afraid to throw his fellow impostor under the bus to save his own hide

-surprisingly good at lying and gaslighting anyone who sees him being sus

-his favorite impostor teammate is noemi, because they both have the same desire to cause endless problems for their friends.

-will often follow people around or act suspicious even when he's a crewmate just to spread chaos

-people usually suspect him of being impostor first, and he gets wrongfully voted out a lot

-when this happens he refuses to finish his tasks

-'felix is sus' 'no YOU'RE sus fuck off'

-will often refuse to vote until the last second just to force everyone to wait the whole time

-constantly screams at people in the lobby

-if felix and eric are impostors together, felix will call a meeting and out both of them because he hates teaming up with eric and knows there's no way they'll win.

-go-to skin is black with the knife hat. if he joins a game of strangers and someone else has claimed the black and purple skins, he'll leave and find another game. he refuses to play as any other color.

Tobi

-surprisingly good as the impostor. he exudes trustworthy energy and is generally calm and reasonable during discussions, so he tends to always be one of the last suspects.

-people tend to follow him since he seems to know what he's doing, and that's how he gets them

-but once he wins as impostor? he taunts people in the lobby to hell and back. lightheartedly, of course, he just loves to bask in his victory.

-he's usually the host because he's the only one who understands all the settings and who can actually be trusted to not fuck with the character speed. he likes to randomly add a ton of tasks sometimes though, just to be difficult.

-he'll always do his best to defend his fellow impostor, but once they're proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt he'll vote them off.

-the only real giveaway for him being the impostor is if david isn't one of the first to die.

-after he finishes all of his tasks, he'll usually end up following david around.

-does his best to contribute to discussions, but he always seems to be on the exact opposite side of the ship from where all the action is, so he doesn't usually have much to add.

-tends to prioritize finishing tasks over sniffing out impostors, so if he sees someone kill in front of him he'll always finish whatever task he's on before reporting. this is problematic if someone else walks in and sees him.

-he usually ends up just trying to mediate and keep the discussion focused. he's the voice of reason.

-"Guys, stop randomly accusing people. Did anyone actually see anything suspicious?"

-if him and cody are impostors together, it's pretty much a guaranteed win for them. they're the ultimate impostor duo.

-go-to skin is dark green with wolf ears. he also has the blue dog pet.

Cody

-the first time he was impostor, he cried.

-*calls a meeting* "I'm the impostor and I don't want to be"

-it took him forever to get used to the game. when he first started out he'd get stuck on corners and get lost constantly, and it typically led to him being a very easy target for the impostors/being labelled as sus by the crewmates due to his aimless wandering

-but as time went on and he got used to the game, he slowly developed a strategy and became the best impostor out of all of them

-as an impostor, he is DIABOLICAL. i'm talking faking medbay scans, sabotaging left and right, organizing double kills, the whole nine yards. no sleazy impostor play is too low for him. it's horrifying.

-his only weakness as an impostor is that he always feels really bad when he kills someone who has a pet

-he also has somewhat spotty wifi connection in his apartment, so sometimes his game will freeze at the worst possible times, like when he's standing over a body

-he almost never talks during discussions, unless he was the one who found the body. he just follows everyone else's lead. this is another reason why no one ever suspects him, they just straight up forget he's there.

-as a crewmate, he does his best to keep to himself. if he enters a room to do a task and someone else is in there, he'll leave and come back later. it's thanks to this that he's usually among the last to die.

-he's the kind of player to call meetings just to see how many people are dead/yell at people to stop following him

-he is horrible at the emptying garbage task on the airship specifically. it infuriates him. yes i'm projecting

-always goes to watch the security feed once he finishes his tasks

-when he's a ghost, he tends to ignore his unfinished tasks in favor of following the person who killed him around to see what they do.

-his favorite impostor teammate is tobi. he works well with felix too, as well as eric. but that's only because eric is such a loud and obnoxious impostor that he's inadvertently the perfect distraction while cody does all the real work.

-his go-to skin is cyan with the devil horns, and he has the hamster ball pet. he named it hamtaro. he loves it.

Eric

-was allowed to host a game exactly once because he cranked the player speed up to max and everyone hated it

-a very trigger-happy impostor. he'll usually kill someone the second his cooldown runs out, which often results in him getting caught in the act.

-does a stack kill every chance he gets

-throws baseless accusations every which way, regardless of whether he's the impostor or not

-sometimes he'll jokingly out himself as an impostor even when he's not just to confuse people, but it usually ends in him actually getting voted out

-overall, an agent of chaos. it's hard for me to write hcs for him because the way he plays the game varies entirely on how chaotic he's feeling at any given moment.

-on rare occassions when he decides to actually try and not just mess around, he's a scarily good impostor. he can be a master of manipulation when he wants to be, and he has a lot more tricks up his sleeve than he usually lets on.

-often gets voted out or killed early on just for being annoying

-likes to run laps around the lobby

-tries to actually make friends with the people he meets in online games and plugs his youtube channel every chance he gets

-sometimes streams among us on his yt when he plays with the rest of the gang

-go-to skin is blue with the brain slug hat, because 'it kinda looks like a frog'

María

-she really doesn't like being the impostor. it stresses her out a lot and makes her feel kind of guilty.

-also she's just. not very good at it. she accidentally presses the vent/kill buttons a lot when she's meaning to press something else.

-she talks a LOT as a crewmate, but hardly talks at all as an impostor. it's a major giveaway.

-she texts really fast and turned off autocorrect on her phone, so when she sees someone kill, reports the body, and tries to say who did it, it takes her a couple tries to actually send a coherent message, and a lot of the time the impostor accuses her before she can accuse them.

'ITBWHAHDBFDHFY'

'IT WHAS HFIDY'

'CDOY'

'FFS'

'C O D Y'

-she gets lost a lot. despite how much she plays, she can never seem to remember where everything is.

-she's always one of the first to vote. much like david, she likes to throw out baseless accusations, but the only difference is that hers are usually wrong

-the CEO of 'if ____ isn't impostor, vote me next'

-likes to track down one person who she's relatively sure is innocent, and stick to their side like glue

-she also does this when she's an impostor. she picks one crewmate to spare and stick with so they'll think she's innocent and defend her during meetings.

-go-to skin is orange, and she tends to alternate between the angel halo hat, the pumpkin hat, and the flowerpot hat.

Noemí

-tends to take the game VEEERY seriously, and will sometimes give her friends (particularly cody) the silent treatment at school if they 'betray' her in-game

-constantly bugs cody in class to teach her his strategies. he just laughs at her.

-she tries really hard to be sneaky as an impostor and be as manipulative as felix and cody can be, but she tends to raise her voice when she lies and it's a dead giveaway.

-she sabotages as much as she possibly can, and overall spends more time just creating chaos than she does actually killing.

-she's not very good at defending herself, whether she's innocent or not. her defense usually boils down to "so-and-so's sus for saying i'm sus"

-"i was doing tasks!" "okay, what tasks?" "uh-"

-much like tobi and cody, she and felix are a terrifying impostor duo, but their approach is more 'mass murder' than 'manipulation and complex strategy'

-she doesn't like being crewmate, she thinks it's boring and she tends to ignore the tasks she doesn't want to do since, in her mind, there's no way they'll be able to win that way anyway.

-so she usually just wanders around and hangs out in security or admin to sus out the impostor.

-go-to skin is purple with the bat wings hat

Lucía

-hardly ever plays, and when she does she's not very good purely due to inexperience

-everyone tends to go easy on her because of this and she hates it

-really good at pointing out holes in people's alibis

-also surprisingly good at deflecting suspicion away from her

-has the potential to be a fantastic impostor, on par with cody and tobi, but doesn't have the controls down yet

-the type of crewmate to call a meeting just to say she's done with her tasks

-always finishes her tasks when she's a ghost. always.

-go-to skin is white with the pompadour hat because she thinks it's funny

Selena

-doesn't take the game seriously AT ALL

-just fucks around. all the time. never does tasks or kills anyone as the impostor, just walks around the ship following ppl around and doing fuck all

-"selena, what are you doing?" "im having a dance battle with eric in medbay, leave me alone"

-she does still contribute to discussions though. she bases her accusations on super petty things like 'eric is dark blue and i don't like that color' or 'david voted for me last round' but the funny thing is that she's usually right.

-much like eric, gets voted off early on just for being annoying. the two of them just hang out in the ghost chat and laugh at everyone screaming at each other during discussions.

-go-to skin is pink, and she switches between the witch hat and the flower headband

#admin jae #this took me forever to type #sorry that lucia and selena's are so short #we don't know much about them yet #and also i just got bored #lalin's curse #line webtoon #incorrect quotes #cody lozano blasco #david garcia martinez #felix lopez dorado #eric bermudez parejo #tobias ruiz castro #maria navarro becerra #noemi roldan segura #lucia castilla perales #selena aguilar calvet

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internalsealpanic · 4 years

Text

Dick Grayson x Mercenary Reader HCs Part 1

a/n: This is basically a Dick Grayson/ Reader thingy that has been stuck in my head for months but I haven’t plotted out an actual fic for. Basically, I have the relationship mapped out in my head but I have no scenarios. I was hoping someone could suggest a plot I can play with. This part is mostly platonic with hints of a future relationship. This is pretty much in a weird version of canon running around in my head.

masterlist

You’re Deathstroke’s apprentice. (This version is the version from the Knights and Dragons movie so he isn't a complete and utter asshole. Look, I just really like that version.) Let's just say you had more moxie than self preservation. It also helps that you’re a meta with a pretty unique power. Anything drawn on your skin turns into a physical object. (You basically have a bunch of permanent markers on you in addition to your usual equipment.)

