#without fast travel without a map it was absolutely hell

[rowanisawriter]

kcd1 hans dlc is like. go get my grandmothers necklace which i lost in a game of dice so i can gift it to this girl i am trying to fuck, the necklace was eventually stolen by a merry band of bandits in the middle of the woods that you have to track down and win in another game of dice. after that go and brew me some viagra, which you have to get the recipe for from a charlatan who makes you collect artifacts for him including rob a grave, pull a rotting tooth out of someone mouth, climbing scaffolding to get a special tree branch, before he gives you the recipe for my viagra. the viagra makes me break out in hives. then memorize these love poems so you can prompt me from the bushes while i try to woo this girl, butcher the poem utterly, embarrass and humiliate myself, climb up into her room to try and fuck anyway, all while you distract her father who has brought two goons and is fully prepared to beat you to death to defend his daughters honor. i dont get to fuck, you get beat up, we both meet in the morning and no one has really accomplished anything. here, you can have this love poem i wrote for that girl but never gave her. maybe you will appreciate it more

[orangeblossomsintheair]

HONEY YOU’RE FAMILIAR | MV33

summary : For a second, he thinks about turning around. Walking out. Pretending he never saw you, because what’s the point? It’s not like he can just waltz up to you and say, “Hey, sorry I ghosted you for no reason other than I’m emotionally constipated. Want to get a drink?”

wc : 5k

an : writing this to distract myself from my other wips? ..i would never.. 😦 also i wrote this at 12 am so let this not be a place of judgement :))

Max sometimes forgets how small Monaco is.

It’s easy to do when most of his memories of the place are a blur of fast cars and glittering parties. He spends most of his time racing through the streets during the Grand Prix or holed up in a hotel room overlooking the harbor.

When you’re constantly traveling the world, hopping between paddocks and podiums, the compactness of Monaco barely registers. It’s a speck on the map, a gilded bubble he never really bothers to think about until it’s right in his face.

But sometimes, like tonight, he’s reminded.

Monaco isn’t a city, not really.

It’s a playground. A handful of streets strung together like a necklace, choked with Lamborghinis, Rolls-Royces, and yachts so big they could be small countries. It’s a place where everyone knows everyone.

Or, at the very least, they know of everyone.

The millionaires gossip about the billionaires. The bartenders know who tips in cash and who never tips at all. Even the stray cats probably have dirt on the local royals.

It’s not just small in size. It’s tight.

Wealth wraps around this place like a noose, strangling it into exclusivity.

There are no dark corners to disappear into, no sprawling suburbs to lose yourself in.

Just a few restaurants, a few clubs, and a few streets where the same people circle each other like they’re on a carousel. If you’re here long enough, you’ll eventually run into everyone you’ve ever met.

Even the ones you’ve been trying to avoid.

Max doesn’t think about that when he walks into the bar.

He’s not in the mood for deep reflection or existential dread. He’s here because Daniel said he needed a drink, and when Daniel Ricciardo says you need a drink, you listen.

That’s how Max ends up at some overpriced lounge that smells like vodka and ambition, standing under soft, warm lighting that’s trying too hard to make the place feel classy instead of claustrophobic.

He’s nursing a beer, half-listening to Daniel tell some convoluted story about a failed date and a stolen Vespa, when he hears it.

A voice.

Your voice.

It’s the kind of thing that cuts through the noise without him even realizing why. It’s not loud or particularly distinct; it’s not like you’re screaming or making a scene. But it’s you. The way you talk, your cadence, the rise and fall of your words. It’s all so achingly familiar that it grabs him by the throat and yanks.

Max freezes. His drink doesn’t make it to his lips.

The years fall away in a blink, and suddenly, it’s like no time has passed.

He’s twenty-two again, still figuring out how to smile for cameras, while you’re draped over the back of his couch, talking absolute nonsense about whether or not the cars in Cars have insurance or not.

He doesn’t even realize he’s turned to look until he spots you.

You’re standing at the bar, laughing as you say something to the bartender. It’s loud, and Max can’t hear you properly, but he can feel you.

The way you lean casually on the counter, the tilt of your head, the way you wave your hand to punctuate whatever you’re saying. It’s so painfully, annoyingly you.

And God, you look good.

For a second, all he can do is stare. You haven’t seen him yet, thank God, because Max Verstappen does not know what the hell to do with himself right now.

You look different.

Not in a drastic way, just… grown.

Your edges are sharper, your presence more refined, like a photo that’s come into focus after years of being a little blurry. But the core of you is still the same. It’s in the way you throw your head back when you laugh, like the world isn’t slowly crumbling under the weight of climate change, billionaires, and whatever Kardashian family drama is brewing this week.

And suddenly, Max is thrown back years.

To a time when you were his person. The one he called when things went sideways, or when he won, or when he was just bored and needed someone to hear him rant about understeer.

You were his best friend.

No. The friend. The one. The only one who ever really got him. And then…Well, then he was an asshole.

He tries to tell himself that you two drifted apart.

People do that, right? It’s life. Except that’s a lie, and Max knows it. You didn’t drift; you held on like a freaking tow hook. You tried—texted him, called him, showed up to races, tried to remind him there was a world outside of 300 km/h and tire degradation.

Max doesn’t know what to do with this. With you. He’s not used to seeing ghosts in real life, and you might as well be one now.

Max debates his next move. He could just… not. Pretend he didn’t notice you. Slip out quietly, finish his drink somewhere else, and avoid whatever emotional grenade this is about to be. That would be the smart thing. The logical thing.

But Max has never been great at logic.

For a second, he thinks about turning around. Walking out. Pretending he never saw you, because what’s the point? It’s not like he can just waltz up to you and say, “Hey, sorry I ghosted you for no reason other than I’m emotionally constipated. Want to get a drink?”

But then you glance over your shoulder.

And your eyes lock.

He doesn’t have time to decide whether to stay or bolt

You see him.

And Max realizes he’s fucked.

For a split second, he thinks you might look away, maybe pretend you didn’t see him either.

He’s not sure if he’s hoping for that or dreading it. But then your face lights up, and the look you give him isn’t what he expects.

It’s warm. Familiar. Like you’re genuinely happy to see him.

His chest tightens. Max isn’t sure what he thought he’d see. Resentment, awkwardness, indifference, maybe.

But this? This disarms him completely.

You wave, and before he knows it, his feet are moving.

“Maxy,” you say as he approaches, your voice carrying that teasing lilt that could only ever be you. It knocks the breath out of him, so familiar and effortless it almost hurts. “Long time no see.”

Max freezes for the briefest of moments, the nickname hitting him like a slap and a hug all at once. Maxy. No one’s called him that in years. Not his family. Not his team. Not anyone.

No one except you.

“Yeah, uh, long time,” he manages, scratching the back of his neck in a gesture so awkwardly familiar it almost makes you laugh. He looks like he’s 17 again, shy and unsure.

Before either of you can say more, Daniel sidles up next to him, a beer in hand and an amused eyebrow raised as he glances between the two of you. “Know her?” Daniel asks, his voice dripping with curiosity.

“He does,” you reply smoothly before Max can fumble an answer. Your smirk is playful, but there’s no bite to it, just that same easy warmth Max hasn’t felt in what feels like forever. “I used to keep this one in line. Back when he was all awkward interviews and tragic haircuts.”

Daniel barks out a laugh, glancing at Max’s meticulously styled hair. “Tragic haircuts? Wait, this-” he gestures wildly at Max’s head, like it’s some architectural masterpiece “-is the improved version?”

You’re already laughing, and it’s the kind of laugh Max hasn’t heard in years.

He groans, dragging a hand over his face, though the corners of his mouth are betraying him with a faint smile. “Don’t encourage her,” he mutters to Daniel, but his tone is far too soft to have any weight.

It’s stupid how easy this feels. How natural. Max isn’t used to easy anymore.

Daniel, bless him, is soaking it all in.

“So?” he says, giving Max a teasing nudge. “Aren’t you going to introduce me, or do I have to guess?”

“I was getting there,” Max grumbles, shooting him a half-hearted glare before looking at you. For a moment, he falters. He doesn’t know what to call you. Acquaintance feels too cold. Stranger would be a lie. And friend? That feels like stepping too far into a past he’s not sure he’s ready to face.

“An old friend,” you offer, saving him effortlessly, like you always did. “And you must be the famous Daniel Ricciardo.”

Daniel grins, full of boyish charm. “Guilty as charged,” he says, tipping his beer in a mock toast. “And let me just say, I already like you. Great taste in insults.”

“Flattery will get you nowhere, Ricciardo,” you say, though your smirk says otherwise.

The three of you fall into an almost absurdly natural rhythm, as though you’ve all been doing this for years. Daniel’s effortless charisma bounces off your sharp wit, and Max finds himself smiling more in five minutes than he has in weeks.

Maybe months.

It’s like the weight on his shoulders has lifted, just for a moment, and he can breathe again.

You’re mid-story when he realizes he hasn’t felt this light in ages.

“So there I was,” you’re saying to Daniel, gesturing dramatically, “dragging Max out of his hotel room because he was refusing to face the world after a bad race.”

“I wasn’t refusing to face the world,” Max interjects, but there’s no real heat in his voice.

You give him a look that could level a building. “You were lying on the floor eating Haribo like it was your last meal,” you say, deadpan. “It was tragic. Genuinely tragic.”

Daniel’s cackling now, nearly spilling his beer. “Please tell me there are photos of this.”

“Sadly, no,” you reply with mock disappointment. “But the image is burned into my brain forever. It was that bad.”

Max groans, shaking his head, though the grin tugging at his lips is impossible to hide. “Why did I ever let you into my life?”

“Because no one else could handle you,” you fire back, and it’s so quick, so natural, it makes his chest ache.

Daniel takes a step back, still laughing. “You two are too much,” he says, pointing at the two of you like you’ve just performed a comedy sketch. “I’ll leave you to it. Don’t get too emotional without me, okay? I’m going to find another beer. Or maybe a Vespa to steal. Who knows?”

You watch him disappear into the crowd, still grinning. For a moment, the two of you are left standing there, and the noise of the party seems to fade just slightly.

“Daniel’s fun,” you say, breaking the silence.

“He is,” Max agrees.

When the music starts bumping up again, the two of you are faced with a whole other problem entirely.

“So, you’ve been busy!” you yell, leaning across the sticky bar top, your voice barely cutting through the bass thumping around you.

“What?” Max shouts back, leaning closer.

“I SAID, YOU’VE BEEN BUSY!”

“I CAN’T HEAR YOU!”

“I KNOW! THAT’S WHY I’M SHOUTING!”

“WHAT?”

You throw your hands up in exasperation, but he just smirks, clearly enjoying this.

So you double down.

“DO YOU WANT ANOTHER DRINK?” you bellow, miming holding a glass.

“WHY ARE YOU YELLING ABOUT DRINKS?” he shouts back, baffled.

“BECAUSE IT’S TOO LOUD IN HERE!”

“WHAT?”

This back-and-forth nonsense goes on for an impressively ridiculous three minutes, the two of you getting progressively louder, until Max finally groans, shaking his head like he’s reached his limit.

He steps closer, leans in like he’s about to shout something else, then just presses a warm, steady hand to the small of your back. “Come on,” he says, not even bothering to raise his voice this time.

“What?” you yell, still committed to the bit.

He doesn’t answer. Instead, he starts gently steering you toward the stairs, and you stumble a little, caught off guard by the unexpected physical contact.

“Where are we going?” you shout, craning your neck to look at him as you climb.

“UPSTAIRS!”

“WHY?”

“BECAUSE I VALUE MY HEARING!” he fires back, glaring at you over his shoulder.

“OH, NOW YOU CARE ABOUT YOUR HEARING?” you tease, but he ignores you, his hand still firm and insistent on your back as he guides you upstairs.

The VIP section is quieter, tucked away from the pulsating bass and the sweaty chaos of the main club floor. Max had slipped a word to a bouncer—who nodded in a way that made you roll your eyes—and now you’re here, sinking into the plush leather of a semi-circular booth with a ridiculous view of the dance floor below.

The relative silence hits you like a warm blanket. You blink, adjusting to the sudden absence of aggressive EDM, and turn to Max, who looks much too smug for your liking.

“Smuggled into VIP like I’m some sort of black-market item,” you tease. “Careful, Verstappen. This is how egos start.”

“You’re welcome,” he says dryly.

“For what?” you shoot back. “The privilege of not getting tinnitus at 27?”

“Yes,” he replies smoothly, sliding into a nearby booth like he owns the place. “You’re lucky to know me.”

“Oh, absolutely,” you deadpan. “My life has improved immeasurably since you dragged me up here. I’ll write a thank-you card.”

“Make sure it’s handwritten,” he quips, signaling a waiter for drinks. “And don’t skimp on the stationery.”

“You’re ridiculous,” you say, rolling your eyes but you’re smiling, and he knows it.

He chuckles, leaning forward slightly. “Hey, if you’re going to criticize, at least admit this is better than shouting at each other over terrible music.”

You glance around the room, all dark wood and dim lighting, where a few scattered people are having hushed conversations or staring down at the dance floor with an air of superiority. “Alright,” you admit, “it’s not terrible. But the crowd up here…”

You nod toward a guy at the next table wearing sunglasses, inside, and sipping champagne like it’s water. “Is this your scene now? Bottle service bros and indoor eyewear enthusiasts?”

Max glances at the guy, smirking. “Not my scene. But I figured you deserved something better than sticky floors and overpriced tequila shots.”

You laugh. “Wow. I feel so special. Nothing says friendship like a quiet room and a drink I can’t pronounce.”

“Admit it,” he says, leaning back again. “You love it.”

“I love judging it,” you correct, grinning. “Big difference.”

Max watches you for a moment, shaking his head with an almost fond expression. “You haven’t changed at all.”

“And you’ve changed too much,” you shoot back, gesturing at his ridiculously put-together outfit. “Look at you, Verstappen. Fancy haircut, custom clothes, actual social skills. Who are you?”

“First of all, the haircut is functional,” he retorts, mock offended. “Aerodynamics.”

“Oh, of course. Wouldn’t want your hair slowing you down at 300 kph,” you say, pretending to be serious.

“It’s a real thing!” he insists, laughing now. “If you knew anything about racing-”

“If I knew anything about racing?” you interrupt, your voice rising in mock outrage. “Excuse me, I was there when you had to Google how to talk to the media without sounding like a robot. You think I don’t know the intricacies of racing, Maxy?”

“Don’t call me Maxy,” he groans, dragging a hand down his face.

“Oh, I’m definitely calling you Maxy,” you say, delighted. “I might even get a custom T-shirt. ‘Maxy’s Biggest Fan.’ I’ll wear it to a race.”

He narrows his eyes at you. “If you do that, I’ll steal your phone and delete every embarrassing photo you’ve ever taken of me.”

“Bold of you to assume I don’t have backups,” you say smugly, sipping your drink.

“Unbelievable,” he mutters, shaking his head, but there’s a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.

For a moment, the two of you fall into an easy silence, the noise of the club below fading into the background. You glance at Max, noting the relaxed set of his shoulders, the way he’s fiddling with the label on his beer bottle—a habit he’s had for as long as you can remember.

“So,” you say, breaking the quiet, “what’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve bought since you became all… you know.”

“All what?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.

“You know,” you say, waving a hand vaguely. “World Champion. Multi-millionaire. Guy who smuggles old friends into VIP sections.”

He chuckles. “Ridiculous? I don’t know… probably the private jet.”

You stare at him, deadpan. “The private jet is the least ridiculous thing about you, Verstappen. Try again.”

“Fine,” he says, thinking for a moment. “I bought a sauna for my house. Didn’t use it for six months.”

You burst out laughing. “A sauna? For what? Post-race existential crises?”

He groans, rubbing his temples. “It was a bad idea, okay? I thought it would be relaxing.”

“Did it come with, like, a tiny man who throws water on the rocks for you?” you ask, grinning.

“No, but now I kind of want one,” he admits, laughing.

“God, you’re the worst,” you say, shaking your head, but your tone is full of affection.

“And you’re jealous,” he fires back.

“Of your unused sauna?” you say, raising an eyebrow. “Yeah, I’m absolutely consumed with envy.”

The two of you dissolve into laughter and the conversation continues.

Next thing you know it’s 3 am and you and Max are stumbling out of the club, too giggly for both of your sakes.

Daniel had hopped on to another place hours ago so it’s just you and him.

The cool night air hits you like a slap, but instead of sobering up, it just makes you giggle harder.

Max freezes mid-stumble, his head lolling back like he’s auditioning for Les Mis on the world’s worst stage. “Why’s the air so aggressive?” he slurs. “Feels like it’s… pushing me. Rude.”

“Why’s the ground so spinny?” you counter, stumbling sideways into him.

“'Cause you’re bad at walking,” he accuses, latching onto your arm like a barnacle while swaying dramatically.

“You’re bad at walking,” you fire back, immediately tripping over a shadow and nearly eating pavement.

“You can’t even walk straight!” Max protests, laughing as he catches you before you faceplant.

His arm slides around your waist, steadying you in the most unsteady way possible.

“You’re the one spinning,” you argue, slurring every other word. “Maaaybe you should ju- just stay still for once in your life.”

“Oh, because you’re the expert,” he fires back, wheezing as you nearly trip again. “Where- where are you even staying at?”

You squint at him, trying to focus. “Uh… good question.”

Max stops dead in his tracks, turning to look at you with a mix of disbelief and amusement. “What do you mean good question? How do you not know?”

“I don’t rememb- ber,” you admit, cackling as if it’s the funniest thing in the world.

Max groans, dragging a hand down his face. “You’ve got to be kidding me. You’re just- what? Homeless now?”

“Homeless for the night,” you correct, wagging a finger at him like that somehow makes it better.

Max laughs so hard he has to pause, doubling over slightly. “How- how do you forget where you’re staying?”

“’S not my fault!” you defend yourself, leaning heavily against him. “The hotel has, like… a name! A boring one! And too many floors!”

Max groans so loudly it echoes off the buildings. “Oh my God. You’re homeless now. You’re a wandering drunk with no home.”

“I'm trying a new lifestyle,” you say, grinning. “Like… nomadic, y’know? Spiritual.”

“Yeah, okay, Buddha, let’s find you a real place to sleep before you start befriending rats,” he mutters, dragging you down the street.

“I like rats,” you say cheerfully. “They’re just misunderstood.”

“You’re misunderstood,” Max shoots back. “Come on. You’re crashing at my hotel. I can’t leave you out here to, like, adopt a possum or something.”

“I don’t wanna!” you whine, digging your heels into the ground.

“Tough!” Max barks, throwing his arm around your shoulders to keep you moving. “You’ll thank me in the morning when you’re not spooning a garbage can.”

You groan dramatically, slumping into him. “Maxxyyy, I’m tired. Can’t I just sleep on a bench or something?”

“Nooo. No benches. Benches are gross. You’ll get, like… pigeons on you.”

“Pigeons are my friends,” you declare solemnly, as if this is a hill you’re prepared to die on.

Max shakes his head, clearly trying to stay serious but failing miserably. “Okay, Dr. Dolittle, you’re not sleeping outside.”

You groan again, dragging your feet even as he starts pulling you along.

“Stop whining,” he slurs, swaying as he tries to walk in a straight line. “It’ll be like- like a sleepover! Like when we were five.”

“Sleepovers at five were better,” you mutter. “Less… you.”

“Excuse me?” Max stops, glaring at you like you’ve mortally offended him. “I’m the best sleepover buddy. I let you steal my Haribo once.”

“You hid the Haribo under your pillow!” you counter, poking him in the chest.

“’Cause you’re a thief!” he says, grinning as he pulls you toward the street corner.

“Am not,” you huff, pouting.

“Are too,” he replies, but his tone is teasing as he hails a cab.

When the cab pulls up, it feels like the world is tilted just enough that the ground might collapse under your feet at any moment. You both tumble into the backseat in a fit of giggles, your laughter echoing off the darkened streets.

It’s the kind of laughter that’s born of a little bit too much alcohol and a whole lot of absurdity. You could’ve sworn you heard a streetlight flicker in disbelief at the sound of your shared joy.

Max flops dramatically against you as if the very act of sitting upright requires more effort than it’s worth.

His head lands squarely on your shoulder, and for a split second, you’re both tangled in the shared warmth of a really questionable decision.

He looks up at you, eyes half-lidded, and grins like a kid who just got away with stealing candy.

“You smell like tequila and poor decisions,” he mutters with a lazy drawl, his words slow but somehow still cutting through the haze of the night.

You’re already shaking your head before you even speak, the words spilling out one over the other. “You smell like someone who wore Axe in high school.”

Max’s eyes widen in mock outrage. “I did not!” He shoots up from your shoulder like you just insulted his very existence, but the motion sends him veering dangerously toward the cab door.

He catches himself at the last second, gripping the seat like it’s a lifeline.

By the time the cab pulls up to Max’s hotel, you're both deep into a discussion about whether Axe body spray could be classified as a biohazard in certain quantities.

It’s a ridiculous debate, fueled by far too much tequila and a complete disregard for logic, but it’s the most fun either of you have had in ages.

Max is practically in tears from laughing, his snort-laugh echoing off the walls of the cab as he tries to argue that Axe is, in fact, a perfectly fine product, just poorly misunderstood by society.

The cab screeches to a halt, and Max stumbles out first, holding the door open for you with the kind of exaggerated flair you’d expect from someone who probably practices his dramatic entrances in front of a mirror.

As he pays the driver, his wallet slips from his hands not once, but twice, and he’s already apologizing profusely, his face flushed from the alcohol and his own clumsiness.

Finally, he gets the wallet sorted, tucks it back in his pocket, and reaches down to drag you out of the cab like you’re a piece of luggage.

You’re both barely standing, teetering back and forth on your feet as if gravity itself is conspiring to make the night even more ridiculous.

“Welcome to my humble abode,” Max says, throwing his arm out grandly to gesture toward the hotel lobby like he’s unveiling the Louvre.

The marble floors, polished to a shine, the sleek, understated furniture… none of it compares to the visual assault that is the ugly carpet underfoot.

“Your palace has really ugly carpet,” you mutter, laughing as you trip over the offending fabric, your feet not quite able to keep up with your brain’s idea of where they should go.

Max snorts, his hand steadying you as you almost face-plant into a particularly gaudy potted plant. “You’re banned from the palace,” he retorts, giving you a playful shove.

You recover, and together, you stagger toward the elevator, which, for some reason, feels like an obstacle course in itself.

The elevator doors open with a dramatic ding, and Max promptly starts jabbing the wrong floor button in a series of random, very confident moves.

Each one is a miss, but he keeps at it, as if this were somehow part of the plan.

You lean against the wall, your body shaking with laughter as you struggle to breathe through the giggles.

“This is why they don’t let you operate machinery,” you manage to gasp, watching him fumble with the buttons in disbelief.

Max grumbles under his breath but finally, miraculously, hits the correct floor button. He turns to you with an exaggerated wink. “See? I told you. Genius.”

You raise an eyebrow, patting him on the head condescendingly. “Sure you are, buddy. A true mastermind.”

The elevator ride is a blur of jokes and half-baked insults as you both fight to keep your composure.

Max leans against the wall with a smug look, clearly reveling in his victory over the elevator button.

When the doors finally open, you both stumble out, holding on to each other uselessly.

At the door to his room, Max proceeds to fumble with his key card in a way that can only be described as tragically incompetent.

