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#have the capacity to get annoyed i guess

bright-and-burning · 1 month

Text

“sports are by nature unfair stop whining about it” is such goofy rhetoric to me lol. cuz by that logic we gotta eliminate like . 3/4ths of sports talk. and not even just on social media like half my water cooler conversations would be dead. i don’t care if unfairness is “just part of the game/sport/insert noun here” it’s my god-given right as a sports fan to bitch and complain lol. and i’ll do it in other sports too!! when the bills lost bc of that dumbass overtime rule i called that shit unfair and stupid as hell not because i expected or even particularly wanted the result to magically change afterwards but because that’s??? how being a fan of a team/athlete/WHATEVER works???? when the uswnt went out in the world cup i was like “clearly that ball did not go in. no i don’t care about advanced technology, i know this in my heart to be true.” on an individual (ish) sports level i’ve seen some insanely unfair shit go down at national track meets and called it unfair and nobody was like “ummm sports are unfair the official made their call and you just have to shut up and like it,” everybody was like “yeah that shits wildly unfair. fuck that official fr” like remember your ROOTS folks

#i gotta stop going on twitter . and into tags #sorry i like don’t have the brain space to scroll bc i like to catch up ENTIRELY when i do. but i DO #have the capacity to get annoyed i guess #god. i need to eat lunch w my normie sports fan coworkers or ill DIE

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tarjapearce · 10 months

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Lips anon! MY HEART 😭 Gabi is such a sweetheart ❤️ Imagine her being particularly pouty, and when Mama asks what's wrong, she's like "I want a little sibling!"

Mama thinks it's funny, but later that night, Miguel is like, "Gabi wants to be a big sister. We should get to work, cariño..."

I can just picture this like:

Gabriela wasn't a quiet child, perhaps a bit pouty when she thought too much on something, another trait inherited from Miguel. And you couldn't help stare at her as she had fixated her somewhat little glare on the fruit she was munching on.

"Are you ok, cariño?"

She just nodded and you stopped chopping some vegetables for tonight's dinner.

"Something on your mind?" You prodded softly not wanting to be overbearing or too pushy. She sighed.

"Everyone in school is talking about how fun is to be an eldest sibling, and Raquel is always all 'my little brother this, my little brother that'" She sighed, annoyed, as your cheeks flushed, knowing now where this was going.

It didn't help that Miguel just walked in, glasses on his face, a mug of coffee in hand and a relaxed expression on his face, that instantly turned into a curious one as he kissed Gabi on the forehead.

"¿Qué le pasa a mi solecito?" (What's wrong with my little sunshine?)

He then kissed you and put his mug on a nearby counter.

"Quiero" She paused and cleared her throat, her hands folded before her, as if she was trying to make a serious negotiation.

"I want a sibling."

Miguel and you froze, most of the nervous glances came from you, Miguel seemed to actually be contemplating it. You elbowed him when Gabriela's stare fell on you upon the silence stretching too long.

"Gabriela, mi amor..." you trailed. A few of the spanish endearment words you had learned from Miguel, "A sibling isn't something that just pops out of nowhere."

"How do you make them then?"

Shit.

Miguel couldn't help but genuinely look at the scene displaying before him with amusement in his eyes. He wanted to laugh, hia fangs poking enough self control.

"W-Well, you see..." your stuttering only made her little frown to turn more curious. Of course she was a smart girl, and explaining where the babies came from was something you had been mentally preparing yourself to do. She was 10.

"Do you know how a baby grow into my belly, right?"

She nodded, curiosity making her eyes round in wonder.

"Teacher explained us that it takes a long time to grow a baby"

"Indeed. Nine months actually" She gasped and frowned.

"But... that means I won't be a big sister until next year?!"

"It's a delicate process, mi amor."

She sighed and nodded, disappointed.

"But, that means the making takes a long time as well then?"

She wasn't leaving it. But if one thing you had learned is to never underestimate the understanding capacity of a kid. You weren't squeamish about talking on sexuality or Sex Ed to Gabriela, you just weren't prepared for it. But the time had come.

"It's quite simple, but it's not always successful. Babies are made when the sperm fertilizes an egg that is my uterus. Right here." You pointed at your lower belly.

"And how does that happen?"

"Something called, sexual intercourse, mi sol." Miguel spoke with a serious expression.

"And what is that?"

"When your father and I love each other, including our bodies."

"Ah..." She looked like putting two and two together and it suddenly clicked.

"Then, you better start soon."

Gabriela shrugged as you both were left speechless.

"A baby girl would it be too much to ask?"

"Let me see what I can do, alright? Go change for dinner" Miguel nodded with a smile as Gabriela hopped off the chair and left you alone. He sighed as you remained there, almost a bit too stunned of how things just happened.

"My god..."

"It was a good talk. Don't worry."

"I worry. She wants a baby sister."

"Guess we have to work hard to get her a baby sister, hm?"

Your cheeks grew impossibly red.

------

(Yeah, kiddos understand way better than people give em credit for. 👀)

#miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara x you #miguel o'hara x reader #atsv miguel #miguel o'hara fluff #💋 anon #t writes✨#Soccer Family ⚽🕷️

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miyu-d · 7 months

Text

Reacting To Your Moods

( Zoro x Reader )

Warnings: None I guess. [SFW]

Sadness

-When you get sad over something, he brings a sake bottle and sits beside you.

-"So, what happened?' he asks you calmly and listens to your venting while drinking his sake.

-If you start to cry suddenly, he gets startled and comes closer to you.

-"Oi..!" He has no idea what to say. But he wants to comfort you.

-He awkwardly says, "Everything will, work fine... Okay?"

-If you don't stop crying, he will sigh and hug you, letting your head rest on his chest. He prefers to comfort you like this more than with words.

Anger

-On the days where you get irritated over almost everything for no reason, he just tries to avoid you and exercise all day.

-If a huge argument starts over about something, he tries not to say anything back. Yes, he is annoyed. But he is the type who gets out of the room in the middle of the argument, saying,

"Tsk, this is going nowhere."

-And comes back again after both of you have cooled down.

Happiness

-When he sees you happy and smiling over something, it brings a slight smile to his face too.

-He watches you from afar.

-Even if he doesn't have much brain capacity, he keeps everything that makes you happy in his mind.

Fear

-If you have a phobia or get scared of something, he will quickly notice it.

"Oi Y/N, Are you okay there?"

-If you are in private, he will hold you in his arms until you calm down.

-If you are in public, he will put a hand around your shoulder and let you know that he is with you.

Jealousy

-There are cons to dating a man this handsome, not to mention how talented a swordsman he is.

-You know he is loyal, but when you see girls stare at him and try to flirt with him, you can't help but get jealous.

-Even if he notices an attack coming from miles away, he will never notice your burning jealousy, even if you are standing just beside him.

-If Sanji or Nami notice it, they might give him a good yell. Sanji will kick him and say,

"Baka Marimo. How could you make a lovely lady jealous like that, huh?"

-Zoro himself will notice that you are acting weird. But, of course, he has no idea why. He will ask you directly what's bothering you. And after you tell him everything, he will say,

"Huuuuuh? When did that happen?" in shock.

When he sees you sad about it, he comes to you. Then he grabs your waist and pulls you closer to him. He looks into your eyes. His other hand runs through your hair.

"You know that you are the only one for me. Right?"

He gives you a charming smile. Then he slowly leans on you and kisses you gently.

Masterlist

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displ3azant · 22 days

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(Before cut is In-Character.)

Hiii! Helloooo!

Hello!!!!!! Hehe, thiz iz actually super weird trying to write an intro-- give me a minute.

So, HIII!!!!!!! I'm Unpleasant! That'z not a joke, that iz literally my name. There'z no "deep reason" behind it, it iz literally just what people refer to me az. But, if that'z too weird, I do also go by Unplez or Plez for short.

Uh, pronounz? I don't really care, actually. I don't have a set gender, I've never really met a gradient who doez. That being said, since I started hanging with Infected I have been called he and she specifically a lot... so if it'z easiest for you, just roll with the crowd.

Right, so... the blog. Thatz thiz blog, haha! Well, the easy answer iz I waz super bored, Infected can suck a huge ####, and I like talking about myself! But... I kind of suck at talking in general, so I guess I'll type and answer questionz about myself.

BUT KNOW MY BOUNDARIEZ BEFORE YOU ASK QUESTIONZ! 👇👇👇

(Below cut is Out-Of-Character.)

To those who know me: Good to see you're still stickin' with me! I promise I will make an effort to make this blog much less of a dumpster fire like the last one.

And to those who are only now coming across this blog: Hello! My name is Hex. You don't have to call me "Mod Hex", or anything, just "Hex" will do. I'm the only guy running this thing here. I'll talk more about myself soon, because oversharing is what I do best.

Blog-Context

So, if it wasn't obvious enough from the intro, this is an ask/rp blog for the Unpleasant Gradient from Regretevator, but specifically in the context of the plez-centric au I have created for him. Or, well, the "AU" in question is actually just some freaky amalgamation of all my fucked up headcanons, which means...

I AM NO LONGER DOING DIRECT BLOG ASSOCIATIONS! Really sorry about that, I love my friends with all my heart but if I wanna keep consistency, I'm gonna have to "write the story" on my own. However, I do want to give full credit to my friends @sk8tr1101 and @party-noob for some major concepts involving Unpleasant, especially Audrey who already has some awesome ideas herself. Go check them both out!

MAIN TAGS:

#unpl3zansw3rz - Asks

#unpl3zrambl3z - Non-ask related posts/reblogs

#unpl3zlor3 - Plot points and similar

#ooc - Out-of-character post

OTHER TAGS (to be updated):

(nothing yet, hehe)

Blog-Owner

So hiiii, I'm Hex. If I can be bothered, out-of-character posts will either have the #ooc tag, be in purple text, or be signed off with my name. I'd prefer if you refer to me using he/it pronouns, thnx!

I'd also like you all to keep in mind I am 17 years old, therefore a minor, and even if I wasn't 17 I do not appreciate NSFW/Explicit jokes towards me, ESPECIALLY if you don't know me. It's one thing when you're my very close friends or my partner, it's another thing when you are a stranger on the internet asking me things I should not have to answer.

My other accounts are: @hexexists - my main blog, if you receive notifications from this account, please know it is just me! @hexational - my regretevator blog @geometricgiovanni - a Jeremy ask/rp blog set in the same universe as this one! Please note, however, that in the context of this blog, Unpleasant is not aware of the blog nor would he like to be.

Ask/RP-Boundaries

Let's start off by reiterating that I AM NOT OKAY WITH NSFW/EXPLICIT ASKS IN ANY CAPACITY! Sick of getting them, they're repetitive and annoying. Asking safe-for-work questions involving Unpleasant's anatomy is one thing, but I am not responding to ANYTHING involving genetalia.

