#where the fuck am iiii

[rapidhighway]

Bro this depression walk escalated

[themusingsofacurlyhairednerd]

In Love and War IIII

Author's Note: I hit a massive writer's slump, thank you for all your patience! Have some Smut, as a treat!

Content Warnings: SMUT with Some Plot I Swear--Masturbation, I guess there's kinda a hint of hate-fucking here but only if you squint, Exhibitionism, Thigh Riding (it's always the hands and thighs of this man I swear it's all I think about); Canon Typical Violence, Character Death (Unnamed), Mentions of Starvation/Abuse.

Summary: Reader grapples with her feelings towards Rhysand and what she has to do to save her people.

Previous Chapter/ Masterlist

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Rhysand is the enemy. His hands have spilled the blood of thousands of innocents. He’s most likely torturing people as we speak. He. Is. The. Enemy.

So why do I lie awake, hours after he’s gone, still thinking about how his hands had felt on my skin? Why do I lay here, tracing the path his lips had taken down my throat and collarbones, around my chest and sides, imagining what might have happened if we hadn’t been interrupted?

He is the enemy. I plan to seduce and destroy him. I will make him pay for all the pain he has caused me and my people.

But who is supposed to tell my body that everything that happened tonight isn’t real? That it’s all part of the plan to get him to let his guard down, I’m not actively interested in sleeping with him. I’m not! 

It’s just that I haven’t slept with anybody in a long time--that has to be it right? What other explanation do I have for the lingering ache between my legs? For the wandering thoughts of what those hands might have felt like between my thighs?

Every time I close my eyes I replay that moment: The feel of his warm body atop mine, callused hands roaming my skin, lips sucking marks into my throat. Gods I let Rhysand give me hickeys!

I’m going to die of shame.

If the need boiling in the pit of my stomach doesn’t take me out first.

I absolutely refuse to do anything about it! I won’t. Selling my soul to get information is one thing, to try and get off while imagining my enemy is a whole other evil. I can’t! It’s all kinds of fucked up.

I think there might actually be something wrong with me, because the more I try and tell myself it’s wrong, the more wetness I feel between my legs, the tighter the coil in my belly grows. My body actively wants something my brain refuses to let me acknowledge, and so I lay there in a bed that smells so much like him, trying to keep my hands off my still bare skin. I should, at the very least, get up and find where Rhysand had thrown my sweater. He’ll get the wrong idea if he comes back to find me still topless in bed. The middle of the night’s a hard time to get information out of anyone, there’s no reason to try and pick up where we left off tonight. I should just go to sleep.

I pull the pillow over my head and try to imagine all the gruesome, brutal ways he’s probably torturing his captives so I’m no longer laying here thinking about his body. It should work like an ice bath, right? But my mind will not linger on thoughts of blood, only how hot he’d looked scrubbing it off those swirls of ink around his bare chest earlier.

He’s going to be the death of me!

It’s like I can’t escape him. The scent of him is all over the bed, no matter where I lay or how many blankets I shift around. His touch lingers on my skin, the more I try to fight it, the more I find my hands trying to replicate the feeling. I roll my nipple between my fingers, imagining the feel of his calluses against my sensitive peaks. My other hand slides down my stomach, slipping easily beneath the worn waistband of my pants.

This is wrong!

I pull my hand away with a groan. I cannot be doing this.

He is the enemy.

I am doing the seducing. Not him. Me! And I have to have more willpower than this. I can’t be so Cauldron damned horny that a couple kisses gets me this worked up! Seriously, how does one male have this much sway over me already?

I can fight this. I am stronger than this…

I make it all of five minutes before my hand is once again sliding beneath my waistband, tracing its way down to the pool of wetness gathering between my thighs. 

He is the enemy.

Yet he would have found no resistance if he stayed. I would have easily surrendered under his touch, let it ignite a wildfire beneath my skin until I’d willingly spread my legs and let him take whatever he needed from my body. I hate the very thought of it, but I know, as my hips buck feverishly against my own hand, that I would have done it. 

“Rhys,” the whimper slips past my lips before I can bite it down, pleasure licking white hot down my spine. I’m too far gone to even be mortified at this point, chasing that high while my imagination runs wild with all the things that might have been tonight. 

It’s unfair that the sheets smell so strongly of him, only fueling my imagination, all the way to the edge of such jarring bliss. Only then does my body finally relax, my thoughts satiated for now. I can be mortified in the morning. Surely, I’ll hate myself in the light of day, but tonight, tonight I’m exhausted and I finally feel comfortable enough to sleep.

----

My dreams are full of my people hurling rocks at me, chasing me out of the Grasslands, calling me a traitor and a whore, Tam telling me never to come back; I try to visit my parents grave, but can never find it, as even in death they cannot bear to be near me.  The guilt I feel upon waking is worse than I imagined it could be. How could I be doing this? How could I want it?

The guilt  makes my skin itch. Every bit of me feels like it needs to be scrubbed down to the bone. I climb out of the bed and go to the basin of water to attempt to get clean. There’s a small mirror hanging from a string against the wall, the worn glass giving a spotty view of the bruises across my throat. I’d let Rhysand give me, not just one, but four hickeys, trailing down past my collarbone. There might have been more were it not for my appearance. I trail the damp towel down my torso, fingers ticking against my ribs like piano keys. I’m so godsdamned thin. It’s not unusual, most of my people are, save for Tamlin and his riders--riders always get first dibs on supplies, the rest of us get the scraps, especially when we haven’t been claimed--but I’d never thought about how bad it might look to someone outside of camp. With the scars I bear from my father’s temper, this looks intentional.

I glance up at the circles under my eyes, my reflection in the mirror hollow as a chill runs through me. Supplies have been thin lately, but… Dear old Dad had intentionally withheld supplies from the un-marked in camp as an incentive to get them to bend the knee, Tam knew that, was trained to do it, and he’d been so miserable lately, it wasn’t intentional, right?

I give myself a shake. Tam’s cold even on his good days, but he’d never intentionally do that to me, no matter how unruly I’ve been in the last couple weeks before this mess. Lucien would always sneak me snacks for him on days he was too busy to come see me; I’m just being paranoid. Being here is messing with my brain.

I toss the dirty towel in a bin and untie my hair. There’s no brushes around so I use my fingers to comb through the knots and tie it loosely behind my head. It’s only when I’m done and half way into my discarded sweater that the tent flap blows open and Mor storms her way in.

“Oh good, you’re awake!” She says by way of greeting.

How is she so perky all the time?

There’s a large bag in her hands that she hurls at me with surprising strength. “Time to get dressed! We’ve got a busy day ahead of us.”

“What’s the occasion?” I should feel excited with the prospect of getting out there and getting new information, but what are the chances we’re going right to Rhysand? How am I supposed to look at him after last night? No I think it’s for the better if I just sit right here in this tent and continue to torture myself with my thoughts. 

“Dress first, talk second,” she returns, hands reaching to help untie the bag since I’m moving too slow for her liking. Bits of dark cloth poke out, the bottom of the bag heavy and lumpy in a way that makes me think I’m holding a pair of shoes. 

Mor pulls out a top, the material as dark as her own, though hers has sleeves, this has none, just a band across my torso. The inside is lined with fur at least. I don’t even have time to question it before she starts pulling the other stuff out and rushing me to get dressed. There’s a moment where I think she might actually start undressing me if I don’t start moving, so I dip behind the bed for some privacy, clothes bundled under my arm. 

The skirt 's more loose fabric cinched around my hips than an actual skirt, nearly all my legs on display. I stare at the vast expanse of my skin and then up at Mor. “Please tell me there’s pants to go with these?” I don’t want to sound ungrateful since my clothes are barely holding on as is, but I also really don’t want to be walking around camp mostly naked either. 

“You’ve got nice legs,” she says, eyes roving over me approvingly. “You’ll look hot.”

“I feel naked,” I retort.

“You’ll adjust. Now hurry up!”

The top is warm but it leaves my arms bare, and even the fur lined ankle boots don’t keep me as warm as I would be if I had a pair of pants. “I really don’t want to sound ungrateful-”

“No time for second thoughts, you’re committed to it now.” Mor interrupts, ushering me over to the mirror again to adjust my hair. 

Her delicate fingers brush over my throat as she works and she grins at me in the reflection of the mirror. “Have some fun last night, did we?”

A blush makes its way across my cheeks. “Well, um…”

She laughs as she braids, blue eyes twinkling as she continues to watch my reflection. “I see now why he picked this top. Gotta show everyone your his.” Mor rolls her eyes. “Males! Always so territorial. Though, if I were you, I’d give him a few back in return.”

“Why do I have competition?” I blurt out. That’s a stupid question to ask. Look at him! Of course I’d have competition. But, despite myself, a flicker of jealousy worms its way into my chest.

“Oh there’s quite a few people in camp who’d literally kill to be you,” she returns as she pins my hair to the top of my haid. Using her fingers, she pulls a few loose strands free to frame my face. “He’s been eligible for a long time now.”

“How come?” I ask as she grabs my shoulders and turns me around so she can apply some dark makeup under my eyes.

The amusement in her eyes fades a bit as she says, “His wife…” She clears her throat and turns away to find where she left a tube of lip color. “Feyre. She was killed a couple years ago by Amarantha.”

My breath catches in my throat, chest heavy with the thought. “Oh.”

“He’s been a ghost since she died,” Mor gives herself a little shake as she turns back with the color and dabs a bit of maroon on my lips. “I’ve watched all these females throw themselves at him and it’s like he can’t see them. Usually the males in my family move on quick, you know? Gotta keep the bed warm somehow, right?”

I nod, having seen it well enough back home. 

“But Rhys…” she sighs. “I thought Rhys died that day too, but now you’re here and I can see a little life in his eyes again. I didn’t think that was possible.”

Gods the guilt is coming back! I should be glad that this monster got a fraction of the pain he caused others inflicted on him, but instead, my heart only aches for him, as if I can feel that pain in my own chest. The female he loved was dead and the monster that killed her was once again knocking on his doorstep. No wonder he’d asked for a distraction last night! And I’d planned to take advantage of that vulnerability.

My stomach turns. 

Mor grips my hands tightly. “I’m glad you’re here. I think he needs you, ya know?”

Please, Mother, kill me! Strike me with lightning or let the ground open up and swallow me. I am a horrible, terrible person.

“You’re too kind, Mor, really I don’t think-” but she doesn’t let me finish as she gives herself a little shake to collect herself and starts ushering me towards the door.

“Now we gotta hurry! We’re gonna be late!”

The early morning light rushes to meet us, such a stark contrast to the darkness of the tent. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust, her hand on my wrist leading me along, oblivious to how blind I am. Once I can finally see, I try to take stock of my surroundings and get my bearings. The set-up is a semi-circle of tents, all open and bustling with activity. Fae of all shape and sizes hurry from their tents, the males wearing fighting leathers, the females wearing variations of my own get-up. No one even glances our way, save for the lone male stalking towards us. He’s massive, a head taller than everyone he passes, a giant sword strapped between his tightly tucked wings. I recognize the sword as one I’d seen on one of Rhysand’s riders, though I hadn’t gotten a chance to glimpse his face then. He’s handsome, his dark hair tied back out of his face with a long string. A bit of stubble dusts his jaw, barely hiding a scar that cuts his way across his cheek. 

“Y/N, this is Cassian,” Mor introduces, no trace of her earlier seriousness to be found. She is once again all smiles. “He’s Rhys’s general.”

General. He certainly looks the part. He could crush my head with his biceps alone if he wanted! 

I don’t know how to move in these stupid skirts, let alone curtsey or bow in any sort of way as I would have back home so all I can manage is to dip my head in greeting. “Hello.” I hope it's enough to not offend this hulking mass of a male.

Despite his size, an easy-going grin cuts across his face. “Glad to officially meet you, Y/N!” His voice booms, even under the din of the rushing crowd. “We should get moving, he’s waiting.”

“Waiting for what?” I ask Mor, wrapping my arms around myself as a breeze hits me head on.

“You didn’t tell her?” Cassian returns.

“He told me not to,” Mor retorts as she loops her arm through mine to help lead me forward. 

