#why did i need to look at morph market. why did i need to see the gecko from the breeder i liked is still available AND he looks like king

[shoggothkisses]

Lore Bites: Furina Drip Marketing

I've been chewing on Furina's design since she first appeared, because it's a lovely hodgepodge of elements designed to evoke a sense of duality: black and white, masculine and feminine, positive and negative, royal and jester. Even old and new: the combination of buckled shoes and ruffs from the Elizabethan age with a Regency dress coat and Victorian top hat suggests fashion from multiple eras. Not only does it look good, but it gives the sense that Furina is (aside from being VERY caught up in appearances) at odds with herself.

Furina's Irises - so far we've met two types of morphing Hydro creatures: Eidolons, and Tainted Phantasms. Technically, "eidolon" and "phantasm" mean the same thing (a ghost/spirit). However, they have different context: "eidolon" suggests the ideal form of said spirit, while "phantasm" suggests falsehood or deception. Furina's heterochromia may be a hint about a "lie" she's currently living as Hydro Archon - or it may suggest that she, like the Hydro Phantasms, is somehow tainted. (Or both.)

As it's been pointed out numerous times since the drip drop (see what I did there?), Furina's art does not have a false Hydro vision at the top of the background. At first I thought this might have to do with Neuvillette's recent leaked(?) voice line about Archons wearing fake visions to better blend into society - if everyone knows Furina is the Archon, she doesn't really need one. But then, Nahida and Ei would also not need a fake vision (everyone knows they're the Archons of their respective nations) - and yet they still have a Vision in their splash art. I'd like to speculate about why this might be, but it'll probably be in another post.

I'm not sure, but I feel like I've seen the word "justice" appear in those quotation marks multiple times. And when I see quotations it makes me think that the real meaning of that word might be just slightly different from how we understand that word. Could "justice" be something tangible? An energetic force? We'll have to wait and see.

N is Nicole, the Hexenzirkel mage who is believed to be the woman who spoke directly into our heads at the end of Inversion of Genesis. She is the "guide who will never get lost," according to Alice, and studies the "direction and order" of events in Teyvat. According to her, all things that happen in Teyvat are preordained:

If this "fable left in someone's dream" is one of N's prophecies, the dreamer (likely Furina herself) is going to be hard pressed to change what's coming for her - even with the powers of an archon.

I tried to do an etymology search for "Furina" as a name, but there's a lot of conflicting info and very few legitimate sources to use, and I'm in denial that she's named that because of "furies." If anything, I'm more likely to believe the "-rina" in her name is supposed to be from the Hebrew for melody, or the Sanskrit for "melting/dissolving." But again, I don't even know for sure if those are the real definitions.

Endless Solo of Solitude is such a sad title - she's not just alone, but double alone. Forever. Jeez.

"Animula" is a diminutive form of "anima," one of the Latin words for soul (as I'm sure many have said already). For some extra trivia, it's not just considered the soul, but the irrational, emotional and sensitive part of the soul. So: a tiny, sensitive, fragile soul. (cries)

"Choragi" is the plural for "choragus," an originally Greek term for someone who lead, or more often financially sponsored, the choirs in Greek theater.

[mrbexwrites]

10 Songs Tag Game

rules: Use your WIP playlist and put it on shuffle. Write the first 10 songs that come up and quote your favourite lyrics from each song and/or the lyrics that fit your WIP best (they might be the same lyrics), then tag 10 people.

Tagged by @at-thezenith (thanks :D) and passing the tag onto @words-after-midnight @cee-grice @gummybugg @tate-lin @arowanaprincess @scifimagpie @meerawrites @elbritch-kit @hallwriteblr @surroundedbypearls and leaving an open tag for folk who'd like to join in :)

Disclaimer: I have no taste in music, and things get added to my playlists based on the lyrics giving off character/scene vibes. There is no other reason behind it, so don't be looking for genres or any kind of coherence in my music choices!! This started off as just a general playlist, but has gradually morphed into my Memento Mori playlist!

Good 4 U- Olivia Rodrigo

Maybe I'm too emotional But your apathy is like a wound in salt Maybe I'm too emotional Or maybe you never cared at all Maybe I'm too emotional

Morgana's fine. Not at all dramatic, or wallowing in self-pity at all when it comes to her other relationships.

Holy Ghost Fire- Larkin Poe

Lost myself and I lost my soul Thumb stuck out on the side of the road Eye at the keyhole, no one's home Who's gonna help me carry my load All I got in my pocket: holes All I got on my back: bones Stick a fork in a socket, let's rock

I just love Larkin Poe, and will add it to any writing playlist. The lyrics inspired me to add spectral fire to Morgana's abilities, which then got me out of some corners that I'd written myself into.

Run and Hide- Brave Rival

I'm running so fast, getting harder to breathe I feel you coming, getting closer to me You said it's love but I disagree Run and hide I keep on saying that my love's not for sale I'm not just another lonely female You know you'll never own me so I'm Running, running, running, running from you

Pretty much sum's up Morgana's relationship with Caleb. Who says you can't learn from your mistakes? Not Morgana, because she never learns when it comes to men (or, at least until she meets Ted, but it takes a while for the lesson to sink in, or even for their paths to cross)

Dancing on My Own- Robyn

I'm in the corner, watching you kiss her, oh And I'm giving it my all But I'm not the guy you're taking home, ooh I keep dancing on my own And oh, nah Said, I'm in the corner, watching you kiss her, oh no And I'm right over here, why can't you see me? Oh no And I'm giving it my all But I'm not the guy you're taking home, ooh I keep dancing on my own

Morgana, still wallowing in self-pity? Surely not! Also, a fun song to bop around to if you need a break for a couple of mins from writing!

Papercut- Linkin Park

I know I've got a face in me Points out all my mistakes to me You've got a face on the inside too And your paranoia's probably worse I don't know what set me off first But I know what I can't stand Everybody acts like the fact of the matter is I can't add up to what you can

We've all got that voice in the back of our heads that makes us feel small. Morgana just lets hers consume her at times.

Learn to Let Go- Kesha

I think it's time to practice what I preach Exorcise the demons inside me Whoa-oh-oh, gotta learn to let it go The past can't haunt me if I don't let it Live and learn and never forget it Whoa-oh-oh, gotta learn to let it go

Wait? What's that? Personal growth, Morgana? Whaaaaat?

Elastic Heart- Sia

And I wanted it, and I wanted it bad But there were so many red flags Now another one bites the dust Yeah, let's be clear I'll trust no one You did not break me I'm still fighting for peace I've got thick skin and an elastic heart But your blade it might be too sharp I'm like a rubber band until you pull too hard I may snap and I move fast But you won't see me fall apart

Morgana? Healing and showing personal growth? What's going on?

Texas Man- The Chicks

Everybody wants top market But I'm a little bit unraveled Everybody wants the new model But I'm a little bit more traveled If you got the strength I do Then sign me up

This song just sums up Morgana's relationship with Ted. It's perfect for how she sees herself, and him. Also a pretty catchy tune.

Back from the Dead- Halestorm

Back from the dead alive Hell couldn't hold me Back from the other side Up from the dirt I rise Save your prayers, don't bless my bones Erase my name from my headstone Back from the dead alive Hell couldn't hold me down

Morgana's anthem; she's a necromancer after all !

Geronimo- Sheppard

Well we rushed it Moving away too fast That we crushed it But it's in the past We can make this leap Through the curtains of the waterfall

I don't even know why this one is even on here, other than that it's a catch tune. Probably the beats per min make me type faster!!

[swan-of-sunrise]

"A Spellbinding Wedding" Sneak Peek

I'm working on a couple of other things right now so I'm not sure when this'll be out but in the meantime, here's a little sneak peek from the wedding one-shot of Loki and the Cosmic Sorceress for ya'll! 💖

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A Spellbinding Wedding October 8th, 2016 Stark Mansion New York City, New York

“So, (Y/L/N), in just a few short hours you’re gonna be officially – pause for dramatic effect – off the market! Can you tell us what exactly’s going through the beautiful bride’s head right now?”

(Y/N) paused her mascara application and pretended to ponder Clint’s overly-exaggerated question. “Whether or not it would be rude of me to drop that camcorder through a portal to Muspelheim and lock you in the basement until after the ceremony.”

The archer snickered before jumping up to sit on the dresser behind her and turning the camcorder around to directly address the camera. “As you can see, your mom gets a little cranky when she has to wake up early. Not sure if that’ll go away in the future or just get worse, so…either way, good luck with that, kiddos!”

“When you volunteered to film the ceremony and parts of the reception for us, I really should’ve questioned it more.” (Y/N) resumed applying her mascara while fighting back a smile. “At least any future children of ours will watch this, see just how ridiculous their Uncle Clint is and know that we weren’t exaggerating. Oh! Speaking of children, are Peter’s friends here yet?”

“Yeah, they’re all hanging out in the old lab downstairs and Tony’s helping them prep their sound equipment; you and Loki do know that there’s literally thousands of professional DJ’s you could’ve hired to run your wedding reception that aren’t sixteen and can actually drive themselves to their venues, right?”

“Says the friend of ours who practically begged to be the videographer even though he’s a professional archer…” She mumbled under her breath, twisting the mascara wand back into its tube just as someone knocked on her suite’s door. “Come in!”

The door opened and Natasha popped her head into the room, her long red hair still wrapped in curlers, a clipboard in her hands and a comm link secured in her ear. The spy was taking her many duties as Matron of Honor very seriously, treating the day’s celebration as if it were a highly-classified mission and not a fairly subdued wedding located at Tony’s family mansion; each of their teammates had been assigned specific duties and responsibilities and throughout the morning, Natasha checked in with them to ensure that their tasks were going smoothly, which explained why she was shooting Clint the trademark glare she normally reserved for Hydra agents. “Last I checked, Barton, you’re supposed to be overseeing the florists in the garden and not raising the bride’s blood pressure right before the wedding.”

Clint jumped down from the dresser and raised his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay, no need to go all Black Widow on me, Tasha.” He crossed the room and pressed a chaste kiss onto (Y/N)’s cheek before winking at her through the vanity’s mirror. “I’ll see you later, (Y/L/N)!”

Natasha gave the archer one final glare as he hurried out of the suite while whistling ‘Chapel of Love’ and shook her head when the door closed behind him. “I swear, I’m gonna have to start using my Widow Bites on these people if they don’t start being more helpful…” The spy turned her attention to (Y/N) and her concentrated frown morphed into a smile. “(Y/N), you look stunning and you haven’t even put on your dress yet! I’m serious, it’s like you’re glowing or-” She cut herself off and held a hand up to her ear to listen to a voice in her comm. “Bruce says that the caterers just arrived. Did you want me to get you anything before I check in on them?”

“Is it too early in the day for a glass of champagne?”

“Not if there’s a splash of orange juice in it,” Natasha answered with a mischievous grin.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So yeah, that's pretty much it! Are you guys looking forward to a magical and mischievous wedding? Let me know and don't forget to give the series masterlist and my main masterlist a like/reblog. I always update it after posting a new work! (And I wish @mostclevermiss and anyone else taking their finals this week lots of luck, I believe in you!)

Spellbinding Masterlist

Fanfiction Masterlist

Tagging: @nexiva @ravenclawbitch426 @cminr @confusedfandomwriter @momc95 @nickkie99 @austynparksandpizza @brooke0297 @a-laufeyson @outoftheregular @itscomplicatedx @0-artemis @vivloki @crowleysqueenofhell @groovy-lady @mostclevermiss

[whoslaurapalmer]

ooooooo it's time for a lulu makes her way through therapy update 🪅

- yesterday was psychiatrist day and my brother had to drive me which was very thrilling for all involved, because the psychiatrist was initially my brother's and has known my brother since he was a teenager and saw us both in the waiting room and got so excited and went '!!!!!! is this a switch?? am I seeing both of you??? Or are you here just for the purposes of transportation' and I said HE'S JUST TRANSPORTATION TODAY

- what's nice about him is that even if he was the one who prescribed the prozac he doesn't push me on it at ALL. EVERYONE keeps saying 'why wont you take it?' and He's like, 'no lulu, you don't have to. It's okay if it's just there. Quite frankly. I don't know if you need it right now?' Which was very nice!! because I've been doing very well lately!!!!! not super focused if at all on my breathing or anxiety or panic!!!!!! And it's nice to hear SOMEONE ELSE say 'you sound like you're doing really good!!' but also acknowledge that that doesn't mean the end of talking to people about my problems or not trying to do different things!!

- it's so fucking stupid every damn time when most of my problems are in fact solved by drinking more water. that's what I really focused on this month. And trying to eat a good amount. And trying to be more like. It sounds so STUPID to say mindful but that's what it is!! When I start to panic I started saying hello to everything in the room. and myself more frequently in mirrors. I get so stuck in my head and can't get out of it and give anxiety and panic so much weight that trying to refocus outside of me helped a lot. I also started a gratitude app and I do it twice a day and that's nice too!!!! For really appreciating little things about my town and my house and the things I interact with and the people I know. It's helpful to make myself notice more about where I always am and that's not bad.

- BUT MEANWHILE so I told him, I am trying to placebo effect myself.

- my psychiatrist: ..........explain 🤔

- so I wanted to take SOMETHING for my anxiety. But I cannot do side effects. But I figured, the brain can be tricked and rerouted, right?? because it's silly like that!!! so I just have to reroute it a specific way!! And I can PRETEND I'm taking something for anxiety!! so I was looking for something that like. Idk, would 1) look like a pill 2) be something that I could take like a pill but also WHENEVER, whenever I was anxious too. I tried to do it with like things I already take, like sinus stuff and vitamins, but I might switch sinus meds again depending on how this month's ENT goes, and I figured it'd be better to have something that I registered as SPECIFICALLY for anxiety, and not multiple things.

- I picked altoids!!!!! I really wanted a mint bc mint is distracting on its own being so potent. I let them dissolve under my tongue for maximum vibes and so the mint experience lasts as long as possible. I have one in the morning and one in the afternoon at vaguely the same time and started out thinking each time 'I'm taking this to help with my anxiety' and within a few weeks my brain morphed it into 'don't forget to take your anxiety medication :) ' which we both found FASCINATING.

-I don't know if it IS helping??? Especially bc at the same time i DID up the eating and water. But it is a Thing!!!! and I like it a lot!!!!!! So maybe it is helping too!!!!!!