ALSO! I am very unlikely to respond to things that is either hard to make a unique drawing for or don't progress the story (unlocking "lore" and such). I'm watching your ass, Mango, I know what you like to do (/lh). Joke asks are still okay, you don't *have* to progress story, but please keep in mind my "criteria" for answering asks when sending them. A clean inbox gives me a clear mind. I do not like notifications.

Shipping content: Shipping content is okay, but I don't care much for romance personally and so will likely not play much into it. Please don't push anything, I guess, and nothing that promotes proshipping or any kind of literally illegal pairing. If you dislike any direction taken ship-wise for this blog, then block me and move on with your day.

Roleplaying: While I'd prefer to not be in direct contact with other rp blogs, I am totally cool with roleplaying side stories and stuff, interactions and such! Please keep in mind though, Unpleasant in this is not a very social person, so you're probably not going to get the reaction you want.

Also! I think OCs are super cool and am happy to respond/interact with them as well! However,

PLEASE DON'T SEND YOUR GRADIENT OCS TO THIS ACCOUNT IF YOU WANT ME TO DRAW THEM! Please instead send them to @hexational! A lot of people were sending me their Gradient ocs to the previous Unpleasant account, and as much as I love seeing Gradient ocs and Gradient sonas, I'd love to be able to draw them, and if you are just asking an opinion on them and not an in-character ask or a genuine question involving other gradients I'd much prefer you send them to the account previously tagged!

That's pretty much all I can think of! Sorry for the long post, I just have a lot to say hehe

Lots of love, - Hex

#unpl3zansw3rz #unpl3zrambl3z #ic #ooc #ask blog #regretevator unpleasant #regretevator ask blog #regretevator infected #unpleasant gradient

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twst-drabbles · 2 months

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Azul 26

Summary: Dinner with Azul was done. You have caught up with what he's been doing over the years, and now it's time for you to be off on your travels. You stop yourself to say one final thing, just so he knows.

(I'll be skipping around because I have scenes in the head and I don't want to write in chronological order. That and I have no clue what the meetings should be like. Brain is empty!)

Haa, alright, it's now or never. If you walk through that door now without saying a thing, you know you'll just leave without a trace once more.

So, you turn around. You can't allow yourself to be coward like this.

"Hey, Azul," you still had his attention, but you had to call to him again, just to focus yourself, "when I leave again, I'm not going to be coming back."

Your tongue almost added 'probably,' at the end, but you won't lie to him.

"Well, I can hardly blame you at all," Azul shook his head, a tired smile waning on his face, threatening to disappear, "stay here and abandon those you've risked so much to get back home to, or go back and let all this drift off into a gentle dream. The choices you've made, I know you to never go back on them."

You didn't move as Azul approached your side. You hate the thought of wavering in any capacity, so you kept your focus on Azul's face, even as it became harder to take in that gentle smile.

"…I won't be able to attend any of your parties, or diners, you know?" It took too much time for Malleus to even get his invitation to you. He was waiting every day by that mirror for ten odd years in hopes you'd respond. And it's a miracle that you did.

A fluke, probably, that it only took ten years. Who's to say it won't be more next time? Who's to say that Malleus will be able to reach you at all? Well, perhaps he'll be able to figure it out and get invitations and letters through in a shorter period of time. You'll still be late, no matter how fast they're sent, because you lived in a different time-axis than the people here.

This world is beautiful, as well as the world back home, but… you don't think you can stand the thought of coming back to world that will always forget you. Where, so many years pass by that your existence just… faded away while you're still alive and living.

Azul nodded, "A shame you won't be able to attend my funeral when it comes. I was planning on having some delectable snacks there too."

The lightness he treated the subject kept you calm, but you didn't like the way your stomach gained more weight at the thought. But, well, you suppose the thought of death and what comes afterward comes when you see the changes in the mirror, see the way the eyes start sinking just the slightest bit deeper, and the way your face gains more lines with time, and the annoying pains in places you didn't expect them to be.

"…yeah," you had to push the word out. You put your hands in your pockets, "Guess I'll miss that too. I'll miss a lot of things."

You missed too many things already, so what's a lot more? May as well not have come here at all if this was what's going to greet you.

A younger Azul probably would have bargained or negotiated his way into getting you to stay. He tried to do so the minute he found out the way home was one-way only. You didn't like it then, the way he was scrambling for something that'll entice you to stay just a few more minutes longer, until he reaches a far away milestone or until his name reaches the ears of those famous and lofty. But, as Azul said, you've always been one to stick with your decisions.

Like weeds, you make sure to get everything out before they dig deeper. Half-assing everything, with anything regarding your life, was simply something you could never do, especially not when you know yourself to leave things until the last minute if you allow yourself.

That's what a younger Azul was hoping for, almost begging for even.

But, not this one.

This Azul's hands were on his custom made cane, drumming his fingers on the hilt as he hummed a familiar tune and tapped with his good foot.

"…you know," may as well get it off your chest while you're here, "it's kind of unfair, for me at least. Everything is still so fresh in my mind," The younger faces, the weird little habits and childish antics, the word tics, "and I came here just to have a little fun, like back in college. But…"

But…

"But we're not the same as we once were," nothing about Azul's composure was lost. It was weird, seeing his smile capable of this type of experienced gentleness, originating from pain he has probably long since come to terms with. He held a hand out towards you, inviting you to take it, "While I can't say I'm a better version than the one you remember, I am different. And I will be different tomorrow and the days onward. If you don't intend to come back once you go home, then let us at least have some fun like you wanted to. Nothing wrong with making more memories, is there? Or do you intend to leave this older gentleman such as I alone on the dance floor?"

You stared at his hand, then his face, and let out an airy chuckle. "Alright, alright old man. Quit it with the Crowley-isms."

You walked past the curtains that gave you two all the privacy you needed, and pulled Azul into a dance you're familiar with. But, it seems he wasn't ready. Poor man stumbled into you.

This time, Azul had to laugh as his hat fell off. "Be careful with me, don't you know how delicate and soft I am? Leave a bruise on me and I'll demand compensation from you."

"With what money?" You barely brought anything.

"Not money, time. I'll demand another dance." Azul is still as cheeky as ever.

"Aren't you gonna pick up your hat?" You can see it getting kicked around by the more drunken folks around here.

"Leave it. It's doesn't matter when I'm having fun. Let the world see my graying hairs."

That's… you were not focused on that. Besides…

"Isn't your hair already gray?"

"Oh come on. Don't tell me you can't see the difference? Look, see? Right there."

And you couldn't. Because you both were still moving and twirling around. It's awkward.

"Azul, we're dancing. I can't really focus on it."

Then, Azul sighed. "I really do have to be more blunt with you, don't I? I'm asking you to touch my hair. So touch it. There won't be a fee, I promise. The feeling alone is it's own reward."

"Should've started off with that Azul."

#twst #twisted wonderland #twst-drabbles #twst-drabbles exclusive #drabble #octavinelle #azul #azul ashengrotto #years later au #reader insert

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tgmsunmontue · 3 months

Text

It's not who you know 4/4

YEAR 4 - Non-angsty Nepo!Baby Bradley and his years at the USNA and his head-in-the-sand approach to the nepotism and the fact that he ends up being known as the guy with the two hot dads instead... (TW: mention of cancer)

(Part 4 is 6.5k long - same length as the first 3 parts combined.)

YEAR FOUR - 2004 and 2005 - PART 4

YEAR FOUR – 2004 – Part 4

Surprising absolutely no-one Bradley chooses aviation as his warfare cruise option for his first class summer. Part of Tom wants to force him to try something different, to make Slider force Bradley to try something different, but he feels like it would be on par with telling a fish to stop swimming. Bradley belongs in the sky, even if Tom secretly thinks he should maybe have joined the Air Force with his considerable aversion to submarines. Natasha Trace has remained one of Bradley’s closest friends, making the same choice as him and going with aviation. They’re getting in and he’s there in an official capacity to greet the midshipmen.

Bradley has decided to share with her exactly who he and Pete are, which is going to be just as well considering Bradley invited her to stay for a couple of nights before flying out to her own family. Unfortunately he’s pretty sure he won’t have told her yet and they’re about to walk past him. Ah well, there’s nothing for it.

“Welcome back Midshipman Bradshaw. Midshipman Trace.”

“Thank you Admiral,” midshipman Trace replies instantly, she doesn’t show any sign of recognizing him, so he guesses Mav was right about the whole uniform and disguise thing. Although she could simply be more concerned about Bradley’s lack of response which forces him to hold back a smile as she elbows Bradley subtly in the side.

“Uh. Yeah. Thank you Admiral.”

Tom nods and moves on to welcoming back some of the other midshipmen, can’t wait to actually see Bradley at home and talk to him.

… … …

“Bradley… why does the new Vice Admiral know my name? Oh my god, what have I done?”

“Do I need to remind you that our names are on our uniforms?”

“How do you score so highly in observational skills? He approached us from the side, the angle was all wrong. I don’t know if it’s a good thing or bad thing. Although, did he look familiar to you? I feel like I’ve seen him before, or maybe I’m just remembering it from the Navy News. Okay, I’m freaking out a little…”

“Yeah. You’re rambling. It’s okay. Uh. Okay, so I have something to tell you. And it’s totally going to make you annoyed, but I’m hoping you’ll understand why I haven’t shared it with anyone. And I mean anyone.”

“What?”

“My dads… have you heard of Peter Mitchell, callsign Maverick?”

Bradley can’t help flinch at the look she gives him.

“Yes Bradley, we just had to learn about him, or had you forgotten already? I mean, you didn’t seem to be paying much attention in class,” Natasha says, her tone just as scathing as her expression and he rolls his shoulders; preparing himself mentally for her . He’s grown up just knowing so much already by dint of who raised him that there are definitely times in class when he zones out.

“I didn’t need to pay attention. Maverick is my dad. Well. This is where it kind of gets complicated. My dad was Lieutenant Nicholas Bradshaw, and he flew with Maverick. But he died in 1986 in a training accident. Maverick helped my mom raise me, until she died. Then it was Maverick and his partner…”

“I’ve met you dad. Peter Bradshaw. You trying to tell me that guy is actually Peter Mitchell?”

“Yeah. He thinks he’s hilarious. Just think, they haven’t shown us any photos of what Peter Mitchell looks like.”

“What, all the tutors are in on this conspiracy theory? I mean… are you okay?” Her tone is suddenly serious, like she’s actually worried about him and he feels a welling up of hysterical laughter. Of course the first time he tries to tell someone the truth they doubt him. Of course.

“Peter Mitchell is my dad –”

“But he came with your other dad… Tom… Mitchell. Wait…” her eyes are flickering around the port and he knows she’s piecing everything together now. “Oh shit. That was Vice Admiral Tom Kazansky, who looks familiar because he’s your other dad. Fucking hell.”

He breaths a sigh of relief, glad she’s suddenly gone from thinking him slightly unhinged to acceptance. Now he just has to wait for the anger.

“Yeah. And I don’t particularly want to have everyone thinking I have it easy because of them.”