The key card slips from his fingers twice, and each time, he lets out a string of expletives in a garble of Dutch and English.

“Jesus. You okay there, Einstein?” you tease, leaning casually against the wall and watching him drop the card once more. You can’t help but laugh.

“Shut up,” he mutters, his voice already tinged with frustration. “Technology’s hard.”

Finally, after what feels like an eternity, the door swings open, and Max stumbles inside with the grace of a rhino on roller skates.

He turns to face you with a theatrical sigh. “There. I did it. Happy now?”

You’re already halfway to the bed, your shoes flying off in opposite directions, one ending up by the dresser and the other getting lodged under a chair.

With a dramatic thud, you collapse onto the bed, your body sinking into the soft, luxurious comfort like it was the only thing holding you together.

“This bed is softer than my hopes and dreams,” you mumble, your voice muffled by the comforter as you stretch out like a starfish.

Max, predictably, flops down beside you with the subtlety of a sack of bricks, his arms and legs sprawling out in every direction.

“Move over,” he grumbles, his face smooshed into the pillow.

“Nope,” you reply, barely lifting a finger to indicate where his side is. “Your side’s over there,” you say, pointing vaguely toward the edge of the bed, but it’s clear from the way your eyes are barely staying open that you’re not in any shape to play the “bedroom politics” game.

“Too bad,” Max grunts, grabbing your pillow from beneath your head and smushing it over his face. “This is a dictatorship, and I’m the dictator.”

“Goodnight, Haribo hoarder,” you slur, your words trailing off into nothing as sleep drags you under.

The last thing you hear before you fully fade into unconsciousness is Max’s muffled laugh, and you can’t help but smile.

For a brief moment, it feels like nothing’s changed at all.

—-

Max’s eyes snap open, and for a second, everything is blurry.

He blinks a few times, the weight of his eyelids making it feel like he’s wading through molasses.

A dull ache sits in the back of his skull, a reminder of the questionable choices he made the night before.

He groans, dry, scratchy, the kind of noise that only belongs to mornings where you regret both your life decisions and your snack choices.

He’s still in his room. So far, so good.

Nothing seems out of the ordinary... except for that persistent feeling in the air that something is off.

Max stretches, or at least tries to. His arms flail in an uncoordinated spasm, which results in a series of awkward grunts and a pop from his back that sounds like a joint trying to jump ship.

For a second, he considers staying perfectly still, hoping his body will remember how to function like a normal human.

But then—

There’s something warm beside him. Something... alive.

Max freezes, eyes snapping wide open. His breath catches in his throat as he tries to process what’s happening. The warmth next to him isn’t the soft comfort of a pillow.

It’s... a person.

A person in his bed.

What the actual hell?

His brain goes into overdrive, trying to make sense of the situation. His mind races through a thousand thoughts in a second, each one more ridiculous than the last.

Did he... did he end up getting a stranger drunk last night? Did someone break into his room to cuddle with him?

Max’s eyes dart to his left, and it hits him like a freight train.

The person is you.

You, sprawled across the bed, fast asleep, your hair tousled and your face peaceful, completely unaware of his mounting panic.

For a moment, Max just stares, brain failing to catch up.

How did this happen? His head starts swimming. His mouth goes dry. His first thought is that he’s dreaming..except, no.

This is far too real. He’s not that lucky.

“I need to call Daniel..”

[thegeminisage]

squeezing in a little korok hunting before i have to Do Stuff just kidding as soon as i finished typing that i had to get up. but NOW im back to hunting koroks

every day my map opens with everything on as default and i just caught sight of two more gloom spawn points and became Afraid. under one hand it kind of takes the fun out of it if i know Where they are under the other i become extremely terrified of even going NEAR where they are. so.

i did go ahead an enable lynels though because you have to be prepared for that shit and i was very surprised to see there are still quite a few on the surface! incheresting...

absolutely disgusted with my past self for doing SO many shrines without getting the chest. what was she thinking!!! girl you never leave the chest! and since i don't have any fans (i have 2 left but theyre for emergencies only), i can't go in and get them without losing my bike and having to spend zonaite to make a new one...after i finish this section, im tracking some fans down for sure. and THEN im gonna expand my energy wells

aw man the spring of power...i'll never forget the memory from here!!!! i can't go into the quarry tho bc Hands >:(

YOOOOOO this statue also wants to know about the mother statue........

oh shit she wants dinraal's claw........also, canonical dinraal she pronouns. hell yeah

oh um. just kidding! i totally do have to go into the quarry! my bike probably wouldn't be able to get out this tiny hole...

this (dragging the bike everywhere) wouldnt be an issue if i just had more FANS. i have like thirty steering sticks. why am i so short on fans!!

i am Extremely Close to the spawn point adn i am Very scared.

oh you know what i shouldve left a fast travel point at the spring of power...augh, but then i wouldn't have enough to do the other springs and still keep one at the temple of time...nevermind, i guess...

wisdom and courage both have one REALLY close by though...well, whatever. i only need to come back once, probably, and if it gives me more to do i'll lay one then. i don't want to go back near the quarry lol

i REALLY miss urbosa's fury. i don't know how to take out taluses that have a weak point on their back without it. this talus is super weak and yet it's taking forever bc i just can't hand a hit on it!

eventually got it with midiar bullet time bomb arrows. apparently this particular talus was a quest objective!

apparently the lynel in this forest is a normal one...maybe i'll try to fight it

oooh i'm v nervous. snapped a pic and saved just in case

GOT HIM!!!!! easy peasy. i'd hoped i was op for this and i am <3 nice to be op for SOMETHING

lost my bike ;_; i knew it would despawn...i mean i can make another but i'm trying to save my zonaite for batteries!!!

this one precise strike shrine is bullshit. i'm gonna have to get this particular chest later this is making me crazy

oooh using the bike to skip the long walk on the big sand spiral....n*ce

263 seeds!! not bad for just an hour or so

[hawksugarbaby]

Kirishima x reader- Magnum

Smut

Chapter includes: Temp play (cold), blow job, sex in a small Space, slight praise.

After an hour or so in the freezer you were sufficiently cooled down, the hot summers day had gone cold as the sun lowered and you had spent your time teasing kiri. You had also ran out of ice lollies. 

But it was time to get out of the freezer. Because you were surprisingly getting cold, there was only so much your quirk could do especially since you were keeping two people warm, it was more work with the air cooling down. "Can you help me back out?" You asked, flailing your arms over the side of the freezer, It was a little too tall. 

Kiri on the other hand wasn't paying attention. His mind had been wandering for far too long. Popsicles. How dare they make you look so enticing. He couldn't stop the thoughts plaguing his head, and he felt a little guilty thinking such lewd thoughts about you. 

He looked up for a moment, he hadn't realised you were trying to get out the freezer until now when you were in a rather compromising position. You were bent over the side of the freezer your arms dangling and you continued to try to hop over the side. "W-what are you doing?" His face burned red and hot, images getting more vivid the longer he stared. "Trying to get out of this freezer, its getting kinda cold"

Suddenly his confidence grew 3x what it was, he stood up and you sighed thankfully expecting him to help you out. Instead he grabbed your hips pulling you back into the freezer and sat down again "I could warm you up?" He whispered lowly into your ear sending shivers down your spine that you knew weren't from the cold.

"H-how do you plan on that?" Despite your best efforts of sounding alluring it came out a mess. You chewed on your lip, your ragged breaths coming out foggy and your heart hammered in your chest. He shifted you so you were straddling his lap and your face erupted in flames feeling the hard tent in his jeans. How hadn't you noticed that before? It should have been VERY obvious.

He hadn't spoke, he kept his lips clamped shut he tilted your chin up, Your (e/c) eyes met his, the black pupils swallowed the crimson making him look more shark like than ever. He leaned in meeting your soft, warm lips with his icy cold ones. He swiped his tongue (which was even cooler) over your bottom lip asking for entrance and as if under some spell you granted.

Why were his lips so cold? 

You shivered and he pulled away with a grin holding an ice cube between his pointy teeth, it was melting fast and you looked away "where did you even get that? How did I not notice you put that in your mouth?" He shifted, and a bag of ice cubes was propping him up, you had thought the freezer was empty, guess you were wrong but how was he not absolutely frozen. 

Your thoughts didn't seem to matter since he shrugged and pulled you forward locking your lips again, the icy cold cube melting against your tongue, trickling down your throat. You moaned into the kiss as he pulled you deeper under his spell, your hair stood on end, and you had goosebumps all up your arms. He pulled away from your lips and traced kisses down your jaw leaving drops of biting cold water off of his lips on their place. 

"K-kiri what are you doing" you shuddered, his lips travelled further down your neck the ice cube starting to melt rapidly the closer it got to your chest where your fire was stored. It was a strange sensation, the freezing cold felt… good? It was different, very different, but it wasn't at all bad. "Your enjoying this a lot more than i thought you would" he murmured against your neck, he was right about that much You didn't expect this reaction in the slightest!

His shark teeth nibbled along your neck down to your collar bone, occasionally they would accidentally pierce your skin and a pearl of blood would stain the vest he had given you. Hot purple marks littered up your throat and neck, down your shoulders across your chest, competing with the cold kiri was dragging across yor skin. 

"Slow down kiri, i can't be the only one getting attenton" you giggled, so innocent sounding for such a sinful situation. You grinded against him making him groan, the obvious tent in his shorts getting more obvious "is that your quirk at play or are you just happy to see me?" You teased, he rolled his eyes as if he's heard that joke a hundred times before and looks down at you. There's no innocence left in his eyes, they burn with desire and lust while he watches you unbuckle his leather belt and unbutton his constraints.

"No underwear huh? And in shorts too? How brave" you tease when his cock springs out of his shorts, laying flat against his stomach. Your only thoughts are 'Big… Very Big!' Almost on instinct you reach out and wrap your hand around the base of his shaft making him moan out, "i haven't even done anything yet!" You shout, both your faces are bright red and hot, the tips of your ears are burning like someone was holding a lighter to them. Kiri's eyes were squeezed shut as tight as possible, his fists were balled and the bag of ice crunched every time he moved. 

You moved your hand up and down slowly, watching his reddening face intensely. It looked like you were doing everything right, it definitely sounded like you were doing everything right from the tiny grunts escaping his mouth. You picked up your pace drawing a long moan from his throat, and you chuckled "Y-(y/n)" he groaned. Your name sounded so salacious coming from him right now, you weren't sure you could ever fill in another form without hearing kiri in the back of your mind and you wanted desperately to hear more like that. 

You would ignore the heat bubbling in your stomach, your thighs rubbing together for friction, and your now soaked underwear until you could satisfy kiri. You stopped your hand movements eliciting an annoyed growl and you shuffled forward again and sat on your calfs between his thighs. "Kneel" you instructed and he did as he was told. "Y-you don't have to if you don't want to (y/n), we can stop any time just say the word and its done" he said. You grinned contemplating how in the space of an afternoon you went from friends stuck in a freezer to, in a relationship while fucking in the freezer, either way you were glad to have someone so caring now. 

"I know" you grinned. You reached behind him and grabbed an ice cube popping it in your mouth and in an instant it was just cold water sitting on your tongue "just like a popsicle right?" You laughed nervously while kiri laughed genuinely. How in the hell did he find that remotely funny. 

You scooted closer wrapping your hand around the base and wrapped your lips around the head. he let out a high pitched moan, one you would never expect from him and you looked up at him through your eyelashes. His nails were scratching at the silver 'walls' of the freezer and his eyes rolled back the red on his cheeks, impossibility dark and his mouth hung open. "C-cold" he said barely above a whisper. 

You bobbed your head up and down using your hand to get what you couldn't fit. Nothing like a popsicle. “Holy shit” he whispered and without thinking gripped your hair pushing you further down his cock without thinking, making you choke and gag. Your waterline filled with tears a few running down your face leaving red trails “s-sorry” he grunted, you hummed accepting his apology the vibrations driving him crazy. 

You drew your head back watching his face for miniscule reactions, his nose twitching, his lip quivering, his hands tugging your hair and knotting it. You hollow your cheeks as you went taking as much as possible in his mouth when his member twitched, you looked up through your eyelashes "it hasn't even been that long" you said, though it was muffled but he could clearly hear what you were saying "shouldn't you be glad, your the one doing it" he rubbed his hands over the purple map of where he'd been and trailed his hands down squeezing your breast and rolling his thumb over your hard nipple. You couldn't argue with his logic so you used your mouth for other purposes setting out an unrelenting pace. He grunted and whispered curses and praises that bounced around the freezer then into your ears. 

"S-shit (y/n) i'm gonna c-cum" he said, his tone sounded almost embarrassed making you chuckle. You pushed your head forward. You were all the way down when he twitched again, this time cumming into your mouth almost making you choke. You pulled off swallowing what you hadn't and looked up at him with half-lidded eyes and swollen pink lips. you were both panting heavily and suddenly you were being pushed down against the floor of the freezer with your knees bent so you could fit. 

”aw getting impatient are you” you teased, he growled and pushed another ice cube in your mouth, his substitute for a gag even though it would melt in no time but you took it as a sign to shut up. He pulled his wallet from his pocket and fumbled through pulling out a condom and ripping it open with his teeth then rolled it on. 

”you want to do this right?” he asked, the harsh intensity behind his eyes replaced by softness and his hand rested gently on your cheek where you nuzzled into it ”yes. I want this” you assured him. 

Kiri had never cared for foreplay, it was the part he always skipped when watching porn, if he for some reason was reading fanfiction he would skim over it and go to the good stuff, and now in this situation, you were both far too desperate for him to even think about it. He knew you weren't a virgin, everyone knew you weren't, you wore it like a victory badge (some people do. Don't judge) and though he was upset it wasn't him he could never judge you. but God was he about to make you forget anyone else was your first, he would make you feel so good you would never say their name again.

He sucked on your neck adding to the gallery of hickeys trailing his hands down your stomach and pulling your shorts off. "You ready?" He asked and you nodded pointing to the bag of ice cubes. The cold made your heart race and the more you had the slower they melted. He raised his eyebrows, he hadn't expected you to like the ice as much as you had and he was really enjoying it. 

He dragged the bag over propping it up in the corner and put an ice cube in his mouth, you glared about to get one yourself but the firm "no" from him was enough to make you retract your hand and pray. His icy cold hands held your hips in place and he leaned down kissing you again with his freezing lips drawing a moan from you. "You make such pretty noises (y/n), you should do it more often" he mumbled biting your bottom lip gently. 

You whined desperately and he smirked "okay okay" he lined up with your entrance and pushed in. Your eyes rolled back and you bit back a moan. "Holy fuck" kiri grunted staying in one place "are you okay?" He asked. You nodded rapidly and reached up gripping his shoulder hard. He pulled out and slammed his hips back into you "A-AH KIRI!" You cried digging your nails into his shoulder "you're so gorgeous" he gushed. What a moment to be all sappy. 

He thrust at a relentless pace drawing a moan from you with every movement, You were convinced If you put this on pornhub you would make bank. "Kiri please" you whimpered stretching your arm to the bag of ice that was centimetres out of reach "fine, since you've been so good" he praised and pressed an ice cube against your tongue while his other hand trailed another down your stomach where it melted and dripped off your sides pooling around you. 

"Kiri god im so close please" you begged bucking your hips to meet his. Every time you said his name he went a little more feral and you had officially broke him. He pounded into you at inhuman speed gripping your hips so hard they would definitely bruise and the heat pooling in your stomach reached boiling point. "KIRI!" You screamed arching your back as your orgasm washed over you. Your mouth hung open in a silent scream while he thrusted a few more times until he came too. 

You huffed propping yourself up on your elbows and he pulled out. "That was incredible" you panted. You were a shivering mess, your quirk no longer able to heat you up but there was no way you were walking for hours. "Fuck yeah it was" he grinned switching immediately back to his cheery self "sorry i went to hard didn't I" he kissed the top of your head helping you put your shorts back on which was a very hard task for such a cramped space. "No it was amazing" you grinned trying to pick yourself up but to no avail. "Im really tired now though" you giggled. He nodded picking you up like a gentleman and climbed out of the freezer with ease. 

He carried you to your room and swaddled you in blankets to get the heat flowing through you again and snuggled next to you. "Is it to early to say I love you?" He asked "depends, how long have you loved me For?" "Since first year" he admit "then i'd say no" you nuzzled into him feeling your eyes get heavy and fighting to keep them open "then i love you" he wrapped his arms around you protectively even though there was nothing to protect you from "i love you too eijiro." 

And into a peaceful sleep you sank yet your dreams were far from it

[katytheinspiredworkaholic]

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.

Oooh this is difficult, because I have my fic WIP, and my novel manuscript WIP. Hmm... Okay, if you want to hear the novel manuscript one send me another ask 💕 I'll answer it twice. But for my current WIP, I'm (finally) finishing The Construct of Time, my HotchReid "valentine's day" fic contribution. That has nothing to do with Valentine's day. And will end up being finished by the end of this month, September. I'm a work in progress myself, okay.

Lore, history, details: here we go. I'm doing a STUPID amount of research every single chapter for the smallest things. Pictures of the Smithsonian in the 1920's, the history of alchemy, time travel and science fiction, Enstine's theory of relativity, the invention of the rubix cube, maps of Georgetown from the 1920's, and jazz/big band Spotify playlists are just some of the tabs I have open next to my Googledocs.

Usually when I write I'm watching a Humphrey Bogart movie (alternating between Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon) or The Mummy (1999) -- for the vibes. This fic is a conglomerate of everything I've ever loved all rolled into one, and written way too fast so it's a little too flourishy and melodramatic, but it's so fun.

And it all started with this in my brainstorm notes: (it's going to be different in the story now, because a lot has changed and progressed in the published fic, so it's not technically spoilers anymore)

I want my damn Casablanca moment on a flightline. They stop the shipment/stolen goods/whatever. They are there windswept and looking at each other and Aaron in all his time-period-correct slang says ‘If you were dame, I’d kiss you.’ And Spencer’s soul cracks in his eyes, a broken thing that has him drawing back, and it’s so tragic and heart-breaking Aaron mutters, “To hell with it all.” Tosses his hat, pulls Spencer in so close his spine arches into a dip off his feet, and Aaron kisses the absolute breath out of him. Full on Scarlett O’Hara style. Soft lips and strong mouth, broad hands curving around Spencer’s frame the same moment artisanal, scholar-bound fingers catch and snag in Aaron’s coat and hair. They kiss like the world is ending, like no one is watching, without a care to if either of those things actually happen or not. The music swells, the vignette fades in, I want all the tropey cinematic moments.

Ask Game

[ophiuchus-interactive]

Hi, darling! ❤ "i’m finally ready to be with you, but you’ve finally moved on from me, and i’m too late" please?

Am I gonna regret this? Absolutely.

Oooh!!! Nobody specified means everyone gets some pain!!!

Thank you dearie!!!

(TW: Death, growing old, regret, mention of grief, slight mention of blood)

Valerian-

“Was it worth it?”

It was like an itch.

No matter how many times over the years Valerian fought with himself to ignore your last words to him, he couldn’t. It crept up on him, crawled under his skin like a memory made of carrion beetles and worms. The question wouldn’t die, it decomposed- fertilizing nightmares of days long gone by. It turned his heart rotten.

He wakes up sometimes with his hand reaching out across the bed, the coolness of his empty linens sending Valerian drowning amongst the currents of time and misfortune again. Giving his decision the moniker of “mistake” would hardly encompass how much of a fool he was, how he thought so assuredly he had you, that you had all the time in the world to wait.

Just one more job, he would tell you, one more bounty. And all there would be left for him, was you.

But you were gone. And your words stung and scraped and dug at his skin. And he scratched and scratched and scratched at the fading memory of you.

Peter-

People talk about the five stages of grief like it’s a process, but really, it’s a map. It’s a state you find yourself in, a sick and twisted path of destinations and crossroads that path themselves in and out of hell. You find yourself there. You hardly ever leave. Some people are lucky; some find themselves in acceptance of their loved one’s death. Some lose themselves in their anger. Some people, desperate to cling to the memories, never make it farther than phase one.

Peter’s destination was bargaining. He never got any further than that.

Desperation. Helplessness. Despite any and all appearances of the cheery, capable man, you saw more in your time with him than most. And he was hurt.

Peter tried many times to get through these feelings, the past clawing at his heart and mind, ripping- always ripping- him back to where he left off. He was so beside himself in his worry for you every time you got hurt, there were times you thought it better to not go home at all. If only to quell the pain. If only to stop his hurt.

And maybe it was bad. Bad to let him go like you did. But how much more could you stomach watching him hurt? Ghosts haunting him, tormenting him, his face twisting at the sight of you coming out of a battle alive.

Be okay, for me. Please be okay.

You hated promises you couldn’t keep.

You hated the thought of breaking his heart even further, if one night you came home, and you weren’t okay.

Rosalie-

Love isn’t perfect. It was an epiphany she had working on a dock, years after she’d left you. She was older, wiser, but still remembers you the way she liked you best: smiling. Your voice had faded from her memory, your words probably twisted by time, but it was your smile that she recalled with perfect detail. It was good, this way. Better.

Rosalie tries not to think about the moments where it wasn’t flawless, and always to her surprise, those memories are nothing more than blunt daggers in her mind. Tears, anger, regret- those feelings surface, dull and subdued, but they don’t affect her the same way it does with your smile.

Where did it all go wrong?

Rosalie doesn’t know. She doesn’t expect it, either. She broke her finger slamming her hammer down, missing the nail when she came to this realization. The shattering sound of her ring finger was a dull, monotone noise compared to the blood that rushed in her ears;

Did I not try hard enough?

It was you, smiling. The crystal clear sound of your laughter. The mute sounds of your anger- the blurry visions of your tears. Faded arguments. Jokes that sound so familiar. Her memories weren’t perfect. Her love for you wasn’t, either.

But it was real.

Real like the fractured bits of bone and knuckle. Real like her scream. Real like the hot, furious tears that poured down her face, the pain- the pain.

Intangible. Imperfect.

Like her memories of you.

Thane-

“You’re lucky you’re not dead, you know,” Thane’s voice was steady, like scolding was part of his profession, “if they were any closer to you-”

“I know,” You say, your eyelids slamming shut. You did your best to hide your frustration, lest Thane suddenly decides he was going to start bitching to you about that, too, “but I’m alive. It’s fine,”

“It’s reckless,” He corrects, and the familiar feeling of your heart dropping to your stomach throws you off. You were over him. His words shouldn’t sting this much anymore.

“Foolish, really,” Thane continues, and his cold, sterile needle seems bury itself deeper into your skin, “but, given your proclivities for practically throwing yourself at death’s doorstep, I’m not surprised,”

You scoff, throwing back your head in disbelief. Is he being serious?

“I jumped in front of the damn gun because you weren’t moving fast enough! Any slower, Thane, and you would’ve been dead.”

He stops. The needle sat still against your skin. The sutures pulled taut- your wound was almost closed.

“What?”

“He was aiming for your effin’ head,” You spit, tired, tired of the damn man in front of you. Never so much as a thank you for the amount of times you saved his ass, and he’s still giving you shit? Still grating on your fucking nerves?

“I…” He sucks in a breath, “I didn’t know that,”

“No shit,” You huff, “you never do.”

That seems to be enough to snap Thane back out of his daze. His piercing, cold eyes met yours, and you were surprised to see that they seem to mirror your irritation. Your fury,

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

That you're loved, you fool. I loved you.