This is not instilling anything but anxiety in me, but this is my chance to look around  so I have to take it. Not that the cold helps. It’s an effort to try and count the tents as my teeth start chattering. 

We follow the crowd down the hill, past a set of sentries that guard the path at the bottom as we head into the main encampment. Some of the people around whisper to each other in a mixture of languages, but there is too much moving and noise for me to get a good grasp on what’s being said. Mor doesn’t say anything either, just keeps one arm looped in mine and the other in Cassian’s to keep us from getting separated.

Once inside the main encampment, past another set of sentires, the path splits and becomes rows of tents, laid out like city streets. I’ve never seen a camp look so methodically laid out, each space like a well groomed and planned street. There are even amounts of tents on each side, firepits and places to sit breaking up the road between them. It’s all very homey and… permanent. A spike of envy rises in my chest as I take it in. This is not a camp that ups and moves frequently. It is settled and intentional in its spacing. It might not be the cities the Night Court once boasted in the days before Hybern, but it is still far more a city than the Grasslands had ever seen. I try to count them as we pass, but lose my train of thought after fifty, when the road starts to thin and people push in around us from every direction. I will have to get back another time and recount. 

The path continues forward, for some time, growing smaller and smaller until we come to a standstill. Mor huffs something about being late as we’re forced to wait under the rising sun as whatever is ahead of us gets closer, one step at a time. Eventually, a large amphitheater comes into view, set deep into the ground like a giant, stone step flanked pit. It must have taken months to dig this deep, let alone shape the stones into such smooth edges. How long has this encampment been here? 

It takes what feels like an hour to reach the flat edge at the top where holes have been drilled into it so that banners can be held aloft, each massive pole waving a different flag. There are multiple Night Court black flags, the shimmering triple stars over matching mountains, but there are others too: Twin Wyverns chasing each other’s tales, their golden maws open and ready to snatch and eat the other; A set of bat-like wings open and extended across a crimson flag, an eight point star at its center. Under each banner, crowded atop the steps are fae of all shapes and sizes, all separated into sections, their clothes matching the color of the banner they sit or stand under. I’ve never seen anything like it. I want to take a second to take it in but I can’t focus on any of it. Not when, at the heart of the pit, standing over two bound figures, is the male that claims to be my mate.

My breath hitches in my chest when I see him. 

He is the enemy. 

This is the male that stormed into our camp all those years ago, this is the male that slaughtered my people in cold blood. Any warmth I had ever seen in those, nearly glowing, violet eyes is gone, only cold indifference remains. Atop his raven hair sits an obsidian crown, the pointed centerpiece glittering with three gems in the center, a nod to the stars marked on the arm of every person crammed into the amphitheater. He wears fighting leathers, but not the ones he’d worn into battle, these are all black, polished to a shine in the early morning light. And his wings! By the Cauldron, I’ve never paid so much attention to anything as I watch the massive membrane flare out behind him, decorated in swirling patterns of violet and blue ink, the patterns a twin to the tattoos that circle over his exposed biceps. He looks every bit a Lord. No, every bit a Dark Prince. Wisps of darkness slither off his shoulders, twining over his fingertips, dancing around his hips and thighs. I feel the power of him in my veins as Cassian leads us down the steps.

No one pays us any mind as we pass, their attention and anger, judging by the shouts they throw, are all honed at the males kneeling at Rhysand’s feet. They’ve been stripped down to their underthings, bare chests slashed with even, precise lines of a blade, the blood long since dried. Both have short, dark hair and eyes so black it looks like all pupil. There are more slashes beneath their eyes, the marks fresher than the others, a few droplets of blood dripping down their cheeks like tears. 

Cassian leads us to the bottom row, where I recognize the shadowy figure of Azriel, saving us a spot. The other male stands with his arms crossed over his chest, the dagger he’d been spinning in his hands last night now safely strapped to his thigh. I shiver as he puts a hand on my back to motion me into a seat between him and Cassian, with Mor squeezing her way in between him and I so we remain together. The shouting of the crowd grows louder with each passing second, the volume and anger making my hair stand on end. I find myself reaching out for Mor’s hands, huddled beside her for both warmth and protection. 

Up until this point, Rhysand has been pacing, hands clasped behind his back, wings flaring behind him. Only once I’m seated does his gaze flick to me, eyes roving over my new attire and I hate the flutter in my stomach the look brings me. I should want him to be looking at me like that, but after what Mor had said, after what I’d done once he’d left… I look away quickly, torn more than ever on what I’m supposed to do here. 

I feel, more than see, the little smirk he gets as his eyes linger on the marks he’d left on my throat, but am spared from any more thoughts about last night when he finally looks away to address the crowd. It’s first in Illyrian, then in Basic. The change in languages makes his voice deeper, huskier; I’m more drawn to it than I’d like to be. Many things about the male are attractive, I’m not so blinded by disdain for him that I don’t notice them, his voice among the top qualities. There are quite a few females around me who lean forward in their seats, enraptured with his every word. It’s almost distracting enough that I forget there are two bound men at his feet.

Almost. My eyes flick to them. Their wounds are precise, methodical, not so deep it’ll kill them, but not so shallow it doesn’t hurt. They keep their heads to their chest as Rhysand speaks, dark eyes darting around for an escape. They say Amarantha’s men are worse monsters than the Illyrians, but they certainly don’t look terrifying now. They’re scrawny, like someone had plucked them off the street, no scars upon their skin to reveal any past battle wounds. I can’t decide if that means they’ve never seen a battle until now or if Amarantha’s fighting men have such an advantage that they’ve never been injured in one. 

“Amarantha thinks that she can do whatever she wants,” Rhysand’s voice booms across the amphitheater, the worn stones trembling beneath us. Darkness mists off his body, violet eyes glowing like starlight in his tan face. “But Hybern and his General have no power here!”

The crowd roars in agreement, some of the fighting men on their feet now, stamping the butts of their spears against the ground. 

“These are our lands!”

My ears ring under the din of the crowd. Mor grips my hand a little tighter to keep me steady. At least she’d been right about one thing: The amount of bodies packed into here makes the cold a little bearable, but I press as close to her as I can all the same. 

“We have bled and died for it!” Rhysand continues. “And we proved last night that we are not to be underestimated! We proved that if Amarantha thinks she can come here and take what is rightfully ours, that there will be blood to pay!”

A shiver runs up my spine as he speaks. Not just at what he says, but the truth of it. There is no mourning here. The injured in the crowd are few--only a handful of males sport bandages, no blood seeping through the white linen as if even the wounds that had landed were superficial and healing, not the open, bleeding mess I’m so used to seeing--and he’d said last night that his men had no casualties. Not only were their numbers greater than I had anticipated, but their powers are far beyond what we feared they were. Rhysand himself is a living testament to that. There isn’t anyone among us who doesn’t feel the reverberations of his power in our veins. His darkness doesn’t just flow from him, it ebbs into us, brushes against every person present like it’s introducing itself to us one by one. I don’t need to see him in battle to know that he can easily blow Amarantha’s men away by himself. He won’t even need an army.

I swallow the lump in my throat. Am I prepared to go up against a one man army?

“And we will make sure that is a lesson that bitch never forgets!” Rhysand roars as stars glitter around his outstretched hand, twinning between his fingers. His wings flair out behind him, the apex talons at the tip growing sharper, the violet of his eyes deepening, I swear I see fangs forming in his mouth. He’s not just powerful, he’s something wholly other.

The crowd jumps to its feet demanding the heads of the two males bound before them, and their Lord obliges, using a glittering trail of starlight to separate their heads from their shoulders, blood splatter across the stones. 

Rhysand lifts their heads up by the hair, admiring his work with nothing but pure satisfaction as he calls Azriel over to him. “Why don’t you deliver these to their doorstep?”

The shadowy figure of Azriel doesn’t even break stride as he grabs the heads from his lord and vanishes into shadow with them.

Interesting, so they know where Amarantha’s camp is? Tam had never been able to track her. Or maybe he’d never tried. 

Rhysand flicks the blood off his hands as he looks to the crowd and says, “We can expect a swift response, so let us be ready.”

A shiver runs down my spine at the thought. He can’t really be trying to take on Amarantha, can he?

“Bring all your un-marked forward, let us ensure the protection of those within our borders before we prepare to strengthen outside it.”

Shit!

I’d forgotten about that part. Why else would this outfit they’d dressed me up in not have sleeves unless they needed to mark me? It should have been obvious from the beginning but I’ve been so in my head I haven’t even stopped to think about the reasons behind all this. 

Mor grabs my arm gently, but I feel the strength hidden behind it regardless. She thinks I might try and run. Truth be told, I want to. How am I supposed to go home with Rhysand’s mark? Even if I manage to get all their numbers and weaknesses, that mark is permanent. It might literally be the signature on my death warrant, no matter what information I take home.

But it also puts me right in the middle of all important matters here. Rhysand said he wanted me to ride out with him. The things I could see if I do that! I’d know how many fighting men he has, would learn battle strategies and weak points, all things no one back home has ever been able to touch. 

Thankfully, Mor helps me stand, my shoes feel like they're full of sand. Even if I’m ready to face Rhysand, am I ready to face Tamlin when this is all said and done? 

Around me, males and females all step forward. A few struggle against it, having to be pulled down into the center of the amphitheater, others go alone, heads high. They’ll have to go through the blood littering the floor to get there, which is clever on Rhysand’s part. Swearing fealty here, after blood has been spilled makes this oath all the more magically binding. We’re all entered into a blood oath without spilling any of our own to do it. 

I let Mor lead me forward, despite every instinct to run. I will be closer than anyone to Rhysand. I can give my people the chance they deserve at having a good life. Maybe, when this is all said and done, this walled in haven could be a place we could call home, safe from war and hunger. I can ensure our future, all I have to do is damn myself to do it.

And put this male through more misery. The image of him last night, the dark circles around his eyes flashes across my mind and I have to give myself a little shake to rid myself of it. I can’t let one tragedy sway me, how many tragedies has he himself caused? 

My chest aches, I rub absently at it like that might relieve the tension. He is the enemy. I have to keep telling myself that, over and over, until it’s ingrained into my very thought process. One loss cannot compare to what he has put us through. I have to think about all the lives I will save instead of the one he has lost. 

It takes so much time for me to convince myself that I am capable of doing this that I genuinely miss everyone’s else’s pledge to Rhysand. By the time I am settled and ready to raise my head again, it’s just me and him, and a river of spilled blood between us. A fitting meeting ground I suppose. 

Mor gives my arm one last squeeze before she slips into Cassian’s arms and I swear the whole world centers in to just me and the massive Illyrian before me. He looks even more a dark prince up close.

“Hello, mate,” he purrs.

I swallow the lump in my throat. Don’t throw up here, don’t throw up in front of all these people.

Rhysand leans in close enough for me to smell the citrus and jasmine scent of him, the heady fragrance invading all my senses like it's trying to carve itself into veins. I’ve never been more aware of his size compared to mine. “Kneel,” his voice is a lover's caress, made for the gentle darkness of the bedroom. “Take my mark, so that you’ll have our full protection, and then you and I can have some fun.”

Those violet eyes flick to my bruised throat, his fangs biting into his lower lip as he admires his work and heat rushes through me. I want to play, just as readily as I had last night, maybe more. 

I tear my gaze away first. There’s no going back from this. 

My heartbeat is a clanging gong in my ears, breath a heavy rasp that tears from my throat as I lower myself onto my knees. The rough stones bite into my exposed flesh; the blood now cold against my skin. 

Rhysand reaches out to touch my cheek, thumb stroking over my skin as he nods encouragingly. His touch makes me think of last night, and what I had done in the aftermath of having those hands on me. I’d managed to not think about it until now, but now that the thought is here, I can’t stop it anymore than I could last night. Heat licks its way up my spine. 

He is the enemy. I am not supposed to feel like this while on my knees, I am supposed to hate him. I really need to pull it together.

“I-” Am I even capable of separating myself from what I want and need to do here? I can’t stop thinking about how badly I want his hands on my body. It’s not supposed to be like this!

“I swear fealty to you, My Lord.” Am I supposed to say something flowery? Make some grand gesture? I never really paid that much attention during these things, I’d spent most of my time trying to figure out how to get out of them, not into one.

