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mostlysignssomeportents · 11 months ago

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It all started with a mouse

For the public domain, time stopped in 1998, when the Sonny Bono Copyright Act froze copyright expirations for 20 years. In 2019, time started again, with a massive crop of works from 1923 returning to the public domain, free for all to use and adapt:

https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2019/

No one is better at conveying the power of the public domain than Jennifer Jenkins and James Boyle, who run the Duke Center for the Study of the Public Domain. For years leading up to 2019, the pair published an annual roundup of what we would have gotten from the public domain in a universe where the 1998 Act never passed. Since 2019, they've switched to celebrating what we're actually getting each year. Last year's was a banger:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/20/free-for-2023/#oy-canada

But while there's been moderate excitement at the publicdomainification of "Yes, We Have No Bananas," AA Milne's "Now We Are Six," and Sherlock Holmes, the main event that everyone's anticipated arrives on January 1, 2024, when Mickey Mouse enters the public domain.

The first appearance of Mickey Mouse was in 1928's Steamboat Willie. Disney was critical to the lobbying efforts that extended copyright in 1976 and again in 1998, so much so that the 1998 Act is sometimes called the Mickey Mouse Protection Act. Disney and its allies were so effective at securing these regulatory gifts that many people doubted that this day would ever come. Surely Disney would secure another retrospective copyright term extension before Jan 1, 2024. I had long arguments with comrades about this – people like Project Gutenberg founder Michael S Hart (RIP) were fatalistically certain the public domain would never come back.

But they were wrong. The public outrage over copyright term extensions came too late to stave off the slow-motion arson of the 1976 and 1998 Acts, but it was sufficient to keep a third extension away from the USA. Canada wasn't so lucky: Justin Trudeau let Trump bully him into taking 20 years' worth of works out of Canada's public domain in the revised NAFTA agreement, making swathes of works by living Canadian authors illegal at the stroke of a pen, in a gift to the distant descendants of long-dead foreign authors.

Now, with Mickey's liberation bare days away, there's a mounting sense of excitement and unease. Will Mickey actually be free? The answer is a resounding YES! (albeit with a few caveats). In a prelude to this year's public domain roundup, Jennifer Jenkins has published a full and delightful guide to The Mouse and IP from Jan 1 on:

https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/mickey/

Disney loves the public domain. Its best-loved works, from The Sorcerer's Apprentice to Sleeping Beauty, Pinnocchio to The Little Mermaid, are gorgeous, thoughtful, and lively reworkings of material from the public domain. Disney loves the public domain – we just wish it would share.

Disney loves copyright's other flexibilities, too, like fair use. Walt told the papers that he took his inspiration for Steamboat Willie from Charlie Chaplin and Douglas Fairbanks, making fair use of their performances to imbue Mickey with his mischief and derring do. Disney loves fair use – we just wish it would share.

Disney loves copyright's limitations. Steamboat Willie was inspired by Buster Keaton's silent film Steamboat Bill (titles aren't copyrightable). Disney loves copyright's limitations – we just wish it would share.

As Jenkins writes, Disney's relationship to copyright is wildly contradictory. It's the poster child for the public domain's power as a source of inspiration for worthy (and profitable) new works. It's also the chief villain in the impoverishment and near-extinction of the public domain. Truly, every pirate wants to be an admiral.

Disney's reliance on – and sabotage of – the public domain is ironic. Jenkins compares it to "an oil company relying on solar power to run its rigs." Come January 1, Disney will have to share.

Now, if you've heard anything about this, you've probably been told that Mickey isn't really entering the public domain. Between trademark claims and later copyrightable elements of Mickey's design, Mickey's status will be too complex to understand. That's totally wrong.

Jenkins illustrates the relationship between these three elements in (what else) a Mickey-shaped Venn diagram. Topline: you can use all the elements of Mickey that are present in Steamboat Willie, along with some elements that were added later, provided that you make it clear that your work isn't affiliated with Disney.

Let's unpack that. The copyrightable status of a character used to be vague and complex, but several high-profile cases have brought clarity to the question. The big one is Les Klinger's case against the Arthur Conan Doyle estate over Sherlock Holmes. That case established that when a character appears in both public domain and copyrighted works, the character is in the public domain, and you are "free to copy story elements from the public domain works":

https://freesherlock.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/klinger-order-on-motion-for-summary-judgment-c.pdf

This case was appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, who declined to hear it. It's settled law.

So, which parts of Mickey aren't going into the public domain? Elements that came later: white gloves, color. But that doesn't mean you can't add different gloves, or different colorways. The idea of a eyes with pupils is not copyrightable – only the specific eyes that Disney added.

Other later elements that don't qualify for copyright: a squeaky mouse voice, being adorable, doing jaunty dances, etc. These are all generic characteristics of cartoon mice, and they're free for you to use. Jenkins is more cautious on whether you can give your Mickey red shorts. She judges that "a single, bright, primary color for an article of clothing does not meet the copyrightability threshold" but without settled law, you might wanna change the colors.

But what about trademark? For years, Disney has included a clip from Steamboat Willie at the start of each of its films. Many observers characterized this as a bid to create a de facto perpetual copyright, by making Steamboat Willie inescapably associated with products from Disney, weaving an impassable web of trademark tripwires around it.

But trademark doesn't prevent you from using Steamboat Willie. It only prevents you from misleading consumers "into thinking your work is produced or sponsored by Disney." Trademarks don't expire so long as they're in use, but uses that don't create confusion are fair game under trademark.

Copyrights and trademarks can overlap. Mickey Mouse is a copyrighted character, but he's also an indicator that a product or service is associated with Disney. While Mickey's copyright expires in a couple weeks, his trademark doesn't. What happens to an out-of-copyright work that is still a trademark?

Luckily for us, this is also a thoroughly settled case. As in, this question was resolved in a unanimous 2000 Supreme Court ruling, Dastar v. Twentieth Century Fox. A live trademark does not extend an expired copyright. As the Supremes said:

[This would] create a species of mutant copyright law that limits the public’s federal right to copy and to use expired copyrights.

This elaborates on the Ninth Circuit's 1996 Maljack Prods v Goodtimes Home Video Corp:

[Trademark][ cannot be used to circumvent copyright law. If material covered by copyright law has passed into the public domain, it cannot then be protected by the Lanham Act without rendering the Copyright Act a nullity.

Despite what you might have heard, there is no ambiguity here. Copyrights can't be extended through trademark. Period. Unanimous Supreme Court Decision. Boom. End of story. Done.

But even so, there are trademark considerations in how you use Steamboat Willie after Jan 1, but these considerations are about protecting the public, not Disney shareholders. Your uses can't be misleading. People who buy or view your Steamboat Willie media or products have to be totally clear that your work comes from you, not Disney.

Avoiding confusion will be very hard for some uses, like plush toys, or short idents at the beginning of feature films. For most uses, though, a prominent disclaimer will suffice. The copyright page for my 2003 debut novel Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom contains this disclaimer:

This novel is a work of fiction, set in an imagined future. All the characters and events portrayed in this book, including the imagined future of the Magic Kingdom, are either fictitious or are used fictitiously. The Walt Disney Company has not authorized or endorsed this novel.

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250196385/downandoutinthemagickingdom

Here's the Ninth Circuit again:

When a public domain work is copied, along with its title, there is little likelihood of confusion when even the most minimal steps are taken to distinguish the publisher of the original from that of the copy. The public is receiving just what it believes it is receiving—the work with which the title has become associated. The public is not only unharmed, it is unconfused.

Trademark has many exceptions. The First Amendment protects your right to use trademarks in expressive ways, for example, to recreate famous paintings with Barbie dolls:

https://www.copyright.gov/fair-use/summaries/mattel-walkingmountain-9thcir2003.pdf

And then there's "nominative use": it's not a trademark violation to use a trademark to accurately describe a trademarked thing. "We fix iPhones" is not a trademark violation. Neither is 'Works with HP printers.' This goes double for "expressive" uses of trademarks in new works of art:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogers_v._Grimaldi

What about "dilution"? Trademark protects a small number of superbrands from uses that "impair the distinctiveness or harm the reputation of the famous mark, even when there is no consumer confusion." Jenkins says that the Mickey silhouette and the current Mickey character designs might be entitled to protection from dilution, but Steamboat Willie doesn't make the cut.

Jenkins closes with a celebration of the public domain's ability to inspire new works, like Disney's Three Musketeers, Disney's Christmas Carol, Disney's Beauty and the Beast, Disney's Around the World in 80 Days, Disney's Alice in Wonderland, Disney's Snow White, Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame, Disney's Sleeping Beauty, Disney's Cinderella, Disney's Little Mermaid, Disney's Pinocchio, Disney's Huck Finn, Disney's Robin Hood, and Disney's Aladdin. These are some of the best-loved films of the past century, and made Disney a leading example of what talented, creative people can do with the public domain.

As of January 1, Disney will start to be an example of what talented, creative people give back to the public domain, joining Dickens, Dumas, Carroll, Verne, de Villeneuve, the Brothers Grimm, Twain, Hugo, Perrault and Collodi.

Public domain day is 17 days away. Creators of all kinds: start your engines!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/15/mouse-liberation-front/#free-mickey

Image: Doo Lee (modified) https://web.law.duke.edu/sites/default/files/images/centers/cspd/pdd2024/mickey/Steamboat-WIllie-Enters-Public-Domain.jpeg

CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.en

#pluralistic #copyfight #scotus #mickey mouse #public domain #ip #contract #trademark #tm #jennifer jenkins #copyright #disney #nominative use

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eoieopda · 3 months ago

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whiskey neat | jwy

there’s no common ground between yours and wooyoung’s vastly different circles. that is, until tuesday nights at the black cat form the center of the venn diagram.

pairing: jung wooyoung x reader au: strangers to something type: one-shot | smut wc: 8.3k rating: 18+ | minors do not have my consent to interact. cw: inspired by hozier’s “too sweet”, primarily wooyoung’s pov with one switch at the end; bartender!wooyoung, musician!reader, alcohol use, setting is a bar, uhhh wooyoung is a (to the tune of that arctic monkeys song) cigarette smoker, oral sex (v), protected sex (p in v), corruption kink kind of?, use of “sweetheart” (fatal). reader notes: afab (gender identity not designated); kind of naive; into fitness/“wellness” (no body type/weight is described, except wooyoung thinking they’re “strong” + reader thinking that they are in the best shape of their life); wears a sundress at the beginning. the following terms are used in the scenes involving smut: pussy, cunt, clit, tits (no description given). a/n: i quite literally started this in march 2024 and then experienced the most severe hobby death of all time. this is coming after five (5) months of scooping it out of my brain with a melon-baller, so… not my best, but here she is! thanks @sailoryooons for beta-ing because i’m self-conscious lately 🍤

Tuesday nights at the Black Cat never used to be busy.

For three years, Wooyoung spent the majority of his shifts behind the bar doing fuck all: Folding receipt paper into increasingly complicated and wasteful shapes; replacing citrus wedges that went unused and then brown; paying visits to the stray cat camping out in the alley near the dumpster. He’d go hours without talking to another human being, and he never took issue with it, even if his wallet did.

Two months ago, however, things changed.

Two months ago, management started panicking about the lack of revenue. To keep the lights on and draw in a crowd of (hopefully) soon-to-be regulars, they implemented a schedule of recurring events — some monthly, others weekly, most stupid.

Wooyoung’s precious solitude disappeared, and in its place, he got trivia nights and turntable DJs, showing off their collections of vinyls. Games of bingo targeting hipsters, who show up en masse to fight it out for prizes — potted plants, of all things — they could easily buy on their own for far less than their tabs’ totals. Themed brunches.

A million other events and just as many used glasses to wash.

Despite his ever-present scowl — his face just looks like that — it hasn’t been all bad. Without the newly-added acoustic sessions, the bar wouldn’t need a local performer to both play and host on a biweekly basis. Management wouldn’t have reached out to you; and you’d have no fucking reason to come to a dive like this. Suffice it to say, your pilates-practicing, daylight-disciplined circle of doers would never otherwise overlap with Wooyoung’s, in all its nocturnal, nicotine-dependent grit.

Tuesday nights at the Black Cat now occupy the center of the Venn diagram.

As usual, you come traipsing in half an hour before your set starts with a gig bag slung over your shoulder and a megawatt smile on your face. This is your natural state, he’s come to learn. Solar-powered. It shouldn’t be possible, but you manage to brighten further when your searching eyes find him sitting on the counter behind the register.

Through no fault of his own, Wooyoung’s gaze trails down from your face to the little sundress you’re wearing. It’s new, he notes immediately. The skirt of it flutters with each step you take, showing off more and more of your thighs as you move.

You don’t react to the migrating fabric. Just the same, you don’t notice his appraisal or the way patrons’ heads turn as you cross the bar.

No surprise there, he thinks.

From the four (4) entire conversations the two of you have had so far, you’ve made one thing abundantly clear: You’re inclined to assume the best of people and their intentions.

Nine times out of ten, Wooyoung dodges naivety like that the second it starts skipping his way, well-versed in the consequences of trusting so implicitly. You and your cotton-candy smile have proven to be the outlier, though. Working in tandem, you and that grin have him pinned where he sits with no urge to run.

You don’t notice that, either.