Why couldn’t you see that?

Why couldn’t you see me?

There was so much at that moment you wanted to say, so many words that turned stale on your tongue. It was bitter, finally seeing the realization on his face, to watch those very lips that you’d only dreamt of tasting, turn until tight, thin frown. Confusion and worry and shock painted his face a pale, pinkish gray. It was the color, you realized, of regret.

Of his regret. Not yours.

Ophelia-

When Ophelia found your first gray hair, she almost cried.

It’s started. The clock is ticking.

You soothed her horror with laughter, plucking the strand of hair straight from your head and throwing it to the side, like it was garbage. Trash.

“You stress me out,” You say with a laugh, and Ophelia finds it in herself to smile. She doesn’t notice at first, how the laugh lines deepen.

You complained of pains in your back. Your hips. Riding a horse has become too much of a pain for long distance travel.

Your head of hair is now silver. Ophelia pays the color little mind.

She insists on riding into town herself more and more, much to her quiet, naked distress.

You slap her shoulder playfully, shrugging off your discomfort like you were twenty-three again,

“And miss out on the candy restock? Perish the thought.”

Ophelia now loves the contoured lines of your face. You’ve laughed a lot. It’s pretty.

You sit at home now, keeping your hands busy as best you can.

Ophelia does her best to ignore the gossip in town. She’s older, and yet they call you the pervert.

Does she really look so young? Has she really not changed? Will there be no sign of growing old with you?

You smiled sadly as she said these things late one night. She’d be crying again,

“Be still, my heart. I am always with you.”

She misses it.

She left for town only a day ago. The tulips were in bloom. Ophelia thought it a good idea to surprise you.

Doc greeted her in town. He shook his head, eyes cast to the ground.

The tulips were ruined in her haste, and Ophelia cried herself into exhaustion.

It was a terrible day. A feather unnoticed on her neck, had turned a light shade of gray.

Javier-

Javier was cold. Dying was a frigid feeling.

His chest heaved slow, shallow breaths. With each rise and fall of his chest, he could feel his own blood fill up his lungs, his own chest caving in. Dying was an uncomfortable feeling.

He held your hand like it was his lifeline. Javier didn’t want to look in your eyes again, he knew the light was gone.

“Re-remember when,” he starts, and the force of his breath alone causes him to gag and heave. For a brief second, he wonders if this was it- he couldn’t even say goodbye, before he said hello again. Javier was okay with that. But his breathing slows and calms down, and it was enough for him to start again,

“R-remember when I first met you?” It was a favorite of his; you looked so wild back then, so free. Years have passed and times have changed, you along with it, but the way you looked then?

It made him believe in such a thing called love.

Javier tries to laugh, but it comes out as a choked, wet cough. His hand still held onto yours tightly,

“...you...made me feel alive. And...and scared, a-and brave, and- oh, god, I love you. I-I love you.”

Javier took a breath. Dying was a tiring feeling.

He held your hand. Dying was a lonely feeling.

But he’s coming, and he’s sorry that he’s so late.

Sergio-

“Thank you,”

He laughs. It’s a hollow sound. Sergio was three fingers deep into his rye when you finally spoke up, and of course, it makes him laugh,

“Is that what divorced people say to each other? Thank you?”

You shrug, gulping down a glass of your own poison. Divorce decrees took more out of you than gunfights. Is it any wonder why one happens more than the other?

“You were my husband,” You say quietly, your eyes never meeting him, “You loved me, for better or worse...thank you, for that.”

“You’re an amazing person,” Sergio says without hesitation. His fingers were cold as he clutched his whiskey glass, raising it high into the air, “I...I mean that. Truly.”

What more was I to do, if not love you?

You smile, gulping down your sorrows, lest they escape your lips. Crying was for later. You’re saying goodbye, now.

“I, ahem,” Sergio clears his throat, his free hand going to wipe his reddened eyes, “I hope that whoever they are, they treat you good and proper, and that you are loved…” He pauses, “...that you are loved, as I’ve loved you.”

Say it more. Mean it. Husband, what words are these, when I’m no longer meant for them?

“I don’t hate you, Sergio,” You blurt, and they were words that demand repeating, “but this...I’m not...we, we’re not-”

They are only meant for you.

“-I know,” Sergio says, giving a wave of his hand, “I know. And thank you,”

“For?”

“For allowing me to love you,” Sergio says unevenly, and he takes a moment more to finish his drink.

????/Hope-

So this is agony.

Another’s hand upon your cheek.

You looked happy in their arms. You wore the same smile that made them realize what love was for the first time- what it could truly mean. Those feelings only grew inside them as time went on, bright and fluttering and bursting, so this is love.

It felt good.

But you never gave them that look you’re giving your lover, now. There’s no light in your eyes when your gaze finds them- you grin, you always grin, but it’s the same look you give Valerian and Peter.

It hurts. But why?

They should be happy for you- you're happy. You have someone to love. If this is what you’re feeling, being in your lover’s arms…?

They’ll have Rosalie run a diagnostic on their systems- surely this is a glitch that needs to be fixed. If you’re happy, they’re happy. Rosalie can fix this pain, and Hope will be normal again.

It hurts, being like this.

[ultraintrovertedgryffindor]

Sweet Pandemonium - Gally (The Maze Runner) Part 2 of 16

(Not my GIF)

~~~~~~~~~~

Everything started to spiral out of control when a new Greenie came up in the Box, Thomas.

You didn’t know him, but you felt connected to him somehow. Why? You had no clue. It’s almost driving you crazy that you can’t place why you felt this way, and if you were being honest, it almost scared you.

Thomas felt this way as well. He felt that same type of connection to you. He never spoke of it for the sake of him sounding crazy, well, even more crazy than everyone else already thought him to be.

All it took was a simple glance in each other’s direction to realize you and Thomas felt the same way about each other.

“Y/N!”

Gally’s irritated tone snapped you out of your daze. “Sorry, what?”

Gally rolled his eyes. “That’s the third time you’ve dozed off today. Get it together, will ya? This shack needs to be built and I don’t feel like getting scolded by Alby because you didn’t do your part.”

You tried not to blush as the rest of the Builders looked at you with amusement, probably glad that they’re not getting yelled at for once.

Gally noticed your eyes traveling to the other Builders and huffed. “Get back to work, you shanks!”

You almost could’ve laughed at how fast they went back to work because they were pretty much scared of the boy.

“What’s up with you today, huh?” Gally asked, surprising you with his slightly softer tone.

You sighed, biting your lip in thought. “I don’t know. I guess it’s just one of those days.” You lied, partly. You truly didn’t know why you felt the way that you did, but had a feeling it was because of the new Greenie. But you didn’t need Gally to know that, especially after he’s expressed so many times about how he didn’t like Thomas.

Yeah...he didn’t need to know.

Gally raised his brow, clearly not buying her reasoning, but he decided not to push it. “Well, just, get back to work, okay?”

“For sure, Captain.” You fake saluted, a teasing smile tugging at the corners of your mouth.

Gally rolled his eyes as he shook his head, struggling to hide a smile. “Shut up. Just get building.”

You sighed as you sat down in your hammock in the Homestead, relieved to have finished that new shack for the Slicers by sundown. After that talk with Gally, you made sure to focus extra hard and you managed to do more work than you thought you were capable of.

Your muscles ached badly. You needed a shower asap.

You tried not to scream when you bumped into a Glader, realizing it was just Thomas. “Oh, hey, Greenie.” You chuckled breathlessly.

Thomas’ face visibly from relaxed to one of irritation. “I have a name, you know.”

“Right. Right. Sorry. Guess I’m just happy that I’m not the one being called that anymore.” You chuckled, clearing your throat seconds after. “I was just heading to the showers so...”

Thomas blinked rapidly, quickly moving out of your way with a slight blush dusting his face. “Uh, Y/N?” He voiced, causing you to look back up to him with a smile. You noticed Thomas’ face contorting in thought. “Uh, sorry. Never mind.”

Before you could say anything, Thomas walked off in a hurry, causing you to tilt your head in confusion. But the aching muscles in your arms and legs begging for the coldness of the shower water caused you to shrug it off quicker than you normally would.

You tossed and turned that night, which was unusual as you normally were able to fall asleep in a matter of minutes.

You felt like you woke up as soon as you fell asleep, the opening of the maze doors woke you from a less than pleasant dream. Yet again, the dream you had left your memory as soon as it appeared. The one thing attaching itself to you from the dream was a face. Thomas’ face.

You groaned as the rest of the Gladers started to get up for the day, knowing that you must’ve gotten an hour of sleep, if even that. You just accepted that it was probably going to be a shit day.

The Builders didn’t have much to do surprisingly, only needing to touch up a few things. But you absolutely didn’t mind the shorter work day, having the night that you had made it difficult to focus on anything. Even Gally’s pretty face.

Still, you didn’t want to be a useless shank. So, against your better judgement, you decided to help out Newt, Zart, and Thomas in the gardens.

You were tired as hell, but you wanted to talk to Thomas eventually, and befriending him felt like the best way to go about doing so. Plus, Newt was an absolute delight to be around.

“Eyo, Y/N.” Newt smiled, “Gally finally given ya a break?”

You laughed softly. “Nah, just a smaller work load today.”

Newt nodded. “Because you work so hard, no doubt. Things are gettin’ built a lot faster ever since you came up, love.”

You rolled your eyes playfully and grabbed a little basket to help pick off some ripe fruit. “I’m just good at following orders, if that’s something to be proud of.”

Newt chuckled. “You give about as many orders as Gally does nowadays. If anything, you seem to be partners.”

You knew Newt probably didn’t realize his phrasing, but it still made you blush nonetheless. “Gally’s an asshole.” Thomas muttered out.

You tried not to laugh loudly. “He has his moments, for sure.”

“Gally’s an alright bloke, he just has issues with change. He’ll warm up to ya eventually. He even avoided Y/N the first week and a half she got here. It’s just how he is.” Newt said.

“You seem close with him now.” Thomas said, looking at you.

You shrugged. “Uh, I’d say we’re friendly. Well, I guess my definition of friendly anyway.”

“Do us a favor, get us some more fertilizer.” Newt asked Thomas.

“Uh, sure. Where is it again?”

“Show him, will ya, Y/N?” Newt asked.

“Yeah, sure.” You nodded. “Let’s go, Greenie.”

“You really think Gally’ alright?” Thomas asked once you both got a few meters into the woods.

“Yeah, I think so. Like Newt said, he’s just scared of change. I think it’s understandable when you live in a box that you can never leave, unless you wanna get horrifically murdered by Grievers.”

“When you put it like that, then yeah. I guess change would be pretty scary.” Thomas paused, “I just, I don’t understand how you guys have been here for three years without making any progress.”

“You’re acting like it’s easy, Thomas. I’m no Runner, but I can tell how hard it is to run a changing maze every single day, having to map it, fearing for your life in the process.”

Thomas stayed silent after that, only speaking up when you both passed the Deadheads. “Who was George?” He asked.

You shrugged. “I wasn’t around when he died. He was the first one to get stung by a Griever from what Newt told me...he wasn’t too eager to talk about him anymore after that.”

“Y/N?” Thomas started, “I don’t really know how else to put this without sounding crazy but...I feel like I know you from somewhere. I know how it sound but-”

The look on you face stopped Thomas from speaking any further. You couldn’t even describe how you were feeling. Almost like relief, but fear, all meshed together in some sort of weird understanding. “You feel that way too?”

A sudden snap of a twig caused the moment between you and Thomas to end abruptly, you both twisting around to see another Glader. “Ben?” Thomas asked.

You eyed the Glader up and down, noticing how frightening he looked. Black and purple veins protruding out all over his body. His eyes red, almost bloodshot. His heavy threatening gaze on you and Thomas.

He had been stung.

You never saw how anyone looked after being stung, not really. You imagined horrible things, things more horrible than how Ben looked now. But seeing him like that disturbed you to no end.

“Ben...” You said slowly. “Are you okay?”

Ben grunted in response, looking in between you and Thomas like he couldn’t decide who to look at. “You did this.” He whispered harshly.

You brows furrowed in confusion. “What? What do you mean?”

“You did this.” Ben raised his voice. “I saw you. Both of you! This is your fault!”

You gasped when Ben suddenly charged at you and Thomas. All the breath being knocked out of your lungs when he body slammed you into the ground.

You and Ben struggled on the floor, him quickly gaining the upper hand and placing his hands firmly on you throat. “Get off her, man!” Thomas yelled, tackling Ben off of your smaller body.

You coughed violently, gasping for oxygen as the pressure on your windpipe finally disappeared as Thomas saved you from being choked to death.

You looked around to see Thomas hit the infected Glader with an animal skull just in time, him quickly pushing a now disoriented Ben off of him and soon helping you to your feet. “Go, go!” Thomas yelled in your ear.

You didn’t have to be told twice.

You and Thomas took off in a sprint, adrenaline pumping through your veins as you feared of being caught by the fellow Glade member. The confusion taking a hold of your mind as you ran, still having no idea why Ben seemed so hateful towards you and Thomas.

Thankfully, you didn’t have to think about it anymore. Ben ultimately catching up to you both due to his Runner status and tackling you and Thomas down a hill.

You groaned in pain, feeling your body topple over and landing on your arm painfully.

Thomas, yet again, helped you get to your feet, making sure you didn’t get left behind. You yelped in pain as he grabbed your now aching arm, pulling you along as he yelled for help as loud as he could.

You almost felt relieved when you saw the Gladers running to your aid, but it was short lived.

Ben grabbed your bad arm and pulled you back, making you fall on your back, but he still went after Thomas first. “Hey!” Newt’s voice filled the air, then a sickening thump, Ben immediately falling to the ground.

Newt quickly ordered the Gladers to hold down the struggling boy, Thomas quickly rushing over to you. “Oh shit, are you okay?”

You nodded, sitting up with a painful groan. You looked down at your arm to see it bruised and bloody, short jagged cuts deep in her skin.

Ben screamed bloody murder over and over again, so loud and animalistic that it even your throat hurt, even though it already hurt from being choked before.

After being taken to the other Med-jacks, it didn’t take for Gally to barge into the room, an almost angry look on his face. “How’s Ben?” You asked.

Gally could’ve scoffed at the question. Obviously Ben wasn’t okay, but you asking about him first was the reason he could’ve thrown a fit. He had seen you at the scene, wanting so badly to go to your aid first, but he needed to help the Gladers get Ben to the Pit. “Seriously? How are you? You were hurt.”

“She’s fine.” Jeff answered for you. “A sprain, and some marks from Ben’s nails.”

Gally would’ve sighed in relief, if Thomas wasn’t there too. “Why were you even with that shank anyway?” He asked, acting like Thomas wasn’t even there.

“What? Just because you don’t like him, that means I can’t hang out with him?” You sassed.

Gally glared at you and Thomas. “Ben’s gonna get banished at sundown. Do me a favor and stay away until it’s over.”

You rolled your eyes as Gally exited the room, trying not to cry at the thought of a Glader getting sent to their death. “What, banished?” Thomas asked you.

You closed your eyes with a heavy sigh. “You know there’s cure for getting stung...it would be too dangerous to keep him here.”

Thomas quickly left the room, probably leaving to see what was going to happen to poor Ben.

At first, when Gally told you to keep away from the banishment, it just made you want to go just to spite him. But you had seen a banishment before, and it was horrible. It still haunted your dreams sometimes. You really didn’t feel like reliving that again, so you listened.

That, of course, didn’t stop you from finding Gally after the fact.

“Hey...” You said softly, running up to Gally to walk with him to the wall of names.

Gally didn’t say anything, he just kept his gaze ahead of him. You knew he was hurting. Ben was his friend after all. You looked down at his hand that wasn’t carrying a torch, and your hand twitched forward, gently grabbing his large hand.

You could sense that Gally tensed at first, but he didn’t pull away. Instead, he squeezed you hand, letting you know it was okay.

“Hold this please.” Gally said, barely a whisper, handing over his torch to you.

You held the torch up as Gally reached up, placing his chisel at Ben’s name to cross his name out.

Another day, another death.

“I’m sorry, Gally.” You whispered, placing a gentle hand on his board shoulder.

Gally simply nodded, giving you a weak smile as he walked away, leaving you at the wall with only the torch as your light in the growing darkness.

~~~~~~~~~~

[yourcoolfriendwithallthecandy]

Magic and Miracles and BEYOND Chapter 14

Ya'll, when I say, that the writer's block for this story practically parked it's 18 wheeler sized ass in front of me, like a boulder on a mountain road AND THERE WAS NO WAY AROUND IT, to the point that I didn't know if I ever would get to write it again and I had to take a break for...way too fucking long. Also- for the record, all of this still happens in my head in 2018, you know, when I started writing this story, because BY GOD, all these characters should have had their weddings and a small piece of happily ever after BEFORE COVID comes to fuck everyone over. But Hazel's dress, that's still 2022 Pnina Tornay, it's a fantasy story, I'm fudging the timeline, a little. Also Hazel's engagement ring? Chocolate diamond. She's a foodie. It made sense.

Also, Yes, I do realize that I am face casting Alex Pettyfer twice. The first was as modern Ravus Nox Flueret, and then...as Dash Parr in my modern Incredibles AU Why So Jaded. Look, I just adore the guy ok? He's...incredibly good looking and talented, and HOT. They don't happen in the same alternate universe, it's fine, it's fine.

Anyway, so back to the road block, sorry, detour, anyway, so then, tragedy struck in my personal life, ok several tragedies kind of piled up all at once it felt like and shook me to my core, and suddenly those earthquakes, knocked that boulder off the road and opened up the creative roadway to this story again, then I wrote something truly horrific for this particular story. AND IT'S AWESOME, like it's brutal, will reach inside and grab your heart, put it into a blender before handing it back to you as you cry and say thank you, kind of awesome, so angsty.

But, I couldn't just...post it and not keep wrapping up other character's story lines because this was still "everyone needs to find their happily ever after" foundations laid. So. What that did, was give me a "if you want this- angsty thing to happen, how do you get the story from here to there, now that you don't have this fucking boulder in the way." and my brain finally went "I got it! TREDD IS AN ASSHOLE" and boom, problem solved. See I had- most of the components to this particular chapter, already written and mentally mapped out and planned out but the "go juice" to write it was empty.

But Tredd, lovable, asshole Tredd, gave me what I needed. I don't even know if I should tag who I used to tag...however long ago I used to post chapters to this story or if they have all changed their usernames and stuff or if any of them are still interested. But you know what? I'm gonna post it anyway. So enjoy.

Also, @the-immortal-marshal, thanks for sticking with me and hanging in there, THE PAIN IS COMMING NEXT CHAP. ENJOY the last moment of "peace and happiness where everything is perfect and nothing hurts" while it lasts.

Magic and Miracles and BEYOND

Chapter 14

“Hello Behbehs!” Selena cooed when she came home from school to her dogs and Duchess who eagerly greeted her before she got all the packages from the little stylish boxes she built out of pallets to create a little place for packages to be stored on her front porch before she and Ravus could get home and get them in their apartment.

“Ah thank goodness.” Selena breathed in relief when a couple of them were those pre prepared meal kits. Because with both her and Ravus being in school and both of them working too, they rarely had a chance to go grocery shopping anymore and the meal kits were a healthy alternative to fast food and surprisingly less expensive than take out and right now they were still in their “try everything once to find our favorites” stage. But Selena barely had them all unpacked and put away by the time her phone chimed.

‘Hope you had a good day today Darling’ Ravus texted when his phone chimed that she had made it home.

‘It’s been fine, busy, how about yours?’ Selena texted back.

‘Not great, I’ll be happy to call it a day soon.’ Ravus texted back as Selena frowned at her phone before she got an idea and raced up the stairs to get dressed in more business formal attire that was clearly flirtatious that covered up some ridiculously sexy lingerie and some really good ‘fuck me’ heels and put on some makeup and put her hair up in a quick bun then quickly left their apartment to go to Miracles Hospital where she parked next to Ravus’ car and purposefully strutted into the offices, using the badge keycard Sylva had made for her to get in before she made a B-Line for Ravus’ temperoary office while his was under construction before she checked in with Kathryn to make sure he was alone in his office before she opened his office door and struck a pose in his door frame with a smoldering look and a mischevious smirk on her lips that had Ravus’ jaw dropping to the floor at the vision she was.

“Hey. What are you doing here? Is there a problem with…?” Ravus began to ask as she closed the door, locked it then sauntered up to him and straddled his lap before she kissed him passionately as he eagerly held her and pulled her to himself as he kissed her back with equal passion that had Ravus thanking God that he put such an amazing, wonderful and sexy as hell woman in his life that could give him the one thing he wanted that he knew money could never buy- her love, priceless and perfect as it was. And with her love came devotion, loyalty, honesty, faithfulness and right now- desire and it was his life’s goal to make himself as desirable to her as he could possibly be because being the object of her affection was all he could ever want and he wanted her to feel as lucky that she had him for a partner- that he felt about her.

“How’s your day now?” Selena purred when they broke for air.

“Ah-amazing, I can’t, can’t complain.” Ravus answered truthfully, his mind desperate in it’s grasping for coherent thought as he was completely blown away and delighted by her little surprise visit as his hands traveled down her body, appreciating every nuance and curve she had.

“Good, now do you want to fuck me here or in the sleep studies wing, in the car or at home?” Selena asked and watched as he swallowed thickly as his own eyes grew a dark stormy gray with lust.

“Is there an ‘all of them’ option?” Ravus returned which made Selena smile brighter as he quickly hiked up her skirt the rest of the way to reveal that she had not been wearing underwear but was wearing thigh highs attached to a matching green silk garter belt ,which were his favorite kind of stockings as his cock tried to break through his pants trying to get into her as he gasped and ‘oohed’ in surprise and delight as she made quick work of his pants and underwear before she managed to seat herself onto him as he let his chair lean back and rest on a filing cabinet so they wouldn’t crash backwards and also so that Selena could ride him as hard as she wanted to without hurting anything as she opened up his silk dress shirt so that his chest and neck were bared to her before he yanked down her shirt and undid her bra so that her breasts, which had been pushed up to show her amazing cleavage before- were now bared to him in turn as he suckled as his hands went to her hips to guide her over him and when his other hand reached down to stroke her clit with practiced ease as he whispered some absolutely filthy things to her in French which he had discovered could get Selena all riled up and to hear and see and feel that was like a drug to him.

Selena could feel her orgasm approaching as her body and mind were in absolute bliss and to hear Ravus whisper, moan and growl in her ear in between kissing and licking and playfully biting every inch of skin he could reach as he drove up into her as hard as he could and rub her clit just right. Not too hard, not too fast, but as if he was delicately conjuring her soul through her pussy was the greatest pleasure she had ever known and she didn’t care what he was saying to her in French, but the way he said it, the way it rolled off of his very gifted tongue and the way he could enrapture her mind, body and soul so easily, as easy as he breathed and leave her so desperate for him, desperate for more. Just one more touch, one more kiss, one more thrust, one more profession of love, of promise, of adoration, everything. How she was his everything and how he was going to love her and cherish her for as long as he lived and she had the utmost faith in every word. And she knew that she was going to love him for the rest of hers. She didn’t care if he lost his fortune or the hospital or anything. She would keep him and he would keep her. And that would be all that mattered.

