#viewers also gotta step in and chat once in a while

[erindrifter]

Yeah! Woohoo! I'm so glad that after two years of doing streams, this is the results I'm pulling in! And the stream in question spent most of the time with 0 viewers!

[genshin-impact-fics]

Streamer!Genshin Reacting to Character!(Y/N) Dying in Game

!Warning!: Major character deaths & angst

Characters: Diluc, Venti, Childe, & Zhongli

Diluc:

It was a race to get inside one of the bases of the Abyss Order to put a stop to whatever plans they were in the process of executing that could potentially put many lives in danger. Diluc was rather calm while playing though it would be a lie to say that it wasn’t a bit annoying that the route to the domain was timed

It was once inside the domain did things pick up fast as it seemed to be a fighting wave system which after beating the first two rooms there was a short scene where in the end Lisa and Amber stayed behind to hold off the incoming enemies so the rest of the group could go further. It seemed like forever doing some of the puzzles to unlock the doors to reach the next fight

In that fourth room after the defeat of hilichurls and abyss mages did suddenly a short cut scene appear to show the appearance of an Abyss Lector. As remembering how much he hated fighting this guy in the spiral abyss he already knew what he was in for; however that was until your character stepped forward with your weapon ready. Diluc was actually sad to have to leave you behind as he was hoping that you’d be one of the characters that went with him to the very end

“I think I’ve watched enough shows and movies to know what this could be leading up to.” He’d comment to his viewers as he finally reached the destination where the Abyss Herald was. Finishing the fight triggered another cutscene as the traveler’s sibling appeared and was making their small speech, asking if the lives of the “friends” the traveler made were worth losing

Diluc is watching with a straight face as he kinda expected this but the who was what he wasn’t sure about and truthfully the only one he’d be truly heartbroken about is your death, but they wouldn’t kill you now of all times right? Wrong; soon the cutscene finally came across where they had left you and you were leaning against the wall extremely injured with your weapon laying beside you. Diluc is frowning cuz he has to watch you die now

Listening to your final words as you spoke to no one Diluc would sulk in his chair a little. In the last moment before your eyes closed, if you mentioned something about not getting to tell his character your true feelings it is visible that Diluc looks like he wants to cry(but he doesn't). Once the screen showed the mission complete he’d grab the plush he had of your character and hold it looking at his camera. “Of all the characters I thought were going to die, I wasn’t ready for it to be (y/n).” At that point he’d probably call it a day from there but he’d still talk to his viewers as he probably would watch the tribute videos that fans had already made

Venti:

Everything was in chaos as it looked like archon war 2 was going to be taking place, but this time it was a war between the Abyss Order and the Archons. He was heading to Mondstadt to help and to check on you. Dvalin was flying around sending attacks at the abyss members. “Ah traveler there you are!” The sound of your voice as you landed before him; as weird as it was to see you in your archon robes was odd but you looked so good! After a short conversation you had gone flying off and it was time to get back to fighting

Things were looking good as it seemed like they were winning against the abyss order though it wasn’t over yet. It was until up in the air did a cutscene starting showing you and the traveler’s sibling fighting going at it. Venti is so captivated by how serious and cool you look fighting, but it all changed when the sibling landed a blow that caused you to fall from the sky ending up falling into the Whispering Woods

Venti couldn’t run fast enough to get to the woods to check up on you but when he did the first thing he saw was the sibling standing before you. He’s already sad and yelling at the sibling for hurting you though it seemed that now he was there the sibling went and disappeared revealing the real condition you were in. “No, no, no! This better not mean (y/n)’s dying.” He’d say in denial as he’s already starting to cry a little

“A-Ah Windblume h-haha… Sorry you have to see me like this.” Even in a moment like this you gave him such a cheesy grin until you seemed to grimace in pain. “Unfortunately it seems like… This is it for me. As long as the winds blow I will always be with you, so please watch over Mondstadt for me.” Your words were making Venti cry as it was like back in your story quest but only ten times worse. And to think it was already painful as it was your next words that did him in. “Maybe in another life we will find each other again and maybe then we can be together.”

Watching you start to glow until you turned into partials of light till nothing of you was left, Venti is devastated. The chat is crying with him as he’s saying how awful it was that his sibling had killed the love of his life! His viewers are going to send him fanart and fics to look at that was an alternative that you lived in the game

Childe:

It was a big fight with the confrontation of the Fatui Harbingers, facing off against one of the other stronger members that blocked the path to proceed to seeing the Tsaritsa. The boss’ first stage was fine; however during the second stage it seemed after losing a certain amount of health the damage that Childe was dealing significantly decreased.

It was when the cutscene started that Childe was already dreading the foul legacy form he’d be facing this time. You suddenly came out of nowhere and already in your foul legacy form yourself Childe is going crazy over how cool you look; he’s also swooning at the fact that you’ve come to his rescue. The fighting progressed until you landed a successful hit that weakened the other harbinger; however, at that same time the other harbinger managed to hit you with a powerful attack

Childe is screaming at the sight of your mask breaking while you fell to the ground. He’s so glad that his character is running over to check on you instead of the fight picking right up, but he’s already feeling the feels hit him hard cuz he hates seeing you hurt. Seeing you back to normal, the damage you sustained was really bad; then the worst thought came to his mind. “This-This better not be what I think it is,” he’s saying not looking away from the screen listening to you weakly talk

“Haha don’t give me that look sweetie, I couldn’t just let this be where your journey ends.” Hearing those words and the nickname you used for his character was sad. “To think we’d be able to travel together more, but hey… Promise you won’t stop fighting and could you look after my siblings for me.” Childe is literally crying now that the reality of the situation is clear. If he gets a choice of dialog to choose from he is going to pick the choice that says that he pinky promises

If your character smiled at the choice he wanted to smile but he’s also just sad, you were dying in his character's arms. If you had given a small love confession in the little bit of life that was in you, he’s going to ugly sob and once the fight was starting again he needs to pause by going into his bag

Immediately he goes getting his big plush of you and coming back to hug it and cleaning his tears with his sleeve before looking at the camera. “I wasn’t ready for this, my baby!” He was not expecting to be losing you; he figured that some characters would possibly die but you were the last character he thought would be killed off in the game. There’s Fs in the chat all around and the crying emote; it’s sad boi hours in this chili’s. He doesn't wanna do the fight but also he gotta avenge you so this last stage fight was for you. Afterwards he’s gonna go look at fanart and video edits

Zhongli:

After helping some of the other nations and their archon’s fend off the abyss order it was time he headed to Liyue to find you. Of course as usual it wasn’t going to be as easy as running around the harbor until he got word from Xiao that you were in Cuijue Slope. So he headed over to help you before anything seriously bad could happen to you

Getting to the open area there you were fighting against the sibling as you were even in your archon robes. Going in and interrupting the fight his sibling clearly looked annoyed and proceeded to try to get him to side with them which of course he didn’t. A Herald appeared to allow the sibling to get away which the fight with the Herald commenced

Just when Zhongli finished up the fight thinking he had won it strangely went to a cutscene as his character and you started to talk; however it was when the fallen Herald came out of nowhere about to attack his character but must to his surprise you shielded him not only taking the hit, but also using your elemental burst to finish off the enemy. Zhongli is frowning at how badly you were hurt as he already has a bad feeling this wasn’t going to end good; the traveler was helping you sit up after having fallen over

“I’m glad to see that you aren’t hurt my friend.” You said as you certainly have seen better days. “Sadly I believe my time has come… Do not be sad dear friend, I have lived many many years… As knowing you has been life changing. Though rocks change from erosion, know that no time will change how I felt about you.” Your words broke his heart as you had such a soft expression on your face as your body began to glow and before he knew it you turned into particles of light and disappeared. He probably wouldn’t cry at most maybe a tear but he is clearly upset about your passing in game and would take a break to talk to his viewers and maybe look at the fanart that surprisingly had been put out already

[findingjoynweirdstuff]

Dream SMP Recap (February 9/2021) - New Lands, Sapnap’s Visit

It wouldn’t be the Dream SMP without emotional whiplash, now would it?

As tensions between Puffy and Ponk have escalated, Karl takes Sapnap and George with him on a journey to a new land to live in, starting a brand new country to house his library. 

What was at first a fun time building the library quickly turned serious, as Sapnap decided that now was the time to pay Dream a visit.

---

VOD LINKS:

Ponk

Tubbo

Jack Manifold

Ranboo

Captain Puffy

Foolish Gamers

Karl Jacobs

Sapnap

Badboyhalo

---

- Ponk is angry at Puffy’s arson from yesterday. He asks Niki for advice on what to do. She says she would burn a house down in revenge.

- He also speaks with Foolish.

- Ponk destroy’s Puffy’s mushroom house, leaving her homeless again.

- Ponk also gets a tour from Warden Sam of the prison. Not to visit, just to be shown the mechanics. 

- He tries to run up the guards’ spiral staircase but when Sam attacks him, he backs down. Sam is irritated at this.

- Ponk and Sam have an argument about tridents.

- Later, Sam tells Ponk that every friendship goes through fights occasionally, and he forgives Ponk. 

- Ponk continues on his Valentines’ Day plans.

- Ranboo accidentally kills Jjjjjjjjeffrey with sweeping edge. Mr. Krabs adds insult to injury.

- Tubbo does an abstract bit.

- Ranboo kills several more pets. He is not having a good day.

- Puffy finds out about the destruction. She’s upset.

- Realistically, she should get retaliation, but she doesn’t know if she should even bother.

- Foolish comes over to where her house used to be, and Puffy says she knows about Foolish’s involvement earlier. She thanks her son for trying to save her house.

Foolish says he was too late, but Puffy replies that it only mattered that he tried.

- Karl comes online with plans to move his library. Sapnap arrives as well and Karl tells him that he has nothing to his name on the server except the library. 

The llamas in Party Park have begun to unionize, and though cleaning up L’manhole would be the responsible thing to do, they are definitely not going to do that.

- George comes online as Karl dismantles the library.

- They start walking down the path to look for an area to build their new country.

Sapnap: “We lost our best friend recently. He’s in prison.”

Sapnap also notices that the Community House has been rebuilt, but...it’s not the same.

- George performs a special ceremony at Spawn.

- They set off, heading out past Spawn in that direction.

- Sapnap gets concerned that they’re heading out so far. He doesn’t want to get too far from the prison.

- They make it to the flower forest biome past Alyssa’s Barn.

- Karl decides on a nice little cliffside to build the library in. He sets down a rule for the other two: a flower that is picked up must be placed down again.

- Sapnap is the protector, as resident tough guy.

- Captain Puffy visits the Temple of Undying to admire Foolish’s building. Foolish helps cheer her up.

- Sapnap reveals that he’s brought Beckerson and Mars with him. They can be the country’s most prized possessions. The oldest pets on the server.

- They plant and grow the first red-spotted mushroom. Karl deems it sacred and unbreakable.

- They repurpose Alyssa’s Barn for mushroom growing.

- They shelter from the rain under the sacred mushroom.

- They start building. 

- Bad magics his way over to help with the building. Karl explains that the mushroom is sacred. Bad compares their country to a fungal growth.

- As they’re building, Karl tells Bad that in a perfect world, everyone on the SMP would join this country. There’s no duel citizenship. Everyone can join (barring Skeppy)

Bad is appreciative of the invitation.

- They continue building. Foolish arrives to assist!

- A pillager raid comes through and Sapnap kills them. As he does so, a white horse wanders by. Sapnap declares it their special horse. It can be their Horsecretary.

- The building continues!

- Dream joins VC and viewer wars break out between Sapnap and Foolish as Dream encourages everyone to try and get their viewer counts to be equal.

- Foolish heads back to his beautiful, stunning, gorgeous summer house to show on his stream.

- Sapnap gets a bright idea to go to the prison and visit Dream.

- Sam joins the call and Sapnap tells him he’s trying to get through the prison portal. 

- Sam asks if Sapnap actually wants to visit Dream, and Sapnap says yes...

-

--- SAPNAP’S PRISON VISIT --- 

-

- Sapnap tries to get into the prison and asks Awesam to let him visit Dream. 

- Awesam agrees. Sapnap isn’t sure if he was ready, or if this is the optimal time, but he ends up going through.

- Sam asks the questions.

This is Sapnap’s first time visiting.

His residence is in a new place that he and Karl are creating.

He believes Dream is deserving of being locked up. 

Sapnap: “We used to be best friends...”

Sam: “’Used to be?’”

Sapnap: “Yeah, I dunno...where we stand anymore, it’s kinda...yeah.”

Sam: “What does that mean?”

Sapnap: “Well, I dunno...I don’t know if he’s the same anymore. I don’t know if he’s the Dream -- my Dream anymore. My best friend.”

- Sapnap reviews the waivers

- They start making their way through the prison. Sapnap is nervous.

- Sapnap signs the other two waivers.

- They reach the lava wall.

Sam: “Good luck getting him to talk.”

Sapnap: “What do you mean? ...Is he not talkative”

Sam: “Something like that.”

- Dream’s cell walls are spotted in crying obsidian.

Sam: “And Sapnap?”

Sapnap: “Yeah?”

Sam: “I hope that you’re the one.”

- Sapnap enters the cell.

“...Hello? Dream? ....You okay?”

- Dream is silent, holding the clock. He hands Sapnap a book that says: “I am not talking.”

- His clock is now labelled “DO NOT BURN”

Dream: “you took so long.”

Sapnap: “You hurt a lot of people, but...you hurt specifically me...took me a little bit to decide to come and see you...”

Sapnap: “You’re better than this.”

- Dream looks at his clock, turning away from Sapnap.

Sapnap: “Once upon a time, we were best friends. If you’re gonna talk to anyone, you can talk to me.”

- Dream turns back to Sapnap, now holding the clock in his offhand while he writes in the book.

Dream: “im on strike”

- Sapnap asks what for, then if Dream is okay.

- Sapnap asks why the cell looks so run-down, with the crying obsidian dripping everywhere.

“it was a security measure.” [The crying obsidian]

“ill get out one day.”

- Sapnap insists that Dream has to stay locked up. 

Sapnap: “I love you man, but you gotta stay here...this is where you belong for now.”

- Dream hands him the book.

“i spend days i broke the lectern i was making a portal and he did this.”

- Sapnap says that he can’t try and escape. He misses Dream, Sapnap says that they can be friends, that he can come and visit, that George can come and visit, but he has to stay here. 

“Please don’t try and escape.”

- Dream runs over and throws the clock in the lava. Sapnap is worried that he’ll make Awesam mad and make things worse for himself.

“eventually.”

“eventually.”

“eventually.”

“eventually.”

- Sapnap repeatedly tells him no.

Sapnap: “If you try and break out early...you know, you only have one life left, okay? And...I don’t think it’s gonna be Tommy. It’s not gonna be Techno, Dream...If you break out of this prison, it’s gonna be me who takes your final life. And it’s not because I have any resentment towards you or anything --”

Dream moves towards the lava but stops.

“-- But it’s because this is where you need to be, Dream.”

Dream’s head turns towards Sapnap and he takes another step towards the lava.

“You have to stay here, okay? We can still be friends, I can come and visit you, but you need to stay here.”

Dream moves back to the back of the cell.

“can you pass a message”

“he stopped visiting”

- Sapnap asks who

“ranboo”

- Sapnap asks what message

“:)”

- Sapnap says he’ll pass along the message.

“thank you”

- Sapnap asks if, if he passes along the message, Dream will behave. If he’ll stop acting up and throwing his clocks away.

Dream finally speaks, though it’s barely a whisper.

"Yes.”

- Sapnap says he’ll visit Dream more, and asks if he wants George to visit as well. Dream hands him the book again.

“yes and tell the warden i need a new clock”

- Dream signs the book.

“thank you for visiting me” is the final message.

- Sapnap says he’s ready to leave. Sam tells him to stand in the water.

Sapnap and Dream stand in the water together and they die by the potion together.

- Sapnap tells Sam that he spoke, and that he said he’d be better. That he needs a new clock. Sam is exasperated.

- Sapnap asks how long it’s been since he spoke to someone else. Sam says it’s been quite a while.

- When’s the last time he saw someone?

- The last person to visit him was Ranboo.

- Sam asks if he told Sapnap anything else. Sapnap says no.

- Sam kills Sapnap with Warden’s Will, sending him to Spawn.

- Sapnap comes back to the prison. Sam lets him through the portal.

- Sam explains that he just thought it was strange that Dream would talk to Sapnap, and had to “make sure.” Sapnap says it’s fine and leaves the prison with his things.

- Ranboo joined the game.

- Sapnap whispers to Ranboo that he wants to talk. They meet at the Community House.

Sapnap tells him about the prison visit, saying that Dream doesn’t seem the same. He doesn’t even talk now. He tells Ranboo that he was told that Ranboo was the last person to visit. He asks if Ranboo remembers anything about his visit, anything off.

Ranboo, of course, doesn’t remember much.

- Sapnap gives Ranboo the message: 

:)

- Ranboo freezes and goes silent, then runs away into the Nether. Sapnap is confused.

- Just as Sapnap is ending stream, Ranboo sends a message in game chat written in Enderman.

Doomed are those who try to run, for it always catches up eventually :)

---

Upcoming events remain the same.

Bad also mentioned that he has an upcoming lore stream that he’s scheduling, though it involves a particular person whose schedule makes them difficult to get a hold of for it.

[weenwrites]

FNF Whitty W/ a Streamer S/O

Pairing - Romantic Category - Headcanons Trigger Warnings - None

When you first explained what you did for a living, he got the jist of it, but found your occupation a bit odd.

Don’t get him wrong, playing video games and having fun in general sounds amazing, but under the pressure of a live studio audience and being broadcasted world wide?

Broadcasted. World. Wide.

…

WORLD WIDE.

The pressure bit was something I added just for fun, what he’s really worried about is what if the Greater Good finds your streams, and finds HIM?

They just need a voice clip, or to at least see a BIT of him for confirmation that it’s him, before then going to track down where you live, busting your door down, and questioning where he is.

So for the most part, he tries to stay off your streams as much as possible.

Of course he goes in and brings you food and water every now and then, but that’s it.

“Okay, okay, chat w-“

*click*

“Oh, hey! Thanks for the water, I really needed it.”

And the chat begins flipping out. You can see right there on your monitor- look! Look, the chat’s questioning who you’re talking to and even thinking that- “OMGG Y/N DO YOU HAVE A PARTNER?!!”

“Chat, what goes on in my personal life, stays in my personal life, okay? Okay! Now back to the stream…”

You take the UTMOST care in making sure that he isn’t exposed in any way.

If you ever play together on stream, the two of you have a pretty good time! And the chat absolutely loves him!

It only takes a bit or so for him to get the hang of whatever game you’re playing.

Whenever the two of you go outside, the two of you mostly stick back there in the alleyways to stay hidden and away from prying eyes.

He’ll notice that there are people who recognize you and want to take pictures with you, or want you to sign something. He won’t think much of it, but he’ll be extremely cautious encase they’re possible GG agents in disguise.

If any of them make you feel uncomfortable, he’ll step in front of you and scare em’ off for you. All you gotta do is give him the go ahead.

Honestly there’s never really a dull moment with you around. You can make the most out of nearly any situation!

If you ever feel stressed or overwhelmed by streaming he’ll be there for you!

As a former famous musician, he understands the pressure of creating content for an audience and worrying if they’ll come back for more content, or if they’ll like it or not.

He gets, understands, and relates with the whole “being famous” thing.

If you’re new to having fans or if you’re nervous whenever a fan pops in for a selfie or an autograph, he’ll try and help in whatever way he can. He’ll be there if you’re nervous, or help you if you don’t want to be recognized out in public.

Sometimes the two of you trade crazy stories that happened while you were just talking to some fans.

“Once there was this fan who accidentally walked into a glass door as they tried to come over and get an autograph from me. They hit their head pretty bad and got a bloody nose.”

“Ouuch... I remember that once while I was eating out with my friends, there was this person who stumbled and nearly tripped down the stairs to get a picture with me.”

He also most definitely has some of your merch, if you have any!

And he’s asked you to let him be a chat mod at least a couple times. He watches your streams whenever he can, and catches quite a couple viewers breaking your rules.

[meltwonu]

| 🍒 CH-CH-CHERRY BOMB! 🍒 |     [CHAPTER 12]

pairing; dom!seungcheol x camgirl!reader

this chapter’s notes; camshow, sex toys, overstimulation, tiniest mentions of daddy!kink, a lil bit of a filler chapter!, this is the most btsvt chapter that it’ll ever get so i’m sorry if you dont like that!! 😭😭, a bit of a lighthearted chapter too tbh to ease everyone back into cherry bomb! 💕 I know its been like two fuckin weeks since the last update which is honestly insane to me! I almost couldnt remember where we even left off lmao kdjfhds 😩💕💕 Thank you for being so patient with me and waiting it out while we had two weeks of Monster Mash! Starting Monday, I’m gonna be going back to my normal posting schedule! 💕 have a great rest of the weekend, yall! 🍒 

chapters; 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 - 12 - ?

“Wait, seriously? You want to work here? But--but I thought you were from out of town?”

Jun’s eyes light up with excitement; fingertips crushing the resume you passed to him moments prior. “Um, well, there was a change of plans… and I’d really like to work somewhere where I have a friend! If you guys are still hiring, that is...” You reply back meekly.

It’d taken you all morning to write up a resume, blushing a little when you realize most of your income had been from camming. It’d also made you pause for a moment when you realized that it meant Jun would also know your real name too; as well as everyone who came through the diner and all of your coworkers.

“Yeah, of course! I, um, just give me a second to pass this to my manager, okay? I’ll be sure to put in a good word!” Jun shoots you a wink before he turns to leave.

You take the opportunity to sit down at a nearby booth, fishing for your phone to text Seungcheol.

‘I think I might be getting the job!!’

cheollie ✨: oh? Not that I doubted you, but is it confirmed already?

‘Mm… Jun is trying to put in a word for me! But I’m confident!’

cheollie ✨: thats my baby ;)

You hear someone call your name hesitantly, only to find Jun standing a few feet away looking at you sheepishly. “Um, sorry, your name’s on the resume so I figured…”

“Oh! Yeah, it’s fine!” You awkwardly giggle. “I figured writing ‘Cherry’ as my name wouldn’t be too smart when you need to cross-reference my ID if I get the job.” Jun laughs as he takes the seat across from you in the booth, papers in hand.

“Well, I convinced my manager to let me interview you. Told him that if we’d be workin’ together that I’d want to scope you out for myself! He bought it, can you believe it!?” Grinning, he sets your crumpled resume down next to a small stack of papers. “I don’t doubt you’d pull your weight around here but I do have to ask… Why here of all places? I thought your, uh, other job was enough? Or I guess I assumed...” You bite your lip, flip-flopping on whether or not you wanted to let him know exactly what happened that led to your sudden decision.

“Um… There were just some big life changes I had to make on the fly and I’ll be living around here now! I’m trying out some new things… I also figured if I worked with you, then you’d know my schedule the best too! And you seem like a really nice and cool guy.”

Jun nods, smiling back at you.

“You got that right!”

“You’re seriously going to start working there?” Jeongguk raises a brow, cables in hand as he sets up the extra PC in his streaming room. “And the guy working there knows you? That doesn’t bother you?”