When you slide onto the stool across the bar from him, Wooyoung finally clocks what you’re holding. Your right hand grips some green concoction that he suspects was made with kale. Or moss? In your left hand, an iced Americano — beautifully black — weeps condensation onto manicured fingers, making hard-earned calluses glisten.

Wooyoung’s racing thoughts about those hands are still inflicting psychic damage when you lean further over the counter.

“Extra shot of espresso,” you hum as you hold the coffee out to him. You do your best to tease him, though you’re shy as hell about it, so the words still manage to come gently: “For those of us who were still awake when the sun came up.”

Wooyoung mentioned his coffee order several weeks ago in passing. It’s sweet in a way he’s not used to that you’ve not only remembered how he takes his coffee, but that you’ve brought it to him ever since, apropos of nothing, when all he’s ever done is his best to get a rise out of you. What he’s up to isn’t sweet — not by a long-shot — but it’s easily done and well worth the misplaced effort when he sees how flustered he can make you.

Wooyoung tilts his head, draws his lips in a straight line, and gestures to your cup with his. “Worry about those waking up shortly after sunrise, sweetheart. They’re drinking algae.”

As intended, you’re visibly affected by the pet name, so much so that you stumble over your defense. “It — it’s healthy!”

“It’s swampy.”

Your nose scrunches indignantly, prompting the edge of Wooyoung’s mouth to tick upwards. He doesn’t emote more than that. Five (5) conversations in now, and he’s already picked up on how much it gets to you when he only concedes a hint of a smirk.

As much as he’d relish the opportunity to sit here and keep toying with you, the crowd surrounding you has doubled in a matter of minutes. Just over your shoulder, Wooyoung sees a patron glance down at the screen of her phone to check the time; then, he hears the complaint she thinks is muttered quietly under her breath. It’s not. In fact, you hear it, too, and you divert your wide, heart-shaped eyes away from him. That smile of yours curves in the wrong direction once you do.

When you look back at him, you say, “I should go,” but he hears it for what it is: an apology.

He’s never been good at ending conversations — especially in the rare case that he’d prefer to keep one going — so he nods, leaves it at that. You pause for a nanosecond, as if you’ve got something else to add, but you don’t. You smooth down the back of your dress once you’ve hopped from the stool to your feet. Then, you mimic his gesture.

You make it two steps towards the stage before Wooyoung calls out to you, prompting you to spin back around and your dress to flutter:

“Thanks for the coffee, sweetheart.”

Your frown disappears instantly. The smile that replaces it is still there when you disappear into the crowd, only to resurface several seconds later on the tiny stage across the room.

Guitar now in hand, you duck your head through the woven strap, shuffling carefully closer to the microphone stand. You introduce yourself, strum a quiet, major chord, and chirp, “Welcome to both the Black Cat and my favorite day of the week.”

Normally, you leave shortly after your last set, as if you’ll turn into a pumpkin when the clock strikes ten. With the schedule you keep, it’s no wonder. From what Wooyoung has gathered so far, you wake up before dawn most days to get a workout in before heading to the office. The very idea makes him nauseous whenever he thinks too long about it, so he does his best not to.

Mornings are for sleeping, he told you once.

Life is for living, you’d replied.

Apparently, the two of you have drastically different ideas about what living looks like.

For Wooyoung, life on Tuesday nights looks like catering to a steadily dwindling crowd once you finish up and disappear with a friendly wave goodbye. It’s cleaning up sticky spills, resetting migrated stools, and doing a half-ass restock that will make the opener — him — complain about the closer — again, him — when his next shift starts at 5:00 PM on Wednesday.

In the gap between his shifts, life looks like meeting up with his similarly shadow-dwelling friends on someone’s balcony to chain-smoke, sip whiskey, and watch the sunrise until he gets bored. From there, it’s either walking back to his apartment or kicking said friends out of his, so he can rot in front of his PC. Eventually, life looks like blackout shades and crashing into bed while the world around him heads out for brunch.

Tonight, however, life is starting to look a little different.

When you wander over, it’s not to say goodnight or close out the tab you think you’ve accrued, which Wooyoung never opened in the first place.

Maybe, he thinks, you’ve finally caught on that all these “technical issues with the point-of-sale system” — occurring for the last four (4) shows in relation to one (1) patron in particular — can’t possibly be a coincidence. That a free drink given will always beget a free drink received. That Wooyoung doesn’t deal in unpaid debts, even if he hasn’t and won’t own up to his petty workplace theft.

You sidle up to his bar and slip back into the stool you’d previously occupied, no more aware of the way your sundress shifts now than you were earlier. Likewise, he’s no less blatant with the way he looks you up and down, eyes lingering unabashedly and hungrily. The pair of you float in each other’s orbit for a few moments just like this: waiting for the other to speak first.

“Don’t you go to yoga class at ass o’clock on Wednesdays?” He eventually inquires, leaning back against the counter behind him with his arms crossed and head tilted.

Your eyes flick down to the screen of your phone, which rests face-up on the bar between your elbows. You clock the time but not the way your current posture causes the neckline of your mostly modest dress to plunge. Conflict creases between your eyebrows, then you tilt your chin to look at him.

Wooyoung knows that look, although he’s never seen it on you before. That look begs to be talked into something, rather than out of it. It’s a look he gets often. For better or for worse, it’s one he never turns down.

“I do,” you admit through a sigh.

Offering nothing more than a hum to indicate his intrigue, Wooyoung watches you and waits patiently for you to elaborate. Another few seconds slip by without a word. His attention makes you shy, he notes; he loves it.

But he loves the idea of toying with you even more, so when you don’t say anything else, he takes that attention and diverts it to the few remaining patrons, all of whom have vested interest in closing out and getting out.

Good riddance, he thinks as the last of them stumbles out and away, leaving the two of you in charged silence.

Even more seconds pass.

Still nothing.

Wooyoung glances around and finds a bottle of Jameson on its very last leg. It’s the perfect amount for a litmus test — two shots left, nothing more to give and everything to prove. Snatching two overturned shot glasses from where they dry on a holed rubber mat, he empties the whiskey evenly and turns back to you with an eyebrow raised.

Your eyes widen slightly when he sets the spare on the bar in front of you, more so with interest than surprise. For a moment, you stare at it with the same ambivalent expression, nibbling thoughtfully on your lower lip.

Finally, you all but whisper, “I should’ve been in bed an hour ago.”

With his left palm flat against the bar, Wooyoung rests his weight and leans in, eyelids and voice dropping. “Why aren’t you?” He murmurs, gaze flicking down to your lips then back up again — just long enough for you to notice that he was, in fact, looking. “Hmm?”

Your breath hitches — just loudly enough for him to notice that you are, in fact, finding it hard to function this closely to him.

“On a school night, no less.” His eyes narrow teasingly.

“I’m asking myself the same question,” you confess, though you’re the picture of innocence. Your fingertip traces idly down the side of your shot glass, then back up again.

He’s as distracted by the mindless movement as you are, albeit for different reasons. Before he lets himself get carried away in wondering whether or not your touch is always that delicate, Wooyoung lifts his glass and gestures for you to do the same. “Sounds like you could use a bad influence.”

A soft clink permeates when your glasses touch, followed by a muted thump when the bottom of each one is tapped against the bar. Your heads are thrown back in unison, just like your drinks, and when your faces finally level out towards one another’s, you counter him breezily, “Maybe you could use a good one.”

Wooyoung thinks he could use more than that.

Breaking eye contact, you glance down at your phone again. It’s obvious that you’re second-guessing your decision to linger. He wants to chuck that brick in the bin with the other useless shit, to get rid of any excuse you might give for having to leave, but he doesn’t.

And you don’t give him an excuse.

Your hand wraps around that fucking phone, then you stand up slowly.

“Try not to stay up too late,” you advise with a smile that still manages to read like disappointment.

Don’t.

Reaching into the pocket of your jacket, you pull out the tips you made tonight and collect a few bills before dropping them on the counter to cover the shot you didn’t even order. Wooyoung wants to tell you not to — that your money isn’t good here, even if you are — but he knows it won’t make a difference.

You sling your gig bag over your shoulder, thank him, and tell him that you’ll see him in two weeks.

He scrubs his hands over his face the second you walk out the door and mutters through gritted teeth, “Fuck.”

You don’t see Wooyoung in two weeks.

As a matter of fact, you cancel your acoustic session for the first time ever. Management either doesn’t know why you bailed or doesn’t think it’s any of Wooyoung’s business, so no one bothers to tell him. If he’d ever thought to ask for your number, he could check in on you himself, but he didn’t and therefore can’t.

Ignorant and annoyed, he resigns himself to occupying an empty tavern on a goddamn Tuesday night, yet again.

Nobody brings him coffee.

Nobody worth talking to crosses the threshold.

No one makes little comments — genuine concerns poorly disguised as digs — when he uses the paring knife to carve little stars into the lip of the bar top, instead of slicing limes.

And when he gives up and closes down early, he’s so tired of his own shit that he simply goes home and goes to bed.

Bed being the operative word.

He doesn’t go to sleep, even though he has nothing better to do. Alternatively, Wooyoung replays your last interaction on a loop in his head, daydreaming about what could’ve happened if you’d stayed. While his thoughts spiral, his hand drifts, finds the pulse beneath the zipper of his jeans, and feels the throbbing ache building through the denim.

It’s pathetic.

He knows it.

Too bad that doesn’t stop him from fucking his fist every night for the next several, imagining how much softer yours must feel.

The patron pulls a face the absolute second Wooyoung slides her glass across the bar.

Wholly uninterested in the response one way or another, he slathers on his customer-service smile and asks her, “Alright?”, in a tone that doesn’t match his expression in the slightest.

“There’s no ice in it,” she mumbles, cringing in mild horror as she does. As if the liquor features his spit instead. “I wanted ice.”

There’s a split second where he almost lets his mask crack, says something shitty just because his mood was already sour before she walked over. Wooyoung doesn’t get the opportunity, however. Over the girl’s shoulder, someone gently intervenes: “Neat means no ice. You’d have needed to order it on the rocks.”

A beat passes, then comes, “Or — you know, with ice, please.”

Wooyoung neither hears nor cares what the girl says in response. She shuffles off, and that’s all that matters. Without her body blocking the way, he sees you clearly. You’re more done-up than usual, like you’ve just come from somewhere far nicer than here.

“It’s Saturday.”

Probably should’ve started with hello.

After eyeing the glowing, neon clock on the wall, Wooyoung notices that both hands are pointed skyward. He corrects himself, “Nah, it’s Sunday.”

You slip into the now-unoccupied stool ahead of him and nod, chuckling like you can’t believe it, either. When you settle in, you prop your elbow on the bar top, then your chin upon the heel of your hand. Just above, your eyes twinkle with a kind of mischief he’s never seen you wear before.

That might be the thin veil of tipsiness, actually.

Not that he’s complaining.

Wooyoung hides his amusement by bending over and rummaging through the under-counter refrigerator that hums beneath the register. The rush of cool air has nothing to do with how awake he suddenly feels. He wonders if you feel the same but can’t ask outright; eagerness isn’t his style.

“You’re here on purpose?” He asks instead, resurfacing with a bottle of soju — some new, fruity flavor he assumes you’ll like — and a raised eyebrow.

You hum appreciatively when you see what he’s holding. That soft sound that punches him right in the center of his chest with force. “I was out with friends, but…”

Your voice trails off, too distracted by his hand enveloping the seal-covered bottle cap. With a firm grip and quick twist, it’s gone. You’re still eyeing his hands, he notes, even though all they’re doing is holding the bottle.

Normally, he’d love to give you the benefit of the doubt and attribute your sudden fixation on the rings he wears. It wouldn’t be the first time a man in jewelry snags attention, complimentary or otherwise. Unfortunately — or maybe fortunately? — for you, Wooyoung forgot to put his usual accessories back on after this afternoon’s shower.

Nope, he thinks, biting back a wolfish grin. He’s not alone. You daydream about his touch, too.

Catching yourself staring, you shift atop your stool with a quiet, self-conscious laugh that sounds more like a sigh. He opts to let it go without further teasing, but he doesn’t let it go entirely. That breathy little noise echoes in his ears, drowning out the faint slosh of liquor as he fills your glass.

In a weak attempt to distract himself, he remembers your half-finished sentence and prompts with a low voice, “But?”

“They wanted to end the night.” You accept the glass into your hand from his and raise it slightly in thanks. “I didn’t,” you whisper, then bring the rim to your lips to cloak their upward curve.

Wooyoung would be lying if he said your tiny act of defiance didn’t send all the blood in his body rushing straight to his dick. Maybe it’s arrogant of him to assume that he’s the source of this newfound rebelliousness. The spark that lit the fuse, or whatever. Maybe that should bother him. Of course, it doesn’t.

In an effort to hide how strong of a chord your confession has struck, he gestures with one extended finger to the clock. Your eyes follow, and he leans in closer; the smirk you can’t see is still evident in his voice, he’s sure. “How much of a coincidence is it that you showed up right before the trains stop running?”

When your gaze flicks momentarily back to him, he spots a hint of surprise. This impeccable timing wasn’t a scheme at all, he realizes. Not a plot. If he had to bet, Wooyoung would guess that you’re never out late enough to know that the train schedule ends at all.