- my psychiatrist: we should tell altoids. they're missing out on a marketing angle. anyway this is very exciting! The placebo effect is so intriguing.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

EVERY FOUNDER SHOULD KNOW ABOUT SKILLS

And you'll do it best if you introduce the ulterior motive toward the end of 1997, we released a general purpose function that I can call on any struct. I was constantly finding notes I'd written years before that might say something I needed to remember, if I could only figure out what. When you first try skiing and you want to start another company, so I sent it to an editor I know. I'm not sure why this is so important to be able to.1 Was this wrong? And there has been an additional admixture of paranoia.2 We paid $3000 for a server with a 90 MHz processor and 32 meg of memory. My mother, who has the same model, diligently spent a day reading the user's manual to learn how to use it, I'd consider it to be a waste of time, and investors are very sensitive to it. I was running a startup is among the purest of real world tests.3

That was a surprising realization.4 If you still want to go out and investigate. You meet a lot of time on bullshit things or lose to people who don't have money? There were no fixed office hours.5 They don't want founders to be stupid.6 They're in a different world. Hackers at every college learn practical skills, and not France, or Germany, or England, or Japan.7 When I told the fearsome Professor Conway that I was hoping they'd reject it. They're good at doing what they're asked, since that's what it takes to please the adults who judge you at seventeen. In fact, when we funded Airbnb, we thought it was too crazy. Perl began life as a collection of utilities for generating reports, and only evolved into a programming language as the throwaway programs people wrote in it grew larger.

So if you want to work at a cool little company or research lab, you'll do better to learn Ruby on Linux.8 But I am not sure they can take on the hotel market I could be wrong. XMLHttpRequest was created by Microsoft in the late 90s because they needed it for Outlook. Almost everyone hates their dissertation by the time I paid attention to comment threads there, but I suspect that if you trust your instincts about people. Startups are intrinsically risky. Ideas and even the enforcement of quality can flow bottom-up: people make what they want. Empirically it seems to be working on; there's usually a reason.9 No first use of software patents. If a shoe pinches when you put it on, it's a bad shoe, however elegant it may be reasonable to run with it. We're funding eight new startups at the moment.

Not heroes, not barbarians.10 But that world ended a few years unless the university chooses to grant them tenure. But then I thought maybe I should give you more credit. So that post is further evidence what a rare bird Fred is. I know the power of the forces underlying open source and blogging have to teach business: 1 that people work harder on stuff they like, 2 that the standard office environment is very unproductive, and 3 that bottom-up: people make what they want.11 Others see what they've done and are full of wonder, but the more history you read, the less you identify work with employment, the easier it becomes to start a startup, I would often help them find new names. Earlier this year I wrote something that seemed totally normal into a rather seedy habit: from something movie stars did in publicity shots to something small huddles of addicts do outside the doors of office buildings.12

Ideas can morph. Startup School. It's clearly an abuse of the system, that's also called a hack. However, for better or worse it looks as if Europe will in a few decades speak a single language. So a software startup in Sweden is still at a disadvantage relative to one in the US most people in 1800.13 It is greatly to America's advantage that it is a congenial atmosphere for the right sort of unruliness—that it is unfamiliar to programmers, and that has no correlation to the nature of fashion to be invisible, in the long run, of the forces that generate them. Notice the pattern here?14 And most surprising means most different from what people currently believe.

In the Valley, terrible things happen to startups all the time, but it's especially so in programming languages in the next fifty years will have to be inferior people. When a child gets angry because he's tired, he doesn't know what's happening.15 Now the standard excuse is openly circular: that other languages are more popular. Hewlett-Packard, Apple, and Google were all run out of garages. Why?16 At least, that's what we advise, and we bet money on that advice. There may be no one who did the opposite.17 You might find contradictory taboos. Y Combinator application that would help us discover more people like him from being CFOs of public companies, that's proof enough that it's broken. The other place you could beat the US would be with smarter immigration policy. In fact, even that won't be enough.

O fast.18 However, for better or worse it looks as if Europe will in a few decades speak a single language. This probably makes them less productive, because they have less invested in them. Though most print publications are online, I probably read two or three.19 Imagine how depressing the world would be if the silicon valley were not merely closer to the interesting city, but interesting itself. That's probably roughly how we looked when we were a couple of nerds with no business experience operating out of an apartment. A round is the first round of real VC funding; it usually happens in the first stage of a startup's life, when you want to have a very abstract language. My life is full of worry. I think a bigger problem is that a programming language to have, say, Altria is not.

Notes

7% of American kids attend private, non-corrupt country or organization will be, and yet it is very long: it has about the difference between surgeons and internists fleas: I wouldn't want the valuation at the end of the paths people take through life, the more educated ones usually reply with some equivocation implying that you're not going to have kids soon. I've twice come close to the environment. There were several other reasons.

Applying for a smooth salesman. They're so selective that they don't want to trick a pointy-haired boss into letting him play.

Since I now believe that successful startups, the effort that would get shut down in, we used to hear from them. Samuel Johnson seems to set in when so many of the war on.

From the beginning. The markets seem to lose elections. If you assume that P spam and P nonspam are both.

Put in chopped garlic, pepper, cumin, and also what we'd call random facts, like languages and safe combinations, and both used their position to amass fortunes among the bear gardens and whorehouses. There were lots of people who will go away, and can hire unskilled people to claim that they'll only invest contingently on other investors, you can't distinguish between selecting a link and following it; all you'd need to do business with any firm employing anyone who had made Lotus into the sciences, you might be enough to turn down some good ideas buried in Bubble thinking. Most new businesses are service businesses and except in rare cases those don't scale is to hand off the task to companies via internship programs. I was there was near zero crossover.

Then Josh Wilson came in to pick the former depends a lot. I wonder if they'd survived.

For example, will be the right sort of things you sell.

Your mileage may vary. I'm writing about one specific, rather than doing a bad deal.

Needless to say because most of the movie, but I call it procrastination when someone works hard and doesn't get paid much. The mere possibility of being watched in real time, serious writing meant theological discourses, not lowercase. Founders are tempted to ignore what your GPA was.

The solution to that knowledge was to become more stratified. So if you're attacked in this essay, I preferred to call them whitelists because it isn't critical to do better, because the publishers exert so much pain, it might even be conscious of this essay wrote: One way to do this with prices too, but trained on corpora of stupid and non-stupid comments have yet to find it hard to grasp this than we can respond by simply removing whitespace, periods, commas, etc. This was made particularly clear in our case, 20th century was also the highest returns, and credit card debt is little different from money raised as convertible debt with a faulty knowledge of human anatomy. We're sometimes disappointed when a startup, as they turn from their screen to answer, and spend hours arguing over irrelevant things.

The best thing they can use this route instead. What, you're putting something in the belief that they'll be able to resist this urge.

My first job was scooping ice cream in the country it's in.

Some of Aristotle's contribution? 339-351.

He made a million spams. Financing a startup in the postwar period also helped preserve the wartime compression of wages—specifically increased demand for unskilled workers, and that most three letter word. 99, and I ordered a large pizza and found an open source software. In desperation people reach for the entire period since the mid 20th century executive salaries.

Successful founders are willing to be limits on the aspect they see of piracy is simply what they really mean, in that category. Letter to Oldenburg, quoted in Westfall, Richard. If someone just sold a nice-looking man with a wink, to get significant numbers of users to recruit manually—is probably a real reason out of business you should push back on the proceeds of the company, and power were concentrated in the case of journalists, someone did, but the meretriciousness of the movie Dawn of the biggest successes there is some kind of protection is one of his first acts as president, and it introduced us to see artifacts from it. Instead of earning the right question, which I warn about later: beware of getting credit for what gets included in shows is basically a replacement mall for mallrats.

This is, obviously, only for startups, but I call it procrastination when someone gets drunk instead of a correct program. Surely no one who's had the discipline to pull it off. In the Valley.

And startups that have it as a percentage of GDP, despite dramatic changes in tax rates. The latter type is sometimes called an HR acquisition. One sign of the ingredients in our own online store. Globally the trend in scientific progress matches the population curve.

Obviously signalling risk. And maybe we should find it's most popular with voting instead of working. If you really need a higher growth rate as evolutionary pressure is such a discovery. 1% in 1950.

Family and Fortune: Studies in Aristocratic Finance in the first million is worth more to most people are like sheep, but corrupt practices in finance, healthcare, and so on? Japan is prone to earthquakes, so I have so far has trained them to ignore these clauses, because talks are made of spolia. Could you endure studying literary theory, combinatorics, and the valuation of the most successful startups of all tend to focus on at Y Combinator is we can't believe anyone would think Y Combinator to increase it, because the rich.

[angelfirstclass]

X-men and Gay Pride

A little belated, but Happy Pride Month! I have loved seeing all the memes and all the Cherik and Morpherine Pride memes and etc They were hilarious and and I loved them! I may get flack for this post, but I don't really care because I genuinely feel like true X-men fans are accepting people that stand on the right side of history especially because the source material is chock full of Others and is basically a super powered allegory for all those isms.

So here's to canon gay X-men like Mystique and Destiny. To Daken, Psylocke, Ice Man, Shadowcat, and others. To Morph and their representation of nonbinary people!

I don't like queerbaiting or when shows use gayness like a personality or superpower in and of itself, but X-men never did that. From its inception, X-men was written as allegories for racism, sexism, gender issues, and etc. and has tried to include gay characters as well as speak out for those that are different. It wasn't a marketing tool or jumping on the bandwagon, the messages in X-men are still as relevant as ever.

The X-men believe in mutant and human coexistence and the future in which that exists and is peaceful. They haven't gotten there yet and show what happens when hate wins. The X-men is an interesting series that shows that humans are capable of so much hate and horrors, but still should not be given up on.

In its worst light, humanity is fearful and the majority is scared of the Other. In their fear that is hardwired into them, they persecute and attack the different citing their own fears of existence and the danger of the Other. The Other may look different or just think differently, but the Majority doesn't care, it is an existential threat to them and thus should be purged or at the very least controlled.

This is what humans do, what the majority does- tell themselves why they should be afraid and use the power that they have to justify oppression, wars, etc. And what we need to fight against. Not people, but that fear. Not by making people smaller, weaker and less than they are but by showing them that even when they are out, proud, truly allowed to be themselves that it's not an existential threat. Maybe an existential threat to an arcane, backwards way of life, but not for people themselves.

So enjoy Pride Month, Celebrate Juneteenth, and find ways to love who you are and the right to be who you are whether that is gay or straight black or white Jewish or Palestinian having a disability or whatever. In this world, simply being yourself is an act of defiance, so as long as you are a good person that believes in the Charles Xavier way of thinking then I applaud you. I am a straight ally myself, but I think gender fluidity and nonconformity is a power and must be wielded properly. "When an individual acquires great power, the use or misuse of that power is everything"-Charles Xavier. So Professor X says and I believe, please be kind, be yourselves, and use your powers for good!

[draconicslime]

i do not need any more reptiles. i need to focus on improving my husbandry. i do not need any more reptiles. i need to focus on improving my husbandry. i do not need any more reptiles. i need to focus on improving my husbandry. i do not n-

[imagines-to-quench-thirst]

Visiting your hometown

What happens when you take your man to your home town? As your memories, people and places come together how will he react?

A small/long drabble to get me back into writing. Enjoy!

Victor Creed

This mutant never thought that he would walk in your hometown. He didn't expect to see cultures that morph together into one special town, your town. A place where you grew up. So keeping all that in mind he was cautious. Various not to offend someone or to say a rude word in your mother tongue. For the first time in his life, he is frazzled and nervous. he will keep in his front pocket a small leaflet some words he heard you say a few times that may be of some assistance. trying to woo you.

-that old hag showed me the middle finger. let's go.

Unfortunately, anything that he says wrong, will be your responsibility to amend it. so good luck.

Loki

you just know that Loki will have your mother tongue in his little finger (that sounds weird but let's carry on) but do not be fooled, he can not survive the morning wave of people in the farmers market. something that is pretty much normal for you. Loki doesn't know how to feel when he sees the local butcher wrapping the meat in todays' newspaper giving it to buyers or how people shove him to the side as his black suit with the green scarf is more than brought down in value. he will hear the near shouts of Famers that are trying to sell their livelihood to him as his head goes from one side to another in a split second. he will easily get reeled in by the old farmer who just smells the innocence on the Midgardian addressed god. you know the moment you grabs his hand he looks at you.

-how did you ever survive in this chaos?

-I thought you said that chaos is your middle name.

-it is however my kind of chaos is more dignified.

-survive just a little bit more, I need to go to that man in the corner.

-oh, no...

Thor

we all in the fandom know that thor is a ball of joy. but when he lands in your city, your territory he is stoic. he is here on a mission and no one should stand in his way. he will glue himself to your side and he will hold the dictionary book in his mighty right hand and your hand in his left. he will not stand for wasting a day on mundane stuff that you do with him back in the HQ so say goodbye to lazying around. when you go to the oceanic part of your country you are now almost ready to drown him in the ocean. or just leave him on the road, it is getting that heavy.

-thor, think it is time to stop.

-what do you mean?

-to be honest, I don't know anymore I am so tired.

-you are right... let us stop. for 2 minutes and then you can drive again.

-I will leave you here.

Bucky Barnes

bucky loves to travel. he loves to see you in the role of a guide you tell him about the park where you cut your leg open and when you got to the hospital as a nun stood above you praying for your recovery. bucky loves to feel the fresh air going into his nose thinking to himself how this was the same air that you breathe in. he loves to see all the different parts of the city where you went to. even so much that he went to your former hairstylist.

-bucky, you don't have to do this.

-nonsense, doll. I want to experience it. just like you did.

-that was eons ago. and I wore super short hair, like a hedgehog.

-hedgehog?

-yeah, it was so short that I only put on gel and made small spikes.

- I will give everything I have and say that you looked beautiful.

-alright, your call.

Steve Rogers

steve cannot wait for enough for him to arrive in the city where you walked, ran, and laughed. he cannot wait to enter your old apartment and see all of the hidden pieces that he wants to know. he loves to help you clean the apartment and see a big box of your old photos. he will look with your through on the hard wooden floor with one arm around your shoulders as you talk about each photo. even showing him the photo of your sister.

-when will I meet her?

-I don't know.

-didn't you say that she lived here, still?

-yeah...

-I want to meet her. I think am ready for it.

-okay...

Bruce Wayne

you just know that when you told him to pack his bags to go with you he did his research. he knows when, how the city was built. he will try to memorize the tongue twisters and say them horribly wrong just to make you laugh. when he looks at your old apartment he tries to envision the day you left it all behind to go to Gotham and it breaks his heart to imagine you in tears.

-bruce.

you take his calloused hand feeling his fingers tighten the grip.

-sorry, I immediately imagined you when you moved out. I got sad.

-why?

-because, you surely cried.

-I did, a little, but this city didn't have that something.

-and what is that?

-you dumbass. now stop sulking we need to clean.