Seungcheol laughs under his breath, “Yeah and he knows me now too. And knows I’d kick his ass if he tried anything.” You pout from your place in the expensive gaming chair; eyes focused on Jeongguk who shimmies under the desk to start plugging in the cables.

“Well, yeah he does know me, but he’s also one of my regulars and knows the schedules I’ll need, so I think we can trust him!” They both nod and Seungcheol is quick to cross the small room until he’s right behind you.

“He seems like a nice guy though, I don’t think we have to worry.”

Jeongguk slides out from underneath the desk, dusting off his pants as he stands. “And if he does end up being a weirdo, there’s always a place for you at the roller rink!”

Seungcheol rolls his eyes, hands gripping onto the backrest of the chair.

“No.”

“Hey guys, welcome back to Golden Closet Gaming! I’m JK, your regular host! Today, we have a suuuper special guest! Why don’t you introduce yourself, pretty lady~”

You take a deep breath as you lean in close to the mic; somewhat nervous and a little out of your usual element. “Hi everyone~ I’m Cherry! Some of you may know me from, um, the other side of the streaming-sphere but I’m joining my friend today in hopes of boosting our channels together and having a ‘lil bit of fun!!”

Seungcheol sits at the side as he watches the two of you; a small smile painted on his lips at the way the two of you seem to fall into your characters easily despite the somewhat different platforms and influx of different viewers.

The sound of donations and comments pour in a lot quicker than Jeongguk, himself, is used to; eyes wide and eyebrows raised as he pauses to watch them flood the screen.

sleepy_wonu has donated $100

xcaliburDK has donated $100

sleepy_wonu: never thought i’d be donating here but here we are

xcaliburDK: i was always a silent watcher but u kno i had to donate for my favorite girl!

seokGENIE: i feel like i’m entitled to something for taking your shift so i wont be donating, sorry pretty girl

j__min: can’t believe this kid got a collab with you before i did :(

j__min has donated $200

dtsug__a: i dont normally watch streams either but im curious

Jeongguk laughs, still in disbelief as the donations continue to pour in from a combination of your viewers and his. He always made a decent amount from his viewers but he couldn’t deny the pull you had from your viewers as well. “Wow, um okay, my donations are adding up a lot quicker than they usually do. That’s… Hey, whaddya say to streaming with me regularly?” He jokes. 

A shy laugh bubbles up your throat; ears and cheeks burning hot at the idea. You had never collabed with any other streamer before and despite your initial hesitance and unsureness, you too, were shocked to find how well the two of you were doing without your usual content.

“Erm, I’m not very good at gaming though… I don’t think your viewers would like it very much...”

seokGENIE: thats ok jk sucks at gaming too, it wouldnt be too different

j__min: lmao fkjdhf

dtsug__a: does he get roasted often on this channel? If so i’ll be tuning in more often

dtsug__a has donated $100

dtsug__a: for your troubles, pretty gal

“On second thought, let’s let this be a special occasion, huh? Maybe collabs for the holiday, Cherry?” Jeongguk grumbles and Seungcheol has to bite his lip to keep in his laughs from his side of the small room. You start to feel more and more comfortable at the lighthearted atmosphere; tucking a stray hair behind your ear before you lean in towards the mic again.

“Ah! Speaking of, don’t forget to tune into my camshow tomorrow~! JK and I will be gaming on there as well but… with some added fun to match my channel~! 21 and over only~” You blink at the computer screen, still a little unused to the idea that you weren’t technically being filmed. Although, it was a nice change for once; not needing to be all done up for a show and simply just talking to your viewers and reading comments.

sleepy_wonu: is dom daddy gonna be on the show too?

“Dom daddy? Oh you mean Se---”

“Yes! Kind of!” You cut off, laughing nervously. Nobody knew Seungcheol’s name except for Jun and you were trying to keep as much of him private as possible, until he was ready. “In a sense, he’ll be there! You guys will just have to tune in to find out!”

Jeongguk laughs into his own mic, scooting in closer to his desk as he loads up the game.

“I think that’s enough chatting for now, huh? Let’s get started! Tonight we’ll be playing Phasmophobia! We’ll be playing something more lighthearted on Cherry’s channel, as she requested. So tonight we’ll be playing something I picked out. You ready, baby?”

Seungcheol narrows his eyes, quietly taking a sip of his water.

“Ready when you are!”

“I gotta say, sweetheart, for someone who doesn’t play video games too often, you’re not too bad.” Seungcheol comments, nodding his head in amazement as the three of you exit Jeongguk’s PC room. He’d had a hard time keeping in his laughs as he watched from the side and he had to admit, you were even cuter when you were outside of your usual element.

“I have to agree with hyung, but maybe it was also the adrenaline and screaming that kept you goin’.”

The two males share a laugh as you pout and plop down onto Jeongguk’s living room sofa. “Hey, how were the numbers for tonight, by the way?” You ask quietly.

“Honestly? I think we made almost triple of what my channel usually sees. I know I don’t really make a ton off of my streams since I don’t really do anything, like, crazy but shit… Even I’m shocked at how much we made.”

Seungcheol’s lip ease into a smirk; Jeongguk really had no idea how much the two of you had made off of a couple videos alone.

“We still have one more stream to do and then we can just pool up the money and split it down the middle!”  

Jeongguk nods, stretching as he sits himself down onto the other end of the sofa. “I’ll bring my spare PC stuff so we can set up a little early tomorrow, if that’s cool with you two? Maybe have some food before we get started too ‘cause god knows I’m gonna be starving.” You look to Seungcheol who nods and checks his phone for the time.

“Yeah, we need to set up the cameras and lighting a little differently too so we’ll probably start earlier. Just text me before you drive over so we know when to expect you.”

You yawn next to Jeongguk; adrenaline having worn off as the tiredness finally sets in. “It’s so weird, usually I’m only just starting my stream right around this time but I’m so exhausted now...” Seungcheol’s eyes from cute crescents as he smiles down at you, stepping closer as he goes in to smooth down your hair.

“You really were screaming a lot, to be fair. How about we head home and you can sleep in the car?”

“Okay~”

Seungcheol lets you sleep in on Saturday morning, watching as your chest rises and falls with soft breaths.

He takes a moment to think over the last few weeks of his life and he can’t help the disbelieving expression that crosses his features when he realizes just how much had changed over the course of just weeks.

When the two of you had met, he wasn’t expecting much. He expected the two of you to hang out for a few days before you went home and forgot he even existed outside of your camshows and the comments section. But now that so much had happened between the two of you, Seungcheol felt a deeper connection to you and felt the need to protect you even moreso than ever.

He sees you shift slightly, sleepy eyes blinking open as you peer up at him. “Good morning, sweetheart.”

“Mm… g’morning ‘cheol…”

You grimace sleepily at how hoarse your voice sounds, “Ew, I sound so… gross.”

Seungcheol moves to get out of bed, leaning in to kiss your forehead before he shuffles towards the bathroom. “I’m going to wash up but you can stay in bed if you like. I’ll make you some tea for your throat, okay? We have a long day ahead of us and I don’t think you wanna sound like that later tonight.”

Nodding sleepily, you lay back down as you yawn and let the sleep take over once again.

“Are you really sure ‘bout this?” Jeongguk takes a bite of his pizza as he watches Seungcheol pull the desk closer to the bed.

“What do you mean?” You ask; readjusting the light that was closest to the younger male. “Like, I dunno, I’ve never been on a cam show like this so… I mean do I have to do anything different?” You laugh lightly as you go in to pat Jeongguk on the shoulder.

“No, just be you. And we went over it already earlier, the only thing that’s different is going to be me! No weird tricks or anything, I promise.”

Seungcheol places another monitor on the tabletop, grunting as he goes. “Yeah, and in all honesty, I would hate to have to watch you get off, ‘Guk.”

“Oh shut up, hyung. You say that like I don’t know what you’re packin’ under those sweats. I think it’d only be fair! Just two bros getting to know each other.” Seungcheol pretends to gag just as you double over in laughter. “No, absolutely not, ‘Guk. And also, nobody told you to watch those videos!”

Jeongguk pauses, lips pressing into a firm line. “You right, you right…”

You leave to get changed just as Jeongguk starts to help Seungcheol set up the last few bits of equipment. He leans in close to the older male, eyes glancing around the space to make sure you were completely out of earshot. “Hey, hyung, honest question.”

“Sure.”

“Are you really okay with all this?” Confusion crosses Seungcheol’s features as he raises an eyebrow at the younger male. “What’s ‘this’ exactly, ‘Guk?”

“Y’know, her living here and you camming all of a sudden, among everything else really… And the question if you’re in love with her which, by the way, we still all know that you are.”

A blush coats Seungcheol’s skin, fingertips almost losing grip of the camera he was about to mount to the desktop. “Listen, yes, okay, I do… like her a lot. But she’s going through a lot right now too and I don’t want to freak her out either. There’s a lot of life changes we’re going through so I’m just going to ...wait.”

“You’re a good man, hyung.”

“Hi everyone!”

You wave to the camera, winking and blowing a kiss to the camera propped up between the two monitors on the table. “I know, this setup is a little wild and not my normal but this is part two of my collaboration with Golden Closet Gaming! Do you want to introduce yourself to those who missed our other stream?” You turn to Jeongguk who nods; this time a little nervous as he stares directly into the camera.

He’d said he was okay with being filmed since he wasn’t actually part of any sexual acts, but he still found himself a little camerashy now that the two of you were live.

Seungcheol sat directly behind the monitors and cameras; his phone open to your cam show to watch from a different angle.

“Ah, hello! I’m JK of Golden Closet Gaming! I’m a friend of Cherry’s and no we won’t be fuckin’.” Jeongguk ends with an innocent smile that has you holding back your laughter.

therealchan99: i dont think dom.cheol would like that very much anyway

universe_WZ has donated $100

universe_WZ: unless he’s into watching

dom.cheol: no

alphagyu97: oh shit hes back

angelhan: huh, so hes not there?

“Oh, he is! He’s behind the camera~” You gesture beyond the camera to where Seungcheol sits and he leans over to quickly wave upside down in front of the camera to prove his existence.

j__min: ah, of course~ we know your daddy would never let you play with anyone else~

j__min: he likes you too much ;)

emerald.tae: oh? also hi new watcher!!!

emerald.tae: ur videos were great!!

emerald.tae has donated $200

therealchan99: im gonna need to start fighting ppl for ur attention i swear

gentleman_josh95: implying u had it

chwenon: yooooooo lmao

“You guuuuys, be nice! Just for that, I’m gonna be sending you a special private pic, okay ‘therealchan99’? You guys pick on him too much!” You pout.

therealchan99: hahaahhAHhhahaHAAHAA FUCKIN LOSERS SUCK ON THAT

tangerine_kwan: bruh

chwenon: damn guess we should can it

You respond to a few more comments as Jeongguk sits by and watches the way you interact with your viewers. He also takes note that you had a donation minimum before you started actually doing anything on your channel and that you’d already hit it pretty quickly.

“Okay! I think we should start now, huh? Oh, I should explain what’s going on!” You giggle cutely, settling into your space on the bed. “So JK and I will be playing this stilt man game! We have to get our character to the finish line without falling or the level restarts! JK has to get to level 30 and I have to get to level 20 and whoever reaches their goal first, wins!”

“I have a higher level to reach ‘cause our skillsets are different and we all know I’d smoke her if we both had to reach the same level.” Jeongguk grins.

seokGENIE: sure

seokGENIE has donated $69

sleepy_wonu has donated $100

hoshi_tiger_xx has donated $100

“And the reason why ‘dom.cheol’ is behind the camera is because...” You pause, eyes twinkling with playfulness as you stare directly into the lens. “In order to get me to do my best, he’ll be controlling a special toy I’m wearing~ Hehe, if my character falls, he’ll raise the vibration setting each time as punishment and leave it on until I cum…”

“Which we are assuming will be a lot. Unfortunately, no medic on standby.” Jeongguk jokes. Seungcheol rolls his eyes as he laughs from behind the camera.

“We have a safeword, don’t we, sweetheart?” You nod in response, “Mmhmm!”

“Let’s get it!”

It takes all of four stages before your character falls for the first time.

Seungcheol turns the vibrating panties on and you immediately jolt as you try to keep your character upright on screen. “Oh, f-fuck!”

kitty_junjun: uh ohhhh it begins

artist8hao: i don’t think she’s gonna last.. babygirl is so sensitive, she’ll probably cum soon

xcaliburDK: i’m giving it until level 6 before she cums

emerald.tae: oh are we placing bets

“Noooo~ Don’t place bets on me, I’m weak!” You whine; already squirming as the vibrations attack your clit. Seungcheol grins from in front of you as Jeongguk laughs from your side, already on level 7 on his own screen.

You had to admit, it was a little weird for someone else to be in the room with you while Seungcheol basically used a toy on you, but the younger male seemed to not care about it at all. Although, he had already seen most of you and Seungcheol at this point.

Your fingertips are shaky on the keyboard and computer mouse; already fearing the way Seungcheol’s eyes almost become darker the longer you struggle.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart? Is the game too hard?”

“A-ah, n--no, it’s not that b-bad…” Squirming, you grind down a little harder onto the bed just as your character falls on screen and Seungcheol raises the setting to the second highest in the blink of an eye. “Ngh, fuh---fuck!”

“Uh oh~ Should I slow down to let you catch up?” Jeongguk teases.

“N-no, I can beat y-you!”

The donations and comments pour in as you struggle to keep your calm and get your character to the finish line; letting out a sigh of relief as you finally enter the fifth level. You let out a choked sob as you already feel your panties starting to stick to you like a second skin from how wet you were getting and Seungcheol can’t help but chuckle.

“You know, you’re technically allowed to cum whenever you want. It’ll just… slow you down, is all.” Grinning, he watches as you look beyond the camera towards him as you pout.

“But I--I wanna win!” You cry; palms clammy as you try to rush through the fifth stage, only for your character to fall almost immediately. “Nooo~”

Seungcheol clicks the vibrator to its highest setting and your body goes rigid as the vibrations wreck your body. You start to grind against the toy as you chase your orgasm and forget about the game almost completely. In a perfect world, Seungcheol would have his cock snug between your walls, but instead you clench around emptiness as you crave his cock.

artist8hao: ah shes already cumming lol

seokGENIE: on level 5? Fuck

universe_WZ: her cute lil cunt cant take it, poor babygirl

seokGENIE has donated $50

emerald.tae has donated $75

alphagyu97: cum baby, u kno u wanna

alphagyu97 has donated $75

A small choked whine is all you can manage before you do cum; eyes clamped shut and fingers wrapped tight around the computer mouse as the waves of pleasure crash down onto your body. Donations and comments flood the side of the screen from a combination of your viewers and Jeongguk’s as they watch your face contort in pleasure.

“Ah, sweetheart, you’re really falling behind~ JK is going through the stages so quickly while you’re sitting there cumming~” Seungcheol teases. He licks his lips, simultaneously wishing you were sitting on his cock while you played your game.

That’d have to be for another time, he thinks.

It takes a second for Seungcheol to turn the toy off and your body immediately slumps forward as you catch your breath. “Ngh, d-damn it…” You grimace when you re-adjust yourself and find your panties soaking wet.

“I’m already on level 17, babe. You gotta catch up!”

You can only groan in response, flexing your clammy fingers before you try to focus on your own screen again.

kitty_junjun: oho looks like our princess is focused now

tangerine_kwan: u got this baby

j__min: show ‘em who’s boss, babygirl

You tune out the sounds of the comments and donations as you manage to get yourself to level eight without falling, but level nine proves to be just a little too hard as your character falls and Seungcheol turns the vibrator back on to its lowest setting again.

“Be careful, baby. Wouldn’t want to fall behind again would you?”

Seungcheol feels his cock throbbing in his sweats as he watches you bite your lip. And for the first time all night, he wishes that Jeongguk would just win and go home so that he could have his own private time with you.

“I’m on level 22 already. D’you think she can even catch up?” Jeongguk teases. He spares you a side glance, taking in your form slumped closer to the table as you try to fight the vibrations.

Your body was already extremely sensitive from your first orgasm and you quickly losing your confidence as you struggled to keep your character upright. If you came even just one more time, there was no way that you’d be able to beat Jeongguk with how quickly he was going through the stages.

therealchan99: she’s cumming just as quickly as JK is getting thru the stages hfdsf

gentleman_josh95: shes so cute when she cums tho

angelhan has donated $50

angelhan: thats the real prize angel

“T-thank you…” You whimper out, fingertips twitching against the keyboard and mouse as you focus your attention to the game to the best of your ability. 

You manage to get to level ten with no more issues just as Jeongguk gets to level 25 and you let out an exasperated sigh as your character falls over again. “Uh oh~ I think I’m gonna win!” Jeongguk cheers; giddiness washing over him as he works to get to the end. 

“Nooo~ That’s n-not, ah, fair!” Whining, you grip the mouse tighter as Seungcheol raises the setting on the toy again, watching as you rub your thighs together at the feeling. 

hoshi_tiger_xx: sadly nothings fair in the gaming world babe

hoshi_tiger_xx has donated $50

dtsug__a has donated $50

dtsug__a: cute for thinkin so tho 

“I don’t th--think I can, hah, c-catch up...” You moan. Your character on screen falls over one more time and all you hear is Seungcheol’s small ‘tsk’ under his breath as he sets the vibrator to the highest setting and leaves it there. 

It doesn’t take long before the vibrations prove to be too much for you and you let go of the keyboard and computer mouse as your hands ball up into fists on top of the table. 

The pleasure washes over you in sharp pin pricks; small whines and whimpers falling from your lips as your eyes completely clamp shut. 

Jeongguk lets out a surprised noise at the way the donations and comments almost make the screen lag and for the first time, his character on screen falls over at his split second loss of focus. 

“Ah, fuh--fuck!” You start to squirm once the pleasure starts to bleed into overstimulation and Seungcheol is quick to respond, “You’re gonna cum one more time as punishment for giving up, sweetheart.” 

alphagyu97: ooo she's in troubleeee

gentleman_josh95: ahhh daddy still has to punish you after all 

seokGENIE: damn is this what this channels abt? this is hot 

artist8hao: babygirl always misbehaves

chwenon: she seems to like it too much 😏

dtsug__a: hooooo shit, thats hot 

“It’s n-not my f-fault, hah, JK is j-just good at g-gaming...” You mumble. 

Jeongguk manages to get to level 30 within the time you sit and grind against the toy; small noises of excitement falling from his lips as he cheers for himself!

“Aww, poor baby. Maybe you’ll focus a bit better next time, hmm?” 

You nod frantically as a small tear slips down your cheek and your lips part in a breathy moan. “God, I--I’m c--cumming!” 

Your body locks up, ears ringing as you cum one more time. Seungcheol wishes he could work you through it; hands massaging your skin as you take your pleasure or thrusting his cock into you as he chased his high with you. 

Instead he watches from across you as your body twitches as your face contorts in unadulterated bliss, licking his lips the entire time with images of what could’ve been dancing behind his eyelids. 

Jeongguk watches as the donations far surpass what the two of you made on his channel; brows disappearing into his poofy head of hair. “Wow, uh, y’all seem to really like it when she gets punished, huh?” He mutters under his breath. 

“Don’t you?” Seungcheol teases. 

“Truuuuue.” 

A garbled moan has both of their attention on you as you try to shy away from the toy still vibrating against your overly sensitive clit. “Ah, ‘m too sen--sensitive now...” You cry. 

Seungcheol turns the toy off completely as your chest heaves in deep breaths; pouting at the fact he wasn’t able to enter the camera frame to take care of you. 

Jeongguk grimaces slightly at the way your body sways in tiredness next to him, unsure of what to do next now that he’d won. 

“Haha, um, medic?” 

[ravenbrenna09]

Jij Verliest - Chapter Eight: Clips 3&4

master list

...

note: decided to drop two clips today because one was just texts; also as much as I want to italicize the texts, I’m not going to because Tumblr never gets all of them :/

also, mild spoilers for the the first part of Pokémon Sword and Shield

...

Maandag 14:11

Broerrrs + Luc

20 July, 14:11

Robbe: What are you guys doing on Wednesday?

Jens: Uh, I’m working that night. But not until like 19:00.

Lucas: I’m working that morning.

Jens: Really?

Lucas: Yeah.

Aaron: I don’t have to work.

Moyo: Me either.

Jens: Lucky you.

Lucas: Why?

Robbe: Because Sander wants to meet you guys. And he gets off at 16:00 on Wednesday.

Jens: Wait really?

Robbe: Yeah. Do you have a problem with it?

Jens: What? No, of course not. I guess I just didn’t expect it to be so soon. Especially after everything that happened.

Robbe: I know, but I want him to meet you guys. Officially. As my boyfriend.

Aaron: Awww, Robbe has a boyfriend.

Robbe: I’ve said he’s my boyfriend multiple times.

Lucas: Yeah, he literally won’t shut up about it.

Robbe: I’m sorry. How many times do you talk about Jens?

Lucas: :)

Aaron: I know, but it’s still new and I’m allowed to be excited.

Moyo: That’s true. We’re excited. And Wednesday sounds good to me. Noor and I are going out tonight.

Jens: Have fun! Wednesday sounds good to me too. Am I going to like him still after everything?

Lucas: Yes.

Jens: Oh really?

Lucas: One look at how he makes Robbe happy and you’ll like him again.

Robbe: I didn’t realize you stopped.

Lucas: He didn’t. He just says that he does. He’s gotta be all macho and protective.

Jens: You like me when I’m macho and protective.

Aaron: VDS at it again.

Moyo: You’re still in the group chat?

Jens: And? I can flirt with my boyfriend when I want to. Even in the group chat.

Robbe: I’m screenshotting that.

Aaron: What for?

Robbe: For when we eventually add Sander to this chat. And Jens tells me not to flirt with my boyfriend. I have proof that I can flirt in the group chat.

Jens: Are we adding Sander to the group chat? We haven’t even met him officially yet. And we never added Thomas to it. 

Robbe: I know, but I have a feeling about this one. Plus, I know you guys already like him anyways. Especially Aaron.

Aaron: That’s true.

Jens: In love Robbe is my favorite Robbe.

Moyo: Yeah.

Lucas: Agreed.

Robbe: Thanks guys.

…

Dinsdag 19:25

It had been on Robbe’s mind for awhile—days, weeks even. It was time for something different.

At least for Tuesday. 

Tonight, Sander was going over to Britt’s parents’ house. It had been an unexpected and last-minute invite from her parents and Sander was asked to come. Britt had messaged Robbe about it, asking if it was okay, and Robbe had said that it was. It still felt a little weird—as weird as his boyfriend pretending to be dating his ex-girlfriend could be—but that wasn’t why Robbe was upset. But, Robbe didn’t even know if ‘upset’ was the word he should be using… Disappointed? Maybe.

It wasn't about Sander going over to Britt’s. It was Sander going over to Britt’s tonight. 

Changing up his streams had been on Robbe’s mind for a few weeks and yesterday afternoon, after playing numerous matches that were just like all the others, he finally decided that he wanted to do it. At least for one day. When Britt had asked—followed shortly by Sander’s call—he thought of pushing the change off until later but, at the same time, Robbe didn’t want to. 