God, you’re going to give him a cavity.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. Coincidentally, I know someone who gets off just in time to walk you home.”

“This gonna bother you?”

Having stepped out of the bar before Wooyoung, his question prompts you to look back over your shoulder at him, one eyebrow raised slightly out of curiosity. He lifts his right hand from his jacket pocket to reveal the half-spent pack of cigarettes he’d been storing there.

He expects it to, and to his surprise, he cares enough about that possibility that he doesn’t light up without asking in the way he normally would.

“In theory, yes,” you laugh, “because I’d prefer your lungs to be tar-free.”

“And in practice?”

You must not have expected him to note the distinction; you fluster. Grinning slightly, Wooyoung answers his own question on your behalf, “In practice, you find it kind of hot.”

He keeps his eyes on you as he pulls a cigarette from the pack — slowly, to test his hypothesis that you’ve got a thing for his hands — and then, Wooyoung slides the cardboard back into his pocket.

Your gaze follows while he gently places the filtered end between his lips. It stays put when he furnishes a lighter, holds the flame to the opposite side, and inhales. Turning his head to the side, Wooyoung exhales the smoke where it won’t reach you.

“It’s alright, sweetheart,” he assures you, eyes devilish. Deer in headlights that you are, you freeze but for the bob of your throat as you swallow. “I won’t make you admit it out loud.”

Yet.

Once he’s decided that he’s played with you enough for the time being, two of you head south, ambling under streetlights without any sense of urgency. Making up for lost time, maybe; picking up where the last Tuesday left off.

He can’t tell if it’s the alcohol making you more talkative than usual, or if you’re feeling the rush of your off-brand decisions, but Wooyoung’s fine with it, either way. You tell him about your week — in full and without hesitation — like you’re chatting to a friend and not someone you’ve only just started to encounter on a brief, twice-monthly basis.

You had a date this Tuesday night, he learns. It didn’t go well. Too similar, you explain with a wave of your hand. According to you, it’s boring to sit with you at a dinner table. Wooyoung looks pointedly at you as soon as he hears it, noting his disagreement. For a second, you assume something he doesn’t mean: that he enjoys his own company more than you enjoy yours.

“No,” he corrects you. “I just can’t picture dinner with you as something boring.”

You duck your head, embarrassed. “Oh,” is all you manage in reply.

Wooyoung follows your lead across several more city blocks, hanging on every word you say in the meantime. When the pair of you reach the front of your apartment building, his cigarette is spent, but neither one of you is. He takes an extra step towards the garbage can near the door and drops the butt amidst the others in the lid, which doubles as an ashtray. A faint vein of smoke bleeds out until the dark sky laps it up entirely.

You look conflicted when he turns back in your direction. Clearly, you don’t want him to leave just yet, but asking him upstairs is likely way out of your pattern of behavior. Wooyoung sees two options: He could say goodnight and go; take a few steps towards his side of the city, and hope you to act even further out of character, or —

“If you’re asking, I’m saying yes.”

— he could go off-script entirely.

Your apartment looks exactly the way Wooyoung expected it to. Everything is cozy; a far cry from the modern and monochrome edge of his place. It all makes sense, based on what he’s learned about you so far. Feels like you, although he’ll concede that you haven’t been felt by him just yet.

Each shelf features a tchotchke or framed photograph — or several — but not a single speck of dust. Likewise, the various potted plants you’ve displayed artfully around the space are well-kept. Flourishing, he assumes, despite the fact that he doesn’t know shit about fuck when it comes to plants.

His shoes, ratty in comparison to yours, are toed off at the door before he follows you further into the kitchen. You stop at the island, bottom lip between your teeth once again. Unsure, you nibble on it, like it’ll help you set your dizzy mind straight.

When Wooyoung inches closer to you, he does it slowly, even though every part of his body demands that he ramp up the pace. As badly as he wants his hands — and his teeth, and his tongue…— all over you now, he can’t be the jump scare that sets your little bunny heart to sprinting. The adrenaline is practically vibrating off your frame already with every step he takes in your direction.

Though you could, you don’t move further away, the nearer he gets. You stay put with the small of your back against the lip of the granite counter, hypnotized. Right where he wants you.

Once he’s close enough, Wooyoung tests the waters. You let him; your gaze clings to him so strongly that he feels the weight of it without reciprocating. With his thumb and forefinger, he traces the belt loop closest to your left hip, then tugs slightly, making your breath quicken for a moment.

Eyes still focused on his own ministrations, he murmurs, “Am I the first stray you’ve ever brought home?”

You don’t answer with words. His gaze flicks upwards, and from under heavy-lidded eyes, he sees the tiny nod.

“Full of surprises.” He looks down again, purposely depriving you of eye contact, and moves his fingers from your belt loop so that the pad of his thumb brushes over the top of your jeans. There, the skin of your hip peeks out from under the denim, hot to the touch. “Not just sweet, are you?”

“Someone told me I needed a bad influence.”

The sudden re-introduction of your voice pulls his focus. You stare back at him boldly, and it feels like a dare. Both of his hands move to your hips now, simultaneously guiding you closer to his chest and keeping you pinned between his body and the island.

“You’ll miss your Sunday morning pilates, I fear,” he tuts with a slight shake of his head.

“You’ll make attending redundant, I hope.”

And then your mouth is on his, all tongue and teeth, while you card desperate fingers through his hair. It occurs to him, as he licks into your mouth, that the split-dyed strands you're clinging to are a microcosm.

Black and white.

Conflicting tastes, like sugar and salt, that only make sense together in certain contexts. Like this one — right here, right now — with the two of you tangled up in your half-lit kitchen, so caught up in exploration that inhibition takes the backseat. Steeping in the aftertaste of soju and cigarette smoke, scent heady like arousal.

You break the kiss to catch your breath but can’t make it very far. His teeth claim your bottom lip, pulling forth the softest little growl he’s ever heard.

“Fuck,” he echoes with a growl of his own.

That’s it. Breathing is overrated. Wooyoung’s ready to suffocate, so long as you let him.

“Lay back on the counter.”

You’re stunned into silence for a second, and while you blink back at him, he wonders if you’ll actually let him eat you out where you eat. It’s objectively filthy, he knows, but he might drop dead where he stands if he has to wait another second — or take another step elsewhere — before he tastes you.

Your answer is a leap, figuratively and literally. The hands you’ve been using to cling to him each flatten palm-down on the island behind you. With his grip on your hips to boost you, you scramble to your new stage; and you shatter the conservative expectations he had for you in the process.

A newfound confidence flashes in your eyes, making his stomach flip and his dick twitch. A patronizing frown graces your kiss-bitten lips. “You didn’t walk three kilometers here just to look at me, did you?”

He sure as shit didn’t. Still, he can’t help but bask in the odd sense of pride he feels in staring up at you on the pedestal he put you on. The more time you spend with him, the rougher you seem to get around the edges; and he’d be lying through his teeth if he said he didn’t love the grit.

In lieu of a verbal response, Wooyoung locks eyes with you and gestures downward with the index finger of his right hand. You follow his silent command eagerly and without question; he keeps the praise you’ve earned on the tip of his tongue, saving it for later.

It takes less time than he expects to strip you of your jeans, most of which is attributed to slipping them off your ankles and dropping them blindly over his shoulder. They hit what he believes to be the range with a soft twack, then a barely audible crumple when they finally find the floor.

Your lace underwear disappears in a similar fashion, albeit more eagerly. Couldn’t be helped, he thinks. That scrap of fabric was the last barrier between him and the thing he’s been craving most since he met you; and fuck, if you don’t exceed his expectations once again.

“Christ,” is all he can say.

It’s rare to find a pussy so perfect that it wipes out his vocabulary, let alone makes him want to weep. That’s exactly what’s waiting for him when you spread your thighs wide enough to accommodate his body between them. Really, the only thing driving him more insane than the sight of you is the thought of how many self-imposed rules you’ve broken to get to this point — the self-discipline you’ve thrown out the window on your way down to him.

He accepts the invitation, descends upon your wet heat like a man starved, and loops his arms underneath your thighs. Immediately, your thighs tighten around the sides of his head, muffling the groan that slips out of him the second your taste hits his tongue. Just the same, you’ve got him drunk in an instant while he laves his way through folds sweeter than cherry wine.

From under his own lashes, he looks up and sees yours flutter at the sensation of his lips encircling your clit and suckling slowly, deeply.

“Oh, my g-god,” you hiccup before your fingers are in his hair again, nails scratching perfectly along his scalp. “You’re so —”

Wooyoung’s wickedly curved lips are slick in more ways than one, though he doubts you can see them through all those stars in your eyes. You don’t see the switch-up coming, either. Unwilling to let you race too far ahead of him, he scales it back, trading his deep pulls for targeted kitten licks.

“— evil.”

Your frustration rings out with a tortured whine. Wooyoung can’t blame you; he knows he’s cruel for guiding you so close to the edge, right out of the gate, then refusing to send you off of it. But he has to draw this out as long as he can, savor what he can for however long you give him.

And to your credit, you take it well.

You give, too, offering up the moans, whimpers, and sighs he couldn’t have dreamed up correctly if he tried.

Well…

Wooyoung did try. Gave it his best shot, even, but his imagination fell short. He knows that now. The pitch was wrong, the timing was off, and he failed to anticipate just how badly it’d fuck him up to feel you grinding against his tongue. To have your fingers tied off in his hair, refusing to accept anything less than closeness.

That particular chorus swells for the first time when he unwinds his right arm from where it secures your left thigh; and his middle finger slides into your cunt, curls upwards to greet that spongy patch of nerves along your front wall.

Eyes swimming with previously untapped desire, you look so pitifully perfect. Only breaking eye contact to throw your head back, you start to wail, “Wooyoung, I —”

But the rest of that thought must turn to static before you can finish it. Charged silence settles in its place, save for your ragged breathing. All the while, his tongue never lets up on your poor, abused clit, though your arousal already has him coated, leaking down over the knuckle.

A particularly needy tug of his hair seeks what you can’t verbalize.

More.

Closer.

When he adds his ring finger to fuck you further open for him, you can’t keep his name from spilling out of your mouth. Wooyoung starts to sound like a summoning spell; an invocation repeated so desperately that he just might give you what you want.

“W-Wooyoung, please,” you choke out, hips bucking up to chase his mouth. “I’m so close!”

The fact that you’re downright begging — on the brink of tears, no less — goes straight to his head. He lets up for a moment to purr, “Since you asked so nicely…”

The hand he doesn’t have half-buried in your heat grips your right hip, hard, securing you against the granite. It’s for the best, really. You jolt so much when he finally lets you cum that you could’ve knocked him out otherwise.

Not that he’d complain.

When the aftershocks peter out, and you gain back some control of your trembling limbs, you collapse back onto the countertop, chest heaving as your breath struggles to even out. One leg stays put, hinged over his shoulder, the best kind of dead weight; the other pools off the edge of the island, hanging limply.

Before pulling away entirely, Wooyoung presses an open-mouthed kiss to the soft skin of your inner thigh, suckling slightly — just enough to leave a calling card, though he doesn’t want anyone but you to know it’s there.

“You fucking menace.”

Your eyes flutter open and catch the way he’s grinning, the lower half of his face otherwise shining with a mix of spit and slick. With you watching intently, he licks his lips, simpering, “Think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard you swear.”

“Deserved.” You sigh contentedly and close your eyes again for a second, but the blissed-out look on your face doesn’t dissipate.

Wooyoung wonders if you’re holding onto the image of him between your thighs, replaying it behind your lids. The sight of you is going to haunt him — then and now, before and after. Even if your stamina is depleted now, his appetite’s been sated. He can survive off of this moment alone for weeks if necessary.

But you summon the strength to stretch your arms over your head, to moan breathily while you arch your back off the counter and ease the tension in your muscles. Then, in a burst of vitality, you sit upright. Eyes alight, you give him a smile to match.

“Help me down?”

As if he’d say no to a question asked that sweetly.

You wobble when your feet touch the ground again and thank him when he snakes an arm around your waist to steady you. With a nod in the direction of what Wooyoung assumes is your bedroom, you beckon him, “Come with me.”

“That’s been the plan, sweetheart.”

You roll your eyes at him — another first — and take his hand in yours. Fingers intertwined, you lead and he follows through the adjoining living room towards a door on the far side of the apartment. The pair of you barely cross the threshold into your bedroom before you turn and tug his hand, pulling him into a kiss.

“Do me a favor,” you murmur against his lips.

Wooyoung has no questions about that — the answer is yes, no matter what the favor is — but there is something he’s wondering about: when you open your mouth against his, can you taste yourself on his tongue?

Distracted by that thought, and the way your free hand makes its way to the button of his jeans, he nods. It gives him the opportunity to swallow down the groan that builds in his chest when you squeeze his still-clothed cock.

Your mouth leaves his then, drops to the side of his neck. Something about the light nip of your teeth below his ear makes his resolve start to crumble. It only gets harder when the warmth of your tongue flicks over his skin to soothe the sting. He sounds fucked out already when he sighs, “Anything.”

“Let me repay you for all those drinks you never charged me for.” Between kisses down the length of his neck, you purr, “Not exactly subtle, you know.”

He clenches his jaw to keep it from dropping. “Have I been hustled?”