In rapid succession Selena came, her shuddering cry of bliss was the most perfect sound in Ravus’ ears as he smiled victoriously that he was able to give her the greatest pleasure possible before Ravus’ own face scrunched up as he came himself, a grunting, hissing moan. His cock throbbing but since his injections, there were no loads, other than an extra load of precum before they both collapsed in the chair as they held each other as Selena let her head rest on his shoulder as they recovered.

Selena traced random designs on his skin around his chest hair that was starting to fill in nicely along with more muscle mass that had started to build just in the last few months since he graduated highschool and gotten back from the most epic summer vacation. It was as if he was a late bloomer. All the bulky muscle he had always wanted was finally filling in the way he wanted it to and he was having to buy new suits and shirts because his old ones no longer fit him the way he wanted them to, but thankfully that glorious cock of his stayed the same, much to Selena’s utter and complete delight.

The only thing that hadn’t grown was thankfully his feet so that meant the man didn’t need to buy new shoes. Which was his own guilty pleasure and obsession, especially dress shoes. While they had gone cross country all summer, he and Luche would hit up all the thrift stores and speciality shops looking for old shoes to restore and when they had been in L.A. They had hit the mother load. All these places that had all the shoes from the old stars of hollywood, whether they became famous or infamous or never even made it on the map. But their very expensive and very good quality shoes were left behind. One shop in particular was run by a couple of older gentlemen that were so happy to see some younger guys were into this kind of thing that they gave them the deals of a lifetime and even Tredd and of course Ignis came along and between Ravus and Ignis, Luche and Tredd got quite the crash course education on shoes, in particular old dress shoes as the four of them practically bought the store out and had to ship out most of them back home because they wouldn't fit with their former travel plans. Ravus and Ignis were the way about shoes the same way some women were about fashion and purses.

Of course that wasn't the only "obsession" Ravus and Ignis had shared with Luche and Tredd, Ravus' mother and of course his grandparents were avid fountain pen collectors and when Sylva's parents had passed, they went over her parent's very, very extensive fountain pen collection that was in the thousands of pens large, Ravus insisted that about two dozen of them go directly to Selena so she could "impress" her more "financially affluent" clients she was starting to get as Sylva happily let those precious few go to Selena, then the rest were picked through by Sylva, Lunafreya who was also an avid fountain pen enthusiast as well as Ravus and Ignis who then coached Luche and Tredd of all people who showed an interest in what he called "rich people shit", just like jewels, yahts, jets, shoes and the like, which amused Sylva who humored him enough to go through what made a good fountain pen and what made different pens valuable and what the more "famous" or well known "name brands" were and what inks were best for which pens and corralating inks to the pens themselves as Luna did the same thing with Selena so that Ravus could coach Luche through the same thing too as the rest were divided evenly and "put away" so that they could become an "inheritance" for the next generation.

Meanwhile Ravus wasn’t the only one who had gone through some changes over the course of the summer and now fall, Selena too seemed to fill in quite nicely, she had gained some weight over the summer, her hips had filled out and her derriere had plumped out and her breasts had grown, filled in and rounded out and while she had gone up a few dress sizes, Ravus couldn’t be happier about the developments. Like she had transformed from lithe teen to full blown woman and he was all too happy to replace every piece of clothing in her wardrobe so that she was comfortable and could embrace her current body.

And with Selena landing what in her opinion was the dream job at Fosters as a junior designer and was currently designing all her friend’s houses as Oak Creek Estates under the supervision of a woman named Samantha Leeds, who had taken Selena under her wing and was showing her the ropes and helping get all the classes at the local college. Selena had had the hardest time understanding CAD but when she finally figured it out. She quickly excelled.

“So what’s going on?” Selena asked after they seemed to recover but were in no need to change their positions or state of partial undress.

“Something stupid in office politics.” Ravus huffed.

“Ok…” Selena urged.

“Some of the board members are getting greedy, in particular Mr. Greed, they look at how much Project Recovery is making them and they’re seeing dollar signs at the other pharma we produce.” Ravus revealed.

“But I thought your mom had a pretty good stance that when it came to life saving drugs like insulin and other medications like it- that you put a cap on all those so they’re affordable to everyone.” Selena frowned.

“She did, but the other board members see Luche and I coming onto the board and think they can get to us and pit us against mother or pit us against each other- thinking their greed is going to be contagious or something or that we’re too young to know what we’re talking about and too inexperienced to have valid opinions.” Ravus grumped before he kissed her forehead sweetly, grateful he could bare his heart and soul like this to her so freely.

“Well that’s not going to work right?” Selena said as she raised her head to fix him with a look.

"No, it's just frustrating to deal with until they retire, although I can’t imagine dealing with Roman or Ainsley is going to get any better, all I hear is ‘chip off the old block’ when Rob talks about them." Ravus shook his head.

"Is there any way we can get Mr. Greed to retire early? Get some peace before Roman and Ainsley come on board or is it not just Mr. Greed that’s giving you all the headaches?" Selena hoped.

"I wish it was just him. But it’s not. It just...comes with the territory. Besides if there was a way to make Mr. Greed and the others to retire early, I'm pretty sure my mother would have done it already. They've been thorns in her sides most of her life and they’re proving to be thorns in ours as well." Ravus mused as Selena frowned deeper.

“Don’t worry about it, it’s not your problem to fix, but thank you for listening.” Ravus thanked her gratefully as he held her comfortably in his arms. “And thank you for this, this was the best surprise.” He smiled appreciatively as he nuzzled her face with his.

“You’re welcome.” Selena smiled happily.

“Hey you wanna go out to dinner?” Ravus asked hopefully. “We could see if Lu and Ada wanted to join us?” He asked.

“Sure,” Selena nodded as she and Ravus worked on getting straightened up as Selena pulled her dress down a bit more so it was a bit more modest and pinned the top up to a much more modest height and by the time they got squared away and unlocked the door they saw Ada coming out of Luche’s office dressed similarly to Selena and Luche himself had the same love drunk smile Ravus was wearing.

“Hey,” Selena greeted as both Selena and Ada blushed before they looked pointedly at each other’s shoes then back up to each other before they both tried to stifle their giggles because they both knew exactly why the other was wearing those heels as they beamed knowingly at each other.

“Dinner?” Ravus asked as he self consciously smoothed his hair as Luche did the same as Luche gave Ada a questioning look and smiled when she eagerly nodded her head.

“Oh yeah.” Luche agreed before they all hopped into Ravus’ new Land Rover and drove to the restaurant that piqued their interest and hunger.

“So how’s the wedding planning going?” Ravus asked Luche while they looked at the menus.

“Good, still deciding on invitations, although we've narrowed it down to three different choices.” Luche answered.

“We did agree to use the same venue Sylva used when she got married.” Ada revealed.

“Yeah, that’s the same venue we decided on too.” Selena smiled happily.

“Do you have any ideas what dress you’d want?” Selena asked.

“Actually yeah.” Ada nodded as she scooted closer to Selena in the booth to show her the dresses she had found on Pintrist.

“Oooh, I like that one.” Selena agreed.

“It’s just going to be a challenge to find one that doesn’t drown me out. Because I’m so short and petite, but I don’t want to walk down the aisle in like 7 inch heels just to not trip over the dress.” Ada confessed as Ravus nearly lost it Luche’s grin as he had that ‘I wouldn’t mind’ kind of expression.

“Are you excited to go back to Kleinfelds?” Selena asked.

“Very much so, I’m already packed.” Ada confessed.

That weekend, the whole crew went back to Klinefelds for Ada to do her dress shopping. As Sylva made sure that Ada’s parents and Luche’s parents were in the middle couch while the boys made sure to keep Luche preoccupied while all the girls happily rallied around Ada as they all had their own ideas of what Ada should wear while Morgan got Sylva’s picks and other dresses into the room.

“Ok, this is Crowe’s pick.” Morgan said as she brought Ada out in the first dress.

“Aww,” they all awwed.

“You’re drowning in it though Love.” Ada’s mother noted as others kind of grimaced and nodded in agreement.

“So what do you love about this dress?”

“I love the bling, I love the tiered layers, it’s just a little too poofy.” Ada offered Morgan.

“Ok, so let’s try again, we’ll be right back.” Morgan offered the crew.

“Ok, so this is a mermaid, fit and flare,” Morgan announced as she brought Ada back out.

“It looks amazing, I just can’t really move because it’s so restrictive.” Ada realized as the rest of her family put in their 2 cents about it before she was back and tried even more, trying on her mom’s picks, Linda’s picks then finally getting to Sylva’s picks but Sylva made sure that Morgan didn’t tell Ada that they were her pick’s and instead urged Morgan to introduce them as her picks before sneaking one into Morgan’s hands that was brand new that had not been there when they had been there last.

Ada softly gasped when she saw it, it was perfect, it had the tiered layers but it also had lace and glitter and just a little bit of everything. It was perfect and when she put it on, she couldn’t help but cry. It was a soft, blushed ivory. It complemented her red hair and her skin tone gorgeously. She felt like a proper bride in this and she could see in her mind- so clearly- how Luche would probably cry tears of happiness if he saw her in this. This was it, this was the one.

“There’s that smile.” Morgan grinned victoriously as she looked at Ada in the mirror after she cinched the corset back closed and got it looking like Ada was born into this dress.

“This is it, even if all of them hate it, this is it.” Ada insisted.

“Well then let’s show them.” Morgan insisted.

Everyone could tell that Ada’s smile practically came from her toes, she was practically glowing with happiness as Sylva got choked up which caused Linda and Ada’s mom Amelia to start crying as all the girls started gasping and cooing before Morgan happily snagged an appropriate veil and put it on her and that’s when they were all practically sobbing.

“It’s perfect Love, absolutely perfect. It has those tiers that you love and the lace is so romantic.” Amelia cried as she squeezed her husband- Richard’s hand who was also getting choked up as they passed a box of tissues down the line.

“You look stunning Ada, really, just perfectly beautiful.” Linda praised as she had already made her peace with Ada being a daughter in law.

“And it still has enough sparkle and glitter to it, that even in low light, you’ll glitter like the jewel you are.” Sylva added.

“So, are you saying yes to the dress?” Morgan asked.

“Yes, I’m saying yes to this dress.” Ada confirmed happily before Amelia got up off the couch and hugged her daughter tightly before her dad hugged her tightly too along with her brother who had also been flown in for the event with his fiance.

A week later, Hazel and Sylva returned to Klinefelds as Sylva had flown out Hazel’s sister Mei and her mother Huan and her dad Tommy along with Titus' mother Helen and Titus’ sister Jenny in for the appointment. Helen and the rest of her family had been all too happy to welcome Hazel into the fold. Once Titus was thirty and then almost 40, Helen gave up on the idea that Titus would ever get married and settle down, especially when the rest of her children were giving her grandchildren at this point but it seemed she was too hasty when Titus finally met Hazel and seemed to get with the program and settle down “properly”.

Meanwhile Huan and Tommy were also over the moon that Hazel was finally settling down and even though Billy wasn’t wild about the age difference at first, the more he and Titus got to know each other, the better they got along, Tommy was happy that Titus made Hazel happy in addition to Titus’ character and stability and profession and Huan was so happy to learn that Titus was a good man, who had a house and was planning on building another with Hazel and when Titus and Hazel adopted Brutus who was Kona, Kahlua and Sasha’s sibling, while Tredd and Stella adopted Brutus’ brother King. To Huan- a grand-dog was close enough to a grandchild, for now. While she was always proud of Hazel for earning her own way though the world and earning enough to take care of them in their retirement, she had been on Hazel since she was in her twenties to have someone take care of her. And it seems Titus had finally come along and to do just that.

“So what are you looking for?” Meredith asked Hazel after everyone had been introduced.

“I’m looking for a very simple, not too many embellishments, comfortable, light weight wedding dress. Titus and I are getting married at the beach next May, right after school lets out, because he is highschool football coach. It’s going to be a very small, intimate wedding with just family and really close friends.” Hazel answered.

“Aww, that’s awesome, is there a price point we’re comfortable with?”

“Ten thousand.” Hazel answered.

“Ooh, more than enough to work with, well let’s go.” Meredith urged as she brought Hazel back into a dressing room to get changed before she went hunting for the perfect dress.

“Simple, light, comfortable.” Meredith echoed over and over again as she combed through the back room, her almost encyclopedic knowledge of the backroom to her aid as she went through all the dresses before she found several that would fit those criteria.

Charlotte came into the bridal shop, a giddy grin on her face as she came and “snuck up” on her family as Sylva turned her head and smiled at the newcomer.

“Surprise!” Charlotte announced to her family.

“Charlie?!” Tommy smiled happily as he got up and gathered up his daughter into his large arms. She may have been a wanted criminal and fugitive, but he was always happy to see her and to him, she would always be his "little Charlie".

“I thought you were overseas?” Tommy asked.

“And miss this? Nah, it’s Hazel’s first big day before the big big day, I wouldn’t miss it for anything.” Charlotte happily murmured into her dad’s chest before Tommy put his arm around his daughter’s shoulders and introduced her to Titus’ family who were completely oblivious as to Charlotte’s true identity as Charlotte sat next to Sylva.

“It’s nice to see you again. Different kind of exciting this time,” Sylva offered with a mischievous grin that Charlotte mirrored.

“I take it you didn’t get any kind of trouble from the last time we were in each other’s company.” Charlotte offered.

“Nope, not a peep, thank you.” Sylva reassured her.

“You’re welcome, this was wonderful, thanks for letting me know, when you get to know their wedding arrangements, forward them to this number, I doubt the groom would be comfortable with Gil and I coming but I want to send them a proper wedding gift that won't be on any kind of gift registry, at least domestically.” Charlotte nodded as she handed Sylva a slip of paper written in Mandarin as Sylva read it quickly, nodded and put it into her billfold just as Hazel came out in her first dress and stopped when she saw Charlotte.

“Charlie?” Hazel gasped in excitement as she saw her sister.

“Hey you, don’t you look beautiful.” Charlie greeted as she set her large, heavy purse on the seat and came over and embraced her sister.

“I didn’t think I would see you again.” Hazel admitted as she hugged her sister tight.

“Sylva invited me, hope you don’t mind.” Charlotte explained.

“Nope, not at all.” Hazel readily assured her sister.

“Is Gil here too?” Hazel asked.

“He’s doing business, as usual, plus I don’t think Dad would be cool and I know your fiance wouldn't be cool if Gil and I showed up to the wedding itself, so this is the best I can do and this is exposed enough without making things difficult or uncomfortable or "unsafe".” Charlotte excused.

“I get it, I'm still really happy to see you and that you're here. It means a lot, especially to Mom and Dad, and of course me as well.” Hazel nodded as Charlotte nodded in unison.

“So is this your dress?” Charlotte asked, changing the subject.

“This is just the first one, you came just in time.” Hazel answered.

“Well then let’s get to it.” Charlotte insisted as she returned to her seat.

“So this is dress number one. What do we think?” Meredith asked.

“It’s nice, I’m not in love with it, but it’s nice.” Hazel answered honestly.

“It makes you look like you’re wearing a tent.” Huan criticized as Helen and Jenny nearly choked on their spit and looked at Huan in alarm as Charlotte akept her snickering quiet enough to pass it off as a cough as Mei just rolled her eyes and complained to her mom in Mandarin that she was being too harsh.

“You don’t look like you’re wearing a tent, but the cut isn’t quite right. You need a more flattering shape to the fabric.” Charlotte offered.

“Agreed.” Sylva nodded.

“Well, that’s what first dresses are all about, finding what elements can work and what elements won’t.” Meredith explained before they tried on a few different picks as Charlotte looked around as did Sylva at the other dresses on display at the other dresses in the store.

“That one,” Charlotte and Sylva said at the same time once they both locked eyes on it and pointed to it.

“Well go get it then, bring it to her, it will mean more to her if you do.” Sylva encouraged before Charlotte got up and strutted across the floor to get the dress in question before she asked to see which room her sister was in before she came to the appropriate dressing room, a security guard shadowing her.

“Try this one.” Charlotte suggested as she handed the dress over to her sister as Hazel gasped softly when she saw it before Charlotte saw her way out and went back to the group and waived the security guard back a little farther so his presence was not felt by everyone else.

“And?” Sylva prodded.

“She had the gasp and the smile.” Charlotte answered as she checked her phone.

“Please let this be the one, I’m running out of time.” Charlotte whispered as she looked at the time on her phone and read the messages her henchmen were sending her as they stood guard a short distance away as her driver himself was scanning the police channels as Gil’s other men were monitoring the area.

Hazel came out a short time later, wearing a smile that shamed the sun, moon and stars as everyone else gasped and oohed and awed.

“Now that’s the dress, you look exquisite Hazel.” Huan finally complimented as Charlotte and Sylva gave each other a meaningful smile as Hazel nearly burst into tears as Jenny and Helen were already crying too.

“It’s perfect, but still incomplete.” Hazel began as she stood up and pulled a special box from her bag and took out a set of jade jewelry and put it on Hazel as Huan and Mei cooed and practically giggled as they put it on her as Charlotte gave Hazel a special sachet as well before Charlotte’s phone chimed.

“Do you have to go?” Hazel asked as Charlotte’s eyes watered as she tried to put on a brave, happy smile but nodded yes.

“Thank you for coming and for all of this. Thank you for being my sister. I love you so much.” Hazel thanked her as the two hugged before Charlotte got to hug every member of her family as Sylva got to get a quick picture of them all together, both with Charlotte’s phone as well as other members of her family so that each one would have a picture of this moment to treasure forever before the Henchmen came over and cleared their throats to get Charlotte’s attention as Charlotte hugged her parents, specifically her dad one last time.

“I have to go, I love you.” Charlotte bid her family before she used her handkerchief to dry her eyes and left with the henchmen as her driver was already anxiously out front, waiting to take his Empress back to a safer, less ‘exposed’ space.

“How come she couldn’t stay?” Helen asked.

“She’s a very busy woman. She lives half a world away and she probably had to fly back pretty soon, and security at the airports is a nightmare.” Sylva delicately excused as she waived it off.

“But now that we found the dress and the veil and obviously the jewelry. Let’s get settled up and get dinner shall we?” Sylva encouraged with a bright happy smile.

When Sylva came back home from flying and taking care of all the other guests, she came home to see all of her kids and their fiances and their friends as they had made a really nice dinner for everyone as Pelna and Yasmine, Gladio and Pashmina, Prompto and Cindy, Luche and Ada, Libertus and Crowe and Craig and Iris were on their way as well as Luche’s family and Ada’s family.

“Hey! So how did it go?” Luna asked as she gave her mom a big hug.

“Good, Charlotte came and surprised Hazel and the family.” Sylva revealed which caused everyone to freeze and look at each other worriedly.

“Charlotte Stevens?” Luna asked, taken aback by the news.

“Oh don’t look so surprised, when Charlotte and Gil used the jet they left a single phone number for the pilot to give to me and said I get to use it once. And I knew Charlotte wouldn’t want to miss the milestone in Hazel’s life because Charlotte knows she probably won't be welcome at the wedding since Cor is one of Titus' groomsmen, so I used it and told Charlotte the plan and she was very grateful for the invitation since no one else in her family knew how to get a hold of her to tell her. Besides, Titus’ family was blissfully ignorant of who she really was and Hazel’s family got to have a nice little reunion within the realitive safety confine of a public space and Charlotte got to see Hazel in her wedding dress as a good sister should. It was fine, I mean she had to be carrying four guns on her and who knows how many knives on her person, she had to have two guns in her outfit and at least another two in her purse and her four henchmen were armed to the teeth as well and she could only stay for about an hour but Hazel found the dress and everyone gave it their stamp of approval and Charlotte gifted Hazel some really pretty jade jewelry which is customary for a Chinese bride to receive which honored that part of her heritage and traditions, which was really nice, it was a lovely time.” Sylva waived off as she got the picture and showed everyone the family picture she took.

“She has got to have the biggest balls in the world.” Tredd noted, impressed when he saw the picture.

“She’s got you beat, that’s for sure.” Stella teased.

“She’s got everyone beat.” Sylva laughed.

“So is this everyone or are more coming?” Sylva asked.

“More are coming.” Luna reported.

“How many more?” Sylva asked before her doorbell rang and slowly then all at once, everyone came as everyone started pulling all the components at the table, setting it up for a large extended friends and family meal before Luche and Ada came in last, both of them having anxious smiles on their faces.

“Is everything ok?” Sylva asked Luche as she tried to keep her knowing smile to a minimum.

“Yeah, yeah, everythings great.” Luche reassured her.

“You sure?” Sylva asked as she looked from Luche to Ada who had the same anxious smile on her face.

“Ok, so we have some news and we wanted everyone to be around to make the announcement and we don’t exactly know how it’s going to be received.” Luche hinted.

“If it’s what I think it is, I will do my best to lead the way in accepting the announcement with all the happiness and joy that such an announcement garners. But I also want to be the first to offer my congratulations.” Sylva reassured them both.

“Thank you.” Luche and Ada breathed in relief.

“Come on, dinner is getting cold.” Sylva encouraged them before they all came into the kitchen where everyone was getting something to drink with their dinner.

“So Luche and I chose wedding invitations!” Ada happily announced as she handed every couple an invitation as well as one to her parents and one to Luche’s parents as well.

“Wait, I thought we agreed on May 18th, this is in December..only three months, it’s the weekend before Nyx and Luna’s wedding?” Linda pointed out.

“Well that brings us to announcement number two. We’re pregnant, or rather Ada is.” Luche announced as there was just a hint of nervousness to his excitement as Sylva was the first to squeal, almost an excited scream in delight, only half a second before Crowe did which got everyone else to cheer joyfully as Sylva came over and hugged them both and offered her first “official” congratulations which got Linda and Ada’s mother Amelia and Linda to get over their initial shock and plaster on happy smiles and congratulate them before Ada was swarmed by the girls with hugs and congrats as the first ultrasound pictures were passed around that she had gotten the day before.

“So how far along are you?” Sylva asked.

“Ten weeks.” Ada announced as Tredd, Nyx and Ravus shared a rather knowing smile, but no money was passed between the three because Tredd and Ravus had “seen it” when Sylva had as well. Crowe especially was super happy because she wasn’t the only one pregnant anymore as her own little baby bump had seemed to pop out since her own wedding.

“Baby bump!” Crowe happily cheered as she gently bumped her little baby bump into Ada’s belly which got Ada to giggle as the two hugged tightly and couldn’t stop laughing.

“Congratulations man!” Libertus congratulated Luche as he hugged him super tightly.

“Thanks.” Luche laughed into the hug before he got more congratulations from everyone else as even Tredd was, for once, gracious.

“So what are you hoping for?” Tredd asked.

“A healthy baby and a non complicated delivery.” Luche answered honestly.

“Good. Ok, everyone listen up! Taking bets on due dates and gender, where’s a white board?” Tredd suddenly turned, raising his voice to shout over everyone as he received a mixture of laughter and groans from some of the adults as Sylva laughed the hardest as Tredd took the whiteboard off the fridge and the little marker and erased all the important reminders after taking a pic of what was on it so none of it would be lost.

“Ok so that technically puts Crowe five months ahead of Ada so if gestation is 40 weeks, that’s basically ten months and Ada is already ten of those 38-40 weeks in- that puts us at...holy shit you’re due on your original wedding date- May 18th. OK, So, taking bets on three day spreads May 18th, 19th and 20th? Any takers?” Tredd continued undeterred.

“You asshole, I announce my fiance is pregnant and you immediately turn it into a bet?” Luche laughed, not surprised by his friend’s behavior, but was hoping he would have at least five minutes before Tredd turned into “The Lovable Douche Asshole”, the lovable part was questionable though most of the time.

