#wanted to make him more wolf like but not full on

[caffeinewitchcraft]

The Hero and Hope 4/5

Okaaaay, so there's 5 parts instead of 4! I realized that the last part was over 6k words, so we're splitting it into two! The last part will still be posted next Friday, so this will keep us on track!

Summary: The picnic has an uninvited guest that you're uniquely suited to greet.

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(part 1) (part 2) (part 3)

“Didn’t think I’d see anyone able to catch Marie,” the Lord says, brows raised. His golden eyes track Isla across the garden and he whistles when she jumps to tag his former knight. “That was not within the capabilities of a Villager.”

Ivan scans the crowd around them. Most of the townsfolk are too far away to eavesdrop and the ones close enough to potentially hear are engaged in their own conversations. “Careful, Brennan. If the Director hears you speculate…”

“Yes, the Director,” Lord Brennan sighs. He brings his teacup to his lips, but doesn’t drink. He contemplates Director Sarah where she crouches with a glass of water near Annie. “You know this is the first time we’ve met?”

It’d been a fight to get Sarah to agree to today at all. Ivan chooses his words carefully. “Your predecessor did not have the sort of…kind interest you do.”

The former Lord’s interest Sarah shared with them was a lot more horrifying. There’s a reason that Isla at only fifteen years old is the eldest at the orphanage.

“That’s one way to put it,” Lord Brennan agrees. He settles back into his seat and sighs in satisfaction. He watches the children gradually grow tired of their game and drift towards the dessert table. He grins when the townsfolk naturally make room for them, a few of them even fetching treats from the center of the table for the littler ones. “See my people together? It was very good of me to lure you and Marie to my territory.”

“You gave us a castle,” Ivan says. They weren’t so much lured as bludgeoned with generosity. Some days it feels like they blinked and ended up standing amongst fine silk and filigree.

“It’s a manor as far as paperwork goes,” Lord Brennan says.

“It has buttresses.”

“A very fortified manor.” Lord Brennan finally sips his tea and sighs again. “This tea is from our fields, isn’t it?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“It’s delicious.” The full canopies of the trees enveloping the estate rustle in the wind. The sun shines warmly overhead. Lord Brennan takes another drink. Delicious. “The land’s come a long way since we ousted my father, hasn’t it? Plentiful harvests, an established trade route, a new school. If it weren’t for the demons, my work would be done.”

“I would prefer you had no work then,” Ivan says dryly.

“Me too.” Lord Brennan sets his tea aside and rubs his eyes. “Any updates?”

“None,” Ivan admits, frustration leaking through his words. His face is still amiable and the disconnect between his tone and his visage is jarring. “We investigated the wolf tracks in the woods and only found carnage. No signs of the demons themselves.”

“So they are demons?”

“Regular wolves wouldn’t be able to evade a squadron of your knights, my lord.”

“Neither would demon wolves,” Lord Brennan says. He rubs his chin, brow furrowing. “I don’t like what that implies. Any sign of larger foes?”

Ivan doesn’t want to discuss this here. Marie’s eyes are on him, sensing his rising distress. He smiles and waves to her. “Besides the horned rabbit migration?”

“Is it a migration?”

“Isla saw five within the first four weeks of summer,” Ivan says.

The Lord’s attention falls on the teenager. She’s patiently letting one of the other children – Hera? The one who’d curtsied to him like a little noble – weave flowers into her braid. He tries to imagine her fighting a horned rabbit and his lips thin. “I’ll call for reinforcements from the capital.”

“Marie and I can—”

Lord Brennan waves Ivan off. “No, no, I’ve asked too much of you already. Aren’t the two of you too busy in your retirement already? I thought you’d be settled with a child by now.”

“It’s not good to rush these things,” Ivan says as he has the last three times Lord Brennan has asked. This time it’s Ivan who sighs. “It took Marie and I a good few months to win Director Sarah over after our misstep.”

“Asking about Destinies, was it?”

“Implying we’d value any child less for not being a knight like us,” Ivan corrects.

“There seem to be a lot of unusual Destinies in the orphanage,” Lord Brennan says. He’s not an Identifier but he’s got a good eye. Though no one can know for sure until a child either develops their mark or comes into their power at fifteen, he’s seen more than a few signs of a Scholar, a Guardian, and a Teacher. Once again he finds his gaze being drawn back to Isla. She’s got a child under each arm and is running from Marie again, the game having resumed after their snack break. “That one is a Guard, at least. Nobody else would have physical abilities like that.”

Ivan ignores the Lord’s comment. “It’s been worthwhile getting to know them all.” His smile turns a little more genuine. “They’re all good kids.”

“Surely you and Marie have an inkling of who’ll be a good fit?” When Ivan doesn’t reply, the Lord clicks his tongue. “You can’t choose all of them.”

Ivan’s voice is a study in nonchalance. “Can’t we?”

Lord Brennan opens his mouth only for no words to come out. At length, he has to laugh. His knights do like to keep busy. “You’d need a castle.”

“You did give us one, my lord.”

“I suppose I did.”

The two men lapse into a pleasant silence. It is good to see the townsfolk this cheerful. This town is the furthest from Lord Brennan’s own castle and he rarely has a chance to visit. The first time he had had been very different. The people still bore the wounds of winter in gouged cheeks and brittle smiles. Now he sees the glow of health everywhere he looks.

He contemplates the Director once again. She’d been the only one back then to not seem pleased to see him ride in on his white horse. Even now he can feel the chill of her scrutiny as she stood defensively between him and the orphanage. None of that chill is present today. Her smile is as sweet as his tea while she tends to a scrape the little Scholar sustained in this round of tag. “Ms. Sarah is very pretty, isn’t she?”

“I know we can’t adopt them all,” Ivan blurts out. He doesn’t seem to have heard Lord Brennan. His gaze is turned towards his own inner conflict which is why he also doesn’t notice the blush dusting the Lord’s cheeks. “It wouldn’t be fair to them. Marie and I decided to adopt a child who would benefit from what little we can offer. Military arts and luck.”

“I don’t think you’re being fair,” Lord Brennan says with raised brows. “You and Marie offer a lot more than a Knight’s experience. Haven’t you shown that already in your actions?” He’s not aware of everything his former knights have done, but he’s heard plenty from the children today. He didn’t think Marie had the patience to teach anyone how to read.

Ivan’s hands fist. “It’s not enough, it’s not—the little boy. Josiah. He’s so smart. I don’t even know where to start with him and even Marie says that he’ll soon outpace her—”

“Well,” Lord Brennan says, “Neither of you are Teachers, true, but there is a school for that--”

“And Annie wants to know why bread rises and why the sun sets and how many seconds are in a day—”

“All kids are curious—”

“Hera staged a whole theater production for my birthday and all we could do was clap—”

Is he missing something? “Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do?”

“We don’t know any actors or directors to introduce her to!” Ivan cries out. He quickly lowers his voice, but can’t hide the stress around his eyes. “What could we give to a child like her? Like any of them?  Marie and I are out of our depth. It would be so much simpler if one was a Knight!”

The Lord tentatively offers, “If Isla’s a Guard--?”

Ivan gives a cry of distress that he barely capture in the palm of his hand. “Isla! That girl feels like my daughter already, but…she’s been through so much. She doesn’t need a father who teaches her how to fight or a mother who teaches her how to withstand a siege! She deserves to never have to fight again. What could we offer her? What could we possibly give to her she hasn’t already learned on her own?”

A light goes on in the Lord’s head. He takes in the festivities with new eyes. The town’s Baker, Blacksmith, Teacher… His friends have invited every possible parent they could in hopes of providing for the children in ways they felt incapable of doing themselves. As noble as that was…“Ivan, being a parent goes beyond the skills you can give a child. It’s more than fostering talent or an offering an apprenticeship. It’s—”

A horse’s scream drowns out the Lord’s next words.

Ivan is in front of Lord Brennan with his sword drawn before the horses and their blood-splattered riders even round the side of the castle.

-----.

 You throw Annie and Josiah behind you the moment you hear the sound of hooves galloping towards the manor.

“Isla, what—” Josiah starts to ask and then cuts himself off as the innkeepers and their entourage burst into the party.

You smell blood before your eyes register the terrible red staining their fine clothing.

“ORCS!” Mr. Innkeeper screams over the frightened snorts of his horse. He stumbles down from his mount and staggers towards the Lord. “They overtook our carriage—please, my wife, she’s hurt—”

Mrs. Inkeeper is holding her side and seemingly barely holding onto the saddle horn. “Our guards won’t be enough to hold them off—”

“Inside,” Sarah hisses into your ear. She points after Hera who’s already shepherding the younger kids into the building. “Now.”

“—an army—”

“—fast—”

“—waiting for us—”

You move faster than you’ve allowed yourself since you arrived. This is no time to take care in hiding your abilities; there are roars coming from the forest unlike anything you’ve ever heard before. Your senses seem to dial up with your heartrate and you can hear the clash of steel against rock and flesh. You scoop Annie into your arms and leap after Josiah and Sarah.

Mr. Dallen’s face is pale as he ushers you all into the manor. He holds the door open for the townsfolk. The hall fills with the sounds of panic and sobs as fear washes through you like a tidal wave. There have never been orcs south of the mountains, there have never been demons bigger than a horned rabbit in the last twenty years, even when the Winter froze the river—

Mr. Dallen waves down Marie as she sprints to the large doorway. You think that he’s going to pull her inside to safety, but instead he thrusts her bow into her outstretched hands.

“Do not open these doors,” she commands. Behind her the knights are assembling into a formation, their Lord at the center. Ivan stands before them all, barking orders to ready their spears as the trees in front of them begin to sway. Marie pulls a dagger from under her skirts and slices the bottom half of her dress clean off. She kicks it away from her feet as she talks. “Take everyone to the basement—”

“Ma’am, the escape tunnel still isn’t cleared of debris—”

Marie swears so violently that half the townsfolk gasp. She grabs Mr. Dallen by the shoulder, her eyes flicking back and forth between him and her husband. “Then we will draw them away. The moment you think you can, run to the wagon. Get the children to—” She bites her lip. You can see the devastating truth flash through her mind. There isn’t anywhere to go. “Damnit. Bar the door and arm everyone you can.”

Mr. Dallen’s lips are bloodless as he nods. “My lady.”

Marie turns to everyone. Her voice is unlike anything you’ve heard come from her lips; it’s harsh and barking. A commander giving orders much like Ivan is doing outside. “Listen, everyone. We are in danger. Our best estimate is that 25 orcs are marching on the manor. There is no guarantee of survival. The moment this door is breached, it will mean the knights have failed. You must be prepared to fight. Do you understand?”

Twenty-five? Your hands ball into fists and your breath catches in your throat. You’ve heard of entire villages being wiped out by three.

“Then we’ll fight with the knights,” the Baker says. He pushes away from the center of the group and marches to the wall. He pulls down the crossed axes, keeps one, tosses the other to the Blacksmith. She catches it easily. “You’ll need everyone who can hold a weapon.”

Marie never voices her protest. You can see the strain of holding it back in her tense shoulders and her poignant silence. At long last, she nods. “You’re right. Stay behind the knights. They know how to handle the frontline better than you.”

There’s a flurry after that. The townsfolk divide in half. Those unable to fight slide back as those who can start scavenging for weapons. Mr. Dallen grimly pulls two long daggers from under his coat while pointing your neighbors to decorative swords, to ornamental spears, to the heavy coatrack just inside the parlor.

Grimly, you stride past Sarah, ignoring her hiss and darting hands. You can leave the weapons to the villagers, there’s a large knife on the dessert table you can use—

Marie slams a hand against your chest. You stagger back at the weight of the blow, breath knocked from your lungs. You’re more stunned than hurt as you gape at her.

“Children stay here,” Marie says. Her eyes narrow. “No exceptions.”

“But I’m—”

“We don’t have time to argue!” She pushes you further back, clearing the doorway for the armed villagers to run outside towards the knights. “You’re strong Isla, but this isn’t your fight. Stay here. Guard the door.”

The winter wind howls in your mind. You splutter. “But I—”

Marie spins away from you. “Director Sarah.”

Sarah’s arms slide around your shoulders. “Yes, lady.”

 The closing of the door feels like a blow in itself. You stare sightlessly at the unyielding wood as your emotions rage. How could she? You’re strong, you can do more, you can help, you’re the one who kept everyone from starving—

“We need to barricade the windows,” Director Sarah is saying to the townsfolk. Half of them gaze at her uncomprehendingly. Her hands slide from your shoulders slowly, as if testing that you aren’t going to leap outside. When you don’t move, she lets go entirely. “Isla, move the furniture. Hera and Josiah, find something to tie it down with.”

You move on autopilot. There are other hands alongside yours as you push the sofa and armchairs in front of the windows, the townsfolk coming together to defend the manor. Hera darts between you all and pulls the curtains closed, reclaiming the curtain ties to use as rope. She’s got a grim determination in her eyes that looks uncomfortably familiar.