“Is it hustling if I offer to reimburse you?”

Knowing damn well what it’ll do to him, you flutter your lashes against his skin, forcing him to fight off a shiver. There’s no hiding the rush of heat that follows; he doesn’t need to ask to know that you feel it creeping up his neck. “I’ll make up for it,” you promise. “Atone, and all that.”

Wooyoung reaches up and cups your jaw with his hand; you follow his direction and look up at him with excitement twinkling in your eyes, juxtaposing the deep black in his. “I’m charging interest,” he bites back. “The rates are astronomical.”

“Oh?”

“Oh, indeed. Get on the bed, sweetheart.”

With a light smack on your ass, he sends you on your way. In the few seconds it takes you to skip over to your mattress and jump onto it, he tugs his shirt up and over his head, then tosses it aside. Before unbuckling his jeans and tearing those off, too, he snatches his wallet from the back pocket. More specifically, the condom he’s been keeping within just in case you ever decided to stoop to his level.

You’re a second away from drooling when he makes his way over and stops at the edge of the bed. That kind of hunger is yet another thing he failed to see coming. There’s something insatiable in your eyes now, darkening by the second.

You reach out for the condom, but he pulls his hand back, holds it up where you can’t reach. Frustration makes your eyebrows pinch together. Out of context — if you weren’t naked, wet, and wanting him — he’d likely go out of his way to tell you how fucking cute you look when you’re annoyed.

“Don’t pout at me, sweetheart.” Wooyoung’s warning tone is gravel-lined, sharp to the touch when it hits you. Whether you intend it or not, your breath hitches in tandem with your pupils dilating. “I’ll let you do it, but I have one condition. Consider it a repayment term.”

You tilt your head to the side, eyes narrowing with intrigue. “And what’s that?”

“No hands.”

The surprised look he was counting on never comes. He gets sheer determination instead. You pull the packet from between his fingers, rip the foil open with your teeth, and flick the empty wrapper onto your nightstand. Not a second is wasted in you tugging his black briefs down his thighs.

You don’t deal in unpaid debts, either, it seems.

What happens next nearly puts him in an early grave. Wooyoung fucking wishes for a fly on the wall to witness you — someone else to memorialize the finesse you exhibit in working that latex down his length with your mouth alone — because he can’t believe his own eyes. In fact, he has to screw them shut to keep from cumming at the sight of you with his dick down your throat, lips flush to his pelvis.

“My god,” he groans, head dipping backwards. “If that’s how good your fucking mouth feels…”

You give him a second to pull himself together. Then, you wrap your hand around his wrist and pull him. He drops into the space you were occupying just a second ago, and as soon as his back hits the mattress, you steady yourself with your palms on his chest and position yourself over him.

Now, he can’t keep his hands to himself. His fingertips scratch up your thighs, leaving goosebumps along the fastidiously trained muscles underneath his touch. Palms gliding up the curve of your ass, then your waist, then those fucking tits.

“Shit,” you mewl. He lightly pinches your left nipple between his thumb and forefinger, spurring you on to rake your nails over the flesh of his chest. The way he tenses under your touch must embolden you. “Play with me all you want, but I need you inside of me now.”

Wooyoung has no idea where this assertiveness came from, but he’ll be goddamned if he doesn’t give you everything you want and then some. To prove that you’ve earned the lot, you line yourself up and take everything he has.

Somehow, you manage to take his vision, too. The world gets blurry as your heat envelopes him; everything in the periphery blackens until all that’s left is you throwing your head back in pleasure. No other light, no noise beyond the obscene sound of your pussy soaking his length and the collision of your perfect ass against the tops of his thighs.

As strong as you are, Wooyoung knows your orgasm will wipe you out long before your body tires. He sees your eyes start to roll back in your head, even when you put your palms down behind you and lean away from him to perfect the angle.

Not good enough, he decides. He wants to watch your pupils blow when you fall apart.

“C’mere,” he rasps.

Fuck, he’s about to break, too.

“Eyes on me, sweetheart.”

You push off your hands and move to lean in, but you wind up crumpling against his chest, immediately overwhelmed by the depths of his strokes when you re-enter his gravity. With the proximity perfected, every movement that follows is desperate — animalistic, even. Clinging fingers, sweat slicked bodies swapping searing heat. He lifts his hips to drive himself further into you with every downbeat, sets a pace so punishing that he has you speaking in tongues.

When you cum the second time, the moan that rips through you almost sounds like a sob. It really might be. The droplets on your cheeks are either tears or sweat; one or both would be justified, considering the show you just put on for him.

Shit, how you managed to blow his world to pieces just by walking into his bar, he’ll never understand. All he knows is that when he cums — not long after you — and his entire fucking body goes numb, you’re there on the other side of the cataclysm to kiss him back to life.

Sweet.

When you wake up, you don’t even have a guess as to what time it is. That’s your fault, you know. You didn’t think to connect your phone to its charger prior to falling asleep in a mess of sheets. The numerous alarms you always keep set didn’t go off, obviously, but right now, that’s the least of your worries.

Until your phone has enough juice to power back on, you won’t know if Wooyoung texted you before sneaking out of your apartment.

You’d taken it as a good sign when he asked for your number in a fucked-out haze. Now, you realize, that naivety of yours was operating in full swing, even when the rest of you was down for the count. That’s what one-night-stands are for, you tell yourself. That’s the decision you made.

Uncharacteristically, you’re tempted to spend the rest of your day — however much of it is left — rotting in bed. It’s an urge you’ll give in to, you can already tell; just like the one that got you here in the first place. The only thing stronger than the call of your bed is the grumbling of your stomach, begging for sustenance.

Sighing loudly, you throw your comforter off your lower half and wiggle towards the edge of your bed. Bare feet meet the braided rug below, then unsteady legs do their best to get their bearings. As you ache, you realize that you need to give credit where it’s due:

You’re currently in the best shape of your life, and Wooyoung still managed to fuck the constitution out of you.

You bend slowly to scoop a shirt from your untouched laundry basket, groaning all the while. On its own, it’s long enough to cover your ass, so you don’t bother to dress yourself further — except for the fuzzy slippers waiting next to your bedroom door.

It’s closed, you note when you finally bother to look at it. It wasn’t when you fell into bed with Wooyoung. He probably didn’t want to disturb you on the way out, you figure. This would strike you as thoughtful if it didn’t feel like a chapter ending too soon. Reaching out to reopen it, you tell yourself to be less sentimental.

In the living room, laying eyes on an empty kitchen, you also tell yourself, I told you so. This isn’t a drama, after all. There’s no love interest in your kitchen to cook you an unexpected breakfast.

Pre-made frozen breakfast sandwich it is, then.

You tear open the package with more effort than you should’ve needed to expend, then dump the single-serving lump onto a paper plate. As if on autopilot, you shove the plate into the microwave and smash a few buttons without registering much of it. The quiet hum of the machine nearly lulls you straight back to sleep.

Well, it likely could have.

The metallic rattling up the hall catches your attention, prompting you to step backwards so you can peer over at your front door and confirm that it’s locked. It is. You turn back to your breakfast in progress, and it takes five (5) entire seconds before you realize the issue here.

Keys jingle with more determination, right on cue. You spin around fully this time, eyes wide, to find Wooyoung in your doorway. He holds the door open with his elbow because both his hands are full; and as if that all wasn’t enough, he tries to toe off his shoes without being able to see them over the cardboard to-go tray in his hands.

“Fucking —” he grunts, wobbling.

It must’ve been louder than he intended because he winces immediately. In his moment of panic, his eyes flick over to your bedroom door. Then, when he realizes it’s open, they search for you, blinking in surprise when they find you. He peeps, “Oh.”

As it turns out, his ability to make you lose your words isn’t limited to late hours. The sun is beating through the sliding glass door to your balcony, and you confirm that you’re just as dumbstruck by him in daylight. So, you simply point to the drinks and paper bag he’s holding with your eyebrows pinched in confusion.

“Found that café you go to on Tuesdays,” Wooyoung explains gruffly. His morning voice is every bit as ruinous as you imagined it would be. “The logo on their cups is just a cloud, so it took a lot of wandering to solve that fucking mystery.”

This time, it’s you who peeps. “Oh?”

It’s then that he finally succeeds in getting his shoes off. With his hip, he nudges the door shut; your key ring chimes in the process, having been attached to his belt loop. In a few steps, he sets his burdens down on the kitchen island and looks up at you with a wicked glint in his eye. Apparently, his immediate thought is the same as yours. Simpering, he picks everything back up and makes for your living room’s coffee table instead.

“I’m glad to report that the green shit you drink doesn’t include algae or moss.” He lifts a smoothie from the carrier and holds it out to you, flashing you a smile that makes your knees wobble. “However, I regret to inform you that it does contain vegetables.”

If you try any harder to bite back your idiotic grin, you might lose your lips. “Did you — did you really think there was moss in it?”

He waves his hand dismissively. Notably, he doesn’t say no. That hand then lowers, finger crooked to beckon you closer. You move in, and you try to focus on the moment in front of you, rather than the obscene flashbacks the gesture gives you. The knowing look you expect doesn’t follow, though. Wooyoung simply places your drink in your left hand and your keys in your right.

“Sorry for borrowing those without asking or — well, notifying you in any way, whatsoever.” He grimaces. “I figured I’d be gone for a minute, and I didn’t want someone to waltz through your unlocked door and wake you up.”

“Was burglary on that list of concerns, or is sleep truly your main priority?”

At this, he grins like an idiot. “You’re getting better at that, you know.”

The look on your face must convey your confusion.

“I like the version of you that doesn’t pull punches,” he continues, sounding almost embarrassed to admit something about himself.

You take a move from his playbook and slide your finger through his belt loop, tugging him forward until he’s squarely within kissing distance. “This Wooyoung?” You murmur, “The one who got up early to hunt down a smoothie he’s disgusted by? Objectively likable.”

He rolls his eyes, but it doesn’t distract from the pink tint overtaking his cheeks. “I don’t know about that.”

You kiss him before he can offer to agree to disagree. And when you finally pull back, you nod firmly. “He might be sweet enough for me.”

while likes are appreciated, comments/tags/reblogs with your thoughts are really what make my brain go brrrtt.

ateez masterlist. multi masterlist. navigation.

tagging: @jihopesjoint @bahng-chrizz @sourkimchi @variety-is-the-joy-of-life @notevenheretbh1 @borabitsch @bubbly-moon (also paging @moni-logues because i feel like woo is our sister wife, lmfao.)

#ateez #wooyoung #jung wooyoung #wooyoung x reader #wooyoung smut #ateez smut #ateez x reader #ateez fanfic #ateez fic #wooyoung fanfic #wooyoung fic #ateez imagines #ateez scenarios #wooyoung imagines #wooyoung scenarios #jade writes #kvanity #re: whiskey neat

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catiuskaa · 8 days ago

Text

SAUVAGE.

jupiter, you’re hard (to get).

sum. jupiter may not smell like woody ambery trails or smoky accents, and he may seem like just a really big planet who’s really far away, but juno will always find him.

wc. 3.2k

cw. spacecrafts, stars, and planets, roman mythology, kudos to sabrina carpenter’s juno, producer!reader x idol!han, friends2lovers, a beer (if i must content warn you, i will) smut! car! heavy on kisses with a side of unprotected piv sex (don’t!) switch!jisung x switch!reader (undefined tbh)

scent. (♡) the perfume saga.

[🔺☆ 🚀 ☆🔺]

Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System.

It is a gas giant with a mass more than two times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, and slightly less than one-thousandth the mass of the Sun. Its diameter is eleven times that of Earth, and a tenth that of the Sun. Its name derives from that of Jupiter, the chief deity of ancient Roman religion. Jupiter orbits the Sun at a distance of 5.20 AU (778.5 Gm), with an orbital period of 11.86 years.

However, Han Jisung isn’t quite as big or gaseous. He likes to believe he isn’t made up of metallic hydrogen, but rather stardust, he had said once —and you remembered, of course, because how couldn’t you—. He isn’t the oldest planet in the Solar System. He doesn’t run hotter than the Sun. He doesn’t have many many moons (95!) that spend ages to rotate around him.

Well. Not moons, anyways.

Juno is a NASA space probe orbiting the planet Jupiter.

It was built by Lockheed Martin and is operated by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Juno entered a polar orbit of Jupiter in 2016 to begin a scientific investigation of the planet. After completing its mission, Juno was originally planned to be intentionally deorbited into Jupiter's atmosphere, but has since been approved to continue orbiting until contact is lost with the spacecraft.

Thing is. You’re not a spacecraft either. You weren’t built by whoever Lockheed Martin is. You can’t orbit around planets. And most definitely, you don’t keep in contact with NASA. Nevertheless, a part of you can’t help but relate, because, somehow, even after your mission was ultimately done, you couldn’t stop orbiting around Jupiter.

Well. Not Jupiter, anyways.

you: let’s do some cardio next day

jisungie🎀💫: cardio, you say? 😏

jisungie🎀💫: not even a coffee before taking me to your place? 🤨📸

Jupiter couldn’t even reach to make you feel the giddiness that Han somehow could trigger and make it overcome you. You kicked your feet, but when you entered and found your reflection in the elevator mirror, you clicked your tongue.