The words are barely out of my mouth before I feel a tingling sensation shoot its way up my arm, from fingertips to shoulder. It’s not painful, feels like my arm fell asleep and lost feeling, even though I still have all my motor functions. When I glance down at the source of the discomfort, a band of ink colored darkness spreads across my skin. It moves in swirling patterns across my bicep, twisting and twining until the familiar pattern of triple stars makes itself clear among the ink. We brand people with an iron in the Grasslands, this magic tattoo is a new sight for me.

Rhysand takes my hand and helps me to my feet before I can even think about reaching out a hand to feel the new piece of me. I don’t even have time to feel guilty about it either, not when he’s crashing his lips against mine, the hunger he feels palpable as his hand slides into my hair. 

The crowd whoops and hollers, reminding me that they’re even there. I’d truly forgotten about them up until now. 

His other hand still strokes my face as he pulls away just enough to say, “I swear, no harm will come to you under our watch.” 

Lofty promises I’m sure, but with the crowd pressing in, now that the spectacle is over, there is not much time to dwell on it either. The next couple of minutes pass in a blur as we all shift from the amphitheater to a mess tent full of benches and long tables full of food and drink.

Rhysand hasn’t let go of my hand, not even at Mor’s insistence that she should get to show me around. The mark might as well be a rope tied around our wrists, dragging me along beside him as he greets various soldiers and sentries. 

The heat of the room soon makes me forget I was ever cold in the first place, a sheen of sweat clinging to my skin the longer we linger. 

In the back center of the tent is the seat of honor, it alone has a single table, everyone else crowds into each other, clambering for seats with no real order. The fighting men mingle with the elders and children and maids alike; the armored sentries dumping their helmets on the tables, the horse hair plumes drifting over the worn wood, holding spots next to the seats of scantily dressed dancers. 

As everyone finds their seats, serving girls start bringing in the food and drink, until all the tables are full of dozens of dishes I can’t name. My stomach rumbles as Rhysand leads me along, an arm looped around my waist like he thinks I might slip away at any moment. He hasn’t stopped touching me since his mark wrote its way across my right arm; a good thing for my plan, I suppose, but I my mind won’t stop narrowing in on the way his fingers dance over my hip bone or the strength of his arms around me. To some degree, I feel small next to him, but not in a way I can convince myself I hate. Not in the way I had felt small back home. 

It’s not long before Rhysand claims this would-be throne and before I can ask where I should disappear to, the warlord is gripping me by the hips and pulling me into his lap! My brain short circuits, all rational thought flying out the window.

He slots one powerful thigh between my, very exposed, legs the scrape of his leathers against my bare skin enough to make my whole body shiver. He’s all sleek muscle, body chiseled from riding and fighting and it is not as if I hadn’t noticed--especially after last night--but I’d never been so aware of him before.

His breath is warm over the shell of my ear as he leans in to whisper, “Now we can play, Darling.”

Here?! Cauldron he’s really going to be the death of me! And rationally I know the more people see us together, the easier it will be for me to maneuver and get information, but it is very hard to think rationally when I can feel so many eyes watching my every move.

Rhysand brushes his nose over the juncture of my neck and shoulder, the soft waves of his dark hair a contrast to the harsh flash of teeth he brushes against my skin a moment later. My heart thunders in my chest, heat rushing to my cheeks. I’ve lost sight of Mor and Cassian, though I doubt they’d be stupid enough to interrupt, let alone save me.

Rhysand sucks a new mark into my neck as he trails a hand up my exposed thigh and the notion that I need to be saved leaves me. This is what I had hoped would happen last night--what I had tried so hard to pretend I didn’t want. The crowd starts to blur in my vision, the only people here are the two of us as he gets closer and closer to the apex of my thighs.  

He is the enemy. Yet, my head falls back on his shoulder as both his lips and his hands trail higher. Every move is warm and calculating and my body is so eager to surrender. I tell myself this is part of the plan, part of the game, but my body doesn’t care about any of that. It just wants more of him.

His hand stills at the pathetic excuse of a covering the skirt offers, thumb stroking against the inside of my thigh. My breath hitches in my throat.

“I’m sorry about last night,” he says softly in my ear. “I’ll make it up to you.”

I think I might actually be so pathetic that I’d beg for it, body squirming under his grip in search of more friction. I’ve never been more acutely aware of the ache between my legs. More so when I find myself grinding my hips down, unabashedly, against his thigh in front of all these people, the scrape of his leathers a heady friction that makes me bite down on my lower lip. 

He chuckles in my ear at my neediness, the sound so rich and deep it only further ignites the heat in my lower belly. If he is supposed to be the enemy, why is his whole body made for such pleasurable sin? There isn’t an inch of him that couldn’t be used to turn me on.

“It’s… it’s ok,” what even are words? “This was important.”

He hums as if thinking, fingers still stroking idle patterns into the tender flesh of my thigh. He’s so close to where I want him. 

“Thank you for being understanding,” he says softly. He sounds about as fragile as he had looked last night and that pang in my chest is back. “I can’t… I can’t risk it, not again, not with you. My mark will guarantee your protection, even if I am not physically here. You’re safe, and you’ll stay that way.”

I slowly raise my hand back, until I can thread my fingers through his hair and he leans his whole head into my touch. “No one’s ever really looked out for me before,” I whisper. Not a lie and not part of this game, but something that slips right out of me before I can trap it behind my teeth. 

“Never again,” he vows.

Perhaps if there wasn’t so much blood between us, I could believe him. 

I can’t take the words back, and I hate that we constantly end up more vulnerable than I thought we could be, I need to get this back on track. The less vulnerable I can keep things between us, the better. All I need to do is keep his focus on what we’d been doing. The more he’s thinking about my body, the less he’s looking at what I’m doing--and the less guilty I will feel. 

 I grind my hips back against him, trying to regain control of the situation, the obvious proof of his own arousal pressing into my ass. 

He hisses, even as he nips at the underside of my jaw. “Needy little thing, aren’t you?”

“You did say you’d make it up to me,” I tease in return, scraping my nails playfully along his scalp. 

“I did,” he muses. “Though I was thinking about doing it after we eat.”

“Liar,” I retort. 

His hand finally, blissfully, snakes higher, dipping beneath my skirts. “See, I was planning on making it up to you with my tongue-”

All thought eddies from my mind as his fingers stroke over my core, heat licking its way up my spine. I have to bite down on my lip to keep from making a sound.

“But if my hand is what you’d prefer, I’ll happily give it to you.” He slides a finger into the budding wetness between my legs, testing to see how much I can take. “That’s what you were thinking about last night, right?”

I freeze and he chuckles in my ear as he says, “It was rather distracting, having your side of the bond open, right as Azriel was going to work on our captives.”

He’d heard me?!

Shit shit shit! How much did he know?

“H-how did you…?” My hips buck instinctively as he curls a finger inside me, hitting a spot I didn’t know was so sensitive. 

“Think of the bond like a bridge,” he explains it so clinically, as if he isn’t currently adding a second finger inside me. “With a door on each end. Last night, you opened your door and let me walk right in.”

“How…” I roll my hips to match his pace, desperate for the friction, even as my eyes squeeze themselves shut from the embarrassment of this conversation. “How much did you hear?”

“Heard and saw,” he corrects, teeth scraping along the underside of my jaw. 

I wish the floor would open up and swallow me!

“Just the last bit, I think,” he continues, picking up his pace as my body clenches around his fingers. “When you called out for me. Want to tell me what you were imagining I was doing?”

Thank the Mother he hadn’t walked in when I was thinking about how much I hated him! I’d be dead otherwise, mark or not, and this wasn’t the position I wanted to be in if that was going to happen.

“This,” I whimper, turning my head to brush my lips along his throat. As long as he thinks it was nothing other than my general horniness, I’m safe, embarrassment aside. 

His fingers plunge deeper, wetness dripping down my thighs; I have to be leaving a mess on his pants at this point. “Hmmm, not very creative,” he tuts. “You could have had any part of me you wanted, and all you could think about was my hands?”

Considering the way my thighs start to shake, breath catching in my throat as he hits a spot inside me that has stars swimming across my vision, I’m pretty sure his hands are far beyond the limits of my imagination. No dream had ever felt this good. I intend to defend myself, or at the very least tease him in return, but the only thing that makes it past my lips is his name, soft and pleading as a prayer as my hips chase the motion of his fingers. My whole body is on fire. No part of my imagination would have ever been able to create this.

From somewhere inside the tent, music has started playing and some of those dancers I’d spotted on the way in start the entertainment portion of the afternoon, which I’m sure is a fantastic display, given the approving sounds of the crowd, but I can’t even pay attention to it. I’m barely aware that it’s there as I press my forehead into Rhysand’s shoulder and whimper, body tight as a bowstring.

“Just like that,” he whispers in my ear, chin dropping to rest on my shoulder so he can watch the way my hips rock against his hand. “Doing so well for me, Darling.”

“Please,” I beg. Gods I’m begging Rhysand. Did that even matter at this point? I’d already gotten on my knees for him, already taken his mark, what was a little begging in retrospect?

He places a tender kiss beneath my ear. “Beg a little more.”

Color heats my cheeks. “Please?” I tilt my face up enough to brush my lips over his warm skin again, my hips doing most of the work now as he slows his pace. I could honestly cry from the sudden lack of stimulation. 

“Little more.”

What could he possibly want me to say here?

Something flares in my chest as my brain spins, the same tugging feeling I’ve felt the last couple of days when I think about him. Is that the bridge he spoke of? Is that really him on the other side and not some bullshit? I mean, he did know what I’d done last night… So maybe this is real, maybe we really are…

It clicks and I drag my own teeth over his throat, leaving a little mark. This is how I keep up this ruse, right? “Please, mate.”

Shadows swirl up my thighs, caressing all the sensitive spots his hands are too occupied to touch. That little tether in my chest warms as he once again picks up the pace. His own hips rock forward, erection hot and heavy against my ass as he leaves another bite mark where my shoulder meets my neck. I’d said exactly what he’d wanted to hear.

“Good girl,” he praises, voice so low and husky it pushes me right over the edge.

Stars swirl across my vision, body going limp in his grasp as I finally hurtle over the edge. I’ve never cum so hard in my life! It’s only by biting down on my lower lip that I don’t let out a scream.

He holds me gently as I come down, shadows now stroking in soothing patterns over my skin as I catch my breath. 

“Fuck,” I whisper. 

He kisses my cheek as he removes his hand from between my legs. One of his shadows brings a cup of ale over for me to drink.  “Let’s get you some food, hm?”

It is still hard for me to wrap my head around that this male is the one that so easily slaughtered my people--the male that just took two heads off in the amphitheater. There is such a contrast to him it makes my head spin. It is even stranger to me that he is still very obviously aroused and not doing anything about it. He’s very content to let me just sit here in his lap after giving me the best orgasm of my life with nothing in return?

“What about you?” 

Rhysand places another kiss beneath my ear. “We have all day, Darling.”

That thing in my chest warms at the thought. At least there are some perks to seducing the enemy, right? 

------

Tag List:

@judig92, @randomperson1234sblog, @nyxbranwenn, @lilah-asteria, @barb00235, @landofpetrichor, @hjgdhghoe @buttermilktea11, @yourforeveryoungblog, @sassyn, @zoeisdreaming6, @minnieoo, @girl-math-aint-mathing

You all are angels for waiting this long for an update! <3 I'll try not to have as much down time in between posts.