Your attention is on the noise outside. The orcs are slow, but loud. The roars change to squeals and bellows of challenge. Branches break and there’s a terrifying, splintering crash as a tree falls. Metal rings as the knights raise their shields. You can see it all in your mind’s eye, the knights in a defensive line across the length of the garden, the Lord securely in their center. Ivan is shouting about this being what they’ve trained for, that there are more of them than there are orcs, that this city won’t fall—

And the Lord is speaking too, quickly and quietly to Marie. The escape tunnel? Damnit, I should have sent more men—

It will be fine, Marie says. Her bow sings as she holds it ready and you know the way her muscles flex and her eyes narrow from experience. We won’t let a single one of those monsters past us. We won’t--

The knights bellow alongside the orcs. Your heart leaps and your focus is jarred. You’re standing in front of the door again, your hands balled at your sides. Everyone can hear the battle now and the townsfolk scream when the orcs’ battle cries shake the manor.

“Quiet!” Is that your voice? It is. Your eyes slide to the frightened faces behind you. “You’ll distract the knights.”

Sarah steps up alongside you. “And let the orcs know exactly where we are.”

The villagers quiet into aborted whimpers and muffled sobs.

The battle rages, louder and louder. Are orcs big? They sound big. When you close your eyes you can hear the way their feet pummel the earth. Do they have weapons? Metal clashes. A knight screams that their hides are too thick. The Lord shouts back to aim for their eyes. A table splinters, a bow sings, there’s a liquid gasp—

BOOM!

You slam your hands against the door, muscles straining as another blow lands against it. The wood convulses under your hands and the lock creaks. The villagers scream.

“No,” someone whispers. “No, they found us.”

You’re eight and the snow spirits are howling for blood. Your shoulders ache with the effort to hold the door against the wind. The cold is biting at your fingertips and there is an old hope dying in your chest--

Small hands slam against the door next to yours. Hera is snarling and swearing, Josiah is crying. Sarah is telling the kids not to worry, Isla and Hera and Josiah won’t let them in –

They’re here. You’re not alone.

“GET AWAY FROM THERE!”

The orc’s bellow isn’t nearly as loud as Ivan’s roar.

The blow you’re bracing for never comes. Ivan goads the orc to follow him, to leave the manor alone, to eat the man readily available to him—

It does not sound like the knights are winning now.

“My Lord!” Marie’s voice is strained.

“Do not fall back, they’ll corner us—”

“Who is that? Who is—”

The crack under the door lights with a sickly purple. The smell of ozone seeps into the manor. For a moment there is a silence so complete you think you’ve been struck. What was that? Magic? You’ve never seen magic before--

Screams rocket across the field. The Blacksmith’s screams. The Baker’s screams. Marie’s rage-filled howls.

“DEMON KING!”

Your Destiny burns.

---.

(part 1) (part 2) (part 3)

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Thanks for reading! If you'd like read the last part of Isla a week early, please consider supporting me on Patreon(X)!

[vivwritesfics]

Howl At The Moon (And I'll Howl Back)

Chapter Three

Summary: A sweet scent filled his nose. Honey and lemon. But he doesn't know who the scent belongs to. Why is the owner of that scent attacking the Pack Omega? Why is she, an Omega herself, without a pack? Why does Bradley want to take her home?

Bradley is the one she's supposed to be with. She knows it. He knows it. The entire pack knows it. Then why does she attach herself to Bob? And why doesn't Bradley mind?

Rooster X Reader X Bob

1.5K

TGM Werewolf AU

Series Masterlist

The doorbell rang. Bradley's head snapped towards it, drawing in the three familiar scents. He stood and rushed towards the door as three of his packmates waited.

As soon as he pulled open the door, the smell of distress permeated the air.

Bob caught it first, head lifting as he breathed in the foul and distressing scent. But, when he went to walk into the house, Bradley's hand on the doorframe stopped him.

"Rooster," Bob warned, but his voice wasn't full of warning. It never was.

Bradley shook his head. "She doesn't need this right now," he answered, eyes moving to Nat and Javy.

They didn't know what she needed. Just like Bradley didn't, Bob couldn't help but think. But he knew, he knew exactly how to help a fellow Omega. Helping her wasn't the present problem though, was it? No, it was getting through to Bradley.

He sucked in a breath. "You go in there and she's just gonna retreat from you or attack. I can calm her down, just like I did earlier," he said, hand on Bradley arm.

"She attacked you earlier," Bradley reminded him.

(Nat looked at the Pack Omega with wide eyes. He'd certainly left out that detail when talking about his trip with Bradley).

Bob resisted a sigh. "If you want to help her, you need to let me in there. Please, Roos."

As the Pack Omega, it was almost Bob's job to know all of their soft spots, everything that would make them bend to his every whim. As soon as the nickname left Bob's lips, Bradley dropped his arm, letting the younger wolf through.

Bob disappeared up the stairs, and Natasha turned her attention to Bradley. "You let Bob get attacked?" She asked, tone accusing.

Bradley shut the door in her face and followed Bob.

As soon as Bob pushed open, the smell of distress only heightened. He searched for her, but he didnt see anything at first. But she was definitely there, Bob could smell her.

And then he saw it. Crouched between the bed and the closet, she held the lamp in her shaking hands, the base of it ready to swing at anyone that came near.

Cautiously, Bob approached her. When a terrified whimper left her lips, he stopped.

Stood opposite her, against the opposite wall, Bob stared down at her. "Hello," he said gently as he came to sit on the floor. Her hands only trembled more. "Do you remember me from earlier?"

There was a moment of hesitation. She swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded her head.

"I'm Bob," he said and reached his hand towards her. But she swung the lamp and snapped at his hand. "Got it," he said, placing his hand back on his lap. "Do you have a pack somewhere?" He asked.

"I-I'm not telling!" She cried. But, as she shook her head from side to side, her stomach made a noise.

That was what she'd been doing when Bob found her, wasn't it? Dumpster diving, searching for food. "You poor thing," he whispered. "Let me let you something to eat."

Bob retreated from the room, but her shaking didn't stop. She put the lamp down, arms already aching from how long she was holding it up.

As soon as that door opened again, she held the lamp up. The guy with the glasses (she'd never seen a werewolf with glasses before, but he definitely was one) sat in his seat against the wall opposite her. He had a plate full of biscuits and cheese. It wasn't the most nutritious, but Bob was gonna make sure she got something good later.

He pushed it away from himself and waited.

The lamp was back in her hands. But she pitched herself forward and stole a single cracker. She held it to her nose and cautiously sniffed. "How do I know you haven't... laced it with something?"

For the first time since Bob had arrived, she was looking in his eyes.

As the Pack Omega, there were things Bob could do that the wolves around him couldn't. His eyes became an icy blue as he said, "trust me, Pup. I just want to help you."

Gingerly, she took a nibble. But then she discarded the lamp and leapt at the plate, devouring everything on it like a feral beast. She finished it in a matter of seconds and retreated back to the space between the wardrobe and the bed. This time, though, she didn't brandish the lamp.

Bob cleared his throat and shuffled forward slightly. "Can you tell me if you've got a pack out there looking for you?"

Pulling her knees towards her chest, she shook her head. Bob took in just how dirty, tattered and ill-fitting her clothes were. "How long have you been on your own?" He asked gently, shuffling forward just a little more.

She shrugged her shoulders, cheek resting against her knee. "Ten years, maybe," she mumbled, "But I don't remember."

Bob drew in a gasp. Ten years, it was far too long for a werewolf to be on their own, especially one like her. But, if she'd been on her own for this long, she probably didn't know what she was.

Her trembling had stopped and Bob moved closer still. He moved the empty plate out of his way. "Can I ask what happened, Pup?" He asked gently.

Suddenly she was shaking her head furiously from side to side. She turned away from him, turning towards the wardrobe. "Puppy, I'm sorry," he said quietly, his voice soft. "D'you... d'you know what you are?"

Slowly nodded her head. "Yeah," she mumbled, voice cracking slightly. Bob made a mental note to get her some water, as soon as he had settled again. A gently smiled at her, encouraging her to go on. "A werewolf."

His smile dropped. "Oh, no, that's not what I meant," he said still in that gentle voice. "You're like me. Can you smell that I'm different to other werewolves?"

Closing her eyes she breathed in through her noise, drawing in his scent. Her shoulders dropped as she did so, body relaxing.

He smelled so comfortable, like clean laundry and an open fire. A whimper left her lips and she couldn't stop her body from moving towards her. Bob let her take his hand and lift it to her face, nuzzling her face against it. "That's it," Bob whispered as if she was a spooked animal.

Bob sat there with her. She breathed in his scent again and moved closer. And then she let Bob touch her, actually touch her. He touched the tattered bit of sleeve on her shoulder and placed his hand on her hip.

He didn't expect her to crawl into his lap. She closed her eyes as she laid her head on his chest and listened to his heartbeat. "I've got you, Pup," he whispered as his fingertips moved up and down her back. "Do you wanna take a shower?"

She nodded her head, but held his shirt tight in her fists, unwilling to let go. Bob wasn't going to force her to, either. All of that tension she'd been holding in her body had released in one big go; Bob wouldn't have brrn surprised if he slept for a week straight.

He didn't notice Bradley standing in the doorway. But she did. That distressed scent spiked once again, and Bob tightened his grip on her. "It's okay, Pup," he whispered against the top of her head. "He's a part of my Pack."

But she shook her head against his chest.

Bob stopped that sigh from releasing his lips as he turned to Bradley and shook his head. "Leave it, Roos," he said and Bradley straightened up. "She'll meet you when she's ready."

Bradley let out a grunt as he turned to walk out of the room. She'd smelt so... calm, that familiar scent of honey and lemon filling his home. But, as soon as he'd shown his face, she'd been terrified all over again.

"Let's get you in the shower," Bob softly muttered.

She nodded her head and climbed out of his lap. As soon as Bob was standing, she was at his side, holding onto him as he led her to the bathroom.

She stood there as Bob turned on the water. He kept his hand under the stream, testing the temperature of the water. When he deemed it to be just right, Bob stepped back. "Have a shower, Pup. I'll be back with some clothes," he said and headed towards the door.

But, before he could disappear out of the bathroom, she grabbed a hold of his arm. "You're coming back, right?" She asked with shining, terrified eyes.

Bob stepped towards her. He pressed a kiss to her forehead and grabbed the doorhandle. "I promise, Pup." He said and disappeared further into the house.

As soon as she was alone, she pushed the bathroom door shut and twisted the lock.

Taglist: @pinkpantheris @woozarts

[beenbaanbuun]

Hiiii bun! ✨ I have a question about Opposites Attract matz ✋🤓 Im wondering about their bedroom dynamic with each other, when their darling isn't there and it's just the two of them. Do they ever have sex (or scenes?) just the two of them anymore? What about before darling came into their lives, what were they like then? Has their dynamic with each other changed since they met her?

isak, i’ve been saying i’ll answer this for ages but then exams and the sadness and now here we are!!

so with or without darling, there is always going to be something so special about the connection that hwa and joong share between themselves. it’s no stronger than the connection they have with darling, but it’s different. more passionate and lust filled and primal. they don’t have to be so sweet with one another, all gentle caresses and soft, dainty words. they can spit and slap and choke until their hearts are content. they can call each other names that would shock even the devil, all while basking in the love they share for one another.

and whilst they love what they have with darling, the need to have someone to pamper becoming ever-more evident with each day that passes by, they can’t help but want something a little less sweet from time to time. yes, hongjoong can spank her and she takes it like a champ, but only seonghwa can take it when he spits at him and calls him a whore. and yes, seonghwa can tie her up with pretty ribbons made of silk and lace, but only hongjoong can appreciate the harsh bite of rope against his pale skin. neither of them would be able to choose one over the other, though; as with everything, it’s just different when darling is present.

and that’s not to say that it isn’t ever different when it’s just the two of them. sometimes hongjoong isn’t up for being tied up and degraded, and other times seonghwa is too tired to don the persona that is able to do all those terrible things. sometimes they just want to lie together and make soft, sweet love. wrap one another up in gentle arms as seonghwa fucks himself gently into hongjoong’s hole. it’s just another way to show their affection, outside of everything else they do for one another, and it’s certainly a nice change of pace from their usual escapades.

these days come far and few between, though. with darling present, their quota for soft gentle sex is already pretty full. they’re passionate people, after all, and darling is just too sweet for them not to bring her to orgasm in the most gentle ways multiple times a day. it doesn’t take away from the affectionate side of it; they work so well as a team that sharing their darling between them is like a bonding experience in of itself. the only thing it’s really changed is the level of rough sex that takes place when darling isn’t present. there’s a lot of it outside of darling, just so they can get it out of their system. slapping, biting, twisting, pinching; it’s all on the table for them during those couple of hours they have during the afternoon nap that yeosang insists they share. they’re very grateful to the wolf in that regard…

[redsnowdrop]

Lewis Hamilton x OC

CHAPTER 7 -Hate to love-

To my -> F1 Masterlist <-

Lewis was looking at her, he was a few centimeters away from her, she couldn't see him because she was turning her back to him. He stopped to look at her for a minute and saw Roscoe had shown her his belly. He didn't notice but he smiled. He went around and also bent down to pet the dog who, as soon as he recognized him, forgot about the girl and started jumping towards him. Soon they stood up and looked each other in the eyes, embarrassed. He didn't say anything to her, he looked at the entrance to the box and then at her. He set off and entered followed by the dog.