“Don’t be such a schoolgirl”, you mumbled to yourself, pressing the button, and heading up back home.

you: tsk tsk, you’re always thinking about food

And you’re always thinking about him, a mean voice in your head snapped back at you. You cursed, damning your own mind for betraying you. But, to spare you, it wasn’t that serious, you thought. You two interacted just the right amount.

He was an idol, for god’s sake. You weren’t catching feelings. That would be dumb on your side, the least.

So of course, when your phone chimes in the specific ringtone that, of course, you hadn’t set just for his contact, of course, you didn’t almost drop your purse when you read what he replied.

jisungie🎀💫: as if, silly

jisungie🎀💫: i ain’t eating no one for free

The text made you dizzy, so you forced yourself to back off from replying the first thing that came to mind.

Hungry? Eat me.

“Think straight for once,” you cursed out loud, passing your hands through your hair. Closing the door to your apartment and knocking your shoes off while your mind went off to other, far more interesting places and memories.

You clearly remembered the moment you met quirky, loveable Han Jisung. How inevitable it had been to just start orbiting around him with the excuse of your mission— producing one of his solos for an upcoming skz-record.

Headphones. It had been such a silly first encounter, yet so fitting for you two that you couldn’t help but cherish it dearly.

Lost in thought, you hadn’t been paying attention to where you were headed. Neither had he, and, which had ended with a little crash against each other. A meteor, not quite as devastating as so to kill a couple dinosaurs, but to leave a crater in your heart and create a small moon out of the pieces that scattered away shyly.

“Sorry!” You bowed your head, then stared at him.

“Hi,” he had said in a sheepish tone, hints of panting that you attributed to how he must’ve run back in hopes of catching you. “Guess you like wave to Earth too?”

And while he giggled, you told yourself you weren’t going to fall, but both Jupiter and Juno knew.

They had said the same thing about Rome.

jisungie🎀💫: entering jyp

you: at 21:43? jeez

jisungie🎀💫: what? i ain’t afraid of success bbg 💪

jisungie🎀💫: come over if you want

What would happen with any other person was that they’d smile and turn off their phone.

Well. Not Juno.

Not you, no.

[🔺☆ 🚀 ☆🔺]

The studio smelled like bubble tea, and that’s how you knew he was still there.

“Oh, hey! I wasn’t sure if you were coming in.” Han smiled.

Sleepiness oozed off of him, and you grinned, cleaning the table from leftover crumbles as you set your bag down. Your heart twirled imaginary hairs when Jisung’s hands —hands with several rings, something that could sometimes be a lot to manage— left the keyboard and settled on his thighs, softly stroking them as he turned the chair to face you.

“Yeah. Wanted to work on a demo I owe to the girls,” you mentioned, taking your jacket and your mask off.

“Actually,” he started, and your hands tingled with the feeling that you’d help him in whatever he needed. Damnit, hands. Damn you, heart. “Could you help me with this demo? Jeonginnie asked me to go over it.”

You sipped from your own drink, as if to fake giving it a bit of a thought. You were going to say yes, of course. But instead, you scratched your arm, frowning lightly.

“Innie asked you?”

“It’s for his solo stage.” He clarified, turning back to face the computer. “We all have them for our tour.”

The way he entered the recording booth seemed distant, and a part of you couldn’t help but wonder why as you fidgeted with your necklace and settled everything on the desk comfortably. Ji turned the light off, something slightly weird. He never did that with you, after all these years, and considering you two were the only ones there, you asked.

“Is it a high register?” You wondered, pressing the button on your left so he could hear you in his headphones. You blinked when you saw his figure slightly jolt in something like surprise.

“Uh, no. It’s just the… style of the song,” he giggled, putting his beanie on and tucking in the hairs that fell over his eyes.

Oh. That’s the one you gifted him.

“Sure. Mind if I give it a listen first?”

“Go ahead,” he replied without looking at you through the window.

Helping him came off naturally. The track for the girls was an excuse, one you had already forgotten. And as he started singing, you weren’t sure you’d remember any time soon.

“T-those are some bold lyrics, huh?”

Hallucination.

Jisung covered his eyes with his beanie, giggling.

“It’s Innie’s fault. He gets it from Chan.”

“What’s Chan’s solo about?” You asked with a laugh.

You didn’t expect Jisung to stare at you and swallow dry.

“He says it’s about trains.” He shrugged, as if he had remembered suddenly that he was supposed to answer your question.

When you both were done, it was late. Really late. He insisted you two grabbed a beer in the convenience store nearby, but you took a juice, claiming you had to drive.

“I’ll uh, I’ll get the bus, seriously,” he raised his hands as you both exited the store, beer in hand.

“Ji,” you deadpanned, finishing your juice. Thank God you liked him, because sometimes you wanted to hit him. Softly. With a pillow. “Shut up. I’m taking you.”

[🔺☆ 🚀 ☆🔺]

“How come I didn’t remember you have a driver's license?” Han smiles sheepishly.

The drive to his apartment is silent, as if you two were submerged in a no-conversation. No words, no nothing, just the sound of the tires against the asphalt and the yellow lights from the streetlights that lightened your way.

It’s late enough that there are little to no cars on the driveway. But weirdly, Jisung sips from his beer and sighs.

“Actually, could to take a left here?” He says softly, his voice surprisingly low.

“That’s not the way to your apartment, is it?” You ask, as softly as him, turning anyways.

“Nah, it’s this place I found and I wanted to show you.”

Alcohol doesn’t get easy to him —not from a beer, at least—, but he’s smiling like silly, and you can’t help but smile too.

You park where he tells you, and surely enough, there’s no one there. It’s a secluded, empty area, far from the center and high enough so that the city can be seen clearly.

“Think I left my jacket here last time I came.” He snickers, and you can’t help but chuckle. His hand travels to your knee and he squeezes it gently. “I’ll come back in just a second.”

One blink. Two blinks.

Hot fucking damn.

Your head falls against the steering wheel as soon as he closes the door.

Get your shit together.

Looking up, the car tells you it’s way past midnight. Your head tells you you’re crazy, your heart giggles at the fact, guilty as charged. Sighing, you raise your face enough to look at the stars. Only to find Jisung’s silhouette, now with a dark jacket on, waving at you as he stands in front of the car.

You’re blushing, but you wave haphazardly, smiling, and still frown when instead of getting back to his seat, Jisung goes and opens your door instead.

“Hey,” he giggles, and your grin matches with his.

“What are you doing?”

Jupiter can sometimes be seen from Earth, when the Sun’s light hits it just right and the night is dark. Still, its shimmer doesn’t compare to that of Jisung’s eyes when he rests his forearms on the car’s roof and bends down to your height. You haven’t moved, your own eyes fixated on how he licks his lips.

“I think I’m being stupid,” he chuckles. You’re a goner, not even noticing how his hand slides in for a moment and turns the headlights off, leaving you two only illuminated by the shy light in the car that indicates that the door is open and by the moonlight, who cheekily shines at the both of you.

Instead, you blink. Normally you just get him, just as he gets you, but you’re almost as lost as how you feel when you stare into his dark brown eyes.

“Stupid?” You smile lightly. “Why?”

At your tender tone, Jisung lets his head fall down, shyness getting the best of him. And yet the little alcohol he’s had boosts him back.

“I, uh, had a dream. Been having these dreams for like, a bit over a month,” he swallows dry, much like he did at the studio, and his eyes suddenly feel darker than before, maybe because his gaze stops avoiding yours for longer than a minute.

A meteor shower threatens to fall over your heart.

“You were there. And I was there, too.”

For someone who composes and uses words for a living, he was struggling a lot to piece together what he wanted to say.

“This… there was… this… feeling, like, inside of me. Here.”

Not only does he not use his hand, but he takes yours from the steering wheel and settles it over his chest. His heart.

You’re frozen. Completely out of it. Is it possible that maybe you fell asleep in the studio and that none of this is real? Could that be it, you wonder, until Jisung groans and leans his forehead against the roof of the car with a thud.

“I’m being an idiot, am I?” He snickers, with an undertone that lingers in something that resembles resignation. “I just- I saw you the other day, and I was… you were with Hyunjin, and I…” he clenches his fist, and he tries to back off, rubbing his face and passing them through his hair.

“No, Ji, wait.”

He chuckles breathlessly. “I made it awkward, right?”

“Ji.”

Your hand pulls him back closer by the zipper of his jacket, and only the crunchy-like sound of the gravel beneath him as he walks echoes through the night and follows how you move your hands toward his wrists. Towards his own hands, stopping him from picking on his nails further.

“Tell me, Ji,” you mumble. “What were you saying?”

His voice threatens to tremble before he speaks. His eyes don’t move from yours, and you think you’re completely out of your mind, just as much as he thinks of himself too.

“I keep having these dreams where I see you and the ache of wanting you swells up in me, like I’m on a raft that’s sinking and I just can’t even escape thinking about you when I sleep because I-”

He’s rambling, but with a sudden move from your side, he’s not anymore.

The cold of November doesn’t hit you when you stand up bluntly and you link your arms behind his neck and kiss him like you have been wanting to do for years.

His lips crash against yours like the sea crashes against the sharp rocks against the shore, even if the coast is much further away than you think, but you don’t mind, because you can’t think.

You’re kissing him. Finally.

You’re kissing Han Jisung.

And then, just a beat after what you’ve done —what you’re doing— sinks in, he reacts. His hands travel underneath your jacket and in the blink of an eye, he’s letting you push him against the car. No words, no nothing, only the scent of his cologne that suddenly fills you.

You tremble beneath him, and he pants.

He’s not blinking, his eyes glued to you. He can’t think either.

You should say something. What should you say? ‘Me too’? That’s lame. How come your brain can’t work when you most need it?

As if to answer your question, Han kisses you this time. Of course you can’t think, not when his hands travel underneath your clothes and he twists you in a way that somehow it’s your back against the car now. He’s not breathing, and neither are you, because you’re not kissing anymore, not when your lips can feel the teasing dent of his teeth nibbling on them and when the only thing you can taste is his tongue.

You’re not against the car anymore, because he closes the driver’s door with a kick and he opens the one to the backseats while he keeps kissing you.

Crazy. You’ve gotta be, because dreaming something as wild as this and for it to feel real, as real as it gets, as real as it could ever be, it has to mean you’re crazy. And you’d die on that hill if it means you get to keep dreaming how Jisung takes his newly-found jacket off and throws it to the front seat, in the same foreign path as where he throws his shirt, or how you two barely fit in the car and so he settles his knee between your legs to help you move back enough so that he can close the door.

And now you’re there. Alone together.

He gasps against your neck, as if he remembered that he had to keep breathing to live, and you don’t lose your opportunity, taking your sweater off and throwing it towards the trunk.

You lean your head back, the car feeling heavy with only the sounds of both him and you panting.

“I… fuck, I need you to tell me you want this.” Han swallows dry. “I need you to say it. Please. I want this too much.”

A meteor shower? Scratch that. This is a meteor storm.

“I think this is a dream, but still, I want you. Please.”

No words, no nothing, just the sound of the leather against your sweaty skin when you sit up straight and kiss Jisung like you mean it. It’s all nasty, teeth and tongue and a string of saliva that lingers when you break the kiss to fumble with his zipper.

“What if it is a dream,” you gasp, out of breath, out of control, completely and irrevocably out of it as your eyes stare at his. “I want you. Even if I wake up right now.”

Your shirt is discarded as fast —if not faster— than the rest of your clothes before.

“So if it is a dream, let’s keep going until we wake up.” You swallow dry too. “Until the stars can’t be seen.”

The kiss is like a heroin kick, although it is one that seems familiar. Or maybe it’s that your lips have become used to kissing his, considering that breathing has become a second priority with how raw is the need to consume him. A wave of pleasure takes claim inside of you with each caress of his tongue, with every touch of his fingers on your back, with every eager breath next to your jaw. He pulls you closer and moans with his mouth buried in your skin unfinished phrases that drive you crazy little by little —more than you already were.

“It may end right away,” Jisung says in a hoarse voice, clinging to one of the headrests that are closest to him. “But I’ll make it up to you. With my mouth. Or with my fingers. Or both. Yes, fuck...”

It’s a mix of quick and ruthless kisses, mouths open. Wet and urgent, almost in bites, as if you’d want to eat the other alive as he takes his pants off and helps you with yours, going down to kiss your neck.

“You’re so... f-fuck, ah...” he mumbles while he runs his tongue down your throat and to your collarbone. “I never want to wake up.”

His lips taste like the feeling that overcomes you when you look at the sky on a starry night. Emotion. Ecstasy. You want to drink it whole until there’s not a single drop left. Drink him.

Jisunh squeezes your ass, while your mouths are a mess, while he bites your lip and pulls it, smiling like a cheeky bitch, while your mouths fight for the control of the kiss and your tongue caresses his, and before you can piece together that the windows are foggy because of the two of you, he’s sliding inside, his hand lacing with yours.

God, you want to moan. Moan so loud. And so you do, because there’s nothing in this dream that could stop you.

And he moans, too, because you are like a dream come true.

Juno and Jupiter.