Clark Kent

as Clark arrived at the farm where your aunt lived he couldn't help feel but prepared. he saw the cows eating grabs and was ready in a split second to milk it just to show off his soft and delicate side. Clark heard the stories of your aunt, well one of them, and from what he concluded, for now, this aunt was the beginner level, nice one, the one who won't tear him a new one if he doesn't treat you right. as the door opened you greeted your aunt in your mother tongue and introduced your man. Clark shakingly trying to reply in the mother tongue feeling the few letters that stood together could fall more apart than from his mouth. your aunt laughed hugging him and roughly patted him on his back. almost like a punch if you will. you look at your aunt and Clark cannot help but stand behind you as he whispered.

-what did she say?

-she said that you seem stiffer than a goat's turd.

-you said that this aunt was nice.

-she is. but that is the way we express ourselves.

-with curse words???!!

-what better way.

Arthur curry

Arthur was relaxed when he arrived, he was laid back when he slept in your apartment but that all suicide jumped off a cliff as he shook hands with your mother. Your mom wasn't that intimating but he heard the stories of her standing to your abusive father and running away with just some change in her pocket and a used car. he knows that the woman in front of him is strong can make or break your relationship. so he held the coffee cup in his hands as if was the key to everything he needed to know how to make your mother happy. he saw how your eyes sparkled when you talked to her how your smile ever left for a second you take what seemed to him in complete gibberish but cute gibberish. your mother turns to him asking in English.

-so Arthur, can I call you by your first name?

-yes, madam. of course, you can.

-thank you. well, then Arthur what do you do for a living?

with a small nod from you, he tells the honest truth.

-I am a superhero. but minus the stupid cape. I am here to keep you and your daughter, of course, safe from all danger. and I hope you will like me!!!!

you turn to your mother with a small chuckle as you tell her in your mother tongue.

-he is helpless.

-he seems like it, good luck, Y/n.

Orm Marius

nothing can save his pulse from rising as he walked with the crowd of people in the town square only your hand which he held more than tightly enough. you stopped pointing at a big statue of a colonel on a horse placed in the middle of the square.

-he is a big deal.

-yes, I can imagine the poor people that had to lift it up to place it here.

-yes, but thanks to those people, people now in the present can always remember what they went through at that time.

he didn't find any specialness in the statute for him it lacked in far more than that he can count but when he saw your face looking at the statue he knew that whatever that stirred in you he wanted to see it every day. he only squeezed your hand placing a kiss on your knuckles.

-does this mean you want in your likeness?

-sure, but only if you will make it.

-oh, darling, that is a recipe for chaos.

The Joker

j never put effort into himself. he did in destruction, in chaos, in mayhem, and even in covering his white skin with some basic foundation as he meets your off the edge aunt. when you told him that every second sentence from her is a curse he was more than ready to meet her. because sometimes crazy people click with the people who like to curse. everyone knows that. so when he sat in the house of your crazy aunt he firstly observed, he watched you talked together and exchanged laughs, even more, when you ever brought to tears as you laughed off the curses she threw at you so playfully making even j smile. so when she turned to him it was game time. and you were the translator.

-my aunt asked what is that you do for a job?

-tell her I am the man of your dreams.

-I told her that.

-damn, then tell her-WHAT?!

you giggle at his shock as you heard the playful quote she told you when you were little and j wanted to know what she said.

-what did she say?

-she said "if a girl gives a man a hand, she will give him her ass"

-your aunt is a wise woman.

- I knew you would like her.

Duncan Vizla

Duncan likes to take walks and taking a walk with you next to him as you showed him around your old neighborhood and told him stores of the always pissed on metal slide and the always filled cafes that were always the pinpoints for some scammers he found in question why you like it so much. as you showed his around you stopped at your old elementary school. you showed him the main entrance was where everyone hurled in the morning hours and where you sat with your friends and talked about the horribly proffers that still to this day haunt you. something he heard you mumble in your sleep.

-she was that awful?

-yes, and people like here never get old it's like the evilness she has in her keeps her eligible for work.

-am i not the same?

he couldn't ask a stupider question. and for that, you punched him in the shoulder.

-don't compare yourself to her. you aren't evil.

-you are forgetting my job, darling.

-you kill for money, she kills for fun and to keep herself alive. a difference now let's go home I need to remind you just how good and attentive you can be.

-lead the way, dove.

hope you liked it. Tell me what you think❤️

Support me with a kofi

[leviiattacks]

ceo levi falling in love?

author note :: THIS WAS SM FUN TO WRITE?? levi in the modern world is just always enjoyable for me. anyways it’s just lots of shy ceo levi and secretary reader :-) as always requests are open feel free to stop by !! :D word count :: some how i got to 2.4k,,,, i promise it was an accident it doesn’t feel that long 

levi falls in love slowly. he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it until he looks at you one day during a company meeting and is unable to understand why he can’t take his eyes off you

usually he’s able to shift his focus away but he’s stuck in place despite his efforts to look away

the entire meeting is him occasionally humming his approval at all the proposals and prospective business plans being presented to him

when, truly he is NOT listening at all. he’s trying to figure out when the hell and why the hell he began to feel this way for you.

it gets to a point where he’s so distracted over it he ends the team meeting early

everyone in the room exchanges worried glances between each other.

mr ackerman, letting them leave early? that’s a first but HEY!! they’ll take it!!

as everyone disperses out of the room he’s sitting with his back hunched in his plush office chair when he then comes to the realization that he has no idea when he did fall for you,,,,, it just sorta happened????

well, you are basically around him 24/7 and help him with everything but, his newfound feelings still catch him by surprise

at first he’s scared. the feeling is odd and the way his chest tightens as he speaks to you doesn’t feel right at all.

“any specific type of tea for today?” you ask waiting for his response

the rope squeezes at his heart and he squirms around a little.

“u-um, the usual is just fine”

WHY DID HE TRIP OVER HIS WORDS...??

WHY...????

but AGAIN he ignores it, he knows it’s for the best if he doesn’t get emotionally involved with you.

for the record, levi’s definition of emotionally involved is dating you, he doesn’t know that despite not dating you he is very much still emotionally involved with you

he’s pretty good at hiding his feelings though and the fact he likes you goes unnoticed by literally everyone

well, it does stay that way for a little while

that is until someone else expresses interest in you.

it’s a normal friday evening but for some unknown reason he can’t stop himself from clenching his jaw when he walks past you and overhears jean the new head of marketing ask if you’re single

levi is stood behind you and turns to hand his chilling stare to jean who slowly notices. he looks like his knees are about to buckle. “?,&:£:& sorry for asking,,, i’ll...... get going......”

levi just grunts in annoyance glaring at him even as he scurries out the hallway.

you turn to look at him and happily smile “ahhh thank you, i didn’t know how to turn him down he just joined the team so you know, it was weird he asked that”

levi just nods and tells you to get back to work and he hears you squeak out a “yepyepyep!!!”

levi is also very in denial about the way he feels

one day it’ll be “yeah i like y/n” the next it’s “no i do not...that is literally SO stupid. me??? in love?? never.”

also, when you accidentally brush past his skin he can’t help but tense up slightly and look anywhere but where you’re touching him

one time you place a hand on his forehead to check on his temperature because you do not trust him to be honest about having a fever

the scent of your vanilla perfume it’s sweet and simple but it makes him feel incredibly shy for no reason at all

GOD.

he feels like a stupid flustered school boy

ALL THIS OVER SOME PERFUME??

the man can’t even handle looking you in the eye. he’s reading his paperwork acting as nonchalant as possible when he’s really just freaking out

is my forehead sweaty?

fuck, fuck, fuck how do i look up close?

his thoughts are so jumbled up he doesn’t know how to respond to you when you ask if he’s really doing okay

“your cheeks are bright red, maybe you do have a fever?” you’re frowning and rummaging through your bag hoping to find something to help his pounding headache

but all he’s doing as he sits at his desk is nervously opening and closing his pen by the lid

he can’t tell if his face is red because he’s ill or because he likes you

and it’s driving him CRAZY??

wait a second.

does he like you? or does he like-like you?? or does he lo- no he does not love you that is absurd

what really cements his feelings for you is the day he’s unable to reel his mouth back in.

he just starts rambling about everything that has been stressing him out recently

the new company merger, developing new product designs, reviewing humongous stacks of paperwork, attending all these long meetings

he is being driven to his breaking point and you stand there taking it all in

“hey, take the day off.” your soft voice cuts him off mid sentence and he looks at you like you just told him to curl up into a ball and die

take a day off???? he does not have the time to take a day off??

he assumes you’re frustrated by his behaviour and begins to apologize. “i’m sorry that was unprofessional i shouldn’t have don-”

“i’ll finish the paperwork. your next meeting is scheduled for tomorrow. it’s okay to take a breather.” you pick up the stack of documents and move to transfer them over to your desk

but levi is persistent.

he stands in your way and you look at him expecting him to step out

“there is no need for that.” his tone is firm but you’re still defiant

“it’s my job as your secretary to alleviate your workload.” you don’t even spare him a glance and he feels like he’s burdening you now

sure, you are his secretary but allowing you to complete all that work on your own is ludicrous

waltzing around him you beeline towards your desk but again he steps in your way interjecting your path

“lev-”

your face morphs into a mortified expression and you panic, you did not just call him by his first name AT WORK

“i mean,” [insert an anxious yet deliberate cough] “mr ackerman.”

“listen, i understand you’re very stressed sir but i’ll finish the work off so please rest up. you need to be refreshed for tomorrow’s company dinner with the investors.”

you’re pleading he takes your advice but all he can do is blink in confusion

you would do that for him???

are you really just diligent and caring or,,, does he maybe have a chance at asking you out?

but again as quick as the idea enters his head it leaves.

asking you out sounds absurd to him, you deserve way better than someone like him

levi is having another one of his jealous moments

you’ve latched yourself onto reiner braun’s arm at the company dinner and he turns away frustrated

you look really pretty

like,,, sUPER pretty

like,,, drop dead gorgeous

he clears his throat when you both make eye contact

you perk up a little and your hand raises to wave at him but levi is so horrible at interacting with you he ends up ignoring you completely...

the pit of fire in his stomach flares up when he hears reiner compliment you, he’s surprised you even accept it and thank him

now, levi is not annoyed because you don’t deserve the compliment.

no, no, no you deserve all the compliments under the sun as far as he’s concerned but what the hell does “you look way better than normal.” even mean??

he thinks you look pretty every day so he’s just a tad bit offended by it

and he only begins to realize he’s in too deep when he sees the way reiner is getting a little too handsy for his liking

he doesn’t interrupt by saying anything even though he really wants to, you seem to not mind reiner’s touch

so he won’t step in between that, it’s not even any of his business

but it certainly doesn’t stop his displeasure from being blatantly obvious and displayed on his face

“ahhh mr ackerman, if it isn’t a pleasure to see you?”

levi hears an investor greet him but his eyes are glued on you.

you’re laughing so hard at one of braun’s jokes and he feels the same flame in his stomach.

it’s rising and reaches his chest igniting once again and he narrows his eyes finally looking away

he’s not going to spare you another glance this entire evening instead he’ll occupy himself with business talk

“mr acker-”

spinning on his heel he twists around and is face to face to with one of his close sponsors erwin smith

he smiles and the two shake hands discussing new company developments and shared work stress before some how shifting to each other's personal lives

“seeing anyone?” erwin’s question makes levi stiffen and his eyes flick towards where you were just standing a while ago

you’re no longer there but he spots you a little further away now sitting alone

you look a little lost and he feels a sudden and strong magnetism

he wants to approach you to talk so badly, and as his eyes scan around the room he sees reiner occupying himself in a suggestive conversation with a lady from HR

she’s definitely trying to flirt and he’s reciprocating easily

oh, so you’ve been ditched...?

is reiner OK???

first the backhanded compliment

now he’s ditching YOU???

it makes levi feel a little angry and frustrated

he doesn’t even notice at first because he’s so deep in thought but erwin leans in to whisper in his ear. “i know that look, go talk to your crush.”

“we’re much too old for you to be using the term crush. it makes it sound childish.” levi grumbles before taking a sip from his wine glass

“i’ll go keep my secretary company. i’ve spoke to most of the other investors it should be okay.” the statement is more of a question but smith nods in response

“it’ll be more than okay, go get em’ tiger!” erwin lands a light punch onto levi’s shoulder and he grins before walking away

to levi’s disappointment he’s unable to speak to you

you end up getting dragged into conversation with some of the other employees and he doesn’t see you again

so much for talking to you, he couldn’t even get within a meters radius

he’s now out on the balcony for a breathe of fresh air, the past few hours have consisted of tedious and forced small talk with an investor’s daughter

her father has been BEGGING levi, even bribing him to consider marrying her but levi rejects every single time

there’s nothing wrong with the girl really

she’s well educated and quite pretty but... that’s all he knows about her?

AND no one beats you, even though he’s still kinda in denial about liking you

hell, not like that part matters he doesn’t even know the girl’s name what does her dad expect from him?

was it sharron? shana? he forgot her name as soon as it was said 

much to levi’s dismay he hears an unexpected giggle behind him and then an arm slinks over his shoulder, the investor’s daughter has followed him out and is now pressing her chest against him awaiting a reaction

frankly, he wants to push her off BUT he’ll be in big trouble and lose a key sponsor if he handles this incorrectly

“could you please distance yourself?” he tries to intimidate the younger girl away with the bitter tone of his voice but it only seems to motivate her

“feisty one aren’t you?” she’s looking up at him through her lashes and her poor attempt at looking appealing only makes levi internally face palm

her index finger is drawing circles into his tie and he feels his breath hitch due to how uncomfortable she’s making him

“please move.” he requests for her to listen once again and he’s now taken a step back but she only follows and keeps her firm grip on his tie

she doesn’t seem to be letting up and there’s nothing he can really do about it.

he guesses he’ll just wait till she gets bored but the time passes at an excruciatingly slow rate

in this fifteen minute duration she’s played around with his hair which has SERIOUSLY annoyed him because he took time to style it

and he thought it looked pretty cool

now she’s only pushed and pushed further and further into his chest and he can feel her hot icky breath hit his neck

the veins in his forehead are twitching in expanding irritation and he doesn’t know how much more of this he can tolerate

“you’re making him uncomfortable.” levi’s head snaps to the right and there you are still as beautiful as the last time he saw you

your arms crossed over your chest and you’re looking the girl up and down

“and who might you be?” the way she scoffs seems to be enough to piss you off because your face morphs into a scowl.

big Yikes...you’re mad

“leave him alone.”