Dick doesn't like you because of your profession but has a grudging respect for your skill. You think Dick is annoying for getting in the way but you understand that he's just trying to do his best to help the city in his own useless way.

YOU LORDING YOUR HEIGHT OVER DICK WHEN YOU'RE KIDS AND YOU QUIETLY CURSING WHEN YOU STOP GROWING.

You and Dick never set out to be friends. You honestly had no clue when this even started. Maybe it was because you keep accidentally saving each other or maybe because you two have a lot to bond over such as murdered parents and emotionally inept mentors.

When it actually started: You, in full costume, recognize your least favourite bird and see that he's crying and that he not only has an ugly bruise in his face but also a bunch of other injuries. you simply sit with him and throw your arms around him letting your muscles relax as if to tell him ‘it's ok and that you’ve got him’. You let him cry into your shoulder. You understand that you have a little more in common than he's willing to admit. You use one of your motion tattoo wings as a cover from the rain and the other to keep Dick warm. When Dick finally calms down enough to think, he's jarred by how nice you are acting. your general demeanor loosened at this point you let your offense show and the very petulant look on your face draws a tired laugh out of Dick. your angry look melts to give way to something resembling relief. You stay there for a while not speaking before Dick decides he needs to leave. Without a fuss you let him go.

After that, instead of fighting each other during encounters, you two kind of just sit together and start talking about what happened since your last encounter. Or you two play rock, paper, scissors to see who ‘won’.

Dick realizes that your personality is hilariously incompatible with your chosen profession. You rant about how Slade lectures you about learning how to lie better and when they tested how bad you were at it Dick was sure Alfred would politely word it as wooden. you had good control over your body language but you had a look caught between pain and annoyance etched on your face.

Mini scenario:

Dick is really stressed out with school and vigilanteing and with Bruce that he just starts wandering around Gotham.

It was a bad idea. Wandering around Gotham is generally a bad idea especially if your head isn't on straight but there is something relaxing about just wandering around.

Dick ends up at one of Gotham's old movie theatres. One of those businesses that you're pretty sure is a front for something because you can't wrap your head around how they could possibly still be in business.

Then there you were a foot from the ticketing windows. His mind instantly recognizes you. You, in turn, recognize him instantly.

When neither of you launch into an attack, you decide to watch a movie together. After bickering for 15 minutes about what movie you should watch, you decide on a coin toss. Because you won, Dick was subjected to your love of terrible movies.

You go out for burgers afterwards and joke about the movie. You complain about the bad acting and the ridiculous story line. You even come up with how they should have done it.

Your lunch was spent outside in the parking lot of the burger joint.

You walk around some more after you explain that you haven't been to this part of Gotham and Dick gives you a mini tour.

You talk about a mix of mundane teenager things and some complaints about their occupations.

You check your watch and explain that you need to go to the grocery store for ingredients.

Dick goes with you just because. He won't admit that he's having a lot of fun.

Being teenagers they fuck around. Being exceptionally athletic and intelligent teenagers you fuck around entertainingly.

At first, you play 'the price is right' because Dick wants to prove he isn't a spoiled rich kid. He doesn't prove jack. You don't do much better but it's on the opposite end.

You get bored and frustrated so you start a scavenger hunt much to the terror of the other customers. How would you feel about 2 terrors zooming around screaming about butter and backflipping over you?

Dick is busy gloating about his victory when the store gets robbed. Dick can't do anything because right now he is a rich boy extraordinaire and should not be capable of fighting. you on the other hand is sore from losing and just yeets a can into one of the robbers faces.

Everyone's attention pans to your as you ready to lob another can at them. The robbers run leaving their unconscious friend on the floor bleeding.

You still pay for the can but ask Dick to get another one.

Walking down the street, Dick notices how many take out places are on the way and asks why you don't just eat from there. you simply tell him you like home cooking more. He notes that for next time.

You exchange phone numbers so you can plan a next time.

The next time they hang out you both bring homemade snacks to sneak into the theater.

They start hanging out in civvies and do really mundane civilian stuff you want to try and that Dick doesn't get to do enough.

You become a sort of hub of normality for Dick. He can talk to you about all the weird stuff without worrying about your not getting it or your judging him while also doing the most mind numbingly human things.

What do they usually talk about:

Casual nerdy stuff

Weird history shit you reads about

Vigilante stuff

Funny henchman stories from the perspective of a vigilante and a higher level henchman

Sometimes they talk about trauma but they only vaguely mention it

They debate over dumb things like whether there's too much variety in cereal. Guess who's on which side.

Sometimes they discuss fighting techniques.

Dick teaches you Romani and about the Romani culture

You sometimes explains various myths and superstitions from your own culture

Dick sometimes talks about school and galas and you end up making fun of weird rich people. They also end up making fun of the various rich people who hire you.

You'll talk about almost everything with each other

You bring him to one of your safe houses for a home cooked meal after he tells you how he lives off of cereal. You were horrified.

The Titans, Batman, and Alfred get really suspicious about Dick's new civilian friend.

Slade gets suspicious of you frequently visiting certain cities.

Somehow they figure out that you are the wraith.

They all lecture Dick about it.

Slade just finds the whole thing amusing and debates on whether he can actually convince you to give up some of Grayson's secrets.

I just love the image of them casually hanging out in civvies with Batman questioning Dick's life decisions and what your has been influenced by his relationship with Catwoman while Deathstroke and Wintergreen are just quietly amused by the situation at some point they were worried about you discussing merc stuff but neither talk about current business unless it's safe to.

Wintergreen isn't particularly worried since Grayson is a good kid. Wintergreen once joked that you should convince him to join their side. You said that Dick didn't have the right personality to be a merc. The irony of this was completely lost on your.

You spending a ton of your hard earned mercenary money to win a stuffed toy that you think little Rose would want. Dick making fun of you for not getting it then he ends up spending too much money but he eventually gets it. You and Dick pass by a shop and you see the exact same stuffed toy in the shop window for a sixteenth of the fortune you spent at the arcade. Good news though, Rose still has the stuffed toy.

Both of you being petty at dance dance revolution.

When you rant to each other in less than private areas, you rapidly switch languages.

Unbeknownst to Slade, Dick actually knows a bunch of his safe houses and unbeknownst to Dick, those are Deathstroke's safe houses. You are technically not lying when you say it's yours.

You have a silent pact not to blow each other's covers unless they deem it completely necessary (when people's lives are at stake). The only person who knows this pact is Jason and they have bought his silence.

You will both go out of their way to help each other out of a bind.

Sometimes when Bruce and Alfred are out of town and the stars align to have you visiting for a job, you end up helping Dick babysit. Jason gets confused and defensive at first. You have dealt with distrustful youngins. Neither Rose nor Joey wanted anything to do with you at first. You, however, grew up wanting siblings so you tried your darndest to look after them and it is really fucking hard to not let this munchkin grown on you.

When you're old enough to hit the club they often go drinking together. You once tried to have you wingman for Dick. Using the ‘fantastic’ negotiating skills you got from mercenary work, you ended up getting the number for yourself. You once told Rose and Joey about it and both of them made lighthearted jokes about it.

Dick gets confronted by Slade at sword point and asks what his intentions are with his kid (He honestly isn't at all serious but he likes how scared Dick got because the man is terrifying.)

Dick also gets interrogated by Joey and Rose because, you know, this is their big sister.

You often insist on family dinners at least once every 2 weeks with your siblings, sometimes with their mom (Adeline is kind of not ok with you and Rose being present but is trying her best for Joey's sake), sometimes with their dad, occasionally with their uncle Wintergreen.

You usually just casually call Slade 'pops' and you drawls 'dad' when you’re pissed and 'papa' when you’re emotional. You try your damndest to only call him Slade or Deathstroke on the field but sometimes you slip up and calls him pops in the field

You have batnapped each batkid at least once. Batnapping meaning seeing a baby bat and throwing them over your shoulder when you’re pretty sure they’re going to get killed. This isn’t limited to kids. You still do this when they’re adults. The image of you throwing Dick over your shoulder when you two were tiny gives me life but you throwing Dick and/or Jason over your shoulder when they’re huge has me cackling.

You basically accidentally become a de facto big sister/ mom friend to the batkids purely through your friendship with Dick.

Images from this scenario I can’t get out of my head:

Stargazing

Teaching Dick how to cook. He just ends up going to your place for a meal though.

Running around during a rain storm huddled under a jacket with Dick because neither of you checked the weather

Casual affection you two share because you’re both tactile people. Casual affection as in just sitting on the couch in each other’s space, bumping shoulders to communicate, leaning on each other, hugging each other when greeting each other, and all that good stuff.

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Thanks for reading! I’m really sorry for the grammar and disorganization.