“Bradley, you work harder and longer than anyone else in our year.”

“Exactly. And I want them to remember that because when they do find out who it is I’m associated with I want them to know I am a hard worker and worthy of respect because I’m me, because I earnt it, not because of Mav and Ice.”

“Wow. You don’t have a chip on your shoulder or anything do you?”

“Wouldn’t you?”

“Army brat, I get you plenty. Huh. Yeah okay. I get it. Damn. A Captain and an Admiral. I really want to be angry but I think I’d have done the same thing. I mean, I didn’t go into the army because I didn’t want to be linked to my family…”

“Thanks. I didn’t like keeping it from you, once we became friends.”

“Wait… so how many people know?”

“Well, I grew up with Mav and Ice. And a lot of their buddies I call uncle.”

“Like who?”

“Uh… Uncle Slider.”

“Admiral Kerner? You call him Uncle Slider?”

“Obviously not when I’m at Annapolis! But yeah, I grew up calling him Uncle Sli. And there’s pretty much any aviator that’s flown with Mav or Ice know all about me. I’m their kid. I spent a few weeks at Annapolis every summer before Plebe Summer helping things get organized. Most of the people there know me pretty well. Have seen me grow up.”

“Holy shit. It is like a massive conspiracy theory! So what, they’re all pretending that they don’t know who you are?”

“No, I just asked them to treat me like any other midshipman. And they’re pretending they don’t know who my parents are, and that means no one else finds out. Unless I tell them.”

“Well, it explains some of your weirder habits I guess. You know, I can’t decide if he looks better in leather or in uniform. Uniform never did anything for me, but I’m maybe seeing the appeal.”

“Oh my god, please do not tell either of my dad’s you think they’re hot okay?”

“They probably know already. Anyway, you owe me one.”

Bradley groans. He guesses he does.

… … …

“It’s so good to see you, welcome home.”

Bradley accepts the crushing hug with a smile, grins at Natasha over Ice’s shoulder, because these are just his dads. The ones that have been doing stupid shit to visit him incognito while he’s at USNA.

… … …

“Oh no, I had no idea who you were until this afternoon. Bradley’s known to all the others as the guy with the hot dads.”

“The what?” Tom asks, glad he didn’t have a mouthful of beer, because Pete is having to clean himself up.

“None of the midshipmen have any idea that Bradley is anything other than one of them. I wouldn’t have believed it except for the fact that I’m sitting here with you.”

“She’s failing to mention she started calling you my hot dads,” Bradley mutters.

Mav cackles and Tom hides his smile by taking a sip of his drink.

… … …

Bradley is studying in the rec room when he hears his name called out. Looks up to find an underclassman looking nervous. He doesn’t blame him, it’s only a couple of weeks in and he’s in his first year, he recognizes him from Plebe Summer.

“Sorry to interrupt you Bradshaw. Just, uh, Admiral Kerner would like to talk to you. As a matter of urgency. He’s on the phone with someone and yelled for someone to come and get you straight away…”

He drops everything, doesn’t bother packing up, just starts running. He doesn’t know what has happened, but his mind has immediately jumped to bad news bad news bad news. Nothing else would have Slider yelling for someone to get him. He doesn’t know if it’s Mav or Ice and he has no idea which would be worse. He takes the stairs up two at a time, runs through the open office door and the look on Slider��s face confirms it for him that it is indeed bad news.

“Take a seat son,” Slider instructs, and he’s so used to following orders he just drops into the chair, eyes not leaving the older man’s face. His stomach is somewhere near his knees and is somehow churning away, he thinks he might be sick. Everything he’s done, and this is what is going to make him throw up.

“It’s Ice. He’s collapsed. Mav is somewhere in the Middle East. You need to get to San Diego. I’ve organized a lift.”

“Oh fuck. Do we know what happened?”

“They’re probably doing tests. But I think he’d appreciate having you there when he wakes up. I can get you there.”

Bradley accepts that, this is special treatment for Ice. They can’t pull Mav out from whatever active duty deployment he’s currently on, but Bradley is… available. He feels a flash of anxiety over his studies and place in the USNA but it’s immediately overwhelmed by guilt, because none of that is more important than Ice right now. He’ll figure something out.

… … …

Cancer.

… … …

Fuck.

… … …

His entire body goes cold as he thinks about his mom and he sucks in a deep breath.

… … …

“We think we’ve got it all. We’re going to do a few more biopsies to be sure. He’s going to need some chemo so we installed a port while he was under.”

… … …

He recognizes the language, doesn’t understand everything that they’re saying but he remembers the feeling. Wishes that Mav was here.

… … …

“We’re not sure yet of the extent of spread, but we’re hopeful.”

… … …

Then Mav is there, arms wrapped around him and he feels like a kid again, but also somehow stronger knowing he’s not going through this alone anymore.

… … …

“Bradley. You’re being offered a deferral. A leave of the remaining year and the opportunity to return next year and finish. It’s a family emergency. This isn’t special treatment.”

“Sure feels like it.”

“You deserve good things too kid. But if it would make you feel better I can give you a list of midshipmen we’ve made similar arrangements for in the last decade or so.”

“No, it’s fine. Thank you sir. Just a lot to get a handle of right now.”

“Which is why you’re deferring. You take care of that grumpy bastard for us. And the crazy one too, he’s not going to handle this well. Think we’ve already discussed how you’re probably the most reasonable out of the three of you.”

“That’s not saying much sir.”

“Well, I didn’t exactly mean it as a compliment. You take care okay, I’ll see you back here soon enough.”

“Thank you sir.”

… … …

Jake notices his disappearance. Of course he does. He was his favorite upperclassman and he seemed to be friends with absolutely everyone, including the tutors. Even the brass seemed to be a little extra indulgent of him and he doesn’t know if he’s imagining the campus being quieter, but it feels that way. He tries asking and it’s not quite like getting stone-walled, but all he finds out is that it’s a family thing. At least he knows he hasn’t dropped out. Because that would be a shame.

… … …

His time becomes somewhat disjointed, in between driving Ice back and forth to chemo appointments, he’s permitted to sit in on particular classes at North Island. He trains with men and women much older than him, experienced commissioned officers, those who know he’s had his final year at USNA disrupted and exactly who has raised him. There is nothing but respect from them, that he has put helping Ice above his naval career.

He hadn’t intended on getting a regular hookup, but he doesn’t turn it down. The guy, Matthew, is about five years older than him, patient and funny and Bradley takes it for the opportunity it is, to learn what he likes in regard to sex without the time pressure or fear of being found out. Matthew’s not Navy, so he doesn’t care about who Mav and Ice are, is easy going and isn’t intimidated by anything that Bradley can tell. Their hooking up has an end-date, Bradley knowing he’s going to be returning to USNA and Matthew already having post-doctoral plans in Australia at the end of his degree. Neither of them are interested in long distance so Bradley let’s himself have this.

He gets to go and watch Natasha graduate. Not only her but his entire original intake. He allows himself to feel disappointed for a few minutes that he’s not taking part, but he doesn’t regret his decision to be there for Ice. Everyone he speaks to he finds the same support, everyone agreeing that his decision to put his studies on hold was the right one. It makes him feel a little guilty that he doesn’t mention that he’s still been able to do some of his study in San Diego, that his physical training hasn’t been impacted in the slightest given that he’s been training at North Island. How in some areas he’s definitely now light years ahead of what they’ll cover at the USNA.

… … …

“Bradshaw!”

“Oh. Hey, Seresin right?” Bradley asks, because he can be smooth, pretend he doesn’t know exactly who Jake Seresin is.

“Yeah. You’re here…”

“Yeah. Just wanted to see everyone graduate. Had to take a break this year. Family thing. They let me defer my final year. I’ll be back next year though. I still managed some classes as I was pretty close to North Island and SDU were pretty accommodating as well,” Bradley says, and he realizes he’s rambling but can’t help it. Apparently being smooth was a pipe dream abruptly evaporated into mist. The guy was good looking before, but now another year of growing has filled him out, broadened his shoulders.

“Well, you’re like one of the best they have right? Want to make it easy for you to come back.”

“Uh… I guess,” Bradley mumbles, and he’s pretty sure he’s now blushing. What the hell?

“So where is home for you Bradshaw?”

“San Diego. Why?”

“Was just thinking of maybe taking a little vacation before returning next year.”

“What, you want a tour guide?”

“Something like that…”

Seresin quirks an eyebrow and Bradley knows his shock is showing on his face. He realizes with him deferring Seresin is now only a year below him, that next year they’ll both be upperclassmen, still different years but not the two it was… He’s going to have to ask Ice for clarification because he sure as hell doesn’t need to be called in, not after already getting a warning for baseless accusations about non-existent fraternization.

“Uh… sure. Here, let me give you my number.”

… … …

YEAR FOUR take 2 – 2005 – Part 4

He doesn’t know what deity has decided to smile down on him, but Mav is taking Ice away for a romantic weekend to celebrate the cancer going into remission and it just so happens to be the weekend that Jake is coming to San Diego. He knows they won’t have any issue with him having a guy over, they were fine with Matthew. However Bradley doesn’t want Jake seeing photos of Ice and Mav and himself scattered around the place so he moves around, slides photos into drawers, or places them face down on their bed and closes the door to their bedroom. Leaves a few of his younger self around, doesn’t want to make it look like it isn’t his place. He does pull out the photo that Slider took when Ice and Mav had visited him and puts it on the bookshelf. If Jake somehow recognizes Ice then he’ll deal with it. Hopefully he’ll be otherwise occupied to pay attention to the photos anyway.

… … …

Jake tries to convince himself he’s not nervous, but he definitely isn’t quite as calm and collected as he hopes he looks as he knocks on the door to a nice-looking house in some suburb.

Bradley Bradshaw’s house.

Or at least the address he gave him.

To come and stay for two nights.

Bradley opens the door and he’s just as perfect as Jake remembers him. He’s never wanted someone as much and for as long as he’s wanted Bradley Bradshaw. Been drawn to him since he first saw him and now, now, he might get what he’s been waiting for.

“Hey.”

“Hey. Come in.”

He glances around, no one else seems to be here and he wonders. He drops his bag and takes off his shoes.

“Parents away?” There’s no way Bradley owns this place.

“Yeah. Celebrating cancer remission.”

“Ah…” Family thing his brain supplies. “Would they be okay with me being here?”

“Yeah, I had a, uh, boyfriend and he was here all the time. They were fine with it. Come on…”

Bradley makes a gesture with his head, encouraging Jake to follow him and he does, moving through to the kitchen. Jake’s brain is catching on the boyfriend, boyfriend, boyfriend and wondering if that’s maybe a position that’s taking applications. He hadn’t considered that and now feels like an idiot for not thinking about it. It’s a traditional time to eat, but he really hopes that there are other things on offer. He doesn’t know how to broach it though, isn’t exactly used to this part.

“You want a drink?”