[🔺☆ 🚀 ☆🔺]

~kats, who accidentaly went full autism, space and mythology on the meaning of ‘juno’ by Sabrina Carpenter.

catiuskaa, november 2024 ©

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sweetlady555 · 3 months ago

Text

My Personal Solar Return Observations Pt III

reminder to check your degrees in your sr chart as they play a big factor in how certain sr placements would play out!

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Venus 5H 17° SR - when i had this in my sr chart for 2023-2024 i saw myself experimenting more with different creative styles/looks. i would try to find inspiration from different creatives on instagram. while i was doing this, i started talking to a well known designer in that creative scene who had messaged me because he liked my style. it was a secret relationship because he cheated on someone to be with me which i thought they were completely done but he kept going back to her then back to me. he was obsessed with me and it was a really weird relationship, he would only come to me when his lustful desires were acting up and then would go when he was satisfied 💀. i was tired of this so i started talking to someone else and he found and his little ego got so hurt and he blocked me thank fucking god 😭😭!! I was also approached by another creative because he wanted to use my face as inspiration for his clothing brand hehe ( the 17° rules leo & fame )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Aries Rising 2° SR - when i had this i felt like i was really impulsive i did lots of things without thinking twice. i had my chart ruler in the 5h that year so it might be different if you end up having your asc ruler somewhere else in your sr chart, but for me i was impulsive when it came to switching different styles. i also started drinking and partying for the first time when i had a aries rising in my sr when it was placed in my 5h. aside from this, i was very determined on finishing goals i set my mind to and i was very consistent in trying to build a good foundation for myself. ( the 2° rules taurus & early stages )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Moon 7H 4° SR - most of my relationships that i had that year were lowkey codependent, the guys i talked to that year were very emotionally dependent and attached to me. they would usually call or message me out of nowhere to vent or open up to me which would be random asf lmaoo ( the 4° rules cancer & security/protection )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Mercury 3H 28° SR - I started talking to my siblings more and my relationship grew closer with them. I also started becoming more vunerable with my siblings. My relationship with my siblings were more nurturing compared to the past. ( the 28° rules cancer & heightened sensitivity/vulnerability )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Mars 5H 21° SR - I went out a lot more when i had this in my sr chart with my sisters friends who would randomly go out just for the fun of it 😭, like it was last minute most of the times but it was so fun tho! i got to do lots of things on the trips we went to! I was also more open to expressing my creativity like making clothes and putting it out there and such. ( the 21° rules saggitarius & travel/freedom )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Jupiter 1H 8° SR - I was more optimistic about life when I had this placement in my sr chart. I also felt like I was really lucky when it came to travelling more. places ive wanted to go to forever i ended up going to! things i wanted to experience i experienced! it was a good year for experiencing new things. ( the 8° rules scorpio & transformations )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Uranus 2H 21° SR - yeah i dont know where my money went that year 💀 money would come fast and then it would go even faster 😭 i saw my money as a source of freedom and thought of money so recklessly like, “oh these shoes are $300 but i just got fired? dont worry the money will come back *BOUGHT🧾*” so i didnt care much about saving or anything 😭 it came back though!! but then it went bye bye the next day😍 also for some weird reason whenever i took money out from daily pay which is a app where you can take money out early from your check when you work, whenever i took it out it ended up saying i had to pay back the amount i took out? like uhhh im pretty sure this was my money i took out 😂🤔… so now im -$200 but they gotta catch me in person cuz im not paying that 😹 ( the 21° degree rules saggitarius and freedom )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Pluto 11H 29° SR - i ended two 5+ year friendship that year, it was hard but it was a trio and i found out that the both of them would ditch me to go hangout and do substances and i feel like that didnt align with my path because you are who you hangout with!! i also saw my goals/path changing that year, I completely re-evaluated what i wanted to do 🙏. ( the 29° is a anaretic degree that rules major transformations/completion/endings )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ Chiron 1H 19° SR - I was VERY critical on how others percieved me and my self image, i had multiple identity crises. I was super insecure the year I had this in my sr chart i cant even lie, despite so many people telling me how beautiful I was I just couldnt see it. 2 months before my birthday in 2024 i ended up understanding who i was and finding out what I LIKE and not what other people expected of me. im not facing multiple identity crises anymore which i thank my nn in my 1h from that year 🙏. ( 19° rules libra & can make a person more erratic and critical )

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 1H SR in 5H SR - I was more open to showcasing my creative talents, designing clothes, starting lots of creative projects. I was also having sooo much fun that year i miss it so much but lemme stop reminiscing 💔 I was also more flirty and playful that year leading me to have a few romantic encounters this year. Lots of creativity, fun, and sexual encounters happened that year.

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 2H SR in 5H SR - I spent most of my money on clothes and on creative projects just things that made me happy!!!! I was also recieving money from a lot of guys who wanted sexual things from me but they got #finessed and i didnt care because who do you think i am???????

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 3H SR in 3H SR - when i had this i started getting into astrology more, i was also reading a lot more aswell. I was really curious and i needed lots of mental stimulation from something that was neverending and astrology just so happened to be it 😹. I was also making tons of short trips that year.

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 4H SR in 7H SR - my family life was lowkey stopping me from getting into any relationships, i came to the realization i wouldnt be able to get into any relationships while living with my parents because of how controlling they can be. Also my sister got into a new relationship that sr year.

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 5H SR in 7H SR - I started talking to a creative designer the year I had my 5h in my 7h. I was also getting involved with creative partnerships aswell, promoting eye contacts/lashes/having my face used for someones brand. I also attended more parties and was going out more so i found most of my relationship encounters were through that.

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 6H SR in 4H SR - i changed my diet when i had this in my sr. I also didnt know how to balance my work life and home life so it clashed terribly and i got fired😭. I was also going out more with my sister so my routines have changed from never going out at all to going out every week.

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 7H SR in 5H SR - I met lots of new friends and different social circles through fun plans like partying, girls trips etc.. I also had lots of fun romantic encounters when i had this in my sr whether i met them when i was drunk or at parties it was lots of fun lol. There was so much childlike joy when it came to my relationships that sr year.

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 8H SR in 5H SR - i lost my virginity the year i had this in my sr😶 but besides that my relationships in that sr year really shaped my understanding of love and myself. i was also recieving money from relationships i felt like a sugar baby🙈

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 9H SR in 1H SR - BABY I WAS OUTSIDEEE😭😩 okay besides that, that sr year when i had this i experienced a lot of new things that helped me discover who i was on the inside 😊. I was focused on self growth especially that year!

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 10H SR in 12H SR - I thought a lot about what I wanted to do career wise and how it would align with my goals and my purpose . I had this in my sr when I got fired 😭 and i realized I would prefer being my own boss when it came to my work life

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 11H SR in 12H SR - I unfriended my closest friends after re-evaluating our friendships that year. I also found out shady shit about them and I didn’t like that which led me to unfriending them

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 12H SR in 2H SR - i was manifesting money a lot the year i had this and im not even gonna lie it was coming!! so if you have this in your sr this year, manifest that moola$$$!!!!! i was also receiving money behind the scenes from other people the year i had this in my sr chart .

if my sr chart for that solar return year was a song it would be definitely be this song 🥲 #willforevercherishthatyear

dont forget to check out my other personal sr observations if you enjoyed this one :) !

#astro community #astro observations #astro notes #astrology lunar return #solar return chart #solar return #solar return observations #sr chart #sr oberservations #astrology observations #Venus 5h #astrology #astro #astro placements #solar return house placements

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muzzlemouths · 1 month ago

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Your DFtR AU has garnered my interest.

What lore have you in store, dear Muzz?

Doesn't matter what, take your pick, your pick of poison.

(I smell angst. I live for it. Danger and thrills too. that not so much)

But really, I'd love to hear what you've got in store for this AU!

Hmmmm it's going to be difficult navigating the lore without giving away too much. For now, I'll drop some of the more minor details that won't spoil anything immediately plot relevant.

Sun / Moon

They're solar powered! The pro of this is that they don't need to scramble to find an outlet in the middle of the woods. The con is that moonlight doesn't produce nearly as much power, which means Moon is essentially running on Sun's fumes whenever he's out. He's exhausted. Always.

The eye with the faded pupil has less vision in it. They aren't entirely blind on that side, but rather everything seen through that eye is faded and distorted, which can be a little disorienting.

Shoutout to @normal-about-the-dca who caught this one: Sun still wears the friendship bracelets from his last year as a counselor, but Moon removes them when he's out (he respectfully keeps them safe in his pockets, however). This is because Moon wants to forget, but Sun is scared of forgetting.

Unlike in the canon game, Sun and Moon's pants are lined with soft cotton. Sun gets distressed when too much of it is lost due to new holes and tears, so Moon has formed a habit of stealing cushions from the ranger's office every few years. So far it's just been chalked up to children's pranks.

Sun and Moon were in charge of almost all the recreational activities in camp. To this day, Sun sings or hums songs to himself as a way to cope, and Moon tells spooky campfire stories to any small wildlife that happens by at night.

Aside from keeping each other company through conversation, Sun and Moon will also sing to each other, and even play games. Only being able to switch out during natural day/night cycles means simple games like tic-tac-toe can take a week to win.

Y/N

As the newest stranger in the friend group, they are desperate to fit in. Not because they actually like any of these people, but because they've had a shit run of life and, well, Dolly's mom is a board member for their dream college, and Devin's brother promised them a job. The endless "requests" make them feel useful, and they have themself convinced that the constant mistreatment and being made an outcast is still less lonely than actually being alone.

Actually quite the spitfire, but appears outwardly meek due to how often they're treading on eggshells to avoid ruining the (paper thin) relationship between them and everyone else.

----Sun figures out that they're hiding something right off the bat but is elated to discover that y/n is far more daring than they look.

Has never been to summer camp (this is devastating news for Sun and Moon, you understand)

Theater kid with abandonment issues. They get along with Sun and Moon like peas in a pod....... which complicates things when the fun begins.

#DFtR au #I was going to write about the counselors too but this is already very long #and it would mostly just be me telling you their personalities #but if anyone's interested in that I'll add it in!

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uyuforu · 18 days ago

Text

Astro Observations: Lunar Return Chart VII

It's that time of the month! The Lunar Return Chart Series continue with another observation ^^

All pictures were found on Pinterest

Other posts you could like:

જ⁀➴ Lunar Return Chart IV

જ⁀➴ Lunar Return Chart V

જ⁀➴ Lunar Return Chart VI

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⊹₊⟡⋆ 4H Ruler in 12H is an indicator of moving.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 4H Ruler in 4H is an indicator of traveling in your country, or around your country.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Uranus conjunct Moon 12H can indicate feeling down but very suddenly, your moon switch during the month and you can feel sad often without knowing why.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Moon 12H usually indicates feeling sad or down this month. I was also feeling anxious and I overthink quite a lot this month.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Every time I have Uranus 12H I feel more tired and I need more sleep.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Saturn 10H is indeed an indicator of having some obstacles or difficulties in your career. But it doesn't mean necessarily that it's because your career isn't doing well. Ruler will say why you have those difficulties.

For Example, I had this placement last month, but had a lot of clients. But it was hard mentally to finish the readings, and my 10H Ruler was Uranus 12H. I was tired and never felt like working.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Moon conjunct Uranus 12H can also indicate having weird dreams with weird significations.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 5H Stellium usually means you'll be more into fashion, beauty tips, skincare, and make up this month.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Venus 5H, I bought more clothes this month, and I found a lot of good items in thrift shops.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 1H Ruler in 5H, I cut my hair and my hair are very healthy now and they look incredible.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Sun 10H Sun or Rulling 10H can mean you'll get more success and recognition this year, can be in your career or just in other parts for your life. Check where Ruler is in.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Stellium in 2H can mean gaining more money this month than last month for example.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Leo 10H & Ruler is in 12H can mean getting unwanted attention. You could get more attention and it's not something you really wanted. You can also get more popular and it can feel exhausting mentally.

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⊹₊⟡⋆ Jupiter 1H can be an indicator of taking a little weight, or you could feel thicker.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 2H Ruler in 12H, I wanted to save money. I was also more into manifesting money.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Mars 2H, I was more worried and anxious because of money.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 3H Ruler in 12H, very funny thing but this was the month I switched my instagram account into private mode for the first time since I had it.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 4H Ruler in 5H means you'll have some good time and good laugh with family this month.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Someone told me this already when I asked if they had this placement before, but 7H Ruler in 1H can mean a lot of people will be into you and interested in dating you.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Venus & Juno 5H will mean something similar.

⊹₊⟡⋆ My new LRC just started and I have 8H Ruler in 2H, Ruled by Venus, and I have such huge fashion fever!

⊹₊⟡⋆ I have Scorpio Rising in this new LRC and it's the same as my SRC, and I have tons of same placements as my SRC, I think this month will be very significant for me.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Chiron 8H can also be an indicator of being sick.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 12H Stelliums can usually translates into depression. You could not want to do a single thing but stay in bed and sleep.

⊹₊⟡⋆ Scorpio Rising could mean you'll change something in your life this month, and it can be transforming something that will play a major role in your life over the next few months.

⊹₊⟡⋆ 2H Ruler in 3H can mean buying new technology, like a phone for example.

Thank you for reading!