If you also want to be added to the taglist, let me know! :)

[hyunsvngs]

heyyyyyyy

just thinking about monsterfucking and what type of monster skz would be and the dynamics of how things would work depending on what kind of creature they are

personally I feel like jeongin gives off some sort siren vibes and yeah :)))

i BELIEVE miss @cbini has answered something similar before so miss ems my lovely dear if you have anything to ADD let me know... but here are my onions as a BIG MONSTER FUCKER

chan: oh not to be stereotypical but werewolf chan has my HEART lmao. like full on werewolf chan who has to be chained up by the strongest industrial chains during a full moon.. yeah. especially if you have to be held back by the other boys because he's imprinted on you too

minho: iiii am once again discussing vampire minho and i WILL be mentioning @jl-micasea-fics story sanguis limerence as my FAVOURITE vampire skz fic. i have nothing else to say please read it

changbin: okay i rly struggled w binnie but then i thought... what abt banshee bin? like you hear the banshee scream when you're about to die, and what if you hear him scream and then you see him and you're like what the fuck he's hot. and then he ends up changing fate n saving u and u fuck :) thanks for listening

hyunjin: succubus. a demon who plagues your dreams with such amazing sex that you wish for the day that he finally enters your room, and when he does? god, you're going insane. takes u to the demon underworld and keeps u there as his cute lil sex slave

jisung: alien jisung. i KNOW there are lots of jisung alien fics and i wholeheartedly agree w him having a cute blue ribbed alien tentacle dick that's soooo jisung. taking u to his planet too where he drops his glamour and the cutie has little antennas!! oh my god

felix: a LITTLE FAIRY. fairy flowers should've told u all how much i love the concept of pixie lixie. cute pink wings that shimmer in the light!! flutters around u like a little tinkerbell and takes u to his little mushroom home :( <3

seungmin: slenderman seungmin with the tentacles and shit. no comment on it ANY further for personal reasons (meaning... u can wait for kinktober).

jeongin: siren 100%. sexy little shirtless siren who maybe has bright blue eyes and soft dark hair and waits for u on the rocks at the beach near ur home every night.. maybe even a beautiful black/dark blue tail that glimmers in the moonlight with the water from the ocean.. oh

♡ juno

[batrogers]

Linked Universe Time with PTSD

My friends have gotten the brunt of me going on these rambles at them directly, so I decided I’d make this everyone else’s problem as well. Especially after the recent update and the somewhat... questionable words exchanged between him and Twilight, I figured this could be a salve for people like me and a few friends going “What the fuck” about how out of the blue it feels.

A comment on my approach to canon: I am aware there are things shared in the Discord that are creator content, and on the Patreon to which not everyone has equal access or can even manage to relocate again with any ease. As such, like I do with most fandoms, I will be discounting those as “extra-canon” only referenced to augment the “core materials” which I am treating as the Tumblr account archive, because that is available to everyone, without an account and without paying.

I am, of course, including all base canon of the games in this analysis as well, which is to say all the canon directly included in the games and not including the Ocarina of Time or Twilight Princess comics. Interviews and so on are considered "extra-canon" here as well.

(Also I am in the Patreon and at the moment none of the “bonus” content is relevant to this anyways, for the curious. I am not, and have never been, in the Discord.)

Approx 1500 words.

IIII

I’m going to start from the comment everyone is making about this update: that Malon must be pregnant. Obviously nothing can prove or disprove that in and of itself, but I would argue that’s both not a necessary read of this and the mere question is actually part of my analysis: Link and Malon are, by word of god and how they’re drawn, in their thirties. They’ve been a couple since they were late teens to early twenties, and they very clearly want to have children from how they react to Twilight!

So why don’t they?

Infertility is suspected after two years of a (presumably) reproductive capable couple having unprotected sex without a pregnancy. If Time and Malon have been trying for ten to twenty years to have children (assuming their relationship started between 15-20, and currently are 30-35), they are incredibly infertile. It’s not out of the question, and a wild stroke of luck could still occur (my own cousin conceived unexpectedly after ten years of trying) but it does serve to investigate other reasons: maybe they had some reason they weren’t trying, either on purpose or because something was keeping them apart.

Something, perhaps, like a war.

The base game of Ocarina of Time does not leave Hyrule in a good state. We are told, in-game, that Hyrule was in a civil war when Link was a baby. His mother died getting him into the Lost Woods, where he was raised as an orphan. The Shadow Temple explicitly states it was used to imprison (and, strongly implied, torture) the enemies of the Hylian royal family. Ocarina of Time is the only game to use its unique script for Hylian, which suggests it wasn’t the original language and did not last into Twilight Princess later on.

Lon Lon Ranch itself is both very protected by location (very close to the Castle, close enough it supplies it with food and other supplies) and by a twelve foot log palisade. The castle grounds themselves have two guarded gates between it and Castletown (do they not trust their own populace?) and a vast number of guards on the hills around it. Kakariko also has guarded, gated entrances.

(This all has a game mechanics explanation, of course. Closing off each section with “gates” and high walls permits loading screens to feel justified and more immersive, and saves game data and space. It creates clearly defined, restricted areas for the console capabilities at the time. But they can still be interpreted this way, because that is ultimately still the world they built in the end.)

In addition to that base of implied precarious stability at home, we have the question of how the matter of Ganondorf was resolved. Time very briefly references pointing the finger at him and causing something to happen, but ultimately there is no result that would not have made the situation politically volatile for some time after. Even if they executed Ganondorf immediately, the bad blood between Hyrule and the Gerudo would’ve festered under Koume and Kotake as potential leaders. If they didn’t, and simply threw him out or banished him, the same would apply this time with Ganondorf still alive... and, if we assume that the Twilight Princess Ganondorf and this one are the same, he looks much older in-model than he does in Ocarian of Time which suggests this interpretation holds more weight.

It’s not really a question of “if” things devolved again after these events, but when and how badly. Remember, again, my comment that the script of Ocarina of Time is gone by the time of Twilight Princess. In addition, I've done an analysis of Twilight Princess game implications that do not imply Child Timeline has been peaceful, either.

But, of course, the question of what the games themselves leave us with doesn’t answer if Jojo went with this position within the canon of the comics. There is of course the potential to disregard this if someone doesn’t want to go the route of war post-game for Ocarina of Time. Many people just don’t want to write it, and that’s valid! I honestly don’t think Jojo really considered it.

But, there is evidence that could support it if you wanted to go there.

First of all, we have Time’s platemail. This is based off of the Hero’s Shade platemail in Twilight Princess. Disregarding all other factors, platemail directly implies a few things about Time’s social position at the start of Linked Universe: he has enough money, influence, and reason to have suffered the cost and length of time required to make what is extremely high-level, personalized (in size and design) armour. This means several things:

Time has social status. That armour is meant to be seen and noticed; it’s something that either was made for show (a “jewel of the crown” level of regard), or because he wanted people to notice it personally. He has money, or political favour: that shit’s expensive. He either paid for it himself, or someone paid for it for him. And he has cause to want the level of defense offered by platemail over chainmail or hardened leather. Platemail is uncomfortable. It's heavy, and reduces agility. You wear plate because you expect to get hit, and hit hard by something that could surpass chainmail or hardened leather. Something like a moblin... or an iron knuckle.

Malon directly references this in their visit to see her: “You’re in danger if you took your best gear.”

Time chose to wear his platemail to go after Dink, but this is armour he already owns before Dink ever entered the picture. In that same chapter, Malon directly states “all the times you’ve come home beaten and bleeding.” While they also joke that Talon doesn’t believe him, remember that Lon Lon Ranch is in a very protected place within Hyrule. A war that takes out the castle and central city is a war that’s very nearly lost. (Hyrule Warriors losing Zelda AND the castle was a devastating, near-lose condition and his Hyrule is probably in severe condition.) Talon can afford to consider the affairs Time gets up to none of his business.

But that doesn’t make them perfectly safe. Malon can fight, she’s been drawn with bow and arrow before. Lon Lon Ranch, as noted, is behind a tall palisade and there’s the implications that Talon’s deceased wife might’ve been a Gerudo. He’s also old enough that he was a young adult at least during the Civil War that killed Link’s mother.

And, somewhere between that picture of Time at sixteen or seventeen, when Malon promised she wanted to know what had happened to him, and the start of Linked Universe (a gap that directly implies that this was not the result of Majora’s Mask!) Link lost an eye and gained the markings of the Fierce Deity mask. And, with it, he gained what we’re told by Jojo (in a VERY old ask) is a terror of using it again.

I’m not going to presume to say what exactly his trauma might or might not look like. PTSD and similar things manifest differently for a lot of people. But it could make Time react badly to the visceral reminder of going back into serious combat. A reminder like, say, a long wait for someone to recover from a nearly-fatal injury. Add in that on long campaigns, letters from Malon may have been his only piece of home, letters that likely carry her terror for his safety with them nevermind the specific news they contain and...

He might not be in a good state of mind when setting out once more with one of the young men he’s pulled into this fight with him. He might struggle to think clearly, when he feels so responsible for their safety and remembers how Malon reacted to Twilight, all because of what he told her.

He might say things in a poor way, with fear weighing more heavily on his mind than reason.

[drawfee-quot3s]

welcome to drawfee, where we take spoOky ideas

and make even spOokiEr draWings

i'm.. hallowEen nathan! ah, ah, ahhhh...

i am regular mE, juliAaa

i'm karina!

and iiii am the return of raaalph

*gasps*-- who the fuck are you people?

- nathan, julia, karina, + ralph

[campbyler]

helllooo!!

i hope you’re all doing well!

just gon leave my overall thoughts on this spectacular, insane, gut wrenchingly beautiful chapter:

- first, thea your writing has me rocking back and forth insanely while sobbing with taylor swift on loud speaker in the background. it’s just. ugh. it’s so. you’re so talented <3

- michael. inhalers should be put in your silly little fanny pack at all times. just shove your snacks into your pockets if you’re that desperate

- lucas is always right.

- hopper knows

- i keep re-reading the asthma attack scene (beforehand) and i have no idea why will was crying - feel like i’ve missed smth but it really showed that mike does, in fact, — no matter how hard he tries to deny this — care about will and i think that perfectly sets their relationship into the ground if yk what i mean?

- will flinches a lot and this will probably be brought up again?? i think it aligns with his dad, lonnie, as in “follow the sparks (i’ll drive)” (which may i say is BEAUTIFULLY written by suni) it’s shown that will has a fear of cars driving past a certain limit - even though mike was driving somewhere around 85 (i forget now but i’m trying) because of lonnie. feel like this’ll be brought up again.

- “Like – what might Will do, if Mike were to kiss somewhere that wasn’t his lips? If he didn’t give Will a clean break; if he were messy about it when he pulled his mouth away from Will’s, if he trailed his kisses along Will’s skin instead? Would Will like it, if Mike used his mouth to trace along the length of his jaw, down to his neck, working his way into that nook of space behind Will’s ear? Would he get mad, Mike muses, if Mike bit into his skin where his neck meets his shoulder, or would he be okay with a bite like that? Would he push Mike away, or would his breath hitch, would his fingers tighten in Mike’s hair, would he bring his other hand up to cradle Mike’s head, too? Would he also have the thought that not all the marks they leave on each other have to hurt – that not all of them need bandaids to heal, that some of them can be smoothed over with a kiss instead? Will’s breath hitches, and all ten of his fingers are knotted into Mike’s hair, and Mike kisses the spot he’s sunk his teeth into so swiftly . . . Mike wonders if he’s gotten carried away, if he got so engrossed in whether or not he could do something, he hadn’t stopped to consider whether or not he should. He brushes another kiss against Will’s skin, apologetic and cautious, and then another – further up, back by his ear, right at the curve of his jaw.” okay, i LOVE the way you’ve characterised mike here. the fact that he’s an over thinker, he over thinks how will is feeling, he over thinks if he’s doing the right thing and overall is being tender with affection as he, quote-unquote, “doesn’t hate will — and that’s all he’s willing to admit”. gotcha buddy…

- “i like your bucket” i had a cheeky giggle

- “Mike thinks he would very much like to hate Will – he thinks his life might be a lot easier if he did. But he doesn’t, and that’s as much as he’s willing to admit.” excuse me. ex—fucking—scuse me?? evil. evil for that ending. you know. you know what you’re doing. and it’s painful >:(

- last, but oh ho-ho not the least. i kid you not when will kissed mike i had to pause. take a large, over exaggerated step back. blink. blink again. look around. then, re-read the first sentence. and scream.

no but seriously, this chapter was absolutely beautiful. again, thea, your writing is amazing and it’s so refreshing to read.

furthermore, please don’t feel like you have to get a chapter done by a dead line if there is something that causes a slower pace! take all the time you need! <3

HELLO!!! WE ARE DOING GREAT!!!!! i am Sat for this ask ty for leaving all your thoughts!! let me try to respond point by point:

SHSH HH . SHH. HSHHHHHSHHSHHSH . why would you say that. WHY WOULD YU SAY THAT!!!!!!! now iiii am rocking back and forth insanely while sobbing with taylor swift on loud speaker in the background!!!!!!!!!

he is more frequently hungry than he is having an asthma attack!!!!!!! he's a growing boy!!!!! let him live!!!!!!!!!

lucas IS always right.

hopper probably definitely knows.

it's not super obvious in the narrative because mike has an asthma attack before he can bring it up LOL but since i'm not sure if it gets addressed in ch05, as the Author, i will confirm: will is a frustrated crier! he is frustrated at himself for the circumstances they've found themselves in and because max and justin are both rightfully mad at him so he is assuming Everyone hates him. he didn't get the same pep talk from max that mike got from lucas so he's just in his feels a little bit! he's good tho fr :)

No Comment At This Time

we ummm. we all love writing mike as an overthinker because that's just #true so the kiss scene was fun bc it was like. mike's actions were being carried out through his thoughts and it was a neat little trick to balance as a writer :')

i personally actually fr say "any questions? comments? concerns? complaints? compliments?" to my team in shift meetings so that was fun to bring in here and it was a nice moment to diffuse the tension LOL

mwhaha and hehe and hoohoo and so on and so forth

thank you so much for your kind words and leniency with the chapter going up!! i am sure that it Will happen again so to have the reassurance of everyone's patience has been so nice :') <3

[felipe-v-fanblog]

My Questions:

What is your favorite portrait of Felipe V and why?

