#we’ll have to see

[mediumgayitalian]

The crooked, creaky door of the cluttered infirmary storage room pushes open and slams shut in the span of a second, just barely allowing someone to dart through. Nico jumps, banging his head on the shelf he’s hiding under, chomping full force on his lip to bite back a shout. The shadows, on lucky reflex, bend around him and shroud his face. The rest of him he tucks further into the forgotten corner between two filing cabinets, holding his breath.

Under the unflattering light of the single swinging lightbulb, Will looks dull.

A thin headband attempts to hold back his frizzy hair, although it does very little. Curls stick out oddly and many shorter hairs are plastered to his temples and the back of his neck. His skin is unusually lacklustre, even pale, except for the high flush around his cheekbones. The bruising under his eyes rivals Nico’s. He has been wearing the same scrubs for the last two days.

With one last look at the closed door, nothing but garbled voices filtering through the heavy wood, he slumps. He drops his face into his chapped and bleeding hands, heels pressed into his eyes, and holds them there for ten seconds, twenty. Slowly, with trembles so minute they are at first glance unnoticeable, his shoulders begin to shake. The long fingers flexed and tensed around his forehead curl tightly, and he twitches, whole body trembling, teeth sunk hard into his bottom lip to stop his chin from quivering.

It does not work.

The first sob is quiet. He catches it quickly, forcing it back down, breathing heavily through his nose and out his mouth to beat it back. The second follows quickly, though, and it’s harder to choke down. When his face crumples, his resolve goes with it, and his knees hit the floor, sharp crack swallowed by the stillness of the room. He curls forward until his nose nearly hits his knees, hands sliding through his hair and over his ears and settling finally clutching together in the dip of his chest, bouncing with every heave of his chest. It’s quiet, his crying, enough that every dropped tear can be heard as it hits the dusty floor. The only time his sobs are ever audible is when he opens his mouth, trying desperately to soak up enough air to catch himself, to carry himself through.

Mute horror holds Nico’s tongue hostage.

He’d escaped in here the second Will had been called away this morning, dragged for the umpteenth time to handle a crashing patient or a complicated hymn or to soothe someone’s nerves. For the past two days he’s been doing his best to monitor Nico and a handful of other front liners who’d exhausted themselves in battle, but his focus has been split and the infirmary has been crowded. Whenever he runs off to put out whatever fire had cropped up — sometimes literally — the whispers start, the glances, the skin crawling up Nico’s back. Nico can hardly tell anymore what’s the shadows and what’s the people around him, watching him out of the corners of their eyes like they’re waiting for him to bust out a scythe and a black hooded cloak and start reaping.

The storage room is supposed to be an escape. Out of the way and forgotten as it is, it is supposed to be the place he can hide for an hour, escape the heavy gaze of the rest of the camp, collect himself before braving it all again.

Clearly, though, he’s not the only one who thinks so.

There’s something disorienting about seeing Will Solace cry. In the few times Nico has spoken with him during his visits to camp, he’s been a barely-contained explosion of energy, whether talking Nico’s ear off with updates about people he barely knows and references he hardly understands or cussing him out for overextending himself. He’s used — as much as he can be to someone he’s only beginning to really get to know — to his wildly flailing hands and widely playful grin, his loud drawling voice, his painful, constant brightness.

His hands, now, clench until they’re bloodless, trembling. There is no hint of his wide smile or twinkling eyes, because his face is hidden by all the hair that his given up on the pretence of the hairband, and the only sound from him are his gasping breaths and swallowed-back sobs. Nico watches him because he cannot look away. He flinches because every cry, every rough, scraping inhale, sounds like shattering rock, like an iceberg breaking off a glacier.

A quiet beeping startles them both.

For a stretch of time Will is motionless. The beeping continues, steady and soft, bouncing off the cluttered shelves and fading before they echo. After the third round — and Nico counts, if anything for something to do besides watch the chafed skin on Will’s hands crack and bleed with every flex — he drags himself upright, nails drawing lines in the thick dust of the floorboards, and rests back on his heels. He breathes for a moment, shuddering, hands pressed flat to his face; in, beep, beep, beep; out, beep, beep, beep. None of his breaths are ever steady, but he wastes no more time, swiping under his eyes and pinching his cheeks to restore his face to some of its usual colour. He grips onto each board of the shelf to his right as he yanks himself upwards, hand over hand, until he’s stretched, finally, to stand, although there remains a slouch to his broad shoulders.

The beeping continues, emanating from the watch on his left hand, growing softer or louder as he trails his fingers over the shelves from one end to the other, from the first, the second, the third. He pauses finally on a collection of bottles, turning them carefully to read the labels, then tucks them each gently into his already bulging pockets until he is left with what he must carry between his fingers.

The shadows bend to cover Nico again as Will turns, unknowingly facing him, and pulls himself suddenly straight-backed, chin set high, shoulders squared. He smiles, wide, fractured, squinting his eyes deliberately. The beeping stops. He breathes, in, smile, out, nod, and turns, striding, back to the door, opening it with flourish and swiping the dust off his clothes.

“Found them! Sorry it took so long, I really had to look —”

The door swings shut behind him, cutting off the rest of his sentence.

Nico stares at it with bile churning in his too-empty stomach.

———

art by the incredible @clingonlikeclingwrap

[hotcheetohatredwastaken]

@somer-writes well here we go, got some chili from Publix lmao

... I'll give it an 8/10

[serpentineshine]

What if I made a devastating but brightly colored vashwood animation to summerboy by lady gaga, what then, huh?