“May 12th through the 15th, and a boy and the winner gets bragging rights but all the money and proceeds go to Luche and Ada.” Sylva said as she fished several hundred dollar bills out of her wallet and handed them to Ada before discretely handing Tredd another one too.

“Sweet, first better, Sylva Caelum, May 12th through the 15th and a boy.” Tredd repeated as he wrote that down and put a note in his phone.

“Oh what the hell. Twenty quid on the 16th-19th and I want a granddaughter so I’m betting on a girl.” Amelia offered as she handed Luche and Ada the money with a laugh of her own.

“May 9th-12th, a boy.” Ignis said as he handed Luche a few hundred dollars as well.

“May 19 through the 21st and a boy as well.” Luna giggled as she handed the couple a few hundred dollars too.

“May 14th through the 17th, boy as well.” Ravus added as he gave Luche most of the money in his wallet.

“Amelia it looks like if it is a girl, you’re getting amazing odds, five to one, that’s pretty awesome.” Tredd grinned at Amelia.

“Oh hell, I say May 21st through the 24th, also a girl.” Linda added as she gave Luche and Ada some money too as soon Luche and Ada were holding wads of cash and laughing as their friends were giving them money as Tredd was taking “bets” from everyone as everyone joined in on this impromptu gamble.

“Ok, so this isn’t so bad.” Ada had to confess to Luche as they tried to organize their “winnings” into a “gift bag” that Sylva had on hand before they all sat down to eat dinner as Luche nodded his agreement to that. That had gone way better than he was fearing as Selena, Stella and Luna all looked at their fiances with thinly veiled suspicion as they were looking at each other knowingly as they also noticed that Sylva also seemed particularly smug as they all happily enjoyed a very nice friends and family dinner as they discussed baby shower ideas as well as when to plan all the bridal showers and such and made a new, accelerated timeline.

[kindofinprogress]

Part 2 to A little nerve(ous)

I originally planned for this to be three parts. But I'm not so sure anymore!

Read part one here

Harry sat at the dinner table with a heavy sigh. He could do nothing more tonight than watch a Weasley family dinner play out in front of his glazed over eyes. It had been a long day of meetings he had no business in- but everyone needed his input at the ministry these days. As if he wasn’t a drop out 17-year old. As if they hadn’t spent the better part of the last three years dragging him through the mud. Harry spent a lot of time letting his mind wander during these meetings. Much like he was now- committing the names of the Fallen Fifty to memory, wondering if there could have been a better way, if any of the deaths could have been avoided, how anyone could see him as a hero, what he was supposed to do next.

“Wanna go for a walk, mate?”

Ron’s deep voice shook Harry out of his trance-like state. The silence that followed was absolutely deafening. Where had everyone gone?

“Huh?”

“Erm… Dinner finished around 15 minutes ago. You’ve been a bit out of it for a while.”

Harry cleared his throat and made to get up with his dish (still full of food) in hand. “Right. Sorry. I should-”

Ron took the plate out of Harry’s hand and set it back on the table “You should come have a walk with your best mate.”

All Harry could do was nod his head and follow Ron. He felt simultaneously completely void of thought and full to the brim with it.

It was a while before Ron spoke again.

“Feels nice, doesn’t it? The breeze. I bet spending all those hours underground at the ministry aren’t doing you any good.”

“Right. Because we certainly haven’t had our fair share of nature and the outdoors over the last year.” Harry recoiled a bit at his own response. That was much too harsh with no reason. “Godric. Sorry, mate.”

“S’alright. It was funny.” Ron said, putting a large hand on Harry’s shoulder and shooting him a kind smile.

Harry felt a bit embarrassed at how nice it felt to have Ron’s hand on his shoulder. There was a time when physical affection was so foreign to him it’d made him uncomfortable. But being a plus one at the Weasley’s had meant having to go from deflecting touch to at least bearing it pretty fast. By fifth year he’d even welcomed Molly’s hugs, Bill and Mr. Weasley’s strong and lengthy handshakes, Ron’s hand on his shoulder, the twin’s ruffling of his hair, Ginny’s… A sigh escaped him at the thought of her. Ron must’ve known what was on his mind because he let her know Ginny was inside still, helping Hermione do some washing.

“But I’m sure she’d be up for a little after hours flying if you wanted me to get her? Or I could leave you two-” he started to suggest, with a raised eyebrow.

“Ron.”

“Oh as if time alone with my little sister isn’t exactly what you want.”

“I… No.”

Ron shot him a questioning look. “No?”

“Ugh. Not ‘no’. But… No.”

“Yeah, I’m not following mate.” Ron’s walking had stopped, he was leaning on a large boulder with his arms crossed. Harry noticed how far they’d walked from the Burrow. He wondered if they were still within the protective barriers. They should turn around. Had he even brought his wand? Was it too late for someone to be creeping around?

“Should we head back?”

Harry had only seen the expression which took over Ron’s face exactly three times before. Once, when Hermione revealed Krum had invited her to visit him over the summer, once when the pair of them had caught Ginny and Dean snogging in an abandoned corridor, and lastly when Ron had caught him kissing Ginny in her bedroom last summer. The look that said he wanted nothing more than to punch a bloke.

“What are you playing at?”

“I just think we should stick closer to the house-”

“About Ginny, you daft monkey!”

“It’s complicated, Ron.”

“No… it’s not. It’s really not, Harry. You pined after her at Hogwarts, you dumped her seconds after you finally got her- don’t interrupt me with your excuses. You pined after you dumped her, and, and… all that in the forest? Pouring over that bloody map day in and day out? The ‘If I come out the other end of this’ speech you gave me? What the hell, Harry?”

Harry’s lips formed into a thin line- keeping everything in he wanted to blurt out. About how much he missed her still. About how he couldn’t keep asking her to wait around for him. About how much better she deserved than a killer. He turned around and started walking faster than necessary toward the lit house. But there it was again seconds later- that huge hand on his bloody shoulder. Harry was tall but Ron had always had a bit on him. He should’ve known better than to think his friend couldn’t match his stride. Harry stopped and stared up at the sky. All that damned vastness. He kicked at the stump near them once, twice, and again and again and again until Ron had him by both shoulders and was steering him toward the pond- muttering something about going a round with a whomping willow.

Harry splashed a handful of water on his face and layed on the earth. Looking up once more at all the vastness up there. It didn’t take long for Ron to join him. Part of Harry thought he might care how silly they must look- two grown men laying side by side like that near a pond. He quickly waved this away though. There was a moment not long ago he and his mate had shared next to a much larger body of water, on a much colder and darker night that bonded them in a way probably not many people could understand. He’d always known Ron- but seeing a man's insecurities played out like Harry had witnessed- It allowed him to understand Ron better than ever.

“You don’t want to be with her anymore then? Think it all just got a bit much? You two seemed rather cozy before-”

“Before I got swept up into being a ministry troll.” He sighed again. “I miss her like you wouldn’t believe.”

“A little ball of light that sounded like Hermione floated into my heart and led me right back to her, remember? I think I know what you mean, mate.”

They laughed at that. Probably the first time Harry had laughed in days… or weeks.

“Yeah, alright. You might get it, then.”

Ron was quiet this time- not pressing him for more but knowing more would come.

“She deserves better.”

“I reckon you’re right. Ginny certainly deserve someone who’ll give her the time of day.”

“I haven’t been that cold.”

“Yeah, mate, you kind of have. This is the first night you’ve been home early enough for dinner in two weeks and you barely glanced at her. I only suggested getting her earlier because it’s been a while since I saw you two strolling around back here.”

Harry groaned and put his hands over his eyes, knocking his glasses backward onto his head. It had been a while. Too long. Godric.

“She does though, you know? Deserve someone better. I can’t give her… I don’t know. A normal life. Normal… happiness.”

“What the hell are you on about, mate?”

“Think about it. I can only travel by restrictive floo right now otherwise I get bombarded with cameras- remember all the gossip at Hogwarts? Imagine that but instead it’s all of Wizarding Britain. I’m as good as being treated like an auror nevermind I never trained or passed any N.E.W.T exams- It’s like you said, this is the first night I’ve been home for dinner in weeks, Ron. And I completely blew her off even though I miss her so much it feels like she’s as far as the moon sometimes.” Harry blushed and stole a glance at Ron, surprised a bit by his declaration.

Harry groaned.

“And it’s not just that, Ron.” A silence that beckoned more from his end met him in response. “How am I ever supposed to look her in the face and tell her the very same dark magic that allowed Tom Riddle to torture her for a year was inside me all along? How could she ever forgive me for Fred-” Harry felt a knot form at his throat. “How did I ever think I could soothe that pain away, knowing he was only in harm's way because of me?” Harry waited for Ron to say something. Anything. But nothing came and so his mind whirred with thoughts of Ginny and he sat there with nothing more to say. He really did miss her, his Ginny. No. Not his Ginny. Ugh.

“Hey.”

He looked up at Ron, who was sitting and staring down at him now.

“Remember fifth year, when Ginny talked to you about her being possessed and all? Really got through, didn’t it? I think… I think 11 year old Ginny could have really used that too. But there was no one around to give that to her. We all just kind of watched her seal all that away and couldn’t do anything about it because well, what did we know? I think… if anyone could understand the full story of the last year, the prophecy-doing things you didn’t want to do, the horcruxes, Kings Cross- everything. And take it in without judgement or.. Or fear or whatever you think they might, I think it’s Ginny.”

Harry wondered how true these words might be. He could only hope they were, even a little bit.

“So listen, you can sit around like a zombie and keep yourself away from… shit, from living your own life the way you want to for the first time ever or you can bloody get up and do something. Where’s that gryffindor bravery? Only let it out to defeat dark wizards? Not to talk to the girl you fancy? Bloody pathetic, mate.”

Harry and Ron allowed themselves to laugh full belly laughs again. They sat there staring at each other then back up at the stars again for a while after their laughter died off. Eventually, Harry got up first and after offering Ron a hand up, they walked back to the Burrow and Ron went up to bed while Harry poured himself a tea and sat out on the back porch by himself for a bit, enjoying the breeze.

[thishintoflove]

“Wildest Dreams” - A Prospect (2018) Fanfic

TSwift Songfic Week Day 2

Pairing: Ezra x F!Reader

Warnings: 18 + Explicit (Language, Sex Pollen, P/V sex, Unprotected sex, Outdoor sex), 2.2k words of smutty forest sex

A/N: Did I really just want an excuse to write a sex pollen fic? Yes, I did. Also Ezra strikes me as a guy who’d be into outdoor sex even without an extra aphrodisiac.

You’ve always loved the forest. When you’re out among the trees, watching the light spread across the forest floor in patterns of green and gold, there really isn’t anywhere else you’d rather be. This planet is filled with oxygen so there’s no need for a helmet, which means you can enjoy this peaceful wood with all five of your senses. You close your eyes every now and then, drifting along on the smells of the warm air and the sounds of native birds calling to each other between the leaves.

“Hey! Come on, Birdie, I hired you to be my guide, not daydream and get us lost.”

Ezra’s deep drawl cuts through the forest and interrupts your peace. The man has paused his endless pursuit long enough to stare back at you with an annoyed look.

“We’re on track, Ezra, just keep heading southwest. I’m right behind you.”

You’re a field researcher who was recently let go by your university, so you’re currently traveling between worlds as an independent contractor trying to make some money. That’s how you found yourself wandering through the vast woods of this backwater planet with a gruff gem prospector. It was your job to analyze the topographical maps, plot the route, and keep Ezra away from the dangers of the natural world as he searched for some kind of valuable gem. At first you were worried about being alone with a strange man for a weeks-long mission, but Ezra seemed respectful and fully dedicated to his job. He was handsome, you couldn't help but notice, but this was a job and you refused to let that be a factor. So you'd agreed to go with him on this trip, taking a 50% upfront commission, and now you're dragging your boots through the wet grass trying to keep up with him.

I thought heaven can't help me now

Nothing lasts forever, but this is gonna take me down

He's so tall and handsome as hell

He's so bad but he does it so well

Ezra is currently stalking along ahead of you, head bowed, eyes scanning the forest floor for any sign of gem pods. Every now and then he turns around to glance at you, to either ask you a question about the flora and fauna or just to check and make sure you’re still there. You could tell he was getting frustrated that it’s been three days of hunting and yet still no gems in sight. You were following along quietly, trying not to disturb Ezra’s hunt. You glance up from time to time to make sure you can still see Ezra’s dark head poking out from behind trees and under bushes, but generally you keep yourself entertained by studying the clumps of flowers and plants on the ground.

Suddenly a rustling sound in a nearby bush grabs your attention. You catch sight of something small and fluffy huddled behind a tuft of grass. You freeze and squint down at the tiny stir of whiskers and wiggle of white-- it was a lop-eared lapine! An adorable furry creature that was often sold in pet shops, but this one was huddling right in front of you in the wild, seemingly unafraid. The small creature lifts its head and turns two very large, very innocent eyes on you. You smile despite yourself, and crouch down as it hops silently towards you. Its fuzzy paws make next to no impression on the grass as it moves.

It hops until it stops right in front of you. You reach a hand out and upon closer inspection, you realize there’s a spiky burr stuck in its fur.

“Aw, let’s see if I can get that pointy thing off you, little buddy,” you mumble, reaching out and running your fingers through its soft coat. You gently grasp the pointy burr and give it a small tug, but to your surprise the bud isn’t nearly as hard as it looks. As soon as you squeeze it, the bud bursts open and releases a surprising amount of yellow pollen into the air. It floats up, getting caught in your nose and making you sneeze.

The sound makes the lapine squeak and scuttle away into the tall grass. As it disappears, you feel your head begin to spin. Your eyes stop focusing for a moment and there’s a hot surge in the pit of your stomach. Your heart clenches when you realize what’s just happened. The burr must have been a native reproductive pod-- one with powerful side effects for humans that was usually sought out for use in performance enhancement medication. And now you’re completely doused in it.

The pollen is still drifting through the air in a cloud, and you try to get to your feet but your legs are too wobbly. Suddenly, a large hand is gripping your forearm and hauling you up.

“Are you alright, my lovely bird?”

Ezra is giving you a concerned look, unused to seeing you so affected like this. You try to warn him about the pollen but your tongue feels thick and useless. Soon Ezra is sneezing too and you know he’s ingested some of it as well.

“I didn’t mean to… didn’t expect…” you try to form complete sentences but there’s a heat rushing through your veins and blush spreading across your entire body. Ezra is still holding your arm and you reach around him to pull his body closer. Heat pours off both your bodies but you still crave the contact. A low groan slips from Ezra’s lips and the sound goes straight to the now aching spot between your legs.

“Is it… some type of aphrodisiac?” Ezra asks between clenched teeth. He’s holding you flush to his body but he seems frozen. “I do not want to hurt you, Birdie. But I’m afraid I am losing all control of my senses here.”

“Yeah it is,” you gasp, feeling a little better now that you had him so close, “It’s okay to...you know. I want you to. I need you to.”

As if to prove your point, you thrust your hips against his. You can already feel the hardness in the pants of his flight suit, and your mouth literally waters at the thought of it inside you.

“Are you absolutely positive? I may still be able to get away from here. Away from you. If I go now-”

“Don’t you dare.”

At your confirmation, Ezra growls and pushes you forward until your back hits a tree. He presses his mouth against your collarbone and sucks, all coherent thought rapidly vacating your brain at his actions.

I said, "No one has to know what we do"

His hands are in my hair, his clothes are in my room

And his voice is a familiar sound

Nothing lasts forever but this is getting good now

You feel dazed, pressed against the tree with your hands pinned on either side by Ezra’s long, strong fingers. You bury your nose in his dark hair as he nibbles your pulse point, inhaling additional pollen, not that you care. He pushes his hips upwards into you, too desperate for friction to question how he’s become so hard so quickly. You rut against him, egging him on and enjoying the amazing sensation of the tight fabric against your clit.

Ezra breaks away from your neck with a gasp and mouths his way along your jaw until your lips finally meet. It’s your first kiss together but neither of you really care at the moment-- the kiss is sloppy in an eager, desperate way brought on by the pollen. You both open your mouths and you tremble with pleasure at the warm slide of Ezra’s tongue against your own. You moan softly into his mouth as you feel his hardness press more insistently against your thigh through the material of his pants.

Then he’s ripping at the zipper and velcro on your flight suit, pulling the top down enough to expose your chest. He keeps his mouth on yours as his hand starts to explore you. He palms your breast, teasing the nipple to a taut peak, and your trembling increases as you struggle to control the heat burning inside you.

"Ezra, please. I need you now. I need to feel you inside me," you beg.

“Relax, my lovely bird. I want to explore you first,” Ezra growls, feeling himself grow even harder as your nipples rise beneath his fingers.

You swallow, unsure if you’re able to comply. He was like a drug to you now, one you never knew you needed. It’s driving you crazy and you know your craving won’t be fulfilled until he’s fully in you. But you take a deep breath and try to relax into his ministrations.

Feeling your body relax, Ezra slowly begins an assault on your senses. He ducks his head and takes one breast into his mouth, running his tongue over the nipple. He sucks gently before biting down, and the jolt of pain-pleasure makes you arch against him and tug at the hair on the back of his head. As he continues to lavish attention on your breasts with his mouth, his hands slip down to slowly work your pants open. You’re almost too distracted to notice until suddenly you feel a thick finger enter you. Your pulse skips a beat as you tremble under his touch, craving more. He continues to pump in and out of you with one hand while his prosthetic arm reaches down to undo the fly of his own pants.

You cry out again as his finger hooks inside you, hitting that special spot that makes your toes curl.

"Ezra, please. I can't take it! I’m going to lose my mind! Please!"

"Fine, have it your way, Birdie," he replies.

In one fast movement he removes his fingers and replaces them with his cock. He slams hard into you, and winds his arms around your back to pull you as close as possible. You cry out at the sensation of finally being filled. You curl into him, your face in his shoulder as he buries himself inside you. He withdraws slowly and sinks back in while he muffles his groans of pleasure into your neck. He strokes in and out of you with a deep, steady pace.

You'll see me in hindsight

Tangled up with you all night

Burnin' it down

“You feel amazing, everything I need,” you babble as the burning sensation inside you begins to settle and shift into pure pleasure.

Ezra groans and pushes against your neck with his nose, “You look so splendid on my cock. Never imagined you would be so wet, so tight. I want to stay in your warm heat forever.”

A rough laugh escaped you at his words-- somehow still trying to be eloquent even with the pollen messing with his brain and tongue. You twist your head to meet his mouth in a passionate kiss. Ezra moans against your mouth as he rapidly chases his own orgasm, hips pounding into yours. Everything feels like too much and not enough at the same time. You’re no longer burning but you’re rapidly falling into a pit of pleasure that you’re not sure you’ll be able to climb out of.

Ezra feels so strong and rough against you. You break the kiss to grin wickedly at him, and lower your head to suck softly on the sensitive skin of his neck. As he speeds up his movements, you bite lightly and squeeze your inner muscles a little more aggressively in time with his thrusts. His balls tighten in response to the feel of your teeth on his neck, your nails in his back, the tightening of your wetness around him.

Ezra reaches down to press your clit with his thumb, and that’s all it takes to make you come undone. You gasp and shudder against him as he thrusts erratically a few more times before following you over the edge. He throbs and gushes deep within you as your walls tremble and tug at his cock. Your orgasms seem to be unending as wave after wave crashes over you both.

Someday when you leave me

I bet these memories

Follow you around

Finally, you come down enough to drop your leg from where it was wrapped around Ezra’s hip. Your head falls back against the tree and you close your eyes as you try to steady your breathing.

“Birdie? Can you look at me?”

Your eyes flutter open and you meet his gaze. Ezra’s dark eyes are filled with apprehension and his brow is low as he looks at you with concern.

“I am… uneasy with how our encounter just went. I want you to know that this isn’t what I had in mind when I hired you. I would never-”

“Ezra,” you say, cutting him off before he can bombard you with more unnecessary apologies, “It wasn’t your fault. It was my fault for not being more careful. This doesn’t have to change anything between us.”

Maybe it’s the remnant of pollen still in your system or maybe you just finally know what you’re missing out on, but you hesitantly lift a hand and reach up to brush the hair off his sweaty forehead, taking extra notice of the blonde tuft at the front.

“But... it could change something,” you continue, “If we both want it to.”

Ezra’s look of concern melted into something fonder.

“I believe that’s something worth discussing. I can’t promise you forever, Birdie. My line of work isn’t conducive to commitments. But if you’ll have me for a time, I would very much like to continue exploring this pleasurable path we seem to have stumbled upon.”

You smile up at him, pleased to see a lighter look in his deep brown eyes. “I believe I can agree to that.”

Say you'll see me again

Even if it's just in your (Just pretend, just pretend)

Wildest Dreams

[girlwiththeblueblood]

Human/Demon/Angel family road trip!

Melaina and Lily purchase a camper van, hoping for some sister bounding time on the road, then the rest of their odd family members show up. They were a little put out, but after a promise of a worldwide trip and some (TARDIS) magic placed of the van, they decided what the hell having everyone around should be entertaining. And off they go!

Lucifer:

Would be to only one Melaina trusts to drive while she’s taking a break or sleeping.

Can’t help but watch Melaina with an amused smile when her road rage comes out to play. 

Is low-key aroused when she yells out the window at the dumb ass drivers to “GET OUT THE FAST LANE!”

Warns her when her still small horns are showing.

He would take the task of driving the behemoth of a camper van very seriously; and would have Melaina sitting at the passenger seat next to him for company, if she wasn’t already spending time with Lily.

Would look over at his sleeping wife any chance he got, and smile softly. He will remove his cloak and use it to cover her when no one is looking.

Thinks Lily is a nice human and is happy to get to know his sister-in-law, but no one compares to his wife.

“Don’t make me turn this van around!”

“And put on your seat-belt!”

“No, we’re not stopping again!”

“You should have gone before we left!”

“Stop fighting back there!”

“Damn it, Mammon!”

Mammon:

Would want the passenger seat all to himself.

Will ask if he can drive. 

Sulks when Melaina said “No.”

Blasting his music and screaming the lyrics. 

Sulks when Melaina turns off the music.

Will be sent to the back of the van if he keeps asking “are we there yet?”

Would, somehow, get the van pulled over by the police and panic about hiding his weed.

Sulks in the time out corner at the back of the van for nearly getting himself and other’s arrested.

Whines to Melaina about visiting Vegas. 

Can’t believe a sweet wall-flower like Lily is related to a snarky and defiant person (now demon) like Melaina.

Wonder if they have other siblings, but keeps that thought to himself.  

Will be buying stuff (that’s not too expensive) for Lily to welcome her to the family.

Wants to hear stories about the sisters’s childhood. 

Doesn’t want to push them to talk about it since their pasts aren’t all sunshin’ and roses.

Levi:

Will be sitting nearest to the outlet to power his phone and other devices. Has took everything but his desktop with him, but only because there was already one on the magically effected van.

In his happy little gaming bubble for most of the journey.

Is happy to play some board games with the others at times.

Gets excited when Lily takes out a DS and wants to play some multi player games and in-game trading with her.

Will be posting about everything the happens as it plays out.

When he’s in the passenger seat, he and Melaina sing to anime intro music. No one knows what they are saying.

Likes the English covers Melaina puts on and the effort other fans have put into making the song!

