#and fight scenes are NOT his element

[anonymous-dentist]

Quackity Commits First-Degree Arachnid Vehicular Homicide in 4k: Or, the PJO au

Reblogs and likes welcome! And stay tuned for the ao3 link in the next couple of days! This one’s a doozy!

-

Now, okay, so Quackity isn’t a bad driver, really. He’s a very good one, actually. He passed his test on his first try, 100%, gold star. He’s read the California state driver’s manual back-to-front at least a dozen times. He practically had it memorized at one point before leaving. 

He isn’t a bad driver. He knows the rules of the road, spoken and unspoken. He likes driving. He’s currently at the end of an eleven-hour stretch of driving up the east coast, and he had a great time doing so. He knows his car inside and out. 

But nothing, and absolutely nothing, in any manual or any class or any instructional video or whatever says what to do when a fucking scopion the size of a Toyota jump out in front of his car and smashes its stinger right through his windshield. 

Quackity likes scorpions. He fucking loves them, actually, he had a pet scorpion when he was a kid back when he stil lived with his dad. But he isn’t eager to die to one, not yet. 

Slamming on the brakes out of sheer instinct, Quackity screeches and ducks to hide behind the steering wheel. He can hear the stinger scraping against the dashboard in front of him, a horrible scritch-scritch-scritch that leaves his teeth on edge and his nerves on fire. He isn’t scared, really. 

His car shakes as the scorpion pulls its stinger out. 

Nah, Quackity isn’t scared. He’s fucking terrified. But just over a week of dealing with this kind of bullshit has left him more or less used to the idea of gigantic creepy crawlies and what-the-fuck-evers showing up and wrecking his day. It’s just that this is the first time that one has broken his car- his dad’s car, his dad’s shitty broken 2007 Honda Accord, his dad’s single most pride and fucking joy, and now it’s going to be smashed to bits and spattered with Quackity’s guts and stuff when the scorpion finally finishes fucking around and starts to find out instead. 

But. He’s fine. He can handle this. He managed to escape the freaky killer sheep down in Philadelphia yesterday. He can handle a scorpion. It’s just a matter of calming down, and-

The Honda’s roof caves in above him with a horrifying ripping-screeching sound. Quackity just barely manages to duck to the side before a stinger as thick as his torso plunges through the hole and aims itself right where his head just was. 

Pressed against the door with his back to the bottom of his seat and his seatbelt choking his neck and pressing uncomfortably into his gut, Quackity thinks, Well, at least it isn’t a fucking spider. 

Watching the stinger flail around looking for him, Quackity decides that maybe it’s time to calm down. Maybe it’s time to do that. No better time than the present, right? What calms him down? Lists, he likes lists. Lists are fun. Lists are fresh. Lists are fun! Take stock of the situation, then make the best of what he has and get away with his life and all of his vital organs and-slash-or limbs preferably intact. 

Take stock. Right. 

The tip of the stinger scrapes against the ceiling leaving acidic burn marks in its wake. 

It’s currently- Quackity checks his watch, breaths and wrist shaking an equal amount- 1:45 in the morning. He has his wallet and his deck of cards on the passenger seat. His backpack of clothes is in the backseat, as is his bag of road trip snacks. So… nothing there. He has a flat tire that he needs to get fixed at the next town he arrives in that will serve an unaccompanied 16-year-old boy with no parents and no credit card. He’s at least an hour away from the nearest town out on the highway out in the middle of nowhere somewhere in New York. Alone. 

The scorpion’s legs press divots into the ceiling. It’s on top, then, probably facing backwards based on the angle the stinger is coming in from. It can’t actually see him, then, okay, that’s good. It can’t have that good a grip on the car. Scorpions are hard to kill, but they aren’t immune to physics, unfortunately. Quackity’s pet scorpion died when his step-mom threw its tank down a flight of stairs. The tank shattered, and the velocity of the scorpion bouncing around the tank’s walls killed it good and dead, mixed up its little organs or whatever. No tank here, but Quackity is alone on an empty highway with a panic brain and a car hotwired to go above its natural speed limit. 

He whimpers as the stinger swipes through the air inches above his face. Just under a week of this, and an infinite amount of time to go. He idly hopes that Tommy, wherever he is, will forget about him if he dies. God knows that kid has enough on his plate as it is. 

Okay. Plan. Quackity loves planning. 

Plan Part One: Physics The Scorpion.

A scorpion can live without its stinger, he thinks, so that won’t work (but it’s not like he has anything to fucking- decapitate? Dismember a gigantic scorpion in the first place.) But scorpions aren’t that fast. If he can get it off the car, then he can just drive off into the metaphorical sunset and see if he can’t just get someone to fix his car down the road. His car. That’s too broken to be fixed, but that’s fine, he can manage.

Nervously, Quackity pulls his beanie down over his ears with both hands, running his thumbs over the scratchy fabric before letting out a breath and placing both hands on the steering wheel. He doesn’t know if scorpions can see if you’re, like, moving and stuff- like scorpion radar- and he definitely doesn’t know if giant hell scorpions can, but, like, whatever. If he dies, he dies. He would just prefer to die somewhere better than inside of a Honda fucking Accord.

The stinger stabs into the headrest less than a foot above Quackity’s head. 

Quackity slams his foot on the gas and can’t help but let out a nervous giggle as the scorpion lets out a surprised-sounding gurgling noise that almost borders on a scream. He kinda feels the same way, actually, and he does let out a scream of his own as a pair of legs crash through the backseat windows trying to find purchase on the rapidly-speeding car. He can vaguely see them flailing in the rearview mirror, okay, good, good. 

“This is insane!” he shouts, an anxious, yet wide, grin slowly spreading across his face despite his best attempts to look properly panicked. “I hope you’re paying for this, asshole! I don’t have any- fuck!”

He reflexively jerks his body left as the stinger goes for his head again. Why does it keep going for the face!? He has a great face! Go for the heart at least, man, make it dramatic. He’d kinda like it if someone can actually identify his body when they find it, thank you! 

“Calm down!” he snaps. “What is wrong with you! What have I done to you guys, come on! I’m literally innocent!”

He feels the car drifting left, but that’s fine. There shouldn’t be any oncoming traffic. If there is, well, poor them. He doesn’t have insurance. Maybe if they ram into him… 

But he is innocent, is the thing, he is! 

…

Okay, maybe he isn’t, but he really doesn’t think that the California State Police are investing in weird hellbeasts to send after teenage runaways. They already have the cops themselves for that. No scorpions needed! 

First it was the birds with projectile feathers that left Quackity down his spare tire and down half of his road trip budget after an emergency stop at an Autozone. Then it was the- god, he doesn’t even know what it was- the snake thing with the bitchy face and the shitty attitude. Then the sheep- oh, the sheep. If he knew that this was how running away was going to turn out, he wouldn’t have done it. But, no, he’s stuck with this for the rest of forever, curse his wanderlust and general spiteful tendencies. 

The scorpion screeches at him, loud and sharp enough to shake the remaining windows. 

Quackity winces as the oncoming wind sends a shower of shattered glass from the windshield right into his face. But, hey, it isn’t all bad. The rearview shows the scorpion’s legs are about out the windows. If he just speeds up some more… 

The speedometer hits 100 as the car hits the shoulder of the road. Quackity yelps as the car jolts and bumps, but he can’t help but let out a cheer as he hears a loud squelch as the scorpion is sent flying off of the roof. And then he screams again as he hears a crunching-scraping noise as his car goes flying through the barrier on the side of the road. Oooooooh, fuck. 

Scorpion gone for the moment, Quackity bolts upright in his seat and tries to get the car under control. He’s going downhill- steeply downhill. It’s not a mountain, but it’s definitely not flat. 

He can almost see some lights in the distance, maybe a farm? He remembers seeing a billboard for some strawberry farm a couple of exits back, maybe this is it? Would they help if he came up in a busted car and told them that there was a monstrous evil scorpion thing trying to kill him? Probably not, right? That’s crazy. It would be crazy. This is all crazy. 

Another nervous giggle escapes his lips. His hands adjust on the steering wheel, fingers gripping and ungripping on a cycle, left pinky to right pinky, and back and forth. He’s fine. That definitely isn’t the scorpion scuttling behind him like a fucking steamtrain. He definitely isn’t about to die in a nameless field in a Honda Accord. A Honda Accord. Somehow, that’s the funny thing here. Not the comically-oversized scorpion chasing him, his dad’s car. 

But the scorpion is right on his tail, and he doesn’t wanna die yet. Not here, anyway, maybe if it was further down the road he’d think about it. But not now, and not here, and certainly not in a Honda. 

So. Plan Part Two: Scorpion Homicide. Let’s gooooo.

There’s a group of trees just over the horizon whose tops he can just barely see and a scorpion charging so fast in such a straight line that it’s destined to crash into whatever is in front of him. Who says that it has to be him that gets hit? 

With an upset little sigh, Quackity presses the gas pedal down to the floor. He leans forward over the wheel like that will somehow convince the car to go faster. He thinks the airbags are working, maybe, possibly, maybe. Maybe. Probably not, but! Maybe they are!

He has to time it just right. He’s a goddamn excellent driver, so he’s got this. Just one… more… 

The trees are right in front of him, less than thirty feet away. The scorpion lunges. Quackity grits his teeth and suddenly jerks the steering wheel to the right as far as it goes. He tries not to get too choked by his seatbelt as he and the car go flying to the right in a sharp turn. 

Out the side mirror, Quackity watches the scorpion slam headfirst into a tree. The tree shakes. The scorpion lays there, dazed and unmoving, but Quackity doesn’t waste any time in skidding into a very illegal u-turn and lining up the angle juuuust right. 

He looks up at the ceiling and lets out a brief prayer before plunging his car right towards the scorpion. Just before he hits it, he swears that he hears someone shouting from outside, but he swears that there’s nobody around. 

And then it’s all noise and blinding darkness as he crashes his dead father’s car into a tree. He can almost make out the soothing noise of a bug getting squished to death above the gut-wrenching crunching and shaking and shattering. A hiss- that’s the scorpion. A pained scream- that’s him. There’s something wet dripping down his forehead, but he can’t see what. Everything is dark, and thank god for it. He might have a panic attack if sees the state his car is in. 

Everything is… muffled. Airbags, that’s the airbags. 

Quackity is pretty sure that he shouldn’t be moving right after a car crash. His brain could be, like, mush. His spine could be broken in seven different places. His arms sure feel broken, and his neck, but maybe that’s just the shock. 

But he moves, anyway, fumbling to unbuckle his seatbelt and to try and open the driver’s side door. There’s kind of an air bag in the way, but he manages. The fresh night air is, uh, well, a breath of fresh air, and Quackity tumbles his way sideways out of his car gratefully. 

He rolls onto his back and stares up at the sky, heart a million miles an hour and lungs screaming in pain. His entire body is in pain, actually, but he still has a terrified, exhilarated smile on his face, and he can’t help but laugh almost maniacally. Adrenaline, baby! He may die of broken bone disease in a minute, but at least he’s out of that goddamn car. 

In a sudden burst of excitement, he pumps both of his fists in the air and lets out a, “Yeah! Take that, bitch!”