“No thanks, maybe later…”

The smile is slow, Bradley’s eyes darkening and he steps into Jake’s space and he resists arching into his body. Boyfriend applications of not, he’ll definitely take sex.

“Am I reading this right?”

“Yeah.”

Then it’s a mess of fingers pulling at clothes, lips sliding against his, stubble scraping across his ear and neck, his body being directed to what is clearly a bedroom. Then it’s naked skin, heat, lips again but around his cock, warm hard body pressing against him, firm flesh yielding. All his systems are in overdrive, so many sensations and he never wants it to end and also wants to come so desperately both in equal measure.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, so okay…”

“Fuck you’re pretty…”

“Please…”

He doesn’t have to resort to begging, lets himself be fucked open at the slowest fucking pace and he pushes back, needing it just that little bit faster. Deeper. Harder. A firm hand on his hip stops him and he lets out a little dismayed gasp.

“Nice and slow okay?”

No, not okay Jake thinks, his body almost shaking from the intensity, but then he’s being pulled a little and Bradley is finally fully pressed inside, grinding little circles and he slumps, lets out a whine he’s not sure is from desperation, pleasure or frustration. The pace doesn’t increase and Jake realizes he’s just along for the ride, Bradley fucking him long, hard and slow, so achingly slow it’s almost a tease except for the way it just seems to be ratchetting him tighter and tighter. It morphs into a repeated cadence of their bodies moving together and Jake wasn’t expecting it to be like this.

He thought hard and fast, rushed and desperate feeling, how he’s felt nearly every time he’s seen Bradley Bradshaw cross his line of sight. The only thing that remains is the desperate building need to come, the fact that he feels like he should have already come over fifteen, twenty maybe even thirty minutes ago. He has no idea. Just feels like it’s fucking typical that Bradley is good at sex as well as everything else he tries his hand at. Hands that are touching everywhere, his body covering Jake’s, hand encircling his cock to encourage it along but never enough to get him off.

“God you feel good… look so good,” Bradley says, sounding gratifyingly breathless.

“Am good…” Jake mutters, not wanting him to have any reason to stop, is starting to wonder if he’ll be allowed to come, if maybe this is some type of sadistic pleasure on Bradley’s part.

“Yeah you are… fuck.”

The fingers digging into his hip are bruising and Bradley’s body is shaking and Jake is pretty sure he’s coming, and he makes a little sound of displeasure. At least he hopes that’s what it sounds like to Bradley, because he wants to fucking come. Then Bradley is pulling out and Jake definitely grunts his annoyance now, but there is a soothing hand on his back, lips at his ear, rustling sound of something he doesn’t care about.

“Shh shh shh… roll over.”

He moves, body feeling heavy and leaden, Bradley kisses him, mouth hot. His cock is encircled in warm slippery fingers and he pushes up into it, chasing the pressure which is finally finally closer to what he wants. Needs. He spreads his legs further and then there are fingers sliding back into him, then a mouth around his cock and the sudden combination has him coming immediately, no time for a warning, no breath to give one anyway. He didn’t know orgasms came in this size, shape or form. He's been on the edge for too long and now he’s

falling

from the height that he was raised to. He knew, hoped, it would be good. The level of good has been exceeded, blown apart and he needs to look up some new adjectives.

“Fucking hell…”

All he hears in response is some humming and more rustling, then the sound of someone drinking water and he reaches out with weak grabby hands, none os his muscles seeming to want to cooperate. Water would be great right now, but he can barely move. Fortunately the bottle is placed in his hands and he forces himself up to a semi-sitting position so he can take a deep drink.

“I need to brush my teeth, lube is gross. Didn’t think that through at all.”

Jake pulls a face, because he hadn’t even thought about it, had been far too busy enjoying it.

“I appreciate your dedication to the job…”

“Thought you would,” Bradley smirks. “I’ll grab your bag as well.”

“Thanks.”

… … …

He pulls on clean underwear and he’s glad there’s already the expectation that Jake is staying. Doesn’t want to have the awkward post-hook up conversation, because while he hasn’t had to have one of those in a while it doesn’t erase the remembered awkwardness at all. Definitely an unexpected perk of a regular hookup. He brushes his teeth as he walks around, re-enters his bedroom and drops Jake’s bag on his bed, goes back to the bathroom; glad he has a task to do because yeah, still feels a little awkward.

He goes back to his bedroom and Jake hasn’t moved much, looks pretty fucked-out and Bradley likes the look on him. He is really fucking pretty, and fucking makes him prettier. He stalks over, shoves the untouched bag onto the floor and crawls up his body.

“Did I tire you out?”

“Fuck off. No. Just. More intense than I thought it would be.”

“Good intense? Wait, that wasn’t, like, your first time or anything was it?” Bradley asks, running his fingers absently over Jake’s body.

“No. Would have been pretty shitty if I hadn’t told you that. Just… I’m not the one here who has had a boyfriend…”

“Uh, I mean I haven’t really either… I mean, I guess he was. But we didn’t go on dates or anything. And he’s in Australia now, we started hooking up and then realized we were both intending to be leaving San Diego about a month apart and it was just… convenient.”

“Still plenty more, uh, experience than me.”

“Oh yeah, that’s fair. God. Too fucking exhausted to worry about getting laid my first year and too busy the second and third…”

“You’ve never hooked up with anyone at Annapolis?” Jake sounds surprised and Bradley shakes his head, because he meant every word about being exhausted and too busy. Plus he hadn’t needed anything getting back to Mav and Ice, because it would have. Case in point, Natasha.

“Nope. Not worth the risk. Already been pulled into the Admiral’s office just on the whisper of rumor I was sleeping with Natasha.”

“You weren’t?”

“No. She’s like… a sister. And I’m gay.”

“And what about now?”

“Uh… I’m still gay.”

“No,” Jake rolls his eyes, shoves at his shoulder. “Worth the risk?”

Oh.

Jake’s looking at him, expression split between nervous and hopeful and fuck, he’s maybe made an error of judgement.

“I’m, uh, not looking for a boyfriend or anything…”

“And how about a regular thing?”

“With you? At boat school?”

Jake shrugs, looking more unsure and Bradley suddenly wants. Previously he’d ruled it out, wanting to focus on being the best. Getting through and not having time to figure out who might be interested, but to already have someone makes things simpler… There’s still the risk of getting caught, but they’ll both be upperclassmen with more liberty leave and he’s not an idiot, he knows there are places and that some of the others definitely have sex on the regular.

“I wouldn’t be averse…”

“And what about the end of the year? When you graduate?”

“I guess we have this discussion again…”

… … …

Jake resists the idea of actual sightseeing, wants to spend every second in bed, but Bradley insists on dragging him out to the zoo and a quick afternoon tour. For all his talk about them just hooking up the whole thing has a very date-like quality to it and Jake leans into it, lets Bradley lick ice-cream from his lips, pull him by the hand to his favorite exhibits in the zoo and not pointing out that he never lets go. He’s pretty sure it’s the best weekend he’s ever had.

… … …

He’s had a weird hypothetical conversation with Ice, probably one of the most awkward ones they’ve ever had. How and where to have sex at Annapolis, and not get caught. He’s reassured that as he’s currently non-commissioned there isn’t a matter of inappropriate misuse of rank, no fraternization he can actually get in trouble for. But his reputation is a different form of currency and he needs to be careful. He really does have to weigh up the risk and benefit but he’s also just spent the last year watching Ice battle cancer and he’s maybe thinking that a little risk in order to live his life to the full is okay.

… … …

It’s different being back, bunking in with a different crowd of guys, a sharp contrast to the sheer amount of freedom he’s had in the last year but also comforting in its familiarity.

“Holy shit Bradshaw, you look nothing like your dads…”

“Uh. They’re not related to me.”

“They adopted him.”

“Aw, like a puppy from the pound…”

“Sure…” Bradley agrees, knows he’s fighting a losing battle, glad that no one has recognized Ice from the photo, but also the knowledge that he has two dads is simply common knowledge and he’s grateful that it’s likely weeded the worst of the assholes from wanting to interact with him. He isn’t close with any of them like he was with Natasha in his year, but he does know many of them, the sheer amount of time they have to spend together resulting in enforced comradery.

… … …

“We’ve got liberty leave.”

“We do.”

“Want to catch a movie together?”

“Sure.”

… … …

“You couldn’t wait until this weekend?”

“No. God. Do you have any idea how fucking hot you look?”

“No, I could do with hearing it again…”

… … …

“Gentlemen.”

Fuck.

“Admiral Kerner sir.”

“Would you like to explain to me what’s going on here?”

“Uh…”

“Wrestling sir. Playfighting.”

Admiral Kerner closes his eyes, scrunches up his face and he looks like he’s almost in pain and Jake hopes he’s not going to have a heart attack. He glances at Bradley quickly, but holy shit he looks calm as anything, completely unperturbed by the fact that they’ve just been interrupted by a fucking Admiral. He thinks he might be sick.

“Right. Okay. Well then can I suggest you use the gym where there are appropriate mats for wrestling. Or other such venues in the city when you’re on liberty leave.”

“Thank you for that advice sir.”

“You’re welcome Midshipman Brad - shaw. And your name?”

“Uh, Seresin sir.”

“Noted. You’re excused gentlemen.”

Jake has never walked away so relieved in his life.

… … …

“Hey Ice, what’s Uncle Slider’s favorite drink?”

“Why?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“Am I going to hear about it anyway?”

“Can you just tell me what he likes to drink? I can buy it myself now.”

“Tell me what happened and I’ll buy him the best… And if he deserves the best then you can’t afford it.”

Bradley groans.

“He, uh, maybe walked in on me in a compromising position.”

“With… who?”

“Uh, just a guy.”

“This the hypothetical guy you may or may not think is scorching hot? The same one you had over the weekend we went away? The totally hypothetical one?”

“Maybe?”

“You sound exactly like Mav when you say that word. What’s his name?”

“Can I take a pass on that?”

�� “Nope. I can just ask Slider. Make it even worse for you.”

“Ugh. Fine. Jake Seresin. He’s a year below me.”

“Okay. I’ll send Sli a case of port and sign it with my name. You’d get in trouble for trying to bribe a superior officer. He’ll know why though.”

“Thanks Ice.”

“Trust me, I’ve gotten Mav out of far worse.”

… … …

“Your dads aren’t coming to graduation? What the fuck?”

“It’s fine, it’s okay. I knew this was always a possibility…”

“Oh, I guess with him being sick.”

“Yeah, of course. Difficult to travel and stuff like that.”

He wants to meet Bradley’s parents, feels like it’s the step to somehow shoving what they have into something more, at least in Bradley’s eyes.

“They might surprise me. They’ve done it before.”

For some reason Bradley doesn’t look thrilled at the idea.

… … …

His graduation day is coming and even a year delayed he can’t help but feel immensely proud. His final year has been easier academically with having the classes split over two years. It’s enabled him to help his peers and help run a couple of the social clubs. And of course, he’s been sneaking around and secretly having sex with Jake. Noone seems to have realized that they’re hooking up, and he guesses it because he hangs out with lots of different groups and people in equal measure, and Jake is in some of those groups as well. He’s even had a couple of guys make a pass at him, which he’s simply deflected and declined. Politely.