She took a moment and went inside. She placed her things on a chair and, when the team recognized her they turned their back to the two so they could argue in peace. They didn't want to interrupt the propitiatory rite.

-You still haven't told me your name-

-you never asked me, Lewis-

Damn, hearing my name with that Italian accent… such nerves. What nerves! That's so sexy said like that... wait, what?

He turned towards her and looked at her mockingly -So?-

-You haven't asked me yet-

Lewis licked his lips and broke eye contact to look into the air for a second. The team was ready to hear plates and knives flying.

He walked around her and put her "with her back to the wall", her back was turned to the wall but she was not actually leaning against it yet, there were still a few centimeters.

-What's your name?- he smiled sarcastically, lifting his helmet and holding it in place with one hand above his head.

-Melissa- she said, looking at the ground and then finding the courage to look him in the eyes. He smiled at her and felt himself blush. That anger!

-Did you come here again today to do a bad job, Melissa?-

The crew now also knew that girl's home address.

-Did you come here again today to have your ass striped by Max?- he then bit his tongue.

Something clicked in Lewis - I already have 7 championships under my belt, he's still on his third -

Melissa didn't know how to respond and apparently instinctively backed away. She found herself leaning against the wall and crossed her arms. She didn't know how to respond. –Well…- muttered.

-Well? Are you being a sheep? - Lewis chuckled to make fun of her.

-He's more charming than you- she moved her head slightly and looked like a cartoon.

-More charming than me?- he laughed, taking two steps towards her. Now he really had her back against the wall. –Have you seen the models and singers I went out with?-

-Now you're playing the lone wolf?- she no longer had intelligent answers. She had felt stupid when she started feeling his breath so close to her. She started to mumble something but Lewis silenced her with a kiss. He covered her with his back and no one saw anything, in reality they didn't notice the incredible silence.

It was just a small but full kiss. They were glued to each other. His breathing was no longer labored, angry. It was deep but calm. Instinctively Melissa had placed the palms of her hands on his chest and he took one with his still free hand while he continued to hold his helmet with the other.

He pulled away before the silence could become deafening and everyone could turn to look at them. He lowered his helmet again and with the visor raised gave her a satisfied look.

And he took to the track, finishing second again.

Hi guys! This is a small spoiler from my Lewis Hamilton x OC FF!

I will publish it on AO3 (and maybe also Wattpad) in the future!

If you have any questions about it my inbox in always open to anyone!

You can find more spoilers and info on my profile; go to F1 Masterlist and then look for the F1 Fanfiction Masterlist!

Hope you like it! Let me know what you think! If I have written something wrong forgive me, English is not my first language!

MORE SPOILERS ARE COMING. STAY TUNED!

xoxo

[asherbakugou]

Your First Kiss

Jiang Kai | Kai Kalama (She/They)

Reader was sat on the floor of her apartment, leaning back against Kai's legs as he flipped through channels on the tv. They had a new sketch due in two days, so they were hoping for inspiration.

The parameters for the project were pretty simple; primary color (red, yellow, blue), one accent color (gold or silver), and female model.

Above her, Kai suddenly leaned over them to look in their eyes, "What if you did something based of Azula? You know, from Avatar. She's got red and gold in her design doesn't she?"

Blinking, Reader turned it over in her mind before nodding. Focusing back on him, she was unsurprised to find his gaze on their lips. Doing their best to not let him know that they saw his gaze, they spoke, "That's good. She does have red, though its more maroon but I can tweak the colors a bit to fit the parameters. Thank you, Kai."

He flushed, leaning back as Reader fought to hide a wider smile. For nearly three months, since they'd begun hanging out, she'd noticed how his eyes constantly strayed to their lips or how focused he'd get whenever they spoke. It was sweet, and was defintely not helping their crush. So today, they decided to do something about it.

Later, after dinner, Kai was at the door preparing to leave. "Well, I guess I should leave a pretty person all alone in their apartment to work on their project." He winked making Reader laugh.

"Kai . . ." Reader trailed off, summoning all of their confidence. "Tell me if you don't want this."

"What–"

Cupping his face, Reader pulled him down a little as they reached up a bit to press a kiss against his lips. Their lips slotted together perfectly, fitting like puzzle pieces. The kiss only lasted for a few seconds, as Kai had frozen in shock.

"Sorry. I thought–"

Kai interrupted her this time, slamming their lips back together as he pushed her against the wall beside the door, hands falling to their hips as Reader wrapped their arms around his neck to keep him close.

Reader couldn't help but notice that he tasted like cinnamon, likely from the gum he loved to chew on all the time. Kai noticed how Reader tasted like the fruity wine they'd had with dinner and nearly moaned at the taste.

Pulling away, but not pulling apart completely, he pressed their heads together. "So, can I take you on a date?"

"Time, date, and place?"

"Next Saturaday, 7, and you'll see."

"I'll see you then, Kalama," Reader teased, seperating. Kai obediantly stepped outside, reverantly touching his lips when the doors closed.

Zane Julien (She/Her)

Zane mediatated peacefully to the quiet sounds of Reader painting, her playlist, and the soft humming. He felt at peace in the whirlwind that was her studio, eventually opening his eyes to see what she was painting.

It was the Aurora Borealis, with a wolf pack tilting their heads back to howl in unison. He was amazed by the motion you'd managed to capture in the painting.

"It looks incredible," Zane complimented, startling Reader into nearly dropping her palette.

"Oh shit!" He was quick to catch it, much to her relief. "Oh thank the dragons. Thank you for the compliment, and the catch."

"Do not thank me, it was my fault for startling you."

"You still caught it for me. So I'm going to thank you. Thank you Zane," Reader stated, smiling as she took the palette back.

Zane smiled softly, starstruck as she turned back to the painting. Standing just behind her, he remembered something Nya had said he should do, based on his feelings and how Reader acted around him.

'Ask permission to kiss her, then take her on a date. But don't push her.'

"Reader," Zane said, quickly catching her attention. She turned to him, setting her pallette down to give him her full attention. "I have a question, but I do not wish for you to feel pressured."

"I wouldn't let myself he forced into anything," Reader agreed, tilting her head.

"Of course." Zane hesitated, stepping closer, flustering her. "May I . . . May I kiss you, Reader?"

Reader seemed to freeze, soft lips parting in surprise. After waiting for nearly thirty seconds, Zane was disappointed by the lack of answer but took it in stride. "I apologize, I did not—"

"No, no!" Reader interrupted, waving their hands around. "You don't need to apologize! I was just surprised! Promise! You're not normally so outspoken, so . . ."

"Was my asking an issue?"

"Just a surprise."

"You still have not answered the question," Zane noted, tilting his head slightly. Blushing, Reader ducked her head down in emberresment.

"I-yes. Yes, you can . . . you can kiss me," Reader whispered, standing a little taller as Zane stepped into their space.

Slowly he pressed their lips together, not wanting to rush and accidentally hurt her. The kiss was soft, chaste and made Reader pleasantly cold as Zane felt his core warm in pleasure. Pulling away, he found his own smile widening when he saw Reader looking at him with a wide smile of their own.

"May I take you out? On a date?"

"Y-yes! Yes!"

"Then tomorrow? At 7?"

"Perfect."

"I shall pick you up then," Zane decided, still smiling. Giggling Reader stepped into his space to sink into a hug.

"I can't wait."

Cole Brookstone (They/Them)

The stars were bright as Reader and Cole laid in a grassy meadow Cole had taken them too. Head resting on Cole's stomach, Reader had a surprisingly good view of Cole's reaction every time he spoke lowly, in order to keep the peace of course.

Tonight was Ninjagos Festival of Stars, recently adopted from the Serpentine but neither of them were fans of large crowds and wanted to see the stars and fireworks alone. So Reader had packed a nighttime picnic, with Cole hovering over their shoulder in anticipation.

Mooncakes, Star shaped iced cookies, and multiple blackberry flavored treats. They'd also brought along their starry night themed drink, with blueberries, bananas, and kiwi syrups to make it a stunning array of colors.

Cole had, of course, nearly devoured his portion in a half hour as Reader talked about their day, and some issues they'd noticed recently, eating far slower.

"So, what made you invite me out to watch the stars? Is it just 'cause ya knew I'd bring ya food?" Reader asked, without opening their eyes.

"What, no! All of the others wanted to go to the festival and celebrate, but I wasn't in the mood to celebrate. I'd rather hang out with you," Cole admitted.

"Really? Me? Mr. Ninja wants to hang out with an uninteresting civilian?"

"Your not unintrusting, which I'm not sure is a word by the way. Your just . . . You're normal, and I need that in my life. And you're fun in a different way."

"Well, thank you for the compliment. Any specific reason you don't like festivals? Or is it private?"

Cole knew that all he had to say was that it was private and he would drop it, but he wanted to share. "My mom used to take me out to festivals all the time when I was younger. She had a piggy bank specifically for those days that I could add change too. It was my money to use to do whatever I wanted with during the festival. When she died, I stopped going. It doesn't feel the same anymore."

Reader was silent, thinking. "When I lost my parents, I no longer thought it was worth it. To live. It took me three years to truly start enjoying the world and some days its still hard." Glancing up, they met eyes. "If you ever decided you want to try, I'd be happy to take you. We could make it a date."

"A date?" Cole sat up, worrying Reader who sat up as well.

"It doesn't . . . have to be a date. Not if you don't want it to be."

"Well, what if I want it to be a date?"

Reader smiled, leaning closer as their eyes flicked towards Cole's lips. "I'd like that."

Smiling softly, Cole and Reader leaned closer together until their lips were barely a centimeter apart. "Would you be upset if I kissed you?" Cole asked, trying to hide his nerves.

"Not at all."

Grinning, Cole eagerly pressed their lips together, twisting until he was hovering over Reader. Fingers wove into his black hair, tugging him closer to them as they made out beneath the stars.

Cole eventually forced himself to pull out of their hold, lips glistening and red as he panted. Reader was not much better, shirt having ridden up at some point. "Well . . . that was not what how I thought tonight would turn out," Cole admitted with a goofy grin.

Reader laughed, eyes bright. "So, we still on for that date?"

"Absolutely."

Jay Walker (She/her)

Lightning flashed across the sky, followed closely by the crack of thunder, making Reader groan. She and Jay were both caught in the rain, having been taking a short break from working on one of his older Mechs.

"Well, this sucks," Reader grumbled, huddling beneath the glass cover of a bus station as Jay watched the lightning sparking in the sky with a strange sort of awe and reverance. Nudging him, she broke the spell cast by the bright flashes. "Everything ok, sparky?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah. Just, ehehe, get a little excited during thunderstorms," Jay explained, allowing a spark to flit through his fingers in demonstration.

"That's . . ." Reader trailed off as lightning struck again, highlighting the sharp angular, boyish features Jay had, bringing out his freckles and auburn hair. "That's pretty cool. Don't think I'll ever get used to people fighting with elements though."

"Seriously? You've hung out with Nya for years, how is it still so weird!"

"I don't know! It just is!"

"Maybe you're the weirdo."

"Huh," Reader gasped, as if truly offended. Grabbing their imaginary pearls, she draped herself across the bench. "To slay me with such cruel words, oh how I die. Must this be the way death comes for me."

Jay laughed, plopping down behind her so she could rest her head on his thighs. He smiled down at her, trying hard to keep his blush down, and failing miserably.

"You're turning pink," Reader mused, poking his cheek as her eyes sparkled with mischief. "Is it because you've fallen for my beauty?"

Jay felt his lips twitch downwards when he heard the sarcasm. He was far less oblivious than people thought and he'd realized a while back that Reader did not think themselves pretty. Just . . . Average.

"Would that . . . be bad?"

Readers smile fell as she stared up at him in shock, "Jay . . ."

"I really want to kiss you."

"Then do it."

Leaning down, she reached up, meeting him in the middle. Neither noticed how the lightning seemed to cover the sky, with barely a secons between the flashes. They were too focused on the press of their lips, on memorizing how the others face felt beneath their fingertips.

Pulling away, Reader giggled, quickly joined by Jay. Their was no real reason to laugh but she was happy and so was he.

"So when can I take you on a date, Mr. Blue Ninja?" Reader asked, laughing at the look he gave her.

"Hey! I'm supposed to ask you out!"

"Too late." He tried to sulk but another kiss had him relaxing into a giddy smile. "Fine. I'll go out on a date with you."

"I'll plan a good date, scouts honor."

"You've never been a scout!"

"Oops."

Lloyd Garmadon (She/her)

Reader was happily pressed against Lloyd's side as they walked, liking the comfort of his arm draped over her shoulder. They'd gone windowshopping in the nearby mall for her hour break and were finishing up to walk back, not that Rufus would mind all that much if she was a few minutes late.

"Ooh, look at that," Reader said, pointing to a shoe store. In the display window were Ninja-themed shoes, with Lloyd's being the most prominent.

Lloyd saw what she was looking at and groaned, cheeks flushing, "Please tell me you're not going to buy those. They're like 100$."

Reader pouted, looking up at him with puppy dog eyes, "But I thought you liked seeing me in your merch?" She'd noticed it a few weeks ago when she'd worn a green ninja shirt, seen how wide his eyes had gotten and how stuttery and blushy he'd gotten.