He points at the smoking remains of the car and the smoking remains of the tree. He can see the scorpion’s tail poking out from above the car’s roof. It’s twitching, but the scorpion has to be dead. It has to be. 

It has to be. 

But, to make sure, Quackity forces himself to his feet. His legs shake under him and his eyes swim with the effort, but he still forces one step, and then another, and then another. 

There are footsteps from somewhere, he can hear them. He can also hear voices- some shouting, some whispering. He’s always been good at hearing, but not too good at listening. He doesn’t know what they’re talking about, but he could care less. He is on a mission. 

He leans against the car to catch his breath, squinting up at the twitching tail. How is it not dead yet? 

“What the fuck?” he wheezes, one arm clenched around his aching chest and the other just barely propping himself up on the car. “You should be dead.”

Somewhere beyond the trees, someone shouts, “Hello? Is there someone there?”

“You should be dead!” Quackity yells. His panicked laugh returns in full force, growing in volume as the car slowly starts rolling backwards, the scorpion unpinning itself and turning around and starting to crawl towards him with purpose. 

He backs up just as slowly, stumbling over his own feet. He thinks that he has a concussion. He thinks that maybe he is about to die after all. 

There is a light through the trees that seems to be growing closer, rapidly closer. That has to be someone. The strawberry farmer? Someone. Maybe they know how to- how to kill a gigantic evil scorpion from the pits of hell. 

So. Plan Part Three: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

The scorpion looks rough. Half of its legs seem to be broken, either dragging uselessly on the ground or missing altogether. One of its pincers is immobile. Its tail is flopped behind it, the stinger’s tip missing entirely. Okay. It wants to kill him. Quackity swears that it has bloodlust in its beady little eyes. Okay. 

But there’s the strawberry farmer, or the whoever, in the trees. Hopefully an adult, ‘cause Quackity is starting to feel like he needs an adult right now. He’s 16, man, what the hell is he doing fighting monsters when he should be learning trigonometry? 

“You’re absolutely disgusting, I hope you know that,” Quackity says. 

The scorpion, expectedly, doesn't respond, and thank god for it. 

“I’m going to be very disappointed if you kill me,” he continues. He lets out a long breath and looks over the scorpion’s… shoulder? Its shoulder. “I promised myself that the only thing killing me is myself or God, and you sure as hell aren’t God.”

The scorpion hisses at him. Quackity, in a sudden burst of spite, hisses back. 

Taken aback for whatever reason, the scorpion stops its approach. It blinks at him confusedly, the perfect picture of arachnid bewilderment. 

Aaaand, go!

Quackity takes advantage of the monster’s pause to summon every bit of strength he has left in his body and charge at it. The scorpion tenses, prepared to snip his body in half, but, at the last second, he ducks left and just keeps running. 

The air above his head swishes as the scorpion flails its tail at him in hopes of somehow managing to skewer him on its pincer. No dice. He’s nimble as hell, motherfucker, he’s fucking nimble. He definitely has a concussion, though. Gut feeling on that one. 

The light in the woods grows closer and closer until Quackity can actually make out the source: a guy not much older than he is with an old-school flashlight from, like, 2005 holding a… okay, sure, he can have a sword. Not the weirdest thing that Quackity has seen today. 

Quackity fucking throws himself at this guy, dashing right into his body and scrambling to find purchase in his horrible orange t-shirt. 

The guy stumbles back, arms outstretched in a T so as to not skewer Quackity on his literal sword. 

“What the hell?” the guy asks, sounding confused as all hell. 

Quackity, gripping the front of the guy’s shirt, looks up at him with more conviction than he’s ever felt in his life and says, “If that thing kills me, I’m going to haunt the everloving shit out of you.”

And then he passes the hell out. 

Whoops.

#unnamed pjo au #a.d.'s fics i suppose #a.d.'s fics i suppose. #LOOK I LOVE THIS AU SO MUCH YOU DONT UNDERSTAND #look at him! he's smart! he's on the run! he's quirky and unique and not like the other girls! #he's entirely pathetic in this au btw he's a pathetic little cat when he isn't in his element #and fight scenes are NOT his element #also hey the guy is actually! he's dream! that's dream!! #what was he doing out alone in the woods at the camp border at night? who knows! not me :D #anyway this will be edited and up on ao3 this weekend

[found--family]

#spn polls #thoughts #look: i think the end of s10 couldve been cooler + i actually do like cursed!cas being an element. but it was all kinda dumb. #i like s13's end bc michael!dean was a longtime coming. although we will never forgive the fight-on-wires scene. #i like what we got of mary in s12 (but i do think they botched her character in s14 + s13 apoc world bored me) but #her sudden appearance as the one thing dean needed most made zero sense for where he was in his life at that point. #s14 was a shitshow tbh + then they round it off with that mcu overthetop wannabe bs especially with jack already awake #conspiring in the empty??? them writers needed to calm the f down + i also hated the way the writers dealt with those issues in s15.

[dramarants]

don’t even look at me if you wouldn’t consider sealing yourself in an ice coffin with me to stay by my side should I suffer an untimely death 😩

#till the end of the moon #tteotm #ranting #luo yunxi you fucking GOD - the way he speaks to and holds her corpse in both scenes. denial. desperation. fear. disbelief. the trembling. #his face walking up to her coffin and subsequent rage and protectiveness with qingyu over both her and their relationship #no matter how many times she said her purpose was to kill him he still believes they loved each other and refuses anything else #the bracelet sequence the face nuzzle the mirthful laughter #he can’t bear to lose her and he has no idea where to direct his overwhelming pain and sadness despite their conflicts #after all what’s grief but all the love still left to give. he has lost ppl before but not like this #there’s prolly a fair amount of guilt and self hatred underlying everything too #all he's done these last eps is try to hold on to her in every way - with every shred of his being - but none of it worked #‘just say one word please’ ‘you’re really hateful’ AAHHHH #his injured hands shaking her as if things are normal. later tucking her hand in gently as if not to wake her despite the truth. #he's lost all sense of self and purpose. his grasp on reality is hanging by a thin fucking thread #he will gladly live in his delusion & try to stay by her side. even in death. even when she didn't want it. #he can't go on w/o her anymore - doesn't know how. she has fundamentally changed him. #(so much that he even fights the devil god voice in her defense 🙏) #it’s scenes like this that bludgeon you with humanity amidst all the unreal fantastical elements and bring you back to these shows #omg I’m remembering his fixation on her not looking at him with ttml before - boy was already going insane w/o her when she was still there #healthy attachment and coping? ttj doesn't know her 😌 #like idk if he fucks her corpse in the novel but props to lyx I’d fucking believe it #and once again nian baiyu is not paid nearly enough for any of this

[zincbot]

i gotta say, 13 hours into omori, i don't get why people call it a horror game

#omori #like there's been occasional creepy scenes but they're usually quite short especially compared to the broader tone of the game #it does have a serious story. about like. trauma and failing friendships? that i'm really intrigued by as it slowly uncovers #like maybe it leans further into horror elements as the game goes on but i gotta say the elements that do exist aren't enough for me #to explicitly call it 'horror' #don't get me wrong i love this game and i love the spooky moments they're really fun! #i just went thru the train ride bit which was pretty fun i liked how the shadow at the end says the name of ur real-world character #even though ur playing as omori in the dream world #also no spoilers but it's unclear to me as of now if omori is just haunted by the memory of his sister's death #or if her spirit is Actually haunting him #also i had flowers and i thought maybe i cld put them on her grave but it didn't give me the option #also i loved the moment where kel talks about hero's depression and the way he himself was overlooked by h #their parents #man. i love all these characters so much #god the scene where aubrey fights you in the church and the whole time all the churchgoers are whispering about how terrible she is #i felt so bad for her man #also her design in the real world is cool as hell #also i actually lost to aubrey during the church scene but i didn't get a game over she just let me be and left #omori spoilers #i know the game is old-ish but my wording may have implied i wasn't going to spoil and i totally did #what i meant was don't tell me abt the future story of the game i'm only on 'three days left'

[rindomness]

ah, if it isn't the consequences* of my actions**

*my fic keeps getting more complicated

**designing for characters and attaching Themes and Motifs to those design choices

#oops #'this will just be fight scene practice' i say #as i place only a single plant in this man's house to serve as a nonessential element #fully aware that this man has a very fucked up sense of his ability to exist #that doesnt fully explain it. but i am not writing an essay down here in the tags <3

[matchandelure]

thinking about tkrb once again...

#idk u guys something clicked in my brain and now im rewatching katsugeki for the...6th??7th time?????? #mostly for the mutsu scenes and the tsuru scenes and the yagen scenes and the first unit scenes and the tsurumika teamup at the end and #oodenta being so cool during the thunderstorm and literally throwing the enemies with his hands and hhhhsodufhdh #and aaaaaaaa i actually discovered ufotable through katsugeki!!! their animation reallly is yummy aaaaa #maybe i'll rewatch hanamaru after too...need some of that lighthearted good stuff to balance things out yknow #ive also been reereading the anthologies and keeping up with the new manga!!! #tourabu that has elements of the supernatural...youkai... waaaaaaaaaaaaaaa its everything #and mononoke's creator is working on it!!! truly amazing #idk sudden feelings and yearning for tourabu again i just love it alot #something about you. and these tsukumogami you have the power to summon. fighting off the enemies in this war waged against time and #history and just. u kNOW ITS LIKE A BIG FAMILY #hanamaru has made me cry before bc they're all just #swords many with such long illustrous histories and those arent always the...prettiest #but the way they learn to slowly adapt to human customs. the lighthearted banter and daily lives they live in the citadel #and THE FACT THAT WE GET SOOOOOO MUCH FREE REIGN OVER THE SANIWA SINCE WE ARE THE SANIWA #THE TINY AMOUNT OF LORE GIVES FOR SO MUCH ROOM FOR CREATIVE FREEDOM #just..udhudhksdfgshdkjghdsldk i love tkrb #comfort series. i love it the same way i love pokemon #i remember discovering it back when zoku first started airing... so like. 2017-early 2018 #maaaaan its been a while hUH?! TO THINK WE GOT MIKA KIWAME THIS YEAR #I NEVER THOUGHT IT WOULD HAPPEN #i mean i knew it eventually would have to but i always thought it was this big huge far away thing #but i love mika kiwame cannot wait to send him off i still...need to prepare stuff #the great invasion event a few months ago really shook me. THE WAY THE OPENING LOADING SCREEN GOT ALL GLITCHY #ALL THE SCENES WITH MIKA NO LONGER INCLUDING HIM #HIM LITERALLY VANISHING LIKE. WHAT NO WHERE R U GOING #AND THE CUTSCENE AT THE END WHERE OUR STARTER SWORD FUSED WITH MIKA AND IT WAS SO PRETTY!!!!! #ok rambling time over im signing off and going to bed gnight #willows rambling branch #willow rambles about tkrb

[tearlessrain]

please help me- i used to be pretty smart but i’m having so much trouble grasping the concept of diegetic vs non-diegetic bdsm!

gfkjldghfd okay first of all I'm sorry for the confusion, if you're not finding anything on the phrase it's because I made it up and absolutely nobody but me ever uses it, but I haven't found a better way to express what I'm trying to say so I keep using it. but now you've given me an excuse to ramble on about some shit that is only relevant to me and my deeply inefficient way of talking and by god I'm going to take it.