Will beg Melaina to stop at some pokestops and gyms.

Any arcades will be also be stopped at.

Also, can we go to Japan!? Pleeeeeeeeease?

Satan:

Will be taking a demon load of books with him.

Quietly reading most of the time.

Will pick up travel pamphlets at each stop they visit. More reading material!

Will also buy more books along the way.

When he isn’t reading, he’s doing a mini book club with Simeon, Melaina (when she’s taking a break) and Lily.

Would sneak in his pet kitten, the one Melaina gifted him in front of Lucifer after he said no last week.

When it’s his turn in the passenger seat, he reads to Melaina with the kitten purring away on his lap.

Knows Lucifer is glaring at him, but won’t do or say anything while Satan in under Melaina’s protection, and it’s just the best thing ever.

Would also be reading to Lily, before his sister-in-law goes to sleep.

Amso:

Photographs everything! Selfies at every stop.

He’ll be doing everyone’s nails at his corner of the table.

Will insist on doing Melaina’s and Lily’s hair.

Dramatic shocked noise when he finds out that Melaina “blow-dried” her hair by lowing the window all the way, letting the wind blowing her hair all over the place as she drives. 

He really adores the bathroom on the van, it’s so cute and cosy but not too small to be cramped, and there’s a bath tub!?

Will offer to have a bubble bath for two with, well everyone.

If he gets a turn in the passenger seat, you know he was get Melaina to singing along with him. Has picked a lot of ABBA and other chick-bands songs for them to sing to.

“That sign said that there’s a spa nearby! Oh Mel-Mel can we stop at the spa!?”

...they’re stopping at the spa. No one regrets stopping at that spa, everyone’s back pain is gone now!

Will be trying out perfumes that each stop has and buying a select few.

Paris👏shopping👏trip👏

He’ll be buying gifts for everyone for sure!

Beel:

Is the one who did most of the heavy lifting when loading up everyone’s stuff. 

Beams with happiness at the size of the kitchen. 

And the fridge!

Is the reason the van stops at most of the fast food places they find.

Worries about Lily’s constant red face and is concerned that she’s sick.

Gets a bit too close when taking her temperature.

“Lily are you ill?! You’re burning up!”

Will be upset when Lily locks herself in the bath room, not knowing that she’s overloaded and flustered.

Thinks he’s upset her and gets upset himself.

It takes half an hour for Bephie to spell it out for him. 

“Dude, she’s got a crush on you” 

“......wait what?”

Ends up getting flustered himself and hides in a cupboard.

It takes another hour for Bephie to get him to leave the cupboard.

When he does he starts to think about Melaina’s reaction to him and her little sister dating.

He goes back in the cupboard.

“Mel’s going to kill me!”

“..Dude, she’s not going to kill you..”

It’s another hour before the situation get’s Melaina’s attention and tries to help coax him out the cupboard.

“I’m not going to kill you, Beel. I think you’d be good for her.”

It’s twenty minutes later when Beel leaves the cupboard and gives both Bephie and Mel a big bear hug.

Beel offers Lily to share some food with him. They are both a blushing mess while sharing a bag of chips together. 

Bephie: 

Claims one of the buck-beds.

When in the passenger seat, he and Mel talk about nothing and everything. Or he’s asleep, wrapped up in one of his blankets.

Will be hanging out with Beel and Lily most of the time.

Likes the idea of Lily being a sister-in-law, via Lucifer/Melaina and Beel/Lily.

Falls asleep on both of them while watching films.

Would climb into Melaina’s bed and snuggle with her.

Flips off Lucifer when he gets glared at for doing so.

Will buy more pillows, blankets and stuff animals at the stops he’s awake for.

Sometimes wakes up to a parked and empty van.

Will be grumpy at everyone when they return.

“...fuck you guys...”

Will lighten up when he’s give a gift from where ever they’ve been.

“Ok, you get to live”

Checks the cinemas nearby for newly released films for them to go and watch.

Will also go to DVD stores and picks a few “So bad they’re good” film for everyone to watch. 

Diavolo:

Is the ultimate Dad on holiday. Constantly has a camera around his neck.

He’s ecstatic for family time and getting to know Lily.

In the passenger seat he switches between quietly watching the world go by and asking a seemingly unending string of questions.

“Those kids are waving at us Mel!”

“They’re playing ‘good car, bad car’.”

“Really? What does game in tale?”

“Well, they wave at other people in different cars, if they get a wave back it’s a ‘good car’, if not it’s a ‘bad car’.”

“Fascinating!”

He waves with both hands. Has the biggest grin on his face when the kids react by cheering.

Will want to know other travel games and might get on his adopted daughter’s nerves just a little bit.

Takes all the photos at every stop.

Fatherly teasing when he catches Lucifer and Melaina holding hands.

Takes photos of them when they have loving moments without them knowing.

It’s the best day ever when Lily (accidentally) calls him dad.

He picks her up in a big Dad hug.

“Look Barbatos! I have another daughter!”

Barbatos: 

Spends most of the time waiting on everyone out of habit. 

Seems to always have some tea ready.

Can tell when Diavolo’s questions are starting to annoy Mel and diverts his Lord’s attention else where.

Is the keeper of the maps and only sits at the passenger seat to help navigate when lost.

He disappears into an unknown rooms in the van and no one knows where the rooms are, how to get there or what the rooms are for.

When asked about it, he just smiles and walks away to fetch more tea.

Makes sure that the humans take their medication/travel sickness tablets.

Keeps the van spotless, snacks on the table and cups full, despite Melaina telling him to stop and relax for a while.

Bakes some cupcakes special for Lily after Lord Diavolo “adopts” her.

Solomon: 

Constantly doing narrating pranks on camera.

“And that’s when they became horrible lost.”

“Are we lost?”

“No.”

“She lied”

“Stop it.”

Keeps making “Married Couple” jokes at Lucifer and Melaina.

Would attempt to prank Lily, but the burning feeling of Melaina glaring at him stops him.

Spends a lot of time exploring the van and all the rooms.

Refuses to admit that he got lost.

Sneaks off from the group when they’ve stopped to visit somewhere.

Keeps everyone waiting to for him to come back before they can leave.

When asked wear the fuck he was, he’d only ever say he was on a hunt for knowledge.

Translation: He’s been finding more magical knowledge with questionable means.

Is banned from the passenger seat, for recording Melaina while narrating everything she does. 

Simeon:

Absolutely adores Lily and decides for himself to be a guardian angel to both sisters.

Every time Lily does something that’s adorable he wraps his arms around her and snuggles her; his wings circle both of them as if protecting her.

“By my Lord, you are so adorable!”

“Melaina, help!”

“Hey, turtle dove, ease it back a bit please.”

He will be interested in Lily’s story, since gender identities work very differently for Angels and Demons, he’d be very interested in the subject. 

Plus, knowing what he does about their birth parents from Melaina; Simeon is concerned about the difficulties the poor thing faced trying to figure out her identity. 

Simeon makes sure that Lily does want to talk about it, he really doesn’t want to push her if she’s uncomfortable.

He ends up learning a lot about the subject from Lily, maybe there’s a new book to be written in the future.

Will be playing board games and card games, that he’s learned from the humans, with Luke and anyone else would like to join.

Can’t help but ship Beel and Lily after seeing them blushing like idiots at each other. 

He actually tears up a little, he’s so happy.

Then he looks toward the front of the van at the other couple. Melaina is asleep and he’s caught Lucifer laying his cloak over her.

Simeon smiles wide, he’s so happy for both the humans and his old friends. 

He feels nice and warm inside.

He’ll request to stop at a church now and then so he can pray for his friends’s happiness. 

He also requests to visit Venice Italy.

Will have his turn in the fabled passenger seat. He had fun picking songs to play... until one started playing that wasn’t his cup of tea.

He slowly looked at Melaina, trying to not judge.

Mel’s lips were pressed together and trying to not laugh.

Simeon then got up and left to sit back down with Luke.

“I’m sorry!”

“.....”

“Simeon?”

“.....”

“Turle Dove?”

“..I need time to forgive you, friend.”

Luke: 

Will be both excited for a road trip with the human sisters and annoyed that the demons are also tagging along.

Low-key is enjoying everyone’s company.

Is either by Simeon side or in the kitchen baking sweats.

Don’t really understand the concept of being transgender, but supports Lily all the way!

Really, really wants to play card games with Melaina, but she’s driving most of the time.

Isn’t aloud at the passenger seat. because they were pulled over by the police about letting a child in the front seat without a booster seat.

He is very, very sulky afterwards. 

[imo-chan-imagines]

『 Haikyuu!! Week 2020 | Day 2 』

· Sept. 26th → One Ball, Heart and Soul ·

Characters: Sawamura Daichi, Testurou Kuroo, Bokuto Koutarou, Ushijima Wakatoshi, Oikawa Tooru, Terushima Yuuji

Prompts: A. favourite position/role + B. travel/journey

Tags/warnings: Haikyuu!! (anime), PG, fluff, crack, headcanons, HaikyuuWeek2020

A/N: I found it so hard to pick a favourite position/role, because they're all so interesting and important, and I love everyone 😭 But I settled on the role of captain because of the headcanons I thought of. Captain Sqaud, assemble! So, want to find out what these boys are like on a road trip?

(Just to be clear, I do love all these guys. None of this is hate 😂) All my Haikyuu Week 2020 posts will be SFW, but I have some NSFW stuff on my blog, too. Feel free to check that out~ Thanks for reading! Please enjoy ♡ Imo~

☆ Sawamura Daichi ☆

Dad-chi™

Comes prepared with all the food, drinks, snacks, med kit, camera – literally everything you could possibly need on a road trip

Plans out the route beforehand down to the tiniest detail nothing gets past this man

As well as multiple backup routes in case there's diversions etc.

Plans for regular breaks at two-hour intervals where everyone can pee, stretch their legs, buy anything they need, etc.

He's the one who's driving he's not letting anybody else get a scratch on his van, lmao

And he's good at it

No speeding he's a cop, y'all but he doesn't dawdle either, no running red lights, turns corners well, keeps an even foot on the gas, etc.

Just a good time, tbh

Nobody is getting car sick because of him that would be a damn disgrace

"Stop fighting right now, or I'm turning this van around"

And will actually do it if you don't stfu, lmfao

Don't even think about making a mess and dropping your rubbish in the van you'll be walking home

Everyone else thinks his music is boring and for old people, but Daichi honestly doesn't care

Besides, it's either that or no music at all, because he needs to concentrate on the road

He takes this shit seriously. People's lives are in his hands, dammit!

☆ Testurou Kuroo ☆

Likes to switch between driving and riding shotgun/being designated navigator

Is fairly decent at both

Is constantly eating something but, like, he probably doesn't even know what it is

Some kind of edible is shoved towards his mouth by whoever's riding shotgun, and in it goes shut up. Not like that, you cretins 😂

Somehow manages to behave like an overbearing grandparent and an overexcited child at the same time?? Nothing new there, I guess 😂

I'm sorry, Kuroo, I love you. Please don't be mad 😭

Has a banging playlist full of throwback songs from the 90s and early 2000s

Drums along sofly on the steering wheel or dashboard constantly

HATES driving in rain he's low-key terrified he's going to aquaplane

Likes driving with the windows wound down and feeling the wind in his hair

Will plan the route, but then forget to save it/print it off, etc.

Cannot work Google Maps or SAT-NAVs to save his life Kenma, please help him

Actually packs properly balanced meals, but is heavy on the snacks, too

You'd think he'd drive too fast, but he's actually really responsible

Constantly telling dad jokes to try and keep people amused the groaners are the best

Would probably fight someone at the gas station if they started being a dick and causing trouble

Kuroo, baby. I love you, but please don't get arrested 😭😂😭

☆ Bokuto Koutarou ☆

Dear God, do NOT let him drive leave it to Akaashi, I'm begging you

Has really bad spacial awareness in a vehicle and drifts all over the place

Probably speeds without even knowing it, too

Likes to ride shotgun, but is a terrible navigator, so is nearly always made to ride in the back

Is the loud one that moves around too much and blocks the rear view mirror strap him in tight, Akaashi

Belts along at the top of his voice to whatever music is playing, he's not fussy

Was told to pack essential items in his backpack and proceeded to fill it with sweets and snacks and a pack of condoms??? and thought he did good

Bokuto: Bro, you said they were essential

Akaashi: NOT FOR EVERY SITUATION

Rarely ever has to pee, but when he does, it's always miles away from any service station, and he has to hold it for hours

Has definitely peed at the side of the road multiple times because he couldn't hold it any longer, but he wasn't even embarrassed as numerous cars zoomed past

Likes sticking his head out the window like a dog on the motorway which gives everyone else heart attacks

Like, get the hell back inside you maniac 😭

If the car has a sunroof, he's 100% standing up through it with his hands in the air just you try and stop him

And they will. Everyone will try

"HORSES!!"

Will get out of the car in traffic jams to find out what's going on and end up chatting with random strangers until it starts moving again

And he's very sad when he has to leave his new friends. Droopy hair and emo Kou for the next 2 hours :(

Unironically enjoys playing 'I Spy' for hours at a time

Is a bit much to handle in such a confined space for hours on end, but he's just so excited for the road trip

Will fall sound asleep in a matter of minutes if you set him up with a travel pillow and it's freaking adorable!!

☆ Ushijima Wakatoshi ☆

No music whatsoever it's distracting. Why would he want it?

Okay driver, brilliant paper-map navigator

Will sit and do absolutely nothing but stare out the window the entire trip if he's neither

Breaks too hard and accelerates too fast, though

Is also kind of heavy-handed with the gear stick he may or may not have snapped one off before...

Never give him a SAT-NAV, though, because he will follow the directions with 100% accuracy and end up driving through a wall or some shit don't try and deny it

Does he ever even blink when he's looking at the road? We may never know

Might be astral projecting, who knows

Forgets people need toilet breaks but refuses to make unscheduled stops

"Just hold it in"

Uh-huh, sure. That's how that works, Toshi

No snacks

Or rather, no fun snacks. Protein bars and mineral water all the way, babyyyy 🙃🙃🙃

Could probably drive all through the night without taking any breaks but that's irresponsible

Don't do it, kids

Will likely devour the entire KFC menu at the service station he's big, okay? He eats a lot

Is prone to leg cramp after long drives oh look, he needs a massage 😏

Doesn't get car sick. Ever. Upset stomachs are for the weak

Has garbage and recycling pouches on the backs of the front seats use them correctly, or feel his wrath

Isn't exactly a barrel of laughs, but it's somehow endearing just like always *happy sigh*

But it's actually a good thing

There's no hidden side to Ushi or any bad or annoying habits that come out of the woodwork on a long road trip

He's just the same old reliable, adorably straightforward Ushijima ❤

☆ Oikawa Tooru ☆

Calls shotgun and demands the aux cord every. Single. Time but it's pretty decent music, so no-one really complains

Not that he's any good at navigation pray for Iwa-chan

Is constantly taking selfies, making TikToks, and documenting the trip on his social media

#ROADTRIP #SQUAD GOALS #BETTER THAN YOU

Will send all the photos in the group chat when it's over, and they actually come out pretty well

Will not stop complaining if the air conditioning is busted and Iwa-chan will threaten to dump him in the middle of nowhere if he doesn't can it 😂

Iwa-chan: I shoulda left you on that street corner where you were standing

Oikawa: But'cha dIDN'T

Bonus points if you get that reference, lmao

Has to keep taking breaks because his butt hurts when he sits down for too long because it's fLaT

I'm sorry, Tooru 😭😭 Forgive me. I love you, really

Is constantly on his phone

But he points out pretty views and interesting sights to everyone all the time awww

Low-key needs to pee all the time, but gets defensive if someone brings it up please stop bulling him, travelling is hard

"Are we there yet?"

Seems kind of annoying, but is actually just genuinely excited to go on a road trip and spend time with his friends 😭😭

Buys matching souvenirs for everyone in secret to surprise them with 🥺

When people complain about all the photos, souvenirs, and enthusiasm, etc. and ask why he has to keep doing it, Oikawa says:

"I want to remember as much of this as possible. I want us all to remember as much of this as much as possible," with a sweet little smile 😭😭😭

And that's when everyone realises how mean they've been to him about being over-the-top and irritating, and they all feel terrible

Just like in the freaking anime, man

☆ Terushima Yuuji ☆

Will hijack the aux cord to play his incredibly niche music taste

Feet up on the dashboard when he rides shotgun

Shoes on is bad enough, but shoes off just stinks up the entire car you have to roll all the windows down, lmfao

Will break all sorts of road laws if you let him behind the wheel please don't

Daichi will come and arrest him 😭😭

Lives on energy drinks

That's all the drinks he packs. Nothing else

Travels in sports wear and sliders yes, even though you reallly shouldn't drive in sandals

Like he knows or cares 😭

Will chat to girls at the gas station and ask for their numbers, even though he's never going to see them again

"You never know, man! It could be, like, fate or something"

Yes, Yuuji, you do. And it's 'or something'

Thinks it's a good time to sext his current booty call because, like, he has hours of free time. What else is he going to do?

Probably forgot to pack actual food

Has to live off of snacks and cheap service station food for the duration of the trip

But not his own snacks, of course. Everyone else's one doesn't keep friends and buy one's own snacks

Genuinely doesn't realise if he's being gross or annoying, so let him down lightly like a bro and he'll probably make an effort to stop

Doesn't plan the route or anything, even if he's driving. Just punches it into Google Maps as he sits his ass down on the day and trusts it to get him there in one piece and on time

Entire Johzenji team: Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death...

For some reason knows how to change a flat tire, though, so he's good for something, I guess 😂😂

Probably saw a YouTube video on it. Maybe a WikiHow article

Somehow still manages to be an endearing part of the trip??

He smiles a lot and makes a lot of jokes, particularly when things go wrong, so it keeps everyone's spirits up

It definitely wouldn't be the same without him

© imo-chan-imagines 2020

[s-c-r-i-p-s-i]

Candy is Dandy but Liquor is Quicker

[Dead by Baelight’s Kinktober // Day 8 and 18 : Outfit/Skin, Cornered]

🖤  🖤   🖤 “Don’t come any closer,” you warned shakily, backing up against the boarded-up door as he stalked forward, every step radiating confidence. “Or you’ll what?” He asked, leaning in. “Arrest me?” Playfully rattling the costume handcuffs on your belt, he set his gun against the door. You stared up at him, eyes wide as saucers, and he just snorted, curling a finger in your hair. “Darlin’…” Tilting his head, his fingers traveled lower, slowly ghosting over your neck, your collarbone…. You inhaled sharply in frightened anticipation, goosebumps rising, only for him to skim over your chest entirely, plucking one of the mini bottles from your bandolier. “I would love…” Long, bony, but strangely elegant fingers unscrewed the cap, flicking it off where it clattered across the floor somewhere. “To see you try.” 🖤  🖤   🖤 Pairing: Deathslinger (Caleb Quinn) x F! Reader

Rating: Explicit

CW: non-con/dub-con, bondage, drinking, smut, canon-typical violence

Word Count: 4,927

Something… odd had been happening lately.

Not the cankerous growths and sickly orange flowers that were always so abundant this time of year - or whatever passed for a year in this everlasting hell. By no means was that unprecedented.

Ask anyone who’d been there long enough to know and they’d tell you; there was a certain… cyclicity to things. Recurring phenomenon - the red envelopes, the flowers, the mysterious gifts wrapped up like Christmas presents. Always sequential, always in order, like some crude imitation of seasons. (And for what? No one ever aged a day.)

No, this was something new.

And new, in the Entity’s realm, was never a good thing. But… You had to admit, this seemed mostly harmless.

Look - It’s not like you were ever really in control of what you wore here, anyway. Most of the time, you were just stuck with whatever clothes you were wearing when you rolled into the fog. Sometimes She (that omnipotent thing in the sky) threw you in something else. Nobody ever really paid it much mind. The Entity worked in mysterious ways. And people, frankly, had more important shit to worry about.

But then when the flowers started blooming this year, things got a little weird.

She -…

She started putting people in costumes.

Cheap polyester numbers, mostly - the kind you’d buy from a big-box store, straight from one of those awful clear vinyl bags.

…It was starting to look a lot like Halloween. Jack-o’-lanterns even began appearing, scattered around the campfire and adorning the generators.

And nobody knew what the fuck was going on. Hell, not everyone even knew what Halloween was. You had quite the diverse cast; some people weren’t even from the same world as you.

The general vibe around the campfire was just… mild amusement if anything. You had a chuckle, then moved on. That was just the way of things. Everyone had these… survivor blinders on. You guess it was hard to get phased by something so minor when you all got murdered on the daily, but…

But you weren’t content with that.

You always had trouble just accepting things at face value. You wanted to know why.

Like - was the Entity stroking out? Things always did get a little strange around this time. Almost as if She were sick.

It was rare, but there were these little… Well, Feng called them glitches, and it was apt a term as any. Just little things, here and there, like She couldn’t quite enforce the rules of her own game.

Almost everything in this world seemed to be harvested from people’s memories. So… Maybe she was starting to pull things at random. Spiraling.

Was this the synaptic failure of a dying god?

Probably not, but there was nothing to do besides let your mind wander, and it was the only theory you had.

And then….

Then She whisked you away to Frontierland in the gaudiest slutty sheriff costume known to man and pit you against the goddamn cowboy.

Yeah, no - that was about a step too far to have been a happy accident.

Maybe you were thinking too hard. Maybe She just had a fucked up sense of humor.

When the fog cleared, you found yourself in the saloon with the others. You half-heartedly laughed it off (“Yeah, yeah. Okay. Very funny.”) and then moved on. Business as usual.

But not before rolling your eyes and discreetly downing one of the liquor minis from the shitty novelty booze bandolier sewn to your costume behind everyone’s backs.

At least She had the decency to stock it.

You were finishing up cleansing a totem when you heard the telltale crack of a gunshot split the air from all the way across the map. Not anywhere close enough to be dangerous, but a dead giveaway as to who you were up against.

…And cold hard proof that your little outfit was far from coincidence. The literal and proverbial smoking gun.

The moment you heard it you deflated, head falling back.

Seriously? What the fuck was She playing at?

Why you?

It wasn’t much of a conscious decision; you found yourself plucking another bottle from your bandolier and knocking it back without a whole lot of thought. You were obviously going to need it. Staring blankly ahead, you incredulously shook your head as you thumbed the moisture from your lip.

Okay. Alright. That was it, for now, you decided.

The Entity gave you a fully loaded bandolier - seriously, you were armed to the teeth with the little mini bottles, to the point it was actually kind of heavy. But you already felt a little weak in the knees after just two shots. It had been a while, so your tolerance was understandably nil. You didn’t want to be useless to your team. More importantly, it now felt critical you get out of there without running into the killer.

The Deathslinger was one of those ones. Not overly talkative, like a couple of the killers were, but he definitely got a kick out of the whole thing. There was a stark difference between the two camps, so to speak - the ones who only seemed like they killed because they had to, and the ones who were completely in their element. And he was obviously one of the latter.

It was that goddamn laugh. Low and sultry. Chuckling whenever he hooked someone or when a survivor did something exceptionally dumb. Even when you weren’t the target of it, you’d come to associate it with pure humiliation.

And you just knew that he’d take one look at you, in your stupid sheriff costume, and… Oh. You were steaming mad only thinking about it.

So you made it your personal mission to avoid him this trial. And to do that, you had to actually get out. Which meant no more drinks for you!