If you guys are interested in the more bickering dialogue heavy part 2 either comment here or send an ask or pm me. *shrugs* This is just really self indulgent on my part.

taglist:

@idkmanicantenglish

@birdy-bat-writes (I will stop tagging you when you run out of good ideas for me.)

#dick grayson x reader #dick grayson x you #dick grayson imagine #dick grayson #Deathstroke #parental #Slade Wilson #BatFam #batfamily headcanon #rant #my writing #merc!reader #batboys #batkids

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mari-onberry · 4 years

Text

Win-Win

For the Kagami Zine! @kagamizine

This was a collab with @landturtlealyce’s beautiful drawing

Also on Ao3

During fencing practice, Adrien could tell that Kagami was nervous. She wasn’t as quick on her feet as usual, and she seemed distracted by something. He knew her identity as Ryuko, and she knew his identity as Chat Noir, so he was sure there wasn’t much to be worried about on that front. Also, she wasn’t the type to let that sort of thing distract her. So, he approached her during break.

“Kagami, are you alright? You don’t seem like yourself today.” Despite them dropping their romantic feelings for each other a while ago when Kagami started dating Marinette, he still worried about her. He wanted her to know that he was there for her, no matter what it was she was going through.

She was a little startled at the question, since she had been stuck in her own head for so long. “I’m okay, it’s just family problems, I don’t want to inconvenience you with that.”

Adrien would’ve been a little hurt by that sentiment if he wasn’t so worried about her. “Kagami, you can talk to me about anything. And I’m probably the one person who can sympathize with you about family stuff.”

She gave in, realizing it would be better to tell him. She needed to talk to someone about it. “My mother wants me to go to that charity gala this weekend. And I’m fine with going, but she expects me to bring along a romantic partner. I would bring Marinette, but…” she didn’t finish her sentence, already a little caught up in her own head again.

“Bring me.” Adrien suggested almost immediately. “I know we aren’t dating, but we can pretend to be to get your mother off your back about it. Plus, it would probably make my father happy as well. Win-win.” He smiled reassuringly at her, hoping his suggestion would be a viable solution.

She pondered it for a moment, seemingly thinking through possible outcomes. “Okay,” she said reluctantly, then, “Yeah, that sounds good,” as she realized that it was her best choice right now. It even seemed like a fun idea, since it would be a good excuse to spend time with him. Plus, the Agreste family was invited to the gala as well, so he would be there anyway.

So, they planned it out, and Kagami was planning on telling her mom about it after practice when her mom picked her up. But once practice was over, they walked out together to see their parents talking. Gabriel had chosen this of all days to pick his son up from practice, which was a rare occurrence. “Father!” Adrien said, feigning excitement, a little worried.

“Son. How was practice?”

“It was fine,” Adrien answered, too preoccupied to elaborate. He started to make his way to the car before either of their parents could question them on their relationship. He didn’t want to lie, but he was willing to do it for Kagami’s sake. He just didn’t want to mess up their plans to tell their parents individually, since that seemed like the best way to not make that big of a deal out of it. If their story was too outlandish, their parents might get their hopes up about them getting married one day. Unfortunately, Gabriel seemed intent on being the one to mess up their plans.

“So, Adrien, have you decided who you’re going to bring to the gala?” Gabriel asked before Adrien could escape to the car. Kagami looked at Adrien, realizing he was being pressured into a relationship, just like she was.

Adrien smiled, seemingly genuine this time, and answered, “Yep!” More excitedly than was needed. “I’m going with Kagami.”

He bought into the lie, probably because he wanted it to be true, and even though their original plans were messed up, this way seemed to have a similar outcome. Then, Tomoe said something that made Kagami’s heart drop.

“Why don’t you bring that Dupain-Cheng girl along with you, too? I heard her fashion designs have been getting popular lately. It’d be good publicity for her,” she asked them.

Adrien almost laughed from the irony, but answered, “I’ll ask her if she’s available.” He didn’t want to complicate the situation even further, so he thought the best thing to do would be to save that for later.

They went their separate ways, and before Adrien got in the car, he shrugged at Kagami to say, “I’m sorry.”

Later that night, Kagami was able to call Marinette. Parental controls had been a difficult obstacle, but Marinette found a bunch of different ways to bypass them through Nino, and it had been a lifesaver. She needed to explain what exactly was going on, since even though Marinette was hopefully willing to go along with it, she was more than likely confused. “Marinette?” She asked as quietly as she could, since her mother was asleep in the other room.

“Kagami!” Marinette answered, sounding ecstatic to get a call from her girlfriend. “I was hoping you’d call. The party sounds fun, I can’t wait!” From her words, it became obvious that Adrien had already called her and told her about the gala.

Kagami decided she needed to clear things up as soon as possible. “I’m going to have to pretend to date Adrien.”

“What?” Marinette asked. That came out of nowhere.

“I asked Adrien to pretend to be my boyfriend while at the gala.” Kagami started, trying to explain her thought process. “I thought it would be easier for him to be my plus one, since both our parents want us to be married, but I didn’t think it would turn out like this. I’m sorry.”

Marinette let the information sink in. “Alright. Well, I know my family life is much different from yours, but we could’ve just gone as friends. I’m fine with Adrien being there, though, especially if it’ll help get your parents off your backs for a while. Thanks for telling me.”

Kagami blushed– she actually had a reason she didn’t suggest going as friends. “I didn’t think I would be able to pretend to be just friends with you anymore.”

Marinette couldn’t believe she was lucky enough to be dating Kagami. She knew that even if they would have had trouble pretending to be friends, most people probably wouldn’t even be able to tell the difference; they weren’t much for PDA after all. “Alright, I guess I can forgive you,” she teased. “Well, hopefully it won’t be too bad with Adrien there.”

Kagami agreed and they stayed silent on the phone together for a while, not wanting to hang up.

“Hey Kagami?”

“Yeah?” Kagami prompted her girlfriend to continue. Her eyes were closed and she had fully expected to fall asleep while on the call.

“Do you still have feelings for Adrien?”

That was a tough question. Even after they started dating, they were both pretty open with the fact that they used to have feelings for Adrien. Key words: used to. It was just expected that both of them dropped those feelings once they started dating. In reality, that wasn’t as easy as it sounded.

When Kagami didn’t answer, Marinette elaborated. “I mean, you did go to him first to ask him to pretend to date you. I know you two are friends, but there were other options,” she explained, then realized why Kagami might be having a hard time answering. “You can tell me, Kagami. We promised to be open about these things. I won’t be mad.” That was a guarantee, but Kagami still felt her heart drop when she thought of the consequences if she said ‘yes’.

“I might. I’m not sure.”

It was rare for Kagami to admit to not being sure about something. “Okay. That’s fine. Maybe pretending to date him will be a good opportunity, then.”

Kagami noticed that Marinette seemed awfully fine with her girlfriend having feelings for another person, and Kagami appreciated it, but in this case, she couldn’t help but read into it. Marinette had always been in love with Adrien, and even if she had buried her feelings when she got together with Kagami, it was hard to drop that kind of feeling just like that. She didn’t say anything, though, since the whole situation was starting to stress her out. And maybe Marinette was right; maybe the fake dating thing would help clear things up.

Soon, it was the weekend, and all three of them met up in front of Adrien’s place to go to the party. Gabriel didn’t like having people at his house, but he had suggested Marinette come, so he thought it would only be polite to give them a ride.

Kagami’s breath hitched once she saw her girlfriend dressed up. Marinette didn’t have time to prepare a new dress for this particular event, so she wore one that she designed a couple months ago. Kagami had seen her in a similar dress before, but she never got used to how pretty she looked all dressed up.

They drove to the gala in near silence, all three of them in the back while Gabriel sat in the passenger seat, and their bodyguard in the driver’s seat. Kagami found it sort of awkward stuck between her girlfriend and the boy who was pretending to be her boyfriend, but she was determined to make the most of it. Gabriel wasn’t looking back at them, anyway, so she took hold of Marinette’s hand, sliding her own hand against Marinette’s to rest it where it always fit perfectly, then set her other hand on top of Adrien’s. His hand was surprisingly soft, and he jumped when he felt Kagami touch him, but he didn’t make any effort to complain or move his hand.

Once they got there, Kagami was actually buzzing with excitement, though she didn’t show it. Earlier, sometime after her call with Marinette, she had decided that if she had to be here with her girlfriend, she wasn’t going to be forced to pretend they were only friends. She didn’t owe anyone that. Plus, it wouldn’t be obvious unless they kissed in front of everyone. Her only problem was Adrien, and although she knew she didn’t owe it to anyone to pretend to date a boy, she actually quite liked the pretending. Adrien seemed to like it, too. So, she walked into the building with Marinette and Adrien on either side of her, arm-in-arm with both of them.

Gabriel didn’t seem to care– Kagami was convinced he was there just to impress potential investors– and it didn’t seem like anyone else there cared either. So, they all embraced it. They sat down at a table that was draped with a fancy white tablecloth, and soon Adrien and Kagami’s parents were nowhere to be seen (no doubt busy with work) so they were no longer supervised.