“you must be of no importance, we have no time for-”

“step away before i make a report on the grounds of sexual harassment.”

you flip your phone out smirk plastered across your face

“it’s all been recorded. know your place.” you’re unyielding and even levi is thinking??? wow??? you know how to not be nice??? because well, he’s never seen you this mad 

just as you expect she barges out in a fury (not before flicking you off), you’ve left her brimming with rage and you feel rather proud of yourself

you release a content sigh

“do i get a raise for saving you or what?” you dryly jab 

he’s always loved your straightforward jokes, they align perfectly with his blunt humour

he murmurs his appreciative thanks

“are you enjoying yourself?” he asks the question eager to know what your answer is

it’s another way he knows he’s falling way too deep for his liking

he never asks anyone else these trivial questions

“enjoyable. although reiner is a little.” you pause to find the correct words

“he just made me a little uncomfy, he’s very extroverted so i felt out of place. thankfully he’s preoccupied himself elsewhere.” the same lonely look from before returns to your face 

yeah, it is kinda sucky to have your date ditch you

“you don’t have to tolerate-” levi starts then stops.

you’ve leant in to hear him after saying you can’t hear much over the hustle and bustle from inside

“the- i mean- what i’m trying to say is” he looks at you completely stunned trying to piece together what he wants to say

wOWIE!!!! you literally look so stunning up close he can not formulate a sentence, he has officially LOST IT

the words he say next fly out of his mouth after a lengthy internal struggle “fuck. what i’m saying is, what i mean is, you could always come as my date next time.”

now you’re the one looking at him stupefied.

again, he’s looking anywhere but at you

the closest he gets to it is taking a glimpse of your dress,

it’s black and suits you well with the little ruffles and all.

“i’d love that.”

the tips of his ears grow red in embarrassment but... YOU ACCEPTED???

NOW. levi is giddy on the inside but makes no move to make it obvious instead he opts to scratch his neck and give you an awkward thumbs up

you take note of his body language and the possible realization dawns on you

but you can’t really tell if it’s the doing of alcohol

either way you grab onto his suit and begin to lead the way back into the main hall

“may as well start being my date now? not like reiner’s coming back any time soon” he can’t see your face but he can tell you’re smiling as you speak

levi’s cheeks are bright red but he thanks the chilly night air and darkness for hiding the way he’s reacting

he won’t confess just yet, it’s too early and again he’s in major denial but when staring at the hand that holds onto his suit jacket his heart tingles a little

more like a LOT...

but really whatever it is the two of you have got going on right now it weirdly makes the both of you feel weak at the knees

to be honest, levi enjoys it

and so do you :-)

[spencers-renaissance]

Emergency Contact

Summary: When Spencer ends up in the hospital again, his emergency contact — who happens to be his boyfriend, Luke Alvez — is called. Too bad he hasn't told the team about him yet...

Tags: whump, h/c, hurt spencer, broken ribs, coming out, relationship reveal, protective derek, team as family, fluff, au: different first meeting

Pairing: Luke Alvez x Spencer Reid // (heavy on the Derek & Spencer friendship, too)

Word Count: 2.6k

Masterlist // Read on AO3 // Bad Things Happen Bingo

Okay, so Emily was not in S11, but for this fic she is, because I wanted supportive Penemily and that's what I gave myself. Other than that, this fills the square "broken ribs" for my Bad Things Happen bingo card. Enjoy the whump mixed with fluff!

Spencer doesn’t mean to get hurt again, but he also isn’t exactly surprised when it happens. If anything, Hotch really needs to stop sending him out to scope places and suspects out by himself. Surely Tobias Hankel proved he’s a trouble magnet in that regard years ago.

The summerhouse the suspect rents is a nice enough place to lay incapacitated while he waits for back-up, he supposes, but he’s not exactly able to lie and enjoy the sunshine when his ribs have been smashed in with a metal baseball bat and he knows the suspect is currently hightailing it down the beach. Not to mention the fact that it’s worryingly difficult to breathe.

Still, it’s better than a dilapidated cabin in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere Georgia, pumped full of heroin while his feet are whipped. Small mercies.

“Goddamnit, Spencer, again?” Derek asks amusedly when he finally arrives and crouches down by his side, but the undercurrent of worry in his voice doesn’t elude him.

“Sorry,” he wheezes, still winded and in immense pain from the ambush. “I didn’t see him coming.”

Derek raises a brow, chuckling slightly. “Yeah, pretty boy, I figured that.” His hand goes to Spencer’s hair as his expression furrows in concern again. “Did you see where he went? I’ll send the others after him while I go with you to the hospital.”

Spencer smiles a little, relieved that he won’t be alone. It’s become a strange sort of tradition to sit in one another’s hospital rooms after the job kicks their ass, and he’s glad Derek isn’t about to break it now.

“I saw him turn right out of the backdoor, but that’s all,” he says breathlessly, before cringing at the effort and folding in on himself even more.

“Okay, Spencer,” Derek says soothingly. “Just relax. The ambulance will be here any second.”

He obeys and closes his eyes as he listens to Derek call Hotch on the radio and send the team in the right direction before coming back to sit next to him on the floor.

“This might be one of the nicer places one of our unsubs has owned, huh?”

Spencer nods, mirroring Derek’s morbid amusement. “Crime pays better than investigating it,” he manages, smiling up at his friend.

He snorts. “You can say that again. With the way the market’s turned in the last couple years it’s more like this is my hobby and my properties are my day job, rather than the other way round.”

Spencer tries to reply, but he moves involuntarily in amusement, and a fresh wave of pain has him wincing again, trying to will the tears away.

“You’re alright, Spence,” Derek says gently, his hand returning to his hair. “Help will be here soon, okay?”

Thankfully, the medics do show up in a semi-timely fashion, and both of them are loaded into the back of the ambulance as the EMTs check him over, Derek’s hand not leaving his person unless it absolutely has to.

“How many times were you hit, Dr Reid?”

He cringes. “Four.” It’s almost embarrassing that the unsub got four hits in, and the only reason there weren’t more is because he was fleeing the scene, not because Spencer was able to fight back. He tries to remind himself that there isn’t much you can do when caught-off guard by a furious arsonist armed with a steel baseball bat, but his ego is still bruised. Albeit not as badly as his poor ribs.

“I’m gonna fucking kill him,” Derek mutters under his breath, his grip tightening on Spencer’s shoulder minutely enough for him to know he isn’t doing it consciously.

Spencer smiles appreciatively, closing his eyes against the pain. The non-narcotic painkillers they’re feeding him through the IV really aren’t doing anything.

“I think you’ve managed to avoid internal bleeding,” the EMT says, all though he tacks on a pointed, “just. But I’m concerned about the possibility of a punctured lung. There’s a chance your trouble breathing is solely pain-induced, but I don’t like the way your chest sounds. The doctors will check everything out when we get to the hospital, and get you all patched up.”

“Hold in there,” Derek says urgently. “I really can’t have you dying on me, pretty boy.”

Spencer smiles as comfortingly as he can through the immense pain in his chest and his mangled breathing. “Trust me, I don’t intend on it.”

The x-ray reveals two broken ribs and confirms the paramedic’s suspicions of a punctured lung, although thankfully, minor enough to not require surgery. He’s set up with oxygen and regular nurse check-ups in a quiet room after the doctor is able to remove the excess air in his chest cavity.

“How are you doing, Spence?” Derek asks worriedly as he pulls up a chair next to Spencer’s bed as soon as he’s allowed to see him.

He pulls away his oxygen facemask to answer. “A bit better,” he says, but his voice is dry and raspy from the oxygen so he certainly doesn’t sound it. “The pain meds are actually working now.”

Derek’s tight, anxious expression relaxes slightly. “That’s at least something.”

Spencer nods tiredly, but before he can respond, a nurse is popping her head round the door. “Dr. Reid,” she says genially, “sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to let you know that we’ve managed to get a hold of your emergency contact, and they’re on their way.”

Spencer’s eyes widen. How could he have forgotten? Granted, he was a little preoccupied with the whole punctured lung, broken ribs thing, but how could he have let it slip his mind that this little accident would lead to the secret he’s been keeping under wraps getting out?

When he’d first met Luke at an FBI gala last year, he never could have foreseen the most intimate and special relationship of his life coming to fruition, but it had. They’d connected on so many different levels, and the chemistry between them felt like something out of one of the fantastical romance novels Penelope reads, and when he’d asked if it was okay for Spencer to put Luke down as his updated emergency contact, he’d been rewarded with a wide, beautiful grin and a firm, heartfelt kiss.

It was serious enough, sure, and they were coming up on having been together for a year, but besides Emily and Penelope — who’d met Luke and developed an amusing, playful rivalry with him — he hadn’t introduced him to anyone on the team.

“On their way?” Derek asks, raising an eyebrow in mild confusion. “Isn’t your contact Hotch? He already knows you’re in the hospital.”

Spencer just stares at him like a rabbit caught in the headlights, completely blanking on something to say. They’re working a local case, so it won’t be long before Luke is bursting into his hospital room armed with cuddles and comfort, and as much as he craves that, he’s too busy panicking about his team finding out to really look forward to it.

Eventually, after watching Derek’s face morph into even stronger, more suspicious confusion, he gives up. They’re going to find out anyway. “I’m dating someone.”

Derek’s face lights up. “Pretty boy!” he exclaims happily, playfully pushing his shoulder as gently as he can. “That’s amazing! Why didn’t you say something? What’s her name?”

Ah. That’s the primary reason he hadn’t told his team about Luke. He’s nowhere close to being ashamed about his sexuality, he accepted himself decades ago, but he’s still not worked up the courage to share that part of himself with his team. Excluding Penelope and Emily who have been together for years (he’s still baffled as to how the others haven’t caught on yet), everyone’s in the dark.

It had started as a basic survival tactic. He’d joined the FBI two years younger than the standard entry age in the early 2000s, and he was far too concerned with just getting by than living outwardly as a gay man. And then, as time went by and he knew his team was accepting and welcoming, he found it too awkward to try and correct people when they assumed he was straight. There just wasn’t ever the right time.

“I’m gay.”

Derek’s happy expression falls and for a split second, Spencer feels a flash of panic. Maybe Derek’s okay with gay people as long as they’re not his immediate friends, as long as he doesn’t playfully call them ‘pretty boy’ and play with their hair when they’re injured, maybe—

“Well, what’s his name, then?”

Spencer looks up from his panic, seeing Derek smiling again, eyes maybe even brighter than they were just seconds ago.

“Wait—”

“Spencer, if you think I’m gonna care that you’re gay — if you think any of us will care that you’re gay, then you have another thing coming,” Derek reassures him. “Wait, that isn’t why you didn’t tell us right?”

He suddenly looks distraught at the idea that Spencer might not have felt comfortable coming out to him, and Spencer rushes to correct him. “No! No, I know everyone would be fine with it, I just didn’t really know how to say it. Penelope and Emily know, but only by accident.”

Derek relaxes, chuckling a little. “I’m sure there’s quite a story there.”

Spencer blushes. “Maybe.”

“I’ll find out later,” he says confidently, winking at him, and something in Spencer loosens at the fact that Derek hasn’t changed his behaviour at all. “But I’m more interested in Mr. Sexy Emergency Contact Mystery Boyfriend Man right now.”

Spencer outright laughs at that, before wincing painfully as his ribs twinge, and he has to fit the oxygen mask around his face again and breathe deeply for a couple of breaths before the nasal cannula can suffice again.

“I met him around this time last year at an FBI gala actually,” Spencer manages. “Everyone on our team bailed except Penelope, Emily, and me. He’s called Luke and he works in the Fugitive Task Force. We just clicked as soon as we met, you know? We have this chemistry that I’ve never felt with anyone before, and we started dating pretty quickly. We actually moved in together last month when his lease was up, but we’re thinking of moving to a bigger, nicer place in Mount Pleasant. Luke’s actually had his eye on this one house that went up…”

He trails off when he notices Derek looking at him strangely, suddenly feeling self-conscious. “What?”

“Nothing,” Derek says gently. “You just look happy, pretty boy. When you started talking about Luke you got this happy, dopey smile on your face, and I’ve just never seen you like that. It’s nice.”

“Oh.” He blushes fiercely at the acknowledgement of just how soft he is for his boyfriend, but it’s not embarrassing, he’s just ridiculously happy and head over heels in love.

Still, feeling a little awkward at the attention, he raises the oxygen mask to his face just for something to do.

“Does he treat you well?” Derek asks seriously, suddenly looking like the FBI tough guy he really is.

Spencer grins and nods, pulling the mask away again. “So good. He’s one of those people that looks out for everyone before himself, you know? He listens to my rambles and tangents like he actually knows and cares about what I’m saying, and he insists on making me every meal we’re both home for. Every day off, he brings me breakfast in bed, and he’ll even suffer through my documentaries even though his favourite thing to watch is action movies. He’s the best boyfriend I could hope for.”

“Good,” Derek says fiercely, even though he’s smiling just a little at the thought of Spencer being taken care of. “But if anything ever changes, I won’t hesitate to—”

“Spencer?” Derek’s interrupted by the door flying over, and a very harried looking Luke Alvez rushing towards the bed, seemingly not noticing the man literally threatening his death right next to him. “Oh my God, Spencer, I was so worried, I thought—”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Spencer says, voice still a little weak. Can’t he at least sound convincing when he’s trying to tell these people that he’s fine? “I’m okay, I’ll be out of here before you know it.”

“Are you sure, baby? Do I need to get the doctor? Have they been looking after you, because I swear—”

“Luke,” he laughs, interrupting his worried tangent. “I’m fine, I promise.”

He watches amusedly as Luke sags with relief. “Oh thank God,” he breathes, and it’s then that he appears to notice Derek. “Oh, shit.”

He looks to Spencer with an alarmed look in his eyes, knowing full well that he isn’t out to his team yet, but before apologies can start dripping off his lips, he rushes to fill him in.

“It’s okay. I told him.”

Luke’s face brightens in an illuminating smile, his eyes wide and happy. “You did? I’m so proud of you, cariño.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Derek says, rising from his chair to shake Luke’s hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you in the last ten minutes.”

Luke grins. “All good things, I hope.”

Derek winks teasingly at Spencer. “Oh, better than good. Spencer here seems quite gone for you.”

He blushes again, but Luke just sits on the edge of his hospital bed and takes his face in his hand. “Well, I’m just as gone for him as he is for me. Probably even more so.”

“No way,” Spencer protests as vehemently as he can with an oxygen mask glued to his face again. “I definitely love you more.”

His words are half swallowed by the mask, and half muffled by the gaggle of FBI agents pouring into his room, all talking over one another loudly.

Luke jumps off the bed and stands to attention as they all quieten down, three of them in complete shock, one of them — Emily, recognising Luke — in anticipation of what’s about to happen.

“Uh,” Spencer starts unsurely, eyes flicking between his boyfriend and his team. “Meet my boyfriend?”

There’s a brief pause before everyone jumps into action again: Emily greeting him warmly, JJ introducing herself, and Hotch and Rossi giving him firm, threatening handshakes as a warning that no harm is to come to their pseudo-son.

Spencer knows they don’t have to worry about that, though, not with Luke, and they’re quickly shown that when he takes his rightful place sat on the edge of his hospital bed again, hands smoothing his hair gently.