What is Felipe V known for?

Is it true that he lived life thinking he was a frog?

ah thank you for asking about him !! he is my hyperfixation forever and ever <3 always happy to talk about any historical figure anyway

i will make a long-ass post i must confess that i dont know when to shut the fuck up:

FIRST OF ALL i really like the hyacinthe rigaud portraits. specially the last one, which i know one of the copies is at Versailles along with a portrait of his brother le petit Dauphin and his father le grand Dauphin and I believe there is one of Charles, duc de Berry too? which is also his brother. Anyway I am insane about all of them so of course its my favourite. BUT my favourite version of that portrait is this one:

he has a heart ! on his wig. over his forehead. there. i think its funny. This portrait has a lot of version which are too similar to eachother but this one is the only one with that weird thing on his wig. Also this one isnt actually for the public display that is why its on a very low quality its being sold. which is a Shame. Its from his second reign as that was the moment he started using the ponytail.

WHAT is felipe v known for is a eh interesting question as i think everybody knows the upside down portrait of him in Xátiva, near Valencia, which is the autonomous comunity which hates the most Philip V as far as I know ? SO he got a lot of hate during the war of spanish succession (1701-1714, starting approximately when he was 17, as he gets to Spain at 16 - it finished around the end of 1714, the year he marries his second wife, Elisabeth Farnese - also a very interesting character which i know a lot of people love a lot) . So eh the important stuff is that spaniards hated bourbons because Spain hates frenchmen ? for some reason ? but im british so im supposed to hate them too. So anyway after the war of succession which is ! ofc after charles ii death which i know you like a lot :3 i also really love him iiii I will keep talking about philip v as to not change subject. So. eh he was also the grandson of Louis XIV which I know spaniards hated because he was in war with the Habsburgs - its a conflict since Louis XIII s times - and they were very culturally different. In fact Philippe suffered a lot when he came to the spanish court a la Marie Antoinette because it was too different. But its like the contrary of Marie Antoinette, because he was suffering because spanish was boring and he didnt even knew spanish. He also felt pity against the gente de placer because they had different morals in the french court (ofc the activity its bad in itself but i will not state the obvious, yet in the court of louis xiv there are many examples of mentally ill or desfigured people which were supported by the state. ofc the majority of them were part of the royal family but anyway philippe knew he shouldnt make fun of these people - he was rather disturbed by the group). So anyway the habsburg faction was against him but he was rather welcomed to Spain, he himself didnt felt spanish enough to be king - and even had to be reassured of keep being king since very young, years before abdicating.

Clearing that out, because the story about Philippe going to Spain, or his childhood, or his first marriage; are all stuff I would talk on and on about, eh, I will proceed to talk about other stuff he is known for. During his first reign his first prime minister, which was a frenchman that Louis XIV send to fix Spain, did fix Spain; ofc not as good as Charles III would later do it, but did the first steps towards it. He also send to made very important buildings of Spain like el Palacio de la Granja, where he is actually buried along with his second wife Farnese. He is also known for being the first Bourbon king in Spain, may say the first bourbons were Isabel de Francia (first wife of Philip IV - sister of Louis XIII) and Maria Luisa de Orléans (first wife of Charles II - daughter of Philippe d Orleáns, brother of Louis XIV - you probably know the tale about Don Juan José negotiating the marriage ! its a funny story). There is also very peculiar characters during his reign like Don Blas de Lezo or the Cardinal Alberoni (which Philip himself made sure to make cardinal by spamming letters to the pope about making him a cardinal - Philip was very fond of him, and even made him his prime minister and Archobisp of Malagá), there is also Louis-Joseph of Vendôme (Luis José de Borbón, as he is known in Spain), which Philip also gave him his life and made him virrey de Cataluña, heir of the throne in case he did without childs, and marshal of Spain. He has a thing for giving the people he loves everything they ask for and more. Louis-Joseph is one of the most important military figures of the war of succession along with the duke of Berwick and the count of Tessé (marshal of France since Vendôme was exhiled from there. also a funny story. Vendôme was a real weird guy and I dont get to understand why Philippe liked him so much).

I finish the last section of this post. Which is getting big asf. The frog thing. Its very weird for me to see many people which make jokes about that ? I guess people think its funny ? but its not the only think he had issues with ? must say he was melancholic aka disordered since all his life. He was not know for being a normal kid, he was very quiet and shy. I know for a fact that he was bulimic, but he also presented a mood disorder, which has been mainly theorized to be Bipolar II, which I am actually okay with that version as he presented many of these traits - more tentative to depression, known as a hypomaniac state, and more tentative to psychosis. Even with that, psychology is very stained with a mysoginistic and racist history, and the diagnosis of male historical figures with bipolarity is one of them. First because they dont actually diagnose him with Bipolar II thats my own suggestion because spanish historians do their job terribly and dont even try to take it seriously enough to stand what kind of bipolarity are they talking about - they just threw off bipolarity because the mainstream idea of bipolarity is someone who tends to be happy for some moments and then deeply depressed. SO after throwing off my own agenda I will state the facts. He was deeply depressed and then went on a manic state from the sound of music. He employed an italian castrato - the most famous one ! - Farinelli to sing and play music for him, as he rested on the bed, and made him repeat the songs over and over again. He would have loved spotify. And after a lot of repetitions he even sang the songs himself, as these made him very happy. He also made Farinelly his prime minister (this guy seriously had problems with giving everything to the people he loved). He also had a very fucked up sleep schedule, making his ministers met him at the bed of his wife at 2 AM, as he never left these chambers. He had a big fear of dying, normal between Bourbons, and a big religious trauma since his childhood - he had a very severe tutor, which is actually a remarkable figure in the reign of Louis XIV; and even the spaniards were weirded out by how much he used to confess himself with Alberoni. He also had paranoid delusions, which are known to be bizarre, such as the time he thought his clothes were shining weird, and that they had poison, and because of that he started to use his wife s clothes (this is, well, a thing that happened for some reason. He ordered to only let nuns make his clothes for this). He was also hypersexual, and there is not a funny part about it, but I always joke about the fact that he was the first guy to drag a dildo to Spain (fun fact). So thats all. Ah he also thought for some time that his body parts would fall off and that he was a frog. Which the first is Cotard delusion and the other is just a bizzare delusion, as many psychotic delusions are. He liked to watch the gardens a lot, and used to be fascinated by the frogs jumping around it. This was a very small moment of his later years, when he barely left the bed, as he was very depressed. Thats the answer to the question. Now you know a lot about Philip V mental state which may or may not be funny. I think the frog thing was made popular by tiktok? but that was a very small part of his mental disorders. I love him a lot hehe. I personally think he had BPD as he was very fond of the people he loved and had many trust issues, and BPD also can make people more tentative to psychotic disorders and bipolarity. Spaniards tend to lie about the bourbons or exaggerate stuff because the historical records are tainted by habsburg faction, so the majority of my information comes from french people of the time. Feel free to ask questions or dont READ THIS AT ALL this is A BIGASS POST. I can also recommend free pdfs to read about his time blablabla I specially like Liselotte (Elizabeth of the Palatinade) letters and the memoirs of Saint-Simon, even if he talks a bit too badly about Louis-Joseph or le grand Dauphin.

[loopscereal]

You said to send you screenshots to redraw, so... Maybe one of these two? Personally my favorite of your redesigns have been for Owynn's gang and the twins (and Deuz but I didn't like any particular screenshot for him).

It's also okay if you don't want to, no pressure fjrvdjdvdjevakavqj

a month + 1 day late but HAHAHAH REDRAWWW

okiii sorry this took a goddamn month and sorry for no shading but i AM doing this for funa nd for free but i never forgot , i never forgot multi i promise, i even let my brogram record a timelapse thingy if you want it. 1) yes u redesigned town from the last time i drews him what about it??? (i also redesigned eak but i never did a digital drawing of his previous default ass ) anyways i was itching to make them both more. more ours i guess? Towns black now cause i want to and also lions are african animals and thats enough to convince me lmao. idk its fun, sue me. we dont uhhhh we dont suuuuper tie where the animal is from tot heir race, but sometimes we do and it works out nicely uhhh

2) multi, or anyone seeing this ig, if ya want zoom'in just tell me and ill reblog this with zoom ins n shit. yeah. 3) I REALIZED I FORGOT TOWNS FUCKING FRECKLES. iiii im iffy on adding freckles to him, they did look cute but im worried itll make his face too busy. eaks face is so busy and i do not need another. also busy-ness is why i didnt doshadeing. i tried, i really did try to ger some quick flat shading in, but it looked too busy and just a mess i couldnt do it kjerhblol lmao. 4)uhhhh feel free to ask questions ig. IF ANYONE ELSE ANTS TO REQUEST REDRAW REQUESTS FEEL SO FREE I LOVE DOING REDRAWS. also im totally gonna do the pup and chica one too dont you even worry about it

anyways tysm for the ask and request :) have a good dayyyy love ya fnafhsblr lmao

[myfanstories]

Where's Bob?! (part 1)

read part 2 here

Read part 3 here

Pairing: Bradley (Rooster) Bradshaw x fem!reader, Dagger Squad x platonic!reader

Summary: A very unexpected night takes a very unexpected twist when your ever so loving boyfriend convinces you to go out with him. The next day some of the dagger squad wake up in a hotelroom with little to no memory of the night before. But they soon realise they’re missing a man… because where the hell is Bob??!!!

A/N: my first series iiii I'm excited! I've had this idea for a while now so let me know what you guys think! The italics are referencing to the past :) reader is also an aviator but I havent decided on her callsign yet but I will next chapter! Enjoy and feedback is always welcome xx

Trigger warning for alcohol, some swear words, alluding to smut, smoking // English is not my first language so I apologize for any mistakes

“Lets just go out for one drink and call it a night, what could go wrong?”