SO. the way diegetic and non-diegetic are normally used is to talk about music and sound design in movies/tv shows. in case you aren't familiar with that concept, here's a rundown:

diegetic sound is sound that happens within the world of the movie/show and can be acknowledged by the characters, like a song playing on the stereo during a driving scene, or sung on stage in Phantom of the Opera. it's also most other sounds that happen in a movie, like the sounds of traffic in a city scene, or a thunderclap, or a marching band passing by. or one of the three stock horse sounds they use in every movie with a horse in it even though horses don't really vocalize much in real life, but that's beside the point, the horse is supposed to be actually making that noise within the movie's world and the characters can hear it whinnying.

non-diegetic sound is any sound that doesn't exist in the world of the movie/show and can't be perceived by the characters. this includes things like laugh tracks and most soundtrack music. when Duel of Fates plays in Star Wars during the lightsaber fight for dramatic effect, that's non-diegetic. it exists to the audience, but the characters don't know their fight is being backed by sick ass music and, sadly, can't hear it.

the lines can get blurry between the two, you've probably seen the film trope where the clearly non-diegetic music in the title sequence fades out to the same music, now diegetic and playing from the character's car stereo. and then there are things like Phantom of the Opera as mentioned above, where the soundtrack is also part of the plot, but Phantom of the Opera does also have segments of non-diegetic music: the Phantom probably does not have an entire orchestra and some guy with an electric guitar hiding down in his sewer just waiting for someone to break into song, but both of those show up in the songs they sing down there.

now, on to how I apply this to bdsm in fiction.

if I'm referring to diegetic bdsm what I mean is that the bdsm is acknowledged for what it is in-world. the characters themselves are roleplaying whatever scenarios their scenes involve and are operating with knowledge of real life rules/safety practices. if there's cnc depicted, it will be apparent at some point, usually right away, that both characters actually are fully consenting and it's all just a planned scene, and you'll often see on-screen negotiation and aftercare, and elements of the story may involve the kink community wherever the characters are. Love and Leashes is a great example of this, 50 Shades and Bonding are terrible examples of this, but they all feature characters that know they're doing bdsm and are intentional about it.

if I'm talking about non-diegetic bdsm, I'm referring to a story that portrays certain kinks without the direct acknowledgement that the characters are doing bdsm. this would be something like Captive Prince, or Phantom of the Opera again, or the vast majority of bodice ripper type stories where an innocent woman is kidnapped by a pirate king or something and totally doesn't want to be ravished but then it turns out he's so cool and sexy and good at ravishing that she decides she's into it and becomes his pirate consort or whatever it is that happens at the end of those books. the characters don't know they're playing out a cnc or D/s fantasy, and in-universe it's often straight up noncon or dubcon rather than cnc at all. the thing about entirely non-diegetic bdsm is that it's almost always Problematic™ in some way if you're not willing to meet the story where it's at, but as long as you're not judging it by the standards of diegetic bdsm, it's just providing the reader the same thing that a partner in a scene would: the illusion of whatever risk or taboo floats your boat, sometimes to extremes that can't be replicated in real life due to safety, practicality, physics, the law, vampires not being real, etc. it's consensual by default because it's already pretend; the characters are vehicles for the story and not actually people who can be hurt, and the reader chose to pick up the book and is aware that nothing in it is real, so it's all good.

this difference is where people tend to get hung up in the discourse, from what I've observed. which is why I started using this phrasing, because I think it's very crucial to be able to differentiate which one you're talking about if you try to have a conversation with someone about the portrayal of bdsm in media. it would also, frankly, be useful for tagging, because sometimes when you're in the mood for non-diegetic bodice ripper shit you'd call the police over in real life, it can get really annoying to read paragraphs of negotiation and check-ins that break the illusion of the scene and so on, and the opposite can be jarring too.

it's very possible to blur these together the same way Phantom of the Opera blurs its diegetic and non-diegetic music as well. this leaves you even more open to being misunderstood by people reading in bad faith, but it can also be really fun to play with. @not-poignant writes fantastic fanfic, novels, and original serials on ao3 that pull this off really well, if you're okay with some dark shit in your fiction I would highly recommend their work. some of it does get really fucking dark in places though, just like. be advised. read the tags and all that.

but yeah, spontaneous writer plug aside, that's what I mean.

#I found their original stuff while I was researching various waterhorses and their folklore for no reason #because one of the characters in their original work happens to be an each uisge #and then it turned out it ALSO included a lot of figures from welsh folklore in general #so yknow if you happen to have my incredibly specific hyperfixations you'll love it but even if you don't it's great #I didn't mean to bring up phantom of the opera so much it just happens to be very relevant to a lot of my talking points #I haven't actually seen it in years

[beyond-crusading]

Thinking about the scene where Paul enlists the Southern Fremen in Dune part 2. I really love this scene, and, let's not kid ourselves, there's an element of power fantasy to it.

But there's something much sinister going on there. Paul specifically screams "I am Paul Muad'Dib Atreides, Duke of Arrakis". The mere fact of calling the planet Arrakis instead of its original Fremen name Dune, and the fact that he claims to be the legitimate Duke of the planet because he's the heir of House Atreides is an insult to Fremen independence. What he was allegedly fighting for this all time...

There's a consistent theme in this scene of Paul refusing to follow Fremen customs, like when he refuses to kill Stilgar and speaks anyway. Paul is doing that on purpose. He asserts his dominance by showing Fremen rules don't apply to him. He can dismiss anything he dislikes about their culture and remake it according to his will.

This scene shows simultaneously the crowning of Paul as a Fremen Messiah and the death of traditional Fremen culture. Paul is pursuing by other means what the Harkonens started.

What Paul is asking of (or rather demanding of) the Fremen, is that they join him in a revolution. But not a revolution towards more freedom, justice and equity. A revolution meant to create a society based around the supreme power of a tyrannical leader. And that's a central component of fascism.

Which can make us question the ethics of Villeneuve's film. This scene shows the birth of a fascist movement in a very epic and heroic light. The intended message of the film is clearly anti-authoritarian, but cinematography leaves much room for misinterpretation.

#i know this blog was originally about the crusades #but if i'm so interested in the crusades you won't find it surprising that i'm very much into dune

[yzashaven]

FEATURING ! shouki no kami/archon!scara x fem!reader

CONTENTS ! there's a short fighting scene, robot fucking, grinding, implied worshipping, mating press, masturbating in front of him, degradation and praise <3, choking, breeding, scara fingers appreciation!! (think that's all :3)

NOTE ! a gift for my bestie @yukiitaooo ‼️ just pretend that the joururi workshop is in inazuma btw for the sake of making this plot work 😭 and do read the synopsis since it's a bit messy. special thanks to yukii for proofreading this for me btw <3

SYNOPSIS— reader is a shrine maiden and scara's lover. she wanted to see his god form aka the vessel/robot and test her skills along with her newly obtained powers by sparring with him. she uses a sword/katana and has an electro vision given by scaramouche.

—♡

"are you sure about this?"

scaramouche asked with a sigh as he was carrying you in his arms, walking towards the joururi workshop, where the shouki no kami was situated within. you nod and lean into his chest, feeling the wind blow gently against the both of you. after some time, you reached what seemed like a small entrance cave which led to the gigantic destination in which in the distance you could see the small elevator-like platform that led up high. he held your hand as you walked along the long and wide corridors, guards and people around kneeling in their stead upon seeing their god, their archon, scaramouche—as per his set rules upon the nation. but you? he gave you permission to be the only exception in this rule of his, walking close beside him as you could sense the jealous wandering eyes of those around. how could a "mere" shrine maiden be worthy enough to walk alongside the god himself? people ask themselves in silence before the two of you finally reached the elevator that led to the main area.

he had already made the much needed arrangements to make sure everyone was unable to enter the area where the enormous robot was in. this was your first time seeing it with your own eyes, in all honesty. and of course, as soon as the main doors opened, your eyes widen for a split second. seeing that it was way larger than you had anticipated, looks like this was gonna be a rough fight. "don't be so nervous now..." he says in a low whisper, walking along the path leading to the machine. "...i'll be gentle with you." the subtle suggestive comment made heat rush to your cheeks into a faint blush to which he darkly chuckles to upon taking a glance behind his back at your direction. "i suggest that you prepare yourself for what's to come, my dearest." as scaramouche said those words with you following behind him, the doors suddenly shut hard from behind you, causing your body to jump in shock. he chuckles, back turned to you, before extending his hand out in front of him to channel some sort of elemental energy from his palm. you watch from a short distance as the shouki no kami slowly moves a few movements, scaramouche shuts his eyes before finally teleporting within the central control area of the robot. the atmosphere changes to one filled with tension as he maneuvers with the various mechanisms of the machine with ease as he lets out a seemingly psychotic laugh.

"bow before me, worm!" his voice had changed, echoing through the room loudly. with widened eyes, you summon out your weapon as you see him urging you to get closer.

"come forth! i won't hurt you... much." he whispers, voice in an alluring tone. you click your tongue as you witness how his cockiness is creeping up him again like always. you laugh shortly before sprinting towards him and skillfully dealing a few hits here and there with your katana, to which he just lets out a sigh, "you're doing practically nothing, mortal!" to your side you could see the arm of the vessel making its way to hit you, fortunately, you dodge it with ease. it's coming back but thankfully you have good reaction time and dodge that attack as well before landing multiple hits against him, using your electro vision as an extra source of power.

"oh? not bad~" he coos sarcastically as his right hand hits on the side of the platform hard, causing it to shake along with causing you to lose your balance almost instantly. you look over to where the sudden shaking of the ground from and see the large mechanical hand. your eyes for some reason glue themselves to the fingers of the vessel, thinking about how he could be moving then from inside. maybe the robot follows his own movements? 'but why does it look so attractive...?' you thought for a few seconds, 'his fingers really are just so... perfect though—' you then regain your composure and stop daydreaming upon getting hit by the reality that you were still sparring with him. looking up above you to see his other hand making its' way to crush you, you immediately raise your blade in an attempt to block the attack. the vessel's fingers were right on top of you, a faint blush spreads across your cheeks as your imagination went wild with sudden desires about him once again. success seemed to be on your side for now as you see scaramouche retreat his hand away but instead hits the platform again. you feel the ground below you slowly shatter until you felt nothingness underneath your feet along with your blade being lost from your grip.

a yelp was ripped from your throat as you braced yourself for the fall that looked as if it would be the last thing you'd experience in teyvat. with eyes shut, feeling the wind against your body as you fell from who knows how many feet high, you really thought this was your last day.

not until you feel your clothes getting caught in something. with a sigh of relief, you open your eyes and see that the shouki no kami was holding you between his thumb and index finger at the back of your clothes, "i've got you." he starts dangling you in front of his eyes as if you were some sort of set of keys that he was inspecting up close. "you look so vulnerable like this, so tiny." you whimper at his words as he toyed with you, "think that's enough for today." he declared, claiming his victory. suddenly, he placed his other hand below you before letting go of your body. when you dropped it didn't hurt but it seems that you had hit your clit somewhere on his palm, the unexpected contact made you moan out of nowhere. it wasn't that loud, it wasn't quiet either; but for sure he heard it. unbeknownst to you, he was already smirking from inside the control area, cock already hard within his pants just from watching your vulnerable body in front of him not too long ago.

as you try to pick yourself up and sit upright, you hear scaramouche laugh from behind. "was that a moan i heard? you fucking slut." the blush on your cheeks reddened even more as you felt a part of your dignity being stripped away, did you really-actually-legitimately just moan from that? "no, i-it wasn't...!" you defensively say while mustering up the courage to face him despite what you both know just happened. you can feel his sharp gaze and smirk at you through the metal, as if he was looking at an ever so helpless prey. well you kind of were the said prey in this situation. although you couldn't help but to feel aroused being on his hand knowing how bad you fantasized about it not too long ago. he brings his hand closer to his face to get a better look at you before speaking, "i'll have you know that i can feel your wetness on this hand. how perverted, lusting over me in the midst of a sparring session?" he teasingly coos at you. "now then, i'm sure you know what i'd like of you? go on..."