Since that Friday night, Robbe had been itching to play Pokémon Sword and Shield, the newest generation in the franchise. With their buzzed and love-drunk minds, they hadn’t really gotten very far into the game. Every once in a while, they would pause to kiss and it would end up a little more handsy than originally planned. Once they managed to pull themselves away, they would barely make any progress before they would tumble back against the bed, kissing each other. 

So Robbe went out and bought a Nintendo Switch after his Monday night stream. Because Sander had a copy of Pokémon Shield—he remembered the opening title scene quite vividly—Robbe chose the opposite version before looking through to see what other games were compatible with the console. Once he got his new purchase home, he spent the majority of the evening setting it up with the help of YouTube videos. Zoë had brought him a plateful of spaghetti as he was knee-deep in cords. 

Once he woke up on Tuesday morning, Robbe put the finishing touches to make sure that everything would run smoothly—or as smoothly as it could without going live. Even though Robbe had informed them that he was going to do something different, his nerves were still running high, bouncing in his chest. For years, Fortnite had been the only thing that Robbe streamed. So the bulk of his audience would expect Fortnite from him.

Before he started the stream, his phone vibrated loudly against the desk, pulling his gaze from the computer in front of him.

Sander: Have a good stream, baby. I’m hoping to catch the end. If not, I’ll watch it before bed.

A flood of warmth shot through Robbe and soothed all of the erratic nerves in his chest. Unconsciously adjusting his headphones, Robbe typed out a quick message.

Robbe: Have a good dinner. Text me when you get home.

Sander: I will <3

Once Robbe placed his phone to the side, glancing at Sander’s framed sketch, he started the stream. Even though he was still nervous, it was all for nothing. To his surprise, a majority of his regular audience were excited to see him play through Sword for the first time. On the other hand, there were still a handful of people who weren’t excited. Before they left the chat, they made passive aggressive comments about going to watch a Fortnite streamer, and the comments stung a little. Thankfully, the majority of his audience encouraged him and he started the game with little fuss. 

On that Friday evening with Sander, they had chosen the water-type starter, Sobble. While Robbe thought that the anxious salamander (or chameleon?) was adorable, he ended up choosing the Scorbunny this time around, which he named Flint. The white bunny with a bandage on his nose had interested him. Plus, if he and Sander were going to continue with Sobble, he wanted to do something different with this one. Once he hit the first route of the game, Robbe caught a Rookidee, which he named Alloy. It was a small bird that looked angry but would eventually evolve into a Corviknight. 

When Robbe finally reached the Wild Area, the vast area between cities—and, he learned, Pokémon’s first step into an open world—Robbe paused to consider getting the online services to connect with his viewers who had Pokémon. After a few minutes, he decided to wait until later in the game before he got the online services. Plus, he wanted to look into the other games on the Switch so he could do what they were temporarily dubbing “Nintendo Tuesday.”

As Robbe prepared to enter the Opening Ceremonies for the first time, his phone vibrated against the desk, drawing his attention. Rebel, Rebel played again as Sander’s text message popped up on the screen. 

Sander: Baby, buzz me in. 

Pulling down his headphones, he barely could make out the buzzer in the hallway. It was still going—which meant that no one else was home. “Umm,” Robbe said, placing his controller on the desk. His character was mid-conversation with a stadium worker and his chat was moving very quickly. “Sorry, I’m going to take my five-minute break now.” 

Muting his microphone and placing his headphones on the desk, Robbe shot out of his bedroom door and hit the buzzer on the front door. It only took nearly a full minute for Sander to arrive at the front door, knocking lightly, and Robbe opened it impatiently to find him there on his doormat. Sander was dressed in a long-sleeve black button-up with a pair of skinny jeans. His cheeks were flushed, likely from the heat. 

As soon as the door opened, Sander stepped into the apartment and kissed him hurriedly. His skin was hot to the touch—and a little sweaty��but Robbe didn’t mind, bringing him closer against him. Sander wrapped his arms around Robbe’s waist before pulling back. “Hi, baby.”

“Hey,” Robbe said, beaming. 

“I’m sorry for interrupting your stream,” he said. “I just really wanted to see you.” 

“Is everything okay?” Robbe asked. 

“Yeah,” Sander said, squeezing his waist. “Everything is fine. While we were at dinner, her parents asked us if we were really dating because we never kissed in front of them. When her father tried to force us to kiss to prove that we weren’t faking it, Britt exploded. She got into a fight with her dad and I could only watch with her mom as they fought. In the end, she came out to her parents.”

Robbe felt his eyes grow wide, pulling back. “What?”

Sander nodded. “Yeah, I didn’t tell you before because she wasn’t ready yet. But when I took her to my apartment and was going to come over here, she let me know that I could tell you. She’s been in a relationship with her girlfriend for six months. Her parents were always a little overbearing and controlling in her life and tonight was the last straw. She packed a bag and she’s staying in Noor’s bedroom until she figures out what to do.”

“Wow,” Robbe said. “I’m so sorry.”

Sander shrugged with a sad look on his face. “It’s been a long time coming. Since she’s found out, she’s been a ticking time bomb with her parents. They always talked about her being with a good guy—even when she was with me, both real and fake—and she internalized all of it. Every time, she got a little closer until it was too much.”

Robbe nodded. He understood that feeling. In high school, he exploded at the Broerrrs. He had been going through so much—his mother in the hospital and his repressed feelings that he refused to acknowledge to even himself—until one day it was too much. Thankfully, he had Milan and Zoë to help him. The Broerrrs forgave his explosion and changed when they realized how much Robbe was hurt by their words. Avoiding Sander’s gaze, he mumbled, “I know what it’s like… to explode.” 

Sander nodded, pressing a kiss to Robbe’s forehead. For a second, they simply rocked in the silence of the foyer. Soon, Sander ducked his head down to press a kiss against Robbe’s lips and he arched against Sander’s chest. Robbe stood on his toes, wrapping his arms around Sander’s neck, and kissed him back. Sander wrapped his arms tighter around Robbe, bringing him flush against his chest, as he dug his fingers into his hair. 

Pulling back, Sander kissed his nose. “You better get back to your stream. I just really wanted to see you.”

“They can wait a little more,” Robbe said.  

“Yeah, but you don’t want to keep them waiting forever,” Sander said grinning. Placing one more kiss on his lips, he moved back to the front door. As Sander reached to open the door and step outside, Robbe tugged him back against him and Sander looked at him confused. “What is it?” 

“You don’t have to leave,” Robbe said. Sander stared down at him with half-lidded eyes and Robbe swallowed his nerves. “You can stay here and come on the stream with me—or hang out in my room if you feel more comfortable with that.” A small smile grew on Sander’s face. “Besides, I need your expertise about my stream and I’d love to have you with me.”

“Didn’t you say last week that I would be distracting?”

“Maybe,” Robbe said, tilting his head back. Sander stared at him with a sly smile on his face. “Maybe I also changed my mind about you being distracting. But you have to promise to be on your best behavior.” 

“Okay,” Sander said, gripping his hips tightly. “I’d love to join. But I don’t know how much help I’m going to be with Fortnite and online matches. All I know is what you’ve told me or I’ve heard on your streams.” 

Robbe smiled, pressing a kiss to his lips before moving to the kitchen. “I’ll be back soon. I still need to grab a glass of water or I’m not going to be able to make it the rest of the stream without another break.” 

When Robbe returned to his bedroom, Sander had kicked off his shoes and unbuttoned his shirt, exposing the black shirt he had beneath it. His bag had been discarded at the foot of the bed. There was an emotional look on his face as he turned to Robbe who stepped into the doorway. 

“You’re playing Pokémon?” Robbe nodded, relishing when Sander closed the distance and pressed another kiss to his lips. Even with a full glass of water in his hands, Robbe wasted no time in wrapping his free arm around his shoulders and kissing him back. When they separated, Sander grinned. “Lucky for you, Mr. IJzermans, I’m quite the Pokémon expert.”

Robbe smiled, stealing another fleeting kiss. “Lucky me.” 

[mysweetgirl2-love]

Livestream~ (corpse_husband x reader)

Alright, I’ve skipped ahead a few prompts because I’ve been just too excited to write out this idea and I was falling behind... so I will be going back, but I’ve skipped to my day 9 prompt. Slight (SLIGHT) exhibition. To reiterate the title, this is a oneshot about you and Corpse. I want to just say that this Corpse is him as a character and not him as a person. Think of a “fanon” version of some sorts. I know that the real Corpse is a very private person (obviously) and I would hate for him to be uncomfortable if he were to ever find this. I am really just writing this for comfort and the enjoyment of others. So, without further ado, enjoy!

Word Count: 5,958

Day 9 - Exhibition (Implied)

“Yo! YO! It’s Corpse! It’s fucking Corpse, holy shit-“

“What? Literally how?”

“I- fucking- I saw you legit go into electrical with pewds, leave, for me to then go up and find his body right next to the vent.”

“He was doing the upload task, I think, cuz’ I left him there when he was alive. You definitely self-reported.”

“Toast, you gotta believe me, it’s fucking Corpse.”

The arguments while playing this game were some of the most frustrating and yet exciting conversations you’d had in ages. Especially when it came down to the final two. That was the jackpot.

“Ah… nah, Fable, you’ve been super sus this entire round. There’s no way you did card swipe that quickly-“

“WHAT?!”

The two dings from your headset indicated that the remaining players had voted which only left you. Since Toast didn’t believe you, Corpse had this round in the bag. God. Damnit.

“Fucking- Fine. Thank god for your detective skills, Toast,” You grumbled bitterly, pouting on camera as you voted for the black avatar. Corpse’s avatar.

“You’re just mad that I figured you out..” The streamer teased, you rolling your eyes in response to his unmatched “knowledge.”

“Yeah, yeah, totally… Corpse is just too fucking good at this game, I swear to god,” You continued, definitely a little irritated that the match turned on you so fast.

It didn’t help when all you could do was helplessly watch from the other side of the screen as your purple avatar launched out into space. Oh well, it was over.

“Heh… I’m just glad you admit it,” The deep voice filled your headphones making you roll your eyes.

The screen suddenly darkened, a red gleam appearing as two characters stood next to one another. Spedicey and, who would’ve guessed, Corpse. Shocking.

“What?!” Toast exclaims.

“I can’t BELIEVE you didn’t think it was him!” Lily speaks up.

“You’re a fuckin’ idiot, Toast,” Felix almost groans, sounding slightly annoyed.

“Seriously…” You comment, smirking slightly at the groan of confusion from the man in question.

“What? Fable, you were so sus that entire round!” Toast stressed, your headphones filling with laughter as you clicked to play again.

“What do you mean?! I Iegit just scanned my card and you’re trying to call me on it! For NO good reason!” You retorted, wanting to facepalm so hard.

“I didn’t think you could do it that fast!” He yelled back, “I thought you were faking it, there was no way!”

“The only one who really struggles with card swipe here is Corpse,“ Jack cut in, you erupting in laughter at his words.

“What?- Uh- Come on, don’t do me like that…” He essentially growled into the mic, your arms erupting with goosebumps at the sound of him once again.

“That’s not true either! Jack, you know how hard card swipe is!” Valkarae stood up for the deep spoken imposter, “…but you guys both won anyway. So, whatever…”

You all simply laughed along with one another at that, the frustration fading as you mentally prepared yourself for another round of this thought-provoking game. Or… so you thought.

“Hey, can we actually hold off for a second? I need to use the bathroom-“ Lily asked, you smiling at how gentle her voice always was.

A stark contrast to the one that followed.

“Yeah, same here. Gamer bladder,” Corpse followed.

You shook your head at the later comment, clearing your throat as before leaning in towards your mic, “So, 5 minute break then?”

“Yeah.”

“Sounds good!”

“Sure, I’ll just be here.”

Felix, Rae, and Jack responded.

“…Sykunno?” You asked, having not heard his voice in awhile.

“He left to use the bathroom after he finished his tasks in the last round, texted me saying something about getting a snack,” Toast replied for him, you nodding to no one in particular but your chat.

“Got it,” You pressed the mute button for discord and turned to your face cam, “Guess I’ll run to the restroom as well, stay tuned!”

You clicked a few things to allow an ad to run across your stream, labeling it for around four minutes before reaching for your headphones. You placed them on your desk and sighed, leaning back in your chair.

You heard the door in the hallway open, smiling gently to yourself before standing from the chair. You turned towards your own closed door, taking the appropriate amount of steps to open it before peaking around the doorway.

“Hm…” You walked out slightly, turning towards the closed bathroom door and smirking before creeping out of your room and over to his.

Corpse’s room. Your boyfriend.

You and Corpse had started seeing each other a month or two into quarantine during the pandemic. Having known each other a year or two from both of your professions bringing you together under the circumstances, it seemed appropriate.

He was a real-life horror story teller, taking people’s information by email and anonymously telling their tales. You? You told mythologies of all kinds through your own renditions of the stories with art. You also managed to make the stories more light hearted and funny with a few jokes now and then, and people seemed to appreciate the humor you found in some of the topics.

Your channel name had always been Fantasized Fables, a little odd but it got your content across. Since your channel hit, your name was no secret but people liked calling you Fable.

You honestly thought it made you sound a lot more badass than you actually were.

Either way, somehow you got connect through a couple of friends and instantly clicked. Corpse was… well, Corpse. You didn’t know that you’d helped him so much when he actually told you what was going on. The endless nights where you would both be up at an ungodly hour and just dm-ing one another. It started after a few nights you both saw each other online, quickly progressing into something much bigger than that.

It got deep all the time. You both had so many thoughts about life and each other’s and your own… you felt so safe when telling this faceless internet friend all your deepest, darkest thoughts. But, you knew Corpse had more. He always told you more, you almost wanted more to comfort him over. The feelings started to fester and grow… there was no stopping how you felt about him.

The day you two actually met was never going to be forgotten, by either of you. It was unintentional, almost straight from a movie. You had, at this point, exchanged contact information and had been now calling for the majority of May. Not to mention, you both found out you lived in SoCal, only progressing  On this particular afternoon, you texted him that you were going on a coffee run to Starbucks… him saying he was going out for the first time as well.

Masked up and muffled, you of course could tell it was his voice from across the street. The slightly amplified “oh fuck” was the biggest giveaway you could’ve imagined. Your eyes looking up to find a man, dressed in complete black, chains and earrings, shaggy black hair- there was so doubt in your mind.

You called his name, his eyes looking up to find yours across the way… traffic laws weren’t going to stop the saint up to him and into his arms. A big, long, well-deserved embraced you knew the both of you needed. He had always been so kind… and gentle… him being physically there was just so… relieving.

The rest is history, and you honestly moved into his apartment as quickly as you could. You couldn’t stand him living alone like that anymore, and he obviously let you in without a second thought.

You both were extremely happy to have each other, and it just kept getting better from there.

You gently shut the door behind you, creeping over to his setup and sliding into his chair, humming softly as you watched the endless chat messages buildup along the screen and peering at the number of viewers he had now achieved.

JEEEZUS christ, 200k?! That’s insane! You thought, widening your eyes at the number on the screen.

Your streams only ever reached 90k, which was a lot more than you had expected. The number was slowly growing now, though… ever since Corpse blew up on tiktok for just posting videos of his hands.

Wild.

You clicked through a few comments, watching super comments flash along the chat as well as mods trying to attempt to get slow chat to work. You couldn’t help but slightly laugh at the struggle, turning back towards the game as a few of the avatars began bouncing around with one another. People were getting back to the game.

You were about to shift around in his seat, reaching for the keyboard to type something in game when two larger hands came gently down on your shoulders. They pushed you gently down against the chair, causing it to lean back with your body. A face moved next to your ear, lips grazing against the skin.

“Whattup Baby?~” That low voice growled, you gently flinching at the rumbling next to your ear.

You turned to find Corpse grinning down at you, his hands easing up off your body and reaching for your face. His right hand came in contact with your cheek, gently squeezing against it as he slowly walked around the chair and crouched down. To be right beneath your eye level.

“Hi..” You hummed, leaning over to press your lips against his forehead before leaning back to look in his maroon-like eyes.

“Why’re you in my chair? You need to get back to your own stream, silly~” He hummed, beginning to stand as he reached for your arm to pull you out of the chair.

You grinned, your head falling back begrudgingly as he easily pulled you from the comfortable seat.

“Wait…! I just wanted to see you…” You lightly whined, him chuckling in response as you stood on your two feet. Him replacing the spot where you had sat.

“Uhuh… and why’s that?” He teased lightly, you couldn’t help but scoff gently while your heart rate increased. He always had that effect on you.

“Well, I mean… I wanted to both congratulate and bother you about your… fucking imposter round-“ He erupted in laughter, you grinning along with him with a simple eye roll, “hey! Let me finish, it was a good round, I’ll give you that… but you threw me under the bus while doing it…! For no reason!”

He raised his brow lightly, his laughter coming to a soft chuckle as he shrugged, “I mean, I gotta keep my title as ‘too fucking good at imposter.’ Sorry, princess…”

You playfully glared in his direction, a stupid smirk spreading across his face. Your lower lip jutted out from your upper one, crossing your arms as you simply pouted in response. He huffed in response, his smirk turning to more of a smile as he reached back out for you.

“C’mere…” He grumbled, his hand grabbing your arm as he pulled you back down to the chair.

“Wait- Ah!” You almost fell against him, barely able to catch yourself against the arm rests on his chair. You looked up, slightly panicked from the sudden fall, to find Corpse smirking right back.

“Wait for what? You’re not ready for affection?” He asked softly, his hand reaching up to push a few loose strands of hair behind your ear.

“N-No, that’s not it…” You mumbled, letting your gaze fall to his chest, seeing the definition of his body through his baggy sweater.

You felt fingers press against the underside of your chin, pushing your face up to look back towards him. You felt your face flush in embarrassment, smiling nervously as his smirk had never faltered.

“You don’t look very sure of yourself…” he whispered to you.

You gently bit at the inside cheek, shrugging quickly, “C-Cuz’ I’m not…”

He chuckled deeply, leaning in slightly as he grabbed you by the lips, gently humming against your mouth as his hands gripped your sides.

You whimpered softly against him, beginning to kiss back as you readjusted yourself in his lap. You quietly wrapped your arms around the back of his neck as you leaned against him.

He chuckled softly, moving his lips against yours as his hands gently slipped up beneath the sides of your shirt and lovingly stroked at your now exposed skin.

“God, you’re so beautiful…” he whispered against you, catching your lips quickly as he continued, “You’re too perfect, fuck… too fucking perfect…”

“Corpse, I-..” You kissed him again, one of your hands reaching up towards his head as you tangled your fingers into the back of his hair.

He hummed against your mouth, squeezing your sides gently as his smily broke out into a grin. The tip of his nose pressed against yours as he sighed, “Yes, princess?~”

“Careful, we need to get back to the game…” You whispered, growing a little nervous as he chuckled.

“They can wait…” He sighed, leaning back in to press his lips back to yours, kissing you deeply once again.

You squeaked lightly, timid as ever before you kissed back. You felt his teeth grazing against your lower lip, gently nipping at the skin. You couldn’t help but slightly moan, pulling away from your lips as he trailed light kisses down your chin and along your jaw.

He was going for your neck, getting there before you could express any protest. You sighed loudly as his lips connected to the skin right below your ear, gently growling against you as you felt a slight wet sensation lick against your earlobe. You shivered, the side of your face falling to the top of his head as he continued his attack on your neck.

“Fuck, Corpse~”

“God, you sound so beautiful baby… you keep acting like this and after the stream? I’ll have no choice but to-“

The desk behind you started vibrating in loud, long buzzes. Both of you freezing in your spots as you turned over your shoulder to find Corpse’s phone lighting up with a phone call.

You quirked your brow, “Who’d be calling you this early in the morning?”

It was 12 pm, you both had woken up at 10 am to actually get ready in time to stream. It wasn’t early for the world, but it was early for this apartment.

“I don’t know… weird,” He leaned forward in his chair, you holding tight against his chest as he grabbed the phone and brought it towards the two of you.

You both looked down at the contact name on the screen, your eyes widening at the name that read.

“Why- hm…” Corpse quickly swiped to answer the call, holding the speaker up to his ear, “Hey Rae, everything okay-“

He stopped suddenly mid sentence, his eyes widening as his cheeks lit up in a bright red. It had to have been the most embarrassed you’d ever seen him, his eyes falling to yours as you read the panic within them.

“R-Right- shit… s-sorry- I-I’ll turn it down now… bye,“ He quickly brought the phone away, immediately hanging up as his eyes flashed towards the chat function on his stream.

“Is… Is everything okay…?” You asked hesitantly, leaning over slightly to read for yourself what people had to say. Did something happen in chat while you guys were preoccupied?

Corpse didn’t respond, his eyes just scanned what the letters read on screen. You frowned, you confusion growing by the second. He hit a button on the keyboard, did he just unmute?

A strained laugh left his mouth, falling back in the chair with you still in his arms. His eyes found yours, his lips slowly turning to a grin before he laughed one of the hardest laughs you had yet to hear from him.

Your eyes widened, completely baffled at this point.

“Corpse, please- What happened?”

“We- We- AHA! We were unmuted!! That ENTIRE time!” He cackled, his hand landing on his chest to almost support him in some way.

You, on the other hand, went from complete befuddlement to absolute humiliation. There was no way THAT was just heard by hundreds upon thousands of people. No fucking way.

“Wh-What??” You began to panic, reaching for his broad shoulders and gently holding onto them, “Wh-What are you even t-talking about?!”

He gently gripped onto you in return, readjusting you against him as he held you there. His laughter died down before he leaned forward and pressed a kiss against your nose.

You both were open that you were in a relationship, people knew… but, that doesn’t mean you necessarily wanted them to hear..

“Hey, baby, don’t worry… it could’ve been a lot worse… We’re fine~” he reassured, your brow still tensed from your worry. You knew the worst had already happened when he blew up, but how would they use his voice in that kind of tone…

You didn’t want to think about it too much. Not jealous, more just… weirded out. Who knew how people would use your voice in that tone either? You didn’t dwell on it.

“Ah, o-okay… yeah, nothing we need to worry about now,” You nodded with him, his gentle features turning to a warm smile. He brought his hand up to your cheek, his thumb gently swiping across your skin as he hummed.

“Mhm, all is fine… I promise,” He mumbled to you, leaning in softly to press his lips back against your forehead.

You sighed, pausing against him for a moment before leaning away, “Well… p-probably shouldn’t keep them waiting m-much longer…”

Corpse raised his brow gently smiling sadly in agreement with a slight nod. He gently reached for your hips once again, holding them gently as he helped hoist you back onto your two feet. You yelped softly as you let yourself be lifted, extending your two legs to meet the floor.

You stood still for a moment, your eyes meeting his as you timidly smiled, “S-Sorry about the mic thing… I should’ve stayed in my stream.”

You nervously laughed, his smile never faltering as yours broke out into a grin. Your slight guilt written all over your features.

“No, no, you’re totally fine… don’t apologize,” He hummed, his thumbs gently pressing against your hips as he kept reassuring.