The loud pounding in your head was a quick reminder that if you ever heard Rooster speak those words again, you should turn around and run. A light groan escaped your lips as you tried to open your eyes, the mascara from the night before sticking them together making it harder for you to do so. Once you got them open you blinked rapidly, scanning your surroundings which made you realise…. you did not recognize the bed you were currently laying in. Your brain was doing overtime as you tried to figure out where the hell you were as something moved at the bottom of your feet “what the-“ you whispered, up until that moment you didnt even realize you were laying in between two people until the person on your left softly groaned “ShhhHHH” the person to your right whisper-yelled “Brad?” You questioned, voice very hoarse “Why are you so loud” he mumbled as you started sitting up straight, you stomach protesting with every movement and it was then you saw the person laying at the bottom of your feet “Jake...I’m so confused?” the room was spinning with every little movement as you moved to lay on your back again “Did we die? Am I dead? Is this hell? I’m in so much pain” Coyote - the person you realised was on your left side - said and you swallowed hard, clearing your throat “I need water” Rooster reached over to the bedside table “I gotchu” but missed the glass full of water by an inch making it fall to the floor “No-ah son of a bitch I’m sorry” he whimpered, eyes still closed. A person emerged from the floor which you quickly recognized as Phoenix as she stumbled to the bathroom mumbling a “I’m gonna throw up” under her breath and loudly closing the door behind her. A soft handed landed on your head, patting it “Baby” Rooster mumbled “Baby?” He asked again and you groaned “Baby help me up” you pushed him with all the strength you could possibly muster, but failing miserably as Rooster made no attempt to get up himself and you quickly gave up "Get up by yourself"

Suddenly a phone rang, very loudly, making the squad in the room groan and Jake shot up from the end of the bed “Make it stop” Coyote yelled “I’m still drunk” Jake yelled as he reached for his phone with shaky hands “I’m still so drunk-hello?” His voice barely above a whisper “Hangman? Where are you guys?” Payback’s voice echoed through the phone “We’re in uh, we’re in… where are we?” Jake questioned, finally looking around to his surroundings “Baby” Rooster whined and you groaned “what?!” You snapped “where are we?” “Rooster I dont fucking know” you covered your face with the blanket as you tried to make yourself as small as possible, hitting Coyote in the process, he groaned and Brad spoke up “Coyote if you touch my girlfriend you’ll catch these hands” he said raising his fists, voice slurred “I aint afraid of you” Coyote slurred back and suddenly a hand flung over your body, a weak slap landing on Coyote’s face “I’m gonna hit you back so hard watch me” Coyote managed to have his eyes closed for the entire altercation as he too slapped Rooster in the face “Oh its on” and before you knew it you were in the center of a very weak, kinda pathetic bitch slap fight “Oh my-guys, why are we in the Gran Miramar Hotel?” this made the two boys next to you pause their bitch fight and Jake looked up at Phoenix and her extremely pale exterior while still on the phone with Payback “What did we do last night?” He questioned “Oh god…Where’s BOB?!”

The evening started of slow. It was Phoenix who send a last minute text in the dagger squad groupchat asking if anyone was up for a drink. Coyote and Jake quickly agreed, Bob also replying he down but you on the otherhand weren’t really feeling it. Your boyfriend on the otherhand, who surprisingly still had a lot of energy at this hour, wanted to go “Babe just go” you smiled “Not without you” he pouted as he made its way over to you since you were already in bed, a book open in your lap. He crawled into the bed with you as you moved your book to the side, making room for him as he planted himself right on top of you. Head on your chest, his arms snaked its way around your waist, reaching under your back to pull you closer to him “We see each other at work almost everyday and if we dont, we see each other outside of work also almost everyday.. one evening without me wont kill you” you said as you played with his hair “It will” he replied and you soon realized he wasnt taking no for an answer “Lets just go out for one drink and call it a night, what could go wrong?” You sighed and paused, really thinking about it before speaking up “Fine, let me get dressed”

“How do you lose Bob?!” As the gang was very slowly starting to come back alive again, panic was starting to set in regarding the Bob situation “Nix, have you met the guy?! He’s like a Ninja” Coyote argued, struggling to put on his button up shirt “And why is my shirt wet?”You looked over at him and noticed he completely missed 2 buttons in the middle making it fit weird and you pointed at it wordlessly, a chuckle leaving your lips “Guys, why am I the only one freaking out about this?! We lost Bob” Phoenix’s attempts to get a reaction from the group went unnoticed by you as you were looking for your shirt since you woke up in your bra and boxer shorts that definitely belonged to your boyfriend. You quickly realized they were his when he stood up and gave a full peep show in the process. “Y/N” you looked up to see Rooster holding your shirt and threw it at you. You quickly put it on and felt a wave of emotions hit you all at once “Baby no” Rooster warned but the lip quivering already started “I would have never found my shirt without you” you sniffed and Jake looked at you with a confused look on his face “What’s happening right now” you sniffed, covering your face “She gets very emotional when extremely hungover” Rooster said, making its way over to you. Just as he was about to reach you he felt something crack under his foot. He looked down, picking up the item he just stepped up and paled at the sight of it “Oh god” “Are those-“ You felt the tears fall on your cheeks as the emotional hangover reached a high “Bob’s glasses”

Soft laughs echoed at the bar as Penny approached the group of slightly intoxicated Aviators “Guys, I love you… you know that but this is last call” She patted Jake’s shoulder as he boo’d lightly making Penny roll her eyes in amusement “I have to say, I didn’t really wanna go out tonight but I’m glad I did” You spoke, Roosters arm locked firmly around your waist “I agree, it was a very good night” Phoenix leaned against the pool table behind her, her head tilted slightly to the side with a smile on her face “Guys, who said the evening has to come to an end already? Lets go downtown, see what the youths are up to at this hour” it might have been the alcohol coursing through everyone’s veins at the moment, but nobody seemed to disagree at the idea. Coyote scanned everyone’s faces, waiting for someone to protest and when nobody did he clapped his hand “Lets go then!”

“Whats the last thing you guys remember?” Ever since finding Bobs - now broken - glasses panic was starting to set in with the group “Nothing, literally nothing” You said, taking a sip from your much needed coffee as your left leg bounced up and down “There must be something! Guys think” Coyote’s head suddenly shot up and he walked towards a bag on the bed “We went to La Bamba first” he said, pulling out a funky looking cocktail glass from the bag as a memory suddenly flooted into your brain “Oh my god, I stole that” you laughed softly

The sound of Beyonce’s voice filled the room as you grinded your ass on Phoenix who had her hands on your waist. Laughing loudly you looked at your boyfriend who was currently so low to the ground you thought he might not be able to get back up again. Bob was sipping from his drink, eyes closed swaying his head to the beat of the song as Jake and Javy made their way through the crowd to you guys holding new drinks from the bar. “Here” Javy yelled as he handed you your drink, you gasped looking at the funky glass in your hand as you thought of one thing and one thing only… that glass was going home with you. After you quickly downed the cocktail you swiftly looked around before opening the tote bag you were supporting around your shoulder and dropping the glass in there “What are you doing?” Rooster yelled with an amused tone as he watched the whole thing play out in front of him “I’m thinking ahead” you yelled back, pointing to the side of your head “When we move in together we need to have cool drinking glasses you know” his right hand made its way around your neck as the other was placed around your waist and he pulled you close “You wanna move in together?” He asked and you looked into his eyes, a tiny blush forming on your cheek as his eyes roamed your face. Even after 2 years of dating, he never felt to make you blush with just a simple look “I mean yeah, we spend basically everyday together already.. why not make it official” Rooster’s smile grew wide “I would love that” As he leaned in to kiss you, Jake threw his hands around the both of you “Guys lets move! The club next door is doing free shots right now”

Phoenix was walking back and forth in the room, making you nauseous just looking at her “Nix, sit down or I will throw up on you” Jake commented while rubbing his head and supporting your sunglasses he stole from you bag to cover his eyes. Phoenix sighed, sitting down on the bed. Coyote sipped from his water bottle, hands shaking as he looked at you “I also remember me and you wrestling in the parking lot of a McDonalds because I said you couldnt fight me if you tried” looking down at your open and scraped up kneecaps you chuckled “So thats why they’re bleeding. I cant remember tho, who won?” Coyote laughed, seemingly unsure of himself “I did“ “No he didnt, I remember and you dragged him to the ground first try” Phoenix said and the guys in the room let out a low whistle and clapped for you as Coyote rolled his eyes “Okay okay, back to the Bob situation please.. has anyone tried calling him?” He asked and you perked up, grabbing your phone “Why didnt we think of that?” Unlocking your phone, you quickly pressed Bob’s contact and waited for it to ring “Its going” you said, but what you didnt expect was a loud ringing noise filling the room the second you pressed ‘call’ on your phone “No way” Rooster mumbled and the squad quickly stood up, trying to figure out where the noise was coming from. The ringing kept going, but nobody seemed to find where it was coming from until Rooster paused in front of the mini refrigerator under the TV. Opening it slowly, he felt as if his eyes were betraying him. He picked up the phone which was still ringing and showed it to the rest of the squad. “Guys… I’m starting to think we actually fucked up. Like fucked up real bad”

To be continued...

[lucyvaleheart]

Hey there Lucy~

I’ve sent you two asks before..one very horny one and one still horny cute kissy one.

Well I think I’ve decided where I want to kiss you.

I think, you’d look oh so pretty on your knees. Hands behind your back. Not tied up at all, just being nice and pretty. I’d step back to admire you. Your pretty curves, your beautiful hair draping over you. How obedient you look Like that…

I’d want to kiss you right then and there. Lean over and brush my lips against yours, the taste of me on your lips…but not yet. I have my own plans. First, I’m putting you in a much more useful position. Head down ass up. Making sure you’re perfectly exposed for me, and you have a nice and soft pillow to moan into..

I don’t think I’d be able to keep myself from spanking you a few times though. At least until my handprint sticks around and you’re whining. I’d be so desperate for you..but I’d only gently run my fingernails up your thighs. Leaning down…the heat of my breath against your sensitive skin….

I. Really want to eat you out. Soft kisses against your ass. Trying my best to be calm but I can’t hide how much I need you and start making out like I don’t want to breathe anything but deeper into you. My hands finding their way between your thighs to help you out…me making you feel good from both sides. I want to be the cause of so many muffled noises…

Maybe…if your knees give out and you need to lay down. I could say that I’m so needy, I want you so bad…and I could lay atop you and fuck you..? You can relax and spread out and lay there as I moan like a mantra how badly I wanted you and how gods fuck, how good you make me feel. How you’re so good at this..

I want to be. So horny for you..make you feel good…..

hhgbhflkjjgfd;alfdakjgf

i. iiii- im. wh... t..t.that.... im....

o-oh goddess above i. um- i- hhiii

p . ..pplease? pplesae- i- h-hi there- im..... oh stars above, i.

f-fuck the way that feels just plucked from my head- i.... pplease, oh my god- jjust relax and be used, and m-made to feel good, i...... 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

y-you have no idea how sensitive i am in those areas- my thighs, my ass, i. f-fuck, you may have to tie me down, i'd squirm so much.... nnot that i'd mind that.... >//////////> i....

....f-fuck, yes please, please,peaespleapeslapeslasepaslease

[cringelordofchaos]

(warning: a ton of swearing, EXTREME stupidity, inaccessibility to screen readers, a ton of ranting)

.

.

.

.

I'm fucking stupid (like. Extremely)

in other words what I'm trying to say is

I don't know math. Like. At all

And it's a genuine fucking problem

(unrelated but my phone keeps trying to autocorrect "fucking" to "rucking/ducking" and it's really pissing me off)

I don't know how to phrase this differently. When I say I am HORRIBLY HORRIBLE at math, and I don't know anything going from 4th grade onward I MEAN it. And it's a fucking problem

Like how do I say this. I stopped paying attention to any classes in school ever since fifth grade and so I never, ever paid attention to math. How I have still managed to move forward, that is unbeknownst to me. But I haven't learned a single goddamn thing in those years and I don't know anything. Older people have told me to just start paying attention to class and I'll somehow catch up but the thing is, looking at the board........ I don't know anything. There is no former knowledge to apply here.

And it's all kinda my fault? I mean it's not like I CHOSE to not pay attention to class? Not really? I don't think st least? Ddisomdidwd

But even then I COULD ask people to help me but I feel so genuinely ashamed....... Like. Guys

To give an example of how genuinely stupid I am

Take this for example. 8 + 7 . EXTREMELY EASY. most people instantly think "oh it's 15" because most people are smart enough

IIII, HIWEVER, think this way: "oh.... Eight... Plus seven... Well first I'll turn eight into ten so it's a bit easier so I'll just take the number two away from seven... Ok now it's ten... Then I uh... Seven minus two.. that's five... So ten plus five is fifteen!"