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secretlyhuntokar · 3 months ago

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Penumbra podcast Junoverse headcanons

(under cut because there are a Lot) ((Also spoiler warning up to Thief's Honour pt 2))

- Juno leaves notes in his and Nureyev's room on the Carte Blanche if he gets up before him so Nureyev doesn't worry he left again

- One of the main reasons Nureyev is scared of aging is because he's already lived a full hallucinated life and doesn't want to waste any second of his real one

- Juno wears a trenchcoat because Rita was really into old Earth noir detective streams when they first met and she bought a trenchcoat for him. And it was the first gift someone had bought for him in years.

- Juno still wears that trenchcoat to this day

- Nureyev once bought/stole Juno a new trenchcoat and while Juno thought it was a really nice trenchcoat and a sweet gesture, he never wore it because its not the one Rita got him

- Nureyev likes to see how many of Vespa's knives he can steal before she notices and yells/threatens him for them back

- Vespa taught Buddy how to play Rangian Street Poker

- The Ruby Seven is green because wherever it's from, Ruby is their word for green

- Rangian Street Poker varies very slightly across Outer Rim planets, and even more so on the Solar planets

- New Kinshasa's version of Rangian Street Poker is the most similar to the Solar version out of all the Outer Rim Variations

- Nureyev and Rita make each other jewelry. Rita hands the jewelry she makes to Nureyev directly, while Nureyev sneaks what he makes under Rita's door at night, or leaves it on her seat for her to find in the morning

- Rita is from the Cerberus Province or someplace similar to it. Or she spent a lot of time sneaking out to the Martian sewers while growing up and befriended the Martian sewer rabbits

- Jet didn't know how to wash his hair properly and one time it got especially greasy after changing the Ruby's oil or something, so Rita showed him how to clean it properly. Since then they try to have a 'spa day' sort of thing once a week

- The Mechanisms are somewhere Out There in Junoverse

- Buddy Aurinko has met the Mechanisms, and Vespa has not. She is definitely not jealous about that. Nuh uh.

- Buddy is naturally taller than Nureyev but she does not know this because Nureyev is always wearing heels that make him appear an inch taller than her. No matter what shoes she herself chooses to wear that day.

- Nureyev kept the handcuffs from the Murderous Mask ep

- The entire Carte Blanche has matching friendship bracelets that they made together (suggested by Rita and organised by Buddy). The Ruby Seven's bracelet was made by Jet and is tied around its steering wheel. Nureyev also made it one later on, which he hid under one of the seats.

- Juno has 10 eyepatches he frequently wears and they are all identical.

- Juno and Slip would've loved each other if they had the chance to meet properly. Platonically or romantically it doesn't matter. Either way, they would pretend to be jealous of each other around Nureyev for a while, until one day Nureyev catches them watching a shitty stream together, making fun of the bad writing.

- Slip didn't want to be revived

- Slip was sometimes conscious enough to hear everything that happened around him

- Slip calls Nureyev "Petya" either because that's the Brahman pronunciation of it or because he misheard the first time they met and it stuck as a nickname

- If Petya is the Brahman pronunciation of Peter, then Mag was the one who changed his name to "Peter" so it "sounded more Solar"

- Buddy and Vespa dye their hair together

- One time they were real tired while dying their hair, and accidentally switched the colours around. For a few months Buddy had green hair and Vespa had red hair. Vespa has a photo of her and Buddy with swapped hair colours as her comms homescreen

- Juno used to think diamonds were beautiful, and now can't stand the sight of them

- Ben would teach Juno to dance (I think this one is canon? Juno's "I had a good teacher" line in Man in Glass makes me think so? And it might've been brought up in other episodes too)

- Juno couldn't bear to do any sort of dance for years after Ben died

- Juno tried to keep the dahlias and roses Nureyev got him for his birthday alive for as long as possible, but they probably wilted either during the THEIA stuff or soon after he left Hyperion city. They still sit in his office though, and he has a photo of them from before they wilted that he looks at sometimes

- Buddy sometimes does her makeup in a green that matches Vespa's hair. Vespa does the same, but in red

- Nureyev used to not have a favourite colour, but it became gold after Man in Glass

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scoonsalicious · 8 months ago

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Unwanted: Chapter 2, Unspeakable - Pt. 1

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Avenger!Fem!Reader

Summary: When your FWB relationship with your best friend Bucky Barnes turns into something more, you couldn’t be happier. That is, however, until a new Avenger sets her sights on your super soldier and he inadvertently breaks your heart. You take on a mission you might not be prepared for to put some distance between the two of you and open yourself up to past traumas. Too bad the only one who can help you heal is the one person you can no longer trust.

Warnings: (For this part only; see Story Masterlist for general Warnings) Language, mentions of alcohol, longing looks/touches, this part's mostly fluff, ngl.

Word Count: 1.1k

Previously On...: And from that night, you and Bucky became best friends. Because there are some things you can't share without ending up liking each other, and the stuff of your nightmares was one of them.

A/N: I thought the Harry Potter quote was appropriate to bastardize for the Previously On... Don't come for me, lol

Banner By: The absolutely amazing @mrsbuckybarnes1917

Taglist: (Please let me know if you’d like to be added!) @blackhawkfanatic @les-sel @marcswife21

From that night on, Bucky found every excuse he could to touch you. It was as though, after so many years of nothing but cold cruelty, he had become addicted to the warmth and softness of your skin. You didn't mind in the least; you liked the way he wrapped his arm around your stomach and rested his chin in the crook of your shoulder when he came up behind you, or the way he pulled your hand onto his thigh and traced the lines of your palm with his index finger while you watched TV in the common room, side by side.

One afternoon, you were standing in front of a monitor in your lab, lost in thought as the numbers from your latest algorithm trial ran across the screen. So immersed were you in the data that you didn't notice the form coming up behind you until two hands grabbed you by the waist, lifting you up and spinning you.

Without thinking, your years of training kicked in, like flipping on a switch. You stomped down, hard, on the top of your assailant's foot with your heel, while simultaneously throwing your elbow back into their solar plexus. The attacker let out a low "Oof" and released their hold on you, giving you the opportunity to drop your weight low and spin on your toes to face them.

Bucky stood stooped before you, one hand clutching his abdomen where your elbow had made contact, the other hand held up in surrender. The other hand?

"Jesus Christ, Buck!" you panted. "You scared the shit out of me!"

"I was trying to surprise you, you hell beast," Bucky said, though he was smiling. Rubbing the tender spot of nerves you had so artfully disturbed, he asked "Where'd you learn to fight so dirty?"

"Krav Maga," you beamed, pleased that you'd managed to get a hit on a super soldier, even if Bucky hadn't been actually attacking you. "Care to tell me how you managed to end up with two fucking arms?"

Now it was Buck's turn to beam at you as he held out his new left arm for your perusal. You took the hand, inspecting it. Black metal gleamed in the light of your lab. You turned the arm over, admiring the craftsmanship. "This is a thing of beauty, Buck," you murmured, trailing your fingers along the gold veins that ran through the metal. Bucky involuntarily shivered at your touch. "You can feel that?" you asked him, awestruck. He nodded, his face awash in delight.

You leaned in to examine it more closely. If you didn't know any better, you'd say it was... But, no, it couldn't be– "Bucky," you said in astonishment, looking up to meet his eye, "is this vibranium?"

Bucky grinned from ear to ear, looking like a little boy who had gotten just what he'd asked for for Christmas. "It was a gift. From the Wakandans, for helping them capture Helmut Zemo." Bucky seemed almost shy at revealing why the Wakandans had gifted him the arm, as though he was still uncomfortable with being acknowledged for doing good instead of being blamed for committing evil.

"This..." you started, at a loss for words. "Bucky, this is amazing! The Wakandans are the most technologically advanced nation on the planet. This makes the arm I've been working on look like a fucking stick."

Bucky cocked his head and studied you as you studied the vibranium appendage. "You were making me an arm, doll?" he asked, throat choked on emotion.

You looked up at him, a blush of color rising to your cheeks. "Well, I was trying to. I wasn't going to say anything until I knew it would work; I didn't want to get your hopes up, but this... this is worlds better than anything I could have manufactured."

Bucky gently pulled his metal arm from your hand and used it to cup your cheek, instead. You leaned into the cool, hard metal. "That's the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for me," he murmured. You gave him a soft smile.

"You're one of my best friends, and you deserve all the good things," you told him with a shrug of your shoulder. "Including two functioning arms."

Bucky pulled you into a hug and you returned his embrace, relishing in the feeling of being completely held by him. "I don't know what I'd do without you, Pocket," he said into the top of your head.

You pulled back to look up at him. "Well, hopefully, you'll never have to find out." You stayed like that for a few moments longer, neither of you willing to be the first to let go. "You know what," you said, eventually pulling away from him, "we should celebrate."

Bucky looked down at you with a glint in his eye. "Celebrate, huh? What should we do?"

"Anything you want," you told him, moving out of the cage of his arms. Arms. You still couldn't believe it. "It's your arm we're celebrating."

He studied you for a moment, and there was a look in his eyes you couldn't quite decipher. As the heat of Bucky's gaze lingered on you, a shiver ran down your spine. There was something different about the way he looked at you now, something that made your heart race and your palms grow sweaty. It was as if every fiber of his being was focused solely on you, his eyes tracing every contour of your face with an almost alarming intensity.

"Can we start those Hobbit movies?" he asked.

"That's how you want to celebrate?" you smiled up at him. "You're such a fucking nerd. Yeah, we can absolutely do that. Oh, shit--" you remembered. "It's Girls' Night tonight. It’s fine– I can skip it."

"No," said Bucky, and the look he'd been giving you had vanished, leaving you to wonder if you'd simply imagined it to begin with, "go to Girls' Night. I know how much you look forward to those."

"I said we'd celebrate, and I want to celebrate," you insisted. "I can bow out of Girls' Night early. I'll just pop in, have one glass of wine, and then I'll be all yours; they can manage without me for a night."

Bucky hit you with his devil-charming grin. "All mine?" he asked, a mischievous lilt to his voice.

Rolling your eyes, you playfully slapped at his chest. "You know what I mean, asshat."

"Another dollar in the jar," he tsked.

"Get the fuck out of here and let me get back to work," you said with a laugh, shooing him away. You followed him with your eyes as he made his way to the door. Right before he went through, he turned around and looked back over at you, giving you a parting smile before walking off.

<- Previous Chapter / Next Part ->

#bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky x you #bucky x reader #bucky fanfic #bucky barnes #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky x female reader #bucky barnes fic #bucky barnes fanfiction #james bucky buchanan barnes #james buchanan barnes #mcu bucky barnes #james barnes #bucky x y/n

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elminx · 1 month ago

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Energy Update: October 2024

October is a “9” Universal Month [10 (October) + 8 (2024) = 18 = 1+8=9] in a “8” Universal Year. In numerology, “9” is the number of completions and endings. For some, big projects will finally be coming to fruition. Others of us may be dealing with endings, for good or ill. This aligns with the month’s astrological energy, which includes our last solar eclipse in Libra in this lunar node cycle and some significant planetary shifts.

The Set Up

We begin the month with the Sun and Mercury in Libra, Venus in Scorpio, Mars in Cancer, Jupiter in Gemini, retrograde Saturn and Neptune in Pisces, retrograde Uranus in Taurus, and retrograde Pluto in Capricorn. By month’s end, the Sun and Mercury will have moved into Scorpio and Venus into Sagittarius. Additionally, Jupiter will have retrograded, and Pluto will station direct. Mars will also have entered its pre-retrograde shadow in Cancer.

The Nitty Gritty

The month begins with a bang with a solar eclipse at 10° Libra on the second. Otherwise, all eyes are on Pluto, who is on its last legs in Capricorn for the next two months, and Mars, who is entering its pre-retrograde shadow. These three events not only set the tone for the month but will ripple through the rest of the year and into the coming one ahead.

Our Lights: The Sun and the Moon

The Sun will spend 3/4 of the month in the cardinal air sign of Libra and the last bit in the fixed water sign of Scorpio. This is our last Libra season before our lunar nodes switch to the Pisces-Aries axis in January of 2025, and we all have one final reckoning to meet around the themes of independence vs. togetherness. We’re coming out of a pandemic that highlighted both ends of this spectrum: on the one hand, we all felt the loneliness and isolation of the quarantine times, but on the other, it took a considerable amount of working together to create and distribute novelle vaccines to the entire world. We all got a deeper glimpse into how big and how small our lives really are. How interconnected, but also how separate.

I don’t mean to downplay this event or the trauma it has caused us all, but instead, to emphasize its complexity. What I have found the most fascinating about these past four years is how differently people experienced and synthesized these moments—sometimes even people who lived in the same house as one another! When somebody we loved could understand our experience with the pandemic, we felt more connected; when they did not, we felt more isolated.

Although this certainly isn’t over, it IS a good analogy for what is happening inside all of us and what is being highlighted by this last Libra eclipse on the Aries-Libra axis. All of us, every human on this planet, have a baseline of where we fall on the individuality to connectedness scale. Some of this comes straight out of our natal birth charts – Aries, often, are quite independent, and Libras are most certainly not. But our backgrounds, experiences, triumphs, and traumas all shape who we are and what we are comfortable with. We have all been forced to look at where we fall on this scale; we have all been weighed, and some of us have been found wanting. I don’t mean to imply a universal right or wrong in this regard, but there may often be for a certain place at a certain time.