Just like right now.

"Wh‐well, of course, but still . . ." Lloyd trailed off, looking away to hide his face.

Giggling, Reader patted his bicep, pleased at the feel of muscle beneath the long sleeved shirt he wore. "I'm kidding, sweets. They're cute, but too expensive for my taste. Besides, I'd look better in one of the Green Ninja sweaters that one store was selling."

Somehow, Lloyd's blush darkened as he whined, "Reader."

"Lloyd," Reader cooed, delighting even further in his blush.

Suddenly, looking past him she spotted Ryker, very obviously looking around for someone. In a heartbeat their eyes met and he started towards her, making her freak out slightly.

"Lloyd."

He immediatley caught the change in her voice and followed her eyes to see where she was looking. Seeing Ryker, he cussed and pulled her towards a hallway between stores to try and hide.

"He already saw me," Reader admitted nervously. Lloyd watched the entrance, tense, as Reader tried to think up a plan.

Grabbing his shirt, she tugged him close until he was pressing her against the wall. Gaping down at her, he seemed frozen in place.

"Trust me?" Reader asked softly, eyes wide. Lloyd nodded, softening marginally.

"Of course."

Leaning up, she pressed their lips together making Lloyd freeze for only a second before he leaned into it. He gently cupped her cheek, keeping the kiss soft and slow as her own hands found their way into soft golden-blond hair.

Neither noticed when Ryker found them, nor when he realized just who was kissing Reader. Furious the man turned away and fled, stomping away as they stayed pressed together.

"So, sweets, when do you plan on taking me out?" Reader asked, breathless. Lloyd stared down at her, emerald eyes alight with awe.

"Friday, at 6. We're going somewhere fancy," Lloyd decided, smiling widely.

Reader giggled, using her grip on his head to tug him back down into a kiss, "Sounds good to me."

Morro (She/Her)

Morro was passed out on Readers couch, sleeping off the inherent exhaustion that came from his longer missions. She was curled against the side pressed against the couch, watching a movie on low so she wouldn't wake him.

Head resting on his shoulder, with his arm loosely wrapped around her side she couldn't help but blush, thinking about what people would say if they saw their position. It was intimate, even for friends. Her face had been warm the entire time they'd been cuddling, though she hoped he hadn't noticed.

Sudden movement from the hand on her hip startled her, making her glance down. Morro was rubbing at the exposed skin of her hip bone with his thumb.

"This alright?" He asked, voice a low rasp from just waking.

"Yeah," Reader mumbled, pressing her face into his chest. "Just fine. Perfect."

He chuckled, embarresing her further. They fell back into silence, though Reader's mind was running a thousand miles an hour.

"Hey, Morro?"

"Hmmm."

"Do you–" She cut herself off to sit up a bit to look him in the face. Morro's eyes were half-lidded but attentive. "Can I take you out? On-on a date?"

Morro's eyes sprang open as he gaped in shock. Fearfully, Reader began stuttering, "B-but not, not if you don't want too! Of course you don't have to agree! Just asking!" She tried to push the tears in her eyes back as Morro sat up, without saying anything.

With a gentleness few thought he was capable of, Morro rested a large hand on her cheek, forcing her to meet his dark grey-green eyes. "Can I kiss you?"

At her shocked expression, he laughed.

"Y-yeah."

Still grinning smugly, he pressed their lips together, wrapping an arm around her waist to keep her close. He barely let her come up for air before diving back in, like she was his air.

Finally he let them seperate, panting slightly, "I'm taking you out. Friday night, wear something you can walk in."

"O-okay." Eagerly she leaned back in for another kiss making his grin as he met her in the middle.

[curtain-caller]

The Parallels Between Korsica and Roquefort

So, when I was setting up my plans for Fly-High Rush, things were a bit one-sided in terms of group numbers, so instead of keeping Korsica the same, I decided to swap her and Roquefort. I figured they were similar enough to make a switch work.

But then I realized they were... really similar. Like, very, very similar. The comparisons just kept coming and they didn't stop.

So here we are. Welcome to my Ted Talk.

1. WIND ATTACKS:

Let's get one of the bigger comparison out of the way: both of them fight with wind. Korsica uses it all the time, from turning off generators to putting out fires to kicking Chai's ass. Then there's Roquefort, who throws out little tornadoes during his fight and tries to send Chai flying with his Big Bad Wolf attack several times. That move also requires Korsica specifically to hold it back with her own wind gust. Yeah, not much to say here.

2. Connection to a Vandelay Sibling:

See, this is the point that really got the gears turning in my head. Both of them have a close connection to a Vandelay sibling who saved their lives: Roquefort to Kale, and Korsica to Peppermint.

"I was on my deathbed when Kale saved me. I was smart, but weak. He fixed that." - Roquefort

"Your wound was really bad...We didn't have a choice." - Peppermint "You... saved my life." - Korsica

Not to say Peppermint saved Korsica single-handedly (shout out to Mac and CNMN, the true mvps), but then again, I doubt Kale painstakingly upgraded Roquefort's body piece by piece on his own, so my point still stands. Both Vandelay siblings had a hand in saving their lives respectively, and because of that, you can see the bonds formed between these two duos.

Peppermint tries to be welcoming and reassuring to Korsica when she first comes to after Kale's murder attempt, and Korsica returns that reassurance later on in Mimosa's level. She hasn't even been with the gang for a full mission yet, is probably still getting used to these changes, and she still tries to comfort Peppermint, especially during her "Kale's my brother" reveal.

Not to mention, during the optional conversations in Roquefort's office before you face Kale, Korsica's dialogue is slightly different in terms of topic. Everyone has something to say regarding their own specific character arcs and motivations, but part of Korsica's dialogue is specifically her worrying about Peppermint.

"But I'm a bit worried about Peppermint. This is personal for her." - Korsica "After all we've been through, it might not be easy... but I think she can handle it." - Chai "You might be right about that, but we need to be there for her when she needs it." - Korsica

Now going back to Kale and Roquefort, while their interactions are brief, you can tell that both of them have at least some respect for each other, which is a hell of a lot more than they give to most of the other Department Heads. Especially Kale.

"Zanzo, Stop. Just stop. Even you jumped the shark on this one. IN THE EYE? What the shit?" - Kale to Zanzo (via SPECTRA Hub vlog) "Only one of of four, Korsica? That's not a passing grade." - Kale to Korsica "It better! No slip-ups! And no defects." - Kale to Mimosa and Rekka Versus...

"Why not? I want to see just how angry you can get, if those punks make it in here." - Kale to Roquefort Sure, Kale still lashes out at him, he's not nice all of a sudden, but it feels like such a massive difference. Kale questions why he ever hired Zanzo, he tried to straight up KILL Korsica, and he's harsh enough to Mimosa and Rekka to the point that they flinch. Hell, REKKA of all people flinches twice. But here? Kale trusts Roquefort to handle things, even if he is a bit dismissive with the "you're just a number cruncher" line.

And on the other side of things, Roquefort is not only loyal to Kale, but surprisingly calm and casual around him. Casual enough to correct him and talk back.

"We...shut down the cafe." - Roquefort "When I said close the campus down, I didn't mean THE CAFE!" - Kale "You said close down everything." - Roquefort

The casual tone of voice is palpable. I genuinely think that's the least angry we see Roquefort, except maybe during the Boss Zoom meeting.

And if you want to go the shipping route, yes, shout out to my lesbians, not much to prove there, but... Hey Kale, do you want to explain why you, a confirmed dog person, gave Roquefort a robotic wolf fursuit? YOU WANNA EXPLAIN THAT??? HUH???

3. Similar Personalities:

They're cold, they're direct, and they're aggressive, and despite their rare goofy moments, I feel comfortable saying they're the most serious of the Department Heads.

Excluding the visual aspects (because this point would be null and void thanks to Roquefort fursuit), these two are by far the least hammy of the bosses. Unlike the others, who provide witty banter, plenty of cheesy lines and over-dramatic reactions, the dialogue for these two is rarely comedic or high-energy.

Here's some examples for comparison:

"I like defects. I like how they taste." - QA-1MIL

"So let's get ready to crumble!" - Rekka

Do I even need an example for Zanzo?

"Let's raise the stakes, and turn down the lights!" - Mimosa

"You've had a few hits, but I think it's time we break up the band." - Kale

Compare that to...

"Caught you off guard." - Korsica "I'll make sure you stay down this time!" - Korsica "You cocky LOSER!" - Korsica

"You sure made an entrance, lad. If you've come for me... I'd walk away." - Roquefort "Where's your confidence now, kid?" - Roquefort "I put my stock in futures, but not yours, kid." - Roquefort

The other bosses are willing to taunt and even go along with Chai's goofiness, but these two? Oh, they don't have much time for that. They barely hesitate, and are not holding back in the slightest. Korsica fucking yeets him down a slope, puts him in a headlock, knocks him out, does whatever she can to hold him back from getting to her office, and only pauses briefly to gaze upon his stupidity before whipping her batons out when he busts in. Even after she gets knocked out and sustains, like, 3 different flavors of concussion(5 if you count Chai and the vent hitting her), she gets RIGHT BACK UP! In a way, Roquefort is a bit more lenient, letting Chai into his office once he gets that far... but the "I'm not fucking around" energy is still there. He's like "Oh, you're really that determined? I respect it. Come at me, kid, I'm not fucking scared." And then he proceeds to back that up. He doesn't even bother attacking Chai with his regular form at first (or at all, frankly), he goes from 0 to 100 and refuses to fall somewhere in the middle. And finally, there's one similarity between them personality-wise that gets its own section, that being how...

4. They're Fueled by Anger:

Basically every boss is aggressive in some way, throwing all kinds of things at Chai as he consistently grinds their 30 day chips from anger management to dust, but here's the thing... When I say "fueled by anger", I mean health-wise. These two heal themselves on-screen because of their anger. With Roquefort, this is pretty well established. He constantly says that all Chai is doing is making him angrier, and that so long as he's mad, he won't be stopped, to the point that thousands of pounds of gold getting the drop on him was the only thing that could take him down. During the verse/phase changes, you can see his health bar quickly refill itself each time, and his wolf form model viewer description wraps this all up in a nice, neat little bow with this line: "Powered by Roquefort's own anger, attacking it will only make it more aggressive and powerful." Now, getting to Korsica... I'll only say this one thing. Can we just acknowledge she went from THIS:

TO THIS:

ALL BECAUSE CHAI CALLED HER OBLIVIOUS??? SHE'S OUT FOR BLOOD, SHE WANTS THAT TWINK OBLITERATED. "That's it! Now I'm mad!" - Korsica Anger Management? More like Angry Management, am I right?

5. Chai is Out of his Element:

*Holds Chai up by the scarf* Get his ass, you two (I say this affectionately)

Yeah, Chai is severely out of his element with both of them. These two fights are especially humbling for him, albeit for opposite reasons. Korsica is the one boss Chai can't just run in and beat the crap out of, so we see him struggle a lot as he constantly rolls nat 1s on charisma. He and the gang go through, like, three different plans in the span of the whole boss fight; first going with Peppermint's plan to state the facts and stay cool, followed by Chai's plan of trying to tire her out until she's willing to listen, and finally ending with "Fuck it, let's just kidnap her, we'll work on a plan D later". And to top it all off, Korsica throws an entire new addition to the parry mechanic at Chai in the middle of all of this, and he just has to keep rolling with it. For Roquefort's fight, I think it's pretty clear that Chai is TERRIFIED of him. He goes in all cocky and confident, thinking Roquefort's a pushover, and gets humbled QUICK when Roquefort reveals his true nature. You only very briefly see his confident attitude resurface during this fight, like when he knocks Roquefort through the glass pane to his money vault. Otherwise, he's either terrified or exhausted, especially at the end, gritting his teeth and getting ready to keep fighting because he has no other option. Not to mention the others are constantly reassuring and being protective of Chai during the fight via their call-in dialogue. Chai is straight up NOT having a good time. At least he got an unintentional nap after Korsica's fight, dude needs a rest after dealing with Roquefort. Where's SMIDGE when you need him, dude needs an energy drink, stat.