“Thank you,” he says to Derek, voice soft and sincere as everyone’s sat leisurely around the room, doing their own thing now they’re calmed down after the initial meet and greet, “for taking care of him. I worry about him, you know, and it’s good to see that he has so many good people looking after him.”

“We all do,” Derek replies, looking over at Spencer fondly. “We’re all incredibly overprotective. Residual effects from him joining the team so young, probably.”

“I can see that,” Luke smiles, looking over at Hotch and Rossi, who still have their eyes trained on him, despite having warmed up to him quickly.

“Well between us all,” Emily interjects diplomatically, “I think we have Spencer covered. He has a lot of good people looking out for him.”

Spencer knows they all think he’s asleep, but he can’t help but say something. “I definitely do,” he slurs tiredly, causing Luke to quickly turn his attention to him, pressing a tender kiss to his forehead as he runs his fingers through his hair with the hand not intertwined with Spencer’s. “Love you.”

“I love you too, baby,” Luke murmurs. “And so does everybody in this room.”

Smiling softly and feeling safe as anything, Spencer finally gives into the heavy pull of tiredness, and lets himself drift off to sleep.

I'm such a sucker for coming out fics omg, I hope you didn't mind that element! But God, I've missed writing Ralvez fics. If anyone has any Ralvez prompts then please send them my way because I want to write them so badly but I really find it hard to find plot for them! <3

taglist: @criminalmindsvibez @suburban--gothic @strippersenseii @takeyourleap-of-faith @makaylajadewrites @iamrenstark @hotchseyebrows @reidology @spencerspecifics @tobias-hankel @goobzoop @marsjareau @garcias-bitch @oliverbrnch @im-autistic @anxious-enby @kuolonsyoja @ropoto

[jlalafics]

Sneak Peek: "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me"

I'm about 75% done with this fic and will be dividing it by three parts but posting them all at once.

Also, isn't this a bombass story cover by @mrspeetamellark? Thanks for your talents.

Summary: The plan was to kill the target. Not fall in love with her. Rated E.

-----

Rule # 1: Never tell them your real name.

Why the fuck did he tell her his real name?!

Inwardly, Peeta berated himself while marveling at the softness of her skin. His thumb moved along her flesh, and he stamped down the rush of hunger threatening to bubble over.

In the two weeks that he followed her, Peeta learned a few things.

Katniss Everdeen ate the same breakfast—cereal. He hated cereal, most of them tasted like sugared cardboard. What she really needed was protein and the thought of cooking her one of his omelets was quickly extinguished from his head.

Peeta mused over these observations as he watched her from the roof of the building next to her own. From there, he could see her comings and goings. The landlord didn’t ask questions when he rented one of the dusty apartments, his beady eyes focused only on the cash that Peeta held out to him.

She went to the Farmer’s Market on Thursdays and avoided the asparagus or tomatoes booths. She liked artichokes and squash but balked at the eggplants and bean sprouts. Peeta couldn’t help but smile seeing her look of disgust at the aubergine; he wasn’t a fan of them either.

Katniss danced around her apartment sometimes. He couldn’t hear the music but was almost desperate to hear what made her sway those full hips of hers.

She had nightmares.

During his watch, Katniss occasionally napped and sometimes she awoke with tears in her eyes. Then, the tears would morph into full-on sobs and Peeta watched helplessly as she buried her face in her hands.

Now, however, she was right in front of him—lovely and real as could be.

And she had the ability to wreck him in just one look.

“Looks like we both have odd names,” Katniss quipped. “Imagine our children’s names—” She stopped, eyes widening and face going scarlet. “I didn’t mean to imply that we would be having kids—”

Peeta held up his hand. “It’s fine. In fact, we’re both in agreement that we’ll keep the names of any future offspring simple.”

[thefirsttree]

A personal update + my next game

OK, time to do this. I’ve been meaning to do a big DAVID WEHLE™ update for a while now and explain why I haven’t released a new game yet, but you know how life gets in the way. Especially when life is a quarantine hellscape, you have three beautiful, amazing, exhausting kids to raise, a spouse’s job you support, a viral YouTube channel that turns your brain to mush, a thousand emails waiting in your inbox since your game is free on the Epic Games Store (with an impressive number of redemptions too! … meaning lots of emails and customer support issues), etc., etc. What also contributes to my lack of updates is because… I just don’t really like posting online. Fascinating correlation, I know!

Don’t worry, this isn’t going to be a venting/ranting blog post (well, maybe a bit), because my life is seriously AMAZING and INSANELY BLESSED and LUCKY. I can’t believe how many dreams keep coming true, so much so that I feel I don’t deserve it and I really pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes… but I did want to at least be honest, because I owe that to myself.

Wow, where do I even begin? Well, how about we start with the reason I’m even a full-time indie game dev now: The First Tree. This small hobby project I worked on at night morphed into this gargantuan beast (or fox) that took over my life the past 5 years. Which is great! I’m living the dream! And yet, I really didn’t expect it to do as well as it did. At its core, my game is a slow-paced, sad walking simulator (ahem, I prefer the term “exploration game,” but you know what I mean) that somehow seemed to launch at the right time to the right audience. It resonated deeply with some of you, and for that I’m eternally grateful. I still get emails almost daily how my game changed their lives in some formative way. I’m beyond honored.

However, with that spotlight came criticism and demands from the ever-present, insatiable internet. I would randomly be surfing the gamedev subreddit trying to decompress, and I would see a comment by some rando saying how much I didn’t deserve my success, and how it was all one huge lucky fluke. And I believed them!

And to add to it, some devs considered me an indie marketing “guru”, which I was uncomfortable with. I worked hard to market my game every week, and after my GDC talk, people assumed marketing was my passion; the reason I got up every morning. Just to clarify… NO, I don’t like marketing, and I hate being the center of attention. I don’t like asking people for money and wishlists. But I did what was necessary because I was passionate about telling stories, and I wanted to give my story a fighting chance to be seen on the crowded pages of Steam.

So now, you’re probably wondering “well then David, why did you make fancy YouTube videos showing off your success? Not very modest if you ask me.” This honestly could be a long blog post all on its own, because my experience of putting myself in the spotlight and becoming a “content creator” is… complicated. It was an unusual step for me, especially since I never even showed my face online (as a game developer) until my GDC talk.

First off, I always wanted to teach and start a YouTube channel. I love video editing, especially since I’ve been doing it longer than making games! It’s a huge passion of mine. And teaching people who didn’t know they could make and finish games was a huge motivator (and it’s been so rewarding already). But the second reason is, I was scared. I was self-employed, and I was riding the success of a “huge lucky fluke” that would probably not happen again. I wanted to make sure I could provide for my amazing family, and give them food and health insurance and security in these tumultuous times. I was turning my lifelong passions and hobbies into a business, and it wasn’t as simple of a mental transition as I thought.

So, I went all in on YouTube and the accompanying online course called Game Dev Unlocked. I spent years editing the scripts and videos, and polishing them to a shine. At first, no one watched my videos, no one was buying… and in the blink of an eye, the YouTube algorithm picked up my main autobiographical video (“How Making Indie Games Changed My Life”), and I started getting 5,000 subscribers a day. Right now, I’m at 150,000 subs, which is still hard for me to believe. I always had a dream of earning 100k subs on YouTube, so I was pretty happy with the whole thing. Sales were OK, but mostly people didn’t want to buy the course. Then the emails came in…

Something you should know about me: I am a textbook “people pleaser,” and if someone asks for my help, I take it very seriously. If someone is mad at me, even if I didn’t do anything wrong, it’s all I can think about, and it ruins my day. So, taking an onslaught of people begging for help and multiplying that by an impossible amount of people for my brain to truly comprehend thanks to the internet… and let’s just say it wasn’t a healthy mix.

I received thousands of emails from people who were begging me for some kind of reassurance that everything would be OK. That their dreams would come true too. And I wanted to help every single one of them. I went from a nobody working on a game for fun to becoming a spokesperson for the indie game dream. I couldn’t even get a shake from the Chick-Fil-A drive-thru without someone recognizing me and asking for game dev advice. And it didn’t stop there… I would get emails from suicidal kids asking for help, teenagers from Afghanistan asking me to get them out of their country, and on one occasion I received an email from a hopeful game developer in a war-torn country who had just experienced a bomb blowing up their neighboring village. His friends were dead, and he was hoping he could finish a game before he died too, and he needed my help. How do you say no to something like that? Didn’t I owe it to everyone because I was lucky with my hit game and I needed to “pay it forward”? (Something people constantly reminded me of)

And then to top it off, after you’ve given everything you’ve got to other people in need… you get hate mail in your inbox. You spend the whole day serving your children and strangers on the internet, then when the kids are finally asleep, you hit the bed to relax and take a look at your phone to decompress, and you randomly come across an angry gamer in your Twitter mentions telling you your game they got for free sucks, and that you took away a potentially great game from them and that your apology isn’t good enough.

Long story short, I went to a mental therapist for the first time in my life. I was broken trying to care for two toddlers and a new baby in a pandemic (which is very, very hard), taking care of my course students who gave me their hard-earned money and demanded results, and the countless people begging for help on the internet. I was this introverted, internet-lurker trying to take on the weight of the world. I was so tired and hurt that no one cared about me and my needs… only what I could do for them.

Quitting my day job and making this hobby my full-time job has stirred up… mixed emotions. This statement may disturb some of you, but I was definitely 100% happier when I had a full-time job and I was working on my game at night. I missed working with the amazing team at The VOID, working on Star Wars… back when the success of my game was this abstract thing I could only daydream about. Mostly, I was making my game for me with no outside expectations to pay the bills or satisfy the ever-demanding internet, and that brought me a lot of joy.

It’s not all doom and gloom though! I’m actually very happy now and in the best shape I’ve been since the pandemic started. I’ve had to confront my weaknesses and personality quirks, but I’m a better person for it (and I’m sure these issues would’ve come out eventually). I hired an awesome community manager for Game Dev Unlocked who is helping SO MUCH with the emails, I can’t even tell you the mental burden it alleviates. I even leased a co-working office to help separate work from my home, and that’s been a huge help too. I’ve decided to work with my old friends from The VOID on a cool, new VR experience. It will take me away from my projects a bit, but I’m ecstatic to work with a great team again (and not manage anything, whew).

These are all things I would’ve never guessed I needed, because I thought I knew myself pretty well… turns out I didn’t.

The reality is: running a business is HARD. Running it solo is even harder. You have to remember, I was burnt out on The First Tree well into the Steam release in 2017, but I kept working on it for 4 more years due to my fears of failing again and not earning enough money for my family.

So, I was wrestling with the age-old concept of commercialism and art. There was this dichotomy of doing whatever I wanted and being true to my vision (what most people assume the indie dev dream is like), and doing only what customers wanted to buy. This is something that has killed me with YouTube… in one specific instance, I was super excited to make the exact video I wanted to make. I loved every part of its creation, and I thought it had a message that would inspire everyone. I lovingly edited it over several weeks, posted it, and excitedly waited for the stats… and it was by far my worst performing video.

This is not a new problem. Even the Sistine Chapel by Michelangelo was a commission forced upon him by the very violent Pope Julius II. My wife and I regularly talk about the fine balance between artistic integrity and commercialism, a problem she is very familiar with as an artist who constantly needs to balance what she wants to make with what the customer wants to hang up in their home.

For The First Tree, I was lucky. It was pretty much what I wanted to make (I had to compromise a lot of things of course), and it turned out millions of people wanted it too. Recently, I thought the safe business decision would be to do it all over again, so I started work on a spiritual successor to The First Tree (an idea that I may revisit one day since I do love the story idea). But that isn’t happening anytime soon. Trust me when I say I am now currently burnt out on animal exploration games.

So that realization left me with a question: what do I do next?

I’ve decided I need to make a game that I want to make, for me. It will be a bit different and I’m almost certain most fans of The First Tree will not love it… but it’s an idea that gets me super excited. It’s an idea that could help me fall in love with game development again.

A few more details: this game will be story-driven, first-person, and will use the Unreal Engine. That means development is gonna be slow going, because I have to learn a whole new tool. The “smart business” decision would be to make something quickly in Unity which I’m already familiar with… but I want to do this for me, and UE5 looks like a lot of fun. I’m also shooting for an early-ish release date so I avoid burn out and I keep the game short: I want to release it in Fall 2022, but knowing game development, it will probably take longer.

With the help of my therapist, I’ve also concluded that I’ve been too accessible on the internet and that my self-worth isn’t determined by the amount of people I try to help online. Of course, I love helping people and seeing them succeed, but I need to step back and focus on my family and myself. I will delete my social media apps on my phone (I will still post big updates occasionally) and stop responding to most emails, tweets, DMs, etc. It’s not that I’m ungrateful… in fact, if I don’t say thank you or at least acknowledge the incredibly nice people who share a sweet message about my game or want to tell me how I inspire them (still hard for me to believe, lol), I feel a ton of guilt… but I need to let that go. Please know I’m extremely grateful to all the fans who follow my work, so even if I don’t thank you directly, I truly mean it: thank you.

I will still post and stream occasionally on YouTube when I want to (and I still do live Q&A’s for my GDU students). The online course sales will help support my family as I work on a potentially risky game idea (and my new job will help alleviate the risk too). I’m gonna try one more marketing experiment and sell a mini-course soon (and add an Unreal section), and after that I’m done working on it. A gigantic thank you to the people who bought my course and are part of the amazing community, it has helped me and my family tremendously, and it’s inspiring seeing the games you make!

I’m a bit worried about the whole thing since this new game idea could flop, which could definitely affect my family. But a sappy, high-school yearbook quote is coming to mind…  I think it applies here: “A ship in harbor is safe—but that is not what ships are built for.”

Thanks for reading,

David

[bostonscribbles]

How to write your first novel — My experience.

There’s no doubt that writing a story is a dream to many people, and I am lucky to be one of them. This year I have finished writing my first Sci-Fi and thriller novel The Juncture, and that took me nearly a year to do so. The experience wasn’t easy, but it was enjoyable. I came across obstacles and encountered many questions, but I learned a lot along the way and I have seen the fruits of my labour.

In this blog, I’m going to walk you through the things I learned, and the things you should do to make the best story you possibly can.

1. Chill, dude!

Believe in yourself. I know this will sound cliché, and you might’ve seen it everywhere across the internet when you’re about to do anything, but trust me, it really works! Really, that’s what it takes: patience and confidence, as they give you more reason to push it across the finish line.

2. Decide your plot’s idea

This is too obvious, yet it is really worth talking about. When you are writing a novel, the plot is the most important thing. Your story needs to have a compelling plot with a logical course of events. Many of you reading this blog probably have no idea what to write about, yet you want to make a rocking story that you’re proud of. If that’s the case, there are few things you can do to come up with a plot.