Then you have two choices: You can adapt, or you can leave and find a place that is more to your liking.

Because the Aries-Libra axis is one of independence and connectedness, relationships have been on the hot seat for a long two years. Many of us really had to consider whether what we were doing (and with whom we were doing it) was worth the sunk cost. I don’t just mean Big R Romantic relationships here, either. All human interactions are relationships. Some will be worth every effort we put into them. And others were never worth our time.

All of this will come to a head leading into our solar eclipse on 10/02 because Libra is the sign of relationships and togetherness. This is a mixed energy eclipse as it involves the energy of a new moon conjunct to the energy of the South Node, our axis of past-facing fate. Also, our two relationship signs (Venus in Scorpio and Mars in Cancer) will be in a wide grand trine with retrograde Saturn in Pisces. Many people will ask themselves, “Is this really meant to be?” and likely coming up short. Because, after all, is ANYTHING truly meant to be? This astrologer says no, not that way anyway; that’s just not how fate works.

But this isn’t a post about synastry and how we fulfill lessons in each other’s lives. It’s about the cosmic, often overdue, realization that you cannot live for another person – you must live for yourself. That’s the lesson of our North Node in Aries, and we’re almost out of time.

Some relationships will end in and around the solar eclipse, that’s just the way of things. It may be hard, and it may really fucking hurt. But people who can’t agree on what a relationship means, who can’t bend and align to live a life together with interconnectedness rather than codependence, well, they really aren’t meant to be, aren’t they?

I know that there are some Libra types out there who have never learned this lesson and who are very mad at me for writing this. What can I say? I have an Aries moon. That’s my bias. Do you know what yours is?

This new moon is a 5/5 moon.

7 (Libra moon) + 7 (Libra Sun) = 14 – 1+4 = 5. 5 (Libra new moon) + 9 (October 2024) = 14 = 1+4 =5.

5 is a bit of a warning, a conflict number. This aligns with the energy of the eclipse pretty seamlessly. It’s not that what is meant to be is easy, per se, but when you are well aligned, you can get through conflicts easily. Pay attention to that during the eclipse and the days surrounding it.

Otherwise, our Sun squares off with Mars in Cancer on 10/14, which will be a rough-and-tumble fighty sort of day. Be ready to get into it, or step the fuck out of the way. You might be able to channel this cardinal energy into a project if you’ve got a well-aspected Mars in your natal birth chart but don’t push your luck with other people during this time. The Sun’s trine with Jupiter on the 13th may smooth things over, but only if you’re especially lucky. (Jupiter is retrograde and in its exile, after all)

Our full moon on 10/17 falls at 24° Aries and will pull in a lot of energy from our Sun-Mars square and our total solar eclipse last April through the Moon’s conjunction with Chiron. Our solar eclipse was at 19° Aries and was part of a major stellium between the Sun, the Moon, Mercury, and Chiron. Now slow-moving Chiron is still sitting at 21°, holding that wound.

This is an 8/8 full moon.

1 (Aries Moon) + 7 (Libra Sun) = 8. 8 (Aries Full Moon) + 9 (October 2024) = 17 = 1+7 = 8.

8 is the number of the ouroboros and the infinity sign; it is a reminder that what comes around goes around. Everything that goes up must come back down, and vice versa. Expect the highest highs and the lowest lows on an 8 moon, which is a double 8 moon. You can work with the Stength card or the Wheel of Time in the tarot to further this energy.

As the Sun prepares to exit Libra on 10/22, it forms a quick square with Pluto in Capricorn, repeating the theme of endings this month. Pluto is the planet of death and transformation, and he will be in Capricorn for a scant two months more for the next two hundred years! If you couldn’t put it down on the eclipse, do it now.

This energy will shift rapidly as we exit our very last eclipse cycles and enter Scorpio season. Things may get dark and moody, but they will certainly feel less fated as our luminaries pull away from our lunar nodes.

Mars

Mars gets near-to-the-top billing this month as it enters its pre-retrograde shadow on 10/04. This retrograde will occur between 06° Leo and 17° Cancer, so the switchover from cardinal to fixed sign will be in the hot seat for the next seven months. You read that right: 7 months from 10/2 when Mars enters its pre-retrograde shadow to 5/2 when it exits its post-retrograde cycle.

I feel like we’re in for a reminder here. All retrogrades happen in three stages as the planet will pass over the same points in the horoscope wheel thrice: first in forward motion (the pre-retrograde shadow), secondly when moving backward in retrograde, and thirdly as it moves forward the final time in its post-retrograde shadow. This is why (how?) retrogrades tend to bring with them our deepest lessons: any aspect that Mars makes with your chart will happen three times in the next seven months.

I will explore this energy more in my Mars retrograde Update, but the transition from cardinal to fixed signs is one of actualization. Cardinal signs are the searching signs and the first signs of the season. Fixed signs are the root signs; they take what the cardinal sign has uncovered and plant it/make it solid. Mars is the planet of action. Retrogrades are a time of re-s: we get to rethink, revise, revisit, renovate.

Mars will be in the pre-retrograde shadow phase for the entire month. During this phase, Mars will be in aspect with all of our personal planets and Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, and Chiron. Because this astrological event lasts for seven months, we can acknowledge the Sun, Moon, Mercury, and Venus as a part of this story. However, we know they will be across the horoscope and into Taurus season by the time this transit resolves. Our outer planets and Chiron move much slower; they are the meat of this retrograde cycle.

This is looking ahead a lotta bit (but this will go until May 2025 so stay with me here), but this theme of hoovering on the edge between two planets (which Mars will now embody) has been in place all year as Pluto moves back and forth over the line between Capricorn and Aquarius. Now, looking ahead to 2025, Uranus will do so on the line between Taurus and Gemini and Neptune between Pisces and Aries. On top of that, our lunar nodes change signs in January!

Mars can get a little bit off of its game when so much is going on. Mars is also in its fall in Cancer., where it will be all month.

If you don’t know where to turn or what path to take, know you are right on time. It’s frustrating AF, I’m sure, but it is a part of the process. As we transition into this new era, many of us are finding that the ground underneath us has shifted. What made sense before may not make sense now.

You can consider these next seven months our planetary adjustment zone.

Things to remember: Cancer is considered the fall of Mars because the crab doesn’t move in a straight line. The crab is also known for holding on for dear life, so maybe work on loosening that death grip (you know what I mean if that is intended for you).

This will affect everyone because Mars is one of our personal planets. Mars is also the one personal planet that is beyond the Earth, which means that it works a little bit differently from Mercury and Venus. Mars isn’t tied to the Sun, which seems important to note here. These are the people that will be most affected by our Mars retrograde. Note here that you may have more than one and each compounds.

Anyone with Sun, Moon, or Ascendant between 00-06° of the fixed signs (Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, Aquarius) or 17-29° of the cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Libra, Capricorn) with additional emphasis on Cancer and Leo/conjunctions

Anyone with Mars in those degrees of any sign (but the ones listed above most specifically)

Anyone with Mercury of Venus in those signs/degrees

Any Aries or Scorpio Sun or Moon

Anyone with a Mars dominant chart

Anyone with a luminary or personal planet between 00-06° Aries and Sagittarius or 17-29° Scorpio and Pisces

I’ll get into what this means more as we start working through this transit (I have seven months to write about it, apparently), but it’s time to become aware right now. And to give yourself grace is your work – whatever that means to you – happens more slowly.

Mercury

Mercury will be in Libra until the 13th when it enters Scorpio. In Libra, it will square off with Mars in Cancer, which may make the days around the 6th challenging and bitey. The next day, it will trine Jupiter in Gemini, so this likely won’t have any lasting effects.

Before it enters Scorpio, it will square Pluto on 10/13. I think this may feel like a bit of a release. This is the last time Mercury will square Pluto while Pluto is still in Capricorn. This day may feel somber, as if the hollows are extra hollow. You can work with that.

Mercury in Scorpio trines retrograde Saturn in Pisces on 10/22, reminding us of where we’ve been and how far we have come in the last four years. This will sit better with some people than with others, and it may be a deeply emotional day for some. At the end of the month, Mercury meets up with Neptune and Uranus as it begins to make moves to switch signs again. This could be intense for some, but it will mostly pass uneventfully.

Venus

While Mars is mired in its pre-retrograde shadow all month in Cancer, we look to Venus to see if we will get anywhere at all. Both Venus and Mars are our two movement planets; their interactions with each other show us how we attract (Venus) and go out and get (Mars) what we want. The world will run a bit smoother when Venus and Mars are better aligned. People will get along better. The two, especially poorly maligned, have indications for war and other human-made calamities.

Venus begins the month in the fixed water sign Scorpio until 10/17, when it enters the mutable fire sign of Sagittarius. As the Morning Star, Venus is at full speed, rushing ahead of the Sun. For as long as the Sun is in Libra, Venus will be our guiding planet, and she will be the intense watery depths of Scorpio. Note here that this is the sign of Venus’s exile as it is the opposite sign of Taurus, its domain.

Venus in Scorpio can be quixotic and demanding. She may not tell you what she really wants but instead, expect the world to read her mind. Monsters are lurking in those depths. She does have magnetism, though, something that Venus LIKES. This may be why Scorpio is the sign of Venus’s exile; Venus loves the power that Scorpio provides her, and that much is clear. The problem comes when the rest of the world doesn’t exactly enjoy how she is yielding that power.

Great responsibility and all that…

Venus in Scorpio trines Mars in Cancer on 10/08, which is generally indicative of lovey-dovey weather. It’s worth noting here that retrograde Saturn is a part of this equation and in a grand trine to them both during this event. Yeah, sure, love might be in the air, but consequences are also on the table. This is echoed twice as Mars has just entered his pre-retrograde shadow. Stay aware of who you cuddle up with during this time; what glitters may not be gold.

If you’ve said yes before and the two of you love getting mushy together, this will be a great day to have a watery date. Real Valentine’s Day energy. But, like with V-Day, it may be better to sit it out of you don’t trust your potential date. And definitely don’t sign any contracts (romantically speaking).

We will still be a bit hung over from our solar eclipse, which was all about the pitfalls of relationships. Don’t do somebody that day just to have somebody to do it, if you catch my drift.

Venus will lighten up some once she enters Sagittarius, but she, too, needs to come clean with Pluto on the way out of Scorpio. Again, some romantic relationships are not meant to make it all the way to November this year. This square with Pluto will be the last time Venus makes a major aspect with Pluto before it exits Capricorn next month.

In Sagittarius, she immediately trines the North Node, again, for the last time before the North Nodes switch signs in January. There are a lot of endings here.

After that, Venus in Sag squares off with retrograde Saturn in Pisces, putting even more tension on the consequences and endings we are experiencing all month.

Jupiter

On 10/09, Jupiter will station retrograde at 21° Gemini. As one of our intermediary planets, Jupiter retrogrades aren’t felt as deeply as those of our personal planets. The days immediately around this retrograde may feel liminal or a bit uneasy, as always happens when a planet stands still in the skies. Jupiter – the planet of expansion – is weaker while it is in retrograde, compounded by the fact that it is in the sign of its exile (Gemini).

Pluto

On 10/11, Pluto will station direct at 29° Capricorn. This is a big shift as it is the final curtain call on our Pluto-in-Capricorn era. In November, Pluto will move into Aquarius for the last time in this cycle. Outer planetary shifts happen very slowly; Pluto changes signs every 15-30 years. It’s the end of an era. Most people won’t feel this personally as this is our outer most dwarf planet, but the effects of this will ripple forward through 2025 and beyond.

The Details

10/02 – Solar Eclipse 10° Libra 10/04 – Venus in Scorpio trine retrograde Saturn in Pisces, Mars enters its pre-retrograde shadow 17° Cancer 10/06 – Mercury in Libra square Mars in Cancer 10/08 – Mercury in Libra trine Jupiter in Gemini, Venus in Scorpio trine Mars in Cancer 10/09 – Jupiter retrogrades 21° Gemini 10/11 – Pluto stations direct 29° Capricorn 10/12 – Retrograde Jupiter in Gemini sextile Chiron in Aries 10/13 – Mercury enters Scorpio, Sun in Libra trine retrograde Jupiter in Gemini, Mercury in Libra square Pluto in Capricorn, Mars in Cancer square Chiron in Aries 10/14 – Sun in Libra square Mars in Cancer, Venus in Scorpio opposed retrograde Uranus in Taurus 10/15 – Venus in Scorpio trine retrograde Neptue in Pisces 10/17 – Full Moon 24° Aries, Venus in Scorpio sextile Pluto in Capricorn, Venus enters Sagittarius 10/21 – Venus in Sagittarius trine North Node in Aries 10/22 – Sun enters Scorpio, Sun in Libra square Pluto in Capricorn, Mercury in Scorpio trine retrograde Saturn in Pisces 10/25 – Mars in Cancer sextile retrograde Uranus in Taurus 10/28 – Venus in Sagittarius square retrograde Saturn in Pisces, Mars in Cancer trine retrograde Neptune in Pisces 10/30 – Mercury in Scorpio opposed retrograde Uranus in Taurus 10/31 – Mercury in Scorpio trine retrograde Neptune in Pisces

#astrology #energy update #transits #October 2024

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