SEE

SEE HOW STUOID I AM

AjIJCUEISJCJDIDJDJDIEJJDIEOSKCMDE

I definitely don't have discalculia or dyscalculia or whatever it's spelled like, I am just extremely dumb and never practice math. Never

I never do my homework, never do anything at school, like I said I have no idea as to how I managed to pass

I don't know who to turn to, because I feel way to goddamn ashamed to open up about this

I'm pretty sure I can talk to my sister but I'm sure she isn't too interested in teaching my basic mathematics

There's the internet, I suppose? Which can help me

The only problem.

I'm way too lazy

I keep telling myself I'll do it, I'll study, and then I. Don't.

I have a math test tomorrow and I told myself and my PE teacher that I'll study, that I'll ask my sister for help

But I didn't. Nighttime is nearing and I'm not doing anything about it but I should be doing something about it

I'll do it or st least try doing it after making this post but I have no idea where to start.

How does one learn YEARS of math in one night.

Nohow.

Well, I have been able to recover 2 years of physics in 3 private classes? Probably because AHEM individualist teaching mechanisms hellomm??? This is why private teaching is so much better than the standard education system???

But

I guess it is fixable just

I just wanted to rant I guess lolz

[ur-dad-satan]

Hazbin Hotel songs keep getting stuck in my fucking head.

Like how am I supposed to not dance when Adam is in my brain going "HELL IS FOREVER WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT, HAD THEIR CHANCE TO BEHAVE BETTER NOW THEY BOIL IN THE POT, CAUSE THE RULES ARE BLACK AND WHITE, THERE'S NO USE IN TRYING TO FIGHT IT, HTEY'RE BURNING FOR THEIR LIVES UNTIL WE KILL 'EM AGAIN!!"

How am I supposed to act normal when Alastor in in my ear like "This plaaace reeks of deaaath, there's a chiiill in the air, and I baarely escaped being killed by a hair, Great Alastor Altruist died for his friends, SORRY tooo disappiont, that is NOT where this ends, I'm huuungry for freeedom like, nevabefour, the constraints of my deal surely haaave a back door, once IIII figure out how to unclip my wings, GUESS WHO WILL BE PULLING ALL THE STRINGSS"

Like how am I supposed to be emotionally stable when Angel/Anthony is always just heartbreakingly over here like "poison😟, I'm drowning in poison😔, I'm filling up my glass🍷, but it's always hollow❌, full of poison☠️, I'm sick of the poison🤢, wish I had something to live for tomorrow😭"

How am I supposed to not stand up and not scream sing when I have Charlie and Emily in the back of my head like "If HELL IS FOREVER, THEN HEAVEN MUST BE A LIE!!!!!!! IF ANGELS CAN DO WHATEVER AND REMAIN IN THE SKY?!?!?! THE RULES ARE SHADES OF GRAY WHEN YOU DON'T DO AS YOU SAY, WHEN YOU MAKE THE RETCHED SUFFER JUST TO KILL THEM AGAIN!!

[luckyfinch]

Chapter 8: Commercial Break!

click HERE for chapter one, story warnings, and other info

The low thumps of footsteps grew louder, echoing through the halls. It was tense, the air crackling with ticked energy as the commotion neared. 

A hand darted out, catching the hood of the running skeleton and pulling him into the cover of the opposite turning hall, a shadow casting over the two and hiding them from sight well enough that the skeleton’s assailant ran right by without a clue. 

The two figures remained still a beat. Two beats. Three. Then, satisfied they hadn’t been discovered, the runner pulled away to face his savior. 

“swap!” 

The bandanna-wearing monster violently shushed him, sockets narrowed though he wore a good natured smile. “Don’t Want Cross To Hear You, Do We?” 

Killer smiled back, head tilting in confusion. “right. why’d you grab me? y’know i was messin’ with crossy.”

“He Seemed Quite Unhappy!! What Sort Of Joke Did You Pull This Time?” 

Instead of the accusatory tone Killer had expected of his alternate, Swap spoke with a quiet buzz of excitement. 

“…i thought you didn’t like pranks.”

Swap laughed, sockets closing as he did. “I Don’t Like Bad Pranks.”

He couldn’t help but let his smirk drop a fraction. Not Papyrus. He turned his lightless eyes back to the other hall, where Cross had run off.

“i put a cardboard cutout of a cow on his bed.”

. . .

“KILLER! You Shouldn’t Use His Fears For A Prank, It Is Not Funny.”

…A little like Papyrus, even though he clearly was one of his alternates, he conceded. The reminders always left an odd, dull pang where his soul should be. 

“aww, why not? he can handle it.”

Swap groaned, clearly annoyed. “That’s Mean, Not Just A Prank. You Should Apologize.” 

—And that brings him to the present, where he stands in front of a glowering Cross with Swap a little behind the other. Fantastic. Swap gave him an encouraging (threatening) look, and Killer sighed.

“i am very, very sorry for putting a cutout of a cow in your room. it was… uhhhhh…” 

Cross stared at him, unimpressed. 

“…it wasss wrong of me to do. annndd.. iii…” 

Killer’s voice trailed off, squinting empty eyes at Swap over Cross’s shoulder. His hands were making an odd repetitive gesture, palms up and pulling his hands back toward himself and back again. What..? Oh! He was trying to help.

“—iiii.. want, you to- no, i want to forgive.. you? wait, wait- i want to t- to have- get- to earn yooouurrr .. for fuck’s sake swap, i don’t know what ‘ya want me to say!” Killer finally gave up, hands bunching into fists.

The monochrome monster turned his glare behind him, where Swap stood with his hands frozen mid-air. Sheepishly, he smiled, pulling his hands behind his back. Cross scoffed.

“Whatever. I forgive you… Asshole.” 

With that, Cross stalked off, hands in his pockets and his lower face hidden in his scarf. Killer let out a breath of relief that the painful conversation was over, finally, but was interrupted by Swap’s too happy smile and wide, squinting sockets. 

Oh, shit.

Killer teleported away in a blip, landing in Nightmare’s study much to the latter’s immediate annoyance. Killer clutched his metaphorical pearls, nervous sweat on his skull. Nightmare turned in his chair to face Killer, a brow raised and scowl on his face. The dark skeleton narrowed his eyes in slight concentration, which a moment later became confused as he zoned back in. 

“… Why is Swap ….. scheming??” 

Oh, shit.

*** 

Cyan boots stomped tiredly towards the kitchen, a frowning and slouched Swap dragging them along with each step. His gloves were gone, as well as most of his usual mesh-armor. All the skeleton wanted was a glass of cool—not cold—water, and to curl up in bed and hopefully ignore the nagging voice in his skull telling him to quit lazing about like his brother.

… His brother. Papyrus. Witty and good natured, with a knack for easing those around him and cheering him up. Oh, Swap missed his brother. On days like these, the memories hurt the most, and the prickly voice in his head sounded more like a certain paint-splashed monster than a cruel twist of his own monologue. 

Pushing into the kitchen, Swap paused to slump against the door 

way, sockets weary and head hanging as he tried to push away the memories he could never return to. 

Apparently too tired to have noticed the presence in the room, Swap now found himself held to a firm chest, large arms wrapped around him and a chin resting on the top of his skull. Subconsciously he sunk into the hold, the tall stature reminding him again of his younger brother, yet it was still so painfully different. 

Horror hummed deep in his throat. For a while, he simply stood there in the doorway holding Swap, letting the shorter soak up the closeness. 

After what felt like an eternity, Swap tried to force his tired bones to pull away from the comfort. Horror, on the other hand, seemed reluctant to let him go so soon. The taller skeleton lifted him from the ground with ease, keeping his arms wrapped around him until he was dropped into a chair at the table. Before he could protest a large skeletal hand patted him on the head, stunning him into silence. A kettle was placed on the stove, a somewhat comfortable silence falling over the kitchen as Horror went about, grabbing two small ceramic mugs and a little box from a cupboard Swap knew he would never be able to reach without climbing onto the counter. It was clearly a space only Horror used, and maybe Nightmare, if he were to use his extra appendages. 

The sudden whistle of the kettle pulled back his attention, and Horror quickly slid it off the heated stovetop. With practiced movements he went about dropping little packets into each cup and then slowly poured the steaming water over them. When a white mug was placed down in front of him, reading “Stab Happy,” with a little cartoon knife underneath, he noted that it was surely Killer’s usual cup of choice. The piping liquid inside was a yellow-green color. Tea. 

Horror slowly sat diagonal from him, his hands wrapped around his own cup of tea. Besides Swap’s whispered thank you there were no words spoken between them, the pair periodically sipping from their mugs and enjoying each other's company. 

The voice in his head was quiet for the rest of the day.

*** 

Swap sat, the damp grass not bothering him much as he directed his attention to his friend.

The dark oozing determination wasn’t as bad today, and Killer wiped at his under eyes with his sleeve. His grin felt flat, blank eyes staring down at Swap.

“The Stars Are Nice Tonight, Don’t You Think?”

A new sluggish wave of determination dripped from the other’s sockets, which he wiped at again with more aggression. “i don’t like stars.” 

He tilted his head, smile faltering. Something about Killer’s tone made him think he shouldn’t press further. Instead, he pushed himself up to his feet. 

“you think just ‘cause i’m a sans, means i gotta have all the same interests?” Killer continued, even though Swap hadn’t responded. His fists balled, shoulders subtly shaking. “well, you’re wrong. i’m not the same. i’m not. i- i-“

Killer cursed, hands flying to his face as he shook. 

“Killer..?” 

“fuck off!”

Swap stepped back, shocked by the outburst. Falling to his knees, the shaking skeleton hunched in on himself. When Swap tried to approach, hand outstretched in worry, a knife rushed past his skull, just barely missing him as he fell to the side. 

His concern doubled, and with it so did his annoyance. “KILLER! WHAT THE FUCK! What Was That For??”

The other froze, his single barely-there eyelight fizzling out in his left socket. He breathed heavily, leaning on one hand and on his ass, looking surprised.

The silence stretched on as they stared at each other, until Killer exhaled shakily and leaned forward. “… sorry. i don’t.. i don’t know where that came from.”

“..Are You Okay Now?”

“yeah.” He responded after a moment. 

Nightmare had told him about the ‘episodes’ that some of the team sometimes had. They could be short, like this one luckily was, or last even hours. Perhaps some sort of flashback? Swap wasn’t sure, but the actions lined up with what Nightmare had described to him; unawareness, a spacey-look, aggression; it seemed that he’d snapped out of whatever ‘it’ was before anything really happened. 

Killer offered him a hand to stand up, a hint of hesitation in his movements. Swap took it and pulled himself up. Then, as Killer tried to retract his hand, he pulled him into a hug. 

“I Know You Didn’t Mean That.” The blue-wearing monster said, voice dropping to a whisper as his grip tightened, “I’ll Avoid Mentioning, Uh, Stars, In The Future. But If You ever Try Throwing A Knife At Me Again Nightmare Will Have To Heal You.” 

“....okay.” 

*** 

“Oomf!” 

Swap slumped against the mat, sighing loudly. He’d been bested.

“Never let down your guard, even when your opponent is down.” 

Cross and Swap were sparring in the gym, and when Cross went limp under his hold, Swap had assumed victory. Clearly he was too soon to celebrate, as Cross immediately knocked him off and sent him practically flying. 

“Don’t sweat it, Swap,” he offered a hand, helping his friend to his feet. “This is why we’re practicing.”

“Hrmf.”

Summoning two dulled bones—he didn’t want to genuinely hurt his opponent—Swap darted to the side, winding up an arm and aiming a blow to Cross’ shoulder. Cross responded by jumping back, grabbing the outstretched wrist of Swap and twisting until he dropped the bone. 

Twisting with his arm, Swap dropped the other too, bracing himself with his back to Cross and grabbing the wrist apprehending him with his free hand, using the momentum to throw the monochrome monster over his shoulder in a swift move. Cross yelped, unprepared, as he was slammed onto the mat at his opponent’s feet. A cyan boot planted itself on his chest, one arm in the air and twisting at an uncomfortable angle.

Swap smiled brightly down at his friend. “Surrender now?”

Grumbling, he nodded, rubbing at his arm when it was released. Plopping down beside him Swap began to prod at Cross’ skull with joking jabs at his stance. He scoffed, a grin pulling at his features as he swatted at the hands.