You should have known She had other plans.

You did your best to keep a low profile, tried to make sure you were on the opposite side of the map from him at all times, while still being useful. A difficult balancing act.

But you couldn’t just leave your friends hanging.

When you saw Meg’s aura flare out in distress as she was lowered onto the hook, you began making your way over, quick and quiet and praying to every god you knew that he would be long gone by the time you got there.

And, lucky you, there was no sight of him. So you crept towards the hook, privately taking solace that at least you weren’t alone in the goof factor; Meg was all dressed up like Wendy - the fast-food icon. The Entity really outdid herself, the braids were right on the nose, and you were almost loosey-goosey enough to make some stupid quip. Almost. Maybe when she wasn’t dangling from a meat hook.

You pulled her off the hook with care, but just as her feet touched the ground, another gunshot rang out, this time much louder. A spear whizzed by so close that you could hear it shear through the air just before it embedded itself in the post, inches away from you both. No sooner had you whipped your head around to find the source than the sound of shoes pounding against the ground filled your ringing ears.

You looked back and Meg was gone. Peeled off like a bandaid.

You decided you better get the hell out of Dodge too.

First things first, you needed to get out of the open; that was just asking to get shot. So you made a mad dash for the saloon. You figured you had a good head start since it should have taken him a hot minute to retrieve the harpoon, dislodge it from the hook, shove it back in the gun… Sounded like a whole ass process.

Except, when you looked back behind you he was hot on your tail. Trail. Hot on your trail.

You made a snap judgment, deciding you’d try and lose him by running up to the second story. Was it cheap? Absolutely. He obviously had some kind of bum leg, unless that brace was some kind of bold fashion statement. Not that it had ever slowed him down, any. But you were desperate. And all’s fair in love and war, right?

Swiftly turning the corner, you galloped up the stairs and dove into the first room you saw, hopping through the window.

By the time your eyes adjusted to the indoors and you realized it was a dead-end, it was too late. The only other exit was boarded up, and you could hear his boots unhurriedly thumping up the creaky steps like he was in no rush at all. Step. Step. You rushed to the boarded-up door and gave it a good open-palmed slam to test its strength - you’d seen killers smash through these like they were cardboard, but it just wouldn’t budge. Shit.

He was getting closer. You could hear his spurs. Hissing, you banged your fist against the boards in frustration. What, impending injury wasn’t bad enough? She had to add insult, too?

The footsteps stopped, and so did everything else, it felt like. Holding your breath, you slowly began to turn around. There he was in the window, backlit and silhouette, dusty sunlight filtering through his ghostly white hair. You had to admit, he cut a striking figure, something cinematic. There was just the trouble of the gun. Aimed right at you.

Didn’t have to climb over the window if he just reeled you to him. Smart man.

Before you could think to dive for cover or something smart like that, he began lowering the gun. It was hard to tell what expression he was wearing, backlit as he was, but you could feel those spectral eyes looking you up and down. From your cheap western style boot covers, all the way up your legs to your fluffy petticoat and layered skirts, the ill-fitted booze bandolier slung around your shoulder… and finally, the gold, plastic 5 point sheriff star nestled between your tits.

Oh God. Here it comes…

He didn’t even have to say a word, hot embarrassment already surging to the surface before he even opened his mouth.

“Well. Pardon me.” You could make out the glint of dirty teeth in the dark as his grin spread. “Didn’t know you were an elected official.”

Why the hell was he exempt from this bullshit, anyway? You’d seen Ghostface in a devil costume, and Myers in a cat ear headband, so you knew they weren’t immune. Maybe the Entity thought he looked stupid and campy enough as is. But… she couldn’t have dressed him up as Woody from Toy Story or something? He probably wouldn’t have gotten it, but you would have found it funny. Maybe then you wouldn’t have felt so small and humiliated.

You hated this. You didn’t even know what to say until he started climbing over the window. Then you had a pretty clear idea.

“Don’t come any closer,” you warned shakily, backing up against the boarded-up door as he stalked forward, every step radiating confidence.

“Or you’ll what?” He asked, leaning in. “Arrest me?” Playfully rattling the costume handcuffs on your belt, he set his gun against the door. You stared up at him, eyes wide as saucers, and he just snorted, curling a finger in your hair.

“Darlin’…” Tilting his head, his fingers traveled lower, slowly ghosting over your neck, your collarbone…. You inhaled sharply in frightened anticipation, goosebumps rising, only for him to skim over your chest entirely, plucking one of the mini bottles from your bandolier. “I would love…” Long, bony, but strangely elegant fingers unscrewed the cap, flicking it off where it clattered across the floor somewhere. “To see you try.”

And on that note, he finally tipped it back - you watched his adam’s apple bob as he swallowed it down. Shaking the empty bottle at you, he slipped it back into its holster on your belt. “Bit frivolous, you know.” He commented, curling his finger in and snapping it back. “A flask does just fine. No need to reinvent the wheel.”

“Right, well,” you huffed, and moved to squeeze past him - he was clearly in good humor, at least, so maybe he’d let you off easy. Wasn’t a little whiskey and a laugh good enough?

Apparently not.

You were immediately met with an arm shooting out, hand landing right beside your head, caging you in.

“Woah there, where d’ya think you’re going, sweetheart?” He smirked down at you, a crooked thing that flashed his teeth, scarred lip snagged over a canine. You’d never noticed before, but one of his incisors had a gold crown. Now that you’d noticed, you couldn’t stop looking at it, the alcohol still floating around in your bloodstream turning you into some sort of easily distracted magpie. He was missing one of his bottom teeth, too. It was… kind of a mess in there, huh? Smelled like whiskey and tobacco.

“You got me all the way up here, I’m not too keen on leaving already.” Sliding his hand from the door, he guided you away by the small of your waist, and you… you just kind of let him, stiltedly trying to follow his direction.

“So how about you…” You reached the bed and he grabbed you by your shoulders, turning you round to face him. “Just sit your pretty ass down.” Just a slight push and you were bouncing on the bedsprings, palms catching your fall.

In the back of your mind you were already fearing the worst, but much to your surprise he just sat down next to you on the edge of the mattress, looking almost comically large and out of place on the twin-size bed. All you could do was blink at him dumbly, unsure what was happening.

He took a long breath through his nose. It felt like forever before he finally released it and said, “Have a drink with me.”

“I…” You drew out the word dubiously, clearly meaning to decline. You were already too tipsy for comfort considering present company was a killer.

“Didn’t ask,” He said gruffly, pulling two bottles from your bandolier and offering you one. “Indulge an old man. Or we’ll do it the hard way.”

Hard to argue with that! You didn’t know what the hard way was, but you didn’t want to find out. So you took the bottle, lips pulling together in a tight, awkward half-smile when he clinked his against yours.

This was weird. Awkward, and in a whole different way than you’d been preparing yourself for.

You actually found yourself glad for the burn that flooded your body as you downed the shot, heat loosening your tense limbs and taking the edge off this… incredibly odd situation, if only slightly.

Besides the obvious threat, it felt like maybe, despite everything… he was really just a lonely old man. In want of someone to drink with. A slice of normality. Isn’t that what you all wanted? You guessed it couldn’t hurt. It was keeping him away from the generators, anyway. Buying you all some extra time.

And… maybe this was what the Entity wanted. The reason she brought you here like this.

“Now, miss,” He spoke, and you turned your gaze up to him, blinking owlishly, your head swimming. There was a lot to take in at this distance. All these different textures. Scars and stubble and pockmarks. You found it all fascinating. “I’ve got to be frank with you.”

You know, you hadn’t really heard him speak at length before, but you were starting to realize that his whole aesthetic, he didn’t really sound straight out of a spaghetti western like you might expect. There was a trace of that, especially in his vocabulary, but his accent was much more reminiscent of… Canada, somehow. With a slightly Irish lilt.

It was ludicrously unexpected, and something about it just made a dopey smile float onto your face. You didn’t even realize you were doing it, until his eyes drifted down, and he huffed with almost fond incredulity.

“Think that’s funny, huh?”

You’re almost positive you missed something he said. You heard it, you just didn’t… process it right. This time when he spoke, you tried to pay attention.

“I don’t usually go taking what ain’t mine, but damn if you don’t look like a present addressed just to me.”

It was your turn to huff, bobbing with amusement. “Okay, cowboy, I know what it looks like, but…” It wasn’t like you chose this outfit.

“Honey,” he interrupted, “I think you’ve mistaken me for the wrong kinda wrangler. It’s not cows I’m after.” He paused, tipping his head as if reconsidering, smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. “But if a heifer’s in need of a good driving…”

It took you a solid minute for your brain to catch up. He was content to watch the cogs turn until it did.

He just called you a cow!

A cow in need of a good dicking!

Your mouth hung open in shock and he - he just laughed.

“Little slow on the uptake, aren’t cha? Had a few already? How bout one more?” His hand began trailing up your leg, dirty fingers slowly dipping beneath your pure white petticoat.

Suddenly, one thing was very clear.

You had to get out of here.

Shaking your head, you tried to stand, but you were swiftly reeled back as soon as your feet hit the ground, pulled into a hard lap, all bones and brace and knobby knees and God knows what else.

“We’re gonna have one more,” his voice materialized right beside your ear, tone final as he pulled another mini from your belt. You shook your head, whimpering some protest between tightly closed lips as he pressed the bottle to your mouth. Behind you, you heard him sigh through his nose like a beleaguered bull. Then his other hand came round your face, pinching your nose shut.

You didn’t wait around for your lungs to give out. There wasn’t any point in that. You knew he wasn’t going to give in. But you did. Almost immediately. Your lips parted for air and got tequila instead, swallowing sloppily as you tried not to choke, rivulets of amber dripping down your chin while he murmured, “There you go… Nice and easy…”

His hand lowered to your throat to tip your head back, your world spinning as a wet sensation dragged across your chin, the man licking up the tequila in one broad and obscene lick. That rotten chuckle inundated your senses. “Awful cute when ya can’t even keep your eyes straight.” He tapped his fingers along the column of your throat, adding in afterthought. “Awful cute anyway, but I’m not really in the mood to fight just for a little company tonight. You gonna be good for me now, darling?”

“…Uh-huh.” You nearly sobbed out the sound, voice meek and pathetic. But you’d be lying if you weren’t starting to feel… sweaty under your skirts, inner thighs getting embarrassingly slick. That always happened when you were drunk, but never this bad.

And despite all the awfulness churning in your stomach, you still felt heat pool in your gut as he cooed, “Good girl. Not at dumb as you look, are you?”

You didn’t even realize he was actually expecting an answer until he probed again, “Are you?”

You quickly shook your head.

Humming, he seemed to accept that, because he was soon re-adjusting you on his lap and catching your lips with his in a messy kiss. He tasted strong and dry, your tongue prickling like your taste buds were trying to retract at the mere slide of his against yours; like salt on a slug. When his hand crept up your skirt this time, you didn’t try to stop him, even as his middle finger began tracing your sopping panties, dipping into the wet seam. You could scarcely think, devolved into a gooey pile of nerves and feelings that he was amusedly plucking at.

Peeling your panties aside, his fingers parted your folds, a pleased rumble emanating in his throat and vibrating in your mouth when his thumb brushed against your clit and your hips twitched in response.

You were gasping for breath by the time he finally pulled his mouth away, but he gave you no time to recover, already pressing two fingers past your resistance. In some attempt to ground yourself, you grasped at his arm as they began curling and pumping inside you, but your weak, drunk grip made it about as easy as catching clouds.

At some point, your barely-there vision drifted towards the window and you dimly realized you were facing it, completely exposed. That if anyone came up the stairs, they’d be able to see everything.

You’d just have to hope his heartbeat would be enough to keep them far away from the saloon. Eyes fluttering to the ceiling, you pushed the thought from your mind. It wasn’t hard. Not when the feeling in your stomach was reaching a fever pitch, nearing the point of no return.

In some ways, he was a lot gentler than you were expecting. Which was good, because you felt hopelessly vulnerable right now, helpless and disorientated in his lap, his looming over you making your mixed up brain feel protected even though some part of you knew that wasn’t right.

Everything felt numb except where he touched you; the heat of his breath on your neck, the kisses he pressed to your skin, the scrape of his beard, the brush of his long hair against your shoulder. All your wires were crossed, every little sensation going straight to your core.

Gasping out as your climax crashed over you, your hips lurched, thighs trying to snap closed around his hand. Unbothered, he just kept stroking you through it until your hips finally began to sink back down and your cunt stopped desperately trying to milk his fingers. Withdrawing slowly, he pressed them into your open mouth, the tang of your own juices spreading across your tongue. You didn’t know what it said about you that your blind instinct was to obediently suck, but that’s what you did, and he breathed out in a low, steady hiss.

“Careful, now. Fool me too good and I might have to keep you.”

Pulling away, he encouraged you to lay on the bed, settling between your legs. You watched the ceiling drift then snap back to place every time you blinked while he fiddled with something - you weren’t sure what until he was fixing your arms above your head and the apparently not-so-novelty handcuffs from your costume were being snapped around your wrists.

Then his hands were skating over you appreciatively, over your ribcage, the curvature of your waist almost reverently. “Guess the good Lord finally answered my prayers.” He murmured, flicking the plastic sheriff star between your bosom. “Not really how I woulda done it, but beggars can’t be choosers, eh? After all…” The man sighed, fingers curling into the top of your blouse and slowly dragging the gingham fabric down over your breasts until they were revealed to his eerie, quietly covetous eyes. “We don’t exactly have all the time in the world, do we?”

What was that even supposed to mean? It seemed to you as if you had nothing but time. Maybe not in this particular trial - and as if to punctuate that thought, you felt a generator kick to life, the familiar thrum of hope in your bones.

Did he know something you didn’t? Or were you just too foxed to follow?

Exhaling, he rolled his hands over your breasts, admiring the feel of them for just a moment. It seemed like he wanted to take his time with you, but the reminder that you were on a timer was the spur in his side that eventually pushed him to move on.

You heard him audibly fiddling with his belts and wondered if you were getting out of this alive. It was cold comfort, but at least you’d probably managed to save everyone else. Not very heroic when it wasn’t even really your decision. But it was something. Maybe. Something to cling to as you felt the heat of him slide across the mess he’d made of you.

Whimpering, you curled inwards from your core as he entered you, bound hands lifting up and both grasping at his chest at the feeling of being run through. By no means was it violent. It didn’t hurt, exactly. But it had been a long time, and he was unforgivingly long and solid and foreign. An intrusion on your body.

“That’s it. There you go, gorgeous. Hang onto me.”

You did, your hands abandoning his chest to loop over his neck, accidentally knocking the hat off his head in your bound fumbling. He didn’t seem to care, swooping down to take your lips again while you struggled to get used to the feeling of him moving inside you.

With how wet you already were, it didn’t take all that long before pleasure started to win out, every little bump and grind against your sweet spot pulling you closer to the edge again, his mouth muffling the pathetic stream of sounds trying to escape yours.

This time, the fall from the top was a slow one, liquid heat spilling out across your core - though you weren’t quite aware how literally until you felt it physically starting to pool beneath you, a wave of embarrassment flaring when you’d realized what just happened. Okay - you didn’t - that had never happened before, drunk or not.

Your hopes that he didn’t notice were dashed as he pulled away to chuckle heatedly in your ear. He wasn’t far behind though, laughter broken by a groan as his hips snapped against yours, burying himself deep as he could go. You felt the alien jerk of his cock inside you, radiating warmth.

Panting, he nuzzled at your neck as he came down, whiskers scratching at your skin. You felt… suspended in place, not sure what came next. But you guessed it wasn’t up to you. Hesitantly, you let your fingers slip into his sweaty white tresses, the texture thick and rough like the mane of a horse, dusty and… probably unwashed for God knows how long.

There was that awkward feeling again. Like you were two pieces of a puzzle that didn’t fit no matter how you turned them, but you weren’t allowed to leave.

Eventually, he took a deep, centering breath and withdrew from you, guiding your hands back to the bed and clicking open the safety release of the handcuffs, setting you free and letting them fall wherever on the floor.

Rubbing your wrists, you groaned in discomfort as he dragged his fingers through the mess, pushing his cum back inside you. No. You just wanted to be done.

But then he pulled your panties back into place. Pulled your shirt back up. Smoothed your skirts down.

His gaze lingered on you for a long moment before he heaved a big sigh and finally dismounted.

Pulling you up by your arm so that you were sitting up, he grabbed his hat from the bed, and you felt him plop it onto your head and adjust it.

“Suits ya.” He said softly, and it was the first thing he’d said in a while. Part of you was waiting for the other shoe to drop, not sure if he wanted a thank you, or…

He eyed you for another long moment, like there was something more he wanted to say, but… Instead, his gaze flicked down to the bandolier round your chest.

You swallowed hard as he plucked the last two bottles from your belt, the thought of taking another shot making your stomach churn and your gag reflex curl.

Patting your thigh, he bonelessly plopped himself in the nearby chair, rolling his eyes as you just stared at him. “Go on, get.” He snorted, uncapping one of the little bottles. “Don’t fall down the stairs on your way out.”

He was letting you go? Just like that?

You hesitated, something about this seemed… unfinished. You weren’t sure if you wanted to go.

But you didn’t want to wait around until he changed his mind, either.

So you uncertainly began heading towards the window, pausing when you remembered - “Your hat…” You reached for it, intending to give it back, but…

“Keep it, I don’t care.” That sounded unexpectedly crabby, and when you looked back, he wasn’t looking at you. He was staring at the wall, avoiding your gaze as he tipped back a shot. “Wear it if you want to see me again. Don’t if ya don’t. I can take a hint.”

You blinked, unable to believe he was sulking. Now. After everything.

Your fingers hovered over the brim of the hat. You needed to quash this now, while you still had the chance. Your conscience was screaming at you, leave it, don’t encourage him, don’t even give him hope.

Don’t bring it to the campfire. Don’t anything. Just… leave it on the windowsill, you told yourself. It shouldn’t have even required thought. Nothing about this was okay.

You didn’t even know his goddamn name.

And yet… You found your hand slowly lowering, falling back down to your side. You gave him one last, long look before grabbing the windowsill.

You could always decide later.

🖤  🖤 🖤

Thank you for reading!!!

🖤  🖤 🖤  

Notes:

Thank you Pugge for beta'ing most of this!

I do not know WHY this took me so long to write but I’m fairly happy with it. Sorta wasn’t the direction I originally had planned for this, but what can I say, I’m cursed. I got the Midas touch, except instead of gold, everything I touch turns to non-con.

This piece was written for Day 8 and 18 of the 🔞 Dead by Baelight 🔞 Discord server’s Kinktober. Anyone over 18 is welcome to join here.

[fuckyeaharthuriana]

Cursed - review (spoilers) up to episode 8 (very long post)

I am going to write a non spoilers review and a spoilers review when I finish the show as well, but for now. Here we go.

The review will be divided in:

Plot: alias, who I am supposed to root for? What the hell is that sword? Characters: alias trying to peek around Nimue to get more scenes from the secondary characters, plus... name droppings? Romance: zero chemistry?? tropey endings?

I generally enjoying the show, especially after the first episodes, which were just boringly long and could honestly be avoided.

1. PLOT

The story starts to be a bit more delineated by episode 7, I have to say. When I started it, I was extremely confused about who I was supposed to root for, what was happening, why all the arthurian names where mixed up. 

First of all, let me say that the show looked very pretty. A part from the hideous transitions (animated transitions), the way the show uses colors was absolutely lovely. 

a) The plot is this: Someone made a magic Sword (let’s call it Sword) which was able to give very good fighting abilities (and magic) to whoever was using it. Merlin came to use it, at some point, but the Sword ended up fusing with him, corrupting him into a need for revenge. He helps raise kings with the use of his sword, until the Sword consumes all his power and almost kills him.

He is saved by a Sky Fay woman who takes the sword out of his body and hides it, trying to save Merlin from his dark power. They fall in love and are together, until Merlin leaves, angrily, when he finds out that the woman has “destroyed” the Sword (but she has just hidden it). She later marries a guy, and has Nimue, who is actually Merlin’s daughter.

The story starts when the Red Paladins attack Nimue’s village and Nimue’s mother asks her to bring the Sword to Merlin. During her journey he encounters Arthur, who is a thief, and Arthur’s sister, a nun called Morgana who actually works with the Fey people, trying to save them.

The plot picks up once we are around episode 6 and 7, and Nimue is finally back with the hidden Fey, alongside Arthur and Morgana, and they decide that they will keep the sword and fight against the Red Paladins.

b) This is the overall plot. The beginning of the show is extremely slow. The show is heavy handed in his need to show us how oppressed and suffering Nimue is. She is shamed by her own people for being “demonic”, she is discriminated by humans (even if she is one of the fey who has zero fey features), she is attacked by both. When the Red Paladins destroyed her village... I was confused, because we didn’t really see any positive feelings Nimue had for her home (she hated everyone, she was discriminated, she was trying to leave). Also, somehow everyone could tell she is Fey? I was confused by how badly she was able to hide, her who looks like a normal human and could have easily cut her hair or something.

Her meeting with Arthur is also... strange. He is introduced as a love interest, we get bits of his story (thrown away from his family, his father has been killed, seeking honor) with the show, he is a thief and his “attachment” to the plot could have been a bit more... consistent. He helps Nimue, bringing her to Morgana, and conveniently Morgana is working to help the Fey and working for an underground smuggling operation. I think I would have enjoyed it much more if Arthur had been more involved in Morgana’s smuggling operations.

The other side of the plot revolves around Merlin or the Vikings (Pym). He is Uther’s advisor, and Uther is a shitty king. He is just there to... give Merlin something to do? I think the show would have worked well without him.

c) Uther and Pym are the comic reliefs of this show. Uther is shown as having no spine, so I am not sure why he was there. He had no interest in the Red Paladins, or the kingdom, he just wanted the Sword because apparently that gives power to the king? At the same time, we have Pym (Nimue’s friend, thought dead in the attack), who ends up as a healer for a raider ship. Honestly, the people in this show were so horrible that I definitely rooted for Pym’s Vikings. I am not sure if the show wanted me to root for the fae or the vikings, but I definitely wished for the vikings to keep raiding.

Now, for the main plot point that confused me:

d) The Fae and the Red Paladins

I was very confused about why the fae were chased and hunted. The world has Christianity, the Pope and the Church but is basically in a fantasy land (but also it has the Ninth lost legion and the Roman Empire, but the gods are not from anything I could recognize). We are supposed to believe that there is an old ancient religion, and that the fae follow.... Hidden gods? shadows? they have power related to the land? But do they? None of them seemed to have any powers, only Nimue had magic. The show seems to imply that they do, but we only see Nimue using her powers, while the fae is powerless against the Paladins. So... I suppose the Paladins attack them just because they look different? Or because they follow another religion? 

I wish there had been a bit extra information about why the Red Paladins are so anti-fae. Something maybe related to the sword, like the Sword murdered a bunch of people and it was made by people following this specific religion? 