"touch yourself in front of me, in front of your god. i'm giving you permission to give in to your desires, take your chances."

hesitating to follow his orders, you look up at him with wide eyes of disbelief. but a part of you was convinced that you should just give in already. you want him, don't you? slowly spreading your legs in front of him as your fingers begin to trail down to a rather sensitive area, you feel yourself through the thin fabric of your panties, fingers delicately rubbing slow circles on your clit. "undress." he sternly says, to which you comply immediately. breathing heavily as you discard your clothes piece after piece, throwing them somewhere near. meanwhile, scaramouche was already palming his hard-on as his gaze was focused only on your form, taking in the sweet sight of you revealing your arousal once again to him as you continue to touch yourself as per his command.

he looks down at you from up inside the vessel, watching with interest as you pleasure yourself right then and there in front of him on the palm of the robot, your fingers rubbing at your clit at a faster pace. "do you really have no shame?" he asks before chuckling darkly, you close your eyes as to focus on getting yourself to cum quicker, but then you feel something large and cold against your entrance forcing your thighs to part. your eyes hurry to open and you see a finger from his other hand in between your thighs, "don't get shy now~" scaramouche says in a manner that seemed humiliating, as if he was mocking you, "grind on my finger, whore. you know you want to."

you couldn't help but whine at his words and the sudden temperature change between your legs. he noticed how you weren't doing what he had just ordered and decided to take control instead. he lets out a long sigh before slowly moving his finger back and forth, having his fingertip rub against your soaked folds, careful not to accidentally apply any sort of pressure that could possibly hurt you in any way—giving attention to the obvious power and size difference of your body and the shouki no kami. the sensation has you moaning out loud, voice echoing as if it were bouncing off the walls repeatedly. soon enough, you find yourself doing the work now, grinding against the metal until it was practically coated in your essence as one of your hands cup your breasts to knead it gently whilst the other rubs at your clit at a steady pace.

not long after, you feel your orgasm approaching already, breaths uneven as you continuously let out moans of his name all the while your body shakes slightly. but as you bucked your hips for friction—you notice how you felt nothing instead, your movements come to a stop as you look at him with pleading eyes. scaramouche lets out a small laugh as he saw your immediate reaction, he had moved his hand away from you completely. "oh, you fucking whore." he says with an intoxicating tone, "if you're gonna ruin this vessel, then..." you try to ignore his words as you focused on getting yourself to climax instead. your eyes closed shut as you start to desperately touch yourself a bit more aggressively than before. unfortunately for you, it didn't really seem to work. well, not until you felt something suddenly fill you up completely, your eyes opening at the intrusion. you gasp as you finally feel his cock buried inside your warmth, along with his thumb replacing the spot occupied by your own fingers that were on your clit as he pinched the bud gently, causing you to let out a moan.

"...i'm gonna ruin you as well."

scaramouche's voice was laced with intoxication as he spoke to you in a whisper. he then began to pound into you roughly, with long, deep, strong thrusts that hit all the right areas with ease as you screamed for him with each snap of his hips against yours. picking up the pace soon after, he began fucking you fast and rough, just the way you like. grunts and groans occasionally left his agape lips as he held your thighs apart. "you love it, right? you love how helpless and submissive you become underneath me~" he says before pulling you closer to him and repositioning you into a mating press, having you folded in half and entirely at his mercy before he started to pound into you once again—reaching even deeper parts of your cunt as he rubs circles on your swollen clit. "fuck, i'm gonna breed you sooo good. you want me to fill you up, don't you?~"

you nod frantically in response, being unable to construct proper words as the overwhelming pleasure takes over you completely. "so close... ah~ scara~!" you cry out as he continues to thrust into you relentlessly, hitting your g-spot over and over again until you were a sobbing, moaning, shaking mess below him. "that's it~" he coos, "come on, cum for me. you are a good girl after all, aren't you? cum for your god." his words bring you to the edge as you cum hard, a pornographic moan escaping from your lips as drool began to drip from the corners of it. "s-scara—" "my lord." he cuts you off, correcting your words before he started thrusting into you again, knowing damn well how sensitive you felt, having practically no time to recover from your previous orgasm. "my lord-aah~! right there...!" you mewl out as he hit another perfect angle that drove you crazy, "tell me..." his hand suddenly went to your neck, fingers wrapping around the soft flesh tightly—not tight enough to the point that you couldn't breathe, but tight enough to make your head spin as his eyes pierced through yours with desire filled in them.

"how does it feel getting fucked by a god like me? having this much power and control over both your body and your mind."

"s-so good... hngh~ ah~!" your vision slowly get blurry as you feel yourself getting weaker by the minute. you feel his cock twitch against your walls, signalling how close he is as well. "you feel so good around me, fuck~" the grip he had on your neck tightens slightly as he groans deeply, "beg me to cum inside you." scaramouche sternly says, "beg your god for his seed~" he grins mischievously as he watches the tears that had formed in your eyes slowly drip down your flushed cheeks. "c-cum inside me, my lord—ahh~! master... m-my god~" you choke out as you feel another amazing climax about to erupt from you, "please~!" your voice cracks a bit as you said those words. not long after, he snaps his hips against yours one final time, making sure to be balls deep as he shoots ropes of his thick and warm cum deep inside your pussy, which had definitely reached your womb as well. "oh, fuck~" he moans lowly as he gently pulled out of you, gaze falling towards your cunt as he keenly observed how your mixed fluids drip out to pool below you, all over the shouki no kami's hand.

you try and relax your body, closing your eyes and just letting yourself lay there tiredly, while scaramouche watches your chest rise and fall as you pant heavily after the intense session. normally, he'd let you rest but that doesn't seem to be what he wants right now. you whimper and look at him with teary, half lidded eyes as he suddenly pulls you towards him once again, pushing his cock back inside, along with pushing the cum back and reaching further down your pussy.

"one load won't be enough to breed you, darling~"

#☾★ written » #☾★ kuni » #scaramouche smut #scaramouche x reader #scaramouche x you #scaramouche x y/n #genshin smut #genshin x reader #shouki no kami smut #shouki no kami x reader #fem!reader

[pianostarinwonderland]

WAHWOSHHHAHUAIAHAJS THE TWEELS!!!! THEY’RE SO 🙏😩😩😩😩😩😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳 JADEEEEEEE AAIAYAHHAHSIIDJSDHDHSJSSS OHHMMYGNGGGODODODFJFJDJ

godddddd this is genuinely one of my favorite scenes so seeing this in manga form is making me go 🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡

THANK GOD YUU AND GRIM WENT FOR THE OTHER TABLE CAUSE THE GAME LOWKEY PORTRAYED IT AS ALL OF THEM BEING UNDER THE SAME DESK AHHAHHAHAHA

GOD. GOOD GOD. GOOD FUCKING LLLLLLLORD

THAT’S HIM THAT’S MY WIFE THE LOVE OF MY LIFE THE MOMENT THE ICON THE LEGEND IN HIS ELEMENT AS WE SPEAK UWUEUEEUUEUEUEUUUEUUEUEUEUEUUEUUEUUEUEUEUEUUEUEUE THE WAY I SQUEALED I LOVE YOU WHEN I SAW THIS PANEL

oh.

oh.

oh.

haha. hah. hahaha. hahahahahaha.

oh laugh at me like that azul, make me feel pathetic and stupid for you please. 😳 oh. oh…

THIS ONE IS CRAZYYYYYY

DUDE THE OCTA TRIO BEING ALL LIKE “you need to be disciplined you should be punished” LIKE. AUAAHHHSISIAOOAAHSHSJSJJDJJSJJS THAT PANEL IS SO HOT????

BUT ALSO IM WHEEZING AT EVERYONE RUNNING AND THEN AZUL USING MAGIC ON THEM LMFAOOOO THEY LOOK SO SAD

IT’S JUST FUNNY ALSO CAUSE IN GAME THEY FIGHT THEM BUT HERE THEY FLED

i love them sm never change tweels

THIS PANEL IS EVERYTHINGGGGGGGGG TO ME

FLOYD’S BLEP AND AZUL SQUEEZING FLOYD’S CHEEKS AS HE GETS INCREDIBLY PISSED OFF AT HIM IS SENDING ME TO HEAVEN

I LOVEEEEE THE WAY THEY PORTRAYED AZUL LOSING IT IN THE MANGA 😭😭😭😭😭 HE WENT CRAZY HE GRABBED FLOYD

This too is everything to me 😭 i love them, i love octavinelle, god i love this update sm

#twisted wonderland #twst #twst manga #azul ashengrotto #jade leech #floyd leech #ace trappola #deuce spade #jack howl

[castellankurze]

Here's the thing that interests me about the dueling scene in Gideon the Ninth. Yeah, the narrative phrasing Harrowhark rose to the occasion like an evening star is peak and the line "Death first to the vultures and scavengers" is pure fire but why is she in that position to begin with?

The situation is thus: Camilla Hect has just won a duel against Marta Dyas attempting to claim the Sixth House's necromancy challenge keys, but she was wounded in so doing. Naberius Tern, backed by Ianthe Tridentarius, is pressing a dueling challenge against the injured Camilla in a flagrant bid to beat Camilla down and take the keys for the Third House while she's already recovering from one match. Gideon is standing by watching things unfold and, to her relief, Harrowhark steps up to put Gideon in the ring as a substitute for the injured Camilla and thus shut down Naberius' vulturing.

Except...why? You'd think that in anything like a polite societal dueling code (I know, I know, but go with it-) Camilla and Palamedes would have the option to demure, saying something like "the Sixth House cavalier just fought a duel and is wounded to boot, piss off for a day and we'll see then." But that's not even floated as an option. Palamedes isn't a dumb guy - far from it - and even if he were out of his element, you'd think someone else could just lean in and say 'dude tell them to shove it.' Judith Deuteros objects by saying "There are rules" and Ianthe shuts that down by pointing out she pressed Marta's duel on incredibly flimsy pretext, so that seems to be an objection on the grounds for presenting the challenge, rather than probing for an option to refuse. If Harrow and Gideon (or Jeannemary, jumping on the bandwagon) hadn't interceded, Camilla was about to fight her second duel back to back.