“Okay, haha… now we’ll never forget to check our mics,” You winked softly, your hands grabbing onto his larger ones and squeezing them gently in return.

“Haha… never,” He nodded softly, tilting his head gently to the side as he simply watched you.

You sighed, begrudgingly pulling his hands from your hips as you took a small step away. You gently bounced on the balls of your feet, awkwardly putting your hands together behind your back.

“Hm… well! I- uh… will see you in game…” You smiled, his body turning in his chair as he leaned his chin against two of his fingers that you had freshly reapplied black nail polish that night before.

His brow raised quizzically at you, the damn smirk playing at his lips once again. His fingers flexed slightly, his hands following the motion. You could see the veins running down his wrist from where you stood.

He briefly chuckled, “Yeah… I’ll see you there, baby…”

With that, he turned back towards his screen while you didn’t hesitate towards the door. You walked over and grabbed the handle, briefly turning back to the darkened man on the screen, clicking away at the bursts of notifications he was getting from discord.

Oops.

“I love you-“ You flushed, his eyes pulling away from his screen to find you in the doorway. You could see the tint of pink along his cheeks in the darkness of the room.

“…I love you too. Hurry though, Rae is flipping out-“ He laughed, you not wasting a second more to close the door and bound back over to your recording room.

You shut the door behind you, looking up towards your brightened monitor and feeling your breath catch in your chest. You could see your chat blowing up from here, your phone lighting up with MULTIPLE notifications… God, what an unfortunate mistake for Corpse to have made.

You quicken your pace back to your chair, sliding in and putting your headphones back atop of your head. Your camera had come back on in the time you were gone, giving the device a nervous grin before turning towards the game.

“S-Sorry guys, didn’t mean to take that long- uhm…” Your eyes scanned over the chat, not surprised to find it full of caps-locked comments screaming about what happened on Corpse’s stream.

You sighed nervously, your eyes now finding your discord application notifying you that you had… almost fifty notifications?! You mentally had to roll your eyes, quickly turning back towards the camera with a sheepish smile.

“I- uh… I have to go for another minute- B-Be right back!” You laughed, turning on another ad before mentally cursing at yourself. God damnit- your eyes scanned over the viewers on your stream.

What the shit- when did I get 30k viewers?! What the hell?! Of course this is when your viewers decide to spike.

You groaned to yourself, your head falling to your hand as the other reached for your mouse. You clicked to your discord, slowly… but surely, un-deafened your mic.

“OH. MY. GOD. You FUCKING dumbass!” Rae yelled as soon as you unmuted, flinching at the pitch to her tone. It felt like you were being scolded.

“What?! I can’t show my girlfriend some love?!” Corpse replied, not yelling but a definite inflection in his tone.

“No! Nothing wrong with that! But CHECK your MIC next time!!” She laughed loudly. Oh my god.

“Jesus Christ, dude… or at least lower the sensitivity significantly…” Jack spoke up, almost sounding disappointed.

“Ey, welcome back, Fable-“ Felix spoke up, the cheeky grin evident in his tone.

What a fucking asshole-

“FABLE!”

“Oh my god-“

“You guys can’t wait til after stream?!”

“Wait, what am I joining into…?” A new voice intervened, interrupting Rae, Toast, and Lily.

Charlie, what a man, coming in at the worst time.

“H-Hey Charlie…” You spoke up in a greeting.

“Wha- Wait! Answer the question, Fable!” Lily squealed, a groan leaving your mouth as you fell towards your mic.

“I’m sorry! I-I really didn’t mean for it to happen! I had no clue-“

“Yeah, wait, this isn’t on Fable. She just went to go visit Corpse in the other room, guys, chill…” Felix actually stuck up for you, your face lifting in surprise as his words.

“Uh- yeah, actually, I guess that’s fair,” Jack commented, you nervously laughing in response.

“I… am so sorry to all of you,” You apologized softly, a gentle chorus of laughs following your meek apology.

“No, no, no, you’re so fine. You guys weren’t trying to broadcast whatever… that was…” Sykunno hummed awkwardly, you laughing lightly at his uncertainty.

“It was a poor mistake on my part, I’m sorry, Fable…” Corpse spoke up, you grinning at the sound of his voice.

“N-No worries… hey, we already went over this in person. Can we get back to the game?” You grumbled, another fit of laughter through the group at your excusing of the situation.

“Ahaha, yeah let’s get back into it,” Toast replied, the sound of his mouse clicking lightly being heard in the call.

You sighed, deafening yourself once again and turning back on your stream, “Hey everyone, yep… yep, everything’s fine. No worries, I promise, haha. We took a break for a little longer than expected, but we’re back!”

You un-deafened and were met with sound of a very very confused Charlie, “Wait… so… no one’s going to explain to me what happened?”

You all erupted into loud laughter, you falling back slightly in your chair as you cackled. The first voice to come back was Rae, shockingly.

“Don’t worry, Charlie… we’ll tell you later,” She snickered, you laughing along as you came back to your keyboard.

“So… we can start now, though?” Toast spoke up once again.

You began to give confirmations of “yes” with soft ‘yeah’s and ‘mhm’s. Lazy, but it got the point across.

“Cool, starting the next round…” He clicked play again and the countdown began.

“Alright, everyone, remember to MUTE your mics!” Jack spoke up, you rolling your eyes in response as Corpse’s laugh raised above the rest.

“Will do. Thanks,” He chuckled, a louder laugh sounding through the call once again from all mics.

Your screen turned dark, the red avatar of the Among Us character moving to shush you from the screen. You sighed, watching it turn dark again.

“Yeah- yeah, you’re welcome!” Jack played along, grinning softly at the joke as the screen began lighting up once against.

Your screen displayed your avatar next to Corpse’s, the bright red letters of “Imposter” reading across the computer. You raised your eyebrows, making sure you were completely muted on call before chuckling.

“Oh… Hell yeah. Let’s go…”

[khadorek]

Hallow’s End Heat: Part 1

This has been written for the third week of the Weekly Writing Challenge! It has been a while since I tried a longform post like this, so excuse my rustiness.

Warning: Contains sexual innuendo, viewer’s discretion is advised.

It had been a little over a month since the duel that saw the end of the Fourth War, and despite the ominous storm clouds that loomed on the horizon, the concept of a lasting peace finally coming to the Alliance and Horde was the cause for many a great celebration; families were at long last reunited, soldiers returned to their waiting lover’s arms, and many military and paramilitary organizations celebrated a job well done, and the Brotherhood of Valor was no exception. The early evening was fairly tame; a few adults in costume strewn about the common room chatting, relaxing, having a few drinks, and all around enjoying the evening they had off while those with children had left for the major cities to take them Trick or Treating. Things only got rowdier as the evening went on, as parties with alcohol involved so often do, not helped by the return of the children not long after the sun had gone down, eager to enjoy their sugary bounty before being sent fruitlessly to bed. The adults, meanwhile, directed their attention to the makeshift stage that had been put up for the contest many of them had been waiting for; the costume contest.

Thursday, October 31st, 10:26 pm, The Hinterlands

“…and last, but certainly not least,” Sebastian announced, shifting in his Headless Horseman costume a bit, and squinting through the black fabric that covered his face as his “head” was running around and playing with the little Pandaren child with a ghostly sheet over her head. Once he got the names down, he looked back up and continued his announcement, “Khadorek Blackbyrne and Katharena Graeson!” On cue, they strode out onto the stage, waving to the crowd as they did so, much like those before them had done. To no one’s surprise, they had, of course, gotten matching costumes and both seem to have taken to it with gusto.

“They’re back from the high seas, it seems; I tried going there once, Hope and Jhulya stopped me, and now I’m not allowed to sing anymore.” Sebastian added, causing part of the audience to groan audibly. As for Katharena and Khadorek, they indeed cut quite the swashbuckling duo; Khadorek was dressed in tough deck hand attire, with heavy black boots over tight leather seaman’s trousers, paired with a loose swashbuckler’s top and a red bandanna covering the top of his head, causing his thick brown hair to fall almost entirely down over his back. His scars were highlighted to look more recent, making him look even more rugged than he naturally was, and with a black leather eye-patch to round out the look. Hefting the faux boarding axe over his shoulder, he cut quite the realistic pirate, if a bit simplistic compared to his counterpart. Katharena, meanwhile, went for a much more ornate, pirate admiral design for her costume; thigh high black boots with heels making her just that little bit more imposing in regards to her height, the tops of which were mostly hidden underneath a mid-thigh length skirt, the perfect mix of frilly and utilitarian. For a top she wore what could only be described as a mix between a low cut, button-down vest and a corset, made of brown leather and cinching her already tight waistline to even more waspish proportions, paired with a long navy blue coat to make her look even more like a captain; as if the fake parrot on her shoulder and tricorn hat upon her blazing curls didn’t already sell the look. The pair of them made sure to show off their costumes, and Kath, perhaps to seal the deal, discreetly snapped her fingers and caused a gust of sea breeze to come into being behind them, causing their last pose to look particularly dynamic. The audience applauds at the extra showmanship as they stepped down, and Sebastian carefully makes his way up on stage to close things off.

“Now those were some really great costumes, I think,” he begins, still wearing his face cover, “we’ll be giving out the prizes once the votes are counted, so be sure to get your votes in now!” He states, beginning to make his way back to his seat as the votes began to come in. Having submitted theirs before they went on ‘stage,’ Khadorek and Katharena made their way to their spot by the bar to get away from the small crowd near the stage.

“Well, that went pretty good!” Khadorek remarks, ordering his usual and easing back into his seat, “nice touch with the wind there; you have that planned?” He asks.

“Nope, spur of the moment.” Katharena replies, awkwardly hopping up into the seat next to him and letting out a heavy sigh of relief as she gets off of her feet. “Ah, damn these heels.”

“You alright?” Khadorek asks, taking his drink and offering to help her up into the stool, something he was used to doing by now, but was waved off; she did that a lot, her independent streak not fettered in the slightest even with him. He always liked that about her; that spunky, tough, farm girl competitive nature appealed to him in ways he never thought it would.

“I’m fine,” she assures him as she finally settles into the seat, crossing her legs and ordering herself a daquiri. “Just these damn boots, I know they’re supposed to be authentic, but I just can’t see a sailor, even a pirate wearing heels like these on duty.”

“Well, the one that was helping you seemed pretty insistent that her old captain wore something like that.” Khadorek retorts.

“These people kidnapped you, remember; new leaf or not, I’d be hesitant to be to trust them.” Katharena counters as she gets her drink, mixing the crush ice in the glass with the straw before taking a sip. “Also, I’m convinced that she was checking me out throughout that whole thing; I mean, look at my outfit,” she gestures to herself, “You don’t think it’s too showy, do you?”

“In hindsight, you do have a point,” Khadorek admits, “and yeah, she absolutely was, but you gotta admit, it gave her an edge; you look even more amazing than normal.” He purrs, doing his best to keep his eyes from lingering on her figure for too long.

“I know you like it, dirty boy,” she teases with an eye roll, seeing through his attempt at hiding his gaze almost immediately, pushing her biceps together on either side of her chest and subtly bouncing her ample bosom while fluttering her eyelashes, causing him to look away flustered and red cheeked, “don’t act like you haven’t been just as bad tonight. If you can think about it with the head on your shoulders for a moment, I want to know if this was too much for a company party.” She asks again, her soft lips curled into a teasing smirk. Khadorek shifts uncomfortably in his seat as his dirty mind is punished in a most ironic way, but he can’t help but smile at how playful she was being.

“You want me to be honest? If Keaye,” he begins, gesturing to the incredibly plush Pandaren woman who had since stumbled back to and began leaning heavily on the bar, skimpy ninja costume straining perhaps a bit more than it should as she downs yet another flaming shot of alcohol, “isn’t getting any trouble, you’re more than in the clear. And maybe so, but you’re hardly innocent either, nor as slick as you think, unless you have been making sure I haven’t sat in something.” He teases right back. “Besides, I’m fairly certain I’ve got more cleavage in this shirt than you do in yours.” He adds, pushing his pecs together in much the same way a woman would do with her chest. Katharena, in the process of going a touch red in the cheeks herself and taking a drink to steady herself, sees this and immediately snorts and nearly chokes as she begins laughing.

“Shut up, you!” She giggles, giving him a playful push and causing him to chuckle as he nearly falls off. “I think we both know who has the best tits here.” She quips right back as she goes back to her drink. Khad’s eyes widen into an expression of amused disbelief at what she just said.

“How many drinks have you had?” He asks her, setting his whiskey down as she sips away at her daiquiri, happily shifting side to side in her seat to the music playing throughout the bar. When she finally stops and turns to Khadorek, there is barely a splash left of liquid and flavored ice in her glass, and he doesn’t need to hear what she says next to know she’s pretty much hit her limit.

“I’ve gone drink for drink with you, handsome,” she states proudly, leaning forward with a coy grin on her face. Khadorek is floored; it was rare she ever drank like this at all, let alone match him. Thankfully, it had been a short evening, but regardless, she was not known for her constitution; he had to step in.

“Okay, I think you’ve had enough.” He affirms, going to put the drink out of reach before his hand was pushed aside.

“Oh, come on now, I was pacing myself!” She complains, turning more towards him, “I was only drinking these things,” she gestures to the daquiri, “they’re no where near the stuff you drink. Besides, I feel fine.”

“You say that now, but come the morning…” Khadorek tells her, knowing all too well what it was like the morning after. “You finish that drink, then your cut off, okay? Don’t want you to ruin your morning tomorrow.” He states. Katharena pouts, but capitulates. Khad smiles and was about to thank her, when he felt something tugging at his leg. Looking down, he sees a little Draenei girl dressed as a Jack-o-lantern; it was little Hope, Sebastian’s daughter.

“Daddy wanted me to bring this to hyoo.” She says in her Draenei accent, holding up a basket of assorted teas and various edible sundries, all of which bore the mark of Loshu. “Congratulations on weening cutest couple, he says!” Naturally, the couple smile and graciously accept their prize.

“Thank you Hope, and you look adorable in your costume.” Katharena says sweetly, mostly managing to feign sobriety in front of the little one, who giggles and does a cute little courtesy before running back to play with Zhaemia and the others. Katharena leaned back into the chair with a sigh, and Khadorek lets out a soft chuckle.

“The children sure are having a good time tonight, don’t you think?” Khadorek remarks, watching the little ones play their game of tag; darting between the tables, chairs and patrons with ease. Katharena, however, does not remark on this. “Kath? Did you hear me?” He asks again, and again no response. Khad turns to face her, and sees her going for his drink. “What are you doing?” He asks in obvious confusion, and she snaps her gaze to him and withdrew her hand. He was about to ask what had gotten into her, but then he saw the look on her face; that look, and his mood softened to one of pity. “C word, right?” He asks, and she nods sullenly; Khadorek raises his arm and almost immediately, she snuggles into his side, letting him rest his hand on her back. “I’m sorry honey, sometimes I forget how much that bothers you.” He consoles her, and she nuzzles her head into his shoulder with a sigh. He knew how much she wanted children of her own, and seeing others with thriving families always exacerbated those feelings; he couldn’t imagine how rough it felt with liquor bringing all those feeling and unhappy thoughts she normally kept hidden bubbling to the surface, aside from that it must hurt, a lot. “Don’t worry, love, we’ll get there eventually, I promise.”

“I know, I know…” she replies, nuzzling into his shoulder even more, “it’s just hard sometimes… they all have their families, and all I can think is that I came so close and then…”

“If that hadn’t happened, we wouldn’t be here right now, would we? We would never have met.” Khadorek counters, hoping to stop the tears before they even started, “Kath, honey, I love you, and I am going to give you everything that you want; everything that was taken from you will be yours again, and I’m going to give it to you, just like you’ve done for me.” He says in the most assuring tone he can muster. Katharena is quiet for a while, and Khadorek was nervous he hadn’t calmed her enough. Eventually, a smile, albeit a sad one, comes to her face, and Khad lets out a gentle sigh as he begins to soothingly rub her back.

“Thank you, my love,” she replies softly, scooting her barstool towards him and moving to kiss his cheek. “I think I need to just get my mind off all of this for a while,” she adds, eyes locking with his, “and I know exactly what I need for that…”

“And what is…” Khadorek begins to say before he notices her smile becoming much more playful, AND where her hand was now resting; most anyone would have just figured she just had her hand on his thigh, but they both knew that was far from the case. “Honey, are you sure, you’re pretty drunk right now…”

“And we both know how I get when I’m drunk…” She purrs as she cuts him off, biting her lip as she felt the fruits of her earlier teasing. Khadorek swallowed and blushed a bit at how forward she was being; he DID know that she got affectionate when she drinks, and around him, affection very swiftly turned to her getting very, very amorous. She KNEW he loved it when she acted so brazen, and such a play to his desires was swiftly breaking down his resolve. She used her other hand to lift his free hand to her cheek, fluttering her eyes in such a way that made his stomach do backflips. “Khad, my love, I want you; I need you,” she purrs, lifting her head from his shoulder and getting right up to his face, “the night is still young; let’s go upstairs and have some fun.” That was all it took, and they both pulled each other into a deep, strawberry flavored kiss; Khad’s other arm pulled her yet closer to him, practically into his lap, and Katharena looped both her arms around him, taking hold of his broad, muscular back, though this did not prevent her from subtly teasing him, as sitting in his lap provided her a whole host of options in that regard. When the kiss finally broke, he had fully fallen under her metaphorical spell, and a devious grin spread across his face.

“Well, if that’s what Katharena wants, that’s what she’s gonna get.” He growls softly, and Katharena’s grinning cheeks redden to hear him so eager; such plays seemed to work on both of them in equal measure. “Lead the way, beautiful.” He added, and that was all that needed to be said before she was hopping down to the ground with a soft click of her heels, taking his hand and leading him towards the stairs.

To be continued...

@quipsbykath @weekly-writing-challenge @ogrimskar (for reference to his character Loshu)

[rkevent]

There are only two episodes left and twenty-five contestants. By the end of the night, your finalists will be revealed. As always, the highlights of the previous episode play on the screen to remind you of everything that happened last week. It goes from a few seconds of the best performers and the eliminations to the revelation of the coaches and what’s about to come. Divided into five groups, the remaining contestants are to represent the companies they’re assigned under. Being the semi-finals, performances are expected to keep their high quality, and, hopefully, surpass it.

The camera pans over the new empty set and, slowly, it is filled with the 1500 viewers who managed to catch a spot in the audience to watch the performances before anyone else. A crew outside gets some comments out of the people waiting in line. “KT has my two favorite contestants!” Says a girl besides her friend. “I’m cheering for LEE NAKYUNG and SIA KIM! They’re both charming ladies so I understand why Katie Lee would want them under her label.” Her friend quickly shakes her head. “Of course I’m here for the team that’ll actually win, Royal. They have LEE SUWOONG and DO KYUNGSOO. This is the team to be frightened.” The scene changes for a mom and a smaller boy, the latter being the one interviewed. “I’m here to cheer for MIYAWAKI SAKURA! I really hope she’ll win!”

Back inside the set, a man makes his way onto the center of the big stage. He is Hong Jinwoo, the MC assigned to present this episode. “Hello, all, and thank you for being here today!” The crowd cheers in response. “My name is Hong Jinwoo and it’s a pleasure to be here as well. Before we start our performances, why don’t we hear from our judges first?” The view changes to the five chairs and the five people sitting on them. It’s your favorite CEOs! “Thank you all for coming,” Seo Jisub starts it off today. “Today we take one last step before the end. Our contestants have prepared their performances according to the companies they were assigned. Each group will have one of their members eliminated, and those who make it through will officially become a finalist. So welcome to the sixth episode and semi-finale of the Mnet Global Auditions!”

They show the cheering crowd once again as they build their expectations for what’s about to come. The MC takes back his role and begins to introduce the acts. “Now, let’s receive our very first act of the day. Here comes the Sphere contestants!” He motions with his arm towards where the contestants appear, five in total. They’re CHWE HANSOL, KANG DANIEL, MIYAWAKI SAKURA, NAM JOOHYUK, and PARK WOOJIN. “Action!” And then all the team members clap their hands in near unison before saying their team name. “We are Hollywood!”

Before they can take their places, the scene changes to the outside of the Sphere building and, then, their designated practice room. DANIEL and WOOJIN arrive together first. “It’ll be nice to have a practice room we don’t have to share with another team,” the first one comments before the rest of their teammates show up. HANSOL approaches him. “Hey, can we talk?” And the two take a seat by themselves to have a chat. “I wanted to talk to you because I didn’t want there to be an odd air between us and I wanted to be upfront so that we could get any weird tension out of the way. I have to admit that based off of last week working with your team in the same room that I did start to feel rather annoyed and put off by both you and Kenta because of all the fooling around.” A very short compilation of the two either whining or doing something weird last week appears with a black-and-white filter before return to the present. “I gotta admit going into that it’s really concerning me. I’m just questioning how committed you are to actually working towards the same goal.”

DANIEL appears sitting for his interview. “Vernon saw me at my worst last week, so he had some doubts going in. Dancing was really difficult.” The interviewer moves on the next question. “There’s been quite some criticism of your guitar, including from contestant Jo Yuri. Any thoughts on what she said?” The boy relaxes a bit before moving on. “I don’t know if Yuri-ssi has actually watched my performances. If she did, she would know I’ve done just about everything someone can do on this show.” As he lists them, DANIEL counts them on his fingers. “I played a self-composed song, I played guitar, I sang. I rapped. I played bass- Just in last week’s performance alone, I sang, rapped, and danced. I don’t know what more she’d like from me, but she can let me know if she’d like. I’m always looking to improve,” and so he smiles.

The view returns to the inside of their practice room and the three assigned coaches making their way inside. Two of them are members of the boy group CONVEX, Jinki, and Jinwook, while the third is the winner of last season, Go Hojung. “They’re so nice! And supportive!” SAKURA says in her own interview. “I’m glad to have them as coaches. They’re wonderful people.” It’s Jinwook who appears next to leave a comment. “It’s been three years since I’ve been here as a contestant myself, and I never expected I’d be invited back to coach. People may be concerned that our team is weak in dancing, but it’s definitely workable. You might not believe it, but Jinki’s the strict one between us. He’s going to make them work hard!”

They all sit together trying to throw ideas of what they should choose to perform. “I don’t know idols very well,” DANIEL admits, “but I listened to all of Sphere’s artists last night and they all seem generally bright but really versatile.” No one seems to go against him for that. “We could always do a remix of a Convex song? Or a mashup with one?” He suggests, but WOOJIN doesn’t seem to like that idea very much. “Maybe you should focus on learning the dance instead of spending time remixing songs.” The other looks down. “I think giving everyone plenty of time to learn the dance is important,” Jinwook chimes in. “Dancing for non-dancers is hard, so it would be better not to do any complicated remixes unless they can come together quickly.”

While the others work on the song, PARK WOOJIN steps aside to learn the choreography by himself. “I ended up being the only dancer in the group, so I had to help the others out with choreography and stuff. Since all my previous teammates had been dancers,” he explains. “I don’t think I’m good enough to be taking that role, but someone had to.” The boy appears dancing until late at night, keeping up with practice because of the role he had been automatically applied. He huffs and puffs when he ends the routine, and before he can start again the scene changes back to the stage where the five members stand ready to perform.