He’s been thinking about maybe telling Jake, but it’s only been a year and he didn’t tell Natasha for three. However he knows Ice and Mav are going to be at his graduation somehow, but he isn’t sure in what capacity and they refuse to tell him. Even Uncle Slider won’t give him a hint, other than confirm that they are both going to be there. He has no idea whether they’re going to pull off the ridiculous disguises again, or attend the formal ceremony in full dress uniform. Rather than be annoyed or worried he wants them there. Desperately wants them there now, knowing that one day they might not be and if there is any silver lining to Ice’s cancer it has to be that.

… … …

“We’re going to miss you. It’s been a pleasure to have you at the USNA Midshipman Bradshaw. I look forward to watching your career with the US Navy.”

“Thank you Admiral Kerner. For everything.”

“You still have your heart set on flight school?”

“Yes sir.”

“Well, you’ve got a recommendation from me. You’ve been an exemplary young man, and I’m saying that not because of your history, but despite it. You could have come in here and coasted. Expected favors from your peers and greased wheels. Instead you’ve kept a very low profile, for the most part. I think some of the others have even forgotten who you’re actually related to…”

“Not you though sir.”

“No, not me. Of course receiving a case of port helps me both remember and forget certain things.”

“Please do sir, sorry about that.”

“I was young once too.”

Fuck. He’s never going to be allowed to forget that.

… … …

“Bradley!”

“Holy shit! Natasha!”

They hug for a few seconds before remembering exactly where they are and stand back, grinning wildly at each other, straightening their uniforms.

“How the hell did you get the leave?”

“I have friends in high places and am not afraid to use them…”

“Bullshit.”

“Nope. I asked whether it was maybe possible and got the response that I’d make a pretty easy graduation gift all things considered.”

“Have you seen them? Do you know what they’re wearing?”

“Have they not told you?”

“No!”

“Oh this is going to be great! Stay here.”

He doesn’t even have to wait, simply turns to where she’s stalked off to and he can see Ice walking toward him, greeting and congratulating others as he walk. It’s not direct, but close enough. The crowds parting in front of him and he realizes then that Mav’s coming up behind him, following in his wake and also dressed in his full dress whites. He wants to hug them. Desperately wants to hug them both. However it’s not permitted in uniform, although he knows many of the brass look the other way on days like today, there is still no reason for him to be hugging an Admiral or a Captain.

“Captain Mitchell, Vice Admiral Kazansky, my best friend Bradley Bradshaw.”

“Nice to meet you,” Bradley says, and it feels ridiculous. Mav is grinning, clearly amused and it isn’t helping him keep a straight face.

“Nice to meet you too Midshipman Bradshaw, your parents must be very proud of you.”

“I’d like to think so sir.”

“Know so. They’re definitely proud. All of them.”

“Thank you sir,” Bradley says, swallowing against the tightness in his throat.

“How about I take a photo? Bradley’s a massive fan of yours Admiral,” Natasha says, clearly amused but he can tell she wants to somehow capture this day for them.

“It’s true, big fan of both of you. I’d really love a photo with you. Please.”

“Of course. Anything for a fan,” Mav says, grinning and Bradley catches Ice’s roll of the eyes.

“I’m just going to take a dozen or so, new digital camera so we can delete the bad ones.”

Bradley poses , smiles slightly and lets Natasha take photos until she seems satisfied.

“Uh, Captain Mitchell, I was wondering if I could also get a photo with you sir?”

“Of course,” Mav agrees, and another Midshipman in his year is getting his photo taken with Mav, and then with Ice.

“Oh, would you mind if I got a photo as well?” Another asks, and Bradley starts backing away, can see people starting to take notice of exactly who they might be and why people might want photos with them.

“Uh, sure…”

There’s a fucking queue forming and Bradley exchanges a look with both Mav and Ice, because this is what they’ve avoided all those other times they’ve visited but he wouldn’t change things.

… … …

Jake freezes, because he’d know that profile anywhere. As he turns he knows for certain that it’s Vice Admiral Kazansky. And okay, he may have done a report on him when he was in high school, made up a whole bunch of shit about admiring him, when he really thought he was hot as fuck. He could multitask and think he was a great pilot and jerk off to photos of him while also wanting to be like him. He watches as he turns again, head lowering slightly to hear whatever the shorter man, a Captain, at his side is saying and the pair of them together look familiar from somewhere, but he can’t place it. People seem to be lining up to take photos with him, and he wishes he had a camera. The man is still damned attractive.

“Uh, hi Jake.”

“Bradshaw.”

“Oh, are we doing last names?”

“Well, you’ve been kind of avoiding me the last couple of weeks so I thought maybe it was your way of not having that conversation we were due to be having…”

Bradley winces and Jake feels a flash of justified annoyance. He’s well aware he’s fallen in love, is aware that Bradley maybe hasn’t and he’d worked at trying to be okay with it. Hoped that at least Bradley would talk to him rather than effectively disappear on him for nearly two weeks.

“So, I’ve been trying to figure something out and you’re kind of distracting.”

“Don’t flatter me to make me stop being annoyed. Just tell me what you’ve decided…”

“Well, uh, I was wondering if you wanted to meet my dads?”

“Did they make it after all?” Jake asks, and yeah, he’s annoyed with Bradley but he’s also excited for him. He clearly has a good relationship with his dads and was disappointed or worried about them making his graduation. “Wait. You want to introduce me to them?”

“Yeah. I’ve been wanting to tell you, but until I saw them just now I didn’t know how and well… I want you to meet them.”

He frowns at the slightly weird turn of phrase but he guesses Bradley is nervous, which is actually fucking adorable considering how confident and sure he is nearly all of the time. Make a nice change.

“I’d love to meet them.”

“Come on…”

He follows Bradley, a little confused that they reach the edge of a small gathering and then simply wait; people are still taking photos with the Admiral and he wonders if Bradley is wanting a photo first. Then the Captain is excusing himself and heading toward them, the smile on his face wide and Jake swallows, suddenly nervous.

“Jake, this is Pete Mitchell. Captain Peter Mitchell. My dad.”

“Nice to meet you sir.”

“And you Jake,” Captain Mitchell says, shaking Jake’s proffered hand.

Then the Admiral is there, clearly having followed the Captain and Jake looks at the two of them, standing either side of Bradley and his mind flashes to a similar image, a bedside photo in a frame, where the clothes are very very different. Oh fuck.

“And this is my other dad, Admiral Tom Kazansky.”

“Oh fuck…”

Captain Mitchell lets out a loud bark of laughter and Bradley looks resigned while Admiral Kazansky has a tiny smile on his face, obviously quietly amused.

“And this is Jake Seresin. My boyfriend…”

Yeah.

He’ll take that title.

THE END

#Nepo!Baby Bradley Bradshaw #Top Gun Maverick #AU where Bradley goes to USNA #Hangster #it's not who you know

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cellarspider · 2 months

Text

13/?? Science interlude!

(Previous) | (Index) | (Next)

⛬

We return to Prometheus, where I am taking a break to ramble about my job. A thing that I love. It will be a nice change. Also: weird blood!

I have been informed that some methods of accessing tumblr do not play well with long alt text rambles. To keep the flow between the main text and alt text separate, I’ll be copying the longest ones below the main text and citations. Captions that I think are going to be long enough to need this treatment will be marked with “Overflow Ramble [number]”, so they’ll be slightly easier to find. It’s not a perfect system, but Tumblr is not a perfect website.

And I am going to need the overflow space this time, because we’re getting into genetics!

After electrocuting a decapitated alien head until it exploded into a shower of green gore, the creatures that claim to be scientists stuck a bit of the goop in some sort of very science-y DNA machine, leading to this:

“Let's have a look at its DNA. Isolate the strand. Okay. Compare it to the gene sample?”

“[Overlay… Processing… Processing… DNA MATCH.]”

“Oh, my God. It's us.”

I want this preserved for posterity, because this made me absolutely hoot. They avoided fake science technobabble by going so far in the other direction that it becomes equally meaningless.

What the scene is trying to say is “this alien shares the vast majority of its genetic material with humans, indicating that they are in fact related.”

I will get to how one would actually determine that, but first: The head turned into green goop. Green goop. Humans are notably not prone to turning into green goop. Otherwise Nickelodeon would’ve probably been shut down within a week.

(Image credit: Rich Fury/KCA2021/Getty Images for Nickelodeon)

This annoyed me so much that years later, I dug up a possible explanation that backfills this with cool biology.

Humans, and almost all vertebrates have hemoglobin-filled blood. And on a tangent that I must follow: The only vertebrate that doesn’t is the icefish Channichthyidae family, commonly known as the white-blooded fish.

You’ll never guess what’s special about them.

Yes, somehow these fish manage to live without hemoglobin, their blood only having 10% of the oxygen carrying capacity of their red-blooded cousins. Hell, most of them also lack myoglobin, which stores oxygen in muscle. The loss of myoglobin isn’t just a one-off event either, genetic studies have shown that these icefish have seen four distinct branches of their family tree lose myoglobin independently of each other. They have a wild series of adaptations to permit this, but basically they were already in such cold-oxygen rich water and moving so slow that they didn’t need all that extra oxygen-having stuff. They lost it, kept going, got bigger hearts, weirder muscles, and just kept going. They’ve actually expanded their range in the past 30 million years or so!

I love them! Evolution is wild. You know what’s also wild? There’s green-blooded vertebrates. Yes. You read that right. Yes, they still have hemoglobin. What they also have are staggering levels of biliverdin, which human bodies only produce when breaking down hemoglobin–when a bruise takes on a greenish hue, it’s because the dismantling of the blood under your skin has created biliverdin. While it’s generally been thought of as just a breakdown product, some research suggests that it also has protective effects against a number of diseases. In moderation, though. If you have enough of it to actually turn a bit green, you’ve got jaundice, which is not a thing you want to have.

But for a number of fish species, bush frogs, and skinks, they have way more biliverdin.

(Austin, C. C., & Jessing, K. W. (1994). Green-blood pigmentation in lizards. Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology Part A: Physiology, 109(3), 619-626.)

Humans usually don’t have much circulating biliverdin at all, so the table above compares someone with untreated jaundice to a number of other species–fish with two to fourteen times that amount, and the green-blooded skinks have twenty-two times as much! These creatures have green blood and turquoise-colored bones, and we still don’t know why. Maybe it’s protection against diseases, maybe it’s protection against parasites like malaria, maybe it’s to make them really blend in with foliage. Could be all of those at once, could be none of them, we don’t know! What we do know is that, as with the icefish, the green-blooded skinks in particular have independently evolved this feature four different times. (Rodriguez, Z. B., Perkins, S. L., & Austin, C. C. (2018). Multiple origins of green blood in New Guinea lizards. Science Advances, 4(5), eaao5017.)