“You look nice.” Adrien said, wanting to start up conversation, but not knowing how. Then, to clarify, he added, “Both of you.”

Marinette replied, “Thanks, you too,” to be polite, but she wasn’t wrong. Adrien looked good in just about anything, so he couldn’t go wrong in a suit.

Kagami’s reply to Adrien’s compliment was quite different. “She does, doesn’t she?” And pressed a kiss to the back of Marinette’s hand, much too intimately to be platonic.

“Kagami!” Adrien scolded, “Aren’t we supposed to be the ones dating?”

Kagami shrugged. “No one’s looking. Besides,” she turned to look at Marinette, “I told you I wouldn’t be able to pretend to just be friends with you.” Marinette blushed, but Adrien blushed even harder.

Marinette didn’t mind. “I do like this better than having to sit around while your parents deal with business deals.”

Adrien rolled his eyes. “Come on, it’s not that boring. I’ve been to a lot of these things, and usually the entertainment and hors d'oeuvres make it worthwhile.” He looked around the room, and although it was full of old, rich people, there were at least plates full of tarts, pâté and other small dishes.

Kagami shook her head, admiring his optimism, but finding it a little naive. “I’m glad you’re able to look on the bright side of things, Adrien, but I’d much rather be doing pretty much anything else right now.” That wasn’t true; she did enjoy being with them, but she would rather they were at a movie, or a concert, or fencing. “We need to do more stuff together, the three of us.” If only their parents would let them. She couldn’t wait until she was old enough to move out.

“Let’s make the most of our time together now,” Marinette said, already coming up with plans in her head. If only they could be alone, without a hundred people around them. “Do you think your parents would notice if we went missing for a while?”

Adrien was worried about the proposition, since he wasn’t one to risk getting caught misbehaving by his dad, but it wasn’t as if Gabriel cared about him in that particular moment.

Kagami was fine with disobeying a little if it meant spending this limited amount of time together. “I’m fine with taking that risk,” Kagami answered, and almost instantaneously, Marinette took her by the hand and dragged her into the hallway, where they could hopefully escape unnoticed. Kagami took hold of Adrien’s hand, and he trailed close behind them.

Just because he was fine with the decision, didn’t mean he wasn’t worried about the consequences. “Where are we going?”

“Relax, Adrien, it’s not like this is the first time we’ve all snuck out, just the first time without a city to save.”

That was enough to convince him. He followed along without another protest after that; after all, Chat Noir wouldn’t worry about this sort of thing. Maybe for the night he could pretend to be his daring superhero counterpart, just without the responsibilities.

Marinette led them out the back entrance and they were finally alone. They weren’t quite at their destination yet, though, and she finally revealed her plan. “I think I saw an ice cream shop on the way here, only about a block away.” They would have to hurry there and back to minimize the risk of their absence being noticed, but they decided it was worth it.

Marinette was right, the walk to the ice cream shop was short, but that didn’t mean it was uneventful. Adrien, intent on channeling his Chat Noir persona, felt a bit more confident. But, being the dense and clumsy person that he is, Adrien was still not the best at expressing his feelings. That sort of thing certainly wasn’t as easy when he wasn’t wearing a mask.

“So, Kagami, now that we’re pretending to date, does that mean I get a kiss?” He teased, knowing it was far-fetched to ask such a thing.

Kagami didn’t see it that way. “Well, we don’t really have to pretend right now, but I wouldn’t mind a kiss.” She liked seeing him flustered, and she especially enjoyed the way Marinette reacted. It was as if she liked her girlfriend flirting with her (supposedly) former crush, despite her better judgement. “My lips are for one girl only,” she said, and Adrien was almost relieved that she had reinforced his suspicions that they were exclusive. As much as he was attracted to the two girls, it was too complicated for him to think about dating them both. Then Kagami added, “But that doesn’t mean there’s no room for a boy,” and that made Adrien look like he was close to collapsing from embarrassment.

Once they got to the shop, they had decided to share a cup with three scoops: one blackberry, one orange, and one peppermint. It was an odd combination, but it was tasty, and Kagami was glad that they were actually trying out the combination of flavors André had assigned them, even if it wasn’t something they’d order again.

After a half an hour of being absent from the party, they decided they had been gone long enough and started to head back. It was getting dark now, and sunset served as a nice view for their walk back. They didn’t look forward to the festivities that now seemed to pale in comparison to their “friend” date, but it was almost bearable now that they had gotten a half an hour to themselves.

“Come on, we have a party to get back to,” Kagami said once they got to the back entrance, taking hold of Adrien’s hand and leading him back into the building as he tried to hide the blush on his face. For some reason, holding hands with her felt a lot more intimate than it did earlier in the day.

That night, maybe she would call Adrien as well as Marinette, and maybe they would talk everything through, or maybe they’d laugh it off as a one-time thing. Maybe a year from now, things wouldn’t seem so simple between them. Kagami decided she could deal with that later. For now, she could just enjoy the way Adrien’s hand clammed up against hers when she winked at him, and savor the quick glances Marinette would give her when she knew no one was looking.

#mlb #miraculous ladybug #adrigaminette #kagami zine #mari writes

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zeldahime · 4 years

Text

cql college/job au xiyao edition

because these two have the potential to be the slowest of slow fucking burns and extremely excruciatingly painfully perfectly polite at all times

featuring: ta/student very-much-not-a-relationship, enough ust to set the entire humanities building on fire, corporate espionage, nie huaisang being the sneakiest and sweetest slytherin, background wangxian, nie mingjue being a boss, intense eye contact, let lan xichen say fuck, meng yao stress hours, WERE YOU ONLY PRETENDING TO BE DELICATE AND POOR, summer internship, background wangxian

it got uh. very long. so.

meng yao starts working for nie enterprises when he’s 16 as a part-time janitor. he has two other part time jobs and is studying for his ged.

one day he solves some kind of problem that nie enterprises is having and nie mingjue likes this guy and promotes him to his personal assistant on the spot

nie huaisong is always flitting about his brother’s office etc, and they become friends and meng yao helps him with his homework.

when huaisong is getting ready to go to small posh private university, he will definitely need tutors. mingjue is happily persuaded into converting meng yao’s job into full-time huaisang babysitting tutoring, including paying for yao’s tuition and room and board to get a degree himself; his job is to make sure huaisang gets good grades and not in trouble. meng yao sees this for the golden ticket it is and very happily agrees. this is going to be the easiest job he’s ever had, and he’s got job security as long as huaisang doesn’t mess up too badly.

first day of classes, meng yao is 22 and looking around at the 30-odd 18-year-old trust fund babies with a sinking stomach telling him that he does not belong here.

this is a philosophy and ethics class like. in a literal ivory tower. this is possibly the last place he should be.

and the most gorgeous man he’s ever seen in his life walks into the room with the professor. and he’s introduced as “and this is our TA, lan xichen.”

lan xichen smiles at the room with the kind of look that makes it feel like he’s making eye contact with everyone. and then he makes real eye contact with meng yao. “he’s attractive as hell,” they both think, and then think nothing of it.

but, it’s a small class. and it meets 3 times a week. and lan xichen shuts down someone who pokes at meng yao’s age, and meng yao asks questions perfectly tailored to making sure that huaisang and the other students actually understand the material. and by the end of week 2 they’re both saddled with an extremely unfortunate crush that they both need to get a handle on. for professionalism’s sake. they’re at work goddamn it.

and one day meng yao comes to office hours to ask a question that’s much more advanced than what they’re talking about in class, and in lan xichen’s tiny ta office talking about ethics, they are exceptionally and perfectly polite and appropriate and within the exact bounds of a ta-student relationship.

they are also both about to catch on fire.

this continues all school year, because it’s a two-part class. meng yao comes to office hours, and he and lan xichen are stringently appropriate the whole time, and at no point do they so much as brush fingers. they see each other every single day.

huaisang thinks this is 1) absolutely hilarious and 2) the perfect distraction. he wingmans the hell out of meng yao in class, he third-wheels on office hours specifically to make it worse, and he arranges “chance” meetings between them outside of class. (he got some details about lan xichen’s daily schedule from wei wuxian, who he is eternally surprised is actually somehow getting information from lan wangji the silent wonder)

(he’s not getting it from lan wangji; lan xichen is wingmanning his little brother. the info wei wuxian is passing on is straight from the horse’s mouth.)

nie huaisang thinks he’s being very clever and sneaky in arranging his classes and portfolio to make it look like he’s just taking electives when he’s really planning on switching to a fine arts major at the last possible minute

he is being clever and sneaky, but meng yao knows what he’s doing anyway

meng yao is keeping that ball up in the air as long as he can though, because that’s a later-problem.

in addition to falling in extremely professional love with his ta, his asshole dad has also come out of the woodwork and is trying to involve him in corporate espionage. which is less than super great.

on the one side, asshole dad who hasn’t supported you in 22 years and didn’t care when your mother died when you were 16 and pushed you down the stairs because you had the audacity to ask for help, who will gladly frame you even if you don’t help. on the other hand, your boss, who has treated you well for a boss, but has explicitly told you your job depends on keeping his little brother as out-of-trouble as possible and who you don’t think will believe you

in this au, he’s solidly with the nie clan because: Golden Fucking Ticket, where the strings are “don’t let huaisang fuck up too bad,” and where “fuck up” means like. drunk driving or failing a class. he’ll probably even keep his job after huaisang’s art degree reveal. all dear old dad is offering is a jail sentence.