The song starts taking over the set. It’s only the soft instrumental at first before KANG DANIEL says the first few lines. The performance may start soft, but the dancing is demanding on the details. To start the chorus comes SAKURA, the only female in the group, followed by WOOJIN and then the girl again, who returns to show she can also rap. When it’s time for the second chorus, HANSOL is the one to start it until JOOHYUK joins along. It’s HANSOL also returns with a rap. WOOJIN leads the finale as the center of the dance break and the eventual end.

“I think…” HANSOL comments, “it was like I met a song where I was finally in my element. I don’t have anything to complain about. I really enjoyed myself on stage this week.”

“Hello! We’re Polaris!” The next group says in unison, a reference to the company’s theme, and receives cheers from the audience. They’re the ones from Nova, the second to stand on stage tonight. The group is composed by CHOI YEWON, KIM SEUNGHUN, SEO CHANGBIN, TAKADA KENTA, and WANG JACKSON. One by one, they introduce themselves individually before they move to their starting positions as the lights fade away. 

All the members are inside Nova’s practice room when they appear on screen again and they zoom in to capture their reactions when the coaches join them. While they don’t look surprised, the strong aura of Nova’s future idols and trainee have intimidates the five. Before the group starts discussing song options, coach Lee Sunmi advises them to pick a song with a strong stage presence that would fit the company’s image. The coaches share some notes with the contestants, telling them the areas they want them to improve, but it’s KENTA who receives harsher feedback from SUNMI, who says she didn’t even expect him to make it past the last round, but he should work hard. “I’ll do my best!” He nods and answers. Following the advice received from the trio of coaches, the group spends most of the day going over songs and getting to know one another, settling on Run by ATS as their final choice.

It’s when they start working on the line distributions and choosing centers that things get more heated up. SEUNGHUN is the first to raise his hand to demonstrate an interest in singing the high note, followed by JACKSON, another well-known vocalist from this season. The group decides to have both of them singing the part to pick the best voice and the older boy is the one who ends up with the position. On the other hand, when it comes to the one who’s starting the performance, things are not solved so easily. YEWON seems clearly upset when KENTA says he’d like to do it and doesn’t hold back her opinions, bluntly pointing out the spot is not a good fit for the dancer. “No, I can do it. You have the first lines, so I think it works better if you come out from behind, like RM does, in the original.” KENTA protests, trying to prove his point. “Look this is going to sound harsh, but I just don’t think you can pull off the role. I’ve seen your performances, and I just would feel better if you took a different role.” She says. The boy insists and promises to work hard and prove he deserves to be there. “Please, don’t underestimate me.” He asks and she waves a hand dismissively at the male. “Fine, fine, whatever.” 

It seems to be just the start of a tough week as the first run-through doesn’t go well. While they sing in front of the coaches, Sunmi and Son Seungwan exchange horrified glances. “Alright, listen!” Seungwan says as she gets their attention. “I noticed how you’re all just vocalizing as a vocal warm-up before you start practicing. That’s great, but before you even think of making a sound, you also have to prepare the muscles that you’ll be using to make those sounds.” Her words are followed by real instructions and tips on how to do that. “Ah right, it will hurt for some of you… YEWON! CHANGBIN! Come here please.” She picks the rappers for the demonstration. What seemed to be simple throat massages, cause them unbearable pain. CHANGBIN grab at her arm and his face scrunches up. “Help me!” He responds weakly. The scene cuts to minutes later, Seungwan edited with an army uniform and the words ‘Sergeant Son’ appear on the screen as she points out their lack of stability. “Run in laps around the training room as you sing.” It’s clear she’s not joking. Even the most athletic members struggle with the mission and the same happens when they show clips of the group planking, with KENTA losing balance and being scolded by the coaches, then running laps one more time. “A-again?’ SEUNGHUN asks with a pitiful look. “Go, go! You can do it!” Lee Sungyeol encourages them cheerfully. They are shown afterward, everyone dripping in sweat and looking exhausted. “Sunmi! Wendy! What have you done to the children?” Sungyeol asks, looking at them. 

Dance practices are also challenging, CHANGBIN visibly struggling more than others. A montage of different days of practice appears, collecting mistakes and nicely executed moves by the dancers and forming a huge mosaic, Sunmi’s voice in the background giving them some pointers. “What if we slow down a bit? Like… Go over it at 0.75x speed instead of normal until the sequence is perfectly memorized and we make no mistakes?” SEUNGHUN suggests when they are the only ones in the room, and it seems to work for them.  Facing different struggles, the camera shows KENTA looking down when CHANGBIN approaches him. “Is everything okay, hyung? You’ve been – a little quiet. Is it because of what they said?” He asks. “Ah, it’s alright. It’s helpful advice! It’s been a little shocking, but that’s how you get cattle to move faster, right? Zap.” The other boy responds and is encouraged by the rapper. “You’ve been doing well, though. Don’t beat yourself up. I know you’ll show your best onstage, regardless of what others might say.” Despite the pressure and the stress, the group has a good time together. During breaks, YEWON and CHANGBIN are seen rapping to popular songs and JACKSON approaches SEUNGHUN for a friendly battle. “Hey, hey, we should have a proper high note battle, you know, the really high one.” He tugs into the younger's sleeve. Going from ‘do’ to ‘sol’ notes, their voices and crazy facial expressions make both burst into laughter. Sungyeol is responsible for bringing snacks to keep everyone healthy and energetic. 

The closer they get to the live stage, more improvements are made, but the group could use some fine-tuning. Seungwan visits them again to check their vocals and points out some problems. “Was I too much?” SEUNGHUN asks under his breath to JACKSON, looking confused with the feedback received. Looking for some guidance, the vocalist approaches the coach later. “You’re probably so used to singing solo, so you’re probably not sure how you’ll fit in with a team. And all the more, this is a survival competition, so I understand the pressure of needing to stand out all the time, but this is also a team performance, so balance is very important. You don’t have to go so hard at every line you sing. There are some parts where you just have to take it easy. You have to know which parts call for being the entree and when to be the side dish.” She explains and tells him she believes in him. The coach makes sure to encourage the whole team before she leaves. “Team Nova, I’m counting on you.”

The camera returns to the live stage and the group is now ready to start the performance. All lights are off, but once the instrumentals kick in, a spotlight follows KENTA, who slowly approaches the group. The blue light that suddenly covers the stage reveals the other members right when YEWON starts off the hit song. CHANGBIN is the next and his rap portion is delivered powerfully. The beat picks up and welcomes a fast-paced and intense choreography. The main and lead vocalists, JACKSON and SEUNGHUN, take over the center for the chorus and put more strength into their voices to match the intensity of the part, contrasting with the soft vocals from the pre-chorus. After the team’s efforts, they manage to execute the synchronized choreography well.  With good facial expressions and confidence, they show a great stage. KENTA puts emotion in his voice and his movements are expressive. The dreamy atmosphere sets the mood for the moment JACKSON hits the high note perfectly with SEUNGHUN doing the low register. They reach outwards and when they open their hands, petals fall onto the ground. Their performance comes to an end and they get into the ending pose that formed a star with CHANGBIN in the middle. 

“Who did you feel was the weakest link on your team?” They ask her, and YEWON doesn’t have a problem replying. “KENTA was the weakest in our group. I just don’t see what he contributes that we don’t already have. He’s not the best singer, his rapping is non-existent. I personally think he’s gotten fortune to have made it this far in this competition.”

Five new people appear, all moving along to the center. They’re the ones under TRC and they’re CHOI MINHO, HWANG YEJI, KANG HYUNGGU, LEE CHAERYEONG, and SHIN RYUJIN. The latter is the one who starts their introduction. “We’re your,” and then they all shout together. “Antidote!”

Appearing in their practice room, the scene that is shown is of their first meeting. Their coaches include two members from K.ARMA, Doyeon, and Sana, as well as the trainee Jung Jinsoul. The first ones to get there are the coaches and they wait for their contestants to arrive. “We had a lot of fun, huh?” Doyeon asks the trainee and the public is reminded that all three of them had actually made their journey together on the previous season, although each one taking a different path. When the contestants arrive, Doyeon seems surprised. “Oh my-” she chuckles while looking at HYUNGGU. “We trained together when I was in high school.” The boy appears in his interview and comments about their relationship. “I actually know Doyeon from a long time ago. We actually trained together at a smaller company when we were both in high school! It’s funny because I went from being her sunbae to us switching up the roles.”

When they sit down to throw song suggestions, CHAERYEONG doesn’t look too content with what they had settled on. She points out how it was too similar to her last few performances and it’d probably look bad on her for repeating. But her teammates work on hard on convincing her that everything will turn out alright and that enough would be different for it not to be the same. CHAERYEONG goes to Jinsoul for help, later on, asking her things about how she could stand out and do her best. Jinsoul tells her that she just needs to be herself and that that would be enough. “Oh and wait CHAERYEONG do this.” Jinsoul smiles and winks and then watches the other girl copy her. “Perfect! I knew it would suit you!”

YEJI and HYUNGGU are assigned the roles of choreography while the other three, MINHO, CHAERYEONG, and RYUJIN, took care of writing their own rap lyrics. RYUJIN is the one who suggests they increment some sort of dance battle into the choreography, and they all agree with it. It’s that same girl who appears working hard to get things done. It’s YEJI the one who approaches her. “RYUJIN ah, you should rest.” She tells her and makes her sit down. “We can do this, ok?” And the other girl does as told, taking some time to relax before they could get back to practicing.

HYUNGGU is the one who brings energy drinks to help encourage everyone to keep up with the high energy until the end of the week. “Getting in a room full of dancers can be tough sometimes,” MINHO says in his interview. “I wondered what we would do because styles can be similar but don’t flow together. HYUNGGU and YEJI made it work in a way that I didn’t feel that struggle or difference at all. I loved their work and we all got to give our input and it turned into a charismatic stage I think is worthy of TRC.”

The screen wobbles, and then suddenly they’re back on the stage, getting ready to perform. RYUJIN is the one who starts the song, and, in between the lyrics, there’s their team name in it. HYUNGGU and YEJI are the ones who take on the chorus along with a couple of words by the other rappers, MINHO and CHAERYEONG. Following it, MINHO takes on the first rap verse following, using the original lyrics he came up with during the week, all while they all danced. After another chorus, CHAERYEONG and RYUJIN show off their own lyrics as well. It’s when they go past the third chorus and a bridge that YEJI gets to do a high note and then they fall into a dance break. The boys divide from the girls, and they act as if they are in a dance break until it leads to them all getting back together and the end of the song.

“MINHO did really well too. I… quite like him, actually.” DO KYUNGSOO says. “He may not look like it but he’s sort of soft inside and treated me well last week.”

The next group makes their way to the stage. They’re JO YURI, SIA KIM, LEE NAKYUNG, WONG YUKHEI, and ZHOU JIEQIONG representing KT. All together, they each make a small heart-bow before saying their introduction. “Shot through the heart! We’re team Foh!cus!” After each of their individual introductions, the members move to their starting positions but are cut by the editing team to show what they were up to during practice.

LEE NAKYUNG can be seen making her way inside the room and, before long, she lets out an excited “Oh my god!” in English as she jumps around the practice room. “It felt crazy, really.” The girl says in her interview. “That’s my dream company and Eclipse is one of my favorite groups just like ChiChi was to me before. It felt crazy that I’d get to spend time with both Minji and Haseul and Luda, too!” Scenes of the coaches entering the room appear on the screen and of NAKYUNG staring at them. “They were all amazing. It really felt like a dream come true!” In contrast to the first girl, another girl appears in her own interview. “Thank god the CEOs all introduced them,” YURI chuckles. “I… didn’t know who everyone was, honestly. I searched Naver to figure out who my coaches were.” She giggles, covering her mouth. “Whoopsie.”

The three female coaches introduce themselves, and Minji goes ahead first. “I’m Kim Minji, Leader of Eclipse, a recently debuted group under KT with a day and night concept.” Below her face, the text appears one by one as if she’s saying exactly what’s expected of the leader. Haseul goes next. “Hello, I’m Jo Haseul, main vocalist of Eclipse. I know how exciting and stressful this time can be. A lot of people don’t understand how hard it is to put yourself out there. I’m… not the most outgoing person, as I’m sure Ariel would be able to confirm, so I know how difficult it can be.”

The team starts working together to figure out which song they’d like to use. They settle on two by ChiChi and SIA works on putting them together alongside JIEQIONG. With the final mix, JIEQIONG gains a new partner in NAKYUNG to choreograph something together for their performance. “Everyone in the group is easy to work with, but I got to try something new this week with mixing our dance break music with SIA so that was really fun,” JIEQIONG says in her interview. “But it’s hard.” Her lips form into a tiny pout. “NAKYUNG and I also got to choreograph the dance break which I loved! She’s really cute and our ideas went nicely together.”

A team name is a necessity in the rules this time around and, for this team, it rises from YUKHEI’s initiative. “Foh!cs, with an exclamation mark after the Foh.” The others pause a moment to think, but then quickly come to an agreement on his suggestion. “The girls from Eclipse, and Luda, were really lovely.” The boy comments. “They gave us lots of pointers and tips and helped as much as they could, maybe even more than they had to.” This leads to a different scene of SIA and Ariel sat side by side in the practice room. “Can I ask what is your main goal? Do you want to be an idol? A singer? To do musicals? To act maybe?” The coach says to the other and it catches her a bit off guard. “Because to be honest with you, I think you could do all of that, I mean, if you so choose and you don’t have to choose only one. But to be an idol, you will have to dance. You’ll be unstoppable if you improve your dancing if you show you can keep up with the dancers in this group.”

The camera slowly zooms into the contestant’s face but doesn’t play what her answer was. Instead, it changes to her interview. “That day was probably one of the biggest learning experiences on the show. Sometimes, we just need someone to tell us we’re doing a good job and it’s enough to make us want to work harder.” With this, the scene changes once again to a different location. They’re back on the stage and with positions ready. It’s time to show what they got.

The other members kneel around YURI who raises from the center while the first few notes start to play, and then the girl winks to the camera before she starts to sing. YUKHEI is the one who starts the chorus and impresses a few of the audience members when he does the famous leg splitting movement, followed by SIA who brings an end to their brief song. That’s only because the song of a record scratching plays loudly, followed by a new beat. The group performs the dance break that NAKYUNG and JIEQIONG had worked on, which leads to the intro of their second song. YUKHEI is the one who starts them off, followed by NAKYUNG. Following the new choreography, the group moves smoothly to the new setting of their performance. By the end, YURI and SIA are the ones in charge of covering the chorus with ad-libs, leading the song to its end.

“I think,” YUKHEI says, “thanks to us all working so well together we did well. It all comes down to teamwork because if we hadn’t worked so well together and trusted each other, we might not have performed exactly like how we practiced it.” PARK WOOJIN appears after. “It’s a bit of an image change for some of them, but even so, they pulled it off really well. I was surprised, honestly, but I should’ve expected their talent to show.”

The final group makes their way to the stage, the five final people to perform. They are DO KYUNGSOO, JEON HEEJIN, KIM HYOJIN, LEE SUWOONG, and SOHN YOUNGJAE. “We are Youth Over Flowers!” They greet before posing like flowers. It’s enough to show before they show a new practice room.

It starts with KYUNGSOO standing quietly and SUWOONG appearing on view, sneaking up behind him and uses his index fingers to pull the corners of the other’s mouth up into a smile. He pushes them in front of a camera and makes sure to introduce them. “Hello, I’m the grumpy kitty, Do Kyungsoo!” Says SUWOONG beehind said boy. “And I’m Suwoong, the cute and fun kitty!” He says with a brighter voice, throwing up a peace sign. KYUNGSOO, still just as quietly, throws up a peace sign as well.

Their coaches are two members of LUXE, Cheri and Ella, and a contestant from the previous season, Jeon Wonwoo. “I know you might be stricken by us,” Ella flips her hair over her shoulder, “and we can take pictures later after we have a song and a dance.” The three of them introduce themselves before Wonwoo appears in his interview. “Team Royal are great! They’re all quite different, so they’ll be able to shine individually but also come together nicely as a team. I think we’ll see new sides of them, too!”

They’re all hard at practice when SUWOONG decides to say something. “Can I try this part, too?” The one he points out had been originally assigned to KYUNGSOO who looks up at his partner. To settle this, Cheri suggests they fight for it to see who’d win the desired part. KYUNGSOO stands up from when he was sitting and moves to the center of the room. “I would like to keep my part,” he says firmly. “I’ve proven that I can embody the dark, mysterious aura from my past performances and I won’t disappoint the audience with my voice.” SUWOONG seems to disagree. “Ah, but it’s a more enticing gaze. The part is short but powerful. It requires someone who has mystery over the subtleties in their expressions, so they can captivate the audience in just a second.” The original owner of the line does not step down. “Please allow me to demonstrate.” With that, he’s the first one to go, performing his part of only a few seconds. SUWOONG goes next, trying it for his own. After a short reunion, Ella is the one who announces the winner, and the line remains with KYUNGSOO. 

From then on, it appears their practice time only gets more complicated. No one seems to be quite getting their moves right, and it gets to the point of SUWOONG’s fan escaping from his hand and hitting HEEJIN on the back of the head. The girl looks back or, well, stares at the boy behind her before shaking her head. “It’s fine, let’s just keep going.” The girl says. “We had a lot of ups and downs during the week, so at first I wasn’t really sure how well we’d be able to practice,” HEEJIN comments during her interview. “Everything, generally speaking, was alright.” She squints at the camera before pointing a finger at it. “SUWOONG, you know what you did. You’re lucky all I did was a glare.” Her glare, however, turns into a grin once she’s done.

The tension does continue. “Are you taking this seriously, Kyungie?” SUWOONG asks KYUNGSOO in the middle of another practice. The other doesn’t hold back anymore. “I’ve been here since 5am every weekend morning and am always one of the last to leave. Just because I am not yet as good as you doesn’t mean I am not trying!” The boy throws his fan onto the ground and the room turns silent. “You tell me if I am taking this seriously or not. Let’s have a break, please.” He says before walking out of the room. It’s another time when HYOJIN suggests they all sit down and discuss their feelings. YOUNGJAE decides to speak up. “We had to make the choreography simpler because of you and Taeyang hyung didn’t get to shine properly as a dancer.” A quick flashback shows both HYOJIN and YOUNGJAE standing together on stage alongside TAEYANG, the latter being eliminated. “Is that gonna happen again?” HYOJIN replies to him. “Truthfully, it’s been hard keeping it to myself all these days. I didn’t know what to say to make it better, or how to properly apologize and decrease the tension. I had a hard time looking any of you in the eyes, because I spent all of my time when I wasn’t practicing wondering, should Taeyang hyung be here in my place instead? Do I really deserve this?” He licks his lips and tried to look up at YOUNGJAE. “I won’t be a burden this time, I promise.”

After their meeting is over, YOUNGJAE approaches HYOJIN separately. “I’m sorry for everything. It’s just… I really want this. I don’t wanna go home.” With moods getting settled, the image on the screen changes to that of the stage and the five contestants wearing their long, traditional robes.

They all carry serious expressions as the music starts to play and a thin layer of fog covers the stage. Along with the beat, they all open their fans in unison. The lights are dim, but they soon turn brighter when HYOJIN starts to sing. SUWOONG goes next, followed by HEEJIN, and then SUWOONG again. They had worked on modifying the choreography, while not by much, just enough that it wouldn’t be too hard for the vocalists to achieve. YOUNGJAE is in charge of the rap, standing out between the vocalists. KYUNGSOO gets to perform the lines he fought for before, and, with the tease of a smile, the stage becomes darker as they all dance together with their robes flowing. HYOJIN brings an end to the song, as he had started it.

“KYUNGSOO oppa,” HWANG YEJI appears to comment. “He’s started dancing did you see? I was impressed with him as well for finally stepping out of his comfort zone.”

With the end of all five performances, the audience leaves the set and the contestants take over the stage once again. They’re all alined with their own teammates, separated by company. It is now the time that’ll settle it. What’ll come next are the final eliminations and all that’ll be left is proving your worth to get the title of a winner.

To start things off, Tiger JK does the honors of starting the final announcements. “We watched all five of your performances with much attention. As said before, no matter which placing you end up with, all groups will lose one of their members. But these placings are still extremely important to you and I hope you realize that.” The man nods. “Next week will be the grand finale and teams will remain as they are after eliminations. This means you should reflect on your positions this week and figure out what you must better or keep for the next and final round.”

The CEO gives the contestants one more look before looking down. “We’ll start today with the group who finished in fifth place for this week.” He takes a long pause to build up tension before proceeding. “The one in last place today is… Nova Entertainment’s group, Polaris.” His eyes are now on them. “For a semi-finals performance, yours didn’t quite reach our expectations. While we understand that Nova is famous for dancing in particular, not all of you are dancers and you probably focused your song search too much on that. And that’s most of what you did, too. We were expecting some more than what you put out for us today. One of you will be going home today, and that person is… KIM SEUNGHUN. Congratulations on your journey up to here.”

With the first elimination out of the way, comes the next announcement. “The group who finished in fourth place today is… Sphere Entertainment’s group, Hollywood. We believed yours took a step away from what is normally thought of when people think of Sphere. It also felt like there was also some trouble accommodating to each of the members’ skills. Just as the group before, you didn’t give us much more than what already came with the song. One of you will be going home today, and that person is… CHWE HANSOL. We wish you good fortune on what you’ll try next.”

To move on, Tiger JK switched out for Baek Jiyoung, who continues with the next announcement. “The group who finished in third place today is… TRC Entertainment’s group, Antidote. Your performance did manage to show each of the members but it still felt a bit lacking. It wasn’t quite as hard-hitting as we would have expected. It was good that you put your own lyrics and choreography but the song continued on the same wavelength until the very end and there weren’t a lot of moments that people could point out after it was done. One of you will be going home today, and that person is… SHIN RYUJIN. We hope you continue working towards your dream.

The woman changes her stare between the two remaining groups, a slight smile on her lips. “Now we only have two groups left, and only one of you will be the winner of the day. I hope you’re feeling as nervous as you would if this were the finals. There is only a week between today and the real results, so you shouldn’t be taking this lightly.” She chuckles. “I’ll be announcing the first place of the semi-finals now. And that group is… Royal Entertainment’s group, Youth Over Flowers! You put on a wonderful performance. The setting was settled from the start, and we noticed you even simplified movements that’d be too hard for some of the members. It’s a thing to worry about with so many vocalists in the group, but you all did a great job. Sadly one of you must leave us today, as well. That person is… KIM HYOJIN. You’re the only one who’ll get to leave as a winner, so we hope you hold onto that and do even better in the future.”

“As for the second place, we have KT Entertainment’s group, Foh!cus. You managed to show different sides of KT, although they weren’t complete opposites, which would have run away from their concept. The transition between the two didn’t work as smoothly as we would have liked, but that’s about as much as we have to point out. You all did a great job as well and we can’t wait to see what you’ll get to show next time. However, you’ll also have to lose a member today, and that person is… ZHOU JIEQIONG. We also wish you the best of luck in the future.”