(https://australian.museum/blog-archive/amri-news/amri-three-tiny-green-blooded-frogs-sing-like-birds/)

(https://web.archive.org/web/20180619143048/https://blog.nationalgeographic.org/2013/09/30/why-do-mysterious-lizards-have-green-blood/)

We have no mammals identified with biliverdin-filled green blood, you would need a lot of tweaks to how our bodies function to make this work. But it’s not literally impossible, like I thought in the theater! I’m quite sure the prop department didn’t do this level of research on the subject, but think about it!

I love biology! It’s! So! Weird!

And because I love biology, you’re not getting rid of me yet. My chosen field is genetics. This movie has presented me with a laughable sci-fi depiction of what we do.

So! What do we actually do, when we want to find out how related we are to another species?

I’m going to get into excruciating detail, so here’s the top-line summary: We extract the DNA, mash it up into readable little chunks, use some wicked cool machines to do the actual reading, and then we compare the target DNA with our DNA, and do some cooler stuff the movie isn’t aware of. A competent analysis would not only be able to tell you how much overlap two genomes have, but also be able to estimate how long the two species have been genetically distinct.

Is this way more than the movie needed for this plot point? Yes. But they didn’t actually have to do this at all, they could’ve just said the truth that science fiction usually ignores for budgetary reasons: “there’s no way these beings independently evolved to look so much like us, we have to be related.”

(Although even Star Trek, despite being the classic example of “putting a rubber thing on an actor’s forehead to make them an alien”, actually does acknowledge this. Precisely once. TNG s6e20, “The Chase”. It has never been mentioned again in the main line series, possibly because Rick Berman didn’t like it.)

Now. Time for me to take you all on a grand tour of DNA sequencing and phylogenetic analysis. You are all getting into the Willy Wonka boat with me. You have no choice.

So! You have a sample you’ve taken from a non-human mammal, one that’s never been genetically analyzed before. You are very lucky. You get to do fun stuff.

But before you get to sequencing, you have to purify any DNA in the sample. Your sample is full of all sorts of other biochemical gunk, and when cells are happy, DNA is packed away in the nucleus–you need to crack those open to get at the DNA.

Next, you need to break the DNA into chunks, that’s #1 on the diagram above. For most of the past twenty years, this has meant chunking DNA down into pieces 25-50 letters long–just enough to probably get something unique over most of the genome, though you will have some areas that look identical at that tiny scale. In recent times, we’ve been getting better and better at what’s called “long read sequencing”, which at this point means fragments of several thousand DNA letters in length–though that’s still pretty short, compared to human chromosomes though: the average length of a human chromosome is 134 million letters long.

Depending on the sequencing technology and its needs, the sample may also need “amplification”: getting copied over and over using a protein originally harvested from hotspring-loving bacteria (#2). I always love that bit just as a concept: it’s one of many places where the modern study of genetics uses the microscopic, biological machinery of proteins for our own use!

After everything’s prepared, Then the sequencing itself can occur. That too is wild–the most common versions these days use tiny little fluorescent proteins to tag each letter of the DNA and read the sequence of lights (#3!). Some use infinitesimally tiny electrical modulations as DNA passes by a microscopic reader. There’s loads of different ways, anything works, so long as it can be read by a computer.

All this takes place in machines that are either small enough to fit on a countertop, or big enough to look like a fridge, and come in Apple White or Cheap Plastic Appliance.

Because you have a new species, you’re building what we call a reference genome. This tries to capture as much of the entire genome sequence as possible. Here’s an interesting wrinkle, though–A lot of samples won’t be just DNA from your target species! You might be picking up microbial DNA along the way as well. That can be really interesting and worth knowing about, though! Some people spend their whole careers studying the genomes of microbes found on people’s skin, or in their bodies. You’ll be computationally sorting out which sequences are in contiguous, mammalian chromosomes, which are from mitochondrial DNA (those cute little powerhouses have their own genomes!), and which come from microbes.

At the end of it, you have sequenced an entire genome. Because you want to find out how related it is to humans, you compare it to our reference genome–The human reference genomes we use is an assembly made from multiple individuals.* We use the reference genome as a common point of comparison that we refer to when studying genetic variation.

*Though if you’re working with data form the Genome Reference Consortium as is usually standard, one anonymous African-European donor, RP11, is still the backbone of the reference, accounting for 70% of the latest assembly.

(https://mk.bcgsc.ca/telomere-to-telomere-human-genome-assembly/posters.mhtml)

So, we’d compare this new mammalian genome to our own–how much overlap would we find? A lot. How you define our similarities and differences from other species can change the answer, but you’ll expect a lot of overlap. Some areas of the genome diverge faster than others, others are highly conserved–generally the more stable it is, the more important it is for our function.

Through many, many, many studies and corroboration with the archaeological record, we’ve worked out how to estimate how long ago two species diverged from each other. Actually, you’d rarely be comparing between just two species at this stage–get out all the other relevant reference genomes you’ve got! Compare them all! Build a phylogenetic tree–the modern version of that “tree of life” idea that Darwin popularized. Then you’ll have a more accurate sense of how your mystery species relates to everything.

(https://www.embl.org/news/science/a-new-tree-of-life-allows-a-closer-look-at-the-origin-of-species/)

I’m going to go off on a tangent to end this post, because that’s just the start, taking the entire genome of a single individual. This is what most people think is what we always do. But no! That’s expensive overkill for most experiments. Once you’re familiar with a species, and you’ve sequenced DNA from many individuals, you can identify areas where lots of them have sequence variants. These can be completely benign, differences that make us all unique, or make an individual more susceptible to disease. This allows us to target what we want out of DNA sequencing: Are we trying to diagnose an illness? Identify a person from a tissue sample? Or are we doing something more exploratory?

Depending on what you want, you select anywhere from a handful of locations, up to tens of thousands. The closest many people have gotten to this stuff is through ancestry services like 23andMe, which uses this kind of sequencing.

But that’s not all! There’s so many different targets to choose from, depending on what you want to do! So many techniques to get DNA in different ways! And we still haven’t gotten to the part that I actually work on.

I’m a computational geneticist. I get all the gigabytes of data that comes out of these experiments and I get to dig into the details, the patterns that emerge between genetic code and the details of the organisms we study, the connections between genome sequence and other, wilder things we can collect data on, the dizzying complexities of what goes on every microsecond of every day in every cell in your body.

I love my job.

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Citations for alt-text rambles:

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_YuTMDkWfI 2. https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.116129 note: this source lists the image as credit to “J.M.B.”, which is not how I’m used to seeing images credited. Those are the initials of one of the authors, but I thought it meant “Journal of Molecular Biology”, so I went on a half hour wander around the internet trying to find where the hell this fish blood came from. 3. https://www.thebhs.org/publications/the-herpetological-journal/volume-13-number-4-october-2003/1729-01-hyperbiliverdinemia-in-the-shingleback-lizard-tiliqua-rugosa 4. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1439-0264.2009.00952.x 5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandrill#Characteristics 6. https://www.vogue.com/article/dune-part-two-costumes-jacqueline-west-interview 7. http://dx.doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.29564.08327 8. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/357946568_New_approaches_and_concepts_to_study_complex_microbial_communities 9. https://karobben.github.io/2023/10/30/Bioinfor/PacBio/

Overflow Ramble 1

the fuckin “DNA MATCH” machine. I already wrote a 380-word alt-text about this thing last time. I’m not doing it again. I’m going to talk about things I like instead. Such as Dune: Part Two! Yes! I mentioned it last week and then didn’t ramble about it after seeing it. Well, NOW I WILL. tl;dr it’s good, go see it. I only vaguely remember the book, but I liked the changes they made to center the fact that no, Paul becoming Lisan al-Gaib is not actually a good thing.

Man, it’s nice to see a movie where the costumers and set designers got good time to work on their craft. (cite 6) Even the generic Harkonnen soldiers looked great–reminded me a lot of my beloved Warframe, probably because the costume designer was using H.R. Giger for inspiration there. Everything felt real. Even the stuff that definitely wasn’t–the gigantic spice harvesters and ships felt like living, physically present beings. The sand worms looked great. The movie did a fantastic job visually communicating the massive size of so many things. Especially because the camera remains restrained: no weightless zipping around, the camera itself follows paths and finds locations that make sense.

Chakobsa continues to be a fantastic conlang, now the work of both David and Jesse Peterson. It’s heard a lot more in this movie, and there are some great flourishes with it. While there isn’t as much Arabic vocabulary in it as in the original books, I remember from DJP’s work streams that he definitely was using the grammar of Arabic as one of his touchstones. Most key words remain Arabic though–jihad was removed, but it made me double-take in the theater when Stilgar referred to Paul as the Mahdi.

I’m of two minds about lowering the Arab influences on the Fremen–on the one hand, missing representation, which included some explicit ties to real world anti-imperial struggles in North Africa and the Middle East. On the other, these first two movies are about how the Fremen are manipulated by a colonial power, using their adherence to a faith that was manipulated by a different colonial power. They become both hapless victims and also perpetrators of colonial violence, with only Chani seeing through it.

I think the general decisionmaking process on cultural changes was motivated by a desire to remove some of Frank Herbert’s bad ideas–particularly around the Harkonnens, thank fuck. That seems to have been the thinking around altering the Fremen a bit as well. Did it succeed? Not my place to say. On all other notes, I have no reservations recommending the movie. It’s a very earnest attempt to bring that world to life, and I think it succeeds.

Overflow Ramble 2

A figure showing the basic steps of the standard Illumina sequencing method (cite 7). It is broken into four sub-figures:

Library Preparation. The genome is snipped into small fragments, then adapters are attached (“ligated”) to stabilize the molecule and make it behave. This creates a “library” of DNA that will be read from.

DNA library bridge amplification. The adapters on DNA fragments stick to a prepared plate, which is covered in little clusters of molecules that specially attach to those adapters. Biochemical processes are then carried out in repeated cycles to duplicate (or “amplify”) those fragments in such a way that the clusters on the plate are all filled with copies of just one DNA fragment.

DNA library sequencing. The DNA is modified so that the four letters it’s made out of all glow a specific color, with each DNA letter shining in sequence. This is pure awesome and I love it.

Alignment and data analysis. Because of some details on how step 1 is done, you have lots of fragments that create an overlapping patchwork of sequences. This allows (most of) the genome to be pasted back together by looking for overlaps (“contiguous sequences”, or “contigs” for short).

Congratulations! You have just attended an abridged graduate-level introductory lecture on Illumina sequencing.

Overflow Ramble 3

A diagram of PacBio Systems’ sequencing technology, Single Molecule, Real-Time Sequencing, or SMRT Sequencing, because scientists love acronyms. Pretty much every step is different from how Illumina does it. I cannot find a diagram that’s both brief and also good at explaining what it’s showing, so this is the best I could find. It’s split into four parts with attendant text, which I’ll try and explain as well.