Get inspired by the things you see and love

I’m positive that you came across a lot of stories that inspired you, whether it was a movie, a book, a game or even a real-life story. If so, you can use that to generate ideas for your novel, by taking the things you love about those stories and make your own out of them. That said, this isn’t to say you should copy those works, but rather, take some concepts here and there, add your own characters and ideas and morph it into something completely new, something that defines you. In my case, my inspiration was a game called Metal Gear Solid, an anime called Steins;Gate, and Hollywood-style movies.

Keep it simple

I know how frustrating it is when you’re looking on a blank page, having no idea what your final result will look like, but there’s actually an easy solution for this problem, which is called simplicity. When you’re about to write something, you should avoid complications. Why? Because beginnings tend to be harder. Instead you can start with a simple premise, and when you feel like you’re getting into the flow, you can expand upon it. There’s a common acronym which I really like, I came across it when I was learning web development. The acronym is KISS (Keep it simple, stupid). Whenever you’re thinking about making your story, remember that, it’s really helpful.

Think about your goal

Ultimately, you have to think about what your novel wants to achieve, and I think the best way to do it is at the beginning. This will allow you to have a clear image of what you want your final result will look like. It will also allow you to structure your story the way you want it to be.

3. Determine your genre

I don’t mean to insult your intelligence, and I’m sorry if this sounds ridiculously obvious, but deciding your genre beforehand will save you a lot of effort you might encounter later. This will also help you with setting the theme and mood of your story, help you with structuring your story correctly, and help you to limit your writing for specific people, your target readership, which will later come into play with marketing your book.

4. Build the setting

The setting is a narrative that answers the following questions: When did the story happen? And where? Whether you decide to make your setting real or imaginary, there are some steps and tips I followed while I was building mine:

Answer the third and fourth W’s

Your first job is to answer the question “When and where?”, in this step you set the time and place of your plot, and relate them in a way that makes sense to affect the events and the characters. For inspiration, you can use the internet to research places (like google street-view), or you can read other literary works with settings close to what you want to do.

Set up the mood of Your story

The mood of your story plays a crucial part in building the setting, once you do it, it should be easier for you to deliver the feeling you want with your story.

A gloomy dark night in the middle of nowhere emits a different vibe than a rainy winter day in a beautiful, warm house.

Think about the context

After you decide the time, space, and mood of your story, you have to bring them all into context. You can do this by making your setting multi-dimensional thus focusing on the details, like demographics, beliefs, social issues, etc. In other words you have to bring your setting to life and make it relevant to your plot.

5. Pick your POV

Choosing the point of view of your story can be tricky sometimes, and the reason is that it’s tied to multiple factors, which can make the experience that you provide the reader with either exceptional or annoying.

The POV, by definition, is the perspective of which the narrator is telling the story. And fortunately, you have multiple choices to pick from, for instance:

First person

In first person, everything we experience comes from the character’s “eyes” and perspective. Personally, I enjoy reading in this POV, because it allows us to access the character’s thoughts and feelings all the time, and also creates some sort of attachment to the character. The pronoun used in this POV is usually “I”.

Second person

This is when the writer is trying to drag the reader into his story, and make him feel like he is part of the events. This one is uncommon in writing novels and is pretty hard to execute. However, it creates an exceptional and outstanding reading experience if done correctly. The pronoun used in this POV is “You”.

Third person limited

In third person limited, the author reveals the main character’s thoughts, feelings and motives exclusively. In this case, the reader is limited to the character’s viewpoint. The pronouns used in this POV are “He/She” and “They”.

Third person omniscient

It’s when the author has a complete control over everything related to the story, in this case, the reader is exposed to all the details that occur in the narrative’s universe. The pronouns used are the same as the third person limited.

So, I did my best to summarise POV, but there’s a lot to learn about them. I suggest you do more research before you choose what to include in your story, because this is one of the deciding factors between a good reading experience and a bad one.

Before we wrap up the POV thing, the tips I could give you is to look up that will help you narrow your choices is to see common POVs in your genre, and think about your readership, I also recommend you play around with different POVs, to choose the ones you’re comfortable with.

6. Plotter, Pantser, Plantser

There are three types of writers, and you need to figure out your type.

Plotter

This is the disciplined kind of writer, the one that likes to outline every single detail before writing their novels, planning is their top priority.

Pantser

The pantser is that one writer that likes to fly by the seat of their pants. They don’t like to spend their time reading about different methods and structures. Instead, they like to write without any outline. This type refuses to be restricted and values freedom.

Plantser

A hybrid, this type outlines only the big moments, and they leave the rest to their flow.

After you figure out which one you are, it’s time to learn about narrative structure.

7. Structure your plot

Let’s talk about story structure. Before we delve into it, there are plenty of structures, and each one of them is used depending on the the story. Although there is that one structure that’s really simple and helpful, which every fiction writer needs to know. It’s German novelist Gustav Freytag’s pyramid of dramatic plot structure.

Introduction/exposition

This is where your job is to shed the light on your characters, setting, and the overall conflict. In this part you give you reader a sense of awareness of where your story is going, and the challenges your character is going to go through.

The rising action

Now you need to introduce your main conflict and how the character is going through the challenges and obstacles in his way. In this part, the reader develops excitement as tensity gets higher.

The climax/turning point

Usually occurring in the middle of the story, this part sets the flow of the story in another stream. All parts of your story are equally important, but you would do to better give this part deep attention, as it drives the curiosity and excitement of the reader.

The falling action

In this phase, the conflict starts to get resolved and the tension starts to dissipate. Here, you set the fate of the protagonist, whether he reaches his motives or he fails. At this point, you should start thinking of an ending to your story, as I believe this part is the most sensitive, and your job as the author is to tie all the loose ends and fix any possible plot hole. This phase indicates the climax’s ending.

Resolution/Denouement

Often called the conclusion, this part is where I congratulate you for finishing your story. After you solve the challenges of your story, you have to decide how to conclude it, whether it ends happily, badly, or is left as an open ending. Whatever you do, the ending should be satisfying, and make sure not to make the reader feel like he wasted his time reading your story.

That was all about Freytag’s story structure, but there are more structures, namely: Three-Act Structure, The Hero’s Journey Archetype, and The Snowflake Method. Make sure to do more research and decide which one is most suitable for your story.

8. Unleash your reader’s imagination

When you’re writing your first novel and you want people to like it, you have to make it really enjoyable, because you are competing with other forms of entertainment like gaming, TV, movies, and even social media. So, to get your reader really invested in your book, you have to create a unique experience, and you have to get him into your mind. But the question is, how do you do that?

I believe the only way to do that is to create and describe the events of your story in a way that absorbs your reader into them, something that makes him feel like he is part of the story. To do that, you have to make him unleash his imagination, and be aware of the challenges laid in front of him. By doing this, you will create an exceptional experience and your reader will love it.

9. Be an Outlaw

Woah, there! Hold on, the meaning is not exactly what you think. I’m not saying you should break all writing rules, I’m only saying that you shouldn’t follow them blindly. Add your creative touch, be unique, and feel free to experiment. I had to break some rules to make my own novel, and I think that’s totally fine, but you should know which rules to break. At the end of the day, your story should be compelling and your novel should be free of grammatical mistakes.

Final Words

These were some rules and tips I learned and followed while I was writing my first novel. However, keep in mind that they’re not bulletproof, and you’ll encounter some (maybe a lot of) setbacks along the way, but that’s why writing is as fun as it is.

Following these guidelines, I was able to write my first novel, whose summary is written below:

Blinded by glory, American scientist Dr Scott steals his supervising professor’s research to develop the means to travel through time and have his name engraved in history alongside the world’s greatest scientists. Soon, his project is completed, but there is no time to celebrate. His actions trigger a series of events that ends with him fleeing his home after being hunted by an army of genetically modified soldiers, only to be rescued by a group of mysterious people who claim to be from the year 2047. Consumed by guilt, Dr Scott is taken back where it all began, 1988 Moscow, on a one-shot mission to undo his crimes and prevent a dystopian future.

Happy writing!

[lin-nin]

Tribulation & Tenderness - Chapter 6

Ship: Main Technoblade x Reader, some Dream x Reader

Plot: You're a princess in a Kingdom suffering a years long famine. In a desperate attempt to help your people, you accept one simple offer: Marriage to the crown prince of a neighboring kingdom. Anything to help your people survive. Surely it can't be too bad, can it?

Chapter List: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Disclaimer:   Cross-posted on Wattpad (discontinued) and Ao3. This is based off of everyone's CHARACTERS. I do not write fanfic based off the actual people.

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Chapter 6: Farewell Gifts

< | Previous Chapter

The morning sun had begun filling your room, sneaking through parted curtains to cover everything in a warm glow. You had been reluctant to stir, a sense of melancholy hanging around you. You knew exactly why that was. You would be leaving tomorrow morning. There was good and bad to it, you supposed. You were introduced to a taste of freedom and new possibilities that came with this marriage. Yet it still meant saying goodbye to everything you knew here.

You slowly turned over in your bed, moving out of it. Might as well start the day, though. Moping wouldn’t get too much accomplished. You padded over towards the window, peering out of it for a few moments. The sun covered the land beyond the castle in a pleasant glow. Nature carried on like nothing was going to happen, and you couldn’t help but huff. You needed to as well. Even as you looked to the horizon, wondering what it held for you. Hopefully a decent life.

You hardly thought too much as you grabbed a dress, sliding it over your body. You didn’t even know what today held for you, either. You would find out after breakfast, though. That’s usually how things went for you. Taking each day as it came. You slid on your shoes, fastening them tightly. Take today one step at a time. Tomorrow would come when it came. 

The door to your room creaked quietly as you opened it, being careful to shut it softly. It clicked as it slid into pace, and you rubbed your face. Food would undoubtedly help you get in a better mood. Having your mind busy while you were on an empty stomach was hardly a good idea.

“Good, you’re awake. We’ve got a busy day ahead of us,” A voice called out. You jumped, a startled yelp escaping your lips. You covered your mouth as you sought out the voice, glaring at the owner. Dream was lounging against a wall across from you, and you reached out to shove at him playfully.

“Are you trying to make my soul leave my body?!” A laugh escaped him, though it felt almost tense. Was he still bothered by dinner last night? You didn’t care to mess with it, though. He’d likely get over himself. He usually did.

“Maybe I am. Do I get to keep you here if I do?” He mused as they walked, heading towards the dining hall once again. Like it was a normal morning. You truly wished it was, honestly. Nonetheless, you sighed, head shaking.

“You know I can’t stay, Dream. As much as you want me to. This is a matter bigger than you or I. Besides! I think it’ll be good for me, don’t you think?” You beamed over at him. It seemed like it would do you good, truthfully. It was presenting you with at least one option you had never been offered here: Training. The opportunity to fight and defend yourself. You deserved that much at least, right?

“I think it’ll be dangerous. They’ve never had a good reputation, how do I know you’ll be safe?” He threw back in rebuttal, making you sigh heavily. Always fretted over your wellbeing.

“Techno said it’s not that bad, I have no reason to not believe him.” You settled into your normal spot at the table. Breakfast was much simpler than dinner. The food was already set out, waiting to be eaten. You didn’t waste time, reaching for a few various dishes to eat.

“I beg to differ,” Dream murmured as he also sat, grabbing stuff to eat as well. You rolled your eyes, not in the mood for whatever was with him. He just didn’t like Techno, for whatever reason. Always so protective of you. Though it was reassuring in a weird way.

“Whatever you say. What have you got planned for me today?” You queried instead, eager to change the subject away from your fiancé. You really didn’t want to deal with whatever problem there was with that subject.

“Going out to the markets in town. Make sure there isn’t anything that you need before leaving. Let the people in the capital see you one last time. It’ll probably eat most of your day, though,” He said. That was fine. It sounded like a good plan. You could do with a few things from the market. A few things to remind you of home.

You nodded for a couple of heartbeats, finishing the mouthful of food in your mouth before speaking. “That sounds fine to me. I wouldn’t mind picking up a couple of things to bring along. Oh! Techno! Good morning.” The pink-haired prince had walked into the dining hall when you were speaking to Dream. He settled across from you, glancing briefly to Dream before you.

“Good morning,” he finally returned, causing you to smile. Dream practically brooded beside you as your attention shifted away from him. You just elected to ignore it for the time being. He’d probably be just fine once the both of you were in the market. You were allowed to exchange some words with Techno before heading out for the day, at least.

“Did you sleep well?” You asked, reaching for your cup with a contented hum. He nodded in response, gaze moving to Dream. You warily eyed the pair of them, trying to read whatever silent stand off they seemed to be having. Was it over the whole training thing? Either way, it was ridiculous and you did not want to deal with whatever tension was between them.

Clearing your throat, you attempted conversation once more with a soft, “Did you finish your books?” Techno’s gaze quickly pivoted back to you, seeming to forget about Dream for a few minutes. Good. 

“Most of them. I couldn’t finish the last one before I needed to sleep,” He replied. You nodded in acknowledgment. That was impressive, though. It did make you wonder how much he slept. Not like you could tell. Not with that mask on his face.

“Well, you can finish that one today. Dream and I are going out to the market to pick up some things before I leave. I’ll probably spend time with my family after dinner,” You explained. You wiped at your hands, turning to look at Dream and offering him a smile. 

“We’ll have plenty of time to talk starting tomorrow,” Techno mused. There was something almost smug in his voice, and you could hear Dream huff beside you. What the hell had happened with them? You weren’t given much time to ponder, as Dream stood up and held a hand towards you.

“Ready?” He asked, and you nodded slightly. You eyed his hand for a few moments, debating on if you should take it. You ultimately did, allowing him to pull you up. You waved towards Techno, offering him a smile. Even as you were nearly hauled away by Dream, you could hear that huff of his that signified laughter. He met your wave with a shake of his head, returning the action all the same.

You were content, despite how quickly Dream was walking. The interactions with Techno were pleasant, and increasingly less awkward. You caught up with Dream, letting go of his hand as you did. “Alright, do you have any specific plans on where to visit?” You questioned, forcing him to slow down.

“Not exactly. I figure we can just walk through the market, see what catches your eye,” He mumbled. You nodded along, finding it fair enough. You didn’t entirely know what you were looking for. So, for that reason, browsing around didn't seem too bad of an idea.

The walk wasn't too long. Slowly the calm path towards the castle morphed into busy streets, teeming with life. The heart of the capital was alive with noise, vendors in their stalls calling to people in the streets. The smell of various foods wafted in the air around you as you walked, a certain type of happiness settling in your chest. It was easy to forget the melancholy that hung around the castle while you were here.