but he still needs to somehow convince jgs that he’s double-crossing nie enterprises without actually doing that, so that he doesn’t get framed for doing it.

it’s stressful.

lan xichen’s life isn’t roses and pearls either, though it’s not nearly as stressful as playing double-agent corporate espionage while also babysitting huaisang and getting a degree

lan xichen’s life is all about being the Dutiful Eldest Son so that lan wangji can have an inch of freedom

this includes becoming a corporate accountant (a job he’s bored just thinking about) and marrying a Good Girl From A Respectable Family (he is extremely gay), and eventually having 2.5 children and a white picket fence and a dog (he’s a cat person and doesn’t know what to do with children). he tells himself it’s all for lan wangji and it’s almost enough to make him want to do it.

being the ta for his thesis advisor’s philosophy and ethics class was supposed to be his Fun Indulgent Treat because he has no idea what “fun” or “indulgent” or “treat” mean

but now he’s in love with one of his students and that’s. not. good.

he’s all of 21 and he’s pretty sure he’s going to be blacklisted from all jobs for his entire life unless he manages, somehow, to keep anyone from knowing how entirely unprofessional he’s being.

he is trying very hard to distract himself from his gayngst by helping wangji with his own. 18-year-olds can be so oblivious in love, he thinks, failing to see any irony at all.

he’s also been telling his bff mingjue about this extremely painful experience this entire time, under a pseudonym. if mingjue has to hear one more word about “Y”’s dimples, he’s going to scream and then he’s going to force Y into a closet with xichen and not let them out until they’ve solved this. he’s very tired.

at one point when he’s about to pass out from extreme eye contact, he gives meng yao his number so that he can “pass it to nie huaisang, in case he has any questions” and just. prays really hard that meng yao will text him after classes are over and he’s back to just being a grad student and they can be friends.

BUT. BEFORE HE HAS THE CHANCE. IN THAT TIME BETWEEN FINALS ENDING AND GRADES BEING TURNED IN.

lan xichen begins his summer internship at nie enterprises in accounting. and meng yao returns to fill in for an admin on her maternity leave. and they see each other in the break room.

both of them: *internal gay screaming* Hi, what a coincidence, how are you doing?

(boys, you are in different departments, nobody cares if you date as long as you don’t start fucking on the desks. they don’t know this because they’re young and very concerned with being Professional and with Career Advancement.)

they have Very Professional lunch together every day. and will buy each other coffee, Professionally. and it would be much more professional if they would just actually make out and then come to work like normal people instead of clearly wanting to make out every time they see each other and instead being Very Incredibly Professional with their words and actions.

mingjue clues in that this is Y. meng yao is Y. Oh my god, first i didn’t want to know that, second this is going to be so easy, and then i’ll never have to listen to xichen wax rhapsodic about his eyes again, he thinks.

he is incorrect.

the harder he tries, the more vehemently perfect their professionalism becomes. which means he’s watching them have extremely intense eye contact at work and can’t actually say anything about it because, it’s just eye contact? what is he going to say? stop looking at people when delivering tps reports?

he also can’t say anything outright like “just. kiss. him.” because. he’s both of their Entire Boss. at the moment he’s xichen’s boss’s boss’s boss. he can’t do anything without probably violating sexual harassment laws.

mingjue is tired.

meanwhile the corporate espionage double-agent act is still ongoing and meng yao continues to be stressed

mingjue is alerted to meng yao “stealing” secrets and has a freak-out; he hasn’t slept in three days and he trusted meng yao and how could he? was this his plan all along WAS HE ONLY PRETENDING TO BE DELICATE AND POOR

xichen steps between them and insists there’s a reasonable explanation and jesus christ mingjue have you slept when was the last time you’ve eaten you look terrible let’s get you to bed and talk about this in the morning

(meng yao doesn’t realize that he’s clutched on to lan xichen’s suit until after he releases it and lan xichen is trying, very hard, to pretend that it didn’t happen because he won’t be able to think of anything else if it did)

xichen, immediately after mingjue is in huaisang’s care: i believe you, but what the fuck is happening, yao.

(if he wasn’t so rattled by the entire mingjue-reaming thing yao would be able to savor lan xichen saying fuck sooooo much better.)

(once yao explains it is a strain not to kiss him right then and there in that empty conference room but he deserves better than lan xichen, who can’t bring anything to the table and can’t even bring him home to eat at his table, because he is the Dutiful Eldest Son and his closet needs to be made of motherfuckin steel)

(huaisang knows exactly what the fuck is up and talks mingjue down, because meng yao is sneaky but he wasn’t counting on huaisang like. actually caring.)

this is also the exact same day where lan wangji brings wei wuxian home for dinner and this goes. as well as might be expected. given Uncle hates everything about wei wuxian from his motorcycle to his leather to his attitude. but wangji is happy and he’s smiling and that’s why lan xichen is doing this. that’s why lan xichen is doing everything.

the next day the 3-zun make a Plan to trap jgs and then get them audited by the irs, since if he’s doing shady espionage stuff he’s also almost certainly doing shady tax stuff (they’re right, he is)

after the internship is over, that very evening, lan xichen asks meng yao if he wants to “hang out, as friends”

oh, you thought this pining dysfunctional trainwreck was going to end here? buddy. lan xichen is in fucking narnia, he’s so deep in the closet, because he must be Dutiful.

they go on several not-a-dates doing Friend Things. and several study sessions where no studying is done. and eventually.

lan qiren: so when are you introducing me to your boyfriend? he seems like a good kid, nothing like that wei wuxian character

lan xichen.exe has stopped working

lan qiren: what, do you think i’m blind? he either is your boyfriend or he should be. good head on his shoulders. *returns to his newspaper*

turns out lan xichen’s self-sacrificial bargain with the universe was borne from a place of living in a heteropatriarchy and not actually from the reality of his uncle’s beliefs, who knew

(lan qiren loves his nephews and wants them to be happy. he also has eyes, in his head, that connect to his brain. he knew xichen was probably gay by the time the kid was 14, and started reading books with titles like “how to accept your gay son” in the living room. xichen assumed this was about wangji, because he also has eyes and wants his baby brother to be happy. wangji bringing a boy home was actually a big surprise to his uncle. this family does not actually talk to each other about things.)

anyway the next friend-not-a-date that he and yao go on, he asks yao on a real date.

he is bracing for rejection when yao kisses??? him???? for some reason?????

they make out &c. this is the boring part

they have a conversation about their feelings and discover that they’ve both been in love for a year a YEAR a fucking year. then they make out some more because lost time.

fin.

#xiyao #lan xichen #meng yao #jin guangyao #cql #cql fic #the untamed #the untamed fic #the untamed au #edited for typo #temper and circumstance

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caramujotan · 4 years

Text

disco elysium text-form #thots:

i finished my first run last friday because i went stupid and played the game for nearly 24h straight. i could literally not drop it. i called it a 10/10 when i was about 2h away from finishing it, finished it and kept that score. it’s a real good game and you can stop here with my endorsement but if you want some more in-depth spoiler-free thoughts on it you can read the rest of this post. it’s big.

due to the content of the game, i talk about mental health topics, suicide, drug use and - obviously - cops 🐷

in a way calling this by numbers feels reductive (scalding hot review take, i know). a 10/10 score doesn’t reflect the awe i felt when gilding through the end-game. it doesn’t say a thing about how viscerally my body reacted to a few pixels and lines of text. it can’t tell you that i spent 2h in bed trying to sleep but couldn’t keep my brain off of it and got up at 8AM to finish it; or how much i’ve been replaying the game in my head, curious about how certain quests or events would have gone if i’d tried a different approach or character build.

i have this funky little medical condition that goes with my autism that makes it difficult for me to identify and process most emotions that i feel. but i can tell you how my body reacted. this game went into my gut. it felt like a leaded fist burrowed through my throat into the pit of my stomach and shredded my insides. it got me fucked up, is what i’m saying.

obviously i can’t go into what caused me to react like that without spoiling the shit out of this game, and since i wish i could gently lobotomize myself in order to experience it again for the first time, i heavily recommend you go through it knowing as little as possible. what i can do, however, is talk about the technical elements of it.

the art is beautiful. the art direction is top-notch and it was definitely of the things that drew me to this game first. the oil painting aesthetic is sublime - gritty and ethereal in equal parts whenever each purpose is called for. finding out that the art team was spearheaded by painting majors from russian fine-art schools made perfect sense - it shows, and the game made peak use of it. the philosophy behind their visual approach is woven into the fabric of the game itself - it’s a perfect compliment to the writing and storytelling, and i’d struggle to imagine this game without it. it permeates and elevates every environment, every interaction, every character build choice - from the character portraits, to the UI, to certain skills and game events. real art cop hours all my homies kin the art cop.

the music by british sea power is subsided and haunting and gives the game that british/european post-industrial melancholic flavor. i’m no music critic sadly. it fits the mood and it stands out beautifully in a few key scenes, but that’s as much as i can say.

the biggest turn off for me was in the voice acting. if you’re interested in playing this game i’m going to assume with 75% certainty you’re in your early 20s to 30s and are politically located to the left side of liberal at a minimum - so i’ll just come out and say it plainly: every second NPC (especially in the late game) is voiced by a leftist podcaster. i’m sure this is a plus for some, and it’s not the kind of thing you’d immediately notice anyway unless you’re a quote unquote dirtbag leftist with terminal irony poisoning twitter brainrot. most of them do competent work, but the sound mixing and general performance is weaker in comparison to the NPCs voiced by actual voice actors.

it’s not that bad, but it’s there - and the fact that this is probably my biggest complaint about the game should say enough of my opinion on it. either way i was cringing with recognition every time it happened and it took me out on more than one occasion because i kept hearing felix chapotraphouse in one of the game’s big tense climatic scenes.