“SMRTbell template. Two hairpin adapters allow continuous circular sequencing.”

Library preparation basically involves taking a longer chunk of DNA and splitting it in half lengthwise, in such a way that the two strands of DNA will form a single-stranded loop. This is called a SMRTbell library. Why? I have no idea!

“ZMW wells. Sites where sequencing takes place.”

Then, these are fed into SMRT Cells, which contain zero-mode waveguides (ZMWs). I was once told what this means, and I have completely forgotten, but it sounds like something from Gundam.

“Modified polymerase. As a nucleotide is incorporated by the polymerase, a camera records the emitted light.”

What I do understand is that at the bottom of each of these little holes, they stick a molecule which the DNA sticks to. This molecule, a polymerase, has precisely one job: make more DNA, an exact copy of what it’s latched onto. So you give it this loop of DNA, feed it a soup of free DNA letters, and it starts cranking out a new strand.

“PacBio output. A camera records the changing colours from all ZMWs; each colour change corresponds to one base.”

Each one of the DNA letters given to the polymerase has a special modifier, on it which flashes a color when the polymerase slots it into the new strand it’s making. A camera picks up this flash. And, because the DNA is a circle, the polymerase doesn’t know where to stop–it just keeps going and going until something breaks or it runs out of letters to work with. This means that even if the camera misses a flash the first time, it will have more chances to see it, and confirm what it already saw.

Wait what in the fuck this figure was from somebody’s thesis (cite 8), but that wasn’t what actually got this into search results. What got it there was a github page with a vtuber avatar sitting in the corner?? What??? (cite 9)

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#Prometheus 2012 #Prometheus (2012)#I go rogue and refuse to talk about the movie #or rather I spend 4600 words talking about a quarter of a scene as a springboard to talk about my job and how cool it is #I kind of envy people who work on wild population genetics #but also their sample sizes are tiny and bad for my particular specialty #so I'm giving a broad overview on how reference genome assembly works and I've only ever done phylogenetics on intraspecific variants #yes this is how much I talk about bits of my job that aren't even directly my job #because working in genetics is SO COOL #tomorrow we'll be back to analyzing inexplicable characters and androids poisoning people don't worry

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oonajaeadira · 6 months

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one of my biggest pet peeves is people standing too close to me in a line. It's a big country y'all. I do not need your breath on my neck, your loud inane convo RIGHT IN MY EAR, and you're certainly getting on my last nerve if you continually bump into me. I don't know you, stop touching me. You're gonna get there, crowding me does not get you there faster. It only makes me uncomfortable and really irritated with you.

Yes, I've given you THAT look. FIVE TIMES NOW. You obviously do not have the capacity to learn. I guess I will have to say it out loud.

You know what people hate? When you ask them not to do these things. Sometimes they comply and are slightly less surly if I explain they're triggering my anxiety.

But I should not have to reveal my mental hangups to strangers. Not if I ask nicely.

It's worse at Disney where people are with their friends and get defensive because they don't want to be in the wrong and would never ever think of themslves as rude, so why should i? Who the hell do i think i am?

Game changer: move to the side and step around behind them. They get what they want--to get there one microsecond sooner--and I get what I want--some escape from the irritation.

And it comes with a bonus--they realize they're being annoying without me having to say anything at all.

Alternatively, if I'm getting saucy, there's always the "Hi! What's your name? Mine's Adira. I tought we should be aquainted if you're gonna get so intimate with me / my ass."

This has been lessons from a Minnesotan (masters of passive aggression).

#It's a long line for rise of the resistance #But at least I'm out of the rain

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shunderdome · 7 months

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The House of Usher: Children's Timeline

I've attempted to put together a timeline of the Usher children's birthdays, ages, arrivals in the family, and one big missing question.

1975/1976?: Frederick (no specific indication, but apparently two to three years older than Tamerlane) d. age 47/48?

1978: Tamerlane (per gravestone, ep. 8) d. 45

Her age is listed as 40 in her newspaper clipping (ep. 1), but this seems both impossible given she was born before New Years 1980 and also a potentially in-character lie if she was trimming her own age for commercial success in the wellness industry.

1984: Victorine (per gravestone, ep. 8) d. 39

1986: Napoleon (year per grave, ep. 8, and age per newspaper, ep. 1, must be a late November/December birthday) d. 36

1988?: Camille (per posthumous press release, ep. 4) d. 35

The press release after her death lists her age as 35, which Tamerlane insinuates is a lie. However, Camille is younger than Napoleon (36/37), and Tamerlane herself seems to be lying about her own age. This may also be a touch of the two “legitimate” children not getting the ages of their half-siblings correct, either consciously or subconsciously (see Prospero).

1996: Perry (per sales pitch to Roderick and Madeline, ep. 1) d. 27

Frederick references his conception as 25 years ago (ep. 2), but this may either be general rounding or refusing to remember his half-siblings ages accurately.

2004/2005: Leo joins the Ushers (age 18, ep. 3)

2007?: Lenore (per gravestone, hard to read) d. 16?

2008/2009: Camille joins the Ushers (age 20, ep. 3)

2012/2013: Perry joins the Ushers (age 16, ep. 3)

The major missing piece for me is when Victorine joins the family. As the first half-sibling to emerge, her existence would be a major turning point for the family and the full siblings in particular. My impression is that she may have joined the family at a younger age, especially given her reference to the three youngest as “The Littles," asking Frederick and Tamerlane if they remember when The Littles showed up and how annoying they were (ep. 5). She is only two years older than Leo, but her longer time in the family may lead her to seeing them as younger/newer additions. In the same conversation, Tamerlane also references remembering when Victorine herself showed up, so there was some time in their youth before Vic's parentage was revealed. Victorine also calls Roderick “daddy” and speaks to him as a younger child in her death scene (ep. 5), which may be their dynamic from her adulthood only but suggests they may have known each other in her youth.

She mentions being raised by a single mother who was a nurse, uses her maternal surname, and still retains her British accent – so my guess would be that she joined the family after age ten but younger than the ages of 18/20. I can think of a few options:

She could have known Roderick for some time in her youth but been raised by her mother/in England with that knowledge

Her mother is not present at her funeral – her mother could have died, speeding up the process of her joining the family as a child or preteen

Roderick simply could have brought his first “illegitimate” child into the fold much more quickly because it was his first rodeo

Whatever happened, my suspicion is that she joined the family in some capacity around age 12/13 (1996-ish) and was the only outsider child for a good eight or so years before Leo arrived.

#fall of the house of usher #roderick usher #frederick usher #tamerlane usher #victorine lafourcade #napoleon usher #camille l'espanaye #prospero usher #mike flanagan #house of usher

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wooteena · 2 months

Note

oh my god i just realized it's been literally years since you've been active. how the hell are you?? :O

helaurr anon omg lets do like a wooteena roundup ❕

still 16 (going on 17) (actually 33 /ref)

still australian (might change if plans go well because CRINGE TW:)

still dating the tumblr boyfriend. remember when i e-begged for a date 3 years ago? snagged dutch fanartist @onlygayminecraftstuff ? still going strong babes. froot for life i tell you.

hopefully going to- 🫣 to🫣 meet up🫣 sometime soon🫣🫣 face reveal for the meetcute when it happens promise

thatll happen once highschool slows down or finishes though. im a 'senior' so to speak ! year/grade 11 or 12, you guess ^_^

graduation might be late or happen differently because im💚 still disabled! trying to fix that too, sorry about the canon disability rep erasure guys my bad /sar

on the srs though? im winning. thriving, even. as much as tumblr was (and is, considering that i check in every 6months 😭) a space that i couldnt have lived without, there is definitely smth unfort to be said that this was the only place i could socialize because of how little capacity for anything i had from ages 12-14 because of chronic pain. being able to say that im full time at school and are finally, fully 'in' that rl friend group and show them the weird shit that happens on tumblr is probably the best, and most unbelievable thing i could tell chronically online, preteen wooteena.

i will never ever stop returning and reminiscing on this stupid minecraft blog is because i got to be an annoying kid with (mostly!) no repercussion and socialised during probably formative years while i was hurting. tumblr gets to be the place for the disabled, queer, and weird, always.

tldr wooteena cringefailed all over the screen about how tumblr saved their life probably. i love the blr because it loved me

get dogged on

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norieoncrack · 4 months

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𝙊𝙣𝙚𝙞𝙧𝙖𝙩𝙖𝙭𝙞𝙖

(𝙽): 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚒𝚗𝚊𝚋𝚒𝚕𝚒𝚝𝚢 𝚝𝚘 𝚍𝚒𝚜𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚞𝚒𝚜𝚑 𝚋𝚎𝚝𝚠𝚎𝚎𝚗 𝚏𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚊𝚜𝚢 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚕𝚒𝚝𝚢.

𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: Fluff

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬: Alkaid McGrath, Lars Rorschach, Clarence Clayden, Ayn Alwyn, Cael Anselm.

𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐦𝐨𝐝𝐞: On

𝐓𝐲𝐩𝐞: Headcannon.

𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐧𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐬: They/them.

𝐒𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: You called them by a weird nickname.

𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠: ooc characters, please note I made this for shits and giggles and is not meant to be taken seriously, thank you.

𝘼𝙡𝙠𝙖𝙞𝙙

♡ “Hm? Is there something you need, darling?”

♡ Was a bit confused at first but recovers fast.

♡ He might have already guessed it was going to happen at some point in your relationship, however didn't think it would be so soon.

♡ Would tease you back for the weird nickname and potentially use a weird nickname as well.

♡ If you used the weird nickname in public he won’t really mind, however as your punishment for doing so you’re sentenced to cuddles and headpats.

♡ “You’re so cute, my little gremlin with a pencil~” you called him garlic bread.

♡ Nicknames that were used: star stalker, garlic bread, rocky mountain oysters, garden hoe-

𝙇𝙖𝙧𝙨

♡ “Really? Goldie locks??”

♡ He doesn’t hate it, he likes it but he usually pouts when you call him by a very random nickname out of nowhere.

♡ He doesn’t mind the more “tame” versions of your nicknames if you used them in publics, the others? He’s gonna sulk.

♡ Will get revenge by calling you with weird nicknames as well, however is not very creative with them.

♡ Your punishment for these nicknames will usually be no cuddles nor kisses until you comfort him out of his sulking phase.

♡ “That still isn’t enough for me to get out of my sulking phase, snail eggs.”

♡ Nicknames that were used: Waffle fries, baby with a wallet, Goldie locks, w a l n u t

𝘾𝙡𝙖𝙧𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙚

♡ “B-Buffalo wings?? What makes you say that?”

♡ Flabbergasted, shocketh, his reaction would probably be the funniest.

♡ Will never get used to you calling him nicknames out of nowhere especially when you call him “buttery croissant”

♡ Do NOT try to call him any of the weird nicknames when he’s at an important event because if you do, I hope your brain has the mental capacity for the extra tutoring from him.

♡ He will try to call you with a weird nickname but will end up snickering to himself when he sees your face and in the end laughs to himself quietly.