***

A knife stabbed into the table, angry shouting from a certain tear-streaked skeleton following. 

“that’s bullshit!” 

“killer, shut the hell up.” Dust spat, “what’s the point in denying it?”

“fuck you, you musty psycho! it’s definitely me.”

Horror interrupted, “can we.. please.. jus’ eat, without.. th’ arguing?” 

“Of course not, did you forget who we’re eating with?” Cross muttered, skull resting against a palm as he leaned on the table. His other hand poked at his food.

Killer’s smile strained at the edges, fingers tightening around his embedded knife’s handle. “i wouldn’t be arguing if dust’d accept the truth.”

“kill yourself.”

“Dust, you can’t just say that anytime you disagr-“ Cross started.

“kill yourself.”

He deadpanned, eyes narrowed. “Dust-“

The quiet, repetitive thumping of Nightmare’s skull on the table continued, though nobody paid it mind. 

“Guys, Horror’s Getting Upset. Can’t You Save This Topic For Later?” 

“no.” Dust and Killer replied in unison, followed by a sharp glare at each other.

The hooded skeleton picked up his fork anyway, taking a bite from his dinner. “you need to accept ya aren’t his favorite.”

“wh- y- as if it could be you!” 

Horror took a calming breath, Swap patting him comfortingly on the arm as the bickering went on.

“could be.”

“could not!”

“I Doubt It’s EITHER Of You!”

Before either could respond, Nightmare finally raised his head, a suffering look on his skull and a tired frown. His voice was low and immediately shut both arguing skeletons up.

“Horror is my favorite. Does that make you happy to hear?”

The mentioned monster perked up, his single eyelight dilating in its socket. Killer’s expression dropped, whereas Dust simply shrugged and returned to his plate.

“but i do everything you ask! i’m the most loyal person here.”

When Dust muttered a sneer of “dog” under his breath Killer kicked him under the table. 

“Horror is quiet… and he cooks.”

Dust smirked at that, sending a pointed look to the determination-dripping skeleton beside him. With a yell, Dust was knocked out of his chair, plate knocking to the floor with him as Killer shoved him to the floor. The pair tumbled across the ground with a series of outraged insults and jeers, fists flying.

Watching the scene unfold—Nightmare angrily pushing away from the table, moving to tear Killer and Dust apart; Cross, jumping up with a huff to help, hands finding Dust’s hood; Horror, more distressed about the plate of food that had dropped than his screaming and hitting friends—Swap, despite everything, grinned exasperatedly, taking another bite of food.

It was still better than the Stars’. 

////

previous < > next

[batrogers]

Prompt writing, "Touch Starved"

That Broken Promise, Outset POV. Rated G. 700 words.

Also on AO3

IIII

Travel with the others was exhausting for Link, when he had to spend so much of his effort just trying to walk without tripping on something. At least he had a staff – at least he’d been able to get a staff in Prince’s world. But that didn’t turn a long day of walking on unfamiliar ground into something easy.

He missed his ship. He missed Tetra, and the others, and a boat he knew without having to check where he was walking as often, or as much, or even fucking care if he tripped and faceplanted on deck. It didn’t matter all that much if he took a minor injury or two at home; others could fill in.

But here? Here, it mattered if he was sick or injured or hurt. It slowed the others down, and not all of them were that patient. Worse: he wasn’t even the most compromised of them. Skyloft or Four was easily worse, and some days Hateno too...

He wasn’t used to that. It felt stupid, to lay on the sleeping pad on solid ground in a tent, brilliantly lit by a flower rooted through the bottom layer of fabric, and miss being the most compromised person in the area...

But he kind of did. He pressed one hand to his face and groaned.

“Are you feeling alright?” Skyloft asked.

“Fine,” Link muttered. He’d forgotten, or just not noticed when Skyloft joined him, which he should’ve expected. He tired so easily some days. “I’m sorry, I’m just...”

“Homesick?”

He thought about lying, then remembered he wasn’t the only person who’d cried themself to sleep of late. He twisted til he could see the shape of his companion in the corner of his eye. “Yeah, I am.”

“Just for company or...?”

He thought Skyloft was looking at him. Link pushed himself up on one elbow and raised an eyebrow. “What kind of company?”

“I mean, you said you live on a ship. I imagine you’re used to being close to others a lot.” It seemed to take Skyloft a second to remember to clarify, “I don’t mean sex.”

Link snorted loudly. “What, are you just cold?”

He wasn’t sure if that was a symptom Skyloft had a lot, but he could admit he did miss the way everyone at home, on Tetra’s ship touched him. Too many of their companions startled so easily it was too much of a risk to reach out but...

Skyloft wasn’t one of them.

“Yeah,” Skyloft said. “Kinda. C’mere?”

He might be lying, but if it made it easier on them both to agree, Link would take it. He pushed his staff further into the corner of the tent and dragged his blanket with him to curl up at Skyloft’s side. The other man did seem a little cold. There was a brief period of fumbling, blankets and tangled legs, but Link got himself against Skyloft’s legs and his head on his pillow, and both their blankets overtop of them. Skyloft sighed gently and laid an elbow on Link’s shoulder.

“Is that okay? I was reading.”

“Book or journal?” Link asked. His face was pressed against Skyloft’s side, his tunic smelling like person but also some kind of scented soap he couldn’t place. He must’ve gotten something at one of their stops. Link had no idea who did their laundry most days – it cycled around people, but never to him. Blindness got him out of a lot of chores, it seemed.

“Technically both,” Skyloft said. “I... We got books when we were in Lorule, I don’t think anyone mentioned them to you given...”

“I can’t write very well, no,” Link agreed. “I didn’t know you write.”

“It’s about the surface – the world I saw on my journey.” His voice was soft, and fond. “I could read it to you? You can tell me how it sounds.”

Link settled further against his side with the relief of knowing exactly where he was, and where someone else was and hummed his agreement, and Skyloft trailed a hand down his arm. He heard pages flip, and he began to read.

[abiiors]

okay so while we’re on the topic… i’m a newer fan of the boys, i actually got tickets to one of their concerts back in october when they were touring in america from my aunt even though i had never really been a fan of them (her heart was in the right place 😭😭 bc i do listen to a lot of music that’s like in their sphere ig?? and i’ve been to festivals that they’ve performed at so i can see why she would’ve thought to get me those tickets, i just never really listened to their music before) but i went to the show regardless bc hello free concert tickets?? would have been a sin to let them go to waste tbh and oh my god am i so glad i did, it was actually one of the best shows i’ve ever been too!! especially considering i only really knew their popular songs?? like robbers, somebody else, aaaand it’s not living if it’s not with you

ANYWAYS that being said, since i had never really followed them before i always pretty much ignored anything i saw about them on twitter and stuff, mainly the negative things said abt matty bc not my faves, not my business?? but i gotta ask someone who’s been a fan of them for a lot longer than i have, what iiiis the deal with all the “matty healy racist” “matty healy homophobic” “matty healy [insert smth hateful here]” rhetoric??? bc from what i’ve seen of him after getting to know more abt the band he doesn’t appear that way at all?? like were there things he said that were taken out of context??? what’s up with the nazi accusations??? also homophobic??? is twt not aware of what he did in malaysia?? also straight men that are homophobic would never have the kind of close male friendships that the band have with one another… it seems like he’s twitter’s scapegoat tbh but idk i’m simply so confused and anything i find online trying to explain it all seems very biased based off the language they use so if you can/would like to… pls help 😭

okay first of all, welcome to the fandom!! i'm so glad you're here and i'm so glad you got to see them live!! they genuinely are so so incredible <33

now onto the questions!

i won't say matty's a saint. he's definitely done things in the past that are disappointing (to me at least, as well as to many others on here). last year he went on a podcast called the adam friedland show where many tasteless jokes were made about japanese people, the porn website ghetto gaggers, ice spice as well as countless other tastelss things were said.

now i really really want to clarify that matty never made those jokes but he did laugh along to them which is also a shitty fucking thing to do. he's since said that he was advised not to go on the podcast by people close to him and he still did it. however, he's also publicly apologised to ice spice and she's also said that the 1975 are one of her fav artists.

in may of 2023 he started allegedly dating taylor swift (i still don't believe it, i still think they either just made music or they just fucked or both) which exposed him to a whole new level of fame that was unprecedented. and the swifties are... rabid, to say the least. they made fun of his appearance, his past addiction issues, hoped he would have a relapse and die, all sorts of horrendous stuff. they discovered the podcast which was pretty fresh at the time and the whole thing spiralled into him being labelled a racist, homophobe, transphobe, pedophile, nazi, you name it, he was being called it.

however literally NONE of it was backed by evidence (but i don't expect people whose sole source of information is twt to realise that)

they have clearly never learned what a nazi is. i'm not even going to try to debunk that here because i feel like it would be insulting to your intelligence

he's not homophobic or transphobic, he's literally an ally to the point of being a fruity lil shit. he's been banned from 2 countries (dubai and malaysia) for openly supporting queer rights. they were also briefly jailed in malaysia for the stunt they pulled and had a lawsuit filed against them. he's even won ally of the year at the diva awards in 2019

literally every single fan who's ever met him has had nothing but amazing things to say about him. he's been incredibly kind and sweet to people

the band has always been openly political and vocal about their beliefs

you're absolutely right about him being the twitter scapegoat because unfortunately that's exactly what it is </3

i hope that clears things up tho, i'm sorry this is so long!!

[simcardiac-arrested]

scenecut

i dont know if you know this (looks around) but i fucking love robots. Like badly. it’s terminal. it’s so so terminal. if there’s some shit i’m watching or reading and there is a little robot thang i will fall in love with them immediately. #1 fave speedrun like ohhhh oh my god. good fucking gtacious. I LOVE ROBOTS SO MUCH !!!! IT’S LIKE. i dont even know where to start. i think their character design is always banger of course. i love futuristic sleek robots and i love robots that are big and clunky. love when they have wires and perhaps buttons and latches and other such things … love when their metal is rusty or perfectly shiny. LOVE IT ALL SO BAD !!!! love when robots don’t look like anything at all and are just these abstract fucking cubes but i also utterly love animal and creature adjacent robots and humanoid robots. just straight up human looking robots too you guys are ok you can get in the pile . second of all why i love robots. it’s the themes ma.n . it’s the themes and narratives. of being something Other. of being created by someone to do something specific and then growing to be your own person. of learning to be human and sometimes learning you don’t have to be human at all. of expressing yourself in your own way. of living in this world how you see fit, not how other people want you to. THERE ARE SO MANY POSSIBILITIES !!!!! and yeah look i know it’s hashtag problematic to interpret robots as aroace or autistic buuuuut idgaf IDGAFFF !!!! DIDNT ASK !!!!!!!!! I LOVE DOING THIS TO ROBOTS I AM HITTING U WITH MY AAA BEAM !!!! FOREVER !!!!!!!!! because robots as a whole just. don’t fit in. they are ostracized because they are not inherently human. and they often tend to have AAA traits of not really understanding humanity and attraction . Cuz like look im aroace and autistic and yeah it’s cool and sexy and whatever but also to be serious for a moment. it’s isolating! it’s lonely. i often feel isolated from my friends and peers and (joker voice) Society as a whole. because there are many things i do not understand just, on a fundamental level. and see robots do this too because of simply Being Created . being not Born Right into this world . and i lauve it. i love robots who’s core theme is Not Fitting In. sentient robots who can’t quite fully relate to humans but also no longer relate to normal programmed robots. CYBORGS !!! MY MAN GENOS FROM ONE PUNCH MAN iiii have been uatistic aabout him for far too long. because look he is a cyborg, he doesn’t fucking fit in anywhere in the opm universe—he is not human, but he’s also not a monster, but he’s also not 100% robot. he’s just his own thing. he often questions his humanity, and one of the main themes of opm is that we don’t change because we’re human, we are human because we change. and throughout the whole story you can see genos changing and opening himself up to the world and. OKAY INB4 THIS TURNS INTO AN OPM/GENOS RANT (sorry i love him so much it’s licherally not my fault) what im trying to say is like. robots. of the metal variety . 👍So gooud