(Even in the first dueling challenge, the tone of onlookers seems to be that people want Palamedes to default and hand over his key to the Second House to spare Camilla the fight, because they assume the Sixth House is weak and don't know how good Camilla is.)

To sum up: the Sixth House seems to have no recourse but to either accept the repeated dueling challenges or default; with no way to decline except to give the Third House something they want (in this case, a Canaan House key).

That's insane.

And if that's deliberate, rather than an oversight on Tamsyn Muir's part, that suggests so much about the Nine Houses' dueling culture. It suggests that a challenge from a cavalier primary can't be refused; you have to either throw down or roll over as if they won. It speaks to a distinct lack of value placed on human lives, that the cavaliers are forced to accept a challenge on pain of their house losing face at best, something material at worst. The defending house can only negotiate to a degree that the attacking house is willing to let them. This is, depressingly, fully in keeping with the series' characters' treatment of the cavaliers. The subsequent books and short stories (especially The Unwanted Guest) really hammer this idea in, that the cavaliers are nominally viewed as a source of blades and shields in the hands of the necromancers, even if the laypeople of the setting don't know all the reasons behind the traditions.

In real life, formal dueling typically had customs and rules for negotiation and ceremony, with multiple exit points for parties to back out of a potential threat to life without losing face. Only truly aggrieved parties would press a suit to the point of confrontation. The Nine Houses say screw that, put up or shut up. They've more or less raised up the informal tradition of 'swords now motherfucker.'

To steal a phrase from another tumblrite, 'congrats god that's the worst anyone's ever done it.'

#TLT #The Locked Tomb #Gideon the Ninth #Harrow the Ninth #The Unwanted Guest #Tamsyn Muir #Camilla Hect #Palamedes Sextus #Gideon Nav #Harrowhark Nonagesimus #Naberius Tern #Ianthe Tridentarius #John open the sanctum I just want to talk

[lacollectionneuse1967]

slip of the tongue part 2 - jealous

Theseus Scamander x Reader

“He was all over you,” he hisses. “I am not a possessive man, but I could’ve killed him then and there. He doesn’t know what’s mine.”

summary: after confessing your feelings for (and sleeping with) your boss, theseus, you join his brother newt's team of wizards attempting to thwart the notorious gellert grindelwald. when you're tasked with distracting and seducing a powerful dark wizard on your first mission, theseus gets uncharacteristically and fiercely jealous.

fem!reader. theseus scamander x reader.

category: smut with plot

warnings: 18+ smut, (light) mdom/femsub elements, unprotected penetration, semi-public sex, jealousy/possessive behavior, also the reader suffers brief unwanted sexual advances in a scene

part one / part two

Your dreams are uninventive. Your nightmares are even less so. 

Often you are hounded by dogs: drooling, snapping canines, bloodthirsty past the point of cognizance, they’re more open mouths than animals. Or, you’re standing on the hill where your old orphanage used to sit in North London, barefoot on the roof while the rest of London floods below, water rising, you know you’re going to drown. Or some other tired, boring allegory for your past catching up with you, at last, your blessings, your wand, crumbling to ash—you know what the dreams mean and they don’t scare you anymore. 

But tonight you are perfectly dreamless. The dream dogs, the wintry world outside, the sound of the wind whistling through the empty London streets, it cannot touch you now. The fireplace is crackling and warm orange light spills in beneath the door from the living room.

Theseus’s arm is draped over your body, your head is on his chest. Every part of your body where your bare skin meets his buzzes with contentment. His room is like a sanctuary, his arms a house that holds you. 

You don’t think you’ve slept for even a full hour. It’s still dark outside when you feel Theseus jostling your shoulder. 

“Y/N. Wake up, darling.” 

You sigh in response and are about to put up a fight, but when you meet his eyes they’re full of sore regret, apologetic. He wouldn’t ask you to leave his bed unless it was important.

You emerge from the covers and start to stretch. 

“What time is it?”

“I’m sorry, love, but it’s nearly four in the morning. We have to be going, it’s urgent.” 

You turn to look at him, he’s raking a hand through his hair, sitting up in bed.

“Did you sleep at all, Theseus?” You ask incredulously.

“No, too much to think about. And besides, I knew if I slept I wouldn’t be likely to wake. Better you sleep…”

Your heart wrenched. In a swell of affection, you went to him, crawling back over his body on the bed.

“No,” he groans, but his hands come around you, sliding down to your hips, anyway. You kiss his neck, raking your teeth over the skin there.

“Don’t do this to me,” he anguishes. His grip tightens on your hip, it’s meant to be chastising but it makes you want him more. “Please. We need to leave, Y/N.”

It wasn’t easy letting go of him. You know he would’ve given you what you wanted with enough persistence. 

“Okay, okay!” You relent, kissing his mouth with a smile. “I’ll stop terrorizing you now.” You leap out of bed again without complaint. 

When he stands he’s serious-Theseus again, your boss. And you love him still. 

For his sake, you pretend not to notice his erection in his boxer shorts. It looks painfully hard. 

“Get dressed,” he says to you before turning to the bathroom. “We need to get to Hogsmeade.”

It was wonderfully strange to see him like this—hair in wavy disarray, looking soft and subdued, barefoot and in his t-shirt. You want to appreciate the sight, you want to talk about what had happened between you and all that had been said. But his mind is elsewhere, preoccupied, and it seems you are both running late.

At your insistence, he lets you apparate to your apartment for a change of clothes, but then the two of you are off, running down the stairs of his building into the dark world below.

————— 

Hogsmeade is more of a detour. There is an incognito meet-up organized with none other than Professor Albus Dumbledore. You’d, mercifully, taken a train--the Hogwarts Express. Theseus mentioned that Dumbledore was being watched by the Ministry, and that there were anti-apparition charms put up around the village and the castle.

You were just grateful to see him sleeping, at last, on the way there. 

It was barely daylight when the two of you arrived, the sun bleak and pink over the Highlands, providing no warmth. You were grateful for the coffee you'd nursed on the train, as you were grateful to relieve yourself of the confidential documents from the Ministry. Their weight was an invisible one for you, evidence of your betrayal.

"Some aspiring Auror you are," you thought to yourself, bitterly.

“I tried to organize them for you. I started to, actually,” You supplied sheepishly when Dumbledore regarded the haphazard stacks of parchment, laid out on one of the tables in what you assumed was his brother's inn.

Dumbledore smiled warmly at you regardless and thanked you sincerely. 

When you step out of the inn, you look to Theseus just as he looks over his shoulder at you. You're both more or less sleepless, and cold, and it seems the both of you have betrayed the Ministry and embarked on a hopeless mission, without many allies in the world.

But you were a united front.

It surprises you when he says, so earnestly that the tension in his shoulders seems to deflate, “God, I missed you. I can’t tell you how much I’ve missed you.”

You blush, but don’t break his gaze. You’re not afraid to let him see you anymore. 

“Where to, Mr. Scamander?”

He flexes his jaw like he’s not thinking about the plan at all, like he’s thinking about last night. But then, with a sigh, the moment is broken. 

“Germany,” he says. “It’s time you meet my younger brother and the rest of the resistance.” 

He says ‘resistance’ like it's some inside joke, some funny jab. You don't understand it until you arrive at the hotel room in Berlin. 

-----------

Other than the hair, that uncommon shade of reddish, honey brown, and the apparent kindness and sense of humanity, Newt is nothing like Theseus. In fact, when he comes over to greet you he can hardly meet your eye, his head is half bowed in the other direction, his mouth a nervous, flat line.

"Pleasure to meet you, Y/N. I was sure that you'd do the right thing when Theseus sent you his letter. It was... very brave of you."

You look to Theseus in sharp amusement, eyes sparkling.

"Was there ever a question of whether or not I'd betray you? Did you really think there was a chance I'd turn you over to the authorities?"

Theseus places a reassuring hand on your shoulder.

"Come now, Y/N," he says. "You know if I were to die I'd prefer it to be at your hand anyway."

You want to roll your eyes, but you're not sure to what extent he's joking.

You shake Newt's hand. You're soon after introduced to a muggle baker named Jacob and an astute, somewhat brash Auror from America named Tina. You're not much of a people-person, but you find that you like them both, immensely. They feel genuine, the sort of strong, singular characters that couldn't deceive anyone if they tried. That is why Newt's explanation of your task for the night sends a bolt of dread down your spine.

"We need to need to retrieve a magical object from a German Minister's office. I-I can't say much, it's better you don't know, but it's safe to assume that a large portion of the German Ministry of Magic has already fallen. Helmut, Vogel--and who knows how many others are under the influence of Grindelwald."

"Which German Minister's office?" Theseus says. His hands are in his pockets, he's leaning against the windowsill, the picture of nonchalance, his hair swept back. He's so handsome you could cry.

Newt ignores him. "Now, tonight may be our only chance. There's a diplomatic gala at the ministry itself. I can get us all in, Pickett and I can handle sneaking into the office itself, but there are five people who know about the object being at the ministry, who will be on the lookout and who need to be distracted until we're out."

He doled out assignments swiftly. Theseus was to distract the head of security. Jacob, the two waitstaff who served as the Minister's private informants. For Tina, the German Auror, Helmut. And for you? The Minister himself.

"Which Minister, Newt?" Theseus asks again, the edge in his voice unmistakable, though you don't understand it.

"Baron Dietrich, the Minister of Finance," Newt says at last.

Dietrich. Most of your work for Theseus was domestic, but you try to remember what you can. Dietrich was some Bavarian-born descendent of the aristocracy. Hedonistic, high society. He fought in the war, but gained his reputation in the drinking clubs of Berlin. Even you knew he was ruthless, notorious. A brute of a man without much respect for the law. That was the extent of what you knew.

Newt is rushing to explain before you or Theseus can speak.

“Please, Y/N, Theseus." He looks between the two of you, trying to appeal to both. "Dietrich, h-he likes…he likes beautiful women and he-"

Theseus crosses the room to his brother in a single stride. "Yes, and do you have any idea what he likes to do to those beautiful women, Newt?” He's seething. “Even everyone at the British Ministry knows he brutalizes them."

“I-I wouldn’t ask her if it weren’t absolutely necessary. So long as she’s able to distract him at the party, keep him interested there, at the party, nothing will happen to her—to you!” Newt turns to you now, addressing you directly. “I’m sure of it…”

Theseus sucks his teeth and turns away from his brother, still fuming. “Absolutely not. You will not send her away from my side, that’s final. Not to that man.”

“Theseus, please-"

“She’s muggleborn, Newt! Do you know what men like Baron Dietrich do to wizards like her? If he found out, if any one of Grindelwald's followers did, she'd be killed.” Theseus is speaking with such firm authority, but you know him well enough to detect the barely concealed panic in his eyes, the fracture just beneath the fortress. “Send Tina instead, she’s an Auror.”

“But Y/N is exactly the sort of girl that Dietrich would be-"

“I want to be an Auror too,” your voice sounds strange to your ears when you find it. It has a clear, confident quality, musical and lucid.