‘but caramujo!’ you say ‘this doesn’t tell me what this game is about’. hold on, i’m about to blow the ‘i can’t do literary analysis unless things are explained to me in clear cut absolute terms’ gang out of a career and spell the themes of this game out for you in detail:

it’s about loss, and renewal - both personal and interpersonal. it’s about rising from the ruins of something that’s been in motion long before you were even thought of, having little power over it, and soldiering on. it’s about heartbreak and the end of a relationship and how that can warp your mind and infect everything around you. and you won’t get better right away - the end game doesn’t wrap everything up with a little bow and lets you cause systematic upheaval. you can’t revolutionize your way out of this one. shit will, for the time being, continue to suck.

it’s about waking up in a body that’s fucked up with a heart that aches in a world that’s been torn apart - and still making the decision to try to make it better - because you’re alive, and your heart beats, and there’s other beings in the world that are tethered to you and we all owe it to ourselves to make it better. communism hasn’t worked, baby - but so hasn’t love - and we’re not gonna give up on that. that’s what it’s all about.

it should be pretty clear right now that i did my first run as a bisexual/questioning communist feminist hobo who kinned karl marx. but i can assure you there’s other ways to play this game, and there’s more to it than that because of it.

the quests (both side quests and a main story) are varied and had me laughing and dropping into existential despair on different occasions. other than trying to be the biggest communism builder, this game is also about:

- having a heart attack because a chair is too uncomfortable, but it’s OK because your buddy cop holds you in his arms like in the buddy cop movies.

- doing copious amounts of drugs and turning on, tuning in and dropping out, maaaaan.

- going on an x-files monster of the week episode to track down a curse that’s dooming the local businesses.

- shilling for the free market to come fix it all with its beatific invisible hand while standing in a town so fucked over by economic embargoes and poverty that the local union leader is a corrupt toad with a plan to revitalize the region by gathering the work force into a nationalized worker owned drug enterprise of the legal and illegal varieties - and it still comes off as one of the more levelheaded economic decisions one could make in that situation.

- trying not to fucking kill yourself even though you have to live with that thought every single day.

- winning the trust of a 12 year old crackhead with a deadbeat dad by becoming a positive masculine role model.

- turning into a fascist you so can get buffs from drinking alcohol, and therefore becoming a raging alcoholic and having to walk up to important story events carrying half a liquor store in your inventory so you don’t have a mental breakdown or kill yourself from lack of morale whenever someone calls you out on your ethnonationalist bullshit.

it’s also - and i cannot stress this enough - about making sure you can find a tape to sing karaoke and make kim kitsuragi smile. it slaps. it’s real good writing.

i don’t know what else can say. pretty sure the game is on sale on steam now. anyway please play this absolute masterpiece and stan studio za/um for clear skin. ACAB.

#disco elysium #.txt #not sure if this is done yet i might add more thots later specifically about the world building

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akaluan · 4 years

Note

Kaito/Ishida/Ichigo/Orihime/Chad/Tatsuki: Platonic Soulmate AU & Curses

It’s barely a month after being named Kaito that he notices it. Fresh from a shower and just barely comfortable with his new looks, he pauses to glance at maybe-himself and—

Leans forward, staring into the mirror — into the face of an almost-stranger — and carefully brushes a thumb across his collarbones. Just to see. Just to make sure…

(His soulmark has changed.)

(He’d only just accepted it before everything happened, and now… now…)

(It’s different, strange like the face that meets his gaze, strange like the buzz of Hollow reiatsu under his skin, strange like the name he has to accept—)

He swallows. Runs a thumb over the prominent orange-blue-white-black feather that curves along his collarbones. Brushes his fingers over the five colorful feathers that trail down his sternum. Wets dried lips and tries to rationalize, tries to understand…

(*For us,*) Ichigo murmurs as Kaito rubs at the feather along his collarbones again. (*I think.*)

(*For all of us,*) Kaito agrees after a moment, tracing the orange-and-blue banding thoughtfully. (*Is this… common amongst Shinigami?*)

(*I… I don’t know. I… Rukia never mentioned it, and I never asked,*) Ichigo admits ruefully. (*But I always had a small tricolor mark near to our group’s mark, which got bigger as I started interacting with Zangetsu more. I just… assumed that Shinigami didn’t speak of it much, or that it was one of those… things. You know, something that everyone obviously knows, so there’s no need to talk about it.*)

Kaito hums in agreement, then flattens his palm over the other five feathers, hiding them from sight. (*These though… I… can’t. I’m not… I only just accepted you and now… now I’m getting shoved into an entirely different group?! I’d… I’d rather have only our new mark than this!*)

Ichigo presses closer, strength-confidence-reassurance, and says, (*That’s alright. You don’t have to push yourself. Maybe Hat’n’Clogs has an answer?*)

The idea has merit. Urahara had provided him with an entirely new look already, so… maybe hiding soulmarks isn’t too strange an ask.

Kaito glances one last time at the almost-stranger with their entirely strange soulmarks and nods sharply.

He’ll ask.

*******

“Pardon?” Urahara asks, eyes wide and fan dangling from his fingers.

“Can you hide soulmarks?” Kaito repeats, barely remembering to meet the man’s eyes as he asks.

(This… this isn’t done.)

(No one purposely hides their soulmarks.)

(But he can’t… he can’t…)

(These aren’t his marks…)

“Maa, you know these things have a way of getting out, right…?” Urahara asks gently, even as he gestures for Kaito to follow him. “A bit of trial and error and I can hide almost anything, but soulmarks… those aren’t stable. The more you try to hide them—”

“I know!” Kaito snaps, then flinches and looks away, breathing through the flash of panic-fury-hate until he has himself under control again. “I know,” he repeats, running a hand through his hair. “But I… my marks are gone. I don’t… I don’t want these. If… if they’re for who I suspect they are, I just… I can’t. I can’t, Urahara-san, because they’re just… they’re not my people! And who ever heard of… of being your own damn soulmate?!”

Urahara’s hand settles on his shoulder, warm-firm-grounding. “I understand,” he murmurs. “And I’ll do my best. But you’ll have to come to me the moment to notice a hint of color showing through, so I can adjust it again.”

“I will, I promise.” Kaito hesitates a moment, then tugs open the kimono he’d thrown on and brushes a finger across the prominent mark on his collarbones. “This one stays, if possible.”

“Alright, I can do that. Shall we?”

Kaito nods. Steps through the door of Urahara’s lab.

Hides himself from his soulmates.

(Victory tastes like ash.)

(But that’s fine.)

(He’s fine.)

(Just fine.)

*******

He keeps up the deception.

Through combat and training and basic interactions, he keeps himself to himself, lest any of the teens begin to suspect.

He lets them catch sight of the brilliant, prominent feather he’d kept. Lets them believe that that is his only soulmark. Lets them make their own assumptions about it.

(He goes to Urahara to update the concealment often.)

(Too much interaction makes the marks… eager.)

The invasion is difficult. Too much interaction, too much stress, and no one who can adjust the concealment in return.

When Ishida carries him away from Kyoraku, the shock of connection is enough to freeze him in place as Ishida only falters, which is enough to give his past self the advantage—

Shiro has no such compunctions.

Kaito lets him rage for the both of them.

Ishida watches them, thoughtful-considering-apologetic, and Kaito ducks further behind Shiro’s rage.

(He can’t… he can’t…)

(He still wakes with his head in Ishida’s lap, wakes with connection beginning to settle deep into his bones, and it’s all he can do to tear himself away before they are truly bound.)

(The irony of Ishida being his first and firmest connection does not escape him.)

Kaito shoves the jangle of discordant feelings aside. Locks the growing want away deep in his soul. Sets his sights on his goal and refuses to be swayed.

Aizen is still out there.

He needs to kill Aizen before anything else can happen.

(The night at the Eleventh is an exercise in restraint.)

(Two of his five soulmates are right there, sleeping just within reach, curled into each other’s arms and he… he wants.)

(But at the same time he doesn’t.)

He wakes to a warm body in his arms and no new connection humming in his head.

(Hanataro knows.)

(Hanataro knows and says nothing.)

(Sometimes he wishes Hanataro was his soulmate, platonic or not.)

When Kurosaki manages to pull him into a hug after the invasion is over, Kaito almost stabs him.