Five contestants less make them twenty, and the last number there’ll be. “All of you remaining here are officially our finalists of the fifth season of the Mnet Global Auditions. Next week, only four of you will be able to become the winners, and you’ll have to do that as a group. We expect to see the best that you can show.”

To see all the of this season’s contestants, click here!

And now, let’s see what’s in store for our seventh episode and grand finale!

With the last round of eliminations comes the grand finale! The groups will remain the same, except for the member they lost. All people involved should show at least two of their performance skills, one of them being dancing. This time around, contestants will have to prepare two performances. On the first, just like last week, they’ll have to portray the image of the company they were assigned under, and for the second, that of another company. For these, the judges sorted things randomly. All groups are told to come up with a name of their own. A list of the groups can be found below:

SPHERE ENTERTAINMENT — Coaches: Jinki, Jinwook, Go Hojung #5017 - KANG DANIEL #5033 - MIYAWAKI SAKURA #5035 - NAM JOOHYUK #5038 - PARK WOOJIN SECOND PERFORMANCE CONCEPT: TRC ENTERTAINMENT

NOVA ENTERTAINMENT — Coaches: Lee Sunmi, Son Seungwan, Lee Sungyeol #5004 - CHOI YEWON #5039 - SEO CHANGBIN #5045 - TAKADA KENTA #5046 - WANG JACKSON SECOND PERFORMANCE CONCEPT: KT ENTERTAINMENT

TRC ENTERTAINMENT — Coaches: Doyeon, Sana, Jung Jinsoul #5002 - CHOI MINHO #5011 - HWANG YEJI #5018 - KANG HYUNGGU #5028 - LEE CHAERYEONG SECOND PERFORMANCE CONCEPT: NOVA ENTERTAINMENT

KT ENTERTAINMENT — Coaches: Haseul, Minji, Lee Luda #5014 - JO YURI #5026 - SIA KIM #5030 - LEE NAKYUNG #5047 - WONG YUKHEI SECOND PERFORMANCE CONCEPT: ROYAL ENTERTAINMENT

ROYAL ENTERTAINMENT — Coaches: Cheri, Ella, Jeon Wonwoo #5007 - DO KYUNGSOO #5013 - JEON HEEJIN #5032 - LEE SUWOONG #5042 - SOHN YOUNGJAE SECOND PERFORMANCE CONCEPT: SPHERE ENTERTAINMENT

The public will know the groups will have a second performance, but not which second concept they were given.

By the end of the next episode, one group will be considered the winner of this season.

Just like the previous episode, the contestants will be recorded during their preparation time. The five companies prepared one of their practice rooms with cameras and will allow their group to practice inside with free use of the high-tech equipment available in it. On the first day of training on Friday, the 2nd, the coaches will visit their practice room to help the contestants decide on songs and give them some tips on not only their past experiences in the MGAs but also as performers. Additional meetings may be arranged if needed and if it doesn’t conflict with anyone’s schedules. The only coaches that won’t be attending are the Eclipse members who will be busy with preparations to go to Japan at this time.

All contestants are supposed to make their own way to the recording studio prepared specially for this episode. This time contestants will have to perform a stage in front of a live audience of 3000 people and also air for the world to watch on the 10th of August. This means that contestants will have more time to practice and there will be no pre-recording of the performances, so make sure to do well. To help with this, the episode will be hosted by the MC Hong Jinwoo, the same from the semi-finals. They’ll go to the same set from the previous episode. The bigger stage will allow for bigger props if needed, and these should be checked with the staff beforehand for them to prepare it. This has backup dancers included. The groups will get to prepare themselves backstage and, this time around will have to wait there while the other groups perform. A room with a TV is available for those who’d like to watch the groups performing.

Sitting between the stage and the public with their much more comfortable chairs are the CEOs of each big company. They’ll make sure only the most captivating contestants will receive the big prize to make this the best season yet and continue to represent their companies.

                          Tune in next Saturday, the 10th, for our final episode!

MGA Season 5 episode seven preview: The finalists have been decided and the final mission has been given. It’s all or nothing now. Will the contestants manage to give the public what they want? Will anyone show any hidden skills? Tune-up next week to find out!

[ All of the performances were aired in their entirety. Cuts from the show itself were uploaded to Mnets’s Official Youtube Channel. ]

If you made it this far, either if you were eliminated on this episode or not, you may add +3 POINTS IN A PERFORMANCE SKILL to your points tally. Make sure to link back to this post for verification.

Contestants have until midnight EST at the end of Friday, the 9th, to post their 200+ words solos about the final challenge in front of the CEOs. Please tag all related posts with #rkmga5 and #rkmga5finale. They’ll have less than four minutes to perform each of their chosen performance and prove their worth to make them the big winners (as long as it doesn’t break any laws). Good luck! Song choices should be submitted to the rkevent inbox. Two groups performing the same song will not be allowed and this will be chosen on a first come first serve basis. Any group chats made for plotting should include both Mod Bianca (luvseungjoon on twitter) and Mod Gab (jindeukii on twitter) for monitoring.

Since the final episode will be filmed live, there is no way for the contestants to record their interviews after the performances. Instead, they will be taken by surprise on Thursday, the 8th, to a separate practice room where they’ll record the very last interview of the season. The contestants will be asked a variety of questions and some may be included in the list found below! Feel free to come up with your own questions if you think they can be fitting.

This is the very last interview. How does that make you feel?

What did you think of the results last week?

How was it like working with your group?

How was it like working with the coaches?

How do you think you’ll do?

Are there any performances you’re looking forward to?

What was your own favorite performance this season?

What was your favorite performance of the season apart from your own?

Who do you think will win?

Once they’re done, they’ll be taken back to their usual practice room.

You may also write an extra 200+ words solo about your muse’s interview, as explained above, to also be posted until midnight EST at the end of Friday, the 2nd. For doing so, you may earn +2 CHARISMA OR CREATIVITY POINTS and these can be added to your points tally as soon as it is posted. Please tag all related posts with #rkmga5 and #rkmga5finale. Please link this post as verification.

COACHES! If you write one 200+ words solo about your muse’s time spent interacting with the contestants you may earn +3 CHARISMA OR CREATIVITY POINTS. You’ll also have until midnight EST at the end of Friday, the 9th, to post your solos. These can be added to your points tally as soon as it is posted. Please tag all related posts with #rkmga5 and #rkmga5finale. Please link this post as verification.

For an additional +2 CHARISMA OR CREATIVITY POINTS, you may also write an extra 200+ words solo about your muse’s interview. These would take place after or in between their time spent together on the 2nd. Coaches will be taken to a separate practice room where a mini-interview-set has been prepared for recording. Questions will mostly be about their thoughts on the contestants and how the performance preparations are going, as well as their expectations for final results. Please post this until midnight EST at the end of Friday, the 2nd, to collect points. These can be added to your points tally as soon as it is posted. Please tag all related posts with #rkmga5 and #rkmga5finale. Please link this post as verification.

If the coaches write their solos or not will not impact the results of the groups. More information about muses joining the live audience will come in a separate post.

[sweetnestor]

On Days Like This | Epilogue: The Second Gold Chip

teamiplier + oc, romantic/angst/platonic

PREVIOUS FICS (if you’re new here then I suggest reading these first)

previous chapter

In the end, separation was a good thing. Helena had told me and Ethan to spend some time apart, seeing as it could help ease the lingering tension. It was a thing married couples would do if they didn't want to divorce. It was pretty easy for Ethan and I to do so, seeing as we had spent two weeks crammed together on a bus with far too many people on top of the problems we were already facing. We needed time to ourselves, so straight after that therapy session, we went to our respective apartments.

The temporary separation included me staying in LA while Ethan went to Maine for his birthday. It was an order from Helena, which meant that I didn't have to tell Ethan that I couldn't go anyway. It was his 21st, which meant that he was planning on getting fucked up. Nope, I could not be around that. He was in LA for a few days, and then he flew off, taking an Uber to the airport instead of having me drop him off.

Aside from that, I was glad to be back in my own bed, in my own apartment. It was little blessings like this that made me glad I hadn't moved in with Ethan yet, even though we had briefly discussed it over the last few months. But despite the fact that I was savoring my solitude, the aftermath was starting to kick in tenfold.

I was waking up alone, eating alone, going to bed alone. I had nightmares that consisted of giving birth to a corpse and bleeding out on stage. Since returning home, I woke up most mornings by clutching the space next to me in my bed and remembering I couldn’t go to Ethan for comfort.

Mind you, I did mention in the team group chat that I was cutting off communication for the time being to recollect myself. No one seemed to mind. I wanted it that way, to recharge and spend some time with myself, yet the desire to drink was stronger than it had been on tour. I didn't have anything to keep me busy anymore, and my thoughts were racing at a dangerous pace. Being alone was getting dangerous.

Thankfully, I caught myself before I could relapse. I got out of bed and got myself ready for the day. By that I mean, I took the initiative to put on an extreme push up bra, a particularly low v-neck shirt, and a dark lip makeup look. Then I took a selfie, focusing on the cleavage, and sent it to Ethan over Snapchat.

I got a screenshot notification in response. Then, through text:

“I'M WITH MY FAMILY”

Not the first time I was told something like that. It did take my mind away from the deadly liquid for a moment. It was exciting, getting to tease him from the other side of the country. Hadn't felt that in a while.

But he wasn't here. I still felt like drowning in whatever hard liquor I could get my hands on. If I drove, then I couldn't drink. That's a good plan. I got in the car (after changing into a t-shirt) and drove to the first place I could think of.

Thankfully, Mark and Amy were at the office. They had been out and about lately with this new, totally-not-creepy white van Mark had bought. I was expecting them to be busy, already knee deep in a new video. They were discussing potential ideas until they heard my steps up the stairs.

They were quite surprised to see me. Chica, on the other hand, was excited, and I definitely needed to pet her for a bit.

“Hey, Bella,” Mark greeted. “Thought you were, uh, detoxing the human race?”

He wasn't wrong. That was how I worded my text. I had been keen on keeping that promise until I received my four month chip and the desire to ruin it all.

“I decided to cut the detox early,” I said, but then I decided to be honest. “I'm not feeling the best. I need to be busy.”

Both Mark and Amy looked concerned. They gestured for me to sit with them on the couch, so I did. Chica put her head on my lap, almost like she knew I needed comfort.

“Have you drank at all? Are you alright?” Amy asked me.

“I really feel like drinking,” I told them. “It's been bugging me since we got back, and even more now that Ethan's gone.”

“Okay, so you're here because…” Mark trailed off.

“I gotta be around people who can help me stay clean.”

Mark smiled and shared a look with Amy. I could tell he was touched by this statement. We had come a long way, now that I had willingly come to him and his girlfriend and opened up to them. I should be happy about that. I should appreciate having these people in my life.

“So how can we help you?” Amy asked as she placed her hand on my arm.

“I need distractions and other things to think about,” I replied.

“Perfect!” Mark exclaimed. “Wanna make a video with us?”

~

We drove out to a pumpkin patch on the outskirts of town. We were also joined by Mark's assistant, Evan, who would be wearing the camera harness and act as the viewer yet again. The purpose of today's video was to show who was not acting as the viewer, so we would eventually be joined by Tyler, and then we would find a way to squeeze in Kathryn and Ethan, who were both out of town.

Amy and I were under a little hut, waiting for Mark and Evan to arrive. We were giving off the impression that we just happened to be at this place, and to reveal that neither of us were behind the camera.

“Oh, hey!” Mark greeted when he, Evan, and Chica showed up.

“Hey, what are you guys doing here?” Amy asked, sounding pleasantly surprised.

“Is this your house?”

“Yeah, we live together now,” I said with a smug smile. Amy put her arm around me and pulled me into her side.

Honestly, I wasn't sure how the viewers felt about Amy and I being friends. Not that I should care, I mean. I'm sure it was bizarre to see Mark's ex-girlfriend and his current girlfriend interact nicely on camera.

“It's still really hot,” Mark said as if nothing happened. He looked around at the hut.

After some banter, we went off looking for pumpkins. Evan took the temperature of many pumpkins, Chica got distracted by some goats, and my makeup melted off under the sun. Amy and I stuck together and went our own way, while Mark and Evan went off somewhere else in the patch.

Eventually, Amy and I sat on a thing of hay in the shade. She was comfortable in her red baseball tee and shorts. Meanwhile, I was pretending not to die in my black tee, black leggings and black boots. I did not think any of this through. Then again, I hadn’t planned on going outside today.

“Have you talked to Ethan?” Amy asked me.

“Not since this morning,” I replied, sighing a little bit.

“Are things still… off?”

I shrugged. “I don't know. I just miss him.” I could have said much, much more, but Mark called for Amy.

“Be right back,” she said as she went over to the man with the pumps.

In the meantime, I checked my phone. Nothing from the birthday boy. My heart sank a little bit. Would it be bad to ask how he's doing? The separation wasn't exactly strict, we were allowed to text and such.

Anyway, I had to participate in the video. Mark picked out two small, matching pumpkins for me and Amy to carve later. He picked one for Tyler as well. Then, Mark and Evan went to the little petting zoo set up and hung out with some goats. Then, it was time to pick up Tyler.

Evan, Amy, and I all squished together in the back of the van so the tree man could sit in the front. I stayed busy on my phone to avoid the crippling nerves running through my veins. The rest of the group could banter without me.

“Oh, are you gonna be here for the charity livestream on Saturday?” Mark asked Tyler.

“I can guarantee that I'll be there for part of it,” he replied.

Mark then pointed at Amy. “You gonna be there?”

“Afternoon,” she said.

“You?” He pointed at Evan, who silently fist nodded. “And you, Bella?”

“I'm there,” I said, not looking up from my phone.

“Cool, it's gonna be on Saturday, around ten A.M.”

Finally, we parked somewhere and all piled into the back of the van. It was time to carve the pumpkins. I went over to the back doors of the van and plopped down next to Evan.

I was about to roll up my sleeves until I saw patches of makeup near my wrists. The heat and the fabric of my shirt must have rubbed my hard work away. My stomach sank a little bit. I had no choice but to settle with staying uncomfortably warm and making a mess on myself.

Carving a skull design into my pumpkin turned out to be therapeutic. It was like hitting a punching bag. At one point, tracing little details and intricate designs onto my skull was just calming. I forgot about my worries for a moment there.

“Look at her, she is stunning,” I said when we all presented our pumpkins.

“Where did that inspiration come from?” Mark asked me.

“Emotional turmoil.” I smiled, but quickly took it back. “Joking, joking. It's almost Día De Los Muertos, so I made this baby.”

Turns out, they all made silly, half-assed decorations on their pumpkins. Standard jack-o-lanterns. Mine was the only one with a serious, detailed design.

Mark and Tyler pretty much handled the rest of the video. They placed our pumpkins on top of the van, and then they FaceTimed Kathryn and Ethan to pick out the best one. Mine won.

After finishing the video, however, Tyler pulled me aside. Mark, Amy, and Evan were cleaning up the pumpkin scraps and the pretended not to overhear us.

“Emotional turmoil?” he repeated suspiciously.

I chuckled. “I can make jokes.”

He gave me a look, and then I cracked.

“I think I'm gonna fall off the wagon,” I admitted. “Once we're done here, I'm gonna go to a meeting.”

“Should someone go with you?”

Knee-jerk reaction: no, I'm fine. I can handle this. Don’t worry about me. Logical reaction:

“Yeah, if you don't mind.”

We went back to the office where I had left my car. Then, Tyler and I said goodbye to the others and went off.

Today's meeting was an open discussion, so Tyler was able to stay in the room while people shared their stories. I rarely participated unless it was a closed discussion. Sometimes just listening to other people's experiences helped my tense emotions.

Today though, I had things to share. I went up to the podium and faced the sizeable group of people. Maybe the fact that I had a friend in the crowd helped give me the courage I needed. I didn’t have Ethan here to help me, but I had a friend.

“At the beginning of this month, I had a miscarriage…”

~

“And so it seems I broke your heart My ignorance has struck again I failed to see it from the start And tore you open til the end”

I felt noticeably better when the meeting was over. I didn't feel as close to the edge as I did before, but Tyler was still going to spend the night at my place just to be safe. Now, I was watching back the cover I recorded.

“Sorry to my unknown lover Sorry that I can't believe That anybody ever really Starts to fall in love me”

“One last time,” Tyler said as he took the seat next to me on the couch, “are you sure you wanna make this whole thing public?”

I had spent the last hour working on this cover. I had been practicing this song for months, and now felt like the perfect time to post it. It was a sad song, “Sorry” by Halsey, and it resonated with me deeply when I first heard it. It was my breakup song for a breakup that I wasn’t even sure existed yet.

Let me just say that I had no intentions to end things with Ethan. I only had this song just in case. It was like a doomsday kit. I had a breakup playlist deep in my Spotify account, I saved many ice cream coupons, and I had friends I could rant to should doomsday actually hit.

But no one had to know that. I just wanted my cover out there without having to explain the details of my personal life.

Tyler had sat on the other side of the camera as I sang and played piano in the living room. My little performance almost reduced him to tears, which meant that this song’s intensity wasn't all in my head. Now that I had the whole thing recorded, I was in my laptop, getting ready to post it to my channel immediately.

“Oh, I'm more than sure,” I told him. “I've been wanting to do a cover of this song for months.”

“Someone will love you But someone isn't me”

Speaking of my unknown lover, I had been getting drunk texts from the birthday boy since I got home. He turns into quite the fuckboy after a few drinks. I wasn't really in the mood for whatever he wanted, so I just played dumb.

“Send nudes”

“lol you're so cute”

“Send me nudes!!”

“ur drunk bubby it's not right”

“If u don't send me nudes I'll die right now”

“well we can't have that now can we”

I had no other choice. I sent Ethan individual pictures of nude colored lipsticks. I would have sent my entire collection had I not been busy with my video, so i just screenshotted various products from the Sephora website and sent them over. Thankfully, Ethan took the joke.

“Shit I'm half mast… send more bby”

It took all my will not to laugh out loud right there. His exaggerated responses were cheering me up. The look on my face was easy to read though, according to my house guest.

“I take it Ethan's having fun?” Tyler asked.

“Oh yeah,” I said. “Kinda wish I was there with him, but I'm triggered enough as it is.”

“You feel weird when he gets drunk?”

“Yeah, but it's something I gotta get used to, I guess. I mean, I didn't mind looking after him when he got really tipsy after tour. But it did leave me feeling like… crappy because I want to drink but I can't.”

Tyler nodded, listening intently.

There was more I wanted to say, but I hesitated. “Ahh, I don't wanna be a whiny girlfriend.”

“Hey, it means you care,” he reassured.

Then it suddenly came out like word vomit. “He said he's in love with me…”

For a moment, Tyler didn't say anything. “That's good, isn't it?”

I shrugged and shifted in my seat. My phone buzzed again, but I didn't pay any attention to it. “The first time he said it, we were fighting, so I didn't think he meant it. Then, he said it again before he left for his birthday. And, well…” I sighed and spilled it all out, speaking quickly. “What if, while he's away from me, he realizes he's better off? What if he feels more like himself and more liberated because I'm not there to bring him down and hold him back? What if I'm here missing him, and he's over there, literally not even thinking about me? What if this is it for us?” I caught my breath after and nearly burst into tears.

Tyler placed a comforting hand on my shoulder. “If he says he's in love with you… and he's texting you right now… I think it's a good sign. You know he never replies to anybody’s texts, and you’re his first serious relationship.”

“People say things they don’t mean all the time,” I retorted. “People always say things and then realize they don't actually mean it. Mark said it, and look what happened!”

“Oh, I get it now. I understand that that stuff stays with you, but you can't let your past affect your present. Things are different now. And you definitely don't hold Ethan back. If anything, you've made him better.”

Hard to believe. I'm a toxic person. It's only a matter of time before he and everyone else realizes. That impending doom made me want to cry more, so I changed the subject.

“I have something for you.”

“What? Me?”

Silently, I took the black case off my phone, taking out the two coins I kept inside, one red and the other gold. I took the gold one and held it up.

“Four months,” I began. “I've been giving my chips to people who have helped me stay clean. I have my first one, Ethan has the second one, Mark has the third. I was debating between you and Kathryn for this one, but Kathryn’s outta town so…”

“So I win by default?” Tyler said with a chuckle.

My phone buzzed several times in a row. Ethan was probably off his rocker. I ignored it for now.

“Well, you were there for me to lean on,” I said. “You helped me keep my sanity during tour, and even now.”

Tyler was all too humble. “You need to give yourself some credit too, Bells. You made all the choices necessary to stay sober.”

“Yeah, but I couldn't do it alone.”

That's what made him accept the coin. “Thank you. I'm honored.”

~

Ethan was back in LA only two days after his birthday. He took an Uber home. It made me anxious. Maybe he didn't want to see me. Maybe there was nothing left to say, and it was over now.

I wanted to avoid my phone and stay attached to it at the same time. If he texted me, I wanted to know, but if he was going to ignore me then I didn't want to know. Instead, I tried to focus on the feedback from my “Sorry” cover. As expected, people were wondering who hurt me so bad that I had to sing a sad song. So I went to Twitter.

@bellasanti: I know it sounds strange but sad songs are my favorite ones to sing. I've been singing emotional songs on my channel for years. It doesn't necessarily have to reflect what's going on in my personal life lmao

@bellasanti: those of y'all making assumptions and trying to figure out why I posted such an intense song, here's why: I felt like it. ty ily 😙

Ethan silently liked those tweets. Usually, he would respond with kind words of support. Or maybe I was just overthinking. Surely he was mad at me, right?

A few minutes after those tweets were posted, he texted me. My heart pounded and my mind started racing.

“Come over D:”

Is this where it ends? Could I prolong this ending?

I managed to get ready without having a nervous breakdown. By that, I mean I put on pants, grabbed my keys, and left the apartment. The drive to Ethan's place was short, which didn't give me enough time to panic. I tried to soothe myself as I walked up the steps to his front door, but it only made me want to cry.

It was stupid to knock because I had a key to his apartment. I realized that after I knocked, so I started to fumble with my keys to unlock the door, but Ethan beat me to it. Somehow, the door swinging open still made me jump.

He smiled brightly and opened his arms, wanting me to hug him. It was almost natural for me to accept the gesture. I couldn't help it. He hugged me tight and held me for a little bit, which was a little surprising. Then he kissed me, which was even more surprising. Was he not going to dump me?

“I missed you,” he said as he pulled me into his apartment.

I chuckled nervously, not knowing how to respond to that. “I'm sure you were too busy having fun to miss me.”

“No, I'm serious,” he told me. “Everyone asked for you. I didn't tell them about your sobriety, so I said you were sick. I did have fun, but I still missed you a lot.”

My heart jumped a little bit. I was starting to think that maybe I read too far into the situation.

“I missed you too,” I said softly. Tears welled up in my eyes before I could stop them.

“Aww, don't cry!” Ethan said quickly. He placed his hands on my upper arms. “Uh, here! Let's dance!” He awkwardly rocked us from side to side and hummed a random tune.

It helped a little bit. I sniffed and wiped away my mascara. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…” And I spilled out the thought vomit I told Tyler the other night, except with more tears and less eye contact.