Theseus looks to you in shock. You wonder if he knew about the promotion you’d been offered at all, if he knew all you’d sacrificed to stay close to him—your very dreams dashed to pieces. From his expression, naked and open as day, he did not. 

“I can do it,” you make an effort to sound settled. Unshaken.

Being a young, vulnerable girl in the streets of East London, at the orphanage after, and then being a woman at the British Ministry as an adult, you’d dealt with plenty of over-friendly and entitled men. Boorish men were everywhere and were not uniquely monstrous. You hoped Baron Dietrich wasn’t either. 

"It's settled then," Jacob claps his hands together, seeming relieved that the tension between the two brothers has evaporated. Theseus is slumped over, leaning back on the nightstand in apparent defeat. "We're going to a party!"

Tina places her hand on your arm, leading you towards the closet. She doesn't seem to be terribly affectionate, so you're grateful to her for extending you this small kindness now.

"Here, Y/N," She says. "Let's get you dressed. We have plenty of time to go over the plan. It'll be okay."

------------------

Your outfit, "disguise" you suppose, is nothing like the subdued robes of your companions. You don't know why you're surprised when they ask you to enter the ministry ten minutes after them, alone.

The skirt of your dress is flowy and short, like a dancer's, ending just above your knee, something that might've been acceptable a decade prior, given the fashion trends. It's made of delicate petals of off-white fabric, adorn with tiny silver and pearlescent beads, glittering. Meant to draw attention. It's sleeveless and the top is breathtakingly form-fitting, pinching in your waist and hugging every curve of your body, but you are gratefully afforded an elegant high neckline. Silk, ivory-colored, wrist-length gloves that do nothing for the cold cover your hands and a fur half-coat is draped over your shoulders. Your lipstick is a deep red.

You understand what it means, these luxury items, your styling, the fact that you were instructed to enter alone. By no design of your own, the implication was that you were an escort, a madame of the night. No wonder Newt had Theseus leave the hotel first, before he could catch a glimpse of you. You didn't dare imagine his reaction.

As you enter the gala, handing the doorman your fabricated invitation without a glance, every head turns to you. Chatter stills as you pass, the women gawk and the men look stricken, hungry as the pack dogs in your dreams. Plates and trays sail overhead and the instruments play on, unattended. The German Ministry of Magic has spared no expense.

Patrons lean in close and speak hushed and anxiously. You assume the upcoming election for the highest office of the International Confederation of Wizards is on everyone's mind.

You head for the bar with your head held high, hoping it doesn't show on your face, your discomfort at being so seen. You were told Baron Dietrich would be at the bar with some of his men. With a trembling, gloved hand you motion the barman over and order a drink.

You don’t dare look for your friends. You assume things are going swimmingly for them, but for you? You are drowning in your finery.

You’re not even alone for a moment before the wolves descend. You should've known a man like Dietrich would come find you.

"Mädchen!" He approaches you partially, but expects you to come the rest of the way, waves you over with a meaty hand. When you raise an eyebrow, haughtily, he switches to English.

"Girl, come here." The timber of his voice is low, gravelly. He has a heavy brow, his hair is thick and peppered with gray. The gray does nothing to diminish the impression of his strength. In a fight without your wand, he could have your neck snapped, broken and rolling around its stem, in a heartbeat.

You walk over, leaving your drink at the bar, untouched.

The gala is housed in a mammoth, marble room, twenty foot ceilings held up by smooth columns, something that reminds you of Gringott's. But around the massive bar at the room's center are half-circle booths and tables, spiraling out like lily pads. You slide into Dietrich's booth and his arm goes around you immeditely.

He smells chokingly of cigars, a perfumey, sickly sweet smell. He is a bloated, thick-limbed man. No, you couldn't have fought him off. There are so many uniformed men at his table that some of the younger ones have to stand. With a sting of shock, you don't see how you could be of any influence on these men at all, they hardly see you as a person, aren't speaking to you. You hope Newt and Pickett work quickly.

Another young man, dressed in what looks like a soldier's uniform, slides into the booth after you, sandwiching you in next to Dietrich. You let out of noise of shock and begin to push him off you when Dietrich grabs both your wrists.

"Don't be fussy. This is my young friend, newly recruited. I plan to make him my protégé."

The other men slap the boy over the shoulder, jostling him in congratulations. He smiles meekly. You could hate him for that meekness. That pathetic deference to power.

"We'll share you tonight, of course." Dietrich is looking at the boy, not you. "In my office."

Dietrich's hand clamps over your exposed thigh and his fingernails jab into the fat of your thigh. You don't react to the bright bite of pain. The other boy begins to lean into you, breath hot over your neck.

Whatever small bird lives in your ribs begins to beat itself against that cage, flailing and thrashing.

"No!" You can't help the edge of panic in your voice. Dietrich is too strong, so you don't bother, but you shove the boy off of you and out of the booth without much effort. The boy stumbles out, dumbfounded.

Dietrich snatches your wrist with real fury, bruisingly.

"What?! You're for sale, aren't you?" He won't hurt you in front of his men, not at the gala, but his face is so colored with anger that it's nearly purple.

"Please," there's a real plea in your voice when you say it, you try to cover it up with a hurried smile, you try to look charming. "Dance with me, sir?"

That seems to sedate him. He looks irritated, but pleased by your attention. At least he won't be able to molest you in front of all his colleagues and superiors.

He leads you to the dance floor and the entire way your mind is racing, scrambling for purchase, trying to figure out how you're going to keep him out of his office. He made it clear he had plans to go there later tonight with his men. With you.

And he was an even cruder man than you'd thought, he'd made no attempt to even flirt with or seduce you. His interest in you was moreso entitlement, the same interest a predator has for a slab of meat.

Your wand, concealed on your person, gave you little comfort. Newt had asked that you did not reveal yourself, didn't make a scene. But if it came down to it, you would fight Dietrich rather than submit to him. He was more than repulsive. He wanted to hurt you.

"Please," you think to yourself. "Please, God, don't make me-"

You startle at the large hand that grips your waist and spins you away, just before you reach the dance floor.

Dietrich, abandoned, turns in flustered outrage and is swallowed by the crowd. You're being whisked away before he can fully react, Theseus guiding you deftly out of the overfull room of diplomats.

You sob with relief. "Theseus-" you start, but he's leading you deeper, still, away from the gala.

It's not until you're in some pitch-dark, gaping mausoleum of a hallway that Theseus finally stops, pressing you delicately against the wall, holding your face in his hands like water, like something precious. He examines your body.

"Are you okay?" He asks, pressingly.

You could cry out in joy, the sight of his face is balm-like, giving you a familiar relief.

"Yes, yes!" You reassure him. "Is it done? Did we do it?"

Theseus nods in confirmation, still looking over you for injuries, turning over your wrists in his hands.

"The others are already out. It was quick. No one noticed a thing, we probably took too many precautions this time around..." He finally meets your eyes. The look in his is dark and indecipherable. When he swallows, it's raggedly. "You're really okay, Y/N?"

"Yes," you answer, hesitant at the intensity of his look. "Why?"

Theseus presses his body against yours harshly, you don't even have time to moan before he's swallowing it with his mouth. Your hands are all over him, but he gives you no room to move, it's as if he doesn't notice, the way he's pushing you up against the wall, kissing you like he wants to consume you.

"You're so damn beautiful," he mutters. "When you walked in I almost blew my cover just to go to you."

"Theseus," you pant. You're needy, you want him to keep kissing you but he's leaning his neck back, pinning you against the wall but holding himself away so he can look at you when he runs his warm hands from the backs of your thighs up to your ass. He hooks his fingers around the waistline of your panties and pulls them down so they're only hanging onto you by one of your ankles.

He leans in for another kiss, just as deep and wretched as the last, just as maddening.

He pulls away again with a pant.

"Your dress is too damn short," he curses under his breath.

"Are you angry at me?" You ask quietly, still writhing against him, desperate for friction, but suddenly self-conscious.

"No, no sweetheart," he soothes. "Not at you. You did so good. Such a good job." His praise has you leaning into his palm, which is cupping the side of your face.

You whimper, "I want you." You realize it's true as you're saying it. You can't ever lie to him. "I want you," you repeat, more insistently.

“He was all over you,” he hisses against your ear. “I am not a possessive man, but I could’ve killed him then and there. He doesn’t know what’s mine.” He punctuates the last word with a squeeze to your backside. 

"Theseus," you breathe out, helplessly. You can't believe this is happening. The wing of the German Ministry that you're in is completely dark, you can barely make out the tapestries and curtains hanging loose from the walls. But there's distant light at the end of the hall, and dim voices and music filter in and out from the gala a few rooms over.

But you want him to keep touching you more than you know better, know you should stop. More than anything.

He starts to hike your dress up, his movements urgent, when he stops abruptly. The spot where Dietrich's nails dug into your upper thigh is small, but he drew blood.

Theseus pauses, loosens his grip and lets you slide down the wall. With a slow-thudding heart you briefly fear he'll be so furious he'll run back to the gala, to find Dietrich, but he only bends down and kisses the wound, just barely, lips ghosting over skin, so gently you could cry. Kneeling before you, he looks like a prince, a knight. He's careful to avoid the wound when he lifts you back up against the wall.

You can't help but stare down at it, in awe, when he takes his dick out. Your body still thrills at the sight of it, there, huge, resting at your entrance. Theseus grinds a slow circle, sliding it against your wet folds, against your clit. You just stare.

He flashes you a lazy smile.

“What? You want me to help you put it in?” 

You moan, audibly. You're not doing a very good job at being discreet, but how can you when he says things like that to you and expects you to answer?

"Yes, please," you close your eyes, too flustered to meet his burning gaze when you say the words.

He grips the base of his cock and guides it into your pussy. Clamps a hand over your mouth to muffle the noises you're making, you whimper dumbly against his palm. Only releases his hand from your mouth once he's fully seated inside of you. The stretch is so big you know it would hardly take any movement at all for him to break that tension and make you come, drive you mad, unravel you completely. Just a few rocks against the wall, a few rolls of his hips and you'd be brainless and spent, crying out his name. You're already dripping around him. But you want to last longer for him this time.

He's looking directly into your eyes.

“You’re taking it, Y/N. You can choose where—in your mouth, on your face, inside. But you’re taking it all.” 

You nod. Then once again he's fucking you dumb, you don't even care that anyone could walk by, you're just thinking about how big he is, how good it feels. He's fucking your body slack now, you don't even have to do anything, he’s holding you up, lifting you onto and off of his cock roughly, debasingly.

His hands nearly circle your waist completely, they’re so large. Your mouth is stuck open, making stupid, feeble noises and he’s grunting small words of encouragement.

"Say my name," he says.

When you don't respond immediately, too blissed out to think, he slams your body down harder onto him and you nearly yelp.

"Hngh, Theseus. Theseus, please-"

You can feel him get almost unbearably hard inside of you, then he’s heaving you up and flipping you around, manhandling you, so your back is his against his torso, his right arm a bar across your chest, still inside. He brings a hand down roughly to your clit to touch you through it, and then you're both coming hard, your loud, jagged breaths echoing through the empty hall.

Your head spins, you're seeing stars.

"Baby," he says, when you don't come back to yourself immediately. "Was I too rough? Are you okay?"