♡ “Your answer is wrong, hairless cat.”

♡ Nicknames that were used: Rubiks cube, eight grade math teacher, cat dad, paralysis demon, buttery croissant, buffalo wings.

𝘼𝙮𝙣

♡ "Call me Tsundere one more time, I dare you"

♡ The most unamused out of all of them, he doesn't entirely hate it... later on but it is a nightmare when you started calling him all sorts of things.

♡ He will ignore you in public if you try to call him with any of the names, if you provoke him hard enough consider dodging lessons with the number of times he's gonna shut you up with kisses, or not-

♡ You think he might not call you with weird nicknames but don't let your guard down too quick, he's going to make you regret calling him "short king" (he's not short compared to the average height but since he was the shortest out of everyone on the list I thought it would be funny)

♡ Once you're done and finish with your weird nickname shenanigans it's his turn to attack with the list of weird nicknames he's compiled in secret.

♡ "Where are you looking at, hagfish~?"

♡ Nicknames that were used: emo vampire, batfish, scaramouche kinnie (no offence-).

𝘾𝙖𝙚𝙡

♡ "Breakfast is Crepes with whipped cream and strawberries"

♡ Out of of all the people, he's the one who doesn't seem to have a reaction at all to your nickname shenanigans, he took care of you, of course he's prepared for your chaos.

♡ He doesn't even care what you call him in public, he's that unbothered by it it almost makes you feel bored, however...

♡ Cael seems to frown and has this annoyed look on him, even if it was brief every time you call him by a certain nickname.

♡ He won't treat you out of the ordinary even when you use the nicknames that make him frown a bit, though don't expect to know how he's planning to teach you a lesson in his own way.

♡ "You're drink is bitter? Perhaps I should just give you milk, fetus~" safe to say the war is far from over.

♡ Nicknames that were used: Marinated wine, dinosaur's cousin, princess, great great great great great grandfather.

Au notes: I was bored.

#lbc x reader #lovebrush chronicles x reader #clarence x reader #ayn x reader #alkaid x reader #lars x reader #cael x reader #♡|fics by author #♡|simping

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genshingorlsrevengeance · 7 months

Note

Your plushie gift headcannon was adorable, can I get the same thing for the entire team 404

(GFL) AR Team and Squad 404's S/O making a plushie of them

(AR Team) M4A1, ST AR-15, M4 SOPMOD II, M16A1, RO635

(Squad 404) UMP45, UMP9, G11, and HK416

I desperately wish for plushies of the T-Dolls IRL.

M4 smiles delightfully upon seeing the stuffed T-Doll, failing to contain her giggle.

(M4A1) "This is adorable, S/O!"

The green strands of cloth stood out among the darker colors, the face expressing a soft smile, much like her own.

(S/O) "Do you like it?"

(M4A1) "I love it, what's the occasion?"

(S/O) "Just...a charm I guess, for good luck. If I made you anything to take out in the field, it'd probably get damaged, so I figured I could make something in your dorm!"

(M4A1) "I'll make sure to take good care of it!"

M4 has the plushie in between a picture of her and S/O and one of the AR Team.

STAR chuckles when S/O hands her a plushie of herself, noting how comfortable it felt in her hands. Well, her sensors anyway.

There was something endearing about human handmade items rather than factory produced.

(ST AR-15) "Quite the striking resemblance."

STAR remarks in an amused tone as soon as she notices the plushie with a very annoyed look.

(S/O) "Had to stare at my reference quite a bit."

(ST AR-15) "Heh, so I've noticed. I'll make sure it doesn't get dusty."

STAR hides the plushie under her blanket, not wanting to get teased by the rest of the AR Team, specifically by M16A1 or SOPMOD.

SOPMOD squeals upon seeing her plushie, squeezing it tightly and then admiring the little details.

Her face was possibly the most expressive she had seen, the eyes were giant white circles, and the mouth was a smug squiggle.

(S/O) "Like it?"

(SOPMOD) "LOVE IT! It's soooo cute!"

She quickly takes S/O into a hug, one that threatened to be spine shattering with how hard she held them.

(SOPMOD) "I wish I could take it with me into battle, but it'll watch over me when I go to sleep!"

SOPMOD holds onto it when she sleeps with zero shame in whoever sees it, bragging about S/O's craftsmanship to any T-Doll or human personnel who asks about it.

M16's eye goes wide as she sees what S/O has given to her.

The plushie was lovingly recreated, the scar and eyepatch were there, so was her case, and a tiny bottle of jack daniel's in its hand.

Though the facial expression made her look drunk, which wasn't entirely inaccurate.

(M16A1) "Do I really look like that when I drink?"

(S/O) "Eh, not really. Figured I'd take some artistic liberties, so to speak."

(M16A1) "I think it made the end result better."

She laughs and kisses her S/O on the cheek.

(M16A1) "Little me is cute, thanks S/O!"

The plushie sits next to M16's pillow in the dorm, showing it off to M4A1 and excitedly talking about how awesome it was to her.

RO is immediately flustered when S/O presents a tinier version of herself.

(RO635) "W-What is this?"

(S/O) "It's a tinier you!"

She admires how much of her features transferred over to such a small stuffed toy, but she can't help but be a bit shy as well.

That meant that was a lot of time staring at her when she didn't realize and other T-Dolls certainly have.

She bashfully accepts the gift and making sure to smile. RO was genuinely happy to receive something so thoughtful, and it made her start thinking of how to pay S/O back immediately.

(RO635) "I'll treasure it always, S/O. J-Just, please don't mention this to the rest of the AR Team, okay?"

RO makes sure to hide where only she can see it and no one else can ever find it. She would not be able to live down M16 seeing her with something so..."cutesy", as M16 would say.

45 starts laughing the moment S/O presents a miniature version of herself.

A whole plushie of herself kind of defeats the point of being in a Black Ops Unit, seeing as she wasn't supposed to exist in any capacity.

But, she's willing to make an exception.

(UMP45) "Heh, even the plush looks smug."

(S/O) "I wonder where it got that from?"

(UMP45) "Couldn't say.~"

She makes sure to take care of the plush whenever she's back in her dorm, finding herself staring at it with a soft smile more than once.

UMP9 gasps in excitement the moment she lays her eyes on the plush, inspecting it with great enthusiasm as she made sure to stand close to S/O.

(UMP9) "Oh, you even got my hair right! And the smile is really cute too!"

(S/O) "I had to make sure to get the most important details, after all!"

She gives S/O a big hug as she continues to admire the plush.

(UMP9) "I love it! Now, how about I try to make a plushie of you? That way tiny me can have her lover too?"

(S/O) "You know how to make plush dolls?"

(UMP9) "Hm...Not really, but I'm sure I can do it if I tried hard enough!"

Upon making a quite scuffed version of S/O, she has it sit lovingly next to her own plush. Both of them always remain without a single speck of dust.

(G11) "Hm...S/O, why did you wake me u-?"

11's drowsy eyes suddenly become wide awake the moment she sees a miniature version of herself.

Slowly grabbing it and examining it, the details begin to make themselves known as she slowly wakes herself up.

(S/O) "I thought your body pillow could use a bit of company!"

(G11) "...I like it a lot."

Her voice was still very quiet, but the smile on her face was very noticeable.

(G11) "If that was it, I'll sleep with the plushie right now."

Whenever she sleeps (which was extremely often), she hugs onto the plushie, as well as her body pillow. Sometimes S/O too, if there was space.

416 says nothing as her expression quietly beams upon seeing the miniature version of herself.

Seeing how much detail was put into it, it made her quite happy. After all, a perfect T-Doll such as herself should look good in any capacity.

(S/O) "Do you like it?"

(HK416) "It is almost perfect, but there is one thing holding it back. Why is the plushie so angry looking?"

S/O just smiled at her teasingly.

(HK416) "Hey, just what exactly are you implying?"

Seeing S/O laugh at her reaction makes her pout.

(HK416) "Fine, keep your secrets then. I'll make sure your effort is not gone to waste."

The soft smile on her face as she stares at S/O's handiwork tells them what her true feelings were.

No Soul or T-Doll will ever see the plushie. If they do and bring it up to her, they'll regret it.

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max1461 · 23 days

Text

I think one of my best qualities, both morally and practically, is that it is very hard to make me feel disrespected. I kind of have this concept where... for lack of a better way to put it, people are yippy little dogs that run around and snip at your ankles and so on. And yeah, that can be annoying, but it's hard to feel insulted by it. When a little Chihuahua bears its teeth at you you don't take offense.

I guess I feel like offense is intimately related to fear. It's a preamble to fear. We get offended at slights because we feel we have to be, because the slight-doer in theory has some capacity to harm us and so we have to take up a "strong" stance at the first sign of conflict to prevent this. We're not offended at slights from harmless entities. I think the fact that it's hard to make me feel disrespected reflects the fact that I am not very fearful of people.

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comradekatara · 1 month

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Hi has your opinion on Prince Wu or any of the characters substantially changed since you’ve first seen the shows?

why is it always prince wu 😭😭 no, not him. i hated that obnoxious little fop from the very first second i laid eyes on him and a decade later my opinion of that twink has not changed. he is a nothing character who only exists to chew the scenery and grate me, personally [<- katara voice]. i doubt he will ever grow on me in any significant capacity. that said, of course my opinions on many characters have changed. for one thing, i don’t think i actually recognized the existence of male characters in fiction until well into my teens (with the exception of iago, because i was a very edgy child). so my love for sokka and aang really developed upon way more recent rewatches. i always liked them, of course, but if you’d asked me as a kid, i would’ve said my favorite male character was iroh without hesitation (and don’t get me wrong, i still love iroh, but i find the way people talk about him as if he’s some irreproachable beacon of wisdom and fatherly love to be really annoying). i also had to really work to love ty lee; i definitely didn’t understand her depth and motivations as a child. haru is also a character i’ve really only come to appreciate fairly recently. conversely, i was obsessed with katara, azula, and toph from the moment each appeared onscreen, and that obsession hasn’t wavered. katara especially is like some kind of parasite to the brain. what can i say she’s an icon a legend she is the moment she is every moment. korra too. as much as i struggled to watch lok back when it was airing because i thought it was such a disappointment (and you know i still think that), i was always obsessed with korra. and of course “korra alone” and korrasami finale literally did change my life. also the herbalist, for some reason, has always been a kind of icon to me. i don’t even really know why, but she imprinted on me at such a young age. i guess she’s just everything i wish to be in life. i hope this answers your question lol

#monarchbutterflysunflower #asks #i literally spent all day trying to think of a second male character i cared about as a kid and literally could not #it was just iago and no one else #not even othello im afraid (i have since come around on othello)#but yeah thinking about how i first felt about these characters as a kid is kind of hilarious #to me it was just the Katara and Azula (and Sometimes Toph) Show #i was also gonna say lok was The Korra Show . but it literally is #(and somehow that still couldn’t save it…………. alas)

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