6. Boss Music:

Okay so I am NOT well-versed in musical vocabulary so like... bear with me on this. Hopefully this is coherent. Anyways, Negotiation and The Fizzith just... have the same vibe to me. Yes, I'm mostly focusing on The Fizzith, I believe in Streamer Mode Supremacy. First of all, I guess I can start off by saying that they're the only bosses with pure instrumentals for their tracks, with everyone else having lyrics in theirs. Second of all, both of their song formats just sound so... similar to me? Idk how to describe it, but like... They both start with a dramatic build up as they instill the fear of God in Chai, with Roquefort having that iconic classical music "DUN DUN DUN DUUUUUN" intro and Korsica having a shorter, but still just as powerful, build up as she jumps up and whips her batons out. This is then followed by, like, a slightly softer and steadier follow up as it proceeds with the rest of the intro cutscene, as Roquefort leaps over Chai and Korsica turns down Chai's offer to talk. Then the tension gradually grows as the fight goes on, with each phase adding another instrument or two to make things more intense. The Fizzith is already a lot more intense than Negotiation at the start, but you can still hear the build up with each phase for both. And then finally, there's a small "calm before the storm" section, aka where Chai almost talks Korsica down, and when Roquefort is amping up for his final Big Bad Wolf attack. Roquefort's goes back to a steady sort of beat for a moment, while Korsica's has that quiet clapping and softened tone. This is then followed by an intense, deep, high-energy climax as Korsica starts throwing everything she has at you, and as Roquefort sends this lengthy tornado sound-wave barrage at you. While this format is by no means an original one (hell, I noticed a lot of this in Mimosa's fight too), there's just something about their music that just... feels interconnected to me. Like, if I had to sit down and imagine any other boss having a parry-based boss fight like Korsica's, just going by their boss fight music, I'd go for Roquefort (with Mimosa as a close second). And genuinely, I have actually sat down and imagined it, and it's almost perfect. I'm connecting the two dots, motherfuckers (I'm not connecting shit) I'M CONNECTING THEM-

7. Control Over Security:

And with that, we're now arriving at the much smaller points that I don't have as much to discuss about. So I don't really need to say much about Korsica during this section, for obvious reasons. But as for Roquefort, he IS the one who takes over once Korsica's out of the picture and shit starts to hit the fan. "Kale, I prioritized shielding the tower. Reallocated the budget so not a bug will get in." - Roquefort And both of them are damn good at holding Chai and the others back. Korsica takes 3 whole stages to get to her, keeping you on your toes the whole time with lasers, brakes, and enemies galore. I imagine it would've been difficult as hell to get into the Security Department in the first place if Chai didn't get knocked out and held for questioning. And while his segment is pretty short, all things considered, Roquefort gives it his all to shield Vandelay Tower, locking it down so well that even the smartest members of the TEA-m are stumped. Chai's the only one with an idea, and even that had several hurdles. The second they started connecting to the cannon to launch Chai, security comes rushing in, and he probably would've gotten caged in if SMIDGE didn't unintentionally hold the door open for him. Let's also not forget the big-screened wanted posters, the whole Invaders Must Die cafeteria fight, and that one specific fucking bird that threw Chai around like a hacky sack. THEY. WANT. THIS. TWINK. OBLITERATED.

8. Their Affection Towards Cats:

Korsica has a folder on her computer labeled "CAT Gifs", and Roquefort fawns over 808 when she uses her Steal the Show ability. I rest my case.

9. Accidental Puns:

Okay, so I would've titled this "both like puns", but the jury's still out on Korsica in my opinion. Yeah, Chai says she's lying about hating puns, but to me, she seems like she's... on the fence of liking them. Like, she's hesitantly annoyed by them. But I CAN say that they've both accidentally made a pun. "You think you can strong-arm ME?" - Korsica "Hey, YOU chose to fight-...Wait, you like puns too?" (points at his arm) - Chai "What? No!" - Korsica "Roquefort here. Shut this place down! Protect Finance at all costs! (Heh, I said "costs!") - Roquefort "Ughhhhhhhh." - Peppermint

10. Probably Awakened Something in Players:

It's no wonder how thirsty the fandom is when these two have some of the most charged lines in the game... "You broke my concentration. So how 'bout I break you?" - Korsica "Let's take this somewhere a bit more secure. So we don't disturb the neighbors." - Roquefort Welcome to Hi-Fi Rush, where they appeal to both the "I love the kind of woman who could kick my ass" community and the furry werewolf boyfriend sugar daddy community.

11. Visual/Dialogue Similarities:

Finishing this off is a section dedicated to miscellaneous visual or dialogue similarities that I couldn't fit elsewhere.

(The camera zooms in before I can get a good shot of Korsica actually ON her desk, so standard shot it is.) TOP 10 WAYS TO ENHANCE YOUR LEADERSHIP SKILLS IN THE WORKPLACE #1: Jump onto your desk to establish dominance

Smug little losers...

GET FUCKING YEETED

Man, they even intimidated the camera man, they can't keep it straight.

Spiky, anime-ass hair/fur. Triangular.

Of course they have blue eyes and nails and pronouns (ft. Chai living the dream) Also, speaking of blue... maybe it's because both of theirs glow blue, but some of their cybernetics have the same vibe to me.

Mostly just the chest and the arms (since that's all Korsica's got). Maybe I'm just looking too hard but like... the blue tubes connected to the arms, the glowing chest... Okay, I'm running out of red string for my evidence board, moving on. Anyways, not as much to bring up about remaining dialogue similarities, but I still have a few. "Is that a floating cat? Ugh, nothing about you even makes sense!" - Korsica "The numbers are in... and YOU are OUT!" - Chai "Wow. That makes no sense, you idiot!" - Roquefort Behold Chai's natural ability to deal psychic damage by not making any sense whatsoever. And finally... mission plan dialogue. "Mission report. Just...go up." - Peppermint "Up?" - Chai "Up." - Peppermint "That's it?" - Chai "Looks like Korsica's in her office, and it's on the top floor. Hence, "up"." - Peppermint

"Chai, you're doing it! The Tower is unguarded. We're headed your way." - Korsica "Chai! Roquefort's office is a couple floors above you. Get up there and kick his ass!" - Peppermint When in doubt: go up.

So in conclusion...

[sagesparrow394]

I have too many aus already but my brain’s thinking

AU where Quesadilla Island is instead a small town that’s known for being a hub for the supernatural

The Federation is a group brought into the town that is made up of, essentially, monster hunters who aim to ‘protect’ the regular human townsfolk. Feelings among the townsfolk about the Federation are mixed. Some support their mission, others are more dubious but still kind to the Federation workers, and others believe they’re making the town more unsafe

Unknown to the Federation, there are a few supernatural beings living right under their noses, pretending to be ordinary people

Charlie Slimecicle is a werewolf

He refers to his wolf form as Slarf. Slarf is a black wolf, with piercing red eyes

He works out and eats a ridiculous amount of protein partially so he can brush off his supernatural strength as a product of his routine

No one knows he’s a werewolf, not even his partner Mariana or best friend and roommate Baghera, and he desperately wants to keep it that way

At some point, he out of nowhere ‘adopts’ a daughter called JuanaFlippa. She’s actually a young orphaned werewolf who got very attached Slarf on a full moon night and now refuses to leave Charlie’s side

Cellbit is a vampire

Not born one, but bitten. He has a sister who is human

His son Richarlyson and his boyfriend Roier are the only ones who know what he is

He gets a job at the Federation to gain information, and with the hopes it’ll reduce any suspicion placed on him - but it potentially does the opposite, now regularly having their eyes on him

When he needs to feed, he tends to target Federation workers to kill two birds with one stone

BadBoyHalo and Tina are demons

They are on earth for different reasons, and they both know about each other

Bad is there to mentor a young demon, Dapper, and teach him about humans

Tina is far more secretive about why she’s living on earth. She’s close friends with Mouse, the only person aside from Bad who knows what she is

Both are close friends (or frenemies in Bad’s case) with Foolish - which becomes potentially dangerous when he gets hired to work for the Federation

Speaking of Foolish, he’s actually merfolk

A shark merman to be specific. He’s also King of the Merfolk, aka KOM. His status grants him immortality and the ability to change his form to have legs. With his long lifespan, the decades he spends in the town are just like a brief vacation to him

Already knows Bad isn’t human - he remembers seeing Bad hanging around on earth a few times over the past hundreds of years. He doesn’t know about Tina

He has a child, his little princess Leo, who likes to hang out with him on land. His husband, Vegetta, tends to spend a lot of time busy in their underwater kingdom

His human roommate, Jaiden, knows about him - they tell each other everything

Joined the Federation both for fun, and like Cellbit to get info and get suspicion off of himself

Philza is an angel

Angel of Death specifically

Feels rather safe despite being a supernatural being due to not being as ‘dangerous’ as others, meaning he likely isn’t a number one target of the Federation. He’s not demonic, legend doesn’t say he lures people to drown in oceans, he doesn’t lose control and attack people, he doesn’t need to go on killing sprees to survive

Not to mention his connection to gods and deities gives him safety and places of refuge

The biggest issue he has is hiding his wings. Aside from that, he’s pretty comfortable living with his human partner and children

Absolutely knows Something Is Up with the other five but doesn’t know for sure what. He’s not a narc, so he doesn’t ask

[wyrmswears]

Alr here comes the "long" ask ig

Thanks to you bringing back my wolf children/werewolves/wolves brainrot, my brain brained a weird lore in my brain about your inhuman thundersnow au.

Remenber this guy? Well yeah, he was the EM of lightning before Libber (also her dad), during the Serpentine War he used his raijū form to fight, even if he was one of the less powerful lightning EM ever seen (based off the color of his lightning being yellow, yellow lightning is less hotter than blue lightning) he took many serpetine down and in general it was like brining a crazy new weapon to the war that suddenly gives certain side a great advantage, ya know, war stuff.

After the war finished, despite him being a good guy. Raijūs started to be seen as horrible bloodthirsty creatures just because of what he did during the war, which wasn't too different to what other EM did is just that he did it as a wolf, even Garmadon thanks to the Great Devouerer venom did worse.

Anyway, people started to get paranoid about raijūs and this caused to some people dedicate most of their time to hunt them down, not all hunters did it because they were corcened or smth but because they simply wanted to have fun killing an exotic species, or simply capturing them for who knows what (maybe using them for taxidermy?? spooky experiments??? biological weapons??? idk)

Slowly the individuals of this species were less and less, until there was only one left, Libber. Her father died and she almost did too, in and the rest is history she leaving Jay with the walkers, etc...

One more species that got extinct thanks to humans.

(this is not my last ask 👹.)

yo this idea is dark af... hell yeah im using it, with some amendments. be warned i also used this ask as an opportunity to do some lore dumping

READ MORE BECAUSE IT GOT LONG

first of all, not all other raijū are gonna be extinct, but their population numbers have dwindled and most of them now avoid interacting with humans. i think it'd be interesting to have the gang meet other raijū at some point so i want to keep the opportunity open :D since they stop interacting with humans though, they are thought to be extinct and aren't really common knowledge among jay's generation.

both raijū and dragon will share this stigma of being dangerous bloodthirsty creatures, given that wu and garmadon also fight in the serpentine war (oni kinda have the stigma engrained in their identity in the ninjago series already ghsghsh and aren't really present in ninjago to most people's knowledge). dragons get off slightly easier however, being considered noble creatures in other legends, but raijū don't have the same reputation and are easier to hunt than dragons so they suffer a greater impact. this stigma is the cause for cole's fear of dragons in s1!

raijū don't make great taxidermy (their corpses eventually dissolve into lightning; full raijū aren't so much comprised of your typical things like flesh and bone), but i can imagine some being captured as living batteriess, although they only have enough power for about a single household, so it would work on a more individual basis than imperium's dragon energy scheme...

i've been having the idea that libber's dad isn't a wolf for his raijū form, but instead a snow leopard! you see, there's not a lot of mythology on raijū recorded online so i'm trying to fit in actual mythos where i can, and raijū aren't limited to a wolf/dog form, but have many four-legged animal forms recorded. i also like the idea of jay and libber's raijū forms looking similar, despite them not looking that similar for two canids, so related raijū in my au don't often have similar animal forms. libber's parents take the form of a snow leopard (in reference to ice who later takes a guardian role of sorts in place of libber's actual father) and a japanese serow.

furthermore, i mentioned this idea in the tags of one of my past posts but for raijū that are elemental masters of lightning, they often die when their child inherits their element. raijū are creatures made of lightning, but for those born with the element of lightning, they don't develop their own lightning because the element more than compensates for the power they need, so when the element is suddenly removed... yeah. so libber's dad is dead Before the main impact of the serpentine war, but perhaps her mother is killed as a result?

jay doesn't have the issue of dying when he loses his element like the bajillion times they do in the series because he's half human! it does mean that the first few times he loses his powers (including contact with vengestone), it feels Extra bad to him because it's literally part of his life-force taken away (i imagine lloyd has a similar effect but by nature of his element instead of his blood), but the longer he is without his power, the more chance his natural lightning has to develop, so by crystallised he can function pretty well without them :]

[riwooga]

Actually you know what, since my art is taking so long have the redesign of the black wolf that I never truly finished but still looks decent in my book!

[hephaestuscrew]

The role of Pryce and Carter's Deep Space Survival Procedure Protocol Manual in the characterisation, symbolism, and themes of Wolf 359

TL;DR: The DSSPPM is used as a tool to help establish and develop Minkowski and Eiffel as characters: Minkowski as a strict Commander who clings to the certainty provided by a rigid source of authority like the DSSPPM, and Eiffel as the anti-authority slacker who strongly objects to the idea that he ought to read the manual. The way their contrasting attitudes towards the DSSPPM manifest through the show reflect their character development and changing dynamic. The DSSPPM can be directly used against the protagonists by those with power over them, and the reveal of its authorship gives a particularly sinister edge to its regular presence in the show. But it can be also be repurposed and seen through an individual interpersonal lens.

Note: There’s plenty that you could say about the DSSPPM through the lens of what it says about Goddard Futuristics as an organisation, or about Pryce and Cutter as people. Or you could talk about Lambert quoting the DSSPPM an absurd number of times in Change of Mind, and Lovelace’s reactions to this. But in this essay, I’ll be analysing on mentions of the DSSPPM with a focus on Minkowski, Eiffel, and their dynamic.