How powerful are they? Why do they have a fortress? Are they getting taxes from the kingdom, is that why they have the “money from the Beggars Land”. Furthermore, in episode 8, why don’t the Red Paladins fight Nimue? Why leave her fight one on one? There has not been enough time for the reputation to build yet, and we have not seen her reputation building (I take as example Black Sails, and the way John Silver’s reputation was built there). The conquest of the Red Paladins in episode 8 was a bit... too easy. All these religious zealots suddenly are like nope, we surrender. The politics were generally quite confusing, I was never sure where the characters were because they could fast travel to any point at any time.

e) The Sword

I have to say that I really enjoyed the idea of the Sword as something that drains (took Merlin’s power) and corrupts. I definitely want to see what happens to Nimue after using it, and how Arthur will end up with it, as king.

f) Too much gore

TOO

MUCH

GORE

There is no point in it. The Red Paladins are shown to mutilate and torture and kill more than once. It is not needed. We need to see it once, then... just cut away. The guy who is following Merlin to kill him? He is immediately shown torturing a poor person buried alive. There is no point for the majority of these gore scenes.

g) Characters just ends up at the right place at the right time

There is no map or order. We NEVER know where character are. They can instantly transport themselves to any place. They are hidden in the forest and surrounded? It’s okay, they can immediately teleport an army to the Red Paladins’ castle.

Nimue is in the caves, hidden? No worries, she can immediately reach Arthur who is in another place, when she needs to.

Gawain is wandering the forest? The Weeping Monk is right there!

h) If you’re a secondary character you die

Unless you have an important arthurian name (and unless you are Kaze), then the character is dead. Ambushes will happen, the main characters will always survive.

2. CHARACTERS

Name dropping

I want to start with something that really annoyed me because of the over use. The name dropping.

The show did this at least four times, if not more. A character would be introduced with a name (ex. here is the Green Knight!) and then the character or the narration would rectify it by giving us a new name (”He is Gawain!”), with a long pause that leaves us (the audience) the time to GASP IN SHOCK BECAUSE “I KNOW THAT NAME”.

It just seemed.... too much, after the first time.

Gawain

Alright, let me start with Gawain because he literally came out of nowhere. It almost felt like the show introduced him at the beginning (Gawain is supposed to be Nimue’s dearest friend) but then they edited out the scenes so when we meet Gawain we are supposed to be shocked by we are not. 

A part from this, he really grew on me. He is the Green Knight, the hero of the hidden fae, and he hates humans (somehow all the main fae, Nimue and Gawain, look like humans). His character arc is well done, because he learns to trust Arthur and that is basically his character growth. 

Morgana

HANDS ON, BEST CHARACTER EVER. Morgana’s journey was amazing, also because of what we know of her arthurian character. She starts in a convent, using the family name Igraine, and having Celia as her lover.

I wasn’t too impressed by the fact that the show seemed to use her being wlw as a way to show how progressive and different Nimue is. Still, at least we have our first tv wlw Morgana! She fights for the fae and helps them escape, which shows her sense of justice, even if it is never really explained why she would do this, or even how she started to relate to the fae.

Still, she was soon set to the path of her personal pain when she lost Celia (I’ll talk more about them down in relationships), and the show is never cruel to her pain. We see that she wants revenge (when she writes the letter! Amazing! Stunning!) AND justice most of all, but she accepts the deal with the demon when she sees Celia again, when she is offered something she really desires. Love THIS FOR HER. I am sure her journey will be more and more interesting by episode.

Nimue

I wasn’t too impressed with Nimue. She feels like a character who needs to be there to forward the plot, but I was also sad when the scene moved from other characters to return to her. I understand the need for her character, but I was not too invested in her character arc? I don’t want to sound cruel, I understand the need for her character development and how she had to discover herself and her destiny, but it was all very guidebook and very expected.

At episode 8, Nimue becomes queen of the Fae and conquers the Red Paladins and allies with the Red Spear? This... happens so fast. Nothing had really happened before this point, no plan, no showing us how the Paladins were in one place only... there is really no sense in it. It was just so fast, as if the show didn’t want to spend too much time investing in grand battles or showing us things. 

Pym and the Red Spear

Pym is the comic relief of the show. She miraculously escape the massacre and ends up with the Red Spear and her raiding ship. Honestly, they were the best characters. I wish they had had more screen, more than comedic relief. They just conveniently are at the right spot at the right moment (somehow the Red Paladins don’t kill them? After normally slaughtering everyone they find, they are just captured) and thus are thrown back in Nimue’s main plot line, but I am afraid that because of this they will just disappear from the show??

Arthur

Arthur is a mixed bag for me. I really enjoyed how his character arc revolved around honor. He felt like he lost honor and had to reclaim it. But when he steals the Sword we never see him regretting it, which was disappointing, as that would have been part of his arc. Also, he somehow ends up working with the fae but he never shows any emotional investment in justice because the show is too occupied to show us how Arthur and Nimue are falling in love.

I think he shines the most in the episodes where he works with Gawain. We see how he is smart, strategic, and a good fighter, but also able to lead (he saves Gawain with a sacrifice) even when surrounded by people who distrusts him. I truly enjoyed it.

I think his character loses when he is in the same scenes with Nimue.

Kaze

KAZE WAS SUPPOSED to be Nimue’s right hand, giving her advice. And her character is shown to have both advice for Nimue but also being wiser than her. Nimue needs her counsel. Still, when Nimue actually takes the throne, Kaze is not really seen counselling her, as the show needs to immediately pass to the next plot point, and only shows us Nimue and Arthur.

Merlin

Merlin’s plot started strong and then... sort of got lost. He starts being Uther’s witty advisor. He doesn’t really care about Uther, but wants to use his need for the Sword to also get the Sword for himself (to get his magic back?). He doesn’t have magic anymore, and his character arc shows us how he goes from being selfish (he wants the Sword to get his magic back) to selfless when he finds out Nimue is his daughter. 

Still, many parts of his plot were...??? He steals fire from the Beggar King (supposedly to destroy the Sword) and this leads to the Fisherman being hired to kill him? But this whole Fisherman subplot was a bit out of nowhere. 

He allies with the Vikings (sorry, I forget the name of the king) because their king also wants the Sword... and against Uther... but Uther is literally doing nothing worthy and he could easily manipulate Uther, but ends up losing any upper hand against the Viking king? What was the point of all that?

3. .Romance? Relationships?

Nimue and Arthur? Nope. Their relationship just happens. I have nothing to say about it, a part from the fact that I always found Nimue and Arthur more interesting when they were interacting with other characters because those were the moments where we got characterizations. Arthur with Gawain? We see Arthur’s ability to lead, and the way he reclaims his honor. Nimue with Kaze? We see her insecurities and her hope for the fae.

DOF AND PYM? Yes please. They were just so cute, and Dof’s death was useless.

Morgana and Celia? Yes? But here we are again with the “buried gay” trope, because we cannot have a happy wlw. I understand that she is Morgana and she is not supposed to be happy, so I am not too annoyed at it, especially if Morgana’s love for Celia is used to give conflict to Morgana.

[wirewitchviolet]

We really need 1:1 time passage in games.

I play a lot of games. I particularly play a whole lot of RPGs, strategy things, survival games, and these all tend to be games that try to create an extra sense of immersion with hunger, thirst, and a day night cycle. And WOW do they ever end up doing the exact opposite with the implementation!

Like, let’s just start with food. If I am playing a survival game, and I choose not to eat for a while, my little hunger meter will bottom out, and I will start taking damage then eventually die. This tends to take like, one real life hour/in-game day, give or take to kick in, and then death comes within like, maybe 5 minutes if they’re generous? And I stave this off by... usually finding, killing, cooking, and eating, 2 entire turkeys per real hour/in-game day.

So... what the hell is any of that!?

So we have hunger, and we’re representing it as this slowly draining meter you have to keep an eye on. Already, that’s just weird. In my experience, you can go an entire day, not eating a damn thing, and not feel a thing out of the ordinary. But when you do actually get hungry, it can be overwhelming and impossible to ignore (have you eaten yet today by the way? My meal schedule’s gotten totally weird). Nothing about that makes sense to simulate as a slowly lowering bar. If you want realism, you have absolutely no onscreen hunger meter, and then like every 4-24 hours or so you have some incredibly distracting hunger indicator kick in and stay kicked in. Like, activate rumble packs and leave’em going at a steady pulse sort of annoying. And it gets worse when you’re actually preparing food.

Also feeling hungry is not an early indicator that you are going to suddenly die of starvation, or even that you’re anywhere near that point. I had dinner 6 hours ago, I’m a little hungry now. It varies a lot, but actually starving to death can take upwards of going TWO WHOLE MONTHS without any food at all. Like if we’re representing that as a meter, “hungry” kicks in when it drops to 99% full. Starvation is not a particularly common cause of death. If you’re dying of starvation, either someone is intentionally starving you to death, or some horrific catastrophe has just wiped out completely absolutely every potential food source in an area you somehow cannot wander your way out of even if you have months to do so. Relevant real world fact- Any time you see stuff about people dying of starvation, that’s never “farming just is not a thing that works in this area,” it’s “some malicious tyrant is actively preventing these people from accessing food in a deliberate effort to cause them to starve.” It’s really not actually a concern in any sort of survival story, unless we’re going real long term.

Meanwhile, have game designers ever actually, like, eaten food? Like I said, 2 whole turkeys per real hour/game day seems to be the going standard and like... have you had a turkey? I live in America, there is this tradition on Thanksgiving to go get a turkey, spend a day cooking it, and serving it as part of a meal served to one’s whole extended family. You’ve got that one turkey (granted, generally with a lot of side dishes) feeding like... a dozen people, easily. And at the end of the day, you’ve only MAYBE collectively made your way through like half a breast. You carve up a bunch more and send everyone home with a ton of leftovers. Then you’ve still got this giant mountain of turkey left, and you’re eating it for like the next week until you’re completely sick of turkey and throw the rest out, with plenty of meat entirely uneaten on the bird. Or hey, do you eat hamburgers? You know how the standard for a really kinda too big to responsibly be ordering it hamburger is “a quarter-pounder?” Which refers to the 0.25 lbs. of meat on the bun? Just quickly googling “beef weight” and copying the preview text from the oddly named first hit, on beef2live.com... “An average beef animal weighs about 1200 pounds and has a hanging hot carcass weight (HCW) of about 750 pounds.“ I can’t honestly say I know what “hanging hot carcass weight” is and I kinda doing want to, but I’m assuming that’s how much you have to work with after stripping out all the bones and organs and such. Multiply that by 4 to get how many oversized burgers you get out of one “beef animal” (why does it not say cow? I’m growing increasingly unsettled)- 3000 burgers. Give or take. You go smack that one Mnecraft cow with your sword, you should be fine for like 5 years. At least assuming we’re not simulating food spoilage. And if we are, HEY THAT TAKES SIGNIFICANTLY LONGER THAN ONE DAY, 2 IF YOU SALT IT!

And I mean, on top of that, we’ve got this whole standard I keep citing of 1 real world hour/1 in-game day. That kinda seems to be one of the more common standards for the passage of time video games use. That or 1 minute=1 hour. And I... really don’t understand why we have these scales?

Like, the earliest example of a day/night cycle in a game is Dragon Quest 3, where 1 steps on the over world map=12 minutes passing, or 120 steps=1 day. That’s a weird scale I’m having to use, but that’s because as the most traditional of JRPGs, DQ3′s sense of both time AND space are super abstracted and walking a short distance across the world map is this super compressed and simplified conveyance of a big long epic journey through the untamed wilderness. The first games I can think of offhand to really do it as a real time elapsed ratio thing are like... The Sims and GTA 3? Let me look at each of those in turn in a bit here.

So, The Sims has to pass days pretty quick, because that’s like, the whole idea. We’re watching this little household drama unfold in a compressed time scale... but the scale is really messed up? Like, we start off pretty simple. Sims work their shifts of like 9-5 on the in-game clock, need an appropriate amount of sleep... but then MOST things have timing based off having animations play at a reasonable pace, which is to say, 1 to 1 time, not 1 to 60. It takes like 3 in-game minutes for a Sim to get up out of a chair, several more minutes to walk to the kitchen and even start cooking, altogether just getting up, making a meal, cleaning up, and sitting back down is going to end up being this hours long affair, most of that being travel time from one room to another. It’s weird, and practically speaking you end up having them eat one meal, use the toilet once, and take a shower once per in game day, because less than that problems occur, and more than that, it’s a huge pain. And forget conversations. Those are like 12 hour commitments.

And then we have GTA3, where 1 real minute=1 in game hour... and this isn’t tied to anything in-game at all really. You don’t eat, you don’t sleep, nothing really has business hours to deal with, the whole day/night cycle is just there to give you a nice cycling change of scenery... and also again, breaks immersion, because the animation speed is 1:1. According to a video I just watched, walking end to end across the map of GTA3 takes a full 48 in-game hours (121 in GTA5). And I mean... there’s races, and high speed chases, and all this other stuff that according to the in-game clock are at such slow speeds you can barely tell anything’s moving. It’s weird and arbitrary! And also unnecessary! Like, I’m pretty sure I sank at least 80 hours into my first playthrough of GTA3. I definitely spent enough time cruising around any given island that if time passed in a 1:1 ratio, I’d still see what everything looked like at every time of day. And hell if you rigged it up to a real world clock I could plan around that, do all the cool missions right at sundown.

But I mean, also, there’s these things called movies and TV shows? You may have heard of them, because it’s where games get a whole bunch of terms they use all the time. Like camera, and scene. So the thing there is, when, say, a movie switches to a new scene, they’ll often arbitrarily jump the day/night cycle ahead by several in-movie hours, or even days, so the lighting is appropriate to what’s going to happen in that scene. You can actually just... do that in games, too. It’s OK. Nobody’s going to stop you or say it’s breaking immersion. I talk to this guy to start this mission at what’s clearly noon, then we fade to back, and I come back out onto the street late at night so I can do this daring nighttime raid. That’s.. OK. You can do that. Honest. No need to have the sun doing crazy fast laps in the background.

Anyway, other games since have all copied that time scale, because blindly copying things from GTA3 was kinda... how people made games for a good stretch of time (and yeah yeah yeah, Elder Scrolls was probably already doing it, whatever... hell so was Robinson’s Requiem I’m pretty sure, and Drakken I know was paced something like that). But anyway, we mixed that sort of time scale with Survival Gameplay and we’re just kinda mashing these problems together. We’re doing everything in this one to one time scale, but the in-game clock is running at like 60 times that, and our already ridiculous food intake needs are downright absurd, and suddenly we’re destroying absolutely all life on sight to sate our ever-present ravenous hunger (and possibly never sleeping).

And like... survival games don’t actually need that? Like the interesting bits of the angle are finding sources of things like clean water and shelter so you don’t die of exposure once the sun’s down and stuff. And these are things you really just need to do once and you’re set. You could... basically set up a whole game, running in real time, where these are early potential fail states. Get some kind of shelter set up within the first 5 hours or so, sleep to advance straight to the next day after pulling that off, then you have like 3 days total to find drinkable water, and... honestly at that point we’re talking like a good 45 minutes of gameplay and you could really end it there, or start your last goal. But instead, no, we’re making some kinda crude axe/bow and killing everything to eat.

Not only is it not realistic, not only does it take me out of the experience by checking the math, the whole affair feels kinda like I’m being put through someone’s weird hyper-masculine cargo cult fantasy of what it would have been like if they grew up Hunting With Dad and like.... OK people who actually do that still kill like one animal, then drag it home, throw it in a big fridge, and eat it for quite a long time, or sell it, or leave it to rot because they’re just really into ending the lives of innocent creatures and don’t want weird gamey meat at all.

So yeah, just let time be time, and don’t ever actually make me eat if we’re trying for some kind of gritty realism thing. I really don’t get hungry nearly that often and fill up quick.

[ussgallifrey]

Hi Katie! From the prompt list, can you do “Quit it! You’re hogging the blankets!” Thank you! 💙 :)

Pairing: Bucky x Female Reader x Steve

Warnings: Implied sexual content, language

When on a mission, it is common practice to refer back to Murphy’s Laws. 

It’s not something he ever had to deal with prior to breaking free from Hydra’s control. But now that he spends his time working on the good side of things, he’s found himself going through a mental checklist every single time he gets sent out on a mission with Steve. 

Only ever with Steve.

1. In any field of endeavor, whatever can go wrong, will go wrong.

“What do you mean we lost their signal?” Your voice is veering on fury, after straining to get a lock on AIM’s jet at the beginning of the chase - which was haphazardly flying and turning its cloaking on after only the first twenty miles in - to lose it now made all that effort completely wasted.

The scanner in front of him has gone blank, no more red triangles or helpfully annoying pings to be heard.

“Uhh…”

You swivel your chair around, storming off to the back of the jet to vent your fury out.

Steve watches you go for a moment before leaning over his scanner, “No traces?”

“Fucking nothing,” he wants to slam his hand on the instrument but settles for curling it into a fist on his armrest instead.

The engine thrums under his feet as the jet continues flying without a clear destination. Minutes tick by as Steve tries to find anything of use on the airways, while Bucky works through satellite images of the area to locate any relevant place for AIM to be traveling to.

You return with a steeled expression, carefully avoiding his eyes as you take your seat with a purposeful calming breath.

Steve works with you to triangulate a location, checking with Bucky on the maps. But you refuse to direct any of your questions his way as if this was all somehow his fault.

2. Left to themselves, things always go from bad to worse.

Visibility was decreasing as the jet traveled further across the northern part of the Yukon. What the hell AIM wanted all the way up here was uncertain, but thoroughly annoying. It reminded him too much of the lost years of his life, existing in the KGB’s homeland for far too long. He never viewed snow the same way since. 

“Well, this is great.”

You’re sitting in your seat still, but with your legs brought up to your chest and your arms wrapped around them. Chin resting on the top of your knees as you watch the snowstorm throttling the windshield.

“It’s fine,” Steve assures from his standing position - hand resting on the window frame at the nose of the jet. “We’ll fly through it in no time. The facility’s only another sixty miles out.”

There’s a grumbling sound from you, probably swearing off him and Steve for everything and anything. 

Steve’s eyes trail down from the storm, landing on your face, and Bucky can see his eyes soften. They get that stupid lovesick aura anytime he looks at you. Bucky wants to punch him for more than just the failing mission now.

3. If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will go wrong is the one that will cause the most damage.

“Remind me to never go on a mission with you two again!” you roar, moving to the gunner’s station as the jet is rocked by another unknown blast.

Steve calls back to you over his shoulder, trying to find the invisible aircraft that’s firing on the jet, “Noted, sweetheart!”

“Steve…”

The sensors are going out of whack. Dials spinning, buttons flashing, screens glitching out.

“Fuck.”

He knows it’s bad when Steve swears.

“Cap!”

Steve’s out of his chair in an instant, striding over to you as Bucky concentrates on the failing systems. 

You’ve got a perfect view of the white vastness of the storm and not much else. But you lean your head towards Steve when he approaches.

“Watch my 2.”

Steve focuses on the storm and then -

A quick flash of a ship, before your own jet is rocked violently to the side by a sudden blast.

“Buck!”

“Already on it!”

You focus all firepower on the sneak ship, but in the end, it doesn’t matter much at all. Your comms are down and the systems are already failing.

4. Nature always sides with the hidden flaw.

It’s clear how badly you want to punch them both right now - not that it would help any. You all look a little worse for wear from the crash landing. The jet’s smoking and the emergency lights are flashing. And there’s absolutely no signal to the outside.

Steve’s hands deep in wires and machinery as he tries to hotwire the main systems. 

Bucky, deciding to be useful in the moment, emerges from the back of the jet with the emergency equipment.

You’re scowling on the bench, but you’re also shivering. The storm is battering the sides of the jet - an absolute white-out all around.

“I wasn’t made for the cold,” you mutter as he sits down next to you on the bench.

Unfolding one of the blankets, Bucky drapes it over your shoulders. You gratefully tug it closer and pinch it under your chin.

“I know, darlin’.”

He drops a kiss to the top of your head before going to see if he can’t help Steve at all.

5. If everything seems to be going well, you’ve obviously overlooked something.

The heat’s back on. So, there’s that. But you’ll still have to wait on SHIELD to pick up on your trail and lack of check-in before anyone gets out of here unscathed. 

He’s been fiddling with his phone for a bit, trying to configure a way to boost the signal. But to be honest, he’s not making much headway with it. You’re almost two hours in and no one’s handling it well.

There had been a suggestion floated around of braving the storm to the AIM facility, but that had been quickly quashed when the ramp lowered into the biting cold tundra. It felt like fucking needles going into his skin. The wind was too strong and the temperature stole your breath away.

Ultimately, it was decided that the best course of action was to remain in the jet until rescue. Which was fine and dandy, if not tediously boring, but then the power blinks out.

“What the fuck, Steve?” you’re sauntering over to where he’s hopelessly staring at the main panel.

“I don’t know,” he responds coolly, hands resting on his hips.

Bucky decides to be helpful, and pipes up from his seat, “Engine cooled down.”

You both whip around to look at him. Steve groans.

“Fuck.”

“Engine’s down, a storm raging, killed our power.”

You look between him and Steve, hands thrown up in frustration, “Well, fuck us, right?”

It only takes a few minutes to notice a change in the internal temperature of the jet. Steve’s trying to work something together, but there’s really no point in trying to force the frozen parts to magically start working again. Your breath is visible now.

Bucky disappears into the back to dig through the emergency supplies. Taking the previous blanket from the bench, he drapes it over your shoulders. And then another one over that.

Another thirty minutes finds you sitting on the floor, teeth chattering as Steve warms your hands with his breath. He’s got you situated over the main engine core, trying to pull some of that lingering heat through the metal grates. Bucky piles on another blanket.

Twenty minutes more, Steve’s lips are starting to pale - reminding Bucky of the winter of ‘36, when Steve was hit with a real bad case of pneumonia. Bucky’s chest aches at the sour-tasting memory. But he imagines he’s not looking his best right now either. 

But at least you’re doing better. The solar blankets are heaped over the regular fleece ones, a giant cocoon around you and two super soldiers to steal heat from. But your teeth are still clattering, and your breath is still visible, and your fingers peeking out from the blankets are like ice.

“C-come on,” you stutter. “Warm me up b-better under here-e.”

He looks at Steve. Steve looks at him with a worried expression. And then they both look down at you, looking absolutely miserable. He shrugs at Steve.

They join you under the blanket cocoon.

“Agh!”

You startle back when Steve’s hand briefly touches your own. Probably colder than you were expecting. Bucky’s mindful to keep his arm as far away from your own as possible, considering himself lucky to be sitting on your left side. 

“Sorry,” Steve shrinks, trying to keep himself as small as possible.

“S-stop, just… n-no h-hands.”

Steve nods numbly.

Your face is contorted into a pained expression as you try to grab them both with chilled hands, “N-now come he-ere.”

They both shuffle in a little bit closer to you. Steve wraps his arm around your shoulder, tugging you closer to his chest. But the movement pulls the blankets his way, exposing you all to more of the cold air.

“Hey!” he yelps, grabbing the blankets to pull them back in place.

“Y-yeah, Steve.” You chide through a stutter. “Quit it! You’re hogging the blankets.”

It manages a chuckle out of the blonde, which is a small victory in itself. He relents, “Okay, my bad. My bad!”

You settle in, squished between them both. Lost in a super soldier sandwich under a pile of blankets, waiting for a rescue. 

After a moment, “I’m still mad at you two.”

Your stutter seems to be dissipating now that they’re in here to leech heat from. Bucky feels the tingling of a smile as they say in unison, “We know.”

Another stretch of silence follows. Only to be broken a moment later when you slowly suggest, “You know, I think there’s this great way to share body heat…?”

It has Steve saying a fast no and Bucky eagerly responding with a yes!

Prompt List