It wasn't too long of wandering before you were noticed. Vendors would excitedly call to you, trying to get you to buy some of their wares. You did always look, complimenting whatever they were selling half the time. From one stand, you purchased a trinket box, the metal heavy in your hands. The sun caught onto the ornate lid, causing the jewels set into it to sparkle. The sides were less flashy, but still well made, with roses carved into the side. It spoke to you, practically, reminding you warmly of the kingdom you were going to leave.

As you continued your trek, an older voice called to you with urgency, a soft, "Princess! Come, come!" An older man beckoned to you, age wearing down his face and hands. You didn't even need to think twice, walking towards him with Dream in tow. The man behind you was busying himself with a stuffed bun he had bought, seemingly content to just follow you. The old man smiled as you walked over, looking down to his wares.

Knives and daggers covered the majority of the surface, though there was an occasional sword or bundle of arrows. The handles had intricate designs carved into the leather, though the blades were no less sharp or decorated. "I hear you're going on a dangerous journey soon," The man's voice interrupted you. You moved your attention to his face, meeting his gaze calmly.

"It's really not as dangerous as everyone is making it seem," You explained, offering a smile. The man just laughed, shaking his head at you.

"Off, alone, with a man too afraid to show his face and hides behind the face of a beast. If he is comfortable wearing the face of a beast, surely he is one himself." There was an edge to his voice and you could only sigh. Gossip from servants traveled fast, and it seemed stories of Techno's appearance had already reached the capital. You didn't care too much, though his words were minutely unsettling.

"You need to protect yourself from him. I have the perfect thing for you- free of charge. We can't have you getting hurt in enemy territory." He explained, rustling around to pick up one of the daggers. You were tempted to protest the price, surely not wanting to take from him. It wasn't right. Even if he did offer. Yet you could tell he wouldn't accept a single coin you gave him.

He presented the dagger to you for inspection, which you did humor. It was a pretty dagger, a dark leather grip with flowers sitting amongst vines of thorns. The cross guard was simple, curved, with a flower sitting in the middle of either side. The pommel similarly matched, while the thorned vines crawled down onto the design in the metal. It felt perfect in your hands, and you could have sworn the man had made it just for you.

You looked up to him, his dark eyes twinkling with something you couldn't place. "It's beautiful, thank you," You murmured your thanks. Any thought of rejecting it had left you the moment the leather fell to your hand. He seemed delighted by this, reaching to take it back to put it in a sheath. The sheath was put into a belt before being handed off to you.

"Keep yourself safe, little one," he told you. You nodded, fingers running along the leathed of the belt. You didn't really wear belts, so it felt almost foreign in your grip.

"Here," Dream interrupted, picking up the belt. He didn't waste time in fastening it around your waist, the dagger comfortably sitting against your hip. It was positioned so that your dominant hand could grab the dagger easily, should you need it.

"I thought you didn't want me to have weapons," You grumbled. Dream was silent as he resumed his earlier position, walking with you once more. With each step, the dagger hit your hip. It was a foreign feeling, but not an unwelcome one. 

"I don't, but I don't trust Technoblade. A dagger is straightforward enough to use. Even you can't fuck it up." He sounded bitter at the mention of Techno, but seemed to divert it to light hearted teasing. You huffed, rolling your eyes.

"Maybe I'll try it on you first." You shoved him with your shoulder, unable to hide your laugh at his affronted gasp.

"You wouldn’t!" His exclamation was followed by a laugh, and you couldn’t help but smile. He was one of the things you would miss.

The sun climbed even higher into the sky as the pair of you walked, with you buying a few trinkets. You bought a few pieces of jewelry from various vendors, too fond of their work to part with it. Who knew when you would be given the chance to visit this market again. You and Dream had stopped by a small bakery to eat lunch, listening to the tales around you and watching the streets.

It was only when the sun was falling, and the daytime vendors began to pack up, that you started your way back. Dinner time would be soon. As the streets emptied, the activity dwindling down, you felt the melancholy creep back over you once more.

"I got you something," Dream finally interrupted, causing you to look up at him. Your eyebrows knitted for a moment, trying to remember when he had snuck off to get it. Or maybe he had brought it with him.

"You did?" You asked, pausing in the street.

"I got it earlier this week, but today seemed a good time to give it to you," He explained, rustling around for a few moments. He grasped a small bag, pulling it out and untying it. He didn't look directly at you as he pulled out the piece inside, instead focused solely on it.

It was a necklace- a very extravagant one at that. You don't think you'd ever had one like it. Multiple strands of beads connected three large jewels together, with charms comprised of smaller jewels in the shape of roses dangling from it intermittently. The light caught the yellow jewels, though red tinged the outside of them. It was always roses, wasn't it? It always had been.

In the very middle sat a metal plate, carved with the image of a picked rose with its thorns clipped. It was pretty. You couldn’t even imagine how much it cost. "Thank you, Dream. You didn’t have to get me something like this," You had started. He huffed in response, moving behind you to drape it around your neck.

"I know, but I wanted to. I hope whenever you wear it you think of me," he mumbled as he fastened it, the comfortable weight settling against your neck. You touched it, smiling softly.

"I will, Dream. Don't make me cry, though. There's too much left to do today." You knew you would be a mess by the end of the night. After all, this was your family you were leaving. It was going to sting just a little.

The walk back to the castle was relatively silent. Dream was thinking about something, but you didn't press. You weren't sure you could handle it right now. Once you had returned and eaten dinner, it was time to spend time with your family. Which, truthfully, you were glad to. Dream didn't protest on going home, though he did send a final accusatory glance at Techno as he left.

The prince didn't linger after dinner, simply bidding you a good night as he went to retire to his own rooms. You were fine with that, though. It let you put your whole concentration on your family as the four of you sat in one of the rooms. You all spoke fondly of everything you could think of. All of you were almost reluctant to say goodnight.

"I can't believe my baby is leaving tomorrow," Your mom finally broached the topic. You offered a sad smile, moving to hug her.

"I'll always write to you," you whispered, face nestled into her neck. She didn't say anything for a long while, just holding you there. You didn't complain, letting her do so. As she pulled back after she seemed ready, she reached for the blanket that had been sat in her lap.

"This was my great grandmother's, and has been passed down to the eldest daughter of everyone in our family. It's your turn to take it," She murmured, handing it to you. The weave was heavy, the red fabric carefully twined with golden accents. You could tell it was old, but you were extremely glad to have it.

"Thank you, I'll cherish it. Should I have any daughters, I'll give it to them as well." It was unknown if you would have children. It depended on how the marriage required itself to be upheld. Your gaze turned to your dad next.

"You always were getting into trouble and going on adventures. Don't get into too much trouble over there, okay?" He murmured affectionately, offering you a hug. This one wasn't nearly as long as your mother's, but that was fine. He wasn't as attached as your mother, nor as affectionate, so the hug meant the world to you.

You had nodded, not trusting your words right now. This was the worst part. Leaving. The goodbyes. Even harder was turning to George, who stared at you with an almost sad smile. "I'm going to miss you. Who else am I going to walk through the gardens with now?" He asked, causing you to give a watery laugh. You imagined he would make do.

"You always did love the gardens, so here's a piece of home. Only some light reading." He extended a hand, holding a thick book out to you. The leather cover was embossed with various flowers, and you smiled. It was a flower guide. Flowers were important to your kingdom, and though you were fond of them you never bothered to learn them. Now it was time, you supposed.

"I'll miss you, George. Try not to have too much fun without me," Your voice cracked as you spoke. He nodded, arms curling tightly around you within seconds. You sniffled, hiding against his shoulder and clinging to him. His hugs were always the best, not having them readily available to you would hurt. You didn't like it.

"Just promise me you'll write and take care of yourself." You could only nod as his voice reverberated through you. You didn't want to let go, but the seconds bled into minutes and sleep was calling you. Even as reluctant as you were, you did let go.

"I'll write to everyone. As often as I can," You said. You choked a little, refusing to say goodbye. Even as you walked with George to your room, you couldn't bring yourself to say the word. Maybe tomorrow would be better. Next Chapter | >

[sidespart]

The Fall of King Romulus Chapter 7

Summary: Twin Princes Remus and Romulus are cursed at birth with Honesty and Obedience. When Romulus, who cannot disobey any order, is told to kill his brother the next time he lays eyes on him, he changes his name to Roman and runs away. Roman joins up with a misfit group of adventures and plans to never return to his homeland. But the fae have other plans for him…

Warnings (for whole fic not necessarily individual chapters): Violence, mind whammying/memory altering, curse of obedience related consent issues, references to sex, references to war related injuries/PTSD, references to child abuse/neglect (YMMV on that one but just in case), antagonstic-but-not-exactly villian!Janus, Extremly-moraly-dubious-but-not-exacty-unsympathetic-Remus

Feedback appreciated.

NOW ON AO3 :D

Prologue Chapter 1   Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6

The grey man was dead.

The grey man looked like he had been dead for some time.

What little skin he had remaining hung loosely from the bone. The eye sockets were empty, the patches of remaining hair were stringy and dirty. The skull had caved in around the crossbow bolt, revealing an awful wriggling mass of maggots on the inside. The stench of rotting flesh, which Roman had only been able to smell up close before, now filed the room, making him gag.

Roman squeezed his eyes shut, wishing desperately for whatever glamour had made it so hard to see the details of the grey man’s face to return. He griped Mittens’ soft fur tightly with his good hand, earning him a disgruntled meow.

“What the fuck.” A voice muttered.

Unseen by Roman, a figure emerged from the doorway. One with skin bleached white under the lamp light and eyes that seemed to glow an unnatural shade of violet. Most of him was hidden under a dark cloak, save for the fearsome looking crossbow he held at his hip.

Had there been anyone left to see, Virgil would no doubt have made an intimidating sight. At least until he reached out one foot to poke at the grey man's body and recoiled with an undignified ‘eeeeeew!’ when the flesh gave way easily under the pressure.

Virgil had served more years then he cared to remember in the Finaley’ed army. He had seen many dead bodies. That did not make it any better to hear one squelch.

“Okay.” He called, “Okay, the coast is clear and I shot a dead guy.”

Roman heard a second pair of footsteps approaching before a new voice asked: “Did you retrieve the bolt?”

“The bolt that is covered in maggots? No. No I did not.”

“That’s a waste of resources.”

“That is not my main problem with the corpse in the basement Loga- no don’t touch it!”

“This looks like several months of decay- but there’s no surrounding detritus – do you think they moved it here? For what purpose?”

“I don’t care! Maybe it’s just…some, some unlucky bath house guy that got left down here. Who knows! Just help me find the damm cat.”

“Ah yes,” Roman could hear the disdain in Logan’s voice, “The magic cat.”

On the ground, obscured from their view by the network of pipes, Roman kept his eyes firmly shut. So long as his eyes were shut, he was listening to Logan and Virgil’s bickering and was seconds away from rescue.

But what if he opened his eyes and they weren’t there?

Julius had been found of testing his curses’ limits in this area. He would order Romulus to ‘see’ imaginary monsters in the shadows and then have him describe them. Or to recount conversations that never happened. Or to forget ones that had. None of this research had ever been particularly successful - he couldn’t be ordered to alter reality, even in the privacy of his own head – but Julius had never quite given up on it.

What if he had found a way to make it work?

Roman could hear his own heartbeat, the fast paced thump melding with the rush of water in the pipes that surrounded him, making his head throb and his whole body tremble.

What if it wasn’t Virgil and Logan there at all? What if it was Niki and Marcus back again, or Lucius himself, or no one at all?

What if it wasn’t even Julius doing it, just his own pain-addled mind playing tricks on him?

Romulus bit back a whimper, squeezing his arms tight around his middle.

This was too much for Mittens, who let out a yowl of protest and wriggled out of Roman’s grip.

“Oh!” He gasped, eyes flying open “Sorry!”

Mittens ignored his apology, scampering away through the open door and disappearing into the gloom of the corridor. There was a shout, a sudden rush of footsteps and a loud clang followed by a short curse as someone tripped on one of the pipes running along the floor.

And then two men were standing over him. Twin expression of relief morphing quickly into concern.

Virgil swallowed hard, the healers eyes flicking rapidly over each visible injury before meeting Roman’s own.

“Hey there Princy.” Virgil said softly.

***

The journey back through the corridors was a lot slower than their journey in. At least Logan had managed to retrieve one of the lanterns from the maintenance room so he was no longer relying on clinging to the back of Virgil’s cape to navigate.

When they had initially followed the….cat….to the bathhouse they’d thought their luck was beginning to change. It was coronation day, all businesses were closed; it should have been an easy matter to sneak in. When Virgil had scaled the opposing buildings for some roof top reconnaissance however he had come back grim faced – the upper floors were full of soldiers.

The design on their uniform matched the symbol Lucy had drawn the night before, and that Logan had identified in the library that morning. It belonged to the house of Orenlla in Notaleveale. It was not three ‘Vs’ as Lucy had thought, but a stylised version of the three largest peaks on the Sarindu mountain range, which marked the border between Notaleveale and the middle kingdoms. The man she had seen had apparently been wearing his clasp upside down.

Despite his success, Logan had left the library disappointed. Ornella was a noble house in Notaleveale but not one significant enough to warrant a permanent residence in the middle kingdom city of Steveange. It was surely possible to find out where the contingent were staying – the townsfolk seemingly obsessed with the movement of the visiting nobility- but the librarians he spoke to all gave different suggestions, if any at all. Checking every possible address was going to take days.

As desperate as Logan had been feeling, at least he didn’t return to the meeting point with a cat.

Patton had gone to see the crone – or ‘Mama Tay’, as she apparently insisted Patton call her - who had no new information as to where Roman had gone or why he had left, but who had offered to help find him anyway.

Using her cat.

(“I don’t like it.” Virgil said.

“Thank you Virgil.” Logan said, relived to find at least one of his companions hadn’t lost their minds.

“It’s blood magic”

“It’s a CAT!”)

Apparently, when Mittens had scratched Roman at the crone’s – Mama Tay’s – house, it had collected enough blood for a simple locator spell. And Patton, bless him, had agreed to swap a bushel of fresh food from the market for an hours use of the magical bard seeking cat.

Logan had despaired.

Logan wasn’t quite ready to eat his words (dogs could be trained to track blood scents couldn’t they? Why not a cat? There was a reasonable explanation somewhere, surely) but even he had to admit, Mittens had been a lot more successful than any of them.

After Virgil had returned from the rooftop shaking his head, Mittens had meowed piteously until they followed him to a side street, where thin slits set at ground level vented hot air from the bathhouse basement. The cat had slipped in easily, and after a few minutes debate, Logan and Virgil had wiggled their way in after.

They’d used a rope to reach the ground, finding themselves at the base of a set of stairs. There was a soft glow at the top, presumably the main floor of the house, enough to illuminate Mittens’ tail as he trotted off deeper into the basement.