You nod, breathlessly, but stumble when he finally stops supporting your weight. Your body is still juddering with pleasure, your fingertips quiver and feel numb as you smooth down your dress.

He's right, you think with a laugh. My dress is too damn short.

Theseus has the decency to look around the hall to make sure no one was watching, and to help you fix your hair and what's left of your lipstick. Your lips are pink and bitten now, swollen.

"They're probably wondering where we are. We should go." His voice is serious, unemotive, but there's something like devotion in the way he looks over you from head to toe, just one last time, to make sure you're beyond reproach. He hands you his jacket, which is huge on you, and slings your fur cape over his arm, bearing the cold himself like a gentleman.

A flurry of snow has begun to spiral down in the streets of Berlin, white particles curling and dancing in the wind. You've always found this type of snowfall to be so fanciful, the closest thing to magic in the muggle world. You walk back to the meeting point in comfortable silence, Theseus's hand clasped firmly around yours.

"He doesn't know what's mine," he'd said about Dietrich, about you. And last night, not that long ago, he'd said, "I love you."

Albeit, after you said it first. You look over to his oblivious face, checking both sides for cars before leading you across the busy street. His kind eyes, the line of his jaw..

You wonder how he could mean it... You'd so meticulously tried to conceal from him all the ugly parts of your life, your past, your fears, even your wants when they seemed to inconvenience him.

Could he love me? Could I let him?

"I want you," you'd said to him in the hall of the German Ministry. You realize now that you meant more than his body. For so long even just a look from him, just a word, was enough to sustain you.

But now you wanted more. Maybe it was selfish, undeserved, that the magical world was giving way to crisis, the dark forces were closing in around hope, and yet here you were, wanting to ask him for more...

part three here

author's note: hiiiiii! YES i switched to present tense from past tense in the last part, and no i'm not sorry... please let me know if you'd like me to continue this fic! i have a third & final chapter in mind. or i can take other theseus requests. the theseus brainrot is real... some AUs would be fun too! as always, feedback is welcome &lt;3 taglist: @mystic-mara

#theseus smut #theseus x reader #theseus scamander #theseus scamander x reader #hp fic #fantastic beasts

[l4long-winded]

i really wanna see carmy groveling 🤭 might be fun, after a fight or something

how cruel... i like the way you think! i tried to write him as close to his character here while still adding in that groveling element. i hope i've done it justice!

o.s. a guilty heart's plea(s)

summary: carmen's said some unforgivable things to you. and yet here he is at your doorstep, pleading for you to forgive him (carmen berzatto x afab!reader)

reflection: as much as i pride myself in my ability to write scenes and descriptions, i still struggle a lot with making dialogue sound good while flowing with my writing. i think this has been good practice for me to really get inside this character's head and see what he could possibly say with a prompt as heavy as this. this took me about a week to write so i really hope i gave it the time and energy it deserves. thank you all for reading and feedback is always welcomed, appreciated, and encouraged!

warnings: cursing, angst, established relationship, implied smut, reminiscing, they're on a break, inner monologue, carmen's pov, rambling, self-loathing, carmen pleading, inability to express feelings, apologies, missed calls, insecurities, acts of service, sydney sweeney mention, smoking, somewhat happy ending (please let me know if there are other warnings i need to add)

word count: 2,132

( this work has been cross-posted to ao3 )

Carmen knocks on the screen door ahead of him. It’s his seventh time doing so, the clattering and aggravating sound of metal reverberating against the second door behind that one. Dust coats his knuckles because it transferred from the opaque metal, a small spot shinier than the rest of the door because he continued to rap at the same area. Maybe he should clean it for you later if you actually decide to speak to him again. His hands fidget at his sides, clenching and releasing, staring blankly as he thinks of all the times he’s come over. For his first initial visit, you unlocked the door, gave him a cautious glance over your shoulder, and then led him inside. During the second time, you held his hand as you stepped past the threshold, squeezing it in reassurance.

On Valentine’s Day, when he surprised you with an assortment of flowers from the farmer’s market, you greeted him with a deep kiss, tugging the collar of his shirt to pull him inside of your house. He didn’t show any resistance, blindly following your lead, dropping off the flowers onto your couch as your hands lifted his shirt, and your mouths departed from one another for a smidgen of a second before they found each other again, more impassioned and desperate.

“Open the door, come on, I’m sorry,” he says, more so to himself than your screen door. He’s been close to shouting at it this entire time, making his pleas, encouraging you to open it for him so he can have a discussion with you face-to-face.

He’s called you plenty of times. Each one has either rang for as long as the line allowed or went straight to voicemail. Two weeks have passed without seeing each other. Two long weeks of unanswered text messages he’s sent day by day and missed calls clogging up your phone’s notifications. You’re ignoring him and he knows he deserves it, guilty as the hand in the cookie jar, but he still can’t shake this overwhelming feeling inside of him to see you again. The albums dedicated to you in his gallery are not enough to satisfy this. His fingers twitch every time he swipes at an image and relives the sensation of running them along your skin. That’s when his nose begins to miss the scent that clings to your neck. That’s when his ears long to hear the lilt of your laughter and that particular way you say his name. That’s when his tongue rejects the nicotine and implores him for a taste of your chapstick, or the bubblegum flavor lingering in your mouth greeting him after a shift at work, or the giggles you fall into as he chases the subtle pecks you graciously feed him.

The door behind the one he’s attending to opens. There you are. He can’t see you since the sun is positioned right behind him, warming his back as it sets into the background. At most, he makes out the silhouette of your frame, recognizable to his eyes as he’s acquainted himself with every curve and slope of you, but he’s aware you fully see him on the other side. He wonders if you’re able to tell how little he’s slept since a look in the mirror this morning painted the picture of an exhausted man through dark rings under his eyes and a slackened jaw.

“What do you want, Carmen?” You ask. Not Carmy. Not Bear. Not any of that cheesy shit Richie pokes fun at him for. Carmen. He’s not sure whether he’s relieved to hear the sound of your voice or offended he’s lost every sweet moniker you’ve bestowed upon him.

“To talk,” he explains quickly, “I just want to talk. If you want me to fuck off, then,” he inhales sharply. It would kill him if you told him to fuck off, but he’s also not about to make you uncomfortable for an issue he caused. “Then I’ll fuck off.”

Unlike Carmen, you’re not rapidly firing away sentences in response to him. You’re quiet for a beat and it’s rather agonizing for him because even though there’s only a door separating the two of you, you’re still so far out of his reach. He’s tempted to cup his hands over his eyes and look past the individual holes of the door to check if you’re still there.

“Go ahead,” you say, interrupting his thoughts and refuting his fear you’ve stalked back inside your living room.

“Talk.”

He gulps. He was hoping to at least do this without a barrier in the way, but he’s not about to fumble the one opportunity and chance you’ve given him after two weeks of nothing. He’d be a fool to.

“Fuck… I…” Well, this is off to a great start. He tries to think about the texts he’s sent. He had time to sit down and write out apologies and yet none of them are splurging onto his tongue to save him the awkward discomfort currently stirring in his stomach.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry for what I said,” Can you let me figure this shit out without breathing down my fucking neck ringing in his ears, haunting him like a phantom stuck on his shadow because it’s one of the last things he said to you before you took off and rightfully gave him the cold shoulder.

“I was stressed and frustrated and, and I wasn’t thinking. Those aren’t excuses for being shitty,” he shakes his head so hard that his hair untucks from his hat and grazes his eyelashes, “If anything, they make me more shitty because only assholes do that and that’s what I am. I’m a fucking asshole and and and and…” He’s rambling, losing the point of this. He’s got a talent for berating himself. He falls into it naturally if he’s not careful.

“And I fucked up. I really, really fucked up. I didn’t mean any of it. I never wanted to hurt you.” But you did. “I don’t know why I do that. I don’t know why I ruin shit, I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me, but something is and you, you, you always… you’re always there and and and then you weren’t and…”

This is hard. He’s never been good at articulating his feelings. He wants nothing more than to just tell you how he’s fucked up and you’re one of the only people who doesn’t think he is, but after his true colors have splintered out of him and sliced at you as they have other people in his life he cares for, your perception’s possibly changed from that. He believes he’s confirmed every horrible thing he’s ever thought and said about himself and usually, he can handle that self-loathing and dissonance on his own, but consternation bubbles in his ribcage and sparks embers licking at the lining of his stomach at the very idea of you becoming desensitized to the version of himself you’ve fallen for. He wants to shove the curtains back into place, pretend you never stumbled upon the man behind them, and continue walking hand in hand with you in the reverie he knew wouldn’t last. But damn it. He wants it to last longer than this. It wasn’t enough time. He craves more of it, grasping for the seconds in his hands despite how much they’re attempting to evade him as the clock ticks and ticks. 

“Fucking fuck,” he bellows, “Man, fuck me, fucking fuck me.” Vulnerability is so fucking repulsive. Who the hell invented it? He can’t finish a keynote to save his life.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he settles on.

“I can’t fucking sleep, I can’t fucking eat, Richie keeps calling me a dumb shit like I’m not already thinking that. I-I-I need you. I’m sorry for making you feel like I don’t, but I do. I don’t blame you for leaving and I don’t blame you for ghosting me, but please, I can’t fucking do this anymore. I know I’m being a selfish fuck, but I can’t shake what you make me feel and I won’t leave until you talk to me.”

He stares hard at the door. The sun’s lower in the sky, making it more difficult to see if you’re still standing there listening to what he has to say, as jumbled of a mess that it is. His hands leave his sides, anxiously pressing palms first into the metal like it’ll ground him. An urge presents itself to rip it off its hinges and see it for himself rather than wait for verification, but he manages to remain steady where he stands. It’s about the same experience he’s had over the past two weeks of texting and calling to no avail. You’re not saying anything. You’re not denying his insecurities, you’re not soothing his temper, you’re not reflecting it, and you’re not engaging like he’s envisioned time and time again. You’re eluding him. You’re slipping past his fingers like liquid as he desperately grasps.

“Please, please, please say something.” His forehead leans into the surface, eyes shutting tight. “Tell me I’m not shit, tell me you never want to see me again, please talk to me.”

Please forgive me, he swallows. Please forgive me and take me back.

“Just… please… I… I want to fix this. I want to make it up to you. I’ll do anything to make it up to you. Please don’t shut me out. I’ll make you something? Yeah? Your favorite? What about that place you wanted to go off Lake Shore? Or, or that movie you wanted to see with, uh, that Sweeney girl? What the fuck was it?” Carmen’s eyebrows knit together as he tries to remember the name. “We can go see it… we can go to dinner… I can make dinner. I can take time off work and we can travel somewhere, we can take a trip like you wanted, whatever—I want what you want. Please…? Hello?”

Carmen speaks your name a few times among his pleading. His forehead slowly detaches from the door, indents of the mesh left behind on his skin. He goes quiet to listen for any movement, but he can’t even hear your breathing like this. He can’t hear anything besides the wind picking up, blowing cold over the tips of his ears sticking out from his hat. He steps away from the door, a lump in his throat alongside all the affection he doesn’t know how to let out that he swallows with great difficulty. Instead of walking away from your house, he sits on the cement step leading up to the walkway. He meant it when he said he wouldn’t leave until you talked to him.