“One of those mandatory mission training things”: the DSSPPM as a tool to establish characterisation

The first mention of Pryce and Carter's Deep Space Survival Procedure Protocol Manual (the DSSPPM) in Wolf 359 is also the very first interaction we hear Eiffel and Minkowski have. In fact, the first time we hear Minkowski's voice at all is her telling Eiffel off for not having read the manual:

[Ep1 Succulent Rat-Killing Tar] MINKOWSKI Eiffel, did you read your copy of Pryce and Carter?  EIFFEL My copy of what?  MINKOWSKI Pryce and Carter's Deep Space Survival Procedure Protocol Manual.  EIFFEL Was that one of those mandatory mission training things?  MINKOWSKI Yes.  EIFFEL In that case, yes, I definitely did.  MINKOWSKI Did you now? Because I happened to find your copy of the D.S.S.P.P.M. floating in the observation deck.  EIFFEL Oh?  MINKOWSKI Still in its plastic wrapping.

This is an effective way to establish their conflicting personalities right out of the gate. Minkowski's determination to "do things by the book - this book in fact" contrasts clearly with Eiffel's professed ignorance about and clear disregard for "this... Jimmy Carter thing”. Purely through their attitudes to this one book, they slot easily into clear archetypes which inevitably clash. Everything about Eiffel in that opening episode sets him up as a slacker who doesn't care about authority, but the image of his mandatory mission training manual floating in the observation deck "still in its plastic wrapping" provides a particularly striking illustration.

By contrast, we immediately encounter Minkowski as a strict leader who cares deeply about making sure everything is done according to protocol; the intense importance she places on the DSSPPM is one of the very first things we know about her. Her insistence on the importance of the survival manual might seem somewhat understandable at first, if perhaps unhelpfully aggressive, but it starts to feel less sensible as soon as we start to hear some of the tips from this manual:

Deep Space Survival Tip Number Five: Remain positive at all times. Maintain a cheerful attitude even in the face of adversity. Remember: when you are smiling the whole world smiles with you, but when you're crying you're in violation of fleet-wide morale codes and should report to your superior officer for disciplinary action.

The strange, controlling, vaguely sinister tone of some of the tips we hear in the first episode is largely played for laughs, emphasised by the exaggeratedly upbeat manner in which Hera reads them. But even these first few tips give us some initial suggestions that the powers behind this mission might not care all that much about the wellbeing of their crew members.

It says something about Minkowski that she places such faith and importance in a book which says things like "Failing to remain calm, could result in your grisly, gruesome death" and "when you're crying you're in violation of fleet-wide morale codes and should report to your superior officer for disciplinary action." (Foreshadowing the Hephaestus Station as the home of immense emotional repression and compartmentalising...) Having those kind of pressures and demands placed on her (and those around her) by people above her in the military hierarchy doesn’t unsettle Minkowski.

Eiffel groans and sighs as he listens to the tips, but Minkowski seems to see this manual as an essential source of wisdom. The main role the manual plays in this episode is to establish Minkowski and Eiffel as contrasting characters with very different approaches to authority and therefore a potential to clash.

When Minkowski demands that Eiffel reads the DSSPPM, he decides to get Hera to read it to him, asking her to keep this as “a 'just the two of us, totally secret, never tell Commander Minkowski' thing”. Eiffel seems convinced that Minkowski won't be happy with him listening to Hera read the DSSPPM rather than reading it himself. This suggests that (at least in Eiffel's interpretation) Minkowski’s orders are not just about her wanting him to know the contents of the manual, since this could theoretically be accomplished just as well by him listening to it. But she wants him to do things in what she’s deemed to be the correct way, to put in the right amount of effort, and not to take what she might see as a shortcut. It’s not just about the contents of the manual; it’s about the commitment to protocol that reading it represents.

“When in doubt: whip it out”: Hilbert’s use of the DSSPPM

In Season 1, the DSSPPM isn't purely associated with Minkowski. Hilbert actually quotes it more than she does in the first few episodes. In Ep2 Little Revolución, Hilbert's response to Eiffel's toothpaste protest is inspired by "Pryce and Carter six fourteen: “When in doubt, whip it out - ‘it’ being hydrochloric acid.”" This tip is absurd in a more direct obvious way than those we heard in Ep1. While this absurdity is partly for humour, it also casts further doubt on the usefulness of this supposedly authoritative survival manual, and therefore on the wisdom of trusting Command.

In Ep4 Cataracts and Hurricanoes, Hilbert starts to quote Tip #4 at Eiffel, who protests "I'm not gonna have one of the last things I hear be some crap from the survival manual". These moments again place Eiffel in clear opposition to the DSSPPM, but also suggest that Hilbert's attitude towards the DSSPPM - and therefore towards Command - is closer to Minkowski's than to Eiffel's.

When Hilbert turns on the Hephaestus crew in his Christmas mutiny, his allegiance to Command is revealed as dangerous. And here the DSSPPM comes up again. As Minkowski dissolves the door between her and Hilbert, she triumphantly echoes his own words back to him: "Pryce and Carter six fourteen: “When in doubt, whip it out - ‘it’ being hydrochloric acid.” Never. Fails." This provides a callback to a previous, more comedic conflict on the Hephaestus, and reminds the listener of a time when Minkowski and Hilbert were working together against Eiffel, in contrast to the current situation of Minkowski and Eiffel versus Hilbert. But it also shows that Minkowski, like Hilbert, is capable of using some of the more absurd DSSPPM tips to defeat an adversary. And it shows Minkowski leaning on those tips in a real moment of crisis.

Once Hilbert has betrayed the crew in order to follow orders from Command, we might look back on his quoting of the DSSPPM as casting the manual in a more sinister light, and again calling into question the wisdom of Minkowski placing such trust in it.

“It's not that I don't believe it, I'm just disgusted by it”: the DSSPPM as an indicator of a changing dynamic

The next mention of the DSSPPM is in Ep17 Bach to the Future:

MINKOWSKI Eiffel's been spot-testing me, Hera. He doesn't believe that I've memorized all of the survival tips in Pryce and Carter. EIFFEL It's not that I don't believe it, I'm just disgusted by it. I keep hoping to discover it's not true. MINKOWSKI Well, believe as little as you want, doesn't change the fact that I do know them. And so should you!

I think this provides an interesting illustration of the way in which Minkowski and Eiffel’s dynamic has developed since Ep1. They still have deeply contrasting attitudes to the DSSPPM, but this contrast is now a source of entertainment between them, rather than merely of conflict.

Given that Hera wasn’t aware of Eiffel testing Minkowski on the tips, we can guess that it’s a game they came up with while Hera was offline. In the midst of all the exhaustion and uncertainty and fear they were dealing with after Hilbert’s mutiny, this was a way they found to pass the time. It must have been Eiffel who suggested it; Minkowski cites his disbelief as the reason for the spot-testing. And yet she plays along, responding each time, even though this activity has no real productive value.

Minkowski is keen to demonstrate that she does know the tips and she emphasises that Eiffel ought to know them too, but their interactions about the DSSPPM in this episode have none of the genuine irritation and frustration that they displayed in Ep1. It feels almost playful and teasing. Eiffel still thinks Minkowski is "completely insane" for learning all the tips and is "disgusted" by her commitment to memorising them, but these comments feel much closer to joking about a friend's weird traits than to insulting a hated coworker's personality. It feels like something has shifted since Eiffel responded to Minkowski’s passion for the DSSPPM by saying “I'm so glad that your shrivelled husk of a dictator's heart is as warm as a decompression chamber”.

Another thing to note here is that Minkowski's respect for the DSSPPM has clearly survived Hilbert's Christmas mutiny and Minkowski's resulting distrust of Command. From Hilbert's behaviour at Christmas, it's clear that the crew's survival is not at the top of Command's priority list. But Minkowski still trusts the book that Command told her to read. She still thinks Eiffel should read it too. The main figures of authority above her are dangerous and untrustworthy, but she still clings to the source of guidance they provided her with.

It's also worth noting that Minkowski has not just learnt the advice in each of the 1001 tips, but she has memorised (nearly) all of them by number. If it was just about the information that the manual provides to inform responses to potentially life-or-death situations, then knowing the numbers wouldn't be necessary. Nor would it be particularly useful to know them all exactly word-for-word. Minkowski's reliance on the DSSPPM is again suggested to be about more than the potential practical use of its content. It's about showing that she is committed and disciplined and up to the task of leading. She does have some awareness of the strangeness of many of the tips, but this doesn't diminish the value of her adherence to the manual for her:

EIFFEL You're insane.  MINKOWSKI I'm disciplined. Although I will admit they do get more... esoteric as you go higher up the list.

There's only one tip Minkowski doesn't seem to remember, and that's revealing too:

EIFFEL 555? Minkowski DRAWS BREATH - and STOPS SHORT. [...] MINKOWSKI Hold on a second, I know this. (beat) Dammit. EIFFEL Hey, look at that! Looks like there may be hope for you yet. MINKOWSKI Quiet, Eiffel. Hera, what's D.S.S.P.P.M. 555? HERA "Good communication habits are key to continued subsistence. Be in touch with other crew members about shipboard activities. Interfacing about possible problems or dangers is the best way to anticipate and prevent them." This hangs in the air for a second. Then – EIFFEL So you forget the one tip in the entire manual that's actually helpful? MINKOWSKI Shut up.

Communication is a key theme of this show, so it’s interesting that this is the one tip Minkowski can’t remember, perhaps indicating an aspect of leadership and teamwork that she doesn’t always prioritise or find easy.

Eiffel saying “Looks like there may be hope for you yet” seems like just a throwaway teasing line, but it’s got a profound edge to it. A lot of Minkowski’s arc is about learning how to provide her own direction and support her crew outside of the systems of authority and hierarchy that she’s grown so attached to. So perhaps Eiffel is right to see a kind of hope in her failure to remember every single DSSPPM tip – she has the potential to break free of her reliance on external authority.

“Which one was 897, what was the exact phrasing of that Deep Space Survival Tip?”: the DSSPPM in interactions with Cutter

The Wolf 359 liveshow, Deep Space Survival Procedure and Protocol, is literally named after the manual. This suggests, before we’ve even heard/watched the episode, that the DSSPPM will be a key symbol here. Which is interesting because I'd say the liveshow has two main plot points: (a) Eiffel's failure to read the DSSPPM or follow orders in general, the resulting disruption to the mission, and his crewmates' frustration with this; and (b) the looming threat of Cutter, the necessity of keeping information from Command, and the risk of fatal mission termination.

Even without the knowledge that Cutter is one of the co-authors of the DSSPPM (which neither the Hephaestus crew nor a first-time listener knows at this point), there's a kind of irony in the contrast between these two plotlines. On the one hand, Minkowski repeatedly berates Eiffel for not having read Pryce and Carter's Deep Space Survival Procedure and Protocol Manual, which was made mandatory by Command. On the other hand, she is aware that Command in general - and Cutter specifically - represents the biggest threat to the safety and survival of her crew.

Cutter uses the DSSPPM against each of the Hephaestus crew in their one-on-one conversations with him. For Minkowski, he uses it as a way of emphasising the expectations and responsibility placed on her:

MINKOWSKI There are always gaps between expectation and reality, but-- CUTTER But it's our job as leaders to close that gap, isn't it? Pryce and Carter...? MINKOWSKI 414, yes. Yes, sir, I know.

Cutter knows that Minkowski will know those tips and he knows abiding by them is important to her. She's quick to demonstrate her knowledge of the DSSPPM and agree with the tip. There's something deeply sinister to me about Cutter's use of the word 'our' here. His phrasing includes them both as leaders who should be ensuring that things are exactly as expected. It’s almost a kind of flattery at her authority, but it comes with impossibly high expectations. This way of emphasising the importance and responsibilities of her role as Commander is a targeted strategy by Cutter at manipulating Minkowski, designed to appeal to her values.

In Hera's one-on-one, Cutter uses a DSSPPM tip to interpret her behaviour and claim that he can read her motives:

CUTTER This thing you're doing. Asking questions while you get your bearings. HERA Sir, I'm just curious about-- CUTTER Pryce and Carter 588: Shows of courtesy and polite queries are an efficient way to gain time necessary to strategize.

Unlike with Minkowski (or Eiffel), Cutter doesn't prompt Hera to demonstrate her knowledge of the manual. That wouldn't work as a power play against Hera, who would be able to recall the manual (or, rather, retrieve the file, however that distinction works within her memory) but who doesn't care about the DSSPPM like Minkowski does. Instead, Cutter implies that Hera’s behaviour can be predicted - or at the very least seen through - by the DSSPPM, which seems like a cruel attempt by Cutter at belittling her.

For Eiffel, Cutter uses the manual as a weapon in a different way again. He asks Eiffel, "which one was 897, what was the exact phrasing of that Deep Space Survival Tip?", something which Eiffel clearly doesn't know, but Cutter of course does. This puts Eiffel on the back foot, trying to defend and justify himself, allowing Cutter to emphasise his position of power yet again.