[anderscim]

looking at some of the details of the music video again—the dev literally has to be japanese ain’t no way /nsrs /lh /j

(i’ll explain (-.-;)

[marmot-bee-person]

My brain won’t shut up about some weird Ducktales-Gravity Falls crossover.

[missmaniac25]

Ok i am actually so excited for the Aniteez characters because! I have a little canvas with Skzoo’s faces on that i made and i’ve been wanting to make something ateez related too but didnt know what - and now i do!!!

Just need to decide if I want to do it similar or a bit different

[threephantomrey]

the fact that i’ve never written a fic including Mortifer is kind of shocking. i had to leave him out of my 13 Ghosts timeline cause of everything else that was already in there. so due to all of that i felt like he wouldn’t fit in there so i had to leave him out. maybe i’ll include him in that 13 Ghosts AU i wanna write sometime this year.

[cryptidheights]

Today I will be trying rum raisin ice cream for the first time, we’ll see if it’s up to snuff

[starsisbig]

I love fearne for the way she interacts with her people. the crownkeepers and bells hells. her fey curiosity and disinterest in grander machinations. the ‘baby in the cage’ situation where releasing it (a deadly monster) would be dangerous as fuck for everyone but she hates leaving it captured yadda yadda

my point. I love callowmoore but her obsessive behavior extends beyond ashton. she’s curious, she likes their sparkly brain, steals from them and they steal from her (or try to), shes vengeful and heals him after he’s nuked by the caster.

she also watches laudna as she sleeps, makes sashimi a wig and sets them up in a provocative position to delight her. she watches FCG in their sleep, looking for buttons and tracing the blades of grass on his front. she flirts with chetney, makes plans to fuck him, flirts with Pretty and is upset when he breaks up with her

(And Don’t get me started on the exu trio. codependency up the wazoo)

I don’t know. I don’t get the feeling that they’re heading toward a romantic relationship. i think she collects things that are beautiful and (like Anjali said in the exu wrap up) she acts purely on her id. does this make me feel good? I want it and I will have it cuz it’s pretty.

Truly I think she’s fascinated by ashton to a large degree. (In a similar, less intense way she is fascinated with the other members of the party). Their relationship is so important to me, I don’t think ash has had someone pay such specific attention to him, like, ever. Cuz he’s pretty. And that dynamic is so beautiful so amazing but I don’t know if it’s romantic (yet)

[violetsteve]

So I just read the second fic after the make out fic (I don't know if it had a name oops), and then Sometimes by MUNA (a cover of Britney) came on Spotify and like, it's such a direct opposite of Eddie's entire vibe but also lyrically I feel like it fit him to a tee? Like, exactly what Steve was talking about to Robin? Anyway I just needed to share that, do with it what you will ... (PS both fic were lovely!)

First of all, thank you so much 🥺 Im glad you enjoyed them!!! It does technically have a name, but they’re just song lyrics bc I’m unoriginal and tbh I just refer to it as “the make out fic companion fic” (the make out fic also has a title but like…that’s also not as fun as referring to it as the make out fic).

ANYWAY. Yes!!!! Oh my gosh EXACTLY!!! Honestly you are soooo valid for this because that’s 100% the headspace I think Eddie is in with Steve and that song represents it flawlessly. I thought about playing more with that dynamic in the companion fic but I just thought it would be too complicated and messy since it was from Robin’s POV. It would be fun to play around with, though, I think…

[transphilza]

i figure the last wilbur lore stream is going to be in august because he told eret to open the book in august... i'm on the edge of my SEAT though. im not ready :((( in the meantime do you have any predictions/thoughts about the upcoming stream with niki? <33 i have no idea how it's gonna go tbh it could go a million different directions and i'm not sure if i like any of em

i’m trying not to make too many predictions, so honestly i just have my same broad hopes and thoughts as always. i hope we keep on the path of wilbur apologizing for his actions (instead of apologizing for Being Mentally Ill, which i’m very very happy we haven’t steered into the territory of) and i hope we also keep on the path of wilbur slowly but surely starting to acknowledge his own suffering, past or current

[poorly-drawn-ace-attorney]

today: maya in the snow again

[the-travelling-witch]

sagau from my understanding is;

self aware genshin alternative universe

hope that helps !!

it does,, kinda jsjsh

i might have more questions than before but if i do ever write any of my creator! reader thoughts down, i’m just going to do some investigating on my own <3

[rosesradio]

i know we were all disappointed by vol 2 when it comes to our fan theories and things about will being vecna’d and stuff…but you gotta admit, dragging all that main character will potential into s5 and spending more time on it than we would’ve gotten in vol 2…i just hope the payoff is worth it 👀

[starlypenguins]

Alright we got $50 added to my steam account

Time to take advantage of the summer sale

[gvmdisease]

so but if a health update it’s been about three or four weeks since i’ve been taking my supplements and shit and guess what…

IT DOESNT WORK ALL THAT WELL WOOOOO

my dizzy spells have gone down a little but they’re still very there chronic fatigue is still very there joint pain is still very there i’ve been sleeping a bit better but still wake up feeling exhausted so i’m not sure what happening i was supposed to feel better after a week..

i have another appointment in like a week and a half to go over my labs maybe draw more blood possibly get my heart monitor and try and figure out if there’s anything else we can do until my heart monitors done collecting it’s data so i’m really ready to stop feeling like this and i wanna know how to get it to stop