He camps outside your house. One hand fishes for his carton of Sapphires, plucking a cigarette from the box. He’s got about two left since he’s been chain-smoking to fill the void. Carmen greatly considers trying to make his plea again on his knees in front of the door if that’s what it’ll take as he lights the end away from his mouth. The pressure of the cement will be a motherfucker, but he’s concocting another game plan to gain your attention since he’s already here and the walk back to his apartment is too long for him to jump at it. If that doesn’t work, then he can leave and come back in the morning before work. He can afford to be slightly late as his normal is showing up early and Sydney and Tina know the prep work that needs to be done.

All his thoughts fade as he hears the door behind him creak. He glances back suddenly, catching it as it slowly swings open. He’s in the midst of standing to his feet and flicking his cigarette into a patch of dirt when you come into view. Your hair’s messy, a white tank top on your torso, and a pair of fleece pajama pants he knows are new. His hands yearn to become acquainted with them as he has your other bottoms. Carmen stares at how you’re hugging yourself, presumably because the cold air is filtering into your warm house. The goosebumps littered over your biceps and forearms confirm his theory.

He’s on you in an instant. His arms wrap firmly around your frame, sighing out as his stress undergoes the mitigation of your own arms embracing him back. Your hand finds his hair, incidentally causing his hat to fall off to the floor, but he doesn’t care. He’s far too busy stamping your temples, cheeks, jawline, and lips with kisses he has weeks of time to make up for.

“M’sorry,” he mumbles into your hairline, “so, so, so sorry. Missed you.”

#l4l.writes #carmen berzatto #carmen berzatto x reader #carmen berzatto angst #l4l.oneshot #the bear fic #carmy the bear #jeremy allen white #a guilty heart's plea(s)

[sharksandjays]

This is sort of going off my recent artwork but I really wanted to take a moment to talk about Jay's adaptability. Specifically weapons. With the other ninjas, they seem to stick to one thing. Kai seems to always stick to a sword, Zane a long distance weapon, Cole an impact-based weapon, and Nya a spear-type weapon. (Lloyd still has the same sword he's had since season 11.) And while Jay does stick to chained weapons, he shows a lot of comfort with continously changing weapons in situations of need.

Personally, I think it's to make up for his element. Lightning is an incredibly powerful element that is likely very difficult to control. He probably doesn't WANT to use it much outside of his usual shocks and power outages. Unlike Lloyd, he doesnt need that much power because he's usually not fighting The Big Bad.

So he makes up for it with variety. With hand to hand combat, agility, speed, adaptability of weapons.

I mean, just look at all of them.

(And dont get me STARTED on how insane it is that he reguarly uses kusarigamas. That's RIDICULOUSLY DIFFICULT TO MASTER. I think this guy needs a ton of respect just for using chained weapons.)

But the coolest thing, to me at least, is that it looks like he specifically trained in the other ninjas weapons. (Maybe the others did too? But i dont really see it as much with them.)

This scene in crystallized is what got me.

Cole literally just threw his weapon to Jay, trusting him to know how to use it. And Jay kicks butt.

I wonder if a little 15 yo Jay trained in the training yard for hours, frustratedly hacking at something with a katana, then training with a hammer, switching to a spear, then to a bostaff, then to sai, and just keeps going and going until he's comfortable with all of them. He cant be the weak man on the team. If his power isnt going to cut it, then he needs to master weapons. Master combat. He wont be the weak link. He refuses to.

Anyways sharkanalysis is back

#ninjago #ninjago thoughts #ninjago jay #jay walker #sharkanalysis #analysis post #ninjago analysis

[imomnba-x07]

EPISODES CAME OUT EARLY YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS

HERES MY THOUGHTS

SPOILERS OBVIOUSLY

EP 1

- GROVER YOU SWEET CUTIE

- also love that they changed up the office scene to give Percy more of a reason to be mad at Grover

- fight with Ms Dodds was a bit rushed but I think that was intentional for us to feel that same “wtf is happening” feeling Percy feels

- Sally enjoying the Rain, feeling it, feeling connected, was awesome. Such a great visual representation of her connection to Poseidon and the water

- “God? Like Jesus” CRYING ON THE FLOOR THAT WAS HILARIOUS

- “I’m actually 24” Grover. You. Adorable. Nervous. Scamp. Your killing me here 😭😭😭

- ANNABETHS LINE YEEEAAHHHHHH

- THE VISUALS ARE GEORGEUSSSSSSS

EPIODE 2

- ANNABETH SILHOUETTE OVER PERCYS BED RAHHHH

- DIONYSUS CLAIMING TO BE PERCYS DAD IS THE FUNNIEST THING IVE EVER SEEN ARE YOU KIDDING. ONLY EPISODE 2 AND THERES NO WAY THEY CAN TOP THAT SCENES COMEDY THE BAR HAS BEEN SET

- Percy burning the blue candy in hopes of being able to reach his mom and talk to her I am a puddle on the floor I’m deceased I am unwell

- the element of Glory was a genius factor for them to add and it’s makes the characters choices hold so much more value. Everyone has a clear motive at camp now because of Glory and it’s just- MY GOD it’s such a good addition to drive characters actions.

- love that they made Luke and Annabeths relationship a clear sibling dynamic, much better then Annabeths crush in the books

- CLARISSE YOU DID WONDERFULLY AND CAN DO NO WRONG IN MY EYES IM SUCH A STAN

- ANNABETH READING PERCY LIKE A BOOK AND BEING SO SOCIALLY AWKWARD AND ALSO LOOKING AT HIM LIKE 🤨 PLEEEASSSEEEEE THAT WAS SO GOOD

- ANNABETH CALLING PERCY SUNSHINE???? ARE YOU KIDDING ME THAT WAS SO- OH MY GOD

- love that you can visibly see the adrenaline take over whenever Percy fights. His face shows you he doesn’t fully understand how he’s doing this but his body’s natural instincts kick in and it’s just 🤌🏽✨

- ANNABETH PUSHING PERCY INTO THE WATER BECAUSE SHE NEW HE WAS THE ONE TRULY 6 STEPS AHEAD OF EVERYONE

1000000/10 INCREDIBLE PHENOMENAL SHOW-STOPPING AMZING NEVER THE SAME COMPLETELY UNIQUE

#percy jackson show #percy jackson #pjo #pjo series #pjo fandom #percy jackon and the olympians #percy and annabeth #annabeth chase #annabeth pjo #grover underwood #grover pjo #clarisse pjo

[n3ptoonz]

Part 2 of MK1 men pushing the reader to a wall while kissing them, please? 😊

i mean i GUESS i can do that 🤭 since you asked so nicely! part one here

how liu kang, reiko, sub-zero, havik, johnny cage, scorpion, and geras go about pushing reader to the wall while kissing them

just know it may not show the long pauses i took while writing this but know IT HAPPENED!! THE THINGS I DO FOR YALL🫵🏾don't say i never did none😫

havik's regeneration mentioned. i've also been told havik looks like that on purpose so like, let's act like he can make his face go back to where it was for the sake of shits, giggles, and pandering XD

tags: @luna18night20 @momopad

warnings: suggestive, fluff elements, sphinx tried her best, there will not be a part 3 im sorry y'all 💔

Liu Kang

Liu Kang was rarely ever rough with you. In fact, the only way he'd do it is if you either verbally say it's fine, or if he knows you're poking the bear just to get a reaction. And when you get a reaction...there's no going back. You've kissed with your back to the wall several times, and every time was gentle and loving and laced with care. However, if you've presented that you were that desperate for him to give you the attention you deserve, he will gladly be a little rougher in pushing you back with his lips on yours. Just be prepared for him to leave some handprints on your waist.

Reiko

Reiko is a warrior. Hardened by battle and discipline, so the way he kisses you usually starts off that way. He can't help it. Not only is it the way he was raised and what he was told a man is "supposed to be", but it also came with how his partners were to be treated. When it came to you his sense of duty and protection spiked every single time. So here you were, well within his unintentional bear hug as your back was against the wall. His kisses always started off like he was going away to war/fight (because he usually was) but he would eventually melt and become smoother because you're by his side.

Sub-Zero

Bi-Han, a truly complex character. I believe that whoever captures his heart will be the main obsession in his life. In this case, it is you. He constantly needs to be on you, around you, see you, hear you, you name it. He can't get enough of your lips and this is especially apparent the way he's almost always pushing you to the wall while kissing you. Can we blame him? He's a tall hunk of touch-starved and the only thing that will satiate that hunger is roughly making out with you every chance he gets all while still knowing how to treat you like a porcelain antique.

Havik

Havik...this guy. Even though I'm pretty sure it's not canon I still feel like he'd regenerate and degenerate for fun and for different purposes/occasions. For the sake of my sanity I can say I found him fine as hell before his face got fucked up, and so did you. But you don't mind him either way because you love his crazy ass. Allow me to set the scene: You say something snappy to get his attention and boom...he regenerates his facial wounds just to back you against the wall and shut you up with pure smugness and arrogance behind his kiss. But, this is what you wanted, nonetheless. And you'd do it again!

Johnny Cage

Who's to say Johnny Cage wouldn't try to get you in one of his films just so he could keep getting takes of him backing you to a wall and kissing you? For Elder God's sakes, he's the one who wrote the script! And of course it's something dramatic like him being a villain that captures the hero and tries to convince them to ditch their position to be with him. Dude would totally think he's Loki (did i say that bc i think it would be hot if Loki did that to me? ..don't worry about it!) He's for sure fucking up his takes on purpose and you know this, but you only pretend to be irritated and maybe even fuck up a few yourself.

Scorpion

Kuai Liang, the romantic this man is. Like Liu Kang, he's never rough with you. Except it would take a little more convincing to let him know it's fine for him to act on his feelings when he wants to. With him, his kisses are slow and gentle. They will always start off like that even if he has a hard day. All he wants is to hold you, but it's like whenever your back hits the wall a gear starts turning in his brain. The idea of you having nowhere to go and enjoying it? Not even an Elder God is pulling him from your embrace. He gets handsy and a lot more affectionate around this time; he's kissing your face, neck, and shoulders too, because why the hell not?

Geras

Geras is a special case. He's an immortal who has never experienced romantic love before. So naturally you will have to teach him some things and even point out things he has observed that can be taken as romantic love. But he's still a man who has seen a lot, so this guy knows what kissing is and how to kiss. Surely you didn't think this giant fine ass immortal being didn't know how to treat his partner? Crazy talk! Understand that when you introduce the classic wall kiss by showing him what to do, he's leaning in to kiss you as he lifts you in his arms with no effort to be found and there won't be kissing going on much longer!

a/n: thanks for reading and i hope you enjoyed! collapses onto the ground

#n3ptoonz #mk1 #mortal kombat #mortal kombat 1 #bi han #kuai liang #mk1 bi han #kuai liang mk1 #scorpion kuai liang #liu kang mk1 #geras mk #mk havik #johnny cage #mk reiko #mk x reader #bi han x reader #kuai liang x reader #liu kang x reader #geras x reader #johnny cage x reader #havik x reader #reiko x reader