Ethan hugged me again once I really broke down. “You don't hold me back,” he mumbled. Then he leaned back and made me look at him. “Hey, it's okay. I'm not going anywhere. And I wouldn’t be better off without you, I need you. I feel… more like myself when I'm with you. You're the only girl I've dated that really understands what I do. And you understand me as a person. I can't put it into words the way I want to…” He paused for a moment. “And I’m sorry for how hard things have been with us lately… But I think spending time apart helped because I really did miss you and I really am in love with you…”

That was the third time he said it. The nerves and fear showed on my face.

“I'm in love with you.” Four times. “Brutal honesty.” Oh my god.

And suddenly a goofy grin was growing on my face. He wasn't lying, after all.

“I love you,” I said. I would need time to say the advanced version.

______

the end??? i think???? im still writing a fuck ton of one shots????? thanks for reading??????? holy fuck?????

[aligalloo]

“Babe”

Pairing: Dan Howell x reader (sorta) Word count: 1,307 Warnings: Swears I guess Requested: Noo, but I was watching Louise’s new video and Dan says babe in it.  I thought it was really cute and this sort of emerged from it?  Idk Requests: Open (Sidemen, Dan and/or Phil, Buttercream Boys etc.)

“Babe,” Dan calls from the kitchen, “Can you come here for a second?”

“What do you want?” I shout grumpily from my spot on the bed, “I’m comfy and you woke me up.”

“Pleeeease,” he whines, although I can hear in his voice that he’s smirking to himself.

“Fine.” I grumble my way off the bed and wander into the kitchen.

“Surprise!” Dan yells, jumping out from behind the counter.

“Jesus Christ, you dick,” I yelp, jumping backwards and nearly smashing into the glass door.

“I made cookies,” he says proudly, holding out the plate to me, “And I wanted to see my best friend.”

“Oh my god, are they burnt? Are they edible?” I ask incredulously.

“Why don’t you try one and see?” He pouts and holds one out to me.

I open my mouth and gesture for him to feed the cookie to me.  My eyes open wide as I realise, “You made pumpkin spice pumpkin coo–  Where’s Phil?” I look around suspiciously, just as Phil jumps around the corner into the kitchen wearing the creepy mask the boys always whack out at Halloween.

“You were going to scare the crap out of me weren’t you?” I ask, looking from one to the other. “I’m going to go back to sleep, call me when you decide to be mature, responsible adults,” I grin at them and head back towards Dan’s bedroom.  

“No, please stay Y/N,” Phil begs, grabbing my hand as I walk out the room.  “We’re sorry for trying to scare you, we just wanted to see you.  All you ever do when you come over here nowadays is go to Dan’s room and sleep.”

I sigh, and walk back into the kitchen. “Yeah, sorry about that, guys.  I know that you miss me.  I’m just swamped with uni at the moment and all I want to do is sleep.”

Dan walks over and wraps me up in a hug.  “Sorry to hear that, Y/N.  Can we do anything to help?”

I close my eyes and breathe deeply, drawing strength from him to look up and answer his question. “Not unless you can make more hours in the day for me to practice and write my papers.”

“Yeah, sorry, no can do.” He replies, looking at me tenderly.  

Phil clears his throat behind us, “Wanna play Mario Cart?  It might take your mind off everything for a bit.”

I turn around, still touching Dan but not in his arms any more. “Yes please!  I haven’t played in forever.”

We play Mario Cart for a bit and when the boys get up to grab food, I reflect on my life as it stands.  Here I am, best friends with the famous Dan and Phil, sitting in their London apartment, the envy of millions of fans around the world.  I am studying music performance at university and so don’t have much time to see them any more, but when I do, it’s like nothing has changed.  We go back to our old banter and the comfort I feel around them never fades with time.  

They come back and I’m jolted out of my thoughts as Dan hands me a glass of Ribena and Phil puts popcorn down on the coffee table.  “Can we watch a movie?” I ask them, “I’m too tired for more Mario tonight.”

“Yeah, ok.” They reply in unison.  “What about a horror movie since its nearly Halloween?” Dan suggests with a grin, as he knows how much I hate horror movies.

“Do we have to?” I groan, looking up at him.  

“Yes!” Phil replies, winking at Dan over my head. “It’s two against one, Y/N, you’re outvoted.”

“Fine,” I grumble, but secretly I don’t mind, because as long as I have my boys on either side, nothing can hurt me.

Phil hops up and puts on Scream while I draw a blanket over myself and get comfortable.  We watch the movie, and I’m suitably scared at all the right places.  Soon enough though, I can feel my head start to nod, and I rest it on Dan’s shoulder, “just for a second,” I mumble, as I fall asleep.  

A few minutes later I hear Dan and Phil whispering, through my half-awake state.  The next thing I know, Dan hoists me in his arms and carries me through to him bedroom, where he lays me gently on the bed.  He pulls the covers over me and tucks me in, before leaning over to kiss my forehead.

“Goodnight Y/N,” he whispers as he backs away slowly.  

“G’night,” I slur slowly before giving in and letting sleep overtake me.

A couple of hours later, I wake up slightly as Dan gets into the bed beside me.  I move so that I’m half on top of him, with my head on his chest, and his arms wrapped around me.  He sighs and relaxes, pulling me closer.  This is the last thing I remember before I slip into a deep sleep.  

-The next morning-

I wake up to sun streaming through the curtains and no Dan in sight.  I groan and pull the covers over my head, before bolting upright. “Shit!” I exclaim, “I’m late!”

“Hey, it’s ok,” Dan says, popping his head through the doorway, “It’s Saturday, go back to sleep.”

I flop back down on the bed. “Cuddles?” I ask innocently.

“Ahh I’m already up Y/N,” Dan replies, but one look at the puppy dog eyes I’m giving him convinces him and he comes back over to the bed, hopping in beside me and drawing me closer to him once more.  

I sigh happily and drift back off to sleep, not waking up until I hear Phil calling our names.

“Dan! Y/N! I’m bored, can we do something?”

“Ughh I’m so tired,” I groan, burrowing deeper into a still sleeping Dan’s neck.

Phil comes over and tears the covers off us.  “Come on!  It’s 1 o’clock already, the day’s almost over.”

“Alright,” I reply, getting out of bed and grabbing my things to go and have a shower. “What do you want to do?”

“How about some Pokemon hunting?” Dan, who’s apparently awake now, suggests sleepily.

“Ok,” Phil and I both agree, before I head into the bathroom to have a shower.

We leave the house within an hour and catch the tube into central London, as that is where all the good Pokemon are normally.  We wander around for a bit, and in the meantime meet some of Dan and Phil’s viewers.

“Hey, can I get a picture with you guys?” A teenage girl asks.

“Yeah of course!” Dan replies, “Y/N, can you take it?”

“Yep, give me your phone,” I smile, and the girl hands me her phone.

I take a few pictures of them and go to hand the girl her phone back.  “Actually,” she says tentatively, “Can I have a picture with you too?”

“Uh, yeah?” I say tentatively, looking at Dan and Phil, who smile encouragingly.

“I’ll take it,” Phil says, stepping up to me and taking the girl’s phone from me.

I go over and stand beside her, and Phil snaps a couple of photos of us.  We chat for a few more minutes before waving goodbye and heading off to search for Pokemon again.

- A few hours later -

“Well, that was successful!” Dan says, as we arrive back at the house.  

“Yeah it was,” I reply, hugging them both, “I should really get home and do some work now.”

“Aww but we’ll miss you,” Phil says mournfully, giving me an extra squeeze.

“Come and visit us soon, yeah?” Dan says, kissing my forehead before letting me go.

“Yeah, I’ll try and come sooner next time - just gotta get my shit together first,” I sigh, and wave at them as I walk out the door to head home.

“See you soon!”

A/N: Does anybody want more of this?  I can keep going... I’m sure it can take me lots of fantastical places lol.  Let me know if you want more, and what direction to take it in.  

Also, set in the old house bc we don’t know enough about the new one for me to be accurate.  

[starryeyed-char]

On Camera

Or that one time Lance decided to live-stream when he really should’ve been resting. The (established) klance YouTuber AU that no one asked for, but you’re all getting. Domestic klance sharing an apartment is my jam, and throwing a little angst in there is a bonus.

I’m actually really happy with this, and if people like it I might do an actual long AU thing with this setting, so feedback is appreciated! For now though, just a one-shot. This is also proof that the best writing for me happens at 3 AM… oops. I hope you enjoy!!

Psst @taylor-tut this is that thing I not-so-discreetly mentioned in my tags, have a wonderful day.

Lance McClain was a rulebreaker in every way, except for one thing. He believed it was always necessary to have a routine, and never stray from it. If asked, he’d inform you that a steady routine was the foundation for a steady life.

Showering every morning, brushing his teeth every night, thinking of a cheesy one-liner for Keith each day without fail, the list went on. Little things.

One of his many routines was to live-stream, always on Sundays. Because who did anything besides sit at home, definitely not with a hangover, on Sunday?

New videos went up on Wednesdays, but the carefully edited ones on YouTube and his live-streams were very different. Many fans even preferred seeing him live, mainly because he couldn’t stop himself from making bad jokes, and was usually too lazy to straighten his bedhead.

And they would always ask him to go bother Keith in the next room, which Lance more often than not was obliged to do.

So when he woke up late one Sunday with a killer headache and a stuffy nose, Lance wasn’t about to let it get in the way of his routine.

He discovered a note from Keith on the kitchen table that said he’d be out running errands, and Lance lamented that he hadn’t been awake to tell Keith to get soup. After shooting him a quick text, the only response Lance got was “You don’t even like soup.”

Lance chuckled softly, which quickly led to a series of wet coughs. Clearing his throat, he began to set up his camera, wrapped himself up in blankets, and started the stream.

“Hey guys,” he said with a small wave, and winced at how raspy his voice sounded. He sniffled, and edged the off-screen box of tissues closer to him.

The chat was quickly flooded with “HELLO”’s and “LANCE!”’s. By now, all the fans knew when he went live. Lance was, however, surprised to see several inquiries about his health.

There were quite a few “Are you okay”’s, and even some “You seem sick”’s, with one of Lance’s personal favorites being “You look like shit.”

He read off the last comment with a short laugh. “Thanks, KeiththeKutie05.” Then, as an afterthought, he added, “Nice name.”

After a short pause of him continuing to scan the chat, he spoke again. “I’m fine though, just got a cold or something. Nothing could stop me from live-streaming!”

As the viewers seemed satisfied with this response, Lance wasn’t surprised to see the usual repetition of “Where’s Keith?” in the chat. He sighed.

“Mullet Boy is running errands,” Lance told them, rolling his eyes for effect. “Probably going out to buy a new pair of fingerless gloves.”

Keith and Lance had been sharing an apartment for some time now, and the Internet was very invested in their relationship, or so it seemed. Keith was annoyed by the whole thing at first, but Lance found it entertaining that his fans seemed to like Keith better than him. Lance could, admittedly, relate.

Eventually, the accidental publicity that came with dating a YouTuber inspired Lance to make a collab channel for them, though Keith never got his own. He insisted that he was too awkward to film anything by himself, which Lance secretly found adorable.

Numerous people began telling Lance to prank Keith when he came back, to which Lance grinned. Playing tricks on Keith during live-streams had become somewhat of a tradition in and of itself. “Maybe I will,” Lance tapped his chin thoughtfully. “You guys got any ideas?”

Lance read through some of the responses but saw nothing particularly appealing, then perked up at someone asking when he’d do a video with Hunk again.

“Actually, I got some good news for you guys,” Lance declared, sneezing into his elbow before continuing. “Hunk and I are going to be playing videogames on Pidge’s channel sometime next week, and Hunk has both of us coming over to his and Shay’s for a baking video. I haven’t decided what we should do for my part yet. Maybe a Q & A?”

Once again, Lance’s eyes scanned through the suggestions until his eyes snagged on one he liked. “Cards Against Humanity, huh? With YouTube’s shitty new rules it could get demonetized, but I do love that game, so why not? I’m positive Pidge owns it, and I can tell them to bring it over. Maybe I can even convince Keith to play with us.”

Lance couldn’t help but smile at the enthusiastic response that got.

“I think I’m going to get myself some more coffee,” Lance decided, looking down at the empty mug resting on a coaster. “Last night Keith made me watch this really scary movie, so I naturally had trouble falling asleep. Gotta have coffee to keep myself functioning. Do you guys prefer coffee or tea? Keith and I are both coffee people, but he likes his black. No sugar or anything, disgusting if you ask me.”

Lance almost regretted this comment as a war of opinions on black coffee slowly took over his computer screen.

“Well, anyway, I’m gonna go to the kitchen real quick. I’d bring my laptop but… I’d probably spill coffee on it, and we can’t have that.”

Lance stood, and was about to start towards the next room when his vision abruptly blurred and refocused. He knew immediately something was wrong.

His legs felt like jelly, and the room seemed to spin as he took a single step forward. Had he only been fine when he was sitting? Lance had half the mind to sit right back down, but his brain was growing muddled, and direction simply didn’t make sense.

Lance’s migraine flared abruptly in intensity, and then suddenly the wood floor was rushing up to meet him. Everything went dark.

Keith glanced at his phone as he moved around to the back of the car, where he’d stored the groceries, and had to repress a fond smile at the Twitter notification on the screen. Lance was, apparently, live-streaming. Keith thought he might actually miss his time-slot for once, but he figured by now he should be used to the Cuban boy’s dedication to routine.

Lance’s channel got some negative feedback from more ‘sophisticated’ YouTubers for being… all over the place. A dedicated beauty guru, or PrinceLotor as his channel was called, had dragged Lance on Twitter on more than one occasion.

Lance was anything but consistent when it came to videos. He did whatever he felt like doing that week, and the fans loved it. Sometimes he played songs on his guitar, sometimes he did prank-calls. He would film Q&A’s, or tell stories about all the interesting stuff that happened in his life— Lance’s bad luck was rather famous. He recommended TV shows, did hauls of what he got for holidays, vlogged on occasion when he went to stores, you name it.

But Lance’s favorite thing to do were collabs.

Hunk, an incredibly smart engineer, had a baking channel as a hobby, and Lance was his favorite assistant.

Pidge was a newer gaming channel, but their obsession with theorizing about the game’s lore while playing and busting other fan theories made them grow in popularity quickly. For two player games, Lance was ideal.

Allura was an extremely popular beauty channel, and Lance let her give him makeovers whenever she wanted to. Shiro could use extra actors in his short films.

And Keith… well, the two of them had a channel together that had no pattern whatsoever, much to Lance’s dislike. Absolutely spontaneous and random, usually doing things by popular fan request, like dancing or karaoke. And uploads were by no means regular.

Keith was surprised at how much he had started to enjoy it. Lance had been telling him he should start an art channel, with animations and speedpaints and the like, and Keith wasn’t… that opposed to the idea. It could be a useful source of income, to help with all the debt he would come into after graduating college. But he’d never tell Lance.

Without thinking too much of it, Keith swiped right across his screen, taking him to Lance’s tweet about the live-stream in order to like it. He was about to close his phone again and begin taking groceries up to their apartment when his eyes snagged on something odd.

Lots of the replies to Lance’s tweet mentioned him, particularly the recent ones, even tagging him in it. Keith couldn’t fathom why they would be talking about him if he wasn’t on the stream, unless Lance was complaining about him live again.

Keith bristled. Lance better not be still annoyed at him for the movie the last night. Signs wasn’t scary at all, and not even a real horror movie! Lance simply stated that 'he didn’t mess with aliens.’

But when he looked at all the mentions, Keith felt his irritation give way to confusion, and then panic.

“KEITH GET TO UR APARTMENT”, “YOU BETTER GO CHECK ON LANCE”, “HOLY SHIT HES COLLAPSED KEITH HURRY YA ASS UP”, and the one that really sent Keith reeling “UH GUYS IS IT JUST ME OR DID WE WITNESS LANCE’S DEATH ON CAMERA?”

Keith slammed the trunk, all groceries forgotten as he sprinted into the apartment building and ran for the stairs. They only lived on the third floor, and he was not about to wait for the slow, crowded elevator.

He fumbled to fit his key in the lock and opened the door to the living room, only to spot the live-streaming set up, with no Lance. Keith rushed forward, but drew up short when he realized that Lance was in fact passed out on the floor in front of the couch.

“Oh my god— Lance!” Keith sank down beside him, turning his boyfriend over. “Lance, are you okay? Can you hear me?”

Lance’s eyes opened slowly, and Keith felt relief flood his system, despite the uncharacteristically pale skin. “K-Keith? Wha… I thought you were shopping?”

“I’m back,” Keith answered shortly, wincing as he pressed a hand onto Lance’s forehead. “Jeez, you’re on fire. Why didn’t you tell me you were this sick?!”

“Are you a fire?” Lance mumbled under his breath, and Keith furrowed his brows in confusion.

“What? No, Lance, I was saying you have a fever.”

“Because you’re hot and I want s'more,” Lance continued, as if he hadn’t heard him at all. Keith was suddenly painfully aware that the live-stream was still going, and that his face was even more flushed than Lance’s, and not because of a fever.

Keith glanced at the computer sitting on the coffee table briefly, noting that most of the chat was full of random keyboard smashing. He smiled apologetically. “At least he’s conscious,” he shrugged, hoisting Lance up off the floor and propping one of his arm’s around Keith’s shoulder. “I’m going to take this idiot to the hospital, he’s way too hot.”

“So you finally admitted it,” Lance’s voice was barely audible, and Keith glanced back down to see him grinning up at Keith tiredly.

“I meant your temperature, dumbass. Next time, tell me when you’re not feeling well.”

And with that, he shut off the stream.

[thatwriterchickrachel]

Mysteries at Midnight - 55.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply

Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug

Relationships: Adrien Agreste/Marinette Dupain-Cheng; Alya Césaire/Nino Lahiffe; Chat Noir/Ladybug

Characters:

Chat Noir (Miraculous Ladybug)

Ladybug (Miraculous Ladybug)

Alya Césaire

Adrien Agreste

Marinette Dupain-Cheng

Nino Lahiffe

Plagg (Miraculous Ladybug)

Tikki (Miraculous Ladybug)

Madame Bustier (Miraculous Ladybug)

Chloé Bourgeouis (Miraculous Ladybug)

Nathaniel Kurtzberg (Miraculous Ladybug)

Lila Rossi (Miraculous Ladybug)

Additional Tags:

dance au

Ballroom dance

College

Grown up AU

Royalty AU

Language:English

Read on Ao3

Chapters 1-30 Chapter 31               Chapter 32 Chapter 33               Chapter 34 Chapter 35               Chapter 36 Chapter 37               Chapter 38 Chapter 39               Chapter 40 Chapter 41               Chapter 42 Chapter 43               Chapter 44 Chapter 45               Chapter 46 Chapter 47               Chapter 48 Chapter 49               Chapter 50 Chapter 51               Chapter 52 Chapter 53               Chapter 54

Chapter 55 - Fuel in the Fire

Summary: Things get tense in the semi-finals

Marinette felt her heart beat faster, she needed water, but Volpina was down the dressing hall, so she excused herself and hurried to the kiosk.

Of course Madame Bustier was telling her to be more like Odile. The black swan was seductive, captivating and cunning. Marinette tried not to think of the other connotations that she was sure Madame Bustier would not be implying, but they swam through her head anyway.

She was only asking her to charm the judges and the crowd, but every time she did she found herself closer to Chat Noir than she intended and after last night, she wasn’t sure she could keep it strictly professional.

The idea that she had to be Odile with Chat Noir when she was typically an Odette with Adrien was laughable to her and the addition of Adrien’s princely title – the irony was not lost on her. She would have laughed if she didn’t know they all died in the end.

She shook herself. She couldn’t let herself get caught up in some simple advice. Madame Bustier was telling her to step up her game, that was all. Why in such strange metaphors she had no idea, but it wasn’t the first time her instructor had provided cryptic words of encouragement.

The lights in the stage area shifted, colours changing from blues and greens to reds and yellows, the voice over the speaker announcing the first of the semifinal rounds were to begin. She finished her cup of water, refilling it for Chat Noir before making her way back, pausing until the line of dancers had trickled onto the floor.

She handed the cup to her partner without a word and watched carefully as the music picked up on the speakers and the dancers began to move. Any number of these could make it into the finals, they all spun with grace, their dresses twirling with their steps, their partners leading them across the space.

She tried to take mental notes but she could feel Chat’s presence behind her stiffen and she turned to see Volpina sneering behind them.

“Admiring the quality costumes along with the talent, I’m sure.”

“They’re nice, it’s unfortunate when someone goes for too many beads though,” Marinette replied, keeping her voice calm and her attention back on the dancers.

"She's right, it can look tacky and provide a hazard for other dancers," Chat added beside her, his attention also on the floor.

“Oh I’d be careful, little bug, about who you call tacky. At least my designer actually has talent and could create something that matched my personality – oh sorry, your designer did pretty well on that,” she added with a snooty laugh.

Mairnette felt Chat tense up beside her.

“You know it’s more about the quality of the craftsmanship,” she replied.

“You know what? I bet she was so embarrassed when her design got leaked that she tried to make a complete new one with no time to get it finished.”

“Volpina come on, drop it,” Dessinatuer’s voice was right behind them and Marinette’s neck hairs stood on end.

“Oh come on, it’s no secret you have a crush on Marinette, but I’m sure even you can see what a fail this dress is. It’s only redeeming quality is the dumb bow at the back, and that’s nearly hidden underneath that ridiculous tulle,” Volpina scowled, tugging at the bow causing it to come loose.

“Hey, hands off,” Marinette turned with a scowl of her own. “Marinette worked really hard to give me exactly what I asked for.”

“Oh so this trash is your choosing. That makes more sense.”

“Come on Ladybug,” Chat took her hand and lead her away. “I need to throw away my cup.”

She nodded but didn’t move until he pulled her away. Volpina was once again getting under her skin, she couldn’t go out in such a state.

“Let me fix it,” Chat said after a moment, his hands gently on her back and positioning her in front of him so he could re-tie her bow. “Are you okay?”

“She just… irritates me so much,” she frowned, crossing her arms in annoyance.

“Well, I like your dress design, it feels very much both like a Ladybug and you,” Chat smiled as he turned her to face him once he was done.

“Thanks Chat,” she sighed.

“Come on, we gotta go out there in a minute and start proving Alya’s viewers what we’re made of,” he rubbed her shoulders comfortingly, making sure to meet her eyes.

“And the judges,” Marinette added and he nodded.

“Sure, but let’s not focus on that. We dance better when we don’t stress, remember?” he asked, raising an eyebrow with his soft smile.

Marinette thought back, not to the night before, not even back to all their meet-ups or lessons, but to when he had lead her around in her living room. That was a feeling she wanted to channel, so she closed her eyes and took a deep breath, remembering how nice it was just to step with him in the small space, no expectations, no pressure.

When she opened her eyes, he could see she was calmer and she gently pecked him on the cheek.

“What would I do without you, Minou?” she asked with a smile.

“Can we never find out?” he asked, his voice almost dream-like and she giggled before the applause in the next room brought them back. “Are you ready?”

“As long as we’ve got each other’s backs,” she smiled.