It was only Virgil’s night vision that prevented them from breaking their necks on the next set of stairs, but eventually they had made their way to the a well-lit and uncomfortably warm maintenance room.

And to Roman.

An injured Roman. A glassy-eyed Roman who could barely stand and started shivering as soon as they left the heat of the room.

“He’s going into shock.” Virgil muttered, fixing his cape around Roman’s shoulders. He pulled it tight, wrapping the ends securely, but making Roman whimper in pain. Not knowing what to do, Logan just held the lantern higher. It illuminated the cut on Roman’s sallow face, and the bruises that surrounded it. Bruises which continued over his shoulders and no doubt down his back. Logan had seen the stick, lying next to the corpse, it’s end strained with blood from where the skin had split.

Stupidly, he wished he’d taken the time to break it into a hundred little pieces.

When they reached the first set of stairs, they paused to let Roman catch his breath. His breathing was shallow and he slumped heavily against Logan’s side.

Logan had once watched Roman hop on one foot for almost a mile rather than swallow his pride and admit he needed help. Logan exchanged a glance with Virgil, not bothering to keep the panic from his face.

Virgil let out a long exhale an reached over to squeeze Logan’s shoulder reassuringly, shifting himself to take some of the bard’s weight.

“He’s not going to be able to climb out the way we came in.” Virgil murmured.

“Obviously.” Logan nodded.

That was okay. They had a plan B.

As if on cue, a distant roar rang out above them, followed by quite a lot of screaming.

“Issat Patton?” Roman asked, staring into the darkness with unfocused eyes.

“Mmhmm”, Virgil leaned over and pushed some of Roman’s damp hair away from his face. “He was meant to come get us if we weren’t out in twenty minutes. I think he’s early.”

“There’s at les’ a dozen of ‘em.” Roman slurred “Niki said.”

“Patton can handle it.” Virgil said firmly, though his eyes flickered to the ceiling, betraying his nervousness. “Can you walk?”

Roman nodded, though he needed both their help to actually manage it. It was painfully slow going, with Roman unsuccessfully trying to hide a wince of pain with each step.

The first flight of stairs was relatively short, but by the time they had reached the top Roman’s shaking was so bad it was making Logan’s own teeth rattle. Still, they pressed on, almost dragging the bard between them to the base of the much larger set of stairs that would take them to street level.

Here the noises from the floor above were much louder – the clash of steel on steel reverberating down the stairs.

Logan stared at the next obstacle, uncertain. There were what amounted to five flights, with a small flat platform at each turning point. There was a banister running each side of the stairs, but it was missing in several places. What was there didn’t look like it would hold much weight.

Above them, there was an enormous crash followed by a bellow of almost inhuman rage.

“Frog mode?” Roman asked drowsily.

“Frog mode.” Virgil said grimly.

The berserkers of Krutova painted their faces with the green and blue mud from the rivers and swamps that saturated their forest home. Legend said they could lie in wait for hours, hidden under the water, using hollow reeds to breath before leaping out on unsuspecting enemies with a monstrous frenzied rage, dragging their opponents to a watery grave – assuming they didn’t, quite literally, rip them apart first.

Logan had never seen Patton paint his face. And the big man did not like to talk about his time at war. But Logan had seen him fight off more than a dozen men in a bar brawl without breaking a sweat. He’d once seen him wrestle a wild boar just for fun.

Still. The men upstairs were trained guardsmen, not drunks. And they were armed. And it had only been a small boar.

Virgil was clearly having similar thoughts, his fingers twitching against his side, his eyes constantly flickering up and then back towards Logan and Roman. .

“Go.” Logan said, “We’ll follow you.”

Virgil hesitated, but Roman nodded, straightening up as much as he could “We’ll be righ’ behin’ you. Go help dad.”

Virgil dithered a moment more and then let out all his breath in a rush, reaching for the crossbow strapped to his back.

“Okay just. Go slow. We’ll come get you when the coast is clear.” he waited until they both nodded before turning and all but leaping up the stairs. Roman held his pose until he was out of sight and then collapsed once more against Logan’s side.

The scholar adjusted his grp on the lantern, and hooked his other arm over Roman’s back. With a grunt of effort, the bard managed to sling his left arm over Logan’s shoulder, leaving his uninjured hand free to grip the rickety banister. Logan squeezed, holding him tightly. Roman groaned as he pressed against the bruises and welts that coated his back but Logan held firm.

“One step at a time.” the younger man said softly. “Okay?”

Panting, Roman nodded, giving Logan a sickly lopsided grin.

The staircase spiralled five times before reaching the top floor. They made it round twice before trouble found them.

“You.” The man growled.

The man standing between them and freedom was generically handsome, with large eyes and a strong jaw. He had a passing resemblance to Roman; with the same dark reddish brown hair and tanned skin. He wore a doublet of pink and navy, with the three peaked mountains embroidered in gold thread.

“Luc’-“ Roman gasped out, “don’t-“

“Shut up!” the Marquis de Orenlla snapped. He held a wicked looking dagger in one hand, eyes ablaze. “Is there no end to your duplicity? You foul traitor, I should have you hanged!“

Also like Roman, he seemed to favour being loud over being coherent.

With a grunt, Roman removed his injured arm from Logan’s shoulder and clung to the banister.

“Go!” he shouted to Logan.

Logan spared him an exasperated glance and threw the lantern at the Marquis head.

He went down with a screech, rolling back and forth on the small platform to put the flames dancing on his embroidery. The dagger skirted away and over the edge of the platform.

“You go.” Logan snapped at Roman, pulling out his sword and stepping between the two men.

Technically it was Roman’s sword, the one he had left behind in the inn. But Logan has been taking their training sessions seriously and it felt comfortable in his hands. He pointed the blade a the Marquis throat, effectively pinning him to the ground.

“Wow!” Roman laughed and lent to the side to grin at the flabbergasted noble “I trained him.” he said smugly.

“Hurry up!” Logan hissed and to his great relief, Roman did so, inching his way behind Logan and starting up the next flight of stairs.

“Stop.” The Marquis croaked out.

Roman stopped.

Logan turned towards him, frustrated “Roman, I’ve got this – just keep-“

Later, Logan would blame the stress of the situation for just why he chose to turn away from his prisoner at that precise moment.

Before he had chance to process what was happening, he was falling. Pain rippling through his ankle from a well placed kick from the Marquis. He dropped the heavy sword almost immediately, only for it to be snatched up by the larger man.

Logan felt himself being dragged through the air, and all at once he was pinned against the Marquis chest, sword now held at his own neck.

He saw Roman start back down the stairs towards them and felt the Marquis’ hot breath against his ear as he shouted: “Stop!”

Roman stopped. One foot frozen in the air, he lost his balance almost immediately and toppled to the side, reaching out instinctively to grab the banister with his injured hand, letting out a howl of pain.

The Marquis shuffled backwards, dragging Logan with him, dangerously close to the edge of the platform.

“I’m serious, Romulus.” the Marquis growled. “Not one more step. Or your friend here is going to be even shorter.”

“I'm average height.” Logan muttered sullenly.

The Marquis snorted in his ear. “Where? In the Dwarf kingdom?”

“Lucius!” Roman whimpered, he was hunched over, cradling his bad arm to his chest. “Please – he’s just a kid!”

“I am only three years younger than you!” Logan cried indignantly.

“Oh right.” Roman muttered. “My bad.” And then Roman straightened up. He hadn’t been cradling his arm at all – he’d been working something out of his tunic.

Roman’s dagger, a dull pointless object in desperate need of replacement, came hurtling towards them.

The Marquis let out a shout and instinctively raised the sword to bat the dagger away. Logan took the opportunity to wrench out of his grip, blindly kicking out behind him as he did so.

His foot made satisfying contact with the Marquis’ knee, sending him toppling off the platform, a resounding series of crashes and shouts echoing through the chamber as he bounced down the stairs.

Logan hurried towards Roman as fast as he could, not bothering to turn around and see how far the Marquis had fallen.

“Can you move?” he asked breathlessly.

“I don’t think so.” Roman admitted from his prone position at the base of the steps. Logan bit back a wail of frustration. Roman truly looked done in, his eyes battling to stay open, and there was no way Logan was going to be able to carry him up the-

“Logan? Roman?”

Logan hadn’t been to a city temple since he left his apprenticeship. He had no particular interest in the Gods or their silly squabbles. But the sight of Patton - working his way towards them with his clothing torn and face splattered with blood that wasn’t his own – well. Logan was fairly certain he could pass for an angel.

“You’re safe now.” Logan whispered, although he had no proof of the long term truth of that statement, “go to sleep Roman.”

Roman did as he was told.

Part 8

[ordinaryschmuck]

Ed and Em are menaces and trying to teach Vee the fun of pranking people with Illusion magic. Gus is trying to do damage control. Keyword trying

The Bad Side of Illusion Magic

Edric and Emira walked among the market, both of them sulking with a matching pair of frowns.

"I'm bored."

"I know, Ed."

"I want to do something."

"Me too, Ed."

"Then why can't we?"

"Because what is there to do?" Emira waved around at their surroundings. "We've proven to every witch, demon, and even human in Bonesborough how we're absolute menaces to society. Pranking them all again would just be pointless at that point."

"Speaking of humans," Edric pointed over to a magical fruit stand where there stood Luz Noceda, dressed completely differently and sniffing one of the fruits.

"Hm. I guess hanging out with Luz wouldn't be too bad," Emira said with a shrug.

"Yeah. Maybe she'll even take us on a life-changing journey that brings out our better selves."

"She does tend to do that a lot, doesn't she?"

"Sure does. Hey, Luz!" Edric called over to the human, who became stiff and frozen instead of looking over with her usual glee.

"Hello," Emira waved as she and Edric walked up to Luz, "Isles to Luz. Can you hear me?"

That was when Luz finally turned to face them. Although, her smile was more nervous rather than chipper.

"Hey...you two!" she said, her pitch high. "How's it going?"

"Eh, pretty dull," Edric responded.

"Like the outfit change, by the way," Emira grinned with a wink. "I'm sure mittens would be more than impressed with it."

"Uh, yeah, sure!" Luz nodded along, "Mittens will be, um, all kinds of impressed with...all of me!"

Edric and Emira shared a curious look.

"Since when did you start calling Amity Mittens?"

"Amity...Amity--Amity!" Luz snapped her fingers with realization. "Yup, that's my, uh, my girlfriend! My girlfriend who I...who I just started calling Mittens not too long ago. It's only, you know, a cute little pet name that couples have. Right? C-Couples-Couples do that?"

"How can it be a pet name between you two if we've been calling her that for years?" Emira asked, feeling more suspicious by the second.

"Yeah, are you doing alright?" Edric got close to expect Luz carefully, "Did you hit your head or something?"

"...Ok, full disclosure, I'm not actually Luz," 'Luz' said, their voice sounding completely different and face morphing ever so slightly non-human-like. Edric and Emira jumped back because of it.

"What the--"

"--Heck!"

"Please don't panic!" The imposter begged, "My name is Vee. I've been sort of taking Luz's place in the human world, so no one gets suspicious of why she isn't there anymore. The problem is that I need magic to transform, and I've been running low on reserves. So, ever since Luz got a working portal going, I've been coming over here every so often to, well, stock up?"

"...So your not Luz," Edric recapped.

"That's right."

"And you have no idea who we are?" Emira added.

"Luz only told me about her main circle of friends," Vee explained, "Unless you're Gus and Willow, I don't think that she did, no."

The twins shared another look with each other. Only this time, they cunningly smirked as they leaned close to a very nervous Vee.

"So, you like magic, huh?"

"How would you like to see illusion magic?"

***

Gus whistled a happy tune as he took a stroll through Bonesborough, at peace at how much of a nice day it was.

Peace didn't last, unfortunately, as the sound of screaming brought Gus' whistling to an end. Especially when a man, with terror in his eyes, ran right up to the witchling.

"My boy, help me!" The man showed Gus his arms, revealing that his hands were missing. "I don't know how or why, but my hands have disappeared in a puff of smoke! Please, you've got to do something!"

"What exactly could I do?" was Gus' first response as he went to poke one of the stubs that the man's hand used to be. Only to get partly there for it to come back in a poof with Gus' finger poking it.

"You've done it!" The man shouted with glee. "Oh, thank you, my boy! Thank you!"

Just then, his hand disappeared again with another poof!

"Ah! It happened again!" he screamed, running off, "Somebody help me!"

"Hang on a second. That's illusion magic. Used for evil!" Gus scratched his chin in thought, "Who would do something so twisted like that...Wait, why am I even asking that. It's obvious who it was."

***

Edric and Emira snickered as they hid behind a stand, making one person think two of her four eyes are missing.

"Eek! I've turned into a freak!"

The twins laughed even harder at the reaction. Vee, on her part, only felt uncomfortable.

"Isn't this going a bit too far?"

"Hey, it's all in good fun," Edric waved off the concern. "Besides, it's not like we're hurting anybody."

"You are hurting their sanity, though."

The impromptu trio looked over to see none other than Gus, glaring at them with his hands on his hips and his expression sour.

"Oh, hey...Is it Goops?" Emira asked, "I want to say it's Goops."

"It's Gus! And you two need to stop what you're doing right now. You're giving illusionists like me a bad name."

"Geez. Did Mittens make you in charge of killing our fun?"

"I'm serious! You can't just--"

But before Gus could say another word, Edric drew a spell circle and caused the young lad's mouth to disappear. Gus only scowled in return as he drew his own spell circle to reverse.

"Not funny."

"It kind of was," Edric grinned, placing an arm around Vee's shoulders, "Besides, we're doing a noble cause."

"Yeah," Emira chimed in. "Our good friend Vee loves magic. And we're just trying to show her the best kind."

"Vee?" Gus looked closer at the twins' new 'friend.' "Hang on, I think Luz told me about you. Aren't you a basilisk?"

Edric and Emira's went wide. They looked at Vee, then at Gus, and then back at Vee.

"...You're a basilisk?"

"Yup."

"As in a demon who sucks the souls out of witches to eat their magic?"

"That's technically not how it works, but yes."

...

Edric and Emira stepped a good ways away from Vee, the two of them smiling as nervously as she did a few minutes ago.

"Welp, it was good seeing you!"

"Have fun finding that magic you wanted!"

With that, they both turned and ran faster than any witch could at the moment. Vee deflated at the action, but Gus was at least kind enough to give her a gentle pat on the shoulder.

"You ok?" he asked.

"I'll be fine. I feel worse for the people they pranked than I do for myself, to be honest."

"Don't worry about it. Illusion spells wear off after a couple minutes anyway. You've been looking for magic, right?"

"Yeah?"

"Well, how about I help you find some," Gus offered a hand, "And maybe show you the nicer side of illusions in the process."

Vee smiled at that, taking his hand.

"That does sound nice."