The DSSPPM plays a double role in the liveshow. On the one hand, as Minkowski reminds Eiffel, proper knowledge of the manual "would've saved [the crew] from these problems with the nav computer" – some of the tips can potentially save the crew a great deal of hassle, stress, and risk. On the other hand, the same manual is used by Cutter to manipulate, unsettle, and intimidate the crew. There are these two sides to the information given to the crew by Command - two sides to the manual which Minkowski still values.

In another duality for the DSSPM, the manual is sometimes used as a symbol of the relationship between the crew members and Command, and sometimes used to indicate the dynamics between the individual crew members, usually Minkowski and Eiffel. Before Cutter’s appearance in the liveshow, Minkowski and Eiffel’s discussions of the DSSPPM reflect interpersonal disagreements between two people with fundamentally different attitudes:

MINKOWSKI Oh come on, why do you think I keep trying to get you to go over these things? Do you think I enjoy going through them? EIFFEL Yes. MINKOWSKI Well, alright, I do. But this knowledge could save your life.

Minkowski enjoys rules, regulations, and certainty, for their own sake as much as for any practical usefulness. Eiffel very much does not. This is a simple clash of individuals, in which the link between the DSSPPM and Command is implicit. Minkowski doesn't seem to question the idea that the information in the DSSPPM is potentially life-saving, even though she knows Command don't care about their lives. But Cutter’s repeated references to the DSSPPM remind us who made that book a mandatory part of mission training – it certainly wasn’t Minkowski, even if she’s often the one attempting to enforce this rule.

At the end of the liveshow, in a desperate attempt to prevent mission termination, Eiffel promises Cutter that he will read the DSSPPM (the liveshow transcript notes that him saying this is "like pulling teeth"), an instance of the manual being used in negotiations between the Hephaestus crew and Command. All Minkowski’s orders weren’t enough to get Eiffel to read that book, but a genuine life-or-death threat might just about be enough. Perhaps it's ironic that Eiffel reads the survival manual out of a desire for survival, not because he thinks the contents of the book will help him survive, but because he’s grasping anything he can offer to buy the crew’s survival from those who created that same book.

In the final scene of the liveshow, Minkowski catches Eiffel reading the DSSPPM, and he fumbles to hide that he's been reading it, a humorous reversal of all the times that he's lied to her that he has read it. Perhaps admitting that he's reading it would be like letting Minkowski win. Minkowski seems to find both surprise and amusement in seeing Eiffel finally reading the manual, but she doesn't push him to admit it. There's some slightly smug but still friendly teasing in the way Minkowski says "were you now?" when Eiffel says that he was just reading something useful. In that final scene, the manual is viewed again through the lens of Minkowski and Eiffel’s dynamic – Command’s relation to the DSSPPM becomes secondary.

“The first thing I'd make damn sure was hard wired into anything that might end up in a situation like this one”: the DSSPPM as a tool of survival

In Ep30 Mayday, when Eiffel is stranded alone on Lovelace’s shuttle, he hallucinates Minkowski to bring him out of his helpless panic and force him into action. And this hallucination also brings with it one of Minkowski’s interests:

MINKOWSKI Eiffel... I worked on this shuttle. Reprogramming that console. EIFFEL So? How does that help – MINKOWSKI Think about it. BEAT. And then he gets it. EIFFEL Oh goddammit. MINKOWSKI What's the first thing that I would do when programming a flight computer? The first thing I'd make damn sure was hard wired into anything that might end up in a situation like this one? EIFFEL Pyrce and Carter's Deep Space Survival Procedure and Protocol Manual.

Again, a conversation about the DSSPPM gives us an indication of the development of Minkowski and Eiffel’s relationship. Not only does Eiffel imagine Minkowski as a figure of (fairly aggressive) support when he’s stranded and alone, he thinks about what advice she’d give him and he follows it. Rather than dismissing the manual entirely, he looks for tips that are relevant to his situation. He’s not pleased about his hallucinated-Minkowski trying to get him to read the DSSPPM, but that was what his mind gave him in an almost hopeless situation. Some part of him now empathises with Minkowski’s priorities in a way that he definitely wasn’t doing in Ep1. He thinks that the DSSPPM might be on the shuttle because he knows the manual is important to Minkowski. It’s by imagining Minkowski that he gets himself to read the manual in order to see if it can help him survive – he certainly doesn’t think about what Cutter or anyone else from Command would tell him to do.

In the end, the tips Eiffel picks out aren’t all that helpful or informative: “Confront reality head-on”; “In an emergency, take stock of the tools at your disposal. Then take stock again. Restock. Repurpose. Reuse. Recycle."; and “"In times of trouble, an idle mind is your worst enemy”. But Eiffel does use these tips to structure his initial thinking about how to survive on Lovelace’s shuttle. In an almost entirely hopeless situation, Eiffel finds some value in the DSSPPM. But since the tips he picks out are mostly platitudes, the actual wisdom that allows him to survive all comes from his own mind; the tips, like his hallucinations, are just a tool he uses to externalise his process of figuring out what to do.

“Wasn't there something about this in the survival manual?”: Minkowski potentially moving away from the DSSPPM

Given the significance of the DSSPPM in Season 1 and 2 to Minkowski in particular, it feels notable when the manual isn’t referenced. Unless I've missed something (and please let me know if I have), Minkowski – the real one, not Eiffel’s hallucination - doesn't bring up the manual of her own accord at all in Seasons 3 or 4. This might make us wonder if she’s moved away from her trust in and reliance on that book provided by Command.

Perhaps the arrival of the SI-5, which highlights to Minkowski that the chain of command is not a good indicator of trustworthy authority, was the final straw. Or perhaps the apparent loss of Eiffel - and any subsequent questioning of her leadership approach, or realisations about the valuable perspective Eiffel provided - were what finally broke down her faith in that book.

Alternatively, perhaps Minkowski still trusts the DSSPPM as much as ever, but trying to get Eiffel or any of the other crew members to listen to it is a losing battle that she no longer sees as a priority. Either way, Minkowski’s apparent reluctance to bring up the DSSPPM feels like a shift in her approach. 

The associations between Minkowski and the DSSPPM are still there in Season 3, but they are raised by other characters, not by Minkowski herself. The manual is used to emphasise Eiffel’s difficulties when he’s put in charge of trying to get Maxwell and Hera to fill out a survey in Ep32 Controlled Demolition. Trying to force other people to be productive pushes Eiffel into some very uncharacteristic behaviour:

EIFFEL Jesus Christ, what is wrong with you? It's like you've never even read Pryce and Carter! Tip #490 very clearly states that – He trails off. After a BEAT – HERA Officer Eiffel? MAXWELL You, uh, all right there? EIFFEL (the horror) What have I become? [...] Eiffel, now wrapped up in a blanket, is next to Lovelace. He is still very clearly shaken. EIFFEL ... and... it was like an episode of the Twilight Zone. I was slowly transforming into Commander Minkowski. [...] It was a nightmare! A terrifying, bureaucratic nightmare!

This is a funny role reversal, but it shows us the strength of Eiffel’s association between Minkowski and the DSSPPM, as well his extreme aversion to finding himself in a strict bureaucratic leadership position. It also suggests that becoming extremely frustrated when trying to get other people to do what you want might make anyone resort to relying on an external source of authority, such as the manual. I don’t know whether this experience helps Eiffel empathise with Minkowski, but perhaps it might give us some insight into how her need for authority and control in the leadership role she occupied might have reinforced her deference to the DSSPPM.

In Ep34, we get a suggestion of another character having a strong association between the DSSPPM and Minkowski. After the discovery of Funzo, Hera asks Minkowski what the manual says about it:

HERA Umm... I don't know if this is a good idea. Lieutenant, wasn't there something about this in the survival manual? MINKOWSKI Pryce and Carter 792: Of all the dangers that you will face in the void of space, nothing compares to the existential terror that is Funzo.

It’s interesting to me that Hera asks Minkowski here. We know from Ep1 that “Pryce and Carter's Deep Space Survival Procedure Protocol Manual is among the files [Hera has] access to”. Two possible reasons occur to me for why Hera might ask Minkowski about the DSSPPM tip here. One possibility is that Hera thinks that retrieving the manual from her databanks and finding the correct tip would take her more time than it would take for Minkowski to just remember the tip. Which suggests interesting things about the nature of Hera’s memory, but also implies that - at least in Hera's view -Minkowski’s knowledge of the DSSPPM is more reliable than that of a supercomputer.

The other possibility is that Hera could have recalled the relevant DSSPPM tip incredibly quickly but she doesn’t want to, maybe because she resents having that manual in her head in the first place, or maybe because she wants to show respect for Minkowski’s knowledge as a Commander. Either way, we can see that Hera – like Eiffel – strongly associates Minkowski with the DSSPPM.

And Minkowski, even if she wasn’t the one to bring up the manual here, recalls the relevant tip immediately. Perhaps she is moving away from her trust in that manual, but everything that she learned as part of her old deference to the authority of Command is still there in her head. She might want to forget it by the end of the mission, but that’s not easily achieved. The way Minkowski’s friends/crewmates associate the manual with her emphasises the difficulty she’ll face if she tries to move away from it.

“One thousand and one pains in my ass”: The authorship of the DSSPPM

In Ep55 A Place for Everything, Eiffel effectively expresses his long-held dislike of the DSSPPM when he comes face-to-face with both of its authors:

EIFFEL What? What the hell are - wait a minute - Pryce? As in one thousand and one pains in my ass, Pryce? (sudden realization) Which... makes you...? MR. CUTTER (holding out his hand) W.S. Carter, pleased to meet you. 

It’s significant that the two ‘big bads’ of the whole series are the authors of the manual which Minkowski and Eiffel were bickering about all the way back in Ep1. It’s not the only way in which the message of this show positions itself firmly against just accepting externally imposed authority and hierarchy without question or evidence, but it does reinforce this ethos.

By being the authors of the manual, Cutter and Pryce have had a sinister hidden presence throughout the show. Long before we know who Pryce is and even before we hear Cutter’s name, their manual is there, occupying a prominent place in Minkowski’s motivations and priorities, and in her arguments with Eiffel. It’s not at all comparable to what Pryce put in Hera’s mind, but it is another way in which these antagonists have wormed their way into the heads of our protagonists.

Minkowski will have to come to terms with the fact that the 1001 tips she spent hours memorising and reciting were written by two people who would have killed her, her crew, and even the whole human race without hesitation if it served their purposes. We never get to hear Minkowski’s reaction to learning the identities of Pryce and Carter, but I think processing the role of their manual in her life will be a long and difficult road that’ll tie into a lot of other emotional processing she needs to do. Her assertion to Cutter that, without him, she is “Renée Minkowski... and that is more than enough to kick your ass!” feels like part of that journey. She doesn’t mention the DSSPPM at all in Season 4. She’s growing beyond it.

"Doug Eiffel's Deep Space Survival Guide": The DSSPPM as a weapon against those who wrote it

Last but not least, I couldn’t write about Eiffel and the DSSPPM without mentioning this scene from  Ep58 Quiet, Please:

EIFFEL As someone once told me: "Pryce and Carter 754: In an emergency, take stock of the tools at your disposal, then take stock again. Repurpose, reuse, recycle." And right now? You know what I got? I got this lighter from when Cutter was using me as his personal cabana boy. [...] and I've got myself this big, fat copy of the Deep Space Survival Manual, and you know what I'm gonna do with it? [...] Eiffel STRIKES THE LIGHTER. And LIGHTS THE BOOK ON FIRE, revealing Pryce just a few feet away from him! EIFFEL I am going to repurpose it... and reuse it... and recycle it into a GIANT FIREBALL OF DEATH! And he swings the flaming book forward, HITTING PRYCE ON THE SIDE OF THE HEAD. [...] EIFFEL That's right! Doug Eiffel's Deep Space Survival Guide, B-

No one other than Doug Eiffel could pull off the chaotic energy of this moment. It doesn’t get much more anti-authority than lighting the mandatory mission manual on fire and using it as a weapon against one of its malevolent authors. It might not be the wisest move safety-wise, and it certainly doesn’t improve the situation when the node gets jettisoned into space. But there is still a powerful symbolism in taking a symbol of the hierarchical forces that have tried to constrain you for years and setting it alight to fight back against those forces. Eiffel takes his own approach to survival and puts his own name into the title, an assertion of his agency and rejection of Command's authority.

The DSSPPM tip that he uses here is one of those he considers when stranded on Lovelace’s shuttle. It’s understandable that after that experience it might have stuck in his memory.

I can’t help feeling that the line “as someone once told me” has a double meaning here. The immediate implication is to interpret “someone” as being Pryce and Cutter – it’s their manual after all – which makes this line a fairly effective ‘fuck you’ gesture, emphasising how Eiffel is using Pryce’s manual against her in both an abstract and a physical sense.

But I think “someone” could also mean Minkowski. Eiffel uses a singular rather than plural term, there’s already an association established between Minkowski and the DSSPPM, and, in Mayday, it’s his hallucination of Minkowski that gets him to read this tip. She's probably also recited this tip to him at other points as well. Under this interpretation, this line is as much a gesture of solidarity with Minkowski as it is a taunt to Pryce. I like the idea that these two interpretations can run alongside each other, reflecting the duality of the use of the DSSPPM that I talked about in relation to the liveshow.