It feels good, the discontented hum of another unrealized connection beginning to settle at last, leaving him limp with relief—

He pulls away before he can give himself away, dusting off his sleeves and doing his best to laugh his reaction off.

The teens don’t try again.

He can’t tell if he’s pleased or disappointed.

(He’s pleased.)

(He has to be.)

*******

Everything is going fine — he isn’t left to his own devices like he’d prefer, but no one is trying to touch him at least — until several months after Aizen’s death. Another malcontent from Seireitei’s past shows up, causes some chaos, and drags Kaito and the others into a battle they have no responsibility to clean up.

(He still takes the bastard down, of course.)

(He doesn’t trust Seireitei to not fuck it up somehow.)

But in the aftermath…

In the aftermath, he collapses without warning, reiryoku slipping through his fingers like water.

(At least Hanataro reaches him first.)

Kaito wakes up in the Fourth, Hanataro hovering nearby, feeling like he’s been run over by a truck. He forces himself upright on shaking limbs, trying to assess what exactly is wrong with him, and… finding nothing obvious; no bandages, no bruises, no obvious wounds of any sort… just a pervasive weakness in his limbs and a feeling like he’s being drained by something invisible.

“I’m s-sorry, Kaito-san,” Hanataro murmurs as he helps Kaito sit up. “This… th-this isn’t… I can’t…”

“It’s alright.” Kaito sighs and swings his legs over the side of the bed, ignoring the way his head spins and his eyesight blurs. He’ll push through it. He’s pushed through worse. “Thank you for trying.”

Hanataro grimaces and catches Kaito’s shoulder, easily holding him in place. “K-Kaito-san… Kaito-san sh-shouldn’t move,” he says softly, concern in his eyes as he meets Kaito’s gaze. “Th-this… Kaito-san w-was cursed, a-and we… we can’t… fix it un-unless Kaito-san fulfills the uhm… th-the clause.”

“Cursed,” Kaito repeats dryly, reaching up to lay his hand over Hanataro’s. “You really think curses exist?”

“Kaito-san doesn’t?” Hanataro asks in shock, then huffs a sigh and presses Kaito back into bed, barely needing to exert effort to do so. “It’s a, uhm… it’s a soulmate curse,” he explains as he arranges pillows to help Kaito remain sitting up. His nose wrinkles and he shoots Kaito a deadpan look as he continues, “O-or, I s-suppose, uhm… it’s… a targeted kido th-that latch-latches onto, well…” He gestures vaguely at Kaito’s chest.

“Unsealed connections,” Kaito finishes with a growing feeling of dread, one trembling hand rising to press against his chest and the five hidden marks there. “It’s a… power drain?” he asks, trying to make sense of whatever the hell this kido is.

Hanataro hums in agreement and drags a stool over to perch on. “U-usually, uhm… usually there’s s-someone connected t-to the kido. T-to, uhm… con-control the drain a-and gain th-the power, but…”

“I killed him before he could finish, didn’t I?”

“Y-yes. S-so now…”

“It’s just draining with no one to control it.”

Hanataro nods. “It’s… n-not common anymore, a-and if there w-was a way t-to break it beyond f-finalizing th-the connections we uhm… we d-don’t know, anymore…”

Kaito rubs at his temple, already knowing what his answer will be; with three fully unsealed connections, one barely better, and the last just shy of sealed, there isn’t time for anyone to try to find a second option. Not when he knows who all his soulmates are.

(When they all know who his soulmates are.)

(Why else would the teens be so careful about not touching him?)

(They aren’t fools, after all.)

“Fine,” Kaito says with a sigh, glancing away from Hanataro’s sad-sad-sad expression as he does. “It’s… fine.”

Hanataro scowls at him. “I-it’s not,” he mutters unhappily, even as he slides from the stool and stands up. “But if Kaito-san insists…”

“I do.”

The look Hanataro shoots him is filled with disbelief-resignation-sadness, but his friend makes no further comment, just stalks from the room with a steel-straight spine and stiff shoulders.

Kaito almost pities the teens.

Almost.

*******

It’s Ishida who steps into the room first, though Kaito can feel the other four lingering in the hallway.

“Senpai,” Ishida greets him as he settles on the stool Hanataro left behind. He hesitates then, chewing on his lower lip, clearly at a loss for words.

“I’m surprised Kurosaki’s still outside the door,” Kaito says with an arched eyebrow, trying to prod some words free from the tangle Ishida is no doubt trying to deal with. “Surprised all of them are outside, actually,” he admits after a moment, because… because…

He’d been certain he’d known what their reaction would be, and… sending just Ishida in to talk with him…

This isn’t what he’d expected.

Ishida scowls at him, the expression a very passable imitation of Kurosaki’s best disappointed-scowl, and says, “Senpai, we’re not blind. We asked Unohana about soulmarks after the invasion, and she said that this… that our situation isn’t unknown. That it meant you’d lost your soulmates and that your soul latched onto ours as the nearest set that could fill the gap left behind.”

Kaito blinks at Ishida in surprise; he’d never actually questioned if there was precedent or if this is yet another thing he’s an outlier in, and to hear that it’s normal, that Shinigami know about it…

(All he can feel is relief…)

“You never even asked about it, did you,” Ishida says in exasperation, then shakes his head. “No, never mind, I know the answer already. It doesn’t matter.” He bites his lip again, clearly gathering his words, and says, “I apologize for not warning Kurosaki sooner. I should have.”

“Warning him…?”

“About your reaction to me touching you,” Ishida clarifies, then scowls and holds up a hand when Kaito opens his mouth to protest. “No. Unohana was clear on that; if you didn’t want the connections, then we shouldn’t pressure you about it. Potential connections aren’t usually dangerous, just… a bit annoying at times.”

Kaito grimaces at Ishida’s words and rubs at the bridge of his nose, scrambling to find his own words. The irony of his past self being the one to talk to him about their current mess is… painful, really.

(Has he changed that, too?)

(Did Ishida accept the others sooner, easier, because of how he’d dragged the teen into the group?)

(If he’d just… in his own reality… would things have… turned out differently…?)

“Senpai,” Ishida prompts, concern-worry-care in his voice as he leans forward, hands tucked against his thighs and body tense. “Senpai, please let us help you. I know you probably don’t want us—”

“Shut up,” Kaito growls, infuriated by the sheer certainty in Ishida’s voice that Kaito doesn’t want them, when sometimes it’s all he can do to not just… reach out and take…

It hurts.

And so does the way Ishida flinches back, eyes wide and body tense, one wrong move away from fleeing and—

Kaito leans over. Snatches one of Ishida’s wrists. Digs careful, trembling fingers into Ishida’s skin and revels in the snap of a fully realized connection, intent sealing the link the way casual touch had not. It doesn’t change much, doesn’t stop the drain on his reiryoku, but it… it feels like finally coming home.

(He knows what that is now, knows what that feels like, and he… he…)

(Why had he waited so long…?)

“I lost my soulmates right after I accepted them,” Kaito forces out, ignoring the awe-warmth-care coming from Ishida’s presence, ignoring the way Ishida’s free hand settles over his, gentle-calloused-strong like a reassurance, like a promise. “I accepted them, and then we went our own ways, and then they were gone.”

(All except Ichigo, trapped inside his soul, a different type of soulmate but still his, still the last trace of what he’d had before it was all torn away…)

“That won’t happen to us,” Ishida says softly, firmly, like he has any right to promise such a thing when it was his fault — Kaito’s fault — that everything fell apart—

Ichigo’s sharp denial-anger-rejection carves a jagged line through Kaito’s mind and he flinches, breathes through the sensation until Ichigo’s emotions finally settle, and directs his next words at both Ishida and Ichigo when he says, “You can’t promise that. You don’t know—”

“And neither do you,” Ishida insists, hand tightening on Kaito’s like he can somehow press his surety into Kaito’s skin. “No one does, but… aren’t we different? Didn’t you spend time teaching us to work together? Haven’t we learned— haven’t we changed?”

Kaito grimaces and looks away, knowing the truth of Ishida’s words and part of him hating it as much as he appreciates it.

(This should have been him, should have been how his soulmates ended up, not… not scattered-shattered-dead—)

Fingertips brush across the back of his neck and he shivers at the touch. Leans into it even as Ishida’s hand settles, tightening to press grounding-reassurance-strength into his skin and—

“Come on, Senpai, up you come,” Ishida murmurs as he stands, looping Kaito’s arm over his shoulder and then letting go of his hand in order to—

Kaito squawks as Ishida lifts him up. Scrambles for a handhold, for security, even as Ishida laughs warm-bright-soft and hoists him higher.

“You should probably eat more,” Ishida teases as he nudges the door open with a foot and steps out into the hallway where the other teens are waiting. “Maybe it would be harder for me to do this, then.”

Kaito scowls at Ishida. Sweeps his scowl to the others as they begin to laugh as well. “And where, exactly, do you think you’re taking me?”

“Our room,” Ishida answers breezily. “So we can all curl up and so you can sleep.”

“I just woke up,” Kaito feels the need to point out. “What makes you think I’ll fall asleep so easily?”

Kurosaki coughs, barely hiding a smirk behind his hand, and answers, “Hanataro says you will, as soon as the drain on your reiryoku stops. Something about your body overcompensating for the drain, and needing rest as soon as it stops.”