“Always,” he grinned in return.

Together they made their way into the line, ignoring Volpina’s sneer and stink eye as they stepped in front of her. Marinette thought she caught a worried look on Dessinatuer’s face but she ignored it. She couldn’t focus on them, she had to focus on her and her partner.

Renée and Carlisle made their way back in, shooting them thumbs up and Marinette spared them a smile. They were the closest thing they had to allies on the floor.

When directed, they followed the dancers in front of them and took position in a corner, Volpina and Dessinatuer in the centre like before. When the music began, Marinette smiled, meeting her partner’s eyes rather than over his shoulder as they had been. He tried to keep his eyes over her shoulder, but while they weren’t travelling, he allowed himself the moment.

Both gave small reassuring smiles to each other as they performed their steps to the beat, Chat looking up with his genuine smile instead of the ones they had before and leading her out of the corner as a pair of dancers barreled towards them. Marinette caught a second couple out the corner of her eye and lightly tapped Chat on the shoulder. He stopped her, leading her to kick her heels up in a boleo before taking her in a different direction, avoiding the other dancers.

They stepped in time with the music, but whether the tempo or change in their attitudes were affecting their dancing specifically, they couldn’t tell. Marinette could feel the crowd start to slip away but she kept herself aware of the people closest to the floor space. It helped her anxiety though, her nerves melting with their steps, each kick of her heel or swing of her body flowing and starting to feel somewhat normal again.

Chat stopped her for a moment as she felt a dancer nearly knock into her; by the way Chat grabbed her waist a little tighter, she could only assume it was Volpina. As they stepped away, ignoring the intrusion Marinette began to feel her waist becoming a little looser. She could feel her heart begin to pound faster in her chest.

Sure, she had planned to reveal her second skirt in the finale, but she had been considering leaving it unless they needed something a little extra, something to guarantee points over Volpina. It looked like the fox was forcing her hand, she thought, clenching her jaw. She inhaled and fought to keep her face calm.

“Chat, spin me out in a sec,” she whispered and he looked at her for a moment but didn’t question it.

When they found a space, her did as he was told, spinning her out and Marinette gave a small tug to the rest of the ribbon behind her, letting the wrap around skirt flutter to the floor and slide neatly against the edge. There were a few gasps and a small applause as she spun back to her partner, her red skirt now on display. She gave him the smallest of nods and let him continue, her thoughts swirling, now unable to relax.

She had to keep composure, she reminded herself. They had to get to the finals.

Chat was practically vibrating with anger as he stepped back and leading her around, both of them passing Volpina and her partner, the two of them doing a double take as they saw what Marinette had underneath.

“Easy kitty,” she murmured as the song ended, her face close to his ear. She was going to have to keep calm for the both of them she thought as he stiffly stepped away from her. They gave the respectable bow and as they made their way off, she ducked to the slide and scooped up her skirt as if it was nothing.

~~~~~

Adrien was furious.

Volpina had tried to sabotage Ladybug, right after insulting Marinette’s hard work. Of course, he was sure Ladybug also had a small smug feeling of pride that Volpina’s attempt had failed.

A few of the other dancers gathered around them and gushed at how unique the dress was and how elegantly Ladybug had made the transition. Of course, most of the dancers on the side hadn’t missed who the saboteur was, but they explained that it wouldn’t matter to the judges; they didn’t seem to put conduct on the score card, Adrien learned bitterly.

He left Ladybug with the other dancers and stormed over to Volpina and her partner who it seemed was also chewing her out.

“Dammit, I never agreed to that! What were you thinking? You could have seriously ruined their chances.”

“Don’t forget whose side you’re on,” Volpina sneered at him.

“No, he’s got a point. What the hell were you thinking?” Chat interrupted and both dancers looked surprised, Volpina recovering quickly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. The handiwork was just such poor quality that it simply came apart on its own. Wardrobe malfunctions happen all the time where I’m from,” she spoke as if it meant nothing to her and it only infuriated Adrien more.

“If you think that you can get away with this, you-”

“And what are you going to do, exactly?” Volpina narrowed her eyes. “You’re hurling wild accusations at me when there is no evidence that I did anything other than dance with my partner. If you had been paying attention to the floor, we would never have collided,” she added, crossing her arms over her chest with an indignant look in her eyes.

Adrien was flustered for a moment, his mind going blank; what exactly could he do? He could tell the judges, he thought, but something about the look in Volpina’s eyes was getting to him. Would they be believed? Would it make a difference?

“Chat,” Ladybug’s voice cut through the fog in his mind as he saw her appear beside him. “Will you come with me for a minute?”

“Need to fix your wardrobe malfunction?” Volpina jeered.

“Malfunction? Did you miss the part where it was supposed to come undone?” Ladybug asked, her voice calm. “Of course, we were going to save it for if we thought we needed something extra, but that’s no matter. I’m sure your attempted sabotage will work in our favour,” Ladybug waved her hand dismissively at the other masked girl before gently tugging on him once again.

How was she being so calm about this? He wondered.

Volpina tried to retort but Ladybug simply talked over her, trying to keep his attention.

“The other dancers were impressed with how well we handled it all. I’m sure we impressed some of the judges. Come on, let’s go see what Alya thought of us stepping up our game,” she said, her face close to his cheek. She tugged on his hand a little more and he felt some of his rage subside.

He regained his composure, hoping that it wasn’t too obvious, and turned, offering his arm for his partner without a word. When she took it, he led her in to the hall to where their small entourage was waiting.

“Whoa, Marinette really planned for everything, didn’t she?” Alya was saying as the approached. “Look how good that looks on the replay,” she pointed to her phone screen.

They had performed the reveal near the corner with the camera and the view was unobstructed as Ladybug made her turn, the black fabric slipping away revealing the skirt underneath. It looked elegant and planned, but as Alya rewound to their paths crossing with Volpina and Dessinatuer, Adrien saw the fox girl’s fingers hook into the bow as she pulled away, loosening it.

“That was definitely intentional,” Nino muttered.

“Oh Ladybug, how are you feeling?” Marinette’s parents asked, their faces troubled. “You must be so upset.”

“Actually, I’m okay,” Ladybug replied, her voice still calm. Adrien looked at her, but she was looking at Marinette’s parents with a reassuring smile. “Marinette thought ahead,” she added, gesturing to the fact that there was still a red ribbon around her waist, but it was sewn into the real dress.

“You guys really did make it seem natural,” Nino said, looking up from the phone.

“Well, Alya? Did we step up our game?” Ladybug asked, turning her attention to the journalist with a slight hint of satisfaction in her tone.

“I-I mean, yeah. Where was this hiding?” Alya stuttered, re-watching the replay on her phone.

“It was for the finale,” Ladybug explained, “in case we needed a ‘wow factor’.”

Adrien watched his partner as she talked, she seemed as calm and confident as ever, but as he took her in he noticed she was twisting her hands in the skirt she had picked up, her fingers white as the ribbon was twisted painfully tight around them.

She was keeping calm for them, he realized too late. She had to think on her feet in the middle of a routine, she hadn’t had time to take in what happened like he had, and he had immediately revealed his feelings. No wonder she was so calm, she was staying calm for him. If they both lost their composure they would appear unprofessional and Volpina’s intimidation would have worked.

He played right into her hands.

Adrien felt guilt flood through him, the anger he had burning inside him now feeling like a thick sludge of shame. She had his back, making sure he kept his cool, ensuring they didn’t get kicked out; and here he was, practically oblivious to her feelings.

“I see you got my message,” Madame Bustier was saying to Ladybug.

“O-oh, yeah. I just… It’s very intense out there.”

“Which is why I said it. Remember the note I wrote for you, that still applies in the competition. You too, Chat Noir,” she added, looking at him. He nodded to the instructor without a word.

What could he say?

“Ladybug, honey, can we get you a cup of tea? You seem like you could use a moment,” Madame Cheng asked, already standing with her purse. Ladybug couldn’t seem to find the words to refuse as she was swept away and Adrien felt himself sag into the nearest seat.

“How are you doing?” Marinette’s father asked him, placing a large hand on his shoulder. As intimidating as it was, it gave Adrien a strange sense of comfort.

“I feel terrible. I’m supposed to have her back, but I just got so mad at what they did. I didn’t think about how Ladybug was feeling, not really.”

“She’ll be okay,” Madame Bustier nodded. “She’s stronger than you think. She’ll bounce back quickly.”

“Yeah, a cup of tea with Sabine and she’ll be right as rain,” Tom smiled warmly.

“Okay, so Chat, what are we gonna do about this?”

“What?” Adrien turned his attention to Alya who had leaned closer to him, her phone screen lighting up under her face casting shadows that left her looking almost… maniacal.

“We need to strike back! The best time to do it is when the judges are announcing their choices for finals, she won’t expect it.”

“Alya, we aren’t going to ‘strike back’,” he sighed. If she had proposed that to him alone, a couple of minutes ago, he would have agreed. But he needed to think rationally now, he couldn’t let Ladybug shoulder this on her own.

“We just have to do our best in the finale.”

“You’re serious?” Alya said after a moment of watching him as if waiting for a punchline. Her expression fell into one of disbelief.

“We’re here to win, of course, but we aren’t here to play dirty like that. You know no-one would be able to accept our victory if we got it any other way,” he sighed. His head was incredibly clear, and it irritated him that it had taken so long.

“But she just… you aren’t the only dancers!” Alya sputtered but Adrien put up his hand to quieten her.

“Alya, please. We’ve got bigger concerns and you know it,” he said, looking at her carefully and hoping she would remember what was at stake for them.

“Fine, but I still think we should get back at them.”

“If it’s any consolation, I don’t think Dessinatuer had anything to do with it,” Adrien explained and Alya widened her eyes, giving a little nod for him to elaborate. “He and Ladybug had a discussion this morning, I don’t know. She took care of it and to be honest, he seems like he doesn’t even want to be here anymore.”

“He doesn’t,” Ladybug’s voice was quiet as she returned. Marinette’s mother had taken the skirt from her and sat back beside her husband whilst Ladybug sat on the arm of Adrien’s chair holding a cup of tea. “He doesn’t like the fact that Marinette cut him out. He wanted to redeem himself by throwing the competition.”

“You’re kidding?” Nino asked and Alya shook her head in disbelief with him.

“No. I told him he had no right to put us through what he has only to back out now.”

“Well you’re right,” Alya sighed shaking her head.

“Well, we better go,” Adrien said as he saw the dancers beginning to gather at the entrance to the hall. “It’s judgement day,” he said, flashing finger guns at his friends who just rolled their eyes and groaned.

“Couldn’t help yourself, huh?” Ladybug murmured as they left and he shook his head, a small smile on his face.

[siliconwebx]

Building an Online Community from the Ground Up

Unless you’re a natural social butterfly, building your own online community may sound a little daunting. However, if you plan correctly, you can set up a little section of the internet that you and yours can call home for years to come. In this post we’ll walk you though a few stages you’ll need to navigate in order to see your idea of a community become a reality.

Planning Stages

You cannot just jump head-first into building a community. Sometimes they just kind of organically emerge, but if you’re looking to start a purposeful group, you need a plan. Otherwise, things can get out of hand quickly. Not necessarily in a bad way — you might become the place to be and grow exponentially faster than you expected to. Whatever the case, approaching building your community purposefully is your best bet for success.

1. Why Do You Want to Build a Community?

To start off with, you need to know specifically why you’re building this community. It is very easy to get in over your head and let a project go sideways without a clear vision of why you’re doing it and where it’s going. So think on it, and ask yourself the hard question: how will this community benefit its members?

That’s a hard question to answer. Especially because there are a lot of communities out there already. The internet is a big place. Just look at Reddit with the massive amount of users and categories and subreddits that people participate in. So if you’re going to build a community from the ground up, what will it bring to the table?

As an example, when I started my first podcast, I talked with my partner a lot about this. What even made us start talking about the podcast to begin with was wanting a place to talk with people. We missed the old days of blogging where conversations happened in the comments sections instead of on social media. It didn’t feel as personal or as social to us.

We wanted to talk to people and make friends. It was as simple as that. We wanted to produce content that would bring people together and have a conversation.

So that was our why.

Determine Your ROI:

Just a quick note about running a community. Sometimes you might not make a profit on it. You may be spending money or time on building this up. It can be a lot of work, so you should ask yourself what return you want out of this. This return should be entirely separate from the community goals above.

You may want an increase in emails to blast mail in return for providing a space for folks to congregate. You may be looking to create a route for customer support and brand loyalty to increase. Your company might even be looking to use it as a recruitment tool, finding new talent from people passionate about your brand or project.

Basically, you want to make sure that you aren’t expending resources without getting anything in return. If taken seriously and done right, a community can be a lot of work, so you want to make sure that even if your motives are altruistic and for the good of your audience and users, there is still a return in some way for you.

2. Find a Concept (or Stay on Brand)

Once you know why you’re going to build your community, the next step is making sure you appeal to the right people. As one of my old bosses used to tell me, “you gotta find your schtick.” Basically, what I’m saying is that you need a brand identity. I really liked how this article from Brandisty put it: “Let me be clear: a brand is the relationship between an organization and an audience.”

With that in mind, I am not saying you need a logo or a 4-color palette for your media kit. I’m saying that you need to know what your community is going to represent to its members. At Elegant Themes, for instance, we work to represent style and empowerment for our users. We want people to see or hear the words Divi or Elegant Themes and think to themselves “Oh yeah, their stuff lets me do my job so much easier than before” or “Man, the photos in that latest layout pack are perfect for [Insert Big Client’s Name]’s site.”

Sure, we have beautiful logos and pretty colors, but those are secondary to what is really important: making your life better through excellent design.

Now, if you have a brand already (and you probably do), think about who your users are and what you want to be to them. What purpose will this community serve to them? For you, it will (hopefully) lead to increased revenue, higher brand awareness and reach, and improvements in your products or service. But what good does it do your users to be members?

As an example of that, with my podcast, my partner and I wanted the relationship between our listeners and our show to be that of a matchmaker. We wanted to facilitate people meeting new friends. So if they listened to our podcast, they would have ample opportunity to talk with like-minded people through our community that we worked on building. Same for Elegant Themes — we have a very active comments section here on the blog, a Meetup network of Divi Nation groups, and so on. We strive to make sure that you participating means you get some value that doesn’t come directly from the software itself.

That’s our brand. Now find yours.

3. Craft a Mission Statement

Yes, those dreaded words. Mission Statement. The only two words that can make a committee meeting even more dreadful. But you need one. It doesn’t have to be anything complex (it’s better if it’s not), but you need to get that concept behind your brand identity into writing. That’s all. Mission statements serve the purpose of giving you a cornerstone to look back on and make sure that you’re on track. And if not, you can easily course correct.

4. Where Will Your Community Gather?

Today, there are a ton of options to choose from, and depending on your type of brand or project, some may work better than others. There are really two things you have to keep in mind about this:

Do you want a completely free forum, or do you want to own and control your own platform?

Where does your audience already hang out?

The pros of going for a free forum is that most of the leg-work is done for you. Choosing an option like a Facebook Group is great because so many people already use it (so you show up where they already are), and you can get started in just a few clicks. It takes mere minutes to get Groups up and running on Facebook.

The cons of using an externally hosted platform is that you don’t have any control over it. Not really. You and your community are subject to their ToS and business model and lifespan and so on. However,

Controlling your own platform gives you freedom to do whatever you want, whenever you want, however you want. But it comes at the cost of being yet another account your users have to sign up for. With forums and various membership site plugins for WordPress, you can absolutely go this route. But if you make the process too much of a chore, your community may never get off the ground.

Some Platform Options:

I want to list some of the more popular platforms to grow an online community, and in many cases, creators and brands choose multiples to reach different segments of their audience. For example, some people may spend the majority of their time online with Discord open in the background, but never log into Facebook. Or some people might be hardcore Redditors and Twitter influencers, but avoid group chat platforms altogether.

Discord – A group chat that is aimed at gamers, but robust enough to work for a variety of community types. Very handy if your user base is already using it, as your server could just be added to their list.

Slack – A group chat that many companies use for work, so people very likely already have this one installed. Setting up your own Slack server is free, and communities here thrive during the day since people can participate while looking like they’re hard at work.

Reddit – The largest community on the internet. Basically one giant forum, anyone can set up a subreddit (subforum), which anyone can subscribe to and participate in.

Facebook Groups – You’re probably already a member of a few Facebook groups. These groups can easily go viral, have lots of admin options, and take advantage of a place your people are already likely to be.

Twitter hashtags – Twitter hashtags can also be a community. Often taking the form of a chat (such as #bibchat or #codenewbies), these tend to be regular, moderated discussions that eventually grow into a tag folks use all the time to keep everyone connected.

YouTube comments – Despite their reputation, if you foster a healthy discussion in the comments of your videos, you can build a very active and thriving community there. People’s channels will follow and interact with one another, share playlists, and just generally grow together.

Live streams – If you regularly live stream, you will get a cadre of viewers who tune in. Those people then fill up the chats as you go, talking with you and each other, and then those comments continue after the stream is over. This is generally not the primary location for your community, but it’s a fantastic way to get people to interact and hang out together.

Forums and Message Boards – While on the decline in popularity, forums and message boards are the old standby for internet communities. Totally asynchronous messaging threads are incredibly useful for long, detailed discussions. However, because they are generally entirely separate from other accounts and platforms, people have to make an effort to check the boards to see new updates. If you decide to go this route, there are plenty of WordPress plugins available including bbPress.

Social Media Pages and Profiles – Simply having a Facebook page or a Twitter profile that interacts with other users in and of itself. Look at the Wendy’s Twitter account. Or Zappos. They keep their social media managers interacting with customers constantly, and their responses stay on brand. So people get involved. Again, this won’t be the primary platform, but it can be very important.

5. Lay Down The Law

You have to write down whatever rules and guidelines you want your members to follow. Communities go downhill fast if you have no rules to govern them. Even if they’re as simple as “no self-promotion, hate speech, or personal attacks will be tolerated.”

As the community manager, it’s your job to determine the bounds within which the members stay. They can be as rigid or as lenient as you want, but the important thing is that they exist and are posted for people to see. Well, and that they’re enforced, but we’ll get to that next.

Action Stages

A lot of the planning for a community is academic. You’re thinking and envisioning and trying to make sure all your ducks are in a row. After that, you get to put you feet to the pavement (or maybe fingers to the keyboard) and start dealing with people.

1. Start It Up

Okay, so take steps 1-5 under the planning stages and do them. It’s time to implement your plan. It’s time to start that Facebook Group or launch that Discord server. Take everything that you’ve been thinking about and make it real. It doesn’t matter that your users aren’t aware of it yet. That’s okay. You want to lay claim to your spot.

If you have been planning it for a while, you might have even told them that you were working on this. So long before you start inviting people, plant your flag and get it to waving. The important thing is that no one gets an Under Construction page or a broken URL. Once you start pointing people at where you want them to be, you want them to stay there. So get the forums up and running. Set the permissions and channels in Discord. Upload your emoji to Slack.

Take your idea and make it real.

2. Soft Launch

A soft launch will be your best bet for introducing people to your community. And by soft launch, I mean, not promoting it to the world at large. Just let people organically trickle in. Maybe you invite a handful of people or casually drop a note about it in your podcast or at the end of an email. Maybe even a Join our Community button on your website. But not putting effort into telling people about it.

Why?

Because of bugs and snags and all the thousands of things that could go wrong. You want to be able to work out the kinks before bringing in a boatload of people. If the first impression that people get of your community is that it’s shoddy, you probably won’t get a second one.

Especially if there’s any kind of premium price tag attached. If that’s the case, give a few free memberships or trials to some people to try out and get things rolling. They’ll feel special, it’ll be a soft launch, and you’ll hopefully get some free advertisement for when you do launch officially.

3. Recruit Staff and Assign Roles

Now this is a kind of iffy stage, to be honest. Some people don’t need this step at this point. Everyone will eventually, though. You can handle going solo, trying to build an online community all on your own (I’m thinking of Saron from CodeNewbie, who did it all by her lonesome at first). Some of you already have a staff or group of volunteers. Heck, some of you already have an audience who are clamoring to be more involved with you.

But if you don’t, it’s time to grease some palms. Figuratively, and maybe even literally.

You won’t need much. Just a few people to make sure things run smoothly. You will want people to moderate discussion, generally, and make sure the rules you set up are followed. Even if you start out doing it all by your lonesome, there will be people stepping up to enforce them for you. Even without you asking. These are perfect recruits. Additionally, you can see the people who engage the most and care about the community’s growth and health and ask them if they want to be involved in a greater capacity.

In the end, it’s the caring about the community’s growth and health that matters.

4. Really Launch and Promote Your Tail Off

This is the big moment. Once most of the outstanding bugs are taken care of, you are ready to get this show on the road. You can shout it from the rooftops and let the entire world know that your doors are open and welcoming to anyone who wants to be a part of something special.

And this is where you have to do most of the work. Because you need to get people interested and invested and actually participating in your community. All of your marketing energy will likely be spent going toward your community for a while, and that’s okay. It’ll pay off. (Remember earlier when we talked about your ROI?)

It depends entirely on your project and brand on what channels you promote through, but in general, you want to go overboard. Just to the point where you don’t annoy people.

Running Facebook ads or AdWords campaigns is a popular way to recruit. If you are a community of artists, Instagram ads would be perfect. Send out an email to all your lists. Then a few days later, segment it to those who didn’t open it. Schedule a lot of Tweets and Facebook posts using Hootsuite or Buffer. CoSchedule is another good option.

For the initial launch period, you may want to do a combination of live streams and interact with your audience or customers that way. Promote those personally. Even do giveaways if it’s a premium community. And use Facebook events, even if you’re not on Facebook. It’s hard to believe how much Virtual Launch Parties can help a project’s reach. Or really any virtual event, for that matter.

Maintenance Stage

So you’ve launched. You’re up and running. You have people visiting your community every day, and everything is going even better than you expected. So what now? Well, you maintain it. You keep on doing what works, and maybe throwing some new ideas in the mix to keep things fresh for your customers and audience.

Basically, to maintain a community, you go through most of the steps you did to launch it, just to a lesser degree.

Periodically look at the mission statement and purpose of your community to evaluate whether you are on track with your goals.

Make sure your ROI is on track. Check if you’re putting in enough effort or too much into keeping things going.

Always monitor the users and keep an eye on MVPs. You can never have too many people in your corner. Harvest the talent there for everyone’s gains.

You should also monitor your monitors. Make sure the rules you laid out are still being followed and that the community is still what you meant for it to be.

Continue marketing. You don’t want to go all-out like you did to launch it. To build an online community requires people hearing about it. Maintaining one is about retention and interactivity. But you will still need to keep it in your marketing rotation so it doesn’t become stagnant or insular.

That’s All There Is To It.

And isn’t that enough? If you are going to build an online community, it takes time, effort, and a lot of planning. But when it’s done right, there is really no better element you can add to your brand or company.  Positive interaction with your target audience is more valuable than pretty much anything else these days, and there’s not really anything more positive than inviting them to your own space that you made especially for them.

What have your experiences been with building an online community? Let’s talk about it in the comments!

Article featured image by O.darka / shutterstock.com

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