Conclusion

The DSSPPM is a symbol of external rules imposed on people by those with power over them. These rules can be strange, arbitrary, and even sinister, but for those with a desire for certainty and control, like Minkowski, they can be tempting. And they can have their uses, as well as the potential to be repurposed. Attitudes towards these rules provide an effective shorthand as part of Minkowski and Eiffel’s characterisation. And the clash between these attitudes, and how that clash manifests, can tell us something about how the dynamic between those characters develops and changes.

[fingertipsmp3]

Should I just write my cowboy falls in love with a werewolf idea. I’m starting to think it’s the only fun idea I’ve had recently

[dirt-str1der]

Sagawa is unfuckable in my head but in my heart he and nishitani had something embarrassing going on

[werecreature-addicted]

Rabbit monsters are always portrayed as soft docile creatures. Especially for rabbit reader x wolf monster. I wanna see a rabbit who is just a menace in bed. Pounding into our cunts non stop and making sure that we truly “fuck like rabbits” and breed like them too

mmhmm you get me anon.

you've long since given up on holding yourself upright, and just settled for getting pounded into the mattress your body fully limp. you aren't even holding your own hips up, your bunny lover is holding your ass aloft as he pounds into you cumming inside of you for what feels like the hundredth time tonight. The sheets are wet beneath you with a mix of sweat and cum. you're too spent to even care, you'd fall asleep in this gross puddle if he just let you.

He winds his fingers under your jaw and pulls your head back and up, pressing a soft kiss on your forehead. it would be sweet if you didn't know it was a trap.

"you can go one more round for me yeah pretty girl?" he asks, slowly humping your sensitive cunt, How is he still hard? How does he not need a break he just came? you groan and shake your head.

"Please, honey? just one more time I promise you just feel so good, I wanna make sure I fuck this pussy right, get you nice and full with my cum, don't you want me to knock you up?" he asks reaching down to slowly pet your throbbing clit, making you whimper in overstimulation. his thrusts are shallow, his long thick cock scraping along your inner walls making your thighs tremble. his head drops and he scrapes his sharp teeth along your neck. "Please bunny let me make you feel good."

"j-just one more round that's all," you manage to mumble out, the second you've given him permission he shoves your head back down and slams into you, his strong thighs pistoning his big cock into you at a breakneck speed.

"Fuck- thank you baby you feel so good around my cock I couldn't hold back much longer," he groans humping you sloppily, his last load drooling out of your sloppy cunt down your thighs. that's alright, he'll cum enough to replace everything that went to waste.

[buckyalpine]

In some universe I like to think Bucky likes to fuck. Hard. He holds back when he has his hands all over your body and he's trying desperately to shut out the monster in his brain screaming to ravage you because he. Wants. To. Fuck.

There are days where he wants that tender loving and he wants to be soft and sweet but on others?

The release feels to good and in that moment he's in full control, chasing that pleasure, hyper focused on the way his cockhead is dripping and swollen, more sensitive than ever. Its throbbing and his veins are pumping all the blood to his rock hard cock.

At first he does a good job of hiding it.

But then the mask begins to fall.

Primal urges want to take over but how can he ruin his sweet little bunny whose laying under him, moaning and looking at him with doe eyes.

How can he-

"Buck?"

Bucky's hips stutter at the sound of your soft voice laced with concern, your hand coming to cup his cheek.

"You okay?" You can tell he's not all there, his movements hesitant, body too stiff. You're plaint under him but his muscles are tight, jaw clenched. "What's wrong Jamie"

Jamie. The name you had for him alone made him want to fuck you till all you could do was scream his-

"We can stop if-

"No-" Bucky cuts you off before you could continue, petting your head reassuringly, "Everything's fine doll, promise" He pecks a kiss to your nose making you blink and it some how makes him harder. You're so trusting, spreading out naked on his bed, completely unsuspecting of all the dirty things he really wanted to do to you. You were checking in on him to see if he's okay, not having a clue he wanted to rail you so hard, you'd forget how to speak. Pound you till you were begging for him to stop because there was too much cum for your tiny cunt to handle and his heavy balls would still be aching for release.

"You can tell me" You whisper, wiggling from under him to wrap your soft thighs around his waist, stroking his scruffy cheek. "Please?"

Bucky doesn't think he can hide his needs for much longer. Not when your scent is all over him now; on his pillow, the sheets, its soaked onto his skin with how closely your naked bodies are pressing against each other. How can he be expected to have any self-control when you're looking up at him like that like a sweet little bunny caught in the wolfs den, cuddling into her predators chest.

"You really want to know?" His voice was husky, letting his nose trail along the column of your neck, breathing in your sweet smell, letting his tongue dart out to taste your sweat slicked skin. The action makes you gasp, clenching around him with a whimper, your eyes growing wide when a growl emits from deep in his chest, "Are you sur you really want to know?"

"Y-yes" You nod, your breath hitching in your throat at the dark smirk that appears on his face as his hand snakes up to softly clasp around your throat.

"I want to ruin you bunny" Bucky's nose nudges against your affectionately before leaning down to nip your pouty bottom lip.

"R-ruin?" You whisper, a wave of slick soaking his cock further which doesn't go unnoticed by him. He experimentally draws his hips back and snaps them forward, hitting your cervix, the salacious moan you let out driving him feral.

"I want to fuck. Promise I'll make love to you after but I want to fuck you pretty girl" He squeezes your throat a little tighter, moving to graze his teeth along your jaw. "Will you let me? Fuck this pretty little pussy?"

The breathy yes you let out is all he needs.

And fuck you he does.

-

"J-JAMIEE"

"That's it-scream-scream for me!" He roars, his fingers digging into the flesh of your hips and he pulls you back to meet his thrusts, his balls slapping your clit each time. He has you on your hands and knees though your arms gave way, your face pressed against the mattress. He brings his leg up to get a deeper angle and the feeling causes white spots to blur you vision.

"M-more-Wan' more" You weakly beg, tears streaming down your face in pleasure, your entire body being held up by his grip as he takes you from behind.

"Greedy slut, begging for more as if she isn't already full of cock and cum" Bucky gritted out, having already emptied himself in your once, your combined slick making it easier for him to pound you. "Just a hole for me to fuck, you're just here to get me off aren't you baby, just a tight little pussy for me to stuff my dick into"

"Ye-ah" You hiccup, overstimulated from the orgasms he's pulled from your body left, right and center. "So-so-good"

"S'good huh, gotta keep you well fucked for my fat cock bunny" You have no idea where he got such a filthy mouth from, another orgasm building in your belly from his words alone, "Can feel you getting tight again, lookit you cumming all over me baby, messy girl, soaking me"

You can't respond aside from wailing with pleasure, trickles of squirt wetting his thighs, the sight making his balls pull towards his body.

"That's it, good girl, fuck gonna cum bunny, gonna give you my cum and keep fucking it back into you, keep you nice and full of me" He rails you faster, the serum in his veins pumping, sweat dripping down his body. He feels impossibly hot, head thrown back as immense pleasure shoots down his spine, his pace growing sloppy. There's not a single thought in his brain other than busting load after load in your sopping cunt till his cock his soft. He doesn't care that it almost hurts, overstimulated himself, panting and rutting into you, he's so far gone, his deep moans slipping into a whimper as his cock starks to leak, he's so close-

"OH-FUCKK" Hot ropes of his spend shoot from his tip as he lets his body fall on top of you, humping and rutting himself till he's all empty, "y'feel to good, can't even stop, holy shit" He moans into your neck, suckling at your pulse point while you writhe under him feeling his cum seep out of you. His movements slow till there's nothing left, his sensitive length still tucked between your folds, pink and soft and wet with your cream. He carefully moves you so you're resting on the pillows, his cool metal hand brushing your forehead.

"Come back to me bunny" Bucky coos, chuckling at your dazed state, your eyes still unfocused, panting and blindly reaching for him, "M'right here babygirl, c'mhere, I got you" He cradles your soft body close to his, kissing your hairline. "Did so good for me princess, so so proud of you"

You let out a sleepy yawn, curling up on his chest like a content kitten, closing your eyes while nuzzling into him. You've never looked so peaceful and happy and Bucky can tell just by your happy little sigh you want more of what he gave you.

[malkaviian]

I've having brainrot over Fredgolden since yesterday

[withleeknow]

Lee Minho/Know + “quit it or i’ll bite.” + “do it. i dare you.” + suggestive

Thank you if you take this request!!! Up to you who's doing the biting :)

feline tendencies. (m)

pairing: minho x f!reader genre/warnings: established relationship, fluff, suggestive (probably a teeny bit more than suggestive), minors dni; practically dry humping, biting kink??, mimo's pecs (yes they deserve their own warning) word count: 0.9k

as always, i’d appreciate any thoughts or comments you may have, and please drop a like and/or reblog if you enjoy reading ♡

navigation › masterlist › ko-fi

"quit it or i'll bite," minho grumbles, wriggling away from you in an attempt to ward your paws off him. "jesus, what's gotten into you?"

"i wish you would," you mutter, crawling toward him again to lay your head on him once more. the man is reading his book, just trying to enjoy his saturday afternoon and yet there's a menace quite literally in his lap, making grabby hands at him. disrupting his peace and quiet, though that's not really anything new.

"insatiable," minho tsks, his fingers carding through your hair, lightly massaging your scalp as he makes an effort to appease you. his attention is then promptly returned to the pages in front of him.

that's how your weekends are usually spent - lounging about, being lazy together, relaxing by each other's side.

you're just acting up today.

your twitchy fingers have a mind of their own. they dance up his stomach, over his abs until they reach their desired destination.

you place your entire hand over one of his pecs and squeeze, giggling to yourself when you feel his skin under your palm. this earns you a glare though it doesn't faze you.

minho may be scary to other people, but never when he's with you. it's just physically impossible, even if he wanted to.

"seriously, what is with you?"

you give his chest another tender squeeze. "boobs," you say simply. you think that's a pretty good explanation.

maybe you're no better than a man after all.

so it started a couple of weeks ago.

minho rarely skips going to the gym and while you are eternally grateful for it, you must admit that sometimes it drives you a little crazy. you respect his commitment, the consistency of his workout regimen (this could never be you, but that's beside the point); it's one of the traits that you admire most about him - he sees things through and adheres to the schedule that he makes for himself. minho doesn't half-ass the things he does or ditches them when he's feeling a little lazy (unlike you).

however...

it's this same dedication to his routine that's been sending you into a frenzy. lately, your boyfriend has been focused on working a particular area of his body and honestly? it's making you spiral more than you have ever spiraled.

chest. who knew it would be your downfall?

when minho came home last evening straight from the gym, you swear you almost passed out the second he walked through the door. his pecs looked especially good even under his shirt that you practically salivated, shamelessly ogling him like a hungry wolf.

minho sighs as if he's at his wits' end with you, though this time, he lets you continue feeling him up. "you wouldn't like it if i did the same thing to you, now would you?"

"actually, i think i would like that very much."

"i will bite you, no joke."

you have no doubt that he actually would. but again, that isn't something that you would been entirely opposed to either. you might be one of the only people on planet earth who can handle lee minho.

"your feline tendencies are jumping out," you comment, your hand still on his chest, alternating between playful pokes and full on kneading his pecs like dough. "do it. i dare you."

minho bares his teeth at you in the cat-like way that he sometimes does. it's cute, oh so cute.

before you know it, the book is haphazardly flung onto the carpeted floor (bookmark be damned) and your boyfriend is forcing a yelp from your lips when he practically pounces on you. your head is no longer on his lap; instead, he's got you pinned underneath him, his hips flushed against yours.

you can feel him through his sweats. delectable.

minho leans in until his lips ghost over yours. "stop testing me," he murmurs.

"stop tempting me," you shoot back.

"but i'm not though?"

"your boobs are."

"my god." he lowers his head to your neck, his soft lips brushing against your exposed skin as he chuckles. "that's not what they are."

"they might as well be. they're gonna be bigger than mine one day."

the sound coming from his mouth morphs into a laugh, airy and completely defeated by your words. "god, you're just so..."

"i'm so what?"

"weird," minho says.

you smile. "perfect for you then, aren't i?"

"mhmm."

then he's closing the gap between his mouth and your neck, lightly sucking on your skin as he rolls his hips against your body, spreading your legs open so he could slot between them more comfortably, so he could fit against you perfectly.

"oh," you gasp when he ruts forward, presses himself into the warmth between your thighs, over your shorts and his sweats. you weave your fingers through his hair to keep his head close to your neck as if he has any intention on moving elsewhere. minho continues to kiss and lick at your skin, nibbling on it gently in alternation.

"i thought..." you breathe out heavily, your body starting to move against his too, "thought you promised to bite me."

"promised? it was more of a threat, wasn't it?"

"same difference."

you can't see him, but you can just bet that minho is rolling his eyes. then, you feel his teeth graze the skin of your neck like he's deciding where the best spot would be. he presses his hard pecs tightly against yours as his mouth closes in. you almost fall apart right then and there.

well, this certainly awakened something in you, didn't it?

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all rights reserved © withleeknow. reposting, translating and/or modifying is not permitted by any means. [posted 20.01.2024]