“This is ridiculous,” Kaito grumbles, resisting the urge to tuck his face into Ishida’s chest in embarrassment. “You could have just… just let me sleep where I was. You don’t need to cart me around like… like some sort of invalid…”

Ishida’s steps falter and he softly asks, “Would you have preferred that, Senpai? Sorry… it… seemed like you wanted us around…”

Kaito flinches and lets go of Ishida’s shoulder with one hand in order to rub at his eyes. Sometimes he hates how well Ishida can read him, for all its almost to be expected given they were once the same person. “It’s… fine,” he answers, unable to give voice to the tangle of need-want-crave that he’s slowly giving in to the longer Ishida holds him.

(It’s… not his father’s hugs, but… it’s still nice.)

(He could… he could grow to like this.)

(Though perhaps with a bit less being carted around like a damsel in distress involved!)

Question-concern-uncertainty prods at him through their new connection, and Kaito sighs softly even as he sends back acceptance-certainty-contentment.

Ishida relaxes even as his arms tighten around Kaito. “Thank you, Senpai,” he says, so many emotions tangled in his words that Kaito can’t pick them apart. “We won’t let you down, I promise.”

“You’d better let me down. I’m not about to be carried around for the rest of my life,” Kaito mock-snarls, purposely missing Ishida’s point in favor of getting a laugh out of the rest of the teens. The soft huff he feels from Ishida tells him he’s escaped that topic of conversation for the moment, which is… certainly a relief.

“Oh, but why not?” Inoue asks, all innocence and cheer as she skips up to Ishida’s side and halfway extends her hand towards Kaito’s. “Don’t you want to be carried?”

Kaito wrinkles his nose at her. “Inoue-san, with all due respect, I’m nearly a foot taller than you and—”

“Yes?” she asks leadingly, a very Unohana-esque smile on her face even as she wriggles her hand at him.

“…never mind,” he mutters as he carefully takes her hand and focuses on that instead of on her face.

(Maybe introducing her to Unohana wasn’t the wisest of decisions after all…)

Their connection hums to life, warm-fierce-protective in a way he never expected to feel from her.

(His connection to his Inoue had been a thing of peace and gentle warmth, but never so protective, never so fierce as this Inoue is.)

(The difference is… staggering.)

(Had he… had he done this?)

Inoue makes a pleased noise and squeezes his hand, her power filtering through their connection, pressing like water against a dam and—

Something snaps as her power ripples into his body, flooding his senses and easing the strain he’s been ignoring. It feels almost like being able to breathe again, but it also makes it obvious how much strength is still being pulled from him.

(Kami… if he’d missed… if that bastard had managed to succeed…)

(No.)

(It’s over.)

(He won.)

Inoue squeezes his hand again, then slips her hand free and darts ahead to open a door just down the hallway. Ishida carries him in, toeing off his slippers and stepping onto the tatami mats—

And instead of setting him down, they both go down, with Ishida kneeling and then tipping backwards into a small pile of pillows.

The teens laugh as Kaito yelps and grips Ishida’s shirt tighter, unused to being manhandled quite so thoroughly. “A bit of warning if you plan to do that again!” he snaps as he slowly releases his grip.

“Sorry, Senpai,” Ishida responds, sounding not at all apologetic. He tugs at Kaito a bit, rearranging their limbs with Kaito’s reluctant assistance, until they’re both reclining and Kaito’s head is resting on Ishida’s chest. “But you have to admit, this is more comfortable than other options.”

Kaito scowls and pinches Ishida’s side. “I don’t have to admit anything,” he mutters sullenly, even as he tips his head slightly to better hear Ishida’s strong-steady-even heartbeat. A hand settles in his hair, tentative and soft, then begins to move when he doesn’t shake it free.

His eyes… maybe close a little, at the feeling.

(Only maybe.)

“You look like a contented cat,” Arisawa says as she drops to sit next to him.

“Shut up,” he mumbles, hoping in vain that his cheeks aren’t turning red from embarrassment. He’d never really known Arisawa in the before, even though she was part of his soul-group, but… he likes this version. She’s a better balance for Kurosaki than Ishida — than any version of himself — will ever be, and it always feels like things are… more steady when she’s around.

“Hand up, kitty cat,” she teases, though her hands are kind-firm-steady as she takes his hand in hers, her strong grip a reassurance even as her link snaps into vibrant-strong-steady life. She feels like bedrock under his feet, immovable, implacable, but no less caring than Inoue or Ishida.

And then she flops down, plastering herself against Ishida’s side, one arm thrown over Kaito’s waist, and… it should feel constricting, should feel like confinement, but…

It just feels safe.

Kurosaki is next, his hand both foreign and familiar as his fingers curl around Kaito’s hand in place of Arisawa’s. Their half-realized connection settles into place slowly, tentatively, like Kurosaki’s afraid that Kaito will once more reject him and—

Kaito huffs. Tightens his grip. Wills the connection sealed with a snap that jars his teeth and makes the breath catch in his throat.

(It’s so familiar.)

(It’s so familiar!)

(He can’t— he can’t…!)

Arisawa’s presence roars to the fore, shielding him from the sense of almost-Ichigo in his head. He can’t suppress the jagged sob of relief when she does so, but he also refuses to let go when Kurosaki tries to pull away.

(He wants… he wants, but he can’t—)

“I really am like your friend, aren’t I?” Kurosaki murmurs, sad-pained-weary as he tries once again to pull his hand free. “Sorry… I’ll do my best to keep from intruding—”

“You’re not,” Kaito hisses, tightening his grip on Kurosaki’s hand, fingers digging deep into his almost-friend’s skin. Kurosaki isn’t Ichigo, but… but he’s a version of Ichigo, and… and if he lets go, if he looks away, if Kurosaki leaves him again—

A calloused thumb brushes under his eye and across his cheek, dampness trailing behind and—

He’s crying.

He’s crying in front of them.

“You’re crying because of me, I certainly think that’s an indication—”

“Of nothing!” Kaito snaps, accompanying his words with a strong jerk at their joined hands.

Kurosaki yelps and tumbles forward, landing awkwardly across all three of them and driving the breath from both Kaito’s and Ishida’s lungs in the process. Arisawa bites back a curse and tugs her arm free of the pile, and Kurosaki yelps again, indignant-wounded-offended, and wriggles closer to Kaito and Ishida as if to escape her.

Kaito swallows once. Twice. Gathers his confidence and whispers, “I don’t want you to leave.”

Still can’t bring himself to admit that Kurosaki leaving is one of his worst fears, is one of his nightmares—

Kurosaki huffs a laugh, more fond than amused, and twists around to wedge his body between Ishida’s and Arisawa’s. He rests his — pointy! — chin on Kaito’s shoulder and settles his arm across Kaito’s chest, even as Arisawa grumbles and readjusts her own position, arm draping across all of them in something almost like possession, almost like protection.

(It… helps.)

The drain is less now, a tiny fraction of what it was, and Kaito can already feel the exhaustion creeping in. Or rather, he can feel his body acknowledging the exhaustion at last, the razor-thin edge of survival finally dulling and giving him a moment to breathe. It’s a familiar sensation, though usually not so drastic, and he knows that Hanataro was right.

(He can already feel himself starting to drift.)

The only one who hasn’t affirmed their connection with him is Sado, which… doesn’t entirely surprise him.

(That Sado and Inoue can stand his presence at all is—)

(No.)

(Breathe.)

Kaito cracks an eye open and blinks away the blur of unshed tears, trying to focus beyond them where—

Sado sits by Ishida’s side, his presence calm-patient-steady as he watches over them. The minute he spots Kaito’s attention on him, he leans forward and offers his hand, waiting for Kaito to take it. It’s a pointed gesture, just like all the others; it’s his choice, the teens all try to convey, even when they all know it’s a lie.

He takes Sado’s hand anyway.

(Maybe he’ll mind later, or maybe he won’t.)

(But for now… for now… the feeling of belonging is worth more than the shame of giving in.)

Sado’s connection is… steady. Poised. Like Arisawa’s own bedrock-steady confidence but… quieter. Sado isn’t the sort to draw attention to himself until he needs to, and that’s reflected in their connection. It feels like the ocean, nominally peaceful but quiet-deadly-vast beneath the surface, ready to roar to life at a moment’s notice.

And with that, the final thread of binding snaps like a brittle twig.

“Kaito-kun should rest,” Inoue says firmly, even as she tucks herself in next to Sado. Her small hand settles on his shoulder again, and her reiatsu filters into his body, a steady trickle slowly filling his reserves.

“Don’t exhaust yourself,” Kaito mutters as he tucks his head more firmly against Ishida’s chest and closes his eyes. “We aren’t fighting again anytime soon. I can rest until I’ve recovered.”

Inoue hums softly but doesn’t stop her kido. “Trust me to know my limits, Kaito-kun.”

Kaito huffs a sigh but doesn’t argue further, just lets the press of everyone’s power quiet his mind.

He breathes.

Drifts.

Sleeps.

#tumblr mashup #platonic au #this went so long #i'm so sorry #this also got kinda painful in spots #hope you enjoy #Anonymous #replies

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